Reflecting on the Republican Cult of Masculinity

A lot of Republicans seem to think that Vladimir Putin would make a better President than Barack Obama, because he's a "Real Man". I don't think that Putin actually is a "Real Man" except in the cheapest sense of the term. And I don't think his admirers are either.

What's a "Real Man"? Maybe this:

The Farce of Congressional Courtesy

Visit any Senator's or Representative's "Contact Me" page and you will see some version of this statement:

"Congressional courtesy dictates that Representatives be given the opportunity to assist their own constituents, thus I strongly encourage you to contact your Representative in Congress by clicking this link to the House Write Your Representative Service."

This is the the message on Rep Sander Levin's website. Other Representatives, like Joe Pitts, say things like "Regrettably, I am unable to reply to any email from constituents outside of the 16th District of Pennsylvania."

In short, Members of Congress don't want to hear from non-constituents. The rationale? YOUR Representative or Senator really cares about your opinions and values, and wants to hear what they are.  YOUR opinions really count.

The only problem with that rationale is that members of Congress in "safe districts" couldn't care less about the opinions, values, interests, or needs of anyone who isn't part of their base, or can be easily persuaded to become part of their base.  To Republicans in particular, if your opinion indicates that you don't think, vote, or pray the way they want you to, you and anything you say mean nothing.

In short, the rules of Congressional Courtesy leave millions of voters effectively disenfranchised, represented by Representatives who refuse, under ANY circumstances, to represent them. Yet those same Representatives take millions of dollars in campaign contributions from non-constituents, work overtime to mobilize out-of-district activists for rallies, and in every way violate both the letter and the spirit of Congressional Courtesy.


It might be a good idea for Congressional Democrats to acknowledge this reality and stop playing by rules that the Republicans routinely ignore.  It might be a good idea for Congressional Democrats to say to voters who are stranded in hostile districts, "If your own Representative refuses to honorably represent you, let me know and I will do what he or she won't."

Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Seoul

According to the most commonly accepted estimates, the bombing of Hiroshima killed about 140,000 people, roughly 90,000 outright, and the rest over the next year.

If the North Koreans attacked South Korea with massed artillery already locked and loaded, US intelligence sources estimate the death toll at about 200,000 within a few hours, most within what those same intelligence sources chillingly call the Seoul "Kill Box." In other words, North Korea's conventional artillery would indiscriminately kill more people than the atomic bomb killed at Hiroshima.

Since North Korea's massed artillery is not a nuclear, biological, chemical or radiological weapon, we do not publicly consider it a Weapon of Mass Destruction. Unless the North also used chemical or biological weapons, the North would devastate the South before we could respond effectively.

If that happened, the US could only hope that South Korean and US forces would be able to hold on until we could mobilize our own conventional forces for a counterattack

Although it was first used to describe the German use of mass bombing on Guernica during the Spanish Civil War, the US has habitually used the term "Weapons of Mass Destruction" to include only nuclear, radiological, biological and chemical weapons. But in 2003, Lake Superior State University proposed that it be banned for overuse, misuse and abuse. According to the University's web page "Many nominators point out that any weapon, used effectively, does a lot of destruction. 'A few thousand machetes in the hands of an army in Africa can lead to mass genocide,' writes Howard Stacy of Atlanta, Georgia."

By limiting the definition of WMD to nuclear, chemical, biological and radiological weapons only, we are playing into North Korea's strategy of permanent brinksmanship. Given the North's increasingly hostile and erratic behavior, we could find ourselves in another war that will take too long, and cost too much to win. The North Koreans seem to know this and think they can keep pushing us and their neighbors with no fear of bringing about their own demise.

We might be able to trump this strategy - and its resulting behavior - by letting the North Koreans know that we would consider a massed artillery attack on the South, with or without the other traditional WMDs, to be an attack with Weapons of Mass Destruction on a civilian population, and would respond in kind.

In 2003, Philip Yun, former staff representative for former Secretary of Defense William Perry, made this assessment of the perceptions that the US and North Korea have of each other, and that the North Koreans seem to have of everyone else. On the North Korean side, things seem to have only gotten worse, which makes it unlikely that they would take our new position seriously.

But the Chinese, increasingly impatient with their unpredictably dangerous neighbor, could take it VERY seriously.

Sonia Sotomayor's ENTIRE statement about "wise Latinas" and "white males"

On May 14, The New York Times published the entire text of the 2001 speech in which Sonia Sotomayor spoke about her hope that her experience as a Latina would enable her, more often than not, to come up with better judgments than white men who lacked that experience.

Dan Froomkin, in the Washington Post, also linked to the entire speech in his White House Watch yesterday.

It's a lot longer, and more complex and nuanced than most television and cable commentators seem capable of understanding. It also completely refutes the "reverse racism" crap that REAL racists like Tom Tancredo, Rush Limbaugh, Glen Beck, et al are throwing at it.

Except for (predictably) Ketih Olbermann, I have yet to see ANYONE on the major network or cable news programs cover the entirety of Sotomayor's speech. Chris Matthews, for example, let Tom Tancredo continually interrupt Bill Press on Tuesday with the same slander. Not once did The Great Interruptor cut Tancredo short to cite the rest of Sotomayor's statement.

More About Denialism: Dissecting the Inner Logic of Deniers

One of my favorite blogs is Denialism, currently ranked #13 on the 100 Best Science  Blogs list.

The bloggers, Mark and Chris Hoofnagle, have been not so much debating or debunking the arguments of globing warming deniers (and similar junk peddlers) as dissecting the inner logic that drives deniers. The basic premise of denial is that seemingly settled issues are not settled at all, and that they are still open to debate.

A few years ago, the Hoofnagles published something called the Denialists' Deck of Cards, a quick guide to the rhetorical tricks and traps that deniers employ to encourage sustained doubt over major issues.

At a time when people like Michelle Bachmann, Sean Hannity, James Inhofe and others seem unfazed by reality, this is one of those postings that remain permanently relevant.

It's new to ME! How "Denialism" works

This is a few years old, but like a repeat television episode I have never seen, it's new to me.

Here is a brief quote:

Denialism: the employment of rhetorical tactics to give the appearance of argument or legitimate debate, when in actuality there is none. These false arguments are used when one has few or no facts to support one's viewpoint against a scientific consensus or against overwhelming evidence to the contrary. They are effective in distracting from actual useful debate using emotionally appealing, but ultimately empty and illogical assertions.

I think of Denialism as a strategy but also as a disease. Maybe a better name for it would be Inhofism, Hannity's Syndrome or Malkinosis. Whatever the name, I get extremely frustrated whenever I see an Allegedly Serious News Person discuss Global Warming (or torture, or health care reform, or labor rights, or regulation, or any other serious issue) with a Denier. The frustration comes from the ASNP seeming to challenge the Denier, but actually giving them undeserved credibility.

As those of us who have raised children remember, the problem with arguing with a two-year old is that, sooner or later, you may start arguing LIKE a two-year old. The same problem crops up when arguing with a Denier. The challenger usually attacks the Denier's false facts or defends his own real ones. The first and most serious flaw in that approach is that it raises the Denier's lies to the level of "opposing facts". The second is that it ignores Sun Tzu's dictum: "...the highest form of generalship is to balk the enemy's plans..."

The rhetorical tricks used by Deniers are hard for most listeners to detect, and require more mental energy than most people are willing to expend. That's why I keep hoping that a Chris Matthews, or a Campbell Brown, or a Bob Schieffer, or a David Gregory will start regularly dissecting the false logic in what Deniers say to them. The fact that they do it occassionally, and effectively, proves they can do it.