Digby's Hullabaloo Posts

Charlie Brown Politics

by digby

Glenn Greenwald has a depressing post up about the Democratic retreat on Michael Hayden:

But by and large, what happened yesterday with Gen. Hayden’s nomination is exactly what would have happened in 2002 and 2003. Democrats are afraid to challenge the President due to their fear — always due to their fear — that they will be depicted as mean, obstructionist and weak on national security. And so, even with an unbelievable weakened President, and even with regard to the most consequential issues — and can one doubt that installing Gen. Hayden as CIA Director is consequential? — Democrats back away from fights, take no clear position, divide against each other, and stand up for exactly nothing.
cimply
It is quite possible that Democrats would not have been able to stop Gen. Hayden’s nomination. It is true that they are still in the minority and thus are limited in what they can achieve legislatively. But that’s really irrelevant. Gen. Hayden is a symbol and one of the chief instruments and advocates of the administration’s lawlessness. He refused to say in his testimony even whether he would even comply with the law. Opposing his nomination is both compelled by a principled belief in the rule of law as well as justified by the important political opportunity to highlight this administration’s lawbreaking. Sen. Feingold, as usual, shows how this works:

The Democrats who voted against the nomination were Russell D. Feingold of Wisconsin, Ron Wyden of Oregon and Evan Bayh of Indiana. Each cited concerns about General Hayden’s role in a controversial domestic surveillance program he ran while head of the National Security Agency.

“I am not convinced that the nominee respects the rule of law and Congress’s oversight responsibilities,” Mr. Feingold said.

In other words, there are serious questions about whether Gen. Hayden will comply with the law and whether he believes in the rule of law, so perhaps it’s not a good idea to install him as CIA Director. Is there some reason Democrats were afraid to make that clear, straightforward, critically important point?

Glenn answered that question in his first paragraph. National security has the Democrats so spooked they are paralyzed and for some reason they don’t seem to understand that every time they retreat they look like they are frightened of their shadows — and thus appear to the American people to be incapable of protecting the country. And what’s depressing is that their primary political concern can be rather easily alleviated by doing the right thing and standing up for their principles. George Bush has no credibility. Perhaps some people don’t grasp the significance of the illegal wiretapping per se, but they are certainly open to argument if someone would care to make one. It’s not as if they trust this president to make good decisions.

More importantly, for electoral purposes, the Democrats simply have to show that they are willing to fight this weakened unpopular president or people will see no point in kicking the bums out — and certainly will not believe that the Dems are capable of taking on someone of real strength. As bad as it was in 2002 and 2003, how pathetic is it that the the Democrats rubber stamping Bush when he’s at 29%? How unpopular do his policies have to get before Democrats take the side of the majority?

Glenn goes on to speculate about the future and sees that there is not likely to be a whole lot of action on these matters going forward, even if we win. And that is my great fear, too. The Democrats have the GOP snake by the neck but I’m pretty sure they don’t have the nerve to kill it. And that is a huge mistake as has been demonstrated over and over again for the last 30 years.

Here’s Robert Parry discussing the last time we had a chance to follow up and knock off the criminal element:

My book, Secrecy & Privilege, opens with a scene in spring 1994 when a guest at a White House social event asks Bill Clinton why his administration didn’t pursue unresolved scandals from the Reagan-Bush era, such as the Iraqgate secret support for Saddam Hussein’s government and clandestine arms shipments to Iran.

Clinton responds to the questions from the guest, documentary filmmaker Stuart Sender, by saying, in effect, that those historical questions had to take a back seat to Clinton’s domestic agenda and his desire for greater bipartisanship with the Republicans.

Clinton “didn’t feel that it was a good idea to pursue these investigations because he was going to have to work with these people,” Sender told me in an interview. “He was going to try to work with these guys, compromise, build working relationships.”

Clinton’s relatively low regard for the value of truth and accountability is relevant again today because other centrist Democrats are urging their party to give George W. Bush’s administration a similar pass if the Democrats win one or both houses of Congress.

