China and India talking...

I got this chat transcript off one of the innumerable lists I'm on. I thought it was worth redistributing, as an example of an exchange between citizens of two emerging world powers, representative of conversations that happen every day all over the world, and yet seem to be completely off the radar of American media.

Items that struck me (aside from the dialogue being held in English): the Indian's skepticism about whether or not the U.S. ever actually landed on the moon, the Chinese woman's comments about good jobs in the U.S., the differing perspectives on Iraq, and the environmental consciousness.

Regards,
Thomas Leavitt


Maia: so, bollywood?

blackcranein: no

Maia: is that famous in india

Maia: ?

blackcranein: thats a capitalist industry runs with black money

blackcranein: i would rather do underground

Maia: what kind of films do you make?

blackcranein: docus

blackcranein: i am working on a film on Bombay

Maia: wow, i love documentaries so much

blackcranein: i move around with the camera and shoot every day

blackcranein: i will then make a film on the city and how it is opressive

Maia: cool,

Maia: mostly i watch national geographic

blackcranein: thats very problematic

blackcranein: its from the first world perspective

blackcranein: they show wildlife as some sex and thriller

blackcranein: interested in mating and violence of animals

Maia: but its what truly happened in the nature

blackcranein: i dont think so

Maia: its natural

blackcranein: they want to say survival of the fittest is natural and it should happen with humans also

Maia: yes, evolution

blackcranein: some people say darwinism is dangerous

blackcranein: in the name of evolution first world says that they are smarter and will rule the wortld

Maia: no not like that, evolution is a science

Maia: you are overreacted

blackcranein: animals do not accumulate, they hunt whatever they need for today and that is also natural

blackcranein: but humans accumulate and thats the problem with the world, the greed of humans

blackcranein: they should focus on the environment friendly ness of animals

Maia: that mostly happened in the 3rd world countries, i think

blackcranein: it happens all over the world

Maia: you cant say america is like this, they are doing good jobs

blackcranein: are u sure u are communist, they are killing innocents in iraq and afganistan

Maia: communist is in the sense of a nation's political strategy, and how we should progress, to change social structures, to be stronger

Maia: we china is also learning from america

blackcranein: u mean imperialist in national strategy and communist in the domestic sense

Maia: we hope to make good relationship with every country

blackcranein: why not with iraq and help them

blackcranein: and cuba

Maia: its none of china's business

Maia: if we do so

Maia: it would just cause troubles

blackcranein: i think u need to read lenin

blackcranein: the workers of the world unite

blackcranein: workers of the world are one against all interantionals capital

Maia: rightnow what we need is to pursue economic development, but not conflicts.

blackcranein: one which sees nature as resourse and exploits it

Maia: tahts the most important thing china needs

blackcranein: we need happiness and not goods

blackcranein: are u interested in reading some interesting stuff of what i am saying

Maia: i dont read those stuff, currently what we learn

blackcranein: go to www.swaraj.org/shikshantar and read their vision of the world

Maia: is DengXiaoping's theory

blackcranein: our education is fucked up

blackcranein: read mao

Maia: maoism is old for china

blackcranein: and sometimes communists have also taken environement badly

Maia: what we are learning is a better way that suitable to china

blackcranein: so lets invent new forms of humanism

blackcranein: what about all the nuclear disasters and flood in china causes by playing with environment

Maia: but the main spirit also came from maoism

Maia: we have noticed that

blackcranein: we have to evolve

Maia: although its late

blackcranein: the world has caused major disaster to the world in last 100 years

blackcranein: polluted the soil our rivers

blackcranein: and go on till we realsie that we cannot eat money

blackcranein: we need to reverse it

blackcranein: nature is a loan from future generations and we have to preserve for them

Maia: you know a lot

Maia: i should learn from you, lol

blackcranein: we all know a lot , just have to see around us

blackcranein: but read the site i just mentioned, i just met those people and they are really sensible

Maia: ok, i will, thanks for the link

blackcranein: i feel my school was the worse thing for me

blackcranein: it taught me a lot of nonsense

Maia: same here in china, what they taught are just vacant theoretic things

Maia: but not realistic

Maia: not applicable

blackcranein: it was the worst form of child labour in a way

blackcranein: i read maths by figures, my mother knew it by making dresss for me from a straight cloth and according to my size

blackcranein: school taught me that my native language is inferior and english is good

Maia: bullshit

Maia: every culture is good

Maia: india has very old culture

blackcranein: it is doing this all over the world

Maia: we should reserve it

blackcranein: western education is fuck all

blackcranein: it teaches us that our tradition is bad

blackcranein: now they have started looking at chinese medicne and fengshui

Maia: fengshui?? geeez

Maia: its all bullshit

blackcranein: why

blackcranein: is it bad

Maia: its cult

blackcranein: i dont think so

blackcranein: they make it a cult when the can sell it

blackcranein: but i think their must be some truth

Maia: nobody believes it rightnow

blackcranein: in west they are going mad after it

Maia: i dont know bout that, maybe they are crazy? lol

blackcranein: u know their is a theory that americans didnt go to moon and it was a drama, we believe them but dont trust our traditions

Maia: i dont belive those theories

blackcranein: i bleieve them

blackcranein: why didnt they go again

Maia: why SHOULD they go again

Maia: since its already successful

blackcranein: no why did they go to antarctic again and again

blackcranein: thats one reason why i think they are liars

Maia: because they need to do so, and go to the moon second time is not needful

blackcranein: coz they cant

blackcranein: they would have buy now taken the minerals or whatever or sold the moon

Maia: no need to waste money on unnecessary things

Maia: thousands of ppl involved in the apollo, do you think its funny to make such a lie?

Maia: cheating the whole world?

Maia: no need!!

blackcranein: thousand can go and kill innocents in iraq

Maia: after all, its racism caused all the trouble

Maia: and racism is human nature

Maia: have to admit it

blackcranein: u say this coz u are fed on national geographic

Maia: prob is we have to change it

Maia: to improve it

Maia: but not to hate

Maia: hatred just cause more troubles

Maia: and disasters

Maia: we need PEACE

Maia: dont be involved in the hatred circle

Maia: thats what we need

blackcranein: now u know why the channel is dangerous

blackcranein: the essentialism and darwinism

blackcranein: but u cant change it if u say it si human nature as we are humans and we will do natural things

blackcranein: i am not

Maia: human is not flawless, racism came up when you were born in a stronger nation

blackcranein: but plz for god sake dont say racism is natural

Maia: IT IS, you have to admit

Maia: im not saying everyone is a racist

Maia: but racism

blackcranein: if it is then as humans we have to do natural things only

Maia: is one of human nature

blackcranein: no its not

Maia: im not saying everyone is a racist

blackcranein: then capitalsim is also one and fascism is also one

blackcranein: then its not human not nature

Maia: yes of course

Maia: so that's why we have to change it, nothing is born perfect, including human

blackcranein: but dont call it natural

Maia: being evil is a human nature? of course it is

blackcranein: its not

Maia: it is

blackcranein: being good is natural and we have to bring it back

blackcranein: its not

blackcranein: its not

blackcranein: its not

Maia: ok

blackcranein:

blackcranein: sorry

blackcranein: u have the right to ur opinion

blackcranein: but i think its not

Maia: well, dont have to argue, although argument is a nature too

Maia: lol

Maia: so improve it

Maia: change it

Maia: so, i want to be a progressivist and leftist

blackcranein: we have to resolve conflict

blackcranein: u are progressive and leftist

blackcranein: and nice person and a beautiful human being

Maia: see? that is do what i wanted to say

Maia: you put it well

blackcranein: we are all children of mother earth

Maia: true

Microsoft a cult?

... I have to agree with the poster. Seriously disturbing.

Ballmer obviously needs to work out more.

Regards,
Thomas Leavitt

[email addresses deleted]

From: Dave Farber
Subject: Steve Ballmer
Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 06:42:37 -0500

Wonder if Dave Packard or Andy Grove ever did this? djf



Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 00:40:22 -0400
From: Alexandros Papadopoulos
Subject: Steve Ballmer
To: Dave Farber



Hi Dave!

Have you seen this clip of Ballmer?
http://andrew.cmu.edu/~apapadop/dancemonkeyboy.mpg (3MB)

I find it scary, all things considered.

-A

Separation of what and what?

Jefferson County Treasurer Mark Paschall presumes to tell jurors how they should go about their deliberations. From a story at FOX (yes really) --

The 61-page booklets promote "jury nullification" -- a concept promoted by conservative groups that say juries have the right to not only decide guilt or innocence, but also whether laws are just and adhere to God's law.

"You are above the law!" the booklet says. "As a juror in a trial setting, when it comes to your individual vote of innocent or guilty, you truly are answerable only to God almighty."

Said Paschall: "I want people to understand the form of government that we have and the rights and freedoms that went before. If it raises eyebrows, I think it perhaps ends up waking people up."

Some questioned whether Paschall has a right to distribute the material at a government office, and County Attorney Bill Tuthill said he was looking into the issue.

Riiiiiight! And since when was it the county treasurer's job to instruct the jury anyway? There's only one person whose job it is to tell you what to do, and you call them Your Honour.

Cheese-eating surrender monkeys!!

