The state of intelligence and the world

Susan Jacoby and Howard Gardner write two fascinating columns on the state of intelligence and literacy in contemporary culture, in today's Washington Post, which illustrate the conundrums and the opportunities for education in America, liberal democracies, and the contemporary world.

Susan Jacoby - The Dumbing of America

Howard Gardner - The End of Literacy? Don't Stop Reading

Both are smart and interesting reads on the state of intelligence in the world and contemporary democracies. Jacoby is rightly concerned with the perenial question, with its contemporary manifestations, of the celebration of ignorance and anti-intellectualism in contemporary society. Gardiner argues, also correctly, I believe, that most modern technologies signal greater opportunities for reading and thinking rather than fewer and that conventional intelligence - an interesting focus for Gardner, given that the bulk of his work is dedicated to a more diversified view of intelligence; if you have not read Gardner's Frames of Mind about his conception of multiple intelligences (eight that Garner has identified, at this point) I highly recommend it - has a long future in store for it.

Fundamentally, I think this discussion is important as a long-standing, timeless, and enduring discussion of how of the importance of wise and intelligent thought and how to open up that circle as broadly, as usefully, and with as much intellectual honesty and integrity as possible.

I think what we are witnessing with the digital age is an opening up of society to help us see, better, the world, more, as it is, and the opportunities as well as the immediate limits in cultivating a commitment and understanding of the importance of conventional intelligence.

H.L. Mencken recognized the problems with perpetually too few people in the world taking intelligent thought seriously. But his older and distant mentor, Mark Twain recognized the greater importance of including more of those people, as much as possible, in the mix of wisdom and intelligent reflection.

There are always too few people who take serious thought seriously enough. It has been an important fact of human existence since the recognition of this unique capacity for survival and thriving for the human species long before there were universities, newspapers, and an internet to contemplate such facts of existence.

And it is for that reason - and the tendency of the uneducated and educated, alike, to undermine the capacity for intelligent engagement and reflection with their rationalization of our base instincts for aggression to somehow compensate for both our ignorance, our lack of thought, and our insecurities in the face of a world that necessitates such thought by virtue of the problems it offers us to solve - that it has been so important to, unendingly and in as many different directions as possible, expand the opportunities for reason, science, creativity, information-gathering, expermimentation, thoughtful reflection, and the long, long list of various forms of intellectual activity to reach as many people as possible, to inform their lives and to bridge the existences, values, and understandings of those who take thinking more seriously and those who do not.

It's an effort that will never end. But it's an effort that reaps value for each successive generation that engages in its labors. It builds and nurtures our humanity and our capacity for mutual learning, growth, and development in a world where still too many people die, suffer, are repressed, imprisoned and restrained, all in the name of aggression attempting, fruitlessly, to compensate for our ignorance.

And every opportunity for us to recognize the edges of intelligent thought, and the liberal values, ideas, technologies and opportunities that nurture and expand that terrain, are valuable for our individual and general welfare.

As most intelligent people know, intelligence, especially its deepest, wisest, most profound versions and permutations, matters. Enormously. The question that individuals and all of humanity has always faced is how seriously we are going to take serious thought and how seriously are we going to engage all of those around us in that enterprise.

And the truth is that though Jacoby is right that the opportunities for modern peoples to revel in the pride that often accompanies stupidity and ignorance are growing and so many signs about the willingness of individuals in contempoary societies to take intelligent thought seriously look somewhat discouraging, in many areas of culture, the fact, I think, is that the horizon looks very bright for intelligent thought and those who take it seriously, and for those who don't take it seriously, and for the opportunities and likely outcomes of much greater proportions of people taking education, intelligence, creativity and thoughtful reflection seriously, even as people take plenty advantage with modern technology and society to avoid what many regard as boring and labor intensive efforts.

Because the truth, eventually, is hard to escape. Intelligence does matter. Learning facilitates opportunities in life. And occassions to develop thought benefit everyone, especially those not quite sold on its value.

And every chance to expand those circumstances - whether through books, movies, music, the internet, business and financial dealings, discussion, debate, creative outlets of all kinds, and every which way that intelligent thought can be cultivated - ups the likelihood and yield of the harvest of better consequences that intelligent thought sows.

Things are looking good even as fear of an uncertain world endlessly plagues the minds of the more and less thoughtful among humanity. That fear will never leave us completely as long as the risk of failure of our efforts and thought are always with us. But it dissipates the greater faith we put in our capacity to discuss, debate, think through and solve our problems despite and as the only real alternative to that fear and its byproducts.

Things look good for intelligent thought because they have always looked good for intelligent thought. Because it is the only real opportunity for anything to look good for the longer term of our lives.

It is our fear and its correlates that always betray us. All of us. Me too.

Ideas and the thinking that renders them have always been the light that shines our way through the darkness. And it is that light that uniquely advances human civilization in the face of a world that is now and forever beyond our total grasp. No matter how smart or not we are or think we are.

Michael Gerson is a pimp (I hope I don't get fired for saying that)

I have to say that while I have thoroughly enjoyed many of Michael Gerson's columns, I was not enamoured of his idea of "Heroic Conservativism" and have been a little skeptical of his thinking since his recent book publication.

But Michael Gerson knocks one out of the park, today, with his column on Hillary Clinton.

Hillary's Unappealing Path

An extended series of gems from that column:

"Hillary Clinton's attempt to define a narrative of her own has been hobbled because her campaign is defined by the rejection of rhetoric. Obama's eloquence and idealism are dismissed as "abstract" and a "fairy tale" in contrast to Clinton's experience and policy substance. It is difficult for a campaign to inspire while using "inspiration" as an epithet.

This theory has other drawbacks. As a lawyer, first lady and senator, Clinton has had little actual experience running anything -- except for a White House health-care policy process that was a spectacle of arrogance and ineffectiveness. And on a purely political level, this argument for experience comes at an odd time, when Americans are generally disillusioned with both Democrats and Republicans in Washington.

The challenge for Clinton is that her other options -- the other narratives for her campaign -- are equally flawed:

First, there is Hillary the Fighter. In recent interviews, Clinton has come out swinging with negative attacks -- what she once referred to as "the fun part" of politics. Obama has "questions to answer about his dealings with . . . a big nuclear power company" as well as with "Mr. Rezko." But it is hard to imagine American voters thinking: "If only the Clintons were a little more ruthless, I'd finally support them." It is this very trait -- after a series of racially charged attacks -- that many Americans, including many liberals, found more repulsive than "fun."

Second, there is Hillary the Comeback Kid. One campaign official commented, "We're taking a long-term approach to the campaign and look at it as a delegate game. This is not like the playoffs, where if you don't win you don't advance." No -- my mistake -- that was not a Clinton official, it was Rudy Giuliani's campaign manager speaking last year. Giuliani tried -- as Clinton is trying -- to disprove an iron rule of politics: When you lose a lot, you eventually look like a loser.

Third, there is Hillary the Tested. "I've been examined one side up and the other side down," argues Clinton, while Obama has not. Well, it is true that the Clintons have been endlessly vetted -- but mainly because their shared career has been an endless string of scandals. Stuart Taylor of the National Journal recently took a depressing stroll back through the derelict funfair of the Clinton years: the deceptions about Gennifer and Monica, the Travelgate firings, the prosperous trade in cattle futures, the questionable transactions of Castle Grande, the strange case of the misplaced billing records. In the midst of these colorful controversies, Taylor observes, Clinton has developed "a bad reputation for truthfulness and veracity."

It is not enough to be vetted. The goal is to be vetted and found clean.

Though it is increasingly unlikely, Clinton may still have a path to the nomination -- and what a path it is. She merely has to puncture the balloon of Democratic idealism; sully the character of a good man; feed racial tensions within her party; then eke out a win with the support of unelected superdelegates, thwarting the hopes of millions of new voters who would see an inspiring young man defeated by backroom arm-twisting and arcane party rules.

Unlikely -- but it would be a fitting contribution to the Clinton legacy of monumental selfishness."

Wow. How fuckin' more dead on can one evangelical get?

Michael and I have many disagreements. He is a conservatives who is, ironically, more enamoured of big government than I am. And while I respect his pro-life and anti-gay marriage social conservativism, I'm a big believer in letting people run their own lives and make their own choices as the best path to people learning to do good in the world.

But one thing that Michael and I have in common that I think helps explain both of our aversions to Ms. Clinton is that for all of my disagreements with Michael, he is a really decent guy. He's a nice guy. A good guy. Charles Krauthammer is smart as all shit. But as his "see only evil" column on Barack Obama demonstrates today, Charles is a serious prick, much of the time. And what Michael and I both don't like in Hillary Clinton - along with our policy differences with her - is that Hillary Clinton is kind of a prick, too, of a quasi-feminine variety. She is a vindictive and nasty bitch. And God knows why anyone would think that such people are safe people with which to invest power.

And Michael Gerson is a serious pimp for calling out Hillary Clinton on her bullshit.

As an aside, is it wrong to say that Chelsea Clinton looks about 100 times better now that she has been publicly compared to a prostitute?

OK, now I know I'm getting fired.

Honesty and politics

Andrew Sullivan gets to the heart, for me, of what is so disgusting about the current political era.

