Norwegian tragedy a symptom of our times?

In a thoughtful piece, Chris Bertram writes: "We may be, now, in ... a world where people select themselves into groups which ramp up their more-or-less internally coherent belief systems into increasingly extreme forms by confirming to one another their perceived “truths” (about Islam, or Obama’s birth certificate, or whatever) and shutting out falsifying information. Put an unstable person or a person with a serious personality disorder into an environment like that and you have a formula for something very nasty happening somewhere, sooner or later. Horribly, that somewhere was Norway last Friday." I fear Bertram is right. This storm too humanity will weather. Unfortunately, the price is likely to be high.

Yahoo! and Humanity's Crooked Timber

As all Philosophy 101 students should recall, Immanuel Kant famously said, "Out of the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made." Its meaning is debated ad infinitum. One reader on a philosophy forum website opined: "Kant is saying that humans have an irrational predisposition so there is little hope of perfecting anything or ever getting it totally right." Another reader said Kant meant "that rarely does humanity ever do the right, logical thing for itself in a linear, logically concatenated manner but more in a perverse, dialectical zigzaggy manner." Both interpretations, variations on a theme, are probably right, methinks.

That said, whenever one Googles a quote, even one by Kant, it invariably kicks back a top-of-page link to that most useless of websites: Yahoo! Answers -- a digital conglomeration of the nitwits, by the nitwits, for the nitwits. Yes, yes -- that's unfair and I'm being overly harsh. Y/A wouldn't exist were it not popular (or, more accurately, didn't attract page hits like moths to a porch light). But in deciphering Kant's "crooked timber" quote, one Yahoo-er hit the proverbial nail on the head for his audience of mouth-breathers.

He/she wrote:

"Kant ... is basically implying that 'humanity' i.e. humans, are incapable and not interested enough in each other to do something for another without personal gain. In other words, we are all 'crooked'. If that was the case, then this website of yahoo questions and answers would not exist. Although Kant would dispute that and say that the only reason people answered these questions was to show off (therefore 'gaining' some misguided form of recognition for their efforts) and the only reason people asked the questions in the first place would be because they were craving some sort of attention."

If Dr. Kant could visit Yahoo! Answers, he just might agree with this unique take on the bent condition of modern "humanity" i.e. humans in the Yahoo-verse. Priceless.

Game over for al-Qaeda?

There is consensus in the US intelligence community that al-Qaeda is on the brink of collapse. Apparently, its remaining players have been reduced to raggedy dead-enders (to use the Rumsfeldian noun). Relentless drone attacks, countless kill & capture missions, and the fact that brandmaster bin Laden is sleeping with the fishes have taken a devastating toll on the jihadists. Wired's Spencer Ackerman thinks it's time to spike the football and declare victory. It's now a question of changing our mindsets. To wit: "That is what victory actually is: terrorism as a manageable threat, not to be dealt with through a perpetual global war. Once we harden some domestic targets, maximize the 'Americanness' of U.S. Muslims, bolster the defensive capabilities of key foreign allies -- their populations more than their security apparat -- then we can slow down the drone strikes responsibly, replace them with ISR orbits and do some strikes and roundups as necessary, harassing al-Qaida's residual capability to regenerate itself. The 9/11 era ends on our terms." Ackerman is right -- with the proviso that we stay mindful of what abolitionist Wendell Phillips once said: "Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty."

Smoke and mirrors on purpose?

I'm no economist. Nor do I play one on TV (like way too many pundits). So I haven't waded too deeply into the debt ceiling weeds. But for those of you who frocklick in them, here's a very smart take on the current state of play by thistle-master Jon Chait: "[T]he Boehner plan is totally unsupportable. But once you've gotten the right to cross the philosophic threshold Boehner has, the next step is a lot easier. Boehner will lose plenty of conservatives if and when he cuts a final deal, but he'll gain Democrats. The key step was breaking down the right's default denialism and sense of entitlement to total victory. That's achieved." I think Chait may be on to something here. It would explain quite a lot.

Thinking of Speaker John Boehner

"It doesn't matter what damn lie we tell, so long as we all tell the same damn lie," said Lord Melbourne, Queen Victoria's first prime minister, explaining how a cabinet government works. (Hat tip: David Frum)

No compromise, copper ... or the kid gets it

John Carney, a senior editor at CNBC.com, writes in The Atlantic that the "White House insists the U.S. government will not be able to stay current on all of its obligations as of Aug. 2 unless the debt ceiling is raised. But can the government of the United States ever really run out of money?" No it cannot, he concludes. "It can only run out if it decides--that is, if Secretary Geithner and President Barack Obama choose--to stop writing checks sufficient to pay all of our obligations." Get it? There's no problem. It's all in Obama's mind. Carney makes a number of technically correct points. Some are kinda compelling. But perceptions drive the Dow Jones Index (see this week's 300 point drop). As money monks are wont to do, Carney completely ignores the gargantuan psychological impact a U.S. credit default would have on the financial markets, both here and abroad. Not to mention the accompanying political implosions. The day after, as Carney implies to the contrary, won't be business as usual. So, in the end, Carney's piece amounts to a cogently written suicide note to which the Tea Party Mad Hatters can eagerly affix their signatures. (Thanks, John!) But this order of business would be addressed only after the hostages, me and thee, are dispatched by the "no compromise" dunderheads in Congress.