A sample from writer Susan Sontag's Friedenspreis peace prize acceptance speech, reproduced in The Guardian:

What the Americans see is almost the reverse of the Europhile cliché: they see themselves defending civilisation. The barbarian hordes are no longer outside the gates. They are within, in every prosperous city, plotting havoc. The "chocolate-producing" countries (France, Germany, Belgium) will have to stand aside, while a country with "will" - and God on its side - pursues the battle against terrorism (now conflated with barbarism). According to secretary of state Colin Powell, it is ridiculous for old Europe (sometimes it seems only France is meant) to aspire to play a role in governing or administering the territories won by the coalition of the conqueror. It has neither the military resources nor the taste for violence nor the support of its cosseted, all-too-pacific populations. And the Americans have it right. Europeans are not in an evangelical - or a bellicose - mood.

Indeed, sometimes I have to pinch myself to be sure I am not dreaming: that what many people in my own country now hold against Germany, which wreaked such horrors on the world for nearly a century - the new "German problem", as it were - is that Germans are repelled by war; that much of German public opinion is now virtually ... pacifist.

Were America and Europe never partners, never friends? Of course. But perhaps it is true that the periods of unity - of common feeling - have been exceptions, rather than the rule. One such time was from the second world war through the early cold war, when Europeans were profoundly grateful for America's intervention, succour and support. Americans are comfortable seeing themselves in the role of Europe's saviour. But then, America will expect the Europeans to be forever grateful, which is not what Europeans are feeling right now.

From "old" Europe's point of view, America seems bent on squandering the admiration - and gratitude - felt by most Europeans. The immense sympathy for the United States in the aftermath of the attack on September 11, 2001 was genuine. But what has followed is an increasing estrangement on both sides.

The citizens of the richest and most powerful nation in history have to know that America is loved, and envied ... and resented. More than a few who travel abroad know that Americans are regarded as crude, boorish, uncultivated by many Europeans, and don't hesitate to match these expectations with behaviour that suggests the ressentiment of ex-colonials. And some of the cultivated Europeans who seem most to enjoy visiting or living in the United States attribute to it, condescendingly, the liberating virtues of a colony where one throws off the restrictions and high-culture burdens of "back home".

Just a snippet of an excellent read: check out the rest.

Stovepipe

Seymour Hersh's story in the current New Yorker comes close to the complete ugly picture of the Bush administration's stupid, mendacious and finally very destructive relationship with the US intelligence community. The tiles of this mosaic are gathered from many disparate sources and stories, not previously understood in their totality. It's good Hersh.

The ultimate source of the forged Niger documents may be the missing key -- the grassy knoll, the 18-minute gap -- to Bush's Iraq war deception. Maybe we'll find it. Probably we won't.

Spam

I'm travelling, so when I can get on I'm using a dial-up connection. Yesterday over 24 hours I received 310 spam messages - all having to be downloaded over a slow connection. This morning it was 86, but that's just since I checked before going to bed.

What keeps Generation X awake at night (hint: it isn't "the bomb" or Islamic terrorists)...

Two words:

China

But that GDP is growing at an annual rate of 8%.

[...]

Meanwhile, China is a country coming alive. Shoucheng Zhang, a physics professor at Stanford University who also teaches at Tsing-hua University in Beijing, can't help but notice it when he returns to his native land. "I love to see the young people changing the world, [c]hanging China," he says.

India

After growing just 4.3 percent last year, India's economy, the second fastest growing in the world, after China, is widely expected to grow close to 7 percent this year.

... and, actually another word: "compounding".

What is America compounding?

The national debt (and the amount of interest paid on it annually).

Deferred maintenance on national infrastructure.

The costs of healthcare and the percentage of GDP devoted to it.

The cost of being the world's sole military superpower and wannabe traffic cop.

We see the nation's blood and our children's inheritance being pissed away in Iraq, and we wonder what the future will hold... as the above examples make clear, even in a global econony, our well being, and the opportunities available to us and ours, is dependent on the wisdom and foresight of our leaders. ... although, in the case of India and China, in some ways, it seems as if they are succeeding despite their leaders, as much as because of them. Imagine where India and China would be right now, if they hadn't been hobbled by an authoritarian/collectivist government for the last fifty years.

Being born an American, from 1946, up until now, has been a unique advantage - I'd rather be an American than anyone else, despite all the faults of my country; the level of economic opportunity... but also personal freedom available here is like no where else - not Europe, not Japan, not India or China, not Hong Kong prior to the mainland takeover, or Singapore... I'm worried about whether that will be true, looking back from 2050, whether or not our country will be seen as a bankrupt land that squandered a golden opportunity.

Seeing reports like this leaves me deeply uneasy... developments like this are what George Bush and Congress should be paying attention to, not tinpot dictators like Saddamn Hussein, and the ravings of crazed Islamic fundamentalists like Osama Bin Laden. Screw the war on terror and mirror-shaded CIA spooks hanging out in third-world capitals... I want to see universities being built, scholarships being awarded, grants and prizes being handed out, infrastructure being upgraded, schools being reformed, the moon, Mars, and near earth orbit being colonized.

The U.S. has leaned on immigration to supply technology innovation for the last hundred years... what happens when our comparative advantage in that area dries up, and people quit coming here to stay? 75% of Chinese who came here for an education used to stay; now 75% of them leave. That means three times fewer scientists, three times fewer companies, three times fewer economic side benefits being thrown off...

But, do we see our leaders worrying about this? No - it's the war in Iraq, it's terrorism, it's Internet pornography, it's taxes... it is anything but what really matters for the future of this nation.

Depressing.

Despicable treatment of American military personnel...

Seems to me that we oughta treat folks injured in the line of duty better than this.

"This ballot sponsored by Coca-Cola." (not a joke)

The Charlotte Observer has an article on the South Carolina Democratic Party's latest initiative: corporate sponsored election materials! Apparently their ED got the idea from Iowa Democrats (who're proposing to sell advertising space on a media backdrop to help pay for their caucuses) and decided to take it a step further; they're having trouble raising the funds necessary to put on a primary election (their state, unlike others, makes the party pay for the cost of holding the elction), and this is their solution. Given that it only costs $500,000, you'd think they could dun the various candidates for the nomination for the funds necessary to put it on (or the DNC), in order to avoid embarassment of this type...

I especially love the last paragraph:

[State Democratic Party Executive Director] Erwin brushed off the criticism, saying it would be worse if the primary were canceled. "It somewhat changes the nature of politics, but boy, isn't it consistent with the way things are changing?" he said.

No kidding.

BTW, this arrived in my inbox via a Green Party mailing list... thanks the the help building the party in South Carolina, Erwin. :)

What first came to mind when offered this big, shiny blog Dave built, was, what could I add? In the archives and posts are a great wealth of information. This is the place I've always sent friends who are new to the web.

Then, the question hits me: what are we doing with all these billions of bites of blogged bounty? We can find more information faster than ever before. What are we to do with it? How do we deprogram the propogandised hordes?

First, I'm trying to understood who 'we' are. Roughly half of American households have internet access, and you can bet your booties that it's income skewed. What percentage of that frequents Weblogs? We need to widen the circle somehow...Enter Dean. More on that later...

What we're up against

We stand little chance of changing the tide unless we understand the nature of the monster that ate our government. The unholy alliance between the neocons, radical religious right, and big corporate money is a mighty foe indeed. How we focus our efforts will make all the difference in winning this fight.

This article, 'Noble Lies and Perpetual War' gets at the real underpinnings of the current governing philosophy of the neocons-in-charge. It's an important read, because it highlights the futility of expecting any respect, or fairness, from our self-styled new ruling class. They have no shame and no guilt because they are convinced that the ends justify the means. Here for the visual.
Strauss does this by putting forward the argument that there is a natural ruling class, and a natural dominated class.
Leo also 'legitimizes' the sort of bull that got us into Iraq:

A natural order of inequality

Danny Postel: You've argued that there is an important connection between the teachings of Leo Strauss and the Bush administration's selling of the Iraq war. What is that connection?

Shadia Drury: Leo Strauss was a great believer in the efficacy and usefulness of lies in politics. Public support for the Iraq war rested on lies about Iraq posing an imminent threat to the United States - the business about weapons of mass destruction and a fictitious alliance between al-Qaida and the Iraqi regime. Now that the lies have been exposed, Paul Wolfowitz and others in the war party are denying that these were the real reasons for the war.

So what were the real reasons? Reorganising the balance of power in the Middle East in favour of Israel? Expanding American hegemony in the Arab world? Possibly. But these reasons would not have been sufficient in themselves to mobilise American support for the war. And the Straussian cabal in the administration realised that.

Danny Postel: The neo-conservative vision is commonly taken to be about spreading democracy and liberal values globally. And when Strauss is mentioned in the press, he is typically described as a great defender of liberal democracy against totalitarian tyranny. You've written, however, that Strauss had a 'profound antipathy to both liberalism and democracy.'?

Shadia Drury: The idea that Strauss was a great defender of liberal democracy is laughable. I suppose that Strauss's disciples consider it a noble lie. Yet many in the media have been gullible enough to believe it.

