Month: November 2004

Expressing Ambivalence

NewDonkey says that Democrats get it wrong when they say that economic populist approaches will work but that changing our position on social issues is right. He’s right about the first part (more on that later) and, as anyone who’s been reading this blog the last few days knows, I believe he is wrong about the second.

He quotes Tom Coburn Senate Nominee from Oklahoma who says:

For the vast majority of Oklahomans–and, I would suspect, voters in other red states–these transcendent cultural concerns are more important than universal health care or raising the minimum wage or preserving farm subsidies. Pace Thomas Frank, the voters aren’t deluded or uneducated. They simply reject the notion that material concerns are more real than spiritual or cultural ones. The political left has always had a hard time understanding this, preferring to believe that the masses are enthralled by a “false consciousness” or Fox News or whatever today’s excuse might be. But the truth is quite simple: Most voters in a state like Oklahoma–and I venture to say most other Southern and Midwestern states–reject the general direction of American culture and celebrate the political party that promises to reform or revise it.

New Donkey says:

We’re the “wrong track” party when it comes to the cultural direction of the country, and we have to decide whether to bravely swim upstream out of loyalty to hip-hop and Michael Moore and Grand Theft Auto IV and Hollywood campaign contributions, or do something else, like at least expressing a little ambivalence about it all. Changing the subject is cowardly and insulting no matter how you look at it.

I agree with Carson that these so-called cultural issues transcend economics for a bunch of reasons that I’ll go into over the week-end hopefully. However, that does not mean that the Democrats will ever gain anything by denouncing popular culture. Carson doesn’t believe it is a false consciousness and maybe it isn’t. Perhaps it is just sheer hypocrisy, I don’t know. But, the fact is that somebody in the red states is watching Will and Grace and somebody is watching Girls Gone Wild and a whole bunch of somebodies are downloading pornography. I’m sure they tut-tut those terrible liberals while they pass the popcorn and laugh over The Bachelor’s latest catfight.The biggest hit of the TV season is the sexually adventurous Desperate Housewives and it ain’t just because people in new York and LA are watching it. The National Enquirer and the Globe are hugely popular in Middle America with their fascination with Hollywood dirt.

This is mass consumer culture and it plays very successfully all across that great swathe of red. Somebody’s watching all this stuff and buying all this stuff and consuming all this stuff. I’m sure that many believe it’s a problem, but I’m just not sure it’s our problem. After all, these are the salt of the earth individuals who believe in taking personal responsibility, unlike us Hollywood and east coast elites. And let’s not forget who’s making the profits selling all this decadent culture to these innocent, God fearing folk who are evidently hypnotised into buying it. Republican Big Business.

I agree that economic populism isn’t going to work. But, we have proven that adopting socially conservative positions doesn’t work either. These people pretend to be morally superior even as they indulge in all the dirty hanky panky they hypocritically pray over in church. It’s not about what they actually do, it’s what they say they do — not the same thing at all. If they were so concerned about moral values they wouldn’t be chuckling along while the drug addicted Rush Limbaugh makes jokes about pornographic images with a knowing nod and wink. They wouldn’t so easily forgive their leaders who are divorced two and three times in ugly and cruel circumstances. They wouldn’t stand for media personalities who call female employees on the phone and regale them with sexual fantasies. These are the icons of their Republican party and media elite. Yet, they are held to a much lower standard than Michael Moore, who may have said inflammatory things but never to my knowledge actually did anything blatently immoral or illegal.

If these people were truly concerned about moral values you’d think they’d start at home.

Nope. This is a marketing ploy set forth by the Republican party to exploit the tribal differences between the red and the blue the urban and the rural by creating a very convenient illusion of middle American (read: Republican) moral superiority. It’s a crock. They consume just as much of this allegedly toxic culture as anybody else in this country. They just lie about it.

Pandering to hypocrites is a fools game — as Brad Carson found out when he was beaten by the crazed wingnut doctor, Tom Coburn, who had hallucinations about lesbians in elementary schools. Obviously, “expressing ambivalence” about Hollywood values will never be able to compete with something like that.