Obama, Clinton, and the war

What disgusts me in how the politics of this war have played out is the dishonesty. How so many in Washington who supported this war without enough thought to its consequences, who cheerlead policies that are clearly failing, and who stick by their policy of pressure, force, and aggression as some kind of engine for democratic progress, how all of these people cannot give it up, will make tragedy of as many peoples' lives as necessary to maintain it, all because of an intellectually and otherwise dishonest resistance to admit when they are wrong.

It is wrong to use power and to explicitly advocate the use of power as a smokescreen for one's mistakes and failures. It is wrong to make tragedy of the lives of others because you cannot face up to those failures. It is human to ignore the evidence contrary to your sacred notions as a means of avoiding your mistakes of judgment and failures of policy. But it wrong to do so when it means ruining, ending, or otherwise seriously fucking with the lives of others because you are too stubborn to face the greatest pride of people in politics: that they might be wrong, about anything.

And every excuse that I have ever heard on this one is one long self-fulfilling prophecy of why pressure made me do it and pressure is the wave of the future and pressure is the force for democratic change and pressure is why I am not responsible for my votes or my policies or whatever the political case may be.

Force is power. Force is freedom. Force is honesty. Force is progress.

Force is everything but me having to admit that I'm wrong. Because that may reduce my power, my ability to use force. And without me having the capacity to force change, where would this world be?

Put this political period on fast forward for 70 years and you might understand the depth of the deception that was Soviet Communism. Put it on fast forward for almost 40, 50, 60 years and you might understand the depths of the deception of Saddam Hussein's Baathism, Fidel Castro's Cuban Communism, the North Korean Communism of Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong Il, or Mao Tse Tung's and subsequent generations of Chinese Communism.

It's dishonest is what it is. Intellectually and otherwise. It is the essence of what people like George Orwell, Lord Acton and the like warned us about power. And there is no opportunity for us to shed its ugly legacy until enough people call it out for what it is.

As someone who doesn't covet power, I seriously underestimated what people will do to have and keep it.

I only hope that I haven't underestimated the ability of more honest folks to see through it.

Madeleine Albright is on a roll

Toward a true dialouge

"First, it is a mistake to conceive of this region or the world as divided between people who do no wrong and those who do no right; between moderates and extremists, secular and religious, evil and good.

A simplistic and triumphal mind-set cannot guide us through a complicated reality. Blame for past mistakes and current disputes must be widely shared; and answers will not be found unless the interests of all are taken into account.

Second, America's enemy is not Islam, nor any subset of Islam. Nor is it Islamic terrorism, for terrorism is by its nature un-Islamic. In the fight against Al Qaeda, Americans of every faith and faithful Muslims of every description are on the same side.

Third, neither America nor any other country can be considered above the law. Every nation is obliged to respect human rights, observe global conventions, and abide by UN Security Council resolutions. Power unhinged from law lacks legitimacy and will inevitably be opposed.

Finally, America must pursue peace in a determined and even-handed way. No U.S. president will waver in supporting the survival and security of Israel. Every U.S. president should respect the dignity and legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people.

Together, we must strive for agreements that enable all who desire peace to live as neighbors. For that to happen, we must not only talk of the need for security and justice; we must move toward a common definition of what those terms mean.

As an observer of world affairs, I readily acknowledge that the United States must think more deeply than it has in the past about why its intentions have been misunderstood.

True dialogue is incompatible with ignorance, hypocrisy, and condescension, nor can it be based on the premise that one people or civilization is superior to another. America has a responsibility to learn more and lecture less."

I can't say that I will ever have much faith or confidence in a law that treats Roger Clemens the way he is being treated today. But I'm fairly convinced, at this point, that many of those who make or enforce or interpret the law could care less if they earn that kind of confidence from people like me or not. They certainly behave as if they could care less. Which will always breed contempt for the law from otherwise decent people.

And that will be a problem for them, for America, and for the liberal democratic and not-so-liberal-and-democratic world, at large, until we face it honestly.

Until then, some very nice wisdom from Madeleine Albright.

History's million dollar question

Howler, Whoops, and Miracles: Which Party is More Strange?

Great line.

"Democrats, who consider equality the value before which the virtuous genuflect, worry that their nomination might be settled by "superdelegates," who are more equal than others. These are august people (officeholders, party officials, former luminaries) who, although no one voted to give them the job, get to vote at the nominating convention because liberals believe that if they fine-tune the world's rules with this or that wrinkle, everything will come out just right."

So true, so true.

"Many Republicans," he continues, "think that, come what may, things will come out the way Providence intends. Daniel Webster said 'miracles do not cluster,' but Webster did not anticipate Mike Huckabee, whose campaign manager is, evidently, God. Two months ago, Huckabee said he rose in Iowa because of divine intervention (the power that propelled him there was not 'human' but the one that fed the multitudes with two fish and five loaves). On Saturday, as he was winning the caucuses in Kansas, where many Republicans think Darwin should go back to Missouri where he came from, Huckabee said that the arithmetic is daunting (he must win almost all the remaining delegates to stop McCain) but he shall persevere:

'I know people say that the math doesn't work out. Folks, I didn't major in math. I majored in miracles, and I still believe in those, too.'

Although some of his supporters defend him against the accusation of sincerity, it is not unfair to assume that Huckabee, who has made his piety integral to his politics, means what he says. There is appealing clarity, but also a whiff of lunacy or charlatanry, in the theory that the Author of the Universe is writing his campaign story. 'The world,' wrote the poet Gerard Manley Hopkins, 'is charged with the grandeur of God." The world, perhaps, but the Republican delegate scramble?'"

It's an equal-opportunity mocking. And well deserved.

At some point, people acting this dumb have to ask themselves why they take themselves so seriously.

Then, again, that's history's million dollar question, now isn't it?

Love and liberty (and their alternatives)

Gaza notes forbidden Valentine's Day

I love this passage:

"Al-Wakid, a policeman who's stayed off the job since the Hamas takeover, said he began buying flowers for Valentine's Day four years ago, when he was engaged. Since then, his wife has come to expect the gesture, he said.

Across the street at the Rose Flower Shop, two young women, one dressed in a black Islamic robe and head scarf, bought a bouquet of roses, a rare sight in Gaza. The shop had managed to bring in 500 roses from Israel, using Gaza medical patients treated in the Jewish state as "mules," and had about 50 roses left.

Salesman Mohammed Sussi, 30, said he hadn't received any complaints about his business. "They didn't tell us anything, whether from the government or anyone else, that it is 'haram'," he said.

But at a third flower shop, a TV crew earned angry glares from salespeople, and shoppers adamantly refused to be interviewed on camera. Asked why the reluctance, one salesman said his customers didn't want to be filmed doing something "haram."

Even in the most repressive regimes, people break the law for a good cause. Always have. Always will.

"Hamas police spokesman Islam Shahwan said Valentine's Day might go against Gaza's traditions, but Hamas is not trying to replace civil with Islamic law. 'We are by nature a religious people and hate and reject all strange things," he said. "(But) we don't kill adulterers or gays or cut off the hands of thieves.'"

What a relief. I guess everyone congratulates themselves for why someone else is a bigger dick than they are.

But it's nice to know that some celebrations still bring out the best in us.

Love and liberty. We perpetually take them both for granted. And, yet, it is within both of them that we learn the lessons we need to learn to live better lives together.

Doubt that? Consider moving somewhere like Gaza where neither of them are taken as seriously as their alternatives.

Love

And we wonder why so many people have marriages and relationships they are unhappy with.

In Romance, Looks Matter Most to the Beautiful

Because we are so goddamn foolish.

If you marry someone for any other reason than because you're in love with them and they seem like a really stellar person, expect to be disappointed. Looks fade, money comes and goes, and none of it is real love.

And when it doesn't work out, you can come whine to me, but I'll tell you the same goddamn thing. Especially if you whine to me on Valentines.

Find someone you love. And love them.

The single biggest reason that people are unhappy in relationships, I think, is because so many people look for someone to love them rather than someone they can love and give more of themselves than they expect in return.

Love is not that complicated. Like everything else, we just expect too little of ourselves and expect of our partners things they can't give us. Love yourself and find a partner who loves themself and then share everything you have to give.

And ignore bullshit research like this.

Happy Valentine's Day.

The consequence of not taking responsibility for our choices

I get so upset, I know. I'm very passionate about what I do.

See, I love these children like they were my own. And a lot of them do not have nearly enough people in their corner. They have plenty of people talking them down. They can be shitty. But they have all also often lived very tough lives by this age. They're resilient. I expect that of them.

But one thing that no child should have to live through is people constantly telling them what they can't do. What they'll never do. What they can't achieve. What they'll never amount to.

That is much of the reason why many of the kids who are in trouble are in trouble. They have had plenty of that message. Far too much. Because they have too many adults in their lives who have given up on themselves. And so they give up on their kids, too.

The whole thing is just so stupidly and needlessly tragic.

But I love these kids like they were my own. And if you talked about my child like they had no chance because you never gave them a chance, I would forgive you. But I could never look my child in the eye and tell them that they should ever take you or anyone who thinks or talks like you seriously. Because you wouldn't deserve it. Not until you could cut that shit out.

