A news story you may or may not have heard about recently is that Chip Saltsman, former campaign manager for Mike Huckabee, is getting roundly criticized–by those in his own party, in fact–for distributing a CD with the infamous song popularized by Rush Limbaugh titled, “Barack the Magic Negro.” Saltsman, like Limbaugh, defends the song as satire.

A common right-wing argument is that critics do not actually pay attention to the actual song itself, they just react to the word “Negro.” Well, let’s look at the song, which is sung by an Al Sharpton impersonator:

Barack the Magic Negro lives in D.C.
The L.A. Times, they called him that
‘Cause he’s not authentic like me.

Yeah, the guy from the L.A. paper
Said he makes guilty whites feel good
They’ll vote for him, and not for me
‘Cause he’s not from the hood.

See, real black men, like Snoop Dog,
Or me, or Farrakhan
Have talked the talk, and walked the walk.
Not come in late and won!

Refrain:
Oh, Barack the Magic Negro, lives in D.C.
The L.A. Times, they called him that
‘Cause he’s black, but not authentically.

(repeat Refrain)

Some say Barack’s “articulate”
And bright and new and “clean”
The media sure loves this guy,
A white interloper’s dream!

But, when you vote for president,
Watch out, and don’t be fooled!
Don’t vote the Magic Negro in
‘Cause… — ’cause I won’t have nothing after all these years of sacrifice And I won’t get justice. This is about justice. This isn’t about me, it’s about justice. It’s about buffet. I don’t have no buffet and there won’t be any church contributions, and there’ll be no cash in the collection plate. There ain’t gonna be no cash money, no walkin’ around money, no phoning money. Now, Barack going to come in here and –

(background vocalists repeat refrain & finish song)

Sure. Nothing wrong here, right?

There is the impression that anything goes with satire, that the simple fact that something is satire legitimizes or at least excuses any excess. But this is not exactly true; it all depends upon what is clearly intended as satire and what is perceived as the true intent. For example, if the leader of a Nazi skinhead group published a “satire” of Jews which, say, accused them of controlling the economy, and then suggested they be exterminated, I don’t think that anyone would really appreciate such as “satire.” An extreme example, but it clearly demonstrates that satire has its bounds. These bounds are broken when it is clear that the intent of the satire is to express something as fact which is not acceptable. Larry Flynt’s satire of Jerry Falwell having an incestuous encounter with his mother in an outhouse was offensive (to some), yes, but nobody believed that even Flynt felt that it was true. Had Flynt been waging a serious campaign that Falwell was a pedophile and ran a “satire” describing his “first time” with an altar boy, that would likely not have prevailed as satire in court.

Satire, as the dictionary definition goes, is supposed to criticize people’s stupidity or vices using humor, irony, or exaggeration. One can see how right-wingers might classify Rush’s song as “satire,” in that it uses humor to express what they see as a truth about liberals’ stupidity. The thing is, that view–the intent of the satire–is in itself racist, and is expressed in a racist way. In short, it falls under the category of using satire as a cover for expressing an otherwise offensive view.

The Limbaugh song steps over several lines for a variety of reasons. First of all, the caricature of Al Sharpton goes too far in the wrong directions, coming across as an audio version of a racist stereotype. Additionally, the song–identical to Limbaugh’s own views–attempts to trap blacks into one of two characterizations: either as radicals or fakes. It suggests that in order to be “authentically” black, you have to be a rapper, a reverse-racist, illiterate, etc.–or a combination of such qualities. And then there’s the fact that the song, through satire or otherwise, suggests that liberals are incapable of voting for a black candidate unless it is due to racial guilt. Were these to be aired by, say, Chris Rock, one would know they were satire. Coming from Rush Limbaugh, one knows they are heartfelt and assumed to be true.

Another indication that the song uses satire as cover comes from the repeated citation of the L.A. Times article that got Limbaugh going in the first place. The article suggested that Obama is or at least resembles a fictional archetype, a black character in a story who exists only to give credence to a white character. And indeed, this phenomenon exists, though more often as something the character does rather than the whole reason for the character themselves, and not just for black people, but for any racial divide. I have seen several such examples arise in Japan-Western fiction, with either a westerner giving respect to a Japanese character in a Japanese drama, or the other way around.

The problem, of course, is that Obama doesn’t fit this profile. The film archetype gave credence to the main character, not to the audience directly. The characterization is stretched by suggesting that the voters themselves are the main character being given credence by the black man. And so we come back to the idea that most, or at least a large number of white voters are attracted to Obama for this reason–to feel good about themselves, to prove they’re not racist.

When it comes to this, one might ask, how can you prove that’s not the real explanation for Obama’s popularity? How do you know that whites really aren’t enamored of Obama for exactly that reason? Well, aside from the limited scope of personal introspection, and aside from the long list of reasons to like Obama which have nothing to do with race, one is faced with being asked to prove a negative, which is usually very hard if not impossible to do. But in this case, there is a strong argument even for proving the negative. Were Obama some lackluster candidate, just a well-dressed guy with no clear reason to like him, and everyone went wild, then the assuaging-white-guilt explanation might fly. But when you have a candidate who has strong charisma, powerful oratory skills, a solid platform of pragmatic and sensible policies, an inclusive agenda, an above-board high-road style, a keen intelligence, strong strategic and tactical abilities, and so forth and so on–when a candidate has so many reasons to like him, it’s kind of hard to believe that white guilt is really the strongest thing driving his popularity. The fact is, there simply is no such feeling of assuaging white guilt that exists out there.

And, of course, the question of evidence is what kills the whole “Magic Negro” claim in the first place: there is no evidence, zero, zip, to suggest that this phenomenon does exist at all, even in the smallest way. It is simply assumed, with nothing to back it up.

Which brings us back to Limbaugh and the L.A. Times article. Limbaugh really had no evidence to back up his claims–until the L.A. Times article came out. Never mind that the L.A. Times article itself had no evidence to back it up–Rush now had a newspaper article to lean on. Which is why the article is repeatedly referred to rather than just the concept itself: it’s Rush’s thin veil of legitimacy. In a sense, the article was Rush’s very own “Magic Racism,” existing only to lend Rush himself some sort of credence to make him feel like he’s not a racist, despite clearly acting like one.

One also gets the very strong feeling that, for Limbaugh, it was more than just the idea of liberal white guilt being the sole cause for Obama’s popularity; it was the excuse to use the word “Negro” incessantly on the air. As if to say, “hey, it’s not me who used the word ‘Negro,’ it was that L.A. Times journalist who used it! Negro Negro Negro!!!”

It’s this breaking of racial taboos that tickles the hard-right’s sensibilities, the forbidden fruit of speaking their intolerance aloud in the age of political correctness and getting away with it. Which is probably why Saltsman included it on that CD, which was filled with such racist crap.

The funny thing here is that Saltsman is getting reamed for this not because he’s crossing a line, but because of Republican political infighting. Saltsman is in a heated race for the leadership of the Republican Party with Mike Duncan, the Current RNC Chairman–who is the one who is taking Saltsman to task for his insensitivity. One can rest assured that if Saltsman were not challenging anyone and just released the song on a CD for fun, neither Duncan nor anyone else in the GOP would have so much as blinked. If you think not, then reflect on the fact that neither Duncan nor the GOP so roundly criticized Limbaugh for releasing and repeatedly promoting the song and using the offending term.