Correction: I made a huge mistake and thought that the above quote was by the democrat Brad Carson. It has been corrected to reflect it was Tom Coburn, the very wingnut doctor who won with his fantasies about grade school lesbians.

This makes Kilgore’s point even less salient. If we are “listening” to guys like Coburn explain why they won then we are bigger fools than I thought. They have absolutely no reason to be sincere about this.

Correction II: Yes, I realize that I screwed up. The quote is Carsons after all. Sorry for the confusion. Mea maxima Culpa. Posting and running is never a good idea.

Wingnut Kool-Aid Acid Test

If anyone wants to see a mere shell of a formerly asute cultural observer, check out this video of Tom Wolfe on The Daily Show.

He’s noticed that boys and girls cohabitate outside the sanctity of marriage nowadays. The parents don’t know what to do when the boys and girls come to visit. It didn’t used to be this way in his day. Who knew?

Wedge Issue

James Wolcott learns that whenever a liberal bi-coastal elite makes fun of Lil’ Andy he is branded a homophobe by the Alan Simpson Man Boy Association.

A racist-t-shirt wearing professor of Creationism at Wayback University who goes by the handle of Instapundit claims that if a Republican had written what I did about Andrew Sullivan’s phantom creeper on Real Life on Bill Maher, it would have been considered “homophobic.”

I found this out myself when I once pointed out on the late lamented mediawhores online that the swaggering George W. Bush gave Lil’ Andy and Leslie Stahl a fit of the maidenly vapors. Andy himself called me a “leftist homophobe.” (It was the first I’d heard any rumors about Stahl but I guess Andy would know.)

Anyway, it was one of my proudest online moments. I still think of it fondly. Back then, Howard Fineman and Lil’ Andy and Jay Nordlinger could rhapsodize for days about Junior’s macho swagger, his fabulous chin, his equally perfect comfort in ermine or epaulets. It was a lot like like listening to people talk on the bus when I lived in San Francisco in the late 70’s. It made me feel young again…

What’s interesting is that Instapundit seems to have joined the chorus about leftist homophobes. With all this PC sensitivity towards gays in the wingnut set these days, you’d think it was the liberals who just won an election with the help of a bunch of mouthbreathers who seem to think that if gay people are allowed to marry then Real American heterosexuals will be required to perform fellatio. (This is, needless to say, what the Concerned Women For America are most concerned about.)

The Big Show

I’m not buying this good cop bad cop routine. Specter flexes a very tiny little muscle, the Reconstructionists howl at the top of their lungs, the Senate traditionalists tell everyone to settle down, Specter gives a public blow job and everybody sees that the Republicans aren’t really in the hands of the Christian Right because Specter still has his chairmanship.

Now we have Bush’s chief consigliere, Gonzalez, supposedly coming under fire for not being enough of a pro-lifer yet Junior the Moderate boldly defies the Christian Right again and nominates the reasonable, middle of the road Gonzalez.

Right. This is what Bush calls reaching across the aisle.

Exit, Stage Right

GOP Wants to End Exit Polls

Ok. I have not yet seen the proof that Bush stole Ohio, but I certainly have my suspicions. And I can’t help but wonder about Florida either. There is ample evidence that our voting systems are in very sad shape and the addition of touch screen voting is only making it worse.

And now here comes the Republican party agitating to get rid of the exit polls — exit polls which have shown the Democrat winning in the last two presidential elections with the Republican coming out barely ahead in the actual vote count each time. And nobody has come up with anything close to a reasonable explanation for this. (Hoardes of giddy Democrats racing to the pollsters to tell their story is ridiculous.)

Unless we can get a federal law demanding a paper audit trail for all elections and keep the exit polls, we will never have a clue when they try to steal it in the future. The arrogant bastards.

This reminds me of a brief flirtation I had with writing a screenplay in which the election was decided by two sets of hackers — one set determined to change the results, the other determined to stop them. (I’d had a few beers.) Considering what a stupid idea it was, it’s hard to believe it’s looking as if my slightly inebriated little fantasy could actually come to pass. Maybe instead of legions of lawyers we’d better think of getting a few good computer nerds.

