Divided We Stand - United We Fall

Carnival of Divided Government Quattuor et Vîcênsimus (XXIV) - "Lost At Sea" Edition

2008-08-03T01:23:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the 24th edition of the Carnival of Divided Government- The special "Lost at Sea" Edition. As explained in earlier editions, we have adopted Latin ordinal numeration in order to impart a patina of gravitas reflecting the historical importance of the series. In this, the Carnival of Divided Government Quattuor et Vîcênsimus (XXIV), as in all of the CODGOV series, we select volunteers and draftees from the blogosphere and main stream media writing on the single topic of government divided between the major parties (leaving it to the reader to sort out volunteers from draftees). Consistent with this topic, the primary criteria for acceptance in the carnival is to explicitly use the words and/or concept of "divided government" in submitted posts. A criteria that, to our endless befuddlement, is ignored by many of the bloggers submitting posts, which sadly results in DWSUWF reluctantly ignoring their fine submissions.

Lost At Sea

The Admiralty of the DWSUWF blog has temporarily transferred command to the bridge of the Morpheus (pictured above leaving San Francisco Bay). Morpheus is a Schumacher 50 racing/cruising sailboat about to embark from Hawaii to San Francisco. She just finished the Pacific Cup race from San Francisco to Hawaii and will be making her way back. MW is serving on the delivery crew as ballast for the return trip - as the saying goes - "From each according to their abilities..."

This CODGOV carnival was prepared prior to embarking on the journey back, while we still have access to some big internet tubes. This is our last night on-shore, and I will be publishing shortly before settling into our new home on Morpheus. I may or may not be able to see any comments until we reach SF around the 17th, and my brother HDW may or may not moderate comments that are posted here when I am gone. However, if anyone really wants to berate me over this or other posts real-time, there is a way to e-mail me short text-only messages on the boat, and I have left sufficient clues for a dedicated commenter to figure it out.

Carnival

The theme for this particular carnival cruise, is the impact that the "Divided Government" meme may or may not have on the 2008 presidential election. We expect increasing visibility and debate on the topic in the months before election day, much as we saw in 2006. With that visibility, comes argument and invective targeting the meme, hurled by those threatened by the logical conclusion demanded by a divided government voting heuristic - To whit: The only way to maintain a divided government state, is to elect John McCain President for one term.

So let us unfurl the main, set sail, and weigh anchor me hearties.

We begin with an MSM account of a John McCain visit to our home port of San Francisco. Carla Marinucci writing in the SF Chronicle notes that "McCain Extends Olive Branch":

"It drives the talk radio crowd nuts when McCain does not wage war on Pelosi and Gore," said Hoover Institution media fellow Bill Whalen. McCain, he said, likely was trying to reach out to moderate and independent voters during his San Francisco visit... At some point, the McCain campaign has to make Congress and the Democratic majority an issue in this campaign ... it's something McCain has to wrestle with," Whalen said. There are three key issues at stake, he said: "The bad performance of the Congress - the reason why the approval rating is 9 to 14 percent. The second is what they want to do when Obama comes into office." The third is the issue of divided government - whether Democrats should indeed control both houses of Congress and the White House, he said."

Exactly so, and the very advice that mw has been offering to the McCain campaign for some time.

Steve Soto, blogging at the Left Coaster, quotes Glen Greenwald and worries that we may be heading into "Familiar Territory":

"Obama should also have been prepared for McCain to launch an appeal for divided government, by touting his alleged ability to work with Democrats in Congress to get things done. McCain has already started this with an editorial board appearance with the San Francisco Chronicle this week, wherein he said nice things about Nancy Pelosi and praised Al Gore's work on climate change. You'll hear more of this (but not in front of the cultists naturally) from McCain in the coming weeks, because if he can establish his bipartisan street cred narrative while his Tier Two effort savages Obama's character and image, he wins over the independents and gets the White House."

Given that Obama has a 95% toe-the-party-line voting record in the Senate, while McCain bucks his party 20-30% of the time, establishing his bipartisan street cred should not be too difficult.

Sometimes on a boat, you find yourself next to a fellow traveler that you would just as soon not have on the boat. Such is the case with a recent Bill Kristol column. I am reluctant to cite Bill Kristol as a validation for the DWSUWF perspective on divided government, as Bill Kristol has been so publicly wrong for so long about so many things and in particular anything to do with Iraq.

