Conservatives are fond of invoking the Constitution and the “founding fathers” in order to end all discussion when a proposed change to existing law would evolve in a direction that they don’t like. This is not always wrong, but often seems quite cherry-picked. For example, when the Supreme Court granted corporations full rights as citizens in Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad (Wikipedia), there was no hue and cry about activist judges. That single decision has arguably had a tremendous... [More]

Obama joins the mainstream media as well as his compatriots across the aisle in a call to forgive and forget. As a constitutional lawyer, it’s not that he doesn’t see that crimes against the Constitution were committed, it’s that he sees more important tasks at hand. It’s an interesting logic that he is likely only willing to apply to the greatest criminals this nation has seen since, well, ever. It is unlikely that he will find a similar softness in his heart for more everyday criminals who... [More]

With an unwavering adherence to the party line, several political cartoonists giddily convey far-right talking points word-for-word, promulgating a severely twisted—and context-free—view of history and the world. Let’s take a look at a sampling from the last couple of months.

The Failing economy proves that Social Security doesn’t work

With Bernie Madoff’s admission that he’d been running a Ponzi scheme for decades, astute commentators asked whether there was a difference between Madoff’s... [More]

In a move that should suprise no one who actually read his foreign policy statements, President Obama ordered his first attacks of autonomous foreign soil just three days after his inauguration. As reported in the article, President Obama ‘orders Pakistan drone attacks’ by Tim Reid (Times Online), the strikes took out 15 people, 3 of them children and 7 of them “foreigners” (assumed to be code for legitimate targets) and were delivered by drones. Perhaps the change is in the improved actual target/innocent victim ratio,... [More]

As reported in Obama Ends Global Family Planning Restrictions by Julie Rovner (NPR), president Obama issued an executive order “rescinding a policy that since 2001 has barred U.S. financial aid to international family planning groups that “perform or promote” abortion.” That now-rescinded “global gag order” was also broadly used to funnel public funding to organizations whose primary measure in family planning was abstinence, with the expected scintillating results.[1] This is fantastic news, despite pro-life opponents... [More]

The article Of the Algorithms, by the Algorithms, for the Algorithms by Chris Wilson (Slate) discusses the U.S. state-of-the-art in redistricting theory. The art/science of districting involves designing electoral districts to optimize representation. On paper, this optimization is supposed to focus on representing the people in a particular district. In practice, instead of being dividing by geography, districts are divided by prevailing ideology in order to stabilize that district—make it “safe”, in the... [More]

It seems everyone’s got ideas for the Obama administration. Organizations and causes that have had nothing to do with the office of the president for at least eight years are crawling out of the woodwork and once again offering up their agendas to the president-to-be’s scrutiny.

Those agitating for marijuana legalization seem much more hopeful than the situation warrants. Obama ran on a “law and order” ticket—interested in enforcing the laws the way they are—and, though he’s shown... [More]

The protest footage starts off promising, with the happy chant and music. A few seconds in, the lyrics are translated from the Hebrew as “bomb a ghetto, raise a cheer”. The event was attended by both New York Senator Charles Schumer and New York Governor David Paterson. If Hillary hadn’t been interviewing for her new job[1], she would doubtless have been there, dancing.

Pro-Israel Against Gaza by Max Blumenthal (YouTube)

Choice quotes from the interviewees in the street are:

“Nothing good is going to come of this; they’ve got to keep fighting... [More]”

Most of the news coming from the Obama transition team is about appointments to various positions within the administration. For those who voted for Obama because they thought he was a progressive, the appointments provoke reactions ranging from disappointed to appalled. For those who listened to the words coming out of Obama’s mouth during the campaign—instead of hearing a prettified translation in their own heads—Obama’s mostly center-right choices are unsurprising. Some are more utterly... [More]

The latest series of pictures, Scenes from the Gaza Strip (Big Picture), has some pictures of the conflict that have squeezed out of the area, despite the blockade on reporters in the area. Two that stood out in particular for the contrast were these two:

