I caught the following discussion between two Irish Catholics–Pat Buchanan and Lawrence O'Donnell–about whether Notre Dame should grant an honorary degree to Barack Hussein O'Bama, 44th President of the United States of America. Buchanan says no, on account of O'Bama's position on the only two issues right wing Catholics seem to care enough about to make any kind of political stand: abortion and stem cell research. Ok, I'm probably wrong about that. I think they also care about gay marriage. You can watch the exchange at this link (I cannot figure out how to embed video–anyone?).
Tag Archives: Barack Obama
She blinded me with ethics
There's a certain laughable cluelessness about George Will. One can seriously wonder whether he really knows that most of his columns advance the shakiest and silliest of arguments. The same is not true of Charles Krauthammer, his arguments advance a fairly malicious brand of sophistry–in particular, the sophistry of wrongly or dishonestly (i.e., by distortion) claiming others guilty of sophistry. See for instance his column on Friday (cf., the greatest non sequitur ever foisted)
Today the topic is stem cells. Two things. Krauthammer is not incapable of making a reasonable argument, and the stem cell issue deserves to be approached with some amount of seriousness. Having said that, it seems that Krauthammer in his most recent column does not approach the issue very seriously. Here's the first bit of unseriousness:
I am not religious. I do not believe that personhood is conferred upon conception. But I also do not believe that a human embryo is the moral equivalent of a hangnail and deserves no more respect than an appendix. Moreover, given the protean power of embryonic manipulation, the temptation it presents to science and the well-recorded human propensity for evil even in the pursuit of good, lines must be drawn. I suggested the bright line prohibiting the deliberate creation of human embryos solely for the instrumental purpose of research — a clear violation of the categorical imperative not to make a human life (even if only a potential human life) a means rather than an end.
On this, Obama has nothing to say. He leaves it entirely to the scientists. This is more than moral abdication. It is acquiescence to the mystique of "science" and its inherent moral benevolence. How anyone as sophisticated as Obama can believe this within living memory of Mengele and Tuskegee and the fake (and coercive) South Korean stem cell research is hard to fathom.
The first part of the second paragraph is false in the sense that Obama does not leave the matter entirely to scientists. But the second part is a bit of ridiculous hyberbole of the slippery slope variety: if we leave the matter entirely to scientits (who are amoral!), we will get Joseph Mengele (that's a very swift violation of Godwin's law by the way). Here, for reference, is the relevant section of Obama's speech:
I can also promise that we will never undertake this research lightly. We will support it only when it is both scientifically worthy and responsibly conducted. We will develop strict guidelines, which we will rigorously enforce, because we cannot ever tolerate misuse or abuse. And we will ensure that our government never opens the door to the use of cloning for human reproduction. It is dangerous, profoundly wrong, and has no place in our society, or any society.
Moving on to the more malicious bits. Here's Krauthammer again:
That part of the ceremony, watched from the safe distance of my office, made me uneasy. The other part — the ostentatious issuance of a memorandum on "restoring scientific integrity to government decision-making" — would have made me walk out.
Restoring? The implication, of course, is that while Obama is guided solely by science, Bush was driven by dogma, ideology and politics.
It's not a stretch to suggest that the Bush administration had a particular disdain for science and scientists who disagreed with their policy agenda. See The Republican War on Science, 238ff, for why someone might plausibly assert such a thing about the Bush administration (so spare us the feigned shock please). But more specifically, the "implication" (that's a logic term) is not that Obama is guided soley (you'll see what he does with this in a moment) by science. That is an overly strong and decidedly uncharitable version of the claim Obama is making. Continuing:
What an outrage. Bush's nationally televised stem cell speech was the most morally serious address on medical ethics ever given by an American president. It was so scrupulous in presenting the best case for both his view and the contrary view that until the last few minutes, the listener had no idea where Bush would come out.
Obama's address was morally unserious in the extreme. It was populated, as his didactic discourses always are, with a forest of straw men. Such as his admonition that we must resist the "false choice between sound science and moral values." Yet, exactly 2 minutes and 12 seconds later he went on to declare that he would never open the door to the "use of cloning for human reproduction."
Does he not think that a cloned human would be of extraordinary scientific interest? And yet he banned it.
