Making Sense of Marijuana Laws

The Obama administration announced this week that the Justice Department will no longer aggressively prosecute medical marijuana users or dispensaries like those in California, where voters legalized use of the drug with a doctor’s prescription in 1996.

Under both the Clinton and Bush administrations, the Justice Department had continued to enforce the federal ban on marijuana despite referenda (reeferenda?) in 14 states legalizing its medicinal use.

The question is, do states have the right to override federal drug laws? Or does the federal government’s authority trump states’ rights? The courts have been adjudicating the issue since 1973, when the first case involving the “compassionate use” of the drug was filed.

Newsprism thinks this is an easy one: the Tenth Amendment to the US Constitution clearly states, “the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

Another question that should be easy for most to answer is, should people whose suffering could be eased by marijuana be allowed to use it? This is an especially easy question to answer when other medications aren’t as effective as marijuana; for instance, marijuana most definitely increases the appetite of patients struggling to maintain their weight due to chemotherapy or AIDS.

A separate issue of interest to college students is, should students who’ve been convicted of drug possession, including marijuana, be allowed to receive federally-guaranteed student loans? At present, even simple possession of marijuana disqualifies a student from these loans for at least one year, and potentially for a lifetime.

As a new generation takes power in Washington, and as budget crises filter through the economies of more and more states, some liberalization of marijuana laws is likely. California, with its history of liberal social policies and its crippling debt, could become the first state to legalize the drug in the near future.

Tinkering with US drug laws carries with it any number of risks, including an increase in the use of any drug that is decriminalized or legalized, an increase in violence associated with the production of such drugs (as has happened in northern California already,) and a diminishing of the social stigma rightly attached to drug abuse.

How our legislators and executive branch officials choose to treat marijuana at both the state and federal levels should at the very least reflect a more enlightened, more compassionate approach than has been seen over the last few decades. Medical marijuana has far too many benefits and far too few risks to be withheld from suffering patients.

Using marijuana possession convictions to refuse student loans seems equally draconian.

Whether the drug should be made legal for all to use is a different issue, but one that can now at least receive a fair and objective hearing in state houses, governor’s mansions, Congress, and the White House.

Newsprism

Rush Limbaugh Demonstrates Why He Doesn’t Belong in the NFL

In a Wall Street Journal column Friday, Rush Limbaugh demonstrates exactly why he’s not worthy of joining the National Football League.

To begin with, the column is subtitled, My critics would have you believe no conservative meets NFL ’standards’. But the issue has nothing to do with the liberal/conservative divide; the opposition to Limbaugh’s participation in the league is based on the fact that he’s made his name by being a provocateur and a controversialist, not on his politics.

Does anyone seriously believe that among the league’s many owners there are no conservatives? Or that NFL fans are any less likely to be conservative than the general population?

Limbaugh, the consummate self-promoter, wants to make this about some vast left wing conspiracy. It’s not.

The NFL’s revenue stream depends largely on its public image; the league is therefore, like any other business, highly protective of its image. Any threat to that image poses an existential risk that no business would be wise to take.

The outpouring of opposition to Limbaugh taking part ownership in the St. Louis Rams proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that allowing Limbaugh into the league would be risky. That opposition came from many quarters, including players, the NFL Commissioner, fans, numerous sports writers and political commentators, and, yes, two outspoken media whores named Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton.

Limbaugh conveniently downplays the players, the commissioner, the fans, the writers, and the commentators in order to concentrate his ire on Jackson and Sharpton as he begins his column by citing a well-deserved litany of their attention-seeking, race-baiting tactics.

But doesn’t Limbaugh play exactly the same game as Jackson and Sharpton? Don’t all three men exploit every controversial  issue possible to keep their names in the headlines? Talk about the pot calling the kettles black!

And speaking of black, is it a coincidence that in this column Limbaugh focuses his fire on four African-Americans—Sharpton, Jackson, NFL Players’ Union head DeMaurice Smith, and sportswriter Michael Wilbon—for playing the race card against him?

Limbaugh deftly uses race to his advantage while always stopping just short of overt racism. For example, on his radio program he made the satirical song “Barack the Magic Negro” a mainstay; accused General Colin Powell of endorsing Barack Obama’s presidential bid solely because Obama is black; called Obama a “Halfrican American”; associated the violence plaguing Chicago with Obama by pointedly and repeatedly calling the city “Obamaland” in a discussion of that violence and its effect on Chicago’s bid for the Olympics; and, after the release of a well-publicized school bus video of black children beating a white child, said that in “Obama’s America” such behavior is now acceptable.

Limbaugh even mentions Obama twice in his WSJ column. Why? What does the president have to do with this?

Then there’s the infamous 2003 incident in which Limbaugh managed to bring race into his sports commentary on ESPN, saying that Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Donovan McNabb was overrated: “I think what we’ve had here is a little social concern in the NFL. The media has been very desirous that a black quarterback do well.”

I’ve never heard a single announcer or commentator bring race into a sportscast. That Limbaugh did so is a classic example of “leakage,” a psycological syndrome akin to a Freudian slip. Limbaugh just couldn’t keep what was on his mind in his mind!

The petulant Limbaugh later claimed with typical arrogance, “All this has become the tempest that it is because I must have been right about something. If I wasn’t right, there wouldn’t be this cacophony of outrage that has sprung up in the sports writer community.”

Even if Limbaugh was right about McNabb (and he wasn’t), it was inappropriate to bring race into the equation. It was damaging to ESPN and to the NFL. Once burned, twice shy; the league has no reason whatsoever to give Limbaugh more opportunities to show his true colors.

Limbaugh’s column ends with as pathetic an example of victimization as I’ve ever read:

There is a contempt in the news business, including the sportswriter community, for conservatives that reflects the blind hatred espoused by Messrs. Sharpton and Jackson. “Racism” is too often their sledgehammer. And it is being used to try to keep citizens who don’t share the left’s agenda from participating in the full array of opportunities this nation otherwise affords each of us….

These intimidation tactics are working and spreading, and they are a cancer on our society.

If Limbaugh is a victim of anything, it’s his own lack of integrity.

And if there’s a cancer on our society, it’s not some vast left wing conspiracy to deny opportunity to conservatives.

No, the cancer on our society is the demagoguery, the brazen intellectual dishonesty, the subtle racism, the exploitation of ignorance, bigotry and narrow mindedness that has made Rush Limbaugh a household name, and increasingly divided the country, and poisoned our political discourse.

Ironically, one of the nation’s best conservative political commentators, David Brooks, chastised Limbaugh and his ilk in a brilliant column two weeks ago. Brooks blames Limbaugh and his media progeny (which now includes the liberal former ESPN sportscaster Keith Olbermann!) for weakening the Republican Party:

The Republican Party is unpopular because it’s more interested in pleasing Rush’s ghosts than actual people. The party is leaderless right now because nobody has the guts to step outside the rigid parameters enforced by the radio jocks and create a new party identity. The party is losing because it has adopted a radio entertainer’s niche-building strategy, while abandoning the politician’s coalition-building strategy.

The rise of Beck, Hannity, Bill O’Reilly and the rest has correlated almost perfectly with the decline of the G.O.P. But it’s not because the talk jocks have real power. It’s because they have illusory power, because Republicans hear the media mythology and fall for it every time.

