Modern Conservatives and F.A. Hayek

In a recent exchange that I had in the comments section of a posting at a Conservative blog, the subject of F.A. Hayek's classic treatise "The Road to Serfdom" was up for some discussion. Of course, modern conservatives think the world of Hayek and often refer to his arguments as both a defense of conservatism and an attack on modern liberalism as an inevitable path towards totalitarianism.

I have read Hayek and find that I agree with him on some issues (his more libertarian bent), but disagree with him on others (such as his mischaracterization of welfare-state liberals as Marxian socialists). I respect his work as a provocative and thoughtful "conservative" intellectual and scholar, and I believe any modern liberal thinker worth his or her salt needs to be familiar with Hayek's work.

But I feel the need to point out to my modern conservative rivals that Hayek did not consider himself a conservative in the way that term has come to be defined. No. In fact, he considered himself to be a classical liberal. And, in fact, he recoiled from the notion that he should be considered a conservative. The reason for this is that he recognized the reactionary tendencies within conservatism as he understood it and found that conservatism posed as much of a potential threat to freedom and democracy as did the modern liberalism he equated with socialism. I firmly believe that Hayek would reject the fundamentalism and the reactionary character of what has come to define modern conservatism today. In fact, this is what Hayek had to say in the Foreward to The Road to Serfdom, written in 1956, 12 years after the original publication of the book, and included in the 1962 Phoenix Books edition of the text published by the University of Chicago Press, page xi-xii:

But true liberalism is still distinct from conservatism, and there is a danger in the two being confused. Conservatism, though a necessary element in any stable society, is not a social program; in its paternalistic, nationalistic, and power-adoring tendencies it is often closer to socialism than true liberalism; and with its traditionalistic, anti-intellectual, and often mystical propensities it will never, except in short periods of disillusionment, appeal to the young and all those others who believe that some changes are desirable if this world is to become a better place. A conservative movement, by its very nature, is bound to be a defender of established privilege and to lean on the power of the government for the protection of privilege. The essence of the liberal position, however, is the denial of all privilege, if privilege is understood in its proper and original meaning of the state granting and protecting the rights to some which are not available on equal terms to others.

Those who would call themselves conservatives in America today, I believe, reflect much of what Hayek finds deplorable, dangerous, and backwards in conservatism. He would see the fanaticism of folks currently benefitting from government-run healthcare through Medicare opposing an expansion of such benefits to others as "defending established privilege" and their disruption of health care town hall meetings as an effort to "lean on the power of government for the protection of privilege." Hayek would see the movement among conservatives to establish a federal marriage amendment to the Constitution as another example of reactionaries seeking to "lean on the power of government for the protection of privilege" as anti-thetical to his arguments and as much a recipe for totalitarianism as left-leaning "socialist" policy would be. He would view the Patriot Act and the powers of the executive to claim the unchecked authority to monitor private phone conversations, for instance, even if this authority were never exercised, as very troublesome and against the entire grain of his argument. I remain firmly convinced that Hayek would not recognize the character of what passes for conservatism in the United States today and that he would think of such Palin/Limbaugh conservatives invoking his name to defend their demagoguery and exclusionary fundamentalism with abject horror.

Two Things Obama Should Do Right Now

To fire up and inspire his coalition, to neutralize the frenzied nuttiness of the healthcare Town Hall disrupters, and to discombobulate his opposition by forcing them to have to pick which issue they want to blow their gaskets over:

1. Announce his intention to suspend immediately the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy while Congress fashions legislation to permanently dismantle it.

2. Encourage Eric Holder, his Attorney General, to appoint a special investigator to look into violations of the law regarding torture and to not exempt anyone, no matter how high up the chain of authority in the previous administration the investigation goes, from the consequences.

Quote of the Day

"Treat a person ill, and he will become wicked. Requite affection with scorn;--let one being be selected, for whatever cause, as the refuse of his kind--divide him, a social being, from society, and you impose upon him the irresistable obligations--malevolence and selfishness." -- Percy Bysshe Shelley, writing in the Athenaeum on November 10, 1832, in review of his wife Mary Shelley's novel Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus. Percy Bysshe Shelley's comment is taken from page 217 of the 2003 Barnes & Noble Classics edition of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, with an Introduction and Notes by Karen Karbiener.

10 Books Girls Should Read Before Age 18

In a previous posting, I listed 10 books that I thought boys should read before age 18. But, since I am a daddy to two young girls and no boys, I figured I ought to take a stab at what books I think young girls should read before they turn 18. Before I do, though, I want to make one point and issue one qualifier. First, I am convinced that girls are wired differently than boys and so I think there needs to be a different set of literature that girls ought to read than what I think boys ought to read. That's not to say girls and boys wouldn't benefit from reading every book on both of my lists, but I think there are different books that will speak much more directly to a girl in a way that can maximize her self-confidence and maturity within the gendered world we live in. Second, I am a guy. So my list comes from a male perspective. My wife (and any woman, for that matter) can probably come up with a better and more relevant list, just because they've been there. But what the heck. Maybe a guy's perspective on what would be good for a young girl to read would be helpful to her in another important ways. At the very least, she can see what one guy (me) would advise for her and learn something from it accordingly. Hopefully, my list doesn't reflect too poorly on me! Here goes ...

1. Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy - This would be for young women closer to the age of 18. It's a tragic story that drives a woman confined by very intolerant and patriarchal expectations regarding love and sexuality to commit suicide; but it is well-written and can force a young woman to think about the conventions that have confined women in the past and how to deal with whatever conventions that might still exist today.
2. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott - A group of strong, loving, and accomplished women who can confront sexism head on and who can celebrate independent accomplishment in constrained circumstances.
3. Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret. by Judy Blume - This is for girls on the cusp of adolescence; but it is, I think, a very good primer for a young girl as she relates to what it means to question identity, to navigate friendships, and to approach the physical aspects of female adolescence.
4. Anne of Green Gables series by L.M. Montgomery - Again a story of a young woman who plows ahead with her dreams and ambitions and succeeds, both professionally and relationally.
5. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee - A young girl's relationship with her father and with a society poisoned by racism and discrimination, and lessons for how to deal with marginalization and difference.
6. Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank - Although a story of tragedy, it is also a story of incredible strength and compassion through the eyes of a young girl dealing with anguish and sadness and suffering.
7. Kristin Lavransdatter trilogy by Sigrid Undset - A great Norwegian epic tale of a woman's life through love and loss. The psychological, emotional, and physical strength of the main character is inspirational.
8. The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir - Written by a well-known existentialist philosopher, this is a book for very advanced readers, but it posits a history of women defined as the other in gender relations and power structures. I've only read parts of it, but I think it would be a helpful guide for young women who seek to understand what their gender has meant in terms of power, social structure, and authority, and who want a bit of historical context framing the subject.
9. Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand - As much as I dislike this book on a whole variety of levels, I have to admit that the main character of Dagny Taggart is a strong, confident, accomplished individual. I personally think this book goes overboard in presenting as a heroine a woman who seems unable to feel or give love, or who does so stingily, and who seems to place career over everything else in life; but I would not deny a young woman the chance to meet Dagny Taggart and make up her own mind about it.
10. Beezus and Ramona by Beverly Cleary - What can I say? I have two girls about the same age as the two characters in this story and I find that the simple discussion of sibling rivalry and affection between the sisters is charming. Not a life-altering book, but a sweet story.

I also need to note that the exercise of thinking about books for girls to read before the age of 18 has revealed to me a couple of things. First, this was a hard thing for me to do. Probably because I'm a guy, but also because I had a hard time thinking of literature that would offer something exceptional to young women as young women. But I wonder if it could also be because there just aren't as many classic options available. Second, and probably a by-product of the first comment above, I'm just not as well read on literature by women, about women, or for women. I need to work on that. If I have any female readers, please help me out in the comments!

Conservative Common Sense on Health Care Reform

Andrew Sullivan shares a bit of common sense on the subject:

One final thing: most Americans do not want people dying in the streets.

If you have guaranteed emergency room care for the uninsured at public expense, you have already effectively socialized medicine. It makes no sense not to bring these people into the insurance system, and to offer less expensive, long-term preventive healthcare. To insist that ideology stand in the way of this piece of compassionate common sense is irresponsible.

I, too, have often thought of this truth and have brought this up in a few conversations with my conservative friends. What do we do with those who simply cannot afford adequate health care and have no recourse but to seek expensive last minute care in emergency rooms? Do we just shrug our shoulders and walk away, leaving these folks to just crawl into some corner of their unfortunate realities and die? No. We would never let this happen, simply out of a sense of common human decency. So, we have very sick poor folks lining up in emergency rooms and we agree, as taxpayers, to pay for this. Fiscally, this is madness. Wouldn't it be infinitely better for the poor or indigent, and much more fiscally sound, to bring them into a public system that provides basic preventive health care that both keeps them out of the emergency room AND ensures that they are healthy enough to perhaps work through their poverty and eventually move off of the public health care option to a perhaps more thorough and comprehensive plan?

