For much of the past century, and especially since the dawn of the new deal era (in the early 1930s) liberalism and by extension the Democratic Party, has largely taken for granted that the state and its institutions are the best agents, defenders and protectors of liberal interests - of humanity and humanism - in American society.
In a move that will almost certainly fatten the wallets of the law enforcement special interests (from the private prison contractors to the prison guard unions to the law enforcement unions) not to mention the increasingly pro-Democratic doctor lobby and titillate nanny statists everywhere, the Democrat govenor of Oregon Ted Kulongoski (not to be mistaken for the statutory rapist former governor of Oregon, or the statutory rapist current governor of California) today decided that the people of his state can no longer be trusted with over-the-counter cold medications.
Just in case the leg humpingly partisan, middlebrow, pseudo-intellectual claptrap Oliver Stone has written and directed over the years isn't enough to convince you he is a wanker for the ages, it turns out that Alexander is apparently too gay for him, or us, or something.
The issue of peak oil has been hashed out enough on this blog that it seems safe to assume a basic understanding of our dependence on cheap oil, and the near-inevitability of a global production peak in the first third of this century (and even possibly in the next five years).
We have been baited again. And we have taken the bait.
The right-wing virtuecrats and their liberal supplicants (the Tipper Gores of this world) have succeeded in turning the discourse about pop culture away from esthetics, and ideology, and into a referendum on indecency, forcing those of us who oppose restrictions on speech to stand side by side with some rather unsavory, reactionary characters.
It is not my habit to publically contradict the management, but Kos's front page post about the politics of the bankruptcy bill is almost as offensive as congressional Democratic enabling of this deeply appalling bill.
Those of you who have bothered to read my posts over time here know that I lean in the moderate direction on many issues. My idealpolitik may be
anarcho-libertarian, but until that utopia becomes possible (something I don't particularly expect in my lifetime, if ever), I'm perfectly willing to settle for a reasonably just and compassionate America. As such, my practical politics lean to the right of many people here.
I'm writing today to express my deep and profound outrage and anger at the imminent passage of the so-called bankruptcy reform bill. Although we have seen the steady erosion of middle class economic security in the last several decades, this legislation represents a cruel and unprecendented assault on middle class families who have fallen into misfortune, and flies in the face of anything remotely resembling decency. And the fact that so many Democrats in both chambers would help to enable it will I believe be a wake-up call to the American people (of all political persuasions). Ralph Nader's prophecy has finally, it seems, come to pass. There really is no difference between Democrats and Republicans on bread and butter economic issues.
This doesn't appear to ever have been blogged here, but something rather incredible seems to have happened on February 2nd. In a must-read-to-believe live online chat Newsweek reporter (in Baghdad) Rod Nordland tells it like it is.
The central thesis of the neoconservatives and liberal hawks, and the latent justification for the war in Iraq is that by promoting democracy in the Arab and wider Muslim world - by military means if necessary - the constituency for radical Islamism will be diminished, and as it is diminished so will the threat of radical Islamist terrorism to the west. Even if it does not amount to liberal democracy, in the modern western sense, the more illiberal elements of Arab and Muslim society will at least have an opportunity to express their particular passions in electoral politics, rather than by flying airplanes into our respective places of work - or so the theory goes.
And the douchebag of the day award goes to Jonatahan Chait...
Echoing the idiot myopia of the official organs of reactionary centrism - the New Republic, the Washington Post, et al - Jonathan Chait writes in today's LA Times that Howard Dean is a horrible (horrible!) choice for DNC chair.
Since the election, there has been no small amount of talk about how to expand the Democratic Party nationally from a 49% party to a majority party of 50-some percent or more. Put in geographical terms, the Democrats own the cities, by and large, and since 1992 have made significant and lasting gains in the so-called inner suburbs, which include prosperous, mostly white, white collar, "knowledge economy" communities in places like Silicon Valley, and much more multicultural, diverse, middle class communities like those in northern Orange County, California.
However, Democrats continue to lose big in both the fast growing exurbs (outer suburbs), and in rural America. One or both of these trends needs to be reversed if Democrats are to become the dominant national party.
Yeah, I know, hardly a Pulitzer worthy diary topic but my last top ten diary seems to have gone over pretty well, and the real world strikes me as just too depressing to contemplate at this moment, so I thought why not another.
Spot would like to know your top ten favorite political songs (defined however you want to define political, although if you're going to try to convince me that some drippy love song is actually a great political song you best have a good, or at least colorful argument, to justify it.)
Over at Cafe Yglesias recently, there was a great thread recently about the best movies of the 1980s. Of course, 80s revisionism is more timely than 70s nostalgia, but the conventional wisdom is that the 1970s was the last great decade of movies...and once in awhile the conventional wisdom is right.
So Spot would like to know what you think the 10 best movies of the 1970s were.
As Kevin Drum points out in a thread from today, even if the problem in Iraq was and is insufficient boots on the ground (and that's more than a little debatable) there simply aren't more than 150,000 troops available for any given rotation in the country, and given the unlikelihood of any other nation contributing forces at this point, it seems reasonable to conclude that the only way of increasing troop levels in Iraq is by reinstating the draft.
"BAGHDAD - The Islamic Army in Iraq, one of the main armed groups fighting U.S. forces in the war-torn country, has threatened to carry out attacks inside the United States, according to a statement posted on a Web site yesterday.
While it is certainly true that there is currently no crisis in social security, it is also certainly true that there is a gross savings/spending imbalance in this country, with American consumers spending too much of their income, and saving too little for their own retirement.
