The Power of Perspective: 2nd Amendment Edition

From Apollo via Marginal Revolution:

The state of Wisconsin has gone an entire deer hunting season without someone getting killed. That’s great. There were over 600,000 hunters.

Allow me to restate that number. Over the last two months, the eighth largest army in the world – more men under arms than Iran; more than France and Germany combined – deployed to the woods of a single American state to help keep the deer menace at bay.

But that pales in comparison to the 750,000 who are in the woods of Pennsylvania this week. Michigan’s 700,000 hunters have now returned home. Toss in a quarter million hunters in West Virginia, and it is literally the case that the hunters of those four states alone would comprise the largest army in the world.

These numbers are part of why those of us who grew up in rural parts of the country simply don’t comprehend the gun-grabbing impulses of some. Every single year, millions of Americans carry high power rifles into the woods and more or less do as they please – some shoot at deer, some just drink a lot – and it is a complete non-story. The number of people injured and killed by these guns will pale in comparison to those injured and killed in driving accidents during the same time period.

But however well or badly we handle our guns, woe will befall he who thinks he can conquer America. 500 years ago, Machiavelli compared ancient Persia with then-modern France. Persia was highly centralized, so the emperor was firmly in control of all parts of his realm, and could muster enormous numbers of men to any part of the country. But if you could defeat that army and the central authority that raised it, then you would almost immediately control the whole nation, as Alexander showed. Medieval France, on the other hand, was very decentralized, with petty dukes controlling small centers of power throughout the country. Because of this, the king of France had only marginal control over vast swaths of his country , but no invader could stand a chance at conquering France because of all the small bands of local opposition.

I wish N.M. was around today, if only to hear the praise he would have for a nation that every year assembles and then disbands the world’s largest army purely for the purpose of managing its deer population. For millenia, philosophers have pondered how one can maintain a well-armed population that can fend off all attackers, while simultaneously maintaining ordered governance. In America, we’ve fulfilled this dream, and we’ve done it so well and so effortlessly that no one seems to have noticed.

Bending the Gullibility Curve

Brad DeLong is surprised by this bit of news:

The Obama administration will extend special bonus payments meant to reward top-performing Medicare Advantage insurers to those that score only average ratings.

The three-year plan goes beyond what the health law called for in creating the bonuses. The law says bonuses, which start in 2012, would go to insurers that scored at least four out of five "stars" on a set of quality measurements.

Instead, a "demonstration project" authorized by Medicare officials will extend bonus payments to plans that score at least three stars. Based on this year's star ratings, the change means 62 percent of all Medicare Advantage insurers — representing 84 percent of enrollees — will qualify for the quality bonuses, compared with only 14 percent of plans under the health law provisions. [...]

The total cost over the three years is $1.3 billion. Wall Street likes it: Barclays Capital analyst Joshua Raskin, in a report, called the decision a "clear and unexpected positive" for managed care stocks. But some consumer advocates expressed skepticism, wryly noting that lowering the bar for bonuses reminded them of the fictional Lake Wobegon, where all the children are above average. [...]

"It's only been eight days since the election," Raskin wrote in his report, "but the rollback of Medicare Advantage cuts got its first step forward."

One provision of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) sets out to fund the expansion of health care in two ways: by capping Medicare payments incrementally and by creating performance incentives for Medicare Advantage (MA) insurers to deliver higher-quality services at a lower cost. Some of those performance incentives include bonuses. Now, these bonuses will reward MA insurers to deliver not top-performing results, but mediocre results, irrespective of any cost-cutting measures.

The Incidental Economist, an expert in health care policy and a long-time advocate for the ACA, is not surprised:

[I]t's just another piece of evidence that administrative pricing doesn't work. Give administrators the authority to fiddle with payments and they're too heavily influenced by those getting paid. This has been a problem in Medicare for decades and, by the way, is a problem for Rep. Paul Ryan's plan too. [...]

This is what opponents of the ACA have been saying all along. Medicare savings are illusory. And as the Incidental Economist himself admits, administratively-set prices and compensation are ripe for political machinations, which this story illustrates perfectly. But yet, he refuses to see the real problem in the ACA:

[T]he American health system has three problems: (1) the cost is too high, (2) the quality is too low, (3) and many people lack sufficient access to care. The ACA addresses the last of these most thoroughly, though not completely. But it does so in a way that at least sets the stage to address the first two as well. There are lots of other provisions in the law, beyond those pertaining to MA, that target costs and quality, some simultaneously. Will those be weakened too?

When will we get serious about this stuff? It really matters and we're blowing it!

Really? So for him, the problem with the ACA is that we haven't started to get serious about it? Oh, brother.

No, the real question is: how is anyone surprised by this?

Marginal Taxes and Work Incentives

Greg Mankiw, writing in yesterday's NYT, provides us with a clear example of how President Obama's proposed higher tax rates will affect his incentives to work. Using his example, I'll argue that the president's plan will also affect most everyone's incentive to work.

Although he doesn't explicitly say so, Mankiw suggests that those who believe the president when he says that the top tax rate "would just go back to where they were under President Clinton," are being duped. Mankiw shows us how the math under the new plan is much different than proposed. Factoring in the reinstatement of a stealth provision phasing out itemized deductions, along with the introduction of the new Medicare taxes provided by the healthcare law, top earners will now pay close to 45 percent of their income in taxes, not an insignificant increase from Clinton-era tax rates. Adding to that the proposed increases in capital gains, dividends, and estate taxes, along with state and local taxes, top earners can face a 90 percent total marginal tax rate.

That bears repeating. The new tax proposals offered by President Obama will force top earners to pay considerably more marginal taxes -- some up to a 90 percent total marginal tax rate. Put another way, if you make 250K a year or more, under the president's plan, for every extra dollar in income you earn, up to 90 cents can be taxed.

With projected increases in federal spending driven by Social Security and to a greater extent, the new healthcare law, will taxing the top 2 percent of earners up to 90 percent of their extra income be enough? The short answer is no. Top earners do not provide nearly enough revenue to close the gap in federal spending. So that means most everyone, including the broad middle class, will face substantially higher real and marginal taxes. But don't take my word for it; let the title to a David Leonhardt piece convince you: "Like Medicare? Then Taxes Must Rise."

And here's where work incentives come into play. Faced with higher real and marginal tax rates, Mankiw turns down a lot of opportunities to work more. There's just no incentive for him to exert extra effort when doing so would provide almost no extra benefit to him and his family. He puts it this way: with a 90 percent total marginal tax rate, "is it any wonder that I turn down most of the money-making opportunities I am offered?"

Any wonder, indeed. But as we've discovered, it's not only top earners who will face perverse work incentives. Higher federal spending in the future means higher real and marginal tax rates for everyone. And this raises another question: will we wonder why no one will want to work more?

I'm sure there's a good essay out there that discusses this...

but things like Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter seem to convince people that 1)they need to elevate the minutiae in their lives and every thought in their head into singular moments of importance, and 2)that the rest of humankind should care about those moments and thoughts.

The irony is not lost on me that it's intrinsic to this blog that I must be convinced that people should care what I have to say as well. So I suppose I'm yet more evidence of the trend. But either way, I can't see how it's good for society at large or the individual in question.

Breyer says burning Korans may not be protected speech...

I can't think of a single way that Breyer's idea makes any sense.

But here it is.

When the NY Times becomes part of the Democrat Political Machine...

I get a morning email from National Review's Jim Geraghty on his political musings of the day. This below was his first section today. I thought it did a good job of illustrating an example of what Republicans view as typical with the NY Times (namely that they come off as taking cues to help build the Democrat Party's political narrative)

1. This New York Times Spin Seems Particularly Deep


"Lobbyists" are one of those all-purpose villains who crop up as needed for a particular Democratic narrative; the moniker is now used with such Stretch Armstrong-level elasticity that whenever I hear it used, I'm ready to presume that whoever is invoking it is trying to pull a fast one. One man's organization of concerned citizens is another man's sinister, powerful special interest. The NRA has lobbyists; I like them. The AFL-CIO has lobbyists; I don't like them. Tom Daschle insisted he was not a lobbyist, even though he worked at a law firm that was (surprise) a powerful lobbying firm. As Politico summarized, "In short, Daschle, working with his firm's lobbyists, uses his decades of congressional experience to tell clients how to favorably influence policy."