Andrew Sullivan Digs Up Conservative Hypocrisy on Race

The example: Oklahoma Senator Jim Inhofe

Sullivan contrasts Inhofe's apologetics in 2002 regarding Trent Lott's comments on Strom Thurmond against Inhofe's 2009 comments on Sonia Sotomayor. It's quite clear that Inhofe can play the race-card game with the best of them. Check it out.

Leonard Pitts Jr. on Race

I just read Leonard Pitts Jr.'s latest syndicated column on the subject of race and how conservatives are appropriating the use of race in ways that they supposedly detest. To capture the sentiment, Pitts starts his column off with an email he received last year. The email was short and utterly ironic. This is what it said:

"You are such a racist nigger."

Incredible, no? Then Pitts, referencing as an example conservative pundit Glenn Beck's recent charge on national television that Barack Obama is a racist, goes on to provide an excellent summation of some of my thinking on the subject, and why I think painting Obama in whiteface, for example, even in reference to Heath Ledger's Joker, is problematic. Pitts explains thus:

Plainly, this newfound concern about "racism" represents an attempt by conservatives to claim and neutralize the language of racial complaint, to do to it what they did to words like "liberal" and "feminist" -- i.e., to render it unusable.

But they are playing with fire in a dynamite warehouse.

What wound in all American life is more raw than race? What is more likely than race to suddenly flare into conflagration? Our most ruinous war was about race. Our greatest social revolution was about race. We have seen a hundred riots and rebellions fueled by race. Race is a major component of our most vexing issues: healthcare, education, the environment, crime. It is our most profound and oldest regret, a tender spot on the American psyche.

Which is why it's often difficult even for thoughtful people to have thoughtful discussions about it. One is at pains to tread carefully, to probe the issues, seek enlightenment and, yes, to dissent -- without blowing up the dynamite warehouse. Then, in walks Glenn Beck carrying a torch.

To be more specific, Pitts's reference to Glenn Beck concerns when Beck called Barack Obama a racist who hates white people on national television and then 75 seconds later said that he wasn't saying that he thought Obama didn't like white people. But the central point Pitts is trying to make is the following:

[Facing the hard truths of race head on] will never happen as long as men like Beck find it profitable to toy with fire in a warehouse full of dynamite. God forbid it takes an explosion for them to get what should be obvious:

There are some things you just don't play with.

Exactly. Read the whole column by Pitts. It's excellent. And when you're done with that, watch this (especially around about the 6 minute mark):

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
So You Think You Can Douche
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Spinal Tap Performance

Teabagger Town Hall Disruptions

There is a difference between passionate debate and intolerant obstructionism.

Under the guise of "free speech," many conservatives (apparently from the "teabagger" movement) seem to be participating in an orchestrated effort to actually prevent and squash speech.

You know what I think? I say, give these folks full reign. Let them in any meeting and let them drown out anyone who opens his or her mouth simply to try to make a point. Let them shout and froth and rage incoherently.

The majority of Americans are smart enough and respectful enough, I believe, to see such tactics as rude and demagogic and, frankly, un-American. I don't even know what these people stand for beyond the spluttering rage of anti-Obama, anti-government hatred. That's probably because they don't know what they stand for either.

But let these nuts rage and splutter. Let them equate Obama to Hitler, and Stalin, and The Joker, and Satan. And then let the rest of sane America judge. These nuts have no idea how they are damaging and overshadowing any principled conservative opposition to the Obama administration and its policies that might exist. If I were a rational, principled conservative, I'd be embarrassed by it all.

10 Books Boys Should Read Before Age 18

Eric, one of my regular readers, posted a question over at another blog we both frequent that asked the blogger what 10 books he would list as books that all young men should read before they turn 18. I thought it was such a good question that I stole it as something I would like to answer on my blog. So, here it is!

1. The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky - This would be for young men closer to the age of 18. Shows the bonds of brotherhood as well as the admirable qualities of a number of young men: the headstrong type, the intellectual, and the sensitive type. Gives a lasting lesson on the virtues of truthfulness, honesty, and empathy (and how difficult they can be to live out).
2. Fathers and Sons by Ivan Turgenev - A bit more complex in its lessons and appropriate for maturing older boys, but it shows poignantly both the despair and the longing of young men reaching for adulthood.
3. The Horse and His Boy by C.S. Lewis - A lesson for how a young boy with not much to speak of by way of wealth and status, and who seemingly had a rough start in life, could overcome his fears and feelings of inadequacy to find courage and dignity in his life adventures.
4. Boy's Life by Robert McCammon - A murder mystery told from the perspective of a boy coming of age in a small, rural Alabama town. Reminds any boy of those magical days of bicycles, baseball, friendship, and father-son bonding.
5. The Lord of the Rings trilogy by J.R.R. Tolkein - Lots of heroism, leadership, and sacrifice in the midst of non-stop battlefield action with orcs and Ents and Elves. What boy with a vivid imagination and a taste for fantasy wouldn't like this?
6. Lord of the Flies by William Golding - Classic for helping young boys sort through questions of adolescent immaturity when it comes to friendship, power, and relationship to authority.
7. The Master of Hestviken tetralogy by Sigrid Undset - A great Norweigan epic tale of chivalry, honor, love, and pride -- but tempered with a stoic submissiveness to love - for wife and family.
8. The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger - Classic teenage boy alienation and angst.
9. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J.K. Rowling - Pure fun, with lots of magic. For most boys, the centrality of the Tri-Wizard Tournament will be the most appealing aspect of this book in the entire series. But a gripping story, too, that emphasizes fraternal honor, and courage and dignity in death, too, which makes this one a must read for young men.
10. Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain - Camaraderie and adventurousness in 19th Century heartland America. Taps into the picaresque nature of young boys on the cusp of adolescence.

If I can think of more elaborate reasons for each of these choices, I'll put them in another posting.

Northshore and NOLA

Something that's been grating on me lately. And if the following rant offends you, I can't say that I'm sorry for it.

If you read the Letters to the Editors section of the Times-Picayune, and look only at the letter writer's location, and see that they're writing from any place on the Northshore of Lake Pontchartrain, you can take it to the bank that, 99% of the time, the letter writer will be some conservative shrill bitching and moaning about the general state of affairs in New Orleans and the havoc we communist, terrorist-sympathizing, family-destroying, anti-Christian liberals are wreaking on this country generally.

Sometimes, it makes me wish that the Northshore would just secede from the Greater New Orleans area and have nothing to do with us. Honestly, I think they'd be happier for it. And I'd certainly be willing for New Orleans to cut its losses with them. I think they need the City of New Orleans and its liberal Democratic residents much more than we need them. But, my how they complain to high heaven about us liberal Democrats, we who do nothing but sustain their sorry suburban lives by keeping New Orleans afloat. When they sit down to pen their Hannity-esque screeds, it would behove them to remember that as New Orleans goes, so goes the Northshore and the rest of the State of Louisiana, for that matter.

The Angel's Game

I am currently reading Carlos Ruiz Zafon's somewhat disturbing, but elegantly written novel The Angel's Game. I'm only about one-third of the way through it, but I am enjoying it and recommend it. So far, I find the plot somewhat predictable and think that if Zafon is trying to spring a surprise on me in terms of the secret identity of certain characters, he's not doing that great a job. But I also wonder if maybe he's only thinly trying to conceal secret identities so as to divert the reader from a real and unexpected surprise later. We'll see how it progresses; but I am enjoying the book, as disturbed as I am by it.

Conservatives and Race

I've written about this before, but it's worth repeating again in the context of Gatesgate and this new poster making the rounds in the blogosphere that has Obama gussied up like Heath Ledger's joker.

I'll leave the whole Gates incident aside for the moment and speak just a little bit about the Obama-as-Joker poster. At a conservative blog I frequent to keep my pulse on what is riling the conservative blogosphere and punditocracy, I made a passing comment on this Obama-as-Joker poster that has stirred up all kinds of vitriol and animosity towards me. I think I was point-blank called a racist about a half dozen times, and sometimes for nothing more than being a liberal Democrat.

What did I say to get conservatives in such a tizzy? Well, in response to this conservative blogger's efforts to spread the poster out to the far corners of the country to undermine Obama as President, I wrote: "A black man in whiteface. Yeah, that'll do it. Just keep at it folks."

When the other commenters predictably started frothing at the mouth calling me a racist, I felt the need to explain that recognizing that this poster might stir up racial resentments linked to the history of race and the practice of black/white facepainting in an effort to demean another human being might not be the best way for conservatives to go about criticizing Obama. And then this discussion progressed, again, to the meaning of race in America. Of course, I argued, as I usually do, that race has meaning to cultural identity and that there's nothing wrong with that as long as that meaning isn't one that seeks to justify discrimination, oppression, and civil rights violations. But, many conservatives, whether through having become so gun-shy about being labeled racist, simply can't seem to recognize that race has meaning to cultural identity, even when they acknowledge such a thing implicitly. For instance, when conservatives speak about the "black" church and its alignment with conservative values on such social issues as gay marriage and the morality of homosexuality are ascribing some meaning to black identity that is distinct from that of other racial or ethnic communities.