And in the meantime, I would feel like fuckin' knockin' your fuckin' clock off.

Children should not have to listen to adults talking them down. Adults should not have to listen to adults talking children down. Noone should have to listen to anyone talking a child or anyone else, for that matter, down.

And if you did that about my child, I would want to fuckin' clock you. Just so you know.

My experience is that the most cowardly people in life, especially those who work with children, have one really serious consequence that they have to deal with when they won't take responsibility for their choices with children, or anyone, for that matter: they won't listen to you.

The long term consequence of avoiding responsibility is that nooone gives a shit what you think. They won't follow your example or your advice. Noone gives a shit about what you think.

And I can't think of a worse consequence to face with my children or with anyone, for that matter, than having a life that is irrelevant.

Cowardice

Why can't people who have given up just shut up?

If you have given up on people or the world or, say, if you're a teacher and you've given up on your kids, why do you have to spend the rest of your fucking life rationalizing why you're such a shithead?

Why is it so tough for, say, a teacher, to say, "I've given up on my kids, even though it's my single most important responsibility. And I'm kind of an asshole for that. And there really isn't any excuse for why I'm such a shithead."

I am so much more down with someone who can be honest and say, "I'm really just kind of a shithead and there really isn't any excuse for it" than "I'm a shithead and the reason is because the world really is rotten, not because of shitheads like me, but because of all of the other shitheads in the world."

That latter excuse is the most common, most cowardly, and most bullshit excuse that people have for what assholes they are than any other excuse in the book.

And when you hold onto that excuse as a teacher, you really do become somewhat worthless.

Because what kid can count on a teacher or a parent or an adult in their life who says, "The reason why I've quit on you is not because I'm an asshole, but because I can see that you're going to be like every other asshole who has ever hurt me (except for me, of course).

It's so fuckin' lame and weak and small-minded and ugly.

It's the smallest kind of person to be.

And, so, if you're going to be that kind of person, why can't you just shut the fuck up and stop pretending like what you say means anything beyond your own tortured bitterness and miserable choices in life?

You want to be bitter, be bitter. But stop acting like the the people you hurt along the way all had it coming because you just had no other choice other than being an asshole. You were forced to be an asshole. It's not that you are a coward. You had to turn in those Jews. You were forced to turn in those slaves. It's not you. It's the system.

And that's why you've given up on the kids who depend upon you to believe in them.

Because you're just too cowardly to face what a shithead you have become.

I am learning that some people know no depths to their cowardice, cruelty, and pettiness. Because they are too cowardly to face their cowardice.

Cowardice is a beautiful thing. Because it always gives you somewhere to hide.

Ultimately, cowardice allows us to hide anywhere, but from ourselves.

Learning to deal with the many faces of terrorism

This is both why the Economist, in my view, is the best news source in the world, and an affirmation of my belief in strong argument and understanding rather than ideology or sanctimonious policy prescriptions to resolve our most critical and difficult issues.

Hamas won't go away

This is a very solid analysis, I believe, borne of much good experience that the British government has had with a similar situation of entrenched terrorism with claims of self-determination at stake, in the case of both Palestine and Northern Ireland, and of the persistent failures of Israel to root out terrorism - particularly in the Gaza Strip, home of Hamas, their most deadly enemy - by military force.

I just read yet another article in the Jerusalem Post, last night, about the discussions by Defense Minister Ehud Barak to carry out yet another military operation in the Gaza Strip to seal up the border and destabilize the Hamas government there. It is indescribably frustrating to watch a government and a people perpetually rationalize a policy strategy that has and continues to result in many unnecessary deaths that lead in no particular positive direction.

Too many Israelis are so wrapped up in their anguish at being the lone liberal democracy of any salt in the Middle East and the number of their civilians who have died in her name that they just cannot imagine that there might be a more constructive route, one that the British government and representatives of Sinn Fein and the Ulster Unionists - with the help of Bill Clinton, you will remember - that might finally put Israel and Palestine on a path of self-determination and mutual respect.

The Economist points the way, here, in a way that is refreshing amidst a time of rationalization of aggression and force, by whatever means necessary, as Minister Malcolm here in the States use to preach, to end this and every bitter struggle.

But it will not ever end that way. More than 80 years of violence, bloodshed, and escalating hostilities and animus should convince any objective observer of that fact.

But politics is not only played out in the objective world of fact, unfortunately. It is also played out in the hearts of those who cannot forgive the bitter struggles and deaths of loved ones.

And it is that unresolved grief, and the hostility it animates, which is responsible for the failure to achieve what to any other and objective observer would seem to be a much more realistic and sustainable peace and relationship between Israel and her Arab neighbors, especially her Palestinian neighbors.

If there were ever a history that bore out the failures of force as a governing philosophy, it may be the history of Israel and Palestine (although the history of Nazism and Communism should do).

Let's hope that particular history finds an end, sooner rather than later, in a decent and sustainable peace.

Wow

Obama narrowly leads McCain in AP Poll

"The AP-Ipsos poll, released Monday, is an initial look at voter sentiment since the Super Tuesday contests last week. In the poll, Illinois senator Obama leads McCain 48percent to 42 percent. New York senator Clinton gets 46 percent to 45 percent for McCain.

The poll shows Obama leads Clinton in the race for the Democratic nomination, 46 percent to 41 percent."

Talk about soft power. It's actually also pretty clear, if you believe in soft power, which two of the candidates are more skilled in using it. I'll give you a clue. Their names don't rhyme with hintin'.

The question is what purposes they use that soft power for. And that is why substantive debate about public policy matters, no matter how much cynicism of about that debate permeates the political classes. So we are all a part of the discussion about when, how, and for what purposes power should be used.

And that is why the quality of the discussion, and the quality of ideas, listening, engagement, decency and open-mindedness of the candidates matters. Because otherwise it doesn't mean a goddamn thing that ideology didn't stamp into the soul of the candidates long before. And what a foolish and arrogant democracy that would be.

Things are looking good for those concerned about a wiser and humbler democracy.

Yes we can

I just want to remind Joe Nye that he and Ann Coulter are now on the same team.

Have fun kids.

On the other hand...



I just want some honest discussion. Is that so much to ask for?

I don't think so.

But what I do know is that Barack Obama and John McCain would make for a pretty interesting and a far more honest discussion and debate about where the country might go that I, for one, would be interested in hearing. I don't pretend to have more answers than I do. And I like that these guys, better than the other Democratic candidate, pretend less than most of their party faithful they have have better answers than they do.

I don't think that's too much to ask for.

Colin Powell doesn't seem to think so either.

Can you imagine how exciting it must be for black folks in America to know that they may elect their first black President this election on his merits and completely independent of his skin color. Barack Obama and I may not agree on everything. But fulfilling the legacy of Martin Luther King, to have my country be a nation where a man is judged not by the color of his skin, but by the content of his character, is certainly appealing to me.

Yes we can.

Why freedom?

Because if you don't do it, who will?

Thank you, Mr. Twain

Mark Twain is on the brain this weekend. My very sweet colleague, Donna Foster, got me a complete and unabridged copy of five novels by Mark Twain, and I have not thoroughly enjoyed reading a novel the way I have enjoyed reading Huck Finn, this weekend, in a very long time. Benjamin Graham was my Friday night investment and money-management reading. But Mark Twain was reading for the soul.

Much of the world, I think, is consumed and fucked up by status anxiety. That's what I love about Twain. Like me, and Benjamin Graham, he comes from a background where you can't afford status anxiety, because you couldn't afford much of anything else, anyway. Although I have dealt with my share of it, too, as I'm quite sure Mark Twain did as well.

Kim Jong Il, Fidel Castro, Saddam Hussein, most people consumed with power and wealth - although, interestingly enough, one of the richest men in the world, Warren Buffet, has built his wealth by not being consumed by the stuff he owns, ironically - struggle, privately, with status anxiety. So do poor people. And middle class people. And educated people. And uneducated people.

It's probably the most common anxiety that all of us feel, at some level. Noone likes it when someone thinks they're better than them. Especially to their faces. Noone.

And, so, sadly, so many people end up living their lives revolved, too much, around this anxiety. Always afraid that someone, somewhere is laughing at them, and thinking they are better than them.

It's kind of sad. And all too true of the human race. And all too responsible for too many, perhaps most, of the problems between us.

How senselessly tragic. And kind of funny, all at once.

Makes reading Huckleberry Finn all the more poignant, while also being a fun ride.

Thanks, Mark. It's nice to know that someone gives a shit that we cut the nonsense out, even as we don't act like we give a shit enough ourselves. Me too. And I'm sure you too. All of us, hopefully, with a commitment to giving it up.

Knowing is half the battle

As G.I. Joe told me hundreds of times as a young squirt during after school television cartoon sessions.

The International Herald Tribune runs an editorial, today, that tells me that some people are beginning to get things figured out.

Are sanctions the answer?

From that column:

"After a decade of experience, it's clear: economic sanctions on Myanmar may feel right, but they have helped produce the wrong results. Encouraging Western investment, trade and tourism may feel wrong, but maybe - just maybe - could produce better results.

