Category: Criticism

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Barack Obama Criticism National Security The Bush Legacy The Opinionsphere The War on Terrorism

Glenn Greenwald’s Civil Libertarian Propaganda

[digg-reddit-me]Last week, Glenn Greenwald felt compelled to make the same basic point that Jack Goldsmith did back in May just before the dueling speeches by Cheney and Obama – that the Obama administration’s national security policies do not make for as sharp a break from Bush’s as they have been portrayed. As Goldsmith described the similarity:

[T]he Obama practices are so close to the late Bush practices is that the late Bush practices were much different than the early ones. In 2001-2003, both fear of terrorism and Bush unilateralism were at their height. But in the last six years, the terror threat has appeared to fade (at least to the public), and Congress and the courts have engaged on terrorism issues, pushing back on some, approving others, and acquiescing in yet others…In these and many other ways, U.S. terrorism law looked wholly different at the outset of the Obama administration than in 2001-2003. The law was much clearer in 2009, and there was much greater consensus–across political parties and the branches of government–about permissible policies and their limits. Many Obama policies reflect that consensus.

Goldsmith doesn’t mention another relevant fact about the Bush administration’s approach – that even as it scaled back the vast powers it asserted in the aftermath of September 11 and rolled back certain practices, it was careful to never admit a mistake or repudiate the extreme measures it had used. At the same time, even to the extent that it did do so, the Bush administration had no credibility because they had lied about what they were doing in the first place – from warrantless wiretaps to torture.

Greenwald though omits this vast change of behavior between the worst practices of the early Bush administration and its later years. Because to bring that up would undermine his propagandistic purposes which involves attacking Obama. See what I mean:

This leads to a more general point:  when it comes to uprooting (“changing”) the Bush/Cheney approach to Terrorism and civil liberties — the issue which generated as much opposition to the last presidency as anything else — the Obama administration has proven rather conclusively that tiny and cosmetic adjustments are the most it is willing to do.  They love announcing new policies that cast the appearance of change but which have no effect whatsoever on presidential powers.  With great fanfare, they announced the closing of CIA black sites — at a time when none was operating.  They trumpeted the President’s order that no interrogation tactics outside of the Army Field Manual could be used — at a time when approval for such tactics had been withdrawn.  They repudiated the most extreme elements of the Bush/Addington/Yoo “inherent power” theories — while maintaining alternative justifications to enable the same exact policies to proceed exactly as is.  They flamboyantly touted the closing of Guantanamo — while aggressively defending the right to abduct people from around the world and then imprison them with no due process at Bagram.  Their “changes” exist solely in theory — which isn’t to say that they are all irrelevant, but it is to say that they change nothing in practice:  i.e., in reality.

Greenwald makes a big deal of the fact that the changes are in “theory” not “in reality” – but neglects to mention that most of the worst aspects of Bush’s abuses of power were only present in theory by the time Obama took office – due to pushback from Congress, the Courts, etcetera. Bagram is a serious issue – and Greenwald is entirely justified in talking about that particular hypocrisy. But the “ideological wind tunnel” that is Greenwald’s calling card causes him to omit key facts here – as it so often does.

And you n0tice – in setting up his own “spike,” Greenwald implicitly accepts Goldsmith’s contentions – that the Bush administration had stopped torturing, had reconstituted its wiretapping program with Congressional and court approval, and had otherwise already ceased the worst abuses of power.

A final note: Greenwald’s approach to Obama seems to have more to do with his discomfort with defending any establishment than with actual policy. There are certainly reasons for civil libertarians to be unhappy with Obama, but for Greenwald, there’s a strong sense he wishes no part in defending any Establishment. This makes him a gadfly – which while often useful does not make him right all the time.

