So Soon No More

Somebody made an oopsie!

2008-09-05T08:30:00.000-04:00

From TGPW:

"Honestly, I've never paid that much attention to Michelle Obama. Just
what little I've seen of her and Senator Obama, is that they're a
member of an elitist class... that thinks that they're uppity."

-- Rep. Lynn Westmoreland (R-GA), quoted by CQ Politics.

'

Ok so this guy isn't a prominent Republican, but he's trying out a few attacks.
We've got the mention of elitism, which is apparently standard and doesn't seem to be that effective against Obama. We've got the dismissal of Mrs. Obama, which is also standard and doesn't seem that effective either.

And then we've got that one word: uppity.

All right then. I don't pretend to know what's going on inside Rep. Wesmoreland's mind, but when confronted with a mental picture of a black woman he would like to see politically defeated, he reaches for the word 'uppity.'

There are two groups of people the word 'uppity' applies to:

African-Americans who don't "know their place"
Women who don't "know their place"

This is what I'd call a political 'oopsie'. It probably won't get wide coverage, but let's be honest - it's not a very common word except in the above contexts. I don't want to argue about whether it's racist or sexist or not. I don't want to argue about whether those features are endemic to Republicans or not (for what it's worth, a large amount of liberal criticism of Palin is transparently sexist: I've heard her called a 'traitor' to her female-ness because she's pro-life). I would hope that Rep. Westmoreland sees he spoke loosely.

[Someday I will give a formal definition of the 'oopsie,' which I plan to make a political neologism just like 'truthiness]

Because I haven't been able to post anything substantial on the VPs

2008-09-04T16:53:00.000-04:00

The following humorous anagrams are taken from The Volokh Conspiracy:

Who's the real secret Muslim in the race?

SHARIA PLAN

Who's most desperate to win?

I NEED JOB

As for Palin, who is more of a 'surprise' than Biden was, her rollout isn't working exactly as her party hoped. Sure she's got the Republicans excited, but when anybody unknown comes suddenly into the public eye there's a huge info-dump. Unfortunately, Palin's info-dump has made the McCain campaign seem...tabloid-friendly.

So all right, McCain picks someone his base loves, and it probably picks him up a couple points among women. But then it also kinda makes his campaign NOT seem like the 'safe' thing anymore. I have no idea whatsoever if this will benefit McCain in the long run.

Polls on RCP show a post-convention, pre-Palin Obama leading in Ohio and Florida. If he wins either, the race is effectively over. There's still room for McCain, but head-to-heads put Obama between 49-51% support. While the Republican convention will probably give McCain some support, will it really drain support from Obama? If he's winning more than half of voters it means that McCain would have to rely on turnout to win the election. The way I see it, the Democrats are the ones with the new turnout advantage in this election.

And let's not forget Barr and Nader. Nader polls at 1-4%. That's bullshit. There's no way that a guy who got .4% last time he ran will do twice to ten times as well in this election, where the nominee is more exciting to vote for than Gore or Kerry was. Barr gets 1-5%, and I think he'll get about 1-2%, basically getting .5% in the coastal areas outside the South and maybe up to 5% in the Midwest. I have no idea how Nader polls so high, but it is literally impossible for him to do as well as he's polling. More people might vote for nearly-crazy-"I'm so entitled I can hit police officers and disregard regulations" Cynthia McKinney, who's the real Green Party nominee this year.

SHAWCO

2008-08-27T15:05:00.000-04:00

[ed: Pictures are sort of working now, this is a re-post.]
\
This is the school building where I've been teaching a group of 8th Graders in Math and English. It's located in Khayelitsha, South Africa. The kids who attend are all native speakers of Xhosa.

I'm working with SHAWCO, through the University of Cape Town. It's a student-run organization for volunteering.

These are a few of the students. You guys will recognize yourselves - leave a comment.

This is hilarious: fun with senate candidates!

2008-08-25T13:28:00.001-04:00

Do you know who this is? This is the woman who was running as the Republican candidate for Joe Biden's senate seat. Her name is Christine O'Donnell. She was going to lose so badly that no one even bothered to do a poll for the race.

Now Biden is VP and the Democrats must find someone who can run in his place to maintain the seat. While it's not likely, there's the off chance that this new person will collapse under the weight of gaffes or scandals or some other unforeseen consequence.

While it's likely that O'Donnell's senate career will end before it has begun, it would be a hilarious bit of political drama worthy of the attempted spin-off of the West Wing if O'Donnell managed to make her way to the senate. At least if she doesn't appear to be a politician, she's not as unsettling as:

Bob Kelleher, Republican candidate for Montana, who loves his kerchief.

This man's name is Bob Tingle. Tingle. Would you, as a voter, let him tingle you?[Republican challenger for Rhode Island]

Scott Kleeb, Democratic challenger for Nebraska. Since when did they start casting former stars of Dawson's Creek for unwinnable seats?

Tom Udall, Democratic challenger and likely winner of New Mexico's open seat, a Nicholas Cage look-alike who thinks that the best photos are always taken in front of pseudo-picturesque mountainscapes.

Black is white, up is down, Francis Fukuyama...isn't a Neocon?

2008-08-15T14:54:00.001-04:00

What is going on in this world? An OG of Neocon theory (possibly partnered with Samuel Huntington for this title) and author of a book titled "The End of History and the Last Man," a very 1990s democracy/triumphalism/USA-as-world-police idea, has written, in the Wall Street Journal:

"Iraq may be stable but the war was a mistake"

Fukuyama seems to be good with provocative titles, but his op-ed is nuanced. Here's the money quote, coming from such a respectable voice supposedly in the community of war-supporters:

By invading Iraq in the manner it did, the U.S.
exacerbated all of the threats it faced prior to 2003. Recruitment into
terrorist cells shot up all over the world. North Korea and Iran
accelerated their development of nuclear weapons.
Indeed, Iran has emerged as the dominant regional power in the Persian Gulf once the U.S. removed its major rival from the scene...

Ouch! Those fight-em-over-there-so-we-don't-have-to-fight-em-over-here war supporters must be hurting.

Creepiest drawing of Obama ever...

2008-07-24T07:19:00.001-04:00

Apparently it's a big worry in Arabic-language media that the US is run/controlled by Jews. No matter what you think of that idea, it cannot excuse the terrifying thing you see above you, where a disoriented and seemingly underaged Obama emerges from the marsupial-like space in the back of Israel's ill-fitting jeans.

If McCain has to fight everywhere, he will lose

2008-07-16T10:49:00.001-04:00

The advantage in the coming election is with Obama. If it comes down to undecided voters who don't know who to pick three days before the election, Obama will win. This is a time when Americans seem to want an opportunity to reject Bush's legacy, and in a pinch McCain is too similar. That doesn't mean McCain can't win, but it makes things hard.

In the past, Republicans and Democrats have been able to rely on certain "safe" states - Northeast and California for Dems, the South and West for the GOP. When the other party can break these blocs, they win the election.

But this election is slightly different. The same trends are evident - Louisiana won't go for Obama any more than New York will vote McCain. But a few of the more marginal Republican states are being pried away from McCain.

All in all, the only tossup territory McCain's actually secured is Florida. I thought it might be up for grabs, but now I predict it will go for McCain, narrowly but solidly. McCain also puts up a great fight in Indiana, Missouri and Ohio, and possibly in New Jersey. But besides New Jersey, all these states have been Republican once or twice in the last two elections. Bush won Indiana (11 electoral votes) by 15 points and 20 points. Now Obama is even or ahead there. However, these states could still go for McCain if he made a powerful push there and really succeeded. If this happened, he could win.

But another factor will prevent him from being able to make that push. Solidly Republican states from all over the map are being seduced by Obama. Polls have shown the following Republican states within striking distance for Obama: Alaska, Montana, Virginia, North Dakota, South Dakota, Georgia, Nevada, Colorado, New Mexico. Honestly, that's a lot of states to hold onto while still making a big push in Ohio.

I personally think McCain doesn't have the power to recover all of these states and also take the few he could steal from Obama. He's got limited time and money, plus everything he says to make Ohio happy could piss off voters in Nevada.

What will happen? The current RCP map shows Obama probably taking Colorado. I think he'll also pick up Virginia and New Mexico. McCain will retain the Carolinas and Georgia, but he'll have to spend a load of time and money to secure them - money that won't be used to help out in Ohio and Indiana. Nevada, the Dakotas and Montana will also likely stay with McCain.

The problem isn't whether McCain will lose those states, it's whether he can afford -in time, money and political capital - to keep them and pick up the swings. For McCain, things look grim.

Mugabe wins, or "Why the Big Dogs didn't act"

2008-06-29T21:37:00.001-04:00

He wins with 85% of the vote. About a quarter million people voted against him, and there's a good chance these brave souls will be tracked down and maybe killed.

The election happened, and Mugabe bullied people into voting to raise turnout, then forced them to vote for him by basically removing the secrecy from the secret ballot. I continue to support Tsvangirai's last-minute move to pull out of the election, but I feel an opportunity was missed here. The three nations that could have had an effect were China, the US and South Africa. I will explain why none of these acted in a way that made a substantial difference.

China: most people don't know the depth of China's involvement in African politics. While the US is trying to recruit friends in the Muslim world and Latin America, and Russia is slowly reasserting itself over Central Asia and Eastern Europe, the third great power is doing a much better job of making friends. China has buddied up to Sudan, Chad, Zimbabwe and countless others. It's a business deal of sorts whereby China 'buys' geopolitical goodwill in exchange for either weapons or clout or cheap goods or other assorted items.
China runs its African associations not like a nation-state but like a business. If you buy, China will be much less likely to allow machinations against you go forward. It is amoral, which from time to time causes China to engage in a bit of immoral dealing. If, bowing to Western pressure, China cut Zimbabwe out of the loop, China would undo the two reasons it supplies Africa:

By buckling to 'whiny liberal capitalist imperialists' China would be embarrassed geopolitically, since China had supported Mugabe less than a month ago
By making an exception from the apolitical trade every single African country that does major business with China would feel pressure to conform to China's will. If China has to assert its will on any one country, the others will change attitude. They will no longer buy happily and support China happily but will be more like the US - buying because it makes sense and then complaining about it.

The USA: There are two schools of thought on this one: the cynical and the pragmatic. Cynics say that because Zimbabwe is poor or black or African or not in control of any important resources [read:oil] that the US won't have anything to do with it. Some have argued that the US didn't feel pressured to act because there was another competent, liberal democracy in the area to blame: South Africa.
I see more pressing reasons in the pragmatic argument. Even if the US had simply committed itself to supervising the elections itself, it would require troops. Zimbabwe isn't large, but let's not kid ourselves - the US can't spare any troops from Iraq and Afghanistan. Meanwhile, the US doesn't do much trade with Zimbabwe, so even sanctions wouldn't be that effective. Add to this President Bush's 25% approval rating and a general American exhaustion with new adventures overseas and any concerted action becomes increasingly unlikely.
Those who aruge that a tiny action by the US could 'fix' Zimbabwe are mistaken, and sound surprisingly like those who argued Iraqis would welcome the US with open arms and immediately become a stable democracy. These two groups are generally from opposite sides of the political spectrum, but they both seem to think intervention on their certain terms is easy. It's not. It requires more than just a removal of Mugabe (though he helps it all hang together). He's built a political machine that could either be dismantled, like de-Baathification in Iraq, or turned into a legitimate political party, the way the South African National Party, purveyors of apartheid, turned into the semi-respectable opposition party. In addition to political groups, many militias are loyal to Mugabe. Even if he died and his successor swore off violence, someone from his entourage would proclaim violent revolution and pick up a number of the militias.
The entire enterprise of Zimbabwe would have been a massive job for the US, and there was no political will, logistical understanding or military capacity to take it on in 2008.

South Africa: There are, I think, three reasons Zimbabwe didn't act: solidarity, Mbeki and history.
Solidarity: Mugabe was the guy who kicked the white minority government out, and until about 2000 he was the 'good dictator' of Africa. He plays up his role as Father of the Nation, and South Africa buys it to an extent. And why not? Half the Founders of the USA were slaveowners and another large chunk were abolitionist quakers. What Founders do isn't automatically moral. Unfortunately, by buying Mugabe's Founder status, and by valuing his African-ness over his dictator-ness, South Africa makes the mistake of exchanging foreign oppressors for local ones. It's misguided, but not at all uncommon. The UK and Australia stick by US policy in the War on Terror, even as the majority of their populations dispprove of it. Latin American countries decry US interference as the making of new Banana Republics. It's not only Africa that practices bad solidarity.
Thabo Mbeki: The President of South Africa has decided on quiet, closed-doors diplomacy for his entire career. It seems to have served him well except in the case of Zimbabwe. Mbeki's personality is not confrontational, and his style is not the kind that would intimidate Mugabe. Plus, Mbeki has taken a very hand-off approach to the economy during his presidency, so that he doesn't alienate the whites. The result of this is that any embargo against Zimbabwe would require a huge policy shift. Again, I understand why Mbeki acts as he does, I simply disagree with it.
History: This reasoning may be unfamiliar to Americans, but southern Africans know it well. During white rule in South Africa, the government carried out military operations against each of its neighbors and politically manipulated both the minor white governments and then the black governments that followed them. The number of operations and actions is staggering, especially since a great number weren't even announced. The Apartheid government played its neighbors, without a great regard for national soveriegnty. When apartheid ended, the new government rejected the previous ways of doing things. The white government had rigidly controlled the economy to keep the races separate, so the new government left the economy alone. The old government didn't address the greivances of apartheid, so the new one did. The old government invaded, bullied and sanctioned ruthlessly. I think that a rejection of apartheid-era foreign policy plays a large role in South Africa's inaction. Unfortunately, in trying to be respectful, it has been over-respectful of Mugabe, who does not deserve it.

'Fixing' Zimbabwe all the way would have been a massive job, possibly too much for this time and place. But maybe the first step was allowing a fair election, which I feel could have been done much more easily than a full-scale program. A fair election would have unseated Mugabe and put Morgan Tsvangirai in his place, and also ousted his political party.

As I think I won't be writing on Zimbabwe for a while, here's an index of every post on the elections:
Mugabe will win
Mugabe didn't win
Mugabe admits he didn't win
Mugabe arrests the winner
Mugabe refuses to lose
Mugabe equates voting against him with treason
Mugabe's opponent is bullied out of the race
Why I care about Zimbabwe

DC v Heller, first thoughts

2008-06-26T12:41:00.001-04:00

First, the decision was broadly correct: ownership of arms is an individual right, and it was meant to be one. This means that McCain was on the correct side of this decision (helping him come back from his over-the-top and incorrect opinion of previous cases). Obama was on the wrong side of this; his statement that DC's ban was constitutional is flat-out wrong. I guess this puts the candidates at 1-1 with regards to the Supreme Court.

But I do have a criticism of one small part of the opinion. The majority, written by Scalia, states: "The prefatory clause does not suggest that
preserving the militia was the only reason Americans valued the ancient
right; most undoubtedly thought it even more important for self-defense
and hunting."

I'm not convinced of this at all; the founders probably would have seen little difference between militia use and self-defense use, since the guns of their day were slow to load and impossible to reload in a critical situation. The idea of a person carrying a gun on their person to prevent robbery would have been foreign. This doesn't mean it's not protected, I just object to the statement that the Founders would have felt hunting uses more important than militia uses after winning a war for freedom that depended largely on popular militias to win. The Second Amendment was put in place because the Founders felt only an armed population could resist illegitimate governmental tyranny, and that government had to be prohibited from being able to deprive people of the means to resist it by voting, protesting, speaking and writing, meeting with likeminded people, and by force of arms if totally required. A huge bundle of the rights in the Bill of Rights are directed to maintaining the freedom won in the American Revolution by preventing the government from curtailing the means by which people could undo tyranny.

When the Constitution was written, I think the most important meaning was for militias. This in no way means militias only. It simply means that I find it ridiculous that of all the concerns on the Founders' minds, they found time to make sure people would be able to hunt in the future and protected it in a specific right.

Let's not make this decision into a partisan shouting festival. Let's not overreact. There's a lot of moderation and good-sense arguments in the decision, and most Americans broadly agree with it. For the second time in a short while, I have to applaud the Supreme Court for issuing a correct decision to complement Boumediene. In that case, the liberal bloc issued a correct decision. In this one the conservative bloc did. But in both cases, the Court curtailed government overreaching and micromanagement.

Why do I care about Zimbabwe?

2008-06-24T14:14:00.001-04:00

In an article titled "Who's Africa's Worst Dictator," Slate correspondent Peter Maass argues that Robert Mugabe is not the worst dictator in Africa. That honor belongs to Teodoro Obiang, who has been more ruthless than Mugabe both in crushing opposition and in oppressing the general public of his country of Equatorial Guinea. In fact, reading the article, I agree: Obiang is a master of dictatorship while Mugabe is simply adept at it. Maass compares Obiang's work to the mess that is North Korea, truly the most oppressive place on earth, without exagerating his original case.

If that's so, why do I keep on posting about Zimbabwe and only toss off references to North Korea and don't even mention Obiang? Because, in a world of limited time and political capital, I believe we should do the most good when the situation permits. Obiang's situation still finds him strong. Maass basically sums up my case:

"Obiang's enforcers don't need to club people on the streets. His
would-be opponents are too frightened to openly demonstrate against
him. His is the Switzerland of dictatorships—so effective at enforcing
obedience that the spectacle of unrest is invisible."

That's the difference: situations on the ground permit the democratization of Zimbabwe in the near term. I was surprised at the results of the elections there earlier this year, where Mugabe's ZANU-PF party lost control of the legislature to Morgan Tsvangirai's MDC. The earlier elections weren't free, weren't fair, but still had high turnout and somehow managed to displace the ruling party from at least one branch of government. What's even more amazing is that the legislative results will stand: the MDC will still be in power when Mugabe wins the Presidency on the 27th.

The people of Zimbabwe want democracy, as evidenced by their high turnout (something that was bad for Mugabe, and was not encouraged by him) and their actual legitimate exercise of the right to vote as they pleased. Mugabe controls the executive, the courts, the army and various local militias, but he's lost the legislature. The people of Zimbabwe are practicing democracy, as well as they can under the circumstances.

The most important reason why I write again and again about Zimbabwe and not, for example, Chad or Sudan, where dictators oppress and kill more people more cruelly is that Zimbabwe has a real alternative. The MDC is a legitimate, built-up political party. If allowed to govern, it would be able to do so (though it might not do very well, that remains to be seen). In many countries run by dictators, the opposition is either ethnic, religious or military. If that was the case in Zimbabwe, I wouldn't be talking about it. The MDC is a political group with national reach and appeal. It has regional and ethnic components, to be sure, but so do the Republican and Democratic parties in the US. So while I dislike Chad's dictator Idriss Deby, I don't talk about Chad because there isn't a ready democratic opposition to his rule.

Another country I do not address is Burma, where the military keeps democratic activist Aung San Suu Kyi virtually imprisoned for decades. While she is a powerful force for democracy, I'm not entirely convinced her party would be able to exist without her. I may be wrong on this point, but I see Aung San Suu Kyi as the glue of her entire democratic movement, while Morgan Tsvangirai is simply the head of a political party that matured from a democratic movement.

Because I see the opportunity for real and lasting change in Zimbabwe, I write about it.

It's officially over in Zimbabwe: Mugabe wins.

2008-06-23T17:54:00.001-04:00

Morgan Tsvangirai has pulled out of the run off election. Only the current Dictator Robert Mugabe is left, and he will win the vote, which is still scheduled for this Friday, June 27th.

There are now two major schools of thought: that Tsvangirai should have stayed in, even though his supporters had basically been intimidated into submission, and that he was right to pull out.

I personally sympathize with those who wanted Tsvangirai to become a symbol for Zimbabwean democracy, but I think it wasn't the time and place to stand up and lose an unfair election. Mugabe would have won anyway, and with Tsvangirai no longer in the race his supporters don't have to disclose themselves by voting. Since Mugabe would have won, he might well have tracked down large clusters of MDC supporters and killed or tortured them.

There will be another set of elections in six years, and Tsvangirai will still be alive; since he didn't make non-electoral trouble for Mugabe this time, Mugabe won't have him killed. Zimbabwe can't stand to be that much of a pariah, and the country would take a massive popularity hit if Tsvangirai died.

The best reasonable course of action I can see is that if Mugabe dies before the next elections, his successor might not have the organizational capacity, popularity, power or desire to supress Tsvangirai and his party. In this case, a democratic or nearly democratic election could take place that would allow the people of Zimbabwe to finally be free.

The most important poll, part II

2008-06-18T09:06:00.001-04:00

Until today, the electoral map I had been using for the Presidential election was very nearly the one we saw in 2000, except that Obama was making inroads with Virginian and Carolinian voters while picking up a few northwest or Midwest states. However, McCain was solidly in control of three big southern states: Georgia, Texas and Florida.

Now something has changed. McCain still has solid (read: insurmountable) leads in Texas and the rest of the "confederate" South. However, a new poll has Obama leading by four points in Florida. This is the first poll in nearly a month in this state, and the first since Clinton's candidacy was truly put to rest. Florida has 27 electoral votes, the fourth-largest total after California, Texas and New York.

Now what does this mean? There's been a lot of pundit-driven speculation that elderly Florida Jews won't vote for someone named 'Hussein'. But this group does not necessarily decide each Florida election. Obama has been strong recently in supporting Israel, and McCain continues to not convince people his foreign policy is different from Bush's. Maybe this contributes to the swing, or maybe other factors are responsible. It's also possible that this poll could be in error. Four points isn't massive, and with a three-point margin of error, it's possible that Obama's lead is really nothing of the kind. Yet the most recent previous poll (conducted by the same service with the same methods) showed McCain leading by four. This is an eight point swing which cannot be dismissed as an error.

The poll before that, conducted by the reputable Rasmussen service, had McCain up by ten. That's a fourteen-point swing towards Obama since May 19th. What used to be a safe state for McCain now becomes a heated contest for both candidates.

But unlike previous days, it's not all good news for the Obama campaign. A new Minnesota poll shows Obama winning by only one point. Previous polls had Obama up by thirteen and fifteen points. The most recent previous poll had Obama up by thirteen just two days before this newest poll started. This appears to be a twelve-point shift to McCain in just five days. A solid Obama state is now totally up for grabs. I personally think this new poll is an abberation - McCain's probably not that close. But it does notify McCain that the state can be won, and scares Obama into thinking the state can be lost.

Still, things appear in Obama's favor right now, as most poll movement is going his way. I'm not obessing about tiny deviations in polls but rather comparing old and new polls so that the swing becomes significant. For example, the reason McCain closed the Minnesota gap so quickly is not that he took votes from Obama but rather he firmed up his own support. His numbers went from 39 to 46 between polls, meaning a whole slew of previously undecided voters (probably leaning Republican the whole time) decided to tell pollsters that McCain was their man. This leaves about ten percent of voters as 'real' undecideds who can be picked up by either candidate. Plus, good manuevering could steal supporters from a candidate's pool. This race isn't anywhere over, but McCain does start with a disadvantage.

The most important poll, and other election observations

2008-06-16T20:40:00.001-04:00

I personally believe that the most highly sought after state in this upcoming election is Virginia. Until this election it was a solidly Republican state for Presidential elections. Now we have a new Rasmussen poll that puts Obama ahead by one point. This is entirely within the margin of error, but means that no matter what, McCain will have to work hard not to lose this state. The easiest state for McCain to steal it New Hampshire, but polls show Obama passing McCain in recent times.

A Virginia VP pick for Obama could basically hand him the state, but the person I thought best suited to the task, Mark Warner, has taken his name out of consideration. I find this a bit strange: Warner was casting about for a Presidential bid in 2006, but took his name out of contention for the nomination before any of the real candidates even announced. Now he has a good chance to be VP, with a good shot at being the shoe-in for the Dem candidate next round, and he turns it down to win a senate seat. Warner's working very slowly, taking breaks in his political career. Why? Does he have some dirt that would cut him out of high offices? Does he have some ten-year plan? Or (I cannot believe I'm suggesting this) is he a principled politician with modest and incremental goals and relatively little burning ambition?

Looking outside America for a second (like anyone cares) we come to Zimbabwe. The run-off election is to be held on June 27th. But first I must clear something up: many (most) news articles I have read about Zimbabwe allege that current Dictator-for-Life Robert Mugabe lost the Presidential election to Morgan Tsvangirai. This is true, but it is always stated in such a way that it seems that Mugabe has already lost the Presidency. In fact, neither candidate gained over 50% of the vote, so there must be a run-off between the two. Except that these results took suspiciously long to come out, so Mugabe probably faked them to cause a run-off and buy himself more time. However, if Tsvangirai had simply tried to move into power he could have been cast as exactly as undemocratic as Mugabe for not playing by the rules.

Now as to the run-off itself, Mugabe has equated voting for the opposition with treason. He has harassed opposition supporters. He has had Tsvangirai arrested again. He had the wife of a local opposition leader burned alive. Barring military intervention by another country (which might backfire horribly and which I don't recommend in the slightest) Mugabe will crush the opposition and remain in power until the next elections. Thus, Zimbabwe has to wait six years (or until Mugabe dies) for its chance to be free. What could other countries have done differently? China could have refused to sell Mugabe weapons. The US could have given a crap about a country where people actually want democracy right now. South Africa could have been more confrontational. The African Union could have demanded to supervise all election proceedings.