Crusade

I am not a religious person. I cannot speak from a Biblical frame of reference. According to the polls, however, I am a member of an exceedingly small minority in this country. Therefore, I wonder if some of the religious people, particularly Christians who voted for John Kerry would care to engage some of these people in a dialog.

I cannot do it. They will not listen to someone like me. They see politics as theology, not philosophy. Perhaps they will listen to you.

But, then again, perhaps not. Sectarian wars were, after all, the reason why the founders were so adamant about not having a state religion. It always leads to religious power stuggles. But, it appears that this is where we are. The idea of secular government is no longer operative.

I’m sorry I can’t help, but I do not have the tools to fight a religious war. This is your fight now.

“You Owe The Liberals Nothing”

November 3, 2004

President George W. Bush

The White House

1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW

Washington, DC 20500

Dear Mr. President:

The media tells us that you have received the largest number of popular votes of any president in America’s history. Congratulations!

In your re-election, God has graciously granted America—though she doesn’t deserve it—a reprieve from the agenda of paganism. You have been given a mandate. We the people expect your voice to be like the clear and certain sound of a trumpet. Because you seek the Lord daily, we who know the Lord will follow that kind of voice eagerly.

Don’t equivocate. Put your agenda on the front burner and let it boil. You owe the liberals nothing. They despise you because they despise your Christ. Honor the Lord, and He will honor you.

Had your opponent won, I would have still given thanks, because the Bible says I must (I Thessalonians 5:18). It would have been hard, but because the Lord lifts up whom He will and pulls down whom He will, I would have done it. It is easy to rejoice today, because Christ has allowed you to be His servant in this nation for another presidential term. Undoubtedly, you will have opportunity to appoint many conservative judges and exercise forceful leadership with the Congress in passing legislation that is defined by biblical norm regarding the family, sexuality, sanctity of life, religious freedom, freedom of speech, and limited government. You have four years—a brief time only—to leave an imprint for righteousness upon this nation that brings with it the blessings of Almighty God.

Christ said, “If any man serve me, let him follow me; and where I am, there shall also my servant be: if any man serve me, him will my father honour” (John 12:26).

The student body, faculty, and staff at Bob Jones University commit ourselves to pray for you—that you would do right and honor the Savior. Pull out all the stops and make a difference. If you have weaklings around you who do not share your biblical values, shed yourself of them. Conservative Americans would love to see one president who doesn’t care whether he is liked, but cares infinitely that he does right.

Best wishes.

Sincerely your friend,

Bob Jones III

President

PS: A few moments ago I read this letter to the students in Chapel. They applauded loudly their approval.

When I told them that Tom Daschle was no longer the minority leader of the Senate, they cheered again.

On occasion, Christians have not agreed with things you said during your first term. Nonetheless, we could not be more thankful that God has given you four more years to serve Him in the White House, never taking off your Christian faith and laying it aside as a man takes off a jacket, but living, speaking, and making decisions as one who knows the Bible to be eternally true.

© 2004 Bob Jones Universitywebsite

Via: Talk Left

More Culture War

Let me make one thing perfectly clear with respect to my post below. The south is not a monolith and “middle America” is not only the south. The south votes more than 40% consistently with the Democrats, many of whom are white progressives and african American.

I am talking about a cultural attitude, much of which has metastisized to other parts of the country, in which liberals are demonized as “the other” and eliminationist rhetoric is commonly cloaked in appeals to religion and “values.” This, I believe, is an outgrowth of a long standing, grievance mind-set with its roots in the south. However, it is being exploited by a bunch of rich, greedy opportunists who have spent billions creating a media infrastructire — particularly talk radio — to pound these attitudes into people’s heads. This dichotomy in our country has been with us from the beginning, but this is the first time it’s been marketed successfully by the immoral oligarchs who, in a sweet bit of irony, are making a tidy profit at it.

