America requires a fearless moral inventory of herself – fearless and cleansing. No person ever uplifted his character by presuming his own perfection. A nation is not different.
As part of that American self-examination of America, I want to examine bigotry. Bigotry is mainstream – not universal, but widespread. I’ll demonstrate that, and I’ll describe how it hurts us, and what we can do about it.
This first part will briefly review recent manifestations of bigotry against African Americans and Latinos. The second part will do the same with Muslims and Roma.
All of this is in the spirit of making America a better, mightier nation. As Abraham Lincoln said, "Let us have faith that right makes might, and in that faith let us to the end dare to do our duty as we understand it."
Sources are listed at the end.
1. Bigotry and African Americans.
Bigotry against African Americans is resurgent . In its usual current form, it no longer contends that African Americans are inferior. Bigotry against African Americans has reconstituted itself as a sense of White victimhood.
a. Bigotry: the old-fashioned kind.
But old-fashioned bigotry still rises from the grime, of course, sometimes among prominent public figures. New York gubernatorial candidate Carl Paladino emailed associates a video clip of an African indigene dancing exuberantly; he said that the dancing indigine was an "Obama Inauguration Rehearsal".
This was bigoted on two levels. First, it equated the new (African American) leader of the free world with an African indigine. Second, it assumed that an African indigene moving exuberantly is innately comical, in ways that a White American doing the same thing is not. To Paladino, it matters, apparently, whether the exuberance is filmed by an anthropologist or by Dancing With the Stars.
Paladino also forwarded an altered photograph depicting Barack and Michelle Obama as a pimp and a prostitute, an invidious stereotype of African Americans.
b. Shirly Sherrod and White victimhood.
But bigotry against African Americans has evolved. It now paints Whites as victims. A conspicuous example is the hue and cry about an out-of-context video clip of a minor Agriculture Department functionary, Shirley Sherrod, an African American. This clip was posted by a conservative blogger. The out-of-context portions posted created the impression that Sherrod was a racist. In fact, the speech was an homage to overcoming racism and reaching across racial divisions.
The publicity that this story received was grossly disproportionate to the relatively modest government position that Mrs. Sherrod occupied. But the story had wide appeal, because it nourished White America’s sense of victimhood.
c. Glenn Beck and our perfidious president.
Media star Glenn Beck also appealed to White America’s sense of victimhood. He claimed that Obama has a "deep-seated hatred of White people." He said this without apparent proof. Obama’s loving mother was White, and his adoring American grandparents were White. But that did not stop Beck.
And Beck proclaimed that Obama’s policies are driven by "Obama’s thinking on . . . reparations" and a desire to "settle old racial scores". In other words, "Be afraid, White America, be very afraid."
d. Dr. Laura and marrying out of one’s race.
Syndicated radio celebrity Dr. Laura Schlessinger stoked the sense of White victimhood. An African-American radio caller expressed her dismay to Dr. Slessinger about her husband’s White friends. Apparently, they make remarks demeaning to African Americans. Dr. Slessinger responded with offensive, racially-charged language. At one point, she chided her pained listener not to go "all NAACP" (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People – a renowned, venerable civil-rights organization). Schlessinger hung up on the caller and commented that people lacking a sense of humor should not "marry out of their race." Dr. Schlessinger remarked that African Americans use their "power" not for good, but to demonize Whites.
e. Newt Gingrich and the ghost of Obama’s father.
Newt Gingrich, former Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, proclaimed that to best understand Barack Obama, you have to consider Obama’s dead father. Obama knew his father slightly, his father having abandoned Obama and Obama’s mother before Obama could remember. Despite the virtually non-existent relationship between Obama Sr. and Obama Jr. – they met twice after the abandonment – Gingrich proclaimed that Obama had absorbed his father’s "Kenyan, anti-colonial [i.e. anti-White] world view". White victimhood is once again proclaimed over a mainstream megaphone.
f. Congressman Ford and fear of miscegenation.
African American Congressman Harold Ford, Jr. of Tennessee encountered White victimhood in his race for the United States Senate. He had attended a party at the Playboy mansion. His Senate-race adversary ran a television political commercial that featured a young White woman, dressed and behaving to insinuate loose morals, importuning the Congressman: "Harold, call me." This was a course appeal to White dread of African American sexuality, preying on fears of miscegenation.
2. Bigotry and Latinos.
Bigotry against Latinos usually multiplies in a fact-free petri dish.
a. Latinos, jobs, and crime.
Immigrants – legal and illegal – create as many jobs as they occupy, maybe more. But this doesn’t stop the snarling about illegal immigrants "stealing our jobs".
And remember Jan Brewer, candidate for Governor in Arizona, claiming that illegal immigrants are drug mules, and that they leave decapitated corpses in the Arizona desert? And John McCain claiming that Phoenix is the number-two kidnaping capitol of the world, behind Mexico City? Wrong, wrong, and wrong. Brewer, McCain, and other Arizona politicians are alarmist and wrong about immigrant crime.
They resemble popular Los Angeles radio-show hosts John Korbylt and Ken Chaimpou, who waive a bloody shirt when an illegal immigrant commits a heinous crime, as if that behavior were typical of illegal immigrants. This incites hatred.
Yet these falsehoods masquerading as fact are the foundation of Arizona’s enacted law SB1070. SB1070 compels police to inquire about a person’s immigration status if the officer "reasonably" suspects that they are in the country illegally. And to seize him if he cannot prove that he is legally in the country.
