How free?

The Economist asks the question America needs to be asking itself.

Land of the free?

"'How Free?' also has some hard things to say about America's criminal-justice system. The incarceration rate exploded from 1.39 per 1,000 in 1980 to 7.5 in 2006, driven, among other things, by the war on drugs. America now has one of the highest rates of imprisonment in the world: 5.6m Americans, or one in every 37 adults, has spent time behind bars. Even though prison-building is one of the country's great growth industries, overcrowding is endemic, with federal prisons operating at 131% of capacity. America is also one of the few countries to ban felons and, in some states, ex-felons from voting. At any one time 4m Americans—one in every 50 adults—is disenfranchised because of past criminal convictions. This includes 1.4m blacks, or 14% of the black male population.

Freedom House's strictures are, if anything, too soft. America insists on criminalising victimless crimes such as prostitution. Last week Deborah Jeane Palfrey, the so-called DC Madam, committed suicide; the government had thrown the book at her, including racketeering and mail fraud, because it really wished to penalise the arranging of assignations between consenting adults. In her suicide note to her mother she wrote that she could not 'live the next six-to-eight years behind bars for what you and I have both come to regard as this 'modern-day lynching'.'

The American legal system also seems to have lost any sense of proportion. Christopher Ratte, a professor of archaeology, recently tried to buy his seven-year-old son a bottle of lemonade at a baseball game. He was handed a bottle of Mike's Hard Lemonade, an alcoholic drink, by mistake. Officials noticed the boy sipping the drink and immediately whisked him off to hospital. He was fine. But the family was condemned to legal hell: the police at first put the seven-year-old into a foster home and a judge ruled that he could go home only if his father moved out. It took several days of legal wrangling to reunite the family.

'How Free?' repeatedly argues, even as it dredges through the most depressing material, that the American system has proved admirably self-correcting. The response of civil-liberties advocates has been swift and dogged. The Supreme Court has forced the administration to extend the Geneva conventions to inmates in Guantánamo and other military prisons. Congress has reined in warrantless wiretapping. The press has repeatedly published leaked material.

This is perhaps a little optimistic—the courts have been slow and Congress half-hearted. But nevertheless the self-correction is now entering a higher gear. All the current presidential candidates, Democratic and Republican alike, have condemned torture and rendition and declared their desire to close Guantánamo. Freedom House's new publication will be an important contribution to this process of self-correction."

I must say that I have a really serious problem with the repressive, aggressive language being thrown about in efforts to defend liberty. It rationalizes such behavior, and it is such rationalizations that got us into this mess, in the first place. I'm tired of people rationalizing this bullshit. And I don't care in the name of what cause it is done.

We know better. We just don't want to own up for our role in this mess.

And that is the problem.

But it is good for reputable folks to be talking about the erosion of liberty openly and honestly.

Perhaps we can develop a more genuine commitment to freedom, rather than the fakery we've been engaged in up till now.

I, for one, would like liberty for real. And for an end to all the bullshit.

Speaking of stupid

I just want the readers of Thomas Friedman's column in today's International Herald Tribune to take a look at and reconcile these two passages.

The new Cold War

"When you have leverage, talk. When you don't have leverage, get some - by creating economic, diplomatic or military incentives and pressures that the other side finds too tempting or frightening to ignore. That is where the Bush team has been so incompetent vis-a-vis Iran."

Now, let's put aside the obvious - that the Bush Administration has already, repeatedly, and with much criticism from the likes of people like Thomas Friedman and me, threatened to attack or war with Iran, the most serious and deadly form of leverage possible - and let's just look at the internal logic of Mr. Friedman's thesis given this argument in the same piece:

"We Americans are not going to war with Iran, nor should we. But it is sad to see America and its Arab friends so weak they can't prevent one of the last corners of decency, pluralism and openness in the Arab world from being snuffed out by Iran and Syria. The only thing that gives me succor is the knowledge that anyone who has ever tried to dominate Lebanon alone - Maronites, Palestinians, Syrians, Israelis - has triggered a backlash and failed."

Mr. Friedman's distinction, apparently, is that anyone who has tried to dominate Lebanon alone triggered a backlash and failed.

If anyone tried to dominate Lebananon, the United States, or Iran with the help of others, on the other hand, everything would be hunky-dory.

Uh huh. Good luck with that one.

In the meantime, fuck liberal democracy. Liberty and genuine democratic engagement is for pussies. Dominance is for real men.

Like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Thomas Friedman, apparently.

Have fun rationalizing what pricks you are, assholes.

And, in the meantime, have fun trying to dominate Lebanon or Iran, until they do exactly what Iran is doing, now, which is get a bunch of friends to fuck you up, if need be.

Noone likes to be dominated. Noone.

And if you do it with me, wait until I get a bunch of friends to fuck you up, too.

Or just avoid you altogether.

I knew there was a reason I didn't read Thomas Friedman's columns anymore.

You gotta fight for your right

I've decided I believe in the right to be stupid.

Because God knows most people, and some, in particular, exercise that right regularly, as it is.