Is he so obtuse as not to see that he had just made a choice of ethics over science? Yet, unlike Bush, who painstakingly explained the balance of ethical and scientific goods he was trying to achieve, Obama did not even pretend to make the case why some practices are morally permissible and others not.
This is not just intellectual laziness. It is the moral arrogance of a man who continuously dismisses his critics as ideological while he is guided exclusively by pragmatism (in economics, social policy, foreign policy) and science in medical ethics.
Science has everything to say about what is possible. Science has nothing to say about what is permissible. Obama's pretense that he will "restore science to its rightful place" and make science, not ideology, dispositive in moral debates is yet more rhetorical sleight of hand — this time to abdicate decision-making and color his own ideological preferences as authentically "scientific."
No straw man has been identified, however: Obama has argued that the choice between the two is false, so naturally he does not choose between the two! (See the quote above). Besides, Obama obviously does not share (see quote above) Krauthammer's nihilistic conception of science, nor does he intend to allow such a science to exist or flourish on the federal dime. Obama has made it pretty clear that he thinks Bush's restrictions, however surprisingly or drammatically delivered, to be out of sync with where we are scientifically and ethically. Such an argument, outlined earlier in the speech, does not entail now that anything goes or that there is no moral basis for his view–that would be a falsely dichotomous understanding of ethics and a complete distortion of what Obama said. The weirdest thing about all of this is that Krauthammer seems to agree with Obama's position.
In any case, it is obvious that the issue of stem cell research is a morally intricate one–one that deserves more serious discussion than Krauthammer would allow.
The greatest non sequitur ever foisted
Charles Krauthammer, on Obama's speech of over a week ago:
The logic of Obama's address to Congress went like this:
"Our economy did not fall into decline overnight," he averred. Indeed, it all began before the housing crisis. What did we do wrong? We are paying for past sins in three principal areas: energy, health care and education — importing too much oil and not finding new sources of energy (as in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and the Outer Continental Shelf?), not reforming health care, and tolerating too many bad schools.
The "day of reckoning" has arrived. And because "it is only by understanding how we arrived at this moment that we'll be able to lift ourselves out of this predicament," Obama has come to redeem us with his far-seeing program of universal, heavily nationalized health care; a cap-and-trade tax on energy; and a major federalization of education with universal access to college as the goal.
Amazing. As an explanation of our current economic difficulties, this is total fantasy. As a cure for rapidly growing joblessness, a massive destruction of wealth, a deepening worldwide recession, this is perhaps the greatest non sequitur ever foisted upon the American people.
He said "logic" and "non sequitur," so we knew we were in for something good from the guy who thinks a slippery slope is a valid form of argumentation. And indeed we were. It seems that Krauthammer has just distorted what Obama said. Distorting what somebody says in order to knock down the distorted version of what they say is a non sequitur. To be specific, it's a straw man. Here's the quoted passage in context:
We will rebuild, we will recover, and the United States of America will emerge stronger than before.
The weight of this crisis will not determine the destiny of this nation. The answers to our problems don’t lie beyond our reach. They exist in our laboratories and universities; in our fields and our factories; in the imaginations of our entrepreneurs and the pride of the hardest-working people on Earth. Those qualities that have made America the greatest force of progress and prosperity in human history we still possess in ample measure. What is required now is for this country to pull together, confront boldly the challenges we face, and take responsibility for our future once more.
Now, if we’re honest with ourselves, we’ll admit that for too long, we have not always met these responsibilities – as a government or as a people. I say this not to lay blame or look backwards, but because it is only by understanding how we arrived at this moment that we’ll be able to lift ourselves out of this predicament.
The fact is, our economy did not fall into decline overnight. Nor did all of our problems begin when the housing market collapsed or the stock market sank. We have known for decades that our survival depends on finding new sources of energy. Yet we import more oil today than ever before. The cost of health care eats up more and more of our savings each year, yet we keep delaying reform. Our children will compete for jobs in a global economy that too many of our schools do not prepare them for. And though all these challenges went unsolved, we still managed to spend more money and pile up more debt, both as individuals and through our government, than ever before.
