Why cover the crazy?

Agreeing with some advice Jonathan Chait offered about political discourse and argumentation, Ta-Nehisi Coates said political commentators — I think he would probably extend this to all opinion writers — should increasingly take on intellectual giants, rather than go after mental featherweights such as Sarah Palin and Michelle Malkin:

Write about something other than current politics. Do not limit yourself to fighting with people who are alive. Fight with some of the intellectual greats. Fight with historians, scientists, and academics. And then after you fight with them, have the decency to admit when they’ve kicked your ass. Do not use your platform to act like they didn’t. Getting your ass kicked is an essential part of growing your intellectual muscle.

I agree to a degree, insofar as it helps the person doing the writing. In Christian apologetics, for instance, it would be more beneficial to the intellectual growth of the writer to argue against some of the best thinkers apologetics has to offer — William Lane Craig, Gary Habermas or Ravi Zacharias, for instance, rather than charlatans like Pat Robertson or James Dobson. That’s not to say the “best thinkers” in apologetics offer a compelling case for belief. I just mean that these “thinkers” — and I used the term loosely — sometimes hold more nuanced views on faith than less erudite pastors and priests who simply quote scripture and assume that’s going to convince us of anything. A person, then, is better equipped to argue from a position of nonbelief when she has anticipated all the ways believers jump through rhetorical hoops attempting to defend faith.

A quote from Omar Khyyam seems apt here:

The Koran! Well, come put me to the test — Lovely old book in hideous error drest. Believe me, I can quote the Koran too. The unbeliever knows his Koran best.

That’s Rhetoric 101. Know your opponents, and anticipate their arguments. So, in this regard providing commentary on the brightest thinkers from any field of inquiry, rather than the most asinine, continues a pattern of learning that, as Coates argues, should not stop once a person gets a college degree.

What Coates doesn’t address is the flip side to this. Does pointing out stupidity benefit readers or does it just needlessly proliferate garbage and give people like Malkin more “air time” than they deserve? Media Matters, of course, has more or less built an empire on pointing out stupidity that takes place on FOX News on a daily basis, and I could crash this server writing about the latest antics of people like Malkin, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and their ilk. While I criticize them on here occasionally, would it be helpful to the larger and probably never-ending debate about which ideology, liberal or conservative, is the best one for leading a nation? Probably not.

But I think pointing out stupidity accomplishes at least two important goals. Deservedly, it marginalizes people like Beck and Malkin and their ultra-religious counterparts to the sidelines. Second, and more importantly, it shines a bright light on just how far the political and religious message in America has gone off the rails and how far the GOP spectrum has shifted, and making light of this could hopefully result in more moderate approaches, even among conservatives. Fringe ideology in either direction, left or right, will get us nowhere fast.

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Malkin spins hate speech petition

Today, in Michelle Malkin’s continued right-wing drivel, she alerted readers that “left-wing church leaders” want the FCC to “crack down on ‘hate speech’ over cable TV and right-leaning talk radio airwaves.”

First, let me say that the preface, “Lead story,” at the top of the Web site is classic and choice … as if one is about to read some hard-line news piece from The New York Times or The Los Angeles Times … as if she actually talked to people on the ground and did any reporting on her own. Does she even know what “lead story” means? In truth, for this post and all others, she cobbles links together and puts forth some argument like any other blogger. I’m not doing anything much different (although I would like to think I’m a little more even-handed), but to claim this is any sort of “story” a la, a piece of journalism, is laughable.

But continuing on. She said various religious organizations, along with the National Hispanic Media Coalition, have teamed up to compel the FCC via a petition (Malkin fails to link to it directly, but there it is) to launch efforts “for combating ‘hate speech’ from staunch critics of illegal immigration.” Think of this as an illegal immigration version of the Fairness Doctrine critique. Now, not only are conservatives, who, let’s admit it, own the talk radio airwaves, railing against attempts to make radio more “balanced” in its presentation of political positions, but honing in on certain specific issues to argue against such equalization. In her column with Creative Syndicate, she said,

Now, the gag-wielders have a friend in the White House (President Obama) – and they won’t let him forget it. Their FCC petition calling for a crackdown on illegal immigration critics (italics mine) cites Obama’s own words in a fall 2008 speech to the Congressional Hispanic Caucus.

The first part of this is patently false, and I hope someone more widely published than myself calls her bluff on it. The FCC petition does not call for a crackdown on illegal immigration critics. The summary of the petition is clear:

The National Hispanic Media Coalition requests that the Commissin (FCC) invite public comment on hate speech in the media, inquire into the extent and nature of hate speech, examine the effects of hate speech, including the relationship between hate speech in the media and hate crimes, and explore options for counteracting or reducing the negative effects of such speech.

