via positiva

I've tried hard to steer clear of online political discussion this season. Today, though, someone sent me a link to the latest McCain ad that sent me over the edge.

For those who don't want to slog through YouTube, it starts out with the usual "Obama hasn't passed any significant education legislation" stuff, but it's also full of weird, distorted photos of Obama with a creepy smile, superimposed on photos of school playgrounds. Then it hits you with the kicker: Obama forced schools to give kindergartners comprehensive sex education! Before they could even read!

I've been curious about something ever since Palin's remarkable convention speech. When Bush was elected in 2000, I and many other members of my church supported him primarily because of the promise of 'compassionate conservatism.' The idea that local groups, charities, and volunteers could make a difference in their communities, and that empowering government officials was the Wrong Way To Solve Problems, resonated deeply.

Eight years later, I'm struck by the fact that a man who decided to delay law school and work for a Catholic inner-city charity for three years -- the very model that we wanted to applaud in 2000 -- is openly mocked by conservative leaders specifically for doing those things. The party is explicitly attacking the very things that they said were fundamental American values just two elections ago.

I don't want to put words in anyone's mouth, and I don't want to assume anything, but... I'm utterly, completely at a loss. How can this possibly be resolved?

A little over a year ago, I posted a frustrated plea to social and religious conservatives: work with me, I'm trying to help you. For years I've insisted that snarky inversion -- "That guy's so adamant that homosexuality is wrong, he must be closeted!" -- is just wrong-headed and lazy. I'm a big believer in good-faith arguments and logical thinking when it comes to important issues, you know? A few years ago, social conservatives started making that really difficult.

It seems like we're watching gay sex scandals unfold with conservatives on a biweekly basis at this point; Gay hookers and meth? Check. Trying to pick up guys in a public bathroom? Check. Offering sex to black men because they're big and scary and black? Check. Getting your subordinates drunk and trying to give them blowjobs while they're passed out? Sweet Jesus, check. The list just keeps going, and last week another one hit the wires.

[Berkeley CA], after providing free berthing for a Sea Scouts boat for 60 years, said in 1998 that a Boy Scout policy barring gay scouts and atheists violated Berkeley’s rules against discrimination. The city said the Scouts would have to leave the berth or pay $500 a month rent.

Eugene A. Evans, 64, a retired high school teacher and for 35 years leader of the Berkeley Sea Scouts, sued for discrimination and for violating the Scouts’ First Amendment rights. The California Supreme Court ruled in favor of Berkeley.

[This week], Mr. Evans was arrested at his home in nearby Kensington on Tuesday after investigators identified four youths, ages 13 to 17, who said they had been sexually abused by him.

Congratulations, social conservatives. You've made a logical fallacy true. In the face of overwhelming evidence, I withdraw the position that I've held for years and admit the truth. The easiest way to spot a closeted gay S&M furry pedophile is to ask, "Did they vote against Gay rights, or do they regularly talk about homosexuality being a sin?" If the answer is yes, hide your pets: God only knows what they do when you're not looking.

There's a thread on Patriotism over at Winds of Change that's generated some interest (if frustrating) discussion. The seed of the post is Jonah Goldberg's article on Patriotism in the LA Times, a ham-fisted false dilemma if there ever was one.

I've come around to the view that the culture war can best be understood as a conflict between two different kinds of patriotism. On the one hand, there are people who believe being an American is all about dissent and change, that the American idea is inseparable from "progress." America is certainly an idea, but it is not merely an idea. It is also a nation with a culture as real as France's or Mexico's. That's where the other patriots come in; they think patriotism is about preserving Americanness.

Any issue-framing that boils down to "There are two kinds of people..." is immediately suspect. This text is extra-special-silly, though. Even if one accepts that there is a fundamental split between two kinds of "patriots," his "change-for-change-sake" and "preserve America" labels are just a clumsy attempts at rehashing 1960s arguments about Those Darn Protesters.

Goldberg claims that America is "not merely an idea" -- this much is obvious. Ideas generally don't have their own currencies, borders, governments, and armies. The "Americanness" that he says must be preserved, though, is by definition an abstract ideal. At least, it must be -- if it simply represents the current state of things, Americanness changes every time there is a cultural shift. Was racial segregation one of those aspects of "Americanness" that true patriots sought to preserve? I'm willing to be Goldberg would say no, but his easy-peasy split between the 'changers' and the 'preservers' gives no tools for tackling the real argument: what American ideals are good and worth preserving, and which ones are ugly and in need of change?