In other words, we have lived through an era where too often, short-term gains were prized over long-term prosperity; where we failed to look beyond the next payment, the next quarter, or the next election. A surplus became an excuse to transfer wealth to the wealthy instead of an opportunity to invest in our future. Regulations were gutted for the sake of a quick profit at the expense of a healthy market. People bought homes they knew they couldn’t afford from banks and lenders who pushed those bad loans anyway. And all the while, critical debates and difficult decisions were put off for some other time on some other day.
Obama has clearly distinguished between the declining economy and "all of our problems." In particular, the failing economy is just one of the problems we face. So he is not making, in other words, the non sequitur of the century or whatever, since that isn't even close to the "logic" of Obama's argument. Whatever the virtues or vices of Obama's proposals, they don't fail for this reason.
To return to the theme of facts and inference, Karauthammer's claim about Obama's argument does not fall within the realm of plausibility–no fair-minded editor could claim that he has accurately represented what Obama said in his summary. The Post really ought to have higher standards than this.
Argumentum ad Obamam
Today Michael Gerson argues that Obama's new politics is all hogwash because, get this because I'm not making this up, some anonymous and unnamed bloggers celebrated the earlier than expected firing of a political appointee. He writes:
But one major personnel error was made from malice. And it calls into question the depth and duration of President Obama's "new politics."
Interesting remark there at the end. More on that in a moment. But here's the evidence for the strikingly general claim that one should now question Obama's "new politics."
Then, the day after the inauguration, Dybul received a call asking him to submit his resignation and to leave by the end of the day. There was no chance to reassure demoralized staffers, or PEPFAR teams abroad, or the confused health ministers of other nations. The only people who seemed pleased were a few blogging extremists, one declaring, "Dybul Out: Thank you, Hillary!!!"
And following directly:
As in most political hit-and-run attacks, the perpetrator was not anxious to take credit. It seems unlikely to be Hillary Clinton herself — Dybul's ultimate boss at the State Department — who had not even been confirmed when Dybul received his call. But someone at State or the White House determined that sacrificing Dybul would appease a few vocal, liberal interest groups. One high-ranking Obama official admitted that the decision was "political."
It may be the case–but Gerson's evidence for the fairly strong claim that this was an "attack" made from "malice" and is completely non existent. He doesn't even try to argue that this had anything to do with Obama or any key Obama operative.
I think we might have stumbled upon a new fallacy–call it argumentum ad Obamam. Here's how it goes. Start from the premise that Obama is better than Jesus, then argue that any negative thing remotely linkable to him shows that he is not in fact the real Jesus after all–as omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent he would have stopped it!–and that maybe there is no Jesus, and that those who believed in Jesus were gullible fools, because all there exists there is evil.
Well, that's a load of crap, of course. Not because Obama is Jesus, but because only a nitwit like Gerson would expect him to be (disingenuously–I mean, Jesus, this guy worked for Bush for six solid years, anyone remember Iraq? Abu Ghraib?) in order to show that silly expectation no one would seriously have to be unfounded.
Opposition party
The other week I was going to post something about how Obama reads criticism closely and takes it seriously. This, I think, is a praiseworthy intellectual habit. Perhaps the following item, however, means that he is taking it too far:
Barack Obama took the next big step in his Republican charm offensive on Tuesday night, when he dined with several of the nation's most prominent conservative pundits.
The president-elect arrived at the Chevy Chase, Md., home of syndicated columnist George Will shortly after 6:30 p.m., according to a press pool report. Greeting him at the residence were other luminaries of the conservative commentariat, including the Weekly Standard's William Kristol, New York Times columnist David Brooks, and Charles Krauthammer of the Washington Post.
The odd-couple gathering led to speculation that Rush Limbaugh, who said that he was in D.C. for a "secret meeting," was also in attendance. "I'm just offering, a personal trip, nobody even has to know about this," the notorious and combative talk show host wrote on his website.
Alas, a source close to the transition confirms, Limbaugh was definitely not in attendance during the dinner affair — likely disappointing some in the conservative blogosphere, knowing full well the fury that would have caused among progressives.
Nevertheless, Obama's choice of dining partners seem likely to cause its fair share of hair-pulling and eye-rolling. As the pool reporter, Ken Bazinet of the New York Daily News, penned in his write up: "This is for real, folks. The bloggers are going to love this one."
Obama has pledged to be a uniter once in office. He's also said he is willing to take policy suggestions from any source, regardless of ideological affiliation, as long as they work. So far, he's living up to his word.
