Category Archives: The Nation

A Memorial Day truce, and other reflections

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As I was firing up the grill about midday, between rainstorms, I glanced at Twitter and was pleased to find this:

RT @AntonJGunn: Remembering my brother Cherone Gunn and his ship mates this Memorial Day.http://twitpic.com/1srfpw

For those of you not yet addicted to Twitter, what’s going on there is that Joe Wilson was reTweeting — that is, sharing with all of his 14,000 followers, Anton Gunn’s sharing of his memory of his brother, Cherone L. Gunn, who was one of the sailors killed on the USS Cole when it was attacked by al Qaeda the year before the 9/11 attacks.

Yes, that was Joe “You Lie” Wilson honoring the brother of the same Anton Gunn whom GOP candidate Sheri Few attacks as a dangerous socialist.

So it is that we set aside our pettier conflicts in the memory of something higher and better.

We all marked the day in our own ways. Burl went by Punchbowl to honor his parents and Ernie Pyle. For my part, I cooked out burgers and hot dogs for as many members of my family as could make it (only three of my kids, but all four granddaughters). Then I made another run with the truck to help one of my daughters get moved out of an apartment. Then I took a nap.

When I woke up, just a little while ago, I watched the end of Clint Eastwood’s “Flags of Our Fathers.”

It ended a little differently from the book, which I just finished reading last week. It ended with the scene of young “Doc” Bradley and some of the other boys splashing in the surf at Iwo Jima. After they had raised the flag over Mt. Suribachi, in a brief interlude in the fighting, some officer had the quirky idea of letting the guys go for a swim. There were weeks of nightmarish fighting against an unseen enemy yet to come, and three of the six flagraisers would be killed before it was over.

The point the narrator was making as we watched them was that they would probably rather be remembered that way, rather than as heroes. Yes, they were heroes, although not for raising a flag. They were heroes for all the other things they did on Iwo Jima, before and after that. Doc Bradley won the Navy Cross for exposing himself to withering enemy fire to treat a wounded Marine (he was a Navy corpsman). He never told his family about the medal; they learned about it after he died in 1994. He didn’t want to be known for that. He just wanted to live his life, build a business and raise his family.

The narrator closes with some words about how they didn’t perform their acts of heroism for flags, or their country, or for abstractions. They did it for each other. Which is what researchers who have studied the way men act in combat have discovered over and over. It’s all about the guy next to you. It’s about your buddies. Nothing profound about that, except that most people who’ve never been in combat probably don’t know it. The implication in this case is that once you’re separated from those buddies, by death or distance, the “heroism” doesn’t mean so much. And it’s just plain bizarre to be celebrated as heroes in the midst of the hoopla of the 7th Bond Drive, the way Bradley and Rene Gagnon and Ira Hayes were. Ira never could handle it, and ended up drinking himself to death. Rene never could get over the fact that his fame didn’t lead to fortune, and was disappointed. Only Doc Bradley seemed to get it together and live a normal, full, satisfying life after the war. Even though he would whimper and cry in the night, and never tell his wife why.

When forced to speak before crowds in the years after the battle, Bradley and the others would tell the people that they weren’t the heroes; the heroes were the ones who didn’t make it. Guys like Mike Strank — or, to go beyond the six, the most famous hero to die on that cinder: John Basilone, who had received the Medal of Honor for his actions on Guadalcanal and never had to fight again, but insisted on going back, and died on the first day of the battle for Iwo (earning the Navy Cross in the process). But that’s the conventional notion of a hero, and not necessarily what they meant.

Talk about messages… The instant I turned off the DVD player from watching “Flags of Our Fathers,” the TV switched to Henry’s “Vultures” ad, just to remind us of the nonsense facing us in the coming week.

What a bringdown, from heroism and the finest selflessness our nation is capable of, to that, which is if anything an appeal to the opposite…

Punchbowl National Cemetery in Punchbowl crater on Oahu.

EVERYBODY’s watching porn on the job. I feel left out…

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Now we know why the oil rig disaster happened:

WASHINGTON – Staff members at an agency that oversees offshore drilling accepted tickets to sports events, lunches and other gifts from oil and gas companies and used government computers to view pornography, according to an Interior Department report alleging a culture of cronyism between regulators and the industry.

In at least one case, an inspector for the Minerals Management Service admitted using crystal methamphetamine and said he might have been under the influence of the drug the next day at work, according to the report by the acting inspector general of the Interior Department….

First the SEC, now this. I demand answers! Specifically, how does one go about procuring one of these jobs?

The REAL problems with illegal immigration

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To continue a discussion from a previous thread, and make it more visible on the blog…

The reason we can’t communicate meaningfully with the folks who are all worked up over the Mexicans is that they see the absolute opposite of what we’re seeing. We’re seeing thousands of people crossing the border to come here and work their nalgas off doing construction, picking crops and processing chickens — and more often than not, coming alone or in groups of workers who send all the money they earn by the sweat of their brows back home to their families. For some bizarre reason, a lot of people see the opposite — freeloaders coming here to sit around and soak up public services. Do they really not see the work these people are doing? Do they really not see that that’s why they’re here?

This is coming from people who have a worldview that I don’t share. It comes from people who have a hair-trigger response that makes them explode at the slightest suggestion that anyone — from Reagan’s welfare queens to these supposed Mexican freeloaders — might be getting something at the expense of the taxes they so hate to pay.

These are people who, when they were kids, were always complaining to the teacher about what Johnny at the next desk was doing (as in, How come Johnny gets to do X, and I don’t?), and the teacher would say, “What Johnny does is none of your concern; concern yourself with what you do.” Only they didn’t listen.