Reporting about a booklet issued by the Progressive Policy Institute, a think tank of the Democratic Leadership Council, the Washington Post wrote, “these centrist Democrats … warned against calls to launch investigations into past administration decisions if Democrats gain control of the House or Senate in the November elections.”

These Democrats also called on the party to reject its “non-interventionist left” wing, which opposed the Iraq War and which wants Bush held accountable for the deceptions that surrounded it.

“Many of us are disturbed by the calls for investigations or even impeachment as the defining vision for our party for what we would do if we get back into office,” said pollster Jeremy Rosner, calling such an approach backward-looking. [Washington Post, May 10, 2006]

I urge you to read the whole article. It shows just what a massive failure it was on the part of Democrats and Clinton not to follow through. Unsurprisingly, the Republicans didn’t see this “let bygones be bygones” attitude as anything but weakness. Clinton was rewarded with a partisan impeachment for his trouble.

This issue perfectly defines the real argument between the netroots and the establishment. We want to engage the opposition head on and they simply refuse. It is not about policy, although there is plenty to discuss on that count. It is about enabling criminal, radical, undemocratic politics to go unchecked in the name of some sort of bipartisan comity that only Joe Lieberman and his friends at the Democratic Leadership Council believe still exists. It’s about not letting Lucy pull the football away again.

It’s true that we are a vanguard at the moment, but this new media technology makes it far easier for a vanguard to become a movement than it used to and we have the momentum. What is happening in Connecticut is the canary in the coal mine if these establishment types care to actually see it instead of flailing about incoherently that leftists are ruining their party like it’s 1968 and we’re all on acid.

Glenn thinks that here in our blogospheric bubble it appears that things are changing when they aren’t. I have to disagree a bit with that. It’s true that the blogospheric bubble often gives the false impression that there is more momentum on our side than there actually is. I suspect that true inside any movement or campaign where you spend most of your time with fellow travellers. But that doesn’t mean things aren’t changing. We are now a factor. They may hate us, fear us and dismiss us, but we’re here and we aren’t going anywhere. (Say it loud, I’m blog and I’m proud!)

Rick Perlstein noted in the discussion of “Before The Storm” and the conservative movement last week-end at Firedoglake that history is complicated, it moves like a battleship. Things aren’t going to turn around overnight. But we are beginning to affect the way the media sees itself and we are putting political pressure on the party. This is how change is made. We’ll ride all their asses like Zorro until they get the message. We’re in for the long haul.

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Bravo

by digby

A Hullabaloo reader’s letter was published in the New York Times today:

To the Editor:

Re “For Clintons, Delicate Dance of Married and Public Lives” (front page, May 23):

I’m not quite sure what to make of your report about Bill and Hillary Clinton’s marriage as provided by anonymous experts.

What I do know is that I’ll be looking forward to the same thorough reporting into the marriages of other presidential hopefuls, like John McCain and Rudolph W. Giuliani, including “interviews with some 50 people and a review of their respective activities.”

I assume that those critical investigations will be prominently placed in The Times as well; I’d really hate to miss them.

V.L.
New York, May 23, 2006

Thank you!

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It Was Just A Matter of Time

by digby

… before Lou Dobbs went full-on racist on the immigration question. Liberal Oasis has the story:

Today on “Lou Dobbs Tonight,” CNN ran a graphic sourced to the Council of Conservative Citizens, a group deemed to have a “white supremacy” ideology according to the Anti-Defamation League.

During a piece about illegal immigrants in Utah, reporter Casey Wian said, “Utah is also part of the territory some militant Latino activists refer to as Aztlan, the portion of the southwest United States they claim rightfully belongs to Mexico.”

