South Dakota Politics

Obama In Aberdeen: What He Said

There is more to say about the Obama event in Aberdeen than about the Clinton event a couple weeks ago in Bath.  I will try to be as brief as possible, but get ready for a long post.  I got there later than Prof. Blanchard and consequently did not have as good a seat, therefore my pictures are from a distance.  It didn't help that I had bright stage lights pointed at me that screwed with the camera. 

Apparently the Obama people put the number of attendees at 2,200.  That's more than I would have guessed.  I thought it was more like 1,200, but I trust 2,200 is more accurate. 

The Obama people were better prepared than the Clintons.  They had more volunteers, some from out of state, and security was a breeze.  The volunteers were pretty young, with the young men unable to tuck in their shirts and those in neckties tugged at the unfamiliar piece of apparel.  I counted 31 people with laptops at the press table, far more than at the Clinton event. 

Burt Elliott and Jim Hundstad were there, even though I got a recorded call this morning from Rep. Elliott asking me to vote for Hillary Clinton. 

Obama was introduced by a local woman, Leslie Schnell, whose husband works for the school district.  She told us of the dire straights she and her husband are in, what with rising costs and stagnant wages.  She is a Republican who will be voting for Obama.  Obama, she said, has shown he can work with Republicans through his work with on the Ethics bill.  He will also take on the oil companies to bring relief at the pumps.  She then introduced Obama. 

The first thing to note is that he got the name of the city right.  He was at Mt. Rushmore yesterday, which he described as "cool."  He had a funny line, saying they couldn't put him up on Mt. Rushmore because there isn't enough granite for his big ears.  He also mentioned the support he's getting from Aberdeen's favorite son, Tom Daschle. 

Obama believes that there isn't time for him to "wait his turn" for the presidency.  There are important problems now.  He started his policy talk with the war in Iraq (an aside: unlike Hillary Clinton, Obama did not cater his talk to South Dakota issues, preferring it seems to go with the standard stump speech).  Obama seems to paint Afghanistan as the "good war," the one against the real perpetrators of 9-11, versus Iraq, a war that should have never been waged. 

He then turned to the economy.  Sounding a populist note, Obama said the economy is growing and corporate profits are up, but that middle-class wages have stagnated.  Ordinary folk are left behind as the cost of food, gas, etc., goes up. 

He claimed the schools are underfunded and teachers are underpaid. 

He stated that he is running because he has faith in the American people. We need to lift up, not tear down.  We need to stop heeding special interests.  We are tired of division; the divisions of race, religion and party. 

He said the Democratic will not be divided.  He praised Hillary Clinton as a quality candidate.  They will unite against the policies of George Bush and Dick Cheney.  John McCain is running for the third term of George Bush.  McCain accepts both Bush's economic and foreign policy, Obama claims.  He cites Scott McClellan as proof that George Bush hyped intelligence on Iraq.  When McCain attacks me as inexperienced, Obama said, don't forget that I was against the war from the beginning.  That shows he is qualified to be commander in chief.  He argued that Iraq distracted us from fighting Al Qaeda.  McCain will have us in Iraq indefinitely.

An aside: judging by the number of people who did not stand during standing ovations, about a third of the audience were not Obama supporters. 

He bashed McCain on the gas tax holiday proposal.  Here he mentioned when he was in "Grand Rapids" yesterday, but then corrected himself by saying Rapid City.  He argued that the oil companies will just pocket all the savings from the tax holiday.  His proposal is to close tax breaks on the oil companies and use that money to eliminate taxes on Social Security for those who make under $50,000 and he'd give $1,000 tax credit to middle-income earners and below.  The real way to fight fuel prices is by investing in alternative energy and increasing fuel efficiency standards. 

He then talked up his health plan.  It's complicated, so just go to his website.  He promised to have it enacted by the end of his first term. 

Quick hits.  We need to rebuild our infrastructure.  We need to make college affordable for everyone.  More money should be spent on early childhood education and we need to pay teachers more. No Child Left Behind should be "fixed." 

Obama spoke for 25 minutes and then took questions.  I will whip through the Q&A period.  The first question was on small business development.  The second question was about the media.  His answers on these questions were not all that notable.  The third was on the national debt.  Obama claimed that when George Bush took office the national debt was $5 trillion and is now $9 trillion.  Bush is no fiscal conservative.  To be fair, Obama said, after 9-11 we were going to have to spend more money.  But we didn't have to give tax cuts that went to the richest 1%.  We can balance the budget by ending the war in Iraq. Even if we use some of that savings to rebuild the military and help out vets, there will be money left over.  Obama touted "paygo," i.e., pay as you go.  If we are going to raise spending here, we need to cut it there. 

The next question was on education.  Obama said parents need to turn off the TV and video games.  Parents are the first teachers.  But, we need to pay teachers more.  He also advocated "billions" in new grants for professional development for teachers.  Obama bashed standardized testing and suggested we need to come up with other methods of assessment. 

The next question was on Latin America and then there was a question on the Pledge of Allegiance.  I will not comment on these matters except to mention that Obama is for keeping "under God" in the Pledge because that is part of our "common commitment" to our nation.  The seventh question was on juvenile justice. I will also skip this. The last question appeared to be a plant on alternative energy.  In the course of answering the question he mentioned we should have an Energy Corps like the Civilian Conservation Corps to bring energy alternatives to the nation. 

Obama concluded by saying he would not make promises he couldn't keep and would try to govern honestly. 

Obama Cuts Cord with Trinity United

Barack Obama resigned membership in Trinity United Church of Christ.  The news apparently broke just as he was flying into Aberdeen.  This is the political equivalent of a tonsillectomy: remove that part of yourself that keeps attracting infection.  It is unclear whether it will fix very much.  Esteemed fellow blogger Cory Heidelberger argued in response to the Argus Leader that Clinton was not more moderate than Obama. 

The Clintons' "moderation" is never a product of philosophy, only of pragmatic political ambition. Obama is as capable of sitting down with opponents and finding common ground as -- if not more so than -- Clinton.

It's hard to argue with that.  But the same is now manifestly true of Senator Obama to anyone but his true believers. Or at least we can narrow it down to three choices.  Offensive, wacky radicalism from the pulpit has now compelled Senator Obama to leave his church of twenty years.  Assuming that this radicalism did not suddenly appear out of nowhere, but has been a feature of the Church for much or all of that time, why is Obama resigning now?

1.  He really didn't notice it until it became a scandal.  This is his story.  If true, it means he is stupid.

2.  He noticed it, did not agree with it, but just went along, like a liberal at a family reunion in Georgia, who pretends to chuckle at a politically incorrect joke. 

3.  He agreed with the radicalism, but for Clintonian reasons is now pretending that it offends him. 

These categories are close to being logically exhaustive.  None are flattering to Obama.  The last is the most plausible, and the most alarming. 

Obama in Aberdeen

The Barack cometh, and I have seen him with mine own eyes.  For three bucks I'll send a blow up high resolution copy of this to Todd Epp, in a heart-shaped frame.

Good speech.  Cheery crowd.  I got there about ten minutes after the doors opened, and lucked out finding a single seat about four rows away.  Here is what I gather are the changes we can believe in:

1.  He will give us universal health care.
2.  He will balance the budget.
3.  He will give us a middle-class tax cut. 

Oh, and

4.  He always tells us exactly what he thinks,
5.  And doesn't make promises he can't keep.

Well now that we have that straight.

Barack Obama: A Crazed Mass Murdering Communist

Or so I suppose Scott Ehrisman would have us believe.  Here's a recent picture he produces on his site, a picture he calls "Che'Bama":

It's not clear whether this is a joke or if Mr. Ehrisman means it seriously.  I'll admit that Mr. Ehrisman's sense of humor is often lost on me.  There is no context other than the header "Join the Che'Bama Revolucion."  I take this to mean that Mr. Ehrisman wants to draw a positive comparison between Obama and Guevara, but one never knows. Is it possible that Mr. Erisman doesn't really know who Che Guevara was, just thinking of him as a cool radical from the past, a kind of Cuban Abbie Hoffman? 

Who was Che Guevara? From Jay Nordlinger's December 31, 2004 National Review article "Che Chic" (not available online).

The fog of time and the strength of anti–anti-Communism have obscured the real Che. Who was he? He was an Argentinian revolutionary who served as Castro’s primary thug. He was especially infamous for presiding over summary executions at La Cabaña, the fortress that was his abattoir. He liked to administer the coup de grâce, the bullet to the back of the neck. And he loved to parade people past El Paredón, the reddened wall against which so many innocents were killed. Furthermore, he established the labor-camp system in which countless citizens—dissidents, democrats, artists, homosexuals—would suffer and die. This is the Cuban gulag. A Cuban-American writer, Humberto Fontova, described Guevara as “a combination of Beria and Himmler.” Anthony Daniels once quipped, “The difference between [Guevara] and Pol Pot was that [the former] never studied in Paris.”

You can read more about Guevara here, here and here.  Some of these sites are cranky, but they get their facts right.  You can also check out the Black Book of Communism, as I would have if I hadn't left it in my office.

What is clear is that Guevara was a beast who enjoyed killing and imprisoning the those whose only crime was to oppose the Communist "revolucion" that some still find so trendy to promote. We have noted other associations of Obama with Guevara here and here.   The Guevara phenomenon represents a cult of personality where the glory of Che and his "revolucion" justifies all his crimes against humanity.  Killing and imprisoning your political opponents is justified if it is in the name of the socialist paradise.  If this is the argument of the Obama supporters, they'd better go back to the drawing board.

To be clear, I doubt Mr. Ehrisman endorses Guevara's crimes.  I suspect Mr. Ehrisman is ignorant of them.   

And Shut The Door On Your Way Out

Susan Sarandon says she'll leave the United States if John McCain wins the election.  Can she take Delmon Young with her? 