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Criticism Giuliani Politics

Stopping Rudy 2012 Before It Starts

[digg-reddit-me]In the Times piece on the White House’s stepping into New York’s state politics by suggesting Governor David Patterson not run for office in 2010, Karl Rove is quoted as saying this move is all about sidelining former Mayor Rudy Giuliani:

The only reason they are doing this in New York is to try to strangle a potential opponent in 2012.

Rove seems to mean this as a criticism, accusing the White House of making crass political calculations which, of course, Rove himself never did. But this makes an opportune point to bring up that the politician being sidelined here is the same one who said:

Freedom is about authority. Freedom is about the willingness of every single human being to cede to lawful authority a great deal of discretion about what you do.

Yes, this “Mister 9/11” who never met an executive power he didn’t like is now searching for another balcony to take yet another shot at the White House.

This man is truly the one person I truly would be frightened of as president. (Sarah Palin runs a close second.)

[Image by VictoryNH licensed under Creative Commons.]

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Criticism New York City Politics The Opinionsphere

The Mayor’s Filthy Salt Habit

Mayor Bloomberg launched a health initiative last year aimed at reducing the city’s salt consumption leading to such memorable headlines as the New York Post‘s:

BLOOMY TO NYC: HOLD THE SALT

The other New York rag, the Daily News, quoted Bloomberg on the new salt initiative:

People are eating too much salt, me included. After this, we can keep going. People don’t like to have somebody come in and tell them what to do, but afterward, if it turns out to be something that’s in their interest, they sure as heck say thank you.

Michael Barbaro of the New York Times though gets the real skinny a year after this initiative is launched: the Mayor himself “dumps salt on almost everything, even saltine crackers.” Barbaro apparently has been watching the mayor in dining situations closely – even counting the number of dashes of salt applied to his pizza: 6. (Salt on pizza?! Really?). This paragraph is representative of the piece:

But Mr. Bloomberg, 67, likes his popcorn so salty that it burns others’ lips. (At Gracie Mansion, the cooks deliver it to him with a salt shaker.) He sprinkles so much salt on his morning bagel “that it’s like a pretzel,” said the manager at Viand, a Greek diner near Mr. Bloomberg’s Upper East Side town house.

There’s nothing wrong with a man – who admits his own faults – attempting to curb unhealthy behavior. But the many micro-initiatives to make New Yorkers healthier do end up getting on my nerves in a manner that makes me more sympathetic to Jacob Weisberg’s Slate piece.

[Image by the Center for American Progress licensed under Creative Commons.]

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Criticism Liberalism Libertarianism Political Philosophy Politics The Opinionsphere

That Annoying “Pox on Both Their Houses” Mentality of the “Independent-Minded” Press

[digg-reddit-me]Jacob Weisberg of Slate has written one of those typical, independent-minded, liberal attacks on the nanny state that crop up when the Democrats are perceived to have a monopoly on power. This type of piece always bothers me even as I agree with most of it on substance – in part because it is only written when Democrats are in power, and in part it has a hidden thesis: a moral equivalence between the liberal and right wing positions. Here’s Weisberg:

The underlying left-right divide is not about whether government has the right to promote private virtue but, rather, about what kind of virtue it should promote. Republicans demand paternalistic policies that uphold morality or social order. In Indiana, where I recently spent my vacation, you can pick up fireworks or a handgun anywhere, but good luck buying a six-pack on Sunday. Democrats, by contrast, deploy paternalism for health and safety reasons, yielding a different set of absurdities. In California, pot is on the verge of becoming more permissible than cigarettes. Both left and right take pleasure in mildly persecuting those who fail to meet their civic ideals.

There’s certainly an insight here – but it does not get to the heart of the liberal-right wing divide. It doesn’t attempt to deal with the civil libertarian strain in the Democratic Party which contrasts with the support for a national security apparatus above the law supported by the Republican Party. It doesn’t address the various mild strains of populist economic and social libertarianism in the Republican Party which are at war both with the economic royal-ism in the party and with the Democratic Party’s focus on regulation and government involvement in ensuring a fair process and/or preventing unfair ends.

