Threads from Henry's Web

Category: Politics

  • Tolerance: A Value, Not an Absolute

    In watching some of the material on Dr. Jeremiah Wright today, I’m reminded of the potential problem of tolerance–getting it above its proper rank as a value. I have been confronted numerous times in face to face discussions with the statement that I cannot be truly tolerant, because to be tolerant, I must tolerate intolerance.

    But that is a sort of binary thinking that is, quite frankly, the basis for a great deal of stupidity. For me tolerance is not an absolute. Tolerance is something I value. I do not value it above all else. It is the sort of thing that when overvalued can become self-destructive. To illustrate from the physical world, I value my home. But when a hurricane is coming, I value my life and my family more highly than my home. So I evacuate when it’s appropriate. Some don’t, and end up dead or injured.

    There are a number of comments by Rev. Wright that I am quite willing to defend. I’m even willing, as you will have noted, to defend a large part of his “God damn America” speech, while confessing that I would never have expressed it that way myself. I can get behind the rhetoric to a good point.

    But in embracing Farrakhan, I believe Wright steps over that line to tolerating intolerance. Farrakhan has, in fact, done some good things in the African-American community. but he has more than balanced that with hateful speech and acts, and with his anti-Semitism. Barack Obama was correct to reject (and denounce!) his support. Rev. Wright does himself a disservice by embracing him.

    To quote from MSNBC.com:

    At the press club, he jokingly offered himself as Obama’s running mate and embraced Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan even though he said he doesn’t always agree with him. He criticized the U.S. government as imperialist and stood by his suggestion that the U.S. invented the HIV virus as a means of genocide against minorities. “Based on this Tuskegee experiment and based on what has happened to Africans in this country, I believe our government is capable of doing anything,” he said.

    To tolerate Louis Farrakhan in this fashion is to tolerate intolerance, and this is a liberal danger. We wish to be so careful not to be intolerant. We want to be even handed, and love all the disadvantaged, underprivileged, and oppressed people. Those are good impulses. But we need to be careful to draw moral lines. We can desire justice for the Palestinians without justifying their killing of Israelis. We can recognize the economic hardships that contribute to terrorist recruiting without justifying the use made of it by terrorists. We can recognize the need for pride in the African-American community without also justifying a new form of hate and racism.

    Besides embracing Farrakhan, who has stepped way over the line, he continues with the claim that HIV was produced by the U. S. government. Based on things done in years past, I would be prepared to hear it if evidence turned up that some secret agency had done this in some way. U. S. government agencies have done some quite evil things. But the key there is the need for evidence. Right now there is no such thing. One of the nastiest ways one can vilify one’s opponents is by suggesting that they have done the things that they are capable of. We are all capable of some form of evil, but we do not all do everything of which we are capable. Evidence should precede accusation; all else is a smear.

    Rev. Wright should be aware of this, considering that around 10% of the American public believes that Barack Obama is a Muslim. The accusation has been made, and it doesn’t matter how much evidence there is that he is not, some of the slime will stick. A pastor, especially should be very careful with his words.

    I am not going to get into the game of blaming associates of associates, i.e. that Barack Obama needs to distance himself further from his pastor so as to be distanced further from Farrakhan. I didn’t like the “associating with people who associated with communists” attitude during the cold war, and this one is certainly no better. But Rev. Wright is responsible for his own words, and along with quite a number of good challenging ones, he has spoken some that are dangerous, hateful, and irresponsible.

  • Bill Moyers Interviews Dr. Jeremiah Wright

    I think we all draw boundary lines between those with whom we disagree, yet consider valid voices in our culture or community, and those whose views we think are so far off the map that conversation cannot continue. For many Americans, Dr. Jeremiah Wright has fallen into the second category.

    I would suggest, however, that in making such a determination one must consider context and intent. The context in which remarks are uttered can completely reverse their effect. Reported by a Jewish writer, “his blood be on us and on our children” (Matthew 27:25) reports on some words, and may express hostility by one group of Jews toward another. Repeated by a crowd of Christians in the middle ages, they became a frequent call to bloodshed.

