Accountability to Those Who Pay the Buck-O’-Five

Ken at Popehat has a perfectly concise take-down of LZ Granderson’s ridiculous CNN essay arguing against seeking too much information from our government about “Fast and Furious“. I won’t be able to say it better than Ken, so here are his words. (And if you’re not reading Popehat, correct that in your RSS reader.)

But to go much beyond the criticism of these men runs the risk of learning that this great nation of ours is heavily involved in doing some things that are not so great.

It would be nice to see this as a wry comment on American willingness to overlook lawbreaking by the government when it is committed (at least nominally) in service of goals of which we approve.

But the straight-faced reading is too similar to what I have come to expect from the media to be certain of my hoped-for satirical reading. Right now scandals over both Fast and Furious and the government response to it are being spun in many places as a cynical partisan obsession. I have not the shadow of the doubt that many of the loudest critics of the government have partisan motives. But if we dismiss criticism of government misbehavior because of partisan motivations, we’ll never entertain significant criticism of the government. We’ll always have partisanship. We can’t let it be an excuse to abandon our obligations as citizens to monitor and criticize the government.

Like Granderson, I know that “freedom isn’t entirely free”. It’s not “squeaky clean”. Unlike Granderson, and like Ken, I expect America to strive to be as squeaky clean as possible. Where we (allegedly) can’t be, I want to know why. I want to know what my government is doing in my name. I do not want elected dictators.

**********

LZ Granderson has exhibited questionable critical thinking skills in the past. A year ago he wrote an essay against the San Francisco ballot initiative that aimed to prohibit non-therapeutic male child circumcision. It was awful in nearly every paragraph. His arguments were either incomplete or idiotic in every case.

Five Year Olds Believe in Free Lunches

With the Supreme Court expected to rule on “Obamacare” (i.e. PPACA) tomorrow, I want to consider this reddit thread asking to explain it to a 5-year-old. There’s a long list of what PPACA does, and will do, if the Supreme Court upholds it. Some may be wise, while others are surely not. The overwhelming point, though, is that none of this is free. Consider this, for example:

Employers need to list the benefits they provided to employees on their tax forms.

That costs money. Even if the change is minor, computer systems have to be reprogrammed and tested. Multiply that across every employer in the U.S. How much productivity is being consumed by this instead of something else that may provide more wealth? What improved health outcomes will this generate?

Or consider:

It creates a new 10% tax on indoor tanning booths. ( Citation: Page 923, sec. 5000B )

A new tax on pharmaceutical companies.

A new tax on the purchase of medical devices.

A new tax on insurance companies based on their market share. Basically, the more of the market they control, the more they’ll get taxed.

Those taxes are taxes on consumers. I suspect many people reading the list, and maybe its author, don’t grasp that. All taxes are on individuals. Consumers will pay higher costs or receive fewer services.

The real beauty of the list comes when the author injects opinion.

The biggest thing opponents of the bill have against it is the mandate. They claim that it forces people to buy insurance, and forcing people to buy something is unconstitutional. …

Yes.

… Personally, I take the opposite view, as it’s not telling people to buy a specific thing, just to have a specific type of thing, just like a part of the money we pay in taxes pays for the police and firemen who protect us, this would have us paying to ensure doctors can treat us for illness and injury.

I don’t see the distinction between buy and have when the only way to get a thing is for someone to buy it. This is the “I like it” and “by whatever means” arguments in favor of constitutionality.

I expect the Supreme Court to strike down the mandate. I suspect the rest will go down, as well, because it’s the least controversial and problematic path if the mandate goes. The rest of the act needs the mandate to achieve the remaining cost savings (that it won’t actually achieve, even with the mandate). The least “activist” thing to do is for the Court to let Congress start over.

None of this is to suggest that we should do a victory dance in favor of the old status quo if the mandate goes down. We need reform within health care. Such as untying insurance from employment, which our current unemployment rate suggests would be wise. We won’t get responsible reform, because we’ll get more rent-seeking like PPACA instead. But if Congress has to start over, there’s a chance, however small.

