I am sitting on a balcony, 60 feet above the rainforest floor, trying to figure out what type of monkey is trashing around in the tree 20 yards from where I'm sitting and typing this. Because my parents are incredibly generous and also I don't work for Walmart.
So many things to be thankful for.
Thursday, November 28, 2013
Tuesday, November 26, 2013
No Easy Answers
Costa Rica has 97% literacy. Their largest export if computer chips. They have universal health care. They have a thriving tourist industry. They have no military to spend millions of dollars on.
Yet every time I look out the window, I see tiny little houses and shanties.
By my reckoning, they are doing just about everything right, but I'm having trouble seeing how the progress that is being made reaches the vast majority of the people.
No easy answers, indeed.
Yet every time I look out the window, I see tiny little houses and shanties.
By my reckoning, they are doing just about everything right, but I'm having trouble seeing how the progress that is being made reaches the vast majority of the people.
No easy answers, indeed.
Sunday, November 24, 2013
Bomb, Bomb, Bomb. Bomb, Bomb Iran
Few things - economics maybe - are more pointless to take a politician's expertise for granted on than foreign policy.
If John McCain (R-Meet the Press) doesn't like the Iran deal, that is simply a vote in it's favor in my book.
Or, as always, what Booman says:
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2013/11/24/92450/061
If John McCain (R-Meet the Press) doesn't like the Iran deal, that is simply a vote in it's favor in my book.
Or, as always, what Booman says:
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2013/11/24/92450/061
Saturday, November 23, 2013
Friday, November 22, 2013
Kennedy
It is striking to me that Kennedy grades out as the most popular president of the last 50 years.
He beats out Reagan and Clinton, who both finished strong.
It's striking to me because Kennedy did jack squat as President. He nearly got us into nuclear war over Cuba, after a botched Bay of Pigs fiasco pushed Castro into Kruschev's waiting arms. He was reticent to embrace civil rights. He failed to advance almost any of his agenda.
It was LBJ who passed the Kennedy agenda, skillfully using the martyred Kennedy as a whip to get Congress into line.
Kennedy was handsome, but mostly he died young. He is associated fuzzily with idealism and public service. It would be interesting to see how many people could name a true Kennedy accomplishment - a concrete thing he did as president.
Meanwhile, LBJ and Obama actually achieved remarkable advances, but LBJ will be condemned for his Vietnam mistake and Obama will perhaps need time to rehabilitate him.
But mostly, this is a victory of high style over substance.
Don't get me wrong. Kennedy is important. But it's his death and the way LBJ used that death to pass a sweeping agenda that is important. Not what JFK did himself.
He beats out Reagan and Clinton, who both finished strong.
It's striking to me because Kennedy did jack squat as President. He nearly got us into nuclear war over Cuba, after a botched Bay of Pigs fiasco pushed Castro into Kruschev's waiting arms. He was reticent to embrace civil rights. He failed to advance almost any of his agenda.
It was LBJ who passed the Kennedy agenda, skillfully using the martyred Kennedy as a whip to get Congress into line.
Kennedy was handsome, but mostly he died young. He is associated fuzzily with idealism and public service. It would be interesting to see how many people could name a true Kennedy accomplishment - a concrete thing he did as president.
Meanwhile, LBJ and Obama actually achieved remarkable advances, but LBJ will be condemned for his Vietnam mistake and Obama will perhaps need time to rehabilitate him.
But mostly, this is a victory of high style over substance.
Don't get me wrong. Kennedy is important. But it's his death and the way LBJ used that death to pass a sweeping agenda that is important. Not what JFK did himself.
Thursday, November 21, 2013
Harry Reid Is From Nevada, He Knows Nuclear
So the Senate just invoked the "nuclear option" to end filibusters of judicial nominees.
I realize that this could lead to problems should the GOP regain the White House or the Senate.
But I think it was pretty obvious that if that DID happen, the GOP would, itself, invoke the nuclear option. Providing, of course, that the Democrats engaged in the unprecedented obstruction of otherwise qualified nominees.
If anything, it puts the focus where it should be: elections have consequences for the Courts. So vote, people.
I realize that this could lead to problems should the GOP regain the White House or the Senate.
