https://buy-zithromax.online buy kamagra usa https://antibiotics.top buy stromectol online https://deutschland-doxycycline.com https://ivermectin-apotheke.com kaufen cialis https://2-pharmaceuticals.com buy antibiotics online Online Pharmacy vermectin apotheke buy stromectol europe buy zithromax online https://kaufen-cialis.com levitra usa https://stromectol-apotheke.com buy doxycycline online https://buy-ivermectin.online https://stromectol-europe.com stromectol apotheke https://buyamoxil24x7.online deutschland doxycycline https://buy-stromectol.online https://doxycycline365.online https://levitra-usa.com buy ivermectin online buy amoxil online https://buykamagrausa.net

Category: Politics & Law

The sublime bullshit of “a growing sense of regret”

So NOW the GOP is sad that they didn’t “contain” Trump. Sort of.

After four years of tolerating Donald Trump’s behavior, rhetoric, and vindictive, transactional nature, in exchange for an all-you-can approve buffet of judges, tax breaks, and executive orders … suddenly GOP leadership finds it has a case of buyer’s remorse.

Kinda-sorta.

One Republican senator who requested anonymity to discuss his conversations with GOP colleagues acknowledged GOP lawmakers should have served as a stronger check on the president over the past four years.

“We should have done more to push back, both against his rhetoric and some of the things he did legislatively,” said the lawmaker. “The mistake we made is that we always thought he was going to get better. We thought that once he got the nomination and then once he got a Cabinet, he was going to get better, he was going to be more presidential.”

Okay, that gets you up to February of 2017. Where have you been the last four years?

But now there’s a sense among a growing number of GOP lawmakers that Trump may have inflicted long-term damage on their party, an anxiety heightened by the debacle of a pro-Trump mob storming and occupying the U.S. Capitol building Wednesday as Congress was meeting to finalize Biden’s election as the nation’s 46th president.

“There’s more concern about the long-term damage to the party than losing two Senate seats in Georgia,” the GOP senator said.

Oh, so the concern isn’t the actual damage Trump has done to the nation, to minorities, to women, to LGBTQ folk, to the environment and climate, to our natural resources, to education, to our standing and alliances abroad, to the social contract, to our health care, to our health, to all these things over the past four years … it’s concern about how that might hurt the Republican party.

Cry me a freaking river.

A second Republican senator who requested anonymity said Trump had inflicted serious damage on his party.

Such concern … that it can only be passed on via anonymous Senators.

Dear Senator Whitefeather: you know how you start to heal/fix the damage to the party? By actually standing up in public and talking about it, not whispering in a parking structure to a reporter from The Hill.

“Every time you think the president has done everything he could possibly do to fuck things up, then he comes out with a tweet, like the election was invalid and the one in Georgia would be invalid,” said the lawmaker, referring to Trump’s tweets Friday declaring the runoff elections to be “illegal and invalid.”

Big talk from someone supposedly in one of the highest offices of the land … afraid to lend their name and face to their words.

The feelings of remorse are only now being expressed privately after Republican senators spent much of the past four years dodging questions about Trump’s controversial tweets, statements and decisions.

They still are dodging.

As to what actual public defiance of Trump has looked like, well, we have this sad example raised up as an exception:

There were exceptions though, such as when Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), said Trump appeared “unsympathetic” after peaceful protesters were pepper sprayed in front of the White House in June so the president could pose with a Bible in front of St. John’s Episcopal Church.

Oh, yes. Clucked tongues and mildly “concerned” rebukes from Susan Collins have been soooooo effective in restraining Trump.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) on Thursday said Trump had “tarnished” his legacy by not condemning Wednesday’s “debacle” at the Capitol.

Graham defended his support for Trump over the past four years as being driven by constituents at home who wanted him to work with the president.

“My constituents made me do it” would be more meaningful, Lindsey, if you hadn’t not just worked with him, but become his most outspoken supporter and enabler. Or maybe reading a bit of Burke would be in order.

“The reason I’ve been close to the president is I think he’s done tremendous things for this country. I think the judges he’s nominated have been outstanding choices,” he said. But he said “it breaks my heart that my friend, a president of consequence, were to allow yesterday to happen, and it will be a major part of his presidency.”

“It was a self-inflicted wound, it was going too far,” he added.

Just note that Lindsey actually seems to love all the stuff Trump did. It was just this last froth of post-election paranoia and delusion, leading up to violence in Lindsey’s sacred workplace, that went a bit “too far” and will “tarnish” Trump’s rep.

Asked if he should have spoken out more when Trump crossed the line during his four years in office, Graham acknowledged he could have but also deflected blame on the media for not covering the president more fairly. […] “Could I have done better? Yes. The question: Could you have done better? Could those of you who cover the White House done better? You need to ask yourself that,” he told reporters.

Yes, if only the media had covered Trump “better” and more fairly, he wouldn’t have been driven to incite a riot.

Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) on Wednesday said Trump’s rhetoric created a political headwind for Sens. Kelly Loeffler (R-Ga.) and David Perdue (R-Ga.), who both lost races that GOP senators had expected them to win. […] “When your most effective argument is you’re going to be a check and balance against a Biden/Pelosi/Schumer agenda but you can’t acknowledge that Biden won, it puts you in a really difficult position,” he later explained.

Again, the regret is not anything Trump did regarding policy, but how he hurt the GOP by hurting them in the Georgia run-offs. And, indirectly, how Trump is now talking about trying to defeat Thune in his next primary.

Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.), who has been a strong Trump ally during his first term …

“First term.”

… late on Wednesday said he does “think the president bears some responsibility” for the violence and chaos on Capitol Hill, which disrupted the Electoral College vote count. “I do think the president bears some responsibility. Certainly, he bears responsibility for his own actions and his own words, and today in watching his speech, I have to admit I gasped,” Cramer said.

A tip of the hat to Sen. Kramer for speaking out loud and laying “some responsibility” on Trump.

Though, to be fair, Cramer — who’s frequently called Trump the “best President of his life” — doesn’t want to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

What really seems to be frustrating Cramer is that the events at the end of Trump’s term in office will overshadow the accomplishments on tax policy, energy and agriculture regulation, and foreign policy that he’s proud to have helped the president enact. “As Republicans distance themselves from Donald Trump, the person we have to hold onto his ideas,” Cramer said.

No regrets over policy, just that Donald turned out to be, um, unstable.

Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.), another staunch Trump ally, said he later spoke with Pence, whom he described as furious over the president’s treatment. “I’ve known Mike Pence forever,” Inhofe told the Tulsa World. “I’ve never seen Pence as angry as he was today.”

Ah. We’re regretful and upset because … Donald was mean to his normally-fawning VP. Well, hold the presses.

Inhofe also said that Trump should have done more to stop the rioting. “He’s only put out one statement that I’m aware of,” he said. “This was really a riot. He should have shown more disdain for the rioters. I don’t want to say he should have apologized — that’s not exactly accurate — but he should have expressed more disdain.”

Not apologize but … “express more disdain.”

For all there may be shock, regrets, and (for the most part mild) criticism, Republican politicians remain terrified of Donald Trump — thus the anonymous quotes above.

National Republicans interviewed by The Hill said Trump may have permanently alienated millions of center-right voters who were disgusted by Wednesday’s ugly scene.

But they acknowledged that the president retains enormous political power at the moment, a dynamic that was on full display when a majority of House Republicans voted to throw out Arizona’s Electoral College results hours after their evacuation.

“Trump has less power now, but he could still probably win a primary today, so does he really have less power?” asked former Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele.

Yesh, they really think he could still win a primary. Which says more about the rest of the GOP political class than it does about Donald Trump. Regardless, since they think he would win a primary — their only criterion for power and, thus, permission to criticize — they are still treading lightly.

Some pointed to the president’s fervent base of supporters outside of Washington to make the case that Trump’s influence would continue to dominate the party for years to come — as well as the House votes on the Electoral College. The president reportedly received a warm reception Thursday morning when he briefly called into a Republican National Committee members meeting.

Some Republicans argued that people have short-term memories and that the transactional nature of politics would give Trump space to rebuild his image and throw his weight around either as a candidate in 2024 or as a kingmaker in GOP primaries.

So the principled thing to do is … speak off the record, keep your head down, and not publicly criticize Trump. It appears that “regret” isn’t all that strong an emotion.

But the violence in Washington, one former Trump campaign official said, “caused him to lose even loyal supporters.” “Trump is a lonely man today,” the person said.

But not so lonely the anonymous official was willing to go on the record about it.

One Republican operative said that the events drastically diminished Trump’s hold on the party, describing the current dynamic as an “emperor with no clothes” moment because GOP lawmakers are publicly pushing back on Trump at a time when he can’t even respond on social media in usual form. The person expected Republicans to be more willing to publicly push back against Trump going forward, especially if he urges primaries against sitting GOP officials.

Still, the GOP operative acknowledged the potential for Trump to split the party and characterized it as “dangerous,” observing that even if Trump only keeps a grip on 20 percent of GOP voters, Republicans who break with Trump would lose general elections even if they make inroads with independents. […] Republicans undeniably benefit from the enthusiasm Trump generates, particularly in rural parts of the country where the GOP must maximize turnout to be competitive.

So, again, even if Trump’s power plummets to only holding onto a fraction of the GOP, they are so close to losing outright against the Dems that they politically can’t afford to offend him.

I guess that qualifies as “regrets.”

But not, apparently, enough “regrets” to actually do anything differently.

Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) on Friday dismissed calls to impeach President Trump in the wake of riots inside the U.S. Capitol, signaling that the effort will ultimately fall short. […] “You don’t have the time for it to happen, even if there was a reason. So there’s no reason to debate this except just pure politics,” Blunt added. […] Blunt added in a separate interview with KSHB, another Missouri TV station, that impeaching Trump was “not going to happen.”

[…] Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) accused Democrats of throwing politics into the aftermath of the Capitol attacks, adding that impeachment “would not only be unsuccessful in the Senate but would be a dangerous precedent for the future of the presidency.”

[…] Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.), who dropped his plans to support challenges to the Electoral College after the attacks, said calls for impeachment are “unhelpful.” “We’re 13 days away from inauguration. This is not the time to keep taking the temperature up. So let’s stand together and govern for the next 13 days,” Daines told a Montana TV station.

Yeah, GOP Senators might have “regrets” over how they failed to “restrain” Trump from damaging their party (if not the nation) … but they certainly have no intention of doing anything about the next few weeks of his increasingly erratic behavior, or back down over the long haul as long as they think Trump may run again, let alone if kicking him and his mob to the curb might mean (gasp) “lost” elections.

I mean, clearly, it’s too late now. If only they’d had another opportunity, even over the last year, to exercise some restraint over Trump.

Oh, well. I’m sure they’ve learned their lesson for when the next mob-darling authoritarian pops up in the party. Right?

Do you want to know more?

A News Report from a Banana Republic

The troubled democracy faced new challenges of terrorist violence today.

Today a radical mob proclaiming “revolution” stormed the nation’s parliament, shutting down the legislative session attempting to settle the recent elections according to constitutional norms. The crowd was incited by the embattled current chief executive, El Presidente, whose term ends in a few weeks after a serious re-election defeat two months ago.

Election observers, as well government officials, many of them from the embattled president’s own party, have validated the results of the election as fair and free of systemic fraud. Challenges by El Presidente have been rejected by the judiciary, including by the nation’s constitutional court.

The outgoing president met with protesting supporters before the attack, many of whom had traveled from outlying provinces to show their allegiance to the popular politician, who has held large rallies around the nation. El Presidente vowed to the crowd to never concede defeat, once again claimed massive fraud and conspiracy in the election, and encouraged the protesters to march on the parliament building to support his allies in that legislative body.

The mob, arriving at the parliamentary building, quickly pushed past police lines and briefly scuffled with security forces within the rotunda, as members of parliament were quickly evacuated to protected shelters. The insurrectionists broke into both legislative chambers and the offices of parliamentary leaders, sending grinning selfies as they ransacked the building, before being finally forced out of the building by late-arriving police forces.

When called upon by national leaders to call his rioting supporters off, the current president, sheltering in the executive mansion, issued video and text messages in social media expressing his love and appreciation for the
“great patriots,” and justified their actions based on his re-election being “stolen” by “evil” people. He called on his supporters to “remember this day forever!”A

Supporters of the current president immediately went to national television, asserting without evidence that the attack on parliament was actually the work of anarchists and anti-government rebels, not supporters of the defeated chief executive.

Parliament met later that evening, in defiance of the defeated insurgent mob, to confirm the results of last year’s election. It remains uncertain whether El Presidente would continue to foment domestic violence to overturn the election results, and, if so, whether the nation’s institutions would be able to address the threat to democratic processes.

Pondering D&D, race, and violence

Thoughtlessly killing conveniently-labeled evil races is … dodgy.

So I came across an interesting Twitter thread from Arcanist Press that caused me to think a bit. What it brings up over the length of a dozen tweets is not new, but takes on a bit more immediacy for me at present.

(The referenced WIRED article is here.)

As someone who’s recently taken back up D&D (and is looking to DM a game soon), this thread is a good reminder of some of the problematic issues in the game’s history that continue to haunt it to the present: racism and its interaction with systematic violence.

Working from the fantasy literature of folk like Tolkien and Howard, who baked racial tropes into their fantasy worlds (yes, they did, though the former did it with likely less intent and a more distant gentility than the latter), it’s way too easy to just throw “Other” races against our heroes (or burden them with “Other” stereotypes themselves) and then commit wanton bloodshed over it.

Well, it’s convenient to have an enemy literally labeled as intrinsically “evil,” and having a “bloodlust” for slaughter. It’s turned out so well in human history.

(Throwing in Half-orcs as a Player Character race doesn’t necessarily improve this: “Half-orcs’ … pigmentation, sloping foreheads, jutting jaws, prominent teeth, and towering builds make their … heritage plain for all to see” is, um, the sort of thing I expect to read white nationalism blog.)

And the Good vs. Evil trope (and its self-righteous assurance of any actions being justified in the fight for Our Side) creates synergies with that racism that lead to even worse ramifications.

“Some kobolds appear in the road and attack you.”

“Yay, we can kill them because they are evil! Which we know because they are clearly labeled as such in the Monster Manual, and also they look like monsters.”

That’s bad story-telling, as well as problematic ethics.

(It’s one thing to say, “Hey, we are being attacked by these people, so we need to defend ourselves.” It’s another thing to add, “But it’s okay, because they are evil and deserve to be killed, so no quarter offered, no prisoners taken.” It’s also one thing to say, “There’s been war with the orcs for generations here” and another to promote, “The only good orc is a dead orc” as a morally defensible position.)

The thread also touches on (under the disturbing Gygax link) the tangle with morality and killing that I just ran up against recently in-game (Lawful Good Paladins and the killing of prisoners). I get it that an intrinsic part of D&D is Killing The Bad Guys, but I personally need a bit more to keep from feeling like a Spree Killer with the Insane Priest whispering in my ear that  It’s Okay, They’re All Bad–Trust Me, I Speak for the Gods.

(We won’t even talk about the “Murder Hobo” tropes of “Hey, let’s raid this dungeon, kill everything, and take their wealth for our personal enrichment” types of scenarios.)

Wait, I thought it was the evil Orcs who “satisfy their bloodlust by slaying any humanoids that stand against them.”

I also get it that D&D missions with a purpose (“You are sent by the king to deal with …” / “You hear rumors of villagers disappearing in the area of …” etc.) can create a violence-is-justified / take-no-prisoners situation. A commando team behind enemy lines (probably the closest analog to the typical Dungeon Crawlers With A Mission Other Than Lining Their Pockets) faces some moral decisions (which they should probably internally settle before the mission starts) that normal front-line soldiers don’t.

That said, trying to dress a necessary evil as a good is … not good.