And thank God for that. I don't know what we'd do in this world with too many smart people.

Go soft, I imagine.

Here's to the hardcore dumbasses and dickheads who we all know really make the world a safe place for everyone else.

Thank goodness for them.

Because I'd hate to imagine how shitty this world would be if everyone was smart and compassionate.

What a fuckin' mess that would be.

Nothin' like the goddamn paradise that persists today.

You gotta hand it to morons and the meanspirited.

They're dumber and meaner than they look.

Politicians and Truth Serum

I don't agree with Robert Samuelson's Chris Matthews-inspired column (if you haven't watched Chris Matthews ask Terry McAulliffe how he would describe the Clinton campaign's chances, at this point, I highly recommend it) on every point in this piece. But I like the idea and the constructive criticism from many quarters, this election, that politicians are not honest enough.

If Candidates Took Truth Serum

"'Fellow Americans, I know you worry about the economy. So do I. But, frankly, if you elect me, I won't do much about it. It's a $14 trillion economy. Every three months, 7 million Americans change jobs. Presidents aren't powerful enough to steer this colossus. Sure, we can pass 'stimulus' programs, but if we overdo it -- as we did in the 1970s -- we will make the economy worse. Believe me, presidents would prevent recessions if they could.

'What we can do is preserve an economic climate that favors long-term growth. That means holding down the tax burden to maintain incentives for work and investments. We're already running a $400 billion or so deficit; some broad-based tax increases may be needed. This will disappoint conservatives, who think no one should pay taxes, and liberals, who think only the rich should pay them. But we must also cut spending, because, unless we do, the future tax increases will be crushing.

'Of necessity, spending cuts should focus on Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. These programs are projected to grow from about 45 percent of the present budget to 70 percent over a couple of decades. Paying for that exclusively with taxes would be devastating for the economy and our children. Paying exclusively by cutting other programs would gut vital government services. I admit that raising eligibility ages for baby boomers and cutting some benefits are unfair. People should have received more warning. But our politicians have so dawdled that there's no warning time left.

'We've also dawdled on energy. No one likes $125-a-barrel oil. Last year, we paid an average price of $64 a barrel for imports. Some blame the oil companies, but the truth is that we're all to blame. Americans like cheap gasoline and big vehicles. Nothing was done to dampen consumption. Meanwhile, Congress restricted new oil and gas exploration on environmental grounds. So, demand rose and supply fell. In 1985, we imported 4 million barrels of oil a day; now that's 12 million.

''Energy independence' is a fraud. We simply use too much foreign oil. All we can do is limit our dependence by shifting to more-efficient vehicles and increasing domestic production. But these measures will take years and have only modest effects. The same is true of global warming. Without major technological breakthroughs, making big cuts in greenhouse gases will be impossible.

'Finally, let's discuss poverty. Everyone's against it, but hardly anyone admits that most of the increase in the past 15 years reflects immigration -- new immigrants or children of recent immigrants. Unless we stop poor people from coming across our Southern border, legally and illegally, we won't reduce poverty. Period. That doesn't mean we should try to expel the 12 million illegal immigrants already here -- an impossible and morally dubious task. Many families have been here for years; many have American children. We need a pragmatic accommodation: assimilate most people now here; shift future immigration to the highly skilled.

'Vote for me. I'll tell the truth.'

Of course, our hapless candidate would be dismissed as misinformed, offensive, possibly racist and, of course, unelectable. People say they value candor, but in practice they don't. Almost all our major national problems require patience: the capacity to take somewhat painful actions now to avoid greater future pain. In an ideal world, elections would help move public opinion toward such policies.

But that doesn't happen. Politics is mostly about immediate gratification -- about offering up convenient scapegoats and instant solutions for voters' complaints, even if the villains and promises are often false. We in the media bless this process by treating much of the self-serving rhetoric with undeserved seriousness. Is it any wonder that our genuine problems persist year after year and, in the end, foster public cynicism?"

It's a good question. It is the question democratic politics, actually.

And if there is any question I am looking to address - in addition to improving international and American security, which matter an awful lot to me, actually - this is the one.

We need more honest discussion. More importantly to me, we need more assumption of good faith between people who disagree. And we need better treatment of one another, in the meantime.

How we behave like this and call it good or call it leadership or call it wisdom or intelligence is completely beyond me, really.

We all need a little truth serum, is the truth.

But being more honest means having more real courage than most of us are willing to offer up. And the real question is are we willing to demonstrate that kind of courage in the face of our fears of a world that will forever be scary and uncertain. Because that is what courage entails. It does not entail our fears or the basis for our fears disappearing from existence.

Courage involves facing those fears honestly and being bigger than our fears might cower us into being.

A little honesty wouldn't hurt either, if we could show some courage and create some space for more honesty to take place.

But that will involve a commitment to more freedom, not less. When you scare people, they tend to get less honest. It's just a fact of leading by fear rather than by courage.

And getting more honest must involve a commitment to not confusing our fears or our dishonesty, and the repression and lack of freedom that make them so, with something better than they are.