Rapey Rape Rape

GOP congressmen still can't keep themselves from talking about rape.  Seems to me if there's one thing you'd want to avoid talking about, it would be that, but they can't help themselves because they truly believe it.  In Republican world if you got pregnant from a rape it means you liked it.

One Coin To Rule Them All

If Republicans again attempt to bring the country to the brink of defaulting on its debt, then yes, Obama should #mintthecoin.  Minting platinum coins is silly, but threatening to block the government from paying its creditors is insane.  Even some in Washington do not seem to understand that the debt ceiling deals with money that has already been appropriated!  If Republicans want to hold money hostage they should do it during the appropriations process and threaten to shut down the government, nut to cause the treasury to default.

I'm getting very tired of governance by hostage taking.  Republicans succeeded in 2011 of bringing down the President's popularity, but obviously they failed in their ultimate goal of making him a one term president.  I don't expect them to join hands with Obama and put all their differences aside, but maybe they could try to advance their views in a way that doesn't destroy the world economy.

Hagelian Dialectic

Today President Obama announced his new nominee for Secretary of Defense will be former Republican Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel.  When I first heard reports Hagel would be the choice a few weeks ago I was weary about a Democratic president appointing another GOP Daddy to the Defense Department, but then I was reminded of the outspoken stand Hagel took against the Iraq War after it became clear it was devolving into a civil war.  Hagel opposed Bush's surge and staked out a position to the left of even some of his Democratic colleagues.

It's clear many Republicans haven't forgotten his heresy by their muted to hostile reactions.  Neocon pundits like Bill Kristol and former Romney campaign stenographer Jennifer Rubin are downright apoplectic at the thought of Hagel being confirmed due to what they claim is his hostility to Israel.  The ire of Rubin and Kristol are enough to make me support Hagel, but his brave Iraq War opposition seals the deal.

My hope is that Hagel's confirmation will show that it is possible to break with Washington's pro-war, Israel-must-never-be-questioned consensus and still advance to higher office.  I doubt Hagel's appointment will result in much policy change, but it's a first step.

From one shameful pastime to another...

I read an article close to ten years ago in George (remember JFK’s political magazine with that famous cover of Crawford dressed up as George Washington?) entitled “America’s Shameful Pastime.” The story featured several disturbing images of young black men (and some women, too) dangling from anything – a tree, a bridge – that could support the weight of America’s strange fruit: the dead, often mutilated, mangled, and castrated bodies of young black men. And almost every image, every gruesome death had a story. The characters changed, but the plot was predictable: an ‘inappropriate’ glance or display of pride, accusations of rape and other lascivious crimes, theft, etc. The crowds would converge to watch the public executions. Oh, and they would watch, their faces plastered with smiles. Most had a look of sheer unadulterated joy, blood lust.

I got to thinking about all of this – the terror and violence which, in its own way, articulated and quelled the fears of many white southerners – as I read articles and watched interviews regarding the scandal surrounding the dismissal of Shirley Sherrod. To be fair, lynching and unjustified public outrage and backlash are not the same. But her harsh treatment by the mainstream media, the careless response of the White House and the NAACP, and the shenanigans of the Tea Party should serve to remind us that, contrary to all this talk of a ‘post-racial America,’ we are an America mired in the discord and acrimony brought on by racism. And we’ve come to a dangerous place where racists – and let’s face it, the Tea Party is a racist organization – have become the arbiters of what’s racist and what’s not. They define racist. Then they sit back and watch as we punish the ‘racists’.

And I guess I can’t help but to wonder if we’ve become that crowd. Do we gather to look on as someone is metaphorically lynched and flogged because they’ve been accused of a crime they’re not guilty of? Is this how we articulate our unspoken fears about race (that it exists amongst blacks and whites, that it still matters, that we still don’t know the full and ugly history of the Jim Crow South, that many crimes from that era have gone unpunished, etc.)? If we are to become a post-racial America (electing Obama is not enough), mustn’t we also acknowledge that we have been, and sometimes still are, a racist America?

How long will this, our shameful pastime, last?

More Like This, Please

The Senate is going to vote today to extend unemployment benefits. With new West Virginia Senator Carte Goodwin being sworn in Democrats now have 60 votes to break a (mostly) Republican filibuster. However, the vote is also coming after President Obama decided to actually press the Senate to act and called out Republicans for blocking the extension.

As I've said before, even if more cannot be done regarding stimulus and aide to the unemployed due to the suckiness of the Senate, the President should at least let it be known what he wants done and where he stands.

That's so compassionate of you!

Shorter Christian Evangelicals: "We support immigration reform as long as it doesn't help the gays."

Some things never change.

Maybe people read my blog after all

Apparently I'm not the only one who sees parallels between the build up to the invasion of Iraq and the sudden onset of deficit-phobia gripping the nation's elites.

The baffling thing about this is that it seems like most Democrats in congress and even the White House know that this is wrong, but there seems to be no will to do anything about it. I understand that the filibuster in the senate limits the actions the government can take, but surely there are ways around this like budget reconciliation. And even if there isn't, the President could at least be sounding the alarm. He's comfortable telling the Europeans why they're being stupid, he should do that same to the senate. At least before the Iraq War there were plenty of Democrats raising hell. Now the White House's position of doing nothing is the better alternative to the Republicans' plan to cut spending resulting in higher unemployment or the Germans' commitment to tight money, destroying the economies of several major countries in the European Union.

Think I'll just move to Argentina. They have cheap steak and booze and let gays get married down there.

Whores

I fail to see what was so awful about what Eliot Spitzer did while governor of New York. So he saw some high class proostitoots? BFD.