Instead I offer Kristol's comments as an early example of another point I have been making for a while. As we get closer to the election, partisans on the right will disingenuously begin to promote the divided government meme as they recognize that there is very little else to move independents, moderates and libertarians to vote for McCain. This is a good thing and I welcome it, as this is truly a case where any publicity is good publicity regardless of source. The case for divided government is a common sense argument that stands on it own merits, and will resonate with voters regardless of who is promoting it or their motivation. Even Bill Kristol.

Finally, as far as Kristol always being wrong, I think the "stopped watch" analogy (right twice a day) is applicable here, so with sufficient caveats firmly in place - Bill Kristol uses his NYT Op/Ed platform to advise independent voters to "Be Afraid. Please":

"...I read a report of a fund-raising letter from Obama on behalf of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, arguing that “We must have a deadlock-proof Democratic majority.” Yikes. But then it occurred to me that one man’s “deadlock-proof” Democratic majority is another’s unchecked Democratic majority. Given the unpopularity of the current Democratic Congress, given Americans’ tendency to prefer divided government, given the voters’ repudiations of the Republicans in 2006 and of the Democrats in 1994 — isn’t the prospect of across-the-board, one-party Democratic governance more likely to move votes to McCain than to Obama? So I cheered up once again. For it will become increasingly obvious, as we approach November, that the Democrats will continue to control Congress for the next couple of years. But if the voters elect Obama as president, they’ll be putting Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid in untrammeled control of our future."

It is certainly legitimate to question Kristol's sincerity, as he was much less vocal about the virtues of divided government when our country was equally in need of divided government in 2004 and 2006. No surprise there. Also not surprisingly, the partisans on the left who were invoking divided government as a voting rationale in 2006 are notably silent now. As interesting as Kristol's comments themselves, are the reaction they generated on the left.

JCasey at Non Sequitur points out Kristol's logical fallacies, but then ignores scholarship and most of the documented modern historical record of voter preference for divided government in his post "Argumentum ad dictum".

"Kristol is guilty of two big mistakes. The first is a priorism–while the evidence he mentions relates to the conclusion (even though the claim about the dissatisfaction with the "democratic" congress is misleading), the availability of empirical data makes such recourse to a priori notions unnecessary. One can, in other words, track poll data now–poll data which paints a rather different picture (so he at least ought to argue against that). Second, the repudiation of majorities 12 years a part does not demonstrate much (it's only two instances) about American distrust of one-party rule–besides, in neither of those years were their Presidential elections."

Jcasey is also guilty of selectively choosing or rejecting poll data that fits or undermines his argument. Exactly what he accuses Kristol of doing. So it goes. Elsewhere...

The Truffle thinks that Kristol is a buffoon. Little Garlic posting at The Garlic exemplifies the hubris on the left, and is making plans for an Obama inauguration, saying "Considering Stumblin Bumblin' John McCain's considerable campaign skills, a convey of bulldozers and payloaders won't "move votes to McCain than to Obama". Brian at Incertus thinks Kristol is "giving American voters way too much credit".

Maybe. And maybe American voters have more common sense than any of these bloggers or the left give them credit for. While the electorate may be perfectly willing, even eager, to punish a Republican Party so deserving of punishment, they may still be reluctant to give one party the most concentrated power we have seen in generations. It is just common sense. Most of the worst excesses of the last eight years would not have occurred if voters had denied Republicans single party control.

Jazz Shaw posting at The Moderate Voice agrees, and wonders "Is Congress Obama's Weak Spot?":

"If Team McCain can’t come up with a positive strategy to convince Americans he is the right man for the job - rather than simply sounding the alarm that Obama is the wrong man - perhaps it is time to get away from the whole attack mode and try this new strategy. Our government dove too far to the right under iron-clad GOP control. Will we be better off if we turn around and let them swing equally off to the left?"

Let me think about it, Jazz. the answer is: HELL NO.

While we are on the topic of the kind of corruption to be expected in single party government, I could not be happier about the indictment of Ted Stevens. He is a picture perfect example of the corrosive effect of earmarks in the legislature, and shows just how bad it can get when you have the kind of cozy camaraderie and lack of oversight that always occurs in a single party government.