How could an admirer of Plato and Nietzsche be a liberal democrat? The ancient philosophers whom Strauss most cherished believed that the unwashed masses were not fit for either truth or liberty, and that giving them these sublime treasures would be like throwing pearls before swine. In contrast to modern political thinkers, the ancients denied that there is any natural right to liberty. Human beings are born neither free nor equal. The natural human condition, they held, is not one of freedom, but of subordination – and in Strauss's estimation they were right in thinking so.

Praising the wisdom of the ancients and condemning the folly of the moderns was the whole point of Strauss's most famous book, Natural Right and History. The cover of the book sports the American Declaration of Independence. But the book is a celebration of nature - not the natural rights of man (as the appearance of the book would lead one to believe) but the natural order of domination and subordination.(emphasis added)

Needless to say liberal thought is considered a weak inferior. Thus this administration's acting like it's entitled to do as it chooses, being superior and all...

A second fundamental belief of Strauss's ancients has to do with their insistence on the need for secrecy and the necessity of lies. In his book Persecution and the Art of Writing, Strauss outlines why secrecy is necessary. He argues that the wise must conceal their views for two reasons - to spare the people's feelings and to protect the elite from possible reprisals.

The people will not be happy to learn that there is only one natural right - the right of the superior to rule over the inferior, the master over the slave, the husband over the wife, and the wise few over the vulgar many. In On Tyranny, Strauss refers to this natural right as the "tyrannical teaching" of his beloved ancients. It is tyrannical in the classic sense of rule above rule or in the absence of law (p. 70).

Now, the ancients were determined to keep this tyrannical teaching secret because the people are not likely to tolerate the fact that they are intended for subordination; indeed, they may very well turn their resentment against the superior few. Lies are thus necessary to protect the superior few from the persecution of the vulgar many.

So, what kind of power are they accumulating over any potential opposition, threat or undesirables?

Information Clearing House has another article up describing US efforts to data mine every person traveling into or through the US, regardless of their home country's policy on privacy.

"In Europe, data protection laws allow information to be used only for the purpose for which it is collected. America has no such laws. The EU is arguing with America over how to restrict its access to the passenger records of European airlines, but from a position of extreme weakness. America says it will fine air- lines $6,000 per passenger if they fail to provide all the access demanded, and the EU's transport commissioner says he cannot afford to bring air traffic with America to a complete halt."

She goes on to describe the creeping erosion of our basic protections....and describes a situation that is chilling to say the least: detentions without benefit of council or even official charges being placed; development of no-fly lists with no way to determine how a person gets placed on, let alone removed from. Interrogations based on one's political opinion:

"Now ordinary people fall under suspicion for ordinary behaviour. In San Francisco, a retired phone company worker got into a fierce discussion at his gym about the failings of President Bush and the war on Iraq. He was woken several days later by federal agents calling at his apartment to interrogate him about his politics. Last February, a middle-aged defence lawyer in New Mexico was in an internet chatroom when he apparently suggested that "Bush is out of control". Within hours, he was surrounded by police, then handcuffed by Secret Service agents and questioned about whether he was a threat to the president. In North Carolina, a 19-year-old was visited by FBI agents who had been told she had "un-American material" in her apartment. It consisted of a poster opposing Bush's use of the death penalty. She was asked what she knew about the Taliban and questioned for 40 minutes. Her details have been placed on file."

But for an answer for where to look to widen our circle, she continues:

...Yet it isn't these measures that have aroused most public anxiety - it is the government's new power to track, secretly, what people read, research and borrow in public libraries. For the past two years, many libraries have had wall signs warning patrons that the library cannot guarantee their privacy, and may be required to hand information on them over to the FBI.

Much of the anger at this has come not from urban liberals, but from conservative rural communities. Robert Reich, who was labour secretary to President Clinton, told me that the library issue has united ordinary people, libertarians and civil liberties activists. "It's become symbolic of the entire effort to watch us," says Reich. "There's something very personal about library books, and it's too close to George Orwell and the behaviour of totalitarian governments. Americans guard their privacy with a tremendous sense of righteousness and indignation. We hate big government. This country was founded on a suspicion of it."

Maybe there's some use to be had of all the efforts conservatives have made demonizing our government....it would be sweet irony to turn the monster they created against them. Feed the snake it's own tail!

This is also a good indication of where we need to look to start building relationships and bring more support to the fight for sane government, although one wonders how the thought of FBI oversight affects surfing habits. But here is the fertile ground where we need to educate and recruit actively to take away more of those blood red states in 2004.
Time to take another look at Library Juice...

A cowboy comes home

US President George Bush and Prime Minister of Australia John Howard like each other, and there are reasons for that which run deeper than their conservatism and their willingness to substitute power for thought in foreign relations.

Australia is the American West writ large. Both are hydraulic civilisations where aridity dominates the economy.

Indeed, had the United States been settled from west to east rather than the other way around, the big government agencies necessitated by scarce water would have preceded the freeman tradition that took root on the well-watered eastern slopes of the Appalachians in the eighteenth century, and a mild form of hydraulic civilization -- highly centralized and authoritarian regimes, like those that built the great water and earth works in India, China, and Mexico -- might have arisen here.

Australia is the driest continent on the planet, with an average rainfall of around 165mm (6.5 inches). In a certain sense we are that mild hydraulic civilisation Kaplan speaks about. Even now, all our railways and the majority of our telecommunications is governemnt-owned and operated. The 'fair go' has always been central in Australian politics and public enterprise has always been more central to our economy. The ecology ensures that.

The peculiarities of the ecology includes rivers that run intermittently, including the Darling, the second largest river in the country. Last year I found myself looking at a chunk of rusted iron near Menindee Lakes, in the far west of the State of New South Wales.

In 1871 the paddlesteamer Providence tied up at Menindee Town to take on a load of wool for shipment down the Darling, then the Murray to the Southern Ocean. The river went down and stranded the boat for a year. When they cast off, after a heavy night at the Menindee Arms, they fired up the furnace but forgot to put any water in the steam engine. The explosion, a few miles downriver, reduced the steamer to matchwood and threw the boiler tank around 100 metres up the bank. No-one survived.

Although Australians and Westerners share many common myths, the history they have forgotten is the big government agencies and big public investments in water projects without which the market economy simply would not work.

While Howard does not share Bush's cowboy style that's the image he carries in much of Asia. The weird thing about the Howard government is that Howard played much the same music as Bush long before Bush was elected president. The Howard doctrine is an example.

: "It's always a treat for a national leader to have a great policy named after him. There's the Monroe Doctrine (making the Western Hemisphere America's backyard), the Truman Doctrine (branding communism Global Enemy No. 1, to be contained at all costs), and, last month, the Howard Doctrine. As in Australian Prime Minister John Howard. Yet barely a week after the country's Bulletin newsmagazine gave his name to a policy of making Australia the regional peacekeeping deputy to 'globo-cop' United States, the PM was hastily denying parentage of the so-called Howard Doctrine. Evidently, the idea went up like a lead balloon in neighboring capitals, which are hardly leaping with glee over the prospect of battalions from Down Under deploying northward to spread peace and harmony. "

In the last week, there's been a similar fuss when Bush promoted Howard (seriously or otherwise) from deputy sheriff to sheriff. Once again, the joke went over like a lead balloon in Asia. Howard has also endorsed pre-emptive antiterrorist strikes by the Australian Defence Force in Southeast Asia. His government has made a great song and dance about UN 'interference' in Australia. Howard's mobilisation of 11 September and the whole area of security politics makes Bush's use of the issue look half-hearted and amateurish.

The parliamentary library report on the Commonwealth Election 2001 reads:

There are strong grounds for supposing that the election was effectively decided at this point, some time prior to the beginning of the formal election campaign. Within a few days of the Tampa hitting the news for the first time on August 26-27, there seemed to be a marked reaction showing up in the opinion polls. In mid-August Newspoll had found an approval rating for the Government of barely 40 per cent (ALP 42 per cent) , but the figure had risen to 45 per cent in its August 31-September 2 soundings (ALP 39 per cent). This seemed inextricably linked with the Government's determined response to the asylum seeker question, with the Prime Minister's approval rating jumping 10 points to 50 per cent. The September 11 events seemed to build on this, and by late September the Government's approval rating was at 50 per cent (ALP 35 per cent), and Howard's approval rating had climbed further to 61 per cent, the highest level in five years.(20) In early October Professor Murray Goot claimed that overall the different polls were pointing to 'considerable Coalition strength' that was likely to last.(21) Essentially this relative position remained constant during the five week campaign, with the Government remaining comfortably ahead. Early in the campaign the pollster, Irving Saulwick, remarked on the electoral mood as being 'one of conservatism and battening down the hatches',(22) and this seemed not to alter.

Writing in April 2000, journalist Richard McGregor spoke of the Prime Minister and his party needing 'to find positive reasons for people to stick with the Coalition'.(23) By mid-September 2001 the Government seemed to believe that it had found such reasons in the sudden and unexpected turmoil of the times. By early October, election analyst Antony Green's reading of the dramatic events was that so 'drastic and complete' was the turn-around of the previous six weeks, that it was difficult to see how Labor could get itself back in the race, 'let alone return to the lead it previously held'.(24) Labor needed to only win eight of its opponent's marginals but as polling day loomed, it seemed that, apart from the difficulty of winning eight, Labor could not even count on holding all of its own marginals, such as Bass, Dickson, Canning or McMillan.