To be clear, Arizona police officers were given the right to roust illegal-immigranty-looking persons (Latinos) based on unsubstantiated assumptions about immigrants and crime – maybe jobs, too. In this rush to persecute Latinos, the Arizona Legislature and its governor did not pause to determine the truth. The truth was not the point. Bigoted beliefs about Latinos were the point.
Would the Arizona politicians do a thoroughgoing and painstaking investigation of their presumptions about crime and immigrants before opening their mouths about it? And certainly before empowering police officers to demand papers from a person apparently guilty of strolling-while-Latino? Apparently not.
The lazy legislative investigation that failed to deflate disinformation about immigrants, crime, and jobs is disturbing. Equally disturbing is the political appeal of this disinformation. This disinformation crossed the finish line ahead of the facts, because condemnation of Latinos has a cultural head start.
That’s the point. AB1070, and proposed legislation like it in other states, is a manifestation of hostility toward Latinos. In a word, bigotry.
I speak of hostility toward illegal immigrants and hostility toward Latinos as the same phenomenon. This is because the hostility toward illegal immigrants is so un-tethered to fact that I perceive beneath it a racial hostility.
b. Puzzling contradiction.
Opposition to illegal immigrants is based on inherently opposite reasons. The anti-illegal-immigrant agitators claim that two negative characteristics typify illegal immigrants: they steal our jobs, and they commit atrocious crimes. But people who work hard typically don't commit crimes. And hardened criminals – the kind who carry drugs into the country and leave decapitated corpses in the desert – typically don’t hold jobs. The anti-immigrant agitators should make up their minds.
c. "Anchor babies".
"Anchor babies" is an urban legend that illegal immigrants give birth in America to manipulate immigration rules, clearing an easy avenue for the parent to remain here. The manufactured horror of this invented ploy has led to talk among leading politicians (Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham look up) about amending the Constitution to eliminate birthright citizenship.
But the path to citizenship cleared by an American-born child is lengthy and uncertain, so it undermines belief in this supposed anchor-baby scheme. No child may sponsor his or her parents until he or she is 21. And then the parents must return to their native country for 10 years before realizing any immigration benefit. Those who claim that this far-fetched scheme is widespread provide no proof.
d. Bigotry and the mask of policy.
These myths, about crime, jobs, and anchor babies, demonstrate antagonism toward Latinos. The transformation of this misinformed antagonism into policy-talk demonstrates the ability of bigotry to disguise itself as serious policy.
Sources
Carl Paladino’s racist emails: http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local-beat/Carl-Paladino-Distances-Himself-from-Racist-Sexist-Email-Forwards-90684749.html
Recap of the accusations against, and vindication of, Shirley Sherrod: http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2010-07-21-usda-racism-resignation_N.htm
Glenn Beck on Obama and reparations, settling racial scores, and "deep-seated hatred of White people". http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/03/magazine/03beck-t.html?_r=1&hp
Laura Schlessinger, bigotry, and African Americans supposedly demonizing Whites (transcript and recording): http://mediamatters.org/blog/201008120045
Gingrich and Obama’s "Kenyan, anti-colonial world view" http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/246302/gingrich-obama-s-kenyan-anti-colonial-worldview-robert-costa
Harold Ford, Jr. and the "Harold, call me" political advertisement. http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/26/us/26adbox.html
Immigrants create as many jobs as they occupy, maybe more: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5312900
http://www.ppic.org/main/publication.asp?i=737
http://www.newsweek.com/2010/05/14/why-americans-think-wrongly-that-illegal-immigrants-hurt-the-economy.html
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2010/09/column_the_payoff_from_immigra.html
http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/Files/rc/reports/2010/09_immigration_greenstone_looney/09_immigration.pdf
Jan Brewer and other Arizona politicians are alarmist and wrong about immigrant crime in Arizona. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/09/AR2010070902342.html
Reason behind Arizona’s SB1979 anti-immigrant law: http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1984432,00.html
Analysis of the anchor-baby controversy: http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2010/aug/06/lindsey-graham/illegal-immigrants-anchor-babies-birthright/
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Sunday, September 26, 2010
The Prisoner and the Politician, Part 3
(Parts 1 & 2 below)
7. Introduction, Part 3.
Part 1 compared two lives: a composite life-prisoner, and Newt Gingrich. Part 2 began to scrutinize the comparative virtues and vices of these men. Both have lied: Gingrich certainly, my client probably/maybe. Part 2 examined why.
8. The prisoner and the politician: comparison, continued.
Let’s examine the comparative consequences of these character flaws, and other revelations.
d. The scope of their failings.
If my client lied about his knowledge of the murder of the house sitter, or his own participation in that crime, at least his lie had no scope. The commissioners and I were his audience, and we are few.
But Gingrich doesn’t lie to the few. He lies to a national audience. And he aspires to speak to the world as President of the United States with his unclean lips.
The scope of my client’s lies is minuscule. The scope of Gingrich’s lies is epic.
e. The effect of their failings.
When Gingrich lies, in addition to insulting the dignity of those he lies to, he deflects his audience from reality and molests their judgment. Based upon what Gingrich says, his credulous followers form opinions. Based on those opinions, they will choose candidates. And they will perpetuate his falsehoods among their friends and relations.
But almost worse than what Gingrich does to his credulous followers is what he does to his followers who penetrate his distortions. Because he is a hero to them, when they see him lie and rise, they are tempted to walk in his ways. This harms their integrity, and that potentially injures their personal and professional lives.