Limbaugh pioneered a form of demogogic and self-aggrandizing infotainment that is damaging not only to the nation’s political discourse, but to the very ideology he purports to advance. There’s no reason to let that poison once again do its ugly work in the arena of sports.

Brooks adds a colorful analogy to his critique, writing that Limbaugh’s story “is a story as old as ‘The Wizard of Oz,’ of grand illusions and small men behind the curtain.”

Rush, get back behind your curtain and leave the gridiron to men of honor.

Newsprism

Deficit Passes $1.4 Trillion as National Debt Approaches $12 Trillion

The Office of Management and Budget released the latest federal deficit figures. For the Fiscal Year (FY) 2009, which ended in September, the federal deficit was $1.42 trillion.

FY2009 includes the last four months or so of the Bush administration in addition to the first eight months or so of the Obama administration. Both Bush’s TARP program and the initial spending under Obama’s economic stimulus plan were included in the figure.

The ongoing federal spending spree (part of which was surely justified by economic circumstances) raised the national debt to $11.9 trillion.

Just over a year ago, Newsprism noted that the national debt had surpassed $10 trillion.

Just over six months ago, Newsprism noted that the national debt had risen another $1 trillion dollars in the previous six months. Now the national debt has once again risen nearly $1 trillion dollars more in just over six months.

President Bush inhereted a national debt of around $5 trillion along with a federal budget surplus when he took office in 2001. Since 2000, here’s how the federal deficit has grown:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Both parties are responsible for overspending without adequate revenue to pay for that spending. While the TEA Party movement is right on in decrying this, the blame must be spread evenly between Democrats and Republicans, and between Bush, Obama, and presidents dating back to Ronald Reagan, all of whom have failed to keep federal spending in check.

We’re stealing from future generations—”we” because we continue to vote for politicians who refuse to confront our fiscal problems.

Shame on us. Shame on all of us.

Newsprism

Whom Do You Trust with Your Family’s Health—Scientists, or Entertainers?

With the rollout of the new H1N1 flu vaccine, some legitimate medical questions arise: who should get the vaccine first? Who can do without it? Under whose authority will such decisions be made?

In today’s political environment, there are also legitimate questions to ask concerning the role and scope of government as well as government’s competence.

Separate from these questions are the comments of media blowhards who would bypass science and exploit any political angle for their own self interest.

The usual suspects are already busy undermining public health in ways that could literally lead to the loss of lives. Rush Limbaugh defiantly insisted on-air he won’t be vaccinated and that the government can’t force him to. On FoxNews, Glenn Beck called into question the dangers the vaccine may entail while repeating his usual call to distrust government.

Interestingly, Beck wouldn’t go so far as to suggest that his followers not be vaccinated. Beck is no fool; couldn’t he be liable if someone took that advice and wound up dead?

The usually more thoughtful Bill Maher said on HBO that he doesn’t trust the government with his health and wouldn’t take the H1N1 vaccine or any other vaccine. A guest on his show, Senator and Doctor Bill Frist, scolded Maher succinctly, saying, “You’re wrong. Look at the science.”

What a novel idea: look at the science. Listen to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). Respect the work of epidemiologists and immunologists. Take the advice of medical professionals.

The CDC has documented the rising death rate from H1N1, and, according to MSNBC, has now specifically attributed 86 deaths of children to the H1N1 flu, including 43 in the last six weeks and 11 last week.

Millions already dismiss the scientific work of the vast majority of the planet’s climate scientists in favor of the conspiracy theories and apologetics of the likes of Limbaugh and Beck.

How many people, including innocent children, could get sick, could die, from this flu simply because someone put the opinions of media blowhards, with all their self-aggrandizement and political posturing, above the knowledge of experts in the relevant fields?

Newsprism

Balloon Boy Transfixes Media as F-16 Pilot Remains Missing in Atlantic

Six-year-old balloon boy Falcon Heene blurted out the truth about his “ordeal” on Larry King Live last night when he said, ”We did it for the show.”

The transparent attempt to extend the Heene family’s fifteen minutes of fame can’t be taken seriously. Falcon’s father, Richard, should be investigated, and if it can be proven that the runaway balloon story was a hoax, prosecuted. The costs of the rescue effort, which involved over 100 law enforcement officers, should be borne by the Heenes, and appropriate charges filed.

Mr. Heene was already suspected of seeking media attention and using his children in the effort. The family was featured twice on the “reality” TV show Wife Swap, and father Richard has been profiled in a documentary. He also runs a web site.

And just by coincidence, the family was videotaping their helium balloon at the very moment it allegedly came untethered and took off with little Falcon inside. What a crock. The behavior of the father, both on this homemade video and in subsequent interviews, makes it clear what happened here. He’s not much of an actor. Tellingly, according to ABC News, the family called their local TV station before dialing 911.

But the larger issue here is how the media has covered the story. The rush to get live video of the stray balloon was reminiscent of the frenzy to cover OJ Simpson’s Bronco chase. That was followed by a stampede of news outlets scrambling to interview the Heenes. Next came an insincere round of questioning whether the event was a hoax or not, followed by some equally insincere self-examination over whether the story ever deserved the attention it received and continues to receive. We can look forward to the hoax angle to be exploited for days or weeks to come.

And who doubts that in the long run, the Heenes will be back on television? Bad behavior is the raw material of reality television. Paris Hilton, Anna Nicole Smith, Ozzy Osborne, Victoria Gotti…we literally reward illicit sex, drug abuse, and even organized crime and murder on the airwaves. Why not reward the Heenes for manipulating and exploiting their son, law enforcement, and the media?

As Neil Postman said, maybe we’re amusing ourselves to death.

Meanwhile, on the same damn day that little Falcon became famous through his father’s conniving and depravity, two air force pilots were involved in a mid-air collision during exercises over the Atlantic off the South Carolina coast. One of the polits made it back to Shaw Air Force Base safely. The other is still missing.

How many of you heard about that?

One hero and one villian. Which one deserves the media’s attention? And which one deserves to be rewarded?

Newsprism

UPDATE: Jim Alderden, the sheriff in Larimer County, Colorado, announced today (Saturday, October 17) that criminal charges will be filed in the case.

Also, Robert Thomas, a former associate of Richard Henne now says that earlier this year, he and Henne planned a hoax involving a balloon made to look like a UFO in hopes of attracting a reality television show contract.

The pilot of the F-16 that crashed in the Atlantic off the South Carolina coast has now been identified as Nicholas Giglio. The search for Giglio has been expanded and includes both seacraft and aircraft from the Coast Guard, Navy, and Air Force.

Politics, Religion and Broadcasting

Could it be that broadcasting rewards the worst instincts in both politics and religion?

What kind of religious leader is most successful on television, for example? The slickest, greediest, most egomaniacal and self-absorbed—Jim Bakker, Jimmy Swaggart, Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell. The best work in that field is done at the grassroots level by the “foot soldiers” in their places of worship, or by a Billy Graham, who took his ministry to the people, not to the sound stage.

