PragmaticIdealists

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2009-11-07T05:35:59.958-05:00

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2009-11-06T10:58:18.267-05:00

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I've commented on this elsewhere, so forgive the r...

2009-10-27T11:21:08.386-04:00

I've commented on this elsewhere, so forgive the recycling of an argument, but Minneapolis does not necessarily have a "small" African American population. The percentage of Black residents in Minneapolis is about 150% the national percentage. So this may be small in comparison to Detroit, but I would hesitate to call such numbers small.

Also, as a white person living in North Minneapolis, I must say it isn't quite as segregated as popular opinion would have it. And to be fair, there is a fair amount of money coming in to the area for purposes of urban renewal, though we have yet to see whether it's meaningful or just another attempt at gov't-led gentrification.

That being said, I do think the main thrust of the idea (that we can't just ship Portland's policies elsewhere) is still valid, but probably for a lot more reasons that the arguable differences in racial diversity and segregation.

I don't think he's really explaining selection eff...

2009-10-26T21:13:35.055-04:00

I don't think he's really explaining selection effects so much as saying "yes, if you look really hard for one criterion on which to make the conclusion you want to make about an entire system, you can find one. But you're off-topic."

I don't like his head-wagging. It seems like a manifestation of some kind of innate insecurity and discomfort. But maybe it's the gender-power thing and if it was a female legislator and a male testifying, I would be like "hell yeah."

At any rate, if he's going to be a head-wagging, finger-shaking bulldog, I'm glad his heart seems to be in the right place.

AD- These are really great points, so let me addre...

2009-10-23T12:28:23.580-04:00

AD- These are really great points, so let me address them as best I can one-by-one.

First, you are correct that there is not a single measure of segregation that captures the entire experience. There are generally five: dissimilarity (uneveness), isolation/exposure, clustering, concentration, and centralization. The two of which I report here are the most commonly used. I also agree entirely that African Americans remain the single most disenfranchised race in America. On the other hand, that doesn't justify Renn's conclusions that these are "white" cities as much as they are "not black" cities. African American's unique disadvantages not withstanding, it is an important distinction.

I would disagree that studies have come up with different results. The different measures of segregation are all highly correlated and, though there are quirks, Midwestern cities tend to have the highest degrees of segregation on all five measures (Massey & Denton). That doesn't take away your extremely valid point that studying the experience of segregation on the ground is also important and manifests itself in different ways -- though there are similarities. And, as sociologist Mary Pattillo has shown, it is true that even middle class black neighborhoods tend to be more disadvantaged than comparable white neighborhoods.

Now, on your last point, I completely agree. Simply transferring policies from Portland to other areas -- and snootily looking down one's noses for being in cities that don't have Portland's composition -- is not going to work. The built environment is different (e.g., New Orleans is a city based on a four hundred year old layout) but, more than anything, racial politics are coded into redistribution policies that make accomplishing those goals much harder. And, particularly for Portland, that is true.

But, as I said before, to call these cities (with the exception of Portland and possibly Seattle) exclusively white is just not supported by the data.

You've offered a worthwhile rebuttal to Mr. Renn's...

2009-10-23T11:37:29.243-04:00

You've offered a worthwhile rebuttal to Mr. Renn's provocative post, but I can't help but think that some of the subsequent commentary puts it most effectively, by focusing on aspects of urban living that remain stubbornly empirical. The Mumford Center's segregation measurements are just a few of many exhaustive attempts to calculate segregation across American cities; no single one that I am aware of has been endorsed by a preponderance of demographers. Segregated or not, cities like Portland/Austin/Denver/Minneapolis with small African American populations (not referring to other races) have to contend with far less concentrated urban poverty and the ensuing public safety or social welfare that absorbs large amounts of city funds for what remains the most disenfranchised race in American cities. This is hardly due to progressive policies that have effectively addressed these issues: the poor African American communities in Minneapolis and Austin and Denver are just as struggling as they are in Cleveland and St. Louis--the only difference is they are much smaller and comprise a lower portion of the city's population at large.

I'm not arguing with the Mumford Center's numbers per say, but I know that other studies have produced entirely different results through their own calculation methodologies. Sometimes how the city looks from a ground-level, empirical perspective matters just as much, since this is what average citizens react to, and influences relocation decisions. And from that angle, of the cities on this list I know well, Minneapolis and Austin both have a visible presence of segregation. North Minneapolis and East Austin are their respective "black" sides of town; visual surveys would reveal that these parts of town are lagging in vibrant neighborhoods that the class of people for which Renn writes are seeking. But these neighborhoods are dwarfed by the surrounding white, vibrant neighborhoods that are not burdened by high crime, abandonment, or high concentrations of persons with less than an 8th grade education. Indianapolis, conversely, has no identifiably black "side of town", with pockets scattered throughout the city, as well as a number of neighborhoods where they comprise 15-25% of the population; in turn, Indianapolis (its successful downtown notwithstanding) by and large lacks the sort of vibrant urban neighborhoods that a person would easily find in the largely white (or at least overwhelmingly non-black) Portland.