In other words, Weisberg takes on this loaded topic but only discusses the “mild persecutions” that we can see changing rather than the structural positions that affect us far more deeply. The caricatures of the left and the right that Weisberg draws then aren’t very persuasive because they ignore the base of these competing political views.

Weisberg is actually conflating two different points in his attempt to even-handedly criticize the left and right. Liberals – especially urban liberals – tend to focus on policies which improve the collective status of most of their constituents. At best, they are – as Weisberg says, quoting Cass Sunstein – “nudges” towards healthier, safer activities. At worst, they are annoying and unnecessary constrictions on minor everyday freedoms like where you can smoke, what you can buy at a restaurant. Suburban, exurban, and rural areas tend to have less of this – whether they are dominated by liberals or conservatives.

On the other hand, the right wing claims it is against government encroachment and in favor of a more libertarian society; but this is a falsehood, as the bulk of the right supports right wing government encroachment and opposes liberal government vehemently. This is what is driving the Tea Partiers – not a fear of all government, but a fear of liberals in charge of the government.

If Weisberg had picked apart these two conceptions – of a right wing that claims to be against government, but instead is only against liberals in the government – and of the differences in the role of government in urban versus non-urban areas, he might have had two pieces rather than one – though neither would have fit as easily into the “pox on both their houses” mentality that independent-minded observers in both observers tend to adopt.

[Image by hegarty_david licensed under Creative Commons.]

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Barack Obama Colombia Conservativism Criticism Foreign Policy Health care Iran Liberalism National Security Political Philosophy Politics The Clintons The Opinionsphere The War on Terrorism War on Drugs

Must Reads of the Past Two Weeks! (Extended Edition): J Street, NPH, Liberalism, Topless, Colombian Hippos, Grassroots, 1990s Reunion, Insuring Illegals, and the Iranian Time Bomb

J Street. James Traub of the New York Times profiles the new Jewish lobbying group J Street. For anyone who is interested in the Israeli-US relationship, a very interesting read that tries to profile one group trying to change the dynamic in Washington.

The Unique Figure of Neil Patrick Harris. Andrew Sullivan has an interesting take on Neil Patrick Harris, and speaking with Emily Nussbaum of New York magazine, Neil Patrick Harris also has an interesting take on Neil Patrick Harris. Takeaway line from Sullivan:

Everyone is a shade or two away from normal; and the pied beauty of humanity should not be carved into acceptable and unacceptable based on things that simply make us who we are.

Liberalism Defined and Defended. E. J. Dionne writing for Democracy magazine reviews Alan Wolfe’s book [registration required] (which was one of the inspiration for this post of mine on the 10 Principles of Liberalism). An excellent review of a book I now feel compelled to read:

Wolfe notes that “it is not sufficient for me merely to be left alone, I must also have the capacity to realize the goals that I choose for myself. If this requires an active role for government, then modern liberals are prepared to accept state intervention into the economy in order to give large numbers of people the sense of mastery that free market capitalism gives only to the few.” Exactly right.

Topless. Meghan Pleticha writes for Alternet about her experiment where she “legally exposed [her] breasts in public.”

There they were — in the sunlight, the eyes of God and New York Penal Law 245.01 — my boobs out, nipples blazing. The girls sitting on the blanket next to us giggled. Some passersby glanced over, smiles on a couple of the guys’ faces. My nipple ring glinted in the sun. Amazingly, I felt relatively calm. Warm. Neither lightning nor cops had struck me down. Furtively looking around, I noticed some guys attempting to be respectful. Maybe they were just thinking be cool or she’ll put her top back on, but gentlemen would glance over and grin, but rarely stare.

The Colombian Hippo Problem. Simon Romero of The New York Times describes how Colombia is dealing with yet another of the legacies of the larger than life Pablo Escobar, the drug kingpin who was gunned down sixteen years ago: an infestation of hippos who are thriving in Colombia’s ecosystem after escaping from Escobar’s private zoo.