In Congress, Dysfunctional 'R Us

After Shays' Rebellion, Thomas Jefferson wrote in a letter to James Madison: "I hold it, that a little rebellion, now and then, is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical." Madison was less sanguine: "Liberty may be endangered by the abuses of liberty as well as the abuses of power." George Washington too was nervous: "Let us have a government by which our lives, liberties, and properties will be secured, or let us know the worst at once." Indeed, the 1786-87 armed uprising in Massachusetts sobered the minds of many attending the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia. It's one reason why the Framers ultimately designed Congress to be, well, dysfunctional. Though Congress was created to pass laws, what it mostly does is stymie them. Easy or undemanding change through legislation, the Framers figured, would be a dangerous thing. Slate's Shankar Vedantam observes that the idea that Congress was designed to gum up the works is nothing new: "Political scientists have made this argument for years ... What we criticize as dysfunction or ineptitude is really an institution designed with a profoundly conservative vision—that's conservative with a small C. ... You can see this as good or bad, but that's not the point. The point is that it's silly to build a supertanker and then criticize the sailors because the ship doesn't maneuver like a speedboat." Therefore, Vedantam concludes, Congress deserves an "A" for not raising the debt ceiling (yet). How's that for counterintuitive thinking? Heh.

Channeling Jefferson?

In his address to the nation Monday night, President Obama said, "The American people may have voted for divided government, but they didn’t vote for a dysfunctional government. So I’m asking you all to make your voice heard. If you want a balanced approach to reducing the deficit, let your member of Congress know. If you believe we can solve this problem through compromise, send that message." They did, deluging the switchboards and computer servers of Congress in the process. Being the erudite man that he is, I wonder if Obama had the words of Thomas Jefferson in mind as he crafted his call to action. In a 1789 letter to English philosopher Richard Price, Jefferson wrote, "Whenever the people are well informed, they can be trusted with their own government; that whenever things get so far wrong as to attract their notice, they may be relied on to set them to rights." Let's hope Jefferson is right.

The triumph of politics

Elvin Lim: "America is the only country in the world that that has the luxury of creating an economic crisis when there isn’t one. ... That we ended up with so much debt is a result of politics, anyway. For all the talk of budgetary restraint coming from Congress, the fact is it was Congress that authorized all the spending that has brought us to where we are. Yes, every single dime." Ridiculous, ain't it?

McCain reintroduces himself to sanity

Sen. John McCain thinks Tea Party-allied Republicans are barking mad if they think President Obama will get the blame if Republicans refuse to raise the nation’s debt ceiling. By that wrongheaded logic, “Democrats would have no choice but to pass a balanced budget amendment and reform entitlements and the Tea Party Hobbits could return to Middle Earth. This is the kind of crack political thinking that turned Sharron Angle and Christine O’Donnell into G.O.P. nominees," McCain said on the Senate floor today. Yowzer. I guess this means McCain, 74, won't be running for reelection. Of course, this is the guy whose "crack political thinking" turned Sarah Palin into his VP running mate in 2008. McCain apparent return to sanity is welcome. But it's a little late, Senator.

A Quote for Wednesday

"Common looking people are the best in the world: that is the reason the Lord makes so many of them." (Abraham Lincoln)

Not since Lincoln

P.M. Carpenter ponders the incredulity of it all with a heavy sigh:

"Not since Abe Lincoln took office has a president's political opposition been so ruthlessly determined to oppose -- even to the point of national disloyalty, which is precisely what the GOP's treacherous machinations over the debt limit represent. It is futile to look back on Obama's first two years and speculate that he should have done this, or that he should have done that, and then this or that might have proceeded better; it is futile because whatever path Obama might have chosen, his opposition was acrobatically hellbent on obstructing it."

"If Obama is to be properly faulted, then his fault lies in the rather incongruent criticism of excessive rationality. No one, least of all a chief executive of profound intellect and with a corresponding belief in the great and unifying power of Reason, could have predicted in January 2009 that the spiritually broken Grand Old Party would redouble its preceding madness, and then double that, and double even that again. ... Neither could anyone have predicted the activist left's infantile behavior and ceaseless crankiness."

Carpenter's entire piece is worth a read. In his famous 1858 "House Divided" speech, Lincoln said, "If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could then better judge what to do, and how to do it." For now, alas, understanding this season of discontent and "whither we are tending" seems beyond the grasp of our current crop of political leaders save Mr. "Abraham" Obama.

