Melting Pots

"You see all the minorities," he said, "and you understand their problems better."

The NYT has an interesting piece on the officer training program in the Israeli military. It talks a little about the debate over the prevalence of 'draft dodging' and implicit is the growing concern that the military's old role as melting pot for Israeli society is being lost.

I know every article can't talk about every aspect of a subject, but I wish more than a passing reference had been paid to the fact that Arab Israeli's are excluded from military service.

Given that Israel is a religious state, I could understand only allowing Jews to serve, but that isn't the case as Druze and Christians do serve. Thus the lesson in the melting pot becomes that anyone can be a good Israeli - except an Arab.

I think the most striking feature of the Arab Israeli conflict is how a classical land/resource conflict was so thoroughly transformed into an existential ethnic conflict in a generation of only occasional hot wars.

Huckabee is on Meet the Press right now making no sense on immigration. Huckabee's plan is that every illegal immigrant should register with ICE within 120 days and then leave the US to return home, then immediately apply for a visa to return (which I presume they would more or less be guaranteed since he is talking about them all coming back).

The kids who are US citizens apparently will just go home with the parents because "they are their parents children first". And the construction and service industry will not collapse, as he previously predicted would happen if illegal immigrants were forced to leave, because they will all be back in a few months.

Of course, the kids could decide not to leave - since they are US citizens - and create a million pissed off, homeless Hispanic kids across the US. And somehow I think shutting down the construction industry for a few months might have some negative effects (though if the housing bubble really bursts, maybe not).

The key thing to keep in mind with Huckabee is that while each sentence individually sounds not terrible, collectively theymake no sense. Rudy or McCain may sound nuts, but at least they are consistently nuts.

Pot calling the kettle black

"My mother always said democracy is the best revenge."

That was Bhutto's 19-year-old son yesterday after he was selected to head the PPP... by his father.

The irony gets better. In case you were wondering why her husband gets to pick the party head, it's because she left the PPP to him in her will. I'm glad to hear Bhutto was so committed to democracy she listed her supporters as assets along side the houses and cars bought with her legendary graft.

For more on her dubious devotion to democracy and subsequent lionization I recommend Matt Yglesias and his various links.

Todays favorite story seems to be the implications of the Presidential candidates responses to the Bhutto assasination. As I called yesterday, the consensus is that every candidate spun it in a positive direction - except for the ridiculous Huckabee responses.

That said, fellow Republicans better be care and use this to argue that Huckabee has no idea what he is talking about IN GENERAL. Leaving it at 'he doesn't know much about foreign policy' isn't actually a winning argument. Most voters don't know much about international affairs so they don't see much reason to care if their President doesn't have an encyclopedic knowledge of georgraphy - so long as he knows we are good and the nebulous 'they' are bad (see Reagan and Bush II).

I promise there are plenty of examples on domestic issues to make the connection, because the 'crazy' or 'out of touch with reality' arguments do work well.

Implosion

http://mobile.nytimes.com/art/128760/19

Unsurprisingly all the candidates are in hyper spin mode talking about why the events in Pakistan mean they are the only person who can lead the US.

Mike Huckabee however seems to have taken the occasion to further demonstrate he has no idea what the fuck he is talking about. While the other candidates spin the implications in the way that helps them - Clinton and McCain talk about experience, Obama judgement, Rudy anti-islam bigotry - Huck has decided the events mean... we need a taller border fence with Mexico?

Once upon a time I used to wonder how a guy could ramble on about the problem of inequality and propose a national sales tax in the same speech. Was the populism a cover for an economic trickster or vis a versa? The reality is he just goes with whatever hair brained scheme pops in his head.

The papers in NH all seem to think Mitt is a huge phoney who must be stopped at all costs. To the NH partisans, I say Huckabee must be stopped at all cost lest we be dupped into a smooth talking looney whose sole allegiance is to whatever divine revelation he is having that day rather than the Constitution and our nation.

'In 2002, the drug maker, Purdue Pharma of Stamford, Conn., hired Mr. Giuliani and his consulting firm, Giuliani Partners, to help stem the controversy about OxyContin. Among Mr. Giuliani's missions was the job of convincing public officials that they could trust Purdue because they could trust him.'

Very tasty story on Rudy today that calls our Rudy for being a two-bit media whore willing to trade on his 9/11 myth.

If you thought Bush was a corporate crony willing to sell out the country, wait till you see Giuliani. We now have confirmed reports that he has taken cash from Hugo Chavez, a sheik who hid and supported Bin Laden, the mob, and the maker of the most abused persciption drug in the US who was looking to avoid extra regulation that would have saved lives at the expense of their profit margin.

One small note on the McCain ascent. Everyone notes that nationally it is basically a bounce from NH. But what everyone misses in NH is that it has nothing to do with Rudy's fall (though most of the new supporters are naturally - as you'll see in a moment - from the Rudy personality cult) or Lieberman. Two weeks ago McCain started running an ad with Curt Schilling - the baseball pitcher and local god - endorsing him.

While I am largely indifferent to the Dem primary race (as far as I can tell they are the same and the battle is over electability and symbolism), Obama may want to take note of this and have Oprah cut some solo spots to air during the daytime soaps rather than wasting her on a political stage and reporters. Frankly, two egos that big clash (why you rarely see Hill and Bill together on a stage).

RIP Benazir Bhutto (1954 - 2007)

My condolences go out the her family, supporters, and all Pakistanis.

It is nice to hear Pres. Musharraf condemning the assassination. But as we talk about the 'terrorist' problem facing Pakistan, it is important to remember that most of them are tacitly (and sometimes directly) supported by the ISI, which is his biggest backer.

Merry Christmas

http://mobile.nytimes.com/art/128439/19

All Big Business wanted this year was to be able to cut off the health care to my grandmother and millions of others like her. Well, yesterday thr EEOC delivered.

The new rule let's employers now give you retirement benefits that expire at 65 if they don't feel like paying for them anymore. Two important things to keep in mind:

1. Everyone seems to forget but retirement benefits are compensation just like a pay check. If a company called you in on payday and said 'by the way, turns out we think we are paying you too much, so this weeks check is only for half what it was supposed to be. Be a team player and don't complain or else we will just shut down and give you nothing' you would probably laugh in your managers face and tell him to go where the sun doesn't shine. For those with total faith in the market, remember that all those people made a ton of economic decisions all based on the assumption that they would get the benefits they were promised. If they don't appear their employer was essentially cheating both them and the market.

It is also important to remember that for five years middle class wages has been stagnant. Couple that with the systematic erosion of benefits and reneging on promises andf it is fair to say the lot of you is getting SCREWED by the fat cats sucking up you annual 3% productivity gain.

2. This is yet another straw to the camel's back that is our public health system. The lynchpin of the EEOC rule is that everyone should get on (and only on) Medicare at 65. Personally I do strongly agree that health insurance should be decoupled from your job on both social justice and economic grounds. Starting the next Microsoft or Boeing is really hard when you have to provide things like this. A family can dip into savings and survive on a dream much better if their sick child can still get her medicine.

But these things are sold as cost cutters in the sense that 'we will kick these people over to the government and then lobby to make sure our taxes don't go up to pay for them' rather than 'if we put everyone into a single basket, cut out aetna's profit margin, and imposed cost saving controls we could insure everyone for less than our current balkanized system'.

AQI and Glasgow

http://mobile.nytimes.com/art/125593/19

Britain has finished an inquiry into the Glasgow and failed London bombing last summer and one finding is that the two bombers were motivated by their anger over Britains role in Iraq and received some level of support from Al qaeda iraq (which in the IC just means someone who doesn't like us, blows things up, and isn't angling for a cabinet job in the iraqi parliament).

Apparently the who 'we are fighting them there so we don't have to fight them here' thing doesn't apply to Britain. Turns out it in practice it is more like 'we are pissing them off and providing them training opportunities over there so they will be inspired and capable to fight us here'.

As someone who focuses on organizational behavior, this has always been one of my pet peeves about the war. Getting things done in an organization requires three things strategic direction, tactical capacity, and motivated people.

The direction was always there, but it should be noted that everytime we get outmaneuvered in this idiotic 'democracy promotion' game and replace an AQ-hostile regime with an AQ-friendly regime it crosses something off their list and puts a bigger bulls eye on our back.

Death to Peace

http://mobile.nytimes.com/art/18258/19

I know if I was making a good faith effort this week to end the P-I conflict I would definitely spend this week announcing new settlements in the West Bank, step up the bombings in Gaza, send in some bulldozers (which have huge symbollic meaning after years of plowing under houses), and throw Abbas under a bus by saying nothing can be agreed to until he retakes Gaza.