But Gingrich offends against more than his followers. He offends against the nation. Lies are toxic to our national lifeblood. On an individual level, any time we make an important decision – like whom to marry, where to invest our money – we crave accurate information. Who would marry if they knew that their would-be spouse was not kind, but cruel behind a mask of kindness? Who would invest their savings in a company, if they knew that the impressive company profits were only an accounting mirage? That's politics, too. America cannot sail itself to a safe and prosperous future under a delusion-based helm.
f. The burden of their failings.
Except in an eternal sense, Gingrich does not bear the burden of his recent failings; his followers and his country do. As Gingrich rises, we (potentially) fall.
g. Hypocrisy.
Gingrich savages Democrats from his position of moral impoverishment. And as Speaker of the House, he famously made the case against Bill Clinton because of Monica Lewinsky. This, while he himself violated his vows to his second wife.
h. Goodwill.
Gingrich possesses contempt for his followers. Contempt is the cause and effect of his falsehoods. Only contempt for his followers permits him to insult their dignity by lying to them instead of telling them the truth. And he necessarily must have contempt for people who cannot penetrate his transparent lies.
i. Humility and hubris.
Gingrich has wealth and power, and he seeks the highest power in politics. He considers his political rise more important than truth, and that is to say more important than God. Gingrich holds a bastard sense of entitlement to power – a sense of entitlement that overwhelms his fidelity to facts.
j. Future.
But it is hard to see a path to Gingrich’s rehabilitation. He has risen high in the world. He has the acclaim of millions. He has power, fame, and riches. And the consequence is pride. I see no catalyst that might alter the practices by which he has risen.
9. Conclusion.
7. Introduction, Part 3.
Part 1 compared two lives: a composite life-prisoner, and Newt Gingrich. Part 2 began to scrutinize the comparative virtues and vices of these men. Both have lied: Gingrich certainly, my client probably/maybe. Part 2 examined why.
8. The prisoner and the politician: comparison, continued.
Let’s examine the comparative consequences of these character flaws, and other revelations.
If my client lied about his knowledge of the murder of the house sitter, or his own participation in that crime, at least his lie had no scope. The commissioners and I were his audience, and we are few.
But Gingrich doesn’t lie to the few. He lies to a national audience. And he aspires to speak to the world as President of the United States with his unclean lips.
The scope of my client’s lies is minuscule. The scope of Gingrich’s lies is epic.
When Gingrich lies, in addition to insulting the dignity of those he lies to, he deflects his audience from reality and molests their judgment. Based upon what Gingrich says, his credulous followers form opinions. Based on those opinions, they will choose candidates. And they will perpetuate his falsehoods among their friends and relations.
But almost worse than what Gingrich does to his credulous followers is what he does to his followers who penetrate his distortions. Because he is a hero to them, when they see him lie and rise, they are tempted to walk in his ways. This harms their integrity, and that potentially injures their personal and professional lives.
But Gingrich offends against more than his followers. He offends against the nation. Lies are toxic to our national lifeblood. On an individual level, any time we make an important decision – like whom to marry, where to invest our money – we crave accurate information. Who would marry if they knew that their would-be spouse was not kind, but cruel behind a mask of kindness? Who would invest their savings in a company, if they knew that the impressive company profits were only an accounting mirage? That's politics, too. America cannot sail itself to a safe and prosperous future under a delusion-based helm.
Except in an eternal sense, Gingrich does not bear the burden of his recent failings; his followers and his country do. As Gingrich rises, we (potentially) fall.
Gingrich savages Democrats from his position of moral impoverishment. And as Speaker of the House, he famously made the case against Bill Clinton because of Monica Lewinsky. This, while he himself violated his vows to his second wife.
Gingrich possesses contempt for his followers. Contempt is the cause and effect of his falsehoods. Only contempt for his followers permits him to insult their dignity by lying to them instead of telling them the truth. And he necessarily must have contempt for people who cannot penetrate his transparent lies.
Gingrich has wealth and power, and he seeks the highest power in politics. He considers his political rise more important than truth, and that is to say more important than God. Gingrich holds a bastard sense of entitlement to power – a sense of entitlement that overwhelms his fidelity to facts.
But it is hard to see a path to Gingrich’s rehabilitation. He has risen high in the world. He has the acclaim of millions. He has power, fame, and riches. And the consequence is pride. I see no catalyst that might alter the practices by which he has risen.
Saturday, September 25, 2010
The Prisoner and the Politician, Part 2
(Part 1 below.)
4. Introduction, Part 2.
Part 1 juxtaposed two lives: a composite life-prisoner, and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich. The lifer committed a revolting murder. His undeserving victim paid the penultimate price, and her family suffers to this day. Gingrich is a prominent Republican leader, a hero to many, and he aspires to be President of the United States.
5. The prisoner and the politician: comparison.
Here’s the first three of a 10-point moral comparison of Gingrich and the lifer.
a. Upbringing.
I feel sorrow for someone who grew up in cruel circumstances. A child should be loved and nurtured, not beaten and ignored. Clearly, my client’s upbringing doesn’t mitigate his crime. People who grow up under cruel circumstances can lead upright lives. Few murder. But you have to have some sympathy for someone with such an unhappy early life.
By comparison, Gingrich enjoyed an advantaged upbringing. He had an intact home, regular contact with his natural father, and a step-father who did things like take him to the World War I battlefield of Verdun (where Gingrich had an early political epiphany). Gingrich enjoyed access to higher education.