A Timeless Quote

“Language most shows a man; speak that I may see thee.” (Ben Johnson, English poet, 1572–1637)

Do I look fat?

Honey, do I look fat? Those are five of the most dangerous words in the English language. Epic civil wars and divorce court proceedings have been launched over them. Now Gawker has added a new twist: Honey, would you dump me if I got fat? "According to Ask Men's annual Great Male/Female Surveys, half of all straight men say they would dump a girlfriend who got fat," Gawker reports. That's right, a whopping 50 percent of guys would just up and say "see ya." How uncivilized, right guys? In fact, it's downright shocking, shocking! ... until you poll yourself with the same question. What's that you say? The thought would never cross your magnanimous mind? You would have no problem at all cuddling nightly, 7 days a week, year in and year out, with the bountiful "babe" shown above 'til death do youse part? Riiiight.

Is this good or bad?

In England, no one can make you go to rehab. But they can in America. Slate's Explainer Column (Brian Palmer): "It's easier to force a family member into rehab in the United States, where 38 states permit involuntary commitment for substance-abuse treatment. The statutes vary widely in terms of what it takes to force someone into treatment and how long she can be kept there against her will." Bonus question: "Does compulsory treatment actually work?" Bonus answer: "The research is, unfortunately, all over the map."

Poor choice of words

Let me state up front that The New Republic's Jon Chait is not sexist. No way, no how. I wouldn't read him if he were. Still, this headline-link on his blog speaks volumes about the unconscious male mind: "WaPost: Bachmann shacked up with Uncle Sam for federal home loans." Was the use of "shacked up" really necessary? Here's the Urban Dictionary take on the expression: "To move into shared accommodation with someone, generally of the opposite sex for purposes of sexual intercourse. As in: I'm shacked up with a few sheilas." I'm almost certain that Chait's innuendo was/is unintentional. He probably spent all of a nanosecond assembling the words for his headline. But as much as it pains me to say it, Bachmann and Palin have a point when they complain that the media deck is stacked against them as females. Just sayin'.

Winehouse, Take Two

Slate's Bill Wyman explains why her music will last: "She was boozy and disheveled, a tarted-up gamin somehow reminiscent both of a blowzed '60s pinup and a canny street urchin, all wrapped up with the bow of her almost Dickensian name on top. Yet she radiated precision and formalism in her music. Her gaze on a stage could be vacant, almost affectless. But somehow her albums betray an astringent intelligence, over- and undertones of meaning and calculation, and a surprisingly nuanced grasp of the music she loved from decades long past. And her arresting voice conveyed not just emotion, but on occasion universal cataclysms of love, loss, and degradation."

Over-thinking Obama

As usual, the Chattering Class is over-thinking President Obama's intent in his debt ceiling address to the nation last night.

TNR's Jon Chait: "I'm not really sure what Obama was trying to accomplish in his speech. I thought he would try to find some kind of lowest common denominator between the Reid and Boehner plans that would stand a chance of passing Congress. He didn't. Instead he appealed once again to the Grand Bargain. If Obama thinks Congress will pass something like that, he's nuts. ... The most rational explanation for Obama's speech is that he's positioning himself for failure. He's explaining his position so that when Congress fails to lift the debt ceiling, Americans will blame the Republicans and not him. Maybe in the meantime some small deal can arise."

Nice try. But Obama wasn't speaking to the know-it-all pundits (who actually have no idea what is in the president's head). He was educating the American people about what the Republicans have wrought. And yes, he's deftly positioning himself politically to deflect blame. That said, Obama will do whatever it takes to force Congress into raising the debt ceiling. And it probably won't be pretty.

A Manhattan Maid's Tale

Nafissatou Diallo, the Guinean hotel maid who accused Dominique Strauss-Kahn of rape, broke her silence today to tell her side of the story. The three-hour interview with Newsweek is riveting. (The magazine couldn't resist giving Diallo the once over, describing her as "statuesque" but "not glamorous" and noting the "faint acne scars" on her "light-brown skin." In other words, DSK didn't mistake her for, say, Tyra Banks or the sculpted beauties he has allegedly manhandled in the past. Decipher that subliminal message as you will.) Though Diallo is compelling as her own witness, angelic is not the adjective I would use to describe her. That goes double for DSK, of course. Frankly, I don't know whom to believe. My gut tells me that this was probably a tryst gone horribly wrong. But I wouldn't bet a wooden nickel on my gut. Diallo's credibility issues notwithstanding, maybe this thing ought to go to a jury for a proper sorting out. (Right. Like that's going to happen.) In any case, one assertion in the Newsweek piece grabbed me by the lapels: "Diallo cannot read or write in any language." That should not have astonished me (the literacy rate in Guinea is 29%), but it did. If, as Shakespeare said, "there is no darkness but ignorance," then Diallo's world is surely beclouded by her illiteracy. Now that she is mired in an unwanted but scandalous predicament, one can only image her bewilderment. The klieg lights will almost certainly deepen it. Diallo may or may not be innocent. But it's hard to avoid thinking that she is an unwitting lamb being led to the slaughter.