I’m not saying that every D&D character should be suffering from PTSD and wake up every night in their bedrolls, screaming over what they had to do to that Drow village — but “Okay, we questioned him, now cut his throat” should not be an undisturbing proposition, either. I also understand that when I’m playing D&D as such, I’m looking at a dopamine shot of victory, not seeking a deep, philosophical debate before each encounter. But just as I would cavil at a game that rewarded me for raping all the opposition, or commit systematic genocide against the racially different folk living in the next valley over, I think there’s at least some room for nuance in considering the in-game justification for killing all the opposition, or treating other races as sub-human, intrinsically evil monsters that deserve to be wiped out. I think human history demonstrates how those attitudes, unchallenged and unconsidered, don’t lead to heroic results.

All that said, I don’t have any grand solutions, other than discussing the matter, and efforts from game fans to offer up alternatives (as Arcana Press says they do) to supplement some minor changes from D&D’s publisher itself. But as I go through the module I plan to DM, I do intend to consider what sort of tropes — social and ethical — I’m being handed, and consider whether there’s something I can do in this instance to make them a bit less problematic, at least for my own conscience.

Jim Jordan Is A Dolt (COVID-19 Edition)

The only freedom-taking is by idjits pretending the disease doesn’t exist.

I know I really shouldn’t waste the time, but I get so tired of this whole attitude — especially in the face of folk who have voluntarily been trying to keep each other safe, let alone folk who are losing their lives over this disease, including health care workers trying to treat others.

Also, I haven’t really written a blog entry about COVID-19. Lots of tweeting, but no blog posts. So maybe this will be that, too.

The Introduction

I give you Jim Jordan, Representative from Ohio’s 4th District (R).

Not to put too fine a point on it, but, no, it’s not.

Jim Jordan, Dolt

This, to me, epitomizes the self-entitled “FREEDUMB!” wing of the (mostly) Far Right, who, through paranoia or laziness or poor self-discipline or selfishness (or a combination of the above) think that anything that anything they want to do is Constitutionally and God-Given Freedom, and any limitation on it, for whatever reason, is Satanic and Un-American Tyranny.

All right, let’s start with a couple of premises.

The Science

First, there is a COVID-19 pandemic. You may have heard of it. To day, nearly a quarter million people have died. And of the roughly 11 million cases identified to date in the US, there’s no telling how many of them will suffer long-term debilitating health effects from the microclots that the disease promotes.

COVID-19 is spread primarily (though not solely) through droplets of spit and mucus expelled by humans when they talk, cough, sneeze, stuff like that. The more forceful the verbal or nasal exhalation, the more and further someone is spraying the disease, which can remain airborne for a time. Disease intensity seems to related to the amount of exposure, which is a function of both proximity and time.

To that end, public health and medical experts overwhelmingly agree that the best way to prevent the spread of the disease is to maintain a safe social distance (6-12 feet), reduce the time you are near people, and reduce the number of people you are near. Being in an environment with moving air (outside, preferably) is icing on the cake. Washing hands regularly is good. Staying primarily around people in your “bubble” is very good. Wearing a multi-ply mask is really, really good.

Not all people who get the disease show symptoms, either at the outset of the disease, or at any time. They avoid death, and most will avoid the long-term effects that have been charted. But they can still infect others, even while being asymptomatic.

The elderly and those with compromised immune symptoms seem most vulnerable. But people of all ages have gotten the disease, and died from it. There is no group that is immune.

That’s all pretty much science. If you disagree with the fundamentals there, nothing I write here is going to matter. If you think that the disease is a hoax, or is only like the flu or a cold, you’re wrong, but all I can suggest is education. And that you keep your distance from me.

The Economics

Oh, and one other item that isn’t science, but basic economics: we have a large, relatively healthy health care system in the US (hand-waving the economics of how it’s paid for). In an ordinary circumstance, we can deal with the peaks and valleys of accidents and illnesses and surgical needs, etc. There’s enough excess capacity in most of the system to deal with day-to-day problems. A hospital might have 20 ICU (Intensive Care Unit) beds, but normally only need 12 at any time; the other 8 are if there’s an emergency (a natural disaster, a mass shooting).

A certain percentage of COVID-19 victims require hospitalization, generally in ICUs. If that hospital that normally has 12 in the ICU suddenly gets an influx of 10 COVID-19 patients needing intubation and intensive care … what does the hospital do? Especially when every other hospital in town is in the same situation.

So bear in mind that a number of actions to reduce infection are not just to keep people from getting the disease, but to keep the numbers infected at any time below the maximum capacity of the ICUs in a given area. Because when ICU beds get maxxed out, people can’t get intensive care. They die. Maybe it’s the COVID victims. Maybe it’s the person with massive heart problems. Or the car accident victim. But if 22 people need ICU beds and only 20 beds are available, 2 people won’t get the needed intensive care. It’s math.

The History

Plagues and pandemics and epidemics are not new to the human race. And, in the face of them, the government has taken reasonable action to restrain their spread, the same way the government takes public safety and public health actions in other emergencies, disasters, or time of elevated danger.

So if there’s a fire, or a hurricane, or a toxic waste spill, or a landslide, I may find my personal freedoms temporarily restrained. I might not be able to drink water out of my tap for a time. I may not be able to go into my house. I may not be able to travel down a particular road.

In the case of public health and disease, quarantines and other actions have been taken in the past to help restrict the spread of disease. These haven’t always been popular, but their imposition didn’t seem to get the same fundamental “FREEDOM! LIBERTY! RESIST TYRANNY!” claptrap that this pandemic has produced. When public swimming pools were closed during the polio outbreaks in the 1900s-1950s — along with beaches, and theaters, and parks, and playgrounds — I don’t recall people saying that the Tyrants Were Stealing Our Freedom to Swim.

But, then, we’ve been living in a nation increasingly poked and prodded by fearmongers, by people telling others that you can’t trust the government. Can’t trust the media. Can’t trust the scientists. That personal freedom is the only good. That they’re all out to get you, and yours, and take it, and give it to the undeserving and dirty and outside and weird and Others.

After multiple decades of that tune, it reached a crescendo under Jim Jordan’s bestest buddy, Donald Trump, who not only used it to gather throngs to his side, cheering him on as their Messiah, but then started pooh-poohing the whole COVID-19 thing, basically because all he had to run for re-election on was a great economy, and taking steps to stop COVID-19 would depress the economy, plus it would be hard work and might not succeed, and it would be unpopular, and all those things would hurt his re-election chances.

Donald Trump still lost. And a good chunk of the reason for that was his (in)actions on COVID-19.

Which actions were egged on, and defended, and are still echoed by dolts like Jim Jordan.

So, what about those freedoms?

Let’s look at those freedoms being “taken away [by] government.” State and local governments have imposed various temporary measures restricting businesses and social contacts — all with precedent, remember — of various stringency over the last eight months. They have closed schools to in-person instruction. They have shut down in-person businesses (except “essential ones”) and other gathering places (theaters, churches). They have dialed that stuff up and down — e.g., as infection rates have dropped, allowing restaurants to re-open, but only to X% capacity and no more than Y people, distanced to 6 feet, and wearing masks except when not possible (like shoveling food in your mouth).

These seem to have been reasonable measures, and by and large they have worked to lower rates and keep hospital utilization within capacity. When they have not worked, it’s because people have ignored the restrictions (most of which, where focused on personal activity, were voluntary).

Jim Jordan disagrees.

Today your freedom:

  • To go to church
  • To go to work
  • To go to school
  • To have friends in your home
  • To leave your home
  • To dance at your daughter’s wedding
  • To celebrate Christmas and Thanksgiving

Is being taken away government.

Let’s examine this, piece by piece.

Your freedom to go to church

This has been the camel’s nose under the door for Right Wing resistance to COVID-19 measures, because to some anything that interferes with a person’s actions that can be associated with religion is utterly sacred and cannot be imposed upon.

Various governments have put restrictions on churchgoing in person. Because, um, not to put to fine a point on it, but a bunch of people crowding together for an hour, chanting or singing, hugging, exchanging (depending on your denomination) bread or wine, etc., sounds like an awesome way to spread a disease like COVID-19.

Yet, somehow, churches have survived. Ours moved to Zoom. Every Sunday (and at least one weeknight), plus other virtual gatherings. When things were improving in the state, we started doing distanced worship in the parking lot (since shut down as the state has trended badly again).

Was this fun? Was the the best church experience ever? Nope.

Did I feel like my freedom to worship was being taken away? Of course not, silly. I was still “there,” with my congregation, singing hymns, saying high, sharing prayer requests, etc. Communion was a problem, but God is understanding.

I mean, there are places in the world where Christians are persecuted, where worship is hidden, worshippers killed if discovered. Christianity  began with persecution from the authorities, including our founder being put to death.

Having to attend church via Zoom does not qualify you for sainthood as a martyr. Restricting in-person attendance during the pandemic to X% to a maximum of Y, spaced 6 feet apart, is not throwing Christians to the lions.

I’m reluctant to tell people how to worship. I’m happy to say that people who ignore these sensible restrictions when there are reasonable alternatives do not seem to be acting in a loving or Christlike fashion.

And, that said, Christ didn’t seem to think going to church was that big a deal.

And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.

Sounds like a great fit for the pandemic.

Your freedom to go to work

A lot of businesses were shut down in the early days of the pandemic. Some are being shut down again, as rates get worse. That’s awful, and causes economic harm, at large and for individuals who are furloughed.

Not everyone’s in that boat. I’m lucky enough to work in a profession (and for a company) that’s made Work From Home work. But that doesn’t help the bar owner whose bar is shut down because a bunch of people crowding around small tables and shouting to be heard over the music are likely to spread COVID-19 to each other.

So what do we do?

The easy answer is that, in a world where the US can borrow money at 0% interest, we should pay to keep businesses closed until it is safe, and for people who cannot work from home to be paid. This is, in fact, a problem we can throw money at. And we should. If it means not having more hundreds of thousands of people die.

In an emergency, your freedom to go to your workplace may be temporarily restricted. The building is on fire. The downtown district is flooded. There’s been a toxic waste spill in the parking lot. That restriction isn’t some Government Tyranny. It’s keeping you, and others, safe.

Your freedom to go to school

School via Zoom is not great. I get that. It gets better as the student gets older, but even my college sophomore has issues with it.

Beats getting a disease and dying, though.

Hey, you know what would have been great? If the federal government, seeing the problems of remote school attendance during the spring, had also thrown money at this problem to allow kids back to school in a safe, distanced fashion. That means construction. That means rearranging things so that maybe high and middle schoolers are remote and elementary kids are distanced in classrooms spread out across the district. Things like that. Rather than Trump sitting on his tiny hands all summer and then, when the fall rolled around, insisting that schools should just open and not worry about COVID-19.

Note that most schools are closing again. Not because the government is “stealing your freedom,” but because kids were getting sick. And teachers were getting sick. And staff were getting sick.

The idea that this is a binary decision between “we shut everything down and never go to school again” and “let the plague run its course and we’ll mourn them this winter” is as doltish as framing this as a “freedom” issue.

Your freedom to have friends in your home

So, how many people have been arrested for having friends in their home. Anyone? Anyone?

Zero.

States and localities have offered guidance, suggesting that, y’know, right this moment, having only a limited number of people at your house, from maybe another single household / “bubble” would be a really good idea, along with still maintaining social distance and masks and all that.

But the Social Distancing Police aren’t kicking in doors looking for gatherings. At most, big parties that break those guidelines (when those guidelines are actually put forward as civil restrictions) that force themselves into public view are, again, at most, broken up by any police that are called to them.

And, yes, these kind of events (et al.)  have spread the disease and led to deaths. Great party!

Note: we have had friends in our home. We have followed the guidelines. We have socially distanced on the back porch. We’ve limited the households visiting at a time. We’ve rearranged things in our dining room, and living room, for social distance. We’ve done masks.

And we’ve also called off all sorts of events that normally would have had a bunch of friends over. Because we don’t want to die. And we don’t want any of them to die. And it would be one thing if the government was saying, “No friends over at your house FOREVER, because we HATE FRIENDSHIP, bwah-ha-ha.” But they are not. They are saying, “During this pandemic, this behavior puts yourself and others at risk, as well as the ripples of still others that might be infected by the attendees. Don’t be a lethal jerk.”

Don’t be a lethal jerk. Doesn’t seem to be a high bar.

Your freedom to leave your home

This goes right with the previous one. I’ve seen restrictions on (a) places you might go, and (b) distances you should limit yourself to traveling — but all of these have had plenty of exceptions, and only been under the most extreme circumstances.

Which, y’know, during a pandemic, as a temporary measure, makes perfect sense. Kind of like a curfew during an emergency (which has plenty of precedent). And as I don’t see checkpoints on the interstate, pulling people over and asking for their travel papers, I really have a problem taking this fearmongering seriously.

Your freedom to dance at your daughter’s wedding

I know a lot of people who have put off weddings. Or wedding receptions. Or postponed funeral gatherings. Or major anniversary celebrations (cough). Or a dozen other social gatherings of this sort, big or small, happy or sad.

And I know others who have said, “Screw this, let’s have a big wedding, and a faboo reception, and drink and laugh and –” — ended up with the Masque of the Red Death, with attendees (or, worse, workers at the shindig) getting infected and dying.

People who are putting these gatherings off are guided by the restrictions — voluntary or (again, imposed through business restrictions) legal — aren’t just doing it because their spirits have been crushed and they feel compelled to obey the government. They’ve done it because these things aren’t safe, and people will get sick and die, and some of those people won’t even be the folk who got to enjoy themselves.

Nobody is happy about putting these things off. No bureaucrat, no petty tyrant, is chortling over imposing these disruptions. My wife and I didn’t say, “Whew! Now we have an excuse not to celebrate our 25th anniversary with all our friends and family, and then spend a few weeks in Hawaii! Thank God we dodged that bullet!”

You know what will be there next year, or even the year after that? Hawaii. And, one hopes, our friends and family. It simply wasn’t worth it having even one person die or face long term health issues, just to celebrate our anniversary. We can have a big shindig down the road. We had a satisfying personal shindig just in our household.

If your daughter decides to get married during COVID-19, there will be time to dance at a reception in 2021. Or, maybe, she had a small ceremony with just the immediate family, not two hundred of her and your closest friends, and you snuck in a dance anyway. This is an emergency. Suck it up. Guys who were serving overseas in war time didn’t get to dance with their daughters at their weddings, either, and they didn’t complain the government was stealing their freedom.

Your right to celebrate Christmas and Thanksgiving

See above, only more so.

I mean, I plan to celebrate Thanksgiving. And Christmas.

Will it be the same as the celebrations of past years? Nope. But, then, if I had broken my back, it wouldn’t be the same. If it was in the aftermath of a tornado, it wouldn’t be the same. If family loved one had died, it wouldn’t be the same.

And, guess what? It’s never the same. Things change, always.

So, yeah, we won’t have Thanksgiving dinner for 20. We won’t have our Christmas party. We’ll be restrained in gift-giving occasions.

We’ll work it out. We’ll make it meaningful because the meaning of those holidays is not in matching the guest list from last year. If it is, you’re doing it wrong.

The government isn’t canceling Thanksgiving. Or Christmas. They are asking people to be smart and responsible about it, and remember the risks of people dying because you wanted that big dinner get-together.

So why is Jim Jordan being a dolt about this?

Who knows? Maybe because he’s drunk the Trump Kool-Aid and denying the potentially harmful/lethal consequences of irresponsible behavior makes sense to him. Maybe he thinks it’s to his political advantage. Maybe he’s just a bad person.

But painting reasonable (if unpleasant) temporary measures to help slow down our edition of a global pandemic that has already killed at least a quarter million Americans (most likely far more) as some sort of government conspiracy to steal your freedoms is disingenuous at best. And to the extent that it encourages people to partake of actions that are dangerous to themselves, their friends and loved ones, and anyone else they come in contact with … it’s morally criminal.

The 2020 Colorado ballot proposition results

I’m mostly happy about the results.