Link via Wil Wheaton, who should heed his own “Don’t Be A Dick” suggestion. Blaming the constitutional challenge to PPACA on “the Koch Brothers and their Tea Party Rubes” as an attempt to “get the Supreme Court to take away” what PPACA legislates is dickish partisanship. Calling one’s opponents names and implying they’re stupid merely based on group affiliation is being a dick.

Penn Jillette on Obama’s Marijuana Hypocrisy

Penn Jillette is awesome for many reasons. As such I’m a fan of his new weekly podcast, Penn’s Sunday School. It always delivers, like last week when he went on a rant about President Obama’s continuation of the unwinnable, anti-liberty drug war and his hypocrisy. It’s brilliant and can be fully experienced in the clip below in a way the transcript can’t deliver.

Like Mr. Jillette, I’ve never consumed drugs or alcohol, but I do not care if another wants to do so. My only criterion is what I use for everything: do it voluntarily and without harm to another. Ingest drugs? No harm. Rob someone to get money to buy drugs to ingest? Harm. Drive while under the influence? Harm. It’s not complicated.

Contrast that with President Obama’s comments in his interview with Jimmy Fallon (video via NORML):

Notice the nanny-state mentality where anything that might be an individual problem automatically becomes a matter of “public health”. No one is an individual, just a cog in the machinery of the state to be managed and used.

Of course, Obama’s hypocrisy goes further. (As it does for all politicians, who are, by default, moral defectives.) Via the same NORML link, he clarified his remarks in an interview with Rolling Stone (from April):

Let me ask you about the War on Drugs. You vowed in 2008, when you were running for election, that you would not “use Justice Department resources to try and circumvent state laws about medical marijuana.” Yet we just ran a story that shows your administration is launching more raids on medical pot than the Bush administration did. What’s up with that?

Here’s what’s up: What I specifically said was that we were not going to prioritize prosecutions of persons who are using medical marijuana. I never made a commitment that somehow we were going to give carte blanche to large-scale producers and operators of marijuana – and the reason is, because it’s against federal law. I can’t nullify congressional law. I can’t ask the Justice Department to say, “Ignore completely a federal law that’s on the books.” What I can say is, “Use your prosecutorial discretion and properly prioritize your resources to go after things that are really doing folks damage.” As a consequence, there haven’t been prosecutions of users of marijuana for medical purposes.

The only tension that’s come up – and this gets hyped up a lot – is a murky area where you have large-scale, commercial operations that may supply medical marijuana users, but in some cases may also be supplying recreational users. In that situation, we put the Justice Department in a very difficult place if we’re telling them, “This is supposed to be against the law, but we want you to turn the other way.” That’s not something we’re going to do. I do think it’s important and useful to have a broader debate about our drug laws. One of the things we’ve done over the past three years was to make a sensible change when it came to the disparity in sentencing between crack cocaine and powder cocaine. We’ve had a discussion about how to focus on treatment, taking a public-health approach to drugs and lessening the overwhelming emphasis on criminal laws as a tool to deal with this issue. I think that’s an appropriate debate that we should have.

Only to a politician does “not prioritize” mean “vigorously pursue”. And, sure, cutting off supply of marijuana to people who may legally possess and use it within specific states isn’t “prosecution”, but it sure isn’t the same as federalism or a passing nod to his campaign promises. Nor, circling back to Jillette’s destruction of Obama’s hypocrisy, is his implied wrongness of recreational use vindicated by anything he’s said or done. He’s nothing more than a bad parent’s slogan: Do as I command, not as I do.

Government Preparation for Adulthood

This story is almost two weeks old, but it still has value.

A two-page oral sex encounter by an awkward teen at boarding school in the coming-of-age novel Looking for Alaska was deemed too racy by Sumner County schools last week.

The district banned the book from its assigned classroom reading list, becoming at least the second in the state, after Knox County in March, to keep students from reading it together in class.

The teen novel is the first in several years to be stripped from Sumner classrooms. Wilson, Rutherford and Williamson county schools say they haven’t banned the book or any titles in recent years. Metro schools didn’t have information on the book as of Monday.

In this case, he said, the value didn’t outweigh the controversy. The book was not pulled from any district library shelves, [Sumner County schools spokesman Jeremy Johnson] said.

