Ethics at the Boundary Line: Torture

Immanuel Kant distinguished between perfect and imperfect duties. The former are universally obligatory, i. e., allow no exceptions under any circumstances. The latter may have exceptions in some cases or alternative ways of fulfilling it?

Does the rule "never torture" define a perfect duty? Is it a moral absolute? Or is it sometimes morally permissible?

Here we enter the realm of "borderline situations " (Helmut Thielicke, Karl Jaspers) in which the usual rules and norms do not provide clear guidance but require a difficult situational decision in which no choice leaves us at ease.

In this context, one can argue that the rule against torture should not be made an absolute. Few moral principles are. There may be rare occasions in which morality may permit extraordinary means, including torture. This could be argued on both deontological and teleological grounds.

Opponents maintain that no such events occur in real life (the ticking bomb scenario) or are so rare as not to justify any exception to the prohibition against torture. Moreover, even if such emergencies justify torture in that immediate extreme circumstance, one might reason that on the whole the damage to the rule of law and to the global image of the country might still forbid it. Hence on balance it may be better to have an absolute rule that is never violated though it may be costly in some instances, though how costly would make a difference. I tend to fall into this camp.

Nevertheless, the ambiguities, contingencies, and uncertainties surrounding this question create a troubling space in which reasonable people may disagree.

http://www.frontiernet.net/~kenc/index.shtml

What is it all About?

When somebody says, "Its not about A, its about B," I usually find it to be the case that it is also about A. Example: Speaking of rape, its not about sex, its about violence. I say it is also about sex. When you hear, its not about the money but about X, check it out; chances are it is also about the money.
http://www.frontiernet.net/~kenc/index.shtml

Use and Abuse of Rights Language

These days anything that anybody thinks we need or want is called a right to it. Rights language is overused to the point it loses its power. I won't even try to list all the "rights" that have been claimed in recent years by somebody.

This is a complicated issue, and I do not claim to have mastered the subject either historically or philosophically. But at least the following distinctions might bring some clarity and precision to what in our national conversation is an unbounded surfeit of loose, if not anarchical, talk.

At least three categories come to mind: natural, constitutional, and legal.

Natural Rights are claims we have by virtue of being human. This list would be short and include the fundamentals: life, equality, liberty, justice for all, and the pursuit of happiness. A natural right cannot be established or taken away by civil law. It can only be recognized and protected. We have rights that are "endowed by God" or nature.

Constitutional and legal rights arise by virtue of being a member of a particular society. The former are grounded in the Constitution as determined by the Supreme Court. The latter are legislative enactments not in conflict with the Constitution.

The order of argument be be as follows:
1. There is a need or desire for which legal provision and protection should be given for the good of individuals and society.

2. The need or desire is either Constitutionally required or permitted.

3. If not Constitutionally required or permitted, it should be because it is rooted in something fundamental in our human nature and essential for our fulfillment as individuals and as a community.

Conversation should begin at 1 and proceed to 2 and 3 only when necessary. For example, adequate health care for all can initially argued for on 1. Hence, instead of speaking of a right to health care, it would be better to say that we have a need for health care and a just claim on available resources that should be given legal status for the good of society. The kinds of health care that should be provided have to be negotiated in terms of what a particular society can offer and is able to afford. Universal health care can be argued for on the basis of need, justice, and the good of individuals and society. If one wants to claim health care as a right, then it needs to stated whether this is a natural or constitutional right. Otherwise, it is loose talk that means no more than 1 anyway.

Marriage requires a different formulation. It does not involve costly resources and availability but is a matter of granting legality to certain forms of relationships along with certain formalizing rituals. It is permissible, thought not necessary, to claim that we have a right to form unions with a partner for purposes of reproduction, companionship, and mutual love based on our sexuality that is part of the nature we were born with. All three factors are equal, and reproduction is not a sine qua non.

Moreover, marriage in the primary sense refers to a certain nature and quality of relationship between the partners. Legality is a socially useful way of recognizing and protecting the relationship. This was the basis on which I declared my son and his partner married regardless of what the laws of Ohio say. It would be sufficient to argue-- apart from any natural right--that we have a need and a desire to form such unions. Therefore, governments should recognize and protect such unions legally. (I have previously argued that arguments from nature and natural law are no more effective than any other, since no argument is persuasive for anybody except those who are persuadable by it. These days it is certainly not profitable to "hold these truths to be self-evident." http://www.frontiernet.net/~kenc/law.htm)

The forms of marriage are a matter for each society to determine based on what works based on justice and the good of individuals and society. Gay marriage can be justified on this basis. Polygamy is different in that it violates justice, since if some men have more than one wife, other men and lesbians can have no wife. But if polygamy is permitted, then polyandry should also.

Should older men be able to marry more than one older woman, since they greatly outnumber men? I see no objection in principle, but would it work satisfactorily in our society and benefit the partners without doing harm to society? I don't know, in some cases it might, but if a ninety-eight-year-old man can marry a twenty-year-old woman, then polygamy for older people is worth debating. Since there is no outcry --or tolerance--for polygamy or polyandry, at the moment it is a debate about principles.

This gets complicated, of course, but it would be better to make an effort to sort it all out rather than to dilute rights language by such overuse and ungrounded rhetoric that it becomes practically meaningless.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right

http://www.frontiernet.net/~kenc/index.shtml

An Appeal You Will Never Hear on a Public Radio Pledge Drive

How refreshing it would be to hear the following on the frequent pledge drives for public radio:

"OK, let's get down to brass tacks here, cut to the chase. All you deadbeats and cheaters out there who listen to public radio but never give a dime to support it: either turn to another station, or send us some money. Got that you shameless freeloaders, you low-down scoundrels and thieves. Call now or go away. Thank you."

My purpose is not to shame the freeloaders but to express the frustration of those of us who make our modest contributions every year on schedule without being asked. Our pledge drive is going on now, and I am weary the same old platitudes, inane observations, and the endless repetition of the obvious. It all reminds me of too many sermons I've heard and of statements by the Pope on his foreign trips urging everyone to be nice to each other and just get along.

http://www.frontiernet.net/~kenc/index.shtml

My How Times Have Changed

Twenty-five years ago neither you nor I would have had no idea what the following meant: RAM, email, URL, http://, ftp, cyberspace, HTML, CPU, computer virus, Trojan, or worm, Security Suite, PC, Mac, burn a CD, www, spam, malware, DVD, HDTV, gigabyte, blog, texting, sexting, YouTube, blogging, etc., etc., etc., and so forth.

And I have not yet mentioned my favorite: Google! Now I google frequently nearly everyday.

My how times have changed.

http://www.frontiernet.net/~kenc/index.shtml

Prosecuting Authorizers of Torture

I am ambivalent about whether members of the Bush Administration who authorized torture should be prosecuted.

Bruce Fein makes a powerful case for just that on the principle that torture violates treaty obligations and US law as well. We are a nation of laws, and lawbreakers should be held accountable for the sake of national integrity and to show the world who we are.

Yet troubling questions arise. Is he saying that if we openly renounced our treaty obligations and changed our laws, torture would be OK? I don't know. But his repeated emphasis on the centrality of law makes me wonder if he has gone too far in absolutizing law as a final referent.

In any case, I would assert that there is a higher principle than law, namely, morality, which is the ultimate justification of law, though not necessarily the only one. I am not sure Fein would disagree. I do oppose those who say that policy differences should not be the occasion of criminal prosecution. Nonsense! If laws have been broken, more than policy disputes is involved.

Setting all this in a larger context may be instructive. It may relativise a narrow focus on the primacy of law. Consider the use of drones by the US in recent days to bomb Pakistani targets. More to the point is the fire bombing of Dresden and of Tokyo in WWII. Many tens of thousands of civilians were killed. Surely these were acts of terror against non-combatants, whatever military targets might have been involved. We have not yet mentioned Hiroshima or Nagasaki where we became the only nation to this day to use nuclear weapons.

And the Nuremberg Trials? Were they in accordance with law? Or did the law emerge along with the proceedings so as to be ex post facto? Prosecution of the Allies was forbidden for any similar acts, thus becoming what the critics called "victors justice."

