Not long ago I discovered a podcast called James Bonding (which, when you search for it delightfully causes this to come up also [note: I do not endorse that service]) which has reawoken my interest in the movie franchise. So I am rewatching the ones with which I am not as familiar as I used to be and the ones I just like watching. I've mentioned my fandom of podcasts before, but these are like listening to fans talk about things they like. I am convinced that every sports broadcast would be improved by simply having two well informed fans of one of the teams that have some chemistry call the game, because like 97% of the announcers are worse than having your county council replaced by an aggressive race of crab people that outlaws butter. (Brent Musburger, you're in that 3% you magnificent bastard.)
Anyway, there are all kinds of comedians who talk about finding henchmen and talking about how incompetent they are in movies like this, and I have all those same questions. But mostly, as an engineer, the questions that keep coming up for me as a I watch an army of technicians sit quietly at their workstations helping Stromburg in The Spy Who Loved Me end humanity are more about procurement. There's a scene late in the movie where the henchmen are all wearing custom made Stromburg navy uniforms. Where'd they come from? Somebody had to make those.
Also, the plot of this movie hinges on a lot of big machines -- an underwater lair, the largest cargo ship in the world, and all sorts of vehicles that are blown up -- that have to come from somewhere. And while they do establish early in the movie that he's one of the richest men in the world, helicopters are still expensive. Another one of the in jokes is that the Russians know a lot about what the English are doing, and vice versa, but the bad guy has a secret submarine swallowing and underwater mansion including underwater aquarium, which makes sense, I guess. I just can't believe that there isn't some chatty pipefitter who might mention at the local watering hole that he's working on a project that is just bananas.
Don't get me wrong, though -- I love these movies. I own all of them (even Die Another Day) and this sort of supervillainous silliness is part of what makes it great. I just wish I could be in the room when the writers were trying to explain to Cubby Broccoli just how they could fit two missiles plus 007's and XXX's luggage into a Lotus Esprit. But, to quote Larry Miller in episode 22, "I don't know why Ursula Andress comes out with a knife. Who cares! It works."
Saturday, July 11, 2015
Thursday, January 17, 2013
Discomfort, Indeed.
As my wife likes to remind me, I am not really a Southerner; I am a Floridian. Even though the latitude of my birthplace is 3 degrees south of hers, I am still an outsider, a sort of mongrel, even though a sizable portion of my higher education and all of my professional life has been spent squarely in the South. I'm not sure I'll ever get to be a member of that club, in part because I don't drink sweet tea and sound like I was born closer to to the Iowa River than the Chattahoochee, where my wife was.
I do feel like I understand this place somewhat, though, and certainly felt more at home in Clemson, South Carolina than I did in Terre Haute, Indiana. I was an outsider there, too, because the Midwesterners categorized me as one of those from the other side of the Line. College is a place where identity is both calcified and shattered, sometimes more than once. I never got the impression that there was all that much that identified an Midwesterner, really, or an "Hoosier" in particular. In fact, nobody even knew what a Hoosier is.
The same could not be said in the Upstate of South Carolina. The people there had a distinct sound -- distinct from the other side of the state, distinct from the other Carolina and distinct from the other side of the Savannah River. I could not tell an Ohioan from an Illinoisan in nearly the same way I can pick out an Upstater from a Low Countryman from an Alabaman or a Tennesseean. The food is different in these places, the music, the dress (especially the colors -- Red is not welcome in the Upstate, and Orange is frowned upon in Athens, Georgia), the sense of place and the sense of story.
I think the story telling comes from the Scots-Irish stock that populates the region; I am convinced there is something inherent in the Celtic blood that makes words pour out like honey -- whether it be from the mouth or the pen. Like any other people with a strong sense of identity, it's strange to have someone else try to tell your story for you, so I am not even sure I am qualified to write this now, but when I came across this New Yorker piece, my reservations about my credentials receded lazily like the tide over the dark, cakey pluff mud of the Charleston marsh.
After spending some half a dozen paragraphs talking about how Southerners are stubborn, xenophobic, backward, somewhat barbaric, greedy, racist, ignorant, out of touch while culturally dominant, football and Nascar obsessed, tribalist, and violent, he closes with a couple of throwaway sentences that make it seem he's really not judging (the phrase that's used down here is, of course, "Bless his heart"):
I am particularly sensitive to that sort of attitude because I chose to be among these people. I picked Clemson University for graduate work. I bought my first house in Augusta, Georgia. I married one of the Peach State's daughters. We decided together to move to Charleston. And, in the next place we live, I am certain we will be greeted with y'alls, elongated vowels and an extremely dedicated knowledge of college football. I like the polite conversation. I like the weather. I like the pace of life. I like the sense of culture. I like the emphasis on faith.
The task of refashioning the identity has been going on here for over 200 years. Re-examinations of what it means to be born between Virginia Beach and El Paso came to a rather violent head in 1861, of course, and no one forgets it. The benefit of losing, though, is being forced to have that conversation; the winner is spared from that kind of existential introspection.
So a magazine entitled the New Yorker is an odd place indeed to read about an explanation on what's going on inside of the cultural mind of the South, especially when, upon completing this story, I was offered a suggested reading link of this story.
Like I said, I'm not actually a Southerner and I don't know if Packer is either.. I don't know why it feels like politics are dramatically different now than just two election cycles ago. But I do know that Packer's infantile reduction of the region to the Republican Party, Wal-Mart and the SEC is not productive or accurate. I am skeptical that you couldn't go to a small town in Michigan, Pennsylvania, or Oregon and find similar evidence of the low-brow to which Packer objects. And so what? What exactly is he trying to argue?