Apparently, political correctness works just fine for Republicans when it serves them politically–but only then.

Stumble it!

Have a conservative friend that you enjoy scaring with things that they will obviously interpret in the worst possible way based upon their prejudices and fears? Then show them this:

Especially good if they live in Arkansas, where all those dots seem to be going. The video plays erratically while loading, so play it through a second time for a smoother result, else stop it at first and set back to the start, waiting for it to finish before playing in full. Via Andrew Sullivan.

Stumble it!

One of the things that we hated about Bush was his complete one-sidedness. Even in a purely symbolic way, he was unable to reach out to the other side. Even being in the same room with someone one the other side of the spectrum was not something you’d expect of him. His harsh partisanship was one of his worst points.

Now, with Obama choosing both Rick Warren and Joseph Lowery to give the invocation and the benediction at Obama’s inaugural, there is a huge uproar: liberals are livid that Obama invited Warren.

True: Warren’s views on homosexuality are galling. It is easy for one to think that Obama could have done better–and maybe he could have. But I think it is important to remember a few things, like the fact that choosing a religious figure from the other side of the social divide who hasn’t made some despicable remark about gays, Jews, women, Muslims, or whomever, would not be an easy task. You’d have to go to the B -list, or maybe even the C-list. Falwell is no longer with us, but he was the kind of person we’re talking about here. Pat Robertson, James Dobson, Rod Parsley, John Hagee… you get the idea.

Another thing to remember is that having Warren give the invocation is not anywhere near the same as agreeing with his policies. As Obama pointed out, Warren invited him to speak to his congregation despite Obama’s views; this did not signal Warren’s intent to change his views on abortion or homosexuality and more than Warren’s invitation signals a sea change for Obama. Though the Saddleback invitation is not the same as an inaugural role, it’s not like Obama’s inviting Warren to write his social policy.

This is what we knew Obama would do: reach out to the other side. It’s the kind of politics we used to see on Capitol Hill before the Republicans went rabid, where politicians from both sides were truly congenial and worked well together despite their differences. One thing to keep in mind was the strange relationship between Jerry Falwell and Larry Flynt. At Falwell’s death, Flynt said:

My mother always told me that no matter how much you dislike a person, when you meet them face to face you will find characteristics about them that you like. Jerry Falwell was a perfect example of that. I hated everything he stood for, but after meeting him in person, years after the trial, Jerry Falwell and I became good friends. He would visit me in California and we would debate together on college campuses. I always appreciated his sincerity even though I knew what he was selling and he knew what I was selling.

Don’t you think that says something?

Obama is trying to do this: recognize a human connection with people regardless of their views, and through that, building a bridge of understanding between them. You don’t change hearts and minds by shoving the opposition into a the corner, never showing them respect, never inviting them in.

Something that is going rather underreported is that Warren is not alone; Obama’s choice of Joseph Lowery is being almost completely ignored, as if he didn’t matter as much. Obama was expected to choose a liberal icon–just not a conservative icon as well. Wasn’t that the kind of one-sidedness we’ve been complaining about for the past eight years? Wouldn’t we have respected Bush a lot more had he done this kind of thing often? What if Jesse Jackson had been invited to give the invocation for Dubya, and not just for show? Would not that kind of behavior garnered Bush more respect, given that Jackson upsets many on the right as much as Warren upsets us on the left?

I think that what Obama did does not deserve the criticism that the left is heaping on him for it. Again, he could have chosen someone on the right with less controversy (though not without sacrificing cross-aisle cachet and credentials), but generally speaking, this is what Obama promised: to truly respect all sides as a means of winning hearts and minds, bringing them to a common ground that will have far more value, even though there will be far less visceral satisfaction than there would be if we just ran roughshod over the other side. Also remember that Obama’s skill is not in sacrificing his principles, but using this common-ground approach to being the other side over to ours.

If we want to make things like gay marriage a reality sooner rather than later, then you bring the opponents in from the cold and let them get used to sitting around the same fire.

Stumble it!

One of the big themes of the McCain/Palin campaign has been about how elitist Obama is, how he and liberals in general snidely look down upon those in rural areas, with “common” American lives and values.

I have said it before and will say it again: it’s conservatives, and at least some rural people who seem to be elitist, feeling that their way of life is far superior, looking down on the urban liberals. Back in the San Francisco Bay Area, anyone who made snide remarks about “hicks” would be excoriated and generally regarded as an ass; in the notably liberal atmosphere of the college office where I work, anyone who put down rural America just because of their lifestyle or common values would be instantly looked down upon with scorn. Those are “San Francisco values.” Apparently, they don’t have the same kind of values in Wasilla.

Apparently, at least among conservatives, it is perfectly acceptable to look down on urbanites for no other reason than the perceived arrogance, and to presume a superiority inherent in their own preferred way of life. Note that when people like Palin sneer at the straw-man “elitists” they create, they then act like it is their own way of life that is superior.

Imagine if a Democratic politician went before a crowd and said the same kind of thing in reverse–instead of putting down “Washington elitists,” they put down “small-town hicks,” and generally lorded the urban experience over rural folk. Imagine if Barack Obama had made this speech:

A writer observed: “We produce good people in our big cities, with honesty, sincerity, and dignity.” They are the ones who do some of the hardest work in America … who manage our businesses, run our factories, and fight our wars. They love their country, in good times and bad, and they’re always proud of America. I had the privilege of living most of my life in a big city, working as a community organizer. And since our opponents in this presidential election seem to look down on that experience, let me explain to them what the job involves. I guess a community organizer is sort of like a “small-town mayor,” except that you actually help people.

Imagine that Obama then sneered at how right-wingers actually looked down on working people, saying, “We tend to prefer candidates who don’t talk about us one way in New York and another way in Podunk.” Now imagine the conservative response. Would this, or would this not, produce cries of “liberal elitist!” from the right wing? Would they not decry it as a call of left-wing arrogance? Would they not attack Obama for taking on airs of smug superiority? And yet, that is the text from Palin’s speech, with the terms reversed, from right to left.

I recall a member of one of my Linguistics classes back in college who made an interesting point about wealthy families and the way people in the middle class perceived them. Not just the stereotypes, but the specific language used. Wealthy people don’t use words like “chauffeur,” they use “driver”; they don’t say “mansion,” they say “house” or “home.” The point being that the popular view of wealthy families was one that presumed a haughtiness, a smug arrogance that, more often than not, did not in fact exist. It was an imagined attitude, a straw man opinion that made it easier to look down upon rich people, seeing oneself as superior. In short, manufacturing the illusion of arrogance on the part of another in order to justify one’s own arrogance over them.

That’s what we have here: the entire “elitist” mythology is a carefully constructed straw man created for the sole purpose of justifying an arrogance conservatives want to themselves enjoy. Like an office employee imagining his company is corrupt as a way of justifying his embezzling from it, the idea of liberal elitists is nothing more than a way for conservatives to commit the very wrongs they assign to others.

Stumble it!