Gingrich’s natural abilities enabled him to take advantage of these gifts. But they were gifts, and these early advantages make Gingrich unsympathetic in his moral failings -- his serial divorces and his flogging of truth in pursuit of political power. True, Gingrich has risen to impressive political heights. But, unlike my client, he did not have to construct a life on the loose soil of a deprived and afflicted childhood.
b. Trajectory.
The trajectory of my client’s moral life contrasts with Gingrich’s.
My client was a thief and a murder, and that will always be an element of his life story. But over years, my client has reshaped his soul. This is not a modest improvement like new paint on the wall. This is major: some walls going down; others going up; and ceiling windows to let in a lot more light. At some point, my client chose to lift himself out of depravity.
Maybe this was because of his encounter with religion; or his encounter with self-help courses; or his encounter with vocational training; or his stark recognition of the futility of the life of confinement that his crime brought him. The morally focusing effect of prison cannot be assumed, but it cannot be disregarded. But for whatever reason, or whatever combination of reasons, my client is a far better man today than he was when he committed his life crime.
Gingrich was once a brilliant man of ideas. Now he is a demagogue and a liar. He smears. His soul sinks even as his star rises.
c. Temptation.
My client is no saint. To my ear, he falls short of the complete truth when he describes his role in the murder that sent him to prison with a life sentence.
This is a blotch on his rehabilitation. But the temptation before him is freedom – the ability to leave a miserable life of confinement. He wants the simple things that we take for granted. He wants to be able to leave his home in the early evening to walk to a convenience store and buy twelve ounces of chilled orange juice. He wants to be able to eat at Burger King if he feels like Burger King, or Del Taco if he feels like Del Taco. He wants to be able to wade into the Pacific, or fish in a mountain lake.
The desire for freedom is a simple but powerful. If my client portrays himself as better than he was, it is because he addresses commissioners who will decide whether he stays confined or goes free. And he hopes that his minimizing will induce them to judge his past less harshly, so that he may walk as a free man among free people.
As to the recent cell-phone violation, my client suffered loneliness for his son. The cell phone was an instrument of reunion.
Gingrich’s wish is that, to the power and wealth that he already has, more may be added. He lies to weaken his opponents, so that he may rise above them.
6. Conclusion to Part 2.
The last part will discuss who pays for the failings of my client and Gingrich, and what those consequences are.
4. Introduction, Part 2.
Part 1 juxtaposed two lives: a composite life-prisoner, and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich. The lifer committed a revolting murder. His undeserving victim paid the penultimate price, and her family suffers to this day. Gingrich is a prominent Republican leader, a hero to many, and he aspires to be President of the United States.
5. The prisoner and the politician: comparison.
Here’s the first three of a 10-point moral comparison of Gingrich and the lifer.
a. Upbringing.
I feel sorrow for someone who grew up in cruel circumstances. A child should be loved and nurtured, not beaten and ignored. Clearly, my client’s upbringing doesn’t mitigate his crime. People who grow up under cruel circumstances can lead upright lives. Few murder. But you have to have some sympathy for someone with such an unhappy early life.
By comparison, Gingrich enjoyed an advantaged upbringing. He had an intact home, regular contact with his natural father, and a step-father who did things like take him to the World War I battlefield of Verdun (where Gingrich had an early political epiphany). Gingrich enjoyed access to higher education.
Gingrich’s natural abilities enabled him to take advantage of these gifts. But they were gifts, and these early advantages make Gingrich unsympathetic in his moral failings -- his serial divorces and his flogging of truth in pursuit of political power. True, Gingrich has risen to impressive political heights. But, unlike my client, he did not have to construct a life on the loose soil of a deprived and afflicted childhood.
b. Trajectory.
The trajectory of my client’s moral life contrasts with Gingrich’s.
My client was a thief and a murder, and that will always be an element of his life story. But over years, my client has reshaped his soul. This is not a modest improvement like new paint on the wall. This is major: some walls going down; others going up; and ceiling windows to let in a lot more light. At some point, my client chose to lift himself out of depravity.
Maybe this was because of his encounter with religion; or his encounter with self-help courses; or his encounter with vocational training; or his stark recognition of the futility of the life of confinement that his crime brought him. The morally focusing effect of prison cannot be assumed, but it cannot be disregarded. But for whatever reason, or whatever combination of reasons, my client is a far better man today than he was when he committed his life crime.
Gingrich was once a brilliant man of ideas. Now he is a demagogue and a liar. He smears. His soul sinks even as his star rises.
c. Temptation.
My client is no saint. To my ear, he falls short of the complete truth when he describes his role in the murder that sent him to prison with a life sentence.
This is a blotch on his rehabilitation. But the temptation before him is freedom – the ability to leave a miserable life of confinement. He wants the simple things that we take for granted. He wants to be able to leave his home in the early evening to walk to a convenience store and buy twelve ounces of chilled orange juice. He wants to be able to eat at Burger King if he feels like Burger King, or Del Taco if he feels like Del Taco. He wants to be able to wade into the Pacific, or fish in a mountain lake.
The desire for freedom is a simple but powerful. If my client portrays himself as better than he was, it is because he addresses commissioners who will decide whether he stays confined or goes free. And he hopes that his minimizing will induce them to judge his past less harshly, so that he may walk as a free man among free people.
As to the recent cell-phone violation, my client suffered loneliness for his son. The cell phone was an instrument of reunion.
Gingrich’s wish is that, to the power and wealth that he already has, more may be added. He lies to weaken his opponents, so that he may rise above them.
6. Conclusion to Part 2.
The last part will discuss who pays for the failings of my client and Gingrich, and what those consequences are.
