Another Rightie Who Can’t Read

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I noticed this trackback to the last post. It proves my point about the general fuzzy-headedness of the “limited government” argument. Even though I specifically (and clearly, I think) wrote that government must be restricted from abusing civil liberties, the blogger wrote,

Does Ms. O’Brien really believe that there shouldn’t be any limits on the will of the people ? If she does, then we’ve got to toss out most of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, because that’s precisely what they do.

I wonder sometimes if these meatheads cannot grasp that, ultimately, “the government” and “the people” are the same thing. In the U.S. the government is an instrument by which We, the People, govern ourselves. The Constitution provides the basic parameters, structures, and divisions of authority of that government. The Bill of Rights enumerates which things the government does not have the power to do, meaning that no government official or political faction can use government to do those enumerated things.

And I think that’s grand. But libertarians want to deprive people of the ability to use government in ways that don’t have a dadblamed thing to do with civil liberties, and which in fact fall under the aegis of matters for which the Constitution was purposed —

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

If We, the People, want to promote the general Welfare by initiating taxpayer funded universal health care, for example, ain’t nothin’ in the Constitution that says we can’t have it. People opposed to it can argue about why they think universal health care is not a good use of taxpayer dollars, and then the voters can decide which way they want to go. But when such a program is nixied purely on some ideological dogmas about “big government,” that’s essentially an argument against republican government, and against democracy itself. It’s an argument that says people may not govern themselves, and it’s a violation of the principles on which this nation was founded.

The blogger I’m snarking about is the one who wants to “toss out most of the Constitution” and replace it with an antigovernment ideology.

It isn’t the size of government that makes it oppressive. I provided an example from history in the post below — in the very decade (the 1870s) that government was “smallest” and least intrusive into matters of business, markets, securities, etc., it was opening peoples’ mail to be sure they weren’t using the postal system to provide information on birth control.

Some years later federal courts ruled that Comstock Law agents could not interfere with dissemination of birth control information and devices. To many at the time, the courts’ rulings were an example of “big government.” Would the libertarians reduce the power of government to protect the civil liberties of people?

The knee-jerk attitude that government is always bad, and “big” government is worse, is not based on either reason or the Constitution.

The simple fact is that people oppress each other. They do this with or without government. Sometimes powerful political factions do use government as an instrument of oppression, but throughout our history government has also been the tool used by citizens to gain relief from oppression.

I say that reducing the size and power of government does not reduce oppression, because oppression takes place by means other than government. Those laissez-faire businessmen of the 1870s oppressed their workers outrageously, for example. Many of the inhuman outrages that were common then are rare today — because of government. We, the People, decided workers should have some protections. Labor unions were behind much of the political organization that brought about the Department of Labor and legislation protecting workers, but labor unions by themselves weren’t having a whole lot of success at protecting workers before that.

I’m old enough to know that much of the hysteria over “big government” that arose after World War II came about because government acted to protect the rights of African Americans and other oppressed minorities. The racist bigots who jeered at the “Little Rock Nine,” for example, thought that “big government” was oppressing them. The Governor of Arkansas had wanted to use National Guard to keep African Americans out of the public high school. A federal judge issued an injunction against this. When Little Rock police feared they could not protect the Nine from mob violence, President Eisenhower sent 1,000 troops from the 101st Airborne Division to protect the students from the mob. Eisenhower also federalized the Arkansas Guard, taking it away from control of the Governor. (Note that Eisenhower acted after the mayor of Little Rock asked for help.)

For years after that, white bigots complained about those armed troops in the streets of Little Rock and whined about how their “rights” were being infringed by “big government.” They were talking about their “rights” to prevent nine teenagers from going to school because of their skin color. They were talking about their “rights” to form a mob and tear nine young people to pieces because of their skin color.

Libertarians want to protect those “rights.” They want to deprive the federal government of the power to protect the civil liberties of citizens.

I’m not saying that all libertarians are bigots. I’m saying they haven’t thought it all through. They see “big government” and think “oppression,” and that’s that. But whether government is “big” or “little” is not the issue; the issue is whether government functions within the parameters of the Constitution, including the Bill of Rights, or whether it doesn’t. The issue is whether our government remains an instrument for self-government as it was intended, or whether it doesn’t.

Update: I’m closing comments on this post, as we’re starting to get an infestation of commenters who don’t know they should be polite to the hostess.

Why Limited Government?

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Michael Gerson’s essay on “The Republican Identity Crisis” makes a fascinating point about “limited government” ideology.

One Republican Party—the Republican Party of movement conservatives on Capitol Hill and in the think-tank world—will argue that the “big government Republicanism” of the Bush era has been a reason for recent defeats. Like all fundamentalists, the antigovernment conservatives preach that greater influence requires a return to purity—the purity of Reaganism.