In case anyone was fooled by last months charade in Annapolis, Israel continues to make clear it has no intention of a peace deal. And that's too bad for everyone.

http://mobile.nytimes.com/art/124468/19

Everyone who cannot possibly understand why Iran could possibly want civilian nuclear power please note:

'Indonesia has already made this flip (from an exporter of oil to an importer). By some projections, the same thing could happen within five years to Mexico, the No. 2 source of foreign oil for the United States, and soon after that to Iran, the world's fourth-largest exporter.'

Tragicomedy

Sometimes even the biggest train wreck can make you chuckle for a second.

http://mobile.nytimes.com/art/123831/19

The President unveiled his big plan for helping home owners in trouble and his finger prints are all over it.

First, at the announcement he gave all those listening the wrong number to call for information if they qualify. Then again since almost no one does I guess he is just creating some extra aggrivation rather than extra disappointment for most of them (then again, I don't know if anyone not getting paid to do so actually listens to the President anymore).

The 'plan' itself is even more humorous. The reason the plan is voluntary is because it is so utterly stupid and hated by everyone that no one would agree to it.

I mean, at least if it was 'everyone with a subprime is a bad person, so we are going to take their house and make them keep paying back the mortgage and freeze all Federal dollars for homeless shelters' I would just assume his nephew got a vp job at goldman or a hedge fund and it would make sense.

Seriously, I cannot emphasize how utterly Solomonic - and sophomoric - his plan is.

The Many Faces of Democracy

Nothing annoys me more about politics than politicians' casual, imprecise, or intentionally misleading use of words that is intended for nothing but to stir knee-jerk emotions on the other end of the communication pipeline.

Clearest cases:
Democracy -- Good
Dictatorship -- Bad

Slightly less clear cut (although probably agreed among a majority of Americans):
Welfare-state / Socialist -- Bad (brews lazy-no-good leechers!)
Laissez-faire / Generally non-interventionist (unless really necessary) Gov't -- Good

It is despicable how President Bush uses "democracy" according to definitions that he fancies for that particular day, or for that particular occasion.

VENEZUELA IS A DEMOCRACY (and as DMA points out, the recent developments clearly demonstrate it isn't a dictatorship). Their democratically aggregated preferences just so happen to result in a leader (and policies) that the US doesn't like, and is friends with leaders and countries that the US is at odds with.

More importantly, contrary to what the president says, people don't like the US not because "they just loathe the idea of a free, democratic society", but exactly because how "undemocratic" (if viewed from a world sphere) the US is in the way it interacts with its less powerful counterparts. [Shut up you realists, I know what you're going to say.]

At the same time though, Carl Rove and co. and their dirty tricks are just as much a legitimate part of the democratic process. OK, granted many of the things they did are indeed illegal, but they also did loads of things that are borderline-just-kinda-legal but utterly low and unethical.

I fault the shortcomings of a democracy not on democracy itself; it's just a mechanical construct, not a magical potion to all the world's problem. I fault them on the blueprint on which democracy operates -- the constitution & laws, aka the rules of the game. The challenge lies in what rules we should write down to give democracy the best shot it has, and even more critically, how we can get there and stay there given the current rules.

Just another one of my usual nerdy rants...

Vanezuela Addendum

For all the insinuations about Chavez controlling all the 'levers of power', don't forget that we have proof that millions of dollars of public money were directed by Carl Rove to vulnerable Congressional districts in 2006. I can only laugh at the hypocracy when the architects of that strategy attack the same thing there. There is no difference between the US and Venezuela except that Chavez occassionally does things supported by more that 30% of the country.

Democracy is Alive

http://mobile.nytimes.com/art/122885/19

In all the coverage of the Venezuelan referrendum it is important to remember one thing:

The measure was defeated. Let me repeat that, CHAVEZ LOST. The are certainly dictatorships that hold elections, but they don't lose!

For all the talk of Chavez controlling all the levers of power, the only difference between this and other recent elections in the country is that this time he was trying to do things that are unpopular. And the result was that people voted against his plan. I know this concept can be hard for some Americans, but in some countries the huge swath of poor workers neither disenfranchised nor deeply commited to voting for people that think their millionaire bosses need to pay even less in taxes and consolidate their economic position at the expense of the rest of the country.

And unlike the US, there as of yet is no indication that Chavez will go to the Supreme Court filled with his daddy's friends to get the voters choice overturned.

http://mobile.nytimes.com/art/118166/21

NYT has a fun little story this morning on earmark hysteria. While offering a partisan balance (alternating back and forth between Democrat and Republican vignettes), it does a good job of highlighting what two-faced hacks most alleged fiscal conservatives are. I wish it had examined Bohner's partisan rhetoric on earmarks along side his assertion that 'there is no such thing as an earmark', but it also did a good job showing there is a bit of contention on the Republican side between those who do not mind earmarks and those who say they do not like earmarks and go after them anyway.

Three small things the article left out that are important add-ons:

1. The earmarks in the HHS bill, even after both sides accepted every single mark, amount to .6% of the HHS budget and less than .1% of the whole budget.

2. City University deciding to name a school of public policy after the man who has represented them for 30 years and him helping them get public dollars for a public education institute

No Such Thing as Bad Press

At my own peril, I am going to wade back into something I said last week for further clarification.

First, I never meant to minimize my own revulsion towards anti semitism. It is bad, should never under any circumstances be tolerated, and should be taken very seriously by university administrators, USCCR, and anyone else in a position to educate people about it or sanction those who promote anti semitism.

But, my reaction is based on the value judgement that 'Combatting hate speech on campuses' is much more a priority than just that against one group. I think there may be times when it is appropriate to designate priority groups. But given that we just finished Islamofacism Awareness Week and the Jena 6, it is ridiculous to think that Jewish groups are facing these challenges alone.

I will avoid walking into Walt-Mearsheimer territory, but I think the impact of politicisation on priorities - which was my original point - is pretty clear and an especially dangerous thing were this practice of appointing hacks partisans at USCCR to continue and anti Semitism were to reemerge as a very serious problem in America.

Proof is in the Pudding

The Post Trys to Become the Daily Show

You have to read todays Post to believe. The op-ed page includes Bob Samuelson arguing recessions are actually good. In other news up is down, left is actually right, and the President isn't a sadistic moron who used to torture his fellow frat boys.

The Ruth Marcus gets the question right but the answer wrong. 'Why should we care if grumpy old reporters get to ask the candidates questions?' Probably because when the press is allowed to talk they aren't asking about issues, theya re trying to play gotcha with decade old quotes, asking about hair cuts, and wondering allowed how voterd would react if the candidate held a bunch of positions they don't. I give Hillary and Obama tons of credit to limiting Q&A to real people, not pompous gatekeepers. And for the record, there have been a dozen debates with everyone moderated by a member of the press. Ruth Marcus please shutup or go get a real job.

Finally, we learn that old friend Julie 'my dad was chairman of the JCS when they appointed me head of ICE despite having never managed another person in my life' Meyers choice for best costume at the office halloween party was a white guy dressed up as a minority prison inmate. Stay classy Julie Meyers.

Wolf in Sheeps Clothing

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/13497.html

Steve Benen has a good catch on how Republicans at the US Commission on Civil Rights have been reregistering enmass as Independents. Why would they do this? Because the Commission prohibits more than half the members being from the same party. In the old days this meant when a Dem or Repub retired someone from their party was chosen by the President to replace them. But recently someone had the brilliant idea that when a Dem slot opened you could just fill it with someone who was a lifelong Republican that changed their registration a few weeks earlier.

Steve and his commenters bemoan how Republicans are cheaters. Personally, I think this is an amazing opportunity so long as the next Dem President doesn't wimp out and uses this to actually advance CR in the US.

One of my favorite movie lines is 'this ain't checkers, this is chess'. My biggest problem with Dems is that they chronically fail to see politics as chess - a game that takes long term strategic planning, not jumping at the nearest open piece. More importantly, there is no crying in chess. You play to win (enact your policies), not just to waste away an afternoon.

BTW, in case you are wondering the effect of this realignment on USCCR, I met their Director a few weeks back. Their number one issue I was told - ending campus anti semitism. I am sure it exists somewhere, but come on.

The Importance of Framing

Today's NYT:

"With Mr. Mukasey's confirmation in doubt over his refusal to state a clear legal position on a classified Central Intelligence Agency program to interrogate terrorism suspects"

Mukasey's confirmation is not in doubt because he refuses to answer a question about a specific program. He is in question because he has repeatedly evaded answering the simple question of whether he believes waterboarding to be a form of torture.

This is a really important moving of the goal posts that as usual the morons who write this drivel do not even notice. While it is legitimate to refuse to comment on a program you have not been briefed on and are not yet associated with, it is completely bs to refuse to answer general questions from the Committee.

Also, whether this technique is used or not used by the CIA has never been officially confirmed or denied, though it has been confirmed off the record by a number of US officials. We do know that DoJ went to the trouble of writing a legal opinion that waterboarding is not, at least in a legal sense, a form of torture. But Bushs comments yesterfay are a clear confirmation that he definitively knows this is happening in CIA black sites. I only hope someday someone has the courage to lock up this faux cowboy.