The Prisoner and the Politician, Part 1
1. Introduction: life sentences.
I might prefer a prisoner to a politician.
In my law practice, many of my clients are lifers. A lifer has been sentenced to prison for life. In California, a life sentence can be irrevocable, or it can come with the possibility of release – a.k.a. parole. All of my lifer clients have the possibility of parole. My duty is go with my clients before commissioners of the parole board and advocate for them. It is hard job, because parole is hard to obtain. It is harder for my clients than for me.
Most of my lifers are murderers. Some have killed multiple victims. One client killed a man, got released on parole, and then killed another man. Some of my clients committed lesser-but-still-grave offenses, such as kidnaping or intentional mayhem.
My friends wonder what it is like to interact with murderers. It feels very normal. Maybe that’s because they are on best behavior with me, but I don’t think so. Almost all of them have, at least to some degree, reformed. You can usually see this in their prison records: indifferent or hostile to prison rules coming in; increasing conformity to the rules as time goes by.
Recently, I watched a famous politician on the internet. I reacted to him in the way that my friends expect me to react to my clients. I was disgusted. On reflection, I discovered that I feared my clients less, and respected them more, than this politician.
2. The prisoner and the politician: biographies.
That might sound hyperbolic. Let me justify my opinion by drawing a comparison between the prisoners and the politician. I’ll start by talking about their biographies.
a. The prisoner.
My client did not know his biological father. He was physically abused by his step-father. His mother did not protect him, in part because she was often drunk. He did poorly in school.
Because my client got along poorly with his mother and his step-father, during high school he moved in with a man he worked for. That man molested him.
In his late teens, my client burglarized a relative’s home. A house-sitter interrupted the burglary, and my client’s accomplice beat her to death. My client claims that he did not witness the beating, nor know about it until it was almost over. But perhaps he deliberately minimizes his knowledge of the crime or his involvement in it, or both.
My client has labored to rehabilitate himself during his decades in prison. He has taken many courses about anger and violence. He has regularly attended Alcoholics Anonymous and knows his 12-steps. He has acquired vocations in prison.
His early prison career was marked by many 115's – serious rules violations. Now, not so much. But he did within months of his parole hearing pick up a 115 for possession of contraband – a smuggled cell phone.
He had the cell phone because wanted to be able to talk unrestrictedly with his son. A correctional officer explained to me that cell phones are a security risk because any un-monitored prisoner contact with the outside is perilous; but that most prisoners who possess this contraband do so because they miss their families.
b. The politician.
As for his upbringing, his parents were divorced when he was little, but his mother’s second husband, an Army officer, adopted him when he was five. He had regular contact with his natural father, a Navy officer.
After he graduated from high school, he followed his high school math teacher to Atlanta. While he studied at Emory University, he married her. After he graduated from Emory, he obtained a Ph.D. from Tulane University. His first job after finishing school was teaching.
After unsuccessful races for Congress, Gingrich was elected to his first term in 1978. During his first term, he divorced his cancer-stricken wife and married his second of three wives.
Gingrich at one time was considered a model for even Democrats for emulate – a man who percolated with brilliance. Presently, a new tactic eclipses his enunciation of brilliant ideas. His new public persona is less glittery with fresh ideas and more focused on scathing attacks, denunciations untethered to truth.
In typical fashion, Gingrich recently warned newly-confirmed Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan away from deciding cases by examining sharia. (Sharia is the law code that derives from the Qur’an.) He threatened that she would not remain in office if she did. The imagined source of Kagan’s attraction to sharia apparently is that, as dean of Harvard Law, she accepted an endowment on behalf of the university. It came from a wealthy Saudi, and its purpose was to create four professorships at Harvard Law to study and teach Islamic finance.
Gingrich knows better. My own law professor taught comparative criminal law; this included study of the Soviet criminal-justice system. But that did not make him a communist. And I studied Greek mythology as a teenager. But I never sacrificed so much as an aphid to Zeus. You can study something – and Islamic finance is important in the world – without wanting it.
This is pure Gingrich in his present incarnation.
3. Part 1 conclusion.
In Part 2, I will begin to construct a 10-point comparison between my client and Gingrich, to say who is more admirable, or less dangerous.
Links
A Gingrich biography: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/newt/boyernewt2.html
A report on a typical scathing speech by Gingrich, including his remarks about Kagel and sharia: http://blogs.abcnews.com/thenote/2010/09/newt-gingrich-kathleen-sebelius-behaving-in-the-spirit-of-soviet-tyranny.html
Kagel and sharia: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/michaeltomasky/2010/aug/05/usa-islam-elena-kagan-sharia-nonsense:
I might prefer a prisoner to a politician.
In my law practice, many of my clients are lifers. A lifer has been sentenced to prison for life. In California, a life sentence can be irrevocable, or it can come with the possibility of release – a.k.a. parole. All of my lifer clients have the possibility of parole. My duty is go with my clients before commissioners of the parole board and advocate for them. It is hard job, because parole is hard to obtain. It is harder for my clients than for me.
Most of my lifers are murderers. Some have killed multiple victims. One client killed a man, got released on parole, and then killed another man. Some of my clients committed lesser-but-still-grave offenses, such as kidnaping or intentional mayhem.
My friends wonder what it is like to interact with murderers. It feels very normal. Maybe that’s because they are on best behavior with me, but I don’t think so. Almost all of them have, at least to some degree, reformed. You can usually see this in their prison records: indifferent or hostile to prison rules coming in; increasing conformity to the rules as time goes by.