For my part, I am readily willing to acknowledge that there is such a thing as black identity and that there is nothing inherently wrong with this. However, conservatives always pretend towards color-blindness and claim that race has no meaning at all in the public square. I think this is simply absurd. They simply cannot seem to grasp that discrimination in social policy on the basis of race is distinct from a shared racial cultural identity. The former is racism, the latter is simply a cultural identity marker much like gender, language, sexual orientation, regional association (i.e. Southern), religion, etc., are. For instance, as a Catholic, I can travel across the world and feel some kind of solidarity and companionship with other Catholics simply because we share this common identity and all that it means. There is nothing wrong or out of the ordinary in that. And so to suggest that the Obama-as-Joker poster, which paints a black man in whiteface, might have ramifications based on the history of race in this country, is nothing more than acknowledging that race has meaning in this country. But when conservatives can only respond to this suggestion with the claim that anyone who says as much is a racist, then I think it is fair to say that conservatives have become the race-obsessed people hurling charges of racism at the drop of a hat, people that they claim to detest, instead of the color-blind people that they would fashion themselves as being. But maybe I'm missing something myself in this whole subject; so if you have some thoughts on this, please enlighten me.

The Commercialization of Education and What It Has Wrought

Honey, honey, honey. We promise you an education, not a job. What you do with that education is your business. Irrespective of whatever job you do or do not get, you paid for knowledge, not an income in your bank account.

On Healthcare Reform

Two things on this subject:

(1) I believe healthcare is a fundamental human right and therefore it is immoral for anyone in the United States to be excluded from an affordable health insurance plan that can provide adequate healthcare to all people resident and working in this country, regardless of immigration status. Because I think healthcare is a fundamental human right, in the absence of an option for affordable healthcare in the free market, the government has an obligation to subsidize or provide for an affordable healthcare option for every single citizen.

(2) The current private market-based healthcare and health insurance system is broken and unsustainable. Health insurance provided through my employer has increased by more than 30% just about every year that I have had it. Needless to say, my income has not kept pace. Insurance companies are designed to avoid payouts if they can. Keeping the current privatized system in place is simply unacceptable, labyrinthine in its approval process, and costly for physicians and hospitals as well as for patients in the time it takes to file claims and fight for insurance company payouts.

Prediction: If there is no healthcare reform legislation passed by the end of this summer, whoever is perceived as being obstructionist will pay a heavy political price.

Teddy Roosevelt and The River of Doubt

I have always been fascinated by Teddy Roosevelt. On the one hand, his abrasive heavy-handedness towards Latin America has always bothered me. But perhaps that is something that comes in hindsight. However, this same stubborn ruggedness has also made Roosevelt into a kind of outdoors icon in American history. He probably would be considered a pretty strong environmentalist were he to be alive today. I also think his embrace of science would have made him a partisan of evolution and also someone who would readily embrace the idea that humans most certainly do have determinative (and harmful) longterm effects on the environment. Of course, we can never know for sure, but I am convinced that Teddy Roosevelt would be on Al Gore's side in the global climate change debates of today.

I am currently reading a wonderful book about Roosevelt's expedition down the Brazilian Amazon's "River of Doubt." The book, titled The River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt's Darkest Journey and written by Candice Millard, is very engaging and illustrative. It reads like an adventure novel and paints quite an admirable picture of Roosevelt, who was ahead of his times in many, many ways. Even though he was a President from the Republican Party, his enigmatic character caused him to shun both the Republicans and the Democrats in 1913 for a run at the Presidency for a third term under a third party banner, the Progressive Party. So, I don't think he can be ideologically pigeonholed that easily. I kinda like the dude. But, regardless, he lived an unusually fascinating life for a U.S. President. And if anyone has an interest in the history of the Brazilian Amazon, I highly recommend this book.

A Thought on the Situation in Honduras

I have to admit that I'm not too enamored of Manuel Zelaya in Honduras. Although I sympathize with his policy positions in many respects, I'm not too keen on his demagoguery and neo-populist methods of threats of violent revolution and rabble-rousing. Even still, I am definitely opposed to the military coup that ousted him and I think he should be allowed back into his country to resume his duties as President of the country.

I think of it like this: would we in the United States tolerate the resolution of a similar situation in our country by accepting the legitimacy of a military ouster of a democratically elected President?

The clear answer is "No." Even if a U.S. President commits first-degree murder, we wouldn't send in the armed forces and exile him. We'd have him arrested and tried in a court of law. I'd even go so far as to say that even if our President defies the Legislature (which, by the way, he does regularly through something called the "signing statement") or the Supreme Court (which is not unheard of in the history of this country - i.e. Andrew Jackson and the Marshall Court's Worcester v. Georgia decision of 1832), we wouldn't tolerate the army storming the White House and sending the duly elected President off into exile without any kind of due process.

So, what remains for me is the idea that if we wouldn't tolerate resolution of a dispute between a President, the Legislature, and the Supreme Court by the armed overthrow of a legitimately elected President in our own country, then we shouldn't tolerate it for Honduras, either.

To accept this method of dispute resolution for Honduras, but not for ourselves, is not only hypocritical, but it also sends a very patronizing message to Honduras itself. And that message is: because Honduras is a "backward" place, "backward" solutions are apprpriate. I reject this attitude. If we would like to promote democracy and the rule of law as the ideal, then we should hold our friends to this ideal. To do otherwise merely encourages those who would rather resolve disputes outside of democratic practices and the rule of law.

Finally, I should say that my lack of being enamored of the behavior and tactics of Zelaya makes me very cautious to embrace uncritically the behavior and tactics of his opponents. If one thinks that Honduran politics is rife with demagoguery and disrespect for the rule of law, it would be naive to think that this aspect of Honduran political culture applies only to one side of opposing political factions and not the other. It wouldn't surprise me in the least to find out that the gang currently running the country isn't itself prone to demagoguic, neo-populist behavior. In fact, engineering a coup outside of the rule of law, in and of itself, hints very strongly in that direction.

Blogging "Self-Nudge"

I recently finished reading Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein's book Nudge. It concerns what the author's call "libertarian paternalism" and focuses on ways that people can be conditioned towards certain behaviors without compromising their freedom or incurring unwieldy costs. It was a very good, provocative book. I was reading it as part of an online book club that I'm a part of called the "Republicrat Reading Group." We're a small group of mixed political and ideological leanings and we read works of non-fiction on contemporary topics that will hopefully expose us to arguments and perspectives that we wouldn't normally gravitate towards on our own. "Nudge" was our first book and we are now in the process of discussing the book, though the discussion is taking its time, which is perfectly fine.

In any case, the premise of the book has encouraged me to try a little "Nudge" experiment that will hopefully get me blogging more regularly. And I want my readers (all five of you!) to try to help nudge me. Thanks to the helpful suggestions of Thaler & Sunstein, here's what I propose to do.

1. I will average at least one blog posting per day tallied on the last day of each month. In other words, at the end of each month, I need to have made 30 or 31 blog posts for the month (28 or 29 for February). There are no conditions on the posts. They can be as short or as long as I want them to be.
2. Only up to three posts per day count. If I make more than three postings in one day, they are to be considered lagniappe and do not count towards the monthly total. In this way, I cannot wait until the last day of the month and make all the posts then.
3. If, at the end of each month, I do not meet the goal of averaging one posting per day for that month, I will contribute a dollar amount equal to the number of days in that month either to the Republican National Committee, SarahPac, or the David Vitter campaign. If, God forbid, it should come to that, I will post on this blog sometime over the subsequent month whatever receipt of my donation that I receive.
4. If I fail to live up this promise, there is nothing anyone can do about it. But I will lose face with anyone who follows my challenge. And I wouldn't want that to happen.
5. As anyone familiar with Blogger.com's program knows, a blogger can alter posting dates. I promise not to do so. And I encourage anyone to verify this promise by visiting my blog and keeping regular track of my blog postings.
6. Finally, I can end this arrangement at any time by announcing my intention to do so in a blog posting. If I make such an announcement in a particular month, it applies only to subsequent months. In other words, I must meet my obligations for the month in which I announce the end of the arrangement. For example, if I announce my intention to quit the arrangement on September 30, 2009, then I am off the hook for subsequent months starting with October, 2009. But if I announce my intention to quit the arrangement on October 1, 2009, I am bound to uphold the arrangement for the month of October, 2009.

There you have it. As of today, August 1, 2009, I commit to this arrangement. A little blogging "self nudge" so to speak. And this posting counts as the first of the month. I have 30 more to go! Wish me luck and keep me honest!

Palinism and the Place of Knowledge in America.

