Digby's Hullabaloo Posts

Christian Soldiers

Maybe I’ve missed it, but with all the hoohah on TV about Robertson putting out a hit on Hugo Chavez today, I haven’t heard much in the coverage about him putting out hits on the supreme court and the State Department (“Maybe we need a very small nuke thrown off on Foggy Bottom to shake things up”) earlier this year.

I don’t know that any of Robertson’s followers literally believe they are the instruments of God, but let’s just say you don’t have to have a crazed imagination to think that one or two just might. And as much as the media seems to be trying to portray old Pat as some sort of a has-been, he still has a very large following.

January 2005:

The 700 Club’s average daily audience, according to AC Nielsen’s November sweeps, is up 26% over last year. At a time when most daily shows are struggling The 700 Club is experiencing tremendous increases. November’s average daily audience of 922,000 households is the highest in ten years and we experienced the same success in October and November.

The Barna Group, which does in depth polling on Christian issues, says:

( Mar 14, 2005) The reshaping of Americans’ lives is evident in various facets of their life, including the spiritual dimension. A new nationwide survey conducted by The Barna Group indicates that while 56% of adults attend church services in a typical month, a much larger percentage is exposed to religious information and experiences through various forms of media. Radio and television are the most popular Christian media, but faith-related Internet sites as well as religious magazines, newspapers and books also enjoy significant exposure.

[…]

The percentage of adults who watch Christian television programming has remained unchanged since 1992, with an estimated 45% tuning in to a Christian program during a typical month. Relatively few adults (7%) watch Christian television on a daily basis. About four out of ten adults (41%) never watch such programming.

Christian television draws its strength from people in their 60s and older, females, residents of the South, African-Americans, people with limited education and income, and born again Christians. Two-thirds of the born again population views Christian programming each month, which is more than double the proportion of non-born again adults (30%) who follow that pattern. The segments of the public least likely to watch Christian TV include mainline Protestants, Catholics, unchurched people, Asian-Americans and college graduates.

A rather large number of Americans watch Christian TV. An increasing number of them get their news from this media. Pat Robertson, whose 700 Club appears more than once a day on Disney owned Family Channel, is the most popular of all…and he’s a lunatic spreading hate and violence to people who are very susceptible to his message. It’s only a matter of time.

This media is an unofficial adjunct of the GOP and an extremely important cog in their evangelical political machine. I can’t tell you how much I’m enjoying watching Republicans squirm as they try to distance themselves from this ass today. Has anyone seen or heard any response from the other big names on the Christian Right?

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Every Loss Is A Win

(Or, a dead soldier is like a dollar in the bank … the Bank of Political Capital.)

Poputonian from Kidding on the Square wrote me this e-mail which I found quite insightful. With his permission, I’m posting it here:

On February 20, 2003, exactly one month before the United States invaded Iraq, Norman Mailer spoke these words before the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco:

Terrorism and instability are the reverse face of Empire. If the Saudi rulers have been afraid of their mullahs for fear of their power to incite terrorists, what will the Muslim world be like once we, the Great Satan, are there to dominate the Middle East in person?

Since the administration can hardly be unaware of the dangers, the answer comes down to the unhappy likelihood that Bush and Company are ready to be hit by a major terrorist attack, as well as any number of smaller ones. Either way, it will strengthen his hand. America will gather about him again. We can hear his words in advance: “Good Americans died today. Innocent victims of evil had to shed their blood. But we will prevail. We are one with God.” Given such language, every loss is a win.

Every loss is a win. So that’s how they do it.

More than two years later, Junior is still drilling down that hole. Reuters made this report on Saturday, August 20, 2005:

Bush invokes Sept 11 to defend Iraq war link:

In a few weeks, our country will mark the four-year anniversary of the attacks of September the 11th, 2001. On that day, we learned that vast oceans and friendly neighbors no longer protect us from those who wish to harm our people.
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Our troops know that they’re fighting in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere to protect their fellow Americans from a savage enemy.
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They know that if we do not confront these evil men abroad, we will have to face them one day in our own cities and streets, and they know that the safety and security of every American is at stake in this war.