He decided to resign in order to spare his state the trouble, I suppose, and for that his name is always preceded by the adjective: "disgraced."

Our New Retarded Economic Consensus

So the western democracies need to get their fiscal houses in order to increase confidence in the bond markets so these countries can keep borrowing at low interest rates, even though interest rates are at historic lows now. Seems to me it would be irresponsible to not keep borrowing now in order to bring the economy to a stage of robust growth and to maybe give some people some jobs. Furthermore, I'm not sure why it's become conventional wisdom that sky-high unemployment caused by a double-dip recession brought on by premature fiscal austerity is going to fill bond markets with confidence.

I feel now about the same way I felt on the run up to the Iraq War. I haven't felt very bloggy lately because it seems that the Great Minds of our society have all gone batshit-crazy, and even my mighty blog posts are powerless to turn the tide.

My greatest hope is that the midterms, whatever happens, will let some of the steam out and the Very Serious People will realize that 10% is not something the country just has to "live with for a while."

But I'm not optimistic.

They have a Wendy's

CNNMoney decided it would make a listicle about the 100 BEST PLACES TO LIVE 2010!...whatever that means. I perused the list and found it to be the usual mix of boring small towns and strip mall banality, but what caught my attention is that Missouri City, TX made the list...at 21!

I'm so old I remember when Mo' City was just a shitty hellhole wedged between Houston and Sugar Land. Don't get me wrong. I have nothing against hellholes, in fact I often prefer them, but Missouri City combines the worst attributes of suburbia and southwest Houston. Apparently now this is what communities should strive to become.

Drill, Baby, Drill

Offshore drilling is now completely safe and environmentally friendly.

Why Sovereign Default In The Eurozone Will Be Bad For The United States

One effect of the possible sovereign default of Greece could be a major decline in the value of the Euro compared with the dollar. While this might please the dollar fearmongers of the world (it's fallinggggg!!!!!), it's actually a very bad thing. Yes European travel might be more affordable, but it will do major damage to our attempts to raise exports because the Eurozone is our biggest trading partner.

I would like to echo Matt Yglesias in placing the blame for the possible collapse of the Eurozone on tight-ass, inflation-phobic German bankers. He also does a good job of showing the idea that Greece, Spain, and Portugal are paying for past sins is bullshit. They're in this position because of German deflationary bias.

The Price Of Progress

A straight man laments the decline of the gayborhood.

I believe there will always be areas of cities where weirdos live and congregate. While they might not be as explicitly "gay" as in the past, they serve the same general purpose and have the same vibe.

More Insipid False Equivalencies

Glenn Greenwald rightly takes down Ross Douthat for claiming that Rachel Maddow only has conservatives on her show who want to bash other conservaties. Maddow always tries to get adversarial conservatives on her show but they hardly ever agree to be on.

As a side note, this shows how appearances can lead to uninformed judgements. I've noticed that most conservatives who don't watch Maddow's show assume she is some sort of militant feminist separatist because she has a butch haircut and wears pants, but that's not how she is at all! She's actually very mild mannered and funny, and her show is one of the most informative news programs on the teevee.

John McCain: Man Of Principle

or not.

I've never really been much of a John McCain fan, really. Sure back in 2000 I thought he was better than Bush but I still wouldn't have voted for him (had I been old enough to vote.) However, watching him walk back every instance in which he's broken with Republican party orthodoxy due to his primary challenge from the right has been a rather sad and pathetic sight. All politicians adjust their views to keep in favor with the electorate, but this is ridiculous.

They're All Bad

One of the most irritating things about our stupid political discourse in this country is the elevation of "centrism" above all else, as if having deeply held beliefs about certain issues is a character flaw.

One of the favorite tools of these purveyors of moderation above all else is to draw moronic, often false equivalencies between both sides of a debate. Charles Lane of the Washington Post brings this art to its apotheosis with his comparison of shouting abolitionists with confederate slave-owners. They were both bad because they were both rude!!!!

Islamic Culture Is So Strange

Apparently when a Muslim woman's husband is killed by a foreign country's army she becomes desperate and seeks revenge on said country. Crazy culture!

Yurp

Generally I'm in favor of greater international cooperation, but I still maintain the Eurozone was a bad idea. It's great that Greece is getting bailed out but it's not great that they are having a series of austerity measures shoved down their throat that threaten political stability as prerequisite.

Greece and Spain and Italy are very different than Germany and Sweden and the Netherlands. The former set are bad with money but have great food and beautiful languages and culture. The latter are very judicious about fiscal policy but are filled with boring people living atop barren hellscapes of countries. Greece and Spain need their own currency so they can devalue the hell out of it and pump up exports.

Maybe this whole conditioned bailout process is exactly what the EU founding fathers envisioned, but it doesn't seem worth it.

Plus the Euro is the most boring-looking currency on earth.

Romanticism

I'll admit that back in my undergrad days I had my own fantasies of running off somewhere to pick fruit with migrant workers. That was until I saw video of how quickly migrant workers have to pick fruit.

I'm aware that this arrangement makes it so the oranges in my grocery store are affordable, but it's still depressing.

Felons' Rights

I have a sneaking suspicion the issue will be demagogued and the bill wont pass, but I applaud some members of Congress for introducing a bill to restore voting rights to felons once they've paid their debt to society. I understand the argument for not allowing them to vote (they forfeited that right, blah, blah, blah), but we should be focusing on ways to integrate ex-convicts into society after prison, not continually holding it over their heads that they screwed up. I'm such a dirty hippy I think prison inmates should be allowed to vote, but I know that's just crazy talk.