Anyway, this fundamental disconnect between folks who see the world that way and those of us who don’t (and who see hard workers, not freeloaders) prevents us from addressing the real problems inherent in illegal immigration. And there are real problems. It is unfair that some people play by the rules and can’t get into this country, or stay once they get here. It is a problem that we have millions of undocumented people in this country that we can’t keep track of, especially in a time when there are a lot of people from other parts of the world who would love to sneak in for purposes of terrorism. It is a huge problem that we’ve got a drug war practically causing the government of Mexico to collape (a war caused by demand on this side of the border), and occasionally that violence spills over. (For that matter, even if it doesn’t spill over, the fact that it’s happening right on our border is a problem for us, if only because it stimulates more illegal immigration.)

These are all things we need to deal with. But we can’t have a rational conversation with those who are just furious that any of those people are here at all. And we need to.

Obama to send troops to Mexico border

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This should absolutely thrill some of you — you know, those who think Mexican laborers are the greatest threat to the nation.

Yes, finally, the president has decided to send Gen. “Black Jack” Pershing after that foul bandido Pancho Villa…

… no, wait… wrong century. Oh, well, just to make this easier, here’s the latest news:

President Obama will deploy an additional 1,200 National Guard troops to the southern border and request $500 million in extra money for border security, according to an administration official. The decision comes as the White House is seeking Republican support for broad immigration reform this year.

The official said the new resources would provide “immediate enhancement” to the border even as the Obama administration continues to “work with Congress to fix our broken immigration system through comprehensive reform, which would provide lasting and dedicated resources by which to secure our borders and make our communities safer.”

The 1,200 troops will join about 340 already working in the border region, the official said. They would provide support to law enforcement efforts against drug trafficking by increasing monitoring of border crossings and performing intelligence analysis.

Feel better, folks? Feel safer?

WVa paper turns three lawmakers into unpersons

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Big Brother would definitely love this:

May 18, 2010 · Last weekend, the Morgantown newspaper The Dominion Post ran a front-page story about the governor signing into law, Erin’s law. But the picture that accompanied the story has turned into a news story of its own.

The law toughens penalties for deadly hit and run car accidents and is named in honor of Erin Keener, a WVU student from Marion County who died in a hit and run accident in 2005.

The Dominion Post decided to remove from the picture three delegates who sponsored Erin’s Law…

You’ve got to go look at the picture, before and after. Shades of Nikolai Yezhov.

And why did the paper do it? Get this: “due to the newspaper’s policy not to publish pictures of candidates running for re-election during the political season.”

I kid you not. Now you know why, during my career in newspapers, I was generally opposed to hard-and-fast rules about what we would run and what we wouldn’t. They are no substitute for what SHOULD be an editor’s most important asset: judgment.

What a classic case of rigid adherence to a simplistic rule leading to a stupid, laughable, unethical action.

This is double-plus ungood, folks.

About those races that are none of our business…

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As y’all know, I don’t hold with getting involved in other people’s elections. We’ve got enough to say grace over here in SC without worrying about whom other folks are electing in other states.

Besides, I think it’s beyond ridiculous to try to draw conclusions from afar, finding artificial intellectual constructs to impose upon those elections to draw conclusions about unrelated matters — such as the national mood, or what is likely to happen in races that are our business. Such as, a Republican wins a race in state X, and therefore the national electorate likes Republicans and woe unto Democrats everywhere. I happen to believe that people make up their minds for a host of complex reasons that can’t be fully divined even if you’re standing next to the voter at the time, much less from afar. And to draw a conclusion based on how 51 percent of the voters in some far-off place reacted to the very specific choice they had between two very specific candidates, when that result involved separate, independent decisions made by thousands of people you don’t even know, which means it involves millions of unknowable variables, is laughable. Or would be, if the oh-so-serious pronouncements that result weren’t so harmful to public understanding.

And yes, I DO struggle to analyze elections I AM following, and share my feeble reflections so that y’all can shoot at them and maybe, just maybe, that ferment will lead to some greater understanding for all of us going forward. But I am loathe to do it with races about which I know little that would not fit on a bumper sticker.

But since folks seem to love to discuss these things, rather than have y’all go off and discuss it at some unsavory blog where you might pick up some nasty social disease or something, I provide you with this safe environment to have your discussion.

Here’s a quick summary of what happened by a guy over at NPR, but I also provide these links to related stories in the NYT and the WSJ and The Washington Post:

The big news came in the Democratic contest for the Senate in Pennsylvania, where five-term incumbent Arlen Specter — who quit the GOP last year because he was not going to survive the primary — wound up losing anyway, despite the backing of President Obama, Gov. Ed Rendell and assorted party luminaries.  Specter, 80, was never able to convince his new party that he was one of them.  Much of the credit for that goes to a savvy media effort by his opponent, two-term Rep. Joe Sestak, who ran ads reminding Democrats that six years ago Specter was warmly endorsed by another president, George W. Bush, and that he spent years voting for Republican Supreme Court justices.  Those Democrats with longer memories still harbored anger over the way Specter questioned Anita Hill during the Clarence Thomas court confirmation hearings back in 1991.

Sestak received 54 percent of the vote to Specter’s 46 percent, ending Specter’s long career in politics.  Specter, in conceding defeat, pledged to support Sestak in the general election….

If the Democratic Party establishment took it on the chin in the Keystone State, Republicans got the same message in Kentucky.  There, local powerhouse Mitch McConnell, the Senate minority leader, muscled out two-term Sen. Jim Bunning (R) from a re-election bid and helped install Secretary of State Trey Grayson as his would-be successor.  But GOP voters weren’t buying, and instead gave first-time candidate and ophthamologist Rand Paul a smashing victory, telling McConnell and party leaders that the old way of doing things was no longer acceptable.  Even though Grayson was not the incumbent, he bore the brunt of the anti-establishment anger.  Paul, the son of Texas congressman and former presidential candidate Ron Paul, utilized his father’s sizable presence on the Web to make him financially competitive with Grayson….

