It is unquestioned received wisdom on the left that Reagan's Star Wars missle defense notions were sheer nuttery. Star Wars and SDI are big laugh lines in any Democratic speech, and everybody seems to believe we don't need SDI, not that it would work anyway.
I tend to oppose SDI proposals, for practical reasons, but I must admit I don't get the joke.
It's true that missle defense technology isn't very good. The last time we tried anything like it in the field was when we tried to stop Iraq's Scuds with Patriot Missiles during Gulf War I. results)">Although the US claimed a 70% success rate at stopping Scuds, everybody else seems to agree the actual rate is somewhere between 0 and 30%.
So it didn't work, and all those opposed to missile defense chortled and snickered. But we did learn a few things and newer versions of missile defense try to account for those early errors. Missile defense is probably still an iffy thing, but I have a lot of confidence that it is not an unsolvable problem. Eventually, we will be able to take out a good number of incoming missiles. We should stop laughing at the ridiculous notion and start figuring out how to do bring the task within possiblity.
Of course, just because missile defense might be possible, doesn't mean we need it, and it doesn't mean we can afford it. Still, I think exploring the option isn't so terrible a use of our resources.
Polis | 0 Writebacks | #
Drug War Rant reminds us that the racist drug war is not a liberal or conservative program. After all, there is virtually no difference between Kerry and Bush on drug policy. Likewise, opposition to it is not liberal or conservative, and people who have woken up to the terrible cost of the drug war come from all over the political spectrum.
The Rant cites Grover Norquist speculating that in 10 years conservatives will be calling for an end to the drug war. I'm not so optimistic as to think that would mean across-the-board legalization, but I hope a few outspoken, respectable, conservative politicians could be the first cracks in the dam.
It's a shame that right now very few officals elected to high office have anything approaching enlightened views on drug policy.
Polis | 1 Writebacks | #
Colorado is considering changing the way presidential candidates get electoral votes. Currently, whoever wins the most votes gets all the state's 9 electoral votes. Under the new proposal, each candidate would get votes in proportion to the votes he or she wins at the polls.
As a matter of gamesmanship, I'm not sure if this benefits Colorado. States generally want to give candidates incentive to court them, that incentive being their electoral votes. If the Republican and Democrat are going to split 5-4 every election cycle, neither really has much reason to devote resources to wooing Colorado voters. The payoff just isn't enough.
For third parties, though, this is wonderful (and probably the motivation for the change). Now Nader can dream about grabbing a couple electoral votes if he shows big in Colorado, a state that is relatively friendly to his run (which is to say not very friendly at all). If enough states follow Colorado's lead, Nader could pick up enough votes in a bunch of states to swing the election, even if he doesn't swing any one state.
Gore would have won in 2000 if Colorado had given him a few of their electoral votes. If every state did this, the electoral college would be essentially moot.
My only problem with killing the electoral college is that it shifts the emphasis from states to population centers. As a person who rarely leaves Manhattan, this would benefit me, but I tend to think it wouldn't be a great idea for the nation as a whole.
Via Lean Left.
Polis | 0 Writebacks | #
NJ Gov Jim McGreevy is stepping down, revealing that he is a "gay American" and was forced to step down after a former lover tried to extort $5 million in hush money from him. McGreevy, a married father of two, feels he can't get through this scandal and be an effective governor.
What bothers me about this situation is that straight politicians have affairs all the time. When they get caught rooting in the cookie jar, they just bite their lips and apologize. They don't lose the ability to govern.
But because McGreevy's is a gay affair, it's a juicier scandal and harder to shake. And that sucks. What kind of narrow-minded straight-privilege motherfuckers still find gay sex more salacious than straight sex? Fucking bigots.
Polis | 7 Writebacks | #
Cheaper prescription drugs.
Unlike Bush, who has done everything he can to oppose Americans paying the same low prices for prescription drugs enjoyed by our neighbors to the North, Kerry would support allowing us to reimport drugs from Canada and thus pay the lower Canadian price.
Gotta love cheap drugs.
Polis | 0 Writebacks | #
Marijuana has an image problem.