    I commented previously that I believe that the preaching style was taken outside of the context of the African-American church. Others have noted, and I agree, that many of the comments (especially “God damn America”) were also taken somewhat out of context.

    There remains points on which I disagree, but that is really unimportant. Dr. Wright is a person who has accomplished much of value, and much of what he said is also valuable. In my view, Barack Obama went too far in distancing himself from the pastor who first brought him to Christ, baptized him, performed his wedding, and then baptized his children. I am disturbed that so many Christians seem to believe that is a relationship to be discarded. Dr. Wright was very gracious about it, speaking of the differences between pastoral and political roles.

    I commend Bill Moyers’ interview, which presents what seems to me a much more balanced view of the man, one which accords with my suspicions after tracking down the context of some of the snippets that have been posted.

    I would particularly commend the idea of “arguing with the text” that he mentions late in the second part. Biblical characters were willing to argue with God. If it seems to us that a text is demanding something improper, perhaps we should take a page from their book.

    (Hat tip to if i were a bell, i’d ring for the video link.)

  • Something is Wrong in Florida

    Hmmm! I would guess nobody is surprised about that. We seem to draw more than our share of attention down in these parts.

    But I’m seeing three interesting things:

    1. We passed a property tax reform bill with the support of our governor. Though I generally like Governor Crist, I voted against it, because I agreed with analyses that showed we would be having revenue problems for things like schools.
    2. For some silly reason our county school board is trying to figure out how many teachers they’ll have to let go next year. Yes, they’re cutting administrative staff as well, though mostly staff that supports the teachers.
    3. Our legislature is busy with such likely activities as a so-called Academic Freedom bill for our high school teachers. I’m sure this is only taking up a small amount of legislative time, considering the silly wording of some of the bills and proposed amendments, but I’d suggest that any time spent on this is wasted.

    Why do I connect these things? No, the time factor isn’t it. I doubt if the legislators took the time they’ve devoted to this “academic freedom” debate and worked on educational funding, they’d solve much of anything. The connection is that these legislators are busy pandering to the stupid and selfish side of the voters. The property tax bill passed because it would reduce the property taxes of enough people, and because the old system was so bad. But nobody wanted to admit what just about everybody knew–our schools would be paying for it afterward.

    It doesn’t bother the folks in Tallahassee that cuts are being made, because it’s local school board officials who have to try to figure out how to live with it.

    Some folks dislike teaching evolution, so the legislators again pretend to be doing something, in this case largely throwing the responsibility onto individual teachers, who would be policed by the courts. Can you say “lawsuit?” Alternatively some versions would make the school boards responsible for something that should have been settled by the curriculum drafters. The curriculum drafters did an excellent job, but some legislators want to pretend to solve the voters problems.

    Until we demand that our politicians at all levels tell it like it is, we’re going to see much of our time wasted on this type of activity. When a politician says he can make something work, but he’s not going to have to pay for it in some other way, he’s lying. Everything costs. You have to make sure you’re willing to pay those costs.

  • A Coherent Foreign (and Domestic) Policy

    I have thought since 2004 that if John Kerry had managed to appear to have an actual policy on terrorism, a strategy for how to make a safer United States and world, he would now be president. As it was, he was perceived to be proposing pretty much what Bush was doing only less of it.

    In Newsweek, Michael Hirsh is suggesting that the Democrats are wimping out on defense again, not on the battlefield, but on the campaign trail. His article The Democrats’ Wimp Factor paints a picture of the Democrats handing the national defense issue to the Republicans.

    To a certain extent I think he’s right. I think the Democratic candidates want to speak mostly about issues they feel they’re already strong on, and that means the economy, health care, education, and other domestic issues. Perhaps they’re right. I’m afraid that personally if I was making the choice purely on domestic issues I’d end up voting Republican. The anti-trade and careless spending policies of the Democrats are matched only by the careless war spending of the Republicans. Both parties seem to think they can propose programs without worrying about cost and sustainability.

    But as I’ve said before about health care, national defense has to be produced. Not only must we have soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines, we need the equipment of war. All of that costs, and that makes strategy extremely important.