That, to my eyes, is where the real arguments break out. Everyone who claims to be patriotic -- liberal, conservative, libertarian, leftist, white supremacist, Christian dominionist, etc. -- has a list of things they feel should change and a list of things they feel should be preserved. Taking this road, though, is harder. It requires thought, analysis of the differing claims and arguments, and decision-making. It requires forming one's own view of what about the current state of "Americanness" is good and what is not. Far easier to just side with "the patriots who want to preserve Americanness." Let them sort out what that means, I'll just keep waving my little flag. I got it at the gas station.

One of the comments, early in the Winds of Change thread, seems to capture everything that's utterly broken about discourse on the right these days. It's just the sort of thing I would've written in 1998 at the height of the Klinton Regime:

Patriotism and nationalism are both good in and of themselves. Because they expand the trust-obligation network to every citizen. Nationalism is not a bad thing, it is a good thing, like love or marriage of which it resembles. Japanese militarism and National Socialism or Italy's Mussolini are not examples of either patriotism or nationalism (despite what Leftist / Volk Marxists think). The latter are examples of racialism excluding large swaths of people from power and civic life. Well, like how Hollywood excludes anyone who is not an elitist.

Five sentences from "Nationalism Is Inherently Good" to "Hollywood Is Like Nazism," with a quick No True Scotsman detour. That takes practice.

Intelligence report says Iraqi leaders "unable to govern effectively." Apparently, our leaders and their advisors are feeling less than thrilled about the current state of Iraqi politics.

Claiming the lack of political progress in Iraq is "unacceptable," Clinton further said, "I share Sen. Levin's hope that the Iraqi parliament will replace Prime Minister al-Maliki with a less divisive and more unifying figure when it returns in a few weeks."

Others have noted that the problem is perhaps not that al-Maliki is divisive, but that the entire country is basically a cluster of fragmented oppositional groups with their own militias, and little incentive to cooperate.

In other news, I turned thirty! It feels a lot like twenty-nine, but CNN tells me that my organs have officially started to deteriorate.

Over on Obsidian Wings, Bruce Baugh weighs in on free markets and health insurance reform, articulating a view I find pretty compelling.

Drug research is an active good, but it is not the only good, and if it can be had only at the price of perpetuating our current system of national neglect, then it's too high a price.

A net buddy of mine pointed out a fresh article on WorldNetDaily and solicited thoughts on it. I tend to shy away from WND; it's a bit like the Huffington Post, but without the rigorous fact-checking. Still, the article gathers together a lot of talking points in one place -- everything from "War On Christmas" huffiness to "I'm An Orthodox Jew, So Evangelicals Recognize Me As An Authority" exceptionalism to "We All Knew Islam Was Evil Back In The 80s" revisionism. It's worth taking a detailed look.

Writer Daniel Lapin starts off by invoking the name of Winston Churchill and discussing the grave consequences of England's failure to stop Hitler before German atrocities blossomed into WWII and the Holocaust. He then jumps to the 1980s, discussing Jean-Francois Revel's 1983 book, How Democracies Perish. It warned that Communism wanted to take over the world, and Lapin implies that it, too, was ignored by muddle-headed folks who played the 'Blame America' card.

I'll spend a little time as possible on that portion of the article -- it's not the meat of his argument, but it sets up his pattern of broad strokes and revisionism quite nicely. First, "Hitler could've been stopped" is always a tip-off that someone's about to snowball you. While it's true that earlier action would have changed the course of the conflict brewing in Europe, that doesn't magically justify a writer's views about what constitutes a grave threat. Society ignored early scientists when they talked about the danger of germs, but that doesn't mean being ignored by society makes you correct. This is basic logic, and Lapin seems to be hoping that readers overlook it.

Second, his comments about communism in the 80s are a telling. Decades after the Cuban Missile Crisis and years into the Reagan administration, there may have been disagreement in the political sphere over how bad the Soviet Union was. There may have been heated discussion about the idea that US realpolitik was just as morally bankrupt. But we were deep into a decades-long arms race with them, fighting wars around the world to keep them from expanding, and calling them The Evil Empire in speeches. I don't think anyone can really claim that Revel was a lone voice crying out in the wilderness when he warned that Communists wanted to take over other countries.

Here, though, is where it gets good:

Heaven knows there was enough warning during the 1980s of the intention of part of the Islamic world to take yet another crack at world domination. Yet instead of seeing each deadly assault on our interests around the world as a test of our resolve, we ignored it. We failed the test and lost 3,000 Americans in two unforgettable hours.