But the golden age of austerity under Reagan is a myth. During the Reagan years, big government got bigger, with federal spending reaching 23.5 percent of GDP (compared with just over 20 percent under the current president). …

… And the critics believe in a caricature of recent budgets. Well over half of President Bush’s spending increases have gone to a range of unexpected security necessities, including military imminent-danger pay, unmanned aerial vehicles and biological-weapons vaccines. … Why don’t anti-government conservatives mention spending increases on defense and homeland security when they make their critique? Because a minimalist state cannot fight a global war—so it is easier for critics to ignore the global war.

Most rightie rhetoric about “big government” fails to make a distinction between big government that is bad because it costs a lot of money or big government that is bad because it intrudes on personal liberty. And these are two entirely separate types of bad.

“Small government” conservatives tend to focus on economic freedom; they want freedom from taxation and government regulation, for example. But government intrudes in private lives in many ways. The Comstock laws, for example, came into being in the 1870s — exactly the same time that laissez faire reached its apex in the U.S., “during the age of industrialization as American factories operated with a free hand.” So a factory owner in 1874 enjoyed complete freedom to exploit his employees, but at the same time the government would not allow information on birth control to be mailed to him.

Gerson continues,

As antigovernment conservatives seek to purify the Republican Party, it is reasonable to ask if the purest among them are conservatives at all. The combination of disdain for government, a reflexive preference for markets and an unbalanced emphasis on individual choice is usually called libertarianism. The old conservatives had some concerns about that creed, which Russell Kirk called “an ideology of universal selfishness.” Conservatives have generally taught that the health of society is determined by the health of institutions: families, neighborhoods, schools, congregations. Unfettered individualism can loosen those bonds, while government can act to strengthen them. By this standard, good public policies—from incentives to charitable giving, to imposing minimal standards on inner-city schools—are not apostasy; they are a thoroughly orthodox, conservative commitment to the common good.

Campaigning on the size of government in 2008, while opponents talk about health care, education and poverty, will seem, and be, procedural, small-minded, cold and uninspired. The moral stakes are even higher. What does antigovernment conservatism offer to inner-city neighborhoods where violence is common and families are rare? Nothing. What achievement would it contribute to racial healing and the unity of our country? No achievement at all. Anti-government conservatism turns out to be a strange kind of idealism—an idealism that strangles mercy.

I’d say it’s an idealism that strangles self-interest as well. “Small government” ideology is not just opposed to programs for the poor. It is opposed to programs that would help most Americans, like universal health care. It’s essentially an ideology that insists We, the People, should not use government to “form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility … promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.” Providing for the common defense is OK, however.

Andrew Sullivan took offense at Gerson’s essay.

Gerson, like many big-government and left-wing types

Translation: Gerson was a speechwriter and policy adviser to President G.W. Bush.

seems to believe that all small government conservatives are libertarians and all libertarians are swivel-eyed loons. Sign me up for that then. But a belief in the ineffable goodness and efficiency of government is every bit as ideological an attitude as thinking markets can provide a better way. It’s not just a belief in free markets per se that persuades libertarians, it’s that markets can also lead to better outcomes. In other words, there’s a happy marriage between principle and pragmatism.

If a belief in republican (small r!) government requires “a belief in the ineffable goodness and efficiency of government,” sign me up for that then. But respect for the virtues of self-government as provided by the Constitution does not require blind faith in the “ineffable goodness and efficiency of government.” Quite the opposite, actually. Citizens should understand that government can become corrupt and inefficient, because it’s up to citizens to pay attention to government and make informed choices in the voting booth.

In other words, a respect for republican government is not about trusting government, but about trusting We, the People. It’s true that the people can be fooled into making bad choices, but our form of government provides means for We, the People, to correct our mistakes eventually. Most of ’em, anyway.

But putting your trust in free markets is putting trust in … what, exactly? Chance? Greed? The benevolence of the monied classes? And if those free markets stampede off in a bad direction (as they did in the 1920s, for example), what remedy do We, the People, have?

In fact, the weight of empirical evidence that history provides us reveals that when markets and business and securities are allowed freedom from government regulation, what follows is plutocracy, exploitation of labor, corruption, and economic instability. A “happy marriage between principle and pragmatism” my ass.

The Carpetbagger thinks Gerson isn’t seeing the big picture.

Hasn’t this chasm existed in GOP politics for the better part of a generation? The libertarian wing demands less government, Republican candidates say the right things, they win, they increase the size of government anyway, and libertarians complain and demand less government again. It’s a beautiful little cycle.

What makes now different? We have a few more leading GOP voices than usual suggesting that the party lost its majority status in Congress because it wasn’t libertarian enough to inspire the base, but the facts speak for themselves — the base turned out exactly as it did the last couple of cycles. Frustrated “true” conservatives didn’t stay home in protest on Election Day; they did exactly what they’ve been doing. In 2006, it wasn’t enough, but you don’t hear anyone in leadership positions suggesting that party activists and insiders settle the broader debate “once and for all.” They’ll tinker with the message, turn Pelosi into some kind of money-generating boogeyman, and try again in ‘08. …

… The Republicans’ problems are far broader than an ideological squabble — they have an unpopular and hard-to-defend policy agenda, unpopular and weak leaders, and a record of scandal, incompetence, and mismanagement.