I wonder who did the cooking.
Ch-ch-ch-changes
So it turns out that my dear governor was everything everyone thought he would be. One local media person covering the current and hopefully soon to be former governor's long ago Congressional campaign, said that after talking to him, "you wanted to check your wallet and take a shower." Eugene Robinson feels the same way, more or less, that everyone does. Whether any of the charges are really justified will have to wait for trial, as it should. Nonetheless, Robinson, a member of the liberal media, has found a way to imagine Obama into the middle of this mess.
In handling questions about the arrest of Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich — for allegedly trying to sell President-elect Barack Obama's former Senate seat to the highest bidder — Obama has gone strictly by the book. His statements have been cautious and precise, careful not to get ahead of the facts or make declarations that might later have to be retracted.
For most politicians, that would be good enough. For Obama, who inspired the nation with a promise of "change we can believe in," it's not.
The scandal involves Obama in only the most tangential way, as far as anyone knows, and actually seems to cast him in a favorable light. But the longer he leaves obvious questions unanswered, the longer the president-elect will have to talk about the seamier side of Illinois politics rather than initiatives such as saving the U.S. auto industry or revamping health care.
By all accounts, Obama is a pretty careful guy. He's about to be inaugurated President of the United States, so he's justifiably careful about the legal implications of what he says. He's probably also knows that whatever he says will receive heavy amount of interpretation. Regardless, he has called upon his staff to reveal any contacts with Blagojevich, and he has asked the governor to resign from office. What more does Robinson want? What would constitute "change" in this circumstance? Robinson answers:
None of this is likely to hurt Obama in any material way or even dim the glow of his victory and upcoming inauguration. But maybe it can be a lesson. Real "change" would be throwing away the playbook and getting all the facts out now, rather than later.
That's pretty silly. And it's an impossibly stupid standard for "change." It's not unlike asking someone participating in a legal battle not to seek legal counsel–why, after all, would he need legal counsel if he's not guilty?
Foro Italico
The low cost of energy, federal subsidies in the form of expressways (but not public transportation) fueled (!) a migration of people out to that land of autonomy, low taxes, and self-sufficiency, the suburbs and exurbs. Now of course people have realized that those place are soul-crushingly monotonous places to spend one's days. David Brooks has also realized this. And the massive FDR-style infrastructure of the Obama administration should step up to remedy the situation. Nothing like small government conservatives! He writes:
People overshot the mark. They moved to the exurbs because they wanted space and order. But once there, they found that they were missing community and social bonds. So in the past years there has been a new trend. Meeting places are popping up across the suburban landscape.
Anyway, now for David Brooks's proposal for the Obama plan:
To take advantage of the growing desire for community, the Obama plan would have to do two things. First, it would have to create new transportation patterns. The old metro design was based on a hub-and-spoke system — a series of highways that converged on an urban core. But in an age of multiple downtown nodes and complicated travel routes, it’s better to have a complex web of roads and rail systems.
Second, the Obama stimulus plan could help localities create suburban town squares. Many communities are trying to build focal points. The stimulus plan could build charter schools, pre-K centers, national service centers and other such programs around new civic hubs.
That stuff sounds really like a state-driven urban renewal plan once undertaken by a guy named Benito. So much for Brooks' conservatives. The people moved out to the burbs, turned it into a nightmare of alienation, traffic, and high fuel prices (they'll be back folks) and now they need to be bailed out by Obama in a massive suburban investment plan. Why this? Well, the alternative is just too boring to contemplate:
But alas, there’s no evidence so far that the Obama infrastructure plan is attached to any larger social vision. In fact, there is a real danger that the plan will retard innovation and entrench the past.
In a stimulus plan, the first job is to get money out the door quickly. That means you avoid anything that might require planning and creativity. You avoid anything that might require careful implementation or novel approaches. The quickest thing to do is simply throw money at things that already exist.
Sure enough, the Obama stimulus plan, at least as it has been sketched out so far, is notable for its lack of creativity. Obama wants to put more computers in classrooms, an old idea with dubious educational merit. He also proposes a series of ideas that are good but not exactly transformational: refurbishing the existing power grid; fixing the oldest roads and bridges; repairing schools; and renovating existing government buildings to make them more energy efficient.
