Cogitamus

Thursday Miscellany and Open Thread

 

"Gigantic" - The Pixies

Hey, Paul, Hey, Paul, let's have a ball

- Roy performs the definitive takedown on Ron Paul's special brand of libertarianism and those on the left who are apologists for him.  (He seems to have a strange hold on certain gay white male bloggers -- yes, I'm looking at you Sullivan, Greenwald, and Savage.  Really what the fuck is it with these guys?) I particularly liked Roy's take on what binds the various strains of crazy that define the Republican Party and its constituents:

These guys can always work together, because they all came out of the same Big Bang of hatred for the New Deal and its legacy: Big Government and the coalition that sustains it -- blacks, gays, unionized workers, women, et alia. Each conservative tribe has its own relationship to that legacy -- some of them (the more intelligent ones, generally) are deeply cynical, and some are as sincere as any schizophrenic street preacher. But all of them deeply hate that a bunch of minorities have coalesced to get something that they think belongs by right to them and people like them, and many of them have learned that it would be more effective (and, these days, more popular) to strike at the state that enables that coalition than at the minorities themselves.

What mania, particularly, animated Paul's newsletter stories of criminal-natured blacks and AIDS-drama-queen gays doesn't matter to me. I know that he's a Republican Libertarian and, having been born earlier than yesterday, that is enough for me.

- Speaking of Greenwald and Paul, No More Mister Nice Blog does a pretty thorough dismantling of America's bestest and bravest civil libertarian's apaulogies for the candidate who opposes the Civil Rights Act of 1964, believes that women have no right to an abortion, and claims that there is no constitutional basis for the separation of church and state.  Not to mention has had his name on some of the foulest racist tracts written in the last twenty years.  Because clearly the civil liberties concerns of women and African-Americans are not nearly as important as Glenn's vendetta against Obama.

- Perfect, except that it is a Golden Retriever named "Moral Hazard", not an Irish Setter.  Charles Pierce takes on the same insipid Brooks article that I wrote about the other day, but does it better.    

- Republicans are whiny babies.  And grotesque hypocrites as well.   

- Very good piece by Yglesias the other day on the madness of trying to make each American an investor responsible for his/her own retirement. 

What else is happening out there?      

The Discrete Charm of the Boboise

In the best of times "conservative thinker" tended to be an oxymoron and we sure as shit aren't living in the best of times.  Nonetheless, I read today's latest from Bobo with cringing dismay as his never ending quest to miss the point reached its apotheosis: to sum up -- it is incorrect to compare present times to the Great Depression because then people loved government and now they fear it.  Also too they now fuck too much and fail to marry those whom they fuck.  It is also incorrect to compare the present moment to the Progressive Era because then we needed government to rein in irresponsible businesses.  Now that that has all been taken care of, we really need government to stop people from fucking too much and failing to marry those whom they fuck.  (Well you do a better summary in a paragraph.) 

Alright David, let me spell it out for you.  We compare the present moment to the Great Depression because current economic conditions, including high levels of joblessness (albeit not nearly as severe as those experienced in the early 1930s) and the attendant lack of aggregate demand have created a self-reinforcing tendency toward economic sluggishness that seems to have no end in sight.  The present moment is not completely analogous to the Great Depression because government programs put into effect to combat the Depression and some fairly aggressive actions by both the Bush and Obama administrations prevented a complete meltdown of the financial system, thereby ameliorating some of the ill effects of the currrent downturn.  The present moment is also reasonably analogous to the Progressive Era in that we too live in age plagued by grotesque speculation and galling inequality -- one crying out for government response.

Brooks does posit an analogy to our times and the Progressive Era, and I must say, it is a head scratcher:

Then, as now, we are seeing great concentrations of wealth, especially at the top. Then, as now, the professional class of lawyers, teachers and journalists seems to feel as if it has the upper hand in its status war against the business class of executives and financiers.

What the hell does this mean?  Do teachers really feel that they have the upper hand in the status war against business executives and financiers?  On the one hand, one can make a salary in the high 40 thousands and eventually collect a pension -- every plutocrat's dream -- on the other there are stock options, bonuses, golden parachutes, and the magic of carried interest.  Clearly teachers are winning this batte in a rout.

As to why Brooks thinks lawyers are aligned with teachers as opposed to business executives and financiers is beyond me.  Does Brooks really not understand what large law firms do and how much money the people who run them make?  And for whom they work?  As for journalists, it seems to me that they spend a lot more time criticizing teachers than they do our business elite.