I still say that libertarianism and “limited government” ideology is essentially anti-democratic. It deprives We, the People of the ability to use government in our own interests. Certainly the powers of government must be limited — the power to censor, the power to search and seize property, the power to intrude on citizens’ private lives generally — but placing artificial limits on the size and functions of government doesn’t restrict government as must as it restricts the will of the people. I’m not calling for “big government” for its own sake. I’m just saying that a government should be as big (or as small) as its citizens require.

What we’ve got with the Bushies is the World of All Worlds. They’ve given us a government that violates citizens’ rights but doesn’t respond to their needs. The question should not be whether government is big or small; the question should be who does government serve? The people, or something else?

Update: See also Matt Stoller, “The Bar Fight Primary.”

“Stop the War by Stopping.”

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James Carroll writes in today’s Boston Globe:

Was the first act of war followed by the first act of denial? The story of Cain (“a tiller of the ground”) and Abel (“a keeper of sheep”) is a parable of primordial conflict between settled farmers and nomadic herders, and the lessons are timeless. Each warring group claims to have justice on its side, and believes that the way to peace is through conquest. War is always fought in the name of justice-and-peace. But peace achieved through war inevitably leads not to justice, but to conditions that cause the next war. History is the record of that succession. Victory through violence is the way to further violence.

I don’t think it’s been true throughout human history that war is always fought in the name of justice-and-peace, but I’m not aware of any war of the past century or so in which the justice-and-peace rationale wasn’t waved about by somebody. That’s not to say that justice-and-peace was the aggressors’ motivation behind all modern wars. In fact, I doubt that justice-and-peace is ever the true motivation behind initiating a war, just the excuse. But most of the time the people making that excuse don’t see that it’s just an excuse. They’ve talked themselves into believing their own excuse.

We might call these people “fools.” We might also call them “neocons.”

I agree with Carroll when he writes, “But peace achieved through war inevitably leads not to justice, but to conditions that cause the next war. History is the record of that succession.” If you step back and look at all of human history, time and time again the seeds of war were sown by a previous war. This is not to say that there aren’t other factors, but nearly always those “other factors” were issues that might have been resolved by other means.

Many who read the sentence “Victory through violence is the way to further violence” will bring up World War II. The victory over Japan, for example, was achieved after terrible violence that included two nuclear bombs. Yet that violence did not result in eternal enmity between the U.S. and Japan. Doesn’t that prove Carroll is wrong? No; it proves that this is one of the greatest anomalies of world history. A great many factors had to come together very precisely to create this anomaly. These factors, IMO, the manner of the U.S. occupation and the Buddhist-Confucian foundations of Japanese ethics. Needless to say, this happy confluence is not present in Iraq.

The lesson to be taken from Japan is not that a violent victory can have a happy result. The lesson is that, after a war, with hard work and a lot of luck the factors that might lead to another war can be substantially reduced. This is a critical distinction.

Our own Civil War was another such anomaly. Long and dear friendships existed across warring lines; officers on both sides knew and actually liked each other even as they tried to kill each other. At Appomattox Ulysses S. Grant ordered his troops not to celebrate the surrender of Robert E. Lee so as not to hurt the Confederates’ feelings. The rebel leaders were not punished for treason but were released on parole. (The only exceptions I’m aware of were the executions of the Lincoln assassination conspirators and the commanding officer of Andersonville Prison.) Compared to the aftermath of any other civil war on this planet, this behavior was downright peculiar. Even so, even though we haven’t had another civil war, there was another kind of violence — the defeated white southerners took their rage out on African Americans, beginning a reign of racial terrorism that has still not completely dissipated.

The truth that countless generations of fools can’t get into their heads is that military victory doesn’t create peace. Sometimes what victors choose to do with the victory can help establish peace, but that’s rare.

Carroll concludes,

The Bush administration embraced the cult of war when it did not have to. Bush re-legitimized that cult, and sponsored it anew. In this, he was supported by the American people, its press and its political establishment. In the beginning, the nation itself re affirmed war as the way to justice-and-peace. We did this. The first fallacy lived. By now, even Washington’s one self-proclaimed “victory” has led to further defeat. The “good” war in Afghanistan put in place structures of oppression that promised an inevitable resumption of savagery, which has begun. …

… Because of the destructiveness of modern weapons, there will be no distant future unless humans, having seen through the congenital illusion of justice-and-peace through violence, come to the rejection of war. That must begin now. Democrats, take heed: Bush must not be allowed to further the chaos. Having led the world into this moral wilderness, America has a grave responsibility to lead the way out. We have to cease killing other people’s children, which is the way to stop them from killing ours. Stop the war by stopping.

Idiocy Abounds

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Just when I thought I had seen the worse idiocy has to offer — the juror from hell — I read this column by Fred Barnes.