All these were unlikely to happen from the start, since they all offer a payoff of nearly nothing in exchange for a pretty large political risk. I never thought Zimbabwe would be handed democracy and freedom on a silver platter by other countries, but it would have been nice if there had been some assistance from the outside. Zimbabwe can't get free by itself, at least not yet. For now, they must wait.

McCain said what?

2008-06-14T15:53:00.001-04:00

"The United States Supreme Court rendered a decision yesterday that I think is one of the worst decisions in history..."

This is not something that needs context. 'Worst ever' means 'worst ever' no matter how you try to gloss it. I could rattle off a bunch more Supreme Court decisions that are worse, but I'd like to point out that this time Sentor McCain is simply wrong. The Supreme Court's decision, or at least the core holding of the decision, is right.

Here is a huge, well-thought out discussion of why. I will simplify it down to bite size:

The Suspension Clause does not require the writ of habeas corpus;
rather, it states that "[t]he Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus
shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it."

The power to suspend that writ is given to the President (probably) in time-critical situations, such as imminent invasion. Otherwise it is given to Congress. Since these detainees were in US custody for years, it is hard to see how the time-critical factor should even play a role. Congress didn't strip habeas corpus, so the detainees still have it. I know there are a whole number of complicating factors, but this is the base of the situation.

If McCain wants to beat up on a Supreme Court decision, he should pick a fight with Kelo v The City of New London, the taking-for-private-use eminent domain case. I would fully support anyone who wanted to overturn that incorrect, illiberal and undemocratic ruling. However, McCain is now on the wrong side of the law, history and apparently his earlier statements on the subject.

When a politician is wrong, I hope to call them out on it no matter what party they belong to. If Senator Obama had applauded this decision I would be castigating him. That's not the case. This time, Obama is right, McCain is wrong, and that's the end of it.

If not Webb, Warner? The search for the perfect attack dog...

2008-06-11T14:54:00.001-04:00

Reading the article Anyone but Webb on Slate has gone a long way towards convincing me that while Webb (a former Reagan Republican with security and military credentials) would add quite a lot to Obama's presidential run, his 'extracurricular' activities might hurt Obama. These include Webb's temper - Obama can't fault McCain for his temper if his own VP has outbursts. Also, Webb has a history of specious statements about women. Right now, the Democratic party is experiencing more enthusiasm than it has in a decade. It's not smart to dampen it by raising Webb to VP where his statements could rekindle the identity politics of Clinton's campaign.

But an angry VP is a good idea. The VP is the hatchet-man for his candidate: he attacks while the candidate sits back and looks Presidential. Then the opposition has to respond and get down in the dirt, looking unPresidential. Cheney was a good hatchet-man. Romney has potential as well. Huckabee has said too many good things about Obama, and made too many jokes on the edge of racism to be an effective attacker for McCain.

But McCain's personality as his campaign crafts it allows him to take Obama on without needing a VP to do it for him. McCain is being presented as the man who speaks his mind; he will challenge the opposition when he feels they're wrong. Obama's campaign personality won't let him do that. He's all about reconciliation and nonpartisanship. He can't attack as ferociously. So what Obama needs is a VP who can and a means for that VP to do it that doesn't contradict Obama's main thrust.

Webb can't deliver that; his attacks would be either partisan or too ad hominem. This election, people don't want character assassination. I also doubt whether Bill Richardson could deliver this as VP. He's not confrontational enough.

But I know who could: Mark Warner, former Virginia governor. Yes, Warner couldn't attack McCain in the tried and true way of saying an idea was outright bad. Warner and Obama have built their images on reconciliation with the opposition; neither can afford to give that up this election. But Warner could do something else. He could attack McCain's positions as being centrist-in-name-only. If Warner expresses disappointment at McCain's failure to live up to a centrist and conciliatory image, if would help undercut McCain's broader appeal. Plus it fits in with Obama's move towards conciliatory politics beyond the usual. In addition, I think that disappointment from Warner would be more damaging to McCain than anger from Webb. Warner could attack McCain in a way that still goes with Obama's "Hope" message.

Of course, there are probably other ways to evaluate VPs but I personally think Obama needs someone to attack for him, otherwise McCain could portray him as a weak candidate. McCain should hope for a VP who won't or can't attack, since a toothless ticket would let him sell the security issue more easily - an area where Republicans usually win the fight but are in trouble this election.

The post-Clinton political roundup

2008-06-09T14:56:00.001-04:00

General Info:
Everyone is calling for Democratic unity. Hillary Clinton's supporters are to join Obama against McCain. But the fact is that in polls, the defection of hardcore Clintonites has already been factored in, and Obama is still beating McCain in almost every poll. Put simply, Obama wants Clintonites, but doesn't actually need them.

How to win:
Meanwhile, pundits are trying to figure out how McCain can pull off a win in this most unfortunate of years for the GOP. One suggestion is to frame the Presidency as a job that is mostly about foreign policy and security. Obama has no experience in either of these areas, and so strategists think this would give him the boost he needs. I disagree, since if McCain's own campaign says the Presidency is about foreign policy, McCain will have to give direct, obvious and clear positions on the issue. Unfortunately for him, his maverick foreign policy is pretty well disliked by the public right now, since it's largely the same as Bush's. Given a choice between a policy they hate and a policy unknown, the voters might well move ever further away from McCain.

McCain could also try to pull a Clinton - run a campaign for the 'common worker' and try to paint Obama as an elitist or socialist. Unfortunately, he's not likely to get the union support he'd need to win this way. Also, his pro-immigration and pro-trade positions, while economically better for the country, are very unpopular in this constituency.

What has to happen? If McCain can make Obama fall apart during a debate it will bolster the 'no experience' image and give him an edge. This is a long shot, since Obama is more comfortable in public than McCain. Meanwhile, Obama would score a political headshot if, during a debate on Iraq and foreign policy, get angry and say something like "You're just another George W. Bush!" in a way that made McCain's temper go off. We've heard a few things about McCain's temper, and if it shows up during a debate people will rethink their image of McCain as a sober elder statesman.

VPs:
Obama needs a VP who can guarentee him a red or toss-up state. Mark Warner (VA) and Bill Richardson (NM) are two candidates who come as a package deal with their home states and either blue collar votes (Warner) or hispanics (Richardson) - both fertile Democratic areas that Obama is weak in. However, Warner is running for the senate now and is going to win. Thinking in a more expansive strategy, does Warner bring more to the ticket than he brings to the senate? Could a quick replacement for Warner actually win? As for Richardson, would his presence make the ticket a bit too...non-white?

McCain needs someone who makes people care about coming out to vote for a Republican in November. With dissatisfaction at an all-time high, he cannot count on people voting against Obama in large enough numbers. A VP pick that excites the religious right would be smart. Could it be Huckabee? Romney? Recent times have heard more chatter about Bobby Jindal. Unfortunately for Jindal, I think he'd actually be a better candidate for the Presidency in 2012 than VP in 2008. If he's on this ticket and loses, it could be like Edwards in the early primaries this year, tainted by defeat. If I advised Jindal, I would tell him not to accept the VP spot. Plus, while he's socially conservative, his emphasis is on economics and he doesn't excite the religious right enough.

A hilarious gay parade float

2008-06-09T13:34:00.001-04:00

A pro-gay group wanted to have a parade float. A local government told the group it couldn't display any references to homosexuality on it.

The result?

the restrictions, which resulted in a float bearing a cowboy-and-Indian
diorama, signs such as "Who pays for school supplies?" and a giant
question mark in the middle of it.

A good, a bad in Zimbabwe

2008-06-05T14:07:00.001-04:00

Morgan Tsvangirai was released today after being held for eight hours without serious charges. Most commentators see this as intimidation and disruption to his campaign. I see it as the first of a series of arrests. Maybe the third or fifth time Tsvangirai is taken in for questioning he'll "resist" and not make it back.

While it's good that he's out, I still hold by my near-alarmist post yesterday. Another unseemly sign has surfaced: [Quoted at length from this post on FP Passport]

Here's James D. McGee, the U.S. ambassador to Zimbabwe, describing the incident to CNN:
"Police put up a roadblock, stopped the
vehicles, slashed the tires, reached in and grabbed telephones from my
personnel, and the war veterans (Mugabe's supporters) threatened to
burn the vehicles with my people inside unless they got out and
accompanied police to a station nearby."
McGee added that his embassy felt the orders were
"coming directly from the top." Whoever gave the orders, threatening to
burn foreign dignitaries alive is a step beyond the usual Mugabe
bullying. It's sickening.

Until now, Mugabe had restrained his worst intimidation to Zimbabweans. Now he's messing with countries much more powerful than his own. Let's just say that if Iran threatened to burn US diplomats alive we'd have a causus belli if not a military action. I explicitly don't think military intervention is the right path, but maybe if Mugabe pisses off the US enough someone will take notice and issue an ultimatum. The fact that Mugabe is willing to insult the US like this shows that he takes outside equivocation for granted. Someone please prove Mugabe wrong.

A sad day for Zimbabwe, and no one really cares.

2008-06-04T20:57:00.001-04:00

Morgan Tsvangirai was arrested today.

He is the leader of the current opposition party of Zimbabwe, and his party won resoundingly in the recent elections. He got more votes than current President-cum-Dictator Robert Mugabe, but neither candidate got over 50% of the vote. That is if you believe Mugabe's government's count. Tsvangirai claims get got 50.6% and doesn't need to engage in a run-off.

Upon seeing that Mugabe wouldn't just let him take over, Tsvangirai slowly moderated his position from saying that he won and would be denying it by engaging in a run-off versus Mugabe to his current one in which he would probably engage and would definitely win if the vote was fair.

Mugabe's men took weeks to release the election results, which were almost certainly tampered with. Now they have tried to purchase large quantities of weapons from China to enforce their rule. Opposition-friendly areas are being terrorized and community leaders harassed or beaten. The only hope I could see to a quick end was Tsvangirai's return (he was out-of-country to avoid assassination) and election victory.

Now Tsvangirai has been arrested without charges and is being held by Mugabe's government.
This is what happened last time he was arrested (inset of Robert Mugabe)

Zimbabwe is not South Africa, and SA still has its problems. But it is one of the most outstanding countries in Africa and I believe Zimbabwe has such potential as well. The first step to change is the removal of Mugabe and his cronies. The run-off election is scheduled for June 27th. I wouldn't be surprised is Mugabe held him until that date, then declared some bogus charge against Tsvangirai and invalidated the run-off, saying people can't vote for a convicted and imprisoned felon.

Until now, I still saw a way out for Zimbabwe. Now, with this arrest and mounting attacks on opposition supporters (some 30 have been killed) I am saddened to know that Zimbabwe will not be free this year. Its people may have to wait for Mugabe's death or the next election - which is six years away. In my estimation only three countries can truly change the course: South Africa, the USA and China.

China will not act against Mugabe. South Africa is slowly growing more confrontational - a good sign - and the incoming leadership is sometimes openly hostile to Mugabe. The USA does not seem to show an interest foreign policy-wise. This is, I believe, a mistake. If the USA wishes to spead democracy, a little well-placed pressure on China and South Africa could turn the situation around. While Americans bicker about whether democracy can or should be spread by force, they ignore a situation where some diplomacy could depose an illegitimate leader from power without the use of military force. This is, I should hope, something that all Americans can agree on.

I want Zimbabwe to be free - it is a moral good and will also massively increase the living conditions of the population. I don't want to have to wait another five years or more. I have been following the situation closely since before the 2002 elections. Each time, Mugabe hangs onto power because no other country will deal with him harshly enough. I am tired of waiting. If I could ask the Presidential candidates one questions, it would be "How do you plan to uphold democracy in Zimbabwe?"

Why are curses inherently bad?

2008-05-30T23:30:00.001-04:00

I was listening to one of my favorite singers - Bonnie 'Prince' Billy - when I heard something that made me think. Billy (real name Will Oldham) is a truly crazy man with a Nietzsche beard who creates cavernous and terrifying pseudo-folk music.

He lulls you into complacency with sparse instrumentals and pretty but obvious lyrics about mountains and women and valleys. Then all of a sudden he hits you with the following:

If I could fuck a mountain
I would fuck a mountain
And I'd do it with a woman in the valley

Why is this so jarring? Two reasons: the image of a man copulating with a mountain is strange, and the use of a curse is totally unexpected. It's crazy and startling.

I asked myself why I was startled. The answer is that I was startled because he cursed. Why does cursing startle me? Because I've been taught (by parents, school and general society) that it should. But should it? Taboo words are part of basically every language. Since I'll be talking linguistically now, there will be quite a few curses. You have been forewarned.

I have seen some people - generally conservative Christians - who argue that words like 'damn' are affronts to God, and should not be said for that reason. Yet in common speech, the harshest curse is ususally 'fuck,' which has no blasphemous quality to it. Neither does 'shit' - the other harsh curse. The religiously-derived curses - 'hell' and 'damn' - are actually quite moderate.

Despite what some people may argue, no word inherently means anything at all. All the meaning comes from how people use a word. The situations in which people use words also determine when they are acceptable. A word is only a package of sounds; without society to inform it, the word is useless.

People object to words like 'fuck' because they're sexually explicit. Yet there are now so many ways of using 'fuck' that groups that guard 'decency standards' must grade whether the word was used in reference to sex or just as an exclamation. The former is heavily punished; the latter is punished more lightly. The fact is that almost any word could be sexually explicit in context. A censorious obsession with euphemism is, in my opinion, misplaced.

This doesn't mean that I'm going to go around cursing in front of little kids all the time. It won't change my habits at all to know that the taboo around 'fuck' is just invented. But it should give pause to those who would argue that there are universal laws of correct and incorrect in language.

P.S. Two fun facts about 'fuck':

1) Fuck comes from a German word meaning 'to strike.' It does not come from an acronym for "Fornication Under Consent of the King". It's been in the English language for longer than words like 'fornication' or 'consent'. I have been told this totally false story so often that whenever someone tries it on me now, I start shouting at them: "WRONG WRONG WRONG!"

2) Many languages have a third affix, in addition to prefixes and suffixes. The 'interfix' does not exist in English - except with the word 'fuck,' which is the only word that can use that form. When added, it emphasizes the meaning with a certain enthusiastic edge: in-fuckin'-credible!

Pfleger!

2008-05-30T16:07:00.001-04:00

I have not looked into this new preacher very heavily. Because it seems people will be talking about him, I thought I would weigh in anyway. I've only seen about a minute and a half of his sermon. In fact, I have only seen this:

Rev. Michael Pfleger on Hillary Clinton

Before you say that I don't have context to judge Pfleger one way or the other, I'll say this: I agree. You don't have context. But this clip is all that most people are going to see of him. And you know what?

It's not what people are claiming. It's a comedy routine. The way the he enunciates, overdoes his gestures, makes everything into a world-ending shout. This isn't a hardcore political speech. It's a stand-up routine.

If you're not convinced, go to 1:00 in the above video. Pfleger says "Hey, I'm Barack Obama!" in such an over-the-top way - possibly the worst impression I have ever seen in my life - that I laughed. His following Hillary-inspired shriek of "Damn! Where did you come from?" is a pretty good encapsulation of the way many Clinton fans feel.

Is he racist? I don't know. Is he self-hating? It doesn't seem like he's critiquing white people, just white priviledge. It's obviously not politic for something like this to happen right now to Obama, but honestly Pfleger is further away and his routine isn't angry. It's funny. In fact, it kind of reminds me of a Lewis Black routine. If you think I'm going soft on Pfleger, watch the video again and ask yourself: does this man want to destroy America or does he just want to wring some comdey out of the primary season?

McCain should be saying "Oh shit!"

2008-05-28T22:27:00.001-04:00

The Republican primary in Idaho was held yesterday. Now I've written before about how a staggering number of primary voters won't throw their support in with McCain. I assumed that the protest effect would get weaker and weaker as time wore on, since people who protest like this aren't going to vote Democrat in the fall. They would inevitably reconcile themselves to McCain, or they would stay home and not care to vote. Either way, there would be fewer 'dissenters' from the party's nominee.

I was horribly wrong in Idaho. McCain made the state his worst showing since winning the nomination. He got 70% of the vote. And this time, the protest vote wasn't split between "none of the above," Huckabee and Ron Paul.

Idaho voted 24% for Ron Paul.

In no way does this mean Paul's candidacy has a chance. But it does mean Bob Barr does. Barr only aims for 2-5% of the vote in November. Votes for Paul are votes of longing for a small-government GOP, which McCain does not represent. With the Republicans scattered and their candidate offering very little to right-libertarians, Barr could spoil the race for McCain.

No third party is even capable of hurting Obama this much - Cynthia Mckinney for the Green Party is a joke. She's a 9/11 Truther and is publicly disdained. [However, a quick google images search shows that much of that disdain is poured out in creepily racist ways]

Back to Idaho, I am not predicting a larger group of dissenters from now on. I think Idaho was an exception and that the remaining states will fall in line. It does point out the ways that voters desire a small-government conservative. Unfortunately, McCain has to choose his VP from either the small-government or religious right constituencies. I think he cannot win without the RR, and that, for practical reasons, his VP should be from that group. This means that he won't be able to pacify libertarian dissenters.

The New Mexico Republican primary is on June 3. I predict McCain gets 78% - better than his previous 75% scores or his painfully low 70% in Idaho. This doesn't mean McCain's out of trouble. By now he should be getting 85-90%. It just demonstrates how badly the GOP is limping right now.

From whence does the perfect VP hail?

2008-05-26T16:37:00.001-04:00

Answer:
For McCain, from the religious right.
For Obama, from Virginia.

For the first time in decades, the Democrat seems capable of taking Virginia. Most polls put Obama within 2 points of McCain with a number of undecideds. Obama looks like he'll lose West Virginia now, but 'real' Virginia is much more important for gaining electoral votes. He has three choices: Sentor Webb, current Governor Kaine and former Governor Mark Warner.

Obama should choose one of these Virginians, and he should choose Mark Warner. Warner is a centrist, working-man's Democrat who won and governed much more solidly than Webb or Kaine. He is well-liked in VA and helps compensate from Obama's deficiencies with certain constituencies. Plus Warner comes with two further advantages: he's not currently in government (and didn't have to take positions on divisive economic or war issues as a governor) and could legitimately run for President himself in 2012 (if Obama loses) or 2016 (if he wins). Hillary Clinton doesn't make sense as VP; it's a small job she wouldn't be happy with. The only other VP who brings the heft that Warner brings is Bill Richardson - a generally small-government Democrat, he brings with him New Mexico and and experience as a governor. He also gives Obama an edge with Hispanics, where McCain is much stronger than your average Republican.

McCain isn't thinking in income or geographic terms. He needs to quell rumors that he's not a true Republican by nominating a VP who gives the religious voter a reason to come out in November. The thing that might kill McCain is if the religious right doesn't turn out as heavily since McCain doesn't excite them into voting. McCain is old: his VP will be, much more than Obama's, the successor to lead the Republican party. Several names have been floated: Huckabee, Romney and Bobby Jindal. Jindal is too young and too new, plus he's more about Reaganomics than religious conservatism. Romney's Mormonism still alarms some RR voters and some fear he's a liberal sneak attack.

Huckabee is the highest-profile, the most palatable and the most obvious. But he's got one fault: polls showed him losing by at least 10 points to Hillary or Obama in a head-to-head. Sure, VP isn't President but whoever it is will be important - they've got to be able to win in a legit election. On top of that, Huckabee balances his social conservatism with a few nanny state moves in health policy that scare small town and small government Republicans - who are already wary of McCain's candidacy. McCain's best bet is a southern governor who combines free market economics with religious conservatism, with an emphasis on the latter. This gives him a few choices.

I think that an Obama/Warner ticket would be the best move, as would a McCain/governor ticket. If these candidates make other choices, I'll have to talk about them. Meanwhile, we should dismiss ridiculous ideas like Obama/Edwards and McCain/Rice, since these pairings just exacerbate the candidate's major faults without giving them enough new support.

Hagee and Wright

2008-05-25T11:16:00.001-04:00

McCain Endorser Hagee: God Sent Hitler, Jews Have Dead Souls

Barack Obama's Pastor his Christianity Jeremiah Wright

The captions on these videos are the names given to them by whoever put them on youtube, not by me. If you disregard the obvious partisanship of both sides, it becomes apparent that something interesting is happening religiously this election cycle.

I'm pretty sure there were a big chunk of Americans who go to thoroughly boring churches and thought that most everyone else did too. The thing is that people like Hagee and Wright have been shown on TV and the internet so much, the public consciousness about controversial pastors has been raised quite a bit. These standard Middle Americans are now questioning just how typical their boring church really is.

For a long time, there has been a misconception that America is mostly Christian (true) and that while they belonged to different sects, most Christians cared about the same things and talked the same way. This is a massive misconception; America may be mostly one faith, but it is still amazingly diverse.

If either of these guys had been preaching about how God loves everyone, even gays, or how gay marriage would undo the fabric of society people wouldn't have noticed. That's pretty much expected by now. The fact is that both these men are saying something many Americans haven't heard before, at least not in a religious context.

During this cycle people also learned a lot about Mormonism, and would have learned even more if Romney had won the Republican nomination. The fact is that the official LDS Church is more mainstream than Hagee or Wright. The mess in Texas with the FLDS has served to remind America unknown denominations aren't unified either.

Maybe later I'll write something about the word "cult," which has been horribly overused in discussing these issues and isn't really a helpful word at all.

Thabo Mbeki and Jacob Zuma

2008-05-24T18:24:00.001-04:00

Right now a large number of commentators are being hostile to Thabo Mbeki, President of South Africa for not doing enough to solve various problems. He is perceived as not having done enough to prevent the mess in Zimbabwe. His term hasn't reduced crime that much, and land is still mostly (some 85%) owned by whites in a country where nonwhites are one in eight of the population.

I truly do understand his lack of 'movement' on these issues. South Africa has a history of being over-involved in the affairs of its neighbors; it controlled Namibia until about 1990. Meanwhile, making a serious effort to fix wealth disparities might either trigger a backlash from rich whites or from foreign investors. Better to let the economy alone, growing slowly, than to try to jolt it and maybe fail miserably.

Pundits are right to excoriate Mbeki for his stance on HIV - that it doesn't cause AIDS - and for appointing likeminded people to the health boards. Except that Mbeki's government doesn't officially make Mbeki's beliefs into policy; the emphasis has been on natural cures that don't seem to do much, but it has not cut off or banned or otherwise majorly interfered with those who want to distribute anti-retrovirals. Compare this to other countries that won't iodize salt to cure goiters because it's supposedly a sterilizer placed there by whites. Mbeki's government may think wrong, but on this issue they mostly act right.

Mbeki has one year left. When he leaves, current ANC president Jacob Zuma will most likely take over. Hearing about his rape trial and accusations about his financial dealings I grew to dislike, then heavily dislike, then hate Zuma. But strangely enough, nearly everything I've heard from Zuma in the last few months I liked. I liked it a lot.

He got tough when talking about Zimbabwe - obviously ready to take a more active role in resolving the mess. When China attempted to ship weapons to Zimbabwe through South Africa, Mbeki was silent. Zuma was fiery and angry, denouncing China in one of the most clear-cut cases of post-election violence in history. And I'll be damned, but Zuma has won me back. I'm now neutral with regard to him and his upcoming presidency.

Strange enough that a man I hoped would be crushed by scandals is now steadily winning back my respect. Both Nelson Mandela and Thabo Mbeki have combined a small, less active government with restrained personalities. Zuma doesn't strike me as an abuser of power, but he would be more energetic. If South Africa wants to debut on the world stage in a new freshman class of countries that include Brazil, Argentina, South Korea and more, Zuma might be the man for the job.

A thought on atheism

2008-05-19T09:39:00.001-04:00

I've mentioned before how many people at FSTDT assert, in insulting atheism and blaming it for basically everything, that atheism is a religion. My answer last time was, "So what if it is?"

I'm pretty well convinced that atheism is a religion, to the same extent that Confucianism - another non-theistic set of practices - is considered religion. In fact there are quite a few 'godless' religions, some of which don't even have a transcendent force involved. You could even argue that the hardcore fans of Classical Greek philosophies which rejected the gods and laid out the order of the world via logic were religions. I think all of these are religions.

Now it's obvious that the people at FSTDT hate atheists. They see atheism as a contagious and dangerous religion, which it is to them and their worldview. Since this is so, they might want to stop calling it a religion before someone in government notices.

Why? Because atheism is assumed to be non-religion, the government doesn't have to worry about calls for religious freedom when it interferes with atheist business. For example, at government functions that start with an invocation, the speaker will often make reference to 'god.' Now the point is that if atheism is recognized as a religion, then basically any invocation of God in a pledge, on US currency, in any speech, etcetera etcetera is the very obvious preferencing of one religion (probably Christianity) over another (atheism). This is not acceptable, and not allowed under the constitution any more than a public proclamation about the correct method of baptizing a new convert.

However, I'm willing to let this issue alone. Most atheists don't think their belief is a religion, and wouldn't dream of pushing for religious freedom on that basis. In fact, the only ones agitating for atheism to be called a religion are highly Christian christianists (they want the state to promote their faith more). What they don't realize is that if they succeed, atheists will have more rights and the references to God and faith in every single area that they've worked for will come under intense scrutiny to make sure it doesn't preference other faiths over atheism. If they succeed, it might be the greatest failure of the christianist movement since the Scopes trial.

