Month: May 2009

The Power of Poop

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by publius Here's something I learned today — the historical success of Western Europe stems in part from its utterly disgusting personal hygiene.  And to be more blunt, from its poop. I'm reading Gregory Clark's A Farewell to Alms:  A Brief Economic History of the World.  One argument is that, prior to 1800, income was … Read more

“I Don’t Believe I’ve Ever Met A Homosexual”

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by hilzoy

James Kirchick writes:

"I oppose using a person's sexual orientation as a job qualification for the same reasons that I oppose the privileging of a candidate based upon their race or sex: It boils individuals down to their immutable traits. The only aspect that Obama should consider as he weighs his options over the next few days is the candidates' jurisprudence."

Matt Yglesias responds:

"The nature of the Supreme Court is that a great many of its most important cases concern the rights of women and various kinds of minority groups. It’s absurd to think that a forum of nine white, male, heterosexual Christians could possibly compose the best possible forum for deciding these kinds of issues. The reality is that a nine-person group can’t possibly fully represent the diversity — in terms of religion, sexual orientation, ethnicity, gender, etc. — that exists in the country at large. But one can do better or worse on this regard and it makes perfect sense to aspire to do better. That’s not an alternative to caring about the quality of the jurisprudence, it’s part of trying to get good jurisprudence."

This is absolutely right, and I think it's why Obama was right to say that he wanted to nominate a justice who is not just "dedicated to the rule of law, who honors our constitutional traditions, who respects the integrity of the judicial process and the appropriate limits of the judicial role", but who has the "quality of empathy, of understanding and identifying with people's hopes and struggles". This is not opposed to caring about getting the law right; it's about understanding what is at stake in various cases well enough to see how the law, as it is written, actually applies.

To see why this matters, consider an anecdote about Justice Powell's deliberations in Bowers v. Hardwick. 

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The Very Principled Archbishop Burke

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by publius I tend to shy away from intra-Catholic disputes such as the Notre Dame controversy.  I wasn't raised Catholic — and there were like 2 Catholics in my town growing up.  So I don't really have a dog in these fights.  But via Feddie, I see that the Archbishop Burke is at it again … Read more

Scoop!

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by von Scoop! Scoop!  Jan Crawford Greenburg reportsthat there is a short list of six prospects to fill Justice Souter's shoes, but she only names three.  I know a fourth!  It's Publius!   Publius is a shoo-in for the nomination.  Pseudonymous bloggers are sorely underrepresented on the Supreme Court:  Even though they make up more than 65% of the population, … Read more

Signs And Portents

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by hilzoy Apparently, it's a big deal in some quarters that Barack Obama did not hold a ceremony for the National Day of Prayer, preferring instead to issue a proclamation and pray in private, "something that the president does every day". This is an instance of something that generally bothers me about many discussions of … Read more

Dueling Videos

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by hilzoy The Senate Republicans have put up an unusually boneheaded video about the idea of holding Guantanamo detainees in the US: Something about 9/11 seems to have produced a kind of amnesia among some people on the right. It's as though they think that we have never before had to figure out such questions … Read more

What Sessions Means

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by publius It’s a telling contrast – this rise of Jeff Sessions to Judiciary ranking member.  On the one hand, the Democratic Party nominated the first African-American president.  At the same time, Senate Republicans have intentionally elevated an Alabama Senator rejected from the federal bench for being a racist. It may seem like I’ve randomly … Read more

Disbar Them

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by hilzoy From the NYT: "An internal Justice Department inquiry into the conduct of Bush administration lawyers who wrote secret memorandums authorizing brutal interrogations has concluded that the authors committed serious lapses of judgment but should not be criminally prosecuted, according to government officials briefed on a draft of the findings. The report by the … Read more

More Specter Weirdness

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by publius I think Freud called this the "death wish."  Halperin reports on an NYT interview with Specter: The new Democrat says the Minnesota Republican should return to the Senate. "There's still time for the Minnesota courts to do justice and declare Norm Coleman the winner." UPDATE:  I still don't know entirely what he meant, … Read more

Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Truth?