In politics, what kind of commentator is most successful on the airwaves? The confrontational, judgmental, provocative, egomaniacal and self-absorbed—Rush Limbaugh, Keith Olbermann, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity.

What a shame that broadcasting has eclipsed the written word in our culture. Writing fosters reflection, depth, self-criticism. Broadcasting fosters shallow spontaneity, emotionalism, self-promotion.

The best political commentary on television tends to come from writers and columnists like George Will, David Brooks, Pat Buchanan, Peggy Noonan, and Michael Kinsley. The cable news and talk radio commentators so predominant today can’t hold a candle to Walter Lippmann and Bill Buckley.

The most profound religious thought, I believe, comes from our best writers—Henry David Thoreau, or, if you read his less popular works, Mark Twain.

Quote for the day: Read not the Times. Read the Eternities. —Thoreau

Newsprism

Neal Boortz Continues Pattern of Attacking Vulnerable Children

I learned recently that on May 18th, Atlanta radio talk host Neal Boortz continued a pattern of ridiculing vulnerable children on his program, which he accurately describes as “insensitivity training” from a host with a “personality disorder.”

This most recent incident involved a teenaged girl who accidentally exposed herself in a high school yearbook photo. As if that humiliation weren’t bad enough, Boortz took the story nationwide  on his radio show (audio), making obscene references to the photo and calling the girl “hefty” and her mother “a blimp.”

Boortz went so far as to refer repeatedly to the girl’s privates, proudly proclaiming, “I got a look at this before they started blurring it out on the Internet.”

How creepy is that?

Then, he addressed the girl as if she were a dog, saying ”Sit. Stay. And cross your legs for God’s sake.”

This wasn’t the first time Boortz has humiliated a child on air.

In 2003, Boortz ridiculed 13-year-old Bethany Hamilton after her arm was bitten off at the shoulder by a shark while she was surfing in Hawaii.

After hearing Hamilton interviewed about the attack, Bpprtz called her ”stupid” and “inarticulate,” joked that she’d “never be a typist,” and called her arm ”shark food.”

The worst example of Boortz’s bullying occurred in March of 2008, when he repeatedly played audiotape of a nine-year-old boy who had been interviewed by Boortz’s own radio station, WSB 750.

Boortz ridiculed the boy’s speech patterns during a full hour of his show, saying among other things that he sounded ”dumb as a stump.” 

On a post at his web site, even after being informed that the boy had a disability (it turned out he had several), Boortz continued to ridicule the child, whom he called a “future worm farmer” who “can’t speak the English language.”

Just to add a twist, on several occasions Boortz has broadcast the names of teenage drivers shortly after they had auto accidents in which a passenger was killed.

It’s no secret that talk radio pushes the boundaries of taste, thankfully—but certain lines shouldn’t be crossed.

I’d draw that line at humiliating vulnerable children.

Newsprism

And That’s the Way It Appears To Be

Walter Cronkite was a print journalist before television came along. As such, he brough old fashioned journalistic ethics to the small screen.

I don’t think there’s any such thing as “journalistic objectivity.” Not even science can lay claim to objectivity all of the time.

But at least Cronkite’s guiding principle was to tell it like it is. When he said, “And that’s the way it is,” he meant it.

At the very best, journalists can realistically say, “And that’s the way it appears to be.”

Today’s television news is a far cry from what the three major network news divisions provided for decades. The fragmentation of the audience and the trend towards infotainment have left broadcast news a shell of its former self.

In the spirit of Cronkite’s genuine attempt to remain objective, I’d like to offer some signoffs for today’s broadcasters to choose from:

And that’s the way I want you to think it is.

And that’s the way I wish it were.

And that’s the way my producer told me to spin it.

And that’s the way I need to spin it to really piss off those loony liberals.

And that’s the way I need to spin it to really piss off those rascally Republicans.

And that’s the way my sponsors would have me spin it.

And that’s the way we report it in order to best counterprogram against our competitors.

And that’s the way to report it to help me sell the most books.

And that’s the way the tabloids would report it.

And that’s the way our audience wants us to report it.

And that’s the way we maximize profits.

At least, that’s the way it appears to me.

Rest in peace, Mr. Cronkite.

Newsprism

 

Something Has to Give—and It Ain’t the Taxpayer

Pat Buchanan’s latest column repeats his ongoing plea for sanity in American fiscal policy. Spending has been out of control for decades, and in response, we’ve been adding entitlements rather than eliminating them. Current levels of spending for Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security cannot be sustained. Our foreign policy includes billions of giveaways. We welcome legal and illegal immigrants who, in sum, take more than they give to this nation.

This kind of irresponsible spending, however well intentioned, cannot be sustained without seriously eroding, and eventually destroying, America’s economic stability.

We just dodged an economic collapse of historical proportions. What sense does it make to set out immediately on the same path—a path that leads off a cliff?

If you think Buchanan is an extremist and/or an alarmist, take note—the director of the nonpartisan and highly credible Congressional Budget Office came out yesterday with a chilling statement:

Under current law, the federal budget is on an unsustainable path, because federal debt will continue to grow much faster than the economy over the long run.

Unsustainable.

Nature imposes limits on everything, including generosity. We as a nation can heed those limits, or march like lemmings off the cliff of good intentions.

Newsprism

Tom Coburn (R-Ok) Asks, “But What If I Want to Drive a Gas Guzzler?” Answer: War, Terrorism, Pollution…

In response to the new fuel efficiency standards set by the Obama administration this week, Oklahoma Republican Tom Coburn asked a revealing question:

“But what if I want to drive a gas guzzler?”

Coburn’s infantile and self-absorbed attitude exemplifies what’s gone wrong with the Republican Party.

Senator Coburn, if we all drive whatever gas-guzzling vehicle we want to, regardless of that gas-guzzling vehicle’s impact on others, we’ll be responsible for:

1.) ongoing war and instability in the Middle East as we protect “our” access to the oil that vehicle wastes,

2.) ongoing terrorism as radical Muslims seek to push us out of the Middle East, and

3.) the possibility, and likely the probability, of long-term global climate change and all the death, disease, and social upheavals that would cause.

To answer Coburn’s question with another question: Senator, is your desire to waste energy and drive a pretentious vehicle really worth all the death, destruction, and destabilization such extravagance causes?

Rush Limbaugh literally mocks efficiency; on his radio program he advocates wastefulness and mocks alternative energy and fuel economy standards. Excess at any cost—is that really what conservatism is all about?

God forbid that ANY American EVER be prevented from doing ANYTHING he or she wants to do, regardless of the consequences for others. That, to too many Republicans, is the American Way.

Senator Coburn, Rush Limbaugh, here’s a little lesson in simple, basic moral philosophy:

Efficiency, good. Waste, bad.

Peace, good. War, bad.

Self-sufficiency, good. Dependence, bad.

Sustainability, good. Unsustainable extravagance, bad.

The bottom line is simple—the post-Bush Republican Party has no clue what conservatism means. Instead of a philosophy centered on social stability, individual responsibility, and tradition, conservatism has become little more than a fig leaf for the greed and excess and selfishness exemplified by ridiculous figures like Coburn and Limbaugh.

Newsprism

Giving the Republican Party a Bad Name (or Two or Three)

At his speech to Republican Party state chairs today, RNC Chairman Michael Steele engaged in some fascinating name dropping.

