Wednesday, June 22, 2005

WHY GOD MADE TABLOIDS. This Herald front doesn't quite rise to the level of the drunken toga party during a late-night House session several years ago. But it will do. Dave Wedge writes:

While the unfinished state budget sat back at the State House, the parade of representatives at the Hyannis public course began at 9 a.m. sharp, with several reps taking trips to the driving range, putting on sunblock and lacing up their golf shoes. Several unidentified players were spotted drinking beer in their carts.

DURBIN GETS IT. Even if some of his defenders don't. From the senator's apology yesterday:

Mr. President, I have come to understand that was a very poor choice of words. I tried to make this very clear last Friday that I understood to those analogies to the Nazis, Soviets and others were poorly chosen. I issued a release which I thought made my intentions and my inner-most feeling as clear as I possibly could.

Let me read to you what I said. "I have learned from my statement that historical parallels can be misused and misunderstood. I sincerely regret if what I said causes anybody to misunderstand my true feelings. Our soldiers around the world and their families at home deserve our respect, admiration and total support."

Mr. President, it is very clear that even though I thought I had said something that clarified the situation, to many people it was still unclear. I'm sorry if anything that I said caused any offense or pain to those who have such bitter memories of the Holocaust, the greatest moral tragedy of our time. Nothing, nothing should ever be said to demean or diminish that moral tragedy.

Now let's get back to the real issue: the well-documented abuses - including torture - that have taken place at Guantánamo and other detention facilities, thus damaging American moral authority in the eyes of the world. (Via Andrew Sullivan.)

17 comments:

Anonymous said...

http://daily.nysun.com/Repository/getmailfiles.asp?Style=OliveXLib:ArticleToMail&Type=text/html&Path=NYS/2005/06/20&ID=Ar00800

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Anonymous said...

So rather than do anything that could reasonable be called 'work' this a.m. I've hopped around some leftish and rightish websites on Gitmo.

Two things come to my mind:

1} The truth probably lay somewhere in the middle. People are alarmingly willing to make sweeping, resolute statements one way or the other based on flimsy hearsay - leading me to

2} Why aren't media pundits beginning to take a look at the inherent inanities of a 2 party system where the middle tends to get excluded by the tacit collusion of the two extremes?

It seems to me, and certainly there's ample room for disagreement, that politics has really devolved to its lowest point in the past, say 30 years.

More energy is spent in the press, and on the congressional floors merely defending extant positions and essentially, well - cheerleading.

Lastly, to the extent Americans want to get the troops out [or maybe more reasonable, set a deadline] I'm not quite sure why the citizenry has been so lulled into the misconception that Congress and the Prez has to do it.

Why can't private citizens demand a referendum on the issue?

A few million signatures presented to Congress would not only be hard to ignore, it would arguably be illegal, or at least, go right to the philosophical heart of what democracy is supposed to be.

Enough goddamned partisan cheerleading and vapid rhetoric.

Let's put politics aside and figure out how to force our government to get us out of this mess within the year.

Anonymous said...

Jaysus, how about just appearing honest? I would guess most reasonable people Durbin went to far. I don't know that that means he should apologize, but at very least he should clarify, and perhaps rely more on argument than analogy.

Dan Kennedy said...

Anthony - Mark Jurkowitz has an enormous amount of intellectual integrity. So you're likely to be disappointed.

Anonymous said...

Chin up, Dan. Pretty soon most of these comments will boil down to quotes from "Revenge of the Sith" at which point you'll be sunning yourself in the Caymans, collecting 7%.

- er, well that's the rumour.

Anonymous said...

Right on, DK. I would add that if you, in fact, don't "understand how today's world of politics, media and marketing work(s)"(sic), you have done a masterful job of snowing The Trustees of N.U. I may disagree with you politically but I'm not enough of a dolt to diss your abilities. Mark J. shouldn't have much trouble with a guy unaware that "erstwhile" would indicate that you have already left.
Rick

Anonymous said...