At least we've got football

Just thought I'd share a note I e-mailed to a friend: "Glad to hear we're gonna have a NFL season after all. Of course, getting to the games could be dicey. After the just-can't-say-yes Republicans drive the country off an economic cliff, our post-debtpocalyptic landscape will be littered with roving "Mad Max" tribes vying for food, water, gas, and football tickets. Worsening matters, there will probably be cannibalistic zombies (mutant Tea Party spawn) to contend with, too. Moreover, with the dollar's extinction, I wonder how many sea shells a Cardinals game will set us back? And we're 6 hours away from the closest Pacific shoreline. Folks in what's left of flyover country could be screwed. But hey, why sweat the small stuff, right? Pro football is on, baby! Cheers."

'Debtpocalypse'

Talk about the Monday blues. I've been lying in wait, Vietcong-like, for the Media-Blog Complex to leap beyond the pale on the debt ceiling impasse. Talking Points Memo finally "went there" this afternoon, calling the crisis: "Debtpocalypse." This means the made-up word has forded the Rubicon and entered the lexicon along side "carmageddon." Swell. Naturally, this please-please-click-me teaser is paired an equally bombastic story on TPM (cue the WWE Raw voice-over guy): "DEBT DEATHMATCH! Reid And Boehner Introduce Incompatible Plans To Avoid Default." How's that for reducing our latest economic Dunkirk to a punchline -- sung to the tune of R.E.M.'s "It's the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)?" But unlike Charlie squatting beside a Mekong Delta trail, I don't have a satchel of Soviet RPG-7s to consummate this rhetorical ambush. All I can do is watch and weep as the politicians potentially drive us over a cliff to the cheering taunts of the media.

Train wreck in progress?

The New York Times' John Harwood on the debt ceiling impasse: "The toughest legislative negotiations always resemble those old movies in which a terrified and helpless damsel lies bound to the railroad tracks. At the last instant, a hero intervenes to stop the locomotive. It happened with tax reform in the 1980s, deficit reduction in the ’90s, and the health care overhaul last year. Odds remain good that because of the immense pressure for action on all involved, the pattern will repeat itself this week on raising the debt limit and averting a default by the United States government." Unfortunately, as Harwood notes, the margin of error is exceedingly small.

'Sugar Candy'

It's easy to over-romanticize Winston Churchill as the proverbial "great man." But the man had a way with words. As a political organism, the nation seems (again) to be at that darkest moment before the dawn. It is therefore worth remembering Churchill's words before the Canadian Parliament in Ottawa on 30 December 1941: "We have not journeyed across the centuries, across the oceans, across the mountains, across the prairies, because we are made of sugar candy."

A thought for Sunday

"Deep in the human unconscious is a pervasive need for a logical universe that makes sense. But the real universe is always one step beyond logic." (Frank Herbert, author of the Dune novels)

History as a comic book

In a thoughtful piece, "Race Man" Chauncey DeVega takes Hollywood to task over Captain America: The First Avenger and the mangling of American history.

He says the movie distractingly "applies a heavy whitewashing to World War 2 that is distinguished by a deep commitment and dedication to an insincere multiculturalism and a childish flattening of historical events."

He writes:

"In a Jim Crow military there are black soldiers fully integrated as equals in fictional white Army units without a mention of tension or conflict. There are African Americans as equal partners in the most secret Allied spy programs of World War 2. Black and white folks sit side by side in integrated recruitment centers in New York City. Black and white kids play together in the streets of Brooklyn, a Nathan Glazer ethnic melting pot dream, all the same, united in childhood and rooting for Captain America and the good guys to win The Big One."

DeVega qualifies his critique by noting that he didn't expect (nor wanted) the movie to be a "treatise on the Double V campaign" for African American freedom at home, and victory Nazism abroad. "Rather, my hope is for a film that works with these realities in order to enhance storytelling by adding richness and depth to a project--moves that make a movie more entertaining and not less," he wrote. Playing script doctor, DeVega then supplies a list of smart ideas.

I wholeheartedly agree with DeVega's premise and his ideas. But I'm also not holding my breath. This is navel-gazing, two-dimensional, money-obsessed Hollywood we're talking about. You know, the folks who put the L, C, and D in the phrase "lowest common denominator." One can always hope. Some filmmaker may yet find a way to get the history right, be entertaining and make money. But I wouldn't bet much on an industry that produced Police Academy and then made six - count 'em, six - sequels to it. And yes, the seventh is due out later this year.