As always with Brooks our problems are never the result of the failed free market ideology he has long embraced nor of the business elites whose side he invariably takes -- no, we (the unwashed masses) suffer because we deserve to suffer -- because we are morally deficient.  If we would only embrace the good old fashioned Victorian ideals of chastity and self-abnegation (again, only an ideal for the masses, not the rich and powerful), the economy would no doubt turn around on a dime.  If only we were worthy.

Merry Christmas Open Thread

 

"Father Christmas" - The Kinks

(Seems to be the Christmas song that best captures the zeitgeist.)

Happy holidays to one and all.  As the year winds down I wanted to thank all of you for reading and especially those of you who have commented -- you are frequently the best reason to stop by here.  I was going to name names, but then feared leaving someone out and causing inadvertent offense -- but you know who you are.  It's nice to be part of a community that ranges as far as the jungles of Brazil and the cities of Australia.  I've also greatly enjoyed having had the opportunity to meet and break bread (or clink glasses) with a number of you -- big bad wolf, kathy a. Jeanne Marie, Mandos, T.R. Donohue -- during the year.  As pleasant as virtual community can be, there is really nothing quite like seeing people face to face.  I hope I get the chance to meet more of you during 2012.

As for 2011, it had a lot of bleak moments, but I am hopeful that we are seeing a little bit of a turning tide both politically and economically.  If things continue to perk up in the economy (let's hope Europe muddles through), then I think the 2012 election could have a respectable outcome -- one that will keep the White House and Senate in Democratic control and stymie the worst impulses of the right.  And hopefully we will take back the House and send Scott Walker packing as well.  It's uphill on several of these fronts, but doable.  We all need to be clear that whatever our frustrations, it remains vitally important to win these electoral battles.

Whatever happens, I am looking forward to sharing it with you.  In the meantime, I hope you all have great holidays and a safe, healthy, and happy New Year.   

Wednesday Open Thread

 

"Eighties Fan" - Camera Obscura

Strangely busy given the time of year, so I think I need to turn it over to you for content.  Well a couple of things first:

- Do you think Obama's recent rebound in the polls is indicative of the public getting an eyeful of the clown car sweepstakes to pick his opponent?  Suddenly, the cool, professorial guy in the White House starts looking awfully good in comparison. 

- Did any of you old folks out there read this and envision this? 

- Not to continue to kick Hitchens whilst he lies in the grave, but I thought this piece by Katha Pollitt was an incredibly important corrective to much of the hagiography -- especially from Sully, who seems to share Hitchens' problem with women. 

- I share Sullivan's amazement, however, at this piece in the Guardian criticizing Vaclav Havel for not realizing all of the great things that communism had done for Czechoslovakia.  Jesus, I didn't realize that dupes like this still walked the earth.    

What else is going on? 

 

Vaclav Havel R.I.P.

 

"Dime Store Mystery" - Lou Reed

Very saddened to hear of the passing of Vaclav Havel, the former Czech president, playwright, essayist, dissident, and human rights activist.  Havel's improbable trajectory from frequently imprisoned and banned artist to president first of Czechoslovakia, and then the Czech Republic was one of the great stories of my lifetime.  (Probably neck and neck with that of Nelson Mandela on the political improbability meter.)

Havel became a hero of mine (and I don't really have a lot of heroes) in 1988 when I read his book Letters to Olga, a series of letters that he wrote to his wife while imprisoned by Czech authorities from 1979-1982.  The letters are tremendous works of humanity, exquisite dissections of a totalitarian society in which no one, including its leaders, actually believes in its foundational myths.  I would still recommend reading this work, as well as later compilations Open Letters and Disturbing the Peace.  There is a fascinating combination of profundity and humility in these works, a man speaking plain and audacious truths to his oppressors, while at the same time remaining conscious of his own limitations. 

Following the Velvet Revolution in 1989, Havel was transformed from dissident to president in a stunning turn of events.  (I think it is a little difficult to describe now just how unlikely this would have seemed to anyone first encountering Havel's works both as a political essayist and playwright.)  Despite ascending to political power, Havel remained an artist at heart, one who enjoyed the spirit of rebelliousness always.  Among his earliest acts as the Czech president were meetings with Lou Reed and Frank Zappa -- really not the sort of thing one expects from the average chief of state.