    I’ve argued for some time for strategy in both our foreign policy, and by strategy I mean something that looks decades, not just months, into the future. I think there is room for a Democratic strategy against terrorism, because frankly the Republicans have a loser–keep occupying countries where terrorists operate. This is not even a World War II style strategy; it goes back to something like the civil war in its architecture, and we’re using it against an enemy that just doesn’t operate that way.

    But if the Democrats respond with just “let’s do less” as in “let’s get out of Iraq” without working on a sustainable plan to make us safer, they will certainly lose on that issue. People tend to go with someone who looks like he has a plan and is doing something as opposed to someone who just says, “No, let’s not do that.”

    But as I was reading that article it occurred to me that neither party actually has a domestic strategy either. We have a “stimulus package” but what is the ultimate goal? As far as I can tell the politicians haven’t even thought beyond the end of the current cycle. McCain’s proposed response on energy–cut out the gas tax for a bit–is the same type of response. Let’s scratch the itch. But the skin disease that caused the itch is still going strong.

    How about a strategy that involves improving education first, with responsibility, accountability, quality educational standards, and extremely qualified teachers? While we’re at it, let’s look at that curriculum carefully and see what is preparing people to live and work in the new high tech world, and what is just wasting time. That will require strategic thinking, again in terms of decades, because education is in such a mess.

    How about a strategy that involves improving law enforcement with better training, better equipment, more manpower, and clearer direction? Perhaps we could prevent more crime if we were willing to invest in having the people there in time to do it. I know many of our law enforcement officers try, but we expect a large amount of results from our investments.

    What about a strategy that builds the tax base rather than talking about how to divide the pie that we have more ways, or take more from the people’s part of the pie to put into the government. I’m not anti-all-domestic-programs. But again, government programs tend to alleviate the current symptom without looking at the root of the problem.

    Perhaps Democrats are wimpy on defense, but our politicians are wimpy on policy. We, the voters, are to blame, because we’ll vote these guys out if they tell us what they’re programs actually cost. We’d prefer to be deceived. We won’t listen to them long enough to explain an educational reform strategy with a reach of decades. We’d find it boring and call that politician a “policy wonk.”

    We need to increase our attention span, pay attention, perhaps take notes, and vote accordingly. We may find that we’re often voting for only a marginal improvement, but if we do that much, we can push things in the right direction.

  • Patriotism: What Do I Owe my Country?

    I like to think of myself as a patriot, but then there are times when I shy away from the term because of some things that are done in the name of patriotism. I served my country in uniform, even while disagreeing with many of the policies of my government. Despite any disagreements, I carried out those policies to the best of my capability.

    I’m an opponent of the war in Iraq, but what would I do if I were still in the military? Would I be protesting? Would I be speaking publicly against the war? No. I would vote my conscience, I would speak privately to friends and relatives, but I would carry out my duties again to the best of my ability. Note that this would not include what I would view as illegal orders–torture, for example. But for the vast majority of those in the military those particular questions do not occur. In the military, I owed it to my country to carry out its policies to the best of my ability.

    We live in a republic in which power resides ultimately with the people. I think the primary requirement for patriotism for those not in the military (or similarly sworn to carry out politically determined policies) under those circumstances is involvement. There are things one can do that are disloyal, such as desertion from the military, providing information to enemies, or actively working to destroy the country. But the primary responsibility of the citizen is to be heard.

    Some seem to believe that patriotism involves supporting your country’s policies, once made, no matter what. There is a sort of reverence when they refer to the actions of the commander-in-chief. But even though I voted against the current resident of the White House, I participated in making him commander-in-chief, and I get to participate in choosing the next president and seeing him leave.

    Would it be patriotism for me to support the current war just because my president got it started? I think it would, in fact, be precisely the opposite. The war is a bad move in what appears to be a bad ad hoc strategy, and it will result in no good for the country that I love. Given that I believe that, could I possibly be a patriot and a person of integrity if I didn’t say it? I would suggest the opposite, that I would be the worst sort of lying traitor in those circumstances.

    That doesn’t mean that the honest supporter of the war is less of a patriot. In fact, such a person would be a lying traitor if he or she does not act in support of those positions. We each owe our country our best arguments and our vote.