I do feel like I understand this place somewhat, though, and certainly felt more at home in Clemson, South Carolina than I did in Terre Haute, Indiana. I was an outsider there, too, because the Midwesterners categorized me as one of those from the other side of the Line. College is a place where identity is both calcified and shattered, sometimes more than once. I never got the impression that there was all that much that identified an Midwesterner, really, or an "Hoosier" in particular. In fact, nobody even knew what a Hoosier is.
The same could not be said in the Upstate of South Carolina. The people there had a distinct sound -- distinct from the other side of the state, distinct from the other Carolina and distinct from the other side of the Savannah River. I could not tell an Ohioan from an Illinoisan in nearly the same way I can pick out an Upstater from a Low Countryman from an Alabaman or a Tennesseean. The food is different in these places, the music, the dress (especially the colors -- Red is not welcome in the Upstate, and Orange is frowned upon in Athens, Georgia), the sense of place and the sense of story.
I think the story telling comes from the Scots-Irish stock that populates the region; I am convinced there is something inherent in the Celtic blood that makes words pour out like honey -- whether it be from the mouth or the pen. Like any other people with a strong sense of identity, it's strange to have someone else try to tell your story for you, so I am not even sure I am qualified to write this now, but when I came across this New Yorker piece, my reservations about my credentials receded lazily like the tide over the dark, cakey pluff mud of the Charleston marsh.
After spending some half a dozen paragraphs talking about how Southerners are stubborn, xenophobic, backward, somewhat barbaric, greedy, racist, ignorant, out of touch while culturally dominant, football and Nascar obsessed, tribalist, and violent, he closes with a couple of throwaway sentences that make it seem he's really not judging (the phrase that's used down here is, of course, "Bless his heart"):
But there is a largely forgotten Southern history, beyond the well-known heroics of the civil-rights movement, of struggle against poverty and injustice, led by writers, preachers, farmers, rabble-rousers, and even politicians, speaking a rich language of indignation. The region is not entirely defined by Jim DeMint, Sam Walton, and the Tide’s A J McCarron. It would be better for America as well as for the South if Southerners rediscovered their hidden past and took up the painful task of refashioning an identity that no longer inspires their countrymen.The implication is that the South we have now is an inferior facsimile of what the South should be that is popularly understood to be personified in a recalcitrant Senator, a dead business man, and a football star, after he describes the region in precisely those terms. I don't know what sort of inspiration Packer expects the natives of my adopted home state and our neighbors to provide when the the picture he paints of Southerners is so grim. None of the buildup to this terminus tells us how the positive qualities do indeed benefit society at large outside of a rather ambiguous listing of positive traits: "At the end of “The Mind of the South,” Cash has this description of “the South at its best”: “proud, brave, honorable by its lights, courteous, personally generous, loyal.” That sounds nice, until two sentences later, he extols vices to counter them. He is treating my neighbors as either terrorists or children who ought to be mollified.
I am particularly sensitive to that sort of attitude because I chose to be among these people. I picked Clemson University for graduate work. I bought my first house in Augusta, Georgia. I married one of the Peach State's daughters. We decided together to move to Charleston. And, in the next place we live, I am certain we will be greeted with y'alls, elongated vowels and an extremely dedicated knowledge of college football. I like the polite conversation. I like the weather. I like the pace of life. I like the sense of culture. I like the emphasis on faith.
The task of refashioning the identity has been going on here for over 200 years. Re-examinations of what it means to be born between Virginia Beach and El Paso came to a rather violent head in 1861, of course, and no one forgets it. The benefit of losing, though, is being forced to have that conversation; the winner is spared from that kind of existential introspection.
So a magazine entitled the New Yorker is an odd place indeed to read about an explanation on what's going on inside of the cultural mind of the South, especially when, upon completing this story, I was offered a suggested reading link of this story.
Like I said, I'm not actually a Southerner and I don't know if Packer is either.. I don't know why it feels like politics are dramatically different now than just two election cycles ago. But I do know that Packer's infantile reduction of the region to the Republican Party, Wal-Mart and the SEC is not productive or accurate. I am skeptical that you couldn't go to a small town in Michigan, Pennsylvania, or Oregon and find similar evidence of the low-brow to which Packer objects. And so what? What exactly is he trying to argue?
Wednesday, September 05, 2012
Conflicted, I guess
As many of my college friends could tell you, I had a bit of a creative infatuation with the work of Aaron Sorkin -- particularly Sports Night. I was at my most prolific as a writer then and at the time, it and the West Wing seemed like the epitome of pop writing and I never thought I had the talent to be F. Scott Fitzgerald, but I at least thought I could be an Engineer by day and a reasonably pop writer of some sort by night. I did that for a while with a weekly in the last place I lived, and sometimes I think I'd like to do it again.
I am watching the season finale of The Newsroom, Aaron Sorkin's latest project on HBO, and the technique is similar, but the tone is decidedly less pop. The Newsroom features a main character, Will McAvoy, who is a disappointed Republican in the state of American politics. Aaron Sorkin, on the other hand, is not a Republican of any sort, so writing a disillusioned one requires a sort of confidence I just don't understand.
I also don't understand how all of the positions are couched in such a way that the disillusioned Republican only targets the Tea Party and the failings of his own party, rather a more holistic criticism of the situation -- including failings of the administration.
Don't get me wrong, I suppose I am somewhat of a disillusioned Republican myself and there are certainly things about the conduct of the party I dislike, although I don't really feel much loyalty to the "team.". (I consider myself more of a classical liberal, where I feel that the role of national government is to do the things that the private sector cannot profitably, and not much more than that.) I don't like the win at all costs attitude of either party, I don't like how much of a dependence there is on the false moral equivalence (both sides have this problem -- and that I said "both" is tragic, because this should not be a binary problem) and I don't like the cowardice to go after lazy arguments rather than attacking the heart of the failings of American liberalism and progressivism.
