Letters to the Editor
-
Empirical reality bites them in ass again
The nice thing about this one, is that there is no ambiguity to these polls. The overwhelming consensus is "keep on investigating until you get the truth"
Glenn (Greenwald) didn't even have to do anything particularly talented here - just note what these morons say, then note the polls proving them completely wrong. Beautiful.
The irony is that the Republican movement has spent years and years fostering an ever deeper distrust of government, culminating in the Clinton years. Now they are shocked that the beast of their creation is attacking them. Nobody believes the president anymore when he says "I'm hiding this for your own good." That the Bush Administration is a criminal empire helps of course, but I suspect even if they were squeaky clean, there would be substantial public distrust and support for investigations.
-
Something came up
While I was eating breakfast with my significant other this morning. I read the piece by Philip Bobbitt that William Timberman alluded to on another thread this morning (The Warrantless Debate Over Wiretapping), I read the other one by Ross Terrill. Oh, yeah, and we had had a conversation last night about the contention (on another thread here) that the pollsters never ask follow-ups, and so never get to the meat of the issue.
The crack in the ice was this: My wife (career professional at things like polls and surveys) said the underlying reason for this is because they are cutting costs. Each question on the poll is very expensive. The polling companies are given marching orders of the form, "We want you to find out..." list of questions + "We want a poll that costs...". So it's just like the person who explained the White House Press Corps behavior by telling us that each question brought into the room is carefully honed by a board back at the office, so there isn't room for follow-ups because they want the answer to the questions they brought.
Cascade -- during, between, and before and after sleep, maybe good, maybe trash.
The Terrill and Bobbitt Op-Eds need to be read as a unit. It will show something extremely interesting. Bobbitt is using his Columbia tenure and a couple of National Security quasi-credentials to get printed, to get taken seriously. In actual fact, each paragraph is from a litany of talking points that I've seen shooter242 enunciate weeks ago, and much more succinctly. This isn't a snide comment. The points were made here exactly, not approximately, and made in a paragraph or two. It there was as much prize for elegance here as there is in the mathematics community, shooter242 would get the tenure at Columbia and Bobbitt would be out on his head. The NYT confused prolix and substance.
By contrast, Terrill's piece is a breath of fresh air to anyone who visits China, and in particular Beijing, can speak at least conversationally with the people on the street, and wanders around a bit. It's not a vision of "The New China" that's either popular or commonly expressed. And for the first time I've seen in print, he begins to draw a picture of just how much China believes is riding on the 2008 Olympics. The article has substance, it's informative, and it occupies the same column space as Bobbitt's, with a bio that says he is a guy at Harvard who wrote a book.
We can't make decisions without information, and it is getting alarming how odd our information is, all of it, and for how long it has been that way. And politicians can't decide which is the real view of what the people want without information, either.
There are three things going on in Washington that lead to lack of spine:
1) When to top off the defense budget?
2) Is every word available for projecting image?
3) What did 70% approval for Clinton during impeachment mean?
The first explains the reluctance of the Democrats to move on issues like Iraq, FISA, and others. For at least 60 years, and perhaps much, much longer, you could never go wrong voting an increase in defense. You could go wrong voting a decrease, if we got attacked. That made it a no-brainer. It has lots of corollaries, for instance, you can never collect too much intelligence; when in doubt, classify; always nominate the vet.
But for the first time in this country's history, one party (at least the rank and file, but others too) believes the defense budget is too big, that we fight too many wars, that our foreign policy is too military. The question of how much is too much has never been answered before. The Republicans still do not have to deal with it, their imperial goals still require it to be bigger, so for them the question is as it always was, and those who want to stop growing the military/intelligence might of the country can be dealt with forthwith. For the Democrats, in an age when every big decision needs a 20 second sound bite, it's a huge risk and a complex problem.
The second question also plagues Democrats more than Republicans. Republicans as far back as 1994, maybe earlier, embraced what in past generations might have been called a "political theater" attitude towards every word and action. They adopted an agenda they believe is perennially correct, and that freed them to use every word, every gesture, every candidate, and every issue as a political weapon. It isn't necessary to tell the truth, for instance, if the purpose of the speech is to convince the public to support something you know in your heart to be right. Neither do contradictions matter, that was what the public needed to hear then, this is what they need to hear now. For the Democrats, this issue is also a major problem, because the means, not the ends, are their agenda. So you watch on countless political occasions, they chafe with their marketers, look wooden saying things they don't believe, and lose and lose and lose. Everytime a group forms that believes in the Republican view of political theater, like the DLC, they are reviled by Democrats in their hearts whether or not they win elections.
The final question is what is at the heart of the timidity on investigations. The take home message to Democrats is: You can't listen to your marketers only half the time. Either abandon your ideals and do the political theater, or hold to them and ignore your marketers. Only in a world where everything is part of your brand, where everything is image, where every waking move is marketing does the viewpoint that says, "Don't investigate and impeach, look what happened with Clinton" make sense. If you hold to your beliefs, there isn't a comparison between an impeachment investigation now, and the one that happened to Clinton. But ignore the marketers on one of their most adamant points? Again, all is risk and doom.