Nancy Pelosi got into trouble when she pointed out that abortion has not always been the sin in Christianity that it has been painted to be. She pointed to the works of St. Augustine in the 4th century, who subscribed to “delayed hominization,” and wrote, “the law does not provide that the act [abortion] pertains to homicide, for there cannot yet be said to be a live soul in a body that lacks sensation.” That was Saint Augustine on Exodus 21:22, the source of “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth”–but also specifies (in a far less quoted preamble) that if one hits a woman so as to cause her unborn child to die, only a monetary fee is required.

Pelosi was quite right–the church has been all over on the matter of abortion, and for most of its history did not frown on abortion itself early in pregnancy. If one is to be perfectly honest, it is a matter which is less ordained by god and more of a detail that church leaders have arbitrarily decided upon–with life beginning at conception being a relatively modern invention (1869, to be exact). What Pelosi was saying is that life-at-conception is not the sure thing that some Christians try to claim it is, and in this, she was right.

The right wing is jumping all over this, with Fox leading the charge saying that “Pelosi blew it” (and that she “committed a major gaff,” which I can only presume is Fox’s bad spelling and not to mean that Pelosi committed a barbed stick) and the Washington Times warning Pelosi that she should not cross the bishops, or else. Much of the media is following their lead.

So, why is Pelosi wrong? Because a bunch of religious authorities decided to interpret biblical works differently than she did, even if Pelosi’s interpretation is closer to how the church has judged abortion for about 90% of its history. But the texts could be read either way, in that biblical texts can say just about anything you want them to say if you stretch and generalize them as much as church scholars and officials have. If you remain more strict to original writings, then interpretation favors Pelosi’s views. Doing it otherwise strays into the territory of letting the church have it both ways–give unequal weight to identical dictums in scripture, or allowing rationalizations about how the “ovum wasn’t discovered until 1827” but we’re supposed to base science on what the bible says.

But hey, with the only thing in the balance being the Catholic Church refusing to give Pelosi Communion and therefore damaging her politically as well as personally, we can at least be grateful that religion is not dictating law. It is only trying really hard, and won’t fully succeed until McCain gets elected. So relax.

Stumble it!

This should be a complete no-brainer. Obama is pro-choice, and like almost all pro-choicers, he does not like the idea of abortion but is not willing to make that decision for others. Expect reasonable, law- and constitution-respecting judges to be appointed.

McCain, however, is flip-flopping from his original stand, which was to outlaw abortion but leave exceptions for rape, incest, or the risk of death of the mother, and now accepts the party’s policy of outlawing abortion with no exceptions. Which means that if a pregnant woman is carrying a non-viable fetus which would surely die a few minutes after birth due to congenital defects, and the mother’s health is such that she has a high risk of dying in any kind of childbirth, then too bad. She’ll have to simply risk death for no reason, even though there is a simple procedure to ensure she will live. Similarly, if a 14-year-old girl is raped by her father and the child is expected to be badly deformed or dead on delivery due to double recessives, she’ll just have to bear down and go through with the emotional terror of bearing her father’s child. Sorry, kid, but you gotta respect the life of a clump of cells–we respect those cells more than we respect you, for sure–so just man up already and quit sniffling.

Expect his judges to be the same as we’ve seen from Bush, too–McCain has vowed (link to 3-minute video clip of McCain babbling about court appointments) to appoint right-wing strict constructionists, which means that one or two of the liberal justices on SCOTUS who are more than likely to retire or pass away in the next four years will be replaced with another Alito or Rehnquist, and choice will sure die soon after.

Add that to the laundry list of reasons not to vote for McCain, if that reason alone is not more than enough.

Stumble it!

This is why so many public opinion polls are worthless:

Ramesh notes the imprecision of the phrase “affirmative action,” a phrase often used by reporters when describing racial preferences. The imprecision is quite useful for supporters of preferences. Voters are far more favorably disposed to policies described as “affirmative action” than they are to policies described as “racial preferences.” When a policy is described as “affirmative action,” polls show an almost even split in support and opposition. In contrast, a Newsweek poll last summer showed that Americans oppose “racial preferences” by a margin of 82%—14%. The opposition to “racial preferences” also includes a plurality of blacks.

Support for “affirmative action” evaporates when it’s revealed to mean that a black applicant to an elite school is 200 times more likely to be admitted than a white comparative. Thus, supporters of preferences employ the term “affirmative action”— a benign policy designed to “level the playing field.” Who could be opposed to that?

This is why conservatives work so hard to vilify certain names, terms, and expressions; controlling the language means controlling public opinion, and through that, public policy. It also shows that the more these policies are understood, the more clear-headed public opinion is likely to be. Were people to understand exactly what Affirmative Action is–not the common political canard–there would be almost universal approval. But what has happened is that the quota–something which is not “Affirmative Action”–has been vilified by egregious examples, and then has been lumped in with all other laws and policies regarding prevention and redress of racial discrimination, under the label of “Affirmative Action.” Many people think that AA means forcing any given workplace to hire unqualified black people–many think, in fact, that this is the intended purpose of AA–when the term “Affirmative Action” by itself is nothing more than a set of guidelines which, when examined, are very fair and reasonable. Quotas are something different, coming in many sizes and types; even many quotas would be largely approved of if understood better.

Take this situation, for example. An employer displays a blatant bias for hiring whites over blacks. The employer advertises only in venues likely to be seen by whites, and rarely if ever hires a black person. One black person who is highly qualified does see the ad and applies for a job, and is turned down. They file a complaint with the EEOC, which then comes to the place of employment and does an investigation. The EEOC investigator finds several inequities in the workplace, noting the hiring practices, and that in a community where the qualified workforce is 20% black, the company in question, with 100 employees, only has one black person working there. The EEOC then warns the business that they should follow guidelines, such as advertising to the community in general, rather than specifically to race-limited venues, and that they keep records of the hiring process to show that they gave fair consideration to all applicants. After 18 months, the EEOC investigator returns, and finds that not only has the firm not made any changes to their hiring policies, but they have fired the only black employee, hired no other black people during that time, and have received three more complaints by highly qualified black applicants turned down with no explanation, for which the company has kept no records to prove equity in hiring. The EEOC gives a more stern warning, and goes away for another 18 months. When they return, the situation is unchanged, with more complaints being entered. Finding a rather clear racial bias at the firm, they bring the company to court and sue for a quota to be established. The judge agrees, and tells the company that they must follow EEOC hiring practices and, since they have shown clear disdain for voluntary fair hiring, must hire in a fashion that reflects the makeup of the local qualified workforce. Not the local community, but the qualified workforce. If the people in the community qualified to fill a position are 20% black, their hiring record must reflect that. “What if we can’t find that many qualified black people?” the company owner asks. “If you can prove that none applied, you’re off the hook” is the answer.

This is an example of the process which generates non-legislative-mandated quotas. It is, one could easily argue, very fair. But because it comes under the category of “racial quota,” a majority would disapprove and want it to be thrown out.

Not all quotas follow this process; some are mandated generally, and some are applied unfairly. Some are required under the law, some are completely voluntary, and others are wrongly enforced by people who believe the untrue version and out of fear of imagined prosecution, enforce the stereotype of the unfair quota they somehow think they have to create. Some quotas are good and even necessary, some are not good and should be thrown out. But each type should be considered separately and specifically described, with the rationale and effects clearly laid out, before it is judged; errant cases of mismanagement should not be held up as model cases, but rather the standard implementation under law. Affirmative Action–which, in the strict, specific sense is nothing more than a set of guidelines for fair hiring, treatment, pay, promotion, and firing–should be considered in the same way, as well as all other related issues.