Thus Renn argues that the policies in place in the aforementioned white cities simply cannot be successfully transposed to Cincinnati, Memphis, or Baltimore. They have to work with their concomitant higher rates of poverty and need, and some cities (Houston and Atlanta) are doing a better job of this than others. Other cities have simply organized "progressive" policies that have been abetted as a result of segregation: cities as divergent as Chicago and Louisville manage to attract an urbanite vibe because all of their vibrant, white neighborhoods are more or less clustered along one side of town with the majority of political capital. The dividing line that separates these successful neighborhood from the African American ones is profound. New Orleans, always an anomaly of which I am quite familiar, has managed to retain a number of successful urban neighborhoods despite being quite unsegregated and having no clearly black "side of town". However, New Orleans' ostensible liberal infrastructure has completely failed to translate into progressive policymaking the way one might see in Denver or Portland.

pitse1eh -- "sausage fest" might not have been the...

2009-10-20T09:08:43.179-04:00

pitse1eh -- "sausage fest" might not have been the best choice of words, I think that my attempt at humor might have fallen short. But, it is quite noticeable that the list was all male.

I think that our system definitely has problems, but, all-in-all, I think that engagement is better than apathy. I know that you are not apathetic, but it is disconcerting when I see lots of people just throw up their hands and walk away, because I think that is what lets these crazies get into office and do the insane things that they do.

hmm... sausage fest? Lately (longly?) politics ma...

2009-10-19T21:43:56.720-04:00

hmm... sausage fest?

Lately (longly?) politics makes me want to bang my head against the wall and strongly desire the ability to vote "no confidence" and chuck the whole system.

You are right about the women voting for the amend...

2009-10-19T01:41:27.599-04:00

You are right about the women voting for the amendment: Collins, Snowe, Hutchinson, and Murkowski all voted yea. And, yes, it was a sausage fest in the nay column.

Hey, did all the female Repub Senators (all like, ...

2009-10-19T01:32:15.083-04:00

Hey, did all the female Repub Senators (all like, 3 or 4 of 'em) vote FOR this amendment? Interesting. All the nay votes appear to be dudes.

"Although the readership of this blog is small [.....

2009-10-19T01:30:58.403-04:00

"Although the readership of this blog is small [...]"

Small of number, but mighty of heart! Call 'em out!

I think this vote will come back to haunt these Senators.

Jay, sorry for not responding earlier. I think th...

2009-10-13T22:09:41.515-04:00

Jay, sorry for not responding earlier. I think that increasing cigarette taxes did help contribute to decreases in cigarette use. But, the link between cigarettes as the primary cause of lung cancer. If the goal of the nominal goal of the policy is to reduce obesity, then I am afraid that when obesity decreases only slightly because sodas are only 5% of the problem (actually probably more because some number of calories are probably valuable). If the results are not strong, the Kents of the world are going to declare victory, as is happening now regarding the fast-food ban in South L.A. -- although that is even a little bit more of a distal cause. I worry that we are going to be worse off after than because its effect will be to discredit all obesity-reducing policies (btw, I think that I overstated what I thought about the policy -- it's not "crappy," as I said, but I just worry about the ineffectiveness on obesity specifically).

Mike, I think that cigarette sales decrease when t...

2009-10-08T13:51:43.517-04:00

Mike, I think that cigarette sales decrease when the price goes up, even in the short run (maybe especially in the short run), i.e, even when social acceptability remains constant. Sugar-water should see the same effect. Yes, it doesn't have the social acceptability problem. On the other hand, sugar doesn't have addictive properties making demand less elastic.

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2009-10-05T08:36:34.529-04:00

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2009-08-24T03:40:46.061-04:00

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"I have become very weary of hearing about the Gat...

2009-08-13T11:40:37.257-04:00

"I have become very weary of hearing about the Gates incident in Cambridge."

Me too! They need to act and resolve this sooner rather than later..

"Thinking that we can adopt their tactics without ...

2009-08-11T17:11:07.766-04:00

"Thinking that we can adopt their tactics without adopting their mentality is what leads us down the road to leftist totalitarianism."