It turns out that the Great Leap Forward to Victory plans were leaked to guests at the White House Christmas party. Barnes explains what the party attendees learned:

Last Monday Bush was, at last, briefed on an actual plan for victory in Iraq, one that is likely to be implemented. Retired General Jack Keane, the former vice chief of staff of the Army, gave him a thumbnail sketch of it during a meeting of five outside experts at the White House. The president’s reaction, according to a senior adviser, was “very positive.” Authored by Keane and military expert Frederick W. Kagan of the American Enterprise Institute, the plan (which can be read at aei.org/publication25292) is well thought-out and detailed, but fundamentally quite simple. It is based on the idea–all but indisputable at this point–that no political solution is possible in Iraq until security is established, starting in Baghdad. The reverse–a bid to forge reconciliation between majority Shia and minority Sunni–is a nonstarter in a political environment drenched in the blood of sectarian killings.

General Keane is one of the three retired generals and two academics who were cherry picked to explain to the President why the Iraq Study Group panelists are poopyheads.

Why would the Keane-Kagan plan succeed where earlier efforts failed? It envisions a temporary addition of 50,000 troops on the ground in Iraq. The initial mission would be to secure and hold the mixed Baghdad neighborhoods of Shia and Sunni residents where most of the violence occurs. Earlier efforts had cleared many of those sections of the city without holding them. After which, the mass killings resumed. Once neighborhoods are cleared, American and Iraqi troops in this plan would remain behind, living day-to-day among the population. Local government leaders would receive protection and rewards if they stepped in to provide basic services. Safe from retaliation by terrorists, residents would begin to cooperate with the Iraqi government. The securing of Baghdad would be followed by a full-scale drive to pacify the Sunni-majority Anbar province.

The catch is that, according to many smart and knowledgeable people, the military doesn’t have 50,000 troops to send. Fred Barnes doesn’t bother to address this little quibble.

I actually stopped reading after this paragraph (emphasis added):

The Keane-Kagan plan is not revolutionary. Rather, it is an application of a counterinsurgency approach that has proved to be effective elsewhere, notably in Vietnam. There, Gen. Creighton Abrams cleared out the Viet Cong so successfully that the South Vietnamese government took control of the country. Only when Congress cut off funds to South Vietnam in 1974 were the North Vietnamese able to win.

You should read that paragraph a couple more times in order to appreciate the magnitude of Barnes’s idiocy. I’ll wait. If you feel a strong urge to bang your head against a wall (as I did) I suggest finding a padded wall to avoid injury.

Now, it is true that Congress reduced appropriations to South Vietnam in September 1974, but Barnes’s notion that the “counterinsurgency approach” used in Vietnam had been a model of success until then is, um, a little off. Most historians believe the war was bleeped up beyond hope of redemption by 1968.

Those of us old enough to remember Vietnam also remember being told, by both Johnson and Nixon, that escalation — stepping up the war effort with more troops or more bombs — would eventually bring the war to a happy resolution.

It didn’t. But more importantly, the Vietnam experience should have taught us that not all problems require a military solution.

Robert Scheer wrote,

Bush seems not to have noticed that we succeeded in Vietnam precisely because we did quit the military occupation of that nation, permitting an ideology of freedom to overcome one of hate. Bush’s rhetoric is frighteningly reminiscent of Richard Nixon’s escalation and expansion of the Vietnam War in an attempt to buy an “honorable” exit with the blood of millions of Southeast Asians and thousands of American soldiers. In the end, a decade of bitter fighting did not prevent an ignominious U.S. departure from Saigon.

Now, however, Vietnam is at peace with its neighbors and poses no security threat to the United States. Many of the “boat people” have returned as investors, and successive American Presidents have made visits to the second fastest-growing economy in Asia. While Vietnam is still run by its Communist Party, eventually post-war leaders on both sides have accepted that peace is practical.

The lesson of Vietnam is not to keep pouring lives and treasure down a dark and poisonous well, but to patiently use a pragmatic mix of diplomacy and trade with even our ideological competitors.

The United States dropped more bombs on tiny Vietnam than it unloaded on all of Europe in World War II, only hardening Vietnamese nationalist resolve. Hundreds of thousands of troops, massive defoliation of the countryside, “free fire zones,” South Vietnamese allies, bombing the harbors … none of it worked. Yet, never admitting that our blundering military presence fueled the native nationalist militancy we supposedly sought to eradicate, three U.S. Presidents — two of them Democrats — lied themselves into believing victory was around some mythical corner.

While difficult for inveterate hawks to admit, the victory for normalcy in Vietnam, celebrated by Bush last week, came about not despite the U.S. withdrawal but because of it.

Since 1974 people have complained that we could have “won” in Vietnam had we just tried harder. And for lo these many years I have asked these people to explain to me what we would have “won” beyond a Korean-style stalemate, or why “winning” would have made any difference whatsoever to U.S. national security. I have yet to receive a satisfactory answer.

That said, I think it is possible — likely, even — that a U.S. military withdrawal from Iraq will be followed by some heavy-duty nastiness throughout the Middle East. There’s no guarantee that, thirty years hence, we’ll be talking about “normalcy” in Iraq. There are huge geopolitical and cultural differences between southeast Asia in the 1970s and the Middle East today that make it foolish to assume withdrawal will have the same eventual outcome. But it’s even more foolish to assume that doing more of what’s failed up until now will be successful someday.

