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Saturday, March 10, 2007
The View From Your Window
10 Mar 2007 07:08 pm
Oulu, Finland, noon.
Small Town Boy
10 Mar 2007 06:12 pm
One man stands up to Coulter.
Quote for the Day
10 Mar 2007 05:47 pm
"Do you understand how it might be difficult for me to understand that a tape related to this particular individual just got mislaid?" - U.S. District Judge Marcia Cooke, referring to a critical tape of a critical "interrogation session" with Jose Padilla, that the government has "lost."
"I don't know what happened to it," said Pentagon attorney James Schmidli. It seems to me that, in the matters of habeas corpus and torture, this administration deserves no benefit of any doubt. They disappear people; and now they disappear critical evidence. Such critical evidence relates to the detention of a U.S. citizen on U.S. soil for over three years without charges, allegations of torture and abuse, and psychological trauma.
"To see what is in front of one's nose needs a constant struggle."
I'm Free!
10 Mar 2007 05:04 pm
Matthew Parris remembers John Inman, the actor who played the queeny, closeted "Mr Humphries" of BBC's comedy classic, "Are You Being Served?"
Guns In DC
10 Mar 2007 03:40 pm
I'm not qualified to say whether the federal appeals courts decision on the second amendment with respect to DC is rooted in sound jurisprudence; and, in general, I've been persuaded that European-style gun-control won't work in America. I'm also inclined to support gun rights, within reason. But it's clear I'm in a tiny minority in these respects in Washington D.C., where I live most of the year. My fellow residents of the District overwhelmingly support their gun laws, the mayor supports them, the cops support them - and many of us live literally in the line of fire. As I blogged recently, two people were shot in broad daylight on my block two weeks ago today.
Nonetheless, I know that the U.S. is not a democracy. It's a republic. The importance of courts is precisely that they strike down laws and policies supported by overwhelming majorities, if such laws and policies violate constitutional rights. Is this judicial tyranny? Is an interpretation of the constitution that, according to the Washington Post, is radically new a work of tyrannical men in black robes? I don't think so. But I wish others would be as consistent in their view of the role of the judicial branch.
The Proof
10 Mar 2007 02:40 pm
A reader writes:
You wrote that your blog "can sometimes be an embarrassing series of recognitions of my own naivete". I often think of your blog as "The Education of Andrew". You are incredibly naive when it comes to the real, down-home nature of American conservatism. All this crap you complain about now - this is the real conservatism. This is the conservative id, broken through the conservative super-ego and run rampant. It's true there's some attempt by the super-ego to reassert some kind of control - you detailed several attempts last week, by Gates, Fitzgerald, etc. - but this is the real energy that underlies and animates much of American grassroots conservatism, and always has: a blend of intolerance, machismo, a cultural resentment stemming directly back to the Civil War, anti-intellectual no-nothingness, Christianism - with all its attendant arrogance, anti-democratic self-righteousness and hidden nihilism - and a just plain old blind pig-headedness, which GWB exemplifies in spades. Nary an Edmund Burke or Michael Oakeshott to be seen.
It's true the Bush years have been a perfect storm, the intersection of a particular modern conservative coalition with new media technologies, an almost equally corrupt liberalism, and world events, but if you cannot trace the strains we see in this current mess back into our long history, you just don't understand this country yet. Bush and company are not the exception, they're the proof; they're not something new, some aberration, they're just the same old same old come bubbling up from underneath and finally to power. And that's why Bush's (s)election in 2000 was the best thing that could have happened to this country, a real blessing in disguise. Now we can see what's really down there in the dark. We can reject it, and go on - and we'd better go on, because with what we have to face nationally, internationally and globally, we don't have much more time to waste on this stupidity. "Conservatism", as we have known it, is over. Too bad the cost has been so high. But as Jung said, those who will not learn will be made to feel.
Face of the Day
10 Mar 2007 02:01 pm
Rocky Elsom of the Waratahs lies on the pitch after being knocked out during the round six Super 14 match between the Waratahs and the Bulls at Aussie Stadium March 10, 2007 in Sydney, Australia. (Photo by Cameron Spencer/Getty Images)
Nanny State Watch
10 Mar 2007 12:31 pm
Some bright spark wants to make it illegal to smoke in a car with a kid under 9. Oy.
Gay Bars and Exclusion
10 Mar 2007 12:13 pm
A reader writes:
I graduated high school in 1982 in Long Beach, California, a beach town an hour south of LA. My straight boyfriend and I (a het girl) and our gay friends spent too many hours in the fantastic gay bars of Long Beach and LA. They weren't as picky as they should have been about checking ID's, which probably stemmed from an impulse not be judgmental or unwelcoming, which permeated these bars. These places were filled with couples and friends of every imaginable orientation, gender, etc. Even groups of nervous straight frat guys would slouch in every now and then, drawn in for the same reasons everyone else was: good drinks, nice people, fun. There was never an incident that I heard of or witnessed, of anyone feeling weird or hostile or unwelcome. Wrong town, wrong era. Mickey is full of it.
Every gay bar I have ever been in on earth, let alone early 80's LA, is live and let live, polite, welcoming, whatever you are is fine with them (a shout-out to my boys at "Ripples", still an institution in Long Beach, where my very straight Dad and I go for drinks when I'm home, a family tradition for twenty years). Gay bars in 1982-83 Southern California made the best drinks and played the best music, were just the most fun. Who could forget all of the Crystal and Alexis nights, with Long Island Ice teas for a dollar?
Thanks for allowing me to remember good times - yes things got scary, tragic and unrelentingly grim pretty quickly right after that (death lists, hospital phone numbers as I recall, lots of funerals, I stopped counting), but I really resent Mickey for trying to defile these kind hearted places with his self-serving lies.
Another writes:
Kaus is clearly wrong that (hot) straight men would not be welcome in gay bars, but I can give you some examples of women being discriminated against in bars.
You may recall that Ziegfield's/Secrets had so many women coming to see the nude dancers that male customers (including me) complained. The bar set a rule that women could not enter the bar unaccompanied by a man. I also recall reading Camile Paglia stating how, in 1970s NYC, she disguised herself as a man to gain admission into certain gay bars with strict entrance codes. Finally, back in the late 80s-early 90s, there was a lesbian bar in North Carolina that forbade admission to men. Lesbians were big into separatism in those days, along with vegetarianism, comparable worth, no-nukes, Sandanistas, etc.
