Friday, June 30, 2006

Thursday, June 29, 2006

A necessary danger?

Sabato makes a case for a Constitutional Convention.

The fundamental problem, though, has never been corrected. The Constitution was written by the Founders when they had not yet realized the vital necessity of politics and parties in the process of our elections. Further, the enormous transformation of politics from the part-time avocation of public-spirited gentlemen to the multibillion-dollar enterprise of electoral institutions in a rich, diverse, continental Republic has not been matched by constitutional adaptation. The absence of modern politics in the Constitution—from the structure of presidential selection to the manner of congressional elections to some critical aspects of electioneering, such as redistricting and campaign finance—has caused no end of difficulties, which can only be corrected by the inclusion of thoughtful provisions in a new twenty-first-century Constitution. It is long past time to do so.

Critics of this constitutional approach may insist that the political inadequacies of our system are best handled through statutory means, the better to make adjustments as needed from time to time. And partly, this point of view has merit. The constitutional provisions on the political system should be kept only as specific as absolutely required to cure the ills discussed here. Congressional and state statutes—the regular lawmaking process in the various legislatures—can supplement mandates in the Constitution.

However, the chances for serious, widespread political reform at this late date are virtually nil without constitutional prodding. Yes, a state here or there may enact a useful reform plan for a piece of the puzzle. But the nation is desperately in need of widespread change to and dramatic updating of the political system. Entrenched interests would fight and stop most or all of the reforms outlined in this essay. The United States now has a massive superstructure of essentially untouchable procedures and traditions with powerful beneficiaries—incumbents, wealthy groups and individuals, even specific states (think Iowa and New Hampshire in the presidential selection process).

It will take a new revolution to modernize America’s ossified politics. It will take a revolution generated by an engrossing national debate—the kind of debate that can only be engendered by the writing of a new Constitution. Enough with the Band-Aids! An end to feeble efforts at reform in one state or region! So much for the occasional initiative or referendum that usually fails due to campaign spending by special interests that would be damaged by change in the national interest. We the people need to confront all the problems at once, to seek a comprehensive solution that will be as permanent as a Constitution can promise.

What constitutes critical thinking?

From Skeptical Inquirer:

Multidimensional critical thinking is not simply a byproduct of something else. It must be taught. Well, then, what about the "critical-thinking" trend that has permeated American education across the curriculum at all levels? Are these efforts succeeding in materially strengthening the quality of critical thinking in society at large? Again, the various indicators of uncritical thought in our society suggest not. It is doubtful that what students learn from those classrooms and texts does much to alter their worldviews and values regarding the truth. A primary cause of this shortfall is the antiseptic nature of the "critical thinking" typically taught to students. Either most teachers and authors do not possess a highly multidimensional conception of critical thinking themselves, or they are reluctant (perhaps with good reason) to approach the perilous territory-way past logical fallacies and weeping Madonna statues-to which full-fledged critical thinking inevitably leads. The result is the commonplace teaching of quasi-critical thinking.


It is naive to expect social-science education, natural-science education, or education in general-at least in their present forms-to elevate critical thinking to something more than a pedagogical fashion that everyone applauds but few conceptualize very deeply. This leaves the skeptical community. We identify ourselves as champions of science and reason. But this is a broad mandate. We should avoid concentrating our skepticism too narrowly on the realms of superstition, pseudoscience, and the supernatural-for the ultimate challenge to a critical thinker is posed not by weird things but by insidiously mundane ones. If we hope to realize the promise of critical thought, it is important that skeptics affirm a multidimensional definition of critical thinking -- reasoning skills, skeptical worldview, values of a principled juror -- that exempts no aspect of social life.


The essay is worth reading in its entirety. There's much there, and more than a little I would argue against.

Through a glass, darkly

From the latest iteration of the Pew Global Attitudes Survey:

After a year marked by riots over cartoon portrayals of Muhammad, a major terrorist attack in London, and continuing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, most Muslims and Westerners are convinced that relations between them are generally bad these days. Many in the West see Muslims as fanatical, violent, and as lacking tolerance. Meanwhile, Muslims in the Middle East and Asia generally see Westerners as selfish, immoral and greedy - as well as violent and fanatical.

A rare point of agreement between Westerners and Muslims is that both believe that Muslim nations should be more economically prosperous than they are today. But they gauge the problem quite differently. Muslim publics have an aggrieved view of the West - they are much more likely than Americans or Western Europeans to blame Western policies for their own lack of prosperity. For their part, Western publics instead point to government corruption, lack of education and Islamic fundamentalism as the biggest obstacles to Muslim prosperity.