For those who are criticising me for not providing solutions but simply whining about the situation, I plead guilty. I wish I had the answer. What I have learned, after years of believing in the DLC experiment, is that this problem isn’t a matter of compromising on issues. The issues are weapons and each time we capitulate they pull another one out of their sleeve. I no longer believe it is really about these issues, it’s about something else.

After the cultural upheavals of the 1960’s and 1970’s and our subsequent losses in presidential politics, we had to retool. We were saddled with the image of tax and spend, weak on defense and immorality and there had been a backlash. The Party set about trying to reclaim the center by taking down some of the cultural shibboleths that we thought were holding us back and trying some innovative economic ideas to persuade Americans that we could be trusted with their tax dollars. The end of the cold war gave us some breathing room on national security.

With the help of Ross Perot, we managed to elect what would have been a moderate Republican not 15 years earlier. And the Republicans went mad. They immediately started moving the goalposts. It did not matter how far to the right Bill Clinton moved they moved farther. There was no meeting in the middle on common ground. They would not allow there to be any common ground.

Still, Clinton successfully managed the economy and had the good luck to preside over a once in a lifetime technological revolution and he succeeded in ending the decades long assumptions about Democrats and the economy. It’s his highest achievement. (It was my hope that Kerry could do the same on national security.)

But, I have come to realize that the main problem isn’t our competence in those areas and indeed, it never was. They were just another “issue” with which to beat us over the head. The problem is the same as it ever was. It’s the culture war and it didn’t begin in the 1960’s.

It grew out of America’s original sin (or perhaps it’s original hypocrisy) about slavery. And it’s colored our vision of ourselves ever since. It’s roots are in the north south divide, but it also cuts across rural and urban, modern and traditional. It’s a problem of identity,grievance and intractability. It’s centered in religion and race.

Today, I think the rhetoric coming from the right wing media is the toxic poison that is spreading this culture war into our body politic so quickly. Most liberals don’t hear what is said about them to millions upon millions of “middle Americans,” in which every grievance, every problem is laid at the foot of the “liberal elite.” The message here is of tribal warfare. Rush and Sean and Bill are not shining examples of moral rectitude and everyone knows it. They are warriors. Down the dial and in the pulpits this battle is explained as fight for moral values, in which the liberal elite is forcing it’s decadence into their workplaces and their homes. Again, the fight is one of life and death. Even for those who don’t listen to the talkers on the radio and in the pews, the message seeps out. Us and them.

Until recently I believed that this culture war was on its way out. But the sophisticated use of modern media to exploit this long standing undercurrent of grievance has changed all that. It may be hundreds of years old but it has new life and it’s not going to go away by ekeing out a win in the electoral college.

I don’t have the answer. But, I do think it’s important that we recognise when things aren’t working. Making a show of compromising on social issues isn’t working. And I say that as somone who always, until now, thought it would.

It Won’t Work

This is more of the same, but I think it’s important so I’m going to keep writing about it. The Democratic party has tried valiantly to move to the center in an attempt to convince “middle America” that they are not hostile to their values. After the electoral debacle of the 80’s it seemed like a good idea and it gave Clinton the opportunity to slip in under the wire in 1992 under very opportune circumstances. But, this was all contingent upon the idea of a “new South” born of modern ideas and a dynamic economy. Those conditions seem to have manifested themselves differently than forecasted (mostly, in my view, because of the rise of talk radio) and I think it’s time that we made some adjustments.

We are beginning to look like Charlie Brown with the football. We need to recognise what these people really want from us.

Kevin Drum wonders why we don’t tweak the abortion and porn issues to peel away some of the values voters from the Republicans. Linking to Matt Yglesias’s piece today in which he elaborates on his red state “chump” thesis in which he points out that the Republicans never deliver much to the conservative Christians, Kevin says:

There’s a germ of an idea here, but it needs to be teased out. The abortion point is a good one, for example. Liberals are in favor of choice, not in favor of abortion per se, so why shouldn’t we talk more often about policies that reduce the need for abortions while continuing to defend the right of choice itself? This won’t impress the hardcore evangelicals, of course, but it might appeal to some of their more moderate neighbors. Ditto for porn.