I think that the current administration is a critically flawed one. I think that, like 2004, there is a tremendous opportunity that is likely to be squandered by lining up behind the wrong guy because it is really hard to unseat an incumbent president. I want to describe what I think the biggest flaws are how I wish the Republican Party -- or anybody, really, -- were challenging them.
I am watching the season finale of The Newsroom, Aaron Sorkin's latest project on HBO, and the technique is similar, but the tone is decidedly less pop. The Newsroom features a main character, Will McAvoy, who is a disappointed Republican in the state of American politics. Aaron Sorkin, on the other hand, is not a Republican of any sort, so writing a disillusioned one requires a sort of confidence I just don't understand.
I also don't understand how all of the positions are couched in such a way that the disillusioned Republican only targets the Tea Party and the failings of his own party, rather a more holistic criticism of the situation -- including failings of the administration.
Don't get me wrong, I suppose I am somewhat of a disillusioned Republican myself and there are certainly things about the conduct of the party I dislike, although I don't really feel much loyalty to the "team.". (I consider myself more of a classical liberal, where I feel that the role of national government is to do the things that the private sector cannot profitably, and not much more than that.) I don't like the win at all costs attitude of either party, I don't like how much of a dependence there is on the false moral equivalence (both sides have this problem -- and that I said "both" is tragic, because this should not be a binary problem) and I don't like the cowardice to go after lazy arguments rather than attacking the heart of the failings of American liberalism and progressivism.
I think that the current administration is a critically flawed one. I think that, like 2004, there is a tremendous opportunity that is likely to be squandered by lining up behind the wrong guy because it is really hard to unseat an incumbent president. I want to describe what I think the biggest flaws are how I wish the Republican Party -- or anybody, really, -- were challenging them.
- Distaste for the law when it restricts executive power -- The two biggest examples are the GM and Chrysler bailouts and the intervention in Libya. Without regard to policy (which I strenuously disagree with), the bailouts was of questionably legality, if not outright illegal. In a guided bankruptcy, pensioners were given priority over bondholders, which is contrary to the way that bankruptcy proceedings go, because they were political allies. (Links are here and here discussing this.) During the NATO led intervention in Libya, which went from April 23 to October 31 (192 days) President Obama asserted that his administration was not in violation of the War Powers Act, which requires Congressional approval for military action exceeding 90 days, because the Libyan intervention wasn't actually a military conflict, since the bad guys weren't able to return fire against our superior forces. That is, to put it nicely, an absurd explanation. Libya was an illegal war. There are other potential examples -- Fast and Furious, the way that the Bank of America president was treated -- but I don't have enough detail to document and defend it.
- Lack of accountability for economic assertions -- During the preparations and sale of the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act to the American people, the Administration sold it as necessary to pass in order to keep the unemployment rate below 8%. That was a mistake, both factually and politically. The explanation from the Vice President was that "everybody guessed wrong." That is tantamount to admitting incompetence and not an endearing answer. The current unemployment rate is 8.3%, which is the lowest it's been in three years, and higher than promised by the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act. The ARRA was passed in early 2009, so the net increase is about 900,000 jobs for a $787 billion package amounts to about $874,000 per job. Not exactly a measure of efficiency. (To be fair, that's an empirical rather than theoretical measure of efficiency -- let's say it saved 2 million jobs, as President Obama says, that's still $393,500 per job, which is not exactly a bargain either.) Now, I do concede that Keynesian style stimulus can raise the GDP (since it's in the definition), I just don't think that there is sufficient discipline in the government to repay the debt when times are good, so I don't think it's effective policy. Another of questionable value is "we ask everyone to pay their fair share." What does that mean? How much is enough? Who decides what is fair? The president is also quoted in that interview with saying, "we can't cut our way out of this hole." Why not? And how do we know when we're out of the hole? Nobody has really said what victory looks like. (To be fair, this isn't strictly a criticism of the president.)
- Insistence on government solutions over individual ones -- We've all heard "You didn't build that" by now (the whole transcript can be read here). The defense is that the president was not referring to business with "that" but rather the infrastructure he described prior -- but on full reading, I don't think it matters. The tone of the speech is definitely one that you shouldn't take credit for your work, because there were a lot more hands in it than you appreciate. The issue, though, is that every American has access to that same infrastructure and we're not all Michael Dell or Steve Jobs or Barack Obama. Individual effort is a pretty big deal, and "you didn't build that" isn't the way the president should be talking about it. Compare the tone of that speech to this one and see if you can tell the difference. The heavy-handed paternalism celebrated in The Life of Julia is rather troubling. It implies that people in general and women in particular can't manage themselves without a government caretaker. My wife will make more than I do over the course of her career and it won't even close, regardless of who is president.
Wednesday, August 01, 2012
Feigning outrage is outrageous
I don't really have any leftovers for lunch today, but I know I won't be going to Chick-Fil-A, even though Mike Huckabee told me to. The reason is not because I am unsympathetic to the position taken (which isn't nearly as offensive as it seems to have been presented, see the quote below) or approve of the reaction that opponents have taken to Cathy's interview. I am not joining in Chick-Fil-A Appreciate Day because the whole dust up is stupid. This is the section of the interview that touched this off (linked here):
I say this is stupid not because of the content of the arguments of the two sides, but because of the non-event that revealed the content. Chick-Fil-A's ownership is famously and unabashedly outspoken about their Christian positions and Dan Cathy was giving an interview to The Baptist Press for crying out loud about maintaining those Christian positions even in the face of business success. If this was a surprise to you, then I can only imagine that episodes of Law and Order are shocking and surprising each time, too. (Hint: if they arrest the guy in the first 10 minutes, it's not him; the moderately famous B-level guest start did it; they're going to get a conviction; and the DA is going to say something somewhat pithy or ironic to close the show. Dun dun.)
