Fraternizing With the Sisters: The Meaninglessness of Party Lines at the Top

There are legitimate differences, not just in terms of policy, but also in terms of world view, between the core constituencies of the Republican and Democratic parties.  As you move up the ranks to the national committees, you find the narrower distinction between “left liberal” and “right liberal,” as ably adumbrated by Mark Richardson.

By the time you get to the very top, with the Bush and Clinton families, there is essentially no distinction at all.  You won’t get much clearer evidence of that than young Barbara Bush’s endorsement of Hillary Clinton for the next Democratic presidential nominee.    This comes on top of Barbara Bush Jr.’s involvement with the Clinton Global Initiative and Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move” group.

You’d think that there would be enough Republican organizations for Barbara Bush to be involved with, and that she might just show some loyalty to the party that nominated two members of her family.  Even if she didn’t feel any loyalty to the Republican party, she might at least be supportive of it in case Jeb Bush eventually decides to run for the presidency.  However, not even crass considerations like that appear able to sway her.

Subtitles for English-Speaking Americans on CNN: The Foreign Country Within the United States

Recently, Cable News Network (CNN) added subtitles to a news video on its website.  To my ears, the audio was clear and spoken in a common regional American accent.  To the ears of CNN and apparently its target audience, though, this particular variant on American English was like a foreign language that needed to be translated.

CNN regularly features hosts like Fareed Zakariah and Piers Morgan without subtitles.  I don’t have any trouble understanding them either, but they plainly don’t speak with American accents.

Having looked at a number of recent news videos on CNN’s website, I could only find one other case of Americans being subtitled in English; it was a video involving a private dispute between Anthony Weiner and one of his rivals.  In that case, the microphone was picking up a buzz of other voices in the room, and the subtitles did help with the clarity.

No such audio difficulty seems to exist on the report of the rodeo clown who mocked Obama over a public address system .  However, CNN seems to have misheard the announcer, reporting that the word “stomp” was used, when the second video on its print report page provides evidence that the word “smoke” was used instead.

If CNN is going to report on events in fly-over country, it should use locals who understand the culture.

Mark Steyn, Doug Saunders, and the Dinner Lady: Misconstruing Islam as a Genetic Trait

Mark Steyn looked at the demographic trends of Moslems in Europe in America Alone, and his ensuing predictions about Europe’s future were considered so alarming that he was hounded by the Canadian “Human Rights” apparatus.  Doug Saunder’s response, to both Steyn and other Islamosceptics, in The Myth of the Muslim Tide, conceded an important future role for Islam in Europe.

Both writers have lost sight of the fact that Islam, like any religion, is an ideology, not a genetic trait.  Thus, it is insufficient to look at the reproductive rate of the current adherents of an ideology in order to accurately predict the number of adherents in the future.

The American Whig party probably looked to have a good future circa 1840, but the fecundity of its women, whatever that rate may have been, was hopeless in saving it.

However, in Britain, there are signs that the establishment is even willing to enforce Islam and block the younger generations from moving away from their parent’s religion.   A school cafeteria worker was fired after mistakenly offering pork to a Moslem student, who accepted the meal and was preparing to eat it before the “headteacher” (headmaster?) moved in and confiscated it.  The whole incident was treated as though the student were allergic to pork and even a single bite might have proved lethal.

What about the student’s freedom to recognize that dietary laws against pork are based on an outdated taboo to avoid trichinosis and similar diseases?  What other ancient superstitions are the educational authorities going to enforce?

The best way to help Moslems integrate into Europe is to allow non-Moslems to explain frankly why we don’t agree with Islamic dogma, so that the Moslems can moderate their religious views or abandon them altogether.  By standing in the way of that natural process, the establishment is creating the potential for future conflict.

Dissent Gored at the Rodeo: Sensitivity Training Unmasked

The rodeo clown isn’t laughing now.  Admittedly, as political satire goes, the clown’s effort was juvenile, but even half-hearted political theater shouldn’t provoke this much outrage.  Isn’t being chased by a bull pretty much the “go to” stunt for the average rodeo clown?  Not to mention that not a Halloween goes by without people using masks of political figures.