The Right Wing Grassroots. Daniel Larison has a rather insightful piece on his blog regarding the relationship between the conservative elites and the right wing grassroots. I don’t endorse his entire analysis, but worth reading.

Like the Opening of a 1990s Political Joke. Dana Milbank of the Washington Post sketches a 1990s reunion of Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, President Bill Clinton, and Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott. An interesting quote by Trent Lott:

I thought it might be a good time for us to show that a president, a speaker, the leaders, can find a way to come together. If three good ol’ boys from the South like the ones you’ve heard today can find a way to get it done. I know the outstanding leaders that we have in the Congress . . . can get it done.

Insuring Illegal Immigrants. Ezra Klein makes the case persuasively:

Illegal immigrants are clustered in service sector and food sector jobs. They clean buildings, prepare boneless chicken breasts, wash dishes, pick food, and generally do jobs that are much more conducive to spreading germs than, say, blogging is. I don’t know exactly why Rep. Joe Wilson and Lou Dobbs and all the others in their cohort want to make it more expensive to hire American workers and make it more likely that Americans get sick, but that’s why I’m not a political strategist, I guess.

The Iranian Time Bomb. George Friedman of Stratfor sees a world of trouble arising from the Iranians’ pursuit of nuclear weapons – as he analyzes how almost every interested party seems to misunderstand the interests and willingness to act of every other interesting part, which he believes could result in catastrophic consequences à la the opening of World War I.

[Image by Eamonn.McAleer licensed under Creative Commons.]

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Barack Obama Criticism National Security Politics The Bush Legacy The Opinionsphere The War on Terrorism

Obama’s Dangerous Hypocrisy on Prisoners at Guantánamo and Bagram

[digg-reddit-me]As a strong supporter of Barack Obama’s candidacy, and of his administration in general, I must concede that Glenn Greenwald yesterday proved why he is such a valuable commentator in taking the administration on. He kept his rhetorical tics to a minimum and avoided the “ideological wind tunnel” effect that so much of his writing produces – and this allowed his piece to have a broader impact.

Alright – he started off with the same weirdly exaggerated sense of perspective – proving my previous point that Glenn Greenwald uses hyperbole the way other writers use punctuation:

It’s now apparent that the biggest sham in American politics is Barack Obama’s pledge to close Guantanamo and, more generally, to dismantle the Bush/Cheney approach to detaining accused Terrorists. [my emphasis]

But Greenwald quickly got down to making the substantive case – which on this front is extremely strong. On my blog and elsewhere, I have brought up Bagram as an example of Obama’s most clear failure, though I haven’t yet made the sustained case as Greenwald does.

As I wrote earlier, the Supreme Court’s rulings on the rights of detainees to certain basic rights at Guantánamo was based on the idea that our government should not be able to deprive an individual of rights merely by moving them to a particular location. Yet this is exactly what the Obama administration is claiming. Our nation’s freedoms are grounded in our traditions, and at the base of these traditions is a single, fundamental restriction on the state. To quote Winston Churchill:

The power of the executive to cast a man into prison without formulating any charge known to the law, and particularly to deny him the judgment of his peers, is in the highest degree odious, and the foundation of all totalitarian government whether Nazi or Communist.

Greenwald does not attempt to reconcile Obama’s views about Guantánamo as a candidate with the positions taken by his administration now – he simply hurls the well-justified charge of hypocrisy while tossing in a few snide remarks about those who continue to support Obama (which is a Greenwald staple.) He does not try to grapple with the issues the Obama administration faces in trying to deal with the political, legal, and strategic consequences of the radical actions taken by the Bush administration.