"Lobby" is a verb, and while the usual connotation is cash-oriented, lobbying is essentially persuasion, the same goal had by grassroots activists, bloggers, media commentators, New York Times editorial writers, talk-radio hosts, and everyone who's ever written a letter to the editor. As much as I don't like the AFL-CIO, I don't spend much time raging against the fact that they have lobbyists working for them. It's nowhere near the injustice that, say, compulsory membership is.

So when the New York Times offers a story on how speaker-in-waiting (maybe) John Boehner is a "G.O.P. Leader Tightly Bound to Lobbyists," well, a lot of right-of-center bloggers have noted that this is a line of attack more tired than Law and Order writers, trying to find an original way for an ordinary New Yorker to discover a murder victim. ("A jogger in Central Park comes across it as the sun rises over the city!" "We've done that eleven times already.")

At the Washington Examiner, Tim Carney tears the charge apart: "If you read this weekend's New York Times' hit job on would-be Speaker John Boehner and his 'lobbyist friends,' you might think, as the reporter clearly thinks, that John Boehner is cozier with lobbyists than most powerful politicians are. But did you know: Nancy Pelosi has raised almost twice as much money from lobbyists this election as Boehner has? At least 18 House Democrats have raised more lobbyist cash this election than Boehner has. Chuck Schumer and Harry Reid have pocketed more lobbyist cash in the past 18 months than Boehner has raised in the past 6 elections, combined?"

At Hot Air, Ed Morrissey is offended but unsurprised: "In this case, the use of the phrase 'especially deep' shows that the Times wanted to make Boehner look as though he was on the extreme outlier of the common practice of fundraising among lobbyists. Whatever one thinks of that practice, it's one of the truly bipartisan efforts on Capitol Hill. But in this cycle, the top five recipients are all Democrats, including two in Senate leadership (Reid and Schumer), as well as six of the top ten (3 Republicans and Charlie Crist being the others), and eleven of the top 20 -- and one of the Republicans on that list, Lisa Murkowski, is no longer a Republican candidate. . . . Why did the New York Times decide to focus on John Boehner instead of all the bigger targets in the House and Senate? Quite obviously, they're attempting to run interference for Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi by pushing a distorted, irresponsible, and highly inaccurate picture of Boehner as some sort of lobbyist lackey. It's exactly the kind of political reporting that we've come to expect from the Times: unethical, biased, and sloppy. In their headline, they accuse Boehner of being 'tightly bound' to lobbyists, but clearly it's the New York Times that is 'tightly bound' to this White House and the Democratic Party."

At Newsbusters, Lachlan Markay hones in on that devious word, "seems": "The Times's omissions are all the more shady given the timing of Lipton's piece -- it came mere days after the Democratic attack machine set its sights on Boehner. Press Secretary Robert Gibbs heavily promoted the piece on the White House press office's Twitter feed. This week, the DNC is slated to run a series of television ads targeting Boehner's lobbyist ties. Hypocrisy in the political realm is nothing shocking. Politicians are not 'objective,' and they don't claim to be. But the New York Times seems to be throwing its weight, and its self-proclaimed mantle of non-partisanship behind a political attack ground in total hypocrisy. Perhaps the Gray Lady should adopt a strict policy of reporting what is, not what 'seems' to be. Isn't that the purpose of the news media?"

NY Post response to the NY Times...

So we've probably all seen those NY Times commercials with various "readers" talking about their favorite sections of the NY Times. While we probably all have our own opinions on them, I hope we can agree that this parody of what a NY Post counter-ad would look like is pretty great.

I like the laughing, nerdy white guy towards the end the best. (I'm not sure how old this is, so you might have already seen it. I just came across it though)

Here's the video. (Warning: Profanity galore)

(Here's the NY Times commercial for comparison)

And also from that website...

There was this piece which is also critical of media coverage of the event (on both sides). And also talks a bit about muslim opinion on Cordoba's building.

Link here.

Not to belabor Cordoba discussion...

but I wanted to link to this article from someone who isn't opposed to the Mosque's building.

It does a good job of analyzing the media discussion of it (specifically how unfair some of the anti-anti-Cordoba Mosque pieces have been).

Link is here.

Luckily...

at least someone out there is still willing to do the hard news.

Did you ghost write this, Berchmans? :)

Reason #1,564,356 our country is doomed...

This may be the single lamest thing I've ever seen appear in a major newspaper.

WTF, America. WTF....

On the other hand, I feel like this pretty much guarantees I'll forever win the argument that our society is infantilized. And yet, I don't take comfort in that.

Islam Before Ground Zero

This article in Slate from 2001 is a must read. In a dizzying array of circumstance, it reminds us how Islam had been a part of the World Trade Center site for decades.

The story goes like this: Minoru Yamasaki, a Japanese-American architect who drew inspiration from Islam for his designs, became a sought-after architect for many of Saudi Arabia's most important structures, including the country's central bank and two major airports. Now, architects are only as good as the construction firms charged with turning their designs into reality. It just so happens that in Saudi Arabia, one family's construction firm was adept—and politically connected—enough to turn Yamasaki's beautiful designs and breathtaking reality: the bin Ladens. And as it happens, Yamasaki also designed the World Trade Center.

As a scion to the construction firm, the article argues that Osama bin Laden must have know about the Islamic influences that adorned the World Trade Center buildings and the plaza in between. This gave bin Laden a reason to despise the site: it embodied the marriage of Islamic art, modernism, and commerce—a combination anathema to his idea of Islam.

We all know the basic reasons why Osama Bin Laden chose to attack the World Trade Center, out of all the buildings in New York. Its towers were the two tallest in the city, synonymous with its skyline. They were richly stocked with potential victims. And as the complex's name declared, it was designed to be a center of American and global commerce. But Bin Laden may have had another, more personal motivation. The World Trade Center's architect, Minoru Yamasaki, was a favorite designer of the Binladin family's patrons—the Saudi royal family—and a leading practitioner of an architectural style that merged modernism with Islamic influences.

The Papal Encyclicals

I once read a sample of Pope John Paul II's encyclicals for an undergraduate class, and came away deeply impressed with the depth of his knowledge and clarity and of thought. After my last discussion with Esquire about Islam, I decided I'd read through some of the passages again. I did so because, while Esquire may have mistaken our debate as a chance to highlight Christianity's virtues and convert me, I'm a believer. (So stand down, proselytizer!)

That is, even while I disagree with the Church's stance on certain issues, I still allow its teachings a primary place in my political thought, always present to negotiate with my other impulses and leanings.

These excerpts struck me as particularly relevant and deeply moving:

When people think they possess the secret of a perfect social organization which makes evil impossible, they also think that they can use any means, including violence and deceit, in order to bring that organization into being. Politics then becomes a "secular religion" which operates under the illusion of creating paradise in this world. But no political society — which possesses its own autonomy and laws — can ever be confused with the Kingdom of God.

This is in line with what Esquire mentioned about Christianity's vision of limited government. But the Pope also clarifies this sentiment in a following paragraph (taken from his 1991 encyclical):

What Sacred Scripture teaches us about the prospects of the Kingdom of God is not without consequences for the life of temporal societies, which, as the adjective indicates, belong to the realm of time, with all that this implies of imperfection and impermanence. The Kingdom of God, being in the world without being of the world, throws light on the order of human society, while the power of grace penetrates that order and gives it life. In this way the requirements of a society worthy of man are better perceived, deviations are corrected, the courage to work for what is good is reinforced. In union with all people of good will, Christians, especially the laity, are called to this task of imbuing human realities with the Gospel.

In a later encyclical on the value of life, published in 1995, the Pope spoke again about the relationship between civil and moral law according to Christian thought:

Certainly the purpose of civil law is different and more limited in scope than that of the moral law. But "in no sphere of life can the civil law take the place of conscience or dictate norms concerning things which are outside its competence", which is that of ensuring the common good of people through the recognition and defence of their fundamental rights, and the promotion of peace and of public morality. The real purpose of civil law is to guarantee an ordered social coexistence in true justice, so that all may "lead a quiet and peaceable life, godly and respectful in every way" (1 Tim 2:2). Precisely for this reason, civil law must ensure that all members of society enjoy respect for certain fundamental rights which innately belong to the person, rights which every positive law must recognize and guarantee. First and fundamental among these is the inviolable right to life of every innocent human being...