The whiplash-inducing jump here, from "We ignored communism in the 1980s" to "We ignored the dangers of radical Islam in the 1980s," is pretty awesome. Lapin needs to step back for a bit of history.

Islamic radicalism as we now think of them barely existed in the 1980s. They came onto the radar because our government funded them as part of the battle against communism. During the Reagan era, we were sending about half a billion dollars a year to the Muslim radicals in that country who were fighting the Soviets. We also put heavy pressure on the Saudis to match those funds, and one of the guys they got on that project was a member of the wealthy Bin Ladin family. You might have heard of him recently.

Two decades later, we can look back and realize that introducing Saudi funding to Islamic radicals, training them, and giving them crates full of surface-to-air-missiles was probably... not the best long-term move. At the time, though, the author's philosophical compatriots were talking about Islamic freedom fighters as great monotheistic buddies in the fight against Godless communists; it's pure revisionism to pretend otherwise. There are lessons to be learned from that adventure, obviously, but anyone who claims that we were both ignoring communism and dangers of radical Islam in the 80s is either ignorant of basic history or deliberately misleading his readers.

Lapin is only just warming up, though. Skipping quickly from WWII to the Cold War to 9/11, he hits the real topic of importance: the atheist war on American Christians.

Phase one of this war I describe is a propaganda blitzkrieg that is eerily reminiscent of how effectively the Goebbels propaganda machine softened up the German people for what was to come.

There is no better term than propaganda blitzkrieg to describe what has been unleashed against Christian conservatives recently.

So, let's get this straight. In America, 92% of the population believes in God and over 80% claim to be Christians. We spent the last 50 years or so pointing nuclear weapons at the people we called "Godless." Christians regularly publish books explaining that atheists are destroying the fabric of our civilization. We've had a president who's said -- on national television -- that he would not allow an atheist in public office. Heck, atheists are the most distrusted minority in our country. Despite all these things, it's the atheists who are gearing up for a campaign to persecute Christians. The evidence?

Consider the long list of anti-Christian books that have been published in recent months. Here are just a few samples of more than 30 similar titles, all from mainstream publishers...

Yep, that's right. Thirty books critical of conservative Christians. Nevermind that a number of the books listed were written by other Christians, and condemned not Christianity but specific theological and political stances taken by particular Christian sects. Nevermind that the books written by atheists in that reading list condemn Muslims just as strongly as Christians. It's all one big mix, this war on Christianity, and the author's just getting started.

First, would you be so sanguine if the target of this loathsome library were Jewish? Just try changing the titles in some of the books I mention above to reflect anti-Semitism instead of rampant anti-Christianism and you'll see what I mean.

This is an awesome game. It's easy to play, too: on my shelf, I have a Christian book titled Kingdom of the Cults. It's an interesting analysis of the beliefs and theological pitfalls of dozens of cults. Let's change that name to Kingdom of the Negro-Lovers, though, and see how innocent it sounds!

Conservative Christians have spent the last three decades actively, vigorously inserting their religious beliefs into the political sphere. I know -- I was one of them. It's reached the point where people who aren't conservative are often branded as 'weak on faith' and not serious about their religious beliefs. Hiding behind the banner of anti-semitism when their ideologies and political activities are criticized is a crass, ugly maneuver. Comparing it to German antisemitism in the 1930s is absurd and offensive.

Lapin hits a few segue-free talking points here, muttering about how books and other forms of entertainment have touched off negative changes in cultures before. Silent Spring, Atlas Shrugged, and the movie Borat are mentioned prominently -- I wish I were kidding.

He spends a few paragraphs, then, quoting controversial statements made by Richard Dawkins, "One of the generals in the anti-Christian army of the secular left." It's certainly true that Dawkins is an outspoken, controversial critic of religious belief. Ignoring for a moment the fact that even many atheists and agnostics find the scientist's rhetorical bomb-throwing troubling, Lapin can't even be bothered to stick to what Dawkins actually says:

He suggests that the state should intervene to protect children from their parents' religious beliefs. Needless to say, he means Christian beliefs, of course. Muslim beliefs add to England's charmingly diverse cultural landscape.

Anyone who's read or heard Dawkins knows that statement is a lie. The handful of 'radical' atheists out there, folks who actively 'preach' that religion is dangerous, cite radical Islam as proof of their thesis. One can only speculate about the intellectual laziness or outright dishonesty that might cause Lapin to make such a statement.

Having hand-waved his way through the propoganda phase of the "war," though, he delivers the shocker. What's the goal of this wave of anti-Christian literature that's flooding the nation?