But I think it was pretty obvious that if that DID happen, the GOP would, itself, invoke the nuclear option. Providing, of course, that the Democrats engaged in the unprecedented obstruction of otherwise qualified nominees.
If anything, it puts the focus where it should be: elections have consequences for the Courts. So vote, people.
Outsourcing Thursday
Paul Ryan is back. And the target on his back is bigger than ever.
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2013/11/paul-ryan-poor-people-need-jesus-not-food.html
http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/The_Latest_In_Zombie_Eyed_Granny_Starving
http://www.salon.com/2013/11/20/its_paul_ryan_is_a_serious_wonk_season_again/
Read them all.
Then lie down and take a nap. You've earned it.
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2013/11/paul-ryan-poor-people-need-jesus-not-food.html
http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/The_Latest_In_Zombie_Eyed_Granny_Starving
http://www.salon.com/2013/11/20/its_paul_ryan_is_a_serious_wonk_season_again/
Read them all.
Then lie down and take a nap. You've earned it.
Wednesday, November 20, 2013
George Zimmerman
So, yeah. Who could have predicted that he would turn out to be pretty much a violent sociopath? Besides everyone who wasn't invested somehow in hippie-punching people who thought it was awful that Trayvon Martin was killed for possession of Skittle and a hoodie.
And as the Creigh Deeds story reminds us, too, the only thing America has more of than crazy people are weapons.
USA! USA!
UPDATE: Never write on the same topic as TNC:
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/11/why-black-folks-tend-to-shout/281629/
And as the Creigh Deeds story reminds us, too, the only thing America has more of than crazy people are weapons.
USA! USA!
UPDATE: Never write on the same topic as TNC:
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/11/why-black-folks-tend-to-shout/281629/
Tuesday, November 19, 2013
Fundamentals Vs Personality
The GOP outreach to women.
During the 2008 and 2012 elections, colleagues would sidle up to me and ask nervously: "Can Obama really win?" And I would always nod and say, "Yes. And it won't really be that close."
Some of this was shell-shock from 2000 and even 2004. Gore should have been elected and Kerry almost was. Having elections ripped from their hands seemed the inevitable lot of Democrats, despite the manifest incompetence of C+ Augustus and Darth Cheney.
The piece above notes how the DC press tends to ascribe campaigns to personality. And certainly in a close election, the personality of the candidate makes a difference. But there is a certain post hoc analysis that ascribes political defeats to the candidate's personality rather than the underlying fundamentals. Gore was wooden (but there was also a sense of fatigue with Clinton, and Gore got half a million more votes). Kerry was stiff (but incumbents almost always win, and Bush's margin of re-election was the smallest since Woodrow Wilson).
The only personality piece that really moves the needle is scandal. Otherwise, you are looking at broad trends and demographics.
The TPM piece talks about the trends (the economy foremost), but it leaves out demographics. There are certain demographic truths about the American electorate right now. Republicans are going to get killed among non-Cuban Hispanics and slaughtered among African Americans. There is no "game change" that is going to alter that reality. At this point, the vocal nativism and racism that exists in the Tea Party and even the mainstream GOP has rendered those votes beyond the reach of the Republicans. The votes of young women are also going to be very hard for the GOP to reach, especially if they can't seem to shut up about rape and sluts who need contraception.
On the converse side, there are huge swaths of white rural and exurban voters who would open a vein rather than vote for a Democrat.
One fundamental that was also omitted is the trend of locking in party identification. Once you start voting consistently for one party, you tend to keep voting for that party. It becomes part of your political identity. Every once in a while, a group flips. African Americans switched from the Party of Lincoln to the Party of FDR. Southern Democrats switched from the Party of Jackson to the Party of Reagan.
But at the moment, the trends favor the Democrats at the national level and they will continue to favor the Democrats, absent a scandal.
As far as 2016 goes, I could see some fatigue for a Democratic White House. But I could also see a lot of energy for having our first female President. Hillary will likely run, and if she runs, she wins the nomination and wins the election. Again, absent scandal or the collapse of the economy.
The Mark Halperin's of the world represent the worst and most superficial analysis of the punditry, and they should only be paid attention to for the purposes of mocking them.
(BTW, I'm sure Halperin would have panned the Gettysburg Address, too. All the smart DC writers did.)