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by Eric Martin Gideon Rachman seeks to set the record straight, and provide some context, regarding the recent outrage in conservative circles about the fact that Obama actually had the temerity to acknowledge that the United States was not infallible. Now conservatives are complaining loudly that…[President Obama] is abasing himself and the country before foreigners. President Barack Obama, they … Read more

Specter’s Dumb Politics

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by publius Josh Marshall has good post up on Specter – he touched on some things I wanted to discuss, but he said it better.  Anyway, the upshot is that Specter is (uncharacteristically) making some enormous political errors by immediately opposing various Democratic positions so loudly.  I don’t really understand his thinking.  There’s no logic … Read more

Resolution

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by hilzoy Matthew Richardson and Nouriel Roubini have an op-ed on the stress tests in the WSJ. It makes a number of good points, but this one is particularly important: "Stress tests aside, it is highly likely that some of these large banks will be insolvent, given the various estimates of aggregate losses. The government … Read more

Conflict Of Interest

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by hilzoy There is just no way that this ought to have been allowed: "The Federal Reserve Bank of New York shaped Washington's response to the financial crisis late last year, which buoyed Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and other Wall Street firms. Goldman received speedy approval to become a bank holding company in September and a $10 … Read more

We have the facts and we’re voting yes

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by von Joshua Treviño offers a characteristically nuanced look at the defection of Arlen Specter, and suggests the following: This said, Specter’s party switch is the latest in a long trend of ideological party-sorting, in which the Republicans get the conservatives, and the Democrats get the leftists. It’s arguable which of the two actually offers more … Read more

Motiveless Malignancy

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by hilzoy The NYT has an interesting story on Bush administration fights over torture policy. (Though, as emptywheel says, it "seems to be at least partly the product of two entities–the Bellinger/Condi- and the Goss-reputation protection entities–that have been working overtime lately.") It claims that the CIA had stopped using the "enhanced interrogation techniques" by 2005: "Still, … Read more

The Hate That Pretty Much Speaks Its Name

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by publius

The Oklahoma GOP recently held their state convention.  And judging by the party platform they adopted, it seems the GOP rebranding effort has a long road ahead.  The platform is genuinely creepy – and apparently uninfluenced by Meghan McCain’s Twitter feed.  (The blog Forever in Hell has multiple posts on the platform, and was my original source.  The GOP platform itself is available here and here*).

Anyway, I know Kevin Drum has previously noted the looneyness of the Texas GOP platform.  And the Oklahoma platform has a lot of similarities.  You know, all the good stuff you’d expect like withdrawing from the UN, restoring the gold standard, requiring biblical creation education, and Taliban-like intrusions on all matters related to sex (e.g., abortion, pornography, indecency regulation, no-fault divorces, Gardasil vaccinations).

But what’s most scary about this platform is its obsessive focus with homosexuality.  The level of hate and vitriol directed at homosexuals by this document – adopted by a state political party – is jarring.  If the national GOP is curious about the source of its image problems, look no further than to the Oklahoma GOP platform.  It’s legitimately frightening.  (On an aside, I think the intensity of this institutional hatred further supports judicial efforts to protect equality).

What’s most disturbing is that the platform references homosexuality again and again in multiple sections.  But of all these references, the section below takes the taco – it’s truly the worst thing in the entire document. 

This passage comes from a section called “Commendations” (p.29):

7. We commend state Representatives Wright, Blackwell, Christian, Coody, Duncan, Enns, Faught, Johnson, Kern, Key, Liebmann, Moore, Murphey, Osborn, Ownbey, Reynolds, Ritze, Sanders, Terrill, and Thomsen for opposing inclusion in the House Journal, the introduction of an openly homosexual minister’s male “fiancé”.

Initial reaction was … huh?  So I hopped on Lexis, and this story is hard to believe, even by the lofty standards of the rump of the Oklahoma GOP. 

At the beginning of Oklahoma’s legislative session last February, the only openly gay Oklahoma legislator invited a gay pastor to give the opening prayer.  In introducing himself before that prayer, the pastor had the audacity to say:  “dear friends, my wonderful parents, and my loving partner and fiance, Michael.”

Well, that last bit crossed the line and several GOP legislators objected and wanted his subsequent prayer excluded from the official House record.  They lost 64-20, but the Oklahoma GOP felt the need to formally commend the Fightin’ Twenty in its party platform for their efforts.  Nice work team. 