Don:
I was the subject of what some folks are calling torture, I had bags placed over my head, stripped searched, pushed around by some really mean people, held in small boxes at times and subject to loud noises, sometimes called music. Not allowed to sleep or eat and if caught put in those small boxes that I mentioned. This went on for several days till I escaped.This was done at the Air Force survial school at Fairchild AFB. You folks must remember our guests at GitMo are not nice people. The are illegal combatents. During WWII these types were shot on the spot.
When they start getting bamboo spikes under their finger nails you can talk to me about torture.

Anonymous said...

Hey, Paul: do tell how many of the following you experienced at Air Force survival school:

1. Sodomy with broomsticks & chemical lightsticks
2. Biting by military dogs
3. Simulated drowning
4. Hanging from hooks by your wrists for hours and days
5. Women wiping menstruel blood on you
6. Lit cigarettes pushed into your ears
7. Being chained to the floor in 100-degree heat with speakers blasting in your ears until you pull your hair out, urinate and deficate on yourself
8. Repeated beatings to your legs until the muscles are pulpified
9. Forced masturbation and sexual contact with other men.

If Iraqis did any ONE of these things to Americans, we'd call it torture.

Our governmnet shouldn't do it and historically we haven't because:

a) It doesn't work - tortured people tell you whatever you want to hear to stop the torture

b) You inevitably kill and torture innocent people.

c) It turns places like Gitmo into what Sen. Biden correctly called "the greatest propaganda tool that exists for recruiting of terrorists around the world."

Anonymous said...

Anthony,
Rule #1- When you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.

Anonymous said...

Anthony:

The simplest explanation for the current plight of "progressives" and liberals would seem to be 1} astounding arrogance, and 2} less popular ideas.

Due respect, I think your analysis is symptomatic, looking at the marketing of ideas rather than the ideas as such.

In fairness, I take your point that conservatives have been better at rhetoric and sound bites and such, but that sort of thing only resonates when the rhetoric and underlying ideas of the other side have left a bitter taste.

Case in point: while personally, I'm very much for gay marriage, I've been amazed at the sheer arrogance of liberals who can only preach about "rights" and don't spend any time essentially commiserating with the concerns of the 'reasonable conservative' who, for example, might support equivalent civil unions, but gets hung up on {judges} changing an eons old "institution" steeped in religious tradition.

If your approach is to simply call these people homophobes, or what not, don't then complain that the only reason your side's ideologues are getting spanked is due to inferior marketing.

Anonymous said...

Belch, burp & fart.
Gasbaggery run rampant.

Anonymous said...

Anthony, if aggressive=
obnoxious=
verbose,
you have already won.

Anonymous said...

Anthony:

While I think you certainly have some good points, I suppose where I'd quibble, at heart, is here:

Republican bloggers and commentators see themselves as advocates and participants in advancing the conservative political agenda, not merely fair-minded observers as most liberals do.

Now - I can't think you really mean that. Groups like moveon.org and such are very anti-establishment, and it's not merely the extreme 5%. It's a broader spectrum of the left, and understandable as the other side is in power and has at least as many bad policies as good.

But its like using the term "gasbaggery" without explication - it's rhetoric, not polemic. The reason I can't watch Fox News is they mix in so many bare assertions with their more objective analysis/reporting. Just saying that the other guy isn't playing fair, even if true, doesn't mean that you are.

Take the example of how you described the Social Security debate. Personally, I don't know much about it other than, in essence, it is supposedly the highest single tax most citizens pay, and the ratio of worker to beneficiary gets less and less sound. Reagan at al. created much of the current mess by borrowing from surpluses - had it been banked or cautiously invested, we'd be in a much different situation.

I suppose, in a nutshell, why I'm such a staunch "radical moderate" isn't because i'm unable to form informed viewpoints that might end up being Left or Right depending, but I'm fairly sick and tired of each side arguing with caricatures of the other side's arguments. It becomes this silly game which is the definition of empty rhetoric.