I’m all for freedom of the press, and networks have the right to air any crackpot talk show hosts or anchors they wish. In fact, members of the press, TV stations or newspapers have the right to be as biased as they want, though I personally think it’s a disgrace to the profession of journalism, and I discourage anyone from encouraging that sort of “news” venue.

But Malkin is wrong here to the nth degree. It’s about hate speech, not about debunking or overthrowing critics of illegal immigration. By their unlearned rhetoric, they pretty well debunk themselves without any effort from myself or others. What Malkin fails to note are any instances of alleged hate speech from members of the “media” (I would use that term loosely for some folks in question, including Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage and others, who fall outside that category).

Case in point. Savage, as Malkin fails to bring to our attention, has made numerous incendiary comments toward immigrants, illegal or not. I would dub them as outright racist comments. Here’s a taste, from a May 10, 2006 taping, Savage said:

… [t]he immigrants, when they take over America, won’t be as enlightened as the (European) people running America today. There is a racial element to the ‘immigration invasion’ … We’re going to lose our nation unless one million people go to the border. …

And then on Oct. 13, we have this gem:

… these immigrants don’t have morals that are similar to those of Americans. They haven’t even gone through the Middle Ages. They’re never going to be compatible with America. They’re never going to assimilate.

Yep, and folks in the 18th and 19th centuries thought slaves could never assimilate either. They were ignorantly wrong there as well. I’m curious to know more about Savage’s comment that immigrants won’t be as enlightened as the European people currently running the country. I didn’t even know Europeans were running the country. Sure, some of European descent are members of state or federal bodies, but so are those of African and Latino descent. One is our president and another is a Supreme Court judge. And before Obama and Sotomayor, there were many other black and Hispanic leaders.

Had Malkin read to the end of the petition she references, she would find example after example of commentators in mainstream media and other outlets, railing, not just against illegal immigratants, but immigrants in general as well as blacks, “chinks,” etc. We can trace this immigrant hatred back to similar feelings leveled against Italians, the Irish and others. It’s a very predictable cycle.

Might I add: this post by Malkin, and her others comments, are very curious, as Malkin, born in America to parents who were citizens of the Phillippines, has, ironically, taken a position against the Citizenship Clause of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, although she herself is a benefactor of that same amendment. Peculiar, indeed.

Obama, the peace prize and country

Much has been said and written today about the Nobel Peace Prize being awarded to President Barack Obama, from Michelle Malkin’s spastic, right-of-right, true-to-form fragmentary post on the subject, to the Huffington Post’s more rosey view of the man. This BBC story attempts to give a sweeping view of some of the sentiments coming from the American media on the announcement.

Obama is the third sitting president to have been given the honor, followed by Woodrow Wilson and Teddy Roosevelt. Jimmy Carter has also won it, but that award came 20 or so years after he left office. Al Gore has as well.

I think this award, more than anything else, amounts to Obama being perceived in much of Europe as the “un-Bush,” as David Ignatius of The Washington Post dubbed it, perhaps fueled, in part, by his speech Sept. 23 to the U.N. General Assembly, and his speech in Cairo, and in his speech on race, and his diplomatic policies, his reaching out to the Muslim world, and, finally, his stance on nuclear nonproliferation. As Ignatius notes,

That’s what he’s being honored for, really: reconnecting America to the world and making us popular again. If you want to understand the sentiments behind the prize, look at the numbers in the Transatlantic Trends report released last month by the German Marshall Fund. Obama’s approval rating in Germany: 92 percent compared to 12 percent for George Bush. His approval in the Netherlands: 90 percent compared to 18 percent for Bush. His favorability rating in Europe overall (77 percent) was much higher than in America (57 percent).

Some, of course, like Dick Cheney, would argue that it doesn’t matter whether we are popular. It matters that we are safe. But, unless our plan is to continue our imperialistic ways forever, I think it does matter, and is a good thing, if other, respected countries within the global community think we are on the right track internationally. No good at all can surely come from being disliked by most of the industrialized, modern countries of the world, as we were under the last woeful administration.

This award, in truth, is not about any one thing Obama has done, for he hasn’t done much on the global stage. It’s about an ideal for a more globally connected America. And while some will cry foul and say many of  the other 200-something candidates were actually doing hard, hands-on work to promote peace, I do believe that this award says more about this country than this president, signifying the stunning reversal from the last administration’s G.I. Joe approach to foreign matters to our election of a diplomat. The Nobel Prize committee, using any rational, could never give this award to Obama based on any tangible accomplishments (and Obama admits this), but as he said, it’s a “call to action.”