UPDATE: Paul Begala writes something similar, though I wish everyone would quit saying things like "calamitous" to describe the ACA or "near impossible" to access the website. It's not "near impossible". It's a hassle. That's all. It's a time consuming hassle. That is not a calamity. Tornadoes and typhoons are calamities.
Monday, November 18, 2013
Might Want To Look Into This
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/obamacare-navigators-gop-smear-campaign
The website is glitchy, but getting much better.
If your health care plan sucks, you won't be able to keep it.
But the central biggest factor in the struggles of the law - why the website is glitchy having to cover so many constituencies, why a throw-away political line has become a national outrage - is because the GOP is doing everything it can to destroy this law.
If we had a functioning press corps, we might be having a discussion as to why we should believe anything the GOP says about the law. If we had a functioning press corps, we might be asking why GOP governors want their citizens to be without health insurance.
But we don't.
UPDATE:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/republicans-obamacare-alternative
This is the reality. For all the talk about "disaster" and "debacle", the fact is the ACA is rolling right along with a lot of its reforms. The desperation that the GOP feels is that by the time 2016 rolls around, ACA will be impossible to get rid of. Hell, by March or April, it will likely be hard to get rid of.
Any jackass can tear something down. It takes a man to build something.
The website is glitchy, but getting much better.
If your health care plan sucks, you won't be able to keep it.
But the central biggest factor in the struggles of the law - why the website is glitchy having to cover so many constituencies, why a throw-away political line has become a national outrage - is because the GOP is doing everything it can to destroy this law.
If we had a functioning press corps, we might be having a discussion as to why we should believe anything the GOP says about the law. If we had a functioning press corps, we might be asking why GOP governors want their citizens to be without health insurance.
But we don't.
UPDATE:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/republicans-obamacare-alternative
This is the reality. For all the talk about "disaster" and "debacle", the fact is the ACA is rolling right along with a lot of its reforms. The desperation that the GOP feels is that by the time 2016 rolls around, ACA will be impossible to get rid of. Hell, by March or April, it will likely be hard to get rid of.
Any jackass can tear something down. It takes a man to build something.
Sunday, November 17, 2013
Walking Dead Liveblog
The return of the Governor. I guess this was inevitable. Still, I'd have liked to have developed some other storylines.
OK, after that opening, I'm glad to see the Governor back.
**
Wow, he really seems to be doing some sort of penance.
Or maybe he's paranoid.
The Gov was always so hard to read, that's working great now.
The family in the apartment definitely begs the question about how many small survivor groups might be out there.
And it occurs to me the Governor's presence explains why all those Walkers showed up at the fence.
***
Have you noticed that most of the women to survive the apocalypse are kind of hot?
It's kind of weird rooting for the Governor.
***
First aid as foreplay. Romance at the end of the world.
Well. This is a pretty interesting episode as a stand alone, but I wonder how we get back to the prison.
***
Nice chess metaphor.
How did these schlubs survive this long?
Ahhhhh, that's how the Governor comes back...
Or maybe not. But somehow we have to go from little tamed Brian to the rage filled Governor again.
***
Road trip! And a little sexual tension between the sisters, methinks.
OK, that was awfully gross.
Solid episode. Got us out of the prison and reintroduced the perils of the road.
12 Years A Slave
(Somehow missed posting yesterday... sorry.)
I went with Gentleman Jim and the Most Lovely and Compassionate Wife to see 12 Years A Slave.
It is a difficult experience to encapsulate. My poor wife could only stay 40 minutes before she had to leave.
It is easy to fall back on talking about craft. So, I'll start there. This is a very, very well made movie. The director, Steve McQueen (I know), does not force the pace of the story. Scenes unfold slowly, recreating the pace of 19th century life and the interminable, permanent nature of slavery. There is a devastating scene of Solomon staring into the distance, staring into the camera and then off into the distance again. That's it. But it plays out over about 90 seconds (an eternity on film) and leaves you feeling helpless in the face of his despair.
Chiwetel Ejiofar has always been a tremendous film actor that no one knows about. His performance has a gravity that makes the entire film work. When a bona fide movie star (and the film's producer) shows up in Brad Pitt, he seems a faded, pale thing next to Ejiofor's Solomon.