Finally, McCain and Graham's statemebt yesterday makes a mockery of their principles. Publicly stating that you are going to URGE someone to take a position AFTER you confirm them and they no longer need your approval for anything is the mosy pathetic concession of impotence and duplicity in Washington.

Yesterdays WH press conference had a question on the departing Karen Hughes (h/t Matt Yglesias):
Q So in your mind, she has succeeded in her goal of outreach to the Arab world, based on those numbers that I just cited?

MS. PERINO: Look, I'm not going to comment or respond to a poll that you just read out. I don't know about those numbers, I don't know the questions that were asked; I think it's inappropriate. What I can tell you is that she has done amazing work. Let me give another example. She started a women's outreach effort with the Middle Eastern countries and started a breast cancer initiative. And just last week Mrs. Bush went and highlighted that initiative and went to four different countries in the Middle East, had a very successful trip in explaining that women have tools at their disposal when they find out that they have breast cancer, early detection and treatment. That is precisely what the President was hoping Karen Hughes would achieve, and she has.

The President was hoping she would raise awareness of breast cancer in Jordan? I don't know anything at all about the initiative, but I am sure it is doing good work raising awareness. That said, little forums that bring together a small group of elite women to talk about breast cancer or education or some other general issue doesn't really do anything to improve our image in the world. I mean maybe a few will notice the USAID logos on everything and think "wow, America paid for me to take a trip to the capital and have a nice lunch and meet some other folks... maybe their decisions to take over another country, spit on the Palestinians, and call declare war on Islam weren't so bad." But even if that happened, changing the minds of a few dozen elite women who were probably already sympathetic to the Western world doesn't actually have any real impact on our standing in the world. It is like saying fi you want to change the view of women in the US you should sponsor a book club for the DC lady's that lunch crowd.

Can't You See that We're at War...

... and with crazy extremists / terrorists, no less?

Can't you see that to deal with extreme people, we need extreme measures?

And more importantly, if you don't support these extreme measures (or the guy that will condone the extreme measures on your behalf), you're not supporting the war on terror?

Goddammit people, where the hell is your patriotism?


To savage that little bit of patriotism left in you, go read President Bush's urge for Michael Mukasey's attorney general confirmation right now.


I can't quite make it out whether

1. Bush is really smart about dodging questions by leading you to a seemingly related, but actually completely irrelevant subject; or
   
2. he is so thick and stubborn he can't possibly see how two unrelated things are, in fact, unrelated.
   

In either case, it's aggravating to say the least to be arguing with people like that. There's just no winning with merit here, they just filibuster you to no end until you stop bugging them about how they're wrong.

In defending his attorney general nominee, Bush says that it's unfair to ask Mukasey whether he thinks waterboarding is illegal, because "he doesn't know whether we use that technique or not."

What the Judiciary Committee wants to know is what Mr. Mukasey himself thinks about waterboarding, unconditionally. Mr. President's complaint unambiguously suggests that the answer that Mr. Mukasey would/should have is:

• If the US uses waterboarding ==> Waterboarding is legal
• If the US does not use waterboarding and does not plan on using it anytime in the future + its enemies are using it ==> Waterboarding is illegal

Mr. President also noted "the American people must know that whatever techniques we use are within the law." Going right back to that model answer Mr. Mukasey should have.

The President continues by saying that "it doesn't make any sense to tell the enemy whether we use those techniques or not." If the US is going to proudly declare its moral superiority on the international stage, it needs to act on its grandiose ideas and rhetoric, unless it wants to look like the 2-faced hypocrite that everyone but itself currently sees. Strategic ambiguity doesn't work here -- this is a case in which the lack of an answer is an answer in itself.

I hate people that take the "pragmatist" view on matters like this - i.e. where moral superiority achieves our goal, by all means use it, otherwise it's only fair and square that the US cares only about its interests and acts as a total jackass. You don't win with a strategy like that - you alienate yourself while you're in power (hence putting yourself on the path to your decline), and don't even try to think what's gonna happen if you're out of power.

And don't go on the "every other country acts just like that" defense either. Seriously, SHUT UP if that's all you can say.

Sorry for the light blogging lately. Work is crazy at the moment. Plus the mobile was down Monday because President Bush decided that the way to avert global warming is to unilaterally push daylight savings time back a week but the phone companies forgot to install the Windows patch so that their clocks would wait the extra week before moving an hour. Last night I plugged it in to charge but of course forgot to plug in the charger. Ugh.

All I have to say is that the DOJ is a real piece of work these days. Mukasey admitted water boarding is ok with him - oh sorry, he just can't say until he reads the official classified department position which we all found out a few weeks ago is that it is ok. More than anything this says to me that he is a barely competent weasel. At least Gonzalex knew he had to lie about things like this rather than giving poorly parsed answers.

Civil Rights is run by a freaking racist. I mean most federal agencies just pack all their token minorities at the head of CR and leave the shop to very good and dedicated career folks. But DOJ is in charge of preventing disenfranchisement; an incompetent manager might not be able to stop all those career folks from preventing disenfranchisement. So they put in a really effective partisan. Unfortunately he is also a biggot so says stuff like things that hamper the elderly are only unfair to white people because all the black people die off before retirement and if black people have an ID for the check cashing place and pawn shop, why can't you bring it to the voting station. Disgusting. Oh, and for everyone saying but it's true, his deputy also collected salary and travel expenses from the department while vacationing in Taxachusetts! Disgusting.

I Say Watson Please Put Down Your Crack Pipe

First, let me say James Watson is a racist. His comment that 'just ask those who work with Black people' is a cowardly attempt to slander a group through a thinly veiled insinuation. Most offensive is the way the sentence hangs there unfinished and begs each of us to fill in our own prejudice and receive his validation.

It really is a remarkably insidious bait and switch. Watson is conflating a discussion about the genetic determinants of intellect with social situations that are pervasively impacted by issues of class, culture, and society. Intelligence is a product of biophysical structures, which are the product of genetic blueprints. There exist heterogenious gene pools, therefor intelligence must be heterogenious. I - and you - know a Black guy that is like, you know, THOSE people. Therefor since you and the mythical THAT guy are of different intellect/social temprament/ worth and different gene pools that difference must be generalizable to all black and white people.

My last point to Watson is that the notion that we would develop in a genetically homogenous way that produced a cingular blueprint for the genetic determinants of intellect is no more surprising than the fact that white, black, yellow, and red people all AMAZINGLY! Managed to develop with a singular blueprint for the number of fingers on a hand.

All that said, I think a far too often overlooked point is that there is no reason except the vestages of neo and historical colonialism that African schools should be modeled on the Western system. Intelligence may have a genetic determinant, but we know it has a social and experiential component. While Africans may or may not have a different genetic predisposition, we know they have a totally different social and experiential upbringing than kids in Omaha, Orange county, or Oslo.

Anyone who wants to argue otherwise I would just point you to THE benchmarks in the educational sector of the development industry - primary school enrollment and literacy rates. I do not consider myself of the out there radical anti-Western intellectual movement. But I think it is a huge mistake to uncritically embrace Western models of economic and social development.

WOW

I'm not totally sure what to think of Watson's racist genetics comments. But here are my two cents:

Watson suggested that stupidity was a genetic disease that should be treated.

(1) Insensitive and controversial as it may be, I don't think it's wrong to say that intelligence (or the lack thereof) is a matter of biological hardwiring.

Often we can make up for what we fall short with hardwork and more time invested, but fixing the amount that one devotes into a task, it's indisputable that some "gets it" faster than others. It probably just has to do with how effective one's synapses in the specific area in question are.

The debate is rather on whether this difference in biological hardwiring is something of nature or nurture, or whether sufficient nurture could possibly overcome nature (alright, but if that is so it's still "nature" winning out, being consistent about our "fixing time invested" paradigm).

Now if only we can "fix" this biological setback at its core -- i.e. not just spending more time or resources to overcome it, but really to (for lack of a better word) "cure" it.

Watson was quoted as saying he was "inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa" because "all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours, whereas all the testing says not really."

(2) I'm not sure whether he really can back up what he's claiming with data from tests. To me, that's just a number-crunching, I-ran-a-regression-and-it's-statistically-significant comment that I generally don't give too much credit for without logical arguments and explanations.

I've seen crazier claims on causality with regressions that makes no sense whatsoever, but somehow managed to be statistically significant.

It pains me to have to cite and give credit to such nonsense, but if you're doubting my claim, please see Sala-i-Martin's "I just ran two million regressions."

while he hoped everyone was equal, "people who have to deal with black employees find this is not true."

(3) Alright, now that's just uncalled for, has no scientific basis, and is clearly asking for attacks. I expect more from a guy who discovered DNA. A lot of bright people are extremely egotistic and think they (or their race I guess) are above all else, I just expected more impartial and logical arguments and hard evidence from people that build their careers (and lives, probably) on objective truths.