But, again, he later on says civil law is always and everywhere subservient to "eternal law," that is, any law in contradiction with God's will is no law at all:

The doctrine on the necessary conformity of civil law with the moral law is in continuity with the whole tradition of the Church. This is clear once more from John XXIII's Encyclical: "Authority is a postulate of the moral order and derives from God. Consequently, laws and decrees enacted in contravention of the moral order, and hence of the divine will, can have no binding force in conscience...; indeed, the passing of such laws undermines the very nature of authority and results in shameful abuse".

And for good measure, here's video of Christopher Hitchens on the notion of "free will" in Christianity (the argument I mentioned in the comments section): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pg5UNxOmTIY

Shariah In The U.S.A.

Unlike Esquire, I don't believe America is under imminent threat from the spread of shariah, or that radical Islamism is slowly creeping under the nation's consciousness, spreading its venomous roots without our knowing it. I chalk his fear up to the conservative's typical tendency to see impending and apocalyptic threats everywhere and anywhere to the status quo. (You can see a similar impulse in Sharron Angle's hilarious 1993 letter to Harry Reid about the End Of Days that the Clinton tax hikes will no doubt bring to the polity. Right.)

I don't think there's anything wrong with opposing change as a principle; I've read enough Burkean texts exposing the limits of human agency to appreciate the stand. But we, as humans, are also cursed with the logic of scarcity, and if we think our greatest threat comes from a creeping Islamofascism in this country, we'll likely do things -- like pass absolutely pointless, political stunts like the anti-shariah law Newt Gingrich has proposed -- that will hog up time for genuinely useful legislation (it exists! I tell you, those bills exist! Cap and trade, anyone? Comprehensive immigration reform? No?)

I do have two thoughts I wanted to discuss: first, re: shariah, Esquire earlier said he generally opposed its notion that God should be recognized as the fount of all laws. But what does that mean for, say, Sarah Palin's recent claim that one can trace a straight line from America's Constitution to the Ten Commandments and Judeo-Christian principles? Forget that Palin said it; it's an opinion widely expressed among conservative circles, e.g. the Constitution is "divinely inspired," or that limited government is a uniquely Christian notion (as Dinesh D'Souza has argued)? What's the difference here and the logic of shariah, other than we're talking different gods? (I'm not trying to be a smart ass here; I'm genuinely trying to tease out some principles on religion/state jurisprudence.)

There was a woman quoted in The New York Times last week who said she had no problem with freedom of religion, except -- and this was a whopper of an exception -- she didn't consider Islam a "religion." Instead, she saw it as a political ideology wrapped in divine pretenses. OK, but what religion doesn't lead its followers to certain political decisions? Couldn't you make a similar charge against Catholics that they can't be trusted with power because they only do the bidding of the Pope? (Wait -- don't tell me, people did make this argument? You don't say.)

Second thought: My bigger problem with focusing on Islam like it's the return of Darth Vader is that it leads certain activists to hold Muslims to higher standards than other communities. We frequently hear about the various crimes committed against women that are routinely accepted, even sanctioned, in traditional Muslim communities. But we rarely hear that a pattern of abuse and domination against women has been the modus operandi of human history and has changed only recently, and that too only in select nations in the Western world blessed with immense national wealth.

If this debate follows this pattern, it also tends to view Muslims chiefly as people who regard religion as the foundation of their personality. That may no doubt be true for certain Muslims, but I reckon -- and this is based just on anecdotal experience -- that a fair number of Muslims place their religion alongside a plethora of other concerns and identity markers (gender, age, family, culture, language, nationalism, politics).

This isn't an argument for cultural relativism, so please don't throw that little bugaboo at me. I'm all for accepting certain universal truths that cross over all cultures, and I'm sure you'll find plenty of activists within Muslim countries who agree with that. But liberalism -- and by this, I mean classical liberalism, of Locke and Mill -- has a nasty habit of proclaiming on the one hand that all people are created equal, but then, in the fine print, poking and prodding certain communities and saying "you're not ready for it." We see this logic in Locke's works, for instance, when he talks about what kinds of rigorous education humans need to fully practice rationality (and, thus, exercise full political rights), thus undercutting the democracy of his idea of government by consent.

It just seems silly to me that on the one hand, we, as a country, are supposed to be fighting for burgeoning democracies in two Muslim-majority countries, and on the other, supposed to believe that this religion and many of its proponents believe a philosophy that is fundamentally anti-democratic. It's also ironic that both the Afghan and Iraqi Constitutions -- you know, the ones we have spent billions of dollars and had thousands of troops die for -- recognize Islam as the chief inspiration for all their laws. (Or do I exaggerate?)

The Anti-Muslim Backlash

Conor Friedersdorf, my new pundit crush, countered Esquire's pundit crush (no prizes for correct guesses) on how tolerant America has been to its Muslim citizens:

When an angry crowd mistook this Coptic Christian man for a Muslim, did that count as a backlash? What else explains the Koran burning event this Florida church is planning (guess what day the event is scheduled). Or consider the Temecula, California mosque project that is also apparently too close to Ground Zero.These are all very recent news items. So what can this assertion that "there has been no “anti-Muslim” backlash actually mean? That it hasn't been as bad as some people feared? If that is what Mr. Goldberg means he should say it.

I'd also like to re-link to this This American Life episode on the lengths to which a school went to ostracize and ultimately expel a local Muslim-American family.

N.Y. Muslims On Mosque Near Ground Zero

I thought this Washington Post article deserved to be widely linked and read. We've heard a lot of talk about the need to protect the feelings of those killed on 9/11 (excluding the 100 or so Muslims also included in that tally), or even a more abstract sensitivity felt in the national ethos. But what about local Muslims in New York City?

This is what the controversialIslamic community center and mosque being planned in Lower Manhattan means to Ehab Zahriyeh: not having to play basketball in church leagues.

For Fatima Monkush, it would be a place to swim -- sans cap and layers of clothing -- with other Muslim women.

While the national debate about the center has elicited passionate statements for and against it from Democrats and Republicans, what Muslims have been left with is a great deal of disappointment. And for the young American-born New Yorkers who hope to use the site as a fitness center, meeting space and prayer hall, among other functions, the sense of rejection is personal.

Friends of Totalitarianism

Over at Marginal Revolution, Tyler poses a question for discussion:

How about a really systematic exploration of other contemporary collaborators with totalitarian regimes whose propaganda you would like to tout to unsettle readers? Or, would that disturb the shocking effect of your bold free thought on your readership?

His response is illuminating. Among the various 20th century thinkers he highlights as "collaborators" to evil regimes are Susan Sontag and Eric Hobsbawm. But even more interesting are his readers' responses. Here's "Bill" commenting on the purpose of the question:

This is an unthinking post.

It is unthinking because it doesn't define collaborator, and relies on guilt by association.

It would be a better post if it asked: what were the ideas that x person agreed with that y person had. And, would be fairer and more objective if it did. And, it should make a distinction between means and ends.

Discussions of the validity of the question aside, it seems to me that MR's readers are by far the smartest and well-reasoned readers anywhere.

I'm interested in Berchmans' and Esquire's responses to this question.

GOP Political Ad...

From a purely political perspective (I know we'll disagree on the ideological perspective), this is a pretty great ad.

Will really resonate with the Conservative base and indepenents I'd imagine...

(I unfortunately couldn't find another link for it, so I had to use this website. I don't know anything about it, other than some of the commentators are morons).

Something I've noticed....

I could be wrong on this, but in my daily skimming of articles/columns/blogs/tweets, I sense that there's a weird dichotomy in discussion of the Cordoba House.

Opponents of it seem to normally refer to it as a "Mosque." Supporters (or rather opponents of the opponents) refer to it as a "Muslim Community Center."

I'm not sure what that means or what would cause it, but if true it's kinda interesting...

