Politics

Sat - October 15, 2005

"Conservatives have ideas -- liberals don't"

Now that Bush & Co. are being jumped on by the media and the establishment types who until the other day quaked in fear of them, we hear the retort: "Yes, but at least they had ideas for running the country. The Democrats don't have a single idea to present to the public."

Posted at 01:09 PM Read More

Sun - October 2, 2005

orthogonal opponents

From the New York Times: Celeste Biever, a reporter for NewScientist, is reporting from the Dover, PA trial pitting the local school board against parents who object to "intelligent design" being recognized as scientific by their public schools. She finds that

When you put intelligent design up against evolution ... "It's not a head-on collision between two scientific arguments; it's orthogonal," with the opponents coming at each other from right angles.

Posted at 06:13 PM Read More

Sun - September 25, 2005

"helpful advice" to the social change movement

Rather oddly, one still hears the argument that left demonstrations should concentrate on specific messages (e.g., for the March on Washington yesterday, "stop the war") and (somehow or other) prevent participation by kooky "identity" types, who just want to flaunt their non-conformity -- usually, these days, non-conformity to heterosexual norms. The argument for this position is that the "identity protesters" turn off the "Peoria" folks whose support is needed for the anti-war campaign to succeed.

Posted at 06:13 PM Read More

Tue - August 16, 2005

Why religious people can be in politics

There is a lot of discussion these days about whether people who identify themselves as religious have a right to engage in politics. Obviously they do, just as non-religious people do, but most of the discussion one hears is not very cogent.

Posted at 12:25 AM Read More

Sun - August 14, 2005

Chastity

It might seem odd to put a post on this subject in the category of "politics," but these days it does seem, like many other subjects, to be taking on a considerable political tone. And hey -- the personal is political, right?

Posted at 12:58 PM Read More

Thu - August 4, 2005

the politics of evolution

Matt Yglesias argues (two or three screens down), under the headline "Intelligent Design: Who Cares?", that the whole fight against intelligent design is not worth political-minded folks' putting their energy into. Issues like women's reproductive rights and gay rights are what we should be worried about. Interestingly, this is reminiscent of the recent idea, popular in some areas of the left blogosphere, that other issues were more important than abortion rights.

Posted at 04:12 PM Read More

Sun - April 17, 2005

Why This War? Why Any War?

Those who continue to argue in favor of the Iraq War seem incredulous that anyone could doubt its essential rightness and gloriousness. Wasn't Saddam a uniquely evil dictator, and toppling him a supreme good? Yes, there were no WMD, and due to Rumsfeld's theories about a "lean, mean" military, there weren't enough invading troops when the government was toppled to prevent looting everywhere and keep a resistance force from organizing. But before long everything will get properly organized (somehow) and that country will inevitably become a brilliant beacon of freedom in the Middle East! Abu Ghraib? What was that? Almost everyone in the U.S. has forgotten about it already. (And very few realize that the inhumanity it epitomized has been much more widespread than that handful of incidents.)

Posted at 01:45 AM Read More

Sun - April 3, 2005

Playing With Fire?

Atrios suggests that the "conservative crackup" many on the left are eagerly anticipating needs for the crack-pots to be kept front and center in the nation's consciousness.

Posted at 04:17 PM Read More

Mon - March 14, 2005

Politics, the Personal, and the Ideological

David Neiwert, aka "Orcinus," in a very thoughtful essay that I am largely sympathetic with, makes one comment that I cannot quite agree with. He writes:

Moreover, I came distinctly to distrust ideologues -- because, I realized, ideas are more important to them than people. This observation arose first out of personal experience, because most ideologues are likely to reject friendships with those who don't think like them or fit their ideologies. I might be able to maintain a friendship with an ideologue (right or left) for awhile, but inevitably, they would reject me because I didn't fit the mold they wanted to make. Eventually this insight translated to my view of politicians and public figures as well. It has been for some time clear to me that hardened right-wing and left-wing partisans alike place their abstractions well above what happens to ordinary citizens in real life.

Posted at 09:40 PM Read More

Sun - March 6, 2005

Social change and political action (1)

For many radicals, political action is the only way to produce real changes in society; for them, "political activity" and "social change" are synonymous.

But there are many other aspects to social change besides political activity in the narrow sense, and sometimes it may be necessary to be rather "moderate" in those aspects in order to make radical political action possible.

Posted at 12:39 PM Read More

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