First, he invoked three conservative legends: Edmund Burke, William Buckley, and Ronald Reagan. Burke is the intellectual founding father of conservatism; Buckley was its greatest American proponent; and Reagan its most compelling American icon. The renewal of the GOP couldn’t be based on a more stable foundation, and by invoking these three, Steele demonstrated a depth sorely lacking in other contemporary conservative figures.

Steele went on to suggest that Republicans should stop attacking Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Tim Geithner, and Barney Frank and concentrate their fire on President Obama and his policies. Again, Steele demonstrated depth and directness where too many on the right have become loose cannons engaged in a circular firing squad.

Finally, Steele alluded to the two most toxic voices on the right, a “conservative talk radio host” and a “former vice president,” without actually naming them. While his criticism was implicit rather than explicit—testament to the ruthlessness and viciousness of both Limbaugh and Cheney—Steele clearly sees them as liabilities, and rightly so.

The fact that Cheney actually prefers Limbaugh over Colin Powell as the face of the party shows how out of touch the former veep has become. Limbaugh’s character alone should disqualify him from that role, while Powell’s is beyond reproach. Limbaugh is an entertainer with zero governing experience of any kind, while Powell has served as Secretary of State and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during nearly half a century of exemplary public service; how can any serious person even compare the two, much less dismiss Powell and lionize Limbaugh?

The most serious problem conservatism and the Republicans face is the success of shallow, mean-spirited, hyper partisan, McCarthyesque ideologues like Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, Glenn Beck, and Michael Savage. These entertainers aren’t fit to shine the shoes of thoughtful figures like George Will, David Brooks, Peggy Noonan, Newt Gingrich, and Pat Buchanan—the heirs of intellectual conservative giants like Buckley and Walter Lippmann.

If conservatism is to make a comeback, its leaders must go back to its roots in Burke’s foundational philosophy and Buckley’s brilliant rhetoric. Re-establishing conservatism’s intellectual integrity may be the first step towards finding its next Ronald Reagan.

With the exceptions of fundamentalists and senior citizens, the Republican Party is losing adherents across the board, but especially among the college-educated.

With a childish clown (and college dropout) like Rush Limbaugh as its most prominent voice, is it any wonder?

Newsprism

Why Are Perez Hilton and Rush Limbaugh Driving our National Discourse?

When California beauty contestant Carrie Prejean was asked her views on gay marriage, she gave a measured, polite response in favor of traditional marriage. In most contexts, in most states, that wouldn’t have raised any eyebrows.

But in progressive California, at a contest judged in part by gossip columnist Perez Hilton, Prejean’s remarks sparked a controversy that flared across the nation on the Internet and cable news programs.

A question worth asking is, why? The answer is simple: liberal bias at cable news bellweather MSNBC, alongside the considerable clout Mr. Hilton exercises in the world of Hollywood gossip, combined to put the non-story in the spotlight.

On MSNBC and elsewhere, Miss Prejean is being cast as a bigot on par with anti-abolitionists in the mid-nineteenth century. In the Hollywood gossip blogosphere (which, as Newsprism loves to point out, includes The Huffington Post,) she’s been demonized even further.

This tempest-in-a-teapot reminds Newsprism of the disproportionate influence weilded by Rush Limbaugh, whose more outrageous comments of late have filtered their way through cable news, talk radio, and the Internet to become fodder for “legitimate” print and broadcast news outlets.

The difference between Hilton and Limbaugh may be less than appears on the surface: Hilton covers the most shallow topics in depth, while Limbaugh covers the deepest topics ever so shallowly.

Both are creatures of the entertainment industry and ought not to be taken seriously when discussing consequential political and moral issues.

Newsprism

UPDATE—On tonight’s NBC evening news, the top four stories in the opening tease: the bank bailouts; wildfires in California; Elizabeth Edwards’ appearance on The Oprah Winfrey Show; and the new Star Trek movie.

Neal Postman was right; we’re amusing ourselves to death.

Obama Budget Cuts TipToe in the Right Direction

President Obama’s proposed budget, released this morning, includes $17 billion in cuts to federal programs deemed inefficient or unnecessary.

While $17 billion dollars is a significant sum, it is dwarfed by the $3.4 trillion in proposed spending for the upcoming fiscal year.

And that’s assuming a Democratic Congress will accept the entire $17 billion in cuts…hardly a sure bet.

The proposed cuts are a step tiptoe in the right direction.

To paraphrase Lao Tzu, “The journey of 1000 miles begins with one tiptoe.”

Newsprism

GOP’s New Mascot—An Albino Dinosaur

What the GOP is missing: a DEMOGRAPHER

I have nothing against old white guys—I’ll be one soon enough myself—but is this any way to compete in an increasingly diverse democracy?

The GOP is rapidly becoming a dinosaur.

An albino one.

Newsprism

R.I.P. G.O.P.? Not Just Yet, BUT…

Barely one in five Americans now identify themselves as Republicans. In the latest Washington Post/ABC News poll, only 21% of respondents identified themselves as Republicans, compared to 35% who identified themselves as Democrats and 38% as Independents.

Now that Arlen Specter has defected to the Democrats, and with Al Franken closing in on the Minnesota Senate seat, the Democrats may soon hold 60 seats, giving them a filibuster-proof majority.

How did a party that three years ago controlled the White House, the House of Representatives, and the Senate—and arguably, the Supreme Court as well—fall so far, so fast? And what are the consequences for the GOP?

Moderate Republican Senator Olympia Snowe says it is the right-wing extremism of the GOP that has “disaffected and alienated so many Americans…” That may be the understatement of the year. Between the antics of Rush “I hope Obama fails” Limbaugh and Dick “Tortures R Us” Cheney, moderates and independents can’t run away from the party fast enough.

The Bush years were disasterous enough for the party without Cheney and Limbaugh acting as constant reminders of the incompetence and, frankly, depravity that characterized the last eight years.

Many others who make up the public face of the GOP aren’t helpful, either. Sean Hannity and Ann Coulter, for example, taint the party with their arrogance, mean-spiritedness, and absolutism. Their schtick may work on FoxNews and talk radio, but to the mainstream American, they look every bit as rabid and irrational as the leftust fringe they routinely demonize.

Worse yet, as moderates and independents leave the party, it becomes even more extremist, creating a vicious cycle that may well relegate it to regional status.

If the GOP continues down the Limbaugh-led path of exclusion, if it continues to rationalize the rigidity and depravity of the Bush years, it will ensure its irrelevance for a generation.

Peggy Noonan, with her usual grace, puts it this way:

A great party allows everyone in, and allows prospective members to self-define. If they say they’re Republicans, they should be welcomed and helped to find a place where they fit. A great party has a lot of such places. A great party is expansive. A great party has give.

Rumors of the death of the Republican Party are greatly exaggerated, but it’s becoming more and more apparent that it sorely needs to treat the tumor of exclusive and reactionary extremism.

Newsprism

TEA Parties Turn Into Pissing Contest

It’s Tax Day—April 15, the deadline for filing federal income tax forms.