That might be politically incorrect, but at least it wouldn't be politically futile."

That really is the essence of it. The same could be said of Iran. And the same could have been said of North Korea until first South Korea, then China, America and the West recognized that diplomacy and incentives got more results.

That's the problem with politics. Too often people don't look at it as a matter of getting the job done and doing good by people and they look at it, far too often as a matter of rooting for the home team, validating their own notions of the world, and doing what feels right while calling it something else. Universities often work the same way, which is what confuses those discussions more than it should.

But, eventually, you gotta come clean about the effectiveness and/or decency of your efforts. You can't bullshit forever. Because it gets you nowhere. I could tell you that I know more about fixing your car than I know. But, eventually, you'd have to catch on that when your car still isn't running, maybe I don't.

And knowing that propensity about ourselves - our propensity to want to be right even when we aren't, out of our foolish and all-too-common anxiety that if we aren't, especially in politics, that must mean we're less capable of knowing what to do and helping out and, if you have such aspirations, leading, than we do; all of which can and should be said about all of us, rightly, and it's really ok that such is so - as G.I. Joe would say, is half the battle.

It's foolish to engage in politics in such ways. Because it just doesn't get us anywhere. And that, when we're not bullshitting ourselves and others, really is the whole point.

Bullshit (a dissertation on politics, empirical reality, and engine repair)

I just want to take a minute, here, because I actually have a ton to do this weekend. But I wanted to take a sec to deal with a subject that I think gets to the heart of a lot of my thinking and our problem in politics and life.

There is a lot of bullshit in life. It is all over the place. It is in the marketplace and in the academy. It is in schools and in churches and in books and in TV and on the radio and in movies and on the internet.

It's the one constant in life, outside of the very constant and decent impulse on humanity's part to get things right or make things better.

We are surrounded by bullshit. Constantly. It is as if not much more perennial as is truth or understanding or any other such pretensions and more solid understandings on our part.

It is everywhere because we are everywhere. And we are full of it. Constantly. All of us. No exceptions. Me especially.

It's why Mark Twain is so close to my heart. Because he did such a fine job of holding a mirror up to us to help us see better that we are all full of bullshit. And he was right. And he loved us anyway. Which is what we deserve. Because we'd all be in seriously deep shit if the criteria for being loved required that we not be full of shit. There would be very little love in the world. And there is already far too little love in the world, thank you very fucking much.

Bullshit is the rule, not the exception. It is the firmest, most rigid, most unmovable, biggest-boss-on-the-fucking-planet rule that our puny, foolish little species has ever conjured up. We are so familiar with bullshit because we eat, shit, fuck, and sleep with it every goddamn day of our goddamn lives. It is, far too often, the essence of too much of our thinking, our relationships, our loves, our hates, our professions, our personal lives, and everything that that we do. It makes up far too much of who we are, and that just is, as a matter of fact. And we all need a little patience with that because not only is it a fact of our lives, but it is a fact that we spend an enormous amount of time bullshitting ourselves about, not wanting to face up to our clear and present need for more humility in the face of our frequent lapsing honesty with ourselves and others about who and what we really are and what we really know.

Me especially. I'm just reporting the facts.

Having said all of that.

There is life outside of our bullshit. There is reality. A lot of it. So much so that we have built institutions of learning where people do their damndest, themselves full of much bullshit and growing our annual crop of such bullshit at an exponential rate, to sort through all of the bullshit. Presumably they do so just to make sure that this year's crop is consistent with last year's yield and so not to embarrass the plowfolk of last year's harvest into reconsidering their planting methods. But the God's-honest-truth-of-the-matter is that those folks in those schools and universities - those scientists and anthropologists and agronomists and dieticians and economists and astronomers and geologists and historians and political scientists and biologists and chemists and medical professional and literary men and women and lawyers and journalists and all such truth-seeking folks - are all trying, clumsily, often failing, too often disagreeing and villifying than recognizing their own errors - a prediction about humanity that none other than Jesus Christ himself made about our foolish, clumsy efforts on this here earth - to figure out what the hell is really going on.

There really is a reality about the world, including about the people who inhabit it, independent of all that jabbering. And we are all just trying to understand our little piece of it and maybe work with some other folks to see if all our little pieces might add up to something that make the mare go.

People have to figure shit out to make things happen. It's our bread and butter. It's what separates us from the birds and the bees those ill-fated dodos and dinosaurs. For the human species, it's what makes the mare go.

When it comes to figuring out what makes the people go, there's a study broadly called social sciences that is our lumbering, bungling, butter-fingered attempt to get a grasp on The Way Things Are among people and their kind.

And the premise of these there social sciences and the empirical notions that undergird them is that things are independent of our opinions about how things are. And they happen to be right about that, I think, after much experience seeing things as they are not and fucking things up and generally looking like a damned fool believing that the whole enterprise didn't matter, or not treating it like it mattered nearly enough.

At some level, then, politics, economics, history - the whole lot - is like getting a car to move. At some level, you either know what the problem is or you don't. And if you don't, noone gives two shits if you scream it from the rafters or you get a bunch of your goonish friends to pressure the mechanic to say you're right or you argue your eloquent and convincing case till your blue in the face. At some level, either you're right or you're not. Either it's the head-gasket or it's the temperature gage. Either it's the gas pedal or it's the clutch. Either it's the exhaust system or it's the carburetor. And either you're right or you're not. It's not personal. We're just not always right.

And the trick about politics, especially, since the whole nature of that godforesaken ordeal is that it is where we have the most conflict and are, therefore, the most pissed off at one another, is that we never seem to be able to admit when we're wrong for fear that that means that the other group of goons will pounce on our ignorance like Winston Churchill on a cheeseburger.

It's goddamn ridiculous is what it is.

Have you ever seen a group of dumbasses stand around a hood and argue till the cows come home about whether the engine trouble is in the throttle body or the intake manifold? Yeah, me neither. But I can just imagine it, can't you?

Now, obviously, it matters to figure out where the problem is so you can solve it. But the truth is that either you've found the problem or you haven't and either you've solved it or you haven't. The trick with politics and economics, like religion and the weather before them, and the rest of them there social sciences, is that they are often about problems you can't solve as much as about problems you can.

But the fact is that either you have a solution that will work every time or most times and then it's got to finally get the mare to go or the engine to run or whatever other damned fool analogy you've opted for in the moment. And if it only works sometimes or most of the time you can't really ever claim to have some final solution, unless you're Adolph Hitler, and we all know what happened with that fellow.

And, fundamentally, either you understand how that goddamn engines, runs, generally, or you don't. I am of the breed that doesn't, apparent to anyone who does who might be pondering the purpose of these ramblings.

We make politics and economics and psychology and history and the whole goddamn lot too complicated is the truth. As simple as possible and no simpler, as some fancy German scientist once spoke. Either that or we sit around on our brains and pretend like all that knowledge doesn't mean a goddamn thing anyway because we wasted all that time in Ms. Johnson's 4th grade Mockingbirds reading group figuring out how far we could rock back in our chairs without falling and missed the whole goddamn point of the experience.

Either way, the mare's gotta go, the car's gotta run, and we gotta figure out, for real, how to deal with problems that often have to show up as Jesus-on-a-burning-cross in our own front yards before we're man or woman enough to admit we were wrong. Generally things get better the more we treat one another like human beings. Which makes sense since that's the correct species. And we need to understand how life is as it is and not as we persistently wish it to be without some kind of plan or idea to make it so. And it is those blasted ideas that make the big bucks for those well-paid, tenured professors and scientists in their lofty ivory towers making the big money trying to figure out if Pluto is a planet or just a great big rock.

That's the bottom line, though, for anything we have to do in life. And politics is no different. Either we know what we're doing and it gets the job done and it does so while respecting people and principles and priorities that are important to them, generally, or we don't.

Everything else is just the same old bullshit. And even much of what we think is not bullshit is the same old bullshit.

That's why we got logic and reason and science and all that fancy thinkin'. To sort through this mess that humanity has always made for itself, wading waste-deep in our own yackety-yak and pretending that we know more than we do.

We prattle on and on or we avoid conflicts that are seeming to get too heated by saying that we believe this and we believe that and that that's all there is to it. But, at the end of the day, what we believe doesnt mean shit, except to ourselves, unless it makes sense in the world that we live in and maybe in a world that might do it a little better.

We fight about this and we fight about that in politics. But at the end of the day, none of it amounts to a hill of beans without that it actually means something useful that understands better what's under the hood and gets the car moving again. And it does so in a way that treats with respect everyone involved.

Otherwise, it's just a bunch of fools sitting around an engine not knowing what will make the damn thing work. And there isn't much use in that. Except for the company, perhaps.

Why we need a presumption against aggression

Al Queda seeks softer approach

Joe Nye's ideas around soft power are excellent. They are the basis for my own work. His insights into the need to look at the broader picture of values and culture to understand power are very important, I think, and unique enough to have his work stand out for me as some of the most important in international policy and security.

Having said that, there is something missing in Joe's analysis. And it is something that has consequence.