Over at the Atlantic, and guest-blogging at Andrew Sullivan's website, Conor Friedersdorf has an intriguing and thoughtful post reacting to a parent's experiment in homeschooling curriculum development for his young highschooler son, named Wes. I have to say, my own contrarian view of homeschooling aside, that I, like Conor, was somewhat envious of the creative, interdisciplinary learning experience that is awaiting this fortunate young highschooler.

In his post, Conor, who admits to being jealous of young Wes, writes:

What strikes me, all these years later, about my lousy but better-than-average high school education is how useful it proved in preparing me for college and the job market. Absent exceptional teachers, an academically competitive high school basically teaches the young how to game the system lots of people call the American meritocracy. It is difficult to describe this skill set precisely, though it certainly includes things like earning good grades in classes you know little if anything about, learning to game standardized tests and exams, employing writerly tricks to obscure the fact that you know nothing of substance about the topic of your five page paper, and understanding which teachers aren't desirous of substance insomuch as they want an ability to fake it on pages where the margins and font are diligently set to their specifications.

Oh to have those youthful years back. As an adult, I understand the preciousness of time, and I sorely regret having wasted any of it simulating rather than gaining knowledge. The experience does inform a suspicion that if we stopped making the overlap between academic skills and life skills a self-fulfilling prophecy, they might overlap less than we imagine. Were that the case, perhaps high schools would rejigger their curriculum to more closely resemble what Alan is attempting: knowledge as something more than a metric to be measured by standardized tests, a means of admission to a selective college or a prerequisite for strategic advancement in the American job market.

A fascinating reaction. And I imagine Conor's jealousy of young Wes is shared by many, myself included, whose thirst for "knowledge as something more than a metric to be measured by standardized tests, a means of admission to a selective college or a prerequisite for strategic advancement in the American job market" is burning and insatiable.

And then I had another epiphany ...

At one level, one would think this disconnect between knowledge and the structural mechanisms that lead to success in Western society are precisely what the Palinite wing of the conservative movement in the U.S. would embrace. But I can't help but think, re-reading exactly what young Wes's curriculum is shaping up to be, that Palinites would recoil violently from such a course of study, considering it to be alien and un-American, and rejecting it as elitist -- simply and only because it develops the critical and integrative capacity of the mind. I am convinced that young Wes would have no place in Sarah Palin's brand of "conservatism." And this realization confirms even more for me that the Palinites are not really anti-establishment and anti-elitist. I'm sure they would be very much at home with a particular kind of "establishment" and a particular type of "elite." Rather, I am reduced to thinking that they are, sadly, anti-intellectual. And that is not a comforting thought.

Thought of the Day: Sonia Sotomayor on the SCOTUS

Forget the jurisprudence, I just can't wait for Sonia Sotomayor to slap that cocky blowhard Antonin Scalia around behind chamber doors! Do not doubt that Scalia will try to pull his Italian macho patriarchal dismissive B.S. with Sotomayor, but do not also doubt that Sotomayor will snap back so hard with that fiesty Puerto Rican female sass and intelligence such that Scalia not only won't know what reamed him, but that he will also be shamed by the realization that he brought this reaming on himself!

Sarah Palin and the Democratic Dream

In a recent op-ed column, which has been much referenced, Ross Douthat of the New York Times pondered what the Sarah Palin story means to the true American Dream that anybody, regardless of gender or class, can become President of the U.S. He had this to say:

Palin’s popularity has as much to do with class as it does with ideology. In this sense, she really is the perfect foil for Barack Obama. Our president represents the meritocratic ideal — that anyone, from any background, can grow up to attend Columbia and Harvard Law School and become a great American success story. But Sarah Palin represents the democratic ideal — that anyone can grow up to be a great success story without graduating from Columbia and Harvard.

My beef with Douthat here is that he draws a clear line between the meritocratic ideal and the democratic ideal. But why should such a line be drawn? It makes no sense to think that Barack Obama's story represents the meritocratic ideal and not the democratic ideal. As Obama himself says, one of the greatest things about this country and its democratic ideals of freedom, liberty, and all the rest, is that, if one works hard, the opportunity and possibility for success exists. Douthat, in fact, seems to be saying in distinguishing between the democratic ideal and the meritocratic ideal, that the democratic ideal means you can get anything you set your heart on just by setting your heart on it. The democratic ideal doesn't require that you "earn" your success (that would make it "meritocratic"), merely that if you are in the right place at the right time you can stumble into success, and that this is good.

But let's run with the distinction as Douthat does. He continues:

This ideal has had a tough 10 months. It’s been tarnished by Palin herself, obviously. With her missteps, scandals, dreadful interviews and self-pitying monologues, she’s botched an essential democratic role — the ordinary citizen who takes on the elites, the up-by-your-bootstraps role embodied by politicians from Andrew Jackson down to Harry Truman.

Now, I agree with Douthat that Palin has botched the "democratic" role he describes. But the reason why she botched it is because she didn't have the skills to represent the American everyman and to keep elites accountable to the Average Joe. In other words, she didn't earn the democratic role that Douthat describes. That role does require leadership. We "ordinary citizens" can't all take on the elites in up-by-your-bootstrap fashion like Andrew Jackson without distinguishing ourselves as capable of leadership in doing so. In other words, even ordinary citizens in a democracy have to earn their leadership props by demonstrating the skills and acumen to serve in that capacity. Sarah Palin botched this democratic role because she simply IS not the "extraordinary" ordinary citizen that Douthat expects can fill it.

Douthat continues:

But it’s also been tarnished by the elites themselves, in the way that the media and political establishments have treated her.

I call B.S. on this. If Sarah Palin had any shred of ability as an ordinary citizen capable of fulfilling the democratic role that Douthat ascribes to her, the "media and political establishments" would have responded to her much, much differently. Douthat seems to be under the delusion that Sarah Palin's "botch job" doesn't merit harsh criticism. He seems to think that the "media and political establishments" just went after Palin because she is from a non-elite class (a claim, by the way, that just doesn't really hold up to any kind of class-based analysis) and because she is a woman. As Douthat must know, there are many women from much more humble backgrounds who have succeeded in fulfilling that democratic role because they earned it through diligence and hard work. And the "media and political establishments" treat such people accordingly. I give Douthat Sonia Sotomayor as a perfect example of this.

More Douthat from later in the article:

All of this had something to do with ordinary partisan politics. But it had everything to do with Palin’s gender and her social class.

Sarah Palin is beloved by millions because her rise suggested, however temporarily, that the old American aphorism about how anyone can grow up to be president might actually be true.

Douthat's absolutist claim that the way the "media and political establishments" treated Palin so critically and dismissively had "everything to do with Palin's gender and her social class" is clearly disproved by the way the "media and political establishments" have treated other women from modest class origins who have sought to make a claim on national power and leadership like Sonia Sotomayor. Reminds me of that 1970s TV game show "The Gong Show" (Maybe today's "American Idol" could compare.) Anyone ordinary could get on the "Gong Show"; but only those with some talent and skills would survive it. Sarah Palin got on the show; and the "media and political establishments" (not to mention the larger public) GONGED her. And it wasn't because of her class or gender, but because she didn't earn advancing toward the prize.

Douthat ends with this quippy bit of pseudo-wisdom:

But her unhappy sojourn on the national stage has had a different moral: Don’t even think about it.

To which I'd add: ... if you don't have the talent. And if you don't have the talent, but put yourself on the stage anyway, you don't deserve for people to pretend nicely that you do.

Why I Don't Home School My Kids

My wife and I don't homeschool our children. Let me tell you a few of the more important reasons why. From what I have been able to discern from homeschoolers, I find that the decision to home school is made primarily out of 2 main concerns, both of which are admirable: (1) a desire to "protect" children from a hostile and inadequate external environment, and (2) a desire to carefully condition the kind of social experience children have and the kind of social reality children are exposed to. Again, both are admirable goals and have a lot of positives to speak for them; but I personally think that homeschooling might actually make achieving these very goals more difficult. In the first place, I believe that the "overprotectiveness" that I detect in some homeschoolers can serve as a disincentive to children to learn to deal constructively and proactively with the reality of a hostile and inadequate external environment when it intrudes, as it inevitably will, in their lives. Second, I think it is important for children to develop an identity and life that is outside of the watchful eye or the managed plan of concerned, loving parents. Even though homeschoolers have very rich social and recreational activities, it is still very much conditioned, planned, and approved by parents. It is, essentially, the parents' conception of appropriate experience and socialization for their children, not the children's. This is not a bad thing, especially at younger ages, but I think it discourages children of crafting their own experiences and learning how to deal with the moral and ethical dimensions of their world and experiences that are truly and exclusively theirs (and not partially mine as well). In other words, I think it is important for children to come into their own, to struggle with issues that mommy and daddy are somewhat removed from, and to have to face their consciences over doing right or wrong, especially when they know that mommy and daddy will likely never know how they chose. I'm sure most homeschoolers are aware of these arguments, but they were very important considerations, among many others, to go the route of the institutional school experience, which also has many "positives" to offer my children.