Recently, I watched a famous politician on the internet. I reacted to him in the way that my friends expect me to react to my clients. I was disgusted. On reflection, I discovered that I feared my clients less, and respected them more, than this politician.
2. The prisoner and the politician: biographies.
That might sound hyperbolic. Let me justify my opinion by drawing a comparison between the prisoners and the politician. I’ll start by talking about their biographies.
My client did not know his biological father. He was physically abused by his step-father. His mother did not protect him, in part because she was often drunk. He did poorly in school.
Because my client got along poorly with his mother and his step-father, during high school he moved in with a man he worked for. That man molested him.
In his late teens, my client burglarized a relative’s home. A house-sitter interrupted the burglary, and my client’s accomplice beat her to death. My client claims that he did not witness the beating, nor know about it until it was almost over. But perhaps he deliberately minimizes his knowledge of the crime or his involvement in it, or both.
My client has labored to rehabilitate himself during his decades in prison. He has taken many courses about anger and violence. He has regularly attended Alcoholics Anonymous and knows his 12-steps. He has acquired vocations in prison.
His early prison career was marked by many 115's – serious rules violations. Now, not so much. But he did within months of his parole hearing pick up a 115 for possession of contraband – a smuggled cell phone.
He had the cell phone because wanted to be able to talk unrestrictedly with his son. A correctional officer explained to me that cell phones are a security risk because any un-monitored prisoner contact with the outside is perilous; but that most prisoners who possess this contraband do so because they miss their families.
As for his upbringing, his parents were divorced when he was little, but his mother’s second husband, an Army officer, adopted him when he was five. He had regular contact with his natural father, a Navy officer.
After he graduated from high school, he followed his high school math teacher to Atlanta. While he studied at Emory University, he married her. After he graduated from Emory, he obtained a Ph.D. from Tulane University. His first job after finishing school was teaching.
After unsuccessful races for Congress, Gingrich was elected to his first term in 1978. During his first term, he divorced his cancer-stricken wife and married his second of three wives.
Gingrich at one time was considered a model for even Democrats for emulate – a man who percolated with brilliance. Presently, a new tactic eclipses his enunciation of brilliant ideas. His new public persona is less glittery with fresh ideas and more focused on scathing attacks, denunciations untethered to truth.
In typical fashion, Gingrich recently warned newly-confirmed Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan away from deciding cases by examining sharia. (Sharia is the law code that derives from the Qur’an.) He threatened that she would not remain in office if she did. The imagined source of Kagan’s attraction to sharia apparently is that, as dean of Harvard Law, she accepted an endowment on behalf of the university. It came from a wealthy Saudi, and its purpose was to create four professorships at Harvard Law to study and teach Islamic finance.
Gingrich knows better. My own law professor taught comparative criminal law; this included study of the Soviet criminal-justice system. But that did not make him a communist. And I studied Greek mythology as a teenager. But I never sacrificed so much as an aphid to Zeus. You can study something – and Islamic finance is important in the world – without wanting it.
This is pure Gingrich in his present incarnation.
3. Part 1 conclusion.
In Part 2, I will begin to construct a 10-point comparison between my client and Gingrich, to say who is more admirable, or less dangerous.
Links
A Gingrich biography: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/newt/boyernewt2.html
A report on a typical scathing speech by Gingrich, including his remarks about Kagel and sharia: http://blogs.abcnews.com/thenote/2010/09/newt-gingrich-kathleen-sebelius-behaving-in-the-spirit-of-soviet-tyranny.html
Kagel and sharia: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/michaeltomasky/2010/aug/05/usa-islam-elena-kagan-sharia-nonsense:
Monday, September 20, 2010
Hold Fire on Christine O’Donnell’s Financial Hardships
1. Introduction: a pitfall.
To attack Republican Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell of Delaware for her financial hardships is ignorant, shortsighted, and wrong. Her money troubles are widely known. http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/09/15/odonnell.profile/index.html To some progressive commentators, these troubles are a political opportunity of first resort. http://m.dailykos.com/stories/2010/9/19/903213/-.html But that’s bad politics and bad policy.
2. Creating compassion for a bad candidate.
It’s is bad politics because it creates compassion for an otherwise bad candidate. If you don’t know that large numbers of our neighbors have struggled financially or are struggling now, then you need to leave the country club more often. I don’t know the statistics on this. But the householder who frets about debt is an iconic and relatable figure in popular, middle-class culture.
Not since the Great Depression have we encountered a worse economic whirlpool. Personal bankruptcies are rising. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB126263231055415303.html People are losing their homes. Unemployment is painfully high. People who don't find themselves in swirling waters likely know someone who does.
So attacking O’Donnell for financial failures only makes her more like everyone else, or like everyone’s neighbor. It makes her, with her extreme positions, into someone that the ordinary Delaware voter can identify with.
3. Embracing bad policy.
Aside from poor politics, denigrating someone for financial debility is poor policy.
a. The old ways aren’t the best ways.
We forget our history. In centuries past, American voters had to be men of substance. For example, O’Donnell’s home state of Delaware, in 1736, required a would-be voter to prove ownership of fifty acres of land or property worth £40. http://www.history.org/foundation/journal/spring07/elections.cfm
An 18th Century commentator on English law, William Blackstone, explained this property requirement. He said that the weak wills of the poor justified it:
This property requirement disappeared in the 19th Century. It should remain a relic.
b. Poverty doesn’t render unfit.