Do you seriously think that women would have been permitted to enter the Mineshaft? Do you think any normal woman (not Paglia) would want to?
So we have one instance of one bar in the 1970s barring women. Probably a sado-masochistic bar like the old Mineshaft (which, alas, was before my time). No evidence of any excluding "breeders" like the faggot-guy.
Bugs on A Windshield
10 Mar 2007 10:29 am
Amazing micro-photographs of the collisions. They look almost beautiful in their splatter. (Hat tip: ScienceBlogs.)
A First Question for HRC
10 Mar 2007 10:16 am
The big-money gays at the Human Rights Campaign don't apparently understand that I have editorial control over my own blog. So they contacted the Atlantic editors to complain that I did not reprint their entire letter on the blog. I edited out about 20 percent of it, because it was boilerplate, or complaining that I'm uninterested in a private meeting, or noting that I've been an occasional speaker for them in the past. But since they asked, here are the opening two paragraphs that I lopped off for concision:
I would like to thank you for allowing us the opportunity to respond to your blog posting
about the Human Rights Campaign.
Before diving into the numbers, it is worth pointing out that HRC’s membership has grown to a healthy 650,000 members and supporters nationwide. Together, we do not presume to speak for the entire GLBT community, but we are proud to give voice to some of the hardest working, most strategic and most passionate GLBT and straight-supportive people in this country working for equality.
Vital stuff, isn't it? It also contains a very questionable statistic. Check out this story from the Washington Blade. Money quote:
HRC membership numbers include the name of every person who has ever once given at least the minimum amount — currently $1 — and provided an address, said spokesperson Steven Fisher this week... This means that someone who donated a dollar or made a small purchase from the HRC store years ago is considered from that time forward an HRC member, even in death unless HRC specifically learns of the person's demise.
The membership never declines. And it's so "healthy" it includes quite a few corpses - and the gay community has had hundreds of thousands of such corpses in the recent past. If you're dead, you have to write in and let them know. So here's my first, open, transparent, simple question to HRC:
The mimimum membership fee on your website is $35. How many members paid $35 or more in annual dues in the last twelve months? You claim 650,000. What's the real number? Please provide documentation to prove it.
Let's see how long it takes them to provide an honest answer. They've got my email address.
Why We Went To War
10 Mar 2007 07:10 am
Dinesh D'Souza's view, from his book:
Why Iraq? One reason is that after 9/11, a number of leading figures in the Bush administration came to the conclusion that, in the face of a catastrophe of this magnitude, it would not be sufficient to go to Afghanistan and shoot some people on the monkey bars. Rather, America needed to take action in the heart of the Middle East. Remember the old Western movies where John Wayne is called into town as the new sheriff to apprehend a bunch of cattle-stealers? He goes into the bar, where the bad guys are shouting and jeering at him. He doesn't know who the culprits are, but he finds a couple of obstreperous hoodlums and slams their heads together, or pistol-whips them, and then he walks out of the bar. The message is that there is a new sheriff in town. After 9/11, I believe, the Bush administration wanted to convey this message to the Islamic radicals. In Saddam Hussein, Bush located an especially egregious hoodlum who would become the demonstration project for America's seriousness and resolve.
A "demonstration project". Suddenly, the otherwise mystifyingly troop-free war-plan makes more sense, doesn't it?
Friday, March 9, 2007
The Post Office Strikes Back
09 Mar 2007 07:34 pm
Blog Power
09 Mar 2007 07:26 pm
A philanthropy blogger thinks my challenge to HRC might be part of a new wave of scrutiny for charities and lobby-groups:
So a gay-rights organization with nearly 600,000 members now has to answer to a gay-rights blogger who has an estimated 60,000 daily readers. This episode raises the power of blogs and other new technologies, which are forcing nonprofits to be more open about their operations, holding them accountable not only to their financial supporters, but also an increasingly skeptic (and engaged) public.
Is this the future of nonprofit transparency? Public fights online between multi-million dollar nonprofit organizations and self-styled online watchdogs? According to Sullivan, the nonprofit has "asked for a private meeting with me. I'd rather bring a few thousand readers along."
More gay bloggers are demanding transparency and accountability.
From "24" To "300"?
09 Mar 2007 06:29 pm
The sadist-bigot trend continues in the popular culture, according to Slate:
Here are just a few of the categories that are not-so-vaguely conflated with the "bad" (i.e., Persian) side in the movie: black people. Brown people. Disfigured people. Gay men (not gay in the buff, homoerotic Spartan fashion, but in the effeminate Persian style). Lesbians. Disfigured lesbians. Ten-foot-tall giants with filed teeth and lobster claws. Elephants and rhinos (filthy creatures both). The Persian commander, the god-king Xerxes (Rodrigo Santoro) is a towering, bald club fag with facial piercings, kohl-rimmed eyes, and a disturbing predilection for making people kneel before him.
Meanwhile, the Spartans, clad in naught but leather man-briefs, fight under the stern command of Leonidas (Gerard Butler), whose warrior ethic was forged during a childhood spent fighting wolves in the snow. Leonidas likes to rally the troops with bellowed speeches about "freedom," "honor," and "glory," promising that they will be remembered for having created "a world free from mysticism and tyranny." (The men's usual response, a fist-pumping "A-whoo! A-whoo!" sounds strangely fratty.) But Leonidas is not above playing the tyrant himself. When a messenger from Xerxes arrives bearing news Leonidas doesn't like, he hurls the man, against all protocol, down a convenient bottomless well in the center of town. "This is blasphemy! This is madness!" says the messenger, pleading for his life. "This is Sparta," Leonidas replies.
Or "stuff happens," as someone else remarked. A reader counters:
I think there’s a huge flaw in trying to look for pro-Iraq War messages in 300: It’s a direct adaptation of a comic that was produced in the late 1990’s, long before 9/11, Iraq, Abu Ghraib, the torture chic of 24, etc. It’s about what it’s about: A small force working to repel an imminent invasion by a large empire, and an up-close look at the unpleasant reality that ideas like life, freedom and independence are ultimately upheld through violent struggle. You can twist that around to make this or that point about our current conflicts — from either direction, if you try — but to say that the whole work was made specifically to indulge in these issues really misses the mark.