See also: Digby, “Up Escalator.”

Update: The Heretik writes,

So Barnes announces Bush finally has a plan for victory. This follows last year’s Strategy for Victory which follow the catastrophic victory that was announced when Baghdad fell the first time. Almost four years into the fiasco, Bush has a plan. Plan for more plans to be announced as needed. We’re going to be in Iraq at least until January 20, 2009, the day Bush leaves office. Whatever illusions Frederick Kagan of the American Enterprise Institute has resold to Bush, we all will have to live with. And our soldiers and Iraqis both will die with over there. They have to die over there so Bush’s dreams don’t have to die over here. And thanks to the Iraq Study Group for providing Bush cover through the election cycle. It’s interesting how Bush says the study’s findings are interesting and then rejects them.

Whose Free Speech?

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A disturbing story that came to light last week, courtesy of Think Progress —

Middle East analyst Flynt Leverett, who served under President Bush on the National Security Council and is now a fellow at the New America Foundation, revealed today that the White House has been blocking the publication of an op-ed he wrote for the New York Times. The column is critical of the administration’s refusal to engage Iran.

Leverett’s op-ed has already been cleared by the CIA, where he was a senior analyst. Leverett explained, “I’ve been doing this for three and a half years since leaving government, and I’ve never had to go to the White House to get clearance for something that I was publishing as long as the CIA said, ‘Yeah, you’re not putting classified information.’”

According to Leverett the op-ed was “all based on stuff that Secretary Powell, Secretary Rice, Deputy Secretary Armitage have talked about publicly. It’s been extensively reported in the media.” Leverett says the incident shows “just how low people like Elliot Abrams at the NSC [National Security Council] will stoop to try and limit the dissemination of arguments critical of the administration’s policy.”

In remarks to the New America Foundation, Leverett explained that the op-ed made a case for diplomatic engagement with Iran. He had submitted the op-ed to the CIA to verify that the piece had no classified information. The CIA cleared the op-ed without reservation. But the White House intervened, claiming there was classified information in the piece. Leverett says this was nothing but a bare-assed attempt to squelch debate on President Bush’s Iran policies.

Carol Giacomo of Reuters reported,

Flynt Leverett, a Middle East expert who once worked for Bush’s National Security Council, advocates a “grand bargain,” offering Iran full diplomatic and economic relations and a security guarantee in return for forswearing nuclear weapons.

This was “the best of the available options for American policy,” Leverett, now with the New America Foundation, told a conference hosted by the CATO Institute thinktank. …

… Bush has resisted even the modest step of talking with Tehran about Iraq and has shown no signs of being prepared to consider what Leverett and other analysts call “a grand bargain.”

In a Voice of America report by Barry Wood, Leverett says the Bush Administration needs Iran’s cooperation if there’s to be progress in Iraq.

Former diplomat and Central Intelligence Agency analyst Flynt Leverett says the Bush administration finds itself in the awkward position of needing Iran’s help to bring stability to war-ravaged Iraq. “They (the Iranians) are very well positioned on the ground, right now, to defend their interests in Iraq without our help. We’ve put ourselves in a situation in Iraq where at this point we need them (the Iranians) more than they need us,” he said.

This is what the Bush Administration doesn’t want you to know. And if indeed the op-ed contained no classified material, it is censorship in the purest sense of the word.

Today some rightie bloggers are also up in arms over “a disturbing story for those of us who defend freedom of speech through our blogging,” quoting Captain Ed. Government interference with the right to blog? Not quite.

HostGator has suspended the Right Wing Howler for linking to and excerpting an “editorial” at IMAO, a well-known source of biting (and excellent) political satire. Vilmar’s offending web page has been cached by Google here.

The article in question calls for saving America by killing all Arab children; in other words, it’s one of IMAO’s lead-balloon attempts at wit. There’s no question that it’s a satire, however unfunny. [Update: Actually, there is a legitimate question on this point; see update below.] HostGator suspended the Right Wing Howler account after the Council on American-Islamic Relations complained; IMAO is still online.

I can empathize with Right Wing Howler’s frustration. I lost more than a year of work when Lycos Tripod destroyed the original Mahablog archives without prior notice. Since I didn’t owe them money and had been very careful not to violate Tripod rules — there was no obscenity; I had deleted most of the graphics to stay within byte parameters, etc. — I can only assume that someone had taken offense at the anti-Bush Administration content. Needless to say, I was very angry. Although I had saved a little of it elsewhere, it still frustrates me sometime that I have no record of what I blogged from July 2002 to August 2003 (when I moved Mahablog to a new web host).

So, yeah, it’s frustrating. But it’s not censorship. Tripod doesn’t have the power to keep me from expressing opinions; it just doesn’t want my opinions on their servers.

