Talkin' to the Morally Elite

I agree with Mathew Yglesias that "moral elite" is an excellent frame (coined by John Holbo). Matt makes an important point about framing that is not talked about enough:

There's a fascinating point in their about the modalities of the term "elite." On the one hand, given the grand US tradition of populism and Jackson/Toqueville democracy, an elite is a bad thing to be for political purposes. Americans (rather oddly) rebel at the notion that anyone is better than anyone else or should have any ability to claim superior wisdom about anything than anyone else. At the same time, however, when "elite" is thrown at you as an accusation, you can hardly deny it. America lauds achievement, accomplishment, etc., so when someone castigates the "intellectual elite" you're hardly going to turn around and say, "no, no, you've got it all wrong -- I'm an idiot!" You're stuck in a weird American cultural void, unable to deny that you think you're better than others, but unable to admit it either.

Negative frame (used against an opponent, as opposed to a positive frame used to boost your side) have many different levels of sophistication:

Level 1: It is relatively easy to come up with frames that paint the opposition in a negative light.

Level 2: What is more challenging is to come up with a negative frame that the opposition will have difficulty countering because they, at least subconsciously, agree with it.

Level 3: What is even better is to come up with negative frame that the opposition adopts themselves!

Democrats have a mixed history with Level 1 negative frames, but they have rarely formalized the process. They have had much less success at Level 2 and Level 3.

Republicans have become masters of all three levels, which is why their talking points dominate the public debate.

We need to do better.

Brilliant!

(link)

Reconsidering Lakoff

I've been thinking a lot about George Lakoff, Elephants and Framing. I am a big fan of Lakoff's work and have distributed multiple copies of "Don't Think Of An Elephant" to many interested parties. I consider it essential that progressives and Democrats learn from Lakoff's work. But, as much as I enjoy his work, there is something that has still not allowed me to accept it fully.

Lakoff has done, I think, a superb job of identify the Republican frame. The "Strict Father Morality" explains so much of the Republican program of the last 20 years that it is hard not to believe it is correct. The source of my discontent is Lakoff's counter frame for Democrats and progressives. The "Nurturant Parent Morality" just doesn't ring true to me as the heart of progressive morality.

There are two aspects of it that gnaw at me:

1. "Nurturant" is a framing word that still entails a sense of namby-pamby, bleeding-heart liberalism. The kind of weak-kneed, jellyfish, why-won't-anyone-love-me frame that has painted Democrats, liberals and progressives into a corner.
   
2. "Parent" is a framing word that invokes a paternalistic sense of relationships. If Democrats and progressives are supposed to be "nurturant parents" doesn't that, of necessity, infantilize the people we are dealing with?

The first problem can be dealt with if we realize that "nurturance" is the frame, not the framing word. We want to invoke the concept of nurturing people to a better life without necessarily using the word "nurturance". Unfortunately, the explicit discussion of framing within the progressive community has lead to people using "nurturance" explicitly, which leads in turn to the entailments discussed above. You don't see Republican's talking about "strict fathers" but plenty of Democrats have started talking about "nurturant parents". If anything, the lesson Lakoff offers us is that words are dangerous and we should be careful how we use them ("Back off! I've got a dictionary and I'm not afraid to us it!")

It is the second problem that I think is more damaging to Lakoff's approach. The Republicans may have a "Daddy knows best" approach. But Lakoff is advocating a variant, a "Mommy/Daddy knows best" approach, that can be just as domineering. At least in the "Daddy knows best" approach the Republicans have a frame that explicitly embraces the authoritarian model. Lakoff's frame is just as authoritarian, it just won't admit it.

Progressives, on the other hand, eschew this authoritarian approach to human relations. They don't view humanity as a family made up of parents and children. They view it as a community of shared interests.

This, I think, gets to the heart of the problem: both the "Strict Father" and "Nurturant Parent" frames are built on the "Family of Man" metaphor, in which all of humanity is viewed as members of a family, some parents, some children. But that is not the only viable metaphor for human relationships. An alternative metaphor would be the "Community of Man" metaphor, in which all of humanity is viewed as being equal members of a community.

In the "Community of Man", each of us has an equal right to a certain level of human dignity ("Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness") while at the same time we have a shared responsibility towards each other to ensure we all have the opportunity to reach our fullest potential. In the "Community of Man" there is no parent. There is no all-knowing poobah who is responsible for raising us and teaching us right from wrong. There may be people who have temporarily been given authority over certain sub-groups in order to achieve certain goals. But those people are not assumed to be on a higher moral plane by virtue of their position.

In the "Community of Man" there are people who are wiser, stronger, more intelligence and/or more natural leaders than others. But in the "Community of Man", such people are not elevated to a position of moral superiority simply because of those qualities. In the "Community of Man" it is not assumed that those who are blessed with greater skills are thereby entitled to a greater say in the future of the community. Indeed, in the "Community of Man", people who are blessed are all the more obligated to use those blessings for the betterment of others ("Mankind was my business" - Marley's Ghost).