In this election year, the Stevens indictment has ramifications, offers a lesson, and serves as a warning for the possible single party Democratic government to come. By gutting the earmark reform bill last year, the Democrats have shown no interest in cutting this cancer out of the legislative process and as such - should they prevail with a single party victory in both legislature and the executive branch - this kind of story will continue unabated for the next 2-4 years at least. The only difference is that there will now more Democrats than Republicans lining up to take their turn on the perp walk.

Frank James posting at The Swamp, while assessing the political impact of the Stevens indictment, incorrectly states that a "divided government of sorts" will still reign regardless of who wins the White House, in his post "Stevens Woes= 60 votes for Dems? ":

"So it's looking right now as though there will still be divided government of sorts, regardless of who wins the White House, since Republican senators will still be able to slow down or kill legislation it opposes. "

Not to put too fine a point on this, but "divided government" is a specific term that has a specific definition and precise meaning as used by historians, economists, and political scientists who research the consequences of divided vs. single party control of the federal government. The definition of "divided government" is not the ability of an opposition party to "slow down or kill legislation". It is not even a "divided government of sorts". The definition of "divided government" is that a single party does not hold the executive branch and control a majority in both legislative branches of government. Full stop. As such, the only way we could realistically continue to have a divided government state in 2009, is if John McCain wins the presidency.

The reason why it is important to be precise about the use of this definition, is that the scholarship outlining the benefits of divided government (restrained growth of spending, greater oversight, less corruption, fewer wars, longer lasting and better considered major legislative reforms - see Mahew, Nisknanen, Slivinski, et.al.) is rendered useless if the same definition is not used.

Dyre42 at Dyre Portents has a good insight into the meaning and potential consequences of "Ted Stevens Indicted":

"If hope that if he is found guilty that he punished to the fullest extent of the law. Additionally I hope that he is the last of the corrupt Republicans still in office. I have little doubt that had the GOP not been in the majority he either would have kept his nose clean or been indicted sooner. That brings me to one of my chief concerns about an Obama presidency. I fear that should the Dems control the house, the senate, and the Oval Office that we'll see the same level of corruption and excess. To me this is one of the most important functions that divided government serves. By that I mean as long as one party feels that the other is is breathing down their neck waiting for them to screw up they tend to stick to the straight and narrow."

True.

Dr. Steven Taylor at Poli-blog quotes Larry Hunter wrestling with "venial vs. mortal" sins in the presidential decision wondering if this is the "Portrait of an Obamacan?":

"At a minimum, the risk of continuism is greater with McCain than Obama, and that may be enough for those who share Hunter’s concerns to take the plunge and support Obama (as, for example, Andrew Sullivan did some time back). Indeed, I count myself basically in that camp. The main positive reason I can conjure for voting for McCain is divided government. However, since the current divided government situation has not generated much in terms of addressing these keys issues about executive power, one wonders about that argument as well. At a minimum I find myself for the first time in my life in a position where I could see myself voting Democratic, Republican or Libertarian. And, I suspect that I am not alone. I was having a conversation the other day with a lifelong friend who is also a lifelong conservative. He concurred that he, too, had a similar view on the choices and his own possible voting behavior."

Andrew Sullivan was only too eager to latch on to Taylor's rationale. Sullivan's preference for Obama is well established. But Sullivan has yet to resolve the dilemma of how to support Obama without contradicting his strong and passionate support of Divided Government in 2006.

Methinks both Taylor and Sullivan doth protest too much. While I have wrestled with these issues myself, I cannot help but wonder whether Steven, Larry and Andrew are straining logic and back filling self serving rationalizations for an appealing candidate they simply like and want to support on an emotional level.

The real risk of the "continuism" that Doctor Taylor fears, is the risk of continuing the abuses of single party control of the Federal government, but this time with a 95% toe-the-party-line President, supported by a 100 vote majority in the house and a potential 60-40 filibuster proof Senate super-majority. As Dr. Taylor himself points out, the FISA vote shows that Obama has no particular desire to impose any legislative constraints on his own executive power. In addition, he will have bigger majorities in the legislature than the Republicans ever enjoyed under Bush43. Why would anyone think that the Democrats will suddenly behave as angels with that much power?