Al Qaeda Losing in Iraq and Beyond

Well, Al Qaeda seems to be losing badly, regardless of who gets the credit.  Two important articles have appeared in recent days that establish that conclusion.  One is in  The New Republic, the other in The New Yorker.  Both argue that Osama bin Laden has lost the Islamic world, and even the most militant parts of that world. 

The most commonly stated reason for this is that Al Qaeda has been much better at killing Muslims than at anything else.  The New Republic article opens with the case of one Noman Benotman, a leader of the militant Libyan Islamic Fighting Group. 

This past November, Benotman went public with his own criticism of Al Qaeda in an open letter to Zawahiri, absorbed and well-received, he says, by the jihadist leaders in Tripoli. In the letter, Benotman recalled his Kandahar warnings and called on Al Qaeda to end all operations in Arab countries and in the West. The citizens of Western countries were blameless and should not be the target of terrorist attacks, argued Benotman, his refined English accent, smart suit, trimmed beard, and easygoing demeanor making it hard to imagine that he was once on the front lines in Afghanistan.

Although Benotman's public rebuke of Al Qaeda went unnoticed in the United States, it received wide attention in the Arabic press. In repudiating Al Qaeda, Benotman was adding his voice to a rising tide of anger in the Islamic world toward Al Qaeda and its affiliates, whose victims since September 11 have mostly been fellow Muslims. Significantly, he was also joining a larger group of religious scholars, former fighters, and militants who had once had great influence over Al Qaeda's leaders, and who--alarmed by the targeting of civilians in the West, the senseless killings in Muslim countries, and Al Qaeda's barbaric tactics in Iraq--have turned against the organization, many just in the past year.

The New Yorker article begins with "Sayyid Imam al-Sharif, he was the former leader of the Egyptian terrorist group Al Jihad, and known to those in the underground mainly as Dr. Fadl."

Twenty years ago, he wrote two of the most important books in modern Islamist discourse; Al Qaeda used them to indoctrinate recruits and justify killing. Now Fadl was announcing a new book, rejecting Al Qaeda’s violence. “We are prohibited from committing aggression, even if the enemies of Islam do that,” Fadl wrote in his fax, which was sent from Tora Prison, in Egypt.

Well that looks like progress.  Imam met Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden’s chief lieutenant, when they were both teenagers.  Now they are denouncing one another over the internet.  Apparently, the Jihadists are splitting apart faster than Democrats. 

Of course a second and perhaps more effective reason that Al Qaeda is losing ground among militant Muslims is that losing on the ground in Iraq.  While they were busy alienating the Iraqi people, they were also curling up like plastic wrap on hot charcoal under the pressure of the American surge.  That military defeat has opened a space in which rethinking among Islamic militants is possible.  Let us hope that the space remains open, and the rethinking continues. 

Big Chips on Democratic Shoulders

The problem with identity politics, as I pointed out in my pastorgate 2 post, is that is generates an intolerance of almost any criticism.  Pastor Michael Pfleger interpreted Senator Clinton's very candidacy as an act of racist resentment against Obama.  What is wrong with this is not so much that it is unfair as that it makes it very difficult to honestly engage with any critic or opponent.  I remember a few years back when Native American mascots were a big issue.  Many people argued that such mascots were demeaning to Native Americans, and they surely had a point.  But when anyone attempted to argue the contrary, for any reason, the reply was always: "you just don't get it."  That effectively cut off all conversation.  How can you take someone's argument seriously if you know in advance that it arises out prejudice against yourself?

But it is not just the Obama camp that suffers from identity politics.  E. J. Dionne has a piece posted at RealClearPolitics entitled "Women Scorned." 

How much anger is there among women about how Hillary Clinton has been treated during this campaign? Some of the nation's leading female politicians will tell you: quite a lot.

"From the beginning, she's been treated very badly," says Therese Murray, the president of the Massachusetts Senate. "No woman would have run with Obama's resume. She wouldn't have been considered." But Clinton has been "demonized by the press and the talking heads. How do you get away with that?"

Dionne talks to a number of women politicians, all of whom feel that Senator Clinton has been treated unfairly by the media. 

"The anger is aimed much more at you all," said Lt. Gov. Elizabeth Roberts of Rhode Island. Added Murray: "Obama wouldn't have gotten to where he got today if it weren't for the bias of the male media -- no offense."

Apparently Ms. Ferraro's infamous gaffe was not just an idiosyncrasy.  This is all flagrant Pflegerism.  It is also nonsense.  Senators Obama and Clinton stand at the center of American politics right now.  One of them (surely the former) is going to be the Democratic nominee.  It's just plain goofy to argue that they have been treated unfairly. 

To be sure, they get unfair questions, and both race and sex enter in in all sorts of irrelevant ways.  But no candidate, regardless of sociological identity, can escape that in the current climate.  Therese Murray, the president of the Massachusetts Senate, tells Dionne that a reporter once asked what her lipstick color was.  Many of her supporters were offended. But for heaven's sake, candidate Bill Clinton was asked whether he wore boxers or briefs.

No doubt there are some who will not vote for Senator Obama because he is Black, or Clinton because she is a woman.  It is difficult to tell how significant this is.  It is easy to show that Obama's race and Clinton's sex have been powerful assets in the campaign.  There is nothing wrong with that because it is what politics is supposed to be about: building coalitions from a wide pallet of voters with lots of different reasons for supporting any candidate.  We may be rightly offended by the motives of some voters, but that's the thing about a liberal democracy: people get to vote for whom the please and for any damn reason they please. 

Both Clinton and Obama are really demanding special treatment.  They won't get it, and it is adolescent of them to expect it. 

Clinton Supporters Protesting DNC

Division in the ranks:

The Democratic presidential race is heading into a fractious end game as supporters of Hillary Rodham Clinton mobilize for a protest Saturday to demand that the party count two outlawed primaries that favored her.

Protesters planned to rally outside the Washington hotel where the party's rules committee will tackle the vexing question of how to punish Michigan and Florida without completely disenfranchising Democratic primary voters from those states.

At least several busloads of Clinton supporters were anticipated from Florida and perhaps scores of people from Michigan as well as demonstrators from various parts of the country. Barack Obama's campaign discouraged a counterprotest, although his supporters vied with Clinton backers for the limited public seats inside the meeting.

"South Dakota, the Last Competitive State"

With the South Dakota primary just four days away, the Wa Po says our state will be the final competitive contest since Puerto Rico and Montana (they predict) will be won by Clinton and Obama, respectively:

Looking for an upset in a state where key leaders have endorsed her opponent, Hillary Clinton is campaigning in three towns in South Dakota, echoing familiar themes of improving education, expanding health care and the importance of her staying in the race through the final primaries.

While referring by name to the men who she also described as "a friend of mine" (John McCain) and "my Democratic opponent" (Barack Obama), she spoke of them only to give her usual arguments: that she has more experience than Obama and that McCain would govern like President Bush.

"I believe it is important Montana and South Dakota get to have the last say in this important election," she told a crowd here at in this town in the western part of the state.

Although the primaries in Montana and South Dakota, both of which will be held Tuesday, will do little to change Obama's lead in the delegates in the Democratic race, South Dakota is the last competitive state. Clinton is heavily favored to win Sunday in Puerto Rico and Obama on Tuesday in Montana.

South Dakota is full of the white working-class voters who have flocked to Clinton's candidacy, but Obama has dominated in small, mostly Republican states such as Idaho and Wyoming. And he is backed by Sen. Tim Johnson and Rep. Stephanie Herseth, the two Democrats who are elected statewide, as well as former senate majority leader Tom Daschle and former Democratic presidential nominee George McGovern.

After finishing her two-day swing here, Clinton heads to Puerto Rico for the weekend ahead of the primary.

As Campaign Details Emerge, The Argus Leader Endorses Clinton

Here is some information about Bill Clinton's and Barack Obama's coming visits to northeast South Dakota:

                   President Bill Clinton will be in Webster Monday afternoon and Aberdeen Monday evening as he campaigns for his wife.

Both events are being called "Solutions for America" talks by the Hillary Clinton campaign. The rally in Webster begins at 3:30 p.m. at a site to be determined. In Aberdeen, Bill Clinton will speak at Graham Hall on the Campus of Northern State University at 5:30 p.m.

Clinton will host similar Monday events at 11 a.m. at the Milbank Visitor Center and 1:15 p.m. in Sisseton at 717 E. Pine St.

All of the events are free and open to the public. No tickets are needed.

Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton's rival for the Democratic presidential nomination, will visit Aberdeen Saturday. He is hosting a community town hall meeting at 5:30 p.m. at the Civic Arena. Tickets are needed and are available at his Aberdeen campaign office, 13 Second Ave. S.E., from 9 a.m. until 9 p.m. Friday.

Meanwhile, the Argus Leader has come out in favor of Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination:

But Clinton is the strongest Democratic  candidate for South Dakota.

Her mastery of complex policy detail is broad and deep, and her experience as a senator and former first lady matches that.

Measured against her opponent, Clinton is philosophically more moderate. That is likely a good thing for South Dakota.

Clinton's energy policy is forward thinking and wise. She advocates a broad federal research initiative to help solve our looming oil crisis. It's a plan that would join university researchers, private industry and individual inventors behind a common goal. (snip)

Her resilience and determination never should be questioned. She has met or overcome every challenge or roadblock in her way, and there have been many. Her determination to carry the nomination process through to its real conclusion has perhaps earned her a grudging respect from those who would never support her.

Clinton might not win this race. In fact, it's a long shot. But whatever some might say, the race is not over, and her name is on the ballot. Win or lose, she's also the best Democratic candidate for South Dakota.