But we don’t do that. Instead, we have public opinion polls which gauge public reactions to terms which are greatly biased due to concentrated political campaigns to distort their perceived meaning. And then we see politicians basing public policy on this.

Conservatives clearly understand this principe and use it as a weapon. To fight abortion, they take the most extreme case possible, twist it out of its true proportion so as to make it look like infanticide, killing healthy babies for selfish, heartless reasons, and then try to classify the entire abortion issue based upon that impression.

As long as we allow ourselves to react to generalities, without demanding clarification and definition, we’ll be open to that kind of manipulation. Of course, the clarification I speak of is largely a task for the media, so I’m not holding my breath or anything.

Stumble it!

Can you tell that Fox News now runs the Wall Street Journal?

The GOP Is the Party of Civil Rights

John McCain is scheduled to address the NAACP’s annual convention in Cincinnati, Ohio today. Although he is unlikely to gain many black votes this year, he should use the occasion to increase Republican efforts to reach out to African-Americans. He can start by setting the record straight on the records of the two parties on race.

Everyone knows this, but it’s worth repeating: The Republican Party is the party of Abraham Lincoln and was established in 1854 to block the expansion of slavery. The Democratic Party was the party of slavery: Its two founders, Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson, owned large numbers of slaves, and every party platform before the Civil War defended the institution unequivocally.

The article then depends on rather impressively laughable tour of historical cherry-picking to bring it up to date: Republicans McKinley and Harding tried to pass anti-lynching laws which were rebuked by Southern Democrats; Roosevelt & Truman were weak on civil rights, and Johnson only passed strong civil rights laws because Republicans were behind it all–but Nixon was a bigger civil rights champion than Johnson. Ergo, McCain is the new Lincoln and Democrats are all racists.

But really, the foundation, the heart and soul of this claim, and not just in this article, is the whole Lincoln thing–as if today’s Republican Party in any way, shape, or form resembles what Lincoln built more than a century and a half ago. It reminds me of a joke about a man who greatly valued his antique sword; when a friend asked him why it looks so new, the man explained that the hilt wore out and broke apart, so he had it replaced, and that the blade wore down too much, so he had that replaced as well. But it still occupied the same space as the old sword. That’s the Republican Party: it still occupies the same name as the original, but all the parts have been replaced. It is no longer the same institution. Republicans claiming ownership of civil rights because Lincoln ended slavery is like Drew Barrymore claiming she deserves an Oscar for her grandfather’s performances, or like Italy claiming it runs the world because of the might of the Holy Roman Empire.

The racism of southern Democrats the article refers to was inherited by the Republican Party several generations back. Like the Earth’s magnetic pole migrating between north and south over time, progressives and conservatives likewise find new homes in different parties. Ronald Reagan said himself that he didn’t leave the Democratic Party, it left him. While Republicans can claim the name of the party Lincoln built, Democrats now preserve its spirit.

Lincoln of course deserves credit for what he did, but the modern Republican Party claiming that it is a champion of civil rights is so patently absurd, so starkly in contrast to their current policies and programs, that it deserves nothing less than to be laughed off the stage in a definitive display of mock and scorn.

Stumble it!

The Supreme Court did what pretty much everyone expected today: for the first time in history, they deemed the Second Amendment an individual right and denied the ability of the government to ban all possession of guns. Most likely due solely to the influence of Justice Kennedy, they did not go so far as to say that there could be no control or restriction, opening the door for gun control laws so long as they do not amount to a gun ban.

Personally, I’m okay with this–I don’t like guns, and am a strong proponent of gun control which is rationally designed to maximize the restriction of illegal gun sales, possession, and use, while minimizing any obstruction to law-abiding citizens to possess arms; I am also a strong proponent of requiring safety training and testing. All of this is allowed under the new decision, which is why I am okay with the results.

What I am not okay with is the route they took. In arriving at their decision to individualize gun rights, the Wingnut Four essentially rewrote American history, claiming that the Second Amendment had no military basis, was always intended for personal/home defense, and so is an individual right. In short, in classic Scalia fashion, they ignored history and made up whatever baloney suited their personal beliefs–reigned in only be Kennedy’s relative moderation.

Scalia concluded his opinion, “what is not debatable is that it is not the role of this Court to pronounce the Second Amendment extinct.” No, it is just your opinion that it is the role of the court to pronounce every other amendment extinct. Just the other day, the Wingnut Four of SCOTUS tried vehemently to expand the use of the death penalty. Previously, Scalia railed that he was in the minority in trying to abolish the establishment clause of the First Amendment. Via their role as strict constructionists, the Wingnut Four have–by the definition of former Chief Justice William Rehnquist (“a strict constructionist judge is one who favors criminal prosecutors over criminal defendants, and civil rights defendants over civil rights plaintiffs.”)–vowed to decimate the Fourth through Eighth Amendments. And they have assiduously ignored the Ninth Amendment, which, after all, completely and utterly negates their beloved Wingnut-code-word philosophy of strict constructionism. Ergo, Judge Bork called the Ninth Amendment an “inkblot,” and Scalia has argues that Congress has the power to decide which rights the people possess, despite the Ninth Amendment clearly stating that the people must be protected from that same Congress to ensure these rights.

To me, the Ninth Amendment is what truly assures an individual right to keep and bear arms; the Ninth reaches back in history for pre-established rights, covers the rights so basic and vital that they need not even be named, and protects other rights that can be inferred from the others which are enumerated. And in this decision, Scalia actually cites all of these reasons, but does not apply them to the Ninth Amendment–he instead sees them as support for the Second Amendment. But there’s a reason he and the other members of the Wingnut Four have this blind spot: recognizing the authority of the Ninth Amendment would inevitably lead to full recognition of a right to privacy, which they absolutely do not want to recognize.

If you read any part of the decision, read the dissent by John Paul Stevens; he tears the majority a new one, pointing out in surprisingly simple and bitingly accurate language how their rationale for seeing the Second Amendment as an individual right is shoddy, at best. He notes that the designation of the right of “the people” in the Second Amendment is indeed not as universal as that in the First Amendment or the Fourth Amendment, as the right to keep and bear arms can be limited and even revoked in ways that the other amendments cannot be; then he quite rightly points out that the preamble to the Second Amendment (“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State”) is not just flowery decoration, but actually means something.

I was also very pleased that Stevens pointed out something else which is blindingly obvious: that the Second Amendment was not drafted so as to allow people to protect their homes from criminal trespass or otherwise for self-defense, but instead was drafted purely as a way to ensure that the people secure the right to maintain small, local armies. He points out what I have pointed out, what people who support the Second Amendment as an individual right pointedly ignore: that until the second-to-last draft, the Second Amendment contained a clause guaranteeing conscientious objection–that is, people who do not wish to fight because of their religious beliefs could be exempt from the obligations of the Second Amendment. One does not have to be exempted from a purely individual right to possess arms if one wishes–but one does have to be exempted from militia service.

The original bill had the added clause, “…but no person religiously scrupulous of bearing arms shall be compelled to render military service in person.” Does that sound like a call for an individual liberty? Of course not. It is not even consistent with that.