This is the federal version of “This Old House.” And this is before the stimulus money gets diverted, as it inevitably will, to refurbish old companies. The auto bailout could eventually swallow $125 billion. After that, it could be the airlines and so on.
It's so boring and uncreative to fix decaying infrastructure in an infrastructure investment plan! On my way to school this morning, I was bored to tears by the tedium of the mini lagoons of frozen dirty water festooning Bryn Mawr avenue, the sewers too aged to handle large but extremely common influxes of water. I'm also bored by the idea that the power grid cannot handle green power innovation–what would be cool is a street with cafes and bookstores on it in a far out suburb. Fixing this stuff shows a lack of creative vision.
The number of the beast
In addition to being a communist, a socialist, a professional politician who won a Presidential election on a center-right platform, Barack Obama might also be the Antichrist. Indeed, it's a serious question, Newsweek, after all, ran a story about it. This story included such gems as the following:
No wonder, then, that Obama triggers such fear in the hearts of America's millennialist Christians. Mat Staver, dean of Liberty University's law school, says he does not believe Obama is the Antichrist, but he can see how others might. Obama's own use of religious rhetoric belies his liberal positions on abortion and traditional marriage, Staver says, positions that "religious conservatives believe will threaten their freedom." The people who believe Obama is the Antichrist are perhaps jumping to conclusions, but they're not nuts: "They are expressing a concern and a fear that is widely shared," Staver says.
No. They're nuts. Completely nuts.
Via Digby and Political Animal.
Teenage Wasteland
Media bias resists simple quantification. First, it's not clear what "bias" means. In the case of a contest between two political candidates, it may mean (1) a tendency to measure people by differing standards; or (2) uncritically adopting or repeating the brand identity (Maverick!) of one candidate over another; (3) deliberately ignoring negative things about one candidate; (4) accentuating negative things about one candidate; (5) purposely going negative on one candidate in order to give the appearance of balance (click that link–it's astounding); (6) uncritically assuming background realities (American is a center right nation!) which favor one candidate over another. I suppose we could go on and on if we wanted to. But you probably get the idea. Second, bias necessarily implies some kind of content analysis, so counting articles as "negative" or "positive" or op-ed pieces as "laudatory" or "negative" just doesn't do anything to enlighten us about media bias.
So Debbie Howell, the bumbling Ombudsman (Oh Noes! I called her a name!), sums up the Post's "favoring" Obama in purely quantitative terms. One simply breaks articles into two groups: negative and positive. Then count. She writes:
The Post provided a lot of good campaign coverage, but readers have been consistently critical of the lack of probing issues coverage and what they saw as a tilt toward Democrat Barack Obama. My surveys, which ended on Election Day, show that they are right on both counts.
Ever notice that in discussions of media bias, the accuser catches the bias, but assumes others are not so acute? Anyway. Now the numbers:
My assistant, Jean Hwang, and I have been examining Post coverage since Nov. 11 last year on issues, voters, fundraising, the candidates' backgrounds and horse-race stories on tactics, strategy and consultants. We also have looked at photos and Page 1 stories since Obama captured the nomination June 4. Numbers don't tell you everything, but they give you a sense of The Post's priorities.
I would say they don't tell you anything. Not to belabor the point, here is an example of Howell's numerological analysis:
The op-ed page ran far more laudatory opinion pieces on Obama, 32, than on Sen. John McCain, 13. There were far more negative pieces (58) about McCain than there were about Obama (32), and Obama got the editorial board's endorsement. The Post has several conservative columnists, but not all were gung-ho about McCain.
Stories and photos about Obama in the news pages outnumbered those devoted to McCain. Post reporters, photographers and editors — like most of the national news media — found the candidacy of Obama, the first African American major-party nominee, more newsworthy and historic. Journalists love the new; McCain, 25 years older than Obama, was already well known and had more scars from his longer career in politics.
The number of Obama stories since Nov. 11 was 946, compared with McCain's 786. Both had hard-fought primary campaigns, but Obama's battle with Hillary Rodham Clinton was longer, and the numbers reflect that.
McCain clinched the GOP nomination on March 4, and Obama won his on June 4. From then to Election Day, the tally was Obama, 626 stories, and McCain, 584. Obama was on the front page 176 times, McCain, 144 times; 41 stories featured both.