More McClellan

Yesterday I blogged on Scott McClennan's "tell all" book about his time as Press Secretary in the Bush administration.  A couple good reviews are up.  Read Peggy Noonan's review.  She finds McClellan to be a poor spokesman for a message that needs to be spread.  While finding the book clunky, dull, and at times embarrassingly ignorant, Noonan opines that McClellan is on to something when he denounces the culture of the "permanent campaign."  Many moons ago I wrote on the permanent campaign, citing political scientists John Maltese and Joseph Pika to this end:

The problem with such tactics is that campaigning--by its very nature--is adversarial, while governing is--or at lest should be--largely collaborative.  As [Hugh] Heclo puts it, "campaigning is self-centered, and governing is group-centered."  When the permanent campaign becomes the predominant governing style, however, collaboration becomes difficult.  Not surprisingly, recent years have seen a breakdown of the elite bargaining community that used to collaborate to produce policy.

I suggested yesterday that Douglas Feith's book is likely a much sounder take on the Bush presidency.  Noonan agrees in her conclusion. 

What's needed now? More memoirs, more data, more information, more testimony. More serious books, like Doug Feith's. More "this is what I saw" and "this is what is true." Feed history.

As Paul Mirengoff writes, the media has ignored Feith's book while playing up the more controversial McClellan work.

McClellan’s book is a topic of intense discussion not just at the Post but at USA Today and the New York Times. The latter two organs have refused to report on Feith’s book (the Times turned down three separate stories by star reporter James Risen), and the Post has refused to review it. Yet, for reasons discussed below, there can be little question as to which book is more valuable when it comes to understanding why we went to war in Iraq and whether it made sense to do so. (snip)

Feith’s book stands in sharp contrast. First, unlike McClellan, Feith was at the center of the policy-making at issue. Second, his book provides detailed accounts of key meetings based on contemporaneous notes. And it includes more than 30 pages of original source material plus almost 90 pages of endnotes. Readers can thus determine for themselves whether the author is providing a reliable account or merely settling scores and/or trying to make a buck (Feith, by the way, is donating all proceeds from his book to help Iraq war veterans). Yet the MSM is breathless over McClellan’s book, while it continues studiously to ignore Feith's.

Obama To Iraq?

Barack Obama, after being called out by John McCain, is mulling a trip to Iraq.  He has, though, rejected McCain's suggestion that the two of them travel to Iraq together.  Reportedly Obama is afraid that McCain will beat him up and take his lunch money. 

"Franken's Porn Story"

When a candidate's name appears in the possessive form in front of "porn story," it can't be good news. 

Preachergate II: This Time It's A White Guy!

Bill Clinton had bimbo eruptions. Barack Obama, apparently, has pastor eruptions.  The latest is Catholic pastor Michael Pfleger, another Obama supporter who got a little carried away last Sunday as preached to Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago.  I am telling you that is some rockin' church.  You really have to watch the YouTube clip to appreciate this.  I got it from Powerline.  Here are samples of the transcript from Fox:

In it, Pfleger mocked Clinton for getting choked up on camera before the New Hampshire primary in January.

“When Hillary was crying … I really don’t believe it was put on. I really believe that she just always thought ‘This is mine. I’m Bill’s wife. I’m white. And this is mine’,” he said, shouting at times. “Then out of nowhere came, ‘Hey I’m Barack Obama’. And she said, ‘Oh damn! Where did you come from? I’m white! I’m entitled! There’s a black man stealing my show’!”

After that, he simulated Clinton crying and then said: “She wasn’t the only one crying. There was a whole lot of white people crying … I’m sorry. I don’t wanna get you in any more trouble. The live streaming just went out again.”

He also said at one point, “America has been raping people of color and America has to pay the price for the rape. “

Now I have to admit that I was suspicious of Ms. Clinton's tears.  I think that if a Clinton passes gas in range of a microphone, it was due to calculation. But I did consider the possibility that they were genuine.  She has been aiming at the White House for decades, and suddenly it seemed to be slipping away.  That would make me cry, if I had such ambitions.  But now I learn that Senator Clinton wasn't crying because she was getting beat.  She cried because she was getting beat by a Black man.  It was raw racism that poured out of her tear ducts.  She thought she was entitled to the nomination (that part is surely right).  But Pastor Pfleger thinks she felt entitled because she was White. 

This is utter nonsense.  I think the Clinton's are guilty of cynically using the race card in this election.  But the key word there is "cynically."  There is no reason to suspect that Senator Clinton was offended by the race of her competitor, and not by the fact that he was winning. 

Watching the tape, Pastor Pfleger strikes me as a text book case of what Norman Mailer called "the White Negro."  That's a White guy who wants to be cool, and thinks he can be cool by acting Black.  Pfleger does it a lot better than most.  He has mastered the style of Black preaching that we saw in the Jeremiah Wright clips.  But this kind of thing is always a conceit.  Can any well-educated and privileged White man really understand what it is like to be Black in America?  I doubt it.  Black American culture has been very powerful.  It has generated some of the most important of Americas gifts: blues and jazz, for example.  No wonder White guys want to be part of that cool. 

The most disturbing thing about this episode is that it reinforces the impression that the Trinity United Church of Christ, which Barack Obama attended for twenty years, is deeply committed to a gospel of victimology.  America is very bad place.  All White people are guilty of racism.  And if they do not agree with anything that Pastor Pfleger or Trinity United Church may believe, that is racism expressed.  So anyone who votes against Barack Obama in the primaries or in the general election, well, that's not choice, it's racism.  This is pathological. 

Pastor Pfleger forgot, in the heat of his sermon, that there were other people watching.  He let us see what he says when he thinks he is surrounded by right thinking people.  What does Obama think and say when the microphones are off?

Clinton in the Badlands

To add to Prof. Schaff's South Dakota primary roundup, I offer this New York Times story:  A Good Day in the Badlands

SDP's Super Scientific Election Poll

Longtime readers of SDP are aware of my highly scientific method of predicting local elections: I count yard signs.  If the primary were held today, I'd say Hillary has the Aberdeen area by some margin.  But this is before Obama comes to town in two days.  I just saw my first Obama signs today.  Stay tuned to SDP for further yard sign updates. 

Video of the Day

Rolling In The Stink

When walking through a field, my dog has the unfortunate habit of finding a dead critter and with great glee rolling around on the critter to ensure maximum transfer of stink onto her doggy person.  This image comes to mind as I read Dave Newquist's lapdog take on Scott McClellan's new book on McClellan's years working in the White House.  Mr. Newquist joins his fellow Bush haters in joyously rolling in the dead animal in order to savor the stink of the Bush carcass. 

If something confirms all of my prejudices, I am immediately skeptical and suspect a work of hackery.  Others, Barack Obama included, find something that confirms all of their prejudices and roll in it with total credulity. 

Maybe Scott McClellan is right on, and maybe not, but here are some reasons for incredulity.  First, Scott McClellan was not Press Secretary during the run up to the Iraq war.  He was not, as they say, in the loop.  Even as Press Secretary he was not involved in making policy.  It was just his job to promote it. 

Second, as many have pointed out, if McClellan was so disturbed by what was going on in the White House, why did he not quit?  All reports indicate that he was forced out, not that he left of his own accord. 

Third, George Bush made Scott McClellan who he is today.  Does it not seem like a dishonorable act to dump all over the man who gave you your career, especially while Bush is still in office?  Should that not give us pause?

Does not the fact that McClellan's book represents precisely the storyline and is being released at precisely the time guaranteed to get a bevy of media attention and sell scads of books give a cautious reader some reason to pause and consider his bona fides?

Relatedly, why are some so sure that Scott McClellan preaches the truth while Douglas Feith is so wrong?  Feith, by all accounts, is a serious, scholarly individual who has written a sober policy book about the Iraq war and his involvement as a member of the Bush team. Why does McClellan get splashed all over the news while Feith is relegated to the sidelines?  Feith (whose book I have not read but I have heard extensive interviews with him) presents a complex and detailed account of war decision and the plans for a post-war Iraq.  One possible explanation of the feeding frenzy over McClellan and the disregard of Feith is precisely that McClellan confirms a previously believed story line.  In other words, McClellan is right because he confirms our prejudices while Feith can be ignored because he challenges them.  And let's be honest.  McClellan's book is tabloid.  Feith's book is policy.  Which do you think will get more headlines?

To be sure, I'd be remiss if I rejected McClellan's account and bought into Feith's merely because of my own prejudices.  In particular, McClellan's charge that the Bush White House ran a "permanent campaign" strikes me as true, although I would add that on this matter the Bush administration is no different from the Clinton administration.  But I think those who roll in the stink like a dog in the field should ask themselves whether they are being told the truth or are they just being handed a dead animal that will sell books. 

    

Clinton V. Obama: A South Dakota Round-Up

Here's a round up of some of the information regarding the last ditch efforts of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama in South Dakota. 

Chet Brokaw has an AP piece on recent events.

The voters of South Dakota look a lot like those who have favored Hillary Rodham Clinton in presidential primaries this year, but her rival, front-runner Barack Obama, has plenty of friends in high places in this rural state.

Not quite the stone faces atop Mount Rushmore. But most Democrats who've won statewide elections, past and present, in predominantly Republican South Dakota have endorsed Obama. These include former Sens. George McGovern, himself the Democratic presidential nominee in 1972, and Tom Daschle, the ex-Senate majority leader, and both Democrats now in Congress, Sen. Tim Johnson and Rep. Stephanie Herseth-Sandlin. (snip)

The state is 88 percent white, consistently ranks last in the nation in annual average wages and has the eighth-largest percentage of residents older than 65. Clinton has handily won states with electorates like this, most recently Kentucky and West Virginia.

No independent polls have been released in recent weeks, and both campaigns call the South Dakota race close.

"It's really, really hard to tell which way it's going to go," said Elizabeth Smith, a political science professor at the University of South Dakota.