I oppose censorship. This is clearly a form of censorship, although not quite as bad as removing the book from the school system entirely. A public school board prohibiting a book from the classroom curriculum is insulting to both teachers and students. It also provides excellent support for a libertarian rant against public provision of education. The argument against home-schooling seems centered around the willingness of some parents to avoid facts. This is no better, since the government engages in the same behavior. It’s also unnecessary. In high school, I had to seek parental permission to read The Catcher in the Rye for an essay because it featured adult language and themes. That’s an imperfect, reasonable solution which leaves discretion to parents and provides a learning opportunity for all students.

The school board’s decision is awful, and especially so because the book is part of a high school curriculum in which students are presumably being taught to think critically. Still, this strikes me as worse:

“Kids at this age are impressionable. Sometimes it’s a monkey see, monkey do,” said parent Kathy Clough, who has a freshman and a senior at White House High School, where the book had been assigned reading. “I’m going to trust that my school board made the right choice. … If they feel like this book is a little too graphic, I’m all for it.”

Or she could read the book and decide for herself. Just an idea.

I don’t understand that kind of parental abdication. Of course her concern is probably quite appropriate, given how willing she seems to turn over the raising of her children (who are nearly adults) to a government body. But this is infuriating because she assumes all parents are as incapable of teaching the idiocy of “monkey see, monkey do” as she implies she is, and therefore, no parents should have the choice for such books to be a part of their teen’s education. If she thinks a “child” 14 or older isn’t aware that oral sex is a thing, she’s mistaken. If a child teen between 14 and 18 hasn’t learned enough to distinguish literature from a directive, the school system is worse than just a censoring band of thugs. It’s an incompetent, censoring band of thugs. All parents should be vehemently opposed to ceding more control to that school system, as Ms. Clough is happy to do.

Here’s the author, John Green, explaining this scenario when it occurred elsewhere in 2008:

Via John Green on Twitter.

Update: Post updated because I found evidence that I had to ask permission to read The Catcher in the Rye.

One’s Conscience Should Favor Children Having Parents

Virginia is so ridiculous sometimes that it makes me say “God, damn Virginia”. Should there actually be a god, surely that god is not a fan of the hatred and bigotry that so many Virginia politicians and citizens embrace and repeatedly seek to codify. So it is again with SB 349 / HB 189, which Gov. Bob McDonnell can’t wait to sign. It updates the law for adoption agencies to include a “conscience clause”. Being Virginia this is nothing more than the legislature’s way of saying “EWWW, TEH GAYZ”.

Child-placing agency; conscience clause. Provides that, to the extent allowed by federal law, no private child-placing agency shall be required to perform, assist, counsel, recommend, consent to, refer, or participate in any placement of a child for foster care or adoption when the proposed placement would violate the agency’s written religious or moral convictions or policies. In addition, the bill provides that (i) the Commissioner of Social Services shall not deny an application for an initial license or renewal of a license, nor revoke a license, of any private child-placing agency and (ii) no state or local government entity shall deny a private child-placing agency any grant, contract, or participation in a government program because of the agency’s objection to performing, assisting, counseling, recommending, consenting to, referring, or participating in a placement that violates the agency’s written religious or moral convictions or policies. The bill provides that the refusal of a private child-placing agency to perform, assist, counsel, recommend, consent to, refer, or participate in a placement that violates its written moral or religious convictions or policies shall not form the basis of any claim for damages.

As a libertarian, private actors should be allowed to discriminate against whoever they want to hate. Denying access to one’s personal services is a right. Free markets require more than one consenting party. Likewise, I possess the right to give my business to someone else who more closely shares my values.

But it’s also clear that one stops being 100% private when one starts (voluntarily) taking public money. Want to discriminate? Fine, do it with your own money. When everyone is forced to contribute money to you, constraints tied to basic principles are reasonable. in short, you’re entitled to your religious beliefs. You’re not entitled to use my money to spread them in the world.

This May or May Not Be How the Drug War Ends

Many people are talking about New Jersey Governor Chris Christie’s high-level proposal from his 2012 State of the State address to shift the governmental approach to drug use/abuse among the citizens of New Jersey.