The reactions to the interview -- most famously by Rahm Emanuel (mayor of Chicago) and Thomas Menino (mayor of Boston) -- are terrible and deserve to be ridiculed. For any government representative to say that a business in unwelcome because of the opinions of that business's owner is outrageous. Buying from Chick-Fil-A today will do nothing to punish those mayors.
For the people who want to boycott or protest, however, that's their prerogative. Except the timing is lazy; according to the Washington PostPartisan blog, Chick-Fil-A has been giving money to "anti-gay" charities for like 9 years and obvious about its desire to be seen as a Christian friendly company since its inception -- they did not just start closing on Sundays, you know.
So, my question is, why did this reaction only happen to the interview a week and half ago? Why today?
Some have opposed the company's support of the traditional family. "Well, guilty as charged," said Cathy when asked about the company's position.
"We are very much supportive of the family -- the biblical definition of the family unit. We are a family-owned business, a family-led business, and we are married to our first wives. We give God thanks for that.
"We operate as a family business ... our restaurants are typically led by families; some are single. We want to do anything we possibly can to strengthen families. We are very much committed to that," Cathy emphasized.
I say this is stupid not because of the content of the arguments of the two sides, but because of the non-event that revealed the content. Chick-Fil-A's ownership is famously and unabashedly outspoken about their Christian positions and Dan Cathy was giving an interview to The Baptist Press for crying out loud about maintaining those Christian positions even in the face of business success. If this was a surprise to you, then I can only imagine that episodes of Law and Order are shocking and surprising each time, too. (Hint: if they arrest the guy in the first 10 minutes, it's not him; the moderately famous B-level guest start did it; they're going to get a conviction; and the DA is going to say something somewhat pithy or ironic to close the show. Dun dun.)
The reactions to the interview -- most famously by Rahm Emanuel (mayor of Chicago) and Thomas Menino (mayor of Boston) -- are terrible and deserve to be ridiculed. For any government representative to say that a business in unwelcome because of the opinions of that business's owner is outrageous. Buying from Chick-Fil-A today will do nothing to punish those mayors.
For the people who want to boycott or protest, however, that's their prerogative. Except the timing is lazy; according to the Washington PostPartisan blog, Chick-Fil-A has been giving money to "anti-gay" charities for like 9 years and obvious about its desire to be seen as a Christian friendly company since its inception -- they did not just start closing on Sundays, you know.
So, my question is, why did this reaction only happen to the interview a week and half ago? Why today?
Monday, July 30, 2012
A Reminder of Consistency
This morning, I my phone told me to read 1 Samuel 12:1-25. On Saturday, it ruined the Lochte-Phelps 400 IM race, so it knew I was angry with it. I think it redeemed itself. I get impression that folks look at Genesis and Leviticus and see discrepancy in the nature of God between the Old and New Testaments. My personal opinion is that any sort of legal document is going to be a complicated view of a people. That's really what Leviticus is, after all.
The Law was written to show us that God is Holy and we are not. The rest of the Bible is written, basically, to tell us that the Law is not to be our God. 1 Samuel 12:20-22 illustrates this:
Even at this point in God's story, He is telling a story of forgiveness. ("All this evil" follows a catalogue of the history of defying God from the Exodus forward, culminating in the request for a king.) Two other places in the Old Testament, in the Minor Prophets (they are minor because they are short and responding to a specific problem, not like the Mediocre Presidents from the Simpsons' musical) we get a little more on the theme:
The Law was written to show us that God is Holy and we are not. The rest of the Bible is written, basically, to tell us that the Law is not to be our God. 1 Samuel 12:20-22 illustrates this:
“Do not be afraid,” Samuel replied. “You have done all this evil; yet do not turn away from the Lord, but serve the Lord with all your heart. 21 Do not turn away after useless idols. They can do you no good, nor can they rescue you, because they are useless. 22 For the sake of his great name the Lord will not reject his people, because the Lord was pleased to make you his own."
Even at this point in God's story, He is telling a story of forgiveness. ("All this evil" follows a catalogue of the history of defying God from the Exodus forward, culminating in the request for a king.) Two other places in the Old Testament, in the Minor Prophets (they are minor because they are short and responding to a specific problem, not like the Mediocre Presidents from the Simpsons' musical) we get a little more on the theme:
He has shown you, O mortal, what is good.
And what does the Lord require of you?
To act justly and to love mercy
and to walk humbly[a] with your God.
And what does the Lord require of you?
To act justly and to love mercy
and to walk humbly[a] with your God.
Micah 6:8
and
For I desire mercy, not sacrifice, and acknowledgment of God rather than burnt offerings.
Hosea 6:6
The Hosea verse was even quoted by Jesus at the conclusion of Matthew 9:9-13, a story criticizing the aloofness and exclusion practiced by the Pharisees. Most importantly, it's a reminder that a relationship with God is accessible; there is no sin that puts us so far out of God's reach that we are lost. This is the message that starts in the Garden and continues through the Resurrection. We get to be a part of that story, no matter what our history. So, thanks phone, for that reminder.
Friday, July 13, 2012
Headlines are fun sometimes
Earlier this week, Mitt Romney spoke to the NAACP. (He's running for president, by the way.) I read a few articles about the event because this time of year is slow for news. I don't mean to minimize the relevance of the NAACP, but I have read this story before. Well, that's not entirely true; I have never read one where the sitting President of the United States was a member of the class for which the NAACP was founded to help.
Now, when I read this headline on Townhall.com, I was surprised: Romney Receives Standing Ovation for Straight Talk at NAACP Convention. Townhall is, admittedly a conservative website trying to spin a conservative angle. Now, compare to a Slate.com headline: Romney Booed at NAACP Appearance for Promising Obamacare Repeal and Huffpo.com: Mitt Romney Booed At NAACP Convention For Saying He'd Repeal Obamacare. Neither of those sites are particularly sympathetic to Romney.