Democratic party operatives persist in claiming that any criticism of Obama is racist.  What’s interesting about this case is how it demonstrates how political sensitivity training really is; it teaches you to be so sensitive to other people’s feelings that you are no longer allowed to have an opinion.

A better president than Obama would call for the clown’s lifetime ban to be lifted.

Inconsiderate: A Contract Law Parable

A farmer had a problem with trespassers coming on his property to eat his delicious berries, so he hired Congress Inc. to build a fence around the farm and provide guards.  Congress Inc. happily cashed the check and built a portion of the fence.  Because the guards were lackadaisical in their efforts, frequently not even showing up for work, the trespassing and illicit berry thefts continued.

The farmer was incensed and confronted Congress Inc.  “We made a deal that you would build a fence and provide security for my farm.  I paid good money for that.  Just what do you think you’re doing?”

Congress inc. replied, “We don’t like your tone, it sounds hateful.  Anyway, we’re willing to sign an additional deal with you.  We will go ahead and finish the fence and provide some guards who will actually show up and do their jobs.  In exchange, you will pay us an additional fee, drop any lawsuits against the trespassers you have caught (those cases make us look bad), and subsidize the education of Congress Inc.’s janitorial staff (so that we can continue to pay them less than minimum wage).”

The farmer grumbled, but signed the new deal.  A few months later, when Congress Inc.’s inaction made it plain that they weren’t going to keep their word, the farmer stopped all payments, and hired a lawyer, wanting to know if he could get out of at least the second contract.

The contract lawyer sat the farmer down, and said, “In contract law, we have something called consideration, meaning that for a contract to be valid, both sides have to receive some benefit.  It could be as little as $1, but it has to be something.  You were already promised a fence and guards in the first contract, so there’s no benefit to you from the second contract.  That second contract is simply invalid.”

Before any further legal action could be taken, however, Congress Inc. went bankrupt.

Long Life Expectancy for Both Democratic and Republican Parties

For the last few American national election cycles, pundits on the Sunday morning political shows have predicted the emergence of “one party rule,” favoring either the Democrats or the Republicans depending on the latest outcome.  So far, these prognostications have proved wrong, and I don’t anticipate one party eclipsing the other any more than I expect a final victor in the cola wars between Coke and Pepsi.

Look at the gubernatorial records of the reddest and bluest states, and you can find Republicans winning in California (Schwarzenegger) and Massachusetts (Romney), and Democrats winning in Georgia (Zell Miller) and Kentucky (Beshear).

Of course, partisans will argue that Zell Miller isn’t liberal on a lot of issues, and Schwarzenegger isn’t conservative on many issues, but this is exactly my point.  What the Republican and Democratic parties stand for is not fixed, and will shift in order to collect votes.

It is notoriously difficult to be successful at the national level in the United States in a third party.  Ralph Nader in his book Crashing the Party explains some of the practical problems.  The notion of a two-party system is so thoroughly ingrained in the American electoral landscape that in Washington one talks of being bipartisan, not nonpartisan as in other democracies.

The Bastardization of the Term “Racist”

The word “bastard” originally meant a person whose parents were not married to each other.  That status had serious social consequences, and so, as an epithet, it stung.

In recent years, however, “bastard” has lost the power to shock people, and it is openly used on American television.  To call someone a bastard is now a simple acknowledgment that you don’t like him.

The term “racist” is following the same trajectory.  Its proper meaning is the belief that one race is a superior to another.  On British Broadcasting Corporation shows, it is now commonplace to hear the accusation of being “racist against Moslems.”  When those so attacked reply, “What race is Islam?” there is no coherent response.  Indeed, Islam is not tied up with any notion of race, and finds adherents throughout the world from a large variety of ethnic groups.

A recent example can be found in a BBC public affairs show in which Tommy Robinson, the leader of a British movement against political Islam, was repeatedly denounced as a racist.  On BBC shows, at least, when someone accuses you of racism, he may as well just be calling you a bastard.