As usual, it's fascinating. But pay some attention to the Methodological Appendix before jumping to any conlcusions.

Tuesday, June 27, 2006

The poor are delicious!

Says Colbert. More seriously (if only slightly) he does toy rather cleverly with the "Class Warfare" cliche. But, let's face it, you'll watch it for the funny.

Fear itself

Jon Stewart on the Miami 7, via Crooks & Liars

Friday, June 23, 2006

Where's the line

between dramatic license and propaganda? Two reviews of "The Road to Guantanamo" from The Christian Science Monitor and the Nation . See more at Rotten Tomatoes. Can a documentary be "objective"? Should it be?

Hard fascism?

From the New Republic, via Atrios:

It's a bizarre phenomenon, the blogosphere. It radiates democracy's dream of full participation but practices democracy's nightmare of populist crudity, character-assassination, and emotional stupefaction. It's hard fascism with a Microsoft face. It puts some people, like me, in the equally bizarre position of wanting desperately for Joe Lieberman to lose the Democratic primary to Ned Lamont so that true liberal values might, maybe, possibly prevail, yet at the same time wanting Lamont, the hero of the blogosphere, to lose so that the fascistic forces ranged against Lieberman might be defeated. (Every critical event in democracy is symbolic of the problem with democracy.)

And what is that last parenthetical line supposed to mean?

Thursday, June 22, 2006

Everything new is old again

Jonah Goldberg, from the Los Angeles Times:

I've toiled in the cyber-fields for close to a decade now (I was the founding editor of National Review Online), and what fascinates me is how the Internet is allowing the nation to return to its historical relationship with the media, not how it's changing everything.

In the 19th century, newspapers played a different role from the one we think they're "supposed" to play. Newspapers contributed a sense of community to the boisterous new cities and towns popping up across the country. Alexis de Tocqueville observed that the young American democracy thrived on competing "associations" between like-minded citizens. But because these people could never all physically meet, newspapers were essential to American democracy because "newspapers make associations, and associations make newspapers."

American newspapers were never as unapologetically and uniformly partisan as European ones were (and still are), but they were still mostly creatures of specific political biases. There were Republican and Democratic newspapers, populist and communist newspapers, union and anti-union newspapers. These publications served as vehicles for partisan education and crusading personalities, in much the same way leading blogs do today.

Take another look at the most flagrantly partisan websites today: the liberal Daily Kos and its conservative doppelganger, Red State. What you see are media outlets trying to serve the same function as newspapers in the 19th and early 20th centuries. A work in progress, they often screw up. The recent clunker by Truthout.org, which reported that Karl Rove was to be indicted when in fact he was cleared, is nothing compared with the 19th century press' routine manufacture of events great and small, typified by William Randolph Hearst's "yellow journalism" to cook up the Spanish-American War.

There will always be a need for serious, professional news-gathering organizations. But there will also always be a need for the politically committed to form their own communities. The Internet is allowing the United States to have both once again.

The Excluded Middle

Columbia Journalism Review on some classic tools of propaganda:

Throughout the summer of 2003, Gardiner documented incidents that he saw as information-warfare campaigns directed both at targeted foreign populations and the American public. By the fall, he had collected his analysis into a lengthy treatise, called “Truth from These Podia,” which concluded that “the war was handled like a political campaign,” in which the emphasis was not on the truth but on the message.

As his paper circulated among government and military officials that fall, Gardiner says he received a call at home one night from a spokesman for the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He told Gardiner that his conclusions were on target. “But I want you to know,” the spokesman added, “that it was civilians who did this.”

The weaponization of information is not original to the war in Iraq, nor is it unique to any military engagement during what has come to be known as the information age. Journalists have always encountered wartime spin, they have been the targets of propaganda and selective leaks, and, on occasion, have been used for purposes of deception (which has resulted, in certain cases, in saving the lives of American soldiers). In The Art of War, which remains an influential text among military strategists though it was written during the sixth century B.C., the Chinese general Sun Tzu writes: “All warfare is based on deception. Hence, when able to attack, we must seem unable; when using our forces, we must seem inactive; when we are near, we must make the enemy believe that we are far away; when far away, we must make him believe we are near.”


Worth a read. Hat tip to Cursor, which is especially rich today.

Wednesday, June 21, 2006

Is it adorably naive?

Or infuriatingly faux-ignorant? From the London Times:

WHAT, actually, is a blog? Simple enough question, which turns out not to have a simple answer.