Via the Rapid City Journal, there is some disagreement in Democratic ranks as to whether party leaders should endorse candidates in a party primary.

State Democratic Chairman Jack Billion of Sioux Falls, National Committeeman Nick Nemec of Holabird and National Committeewoman Sharon Stroschein of Aberdeen have endorsed Obama. State Vice-Chairwoman Cheryl Chapman of Rapid City, who is also the Democratic Party's chairwoman in Pennington County, didn't endorse a candidate and won't say who she supports leading up to the June 3 primary vote.

"I just think it is important that party officers, whether it's at a county or state level, remain neutral in a primary process," said Chapman, whose husband, Malcom, is a Clinton supporter.

Finally, some details are emerging about Obama's trip to Aberdeen on Saturday:

Barack Obama will be in Aberdeen on Saturday. He will host a town hall meeting at 5:30 p.m. at the Civic Arena. Doors will open are 3:30 p.m.. Obama will take questions from the audience after his opening remarks. (snip)

The Obama event is free and open to the public. However tickets are required. Tickets can be picked up from 5 to 9 p.m. today and from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Friday at Obama's Aberdeen office, 12 Second Ave. S.E. 

Hillary's Right: She's a Victim

A victim not of sexism, but of a mad hatter nomination process.  Here is something from a note from Ms. Clinton to all the superdelegates, courtesy of RealClearPolitics: 

Recent polls and election results show a clear trend: I am ahead in states that have been critical to victory in the past two elections. From Ohio, to Pennsylvania, to West Virginia and beyond, the results of recent primaries in battleground states show that I have strong support from the regions and demographics Democrats need to take back the White House. I am also currently ahead of Senator McCain in Gallup national tracking polls, while Senator Obama is behind him. And nearly all independent analyses show that I am in a stronger position to win the Electoral College, primarily because I lead Senator McCain in Florida and Ohio. I've enclosed a detailed analysis of recent electoral and polling information, and I hope you will take some time to review it carefully.

In addition, when the primaries are finished, I expect to lead in the popular vote and in delegates earned through primaries. Ultimately, the point of our primary process is to pick our strongest nominee - the one who would be the best President and Commander in Chief, who has the greatest support from members of our party, and who is most likely to win in November. So I hope you will consider not just the strength of the coalition backing me, but also that more people will have cast their votes for me [my emphasis].

That is Ms. Clinton's case for the nomination.  Senator Clinton surely has a point.  Under a more rational nomination process, she would be the nominee.  Byron York makes this case in USA Today:

In the Texas primary on March 4, Clinton won by a margin of 100,000 votes out of 2.8 million cast. For that victory, Clinton was awarded 65 delegates, while Obama got 61. Then, on election night, according to the Texas Democratic Party, nearly 1 million Democrats — many of whom had already voted in that day's primary — gathered in party caucuses. We don't know how many came down on either side, but we know that more came out for Obama than for Clinton. For that, Obama was awarded 38 delegates to Clinton's 29. 

Put them together, and Obama left Texas with 99 delegates to Clinton's 94 — even though Clinton handily won the contest in which votes were actually counted.

In Idaho, about 21,000 Democrats gathered for caucuses. Obama won in a blowout by a margin of 13,000 votes. For that, he won 15 delegates to three for Clinton — a net gain of 12 delegates.

In New Jersey, Clinton won by a margin of 110,000 votes out of more than 1 million cast. For that, she won 59 delegates to Obama's 48 — a net gain of 11 delegates.

There must be some universe in which this system makes sense, but it isn't this universe.  Of course none of this will matter if Obama wins in November.  But what if he doesn't?  Senator Clinton looks like she believes she still has a chance, but I have been arguing that she is really working on Plan B.  Chris Cillizza at the Washington Post agrees with me:

Facing almost impossible odds in her quest to become the Democratic nominee for president, Hillary Rodham Clinton has started to cast the presidential race as a historical anomaly in which she is being badly mistreated.

In doing so, Clinton and her husband seem to be laying the groundwork -- whether unconsciously or consciously -- to go back to Democratic voters if Barack Obama comes up short in November with a very concise message: "Told you so."

Senator Clinton doesn't have to decide whether she has any chance this year, because her strategy is the same either way.  But she does have a point when she presents herself as a victim.  She is a victim of a party that cannot decide what it is trying to do. 

 

South Dakota's Really Smart Primary Date

Well, we considered doing what California did, which is to say, the dumb thing: moving our party primaries to early in the year.  But we didn't, and as a result you can't spit in the prairie wind without hitting someone from the Clinton Campaign.  Professor Schaff notes below that President Clinton will be spending a lot of time here this week.  By contrast the Californians, having gone late and uncelebrated for so long, moved their primary to February just in time for the first election when June became the hottest temporal real estate.  Great going!

I think we are now in the position to see what a good scheduling strategy would look like, from the point of view of a state that would like to sell a lot of hotel space and pork sandwiches to journalist and campaign personnel.  It would look like getting a hit in baseball: the trick is not to hit it here or there, but to "hit it where they ain't."  This year the best time to have a primary turned out to be last, because nearly everyone else tried to go first.  That might not be the way it is next time.  There's no point in trying to game the Republican schedule (assuming there is still a Republican Party next time).  The GOP system is well-designed to produce a nominee in an efficient manner.  The Democratic primary system is designed to avoid that. 

So long as the parties do not manage to come up with a rational, national schedule, such as SDP has long advocated, our state should wait as long as it can for the other states to schedule their primaries.  Then pick a spot on the calendar where nothing much is going on for a few weeks.  Looking at this year's schedule, and without the benefit of knowing that the Democratic contest would go on as long as it did, I would have had us share May 3rd with Guam.  If the contest were still going at that date, I think we would have gotten more than our usual share of attention.  Whoever wins Penn. would be trying to turn that into momentum, and the loser would be Hell bent to stop that momentum. 

If a lot of states tried the same strategy, it might be that a rational schedule would emerge spontaneously, as each state tried to find its place in the sun.  That's what us Darwinists call a "self-organizing system."  It's a lot to hope for, but if it should happen, I am taking credit. 

Bill Clinton Heading to South Dakota this Weekend

Argus Leader:

President Bill Clinton's will return to the state Friday, Saturday and Monday.
On Friday, he will attend campaign events in Spearfish, Mitchell, and Vermillion.

President Clinton will continue campaigning for Hillary on Saturday in Canton, North Sioux Falls, Dell Rapids, Flandreau, and Madison.

On Monday President Clinton will attend campaign events in Watertown, Milbank, Sisseton, Webster, Aberdeen, and Sioux Falls.

Additional details and sites will be announced later.

Also, Aaron Bruns comments on Clinton's hopes of doing well in Indian Country to boost her chances in the state.

Obama To South Dakota

U.S. Senator and Democratic Presidential candidate Barack Obama will campaign in several South Dakota locations including Sioux Falls area this weekend.  Obama will visit the Rapid City area and Aberdeen area on Saturday before stops in the Sioux Falls area and Mitchell area on Sunday.  Further details of the trip will be announced as they become available. 

Word is that Bill Clinton is coming to Aberdeen on Monday. 

Polls In South Dakota: Clinton vs. Obama

I understand that internal polls from the candidates are showing a dead heat here in South Dakota.  If anything, their polls are showing a slight lead for Hillary Clinton.  That may explain why she is spending so much time in the state. Apparently Obama is planning on making a return visit this weekend.  Let's hope he knows which city he's in this time.  One also notes that he has replaced his creepy (in my opinion) "we can change the world ad" with a much more conventional Tom Daschle ad. 

Herseth-Sandlin: "Show Me The Study"

Here is a video of Stephanie Herseth-Sandlin quizzing oil executives about fuel prices.  I take it this is from late March or early April.  I found the video here, and the post is dated April 3.  If you skip to about minute 3:40, you get Herseth-Sandlin asking the executives if they know of any "independent studies" linking subsidies for bio-fuels to an increase in food prices.

The oil execs didn't have much of an answer, but I do.  I have posted these before.  From the May/June 2007 edition of Foreign Affairs, University of Minnesota agricultural economists C. Ford Runge and Benjamin Senauer wrote "How Biofuels Could Starve The Poor."  Rep. Herseth-Sandlin asks if the executives know how much ethanol is pushing up the price of food.  We know that, too. 

Ethanol is to blame for some of the increase in the price of corn to $6 a bushel from $2 a bushel two years ago, according to a new study by University of Wisconsin agribusiness professor Randy Fortenberry and graduate student Hwanil Park.

The study looked at the rise in corn prices paid to farmers from September 2006 to December 2007. It found that 31 percent of the total price increase was related to ethanol production. The remainder was linked to a combination of other factors - increased demand for food from developing countries, the shrinking value of the dollar and commodities speculators.

A Clinton A Day

A member of the Clinton family will be in South Dakota every day until primary day (Tuesday). 

The Clinton campaign today announced that Hillary, President Clinton or Chelsea Clinton will combine to visit South Dakota every day leading up to the June 3 primary.

"The people of South Dakota have an important voice in picking who should be the next President and they deserve to see and hear from those of us who are seeking their support," Hillary said. "That is why Bill, Chelsea and I plan on returning as often as possible over the next seven days to present real solutions to the challenges families here face."

It's hard to say whether they are running this hard because they think they can win here or whether it is just a sad last gasp.   

The Delicate Delights of Delegate Calculations

RealClearPolitics reports that Barack Obama is 50 delegates away from the 2025 required for nomination.  When he reaches his magic number, does that mean that Senator Clinton will be forced to withdraw, and that our long national nightmare will be over?  Not so fast. 