Havel demonstrated what it means to be a real dissident and man of political courage -- hint, it doesn't mean exchanging one set of cocktail party friends for another -- someone who was willing to face artistic banishment and the constant threat of forced exile or imprisonment.  One thing that struck me in reading his works was the fact that he always had a little kit packed containing necessities in the event that any given day might prove to the day that the authorities imprisoned him, something that happened multiple times throughout his life.  Throughout it all, however, Havel maintained his humanity, his abhorrence of political violence, and a certain kind of equanimity that is hard to fathom.

His was an extraordinary life.         

Hitchens R.I.P. and Weekend Open Thread

 

"Virgin" - Manchester Orchestra

- There has been an awful lot of words written about Christopher Hitchens over the last twenty-four hours.  I don't have too much to say that would add a lot to what I wrote about Hitchens last year (back in more convivial times around the blog by the looks of the comments).  He seemed to have faced the horrors of his illness in an incredibly resolute way.  But I think that the last thing Hitchens would want is to be white-washed beyond recognition.  And to me, he remains a dubious thinker -- a guy with a sharp tongue and pen and a gift for insult, but not really someone whose work really holds up all that well.  And for fuck's sake, he was no George Orwell.  To me, he will always be the guy who gave aid and comfort to those who were trying to impeach Bill Clinton, was contemptuous of Al Gore during the 2000 election -- he really was the original firebagger --  and was an unending enthusiast for the disaster that was the Iraq War.  None of these mark him as either a terribly serious thinker or practical man of the left.  He was a bit of a wrecker and a vandal, albeit a sometimes entertaining one.  Anyway, I think Kevin Drum and Amanda Marcotte both have useful correctives to the general hagiography.  Steve at No More Mr. Niceblog concurs.

What else is going on?  I am going to decorate the tree tomorrow with the family and then settle in to watch the Patriots ask Tim Tebow "where's your God now?"

Mean-Spirited Motherf#!kers

The Republican Party continues to amaze with its capacity for cruelty and caprice, especially when dealing with the most hard-pressed of our fellow citizens.

The latest outrage is the attempt to link continued funding of emergency unemployment benefits to the requirement that people collecting benefits submit to drug testing -- and to require anyone who is collecting benefits and not a high school graduate to show that they are pursuing a GED.  Isn't it bad enough to be without a job in the midst of the worst recession in the post-World War II period?  Who feels the need to harass and demean people who are in many instances facing economic ruin -- or at the least tremendous insecurity?  

This sort of thing just confirms my sense that to be a Republican these days is to not be fully human.  (Even those who try reveal themselves to be sporting a heart that is three sizes too small.)   One has to have some kind of hole in one's soul to really embrace this sort of punitive thinking.      

Et Tu Wyden

This just fucking pisses me off.  One of the must frustrating things about being a Democrat is that there is always some clown in the party who has to go off message and give aid and comfort to the enemy.

This time it's Ron Wyden hopping into bed with Paul Ryan on Medicare reform -- in the process helping give the Republicans cover on what should be a great issue for us in the 2012 election.  Why, why, why you might ask.  And honestly, I couldn't fucking tell you.

A friend of mine with extensive dealings on the Hill posits that Wyden has been politically incoherent for much of his career, is a little bit crazy, and very enamored of his own ideas and rectitude.  Sounds completely plausible to me. 

 

Tuesday Trivia and Open Thread

 

"Lights Out" - Santogold

Sorry for my lack of production -- I was down all day in the former Confederate capital.  I am afraid my writing production is slipping.  I can't tell if it is a symptom of the end of cultural history, general ennui, or the fact that I haven't been drinking much lately.  (Not due to any commitment to clean living -- I just find that when I have a couple of drinks and sit here with my laptop, I have a distressing tendency to fall asleep.)  So just a couple of quick thoughts before returning to the culture discussion, which I continue to find interesting.

- Isn't this sort of thing a form of mental illness?  Seriously, why does an immensely rich guy who has achieved all kinds of success need to engage in this kind of bullshit?  There is something pathological about our masters of the universe class.  (h/t to Atrios.) 

- We had a discussion the other day about the blogger who had been hit with a $2.5 million judgment for libel.  I had given a pretty cursory analysis about why I did not find the case alarming and, indeed, on the basis of the offending blog post had a feeling that the case was correctly decided.  Paula points out this article in the NY Times today that confirms my reaction. 

- I think that there is much to be said for this description of why many Republicans -- against all reasonable judgment -- cannot resist the temptation to back Newt -- or any other non-Romney candidate. 