The CCC is a well known neo-confederate group that is the direct heir to the White Citizens Councils of the Jim Crow south. Trent Lott probably would have kept his leadership post had it not been for a previous scandal featuring him and the CCC which caused quite a furor in 1999:

By Charles Pope, CQ staff writer
February 2, 1999, 11:52AM. EST

The last thing Trent Lott needs is another controversy with staying power.

But floating around the Senate majority leader is a storm that has been rumbling for weeks, fueled by race, partisan politics and, most of all, the weather-makers at the Council of Conservative Citizens and its leader, Gordon Lee Baum.

The council claims 15,000 members nationally and has an active chapter in Republican Lott’s home state of Mississippi, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, which studies hate groups. The law center and other critics characterize the council’s agenda as racist and white supremacist; at least one member of the Republican National Committee has called the group “unsavory.”

It is, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, “the reincarnation of the racist white Citizens Councils” that became a potent political force in the 1950s in the South to fight integration. Moreover, the law center concludes the council is “shot through with white supremacist views, members and political positions.”

Baum and other leaders vigorously dispute those labels, but writings in council publications have likened interracial marriage to white genocide and suggested that Abraham Lincoln was elected by communists.

It is not the type of group to which a national politician like Lott wants to be linked. But linked he is, despite repeated efforts to distance himself from the group and claims he was not aware of their views.

When these things happen nobody, it seems, are aware of the CCC’s views. I am sure that Lou Dobbs will say the same. He’s only a credentialed journalist, after all. You can’t expect him to have nose for racist propaganda.

This certainly does bring up an interesting question for me, however. I never thought of the CCC as being a white supremecist organization in the mode of say “Stormfront” or something like that. It’s a neo-confederate group which is certainly racist but organized explicitly around hatred of African-Americans. The fact that they are touting the ridiculous Aztlan “threat” puts the lie to any claims that this immigration debate isn’t being fueled by racism. (Not that that’s a big surprise.)

When you go back to those articles I linked above to the CCC scandal back in 1999, there is a clear desire on the part of the institutional GOP to back away from any association with these people. The party was very, very anxious to shed its racist image. Some of these articles even applaud the end of the southern strategy. Yet here it comes again. This time it’s the “aliens” rather than the blacks, but it’s the same old drill.

It is a sign of Republican weakness this time. They should not have to be shoring up their base with this tired old stuff. But their racist base is restive, looking for a fight, wanting to kick someone’s ass to account for their own feelings of impotence in a complicated world. (Same old shit.) The leadership knows it is a losing long term strategy but they’re left with nothing else.

Lou Dobbs pops an aneurysm any time somebody says that this debate might just be a teensy bit racist. I would suggest that any time someone goes on his show they mention that only a racist would use information from the CCC, the progeny of the White Citizen’s Councils, and not recognize it for what it is.

Here’s the contact info for CNN.

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The Discreet, Measured Tone Of The Right

by tristero

Occasionally, I get taken to the carpet for my angry tone. Occasionally, the person complaining is right, but most of the time they’re not. And here’s why.

The unprincipled fuck in the video at the link gets paid to compare a Vice President of the United States to a Nazi propagandist (and notice: no one tells him he’s gone “too far,” no one tries to interrupt what he’s saying; this is considered reasonable discourse on Fox News). And why does this shithead get paid to do such a thing? It’s not because he believes it. He knows he’s spouting bullshit. No, this asshole gets paid to say things like that because he knows Gore’s argument is good and he can’t attack it on his merits.

Now, you may respond that calling this unprincipled fuck an “unprincipled fuck” simply perpetuates his sin or worse, that I don’t have any way to attack his position on its merits.

You’re 100% right about your first objection. It does perpetuate a pithecanthropic level of discourse for a very good reason: there is no possible way to avoid doing so without being a total fool. You think you can “politely engage” someone who compares an American vice-president who served his country honorably for 8 years – not to mention his previous services to America in government – to a Nazi? You can’t, or rather, you shouldn’t. Nor can you ignore it (although the vice-president should). The terms of engagement have been set by this slimeball – the rhetorical battle-field must always be level. There is no higher ground and attempts to claim it will lead to your destruction (see Daschle, Tom for details).