But sometimes when political capital is low, really, really low, when your own worshipers begin thinking disloyal thoughts, you have to pull out all the stops. This is when you start trading in dead soldiers. Even National Public Radio noted how unusual it was that in his speech today in Salt Lake City, Bush invoked the dead. Here is what a desperate president said to his throng of future detractors:

We have lost 1,864 members of our Armed Forces in Operation Iraqi Freedom, and 223 in Operation Enduring Freedom. Each of these men and women left grieving families and loved ones back home. Each of these heroes left a legacy that will allow generations of their fellow Americans to enjoy the blessings of liberty. And each of these Americans have brought the hope of freedom to millions who have not known it. We owe them something. We will finish the task that they gave their lives for. We will honor their sacrifice by staying on the offensive against the terrorists, and building strong allies in Afghanistan and Iraq that will help us win and fight — fight and win the war on terror.

Given such language, every dead soldier is a win.

The Politics Business

Writing about this morning’s very creepy article about the new evangelical Christian training for conservative aides on capitol hill (which he points out should hardly be necessary since there already exist a ton of institutions for that purpose called … “church”) Jesse notices something that I think is quite important:

There are times where I really wonder if there’s any such thing as grassroots conservatism anymore. Conservatives seem to be intent on making any expression of conservative belief little more than the assembly of an out-of-the-box movement. You want to start a petition for intelligent design in your school district? Here’s the talking points, magazines, a list of local experts and the e-mail for your very own Discovery Institute scientist.

The modern Republican Party isn’t just antipathetic to democracy – it seems to be doing everything within its power to convert it into a sham of itself, all the benefits of democracy without any of the actual practice or participation. You can be a principled Christian conservative for $345, with free lunch! For an extra $50, learn how to dress your spouse to communicate that they’re not Hillary!

For all the talk of the conservative philosophical backbone, modern conservatism is little more than a paint-by-numbers affair, with doting teachers standing over you making sure that #3 is red and not green, because that might otherwise send the wrong message. It appropriates the rhetoric of soul-saving while remaining entirely soulless itself.

I think that its soullessness may be due to the fact that movement conservatism is now a business. So is the Christian Right. The “Republican industry” has become a livlihood for a whole lot of people who are not directly involved in the political process or the typical televangelist ministries. Somebody has to provide all those “paint-by-numbers” petition kits and out of the box local candidate blow-up dolls. We need to start seeing them through this prism.

The question is what kind of a business model are they using? (It may or may not be relevant that one of the biggest funders of conservative causes in the nation is the DeVos family — of Amway fame.)

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Efficient Pain

OneGoodMove has video of a protestor being tasered over the week-end. As with all these taser vids, I got a queasy feeling in my stomach when I saw it. I don’t know how many of you have been shot with electricity, but I have had it happen by accident and it’s really awful. Worse than being hit hard. Way worse.

This video shows an unarmed, restrained, female protestor on the ground being tasered. It looks very efficient, very easy, very simple. I’m very suspicious of police having simple, easy, efficient and unaccountable ways of subduing unarmed citizens.

I understand why cops like tasers. It’s a non-lethal way of making citizens immediately compliant. Who wouldn’t like that? But I am viscerally uncomfortable with the fact that police have the unrestrained discretion to inflict serious pain on citizens simply because it does not leave a mark. Just as they should not be allowed to punch a restrained protestor in the face, which would also subdue her, they should not be able to taser a restrained protestor. The law should not allow authorities to inflict pain unnecessarily even if the pain does not result in serious damage. And evidence is mounting that it does.

Talk Left (which has a very handy compendium of information on the taser, here) wrote yesterday about the police who are suing because of injuries sustained when they were tasered in training. And quite a few lawsuits are coming down the pike from others who have been permanently damaged by tasers. The company that manufactures them has been extremely uncooperative and unforthcoming with information. It’s most telling that cops who volunteer to take tasering in training rarely offer to take another one.

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Tid Bits

I don’t want to get into the Able Danger mess because, as I wrote earlier, my gut tells me it’s nonsense. However, I can’t resist sharing two new pieces of information:

From Steve Soto I learned that the whole “roll-out” of the story was pre-approved by Dennis Hastert, Pete Hoekstra and most amazingly, Steven Cambone at the Pentagon. I’m sure they were all just showing their deep respect for whistleblowers. (Too bad Bunatine Greenhouse didn’t get pre-approved.)

The other tid-bit, via Laura Rozen, is that another member of the team came forward to say that Atta had been named in 2000. Unfortunately, he couldn’t produce any evidence because:

The former contractor, James D. Smith, said that Mr. Atta’s name and photograph were obtained through a private researcher in California who was paid to gather the information from contacts in the Middle East. Mr. Smith said that he had retained a copy of the chart for some time and that it had been posted on his office wall at Andrews Air Force Base. He said it had become stuck to the wall and was impossible to remove when he switched jobs.