All of these are exceedingly complex and controversial. issues. That is exactly my point. It is too simple, I think, to demand prosecution of the Bush torture authorizers as a violation of law as the sole justifying principle.

I am inclined to think that, on the whole, it is preferable to denounce torture, renounce its future use, and take steps to see that it does not happen again. To be fair, prosecution would have to include Cheney and Bush, and this would severely divide the country in a time of economic crisis at home and grave threats abroad. Pragmatically, in the presence of so much ambiguity, complexity, and contradiction at the edge of morality, which course of action would be relatively better for the nation and the world? I conclude that it is more important to give attention to these enormous and challenging problems than to get involved in past acts.

But Bruce Fein makes a powerful case.

http://www.frontiernet.net/~kenc/index.shtml

Quasi-Acerbic Oddities for Today

Yogi Berra famously said, "It ain't over til its over." But in the current Minnesota senatorial election, even when its over, it ain't over.

Miss California Carrie Prejean has achieved notoriety by stating her convictions against same-sex marriage. Someone who parades before millions of people as nearly naked as she did -- and that with technologically enhanced boobs -- for the purpose of creating admiration among males and envy among females should not uncritically be regarded as a moral authority. Now we learn that she had earlier posed topless and allegedly lied about it to pageant officials. Selah.

The more often you go to church, the more likely you are to approve of torture in some circumstances.

http://pewforum.org/docs/?DocID=156

Somehow it did not seem strange that CNN found a "red light district" in Lahore, Pakistan.

http://www.frontiernet.net/~kenc/index.shtml

Eschatological Consequences of Phone Mazes

I am a theologian, and I can guarantee you that people who design complex automated telephone programs used by banks, insurance companies, governments, and many other bureaucracies will spend the first 10,00 years after their deaths trying to call a complicated automated 911 system while their pants are on fired. The same fate will befall the executives who mandate the use of these demonic artifices.

Today I had to call my insurance company. They had an elaborate robot-directed telephone maze in which I had to answer questions, give information, and state my problem. The automaton, of course, never understands. After two calls, I finally confused the robotic voice sufficiently to provoke a transfer to a real human being.

I spoke to a nice lady who promptly faxed the the form I needed, and all ended well. I said to her, "You know, of course, that all your customers hate the telephone maze they have to endure before they get to you." She replied, "Oh yes, we know!"

Later, I found some golden plates under a rock in my back yard on which there were words written in a strange language. I was able to translate the writing in a vision provoked by putting roasted peanuts in my Coke Zero. It was then and there that the eschatological consequence of designing and ordering the use of these satanic phone mazes was revealed to me. I merely pass the information on to you.

http://www.frontiernet.net/~kenc/index.shtml

When Bureaucracies Get Crazy

Max Weber provides the classic understanding of modern bureaucracy. As an 'ideal type' bureaucracy is characterized by a hierarchical division of labor directed by clear mandates impersonally applied, staffed by full-time, life-time professionals. The aim is to bring rationality and efficiency into complex organizations by reducing as many transactions as possible to routines governed by explicit rules. He recognized that actual bureaucracies could be dysfunctional. Later critics have suggested that they can really screw things up sometimes, e. g. Robert K. Merton and Michael Crozier.
http://lilt.ilstu.edu/rrpope/rrpopepwd/articles/bureacracy2.html

We all have had experiences of how the "red tape" we encounter can be anything but rational and efficient. My worst came about like this. In 1961 I bought a car in Georgia with a loan from my hometown bank, then shortly after moved to Pennsylvania and in 1964 moved to Delaware with the loan paid. I went through the routines of getting my Delaware license but was thwarted because Delaware rules insist that the loan must be marked "paid" on the outside, because that is the way it is done in Pennsylvania. I had every legal document the state of Georgia provides to show that the car was fully mine with no lien, but it was not marked "paid" on the outside. I appealed to the supervisor, but he merely restated that rule and refused to grant me a license, although he admitted that I had a legal and lien-free title, but rules are rules.

I had to send the loan document back to my hometown Georgia bank, explain my problem, request that it be marked "paid" on the outside. The banker kindly did and now in accordance with Pennsylvania practice and Delaware rules for cars coming from Pennsylvania, I got my license.

This was neither rational nor efficient, but with no provision for legitimate exceptions, it became a nightmare of frustration, not to mention extra work for me, the banker, and the Delaware license bureau organized on bureaucratic principles.

Selah!

http://www.frontiernet.net/~kenc/index.shtml

Nevada As Vast Solar Panel

I propose that the entire state of Nevada be made into a vast solar panel as a source of alternative energy. Just think of how much energy could be produced by this mostly desolate wasteland.

Nevada's only contributions to society have to do with prostitution, gambling, drinking, and entertainment, and we have enough of those already without this largely desert expanse of barren territory.

Residents who voluntarily chose to live there should be forced to become citizens of Utah for at least five years. They deserve it, and it would improve both states. Those who were sent there by others can transfer wherever they please.

My next blog will demonstrate that Idaho does not exist and never has. It is a gigantic illusion created by the ancestors of the Wizard of Oz using smoke and mirrors aided and abetted by a multitude of hypnotized co-conspirators.

http://www.frontiernet.net/~kenc/index.shtml

Free and Unfettered? Nah, Just Acting According to Type

In my mini-systematic theology I identified myself as "a skeptic, a relativist, and a pragmatist." On the Myers-Briggs inventory of personality types, I am an INTJ (although pretty close on the T F scale, but totally I). In a book describing the sixteen types (Keirsey, Please Understand Me), I read that INTJ's are skeptical, relativistic, and pragmatic. Hmmm. In a previous blog I noted that I voted as my demographic location plus zip code would indicate. Hmmmm. Seems like I am behaving according to type.

So you think you are the "Master of your fate, Captain of your soul (William Ernest Henley)?" Nah! I bet that, just like me, your typical ways of thinking, feeling, relating to nature and other people, and preferences in life, love, and work are all in accordance with your type.

Given the details of your demographic location, your Myers-Briggs scores, and your zip code, knowledgeable analysts could discern enough about your predispositions, temperament, and the likely way you vote to give you the impression that someone has been following your around and peeping into your mental and emotional. processes. I refer here to primary ways of perceiving the world and relating to it and other people characteristic of your dominant type, not the specific content of your mind and life peculiar to you.

Masters of our fate, Captains of our souls, free to choose as we choose to choose? Nah, we just all think, decide and feel according to type.

The professor in me insists that I point out that there are numerous locations between each of the four polarities of the Myers-Briggs inventory, creating many variations. Hence, the total number of types is quite large, but our outer and inner lives are expressive of our dominant and secondary formations. Any notion of human freedom that does not recognize these restrictions on our capacity for choice is inadequate. Freedom means self-determination not absence of determination.
http://frontiernet.net/~kenc/freedom.htm

http://www.frontiernet.net/~kenc/beliefs.htm#Modernism

See:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myers-Briggs_Type_Indicator

http://www.personalitypage.com/portraits.html

David West Keirsey, Please Understand Me.

Or just do some googling.

How Do Jokes Get Started?

One day he wins the lottery, two days later he meets the love of his life. Some guys are so lucky.
http://content3.clipmarks.com/image_cache/merrie/512/9C174855-492F-4D6A-BFF1-E4A6157E7BCE.jpg

Nearly every day I receive jokes from one or more sources, often in retaliation for something I sent them. They range from the squeaky clean to the ones not repeated in polite company. They are often about sex or other topics that regrettably frequently involve unfavorable stereotypes of women, especially blonds. Over a lifetime I must have heard or read thousands, yea, tens of thousands. But how do these funny stories gets started?

A little googling yielded no helpful results, except for a professor who is quoted as saying the obvious, i. e., that it is nearly impossible to trace the origin of a particular funny story.

My guess is that many start as one liners. Somebody says something funny in some circumstance. It gets repeated, catches on, and is gradually elaborated and revised as it goes. Eventually it reaches canonical form and is more or less retold verbatim, with memory lapses and surges of creativity endlessly refining it.