I haven't seen the movie. If I do, I'll blog my own view.
Face of the Day
09 Mar 2007 05:33 pm
Recording artist Snoop Dogg attends a press conference to promote the P. Diddy and Snoop Dogg European Tour, held at the Kamp Hotel on March 9, 2007 in Helsinki, Finland. (Photo by Dave Hogan/Getty Images)
The VRWC Against the VRWC
09 Mar 2007 05:25 pm
A reader sends in a brilliant email:
What makes the whole Libby thing different is that the Republicans did it to themselves. This is not the Democrats going after Nixon. This is not the Republicans going after Clinton.
No. The right hand man of the most powerful Republican Vice President in history was done in by a lot of other Republicans. The John Ashcroft Justice Dept agreed with the CIA request to investigate the Valerie Plame leak. Ashcroft’s Republican assistant, James Comey, appointed one of his own, Patrick Fitzgerald, perhaps the only Republican in Chicago. When Libby lied to Fitzgerald, and in so doing, made Fitzgerald's leak investigation meaningless, Fitzgerald sought to expand his investigation, probably by going to the same sort of Republican three-judge panel that agreed to expand Kenneth Starr's investigation some years earlier.
Then, after years of Republican complaints that the press had too much immunity under the First Amendment, Fitzgerald basically had the law completely reinterpreted, and forced a lot of very rich, very well-backed reporters to testify. In fact, the only person who saw, who is likely to see, jail time in this whole enterprise was a reporter for the Republican bete noir, the New York Times.
In the end, a Republican prosecutor got Republican judges to get Democratic reporters to testify against Republican politicians.
That just about gets it right. But, wait, there's more!
Similarly, just like all the leading players on both sides of the issue in the U.S. attorney firings are Republicans. Most of these U.S. attorneys were appointed by John Ashcroft, a former Republican elected official, with the support of Republican senators and congressmen. Just like a new Republican Secretary of Defense is forcing the generals feet to the fire in the Walter Reed scandal.
But to hear the right-wing media tell it, Fitzgerald, the U.S. attorneys, and Secretary Gates are all bleeding heart liberals trying to bring good conservatives down. But that's not true. This is just another vast right-wing conspiracy. Only this time, they are purging themselves.
A surge in Iraq and a purge at home. More, please.
"Wussy"
09 Mar 2007 04:53 pm
That was the word the faggot-guy used to defend Ann Coulter from any social disapproval associated with the word "faggot." A reader explains the provenance of the term:
We don't really think of it as much of a slur today, but as defined in Fast Times at Ridgemont High, which helped popularize it back in the day, it really is. Says one male movie character to another:
"You're a wuss - part wimp and part pussy"
The misogyny behind it - as behind so much homophobia - is pretty clear.
By the way, a reporter tells of another joke making the rounds at CPAC here. Anti-Mormon and anti-gay. What a wonderful carnival conservatism now is.
The GOP In New Mexico
09 Mar 2007 04:25 pm
With Domenici in deep doo-doo over the U.S. attorneys scandal, the Mountain West looks like it may shift decisively away from Republicans. At least, that's Ryan Sager's latest take.
"FBI Misused Patriot Act"
09 Mar 2007 04:19 pm
Okay, I can be naive sometimes. But this is news? Under any administration, this would be likely. Under Gonzales? You think? The odds on his resignation soon just went up another notch.
Libby and the Right II
09 Mar 2007 02:57 pm
Rod Dreher suggests (seconded by Mark Shea) that conservatives who think Libby should go free because there was no 'underlying crime' are guilty of inconsistency, since they accepted no such excuse in the case of Bill Clinton. I think Dreher is right. But plenty of conservatives have argued for a pardon for Libby without claiming that perjury is no big deal. They argue either that the jury got it wrong, or that it was not allowed to consider all the factors that militated in Libby's favor. One can consistently regard Clinton's admitted perjury as an offense while thinking that Libby didn’t commit perjury.
What proportion of pro-pardon conservatives have rested their case on the technical issue, rather than on the point that there was no underlying crime and so a pardon is necessary?
Coulter-Faggot-Guy Update
09 Mar 2007 02:16 pm
More and more newspapers are dropping Coulter's columns. And the chairman of the syndicate that publishes her hate-speech has agreed to consider answering emailed questions about his continued support for the Faggot-Woman.
The Coulter Republicans
09 Mar 2007 01:52 pm
Rush Limbaugh joins the throng.
My Response to Coulter
09 Mar 2007 12:54 pm
I keep getting emails asking me where it is. It's in the archives now. But here's the link. If any newspaper wants to reprint it, as some now have, feel free. No charge. Just cite the blog.
Buckley Asks
09 Mar 2007 12:45 pm
"Bush took the blame for Abu Ghraib, but who believes that he desired torture and obscene handling of the enemy?" - Bill Buckley.
Where to start? First, I don't recall Bush personally taking the blame for Abu Ghraib at all. He even refused to let his defense secretary take the blame and resign. I remember him insisting that "this is not America" and denying that he had any role in it, despite signing a memo that allowed all such abuse if "military necessity" demanded it.
Bush's signature is on the memo. Period. He is in charge of his mental faculties and he is commander-in-chief. Period. His own defense secretary sent Geoffrey Miller to Abu Ghraib to replicate the torture Bush had already ordered at Gitmo. Torture continued long after Abu Ghraib was exposed under Bush as commander-in-chief. Given a chance to ban it entirely last year, Bush did all he could to keep torture alive as a program, succeeded, and then planned on running a campaign boasting of his aggressive treatment of military detainees. He has done everything to push the actual blame for torture on military grunts, rather than on the civilians who authorized and directed them. In fact, he got the GOP to pass a law retroactively immunizing him from legal culpability for torture in the last days of the last Congress. If he is prepared to do all this, then, sorry, Mr. Buckley, but you need to wake up.