This is the American Schindler's List.
That movie is obviously hard to watch, and so is 12 Years, because they both are grounded in an historical reality that reveals the brutishness possible in human behavior. Where 12 Years varies from Schindler's List is in the choices made by the director and writer.
Spielberg, being Spielberg, gives a faint glimmer of hope to Oskar Schindler. In the face of incomprehensible horror, Schindler risks his life and expends his fortune to save people's lives. So while the movie soaks in the blood and ash of the Holocaust, it ultimately redeems humanity in the form of a flawed man who embraces the good in him.
McQueen does not give us that respite. He does not end with the Emancipation Proclamation, Appomattox or the passage of the 13th Amendment. Spielberg would have, or he would have shown us Solomon Northup's current descendants. McQueen gives us as happy an ending as possible, but one so melancholy and fraught with loss that it only seems happy in compared with the extended, grinding misery of the preceding two hours.
I read someone wondering if an American could have made this film. Probably. But an American could not have played slave owner Edwin Epps. Ironically, the actor - Michael Fassbender - was born in Germany. He embraces the sadism and debauchery of Epps in a way that is both artistically brave and makes you worry how you come back from playing a role like that. If we make the obvious comparison to Ralph Fiennes' Amon Goeth in Schindler's List, what we see in Epps is more human than the cold, emotionless Goeth and therefore oddly more terrifying. With Goeth there was a logic in random violence, it was used for control. With Epps, the violence is unpredictable and mercurial, a product of his own delusions and emotional imbalance.
Epps is the personification of American sin. He is the slaveholder from hell. The movie does not engage in polemics: it does show a kindly slave owner in Benedict Cumberbatch's Ford. There is another slave owner - Master Shaw - whose plantation seems an idyll compared to Epps'.
But it is precisely this relative compassion that shows the horror and waste of slavery. When Solomon works for Ford, he uses his intelligence and experience to increase the efficiency and yield of Ford's lumber business. Ford is impressed, but his overseer - a dim and vicious Paul Dano - is threatened. Since slavery depends on the idea of white supremacy, Solomon's intelligence and ability are a threat to the one thing that makes Dano's overseer's life palatable: his racial superiority. Slavery requires that blacks be brutes. Any glimmer of humanity must be crushed. Solomon's decision to be exceptional directly leads to his chastisement, debasement and torture. From there on out, he has to hide his abilities.
Before the Civil War, roughly a third of the Southern population were enslaved blacks, in the cotton belt is was closer to 50%. That population was kept ignorant and any effort to express their humanity beyond the infantile, the sexual or the musical was crushed.
That is the crime of slavery that the film hammers home. There is a scene where slaves are being auctioned that shows how they were reduced to livestock, which was pretty much their legal status. For all the beneficence of a master like Ford, the system itself was degrading. And as the Epps character shows, that degradation happened to whites as well as blacks. The scenes of sexual predation and the destruction of families are sickening.
There is no let up in this movie. Like slavery itself, it is "All night, all night forever". The decision not to leaven the movie with humor or love makes it hard to watch. I'm not sure I took a full, deep breath during the last hour of the movie. And when I did at the very end, it was mixed with trembling sobs.
Spielberg's historical epics have been derisively called "broccoli movies" - they are good for you, but bland. I'm not sure what to call 12 Years A Slave. It is a harsh, harsh medicine - a purgative perhaps - not even as enjoyable as eating your broccoli.
But it's an essential experience. It has to be seen. But sadly, it has to be seen especially by those who will never see it. This is a horror movie where the monsters are the great-great grandfathers of audience members. That central fact flies in the face of the lies we tell ourselves about our country's past.
If the truth sets Solomon free in the end, then we must embrace that truth about ourselves and our history to free ourselves, too.
Chiwetel Ejiofor and Michael Fassbender
It is a difficult experience to encapsulate. My poor wife could only stay 40 minutes before she had to leave.
It is easy to fall back on talking about craft. So, I'll start there. This is a very, very well made movie. The director, Steve McQueen (I know), does not force the pace of the story. Scenes unfold slowly, recreating the pace of 19th century life and the interminable, permanent nature of slavery. There is a devastating scene of Solomon staring into the distance, staring into the camera and then off into the distance again. That's it. But it plays out over about 90 seconds (an eternity on film) and leaves you feeling helpless in the face of his despair.