Hillary knows she has lost, and now I have proof.

2008-05-14T19:47:00.001-04:00

She lost a long time ago, really, when Obama started to pull ahead in delegates again and again. Yes, something unforeseen could have killed him, but those revelations (Wright, Ayers, Rezko, 57 states) didn't kill or even injure Obama - they just slowed him down and made him limp for a second.

Now Hillary Clinton has figured it out as well. I can prove this in a few easy steps:

1) She is not negatively attacking Obama anymore. This one was good for her even before she lost, since I don't consider the "he's inexperienced" jab a slimy assertion. Obama does not have experience at being President; no one does except incumbent Presidents. As for attacking Obama's character, that never served her well - it hurt Obama, but Clinton as well. By halting the negatives, she can not only go out well but also keep face by staying in the race until June/the convention.

2) Her base within the Democratic party - the people who gave her a MASSIVE victory in West Virginia - is about to have really good reasons to defect. Clinton won them by positioning herself as the 'average worker' candidate during the second half of primary season. During the first half, this was Edwards's thing. Now he's going to endorse Obama. More than that, there's some real chatter about Jim Webb for Obama's VP. Webb is a moderate Democrat, former Republican, won't stand for any hyper-liberal social agenda, from Virginia (a well-liked governor), experienced at something or other, and actually has cross-party appeal like Obama. If people wanted a reason to like Obama but stuck with Clinton because she was more 'down to earth,' then this group will soon begin to split for Obama after a possible Edwards/Webb double whammy.

3) This is most important: Hillary Clinton has begun the transition towards Obama. She's not stupid; she knows that if she dropped out suddenly right now, her partisans might not vote, or would vote McCain. She's going to ease out of it.

She said, just today:

Anybody who has ever voted for me or voted for Barack has much more in
common in terms of what we want to see happen in our country and in the
world with the other than they do with John McCain.
I'm going to work my heart out for whoever our nominee is. Obviously,
I'm still hoping to be that nominee, but I'm going to do everything I
can to make sure that anyone who supported me ... understands what a
grave error it would be not to vote for Sen. Obama.

Who knows? This actually sounds quite classy to me. Maybe Hillary will leave looking like a statesman after all. She probably can't run for President again, no matter what, but she could try governor or some cabinet position.

The reason the quotes are proof positive that she's done is that in the past she has done everything possible to highlight distinctions between herself and Obama. In fact, they're not so different policy-wise. She's easing her supporters into it before she ends it. This might even make her some new Democratic friends to replace the ones she lost over the campaign. Plus it's a smart move if she somehow pulls out a win, since her recent comments have skirted issues of race-based divisiveness.

I will say it now with confidence: even though she has lost the nomination, Hillary Clinton is still very smart and knows how to politic.

Some people REALLY like Ron Paul

2008-05-14T11:40:00.001-04:00

This is nowhere near the end of it.

I IMPLORE you to visit this link to view the most glorious celebration of freedom, bad editing and anachronism in all of political art. It is called "Liberty Spears the Enemy". In it, Benjamin Franklin is smoking a joint.

Aliens and religion!

2008-05-13T15:57:00.001-04:00

Yes it's a ridiculous subject. Yes I'm going to write about it. What if, tomorrow, aliens of some kind were discovered. How would this change people's religious views?

I don't think alien existence is impossible, but the chances of any smart species somehow reaching us within our lifetimes are very low. Most people agree that if life is found off-Earth, it will be simple, proto-animals or proto-plants. It might just be bacteria. I'm not going to deal with the question of sentient aliens or alien religion because they're too speculative.

A horribly sidetracked discussion on ReasonOnline finds one James Anderson Merritt saying the following:

I think it is important that the assertion was that a belief in aliens
would not contradict a "belief in God." Belief in the truth of the
scriptures, however, is quite another thing. Genesis, Chapter 5, says
quite clearly, "In the day that God created man, in the likeness of God
made he him..." We styled ourselves "God's favorites," because we were made in "the
likeness of God," and were given dominion over all of "God's
creatures." I think it is interesting that the vatican assertion was
that aliens would also be among "God's creatures." So would aliens simply be animals? If they didn't look or think much
like us, which species would more accurately reflect "God's likeness"? While belief in aliens would not necessarily preclude belief in "God,"
it would be hard to believe in a God who made us in "his likeness" --
i.e., the God of catholicism -- if we were to encounter sentient
aliens, Unless, of course, they seemed exactly like us. Not being especially religious, I nevertheless hope that I live to see the answer to these questions.

This comment is basically on-track. Meeting aliens doesn't mean everyone will magically become atheists, despite the fears of some. Since the life would probably be simple, I'm not even sure that the problem of "In the image of God" would come up. How worked up would you be about bacteria infringing on your status as God's image? Besides, the quote above sees the word 'image' very narrowly - it could be a spiritual, symbolic image. Even a literalist reading of the phrase must give it some symbolic quality, since humans can't be strictly 'God's Image' since we don't all look alike.

However, life on other planets would be a blow to hardcore creationists since the Bible seems to make it clear that no other planets were mentioned. Obviously there are ways to reconcile this: God could have placed simple forms all around the universe. Or there could be denial that the life is actually extraterrestrial - it could be blamed on contamination from whatever probes detected it.

In Islam, a group of beings called the Djinns were created prior to humans. They are more powerful, but they are not angels, since those cannot sin in most interpretations. Djinns have free will like humans, and can convert to Islam - something Muslims were actually tasked with doing if they encountered one. I bring this up because alien life wouldn't shake up Muslims as much as Christians, since Islam has a looser creation story that has a bunch of ways to reconcile a new kind of life.

Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism and friends don't often deal with creation issues right now, and something like alien life wouldn't do much to disturb believers. One thing I would predict is that certain New Religious Movements - the things that derisive media usually call 'cults' - would rack up a few more followers. There have been a number of prominent NRMs that openly predict and discuss alien life and especially aliens as technological salvation. A discovery that these groups had been a least partly right in their predictions would drum up interest and some conversions at the very least.

As for me, I think that as long as alien bacteria don't kill all life on Earth, I'm perfectly fine with any alien discovery.

Do you know Bob Barr? You should.

2008-05-12T20:04:00.001-04:00

Bob Barr is the frontrunner for the Libertarian Party nomination. Yes. Libertarian Party. The one that doesn't break 1% nationally. The one that does worse than the Greens, the Reforms, the hardline Constitution Party. It basically beats only the Prohibition Party, which does still exist.

But here's a little something to note: between 15-20% of Americans have basic libertarian sympathies. This doesn't mean they even know it, or that they'll vote lib in the election. But self-identified libs are a generally Republican group. They're willing to vote this way because most Republicans throw them something about deregulation or lower taxes.

This year, two things combine to make the LP an important feature. First, McCain doesn't offer much to libs who would normally vote Republican. Obama may offer these voters something, since some of his rhetoric about judges and the executive is very lib-friendly.

The second factor, which is more important than a small lib swing towards Obama, is the now Libertarians know who they are. Ron Paul, never truly viable, has had a huge cultural effect. People know what the word means now, and might begin identifying themselves with it. If Ron Paul endorsed Bob Barr, I could easily see him taking 2-5% nationally. And most of that vote would be either 'new' votes - people who came out specifically for Barr and wouldn't have voted for either candidate anyway - or votes from McCain's pocket, since that's where most libs currently dwell.

Barr is against the Iraq War, a popular position and also a doctrinaire Libertarian one. He likes civil liberties and low taxes. Agree or not, these are pretty popular positions. If any 3rd Party gets a noticeable chunk of the vote this election, it won't be a 'spoiler' like Nader, whose candidacy brings up more issues about campaign finance and debate rules than actual issues. It will be the LP, probably with Barr at the head. Since the LP is friendly with both Republican Ron Paul and Democrat Mike Gravel, both candidates with hugely devoted fan bases, it is possible for the LP in 2008 to be the biggest 3rd Party since Ross Perot.

No, they won't win anything. But libertarians are getting more popular, and there's not a whiff of small-government conservatism from the Republican party right now. If Huckabee is the Vice Presidential nominee, then another group of secular libs may jump off the Straight Talk Express. Chalk up another thing against John McCain for November.

Hussein

2008-05-07T15:21:00.001-04:00

For those about to use Barack Obama's middle name in referring to him, I ask this question: Do you really think that people don't know what you mean when you say it?

Sure, some people are called by their full names. However these people are rare, usually just use an initial and choose to present themselves that way. For example, we don't talk about John Sidney McCain. It is not conventional to use the middle name. Using it means something, and those about to use it know what it means.

It's coded language. It carries baggage - the Obama is a secret Muslim, or that he has been tainted by his Muslim heritage. Yes, it is his name. It is not automatically illegitimate to use it. But it is no more normal to say it with emphasis than it is for someone to call McCain "Sidney" exclusively. So when you shrug your shoulders and say, "What am I doing wrong by saying Obama's name?" I must ask, do you really think people don't know. The people you're speaking to know what it means, and so do I. You know. You're not saying it because you like middle names. You want to character-assassinate Obama.

I think that politicians should be judged on their policies and character. Obama's name is not part of that. Maybe his friendship with Rev. Wright is. But then again, so is McCain's personal life. I'm tired of politics motivated by anger. I'm tired of win-at-all costs races where party affiliation matters more than policies. Most of America is tired too.

Thus ends my rant. If you want to feign ignorance about what 'Hussein' means, then I expect you to actually be that stupid in real life. If you're not, I will not allow you to get away with it.

PS: the name 'Barack' is an Arabized version of the Hebrew 'Baruch' - which means 'blessed'. Baruch is a common biblical name, and there is a non-canonical Old Testament Book of Baruch. Buraq (pronounced similarly) is a creepy flying horse with a human head that carries Muhammad to heaven during the Night Journey. When I say creepy, I mean it.

This is how Buraq is depicted:

Primaries, even though I said I wouldn't

2008-05-07T01:30:00.001-04:00

So I peeked. I promised myself I wouldn't look until tomorrow, which I then reinterpreted as starting at 12:01, not when I wake up.

At this point, Obama has kicked Clinton up and down North Carolina. Hillary may win Indiana, but it won't be by more than two points. She has no way to spin this whatsoever. It is, once again, over for her.

Since I must find something interesting to report:
Republicans have primaries too! Sure, McCain already has the delegates, but Indiana and North Carolina get to vote too. Here's the interesting nugget: McCain, who has won the nomination, gained 77% and 73% in those states. This means that something like 25% of Republican primary voters want to register protest votes against McCain.

And who got the big numbers that were taken from McCain? Wistful bloggers at Reason, a libertarian organization, had hoped Ron Paul (a quasi-libertarian if anything) would pick up about 12-18% of the vote, as protests against McCain's unsuitability. Paul is still in the race, but he has about a dozen delegates to McCain's hoards.

Paul got 8% in both states. This makes sense; this is his normal level of support, and his fans wouldn't prop up McCain since they're not loyally Republican, just jumping into the party to help out their impossible candidate.

But Paul came in third. Behind Mike Huckabee. A candidate who's not even in the race anymore got more votes in protest than Ron Paul, who's still viable as an issues-exposer. I think I know who those 10% are. They're the hardcore social conservatives who are afraid McCain (and Romney, and Guiliani) is a 'secret liberal' with agendas. SocialCons got used to being the big powerful bloc under Bush. But they failed this election, and they'll never hold the same power again. They just don't know it yet. So while they may come out in November and vote for McCain, it will be out of necessity, since no Democrat will follow their policies. Huckabee was their last chance, and he almost made it.

Here's an indication of how far the SocialCons have fallen off: head-to-heads showed Obama beating Huckabee by an average of 10-20 points. Some had Obama up by 25 points on Huckabee. His nomination would have been a concession from the start.

What might this mean for McCain in the fall? SocialCons will still turn out to vote for him, but noting beats enthusiasm. If Obama's supporters truly like him, and McCain's supporters just dislike the opposition, he will lose. John Kerry lost because his supporters didn't like him so much as they disliked Bush. The fact that one in four primary voters won't openly support McCain is a bad sign for him.

The Baha'i faith, an anecdote

2008-05-06T19:33:00.001-04:00

A friend of mine recently converted to the Baha'i faith. If you've never heard of it, it's a unitarian faith the comes most directly out of Islam. It affirms that all the founders of each religion came from God, and that God progressively revealed more of his faith. Baha'u'llah, the Baha'i founder, was supposed to be the last prophet of this age who would draw all the religions of the world into one with his teachings. Baha'is see other religions as valid and correct, but theirs is the most correct and pure.

Such a poorly-known religion, with such tolerant principles and modern sympathies doesn't alarm the religious watchmen in the US. They would see it as either a useless outpouring of Unitarianism in disguise, or a secret way of injecting Islam into the culture. Baha'is are unlike Muslims, unlike Christians, unlike the rest. Their practice is distinct. It's a religion of its own.

But I noticed this: when my friend converted, her manners of speaking and writing changed. They seemed more mature; she used wonderful, beautiful flourishes when describing her thoughts on the world, humanity and the future. But as I read more of her writing I found these same phrases - like 'identity of all humanity' - used over and over. What had seemed special to me was actually lifted from Baha'i scriptures.

It made me uneasy in a gut reaction. I wanted to know why I reacted this way. It wasn't because I resented her conversion or disliked her religion or its teachings. It was because she constantly used these phrases and did not invent new ways of thinking. Her entire process was voluntary, but she stopped thinking so independently. I checked the books she had read; most of what she wrote was simply Baha'i teachings translated into language for people her age.

I was made uncomfortable because it looked a lot like brainwashing. But the process of acquiring language and ways of speaking is part of growing into a religion. You don't become a born-again Christian, for example, without talking about being born again, or salvation, or about faith.

Of course, there are people who convert or grow deeply religious, use a huge amount of their faith's vocabulary and still don't make me uneasy. It unsettled me the way my friend wrote because she was not one of those people; she'd been subsumed into the religious language and never came back out. Maybe in time she'll emerge a bit. I don't mean she should cool her faith, I mean that she may someday adapt the language she's using to say things with the variety she used to in her writing.

Isn't this better than a boring post about the Democratic Primaries?

I would have been wrong

2008-05-05T22:35:00.001-04:00

At Volokh Conspiracy various bloggers are having an argument over Burkean conservatism. I don't in any way think of myself as a Burkean, and I am skeptical of the deference to tradition and status quo that Burkeanism includes. I will never truly understand the idea of preserving tradition for traditions sake in the face of opposition.

But there is a facet of Burke that I do subscribe to: gradualism. I think that huge problems cannot or should not be resolved quickly. I think that quick solutions either fail or simply steamroll the opposition without addressing their concerns.

What gradualism does not mean is opposition to anything happening quickly. It opposes big things happening quickly. Gradualism does not apply to whether we keep troops in Iraq, but it does apply to a general strategy of democratizing the world. In that sense, the idea that quick military impositions could overcome the systematic hurdles is totally against a gradualist approach.

But there are times I would have wanted to be too gradual and if I had been in power, I would have slowed down the progress of freedom. I also know why I would have been wrong.

For example, with regard to Apartheid, I would have favored a slow dismemberment of the system rather than the quick evisceration it got. The system went from the peak of its power in the 1980s to a 'palace coup' in 1990. Within four years, the legal framework of Apartheid was dead and a truly democratic government was elected in 1994.

This example will make me look very bad. However, it is the truth and I write it without animus. At the end of the Civil War, I would have favored a gradual approach to freeing the slaves. I would have argued, in that time and mindset, that a quick changed - and especially a move like the 13th Amendment - would create too much opposition to black freedom. I would have been too pragmatic and not idealistic enough, too willing to compromise with an evil system. Sometimes bad systems need to be shot in the head, not picked apart.

Yet, if I was a powerful person in either scenario I would have favored the side which eventually won, but opposed their methods. I've already talked about graduated emancipation as an alternative, but in a totally different context.

Why would I have been wrong in my gradualist way? Because I could not have seen the popular willingness to make radical changes. There are times when people want a big shift, and some event allows that. I would have thought that wagering so much on a hope like this was too risky, better that it happen slowly and surely. Slowly doesn't mean any specific period of time, but it does mean in stages.

So which way is better? I think more often than not, people aren't ready to make large changes. More often than not, gradual approaches don't force things along. For example, President Bush's advisers must have truly believed that Iraqis would quickly embrace democracy. That would have been a massive shift. Had it worked easily, gradualism would have been wrong again. It turns out that it was right this time; the systematic and cultural networks that would have made democratization quick and popular weren't present.

I will continue to be gradualist. When events prove me wrong, I will say so. But I believe that I will be right more often than not, and that the effect of overreaching is something to be avoided.

Cato on Cuba, as if they read my mind:

2008-05-02T18:12:00.001-04:00

Article below is quoted in full from here:

Today, Cuba officially lifted its ban on the sale of computers to the general public.
Some other prohibitions have also been scrapped in recent weeks: Cubans
can now buy cell phones, stay in hotels previously reserved for
tourists, and buy appliances like microwaves and TV sets.

Is this a sign of openness from Cuba’s geriatric regime? Not so.

A Cuban dissident I met in Havana last year sent me today an article
he wrote about the real motive behind relaxing these bans. It has been
reported in the state-controlled media that people purchasing these
goods are later being investigated by the authorities who want to know
the real sources of their income. As it’s widely known, the average
Cuban salary is less than $20 a month, while the cost of most of these
goods ranges in the hundreds of dollars. Many Cubans get their extra
money from relatives in the United States, but many others run
independent (and illicit) small businesses.

My friend tells the story of the first person to purchase an
electric bicycle, which cost the equivalent of $1,070. This man had a
small butter factory that apparently was very profitable, since he was
selling the butter at a lower price than the government. After buying
his electric bicycle, the authorities investigated him and discovered
his factory. They proceeded to confiscate everything they found in his
home, including the bike.

Let’s not forget that, after all, there is still a Castro brother
running the show on the island. As my Cuban friend says about the
so-called “reforms,” the fact that something is no longer prohibited
doesn’t mean that you can do it.

There are so many Castros, what are we to do with them?

2008-05-02T16:46:00.001-04:00

Cuba recently held elections for a national legislature. Fidel Castro stepped down and his brother Raul took over. I thought at the time that this was the first step towards further democratization, as the old guard of Cuba's regime slowly aged or died off.

FP Passport has made me think again.

Castro family members, and those who married into the family, represent a huge chunk of the top government and business leaders. Even if Raul and the current legislature chose to democratize further - which isn't likely at all right now - the other Castros would not want to lose their clout in the transition. Meanwhile, for one reason or another, Cuba isn't as economically wrecked by its semi-communist economics as other countries have been. This is probably due to an effective tourism industry that brings in valuable foreign money.

As for Cuba's health care system, it seems the country trains a number of competent doctors. However, recent reports indicate that there aren't enough, and that while people in major population centers may get free health care, rural people have no access to basic treatments. In a country like Cuba, where private health care is restricted, this is more than irresponsible.

What's more, the American boycott has not brought down the regime. Maybe it made sense in 1959. Maybe it made sense up until 1991. Does it make sense now, seventeen years after the Soviet Union broke apart? You could argue that it punishes and weakens the Cuban regime. Probably it does, but if the American economy was opened to Cuba tomorrow, the massive new selection of goods would demonstrate how superior the American system is. Unlike the lower-tech communist regimes like China and North Korea, Cuba could not stop American books, magazines and movies from finding their way into the country. The internet can also be a great tool for Cubans hoping to move their country towards democracy.

I thought that when the leader of Cuba was no longer named Castro, the US would finally lift the ban. The lure of America did help contribute to the democratization of Easter Europe. However, seeing Passport's never ending list of Castros, I wonder if democracy will come to Cuba in our lifetimes.

The Provocateur is wrong! Someone is wrong on the internet!

2008-05-01T19:53:00.001-04:00

[Title explained here]

A blog out there, found through RealClearPolitics, is titled 'The Provocateur.' Today he writes against Mary Mitchell, apparently an inflammatory African-American columnist for the Chicago Sun Times. What did she say that incenses us so?

This is a sad day for Black America.
At a time when African Americans
are on the cusp of watching a barrier come crashing down, up jumps a
divisive issue that is being driven by those outside of the black
community.Obviously, Wright's timing for a press conference about his sermons couldn't have been worse. Still, when Obama
says he is "offended" by Wright's latest comments -- given in defense
against an orchestrated assault on his character and on his ministry --
he's opening up a can of worms. There is no institution in the
black community more respected than the black church. And the notion
that white pundits can dictate what constitutes unacceptable speech in
the black church is repulsive to most black people.

Let me say this: I understand both sides of the issue here. Of course some in the black community see Obama's candidacy as a breakthrough, and the possibility of it being undone when he's gone so far arouses resentment. I also see that others, often outside the black community, would see the kind of rhetoric Mary Mitchell uses as too heavily race-based or divisive. But what our kindly Provocateur does is to make the wrong move about this. Instead he does the old "let's flip the races and see if it sounds like the KKK" gambit.

I could do the easy thing and say "Why doesn't anyone complain about Asian, Jewish, Italian, Irish, German organizations? Why is it black organizations? There are groups advocating the same solidarity within Jewish and Chinese communities today, as well as others I don't know about. If the problem is with self-segregation, which you say it is, then you will now denounce these groups publicly."

Now that I've said the easy thing I'm going to say the hard thing. The reason that any group exerts pressure is that it's a minority. Majority groups make the situation against which pressure groups move. Majority groups have their system and their values normalized by virtue of being the majority.

Black Americans have to contend with a totally different power dynamic. That is why it is acceptable for Mary Mitchell to speak as she does. It matters how both sides see the problem involved. Provocateur sees it as separationist. I am not comfortable with the part that appears too ready to blame deliberate malice on the part of the white community. Yet there is also the other side of Mitchell's statement which comes from a long history of power imbalance between black and white communities. If you think that power imbalance ended with the Civil Rights Act, you are sorely mistaken. Even if every racist law in the country was struck down tomorrow there is the amorphous cultural power where Black America can in no way present a legitimate challenge.

It's not up to me, or the Provocateur, to say "Mary Mitchell is a racist" or "Mary Mitchell is a legitimate spokesperson for the black community". It is important to note that simply swapping the races in her comment cannot prove it is unacceptable because 'caucasians' do not have the history that correctly contextualizes the comment. I reject the 'race-swap' tactic in all its forms because it assumes that race relations develop in a historical vacuum and that any group can be substituted for any other. This is not true, and so the tactic is illegitimate.

Religions based in Fear (FSTDT)

2008-05-01T14:18:00.001-04:00

Browsing around Fundies Say The Darndest Things, I found this quote:

For many years, I've been tip-toeing through life, afraid that if I
make the wrong move, God will punish me horribly. Whether or not that
is theologically accurate, I do not know. But it's like everytime I do
something that I think might be bad in some way, no matter how small it
is, I start thinking "Please God, don't hurt me. Just don't hurt me!"
It's just gotten worse in the last year or so, and I don't want to live
my life in utter misery and constant fear of God spiritually hitting me
over the head. Any advice?

The commentators who critiqued this quote were pretty hostile. A sampling:

You have no idea of theology.
Get therapy for paranoia and religious indoctrination.
Yes. stop believing that God will hurt you. God never will.
A perfect example of how effective religion can be at controlling people through fear.

For all these commentators, fear is not a legitimate aspect of religion. Must are antagonistic, but the third espouses a God that is sympathetic. Is fear just tangential to the process of religion, or is this 'Fundie' onto something?

Some time ago, I watched a documentary on North Korea on the National Geographic channel (which now refers to itself in a too-hip manner as 'NatGeo'). This is solely my opinion, but based on what I have heard and read in books, the internet, television and news reports I believe North Korea is the most oppressive regime and governmental system in the history of humanity. I believe that it has, more than any other organization since time began, come close to actually controlling the thoughts and actions of its citizens as much as is possible.

It is supposedly communist, but not in a way Marx might recognize. The official philosophy is 'Juche' - self reliance - which means North Koreans are doin' it for themselves, mostly. This means that crop failures inevitably lead to famines and that while South Korea has become a truly modern country, the North may actually have declined since the end of the Korean War.

It's also somewhat anti-religious, as many communist regimes are. Yet Juche and deification of Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il act almost as a substitute religion. A picture of one of the Kims is found in almost every building. Near-godlike powers are ascribed to the Eternal President and his son. The NatGeo documentary concluded that for North Koreans, fear and worship aren't such different things at all.

So while the governmental system may be unique, is the concept of a religion in which a primary motivating factor is fear also new? Not at all. In fact, fear may be more fundamental in the history of religion that the standard given answers. Many historians, trying to explain the universal religious impulse in humans have said that religion 'explains the natural world' or 'allows people to order their lives with regard to some higher organization'. I think that these reasons are important, but that fear is a fundamental part of primal religion that is often left out.

The fact is that even mainstream Christianity has a vocabulary of fear. Until recently, many people were self-described 'God-fearing' men and women. More apocalyptic versions have emphasized the terrible wrath of God's judgment. The best modern example of Christian fear is found in the last book of the Left Behind series, an evangelical account of the End Times in a trashy action-movie format. This last, The Glorious Appearing, has taken a lot of criticism because the returning Jesus is a judgmental conquerer who physically punishes the enemies of God. I see this not as a new development in Christianity but rather a hearkening back to pre-Christian ideas about deity.

