March 2012
106 posts
“When you took your oath of office, you placed your hand on the Bible and swore...”
– Jamie Raskin - who is now a senator in Maryland and served as floor manager of the recently passed bill allowing same sex marriage. (via abaldwin360)
yes, yes, yes. Politicalprof.
February 2012
119 posts
denimbeard asked: If gold cannot be money, or used as money, then why can rags of cotton or copper and nickel disks be used? By your gold argument, no rare or common substance should he used as a means of establishing a trade medium, besides barter.
Sorry Goldstandardians: Gold Is Not Money
Gold is a naturally occurring substance that human beings choose to dig out of the ground or pick up on the surface, usually in or near riverbeds in which running water has exposed previously subsurface gold. It has historically been valued for its perceived beauty, its malleability, and its comparative scarceness. It is because of this last condition, its scarceness, that some economic systems...
CNN must be joking
It depicts pro-Santorum states in PURPLE? Do they know nothing? Or are their collective tongues in their collective cheeks?
5 tags
In Which David Brooks Gets Something Right
NY Times columnist David Brooks has been on a fairly annoying kick recently of offering pieces filled with what he thinks are big ideas about the shape of contemporary society and then addressing their “meaning” … all within the word limit constraints of the NY Times editorial page.
It hasn’t really worked.
But today I’m on board—because, I think, this time...
“But can we please admit that many four year colleges do in fact attempt to...”
– This is pedantry at its best.
All education is transformative. No one is born believing a darn thing.Your parents, your church and your community all install ideas and beliefs and faiths in you. College comes late to the game, and can only provide those students who care to develop them with the...
Squashed: Democratic shenanigans in Michigan? →
squashed:
Michigan has an open primary. While you can’t vote in both parties’ primaries, there is nothing to stop you from voting in a primary you care about rather than one where the results are foreordained. For example, in 2008 I cast a Republican ballot for John McCain because I thought he was a…
I would add only that the research in this area is consistent: almost no one ever...
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Remember When Romney Was Inevitable?
As we have the Michigan and Arizona primaries today, I thought we should think back to those halcyon days of, oh, seven weeks ago or so (!) when everybody who was anybody saw a Romney runaway with the Republican presidential nomination.
I, too, argued that Romney was likely to win—a position I still take. He has more organization than anyone else, and historically it has been organization,...
bloglinsk asked: I have two questions. First what is your opinion of Leo Strauss if any and secondly which political philosopher, if any, do you enjoy reading?
demablog asked: I've heard a lot lately about the Republican Party being in danger of splitting due to a difficult primary season, increasingly vocal factions, and a possibly politically dangerous national campaign (depending on who you ask and who gets nominated). In the event that the current Republican Party does indeed split, what do you see as being the possible political future of America?
Blessed Irony
Interesting news tidbit: A lesbian local trial judge in Texas is refusing to perform marriage ceremonies for straight couples as a matter of principle.
h/t: BB
“President Obama once said he wants everybody in America to go to college…....”
– Rick Santorum
—a graduate of Penn State University (BA, 1980); Pittsburgh (MBA, 1981), and Penn State University (JD, 1986). So maybe public universities aren’t quite the engines of liberal indoctrination he supposes.
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On Populism
Populism is afoot in the land.
Populism, taken simply, is a political ideology grounded in the belief that some elite somewhere runs things for their own good, inevitably screwing the deserving groups of society. Populist movements occur when groups of people band together seeking to overthrow this elite in the name of the “people.”
But it turns out the story is more complicated than...
A brief note on journalism and language
I didn’t watch the NBA All-Star game yesterday: don’t care, not interested, of no value.
At least I wasn’t interested in the All-Star game until I saw news coverage today that noted that the West “held on” for a victory over the East.
The final score was 152-149.
People, no one “holds on” for a 152-149 win in a 48 minute basketball game. I’d buy...
“We establish no religion in this country, we command no worship, we mandate no...”
– Ronald Reagan
“To say that people of faith have no role in the public square? You bet that...”
– Rick Santorum, discussing John Kennedy’s famous 1960 speech on the separation of religion and politics in light of his Catholic faith, on ABC’s “This Week” today.
—Only one quick thought: Kennedy’s speech was reasoned, literate and thoughtful whether you agree...
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The #Politics Tag: What I Need as an editor
I’ve had about a week as a #Politics editor for Tumblr, and I have few requests:
1. Libertarian posts that engage the complexities of libertarian ideology as translated into political practice.
Most of the libertarian posts that come up on my dashboard are little more than ideological screeds. They begin from “libertarianism is the answer to all issues of human freedom” and end...
Squashed: A simple question →
The Taliban are unspeakably vile. So are the Lord’s Republican Army in Congo. The Assad regime in Syria. The monstrosities that run Equatorial Guinea and Burma and North Korea.
It is simply not the United States’ job—nor is it within its capacity—to fix all the evils in the world. More, the notion that we have a sacrosanct ability to understand what is best for others is a...
A simple question
squashed:
politicalprof:
Can anyone offer me a serious answer to the question: why are we still in Afghanistan?