The "Family of Man" metaphor naturally leads to a bifurcation of society.  The "Family of Man" encourages dictatorial rule (Fascism under "Strict Father", Communism under "Nurturant Parent"). The "Community of Man" metaphor is naturally immune to this defect.

Now this is very important: when I argue that the "Family of Man" metaphor has defects I am not arguing that the "Community of Man" has no defects of its own. It most certainly does. For example, its reliance on mutual cooperation and shared responsibility can encourage the avoidance of responsibility. If the entire community is mutually responsible then no one is individually responsible. This can open the "Community of Man" to destruction through decay or attack from an external "Family of Man" society. For example, the "Community of Man" approach of a Mahatma Ghandi would have ultimately failed against the "Strict Father Family" approach of Adolph Hitler.

It is my personal belief that a functioning society is one in which the "Family of Man" and the "Community of Man" compete with each other. It is only in the struggle between them that society as a whole continues to survive. It is when one metaphorical approach dominates that a society risks corruption and destruction.

America is currently in danger of total domination by a "Family of Man" approach. Lakoff's "Nurturant Parent" frame, far from countering this danger, may simply encouraging it in another form.

Discuss.

Bad move from MoveOn

First, let it be known that I am a big fan of MoveOn. I've supported them from the beginning when they first started as a counter to the Clinton impeachment. I've defended them against Peter Beinert's call to purge them from the Democratic party. I will continue to defend them as a valuable partner in reforming the Democratic party.

Having said that, I think their declaration of war on the Democratic establishment is a serious tactical error.

I agree with the essence of their latest campaign (I've signed the petition) that the next DNC chair should be someone who represents the Democratic base instead of corporate lobbyists. But I think they made a mistake in personalizing the campaign by attacking Terry McAuliffe by name.

This is not because I don't think McAuliffe isn't worthy of criticism. But, by personalizing the campaign, they have forced the hand of establishment Dems who actually might be sympathetic to our cause. They have needlessly created a dividing line within the party at a time when we need to come to a mutual understanding about our future. Just as an example, I heard Rep. Barney Frank on Air America this morning defending McAuliffe against MoveOn's attack. Frank is a good guy who is on our side. But MoveOn's broadside essentially forced him to close ranks.

Bad move.

This is something people on this side of the Reform aisle need to understand: we can't succeed in the reform mission if we don't win over some of the people on the other side. We can do so without compromising our principles. We can do so by persuading them with argument and with achievements. We cannot do so if we needlessly personalize the struggle.

Peter Beinert made the same mistake in his call to purge the Democratic party of Michael Moore and MoveOn. MoveOn is making the same mistake in their call to purge the party of Terry McAuliffe.

They are two sides of the same coin. A coin we can't afford.

Republican vs. Republican-Lite

J of Value Judgment comments on my post where I wondered if members of the Democratic establishment have ever bothered to come to a meetup, adding some valuable insights of his/her own. He/She concludes with this:

Have they become like the Republicans? Afraid to let a few actual facts get in the way of their pre-conceived notions of how the world is? Once again, I will wander through my day wondering wtf is wrong with these people.

I don't think they have become like Republicans. I think they have just become establishment, which means they have lost touch with the rest of the party. There is nothing Republican about that. It's just human.

I think we should avoid the reflex to label anyone who disagrees with us as "Republican". I think Dean went over the line during the primary campaign when he started saying that. We need to adopt our own version of Reagan's 11th commandment. We can criticize each other for the actions we take, but we should avoid getting personal about it.

Note: "Republican-Lite" is not the same thing as Republican. The essence of the "Republican-Lite" charge is that Democrats shoudn't sell out their principles in order to achieve quick victories by simply stealing Republican thunder when there is plenty of Democratic thunder lying around.

The potential is there if only Democrats would use it.

Feel the love

Ann Coulter: "[Canada] is lucky we allow them to exist on the same continent as us."

Tucker Carlson: "Canada is a third-rate country, like Honduras but colder and not as interesting."

(link)

Framing Reform

Kos borrows from Eliot Spitzer to define reform (link):

Eliot has a good working definition for the word "reform" that can be applied to everything from the DNC race, to Democratic runs at all levels of government:

"We sorely need to re-energize state government, make it smarter, more efficient, responsive and accountable," said Spitzer, who on Tuesday formally announced his run for the Democratic nomination for the 2006 race.

Smarter, more efficient, responsive and accountable. Sounds about right to me.

Everything that Bush is not.

Losers!

Steve Gilliard gets straight to the point: the DLC are many-time losers. Why should we listen to many-time losers?

What isn't being said in all this is the fact that this is probably the first time in the history of the Democratic party that this many Democrats have ever cared about who will be the chairman of the party. How many of us even knew what the process was for selecting Chairman one month ago? And somehow the Democratic establishment feels threatened by this turn of events?