Most religions in the modern world have toned down or muted the fear aspect. There is one historical example of a religion that, like Juche/Kim Worship, was based primarily on fear. That is the polytheism of ancient Sumer. Sumerian religion isn't well known, and most people have only barely heard of the Epic of Gilgamesh. It does reveal aspects of the religious system, however. Like Greco-Roman gods, the Sumerian gods each had a domain. They were flawed beings who ruled because they were powerful, not because they deserved to rule. They demanded sacrifices, which the people gave. Unlike Roman sacrifices, the Sumerians offered their not out of the hope of favor from a particular god but because the failure to do so would be horribly punished.

Sumerian religion is older as a systematized setup than Greco-Roman faith. It was also practiced in a much harsher climate. While maintaining many structures, all the polytheisms that eventually flowed from Sumer seem to have slowly toned down the role of fear in the relationships between gods and humans. Yet we should not forget that the Old Testament contains a healthy dosage of near-threats from God to his chosen people.

Then again, maybe North Korea's system is unique - it's one of the few religions in modern times to put fear front-and-center. However much certain strains of political Christianity have tried to inject 'fear' back into their theology, that aspect remains one of the more embarrassing for evangelists of this brand of Christianity. For one reason or another, fear-centric worship is rare and rather disliked in today's world.

What the hell is happening?

2008-05-01T14:06:00.001-04:00

Barack Obama has been doing rather badly in recent polls. There are a few reason - the resurfacing of Rev. Wright, the larger-than-optimal loss in Pennsylvania, the possible association with certain Weathermen (Weathermans? I'm not entirely sure). But what's interesting is the Hillary Clinton, the obvious beneficiary of all this, isn't getting more popular. It's just that Obama's support is eroding. What this means is that if Clinton manages the nomination, she won't be any stronger against McCain for having defeated Obama.

McCain continues to be relatively quiet, saying some fuzzy things about health care and the current financial crisis. His solutions are disturbing for some Republicans because they tend to be much more comfortable with Big Government mechanisms that are often lambasted as 'Democractic' ideas.

Meanwhile, it seems that even Robert Mugabe's government in Zimbabwe is willing to say that the opposition won. Yet Morgan Tsvangirai claims he won 50.6%, which would mean he does not have to engage Mugabe in a direct run-off. Mugabe's government seems near to releasing results in which Tsvangirai won, but was under the 50% threshold. If Mugabe actually plans to relinquish the Presidency, he is not acting like it. I personally believe he won't give it up willingly and that he plans to intimidate the opposition and rig the vote in the run-off election. China has attempted to ship weapons - suspiciously ordered right after the first round of elections - into the country but South Africa and now Angola - a big Zimbabwe and China supporter - have prevented the goods from reaching Mugabe's men. Mugabe's government is currently recounting votes, possibly stalling for time while they try to obtain weapons.

And you know that food shortage we've been hearing about? Apparently it's struck hardest in repressive regimes like Zimbabwe and Egypt and Haiti. While I am not disregarding the human aspect of the shortage, the political aspect has caused the weakening of a number of vicious and illiberal regimes. Maybe this will make people reexamine their commitment to food aid for foreign countries where American grain may prevent famine at the expense of propping up an authoritarian.

What about Bush?

2008-04-29T22:19:00.001-04:00

Over at Reason there's a discussion going on about the most overrated and underrated Presidents of all time. It's pretty predictable, with snarky libertarians taking the piss out of Reagan (liked for his economics, hated for his foreign policy) and Lincoln (who expanded wartime executive powers).

This got me thinking about President Bush. Commentators have speculated on what his legacy will be. Of course, a certain contingent will always find him the worst President of their lifetimes or even of all time. For the all time-worst I would pick James Buchanan, the man who directly proceeded Lincoln. If Lincoln overstepped his bounds and did unconstitutional things to win the war or squash dissent, Buchanan failed his oath of office by tacitly allowing secessionists to maneuver themselves into positions that would make some military confrontation inevitable for his successor.

But I digress. Now certain people are worried that if Iraq succeeds, Bush will be seen as a genius and that his history will be whitewashed. Exactly what a successful Iraq looks like is also up for debate. What I know is this: Iraq will not be settled within Bush's term. It will definitely be up to the next President to finish it in whatever way they do.

So what will Bush's legacy look like? I think history will record him thusly:
Immediately following 9/11, Bush enjoyed ridiculous levels of support (92%!). No human could maintain that level. If Jesus was President he couldn't keep his approval rating that high. The problem is not that his ratings fell afterwards but how ready Bush was to spend that political capital in divisive areas and how quickly it vanished.
The invasion of Iraq has three parts: convincing the public, winning the war and holding the territory. Convincing the public seemed to go over pretty well at the time. Approval for the war was about as high as any other modern-era war at its start. Bush seemed to be too much in a hurry though, which made it appear that he was set upon invading even if there were no weapons of mass destruction or a program to make them - which was the case that an obviously uncomfortable Colin Powell presented to the American public.

Once engaged, winning the war was easy. With the US military apparatus as it is now, I could even have won the war. I'm not saying I have any military skill, I'm saying that the US military is the best at what it does in the entire world.

Holding the territory and making something out of it is where Bush's legacy truly hinges. I think history will remember him thus: whatever the US ends in Iraq, Bush pursued a policy - even in the face of on-the-ground failures and much criticism - that very nearly made it impossible for any change in strategy to make anything of Iraq.

The point at which Bush's Iraq strategy changed most noticeably was after the 2006 midterm elections, which were heavily about Iraq and in which Bush received a "thumpin'". American have generally been most satisfied with government when the executive and legislative branches have belonged to different parties. While some would argue that the current congress had been relatively do-nothing, I think that the effect of a big loss, no matter how it was followed up, changed Bush's plans for Iraq. He substituted in new people who were not committed to the 'it will be easy' view of things. The new policy was slower, more pragmatic, more willing to make concessions.

If this is the policy that stabilizes Iraq and creates a democracy there, it won't be recorded as some massive work of genius on Bush's part. The policy congealed over literally three years, lacked real coherence until midway into the 'surge' and was produced more by events than by Bush's central planning.

I think this will be the legacy view of President Bush - that during his second term (especially since 2006) he saved Iraq from his own first term. Someday way into the future, archives will be available that will tell us exactly who knew what about Iraq and when. That will settle the debate about whether Bush's war pitch was a lie, and what the original goals for invading Iraq were. Until that time, I'm not worried that he'll be unduly canonized. There is no doubt that the Bush presidency has had far-reaching effects on the world, but if the War on Terror is not similarly pursued by the next President, Bush's terms may seem more of an aberration than a epoch-making event.

What is a religion?

2008-04-28T12:11:00.001-04:00

I've been prompted to write about this for two reasons. One, a post at the Volokh Conspiracy, is titled Soldier sues army, saying his atheism led to threats. The other is the website Fundamentalists Say the Darndest Things, which I check from time to time.

While Volokh's discussion of possible unfair discrimination against atheists in the army is evenhanded, the quotes featured on FSTDT new are: it is a repository of things that are supposed to be far-out. It encourages a kind of distancing, since most of the quotes are from political Christians, and this allows us, as readers, to dismiss the entire movement as a 'bunch of crazy people'.

First, about the army. I don't doubt there are some people in the army command structure who want their soldiers to all be Christian. Some may promote this either by preferring Christians or discriminating against non-Christians. This has doubtless happened. This particular case, I am not entirely sure since I haven't read enough about it. And if something improper did occur, the army has a culture in which it rarely admits such mistakes. It will probably not do such a lot in this case, not because it shares a Christian agenda but because it does not appreciate outside pressure or transparency.

But is atheism, as so many commentators on FSTDT say, a religion? Basically the answer is "maybe." To know if something is a religion, we would have to define what 'religion' is. Yet I've never seen a satisfactory definition of religion in my life. I'm tempted to just ask atheists if it is religion, but no matter what they tell me, that won't solve it. Many Africans who practice traditional religions see these practices as part of their culture, not their religion. The entire term is so annoyingly subjective.

The fact is that atheism is a system of belief. It receives input from science and logic and reason, but so do other systems that we commonly consider religions. I can imagine atheists who are horrified as a say this but atheism may indeed be a religion. And so what if it is? There are wonderful arguments that patriotism forms a kind of civil religion, since it comprises a large number of the same functions as things we commonly see as religions (Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, etc.).

Eventually I will start a series of posts on various topics from FSTDT, simply because it captures a massively important part of American culture that just isn't given the serious appraisal it deserves.

Alternate History #5: Roe v. Wade heads back to the states!

2008-04-26T15:47:00.001-04:00

Recently, certain states in Mexico have begun to legalize abortion in increasing numbers of circumstances. Mexico is generally more culturally conservative than the US, but it has worked out a totally different system of federalism and states' rights for abortion. The central government won't dictate policy, and each state can set its own limits. The more developed, cosmopolitan states have begun to legalize more kinds of abortions.

Obviously there are opponents to this measure, but in the state which have legalized, these objectors - mainly religious Catholics - are seen as needlessly domineering. Could something similar have happened in the US?

Some people have argued that Supreme Court decisions dictate American culture - Brown v Board eliminated the validity of segregation which was still enjoying some popular support in the south. Yet sometimes Supreme Court decisions create opposition movements - Roe v Wade is the most obvious of these. Before Roe, abortion law in the US was a patchwork of permissive laws in liberal states to total restriction in the conservative ones to any number of moderate limitations in the Midwest.

When Roe made all US abortion law uniform by making it a right, it didn't change the culture the way Brown did. The reason for this difference escapes me - why did one decision make the result more popular, the other make it less popular? Both decisions were for generally liberal causes, done in the face of large opposition which was largely in the south. However, the difference between the cases does not change this fact: in Roe, a large number of states were dragged further to the political left in abortion law than they were willing to accept.

But what if the Supreme Court had decided that they couldn't form a majority opinion in Roe? What if they decided that any result would have been too divisive for both Court and Country? What if the Court had given a unanimous opinion that abortion policy was a state matter, not to be handled at the federal level?

Several things would change. First, I believe that a large amount of the power and popularity enjoyed by the pro-life movement comes, originally, from the top-down manner in which Roe imposed new law. Roe created a rally point - the number of religiously-motivated politicians vowing to 'overturn Roe' is proof of this. Without something both symbolic and federal, the pro-life movement could never have attained its current clout and power.

So in 1973, when abortion becomes a state matter, the laws are all over the place. What this means is that some states with total bans would border others with very slight restrictions. It's unlikely that laws prohibiting travel across state lines to procure abortion would have passed - they might be ruled unconstitutional by state or federal courts. This means that each state is not a 'black box' - people in restricted states could travel into a neighboring state if they wanted an abortion.

In an article about the Mexican state laws, the commentator, a rather utopian libertarian, pined that if Roe had gone back to the states, laws all around the nation would be much more liberal and acceptable. I think this is a bit naive, since it seems to assume that the wave of cultural conservatism starting in the 1980s, and possibly ending with this current election, would not have happened, or would be much weaker. I personally think Roe help the political Christian movement - always present but dormant until the 80s - come back into the mainstream. Roe woke up the religious conservatives but did not create them. What this means is that if abortion law was a state matter today, the red states might even be tightening their restrictions or banning the process entirely. To assume that, without Roe, abortion law would gradually 'progress' to liberal law is wrongheaded.

But in red states, where religious conservatives sought to ban all abortions, there might be an additional wrinkle. Even with Roe, certain states (I'm looking at you, South Dakota) have tried total bans anyway. If Roe was liberal overreaching at the federal level, there's no reason to think there wouldn't be conservative overreaching at the state level. In this alternate timeline, during the apogee of the conservative Christian movement certain states would have issued total bans and found their general population just as upset as people were over Roe. The reason abortion law becomes so contentious is that it is often settled by one side muscling its morality upon the other. This creates resentment, and the conservatives who tried total bans in their states would find that out for themselves.

My opinion is that by 2008, all or almost all state laws would allow abortions for rape, incest and the health of the mother. A great number would allow it fully, and a few states would have no parental consent laws for minors. Abortion law handled at the state level is less divisive and creates less hatred between pro-choice and pro-life. Plus it pushes the aggregate law towards moderation since any overstepping will cause an adverse reaction.

Alternate History #6: Ottoman Colonialism

2008-04-25T16:16:00.001-04:00

The start of the colonial period, in the mid-1500s, was not a time of European supremacy. In fact, the Islamic Ottoman Empire might have been the most powerful force in the world. China was also strong, but far away. There was a viable Iranian Safavid Empire, and a forming Empire in Mughal north India. The Europeans were the ones who colonized for a few reasons:

Their ships could reach the other lands
They built trading empires which liked the goods colonization could bring
They were geographically placed to send many expeditions
They had the wealth to do all this

China fulfills all but the first; they could build better ships, but those kinds of ships were sometimes banned or their voyaging paths restricted. The Islamic Empires fulfill all but the first and third. However, massive ocean-going ships would have been copied from Europeans...if the Islamic Empires had had need of them.

What really changed things was the European control of Gibraltar. The Ottomans couldn't leave the Mediterranean. So how might things have come out differently? Until the very late 1400s, there was an Islamic power controlling southern Spain. If it had somehow held out for another hundred years, it would have afforded safe passage to Muslim ships seeking the Atlantic - specifically Ottoman ones.

In schools, children are taught that the Muslims were pushed out so the Spanish kingdom could be unified. This means that it's unlikely that a Muslim state - Grenada - could have survived as Spain's power rose. Yet the Spanish rulers did not find it necessary to control Portugal in order to 'complete' their country. Yes, Portugal was also Catholic, but the rules had found in necessary to consume the various other Catholic factions of Spain. What I mean by this is that the conception of 'complete' Spain was relatively arbitrary; had the rules been more concerned with French encroachment, or regional separatism, or Portuguese land-grabs, they might not have had time for Grenada.

So Grenada survives. The Ottomans, at that moment trading heavily with Italian powers, get and copy maps of the new world. We have one of those maps, the oldest to accurately map the coast of Brazil. It has captions on it which basically amount to "There are good lands out there and we should go seek them." If, as some would argue, there is no overseas-colonial instinct in the Ottoman world, I would use this map to argue there was.

Where might the Ottomans have colonized? My first guess would be West Africa and the entire western coast of Africa. While the Ottoman slave system was different from the chattel-slave system in West Africa, there were other Islamic (and Eastern European) powers who might have been very willing to take an influx of slaves. There had been an experiment in plantation slavery (like the southern USA) in souther Arabia early in Islamic history, but the Zanj (Black) Revolt had ended the systematic enslavement of East Africans. West Africans, taken far from home and disoriented, might have been easier to control. A large plantation-based system might arise in Iran and south Arabia, but would not likely prosper within the Ottoman lands themselves.

Seeking to keep its sea lanes open, the Ottomans would become heavily involved in politics between Grenada and Spain. When Spain, hoping to cut of the Ottomans and solidify Christian rule over the Peninsula, attacked Grenada, the Ottomans send a massive fleet and army. Spain is beaten back, and Grenada becomes a puppet of the Empire. Ottoman access is never endangered again, as Spain fears a Portuguese-Ottoman alliance if it tries to take Grenada.

Once colonies in West Africa were set up, the Ottomans might have either settled down or kept on sending ships out. I think that once the instinct sets in, they would have kept going. Central America would have been totally under Spanish control; the Ottomans would have sought to balance this. It is possible that South America, or at least the coasts, would be filled with Ottoman traders. North America, especially New England and Canada, would have been cold and unpleasant; the Ottomans might have wanted to keep the southern US and the extremely profitable Caribbean islands, however.

Many European states prohibited slavery on their own soil but allowed and financed it in the New World. The Ottomans might have set up slave systems in the islands and south, much like the ones Europeans set up. By the time France and England began to seriously try to colonize, the continents would have been claimed by Spain and the Ottomans. The only open zone would be in the northern US and Canada, where England was most successful at setting up permanent settlements.

Obviously, attempts to convert the natives to Islam would have been undertaken; the Ottomans in this period had great tolerance for Christians and Jews, but not for polytheistic pagans. The conversion mission might have been even more important to Muslims than Christians, since Muslim empires are very concerned with getting their citizens to worship only one god - no Islamic empire has long allowed a substantial portion of its population to remain pagan/shamanistic/polytheistic.

Ottoman influence would extend down along the coast of Africa. If it reached the Cape, it would have cut off the zone that the Dutch and English used to access their colonies in Asia. If the Ottomans controlled southern Africa well enough, the Europeans might never have been able to station and supply enough troops to take India.

The world would then look like this: Portugal, Netherlands have lands in Asia, mostly islands. Ottomans have some control over the African coast but not inland, as well as the Brazilian coast and southern North America. These zones would be converted to Islam, and would probably speak both their original languages and some dialect of Turkish. They would all use the Arabic writing system, though not many could actually speak the Arabic language. Spain would be worried as hell about messing with Grenada, but would be flush with gold from Central America.

Maybe sometime I will write up a possible Chinese/Japanese colonial race, since that could also have happened if a few things had happened differently.

A Four-Party America?

2008-04-25T11:30:00.001-04:00

For a politician to advocate lower taxes, they must also be pro-life. For a candidate to support affirmative action they must also support environmental regulations on businesses. The fact that the US has only two viable political parties makes it nearly impossible for anyone to deviate too far from the central platform on any issue. In these examples, there is no good reason why supporting on requires supporting the other.

There are actually a number of different strains in American politics. If we had a parliament instead of an executive/legislative balance, they would split into four or more parties within a couple elections. Let's take a look at what these parties actually are:

Fiscal Responsibles: mostly they vote Republican, but don't like the moralizing or war affinity. Generally oppose any social programs or anything that gives money to the government. For lower taxes most of the time, but a principled FR might support raising taxes to pay off a budget deficit inherited from a previous government.

Christian Wing: the other major sector of the Republicans, more approving of foreign policy 'agendas' and highly demanding on the social front. Various goals include condemning oppression of Christians worldwide, abstinence education, regulation of TV/internet content, and pro-life goals. Economics is not a priority for this party, as social policy was not for the FR.

Civil Rightists: A traditionally Democratic group, they have become even more so under President Bush's various suspensions of assumed rights. Anti-censorship, often interested in fair prison sentences and even drug decriminalization. Mostly opposed to adventures abroad, unless the US makes up only a small part in a multilateral operation. Basically the opposite of the CW; economic policy is not a priority once again.

Equality and Justice: The economic sector of the Democrats. Protectionist and neoliberal at the same time, they like the social programs set up by FDR and Johnson, but want to reform them to fit the current era. Bill Clinton is their most obvious success. Highly concerned with minority issues, they also support extensive foreign policy, along the lines of Bosnia, not Iraq.

These are the four major types of political thought in America, but they've been lassoed together so that a Civil Rightist has to end up supporting the agenda of an Equality&Justice candidate, or vice versa. Meanwhile these categories aren't perfect but the ideas in each do make more sense as a package than our current setup.

So how would a hypothetical four party system work? The parties would have to form coalitions. These could be the same kind that we currently see - CW and FR, CR and E&J. But there are lots of other ways to organize the parties, and the current setup is not self-evidently the best one. A FR+CR coalition would be a libertarian's wet dream. An E&J+CW coalition would be wonderful for compassionate Christians (not Compassionate Conservatives specifically but those who like overseas promotion of American values as well as well-funded public social and education programs).

The point is not that the parties should split like this, but that these are the big strands of American politics. If the US government was organized differently, they might be viable. I think that our executive-headed system makes it difficult for more than two parties to grow very large, at least for more than one election.

I was right (enough) about Pennsylvania

2008-04-23T23:44:00.001-04:00

It was kinda boring except when early polls said Obama might win. So Clinton won by ten points. She picked up 15 delegates at most, meaning she's only behind by 130 now. Maybe if she's reached that 12-point win, it really would've meant something. A bunch of people predicted Obama wouldn't get over 43%; he got 45%.

Both Democrats still beat McCain in Pennsylvania, so Clinton's assertion that Obama can't win big states does not make sense in this case.

I really had hoped for something spectacular to happen, but it's two steps forward two steps back. I might just swear off posting about the Democrats until they sort this thing out.

Why is black America so different?

2008-04-23T23:38:00.001-04:00

Bill Cosby complains about it. He wrote a book chastising black Americans for not living up to the potential given to them. The book is called "Come on People!" Unfortunately, he didn't notice that there should be a comma there. The book went to print as "Come on People!" instead of the (clearer) "Come on, People!"

I've talked about how blacks are more likely to get abortions because they are more often in the financial/relationship situations that make women want to get abortions. The question I've never gotten around to is why this status is the case.

If I could answer it simply, I'd have a wonderful solution all packaged for you. Unfortunately the explanation I find most convincing is so nuanced that I have not idea how to change the situation. The man who explains the problems of gangs, drugs, pregnancy and educational/achievement failure in black communities is Elijah Anderson. I read his book, Code of the Street, two years ago and had a number of conversations with people about the ideas.

He bases the book of off immense amounts of case-study research. A single case study is just an anecdote, but a lifetime of them is better than any survey or statistical analysis because such 'hard math' often fails when applied to sociological issues.

Anderson has one gigantic idea from which many of the problems in black communities can be derived. I call it the 'shortened time horizon'. For one reason or another, African-Americans in poor communities do not consider a long scope of time ahead of their present position.

This might sound like some simple, subtly racist idea: "blacks can't think ahead and plan."
That's not it at all, and if you think that's what I mean, please read the book.

The point is that a huge web of factors cause it to be impossible to get enough time perspective to create large change within a community. Only certain select people can save themselves from this - personal redemption only, like in The Wire, which is easily in the same vein.

Here's an example of how interconnected the whole mess is: Anthony grew up without a father, raised mostly by his grandmother. None of the other men around him have jobs besides selling drugs or gang-related activity. That's because all the jobs are far away from the ghetto where Anthony lives, and you have to move out to get one that's worthwhile. Within the community, living to 35 is a blessing for a man. The school Anthony goes to is full of kids who don't give a shit about learning because they don't expect to use anything they've learned in school. Even if Anthony wanted to learn, there are social pressures against it (acting white - which is often overstated in my opinion) and failing that his classmates have disrupted the whole idea of school so totally that no one but a real, gifted teacher can hook more than a few kids. When Anthony goes home he sees his mom come home from one of her several, very low-paying jobs. He expects, just like everyone else around him, that he'll be dead within ten to fifteen years. He needs or wants money, for his family or just for himself. There is a way to get it - he sees people making easy money selling drugs. Most of them get killed eventually, but he'll be killed anyway before long and the money is important.

This isn't exactly taken from Anderson's book, but the basic idea is: there is a huge set of social, cultural and institutional factors that all do one thing: make everyone within them pessimistic about the future. Maybe this sounds too neat and tidy, as if having a sunnier outlook could cure gang violence. The lack of role models is especially important. No, black sports-players don't count. I might even argue they detract, giving people a chance to lie to themselves about whether they can become real athletes and not work towards a living the way most people do. When I say role models, I don't mean it in the normal sense, but in the sense that Anderson uses it: if you don't live near anyone who has a real, steady job that supports them, it's easy to imagine a hopelessness setting in.

The shortened time horizon not only explains poverty and gang-drug connections, but also alarming numbers of single parents and very young mothers. Seeking to prove themselves under social pressure (just like anyone) young black women try to form attachments to men around them - who might be gang members simply because of the statistics of it - and the way they do this is with sex. The downsides of having a child young mostly lie in the far future - the costs aren't always apparent. Anderson makes the argument so much better, but I've tried to summarize a few bits here.

Code of the Street uses a few concepts such as reputation and shortened time horizon to explain most of the peculiarities of black America. He applies it to conspicuous consumption, consumption beyond one's means, violent bravado, and on and on. One thing he doesn't do - and maybe he doesn't know the answer - is explain why and how the institutions he analyzes came into being in the first place.

He also does not go into the specific contours of gangs and drugs, which are often the most incomprehensible part to outside observers. What's interesting to note is that as more Hispanics move into the US, ones that settle in areas near or similar to ghettos begin to develop a Hispanic-inflected culture that is very similar to the black one Anderson describes. This suggests, but doesn't prove, that the environment in which a culture survives is very important in how it defines goals and time horizons.

Pennsylvania - maybe something interesting can come out of this

2008-04-22T20:29:00.001-04:00

Winner still undecided. Looks closer than I had predicted though.

Interesting thing from CNN exit polls:
Obama won those who never go to church and those who go more than once a week. Clinton won the moderate - once a week to once a month churchgoers. Sarcasm: Can Obama unite the highly religious and highly secular against the moderate middle?

Another thing:
Among voters who said gender was important in picking a candidate, 70% went for Hillary. I know its an exit poll, and I know people lie. But this is a much larger margin than any random act of lying could create. We've heard all the arguments about people not wanting a woman CiC because she'd get hormonal, or that women are weaker or less decisive. Apparently, the real gender aspect works the other direction. Maybe a longer analysis later.
(only 21% said gender mattered to them; those who didn't care nearly split between Clinton and Obama)

More on Blacks & Abortion from TVV

2008-04-22T17:58:00.001-04:00

TheValuesVoter, the author of the post which I critiqued a while back, has posted several comments on this blog. One is the series of statistics I had mentioned in that critique. These stats continue to uphold my assertion that black people in America find themselves in the situations that cause people to want abortions more frequently than whites or other groups do. This accounts, I would argue, for the imbalance in abortion rates between communities - not some plan to slow the growth of the black population or some ill-defined idea of 'coercion' that TVV sometimes talks about.