Further, CAIR says the one li’l satire wasn’t the only problem with Right Wing Howler.

Other entries on the site contain obscene and hate- filled attacks on Islam and Muslims, as well as support for violent actions. One entry states: “It’s bad enough some (expletive deleted) in Minnesota elect a Muslim to Congress but the people in Michigan might have done them one better…Start sticking (sic) up on guns and ammo. The war will start soon.”

Here’s the post quoted above, courtesy of Google cache. It is not satire. However, it is par for the course for a rightie blog. If CAIR tries to shut down every blog publishing anti-Muslim hate speech it’ll have to take on most of the Right Blogosphere. They might as well try to clear the sand off Miami Beach.

But the point is that HostGator and Tripod are not restricting free speech. They are not the government. Tripod is a wholly owned subsidiary of a North South Korean corporation. HostGator is a privately owned company. Neither is under any obligation to host or publish anybody’s rhetoric they don’t want to host or publish. HostGator’s Terms of Service statement clearly says

We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone. Any material that, in our judgment, is obscene or threatening is prohibited and will be removed from our servers with or without notice.

The flaming bigot of Right Wing Howler is free to set up shop at another host and resume spewing out pollution.

Flynt Leverett, on the other hand, is being censored by the government. Even if Leverett does find another venue for his opinion, he (and his publisher) could face serious repercussions from the feds. Do you see the distinction, righties? If so, do you care?

Update: Amanda argues that to call the IMAO piece a “satire” in the style of Jonathan Swift’s A Modest Proposal, as Captain Ed did, is a slur of Jonathan Swift. She says,

The piece that’s being defended today is at lMAO, and it’s a “satirical” piece suggesting that the best way to handle terrorism is to kill all children of Muslims. Now, to make it very clear, the authors are right wing shills who support killing Muslims, at least under the guise of the Iraq War. This is critically important to understanding why the comparisons to Swift are asinine, besides just quality issues.

My reading — a casual reading, I admit — of the piece is that it is intended to make fun of people who are unconscious bigots. I base that opinion mostly on this bit —

Others object to this as genocide, but only a moron would do that. I’m not saying we should kill all Arabs; I’m just saying we should kill all their children. Think before you speak.

As I said, it’s a lead-balloon attempt at satire. I don’t think it gets anywhere close to being “Swiftian.” But the “Think before you speak” lick lifts the piece to the level of being almost clever. Or maybe that’s just me.

On the other hand, Pandagon commenter DivGuy writes,

As Amanda points out, in theory, this could be Swiftian satire.

Of course, satire always has a point. The point of A Modest Proposal was that the colonial treatment of the Irish was a moral abomination of such great extent that eating Irish babies would be a logical extension of the injustice.

If the IMAO piece is satire, it is one of the most cutting critiques of US policy to be posted to the web at any time, let alone by a wingnut site. The logic of a Swiftian satire of US policy would be, again, that the war was so horribly unjust that the US might at some point start killing Muslim children.

I agree; if it’s supposed to be a “swiftian” satire, as Captain Ed claims, that’s the only reasonable interpretation.

Free at Last

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The Dumbest Trial of the Century has been discharged with a hung jury. Now that I’m free to talk about it, I’m going to vent.

First off, this was a bleeping marijuana possession case. The People contended that a substantial quantity of marijuana that had been found near, not in, the defendant’s apartment had been in the possession of the defendant. The People’s case had holes you could drive a truck through. The detective on whose uncorroborated testimony the prosecution’s entire case was based was caught in several, um, inconsistencies while he was on the witness stand.

Deliberations began yesterday morning. Just over an hour into the deliberations we took a vote — 11 not guilty, 1 guilty.

You can probably guess the rest. The one holdout wouldn’t budge, even though (after two full days of attempting to “deliberate”) he was unable to explain why he was certain the defendant was guilty. The fellow changed his “reasoning” several times over the past two days, but not his guilty verdict. Finally his “reasoning” devolved into guilt by association — drugs were found near (not in, remember) the defendant’s apartment. A Yonkers detective said the drugs belonged to the defendant. Therefore, the defendant was guilty.

And yes, the juror was an elderly white man, and the defendant was black (as was the prevaricating detective). Do I think racism was a factor? Hell, yes. But I suspect stupid was a factor, also — the juror lacked the mental capacity to understand abstract concepts like “burden of proof” or even “evidence.”

I was the jury forepersonlady, so the composition and rhetoric of notes sent to the judge were under my purview. I became so rattled I could barely crank out cohesive sentences, and I guess my last note (of about 4:50 pm today) was unhinged enough the judge took pity on us and declared a hung jury.

And here’s the kicker — as a clump of us jurors hustled out of the courthouse, we encountered the defense attorney. And he guessed without being told which juror was the problem. Apparently his client, the defendant, had been the one to insist that man be seated on the jury over the attorney’s advise otherwise. The defendant had a “feeling” about the juror, the attorney said.

There’s a moral here, somewhere.

And yes, I was terribly disappointed that I didn’t get to stand up in court and announce a verdict. I’ve always wanted to do that. It’s unlikely I’ll get another chance.