Now, I have often come across the argument critizing the reasoning above as a kind of abdication of parental responsibility to protect vulnerable and easily-influenced adolescents and teenagers from what is an unnecessary exposure to the dangers and harshness of the rough-and-tumble world of peer pressure with minimal supervision. The argument is usually that kids don't need to be "thrown to the wolves" as part of a kind of hazing ritual in order to come into their own. I agree that children need protection. After all, they are still very vulnerable individuals subject to all kinds of pressures and influences, not all of which are good. But I don't see how sending children to a school is necessarily an abdication of the responsibility of parents to protect their children. It's not an all or nothing proposition. If I ever thought my children were really threatened by being in a regular institutional school environment, I would most certainly intervene to protect them. And my wife and I certainly are involved in the life of our kids' school as much as our time permits, so we do know what's generally going on there. I'm not talking about throwing my children to the wolves, just letting them have a little bit of their own lives decided by them and, at times, kept to themselves. And let's not forget that children still spend a good deal of time at home, too. Sending a child to school is not an abdication of parental responsibility, it is part of it.

I often find that the very admirable parental tendency to want to protect one's children (and I have this tendency in abundance) can easily slip into a rather unhealthy overprotectiveness that can infringe upon a child's unique sense of independent identity. Even at young ages, our children are not helpless mini-me's; they are their own persons, completely independent of us, and I think it is important to let them find space to stake out their independent identities truly separate from us. For instance, let me lay out a common scene that takes place at the dinner table of my home, and I think of probably every non-homeschooling family, but which I can't really imagine being possible at the dinner table of a homeschooling family. I ask my daughter how was her day at school. Sometimes I get the full story, told with enthusiasm and joy at being able to surprise me with details about which I'm in the dark. She's, in effect, the agent in revealing her life to me, as a surprise gift completely at her discretion to offer, and not the other way around. How do homeschooled children get the pleasure and self-satisfaction to boast to their parents about having won the spelling bee that day, and then get to tell the story to a curious parent of how she worked out spelling the winning word? Or, how she tried to comfort the friend who scraped her knee at recess? Sometimes, however, I get a shoulder shrug and the one-word reply "good" that will have to suffice in answer to my question about how the school day was. I can't say that I particularly like the latter response, but I don't think it's because my child is keeping dangerous secrets from me. I think it's either that she's just not interested in talking about it, or, at an unconscious level, she wants to keep her day special to herself. I think that's healthy up to a point.

Finally, there is no guarantee that homeschooling keeps the reality of the world we live in at bay. Personally, I think that's a very nice, but unrealistic, way to approach life. And I'd rather that my children learn to live in the world, as it is, with both its warts and its glories, on their own terms, and not in the idyllic (and impossible, I believe) dreamworld of innocence.

But in the end, I know that loving parents who live out what they feel is best for their children are ultimately all that matters. And in that respect, I know that homeschooled children as well as "institutional system" schooled children who have the benefit of such parents in their lives are not likely to go wrong.

Sarah "Cut-n-Run" Palin

I've always thought this woman was a basket case; but this latest stunt is just bizarre. How anyone can take this woman seriously is beyond me. I have always thought of her as a joke. She seems like a nice enough person; but she always struck me as the most unserious, unprepared, and erratic candidate for national high office that I've ever seen. There was the cringingly embarrassing Katie Couric interview, which should have been enough evidence of her incompetence for any intelligent person; but now there's this resignation.

What does it say that she can't even finish her first term as governor of Alaska? Nothing good, I think. No matter what rationale she gives, the fact will always remain that she just quit.

But let's look at the specific reason she gave. It went something along the lines of: "I don't want to waste the taxpayers' money and time as a lame duck executive." WTF?!?!?! How lame can that be? What would we think about Sarah Palin as President after a stunt like this? I can see it now, after just 2 and a half years as President of the US, facing all kinds of scrutiny and criticism, President Palin calls a hasty press conference to quit the job.

Let's just face it, the woman never has been and never will be cut out to be President. Anybody that continues to support a Palin Presidential run simply isn't thinking straight and just can't be taken seriously.

The Facebook Phenomenon and My Generation

Lately, I have had some seemingly quite surreal moments through that social networking site known as Facebook. Yes, I have a Facebook account and access it fairly regularly. I have actually been on Facebook for quite a while now and have seen it evolve somewhat. As it has evolved, I have noticed a phenomenon that is peculiar to my generation and our relationship to this social networking medium.

This is what I've come to discover ...

The young folks of today (and by young I mean the under 30 years old crowd) have grown up with Facebook and the other social networking sites like MySpace and LinkedIn. For this generation, their personal and social history is chronicled at the moment of its birth, archived instantaneously, and immediately accessible at any time. Both to themselves as well as to others. Their social relationships are woven together and preserved over long stretches of time, and all it takes is a click of the mouse to reconnect, to refresh memory, and to stay informed. Because of this, their past never fades into the obscure recesses of memory as it has for all previous generations. For instance, when I transitioned from elementary school to high school, and then from high school to college, the break between my social networks established through these transitions was pretty clean and pretty complete. It was expected to be that way. When we could, we maintained contact through handwritten letters delivered by regular post. But this method of keeping in touch was tedious and sporadic. Consequently old relationships faded quickly and, most of the time, fairly completely. And in most cases, at least in my life, memories of people were stuck in particular moments of time, in particular emotional and psychological environments, such that if and when contact would be reestablished years later (say at planned reunions), it was always a wonderful, and sometimes incredible, moment of readjusting past memories to very changed current realities. The skinny geek turned out to be the stocky gigolo. The homely girl with braces turned out to be the glamorous and beautiful stage peformer. The bully turned out to be a kind and gentle philanthropist. Etc. There was (is) a magical and almost surreal quality to this process of social relations. Now, for the younger generations, that magic is gone. There is much less mystery and wonder about who is doing what, when, and where. All you need to do is keep your Facebook account active and make sure to regularly check in on your Facebook friends. That's not to say that the mystery and wonder of social networking across different contexts and extended periods of time disappears, just that it is diminished overall. I doubt that my children will get the same kind of thrill out of reconnecting with "long lost" old friends and acquiantances. And that is because nothing these days about social networking lends itself to any friendship or acquaintance being "long lost," and thus subject to the thrills and, perhaps, anxieties of rediscovery.

However, my generation is distinct from older generations in that we are close enough to technology and the wonders that it can bring via social networking to not simply write it off as a novelty. For my parents' generation, too much time has passed, too much history has been buried, too little knowledge of and experience with technology exists, and too much effort would be required to resuscitate the "long lost" such that things like the Facebook phenomenon are merely curiosities and mostly meaningless.

So, what all this means, as far as I see it, is that my generation is caught in this unique and surreal space where, through things like Facebook, we can explode the wonder of times past and freshen memories of friendships and social relationships that aren't so far removed from our identities that we wouldn't find meaning in dredging them up and restoring them.

Even though online social networking sites have been around for some time now, my generation is just now catching on to the excitement of it. And we ARE excited by it in ways that the younger generations could never be, precisely because of its ability to restore the "long lost." Folks from my generation are setting up Facebook accounts by the droves. People I grew up with in the old neighborhood, folks I went to grammar school with, guys and girls that I hung out with in the heady days of adolescence and high school and undergraduate college, are all searching each other out and reconnecting. We are like giddy kids in the proverbial candy store.

And whenever one of these "long lost" friends reconnects with me through Facebook, the inevitable first thrill of the contact is almost always prefaced by something like the following: "Isn't this Facebook thing just crazy-cool?!?!?" And it is! It's a wonderful moment. Finding out about jobs, careers, families, interests. Seeing pictures of people 20-30 years after the last moment of contact. There is something sweet and innocent about finding out that your best friend from the 5th grade, whom you haven't seen in 25 years, still thinks of you, too, now, as that best friend from 5th grade -- even after so many years have passed.

Recently, after having discovered through Facebook the web of current, new relationships that have unexpected and surprising connections to relationships of 20-30 years ago, I wrote for my status update the following: "Jimmy Huck seems to have unwittingly taken the red pill and is now discovering how deep the rabbit hole goes!" (For those not in the know, this is a reference to a scene in the movie The Matrix, when Morpheus gives Neo the chance to know the surreal truth of the Matrix and his life as he knew it at that moment.) For folks in my generation, that rabbit hole is deep, indeed. But the surreal fall down into it is pretty thrilling and affirming. I can't speak for any other 40-somethings, but for me it is enlivening my personal history and enriching my present. I love it. And I have to say that I'm pretty darn pleased that the wonder of it is something I think only my generation gets to appreciate.

Louis Jordan

The true originator of Rock-n-Roll.

HB521 - To the Governor

HB521 - a bill proposed by Representative Juan LaFonta of the Louisiana House of Representatives to create "an advisory council to propose ways to eliminate obstacles to the effective delivery of governmental services to Latin Americans" - has passed the House concurrence vote on the Senate's amended bill by a vote of 86 Ayes, 0 Nays, and 18 Absent. So, the original bill passed the House, moved to the Senate where it passed with Amendments, went back to the House for its concurrence with the Senate Amendments, where it was passed by a large margin.