Since I talked about my Colorado ballot proposition choices before the election, it’s only fair I report on how the People voted. Colors will indicate whether I won or lost.

Amendment B: Doing away with the Gallagher Amendment on Property Taxes

I voted YES. Result was YES (57-43). Colorado’s tax laws remain a mess, but this has yanked a few wires out of the tangle.

Amendment C: Easier / more profitable to run bingo-raffle games.

I voted NO. Result was YES (52/48), but fails by not reaching the required 55%. Changes in the ballot proposition system a few elections back means that some proposals require a 55% win. This one didn’t meet it, which I’m just as happy about, as the whole thing sounded like a scam.

Amendment 76: Edit a voting requirement to “must be a United States citizen”

I voted NO. Result was YES (63-37). A solution searching  for a problem, and a sop for nativists.

Amendment 77: Allow limited gaming towns to go hog-wild with games and stakes.

I voted NO. Result was YES (60-40). Some towns and community colleges will get a little richer. Some gambling companies will get a lot richer. A bunch of Coloradans will get a lot poorer.

Proposition EE: Nicotine tax on vaping products and smoking tobacco products.

I voted YES. Result was YES (68-32). Everyone loves a sin tax.

Proposition 113: Join the National Popular Vote compact?

I voted YES. Result was YES (52-48). The Electoral College sucks. Enough Coloradans feel that way, too.

Proposition 114: Reintroduce gray wolves in Colorado?

I voted YES. Result was YES (50.3-49.7). This one barely eked its way to victory. Oh, btw, the Trump Administration just announced gray wolves were off the Endangered Species List.

Proposition 115: Ban abortion at 22 weeks?

I voted NO. Result was NO (41-59). I wish the margin had been higher. But, then, I wish folk would stop putting this on the ballot every election.

Proposition 116: Cut state income tax from 4.63% to 4.55%

I voted NO. Result was YES (57-43). Most people won’t notice the difference, but state programs will. 

Proposition 117: Require voter approval of state enterprises that charge un-TABORed fees?

I voted NO. Result was YES (52-48). This state remains compulsively anti-tax.

Proposition 118: Create a paid family and medical leave program?

I voted YES. Result was YES (57-43). But we’re also kind of progressive on what we want government to do. Yes, that’s quite a contradiction. But I’ll take it on this one (though it will be up for referendum in two years based on the win of Prop 117).

Overall, I’m pretty pleased, going 7–4 on how I wanted the vote to go — and not losing on the ones I felt most strongly about. So … I’ll take my victories where I can.

My only thoughts on a post-election afternoon

The afternoon after the night before.

  1. I am guardedly optimistic that, despite Donald’s appalling dishonesty about and continuing shenanigans with the electoral process, Biden will eventually win.
  2. Even if so, I am deeply, deeply dismayed with the US that this election is this close. That 67 million Americans are willing to overlook (if not support) Trump’s horrible personality, his racism and sexism, his incompetence at home and abroad, his corruption, his authoritarianism, and his never-ending litany of lies … boggles my mind. 
  3. I expect my animus toward Mitch McConnell will deepen to unexpected but off-putting levels over the next few years.

Quotations about the Presidency

What do I want from a President? A lot of stuff I haven’t gotten from Trump.

As mentioned in the previous post, I collect quotations at my Wish I’d Said That (WIST) site. Here are some quotations I’ve picked up over the years on the presidency, and leadership, in consideration of what I think of as being a President, of being presidential.

It will not surprise you to discover I find a tremendous contrast between Donald Trump and these ideals. To me it’s a reminder of what we’ve lost the last four years, and have an opportunity to regain.

Links go to the original quotation on WIST, which may have additional sourcing information or notes.

Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition. Whether it be true or not, I can say for one that I have no other so great as that of being truly esteemed of my fellow men, by rendering myself worthy of their esteem.

Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
“To the People of Sangamo County,” speech running for Illinois state legislature (9 Mar 1832)

A politician, for example, is a man who thinks of the next election; while the statesman thinks of the next generation.

James Freeman Clarke (1810-1888) American theologian and author
“Wanted, a Statesman!”, Old and New Magazine (Dec 1870)

Although in our country the Chief Magistrate must almost of necessity be chosen by a party and stand pledged to its principles and measures, yet in his official action he should not be the President of a part only, but of the whole people of the United States. While he executes the laws with an impartial hand, shrinks from no proper responsibility, and faithfully carries out in the executive department of the Government the principles and policy of those who have chosen him, he should not be unmindful that our fellow-citizens who have differed with him in opinion are entitled to the full and free exercise of their opinions and judgments, and that the rights of all are entitled to respect and regard.

James K. Polk (1795-1849) American lawyer, politician, US President (1845-1849)
Inaugural Address (4 Mar 1845)

You cannot be a leader, and ask other people to follow you, unless you know how to follow, too.

Sam Rayburn (1882-1961) American lawyer and politician
Quoted in The Leadership of Speaker Sam Rayburn, Collected Tributes of His Congressional Colleagues, House Doc. 87-247 (1961)

For of those to whom much is given, much is required. And when at some future date the high court of history sits in judgment on each of us — recording whether in our brief span of service we fulfilled our responsibilities to the state — our success or failure, in whatever office we hold, will be measured by the answers to four questions:

First, were we truly men of courage — with the courage to stand up to one’s enemies — and the courage to stand up, when necessary, to one’s associates — the courage to resist public pressure, as well as private greed?

Secondly, were we truly men of judgment — with perceptive judgment of the future as well as the past — of our mistakes as well as the mistakes of others — with enough wisdom to know what we did not know and enough candor to admit it.

Third, were we truly men of integrity — men who never ran out on either the principles in which we believed or the men who believed in us — men whom neither financial gain nor political ambition could ever divert from the fulfillment of our sacred trust?

Finally, were we truly men of dedication — with an honor mortgaged to no single individual or group, and comprised of no private obligation or aim, but devoted solely to serving the public good and the national interest?

Courage — judgment — integrity — dedication — these are the historic qualities … which, with God’s help … will characterize our Government’s conduct in the four stormy years that lie ahead.

 John Fitzgerald Kennedy (1917-1963) US President (1961-63)
Address to the Massachusetts legislature (9 Jan 1961)

It is part of the price of leadership of this great and free nation to be the target of clever satirists. You have given the gift of laughter to our people. May we never grow so somber or self-important that we fail to appreciate the humor in our lives.

Lyndon B. Johnson (1908-1973) American politician, educator, US President (1963-69)
Letter to the Smothers Brothers (Nov 1968)

The aim of every political constitution is, or ought to be, first to  obtain for rulers men who possess most wisdom to discern, and most virtue to pursue, the common good of the society; and in the next place, to take the most effectual precautions for keeping them virtuous whilst they continue to hold their public trust.

James Madison (1751-1836) American statesman, political theorist, US President (1809-17)
The Federalist #57 (19 Feb 1788)

Dishonor in public life has a double poison. When people are dishonorable in private business, they injure only those with whom they deal or their own chances in the net world. When there is a lack of honor in Government, the morals of the whole people are poisoned.

Herbert Hoover (1874-1964) American engineer, bureaucrat, President of the US (1928-32)
Address, Des Moines, Iowa (30 Aug 1951)

Ultimately, a genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus, but a molder of consensus.

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968) American clergyman, civil rights leader, orator
Speech, Labor Leadership Assembly for Peace (Nov 1967)

PRESIDENT, n. The leading figure in a small group of men of whom — and of whom only — it is positively known that immense numbers of their countrymen did not want any of them for President.

Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914?) American writer and journalist
The Cynic’s Word Book (1906)

The measure of leadership is not the quality of the head, but the tone of the body. The signs of outstanding leadership appear primarily among the followers.

Max De Pree (b. 1924) American businessman and writer
Leadership Is An Art (1987)

Your public servants serve you right.

Adlai Stevenson (1900-1965) American diplomat, statesman
Speech, Los Angeles (11 Sep 1952)

The best foreign policy is to live our daily lives in honesty, decency, and integrity; at home, making our own land a more fitting habitation for free men; and abroad, joining with those of like mind and heart, to make of the world a place where all men can dwell in peace.

Dwight David Eisenhower (1890-1969) American general, US President (1953-61)
Inaugural Gabriel Silver lecture, Columbia University (23 Mar 1950)

The legislative job of the President is especially important to the people who have no special representatives to plead their cause before Congress — and that includes the great majority. The President is the only lobbyist that 150 million Americans have. The other 20 million are able to employ people to represent them — and that’s all right, it’s the exercise of the right of petition — but someone has to look after the interests of the 150 million that are left.

Harry S Truman (1884-1972) US President (1945-1953)
Speech, Press and Union Club, San Francisco (25 Oct 1956)

To serve the Public faithfully, and at the same time please it entirely, is impracticable.

Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) American statesman, scientist, philosopher
Poor Richard’s Almanack (Oct 1758)

The politician in my country seeks votes, affection and respect, in that order…. With few notable exceptions, they are simply men who want to be loved.

Edward R. Murrow (1908-1965) American journalist
Address at London Guildhall (19 Oct 1959)

I believe that the public temper is such that the voters of the land are prepared to support the party which gives the best promise of administering the government in the honest, simple, and plain manner which is consistent with its character and purposes. They have learned that mystery and concealment in the management of their affairs cover tricks and betrayal. The statesmanship they require consists in honesty and frugality, a prompt response to the needs of the people as they arise, and a vigilant protection of all their varied interests.

Grover Cleveland (1837–1908) American President (1885–1889, 1893–1897)
Letter accepting Democratic nomination for President (8 Aug 1884)

When I ran for Presidency of the United States, I knew that this country faced serious challenges, but I could not realize — nor could any man realize who does not bear the burdens of this — how heavy and constant would be those burdens.

John F. Kennedy (1917-1963) US President (1961-63)
“Radio and TV Report to the American People on the Berlin Crisis” (25 Jul 1961)

The first rule of democracy is to distrust all leaders who begin to believe their own publicity.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (1917-2007) American historian, author, social critic
“On Heroic Leadership,” Encounter (Dec 1960)

I pledge you, I pledge myself, to a new deal for the American people. Let us all here assembled constitute ourselves prophets of a new order of competence and of courage. This is more than a political campaign; it is a call to arms. Give me your help, not to win votes alone, but to win in this crusade to restore America to its own people.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945) US President (1933-1945)
Presidential nomination acceptance speech, Chicago (2 Jul 1932)

Dependability, integrity, the characteristic of never knowingly doing anything wrong, that you would never cheat anyone, that you would give everybody a fair deal. Character is a sort of an all-inclusive thing. If a man has character, everyone has confidence in him. Soldiers must have confidence in their leader.

Omar Bradley (1893-1981) American general
Personal interview with Edgar Puryear (15 Feb 1963)
Quoted in Edgar Puryear, 19 Stars : A Study in Military Character and Leadership (1981).

You have heard the story, haven’t you, about the man who was tarred and feathered and carried out of town on a rail? A man in the crowd asked him how he liked it. His reply was that if it was not for the honor of the thing, he would much rather walk.

Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
When asked how he enjoyed being President. (Attributed (1861))

Because power corrupts, society’s demands for moral authority and character increase as the importance of the position increases.

John Adams (1735-1826) American lawyer, Founding Father, statesman, US President (1797-1801)
(Attributed)

The worst error a president can make is to assume the automatic implementation of his own decisions. In certain respects, having able subordinates aggravates that problem, since strong personalities tend to have strong ideas of their own. Civil government operates by consent, not by command; the President’s task, even within his own branch of government, is not to order but to lead.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (1917-2007) American historian, author, social critic
The Age of Roosevelt: The Coming of the New Deal, ch. 33, sec. 3 (1959)

The second office of this government is honorable & easy, the first is but a splendid misery.

Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) American political philosopher, polymath, statesman, US President (1801-09)
Letter to Elbridge Gerry (13 May 1797)

The task of leadership is not to put greatness into humanity, but to elicit it, for the greatness is already there.

John Buchan (1875-1940) Scottish novelist, poet, and politician; Governor-General of Canada (1935 -1940)
Montrose and Leadership (1930)

All presidents start out to run a crusade, but after a couple of years they find they are running something less heroic and much more intractable: namely, the presidency.

Alistair Cooke (1908-2004) Anglo-American essayist and journalist
Talk About America, ch. 6 (1981)

He serves his party best who serves the country best.

Rutherford B. Hayes (1822-1893) American attorney, soldier, politician, US President (1877-81)
Inaugural address (5 Mar 1877)

The first responsibility of a leader is to define reality. The last is to say thank you. In between the two, the leader must become a servant and a debtor.

Max De Pree (b. 1924) American businessman and writer
Leadership Is An Art (1989)

You can lead an organization through persuasion or formal edict. I have never found the arbitrary use of authority to control an organization either effective or, for that matter, personally interesting. If you cannot persuade your colleagues of the correctness of your position, it is probably worthwhile to rethink your own.

Alan Greenspan (b. 1926) American economist, bureaucrat
“Federal Reserve’s Chairman Blends Eye for Politics with Economic Skills,” New York Times (26 Jul 1990)

The Presidency is not merely an administrative office. That’s the least of it. It is more than an engineering job, efficient or inefficient. It is pre-eminently a place of moral leadership. All our great Presidents were leaders of thought at times when certain historic ideas in the life of the nation had to be clarified.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945) US President (1933-1945)
In The New York Times Magazine (11 Sep 1932)

If we do not lay out ourselves in the service of mankind whom should we serve?

Abigail Adams (1744-1818) American correspondent, First Lady (1797-1801)
Letter to John Thaxter (29 Sep 1778)

I despise toadies who suck up to their bosses; they are generally the same people who bully their subordinates.

David Ogilvy (1911–1999) British advertising executive
Confessions of an Advertising Man, ch. 1 (1963)

Do you know what makes a leader? It’s the man or woman who can persuade people to do what they ought to do — and which they sometimes don’t do — without being persuaded. They must also have the ability to persuade people to do what they do not want to do and like it.

Harry S Truman (1884-1972) US President (1945-1953)
Speech, Annapolis (24 May 1952)

The President is merely the most important among a large number of public servants. He should be supported or opposed exactly to the degree which is warranted by his good conduct or bad conduct, his efficiency or inefficiency in rendering loyal, able, and disinterested service to the nation as a whole. Therefore it is absolutely necessary that there should be full liberty to tell the truth about his acts, and this means that it is exactly as necessary to blame him when he does wrong as to praise him when he does right. Any other attitude in an American citizen is both base and servile. To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public. Nothing but the truth should be spoken about him or any one else. But it is even more important to tell the truth, pleasant or unpleasant, about him than about any one else.

Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919) US President (1901-1909)
“Sedition, A Free Press, and Personal Rule,” Kansas City Star (7 May 1918)

You convey too great a compliment when you say that I have earned the right to the presidential nomination. No man can establish such an obligation upon any part of the American people. My country owes me no debt. It gave me, as it gives every boy and girl, a chance. It gave me schooling, independence of action, opportunity for service and honor. In no other land could a boy from a country village, without inheritance or influential friends, look forward with unbounded hope. My whole life has taught me what America means. I am indebted to my country beyond any human power to repay.

Herbert Hoover (1874-1964) American engineer, bureaucrat, President of the US (1928-32)
Letter to George Moses (14 Jun 1928)

When you get to be President, there are all those things, the honors, the twenty-one gun salutes, all those things. You have to remember it isn’t for you. It’s for the Presidency.

Harry S Truman (1884-1972) US President (1945-1953)
In Merle Miller, Plain Speaking: An Oral Biography of Harry S. Truman, ch. 15 (1973)

Widespread intellectual and moral docility may be convenient for leaders in the short term, but it is suicidal for nations in the long term. One of the criteria for national leadership should therefore be a talent for understanding, encouraging, and making constructive use of vigorous criticism.