Chiwetel Ejiofar has always been a tremendous film actor that no one knows about. His performance has a gravity that makes the entire film work. When a bona fide movie star (and the film's producer) shows up in Brad Pitt, he seems a faded, pale thing next to Ejiofor's Solomon.
This is the American Schindler's List.
That movie is obviously hard to watch, and so is 12 Years, because they both are grounded in an historical reality that reveals the brutishness possible in human behavior. Where 12 Years varies from Schindler's List is in the choices made by the director and writer.
Spielberg, being Spielberg, gives a faint glimmer of hope to Oskar Schindler. In the face of incomprehensible horror, Schindler risks his life and expends his fortune to save people's lives. So while the movie soaks in the blood and ash of the Holocaust, it ultimately redeems humanity in the form of a flawed man who embraces the good in him.
McQueen does not give us that respite. He does not end with the Emancipation Proclamation, Appomattox or the passage of the 13th Amendment. Spielberg would have, or he would have shown us Solomon Northup's current descendants. McQueen gives us as happy an ending as possible, but one so melancholy and fraught with loss that it only seems happy in compared with the extended, grinding misery of the preceding two hours.
I read someone wondering if an American could have made this film. Probably. But an American could not have played slave owner Edwin Epps. Ironically, the actor - Michael Fassbender - was born in Germany. He embraces the sadism and debauchery of Epps in a way that is both artistically brave and makes you worry how you come back from playing a role like that. If we make the obvious comparison to Ralph Fiennes' Amon Goeth in Schindler's List, what we see in Epps is more human than the cold, emotionless Goeth and therefore oddly more terrifying. With Goeth there was a logic in random violence, it was used for control. With Epps, the violence is unpredictable and mercurial, a product of his own delusions and emotional imbalance.
Epps is the personification of American sin. He is the slaveholder from hell. The movie does not engage in polemics: it does show a kindly slave owner in Benedict Cumberbatch's Ford. There is another slave owner - Master Shaw - whose plantation seems an idyll compared to Epps'.
But it is precisely this relative compassion that shows the horror and waste of slavery. When Solomon works for Ford, he uses his intelligence and experience to increase the efficiency and yield of Ford's lumber business. Ford is impressed, but his overseer - a dim and vicious Paul Dano - is threatened. Since slavery depends on the idea of white supremacy, Solomon's intelligence and ability are a threat to the one thing that makes Dano's overseer's life palatable: his racial superiority. Slavery requires that blacks be brutes. Any glimmer of humanity must be crushed. Solomon's decision to be exceptional directly leads to his chastisement, debasement and torture. From there on out, he has to hide his abilities.
Before the Civil War, roughly a third of the Southern population were enslaved blacks, in the cotton belt is was closer to 50%. That population was kept ignorant and any effort to express their humanity beyond the infantile, the sexual or the musical was crushed.
That is the crime of slavery that the film hammers home. There is a scene where slaves are being auctioned that shows how they were reduced to livestock, which was pretty much their legal status. For all the beneficence of a master like Ford, the system itself was degrading. And as the Epps character shows, that degradation happened to whites as well as blacks. The scenes of sexual predation and the destruction of families are sickening.
There is no let up in this movie. Like slavery itself, it is "All night, all night forever". The decision not to leaven the movie with humor or love makes it hard to watch. I'm not sure I took a full, deep breath during the last hour of the movie. And when I did at the very end, it was mixed with trembling sobs.
Spielberg's historical epics have been derisively called "broccoli movies" - they are good for you, but bland. I'm not sure what to call 12 Years A Slave. It is a harsh, harsh medicine - a purgative perhaps - not even as enjoyable as eating your broccoli.
But it's an essential experience. It has to be seen. But sadly, it has to be seen especially by those who will never see it. This is a horror movie where the monsters are the great-great grandfathers of audience members. That central fact flies in the face of the lies we tell ourselves about our country's past.
If the truth sets Solomon free in the end, then we must embrace that truth about ourselves and our history to free ourselves, too.
Friday, November 15, 2013
The ACA Website Fix
A bunch of code writers did something incredibly smart and easy. It's called HealthSherpa.com.