Soft power is a good idea. Except when it is used to rationalize manipulating others for ends that are not their own. Meaning, soft power is a good idea except when it is used to circumvent the very liberal democratic principles and liberal values - namely self-determination and self-governance - that are the basis for its strength.

As I argued for Joe on his blog, soft power, without a presumption against aggression, force, and the use of power, is illiberal in both theory and practice unless there is an understanding that aggression, force, and power are to be presumed against.

Gangsters, terrorists, and despots all use some combination of hard and soft power to seek their ends, as this article on the changing tactics of Al Queda demonstrates. Gangsters pay off allies as well as kill their enemies. Terrorists persuade their followers - and, most recently, terrorist groups like Hamas and Al Queda have been explicitly using manipulation around concepts of forgiveness, just as too many in the West have done the same in popular political arguments - as well and as a means of continuing their efforts to murder innocent civilians. Dictators like Saddam Hussein and terrorist groups like Hezbollah or violent groups like the Black Panthers provide social services as well as killing and intimidating.

Decent liberal democratic peoples need to create and carry a presumption in their thinking against such barbarism and rationalization if we are to honestly account for distinctions between the aims and values of liberal democracies and the aims and values of gangsters, terrorists, and despots. Otherwise such groups have a much easier time persuading civilian populations to join or support their ranks.

It is what made pursuing and prosecuting the ugly and power-hungry practices of the Mafia in the early 20th century so difficult, as prohibition against alcohol made heroes of murderers and thugs for citizens fed up with laws against a favorite pasttime. And it is what fuels the violence in both that trade and in the contemporary drug trade, where a favorite, if often foolish, recreation of so many citizens is made illegal and therefore underground and enforced by the arbitrary use of weapons and mayhem by gang leaders rather than openly consumed with an expectation of responsibility for its use and decency and rough law-abidance in the trade, a fact that is undermined by the laws against its use as much if not more than by those who use it and break the law doing so.

But much more important than the folly of the drug war, an absense of a presumption against aggression, force, and power as a means in a liberal democratic society for resolving problems, and a presumption for conscience, thought, engagement, debate, discussion, and committed efforts for doing the same, means that other actors who also carry no such presumption, like Hezbollah, Hamas, Chinese Communists and the Myanmar military junta, dictators like Kim Jong Il and Robert Mugabe, and groups like Al Queda, featured in this article, simply switch tactics, become softer in their approaches to win support, and never face the clear need to take liberal values and liberal democracy more seriously.

And neither do we.

The liberal democratic world, and Americans as members of that community, needs to presume against aggression, force, and power, as a general principle, if they are going to make the distinctions between liberal values and the tactics of gangsters, terrorists, and despots clear enough, and to make the choice more clear between liberal and illiberal values and instititutions.

Otherwise, people in liberal societies and institutions really do begin to look much more like their illiberal brethren. And the harder it is to make the distinction, the more support organized crime figures like the mafia and violent gangs leaders and members, terrorists like Hezbollah, Hamas, and Al Queda, and dictators and despots like Kim Jong Il, Fidel Castro, and Robert Mugabe and less despotic yet still illiberal leaders like Vladimir Putin and Wen Jiaboa, and all of the less liberal practices and their practicioners in liberal and illiberal corners of the world and those who take seriously, practice, and elaborate on more genuinely liberal values. And that does not even mention the poor governance practices in liberal governments that romanticize power and fail to account for its failure to address, and often exacerbate, serious problems in their societies.

I have a lot more to argue about this to make it clearer, I know.

But we need a presumption against aggression, force, and power in our dealings with one another if reason and conscience are to have any of the breathing space they need to do for us what it has clearly done for the length of liberal history - help us solve problems that aggression, force, and power cannot solve and which they often make worse because of their propensity to crowd out the very reason and discussion that is needed to solve them.

There is no way to force our way out of this one or to fake progress by force, aggression, or power. These just aren't more genuine means for progress. They are, at best, artificial compromises that have often created as much trouble as they have resolved our problems, and, at worst, rationalizations for the ugliest crimes against humanity that have ever been committed.

It is time we ended that rationalization. And understood, more humbly, liberty and the limits of power.

While I'm at it

I thought I'd share something I haven't shared in a few years. Seems appropriate, right now.

On Valentine's Day, February 14, 2004, Michael Wolmetz described the death of his father two years earlier and then surreptitiously proposed to his girlfriend, Debora Brakarz, on a taped Storycorps audio broadcast for National Public Radio.

A Couple's Tender Moment, on Valentine's Day

It was one of the most beautiful moments I've ever heard caught on radio. A really touching moment.

To all lovers out there, take heart. Valentine's Day is the day to remember why you have it so good. And for single guys like me, it's a day when hope springs eternal.

Is is coincidence that I am so love-obsessed right before Valentines? I have no clue. I just know that I won't ever take such moments for granted ever again in my life. They are too precious. And worth sharing as often as possible with the one you love.

Happy Valentine's, Debora and Michael. And to everyone with and without a sweetie.

Love,
Ben

The Book of Love Part Deux

That Peter Gabriel cover of the Book of Love has been in my head, now, all week. It's gorgeous, if you've not heard it.

It also happens to been originally written and performed, it turns out, by Stephen Merrit and the Magnetic Fields.

I love highlighting less-well-known singers or bands who deserve recogition for the music they write and perform. Dar Williams, a gorgeous folk artist, is one of my favorites for this purpose. Jamie Cullum is a really exciting jazz singer and performer. Patti Griffin is a folk singer who wrote and sang the original version of the Dixie Chicks' Top of the World, both versions being brilliant, if you ever get a chance. Aesop Rock is a recent hip hop artist with a lot of potential who I like (for fun more than for meaning). There's a million of them, really.

But this song really bowled me over. I love the Peter Gabriel version. But the Magnetic Fields version is really authentic and terrific. If e.e. cummings writes a love poem, I want to hear e.e. cummings deliver it, if I can. He's the one who felt what's being said, after all. And if Stephen Merrit writes the Book of Love, and I want to hear him sing what he felt.

Enjoy.

Looking a gift-horse in the mouth

The ever insightful George Will says exactly what should be obvious, at this point, to Democrats, if they will get their heads out of their asses

Democratic Re-gifting

As Will writes:

"Forewarned, Democrats now are forearmed -- not that they will necessarily make sensible use of the gift. Tuesday's voting armed Democratic voters with the name of the candidate that their nominee will face in the fall. Will their purblind party now nominate the most polarizing person in contemporary politics, knowing that Republicans will nominate the person who tries to compensate for his weakness among conservatives with his strength among independent voters who are crucial to winning the White House?

Perhaps. The Republican Party's not-so-secret weapon always is the Democratic Party, with its entertaining thirst for living dangerously."

George Will is undeniably right, here. For Democrats to nominate Hillary Clinton, at this point, would be an incomparable blunder. They know who they're hitting. They know which one of their candidates is more likely to compete for votes in the general election (at least they should know, if they weren't so blinded by partisanship and political fights of the 60's and the New Deal). If Democrats don't know which one of their candidates is more likely to win a general election, independents like me and Republicans like my family members do. And it ain't Hillary Clinton, that's for damned sure.

The truth is that if anyone listens to the right, these days, as they have discussed and contemplated which Democratic candidate they would rather live with, while they have tossed and turned and waxed ambivalently on the matter, there is a slow but recognizable preference for Obama and his willingness to listen to conservative ideas.

It's so ironic. Bill Clinton was an effective executive, when he was, for exactly the reason that Hillary Clinton and the Clinton campaign, fresh from nostalgia for their fights over Vietnam in the 60's, are running away from today.

Who would have known that the Democrat who would carry the more honest mantle of what worked in the Administration of William Jefferson Clinton would not be another candidate by the name Clinton? Who would have guessed, that in their fond memories of foreign protests against American "imperialism" and impeachment proceedings against a President of a different era, that the Clintons would run away from the very ideas that made Bill Clinton such a far from perfect but very good President?

The Clinton era was marked by a commitment to public/private partnership, a domestic and international outlook that consulted others and other nations as it took action, and a third way that transcended conventional polarized politics of the 20th century. It's dark side was a triangulated arrogance that prioritized positioning over substantial engagement and give and take with the Republican Congress with which Bill Clinton governed.

And, as it turns out, an important shard in that dark crystal has been Hillary Clinton's radical posture, a self-righteous liberal flanking position which assumes that power is more important than reason in politics and political discussion and decisions, at least once you figured out that liberals were right and conservatives were wrong and everything else was just formalities.

I'm referring to Hillary's radical feminism in her youth - if you are not familiar with radical left circles, I strongly suggest David Horowitz's Radical Son which is a damning and all-too-accurate, if somewhat harsh, indictment of the radical left; her repeated engagement in political pressure tactical positioning almost her entire tenure in the Senate, especially her disastrous leadership during Hurricane Katrina (what leader starts a criminal investigation during an emergency rather than helping out with the emergency response?); her triangulating vote for the Iraq war and then whining that she was fooled by the big bad President Bush about weapons of mass destruction when the popular tide favored a left tilt (do you really want someone that gullible to be President? Even if you thought it was true, which is the biggest load of shit I've ever heard in my life. Unless she really is that stupid, in which case, what better reason to not want her in the White House); her work to shore up the liberal base, the majority of voters who go Democratic who are largely uneducated, economically insecure, and otherwise looking for a messiah and thus plenty pliable and easily manipulated by the all-too-manipulative Clinton campaign.