¶ Carl Sagan (1934-1996) American scientist and writer
Billions and Billions, ch. 14 “The Common Enemy” (1997)

The intoxication of power rapidly sobers off in the knowledge of its restrictions and under the prompt reminder of an ever-present and not always considerate press, as well as the kindly suggestions that not infrequently come from Congress.

William Howard Taft (1857-1930) US President (1909-13) and Chief Justice (1921-1930)
Speech, Lotus Club (16 Nov 1912)

The leader holds his position purely because he is able to appeal to the conscience and to the reason of those who support him, and the boss holds his position because he appeals to fear of punishment and hope of reward. The leader works in the open, and the boss in covert. The leader leads, and the boss drives.

Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919) US President (1901-1909)
Speech, Binghamton, New York (24 Oct 1910)

The culture of any organization is shaped by the worst behavior the leader is willing to tolerate.

Steve Gruenert and Todd Whitaker, School Culture Rewired, ch. 3 (2015)

Leadership is a potent combination of strategy and character. But if you must be without one, be without the strategy.

Norman Schwarzkopf (b. 1934) American military leader
(Attributed)

Leadership is solving problems. The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help or concluded you do not care. Either case is a failure of leadership.

Colin Powell (b. 1937) American military leader, Secretary of State
My American Journey, ch. 2 (2003)

I praise loudly, I blame softly.

Catherine II (1762-1796) Russian empress [Catherine the Great]
Letter (23 Aug. 1794)

If you don’t understand that you work for your mislabeled subordinates, then you know nothing of leadership. You know only tyranny.

Dee W. Hock (b. 1929) American businessman
“Unit of One Anniversary Handbook,” Fast Company (28 Feb 1997)

No President should fear public scrutiny of his program. For from that scrutiny comes understanding; and from that understanding comes support or opposition. And both are necessary.

John F. Kennedy (1917-1963) US President (1961-63)
Speech, American Newspaper Publishers Association (27 Apr 1961)

We need leaders not in love with money but in love with justice. Not in love with publicity but in love with humanity.

¶ Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968) American clergyman, civil rights leader, orator
“The Birth of a New Age,” speech, Alpha Phi Alpha banquet, Buffalo (11 Aug 1956)

The President must be greater than anyone else, but not better than anyone else. We subject him and his family to close and constant scrutiny and denounce them for things that we ourselves do every day. A Presidential slip of the tongue, a slight error in judgment — social, political, or ethical — can raise a storm of protest. We give the President more work than a man can do, more responsibility than a man should take, more pressure than a man can bear. We abuse him often and rarely praise him. We wear him out, use him up, eat him up. And with all this, Americans have a love for the President that goes beyond loyalty or party nationality; he is ours, and we exercise the right to destroy him.

John Steinbeck (1902-1968) American writer
“America and Americans” (1966)

Divide and rule, the politician cries;
Unite and lead, is watchword of the wise.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) German poet, statesman, scientist
Sprüche in Prosa (1819)

The function of leadership is to produce more leaders, not more followers.

Ralph Nader (b. 1934) American attorney, author, lecturer, political activist
Time Leadership Conference, Washington, DC (Sep 1976)

You can judge a leader by the size of the problem he tackles — people nearly always pick a problem their own size, and ignore or leave to others the bigger or smaller ones. The chief executive should be thinking about the long-term changes which will bring growth or decay to different parts of the enterprise, not fussing over day-to-day problems. Other people can cope with the waves, it’s his job to watch the tide.

Antony Jay (b. 1930) English writer, broadcaster, director
Management and Machiavelli: An Inquiry into the Politics of Corporate Life, ch. 17 (1967)

For a man of sensitivity and compassion to exercise great powers in a time of crisis is a grim and agonizing thing.

Richard Hofstadter (1916-1970) American historian and intellectual
The American Political Tradition: And the Men Who Made It, Part 5, ch. 7 (1958)
Referring to Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War.

It is loyalty to great ends, even though forced to combine the small and opposing motives of selfish men to accomplish them; it is the anchored cling to solid principles of duty and action, which knows how to swing with the tide, but is never carried away by it — that we demand in public men, and not sameness of policy, or a conscientious persistency in what is impracticable.

James Russell Lowell (1819-1891) American diplomat, essayist, poet
“Abraham Lincoln” (1864), My Study Windows (1871)

Never hire or promote in your own image. It is foolish to replicate your strength. It is idiotic to replicate your weakness. It is essential to employ, trust, and reward those whose perspective, ability, and judgment are radically different from yours. It is also rare, for it requires uncommon humility, tolerance, and wisdom.

Dee W. Hock (b. 1929) American businessman
In M. Mitchell Waldrop, “Dee Hock on Management,” Fast Company (Oct/Nov 1996)

The supreme quality for leadership is unquestionably integrity. Without it, no real success is possible, no matter whether it is on a section gang, a football field, in an army, or in an office. If a man’s associates find him guilty of phoniness, if they find that he lacks forthright integrity, he will fail. His teachings and actions must square with each other. The first great need, therefore, is integrity and high purpose.

Dwight David Eisenhower (1890-1969) American general, US President (1953-61)
(Attributed)

Our loyalty is due entirely to the United States. It is due to the President only and exactly to the degree in which he efficiently serves the United States. It is our duty to support him when he serves the United States well. It is our duty to oppose him when he serves it badly. This is true about Mr. Wilson now and it has been true about all our Presidents in the past. It is our duty at all times to tell the truth about the President and about every one else, save in the cases where to tell the truth at the moment would benefit the public enemy.

Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919) US President (1901-1909)
Kansas City Star (7 May 1918)

Your position never gives you the right to command. It only imposes on you the duty of so living your life that others can receive your orders without being humiliated.

Dag Hammarskjöld (1905-1961) Swedish diplomat, author, UN Secretary-General (1953-61)
Markings (1955) [tr. Sjoberg & Auden (1964)]

The job of getting people really wanting to do something is the essence of leadership. And one of the things a leader needs occasionally is the inspiration he gets from the people he leads. The old tactical textbooks say that the commander always visits his troops to inspire them to fight. I for one soon discovered that one of the reasons for my visiting the front lines was to get inspiration from the young American soldier. I went back to my job ashamed of my own occasional resentments or discouragements, which I probably — at least I hope I concealed them.

Dwight David Eisenhower (1890-1969) American general, US President (1953-61)
Speech, Republican State Chairmen, Denver (10 Sep 1955)

You can’t do the biggest things in this world unless you handle men; and you can’t handle men if you’re not in sympathy with them; and sympathy begins in humility.

George Horace Lorimer (1867-1937) American journalist, author, magazine editor
Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son (1901)

The high sentiments always win in the end, the leaders who offer blood, toil, tears, and sweat always get more out of their followers than those who offer safety and a good time. When it comes to the pinch, human beings are heroic.

George Orwell (1903-1950) English writer [pseud. of Eric Arthur Blair]
“The Art of Donald McGill” (Sep 1941)

Oh, if there is a man out of hell that suffers more than I do, I pity him.

Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed (1862))

Our trouble is that we do not demand enough of the people who represent us. We are responsible for their activities. … We must spur them to more imagination and enterprise in making a push into the unknown; we must make clear that we intend to have responsible and courageous leadership.

Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962) First Lady of the US (1933-45), politician, diplomat, activist
Tomorrow Is Now (1963)

God give us men. The time demands
Strong minds, great hearts, true faith, and willing hands;
Men whom the lust of office does not kill;
Men whom the spoils of office cannot buy;
Men who possess opinions and a will;
Men who have honor; men who will not lie;
Men who can stand before a demagogue
And damn his treacherous flatteries without winking;
Tall men, sun-crowned, who live above the fog
In public duty and in private thinking ….

J. G. Holland (1819-1881) American novelist, poet, editor [Josiah Gilbert Holland; pseud. Timothy Titcomb]
“Wanted” (1872)

Quotations on an Election Day

Some thoughts about elections, voting, and democracy

I collect quotations at my Wish I’d Said That (WIST) site. Aaand, every couple of years, on election day, I pull out some thoughts from the past that I find pertinent to our present.

This one’s a bit longer than usual, but it keeps me off the streets and out of trouble.

Links provided are to the WIST site, which often has original sourcing and additional notes on each quotation.

Nobody will ever deprive the American people of the right to vote except the American people themselves — and the only way they could do this is by not voting.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945) US President (1933-1945)
Radio address (5 Oct 1944)

It is the common fate of the indolent to see their rights become a prey to the active. The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance; which condition if he break, servitude is at once the consequence of his crime and the punishment of his guilt.

John Philpot Curran (1750-1817) Irish lawyer and politician
Speech before Privy Council, Dublin (10 Jul 1790)

Whatever the laws may provide, however lofty may be their sentiments, a man without a vote is a man without protection.

Lyndon B. Johnson (1908-1973) American politician, educator, US President (1963-69)
(Attributed)

The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country.

 Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) US President (1861-65)
Annual Message to Congress (1 Dec 1862)

This is a column for everyone who ever said, “I’m sorry, I’m just not interested in politics,” or, “There’s nothing I can do about it,” or, “Hey, they’re all crooks anyway.” … I’ve got one word for all of you: Katrina. … This, friends, is why we need to pay attention to government policies, not political personalities, and to know whereon we vote. It is about our lives.

Molly Ivins (1944-2007) American writer, political columnist [Mary Tyler Ivins]
The Progressive (Oct 2005)

Build movements. Vote with your values, but vote strategically. Voting isn’t a Valentine. It’s a chess move.

Rebecca Solnit (b. 1961) American writer, historian, activist
Facebook (17 Oct 2016)

Democracy is a device that ensures we shall be governed no better than we deserve.

George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) British playwright and critic
(Attributed)

If a man has a genuine, sincere, hearty wish to get rid of his liberty, if he is really bent upon becoming a slave, nothing can stop him. And the temptation is to some natures a very great one. Liberty is often a heavy burden on a man. It involves that necessity for perpetual choice which is the kind of labor men have always dreaded. In common life we shirk it by forming habits, which take the place of self-determination. In politics party-organization saves us the pains of much thinking before deciding how to cast our vote.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809-1894) American poet, essayist, scholar
Elsie Venner, ch. 18 (1859)

If there is distrust out there — and there is — perhaps it is because there is so much partisan jockeying for advantage at the expense of public policy. At times it feels as if American politics consists largely of candidates without ideas, hiring consultants without convictions, to stage campaigns without content. Increasingly the result is elections without voters.

Gerald R. Ford (1913-2006) US President, (1974-77) [b. Leslie Lynch King, Jr.]
Speech, Profiles in Courage Award Acceptance, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library (2001)

There are worse things than losing an election; the worst thing is to lose one’s convictions and not tell the people the truth.

Adlai Stevenson (1900-1965) American diplomat, statesman
(Attributed)

We’d all like t’vote fer th’best man, but he’s never a candidate.

Kin Hubbard (1868-1930) American caricaturist and humorist [Frank McKinney Hubbard]
Abe Martin’s Primer (1914)

When you have to make a choice and don’t make it, that is in itself a choice.

William James (1842-1910) American psychologist and philosopher
(Attributed)

Since the beginning of our American history, we have been engaged in change — in a perpetual peaceful revolution — a revolution which goes on steadily, quietly adjusting itself to changing conditions — without the concentration camp or the quick-lime in the ditch. The world order which we seek is the cooperation of free countries, working together in a friendly, civilized society.

 Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945) US President (1933-1945)
Annual Message to Congress (6 Jan 1941)

The people — the people — are the rightful masters of both Congresses, and courts — not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert it.

Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
Speech, Cooper Union, New York City (27 Feb 1860)

Always vote for principle, though you may vote alone, and you may cherish the sweetest reflection that your vote is never lost.

John Quincy Adams (1767-1848) US President (1825-29)
(Attributed)

The single most dangerous thing you can do in politics is shut off information from people who don’t agree with you. Surround yourself with sycophants, listen only to the yea-sayers … then stick a fork in it, you’re done.

Molly Ivins (1944-2007) American writer, political columnist [Mary Tyler Ivins]
“Election Denial” (3 Apr. 2001)

Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.

Winston Churchill (1874-1965) British statesman and author
Speech, House of Commons (11 Nov 1947)

Pessimism about man serves to maintain the status quo. It is a luxury for the affluent, a sop to the guilt of the politically inactive, a comfort to those who continue to enjoy the amenities of privilege.

Leon Eisenberg (1922-2009) American psychiatrist and medical educator
“The Human Nature of Human Nature,” Science (14 Apr 1972)

Bad officials are elected by good people who do not vote.

George Jean Nathan (1892-1958) American editor and critic
(Attributed)

But I go on this great republican principle, that the people will have virtue and intelligence to select men of virtue and wisdom. Is there no virtue among us? If there be not, we are in a wicked situation. No theoretical checks, no form of government, can render us secure. To suppose that any for of government will secure liberty or happiness without any virtue in the people, is a chimerical idea. If there be sufficient virtue and intelligence in the community, it will be exercised in the selection of these men; so that we do not depend on their virtue, or put confidence in our rulers, but in the people who are to choose them.

James Madison (1751-1836) American statesman, political theorist, US President (1809-17)
Speech at the Virginia Convention (20 Jun 1788)

The idea that you can merchandise candidates for high office like breakfast cereal — that you can gather votes like box tops — is, I think, the ultimate indignity to the democratic process.

Adlai Stevenson (1900-1965) American diplomat, statesman
Comment, after his presidential nomination acceptance speech, Chicago (18 Aug 1956)

But freedom isn’t free. It shouldn’t be a bragging point that, “Oh, I don’t get involved in politics,” as if that makes someone cleaner. No, that makes you derelict of duty in a republic. Liars and panderers in government would have a much harder time of it if so many people didn’t insist on their right to remain ignorant and blindly agreeable.

William “Bill” Maher (b. 1956) American comedian, political commentator, critic, television host.
When You Ride Alone You Ride With Bin Laden (2002)

We are not a cynical people. The will to believe lingers on. We like to think that heroes can emerge from obscurity, as they sometimes do; that elections do matter, even though the process is at least part hokum; that through politics we can change our society and maybe even find a cause to believe in.

Ronald Steel (b. 1931) American writer, historian, and professor
“The Vanishing Campaign Biography,” New York Times (5 Aug 1984)

CALVIN: When I grow up, I’m not going to read the newspaper and I’m not going to follow complex issues and I’m not going to vote. That way I can complain when the government doesn’t represent me. Then, when everything goes down the tubes, I can say the system doesn’t work and justify my further lack of participation.
HOBBES: An ingeniously self-fulfilling plan.
CALVIN: It’s a lot more fun to blame things than to fix them.

Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin & Hobbes

The vote is the most powerful instrument ever devised by man for breaking down injustice and destroying the terrible walls which imprison men because they are different from other men.

Lyndon B. Johnson (1908-1973) American politician, educator, US President (1963-69)
Speech, Signing of the Voting Rights Act (6 Aug 1965)

Monarchy is like a sleek craft, it sails along well until some bumbling captain runs it into the rocks. Democracy, on the other hand, is like a raft. It never goes down but, dammit, your feet are always wet.

Fisher Ames (1758-1808) American politician, orator
(Attributed)

Every honest and God-fearing man is a mighty factor in the future of the Republic. Educated men, business men, professional men, should be the last to shirk the responsibilities attaching to citizenship in a free government. They should be practical and helpful — mingling with the people — not selfish and exclusive. It is not necessary that every man should enter into politics, or adopt it as a profession, or seek political preferment, but it is the duty of every man to give personal attention to his political duties. They are as sacred and binding as any we have to perform.

William McKinley (1843-1901) US President (1897-1901)
Speech, Woodstock, Connecticut (4 July 1891)

As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy. Whatever differs from this, to the extent of the difference, is no democracy.

Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
“On Slavery and Democracy” (fragment) (1858?)

It is enough that the people know there was an election. The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything.

[Я считаю, что совершенно неважно, кто и как будет в партии голосовать; но вот что чрезвычайно важно, это – кто и как будет считать голоса.]