Greenwald is not the “fox” of Isaiah Berlin’s parable, but the very Bushian hedgehog. And on this issue, the hedgehog has grasped the basic truth: In condemning Bush for Guantánamo and the secret CIA prisons while expanding Bagram and using this different location for the same or similar purposes cannot stand, the Obama administration is engaging in rank hypocrisy which we cannot let stand. (As Greenwald points out, its unclear what exactly Bagram is being used for as the Obama administration has been keeping too many documents secret.) I highly reccomend you read Greenwald’s important post from yesterday.

By acting this way regarding detainees at Bagram, Barack Obama threatens the very Rule of Law that he came into office promising to protect – and that he swore to protect when taking the oath of office. Liberals must oppose this; conservatives must oppose this; libertarians must oppose this; Americans must oppose this, and be guided by “Something wiser than our own quick personal impulses… [&] sweeter than the taste of a political victory.”

We must be guided, simply, by Our Lady of the Law.

[Image by DVIDSHUB licensed under Creative Commons.]

Categories
Criticism History Politics The Bush Legacy The Opinionsphere

Dana Perino’s Misleading Spin Regarding Matt Latimer

That’s how the media world works, unfortunately. But since I was there, I will try to do my part to stamp out myths before they gain traction.

[digg-reddit-me]Yesterday, I came across (from multiple sources) a piece in the new edition of GQ by a former Bush speechwriter Matt Latimer – a kind of tell-all purporting to reveal what Bush really thought at the end of his term. (Beware: GQ has designed this piece to maximize page views, so it’s a pain to read, though overall worth it.)

The piece was interesting enough, though one could feel the editing of someone intent of keeping the material fresh and with the intent of enhancing the reputation of the author, so I wouldn’t classify it as inherently trustworthy. Latimer portrayed Bush as an almost comic figure – one who believed he had remade conservatism, who derided the “conservative movement,” who had excellent political instincts, who was willing to buck the crowd, and who governed and authorized statutes he had not quite understood. Overall, Latimer’s portrait represents a positive reappraisal of George W. Bush as a flawed but complex figure.

Dana Perino though will have none of it – and responds to the post with an extremely misleading post at NRO’s The Corner. For example, she makes a big deal of this as undermining Latimer’s account:

And I don’t think [Bush has] ever even said the word ‘keister.’ C’mon.

Yet the passage she’s referring is this one:

‘Wait till her fat keister is sitting at this desk,’ he once said (except he didn’t say ‘keister’).

She also writes:

For example, [Latimer] writes that President Bush didn’t know who Sarah Palin was.”

But in Latimer’s tale, he doesn’t claim this. Rather, he quotes President Bush as joking around after the announcement:

“I’m trying to remember if I’ve met her before. I’m sure I must have.” His eyes twinkled, then he asked, “What is she, the governor of Guam?”

I’m no defender of Matt Latimer – but also not a fan of dishonest spin.

Edit: I’ve emailed Ms. Perino as the obviousness of her misleading statements seems a bit too much to see if she is considering retracting them or has any other response.

Updated: Peter Robinson, also at The Corner also points out the two specific inaccuracies I mentioned. Perino them responded with a quasi-apology and seems to admit that she hadn’t actually read the piece. Her lack of knowledge though that did not stop her from smearing Latimer. But no surprise, she somehow ends up blaming the media coverage, though I would hope any old flack – let alone someone with her soapbox – would take the time to read something before attacking it in print.

[Image not subject to copyright.]

Categories
Barack Obama Conservativism Criticism Domestic issues Economics Liberalism Libertarianism Political Philosophy Politics The Opinionsphere

Protests Against Liberals Running the Gov’t (cont.)

[digg-reddit-me]I should have made a bit more clear in my post yesterday that Andrew Sullivan was well aware of the contradictions within the right wing response to Obama – and had articulated a coherent response to them from his conservative, Oakshottian perspective earlier yesterday in a post I had printed out to read. He did reach a bit too far in seeing that particular silver lining to this movement though.