Our survey results are comparable to figures for the national news media from a study by the Project for Excellence in Journalism. It found that from June 9, when Clinton dropped out of the race, until Nov. 2, 66 percent of the campaign stories were about Obama compared with 53 percent for McCain; some stories featured both. The project also calculated that in that time, 57 percent of the stories were about the horse race and 13 percent were about issues.
Counting from June 4, Obama was in 311 Post photos and McCain in 282. Obama led in most categories. Obama led 133 to 121 in pictures more than three columns wide, 178 to 161 in smaller pictures, and 164 to 133 in color photos. In black and white photos, the nominees were about even, with McCain at 149 and Obama at 147. On Page 1, they were even at 26 each. Post photo and news editors were surprised by my first count on Aug. 3, which showed a much wider disparity, and made a more conscious effort at balance afterward.
Some readers complain that coverage is too poll-driven. They're right, but it's not going to change. The Post's polling was on the mark, and in some cases ahead of the curve, in focusing on independent voters, racial attitudes, low-wage voters, the shift of African Americans' support from Clinton to Obama and the rising importance of economic issues. The Post and its polling partner ABC News include 50 to 60 issues questions in every survey instead of just horse-race questions, so public attitudes were plumbed as well.
Ok, that was long and rather silly. We don't know what those articles said and Powell doesn't seem to care much. But how would one remedy such evident bias in favor of Obama? Powell has an idea:
But Obama deserved tougher scrutiny than he got, especially of his undergraduate years, his start in Chicago and his relationship with Antoin "Tony" Rezko, who was convicted this year of influence-peddling in Chicago. The Post did nothing on Obama's acknowledged drug use as a teenager.
There's always next time.
They make dessert and call it peas
Today Michael Gerson writes of the "Decency of George W. Bush." The other day, in a similar vein, some jackass argued that George Bush's approval rating of the nation ought to be taken into account–the nation, the American people, have failed Bush. It wasn't Bush after all who lost an election in the popular vote and declared and acted as if he had a mandate, who stocked his cabinet with incompetent cronies, who ignored intelligence that could have prevented 9/11, who squandered the good will of the world on belligerent unilateralism, who invaded a country that had not attacked us with no plan for managing the war's inevitable aftermath, who ate cake with John McCain while New Orleans filled with water. No–all of that must have been the fault of the American people. Worse than that, all of these things must be the fault of Democrats:
Earlier this year, 12,000 people in San Francisco signed a petition in support of a proposition on a local ballot to rename an Oceanside sewage plant after George W. Bush. The proposition is only one example of the classless disrespect many Americans have shown the president.
AP
According to recent Gallup polls, the president's average approval rating is below 30% — down from his 90% approval in the wake of 9/11. Mr. Bush has endured relentless attacks from the left while facing abandonment from the right.
This is the price Mr. Bush is paying for trying to work with both Democrats and Republicans. During his 2004 victory speech, the president reached out to voters who supported his opponent, John Kerry, and said, "Today, I want to speak to every person who voted for my opponent. To make this nation stronger and better, I will need your support, and I will work to earn it. I will do all I can do to deserve your trust."
Not to put too fine of a point on it, but I can't get over how dumb that is. That is, I couldn't get over it until I read something even dumber. Here's Gerson:
Election Day 2008 must have been filled with rueful paradoxes for the sitting president. Iraq — the issue that dominated George W. Bush's presidency for 5 1/2 bitter, controversial years — is on the verge of a miraculous peace. And yet this accomplishment did little to revive Bush's political standing — or to prevent his party from relegating him to a silent role.
The achievement is historic. In 2006, Iraq had descended into a sectarian killing spree that seemed likely to stop only when the supply of victims was exhausted. Showing Truman-like stubbornness, Bush pushed to escalate a war that most Americans — and some at the Pentagon — had already mentally abandoned.
Perhaps Gerson has forgotten–after all, he was just the speechwriter for Bush before and during the Iraq war–that Bush waged the unnecessary (in the sense that all of the justifications offered have turned out not to have been legitimate) war of choice which thrust Iraq into the situation it is now. It's Bush's mess. One he will leave to his successor, President Barack Obama.