The natural state of man

Someone recently asked me why it is that Bush seems hell bent on a course of perpetual war. Why do he and his buddies actually seem to thrive on it?

It occured to me, in answering the question, that its premise was wrong.

Bush and his neocon buddies don't want perpetual war. They just think that perpetual war is the natural state of Man. And any who resist this idea is either naive or in league with the enemy.

Blame the consultants?

David Sirota makes an interesting point. All the recent bashing of the entrenched consultant culture in the Democratic party (most notable recent example in "Crashing The Gate") misses something essential: it is the politicians who are responsible for hiring those consultants.

... to focus more blame on consultants - as opposed to the politicians who hire them - is to avoid the real problem. In many cases, that is deliberate avoidance, so as to prevent raising the ire of politicians many in Democratic circles are still afraid to challenge - no matter how many times they sell us out. It's like pretending that when you get sick the real problem is your stuffed nose, rather than the cold that is causing the stuffed nose in the first place. Actually, it's worse: it's like blaming the stuffed nose because you don't want to make the cold germs feel bad.

I don't quite go along with Sirota's suggestion that those who criticize consultants are deliberately avoiding criticism of the candidates because they don't want to piss of those candidates. I've seen a fair share of criticism of Dem politicians for just that (several post-mortems of the Dean campaign raked him over the coals for not doing a better job of managing the people who worked for him). I also think it is important to remember that many politicians, especially in low-level races, are naive about the system they are entering. They are sheep who can be easily rolled by the wolves in the consultant culture.

But I think Sirota's point is a useful caution to those of us who might be looking for a singular explanation for Democratic woes. The consultants are not THE problem. But they are certainly a major part of it.

Signs of hope

South Dakotans are working to put an initiative on the ballot to overturn their states draconian anti-abortion legislation. They have until June 19th to collect over 16,000 signatures. The backers of this initiative were expecting it to be an uphill battle. But after only a couple of weeks they have already reached 1/3 of their goal!

In fact, staunch Republicans are signing the initiative. Why?

Spotting three teenagers with clipboards as he walked up to the Sturgis post office, Jack Hoel, 74, broke into a grin.

"I can't wait to sign," he said. "I was going to go out looking for this petition."

Hoel is a staunch Republican in a county that twice backed President Bush with nearly 75% of the vote. "You have to be, in South Dakota, or you get extradited," he joked.

But Hoel disliked the thought of politicians interfering in a family's most intimate decisions. "It's too personal to be legislated," he said.

The road for the Democrats out of the abortion jungle is paved with questions about the proper role of government in our most personal medical decisions. South Dakota and Terri Shiavo are the poster children for this effort. They demonstrate clearly what the real agenda is: requiring government approval before we can make decisions about birth and death.

As Markos so aptly put it on The Colbert Report the other day, "We have found that the Republicans are really good at telling you when you can be born, they're good at telling you when you can die, but not very good at the stuff in between."

If neither South Dakota or Terri Shiavo had happened it would have been difficult for Democrats to convince voters that this is really what the Republican party stands for. But they have made our case for us.

Thanks guys!

UPDATE

Apparently this question has been polled already in SD and the results look very promising:

Pollsters hired by Focus: South Dakota contacted 630 South Dakota voters by telephone for random interviews from Thursday through Saturday, and 62 percent said the legislation is too extreme, 33 percent said they support the bill and the rest were undecided.

When people were asked if they thought the abortion ban should be put on the November ballot, 72 percent answered yes. Pollsters found that 79 percent of Democrats, 67 percent of independents, and 65 percent of Republicans favor a statewide vote on the issue.

The people behind this initiative can be found here.

Rationality and Joe Lieberman

Is it rational to perform a rational analysis of the rationality of Lieberman's actions?

Armando, sacred cow hunter of the DailyKos, goes after Matt Stoller for the latter's attempt to perform a rational analysis of Joe Lieberman's threats to leave the party and run as an independent if he doesn't get the nomination. Armando, being Armando, doesn't mince words:

What a strange political party we support. It is oftentimes hard to understand what our leaders are thinking. But it is sometimes harder to understand what some Dem bloggers are thinking. Matt Stoller today publishes the most bizarre reaction of all to Joe Lieberman's threat of political treason. Matt thinks Joe is being rational:

And realize that for Joe, who is perceived as popular in CT, running as an independent isn't just a last resort; it's actually a pretty rational move.

It is a sad commentary when a Democratic candidate's threatening to leave the Party is considered a reasonable rational move. It's sad for the Party and its adherents. Frankly, Stoller's comment amazes me.

From Armando's perspective (at least my perspective of his perspective), it is irrational for any Democrat who is loyal to the party to even consider that Lieberman's actions are rational. Why? Because doing so gives those actions moral weight. It makes them seem "okay".

This isn't some academic debate being held within the halls of some university. This isn't a poli-sci discussion where we step back and analyze political actions on a higher plane. This is ground-level, activist politics. And at that level, Lieberman's actions are a betrayal. Any ground level Democrat who doesn't condemn it as such, who wastes time trying to analyze Lieberman's actions, is acting irrationally (i.e., against their own best interest).

Democrats have had a bad habit applying academic, objective analysis to political matters while losing sight of the fact that, to the people on the ground, all of that matters for shit. It's this habit that makes Democrats look disconnected to the average voter, who doesn't give a crap about political science theory and thinks anyone who does is just weird.

For the activist Dem, Lieberman's actions are simply reprehensible. End of discussion.

I think what Armando is trying to do, in his own unique style, is force people to pay attention to the ground game and leave the acadmic analysis to the academicians.

I support that effort.