Blog is short for weblog, so blogs are logs of the web? Well, yes, they were when they started, and there remain excellent traditional weblogs in the US. Arts and Letters Daily is an example. It gathers up articles that you just might want to read.

Weblogs developed in two ways. One was as logs of people’s lives, the second as political columns or magazines. These columns combine logs of the web (gathering articles and providing critiques of them) with additional comment and argument. The best have become very influential.

In the US Andrew Sullivan’s blog has become so well read that it has the capacity to drive political debate. Mickey Kaus’s blog helped to depose the Editor of The New York Times. Both now have financial support from big media groups.

In this country the “blogosphere” is growing. Try to see a blog grow into a major political publication. Watch Oliver Kamm torment those on the left he thinks employ sloppy logic, or try Clive Davis, who is adept at identifying interesting material on the web.

Or there is the ultimate political geek’s experience — bloggers broadcasting from their bedrooms.




Monday, June 19, 2006

Tuesday, June 13, 2006

"As much a media event as it was a high-level strategy session"

Entirely plausible, but where's the evidence for the claim? And if a staged media event, why play along?

Monday, June 12, 2006

Framing is not spin?

Yeah, it's a bit self-serving on their part, but it's an interesting effort to carve out the distinction

Sunday, June 11, 2006

So says the Kaleej Times

The "free-spirited American media. . . guardian of the public interest." Interestingly, not satire. Huh.

Friday, June 09, 2006

Technically, it's satire

At the Whisky Bar:

The Pentagon Channel today announced the cancellation of its long-running reality TV series, The Abu Zarqawi Hour, saying tonight's special-effects extravaganza, in which Keifer Sutherland and a team of secret agents trail the terrorist mastermind to his hideout and call in a massive airstrike, would be the show's last.

The show originally piloted in 2003, and found a regular place in the Pentagon Channel's prime-time lineup in February 2004, replacing the widely panned sitcom Mission Accomplished, now in syndicated reruns on Fox News.

The Abu Zarqawi Hour debuted to generally favorable reviews, with New York Times critic Dexter Filkins praising the show for its "imaginative" storytelling and "gritty" realism. However, ratings declined sharply in 2005, with many viewers complaining that the show's episodes, which frequently featured the death and/or capture of Zarqawi's closest lieutenants, had become repetitive and unimaginative.

Critics reacted particularly negatively to this year's four-hour special, in which Zarqawi had obvious difficulty staying in character, and was unable to properly reload and fire his Kalishnikov rifle.

Although some critics defended the sequence as a daring experiment in Brechtian alienation technique, most panned the performance, saying it made it extremely hard for the audience to believe that Zarqawi was actually a seasoned terrorist leader, instead of a paid actor pretending to be a terrorist.


There's some more. . . . .

Thursday, June 08, 2006

Because No One Ever Links to Le Monde Diplomatique

But mostly for those who wonder just why there's this sudden urgent outbreak of discolored toenails:

"Thirty years ago the head of one of the world’s best-known drug companies, Merck, made some over-candid comments. The aggressive chief executive, Henry Gadsden, who was close to retirement at the time, told Fortune magazine of his distress that Merck’s potential markets had been limited to sick people; he said he would have preferred Merck to be more like the chewing-gum manufacturer Wrigley, because then Merck would be able to “sell to everyone”; it had long been his dream to make drugs for healthy people. His dream has since come true.

"The marketing strategies of the world’s biggest drug companies now aggressively target the healthy. The ups and downs of daily life have become classified as mental disorders, common complaints are transformed into frightening conditions, and more and more people are turned into patients. The $500bn pharmaceutical industry is changing what it means to be human, with promotional campaigns that exploit our deepest fears of death, decay and disease. Rightly rewarded for saving life and reducing suffering, the global drug giants are no longer content with selling medicines only to the ill. As Wall Street knows well, there is a lot of money to be made telling healthy people that they’re sick."


Read the whole thing, as the kids say.

Wednesday, June 07, 2006

Here We Are, at the Waldorf

Jon Stewart, from the Daily News, via Washington Monthly

Monday, June 05, 2006

Nightline hits the Pitts

You don't have to overstate the virtues of Koppel's Nightline to find this a bit sad, if entirely predictable.

Sunday, June 04, 2006

It's a little uncomfortable to watch at the very end

I have been known, without apparent provocation, to sing the praises of Keith Olberman, who runs what is likely the best news program on television (and no, I do not mean to damn with faint praise. . .). But I must say that this entirely warranted jeremiad, courtesy of Crooks & Liars, is, well. . . . . . .