What this means is that now the bill heads for Gov. Jindal's desk and will become law unless Gov. Jindal vetoes the bill, which is extremely unlikely to happen.

What a change from last summer. I couldn't be more pleased. Even though this advisory council really has no "teeth" to effect policy, it's symbolically important for the message it sends to the Latin American and Latino residents of the State of Louisiana.

Thanks to Rep. LaFonta for authoring the bill and for shepherding it successfully through the legislative process.

Experience LatiNola

LINK.

Come out to Lakeside Mall on Saturday, June 13, and "Experience LatiNola." Click the link above for more information.

Update on HB521 - Creating a State Advisory Council for Latino Affairs

Some while ago, I wrote about a bill before the Louisiana Legislature sponsored by Rep. Juan LaFonta to create an Advisory Council charged with advising the state government on Latino/Latin American affairs.

This bill has been slowly working its way through the system and appears headed for final passage. Just today, the Senate easily passed its version of LaFonta's bill. However, the Senate added some amendments to the bill, so it now has to go back to the House for what is called a "concurrence" vote. This simply means that the House has to vote on whether it will accept the Senate's changes to the bill. The vote on House concurrence is scheduled to take place on June 9. I can't see any reason for it not to pass the House, where it was previously approved almost unanimously.

After that, it goes to the Governor's desk for signature, which is also pretty much a given, as I have been led to believe.

So, in a few days, it looks like we will have an Advisory Council "to propose ways to eliminate obstacles to the effective delivery of governmental services to Latin Americans." If you want to read the full bill and all the approved amendments, you can search the bill on the State Legislature website. Again, I should remark that this is quite a reversal of sentiment from last year, when the mood was to attack the undocumented migrant Latino community and those who would serve them, to one where now the state is establishing an official Advisory Council to see how government can best serve this community itself! Quite a good turn of events, if you ask me!

The Archbishop of New Orleans Does It Again

That is ... pulls another cynical, boneheaded stunt regarding church closings and such.

Only this time, it's even more cynical a stunt, if you ask me. Seems the Archdiocese wants to divert FEMA resources (some $10 million) specifically allocated for the reconstruction of damaged parish schools and church community centers in poor, predominantly black communities in urban New Orleans to relatively wealthy, white suburban churches in St. Bernard Parish and on the Northshore.

Yeah ... that's the symbolic message the Archdiocese needs to send to poorer communities who could use the resources reinvested in their neighborhoods: take the taxpayers money away from poor communities, who are already spiritually damaged and hurting by the Archdiocese's decision to shut down their parishes, and then reinvest this public money in places where the Church can profit more from expanding services to the white monied Catholics in places where everyone knows racism and disdain for anything urban thrives. (And anyone who dares to say that St. Bernard Parish and the Northshore aren't places where the legacy of Jim Crow is more alive than not is just being wilfully blind. EVERYONE knows that racism thrives in these places. It is no coincidence that David Duke's base of operations is located on the Northshore and that David Duke is popular figure in St. Bernard Parish. So the racial symbolism of this move by the Archdiocese, no matter how they try to spin it, will not be lost on folks who are watching with their eyes wide open.)

It's heartbreaking, really. It conveys the message that the Archdiocese doesn't give a rat's rear about poor folks, especially if they happen to be poor, black folks. It also invites protestant churches to step in, fill the void, and heal the hurt left in the wake of the Archdiocese's brazen insensitivity and dismissiveness of these communities. It's heartbreaking, but it also makes my blood boil.

It's no wonder that I've come to consider myself over the past few months to be an Exodus Catholic. I have said previously that I would not tithe to Parish churches anymore as long as this current leadership persists. And I have kept that promise. Now I have one more reason to cement my resolve in this way. If you are a Catholic who cares about New Orleans and its marginalized communities, I would ask you to make the same resolution. Give your money and time to individual communities, individual priests, or the religious orders. If your money and time go to the Archdiocese, you can rest assured that it will likely be re-diverted to causes anti-thetical to the social justice mission and teaching of the Church.

The Archbishop is not God. He is a fallible man. And this one, in particular, is full of mistakes and bad will. In my opinion, he abandoned his flock following Hurricane Katrina and holed himself up in Baton Rouge until he could feel comfortable returning. He destroyed parishes and shut down churches that were self-sustaining for reasons that are beyond the comprehension of any compassionate human being. He exercises political intervention by publicly snubbing (of all institutions) Xavier University, an historically black university, because it invited a prominent black Democratic strategist and pro-choice political figure, Donna Brazile, to be its commencement speaker; yet he NEVER questions the morality of politicians who unapologetically and proudly endorse torture, war, the death penalty, and a myriad list of other anti-life measures. And now he wants to take federal government money away from poor, black, progressive communities and use it for the benefit of predominantly white, conservative, suburban, and relatively wealthy communities. The man is pathologically tone deaf to Catholics on the margins who are starved for compassionate and understanding pastoral leadership. He is so wrapped up in his comfortable, conservative, privileged cocoon that he can't even recognize the damage he is doing to the Catholic community of New Orleans.

Rising Tide IV????

Is there one this year? Just wondering...

Race and Merit: Conservative Hypocrisy

I get frustrated and repulsed by the duplicity of conservatives when it comes to questions of race and merit in terms of individual accomplishments.

For many conservatives, everything Barack Obama accomplished was due to the preferential treatment he was given because of his race.

Now, I hear the same argument being posited regarding Sonia Sotomayor. That argument goes something like this: Were it not for the fact that Sotomayor is Hispanic and female, she wouldn't be where she is today.

Puh-lease!

Here are the facts. Both Barack Obama and Sonia Sotomayor came from modest backgrounds and very daunting family situations. A reality that daily stands in the way of many individuals' ability to reach their full potential. Under these trying situations, situations that may have set back the best of us, both of these individuals persevered, achieved, and rose to prominence such that today Barack Obama is President and Sonia Sotomayor is up for the Supreme Court. No small feats.

If Barack Obama and Sonia Sotomayor were conservative Republicans with the same achievements, they would be hailed as testaments to individual perseverence and accomplishments in the face of such daunting odds. They would be treated with the same reverence and deference that Condoleeza Rice and Clarence Thomas are treated.

Instead, because Barack Obama is a liberal Democrat and Sonia Sotomayor is his choice for the Supreme Court, they are demeaned as unworthy of their success, which is considered the product exclusively of identity politics.

Let me just say this: There are hundreds of thousands of black and hispanic citizens of this country, both liberal and conservative, that don't graduate from high school, much less get admitted to Harvard or Princeton, much less graduate from these institutions with top honors and with recognized leadership roles in prestigious institutions, much less with successful professional careers. For anyone to suggest that Barack Obama or Sonia Sotomayor have not earned any of these accomplishments and are simply the beneficiaries of affirmative action is to exemplify the height of cynicism. It tells folks like me that such conservatives are not at all interested in individual initiative and merit, but are driven purely by ideology. It tells me that such conservatives think that only minorities who are conservative Republicans are capable of success and accomplishment by the merits of their own abilities and intelligence, instead of by affirmative action.

It's one thing to challenge Obama or Sotomayor on the merits of their thinking and their ideas, but it's another thing altogether to claim that their successes are due primarily to their status as racial minorities. Any conservative who even thinks this, in light of the objective impressiveness of Obama's and Sotomayor's accomplishments, isn't worthy of being taken seriously at all. In fact, any conservative who even thinks this is nothing but a hypocritical, angry, petty, race-hustling boor in my mind.

Liberty University College Republicans and Jim Gilmore

Former Republican Governor of Virgina, Jim Gilmore, threw his hat early into the ring for the GOP nomination in the 2008 Presidential Election. Consequently, we have a lot of good information on Jim Gilmore regarding his stances on the controversial moral issues of the day. We also have campaign finance information on his candidacy, too. Put the two together and this story emerges:

In general, Jim Gilmore is a pro-life Republican. BUT, Gilmore apparently supports the right of a woman to choose an abortion up to the 8th week of pregnancy. Or at least he doesn't believe in interfering with or denying a woman's right to choose an abortion for any reason up to the 8th week of pregnancy. And Gilmore also supports abortions after the 8th week of pregnancy when the life of the mother is threatened and under other extenuating circumstances.

In an interview on CNN's Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer on May 6, 2007, this exchange occurred:

Q [Blitzer]: Your position on abortion, correct me if I'm wrong, suggests that there is a moment, at least early on in a woman's pregnancy, when abortion would be OK. Is that right?

A [Gilmore]: Well, OK is not exactly the way I would put it. But what I would say is this: There has to be some time for the baby to form in the womb, which I think happens at about eight weeks. And after that, I think that abortion should be limited except to save the life of the mother.

Q [Blitzer]: Between the beginning and eight weeks, abortion would be OK if necessary?