If Bush is willing to take responsibility for toppling Saddam - and to dress up in military uniform and land on an aircraft carrier for good measure - then he must take full responsibility for torture and for the appalling treatment of injured vets at home. He cannot have it both ways. Either he is commander-in-chief or he isn't. You don't get to be commander-in-chief for all the good times; and have someone else take the responsibility for the bad ones. Your daddy isn't going to let you off the hook, any more Dubya. Get that?
But Buckley asks a deeper, more interesting question. Bush authorized and endorsed torture. That much is indisputable. But did he actually fully realize what he was doing? He is certainly shallow enough to authorize torture and not fully grapple with what that means. The man is a master in denial. And he is deeply, deeply morally lazy. This is a guy who could laugh and mock a woman he was about to execute. Remember that? He makes his cut-throat mother look compassionate.
Did he wrestle long and hard with the question and decide that allowing torture was a terrible thing but he had no choice to protect American lives? Or did he just say "fine," do what you have to do, and move on? I suspect the latter. Occasionally his glib callowness still has the capacity to shock, even after all these years. His dry-drunk capacity for utter denial of reality - especially about his own moral complicity in torture and the deaths of thousands of innocents in Iraq - renders him immune from taking moral responsibility. For anything.
That's what fundamentalism can do to a person: it can so convince you that you are on the side of absolute good that you do not even stop to imagine that you are also capable of absolute evil. But Bush has been capable of absolute evil. His glib, lazy hands are covered in the blood of others, and he has tainted the honor of his office and the military more deeply than any president in modern times. But he is saved, isn't he? And the saved cannot do evil, can they?
(Photo: a detainee tortured and killed at Abu Ghraib under the command of president George W. Bush.)
Libby and the Right
09 Mar 2007 12:30 pm
A reader writes:
You're falling down on the Lewis Libby conviction. The reaction from the right to Libby's conviction is like something from the Colbert Report. From the bizarre ranting of Ann Coulter to the demand for an immediate pardon, it's unseemly. At least the actual readers of the WSJ (which, I suspect, is on the whole a fairly conservative bunch) are somewhat grounded in reality. From a letter today:
"Let's get this straight. A jury of 11 people unanimously agrees, in a trial no serious observer suggests was unfair, that Mr. Libby lied to a grand jury under oath. How in the world does this mean the prosecutor criminalized a policy difference?"
Indeed. Curiously, proving that they are not serious observers of anything, the WSJ (which often rails against "junk science" and fake experts when it suits their purposes) today prints an op-ed that concludes the trial was fatally unfair because (get this) the judge refused to allow the defense to trot out a "memory expert." This guy, we're told, would have explained to the jury that contrary to their own experience and the experience of human beings over the last, oh, five thousand years or so, they have it all wrong and that the way memory somehow really works is "diametrically opposed to the popular understanding of how memory and the mind work." Really? I mean, come on: you do have to laugh at the straws that are being grasped at, don't you?
To date, I have not seen a single conservative commentator acknowledge that perhaps, just perhaps, Scooter should have told the damn truth when he raised his hand and swore to do so and that only he is to blame to choosing not to.
Well: O'Reilly did. And Buchanan. The Irish get it.
The Faggot-Guy
09 Mar 2007 11:53 am
It's somewhat excruciating to watch Mickey Kaus's latest bloggingheads encounter with Bob Wright. This is a journalist who is a stickler for others' perceived or minor conflicts of interest, even when fully disclosed. (Ask Howie Kurtz.) And yet only now does he concede of Ann Coulter that "I'm a friend of hers. I know her." Only now does he tell us that their friendship goes back to before the time "Ann Coulter became Ann Coulter". He still will not admit that he reprinted an email from Coulter because he got it from her, passing it along to readers as if he were not an interested party. His defense of Coulter's slur with respect to Edwards and the word "faggot" is as follows:
"Edwards being flighty, dancing around like a little elf and being wussy on foreign policy."
Hence "faggot". Those pejoratives have never been used to stigmatize homosexuals, have they? If Coulter wanted to call Edwards a wuss, she could have. She chose to call him a "faggot" because she is pandering to bigotry. She has every right to do so; and I would defend her right to it with my last faggoty breath. If her defense is that she is actually not a a bigot - "some of my best friends are closeted gays" - then it is even worse. She simply uses bigotry to earn money, applause and attention. I just don't buy the argument that she had no idea what the word 'faggot" implied. But if she was genuinely that clueless (some mega-rich Republicans have no idea what homophobia actually is), she could always explain that, apologize for being completely out of it, and move on. But she didn't.
Mickey also says on bloggingheads that
"Andrew made exactly Coulter's argument in 2001 ... He defended the use of the f-word specifically in the schoolyard context."
Go read the full post here. I assume Mickey did. He's lying - obviously lying. As for his new acknowledgment that he did indeed support and frequent a bar that had the notice "No Fagots" pinned to the bar and "No Fagots" on its matchbooks, and was furious that they were forced to take those signs down, he now says he regrets the piece. He doesn't explain now why he thinks he was wrong then. The owner of TNR expressed his disapproval, apparently. But everything Kaus now says and writes is completely of a piece with the view in that piece: that gay men are repulsive, that he is viscerally creeped out by us, that he wants to be able to live and relax in spaces that are reliably homo-free. If someone said that about Jews or blacks, would they still be a blogger at Slate?
He also says he has used the f-word in conversation, and once used it routinely. When asked by Bob why so many applauded and cheered the use of the term "faggot" at CPAC, Mickey actually said:
"Half of them were probably gay."
He really has morphed into Coulter, hasn't he? Kaus has no evidence to support his 1983 claim that gay bars exclude "breeders like me". In response, he throws out the wild red herring that some gay bars in the past may have excluded women. I wasn't living in L.A. in 1983, but I have been in many, many gay bars in my life and I have never been to one that excluded women. Still, that isn't what he wrote and it isn't what I asked. Can Mickey name a single gay bar in America that refuses to serve straight men or women? If he can't, would he withdraw his absurd claim of victimization?
I know this blog can sometimes be an embarrassing series of recognitions of my own naivete, but I used to think, and often said, that, for all his quirks, Mickey Kaus isn't now and never has been a bigot. So let's stipulate that Mickey isn't a bigot. But from now on, inspired by South Park, on those few occasions when his name comes up, he will have a new appellation on this blog. He's the Faggot-Guy now. How does it feel, Faggot-Guy?