The results were less definitive in Arkansas, but what happened there can’t be comforting to Sen. Blanche Lincoln, a two-term Democrat whose avowed centrism — in a state that gave Obama just 39 percent — didn’t go over well in the primary.  She managed 45 percent of the vote, to 43 percent for Lt. Gov. Bill Halter.  And because neither candidate received a majority — a third candidate, conservative businessman D.C. Morrison, pulled in about 13 percent — Lincoln and Halter continue their battle for three more weeks, in a June 8 primary runoff.

Have at it.

Graham on his meeting with Elena Kagan

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Sorry I haven’t posted yet today, and now I’m rushing off to lunch. But to give y’all something to chew on, I thought I’d share Lindsay Graham’s fairly positive report on his meeting yesterday with Elena Kagan:

Graham Meets with Supreme Court Nominee

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) today made this statement after meeting with Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan.  Graham is a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

“Ms. Kagan is not someone a Republican president would have chosen for a position on the Supreme Court.  However, the questions the country and Senate will be required to answer are whether she is qualified for the job, possesses the appropriate temperament, and whether her judicial philosophy is within the mainstream of American jurisprudence.  It is very important for a nominee to understand the difference between the role of a judge who interprets the law and an elected official who writes the law.

“We had a good meeting and discussed her qualifications and background in the law.  We also discussed legal issues related to the War on Terror and positions she has taken in her position as Solicitor General.  On many of these issues, we found common agreement.”

Judicial Experience:

“I do not believe that prior judicial experience is a prerequisite for sitting on the Court.  Some of the most distinguished justices in history, such as the former Chief Justice of the United States William Rehnquist, did not have prior experience.

“However, Ms. Kagan’s lack of a judicial record will make the hearings even more important.  Because she has no judicial decisions to review, her writings and opinions on issues regarding the law will be closely scrutinized.  These documents will provide the committee and country a window into her judicial philosophy, qualifications and temperament.

On Military Recruitment:

“Ms. Kagan explained to me that any position she took regarding military recruitment at Harvard should not be taken as a lack of respect for the U.S. Armed Forces.  She noted that her father was a World War II veteran.  I take her at her word that she respects the military and our men and women serving in uniform.”

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Apparently, he did NOT ask her for her views on softball. That Lindsey Graham is all business…

Leventis sticks up for Spratt. Good for him…

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Just got this release from our friend Phil Bailey:

Senator Leventis Condemns Attack on Spratt

Sumter, SC – South Carolina Senator Phil Leventis (D-Sumter) today condemned the National Republican Congressional Committee for their attack on Congressmen John Spratt. NRCC spokesman Andy Sere attacked Congressman Spratt by implying that his “memory must be failing him” and calling him “Amnesiac John” in a press statement on Monday.

Senator Leventis issued the following statement:

“Statements like that should have no place in our political debate. To denigrate a man who has committed much of his adult life to serving his state and his country is troubling. This type chicanery has no place in a public forum.  No one from the National Republican Congressional Committee lives here and none of them would call a family or friend amnesic just because they have a disease which is well controlled.”

“It’s not the dog in the fight, it’s the fight in the dog.   My good friend, Congressman Spratt, has one of the keenest minds in the Congress. His understanding of complex issues and ability to navigate the halls of government has served our state well. And disgusting comments like the ones from the Republicans are to be condemned.”

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Amen to that.

This episode aside, I get really tired of John Spratt having strong opposition every two years, no matter what. That sounds really undemocratic of me; I know. Doug would say I’m defending perpetual incumbency, and it’s a good thing when these “career politicians” have opposition to keep them on their toes. But I say it for these reasons:

  • John Spratt is, and has been for as long as I can recall, the strongest member of South Carolina’s House delegation, both in terms of ability and service to the state and country. And he’s one of the brighter, soberest, least partisan members of Congress.
  • Other members of our delegation NEVER get the kind of strong, well-funded opposition that Spratt gets — certainly not Joe Wilson or Jim Clyburn. (And if you think Rob Miller constitutes strong opposition, you haven’t taken a close look at him. The fact that he has money just means that a stronger candidate can’t emerge.) It would be MUCH better for the state and country if hyperpartisan reps like them had strong opposition than Spratt.
  • The REASON Spratt always has this opposition is not because his district is dissatisfied with him, but because the national Republican Party always has him in their sights. The national GOP believes that district should belong to it, rather than to the people of the 5th District.

So that’s why I get tired of it. All that money spent, all that energy, every two years, just because Washington Republicans want another hashmark in their column.

What’s the difference between ugly good ol’ boy populism and Palin/Haley populism? Lipstick.

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Sorry not to be forthcoming with a post on the Sarah Palin/Nikki Haley event last evening. I’ve been too busy — my baby granddaughter spent the night with us last night, my youngest daughter came home from Charlotte and my wife and I had a lot of errands to run this morning (including, alas, taking her car in for several hundred dollars worth of repairs).

So I was living life instead of blogging. But I should add that I was glad I couldn’t post right away, because I’ve been… depressed… since that event. As I’ve turned over what to say about it in my minds (I almost corrected that to the singular after typing the S, but then realized that plural is correct; I am of several minds on all this), I’ve been unable to think of anything constructive to say. And even when I’m going to be scathingly critical of something, I want it to be for a purpose. I want there to be a constructive point in mind, something to add to a conversation that would help us all move forward somehow.

But I haven’t arrived. Instead, I’m feeling a level of alienation that would make Benjamin Braddock and Holden Caulfield seem happy and well-adjusted.