I'm probably right of you on some issues. But I want to be able to opt out of Social Security not because I hate old people, or resent paying into a pot to provide a sdafety net but because it is my money and all told my taxes combine to take over 50% of my income {when you account for state, city, sales, excise, registry, FCC, and other taxes} and to the extent the program is for my retirement - I am not certain I'd ever actually retire, and I could really, really use that money now, faced with massive credit card debt and massive loans for college and now, foolishly law school.

If I'm not strongly "pro-choice" its because i think, semantics aside, it is objectively killing a living "something" and merely asserting it's not human presupposes the very conclusion a reasoned debate is supposed to reach. Having a little background in developmental psych, I also wonder to what extent a fetus might experience pain. Having 'looked into' so-called partial-birth abortion, unless there were some fact pattern where an abortion had to be performed that way on a late-term fetus to save the mother's life {not just 'health' which liberals have relied on to be vague enough of an exception to swallow the rule} - it strikes me as utterly barbaric, plainly murder, and when liberals can't be bothered respecting these reasoned [if not exclusively correct] views, it just makes me want to vote against them...

I mean, I don't think that the liberal and progressive views are merely opposites and equals - the liberal point of view by nature is more considerate and fostering of progress than the rather uncreative conservative ideology, but goddammit, man - it's more irritating when Lefties are smugly close-minded. You guys are supposed to know better.

Lastly - and to engage in tautology, the reason why Hilary is so damned hard to like is its hard to like Hilary. Being smart, in Arkansas for so long, contributed to a largely unconscious, supercilious style. She honest to God would overcome 75% of her image problem if she simply spoke her mind, floated moderate compromises, and explained why she believes what she believes. to the extent the RW Conspiracy strategizes against her, she could simply invite her critics to live television debates.

Ah, but honesty...is such a lonely word...

;0|

Anonymous said...

Michael Miner's column (www.chicagoreader.com/hottype/index.html)
on the coverage of Durbin's speach is a must-read. Excerpt:

<>
Readers who believe what they're told to believe would have been foaming. But other readers like to make up their own minds, and they must have noticed the missing fact -- namely, what the FBI agent had said in the e-mail Durbin read to the Senate. The Tribune didn't report that. (On Saturday it would get around to it.) Here's the entire passage:

"On a couple of occasions, I entered interview rooms to find a detainee chained hand and foot in a fetal position to the floor, with no chair, food or water. Most times they urinated or defecated on themselves, and had been left there for 18-24 hours or more. On one occasion, the air conditioning had been turned down so far and the temperature was so cold in the room, that the barefooted detainee was shaking with cold. . . . On another occasion, the [air conditioner] had been turned off, making the temperature in the unventilated room well over 100 degrees. The detainee was almost unconscious on the floor, with a pile of hair next to him. He had apparently been literally pulling his hair out throughout the night. On another occasion, not only was the temperature unbearably hot, but extremely loud rap music was being played in the room, and had been since the day before, with the detainee chained hand and foot in the fetal position on the tile floor."

When Durbin said this sounded like the work of totalitarians, it's curious that no senator stood up to tell him, "Don't be silly. The rap music's the giveaway. Only freedom-loving Americans torture like that."
<>
Mike_B

Dan Kennedy said...

Anthony - You're on to something, but the biggest difference is very simple: most liberal journalists are journalists first. Most conservative journalists are conservatives first, and oftentimes not journalists at all.

I mean this not to criticize conservatives, but to explain something very real. Conservatives tend to come into journalism from other walks of life, and see their roles as to be as partisan and activist as possible. Liberals tend to come up through the ranks as straight news reporters, and adhere to the rules and customs of the business even after they move over to the opinion side.

That's why even though most of the mainstream media are vaguely liberal, at least on certain cultural issues, the activist right-wing media are able to drive the conservation.

The solution is not for liberal commentators to stop being professional journalists. The solution is for the mainstream media to stop giving in to right-wing attacks, but instead to identify and expose them.

Dan Kennedy said...

Anthony - It's now been three days since I officially shut this blog down, so I suppose I shouldn't keep responding. Let me just say that we should continue this conversation whenever I set up my new blog, which I will announce at some point during the summer at dankennedy.net.