The point is that Lincoln’s financial struggles contributed to his greatness. It irreplaceably fortified his essential empathy
c. Wealth doesn’t render fit.
And if poverty were to render unfit a would-be office holder, then the opposite would also be true. Financial wealth would equate to political worth. New York gubernatorial candidate Carl Paladino reportedly is worth $150 million. But he is hardly an A-rated candidate; he has a penchant for sending pornographic and racist emails. http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/09/17/carl.paladino/index.html.
It would be error to overcorrect and conclude that wealth disqualifies a candidate. Strong leaders like Franklin Roosevelt, John Kennedy, and Michael Bloomberg refute that. The point is that wealth is wealth, and political leadership is political leadership, and they are not the same.
4. Bribery.
You might argue against candidates with financial troubles because of their vulnerability to pay-to-play politics. Two replies refute this is a modern-day reiteration of Blackstone’s warning against the weak will of the poor.
First, welcome to the modern world. Campaign contributions already win political hearts and minds.
Second, bribery isn’t a product of poverty; it’s a product of greed. Politicians recently entangled in financial scandals weren’t driven to that by their inability to pay bills, any more than politicians lately caught in sexual scandals had no other sexual outlets. Married men tumble sexually.
Instead of financial difficulties, the moving force behind political corruption lies in something John D Rockefeller said. When asked "How much money is enough?", he answered, "Just a little bit more."
Harry Truman proved that neediness need not lead to the exploitation of office. Truman left office with nothing financially to show for it. He returned to his unfashionable Missouri home because couldn’t afford better. (Presidential pensions were not enacted until 1958.) But Truman persistently rejected lucrative post-presidency financial opportunities because he refused to cheapen the presidency by cashing in on it. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/02/opinion/02iht-edjacoby.4775315.html
5. A more representative Senate.
The Senate would benefit from a poor gate-crasher into that high-end assembly.
a. The perspective of the poor.
People who are poor and people who have struggled have more empathy than the wealthy. If I lived on the streets, I would not assume that the well-dressed were the best source for charitable handouts, just because they had money to spare; money to spare is not the issue. I would appeal to people who looked like they struggled, because they have more empathy. Poor neighborhoods frequently are rich in mutual concern and mutual assistance in ways that richer neighborhoods are not.
I’m not saying that O’Donnell falls within this generalization; I don't know. But other hole-shoed candidates might be highly empathetic and highly qualified, and we should not bar them from office by stigmatizing poverty as a substitute for the property requirements of another age.
b. A recent example.
After all, Obama famously struggled early in life and for much of his adult life. When he arrived in Los Angeles to give his breakthrough speech at the 2000 Democratic convention, he tried to use his credit card at the airport, but it was declined. http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN0742632720080107
Obama voted against a 2005 bankruptcy bill enthusiastically endorsed by banks and credit-card companies, that made it harder for consumers to escape crushing debt. http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=109&session=1&vote=00044#name Multi-millionaire John Edwards voted for the bill. Multi-millionaire Hillary Clinton missed the vote because her husband was ill; but she voted for a substantially identical bill in 2001. http://thepage.time.com/obama-statement/
Certainly, this does not completely explain the votes of Obama, Edwards, or Clinton. But it easily might have influenced those votes.
c. The Senate as a rich man’s club.
The Senate historically has been known as a rich man’s club. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,987485,00.html In fact, as a senator, Joe Biden was among the poorest, even though his home was worth half-a-million dollars.
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2008/aug/27/howard-dean/we-should-all-be-so-poor/
Someone who made the Senate a little less rich would bring a little balance.
9. Conclusion: Let’s not lob bombs at financial embarrassment
Recently, a good government group filed a complaint against O'Donnell for illegal use of campaign funds. That might be a piece for another day. This piece is about piling on because of financial hardships.
O’Donnell is a target-rich candidate. So her opponent and the Democrats and their supporters don’t need to and shouldn’t lob their bombs at her financial hardships. We on the left should show restraint.
To attack Republican Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell of Delaware for her financial hardships is ignorant, shortsighted, and wrong. Her money troubles are widely known. http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/09/15/odonnell.profile/index.html To some progressive commentators, these troubles are a political opportunity of first resort. http://m.dailykos.com/stories/2010/9/19/903213/-.html But that’s bad politics and bad policy.
2. Creating compassion for a bad candidate.
It’s is bad politics because it creates compassion for an otherwise bad candidate. If you don’t know that large numbers of our neighbors have struggled financially or are struggling now, then you need to leave the country club more often. I don’t know the statistics on this. But the householder who frets about debt is an iconic and relatable figure in popular, middle-class culture.
Not since the Great Depression have we encountered a worse economic whirlpool. Personal bankruptcies are rising. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB126263231055415303.html People are losing their homes. Unemployment is painfully high. People who don't find themselves in swirling waters likely know someone who does.
So attacking O’Donnell for financial failures only makes her more like everyone else, or like everyone’s neighbor. It makes her, with her extreme positions, into someone that the ordinary Delaware voter can identify with.
3. Embracing bad policy.
Aside from poor politics, denigrating someone for financial debility is poor policy.
a. The old ways aren’t the best ways.