Part of it, but just a small part, is this problem I’ve been wrestling with of my increased sense of alienation from Republicans in general. I don’t like it; it runs against my grain. To react with constant negativity to Republicans and all their works suggest partisanship, an affinity for Democrats, to most people. Not to me — Lord knows, I still find the Democrats off-putting enough, and am still pleased not to identify with them either — but to other people. And when you write a blog, how you are perceived by others matters. But I can’t help it. While the Dems are merely no more irritating than usual these days, the Republicans have so aggressively, actively offended my sense of propriety and my intelligence as they have flailed about since the 2008 election, that even tiny things set me off now. I no longer have to see one of those maddening TV commercials — like the two I saw last night, Andre Bauer talking first and foremost about the need for smaller government (as if THAT were the main problem facing a state that’s laying off teachers left and right) and Henry McMaster talking about the “radicals” running Washington (as if that were any less crazy than the claims of the birthers). Now, just small things send me deeper into my funk. This morning I saw a sign for a candidate who had only one thing to say about himself, that he was a “Rock Solid… Republican” — as though that identification were sufficient, that reassurance that I am not one of them; I’m one of us. The sheer, obnoxious, impervious smugness of it…

(If I were a Democrat, I wouldn’t worry about this. They can console themselves with the fantasy that all they have to do is win the election, and their troubles are over. I’m always conscious of the fact that as many as 40 percent of voters would still be Republicans — just as between 30 and 40 percent are Democrats now, even with a Republican governing majority — and you’d still have to deal with them and reason with them if you really want to move our state forward. Especially in our Legislative State, you sort of have to build consensus to get things done. So when either party seems to be trying to drift beyond reason — say, when Dems were in the grips of Bush Derangement Syndrome — that worries me.)

But the alienation I’m feeling standing in that crowd of Haley and Palin supporters is different. Partly because these women aren’t positioning themselves as Republicans. On the contrary, they are relishing their animosity toward the people in their party who already hold a majority of public offices in this state. They are proud to antagonize and run against those Republicans with greater experience and understanding than they have. They turn their inexperience and lack up understanding of issues from a weakness into a virtue. Their fans cheer loudest when they hold up their naivete as a battle flag.

A little over a year ago, Nikki Haley was just an idealistic sophomore legislator who was touchingly frustrated that her seniors in her party didn’t roll over and do what she wanted them to do when she wanted them to do it. It didn’t really worry me when I would try to explain to her how inadequate such bumper sticker nostrums as “run government like a business” were (based in a lack of understanding of the essential natures not only of government, but of business, the thing she professes to know so well), and she would shake her head and smile and be unmoved. That was OK. Time and experience would take care of that, I thought. She was very young, and had experienced little. Understanding would come, and I felt that on the whole she was still a young lawmaker with potential.

I reckoned without this — this impatient, populist, drive for power BASED in the appeal of simplistic, demagogic opposition to experience itself. It’s an ugly thing, this sort of anti-intellectualism of which Sarah Palin has become a national symbol. This attitude that causes her to smile a condescending, confident smile (after all, the crowd there is on HER side) at protesters — protesters I didn’t even notice until she called attention to them — and tell them that they should stick around and maybe they would learn something. If a 65-year-old male intellectual with a distinguished public career said that to a crowd, everyone would understand it was ugly and contemptuous. But Sarah is so charming about it, so disarming! How could it be ugly?

Her evocations — echoed by Nikki — of traditional, plain values (and complementary exhibition of contempt for anyone who disagrees) seem so positive and good and right to the crowd that cheers such lines as Nikki’s about how good it is that traditional politicians are “afraid” (which, coming from different lips, would send a chill down spines). They don’t see the ugliness. After all, see how lovely the package is! See how they smile!

The thing is, I probably agree with these people about so much that they are FOR — traditional moral values, hard work, family, patriotism. And mine isn’t your left-handed liberal kind of patriotism (you know, as in “I oppose the war and criticize my country because I’m a REAL patriot,” etc.). No, in fact, my own kind of patriotism is probably even more martial and militaristic than that of these folks, if that’s possible, given my background. And I would never take a back seat to any of them in my belief in American exceptionalism. I may not like the smug way they talk about these things, but the values are there.

It’s the stuff that they’re AGAINST that leaves me cold. Paying taxes. Government itself. Moderation. Patience with people who disagree. Experience. Deep understanding of issues. They are hostile  to these things.

And their certainty, their smugness, is off-putting in the extreme.

But as I stood there in that crowd and listened to the cheers at almost every questionable statement those smiling ladies muttered, I despaired of ever being able to explain any of this to these folks, of ever having a meeting of the minds. It’s THEIR alienation that makes me feel so alienated…

And that’s what has me down. I hope it will pass. But it wasn’t a good way to spend a Friday evening.

Knowing how to stand at the plate is a GOOD thing

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So the other day I saw this WSJ front page, and the thought I had immediately was, “Well, she certainly knows how to stand at the plate.” And I almost posted that, but then my threat receiver went off. I could see me getting it from the feminists on the one hand — “You mean, … for a girl’…” And yeah, I guess that’s what I did mean, so that was only going to lead to more trouble.

Then I’d get hit from another direction because somebody would say I was suggesting Ms. Kagan was a lesbian. Which would lead to a lot of “no I’m not, but what if I was; are you saying that would be bad” yadda yadda and I just didn’t want to go there. So, as happens with nine out of 10 ideas for blog posts, it got dropped.

Now, I see that the WSJ has gotten into hot water over the picture for that very reason (and yeah, I’m behind on this “news;” I just saw an old Drudge Tweet about it while looking for something about her views on the Bill of Rights, silly me):

A spokeswoman for the Wall Street Journal said today its cover art was not intended as innuendo about Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan’s sexual orientation after the paper’s front-page use of an image of Kagan playing softball provoked a mixture of irritation and amusement from gay and lesbian advocates.