I'd like to take an opportunity to talk about another of TVV's posts on the subject, one comparing the unacknowledged personhood of slaves to the unacknowledged personhood of fetuses/embryos/whatever word you want to use.

The big quote to critique:

They're not pro-abortion. They're pro-choice!! And to the people who would reply this way, there is some huge difference in the two.
Let me try to quickly explain why there isn't really any.

Unfortunately, the justification boils down to the following: slavery was bad, and slaves weren't seen as people. Thus, another case where something seen by only certain persons as 'human' is also wrong.

There can be a huge variance between what you think about 'conception and such' and the response you give to the question, "Are you pro-choice?" This reminds me of Presidential Candidate Santos on the last season of the West Wing, who was pro-choice in most respects but believed abortion to be murder. He gained this belief from his religious values, and he asserted that it wasn't his place to let his religious values guide his policies.

There's something vaguely unhinged behind TVV's little essay, which does a good job of picking out quotes that make it seem like an easy equation between living slaves and living fetuses. But when does like begin? I will answer that question: I don't know. We don't know and can't know scientifically right now. If life did begin at conception, and you could prove it to me, I'd have to think differently than I do now. If your only proof is a religious idea or a suspicion, I cannot accept it in determining my opinion.

And for all you feminists out there, I haven't left out the concerns of the mother because she's not important. I just wanted to answer TVV on his own terms on the subjects he talks about. But, coming soon, an alternate history in which Roe V. Wade is...dismissed.

Pennsylvania primary boring

2008-04-21T20:50:00.001-04:00

It's not that exciting, really. Hillary Clinton needs a victory by 10-12 points to really have a chance at a Superdelegate-stolen nomination (which wouldn't happen anyway, so never mind). She's going to beat Obama by six to eight points. That gains her 15 to 30 delegates on Obama, who leads by at least 140 delegates. Even if Hillary really pulls it out at the last minute and wins by 15 points, than big chunk of gained delegates will be equalized in North Carolina, where Obama will win by more than 10 points (maybe as high as 20). At that point the situation will be the same as it is right now.

If Obama pulls off a close loss - within five points of Clinton, I think - then there will be another round of "Hillary, please drop out" op-eds in the papers. A debate performance generally regarded as hostile and lackluster did not damage Obama, and didn't help Clinton either. Not much has changed in a long time. This political situation is stuck on a treadmill, and Clinton is running low on endurance.

I almost hope something important happens tomorrow, just so I can be wrong and have a chance to explain why I was wrong.

Only one good thing has come from this Pennsylvania mess for the democrats: whichever one wins, the nominee will have a very good chance to beat McCain in this crucial state.

The historiography of grand strategy computer games (aka. the most boring title ever for a post)

2008-04-21T20:32:00.001-04:00

I have been playing a computer game recently, and it's good. It's addictive and eats up time. It's called Europa Universalis, and it's one of the most complicated and historiographically acceptable of any of the 'conquer the world' games I've played yet. The combat of armies, the loose political organization, the factoring in of culture and religion in a non-trivial way all make for a fun but also acceptably historical game. It's nothing like another favorite of mine, Medieval: Total War, which makes each playable faction out to be an empty container that can build a massive force and steamroll across Europe regardless of culture and religion.

But amid all this is a disturbing little nugget: the way that EU calculates the rate at which your government researches technology exposes two important ideas about how nations advance, both of which are faulty.

First, advances in technology - from governmental forms to new types of military to better trading practices - come about only by direct investment from the player. Since you play as the central government of your faction, this seems to be telling us that governments create innovation, and that advances are made only this way. I give the developers a huge amount of leeway since they had to think of some system, and even if they didn't mean this, I must discuss it.
Most large advances in any area of technology came from individual or group (though not always private) experimentation or thought. They did not come from governments pouring big buckets of money into an idea. This only began to happen when new technology became expensive. The first big tech breakthrough totally made by governments was, in my opinion, the atomic bomb. There is only one other big breakthrough since then: spaceflight. Some would even argue that the government spaceflight programs are a dead end, marking not a breakthrough but a hobbled mistake that needs to be ditched. The major breakthroughs until then, from Longbows and heavy armor for knights and horses to powered flight to electronic components were mostly free of government funds. Most great political thinkers weren't subsidized.

The second problem with EU's historiography is again about technological research. In the complicated formula determining how quickly an area of research is completed, there is a variable based on which major culture group your faction belongs to. Based on which group you belong to, your research speed gets multiplied by a number. The groups and their values are:

Latin (Western Europe): 1.0
Eastern (Eastern Europe): 0.9
Muslim: 0.8
Indian (India, Pakistan, Bangladesh): 0.5
Chinese (and Southeast Asia): 0.4
African: 0.2
New World: 0.1

Well if that isn't Eurocentric and condescending! This feature actually wasn't required to make the game playable, unlike my first complaint. Even taking the actual values very lightly, there is a startling downplaying of New World tech and ideological prowess. Africa likewise gets shafted. The game begins in 1453, when Muslims, not Westerners, were the preeminent culture group. China's technology rivaled Europe's for maybe another two centuries.

What this means is that by the time you being to colonize as a European faction, the African and New World ones are pushovers. Your troops cut them to bits and settle on their lands. There are, however, good arguments to be made that New World tech was actually much more advanced in some areas than European kinds. The bows Amerinds made were superior to European bows and guns, and hardened leather armor they used could actually repel bullets up until better methods were found in the 1840s.

This game, like almost every other I've played, seems dead set on explaining that Europe really was the best in most every way. It's nearly impossible to play as a New World faction, and I (playing as England) ripped apart an Amerind alliance of three nations comprising the entire Southern US, then without stopping conquered all of Mexico and Central America. From this game, it's pretty evident that a kind of Eurocentric and imperialist attitude to history still exists.

(For more on Amerind sophistication, read 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus. Charles Mann is an amazing popularizer of real, substantial history.)

Refining my ideas on China, with thanks to xiaoyong

2008-04-18T18:00:00.001-04:00

A commenter here named xiaoyong has said some interesting things about my posts on China, the wider world, and Tibet. I know nothing about this person except that they are Chinese and that English is not their first language. They made some good points, though sometimes I couldn't understand what they were trying to say.

When they made their first comment, I wanted to write something snarky like, "someone responds to posts about China overreacting by...overreacting." But there are some good points in there: China did raise the standard of living for many of its citizens. Tibet was a backwater before China took over. These things are true, but we need to have a discussion over whether the human rights violations required to obtain them were worth it.

I may have been overly harsh in characterizing the Chinese people, but I stand by my idea that an international diplomatic culture has not yet developed among the citizenry. This means that in the face of criticism, the Chinese are more likely to huddle together in nationalism and not respond fully. Plus, calling people who try to put out the Olympic Torch terrorists does not help mellow the image.

Obviously, xiaoyong is a proud Chinese nationalist. That's fine, and they do notice that people overreact and find it embarrassing. What I would ask of this person is to note the bad things that China has done and continues to do. No country is perfect, least of all the US. We have a history of slavery, problems with religious, racial and gender equality and a host of other things. I love to critique the US. When I ask my country to be better, it shows I am a part of it. I hope that Chinese citizens can find an opening to do the same and not whitewash their own past.

Tibet, and more on childish China

2008-04-17T21:39:00.001-04:00

Ah, Facebook. That place where everyone under 25 spends at least twice as much time as they want to. It's the place where you can find the most unintelligent debate on any subject. Girls asking if, as a Catholic, she can call herself a Christian. People asking if Obama is a secret Muslim who prays to idols and shouts 'Allahu Akbar!'

And then we get to the Tibet groups. There is the obvious Free Tibet group. There is the Tibet IS China group. But last of all, there is the most interesting. It is the group called "Tibet WAS, IS AND WILL ALWAYS BE a part of China." It has some 23,000 members. It is the most virulent pit of childishness and petty attacks that I have seen (save a few groups directed against Bush and a few against abortion). Now I know that what's said on facebook is exaggerated and often intentionally so, but I think that the constant overreaction of Chinese nationalists is yet another symptom of the lack of a worldwide diplomatic culture in China.

The group is mostly in English, otherwise I couldn't read it. One section is: "An applaud to Jin Jing for her valiant effort to protect the torch in Pairs and shame to the terrorists who attacked her." There we have it. Protesters trying to put forward a political point (in an inflammatory and probably illegal way) aren't just wrong. Neither are they simple lawbreakers. They're terrorists! I could make a joke about how only China is more willing to label people as terrorists than the USA...wait, I already made it.

What I really wanted to do was critique the name of the group. It makes three claims:

Tibet was part of China (presumably in the past)
Tibet is part of China
Tibet will always be part of China

Tibet was part of China: This one is the hardest to talk about, simply because I don't know what 'was' means. There have been many periods in history where Tibet was independent of China. The traditional zone of China rarely extends as far inland as Tibet. Most of the Chinese Empires were more coastal. That deals with the far past. How about the near history? Until the late 1950s, Tibet was independent. Whatever the status of the people - poor, oppressed, etc - it does not change the fact that Tibet was not a part of China, at least de facto, less than sixty years ago. So the first claim is false, Tibet has not always been part of China. It is culturally related, but not the same. It is ethnically related, but not the same.

Tibet is part of China: Yeah, of course it is. No one would argue with this. Some people would say that it should not be, but that's normative. This claim is descriptive.

Tibet will always be part of China: I don't know how to assess a statement that must apply throughout all time. Besides, if something will go on forever that does not necessarily make it good or acceptable. Inequality and unfairness will go on forever, but they are neither good nor acceptable.

The reason I went through the name is that is becomes some sort of slogan for pro-China groups. There are ten groups with variations on this slogan, which does nothing to attempt to convince people who don't already believe. It's childish to suppose that saying this over and over will do anything but make undecided people suspicious of the seeming craziness of the slogan itself. Besides, for a group that finds history so important it's pretty historically inaccurate.

China whines, "Why can't we force people to like us?!"

2008-04-16T20:31:00.001-04:00

This whole long mess over Tibet and human rights abuses, brought to a head by the Olympics, demonstrates one important thing: China is an economic power, but not a mature country.

What I mean by this is that Chinese citizens and politicians and diplomats and businessmen have been isolated from the world for so long that they have absolutely no idea how to respond to people disliking them. Of all the expressions of nationalism I have seen, China's is the most hair-raisingly unthinking. The Chinese people have not developed a cultural system to deal with being criticized by other countries.

France floated ideas about a boycott over the Tibet violence, and Chinese citizens reacted by trying to organize a total boycott of French goods. Now, you might point out that French opposition to the Iraq war almost resulted in a harrowing 'Freedom Fries' schism. There is, however, a fundamental difference between the American overreaction and the Chinese. The US wanted support on specific policies, France refused. China wanted other countries to like and respect it, and France refused.

The American reaction was citizens registering displeasure because they felt France was wrong. The Chinese wanted to force France to like them by hitting them with an economic club. They did not want diplomatic relations, or the kind of 'friendship' the US enjoys with, say, Saudi Arabia. They wanted to be liked as a country and a people by the French country and people.

What it does is make China look idiotic. And it happens over and over: another country expresses displeasure at China and gets a huge nationalist backlash from the Chinese. China's big debut on the world stage may go over without violence, but its citizens are building a nasty reputation for themselves as the most childish of all great powers. The 'mature' Europeans often scoff at American enthusiasm and hotheadedness, but even the worst of Americans are being made to look measured and thoughtful by the Chinese reactions.

The USSR never had this problem, even as it far more despised by the West. Neither is it a problem of being non-European. Japan does not constantly overreact. South Korean has indeed had its missteps, but more often than not they're things like attempting to apologize for the Virginia Tech killings, simply because the shooter was Korean. Venezuela does not go crazy when important US spokesmen insult Hugo Chavez.

I suspect that if Kim Jong-Il's regime collapsed tomorrow, the North Koreans would have a similar problem to the Chinese: they've been out of the loop of global discourse for so long, they don't understand how to respond. Eventually the Chinese will toughen up and learn to either take criticism or change. For right now, citizens may be undermining the Chinese government's claim that it's ready to stand tall on the world stage.

McCain hasn't spoken yet...to his benefit right now

2008-04-15T22:29:00.001-04:00

McCain is either leaded or close behind Obama or Clinton in head-to-head polls. Over the past number of weeks, the margins between him and the Dems have fluctuated, but I noticed something important: they only move based on what the Democrats do.

When Clinton looks down, she loses ground versus McCain. When Obama says something dumb, he moves down versus McCain. Nothing McCain has done or said has effected the polls one way or the other. That's because he's not done anything of note since becoming the nominee except some small foreign policy gaffes that most Americans didn't hear about and don't care about. Right now, McCain looks like he's tried to portray himself - a maverick, centrist Republican who's not afraid to stand up to his party. The fact is that, as much as he has stood up to his own party, his political positions are pretty generic. Right now he looks like he could be a change candidate, and well-qualified to lead. I'm not disputing the fact that many people see him as most qualified, but his image of renewal can only wear away once he opens his mouth versus the final Democratic nominee.

Something like 15-25% of Democrats say they'll vote for McCain if their candidate doesn't get the nomination. They may think so right now, but Clinton and Obama aren't much different on policy. The big split is in their personalities and styles, with Hillary representing the 'old power' with experience to start right away, and Obama the 'new thinking' that might let American get over partisan woes. The faithful may think they'll go for McCain, but when he becomes known - as a slightly rebellious Republican, but a solidly Republican candidate - these 'party traitors' will change their minds. Not all of them, of course, but a number.

Plus, the head-to-head polls already factor the protest vote for McCain. As Democratic protest votes drop away from McCain, he will fall at least a few points. Since Obama will be the nominee, and he is tied or up 2 points on McCain, expect him to gain 3-5 points on McCain over the course of a few weeks after the nomination. Of course, Obama will also lose the support of some moderates once he gets the nomination, since he'll have to open his mouth just like McCain. Maybe the 3-5 point bump won't show up, but I will be willing to bet money that a poll the day before the election asking Clinton supporters if they're voting McCain in protest will show that 25% of them didn't defect. Maybe 5%. Maybe 10%. I don't even think it will go that high.

Laicite versus Separation

2008-04-14T17:17:00.001-04:00

The United States has a political philosophy of separation of church and state. The US government (specifically congress) may make "no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof". This is from the First Amendment, probably the most important for preserving rights in America, and a personal favorite of mine. This doctrine has been interpreted to mean that the US takes no sides in religious disputes, that it does not legislate something because it is religious (though debate over legislating semi-religious morality is ongoing) and does not ever ever EVER promote a religion of inhibit another. Of course, the US often fails in the these goals, but they are an idea to live up to not a template from which the US will be docked points. Despite ahistorical assertions protestations by those who want a larger role for Christianity, the Separation doctrine is the current law of the land.

France and Turkey are examples of another philosophy of secularism. I believe that secularism of some form is the best way of organizing a democracy and modern government. Turkey draws its tradition of secularism directly and explicitly from France, which created this philosophy, laicite (actually laïcité but I don't want to spend ten years typing out diacritics). Laicite arose during the French First Republic, which tried to change the governmental order so completely that it made many Europeans sure the End Times were near.

Laicite is not Separation; it is a policy of 'active noninterference' on the part of the state. This leads France to seriously contemplate banning headscarves in its universities, as they are a religious symbol. Laicite prefers religion and religious activities to be private (in the sense that they're not state-supported) and private (in the sense that they take place out of the public eye). Turkey is similarly inclined.

Now which of these philosophies is theoretically superior for maintaining secularism? If the 'active noninterference' of laicite were always carried out by a just government (as defined by whose standards?) then the two might be near-equals. My argument is that Separation is more universal and laicite is more discretionary, which means that Separation can more easily balance between secularism and freedom of religion.

First off, laicite is indeed discretionary: the government must positively decide to act to preserve secularism. This means that sometimes it will not act. The government action will have a stated purpose: the headscarf ban construes the wearing of scarfs with Islamic denigration of women. However, some Muslim women see the headscarf as a thing of pride since it was originally for Muhammad's wives. It is, to them, respectful and superior to wear a scarf. By banning the headscarf in universities, laicite has cut into religious freedom.

This is not to say that Separation does not sometimes abridge religious freedom. Of course it does. Rules for the slaughtering of animals, or the possession of items the government designates as 'drugs' do indeed curtail some religious traditions. That is sad, sometimes bigoted, and unfortunately unavoidable to some extent.

The difficultly that laicite has to cope with, which Separation avoids, is discretion. Sometimes, a laicite-style government will choose not to act. Have crucifixes been banned in universities, seeing as Jesus advocated nonviolent overthrow of the state economic system? Some would argue Jesus did such a thing, and so a call to ban symbols of his teaching would not be impossible under laicite. Even in more subtle situations, the government may not act. My argument, sure to be accepted by anyone cynical enough to read this post, is that when choosing to act/not act, a laicite government will overall prefer the religious interference of whatever faith is the majority in the country at the expense of minority faiths.

Separation avoids this fate by have a default position of non-action, and by creating a dynamic tension between many different faith groups. If the government tries to curtail the religious freedoms of, say, the Seventh Day Adventists it will be more obvious that this action is targeted. There is a reason that the greatest court cases in favor of religious liberty were all won by Jehovah's Witnesses. Much like the distinction between unitary and federal states, the Separation doctrine makes assaults on any one group much more visible by all the groups, and more likely to be opposed.

Both systems are superior to a non-secular system, but within secular systems Separation more easily preserves both secularism and religious freedom.

To sum it up in a just-so-story kind of way:
The USA got religion right, France and Turkey slightly off, Iran got it wrong.

The False False Flag: Why I never paid much attention to the 9/11 Truth movement

2008-04-13T15:41:00.001-04:00

Q&O has a small article making fun of Richard Falk, just chosen by the UN to talk about human rights in the Israel-Palestine conflict. What the post points out is that Prof. Falk is also sympathetic to/involved in the 9/11 Truth movement. It argues, and I agree, that this makes him a suspicious and not very good choice to investigate the human rights mess he's been assigned.

9/11 Truthers believe one of a number of things. Either the Twin Towers were blown up by the government or someone working for them, or the hijacking plan was known but not stopped to further certain interests. These are the two most moderate theories. There are others, like the idea that lasers from either aliens or satellites destroyed the Towers, or that the Towers were 'transported' away and not destroyed.

A big chunk of the US population thinks the Truthers are on to something. The number of believers ranges from 10% (probably about right) to 50-60% in some clearly alarmist surveys. These people don't necessarily accept Truther methods or even conclusions, but they think there's something vital the government won't reveal. Here's the real truth: there is indeed material and records the government won't reveal, but that material is not going to be vital to understanding 9/11.

We really do know the important stuff already: President Bush got a security briefing mentioning a possible terrorist attack by airplane. The Twin Towers had been targeted years earlier. The Pentagon is also an obvious place to hit. By some failed bureaucracy and a sense of 'this can't happen here,' Americans and the Administration failed to anticipate and take action against such a terror plot. Terrorist captured planes, used them before a coherent response could be formulated. The Towers were weakened by the hits, and they fell, killing more than 3000 people in total.

That's the vital information. That's the outline. There's nothing in this outline that pretends to know 'why' certain people did what they did. Since we can't reach inside their minds, we will never actually know why people did certain things. One big Truther mistake is to think they can do just that. They 'know' what Bush, or Bin Laden, or the international Zionist Conspiracy was thinking.

A lot of Truther support comes from this feeling of "How could they let this happen?" We're told the US is the most powerful country, but it was hurt by eighteen guys with sharp objects and flight training. What this view misses is that the US is a massive leviathan of interlocking systems, not a centralized and unitary item. Each bit can make a small mistake, and over time these add up to a large security hole.

The moral of the entire story is not to simply dismiss the Truthers but to understand that, given the choice between an act of stupidity and an act of malice, assume stupidity until you have perfect evidence to prove otherwise.

Alternate History #4: There is no viet nam but Vietnam, and Ho Chi Minh is its President

2008-04-11T13:52:00.002-04:00

When I read William Duiker's amazing Ho Chi Minh: A Life, I was not only adding to my collection of communist leader biographies, I was also constantly looking for alternate histories. Duiker's work, the best English biography of Ho, and the first to use Vietnamese-language sources that aren't full of suspicious propaganda, portrayed Ho in a way that most Americans would not be familiar with.

He wasn't a communist radical, but he was a communist. He wrote to expand Marxist-Leninist revolutionary theory. He was very important in the 1920s in getting the Vietnamese communist movement off the ground, but his school of thought fell out of favor. It was only a very lucky change of theory by the Communist International that catapulted Ho Chi Minh to the leadership of the 1940s resistance against Japan. By 1946, his Viet Minh had managed to securely control all of northern Vietnam. France, which had ruled the area before Japan took it, wanted the colony back. A series of autonomy measures were proposed, but constant governmental changes in France and a stubborn colonial attitude caused all these to fail.

France tried again to assert control, and at this point Ho begins to fall out of power. His military role is taken mostly by General Vo Nguyen Giap (who is still alive, amazingly), his political role taken over more and more by Truong Chinh. The reason for this is that both new men were fiery, passionate. They were full of vitality, whereas Ho was by that point much more laid-back.

Most important was where they differed. Ho lost clout and leadership powers as he failed to secure South Vietnam. By the time the US arrived, Ho was very old and had no powers beyond meeting with Chinese leadership. He cared more about a united, free Vietnam than about a communist Vietnam.

How might things have gone differently? The main reason that Ho's control never reached all the way south was because the Party apparatus there had decided to rise up in 1940. It was easily crushed by Imperial Japan, which at this point was at its most vital in history. In fact, the Japan which South Vietnam attempted to dislodge was the most powerful state in Asia, and the most powerful Japan in history. The Japanese put down the nationalist-communist rebels easily, and this basically killed Party power in the south. By revolting earlier (the north took over in 1945, and succeeded against a terribly shattered Japan) the south fell far behind in terms of organization.

But what might have happened if the south had, like the north, allowed resentment to build against the Japanese and waited until the US wore the Empire down? Ho Chi Minh favored this tactic, and it worked marvelously. A more patient south might have been able to join the successful revolt against the crumbling Japanese power. This would leave one unified Vietnam under the main leadership of Ho Chi Minh, now with extra credibility for having united the land with a relatively short military struggle. With this extra political capital, Ho might have remained the center of Vietnamese politics with Giap as his arms and Truong Chinh as the liaison with staunchly communist China and Russia.

France would not want to give up claims in Indochina, since it was losing Vietnam that turned France from being an imperial power. However, Ho would be in a very stable position to negotiate. France used the weaker south to gain currency as imperator; here a strongly-held south would give France no easy way in. From Duiker's analysis, Ho seemed to have been ready to sacrifice total autonomy in exchange for guarantees of local control and good conditions for the Vietnamese people. In this alternate history, he would not have to give up even so much. France could either fight (a more difficult option than in our history) or allow for a very loose colonial framework. Maybe France would agree to limited input on Vietnamese foreign policy and no trade barriers, as well as property rights guarantees for white Europeans in the country. This would establish a very loose connection, much like the one between Canada and Great Britain.

It is my personal opinion that Ho would have accepted this measure, seeing as he said something along the lines of, "Better to eat French shit for fifty years than Chinese shit for one thousand." France would serve as a protector from undue Chinese influence, and from overreaching by the Comintern or USSR.

The major effect of a united, protected, moderate-nationalist-socialist Vietnam relates to the US. The US would never need to get involved, since the issue would have been settled by 1955, just as the US came out of Korea. To image that the US would jump from Korea directly into Vietnam, which would have been solidly under control since 1945, is ludicrous.

It is also my opinion that a Vietnam united earlier would have been more heavily influenced by Ho Chi Minh. It would have indeed been Communist, but French cultural influence along with Ho's moderation would likely have guided it down a less repressive path. It might have emerged into the modern world much like South Korea did. It's strange to imagine that a more decisive Communist victory would have been nearly all positive (compared to our timeline) for the country, but as I see it this is true.

Blacks and Abortion

2008-04-08T22:35:00.001-04:00

I found this little something-or-other via Real Clear Politics under the title "How Obama lets us down on abortion" or somesuch. The real name of the article is "The Impact of Abortion on African Americans". It is, quite simply, a black-solidarity call to oppose abortion. Unabashedly pro-life, it does not descent into moralistic shouting which means that the statements made in it can be legitimately critiqued.

A quote will give a bit of the tenor of the article:

Although African Americans make up 12.4 percent of the U.S. population we make up 35% of the abortions

Note the 'we'. The article has black solidarity and unity running constantly through it. The reasons given to oppose abortion are not conservative or morality-based, though I do detect a certain abortion-is-murder mentality to the article. The real reason to oppose abortion, the author argues, is specifically black:

Even though abortion usually
happens as the result of a voluntary action by the expectant mother
(but not always), it has long been suspected that certain organizations
have encouraged blacks in particular to have abortions.

"Which organizations would these be?", you might ask:

Planned
Parenthood, which has long been suspected by many of placing its
clinics in areas with high concentrations of African Americans, and
whose founder once spoke at a Ku Klux Klan meeting and who spoke at
another point with Nazi anthropologist Eugen Fischer, stated that it had taken "corrective action" against the individual.

Despite the conspiracy-theory suggestions and the obligatory mentioning of Nazis and the KKK, the tone remains level-headed. When someone says such things as this but doesn't bluster, you must actually answer their statements with your own.