As for that second objection you could make, well I gotta admit it: you are right once again. I do have no way to attack his position on his merits, again for a very good reason. What he is discussing is not Gore’s ideas or global climate change. No, what he’s talking about, the only subject is, “how exactly comparable is Al Gore to Josef Goebbels” and I will not dignify this scumbag’s comparison by explaining in measured, avuncular tones why such a comparison is, and I hesitate timidly before saying it, “unfortunate?” There is no way to attack his position on the merits because there is no merit to his position. And he knows it.

If this is how the right wants to discuss Gore’s movie, I’m ready. And I’m not gonna deplore the low level they’ve set. I’ll simply meet them, tit for tat. Oh, yes, I can give people the facts, too. But this isn’t about facts, but something else. And those who come to Gore’s defense in the media over the next few weeks have to be prepared truly to engage that “something else” and do a good job of it before facts can have a chance of being heard. And yes, if Sterling Burnett’s appearance is any indication, it will be ugly, and not in a good way.*

Hat tip to Atrios for the link.

*And no, I’m not simply referring to Burnett’s Hot Or Not? prospects: that would be cruel. I’m referring only to what he said. On that basis alone, he would score a 0; his rugged manly (if you’re a chickenhawk) looks could only raise his hotness quotient.

[Edited slightly after original posting. Spelling error in Burnett’s last name corrected (thank you HC in comments). Spelling of “pithecanthropic” corrected (thak you “u…” in comments. )]

Winning

by digby

Matt Yglesias subbing for Marshall at TPM makes the point that despite the fact that Democrat William Jefferson is obviously a crook, he’s just a run of the mill free lance criminal rather than being part of a criminal syndicate like Tom DeLay and Duke Cunningham. This is true and Democrats have a right to make this distinction and should.

But I think the most important thing about all this culture of corruption stuff isn’t who benefits from it as a rhetorical device in upcoming political campaigns. What’s important is that the GOP machine be broken up into little pieces.

I like the “culture of corruption” as a rhetorical frame, and frankly I think it’s probably working quite well. I wrote about this some time back: images are far easier to stick on political opponents if they fit in with preconceived notions of how their side tends to work. Democrats tend to be concerned with issues that affect the weaker members of society and are therefore more easily tarred as “soft.” It’s why the Republicans have always found it easy to win in times of perceived danger — and if we aren’t in times of perceived danger, they’ll create danger out of whole cloth. (Sex is a threat to civilization!)

Republicans tend to look after those with wealth and power and are therefore more easily tarred as greedy and crooked. I’m glad the Republicans gave us such an easy frame for our congressional elections. But I’m even happier that they were so transparently corrupt that even a Republican justice department couldn’t ignore it.

That K Street Project was going to kill us. If the Republicans had played it cool they could have fashioned an impermeable national political machine that could have locked us out for decades. Fortunately, they are greedy and stupid and couldn’t keep themselves from stealing while still in office.

The long term health of our democracy and the long term health of our party required that this machine be shut down. Whether they can effectively frame this as a bipartisan problem or not the truth is, regardless of their hype, this was the GOP’s baby all the way and it has been irreparably damaged. No matter what happens in the fall, in a larger respect we have already won.

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Uncivil Liberties

by digby

Here’s a great post by Glenn Greenwald in which he proves that the pollution of our political discourse can be simply defined as anyone publicly disagreeing with Republicans:

So, that’s the behavioral standard that Bush followers are advocating. The greatest sin against civility is to boo someone while they give a political speech, and those who do that show that they are deranged and “angry” and are therefore acting at their own peril.