You Know What Grinds My Gears: Part Deux

Continuing on with my superficial news rant, Tom Tancredo is a moron to even think that he'll have a chance to get a World Series bet going with Mitt Romney. More likely than not Tancredo is just trying to get on the news (at least on page 18 of the paper!) a bit more, and to make it sound like he's aware of events that regular-joes care about.

C'mon now, Romney has already made it exceedingly clear he bears no allegiance whatsoever to Massachusetts when he turned his back on policies he promised Mass. voters, changed his mind (sorry, had a soul-searching revelation) on social issues, and toured the nation (and other nations) much more than he spent time in the state at the end of his governorship.

Romney giving up his run for President for the Red Sox? Yeah right.

Rally against GT

Oh please God let it be true...

It's not cool to wish bad things upon people, but I just get sick every time I see the "we-have-it-all" couple having it all... know what I mean?

Plus, I really can't stand the accent. Somehow men find it extra sexy (as if it's possible with Gisele), but it just annoys the hell outta me.

Maybe it's the shallowness of men that I'm really against here, I mean there's nothing wrong with being good-looking and attractive, but when that's what you're all about, in the sense that it overwhelms any other quality you can possibly have, it actually ends up making you less interesting or deep a person.

I know I don't know her and she could be super smart, super funny, or super kind, but let's face it, that's not why everyone turns back around and look at her again. My comments and judgments are unfair and probably stem from nothing but pure jealousy, but I'm just saying out loud what most females are thinking in their heads.

"Thompson was the only candidate with a concrete proposal, offering ideas that were bold and unpopular"

Didn't get to this yesterday. One of the best lines in a while that sums up exactly what is wrong with the Post and the modern construction of journalistic impartiality.

For some inane reason it has been decided that offering solutions that both fail to achieve the broad goals of the program (for Social Security preventing poverty among retirees) and are wildly unpopular is a virtue.

You Say Tomayto, I say Tomahto

http://mobile.nytimes.com/art/112839/19

NYT has a great piece today on the Kurds stirring up trouble in Iran. I do not know if this is a flaw or a function of US middle east policy, but after Israeli the Kurds are the next most hated people in the region by virtue of trying to turn their minority status in four countries (Iraq, Iran, Turkey, and Syria) into a single Kurdish majority country. They are also the archetypical transnational insurgent/terrorist organization, but since the enemy of my enemy is occassionally my friend get a free pass except in Turkey.

Read the article and it will be clear why the Iranians might be running mil ops in Iraq. My only quibble is that the US response that "The consensus is that U.S. forces are not working with or advising the P.J.A.K.," is the lamest non-denial I have ever heard and almost certainly means there are Special Ops teams working with them (probably intel and/or training).

Brian Beutler has an interesting post on "how much did the Democrats suck" last week. I think he is right in his broad point that asking people to play nice or do the right thing is not a very effective technique for getting votes. Someone willing to throw kids under the bus to help out their corporate overlords is probably not too interested in the warm and fuzzy feeling of keeping kids healthy.

But, I disagree with this point:
It's a real disappointment, I think, that the Republicans in both chambers have either a better understanding of parliamentary procedure or a greater willingness to use it to their advantage. I'm not a student of modern Republican political history, but I'd speculate that this comes from their 40 year absence from Congress in the mid-to-late 20th century, and the revolutionary spirit with which they regained power in the 1990s--basically, that, as an energized movement, they come to the Hill everyday intending to win.

Republicans do not have a superior ability to utilize parliamentary procedure to their benefit because Democrats have not studied their rules closely enough or ignored them because they were too comfortably on top. Republicans have a superior ability to utilize procedure because in the media narrative that impacts whether they get reelected every few years the press gives them a free pass, while the Broder's of the world throw a big and public hissy fit everytime the Democrats even mentioned the word filibuster or ammendment.

A Little Birdie in a Suit Said So

http://obsidianwings.blogs.com/obsidian_wings/2007/10/a-mystery.html

Hilzoy over at ObiWings also read the article on McCain in the Times and is genuinely wondering "why does this kind of thing work?"

There are two important things that I think answer the question of why I think 'anonymous' smear campaigns work.

First, it important to remember that for the average American voter keeping up with American Idol is more important than the Presidential election (let alone primaries, where whisper campaigns are most often used). For those of us in the small minority who are part of the political process or covering it daily it is unimaginable that a flier with 'Mrs. McCain is a coke whore' plastered on it would incite any reaction other than a frantic Google search and wtf emails to our favorite muckrakers. But seriously, for most folks it goes in one ear and then takes up quiet residence in the subconscious. When election day comes they get in the booth, try to remember what they have heard about the names on the ballot, and then think: 'McCain? Oh yeah, the POW guy with the coke whore wife.'

The second important part is that for us participants it is an anonymous whispering campaign, but for the person getting those calls it is in the guise of a polling firm. As Uncle Rico in Napolean Dynamite knows if people are going to take you serious you need something to look real official - you know like a name badge with your picture on it. It is unimaginable that Gallup would ask 'If you knew the President was a confirmed communist would you be more or less inclined to vote for him?' But avergae Joe doesn't know the difference between Gallup and Gellup, so he gives each one the same benefit of the doubt.

McCain 2.0

There is an interesting piece on the 2000 Republican primary in South Carolina and its impact on John McCain. The point of the piece is nicely summed up by McCain himself talking about his 'evolution' on the issue of the Confederate flag:

"I feared that if I answered honestly, I could not win the South Carolina primary," Mr. McCain later conceded. "So I chose to compromise my principles."

In a clear (and somewhat frightening) by whatever means necessary move, McCain has actually hired the Bush state chair that ran the smear campaign against him in 2000 and still refuses to apologize for attacking McCain's daughter and wife - calling it just 'part of the process down here'.

While he may be a megalomaniac, McCain also seems like the type to harbor a grudge. Would President McCain be a sellout to religious groups or use the powers they have helped Bush consolidate to put a boot to the back of everyone of them who even looked at his daughter cross eyed? The only thing worse than a lover scorned is a father antagonized.

http://mobile.nytimes.com/art/111881/19

By the way, if the Sox make it back to Boston and you can only run down one player please make it Coco (however, if you see him, Gag-me, and Lugo on the same corner and plow them all down I am pretty sure that makes you eligible for a World Series ring). If Jacoby Ellsbury isn't leading off in center next year I will personally hunt down Terry!

Two Points of Response

I generally agree with DMA's comments in "Why the Road Matters" (except where DMA disagrees with me, of course), but two points from my nitpicking self:

(1) A country's "neighbors" do not have to be restricted only to neighboring states. In any case, my point was that it's absurd for Salih to claim that Turkey interfering militarily would have implications for its neighbors' tendencies to jump in, while the US's now years of military intervention (or "assistance", if one insists on the view of the US's invited and welcomed presence) would not. We already see these implications every day.

(2) Holding constant the dire situation of Kurdish resistance, I am willing to bet pretty serious money that were the Armenian "genocide" resolution not put forth in Congress, the US government's urge for Turkey to refrain from sending troops into Iraq would be a great deal more effective. That's all I'm saying.

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PS. I understand DMA's (and clearly many others) idealistic desire for justice and setting the history books straight, but I think it speaks volumes when 8 Former Secretaries of State think this genocide resolution is a bad idea.

In the world of politics, pragmatism and strategic thinking should always take precedent over ideology. Afterall, ideology can only prevail if one manages to strategically place himself in a position where persuasion or manipulation has any chance of being effective. In the area of diplomatic strategizing, few others possess more knowledge and experience than these 8.

Why The Road Matters

One big problem I notice in commentary - and ir has gotten better as the blog age has matured - is the tendency of people to focus on conclusions rather than the reasoning behind them.

This was most prominent in 2003 when just about everyone agreed we had to invade Iraq, but the rationale was ala carte - wmd, osama, xenophobia, democracy, human rights, oil, bellicocity, etc. If any group had been looking at the others reasons each would have been knocked down pretty quickly; instead everyone was happy to leave others alone to get their outcome.

With this in mind let me start by endorsing HRPs conclusion that the Iraqis need to do a better job if they want people to respect their sovereignty. However, everything else I disagree with. In short form: the US is not a neighboring state, after losing two dozen troops the past week to PKK rebels operating out of Iraqi territory they are completely justified and in no way petty in authorizing military action, and to this point the Coalition forces are still technically at the invitation of the government whether or not some (or even most) members want them to go. Off to work.

How Dare You Turkey!!

According to CNN, Iraq's deputy prime minister Barhim Salih said the following regarding the issue of Turkey sending troops into Iraq to fight Kurdish rebels:

If Turkey were to give itself the right to interfere in Iraq militarily, what is there to stop other neighbors from doing so?

I can't help but let out a dry laugh of sarcasm. Whhhhhat? Wait, remind me what the US or (the dwindling) coalition forces are doing in Iraq?