    Patriotism, in my view, is not the support of a set of policies, but rather that one gives one’s best in all areas, including one’s mind and judgment to one’s country and does so with integrity.

  • Jon Stewart on the Obama Gaffe

    While personally I think Obama got caught uttering a truth, or at least something he actually believes, I personally record it as a negative, because as president he needs to control his tongue. It doesn’t change the fact that I will vote for him. It’s just that in a very disciplined campaign, it’s disappointing.

    If he wanted to utter the actual truth, I think it would be that some people fall back on parts of their faith as a justification for existing bigotry. Faith doesn’t justify bigotry, it gets co-opted by bigotry. The partial truth results in a generalization that will certainly be false, which is again a problem. We try to distinguish moderate Muslims from radical Muslims; we need to also distinguish ignorant bigots from ordinary, hardworking people.

    But what Jon Stewart did about this on The Daily Show was more fun, and also showed Hillary Clinton as the suddenly faith-filled, spiritual, gun-toting gal that is wants to be perceived as.

  • Hillary Clinton Should not be Blamed for This

    All my readers know by now that I prefer Barack Obama out of the available options. Now we receive the exciting news that Bill Clinton disagrees with her on free trade with Colombia. Huge surprise there, considering he pushed NAFTA through, though it’s mildly surprising that he isn’t trying to cover it all up.

    Personally I’m with Bill Clinton on this one. I favor even the slow progress of free trade, and I am unhappy with both Democratic candidates for their stand on this one. But such is life. There is no candidate I can endorse without a footnote.

    But I think it is terribly unfair if people criticize Hillary Clinton for her husband’s position on this issue. My wife and I can argue a great deal on politics, and I think we’re both better for it. Before each election we sit down together with a sample ballot and debate our intended votes. Occasionally one of us changes the other’s mind. Mostly we clarify. Sometimes we go back and do more research. But I think both our votes are more intelligent because of the process.

    Two people don’t have to agree on everything just because they are married. There may be some basis to question Hillary Clinton’s firmness on free trade, but this isn’t one of them.

  • Health Care: My Visit to the Emergency Room

    I take this detour from discussing the church and medical care to talk a bit about why it is so difficult even to discuss medical care in this country, based on a recent personal experience.

    I’m 50 years old, and a few weeks ago I made my first visit to the emergency room. (Just for interest, I have never been admitted to a hospital in my life for any reason.) I had pain in my upper abdomen, quite severe, and it just wouldn’t go away. I arrived there between 9:00 and 9:30 pm, and eventually left around 5:00 am. While there I underwent three scans, numerous lab tests, and a few discussions with the doctor.

    I should note that it took some time to get any attention, but not really that bad as such things go. While I haven’t been to the emergency room for myself, I’ve been there with others, and I’m from a very medical family. It’s very useful to have things like an insurance card and a checkbook along on such a visit. Questions about money come up very quickly.

    After all this testing, they still have no idea what was wrong with me. We’re eagerly awaiting transfer of the records to my family doctor so that he can follow up.

    I got a call from my brother the cardiologist the next day, and he was very upset that they hadn’t done an EKG. He thinks that should be automatic when a 50 year old guy shows up with pain in his upper abdomen, and would like to inform the E. R. doctor that he was negligent, or something along those lines.

    The bottom line is this: After the rather strong medication they gave me for pain wore off, the pain was gone and hasn’t returned. But nobody has any idea where it came from or where it went.

    A couple of days ago I got the bill for all this. The initial bill for that incident was over $13,000. With the amount that is generally disallowed by the insurance company, the amount that will actually be paid to the hospital is over $10,000. My portion appears annoyingly large, but is actually blessedly small, all things considered. I have good health insurance.

    Now as the son of a doctor and nurse, brother of another nurse and another doctor, and husband of a nurse, not to mention cousins and uncles and such who have pursued careers in the medical field, I have a fairly good idea what costs what. I knew the scans were expensive when I took a look at the machine they were putting me through. I also knew how annoying some of the older machines would have been, and how much better of a picture of my innards the radiologist would have to study. I had talked to my brother, and knew that he would suggest more, not less tests.