A [Gilmore] : Not OK, but the question is, should the law prohibit it at that point? And I've never taken that position. [Emphasis added.] On the other hand, my record has governor of Virginia with the pro-life movement has been very strong. We passed a 24-hour waiting period, parental notification, & informed consent. I signed the partial-birth abortion ban. And I think I have furthered our pro-life movement very substantially, even though not everybody would agree with every nuance of my position.

And later, at the May 3, 2007, GOP Primary Debate at the Reagan Library, hosted by MSNBC, Gilmore was asked:

Q: You have said in the past that you believe in the first eight to 12 weeks of pregnancy that the woman should have the right to have an abortion. Do you still want to stick with that exception?

Gilmore responded:

A: I do. My views on this, my beliefs on this are a matter of conviction. And they've always been the same, and they've never changed, the entire time that I've been in public life. However, my record as governor of Virginia, I think, has been one that the pro-life community, of which I'm a part, would be very proud: passing a 24-hour waiting period, passing informed consent, passing parental notification, signing the partial-birth abortion law in Virginia. So I think the record is there. But my views -- my views are strongly and fundamentally believed and been held that way.

Whatever else that might be, that doesn't sound like a categorical pro-life, anti-abortion position to me. Now, the relevant question to this debate is whether Gilmore's "nuanced" position on abortion is consistent with Liberty University's moral foundations? I'm not sure, because I don't know if Liberty University has a specific position on whether any abortions, even under particular conditions or following a particular pregnancy timeline, are acceptable or not. But, if I had to make an educated guess, I would imagine that Liberty University's position is one that holds that life begins at conception and therefore that abortion is morally wrong absolutely and at any point during a pregnancy. So, if this is Liberty University's position, as I suspect it might be, Jim Gilmore is a candidate who supports a position regarding abortion at odds with Liberty University's principles on the subject. And, regardless, Gilmore clearly supports a woman's "right" to an abortion under current law.

Here's the kicker ... Guess to whom the "Jim Gilmore For President - Exploratory Committee Inc." paid $445 to in the Spring of 2007? According to the Federal Election Commission's April 2007 Quarterly Report, it was the Liberty University College Republicans!!!!!!!! Presumably the payment was for travel costs associated with the Liberty University College Republicans' hosting a campaign event for Jim Gilmore, who was scheduled to speak at Liberty by invitation of the Liberty University College Republicans. I am guessing that the Liberty University College Republicans paid for Gilmore's travel, and then were reimbursed by Gilmore's Exploratory Committee in order to be in compliance with Campaign Finance laws. I'd really like to know what this exchange of money between Gilmore and the Liberty University College Republicans was truly about, though. In any event, there is a clear connection between the Liberty University College Republicans and support for a particular Republican candidate whose pro-life credentials seem not to be 100% in line with an absolutist life-begins-at-conception, anti-abortion position.

And guess what Liberty University did to the Liberty University College Republicans for this egregious violation of the University's moral position on abortion by supporting and sponsoring a Republican candidate whose pro-life bona-fides were suspect? Yep, you guessed it: DIDDLY SQUAT.

Yet, here's how Liberty Univesity's Chancellor and President, Jerry Falwell, Jr., ends a letter defending the University's decision to elminate the College Democrat club's official standing:

To blindly support any candidate solely because of party affiliation irrespective of their moral views is wrong. Liberty would never endorse a Republican student group that supported abortion rights. [Emphasis added.] Liberty stands for certain core values; not for a political party.

I want to hold Jerry Falwell, Jr., to that statement.

I demand that the Liberty University Administration apply its policy in a consistent manner and take the same action with regard to the Liberty University College Republicans that they took with regard to the Liberty University College Democrats. And if they don't remove the Liberty University College Republicans from officially sanctioned status, they should reinstate the College Democrat club. Otherwise, there is no other thing to conclude than that Liberty University = Republican University.

It's Sotomayor for SCOTUS

I just saw the headlines that Obama has selected Sonia Sotomayor to be his nominee to replace David Souter on the US Supreme Court. I know very little about Sotomayor, but I applaud Obama for his selection. I will be following this nomination closely and learning what I can about Judge Sotomayor over the next few weeks. As someone very much partial to finding a justice with a solid understanding both of US law and with a personal understanding of the Latino community, I can't help but be initially quite thrilled with this pick.

Here's a bit more on Sotomayor's life and career as a lawyer and judge.

Liberty University Disappoints: Where's David Horowitz?

I often hear from conservatives how universities and colleges routinely squelch divergence of opinion and free expression on campuses when it comes to conservative causes and ideas. Yet, all I usually hear as proof of this are how conservative speakers at colleges and universities are subject to a very unwelcome reception by activist liberals. Yeah, I guess it's true to some extent; but the fact always remains that these conservatives are actually invited to speak on college campuses and are at the very least given a forum and space to talk. So, I fail to see how universities and colleges are in any way bastions of such intolerance of differing opinions and expression.

For instance, I do not know of a single "liberal" university or college, whether public or private, that actively prohibits and bans such things as interracial dating, the formation of student Republican groups, etc. I challenge any of my conservative readers to point me to any instance where discrimination appears in such ways in a "liberal" university.

Yet, on the other hand, I can point to numerous instances where "conservative" colleges and universities practice exclusion simply on the basis of political ideology. We all know of Bob Jones University's prohibitions on interracial dating. The most recent example of conservative intolerance and exclusion simply because of political party affiliation is Liberty University's outright ban on a College Democrats club. Just so that I can't be accused of misrepresenting reports of this by the "liberal" MSM, here's a snippet from "fair and balanced" FoxNews' report of the situation:

Liberty University has ordered its fledgling College Democrats club to shut down, saying the group stands against the conservative Christian school's moral principles.

Club president Brian Diaz said he was shocked to be notified by e-mail last week that the club was being banned by the private university in Lynchburg founded by the late Rev. Jerry Falwell. The university first recognized it in the fall.

"We were shocked, as well, that (the club) even got accepted. It was huge, and we were glad that Liberty did that," Diaz said in a telephone interview from Orlando, Fla.

The club is barred from using Liberty's name, advertising events and holding meetings on campus. Violators could be reprimanded and face expulsion for repeated offenses.

Vice president of student affairs Mark Hine said in the e-mail sent to Diaz on May 15 that the Democratic party violates the school's principles by supporting abortion, socialism and the "'LGBT' agenda," referring to lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgender people. The e-mail said that even though the campus group "may not support the more radical planks of the Democratic Party, the Democratic Party is still the parent organization of the club on campus."

How's that for a "conservative" university's respecting ideological diversity on campus? Note that even if Liberty University's College Democrats club doesn't even support the more "radical" elements of the Democratic Party platform that run counter to the University's moral convictions (and I would bet anything that the group is very careful in this regard), it's still being punished only and exclusively because of its association with being Democratic. If it's a club filled with "pro-life" Democrats -- no matter. If it's a club filled with anti-GLBT Democrats -- no matter. If it's a club filled with "good kids" who are Democrats -- no matter. It's "Democrat" -- and that's all one apparently needs to know.

If you want to see some inconsistency and warped logic in Liberty University's position, check out the following contradictions in the FoxNews report. In the first paragraph, University officials are reported as claiming that the ban occurs because the group stands against the University's moral principles. And yet notice how there is absolutely NO EVIDENCE provided that this group does anything of the sort. The only apparent reason given is that it's Democratic. The University doesn't point to any specific action that the group has done that goes against the school's moral foundations. In fact, if you read Liberty University Vice president of student affairs Mark Hine's email above, there seems to recognition that the Group actually DOESN'T embrace or advocate Democratic Party positions that run counter to the University's moral foundations. What's patently clear is that just the label "Democrat" is enough to get a group banned from campus, irrespective of what that group actually advocates and does.

I have to say that when I read stuff like this, I find conservatives' complaints about the "liberal" university's intolerance of conservatives to be hollow and hypocritical. Where's David Horowitz and his Freedom Center's Campaign for Academic Freedom? Where's the Horowitz-sponsored Students for Academic Freedom coming to the defense of these Liberty University College Democrats? If they really cared about academic freedom, diversity of intellectual opinion, and even their moral convictions, Liberty University's actions would be as loudly condemned by Horowitz and his minions.

It's a shame, because Liberty University just got some really positive exposure through liberal college student Kevin Roose's very sympathetic book on intellectual, ideological, and religious pluralism at Liberty University based on his very open-minded experience as a student there. Here we have an ivy-league liberal young man giving Liberty University the benefit of the doubt on the one hand, and now we have on the other hand Liberty University officials confirming the worst about the University's official intolerance of difference.

It's a shame, because the message that comes out of this decision to ban the College Democrats club at Liberty University is now quite clear: Liberty University = Republican University. You can't be a public Democrat at Liberty University, even if you support the moral foundations of the University, in a way that is recognized officially by the University. Simply being a Democrat is considered a violation of the moral foundations of the University. There's no other way to interpret this action.