His unsupported argument that divided government did not sufficiently curb the executive power grab is spurious. The fact is that the divided government state did begin to reverse that trend. Six years of abusive single party control are not going to be undone by 18 months of divided government. Yet, as a direct consequence of divided government, we have a new Secretary of Defense, a new Attorney General, a marginal improvement in the Patriot Act and FISA vs. the Bush/Cheney versions, a great deal more oversight revealing many of the abuses of the six years of single party control, and a reduction in the rate of spending growth in 2007. These improvements, though marginal, should not be dismissed out of hand.

It is absurd to believe that handing all the levers of power to the Democrats is the answer to the abuses we saw as a result of handing all the levers of power to the Republican.

Bon Voyage
See you in September

And with that we conclude this edition. Thanks for stopping by, and thanks for all of the submissions (on-topic or not). The next edition will be the Carnival of Divided Government Quînque et Vîcênsimus (XXV) - Special "Labor Day" Edition, which we will be working diligently to produce on or about the 1st of September. Submit your blog article at carnival of divided government using our carnival submission form.

Divided and Balanced.™ Now that is fair.

Technorati tags: divided government, CODGOV,blog carnival, 2008 Election

About the blog.

2008-07-30T10:02:00.000-07:00

World Headquarter of the DWSUWF blog has been temporarily relocated to Hawaii. Details later, but in the meantime ....
Apparently, this is what I have been blogging about for the last few weeks. The image is a "word cloud" of this blog, generated by a cool application from Wordie. The application pulls from the rss feed, so the cloud is based on the number of post in the blog feed configuration. For DWSUWF, I think this is the last five posts, which has been dominated by the New Yorker cover. Since I just mentioned the New Yorker cover again, those words will be reinforced by this post , and continue to dominate the word cloud. But this blog is really not about the New Yorker. I don't even read it that often. Crap, I just mentioned the New Yorker again. That's it. I am declaring a moratorium on New Yorker mentions in this blog.

The real core topic of the blog does not appear in the word cloud, as the application apparently interprets "divided government" as "divided" and "government", and divided does not make the cut.

Hat tip to HDW.

Divided and Balanced.™ Now that is fair.

Technorati tags: Navel Gazing, Divided Government, blogging, wordie.

John! - Remember that "Iraq stands up, we stand down" bit?

2008-07-22T00:01:00.000-07:00

UPDATED: Apparently McCain is taking my advice (see end of post). Good. Very Good.

Conventional Wisdom is that Maliki's statements about a time horizon for our withdrawal from Iraq is a big plus for Obama and a negative for McCain. On the right - AllahPundit says that the McCain camp "discomfort is palpable" and Ross Douthat writes that Maliki's comments have "placed John McCain in a difficult spot". On the left - Jonathon Chait crows that Maliki endorsing a US withdrawal is "a huge huge deal" and Markos Zúniga agrees that these event "suck for him [McCain]". In the center - John Whitehouse is sure this is "the perfect time for this story to break as far as the Obama campaign is concerned..." and Justin Gardner wonders if "...Maliki stabbed McCain in the back?" while explaining that "this puts McCain in a particularly precarious position." Among the libertarian leaning Doug Mataconis scores this "a big win for Obama". Main stream media like NBC, Politico, and the Washington Post agree.

Yes - it is virtually unanimous. Bloggers and pundits across the political spectrum agree that the Maliki withdrawal time-frame statements are bad news for McCain and great news for Obama.

It is truly astonishing that they could all be so very wrong.

In fact, the entire story out of Iraq this week works to McCain's political advantage. Well... let me be more clear. It should work to McCain's political advantage and could work to McCain's political advantage, if only John McCain and his campaign could get out of their own way and get the narrative right.

If McCain has been politically wounded by this, then it is a self-inflicted - shoot yourself in the foot- reload - shoot the other foot - kind of injury. Maliki has served up on a silver platter a perfect opportunity for McCain to undercut Obama's support among independent voters. Whether he chooses to partake of this opportunity is another matter altogether.