I’m going to get tipsy now. Regular blogging resumes tomorrow.

Updating the Updates

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I’m traipsing back to the courthouse today to defend truth, justice, and the American Way. In the meantime —

Overnight news on Senator Tim Johnson is encouraging; or, at least, there’s no change from last night’s news that the Senator is critical but recovering.

Regarding Senator Johnson, I second what Eleanor Clift writes,

Johnson’s illness should inject a sense of urgency into the Democrats’ agenda. No one would have put the robust-looking Johnson on an endangered list. Democrats have plenty of octogenarians and septuagenarians to worry about making it through to the next election. A health crisis that strikes without warning is a reminder of the fragility of the Democratic majority. With the direction of U.S. policy for the next two years riding on Senate control, Democratic leaders can’t afford to sit around figuring out how to position the party for ’08. That doesn’t mean they have to overhaul Social Security, but they should do what’s doable. Don’t delay; raise the minimum wage and try to lock in whatever reform protections they can. Life is ephemeral, and so is control of the Senate. …

… The doctors will soon have their say about Johnson’s prognosis, and assuring him that he remains a U.S. senator could be an important part of his recovery. If that’s the case, however eager the Republicans are to reclaim Senate control, it’s hard to imagine the governor of South Dakota, who is a Republican, wanting to do anything that would jeopardize Johnson’s recovery—like naming a Republican to replace him. That alone should forestall a change in party control. The Senate is a clubby place, and unlike the House, most members have experienced life in both the minority and the majority. With such tiny margins, the health and well-being of every senator becomes paramount. They’re important. They should start acting like it.

Believers might even consider Tim Johnson’s incident to be a memo to the Dems from God. Just a thought.

Following up the last post on the remarkable idiocy of Jonah Goldberg — Dr. Steven Taylor of PoliBlog writes a better criticism of Goldberg than I did.

(Warning: Civil War history buffs with weak hearts may want to skip to the next paragraph.) Yet the idiocy continues — We’ve seen President Bush compared to Truman and Churchill, which is stupid enough. Now John Hinderaker of PowerTools compares Bush to Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain at Gettysburg. Oh, sure. While we’re at it, let’s conclude that Bush is just like Einstein, Lincoln, Mother Teresa, and Ghandi, too. He also is barely indistinguishable [from] most brands of frozen peas. In fact, this morning as I shoved some bread into the toaster, I thought to myself how much that toaster was like President Bush. The resemblance is uncanny.

Via Chris Bowers at MyDD — Paul Waldman writes that the 1960s culture wars might finally be coming to an end. That’s because we Boomers are getting old and will soon go the way of the dinosaurs. I can’t say I’m completely cheerful about this, but it’s an interesting article nonetheless.

At WaPo, read “A War Bush Wouldn’t Pay For” by E.J. Dionne and “Doing It for the Soldiers” by Dan Froomkin.

Later.

Stupid Is As Stupid Writes

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Speaking of brain impairment, check out Jonah Goldberg’s latest column.

I THINK ALL intelligent, patriotic and informed people can agree: It would be great if the U.S. could find an Iraqi Augusto Pinochet. In fact, an Iraqi Pinochet would be even better than an Iraqi Castro.

Both propositions strike me as so self-evident as to require no explanation.

I thought that Iraq had an Iraqi Augusto Pinochet. His name was Saddam Hussein. We deposed him, allegedly for being brutal and gassing his own people and such. But if Pinochet is our model, then the brutality part was not the real problem. I guess we deposed Saddam Hussein because he was bad for business. Or maybe he wasn’t Latino.

Anyway, Goldberg doesn’t want Saddam Hussein back …

But these days, there’s a newfound love for precisely this sort of realpolitik. Consider Jonathan Chait, who recently floated a Swiftian proposal

I thought Chait’s column was stupid, but “Swiftian” is a key word here.

that we put Saddam Hussein back in power in Iraq because, given his track record of maintaining stability and recognizing how terrible things could get in Iraq, Hussein might actually represent the least-bad option. Even discounting his sarcasm, this was morally myopic.

No, dear, it was “Swiftian.” That puts it closer to satire, or maybe caricature, than to mere sarcasm. What I am writing right now is sarcasm, but not satire or caricature.

But it seems to me, if you can contemplate reinstalling a Hussein, you’d count yourself lucky to have a Pinochet.

Yes, child, but you’re (note example of sarcasm) a bleeping idiot. Your argument is that Pinochet didn’t kill as many people as Castro; therefore, he wasn’t so bad. Moral relativism, sir?

Apparently the Right has been playing this Castro v. Pinochet game for the past several days. Hey, I can play that game, too — Mao killed a lot more people than Hitler; therefore, Hitler wasn’t so bad. So would Iraq be better off with Hitler? Hitler killed a lot more people than Saddam Hussein, after all. I guess Saddam Hussein want so bad, by Goldberg’s reasoning.