The 14th Amendment

As a so-called "anchor baby" myself, I don't think I need to say too much on how I feel about recent proposals from the Republican Party to change the 14th Amendment and birthright citizenship.

Some commentators note that the amendment's drafters wanted chiefly to protect slaves and their kin, not allow Mexicans to run a vast birthing conspiracy. Maybe so. Even if that were the case, there are other amendments in the Constitution -- namely the second one -- whose original purpose (to protect Americans from a federal army) has long been subsumed to other more modern political agendas. Justice Scalia admitted as much in Heller v. D.C., when he concluded his majority opinion by saying:

Undoubtedly some think that the Second Amendment is outmoded in a society where our standing army is the pride of our Nation, where well-trained police forces provide personal security, and where gun violence is a serious problem. That is perhaps debatable, but what is not debatable is that it is not the role of this Court to pronounce the Second Amendment extinct.

But what did the 14th Amendment's drafters want when they codified birthright citizenship? Concentrating on the slave issue is surely too narrow. Akhil Reed Amar, a widely respected (though, I admit, liberal) constitutional scholar, explained on a recent visit to the Colbert Report that the amendment had much grander aspirations. It was nothing less than the "textual embodiment" of Thomas Jefferson's quaint notion that "all men are created equal." No matter who our parents are, he went on to say, or their particular identity markers, we are born equal. (Also, Linda Chavez explained the historical basis for birthright citizenship much better than I can in a recent editorial in the WSJ. See here.)

Quoting Jefferson in such fashion makes me sound a bit too high-minded and simplistic. But I'll add that the notion Mexican immigrants think an American child is a fast-track to citizenship and safety for themselves is ludicrous. For one thing, the child can only apply for a green card once s/he turns 18, and even then, there are financial and other application requirements that must be met. If at any time ICE decides to deport you before these proceedings are concluded, having an American child is not much of a defense. (Between 1999 and 2009, in fact, more than 100,000 parents of American-born children were deported. See here.)

On a more depressing note: there are days when I stop and think about my differences with conservatives and almost conclude they aren't that vast. (Lowering the higher marginal tax rates doesn't inspire that much political passion for me, though I do oppose it.) But then, the right's brand of identity politics emerges and I quickly run off to the other side of the political spectrum. I'm not calling anyone racist. This is a perfectly reasonable debate to be had (though its context is rather ugly). I'm just with the other side on this question -- and, quite frankly, on most involving race.

Hitchens on the Cordoba House...

You may have seen this. All things considered, I think he's probably exactly right.

On the Steppes of New Amsterdam

I'm a little late to this, but I see that Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York City tossed his hat in the ring last week to defend the religious rights of the Cordoba House planners. In his moving speech, he invoked the memory of those who died on September 11th, 2001, and appealed correctly, I think, to first principles:

On Sept. 11, 2001, thousands of first responders heroically rushed to the scene and saved tens of thousands of lives. More than 400 of those first responders did not make it out alive. In rushing into those burning buildings, not one of them asked, 'What God do you pray to?' (Bloomberg's voice cracks here a little as he gets choked up.) 'What beliefs do you hold?'

"The attack was an act of war, and our first responders defended not only our city, but our country and our constitution. We do not honor their lives by denying the very constitutional rights they died protecting. We honor their lives by defending those rights and the freedoms that the terrorists attacked.

The importance of geographically broad support...

Over at RealClearPolitics, Jay Cost has a really interesting analysis about the political difficulties that President Obama has faced in enacting his agenda (and why he is no FDR, for example).

It challenges the view that Obama didn't go "Liberal" enough, and suggests that the geographically narrow nature of Obama's support is the reason why he's facing such difficulty.

As an aside, I'm a big fan of Cost's. He's extremely smart and articulate. And he once took the time to write me several emails of advice on where to attend graduate school.

The Markets Are Efficient .. But Only This Time

We've just gone through a period where we were told emphatically that the recent financial crisis proved without a shadow of a doubt that the efficient market hypothesis is bupkis. Now critics of that idea are saying that the market is indeed efficient and we need more stimulus spending.

Here's how the argument goes: if the bond market fears the direction the U.S. is headed – long-term unemployment, high budget deficits, unsustainable social programs – then it would be putting its money where its mouth is. It would be much more costly for the U.S. to borrow. But what we're seeing now from the bond market, this argument continues, is something completely different. That market is buying U.S. bonds hand over fist, efficiently telling us that – well, I don't know what that's telling us. But no matter. We can borrow really cheaply. That market is saying we need more stimulus spending!

See. Don't you get it? Before the financial crisis, it was really easy for the U.S. to borrow, so the market was inefficient. But now that it's really easy for the U.S. to borrow, it's efficient.

OK, I'll admit, I'm really confused:

The volatility in the stock market has also pushed some investors to allocate more of their funds to cash and cash-equivalents like Treasury securities. In addition, overseas demand for federal securities has been high because U.S. bonds are still considered the safest haven in the wake of concerns about the fiscal stability of Greece, Spain and other countries.

But all of this also proves the point about the former vigilantes becoming deficit cheerleaders. Banks and investors would look for other places to park their cash if federal bonds were considered dangerous or likely to become illiquid because of borrowing concerns. That's obviously not the case.

So, depending on the day, critics tell us either that the market is being very clear and efficient (go stimulus spending, go!) or the market is sending mixed signals and being inefficient (go stimulus spending, go!).

They seem to want it both ways, don't they?

Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night

Christopher Hitchens offers an acerbic and somewhat piquant portrait of becoming stricken with cancer:

So here's the wager: you stick around for a bit, but in return we are going to need some things from you. These things may include your taste buds, your ability to concentrate, your ability to digest, and the hair on your head. This certainly appears to be a reasonable trade. Unfortunately, it also involves confronting one of the most appealing clichés in our language. You've heard it all right. People don't have cancer: they are reported to be battling cancer. No well-wisher omits the combative image: You can beat this. It's even in obituaries for cancer losers, as if one might reasonably say of someone that they died after a long and brave struggle with mortality. You don't hear it about long-term sufferers from heart disease or kidney failure.

Prop 8

By now you've no doubt heard about the very unsurprising overturning of Prop 8 out in California (unsurprising because the Judge ran the trial in a way that made it pretty clear how he felt about the law from the get-go).

I am not bothered by gay marriage as a concept. I do have reservations on the process to enact those rights, and wish to make sure that whatever legal regime we design to incorporate gay marriages/unions is written carefully so as not to signify that we cannot exclude any consensual relationship under the "marriage" definition.

Anyway, I haven't finished reading the decision yet, but the Judge does base quite a bit of the decision on the notion that public conceptions of morality cannot be used as a basis for legislation. While that sounds good and fine, isn't that more or less totally untrue by practice?

It seems to me that there are a whole host of laws that are based on moral principles across the spectrum of laws (including but not limited to drug laws, gambling laws, prostitution, and yes...a number of things related to marriage). For example, common law marriages are based off of established timelines of commitment; that is, society decided that marriage implies a dedication/value demonstrated by cohabitation for a period of significance; that's a moral determination about the idea behind marriage.

If the standard is that carte blanche legislation related to marriage cannot be based off of cultural moral conceptions, then how can the People (and the State) make arbitrary provisions that ban polygamy (in its various forms), incestuous relationships, or any other type of consensual relationship (And how can they decide that the concept only be between two people)?

I think society does have a right to use morality as part of legislation (though I would hope it's not the main or only justification); I just don't think that gay marriage should be considered "immoral." I view marriage as an essentially arbitrary definition. And I'm fine with that; just slide the arbitrary line over slightly to include two person, gay unions.

As I said, I don't have a problem with gay marriage (for me the ideal solution is to have everyone get civil unions, and leave "marriage" as a purely religious notion). But I do have a problem with stupid judicial decisions that are based on preconceived political ideas and without thought about how it'll impact our broader legal regime. I could be wrong, but this decisions really doesn't seem like it's based on solid principles.

Hopefully the Supreme Court can straighten all of this out. For me, I hope it will return these issues to the forum of democratic deliberation where I think they belong. And we can all work to convince people that gays aren't some fifth column of evil, child endangerers.