Self-Hacked
09 Mar 2007 11:14 am
Michael Barone's blog item was not written by some lone hacker, who broke into US News' website. It was written by another US News writer, Bonnie Erbe, and the editors at USNews published it on Michael's blog by mistake. Memo to Michael: post your own posts. This is the blogosphere. As soon as MSM editors get their hands on your copy, the mistakes creep in.
It Has Come To This
09 Mar 2007 10:32 am
The corruption in Gonzales' Justice Department has now forced me to link to Paul Krugman's column this morning (TimesDelete), because the information it provides, and I have no reason to believe it's false, is about as shocking as it gets. Money quote:
Donald Shields and John Cragan, two professors of communication, have compiled a database of investigations and/or indictments of candidates and elected officials by U.S. attorneys since the Bush administration came to power. Of the 375 cases they identified, 10 involved independents, 67 involved Republicans, and 298 involved Democrats. The main source of this partisan tilt was a huge disparity in investigations of local politicians, in which Democrats were seven times as likely as Republicans to face Justice Department scrutiny.
How can this have been happening without a national uproar? The authors explain: "We believe that this tremendous disparity is politically motivated and it occurs because the local (non-statewide and non-Congressional) investigations occur under the radar of a diligent national press. Each instance is treated by a local beat reporter as an isolated case that is only of local interest."
And let's not forget that Karl Rove's candidates have a history of benefiting from conveniently timed federal investigations. Last year Molly Ivins reminded her readers of a curious pattern during Mr. Rove's time in Texas: 'In election years, there always seemed to be an F.B.I. investigation of some sitting Democrat either announced or leaked to the press. After the election was over, the allegations often vanished.'
I suspect Rove has been at it again, quietly using the system of justice to advance partisan political power. Gonzales has now agreed to relinquish all hiring decisions of interim U.S. Attorneys - an astonishing concession to the gravity of the charges. If all this pans out, Gonzales should be forced to resign very soon.
(Photo: Win McNamee/Getty.)
The Levees Weaken
09 Mar 2007 10:11 am
Scott Horton provides an over-arching schema for the troubling constitutional developments of the last few years. I'm still absorbing the post. On torture and the corruption of the justice system, Alberto Gonzales's role in allowing the justice system to be polluted by political interests is central. The U.S. attorneys scandal is very troubling, but it is just a small part of a much larger pattern of infringement on the constitutional limits on executive power and against factional abuse. The damage is not irreparable; but it is too dangerous to be complacent about. Soon, I believe, Gonzales will be forced out, and rightly so. But what worries me is not so much where we are, and what damage has already been done, but how the existing damage has weakened the entire system of democratic governance. How confident can we be that the organs of government really are neutral with respect to party and person any more? And how comfortable do you feel living in a country where the president has the right to detain any one indefinitely without trial, and subject them to torture if he deems to appropriate?
What worries me even more is where this administration or a future one might take the country after another terror attack on the scale of 9/11. That's why I worry about Giuliani. I may prefer him on social issues, but he would be a dangerous executive, given the presidency's expanded powers under Bush and Cheney. The levees of the justice system have proven weak so far, and this administration has corroded them badly. Money quote from Horton:
[George] Washington made clear that he felt partisanship should not be a factor in the selection of officers of the Justice Department or judges, and that the executive should likewise avoid other displays of favoritism based on family or other association, keeping only to merit. Of course, Washington’s approach did not last long, and it would be unrealistic to imagine America in the twenty-first century returning to a standard in which involvement with political parties and their agendas is excluded. However, it is time to recognize that the pendulum has swung too far, and it is urgent that it be brought back to the center.
In the Bush presidency, we have witnessed a severe systems test of foundational principles, indeed, an effort to transform the system. At this point, the outcome remains uncertain. A few scattered newspapers and Congressional hearings will not be enough to check the sea change that Bush's legal team has launched.
(Photo: Win McNamee/Getty.)
The View From Your Window
09 Mar 2007 10:05 am
Edgewater, New Jersey, 10 am.
McCain vs Giuliani
09 Mar 2007 09:32 am
Ryan Sager runs some numbers.
Quote for the Day
09 Mar 2007 08:28 am
"Europe cannot defeat the far-right poison of Islamic fundamentalism by turning to a parallel far-right mythology of its own. Once before we logged the race of babies. Once before we invented conspiracies like the Protocols of the Elders of Mohammed peddled by Steyn. It is a startling indictment of the intellectual standards of the American right that they have welcomed this Eurabian fiction with anything other than cheap, repulsed laughter," - Johann Hari, on Mark Steyn's book, "America Alone." Read the whole thing. If Hari - and Tony Blankley - are correct on Europe's demographic data, then the entire thesis of Steyn's book evaporates into thin air.
The Problem With Rudy
09 Mar 2007 06:59 am
Ask a neocon New Yorker:
The first serious problem is structural and political: A man who fought the inherent limits of his mayoral office as fanatically as Giuliani would construe presidential prerogatives so broadly he'd make George Bush’s notions of 'unitary' executive power seem soft.
Even in the 1980s, as an assistant attorney general in the Reagan Justice Department and U.S. Attorney in New York, Giuliani was imperious and overreaching, He made the troubled daughter of a state judge, Hortense Gabel, testify against her mother and former Miss America Bess Meyerson in a failed prosecution charging, among other things, that Meyerson had hired the judge's daughter to bribe help 'expedite' a messy divorce case. The jury was so put off by Giuliani's tactics that it acquitted all concerned, as the Washington Post’s Ruth Marcus recalled ten years later in assessing Special Prosecutor Kenneth Starr’s subpoena of Monica Lewinsky’s mother to testify against her daughter.
At least, as U.S. Attorney, Giuliani served at the pleasure of the President and had to defer to federal judges. Were he the President, U.S. Attorneys would serve at his pleasure -- a dangerous arrangement in the wrong hands, we've learned -- and he'd pick the judges to whom prosecutors defer.