The contents of each piece are a bit different, too, with Townhall going into the most detail and making it sound like he's going to peel away a third of black voters, even though polling suggests he has 6 percent of support among that group (according to the Slate article).
This is an interesting case, because Slate and Huffpo are really "Dog Bites Man" stories, so they're not really that newsy in the first place. Townhall comes off as that weird place where emphasizing facts in a particular way comes off as bias -- kind of like moving what should be an A6 story to the front page. Townhall was the only one to mention standing ovation at the end (and buried it, so it was probably a zealous editor writing that headline) and Huffpo did mention the politeness of the crowd. The Slate story only talks about the boos surrounding Obamacare.
Each outlet did publish other stories, but these were the first to come up after the event, the sort of first impressions. I found it quite interesting that each chased the angle they wanted in the first run by the editorial staffs.
What does this mean? I think that the headline, the newsy part is that Romney spoke before the NAACP, because that is not always something Republicans do. The fact that he would be facing a hostile crowd is not hard-hitting journalism and trying to paint as rosy a picture as Townhall does is really nothing short of spinning for your guy. Both really strike me as sorts of hackery.
I think that if you read all three, you can come away with a reasonable picture of the story -- the NAACP was a polite but partisan crowd hearing a speech from a presidential candidate maybe 2% of the attendees would vote for. And quite frankly, the more interesting story coming out of the NAACP Convention is that Obama did not speak at the convention this week, the summer before his re-election to president when he needs to have the NAACP's constituency as energized as possible to win. (Here is a Townhall.com link about it and a Huffpo.com link about it -- oddly enough, I could not find a Slate.com one telling that same story.)
I guess the moral of the story is to take your news with some skepticism, even for benign, trivial stories, and seek out sources from different perspectives. The aggregate of these small stories matter in shaping the political and social narrative by reinforcing expectations (Huffpo and Slate) or really making the outlook seem rosier than it might actually be for Romney (Townhall).
Now, when I read this headline on Townhall.com, I was surprised: Romney Receives Standing Ovation for Straight Talk at NAACP Convention. Townhall is, admittedly a conservative website trying to spin a conservative angle. Now, compare to a Slate.com headline: Romney Booed at NAACP Appearance for Promising Obamacare Repeal and Huffpo.com: Mitt Romney Booed At NAACP Convention For Saying He'd Repeal Obamacare. Neither of those sites are particularly sympathetic to Romney.
The contents of each piece are a bit different, too, with Townhall going into the most detail and making it sound like he's going to peel away a third of black voters, even though polling suggests he has 6 percent of support among that group (according to the Slate article).
This is an interesting case, because Slate and Huffpo are really "Dog Bites Man" stories, so they're not really that newsy in the first place. Townhall comes off as that weird place where emphasizing facts in a particular way comes off as bias -- kind of like moving what should be an A6 story to the front page. Townhall was the only one to mention standing ovation at the end (and buried it, so it was probably a zealous editor writing that headline) and Huffpo did mention the politeness of the crowd. The Slate story only talks about the boos surrounding Obamacare.
Each outlet did publish other stories, but these were the first to come up after the event, the sort of first impressions. I found it quite interesting that each chased the angle they wanted in the first run by the editorial staffs.
What does this mean? I think that the headline, the newsy part is that Romney spoke before the NAACP, because that is not always something Republicans do. The fact that he would be facing a hostile crowd is not hard-hitting journalism and trying to paint as rosy a picture as Townhall does is really nothing short of spinning for your guy. Both really strike me as sorts of hackery.
I think that if you read all three, you can come away with a reasonable picture of the story -- the NAACP was a polite but partisan crowd hearing a speech from a presidential candidate maybe 2% of the attendees would vote for. And quite frankly, the more interesting story coming out of the NAACP Convention is that Obama did not speak at the convention this week, the summer before his re-election to president when he needs to have the NAACP's constituency as energized as possible to win. (Here is a Townhall.com link about it and a Huffpo.com link about it -- oddly enough, I could not find a Slate.com one telling that same story.)
I guess the moral of the story is to take your news with some skepticism, even for benign, trivial stories, and seek out sources from different perspectives. The aggregate of these small stories matter in shaping the political and social narrative by reinforcing expectations (Huffpo and Slate) or really making the outlook seem rosier than it might actually be for Romney (Townhall).
Tuesday, July 03, 2012
Goo goo gachoo Mr Roberts
I, like everyone else, was surprised by the outcome of the Supreme Court decision on the Affordable Care Act. I did kind of anticipate that it would be struck down, like most of the smart money seemed to as well. My personal impressions of the law are not especially positive, because, like the Obama Administration's characterization of the Constitutionality mechanism, is a bit of a bait and switch.
As I hear about Roberts' explanation about defending ACA as a tax, I am pretty ok with his reasoning. The powers granted to Congress for taxing are pretty broad and behavior changing taxes (particularly tariffs) have a long history; just because I think Congress can pass a tax, though, does not mean I think it's a good idea. It is not called a tax in the body of the legislation, which to me is immaterial; if they called a future tax whiskey, it would not actually be whiskey and should not get special considerations simply because it is not actually called a tax.
The ACA does not really seem to be a health care reform, it's more of a health insurance reform. It is kind of weird that the discussion always seems to center on the fact that the problem with our medical care is insufficient insurance (which, typically, isn't insurance at all; it's usually a payment plan for medical services) rather than addressing alternative means of access. What I mean is that when I go into the doctor for anything from antibiotics for strep throat or a broken arm, I have no idea what it is going to cost nor what it should cost. (Bear in mind, my wife is also a doctor.) Why has there been no mention of a move towards transparency in costs? By adding more people to insurance, that only gets more muddled, because somebody else is paying for a large share of it. If we knew how much it cost, really, to examine, x-ray, set and follow up on a broken arm, then we could evaluate whether or not something like a 401k model for health expenses would be better, or what it would take to put that kind of control in our hands rather than some corporate accountant.