Why don't the Washington Insiders just come to Meetup?

Maybe it's just a matter of where you are watching the battle from, but I come to an assessment that is completely opposite of Nick Confessore's with respect to the coming battle for the DNC chair (link):

The problem for Dean is that, while he is generally on the reform side, and is himself a New Democrat in all but name, his grassroots political constituency consists largely of antiwar liberals who are full of inchoate fury at Democratic leaders for being a bad opposition party and not blocking the Iraq invasion (fury that is not entirely misplaced). So to get elected DNC chair, Dean has to convince them that the bad guys, the rump establishment, are the DLC and the ex-Clintonites. The DLC makes this a little too easy for Dean because, although they acknowledge that his policies aren't liberal, the tacticians there see his anti-war vibe and Northeastern roots as sending exactly the wrong message to the rest of the country. They don't want him running the party. So the DLC used to pretend Dean was a liberal when really he's not. They've more or less given that up, to their credit, but once the DNC chair fight commenced, Dean had a renewed interest in stoking the food fight. Thus many of the outside-the-Beltway supporters of party reform have come to view it as a battle between Washington centrists and grassroots liberals -- even though it isn't.

I am a founding member of that "grassroots constituency" that Nick speaks of (I started going to Dean meetups in March of 2003). I have seen the Dean movement from its beginnings, at its highest and at its lowest, and I can say without a moments hesitation that Dean's constituency DOES NOT "consist largely of antiwar liberals". Yes, the anti-war crowd gravitated to Dean during the election, but anti-war has never been the defining issue of the Dean movement. The defining issue, at least as I see it, is that Democrats have been allowing themselves to get rolled repeatedly by the Republicans and we are SICK AND TIRED OF IT!

Dean demonstrated that the Democrats could act like an opposition candidate and actually achieve some measure of success. Dean may not have won the nomination, but he went from being a vanity candidate to a real "threat" to win the nomination, shattered previous Democratic fundraising and volunteer records, and managed to come the closest to defining a viable alternative course for the Democratic project. By nearly any measure I consider the Dean campaign to have been a success. John Kerry, bless his soul, ran as much on Dean's message as his own (of course, that may have just contributed to the confusion about just what Kerry stood for).

But my disagreement with Nick goes even beyond this, because Nick sees it as the outsiders who have come to view it as a battle between centrists and liberals. Yet didn't he just label Deanies as primarily "antiwar liberals"? It is the insiders, like Nick, Peter Beinert and the TNR crew who continue to portray the Dean movement as nothing but warmed over McGovernite liberalism.

I actually agree with much of what is in Nick's post. But this paragraph proves that he still "doesn't get it" about the Dean movement.

My question for the insiders is a simple one: how many Dean meetups have you been to? How man Deanies have you really talked to? And I don't mean just the most fringe elements of the group (every group has fringe elements). I'm talking about the large group of meetup attendees who don't follow the works of Noam Chomsky or listen to Air America religiously. I'm talking about the large group of meetup attendees who are coming to the meetings because they "want to do something" but the Democratic party isn't offering them an outlet for their frustrations. These people are the core of the Dean movement. They are the ones who have made him as big as he is.

They aren't scary do-good peaceniks. They are nice people who love their country and are worried about where it is going. Maybe you should come out of your Washington, D.C. salons some time and meet them. You're more than welcome to attend any time. Just click here and find the nearest meetup in your area (next one is on Jan. 5th).

(You know, I think I'm beginning to understand the "heartland" church-going crowd and their complaints about elitist liberals looking down their nose at them.)

A national disgrace

Spencer Ackerman points out that Rumsfeld's disrespectful performance yesterday wasn't just limited to the question about body armor (link). Lord Rumsfeld was condescending to several of the questioners and, in essence, treated them like a bunch of hostile reporters at a Pentagon press briefing.

Changing the story

Anyone else notice that some of the more recent reports on yesterday's incident with Rumsfeld in Kuwait has been trimmed down to exclude the sound of the cheers Army Spc. Thomas Wilson received when he questioned Rumsfeld about armor?

It's almost like they are trying to turn the story into a conflict between one disgruntled GI and Lord Rumsfeld.

It's not just me. There are several commenters on this DailyKOS thread that have noticed the same thing.

Chose wisdom before wealth

Howard Dean has a column in The Hill today (man, for a "loser" he is certainly everywhere these days) in which he talks about the use of the web in politics (link). He points out what has become obvious to us but may still be lost on the older generation of political operatives: the web is more about organizing than raising money.

I am reminded of the story of how God offered the gifts of wisdom or wealth to Soloman. Soloman chose wisdom and that wisdom helped him to eventuallly achieve great wealth.

The web makes a similar offer to politicians: you could treat it as just another money source and it will probably work for you that way. But the much greater riches the web has to offer comes in the form of greater citizen involvement in your campaigns. That involvement has a greater capacity to spread your message, get out the vote and, ironically, increase your campaign contributions.