Josef Stalin (1879-1953) Georgian revolutionary and Soviet dictator
Comment (1923)

The death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination from ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference, and undernourishment.

Robert M. Hutchins (1899-1977) American educator and educational philosopher
Great Books: The Foundation of a Liberal Education (1954)

Democracy does not give the people the most skillful government, but it produces what the ablest governments are frequently unable to create: namely, an all-pervading and restless activity, a superabundant force, and an energy which is inseparable from it and which may, however unfavorable circumstances may be, produce wonders.

Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859) French writer, diplomat, politician
Democracy in America, 1.14 (1835) [tr. Reeve and Bowen (1862)]

All free governments are managed by the combined wisdom and folly of the people.

James A. Garfield (1831-1881) US President (1881), lawyer, lay preacher, educator
Letter to B. A. Hinsdale (21 Apr 1880)

Look at the tyranny of party — at what is called party allegiance, party loyalty — a snare invented by designing men for selfish purposes — and which turns voters into chattels, slaves, rabbits, and all the while their masters, and they themselves are shouting rubbish about liberty, independence, freedom of opinion, freedom of speech, honestly unconscious of the fantastic contradiction; and forgetting or ignoring that their fathers and the churches shouted the same blasphemies a generation earlier when they were closing their doors against the hunted slave, beating his handful of humane defenders with Bible texts and billies, and pocketing the insults and licking the shoes of his Southern Master.

Mark Twain (1835-1910) American writer [pseud. of Samuel Clemens]
“The Character of Man” (23 Jan 1906), in The Autobiography of Mark Twain, Vol. 1 (2010)

The deadliest enemies of nations are not their foreign foes; they always dwell within their borders. And from these internal enemies civilization is always in need of being saved. The nation blest above all nations is she in whom the civic genius of the people does the saving day by day, by acts without external picturesqueness; by speaking, writing, voting reasonably; by smiting corruption swiftly; by good temper between parties; by the people knowing true men when they see them, and preferring them as leaders to rabid partisans or empty quacks.

William James (1842-1910) American psychologist and philosopher
“Robert Gould Shaw: Oration upon the Unveiling of the Shaw Monument” (31 May 1897)

Politics is the gentle art of getting votes from the poor and campaign funds from the rich by promising to protect each from the other.

Oscar Ameringer (1870-1943) German-American political activist, Socialist organizer, author, politician
The American Guardian

Another point of disagreement is not factual but involves the ethical/moral principle […] sometimes referred to as the “politics of moral witness.” Generally associated with the religious left, secular leftists implicitly invoke it when they reject LEV on the grounds that “a lesser of two evils is still evil.” Leaving aside the obvious rejoinder that this is exactly the point of lesser evil voting — i.e. to do less evil, what needs to be challenged is the assumption that voting should be seen a form of individual self-expression rather than as an act to be judged on its likely consequences. […] The basic moral principle at stake is simple: not only must we take responsibility for our actions, but the consequences of our actions for others are a far more important consideration than feeling good about ourselves.

Noam Chomsky (b. 1928) American linguist and activist
“An Eight Point Brief for LEV (Lesser Evil Voting)” (15 Jun 2016) [with John Halle]

I am a democrat because I believe in the Fall of Man. I think most people are democrats for the opposite reason. A great deal of democratic enthusiasm descends from the ideas of people like Rousseau, who believed in democracy because they thought mankind so wise and good that everyone deserved a share in government. The danger of defending democracy on those grounds is that they’re not true. And whenever their weakness is exposed, the people who prefer tyranny make capital out of the exposure. I find that they’re not true without looking further than myself. I don’t deserve a share in governing a hen-roost, much less a nation. Nor do most people — all the people who believe advertisements, and think in catchwords and spread rumours. The real reason for democracy is just the reverse. Mankind is so fallen that no man can be trusted with unchecked power over his fellows. Aristotle said that some people were only fit to be slaves. I do not contradict him. But I reject slavery because I see no men fit to be masters.

C.S. Lewis (1898-1963) English writer and scholar [Clive Staples Lewis]
“Equality,” The Spectator (27 Aug 1943)

Let us not be afraid to help each other — let us never forget that government is ourselves and not an alien power over us. The ultimate rulers of our democracy are not a President and Senators and Congressmen and Government officials but the voters of this country.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945) US President (1933-1945)
Speech, Marietta, Ohio (8 Jul 1938)

Many of the issues of civil rights are very complex and most difficult. But about this there can and should be no argument. Every American citizen must have the right to vote. … Yet the harsh fact is that in many places in this country men and women are kept from voting simply because they are Negroes. … No law that we now have on the books … can insure the right to vote when local officials are determined to deny it. … There is no Constitutional issue here. The command of the Constitution is plain. There is no moral issue. It is wrong—deadly wrong—to deny any of your fellow Americans the right to vote in this country. There is no issue of States’ rights or National rights. There is only the struggle for human rights.

Lyndon B. Johnson (1908-1973) American politician, educator, US President (1963-69)
Speech, Congress (15 Mar 1965)

It is the besetting vice of democracies to substitute public opinion for law. This is the usual form in which masses of men exhibit their tyranny.

James Fenimore Cooper (1789-1851) American novelist
“On the Disadvantages of Democracy,” The American Democrat (1838)

The test of a democracy is not the magnificence of buildings or the speed of automobiles or the efficiency of air transportation, but rather the care given to the welfare of all the people.

Helen Keller (1880-1968) American author and lecturer
“Try Democracy,” The Home Magazine, Vol. 11, # 4 (Apr 1935)

It is high time that we stopped thinking politically as Republicans and Democrats about elections and started thinking patriotically as Americans about national security based on individual freedom. It is high time that we all stopped being tools and victims of totalitarian techniques — techniques that, if continued here unchecked, will surely end what we have come to cherish as the American Way of Life.

Margaret Chase Smith (1897-1965) American politician (US Senator, Maine)
“Declaration of Conscience,” Congressional Record, vol. 96, 81st Congress, 2d. sess. (1 Jun 1950)

Political strategies and tactics are not jealous lovers. You don’t have to be monogamous. Direct Action will not feel betrayed if you also vote from time to time — you can be poly in your tactics. And I am. Of course I vote! If you’re a woman, or a person of color, or a person who doesn’t own property, or even a white male who doesn’t belong to the nobility, centuries of struggle and many deaths have bought you the right to vote. I vote to keep faith with peasant rebels and suffragist hunger strikers and civil rights workers braving the lynch mobs of the South, if for no other reason. But there is another reason — because who we vote for has an enormous impact on real peoples’ lives.

Starhawk (b. 1951) American writer, activist, feminist theologian [b. Miriam Simos]
“Pre-Election Day Thoughts,” blog post (7 Nov 2016)

Let us not be mistaken: the best government in the world, the best parliament and the best president, cannot achieve much on their own. And it would be wrong to expect a general remedy from them alone. Freedom and democracy include participation and therefore responsibility from us all.

Václav Havel (1936-2011) Czech playwright, essayist, dissident, politician
“New Year’s Address to the Nation” (1 Jan 1990)

There has been a certain cynical genius to what some of these folks have done in Washington. What they’ve realized is, if we don’t get anything done, then people are going to get cynical about government and its possibilities of doing good for everybody. And since they don’t believe in government, that’s a pretty good thing. And the more cynical people get, the less they vote. And if turnout is low and people don’t vote, that pretty much benefits those who benefit from the status quo.

Barack Obama (b. 1961) American politician, US President (2009-2017)
Speech, Purchase, New York (29 Aug 2014)

The greatness of America lies not in being more enlightened than any other nation, but rather in her ability to repair her faults.

Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859) French writer, diplomat, politician
Democracy in America, Vol. 1, ch. 13 (1835)

Democracy postulates community of interest or loyal patriotism. When these are absent it cannot long exist.

William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Our Present Discontents,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1919)

This is the affirmation on which democracy rests … [W]e can all be responsible … We become what we do. So does the world we live in, if enough of us do it — whether “it” be good or detestable. This is the burden of freedom: that it is all our fault or our credit.

Herbert Agar (1897-1980) American journalist and historian
“The Perils of Democracy” (1966)

To give the victory to the right, not bloody bullets, but peaceful ballots only, are necessary.

Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
Speech fragment (c. 18 May 1858)

The 2020 Election and Dark Fantasies

Donald has damaged the nation by damaging the election, and it may get worse.

Of all the awful things Donald Trump has done, his teeing up this election to be a shit-show that his pet Attorney General will litigate to the bitter end is arguably the worst. I know that list has bitter contention for top billing, because the nominees are legion. But I believe it so, because Donald’s actions, attitude, and announcements have fractured a keystone of our democracy / representative government: that election results can be trusted.

(Yes, for some populations in the US, that’s hardly new news. But we’re potentially talking here about a majority of Americans having that faith called into question.)

Everything stems from belief in election results. From the Constitution to the courts, from effective governance to crisis management. Taxes, obeying the law, basic societal bonds — all are affected by that basic trust. Because, as Donald’s own behavior shows, a lot of our society runs on a degree of confidence in the system, and voluntary compliance to civil norms.

Donald is damaging that. He’s setting things up so that confidence will be –already is — rattled, and so compliance becomes something for suckers because it’s every person for themselves. The social contract we have in this country is at stake.

So what’s the worst that could happen?

There are no electoral scenarios where things necessarily end well, because Donald has already called the whole process into question, and seems ready to continue to do so regardless of the outcome.

If Donald wins “bigly” (he will make any win into a “bigly” one, no matter the actual numbers), his and the GOP’s shenanigans regarding mail-in votes, on top of the (reprehensibly) usual GOP voter suppression, will further erode the idea of elections meaning anything. Even among his supporters, it will enforce the idea that winning depends on who’s willing to be the most cut-throat, regardless of traditions or even the law.

If Donald barely loses, he will fight tooth and nail in court, abetted by his pet AG, to call into question enough of the votes (mail-in or in-person, through his already asserted claims of massive fraud and illegal voting) to get the results changed enough to win. And then do his damnedest to make sure that the party (and his) advantage so gained is codified in law, as supported by a judiciary of the same persuasion.

(I have no faith that Donald, should he win, will not attempt to get the Constitution changed to allow him to run for another term. Or get SCOTUS to rule that so much of his first term was tied up in the “FAKE RUSSIA HOAX AND IMPEACHMENT HOAX TOO” that it doesn’t count. In either case, he will have a personal stake in making vote suppression even a bigger thing.)

If Donald loses big-time (doubtless with an accompanying drubbing of the GOP in the House and Senate), he’ll just switch to the Big Lie and use it as proof of massive fraud (“The only way I could lose is if there’s huge fraud, because everyone loves me, and the Dems always cheat, and this is proof of it” kind of thing).

Does anyone actually think he WON’T claim massive vote fraud, regardless of the outcome?

Again, massive court fights will ensue. And remember, he has as potential allies not just the executive branch, and half of Congress, but a massive fraction of federal judges he’s gotten appointed, plus 2-3 SCOTUS justices he’s named.

Even if Roberts declines to damage SCOTUS’ rep by supporting a perceived coup, if the Trump nominees and Thomas & Alito vote as a bloc, they win 5-4 vs Roberts and the remaining liberal justices. And I have no question in my mind that this, far more than any sentiment about abortion, is why Donald is pushing his SCOTUS nominee so fast. He’s admitted it. And that Mitch is supporting that raises even more grave doubts about outcomes.

And, to that end, there have already been discussions with GOP-run statehouses about how state legislatures could override the popular vote. (The Constitution gives the selection of electors to the lege, not to voters; it’s just a norm, under the law, that the voters get to make that decision. And we all know about the fragility of norms under the Trump presidency.)

Or for that matter, it might only take a GOP-run state to declare that there was massive fraud and they cannot select electors reliably. SCOTUS might rule the same. If the neither side ends up with 270+ electoral votes … then under the Twelfth Amendment, the election goes to Congress.

In that case, the House elects the President — but each state only casts one vote, as polled within its delegation. And there happen to be 26 states with a majority of GOP Representatives, vs 22 with a majority of Dems (one state, PA, is tied, and one state, MI, with has half Dems, an Independent, and the rest GOP). That means the House, if everyone follows party lines, chooses Trump for President. (And you thought the Electoral College was bad.)

(The VP is chosen in the Senate, where each Senator has a vote, so we know how that goes.)

Even if he’s finally stopped in court, and we don’t get state legislative shenanigans — however long that whole process would take — the spectacle itself would itself be a shock to the nation’s confidence and trust, and Donald’s inevitable rallying of the public (and the counter-rallying done by his opponents) further fracture the country. And it would, as importantly, firmly set the precedent first dabbled with in 2000: elections will be appealed and settled in court, not the ballot box, no matter the apparent result.

Way to be a bummer, Dave

So, yes, all of that is very depressing, and I sincerely hope against hope that the only Donald outcome we get is his leaving the White House grounds in January for good.

But that he’s made such dark fantasies even half-plausible demonstrates the damage he’s already done in four years, abetted by the news networks and pols and pundits who’ve been willing to deny reality and show undying loyalty, even in the face of regular zany behavior, in exchange for a cut of continuing power. They’ve all, collectively, called into question for coming decades, if not longer, how stable and reliable and honest our elections are.

And, by extension, our democracy, our government, and our society.
 
“It can never happen here” is itself a pleasant fantasy. Donald’s proven that to us in four short years.
“MINE!”

Looking at the 2020 Colorado ballot propositions

It’s a long list, but here are my initial judgments and inclinations.

We received our 2020 State Ballot Information Booklet yesterday for November’s election. There are 11 statewide measures up for voter approvals: amendments to the state constitution, amendments to state law, a tax question, and a referendum on a passed state law. Here are my thoughts after going through them all.

Amendment B: Repeal the Gallagher Amendment

This one gets kind of deep in the weeds of the mess that is Colorado state taxation, a result of conflicting voter amendments over the past few decades whip-sawing between “taxes bad!” and “government services essential!”

The 1982 Gallagher Amendment locked up the proportion between residential (45%) and business (55%) property tax revenue each year, which causes a mess given that (a) property values have gone up at different rates (residential is now 80% of the property value in the state, up from 53% in 1982), and (b) there is a lock on the nonresidential assessment rate.

Bottom line, if this passes, the tax rate for residential property will likely stay stable, leading to increasing taxes (as property values rise), combating programmed drops in local and state tax revenue and, in turn, public services. That seems reasonable to me, even as a person whose property tax costs are likely to go up. I’ll keep reading on the arguments about this, but my vote is Probably YES.

Amendment C: Conduct of Charitable Gaming

This amendment lets new non-profits more quickly run bingo and raffle games after they start, and hire professionals to do so. That sounds like a great way to implement “soft” for-profit gambling under the guise of charity. NO.

Amendment 76: Citizenship Qualification of Voters

Populist amendment to restrict all voting to only US citizens. A solution in search of a problem. Bah. NO.

Amendment 77: Local Voter Approval of Casino Bet Limits and Games

Colorado allows low-stakes gambling (certain games, bet limits of $100) in three old-timey towns up in the mountains: Black Hawk, Central City, and Cripple Creek. This proposition allows local voters there to add additional games and new bet limits, with added revenues mostly going to community colleges.

Meh. I don’t see any need to turn those towns into even bigger gambling meccas, let alone the costs of gambling addiction problems. The idea that all this only affects those three communities, when they draw on the population of all over the state to visit and drop their money at the tables, doesn’t pass the laugh test.

I also dislike, on principle, the “let’s do this bad thing because we’ll give the revenues to a good cause” enticement. NO.

Proposition EE: Taxes on Nicotine Products

While in principle I am fine with taxing the snot out of tobacco consumption, and even with adding some sin taxation on highly addictive vaping products, there’s a certain illogic in using such increased taxes to pay for essential programs like education, as that then creates a perverse incentive to actually keep the revenue source (smoking, vaping) continuing at high levels — especially perverse, since part of the tax revenues is to pay for “tobacco education” that would reduce such revenues. Still, I’m  Probably YES.