What the article gets wrong is the cause of abortion. It's not availability of clinics, though this does have an influence. When asked why they choose to have an abortion, the plurality of women pick, as the most important reason, 'could not support child financially.' {This is from a Time Magazine article about a year ago, I cannot find a link to it} Other important reasons include: 'unstable living arrangement', 'unstable partnership', and 'too young to take care of a child.'

The fact is that African-Americans are more often in the situation that causes women to want an abortion. It's not that they're black, it's that blacks are poor and/or financially unstable in much higher proportions than whites, at least in urban areas where clinics are more available.

So even though some people do approve of the overwhelmingly disproportionate number of black women who have abortions [They exist. I have met them.] the purpose of supporting choice for women is not to keep any racial group from out-breeding whites.

As to the question of how to end the racial imbalance of abortions, the answer is to find some way to make real lasting wealth available to African-Americans who are in a bad way. This explicitly does not mean some kind of welfare payment, since that does not fit my definition of 'lasting wealth.' This issue is far too large to deal with in one post, but I've done what I came to do: refute the notion that blacks must stand together in opposing abortion because of its effects on the black community and population. As with any group of people, no political affiliation is required by ones race. Meanwhile, for those who say that only liberal causes play identity politics, I suggest you take a good hard look at "The Values Voter's Blog."

FP Passport Cares about Absolut History

2008-04-08T15:36:00.001-04:00

Despite being totally uninfluenced by my previous post, FP Passport has a new post today about the Reconquista-based vodka ad. This happens on the internet, as a bunch of blogs hover around the same material, picking at it like vultures on a decaying carcass.

Also, I had previously referred to third-party hypercandidate Ross Perot as "batshit". I do not hold a negative opinion of Perot, and probably should have called him "hilariously unpredictable, like unto a distant relative who married into your family."

A revolutionary feminist theology in Genesis 3:16

2008-04-07T21:59:00.001-04:00

Everyone knows the Adam and Eve story. Eve temps Adam to eat the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, and he does, and so God curses them and expels them from the garden. God curses Adam and Eve differently, giving Eve pain in childbirth and forcing Adam to toil for his food.

But the verse in which Eve is cursed, Gen 3:16, holds a possibly revolutionary idea. From the King James Version:

Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy
conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire
shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.

This an many other verses elsewhere in the Bible combine to create a theological idea of female submission to rightful male dominance domestically and politically. The highlighted portion especially is used, since it is God's decree to humankind.

But is that the end of it? No, if it was I wouldn't be writing this post.

These curses are punishments that diminish humanity in retaliation for disobedience. If, as a plain reading of this verse suggests, male rule over women is a punishment, then total sexual equality would be the Edenic ideal. The other punishments on humanity, while impossible to undo in the past, have come to be less problematic in recent years. No longer must men physically toil to obtain food. An epidural during childbirth can alleviate the pain. If the undoing of these parts of the curse by technology are acceptable, as the whole world seems to think, then why is the most pervasive part of the curse accepted as normative, the way things should be.

The curses established a new order, but did not make that order good. Women's pain was not good, it was punishment. You could easily argue that male rule over women was not meant to be good, but rather punishment as well. Certain types of discourse, such as feminist critical theory (which evaluates gender inequalities) can be considered technologies of ideas. If physical technologies allow humanity to undo parts of the curse, why not employ idea-technologies to fully undo the curse?

Opponents of this view would obviously quote the next verse in refutation (Gen 3:17)

And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of
thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee,
saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in
sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life;

Since God criticizes Adam for listening to his wife, they argue, it shows male dominance to be correct. But you could easily argue that God criticizes Adam not for listening to Eve in general but rather in this one specific disobedience. If the clause "and hast eaten of the tree" is connected to the highlighted clause, as proponents of this theory would argue, then Adam's mistake is not listening to women but disobeying God.

So, at the end of it, male and female equality are affirmed but disobedience to God is prohibited in strongest terms. And who says feminists have to be atheist lesbians?

10 things to know about McCain

2008-04-07T12:57:00.004-04:00

I received an email today titled "10 things to know about McCain (but probably don't)." It originated from MoveOn.org, a liberal/progressive organization that always goes Democrat. It lists ten things about McCain that it wishes to warn people of. But are these really such revelations?

No, not really. The list mentions standard Republican platforms and facts about McCain that were already well known. I'll go through them one by one. There's not a thing in here that's a surprise.

1. John McCain voted against establishing a national holiday in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Now he says his position has "evolved," yet he's continued to oppose key civil rights laws.
Maybe McCain just didn't want another holiday. Of course you can say he 'opposes civil rights laws' but without saying what effect they have I tend to disbelieve. In fact, I can't really think of much legislation nowadays that would really be called 'Civil Rights.' Just because it pertains to blacks or black issues does not make it Civil Rights. Voting against King was probably a bad move for McCain's Presidentail run though.

2. According to Bloomberg News, McCain is more hawkish than Bush on Iraq, Russia and China. Conservative columnist Pat Buchanan says McCain "will make Cheney look like Gandhi."
McCain is more hawkish. This is his official position. If you've never heard this before, then you're under-informed, not deceived.

3. His reputation is built on his opposition to torture, but McCain voted against a bill to ban waterboarding, and then applauded President Bush for vetoing that ban.
Because, like so many others, he would argue waterboarding isn't torture. This simply goes hand-in-hand with McCain's conception of large expansive executive powers and 'emergency measures.'

4. McCain opposes a woman's right to choose. He said, "I do not support Roe versus Wade. It should be overturned."
This is part of his party's platform. He would not be on anyone's radar if he was a pro-choice Republican. Meanwhile, McCain places pro-life issues at a much lower priority than most other candidates did.

5. The Children's Defense Fund rated McCain as the worst senator in Congress for children. He voted against the children's health care bill last year, then defended Bush's veto of the bill.
I don't know what "for children" means here. Is banning pornography on the internet 'for children'? Is regulating down to the most ridiculous detail what can be served in school cafeterias? Is opposition of abortion? I guess health care is, but the bill mentioned here could simply have been a bad bill. We're supposed to assume that McCain's opposition makes the bill a good one, but what if he opposed it because it was single-payer instead of universal? Or vice versa?

6. He's one of the richest people in a Senate filled with millionaires. The Associated Press reports he and his wife own at least eight homes! Yet McCain says the solution to the housing crisis is for people facing foreclosure to get a "second job" and skip their vacations.
So what if he's rich. So is everyone else. Owning lots of homes makes him susceptible to the subprime mess, and having a big chunk of cash makes him less likely to need money from lobbyists. The Clintons are ridiculously rich, but no one tells them to drop out of politics because of it. I would be less hasty to hold someone's personal wealth against them unless they're batshit like Ross Perot.

7. Many of McCain's fellow Republican senators say he's too reckless to be commander in chief. One Republican senator said: "The thought of his being president sends a cold chill down my spine. He's erratic. He's hotheaded. He loses his temper and he worries me."
Of course, the source is unnamed because he didn't want to seem unfaithful to his own party. But that makes me suspect whether it was said at all. This might be the only item on the whole list that would sway undecided voters, since all the others simply assume a liberal outlook. An undecided might want a calm and collected Commander, and this is the only item here that might sway them towards the Democrats.

8. McCain talks a lot about taking on special interests, but his campaign manager and top advisers are actually lobbyists. The government watchdog group Public Citizen says McCain has 59 lobbyists raising money for his campaign, more than any of the other presidential candidates.
He's also been in politics longer than Clinton or Obama, and is the decided nominee. Lobbyists will coalesce around whichever Democrat wins too. No lobbyists go near Ron Paul because he scares them. Lobbyists aren't automatically evil either, nor are they automatically corrupt. There are lobbyists for liberal causes too, and I'm sure that a few of those have talked to McCain.

9. McCain has sought closer ties to the extreme religious right in recent years. The pastor McCain calls his "spiritual guide," Rod Parsley, believes America's founding mission is to destroy Islam, which he calls a "false religion." McCain sought the political support of right-wing preacher John Hagee, who believes Hurricane Katrina was God's punishment for gay rights and called the Catholic Church "the Antichrist" and a "false cult."
McCain is, yet again, just reflecting his party makeup and platform. This isn't new or special, though it might concern Muslim Republicans, or gay Repulbicans, or any potential antichrists out there who've just lost their title. Besides, didn't we hear all about the separation between religious and political messages with regard to Rev. Wright? Again, McCain puts religious issues at a lower priority than other Republican candidates.

10. He positions himself as pro-environment, but he scored a 0—yes, zero—from the League of Conservation Voters last year.
Would MoveOn have preferred a lobbyist convince him? That would count for him in part 10 but against him in part 8.

The problem with this list of grievances is that it won't convince undecideds. This is a mistake for MoveOn, and for Democrats who publicize this list. It just assumes a liberal position on environment, health care, abortion, etc. Only part 7, which details McCain's most well-known character flaw, could sway an undecided. That said, there are myriad reasons to vote for McCain and myriad to vote against him. Neither party will win without convincing moderates to join it, and this series of problems will not do that. It may make Democrats angry, get them pumped up for a fight, but it won't do much more. The point of dissecting this email isn't to slam McCain, or to slam MoveOn but rather to muse upon a mass-mailing that's much less effective than it thinks it is.

There is no liberal Great Awakening

2008-04-06T14:28:00.001-04:00

Over at Reason, there is an article called "The New Age of Reason" that has the small undertitle "Is the Fourth Great Awakening finally coming to a close?"

The short answer, from the article and reality, is yes. Great Awakenings are periods of religious ferment, when faith becomes far more popular an prevalent. While historians only truly recognize the first three, the Fourth is the one in which our current political climate is being formed. The Fourth started with the re-emergence of the Christian Right, reached its greatest political popularity with President Reagan and its greatest political power with President George W. Bush. What I mean by this is that Reagan was elected with the help of the Christian Right, Bush was elected by the Christian Right.

McCain's selection as the republican nominee over Huckabee, a much more religious man, and Romney, who tried to paint himself as a religious true conservative, shows that the political power of the groups that came from the Fourth Great Awakening is fading. True, McCain does support many Christian Right positions on foreign policy but does them out of a secular neoconservative philosophy rather than a religious one.

However the author of the article, Ronald Bailey, speculates that religious sections from the Fourth Great Awakening may find root in the Democratic Party, making a Religious Left. As a writer for a libertarian magazine, Bailey opposes any such move just as he opposed the Right in its religiously-inspired moralizing. Here, Bailey is wrong in a very obvious way. As examples of liberal religious moralizing he cites: "anti-smoking campaigns," "health-related legislation," and "apocalyptic environmentalism." If Bailey actually thinks that liberals support these causes out of religious enthusiasm, he is massively disconnected from reality. The only religious proof he gives on these subjects is that

The contemporary cult of the body [which he sees as responsible for legislation on obesity and smoking], with its obsession with diet and
exercise and its emphasis on beauty and perfection, has roots in the
biblical notion of the body as a “temple of the Holy Spirit.”

This is very weak proof indeed. Just because the movement has metaphorical similarities to religious moralizing does not make it religiously motivated.

There is indeed more religious Democratic enthusiasm than has been seen in some time, and Obama seems more openly religious than the average Democratic candidate [read: John Kerry], but religiously-minded Democrats will never make up the deal-breaking sector of the party the way they did among Republicans. Christian Leftists may be a part of the Democrats from now on, but they will no more control the party than the radical environmentalists. The core of the Democrats will be civil liberties, social justice , economic issues and liberal foreign policy voters.

What happened during the height of the Fourth Great Awakening was a religious imbalance within the parties. The Democrats were quite a-religious in the most religiously active Western country, and the Republicans were heavy-handedly religious in a country of moderates. The current election is showing a realignment towards an equilibrium that makes sense demographically: religious sectors of each party that influence, but do not control, the parties they vote for.

Someone else cares about alternate history!

2008-04-05T12:26:00.001-04:00

For once, alternate history goes mainstream and isn't about the Civil War or WWII. This time, the Nazis don't win, the Confederates don't win. Mexico wins:
(Courtesy of poor targeted advertising)

Sure, it's an ad for vodka, but it's also got a map, and I love maps. Now I know next to nothing about the Mexican-American war, where the US gained the land that makes up its current boundaries. I can't point to some specific thing that could have been changed in 1848 to tip the balance in favor of Mexico.

There's only one thing that I do know. Within the US, the Democratic party of the time supported the jingoistic war with Mexico and the opposition Whigs, generally more anti-slave, were split over support. When the US won, anti-war Whigs fell out of favor. Among these were Abraham Lincoln and many members of his cabinet. If the US had outright lost, the Democratic party would have taken a huge hit in popularity at the same time the Whigs were in deepest crisis. Instead of breaking up as they did - into pro-slave elements that largely joined the democrats and anti-slave coalitions that swept up other constituencies into the anti-slave Republican party - the Whigs might have been able to go though an election without a real opposition. In power for at least four years, they might have been able to coalesce into a united party again. Thus, the slave issue would not be sorted out by political parties.

In addition, a western politician like Lincoln who opposed the war vocally and from the start would have been especially viable as a candidate. Combine that with Lincoln's double-talk on slavery and you might have a powerful candidate. So maybe Lincoln would have been president anyway; the Democrats certainly would not have held the office for a couple terms.

Thank you, Absolut, for caring about alternate history in a creepily ethno-nationalist way! I'm sure your ad will go over well with all dozen serious supporters of an 'American Reconquista.'

Some politicians are done #2

2008-04-04T14:13:00.001-04:00

Hillary Clinton has lost the Democratic nomination to Barack Obama.

No it's not official yet, but the media and the politicos have registered their tiredness with Hillary. The math, whether you go by delegates or states, is against her. Obama is closing in in Pennsylvania, where Hillary needed a 12-point win to really stay in it. She's now up by 6, or down by 2. Either way, her lead isn't big enough.

The Bosnia story hurt her. I do not know why someone would invent such a story. I'm not truly convinced she even knew she was lying. I have often remembered events that did not happen in such-and-such a way. What makes me wonder is how her staff let her repeat it. Did they check the facts? If so, why let her lie? If not, they should be fired for negligence.

Obama didn't implode over the Rev. Wright mess. It hurt him, but not so much as everyone seemed to think. I guess democrats and independents realized that they weren't voting for Wright. It might have hurt Obama more if anyone but Sean Hannity really believed he agreed with Wright's positions.

A few mistakes from Hillary's campaign coupled with her long run of not-winning and not-winning-by-enough seem to have convinced non-partisan observers that she's lost. You don't need to support Obama, or the democrats, or even the USA to reach this conclusion. You can believe that Obama can't win in November and reach this conclusion.

Expect more stories about Hillary's distasteful behavior to come out as the "she's a candidate, let's have some respect" aura fades from her. Cautious Hillary supporters may begin to pressure her to leave, since her insistence on staying may do damage to the democrats.

What makes me wonder, once again, is how she and Bill behave towards Obama. Do they honestly think that being mean to him, demanding delegates, being inflexible and denying reality ("there's no such thing a a pledged delegate") will win Hillary the nomination? What makes the Clinton Campaign so sure that people would even vote for such a personality, especially since McCain is making himself out to be a measured and thoughtful man?

Stranger still is the fact that Bill Clinton seems dead-set, Jimmy Carter-style, on making far-out assertions are ruining his own legacy. Carter, until a couple years ago, was a kind man and religiously-minded moderate. Now he calls Palestine an apartheid (Ask a South African and he will sharply disagree) and says a lot of mind-bogglingly non-moderate stuff. Bill Clinton seems to be going down a similar path. It's a bit distasteful to watch.

I thought people were supposed to mellow with age.

Some politicians are done #1

2008-04-04T13:46:00.001-04:00

A bit ago, I said:

If there were real elections in Zimbabwe, my cynical side tells me
Mugabe and ZANU-PF would still win, since the average Zimbabwean
doesn't have much basis for comparison. Mugabe did indeed end Western
control of the country. He does have popular support. Forcing him not
to propagandize a couple months before an election wouldn't undo the
pervasive effects of his twenty-five years of propaganda. But the
opposition party, the MDC, would probably get quite a few seats - a lot
more than Mugabe would like. It would set itself up as a real
opposition party, waiting for the elderly Mugabe to kick the bucket.
Zimbabwe is not, and has never been, a real democracy. But I hold out
hope that sometimes soon, it may join the club. [Important section highlighted]

Why was I wrong? I was indeed wrong, since it seems that the MDC
opposition has won more seats than ZANU-PF. Mugabe is currently
looking for a way out. He may, it seems, remain in power but this
looks less likely as time goes on. I said there won't be real
democracy in Zimbabwe until Mugabe dies. What did I get wrong?

I didn't anticipate that people could actually see through Mugabe's
propaganda. The average person noticed that there was 200,000%
inflation and that all Mugabe did about it was blame white people and
imperialists. The average person noticed that the opposition, while
not likely to wave a magic wand and end the crisis, at least provided a
possible way out.

I don't doubt that Mugabe wanted to rig the elections if the opposition looked likely to win. What happened, it seems, is that people were so totally against him and his party that a vote-rigging became impossible. If he had done it, it would have been the most transparent move ever. Even South African President Thabo Mbeki might have broken off relations. The overwhelming support for the opposition was aided by the fact that Mugabe is a petty, not authoritarian dictator. Petty dictators are found all over Africa and Latin America. They cannot control all aspects of their population, but rely on rich supporters and the military to do it. They often arise when the leader of a 'freedom fighting' anti-imperialist group simply never leaves power. Authoritarian dictatorships, like Saudi Arabia, Iran, Egypt, North Korea, etc. have more power over their population. The leaders have religious or semi-religious origins and are often military.

An authoritarian would never have lost this election. Mugabe's own status, which made him less of a human rights violator (though still a bad one) caused his party to lose the election. I am amazed at what happened here. I don't count on the MDC to be some kind of savior-party, nor is their leader Morgan Tsvangirai a Nelson Mandela. What amazes me here is that a non-western country has made a true opening for democracy with no western democratic help. Zimbabwe may not capitalize on this chance and might slide into one-party rule again, but a window of opportunity has been bought. The country pulled itself up by its bootstraps. This is the way things should happen - a model of democratizing without western takeover and occupation. I truly think most countries around the world want some kind of democracy. They may not recognize all the rights we do, and may have different ideas about freedom and religion and the role of the state, but I think that most people who know about elections and voting prefer the idea.

Too much democracy? What's the point?

2008-04-03T19:54:00.001-04:00

Over at the Volokh Conspiracy (an unbelievably smart clan of politically astute lawyers) there is a growing series of posts about a recent UN Human Rights Council resolution. The resolution is being condemned by all commentators there for being...against human rights.

Which, in fact, it is.

The resolution urges the member states of the UN (not just the ones who voted for this measure) to use legislative and police means to prevent any incitement of hatred or violence against a race or religion. This provision in and of itself would not likely be abused too badly by strong democracies. In the US, the government may act against hateful speech if it seems likely to cause actual violence. A legitimate threat enables the government to go against free speech to preserve the more fundamental right of freedom from harm. Of course, religiously divided countries would use this provision to go after opposition. Countries with ethnic minorities that accuse the majority of 'imperialism' could also find this measure used upon them. For some regimes, opposition to total rule by a foreign ethnic group is racial incitement.

Fine, fine. The UN has no enforcement apparatus. Any state that wanted this stuff could/would do it anyway. Now they just get to point to the UN resolution and say 'hey, it's all right.'

But:

10. Emphasizes that respect of religions and their protection from
contempt is an essential element conducive for the exercise by all of
the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion;

This is incorrect. This is wrong. This is the section that violates the human rights the council is supposed to uphold. There are strategies for allowing free exercise of religion. One is government noninterference, a separation of church and state. This is a strategy that I personally do like. But no modern democracy should ensure that a religion will be 'respected'. What standard will be used to judge 'protection from contempt?' If someone rails against religious creationists saying that their faith blinds them to scientific consensus, does this constitute contempt? I think it very well might.

States should not act to prevent defamation of religions. Discrimination, yes. The banning of religious groups from activities is a violation of rights. But is there a right to not be offended? There is none. People whose religion is being attacked can do two things in a free society: suck it up and ignore the shouting defamer, or try to rebut them. They may not ban the defamer or send the police after him.

When you look at which countries voted in approval of this resolution, it becomes apparent that the ones who did are in no way strong democracies. They are, for the most part, human rights violators of the worst sort. This resolution is religious-collectivist nonsense that does far more to undermine rights and freedoms than to uphold them.

This brings me to a quandary: should rights violators be allowed on the UN Human Rights Council? No. So what is the council for?

The council runs into the following problem: it's too democratic. Sure, that word has become a loaded buzzword in recent times. 'Democracy = good' is a simple equation. But how permanent and important are any rights that 50%+1 countries can just add or take away at any time? The lack of structure in the UN makes it a very bad contender for a world-wide government.

An essay (which I cannot remember now) said that, as a governing body the UN was destined to fail, and it deserved to. But as a stage, a place where discussions can happen and the proclivities of other nations can be determined, it is actually valuable.

So what about a Union of Democracies? Under the best circumstances, the UD could be set up by a number of strong democracies from around the world. Imagine how much clout something such as this could gain if the original members were smaller but strong democracies. The larger ones would wait until the organization was set up, then apply for membership. Watching the process of admitting states like Germany, the US, France, and the UK to something started by smaller states would be amazing.

My dream team to start the UD:

Mexico - sure it can be corrupt, but they love to vote and don't like vote-rigging
South Africa - yes it's a one-party state right now, but that's because no other party can define itself well enough to capture a new segment of the population. It is, however, a model African democracy
Turkey - hopefully there won't be any more military coups. Another model - a working, secular Muslim state
Czech Republic - Eastern Europe should be represented in here somewhere.
South Korea - not Japan, because it's too well established as a democracy. The whole point is to let upstarts found the organization

This gives one African, one Muslim, one Asian, one American and one European member to the founding group. Immediately afterwards, the US and friends (Western Europe, Canada, Japan, etc) would apply and go through the formal vetting process. States get into the UN quite easily, but getting into the UD would be something to get excited about. This is not to set up the UD as a world government, but rather to let someone other than Cuba and Egypt set the human rights agenda for the world.

Why is Islam so old?

2008-04-01T14:37:00.001-04:00

In various articles on various news services (especially the BBC) I have noticed a group of stories about Turkish religious academics trying to recontextualize Islam for the modern era. Turkey is a special case in the Muslim world, independent for long enough to be stable but not Arabic-speaking. This lets the country develop in a looser way - it's not held in place by various Arabic ways of governance but is instead free to explore various ideas.

What does the academic recontextualization mean? If it were Christian academics revamping Christian theology, I wouldn't expect that much. Any major change would be shouted down as elitism, much the same way that American Evangelicals discount the recent theology of liberal Protestants as something imposed from above on an unwilling population. Yet this is Islam, where a legitimate tradition of scholarly revamping exists. The legal schools within Islam and even the very essences of sharia law were worked out by legal scholars and eventually accepted. Wise men writing essays is a viable means of reinterpretation in Islam.

This brings me to my original point, the one in the title of this post. In all these articles about revamping mention the age of Islam. That is, they all point out that Islam is 1400 years old. There are two ways to take this:

1) People are not as educated about Islam as about Christianity, since most English-speakers who read the BBC online will be Christian. Thus the information about how old Islam is comes from a desire to inform the reader. It falls kind of flat in the article itself (it seems like a journalistic insertion) but that is all.

2) It is supposed to subtly imply that Islam is old and thus outdated - 'due for a reformation.' This is part of a bias against Islam on the part of some reporter or editor, or by the BBC service itself.

The fact is that mentioning the age of Christianity in an article would seem out of place, especially if the article talked about who Christians need a new set of principles to go along with new reproductive technology. Some people would see it, correctly, as biased in favor of these new technologies and against their faith. It is the same in these articles on Turkey. Even if the intent is #1 rather than #2, they both have the same effect - implying that Islam is outdated.

There are parts of Islamic theology and practice that don't sit well in the modern world, but the implication that an entire faith is outdated goes beyond that. It recalls the idea formed by Christian apologists that their faith was one of reason and sense while Islam was misguided passion and incorrect belief.

I don't think the editors mean to denigrate Islam; the rest of the article is enthusiastic about the revamping. Nor do I want the BBC shouted down for mentioning how old Islam is. What I mean to do is point out an event of probably unconscious bias. Let us not be oversensitive about it, but rather notice that such biases do exist even in those who are not hostile to Islam itself. I am sure to have said something biased in this post, but I do not mean to.

It's all very postmodern.

Early Council of Trent

2008-03-31T17:26:00.001-04:00

By the early 1500s, the Catholic Church (hereafter CC) was in trouble. It was in many places corrupt and was stepping over certain boundary lines of power. While the average European was more fervently and popularly religious than at most other times in Christian history, the Church was seen by a large contingent as failing in certain areas. This is the reason someone like Martin Luther could write against the CC and manage to break it apart. He began critiquing in 1516 until his death; the CC did not issue a total response until the Council of Trent in 1563. This council reformed the CC and corrected many of the injustices that Protestants had complained about. It was too late, however, and German regionalism and a dislike of papal taxation kept the various Protestant movements alive. John Calvin created an even more popular Protestant group, and some Papal hesitancy and English egotism helped create the Church of England.