[…]

According to Instapundit — who cited the Gateway Pundit post and said that “a Hateful anti-war speech by Rep. Lacy Clay (D-MO) . . . provokes a near riot” — this episode “[s]eems to illustrate the point made in this WSJ editorial about the Democrats’ penchant for self-marginalization and self-destruction.” The WSJ Editorial to which Instapundit cited condemned the heckling and booing by the New School students of McCain’s speech. But to Instapundit, that same Editorial also shows that Democrats are acting stupidly and angrily when they give commencement speeches and are heckled by Republican students to the point where they need security to be escorted out.

Can’t win for losing. But you must admit that it’s heartwarming for the concern trolls to be so worried about the Democratic penchant for self-marginalization. But when your president is at 29%, you’ve probably got some people closer to home who need some of your good advice about how to avoid self-destruction.

The right has been thuggish and uncivil for decades. And they are very good at smirking faux outrage at the other side doing anything comparable. They call for the smelling salts with such over-the-top fluttering of delicate little hands and eyelashes that you have to laugh. Elephants in a tutu. It’s a parody.

This is one case where I think we just have to play the game they’ve set out. I’ll match my outrage to their outrage any day. It’s not particularly pleasant, but blogs are an appropriate place to do this sort of thing in a way that nobody else can.

So bring it. You want examples of incivility? I’ll give you examples. How about this:

Is the Democratic Party the “Party of Death”?

If you look at their agenda they are.

IT’S NOT JUST abortion-on-demand. It’s euthanasia, embryo destruction, even infanticide—and a potentially deadly concern with “the quality of life” of disabled people. If you think these issues don’t concern you—guess again. The Party of Death could be roaring into the White House, as National Review senior editor Ramesh Ponnuru shows, in the person of Hillary Rodham Clinton.

In The Party of Death, Ponnuru details how left-wing radicals, using abortion as their lever, took over the Democratic Party—and how they have used their power to corrupt our law and politics, abolish our fundamental right to life, and push the envelope in ever more dangerous directions.

[…]

Ponnuru’s shocking exposé shows just how extreme the Party of Death has become as they seek to destroy every inconvenient life, demand fealty to their radical agenda, and punish anyone who defies them. But he also shows how the tide is turning, how the Party of Death can be defeated, and why its last victim might be the Democratic Party itself.*

This from a highly regarded conservative intellectual who supported the violent killing of thousands of actual living Iraqi children for no good reason. I call that uncivil in the extreme.

*Ponnuru claims that this book jacket doesn’t reflect the actual theme of the book which is that the Party of Death isn’t really the Democratic party, but rather some other non-partisan death party, which doesn’t actually exist. Right.

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Desperate Lightweights

by digby

Did you know that the Democrats have to “root, root, root” for material to beat the Republicans? Via Peter Daou, The Note Says so:

“As is always the case with the out-of-power party, Democrats have to root root root for bad news. And no bad news source is better for the Democrats’ election prospects than the bad news from Iraq.”

It doesn’t seem to me as if the Dems have to do anything but sit on their asses and eat freedom fries; the bad news is falling from sky like rain. It’s everywhere you look. So why does the voice of DC conventional wisdom portray the political situation as the Democrats feverishly trying to dig up dirt?

Well, that would be the first step in framing the upcoming election as the Democrats unfairly smearing Republicans. It’s quite predictable, really. The derisive coverage of Democratic infighting, the constant refrain that the people will have to hold their noses to vote for Democrats, and now the cranking up of the trivia and tabloid machine, I think it’s quite clear that we are not going to have any easier ride with the mainstream media than we ever had.

No matter how much the GOP destroys the country, the media, for whatever reason, continues its assault on Democrats. We are going to have our hands full for the next two years — and if we win, for the forseeable future. Nothing has changed except for adding the “angry left” meme to the established narrative of Democratic triviality, mental instability and immorality.