Riiiiight, the American forces are there at the Iraqi government's request -- an American-backed Iraqi government, may I hasten to add -- whereas the Turks (other than those that are part of the coalition forces) are coming uninvited.

Don't get me wrong, I totally think that this move by the Turkish parliament is nothing but a bitchy retaliatory act against the little "genocide" issue current on the table in Congress. I don't believe for a second that it actually has to do with the need to fight Kurdish rebels, or at least to fight the Kurdish rebels right now.

So the Iraqis do have a right to protest this bitchy move. It's just that you can't make arguments that someone can so easily - and I mean sooooooo so easily -- dismiss.

C'mon, you can do better than that. You'd better.

Why I Love John Stewart

Last night I watched the replay of John Stewart's interview with Lynne Cheney last week. If you have not seen it go to Comedy Centrals web site to watch it.

Interviewing is one of the most underrated skills for someone in the media. Most people either do not know how to talk to a camera and tell a story in a limited time, or are spin masters who talk in meaningless and disconnected phrases. A great interviewer is one part facilitator helping people tell their story and one part audience advocate cutting through the fog of misspeak, deception, and half truth. At the same time the great ones always treat their guests with the basic respect and dignity owed everyone regardless of partisan and personal differences.

I have said it before, but John Stewart really is one of the great interviewers in my lifetime - on par with folks like Charlie Rose and Brian Lamb.

What makes Stewart really special is his ability to bring an ideological, occasionally partisan, point of view together with people that in any other domain would be considered 'enemies'. Despite his vicious satirical opposition to the war in Iraq, John McCain has been on his show a dozen times over the years. Yet no matter how much one disagrees on the issue, the basic decency with which Stewart treats his guests combined with his commitment to honestly portraying his own and his opponents position and allowing the viewer to make a choice ensure the two can shake hands and laugh at the end.

Despite Cheneys flight at the end, I thought his skill was really on display in that discussion. When he noted 'you are not your husband and so I am going to stop pretending you are and asking these questions' it was one of the most honest self reflections I have ever seen on tv - something I wish far more people would recognize and take seriously.

His handling of the discussion about their daughter Mary was also very interesting and allowed such a different type of discussion than usual. His willingness to both let Mrs. Cheney use her own voice but also engage with really important issues like their families engagement with politicians who want policies that fundamentally oppose their views of justice and liberty (and not in a live and let live kind of way) added depth to the entire national discussion on the issue. A rare thing in a world of screaming head tv.

Anyway, like I said check it out if you have not already seen it.

Iraqi "Sovereignty"

So the Iraqis have done their own investigation and concluded that Blackwater did indeed fire on Iraqis unprovoked, and demanded that the private contractors leave Iraq.

The US Embassy's response (paraphrased but accurate - see mentioned article) is "wait, let us finish our investigations, then we'll recommend what you should do."

I know this turning-over-power-returning-Iraqi-sovereignty thing is bogus right from the start, but really, can we make it any more obvious here that the Iraqi government doesn't get to call the shots at all?

I don't know whether the head of Blackwater is a personal friend of Condi's, or how much money they give in donations etc., but it really is time that the US step its foot down and hold accountable the people that have given the US a bad name overseas in this "war on terror." (or as Borat calls it: "The war of terror")

The excuses of (1) the allegations aren't true! ; and (2) they're just a few bad apples ; are getting old and stale.

I mean, c'mon, at least pretend that the Iraqi government has some power. Give them some face.


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UGH, and don't even get me started on how a country is only "truly democratic" if it elects a government that the US agrees with (I picture a fat bully making his friends do-over again and again as long as the outcome of the game isn't how he likes it). Or how as long as the government in power is a US ally, being "a bit" non-democratic is OK because it's on a gradual but steady path towards democracy.

I don't so much dislike people with extreme (and of course opposing) views as I do those with inconsistent ones. Because that means they either have no true thoughts and beliefs of their own, or they can't get his thoughts or beliefs straight. I have no patience for those with no heart or no brain.

Wanted: One More Reliever

I send this challenge out to everyone in Boston. If you truly love your Sox and see Eric Gagne before they head to Cleveland, PLEASE run him over or push him in front of a moving vehicle! It is beyond me why they keep trotting his carcass out there - surely they could find a Little League pitcher somewhere.

And Bud, why not be really edgy and start a game at midnight? What about 8am? Seriously, is it too much to ask to not have to be up past 11. It is the freaking playoffs!

The Biggest Lies in Government Turned on Their Head

A guy I know who has done management training for the government for many years favorite joke to tell is 'the two biggest lies in government are 'hi we are from the Inspector Generals office and we are here to help' and 'We are damn glad to have you''.

The very point of an IG is to have someone challenging every decision for its practicality, fairness, and legality from an external perspective. While overwhelmingly fair, their independence frees them from the compromises and concessions we all make in the course of program implementation and to ask the hard questions. We all do resent the IG folks judging our every decision, but the overwhelming majority respect them and accept their importance to the process of providing superior service to the American people.

That is why this article scares the crap out of me:
http://mobile.nytimes.com/article?a=110161&f=19

"Some agency officers believe the aggressive investigations by Mr. Helgerson amount to unfair second guessing of intelligence officers who are often risking their lives in the field."
"These are good people who thought they were doing the right thing," said one former agency official. "And now they are getting beat up pretty bad and they have to go out an hire a lawyer."

First, the job of the IG is to 'second guess' decisions. If a spook shoots a prisoner it may have been justified, they may be a 'bad apple' or they also may have not been given proper rules of engagement or training or given a faulty decision matrix. If we just say 'well he was an agent so it has to be the first case' the organization is completely failing its mission. If the IG is conducting inappropriate witch hunts Hayden can appeal to the President, but his not wanting to 'blow this out of proportion' is just an admission nothing improper is happening there.

Also, to the unamed official horrified that spooks are having to hire lawyers I would note that - horror - people are rightly and wrongly
accused of crimes every day and forced to retain lawyers. But if the agents were so unsure of the legality of their orders when they got them the time to ask questions was before doing whatever they did, not after.

Re: The definition of genocide

I'd like to see someone take a poll of how many in Congress (or in any policy-making position) can actually accurately outline the definition of genocide as laid out in "The Convention." The problem arises exactly when a jargon becomes mainstream, but through that very process the meaning of the word itself changes.

Case in point: The definition of the word "rational", as understood and used by economists, is very different from most people's casual use of the word.

PS. Matt Bastard? Really??? That's awesome. I wish someone had that last name.

More genocide

Commenter mattbastard at ObiWings succinctly puts the practical importance of the House bill in focus.

http://obsidianwings.blogs.com/obsidian_wings/2007/10/why-armenia.html
Adding to what Nell said, nations that officially recognize the genocide adds to pressure on the the Turkish gov't to reform its longstanding official policy of denial. Considering Turkish citizens can still be arrested (or killed) for even mentioning the atrocities of 1915, I'd say the concern is more immediate than you think.
(JFTR, Canada passed a similar resolution in 2006.)

I had completely forgotten that in Turkey it is actually a crime to even debate what happened in 1915. I remember a few years ago reading a news story about a Turkish bookseller who was killed for carrying a book that used the term genocide. As I said before I personally find it bizarre the way Turkey refuses to acknowledge what happened - going so far as to threaten to break off ties with Israel unless the Jewish diaspora join them in denouncing the House resolution - but you can be sure if Germany or Rwanda tried to deny what happened in their country people would not be saying we have to respect them and not rock the boat.

The definition of genocide

Just because:

In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

From the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. The Convention was ratified by the US in 1988(!) with several understandings (essentially our interpretation of certain words and phrases):

Understandings:
"(1) That the term `intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial, or religious group as such' appearing in article II means the specific intent to destroy, in whole or in substantial part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group as such by the acts specified in article II.
(2) That the term `mental harm' in article II (b) means permanent impairment of mental faculties through drugs, torture or similar techniques.
(3) That the pledge to grant extradition in accordance with a state's laws and treaties in force found in article VII extends only to acts which are criminal under the laws of both the requesting and the requested state and nothing in article VI affects the right of any state to bring to trial before its own tribunals any of its nationals for acts committed outside a state.
(4) That acts in the course of armed conflicts committed without the specific intent required by article II are not sufficient to constitute genocide as defined by this Convention.
(5) That with regard to the reference to an international penal tribunal in article VI of the Convention, the United States declares that it reserves the right to effect its participation in any such tribunal only by a treaty entered into specifically for that purpose with the advice and consent of the Senate."

Whether it matters or not for policymaking is another debate all together, but this is the legal definition.

Genocide Schemnocide

I have in a blog post weeks ago mentioned my disdain for our tendencies towards labels, broad categorization, and name-calling. I know that in our busy lives we want to absorb as much information as quickly as possible, but efforts along these lines seem to backfire more often than any efficient mechanism should.