It would be interesting to know if he switched jobs before or after 9/11.

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Politics vs Policy

Matt thinks that the base is all about shrill rhetoric over substance, and I think there’s some truth to that.

My main critique of the netroots would be that I sense a large degree of willingness to elevate shrill rhetoric over actual policy. Dick Gephardt, having done more than any other member of the Democratic Party to land the country in Iraq, was able to recapture the hearts of many bloggers by calling Bush a “miserable failure.”

It warmed my heart to hear that line, too, just as I thrilled to Hackett’s Bush-bashing. But I’d much rather live with a moderate tone and an an anti-war policy than live with the reverse. Liberals need to be clear about what our priorities are.

I think most liberals’ first priority at this point is to remove the Republicans from sole power and many in the Democratic netroots have come to the political conclusion that we will only do that if we speak truth to power. The immoderate tone that thrills the netroots is not just for emotional satisfaction; it is a political strategy for beating the opposition.

I think that many in the netroots are no different than the vast majority of Americans everywhere. Policy is seen through a heuristic prism of impressions, image and preconceptions. Very few people are engaged in politics as a purely intellectual debate about the actual efficacy of one policy over another. Most people, even most smart people, make their political decisions based on a whole range of perceptions, only a few of which are based on strict reason.

I think the base of the Democratic party has come to the conclusion that one of the reasons Democrats have been successfully tagged as being soft on terrorism, crime, national security what have you, is because of the way we appear to the American people when we allow the other side to bash, swift-boat and deride with impugnity. And they have concluded that one way to show that we are not in fact a party of wimps and sissies is to call out the Republicans.

It is conventional wisdom that one of the reasons Hackett did as well as he did was because of his sincere righteous indignation about the leadership of this country and I think it’s at least partially true. That translates to strength and authenticity to people who hear long-winded multi-year withdrawal scenarios and immediately switch the channel — which are a majority of voters. I think the guy is tremendously charismatic whose status as an Iraq war veteran made him somewhat unique, but there is little doubt in my mind that he was able to win over some people, probably the Ross Perot type independents, who respect candor and authenticity. In this day of over-handled candidates it is a very heady breath of fresh air to see a Democrat appear unafraid and unintimidated.

I think it’s terrific that people want to have a dignified wonk-fest about how to deal with the situation in Iraq. But I will guarantee you that the best “plan” isn’t going to win any elections. They never do. Elections will be won because the country is sufficiently disillusioned with the GOP and the Democrats prove to them that they are a better alternative. And that proof will not come from the details but from the big picture.

I’m not even sure I think that Democratic politicians should be on the record with any detailed withdrawal plans at all at this point. The focus, to my way of thinking should remain on the president as the country (finally) internalizes the fact that this war was a mistake. There is plenty of time for our patented 10-point-plan yawner of a stump speech as we move into the next election cycle.

Right now I think the right political move is to keep the pressure on the Republicans. Make them take ownership of this war, gas prices all the simmering discontent that you can see lurking in all the polls on every issue. Separate ourselves, not with our intellectual superiority (which is a given in any case) but by our energy and our disgust with the status quo.

The think tanks and pundits can debate the various strong points of withdrawing on a six month vs a two years modified pull back or an urban withdrawal backed by air support or whatever. I think that’s great. But since we have no chance of implementing any plan ourselves and since it is, in my view, almost impossible that any action the Bush administration undertakes will be successfull no matter how perfectly we design a plan for him to implement — from a political standpoint all this wonkery beside the point.

What we should be debating is how we win elections. The base of the party is ready to support anyone who is willing to speak in clear, straighforward terms about the contrast between the Republicans and the Democrats and they believe that it could be a winning electoral strategy to do that. Certainly, they are extremely impatient with the split the difference, triangulation strategies that have failed to win majorities for the last several election cycles.

That, I think, is the real question here. Will our “shrillness” help or hurt the party? I think the netroots believes it’s time to try a message that has a little more heat than lukewarm water. The establishment, still smarting from their seminal loss in 1972, is scared to death of anything that resembles real passion. Far more than a serious division in the party over specific policy, that, I think is the real fault line. What kind of politics — not policies — do the Democrats think will win?

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Not Ready For Prime Time

I just saw that bozo Gary Qualls on Olbermann talking a bunch of outrageous gibberish about Cindy Sheehan misusing his son’s name and how she isn’t taking care of her family etc. He is pathetic.