RCP gives Obama 1976 delegates.  I can't resist pointing out that that designates the year in which Jimmy Carter was elected.  But that number is the sum of pledged delegates won in primaries and caucuses (1659) and superdelegates who have announced their choice (317).  Now the pledged delegates are more or less bound to vote for Obama; but the superdelegates can do whatever they please when they please, regardless of what they told CNN.  There is always the possibility, however remote, that Senator Clinton can persuade enough superdelegates to come over to her side.  That is what she is playing for, and I think this means that she is in it all the way to the convention floor. 

And the Clintons have an argument. 

"She is winning the general election today and he is not, according to all the evidence," Clinton said. "And I have never seen anything like it. I have never seen a candidate treated so disrespectfully just for running. Her only position was, "Look, if I lose I'll be a good team player. We will all try to win but let's let everybody vote and count every vote.'"

Clinton also strongly criticized the media, saying that ever since Iowa they have been against his wife, making him feel as though he was living in a "fun house."  As he concluded his thoughts on how this election has been handled, he again went back to the media's choice of coverage. 

"If you notice, there hasn't been a lot of publicity on these polls I just told you about," Clinton said. "It is the first time you've heard it? Why do you think that is? Why do you think?  Don't you think if the polls were the reverse and he was winning the electoral college against Sen. McCain and Hillary was losing it, it would be blasted on every television station? You would know it wouldn't you? It wouldn't be a little secret. And there is another Electoral College poll that I saw yesterday had her over 300 electoral votes, yeah. She will win the general election if you nominate her. They're just trying to make sure you don't."

It's nice to know that the Clintons finally know what it is like to be looking down the business end of a hostile press.  But Bill might well be right that Hillary, and not Barack, is the candidate who can win in November. 

It's hard to imagine how the Clintons can win this argument.  I have been arguing that they are really playing for 2012.  But that assumes that they grasp present realities.  I may have been assuming too much.

Hillary In SoDak, Again

She's in Kyle, SD tomorrow at 11:30 and in Rapid City, SD at Memorial Park at 4:00.

Daschle For VP?

We have spent some time considering the prospects of John Thune as John McCain's Vice-Presidential pick, we haven't dealt with the notion of Tom Daschle serving the same role for Barack Obama.  David Brooks does so today:

Obama will need a vice president who knows the millions of ways that power is exercised and subverted in Washington. He’ll need someone who can be a senior, authoritative presence in a cabinet that may range from Republican Senator Chuck Hagel to the labor leader Andy Stern. He’ll need someone who can supervise his young reformers and build transpartisan coalitions more effectively than Obama has as senator.

Sam Nunn and Tom Daschle seem to fit the bill. Nunn is one of those senior Democrats (like David Boren and Bob Kerrey) who left the Senate lamenting the dumbed-down nature of modern politics. Daschle was more partisan as majority leader, but he is still widely trusted and universally liked. As experienced legislators, both could take Obama’s lofty hopes and translate them into nitty-gritty action.

Daschle has obvious electoral weaknesses (he may deliver no states and was defeated for re-election).  Brooks encourages voters to consider not who would gain votes for the top of the ticket, but who would serve well in the office of Vice-President.  On those grounds Daschle is top tier. 

Obama Wins the Patriotic Zombie Vote

Barack Obama said this in New Mexico on Memorial Day:

On this Memorial Day, as our nation honors its unbroken line of fallen heroes -- and I see many of them in the audience here today -- our sense of patriotism is particularly strong.

So far, no one had interviewed any of the fallen heroes in the audience. 

Meditations on Memorial Day

Jon Schaff posts the words to the Battle Hymn of the Republic below.  It is a very fine example of its genre.  The ancient Athenians had lots of battle hymns, though I don't know if any survive.  We learn from Aristophanes' The Clouds that old men liked to hear them recited.  We don't have a lot of them in American political culture.  Our national anthem is the only other one I can think of off-hand.  Other patriotic songs (America the Beautiful, My Country Tis of Thee) remind us of the blessings and not of the iron and blood.  I am content with that, but the Battle Hymn and The Star Spangled Banner are very powerful songs, and are robust with civic piety. 

One reason we don't have a lot of such songs is indicated by the oddest feature of the Battle Hymn.  That is one militant Jesus in that song, brother.  That's Christ with Rambo make-up, ammo belts over both shoulders, and a blazing rifle in each hand.  The hymn also joins war and politics on the one hand, with religious fervor on the other.  Americans tend to be nervous about that sort of thing.  But then the Civil War was a very unusual war. 

Andrew Ferguson has a piece in the Wall Street Journal on the Lincoln Memorial.  As it happens, I posted a comment on this remarkable piece of civic architecture back in December 2006, in a series of friendly exchanges with David Newquist concerning Abraham Lincoln. 

Professor Newquist denies that his posts reflect hero worship.  I am not so embarrassed by that term.  In ancient times such a leader would be literally worshiped after his death.  I have stood before the Lincoln memorial, and I have to say that it looked a lot like a Roman temple.  Todd Epp was quite right to point out that Lincoln was a man and not without his flaws, and that it is no insult to Lincoln to recognize this.  We may be like the ancient Romans in some respects, but we are not ancient Romans.  Still, in Lincoln's case, a little hero worship is in order.

Ferguson's piece is worth reading in its entirety.  He takes issue with some churlish interpretations of the monument.  But he also points out something very important about the monument that distinguishes it from its ancient counterparts.

The statue that French produced is casually called an "icon." It's a double-edged cliché. We use it sometimes as a compliment, more often as a sly denigration, to describe figures of history who have been idealized into unreality -- stripped, as Mr. Thomas says, of all earthly imperfection.

Yet French worked hard to make his huge Lincoln a man and not a god. This is one rumpled icon. The imperfections are hard to miss. His hair is uncombed. His tie is askew. His hands betray a fidgety disposition, and his eyes aren't quite symmetrical. He's really, really big, but he's still a man.

Yes.  The Lincoln depicted is very much a human being.  But why is Lincoln so big?

The truth of the icon, the reason behind it, is there in the temple itself, in plain sight, not hidden or encoded or insinuated. It's found etched in the wall to the right of the statue, in the Gettysburg Address, in which Lincoln reminded his country that its potential for greatness lived in its founding proposition. And that's why the memorial is so large, so grand, so perfect in form and scale: It honors not just a man but a proposition -- an idea that no wised-up debunker can hope to deflate.

Worship of the dead is hardly unknown in Christianity.  But saints have only rarely been military heroes.  We do not visit the Lincoln Memorial in the hope that Lincoln can reach forth from the grave and intercede on our behalf, nor do we celebrate Memorial Day because we believe that our fallen men at arms can stir the wind behind our ships or terrify our enemies by night.  We remember our dead to remind ourselves of how lucky we are that others were willing to pay a heavy price for the liberties we have inherited.  My father and three uncles served in the Pacific in World War II.  One of them, my Uncle Bill, perished on Okinawa.  This has been a good day to remember him. 

Happy Memorial Day

Battle Hymn of the Republic

Mine eyes have seen the glory
Of the coming of the Lord;
He is trampling out the vintage
Where the grapes of wrath are stored;
He hath loosed the fateful lightning
Of His terrible swift sword;
His truth is marching on.

Chorus
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
His truth is marching on.

I have seen Him in the watchfires
Of a hundred circling camps
They have builded Him an altar
In the evening dews and damps;
I can read His righteous sentence
By the dim and flaring lamps;
His day is marching on.

Chorus
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
His truth is marching on.

I have read a fiery gospel writ
In burnished rows of steel:
"As ye deal with My contemners,
So with you My grace shall deal":
Let the Hero born of woman
Crush the serpent with His heel,
Since God is marching on.

Chorus
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
His truth is marching on.

He has sounded forth the trumpet
That shall never call retreat;
He is sifting out the hearts of men
Before His judgement seat;
Oh, be swift, my soul, to answer Him;
Be jubilant, my feet;
Our God is marching on.

Chorus
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
His truth is marching on.

In the beauty of the lilies
Christ was born across the sea,
With a glory in His bosom
That transfigures you and me;
As He died to make men holy,
Let us die to make men free;
While God is marching on.

Chorus
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
His truth is marching on.

Senator Clinton's Tenacity, Evaluated

Should we admire Senator Clinton for refusing to withdraw, even when her chances seem hopeless?  The best defense I have seen was published recently by Richard Cohen.  Here's the part where the pipes and drums are playing:

Let me suggest that pride, honor and a sort of unforgiving toughness are not male or female qualities. They are the qualities of leaders. It's hard to imagine Margaret Thatcher or Golda Meir or Indira Gandhi doing a Tammy Wynette -- standin' by their man. They might well have done so, but the reason we have a difficult time picturing such a thing is because they had leadership qualities that, whether male or female, suggest otherwise.

Hillary Clinton is now exhibiting those leadership qualities. In rejecting the chorus of demands that she get out of the race, she is acting as any leader would. Take a tour of statues throughout the world, and while you will find plenty of historical figures who lost battles, you will find none to "A Gracious Loser." As Vince Lombardi or Leo Durocher -- both famous for mythical statements about winning and losing -- could have told you, there is no such thing. You lose hard. You lose tough. You lose only when you are beat.

In the end, no one begrudges a bitter-ender. Robert E. Lee is not vilified because he fought on too long, wasting lives and all of it, mind you, in the cause of slavery. In Israel, Masada is venerated because the zealots held out and killed themselves rather than surrender. Thermopylae is not considered a defeat but a lesson to us all: Never give up!  This is precisely what Hillary Clinton is doing.

I think that is mostly well-said.  For all Senator Clinton's faults (and that is a long list), she did the hard work of politics in a republic.  She played on her fame as first lady, as well she should have done, to win a Senate seat and the defend it.  She played both the fame and the seat to win about half the votes in this year's Democratic nomination contest.  There is greatness in that, to be sure.