The truth is that radicalism, like terrorism, another more extreme form of political flanking and political pressure for negotiating position, is what weakens liberal democracies. It doesn't weaken the democracy because it compels them to its will, which rarely happens in the bigger picture. It weakens the democracy because it appeals to vanity of its ideological allies that they, and they alone, have the answers to the political problems that individuals, communities, countries and the world face, and that what is necessary is not more thought and debate and discussion and engagement and understanding of those who disagree with you and your thinking. What is missing is action, and enough power to flank efforts to impose their superior wisdom on a recalcitrant population unawares of its unassailable wisdom.

It weakens democracies because it undermines the centrality of the original and not-so-original thought and diverse and democratic engagement in an open marketplace of ideas which is the most important strength, along with the liberty and self-governance central to democratic principles to make decisions for our own lives, in democratic politics. And, more relevant to contemporary politics, it weakens liberal democracies because it feeds the rationalization for terrorism, another form of political flanking and pressure group activity, because it is an identical rationalization taken to a much more deadly and tragic extreme. That is the reason that left-wing and right-wing fringe groups often engage in terrorist activity - to pressure the population into taking their priorities seriously. It's kind of laughable, really, to look to every other explanation of terrorism than the really obvious one as its central purpose. And it's bad for everyone, liberal democratic or not.

In case you missed it, it's bullshit. Same ol' bullshit you see from televangelists and dictators and a whole host of folks through the centuries who were certain that they knew what was good for people whether they fuckin' liked it or not.

And the irony of the whole Clinton charade is that - given all of this bullshit and clearly more unfavorable ratings it has created for the manipulative Clinton campaign - Hillary Clinton now has the gall to argue that she, and she alone, can bring home a Democratic crown in November.

Clinton says she can beat McCain

But the truth is that George is right. It's actually pretty obvious if you're listening outside of your radical/liberal soundproof existence who is more likely to get support from Republicans and independents like me, this election. And it ain't Hillary Clinton. She's just too full of herself to see the writing on the wall on this one.

I'm saying it ahead of time. If Democrats nominate Hillary Clinton, absent some very good argument for her candidacy that I have yet to hear, I am voting for John McCain.

He's just more honest than Ms. Clinton. And I do not live with the pretension that Democrats know more or have better policy prescriptions than they do, and certainly not Hillary Clinton, who has shown very little policy imagination beyond what appeals to that liberal base, meaning very little imagination or original thought, at all.

It's so disappointing watching a party that I have identified with most of my life behave this way. And it makes me very glad that I recognized this ugly, arrogant tendency - in so many liberal politicians, activists, professors, and so many progressives drinking too much of their own koolaid that they have more answers than they do - rather than feeding it.

George Will is right, whether Hillary Clinton likes it or not.

If Democrats are interested in making this race both a meaningful one and one where Democrats will have a shot at having a voice in what leadership will look like in the next 4 years and perhaps having one of their own represent that voice in the form of the Presidency, then Barack Obama is clearly their better pick. He just doesn't carry the baggage with him that entitled ex-first-lady carries. And while radical feminists come out of the woodwork to encourage the shrewd quest for power of their sister-in-arms, Republicans, like most of my family, and independents, like me (my immediately family is very liberal, which has something to do with my skepticism of liberalism as having more answers than it does), are clearly far more enamoured by the humility, the original thinking, the unifying themes, and the inspirational message of Barack Obama.

But, if Democrats aren't interested in that, there's always John McCain. I don't always agree with John. But he's more honest than Ms. Clinton, by my lights, at this point (I'm open to argument about that and everything else in this campaign and anything anyone want to debate anytime, of course; but that's the way I call 'em, at this point).

George may be right. Democrats may look a gift-horse in the mouth on this one. Wouldn't be the first time that Democrats have tripped over their own pride.

But it would be nice to have a more honest race and a more honest choice for the Presidency, this November. Choosing between Barack Obama and John McCain would be much more difficult for me than choosing between Hillary Clinton and either of those two candidates. It'd be nice for me and for America to actually have a decent choice to pick from this November.

America will survive, no matter what she chooses. The question is will we take steps forward in our national debate and discussion and the way it informs our policies and who we are or will we flounder or take steps forward despite our President rather than supported by the quality of their leadership.

Barack Obama and John McCain offer a forward path in that discussion, by my lights. Hillary Clinton offers far less in the way of such leadership. I wish I could say that I had a choice between two really good options among Democrats to move America forward, but that's really not true.

Democrats can either make my choice easier or harder in the 2008 election. I hope for my sake and for the sake of the country, they make my choice more difficult. Because that makes things much more interesting and makes for a much more meaningful discussion of how we can tackle the problems America and the world faces.

May we choose wisely.

Jesus Christ

I thought speech and debate in the States was hypercompetitive.

Scandal hits famed Oxford debating club

Though, to be fair, that kind of drama is everywhere.

We hit an Oxford debate team my freshman year of college. They traveled all over the U.S. debating American teams. They kicked our asses fair and sqaure. On our home turf with our own students and professors and hometown folks voting. It was a great time.

Wouldn't it be nice to have reasonable debates and discussions, somewhere, about important matters where the ideas and outcomes mattered more than the egos?

Though I have to say that speech, debate, literary, comedy, film, research, and university cirlces are about as close as you get. It'd just be nice to have more of that, especially around important political issues, occur in a location that you could count on. Presidential debates hardly fit the bill. The blogosphere is nice and broad and accessible, which is what I like about it. But I'm thinking about something more engaged and serious, with maybe some room for the Eric Cartman in all of us. I'll keep working on that one.

An Obama endorsement

I'm caucusing, tomorrow, in the Democratic primary.

I've been a lifelong Democrat, now independent, who voted in his first election for Republicans like George H.W. Bush for President and, sadly, Eric Yost for Kansas Attorney General. Bill Clinton was a better president than either George Bush, I think. But I don't think he would make a better President another time around, and I definitely don't think his wife, with fewer intellectual or people-person gifts of her husband, would be a better President.

I'm not an Obama fanatic. As an independent, I think I'm pretty realistic about the limitations of an Obama Presidency. I don't like his more conventional liberal turn to government to solve more problems than I really think it can. But I do have to say that the reasons for an Obama candidacy expressed in this Washington Post editorial are ones that resonate with me, especially relative to the cynicism of the Clinton campaign and Hillary Clinton's leadership in most situations I have seen her in, up to this point.

Obama vs. the Phobocracy

It is true that the elements of the Democratic party that turn me off, most, are the fear-mongering, attack-dog, cynical leftist circles that Clinton grew up in, affirms with far too much self-righteous attachment, and which seem to fuel too much of her outlook on the world. It is these circles, on both the left and the right, that are the heart of what is wrong with American democracy, these days. People with far too much bitterness and certainty of their cause with far too little real engagement or skepticism of their own ideas or listening or appreciation of what those who disagree with them think. That is an especially pernicious habit when you are wrong on issues or where the jury is still out, nevertheless when you are right.

It is this kind of arrogance and obsession with power at the expense of reasonable and broad engagement that I think lies at the heart of everything that is corroded and dysfunctional and unwilling, though not unable, to let more reasonable and thoughtful discussion, debate, ideas, engagement, and serious attention to empirical consequence from policy - everything that Enlightenment thinkers wrote and spoke about and often made enormous sacrafices for those of us in liberal democracies to enjoy, today - lead our policy decisions rather than the bitterness, sanctimony, and all-too-certain cynicism that animates too much of politics and far too much of the Clinton campaign, and, I think, another Clinton Presidency.

I think we can expect better. I have my disagreements with Barack Obama and John McCain. Very serious disagreements, often. But I think they come at the discussion more honestly than Hillary Clinton, Mitt Romney, or other candidates running, right now (though I do hope that the spirit of Ron Paul informs our discussions, even as I am unconvinced that Ron would be a terribly effective leader).

I want politics to get more honest. And I just don't think that Hillary Clinton will take us in that direction, right now. I think Barack Obama will. So I'll be caususing for him tomorrow.

The Book of Love

I am such a cheeseball. I love these things.



This is now one of my favorite Youtube marriage proposals, along with My Early Muir Owl (which I also recommend, if you get the chance), and a million others. It's just so goddamn sweet.

And a love song by one of my favorite singers, Peter Gabriel, The Book of Love, that I'd somehow never heard before. Not everyday that happens. And a really beautiful song.

Way better than porn. Not quite the same, obviously. But you get the idea.

Voluntarism and self-governance

The American Interest has a fascinating cover story in their January/February 2008 edition that gets at the heart of the democratic principles at stake during this political period.

A Call to National Service

The emphasis in this article on voluntary service and self-governance is encouraging during a period of romanticism of top-down and coercive governance. It both embodies DeToqueville's celebration of American democracy as a land of citizens who solved problems without government oversight or prompting and is the basis for much of what has always made American democracy special - in its capacity to inspire Americans to do for themselves and for one another - in a world where monarchs and empires were too often driven by the narrow and often self-centered ambitions of powerful leaders and those with power.