Some are doubtless created by the deliberate efforts of people with a comic spirit. Some genres with particular subject matter may originate collectively when two or more people try to add to a type, e. g., "Yo Mama" or "Little Debbie" stories, fanatical golfers, a guy walks into a bar, etc. In my rural Georgia childhood I heard a number of scatological stories from the “Ike and Mike” series. A joke is a favorite way for one group to make fun of another regarded as inferior or to show the superiority of ones own.

Examples: How do you lubricate a Volkswagen? You run over an Italian?

How do you tell the bride at a Polish wedding? She's the one with the clean polo shirt.

Here are some I came across today that illustrate various genres:

A little girl goes to the barber shop with her father. While her dad gets his hair cut, she stands right next to the barber chair, eating a Hostess snack cake. The barber says to her, "You know, sweetheart, you're gonna get hair on your Twinkie." "I know," she replies. "I'm gonna get tits too."

A husband and wife were having dinner at a very fine restaurant when this absolutely stunning young woman comes over to their table, gives the husband a big open mouthed kiss, then says she'll see him later and walks away. The wife glares at her husband and says, "Who the hell was that?"
"Oh," replies the husband, "she's my mistress."
"Well, that's the last straw," says the wife. "I've had enough, I want a divorce!"
"I can understand that," replies her husband, "but remember, if we get a divorce it will mean no more shopping trips to Paris, no more wintering in Barbados, no more summers in Tuscany, no more Lexus in the garage and no more yacht club. But the decision is yours."
Just then, a mutual friend enters the restaurant with a gorgeous babe on his arm. "Who's that woman with Jim?" asks the wife.
"That's his mistress," says her husband.
"Ours is prettier," she replies.

My favorite fanatical golfer story: One Saturday morning a wife reluctantly agreed for her husband to take the car and go golfing – but only with the solemn promise that he would return by 1:00 PM so she could have the car. By 3:30 PM when he finally got back, she was livid with anger at having to miss an important engagement. She was ready to excoriate him when she noticed he looked so weary and so terribly downcast that her mood changed.
“Honey, what’s the matter?”
“Oh, it was terrible,” he said, "Just horrific.”
“What happened,” she asked anxiously.
“Well, everything went fine until the fourth hole when Charlie dropped dead.”
“Oh, honey, that must have been awful for you.”
“I’ll say, from then on it was hit the ball, drag Charlie, hit the ball, drag Charlie.”

A global search for the best joke in the world elicited many thousands of entries from a large number of countries who voted for their favorite. The winner:

Two hunters from New Jersey go into the woods. One collapses and the other rings for help telling the operator he thinks his friend is dead. She asks if he is sure. There is a gun shot. When he comes back on the line, he says, "OK, now what?"

OK, but I liked the winner in the UK better: A woman gets on a bus with a baby in her arms. The bus driver says, "That is the ugliest baby I ever saw. Ugh!
Very angry she goes to the back of the bus, takes a seat and says to the man next to her."That driver just insulted me."
"Well," he says, "you just go right back up there and tell him what you think. Go on, I'll hold your monkey for you."

I wonder how they all got started.

The Obsoleteness of Some Classical Dualisms

Christian theology inherited a set of dualities from the Bible that have been the source of mischief and of irresolvable problems.

1. The first -- and fundamental one--is the sharp distinction between the saved and the lost. This can be traced to apocalyptic thought in which at the Endtime a final judgment will separate the sheep from the goats, roughly -- though not universally or without qualifications -- translatable into Israel and its enemies. In the New Testament this dualism is spiritualized and universalized and functions without regard to nation, race, or ethnicity but still divides the human race into two distinct categories. You are fundamentally either in or out; you go to heaven or to hell (Matthew 25).

2. The second is between salvation by grace or by works as determining whether you are to inherit the Kingdom or not, i. e., be a sheep or a goat. However grace and works are related and whether grace goes to those divinely chosen (Calvin) or who freely accept proffered grace (Arminius) and however the two might be combined in the total picture, the fundamental distinction between the saved and the lost is not abrogated here and hereafter-- with rare exceptions (Origen, e. g.).

3. The third is between justification and sanctification -- closely related to but not identical with grace and works. Justification is absolute; you either are or are not justified-- saved or lost--whether by grace or works or some combination. Sanctification is a matter of degree. You can be in a perpetual paradox -- justified and yet a sinner, no matter how good your works get (Luther), or you can move part way (Calvin) or ideally totally toward perfection (Wesley), with most reserving total sanctification for the life beyond.

Brevity compels me to assume that readers can spell out the major positions that been taken and the names of theologians who developed them over the centuries. History discloses a complex variety that would take volumes to detail and that cannot be represented accurately in every respect in a few words. (The professor is leaving an escape hatch for himself.)

The problem with all these dualities is that the complexity and variety of human experience defy the precision they seek. There is no way the spiritual and moral multifariousness of actual life in real people can be fit into the classical theological categories designed for the purpose without vitiating them. In fact they were not developed inductively by reasoning from experience. Rather, in classical theology they were constructed from the exegesis of texts and by using the vocabulary that arose over the centuries and applied to experience, although experience certainly entered into their original formation and were tested through the ages by experiential references, though the inherited tradition provided the fundamental referent points in deciding among options.

Let us admit these categories with their dualities do not function operationally in many churches these days, especially those in the mainstream of non-fundamentalist, non-creedal ones. Liberal professional theologians give vary degrees of attention to them in their constructive work, and the everlasting distinction between the saved and the lost has been generally abandoned, along with the notion of a never-ending hell for the wicked. For some, belief in the reality of life beyond death is itself optional. Even when the classical categories are employed, it often seems it is more out of respect for tradition rather than as essential tools of thought.

Why, then, do I bother? Good question! I guess because the professional in me likes to practice a little in retirement mode.

The alternative to classical categories is some form of holistic thinking which employs more organic models using biological analogies like health. I propose that the physical, moral, and spiritual dimensions of health in their unity, distinction, and interdependence are manifested in "infinite variety" (Shakespeare). The Hebrew notion of shalom meaning "completeness, wholeness, health, peace, welfare, safety, soundness, tranquility, prosperity, perfectness, fullness, rest, harmony, the absence of agitation or discord" (Strong's Concordance 7965) might be a good place to start.

This would produce a continuum from the least moral and spiritually fit human being to the most healthy, e. g., as we would get with physical health. While there are certainly enormous differences between human beings with respect to their relationship to God and neighbor, any bright line between the saved and the lost would be arbitrary and of limited utility.

Well, you can take it from there.

Cry, no Saab -- and Other Oddities

Sob, Sob, Sob. Saab is gone.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/23/world/europe/23saab.html?hp

National Garlic Day is the 19th of April, which is Stress Awareness Month. Keeping up with all this is so000000 stressful. And wouldn't eating garlic tend to increase stress for those around you? I worry about these things.

Martin Feldstein in The Washington Post criticizing Obama's proposal to reduce slightly the charitable deduction on high-income folks:

"While no one makes a charitable contribution to get a tax deduction, the deductibility of charitable gifts reduces the cost of giving and therefore increases the amount that individuals give."

While there is not necessarily a logical contradiction here, it does make an empirical assumption, which does not necessarily follow, i. e., the conclusion may or may not be true.

I wonder why

Some liberals reportedly don't like Rush Limbaugh.
I WONDER WHY.

Firefox 3.1 and Internet Explorer 8.0 have a "Private Browsing" feature which makes it possible to access sites and leave no record. It is also called "Porn Mode."
I WONDER WHY.

Pharaoh said to be upset with Moses after Red Sea incident.
I WONDER WHY.

Claimed by some males to be the best USC cheerleader picture ever.
http://www.hottestgirlsofcheerleading.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/01/usc-cheerleaders-14.jpg
I WONDER WHY.

In Ulysses, James Joyce the Prison Gate Girls sing:

"If you see kay
Tell him he may
See you in tea
Tell him from me."

Many people have found something dirty in these lines.
I WONDER WHY.