“It clearly is an allusion to her being gay. It’s just too easy a punch line,” said Cathy Renna, a former spokesperson for the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation who is now a consultant. “The question from a journalistic perspective is whether it’s a descriptive representation of who she might be as a judge. Have you ever seen a picture of Clarence Thomas bowling?”

The vintage of the image, released by the University of Chicago, was a particular source of questions in the context of persistent, public chatter about the nominee’s sexual orientation. This isn’t exactly a whispering campaign, as the question — no longer particularly scandalous — has made it to the Washington Post and widely-read websites. White House officials have denied, on background, that Kagan is a lesbian.

“I think it’s strange that you’d go back 17 years to dig up a photo of someone who’s one of the most photographed women in the world today,” said Jenna Lowenstein, communications director for the National Stonewall Democrats.

“Personally I think the newspaper, which happens to have the largest circulation of any in the U.S., might as well have gone with a headline that said, ‘Lesbian or switch-hitter?'” grumbled the Dallas Voice’s John Wright.

The Wall Street Journal’s sister papers in the News Corp. empire are famous for cheeky cover photographs and thinly-veiled innuendo, and the Journal appeared to cross into the same territory earlier this year when it inserted a picture of New York Times publisher Arthur Sulzberger into a photo array accompanying an article on feminine-looking men.

But Journal officials ridiculed a question about the image, which also appeared among other photographs in the Times’s coverage of Kagan.

“If you turn the photo upside down, reverse the pixilation and simultaneously listen to Abbey Road backwards, while reading Roland Barthes, you will indeed find a very subtle hidden message,” said Journal spokeswoman Ashley Huston.

“I think your question is absurd,” said Journal Deputy Managing Editor Alan Murray in a separate email.

Oh, boy. All we need. Then I saw this from today, also brought to my attention by Drudge (who seems obsessed with the nominee’s sexuality):

By Howard Kurtz

Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, April 16, 2010 The White House ripped CBS News on Thursday for publishing an online column by a blogger who made assertions about the sexual orientation of Solicitor General Elena Kagan, widely viewed as a leading candidate for the Supreme Court.

Ben Domenech, a former Bush administration aide and Republican Senate staffer, wrote that President Obama would “please” much of his base by picking the “first openly gay justice.” An administration official, who asked not to be identified discussing personal matters, said Kagan is not a lesbian.

CBS initially refused to pull the posting, prompting Anita Dunn, a former White House communications director who is working with the administration on the high court vacancy, to say: “The fact that they’ve chosen to become enablers of people posting lies on their site tells us where the journalistic standards of CBS are in 2010.” She said the network was giving a platform to a blogger “with a history of plagiarism” who was “applying old stereotypes to single women with successful careers.”

Sheesh.

Back to the photograph: Personally, I thought it was a flattering picture that put her in a positive light. Hey, not enough people know how to address the plate properly nowadays, including a lot of guys. So put this in the nominee’s plus column, far as I’m concerned. I’d pick her for my team.

Sarah Palin coming to SC to back Nikki Haley

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OK, just in case you didn’t have enough reasons to worry about Nikki Haley — the Sanford endorsement, all that Sanford cabal money buying ads in her behalf, and so forth, here’s one more for ya, courtesy of our ol’ buddy Peter Hamby:

(CNN) – Sarah Palin will be in Columbia, South Carolina on Friday to endorse state Rep. Nikki Haley for governor.

This will mark the former Alaska governor’s first political visit to the early primary state. Jenny Sanford, ex-wife of current Republican Gov. Mark Sanford, will also campaign with Haley on Friday…

“It is a tremendous honor to receive Governor Palin’s endorsement,” Haley said Thursday in a statement. “Sarah Palin has energized the conservative movement like few others in our generation.”Palin’s endorsement of Haley puts her at odds with her running mate in the 2008 presidential election, Sen. John McCain, R-Arizona.

McCain has backed McMaster in the primary. McMaster chaired McCain’s South Carolina campaign in 2008.

Man-oh-man … like we didn’t have enough Crazy in South Carolina, we need to start importing it…

Hey, all that pandering to the Tea Party crowd Nikki’s been doing has paid off, huh?

Folks, I have a feeling that the GOP contest for the gubernatorial nomination just became an ideological knife fight. This is NOT going to be pretty.

On the bright side, this should be a settler for those ugly nativists who tried to trash Nikki in her first election — from whom I defended her, back in the days before she started going after the nativist vote (the only conclusion I can draw from her embrace of the TPs). Now they’ll have to face that she MUST be a “real American” — or else the self-appointed final arbiter of such things wouldn’t be coming to endorse her.

Graham signals he won’t be pushover on Kagan

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Having voted for Justice Sotomayor, and faced with a second Obama Supreme nominee whom other Republicans are saying nice things about, Lindsey Graham seems to be making a point of letting everyone know that he doesn’t ALWAYS go along with the president’s preferences. Today, he announced his opposition to the nomination of Goodwin Liu to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco thusly:

“I am a big believer in the concept that elections do have consequences.  But I also believe a U.S. Senator has an obligation to ensure nominees to the Court of Appeals understand the difference between an elected official, whose job it is to write laws, and a judge, whose job it is to uphold them.

“I am convinced that Professor Liu does not understand or appreciate this difference.  His writings are very disturbing.  Professor Liu consistently points to various constitutional clauses that he believes empower a judge to be the ‘righter’ of social wrongs.