Phase one in this war is to make Christianity, well, sort of socially unacceptable. Something only foolish, poor and ugly people could turn to.

I have news for you, sir. Richard Dawkins is not making it 'sort of socially unacceptable to be a Christian.' The lady who tours the country comparing God to an octopus is. The mega-church pastor who attacks homosexuals, then gets caught doing meth with a gay hooker? He is. The people who sell Testamints? They are. The church officials who protect child molesting priests? They are. The congressmen who demand that the Ten Commandments stay in courtrooms, but can't recite more than three of them? They are.

When it comes right down to it, being a hypocrite is going to get you mocked. Sadly, believing the same things that publicly revelaed hypocrites do is going to get you mocked. When it gets down to brass tacks, just believing in anything passionately is going to get you mocked. That's true whether you're a Christian, an atheist, a Tori Amos fan, a vegan, or a libertarian.

Considerably more intellectual energy is being pumped into the propaganda campaign against Christianity than was ever delivered to the anti-smoking or anti-drunk-driving campaigns.

This is where he veers into rabid weirdness and alternate-universe weirdness. Wake me up when government-sponsored Public Service Announcements hit the airwaves, telling people to refuse communion because only losers love Jesus, mmkay?

If they succeed, Christianity will be driven underground, and its benign influence on the character of America will be lost. In its place we shall see a sinister secularism that menaces Bible believers of all faiths. Once the voice of the Bible has been silenced, the war on Western Civilization can begin and we shall see a long night of barbarism descend on the West.

You heard it here first, folks. If those damn atheists keep writing books, who knows? A few of them might be elected to public office, where they can introduce legislation that the other several hundred self-professed Christians in Congress and Senate can vote against. The important thing to remember is that if people are allowed to say unflattering things about a particular politically active group of Christians, America has lost and western civilization will collapse.

No article like this would be complete without the rhetorical cherry on top:

Which is why I, an Orthodox Jewish rabbi, devoted to Jewish survival, the Torah and Israel am so terrified of American Christianity caving in.

It's difficult to understand how this works for those outside the subculture, but Jews occupy a special place in the evangelical theological landscape. Yes, they will all go to hell unless they become Christians. But until that very moment of damnation, Christians must support and agree with them, because they are God's chosen people. Chosen people who will go to hell, yes. But chosen people nevertheless.

Ignore the fact that The Jews are individual people, with different views and a wide variety of positions on important political, cultural, and theological matters. Ignore the fact that liberal Jews are immediately grouped with those Hitler lovin' commie atheist ne'er do wells. The important part is that A Rabbi Says We're Right.

Whenever news of killings, massacres, and general mayhem is circulated, let it be known that I am anti-killing and am shocked and horrified by brutality and murder no matter who the culprit is and who the victim is.

Let it also be known that when Americans or our trusted allies are the ones committing any sort of atrocities, I will be far more vocal in my shock and dismay. Why? Primarily, because America is composed (at least in part) of me and I share responsibility for actions taken by its representatives. When bad things are done by "our own," it is not time to circle the wagons. It is time to clearly and articulately delineate what is and is not acceptable. Healthy civilizations recognize this.

Any fool can whip up a healthy dose of rage at The Other for crimes and horrors both real and imagined. It takes dedication and a strong spirit to scrutinize one's own "team" and hold it accountable.

Anyone who believes that this is "traitorous," or that it in some way indicates greater sympathy with "our enemies," is a child and a simpleton. Conversation with them is a waste of time. Do yourself a favor and cut your losses: they aren't worth the effort. If I continue to converse with one of them after they have made that clear, it is most likely an accidental oversight on my part.

Just for reference.

When Jonah Goldberg and Glenn Greenwald agree on something, chances are it's worth paying attention. Arianna Huffington's latest column lays the blame for McCain's imploding campaign at the feet of his Iraq war policy -- more precisely, his support for the President's policies. Both Glenn and Jonah, not known for agreeing on matters Iraqi, fired off responses almost immediately. See if you can guess who's talking in each of these quotes...

...The opposite is true: no presidential candidate can possibly hope to win the GOP nomination unless he... supports the war in Iraq.

...All of the punditry — save Huffington's — argues that McCain has no choice to become a single-issue win-in-Iraq candidate if he wants to save his campaign.