A history teacher of mine speculated that if the Council of Trent had been held earlier, even in the first decade of Luther's critique it might have been able to head off the Protestants and Europe would still be religiously Catholic. It would do this by taking the wind of popular support out of Luther's sails. Obviously, some would agree with his ideas of 'faith alone' but the majority population would not have supported them if there hadn't be so many vacancies, huckster priests and indulgence peddlers.

The Council of Trent was spurred on by the Protestants, so how might it have happened earlier? There were a huge number of people calling for reform and only a few were ready to split the church. It just so happens that the guy most luckily placed was one of those men. But his anti-schismatic friend Erasmus was also a powerful voice for reform. A more amenable Pope, in combination with more learned men like Erasmus, could have caused the Council to be held earlier.

How it might have happened, written in the style of a history textbook:

With the end of the Council of Trento [this is the real name of the city in which the meetings happened] in 1511, the CC began the widest pattern of reform it would see until Vatican II in the 1960s. Requirements were put in place to ensure all priests had proper training and that Church officials could hold not more than one spiritual office. This did away with incompetent or absent pastors. Indulgences were banned, not because of their invalidity - the Council maintained they did serve a purpose - but that the 'weakness of some' perverted their use and on the whole undermined rather than uplifted the CC.

Erasmus's moderate and popular critiques were highly influential, but the biggest departure for the CC was the doctrine of relationship between faith and works. Quoting from scripture that "Faith without works is dead," the Church laid out the primacy of both faith and works in salvation.

The most important document produced by Trento was a pamphlet that, while not an official Papal doctrine, popularly depicted the relationship between faith and works. Its author, while unknown, is widely assumed to be the young academic and monk Martin Luther, who would go on to publish many popular tracts. He is widely credited with both informing the public of doctrine and with rekindling antisemitic ideas in the eastern Catholic countries.

"How may a man be saved? The priests say that by their miracles alone may God take a man up into heaven upon his death. But what of a child, knowing of our Lord Christ and being baptized in His name, who is stranded upon an island. With no other men about to be priest, can this good Christian really be damned? No, for the abandonment of a good person for no other reason than the lack of a man in a silk robe would be unlike the loving nature of God. How then is the man saved?, for saved he must be. It is by his continued faith in God in the face of a terrible fate. Yet some people are good who have not faith because it is not in them to do so. They may take the communion but their actions are hollow. Yet in their life they practice good works. Because he does not have true faith, is the man damned? No, for again we find a good man who will not be kept out of heaven by circumstances. God is beyond all circumstances and will not be restrained by the legal formulations of 'faith only' and 'works only'. Each of these has its own proper time, neither superior to the other. The sun is in the sky during the day, and the moon at night. Yet neither overmatches the other but plays its own role in its own time. If a situation calls for a man's faith, God will ask that faith for his salvation, but if the demand is for compassion, for sacrifice, for works on the part of God's purpose then those works will be demanded of the man by God. The saying that God demands only one of these at all times is a solution based not in religion but in law, and is like unto the Laws of the Jews, whose God is bound by the Law in determining which are acceptable to him and which not. God is limitless and not bound by Laws that He Himself created, and to say otherwise is both wrongheaded and evil."

This passage shows how even the popular supporters of Trento were often at odds with the papal structure; priests are given only passing mention, and a rather dismissive one at that. The pamphlet then goes on to describe how the Papacy determines which are the good works one should do, and which are the times God calls for faith or works.

The Bible was, for the first time, translated into the native languages of the states. As part of this indigenization, the requirement that all priests be adequately trained was to be borne not by the CC but by each state itself. This not only kept financial pressures off the CC but also allowed German priests to speak and read in German, French in French. As Kings funded Universities for the production of priests, they became more native and nationalistic. While still subservient to Rome, Spanish Catholicism was distinctly Spanish. Local regions took pride in their Universities and the indigenous languages. Indigenous Bibles in high illuminated style were some of the great treasures of the age.

But there were people who called for even more reform, and others who felt the CC had descended into heresy. The reformers failed to gain enough support, though pockets in Germany and Switzerland did convert. The Old Catholics, who denounced Trento as invalid, were declared heretics. Their Pope was hunted down and put to death, as were thousands of followers who refused to accept Trento.

The greatest danger to Catholic unity was England, were a refusal to issue an annulment caused Henry VIII to declare his kingdom separate from the Pope's authority. While he attempted to frame the breakaway as a rejection of Trento, his new Church of England proposed something too close to Trento to be distinguished. Henry's daughter Mary, married to a King of Spain, was proclaimed the ruler by Catholics. A joint French, German and Spanish invasion launched the Anglican Crusade, the last major Crusade action. It resulted in Henry's beheading and the installation of a monarchy descended from Mary and the Spanish royal house.

So it might have gone.

Could an eccentric billionaire have prevented the Civil War?

2008-03-30T23:04:00.001-04:00

In his book For the Glory of God, Rodney Stark asserts that Christianity ended the slave trade. He makes a convincing argument that the Marxist accounts of slavery's end - that it wasn't profitable, that it was becoming outmoded - are wrong. At the time that Britain unilaterally ended the transatlantic trade, slavery was more profitable than ever, and getting even more so. But ending the trade didn't end the institution of holding slaves in the US. While the practice could not be maintained on the Caribbean islands, where conditions usually killed the slaves, the US South had conditions conducive to a sustainable slave population.

Stark also argues that people don't cause changes: organizations do. He points especially to the Quakers in leading the charge against the trade first and the institution second. In America, the Quakers were the most prominent group advocating abolition, usually at the federal level. This is where southerners disagreed - many thought that the federal government could not, and should not be allowed to exercise this kind of power. They preferred the primacy of state governments.

Now imagine that some wealthy Quaker (there were quite a few of these) had decided that this tactic was just inflammatory, and might lead to reprisals. He wanted to make non-slaveholding southerners sympathetic, and pushing for a law against their domestic institution would not do this. If the slave issue ever came to blows, a slave power that had popular support would be much more formidable than rich elites yelling at the rank and file southerners to protect their own business interests.

And so my hypothetical rich Quaker decides to take the wind out of the slave power's sails. He beings to buy every single slave an owner will sell to him and immediately free them. He pours all of his wealth into this, and by 1845 he's accumulated about five hundred. At this rate, he will never make a difference. So he follows Stark's advice and enlists the Quaker community. The Churches will help reorient the newly-freed slaves, and anyone who will contribute money to the purchasing is welcome to it.

Any small-scale farmer falling on hard times can find a Quaker to purchase his slaves at far above market value; this actually generates goodwill among the southern population. But after nearly a decade of buying, the effect is too small. My rich Quaker and his rich Quaker associates decide to change their plans: instead of offering to buy each slave offered, they will actively seek to buy out the slaves of all owners in a concentrated area, effectively ridding it of slavery. Targeting southern Virginia, this group of men sweep through with immense amounts of money and buy nearly 85% of the slaves in the southern section of Viginia. Those who refused were mainly large rich plantation owners and the few who are morally opposed to abolition. Some slaveowners who were on the fence about the plan are softened up with prices far above market value.

The essence of the plan is theological: by removing the temptation, the collective soul of each state will be cleansed. These purified souls will respond by banning slavery, as many northern states had done. The process is gradual, and will take a long time. It sacrifices speed for pragmatism. The Quakers know that these mass-purchases are driving up the price of slaves, leading more owners to 'encourage' slaves to have many children, but they are convinced that at some point a critical mass will be reached when slavery in the south will no longer be tolerated, and will come to a sputtering, nonviolent end.

Many people saw the Civil War coming, though no one got its form exactly right. The problem the Union faced was that, because it was widely seen in the south as overwhelmingly federal and disrespectful of the states, it aroused the sympathy of those southerners who did not own slaves. The large majority of those who fought for the Confederacy did not own slaves. They fought, more or less, on a principle of rights for states against the government. This isn't to say they were fully idealistic; less federal regulation was supposedly in the interest of every man in the Confederacy.

With slavery diminished to an issue of the elites, the Quaker plan or any other compensated emancipation plan could possibly have prevented the war. No southerner would pay taxes just to have them used to free blacks, so only a private enterprise could have made a change. No private group could have bought all the slaves; their value is estimated to be larger than any other economic sector at the time. What the rich Quakers could have done was change to culture of just one slave stronghold. If, for example, South Carolina or Virginia had not joined the Confederacy the entire enterprise would have fallen apart. South Carolina was the most important - it left the Union in the first wave, before Virginia, and was as crucial to the CSA as it had been in ratifying the US Constitution decades before.

The reason this scenario is somewhat unpleasant is that it doesn't have that dash of good-versus-evil narrative; the entire thing is almost a compromise. Could Quaker idealists really have carried it off? Would it have changed the southern states enough? The purpose of the enterprise would not be to cause the states to ban slavery, but to eliminate the southern and northern causes of possible aggression. The moral purification of the south would come in time, once slavery was a curiosity and not a practice. By buying out 'commoner' slaveholders, the plan would make slavery something identified with the rich and powerful. Very rarely has a movement been workable that tried to mobilize the masses to defend the wealth of the wealthy without promising the masses something in return. Maybe the embryonic Confederacy would have been castrated of popular support by the new conception of slaveowning as something only 'those rich people' did.

Democratic Backsliding

2008-03-30T11:50:00.001-04:00

Elections are coming up again in Zimbabwe, my favorite train wreck of a country. The place has nearly as much potential as South Africa, but seems determined not to live up to it. This election will most likely be a sham again. Opposition candidates are arrested or beaten. Regions likely to vote against the ruling ZANU-PF party are threatened. Yet elections are still held, again and again. They are never free or fair, and never will be as long as Robert Mugabe is alive.

This made me think about democracy: some countries have been democratic and somehow transitioned out of it. The most important example is Germany, which really did elect the Nazis at one point. The failed democracies in Russia under Yeltsin and China in the early 1900s are also examples, but neither had any kind of real tradition of voting. Pakistan seems to alternate between weak democracy and military rule that's afraid to be too oppressive.

When a country beings to be democratic, it's obviously seen as a logical progression. We don't seem to talk about countries quitting the democracy club. Outside of Eastern Europe, the number of backsliders roughly approaches the number who have instituted non-shambolic democracies.

I won't go into the reasons why backsliding occurs, but it's worth noting that a lot of democracies that fall into petty dictatorships have an executive President like the US instead of a Prime Ministerial system like Canada. Is there a way to prevent democratic backsliding? Yes - it's very simple and very hard.

To keep a country democratic forever, just hold free and fair elections at a set interval. Free meaning people can vote as they see fit and regionalism isn't used as a hammer against rival parties. Fair meaning that no party obtains government or military help in "campaigning." It's a very simple theory: when any party seeking to be too authoritarian stays in power too long, the citizens will get pissed. They will eventually vote that party out. This is how democracies can be shielded against Hitlers - people who are elected and never leave.

Of course, such a simple solution means that it's also impossible. You can't simply force an unwilling government to hold an election. If the US means what it says about promoting democracy around the world, then maybe it should think about placing more emphasis on demanding elections. Egypt, for example, bans the highly popular Muslim Brotherhood from contesting elections. Vietnam bans any non-Communist party. To promote democracy, let countries elect parties the US hates. When those parties can't deliver on their messages, their reputation will be severely diminished.

Hamas won elections in Palestine, and the US was worried, with good reason. Hamas is much less friendly to US ally Israel than Fatah was. But since coming to power, Hamas has found itself unable to deliver the goods - it actually might have been more effective when it was a non-governmental organization. Free and fair elections, held again and again, will indeed remove from power those people who overreach.

If there were real elections in Zimbabwe, my cynical side tells me Mugabe and ZANU-PF would still win, since the average Zimbabwean doesn't have much basis for comparison. Mugabe did indeed end Western control of the country. He does have popular support. Forcing him not to propagandize a couple months before an election wouldn't undo the pervasive effects of his twenty-five years of propaganda. But the opposition party, the MDC, would probably get quite a few seats - a lot more than Mugabe would like. It would set itself up as a real opposition party, waiting for the elderly Mugabe to kick the bucket. Zimbabwe is not, and has never been, a real democracy. But I hold out hope that sometimes soon, it may join the club.

Theories of History

2008-03-29T15:59:00.001-04:00

Why do events happen the way they do? Why not something else? At a very micro level, we can ask if one assassination or birth could change things. At the largest level, observing hundreds of years of history at once, these micro changes seem to give way to material explanations.

This, at least, is my opinion. So now I'm taking sides in the huge debate between materialists as nonmaterialists. For example, Marx was a certain kind of materialist when he spoke about history. He said that culture or great people did not drive history (I agree) but that resources and geography (I agree) created systems that competed and over time evolved towards the final utopian stage of Communism (I do not agree).

There are actually a huge number of nonmaterialist arguments in popular media today, but they get play alongside nonMarxist materialism without anyone remarking on their incompatability with each other. Not to say that the theories are entirely opposed, but they can't both be fully correct. I personally see the large sweep of history being determined almost entirely by material concerns: time, geography, population density, technology, resources. A nonmaterialist argument heard often in the US - mostly from folks on the political right, but sometimes from the left as well - is that the US and the Western world are great because of certain aspects embedded in Christianity. This is not at all the vulgar argument that the US wins because 'God favors our undertaking' - that argument requires faith in a certain kind of God and is not provable or testable in a meaningful way to a historian.

The real nonmaterialist argument is much more subtle and does not assert the existence and superiority of one kind of God. It merely says that, for example, Protestantism favors hard work theologically, and shapes Protestant nations into hard-working ones. This is one tiny example; one could argue technological innovation is slowed down by a religious or overly conservative culture [conservative meaning 'resistant to changes']. True enough, obvious enough. It's a good theory. It's not something you can defeat with just one counterexample, as some vulgarians would like to do.

Meanwhile, I think the materialist/nonmaterialist debate thinks too small, and that this is to the detriment of the materialists. While a culture may influence a specific event, or a path taken by a group of people, the aggregate effects of dozens of groups competing and defeating each other can be conceptualized more easily by materialist theories. When you observe China and Western Europe, and see that they are of relatively similar size and that until very recently were similar in cultural and ethnic diversity, you can wonder about why they are so dissimilar today.

northern China has spent the majority of recorded history either united or split between a small (at most 4) number of kingdoms. southern China has often been included, in whole or in part, in this unity. Meanwhile, the Roman unity of the Mediterranean lands looks more like a lucky accident than a pattern. While much of modern China has been politically unified for over half a millennium, not a single European empire has managed to hold both Germany and France, or England and France, or France and Spain, or England and Spain, for more than fifty years and keep it stable. It has not happened, and is unlikely to happen anytime soon - no European country is going to surrender its sovereignty to the EU in our lifetimes.

Why did this happen? Why did Europe stay in bits why China hung together? I take the materialist explanation from Jared Diamond most seriously: geography. China is surrounded by inhospitable zones and mountains, making invasion less likely to break it apart. Within China, natural boundaries are not enough to hold off armies or moving settlers. Meanwhile, Europe's rivers, mountains and forests do not cut it off from invasion - they almost welcome it. European history is full of mass migrations: Franks, Goths, Germanic Tribes, Slavic Tribes, Huns, Avars, Mongols, Turkics. The geographical features cut pockets of territory off from each other, leading to a fractured and not united Europe. Switzerland is tiny and has never been a world power. It survives because it is in the mountains and could not be destroyed by French or German attempts.

And in my opinion, this is where the debate about materialism driving history goes astray. People end up arguing over why certain very specific events happened when the really huge questions don't even get brought up. So when writing about history, or how it could have gone another way, we can indeed factor in culture, religion, ethnic and tribal ideas. But the further back we go, the more and more we can see broad patterns determining things. So, in the end, I'm not at all hostile to a nonmaterialist version of some localized event, and together the two theories make a relatively good synthesis, but priority should be given to the materialist branch in matters of debate.

Alternate History #3.1: A weak Russia in the East

2008-03-28T11:46:00.001-04:00

Nazi Germany is the master of Eastern Europe, slowly industrializing the various lands. Russia has all but given up on being a large empire again, and has retreated to the highest-population areas to counteract overextension and famine. France and England can't manage to get popular support for an anti-Nazi war. Italy is the facism sidekick of Germany. The US has no reason to awake from European isolationism. It's 1946 and WWII has not happened, mainly because of Nazi advisers managing to keep Hitler from trying to do everything at once, instead expanding into the vacuum left by the lack of the USSR.

But how did Asia turn out? Asian Russia and Central Asia are scattered places, not unlike a less-divisive Afghanistan in 2005. No legitimate central authority, many different power-bases for different ethnicities. But the same forces that ended the Russian Czars were also operating in China, where a revolt took place in our timeline that removed the Emperor and began a democratic government. In this timeline, as in ours, the military soon usurped the democratic government. However, in our timeline, the Chinese nationalists who would take power for a few years before Mao were highly financed by the Soviets. The US was interested in a nationalist China, but was less enthusiastic until WWII.

The most important effect is how this works to Japan's favor. Without funding from Soviets and with the US in isolation for the moment, Japan has an easier time conquering northern China. They set up a puppet kingdom and continue to build the Japanese Empire. There are communist and nationalist resistances to Japan in China, but neither can pull itself together and both are crushed. Around 1940, Japan sees the US stirring from its isolation: too many powers hostile to US allies are gaining too much power. Because of their racial programs, the US presidents cannot bring themselves to ally with Germany or even carry on cordial relations. Meanwhile, Australia and the Philippines are very close to the Empire of Japan's edges.

At this time, Japan decides that conflict with the US is inevitable at some point. Without a war to pull it out of the Great Depression, the US in 1943 is recovering, but slowly. Some postwar technologies that created dramatic increases in standards of living after the war in our timeline are being invented, but without intensive production they are not yet affordable to even upper-middle class people.

Finally, in 1944, Japan launches a massive effort against every US possession in the western half of the Pacific. The great prize here is the Philippines, taken by the largest landing in modern military history. This is the Japanese equivalent of Normandy - a risky operation, it results in the surrender of US forces on the islands after only token resistance. To be fair, the US is caught unawares - intelligence indicated an Australian landing, or one in New Zealand.

This is the timeline's WWII. It is between Japan - not as powerful as Germany was in our timeline, but with more territory and much more manpower. Japan can more effectively leverage Chinese production because of the lessened resistance. It is friendly with Germany and Italy, but will not be joined by them in the war.

The early war goes badly for the US. Submarine designs bought from Germany and innovative airplane designs allow Japan to take all US possessions in the west Pacific, then the East Pacific. A failed Japanese invasion of Alaska via the Aleutian Islands marks the first Japanese setback of the war. Meanwhile, California is in a panic. Japanese Internment is carried out so quickly, some European observers liken it to the Nazi's deportation programs. England is worried that the US may try to expel Japanese citizens. Fortunately, the US policy is to continue internment only until the threat of Japanese invasion of the US is removed.

The longest battle of this war is the Battle of California - much like the Battle of the Atlantic, a series of submarine, airplane and battleship confrontations that the US wins by sheer productive capacity alone. Japan may have three times as many workers in its empire, but the Empire itself is loose and inefficient, and lacks major productive capacity that the US has. Japanese presences are reduced to hovering around occupied islands. The US invasion of occupied Hawaii in a costly success. A second Pyhrric victory at Midway gives the US control of the east Pacific again; internment on the east coast is disbanded, though still in place on the west coast.

At this point, in 1947, after four years of tense but not particularly intensive war, the US develops atomic weapons. US policy becomes targeted use of atomic weapons to minimize US casualties. Many islands Japan holds are uninhabited except for the soldiers. The main US strategy now becomes naval superiority for blockades, and atomic bombing of the atolls. This is known as the Atoll Campaign - dozens of atomic weapons are used, and before each strike radio broadcasts are sent into all Japanese territory proclaiming the intended target. Because of US naval power, the atomic bombers cannot be stopped. Island after island is decimated, and the Japanese Empire is shown again and again to be impotent. This strategy works in US favor, since the majority of casualties are soldiers or support workers - all combatants. France and especially England, worried about colonial possessions near the Empire of Japan, support the US strategy.

Because of the absolute humiliation of Japan at the hands of the US, the regions of the Empire are once again able to develop nationalist movements. Japan is widely hated in Asia as a bully, and an impotent one at that. Attempted revolts in Vietnam, Philippines and south China spread Japanese security forces too thin. Many Japanese believe their Empire is doomed, and will be slowly taken apart by the US and various nationalists. The US is still unable to gather public opinion for a large troop deployment.

However, without an attack on their homeland, Japan will not surrender. The US then makes its most controversial move of the war: is advertises that it will drop atomic weapons of Tokyo in one week if no surrender is made. Tokyo's population largely flees, but one in eight people stay and many fervent supporters of the Empire move in, in order to pressure the Emperor to launch one last defense of the homeland. The Japanese try, but fail, to stop the bomber and Tokyo is obliterated. The failure of Japan to keep safe the capital city, and the two-year naval blockade of all Japanese possessions results in violent populist nationalist uprisings in the various Asian countries, which Japanese soldiers cannot resist and very rarely try. They prefer to be captured and ransomed back to Japan itself. With its provinces falling away as independent Vietnam, Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Laos-Cambodia, Korea and China, Japan must confront the truth: a conditional surrender, asserting the unity of the Japanese home islands and the Emperor's power, as restricted by a new constitution, as well as the renunciation of expansion or of any atomic/nuclear program.

The US never fully emerges from isolation; the Japanese-American war results in less than 50,000 US citizens dead, most killed in Hawaii or Midway or by disease in the process of supplying the Asian nationalists. The strategy succeeds because Japan's empire was built on an image as well as power. When the image is totally shattered by the bombing of Tokyo, and the power eroded by blockade, the Empire collapses. The first half of the war accounts for 85% of casualties and 80% of lost materials by the US.

The US heads off any assertion of European colonial power in Asia, and begins to 'adopt' China, giving it aid and advisers in order to balance it against Japan, which the US is sure will rise again. In a future war, China will be able to fight back against Japan. The postwar world is one in which Germany seeks to make allies in the loose sections of Russia, and where the largest conflicts are those over decolonization. Without the exhaustion of WWII, England and France take a decade longer to let go of their colonies. A rough Cold War-analog exists between Germany and the democracies, exacerbated by nuclear weapons.

So, all this might have happened if, way back in 1921, Herbert Hoover hadn't tried to be such a nice humanitarian.

Alternate History #3: Soviet Russia strangled in the cradle

2008-03-27T15:30:00.001-04:00

At the end of WWII, the Soviet Union became a world power by fully utilizing the combined forces scattered about Eastern Europe, uniting the region under one relatively unified political ideology. But the USSR had nearly been killed just three years earlier, when the Nazi forces had almost taken the western half of Russia. This was not the first time the Soviets had been saved from near-death.

What happened:
In 1921, US President Warren G Harding had put an embargo on the newly-communist Russia in an attempt to force a regime turnover. A famine came upon the country, and Lenin was horribly worried that some new peasant revolution would overwhelm his government. At the last possible moment, Harding's Secretary of Commerce, Herbert Hoover, sent food aid to starving peasants in Russia in a humanitarian gesture. This may have been remembered by Stalin when he worked alongside the US in WWII, and it also might have saved the Soviet state.

What might have happened:
Either Herbert Hoover is more heartless and didn't push for food aid, or he's removed from the cabinet. In the second scenario, he wouldn't have had the clout to become President, so let us assume that he simply does nothing.

The effects:
Soviet Russia revolts again; the country is now known as a perpetually unstable place. An attempt at a democratic regime fails when the army steps in to 'correct the corruption' present among the Russian parliament. By 1929, the authoritarians have a firm hold on western Russia and Ukraine - the eastern section of the country is nominally controlled but the autonomous Republics conduct themselves like independent zones. Siberia especially has leeway; its warlords run not on military power but on laborers extracting its considerable resources. The military cannot get these materials without giving over large amounts of power to the Siberians. Siberia, too large to pacify, exists in a loose federation with European Russia.

Meanwhile, in central Europe, the Nazis come to power as they did in our timeline. Hitler promises to fix the mess made by the great depression. Without Stalin to modernize the country, Russia is a large but relatively backwards land. Its considerable Ukrainian farmlands are badly used, being allocated by the government to powerful supporters. Sometimes the Russian government verges on facism like Spain, Germany and Italy, but is full of too many communist and socialist sympathizers to go totally in that direction. Eastern Europe is a scattered mess of weak states.

Hitler is, as always, expansionist. However, lacking a counterbalance in the East he sees an easier route to power than through attacking France. He annexes Austria, the Czechs, allies with Romania, takes Poland easily, continues into the further East. France and England worry about Hitler, but he's only taking over Poland and other nonce countries; they cannot find a way to motivate their populations into a popular war.

Hitler always thought that conflict with France and England was inevitable; this made him too ready to attack France in our timeline. Upon taking much larger bites out of Eastern Europe, this Hitler finds them totally lacking in industrial capacity. Instead of beating down France, he finds that he must instead organize the building-up of the Eastern Reich. He sees the Reich as a grand project, much like how Lenin and Stalin saw the USSR - something inevitable, not to be rushed. His advisers intentionally sidetrack him into dealings in the East to keep him from biting off too much, namely a war with the West.