What usually passes with a few (million) grumbles and some local news video of post offices packed with procrastinating taxs filers has has taken on added significance in the media this year as hundreds of TEA (as in, “Taxed Enough Already”) Parties are being held across the nation. This kind of protest should be welcome news in any democracy, but for a few prominent voices in the media, it’s little more than an excuse to misbehave.

Right wing news outlets and commentators, especially on FoxNews and talk radio, have been promoting the events ad nauseum, to the point that FoxNews is acting more like a corporate sponsor than a news organization. This at the very least blurs the line between advocacy and reporting. Many commentators on the right have also strongly criticized the mainstream media for failing to cover the events (quite a neat trick, considering that most of the criticism came before the events were held…)

On the left, while the news coverage has been mostly straightforward (with the notable exception of  this grandstanding CNN reporter who lost her cool with a protester), the commentary has been anything but. Numerous commentators have  belittled the events as staged propaganda planned and coordinated by right wing media and public interest groups, as if libertarians and conservatives can’t possibly think for, or organize, themselves.

The worst behavior has been on liberal cable news. MSNBC’s prime time hosts—Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow—along with other anchors on MSNBC and CNN have inexplicably chosen to disparage, ad nauseum, the tea parties as tea bagging (a slang term for an unusual sex act…Google it if you don’t know.) Liberal pack journalism has never been as vulgar and sophomoric as it was today.

You’d think the left, with its tradition of protest and civil disobedience, would honor citizens exercising their First Amendment rights.

Sadly, it seems the usual suspects on the left and right are incapable of rationally discussing the issues involved—taxation and the size and scope of government. Instead, the cartoon conservatives on FoxNews (Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity) and talk radio (Hannity, Rush Limbaugh) are using the events to shamelessly promote themselves while glibly criticizing the mainstream media for failing to cover that self-promotion. The loony liberals on cable news and in the blogosphere are using the events to mock and patronize conservatives, too often with a vulgarity that is puzzling and disturbing.

Both sides can go tea bag themselves. While more thoughtful media outlets—including the network news divisions and most newspapers—are covering the events responsibly without a red or blue filter, the loons on the left and the cartoons on the right are cynically exploiting the TEA Parties to boost their own ratings and circulation.

I wonder what the patriots who participated in the Boston Tea Party would think of the way Olbermann and Maddow, or Beck, Hannity, and Limbaugh, are turning honest protest into a pissing contest.

One thing’s for sure. This isn’t the best moment to be swimming in the waters of American politics.

Newsprism

Pig Book Documents Swine Research

Citizens Against Government Waste has just released this year’s (fiscal year 2009) Pig Book, their annual compilation of pork barrel projects coming out of our esteemed Congress.

Last year (fiscal year 2008), we spent $17,200,000,000.00 on 11,600 special projects, or “earmarks,” proposed and funded by members of Congress.

The good news: this year we only had 10,160 such projects, a decrease of 1,440 earmarks.

The bad news: those projects cost $19,600,000,000.00, an increase of $2,400,000,000.00.

The Christian Science Monitor calculates those numbers to be a 12.5% decrease in the number of earmarks, and a 14% increase in their cost.

This is just the kind of “progress” Congress specializes in.

Among the pet projects imposed on taxpayers are these gems:

$1.8 million for swine odor and manure studies in Iowa. Ah, the sweet smell of what comes out the rear end of pigs!

$27.8 million for fitness centers at Air Force bases in Texas, South Carolina, and Mississippi. ‘Cause how else are all those flyboys supposed to stay in shape? (Hint: PUSHUPS)

$950,000 for energy efficient street lighting in Detroit. Great! Now the gangbangers can see whom they’re shooting at without damaging the environment!

$2 million for the Pat Roberts Intelligence Scholars Program. Sponsored by (who else?) Senator Pat Roberts!

Democrats came to power in 2006 and 2008 promising reforms. Fat chance.

Menwhile, Republicans have been grunting and grumbling over spending by Democrats; CAGW notes that about 40% of earmarked funds came from Republicans, who make up, oh, roughly, 40% of Congress.

Newsprism

 

National Debt Up Another Trillion—IN SIX MONTHS

Just six months ago, the national debt passed the $10,000,000,000,000.00 mark, having roughly doubled during the Bush administration.

Due in part to the tail end of the Bush spending splurge, and in part to the beginnings of the Obama spending splurge, our national debt has now passed the $11,000,000,000,000.00 mark.

When will our representatives in Washington stop putting their short-term interests first—getting re-elected, supporting pet projects, getting their names on bridges and buildings, greasing the palms of special interests for whom they hope to lobby—and take seriously the long-term interests of the nation?

This is shameful. One day our descendents may look back and wonder, “What the hell were they thinking?” (Or more to the point, “Were they THINKING???”)

During the next few decades, what was once an economic supremacy not seen since the British and Roman Empires will have been squandered over the course of just a generation or two.

While the economies of Brazil and China are poised to skyrocket, ours seems doomed to fizzle like a wet Fourth of July firecracker.

For some perspective, check out this clever way to visualize what eleven trillion dollars’ worth of $100 bills (not ones or tens!) would look like:

See that tiny spot in the lower left corner of the image? That's any US citizen staring up at what we'd be leaving future Americans IF WE STOPPED ADDING TO THE NATIONAL DEBT TODAY!

 Thanks to PageTutor.com for the image.

That massive debt lays at the feet of both Democrats and Republicans in both the Executive and Legislative branches of government. As Americans, we should be outraged, and the younger the citizen, the more outrage is called for.

Maybe this Fourth of July, instead of shooting our fireworks into the sky, we should put them somewhere more appropriate…

Newsprism

AIG Bonuses—A Pimple on a Heart Patient

The story dominating the headlines this week involves insurance giant AIG, the recipient of a $170 billion dollar bailout from the taxpayer, giving $165 million in bonuses to current and former executives.

While rewarding perhaps history’s most damaging economic failure with huge bonuses rightly deserves our scorn, the bonuses are insignificant compared to the meltdown occurring in the world economy.

Why the obsession with AIG? Simple: outrage over the bonuses makes for a good cable TV (and radio and blogosphere) controversy. It pumps up  cable TV news and talk radio ratings and drives traffic to blogs.

Because the media made this a huge story, Congress chose to take advantage of the situation and create yet another three-ring circus. AIG’s CEO was dragged before a committee for a public flogging by representatives, many of whom wrote and/or voted for the bill that allowed the bonuses in the first place.

Both David Brooks and Charles Krauthammer—the former a moderate voice on the right, the latter an increasingly extreme one—agree on this one.

Brooks, in Perverse Cosmic Myopia, put it like this:

The Washington political class has spent the past week going into made-for-TV hysterics over $165 million in A.I.G. bonuses. We’re in the middle of a multitrillion-dollar crisis, and our political masters — always willing to throw themselves into any issue that is understandable on cable television — have decided to risk destroying the entire bank-rescue plan because of bonuses that account for 0.001 percent of the annual G.D.P.

Krauthammer, in Bonfire of the Trivialities, wrote this:

…in the scheme of things, $165 million is a rounding error. It amounts to less than 1/18,500 of the $3.1 trillion federal budget. It’s less than one-tenth of 1 percent of the bailout money given to AIG alone…. For this we are going to poison the well for any further financial rescues, face the prospect of letting AIG go under (which would make the Lehman Brothers collapse look trivial) and risk a run on the entire world financial system?