The transcript (video excerpt in bold):

At the same time, let us reclaim the lives of those drug offenders who have not committed a violent crime. By investing time and money in drug treatment – in an in-house, secure facility – rather than putting them in prison.

Experience has shown that treating non-violent drug offenders is two-thirds less expensive than housing them in prison. And more importantly – as long as they have not violently victimized society – everyone deserves a second chance, because no life is disposable.

I am not satisfied to have this as merely a pilot project; I am calling for a transformation of the way we deal with drug abuse and incarceration in every corner of New Jersey.

So today I ask this Legislature and the Chief Justice to join me in this commitment that no life is disposable.

I propose mandatory treatment for every non-violent offender with a drug abuse problem in New Jersey, not just a select few. It will send a clear message to those who have fallen victim to the disease of drug abuse – we want to help you, not throw you away. We will require you to get treatment. Your life has value. Every one of God’s creations can be redeemed. Everyone deserves a second chance.

It’s being applauded. In an important way, it should be. He’s proposing a shift from prison to treatment. We’re long past the point at which society can pretend the War on Drugs has been or can be successful. Experience has consistently shown it will not work. Now, the War on Drugs is just an excuse to provide ever-increasing power to the government. Good riddance to any part of that we can dismantle.

But therein lies the problem with Gov. Christie’s proposal. While a move in the right direction, he’s not proposing the removal of the state’s police power from the discussion. He proposed mandatory treatment for every non-violent offender with a drug abuse problem. That leaves the state police power involved. His speech was too high-level to establish that this will be terrible or that it can’t be good if the details are specified. But who defines “offender”? Would buying drugs still be an offense? And who defines “problem”? Would mere use of a drug be considered evidence of abuse? That’s a considerable amount of discretion when discussing mandatory (i.e. compelled with force) treatment.

There is a flaw in the term “non-violent offender”. And he said “…God’s creatures can be redeemed” rather than something about having freedom to ingest whatever one wants or the irrational economics of putting a “non-violent offender” in jail. Gov. Christie needs to elaborate before I’ll assume this is a push for liberty rather than the 2012 version of compassionate conservatism.

Via Elias Isquith at The League of Ordinary Gentlemen and Andrew Sullivan.

I know the video doesn’t fit. At some point I’ll update my blog theme to something newer than 2005.

Lifting the Venn of Ignorance

This Mother Jones blog post – “The Venn of Ron Paul and Other Mysteries of Libertarianism Explained” – is ostensibly a rebuke of libertarianism by dumping on its (alleged) chosen vessel, Ron Paul. Unsurprisingly, the author, Josh Harkinson, does not understand libertarianism. The diagram:

Mother Jones: Venn of Ron Paul

I know, ha ha. Especially with the additions of the accompanying “Libertarian Theology” glossary and the “Rand of the Free” poll. It’s so powerful.

If only it were true. To quote David Boaz:

… Libertarians are not against all government. We are precisely “advocates of limited government.” Perhaps to the man who wrote the speeches in which a Republican president advocated a trillion dollars of new spending, the largest expansion of entitlements in 40 years, federal takeovers of education and marriage, presidential power to arrest and incarcerate American citizens without access to a lawyer or a judge, and two endless “nation-building” enterprises, the distinction between “limited government” and “anti-government” is hard to see. But it is real and important.

And:

A government is a set of institutions through which we adjudicate our disputes, defend our rights, and provide for certain common needs. It derives its authority, at some level and in some way, from the consent of the governed… What we want is a limited government that attends to its necessary and proper functions… Thus libertarians are not “anti-government.” Libertarians support limited, constitutional government — limited not just in size but, of far greater importance, in the scope of its powers.

Admittedly, in the comfortable mindset of someone who likes ignorant gotchas, I probably violated my libertarian principle of individualism because I let someone else speak for me. I just stole his words. Nevermind that I cited Mr. Boaz and provided the necessary links. As a libertarian, I’m required to live without assistance from anyone for anything, forever. Hell, I drive on government roads every day. Eventually I’m going to figure out that this makes me not a libertarian.

To show that anyone can have fun with drawing, I’ve attempted my own Ha Ha.

Making Ha Ha

To finish the point, I have an entire blog category in which I explain why more state action is warranted and necessary. So, yeah, “anti-government”? Not so much.