There are many reasons to like Giuliani, but his personal intolerance of any hint of disloyalty, his contempt for dissent, his corner-cutting executive excesses and long history of cronyism must and surely will be weighed in the equation. Jim Sleeper is no lefty. His concerns are serious ones in a period when the constitution has already been strained to near-breaking point.
Thursday, March 8, 2007
Rudy's Problems
08 Mar 2007 10:26 pm
Lowry notes of a new WSJ poll:
Fully three of four Republicans—including a majority of those backing the former New York City mayor—say they would have reservations if they learned Mr. Giuliani supports abortion rights and supports civil unions for gay and lesbians couples.
You Know It's Bad
08 Mar 2007 10:21 pm
Even Reynolds is linking to bloggers who think Gonzales should be fired.
HRC Responds
08 Mar 2007 10:10 pm
Here's the relevant section from an email sent to me by the Human Rights Campaign, the largest gay rights group. You decide if they satisfactorily answer the questions raised here, here, and here:
We are committed to the transparency of the organization. Ninety-three percent of our total income comes from individuals, reflecting the importance of our work as seen by the broader community, and it is important they understand how their dollars are being put to work.
Charity Navigator is a rating entity that only analyzes the IRS Form 990 for 501(c)(3)s. In our case data for the Human Rights Campaign Foundation (HRCF), which focuses on non-political educational programming and outreach, was the only data considered. Unlike other national GLBT organizations such as GLAAD, GLSEN, etc., much of the activity undertaken by HRC is through our 501(c)(4), which receives contributions that are not tax-deductible. As you know, HRC’s 501(c)(4) is the political arm of the organization that is responsible for, among other things, lobbying Congress and state legislatures, mobilizing grassroots supporters to engage in pro-GLBT political activities and investing strategically to elect fair-minded officials.
HRCF’s current rating on Charity Navigator’s site does not reflect the latest information available from the IRS Form 990. HRC’s rating by Charity Navigator’s methodology is also affected by our capital campaign to build a national headquarters that was started in 2000 (which I will address in a moment). We estimate that HRCF’s rating on Charity Navigator would rise from one star to three stars for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2006, if data for the capital campaign were removed from the calculation as we understand it.
I believe it is important to point out a few facts about our capital campaign. When the campaign was launched, analysis showed that the organization would save more than $15 million over 15 years by owning a building rather than paying rent to a landlord. That estimate was using conservative assumptions for rental and operating cost increases, and did not factor in any potential appreciation in the value of the building. That means that instead of membership dues going to pay ever-increasing rent, the resources entrusted to us would continue to go directly toward the fight for equality. And it is important to note that no membership dues were used to finance the capital campaign.
In a subsequent posting, you refer to the Better Business Bureau’s “Wise Giving Alliance” - another rating system that only analyzes 501(c)(3) organizations. Like Charity Navigator, the Better Business Bureau’s guidelines do take into account the capital campaign which would unfairly skew our numbers. We fully expect to submit documentation and we anticipate we will pass all 20 of their standards.
A PDF file of HRC's 2006 IRS 990s can be downloaded here. I've asked HRC if they will answer a few emailed questions about their operation, what it spends, how it spends it, and what achievements they have won for the money. If you have any questions, especially if you've read the 990s, feel free to email me. I don't know yet whether they'll respond. They asked for a private meeting with me. I'd rather bring a few thousand readers along.
Blacks and Obama
08 Mar 2007 07:54 pm
Bacardi L. Jackson watches as various African-Americans cast aspersions on Barack Obama's candidacy and talk about whether he is really a good representative for black Americans. Then she loses it:
If I had the technological savvy, I would jump off this page with all the passion, hope, rage and volume of Spike Lee's Dap and tell you, brothers and sisters everywhere, please please please WAKE UP!!!!!!!!
The best thing Barack can do for us is to win, not show up at yet another black forum simply to prove he's one of us by placating the egos who believe Barack should clear his calendar for their "ultimate black" event! There are plenty of other candidates (and so-called leaders) who warrant our scrutiny and skepticism - not to mention a host of misogynistic lyricists, child molesting musicians, and other unaccountable black-community-made millionaires. Barack, however, has proven with his excellence, his achievements, his commitments, and his life's work that he warrants our support.
Read the whole thing.
Taranto Pulls a Coulter
08 Mar 2007 06:35 pm
Well, without the slur, which matters. But the same gutter instinct: he refers to John Edwards' "womanly charms." These kinds of insults are now what pass for arguments at the Wall Street Journal. But then they don't think that the Khmer Rouge's waterboarding techniques ever came close to torture.
From Crack-Up To Realignment?
08 Mar 2007 05:44 pm
Dan Casse is asking a lot from Rudy. Me? I like Rudy a lot. But I fear for civil liberties.
Quote for the Day
08 Mar 2007 04:52 pm
"One day there will be a new attorney general, maybe sooner rather than later," - Senator Arlen Specter, today. The U.S. attorneys scandal is about as deep as corruption goes.
An Attack Ad On Rudy
08 Mar 2007 04:47 pm
And even as I disagree with some of his positions (I'm less anti-gun and would ban partial birth abortion in a heartbeat), it makes me like him more. It seems as if David Frum feels the same way for different reasons. That probably alarms him as much as it alarms me.
The Barone Post
08 Mar 2007 04:22 pm
A reader alerts me that it might have been a hacker's work. It's not listed on his blog's full posts. I'm checking into it. In the meantime, I've taken it down. I'll keep you posted, as it were.
[Update: it was a hoax inserted into his blog by a hacker. Michael just emailed to confirm:
"I'm pretty sure I haven't commented on the firing of the U.S. attorneys. I really haven't looked into it enough to be able to comment knowledgeably."
I apologize. I was duped by a hacker. And it was a very good hacker. I've alerted US News' site as well.]
Hillary and HRC
08 Mar 2007 04:21 pm
More feedback for and against. Meanwhile: a newish blog: HRCWatch. Gay people are finally not taking it any more, are they?
Face of the Day
08 Mar 2007 03:55 pm
Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) listens to colleagues speak during a news conference March 8, 2007 in Washington, DC. Democrats today unveiled legislation requiring a pull-out of U.S. troops from Iraq by the fall of 2008. Photo by Win McNamee/Getty.