Note too the platform's quotation marks around fiancé.  You can almost feel the Christian love and tolerance.  (Also, Jones has a blog and wrote about the incident here).

This obnoxious provision, however, is far from alone.  Below the fold, I’ve listed other provisions in the platform that explicitly reference homosexuality (I excluded hate crime stuff, but that should arguably be in too). 

As you’re reading, note how many different sections of the platform reference homosexuality in some way.  Note too the provision that would – by my reading – ban homosexuals from being teachers or interacting with children in any professional context. 

It’s an eerie and creepy obsession.  It’s more than that actually.  It’s just hateful – and that’s about as precise an adjective as I can conjure to describe the Oklahoma GOP at the moment.

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Well, I Think Demographics Is Interesting …

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by hilzoy Here's a fascinating article on global demographics (h/t): "Something dramatic has happened to the world’s birthrates. Defying predictions of demographic decline, northern Europeans have started having more babies. Britain and France are now projecting steady population growth through the middle of the century. In North America, the trends are similar. In 2050, according … Read more

“He Used … Sarcasm”

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by hilzoy Erick Erickson informs us that "The Obama Thugocracy Has Arrived", and that Obama is "turning to the bully pulpit and the press to beat the hell out of dissenters." "Beating the hell out of dissenters"? With the White House Press Corps? It all sounded very peculiar, so I clicked the link Erick provided, expecting … Read more

Erosion

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by hilzoy The Washington Post has an article with the headline: "Wage Growth Is Eroding As Firms Rush To Slim Down". It opens with this example: "In December, Timothy Owner, a trombone player with the Virginia Symphony Orchestra, called his landlord to tell her he might have trouble paying rent around May. He and the … Read more

Clone Wars

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by publius I’ve got to hand it to Ed Whelan – he’s done some fine sleuthing.  He’d be a solid investigative reporter.  For instance, he’s pretty much exposed the liberal conspiracy to make the world safe for cloning: Indeed, in coming years, Souter’s replacement may well provide the fifth vote for: . . . the … Read more

Hands steadily purexed, but never quite clean

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by von Purity.  That has been the response by a number of Republicans to Sen. McCain's defeat by President Obama:  focus on ideological purity.  And how is it going?  Well, it has cost us the Senate.  We spend a lot of time defending a failed Vice Presidential candidate.  Sen. DeMint proclaims "I would rather have 30 … Read more

Clyburn at FCC – Obama’s Harriet Miers?

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by publius In case you haven’t seen, Obama plans to nominate Mignon Clyburn for FCC Commissioner (she would be third Democratic seat – there are 5 total).  Name sound familiar?  It should – she’s Jim Clyburn’s daughter.  He’s the House Majority Whip from South Carolina. Sound fishy yet?  It should.  In fact, it’s a baffling, … Read more

Blessed Are The Stress Positions

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by publius Interesting nugget from a Pew poll measuring religion and support for torture: White evangelical Protestants were the religious group most likely to say torture is often or sometimes justified — more than six in 10 supported it. People unaffiliated with any religious organization were least likely to back it. Only four in 10 … Read more

Paul Krugman Asks An Excellent Question

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by hilzoy Paul Krugman's column today is on the costs of cap and trade: "If emission permits were auctioned off — as they should be — the revenue thus raised could be used to give consumers rebates or reduce other taxes, partially offsetting the higher prices. But the offset wouldn't be complete. Consumers would end … Read more

No, We Shouldn’t Close The Border. Sigh.

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by hilzoy In the wake of the swine flu outbreak, we have the inevitable calls for closing the borders with Mexico (h/t): "A spokesman for Rep. Trent Franks, R-Ariz., said Wednesday night that Franks believes the border should be closed right now except in critical cases or situations involving emergency personnel. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., … Read more

Souter Will Resign

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by hilzoy From the NYT: "Justice David H. Souter has indicated that he plans to retire at the end of the term in June, giving President Obama his first appointment to the Supreme Court, three people informed about the decision said Thursday night. Justice Souter, who was appointed by a Republican president, George H. W. … Read more