Howard is sophisticated when it comes to dog whistle politics. Just as Bush announced (in a famously wrong claim) that US foreign policy is not 'subject to the decisions of others', Howard told the electorate, at the height of the Tampa crisis:

we and we alone will decide who comes to this country and the circumstances in which they come. That is a fundamental and absolute right of any Government

That was not about immigration policy, it was about blowing a large dog whistle that immigration opponents could hear but the prime minister could deny.

The Bush visit was originally planned before Bush's standing started falling. It was originally spoken of as a much more dramatic and public event, perhaps with Bush and Howard taking cheers together at the Rugby world cup. It's been trimmed back dramatically and the Australian parliament, under US Secret Service pressure, has closed its doors to the Australian people for the first time in it's centurylong existence.

Howard would almost certainly have committed troops to Iraq no matter what the circumstances. He believes in the US alliance that strongly. With hindsight, his insistence that most ADF troops be withdrawn as soon as the war ended looks like genius. His poll standings have not been battered by the constant drumbeat of casualties and his government is not seen by the electorate as responsible for the aftermath of the Iraq war. Howard's economic management has been better as well, so there are no collapsing job figures to drive his standing down. The federal opposition is simply incoherent. Howard has more going for him than (as Bush famously said) his nonexistent charisma.

They will talk in Bangkok at the APEC summit and again in Canberra during the visit itself. They agree on most issues so I'm not really sure what they will discuss. Howard would like much more access to the US market for our agricultural exports, but otherwise they're in total agreement. They don't remember the real history of heavy public investment in their economies and they certainly do not doubt that force is the key to the War on Terror. Howard is infinitely more flexible than Bush and the imbalance of power between the two leaders is dramatic so Bush will almost certainly get whatever it is he wants. Except an ADF return to Iraq.

When Clinton arrived at Sydney in 1996 most channels carried Air force One's landing to the tune of the Star Wars theme. This visit is a lot grimmer. I'm not sure they'll repeat the joke.

Shocked and Awed

Iraqi children's interpretations of the 'war on terror:'

The drawings were collected over a 2-month period in May and June 2003 at the request of Carl Rosenstein and the Puffin Foundation. The task proved a difficult one due to the chaos and instability created by the war's aftermath. Schools were looted. Teachers, parents, and children became casualties of war. "Real" security was nonexistent despite numerous checkpoints and the heavy-handed crackdown by American forces. My good friend Hayder Mousa, an Iraqi filmmaker with two children of his own, was instrumental in organizing the classroom settings in which these drawings were made.

Assail School is located in New Baghdad, a working-class sector in the south part of the capitol. It had been damaged during the fighting and looted by displaced and desperate locals after the massive bombing campaign devastated the city. When I arrived the school was filled with children trying to return a semblance of normalcy to their lives. Their instructors attempted to teach class despite a lack of books, desks, chairs, and ceiling fans in the hundred-plus degree heat. They taught amidst broken windows, raw sewage, and the specter of continued violence.

It's pleasing to see that the children are supportive of Saddam's being deposed, but it's definitely interesting to note the proliferation of images depicting civilians being harmed.

Boykin apologises: says he's neither an 'extremist' nor a 'zealot'

Boykin insists he's not a zealot:

"I am neither a zealot nor an extremist. Only a soldier who has an abiding faith," said Boykin, deputy undersecretary of Defence for intelligence and war-fighting support.

"I do believe that radical extremists have tried to use Islam as a cause for attacks on America," he said. "As I have stated before, they are not true followers of Islam.

"In my view they are simply terrorists, much like the so-called 'Christians' of the white supremacy groups, or extremist (sic) of any faith," Boykin said.

(...)

In one speech, Boykin recalled a Muslim fighter in Somalia who said U.S. forces would never get him because Allah would give him protection. "Well, you know what I knew, that my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God, and his was an idol," Boykin told his audience.

In his statement, Boykin said his comments about that Muslim fighter "were not referencing his worship of Allah but his worship of money and power; idolatry. He was a corrupt man, not a follower of Islam."

Well, sweetheart, maybe you should have said.

L'image du jour

Welcome to Manilla, Mister Bush!

It Is ALL Astroturf!

Please read Thom Hartmann's article, The Battle Hymn of the New Liberal Media: A Good Business Plan. It talks about how right-wingers came to completely dominate radio. It's not how you think.

"Christian broadcasters have known this equation for decades. Many radio stations will sell 'block time' - entire hours - for a bit less than they'd normally get if they had just sold all the ads on an existing show. The purchaser gets not only all the commercial minutes, but the entire hour to do whatever they want with. Christian broadcasters use that hour to evangelize and beg for money, and if they get more cash from their donors than the hour cost, they keep their show on the air on that station and grow to the next.

One step down are light sponsorships - where advertisers (often Bible publishers) buy one or a few 'seed' ads on a local station, so as soon as the program starts on the station, management knows its downside is limited.

Talk radio has a similar past - and present.

Well-funded syndicates get together and buy block time, put a conservative host on the air, and then find sponsors to pay for it. If the income from the sponsors exceeds the cost of buying the block time, they make a healthy profit. If not, the message still gets spread, Republicans get elected, and the interests of the investors are furthered. "

Richard just IM'd me: "Block time on radio, block book purchases, block form letters from soldiers in Iraq -- it is ALL astroturf." (I stole a line from my own guest blogger!)

10,000 jobs!

Need a job?

My friend David Spector has some really good news! (If you live in India or Russia.)

Randi Rhodes

OK, where have I been? I finally decided to listen to Randi Rhodes.

Wow. She's funny, smart, and prepared. Very New York (even though she broadcasts from West Palm Beach, FL).

And she and a partner are self-syndicating. Meaning she needs you to ask local radio station programming directors to get her on the air. Check out her program, either live or at White Rose.

John Podesta and The Center for American Progress are about to launch...

Dave's been talking to me about Podesta's efforts for almost a year now, so I'm really curious to see whether they're able to make a difference. What they're attempting to do is very similar to what the Commonweal Institute has been aiming at, and talking about, for quite a while. Something, after reading through their materials, that I buy into completely: the "left" (i.e., all of us non-lunatics) has got to build the same type of ideological infrastructure that has enabled the right-wing to saturate the media with their message, and shift the framework for discussion on their core issues far to the right of where it was thirty years ago.

I blogged about this briefly yesterday, on my personal site, in reaction to a NYT Magazine article on their upcoming launch (October 20th, 2003). The main thrust of the article, by my read, was that Podesta, as a member of the Democratic Party establishment, is going to be hard pressed to emulate the kind of paradigm destroying outsider recklessness that propelled the think-tanks of the right to prominence, and enabled them to recast the Republican Party in their image. I think it is a fair point... and of course, as an evil, scabbing, spoiling, vote splitting Green Party member (as Bill the Cat [am I dating myself here?] would say: "Oop! ACK! Thppt!"), my natural inclination is to point to the Green Party's total lack of inhibitions in this area, and say that its a natural to play such a role. :)

But, in respect to Dave's sensibilities, I won't go into that. :)

You can find out more by going to their web site.

Side note: is, like, George Soros the only billionaire who is willing to put his money where his mouth is? I see that he's behind funding for this, and of course he's also dropping $10 million on a broad range of projects designed to oust Bush in 2004.

"We're on a mission from God!"

Saw this item on Dave Farber's Interesting People list (one of the oldest and most prominent agglomerations of "opinion leaders" on the net - I've been subscribed since the early 1990's)... Tony Norman of the Pittsburg Post-Gazette writes about Army Lt. Gen. William "Jerry" Boykin's, uh, interesting opinions about current events. He's apparently writing in reaction to a recent column by William R. Arkin in the Los Angeles Times (also accompanied by a news article) that includes even more choice quotes.

Here are a couple of choice quotes from the man Donald Rumsfeld just appointed to be in charge of chasing down Osama Bin Laden:

"George Bush was not elected by a majority of voters in the United States," Gen. Boykin told an Oregon congregation in a moment of biblical clarity five months ago. "He was appointed by God."

"It is a demonic presence in that city [Mogadishu, the capital of Somalia] that God revealed to me as the enemy," he said, indicting the devil for the murder of 18 American soldiers.

I.e., Satan, whose shadow he apparently detected hovering over Somalia in photographs (and no, he wasn't speaking figuratively - he meant a literal, physical shadow). Mr. Boykin apparently believes it is his mission in life to protect this "Christian nation" from the onslaughts of Islamic fundamentalists and Satan's minions.

As Mr. Norman said, is this the man we want in charge of co-ordinating the effort to hunt down Osama? If this guy sets off the average American's fruitcake detector, what the hell kind of reaction is he going to generate in those Pashtun villiages on the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan, where we've got to win the hearts and minds of some very religiously motivated Muslim folk who are deeply suspicious of our motives?!? We're critical of Islamic fundamentalists who talk about a "jihad" against the West, but then we put a Christian fundamentalist who talks about a Chrisitan "crusade" against Islam in charge of our efforts to track down Osama? This makes sense only in the warped, completely U.S.-centric view of the neo-cons... these folks are even more insular than your old style isolationist Republicans. At least those folks didn't insist on spending America's blood and treasure abroad in pointless exercises of U.S. imperialism for political gain, while remaining devoutly ignorant of worldly reality.