Newsweek sells for $1

You may have seen that the husband of Rep. Jane Harmon (the liberal California Democrat) bought Newsweek for $1.

The Washington Post Company, which owned Newsweek, apparently rebuffed higher offers from Newsmax Media, stating that it felt Newsmax was "too Conservative," which ostensibly implies that they were seeking a more objective, balanced owner. (I guess?)

I don't fault them for the decision (it's their prerogative to sell to whomever they want for whatever reason they want), but if I'm correct, it's funny that their idea of balanced is to sell to the husband of a liberal California congresswoman...

Jon Meacham is apparently out as editor as well (though he was planning on leaving anyway, I believe)

On Evil

I came across this Charles Krauthammer essay in Time magazine back in 1985. I thought it still relevant and thoughtful.

It's on the idea of evil and the media.

On Banning the Burqa...

Here's an essay on banning the burqa by a freelance journalist living in Turkey.

I liked it for several reasons, including that I think it does a good job of highlighting the notion that our moral/legal decisions do not exist in a vacuum. In the abstract, it can seem clear that rights/values are necessarily absolute. In the real world, however, there are times where circumstances and challenges dictate that the prudent course is to violate the values we typically view as inviolable. (Aphoristically, this is often described as "The Constitution is not a suicide pact.").

I'm not sure how convincing a case this makes for one not already ascribing to the viewpoint, but at least for me I thought it was well articulated and convincing. (I shamelessly note that she does mention the idea of civilizational confidence that I had described previously)

It's a uniquely pathetic....

life form who claims to be an economic conservative...and who also thinks it's their (or public) business how much money President Clinton and Sec. Clinton spend on their daughter's wedding.

I hate hacks.

(But wish much happiness to Chelsea and her husband, because hey: marriage is a beautiful, happy affair.)

Taken To Extremes

From The Daily Dish, an excerpt of a Tea Party blogger's recent post:

"Muslim Day at Six Flags is inappropriate for a multitude of reasons and I'm saddened and shocked by the ignorance of the Corporate folks and by the action that now must be taken by the rest of us. ... Islam is dying in America because Americans are learning (finally) what Muslims are about, what their 'faith' is based upon, how they're recruited, how they prey on the weak, their idea of 'rights' how they cannot ever respect our constitution because it's in direct violation with Sharia and how they must abide by a set of laws called dualism, compelling them to lie to others.

[...]

STOP placating them - in addition, there is no such thing as a moderate muslim, regardless of what you've heard - from the mouth of the son of a well known Imam. Islam is as Islam does. And Regardless of what you might think, there is no such thing of a 'mild' muslim, even the 'quiet' ones who live on the street corner, drive the BMW and work in the dr's office...they go to mosque, satisfy the pillars, pray, etc...and the money they are giving, that is funding terror.

Counter Gingrich

I think it's important to supply some countervailing evidence to Gingrich's thesis. Here are two long articles; I posted the first one a while back, but I think it's a compelling repudiation to the notion that Muslims have overrun Western Civilization in Europe.

"The New Inquisition," The Nation: http://www.thenation.com/article/new-inquisition?page=full

An excerpt:

Caldwell also suggests that Muslims are far more likely to commit violence against women. Under the heading "Virginity and violence," he writes that "there were forty-five [honor killings] in Germany alone in the first half of the decade." Since the argument here is that Muslims are more inclined to commit homicides against women in the context of "some trespass against sexual propriety," it would have been helpful if Caldwell had included, for the sake of contrast, the number of ethnic German women killed in incidents of domestic violence, as well as numbers for an entirely distinct and recent immigrant group, such as Eastern Europeans. Without such empirical comparisons, it is difficult to see how he can reach the conclusion he does, which is that "such acts make law. They assert sovereignty over a certain part of European territory for a different sexual regime." The label "honor killing" makes violence against women and girls sound like an exotic import rather than the pernicious and all-too-frequent reality that it is. Caldwell doesn't mention that domestic violence has been treated as a criminal problem in Europe thanks to the work of European feminists in the 1960s and '70s, and that now European Muslim feminists are working to create a similar zero-tolerance level about honor killings. Encouragingly, a recent Gallup study found that Muslims in Paris, Berlin and London disapproved of honor killings and crimes of passion about as much as the general French, German and British populations.

And this is Noah Feldman's piece on shariah. I don't know anything about this subject. Take it for what it's worth: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/16/magazine/16Shariah-t.html

Speaking of Gingrich...

Here's a video of his speech today at the American Enterprise Institute. I thought it was excellent (he is an excellent orator.). He does also briefly address the Cordoba House issue, explaining his perspective. I agree with him that its origin lies in politics more than religious piety, though I still side with Berchmann's on the idea that when it comes to the application of our principles, it's largely irrelevant what other countries (such as Saudi Arabia) do.

Anyway, I quibble with several arguments he makes (particularly about the war strategy in Afghanistan), but I think he makes a powerful broader argument. I particularly agree with him about Sharia.

The speech is roughly an hour long, but well worth watching if only for the the discussion it engenders. It's titled "America at Risk: Camus, National Security, and Afghanistan."

Return To Cordoba House Debate, Please

Just posted a reply in the comments section to your two comments on the Cordoba House project, Esquire. Please see and reply when you can. Thanks.

McCarthy on AZ Decision...

And here's conservative legal scholar Andy McCarthy on the ruling. I'm indifferent to the political analysis at the end, but the legal remarks themselves are interesting. (Again, this is from NRO's Corner)

On a quick read, the federal court's issuance of a temporary injunction against enforcement of the major provisions of the Arizona immigration law appears specious.


In essence, Judge Susan Bolton bought the Justice Department's preemption argument — i.e., the claim that the federal government has broad and exclusive authority to regulate immigration, and therefore that any state measure that is inconsistent with federal law is invalid. The Arizona law is completely consistent with federal law. The judge, however, twisted to concept of federal law into federal enforcement practices (or, as it happens, lack thereof). In effect, the court is saying that if the feds refuse to enforce the law the states can't do it either because doing so would transgress the federal policy of non-enforcement ... which is nuts.

The judge also employs a cute bit of sleight-of-hand. She repeatedly invokes a 1941 case, Hines v. Davidowitz, in which the Supreme Court struck down a state alien-registration statute. In Hines, the high court reasoned that the federal government had traditionally followed a policy of not treating aliens as "a thing apart," and that Congress had therefore "manifested a purpose ... to protect the liberties of law-abiding aliens through one uniform national system" that would not unduly subject them to "inquisitorial practices and police surveillance." But the Arizona law is not directed at law-abiding aliens in order to identify them as foreigners and subject them, on that basis, to police attention. It is directed at arrested aliens who are in custody because they have violated the law. And it is not requiring them to register with the state; it is requiring proof that they have properly registered with the federal government — something a sensible federal government would want to encourage.

Judge Bolton proceeds from this misapplication of Hines to the absurd conclusion that Arizona can't ask the federal government for verification of the immigration status of arrestees — even though federal law prohibits the said arrestees from being in the country unless they have legal status — because that would tremendously burden the feds, which in turn would make the arrestees wait while their status is being checked, which would result in the alien arrestees being treated like "a thing apart."

The ruling ignores that, in the much later case of Plyler v. Doe (1982), the Supreme Court has emphasized that

Although the State has no direct interest in controlling entry into this country, that interest being one reserved by the Constitution to the Federal Government, unchecked unlawful migration might impair the State's economy generally, or the State's ability to provide some important service. Despite the exclusive federal control of this Nation's borders, we cannot conclude that the States are without power to deter the influx of persons entering the United States against federal law, and whose numbers might have a discernible impact on traditional state concerns. [Emphasis added.]

Furthermore, as Matt Mayer of the Heritage Foundation notes, the Fifth Circuit federal appeals court similarly held in Lynch v. Cannatella (1987) that "No statute precludes other federal, state, or local law enforcement agencies from taking other action to enforce this nation's immigration laws."