If you have not read Alexis DeToqueville's Democracy in America, I highly recommend this Frenchman's descriptions from his experience trekking across the American landscape providing a first-hand account of the new American democracy in the 19th century and its unique capacity for self-governance and voluntary citizen efforts. Carl Kastle's Pillars of the Republic: Common Schools and American Society, 1780-1860 is an excellent history of this very spirit among committed citizen in the creation of common schools that are the antecedent to our contemporary public schools and the commitment to education for all children that they embody in America.

This commitment to voluntary citizen efforts being the backbone of American democracy and the American economy are the fundamental strengths in American society and the source of the most sustainable strength in liberal democracies outside of official government responsibilities - national defense and law enforcement, most notably - that only government can exercise authority over (though for both of which voluntary efforts are also required and function most effectively the more citizens are freely responsible for the underlying duties involved).

So a focus on voluntarism and self-governance, during a period of illusions about the power of coercion and top-down governance to solve more problems than either actually can solve is a welcome contribution to the public discussion.

I am ambivalent about the authors' proposal for a National Service American Dream Account, not because I do not believe in its purposes, but because it seems to have serious tension with the underlying strengths of this commitment - that it is self-governing and voluntary rather than goverment taxed and run - and that it seems to be a strange proposal at a time when it is clear that the the Federal budget is very much in the red.

This is the bottom-line on such proposals. I like the idea, generally. If Americans want such an idea, they need to be prepared to pay for it and not bitch about the taxes involved. I think such efforts are better and more sustainably funded and have more integrity to their missions if they are in the private and non-profit sector. But if people want to pay for such an idea through government, so be it, as long as they are willing to pay for it and as long as they are willing to cut government programs that need cutting to balance the budget and end this remarkably foolish policy of servicing the national debt at a rate of more than $400 million for more than $9 trillion dollars of debt.

This is the inherent weakness of having the Federal or even state or local governments be responsible for such efforts rather than having them be genuinely voluntary and self-governing - meaning citizen founded and run. The authors' cite the KIPP Academy as an example of the spirit they would like to encourage, missing the irony, I suppose, that the KIPP Academy, a series of charter schools to help disadvantaged youth, was started explicitly to get out from under government bureaucracy and mandates that had often been counterproductive in regular public schools. Genuinely voluntary efforts - non-profit groups like KIPP or the Red Cross or the United Way, for instance - offer a more sustainable path to more flexible and effective efforts, more room for experimentation and diversity of purpose, activities, and ideas, and more sustainable funding for such efforts that do not require the drama of national and state political fights that generally serve to polarize support for otherwise good and decent programs.

But if people want to adopt such a program, I just suggest that they do so and make peace with the taxes that are involved with funding such efforts and give the administrators plenty of room to handle such programs as they see fit rather than perpetually polarizing such efforts with ideological disputes that often undermine their purposes.

You may note a touch of skepticism on my part that such programs will actually be able to do this while being government run and funded, which is more than reasonable given our history, I think. Because too typically the noble intentions of such programs get drug into the mud of polarized and endless ideological sniping which often undermines decent efforts. When groups like KIPP raise money for their own efforts and they are responsible for its administration, there is often less room for sniping and polarized political efforts to undermine their operations. Not so for publicly funded and operated programs, sadly. Though it would be nice if were not so.

It also would be nice if Americans would reconcile what they want to spend on government programs with what money they are actually willing to spend so the Federal Government does not end up being saddled with almost half-a-trillion dollars in interest on such debt - outside of the over 9 trillion dollars in debt that the U.S. Federal government carries - in order to live beyond our means.

It is a perpetually dysfunctional cycle we have in our politicization of government efforts like this one and our capacity to pay for them, which I think is bogged down in the inherent problems of a budget that noone feels final responsibility for, programs that inevitably get loaded down with ideological baggage, and the coercion inherent in taxation. But if we can somehow escape that tendency with a program like this, it, like the G.I. Bill, might be a worthy effort.

I would like to see us find some resolution around these more fundamental issues, which I'm fairly convinced will only happen the more we transition such efforts into the genuinely voluntary and civil sector, for-profit and non-profit. But absent that, have at it, I suppose. Maybe we can still do some good with a model of governance that will only get better the more we genuinely make peace with the commitments we make. I don't think the fundamental issues will be resolved until we start making a transition of such programs to the private and non-profit sectors and show the willingness necessary to cut the Federal budget to sustainable levels that also free up the economy to do the magic we need it to do to support growth and jobs.

The bottom line is that we need to be more responsible on our choices around such issues. This will happen better the more such efforts are genuinely voluntary in the civil sector rather than government-run, I am convinced. And, worst of all, our current budget and government commitments are a terrible example to the American public for the kind of fiscal self-discipline that they need in their own lives to save, invest, and grow sustainable nest eggs for their own lives and which is the larger and more important solution to many of our more serious budget issues, like Social Security and Medicare, which, ironically, were both started with the same purpose in mind. As always, I am open to being wrong on such issues. But it seems to me that we need to be focussed on helping Americans to learn the kind of fiscal self-discipline that the Federal budget is the poorest possible example for if many of the issues we care about are going to be funded and if those working such programs are to have finances over the course of their lifetimes and in their retirements that will support them. This kind of proposal makes that harder, I think, rather than easier.

Diplomacy or force and the wisdom of Shirin Ebadi

Nobel Peace Prize winner and Iranian human rights activist, Shirin Ebadi, urges direct diplomatic talks to end the stalemate between Iran and the America and the West.

Follow the path of negotiation and peace - An interview with Shirin Ebadi

If I had to choose between Shirin Ebadi or the Bush Administration, the U.N. Security Council, and Western observers for whom would know better the direction of peace, denuclearization, and democracy in Iran, Shirin has the inside track, I think. She does the dirty work that all of those others would not dare to do - pursuing those goals while living within the repressive conditions of Iran. She also has the benefit of being both committed to peace and human rights and being an Iranian citizen aware of the interests and perspectives of her home country and the limitations and pace of more genuine change in her homeland.

What Americans and the West have long misunderstood is that all of the provocative gestures with Iran have not only shored up too much support for a weak leader, but produced dissent among even reform-minded Iranians concerned both with Iran's right to a peaceful nuclear program, it's right to self-defense - independent of American or Western aims - and much more wary of the motives of Washington than suspicions Washington harbors for itself.

That's the problem with an obsession with power. Everyone has good reason to be mistrustful of your designs as long as you pursue it. Because it is a sign that you are more interested in winning your position rather than winning their trust.

And trust is what all parties in this drama, and all parties in most political dramas, must earn if genuine resolution of competing aims is to take place. There is no win that finally resolves our most serious concerns. There is either resolution, or there is not.

And, generally, I trust someone like Shirin Ebadi who clearly is more interested in such resolution than any of the players, especially the Bush Administration, hoping to bluster their way to an endgame. The movement towards diplomatic resolution on the part of Secretary of State Rice is a hopeful one, in this direction. Let's hope that such movement translates into better results than the current policy has produced.

The limits of pressure

The Economist and I have long seen the situation with Iran very differently.

They have favored efforts to pressure Iran, convinced that enough pressure would halt a nuclear weapons program. I have been skeptical, at best, that pressure would resolve this situation in the direction the West preferred, and concerned, at worst, that such efforts had been counterproductive and, in fact - the NIE conclusions not in the least resolving either my concerns or the concerns of the Economist and other observers - accelerated Iran's ambitions to get the bomb. Meaning, my concern has long been that the more the West pressures, the more defiant Iran becomes, and the more they pursue the bomb in their own bizarre and half-witted paranoia and desire for attention and rogue prestige.

Today, the Economist publishes the best case that they or any other publication I have read has made for a likely nuclear program and the closest I have ever read them come to conceding that perhaps pressure is not working.

As the enrichment machines spin on

It is difficult to acknowledge that a favored policy is failing. It is difficult for anyone to admit failure. And it is the sign of wisdom when one is able to do so and correct course accordingly rather than stubbornly clinging to a failed strategy. It is wisdom I have come to expect from the Economist.

It could be that I am wrong and the basis for much of my thought about the world is wrong too. In which case, it would be up to me to admit the same. I'm not convinced of that, yet. And the Economist seems to be conceding that perhaps I am right. But I still may be wrong. And the Economist and others who favor pressure as a political strategy may turn out to be right on this question. In which case I am a kindly young fool who needs to stay in a classroom and out of the way of those real men and women leveraging our way to progress.

As you can see, I'm somewhat skeptical of that notion.

And the fact that the Economist, a long-time advocate of this policy, is skeptical of it, too, should give all of us pause to really consider if, perhaps, such skepticism can yield wiser policy.

Either way, we should all hope that the world community, including Iran, takes the commitments to peace and security that the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty embodies is taken seriously by all of its member countries. And that we do not return to a world of nuclear brinksmanship that was the norm of the Cold War and too much of the 20th century.

And that is a commitment that none of us should blink from.

That's what I'm talking about

Mohammed Yunus is my homey. He and I are very much on the same page.