Link via Boing Boing. (Note: Original venn diagram re-sized to fit my out-of-date blog template.)

All Government Is Force. Even Regulation.

Back to the Occupy movement…

I have some sympathy for Occupy Wall Street and its offspring around the country. There is enough broken in the way our economy works that only a fool would advise inaction. Where I quickly part ways is with the obvious implication that our government can fix crony capitalism (i.e. corporatism). Our government is complicit in this problem. It serves the needs of politicians. Where power exists to grab, it will be grabbed. If this involves buying access to or the use of that power, it will happen. The solution is to limit power, not to pretend that human nature can be changed.

This interesting post from writer Lauren McLaughlin addresses an approach for going forward. She’s right that the movement needs to stop protesting and Do Something. I don’t think she’s right on what should be done.

For example, she suggests:

Early complaints about the movement’s lack of specific demands is also falling away as an increasingly focused platform centering on economic justice comes into focus. Poll the former residents of Zuccotti Park or any of the other occupation sites and you’ll hear a variety of ideas, but the most common seem to be the following:

– Regulate banks in a way that disincentivizes the reckless gambling that puts all of us at risk.

– Tax investment returns at the same rate as income.

– Reform campaign finance laws so that we’re no longer being governed by Goldman Sachs.

On the first item, banks were regulated before the financial crisis hit. That we still had a financial crisis may indicate that crimes took place, although I’m doubtful the evidence is strong. But it also demonstrates how difficult it is to get the correct regulation. Unintended consequences will occur. If we radically alter and/or increase regulation, what happens?

It’s also worth noting that capitalists, rather than corporatists, advocate letting banks fail. The fear of failing, including bankruptcy, is a motivator. It’s unlikely to be the exclusive answer, but we haven’t tried it in conjunction with anything yet.

I’d flip the second to suggest taxing income at the same rate as investment returns. Power is the problem, not inadequate revenue. The point of reducing the government is not mere animosity to government (or worse insinuations). As long as power exists, it will be abused.

On the third, I’m not clear enough on the implication of the item to comment extensively. If it’s a response to Citizens United, then I disagree. Corporations are not people in the literal sense, but in the legal sense they are, and for good reason. Corporations (and other forms of organization) are made up of people. Those people do not lose rights because they’ve chosen to work together. If they do, it’s not a large leap to discredit democracy. But, again, reduce the scope and amount of power available within government and the incentive to buy it will reduce.

Ms. McLaughlin’s next paragraph is revealing from my perspective:

Of course, there are other ideas, like making banks finance their own future bailouts through a financial transaction tax, but I think it’s fairly easy to see the big idea at the heart of the movement: American capitalism and democracy are broken. The big difference between Occupy Wall Street and The Tea Party is that the latter sees the government as the big evil, whereas the former fingers a reckless and under-regulated banking industry that has captured our government and bent it to its will.

I’m not a Tea Party guy, so I’m not so concerned about the difference. But the two have similarities and should recognize that the root causes are very similar. Why does the Tea Party see the government as evil? I think there’s some truth to the assertion, but I don’t know the answer. I also know many Tea Party members have taken the initial, singular focus on government spending and turned to other causes in which they want more government, not less. I’m not sure the analysis that it thinks government is evil is accurate.

Either way, if that’s true, the only way “a reckless and under-regulated” – both subjective terms, with the latter being much less defensible – banking industry could capture our government and bend it to its will is with the full participation of our government. Corporatism is a sinister cooperative effort, not a sinister takeover. Trusting the same government that’s been captured so readily and thoroughly to provide a solution is bizarre. As long as there is power to abuse, this will continue, even if it takes a different form. Any action that is to be a solution rather than a perpetuation of chasing new problems must account for this. I haven’t seen evidence that the Occupy movement understands this. It may yet win, but I fear the outcome if it does.

In related news, the government that will somehow help is the same government that sees no problem with pepper-spraying peaceful, if disruptive, protesters with a callous disregard for the necessity or safety of the force. This is the state in action. This is what Occupy requests when it calls for more government regulation. All government is force. Why is it wrong to use against you, but okay to use against me?