Put this way: you could spend $1,000 developing a web-site that will ask for contributions and will produce $10,000 in response. Or you could spend $1,000 developing a web-site that will encourage organization and involvement and will produce 1,000 volunteers who will spread your message to 10,000 voters who will contribute $100,000 to your campaign!

The message: if the message is good and the organization is good than the money will follow.

Now that's the kind of message legislators weary of constant glad-handing should welcome!

TOTAL THERMONUCLEAR WAR WIPING OUT ALL HUMANITY!!!

Josh Marshall, a self-professed liberal hawk, weighs in on Beinert's article (link). I won't quote it extensively (read it yourself, please), but Josh gets to a key point when he points out the uncomfortable (for some) truth that the threat of Islamic terrorism is just not of the same degree as the threat of Soviet communism:

Let�s survey the world stage the ADA folks faced in 1947 for some points of comparison. Having vanquished fascism, the democratic world faced in world communism a political movement that in its basic hostility to democracy and liberalism was more similar to than opposed to fascism. Russia, half of Europe and (in a couple of years) China were all communist. The communists controlled the largest land army in the world and would soon have nuclear weapons. Communism had substantial minority support across Western Europe, including vast support (active or passive) among the most articulate in society. And in the United States many on the left saw communists less as enemies than as errant allies, with whom cooperation was possible on common goals.

Placing context or limits on the danger posed by Islamic terrorism is a hazardous business these days. But unlike communism in 1947, militant Islam simply does not pose an existential threat to our civilization. It just doesn�t. It puts us all physically at risk. And especially for those of us who live in DC, New York or other major urban areas, it could kill us tomorrow.

But aside from middle eastern immigrants in western countries, this ideology has close to no support anywhere outside the Muslim world. As an ideology it controls at best a few small states; and it has possible access to Pakistan's small nuclear arsenal. But where is the danger of the Islamist takeover of any of the world�s great powers? China? The US? Europe? India? Japan? Brazil? Will Germany or Canada becomes �finlandized� by Islamist power? That doesn�t mean the danger doesn�t exist, only that it�s different. And those are fundamental differences we shouldn�t ignore.

Admittedly, the lack of Islamist power, in this sense, will be cold comfort for many of us if al Qaida brings us cargo ship with a nuclear weapon into New York harbor tomorrow. But the difference between an existential threat and a physical one is an important one for thinking about its impact on our politics. Particularly, whether it should lead us to purge folks from the Democratic party or from American liberalism who haven�t yet come around yet to a sufficiently serious view of the threat of terrorism or a coherent and tough-minded national security policy.

As much as people fear the threat of terrorism, that fear, for me at least, comes nowhere close to the fear of TOTAL THERMONUCLEAR WAR WIPING OUT ALL OF HUMANITY that was a constant fact of life during the Cold War. I only came into this world in the latter stages of that conflict, but I can remember sleepless nights during the Reagan years when I lay in bed straining to hear the sound of Russian bombers coming over the horizon. As bad as the destruction of a single city in a terrorist nuclear attack would be, it still doesn't compare to the threat of TOTAL THERMONUCLEAR WAR WIPING OUT ALL OF HUMANITY.

When people like Beinert question our commitment to fighting terrorism because we don't treat it as a threat equivalent to TOTAL THERMONUCLEAR WAR WIPING OUT ALL HUMANITY (last time, I promise) then I have to wonder where his sense of proportion has gone.

Josh covers a lot of other points, not the least being that organizations like MoveOn are not comparable to the communist fellow-travelers of the 1940s (ANSWER is a different matter) and may be the greatest hope we have for a progressive renaissance in this country. Purging the group as a whole would be foolish.

Aside: I have to wonder what the impact on the future will be as our population shifts towards a demographic that has never leaved under the fear of ... okay okay, I promised I wouldn't do it again. Still, the impact of that global existential fear on our psyches as children couldn't help but shape the way our minds work. The lack of that fear must be having a similar titanic impact on the thinking of the next generation.

Administering the Ipecac

Ruy Teixeira gets to the heart of what is most troubling about Peter Beinart's much-talked-about TNR article on how Democrats should deal with the issue of terrorism (link)

Peter Beinart, editor of the The New Republic, proposes in their latest magazine that Democrats stop all this unity nonsense and get down to what's really important: purging the party of all those wrong-headed "softs" who don't have the backbone to stand up (really stand up) to the new totalitarian threat of Islamic fundamentalism. Their failure to "report for duty" (Beinart specifically mentions only MoveOn and Michael Moore but I think his criteria for softness would also implicate most of the liberal blogosphere, most Dean campaign activists, a good chunk of the leadership of the 527s and countless others within the party) cost the Democrats the White House in 2004 and will do so forever until Democrats decisively remove them from power and influence in the party. Yes, it's purge time in the glorious spirit of the late '40s actions against Communists and those soft on them within the Democratic party.:

Ruy is right. Beinert and those of a like mind may deny it, but there really is no way to interpret his article other then as a call for a purge. And it's not just a purge of the most extremist elements, which could arguably be considered a correct thing(*). Beinert is calling for a purge of those who have not sided with the proposition that the Iraq War is a part of the War On Terror (in other words, his side). These are the people who have argued that the war in Iraq was a distraction from that greater conflict.