Italy wants to be a world-class power, and is good allies with Germany. It hopes to expand its African colonies, and begins troop movements that impinge on English and French lands. Hitler is inclined to fight France there and then, but his advisers convince him to discipline Italy. Germany sends a delegation to the Italian King, who stops Mussolini from making any further moves. There will be no grand Italian Empire; Germany has made it clear that only one fascist empire will exist. Italy may play sidekick, much like the current UK does with the US. Knowing that if they disobey, Germany will launch reprisals that will not be fought off by France or England, Italy assents to the lesser role.

Russia, seeing Germany crawling closer, makes an amazing move: it willingly grants independence to much of the country. Now there is a stronger government in Moscow that stretches into the Ukraine - the most productive zones. This government is not overtaxed in holding onto empty lands it cannot really police. It makes friends quickly with France and England and Turkey, the only powers of any importance who openly oppose the Nazis. Overwhelmed with a crushing industrialization program, the Reich sees Russia's consolidation as a natural boundary. This generation it will not take more than this territory; the historical project of the Reich means that it can think long-term. The USSR did a similar thing - not pressing for a military engagement because its own ideology told it that, post-WWII, the capitalists would fold. The Reich believes that the people it has conquered (often 'discovered' to be germanic people rather than slavs) will in the end be stronger than any other.

Russia is now in bits - small, fractious ones in Central Asia and the Caucasus and a large Siberian one in the far East. These bits are horribly weak, especially Siberia. All of Russia still subscribes to a federative idea but the small bits are de facto independent.

Next time: WWII with a super-Germany and a tiny Russia.

Alternate History #2: Wendish Paganism and Cathars gone wild!

2008-03-26T22:29:00.001-04:00

The most successful Crusades, in terms of setting up hardcore Catholic states and holding them, were not in the Middle East but rather in Europe itself. The most successful of these was the Albigensian Crusade, in which the exceedingly popular dualist/Christian Cathars were, over the course of twenty years, totally wiped out.
Fifty years earlier, the Wends, whose paganism was apparently becoming highly organized and resistant to conversion, had been dealt a blow by an earlier Crusade.

What happened:
The Wends, unable to pull themselves together enough, were beaten badly and their lands destroyed. They did not present a serious threat again. Half a century later, Cathars took over southern France. They looked in good position to hold it, and their religion was percolating into the general population well. The Crusade destroyed their political power and returned Catholicism firmly to the region.

What might have happened:
If a Crusade against the Wends had happened earlier and been badly organized - like the People's Crusade (crushed utterly by the Turks) or the Children's Crusade (disbanded when the crusaders were sold into slavery) - the Wendish religion and political unity might have come together at last. This early crusade would have been beaten back, and the second, better funded one would not have made much headway either.

The effects:
A pocket of ethnically-based paganism survives in Eastern Europe, and a few good Kings and generals grow the Wendish kingdom. Anti-Christians from surrounding regions (who were often the elites - rich and better educated) fled to this Wendish kingdom. The main Crusading obsessions from 1150 onward are not in the Middle East but Wendland and its small slavic allies. However, Wendland has an advantage: it's small and headed by a King. It doesn't break apart into factions, since it's too small for any one bit to survive alone. The King is smoothly succeeded by his eldest son for quite a number of power-transitions. This is uncommon in Europe until about 1400, but small, homogeneous, fierce Wendland manages it.

With all their resources for Crusade heading to Wendland and making no progress, the fever of war is dimming around Europe. Then, Cathari nobles come to power in southern France. At this point there are three Catholic Kingdoms: the Holy Roman Empire, France and England. Spain is mostly Muslim. These three have their attention split between each other, Spain, Wendland, the Middle East and now south France. This is just too much.

France obviously wants to fix its Cathari problem, but the HRE is being bothered and worried by expansionist Wendland. England is trying to take Scotland and hold it, to fund Spain against the Muslims, to do something in the Middle East. The reason why the Catholics succeeded in our history is because they could deal with each problem one at a time. The addition of the Wends as a power undoes that. The HRE can't get its act together to held France out, and this time, the Cathars beat the French back. The HRE does contain Wendland for now, but the Cathari state of Languedoc has emerged. It makes quick friends with the Wends and Muslim Spain, as well as anyone who can protect it against a further Crusade, which it knows is coming.

Thirty years pass, and it's now about 1230. The young nobles of France and Germany have lived their whole lives with Languedoc free, and the urgency of destroying it is fading among the less faithful. Wendland had fallen on hard times with famines and such. France, without its southern ports, is noticeably weaker. The HRE looks at France and likes what it sees: a Franco-German war ensues which weakens both participants. This gives Wendland a bit of time to get strong again and lets Languedoc build more friendships and defenses. Crucial to this strategy is an alliance with the HRE, which the Cathars obtain. They harass French troops in the south, taking lands they don't hope to hold in order to aid Germany.

By a stroke of luck, the HRE army wins a couple big battles, but can't keep any territory. The battles are hugely expensive in money and men, and both countries are exhausted. France is so tired it can only take back about half of what the Cathars took, and with major effort. Languedoc is now strong, permanent. The HRE misses its big chance to eliminate Wendland while it's weak. North Poland and the Baltic states belong to it now. Wendland behaves half like Scandinavia - raids and quick strikes from the sea - and half like a standard European kingdom.

And this situation sticks around. There are six European powers, only three are Catholic.

Catholic England, Germany and France
Cathari Languedoc
Muslim Spain
Pagan Wendland

So what happens is that European history is much more religiously diverse. Historically, Muslim Spain didn't want to expand - they felt Europe was too cold for comfort. Wendland, I imagine, would shrink and grow over time, sometimes making large conquests southward but always restrained by the HRE to its west.
The most interesting of these new states would be Languedoc, because Cathars showed a remarkable ability to convert Catholics. Maybe northern Spain would go Cathar, leaving no Spanish Catholics in power.

Why all this establishment?

2008-03-26T21:44:00.001-04:00

In almost every confrontation between an organized religion and an 'indigenous' one, the organized one has succeeded in converting the natives - or enough of them that the old system is fatally undone. This happened again and again, in vastly different times and places:

The Turkic peoples of Central Asia took on Islam and moved away from their traditional shamanism
The various African religions and tribal idea systems were absorbed, broadly, into either Christianity or Islam
The Americas were Christianized over hundreds of years
Europe, after the fall of Rome, was Christianized out of scattered pagan, polytheistic, druidic and shamanistic faiths
East Asia was thoroughly taken over by a combination of Buddhist and Confucianist ideas which replaced ancestor worship, Korean shamanism, scattered Chinese paganisms, Indochinese idol worship

Each time, a 'codified' faith entered the region of an uncodified one. These 'loose' religions may have been at a disadvantage because they had no book to refer back to, or because they were simply never examined with academic rigor. Yet Islam spread among the illiterate Turkics, so the Quran was not such an advantage. And Greco-Roman paganism had hundreds of volumes dedicated to its study, but was not spared from the overwhelming wave of Christianity. It seems that the codified religions win out, given enough time. As we can see today, the very last vestiges of African Traditional Religion are being swept out - now all ATR is rolled up into Christian and sometimes Islamic faith. Fewer and fewer people are identifying themselves as practitioners of only ATR. I believe there is only one African country where the largest religious group identifies as only ATR, and they are not an absolute majority - just larger than either Muslim or Christian populations.

But does it have to be this way, historically? The evidence - which I have not come up with a theory to explain - seems to indicate yes. Of course, you can explain away any one case: the Americas were Christianized because the Europeans had the technology and the germs to prune away rebellious populations, etc. But you cannot explain away all the cases.

Do uncodified religions ever survive, then? Yes they exist in the US, but anyone who thinks the Native American Church (a native/Christian hybrid anyway) is a powerful movement is in need of medication. But uncodified religions do survive. It is my understanding (knowing very little about either) that both Indian Hinduism and Japanese Shinto crystallized out of various native paganisms. So, by that count, nearly one billion people do identify as some kind of aboriginal religious group.

I recently read a book called The Barbarian Conversion, which detailed the Christianizing of Europe after the death of Rome. Some stories in it are familiar to anyone who's taken a course in Medieval history - the conversion of the Franks, the various Germanic conversions, the eventual Scandinavian conversion. But there was one section that proved most interesting of all: Eastern Europe.

The book spent some time on the East, past the Germanic tribes where no intro course dares to go. In the area of Poland-Balkans-Baltic-Slavic people there was a tremendous diversity of religion. And somewhere in there was a group called the Wends, who are possibly the greatest religious what-if of Medieval Europe. They followed a relatively familiar polytheistic faith, similar to the Norse or Germanic tribes. Various gods for various jobs, with a head god who was most powerful. The Wends (who didn't call themselves that) held out against Christianity for quite some time, until a few military losses and royal deaths but Christians and Christian-sympathizers into power. Wendish paganism lost all real power in a short time after this confluence of events. What is so important is that just before this mess happened, the Wends were being politically united more like Western European proto-states, and their religion was being codified.

It seems that some anti-Christian Wends had thought very seriously about their faith and had done a lot of the work needed to call something codified. We don't know much about it, but organized Wendish paganism may have been a short time away from presenting a serious religious challenge to Christianity. The Wends were trapped between Eastern Orthodox Slavs and Catholic Germanics, so even if they'd managed to fend off the Christians their organized paganism (the first to my knowledge in Europe) wouldn't have been able to expand very far. But how different might Europe's history have been if there had been a pocket of non-Christian, even anti-Christian believers somewhere in the region between Poland and Greece?

Unitary States and Federal States

2008-03-12T21:34:00.001-04:00

There are, broadly, two kinds of states in the modern world: Unitary and Federal ones. I live in the USA, a federal state. Ever since discovering the two opposing concepts of state organization, I wondered which I would prefer. Eventually I settled on a federal state, since I was already living in one. Now I've had an opportunity to rethink that idea.

To explain:
In a federal state, the subdivisions of a country (US states, Swiss cantons, Russian federated republics) have some measure of inherent authority - something the central government cannot take away. Federal states often emerged historically from the union of smaller groups either by assent or loose cultural/military conquest. Some federal states include Russia, the US, Germany, India - as well as some lesser lights - Sudan, Ethiopia.

In a unitary state, the government delegates authority to the provinces (as the subdivisions are called in most unitary countries). The provinces do not inherently reserve powers to themselves, but are given them by the central authority. Unitary states have often entered the modern world through revolution, and most communist or ex-communist countries are unitary. Leaders include France, Spain, the United Kingdom, China - and some lesser lights - Saudi Arabia, Belarus, Zimbabwe.

Scanning these two options, anyone who does not seek to be authoritarian might prefer the federal system. The idea that the central government gets to decide how much power to allocate the regions is too prone to abuse, you might say. But eventually, I became convinced that a unitary government is easier to handle, less prone to get out of hand. Of course, what follows does not apply very well to countries without strong democracies, where race or religion or military juntas dictate power distribution. But, let's remember, there are strong democracies among the federal and unitary.

To demonstrate my argument, let us look at the US (federal) and UK (unitary). US states know they have certain powers - setting state taxes, local law enforcement, etc. But over time the states, who were supposed to be primary, were gradually overwhelmed by the central government. No serious observer should argue with the idea that the central government has grown at the expense of the states (primarily through use of the commerce clause, I would argue). Why have states been unable to keep certain powers when challenged, even though the states say they reserve these powers? I would argue that US states don't come to each other's aid as often as they could. They suffer from a sort of diffuse responsibility: each time the central government tries to exert power over a state, the other states say, "well, that's not me" and do nothing. This is easier because it's not always obvious when one state's loss will be expanded into another state's. One day the government says it wants to regulate porn coming into Alabama and Texas does not stand with its sister state. The next decade, the government is striking down Texan bans on sex toys. Maybe if the states had teamed up, the government wouldn't have been able to pull it off.
In the UK, the four constituent countries (England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland) are guaranteed no powers. But in each, movements for greater regional autonomy are succeeding. Scotland may be seriously considering secession. When the central government of a unitary state wants to increase its own power, it must very publicly remove that power from the purview of the subdivision. This way, both central and subcentral governments know what they may do - unlike in the US where there is a constant pull over what each state may do and what the government may regulate within a state. The fight in a unitary state is very explicitly one over subdivision powers, and an attempt to strip them is obvious and will be fought because it clearly establishes precedent to take power from other regions.

As for the idea that federal states always collapse into the central government, that's obviously not true. Switzerland - the OG of federal states - has a weak central government, and German politicians must derive consensus from the subdivisions for policies that effect them. Meanwhile, France - the archetypal democratic unitary state - has a very low level of subdivision.

What a unitary state allows, in reality, is the ability of its citizens to find and maintain the level of autonomy they desire. Spain - unitary, democratic, highly regional - wants a lot, as does the UK in recent times. France wants very little.

Maybe the thing I don't like about federal states is the way the government can sometimes take away from its subdivisions without them clearly knowing it. It almost feels like cheating.

Alternate History #1.1

2008-03-09T21:08:00.001-04:00

Continuing from the scenario in which Russian possession of Alaska sparks a North American Amerind revolt, I realized that there is a horrible ending for this line of history. In the last sentence of the post, I wrote a tossed-off line:

Assuming this crisis escalates quickly, the US could find itself
needing to put down reservation secessions by 1950. This is just five
years after the last of the Japanese internment camps closed, and it's
not totally out of the question that they could be reopened once more
for another US minority.

Now here's a thought. In real life, the validity of internment has never been repudiated. There were several Supreme Court cases about whether such a scheme was valid or constitutional, and none of them ended with a definitive verdict against internment. The most direct on the subject, Korematsu, explicitly allowed internment. Since the case was decided, it has been reevaluated. This seems wonderful for freedom-loving people. Unfortunately, the case was not overturned. Instead, the facts upon which the case was based were found to be lacking and the verdict was evacuated. What this subtly implies is that if the facts that certain military officials basically fabricated about Japanese Americans had been true, the internment would have been allowable.

Scared to death by communist Amerinds demanding and later receiving independence in Canada (in three different SSRs - bringing the American total to four Amerind SSRs - Alaska, Yukon, Nunavut and Saskatchewan) the US interns its own Amerind population. Or maybe they are offered a choice: leave the US and reside in the SSRs or be interned until the threat passes. "The Threat" can only be resolved by building a huge expensive border fence with the SSRs, which cover one third of the US's northern border.

The point of discussing internment so much is that if two different groups are interned within five years, and even in our current history the courts and government can't bring themselves to invalidate the strategy, then a much less secure US might find internment to be a legitimate strategy going forward.

Here's where things get truly horrible. Amerinds make up no more than two percent of the US population. Now it's the 1960s, and the SSRs are sealed off. Amerinds are freed but suspect to the white population. As in our history, the largest minority in the country begins to push for full rights. In the 1960s, the black population decides it is finally time to stand up.

Let us be honest: the Civil Rights movement had frequent socialist (if not communist) leanings. While anti-Civil Rights politicians argued that the blacks were manipulated by commies, this was never the case. Besides, it is entirely understandable why minorities might turn against capitalism: its systems had failed them and socialism or communist offered ways out. But that's never the way politicians saw it. For them, especially in the South, the black unrest was fully and utterly Communist with an uppercase C.

Now we have the following situation: blacks demand rights and reparations, many leaders are socialist or Christian socialist (much like Dr King). In this world, unrest can legitimately be met with internment if the people are scared enough. Blacks make up between 12-20% of the US population. Black internment would be, in raw numbers, the worst violation of American liberty since the passage of the 13th Amendment ended slavery.

Some might say that this could not happen. Of course, the threat to the US would have needed to be much more dire than it ever was in our history. But the Amerind SSRs scared this alternate America. It could indeed have carried out black internment. But could it have been done logistically? Could a country intern one in eight of its citizens? I think it could be done, but it would hurt the US economy and require sacrifices from the free population. Let's remember that when it was taken by Nazi Germany, Poland's population was 10-15% Jewish. Now there are 1,000 Jews in a country of 40 million. This is a testament to the logistical possibility of black internment. Just as with Jewish deportation to camps, many of the suspect group would assume their plight was temporary and it was not worth fighting. Many Jews gave themselves up to the German authorities; no doubt many apolitical blacks would do the same. And while black internment would not be a prelude to extermination, it would permanently dislocate blacks from the American economy and culture.

Remember where all this started? The purchase of Alaska? We've come a long way down a horrible road.
Moral of the story: If you can buy some useless territory, then do buy it no matter how much the other politicians tease you.

Ethnic Nationalism and State Borders

2008-03-06T14:14:00.001-05:00

What I've been wondering for some time is to what extent national borders should coincide with ethnic or religious groups. The lack of a reasonable ethnic division in Africa, for example, has probably caused or exacerbated many conflicts in the post-colonial era. But what would another way of doing it have been?

Had the English or French decided to carve up their empires in a reasonably ethnic manner (as Woodrow Wilson generally believed that borders and ethnicities are meant to coincide) that would have left Africa with something like 800 tiny states. Some ethnic groups have 100,000 members. Others have 500. The ability of a state of 100,000 to simply overwhelm the tiny ethnic state might have created more instability. With ratios that skewed, you just need one twentyeth of one percent of the population of the larger state to join the army (most states have armies in the 1-10% of population range). With this miniscule army, you could march into the small country and have each soldier kill just one enemy man, woman or child. This done, the smaller state would be totally wiped out. It would be the most complete genocide in the history of the planet, a 100% destruction of an ethnic group. Assuming neither country sat on oil or diamond resources, it might happen too quickly for other powers to do a thing. The large state could then claim and occupy the smaller one. It would be a horrific but brutally efficient lebensraum. The large state's ethnic group could grow faster using the space and food resources.

We've seen how most Western states won't stop a genocide, and there's no reason to think they would stop this kind either. At least by aggregating the many similar ethnic groups into larger states, the current system makes wars and genocides more costly. Any group that wishes to use their army to wipe another groups out will face massive disapproval from the international community, with sanctions and possible military intervention. This hasn't stopped genocides by any means, but maybe it has decreased the wholesale destruction of small ethnic groups.

As a historical aside, people often don't mention that during the Rwandan Genocide (which also took place in neighboring Burundi) there were retaliatory killings of Hutus in Tutsi dominated areas after the genocide began. And both groups killed the minority third ethnic group, the Twa pygmies.

But there were also colonial empires outside of Africa, in Asia and the Middle East especially. Asia's borders are, by and large, correlated with major groups. Central Asia (all the countries that end in -stan) is sliced up almost esclusively on ethnic grounds. While this area is nowhere near prosperous, it is also less ethnically violent. The biggest problem in Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, etcetera is not genocide, war or civil strife but corruption and government opression. Corruption and injustice we can deal with. Genocide is harder.

As for the Middle East: it has fewer groups than Africa, and so an ethnic/religious partition of the region would not easily cause the genocide scenario above. All the groups are large enough that no one can destroy the other overnight.

Credit: Ralph Peters & Chris Broz

Here's a proposal for just such a partition, made by militarily-connected men who know a thing of two. It slices up the Middle East in new ways that reflect the various entities that actually exist there. Unfortunately, the three biggest losers in this scenario are also the most powerful: Saudi Arabia loses some land to Jordan, loses its Holy Lands to the interestingly-named Islamic Sacred State, and its Gulf coast to the Arab Shia State. Iran and Turkey both lose territory to Kurdistan, but that territory is currently held by ethnic Kurds, so the partition at least makes some sense.

While most people probably look at the map for its Iraq-related regions, I'm more interested in the Islamic Sacred State. Imagine it truly existed - would the Wahhabi-inflected Saudis pack up an move there, allowing the Saudi Homelands to travel the modernist path using their oil wealth? If the most conservative members of the Middle East all packed up and moved to one localized area, the rest of the region might jump into modernization (though by no means secularization).

One last thought: Baghdad is listed as a city-state, like the ones from Classical Greece. I wonder why we don't really see too many of those anymore. City-States seem like workable solutions to the problem of disputed ethnic control over a major capital city.

Alternate History #1

2008-03-05T15:33:00.001-05:00

The concept of alternate history is something I am absolutely in love with. There are full-fledged novels based on some good alternate history concepts but I prefer to take a more academic look at the long range effects of certain events. Obviously, in changing any event you must determine what would happen as a result. This is easy to do when you are close in time to the divergence, or when the change is not very large. For longer effects, you obviously need a theory or supposition about why history happens the way it does.
Why, for example, did Japan and China, both more sophisticated in guns and ships respectively than Europe until very recently, both abandon their great technologies? Originally I thought that the abandonment was the choice of a single ruler. Had that ruler been killed or replaced earlier, the ban would never have crossed the minds of the next ruler. It turns out this is wrong, and that banning guns in Japan was more popular than I could have guessed. So as I hypothesize about history, I sometimes find out I was wrong and must abandon my old ideas.

Now for my first presentation. Background is all true, putting the situation in context, Divergence is the changed part, and Result is the effect on later history.

Background: It's 1865, the Civil War is over. France and Britain had been hostile to the Union government, seeking to protect cotton interests in the Confederacy. The Union did have one European ally: Russia, at that time the owners of a huge stretch of empty land known now as Alaska.
Southern discontents, seeing the Union and President Lincoln as tyrants, formed a conspiracy to assassinate top Union officials. Three men set out to kill the President, Vice President Andrew Johnson and Secretary of State William Seward.

Divergence: As it happens, the man tasked with killing the VP chickened out, and Seward was only wounded. Lincoln was indeed killed but the conspiracy had no long-lasting effect. Seward, who remained on in the Johnson administration, rewarded US ally Russia by buying Alaska for an amount of money most considered "folly." Now if Seward's assassin had just stabbed him a bit more soundly, the man would have been killed. It was his idea to buy Alaska, and his political capital that led the government to actually do so. His death would probably have headed off this chain of events.

Result: It's now 1948, and the world is looking uneasily at the US and USSR as they rise from the ashes of WWII and struggle for global supremacy. The Soviets have a tactic of funding communist parties in areas where the people are being exploited, as it is fertile ground for Marxists. Particularly worrisome to the US is the Russian presence in the Alaskan SSR, which shares a huge, indefensible border with neighbor and ally Canada. In addition, Canada's less than fair practices towards its indigenous inhabitants, the so-called First Nations, have made these various groups (who mostly live in the emptier western section of Canada that is near the Alaskan SSR) susceptible to communist calls for independence and resistance to imperialists.
The US worries about communists filtering into the northern states through Canada, which is resistant to crack down on First Nations in the west for fear of causing instability among First Nations in the east. [American Indians or Native Americans, from now on Amerinds] Amerinds, especially those with radical tendencies, being to filter out of the US up into Canada with two aims: some seek to join the revolution and secure part of North America for its aboriginal people, others want to simply outnumber whites and 'Amerind Unionists.' Once the population balance is in favor of the Amerinds, there are plans to put forth a referendum for independence. Since these regions are very sparsely populated, even small migrations make a difference.
French-speaking Quebec, which is friendly with France (where communist parties almost came to power in several different elections prior to the 1950's) is also interested in leaving Canada. The US regards these developments with horror, as the European-dominate British possession seems to be breaking apart into three parts, one of which is solidly capitalist (The East), one socialist-sympathetic (Quebec) and one nationalist-Marxist (The First Nation Territories). To ward off a break-up, the US vows to send troops to Canada if any revolutionary or secessionist activities take place.

There we have it: a totally different Cold War, caused by Russian presence in North America. I don't know enough to continue much further, but let's speculate what the worst outcome could have been for the US. It is possible that, in response to US deployments against Amerinds in Canada, the reservations within the US could have declared independence. Added up, US reservations are about four times the size of Rhode Island - not an easy area to pacify, especially since they are often in bad land over difficult terrain. Assuming this crisis escalates quickly, the US could find itself needing to put down reservation secessions by 1950. This is just five years after the last of the Japanese internment camps closed, and it's not totally out of the question that they could be reopened once more for another US minority.

The Effect of the Party Primaries

2008-03-05T11:54:00.001-05:00

The two American political parties have different ways of racking up delegates in their primaries, and it explains why John McCain will get to sit back and watch Hillary and Obama beat one another senseless for some time yet.
Observe:

Republican primaries are almost all Winner-take-all. If Candidate A gets one single vote more than B, A takes every single delegate. This means that someone who is popular in the first few states can end up with a huge chunk of delegate even before his opponents get more than a handful, even if this candidate will do horribly in the later primaries. Unless two opposing candidates both have regional power bases - one in the Midwest, another in the Deep South, the contest will be decided relatively early. The reason no clear winner emerged earlier this time around was not that there were different bases but rather too many candidates. As they cleared out, McCain began to win. The effect of this system is that it ends the contest quickly, so the Republicans can begin to campaign for President in earnest.

Democrats, on the other hand, have a more proportional system of handing out delegates. If you get 45% of the vote, you get nearly 45% of the delegates in most states (there are exceptions for both parties). This means that unless somebody has a huge power base in the early states, the contest will drag on and on. This is currently happening. Notice that having a base ends the contest for Democrats but prolongs it for the Republicans.

Personally, I don't like the winner-take-all system because it seems undemocratic. If A wins 51-49 in one state but loses 70-30 in another equally sized state, A and B end up tied in delegates, but B is far more popular overall. Meanwhile, I don't like the Superdelegate system the Democrats have either, again because it's undemocratic. It also seems to favor an established candidate (like Hillary) in an elitist manner. If Democratic voters truly want an establishment candidate, can't they vote that way without party moguls acting as Superdelegates?

Personally, I would prefer a primary system for both parties that was like the Democrats' system, but maybe with a small stable of extra delegates to reward the outright winner of each state. But then again, I'd also like to see the popular vote instituted for President, and that's not going to happen right away.