Cicero's Father Eulogizes

Behold a tattered toga
Ripped asunder by this display of
Bald treachery: Your lifeless
Head and hand tacked unceremoniously
(A wordless bulletin!)
To the site of your silver-tongued triumphs.

My liver is a Pompeiic eruption of
Paternal devastation.

I suffered you once proudly past me, my son.
It was a painful passing of the torch.

You always had the brilliant last word,
The perfect argument.
I could never contest.

Your famous fiery rhetoric is but
A fading whisper,
A muffled sob, a cooling ember.
As am I.
The words have flown with you and
Escape me.
There is nothing more to say.

Michael Steele, Gay Marriage, and Business

I couldn't believe my eyes when I read that the current GOP chairman floated the boneheaded argument that Republicans should advance their opposition to gay marriage by showing how "gay marriage" will hurt small businesses.

My first reaction, after I put my incredulous eyeballs back into their sockets, was to ask, if Steele really believed that gay marriage would hurt business, why wouldn't interracial marriage or heterosexual marriage or any marriage hurt business in the same way? Really. Didn't Steele even think about what he was saying? The implications are so damn obvious.

There is absolutely no way Steele can make the argument that opposing gay marriage saves businesses money by denying the civil benefits of marriage without coming across as specifically targeting gay people for discrimination in the workplace by sharing in the exact same institution and the benefits it provides as heterosexual employees.

Steele's comments reveal that the GOP is desperate, flailing, and incapable of recognizing that, in a civil society grounded in equality, there is NO good, sustainable argument for denying gay people the civil benefits of marriage.

Confidential to President_Friedman

A very sincere and heartfelt thanks. I wish there were more minds and men of character like you at places like RWN.

Jessie Ventura, Waterboarding, and Dick Cheney

"You give me a waterboard, Dick Cheney and one hour, and I'll have him confess to the Sharon Tate murders."



Let's remember that Jessie Ventura, as crazy as he is, is a Navy S.E.A.L. who knows what he's talking about when it comes to waterboarding and whether it's torture.

Wiki-Hoax

A lesson for researchers. Now, don't get me wrong: I love Wikipedia and find it to be fairly accurate for the things that I research and know about; but the point shouldn't be lost on researchers and students.

Never, ever think of Wikipedia as the final and authoritative source on any subject. Always cross-check the information on Wikipedia with other reliable sources. And always hold Wikipedia to the same scrutiny of verification that you would hold any other resource.

In this case, the duped media outlets lifted from Wikipedia what was supposedly a direct quotation from an individual. However, this quotation was never sourced on Wikipedia. In fact, it was a planted hoax, designed to see how media would use it. And apparently, the media used it carelessly.

As I said, a lesson to be heeded.

Run, Mitch, Run!

I'd like nothing more than to see Mitch Landrieu join his sister, Mary, in the US Senate. Yeah, a Landrieu Brother/Sister combo might spook some of the conservative northern fundagelicals of the "Gret Stet" (and maybe even some of the conservative southern brain-deaders of the State); but Mitch is the only Democrat I can think of who has statewide name recognition, is not considered an overly ideological liberal, has done quite well as Lt.-Governor, and has infinitely better family values than Vitter. Besides which, Mitch, I think, can make some serious inroads in the more conservative suburbs of the Greater New Orleans area, a region which Vitter is going to need to go overwhelmingly for him, but which feels much more personally betrayed and wounded by Vitter's sexual indiscretions and family-values hypocrisy.

The one question mark for Mitch will be the lingering fallout from his racially contentious matchup against Ray Nagin for New Orleans mayor the last go around.

Even still, I think Vitter is vulnerable; but his defeat will require a well-known, family-values-unassailable Democrat. And Mitch Landrieu is really the only person I can think of that would fit the bill at this time.

Obama and "Don't Ask, Don't Tell"

I'm stunned, flummoxed, and flabberghasted.

I'm not a single-issue voter, but I can't hide the fact that Obama's apparent firing of an openly gay member of the military under that disgustingly atrocious piece of garbage legislation known as "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" is extremely disappointing to me and does some serious damage to Obama in my eyes.

Believe me, I want to try to find some rationale that would make this shocking thing seem less so, but I can come at it by every which angle and there's just no getting around it. As Aaron Belkin notes, Obama could have stopped this legally, easily, and instantaneously; but he didn't. He could have effectively ended "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" with a stroke of the pen, and had both the public's support and the cause of justice and moral righteousness on his side; but he didn't. Obama, as Commander-in-Chief, could exercise some authority over this issue; but he hasn't. Worse is that he doesn't even seem likely to.

Obama better change course on this soon, and live up to his clear campaign promise, or my enthusiasm (and support) for him will start to drop like the recent stock market.

Quote of the Day

"But surely, when it comes to combating teen pregnancy, the Palin family has done enough damage already. What worse message could you send to teenage girls than the one they delivered at the Republican convention: If your handsome but somewhat thuglike boyfriend gets you with child, he will clean up nicely, propose marriage, and show up at an important family event wearing a suit and holding your hand. At which point you will get a standing ovation." New York Times Op-Ed Columnist, Gail Collins

Class of Katrina Graduates

Kudos to all the Spring 2009 College Graduates in New Orleans. This graduating class was the "Class that came back" after being scattered to the four corners for Hurricane Katrina. For many of these students and their families, the Katrina experience meant arriving to New Orleans on Friday or Saturday, unpacking and getting settled in the dorms, only to immediately have to pack up and leave for an evacuation that stretched out for more than 4 months. This class deserves a lot of credit for not only coming back to New Orleans and the local universities they had committed to attend, but also for being the first wave of young energy that really catapulted the City on its path to recovery.

Read this nice article from MSNBC on this graduating class.

Patriot Act

To all my readers who embrace the Patriot Act as a necessary and good policy in these troubled times, take heed of this story and know that any tech-punk with minimal skills could easily make an example of you or your own children.

Support the Patriot Act and its attack on basic, fundamental civil liberties out of fear if you must, but be ready to accept that you, or someone you love, could be wrongly subject to detention without any claim to due process recourse.

But I have this to say to you: If you think this one "mistake" is worth the price of your illusion of feeling more secure, you are no friend of freedom. The simple fact is that you are willing to sell out your fellow American's freedom without any solid guarantee of your own. And that's friggin' sick.

UPDATE: Friday, May 8, 2009: 10:00AM: One of my readers informs me in the comments that an update to this story has been filed that calls into question the Patriot Act as the source for this detention and arrest. Here's the new story: Link. Thanks to Eric for bringing this to my attention. It is still quite true that the Patriot Act could be used in this way and that detention without recourse to due process is possible under the Patriot Act. So I still stand by my general comments. As a matter of principle, the Patriot Act's potential assaults on the freedoms of American Citizens and their access to due process make any supporter of the Patriot Act no friend of freedom.

Juan LaFonta and HB521

Louisiana Legislator Juan LaFonta, from House District 96 in New Orleans, has filed a great piece of legislation that warrants everyone's support.

This legislative initiative, HB521, calls for the creation of "an advisory council to propose ways to eliminate
obstacles to the effective delivery of governmental services to Latin Americans."

Such an advisory council has long been needed. I can tell you from personal experience that the delivery of governmental services to Latin American and Latino residents of Louisiana suffers greatly from a lack of coordination. This advisory council would go a long way towards helping the Governor and his executive agencies provide much better and more efficient services to this growing community. Law enforcement agencies, state health agencies, the state department of education, etc., are having to contend with new issues and complexities in dealing with the Latin American and Latino residents of the state, especially recent arrivals.

Right now, HB521 is referred to the Committee on House and Governmental Affairs. It is on the Committee's agenda and will probably be scheduled for a hearing and debate within the next couple of weeks.

Rep. LaFonta will be hosting a public forum to discuss specifically HB521 this Thursday, May 7, 2009, from 7PM to 8PM, at the University of New Orleans Homer Hitt Alumni Board Room at 200 Lakeshore Drive, New Orleans, Louisiana.

Please try to make it out to this meeting. But at the very least, please support this legislative initiative by contacting your Louisiana Legislators in both the House and the Senate.

As some of you might recall, last year there were all kinds of legislative bills seeking to marginalize and ostracize undocumented Latin American migrants to Louisiana (and by extension, their documented friends and family residing in the state), while also seeking to criminalize those citizens who would have been good samaritans to such migrants. Thanks to the concerted efforts of many individuals and groups, every single one of these hostile and punitive bills was defeated. A strong message was sent to Louisiana legislators that Louisiana is a place that is friendly to its Latin American and Latino residents and workers, regardless of immigration status. In fact, this message was so strong that this year there seem to be no such hostile and punitive legislative bills on the docket. On the contrary, instead of such nasty legislation, there's LaFonta's HB521 which seeks to institutionalize the state's commitment to and interest in its Latin American and Latino residents. Let's punctuate the victories of last summer with the exclamation point of getting LaFonta's proposed advisory council established in this year's legislative session.

I'll keep you posted on this bill as it works its way through the current legislative session. Stay tuned!