This despite (and perhaps because of) the fact that those people happen to be right.

 

(*) Purges are not necessarily wrong when the objects of the purge are inherently damaging to the movement as a whole. Republicans could stand to purge elements like Ann Coulter and Michael Savage while Democrats could stand to purge elements like Al From and Bruce Reed (joke joke (not really)).

Hooray for Class Warfare!

David Sirota has an important article in this month's American Prospect that highlights the many examples of Democrats succeeding in "red" regions of the country by emphasizing their populist, class-based appeal (link). These successes, some of the few bright spots for Democrats in 2004, were in direct conflict with the conventional wisdom that says that Democrats cannot succeed with these kind of appeals but must, instead, "swing towards the middle", be friendlier to corporate interests, hit "moral values" hot buttons and never NEVER engage in class warfare.

Yet how to explain the success of Bernie Saunders?

In Vermont, Representative Bernie Sanders, the House�s only independent and a self-described socialist, racks up big wins in the �Northeast Kingdom,� the rock-ribbed Republican region along the New Hampshire border. Far from the Birkenstock-wearing, liberal caricature of Vermont, the Kingdom is one of the most culturally conservative hotbeds in New England, the place that helped fuel the �Take Back Vermont� movement against gay civil unions.

Yet the pro-choice, pro�gay-rights Sanders� economic stances help him bridge the cultural divide. In the 1990s, he was one of the most energetic opponents of the trade deals with China and Mexico that destroyed the local economy. In the Bush era, he highlighted the inequity of the White House's soak-the-rich tax-cut plan by proposing to instead provide $300 tax-rebate checks to every man, woman, and child regardless of income (a version of Sanders� rebate eventually became law). For his efforts, Sanders has been rewarded in GOP strongholds like Newport Town. While voters there backed George W. Bush and Republican Governor Jim Douglas in 2004, they also gave Sanders 68 percent of the vote.

Sanders' strength among rural conservatives is not just a cult of personality; it is economic populism�s broader triumph over divisive social issues. In culturally conservative Derby, for instance, a first-time third-party candidate used a populist message to defeat a longtime Republican state representative who had become an icon of Vermont�s anti-gay movement.

In all the success stories Sirota details there is one common element: the successful Democratic candidates came from working class and/or rural backgrounds who spoke the language that was familiar to the people they wanted to represent. They succeeded primarily against opponents that represented corporate interests (many were former lobbyists). The message is that being a real "man of the people" is the #1 characteristic we should look for in potential candidates.

Yes, I know, Bush does not fit this model. He is not a real "man of the people". But Bush benefits from having a billion dollar media apparatus working day and night to create the illusion that he is "one of us". The problem for most politicians is that very few of them can afford that kind of apparatus. Fortunately, the sheer size of it demonstrates that it is not easy to pull off this kind of a con.

This is the second message: we shouldn't even try to pulling a similar con. We should, instead, find the real REAL "man of the people" candidates (both men and women) and send them out with a populist, class-based appeal. When you run that kind of candidate against lobbyist-turned-politicians, the populist candidate will win, regardless of what political party they belong to.

Let them mock

I initially reacted with anger and frustration when reading this NY Post column by Deborah Orin about Howard Dean's possible run for the DNC chair. First there was the ever-present anonymous Democrat expressing the establishment fear of Dean. Then there was Orin's own characterization of Dean as leading the Democrats off the cliff because his leadership would show that Democrats are "not ready to face the fact that terrorism was the key issue on Nov. 2". The column was frustrating to me because it presented so many of the misconceptions about Howard Dean, both deliberate and otherwise, that have become legion and it did so in such a compact fashion.

But then it occurred to me that I have seen this kind of thing before. I've seen a political leader characterized as someone who would destroy their party, said characterization coming from members of both parties. I've seen that leader mocked by the opposition as being obviously unfit for the roll. I've seen that leader succeed despite, if not in part because of the derision.

That political leader was and is George W. Bush.

We really need not be angered by the mischaracterizations, distortions and jokes about Howard Dean. We just need to give him the power necessary to make the changes he is advocating. Let others mock him and us. It can just make us stronger.

Dean won't seek presidency in 2008 if he gets chairmanship

At least that is how The Baltimore Sun is reporting it (link):

Following a speech at George Washington University, the former governor said that if he became party chairman, it would preclude another presidential try, at least in 2008.

