Month: June 2012

Googling the underbelly

by digby

Just remember. If you even hint that some of your fellow Americans might be harboring racial animus, you are a racist yourself. But taking that into consideration, check this out. Knowing that self-reporting about racist attitudes results in dubious results, a researcher decided to track racist attitudes by what people do in the privacy of their own homes:

Many Americans use Google to find racially charged material. I performed the somewhat unpleasant task of ranking states and media markets in the United States based on the proportion of their Google searches that included the word “ni**er(s).” This word was included in roughly the same number of Google searches as terms like “Lakers,” “Daily Show,” “migraine” and “economist.”

A huge proportion of the searches I looked at were for jokes about African-Americans. (I did not include searches that included the word “ni**a” because these searches were mostly for rap lyrics.) I used data from 2004 to 2007 because I wanted a measure not directly influenced by feelings toward Mr. Obama. From 2008 onward, “Obama” is a prevalent term in racially charged searches.

The state with the highest racially charged search rate in the country was West Virginia. Other areas with high percentages included western Pennsylvania, eastern Ohio, upstate New York and southern Mississippi.

Once I figured out which parts of the country had the highest racially charged search rates, I could test whether Mr. Obama underperformed in these areas.

He did:

Add up the totals throughout the country, and racial animus cost Mr. Obama three to five percentage points of the popular vote. In other words, racial prejudice gave John McCain the equivalent of a home-state advantage nationally.

Yes, Mr. Obama also gained some votes because of his race. But in the general election this effect was comparatively minor. The vast majority of voters for whom Mr. Obama’s race was a positive were liberal, habitual voters who would have voted for any Democratic presidential candidate. Increased support and turnout from African-Americans added only about one percentage point to Mr. Obama’s totals.

If my findings are correct, race could very well prove decisive against Mr. Obama in 2012. Most modern presidential elections are close. Losing even two percentage points lowers the probability of a candidate’s winning the popular vote by a third. And prejudice could cost Mr. Obama crucial states like Ohio, Florida and even Pennsylvania.

In 2008, Mr. Obama rode an unusually strong tail wind. The economy was collapsing. The Iraq war was unpopular. Republicans took most of the blame. He was able to overcome the major obstacle of continuing racial prejudice in the United States. In 2012, the tail wind is gone; the obstacle likely remains.

I wonder what you’d find if you measured other, less harsh racist terms. But then, I suppose there’s no need: “From 2008 onward, “Obama” is a prevalent term in racially charged searches.”

Keep in mind that this doesn’t necessarily mean that only two percent of Americans are racist. After all, the vast majority of them are already in the GOP camp. But it does mean that some swing voters and Democrats are as well.

* I’m not endorsing this methodology. It’s possible that it’s completely wrong and this fellow has no idea what he’s doing. But the conclusions don’t seem surprising. The real surprise is that it wasn’t a higher percentage than it was. You can bet it would have been 25 years ago. Progress.

.

Video ‘O the Day

by digby

Darcy Burner at Netroots Nation on the issue of building power, specifically aimed at women, but useful across the board:

Do you think the “powers that be” want this woman in the congress?

I didn’t think so. You can donate to her campaign here. She’s leading in her primary battle so far, but the Big Money Boyz haven’t weighed in yet.

.

Hispanic frustration

by digby

This story in today’s Washington Post about Obama’s chilly relationship with various members of his base, is worth reading. It shows a president who doesn’t understand liberal supporters who question his commitment and is sorely disappointed — even angry — that he has failed to engender the kind of unquestioning loyalty he expected. I guess I can understand that. He believes that his life itself is a testament to his own higher motives.

But this anecdote shows something more, I think:

One after another, they spoke their minds, telling the president what he had done or not done that bothered them. They complained that a rising number of deportations on his watch were “terrorizing” Hispanic neighborhoods and tearing apart good families. They warned that he was losing credibility with a crucial constituency that had put its faith in him.