But Cohen is wrong to say that no one ever "begrudges a bitter-ender."  Ask a lot of Democrats what they think about Ralph Nader, without whom George W. would surely not have become President.  Nader split the Democratic Party during the general election.  Ms. Clinton will not do that, but only because the damage is already done.  By staying in so long, she has turned a potential split in her party into an actual one, with all the loose nerve ends dangling nation wide.  No one can know yet whether this will matter in November, but it surely might matter. 

Senator Clinton might have withdrawn much earlier, when it was clear that the math was against her.  She might have done so for the good of her party and, presumably, for the good of the Republic.  Maybe we would never have admired her for that in the way that Robert E. Lee is admired by many, but sometimes the heroic thing to do is precisely the thing that will not win immortal fame. I note that some of us admire Robert E. Lee most for his decision to surrender, when many a Johnny Reb wanted to fight on as guerrillas in the central highlands. 

Of course, the American Republic has rarely relied upon heroic actions at the level of Presidential leadership.  The job of Presidential candidates is to build coalitions, for that is the only way that the popular will can become effective.  The rough half of Democrats who supported Hillary Clinton probably think they have a right to half the say in the outcomes.  They won't get it. 

I have argued that Senator Clinton is playing for 2012.  That is a very doubtful game.  If Obama loses in November (and I am not predicting this), she will say: you should have nominated me.  But a lot of Democrats will look back on her tenacity as the thing that cost them victory.  Senator Clinton has earned her place in history.  I think she will never be President. 

Ann Leaves Dakota Women

My dear friend Anna has announced that she is departing from the Dakota Women blog, and the regional blogosphere. 

The other posters at Dakota Women have recently felt the need to distance themselves from my posts about the primary. I don't feel that any of them were unreasonable, but it's possible I could be wrong. With that in mind, I'm going to stop posting here and take a long break from the local blog world.

She has been trying to shake the Dakota dust off her feet for some time, and her reasons for this are all legitimate and not at all insulting to anyone who remains here.  But I, for one, am sorry to see her go.  I had the pleasure of meeting Anna, and the pleasure of engaging with her over many issues.  We disagree over a lot of things, and agree at least on a few.  But she is a genuinely decent person with a very sharp mind.  I hope she will keep in touch. 

Minnesota, Politics, and the Bloggers

New York Times:  Senate Race in Minnesota Shows Power of Bloggers

Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull: A Review

A couple days ago I linked to John Miller comparing the Indiana Jones films to the National Treasure films.  After taking in Indiana Jones and The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, I'd say that comparison is apt.  The latest chronicle of Jones is essentially National Treasure with archeology substituting for history.  The film is a rollicking good time, and despite an ending that I found downright silly, I can still recommend the film. 

The film opens in 1957 with rock-and-roll now king but with Indiana Jones still getting into trouble.  This time it is with Soviets who have kidnapped him and taken him to an installation in Nevada where the government hides some of its prized secrets (such as a certain ark important to the Hebrews).  They are looking for a particular artifact and they think Indy knows where it is.  Let's just say the artifact pertains to an occurrence at Roswell, NM.  They eventually get their object, but not Indy as he has escapes in the first of many chase scenes in the film.  It concludes with Indy surviving a nuclear blast.  Yes, you read that right.  Indy also finds out that his buddy Mac is an agent for the Russians (or is he?). 

Back at his nameless university, Indy meets up with young James Dean type Mutt, played well by Shia LaBeouf.  Mutt knows one of Jones' old colleagues, Prof. "Ox" Oxley, who has disappeared in South America while looking for a certain crystal skull.  Here is where the adventure really starts, and it will not surprise you to learn that the Russians, led by the evil Irina Spalko (played by Cate Blanchett), are after the same artifact. 

The rest of the film involves Mutt and Indy's quest to find the skull, elude the Russians, escape from the Russians (no surprise), and figure out what precisely are the powers of the crystal skull. This whole aspect of the film includes multiple chases and crawling through a number of creepy caves in Peru, which the Peruvians seem to have in abundance.  These are done well and with a lot of pluck. 

The film has its weaknesses.  If anything, it goes at breakneck speed and does not allow the audience to catch enough breathers.  And, frankly, I found the secret of the crystal skull pretty easy to figure out.  The film does re-introduce Karen Allen as Marion Ravenwood.  Unfortunately they do little with her other than have her squabble with Indiana like an old married couple. At one point they are harping at each other and both their Russian guard and Mutt tell them to shut up.  They were saying what the audience was thinking.  And while clearly this is the kind of film where you set your brain on numb, it was hard not to notice that a middle aged woman was achieving physical feats that would kill a man half her age.   There's suspension of disbelief and then there's "Oh, come on!" 

The film works better if you think of it as simply a live action cartoon.  If you slam Daffy Duck against a wall a dozen times, he gets up and walks away.  So does Indiana Jones.  There is actually a vignette where Mutt duels with Spalko, each on moving vehicles traveling side by side.  Eventually Mutt finds himself with feet on both vehicles straining to stay upright.  In fairly poor CGI, Mutt's legs get unusually long, one might even say cartoon-like.  At this point we are essentially in Loony Tunes land.   

(A digression: This film is one of a growing series of examples of how CGI gets in the way of good film making.  I don't know if the ease of it stops filmmakers from thinking or what, but frankly the action scenes from the 1981 Indiana Jones film are better and they couldn't even spell CGI.  This, in my opinion, is what got George Lucas in trouble in the more recent Star Wars films. Lucas, who executive produced Crystal Skull and helped with the story, seemingly spent excessive time in those Star Wars films with special effects to the detriment of story and script.  One could make the same accusation here, but with less detrimental effects.) 

Harrison Ford is as good as ever, still playing the daredevil, but with a recognition of age.  The film deals with this fairly well, acknowledging the Jones is now middle aged but allowing him to step out now and again.  The film is sillier than previous Indiana Jones films, but the silliness usually (but not always) works.  The actions scenes are exciting, if a bit cartoonish  (and the film sets some sort of record for number of characters jumping from one moving vehicle to another).  The real find here is Shia LaBeouf, who continues to excel.  He is one of the most watchable of all young actors. It is his character and the dominatrix-like Spalko who keep the movie fresh.  This is not because Indiana Jones himself is boring, but that he is a well-known character already. The film is cheeky and fun.  It certainly is the most lighthearted of all Indiana Jones films. 

The film is largely edifying, giving a message not unfamiliar in Indiana Jones movies, that the desire to know and control can be very dangerous.  The Spalko character claims to want to know everything, and this ends up being her comeuppance. Also, it's nice to see the Commies as bad guys, something not every filmmaker is willing to do.  At one point Spalko asks Indy if he as any last words and Indy responds, "I like Ike."  Could Indiana Jones be a Republican? 

Again, if viewers go in with the notion of seeing a cartoon, they will have a great time.  Don't take this film too seriously.  Clearly those who made it did not. 

The Weakness of Asian Buddhism and Asian Horror Movies

I haven't blogged much recently about Asian horror, one of my many interests, because I haven't had much to blog about.  I have seen most of the good Japanese, Korean, and Chinese movies that have been pushing their way into American remakes.  It looks as if that well may have run dry. 

I just watched a low-end sample of the genre: Shikoku (1999). It was very badly written; but it is almost redeemed by the performance of Yui Natsukawa, who is so damn good an actor that she can carry any weight.  She is also dreadfully beautiful, a kind of Japanese Cathrine Zeta-Jones.

The film did have some features that are worthy of thought.  One of them was the magic by which a woman manages to resurrect her drowned daughter.  Pilgrimages are common in Eastern religion as they are in Western Biblical traditions.  It's a great way to generate tourism, and it feeds into two archetypal ideas: that travel may redeem the traveler, and that certain actions (prayer, bowing) repeated enough times can change reality.  In this film, there is a tradition of making a pilgrimage around an Island, stopping at 80 or so temples.  At each stop, one's spiritual passport gets marked.  But here is the trick: pilgrims are supposed to go around the island counter-clockwise.  This is supposed to seal off the realm of the realm of the dead from our world.  The grieving woman completes the circuit sixteen times in the opposite direction.  You can guess what happens. 

The idea of the two realms is a relic of early religions in the West, largely eclipsed by Christianity, but it is still pretty near the surface in Asian drama.  In Shikoku, the tension between ancient mythography and modern life comes down to the conflict between a husband and wife over raising their daughter.  She wanted the daughter to continue the ancient family line of temple seers.  He wanted her to get a modern education.  She won. 

Lastly, this might be the first Asian horror movie I have seen in which Buddhism was so much as mentioned.  Taoist magic is prominent is several Japanese and Chinese films, but in this one it is a Buddhist priest who comes to the rescue and repairs the breach between worlds.  "I have always believed in the Buddhas, living and dead," he says as he shakes a stick at the demonic daughter.

I am guessing that Buddhist religion is very weak in China and Japan.  It survives, if barely, only because they have nothing else.  Asian horror seems to be in decline as well.  Its fans can only hope that Hollywood's recent appetite for translation will resurrect that ghost.  I surely hope so.  Horror movies are one of the most direct routes into the ancient history of the human heart. 

Clinton in Sioux Falls, the A word, & Decorum

Speaking today with the Argus Leader editorial board, Senator Clinton made the following remarks to explain why she is remaining in the Democratic race:

EB: You don’t buy the party unity argument?

I don’t, because again, I’ve been around long enough. You know my husband did not wrap up the nomination in 1992 until he won the California primary somewhere around the middle of June

EB: June

We all remember Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California. Um you know I just I don’t understand it. There’s lots of speculation about why it is.

Well, that made the national news!  It was obviously an enforced error, as the Senator has since felt compelled to issue an apology.  But why, exactly? 

Anna at Dakota Women, responding to Jon Schaff, comes to Senator Clinton's defense:

The point she was trying to make, Jon, was that primary contests have often gone through June in the past.  Nothing more, nothing less.