But, as I said, the end result of this decision is not as disastrous as one may fear, as it does not put an end to gun control–in fact, one criticism of the majority decision in the dissent was that the ruling left determinations on specifics of what restrictions may or may not be allowed an open issue for future courts to resolve. But for now, there is nothing keeping cities, states, or the federal government from enforcing a broad range of gun control laws, in addition to banning some forms of guns, such as fully-automatic “machine” guns and other weapons which go beyond normal definitions of self-defense.

To take the most optimistic view, this decision may even help gun control, as the main reason most Americans oppose them is that they fear such controls would evolve into gun bans. Now that the Supreme Court has ruled that such a thing is unconstitutional, that fear should now evaporate, making it possible for people to express outright favor for restrictions they agree are reasonable, but before feared would lead to gun bans.

You can read the decision in PDF form here. I have not had the chance to read as much of it as I would like to due to time constraints (it’s late at night as this story breaks, and I have a ton of work to do through Saturday).

Comments?

Stumble it!

For a conformist society, Japan can be surprisingly lax about gender roles at times. Yes, there are men traditionally playing women in Kabuki, and there are those popular stage shows where women play men. And some of the manga are pretty flexible with gender, at least in appearances. Generally, homosexuality, bisexuality, and other non-standard gender roles are not really universally accepted here, but neither is there the visceral and even violent reaction that you might see in the U.S. or elsewhere. There seems to be an indifference, a live-and-let-live attitude, even if the let-live part is mostly tolerated if it remains more muted than otherwise.

Tonight, on one of Sachi’s variety shows, they had a story of a boy who identified more with girls since a very early age, and took on the role of female more and more as he grew to maturity. In his college years, he eventually took a leave of absence and underwent a sex change operation overseas. Returning to Japan, she became legally female–something the law has allowed for here since the late 90’s. This story may have come up due to a recent change in that law: previously, one could not change gender if one had children; the revised law allows it if the children are fully grown.

What struck me was how the story was told: very tastefully, fully sympathetically, and with not a small amount of genuine emotion. It was a wonderful piece of television, making you understand this person’s identity, her pain in trying all her life to fit in, and working through the difficulties in dealing with her family as well as society at large. They didn’t handle it clumsily or nervously, there was no poking fun or making jokes; the story was played out with dignity and respect, even tenderly. At the end, the young woman was revealed to be in the audience, and spoke some with the hosts.

And I reflected that I had never seen something like this on American TV–telling the story of a transgender individual with such empathy that the viewer could, if not identify with her, then surely could come to understand and fully accept this person. I especially could not see it hitting national television, as non-fiction, in light of a liberal shift in such laws.

I don’t know, maybe American television has done this and I simply never heard of it, but under today’s political and social conditions in the U.S., I cannot imagine it playing there. But if it did, despite the strong objections of the fundies and the others whose unconditional love is sharply conditional, I think there would be far more sympathy and acceptance of those with a different sexual orientation–and the fact that some of these people are finally enjoying the right to marry would be more of an occasion of joy than one of controversy.

Stumble it!

McCain is at it again. His propensity for lying in only thinly veiled disguise is pretty stunning. A week or so ago, he said that our troop levels are at pre-surge levels, then he denied he was wrong, trying to pretend he never said “pre-surge” in a way that was pretty blatant. Today, he’s lying even more outright–listen:

So, essentially, he’s saying that he’s not for privatization, those damned nasty liberul Democrat Party meanies will twist his words and claim he’s for privatization, but he’s not. Instead, all he wants to do is allow for people to put money that would otherwise go to Social Security payments and instead place them in personal accounts. In other words, privatization. (Oh, no! I just twisted John McCain’s words! I’m going to hell for sure now!)

Josh Marshall points out how Republicans, similar to the way they blamed their own “nuclear option” terminology on Democrats, backed off from “privatization, saying the that Democrat Party™ was responsible for it all along. They switched to ”private accounts,“ and when that didn’t work, ”personal accounts,“ the language McCain just used in aggressively denying he was for privatization. It’s kind of like watching an intelligent-design proponent vigorously deny he’s a creationist when all the time he’s thumping on a bible.

Undoubtedly, we are taking him out of context yet again, which is now McCain’s knee-jerk response to any public mention of his numerous lies. So, for context, here is the word from John McCain himself:

So, what do we have just recently? McCain claiming that Obama lacks knowledge and experience about Iraq, while claiming that our troops are at pre-surge levels, and that all violence in Iraq will magically disappear soon after he takes office. (This built upon repeated McCain gaffes and blunders about Iraq, from his famous ”marketplace stroll“ fantasy to his inability to discern Shiite from Sunni.)

McCain claiming that Obama will raise Americans’ taxes by ”thousands of dollars,“ that ”Americans of every background would see their taxes rise,“ claiming that McCain is the middle-class tax-cutter when in fact, Obama would cut middle-class taxes much more than McCain, and would only raise taxes on people in the upper class while giving small businesses and middle-class workers big cuts; McCain, meanwhile, gives the lion’s share of his tax cuts to the rich.

According to McCain, Obama is dirty because one of his Veep Vetters simply worked for Fannie Mae, while McCain’s own Veep Vetter was a paid lobbyist for Fannie Mae.

And that’s just in the past week or so. Keep going back and it’s practically anunending string of stuff like this–reversals, lies, and double-standards.

My question is, how long will it take for the media to recover from the softening effects of the Kool-aid-drinking McCain barbecues and start reporting even half the obvious truth about McCain, showing him up to be a liar, a flip-flopper, and a hypocrite on levels that makes even George W. Bush pale?

Five minutes after that happens–if it ever does–expect the right-wing PR machine to go into high gear, claiming that the (a) Liberal Media™ has (b) gone back on the May-I-Get-You-A-Pillow-Senator-Obama Bandwagon and (c) is unfairly demonizing John McCain for no good reason.

Stumble it!

I was listening to the iTunes podcast of Bill Moyer’s Journal, and he was discussing the idea of separation of church and state, beginning by reporting on the Pope’s concern that the United States was becoming a “secularized” society, as if that were some form of evil, like creeping fascism. I griped internally that it never fails to tire me when religious people try to force religion into the public square and down our throats. But in an effort to see things from both sides, I then reflected on the idea that maybe they see people like me in the same light: trying to shove my secularism and science down their throats.

But when I got through, I came out with the conclusion that secularism and science are appropriate as a public standard whereas religion is not. The principle behind that is the ultimate fairness of the neutral starting point: we begin at zero, with no pre-standing biases or beliefs–a level playing field, in other words–and work from that point forward.

Secularism is very close to, if not the embodiment of, that fair and equal starting point; nobody gets an advantage, all are treated equally. In contrast, having religious faith be a public standard is far from that; it disrespects those who choose not to have a belief in religion. And let’s face it, in most cases, people who say they want “faith” or “belief” in general to be the standard really want their faith, to the exclusion of all others, to be that standard–which is why Christians became furious when a Hindu was allowed to give the invocation in the U.S. Senate. And it’s not just other religions; when it comes down to it, any other sect tends to become the enemy just as easily. In which case it is not just the atheists and agnostics who suffer, it is every religious sect aside from the dominant one who suffers. Not a level playing field, by far. Thus, secularism is the best safeguard for the freedom of all beliefs, including religious beliefs.