Imagine how well this narrative will serve Republicans in the upcoming elections this fall and in 2008: Yes, the country has problems. Yes, they need fixing. But the Democrats are frivolous lightweights who will mire the nation in tabloid scandals and silly personality issues and aren’t we all sick of that? Do we need yet more of this tiring partisanship? (Pssst. By the way, did you hear about Russ Feingold’s divorce? Biden’s personality defects? No? Well, pull up a chair, Ken Mehlman faxed over this hilarious …)

By contrast John Mccain/Rudy Giuliani/George Allen/whomever are maverick GOP tough guy outsiders who will knock some heads together on both sides and get things done. The looney, scandalous Democrats simply aren’t serious enough to run things.

Reader Kay, in the comments below, puts it this way:

Whatever my problems with President Clinton pale in comparison with the insanity that stalked his presidency from the right using an apparently lobotomized national media and the malignant incompentence that has follwed it.

While the GOP masters of this slight-of-hand game never quite succeeded in stealing Clinton’s presidency and bringing him down personally, they did manage to make off with the 2000 election, the Congress, and any serious debate about issues that actually matter. You can make a pretty good case that the Ken Starr driven tabloidization of the Clinton presidency drowned out the discussion of terrorism that we ought to have had in the late 90’s.

But I agree completely that this is not about the Clintons. HillBill is their easiest target, sure. Because of the familiar “storyline,” Hillary can be attacked for all of Bill’s shortcomings while being simultaneously measured unfavorably against his talents and virtues. It’s a triple play when used against Hillary, distraction, personal attack and professional minimalization.

So it’s easier and it’s deadlier for her but this type of “concerned” investigation is part and parcel of a GOP meme that the media adores for its “entertainment” value.

It might be worse if Hillary really runs for president but even if she decides to stay home and bake cookies, this crap will not go away — we will just get some other form of tabloid political analysis shoved down our throats. Did John marry Theresa for love or money? Did you hear he shot himself to win one of those purple hearts? Did Murtha too? How embarassed was Tipper by that too mushy to be real kiss at the convention? (Remember? I know they do.) Did Al start embellishing the truth (you know… inventing the internet and all) to impress his remote, unloving dad? Did Elizabeth Edwards really beg John to stay home with their family in her trying time? (You know he ran off to politics just after another family crisis. Nudge, wink.)

If everything goes according to plan, some fledgling Joe Klein will write a “hip insider” novel explaining the psychological shortcomings of whomever (oops… entirely fictional person who just happens to resemble the nominee) the Democrats eventually nominate.

So just forget Hillary and pretend that the same article was written Feingold’s unmarried status or why Mrs. Dean stays in Vermont. This is really all an entirely different overly familiar storyline from the GOP called alternately “family values” or “character matters.” It is now, just as it once was, GOP-wingnut strategy writ large by a lazy and complicit media.

Democrats, you see, don’t really have families, marriages, true friends, career accomplishments or character. If they appear to have any of those things, there must be, say the wingnutters, a devious ruse that requires endless investigation and liberal doses of unsubstantiated “fun” gossip. If the press is slow on the uptake, they fill the air with innuendo and “everybody knows…” whispers until the press catches on.

All that “fun” stuff can distract us from tedious discussions about war, torture, health care, privacy rights, global warming, competent national security, and staggering budget deficits. God forbid that the right be held in an honest debate about any of that stuff — Joe six pack might get bored or (worse) learn something.

I suspect that if this is not challenged vociferously right now, the press will guide the public to listen to the serious political discussion that the serious Republicans will wage among themselves over the next two years. The Democrats, however, will be relegated to celebrity gossip and cheap armchair psychoanalysis — even if we win in the fall. The political debate will, once more, be between the right and the far right.

Update: This is sort of funny. I interpreted “root, root, root” to mean “dig” which is bad enough. But upon reflection, I see they clearly meant that Democrats are rooting for death and destruction in Iraq which is just outrageous.

I guess we can add incomprehensibly sadistic to our tabloid reputations. Good to know.

Update II: Check out Greg Sargent’s The Horse’s Mouth’s take on the Clinton NY Times Story. This blog is devoted to analyzing the press and Sargent is unsparing; it will be worth keeping an eye on.