Whilst in a profession in which how we define terms and set up the environment is critical to the conclusions drawn, I am still annoyed as hell whenever I see arguments coming down to definitions and semantics. It's one thing for academics to engage in such circular, never-ending, and probably irrelevant (to anyone outside their immediate field anyway) debates -- how else are we going to get published, after all? -- it's a completely different story when it comes to policy makers, legislators, and politicians (broadly defined) going down this extremely counter-productive route.

People are dying each and every minute that you waste time dwelling on the "but well, according to my definition of XXX", for f's sake.

It is this same bs that's slowing efforts to end the violence in Darfur, or that Congress is obsessing over re: Turkey & Armenia right now. Genocide schemnocide, who gives a crap whether it has or has not happened?

Oh wait, everyone cares. It's just that everyone have their own variant for the definition of genocide.

Look, I do think what happened in the Ottoman Empire around 1915 represents a very dark page in human history, and I believe the facts should be brought to light and (ideally) those responsible should step up and acknowledge what has happened.

I just think that putting the label "genocide" over it isn't the be-all and end-all of things, nor is it fair to simply clump what had happened in Armenia with its supposed counterparts in Nazi-Germany, Rwanda, or Kosovo.

Forget about whether or not "genocide" (in its many definitions used) occured. What I want to know is:

(1) How many people were killed as a direct consequence of the event in question?

(2) Who were killed and who were the killers? (these groups more often than not overlap)

(3) What were the root causes of the killings?

(4) Was the violence justified / in proportion given the situation?

(5) Is there a way we can stop all this now or avoid it in the future?

I know the different sides will invariably disagree on at least some of the answers to these questions, but at least it's a step forward from "is it or is it not genocide."

In my area of work we talk about information as partitions of the true state of the world, meaning that the finer the (or the more the no. of) partitions, the better the information we have. I actually think that the finer the partitions, the larger the percentage of facts the relevant parties will agree on.

And the more common ground all sides can gain on an issue, the less likely they'll be in conflict. See why we should try to avoid broad categorization as much as possible now? It really ain't rocket science.

Finding the Backdoor

First, I do not doubt Nancy Pelosi's genuine support for the resolution recognizing the Armenian genocide. It has been an annual issue for over a decade and she has always been one of the main supporters. 2007 is the first time she has been in a position to push it forward.

I also think there is a great deal of merit and importance to the sentiment expressed by Tom Lantos that being Americas friend should not immunize you from your crimes against humanity - past or present. Whatever word you want to use to describe it, a vastly superior military force displacing millions of people and killing 1.5 million along the way is among the worst and most vile of acts. Personally I would prefer a reconcilliation process between the Turks and Armenians, but so long as the Turks continue to bizarrely (given that it was not even the modern Turkish state that committed the crimes) cling to the notion that 'Nothing happened in 1923! Everyone was on vacation! I will not hear such lies! Lalalala!' and show no sign of changing then reconcilliation is pointless to consider.

All that said, I do not see how Turkey's threats to cut off troop and supply access into Iraq is in anyway going to move the House leadership. This may turn into the best backdoor gambit against the war yet, as I do not see how the White House can win the argument on this. They have established a clear line of us against the rest of the world vis a vis Iraq - if we do not need Canada, France, the UK, or anyone else how can you argue Turkey is indispensable? It tequires far to much detail and nuance for political commentary.

It is also important in all this talk of 'allies' to remember that Turkey is on the eve of going to war with Iraq against our only friends in the country, the Kurds.

Death to O'Hanlon

Via Matt Yglesias, it seems Michael O'Hanlon has decided to expand his Brookings funded Bush apologies to health care. After gushing over the "rich array of options for policy-makers as well as Americans in general to consider" he zero's in on:

1. Stop being so fat and lazy; obesity is your fault America!
2. Getting insurance is your personal responsibility. For reasons untold, a dreaded "European style" national system is impossible.
3. We should fund expansion by pushing more costs onto the back of American families.
4. "Although not directly related to health care, Americans should be encouraged to work longer hours."
5. Again, a federal solution is impossible so go for a balkanized state approach.

Ezra Klein and many others have written volumes knocking down each of these, but quickly.

1. No one disagrees that there is an element of personal responsibility, but the government also has an important role indirecting our behavior through its policies - from local land use laws that promote walkable neighborhoods and cities, to which foods we subsidize the production of, to how many hours we spent tethered to a desk working.
2. A national system is primarily impossible because jackasses like O'Hanlon keep telling every American it is impossible. While O'Hanlon claims (without any source) that 75% of Americans are happy with their private insurance, this actual study of the question puts it at 20%. Every piece of anecdotal evidence I have ever heard (including from some Brookings folks) suggests the 20% may still be to high.
3. A favorite of the Chamber of Commerce crowd. It is analogous to the Post op-ed today on how big businesses really need more public investments in transport infrastructure to keep making money but that it should be funded for by increasing the gas tax you pay to get to your job that hasn't given you a pay raise in the past four years and buy your ever-more-expensive groceries.
   
4. As he said, not related at all though again a nice shout out to the corporate crowd that thinks you should be damn grateful they are even willing to give you a job.
5. See number two, as well as Ezra Klein's article on the subject. States can be laboratories, but they cannot fix the whole problem in a country where people and countries freely move from state to state.

On a larger note, if by some small miracle anyone who gives to Brookings reads this please stop contributing until they fire that two-bit hack. If he wants to push right wing policies on which he has no expertise and is totally unqualified to talk about in an intelligent fashion, then let him go work for AEI. There's no reason he has to be allowed to use Brookings partisan identity to provide "bipartisan" cover for stupid policies.

Andrew Sullivan writes:

The idea of America being run by two families for two decades is anathema to
such conservatives, as it is to many liberals. There is something inherently
corrupting about it - not just corrupting of them, but corrupting of us. The
experience of such power - presiding over the most powerful nation in modern
history - cannot but corrupt; and our decision to delegate real decisions to
various royal families while boning up on the latest news from Britney Spears is
a sign of real decadence. In a war this dangerous, it's positively reckless,
especially given the vast new neo-monarchical powers this administration has
seized and will, in large part, bequeath to the next president. We have learned
how one such succession has worked out. We should be extremely leery of another.

I am sympathetic to the concern about the emergence of the dynastic presidency. But it rings pretty hollow for me when folks who had no problem ignoring the current President's lineage trot it out as some kind of automatic disqualifier against Hillary Clinton.

With the increasing consolidation of mass information channels and the importance of campaign fundraising, the incumbency advantage continues to grow in strength. This makes it doubly important to ensure related candidates are actually qualified and sufficiently experienced on their own terms, and not simply a figment created by the previous President's friends looking to get themselves back in good favor.

That said, I think Hillary Clinton has passed that bar. To those who bemoan her as simply a junior Senator, I would remind them that her two main competitors have together won as many statewide elections. As for the rest of her resume, it is to voters to decide whether they prefer eight years in the White House to 20 years as a trial lawyer or a decade as a community organizer. All three have fundamentally different backgrounds, but I think they are all equally valid in assessing the formation of that candidate.

Since When is Intelligence Required?

"The defendant, a career politician with a college education, is of, at least, above-average intelligence," Judge Charles A. Porter Jr. ruled in Hennepin County District Court.

Will Larry Craig take the bait and appeal the ruling on the grounds that, actually if you look closely, he is clearly not of above average intelligence?

The whole thing continues to provide some solid evidence that god both has a sense of humor and votes Democrat.

Darfur

While I have heard some good things may come out of the high level visit in Darfur this week, things are still getting worse there as the fighting between rebels and everyone else seems to have picked up in tempo.

The raid on the AU forces appears to have been a local commander allied with JEM. In the scheme of who controls things in Darfur JEM is fairly small, but it was their failed attempt to undercut Bashir in 2002 and subsequent defection from the political process that seems to have sparked the powder keg. They swear it was not signed off on by the leadership, but the way negotiations have been shaking out they look like a big loser (keep in mind this is a political analysis, the REAL losers are the million Darfuris whose lives have been destroyed).

Attacking the AU force looks like bad news for a couple of reasons. First, do not ever fuck with Nigerians; they will kill you and your family and your neighbor and not feel a hint of remorse. Seriously, this is bad because if suddenly they are more worried about getting attacked by rebels there may be a big behind the scenes shift in their pressure.

Second, the Senegalese withdrawl has set a precedent for others to pull out. Not only do the Senegalese have some of the best officers in Africa, but the AUs biggest problem has always been capacity and this will really hurt, which means fewer observers to try and guard against attacks on civilians.

My biggest complaint about the Save Darfur folks - who have lots of people who should know better - has always been that by ignoring the other side of the conflict they make it harder to achieve a final settlement by providing the rebels the illusion that a foreign white horse is going to ride in and give them the keys to the castle (which is what JEM has always been after).