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Now, I may disagree with Armando mostly on points of style but not on substance. Armando says that Democrats shouldn't be "allowed" to think about Lieberman's actions objectively. I disagree. Of course they should be "allowed" in the sense that, as an American, Stoller is free to put his considerable brain power to whatever exercise he wants. The question is whether this kind of analysis is helpful to Democrats when it comes to winning elections and influencing public policy.

It isn't. It is just a distraction from the kind of work we should be doing (getting out the vote, supporting good candidates, countering Republican spin and smears, etc.)

Armando speaks in absolutes. That's not my style, but I understand the point he is trying to make and I appreciate him trying to make it.

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Some who have disagreed with Armando on this point have stated that he is misrepresenting Stoller's point. Stoller, is only saying that Lieberman's actions may be rational. He is not saying they are good. This demonstrates a serious lack of understanding of opinion dynamics.

Meaning has two aspects. There is the meaning as intended (implication) and the meaning as received (inferation (not a real word, but it should be)). I know that, in a technical sense, describing something as rational does not mean you are saying it is right (in academic parlance, it is not normative.) But to the layman, "rational" has an emotional component to it which implies approval. It is a positive label and thus anything you apply it to gains a positive inferation.

This is a mistake Democrats have made time and time again. When they talk about the political ideas of their opponents, they often talk about them on an academic level. They acknowledge the potential rational for the opposing point of view. This kind of discussion causes the casual viewer to infer that the Democrat is actually approving of the idea. When the Democrat then expresses disapproval it creates a cognitive dissonance in the audience that is resolved by concluding that said Democrat is muddled in their thinking. He is a waffler. He is flip-flopping. He doesn't know what he stands for. He was for it before he was againts it. Blah blah blah.

In the end it does not matter if, when you call something "rational" you know you aren't calling it "good". In the mind of your audience, the formula "rational = good" fills in the missing piece.

Only an academic would say that "rational" has no normative value to it. Everyone else understands that the working assumption is "rational = good".

It doesn't matter if, on an academic level, you could describe Lieberman's threat as "rational". What matters is whether it is rational for Democrats to respond to it in any way other than outright condemnation.

It is not.

The hidden subtext behind Lieberman's threats

Many Democrats are justifiably upset with Joe Lieberman strongly suggesting that, if he doesn't get the nomination of the Connecticut Democratic party for re-election, he will leave the party and run as an independent.

Joe Lalli: Ned Lamont has already stated that he would support you if you won the Democratic nomination and Zell Miller once stated that he would always be a member of the Democratic party. Can you make similar promises?

LIEBERMAN: I'll always be a member of the Democratic party. I hope there's not a primary. I'm confident if there is one, I'll win it, but I'm not gonna rule out any other option for now because I feel so strongly that I can do better for the State of Connecticut for the next six years in the United States Senate that I want to give all the voters a chance to make that decision on Election day in November. I want to do it as a Democrat. If I didn't want to do it as a Democrat, I would choose to run in some other party, trust me. But I want to do it as a Democrat because I believe in the Democratic party, so really the choice is up to my fellow Democrats...

Joe says he "hopes there won't be a primary". But Ned Lamont is already declared and running. There already is a primary. So what's the deal with Joe's wistful desire for an unfettered path to the nomination? Joe wants Lamont to drop out, but Lamont obviously isn't going to do that at the Joe's request. So what is Joe tryng to accomplish here?

Joe is trying to force the Democratic party (both state and national) to force Lamont out. And he is threatening them if they don't do it.

What is interesting here is not so much that an incumbent politician wants his party to clear the field for his nomination. That kind of thing happens all the time in politics. But it usually happens behind the scenes with political operatives making deals with potential opponents (or, if that doesn't work, the occaisional threat).

What is interesting here is that Joe, who knows a lot about backroom politicking, feels it is necessary to go public with his (not-so-)subtle effort to force Lamont out. In fact, he hasn't just gone public with this, he has done it in the most threatening manner possibly, by leaving open the possibility that he may abandon the party completely.

What does this tell us? It tells us that Joe has lost the ability to get the Democratic party (both state and national) to do what he wants it to do. Joe is weak, and he knows it.

He has already called in all of his chits with the Connecticut Democratic party, forcing all of its elected leaders to come out and endorse him early in the race (even before Lamont announced). But that didn't stop Lamont from running. Nor did it quell the interest in his race. If anything, it has inflamed it.

Joe still wants Ned out. But he doesn't have any chits left to call. He's already blown his wad.

So threatening his party membership is the last arrow in his quiver.

Joe Lieberman is weak and he is a coward. He is so desirous of holding on to power that he doesn't want to risk losing it in an honest race.

No wonder he likes Bush so much.

(Contribute to Ned Lamont)

Did Nixon order the Watergate break-in?

What many people forget is that it has never been proven that Nixon knew of or approved of the actual break-in of the Democratic headquarters that ultimately resulted in the scandal that brought down his presidency.

Yes, a lot of other malfeasance was proven, but the criminal offense that started it off was never directly linked to Nixon.

Lesson: it is not necessary to link the outing of Valerie Plame to Bush in order for him to be permanently crippled by the revelations from this scandal.

Did Nixon order the Watergate break-in? We will probably never know. But we do know that he ordered the coverup.

Did Bush authorize the outing of Valerie Plame? We may never know. But we do know that he authorized the release of national security secrets for the purpose of protecting his political butt.

It is not everything. But it just may be enough.

Bush's only defense

I think most would concede that a President has and should have the authority to selectively declassify national security secrets if doing so is necessary to protect national security.

What Bush did was selectively delassify national security secrets in order to protect himself against a political scandal.

Therefore, Bush's only defense is to argue that his political security is equivalent to the national security of the United states.

That kind of argument hasn't been made since the time of kings and emperors.