Another Standin (or Standup) Blogedian

Gday, I'm another secret member of the Blogging Proliferation Initiative. I want to have fun with an Aussie's eye view of the US presidential visit as well. I might slam their electoral system a bit too.

But remember, I was not here. This conversation did not take place...

Dave's Coalition of the Willing grows

Hi, I'm Raena -- another guest blogger, checking in from the land down under. I don't often have the energy to publicly put the boot into the US administration, but with Dub-Dub visiting our fair shores this week, who can resist? Besides, we've been promoted from deputy sheriff to a real live genuine Sheriff of the US Peace. Lucky us.

Yes, they'll be closing all the roads that he'll be using, and yes, there'll be big piles of armoured vehicles and medical facilities, and yes, there'll be Marines and Secret Service and Australian Protectives aplenty. The Parliament House will be closed to all visitors and locked down tighter than a safe. There's protests planned, but it looks like they'll be shooed away like usual.

Gutless. Gutless. Gutless. It's called a democracy. Oh well, at least we're not bulldozing our slums.

History News Network

Have you been to History News Network lately?

Dave's a brave man.

Letting his crazy friends natter about in his blog. :)

But, boy, there is sure a lot to rant about... how about The U.S. Army bulldozing Iraqi farmers' orchards? Or the fact that we have to read British media to get the whole story on stuff like that, and the e-voting controversy? How about the growing backlash against the Bush Administration's political interference in the selection of scientific experts on government study panels? Or how the Bush Administration is making sure protestors are completely invisible?

Or how about some lighter fare? Like how utterly pathetic and stereotypically whiny your typical 'winger is? What planet are these people on? I swear, I could write a program to automatically generate this without ever once referencing actual content.

Or, some really serious stuff, like how totally and utterly screwed your average California municipality and county is, after granting unprecedented levels of retirement benefits (discount the 'winger source, the data's solid) during the late 1990's based on absurd projections of expected annual returns by CalPERS pension funds (12-14%?!? what were they thinking?!?)... 40% of base salary for public safety workers going to retirement pension benefits (alone, not counting healthcare, etc). This has our local City Council folk here in Santa Cruz muttering about how the city is going to be forced into bankruptcy.

Anyway, there's a lot to talk about... you're also welcome to visit my personal blog, newly upgraded to the latest and greatest version of WordPress. And now I'll shut up until Dave's gone on vacation (hehehehe...).

Why The FAA?

Commission on 9/11 Attacks Issues Subpoena to the F.A.A.:

"The federal commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks announced on Wednesday that it had issued its first subpoena, to the Federal Aviation Administration, after discovering that the agency had withheld a variety of tapes and documents that were 'highly material to our inquiry.'"

Now what? And this:

The possibility of an extension is worrying to the Bush administration, since it could mean the public release of a potentially embarrassing report in the heat of next year's presidential campaign.

It's all about the campaign and The Party. None of it is about the good of the country or about our safety.

Guest Bloggers Practicing

If you're seeing funny things on the blog, it's guest bloggers trying out the interface. Then taking things down. Or not.

Spam

My spam volume has increased tremendously in the last week. I'm getting in the hundreds again!

Want To Be A Guest Blogger?

I'm going away next week. Anyone want to be a guest blogger? Drop me a line. You have to promise to use bad words, incorrect grammar, and WRITE IN ALL CAPITALS SOMETIMES. Also lots of bold and bold italic. Rants are good. Republicans are bad.

Salon Voting Machines Story

This Salon.com story, Bad grades for a voting-machine exam, talks about how the tests of the systems aren't sufficient and the machines are not necessarily secure, etc...

But you know? None of that matters to me. I don't CARE how much testing is done of whether they tell me the machines are secure. It all boils down to this: If I can't see something on paper that shows how I voted so I can see that it is recorded correctly, and that paper goes into a secure ballot box so it can be counted separately from what the machine says, then nothing they tell me matters. There is no reason to believe or not believe what they TELL me. What I will believe is what I see with my own eyes, and I am a citizen and it is MY vote, and not someone else's place to tell me my vote is OK. I mean, I am the citizen, and I want to know my vote is OK. I want to see it for mySELF. I don't want someone ELSE telling me my vote is OK. It's not their vote, it's MY vote.

And if I CAN see for myself that MY vote is recorded on paper in a separate ballot box, then I don't CARE if the machines are secure or tested. THE SEPARATE BALLOT IS THE SECURITY AND THE TEST.

Smoking

The Secondhand Smoking Gun:

"The citizens of Helena voted in June 2002 to ban smoking in all public buildings — including restaurants, bars and casinos. Soon after, doctors at the local hospital noticed that heart-attack admissions were dropping. So they, in conjunction with the University of California, San Francisco, did a study to measure the potential short-term effects of a smoking ban.

Helena is a perfect place for such a study: relatively isolated, with enough people in the region (66,000) for a meaningful population sample, and only one cardiac-care hospital within a 60-mile radius. So it was easy to control the study sample and methodology: if you get a heart attack in Helena, there's only one place to go for treatment.

The study showed two trends. First, there was no change in heart attack rates for patients who lived outside city limits. But for city residents, the rates plummeted by 58 percent in only six months.

'We know from longer-term studies that the effects of secondhand smoke occur within minutes, and that long-term exposure to secondhand smoke is associated with a 30 percent increased risk in heart attack rates,' says Stanton Glantz, a professor of medicine who conducted the study's statistical analysis. 'But it was quite stunning to document this large an effect so quickly.'

It was also stunning to witness what happened next. The Montana State Legislature, under pressure from the Montana Tavern Association and tobacco lobbyists, rescinded the ban in December. The result: heart-attack rates bounced back up almost as quickly as they dropped."

How close is it to murder, to take money from pro-tobacco interests and rescind a ban on smoking in public places, leading to many deaths? How is that different from murder?

Surprise

Iraq Will Hold Elections in 2004: "The president of the U.S.-appointed Iraqi Governing Council said Wednesday his country will 'definitely' hold elections in 2004."

Probably in October. Surprise!

The Attack on Trial Lawyers and Tort Law

The report The Attack on Trial Lawyers and Tort Law is now available in HTML so you don't have to download a PDF. It's broken up into sections. The endnote references work. Later I'll be adding the ability to click on the endnote itself to take you back to the point where it is referenced.

Here is the Table of Contents, linked into the report itself:

Cover Page, Opening Quote (scroll down) and Table of Contents

Introduction

Section 1 -- Tort Reform Organizations and the Far Right

A Network of Seemingly-Independent Organizations

The Funding Behind the Right-Wing Movement Organizations

Coordination and Interconnection of the Right-Wing Movement Organizations

The Ideology Underlying Tort Reform Arguments

The Political Agenda – Defunding Trial Lawyers

Section 2 -- Reaching the Public, Legislators and Judges

Multi-Issue Think Tanks and Communications Organizations

The Right's Communications Infrastructure

A Broad Campaign, Utilizing Multiple Channels

Coordinated Dissemination of Ideological Messages

The Tactic of Creating Conventional Wisdom

Reaching State Legislatures

Tort Reform Organizations Work to Influence, Elect, and Appoint Supportive Politicians and Judges

Section 3 -- Effectiveness of the Tort Reform Campaign

The Right Sets the Public Agenda

Influencing Jurors

Achieving Their Goals

Section 4 -- Conclusion

Fighting Back

--------------
Appendix 1 -- Example Of Coordinated Dissemination of a Strategic Message

Appendix 2 -- An Example of Interconnectedness

Appendix 3 -- Examples of Ridiculing and Demeaning of Trial Lawyers

Appendix 4 -- Examples of the Involvement and Funding of Right-Wing Organizations ThatAdvocate Tort Reform

Appendix 5 -- Examples of the Involvement of Organizations That Advocate Tort Reform

Appendix 6 -- Examples of State Tort Reform Organizations

Notes & References

If you are forwarding this to anyone, here's the address:
HTML: http://www.commonwealinstitute.org/reports/tort/tortreport.html
PDF: http://www.commonwealinstitute.org/reports/TortReport.pdf

There Will Be A Test

Have I told you how important I think George Lakoff's work is? There is a longer summary (than the one I posted below) in this article, Framing the Dems. Here is an excerpt:

. . . there are distinct conservative and progressive worldviews. The two groups simply see the world in different ways. As a cognitive scientist, I've found in my research that these political worldviews can be understood as opposing models of an ideal family -- a strict father family and a nurturant parent family. These family models come with moral systems, which in turn provide the deep framing of all political issues.

The Strict Father Family

In this view, the world is a dangerous and difficult place, there is tangible evil in the world and children have to be made good. To stand up to evil, one must be morally strong -- disciplined.

The father's job is to protect and support the family. His moral duty is to teach his children right from wrong. Physical discipline in childhood will develop the internal discipline adults need to be moral people and to succeed. The child's duty is to obey. Punishment is required to balance the moral books. If you do wrong, there must be a consequence.

The strict father, as moral authority, is responsible for controlling the women of the family, especially in matters of sexuality and reproduction.

Children are to become self-reliant through discipline and the pursuit of self-interest. Pursuit of self-interest is moral: If everybody pursues his own self-interest, the self-interest of all will be maximized.