Is Health Care an Entitlement

Harold Meyerson hits the S-CHIP issue right on the nose in the Post today. In making an analogy to public school, he writes:

A free public education is a right, or, if you prefer, an entitlement in
America, because the nation long ago decided that an educated population is a
national good.

The economics are already pretty solidly behind creating a single payer system with incentives for preventative care - see Medicare and the VA. In the aggregate everyone gets more "good health" and pays less.

But, the fundamental political question around S-CHIP, and for that matter the entire health care reform debate, is whether or not everyone is entitled to access health care. If your parents are poor, or your mom's company just decided to stop providing insurance, should you be able to go see a doctor with anything less than an emergency problem?

The Problem with Mercs

"Our job is to get them off the X - the preplanned ambush site where the bad guys have planned to kill you,"

That was Blackwater's boss yesterday. I am a negotiator by training and so the first thing I look for in any situation is the interests of the parties.

For mercenaries their interest is fundamentally making money. Making money requires having soldiers and winning contracts. Both of those things require above all else that the people in your convoy do not get killed under any circumstances.

Marines do not like to die either. But the key difference is that if a unit thinks it is about to get ambushed and decides to mow down everyone on that block the tactical commander get in trouble.

Through Iraqi Eyes

The BBC has part of a great new photo exhibit on
Iraqi women online that I highly recommend.

It is not often that we get to hear the personal stories of ordinary
Iraqi women living under occupation. Earlier this year, however, eight
women were asked to record their daily lives in a series of photo diaries.

I am a big believer in the contact hypothesis, and so creative works like
this that offer a glimpse into the lives of the other are, I think, hugely
important to undercutting grand scale miltary adventures and the xenophibia
that often enables them.

Many years ago the mother of a Russian friend came to stay with my family for
a week while attending a conference and the most lasting impact on my mother - who grew up in the Cold War and its imagery of the other - to this day was
the awesome revelation that Russian mothers wanted 99.9% of the same
things for their Russian kids that American mothers wanted for their
American kids.

Figureheads

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7021986.stm

HRP:
Is the President of Syria a puppet too, or does he have actual authority / power? Interestingly, all this development isn't much reported in the US media at all. Maybe it's just my limited reading of US media...

DMA:
Assad is not a puppet and is the one with the real power in Syria.
Honestly, I'm a bit surprised even BBC is reporting it (mostly just because their reporter had an exclusive with him), as Syria saying the Golan has to be part of any comprehensive peace agreement and the US hosting a "peace conference"/PR stunt that isn't going to accomplish anything are both old news

HRP:
Does Syria actually care about Golan? I thought you once told me that Israel occupies some land of Syria that Syria doesn't really care about? Or is it Jordan? Or Egypt?

I think it's surprising that Bush is even trying to have a "PR stunt" of this Mideast Conference. Seeing that nothing substantive on the Israel-Palestine issue will possibly be accomplished in the remaining of his presidency, Bush should really stop getting his paws into too many puddles of water, adding more items on his "failed to get done" list.

Maybe he just wants to say that he's tried and that it's these Axis of Evil countries that aren't cooperating, but at this point, who's even giving him the benefit of the doubt anymore...

DMA:
As a substantive issue, Syria doesn't care too much about the Golan; however, as a symbolic issue any Israel/Syria detente will require some sortof "joint" final status decision. You may not like the sink hole in your backyard, but if your neighbor whose dog has been shitting on your lawn just comes over and claims it as his you cannot just say "oh well, I didn't even want it".

The conference is because he and Condi were taking shit for having:
1) told the Palestinians the US was going to freeze the peace process until they hold elections,
2) cutting off aid when the wrong guys (Hamas) got elected,
3) then not doing anything substantive after the guys they wanted to win(Fatah) staged a successful coup against Hamas.

So in order to kick the can down the road and undercut any pressure on Israel/US for the new peace process they promised 2 years ago, they decided they would hold these bs meetings (because if you say "why aren't you doing anything" they can just keep saying "we are having a meeting about it, so you have to wait until after the meeting before you can complain about a lack of outcome").

At this point Israel/Palestine is a big enough issue that it goes on everyPresident's success/failure list no matter how much they actually engage.

HRP:
Speaking of this US/Israel "acts in support" of the Fatah government, what with the recent Israeli release of Palestinian prisoners and all I seriously think that the US and Israel have just gotta stop with this supporting-one-side-to-undercut-the-other bullshit. From the cold war & Bin Laden's Al Qaeda/Taliban to India & Pakistan to different coups in Africa and South America, this funding-your-lesser-enemy strategy has turned out to be nothing but utter disasters and often comes back to bite one's own ass.

DMA:
Agreed in practice, but not as much in theory. The problem the US faces isn't picking sides as much as their tendency to kick people to the curb the minute they are no longer immediately useful and then wonder why the people they screwed over are pissed off.

Playing empire is a game of chess - you have to see five moves down the road - that the US plays like a game of checkers - taking the jump in front of you.

Read this now

Army of Dude has far and away the best response I have seen to the deplorable comments made by Rush Limbaugh last week.

This is Chevy in Baghdad. Brian Chevalier was going to reenlist but decided
against it before he was killed on March 14 during our first mission in Baqubah. His phony life was celebrated in a phony memorial where everyone who knew him cried phony tears. A phony American flag draped over his phony coffin when his body came home. It was presented to his phony mother and phony daughter.

In the event anyone actually is listening to my ranting, please go and read the whole thing and pass it on to everyone you know. And thank you Chevy, Alex, and all the soldiers, friends, and family who have served during these difficult years of too long deployments and too little armor and planning.

Friday afternoon heading home blogging

Noah in the Danger Room highlights a great new Navy report designed to highlight how unhip and out of touch their HR folks are.

There is lots of good stuff in his wrap up, but most interesting to me was that 32% of the 'millenials' surveyed self described themselves as less patriotic because of the war in Iraq.

During Vietnam most folks opposed to the war considered themselves patriotic no matter what the other side said. Today you often hear those in the chattering class who have opposed the war at various times continue to speak of themselves as the guardians of 'America'.

That these kids are willing to cop to being 'less patriotic' tells me two things. First, proponents have succeeded in framing support for the war as a with us or against us proposition. Second, and more frightening, this age group has responded by saying 'fine, if that's the case then fuck America.'

Sure this is bad news for Gates plan to add 50,000 troops, but it seems really bad for the future of American civil society if it becomes a long term trend.

http://blog.wired.com/defense/2007/09/omg-navy-calls-.html

File it Under 'Are You Serious'

http://mobile.nytimes.com/article;jsessionid=691EFAC3CE4DD7D01346664B4B2124EB.w5?a=106597&f=21

As a low level government paper pusher I am witness to all sorts of rediculous waste of all our tax dollars. But this story just blows my mind!

The ADL is forcing the Navy to spend 600,000 because some barracks designed 50 years ago sort of look like a swastika when viewed from above. Even better, the barrack is in restricted airspace so literally the only way you can see this is on Google earth (imagine if someone at CAIR admitted to using Google to look at military bases... you would never see the guy again).

The Holocaust and Naziism were really bad things. And were it just a case of 'maybe they should consider a different design' I probably would not have a problem. But seriously, we are talking about more than half a million dollars!

Buying a Skunk

http://mobile.nytimes.com/article?a=105154&f=19

It looks like Congress is about out of tricks to "bring the war to a responsible close" or whatever the current triangulated phrase is. That said, for some time now I have been of the mind that the Dems do not from a poltical standpoint want to force any substantive changes.

Kevin Drum made the very smart point last week that the last thing the Dems want to do is set themselves up to have any culpability for this fuck up and particularly any deterioration of the situation in the future (a point Lindsey Graham alluded to when he noted that "Repubs own this war... And there may be consequences to that" today).

Sure it is disguisting to use soldiers lives as political props, but if one side is willing to do it you do not really have a choice. Politics is chess, not checkers.

Proof by Contradiction

RE: DMA's response

Interestingly, I did start out writing "Darwinian" when describing "survival of the fittest", then promptly removed it at the thought of the contradiction of conservatives and evolution.

However, if you think about free market, small gov't (which is fundamentally a free-market based philosophy), and a few other conservative economic principles, they are all founded on the belief that evolution-type equilibrium that emerges in all spectrum of life is efficient and should not be interfered with.

I guess conservatives do believe in evolution, just not the specific case of human beings having been evolved from apes.

Choice, evolution, and conservatism

For the most part I agree with HRP. Having a kid (like whining you cannot sit still until some lazy counselor gives you ritalin) is a choice, which is fundamentally at odds with the non-choice nature of a true disability.

But she writes:

The following statement probably makes me officially a extremist,
non-compassionate conservative: survival of the fittest has long been the
ruling force that drives development on all fronts, yet we now think we've
advanced enough that we should dispose of or even reverse that rule.

Real conservatives do not believe in evolution!