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Right Wing Hack Mark Steyn Lifts In Part From Linguist Geoff Pullum’s Post

by tristero

Thanks, PZ, for turning me on to this most amusing post.* To add to the amusement, Steyn had to resort to plagiariz…sorry, “borrowing,” merely to diss the style of author Dan Brown. Talk about being lazy! Pundit Steyn even paraphrased – and poorly – the famous title of the original source, “Renowned author Dan Brown staggered through his formulaic opening sentence.”

(Special note to less-than-quick-on-the-draw-but-who-think-they’re-really-geniuses- rightwing readers: No kidding? You noticed my own careless deployment of anarthrous occupational nominal premodifiers? Whoa, are you sharp!)

* And PZ, I loved reading about the evolution of whale morphology, too, and think I got the basic points, even if many of the details were beyond my immediate knowledge. But as it happens, I wrote the music for the whale evolution section of the PBS Evolution series, so some of the issues were familiar. Fascinating stuff.

Shorts

by tristero

[Update: Tip of the prop to Steve Silberman, the author of the Wired article discussed below, who is participating in the discussion in comments. Thanks so much for taking the time to do so! He also corrected some information about the legal status of model rocket engines that I misremembered from his article (it was not in front of me), which I appreciate. Sorry to have misrepresented it.

I was thrilled to hear from from a longtime model rocketeer, who will be attending the National Sport Launch in Waco, TX this weekend. He wrote to inform me that there has been a significant increase in the number of women involved in the sport, which is great news. I’m hoping I can persuade him to write a little bit about his experience down in Waco!

Finally, I’d like to address the issue of mandatory vaccination against cervical cancer, which came up in comments. If – a big if – the cervical vaccine is as safe and as effective as is claimed, then it is immoral – no, make that evil – not to require the widest possible vaccination of youngsters. Period. That protecting your child from cancer has become a political football for the rightwing is simply beyond belief.

Of course, if there are serious reasons not to vaccinate an individual child – eg certain medical conditions, for example – there should be available some mechanism for opting out. But there are ways of creating an opt-out without indulging the rightwing’s perverse desire to place the lives of their children in danger’s way from this kind of now-preventable cancer.

As far as I know, however, there may be some scientists who are urging commonsense, but there are no serious plans to mandate vaccination in the US, nor will there be, for the simple reason that ignorant rightwing creates will create too much of a fuss. The lack of a mandatory vaccination program doesn’t make such neglect any less evil simply because a large part of the presently acceptable cultural discourse has been hijacked by crazy people. This campaign against a non-existent mandatory vaccination program is merely a way to limit, as much as possible, the distribution of the vaccine to those who, if they knew about it, would insist upon having their children protected from a ghastly, deadly cancer.

The only conclusion I can reach from this is that the evilosity of the right knows no bounds. Even children are endangered by their idiocy? Yes, even children.]

Cervical Cancer Vaccine – The Times has an article that mentions the rightwing opposition to the wide distribution of a truly astounding vaccine that could seriously reduce the incidence of cervical cancer. I discussed this recently in the War On Fucking series. If ever there was an issue in which the utterly evil stupidity of the rightwing agenda is exposed for what it truly is, this is it. No genuinely serious system of moral values could ever justify a campaign to minimize the distribution, if not the outright witholding, of a significantly important life-saving medicine from a child (which is the best time for this vaccine to be administered). For most of us, this is a given. But not for the extreme right of Dobson, Robertson, and their numerous allies in the Bush administration. It would be extremely interesting to get Bush himself on record as to what he thinks should be done.

The War On Brains – Wired magazine has an article in the current issue (not yet online) about the increasing discouragement of real science opportunities for kids. Chemical sets, which were once boxes filled with wonder and (carefully circumscribed) danger, have been emasculated due to liability concerns. And some scientific supply houses have undergone extensive harassment, all in the name of fighting terrorism of course, in order to shake out information on who orders what chemicals and when.