Proposition 113: Adopt Agreement to Elect US President by National Popular Vote

The state government passed a bill this year to make Colorado part of the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC), which commits the state to selecting its presidential electors based on the national popular vote (once an electoral majority of states join the compact). It’s a cheap-ass but effective way to bypass the Electoral College mess embedded in the US Constitution.

This is a citizen-initiated referendum on a passed bill (the first successfully petitioned referendum since 1932), filed by folk who think the Electoral College is really keen because it’s netted them two GOP Presidents in the last few decades who ought to have lost. They also seem to think it’s very unfair that, under it, cities with more people in them would get voting power actually proportional to their sizes. That they are couching their arguments in the dishonest assertion that this is “protecting Colorado’s vote” doesn’t lend them any more credibility. Bah. YES.

Proposition 114: Reintroduction and Management of Gray Wolves

This allows state management (under federal endangered species supervision) to reintroduce and manage gray wolves in Colorado, with state funds helping ranchers who lose livestock to the wolves.

Yay for wolves. YES.

Proposition 115: Prohibit Abortions after 22 Weeks

Colorado conservatives perennially put up an anti-abortion measure, which perennially gets shot down (and probably pulls more liberals to the polls than would do so otherwise).  This year’s edition avoids “personhood” bits by simply dropping in an arbitrary 22 week limit except in cases where the woman’s life is physically in danger.

My personal belief is that decisions about abortions should be made by the mother involved, hopefully in consultation with a physician (and, where appropriate, in consultation with the father). Late-term abortions are very rare (1.3% would fall into this category), and a number of the grave factors involved in them are not covered by this one-size-bans-all bill.

I also find an intellectual dishonesty in putting the legal burden — fines and medical license suspension — on the doctors involved. If abortion is the grave moral wrong that the proposition’s supporters assert it is, exempting the woman involved from penalties is solely pandering in order to pass the proposal. NO.

Proposition 116: State Income Tax Rate Reduction

“Taxes bad!” is not good public policy. Especially in a year when state taxes are already strained beyond the breaking point. NO.

Proposition 117: Voter Approval for Certain New State Enterprises

Another tax policy snafu. The state has formed various state enterprises over the years, from the Colorado Lottery to state universities to the state’s Unemployment Insurance and Parks & Wildlife groups. These enterprises charge fees for specific services (e.g., lottery tickets, hunting licenses, tuition), rather than drawing on general tax revenue.

The distinction is that under the early 90s TABOR (Taxpayer Bill of Rights) initiative, which is responsible for 75% of the zaniness in the state legislature, taxes cannot be initiated or increased without voter approval, but fees can be. Further, state enterprises are exempt from TABOR budget growth limits.

The proposition basically calls large state enterprises a runaround of TABOR, and so would require taxpayer voting before they were created.

Bah. Anything that carves out exemptions to TABOR is fine by me. NO.

Proposition 118: Paid Family and Medical Leave Insurance Program

Sets up a program, like it says, that would function a lot like Unemployment Insurance for family leaves (intersecting with the federal unpaid Family Medical Leave Act and state-mandated sick leave provisions). This would cover people taking time off for birth/adoption, care for a family member with a serious health condition, for circumstances around a family’s active duty military services, or for a short term leave dealing with issues of domestic abuse, sexual assault/abuse, and stalking.

This all seems like a fine and civilized idea. The counter-arguments that it will be very complicated and that it will actually cost money, are both expected and insufficient. It’s the right thing to do. YES.

Other Stuff

We also have a mill levy increase for Littleton Public Schools. YES.

Do you want to know more?

No, nobody is enjoying the COVID-19 crisis

I don’t enjoy wearing masks. But I do so anyway, because I’m a damned grown-up.

This started as a Twitter thread, but I wanted to get it down in my blog for the longer term.

There seems to be this weird myth going along amongst the anti-maskers, anti-distancing, anti-treating-#COVID19-as-a-serious-public-health-threat crowd, that their “opposition” are getting some special joy out of forcing people to obey all these restrictions, regulations, and shutdown activities that they are doing themselves.

Image
Because the Founders, who regularly evacuated big cities during the summer, would have found mask-wearing a terrible, existential affront.

The idea that we’re all chortling over people being forced to wear masks, shut down businesses, and juggle questions of safety for ourselves, our kids, our parents, our friends, our communities … that idea is not just wrong, not just insulting, but this is maddeningly offensive.

I hate this. I hate all of this. Wearing masks. Treating my mom and in-laws like precious china and restricting myself to things that won’t, in passing, threaten them. Not traveling on vacation. Not having folk over for game day, or BBQs, or (99% likely) Thanksgiving. I HATE it.

Image
Not knowing what is happening next, or when things will return to normal, or what normal will look like, is pretty awful, too.

And I say that as an introvert who, normally, would just as soon cocoon from the world and recharge my batteries. That little green “recharge is complete, better unplug or else you’ll damage the circuits” light is blinking.

This needful isolation is driving even me bats. So I sympathize with those who hate it even more than I do.

Image
Too much of an often good thing.

Y’know what I hate more? People taking the measures I feel are moral imperatives to protect my family, my friends, myself … and spitting on them as some kook conspiracy, as some libtard craziness, as a hoax, as a political ploy.

Image
Yeah, NOW they want to “be like Sweden.” Which only pursued its strategy because it had a robust, publicly funded, universally available health care system that it thought couldn’t be overwhelmed.

Spitting on science AND my own sacrifices as some unbelievable plot to steal some kindergarten sense of FREEDUMM! from people. And, in so doing, making this problem worse, and last longer.

Tantrums are unbecoming a nation that prides itself on strength and a history of resolve. Yet, here we are.

I have screen savers and digital frames of photos of the cool things our family has done: fun travel, enjoyable parties, get-togethers and the like. And I love those pix for the memories they recall, but they also taunt me because I can’t do things like that right now, because they are DANGEROUS to myself and my loved ones.

Image
Probably not revisiting Greece any time soon. Assuming they’d let Americans back in the door in the first place.

And, again, introvert talking here. I am not the party-three-nights-a-weekend type. But even I need more direct social contact than I am getting.

For various folk to take having to wear a mask to visit their local Costco as some intolerable personal offense, when I am watching the clock run out on being able to travel with my mom to some of the places she’s always wanted to go … is infuriating.

Image
Tantrums are unbecoming for [see previous caption]
Nobody wants this. Everyone hates this. And in some cases that translates into redirected hate, or at least anger, against people who are making the situation worse, by being self-indulgent, rebelling against sensible measures, and helping further spread this disease. Throwing away the sacrifices already made. Killing and crippling more people, and forcing shut-downs to last longer.

Image
Yes, please, record your stupidity for posterity. Assuming you have one.

Or worse, those who encourage such irresponsible behavior in their words and deeds, to politically benefit themselves at the cost of goddamned freaking HUMAN LIVES.

This guy. THIS guy.

I am an adult. As such, I acknowledge I cannot do everything I want, and, in fact, am at times morally restrained from doing things that are attractive, things I want to do, things that would be fun, because the cost to myself and (most importantly) others would be too high.

Image
A lesson we all learn. Sometimes repeatedly.

And sometimes, when temptation is too high or the risk too great, we actually restrict people from doing things. Sometimes temporarily — closing a road because of a possible slide, taping off a crime scene, check-points to find drunk drivers on a holiday weekend — and sometimes permanently.

That’s what being a mature adult is about. Not about stamping one’s foot and demanding “FREEDOM!” from restriction. That’s what six-year-olds do, because their worldview is strictly about them and their wants. Adults are supposed to be different.

We all do, honey. Now shut up and go to your room.

Liberty is not libertinism. Freedom is not about ignoring the freedom of others. We live in a society, not some Libertarian / Hobbesian war of all-against-all. Unless we want our lives to be nasty, brutish, and short.

Ah, the social contract. What we agree to do for each other, for mutual safety and prosperity. I remember those days. Good times, man, good times.

Argue, if you care to, about the facts. About what is actually needed. About how we get to the point where the survival-needful restrictions on our liberty (and economy and convenience and pleasure) can be eased. Have an honest, serious, greater-good discussion about that.

But don’t act like this is a cosmic battle between the Defenders of Liberty and the Right to Party Hearty vs. the Cackling Evil Hordes of Burka-Mandating Authoritarianism. Because you are not only profoundly wrong, but you are being profoundly insulting.

Image

Small town evangelicals talk about why they support Trump

He offers them power against the scary cultural tide

Fascinating, disappointing, interesting, and concerning article, talking with people in Sioux Center, Iowa, where Donald Trump gave his famous “Fifth Avenue” shooting comment during his 2016 campaign, but where he also promised his evangelical Christian audience that, under his presidency, “Christianity will have power.”

“I will tell you, Christianity is under tremendous siege, whether we want to talk about it or we don’t want to talk about it,” Mr. Trump said.

Christians make up the overwhelming majority of the country, he said. And then he slowed slightly to stress each next word: “And yet we don’t exert the power that we should have.”

If he were elected president, he promised, that would change. He raised a finger.

“Christianity will have power,” he said. “If I’m there, you’re going to have plenty of power, you don’t need anybody else. You’re going to have somebody representing you very, very well. Remember that.”

What struck me in reading this was the irony that a religion whose founder was killed by those in power, and who taught the virtue demonstrated and grace given when refusal to compromise principle for power leads to persecution, has so many followers who just want to be the ones “in charge.” To have Caesar promise them power in exchange for their support at the ballots.

Not necessarily malicious power (though clearly there are some), but just comfortable power. Their scripture in all public places. The assumption that they are “normal”. Laws that adhere to their religious code. And those who aren’t of their belief, left on the margins, at best.

And if their perceived rights conflict with those of others? Women who want equal treatment, or those of other races, or sexual orientation or gender expression or religious faith? Well, the advantage of firmly believing God is on your side is that you don’t worry about others who don’t believe as you do. You can argue that you need the power to have the nation do what you want, but frame it as making sure someone isn’t oppressing you.

Explained Jason Mulder, who runs a small design company in Sioux Center: “I feel like on the coasts, in some of the cities and stuff, they look down on us in rural America. You know, we are a bunch of hicks, and don’t know anything. They don’t understand us the same way we don’t understand them. So we don’t want them telling us how to live our lives.”

One has to consider some are projecting concerns that they will find themselves being treated as poorly on the margins as Jews, or Muslims, or atheists, etc.

The irony is that the nation’s history shows that when Christianity “has power,” it turns on itself as much as on those outside. Along racial lines. Wealth lines. Most importantly doctrinal lines. Catholic vs Protestant. Evangelicals of different flavors. James Madison grew up seeing Baptists tarred and feathered, which led to his pressing for protections against the church being entangled with the state.

When Christians “have power,” it’s not all Christians, ever.

“Obama wanted to take my assault rifle, he wanted to take out all the high-capacity magazines,” Mr. Schouten said. “It just —”

“— felt like your freedoms kept getting taken from you,” said Heather’s husband, Paul, finishing the sentence for him.

Is Christianity “under siege”? Well, it’s losing numbers. And it’s losing (to coin a phrase) the “special rights” of being the assumed norm, of having the presumed power when push comes to shove, of having its values be the values everyone has to adhere to (in theory).

And, weird thing, as that norm has faded, some people in some groups who have been pushed around by Christians following what they think is Christian doctrine, when they get a chance, they speak out. They verbally attack Christianity. Sometimes they push back, too.

She worried that the school might be forced to let in students who were not Christian, or hire teachers who were gay.

“Silly things. Just let the boys go in the boys’ bathroom and the girls go in the girls’,” he said. “It’s just something you’d think is never going to happen, and nowadays it could. And it probably will.”

“Just hope nobody turns it upside down,” he said.

“But we feel like we are in a little area where we are protected yet,” she said. “We are afraid of losing that, I guess.”

And it all feels so much like a zero-sum game. That the only way for someone to get freedoms, liberty, rights, is to take them from someone who already has them. The idea of rights being a universal pool to which only some people have been invited, and that those people were now insisting on their fair share … doesn’t matter to them, maybe because they don’t know or acknowledge some of the groups insisting on their freedom, liberty, rights.

The years of the Obama presidency were confusing to her. She said she heard talk of giving freedoms to gay people and members of minority groups. But to her it felt like her freedoms were being taken away. And that she was turning into the minority.

“I do not love Trump. I think Trump is good for America as a country. I think Trump is going to restore our freedoms, where we spent eight years, if not more, with our freedoms slowly being taken away under the guise of giving freedoms to all,” she said. “Caucasian-Americans are becoming a minority. Rapidly.”

But if Christianity is diminishing in the US, it’s not because of those attacks. It’s not because of Hollywood, or liberals, or Satan whispering in the wings. It’s ultimately because Christians, in all their different flavors, are not being persuasive that theirs is the better way, the right way. That the salvation they trust is coming, and the peace and joy they claim to feel in their lives, and the righteousness of their cause, is worth it as a belief system and lifestyle.

Taking a shortcut by having power in secular terms doesn’t seem to fit into any of the New Testament teachings I can find. And the more they grasp at that, the more they drive people away,

They want America to be a Christian nation for their children. “We started out as a Christian nation,” she said.

“You can’t make people do these things,” he said. “But you can try to protect what you’ve got, you might say.”

One might think, if this were simply a matter of faith, the folk talked with here would be focused on their beliefs and their relationship with God. They would bear the insults and slights as signs that they’re doing something right. (They might also consider any justice of the accusations against them, but one step at a time).

Instead, what we hear about is all about Us and Them, and fear, and discomfort, and change, and Donald being the guy who will Restore Our Power, take away the insecurity, the questioning, the (gasp) marginalization, the laws and culture that say they’re “wrong” or “silly” or “hurtful.” He’ll keep them safe, their religious schools pure, their bathrooms binary, their neighborhoods white … just like they’ve always been.

“Trump’s an outsider, like the rest of us,” he said. “We might not respect Trump, but we still love the guy for who he is.”

“Is he a man of integrity? Absolutely not,” he went on. “Does he stand up for some of our moral Christian values? Yes.”

The guys agreed. “I’m not going to say he’s a Christian, but he just doesn’t attack us,” his friend Jason Mulder said.

It’s a transactional scam on Donald’s part — he’s no more pro-Christian than my cat is — but they don’t see it, or they don’t care. They’re terrified, they feel that power, power from the modern Caesar, is the only cultural salvation for them in the short run, and they don’t care what it is costing them in the long run.

Holding the police to a higher, older standard

Dragnet and Adam-12 were an LAPD-blessed ideals of what cops should be (even if the real cops weren’t).

Jack Webb was politically conservative. His police shows — Dragnet (1967-70), Adam-12 (1968-75) — were profoundly pro-police. They got production assistance from (and gave thanks/credits to) the Los Angeles Police Department, which, in the 60s-70s was billy-club conservative, too.

But, for all that, the shows were an expression of the ideal of “Protect and Serve.” They were, yes, propaganda for the LAPD as to what they wanted to be seen as, but, as such, they were aspirational. And I imprinted on them as what cops should be — not what they were, but what they thought they ought to be.

Dealing with the public for these 60s-70s cops was never easy. Sometimes it was just goofy civilians causing our heroes grief. Sometimes it was folk — good or bad — who were suspicious or disdainful of cops. Sometimes it was dangerous.

Through it all, our protagonists always maintained that public service, “To Protect and Serve” attitude. Even in the face of danger, known or possible, they were by the book, because that’s what made them policemen, not vigilantes.

The shows often touched on how the police regulated themselves, and it was fascinating. They dealt with rules. With procedures. Sometimes scary. Sometimes complex. Sometimes even unfair from a cop’s eye. But that was how it was — that’s what was needed to make cops, like Caesar’s wife, “beyond reproach.”

And the shows did deal with things like police brutality,  or even police shootings, as when Friday himself was accused of an unjustified killing in Dragnet. “I thought maybe he had a gun” wasn’t treated as sufficient to get Friday off. “I was in fear of my life” wasn’t an excuse for using a firearm.  Proving the other guy shot first was necessary for Friday to keep his job.