I think that this, more than any theories about secret loves of Democrats (for this or that industry, for war, for unlimited presidential power) is why they act like they do. They fear the way the press will carve them up, and they are right to fear that. But in the end, what they need to do is to ignore the press and follow their hearts. Their hearts say the military has gotten so big it fights wars that don't need to be fought, and intelligence too invasive. Their hearts say that truth and what's right matter and the marketers need to be sent packing. Their hearts say the administration has committed impeachable offenses.
They'd be well off to remember that the media also likes "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" and politicians who follow their hearts. That movie still sells soap!
-
Bebop-o
I love the ocean. Thanks for sharing the salt spray with us and come back to us when you can. We miss your voice here.
-
Wishful thinking
I suspect one of the motives that impels right wingers to make up the "too many investigations" reason for Democratic unpopularity is they just hope so much that it be true. Given the Democrats penchant for accepting the right wing meme and going into cower mode, who can blame the Glenn Reynoldses of the right wing fog machine for trying the gambit again?
-
I am kind of getting tired of them though
Mainly because there haven't been any really hard hitting repercussions or results. The only effect has been people quietly slipping out the back door. And while I'm glad to see them leaving, it's at the tail end of it all. I'm afraid everyone's attention is going to turn very soon to the next Presidential elections and all will be forgotten, no justice will have been served.
-
Nice summation, ondellete
You're right. Our information is odd because its purveyors are dishonest. What they tell us always smells of the lie, even when it obscures the truth, and therefore prevents us from acting on it.
As far as the liars' purposes go, I suppose confusing us is as good as convincing us, but an entire society which lives in a propaganda (marketing) fantasy is doomed, the liars no less than the honest folk. In the meantime let us do the best we can, as Glenn does, and above all avoid irony, which, when all is said and done, is a religion of the weak.
-
Every Single Time.
Over at The Poorman Institute (Freedom & Democracy & A Pony), there's a post about this article ("Glenn Greenwald Is Making Sense") which quotes and supports Glenn's critical point:
Thus, the only rational conclusion is ... the weaker Congress is in defying the President, the more unpopular Congress becomes.
I was a little surprised by the number of replies of the "Don't you bash the Dems! Don't you DARE!! stripe -- so, I added this comment:
Often, I wonder if what Greenwald describes isn’t the result of the general Beltway Effect.
Wings of political parties, lobbyists, members of Congress, industry and the military; the foreign policy “community”, journalists and pundits, have created a separate dimension in D.C. Crossing over the District line, it's mandatory to suspend all disbelief, as if you were about to step into a poorly-written historical drama.
Actually, it’s more like a bad episode of the original Star Trek: The inhabitants of a beautiful, capital city of a planet live in a separate reality, which has no real bearing on events outside the boundaries of their town.
Receiving no response to hailing, Kirk and Spock beam down, and tell the leadership of the political parties in the capitol that a Giant Thing From Space is bearing down on them; they need to take action and the Federation can assist. Already, their fellow citizens elsewhere on the planet are beginning to suffer.
However, the political leaders in the beautiful city chuckle, knowingly and politely: How absurd. Then, when Kirk insists, they turn tough — they have important things to decide. Politics is a delicate game of posturing and action — so many people depend on what they do for their livelihoods! Plus, there’s Quatloos to be made! and reputations to uphold! and power to be wielded!
Kirk and Spock end up in a cell; what the people in the capitol think is important is only true for them, and a few thousand others.
KIRK: It’s senseless, Spock — there’s a thing the size of a solar system heading this way, and all they can really think about is — Quatloos!
SPOCK: Fascinating, Captain.
Until the scales fall from everyone’s eyes about the true price being paid for the incestuous circle-jerk which appears to seduce everyone in Washington, at some time or other -- we can expect that the giant thing from space will get us. Every single time.
-
I am also for jail time
For traitorous Chief (and Vice Chief) Executives of any country.
Also for their corrupt Attorney Generals.
-
Why do pundits make these claims?
Ask Camille Paglia - she made that exact claim in her latest vomit-onto-a-page performance art.
I suspect it is mostly ego. I like Butterscotch Ice Cream so clearly everyone else must too.
-
Beltway platitudes
That could be your next book I think.
-
Good AP article actually at TPM:
Link is my signature:
Democrats pursue agenda with inquiries
When Their Bills Fail in Congress, Democrats Pursue Their Agenda With Inquiries
CHARLES BABINGTON
AP News
Congressional Democrats are using subpoenas and other investigatory powers to expose Bush administration missteps and push for policy changes even as they struggle at times to enact legislation.
...
Congress' oversight and investigative powers are especially vital to Democrats because a potent GOP minority in the Senate has kept them from passing legislation on issues such as immigration and an Iraq withdrawal plan.
"Maybe it's even more important than legislation," said Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., a key player who chairs the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.
see the rest at the link, but in short, he gets pretty much everything factually correct, and even points out the positive progress the investigations have brought.