The main problem is that this right wing movement is still somewhat amorphous. Lydia DePillis of The New Republic had this dispatch from the D.C. protest this past weekend explaining the core complaint of the movement:

Their complaint? Hard to say, really. Some, like the contingent of coal miners in hard hats with anti-cap-and-trade signs, had a concrete beef with the administration. But for most, there was both an incredible specificity to their protestations–all those czars, and ACORN, and Obama’s missing birth certificate–and a fuzzy vagueness.

“We’re losing America,” said Kris, from Maryland. “Government is trying to take over everything.”

It’s one thing I have noticed as well – both the specificity of what they are outraged over and the sense that the tawdry specifics don’t explain the rising crescendo of outrage.

Matt Welch – editor in chief of Reason magazine – tried to defend the protestors against liberals attempts to write them off – and to defend them against charges of racism. He does so by misrepresenting two liberal responses to the protests and then knocking down the strawmen he creates – which is about par for the course in terms of New York Post op-eds, but I expect more of Welch whose work I often enjoy. Welch would have done better to explain what he found most of the protestors stood for, but I suspect he would have had the same difficulty DePillis did.

So, instead, he writes that “popular left blogger Josh Marshall reported from his armchair” that this was a “Small protest.” Welch declines to link to Marshall’s post saying such – probably because if he had, readers might have found that this was one in a series of posts by Marshall and others at the TalkingPointsMemo covering the size of the crowd, and that Marshall had concluded his post with the D.C. Fire Department’s estimate of 60,000 to 70,000 saying the protest was “smallish by big DC protest/event standards but definitely respectable.”

Welch then goes on to say that the Center for American Progress claimed that the protest was marred by “racist, radical portrayals of Obama.” Welch has this to say about the evidence presented by Think Progress:

Among the dozen or so pieces of evidence? A placard claiming, “Ayn Rand is right,” and one of President Obama with the caption, “When his lips move . . . he’s lying.”

Once again – an extremely misleading selection by Welch given the main signs focused on by the piece, including this one:

Welch could have made the argument that focusing on these people was misrepresenting the crowd – but instead he choose to made a much less defensible point.

Nothing Welch says challenges the point I made yesterday – that right wingers are fans of big government run by christianist right wingers, but wary of any type of government run by liberals, such that even pragmatic, incremental, modest Obamaism is seem as a radical assault on their children:

The protests aren’t about the size of government or its role; they are a viceral response to the fact that a liberal now runs the government. That frustration is rooted in cultural and social issues, rather than economic ones.

There are libertarians who legitimately object to big governmen (Ron Paul and Matt Welch himself come to mind), and I can respect their views even if I disagree – but they don’t seem to be well-represented in the Tea Party movement, in the Republican Party, in the bulk of the emotional resistance to Obama.

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Barack Obama Criticism Economics Financial Crisis History Morality Political Philosophy Politics The Bush Legacy The Opinionsphere

Must-Reads of the Week: Krugman v. Ferguson, Ted Kennedy again, Hank Paulson, Sedaris, and Phreaking

This week there are quite a few good pieces to take a look at over the long weekend – in between games of beer pong, or BBQs…

Krugman v. Ferguson. Matthew Lynn in the Times of London wrote a feature on the “war” over the response to the economic crisis going on between the American Princeton Professor, New York Times columnist, Nobel-prize winner, and noted liberal Paul Krugman and British Harvard Professor, Financial Times columnist, and noted conservative Niall Ferguson. I had been following it closely already, but this article had a number of more details and conveyed the story arc well. Meanwhile, Krugman released another attack on Ferguson – indirectly though – in which he laid out his vision (as a kind of short intellectual history of economics in the 20th and 21st centuries) of what happened in the most recent crisis, why so many economists got it wrong, and why we’re taking the right steps now:

As I see it, the economics profession went astray because economists, as a group, mistook beauty, clad in impressive-looking mathematics, for truth. Until the Great Depression, most economists clung to a vision of capitalism as a perfect or nearly perfect system. That vision wasn’t sustainable in the face of mass unemployment, but as memories of the Depression faded, economists fell back in love with the old, idealized vision of an economy in which rational individuals interact in perfect markets, this time gussied up with fancy equations. The renewed romance with the idealized market was, to be sure, partly a response to shifting political winds, partly a response to financial incentives. But while sabbaticals at the Hoover Institution and job opportunities on Wall Street are nothing to sneeze at, the central cause of the profession’s failure was the desire for an all-encompassing, intellectually elegant approach that also gave economists a chance to show off their mathematical prowess.