We can improve capitalism

I highly recommend this interview. This is the future of both addressing wealth inequities, markets, and the future politics of such issues. The American Democratic party doesn't see it quite yet. But they will.

Power follows great ideas. Not the other way around.

The good news

The world's silver lining

The Economist notes our progress at a time when many economies are feeling a little under the weather.

What guts really look like

This is what heroism looks like in the face of force as a governing philosophy.

'I Little Slave': An Interview With Bounsang Khamkeo

Thank you, Bounsang Khamkeo, for your courage.

Why humility matters in foreign policy and in life

Because you really never know.

Interrogator: Invasion surprised Saddam

George Piro, an FBI interrogator who questioned Saddam Hussein after his capture reports on 60 minutes that Saddam intentionally allowed the world to think that he might have weapons of mass destruction to deter another Iranian invasion, believing that his country would experience an attack similar to the 4-day aerial attack the United States inflicted in 1998.

You really never know. That's why it is best to keep communication lines as open as much as possible, so you can always know better than when you shut them down, say when you threaten aggressive action.

It's better to have the lines of communication open, to have access to as much information as possible, because your guessing and conjecture and suspicion and cynical pondering will never, ever come as close to the truth as the truth itself.

Take it from an FBI interrogator.

Maybe it's matters more to play it smarter than tougher?

Generally.

Because a bluff or even the use of blunt force is never as good as knowing for real what you're doing, better. And knowing when and how to use force and what presumptions we have on its use are what make liberal democracies great. So knowing better only makes us greater. And far more effective, generally, while we're at it.

If you doubt that, go talk with Saddam Hussein.

Underwhelmed by kids, these days, and MLK

I never thought I'd hear myself say this.

But, kids, these days.

We studied Martin Luther King in all of my classes, yesterday and some today. King has a lot to do with who I am, today, and the work I do. My school specializes in kids with the most serious behavior and academic issues because I care about the kids and people who are easy to write off, a commitment inspired by King as much as anyone else.

And while some kids showed interest, a lot of kids, both this year and last year - my first two years teaching - have been both underwhelming and often just downright nasty and unbearable in their responses.

One of the responses of my more thuggish children last year to a discussion about Dr. King was "Fuck Martin Luther King."

Thankfully, I've been spared that particular response, this year. But I still faced enough apathy and could-give-two-shits attitude about Martin Luther King and the holiday and the legacy that it honors that I found myself pretty infuriated about it yesterday and still somewhat discouraged today (that and a couple of knuckleheads who just don't seem to ever be able to take responsibility for their behavior).

A lot of it is the particular kids I teach. I teach kids who have the most serious behavior issues. Many of these kids are thugs trying to impress their friends by how cold and hard they can be. And being cold and hard about MLK has got to be a perverse thrill for a lot of kids. I've told my share of Holocaust and dead baby and otherwise un-PC humor to understand this impulse. But it's a pretty shitty impulse to have when you're having a discussion about the serious risks people took and sacrafices people made in that civil rights movement, and King, in particular. And anyone who spends their visit to the Holocaust Museum making Holocaust jokes is kind of a sick puppy and really missing the point in a serious way.

Maybe they're young. Maybe they just don't give a shit. That latter reason is more likely, really, given my experience with them.

It's just discouraging to see people not give a shit about something as important as King's legacy. I imagine attending a funeral with the Phelps' would be worse, so I suppose I should have some perspective.

But it does make me yearn for the days I spent sharing African American seders and engaging in race dialogues with people who gave a shit about such things. It's just nice, knowing how little some people give a shit, to hang out with people who do, every once in awhile.

I gotta go find me an MLK celebration. Or maybe just a decent political discussion. Or maybe just a church. Or maybe take a class.

Wherever decent people congregate.

The pretensions of intellectuals (or why I'm happy to know that my shit stinks)

This is what I cannot abide in the scholarly world.

On the cusp of economic history

It's an interesting article discussing some novel ideas for dealing with equity issues and globablization. The proposal by Nicolas Sarkozy, a conservative politician, commissioning Amartya Sen, the most important liberal economist in the world that I have studied, and Joseph Stiglitz, another recognized liberal economist, to develop a better indicator of economic progress than gross domestic product, is particularly intriguing.

Stiglitz's analysis of economic and policy matters concerns me since he and I work from different assumptions. Stiglitz assumes in much of his analysis that politicians and policymakers can better correct for market failures than participants in markets themselves.

I don't doubt that government can do good at times, and believe in active government efforts that are consistent with free trade principles and the principles of a free economy, generally. Federal Reserve efforts to improve economic growth with interest rate cuts to stimulate investment or tax cuts as economic stimulus for investment and spending are measures that make an immeasurable amount of sense to me to preserve the integrity of free markets and to provide some relief from political pressures for government to "do something" while offering some moderate and temporary stimulus which does moderate good within the market.

I believe government efforts to, for instance, regulate environmental issues would be better cast as collaborative efforts between government, business, non-profit, and other actors to solve environmental problems with freedom for participants to find approaches that best address various issues and accounting for different interests and concerns that parties might have, with coercion as an option only when death or serious health issues are certain and imminent and parties are not in good faith (and with an understanding that such measures will, generally, be far from as successful as genuinely collaborative efforts, no matter how much coercion or incentives are used).

Meaning, I think people work together better when they are free to do so without presuming, generally, that one party knows best, especially since, generally, no one party, no matter how smart they are, does know best, and, as such, parties shouldn't coerce, as much as possible, because it interrupts and corrupts this process and it can never, in any of its best case scenarios, be as successful as genuine, honest, voluntary collaboration. Efforts by Bruce Babbit and Bill Clinton to bring together logging interests and environmentalists to discuss ways to address issues of nature preserve and logging in the 1990's were a model that closer approximates what I think constructive activity would look like on this front than the current liberal obsession with regulation.

I guess my concern with Stiglitz's work and with the tone of this article is that it seems to presume that people in government have sufficiently better understanding of markets and other issues impacted and that impact markets than those who participate in markets themselves that, of course, we should presume in favor of government intervention because markets are just never perfect and economists like Joseph Stiglitz, on the other hand, are just overflowing with unchallengeable economic wisdom to make those markets operate more efficiently.

As someone who has spent much time in scholarly and policy circles at this point in my life, I just think that's a load of shit, no offense to scholars like Joseph Stiglitz who spend their lives studying such matters.

While I have been a liberal more of Stiglitz's breed, in the past - although I must restate; I am an independent, today and have no such liberal attachments, these days - I have never shared that level of faith in scholars and academics, nevertheless in politicians and policymakers who often employ their skills.

I remember reading Plato's Republic my freshman year of college and thinking, "What an arrogant and dangerous worldview." I shared Plato's concern that government was often not intelligent enough. I still share it. I shared his view that thoughtful, wiser people needed to be making decisions, if we were going to have a representative democracy, than more rash and less thoughtful people.

But I never shared Plato's faith that intellectuals, philosopher kings, could be trusted to govern for the rest of us without a liberal democratic discussion and marketplace of ideas that was always a better barometer of better ideas and policies and the freedom of individual conscience taken more seriously than any of it.

It is why I like Twain and Mencken so much and why I aspire to write in their vein, as well. Because they just didn't swallow the bullshit that academics fed themselves that they knew more than they did. And it is obvious, really, to anyone who is not being defensive of academics or anyone, for that matter. That's why I like Twain and Mencken and humorists and comedians, of all stripes, to parody the flaws that all of us and each of us have, no matter how smart we think we are.

That's why I am much more seriously skeptical of Stiglitz's worldview and the standpoint of this International Herald Tribune article than I am of the market and its failures. Because anyone whose perspective starts from, "I am smarter and therefore know what is best for others" reeks of arrogance and smugness to me. And my nose for bullshit is stronger for those who reek of that kind of smugness much more than my nose for perhaps any other kind of people. It is the fact that they are so intelligent that makes them so dangerous, in this regard, and which gives such a bad name to intellectuals and institutions of education, for those for whom such people and institutions have a bad name, than any other kind of people.

I'm plenty arrogant, at times, I'm sure. I try to be as humble as I know how. But I carry with me more humility than that line of reasoning offers, and, in the case of folks like Joseph Stiglitz, seems to offer at every corner where someone might defend the right of people to make their own decisions, even when Joseph Stiglitz doesn't think it's good for them and even when he might be right.

I have many friends who smoke, for instance. But if Stiglitz takes after their right to smoke, on the grounds of "inequitable market information," one of the funniest and most foolish arguments that could made against smoking and one of the best reasons to presume that people should be able to do even bad things to themselves without others meddling, even if those arguing for "corrections for market inefficiences" don't approve, you can be sure that I will be protesting such a move with the whole of my passionately free-thinking being, even as my smoking friends, as with many bad things in the world, would have to concede that smoking isn't good for you.

This is what concerns me most about the current political period. This assumption that so many people carry with them that they are smarter than everyone else therefore they know better. And if you don't like it, you can sit in jail for awhile while they help you sort it out for yourself better.

It smacks of Ahmadinejad, in more stylish clothing. But I'm not convinced, in the least, that such emperors wear enough clothing to cover for their hubris.

This inspires me to write.