The simple fact remains that a majority of Americans (59%) think the Iraq War was a mistake and (51%) think the war is going badly [NYT/CBS Poll PDF]. Among those Americans are many conservatives, libertarians, and independents who would be inclined to vote for McCain were it not for the Iraq War. I am among them. Many or these voters find the 2009 prospect of the largest concentration of single party power since FDR to be disquieting - to say the least. There is ample reason to fear the what might emerge out of the very real possibility of a 100 vote Democratic party majority in the House of Representatives, a 60-40 filibuster-proof Democratic Party plurality in the Senate, all "led" by a 95% toe-the-party-line voting record Barack Obama as President. Despite the concerns and enormous risk inherent in that concentration of power, as it stands today, many independents may still choose to vote for Obama on the basis of the single overriding issue of getting out of Iraq.

I presented the independent voter conundrum in my Iraq War anniversary post - It's still the war stupid:

I find myself impaled on the horns of a dilemma. The choice:
RED PILL - Divided Government (good) but Permanent War (bad)
BLUE PILL - Single Party Democratic government (bad) with expanded majorities, possibly a filibuster proof Senate (really bad) and Obama at the controls of a Cheney designed unitary presidency (really really bad).
Pick your poison.

Maliki and the Iraqi government has resolved the dilemma. They are clearly behaving like a real sovereign government and stating they are ready for us to leave. All McCain need do to take advantage of this opening, is follow this simple 3 step process:

Step 1- McCain must strongly embrace the Iraqi government position on American withdrawal. This does not mean any change of position for McCain. All he has to do is say exactly, word for word, what he said in 2004:
Question: “What would or should we do if, in the post-June 30th period, a so-called sovereign Iraqi government asks us to leave, even if we are unhappy about the security situation there?”

McCain’s Answer: “Well, if that scenario evolves than I think it’s obvious that we would have to leave because — if it was an elected government of Iraq, and we’ve been asked to leave other places in the world. If it were an extremist government then I think we would have other challenges, but I don’t see how we could stay when our whole emphasis and policy has been based on turning the Iraqi government over to the Iraqi people.”
Step 2 - McCain should repeatedly point out that if the Iraq government is ready for us to leave, it means that the surge worked. McCain can rightfully claim that he was right and Obama was wrong on the surge strategy and pound that point over and over. He can legitimately say that his aggressive support for the surge created the path out of the quagmire. It is a perfect time to declare victory. He can even use this construct from his rejected NYT Op-Ed piece:
"Progress has been due primarily to an increase in the number of troops and a change in their strategy. I was an early advocate of the surge at a time when it had few supporters in Washington. Senator Barack Obama was an equally vocal opponent. "I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq is going to solve the sectarian violence there,” he said on January 10, 2007. “In fact, I think it will do the reverse." Now Senator Obama has been forced to acknowledge that “our troops have performed brilliantly in lowering the level of violence.” But he still denies that any political progress has resulted..."
Then add this one sentence:
The success of the surge in creating room for political progress in now undeniable - even for Senator Obama. The elected Iraqi Government has stated that they are ready to stand on their own. My friends, our job in Iraq is done. We have victory.
Step 3 - McCain should leave himself the exact same wiggle room that Obama uses - by holding out the possibility that the pace of the draw-down can and will be "refined" by evolving conditions on the ground.

This would do so many good things for McCain's campaign. It would render moot Obama's single strongest issue against McCain. It puts McCain on the same side as the majority of American voters. It creates space between McCain and Bush. It makes it easy for independents, moderates, and libertarians to vote for McCain on the basis of maintaining the checks and balances of divided government.

Finally, it is just the right thing to do and the way for McCain to get on the right side of history. Our military leadership wants a draw down in Iraq, because we need to rebuild our forces and reinforce Afghanistan. The majority of Americans want out, because we cannot afford to maintain this level of military presence in Iraq. And now the Iraqi government want us out by the end of 2010, because they want their country back. It is inevitable that we will be mostly out of a combat role in Iraq in this 2010 timeframe.

Maliki's statement simply reinforces that there is no practical difference on what our military posture will look like in Iraq by the end of 2010 regardless of who is president. With that realization Obama loses his biggest advantage in November, and we can potentially avoid the disaster of single party Democratic government with expanded and potentially filibuster proof Democratic majorities.

Net net. As a voter I get my cake and eat it too. I can vote to limit the concentration of single party power in Washington, and get also get a quicker or at least equivalent draw down in Iraq by supporting McCain. It's all good.

Just do it John. After all, It is exactly what this administration said we wanted all along...