Some, like this YouTube user, wrongly suggest that the Nobel Peace Prize committee’s decision was “apparently made just after the president took office.” (One can gauge this person’s level of credibility by noticing the channel he happens to be watching in this video.) No. In fact, nomination submissions close Feb. 1, but the choice isn’t made until October. Thus, it is true: someone nominated Obama just after his inauguration, but Obama’s leadership through these seven-eight months must have had some impact.

Regardless, as I’ve said, does he deserve it on his own merit? Probably not. And he says so himself. Is it a good thing for our country? Absolutely. John Adams, a founder whom I’m come to revere greatly, saw, not only the importance of believing in his “country,” but also recognized the importance of being respected on the world’s stage. If we aren’t, we’re cowboys. Though Cheney and Bush would seemingly have it no other way, the era of cowboys and gunslinging is long gone, and we must move with, not against or in spite of, other sovereign, modern, democratic nations.

Health care: ‘Welcome to middle-class poverty’

Just because I felt like writing tonight, and really for no other reason, I scooted over to Michelle Malkin’s oh-so-learned attempts at commentary (http://michellemalkin.com/), on which I found the lead “story” to be about an 11-year-old girl, Julia Hall, who asked President Obama a health care question during a recent town hall meeting in New Hampshire. From The Boston Globe:

A girl from Malden asked President Obama a question at Tuesday’s town hall meeting in New Hampshire about the signs outside “saying mean things” about his health care proposal.

Eleven-year-old Julia Hall asked: “How do kids know what is true, and why do people want a new system that can — that help more of us?” — The Boston Globe, Aug. 11, 2009

As it turns out, Julia’s mother was an Obama supporter during the 2008 election and a donor to the campaign in Massachusetts. Malkin, however, with her sardonic, “As we always like to point out: There are no coincidences in Obama world,” seems to suggest the girl was “planted” by the Obama administration to ask the question in order to make a point it felt needed making. The girl also queried Obama about the signs outside the town hall meeting “saying mean things” about Obama’s health care plan. Obama’s reply, which Malkin fails to include in her clunky polemic, was this, from The Globe:

“Well . . . I’ve seen some of those signs,” prompting laughter. “Let me just be specific about some things that I’ve been hearing lately that we just need to dispose of here. The rumor that’s been circulating a lot lately is this idea that somehow the House of Representatives voted for “death panels” that will basically pull the plug on grandma because we’ve decided that we don’t — it’s too expensive to let her live anymore. And there are various — there are some variations on this theme.”

According to a White House transcript, Obama continued:

“It turns out that I guess this arose out of a provision in one of the House bills that allowed Medicare to reimburse people for consultations about end-of-life care, setting up living wills, the availability of hospice, et cetera. So the intention of the members of Congress was to give people more information so that they could handle issues of end-of-life care when they’re ready, on their own terms. It wasn’t forcing anybody to do anything. This is I guess where the rumor came from.”

“The irony is that actually one of the chief sponsors of this bill originally was a Republican — then House member, now senator, named Johnny Isakson from Georgia — who very sensibly thought this is something that would expand people’s options. And somehow it’s gotten spun into this idea of “death panels.” I am not in favor of that. So just I want to — (applause.) I want to clear the air here.”

“Now, in fairness, the underlying argument I think has to be addressed, and that is people’s concern that if we are reforming the health care system to make it more efficient, which I think we have to do, the concern is that somehow that will mean rationing of care, right? — that somehow some government bureaucrat out there will be saying, well, you can’t have this test or you can’t have this procedure because some bean-counter decides that this is not a good way to use our health care dollars. And this is a legitimate concern, so I just want to address this.”

“We do think that systems like Medicare are very inefficient right now, but it has nothing to do at the moment with issues of benefits. The inefficiencies all come from things like paying $177 billion to insurance companies in subsidies for something called Medicare Advantage that is not competitively bid, so insurance companies basically get a $177 billion of taxpayer money to provide services that Medicare already provides. And it’s no better — it doesn’t result in better health care for seniors. It is a giveaway of $177 billion.

“Now, think about what we could do with $177 billion over 10 years. I don’t think that’s a good use of money. I would rather spend that money on making sure that Lori can have coverage, making sure that people who don’t have health insurance get some subsidies, than I would want to be subsidizing insurance companies.