Both the media and the government share responsibility for this ridiculous diversion. Both need to get back to the business of handling a financial crisis that threatens a devastating global collapse.

The AIG bonuse issue is like a pimple on the ass of a patient suffering a massive heart attack.

Newsprism

Bush Shines as Cheney Whines

A longstanding, informal rule asks that outgoing presidential administrations refrain from criticizing incoming ones. Most former presidents and vice presidents obey this rule for the good of the country, though there are surely strong disagreements that would tempt one to rip a new administration a new you-know-what.

Over this past week, former Vice President Cheney chose to ignore this informal rule, while former President Bush chose to obey it.

Whatever you may think of the policies of the Bush-Cheney years, both men put the safety of the nation foremost, even if that meant violating our Constitution (warrantless wiretapping) or international law (torture, rendition).

With the new administration struggling to deal with a severe economic crisis and the consequences of the Bush administration’s foreign policy, President Bush took the high road in his speech yesterday in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, and again when asked about Obama’s changes to Bush policies.

Said Bush:

I’m not going to spend my time criticizing (Obama). There are plenty of critics in the arena. He deserves my silence…

I love my country a lot more than I love politics. I think it is essential that (Obama) be helped in office.

Bush went on to say that he would be happy to help Obama in any way if asked; this gracious offer comes after Bush showed great class and patriotism during the transition between administrations.

Vice President Cheney, on the other hand, has repeatedly criticized Obama for his handling of the economic crisis, his domestic policy agenda, and most recently, for his changes to American foreign policy. On CNN’s State of the Union last Sunday, Cheney said that Obama had made the country less safe, and that the president is using the economic crisis to inappropriately expand federal power. Two Cheney quotes from the CNN interview:

(Obama) is making some choices that, in my mind, will, in fact, raise the risk to the American people of another attack.

(Obama’s policies are) one of the greatest expansions of federal control over the private economy, probably in the history of the republic.

Of course, Dick Cheney has every right to speak his mind in whatever forum he chooses. To undermine the president so publicly, however, weakens the nation and opens the door for future ex-administration officials to do the same.

Worst of all, it appears that Cheney is motivated in part by a desire to influence judgments of the economic and foreign policy choices of the Bush years—a process better left up to more objective voices speaking in the fullness of time—and in part by a desire to innoculate himself and his former boss from accusations of responsibility for future terrorist attacks.

Cheney also refused to criticize Rush Limbaugh, who famously hopes for the Obama administration to fail.

One wonders if Cheney shares that profoundly immature and unAmerican wish.

Newsprism

Orange Juice, Oatmeal, and Conservatism

As the Republican Party struggles to regain its political health, it might be a good idea to go back to philosophical fundamentals.

A recent finding in the field of nutrition serves up a healthy metaphor. According to University of Minnesota epidemiologist Dr. David Jacobs, certain food combinations provide an added benefit that he and fellow researchers call “food synergy.”

The idea is that the way the body metabolizes food is more complex than a simple absorption of nutrients. The focus by governments and health experts on individual nutrients—vitamins, minerals, fibers, supplements—should be enhanced, perhaps replaced, by a focus on whole foods and the ways the body processes whole foods, both alone and in combinations.

So what does this have to do with conservatism?

Dr. Jacobs explains food synergy like this:

The complexity of food combinations is fascinating because it’s tested in a way we can’t test drugs: by evolution….(I)t’s tested in the most complex of systems: life.

The same could be said about social institutions. Societies evolve social structures that work because they’re tested against real life, against real and changing circumstances. Individual humans, even the most rational, are ill-equipped to understand and alter social institutions for the better. That’s a job for time, for life, for tradition to undertake in the slow and ponderous process of social evolution. In addition, the mix of institutions creates a kind of synergy that can suffer with even the most miniscule change.

Trying to fundamentally change a society like Iraq, or to improve a social institution like marriage, requires a certain arrogance commensurate with the inherent risk. While social progress is clearly a noble goal, it should be undertaken with the most profound respect for social evolution, for the wisdom of tried-and-true social institutions.

The social problems associated with single-parent homes are the result of a short-sighted liberalization of divorce laws in the 1960s and 70s. Marriage and the nuclear family are the foundation of ancient and modern societies and shouldn’t have been tinkered with so foolishly. (In 2007, federal researchers report that 40% of births in America were to unwed mothers…)

Similarly, gay marriage, the radical change in the institution proposed and defended by so many progressives, can be opposed from the most stable of philosophical bases. Assuming that anyone against gay marriage does so out of bigotry isn’t just wrong, it is itself a form of bigotry.

Among the food combinations thought to have positive benefits to the health are the tried-and-true oatmeal and orange juice so many enjoy at breakfast around the world. Evidence also suggests that a traditional diet, like a Mediterranean one, has significant benefits, even if we don’t yet understand why.

Maybe we should stick to the tried and true, rather than accepting on faith the value of nutritional supplements, multivitamins, fad diets, calorie counting, energy drinks, and other “progressive” paths to health.

Newsprism

Stormy Seas, Uncharted Waters…and We’re Adding Ballast?

Let me torture a metaphor for a moment.

The Ship of State is currently sailing through stormy seas in uncharted waters.

We’ve sailed into stormier seas before—in 1873 and 1929, for instance, the US entered more severe depressions (interesting article here about which depression more closely parallels the current situation.) We’ve spent many a decade in uncharted waters as well, for example, when we transformed the country from an agrarian to an industrial economy, and from an industrial to an information economy. The first transformation helped spark the Civil War, and the second led to the bursting of the dotcom bubble and, to some degree, the credit crisis.

Now, we seem to be struggling through some stormy economic times while transforming from a nationally-based economy to a globally-based one, and from a production-based economy to a borrowing-based one.

So how should we steer the Ship of State through this storm?

On real ships, “ballast” is weight added to stabilize the craft, improve steering, and control buoyancy. Ships of state take on added debt for a similar purpose.

The problem is that both kinds of ballast take up room that could be used more productively. On the real ship, ballast replaces cargo with dead weight; on the ship of state, debt, while enhancing economic stability and allowing for more precise “steering,” the ballast of debt takes capital out of the system. Debt is like dead weight on the economy.

The budget submitted by President Obama will spend over $3.5 trillion in the upcoming fiscal year. The Omnibus Spending Bill up for a vote in Congress will spend over $400 billion in the remainder of this fiscal year. Hundreds of billions more are promised to failing banks and mortgage holders. Another $500 billion is proposed to shore up the FDIC—and if you want to see these stormy seas turn into a tsunami, just let the whisper of mass bank failures start to spread.

This is not the time to be adding tons and tons of ballast, of debt, to the Ship of State. It’s well past time to instead jettison as much debt as we can.

That means raising the retirement age and reducing Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid benefits. It means cutting government programs that aren’t vital (and that would be the majority of government programs…) It means freezing government spending, not increasing it. It means making difficult and unpopular decisions that shrink the size and scope of government and put more responsibility on the individual for his or her own well being.