It's actually not an absolute statement that he won't run in 2008. It's more an acknowledgement of the reality that holding the DNC chair would make it difficult for him doing so.

Of course, if Dean were in charge of a profound turn-around in party fortunes in 2006 then whose to say whether the party might not be more open to the possibility of his running anyway.

Here's how the AP reports it (link):

One woman among the crowd of well-wishers who surrounded Dean after the speech asked how she can contact him, and Dean told her that if the DNC "works out," she could contact him at the party. Dean also told reporters that anyone who becomes DNC chairman should be ruled out as a candidate for president in 2008.

"Our troops go to war with the Army that our nation's leaders provide."

Could there be some political fallout from Rumsfeld's flippant response to a soldier's question about inadequate body armor? There could be, if more Democrats follow the lead of Chris Dodd. (background: The soldier complained about having to dig through landfills for scrap metal to reinforce his vehicle, to which Rumsfeld replied, "You go to war with the Army you have.")

• Sen. Christopher Dodd (D-CT) has written a letter to Rumsfeld calling his response "utterly unacceptable" and saying that it is the government's responsibility to provide safe equipment for soldiers in battle. He said, "Our troops go to war with the Army that our nation's leaders provide." (emphasis mine)
  
• Military analysts say that the harsh questions to Rumsfeld are a sign of growing frustration and dropping morale among the troops in the field according to a report in the Kansas City Star. This report also points out that the soldier who asked the question, Spc. Thomas Wilson, voted for Bush in November.
  
• The Seattle-Post Intelligencer applauds Wilson's question, saying he should be awarded a medal for staring down Don Rumsfeld. They go on to criticize Rumsfeld for championing the war-on-the-cheap approach that may lead to a "battlefield victory against a far weaker adversary but has left our forces unprepared and unequipped to maintain the peace."
  
• NPR has a report on the exchange and on the issue of armored vehicles.
  
• WVLT Channel 8 in Knoxville Tennessee, home of the unit Wilson belongs to (the 278th Regimental Combat Team), has some comments from a wife of another member of that unit. She considers Wilson's question to be legitimate even though he own husband wouldn't complain about lack of protection.

There are over 986 Google News hits on this story.

Fahrenheit 9/11 nominated for People's Choice Award

You can vote for it here.

Those who resist the process to create a new vision will be left behind

This is is over three weeks old, but I just discovered the November 3rd Theses. They provide a nice addition to the themes developed by Gov. Dean in his speech today.

"We are what we believe" -- Howard Dean, Dec. 8th, 2004

The transcript for Dean's "Future of the Democratic Party" speech is up (link). I haven't heard it yet, but the text hits all the essential points. Check it out.

No, Dean does not announce his candidacy for the DNC chair. In fact, he doesn't even mention it at all.

I think Dean wants the job, but only if he can get it on his terms. As such, I don't think he will go for it unless he gets a clear sense that he has the support of the party to do what needs to be done. This speech is his attempt to sell himself to the party as the one to lead that change. He's now going to wait and see how the party leaders respond to it. If they respond favorably, then he will go for it. If they don't, then he will stay on the outside, for now.

Insanity

If you witness torture in Iraq you must be delusional.

On June 15, 2003, Sgt. Frank "Greg" Ford, a counterintelligence agent in the California National Guard's 223rd Military Intelligence (M.I.) Battalion stationed in Samarra, Iraq, told his commanding officer, Capt. Victor Artiga, that he had witnessed five incidents of torture and abuse of Iraqi detainees at his base, and requested a formal investigation. Thirty-six hours later, Ford, a 49-year-old with over 30 years of military service in the Coast Guard, Army and Navy, was ordered by U.S. Army medical personnel to lie down on a gurney, was then strapped down, loaded onto a military plane and medevac'd to a military medical center outside the country.

Although no "medevac" order appears to have been written, in violation of Army policy, Ford was clearly shipped out because of a diagnosis that he was suffering from combat stress. After Ford raised the torture allegations, Artiga immediately said Ford was "delusional" and ordered a psychiatric examination, according to Ford. But that examination, carried out by an Army psychiatrist, diagnosed him as "completely normal."

A witness, Sgt. 1st Class Michael Marciello, claims that Artiga became enraged when he read the initial medical report finding nothing wrong with Ford and intimidated the psychiatrist into changing it. According to Marciello, Artiga angrily told the psychiatrist that it was a "C.I. [counterintelligence] or M.I. matter" and insisted that she had to change her report and get Ford out of Iraq.

Documents show that all subsequent examinations of Ford by Army mental-health professionals, over many months, confirmed his initial diagnosis as normal.

This is a growing problem among our troops:

Col. C. Tsai, a military doctor who examined Ford in Germany and found nothing wrong with him, told a film crew for Spiegel Television that he was "not surprised" at Ford's diagnosis. Tsai told Spiegel that he had treated "three or four" other U.S. soldiers from Iraq that were also sent to Landstuhl for psychological evaluations or "combat stress counseling" after they reported incidents of detainee abuse or other wrongdoing by American soldiers.