"When the Iraqis stand up, we stand down."

The Iraqi government is standing up.

Time to stand down.

UPDATE: Friday 25-July-2008
John McCain wisely decided to take my advice today. ABC picks out the interesting quote in a CNN interview:

"During a Friday interview with CNN, McCain called a 16-month withdrawal from Iraq "a pretty good timetable. That answer came when McCain was asked by Wolf Blitzer about the Iraqi prime minister's recent description of a 16-month timetable as "the right timeframe for a withdrawal, with the possibility of slight changes."

The Left of center blogosphere calls it a flip-flop, and completely misses the point. Sure it is. So what? Most Obama supporters cheered when Obama ~~flip-flopped~~ moved to the center on a whole host of issues. With a similar move, McCain just took away the single biggest issue advantage that Obama had with Moderate/Center/Independent voters - Iraq.

If there is no practical difference on an Iraq withdrawal time frame, then Independents will vote based on other priorities. Like maybe avoiding a single party Dem government with a toe-the-line Democratic party president, 100 vote Democratic majority in the House, and a filibuster proof Democratic Senate promising more taxes, more regulation, more spending programs, more money for faith based initiatives, less free trade, mandatory government service, etc. etc. None of that stuff comes into play if all the Independent voter cares about is Iraq. But as far as I can tell, Iraq as a distinguishing issue between these candidates just went away. Good on ya John.

X-posted at Donklephant.

Divided and Balanced.™ Now that is fair.

Technorati tags: Iraq, 2008 election, John McCain, Divided Government , Republican , Democrat, Maliki, Barack Obama .

Friday Flotsam - Genius Edition

2008-07-18T09:00:00.000-07:00

Wherein we take a stroll down the metaphorical beach of the DWSUWF blog and observe the detritus that has washed ashore and cluttered this little island of rationality in the great big blogospheric ocean.

Since I am currently consumed with watching Geg Norman, an old fart like myself (albeit, unlike myself, one with actual golf skills), leading the British Open today, please accept this display of a few shiny, sparkly items that caught my eye on the beach...

ITEM - Jib Jab Genius
Between Bill's cigar, Hillary's ambition, McCain's tank, Cheney's legacy, and Obama riding a Unicorn farting rainbows*, this latest Jib Jab offering is a gem. You've got to hand it to those Jib-Jab boys. The ability to embed an image of yourself in the video is a stroke of simple marketing genius. Unless you've been under a rock, you have probably already seen this, as it was displayed on every blog and TV channel this week. But you have not seen... The DWSUWF embedded version!

Send a JibJab Sendables® eCard Today!

*Hat Tip to Tully for the useful descriptive phrase.

ITEM - Goose and Gander Department.
Like everyone else, I had a lot to say about the New Yorker cover this week. More specifically, I had a lot to say about the humorless, condescending over-reaction of some on the left to a brilliant smackdown by the New Yorker of the inanities spewed about Obama from the rabid right. Hand wringing liberals filled the blogosphere with warnings of dire consequences should "low-information" voters accidentally see the offending magazine cover. "What if the shoe were on the other foot?" They asked, "What if it was McCain portrayed as a doddering old fool on a National Review cover?" David Horsey of the Seattle Post accommodates:

Genius. A pitch-perfect portrayal of how the loony left views McCain, just as the New Yorker cover is a pitch-perfect portrayal of how the rabid right view Obama. All that is needed to complete the circle is for The National Review to actually publish this cover. It would be a two fingered poke in the eye for Obama supporters: First holding up a mirror to the more inane views of the left, as the New Yorker did to the right; Second, it would be saying - unlike the left, our readers are smart enough to figure this out. We'll see if NR has the cojones.

ITEM - The Daily show knows something about humor ...
...and weighs in with this penetrating analysis of the consequences when "low-information" voters are confronted with the New Yorker cartoon. The Daily Show team of crack investigative journalists explain satire and humor to passer-bys on the streets of New York:

More genius? Or is DWSUWF just easily impressed?