Wholesome Britney Spears latest video "If U Seek Amy" contains the following line:

"All of the boys and all of the girls are begging to if you seek Amy."

I understand that some folks have suspected something unwholesome here.
I WONDER WHY.
See: http://www.slate.com/id/2214106/

The Ambiguity of Capitalist Self-Interest

Adam Smith, author of The Wealth of Nations, patron saint of capitalism, believed that if all economic actors pursued their own self-interest, an "invisible hand" would guide the nation into general prosperity when properly joined to the miracle of market efficiency by governmental laissez faire.

Certainly there is some truth here -- but not the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Sometimes general pursuit of individual self-interest leads to national harm. Garrett Hardin's "The Tragedy of the Commons" illustrates.(1) In a pasture open to all (a commons), it is in the interest of each herder to add one more cow to graze, but if all add one or more cows, the whole commons could be ruined for everyone.

Apparently something like that is happening today. A lot of people, after the recent debauchery of greedy, profligate, credit-enabled spending, are saving -- all in the perceived self-interest of the former prodigals. But what the return of general prosperity requires now is consumer spending, in the absence of which the federal government must provide -- thus stimulus packages.

Again, note that nobody expects or even seems to think that the big banks should make the slightest sacrifice to begin lending, although the economy as a whole is dependent on their functioning as banks. Why, because it is not in the self-interest of individual banks to do so. As a result we all suffer. Many economists think this calls for a temporary nationalization of the essential financial institutions to break out of this bondage, but the Obama Administration seems too timid to do so, despite the fact that some Republicans call for it.

Memo to Adam Smith: Send us your recommendation immediately.
_____________________________________________
(1) http://dieoff.org/page95.htm

The Virtuous Lie

Last Saturday morning my wife Gloria left the house saying she was going to get her hair cut. Some time later she returned, opened the front door and entered. A few steps behind her was my wonderful younger daughter Melissa. The two had conspired for weeks to surprise me in anticipation of my approaching birthday by having Melissa come for a visit. I was totally astounded, had no hint of what was going on. We had a marvelous weekend.

But Gloria told me a lie. It was unvarnished prevarication, an outright fabrication totally lacking in verisimilitude. Yes, but it was a virtuous lie, free of all moral delinquency., absent of any moral taint. The act met the two fundamental criteria of moral judgment(1). It honored my worth as a human being, and it had good consequence.

I shall always remember with gratitude this virtuous lie.
___________________________
(1) The two are: honor the intrinsic worth of all sentient beings, especially humans, and promote the optimum good possible in a situation. My authority is the renowned philosopher-theologian Kenneth Cauthen in his classic work, The Ethics of Belief, 2 vols (Lima, Ohio: CSS Publishing Co., 2001)

Annual Primal Scream

It is time for my periodic rant against grocery store -- and other -- coupons. On March 4, the store receipt says we saved $21.46 from manufacturer's coupons on a total grocery bill of $300.86. Hooray for us, right? Well, yes and no. Here's why: We saved money in the immediate context but contributed to a scheme that is on the whole inefficient and wasteful.(1)

Suppose all manufacturers and retail stores without exception abandoned them and competed solely through prices. That practice would be more efficient and could make possible reductions in prices for all consumers and yet not hurt the ability to compete or the profit margin -- but only if everybody cooperated and did not violate the process for their own immediate private gain..

Just think of the complicated and expensive process involved: Somebody has to decide which items are to be promoted with coupons. They have to be designed, printed, and made available to consumers in various ways. The consumer has to look for them, choose relevant ones, clip and sort them, search for the qualifying products in the store, and hand them to the cashier, who has to ring them up, followed by a further sorting to send to the manufacturer, who has to make sure they qualify, send the promised handling fee to the stores, which have to feed it into their accounting system. Whew! The inefficiency involved is clear in terms of money, time, and materials.

So why do they work? A. Manufacturers like them because of what economists call "price discrimination."(2) B. Customers use them to save money in the immediate context.

Will they be abandoned? Not likely, so I will continue my protest-- a voice crying in the wilderness, fragrance wasted on desert air.
_____________________________________________
(1) At one time Proctor & Gamble said "it would lower prices instead of providing coupons"and called "coupons inefficient, saying only 2 percent of the millions it distributes are ever redeemed."
http://www.madison.com/archives/read.php?ref=/madison.com/html/archive_files/wsj/1997/09/11/9709110144.php

"But despite the growing sentiment among many major marketers in the US that coupons are ineffcient and wasteful, very few are likely to abadon them entirely." See:
http://books.google.com/books?id=T3UUfNBE1DcC&pg=PA315&lpg=PA315&dq=%22coupons%22+inefficient+wasteful&source=bl&ots=atZMW3UhbF&sig=dO6EzTmrqm8454yrARdkI3beNwc

(2) Read about the theory of "Price discrimination," i. e., the ability to sell the same product at different prices to different customers to the sellers advantage:
http://stuartbuck.blogspot.com/2003/06/economics-of-coupons.html

Valentine's Day at My House

Me: I have to go to the bank on Mt. Hope and deposit a check.

Her: Stop at the deli on your way home and get us a tuna fish sub for lunch.

Me: Well, actually, I had a secret mission in mind after going to the bank, but if you come with me, you could pick out your Valentine flowers.

She: I had rather have a tuna fish sub.

Me: In addition to or instead of?

Her: Instead of.

Me: Well, OK.

Now it is hard to top a tuna fish sub for Valentine's Day, but I did get a piece of tiramisu before the night was over. Now that will blow your chakras.

Oddities for Today`

Did it ever occur to you how funny the act of eating is? Just think of it. You sit down at a table and push stuff into a hole in your head that opens on a hinge. In a few hours you repeat the process. Angels must get a big kick out of watching.

At this time I will not deal with the the other end of the story, but it is hilarious.

We are so fortunate in this country to have three all-news networks. There is Wolf Blitzer with "The Most Conceited Political Team on Television," Campbell Brown with "Mostly Bias, Lotta Bull," Lou (Keep Demagoguery Alive) Dobbs, and Larry (Hit Them with Powder Puff Questions) King -- all on CNN. Next we have MSNBC as "The Place for Democratic Politics." Finally, we have Fox Network with its "Unfair and Unbalanced" approach -- so far right, its wrong. They all love controversy, prefer heat to light, and have hours to fill, and not all the fillers are edifying.

Oddities for Today

The lead sentence in the article said, "Some Super Bowl viewers had their football interrupted by porn. It could happen to you, too!" (Slate, February 4) Really? How can I improve my chances of that happening?

I used to amaze, amuse, and produce consternation in my students by asking: "Since the church continues the ministry of the apostles, how is the project of raising the dead and casting out demons going in your congregation (Matthew 10:8)?"

Or, "Why do we stop praying for people when they die, since an omnipotent God would have no problem bringing them back to life here and now? Why such a God could do it before breakfast without breaking a sweat."

In church when we sing "Breathe on Me, Breath of God," I always add quietly, "Unless you had onions for lunch!"

Does this cast light on why I entitled my autobiography, Born into the Wrong World?"

http://www.frontiernet.net/~kenc/index.shtml

Hoping and Waiting: Obama Again

I still have hope for the country and the world with Obama at the helm, but not everything he has done or not done has pleased me, e. g.:

1. Rich appointees who couldn't afford a good tax accountant.

2. So many Clinton leftovers some tainted -- and too many who are so closely identified with the reigning plutocracy I thought we might tame -- you know, change.

3. A stimulus bill that includes too many liberal-loved items that should be left for later in order to concentrate on the more stimulating features needed right now -- as Alice Rivlin has suggested.

4. An Afghanistan policy that sounds too much like a continuation of the same old things -- bombing Pakistan, e.g. -- and no sign that the solution is not primarily military but requires new developmental and political initiatives -- those suggested by Fareed Zakaria, e. g. (See February 3, today's Washington Post)

5. Appointment of a Commerce Secretary whom the Chamber of Commerce will love and labor Unions will hate. See
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/2/3/23010/80009

6. And sometimes I wish Obama were not so damned confident about everything.

Perhaps he is thinking long-term and will be shown to have taken the right approach. I did hear him say to his critics -- look who's sitting in the Oval Office right now. He got elected by ignoring half of what I told him.