The Origins of Heterosexuality
08 Mar 2007 03:26 pm
An inquiry.
International Women's Day
08 Mar 2007 03:04 pm
The Saudis celebrate:
The 19-year-old Saudi woman was abducted by a gang of men wielding kitchen knives who took her to a farm where she was raped 14 times by her captors. Five men were arrested for the rape and given jail terms ranging from 10 months to five years by a panel of judges in the eastern Saudi city of Qatif, near the teenager's hometown.
But the judges also decided to sentence the young woman, identified only as "G," to 90 lashes. "G" was told by one of the judges that she was lucky not to have been given jail time. She said yesterday that she would appeal against her sentence.
The woman told the Saudi Gazette that she tried to commit suicide because of her ordeal and was beaten by her younger brother because the rape had brought shame on their family.
Is it Islamophobic to call this barbarism?
Hope for Republicans
08 Mar 2007 02:29 pm
George Will continues to be the best conservative columnist in America - and his record over the last few years is a stellar example of cool conservatism under fire. And I think he's right that all three current GOP front-runners are less awful than some seem to think. If the small but encouraging developments in Iraq lead to more progress, McCain will get a second wind. Giuliani and Romney are both excellent executives, representing two sides of the Republican libertarian/theocon divide. None of them is as incompetent as Bush (although Giuliani is as dictatorial, dangerous and controlling as Cheney). Sane conservatives are also beginning to realize that some of the most divisive issues, like abortion and marriage, are best dealt with at a state level or by judicial appointments - defusing some of the passion. And people forget who Ronald Reagan really was. Money quote from Will:
Suppose someone seeking the presidential nomination had, as a governor, signed the largest tax increase in his state's history and the nation's most permissive abortion law. And by signing a law institutionalizing no-fault divorce, he had unwittingly but substantially advanced an idea central to the campaign for same-sex marriages -- the minimalist understanding of marriage as merely a contract between consenting adults to be entered into or dissolved as it suits their happiness.
Question: Is it not likely that such a presidential aspirant would be derided by some of today's fastidious conservatives? A sobering thought, that, because the attributes just described were those of Ronald Reagan.
The GOP has gone insane these past few years with big government spending, borrowing and moralizing. But the Bush era is ending; and a better day may be coming. We shouldn't forgo a better future in the process of excoriating the recent past.
A reader comments:
My political education and activism grew out of the roots of the evangelical, social conservative, religious right movement of the early to late 90’s. That being said; I have no problem, at this stage of the campaign, to state that Rudy is the best candidate for the 08 GOP nomination. If conservatives actually want to win, that is.
My stance and my energy on these 'social issues' have wavered slowly since 9-11 and Iraq. The rise of political Islam, the disastrous results of regime change in Iraq, which I originally supported, your blog, George Will's columns, and most importantly, CS Lewis's Screwtape Letters have changed my perspective on the relationship between faith and religion.
Keep hope alive.
Leftists For Huckabee
08 Mar 2007 02:28 pm
What's not to like?
What's Happening in Iraq?
08 Mar 2007 01:15 pm
Obsidian Wings has a must-read round-up of reports from people who are actually there, or who recently returned. The South is Shiite mafia-central, Anbar is improving, the Shiite areas in Baghdad are calmer but the ethnic cleansing continues. Read the whole complex thing. Money quote from Bing West:
What, then, is the biggest problem? How the Americans can infuse into the Iraqi army and police in Baghdad a sense of mission and even-handedness such that the Americans can withdraw from neighborhoods in eight to twelve months without backsliding.
Existing American military tactics and techniques are adequate to staunch the ethnic cleansing; to transfer those conops or to design substitute techniques that the Iraqi army and police can use – and to meld the army and police into a unity of effort – is a far more problematic task. On the other hand, I’ve seen enough examples of tough Iraqi leadership at the battalion and police chief level to believe that some leadership is emerging. Right now, though, the glue is the presence of the American troops. They have to be out on the streets first, then the Iraqi forces fall in behind them.
The places in Baghdad where I saw clean streets, open shops, and guards on every corner were the Shiite areas. It’s too early to tell whether we’re dealing with a rope-a-dope feint by the Shiite politicians. It is in their short-term interests for them to help us purge bad elements, and restore order and services. But whether they believe a compromise with the Sunnis is possible or necessary – who knows?
The evidence that is slowly accumulating makes me tentatively believe that the "surge" has not failed so obviously that it should be abandoned any time soon. I will neer give Bush or Cheney the benefit of ay doubt in the future. They have lied too often. But Petraeus? He gets the benefit of the doubt. One important, under-reported fact:
26 of 31 sheiks have turned their backs on al Qaeda and are putting together their own security forces.
This is good news.
The Cheney Archipelago
08 Mar 2007 01:06 pm
New evidence of a secret CIA detention (and torture?) site in Poland. Interesting detail:
According to a confidential British intelligence memo shown to RAW STORY, Prime Minister Tony Blair told Poland's then-Prime Minister Leszek Miller to keep the information secret, even from his own government.
More here.
O'Reilly, Call Your Office
08 Mar 2007 12:42 pm
The "secular-progressives" have gotten their filthy, liberal mitts on the currency.
A Magnet Where?
08 Mar 2007 12:20 pm
I'm sorry but this is either very, very weird or deeply suspicious.
A Shift in Baghdad?
08 Mar 2007 11:57 am
I don't mean the surge. I mean the most hopeful small sign in a very long time. The NYT reported it this morning:
On Iraq's political front, a growing number of politicians publicly declared that they embraced the idea of a cross-sectarian political movement that has been gaining strength this week. It was not yet clear the form the front would take, but if successful it would have broad implications for parliamentary divisions and the way government ministries are apportioned: they are currently handed out to parties, most of which have clear sectarian sympathies.
Most significantly, the Fadhila Party, a faction of the united Shiite bloc, the largest group in Parliament, announced it was leaving the bloc.A spokesman for Fadhila suggested there was frustration with sectarian politics.
"We want to try to build a new politics that is not sectarian that will include all of Iraqi society," said Bassim Sharif, a leader of the Fadhila party. However, he stopped short of saying that they would join the new bloc. "For now we will try to work alone to prove there is a Shiite party that can work in a nonsectarian way." But, he added, "this is the first step to save Iraq from this crisis."