Especially in cases like Robinson’s, who is on the politically correct bandwagon in every way except for its embrace of Islam, it may make sense to react as though he is being called a bastard.  Namely, he should reject the term as “empty name-calling,” and not consistently stay on the defensive asking why he is considered a racist.  I think Robinson is most effective in this manner when he states that the woman has no content to her argument.

You can make a case, as with Godwin’s law, that the first person to accuse his opponent of being a racist has lost the argument.  Then the abusive use of the term will become an unwanted orphan in debates with any pretense of sophistication.

Ready to be Offended? It’s a Date

Today is Wednesday, August 7, 2013 A.D.  Are you offended yet? If not, your progressive credentials are in peril.

Don’t worry, we’ll soon sort out a pretense for being incensed.

Is it “Wednesday?”  The word is derived from a warlike Norse god.  That must be it, mustn’t it?  No, try again.

Is it “August?”  The origin of August is related to Caesar Augustus, the first emperor of the Roman Empire, who brought an end to the democratic Roman Republic through his dictatorship.  Is the thought of dictatorship offensive?  No, not if the progressives are doing the dictating.  Keep going.

What about the numbers in the date?  The progressives are working on it, but they haven’t yet invented a basis for outrage over numerals.

I guess it must be the “A.D.,” mustn’t it?  What does “A.D.” mean, anyway?  It’s an abbreviation for the Latin phrase traditionally translated as “in the year of our Lord.”  Aha! An obscure reference to Christianity!  Why, this must be eradicated at once – and so it is, in various museums and texts with the replacement abbreviation “CE.”

The progressives will tell you “CE” stands for Common Era, but I leave it to you to educate them that it really stands for “Christian Era.”  You see, you may explain, different cultures have different calendars, so there is no global standard to justify the term “Common Era.”  On the other hand, the epoch measured by “A.D.” was always intended to start with the birth of Jesus, the founder of Christianity – although the exact starting year is only approximate.

The progressives are always keen to educate you, so it is only fair that you should return the favor.

Watermelons for the Birds: Stereotyping is Essential to the Scientific Process

It is commonplace to hear progressives talk about their fight against stereotypes.  For example, a devout progressive in the United States is made uneasy by statements about blacks liking watermelons.  When presented with individual blacks who do like watermelons, the progressive immediately “educates” us to the effect that not all blacks are the same, and that we “shouldn’t stereotype.”

Arguing from the specific to the general, or induction, is critical to the scientific process.  The biologist sees several species with feathers that can fly, and many species without feathers that cannot fly, and from these facts deduces a general rule that feathers are connected to flight.  This turns out to be only partially true, because there are flightless birds, which nonetheless have feathers.

What progressive would complain about the statement that “birds can fly?”  Yet, this is plainly a stereotype that is not universally true.  Would the biologist’s understanding of the world be enhanced if he were dissuaded from using this helpful stereotype?  In the real world, there can be great value in statements that are usually but not always true, as long as you recognize the limitations.

Watermelon growers in a black area might perform market research to determine the amount of demand for their produce.  If they found that x% of the local population liked watermelons, then the proposition that (local) blacks enjoy watermelon would have a truth value of x% (using fuzzy logic).  If the value of x were sufficiently high, then a claim about local blacks liking watermelons would be a reasonable short-hand for the more precise statement.

Instead of becoming infuriated about stereotypes, progressives would do better to try to understand to what extent a stereotype is true.  When a stereotype is mostly true, to try to agitate against people believing the stereotype is to admit that reason itself has flown the coop.

Actually Correct: The Opposite of Politically Correct

Increasingly, I encounter progressives who embrace the label of “politically correct.” Britain has the expression of “political correctness gone mad,” suggesting that in limited doses it is reasonable.

As I discussed in an earlier post about the abuse of “phobias,” political correctness can be insidious indeed.  The terms it espouses are misleading at best, and at worst are blatantly dishonest. The question then becomes what opponents of political correctness are to call ourselves.

When the intent is to counter progressive hokum with facts, I suggest the term “actually correct,” or perhaps “factually correct.” This nicely suggests a sharp distinction between empiricist and polemicist.