Obama’s body stiffened, according to several witnesses, and he started to argue with them. If they wanted meaningful change, he said, they should focus their pressure on the Republicans in Congress who opposed reform, not on him. He was with them but could only do so much. “I am not a king,” he said.

No, he isn’t a king. But he does have control of one of the three branches of government and that branch is the one that has boosted deportations to higher levels than any previous administration. Congress has a lot to answer for, but this is all on the executive branch. It’s a very clumsy attempt at misdirection. These people are morons.

I’m guessing his thin-skinned response (well documented in other situations in the article as well) comes from his knowledge that they’re right — that his sensitivity to this particular kind of criticism shows that he knows he’s bargained away their cause in gestures of good will to opponents who take the concession and then laugh in his face. It must be galling to be reminded of that.

Read the whole article to get an idea of just how much the immigration activists have been given the run-around. It sounds as though the hardcore tactics that worked so well for the LGBT activists aren’t having the same effect. Of course, the LGBT community held out the threat of withholding their substantialcampaign donations which is guaranteed to strike true fear into the hearts of politicians. They’re back in the fold now that the president responded and (with the help of the joint chiefs of staff) got DADT repealed and has affirmed his personal support for gay marriage. The Hispanic community remains empty handed.

Update: Ooops. This is on the front page of the New York Times this morning:

The nation’s rapidly growing Latino population is one of the most powerful forces working in President Obama’s favor in many of the states that will determine his contest with Mitt Romney. But Latinos are not registering or voting in numbers that fully reflect their potential strength, leaving Hispanic leaders frustrated and Democrats worried as they increase efforts to rally Latino support.

Interviews with Latino voters across the country suggested a range of reasons for what has become, over a decade, an entrenched pattern of nonparticipation, ranging from a distrust of government to a fear of what many see as an intimidating effort by law enforcement and political leaders to crack down on immigrants, legal or not.

I guess their only hope is a return to the monarchy.

Update II: I should clarify that I obviously don’t actually know what the president is thinking about all this. I’m just speculating about why he might be thin-skinned about such criticism, based on my observation of human behavior over the past few decades. For all I know it’s something else entirely that makes him short tempered in these situations. But the result, the only thing we really have to go, remains the same.
.

So Rick Santorum said this today:

“I like the platform that we have now,” Santorum told host George Stephanopoulos on ABC’s “This Week.” “I’m concerned that Ron Paul and some of his supporters out there are looking for a platform fight, and I want to make sure we have strong, principled conservatives there who stood with me in our primary fight to go there and counterbalance the effect of the Paul folks.”

I think that calls for a round of applause for Adele Stan at Alternet, who saw this coming a while back when everyone else was still assuming that Ron was just angling for a Rand VP nom. She sketched out how the Paul delegates could force the choice on Romney at the convention, but then offered this up as a serious possibility:

So, falling short of some sort of Rand-a-palooza at the convention, what else might Paul win through his delegate-stacking exploits?

In 1996, Patrick J. Buchanan shocked the political world by winning the New Hampshire primary. Though he didn’t get very far in subsequent contests, he did accumulate enough delegates devoted to his far-right ideals to cause Republican nominee Sen. Bob Dole a major headache. It wasn’t until the eve of the convention that Buchanan announced he would not run a third-party challenge to Dole. In exchange, he won control of the party platform, which was largely written by Phyllis Schlafly, a Buchanan campaign co-chair, and Buchanan’s sister, Bay, who managed his campaign.

That may not sound like a lot, but it forced Dole to run in the general election on a platform that not only trumpeted an anti-abortion policy with no exceptions for rape or incest, but also called for U.S. withdrawal from U.N. forces and all sorts of other paranoid proclamations. (The seating of the Buchanan delegation also led to the booing from the convention floor of Gen. Colin Powell, then just retired from the armed forces.)

She went on to speculate about the possibility that they could take over the platform as Buchanan did and force Mitt to run in the fall explaining an isolationist or drug legalization Party platform.