It also seems weird how excited Democrats are for that control to be given to insurance and pharmaceutical corporations. On Meet the Press, Nancy Pelosi, of course, said the opposite, also while denying it was a tax (even though she conceded that it was clearly granted under the taxing power and would be collected by the IRS). That's kind of a joke. I don't have any particular aversion to corporations playing a role in our society, but it is really intimidating to think that I don't have any idea what to expect to pay for anything. I am going to get my wisdom teeth taken out and I could owe anywhere from $0 to a few thousand, and until they tel me, I won't have any idea how to plan for that.
I was quite glad to see that the majority did say that this is clearly outside the scope of either the commerce or necessary and proper clauses. I am no attorney, but that seemed ludicrous on its face. While it really does nothing to say that Congress could not just frame whatever they wanted to do in terms of a behavior influencing tax, that is much harder politically to implement -- hence this very discussion.
Normally, taxes like this are presented as credits rather than penalties (like home interest deduction or incentives for buying energy efficient windows -- I lose money that would otherwise be on the table for not buying those products), but that distinction is pretty insignificant. Any vote against a tax cut is an effective tax increase, and I think that should work in reverse, as well.
I also do not really get how such a body really does fall down partisan lines every time. Why is there that much latitude, really? The Constitution is not Ulysses. It is largely written in pretty plain language and that there can be such violent disagreement entirely rooted in a partisan manifestation is weird. People have disagreements about interpretations of automotive specifications sometimes, but it is not like there is a pro-four door/anti-four door delineation of reading them. It does make the court seem petty, and I tend to sympathize with the conservative wing on issues like this because the spirit of the document was to limit the powers of the Federal Government, and reading into it otherwise seems like using the Bible to justify child pornography.
As I hear about Roberts' explanation about defending ACA as a tax, I am pretty ok with his reasoning. The powers granted to Congress for taxing are pretty broad and behavior changing taxes (particularly tariffs) have a long history; just because I think Congress can pass a tax, though, does not mean I think it's a good idea. It is not called a tax in the body of the legislation, which to me is immaterial; if they called a future tax whiskey, it would not actually be whiskey and should not get special considerations simply because it is not actually called a tax.
The ACA does not really seem to be a health care reform, it's more of a health insurance reform. It is kind of weird that the discussion always seems to center on the fact that the problem with our medical care is insufficient insurance (which, typically, isn't insurance at all; it's usually a payment plan for medical services) rather than addressing alternative means of access. What I mean is that when I go into the doctor for anything from antibiotics for strep throat or a broken arm, I have no idea what it is going to cost nor what it should cost. (Bear in mind, my wife is also a doctor.) Why has there been no mention of a move towards transparency in costs? By adding more people to insurance, that only gets more muddled, because somebody else is paying for a large share of it. If we knew how much it cost, really, to examine, x-ray, set and follow up on a broken arm, then we could evaluate whether or not something like a 401k model for health expenses would be better, or what it would take to put that kind of control in our hands rather than some corporate accountant.
It also seems weird how excited Democrats are for that control to be given to insurance and pharmaceutical corporations. On Meet the Press, Nancy Pelosi, of course, said the opposite, also while denying it was a tax (even though she conceded that it was clearly granted under the taxing power and would be collected by the IRS). That's kind of a joke. I don't have any particular aversion to corporations playing a role in our society, but it is really intimidating to think that I don't have any idea what to expect to pay for anything. I am going to get my wisdom teeth taken out and I could owe anywhere from $0 to a few thousand, and until they tel me, I won't have any idea how to plan for that.
I was quite glad to see that the majority did say that this is clearly outside the scope of either the commerce or necessary and proper clauses. I am no attorney, but that seemed ludicrous on its face. While it really does nothing to say that Congress could not just frame whatever they wanted to do in terms of a behavior influencing tax, that is much harder politically to implement -- hence this very discussion.
Normally, taxes like this are presented as credits rather than penalties (like home interest deduction or incentives for buying energy efficient windows -- I lose money that would otherwise be on the table for not buying those products), but that distinction is pretty insignificant. Any vote against a tax cut is an effective tax increase, and I think that should work in reverse, as well.
I also do not really get how such a body really does fall down partisan lines every time. Why is there that much latitude, really? The Constitution is not Ulysses. It is largely written in pretty plain language and that there can be such violent disagreement entirely rooted in a partisan manifestation is weird. People have disagreements about interpretations of automotive specifications sometimes, but it is not like there is a pro-four door/anti-four door delineation of reading them. It does make the court seem petty, and I tend to sympathize with the conservative wing on issues like this because the spirit of the document was to limit the powers of the Federal Government, and reading into it otherwise seems like using the Bible to justify child pornography.
Sunday, June 03, 2012
I beg to differ
I know that language is evolutionary and usage tends to trump history. That discourages me for the future, given the pervasiveness of stupid shortening of words induced by email and texting and what not (a friend of mine told me he was "totes jel" over the weekend [totally jealous, I think]; while he was being tongue in cheek, the fact that that is a joke to be made makes me feel like a cranky old man yelling for you to stay off my lawn). The one that seems to get me at a disproportionately high level compared to everyone else I know is begging the question.
It does not, traditionally, mean the same thing as raising the question. It is a logical fallacy where an unstated question of dubious validity is assumed to be true as part of the initial premise. For example, to say that Justin Bieber is better than John Lee Hooker because he has sold more records begs the question that selling records is a valid measure of musical goodness. And yes, I said records.
One that came up while listening to the Slate Political Gabfest (motto: 50 minutes of pretension every week!) was about "fixing" the constitution in response to a Texas Law Professor's blog at the New York Times. The basic assertion is that our government isn't very effective and the Constitution of a big part of why, so let's fix the Constitution so that the government can solve our problems; insisting that making ours more like a Parliamentary system would be preferable.