Without competition, people would not have to develop discipline and so would not become moral beings. Worldly success is an indicator of sufficient moral strength; lack of success suggests lack of sufficient discipline. Those who are not successful should not be coddled; they should be forced to acquire self-discipline.

When this view is translated into politics, the government becomes the strict father whose job for the country is to support (maximize overall wealth) and protect (maximize military and political strength). The citizens are children of two kinds: the mature, disciplined, self-reliant ones who should not be meddled with and the whining, undisciplined, dependent ones who should never be coddled.

This means (among other things) favoring those who control corporate wealth and power (those seen as the best people) over those who are victims (those seen as morally weak). It means removing government regulations, which get in the way of those who are disciplined. Nature is seen as a resource to be exploited. One-way communication translates into government secrecy. The highest moral value is to preserve and extend the domain of strict morality itself, which translates into bringing the values of strict father morality into every aspect of life, both public and private, domestic and foreign.

America is seen as more moral than other nations and hence more deserving of power; it has earned the right to be hegemonic and must never yield its sovereignty, or its overwhelming military and economic power. The role of government, then, is to protect the country and its interests, to promote maximally unimpeded economic activity, and maintain order and discipline.

From this perspective, conservative policies cohere and make sense as instances of strict father morality. Social programs give people things they haven't earned, promoting dependency and lack of discipline, and are therefore immoral. The good people -- those who have become self-reliant through discipline and pursuit of self-interest -- deserve their wealth as a reward. Rewarding people who are doing the right thing is moral. Taxing them is punishment, an affliction, and is therefore immoral. Girls who get pregnant through illicit sex must face the consequences of their actions and bear the child. They become responsible for the child, and social programs for pre- and postnatal care just make them dependent. Guns are how the strict father protects his family from the dangers in the world. Environmental regulations get in the way of the good people, the disciplined ones pursuing their own self-interest. Nature, being lower on the moral hierarchy, is there to serve man as a resource. The Endangered Species Act gets in the way of people fulfilling their interests and is therefore immoral; people making money are more important than owls surviving as a species. And just as a strict father would never give up his authority, so a strong moral nation such as the United States should never give up its sovereignty to lesser authorities. It's a neatly tied-up package.

Conservative think tanks have done their job, working out such details and articulating them effectively. Many liberals are still largely unaware of their own moral system. Yet progressives have one.

The Nurturant Parent Family

It is assumed that the world should be a nurturant place. The job of parents is to nurture their children and raise their children to be nurturers. To be a nurturer you have to be empathetic and responsible (for yourself and others). Empathy and responsibility have many implications: Responsibility implies protection, competence, education, hard work and social connectedness; empathy requires freedom, fairness and honesty, two-way communication, a fulfilled life (unhappy, unfulfilled people are less likely to want others to be happy) and restitution rather than retribution to balance the moral books. Social responsibility requires cooperation and community building over competition. In the place of specific strict rules, there is a general "ethics of care" that says, "Help, don't harm." To be of good character is to be empathetic and responsible, in all of the above ways. Empathy and responsibility are the central values, implying other values: freedom, protection, fairness, cooperation, open communication, competence, happiness, mutual respect and restitution as opposed to retribution.

In this view, the job of government is to care for, serve and protect the population (especially those who are helpless), to guarantee democracy (the equal sharing of political power), to promote the well-being of all and to ensure fairness for all. The economy should be a means to these moral ends. There should be openness in government. Nature is seen as a source of nurture to be respected and preserved. Empathy and responsibility are to be promoted in every area of life, public and private. Art and education are parts of self-fulfillment and therefore moral necessities.

If you take anything from reading Seeing the Forest, take this. I think Lakoff's work is one key to starting to change what has been going on. We must find ways to reinforce the "nurturant parent family perspective" in the general public, and to diminish the public's acceptance of the "strick father" metaphor. (Why do you think Clear Channel pushes Dr. Laura 3 hours a day on the radio?)

The nurturant parent family is a healthier family than the strict father family. And it is obvious that a nurturant parent country is healthier AND SAFER FOR THE PLANET than the far-right's strict father parent model for the country.

Please read the rest of the article where he lays out ideas for promoting progressive values. This is so important!

Activation of the progressive model among swing voters is done through language -- by using a consistent, conventional language of progressive values. Democrats have been subject to a major fallacy: Voters are lined up left to right according to their views on issues, the thinking goes, and Democrats can get more voters by moving to the right. But the Republicans have not been getting more voters by moving to the left. What they do is stick to their strict ideology and activate their model among swing voters who have both models. They do this by being clear and issuing consistent messages framed in terms of conservative values. The moral is this: Voters are not on a left-to-right line; there is no middle.

Here is a cognitive scientist's advice to progressive Democrats: Articulate your ideals, frame what you believe effectively, say what you believe and say it well, strongly and with moral fervor.

There WILL be a test later. Post in the comments what his last line from the article is.

Why We Vote The Way We Do

I have come to believe that George Lakoff's book Moral Politics holds the key to understanding progressive and conservative politics.

This article, The Frame Around Arnold contains a good summary of what Lakoff is saying to us:

"Our politics is organized around two opposite and idealized models of the family, the strict father and nurturant parent models.

The nurturant parent family assumes that the world is basically good and can be made better and that it is one's responsibility to work towards that. Accordingly, children are born good and parents can make them better. Both parents share responsibility for raising the children. Their job is to nurture their children and raise their children to be nurturers. Nurturing has two aspects: empathy (feeling and caring how others feel) and responsibility to take care of oneself and others for whom we are responsible. These two aspects of nurturance imply family values that we can recognize as progressive political values: From empathy, we want for others: protection from harm, fulfillment in life, fairness, freedom (consistent with responsibility), open two-way communication. From responsibility there follows: competence, trust, commitment, community building, and so on.

From these values, specific policies follow: Governmental protection in form of a social safety net and government regulation (as well as the military and the police), universal education (competence, fairness), civil liberties and equal treatment (fairness and freedom), accountability (from trust), public service (from responsibility), open government (from open communication), and the promotion of an economy that benefits all and functions to promote these values. The role of government is to provide the infrastructure and services to enact these values and taxes are the dues you pay to live in such a civilized society. In foreign policy, the role of the nation should be to promote cooperation and extend these values to the world. These are traditional progressive values in American politics.

Different Family Values

The conservative worldview is shaped by very different family values.

The strict father model assumes that the world is and always will be dangerous and difficult and that children are born bad and must be made good. The strict father is the moral authority who has to support and defend the family, tell his wife what to do, and teach his kids right from wrong. The only way to do that is painful discipline – physical punishment that is to develop by adulthood into internal discipline. Morality and survival jointly arise from such discipline – discipline to follow moral precepts and discipline to pursue your self-interest to become self-reliant. The good people are the disciplined people. Once grown, the self-reliant disciplined children are on their own and the father is not to meddle in their lives. Those children who remain dependent (who were spoiled, overly willful, or recalcitrant) should be forced to undergo further discipline or cut free with no support to face the discipline of the outside world.

Project this onto the nation and you have the radical right-wing politics that has been misnamed "conservative." The good citizens are the disciplined ones – those who have already become wealthy or at least self-reliant – and those who are on the way. Social programs "spoil" people, giving them things they haven't earned and keeping them dependent. They are therefore evil and to be eliminated. Government is there only to protect the nation, maintain order, administer justice (punishment), and to provide for the orderly conduct of and the promotion of business. Business (the market) is the mechanism by which the disciplined people become self-reliant, and wealth is a measure of discipline. Taxes beyond the minimum needed for such government are punishments that take away from the good, disciplined people rewards that they have earned and spend it on those who have not earned it.

In foreign affairs, the government should maintain its sovereignty and impose its moral authority everywhere it can, while seeking its self interest (the economic self-interest of corporations and military strength)."

There's more . . . so much more . . .

"What conservatives have learned about winning elections is that they have to activate the strict father model in more than half of the electorate – either by fear or by other means. The 9/11 attacks gave the Bush administration a perfect mechanism for winning elections. They declared an unending wear on terror. The frame of the War on Terror presupposes that the populace should be terrified, and orange alerts and other administration measures and rhetoric keep the "Terror" frame active. Fear and uncertainty then naturally activate the Strict Father frame in a majority of people, leading the electorate to see politics in conservative terms. "

Vothing Machines

If you want to get really scared by a voting machines story, read All the President's Votes? Even if you don't want to get scared, go read it and get scared.

If you have been looking for the right voting machines story to forward to all your non-political friends to let them know what it is that you have been shouting and ranting and raving about, send them to this one.

Duh!

Study: Price matters for broadband

Billmon Is Un-Endorsing Dean

Whiskey Bar: Deserting Dean

What Have I Been Telling You?

From Notion Building in today's NY Times Magazine, about "think tanks":

Weyrich was 31 when he and Edwin Feulner, then serving as disgruntled aides in a Congress dominated by Democrats, founded the Heritage Foundation in 1973 with early donations from a handful of wealthy families with names like Coors and Scaife. Determined to foster conservative scholarship and get it into the hands of like-minded policy makers, Weyrich and his compatriots were driven by a single, overarching conviction that grew out of the Goldwater campaign in 1964: government needed to be stingier at home and tougher abroad.