Lots and lots of people have smoked weed or know people that do. And the more you know, the less impressed you are by the claims that marijuana will make the sky fall. This is because "An individual's perception of the risks of substance use has been shown to be related to whether he or she actually uses the substance." Imagine that.
To convince us that weed is really, really bad for you, the ONDCP has embarked on a campaign to convince us that the nice, harmless weed you smoked in the 1970s is nothing like the big, bad weed of today. To that end, they ONDCP promotes studies proving the obvious: weed has improved over the years. They spin this as increased "potency" and try to claim this is a bad thing.
But those of us who actually smoke know that better weed is a good thing. Smokers self-regulate. Weed hits you pretty fast, so you know how high you're getting, and you generally know when to stop. And if you smoke too much, you get a little quiet, maybe even sleepy-- i.e. the perils of potent marijuana aren't dangerous or even offensive.
The ONDCP keeps telling us a tale that doesn't match up with what we know. So we keep ignoring them and they lose all credibility. When they tell us about dangers that actually do exist, we ignore those too because they're a bunch of liars.
Imagine if the ONDCP could do honest research designed to make drug use safer, to reduce the harm associated with drug use. Imagine if they could issue safety bulletins that we could trust, listen to, and rely upon to actually promote health and save lives.
The ONDCP is a $12 billion agency that does little more than lie to us. Imagine using that $12 billion to make us safer.
It's a shame that neither candidate for office wants to fix the broken, misguided drug warriors.
Polis | 2 Writebacks | #
A California court annulled 4000 San Francisco marriages. Just like that, they took 4000 married couples and declared that they are no longer married. Furthermore, they spit in the face of reality and claim these people were never married at all. What true courage that takes.
Moreover, they ducked themost important issue: deciding whether or not people actually have the right to nondiscriminatory marriage. Sure, why settle the question? It's not like anybody is eager for an answer or anything.
"Del is 83-years-old and I am 79," Lyon said. "After being together for more than 50 years, it is a terrible blow to have the rights and protections of marriage taken away from us. At our age, we do not have the luxury of time."
Oh well, two steps forward, one step back. Gotta love Gavin Newsome and we should always remember he was the more conservative candidate for mayor in SF.
Via A Brooklyn Bridge.
Polis | 0 Writebacks | #
If you're going to Burning Man and have old, unused prescription glasses, bring them with you. Lions Camp is collecting your unused prescription eyewear.
They will be cleaned, sorted and gifted to programs and people that need glasses but can't afford them.
Lions Camp is located on the 3:00 outpose at 10:00. They're with the Bookmobile people.
Polis | 0 Writebacks | #
Dean Esmay relates that "Islamofascists" claim to have beheaded a CIA agent. The CIA says all its peope are accounted for and nobody is yet sure whether the video is real. I hope its fake.
Like many, I've never really liked the term "Islamofascist". I don't think the term is racist or anything like that, but it just strikes me as inaccurate.
Fascism is all about the glorification of the state. It's an extreme kind of nationalism. But that's not what Islamic terrorists are about. They couldn't care less about nations. The people that make up these groups move fluidly from country to country, are made up of people from all over the world, and they strike indiscriminantly against all nations. Their goal is to devalue the state, to lessen the role of nationality and weaken the power of governments.
To the extent Muslim extremists are statist or work with governments, it is in service to their religious goals. If they were really fascists, it would be the other way around. They would be using religion as a way to strengthen and unify the state.
There should be a better term. I understand that fascism is a bad word that has been diluted to mean something like "cruel and authoritarian", but that's a shame. Fascism describes a historical political movement and torturing language to slander the enemy doesn't get us very far.
That said, I don't really have a better word. We've never really faced something like this before, so I don't think history will provide the term.
Polis | 0 Writebacks | #
John Perry Barlow was a lyricist for the Grateful Dead. He also helped found the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which really should be called the Electronic Freedom Foundation. They were the first and are the premier fighters for rights and freedom and libertarian technoanarchy in this digital world.
Today, he's still involved in Dead affairs and with the EFF. He spends most of his time spouting off. He's arrogant, opinionated and sometimes get things quite right.
Brian Doherty interviewed him for Reason magazine. It's a good read and he has some insight into "lifestyle libertarians".