However this ruling came out, it was only going to be the first round. Appeal is certain. But the gleeful Left may want to put away the party hats. This decision is going to anger most of the country. The upshot of it is to tell Americans that if they want the immigration laws enforced, they are going to need a president willing to do it, a Congress willing to make clear that the federal government has no interest in preempting state enforcement, and the selection of judges who will not invent novel legal theories to frustrate enforcement. They are not going to get that from the Obama/Reid/Pelosi Democrats.

Levin on the AZ decision

I was on the road all day and so haven't had the chance to read up much about it, but I thought this response from Mark Levin (the ascerbic radio host and former Justice Department/White House lawyer) on the AZ decision is interesting:

(From NRO's Corner)

This is a typical example of a judge stating the correct legal standard, but then ignoring it and applying the test in a fashion completely divorced from the facts of the case in order to reach a predetermined decision.


First, the court states correctly that the sort of constitutional challenge brought here — a facial challenge — is the most difficult challenge to mount successfully. It requires that the plaintiff (here the federal government) must demonstrate that the law can never be applied in a constitutional fashion. The test cannot be met with hypothetical arguments — yet that is exactly what the court relies on in its ruling: the assertion that the AZ law will impose an impermissible burden on law enforcement, which is to determine the legal status of a person detained pursuant to the AZ law on the reasonable suspicion that the person is in the country illegally. The court does not provide any empirical basis to support its conclusion. It’s pure supposition.

As the court notes, the burden a party must meet when engaging in a facial challenge of a given statute is established in United States v. Salerno. The court pays lip service to Salerno at the beginning of its analysis on the “likelihood of success on the merits,” but then proceeds to ignore the Salerno principles.

The court cites Salerno when it notes: “A facial challenge must fail where a statute has a ‘plainly legitimate sweep.’” In deciding a facial challenge, courts “must be careful not to go beyond the statute’s facial requirements and speculate about ‘hypothetical’ or imaginary cases.” Then the court doesn’t even attempt to actually analyze the provisions it overturns within the Salerno context, except in one instance — in fn. 18 — where it upholds a provision of SB 1070.

Distinguish the facial challenge from an as-applied challenge. At one point the court engages in a hypothetical example, when it talks about a potential unfair burden on a legal alien failing to have a dog on a leash, wondering whether he could be detained and subject to an impermissible burden for not carrying his papers under that circumstance. (The court talks about John Doe, a legal alien from Chile who was walking his dog without a leash and was stopped by Sheriff Smith and detained at the local jail for eight hours while his status was checked. It didn’t actually happen.)

The judge also worries that increasing the time a person is detained while his immigration status is being determined might be unconstitutional. Again, pure speculation. (Moreover, the First Circuit Court of Appeals has already found that such a delay is permissible where there is reasonable suspicion to check a person’s status.)

In the bulk of its legal analysis, the court applies a selective reading of the case to an incomplete reading of the statute. In particular, respecting the provision related to confirming a person’s legal status, the court largely ignores the requirement that law-enforcement officers are able to confirm a person’s legal status only where there is a reasonable suspicion that a person is in the country illegally. The judge essentially omits the reasonable-suspicion component of the law and concludes that the act implements a new set of immigration rules particular to Arizona, in violation of a case called Hines v. Davidowitz.

Hines is an old case dealing with a vastly different Pennsylvania law. Here’s what the Hines court correctly concluded: “The question whether a state law is invalid as conflicting with Federal laws touching the same subject is not to be determined according to any rigid formula or rule, but depends upon whether, under the circumstances of the particular case, the state law stands as an obstacle to the accomplishment and execution of the full purposes and objectives of Congress.”

The Pennsylvania act required every alien 18 years or over, with certain exceptions, to register once each year; provide such information as is required by the statute, plus any “other information and details” that the Department of Labor and Industry may direct; pay $1 as an annual registration fee; receive an alien identification card and carry it at all times; show the card whenever it may be demanded by any police officer or agent of the Department of Labor and Industry, and exhibit the card as a condition precedent to registering a motor vehicle in his name or obtaining a license to operate one. The Department of Labor and Industry is charged with the duties of classifying the registrations for “the purpose of ready reference,” and furnishing a copy of the classification to the Pennsylvania Motor Police. Nonexempt aliens who fail to register are subject to a fine of not more than $100 or imprisonment for not more than 60 days, or both. For failure to carry an identification card or for failure to show it upon proper demand, the punishment is a fine of not more than $10, or imprisonment for not more than 10 days, or both.

"Our conclusion,” said the court, “is that [the challenger of the PA law] is correct in his contention that the power to restrict, limit, regulate, and register aliens as a distinct group is not an equal and continuously existing concurrent power of state and nation, but that whatever power a state may have is subordinate to supreme national law.” Hines does not support the court’s conclusion respecting the AZ statute. That case clearly deals with an entirely new legal regime. AZ’s statute merely complements the federal statutory scheme.

Amazingly, today’s decision does not provide any substantive analysis of the very high standards required for mounting a successful facial challenge. The judge thinks certain events or difficulties will occur, and then uses her thoughts as a substitute for empirical evidence. The fact is that the AZ law does not create any new or additional federal responsibilities. It does not establish any new or inconsistent obligations for aliens legally or illegally residing in or otherwise found in Arizona. And. unlike the Hines case so prominent in the court’s ruling, Arizona’s law does not establish any new or extra forms, registration procedures, or other obligations for aliens, legal or illegal.

Respecting preemption, which is the substantive core of the federal government’s case, once again the court presents no evidence in support of its conclusion that AZ is likely to impermissibly interfere with federal law on multiple fronts, including the requirement that aliens carry papers or that state and local law enforcement may undertake constitutionally proper inquiries into the legal status of those they stop. AZ isn’t requiring the federal government to do anything. The federal government can choose not to take AZ’s calls and not cooperate. The court has essentially parroted the federal government’s claims about burdens.

Moreover, the federal government does not “occupy the field” in any event. Indeed, as a matter of federal law and long-standing practice, it encourages states to assist in the enforcement of federal immigration law — both in practice and law. In fact, it relies heavily on them.

Federal preemption can be either express or implied: express where the Constitution says so (declaration of war), implied by conflict with federal law. In the immigration context, implied preemption exists only 1) if a statute falls into the narrow category of a “regulation of immigration”; 2) if Congress expressed “the clear and manifest purpose"”of completely occupying the field and displacing all state activity; or 3) if the state regulation conflicts with federal laws such that it “stands as an obstacle to the accomplishment of the full purposes and objectives of Congress” (De Canas v. Bica). Federal immigration law does not preempt AZ law, and the authors of the AZ law were well acquainted with the pitfalls they needed to avoid — and avoided them.

I think the word “abomination” does not overstate this court’s decision.

— Mark Levin is president of Landmark Legal Foundation, which has filed an amicus brief in this case.

Mickey Kaus on JournoList...

Another take on Journolist, from blogger (and current Democratic candidate for Senate in California! Go Mickey Go!). More accurately, he's responding to a piece from Riehan Salam, but same difference.

The comforts and dangers of not taking a stand.

The message of this seems like advice I should consider. Thought I'd post it here since it's kind of an interesting argument.

An essay on the dangers of critical reason and the fear of erroring.

Sen. Webb on Affirmative Action...

Some good insights in this WSJ guest column by Sen. Jim Webb (D, Va.). Some factoids that I wasn't aware of too.  (Only 5% of Southerners owned slaves at the time of the Civil War? I knew the super-wealthy owned a majority, but didn't realize it was that severe).

I'll withhold the obligatory (but in jest!) anti-Irish Protestant comments that the article raises in my mind though.

(Despite my Irish Catholic heritage, one of my best friends is Orange Irish...I have yet to figure out why I haven't had him killed yet...)

FP take on 90,000 leaked classified docs about Afghanistan...

A number of good links in here in a blog from Foreign Policy magazine. (Including an unrelated link redirection to a lot of articles about Journo-List that Berchmans will no doubt pretend aren't there....I kid, I kid).

It's late here, so I won't write any more now. Perhaps later, young padewans.

Language and Reality...

You may have seen this guest column in the WSJ. Fascinating conversation about how the differences in languages affect our understandings of reality and our behavior.