Now, this begs the question that effective government is a positive outcome. The solutions that we have gotten (especially recently) are not really evidence in favor of this. The complaint that the Constitution is difficult to amend is regarded as a weakness, and I think it is a strength, particularly given the animosity we see right now. This is essentially saying, "Because you disagree with the actions I want to take and the rules let you, we need to fix the rules because I'm smarter than you." It is ironic, too, that we call the people who believe this "liberals" these days.
Political moments like these are precisely the reason that the Constitution should be hard to amend. What would the fixes look like? If it's hard to pass as legislation, why should we want that to be institutionalized more permanently? Remember prohibition? It was stupid.
A lot of the discussion centers on the Senate, which is unrepresentative, by design. This is the only body I think that does need to be reformed. My fix: repeal the 17th Amendment. The direct election of senators has supplanted its whole purpose, which, of course, was to make legislation harder to pass. Everything that government does takes rights or powers away from somebody else. The Senate was supposed to serve as a backstop for the State Governments against the Federal Government, and now it doesn't. Now it's just a weird distortion of the House of Representatives, but with a bigger district. Also, the House districts are too big. The initial district size was 1 representative for every 30,000 people. At current population, there would be 10,000 representatives. Granted, that seems impractical, but at 435, that's way too small.
The biggest thing that irks me, though, is that those who want to strengthen government are driving the discussion so much better than those who are skeptical. The fact that publications can ask, "How do we 'fix' the Constitution" when it is function as intended without being utterly laughable is confounding. That we are discussing the fact that government might not be a never-ending source of benefits is, too.
The position asserted by Slate and Levinson requires a fundamental and dramatic reorganization of what "America" means and I'm just not sure that there's compelling evidence that's necessary, or even preferable if it were. In that same podcast, Emily Bazelon in particular has claimed that both parties are getting more extreme, but especially the Republicans. I don't think I can keep your attention any longer and argue with that, but I'll just say that that assertion, like the larger one about the Constitution earlier, requires using a target for the "center" as moving much faster than the public at large has and try to come back to that in a future post.
So, when we are becoming more divided, legislation is getting harder to pass, and politics is as rancorous as we can remember seems like an odd argument to make it easier to make sweeping changes, rather than harder. I mean, after all, these people bought more Justin Bieber records than John Lee Hooker records.
And progressives are suggesting we trust them to rewrite our Constitution? I beg to differ.
It does not, traditionally, mean the same thing as raising the question. It is a logical fallacy where an unstated question of dubious validity is assumed to be true as part of the initial premise. For example, to say that Justin Bieber is better than John Lee Hooker because he has sold more records begs the question that selling records is a valid measure of musical goodness. And yes, I said records.
One that came up while listening to the Slate Political Gabfest (motto: 50 minutes of pretension every week!) was about "fixing" the constitution in response to a Texas Law Professor's blog at the New York Times. The basic assertion is that our government isn't very effective and the Constitution of a big part of why, so let's fix the Constitution so that the government can solve our problems; insisting that making ours more like a Parliamentary system would be preferable.
Now, this begs the question that effective government is a positive outcome. The solutions that we have gotten (especially recently) are not really evidence in favor of this. The complaint that the Constitution is difficult to amend is regarded as a weakness, and I think it is a strength, particularly given the animosity we see right now. This is essentially saying, "Because you disagree with the actions I want to take and the rules let you, we need to fix the rules because I'm smarter than you." It is ironic, too, that we call the people who believe this "liberals" these days.
Political moments like these are precisely the reason that the Constitution should be hard to amend. What would the fixes look like? If it's hard to pass as legislation, why should we want that to be institutionalized more permanently? Remember prohibition? It was stupid.
A lot of the discussion centers on the Senate, which is unrepresentative, by design. This is the only body I think that does need to be reformed. My fix: repeal the 17th Amendment. The direct election of senators has supplanted its whole purpose, which, of course, was to make legislation harder to pass. Everything that government does takes rights or powers away from somebody else. The Senate was supposed to serve as a backstop for the State Governments against the Federal Government, and now it doesn't. Now it's just a weird distortion of the House of Representatives, but with a bigger district. Also, the House districts are too big. The initial district size was 1 representative for every 30,000 people. At current population, there would be 10,000 representatives. Granted, that seems impractical, but at 435, that's way too small.
The biggest thing that irks me, though, is that those who want to strengthen government are driving the discussion so much better than those who are skeptical. The fact that publications can ask, "How do we 'fix' the Constitution" when it is function as intended without being utterly laughable is confounding. That we are discussing the fact that government might not be a never-ending source of benefits is, too.
The position asserted by Slate and Levinson requires a fundamental and dramatic reorganization of what "America" means and I'm just not sure that there's compelling evidence that's necessary, or even preferable if it were. In that same podcast, Emily Bazelon in particular has claimed that both parties are getting more extreme, but especially the Republicans. I don't think I can keep your attention any longer and argue with that, but I'll just say that that assertion, like the larger one about the Constitution earlier, requires using a target for the "center" as moving much faster than the public at large has and try to come back to that in a future post.
So, when we are becoming more divided, legislation is getting harder to pass, and politics is as rancorous as we can remember seems like an odd argument to make it easier to make sweeping changes, rather than harder. I mean, after all, these people bought more Justin Bieber records than John Lee Hooker records.
And progressives are suggesting we trust them to rewrite our Constitution? I beg to differ.
Sunday, May 20, 2012
Stop Children, what's that sound?
After watching How I Met Your Mother reruns tonight on WGN, the Chicago news came up, covering the ongoing protests of the NATO summit there. The reporter asked the protestors what message they were trying to send and she had to go three deep before anybody had anything meaningful to say: complaining about the Afghanistan War, which was part of the summit's mission anyway. (The first said she was there to hang out because the leaders were having dinner and "we weren't invited" the second guy literally said nothing.)