A wait and see -- and hope-- approach is called for, i. e., whether his attempt to be so post-partisan and inclusive is the beginning of a new era or a path to disappointment.

Obama: The Gift of Providence?

"And who knows whether you have not come to the kingdom for such a time as this?" Esther 4:14

http://www.frontiernet.net/~kenc/index.shtml

Question for Obama

Will Obama's passion to be post-partisan, inclusive, to reach out to the opposition, etc. lead him to make compromises with a progressive agenda? If so, how far is he willing to go to get consensus? As the landslide winner with a majority in both houses of Congress, will he forge ahead enact a robust progressive agenda if he can only get 60 votes in the Senate instead of compromising with the opposition in order to get 80 votes or 90? How does one measure short-term success for liberal to left measures enacted with a bare majority versus long-goals of remaking American politics and gaining a sustained capacity to get things done?

I have noted before the tension between principles and pragmatism and idealism and realism. The questions above are grounded in that tension. How will Obama resolve them in practice? We will have to wait and see.

Oddities for a Cold Day in January

When the Treasury Department was asked why the new 20, 10, 5, and 1 dollar bills that beamed brightly in vivid color in the dark did not work when used as decorations on a Christmas tree, they replied, "Everyone knows that money does not glow on trees."

Who ought to be in jail? The !&%$#@! people who leave their #@%$#& grocery carts in the parking lanes, especially on a rainy day.

In with them and Bernie Madoff should be the ^&%#!) folks who straddle two parking places in order to create distance between them and the law-abiding citizens who park inside the lines. Thus do they create distance and reduce to the danger to their -- usually large -- vehicles.

Russia has started passing gas toward Ukraine again. Paradoxically, this is good news.

President Bush claimed that he was a unifier not a divider. Exactly. More than 2/3 thirds of Americans are united in disapproving of his presidency.

Memo to Liberals: Cool it!

We have gotten so sensitive in this country that every group across the ideological spectrum dares anyone to offend them. So my message is: cool it, calm down, take it easy, get a sense of perspective.

The latest example is the liberal furor over the Obama choice of Rick Warren to give the inaugural invocation. It would not have been my choice, and I am on record as an advocate of gay marriage and have performed one for my son. Granted, some of Warren's acts and comments have been despicable. But he has also broadened the evangelical agenda and has devoted enormous energy to fighting poverty, AIDS, and global warming.

The liberal criticism magnifies the significance of this prayer all out of proportion. Did liberals not hear what Obama said repeatedly throughout his campaign -- that he intends to cross ideological and political boundaries?

Anyway, the bigger story is that Rick Warren has agreed to pray at the inauguration of a pro-choice, pro-gay rights president.

Ignored is the fact that Joseph Lowery-- a civil rights hero and an advocate of civil unions -- is giving the benediction.

No one could get elected who ran on my agenda regarding cultural, political, and social values. But Obama's aim is to govern effectively not to be doctrinally pure. After eight years of government cronies who were ideologically correct but sometimes incompetent, we should welcome Obama's more ecumenical approach.

My main concern would have been that Warren and Lowery not give a sectarian prayer in the name of Jesus and would have made that a condition of appointment.

So, Americans, calm down, develop some tolerance for others while vigorously pursuing causes dear to you.

Would I have made the same argument if the appointee had been a vicious racist? Probably not, unless he or she had overwhelming countervailing values on other vital issues backed up by deeds -- an ulikely possibility. Lines must be drawn between the tolerable and the intolerable. Knowing when and where to draw them is the challenge to social wisdom.

The Common Good: Difficult to Define

Everybody believes politicians should seek the common good not some particular private or selfish good. But seldom does anyone define what the term means. It turns out to be a complex notion, as slippery as a live, wet catfish.

A beginning can be made by saying a good is common if all participate in it. Two dimensions can be specified:

A. it refers to the general structures and processes necessary to there being a community at all worth living in -- a well-functioning democracy, a system of law and law enforcement, a peaceful social order, and the like with all the conditions that undergird them.

B. Closely connected but distinct are particular goods from which everyone benefits. Roads, bridges, a postal system, an electrical grid, and the like benefit us all or nearly everybody and certainly are essential for a functioning society. Other things benefit many or most but not necessarily all -- airports, e. g., except in some diluted or secondary form. If we don't fly, we may get UPS packages that came most of the way by air.

After that it get more difficult. Take the trio all, some, or none. Some things benefit all or almost so. Few, if any, things generated politically help absolutely no one. "It's an ill wind that blows no good."

I suspect that most goods benefit some and not others and may harm others. This is what we fight about most of the time. Who is helped and who is hurt and who is not affected at all? Politics, we say, determines who get what.

We all like to identify the good we seek with the common good. "What is good for General Motors is good for the country." (former GM CEO Charlie Wilson) We were told that Main Street had to to help bail out Wall Street, or we would all go down together. Enough people in power believed it to make it happen.

What about the auto bailout? Agricultural subsidies, NAFTA, state subsidies to foreign car makers versus a federal bailout for the American Big Three, etc., etc., etc.

Too much of our discourse is conducted in a Manichean framework in which a sharp dualism of good and evil reigns -- a policy is either good or bad, right or wrong, desirable or undesirable, common or private. Is it safe to fly in an airplane? Meaningless unless you define safe. Then we can state facts and don't need personal opinions, unless we are just asking whether someone is afraid to get on an airplane, i. e., feels safe. Are we safer now than before 9/11? What does that mean?

Approve or disapprove? Ask me if I approve of Barack Obama, and I will ask you whether you mean in all respects, in some particular respects, or in no respect.

Social reality is complex and ambiguous -- a mixture of good and bad, costs and benefits. But we cheapen and trivialize discourse by framing it in terms of of a shallow dualism.

The press, including print and electronic media, could serve a valuable service by helping us sort all this out instead of simplifying most everything to sound bites and offering us banalities, pablum. Thank goodness for PBS and C-Span -- a small oasis in the "vast wasteland" of TV (Newton Minnow).

We cannot do without reference to the common good, but it would serve us all if we defined what we mean by it and insist that all everyone else do the same.

Buzzards and Journalists: How They Are Alike

• The cartoon pictured two gaunt buzzards, obviously very hungry, sitting on a bare limb on a leafless tree in a barren wilderness. One says to the other, "Patience, hell! I'm gonna kill something."
• The election excitement is over. Obama's moves have been flawless and his appointments impressive. We are in the holiday season when much else clamors for time and focus. What are the poor political journalists to do to grab attention?
• You would think the bleepin Blagojevich scandal would be bleepin juicy enough for them. But Obama is the center of the political world right now, so they are straining every nerve, looking under every rock, parsing every word he or his staff utter or write, following every lead large or small and otherwise turning the universe upside down to find something that stinks linking Obama to the Governor. Leading the pack, of course, are the slobbering Republican operatives who have been dispirited since November 4. Right alongside is Fox news drooling at even the prospect of some hint of scandal. But even the more sober journalists can't resist the hunt.
• Meanwhile, out in the real world many struggle to pay the mortgage, keep or find a job, and otherwise stay afloat in these perilous times. The rest are too busy with Christmas, Hanukkah, or the non-offensive generic "holidays" to care about the trivial pursuit the hungry birds are undertaking.
  
• So leave Obama alone unless you find something worth reporting and go spend some money shopping. That would at least help the economy, while all this furor over trivialities merely annoys.
• Be patient, you buzzards, until something dies, and you can follow the bad odor to relieve your post-election hunger for some Obama excitement. Meanwhile, I can understand your feeling that you may be forced to kill something.
  

Biblical Exegesis Will Not Solve Gay Issues

Anyone who thinks that finding out what the Bible really teaches about same-sex love will resolve the issues for churches and individual believers misunderstands how things work in the real world. What the Bible really teaches is a function of somebody's interpretation. As my country relatives in Georgia used to say, "You can prove anything by the Bible."