The article is missing Krugman’s usual zingers and partisan swipes – and is really quite good. It also reminds you that Ferguson is an historian – not an economist.

Ted Kennedy, leaky vessel. Sam Tanenhaus writes about Senator Ted Kennedy as a kind of magnificent character, capturing him and the movement he led better than most others:

But if the art of governance did not redeem Mr. Kennedy, it irradiated him, and the liberalism he personified. At a time when government itself had fallen into disrepute Mr. Kennedy applied himself diligently to its exacting discipline, and wrested whatever small victories he could from the machinery he had learned to operate so well. Whether or not his compass was finally true, he endured as the battered, leaky vessel through which the legislative arts recovered some of their lost glory.

Hank Paulson. Todd Purdhum of Vanity Fair finally writes his piece about his many conversations with Hank Paulson before and during the financial crisis – a piece notable for the fact that Paulson seemed exceptionally forthcoming as he knew the piece wouldn’t come out until well after he had left public office.

The Wisdom of David Sedaris. A nice story from last week’s New Yorker:

[S]he invited us to picture a four-burner stove.

“Gas or electric?” Hugh asked, and she said that it didn’t matter.

This was not a real stove but a symbolic one, used to prove a point at a management seminar she’d once attended. “One burner represents your family, one is your friends, the third is your health, and the fourth is your work.” The gist, she said, was that in order to be successful you have to cut off one of your burners. And in order to be really successful you have to cut off two.

Pat has her own business, a good one that’s allowing her to retire at fifty-five. She owns three houses, and two cars, but, even without the stuff, she seems like a genuinely happy person. And that alone constitutes success.

I asked which two burners she had cut off, and she said that the first to go had been family. After that, she switched off her health. “How about you?”

I thought for a moment, and said that I’d cut off my friends. “It’s nothing to be proud of, but after meeting Hugh I quit making an effort.”

“And what else?” she asked.

“Health, I guess.”

Hugh’s answer was work.

“And?”

“Just work,” he said.

Phone Phreak. David Kushner in Rolling Stone features the story of a poor, fat, lonely, blind boy who finds a way to be happy as a phone phreaker (a kind of hacker on telephone lines.) The boy – Matthew Weigman – submerges himself in the culture, and due to his unique skillset is able to become an almost cartoon villain, without the manic desire to take over the world. Instead, he unleashes SWAT teams on girls who refuse to have phone sex with him, as he fakes calls from inside their house pretending he is holding them hostage; or ferrets out all the names and biographies of the team tracking him down, which he jovially explains to an FBI agent who comes to recruit him.

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Barack Obama Criticism Health care Politics The Opinionsphere Videos

John McCain’s Cowardly Politics

[digg-reddit-me]Senator John McCain established his reputation as a “maverick” in a large part for the bold positions he staked out in the 2000 campaign on long-term problems affecting our nation. That was his trademarked, “Straight Talk.” He was one of the few politicians out there who would tell you how much trouble Social Security and Medicare were in. But under the Obama administration and to a lesser extent throughout his career, McCain has gained great credibility and popularity by taking very strong, responsible positions on long-term issues – while finding some minor excuse to oppose any attempts at reform that cost him politically.