The BooMan explains it all, with sarcasm:

See, contrary to your prejudices, all serious, patriotic, and informed conservative thought revolves around nuance. You see, Pinochet displaced a duly elected official and imposed a brutal dictatorship. Saddam replaced a brutal dictatorship with an even more brutal dictatorship. Therefore, Saddam is worse and unfit for a restoration. That would be morally myopic. But if we could find a guy just a little less brutal and a lot more business friendly, then that would be excellent. …

… But what if unfrozen-reanimated-Iraqi-Pinochet-man found that he couldn’t stabilize Iraq without being every bit the son-of-a-bitch Saddam was? Well? Shit, I guess putting Saddam back in power wouldn’t have been that myopic after all.

I mean, if numbers are all that matters, according to this chart Augusto Pinochet was responsible for more deaths than our old nemesis, the late Al Zarqawi. I guess that means Al Zarqawi wasn’t so bad.

Another Update

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I am sorry to be out of the loop today, but I am still reporting to the courthouse for jury duty. I have to show up again tomorrow.

So I rushed home to catch up on the news. On Memeorandum there was a stack of headlines that seemed to tell a story:

Sen. Johnson in Critical Condition After Surgery

Should Johnson be unable to continue to serve …

Fox News Speculates How Officials Could ‘Declare’ Sen. Johnson ‘Incapacitated’

Sen. Johnson recovering after brain surgery

In a nutshell: Elements of the Righty (notably Faux Nooz) are salivating over the possibility of keeping the Senate, even as they feign shock that anyone is even talking about what might happen if poor Senator Johnson leaves the Senate. And they are dumping on the Left for … well, whatever. For breathing. The usual stuff. Anyway, as I keyboard the most recent news is that Senator Johnson is still critical, but recovering. There won’t be a long-term prognosis for a couple of days.

CNN reported this afternoon that

The Democrats’ slight hold on power in the Senate is largely safe despite South Dakota Democratic Sen. Tim Johnson’s health scare, Senate Historian Don Richie tells CNN. As stipulated by Senate rules, Johnson could retain his seat even if he is incapacitated, unable to vote, and not even able to show up to work.

Moreover, the Senate does not have the power to forcefully remove Johnson unless he committed a crime.

Such a scenario has even occurred in Johnson’s home state of South Dakota. After South Dakota Sen. Karl Earle Mundt had a stroke in 1969 he remained in office until his term expired in 1973 without casting another vote after the governor refused Mundt’s wish of appointing his wife to the post.

A state governor has the power to appoint a new senator only if the current senator dies in office or resigns his seat.

There is “little or no precedent for forcibly unseating a member of Congress due to illness or other incapacitation,” writes Jonathan Singer at MyDD.

Senator Johnson Update

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Senator Johnson underwent surgery last night, although no one is saying what made him ill. If they’re operating on him, I assume the doctors have a theory.

More on Senator Johnson from today’s New York Times:

An unassuming fourth-generation South Dakotan, Mr. Johnson was first elected to the Senate in 1996, after serving 10 years in the House, where he had replaced Tom Daschle, a fellow Democrat who ran for the Senate and ultimately became the majority leader.

Mr. Johnson faced a tough race in 2002 against John Thune, a Republican. With the state suffering billions of dollars in losses from a severe drought, Mr. Johnson and Mr. Daschle promised $5 billion in drought relief, and Mr. Johnson won narrowly after President Bush visited the state for Mr. Thune and declined to announce that he would support the relief. (Mr. Thune went on to beat Mr. Daschle in 2004.)

Mr. Johnson is up for re-election in 2008. His oldest son, Brooks, served in Afghanistan and is serving in Iraq.

Click here for Senator Johnson’s biography on his web site.

My understanding is that if the Senator survives he is under no obligation to resign from the Senate, even if he is impaired. Back to the New York Times:

He is the second senator known to become ill since the November elections. Senator Craig Thomas of Wyoming, a Republican, is being treated for leukemia, but has been at work.

According to information from the Senate historian cited on CQ.com, at least nine senators have taken extended absences from the Senate for health reasons since 1942. Robert F. Wagner, Democrat of New York, was unable to attend any sessions of the 80th or 81st Congress from 1947 to 1949 because of a heart ailment. Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr., Democrat of Delaware, missed about seven months in 1988 after surgery for a brain aneurysm. And David Pryor, Democrat of Arkansas, suffered a heart attack in April 1991 and returned to the Senate in September that year.

The Right has decided it’s indelicate to even mention the significant political consequences of losing Senator Johnson. In fact, posts about Senator Johnson on rightie blogs this morning are so consistently conciliatory about the Senator one wonders if they were all on the same conference call with someone from the RNC.

It is of course quite possible to be genuinely concerned about the Senator as a person and worried about the political consequences of his death or resignation at the same time. This is especially true for those of us who fear that if the Senate stays in Republican control our country will be significantly impaired. Here’s another New York Times story about something that won’t happen if the GOP stays in charge, for example. If it’s indelicate to be gravely concerned about the future of the United States of America, then I will be indelicate.