Resentment against such fairness comes from the propensity of individuals to consider their preferred state as the starting point, instead of a truly neutral environment. A person of faith might actually consider a state of religious faith to be the “neutral” or fair environment from which to build; their bias could preclude them from considering the idea that others may not share their views, or that such people are by nature evil or at least lacking any sense of morality. But intolerance is not a good benchmark for equality, and thus the “equal” or “fair” judgment of such people falls somewhat short.

It’s kind of like arguing with militant smokers, who will not accept that a room with clear air is a fair starting point, instead insisting that the starting point is that you do what you want and I do what I want, and if you want me to stop smoking, then we negotiate from there–if I even feel like negotiating.

Again, I have to consider the idea that maybe my starting point of a blank slate is unreasonable, and I have tried to work that out. The answer I come away with is that the blank slate can always be fairly applied, whereas the “everyone is doing whatever they want” starting point, or the “my way is the natural way” starting point can easily be shown as unfair by applying it to any number of situations you would naturally recognize as unfair (e.g., you want everyone to have privacy, but I want to photograph you in the shower; shall we start from there?).

The more reasonable approach to the injection of religion into public affairs is to say that “my religious faith is part of who I am, and I cannot leave it behind when I act in public.” The pope expressed this when he warned of the dangers of secularism:

“Is it consistent to profess our beliefs in church on Sunday, and then during the week to promote business practices or medical procedures contrary to those beliefs? Is it consistent for practicing Catholics to ignore or exploit the poor and the marginalized, to promote sexual behavior contrary to Catholic moral teaching, or to adopt positions that contradict the right to life of every human being from conception to natural death?”

This claim is reasonable only up to a certain point: when it stops being about what the person of faith does related to their own private lives, and starts being about what other people choose to do. When your faith begins to impede on the free choice, beliefs, and actions of others, you have crossed a line that cannot rightly or fairly be crossed.

The pope skimmed very close to the line of being objectionable (and crossed the line when he touched on abortion); he held back only by saying that it was wrong to promote actions or ethics the church found unreasonable, or to commit actions that could universally be regarded as wrong. Okay, as far as that goes, I agree; I would not expect a Christian opposed to abortion on religious moral grounds to promote abortion for the sake of secularism. It is, however, a completely different matter if that same person tries to ban abortion for those very same reasons. Not promoting is a personal choice; banning is interfering with the choice of others, which clearly crosses the line.

And that line is defined by a neutral starting point: neither one person’s Catholicism nor another person’s Atheism is the defining standard from which we must move forward, nor is anyone else’s belief system. It must be a neutral starting point. What likely ires many militant religious people is that a neutral starting point, to them, seems like Atheism. That’s why they tend to see Science as some Atheist plot; in order to stay true to scientific principles, you must begin from a neutral, objective starting point–which is also why Science is appropriate as a subject in public schools, free from interference by “faith” or religion: Science teaches us only what is observable and demonstrable. If the real, measurable, observable world comes across as an “attack” on your religious faith, then that shows up a problem in your religious beliefs, not a problem with the fairness of the science curriculum in our schools.

And it is no reason for me to surrender the precious and invaluable gift of secularism (a gift to those with religious faith as much as it is to everyone else) just because those with “faith” cannot bring themselves to play fair.

Stumble it!

Wow, the right-wingers are really showing their true colors as bigots. They just filibustered (what, the 5,349,816th time this session?) a bill that would make it possible for workers to sue for pay discrimination, essentially killing it. Obama and Clinton returned to D.C. to vote for it, and McCain stayed away, signaling that he would have voted to kill it anyway.

Let’s rehash: this is based upon a scummy re-interpretation of law by the Bush administration. The original law was intended to make it so that if you found out your employer was paying you less than another worker for the same job because you were the wrong gender or race, you could sue them, so long as you filed suit 180 days after the last occurrence of the discriminatory pay. That was obviously meant to be structured so that the 180 day deadline happened after the last disparate paycheck was issued.

In a suit based upon this law, an employer tried to claim that the 180-day deadline started when the initial decision was made to issue unequal pay, taking advantage of wording that was just nebulous enough to allow for that interpretation (if you’re a complete idiot). Co-workers don’t immediately disseminate how much money they make to all coworkers, and employers often strongly discourage (or even try to prohibit) such sharing in any case. Finding such disparity within 6 months of the initial pay difference is so rare to discover that the law would essentially be meaningless under the new interpretation. It’s about as obvious as it can get that this was not the way the law was supposed to work.

The plaintiff, Ms. Lilly Ledbetter, won her case, and all the appeals until it reached the conservative-stacked 11th circuit (a spin-off of the 5th circuit, the most conservative in the country)–whereupon the law suddenly changed to support discrimination. Then the case was appealed to the Supreme Court, and naturally, the Bush administration jumped on the company’s side, filing a brief in support of the bigotry, in opposition to the EEOC’s rational application of the law in accordance with decades of precedence. And the 5-member Republican majority on the Supreme Court voted along straight party lines to uphold the ludicrous reinterpretation that essentially gutted the law. (Message: if you’re a corrupt, lawbreaking corporation, now is the time to get your suits before the high court! Get the payoffs while they last!)

Some right-wingers used the “it’s the law’s fault” defense, saying that they’d like to fight against discrimination, but darn it, the law is just so clearly written to be stupid, we have no choice but to follow it and be stupid ourselves. The Bush administration made no such dodges; they simply claimed [PDF] that once a decision was made to discriminate, a corporation could not be expected to remember that it had initiated such discrimination beyond 6 months, and it would be a travesty if people were allowed to sue after discrimination had continued for years and years. (They even made the deranged argument that the Ledbetter law would discourage allegations of discrimination from being “expeditiously resolved.”)

So if a corporation got away with discrimination for 180 days, then they were home free–untouchable from that point on. As I pointed out before, this asinine view of the law just begs for abuse, and is even institutionalized in posterity if pay increases are decided as a percentage of initial pay levels.

Well, no problem–just re-word the law so that it clearly states the obvious intent. But there’s a big problem–no, two big problems: one, the president–who vowed to veto the reworded bill, and now the Senate Republicans, who just filibustered it to death before it could even get to the president’s desk.

So the conservative wingnuts in all three branches of government have not voiced their intent to let bigotry reign.

Ready to vote yet?

Oh, and I almost forgot to mention: the insidious Liberal Media™ continues to call Republican obstruction “blocking” or “denying” in their headlines, even eschewing the correct term “filibuster” in the full text of most of the articles covering this story (the few that there are, that is). They showed no such reluctance to use the word “filibuster” almost endlessly in the far more rare cases when Democrats blocked a handful of the most extremist right-wing judicial nominees.

Oh, and here’s a bonus bit of Republican hypocrisy:

Republicans said Democrats were playing politics, by timing the vote to give the Democratic presidential candidates, Sens. Hillary Clinton of New York and Barack Obama of Illinois, time to return to the Capitol from the campaign trail. Both senators spoke in support of the bill before the vote.

Yes, how terrible that they allowed senators time to vote on legislation. As opposed to four years ago, when Kerry returned to D.C. to vote for a veteran’s health care vote… and the Republican leadership delayed the vote so Kerry couldn’t vote on it. Those Republicans are just pips, aren’t they?