No.   Jon was certainly right than an argument was implied: I should stick around in case something happens to the front runner.  See Jon's post for reasons that the argument is weak. Anna points out that Senator Clinton made this argument before, and seems to think that the fact that it went unremarked upon then is proof that it was unobjectionable; hence the current attention is politically motivated.  Maybe, but the fact that she has said virtually the same thing twice reinforces the idea that she had something specific in mind.  She wasn't just speaking off the cuff. 

However, a weak, inexplicit argument does not amount to a gaffe.  Charles Krauthamer put his finger on why Senator Clinton's remark was suspect: it is simply very bad form to mention assassination in this context.  My friend and esteem Keloland colleague Todd Epp points this out, and then goes off the deep end himself:

I am absolutely shocked and disgusted by even a hint that assassination is on the table or a possibility in this campaign. Not only that, but she obviously feels entitled to the nomination should some idiot actually shoot and kill Sen. Obama.

So what if someone shoots Obama?  Seems to me the first place the investigation should start would be the Clinton Campaign.

That last part doesn't exactly help the situation. 

There is good reason why good taste does not allow that kind of comment, or Senator Clinton's mention of the possibility of assassination: a lot of bad things happen just because someone put a pernicious idea in the head of some unstable person.  Maintaining some level of decorum is not just a matter of avoiding offense.  It is much more serious than that.  But then the Clinton's have never had the slightest respect for decorum. 

 

Rep. Waters: Socialize the Oil Industry

Because, you know, government is so good at running things...

Clinton Raises Assassination Issue in Front of Argus Leader Editorial Board

On Drudge:

Senator Clinton's statement before the ARGUS LEADER editorial board was unfortunate and has no place in this campaign, said Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton...

SEE THE VIDEO...

NOW SAYS SHE REGRETS COMMENTS...

Hillary At Argus Leader: What if Obama is Assassinated

What to make of Hillary Clinton's use of the Bobby Kennedy assassination as a reason to stay in the race in a discussion with the Argus Leader editorial board?  I shall post the video below.  One reasonably draws the conclusion that she is arguing that, like in 1968, something might happen to the presumptive nominee, like an assassination, in which case the party will need a pinch hitter. 

One should think it obvious that this is a pretty weak argument.  First, it surely is irresponsible for Clinton to raise the assassination specter.  She is being condemned by the Obama camp, and rightly so. Second, the likelihood of assassination is so small that it is a tad desperate (in addition to irresponsible) for Clinton to raise the issue.  And let's even assume the worst.  Would the Democratic Party really feel limited to those still officially in the race as possible replacements?  Surely what we'd have is a convention decision, with Hillary Clinton being in a strong position whether she was officially in the race or not.  Any way you cut it, dumb move by Clinton.  Here the vid.

Hillary obama rfk
by dollarsandsense123

Update:

The Argus Leader’s Executive Editor Randell Beck issued the following statement today:
“The context of the question and answer with Sen. Clinton was whether her continued candidacy jeopardized party unity this close to the Democratic convention. Her reference to Mr. Kennedy's assassination appeared to focus on the timeline of his primary candidacy and not the assassination itself.”

Clean Cut Kid Pleads Guilty

Read all about it here. 

A former business manager of Hildebrand Tewes Consulting admitted in court this week that he stole from his former employer.

Chad Schuldt, 37, pleaded guilty Tuesday in Minnehaha County Circuit Court to two counts of grand theft.

He overpaid himself, issued cash advances and made unauthorized purchases on a company credit card, a police affidavit says, costing the firm nearly $200,000.

Under a plea deal, he will get five years of suspended prison time on one charge and could get up to 10 years on the other. A sentencing date has not been set.

The Dumbest Generation: Read This Book, If You Can

Mark Baerlein's The Dumbest Generation: How The Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes Our Future is one of the most rewarding reads I've had in some time.  Every educator and parent should read this book.  Many thanks to Joe Knippenberg who recommended the book a couple weeks ago at NLT.  Bauerlein, a professor of English at Emory University, successfully marshals evidence of the academic failures of our young and relates those failures to a phobia for books and love of "screen time" (computer, television or otherwise).  Bauerlein illustrates the consistent failure of technology to fulfill its promise in education by explaining how the very nature of the computer experience is conducive to providing information but not knowledge.  He concludes with a discussion of the betrayal of the young by older mentors who should be helping usher the young into adulthood by challenging their prejudices (as opposed to massaging them) and helping the young encounter the great tradition of ideas.

Bauerlein is aware of the challenge that he is simply an old fuddyduddy who hates what is new.  He eloquently rebuffs this notion by showing the facts of academic malfeasance and by making one of the most succinct and convincing arguments I have encountered for teaching great books. Bauerlein also discussed research that suggests that the very nature of "screen time" mitigates against any acquisition of knowledge.  For example, when using the internet for school research, students tend to "cut and paste" from web sites without ever really reading or thinking about the information they are presenting.  Bauerlein gives opposing views their due and proceeds to rebut them in a methodical manner with logic and solid evidence. 

One thing I learned from Bauerlein's book is that if I make this blog post too long no one will read it, so let me just sum up the argument.  Bauerlein begins by producing prodigious amounts of data of the various gaps in the knowledge of our young.  One can quibble here and there with the use of statistics, namely whether they have comparative value.  Compared to 50 years ago we educate a higher percentage of the population both in K-12 and certainly in college.  Therefore when you talk about students of the past you are talking about a different population make-up than we have today.  But the author also shows that in the last 25 years or so, when populations are fairly comparable, the drop off in performance is remarkable. 

Bauerlein is not just interested showing, once again, how little our students know.  His other point is that some make extravagant claims as to the promise of technology, but young peoples' experience of technology does not match.  Technology is not used by them to gain knowledge but to amuse themselves.  This use of technology reinforces a youth culture that is self-obsessed and unconcerned with the outside world.  While technology may have the promise of revealing a whole world of ideas, the young use it to chat, play games, and goof around.  This leaves students unable and unwilling to sit in quiet, read a book, concentrate on it, and think about it.  While the young today have unprecedented access to information, they do not have the skills to analyze the information intelligently, to put it into any context, and turn that information into knowledge.  This leaves young people ignorant creatures of prejudice, and, worse yet, solipsistic adolescent prejudice that they are never challenged to overcome.

Bauerlein writes:

[Screen time] conditions minds against quiet, concerted study, against imagination unassisted by visuals, against linear, sequential analysis of texts, against an idle afternoon with a detective story and nothing else. 

One of the book's strongest sections is where Bauerlein discusses the way in which language is acquired and used.  We tend to talk with a lesser vocabulary than we write, so those who don't read will develop a smaller vocabulary than those who do, and Bauerlein goes to some lengths to show the paucity of reading by our students.  Bauerlein makes the powerful point that most learning actually takes place out of school. So it isn't just what goes on in the schools, but the habits of leisure time that build the mind and prepare it for adulthood and citizenship. Bauerlein convicingly shows how the inability to read dampens one's ability to formulate one's own ideas and analyze the ideas of others.  And it must be stressed that Bauerlein shows that it is not just that we use computers badly, but the very nature of how people encounter computer screens (to say noting of the passivity of television) makes sound learning difficult. 

This post is already long enough that most will not make it this far.  So let me terminate with Bauerline's own conclusion.  Throughout the book Bauerlein shows that the young are not just ignorant; they are disengaged from the civitas.  As Jefferson would have predicted, a semi-literate, unaware population is not capable of self-government.  Unable (and unwilling) to assess complex arguments, incapable of analyzing phenomena in the light of history, the young are poor citizens who, like subjects, must defer to authority to tell them what to do and think.  They lack the capacity to question that authority. In short, they are unable to perform the tasks of the vigilant citizen Jefferson thought necessary to make free government possible.  Not only do the young have impoverished souls, they are poor citizens.  This does not bode well for the Republic. 

Oh, and Bauerlein provides copious evidence that "mobile computing" education is a complete waste of money.

Update: Joe gives us a link. 

Clinton's Chances in the Rushmore State

Dave Barry once wrote that the population of South Dakota is so small, anyone entering it automatically becomes a member of the State Legislature. At present, Senator Hillary Clinton is acquiring seniority. 

Jonathan Ellis reports in the Argus Leader that Senator Clinton will visit Brandon and Brookings tomorrow, and the Pine Ridge Reservation next week.  That last part is interesting.  The Clintons have cultivated good relationships with many minority groups.  They once had a lot of loyalty among African Americans, but that's long gone.  I am guessing that there is some residual loyalty among Native Americans, and that Senator Clinton will carry that demographic.   

If so, she stands a reasonable chance of winning the state.  There aren't any recent polls, or at least not any public ones.  The campaigns surely have their internal polls.  South Dakota is not easy to predict at this moment.  The state is hip-deep in hip-wader Democrats, just the kind of people that gave Ms. Clinton her gargantuan victories in West Virginia and Kentucky. 

On the other hand, lava-lamp liberals and over-educated professional types like Todd Epp make up a disproportionately large slice of the Democratic pie due to our small population.  They may yet help Obama prevent a defeat or at least a massive defeat. 

I wouldn't bet a dollar of my own money on June 3rd.  But if someone gave me a wad of cash to put down, I would put it on a Clinton victory.  I would also bet that Ms. Clinton is headed to the Convention floor.  Even if the delegate count goes over the magic number for Obama, she wants to make the case that she should be the nominee.  The Clinton campaign is not something that occurred to Bill and Hillary last year.  It is something they have been forging (think of Sauron at Mount Doom) since the first months of Bill's presidency.  Ms. Clinton wants to make the case that she is the one who could win in November.  Then she just has to hope that Obama loses. 