It means asking us—all of us, rich and poor—to make sacrifices for the greater good.

Instead, President Obama is expanding the size and scope of government, increasing benefits, and running up an already obscene national debt to levels that make the waste and idealism of George Bush look modest.

What good is stabilizing a ship with ballast, if that ballast could cause the ship to sink?

Newsprism

Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Rush? (Maybe It Should Be Conservatives…)

President Obama was roundly criticized in January for making this statement in a meeting with Republican lawmakers:

You can’t just listen to Rush Limbaugh and get things done.

The San Francisco Chronicle called Obama’s dig “the first tactical error of his young presidency” and said that it “elevated a talk show host to his level—the leader of the free world.”

After Obama’s statement, several Republicans echoed the criticism of Limbaugh and his far right radio brethren. Georgia Congressman Phil Gingrey, for example, noted that

…it’s easy if you’re Sean Hannity or Rush Limbaugh or even sometimes Newt Gingrich to stand back and throw bricks.

Fair enough. Lawmakers live in a world of compromise and consensus, where, as the Founding Fathers intended, moderation and stability are served; radio hosts live in a world of confrontation and caricature, where, as shareholders expect, profit is served.

But Gingrey became the first in a line of Republican lawmakers who followed principled criticism of the radio commentators with fawning apologies. After being flooded with emails and phone calls by rabid Limbaugh listeners, Gingrey apologized to Limbaugh, first at his Congressional website and later on the Limbaugh program.

There’s no question that Limbaugh has benefitted from Obama’s invocation of his name as a symbol of right wing extremism.

But has Obama really suffered?

The issue emerged anew this weekend when GOP Chairman Michael Steele characterized Limbaugh’s rhetoric this way on CNN:

Rush Limbaugh, his whole thing is entertainment. Yes, it’s incendiary. Yes, it’s ugly.

Limbaugh wasted no time attacking Steele on Monday’s program. And Steele, like so many before him, immediately apologized to El Rushbo.

Over a period of less than six weeks, a single statement by President Obama has sparked a heated debate over the role of extremist commentary in the conservative movement. The result: some short-term publicity for Limbaugh and some energizing of the right-wing base.

But in a larger sense, the dustup has caused polarization that may well harm conservatism and the Republican Party in the long run. Specifically, more and more moderates may now see a Republican Party increasingly dominated by a narrow, extremist base reflected in Limbaugh’s audience, which is largely white, male, ideologically rigid, and subtly bigoted.

So the result, ultimately, of Obama calling Limbaugh out appears to be the further shrinking of the base of the Republican Party and a certain discrediting of conservatism.

So who, aside from a substantial number of cowardly conservatives, is afraid of the Big Bad Rush?

Apparently, not Barack Obama. Obama, as shrewd as they come, appears to have manipulated Limbaugh into a strategic mistake. Limbaugh and the Republicans are now seen as putting their ideology above the best interests of the country. How else is one to interpret Limbaugh’s repeated assertion that he hopes Obama’s economic program fails, with all the damage such failure would do to the nation?

Like much of his rhetoric, Limbaugh’s initial response to Obama—”The president’s more frightened of me than of (Republican lawmakers) Boehner or McConnell”—was loud, self-aggrandizing, abrasive, divisive, and wrong.

Did it also, like much of  right wing talk radio’s excesses, do more harm than good to the conservative cause?

Newsprism

Promises, Promises

Barack Obama’s speech before a joint session of Congres tonight (video) was expansive in scope and evocative of hope (transcript).

To call it ambitious would be an understatement. Three major policy thrusts were put forward, each of which is designed to enhance the long-term prospects for our economy. In health care, the president proposed reforms intended to take the burden off both families and businesses by reigning in costs and eliminating waste. In energy, he promised a long overdue reversal of our dependence on oil and a concomitant effort to enable the growth and development of alternative energy sources. In education, he pledged that every American will be able to afford a college education and that by 2020, America will once again lead the world in the proportion of citizens with a college education.

On the financialal front, Mr. Obama said his administration was working to shore up the banking system and get credit flowing once again. On the fiscal front, he said that old ways of hiding government spending would come to an end, that earmarks and wasteful or ineffective programs will be terminated, and that future generations won’t be burdened with an overwhelming debt. Att the same time, he promised that no one making under $250,000 a year will have their taxes raised and that taxes will be cut for 95% of the American people. He also noted that beginning not this year, but next year, the federal budget would be gone over line by line to eliminate waste and earmarks.

The biggest challenge Obama faced was to renew confidence in the economy. Rhetorically, he did exactly that; the speech was stirring and highly encouraging. In reality, however, one wonders whether a single speech, no matter how brilliant, can have any lasting effect on a disheartened public. Both the speech and the speaker were Reaganesque; no one can say whether it’s morning in America again, but for an hour at least, if felt that way.

In foreign affairs, the president promised a new era of engagement, with aggressive diplomacy replacing unilateralism. At the same time, he threw down the gauntlet to our enemies, insisting that those who wish to harm us won’t be allowed to plot against us from safe havens anywhere, particularly from Pakistan. He declared that Guantanamo Bay will be closed and that most of our troops will be withdrawn from Iraq while maintaining order in that country.

There were three overt rebukes of the Bush administration. On torture, the president made an unequivocal declaration that the United States does not torture (implying, of course, “any longer.”) The Joint Chiefs of Staff and John McCain were among the first to stand and applaud, and rightly so. The president made a pointed reference to the squandering of the balanced budget Bush inherited from Bill Clinton, and another to the Bush administration’s mismanagement of the $700 billion dollar bank bailout.

Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of the speech was its invocation of hope. Whether that hope is more realistic or fantastic remains to be seen. What President Obama didn’t make clear was how, short of divine intervention, we can do everything he promised while at the same time reducing the budget deficit and chipping away at the national debt.

Mr. Obama appealed to the promise of America, which he called the most powerful force for progress on earth.

The promise of America isn’t built on promises, however.

Talk is cheap. What the president promised tonight won’t be.

Newsprism

Freedom, Order, and the Limits of Individualism—A Crisis for American Conservatism

The 2006 and 2008 elections were, at least in part, rejections of the extreme individualism of American conservatism in favor of a more collectivist approach to governance.

As a libertarian conservative, I value individual liberty above all else. But I also recognize that social order is a fundamental necessity if liberty is to thrive.

Absolute freedom is anarchy, and anarchy inevitably subverts individual freedom to the tyranny of the strong and the ruthless. What good is your absolute liberty if you’re oppressed by others who will inevitably abuse theirs?

Absolute freedom is not perfect freedom; far from it.

In its original conception by Edmund Burke, modern conservatism had at its center the wisdom inherent in tradition. Social traditions evolve out of social order; that which works to create and maintain order wins out over that which destroys or erodes it. Over time, traditions may change, but their essence always tends towards the maintainance of order.

To the Burkean conservative, society is conceived of not as a collection of individuals, but as a single organism, as in Herbert Spencer’s sociology.

In the West, a tradition of individual liberty and individual responsibility has nonetheless produced a dynamic and relatively stable civilization. Liberty unleashes the most innovative and creative human faculties. The French and American Revolutions (which Burke strongly criticized at the time) produced a paradox: a high degree of individualism can lead to a thriving and prosperous, well-ordered social organism.