Dave, this is a very good point and I think that it is wise to heed this advice. On the other hand, I, like Jay, would really love to see the hypocrisy of right-wingers pointed out. I would especially love to hear from those who publicly declared the LIOLI attitude under Bush just to see what mental acrobatics they could come up with.

But, on more careful analysis, doing something simply out of vengeance and to provoke a reaction is not the best reason to do something, either tactically or morally.

I agree with Dave. I don’t like the idea of adopt...

2009-08-11T12:34:14.919-04:00

I agree with Dave. I don’t like the idea of adopting a “love it or leave it” attitude. I was trying to point out that it’s only the conservatives who take this stance and that they’ve been getting away with it. I think that someone should point out to them that if dissent is unpatriotic, it’s unpatriotic . . . even when the Democrats are in power. But the wrapped-in-the-flag conservatives don’t see it that way. They think that the Right is patriotic whether they are in power or dissenting, and that the Left is unpatriotic even when the Left is the government. So even though I don’t think the left should really adopt the LIOLI attitude, I do think that someone should say it to the wingnut dissenters just to see how they react.

Jay and Mike, if I may dissent...I think it would ...

2009-08-11T12:20:46.236-04:00

Jay and Mike, if I may dissent...I think it would be horrible if we on the left adopted the "America, love it or leave it" stance, even just for fun. What I love about America is that we all have the right to stand up to our government. We all have the right to speak out. The reason the Bush admin were fascist thugs was because they blocked or arrested dissenters. They took away our right to be American. Thinking that we can adopt their tactics without adopting their mentality is what leads us down the road to leftist totalitarianism.

The way I see it, if my Congressman wants to hold a two hour meeting to "hear from the citizens," I don't see why that discourse has to be civil and polite. At it's best, it's just the Congressman rambling for an hour spewing talking points and then people getting up at the microphone for their two minute rant about whatever talking points their heard/read last. I mean, does anyone expect an original thought to be expressed or a mind to be changed at these things?

Jay -- Thank you for posting this comment. I thin...

2009-08-11T11:41:51.112-04:00

Jay -- Thank you for posting this comment. I think, re-reading my post, I wasn't exactly saying what it is that I wanted to say and I think that I can clarify a little bit here.

Taking your second point first, I was severely distressed and angered by the Bush Administration and their stool pigeons saying that I wasn't patriotic because I didn't support a war of choice or didn't think that torture was acceptable on any terms. Because I felt so strongly about that, I feel that it is wrong for any government official -- whether I agree with them or not -- to do the same. That is why I am arguing that it is wrong that Pelosi, Hoyer, and Baird do the same. That said, if Move-On wants to advocate for lefties to start plastering their cars with "love it or leave it" signs, I would be all for it. But, for government officials to question the patriotism of those who disagree crosses a boundary that I think should not be crossed.

On the first point, I think that I slightly mis-stated my position and you are correct. I would hazard to guess that those who are protesting at town halls were fine doing whatever the government said. I was thinking more of those who are more passively participating in this debate, some of whom I've had conversations with. All had REAL problems with the Bush Administration, but many also have a real suspicion of government intervention. I disagree with them, but I can see that there are things that the government has done that have not had the desired effects and simply denying this or lumping them in with the protesters is problematic. But, that gets to the real point of my post, which is that we (i.e., proponents of reform) need to organize those people because right now the people having conversations with this group of people are the protesters and active organizers on the right opposing this.

"is likely a fear and mistrust of the government t...

2009-08-11T10:29:12.361-04:00

"is likely a fear and mistrust of the government that has a real basis in reality." These same protesters -- what did they do from Jan 2001 to Jan 2009, when the White House was greatly expanding its powers? They were extremely trustful.

"not to disparage and insult those who are protesting, to question their patriotism " Why is it that only the right gets to question the patriotism of those who dissent from government policy? When the Obama health plan is finally enacted (in whatever dismembered form), if wing nuts are still protesting, why can't the lefties haul out the old right wing placards that say "America -- love it or leave it"?

This should be used in classrooms across America: ...

2009-07-30T01:20:07.767-04:00

This should be used in classrooms across America: "Rasmussen is an outLIERRRR!" Terrific.

Between back ups, I email it to myself. Oh, lovely...

2009-07-24T08:47:10.639-04:00

Between back ups, I email it to myself. Oh, lovely gmail.

moronity - See, now that's a label!

2009-07-23T15:11:15.471-04:00

moronity - See, now that's a label!

Finally! A proven correlation between porky-ness ...

2009-07-13T21:02:50.158-04:00

Finally! A proven correlation between porky-ness and intelligence.