“My opposition to Professor Liu’s nomination is not a disagreement over judicial philosophy, as I expect this Administration to put forward judges with whom I disagree.  Instead, my opposition to Professor Liu is based on a deep-seated disagreement over the proper role of a judge in our democratic society.

In Professor Liu’s world, the Constitution places virtually no limits on the role of a judge to impose their opinion on almost every area of life.  This leads me to one conclusion – Professor Liu should be in elected politics, not in court as a judge.”

Of course, conservatives won’t be happy with him until he sponsors legislation to disband the 9th Circuit altogether. Personally, I’d probably vote for that myself.

Sen. Graham sets an interesting standard. Of course, it can be argued that the president himself has a disturbing viewpoint of “the proper role of a judge in our democratic society.” In fact, I’ve argued something along those lines myself (in my last column before the election). But that was before the election, and this is now, and besides, the president’s disturbing views on the subject don’t mean he can’t appoint judicial nominees with a proper respect for the constitution. And when he does, as with Sotomayor, I expect Sen. Graham to vote to confirm. That’s his pattern.

Rethinking Miranda rights for terror suspects?

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There was a  heated debate over a week ago over whether the Times Square suspect should have been Mirandized. And lots of folks said absolutely, and not just the usual types on the left who think terror is about crime and not war. Conservative voices spoke up quite thoughtfully in defense of the idea that

Today, as three more are arrested, seems like a good time to revisit the issue.

Especially since the Obama administration signaled a couple of days ago that it was rethinking the wisdom of reading such suspects their rights.

Did you see that? Here’s an excerpt from a report about that:

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration said Sunday it would seek a law allowing investigators to interrogate terrorism suspects without informing them of their rights, as Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. flatly asserted that the defendant in the Times Square bombing attempt was trained by the Taliban in Pakistan.

Mr. Holder proposed carving out a broad new exception to the Miranda rights established in a landmark 1966 Supreme Court ruling. It generally forbids prosecutors from using as evidence statements made before suspects have been warned that they have a right to remain silent and to consult a lawyer.

He said interrogators needed greater flexibility to question terrorism suspects than is provided by existing exceptions….

I didn’t realize that had happened until I saw an op-ed piece today in the WSJ praising it:

… In other words, the Miranda rights to remain silent and have an attorney present during questioning would be suspended for terror suspects believed to possess information that could prevent an attack.

The administration is making a number of admissions here: Mirandizing Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, aka the underwear bomber, after only 50 minutes of questioning was a mistake; terrorists are enemies of America, not ordinary criminals; and the law-enforcement approach to combatting terrorism, which is designed to obtain evidence admissible at trial after a crime has already been committed, is not the most effective way to obtain intelligence to prevent future attacks.

This is an important step forward and a sign that, after the Manhattan subway plot, Fort Hood, Detroit, and now Times Square, the administration has become more adaptable to the realities of the war on terror. Yet the jury is out on whether the administration has a real plan or is merely improvising. Times Square bomber Faisal Shahzad remains in the criminal justice system and has not been designated as an enemy combatant, though he is still eligible for such designation….

Of course, the idea that Mr. Holder is raising is based in the oft-cited nostrum that the Constitution is not a suicide pact.

Anyway, I was wondering if anyone had had any further thoughts on this point.

Visitors from Azerbaijan

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The six visitors and me at St. John Episcopal Church today. At the far right is our interpreter, Bahruz Balayev.

Today, a white guy from South Carolina met some REAL Caucasians.

Specifically, I had the honor of speaking to a group of journalists from the Republican of Azerbaijan, which for you geography-challenged folk is located in the Caucasus, hence the bad pun.

They were visiting in connection with the Open World Program of the National Peace Foundation. Their local sponsors were Mary Bryan (whose daughter Chandlee follows me on Twitter, just to get a plug in) and Tom Kohlsaat, who traveled to Azerbaijan in 2006 where Mary worked with their friend Ann Furr to provide mediation training as part of a Rule of Law program funded by CEELI and OSCE. Also, Tom is currently providing technical support to a fledging conservation nonprofit in Azerbaijan.

But that’s not what I was there to talk to them about. I was there as a blogger with MSM experience to talk about new media, old media, and how to overcome the challenges facing both.

Of course, the “challenges” facing journalists in this country are pretty minor compared to what folks in that former Soviet satellite face. When Khalid Asif Kazimli mentioned that there are fewer newspapers and other news outlets in his country than there were six years ago, I rather superficially asked whether that was because of the financial challenges they face. He said yeah, that — and government suppression.

Another member of the group, Samira Bahadur Guliyeva, asked me whether it was more meaningful to be a journalist in a totally free country or in one that is less free, I told her that obviously, you have more of an impact when you are one of the few journalists in a country in which journalism is rare, and especially where it is officially discouraged and constrained.

I should have added, to all of them, that I have tremendous respect for them for being journalists at all in any country that lacks the legal, political and cultural protections that we take for granted in this country. They are far braver than I am.

It was an honor and privilege to meet them. Here are excerpts from the profiles of the group I spoke with:

Guliyeva, Samira Bahadur
Current Employment: Correspondent, Make-up Editor, Turan News Agency
Additional Leadership Position: Executive Board member, Institute for Reporters Freedom and Safety
Level of English: Basic conversation
Other Languages: Russian
First Trip to US:  Yes.

Kazimli, Khalid Asif
Current Employment: Web-editor of musavat.com web-site, “Yeni Musavat” Newspaper
Level of English: Basic conversation
Other Languages: Russian, Turkey
First Trip to US: Yes.

Mammadli, Turgut Zeynal
Current Employment: Sound Arranger at Cultural Program, Azadlig Radio
Additional Leadership Position: Public Relations Officer, Journalism and Development Center
Level of English: Fluent
Other Languages: Russian, Turkish
First Trip to US: Yes.