The Hamas rocket lies in the road in which it barely made a dent on impact. The winter ice in upstate New York does more damage to a road than that rocket. Not to make light of a metal tube falling out of the sky,... [More]

The video below is interesting and starts off strong, though the lengths a CNN anchor feels he has to go to in order to report a fact that runs counter to the standard received wisdom are ridiculous. Once the facts have been presented, however, the co-anchor (you’ll forgive me for not having noted the names of what looked like two guys transported from Monday Night Football to the news desk) ignores them and plows forward with more-or-less the standard line. After one more attempt to get an... [More]

The first film is called Obsession: Radical Islam’s War Against the West. It is of interest for one main reason: a DVD containing the film was sent to 28 million households in America in the last month leading up to the 2008 election. The primary sponsor of what is estimated to be a $50 million marketing campaign is completely separate from the pro-Israeli organization that has the same address and three of the same original founders.[1]

The film is almost pure propoganda, shot very nicely, but... [More]

Though many say that the tendency to question authority fades with age, there are several notable exceptions.

One is[1] Harold Pinter, the legendary British playwright, who was outspoken critic of war—the Iraq War in particular—and of the British role in it. His Nobel acceptance speech, called “Art, Truth and Politics” by Harold Pinter (Democracy Now!) (Part 1) and Part 2, is absolutely fantastic and worth listening to all the way through. The links contain video, audio and transcripts.

“The United States supported the... [More]”

It looks like Thomas Friedman really does know where the wind blows, on which side his bread is buttered and so on and so forth. Now that it’s politically safe to do so, he’s going full-bore liberal and no longer arguing how flat the world is or how awesome it is that people around the world can buy a Lexus. Time to Reboot America rips the U.S. government for having gotten into the mess it’s in, one very analogous to that in which General Motors finds itself. His column is kind of short, so he... [More]

It’s hard to tell which round they’re on, but Israel is winning this one decisively; as of this morning, the score—in human lives, of course—is nearly 400 to 2[1], according to the BBC. Israel would dispute this—of course—because they don’t agree that Palestinians are human. According to Israel, there is no such thing as a Palestinian civilian, since, in the words of one commenter[2], “[t]hey’re all guilty, and paying the price for their recklessly voting into power the murderous zealots of... [More]”

The U.N. is mostly powerless; they have the power to create recommendations and suggestions, but their ability to force countries to conform to international standards is quite limited. They have relatively limited funds and enacted measures must be approved by an overwhelming majority. At this point, the average American is beaming ear-to-ear because their view of the U.N. has been corroborated. But there is a logical fallacy to the inevitably-drawn conclusion that all international... [More]

Accusations fly fast and furious about the mismanagement of car companies and investment banks. Demands are made for reparations, for punishment, for some semblance of shame or accountability on the part of those responsible. Take a $1 salary for a year; forget the exhorbitant bonus for once; tighten your own belt first. Show some humility or basic human decency instead of claiming the market rules above all else like a broken record, as if those of us with principles and ethics care about how... [More]

It’s going to take some advanced mental yoga to justify Obama’s choice of Rick Warren to give the invocation speech at his inauguration. Without further ado, let’s let John Sherffius put it in perspective:

John Sherffius: Obama's Inaugural Program

As if a ridiculous level of homophobia wasn’t enough—he’s compared “gay marriage to incest, polygamy, and pedophilia”—he’s also strongly anti-abortion and supports the repeal of Roe vs. Wade. Can you feel the progressive change? Can ya? Granted, he’s not as singularly bad as other... [More]

It is rather difficult to conceive of the person capable of writing the following passage from Dreams from My Father as being particularly open-minded vis-a-vis the unknowable “other” that threatens our fair shores with its mindless desire to wipe us from the face of the earth (to borrow a popularly misquoted phrase):

“Nor do I pretend to understand the stark nihilism that drove the terrorists that day and that drives their brethren still. My powers of empathy, my ability to reach into... [More]”