Weyrich and Feulner were not interested in securing immediate victories for a Republican Party that seemed to have, at that time, almost no hope of controlling Congress. In fact, many of the ideas they would ultimately champion -- Social Security privatization, school choice, missile defense -- began well outside their party's mainstream. They were insurgents, and they set about staging an ideological takeover of the party, a process that came to fruition sooner than they might have hoped when Ronald Reagan, a fellow outsider, was elected president in 1980.

Today the Heritage Foundation, with an annual budget of roughly $30 million, is like a university unto itself. Its eight-story building houses some 180 employees, and it just completed an addition that has, among other amenities, state-of-the-art teleconferencing, apartments for about 60 interns and a fully wired 250-seat auditorium with its own greenroom. The foundation's in-house scholars are a constant presence on radio and cable TV. (Laura Ingraham, with one of the nation's largest radio followings, broadcasts from a Heritage studio.)

In all, according to a study by the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy, Heritage and other conservative think tanks -- the best known being the libertarian Cato Institute and the neoconservative American Enterprise Institute -- spent an estimated $1 billion promoting conservative ideas in the 1990's. From their ranks sprang some credible academics whose think-tank writings spawned powerful careers, including Jeane Kirkpatrick, the former U.N. ambassador, and Antonin Scalia, the Supreme Court associate justice. There also came a flood of conservative theorists -- like Charles Murray, whose book ''The Bell Curve'' attacked assumptions about racial equality, and John Lott, who proposed that we would be safer if everyone carried a gun -- whose arguments, however dubious, bled indelibly into the public debate.
. . .
The leading candidates spend their time debating questions that were put on the agenda by Republican think tanks, like tax cuts and pre-emptive first strikes, while proposing programmatic variations on old ideas, like universal health coverage and national service -- worthy notions, certainly, but no worthier than they were when Clinton put them forward 12 years ago. "

I cover this in my recent report, The Attack on Trial Lawyers and Tort Law (PDF file). This report talks about the link between the "tort reform" movement and the Right, talks about the Right and their funding, their communications infrastructure, and how they use it.

Just Not Getting It At All!

In this story in today's New York Times, Working to Spin Distrust of Media Into Votes there are further examples of New York/Washington media professionals just not "getting it." Writing about Howard Dean's appearance on Meet the Press:

"Barbara Levin, a spokeswoman for NBC News, said Mr. Russert was only doing his job. 'When Russert asks tough questions of Democrats, they don't like it. When he asks the tough questions of Republicans, they don't like it either.' "

Well, no, that's NOT what has people upset. Not at all. What absolute crap!

People were upset about Tim Russert's treatment of Howard Dean on Meet the Press that day not even a little bit because Tim Russert asked tough questions. Bullshit. People were upset because Tim Russert and the rest of the mainstream media pounded Clinton through his entire term, and do not ask Bush tough questions, and make excuses for Bush's lies and distortions! Dean did fine answering the questions. When Russert implied that Dean hadn't answered questions about the military correctly, it turned out later that Dean had his numbers right. The point is that Russert would never ask Bush or any other Republican a tough question, and would never imply that they aren't serving the country with their answers.

After YEARS of pounding on Clinton, "reporting" every nonsense right-wing smear story as "news" and DEMANDING investigations, and putting hoards of far-right commentators on the screen without comparable progressive voices, (and never, ever a Labor voice!), and letting The Party get away with every single nonsense right-wing crapola propaganda effort, now they have given Bush a totally free ride. I mean how obvious can it BE? To people who pay attention and have memories, the situation with the mainstream media is intolerable. THAT is what pisses us off.

I'm getting angrier as I write this. I mean, Holy shit, Clinton was accused by right-wingnuts of losing some money in a real estate deal, and the press hounded him and his wife and everyone they knew, even accusing them of murder, always implying that they were lying about everything, to the point of impeachment, when even the far-right's massively funded investigations -- utilizing so much of the FBI's resources that they stopped investigating terrorists like Bin Laden -- found them COMPLETELY INNOCENT OF EVERY SINGLE ACCUSATION. Only at the end, as a byproduct of the investigations, did they learn that the President had an affair. Big deal. And meanwhile, every one of the Republicans involved in going after him for having an affair turned out to be having affairs!

But Bush comes along, was involved in blatantly lying, and in illegal and unethical activities like insider trading, involvement with a company setting up offshore tax havens, stealing land to build a stadium that made him rich, involvement in his company reporting revenue from the sales of a subsidiary while hiding that the company itself PAID for the purchase... (How long could I go on with the list of Bush's illegal and unethical activities - not to mention deserting his National Guard post in a time of war?) And what do the mainstream press say about Bush? What does the public learn about this man's background? What does the public learn about this man's promise to "restore honor and integrity to the White House?" This man associated with Enron and their crimes, and given the responsibility to investigate and prosecute all the corporate crimes we are subjected to? What does the press say about him? Instead of reporting on this man's background, they spent the entire 2000 campaign calling ex-seminary-student GORE a LIAR!

It is just so fucking obvious, the difference between how Clinton was treated by the press then, and how Bush is treated by the press now! But instead of REPORTING what is GOING ON, we get stories like the one in today's New York Times saying that it's just Democrats complaining when they get asked tough questions, just like Republicans complain when THEY get asked tough questions. As if the last 10 years just didn't happen. Give me a fucking break! JEEZE!

Get THAT!

(OK, Dave, go out for a run. Calm down.)

A Conversation

An instant messaging exchange, about the Hartmann Radio Show, Friday, between me (STF) and another guy (OtherGuy): (editted to make us look better)

OtherGuy: hartmann was talking to krugman, who was cool until the end when he said the usual (employed economist) bullshit about there being new jobs to replace all the exported ones. (WHY do otherwise intelligent, skeptical people believe that absolute crap?)
STF: Because he's a professor and he has tenure.
OtherGuy: yeah, but I assume that some equations work out to prove it too. I wish I had the time and inclination to prove why these equations are flawed.
STF: other than using our own eyes?
STF: Brad DeLong's site goes on about this as well.
OtherGuy: usually when your own eyes contradict equations it turns out your eyes are being tricked. or the equations are based on some very subtly wrong assumption.
STF: Here's how I worked out the problem once: The idea is that you take a $100,000 job, and send it to India where the worker is paid $10,000. That means you have $90,000 more in your economy to invest or buy stuff.
OtherGuy: yes, but everything is more efficient!
STF: So your loss of $100,000 consuming power is balanced by the purchase of $10,000 from you by the India guy, AND the $90,000 extra for investment or consumption here. BUT that doesn't work if instead some rich fuck POCKETS the $90,000 and puts it in a swiss bank - which is what IS happening. The concentration of wealth cancels out the beneficial results of that extra $90,000 AND nothing at all says that $10,000 WILL come back to the US resulting in exports
STF: at least in our lifetime.
OtherGuy: except for literally putting the money in the mattress, "just pocketing" is a myth. yeah, the lag time is the problem.
STF: Well, if the money goes out of the US, it helps the Swiss or Caymans prosper, which is supposed to also come back to us. Eventually. But, again, not in our lifetimes.
OtherGuy: and the fact that entire industries seem to be wiped out almost instantaneous. the one question NONE of these people can ever answer is : "What do I retrain FOR?"
STF: Yeah, retrain, to become a different cog in the machine. Your only value in America is the extent to which you can serve as an economic unit, making some rich fuck richer.
STF: Another problem is that Mexico is losing jobs to VietNam and VietNam is losing jobs to Cambodia and Cambodia is losing jobs to China.
OtherGuy: Exactly. and as hartmann always points out that global capital is (now) almost completely free to move anywhere instantly, whereas labor is stuck where it's stuck.
STF: On the macroeconomic scale it's a wash. But it doesn’t take into account WHO benefits. Like the room where there’s a hundred people, and Bill Gates. On average that is an extremely wealthy room full of people. Never mind that 99 of them are starving.
STF: It is a downward spiral. A free market in labor in a world with too many people is necessarily a formula for worldwide poverty.
OtherGuy: yup
STF: If the market is completely free and "clears rapidly" the consequences NECESSARILY are that wages reach subsistence AFTER enough people have starved, leaving just enough workers for the jobs.
OtherGuy: It's really very depressing to know that there is nothing I can do that will prevent me from continuing in relative poverty for the rest of my life. [Note - OtherGuy is a programmer.]
STF: Until enough people have starved off, of course the wages don't NEED to be at subsistence level. You only need to pay enough that someone will take the job and starve slower than the rest.
OtherGuy: eat the fucking rich!
OtherGuy: and EVERYONE (except a very few rich fucks) would be better off.
OtherGuy: Revolution. heads on pikes!
STF: In such an economy, where the unemployed are starving off, and employers are only paying a penny or so a day until enough people have starved, leaving just enough people remaining to do the jobs, a person with extra fat on his body has the advantage over a thin person, because the thin person will die of, and the person with fat will live long enough to outlast the labor surplus
OtherGuy: that's my plan!
OtherGuy: (being fat)
STF: You're way ahead of the game
OtherGuy: heh
STF: you are one of the elite few who will survive
STF: survival of the ...
STF: wait for it...
OtherGuy: heh
STF: fattest
OtherGuy: yay!
STF: I think I should blog this

Moral of the story: Who is our economy FOR, anyway?