Stumble it!

China’s pissed:

“Reaction [in China to protests in Japan] would be huge in comparison to the reaction against protests in France,” in which Web sites called for a boycott of French products sold at Carrefour stores, an international issue expert said, pointing out that negative feelings toward Japan remain strong in China due to historical issues.

A man in his 30s who runs a Web site that is popular with many Chinese “patriots,” told The Yomiuri Shimbun, “Chinese people won’t forgive [Japan] if the Japanese do the same things as the Americans and Europeans, such as making distorted reports about the Tibet issue.”

Well, China asked for it, and now they’ve got it. Seriously, did they expect that they could hold a summer Olympics and not have Tibet take the opportunity of a world spotlight to rebel? And when scattered protests break out in various nations, do they really think that threatening other countries is the way to make things better?

As for Japan, I bet they must really be scared at the threat this guy is making. Because, after all, Japan is so used to and dependent upon China forgiving it. Haven’t the Chinese been just the picture of forgiveness? Not that Japan hasn’t gone the full distance in asking for it, but China has come even less close to giving it.

If nothing else, these Olympics will serve an important purpose: to demonstrate that China is not ready to be an internationally respected leader of any global interest. Hell, they might even outdo the Bush administration.

---

But then again, Japanese right-wing extremists have been behaving badly themselves:

At a special preview of “Yasukuni” demanded by rightwing groups, some of the 150 members criticized the controversial, but award-winning, documentary about the so-named Tokyo war shrine and even threatened to sue the state for subsidizing part of its production. Rightwing groups arranged the preview so their members could have an opportunity to watch the film before passing judgment on it. Lawmakers demanded and got an earlier preview. …

One in the audience suggested he and his like-minded colleagues should sue the agency and the state, demanding the return of the film’s subsidy. Another said the movie should not be shown in Japan because it would give the impression that the war Japan waged was an act of aggression. “This is no good,” he said. “I absolutely do not want this movie to be screened.”

Mitsuhiro Kimura, one of the preview’s organizers and the president of Issui-kai, a rightist group, “I would like to produce a pro-Yasukuni movie with about ¥15 million” in agency subsidies.

My first reaction is, “right-wing extremists can force the government to give them a special screening so they can trash the film?” How did that happen? Lawmakers getting a screening I can understand, but the extremists? What official say do they have in this?

Of course, the rightists are extremely vocal about such things, and people on the other side tend to shut up, especially when the rightists threaten them with loud, hostile protests and even violence. These extremists have something of a hold over social commentary in Japan, often getting their message out in a louder and more aggressive fashion–and they are not shy about intimidating others.

An interesting contrast would be the 1995 Smithsonian exhibit of the Enola Gay fuselage. When text for the exhibit was released and it seemed to show sympathy for the Japanese victims of the bomb, American veterans and right-wing groups protested that the text was an “attack on America’s conduct in the war,” and successfully got the Smithsonian to tone down the message to a minimalist description. Historians then objected right back–but they did not have the clout that the right-wingers did. Conservatives controlled Congress at the time, and started threatening the Smithsonian with budget cuts and investigations. Intimidation of a different sort, but still intimidation.

And, oh yes–Japan protested as well, as they did with a similar Enola Gay exhibit in 2003. Hmm. Someone want to remind them of this in light of the Yasukuni protest?

It’s not as if Japanese cinema doesn’t get its share of right-wing sops; from heavily anti-American documentaries on the Tokyo Tribunals to a right-wing revisionist love letter for Hideki Tojo, Japanese cinema has without doubt leaned toward right-wingers’ view of history. Even Akira Kurosawa, long neglected by Japanese viewers, enjoyed a popular comeback when he produced a film about Nagasaki which featured Richard Gere delivering a heartfelt apology from America to Japan.

But films which portray the other side of things tend to get this kind of reception in Japan. Not to say that this doesn’t happen elsewhere, but at least in debates on such subjects in the U.S., both sides tend to get heard. Right now, there is some doubt that this movie on Yasukuni will even see the light of a public film projector.

Stumble it!

You might want to read this article in The Politico by Joel Kotkin about the emerging class war in the United States, and how it will replace the culture war:

Increasing numbers of Americans find it ever more problematic to maintain a “middle class” lifestyle. The current mortgage crisis, which has eroded the value of the most valuable asset of millions of Americans, only exacerbates these concerns. In such a situation, it’s hard to see how micro fractures among ethnic and gender identities will continue to be the defining issues of our politics as they were during the last half of the 20th century.

… [E]conomic issues seem certain to become more important in the next decade. This is a matter for not only older Americans: As the large millennial generation ages, it could well face an increasingly difficult economic climate. In the past, a college education alone has been the sure ticket to upward mobility; in this century, the newest research shows that it no longer guarantees any such thing. Wages for recent college graduates, particularly males, have been dropping since 2000, even as less-educated workers, at least in some places, have done better.

Stumble it!

Here’s a hypothetical I’d like to ask those in the audience who are pro-gun: if a weapon were developed that would be an effective stun weapon, in essence knocking someone unconscious but not killing them, and therefore would be safer in the home for children and could not be used easily for suicides, especially if such a weapon could more reliably subdue an intruder than a traditional firearm, would you be willing to replace your gun with such a weapon? And if not, why not?

Same for hunting: let’s say there was a weapon which could act like a rifle, but instead of shooting a bullet, it would instead shoot a small cloud of paralyzing darts, like a flechette gun. It would instantly drop an animal unconscious, and the hunter could either (a) count it as a “kill,” and move on to let the animal recover, or (b) walk up to the animal and slaughter it while unconscious. Would you be willing to give up a hunting rifle in exchange for such a weapon? Again, if not, why not?

The point being to ascertain, of course, if it is actually home/self defense and hunting which are the issues, or whether the issue is wider than that.

Stumble it!

Have you heard of the recent “Winter Soldier” event? Probably not, and there’s a reason for it. Winter Soldier is named after a similar event following the Vietnam War–you probably heard of that one, seeing as how conservatives used it to call John Kerry a traitor. The event this time around, like the last, is one where soldiers returning from war tell of the horrors they saw and experienced, and speak both eloquently and powerfully against the need for the wars being waged. These soldiers are protesting the Iraq War, and while soldiers supporting the war tend to be given coverage, the media is all but silent about this much more provocative and important event.

In fact, though regional and local papers have dedicated a few columns to it, the mainstream media, the big, national news outlets, have been completely silent on this rather significant news story. The New York Times, The Washington Post, USA Today, CNN, CBS, ABC, Fox–none of them have written a single word on the event. MSNBC had an article, but they inexplicably took it down less than a week after the story was published.

Why the silence? Why not honor the service of these soldiers, and hear the message they have to tell us?

Go ahead, read. (Hat tip to Charles for this story.)

---

A card-carrying member of the Liberal Media™ reveals the left wing’s secret agenda to destroy Republicans and give liberals a break. From NBC journalist Chuck Todd, commenting on the media’s treatment of John McCain after repeatedly confusing Sunni al Qaeda with Shiite extremists:

Even if he gets dinged on the experience stuff, “Oh, he says he’s Mr. Experience. Doesn’t he know the difference between this stuff?” He’s got enough of that in the bank, at least with the media, that he can get away with it. I mean, the irony to this is had either Senator Clinton or Senator Obama misspoke like that, it’d have been on a running loop, and it would become a, a big problem for a couple of days for them.