Polis | 0 Writebacks | #
The convention is coming to town, and it's going to be complete chaos. The protestors won't play by the rules (though they have their reasons). The cops might not play at all. As for me, I'm outtie.
Polis | 3 Writebacks | #
TalkLeft is down with the movement to let non-citizen immigrants vote. The rationale is pretty easy:
They live here. They work here. They pay taxes and support the community. Why shouldn't they be allowed to vote in local elections?
And the answer is just as easy: because they're not citizens. To me, voting is the essence of citizenship. It's what it means to be an American.
If we erase the citizenship requirement for voting, then what is the meaning of citizenship? Why would immigrants care about the color of their passports? We require a certain long term committment and allegiance to America before we let people vote. The certification of that committment and allegiance is citizenship.
The taxation without representation argument pushes all our grade school civics buttons, but it is pretty meaningless. Non-immigrant foreigners working here pay taxes, live here and get involved in community, but we don't let them vote either. And nobody cries foul. They pay taxes because they have a financial obligatoin to support the society that they live in. Period, end of story, and it has nothing to do with voting.
It seems to me that if immigrants are so tied to America by work, taxes and community involvement, then they essentially are functioning as citizens. And so we should give them citizenship. But fudging things by giving them all the trappings of citizenship while denying them recognition as Americans just clouds the issue.
So here's my solution. Don't let immigrants vote. Instead, recognize their contribution by making it easier for immigrants to become citizens. Shorten the timeframe and cut down on the paperwork.
Polis | 0 Writebacks | #
Say Uncle is pretty much the center of my pro-gun universe. I waffle back and forth and don't really feel the issue with much intensity, but to the extent I'm down with arming our polite society, I look to him to articulate the arguments. Usually he does a good job.
But here's one argument I just don't buy. A group of people killed some other people with baseball bats and knives. Sounds like a pretty standard day for the Bensonhurst neighborhood watch to me. But because they used bats instead of guns, pro-gunners make the argument that if the killing potential of bats doesn't justify making them illegal, the killing potential of guns can't justify making guns illegal.
They usually don't come right out and make the argument. Instead, they make some snide comment about banning bats and knives and anything else that could possibly or implausibly serve as a weapon. Perhaps this is for entertainment purposes or perhaps it's because when you spell the argument out it becomes a little foolish.
Bats and guns are apples and oranges. They occupy very different places in society and have very different killing potentials. It makes sense that society would have two different regulatory approaches to these two different items.
To say that consistency requires us to ban bats if we ban guns is as ridiculous as saying consistency requires us to ban bats if we ban tanks and bazookas.
It's just not a very good argument, and whenever I see it, I think about how loony much of the second amendment crowd can be.
Polis | 5 Writebacks | #
We all know Burners have the same interests and fashion sense as 5-year-old girls (we're all whores for My Little Pony when we hit the playa). Now you can have the same toys too. Go ahead, make blinky art, just like the cool kids.
Via Say Uncle.
A woman in NYC couldn't figure out how to use her Metrocard, so she complained to the clerk in the token booth. She asked the clerk for assistance. He refused to come out and swipe it for her. She begged, he responded with insults, she responded with insults, he came out of the both and proceeded to kick her ass.
So far this is a tragic story about a woman who can't figure out how to swipe a metrocard, fiery tempers, and an asshole who beats helpless women. But these kinds of stories happen every day in every city.
Here's the part of the story I love: while this woman and her friends were fighting with the clerk, she dropped her wallet. It was promptly stolen by somebody quitter-witted than the combatants.
I love New York.
My good friend Claire Smith edited a book about Burning Man by Reason's Brian Douherty. The book is called This is Burning Man, and it has its own blog.
The book is quite good, a revealing factual and ideological history of Burning Man from inception to (in some eyes) impending death. It has great stories, lots of famous-for-Burning-Man characters, and it sparked a bunch of memories for me.
The thing that sets this books apart from the rest is that its author has been going to Burning Man for almost a decade. A lot of the people he discusses are people he's known for many years. A lot of the formative events he relates are ones he's actually witnessed.