A few weeks ago I was visiting New York for work, and I was stuck on the runway while JetBlue played musical chairs with its queued up planes. I flipped on the little in-flight TV and started channel surfing, only to discover Bill O'Reilly solemnly announcing that his Crime Expert had some Starting And Disturbing News to announce. I'll just let the transcript speak for itself:

"Well, you know, there is this national underground network, if you will, Bill, of women that's lesbians and also some men groups that's actually recruiting kids as young as 10 years old in a lot of the schools in the communities all across the country, and they actually carry a number of weapons. And they commit a number of crimes.

"...We've actually counted, just in the Washington D.C. area alone, that's Washington D.C., Maryland, and Virginia, well over 150 of these crews.... And they -- like I said, they recruit these kids to be members of these gangs. As a matter of fact, some of the kids have actually reported that they were forced into, you know, performing sex acts and doing sex acts with some of these people.

"It's all over the country. I mean, you go from New York to California to wherever you want to name, you can see these organizations. Now, the other thing, too, that our viewers are going to find very, very interesting, is the fact that they actually carry -— some of these groups carry pink pistols. They call themselves the pink-pistol-packing group. And these are lesbians that actually carry pistols. That's 9-millimeter Glocks. They use these. They commit crimes, and they cause a lot of hurt to a lot of people."

Quick show of hands, here -- does anyone think that passes the smell test? If nothing else, the idea that a hardcore lesbian gang is going to name itself "The Pink Pistol Packing Group" is hilarious. Maybe they publish a comic called Dykes For Which One Should Be Alert.

Rob Wheeler, the Crime Expert who offered up these pearls of wisdom, has posted a convenient retraction on his web site:

During the O’Reilly Factor segment on June 21st, while engaged in a discussion on Lesbian gangs, I inadvertently stated that gang members carry pistols that are painted pink and call themselves the "Pink Pistol Packing Group." I was not referring to the gay rights group "Pink Pistols" who advocates for the lawful rights of gays to carry weapons for protection.

Further, I mentioned that there are "over 150 of these gangs" in the greater Washington DC area. What I actually meant is that there are over 150 gangs in the Washington DC area, some of which are in fact lesbian gangs.

Lastly, I mentioned in the segment that there is this "national epidemic" of lesbian gangs. A better choice of words would have been to say that there is a growing concern nationally, and especially in major urban areas, of increased gang activity, which includes some lesbian gang activity.

In other words, I completely BS'd my way through a gay-menace segment on national TV. But statistically, there HAVE to be SOME lesbian gangs out there, right? Right?

Next up? Middle-class white guys who eat their neighbors: A growing trend!

A couple acquaintances and I were having a conversation about Congress' shockingly low (18%) approval rating. One of the guys, a staunch Republican, believes this is proof that people resent the Democrats for 'backpedaling' on all of their campaign promises. I was inclined to agree, noting that they've squandered a real opportunity in the post-2006 cycle.

Hilzoy on Obsidian Wings, though, pointed out something interesting today. Democrats have obviously dropped the ball on 'funding,' a tool for porking out funding bills. But if you think back to the 2006 election cycle, the conversation was about... well, the economy and the war. Most of their commitments were about things like minimum wage increases, passing the 9/11 commission's recommendations, reform of the shockingly expensive Medicare drug bill, renewable energy research funding, etc.

You know what's interesting? They passed them.

All of these measures got a majority votes -- when they were able to make it that far. Unfortunately, Republican members of congress have blocked their passage with parliamentary maneuvering, like refusing to appoint enough committee members to put the measures to a full Senate vote, or the much-maligned filibuster.

The filibuster is especially interesting, since just months ago we were hearing from everyone and their brother how 'broken' the system was because it allowed a minority party to 'obstruct' the will of the people. Remember all the chanting about "The Nuclear Option" that the Democrats were considering using to prevent righteous Republican bills from passing?

Today, house Republicans filibustered Jim Webb's amendment to the armed forces appropriation bill, which would have ensured that soldiers on rotation in Iraq would be assured of some downtime here at home between deployments, and protect them from more than three non-voluntary tours of duty.

Support the troops, yo.

What's fascinating is that the national narrative while Republicans are in power is that Democrats were 'obstructionists' for even considering things like filibusters. Now that people voted Democrats into power, and Republicans are resorting to things like cloture votes to prevent full congressional votes on Democrat-sponsored bills, what's the generally accepted narrative?

Democrats breaking their promises, of course.

This is the thing that makes me scratch my head when folks talk about the liberal media. If they're so liberal, why the weirdly distorted double standard? The media, for the most part, rolls with whatever story fits the prevailing narrative. And for better or worse, Republicans have managed to wrestle control of that narrative to the right. Actual events don't matter -- they're wearing white hats and the Democrats are wearing black, and everyone knows what that means.