ITEM - The ACLU New York Times "Listening" ad.
The genius of of the founding fathers can be found in the recognition that three co-equal branches of government, each checking and balancing the excesses of the other, are needed to protect the liberties of the governed. The executive and legislative branch have failed to respect and sustain the protections against unreasonable search and seizure that the founders intended in the fourth amendment. The judicial branch is our next best hope to reverse the FISA capitulation. The ACLU is leading the fight to challenge this law in the courts and in the court of public opinion with this print Ad [PDF]. I have signed on to the ad, will be contributing to the ACLU, and encourage every one else to do so also.

One complaint - the ad discriminates against those of us with last names at the end of alphabet, since very few of the 65,000 signers whose last name starts with N-Z made into the Ad itself. Very disappointing, but for one who has lived with this end-of-alphabet discrimination since grade school, not surprising.

ITEM - Carnivalingus
Some recent genius collections of high quality blogging punditry:

Lisa Renee presents The Carnival of Ohio Politics Rule #126 hosted at Ohio Politics Carnival.
Pat Santy presents Carnival of the Insanities hosted at Dr. Sanity.
Montag presents the Carnival of the Liberals LXIX hosted at Stump Lane.
BillSpaced presents Rants! - July 14 hosted at Rants and Reviews.
Counting Cats presents Karnival Time - Carnival of the Libertarians hosted at Counting Cats in Zanzibar.
Angelo is recruiting new members for the 08 Bloggers Network hosted at 2008 Central.

ITEM - Carnival Reminder
The next edition will be the Carnival of Divided Government Quattuor et Vîcênsimus (XXIV) - Special "Lost At Sea" Edition, which we will be floating on or about the 3rd of August, shortly before embarking on a Pacific passage sailing adventure from Hawaii to San Francisco. Submit your blog article at carnival of divided government using our carnival submission form.

Divided and Balanced.™
Now that is fair.

Technorati tags: New Yorker, blog carnival, 2008 election , John McCain, Barack Obama, ACLU, FISA.

Maddow & Alter: "The New Yorker cover is irresponsible because Americans are too stupid to understand it."

2008-07-15T17:23:00.000-07:00

UPDATED: 19-July-2008
In my last post I said that the New Yorker magazine "cover is not the real story. The real story is the reaction to the cover by Obama, his campaign and his supporters." Rachel Maddow goes one better, saying "the details in the New Yorker cover drawing are not the story, the outrage over the cover are not the story, the potential consequences of the cover are the story." Hmmm.

Keith Olbermann is still on vacation, so Rachel Maddow is filling in on MSNBC's Countdown. In general I think this has been a trade-up. I like Maddow. Don't agree with her most of the time, but I like the way she thinks. However, when a ~~journalist~~ television personality decides to crawl right in the bag with a political candidate, it is apparently written in stone that said personality must twist themselves into an intellectual knot and make utter asses of themselves on the air in defense of their object of affection. It does not matter if it is Rush Limbaugh carrying water for big spending, big deficit, big government Republicans under GWB, or the regularly scheduled Keith Olbermann and Jonathon Alter Obama Infomercial on MSNBC or Maddow substituting for Olbermann last night. An interesting oddity is that Jonathon Alter reprises his role as sidekick sycophant with Rachel. He should worry about being typecast:

I wanted to include the transcript here, but MSNBC has linked the wrong transcript to the July 14 show. I'll update later with actual quotes when they get it fixed, but paraphrasing:

MADDOW: Jonathon, Isn't the real problem here that way too many Americans are too stupid to get the joke?
ALTER: Yes, Rachel, 13% of Americans are so stupid that they tell pollsters that they believe these lies, so there are consequences from an image like this and the New Yorker should have considered the consequences of stupid Americans seeing this image.
MADDOW: In that context do responsible journalists and commentators like us have a responsibility to explain to stupid Americans that Obama is not a Muslim every time this comes up?
ALTER: Yes Rachel, this is part of our responsibility - to take the time to refute these lies for all those low information (stupid) voters out there who are not paying attention. But it is still a problem because these voters are so stupid that they will just look at the picture, not get the joke, and not listen to us.

True to his word, Jonathon Alter dedicated his column today to once again explaining to the stupid American voters that Barack Obama is not a Muslim and the New Yorker cover is a joke.

"... the New Yorker cover, now being displayed endlessly on cable TV, speaks louder than any efforts by Obama supporters to stop the smears... negative images burn their way into the consciousness of voters in ways that cannot be erased by facts. With one visual move, the magazine undid months of pro-Obama coverage in its pages."