The upshot is that it is becoming increasingly difficult for smart kids to get hands-on experience in chemistry and other sciences. And under the Bush administration, it is becoming near hopeless. As Wired explains it, the problem is not only that it deprives many of our children of a wonderful hobby, but that it seriously stunts the educational development of scientists, who should learn to “speak” chemistry – by doing chemistry – as young as possible. Nearly every scientist I know traces their interest, not surprisingly, to a childhood fascination with their science toys. Yes, there are potential dangers with some of this stuff but the article responds “So what?” and makes a good case.

This fear of science has been taken to ludicrous extremes by political opposition (Schumer, among others) which has led to attempts to ban the sale of model rocket engines. I’ll have more on this later when I’ve had a chance to do more research, but it seems as if the article is mistaken [UPDATE: Not so, see Steve Silberman’s discussion in comments for details], that model rocket engines aren’t being banned exactly, but some legal things are still being left up in the air -so to speak. The larger point of the article, tho, is right on: This country should be doing everything possible to encourage scientific curiousity and experimentation among our kids, not finding excuses to lock up bicarbonate and vinegar so that a science teacher has to check the stuff out whenever he wants to do a demo. Given our shameful ignorance of science and its methods, this is close to being a serious national emergency.

As I said, more later. I think model rocketry is a very important subject – recreationally, educationally, culturally, and politically – which deserves more attention than it’s received.

Christianism – Due to some other stuff, I missed out on my regular sojourn amongst the blogs last week and learned that Andrew Sullivan recently suggested the use of the term “Christianism” to denote the political ideology that makes use of Christian symbolism.

Dave Neiwert credits me with the original coinage of the term three years ago, and links to this post from back then. Not quite, which I’ll explain in a second. But it’s the larger issue that needs to be emphasized:

There is a difference in kind between religious belief and politics that hides behind religious belief to escape criticism. Whether you call such politicians “Christianists” or “Dominionists” as Dave Neiwert suggests isn’t terribly important, I think.

What is crucially important is that such a distinction be drawn. The christianists have co-opted not only the symbols of Christianity but have succeeded in forcing the media to mislabel their political behavior as “Christian.” Thus, we hear about “Christian values” such as opposition to the teaching of science, which have nothing whatsoever to do with the religion that worships Christ as Savior. Christianists, of course, are free to call themselves whatever they like. But there is no excuse for permitting them to hijack the term “Christian” for their specific political purposes, let alone the symbols of that religion.

Regarding coinage of the term, according to William Safire, Andrew Sullivan first used the term “Christianism” 1 day before I did. For the record, I never read, and still haven’t read, Sullivan’s post. (He’s not on my list to read, which is long enough, thank you very much. In fact, I doubt I’ve read more than two or three of his posts, total.) While I’m quite sure I used the term online before that post, I don’t care that much about priority to bother to search it out. (Besides, as Safire’s article points out, the word goes back to Milton.)

What I did do regularly, and what I still do regularly, is discuss the importance of calling christianists to account for their hijacking of religion – Dave and I had an interesting discussion about it, which he mentions in his post, and I initiated others as well. I gather Sullivan just used the term and dropped it – like I said, I have no idea what he writes or says.

If, by pushing the term “christianist” I helped some folks distinguish between genuine religious devotion and cynical political activism hidden under the skirts of priests, then I am glad. But my efforts are minor compared to the work of many priests, ministers, rabbis, mullahs, and other devoutly religious people who have been struggling for decades – often futiliely – with a concerted right wing assault on their congregations and institutions.

Stars

by tristero

As Digby mentioned, the tale of Iran forcing Jews, et al to wear distinctive clothing or badges is apparently false. It seems to have been concocted by American rightwing propagandists and has no basis in fact.

On the other hand, Operation Red Scare, in which the Santa Rosa Junior College Republicans posted Red Stars on the doors of professors they identified as advocating communism is true.