Spoilers, sweetie.

Or when Kent McCord, who went on to play Reed on Adam-12, played a cop accused of armed robbery. Friday gives a famous speech about how rough the life of a cop is, but how that’s what he signed up for and is glad he has.

The shows were unapologetically pro-police — but not because police were a special tribe, or uber-warriors, or beyond reproach, but because they were portrayed as dedicated, upright people of duty and honor, and because they policed their own.

There were no police union reps keeping accused cops from being questioned for days. No training films about kill-or-be-killed. No politicians nudge-and-winking abusive behavior against the out groups. No thin blue line of tribal silence when a cop did something illegal.

Civilians weren’t seen as potential threats until proven innocent. Racial prejudice was deemed profoundly unworthy of a protector of all the people. Choke holds and kneeling on someone’s neck would be unthinkable. Kitting up in paramilitary uniforms would have drawn a sneer and a snarky reference to military dictatorships.

When things got *really* serious, they pulled out the shotgun, not the multi-million dollar army surplus tank.

Police were made out to be heroes in these shows because their actions, their ideals, their adherence to duty even dealing with disrespect, stress, frustration, judicial coddling of crooks, was beyond reproach. They were heroes, not in a Hollywood action sort of mold, gunning down the bad guys,  but because they had a moral and ethical code and they stuck to it, no matter how difficult. And if anyone stumbled, or questioned that code, the wise elders (Friday, Malloy) stomped on them. Hard. Because being a cop was a trust — and betraying that trust, in any way, hurt everyone.

And for all that Webb was politically conservative, he and his police officers held no truck with racism or authoritarianism. It was way too close to WW2 for that lesson to have been forgotten.

Sure, it wasn’t a realistic portrayal of how the LAPD actually was, let alone is. But it did portray the ideal of what cops should be, with the aid and abetting of an actual police department.

Which brings us to today.  Friday and Malloy (and Gannon and Reed) would all have been sorely tempted to take Derek Chauvin and his three buddies into an alley and thrash them within an inch of their lives, all the while lecturing them in Webbian tones as to how they had profoundly betrayed everything that made police better than thugs.

But  they wouldn’t have. They would instead have stepped up and slapped the cuffs on. If they had witnessed George Floyd’s killing, and been unable to intervene, they would have been the first to testify as to what they’d seen. Because they would know, in every bone of their bodies, that bad cops are worse than the worst criminals. Because they corrupt the body politic, they destroy trust in our institutions, they make us all less free, less secure, less protected. Because they are traitors to their badges, and profoundly wrong.

It is, I confess, arguably silly to use TV characters as exemplars of how the police should behave. Ditto for, when I see cops acting a certain way or doing certain things, judging them against Reed and Malloy, or Friday and Gannon. What would Joe do? 

It would probably involve some speechifying

But these were characters crafted by a man who believed in what the police should be, with the input and guidance of a police department who were willing to put that vision forward as what they strove to at least appear as (even if they fell far below that level). So it’s no less silly than simply shrugging and saying “The cops are always right.”

The Jack Webb shows are myths, if highly detailed ones — and myths always carry truths worth looking at. So I’d rather have a Joe Friday running the Minneapolis PD than its current administration (let alone its loathsome police union leader, Bob Kroll). There would doubtless be policy directions he took I wouldn’t agree with. But he’d also approach the job as a public service, where his goal is to protect and serve the people of the city, not the cops that work there. Where the ideal of being the weary but noble protectors of the people, not their “dominators,” would flower.

The Projecting President

“I know you are, but what am I?”

Always remember, when Donald Trump says something negative about someone else, he is, at least 95% of the time, projecting about his own behavior.

“How can you possibly support Candidate B?”

Because the alternative is President T.

Even before Warren’s dropping out, I’ve been beating the drum for quite some time about the need to, eventually, whichever way the chips fall, vote for the Democratic nominee … whether it’s Bernie or Biden.

“But Dave! How can you possibly support Candidate B, who is obviously such a bad candidate?”

Let’s make it clear I understand some of the obvious weaknesses of each significant Dem candidate still in the race.

Image result for joe biden

Joe Biden …

  • has a long political record, and a lot of it has aged poorly. His actions as US Senator don’t align with what we want from a President today.
  • says a lot of self-aggrandizing things about his history that are untrue.
  • is definitely not progressive. He’s made some interesting proposals during this race, but mostly he’s a candidate of “Hey, things were great during the Obama era.”
  • has a poor filter, thinks faster than he can talk, and possibly has cognitive issues.
  • overly relies on his Obama legacy, glossing he was brought in as a more conservative (and white) balance to the the ticket.
  • came into this race with an entitlement chip on his shoulder, and has never quite gotten over that.

Image result for bernie sanders

Bernie Sanders …

  • is angry, shouty, accusatory.
  • has a long record of not working and playing well with others.
  • has big goals without any real sign of detailed policy or practical political ways of achieving them, beyond shouting and pointing and getting his supporters to shout and point, too.
  • talks and argues in absolutes.
  • is also old, and has a history of cardiac problems, including a recent heart attack.
  • clearly feels entitled to the nomination.
  • has (despite his protests and condemnations) a cadre of supporters who are just as mean-spirited and absolutist as Trump’s, even if for an arguably better cause.
  • regardless of “socialism” not really being a dirty word, has a background of radical rhetoric over many years that will provide a lot of fodder for Trump in the fall.

And there’s more for both. And whoever is the nominee, you’ll hear about it in lurid detail from Donald Trump and Fox News. It’s depressing.

So, yeah, I know neither candidate is perfect. So how can I support one over the other?

Well, my state primary is done. And my vote wasn’t for either of them. So I’m not supporting either of them over the other. If I was backed to the wall as to which one I’d vote for … I’d be a resident of another state. In other words, I’d rather not square that circle.

But there’s something far more important going on.

In nearly every one of those categories and criticisms, of both candidates, Donald Trump is far, far worse. He’s worse than Biden. He’s worse than Sanders. Categorically. Unequivocally.

Image result for donald trump

Donald Trump …

  • has a personal and business record that are the stuff of dark comedy.
  • lies about himself (and everything else) all the time.
  • Has politics that are not principled, but opportunistic and transactional, to which end he’s hitched himself to the reactionary wing of the GOP.
  • has no filter, says whatever will benefit him most (truth or not), and almost certainly has cognitive issues.
  • overly relies on his business background, glossing over or lying about his huge early support from his dad (and then his dad’s business) and his serial bankruptcies and stiffed creditors.
  • lies continuously about his accomplishments.
  • has built a cult of personality and surrounded himself with yes-folk because he only values the loyalty of others toward him, not their advice or experience.
  • disdains experts and scientists because they too often tell him (and, worse, others) things that are inconvenient, unpleasant, or unprofitable to him.
  • is a bully, mean-spirited, a name caller who is always, always eager to punch down.
  • will turn on any one who he considers disloyal, a failure, or just disagreeable, fire them in the most cruel and humiliating way possible, then tweet insults at them.
  • swaggers on the world stage, alienating allies, making kissy-faces with dictators, and destroying any shreds of American credibility.
  • panders to big money, theocrats, and anyone else whose support will benefit him, unhindered by any ideology other than what benefits him — his business, his political success, his historical legacy.
  • has no idea of how a constitutional republic works, and treats government like a private company, raging at or simply ignoring legal restrictions.
  • constantly attacks people (falsely) for doing things he’s actually done or wants to do, for reasons he has
  • is a xenophobe and white nationalist (though he’s happy to pretend he’s not if it helps him, just as he’s happy to pretend he’s a devout Christian if it helps him).
  • is inept as a politician and collaborative partner, the only thing that has kept his first term from being far worse, as at least half the time he steps on his own shoelaces while trying to get away with stuff. All he knows about leadership is  bluster and bullying and shamelessness.
  • has coarsened public discourse and society as a while.
  • teaches our children that being without shame gets you ahead. He has normalized and boosted bullying, racism, sexism, and nationalism. He has shattered norms and both encouraged and partaken in corruption.
  • has no respect for the Constitution, except where it gives him power to do stuff.
  • has supported GOP efforts to suppress the votes of their opponents, and himself been happy to take advantage of foreign interference in our elections where it benefitted him, and then lie to the American people about it and obstruct justice in investigating it.
  • has taken actions have directly harmed people of color, immigrants (legal or otherwise), women, LGBTQ folk, the poor and economically vulnerable.
  • has taken actions that have less directly increased the risk of war, the risk of catastrophic climate change effects, and, most recently, the risk of a lethal pandemic in the US.
  • would be perfectly happy to see abortion banned, LGBTQ folk thrown back in the closet, unions abolished, unfriendly journalists and political opponents jailed, and a daily military parade in front of the White House. And if he were offered the chance to be President-for-Life, I have very little doubt he’d jump on it.

Against that partial track record — which I state here much more baldly than is my usual wont — the weaknesses and flaws of either Biden or Sanders pale in comparison. They are real, yes, harmful and hurtful in their ways, but trivial compared to Trump.

Sure, arguing that someone is less bad than Donald Trump is a very low bar. But it’s an important one. (And, for what it’s worth, I would still consider both Bernie and Biden significantly better than their GOP competitor. Despite the litany above, both have what I consider positive aspects as well; this is not just a matter of lesser of evils.)

Regardless, the reality is, one person will be elected in November, and it will either be Donald Trump or the nominee of the Democratic party. Which one would you rather live under? Which one will leave the country better (or worse) than the other? It’s not — it’s never — a question of which candidate is going to usher in the new utopia. Even if my favorite candidate had gotten the nod, and won in November, it wouldn’t have been utopia. But it’s going to be better (or worse) with one or the other.

The question is not which Candidate B I support, but what am I going to do when it’s one of those Candidate Bs vs President T.

Those are the two choices. Pretending that not voting or voting for some protest third party candidate isn’t contributing, negatively, to the outcome is sophistry. Saying T is awful, but B has some flaws, so you won’t vote for either is … well, it’s basically supporting T. Because there’s no moral equivalence here. Not acting to defeat Trump, even with whatever ill effects might come along with Candidate B being elected, is to condone and support Trump’s re-election, and the doubling down on what has gone on in his first term.

(“I live in a state that will definitely go to the Democrat, so I don’t need to compromise by voting for a Democrat I don’t like.” Except that nobody really knows the narrowness of that margin — a sliver of votes in a set of states got Trump an electoral college majority even if he lost the popular vote — and it’s already clear that Trump will protest any electoral loss in November, so the vote against him has to be overwhelming.)

So argue about which B is better or less bad now, during the nominating process. Cast that primary vote; wax eloquent in your caucus; tweet your tweets; speak out on street corners. But realize your candidate might not get the nomination, and you might need to vote for someone you’d rather not have to.

Biden supporters might need to vote for that radical shouty guy who wants to get rid of private health insurance and raise taxes. Sanders supporters might need to vote for that big money centrist who opposes legalized pot and will only incrementally improve health care access.

Deal with it. Because the alternative is supporting that existential threat to America and the world, Donald Trump.

Image result for donald trump

Whether Sanders or Biden get the nomination, I am all in on them.  I can firmly support their candidacy without agreeing with everything about them or pretending they are perfect or even having either of them as my first choice. Because we cannot afford another four years of Donald Trump, even if that means four years of Joe Biden or Bernie Sanders instead.

It’s like arguing about having to pick the cold soup or the stale sandwich,  when the alternative is a plate of shit laced with polonium.

That’s why I’ll support Candidate B. Whichever one it is.

Image result for biden sanders

Why didn’t Warren win the Democratic nomination?

Everyone’s looking for a single, simple answer. There isn’t one.

I would normally do this as a set of Twitter entries these days. But it’s a bit long, so …

As Elizabeth Warren — my primary choice — drops out of the field after a poor performance on Super Tuesday, the question that naturally arises is, why didn’t she win?

Everything seemed like it could have been there for her to do so. She had a remarkably high favorability score amongst Dem voters. She was usually at the top of the list as a second choice candidate. She was articulate, intelligent, passionate, showed her homework, and on and on.

Is there a magic, singular reason it didn’t happen? Nope. Instead, there are several reasons that coalesced to erode away her front-tier status — some of them her fault, some of them nobody’s fault, others …

It was a very crowded field. This was one of those years when everyone and their sibling decided to run in the Democratic field against Trump, heartened both by Trump’s own “anything’s possible” win in 2016 and his deep unpopularity. Remember those first few debates, where the contestants got mixed randomly across two nights?

Image result for first democratic debate

The result was that a lot of folks liked Warren and even would have been okay with her, but were able to find someone closer to their preferences as their first choice.  And among Warren’s own supporters, polls showed that they tended to be more excited about other candidates than other candidate’s supporters were, meaning other factors meant it was easier to peel off that support.

That said, to the extent that she, along with Sanders, were off to the further left side of the spectrum, she also suffered from direct ideological competition with Sanders, who came into the race with a large group of dedicated followers and the experience of 2016. If Sanders had not been in the race, a lot of that support would have presumably gone to her.

Image result for warren sanders gif

A lot has been made about sexism, given how we’ve gone from a large candidate tally that had multiple female candidates of varying credibility — Williamson, Gabbard, Harris, Gillibrand, Klobuchar, Warren — and have ended up with Two Old White Guys. (Gabbard remains in the race, but very much under the radar, and for reasons and goals that do not seem to be an actual run for the presidency.)

The sexism here is definitely a factor. Nobody credible said, “Oh, a woman can’t be President,” but plenty of people worried, “Hmmm, can a woman be elected President?” It wasn’t their own feelings that restrained them from supporting Warren, but their evaluation of other peoples’ feelings — the dreaded “electability” consideration. “Will Trump supporters who might be wavering consider voting for a woman?” “Will being a woman make her a particular target for Trump, like Clinton was?”

Image result for democrawtic women candidates high five

Even some folk who might overcome those questions in the abstract, when faced with the overwhelming urgency to defeat Trump, might have decided to play it safe and go for a guy.

That similarly came into play in the question of Warren’s progressive politics — my sense is that she sold that policy more effectively for a lot of people than Sanders has, having  more appeal to people closer to the center, but that whole “socialism” thing played into her electability factor as well. “I’d vote for her, but I’m not sure other people will” being the the self-fulfilling prophecy in the era of fearing Trump’s re-election.

Indeed, to the extent that the “socialism” thing has generated worry within the more centrist/moderate ranks of the Democratic party — where, even if they like individual proposals, it feels risky right now in a time of plague and with a Trump re-election at stake. Had Biden continued to falter, would Warren have been seen as a possible middle ground between Bloomberg and Sanders? The Biden resurgence at Super Tuesday, following his success in South Carolina, not only knocked out his immediate moderate competition, but ultimately Warren as well.

Image result for super tuesday results

While Warren seemed to be less seen as an enemy of the Democratic establishment than Sanders, it’s also been clear that establishment — whether from fear of a Trump re-election or fear of their own wealth — were less enthused with the progressive left than the moderate / centrist wing of candidates. I don’t think they particularly put their thumb on the scales in her case, but I think they are just as glad to see her go.

Warren got generally good marks for her debate performance, and everyone seems to agree that she gets the lion’s share of the credit for knocking Mike Bloomberg out of the race. But I found her outings at the debate a mixed bag, too reliant canned answers and repetitious anecdotes (she fared much better in 1:1 interviews and other less game show-style verbal outings). While her Vegas debate got her a small bump, I don’t think the debates helped her enough.

I’ve mentioned the problems of being, policy-wise, competing for the same ground against another major candidate whose turned out to be in the final contention. Subjectively, in the Twitter threads I followed, I found that there was a particularly vocal cadre of Sanders supporters who were aggressively resentful of her running as a progressive, “stealing” votes from Bernie, not being as ideologically pure as Bernie, and (worst of all) her occasionally criticizing or disagreeing with Bernie.