Conservative Political Correctness

I don't mean to sound like a naive hippie, but the continued bout of public opposition to mosque-building around the United States really, really gets my goat (it's 2 in the morning where I am, so forgive the chatty tone). There are three points I want to quickly make:

1. I find it hilarious that several conservative commentators, including ex-office holders like Newt Gingrich (and current political candidates), have argued that building mosques in America should be contingent on the conduct of Muslim-majority countries in the Middle East (especially Saudi Arabia, which apparently doesn't show as much respect for "people of the Book" as prescribed). This is funny to me for two reasons: A) It's ludicrous to suggest that time-honored (some would say "natural") principles like freedom of religion and association should be defined based on the question, "What Would Saudi Arabia Do?" But B) it's especially silly for conservatives, who generally take the "originalist" approach to constitutional interpretation, to take this position, not only because the Constitution doesn't really endorse Gingrich's curious argument, but also because conservatives generally have a dim view of what foreign countries and jurisprudence can offer to their own.

2. OK, so Gingrich is an easy target, and I should move on. But then, Sarah Palin posted another item on her Facebook about the proposed mosque near the World Trade Center, which then splashed across all the (left-wing, pinko, biased, slanderous, anti-Palin) media websites I read (that is, they all reported, without being able to question Palin, what she said -- ah, the perfect megaphone). Basically, the ex-governor conceded that Muslims had a right to worship where they wanted (how kind), but asked them to 'refudiate' the project because the wounds of 9/11 were still too raw. In a nutshell, her message is a paean to political correctness, that supposed conservative bugaboo: please, your right to practice your religion, even though a firmly ingrained principle of our Constitution, hurts people's feelings, and we wouldn't want to offend anyone, now would we? (I always find it curious when conservatives bash 'political correctness' that they don't want to admit that they have their own set of taboos and speak-no-evils.)

3. I've yet to see a better explanation as to why a project like the Cordoba House should not be allowed, other than Muslims worshiping may or may not worship the same God as the terrorists who blew up the Towers. The Weekly Standard, bless its heart, did recently put out an essay that purported to explore the deep, hidden radical views of the preacher leading the project. I'll let Robert Wright summarize my views on the piece:

Its latest issue features an article about Park51 chock full of angles that never would have occurred to me if some magazine had asked me to write an assessment of the project’s ideological underpinnings. For example: Rauf’s wife, who often speaks in support of the project and during one talk reflected proudly on her Islamic heritage, “failed to mention another feature of her background: She is the niece of Dr. Farooq Khan, formerly a leader of the Westbury Mosque on Long Island, which is a center for Islamic radicals and links on its Web site to the paramilitary Islamic Circle of North America (I.C.N.A.), the front on American soil for the Pakistani jihadist Jamaat e-Islami.”

Got that? Rauf’s wife has an uncle who used to be “a leader” of a mosque that now has a Web site that links to the Web site of an allegedly radical organization. (I’ll get back to the claim that the Westbury Mosque is itself a “center for Islamic radicals.”)

Wright's essay also includes a helpful distinction about views on Hamas. Read it in full. (By the way, Vade Mecon, it's good that you add a comment once or twice every other fortnight, but that doesn't really count for intellectual credibility much these days. Write, or get off the pot.)

The Journo-List Non-Scandal

I see conservatives are slowly losing their mind over Ezra Klein's former online cabal, the Journo-List. I'm not sure how the list can be used as evidence of widespread bias in the mainstream media; most of the names unearthed show that the participants are all opinion writers (I didn't count a single person in the top 15 of this list who is a good ol' fashioned objective journalist). It's absurd -- as if people of like-mind political leanings cannot join together and write each other about the goings on of the day. (And comparing Journo-List to the so-called "Climategate," another pseudo-scandal happily inflated by global warming quietists, also makes no sense -- have these opinion writers done anything to suggest skewering their coverage given that their coverage is meant to be skewered toward an opinion anyway?)

I'm angry about this dispute because I think it's an invasion of privacy and an attack on a profession that I studied for a year and a half in a very, very cold place (that you both of you will no doubt remember). We have long argued about whether or not journalists are capable of balance (I find it curious that conservatives believe judges can be even-handed and non-ideological, even though they instinctively believe journalists care more about their partisan agenda than earning a paycheck). But most journalists in this country do not work in Washington, and they do not cover the Obama Administration (I'd venture to say most do not even cover political issues, but particular beats like health, crime, etc .). It's really, really hard to be biased one way or another about whether or not a new traffic signal should be installed in X Township. (It's also really hard to feel motivated enough to convey this bias in print.)

At a time when easily edited videos (some, like those that supposedly exposed ACORN, taken under false pretenses) can masquerade as journalism, I think the need for people who at the very least ask all sides in a particular dispute for comment deserves a little more respect than currently on display.

The worth of Thais...

I thought this was an interesting piece in the Bangkok Post. A number of good, general principles that relate to the American ideal (and our view of human rights).

Why Do We Believe What We Believe

This Boston Globe article about facts and political beliefs has been making the rounds on the Interweb. It cites a growing sample of studies that show that American citizens -- and partisans -- do not change their minds when confronted with their own empirical ignorance of certain issues. Money quote:

Most of us like to believe that our opinions have been formed over time by careful, rational consideration of facts and ideas, and that the decisions based on those opinions, therefore, have the ring of soundness and intelligence. In reality, we often base our opinions on our beliefs, which can have an uneasy relationship with facts. And rather than facts driving beliefs, our beliefs can dictate the facts we chose to accept. They can cause us to twist facts so they fit better with our preconceived notions.

There are a number of great studies cited (one found that only 3 percent of 1,000 people surveyed in Illinois offered accurate answers on the state's welfare system). But while the article focuses on a neurological explanation, it also brought to mind an old question Vade Mecon posed when we were all shivering in Syracuse. That is, if I read everything Esquire did (and vice versa), could we imagine switching places on the spectrum or at least modifying them?

And, since I'm dismissive of all of V.M.'s suggestions, said no. Of course, at the time, I was in the thrall of communitarian literature (long live Michael Sandel!), and deeply suspicious of the reliance on the rationalist abstract individual so often posited in Western political philosophy. But I still hold on to a nugget: whatever I believe, I ascribe to culture, family, friends, years of growing up in certain communities. It's depressing in one sense, because no one likes to insult one's own mind; we'd all like to think we choose what we think after careful and deep consideration.

But what if everything was already decided for us?

Clarence Thomas And Impartial Juries

I was reading through Tom Goldstein's excellent review of the Supreme Court's term on Scotusblog. It received a lot of attention when it came out, and I think anyone in need of evidence that the Supreme Court isn't just a political tug-of-war should read it. (In brief: roughly 50 percent of cases before SCOTUS are dealt with unanimously; of the other half, only one in 12 go down to 5-4, and of those, even a smaller number are decided along conservative-liberal lines.)

But in one of those unanimous decisions -- Berghuis v. Smith -- Clarence Thomas wrote a concurring opinion that has startled a few people (including me). The opinion is very brief -- barely two pages -- but he basically says he'd be willing to revisit the Court's precedent that juries should have a fair cross-section of society. Now, the reasoning relates partially to my problem with originalism and its 18th-century fetishism. Here's what Thomas writes:

The text of the Sixth Amendment guarantees the right to a trial by “an impartial jury.” Historically, juries did not include a sampling of persons from all levels of society or even from both sexes. See, e.g. , Alschuler & Deiss, A Brief History of the Criminal Jury in the United States, 61 U. Chi. L. Rev. 867, 877 (1994) (In 1791, “[e]very state limited jury service to men; every state except Vermont restricted jury service to property owners or taxpayers; three states permitted only whites to serve; and one state, Maryland, disqualified atheists”); Taylor v. Louisiana , 419 U. S. 522 , n. 13 (1975) (“In this country women were disqualified by state law to sit as jurors until the end of the 19th century”). The Court has nonetheless concluded that the Sixth Amendment guarantees a defendant the right to a jury that represents “a fair cross section” of the community. Ante , at 1 (citing Taylor , supra ).