Individualism and social order aren’t opposed to each other, but rather depend on each other. Still, there are limits, and over the last sixteen years, the limits of individualism have been stretched to the breaking point. The reckless and selfish indulgences of Bill Clinton, while damaging to the presidency, were, compared to the policies of the Bush years, superficial distractions from an otherwise relatively centrist administration.

The character and politics of both Baby Boomer presidents were formed in the social turmoil of the sixties, but with very different results. The Great Irony of post-Reagan conservatism is that the sixties generation so famous for its leftist radicalism has produced a kind of conservatism so undisciplined, and so self absorbed, that the label is nearly meaningless. If sixties leftism made a fetish out of progress, contemporary rightism has made a fetish out of self interest.

While he has plenty of company, most notably Rush Limbaugh, George W. Bush is the poster child of this undisciplined, shallow, idealistic conservatism, which has no intellectual roots, little knowledge of its history, and a poor understanding of the singularity of circumstance. Neoconservatism as practiced by Bush isn’t conservatism at all. It’s far too radical and far too rigid, rejecting the vital center—social, cultural, and political—so brilliantly elaborated in the sociology of Edward Shils.

Neoconservatives, and to a lesser degree Republicans in general, act as if self interest is all that is needed to maintain social order. What Burkean conservatives understand is that enlightened self interest undergirds social order, while merely crass, atomistic self interest erodes it. In addition, Burkeans understand that social order evolves slowly, step-by-step and institution-by-institution, with every society unique, every circumstance singular. To attempt any radical change in a society is to invite unintended consequences, and to ignore the latent virtues that exist in traditional, socially centrist institutions like marriage.

This is why on the economic front, Bush and Limbaugh’s ideology has brought such disastrous consequences. The current crisis is largely the result of unregulated and unenlightened self interest, of naked greed masquerading as virtue, of an “I’ve got mine” attitude that isolates the individual from the traditional social context so necessary to true human liberty. Gated communities and McMansions, much like the sky-scraping commercial fortresses of our cities, where the affluent are insulated from the realities of the larger society, are sad, lonesome icons of the times.

On the foreign policy front, the Bush agenda has been an equally tragic disaster. The naive and idealistic notion that American-style democracy can be transplanted into the Middle East makes as much sense as the hope that one can chop down a fig tree and expect a cherry tree to spring up in its place. Does anyone really believe that if China were the world’s hegemon, she could impose communism on America by force? Iraq and Afghanistan can’t be transformed by brute force or good intentions. To attempt to do so was the height of arrogance, and of ignorance.

The more intellectual conservatives—George Will, Pat Buchanan, David Brooks, the late William Buckley—realized early on that Bush is no conservative, at least not in any sense that retains the essence of conservatism. Similarly, intellectual conservatives, like those at The American Conservative magazine and (sadly, less and less so) National Review hold their noses while their powerful ally, Rush Limbaugh, sacrifices far-sighted traditionalism on the altar of short-term individual self interest.

Imagine Limbaugh, who quite literally advocates gluttony and ridicules frugality in our use of oil, trying to explain to Burke (or to future generations) how maximizing consumption of natural resources, rather than conserving them, is conservative!

Buckley put it this way:

Mr. Bush faces a singular problem best defined, I think, as the absence of effective conservative ideology — with the result that he ended up being very extravagant in domestic spending, extremely tolerant of excesses by Congress. And in respect of foreign policy, incapable of bringing together such forces as apparently were necessary to conclude the Iraq challenge.

The reaction to President Obama’s stimulus plan illustrates the crisis American conservatism faces as it attempts to balance individual liberty with social order. The same congressional Republicans who slathered bill after bill with pork during the Bush administration are suddenly aghast that Obama is spending hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars in order to stabilize the economy they helped to devastate.

Hypocrisy reveals self indulgence and a lack of intellectual discipline, as when the same Rush Limbaugh who celebrates imprisoning marijuana users was found out to be a narcotics addict. Now, Limbaugh would rather see Obama’s social policies fail, with all the damage that would do to the greater society and the world, than see them succeed and discredit even slightly the extreme individualism of the contemporary far right. Conservatism is by its very nature center-ist, if I can coin a word, not radical or extremist.

Earlier this week, Rick Santelli of CNBC went on an on-air rant about how unfair it is that some citizens who made poor financial decisions may be bailed out by those of us who made wise ones. But wouldn’t a true conservative understand that sometimes circumstances demand some sacrifice by the few to maintain the social order necessary for all? To whine about necessary, albeit perhaps overreaching, solutions to a social crisis because you might lose a few dollars yourself is short-sighted and selfish, not conservative.

The conservative American Issues Project  condemns the $787 billion stimulus package in a TV ad that shows the three wise man as the narrator says, “Suppose you spent $1 million every single day starting from the day Jesus was born — and kept spending through today. A million dollars a day for more than 2,000 years. You would still have spent less money than Congress just did.” The upshot of the ad is that Jesus would oppose the stimulus… But what true conservative actually believes that Jesus, the champion of the poor, would oppose taxing the prosperous to protect those who are at risk in a communal crisis?

David Brooks, as usual, gets right to the heart of the matter. While he bemoans the irresponsibility of those whose greed and dishonesty led to the economic crisis, Brooks accepts, in “Money for Idiots”, that the stimulus package is, from the perspective of social order, a necessary evil. He begins,

Our moral and economic system is based on individual responsibility. It’s based on the idea that people have to live with the consequences of their decisions. This makes them more careful deciders. This means that society tends toward justice — people get what they deserve as much as possible. Over the last few months, we’ve made a hash of all that. The Bush and Obama administrations have compensated foolishness and irresponsibility.

But unlike all but three Congressional Republicans, and Limbaugh, Santelli, and the American Issues Project, Brooks is able to put rigid ideology and his own self interest aside and think about what’s best for the social order. He concludes:

The responsible have been punished along with the profligate….(But) it makes sense for government to try to restore some communal order. And the sad reality is that in these circumstances government has to spend money on…people who have been idiots.

The nation’s economy is not just the sum of its individuals. It is an interwoven context that we all share. To stabilize that communal landscape, sometimes you have to shower money upon those who have been foolish or self-indulgent. The greedy idiots may be greedy idiots, but they are our countrymen. And at some level, we’re all in this together. If their lives don’t stabilize, then our lives don’t stabilize.

I don’t relish the advance of socialism under the Democrats. But after eight years under Bush, maybe we need to turn left to get right.

And as conservatism demands, ideology must not trump the contingencies of the moment. The natural enemy of conservatism is radicalism, not liberalism. Part of the genius of the American system is that the people, that reservoir of traditional wisdom, can choose leaders suited to the circumstances of the day.

Excessive individualism subverts social order, which in turn threatens individualism itself. Freedom requires order. Until American conservatism learns that lesson, it risks being increasingly marginalized.

American conservatism must return to First Principles. We must reject the pop culture conservatism of Rush Limbaugh and the neoconservatism of George Bush in favor of the philosophical roots of conservatism: Edmund Burke’s traditionalism, Herbert Spencer’s organicism, and Edward Shils’ center-ism.

Newsprism