Look, I have no problem with Alter's thesis - the "Obama is a Muslim" lie must be challenged, confronted and corrected in the strongest possible terms. I have done so myself here and at Donklephant and will continue to do so.

But perhaps Maddow and Alter, and other Obama supporters wringing their hands about the 12-13% of "low-information" voters in the poll should consider the possibility that they are not all ignorant and stupid. Consider what Craig Crawford said on MSNBC a few hours later - David Shuster, substituting for Dan Abrams on "Verdict!" joined those on the left who are hand-wringing about the same poll, when Craig Crawford floated the right answer:

SHUSTER: "...there is some new polling from “Newsweek” that underscores Obama‘s potential problem. Twelve percent think he‘s a Muslim and 12 percent say he used the Koran for a Senate swearing in ceremony, 39 percent believe he attended an Islamic school in Indonesia, while 26 percent think he was raised a Muslim. None of those are true. Craig Crawford, how, in your view, should Obama address this?"
CRAIG CRAWFORD, MSNBC ANALYST: "...But, as far as the percentages of people believing he‘s a Muslim, he‘s got time, he‘s just got to keep making the case, putting those speeches out there, and talking about his faith, and trying to deal with it. I‘m not sure a lot of this people actually believe this. I think they just don‘t like him and don‘t like to say it."

Bingo. Here is the real "joke". While there are indeed wingnuts on the right who really believe that Obama was a Muslim, or that he is the Anti-Christ, or he is an Islamic "Manchurian Candidate", or whatever stupid thing they want to worry about today, it is entirely possible that most of that 12% do not really believe it. They just like messing with the pollsters and left wing pundits who get their panties in a bunch whenever they read polls like this. And if that is the case, the real joke is on condescending pundits like Alter and Maddow who are so concerned about these "low-information" voters.

Jonathon, Rachel - Relax.

They're just messing with you.

UPDATE: 19-July-2008

This is too cool. In the Countdown video clip, you hear Jonathon Alter say this:

"In 1925 when the New Yorker was founded, the founder Harld Ross specifically said to investors, that the magazine was not for the little old lady in Duquque."

In the linked column, Alter repeats the theme saying:

"When Harold Ross founded The New Yorker in 1925, he told potential investors that it was not edited for "the little old lady from Dubuque." This is still true, as the flap over the latest cover suggests."

Alter then proceeds to explain why the New Yorker cover is "indisputably harmful" with those unsophisticated "low information" voters, like that little old lady from Dubuque.
The only problem with Jonathon Alter's thesis, is that when the New York Times went to Dubuque, they learned that "The Old Lady in Dubuqe is smarter than you think.":

"When The New Yorker came into being in the 1920s, its founder, Harold Ross, held up Dubuque as the sort of backwater he wanted nothing to do with. Ross, with Eustace Tilley nose in the air, said the magazine would not be “edited for the old lady in Dubuque.” Not surprisingly, Dubuquers thought it terribly snooty of him, not to mention unfair. But they know enough to recognize satire.
“Yeah, we get it in Dubuque,” Mr. Rusk said by phone. “Anybody with a reasonable sense of humor” does. “The New Yorker, which touts itself, accurately, to be a highly intellectualized and savvy sort of a publication, ought to be able to get away with that,” he said. “If they can’t, who can?”
Score one for Dubuque, which is more than you can say about some people in this city. Let’s not even go into the reflexive condemnations of the drawing from Mr. Obama and Senator John McCain. Both know that you can hardly go wrong in national politics attacking a publication like The New Yorker and those smart-alecky fops who read it and think they’re better than everyone else. The thing is, though, that some who have accused the magazine of elitism are themselves elitists. They include outraged writers of letters to the editor who talk about Mr. Obama in near-Messianic terms. Some of them strongly suggest that too many Americans lack the brains to recognize the illustration for what it is, and will think it to be literally true."

Exactly right. Jonathon Alter = Elitist. Rachel Maddow = Elitist. Those who criticize the New Yorker cover on the basis of not unduly influencing those poor "low-information" voters? Elitists one and all.

I love the New York Times.

Divided and Balanced.™ Now that is fair.

Technorati tags: Keith Olbermann, 2008 election, Democrats, Barack Obama, New Yorker, Rachel Maddow