But he really shouldn’t be allowed to go on television and say that Cindy Sheehan treated him disrespectfully when there is so much documentary evidence to the contrary.

Hesiod has been on the Qualls story for a while now and he featured an account from last week when Qualls met with Cindy and they hugged and he told her he loved her.

Cindy Sheehan, right, hugs President Bush supporter Gary Qualls of Temple, Texas after the two met at her camp near Crawford, Texas, Saturday, Aug. 13, 2005. Qualls’ son Marine LCPL. Louis W. Qualls was killed in the battle of Fallujah Nov. 14, 2004. Qualls answered an invitation from Sheehan to meet with pro-Bush parents that lost children in Iraq. Qualls was the only parent that came.

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Credibility Gap

Kenneth Baer says that the Democrats should have a robust, public debate about foreign policy and then people should pick a side and fight it out in the primaries in 2008 — as opposed to what is happening now which he characterizes as this:

The argument within the party has been played out through blog posts and random quotes in newspapers across the country. But while there is contentiousness, there is hardly a debate. There is a vocal group on the left who is angry — at the Democratic establishment and the foreign-policy establishment. Yet, the establishment is relatively quiet in its response. In many ways, this silence only magnifies the perceived influence and power of the Democratic left (which, while possessing its own unique power, has yet to prove the hold it purports to have on the zeitgeist of the Democratic rank-and-file: beat a more hawkish Democrat in a primary or win a general election, and then you’ll have some weight behind your claims.)

Well, he has a point. Although it would be much more powerful if the Democratic establishment could boast of winning any elections lately either.

And I would have to say that he would have an even better point if the Democratic foreign policy establishment hadn’t enthusiastically signed on to the greatest strategic cock-up in American history. If it’s credibility we’re talking about, I think the establishment needs to walk a little bit softly right now. It isn’t the left who fucked up this time.

It’s not that there is no desire or ability to compromise, strategize or agree on tactics among the various factions. But, for those of us who have been bellowing until we are hoarse for the last four years about the magical thinking about Iraq, it is ineffably galling to still be treated as if we are the starry eyed hippies when in it’s the allegedly sophisticated savants of the foreign policy establishment who have behaved as if this war could be won by clicking the heels of Laurie Myleroie’s ruby slippers.

We are the ones who pointed out the fact that Bush’s delusional PNAC/TeamB/CPD braintrust had been wrong about everything since the dawn of time and were the last people who should be trusted with a pre-emptive war doctrine. We’re the ones who noticed that you didn’t have to be a nuclear scientist to see that the “evidence” of Saddam’s arsenal had a bit of a comic book flair to it. (The drone planes should have been a tip-off.) We’re the ones who understood that people tend to not like being invaded by foreign troops even when they despise their own leaders.

It was the sophisticates of the establishment who bought every bit of snake oil the administration was selling, not us. And yet we still have to be condescended to from the people who were flat out, 100% wrong?

I am not a pacifist. And I never said that we should not respond to the threat of global terrorism. But I disagreeed with the way this administration and the Democratic hawks went about doing it — especially this enormous mistake of invading a middle eastern country for inscrutable reasons, at this time, in this way. And I was right. I don’t know if I represent the zeitgeist of the rank and file, but I do know that I and others of “the left” who saw this debacle for what it was have earned a little fucking respect.

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Winning Dumb

I keep hearing that the beltway insiders have their money on George Allen to be the Republican nominee in 2008. I assume it is because he is just as stupid as George W. Bush.

From Michael Crowley subbing at TPM:

When Republican senator/presidential hopeful George Allen was on ABC’s This Week today praising the Bush administration for its training of Iraqi security forces, George Stephanopoulos suggested that the Post’s story has some pretty troubling implications for that utterly essential element of our success there. Not to worry, Allen said — factional divisions are nothing new:

[Y]ou have that even in our United States. We have local police, we have state police, and you have the FBI.

Got that? Bloodthirsty Shiite militiamen really aren’t so different from, say, Virginia state troopers. To which a startled-looking Stephanopoulos objected: “They’re not militias going out and killing people outside the law!”

The Republicans have determined that they do better with nominees who make their constituents believe they are smart enough to be president. It’s the right’s version of the self-esteem movement.

George Allen is an extremely dumb guy. Really dumb. Awesomely dumb.

Who do we have that’s dumb enough to beat him?

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Novak: Black Kettle Edition

War protesters sleeping with the enemy

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