    So supposing I’m an average citizen and I’ve been to the emergency room for pain that went away pretty much, I might suppose, on its own. Supposing I’m still waiting for my medical records, and haven’t been able to take care of the follow-up. What do you suppose my reaction would be to the bill? The hospital is receiving something like $1500 an hour to keep me on an uncomfortable hospital (stretcher? not-bed?), and for a couple of very short breaks, take me out to get tests.

    If I’m this average person do I:

    a) Say, “That’s the cost of good medical care and I’m glad to pay it?
    b) Yell, “$10,000 for that?”
    c) Call my lawyer
    d) Vote for a politician who will provide single-payer health care
    e) Get more and more frustrated with the health care system, but not know what to do

    I don’t know which of those I’d do. Actually, I think a large portion of that is what we pay for some pretty good health care. Some items weren’t working perfectly in my case, but I know how much the machines cost, and I know the hospital in question isn’t rolling in money. My family and I have been very satisfied with them over all for many, many years.

    The problem is that as soon as a politician starts talking about “controlling health care costs” two things happen. First, people assume that what is going to get cut out is unquestionably waste. Second, many people, especially politicians, assume they’re going to be able to cut out more than they realistically can.

    There’s a constant refrain about unnecessary tests. Someone might well call my scans unnecessary. They didn’t find anything. Maybe I’m just a wimp and I can’t stand pain. As a matter of fact, I’m really not sure. I’ve never felt anything like that before in my life. The most pain I’ve undergone for any period of time was a sprain. But the difference between a necessary and unnecessary test in the eyes of the person who isn’t there is simply whether it found something. In my case, it didn’t. My guts look reasonably good when properly enhanced by computer. But the doctor didn’t know that.

    On the other hand, it’s probably impossible to convince someone who hasn’t researched the various machines and their costs that the cost of that visit is at all reasonable. To be honest, I’m not certain myself whether all the tests were needed. My brother the cardiologist seems to think they were a good idea.

    I guess I’m kind of beating around the bush, but it seems to me that we have a long way to go in understanding health care such as to get to the point of discussing it intelligently. I determined several months ago to study out all these health care plans, and I’ve found it pretty tough going. But the more I look the more I think that the plans are being sold optimistically. They are optimistic in terms of how much can be saved and they are optimistic in terms of the quality of health care that will result.

    Perhaps the media should take up some of the time they spend trying to figure out just what Richardson said to the Clintons and when, and spend some time educating the public on the intricacies of health care. Perhaps the public should demand it. Of course, back in the real world, we’d be lucky if anyone watched it, much less demanded it!

  • Freedom from (not of) Expression

    Ed Brayton notes that the UN Human Rights Council has endorsed an anti-religious speech code proposed by the Organization of the Islamic Conference. I could write about this with the anger and disgust I feel, but Ed already said it so well:

    Now I am one of those people who is careful to distinguish between Islamic radicals and Islamic moderates. I strongly believe that most Muslims around the world, probably a significant majority, just want to live their lives as people of any large group do. Bin Laden certainly does not speak for them, nor should we lump all Muslims together under him. But there is at least a sizable minority of Muslims around the world who really do embrace what I regard as the most reactionary and barbaric ideology in the world today.

    While you’re expressing your deep concern about those who identify Islam with terrorism and human rights violations, how about at least expressing equal concern about those many millions of Islamic reactionaries who themselves openly identify Islam with terrorism, violence and who routinely violate the human rights of those around them? While you’re complaining about Muslims being stereotyped, how about at least pretending that you care as much about school textbooks in madrassahs in Saudi Arabia, Egypt and elsewhere that call Jews pigs and devils? At least keep up some pretense of being objective about this.

    Precisely!

    Ed also notes the irony of having Saudi Arabia of all places trying to lecture the west on freedom of expression. Quoth Daffy, “it is to laugh,” except that these folks aren’t funny; they’re dangerous.

  • Context for Obama and Dr. Jeremiah Wright

    I commented before on how we’re getting snippets out of context. Peter Kirk has done some looking regarding the God damn America comment. From another angle, my wife thinks Obama needs to say “enough!” and get on with the campaign.