The Explanation May Not Fit on a Placard

Continuing with the Occupy Wall Street theme, the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee released an “Open Letter of Support for the Occupy Movement”. It’s predictably full of pointless nonsense which I think underlies the larger problem with the Occupy protests. To be clear I do not assume that UUSC speaks for the movement. I’m only aiming at it because it states ideas that appear to be generally applicable to Occupy Wall Street.

From the beginning:

I stand with people around the country and the world who are calling for economic justice.

“Economic justice” doesn’t say anything. What’s meant by the term? Equality of process? Equality of outcome? There are different possible meanings. Some are legitimate and principled. Others are naive. Which is it here?

My values affirm that each person has inherent worth and dignity; that justice, equity, and compassion should be the guiding principles for human relationships; and that all people deserve access to the democratic process.

More ideals without evidence to demonstrate we do not have them in some form. In the abstract, sure, these are great. But what does it mean in reality? Who doesn’t have access to the democratic process? What are the intended consequences? What might be the unintended consequences? Can “the democratic process” create valid outcomes that you don’t like?

My recognition of the inherent worth of every person compels me to speak out against policies that privilege the demands of corporations over the human rights of people. I support the Occupy movement in its affirmation that protecting workers’ rights and ensuring that basic human needs are met must take precedence. All people have a fundamental right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of themselves and their families.

Please provide examples of where the demands of corporations are privileged over the human rights of people. Government requires a balancing of rights. It’s primary task is protecting the rights of individuals. Corporations are individuals, which is to say a collection of individuals. If individuals have a human right to free association, the form of that association shouldn’t matter, right? Is the Occupy movement free association? Are the human rights of people the rights of individuals or the abstract of a right, like “free speech”? Are “workers’ rights” a subset of human rights or separate and applicable to everyone?

If someone believes my last paragraph, how does free association and an individual’s inherent worth and dignity matter only to the extent that their “fundamental right” to a standard of living is met? If the solution is to tax the rich (more), and that seems to be the Occupy movement’s demand, then there’s an implied point at which an individual becomes a valid target for the rest of society. Justice and equity require both a floor and a ceiling?

I also join the Occupy movement in decrying the wealth disparity that leaves millions struggling for economic security. Policies and legislation that promote economic marginalization are morally unacceptable. Everyone is entitled to a government that recognizes and promotes basic economic rights. Justice, equity, and compassion should be foremost in our government’s decision making.

Is this alleged wealth disparity the cause, or merely a coincidental fact? Wealth and prosperity is only fixed in the moment. But we don’t live in a moment. There is tomorrow, and if we create and produce, there will be more tomorrow. Some will get rich, some will not. This isn’t necessarily problematic or unfair. Stating that everyone should have some minimum is not the same argument as assuming that no one should have above some maximum. Is Occupy interested in creating and producing, and is it interested in consent in achieving economic security, which is not well-defined here?

I agree that policies and legislation that promote economic marginalization are morally unacceptable. However, the solution includes limiting government power, not relying on the right mix of benevolent politicians. The latter don’t exist in sufficient numbers to make a technocratic democracy work without horrible, rights-violating offenses.

Economic oppression is not only a violation of fundamental human rights, it is also a blow to democracy. When economic power is concentrated in the hands of a few and when corporations are awarded the same status as actual human beings, the democratic process is fundamentally compromised. Basic fairness requires that all people have equal opportunity to participate in political debate and to be represented in government.

Define “economic oppression”. Provide examples. Explain how the Occupy movement’s undefined solution resolves the problem. What are the intended economic consequences of democracy? What might be the unintended consequences? Can “the democratic process” create valid outcomes that you don’t like?

Economic power is concentrated for many reasons, including cooperation from politicians. Politicians will be involved in democracy. Democratic tyranny is possible. This is why equality of process is superior to equality of outcome. Democracy does not guarantee equality of process. How would the Occupy movement address this?

Have corporations been awarded the same status as actual human beings? Who will Apple vote for next week? In 2012? What about Starbucks? Again, corporations are a collection of people exercising their natural right to free association. Do they lose certain rights because they join collectively rather than act alone? What would be the consequences – good and bad – of altering the current corporate structures?