A win in South Dakota will be an upset in her favor, if due only to a very outdated poll.  A big win is what she is playing for.  Short of a catastrophic McCain collapse (which is surely possible), neither Democrat will carry South Dakota this November.  The 2012 presidential election has already begun. 

The Al Gore III Get Away Prius Carbon Footprint Question

My esteemed Keloland colleague Cory Heidelberger draws our attention to an interesting post by my pal Doug Wiken on the dubious environmental benefits of hybrid cars like the Prius. 

The June 2008 WIRED magazine page 153 suggest used vehicles might be better choices for lower carbon emissions than buying something like a new Prius because making a new Prius consumes 113 million Btus.  A single gallon of gasoline contains about 113,000 Btus, so "Toyota's green wonder guzzles the equivalent of 1000 gallons of gasoline before it moves one mile. But, buy something like an old Tercel or other vehicle that gets 35mpg and the Prius will have to go 100,000 miles before it catches up.

I understand the comparison here is the energy cost of producing a new Prius vs. buying a used vehicle, which is the kind of angle that usually doesn't get reported.  I have heard it said that we could save a lot of energy by getting all the gas-guzzlers off the road; but Wiken's point, based on WIRED, makes that look very doubtful. 

The above doesn't count against the Prius if one is determined to buy a new car.  But there are other considerations. What are the environmental consequences of producing the batteries that the hybrid vehicles require?  The total production and disposal costs have to be counted in order to decide what the polar bears would drive. 

All this might be eventually made up for by the hybrid's smaller environmental footprints while in operation.  But do they really have smaller footprints?  The London Times reports on a study by Auto Express that is throwing cold water on that claim. 

Cars promoted as eco-friendly were criticised yesterday for pumping out up to 56 per cent more carbon dioxide than the manufacturers claim.

Three models, including the Honda Civic hybrid, performed so badly in tests that their environmental claims were dismissed as a gimmick.

Apparently one car produced more carbon emissions than other non-hybrids using the same engine.  And then there is the kicker, from a comment on the Times article:

The only thing green about Hybrids is how much more of it you have to put out to buy and operate them. A recent article in a Toronto newspaper detailed that a Ford Escape SUV hybrid costs $14,145.00 more to own over 7 years than it's petrol brother. Even the Toyota Camery hybrid was $1298.00 more.  Buy a fuel efficient petrol/diesel car and spend the money you save vs the hybrid to plant trees. You'll do the planet a bigger favour.

The truth is that it's next to impossible to solve ecological problems this way.  The process of building, marketing, operating, and disposing of an automobile is just too complex for that.  The only reliable guide we have is the economic one.  Graham of Toronto is right: buy the car that meets your needs at the best price you can get.  Use the extra money to plant a few trees and buy a bicycle.  Buy the Prius only if what you are really in the market for is environmental chic. 

Why Isn't Obama Doing Better Among Caucasians?

Democratic Senator Jim Webb has an answer, via Professor Bainbridge:  "Virginia Senator Jim Webb speaks a truth that's supposed to remain unspoken and thus probably disqualifies himself as Barack Obama's running mate. . . . This statement isn't just going to get Webb in trouble with the non-black ethnic groups eligible for affirmative action, such as Asians, Native Hawaiians and Other Pacific Islanders, Hispanics, Native Americans and Alaska Natives, it's going to exacerbate the sexism debate roiling Democratic waters these days."

Also, the Obama/media axis gets stronger.

SDP Jazz Note: The Dean of Jazz

A question that's often raised when you tell people you're studying history is, "what can you do with a history degree?"  For one Columbia University history major, class of 1973, the answer was to be passionately informed about jazz.  Phil Schaap hosts "Bird Flight" on Columbia University's radio show WKRC and was profiled by the New Yorker this week, a tribute to his encyclopedic knowledge of jazz and unusual stories about many of jazz's greatest players.  It's a fun read and an interesting reflection on memory and forgetting, so be sure to check it out.

[cross posted at SDP Jazz Note]

Tim Johnson: Protecting America From Too Many Trees, School Kids, And Sick People

Here is Tim Johnson's press release on the passage of "the $165 billion supplemental appropriations bill to provide for our nation's service members and fund ongoing operations in Iraq and Afghanistan."  Included in this supplemental are:

Included in the bill is $400 million for the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act of 2000.The funding compensates local school districts for decreased revenue as a result of reduced timber production on public forest lands. Six counties in western South Dakota are receiving payments through the program, including Pennington, Custer, Lawrence, Meade, Fall River, and Harding.

 

The supplemental also contains a delay of several Medicaid rules proposed by the Bush administration.  If allowed to take effect, these rules would substantially reduce federal Medicaid funding to South Dakota. Senator Johnson has worked on several fronts to delay these rules and is pleased a delay is included in this legislation.  If enacted, this rule would cost South Dakota more than $7.4 million annually.

Can Sen. Johnson explain how supplementing school budgets for lost timber revenue and increasing Medicaid funding are related to providing "for our nation's service members" and "ongoing operations in Iraq and Afghanistan"?  He can't of course, because what he is really doing is buying our votes with our own money.  He also has cagily slipped these nuggets into a bill on defense spending because otherwise the president would probably not approve them.  Between legislation like this and the Farm Bill, we are really seeing politics as usual over the last week. 

The Theology Behind Obama's Church

The May 19, 2008 edition of National Review contains a cover story by Stanley Kurtz surveying the black liberation theology behind President Barack Obama's Trinity United Church of Christ.  Kurtz investigates the theology of James Cone, whose thought undergirds Trinity and has a devoted student in Trinity's recently retired pastor, Jeremiah Wright.  This story is not available online. 

In Kurtz's account, James Cone was highly influenced by Malcolm X's condemnation of Christianity as a "white man's religion."  How, then, could Cone, a Christian and disciple of Martin Luther King reconcile Christianity and authentic blackness?  The answer is a synthesis of Christianity and Marxist politics.  Cone sought:

an authentic Christianity, grounded in Jesus’s blackness, [that] would focus with full force on black liberation. Authentic Christianity would bring radical social
and political transformation and, if necessary, violent revolution in the here and
now.

Cone advocates revolution, violent if necessary, to throw off the rule of the oppressors.  Cone writes:

“There will be no peace in America until whites begin to hate their whiteness, asking from the depths of their being: ‘How can we become black?’”

(Note: In the piece Kurtz attributes this quote to Jeremiah Wright, but a little research and a look at the context seems to indicate that this is a typo and these are James Cone's words). 

Cone sees white America as throughly racist, arguing that black hatred of the white man is as justified as the Jews hatred of Germans and advancing the Lerone Bennett thesis that Abraham Lincoln was really a racist who did nothing to free slaves. 

As stated, the Marxist influence in Cone's work and in Trinity's theology is unmistakable.  Kurtz writes:

A scarcely concealed, Marxist-inspired indictment of American capitalism pervades contemporary “black-liberation theology.” Far from the mainstream, Trinity (and the relatively small band of other churches that share its worldview) sees itself as marginalized and radical, struggling in the face of an overwhelming rejection of its political theology by mainstream black churches.

And here is a James Cone quote:

“The black church cannot remain silent regarding socialism, because such silence will be interpreted by our Third World brothers and sisters as support for the capitalistic system, which exploits the poor all over this earth.” And: “We cannot continue to speak against racism without any reference to a radical change in the economic order. I do not think that racism can be eliminated as long as capitalism remains intact.”

The Cone/Wright thesis is that black America has made no advancement.  Indeed, any economic advancement of blacks is just a sign that blacks are buying into the white middle-class dream.  One wonders if Cone and Wright advance the notion unfortunately popular in some black circles that denigrates education as just a way of acting white. Here's Kurtz's summary.

At the heart of Cone’s and Wright’s refusals to enter the mainstream of American culture lies the ongoing conviction that, appearances to the contrary, nothing in American race relations has improved. No matter how different things look today, it’s all just a disguised form of slavery or holocaust. Cone’s original attempt to justify black hatred of whites by equating America with Nazi Germany was unconvincing, but the slavery/Holocaust
analogy lives on as the indispensable linchpin of black-liberation theology.

Barack Obama is a smart man.  It is inconceivable that he remained ignorant of the ideology behind his church for twenty years.  What is more likely is that President Obama joined the church specifically because of its ideology.  Is not this passage from Kurtz reminiscent of Obama's "I am confident that we can create a Kingdom right here on Earth" statement?

But what about Marxism’s rejection of God, and the claim that religion is the “opium of the people”? Cone concedes that white and black middle-class religion may stultify action, just as he conceded the soundness of Malcolm X’s attack on dreamy, heaven-in-the-hereafter faith.

Here is the basic theology/ideology of the next president of the United States.  Luckily he is also ambitious, so perhaps he will not govern according to this ideology.

BTW, the opening section of this video, which I have posted before, indicates that Obama is very familiar with Malcolm X and is happy to ape Malcolm's rhetoric. 

   

Farm Bill Follies

This is the Congress that couldn't legislate straight.  Apparently Congress sent the wrong Farm Bill to Bush for him to veto.  Therefore it was all invalid. 

The House overwhelmingly rejected President Bush's veto Wednesday of a $290 billion farm bill, but what should have been a stinging defeat for the president became an embarrassment for Democrats.

Only hours before the House's 316-108 vote, Bush had vetoed the five-year measure, saying it was too expensive and gave too much money to wealthy farmers when farm incomes are high. The Senate then was expected to follow suit quickly.

Action stalled, however, after the discovery that Congress had omitted a 34-page section of the bill when lawmakers sent the massive measure to the White House. That means Bush vetoed a different bill from the one Congress passed, leaving leaders scrambling to figure out whether it could become law.

Buried in this story is the true impulse to act quickly to resolve this problem:

The legislation includes election-year subsidies for farmers and food stamps for the poor - spending that lawmakers could promote when they are back in their districts over the Memorial Day weekend.