But the Obama administration apparently still continues to hope to meet the McCain who was often invoked, though rarely seen, in the 2008 campaign – the “maverick” with an interest in “bipartisanship” who “puts country first.”*

McCain’s 11th Sunday morning talk show appearance this year occurred this Sunday, as he  appeared on This Week With George Stephanopoulos. Chris Cilizza of theWashington Post said he expected the interview to be “Must Watch TV” – and in fact, it was – as McCain demonstrated a phenomenon I call “the politics of irresponsible responsibility.”

In his interview with Stephanopoulos, McCain talked like a moderate on domestic policy issues – but managed to find a single or dual objection that allowed him to obstruct Obama’s agenda on every issue. The two-step would go like this: “Yes, [fill-in-the-blank] is a serious issue. I am in favor of reform. We need to do something right away. But Obama’s plan is missing [fill-in-another-blank] so I will fight to stop this effort at reform.”

  • On Guantanamo Bay, McCain agrees that the prison should be closed – and soon – but opposes the Obama administration’s attempts to do so because he doesn’t think they “have an overall policy developed.”
  • On the stimulus package, he does not deny that there was a need for government spending to stimulate the economy, but nevertheless opposed it because there was pork spending in it.
  • On cap and trade, he agrees that climate change is real and serious and the government must act – but opposes every action proposed because they don’t include support for nuclear energy (and beyond that, he presumes that the bill must contain large amounts of pork spending).
  • And then on health care, he supports reform – and knows we need it – but he opposes every reform on the table because of the public option.
  • He believes we need to “reform Medicare” to cut trillions in costs, but he demagogues Obama’s proposal to create a board that studies the effectiveness of treatments as a common-sense measure to restrain spending as “not quote death panels” exactly – but certainly something scary.

As George Stephanopoulos pointed out, John McCain – despite his rhetoric – has hewed more closely to partisan positions this year than at any point in his career – even after he called on his supporters to support Obama in his concession speech:

McCain had an explanation for his increasingly partisan record: “It’s been some of the issues.” Though he claims to see the need for reform and take the issues seriously, he’s not willing to pay the political cost of getting serious. In this McCain represents – perhaps better than any politician – the politics of irresponsible responsibility. Like another “respected,” “serious,” “moderate” Republican, Senator Chuck Grassley, McCain will work to get his ideas into legislation, but will demagogue and oppose even a bill he agrees with if he believes if will cost him support among the Republican base.  He talks about serious issues affecting our nation – and boldly states the problems in stark terms. But his boldness evaporates when he is asked to take an immediate position. Guantanamo should be closed, he agrees; but take a step towards doing so, and his long-term conviction does not restrain him from attacking what is being done to close it. Climate change is real and serious – on this he agrees with the Obama administration; but he will oppose any steps towards reform if they don’t include his pet ideas of nuclear energy and pork barrel spending. It’s a low cost way to kneecap reform while maintaining the mantle of a reformer.

This is not a courageous position. And it demonstrates the inadequacy of our current political conversation. When the most powerful people in the Republican Party blatantly lie about issues – and those who are “responsible” and “moderate” find any excuse to avoid dealing with the issues they say are essential, any attempts to deal with the systematic problems facing our nation will falter. And we face no shortage of problems – built up over decades of avoiding them – climate change; economic growth dependent on bubbles; our deteriorating health insurance and transportation  systems; our long-term deficit and the looming entitlement crisis; our economic imbalance with Japan and China – the list goes on.

A courageous politician, a maverick would take a stand in favor of responsible reform – and not seek to obstruct every effort as Senator McCain has done. His actions are not that of a maverick or reformer – but of a coward.

*On one set of issues, McCain has lived up to his reputation. Like most public officials are, McCain is treated as an expert on any policy matter before the Senate – but his interviews and various statements in the past demonstrate that McCain is no expert on foreign policy or domestic policy issues. The area where McCain has shown expertise is the military components of national security. On everything else, he seems a bit lost – jumping from one talking point to another – like a more seasoned version of Sarah Palin.

[Image by marcn licensed under Creative Commons.]