The names that Barack Obama has consistently thrown into the ring for his cabinet and other important posts throughout his administration have been primarily center-right in their political views. The Obama Transition Team ™ (OTT) has explained this away so far by pointing out that Obama is stressing a “team of rivals” approach similar to that taken by Lincoln in his presidency. He is choosing the most qualified and experienced people for the job, it is said, and will remain the undisputed... [More]

From the article, Farewell to the Windfall Profits Tax by Ken Silverstein (Harper's), there’s this news about the Obama campaign’s promise to “make oil companies like Exxon pay a tax on their windfall profits, and we’ll use the money to help families pay for their skyrocketing energy costs and other bills”. The Obama Transition Team™ (or OTT) has a much more practical approach that involves a lot less boat-rocking than the campaign team promised in order for the OTT to even come into existence. That’s why the “language... [More]”

Though much-vaunted for being the bastion of liberalism in America, California is actually a very divided state, with the hippy-dippy liberals living amid the swirling, crenelated parapets in the north and the closed-minded, stone-age thinkers manning the bastions of the massive, hulking fastness that is the Orange County Wall. It is a state that elects a remarkably high number of Republican governors and the one that bestowed the benighted rule of Ronald Reagan on an unwitting America.

They... [More]

Election day.

Whom to choose?

John McCain?

McCain’s policies, his clarity of thought and the cohesiveness of his vision leave a lot to be desired. He is anything but cool when cornered and anything but well-read or well-versed on the major issues facing the nation today. He runs on his record, which has some impressive interludes, like his fight against pork spending or his alliance with Feingold to reform campaign finance. For every feather in his cap, however, there are several... [More]

Dear Barack Obama,

Judging from a few of your more recent interviews, you seem to have a good sense of humor—even after such a long, brutal campaign. If you are elected president, a wonderful gift to the “hard-core Sean Hannity fans”[1] would be to, starting on election day, grow a luxurious beard for your inauguration on January 21st. A well-trimmed, Muslimy-as-all-get-out beard.

As for background music? How about anything off of The Best of the Black President by Fela Kuti?

Liberalism has, for at least the last few decades, been equated with evil in American political discourse. The media and politicians alike have bent over backwards to assure Americans that they are not liberal. Communist was an epithet from the 50's, during the reign of Joe McCarthy. Terrorist became all the rage after 9-11 as the muzzle of choice for those seeking to shut down an rational— or, god forbid, intellectual—discussion. Barack Obama, with his superstar status, clearly deserved... [More]

Designating 9-11 as a pinprick is an incendiary characterization. It was, however, an entirely appropriate,... [More]

After what seems like weeks of interviews that ranged from overly defensive to outright hostile, campaign ads that, at times, transgressed all bounds of logic and good taste and stump speeches that, one after the other, flamed out in flustered desperation, John McCain came back strong on Saturday night with a solid, funny, genial six-minute skit on Saturday Night Live. He was joined by Tina Fey—for those who have seen more of Tina than Sarah, it’s hard to tell the difference—and his wife,... [More]

Christopher Buckley made an appearance on the Daily Show last week. He’s actually quite an entertaining fellow and not at all arrogant and full of himself like his father (was). His father—William F. Buckley—was very intelligent and had an enviably large vocabulary, but behaved like an ass whenever he dared to speak to anyone just as intelligent who was simultaneously in possession of irrefutable facts that contradicted his deeply-held beliefs (check YouTube for interviews with Noam Chomsky... [More]

The presidential debates are over and none too soon. Obama’s adherents probably thought their candidate kicked McCain’s ass all over the stage and McCain’s probably thought their candidate looked forthright compared to Obama’s blasé information-rich stream of prose. McCain spent the three debates designating Americans as “his friends” whereas Obama addresses “folks” all the time. True believers are on-board, but does this work with the undecided? Why are people so eminently manipulable? Why... [More]