I envision a powerful and radically inclusive movement for economic justice. I recognize economic justice as a right that is due to all people, regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, language, religion, political or other opinion, immigration status, national or social origin, property, birth, or other status or distinction.

Is economic justice a right due to “rich” people who are to be taxed? What does this right look like for anyone classified as rich?

I sign this letter as an expression of gratitude to all who are working for economic justice in the United States and around the world, as an affirmation of my hope for fair and compassionate economic reforms, and as a renewal of my commitment to help make it so.

Are we listening to those working for economic justice who know nothing more than the slogans and solutions, those who haven’t attempted an understanding of the complex problem?

Link via Ethics Alarms.

Krugman says, “I’m Rubber, You’re Glue…”

It’s been a decent chunk of time since I last posted, but I have things to say again. (And Google removed shared items from Google Reader.) We’ll see how long it lasts.

What better (i.e. easier) way to jump back in than to comment on Paul Krugman saying something stupid and lacking in self-awareness. As always it’s “you shouldn’t do that, but ignore that I’m doing it.” Consider this, from last week:

Over the last couple of days, I’ve been getting mail accusing me of consorting with Nazis. My immediate reaction was, what the heck? Then it clicked: the right wing is mounting a full-court press to portray Occupy Wall Street as an anti-Semitic movement, based, as far as I can tell, on one guy with a sign.

I have a lot of sympathy for this complaint, given one of my major interests. It’s a pathetic generalization and an embarrassing reflection on the person willing to dabble in stereotypes without individual evidence. It’s a dishonest tactic, which suggests fear dominates rather than confidence. Any large-ish movement is going to attract its share of crazies who value conspiracy theories over logic. Unless the movement is based on the conspiracy theory itself or a plainly evil belief, the extreme views are probably not widely held within the group and many group members are likely fighting the nonsense out of public view. Generalizing in this way is flawed and stupid, as any case of being uninterested or unwilling to think is.

So, one paragraph in, Krugman has my sympathy. If this had been the issue Krugman intended to pursue, fine. He didn’t.

My first thought was that OWS must have the right really rattled. And there’s probably something to that. But actually, this is the way the right goes after everyone who stands in their way: accuse them of everything, no matter how implausible or contradictory the accusations are. Progressives are atheistic socialists who want to impose Sharia law. Class warfare is evil; also, John Kerry is too rich. And so on.

Krugman makes no distinction between those making accusations and those who share (some) similar, conservative views. It’s “the right”, without specificity. That stroke is too broad.

The key to understanding this, I’d suggest, is that movement conservatism has become a closed, inward-looking universe in which you get points not by sounding reasonable to uncommitted outsiders — although there are a few designated pundits who play that role professionally — but by outdoing your fellow movement members in zeal.

He’s closer here, since it’s clear that “movement conservatism” implies “professional”. But his aside is not enough to excuse what he’s doing. Most people see the distinction between Rush Limbaugh and a neighbor, perhaps even when the neighbor praises Limbaugh. I hope the same is true of anyone tempted to make a professional pundit like Bill Maher the spokesperson for every liberal progressive everywhere. It’s a silly, immature way to view the world (and a key reason I hate partisanship).

Krugman continues:

It’s sort of reminiscent of Stalinists going after Trotskyites in the old days: the Trotskyites were left deviationists, and also saboteurs working for the Nazis. Didn’t propagandists feel silly saying all that? Not at all: in their universe, extremism in defense of the larger truth was no vice, and you literally couldn’t go too far.

Many members of the commentariat don’t want to face up to the fact that this is what American politics has become; they cling to the notion that there are gentlemanly elder statesmen on the right who would come to the fore if only Obama said the right words. But the fact is that nobody on that side of the political spectrum wants to or can make deals with the Islamic atheist anti-military warmonger in the White House.

The last line says it all. (It’s not the last line in the post; just the last important line.) Is it only “that side” engaging in heated, sweeping accusations? “That side.” Krugman is in pot-meet-kettle territory. Everyone who believes anything and shares that belief is a propagandist, literally. In the pejorative, as Krugman implies here, he’s claiming that only the right propagandizes. It wouldn’t take long to find instances of the left engaging in the same tactics against the right, considering I read Krugman’s post.