That would be something.

.

Life is too damn short

by David Atkins

If you have 20 minutes to spare, you can listen to my interview on Angie Coiro’s In Deep radio show a few days ago to talk about Wisconsin, the Presidential race, and how abnormal we are as activists. The direct podcast link is here (my segment goes from minutes 20-40.)

Otherwise have a great Sunday, everyone. There’s going to be a heck of a fight gearing up to November, so get some rest and relaxation where it’s available. While our choices at the Presidential level may not be able to make things all that much better in the coming year, we can at least prevent them from getting much worse even as we fight to make things better at a local level.

Make sure you call and hang out with your friends and loved ones, too. I’ve been visiting a friend and lifelong progressive activist in hospice over the last few days, and I fear today may be his last. No matter how unjust and unequal things become, the Great Equalizer awaits us all, and all the money in the world can buy us somewhat better health and treatment, but no guarantees of extra time. More time with my friend is what I wish I had more than anything else right now. Life is too damn short to spend it all grousing about national politics in front of a computer screen.

.

Saturday Night at the Movies

Perpetual Political War

by digby

From Brainpickings:

The intersection of propaganda and creative culture has always been a centerpiece of political communication, from the branding of totalitarian regimes to the design legacy of the Works Progress Administration to Soviet animated propaganda. Now, from The Library of Congress — America’s most centralized collective memory — and Quirk Books comes Presidential Campaign Posters: Two Hundred Years of Election Art — a magnificent large-format volume of 100 tear-out, ready-to-frame political campaign posters from the Library of Congress archives, each contextualized by a short historical essay on the respective election, alongside its final electoral and popular vote statistics.

It’s interesting that Grant is depicted as a “working man” in that poster instead of a general, although he was both. You would have thought that his leadership was the big selling point but having Real American credentials has always been a big seller in our politics.

Brooks Gladstone does the preface and says something that rings very, very true:

The ultimate lesson of this collection is how choppy those waters are. Political art is nothing less than an illustration of the skirmishes and stalemates that created and continue to animate the American experiment. As you look at each poster and read about each campaign, it becomes increasingly clear that the tug of war over taxes and trade, the distribution of wealth and power, and the role of government itself, will never end.Every generation renews the battle and fights it again. And every time, political candidates borrow from past campaigns the lexicon of perpetual political war. It reverberates in the slogans and the speeches, the urgent need: for tax relief or social protections, for an active government or a dormant one, for war or peace, to stay the course or to change direction.

It’s taken me a long time to realize this. Progress is made, in fits and starts, but the fight is never over — especially in America which was founded on a particularly odious “Grand Bargain” that resulted in duelling cultures as much as political divisions. I suppose you could get depressed about that and bemoan the fact that your efforts haven’t resulted in the wholesale change you think they should, but I think it’s better to assume that as long as you keep fighting, the authoritarians and the plutocrats can’t ever entirely relax. That’s worth something. After all, as long as the fight continues, we can at least be sure they haven’t won it.

.

The wrong Grand Bargain

by digby

Ezra says:

At this point in George W. Bush’s administration, public-sector employment had grown by 3.7 percent. That would be equal to a bit over 800,000 jobs today. If you add those hypothetical jobs, the unemployment rate falls to 7.3 percent.

Now I realize that the presidency is nothing more than a ceremonial position in terms of domestic policy with no power to do anything but look pretty and passively sign bills that the congress sends to him, but I still think that comparison raises a question: did the Obama administration believe that they would be better rewarded in 2012 for being “responsible” about the deficit than they would be for bringing down unemployment? Or were they truly convinced that the private sector was doing so “fine” that they could do what the president announced in his 2011 State of the Union address and have it all:

Now, the final critical step in winning the future is to make sure we aren’t buried under a mountain of debt.

We are living with a legacy of deficit spending that began almost a decade ago. And in the wake of the financial crisis, some of that was necessary to keep credit flowing, save jobs, and put money in people’s pockets.