Spam Propaganda Letters

Atrios found this: Google Search: "I have been serving in Iraq for over five months now"

Discouraged

Maybe I haven't been writing as much lately because I just feel overwhelmed and discouraged, and that it's useless to keep pointing things out. For example, these two stories, about items released by the Bush administration on Friday afternoons - so that the stories are "buried" and the public never hears about them. First, U.S. May Expand Access To Endangered Species:

The Bush administration is proposing far-reaching changes to conservation policies that would allow hunters, circuses and the pet industry to kill, capture and import animals on the brink of extinction in other countries.

And this, also released late Friday, Bush eases mining rules:

The Bush administration announced Friday that it would start allowing companies that mine gold, silver and other precious metals as much public land as they need to help them develop their claims.

I often say that one way to learn about Republicans is to listen to what they accuse others of, and then realize that their tactic is to cover their OWN motives an actions by accusing others of those very things. (Another long, convoluted sentence. Does this one get the prize?) For example, they were accusing Clinton of being corrupt and immoral -- and now look at the Bush administration, the most corrupt and immoral in history. Or how about Bill Bennett being the "morality" guy? And, of course, Mr. Judgement himself Rush Limbaugh.

What I'm getting at is, they accuse everyone else of being evil...

So they have this tactic of releasing news like this on Friday afternoons so the story gets "buried" in weekend WORKS. How do we get the public to understand that things like this are happening? I hope everyone reading this is doing all they can to get people reading online news sources like BuzzFlash, and weblogs like this one!

Keys

Y'know, if you always know where your keys are because you always put them in the same place, and then one day you can't find them no matter where you look, it's better to remember BEFORE you call your wife demanding to know where she hid them, that you bought one of those little USB storage devices and put it on your keychain, and now it's plugged into the back of your computer.

Also, this is longest sentence contest day.

Mapping Votes by County

style.org > Mapping Votes by County.

Just go look.

Update - Now go look at Billmon's maps!!!!

Voting Machines and Working At The Polls

One of the things I have learned from working at the polls on election day for the last couple of elections is the way they safeguard the ballots. There are fairly extensive procedures for making sure that all of the ballots are accounted for and only those ballots marked by actual voters are counted.

In California's San Mateo County they use optical scanning equipment. The voter is given a paper ballot. The voter marks the ballot by completing a thick line next to the choice the voter is to make. For example, for the recall there are two choices, YES and NO. The voter sees something like the following:

YES  <<===    ===



NO   <<===    ===

The voter uses a special pen to connect the line next to the voter's choice.

Before the ballot can go into the ballot box, it passes through a scanning machine. If there are any problems with the ballot, like an overvote or an incorrectly marked choice, perhaps by circling instead of drawing the line or writing in a name as well as marking it -- problems like we heard about in Florida -- the ballot is rejected and the voter has the opportunity to try again. If the ballot is accepted it drops into a locked ballot box and can be used in a "hand count" to check whether the machine correctly tabulated the voters' choices.

When the polls close there are special procedures for making sure that only the voters' choices are counted. There are several "judges" who must independently verify several things. The number of ballots received before the polls opened must match the number voted, spoiled or remaining to be voted. The number voted must match the number of signatures from voters who showed up and voted. The marked ballots are guarded using special procedures, and are taken to the central counting location in one car with another judge in ANOTHER car following to make sure that those ballots make it there with no funny business along the way. Many other procedures are in place to guard against any kind of fraud or mistake.

Having experienced all of these procedures makes it all the more difficult for me to understand how any voting machine company would even THINK of trying to sell a voting machine that did not allow the voters a way to ascertain that their votes are correctly tabulated! How could they even imagine that any election official would do anything but laugh at the idea of purchasing and using such a machine? By the same token, it is inconceivable that any county election official would EVER have allowed such machines to be used!

Yet, we have voting machine companies that refuse to offer -- and receive the extra revenue for -- voting machines that provide the voter with a ballot they can look at that is clearly marked with their choices. And we have election officials who accept these machines and tell the voters to "just trust us."

It is my opinion that any election official that shows so little respect for the sanctity of the voting process that they would accept a machine that does not allow the voter a way to be sure that their vote is correctly counted and backed up should not be allowed to continue in that office! That official is in the wrong line of work, and needs to go be a realtor or something.

Fortunately, awareness of this issue is spreading. People are learning of the dangers of these new electronic voting machines that do not have a way for the voter to double-check that their choices are correctly tabulated. Already enough people are aware of the problem that I do not expect that election results from these machines will be accepted. Soon I expect that the public will demand that their election officials respect the need for procedures that reassure the public that their votes are correctly counted. Just telling the public to trust the machines is not enough.

Views Of The Media

This depressing Gallup Poll confirms what my own research has shown me. In the early 70's the Right started a well-funded campaign to push the public to the right. Telling the public that the media are liberal is just one part of the strategy. You can trace the specific funders and organizations involved. See this and this [large PDF, html coming soon] and the How They Do It series.

In the Gallup story, scroll down to the chart that shows public perceptions of the media over time:

"Gallup first asked Americans about their trust and confidence in the media back in the 1970s, but stopped at that point and didn't begin to use the question again until 1997.

There was a clear change in views of the media between these two periods of time. About 7 in 10 Americans said they had a great deal or fair amount of trust and confidence in the media in 1972, 1974, and 1976, perhaps reflecting public approval of the news media's role in uncovering the Watergate abuses of power. When Gallup picked up the question series again six years ago, however, the trust levels had fallen to the mid-50% range."

The Right's campaign really got going in the early-mid 70's, after the Heritage Foundation was started in 1973. It was well underway by the time Carter was President -- reflected in his "Malaise Speech," as I wrote about in this post. Looking back, the Right's attacks explain a lot about how Carter's presidency proceeded and is perceived now. Think about what is said about Carter, through the lens of knowing what they did to Clinton.

And think about the tremendous influence they now have on the public, 45% of whom think the media is "too liberal."

Splitting the State

I think this map shows some of the best boundaries for splitting California into two states, as has been discussed over the years.

What Were We Thinking?

This story, Leaker May Remain Elusive, Bush Suggests:

"President Bush said on Tuesday that he was not sure whether the Justice Department would determine who disclosed the identity of an undercover C.I.A. officer to journalists, but he pledged to provide investigators with "everything we know."

For a few minutes last week some of us thought maybe this time would be different. Maybe this time the press would get involved. Maybe this time a Bush crime would be exposed. Maybe this time there might be an honest investigation. Maybe this time something they had done would "stick" and the public would demand answers.

I mean, this was SERIOUS SHIT. The Party actually outed an undercover agent working to stop WMDs, as revenge for criticizing The Party. Serious consequences - the possibility of dead informants and agents, exposure of the network of companies and other covers the CIA used, and, of course, most importantly the WMD she was trying to stop now able to find other ways into the hands of those who would use them against us. Can't get much simpler and clearer than that.

What were we thinking?

The press was only waiting for The Party to feed them their new line -- there are lots of leaks, mushy liberals and the press are usually the culprits, and the President wants to stop these terrible leaks. The headline of today's story in the San Jose News, for example, presents Bush as the hero of the whole affair and the press as the bad guy: "Bush eager to find leaker":

Bush said he is eager to discover the identity of those who disclosed the name of CIA operative Valerie Plame, who is married to former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, a prominent critic on Bush's Iraq policy. . .

Bush said, ``Everything we know, the investigators will find out,'' but he told reporters: ``I have no idea whether we'll find out who the leaker is -- partially because, in all due respect to your profession -- you do a very good job of protecting the leakers.''

What were we thinking? The system isn't going to stop them because they ARE the system now. The Supreme Court is the system, and the Supreme Court put The Party in total control of all of the branches of our government. The Justice Department isn't going to investigate this - the Justice Department gave them a day's warning that they are going to ask for documents. The FBI is little more than the investigative branch of The Party - they're the ones who put all their resources into investigating Clinton instead of al-Queda. The Courts are now dominated by Federalist Society drones. The Congress refuses to look into this, but the Congress is run by The Party. And the press...

See the forest - these are the people who marketed tobacco to our kids. They are GOOD AT THIS. They convinced people to kill themselves and blame themselves for it, but first to hand over their money to them.

It's over. It's not just over but it was OUR FAULT and THEY ARE THE HEROS.

A Long-Ass Day

I just got back from working at the polls. All I can say is 6am to 9:30pm is one long-ass day. We were short-handed so I got one 20 minute break to run and get a sandwich.

Tuesday

Tuesday I am working at the polls. I have to be there at 6am, and probably won't be back home until after 10pm. Don't wait up for me.

DNC Voting Machines Resolution

Here is the relevant section of the DNC's resolution. There are a nuber of "Whereas" clauses, and a few "Be It Resolved" clauses, and this:

"BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the DNC goes on record demanding that all electronic voting equipment used in public elections must incorporate an accessible voter-verified paper audit trail as soon as practical, but in no case any later than the November 2004 general election."

Make these donuts with extra grease. This batch is for the chief of police.

Does anyone remember a tune from the early 80's that was a lot of guitars strumming a monotonous tonal thing for a long time, and then, just once, lyrics, shouted, "Make these donuts with extra grease. This batch is for the chief of police!" and then guitars again for a long time?