I don't know whether this will hold, whether it will gain enough momentum to make a difference, let alone help form a new truly national government. But that it is happening at all is encouraging, no? We have been hoping for a miracle. This isn't one, but it's the first step away from civil war that I've read about in ages. Petraeus today endorsed the obvious fact that this kind of deal - and this alone - can improve the disaster in Iraq:
"Any student of history recognizes there is no military solution to a problem like that in Iraq, to the insurgency in Iraq. Military action is necessary to help improve security ... but it is not sufficient. A political resolution of various differences ... of various senses that people do not have a stake in the successes of Iraq and so forth -- that is crucial. That is what will determine, in the long run, the success of this effort."
Which is why this minor development matters. We are also facing the imminent international conference in which the U.S. will be talking with Iran and Syria about Iraq's future. Keep hope alive.
(Photo: A US army Apache helicopter drops flares as it flies over Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone 08 March 2007. By Patrick Baz/AFP/Getty Images)
Judging HRC
08 Mar 2007 11:33 am
A reader sent me Charity Navigator's assessment of the biggest gay rights group's tax-deductible foundation, the Human Rights Campaign Foundation. They get one out of four stars overall. Their efficiency rating is zero out of four. What do these ratings mean? According to Charity Navigator, one star 
means:
"Fails to meet industry standards and performs well below most charities in its Cause."
Zero means:
"Performs far below industry standards and below nearly all charities in its Cause."
Of course, this does not even include the fact that their one explicit legislative goal for the last twenty years - the Employment Non-Discrimination Act - is still not the law, despite massive public support. In those two decades, the private sector has made more strides for gay equality than HRC, making ENDA close to irrelevant in much of corporate America. Yes: conservative corporations have beaten liberal HRC in advancing HRC's alleged primary goal. This despite the fact that HRC sucks over $20 million a year from the gay community, and its foundation is sitting on over $20 million in assets, according to the latest IRS-mandated reports, which HRC won't publish on its own site. And two decades ago, young gays were told that pushing for marriage rights was a bad thing because ENDA had to come first. We ignored them and battled their intense efforts to squelch marriage rights in the 1990s. Despite their efforts - marriage was off-brand for HRC because it was off-message for the Clintons - other pro-gay groups succeeded. HRC takes the credit, of course. That's one thing they're really good at.
If readers who are more adept at measuring the efficiency of various groups have more data defending or further subjecting HRC to criticism and scrutiny, I'll happily post it. If HRC cares to respond, I'll happily post their self-defense. Enjoy your teddy bears. And next time their hired telemarketers call, demand better.
Mickey and the Faggots
08 Mar 2007 10:36 am
The story goes back at least as far as 1983 in the following Kaus piece in The New Republic (not on Google):
There I was, moping in my beer, because Barney's Beanery (a famous old hangout on Santa Monica Boulevard) was forced to stop distributing matchbooks bearing its ancient motto, 'Fagots Stay Out,' and to take down a similarly misspelled sign tacked over the bar. The restaurant had since been sold and did not actually exclude homosexuals. The matchbooks and sign were kept as part of the place's heritage.
But Barney's had the misfortune of being located in West Hollywood, a sliver of miscellaneous L.A. County land incorporated last November after a petition drive by gay and tenant activists. About a third of the area's residents are gay, and three of five members of the new city council are openly homosexual. Their first official acts were to roll back rents and to ban antihomosexual discrimination. (As James Wolcott once said of the politics of The Village Voice, "We're for fistfucking and against gentrification.") Attorneys for the city threatened to turn over the Barney’s matchbooks to the D.A.'s office. After a brief period of pleading the First Amendment, Barney's owner caved in. The city's mayor (yes, one of the three) removed the offending sign from above the bar in a brief ceremony on Martin Luther King's birthday.
Civil rights march on. So why did I find myself sympathizing with Barney's? Was it that the slogan was unenforced? Partly. I certainly don't sympathize with the Jonathan Club, an oceanfront resort in Santa Monica that seems to actually exclude blacks, women, Jews and Hispanics. But I'd be offended if the matchbooks said 'Nigers Stay Out,' even if the policy was unenforced. I guess I have two arguments. First, while homosexuals certainly have a history of oppression, it seems clear that, at least in West Los Angeles, they are no longer the oppressed group. They've won, politically and, more important, economically, in a way that blacks haven't. There is something inflated, and unnecessarily defensive, in the gay politicos' righteous invocation of the elaborate and (necessarily) humorless mechanisms of racial equality.
Second, the Barney's sign wasn't really designed to keep out homosexuals so much as to keep out the homosexual life-style, which was taken over virtually every other bar in the area (except one called The Raincheck Room which responded to the Barney’s Crisis with a mysterious sign warning 'Farraguts Stay Out'). The difference seems important. Sexuality may not be a matter of choice for many people, but 'life-style' is. And some discrimination on the basis of life-style is, I think, both unavoidable and ultimately healthy. What the Barney's sign implied was that, no matter what your sexual preference, you were expected to act a certain way inside. You were supposed to feel uncomfortable if you didn’t. I am made to feel uncomfortable in most gay bars, if they don't stop me right at the door. So what? One of the ways the gay life-style is defined is by excluding 'breeders' like me. Should I be able to sue if I can't get in to Studio 54 because the doorman thinks I look like a nerd?
Does the 2007 Kaus still believe what the 1983 Kaus believed? On just one point of information. I know of no gay bars anywhere that exclude straight guys. We have no issues with straight guys, nerds included.
Mr. Marriage
08 Mar 2007 10:00 am
Romney has found his theme. But if they put the five sons up there, won't they look like the Osmonds?
The View From Your Window
08 Mar 2007 09:38 am
Qinghai Province, China, 3 pm.
The Press in Russia
08 Mar 2007 07:10 am
It's under siege - and no one knows who exactly is murdering whom. Here's a piece from a pro-Putin realist who nonetheless believes the level of intimidation has reached crisis levels.
Rudy's Problem
08 Mar 2007 07:00 am
It's with voters and activists