A more humane view of gay marriage and its attendant issues will come like the resolution of African slavery, the right of women to vote, segregation, and the role of women in the church. It will come as a result of a change of consciousness in the secular culture and in the minds of Christians.

Slavery, the denial of women's rights, and segregation were all once defended on biblical grounds by wide segments of the Christan world, including biblical scholars, theologians, and lay people. They are not any more because the Christian community came to recognize that what they had been defending and supporting was wrong, and accordingly exegesis now easily produces a different result aided by hermeneutical miracles that are always available when needed.

Christians never let the Bible when it is speaking as the Word of God support or condone what is known or strongly believed to be either untrue or immoral. Check it out in church history.

The same pattern will repeat itself with regard to same-sex love. Southern Baptists apologized some years ago for defending segregation. Bob Jones University has decided its ban on interracial dating was a matter of culture and not a scriptural mandate. Nobody today thinks the Bible supports slavery.

With regard to homosexuality we are now where we were with slavery in 1850 and segregation in 1950. Biblical scholars at the moment divide sharply on the question of whether the Bible forbids and condemns same-sex love as immoral. In a half-century, I predict the exegetical, ecclesiastical, and theological worlds will sing a different tune. The Roman Catholic hierarchy moves at its own pace, but eventually will come around as it did on Galileo, evolution, democracy, separation of church and state, and other things.

Meanwhile, in the secular and political world change is coming slowly, and it is coming generationally, geographically, racially, ethnically and in terms of social and cultural location. New New England led the way, and California and New York are moving along. The upper Midwest could be next. The South, Midwest, Plains and Mountain States will follow in time.

Many highly-educated whites in the knowledge and professional classes are further along than many African Americans and Hispanics, especially the more religious ones, although education, culture, and class matter here too.

In the meantime, it you wish to gauge the opinion of Christians ask first not about their church membership but about their zip code.

When all the nuances, qualifications, and caveats are added, I will stand by the claims herein.

Signs of the Times

News headline:

Cell Phone in Man's Chest Pocket Stops Bullet
Associated Press, Nov. 20, 2008

It used to be that pocket New Testaments did that. My how times have changed.

Oh No, Barack, Not That!

Most of the time I agree with Barama on issues and have defended him even when he is a pure politician, i. e., have recognized pragmatically that idealistic purists win only moral victories and never get elected. But now he has gone too far. He has endorsed a playoff system for college football and says he will throw his weight around to bring it about. Terrible, terrible!

A playoff system to be fair must include more than eight teams. Basketball starts with sixty-four. It would extend the football season even further into the New Year. Who says we have to determine a number one anyway? Better to have something to argue about over the winter. Besides one game does not necessarily decide which is the better team. Too many things can happen to determine who wins on a given day.

I will throw my weight around to return to the good old days when the major bowl games were on January 1, and we were done with it after such a major overdose on one day. Today's money-driven system is crazy, beyond redemption.

College football is thoroughly corrupt anyway. Consider the salaries and perks of the big-time coaches compared to that of the best professors and presidents of those schools. Utterly absurd. It is a sport driven by money and fat TV contracts, an abomination for educational institutions.

So Barama, get real. If you really want to do something worthy of your office, denounce it for the corrupt system it has become.

OK, OK, I know supporting a playoff system will get you lots of plaudits with thousands of fans who are beset with the same delusions you apparently share. So much for new politics.

Post-Election Reflection

1. Some of us remember a song from World War II -- When the Lights Go on Again all Over the World. Well, they went on about 11 PM, November 4, 2008. when the TV announcers said that Barack Obama had been elected President of the United States.

2. I cried twice on election night, once when I first knew that Barack Obama had won and thought how wonderful and again when I first knew that Barack Obama had won and thought how awful it was to have the job given the mess we're in. As The Onion put it in a headline, Black Man Given the Worst Job in the World.

White House Tour: Toilet in Lincoln Bedroom

When Laura was showing Michelle around the WH, I hope she warned her that you have to jiggle the handle in the toilet in the Lincoln Bedroom after every use to keep the water from overflowing. That always annoyed me when I was there.

And I thought that handwritten note that Rosalyn Carter had taped on it in 1979 reminding everyone to jiggle after flushing was a little tacky.

Maybe with all the books Barack is selling since his election, he could afford to bring in a plumber to fix it. Actually, I would do it free if they wanted, just to save taxpayers a little money, what with the deficit and the economic crisis and all.

Famous But Fatuous Political Statement

Some of the most famous statements in recent political history are bull biscuits.

In 1933 Franklin Delano Roosevelt said, "We have nothing to fear but fear itself." Nonsense. People had a lot to fear, during the Great Depression, things like unemployment, poverty, homelessness, hunger, and the like. Just ask my Dad, who lived through it.

In his campaign for VP with Michael Dukakis in 1988 against George the Elder Bush, Lloyd Bentsen said to Dan Quayle, the Republican candidate, "I know Jack Kennedy . . . and, Senator, you are no Jack Kennedy." That statement was mean, gratuitous, insulting, vacuous, obvious, just to get started.

In 1961, John Kennedy said, "Ask not your country can do for you but what you can do for your country." Nice rhetoric, has a nice sound to it, clever to use the reverse images, etc. But the statement is empty without some specifics to give it content.

And not universally applicable, e. g., those who were sent to Iraq to fight this senseless war have every right to ask what their country can do for them when they return -- if they do.

Kennedy's speech to the Baptist preachers in Houston in 1960 is lauded as a clear-headed statement on church and state, but it is actually shallow and confused regarding the difference between church and state and between religiion and politics.

http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/jfkhoustonministers.html

Maria Cumo and Obama have a much better and more profound grasp of the issues.

See my article:
http://www.frontiernet.net/~kenc/presidentialreligionpolitics.html

Why, then, are they so famous and so often repeated? Beats the heck out of me.

Trust Obama, Oh Ye of Little Faith

Some are already criticizing Obama for designating Rahm Emanuel as his Chief of Staff -- one of his very first choices -- because of his close Israeli ties.

Here is my theory about Rahm Emanuel. First, it is a gesture to the Jewish community that will help him to get tougher on Israel later on. Second, he knows that to get stuff done, he has to pass legislation through Congress. RE is just the kind of tough SOB who can help with that.

Whether my theory is right, you can be sure that Obama had clear purposes in mind that had been thoroughly thought through when he chose RE. I trust him. He succeeded in the primaries and in the election by ignoring the advice I gave him.

BO will certainly make choices that will make those of us on the idealistic left squirm. We should not hesitate to criticize him when we think he is wrong. He plays a tough political game. He obviously catered (pandered?) to farmers in Iowa and Illinois in supporting ethanol subsidies. He broke his promise on public campaign finance. He has been quiet on Israel's sins, etc., etc. Jack Kennedy's father bought West Virginia for him in the primaries by paying off the country sheriffs in 1960, as I understand it.

He could not survive politically if he tried to satisfy my tendency toward democratic socialism, even if he shared my views. The question is how does Obama balance realism and idealism, pragmatism and principle, in the long run, especially on the big issues.

For the moment, I trust BO more than I do the people so eager to criticize him so early. I think we should give him a break and allow him some time, but when appropriate we need to be critical as necessary, and I think he would want that.

Cloning Extinct Species

I read in the paper this morning that scientists hope to clone extinct species. My understanding is that their first effort will focus on the Republican Party.

Ten Reasons Why John McCain Could Still Win the Election

Watch the video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2XgR10u_Mk

10. Sarah Palin climbs on a big rock in her back yard to get a better view of Russia, and when it rolls over discovers a new oil field that has more oil than Saudi Arabia.

9. Michelle confesses that her secret wish is to start a madrassa in the White House and teach Wahhabism to black kids from the D. C. ghetto.

8. Barack acknowledges that a spell has been cast on him such that if he even glances at a full moon, he will turn into Dick Cheney and look like Alan Greenspan.

7. The Pope puts Sarah on the fast track to become a saint.

6. Bill Gates and Warren Buffet agree to pay off the national debt if Sarah Palin with go with them on a 10 day moose hunt in Alaska with only a very small tent to sleep in while Todd stays home with the kids.