On top of that, Douherty is an actual journalist, a guy with the training and ability to write about the history and pathos of Burning Man with skill and vigor. The book is no academic slog, no wide-eyed paean, no naive rant about consumer commercial culture.
Douherty being an editor of a well-regarded libertarian magazine, it's not surprising that he grinds his political axe a bit much, but at the same time he really celebrates the spirit of Burning Man. Most of the time, he soft-pedals the politics, and if you skip the weird montage at the back of the book, you'll have a fun read.
If you have any interest in Burning Man, you should check it out. You'll be glad you did.
Polis | 0 Writebacks | #
Media Matters has details on the deception that is the Swiftboat Vets ad.
Polis | 5 Writebacks | #
Unmedia discusses suspicious things he has done on airplanes. As an American who is ethnically Indian and religiously Bohra, he has a different point of view on the subject than many Americans.
Via Boing Boing.
Polis | 0 Writebacks | #
A bunch of blogs (here, here, and here) are quoting the President and his latest verbal gaffe:
Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we.
Sure this is funny and I'm not a fan of Bush, but the glee lefties get from poking fun at Bush's tortured speaking style is getting as old and tasteless as the jokes about Michael Moore's weight I keep hearing from the right.
Polis | 3 Writebacks | #
I just watched the Swiftboat Vets ad. Like Dean Esmay, I think this is "the most devastating political ad I've ever seen". Those vets are all Tanya Harding and John Kerry is Nancy Kerrigan's knees. Kapow!
It's a shame the ad is misleading. Most of the vets in the ad say they served with Kerry, which makes it sound like they directly observed his behavior in Vietnam because they served by Kerry's side.
But they didn't. Most of those guys know as much about Kerry as you or I do. They've seen news clips, heard a lot of hearsay, maybe know his 1971 Senate testimony. They don't like him (perhaps with good reason), but their opinions aren't based on the experience implied by the ad.
Still, lies misleading or not, it's incredibly effective. People will see that ad and run from Kerry.
Polis | 1 Writebacks | #
Some bloggers seem to think we've found WMD in Iraq. They cite questionable news accounts (but never the discrediting followups) or just boldly assert that the WMD have been found. They talk about moving goal posts and say "See, techincally, we found WMD."
But we didn't find what we were looking for. Even the president admitted so on August 2, 2004, and you can see it on the Whitehouse website (at least, until they edit the historical record):
Let me talk about the intelligence in Iraq. First of all, we all thought we’d find stockpiles of weapons. We may still find weapons. We haven’t found them yet.
Via Josh Marshall.
Polis | 9 Writebacks | #
To the long list of crimes committed by the Israeli army, we can now add a new and different atrocity: smoking pot. Apparently patrolling Palestine is a stressful job and the weed helps. Who knew?
I wonder if could be the basis of a movement to let our troops in combat smoke. Of course, if all the soldiers and the terrorists and the insurgents and the freedom fighters and the war lords sat down and passed the peace pipe, there wouldn't be any fighting.
I also wonder how much opium and hash our troops are smoking in Iraq and Afghanistan. I would bet it's a lot.
Support the troops, get them high!
Via Drug War Rant and TalkLeft.
Polis | 0 Writebacks | #
Polis | 0 Writebacks | #
The New York Times says Barack Obama is a different shade of black because he's not black in the usual way. It's a weird opinion piece because it doesn't really understand what makes a person black (or white, for that matter).
Race is a cultural group. What makes Obama black is that he considers himself to be of that group and other people treat him like he is of that group. Obama can identify with the black experience because he lives it. Just because his mother is white doesn't mean anybody treats him like a white man.
And these are the things that make him black, just like every other black person in America. It's not just about skin color or a drop of blood.
Vanessa Williams, writing for the Washington Post, takes the Times to task for treating Obama like a "brother from another planet". It's worth reading, even if you skip the Times piece because it effectively makes the point that White America only sees one kind of black person, and this reduction of people to one signifying trait is what objectification is all about.
Polis | 2 Writebacks | #
The free speech cages where police confined protestors during the DNC are, of course, disgusting. And it won't be any better at the RNC.
But at least we get cartoons out of it.
Polis | 1 Writebacks | #