- On the other hand, Romney seems like a man who may be getting increasingly cranky at the thoughts of his ambitions being thwarted by the Pillsbury dough boy's egomaniacal right-wing older brother. 

- Evidently conservatives are having deep doubts about the wisdom of a primary campaign dominated by debates. 

- The other impact of the dominant role of the debates is to provide an abundance of free media to underfinanced candidates like Gingrich.  This, in turn, has diminished the need for a traditional campaign organization.  (Someone also pointed out to me recently that the process in Iowa for Republicans is much less complex than that used by the Democrats -- there is less need for the traditional "ground game" in this setting.)  . 

- Sullivan linked to this pretty good bit of advice about how to blog well.  I try my best to follow rule # 1 at least.

What's going on with all of you?

The End of Cultural History (and Open Thread)

 

"Hard to Be" - David Bazan

(The post title is not a comment on the song, which I quite like and was intrigued to see was filmed in the living room of someone in my hometown.)

I am finding it difficult to comment much more of the dynamics of the Republican race until such time as we get a clearer indication that the Gingrich phenomenon is genuine.  If so (and it appears to be), it will violate so much of the conventional wisdom -- especially the need for a good "ground game" to win in Iowa.

In the meantime, I found this article by Kurt Andersen in Vanity Fair to be really interesting.    In it, Andersen ponders the seeming lack of aesthetic change -- in terms of fashion, music, art, architecture, and literature -- over the last twenty years, noting how anomalous that really is.  He asks you to think about for example differences in dress and style if you went from 1912 to 1932 to 1952 to 1972 to 1992.  I think we would all agree that the clothes, hair styles, cars, buildings, movies, novels, and music between say 1952, 1972, and 1992 were all markedly different.  I tend to agree with Andersen that you would not notice all that much difference with respect to any of these things between now and 1992.  

It used to be that twenty years was a huge amount of time in many matters cultural and aesthetic -- here are the top musical LPs of 1958 -- they were followed nine years later by Sgt. Pepper's, which in turn was followed  nine years later by Never Mind the Bollocks.     In 1992, Nirvana released Nevermind and Dr. Dre released The Chronic, neither of which would sound dated today.  Or look at the American films of the late 1950s say versus those of the early 1970s.  It was like several coats of paint were removed from the country's surface during those years.  Again, I don't see the same kind of change between the films of 1992 and the present.   

Andersen posits a few theories for this, although I think it is a really difficult question to answer.  He notes that the main changes between the present and twenty years ago are largely technological rather than artistic -- that is, there was no internet then, no blogs, no ipods, no youtube, no twitter.  But this represents a change in media rather than a change in aesthetics -- we communicate and consume differently, but it does not seem that we create all that much differently.

What do you think?  Do you agree with Andersen's premise?  If so, do you have any persuasive reasons for why this is so?

Add anything else that's on your mind. 

When Will Mitt Take Off the Gloves

As Newt Gingrich improbably surges to the status of front-runner in the Republican presidential race, Mitt Romney is faced with the dilemma of what to do in response.  It's a tricky position he's in.  Gingrich apparently has a double digit lead in Iowa, while also leading in the polls for South Carolina and Florida.  Romney faces a dangerous scenario in which Gingrich wins big in Iowa on January 3rd, garnering a whole lot of momentum, publicity, and, potentially, money.  Romney still seems likely to prevail in New Hampshire on January 10th, by which time the field will probably be winnowed considerably.  (Ricky we hardly knew ye).  It seems to me that at this point the anti-Romney voters -- who seem to be the majority of GOP voters -- will move toward Gingrich.

Gingrich appears positioned to be able to win convincing victories in South Carolina on January 21st and Florida on January 31st.  At that point, it will probably be a two man race (plus Ron Paul, who really doesn't count) and Romney will be bleeding profusely.  He will no longer be inevitable and his "electability" -- his major selling point to most of his supporters -- is going to seem far less compelling.  One senses too that Romney will not perform well at the moment when it all seems to be slipping away -- certainly his recent whiny disaster of an interview on Fox suggests this.

All of this argues for Romney to go after Gingrich aggressively right now and try to prevent this scenario from unfolding.  Certainly there is much to attack.  But the question is, can he do so in a manner that is both effective -- we are down to a matter of just a few weeks now before these contests unfold -- and is not costly to Romney in terms of the Fox and talk radio primaries.  Although many on the right see a Gingrich nomination for the disaster it will be, there remains such a deep skepticism regarding Romney that a poorly conceived attack on Gingrich could have a rallying effect for his opponent. 