But now that the worst of the recession is over, we have to confront the fact that our government spends more than it takes in. That is not sustainable. Every day, families sacrifice to live within their means. They deserve a government that does the same.

So tonight, I am proposing that starting this year, we freeze annual domestic spending for the next five years. (Applause.) Now, this would reduce the deficit by more than $400 billion over the next decade, and will bring discretionary spending to the lowest share of our economy since Dwight Eisenhower was President.

This freeze will require painful cuts. Already, we’ve frozen the salaries of hardworking federal employees for the next two years. I’ve proposed cuts to things I care deeply about, like community action programs. The Secretary of Defense has also agreed to cut tens of billions of dollars in spending that he and his generals believe our military can do without. (Applause.)…

Starting in 2011, we are prepared to freeze government spending for three years. (Applause.) Spending related to our national security, Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security will not be affected. But all other discretionary government programs will. Like any cash-strapped family, we will work within a budget to invest in what we need and sacrifice what we don’t. And if I have to enforce this discipline by veto, I will. (Applause.) …

Now, I know that some in my own party will argue that we can’t address the deficit or freeze government spending when so many are still hurting. And I agree — which is why this freeze won’t take effect until next year — (laughter) — when the economy is stronger. That’s how budgeting works. (Laughter and applause.) But understand –- understand if we don’t take meaningful steps to rein in our debt, it could damage our markets, increase the cost of borrowing, and jeopardize our recovery -– all of which would have an even worse effect on our job growth and family incomes.

In fairness, he did also say that the government should do more to “win the future” by investing in innovation, education and infrastructure. And he also said the Bush tax cuts for millionaires should be allowed to expire. But that passage above was the opening ante in the Grand Bargain negotiations that were to come.

I would suppose that looking back they would prefer to have deficit reduction and 7.3% unemployment, but it turns out by embracing the former, they pretty much ensured they wouldn’t have the latter.

It’s not as if there weren’t people saying it at the time. And Mike Konzcal revisited it later in the year:

President Obama announced the freeze and veto threat, and didn’t sound alarm bells, because he believed that the potential risks associated with not signaling to the bond market that deficit reduction was coming outweighed the reality of high unemployment and trying to expand the deficit immediately. 20+ million people not finding full-time work with certainty is bad, but just the possibility of the confidence fairy getting angry is far worse.

This stands in for policy more generally, and it leads directly to all the failures of Grand Bargains and two-deficits cartwheels when it came to plans for dealing with the unemployment crisis. It splits the party between those who have to argue for bond vigilantes and those who have to argue against. The deficit hawkery negates the most powerful market indicator we have for what the government should do – the interest rate. This approach puts boundaries on the range of acceptable ideas on what can be done for the economy – and places getting stimulus out the door through discretionary spending, outside of Congress, out of bounds. And meanwhile current interest rates have never been lower – they are negative in real terms for 10 years out. This was exactly the wrong call to make in early 2010.

Yes it was.

.

The wingnut martyr of our time

by digby

Dear God, this is apparently a real thing you can buy:

(Who knew he had such shockingly short arms?)

Tbogg has the details:

Breitbart “Fight” Print (36×48″ Limited Edition Canvas)

Product Description

36″ x 48″ giclee on canvas, stretched and glazed (ONLY 43 numbered and artist autographed editions will be made available; when they’re gone, they’re gone!)

ARTIST: David Bugnon

When it came to the cause of truth, Andrew Breitbart was one in a million: a provocateur par excellence. America witnessed his combatant spirit up close and personal when he and Hannah Giles blew the cover off of ACORN.

Andrew would happily fight people, organizations and governments with tooth, fang and claw if he sensed any anti-American BS. David Bugnon’s piece captures Breitbart’s essence as a contrarian: confident and geared-up.