Mehdiyev, Rashad Azad
Current Employment: Director, RIYAD MEDIA Information Agency
Level of English: Basic conversation
Other Languages: Turkish, Russian, English  First Trip to US: Yes.

Huseynova, Sayida Mammad
Current Employment: Reporter, Internews Azerbaijan Public Union, Mediaforum Website
Level of English: Basic conversation
Other Languages: Russian
First Trip to US: Yes.

Farzaliyev, Elshad Akif (Facilitator)
Current Employment: Head of Corporate Communications, Azerfon LLC,Local Mobile Operator
Level of English: Fluent
Other Languages: Russian, Turkish
First Trip to US: No.

Graham not so ‘cool’ now on global warming

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Back in late February, Tom Friedman wrote the following about our senior senator:

And for those Republicans who think this is only a loser, Senator Graham says think again: “What is our view of carbon as a party? Are we the party of carbon pollution forever in unlimited amounts? Pricing carbon is the key to energy independence, and the byproduct is that young people look at you differently.” Look at how he is received in colleges today. “Instead of being just one more short, white Republican over 50,” says Graham, “I am now semicool. There is an awareness by young people that I am doing something different.”

But today, we have the following  release from some of his erstwhile young fans:

Youth Activists Demand S.C. Leadership on Energy and Climate Legislation

(Columbia, SC) – Responding to Senator Lindsey Graham’s withdrawal from federal energy legislation and the offshore oil disaster, youth activists in South Carolina have called on the Senator to renew his leadership.

“Students at Clemson were proud to stand behind our hometown Senator in pushing for federal energy and climate legislation,” says Gabriel Fair, co-president of Clemson University’s Student for Environmental Action. “Lindsey Graham’s leadership really encouraged the young people who are fighting to cut carbon pollution and create a clean energy economy in this state.”

Over the previous months, Graham has led in federal energy and climate legislation. In February editorial in the New York Times, Thomas Friedman quoted Graham saying, “I have been to enough college campuses to know if you are 30 or younger this climate issue is not a debate.  It’s a value.  These young people grew up with recycling and a sensitivity to the environment – and the world will be better for it.”

Senator Graham’s withdrawal from the federal energy debate has disappointed students across South Carolina. “We’d like to stand behind our Senator again and hope he comes back to the table and strengthens the bill further,” says Fair.

Students in South Carolina are looking for the jobs comprehensive energy and climate legislation would produce. According to Winthrop University student Lorena Hildebrandt, “Young people face the highest unemployment rates in this country right now. Like many of my friends, I’ll be graduating college soon and looking for a job.  That’s why building a new clean energy economy is so important to young people. It’s absolutely necessary we pass comprehensive federal legislation to create a clean energy economy.”

Graham’s backing away from the process occurs at a crucial time for federal energy legislation.

In light of the unfolding oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, Americans are reconsidering our country’s dependence on oil. Recent polls have indicated that the Deepwater Horizon explosion has actually bolstered support for federal climate legislation, while support for drilling is falling.

According to a poll conducted last week by Clean Energy Works, 61 percent of Americans now favor a climate bill that would cut carbon pollution.  Meanwhile, CBS News reported this week that forty-one percent of Americans feel the risks of offshore drilling are too high, up from twenty-eight percent in 2008.

Students on the coast are worried about what Graham’s pulling out will mean for federal legislation on energy and climate. “We’re disappointed here on the coast that Senator Graham walked away from federal energy and climate legislation,” says Marissa Mitzner, Sustainability Coordinator at Coastal Carolina University. “Especially with the oil disaster in the Gulf unfolding and our own South Carolina coasts vulnerable to the impacts of climate change and the threat of oil drilling, we need Senator Graham’s leadership more than ever.”

###

Face it, senator: You’re not even “semicool” now, not with the kids.

As for what a cool guy like me thinks, well, I’d certainly appreciate a better understanding about why the Dems’ recent moves on immigration mean you can’t lead on this.

Oh, and kids — Tom Friedman didn’t write that in “and editorial.” It was a column. He doesn’t write editorial.

Old people just worry too much

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Just saw this Reuters story:

Elderly fear cuts in U.S. deficit debate

(Reuters) – Advocacy groups for the elderly are gearing up for battle over U.S. Social Security, concerned that the administration’s efforts to tackle budget deficits could result in big cuts to the retirement program.

To which I say, Oh, get over it, old people!

There’s no way this or any other Congress is going to cut your benefits. They never have; they never will — and especially not a Congress that is WAY more in love with spending than with taxing. Ever hear of the stimulus?

No, they’ll wait until I’m eligible for Social Security and Medicare after paying for it my whole life for you, and then they’re going to cut the bejeebers out of them.

So, rest easy.

(Good thing I’m not anywhere near old, or y’all would have something to worry about.)

USA Today: Tax bills in 2009 lowest since 1950

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Jim Clyburn’s office made sure I didn’t miss this, and I’m making sure that YOU — especially our Tea Party friends out there — don’t miss it either:

Tax bills in 2009 at lowest level since 1950

By Dennis Cauchon, USA TODAY
Amid complaints about high taxes and calls for a smaller government, Americans paid their lowest level of taxes last year since Harry Truman’s presidency, a USA TODAY analysis of federal data found.

Some conservative political movements such as the “Tea Party” have criticized federal spending as being out of control. While spending is up, taxes have fallen to exceptionally low levels.

Federal, state and local taxes — including income, property, sales and other taxes — consumed 9.2% of all personal income in 2009, the lowest rate since 1950, the Bureau of Economic Analysis reports. That rate is far below the historic average of 12% for the last half-century. The overall tax burden hit bottom in December at 8.8.% of income before rising slightly in the first three months of 2010.