Basically, what it seems to do is allow you to shop for plans.
This basic failure of the ACA Website is the worst failure it has.
Now actually signing up for health insurance through the website is - and probably ought to be - really thorough. And thorough means slow. They have to verify your income, your marital status, your residency, what kind of care you may qualify for from the VA or other government entities... there's a lot going on.
But one thing you should be able to do is sign on, give your zip code and compare prices. I entered a zip code for Austin, Texas (Connecticut has set up an exchange that works outside the ACA website), entered the number of people in my family, the fact that I wanted a Silver level plan and it gave me the four prices per month for health insurance in Texas for me and my family.
Now, the one thing it doesn't do is describe the plans in detail. I'd call that a glitch, frankly.
But it can tell your VERY FAST what plans are available and at what cost.
And some guys threw this together in a few days.
The fact that no one thought, "Hey, we should have a shopping website and a separate buying website." is mind-boggling.
Basically, what it seems to do is allow you to shop for plans.
This basic failure of the ACA Website is the worst failure it has.
Now actually signing up for health insurance through the website is - and probably ought to be - really thorough. And thorough means slow. They have to verify your income, your marital status, your residency, what kind of care you may qualify for from the VA or other government entities... there's a lot going on.
But one thing you should be able to do is sign on, give your zip code and compare prices. I entered a zip code for Austin, Texas (Connecticut has set up an exchange that works outside the ACA website), entered the number of people in my family, the fact that I wanted a Silver level plan and it gave me the four prices per month for health insurance in Texas for me and my family.
Now, the one thing it doesn't do is describe the plans in detail. I'd call that a glitch, frankly.
But it can tell your VERY FAST what plans are available and at what cost.
And some guys threw this together in a few days.
The fact that no one thought, "Hey, we should have a shopping website and a separate buying website." is mind-boggling.
Some Friday Awesome Awesomeness.
San Francisco values? Yeah, I'll take them every day and twice on Sunday. This is tremendous.
And if you like your awesome awesomeness with a little cynicism, I give you this:
http://www.balloon-juice.com/2013/11/15/twitterdammerung/
JP Morgan was going to go on Twitter and answer questions. Here are some of the questions:
And if you like your awesome awesomeness with a little cynicism, I give you this:
http://www.balloon-juice.com/2013/11/15/twitterdammerung/
JP Morgan was going to go on Twitter and answer questions. Here are some of the questions:
Thursday, November 14, 2013
Inside The Borg
http://www.thenation.com/article/177018/grand-old-tea-party?page=full#
Rick Perlstein is the pre-eminent historian of the modern American Right.
He is fundamentally right about where it's coming from, how it operates and how it succeeds.
The current meltdown over ACA is caused by the nullification of the law by Rightist governors. Obviously not entirely, but the website has to handle more traffic with more variable because state governors didn't set up exchanges. One of the real successes early on has been Medicaid enrollment, but that isn't happening in states where the governor - with an assist from the Roberts Court - has stopped the Medicaid expansion. The GOP is hellbent on neutering this law, and that is having an effect.
Politically, the Right is winning right now.
What they are not doing is offering a governing solution that addresses our health care deficiencies. What they are not doing is offering a roadmap out of sequestration. What they are not doing is solving our immigration quandary.
It's a fairly long read (try reading Nixonland), but Perlstein lays out that the animus against Obama is nothing new.
Rick Perlstein is the pre-eminent historian of the modern American Right.
He is fundamentally right about where it's coming from, how it operates and how it succeeds.
The current meltdown over ACA is caused by the nullification of the law by Rightist governors. Obviously not entirely, but the website has to handle more traffic with more variable because state governors didn't set up exchanges. One of the real successes early on has been Medicaid enrollment, but that isn't happening in states where the governor - with an assist from the Roberts Court - has stopped the Medicaid expansion. The GOP is hellbent on neutering this law, and that is having an effect.
Politically, the Right is winning right now.
What they are not doing is offering a governing solution that addresses our health care deficiencies. What they are not doing is offering a roadmap out of sequestration. What they are not doing is solving our immigration quandary.
It's a fairly long read (try reading Nixonland), but Perlstein lays out that the animus against Obama is nothing new.
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