5. Michelle admits that she slept with Bill Clinton to get him to campaign for Barack.

4. Obama admits that McCain has found him out and confesses to being a terrorist, a socialist, and a Muslim cousin of Saddam Hussein, from whom he got his middle name.

3. An angel appears on Mt. Sinai with irrefutable proof that McCain was born of a virgin.

2. Osama bin Laden helicopters into the middle of a rally in Ohio and personally surrenders to McCain.

1. President George W. Bush endorses Obama.

McCain-Palin -- a Poetic Reflection

See the video:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2030649403297420759

Have no fear. All is well.
McCain's chances have gone to hell.

He chose to go with a beauty-queen hottie.
Now his hopes are in the potty.

A bridge to nowhere: Sarah Palin.
M's gimmick -- deservedly failin'.

Let them throw their dirty dirt.
It will not Obama hurt.

Will be seen for what it is:
A final, desperate, worthless fizz.

Socialist, terrorist -- it didn't work.
Just showed M to be a jerk

Have no fear. All is well.
McCain's chances have gone to hell.

Still we wait, dreading the worst.
Surely our bubble yet will burst.

Yet on we go trembling with hope.
Please ruthless fate don't say NOPE.

Nader Revisited and Obama Praised

My first blog was about Ralph Nader (April 19, 2004). The main point of it was Nader is a secular prophet and saint, a political idiot, and a massive ego burdened by self-righteousness.

I was reminded of this last night when I heard him on the NPR News Hour. He is right on all the issues from my point of view.

He pointed out, for example, that both candidates speak always of the middle class, never of the poor. That simply indicates that a presidential candidacy based on Nader's ideas has a zero chance of success in the prevailing political and cultural climate. This morning on NPR Kevin Phillips repeated some of Nader's themes.

I fervently hope that Barack Obama is elected president. That for me will be a day of great rejoicing. I think he will be as good a president a political reality will allow to be.

The problem is that both parties are ruled, or at least constrained, by the wealthy and the corporate class. They provide the money without which political success is impossible, but it is a corrupt system. Obama is the victim and perpetrator of it. He received in 2008 693 thousand dollars from Goldman Sachs alone and hundreds of thousands more from similar institutions.

The cultural reactionaries, among whom are many Protestants, and the plutocracy have far too much influence.

White Protestants have helped elect Republicans for decades since the era of FDR and the southern embrace of Republicans since the Civil Rights era. White Protestants gave us Nixon, Regan, and two Bushes.

Obama will be less bad, even much better than McCain, but from the perspective of this democratic socialist, he cannot be a good president because the system will not allow him to be even if he wanted to be, and I am not sure of the latter.

Until we have a radical social, political, and cultural transformation, improvements in justice for the poor, the working class, and the middle class will be at the margins. However, as Reinhold Niebuhr pointed out decades ago, even minimal advances toward justice can make a great deal of positive difference in the lives of large numbers of people.

That is why I fervently hope that Obama will be elected president.

What Do You Mean, Who Won?

After every debate the great question is, Who Won? But nobody ever defines what winning means. Therefore, any answer is meaningless. I can think of several possibilities:

1. X was the better debater -- better informed, all factual claims were accurate, more articulate, logically compelling arguments, and the like.

2. X had the sharp zingers that will dominate the news the next day.

3. X won more voters for his/her candidate than the other.

4. X was more personally engaging, made better contact with the audience.

5. I preferred candidate X for my own reasons.

6. A combination of some or all of the above.

7. None of the above.

Next question: Are we safer now than before 9-11? Adapt the above argument to this one, i. e., meaningless without definition.

Selah!

In Praise of Sarah Palin and all the Unqualified

I'll tell you, I am just sick and tired of hearing people say that Sarah Palin is not qualified to be Vice President. Of course, she is not, but so what?

There are millions and millions of people in this country, including myself, who are not qualified to be Vice President. The unqualified deserve to be represented just like everybody else. She is one of the unqualified, so who better to represent the unqualified than she?

On Getting Sick Enough to Vomit: The Discipline of a Good Depression

We all know that you feel better after you vomit, but nobody wants to get that sick.

It is horrible to think about it, and I feel guilty for even letting the idea surface. But I will proceed anyway. Would a serious economic depression be good for us in the long run? It might.

Could a good depression revive the prudence, discipline, and caution that the Great Depression reinforced in the generation represented by my parents and grandparents.? If so, America might be the better for it.

In recent decades we have developed some toxic cultural habits -- runaway consumerism, an unrestrained self-indulgent hedonism promoted by corporate advertising, disdain for delayed gratification, greed for bigger houses, cars, and the latest gadgets, a pattern of living beyond our means, a careless attitude toward debt aided and abetted by the easy availability of credit and credit cards, failure to consider the consequences of our reckless extravagance, and the like.

To revive an old phrase, the "Protestant ethic" has died. Even many of the churches that are growing rapidly are preaching a gospel of prosperity that a shocked Calvin would have abhorred. Paradoxically, it was the disciplined style of life that valued work and thrift as a divinely-approved virtues that helped generate the widespread prosperity subsequent generations enjoyed. In capitalism individual self-interest was supposed to produce universal welfare. Sadly we find in the current generation a bastardized form of culture that lacks the self-restraint and prudence of the stringent ethic of the past and retains only the desire and expectation of the unlimited possession of material goods in a life of self-indulgent gratification.

No, I don't wish another Great Depression on myself, my children, and grandchildren along with the whole lot of us. I just wish that we could recover the ethic strengthened by it for a generation badly in need of repentance and newness of life. But sometimes we need to get very sick before we can vomit and feel better.

Damnation by Designation: the "Bailout"

What's in a name? A heck of a lot.

The rescue plan that was defeated today was damned from the start once it became known as a "bailout of Wall Street by taxpayers." Of course, we all hate that.

But that's about all that got through apparently. The dire consequences of not rescuing the financial industry was only a echo of the original ear-splitting blast.

Once the idea of a bailout of Wall Street became the way most people thought about it, proponents failed to make the point that the "bailout" was the means. The end was to save us all -- Wall Street and Main Street. In the glare of a"bailout" of the very financial geniuses of Wall Street who caused it (forgetting about all the greedy people who foolishly bought houses and cars, etc., etc. etc., and got themselves into unsustainable debt) the little glimmer of light that failure to do so would sink us all never got into the public mind, despite all the warnings from all sides.

My understanding from the economists I trust is that while the rescue plan was badly constructed and probably not the best way to accomplish the objective -- saving the financial system -- it was better than doing nothing and was the bill before us.
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/09/30/where-will-the-money-come-from/

Once the serious consequences of a failure to get credit flowing again begins to hurt masses of people, maybe some constructive action will follow.

Now if only the politicians would stop trying to exploit the issue for partisan purposes, but, uh oh, I am dreaming again.

Quasi-Acerbic Oddities for the Day

I am now convinced that Bill Clinton wants Obama to lose, so Hillary can run in 2012. He is oozing with enthusiastic praise for McCain and Palin and damning Obama with "Oh, he's nice too" remarks. I take back the nice things I said about him after his Convention speech.

Sarah Palin is self-destructing. She has been knocked off her lofty perch, has lost confidence, and is giving 10th grade answers to simple questions, and looking like a simpleton. Can she recover? Maybe.

Sinister Scheme to Make McCain the Economic Savior

I smell a rat. I suspect that the mother of all Rovian plots is about to appear that will make McCain the brave hero who saves the nation from economic disaster just in time for him to make the debate tonight on foreign policy on which he already has an advantage.

It can take several paths. He scares the daylights out of House Republicans, convincing them that if that don't come to his aid right now, Obama will become president and appoint liberal judges to the Supreme Court, bring in a reign of government control, spend great sums on social programs, and so on. They agree to hold their nose and support a bi-partisan Rescue Package enabling the revised Paulson plan to pass.

McCain gets Democrats to accept enough of the House Republican modifications to persuade everybody to go along. Democrats will either have to accept the changes to get a deal, or they will have to refuse and take blame for the failure. Or Democrats can pass it on their own and risk ruin if the plan fails.