I don't really sympathize with protestors now, so when I look back at the protestors 50 years ago, like the Freedom Riders and civil rights leaders, I kind of wonder if I'd have been on the right side then. I hope I would have. Looking now, though, I find it hard to believe that history isn't going to look at these people as jokes, if it remembers them at all.
It feels like a disappointment that these people are getting this kind of news, thinking they're changing the world, yet they don't know what they're changing from or to. My generation is awesome.
I don't really sympathize with protestors now, so when I look back at the protestors 50 years ago, like the Freedom Riders and civil rights leaders, I kind of wonder if I'd have been on the right side then. I hope I would have. Looking now, though, I find it hard to believe that history isn't going to look at these people as jokes, if it remembers them at all.
It feels like a disappointment that these people are getting this kind of news, thinking they're changing the world, yet they don't know what they're changing from or to. My generation is awesome.
Sunday, May 13, 2012
From the lion's mouth
I like going to weddings now. It's a party with food and music and drinks and sometimes friends you know and other times friend you know. It's especially good having a built in date, because stressing over whether or not you're serious enough to invite a girl to a wedding, especially if it's far a way, is some jive I just don't need. It just stinks when Dr. Sighted can't make it, because while you can dance to My Humps in a group, Can't Help Falling In Love doesn't really work the same way.
The reception isn't all that's nice about it, though. The weddings themselves are part of what makes them good, too. The ceremony serves as a reminder of the seriousness and sanctity of my own marriage, and how nice it is that Dr. Sighted will be Dr. Sighted forever. (Answer: pretty darn nice.)
We traveled to, of all places, North Carolina for a wedding this weekend (man and woman, of course) and with all the talk that's been going on about the amendment and the Dan Savage video flying around facebook and what not, thinking about my own marriage is not the only heady topic that came up this time.
On the drive up here, Dr. Sighted asked me, "Why do people who aren't [religious] even want to get married anyway?" Hers is a more cynical view that if you are not asking for God's blessing on a permanent union, then what difference does it make anyway, aside from tax and medical conveniences. It really amounts to, I think, that when religious people say the word "marriage" they mean something different than when the non-religious do.
I'm not sure whether marriage was first a religious or civil institution, but the modern Western conception of marriage is clearly so colored by its religious character that it's hard to say it's not a religious one now. Religious marriage is a joining of a man and woman before God that is severable only by death or, in bad cases, "sexual immorality," as per Matthew 19:1-11 (which also is a part where Jesus expounds on what marriage means). For Kim Kardashian, Rush Limbaugh and Newt Gingrich, marriage means something else. And shame on us for letting people like that abuse the institution without calling them out on it.
There is, though, in addition to this religious ceremony a package of civil benefits that goes along with that because it was in the state's interest to encourage this sort of association. That package of benefits got called marriage too because most everyone who got them also did the religious thing, too, so there wasn't really any trouble. I think that we as religious people may have done a disservice to the institution of marriage by allowing the package of associational benefits to be conflated (in name, certainly) with the promise to spouse and God.
The discussion this week has been not just about preventing gay "marriage" but also the package of associational benefits as well in the state I am in right now. I don't think there is really any Biblical basis for a Christian religious marriage between two people of the same sex. I don't really see why there shouldn't be a contractual means for creating a package of benefits for, really, any pair of people for inheritance, medical and some other benefits.
The rest of it -- the dancing, the music, the drinks -- is a celebration mostly for show. Just ask Kim Kardashian. And there has been nothing stopping anybody from throwing a party for any reason they want.
The reception isn't all that's nice about it, though. The weddings themselves are part of what makes them good, too. The ceremony serves as a reminder of the seriousness and sanctity of my own marriage, and how nice it is that Dr. Sighted will be Dr. Sighted forever. (Answer: pretty darn nice.)
We traveled to, of all places, North Carolina for a wedding this weekend (man and woman, of course) and with all the talk that's been going on about the amendment and the Dan Savage video flying around facebook and what not, thinking about my own marriage is not the only heady topic that came up this time.
On the drive up here, Dr. Sighted asked me, "Why do people who aren't [religious] even want to get married anyway?" Hers is a more cynical view that if you are not asking for God's blessing on a permanent union, then what difference does it make anyway, aside from tax and medical conveniences. It really amounts to, I think, that when religious people say the word "marriage" they mean something different than when the non-religious do.
I'm not sure whether marriage was first a religious or civil institution, but the modern Western conception of marriage is clearly so colored by its religious character that it's hard to say it's not a religious one now. Religious marriage is a joining of a man and woman before God that is severable only by death or, in bad cases, "sexual immorality," as per Matthew 19:1-11 (which also is a part where Jesus expounds on what marriage means). For Kim Kardashian, Rush Limbaugh and Newt Gingrich, marriage means something else. And shame on us for letting people like that abuse the institution without calling them out on it.
There is, though, in addition to this religious ceremony a package of civil benefits that goes along with that because it was in the state's interest to encourage this sort of association. That package of benefits got called marriage too because most everyone who got them also did the religious thing, too, so there wasn't really any trouble. I think that we as religious people may have done a disservice to the institution of marriage by allowing the package of associational benefits to be conflated (in name, certainly) with the promise to spouse and God.
The discussion this week has been not just about preventing gay "marriage" but also the package of associational benefits as well in the state I am in right now. I don't think there is really any Biblical basis for a Christian religious marriage between two people of the same sex. I don't really see why there shouldn't be a contractual means for creating a package of benefits for, really, any pair of people for inheritance, medical and some other benefits.
The rest of it -- the dancing, the music, the drinks -- is a celebration mostly for show. Just ask Kim Kardashian. And there has been nothing stopping anybody from throwing a party for any reason they want.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)