“The idea that taxes are high right now is pretty much nuts,” says Michael Ettlinger, head of economic policy at the liberal Center for American Progress….

Of course, the very next sentence was from the “It is NOT nuts!” crowd:

The real problem is spending,counters Adam Brandon of FreedomWorks, which organizes Tea Party groups. “The money we borrow is going to be paid back through taxation in the future,” he says.

And so forth, yadda-yadda.

By the way, for you boys and girls out there (those who don’t have grandchildren) — the Truman administration was, like, a really long time ago.  You’ve seen “Mad Men”? Well, like that, only like a decade earlier, and the clothes weren’t as sharp looking. In fact, President Truman himself wore bow ties. Which are sharp-looking; don’t get me wrong. Just not “Mad Men” sharp, unless you’re Bert Cooper. And they’re way butch, too — Harry dropped two atom bombs on another country because they messed with us, so don’t get me started on bow ties.

Where was I? Oh, yes. Our taxes were lower in 2009 than at any time since before I was born. So quit yer whining. Especially you, governor.

Note how markets react to stimulus news

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Just thought I’d point something about about gummints and markets.

Markets rose yesterday on news of massive European bailout. That’s because markets are pragmatic, not ideological, things.

Also, while I know Europe has it’s own psychoses (thank God our own neo-Nazis are marginal), I haven’t heard of anything equating to a Tea Party movement arising across the Continent to complain about the gummint taking steps to stave off disaster. That’s a peculiarly American phenomenon.

Of course, it’s early yet.

Talkin’ ’bout the Tolly-Bon

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Was listening to the radio this morning — NPR, probably (I only listen to music on commercial stations) — and the announcer was talking about the pending confab between Presidents Obama and Karzai, and a mention was made of Mr. Karzai’s dealings with the Taliban.

Only the announcer didn’t exactly say “Taliban.” He took a sort of half-hearted stab at pronouncing it the way President Obama does, “Tolly-Bon.”

Here’s the thing about that. Having grown up speaking Spanish as well as English, I approve of people pronouncing words from other languages properly (personal peeve: English-speakers pronouncing “llama” as “lama”).

But when the attempt is lame, it grates. And the president, with his extremely normal American accent, simply does not pronounce “Taliban” the way a man from the Mideast or central Asia would. He sounds like… well, a Texan speaking Spanish. OK, not THAT bad, but it sounds odd, and it’s distracting, and it causes you to miss the rest of what he’s saying while you’re going, “TOLLY-BON?”

Actually, truth be told, it can be distracting even when it’s done perfectly. I always sort of go huh? when, at the end of a report delivered in perfectly accentless broadcast English, I hear the reporter sign off as “Mandalit del Barco.” That’s because she pronounces it with a perfect, extra-intense Spanish accent. And obviously both are natural to her, but it’s still distracting. It’s as though an actor were speaking a line with an Italian accent, and in the middle pronounced two words as a German.

It’s also a bit — showoffy. Because not many people can do it, perhaps. I could have, when I was young and fluent in both. But as I’ve gotten older, it can take me several minutes to get the muscles of my mouth warmed up to read Spanish properly (which I have to do from time to time to proclaim the Gospel in Spanish at Mass). If I try to pronounce “Mandalit del Barco” properly in the middle of a sentence in English, my tongue would trip over my front teeth, and I wouldn’t be able to get any of it out. It’s not so much the “Mahn-da-LEET,” which even a Texan could almost say correctly, but getting the L and especially the R right in “del Barco.” I can’t represent the difference phonetically. They’re just pronounced completely differently in Spanish. The tongue does tricks it’s never called on to do in English. (Here’s a link to a report by her that illustrates some of what I’m saying. It starts with a gringo anchor introducing her, saying her name with a lame American accent, then she goes on to report a story about recent immigrants with a fairly smooth, nondistracting shift between words like “sombrero” and English words — which I guess contradicts my point. But when she signs off at the end, as usual, she really punches the correct pronunciation of her name. It’s like she takes several steps back and gets a running start at it. And maybe that‘s what grabs my attention. Whatever the accent, you seldom hear an announcer so overpronouncing his or her own name.)

Anyway, I have thoughts like those every time I hear her. Which is distracting. I suppose there’s something to be said about the arrogant British habit of pronouncing everything, every foreign name or word, with an English accent, and foreign sensibilities be damned. It at least makes for a smoother delivery, with fewer cognitive bumps in the road. (But, as I said in the previous parenthetical, one CAN pronounce things correctly without distracting, if one is really good. Maybe Ms. del Barco just has an ego thing about her name; I don’t know.)

Something just occurred to me: Maybe the president does that Tolly-Bon thing as a very subtle way of having his cake and eating it. Maybe he makes a lame stab at pronouncing it “correctly” in order to reach out to folks in other parts of the world, but does it with a painfully American accent so as not to sound too alien at home. Could it be?

Graham comments on Kagan

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Since he is one of those rare senators who will actually fairly consider a court nominee based on merit rather than party affiliation of the nominating president (he voted, for instance, for Sotomayor), I take interest in what Lindsey Graham has to say about each nominee. Here’s what he said today about Elena Kagan:

“Solicitor General Kagan has a strong academic background in the law.  I have been generally pleased with her job performance as Solicitor General, particularly regarding legal issues related to the War on Terror.  I look forward to meeting her again, this time to discuss her qualifications to sit on the highest court in the land.

“As a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, I intend to be fair and firm in my questioning of the nominee.  The hearings can be a valuable public service as they give us a window into the nominee’s judicial philosophy and disposition.  I hope we will have a meaningful opportunity to explore the qualifications, judicial temperament, and judicial philosophy of Ms. Kagan.”