Make room on your wall for a limited edition reproduction of Bugnon’s painting. We should all emulate the moxie Andrew perfected for that which is just and true. Hang your print by the front door so as you depart your house and dive into the cultural trenches you will be ever mindful, thanks to Andrew’s example, that there are things worth scrapping for—and America’s founding documents are definitely one of them.

…and now, the punchline:

Price:
$3,999.95

First Dana Loesch started running around wearing a Breitbart t-shirt and screaming incoherently at rallies “Behaaave yourselves, stop raping people!” and then the Heritage Foundation created the Breitbart Awards. Now this. I’m thinking we have the making of a full-fledged religion.

.

Are they killing us with pleasure or fear?

by digby

If you’ve got some time to spare this week-end do yourself a favor and watch the discussion below between Bill Moyers and Marty Kaplan:

MARTY KAPLAN: Push journalism is the old days, which seem no longer to apply in the era of the internet, in which an editor, a gatekeeper, says, “Here’s the package which you need to know.” All of that is ancient history now.

Instead, now, it’s all driven by what the consumer is pulling. And if the consumer says, “I want ice cream all the time.” And whether that ice cream is Lindsay Lohan, or the latest crime story, that’s what’s delivered. And as long as it’s being pulled, that’s what is being provided. So it’s quite possible that in the U.S., the calculation was made that the crisis in Europe and the head of Italy would not be a cover that one could use. But that pet friendships would be the sort of thing that would fly off the newsstand.

BILL MOYERS: So the reader is determining what we get from the publication?

MARTY KAPLAN: On a minute by minute basis, stories that the reader’s interested in immediately go to the top of the home page. There are actually pieces of software that give editorial prominence to stuff that people by voting with their clickers have said is of interest to them. No one is there to intervene and say, “Wait a minute, that story is just too trivial to occupy more than this small spot below the fold.” Instead, the audience’s demand is what drives the placement and the importance of journalistic content.

BILL MOYERS: So George Orwell anticipated a state as big brother, hovering over us, watching us, keeping us under surveillance, taking care of our needs as long as we repaid them with utter loyalty. Aldous Huxley anticipated a Brave New World in which we were amusing ourselves to death. Who’s proving the most successful prophet? Huxley or Orwell?

MARTY KAPLAN: Well, I think Huxley is probably right, as Neil Postman said in—

BILL MOYERS: The sociologist, yes.

MARTY KAPLAN: –in Amusing Ourselves to Death. That there’s no business but show business. And we are all equally guilty, because it’s such fun to be entertained. So you don’t need big brother, because we already have big entertainment.

BILL MOYERS: And the consequences of that?

MARTY KAPLAN: That we are as in Brave New World, always in some kind of stupor. We have continual partial attention to everything and tight critical attention on nothing.

That sounds like my life alright …

It’s a fascinating discussion about the media’s role in our current plight. The tsunami of money that’s drowning us is pulling it down too.

But I highlighted the above because I think it’s an interesting question, which Moyers posed on his site:

In his book “Amusing Ourselves To Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business,” the late media critic Neil Postman compares two dystopian futures — one, imagined by George Orwell in his book 1984, in which the government maintains its control by keeping us under constant surveillance; the other, conceived by Aldous Huxley in Brave New World, in which citizens are kept happy enough to never put up a fight:

“We were keeping our eye on 1984. When the year came and the prophecy didn’t, thoughtful Americans sang softly in praise of themselves. The roots of liberal democracy had held. Wherever else the terror had happened, we, at least, had not been visited by Orwellian nightmares.

But we had forgotten that alongside Orwell’s dark vision, there was another – slightly older, slightly less well known, equally chilling: Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. Contrary to common belief even among the educated, Huxley and Orwell did not prophesy the same thing. Orwell warns that we will be overcome by an externally imposed oppression. But in Huxley’s vision, no Big Brother is required to deprive people of their autonomy, maturity and history. As he saw it, people will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think.

What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny “failed to take into account man’s almost infinite appetite for distractions”. In 1984, Huxley added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us.”

If you click over, you can vote for which one you think was more prophetic.

.