These poor deluded soldiers must be helped!

A better man than I

I've tried to point out the problems with the criticism of the anti-war left that is coming from the liberal hawk wing of the Democratic party, but haven't done that great a job of it.

David Neiwert does a much better job (link).

Sometimes I wonder if I really have the time and the resources necessary to contribute to this discussion in a useful way.

Being anti-Iraq War is NOT being soft on terrorism

DailyKOS diarist BriVt provides a good defense of the anti-Iraq war position in an open letter responding to Pete Beinart's suggestion that that position is an example of "soft" liberalism that leaves the Democratic party in a weakened position (Fighting Faith). To summarize some of his point (please read the whole post):

• Opposition to the Iraq war is not necessarily based on an opposition to war in general but instead on the belief that the Iraq war was a distraction from the real war against terrorism inspired by religious fundamentalism.
• The reason the anti-Iraq faction had to align itself with more general anti-war forces (ANSWER, Michael Moore, etc.) is because there was very few alternatives presented by the Democratic establishment.
• One of the few who did offer such an alternative was Howard Dean and the establishment reacted to his success by working with Republicans to paint Dean as just another example of a liberal peacenik (in complete contradiction to reality).
• The struggle we are in today is not against totalitarianism, as Beinart suggests, but religious fundamentalism and it is the GOP who has the greater obligation to face up to its past association with such.

With respect to the last point, I quote BriVt:

[...] Iraq was not part of the global terrorist network in any meaningful sense. Iraq was "totalitarian," which, by your language, makes it a part of the "enemy," but that shows the limit to your language. We are not fighting a totalitarian view, we are fighting a religious fundamentalist view. See the Pentagon report quoted here to see how damaging to our cause this lack of understanding has been.

The GOP has not made this distinction because they can not talk about fundamentalism due to domestic political concerns. While the Democratic Party of the late 40s needed to shed its Communist sympathies to confront the Soviet Union, it is now the Republican Party that needs to shed its fundamentalist sympathies to confront Al Qaeda. But your formulation that we are fighting "totalitarianism" and that Iraq, while bungled, was part of that fight, is further obscuring this central truth.

I happen to have a lot of sympathy for the liberal hawk position. I could very well have supported a war against Iraq on different grounds (Saddam Hussein was in violation of UN mandates and was dangerously cagey about his WMD capabilities). But I happen to believe that even a war that could be justified legitimately can be corrupted if it is tied inextricably to an illegitimate justification. The fight against al Qaeda and religiously inspired terrorism was an illegitimate justification for what we did in Iraq.

Where the liberal hawks lose me is when they suggest that opposition to the Iraq war because of that illegitimate justification is equivalent to opposing the Iraq war in general and is therefore an example of "softness". That's just another variation on the objectively pro-terrorism canard and no amount of sympathy on my part will abide that kind of scurrilous suggestion.

What to do with Michael Moore

There's been some back-n-forth in the blogosphere the last couple of days between Atrios, Kevin Drum and Matthew Yglesias about opposition to the Afghan War. Ancillary to this debate has been the question of the role Michael Moore has played in Democratic politics. Specifically, it has lead to the question of whether Democrats should embrace or repudiate him. I won't try to summarize the points-of-view of those involved in this debate, but I would like to bring up something that I haven't seen mentioned in this discussion.

One of the knocks against the Democratic party in recent years is that it is the party of left-wing, elite, ivory tower intellectuals. The Democratic party is criticized, both by the Republicans, and by some Democrats, as having abandoned its blue collar roots. This is a fair criticism. Several of the most prominent Democrats of the last few years have rarely had to earn an "honest" living. Many in the middle part of the electorate simply don't know how to relate to the candidates the party has put forth of late.

Here's what I would like to point out: Michael Moore is the most prominent blue collar left-wing (would-be) Democrat in the country. No one could accuse him of being an ivory tower intellectual. Moore's popularity is based, in part, on the fact that he provides a criticism of Democratic elitism from the left (as opposed to the multitude of said criticism coming from the right). Moore has an ability to appeal to the blue collar segment of this country in a way that few Democratic leaders can anymore.

And many of those Democratic leaders want nothing to do with the guy. Indeed, many of them want to join with their Republican opponents in using support for Moore as some kind of litmus test for acceptability in Democratic circles.

Nothing could please the Republicans more than for Democrats to continue to use Moore as some kind of dividing line in the party. Until the Democrats can treat Moore as an acceptable voice of opinion within the party, it will continue to struggle in the fight to win over the working class that he represents

(And Matt, no one is saying that criticism of Moore shouldn't be allowed. We're only saying that it shouldn't be required.)

Dean: a preview

The latest edition of Dean's weekly column appears to be a preview of what he will be talking about on Wednesday.