“Another way of putting this is right now insurance companies are rationing care. They are basically telling you what’s covered and what’s not. They’re telling you: We’ll cover this drug, but we won’t cover that drug; you can have this procedure, or, you can’t have that procedure. So why is it that people would prefer having insurance companies make those decisions, rather than medical experts and doctors figuring out what are good deals for care and providing that information to you as a consumer and your doctor so you can make the decisions?

“So I just want to be very clear about this. I recognize there is an underlying fear here that people somehow won’t get the care they need. You will have not only the care you need, but also the care that right now is being denied to you — only if we get health care reform. That’s what we’re fighting for.” — The Boston Globe, Aug. 11, 2009

It is, indeed, “fishy,” as Malkin states that town hall meeting participants were “bussed in” to the event, as reported by WMUR of Portsmouth, N.H. But there is no proof these folks were bussed in specifically by the Obama administration to the town hall meeting to pad the seats, as it were. Actually, it would seem very likely that the folks who would be interested in attending town hall meetings would be supporters of the president. Would I, for instance, be eager to listen to Mark Sanford, the governor of my home state of South Carolina, talk about his opposition to the bailout funds and whine about how he’s sorry for having an affair with Maria BeLen Chapur with his four kids sitting at home? I think I would rather stay right here where the walls and this computer screen are more entertaining. The same, thus, likely held true at Obama’s town hall meeting. Boston is a hop, skip and jump from New Hampshire, so it’s not unlikely that Julia and her mother were in attendance. Plus, there is no rule that I know of to require a president or elected official to randomly, as if from a hat, select one questioner over another. My point is clear at this point: Malkin’s claim, and others’ is flimsy and unquantifiable.

But, for the fun of it, let’s examine a few of the comments given in the WMUR report by folks actually protesting, or not, outside the event. Here’s a small selection:

“… And I earned my health insurance. I paid for it with my money that I work very hard for.”

“Capitalism is America”

“A little rain for health care reform? Hey, I’ll do it.”

“They didn’t fix GM. They just propped them up with our money.”

“No profits, no health care.”

On the “capitalism is America” point, a co-worker of mine wrote a good piece recently in which he detailed a few irrevocable facts, which deconstruct this claim down through history: slavery is as anti-free-market as it gets, monopolies destroy the idea of capitalism and so does deregulation.

On the “earned” health insurance argument, I would say that many, who are not in as comfortable a position as the speaker, also pay for their own health insurance and still can’t afford their medical bills. Here is the crux of the entire argument. Let’s ignore for a moment (but certainly only for a moment), the millions of folks who do not have any type of coverage. Members of, what I would call the middle class or lower middle class, may have coverage (or once did but found it too expensive), but when something arises beyond their control, the coverage they have simply is meager. We don’t have to search long and hard to find examples:

The majority of the uninsured are neither poor by official standards nor unemployed. They are accountants like Mr. Thornton, employees of small businesses, civil servants, single working mothers and those working part time or on contract.

“Now it’s hitting people who look like you and me, dress like you and me, drive nice cars and live in nice houses but can’t afford $1,000 a month for health insurance for their families,” said R. King Hillier, director of legislative relations for Harris County, which includes Houston.

Paying for health insurance is becoming a middle-class problem, and not just here. “After paying for health insurance, you take home less than minimum wage,” says a poster in New York City subways sponsored by Working Today, a nonprofit agency that offers health insurance to independent contractors in New York. “Welcome to middle-class poverty.” In Southern California, 70,000 supermarket workers have been on strike for five weeks over plans to cut their health benefits. — The New York Times, Nov. 16, 2003

So, here’s the thing: the modernized countries who have some form of universal health care all are healthier than this country of dullards who would rather die under crushing debt and medical bills than adopt policies that may help, not just a few or some or half of our citizenship, but all of our citizenship. England, which even today, is still healthier than America on the whole, has full, universal coverage and has for more than 50 years (Private insurance is used by less than 8 percent of the population  there)! As my cohort notes, Japan has no bankrupties caused by medical bills, while half of the bankruptcies in the U.S. are medically related. Some system, huh?

No one in this country knows what the final form of health care reform will look like, but I side with this commenter, who said, “A little rain for health care reform? Hey, I’ll do it.” As the saying goes, “If the system ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” But it is broken. This country’s average life expectancy and health care, money-grabbing track record prove as much. The insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies have one thing on their collective, rabbit-ass minds: money, and the health and well-being of those riddled with illness, who can’t afford treatment even with insurance, be damned. We can only hope the reckoning will come soon.