Image result for elizabeth warren snake twitter

I don’t actually think a host of snake emoji and hashtags and vitriol scared her off, but it made any positive discussion of Warren and her campaign more difficult.

One of Warren’s tag lines was her “I have a plan for that.” I think that, net-net, that was a positive for her: she’d thought about these things, came up with concrete ways to address them that didn’t rely on magical thinking, and pursued them with confidence.

The problem with so many plans was two-fold. For some folk it came across as too intellectual and wonkish. Like the Emperor’s “too many notes” critique in Amadeus, for some people her intellectual rigor and professorial background was a turn-off  (which, coupled with societal sexism, probably didn’t help, either).

The other problem is that, when she felt she needed to revise something — from a misunderstanding, or because she saw a way to improve it, or even for political practicalities — it left her open to attack. This came up in particular over her shifting on Medicare For All; her shift (however you characterize it) on implementation timing didn’t improve her appeal to moderates who think M4A is either an awful idea or an election killer, and it was throwing chum into the tank for the Sander supporters who wanted to characterize her as No True Progressive And, In Fact, Probably Just Plain Evil Hssssssss (that Sanders politely disagreed with her and has spoken positively about her M4A support didn’t do anything about that kind of attack).

Image result for elizabeth warren plans

The question of age has come up in this election. While Warren always showed remarkable vigor, physically and mentally, she was sometimes lumped in with the other older candidates by some folk, and, to get back to the sexism thread, age is always more of a handicap for women in the public limelight than for men.

While some media outlets and individuals seemed warm to Warren, the nature of contemporary news coverage of elections netted out against her.  She got face time when she was rising, but once that had stalled and she was further back in the pack — 3rd to 5th — she became yesterday’s news, to the extent that she was sometimes left out of polls or reporting on them, even in favor candidates that were doing worse but were the media flavor of the week (as Klobuchar and Buttigieg took turns with late in the campaign).

The media loves a horse race, competitive drama. When Warren wasn’t providing that, the media coverage dried up, whether or not it shouldn’t have. Super Tuesday was a poor showing for her, but the coverage of that night made it out to be a two-person race regardless of what primaries were still to come or the nature of the convention. That didn’t help.

The last element in the room, so to speak, was the whole Native American heritage kerfuffle.[1] Warren’s initial error in letting family stories about that heritage convince her to identify for a time as Native American (though not with any actual harm done or advantage gained, from all that it has been investigated), and then her attempt to confirm that family story through DNA testing would always have been a blot of misjudgment on her record. But its gleefully racist misuse by Trump made it be seen as a liability in the election, and there were enough folk who felt, despite Warren’s repeated explanations and apologies, that it a serious problem that it gave more ammo to her critics within the party (again, generally from the Sanders camp) as if she had been gleefully stealing money from Native American babies while wearing a Washington Redskins jersey, hisssssssss.

What should have been — in the face of a thousand racist (etc.) transgressions by Trump, or of Biden lying about his background in the civil rights movement, or even some of the baggage Sanders is carrying around — a road bump became, not the iceberg that sunk Warren, but a wound that never was allowed to heal.

No list of “Why did this happen in the election” is complete without mention of possible foreign interference (thanks, Trump, for letting that particular concern about our democracy metastasize). Nobody’s suggested that Warren was a target for opposition (or support) by, say, Russia. But I can’t see her as a potential president that Russia would consider in their interests, like Trump, nor is she as divisive as her ideological niche competitor, Sanders.  If nobody actively targeted Warren, the general partisan and intra-partisan conflict that Russia has fomented certainly worked against her.

None of these were conclusive. None of these factors explain everything. Individually Warren could have survived any of them. Cumulatively, though, they drove her campaign to the point of non-viability to win outright, or even to have a substantial delegate role in the convention.[2] Her decision to suspend her campaign is, sadly, probably the best one.

But I’ll always regret she didn’t get the nomination and become the next President of the United States.[3] Thanks, Senator Warren!

 

[1] I am not Native American, so I acknowledge my perspective here has limitations. It did seem that I saw a lot more criticism of Warren on this from non-NAs than from NAs and tribal representatives, esp. after she apologized early days in the campaign.

[2] Note that there is a timeline out there where we end up with a contested election and Warren gets drafted as the compromise candidate between Biden and Sanders– this kind of possibility is one reason why candidates always suspend their campaigns, not end them (though campaign finance is a much bigger reason). I deem this scenario highly unlikely, but it is not outside the bounds of historic possibility. Just saying.

[3] It has been suggested that either Biden or Sanders might offer her the VP role. I don’t think she would take it; more importantly, she is of more value in the Senate, both for her ongoing contributions and because, if she was elected as VP, the GOP governor of Massachusetts would name her, presumably GOP, successor, and Senate balance is nearly as critical as the White House.

That said … Senate Majority Leader Elizabeth Warren has a nice ring to it.

I, the Jury

Mitch McConnell, the jury foreman in the impeachment trial is admitting that he’s collaborating with defense counsel.

Sure, everyone sort of expected that the GOP Senate would never actually convict Trump in an impeachment trial, and that Mitch McConnell, as Republican Majority Leader in that chamber of congress would make certain it never happened.

On the other hand, it’s kind of shocking that he’d actually, publicly confess / brag that he’s in the bag for Trump.

Everything I do during this, I’m coordinating with White House Counsel. There will be no difference between the President’s position and our position as to how to handle this … in total coordination with the White House Counsel’s office and the people who represent the President ….

Can I just note how … profoundly wrong this is?

The US Constitution — you know, the thing Mitch (and other federal officials) swore an oath to uphold and defend — the Constitution dictates that the Senate serves as the place for an impeachment trial. The House indicts (with articles of impeachment), and the Senate acts as jurors (with the Chief Justice of the United States serving as judge).

Mitch McConnell, effectively the jury foreman, just proclaimed he’s coordinating with the defense counsel.

And if that oath to uphold and defend the Constitution isn’t enough, there’s an additional oath Mitch will be taking, along with every other Senator.

I solemnly swear … that in all things appertaining to the trial of the impeachment of Donald J. Trump, now pending, I will do impartial justice according to the Constitution and laws: So help me God.

I don’t see how he can possibly do that, if he’s already confessing his coordination with Donald Trump’s counsel.

McConnell’s statements are emblematic of the ultimate corruption of the Republican party, whose sole purpose has become, it seems, to protect and defend the presidency of Donald Trump, regardless of what he says or does.

Given that, it’s unlikely that the impeachment trial will result in a conviction, not because there is  (or isn’t) sufficient evidence to convict, but because the GOP majority (as led by Mitch McConnell) simply are disinterested in “impartial justice according to the Constitution and laws.”

Indeed, there are loud rumors that Mitch will simply push through a vote to acquit, without any witnesses being heard (this after the GOP spend the last month or two complaining about not being able to call witnesses, even as the White House forbade any of its people to respond to subpoenas to act as witnesses).

Through such tactics, they can ensure that Donald Trump won’t be convicted under the articles of impeachment. But history — assuming it is written by Americans — not be kind to their dereliction of duty, and their being forsworn of their oaths.

 

 

 

Tweetizen Trump – 2019-10-07 – “My Great and Unmatched Wisdom”

Trump’s betrayal of the Kurds is just another step in dismantling US foreign policy and reputation

And when people ask, “Why do other countries not trust or like the US,” it’s because we pull shit like this.

That’s the US telling Turkey, “Hey, you feel free to go in and attack the Kurds that we convinced to disarm because we would protect them while they helped us fight ISIS, but you guys have always (and not without some reason) considered them terrorists and know that the Kurds have aspired for an independent state for over a century, so, hey, it’s all yours, we’re out of here because nobody’s paying us to be here.”

In the face of people worried about the folk we took under our wing and promised to protect, Donald was right there with a more egomaniacal statement than is normal even for him.

“In my great and unmatched wisdom.”

Humility has never been one of Donald Trump’s strong points. Though usually even he doesn’t end up writing like one of Kim Jong Un’s publicists.

It’s also a laughable way to try to disarm grave and bipartisan concerns (heck, even Lindsey and Mitch seeming peeved) about his throwing our Kurdish allies once more to the wolves.

(I can imagine the Senate GOP actually using this as a cover to convict on Trump if they need to, even if it’s not one of the Articles of Impeachment. I can also imagine them using it as a cover to say, “How dare you suggest I am a lackey of Donald Trump? Look, I expressed sincere reservations about his Syrian policy, even though I didn’t really do anything about it.”

I’m sure the Trump Tower Istanbul has nothing to do with Trump’s caving to Erdogan’s desires to wipe out the Kurdish areas in Syria. And I’m equally certain Trump’s threat to “totally destroy and obliterate the Economy of Turkey” is as empty as … well, when he … did it before? (When was that, precisely, and how long did it take Turkey to recover in the last three years?)

Trump’s casual assertion that the US “captured 100% of the ISIS Caliphate” would probably irk some of those allies that assisted at great cost, like the Kurds, if they weren’t facing an attack from a Turkey that has longed to destroy their separatist aspirations.

(I’ve been reading a history of the post-WWI Paris Peace Talks, and it’s probably only one of those weird coincidences of history that it was a century ago this year that the West sold out the Kurds to the Turks, too.)

Finally, as Donald takes some well-deserved mockery for the ego, pomposity, and zaniness that is involved in referring to one’s “great and unmatched wisdom” ….

(Also waiting for the Trump fanatics to say, “Well,  you know, he is pretty darned wise!”)

Meanwhile, the one thing Donald is probably not worried about:

He’s not worried because Pat and his Christianist cronies have been more than happy to support Donald up to the gills, regardless of what he’s done, in order to get all the juicy anti-abortion, anti-gay, pro-religious-freedom-trumps-everything laws and regulations and Justice Dept., and they’re not about to actually turn on him now.

 

Independence Day

What is the meaning of July 4? Hint: It’s not about showing off tanks and jets.

When does the United States celebrate on July 4, “Independence Day”? What is it that John Adams wrote would be celebrated?

I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated, by succeeding Generations, as the great anniversary Festival. It ought to be commemorated, as the Day of Deliverance by solemn Acts of Devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with Shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this Time forward forever more.

Is it the first noteworthy conflict with soldiery of the nation we rebelled against? Nope, would be the Boston Massacre, September 13.

How about the first defined military conflict with the British, at Lexington and Concord? Nope, that’s April 19.

Any other major Revolutionary War battles? Bunker Hill? Crossing of the Delaware and Trenton? Saratoga? Nope, those are June 17, December 26, October 17.

The British surrender at Yorktown? Nope, October 19. The Treaty of Paris, where Great Britain and the United States formally ended the armed conflict, recognizing American independence? Nope, September 4.

Unlike a lot of other countries, we don’t celebrate our national birthday based on a battle or war or even a violent protest. We have different days set aside to celebrate our military (Veterans Day, Memorial Day, etc.). We even have a different day set aside for the patriotic symbol of the US Flag.

Nor is it a date chosen to celebrate great individuals and their accomplishments, even among that generation. Presidents Day (the conglomeration of Washington and Lincoln’s birthdays) shows up in February. Not many still celebrate Thomas Jefferson Day (April 13), though it was once a big thing.

July 4 represents something special, transcendent of any one battle, any one enemy, any assertion of martial power, any one individual. It celebrates the ratification of the Declaration of Independence.

And the Declaration isn’t about the force of arms, but a document — a political document, a philosophical document.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

It declares those human rights and, as a ramification of them, the right of a people to change or throw off a government that commits offenses against them, a government in which the people have no voice, no ability to consent in how they are governed.

It’s an imperfect document, if only for the compromise of removing a clause condemning slavery in order to get the required unanimity from the Southern states. But even that omission does not change the overarching message of human equality and human rights.

The Declaration is not a statement of military might. It is not about how we have the strongest army, the shiniest cannon, the pointiest bayonets, the fiercest soldiers, the most powerful ships of war. It is, instead, about values, about what is important, about the natural rights of human beings. It isn’t a screed against a specific foe so much as it is a statement of principle as to what political truths we stand by, what is important to us, transcending all national boundaries and political divisions.

It could have been a document about military conflict and war. It could have talked about how we’d beaten the British, how we were all taking up arms, how we would fight to the last man. It could have been about Us vs. Them, centering on that as its basis for declaring revolt against the Crown. Instead, it spoke of a higher set of principles, principles that applied no matter who was the strongest, who was the most powerful, indeed, no matter who actually won the conflict already begun.

As Lincoln wrote in 1859:

All honor to Jefferson — to the man who, in the concrete pressure of a struggle for national independence by a single people, had the coolness, forecast, and capacity to introduce into a merely revolutionary document, an abstract truth, applicable to all men and all times, and so to embalm it there, that to-day, and in all coming days, it shall be a rebuke and a stumbling-block to the very harbingers of re-appearing tyranny and oppression.

That’s what we celebrate today. And those who seem obsessed with making it about military power, a display of our our might making us right, about how this day makes is bigger and better and more important than anyone else … it seems to me that they’re not only missing the point of the Declaration of Independence, and the day celebrating its ratification, they’re actively opposing it.

Casting about for a casus belli

The Trump Administration’s “proof” about Iran attacking ships is far from convincing.

Despite Trump and his Administration baldly asserting that Iran is behind the tanker attacks in the Straits of Hormuz this week, there remain far more open, unconfirmed, and even weird questions about attacks and their aftermath. To name just a few …

  1. Why would the Iranians attack a Japanese tanker while hosting the Prime Minister of Japan, who was there on a peace mission?
  2. Why does the crew of the Japanese tanker say that the ship was hit by flying objects, not mines?
  3. If you’re sneaking up to a ship to remove a limpet mine you put there which didn’t go off for some reason, do you have all your crew crowd around while you’re removing the unexploded mine?
  4. If those were the Iranians doing that, why did the UN Navy just let them do so and and then sail off without, apparently, tracking where they went?
  5. How do the Iranians benefit from all of this?

That last one is key in this. Cui bono?, “To whom the benefit?” is an old Roman legal maxim. When seeking suspects, figure out who gains an advantage, who has a motivation.

Analyzing motivations is by no means foolproof, of course, as it assumes a certain level of rationality, enlightened self-interest, command and control within all the parties involved, and that you have sufficient facts on hand. On the other hand, just making assumptions based on biases toward an end you are seeking is even more of a mook’s game.

So how does Iran benefit by attacking these ships, at this time?

One semi-rational suggestion I’ve read about this (beyond vague “They’re crazy religious fanatics, go figure?”) is that by causing oil prices to surge, Iran’s restricted oil exports are worth more.  That seems a very high stakes way for a short term gain.

Another suggestion is that Iran is sending (while denying the attacks for international sensibilities) a veiled signal that it could cause significant economic damage, if it chose to, and if it is in fact attacked by the United States. The risk calculus there still seems dodgy, but the Iranians (among others) might not see it that way.

So, yes, these attacks certainly could be Iranian. That might even be the most likely answer. Or they could be by Iranian proxies, enough at arms length for plausible deniability.

Or, alternately, they could be Saudis or Emirate forces, looking to get the US to attack their regional enemy (and, hey, drive up oil prices, too!). For that matter, I have full faith in the Israelis being able to stage this, should they choose to see this as a way of taking down by proxy what they consider an existential enemy.

And that doesn’t even count the terrible possibility that it was actually perpetrated by US forces under a false flag.

Given US history, and our willingness to rush to war on mistaken or intentionally fabricated facts (the Maine, the Lusitania, the Gulf of Tonkin, the war in Iraq), and given the staggering cost in blood and money that war  incurs, we should always question the proof provided as a casus belli, and call for it to be of the highest transparency possible. We need convincing evidence, presented by convincing representatives.

In this case the scanty proof (mostly assertions) given us by a US Administration whose leaders have made it clear they are itching for a reason to take down the Iranians, and whose penchant for dishonesty on matters small and great is staggering, is as yet unconvincing.

Do you want to know more?