It is more of a summary of ideas rather than a bullet-point plan. Hopefully the latter will be forthcoming on Wednesday.

Something brewing on the Dean front?

Hmmm...

Over the past month, as he always has, Governor Dean has been listening to what Democrats, independents, and regular people across the country have to say.

On Wednesday, December 8, at The George Washington University, Governor Dean will speak about a vision for the future of our party.

He'll be speaking at the Jack Morton Auditorium in the Media and Public Affairs building at 11 AM.

Bernard Kerik: The Typhoid Mary of Terrorism?

Boy, I hope some enterprising Senator uses this piece by Josh Marshall as the basis for some interesting questions of Homeland Security Czar designate Bernard Kerik.

The obvious question to ask: Why should America trust its most important security position to a man who oversaw some of the worst security failures in the early months of the Iraqi occupation?

More experiments in perversity

In this post I talked about my theory that those who most vigorously advocate for greater state control over "experiments in perversity" may believe that they will give in to that very urge and therefore their advocacy stems from a sense of self-preservation.

Well, little did I know that there is actually a name for this idea. It is called the "secret sin" theory of politics and Mathew Yglesias has a post talking about it. Check it out.

And check out the Andrew Sullivan post that inspired Matt's post.

Addendum...

I've been thinking a little more about the Reid/Russert exchange on Meet The Press. To repeat:

[Reid in '94] We have to all swallow a little bit of our pride and go toward the middle.

Russert: Is that still your advice to the Democrats?

I think there's no question about it. You know, we don't accomplish anything on the far right or the far left. Things are accomplished in the middle. We have to work toward the middle. And I think that that's clear. I feel no differently than I did ten years ago.

If we think of politics in purely marketing terms, then this is the sales pitch of a loser. What is the fundamental message that comes from Reid's comment? It is this:

The Democrats have nothing useful to sell you. So we are just going to sell you what the Republicans are selling, but with nicer packaging.

Gee, that's a compelling pitch isn't it?

The first step Democrats need to take before they can win is to believe they actually have something worthwhile to sell to the buyer/voter. The second step is to develop your own marketing plan to sell your product. One of the key requirements of that marketing plan is that it not adopt the opposition's talking points because those talking points have been carefully manufactured to carry the implicit message that your product sucks.

Would Coke get anywhere if it adopted the slogan, "The Better Choice of a New Generation"? Of course not! The obvious variation on Pepsi's slogan would do nothing but invoke the idea of Pepsi in the mind of the consumer. In other words, it's a slogan that would make potential Coke buyers thirsty for a Pepsi!

To repeat:

1. Believe what you have to sell is worth buying

2. Sell it by making people want to buy it without making reference to the other guys product ("Coke: It's the Real Thing!")

Republicans are the ones who need to change

Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV), the incoming Minority Leader, was on Tim Russert today. Russert played a tape of a comment Reid made in 1994 and queried Reid about it (note: transcript is courtesy a poster over at the DalyKOS. It is not official):

[Reid in '94] We have to all swallow a little bit of our pride and go toward the middle.

Russert: Is that still your advice to the Democrats?

I think there's no question about it. You know, we don't accomplish anything on the far right or the far left. Things are accomplished in the middle. We have to work toward the middle. And I think that that's clear. I feel no differently than I did ten years ago.

Now, it is correct that. in order to get anything done in government, you need to be able to meet the opposition in the middle. It is the extremists who throw the wrenches in the works that keeps the government from getting the job done. So Reid is not incorrect in stating that Democrats need to go towards the middle. But what he leaves out in this comment is that the Republicans need to do the same. By leaving out that essential point Reid implicitly supports the frame that Democrats are still under the sway of the most extreme elements of their party and that is the only reason they are out of power. This public posture by Reid continues to support the idea that it is the Democrats that need to be more accommodating.

This is the posture of the loser. But with a slight modification, it could be the posture of a winner (my additions are in bold):

[Reid in '94] We have to all swallow a little bit of our pride and go toward the middle.

Russert: Is that still your advice to the Democrats?

I think there's no question about it. You know, we don't accomplish anything on the far right or the far left. Things are accomplished in the middle. We have to work toward the middle. And I think that that's clear. I feel no differently than I did ten years ago. The Democrats have swallowed their pride. We are now the party that represents the middle of America. It is time for the Republicans to swallow their pride and meet us there.

The truth is that it the Democrats do represent the middle in this country. All the public opinion polling backs this up. The only reason the Republicans have a slight advantage in the electoral arena is because they are simply better at selling themselves.

Our government is in a shambles. But the reason nothing gets done is because the Republicans are dominated by the extreme right. Democrats should always present themselves as the ones who are waiting patiently in the middle for for those silly Republicans to "swallow their pride".

Of course this would lead to a lot of Republicans scoffing at the idea that the Democrats represent the middle. But then that's the kind of public discussion we'd like to get into.