Combinations and variations of all the above or some new possibilities emerge -- all designed to make McCain the hero who rode into town and took charge.

It could be worked so that failure still looms until Obama leaves for Oxford. Then the McCain-engineered plan could be worked out and announced just as Obama begins his town hall meeting before the nation, thus stealing the spotlight from him.

I tell you that some nefarious scheme is underfoot to make McCain look good as the Great Leader and Obama to look weak and ineffectual in times of crisis -- more willing to hold a silly old debate than to save the nation from disaster. We have reports already that McCain was working the phones all night.

Can the Democrats spoil the conspiracy and save Obama's hide? Maybe. Am I paranoid? Maybe, but just because you are paranoid does not mean they are not after you.

If I am wrong, I will repent and confess my lack of faith. If I am right, I will not enjoy my prescient vision of Democrats once again blowing the presidency by being outsmarted by the forces of darkness.

Deep Thinker Palin or I Can't Believe She Really Said That

With thanks to Ruth Marcus of The Washington Post.

In a recent interview Sean Hannity of Fox News tossed Sarah Palin the following softball (slow pitch):

Hannity: What is our role as a country as it relates to national security?

Palin: Yes. That's a great question, and being an optimist I see our role in the world as one of being a force for good, and one of being the leader of the world when it comes to the values that -- it seems that just human kind embraces the values that -- encompass life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and that's just -- not just in America, that is in our world.

And America is in a position because we care for so many people to be able to lead and to be able to have a strong diplomacy and a strong military also at the same time to defend not only our freedoms, but to help these rising smaller democratic countries that are just -- you know, they're putting themselves on the map right now, and they're going to be looking to America as that leader.

We being used as a force for good is how I see our country.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com
/postpartisan/2008/09/palin_on_thin_ice.html

Gee, Sarah, I bet you made an A in that 6th grade civics class.
You what? You want to be a heartbeat away from being President of the United States.

Geography is Everything, Well Almost

I did the interactive electoral map at RealClear Politics and chose the states (blue) I thought Obama could put in his column and thus win the election.

The geographical elements were so strong that it reminded me of a previous blog in which I set forth a geographical theory of politics. It is so prescient and so brilliant (ha ha) that I dare to repeat it here.

Thursday, November 18, 2004

A Geographical Theory of Winning in 2008

Look at the electoral maps of 2000 and 2004. The geographical pattern is striking, allowing for minor exceptions. The blue Democratic states are the Northeast, the upper Midwest, and the states bordering the Pacific. The red Republican states are the Southeast, Southwest, lower Midwest, mountain and plains states. A pre-Civil War map showing free (blue) and slave (red) states and territories almost exactly matches the electoral map of 2004.

While electoral maps of many other years would not be this striking, a geographical factor is present, except in blowout years like 1936, 1972, and 1984. Look at it another way. Democrats won the large cities, while Republicans won the small towns and rural areas, with the suburbs split. Divisions are also noticeable with regard to income, education,, religion, race and ethnicity, age, marital status, and gender, but geography is relevant to many of these as well. Zip code is an important clue all by itself.

Since this is a blog and not a book, what can we learn from this? Geography is a useful clue to many other things -- history, economics, religion, and culture. The geography of the South, e. g., was conducive to cotton growing and therefore slavery, which has deeply affected its entire history. Geographical factors account in part for immigration patterns and the Protestant domination of the South.

Geography is a component of, if not clue to, how things worked out in other areas with regard to economics, culture, and religion. So what does this mean for 2008? Assuming that the situation will remain much like it is now in terms of red and blues states as is probable, ask how the blue states can be preserved for the Democrats while reaching out to enough other states that can be likely won to win the election. Some decisions are easy. Massachusetts is probably a safe bet if the Democrats don't do something crazy, but forget Utah for a while. Either Florida or Ohio is probably a must, remembering that a shift of only 70,000 votes in Ohio in 2004 would have given the victory to Kerry.

Looking toward 2008, Democrats live in tension between holding true to their values and getting elected. How to win without losing your soul -- that is the question. With Gov. Mark Warner of Virginia, we risk losing our soul. With Sen. Hillary Clinton, we risk losing the election. My sentimental favorites at the moment are John Edwards and Barack Obama, but time may question the wisdom of one or both. But to begin with candidates, issues, and values is to get the cart before the horse. We need to start with geographical, historical-cultural factors and make a structural analysis of where enough more votes can come from next time to enlarge the number of blue states. Then we can match messenger and message to that purpose.

Semi-Acerbic Oddities on a Night of Upset Tummy

Will somebody please explain to me the difference between "moral" and "ethical" when used together to speak of issues or problems. Thesis: one or the other should be dropped.

Time to retire the following terms: campaign trail, populist, Wall Street and Main Street, bailout

I would suggest the two words most needing retirement -- well and you know -- but, well, I am aware that, you know, that is impossible since it would paralyze most speakers.

Time to quit having the following on TV news shows: political strategists of all denomination -- Democratic, Republican, or whatever. They offer nothing valuable and are boring time fillers, a waste of time.

Politicians should be allowed to speak only when attached to a polygraph machine and after a shot of truth serum. Any lie detected should generate an electric shock in the _________ (fill in the blank).

Medical wonders occur every day. But remember, doctors don't do it alone. They do it with nurses.

No More Sexism Please

I think the sexism expressed in regard to Gov. Sarah Palin is terrible. Those who are guilty of it should be ashamed. An apology is owed to the Governor by those delegates at the Republican Convention who wore badges that said, "Hoosiers for the hot chick."

Some Interesting Sidelights: Obama and McCain

The more education you have, the more likely you are to be for Obama and the less likely to smoke.

The more you attend church, the more likely you are to be for McCain and the less likely to smoke.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/107110/Obamas-Support-Similar-Kerrys-2004.aspx

http://www.gallup.com/poll/28213/Latest-Gallup-Update-Shows-Cigarette-Smoking-Near-Historical-Lows.aspx

http://groups.google.com/group/alt.smokers/browse_thread/thread/e69d610277262e52

Reforming Washington: A Fact Check on Obama and McCain

Our presidential candidates have informed us that there is greed on Wall Stree. (GASP) and a need to reform financial markets in the light of recent events. Not to worry, they both promise to ride into town like Hopalong Cassidy in the old Westerns and clean the place up. Boy, are they gonna get those "malefactors of great wealth" (T. Roosevelt).

Flip-flopping McCain has even had a near deathbed conversion and is now in favor of regulation. A Republican advocating more regulation of big business (GASP)! Contrary to Reagan, whom he and the whole GOP adore, government, he admits, is not always the problem, sometimes it is the answer (GASP).

I think it is wonderful that help is on the way, no matter who wins. But in the interests of transparency (we all love that), I propose that they both publish lists of their largest contributors. Hint: some of them are Wall Stree financial giants (GASP). Obama's largest 2008 contributor is Goldman Sachs: $691+ thousand.

Check it out with The Center for Responsive Politics:

Obama
http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/contrib.php?cycle=2008&cid=N00009638

McCain
http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/contrib.php?id=N00006424&cycle2=2008

(GASP)

What? A Jail in Wasilla?

I was shocked to learn that there is a jail in Wasilla, Alaska, hometown of Sarah Palin. I knew other small towns had jails but Wasilla? Sure other small towns have people who gossip, commit crimes, use illegal drugs, have prejudices against various groups different from them, even teen age pregnancies without benefit of clergy. But Wasilla?

I was pastor of a church in a small town, went to school in another small town, lived in a another small town. But mostly I grew up in the country among farmers. I love small towns and rural areas. We all are sentimental and nostalgic about them. We know and appreciate their virtues. But they are made up of people who have faults just like people who live in cities.

But after hearing Sister Sarah, I thought Wasilla was different, not like that awful den of iniquity San Francisco.

You mean I need to check out stuff the Governor says? Can't anybody be trusted any more? After all, she comes from a small town, was even Mayor of one.

OK, this is another one for the choir, but heck we all like to gossip, even in small towns.