In my view, that conclusion rests less on the Sixth Amendment than on an “amalgamation of the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment ,” Duren v. Missouri , 439 U. S. 357, 372 (1979) (Rehnquist, J., dissenting), and seems difficult to square with the Sixth Amendment ’s text and history. Accordingly, in an appropriate case I would be willing to reconsider our precedents articulating the “fair cross section” requirement. But neither party asks us to do so here, and the only question before us is whether the state court’s disposition was contrary to, or an unreasonable application of, our precedents. See ante , at 23, 810; 28 U. S. C. §2254(d). I concur in the Court’s answer to that question.

I admire the fidelity to the text, sure, but this seems a bit extreme, no? I have two problems: first, is Thomas suggesting that it would be constitutional for a statute that barred women or minorities from serving on juries, since that was common practice when the Founders roamed the Earth? And secondly, knowing the problems and history of jury selection, and the insidious role race often played, is it wrong to think that a "fair cross section" of society will most likely yield an "impartial jury," as the Sixth Amendment demands?

Can anyone explain this to me?

Jon Kyl And Deficits

The liberal blogosphere has thrown a fit over Jon Kyl's recent remarks on tax cuts and "off-setting." The exact quotes:

"[Y]ou should never raise taxes in order to cut taxes," Jon Kyl said on Fox News Sunday. "Surely Congress has the authority, and it would be right to -- if we decide we want to cut taxes to spur the economy, not to have to raise taxes in order to offset those costs. You do need to offset the cost of increased spending, and that's what Republicans object to. But you should never have to offset cost of a deliberate decision to reduce tax rates on Americans."

There are a couple of problems here: first, it belies the notion that Republicans -- well, at least Kyl -- are serious at all about deficits. If the deficit were your chief concern, then raising taxes should be on the table at some point (rather than the 'never' that Kyl envisions).

Secondly, it shows -- partly -- why we've gotten to the dire fiscal situation we have. One side refuses, almost on principle, to admit that cutting taxes at every juncture (that is: a) when the economy is doing badly, we should cut taxes to stimulate growth, and b) when the economy is doing well (circa 2000), we should cut taxes again because the government has no business having a budget surplus), all while refusing to seriously contain spending (indeed, the Republicans came out as Medicare's chief defenders during the health care reform bill). Finally, as Ezra Klein points out, this leaves the mantle of responsible checkbook-ing with the other guys on the left:

This is much crazier than anything you hear from Democrats. Imagine if some Democrat -- and a member of the Senate Democratic leadership, no less -- said that as a matter of principle, spending should never be offset. He'd be laughed out of the room.

Now, the supply-siders and Laffer enthusiasts among us will reply that cutting taxes generates growth on their own, which then results in higher tax revenue (magical in its simplicity). I don't believe it, but we can trade statistics on that in the comments section.

I get the impression that this article...

was written by someone who is new to the issues being discussed.

But (and I'm sincerely asking here) what does this mean:

Two years ago, the court declared for the first time that the gun rights of individuals were protected by the Constitution. This year, the justices made clear this was a "fundamental" right that extended to cities and states as well as federal jurisdictions.

??? Haven't protected individual gun rights as a broad idea been established since the Bill of Rights was written? The debate is over periphery of what those rights mean; not whether the right to gun ownership exists at all...

Lastly, I find it tedious to hear the notion that cancelling out prior decisions and returning to a prior standard is the same thing as creating a brand new standard. That strikes me as a logical fail...(I'm not using this as an argument that the Roberts Court is ipso facto always doing so; merely that lots and lots of commentators seem to suggest that such a notion is impossible.

I'm reminded of William F. Buckley's famous remark on the distinct methods of pushing old ladies....

The Law of Unintended Consequences...

I thought this Cracked article was amusing and interesting. Helps explain why I'm a conservative.

6 Laws that were great on paper (but insane everywhere else).

Paglia on Sex...

I thought this was interesting, though I haven't even begun to examine whether I agree with it or not. At first read, it passes my plausibility test though.

Open And Massive Bigotry

Sorry I've been away. Just wanted to link to this New York Times article about opposition to a new mosque in Staten Island (where else?). Very chilling stuff; it describes a civic association meeting where the audience -- mostly white -- attacked Islam and the basic principle of freedom of religion. (I'm open to other interpretations, of course). A sample:

But just 20 minutes earlier, as Bill Finnegan stood at the microphone, came the meeting’s single moment of hushed silence. Mr. Finnegan said he was a Marine lance corporal, home from Afghanistan, where he had worked as a mediator with warring tribes.

After the sustained standing ovation that followed his introduction, he turned to the Muslims on the panel: “My question to you is, will you work to form a cohesive bond with the people of this community?” The men said yes.

Then he turned to the crowd. “And will you work to form a cohesive bond with these people — your new neighbors?”

The crowd erupted in boos. “No!” someone shouted.

Wowsers.

A pretty shocking video from a question/answer during a David Horowitz presentation in a UC school, via The Corner.

I was trying to figure out if there's any way that her last answer might have come off differently than she meant it. But I can't find any other way to take it.

Scary Thought of the Day

The U.S. Treasury released new data on the health of the government's Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP). The HAMP program seeks to provide homeowners who are delinquent on their mortgages a chance to modify the terms of their loans in an effort to stave off foreclosure. (Full disclosure: I help run the numbers to determine the cost of the HAMP program to the government.)

The data look really bad. Here's how Calculated Risk sums it up:

If we look at the HAMP program stats (see page 5), the median front end DTI [debt to income ratio, which includes just mortgage debt] before modification was 44.9% - up slightly from 44.8% last month. And the back end DTI [debt to income ratio that includes both mortgage and all other additional debt, like car loans, credit card debt, taxes, etc.,] was an astounding 80.2% .

Think about that for a second: over 80% of the borrower's income went to servicing debt. And it is over 64% after the modification. Do they have a life?

Just imagine the characteristics of the borrowers who can't be converted.

The data say that the median homeowner applying to the HAMP program has 80 cents of every dollar she makes going toward paying debt.

How is that possible?

Where We Go From Here

Ross Dohout, the conservative op-ed columnist for the NYT, has found his voice:

Taken case by case, many of these policy choices are perfectly defensible. Taken as a whole, they suggest a system that only knows how to move in one direction. If consolidation creates a crisis, the answer is further consolidation. If economic centralization has unintended consequences, then you need political centralization to clean up the mess. If a government conspicuously fails to prevent a terrorist attack or a real estate bubble, then obviously it needs to be given more powers to prevent the next one, or the one after that.

The C.I.A. and F.B.I. didn't stop 9/11, so now we have the Department of Homeland Security. Decades of government subsidies for homebuyers helped create the housing crash, so now the government is subsidizing the auto industry, the green-energy industry, the health care sector ...

The pattern applies to personnel as well as policy. If Robert Rubin's mistakes helped create an out-of-control financial sector, then naturally you need Timothy Geithner and Lawrence Summers — Rubin's protégés — to set things right. After all, who else are you going to trust with all that consolidated power? Ron Paul? Dennis Kucinich? Sarah Palin?

MSNBC...

So we, the public, clearly don't have much information thus far on the Faisal Shazhad, the man arrested for the attempted Times Square bombing the other day.

Without presupposing anything, but given that Shazhad travelled to the FATA region of Pakistan recently and that the Pakistani intelligence agencies announced arrests of people suspected of having a connection to the bomb plot, doesn't MSNBC's headline seem to have a bit of a bizarre focus? It reads:

BOMB SUSPECT LOST HOME TO FORECLOSURE.

I don't think I'm reading too much into the article in feeling like they're suggesting that his losing his home was the reason for him trying to blow up people in Times Square. Could it be true that the foreclosure caused him to snap and go crazy? Yes, I suppose so. But given all the other information out there, it doesn't seem to me that that would be the most pertinant information to highlight as essential for readers to know about this guy. (For one, a terrorist might "buy" a house to help him blend in. He would, however, have little to no incentive to actually make mortgage payments, particularly once he's on the course to commit a terrorist act.)

If I was cynical, I'd wonder if MSNBC's headline has something to do with the seeming need of some folks to never suspect that a guy's motivations have anything to do with a perversion of a religion. That or it's a reflection of ideological view about the meaning of the housing crisis.

Whether either those is true, all in all the focus on mortgage default it's just a weird editorial decision to me.