It’s an everyday thing to see the media acting this way. It’s far more rare for them to come out and admit it.

---

Also under the category of “Why Won’t the Damned Liberal Media™ Ever Give Poor John McCain a Break?” is the media disparity in reporting religious affiliations. Yes, Obama’s pastor said things which, out of the context of his community and its history, sound pretty shocking to White America; however, Obama has made clear that he denounces such speech, and has made equally clear that Wright is about far more than just those few words. At the very least, this story should be on equal grounds with John McCain’s story, where he actively sought and publicized the endorsement of the even more offensive John Hagee, who has said stuff like, “All Muslims are programmed to kill and we can thus never negotiate with any of them,” or that gays caused Katrina or that we should hasten the apocalypse by invading Iran. At the very most, you can say that these sound shocking out of the context of the fundamentalist Christianity–in other words, that McCain’s religious affiliations are no less damning than Obama’s.

So, does the media cover them equally? Hell, no. Does the media cover them just a bit disproportionately? Nope, not that, either. In fact, while the media just won’t let go of the Wright story, injecting it in stories about Obama that have nothing to do with Wright, the same Liberal Media™ virtually ignores the Hagee story, writing almost nothing about it at all.

Meanwhile, Obama tends to get grilled not only for what his pastor said, but for what other people say or do, apparently just because they’re black, too. (As I write this, CNN is running the Wright video clips for the millionth time.)

---

The buzz is getting louder on what exactly Hillary must think she’s doing in this race, in that it seems pretty close to impossible for her to win without wreaking serious havoc within the party, alienating a huge number of Democrats, and virtually handing the presidency to John McCain. She’s too far behind in delegates, has now lost the chance to get Florida to boost her up even somewhat, and has just received a major blow with Bill Richardson, a man very close to the Clintons, who perhaps owes his career to them, giving his endorsement to Barack Obama instead. And it now seems that Obama has weathered the Wright storm very well and is back on top in the polls, showing that he can survive and flourish even under the worst conditions possible for him.

The rundown: Hillary can’t win this. She should withdraw. But it’s pretty obvious that she won’t, probably not even if Pennsylvania goes badly for her. She’s going to hang on no matter what, and she’s going to hurt the Democratic cause in a major fashion by doing so. The general consensus is, she should read the handwriting on the wall and drop out, giving the Democrats a far greater chance of winning.

But some see even baser motives in Clinton’s Quixotic challenge: that if Obama wins, he’ll be the new boss of the Democratic Party, while if Clinton or McCain win, the Clintons will maintain their control. Yikes! That’s a pretty harsh charge–that Hillary would be willing to sink the Democratic chances at the presidency just to maintain political control over the Democrats. I would not quite go so far as to accuse her of that… but I would not put it past her at this point, either.

---

Here are some interesting political results out of the technology community:

IT workers are evenly split between Barack Obama and John McCain as their choice for the next president of the United States, according to a new survey by the Computing Technology Industry Association and Rasmussen Reports.

The survey of IT workers, taken in early March, shows Obama and McCain in a dead heat, with each receiving 39 percent of the vote, and Hillary Clinton trailing at 13 percent.

The survey also shows that while 35 percent of IT workers identify themselves as Republicans and another 26 percent call themselves Democrats, 40 percent chose no party affiliation. An overwhelming majority—75 percent—put themselves in the conservative-moderate political spectrum.

Interesting that Obama does so well in a right-of-center environment; equally interesting to note that if Clinton were not in the picture, her support would almost certainly shift to Obama, giving him the clear advantage here.

Not a November prognosticator or anything, but interesting nonetheless.

---

Obama has called for a dialog on race. Fortunately or unfortunately, that dialog is already beginning to work; we’re beginning to see the true raw edge of white hatred beginning to peek out a little bit more honestly:

But Obama has invited us to talk about race.

Okay. I’m accepting the invitation. He can regret it at his leisure.

I don’t hate black people. I can’t pretend to be color-blind because absolutely nothing in my culture will allow me to be. I admire Thomas Sowell, Duke Ellington, Roberto Clemente, Muhammed Ali, Alexandre Dumas, Sidney Poitier, Denzel Washington, Count Basie, Tiger Woods, and Bill Cosby. There are many others but that’s a sampling of the famous folks whose courage, genius, character, and achievements I would be proud if I could get anywhere in the vicinity of. The bald truth of the matter is that they’re better than I am, and it doesn’t arouse a flicker of racial feeling in me to acknowledge it. They have enriched and elevated my own experience of life.

On the other hand, I am sick to death of black people as a group. The truth. That is part of the conversation Obama is asking for, isn’t it? I live in an eastern state almost exactly on the fabled Mason-Dixon line. Every day I see young black males wearing tee shirts down to their knees — and jeans belted just above their knees. I’m an old guy. I want to smack them. All of them. They are egregious stereotypes. It’s impossible not to think the unthinkable N-Word when they roll up beside you at a stoplight in their trashed old Hondas with 19-inch spinner wheels and rap recordings that shake the foundations of the buildings. It’s like a broadcast dare: Go ahead! Call me a nigger! And then I’ll cap your ass.

Here’s the dirty secret all of us know and no one will admit to. There ARE niggers. Black people know it. White people know it. And only black people are allowed to notice and pronounce the truth of it. Which would be fine. Except that black people are not a community but a political party. They can squabble with each other in caucus but they absolutely refuse to speak the truth in public. And this is the single biggest obstacle to healing the racial divide in this country. The dammed-up flood of good will in this nation for black people who want to work for their own American Dream is absolutely enormous. The biggest impediment is the doubt created in each and every non-black American by the clannish, tribalist, irrational defense of every low act committed by any black person. If you’re offended when Republicans defend Richard Nixon or when Democrats defend Chuck Schumer, imagine what it’s like when black people swarm the streets to defend Jeremiah Wright.

I’m not proposing the generalized use of the term, just trying to be clear for once, in the wake of Obama’s call for us to have a dialogue about race. However much they may scream and protest, black people will know what I mean when I demand they concede that the following people are niggers:

- Jeremiah Wright
- O.J. Simpson
- Marion Barry
- Alan Iverson
- William Jefferson
- Louis Farrakhan
- Mike Tyson

You know what I mean. They hold you back. They’re dirty, violent, and stupid. They make you look bad, and you foul yourselves by defending them, by reelecting them to office, by admiring them in spite of all their awful behavior.

I think this post is important in that it highlights a way that right-wingers legitimize racist views. They know that they don’t hate all blacks, and can list blacks they admire (all too evocative of the old “some of my best friends” line), and so use this as proof that they are not racist–whereupon they then release some pretty baldly racist invective. In this case, you have the person involved spilling forth a list of people he feels that deserve the base epithet, and the only common factor among them is that they are black and have said or done questionable or illegal things (are all whites who have similar pasts “crackers,” or whatever the epithet is today?). The claim is that they are defended and admired only because they are black (which somehow makes them qualified for the epithet), a charge you’d have a hard time defending for most of the people on that list. I don’t see Mike Tyson defended because he̵