It's the sort of difficult tactical situation that Romney has been able to avoid as his other potential challengers self-destructed.  Gingrich strikes me as different -- although he is deeply flawed and has more baggage than any front-runner I've ever seen, he has been in the big time before, he has an incredible capacity for bluster, and basically, his warts are well known to the Republican audience.  Many of them just don't care -- they view him as a leader and as someone who presents an exquisite "fuck you" to the establishment (whoever that is), notwithstanding the fact that Gingrich is the kind of grifter that Sarah Palin could only dream of being.  

I have my doubts that Romney has the chops to pull this off.  The question then is whether he can recover -- South Carolina has generally been the pivotal contest in competitive GOP nomination races -- and beat Gingrich on the more favorable turf that will follow Florida.  

Personally, I am rooting for Gingrich with all of my heart.  If Obama can't beat him, then I agree for once with Will Wilkinson: "we all deserve to die in a purifying fire."       

     

David Brooks on the Euro Crisis and Other Miscellany

 

(A dramatic reenactment of Brooks on the Euro and the problem with those swarthier type Europeans.)

-  It is, as others have pointed out, amusing to see Brooks point to the Germans as the embodiment of capitalist ambition versus those lazy Greeks and Italians.  It should be noted, by the way, that the average Italian works over 350 hour per year more than the average German.  Indeed, the average German, clocking in at about 1419 hours worked per year, works less than pretty much any other OECD country, except the Netherlands, another country cited by Brooks as a model for capitalist virtue.  The average Dutch person works about 110 hours per month.  One thing that you can pretty much count on is that in matters of economics, David Brooks is always wrong.

- Krugman, who has this habit of looking at facts in arriving at positions, has a good chart today noting that the interest rates currently being paid on European debt have little to do with the generosity of social programs in various countries.  

- I've been meaning to comment on this for the last week or so -- alas travels have really killed my posting -- but what in the world could possess Andrew Sullivan to keep nattering on and on -- in highly dubious fashion -- about the study of race and intelligence, bemoaning in the process the unwillingness of most people of good faith and sound mind to stay away from this loaded topic.  Now I am somewhat indulgent of Sullivan as a general rule despite some real ugliness by him over the years -- I generally find him to be highly entertaining and intelligent, even if I have significant areas of disagreement with him.  But the whole Bell Curve thing was pretty unforgivable and this recent inexplicable foray back into this zone is as well.  Anyway, Roy pretty much handed him his ass last week in a rather concise and definitive manner.    Nothing more to add, except that if you don't want to be treated as a racist, than stay away from classic racist memes.  It's not the bold pursuit of truth, it's offensive and historically and scientifically illiterate.  

What's on your minds?     

Some Music for a Saturday Night

 

Open thread.

How Bad Is This Recession, For Actual Human Beings? 3-4 Times As Bad As Any Other Post-WWII Recession

And we're a long way from done.

Here's Calculated Risk's chart showing how this recession compares to all other post-WWII recesssions, in terms of job losses:

 

 

The best measure, here, is the size of the area over each curve and under the zero line.  (Geeks like me would call that an integral, but that's more math than we need.)  Each of those squares between the faint lines represents the loss of 0.2% of our pre-recession jobs, for one month.  Sum up the squares above a curve and below the zero line, and you get a measure of how bad this has been for how long, in terms of job losses.

Just from a quick eyeballing, it's clear that you could fit three or four of any previous postwar recessions into the area over the red curve measuring this one.  And we've got years to go before that red curve gets up to the zero line.

This recession is already 3-4 times as bad as anything else that's happened in the past 70 years, in terms of people being unable to find work.  And it's likely to wind up being more like 5 or 6 times as bad by the time that curve gets up to zero.

And yet, nobody other than us DFHs seems to be particularly concerned about it.  Ruth Marcus is bothered more by a teenage girl who used words like 'sucks' and 'blows' in a tweet to her friends.  The GOP is adamantly opposed to doing anything about the problem, but you expect that: their mission is to keep the supply of labor as cheap and abundant, relative to job openings, as possible - and boy howdy, they've succeeded.  But most of the time, it doesn't even seem like the Democrats are really all that concerned about it, about the loss of jobs, the continuing damage to lives and families and people's hopes of having a decent career and saving for retirement.

Because that's what the area over that red curve represents: a titanic gutting of people's lives and hopes.  It's a graph of millions of individual tragedies.