Gay rights and feminisim are another thing entirely. Liberals are just fundamentally in favor of this stuff, and we shouldn’t even think about trying to talk our way around it. If we lose votes for it, we lose votes for it.

Basically, then, I think Matt has a point worth thinking about, but we have to figure out which issues it applies to. Abortion and porn are good examples, and that’s why master politician Bill Clinton talked about making abortion “safe, legal, and rare” and supported anti-porn measures like the V-chip. Neither of these things infringed on any liberal principles, but they did address some of the real-world concerns of those ordinary heartland voters we hear so much about.

The fundamental problem is that the super Christians won’t compromise on principle and the rest of these “values voters” are hypocrites. Nobody bought the v-chip in red state America or anywhere else. They don’t want to take responsibility for what comes into their TV’s, they want to hector people for “forcing” them to watch these horrible things while they pass the popcorn. These same people listen to Rush refer to Abu Ghraib as “blowing off steam” and think that Bill O’Reilly is a salt of the earth regular guy despite his little obsession with porn stars. There’s your heartland values for you and they look surprisingly like the values you see on your television set. That’s because they are.

“Heartland values” is just another world for tribal identity. And this division is about crying Uncle.

Here’s a passage from Lincoln’s speech at the Cooper Union (thanks CRL) in 1860. Tell me if this doesn’t strike a chord:

The question recurs, what will satisfy them? Simply this: We must not only let them alone, but we must somehow, convince them that we do let them alone. This, we know by experience, is no easy task. We have been so trying to convince them from the very beginning of our organization, but with no success. In all our platforms and speeches we have constantly protested our purpose to let them alone; but this has had no tendency to convince them. Alike unavailing to convince them, is the fact that they have never detected a man of us in any attempt to disturb them.

These natural, and apparently adequate means all failing, what will convince them? This, and this only: cease to call slavery wrong, and join them in calling it right. And this must be done thoroughly – done in acts as well as in words. Silence will not be tolerated – we must place ourselves avowedly with them. Senator Douglas’ new sedition law must be enacted and enforced, suppressing all declarations that slavery is wrong, whether made in politics, in presses, in pulpits, or in private. We must arrest and return their fugitive slaves with greedy pleasure. We must pull down our Free State constitutions. The whole atmosphere must be disinfected from all taint of opposition to slavery, before they will cease to believe that all their troubles proceed from us.

So what else is new? We are dealing with an absolutist culture that demands total capitulation or nothing. Compromise will not work and it certainly will not work on these “values” issues. (Indeed, I think it’s part of what makes us look weak to some other factions who might be willing to vote for us.) This is the same old shit over and over and over again. We backed off on the death penalty, gun control, welfare, affirmative action and here we are with a new slate of issues about gays. Tomorrow it will be creationism. Until we realize that their condition is that we FULLY EMBRACE their cultural dominance in both word and deed, they will not be satisfied.

It is not enough that they be left alone to do what they choose. We must join them and do it thoroughly and with fervor. No amount of tweaking will work. Their real beef is psychological and tribal. Issues are fungible.

Another Winning Issue For The Future

As you know, now that the real Americans have spoken, I think it’s important that we take on the moral issue head on if we hope to win in Real America. Creationism will be our flagship, but there are many other topics we explore, like making sure that all textbooks reflect the fact that marriage is between a man and a woman as Texas just did. The books had used the words “marriage partners” but the school board luckily saw through it:

Terri Leo, a Republican, said she was pleased with the publishers’ changes. She had led the effort to get the publishers to change the texts, objecting to what she called “asexual stealth phrases” like “individuals who marry.”

It’s those stealth phrases that we have to fight against if we want to get the respect of the fine salt of the earth Real Americans. It’s not so much the positions we take, it’s the sneakiness they can’t abide.

Neither publisher made all the changes that Ms. Leo initially sought. For instance, one passage that was proposed to be added to the teacher’s editions read: “Opinions vary on why homosexuals, lesbians and bisexuals as a group are more prone to self-destructive behaviors like depression, illegal drug use and suicide.”