I believe the concern is that as much as it sucks to be in Afghanistan the alternative is worse. When climbing over a mountain, you can’t just cut the ropes and bail half-way down the far face—no matter how bad an idea the entire expedition was. Even if that works okay for you, it...
A simple question
Can anyone offer me a serious answer to the question: why are we still in Afghanistan?
gallen asked: I've often wondered if an appropriate rebuttal to someone blathering on about how the US is a Christian nation wold be "If you have to assign any one religion on the US, it was actually formed as a deist nation."
The Jefferson Bible
I was asked for this to be reposted in a different way. So here you go:
You can buy a copy of the Jefferson Bible on Amazon and elsewhere. But I wouldn’t run for office today with a copy in my hand!
For those of you who don’t know, Jefferson excised the miracles from the Bible—he literally took a razor and cut them out. There is substantial textual evidence that the miracles were added later,...
seltaire asked: It funny Jefferson was able to cut up a Bible in the 18th Century ... I think if he did that now, he'd be burned at the stake.
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Separating Church and State
This year’s Republican primary has brought the return of the culture war: the war between those who some allege to be godly against others presumed to be ungodly; the war between those who insist they are moral against those who are found to be immoral. Front and center in the culture war this year has been contraception, most notably things like the birth control pill, the morning after...
“I believe I am kindly enough in nature, and can be moved to pity and to pardon...”
– Abraham Lincoln, refusing to pardon Nathaniel Gordon, who was executed for slave trading.
Wonklife: President Obama as an alien →
They say that President Obama is a Muslim, but if he isn’t, he’s a secularist who is waging war on religion. On some days he’s a Nazi, but on most others he’s merely a socialist. His especially creative opponents see him as having a “Kenyan anti-colonial worldview,” while the less adventurous…
Just choose an argument, people, and stick with it. Please.
True Love
True love. Is it normal is it serious, is it practical? What does the world get from two people who exist in a world of their own? Placed on the same pedestal for no good reason, drawn randomly from millions but convinced it had to happen this way – in reward for what? For nothing. The light descends from nowhere. Why on these two and not on others? Doesn’t this outrage justice? Yes it does....
echotangowhisky asked: Are there other political blogs you might suggest? Also, thank you for being so sensible in your posts. I hate the sensationalized crap that I find everywhere else.
Scanning the Heavens: Close the Tamms Supermax... →
michaelgizzi:
Illinois Governor Pat Quinn announced plans to close 14 government facilities, including two prisons, Dwight Correctional Center (a women’s maximum security facility in Livingston County), and the Tamms Super-Max Prison in far southern Illinois. While I think the arguments for closing Dwight are…
Who Does Congress Represent?
michaelgizzi:
Twenty years ago I first read a book by this title - “The Best Congress Money Can Buy,” and today it is more relevant and out of control than ever.
Professor William Domhoff provides a great deal of data on wealth distribution in the United States, but I want to focus on just one chart:
We supposedly live in a democratic Republic, yet, 42% of the House and 43% of the US...
“Everywhere I go I’m asked if I think the university stifles writers. My opinion...”
– Flannery O’Connor
—some days I think this about lots of things I read.
rickrosswifey asked: that post really bothers me; i.e., the part that states that democrats want a larger "helpful" part of the government, and a smaller "hurtful" part of the government" and republicans vice versa. i feel that statement is incredibly biased. you think republicans want a less attention/financial focus on the education system, less evaluation on the safety of food and drugs,...
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Republicans and "Smaller" Government
One constantly hears that Republicans are the party of small government while Democrats are the party of big government. And, of course, the person making this claim usually makes it clear that small government is good and big government is bad.
Except, of course, this characterization of the two parties’ positions on government is factual twaddle.
Think about it this way: some parts of...
With regards to your post about Iran, and the US...
Tensions with Pakistan are certainly high. And we did the bin Laden raid and continue to do drone strikes without Pakistani permission.
But there is no prospect that the United States will seek to invade Pakistan as it did Iraq. Nor is there any prospect that the United States will engage in a systematic series of massive airstrikes against Pakistan as it is considering against Iran and its...
Why Might Iran Want a Nuclear Weapon?
Well, here’s one observation:
The United States has never so much as spat at a nation that possesses a nuclear weapon.
Just a thought.
The Red Wheelbarrow
so much depends upon a red wheel barrow glazed with rain water beside the white chickens.
William Carlos Williams
taniabunke asked: Why AV (Instant Run-Off) rather than a different non-FPTP system? AV sometimes ends up with thing like the UK Labour leadership elections last year, where a candidate who got a very small proportion of the first-ranked votes ended up winning, which seems counter to the principal of electoral democracy. Wouldn't some version of PR (or perhaps a PR and FPTP system as in Germany or Scotland) be...
anticapitalist asked: What is your opinion on alternate voting systems like Single Transferrable Vote and Instant Run-Off Voting?
Now It's Illinois' Turn
The House AGRICULTURE Committee in Illinois has now decided transvaginal probe ultrasounds ought to be required in at least some cases when women seek abortions.
As my friend Mike Gizzi says: the AGRICULTURE Committee. Because women are apparently cows.
And let’s be clear: ALL THIS TO GET A PROCEDURE THAT IS LEGAL!
It’s time to stop abusing women in the law.