I Would Like to Thank the Distinguished Gentleman for Being a Dick

http://mobile.washingtonpost.com/news.jsp?key=92718&rc=dana_po

John Warner has long been lionized for his courageous maverickness. Most recently the Post did a few big pieces last week when he announced he wasn't running again, but these kind of stories have been going on quite a while.

That is why I was so excited to see Millbank spend an entire column on how Warner is a duplicitous piece of shit with a long history of stabbing each and every bipartisan measure he works on in the back.

Given the media's love affair with bipartisanship (which I think for most is simply because covering any solution that isn't bipartisan means folks on one side are gunning at them) it really is important for them to point out which dirty old men are most responsible for preventing bipartisan outcomes.

And for the record I wish all sorts of unmentionable bad things on the fucking spineless Republicans that voted against Webb's ammendment, which had nothing to do with ending the war and everything to do with taking care of the men and women serving the country.

Constitutional Right to Pump Milk??

Anything that one thinks one has a right to do is apparently argued as one's "constitutional right" in a court of law nowadays. I find it amusing to imagine the founding fathers discussing, debating, or even thinking about a woman's right to pump her milk as their write down the constitution.

Sure thing, just go ahead and do it. Who's really stopping ya?

The Boston Globe reports on a case of a medical student (female, and with a young child) suing the National Board of Medical Examiners (NBME) for not allowing her extra time in her 9-hour exam so that she can breastfeed her child.

I have almost made up my mind about the NBME being discriminatory and inflexible until I saw that the student is already taking her exam over 2 days instead of 1, and given a 45-min break on each of those days (others get one 45-min break in their one-day-nine-hr exam), because she has dyslexia and ADD.

No offense to others with these "disabilities", but that just sounds like a whiner to me.

C'mon, you got the same amount of break time each day, for really only about half the exam length per day. I'm not saying that makes it a piece of cake, but they clearly cut you some slack on the "disability" front, why don't we just see the extra break time that you got as in part accommodating for your breastfeeding too?

Then it got me thinking: if the NBME chooses to accommodate dyslexia and ADD, which to me is more an obstacle than a real disability, then being a mom and having to breastfeed seem like an obstacle as well. It's inconsistent, if anything, that they're accommodating one problem but not another.

I understand in the ideal situation you'd like to breastfeed your child directly from your breasts, but perhaps for an exam like that, you can pre-pump the milk and leave your child with somebody you trust? I can't even begin to imagine her having the bring her kid to the exam anyway... what if the baby needs changing? You get extra time for that too?

To sue on something like that, when accommodations have already been made (I know I know, I have to separate issues here), seems nothing but frivolous to me. Oh, the sense of entitlement that (some) Americans have.

Now, onto the "disability" issue -- you can see I can't write it without put quotations around. I know I'm being very insensitive here, but frankly I don't much care about sensitivity if caring means people are going to blatantly and shamelessly throw bs at me.

Maybe I'm old school, but people have gone on with these "conditions" before now at school and elsewhere without any special accommodations, and many do just fine, albeit having to endure additional struggles. If we really start going down this path of calling various individual setbacks as "disabilities", can we start ranking every student according to their IQ and give those with lower IQ more time in exams, or grade them on a more gentle scale? I'm sure with further-enough advances in medicine we'll be able to find where in the brain people with low IQ are deficient -- hence establishing a physical defect / disability.

The following statement probably makes me officially a extremist, non-compassionate conservative: survival of the fittest has long been the ruling force that drives development on all fronts, yet we now think we've advanced enough that we should dispose of or even reverse that rule.

Let's throw this idea to investment banks: employees' salary and bonuses should be a function of both actual performance and their intellect / ability (I'm sure we can come up with some index for that). In particular, salary and bonuses should be inversely related to intellect. Because, c'mon now, for a less able person to come up with the same kind of numbers as a really smart guy, the dumb guy must've been a really smart dumb -- sorry, "disabled" -- guy.

Huh?

The usually coherent Tom Friedman left me utterly confused this morning. After taking us on an "I am SO much more worldly than you" travelogue he ostensibly takes on climate change. But his take seems to be pretty dismal; thanks to China and the Arabs and TNT (Europe's Fedex) the world is doomed and it is all the fault of you damn Americans!

It's a really bizarre sight and the only coherent piece I can find is Friedman's continuing thesis that the world is flattening (which I agree with) and everyone wants to be an American (which I vigorously disagree with).

Rather than outright mocking the small but real shift in American consumption patterns wouldn't it be more productive to either:
-make more than a cryptic reference to the 'energy matrix' and come out and say we need to put more money into the engineering and science of new clean sources

-Note that it will take a cooperative global effort REALLY SOON to do anything, and that we need to recognize "We will give up incandescent bulbs if you stop developing" is not a real starting point.

A Good Idea

http://mobile.nytimes.com/article?a=103166&f=20

In reading this NYT piece on Iraqi's response to Patreus it seems to me the consesus there is things are bad, we can't see them getting better, but they can get a lot worse. From an Iraqi perspective having 160000 Americans isn't that terrible - we do kill plenty of bad people and there aren't nearly as many crazy GIs terrorizing the population as in Vietnam.

But I am still lost as to why AMERICANS would want to spend 150 billion a year maintaining a status quo. Basically pick any systemic, seemingly unsolvable problem in the US - schools, health care, roads, public transport - and it could get FIXED for way less than that. Instead we are using that money to spin our wheels in the Iraq desert.

That said, if we wanted to significantly decrease the carnage in a post withdrawl environment it seems to me that one easy and sensible solution would be to stop handing out briefcases of cash, assault rifles, and logistics training to all the folks most likely cause that carnage.

Fordized

The always astute Juan Cole raises something I have been thinking about lately. What happens if Dems win the election, withdraw, then immediately watch Iraq fall apart. Given the limited mental capacity and interest of the vast majority of Americans, are Dems going to just adopt a millstone briefly that allows the Republicans to sanitize their role and reembark on another 30 years of assendency/fucking up America?

Everyone who knows me knows how skeptical I am of democracy and the wisdom of the masses in the (dis)information age. Plus, I generally think liberals are too good hearted to win a street fight (not necessarily a bad thing on an interpersonal level, but collectively devistating). So can the Dems avoid the trap being left?

I think if Iraq is anything more than a collective bad dream in 4 years the Dems are screwed. The challenge of transnational terrorism will still be there making security a salient issue for voters, and the Republican candidate will make sure to tie our hopes and fears to the bedlam in Baghdad that broke out on Dems watch.

That means a strong domestic agenda plus a single non kinetic international initiative (think a shiney bow to distract the voters) will be vital to whoever is the President if they hope for two terms.

Also, it's the economy stupid! As Cole notes inflation plus fear of the crazy guys with towels coming to get us is a losing recipe. Since the latter will be a near certainty, the former really must be avoided.

Pointing fingers on the school yard

http://mobile.nytimes.com/article?a=101321&f=19

In reading the NYT story on the Israeli barracks that were hit by a rocket thrre were two glaring factual ommissions:

1- Palestinian rockets aren't just "dumb" (ie nonprecision), they are the dumbest weapons out there. Not to say they aren't culpable for the results of firing them off. But for those soldiers it is a case of shitty luck, not some nefarious premeditation.

2- The night before IDF special forces conducted a brazen raid on a Gaza compound (wearing Hamas uniforms to get close) and abducted some fairly senior Hamas guys. Now the rocket may not have been a direct retaliation - after all these are launched every day, usually landing harmlessly in empty fields - but the larger point is that it isn't like Israel was just sitting there twiddling it's thumbs when big bad Hamas pointed at the barracks on a map and 2 minutes later boom!

After all, the article reveals that the Israeli's have been publicly considering cutting off the little bit of water and power that even gets to Gaza in their continuing quest to delegitimize Palestinian opposition to a de facto unilateral final settlement.

Best line was the author's attempt to use the random child in the street with candy as a prop to prove how those dirty sand monkey A-rabs are just frothing at the mouth and celebrating the deaths of the poor, innocent Israeli's being trained to kick down their doors and shoot them.

Wait till next year

Patreus has spoken and the answer is we are doing so well we are going to leave most of the previously-temporarily surged troops there for another year.

Of course this makes sense given that everyone not in the White House's Wonderland knows violence is getting worse despite there being fewer and fewer Iraqi's available for the militias to ethnically cleanse.

Patreus is a tool whose complicity in Bush's hubris is DIRECTLY responsible for the death of Americans, and he should be treated accordingly.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/nolpda/ukfs_news/hi/newsid_6986000/6986461.stm?

Props

Before I forget, I want to recommend Karen DeYoung's two front page stories in todays WaPo. I'm sure they will be much talked about elsewhere, but nothing else she deserves huge credit for writing good articles on really important topics and being willing to stand up to the Patreus propoganda machine. Maybe WaPo won't turn into the WashTimes. If only we could do something about Hiatt.