We forget our history. In centuries past, American voters had to be men of substance. For example, O’Donnell’s home state of Delaware, in 1736, required a would-be voter to prove ownership of fifty acres of land or property worth £40. http://www.history.org/foundation/journal/spring07/elections.cfm
An 18th Century commentator on English law, William Blackstone, explained this property requirement. He said that the weak wills of the poor justified it:
The true reason of requiring any qualification, with regard to property, in voters, is to exclude such persons as are in so mean a situation that they are esteemed to have no will of their own. If these persons had votes, they would be tempted to dispose of them under some undue influence or other. This would give a great, an artful, or a wealthy man, a larger share in elections than is consistent with general liberty.Blackstone’s rationale implies large-scale coercion.
This property requirement disappeared in the 19th Century. It should remain a relic.
b. Poverty doesn’t render unfit.
Financial struggles don’t render you unfit for office. Abraham Lincoln famously struggled in early life. His surveying equipment, horse, and saddle were seized and auctioned to pay his debts. His New Salem neighbors rescued his livelihood by buying them back and returning them to him. http://www.mrlincolnandfriends.org/inside.asp?pageID=13&subjectID=1
And when Lincoln arrived in Springfield to set up his law practice, he possessed no money and little personal property. He went into Joshua Speed’s store and negotiated a price for a bed and other household goods. Then he sadly explained to Speed:
And when Lincoln arrived in Springfield to set up his law practice, he possessed no money and little personal property. He went into Joshua Speed’s store and negotiated a price for a bed and other household goods. Then he sadly explained to Speed:
"It is probably cheap enough; but I want to say that cheap as it is I have not money to pay. But if you will credit me until Christmas, and my experiment here as a lawyer is a success, I will pay you then. If I fail in that I will probably never be able to pay you at all."Speed offered to let Lincoln sleep in his commodious bed, which Lincoln accepted, and they formed a lifelong friendship. http://www.mrlincolnandfriends.org/inside.asp?pageID=38&subjectID=2
The point is that Lincoln’s financial struggles contributed to his greatness. It irreplaceably fortified his essential empathy
c. Wealth doesn’t render fit.
And if poverty were to render unfit a would-be office holder, then the opposite would also be true. Financial wealth would equate to political worth. New York gubernatorial candidate Carl Paladino reportedly is worth $150 million. But he is hardly an A-rated candidate; he has a penchant for sending pornographic and racist emails. http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/09/17/carl.paladino/index.html.
It would be error to overcorrect and conclude that wealth disqualifies a candidate. Strong leaders like Franklin Roosevelt, John Kennedy, and Michael Bloomberg refute that. The point is that wealth is wealth, and political leadership is political leadership, and they are not the same.
4. Bribery.
You might argue against candidates with financial troubles because of their vulnerability to pay-to-play politics. Two replies refute this is a modern-day reiteration of Blackstone’s warning against the weak will of the poor.
First, welcome to the modern world. Campaign contributions already win political hearts and minds.
Second, bribery isn’t a product of poverty; it’s a product of greed. Politicians recently entangled in financial scandals weren’t driven to that by their inability to pay bills, any more than politicians lately caught in sexual scandals had no other sexual outlets. Married men tumble sexually.
Instead of financial difficulties, the moving force behind political corruption lies in something John D Rockefeller said. When asked "How much money is enough?", he answered, "Just a little bit more."
Harry Truman proved that neediness need not lead to the exploitation of office. Truman left office with nothing financially to show for it. He returned to his unfashionable Missouri home because couldn’t afford better. (Presidential pensions were not enacted until 1958.) But Truman persistently rejected lucrative post-presidency financial opportunities because he refused to cheapen the presidency by cashing in on it. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/02/opinion/02iht-edjacoby.4775315.html
5. A more representative Senate.
The Senate would benefit from a poor gate-crasher into that high-end assembly.
a. The perspective of the poor.
People who are poor and people who have struggled have more empathy than the wealthy. If I lived on the streets, I would not assume that the well-dressed were the best source for charitable handouts, just because they had money to spare; money to spare is not the issue. I would appeal to people who looked like they struggled, because they have more empathy. Poor neighborhoods frequently are rich in mutual concern and mutual assistance in ways that richer neighborhoods are not.
I’m not saying that O’Donnell falls within this generalization; I don't know. But other hole-shoed candidates might be highly empathetic and highly qualified, and we should not bar them from office by stigmatizing poverty as a substitute for the property requirements of another age.
b. A recent example.
After all, Obama famously struggled early in life and for much of his adult life. When he arrived in Los Angeles to give his breakthrough speech at the 2000 Democratic convention, he tried to use his credit card at the airport, but it was declined. http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN0742632720080107
Obama voted against a 2005 bankruptcy bill enthusiastically endorsed by banks and credit-card companies, that made it harder for consumers to escape crushing debt. http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=109&session=1&vote=00044#name Multi-millionaire John Edwards voted for the bill. Multi-millionaire Hillary Clinton missed the vote because her husband was ill; but she voted for a substantially identical bill in 2001. http://thepage.time.com/obama-statement/
Certainly, this does not completely explain the votes of Obama, Edwards, or Clinton. But it easily might have influenced those votes.
c. The Senate as a rich man’s club.
The Senate historically has been known as a rich man’s club. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,987485,00.html In fact, as a senator, Joe Biden was among the poorest, even though his home was worth half-a-million dollars.
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2008/aug/27/howard-dean/we-should-all-be-so-poor/
Someone who made the Senate a little less rich would bring a little balance.
9. Conclusion: Let’s not lob bombs at financial embarrassment
Recently, a good government group filed a complaint against O'Donnell for illegal use of campaign funds. That might be a piece for another day. This piece is about piling on because of financial hardships.
O’Donnell is a target-rich candidate. So her opponent and the Democrats and their supporters don’t need to and shouldn’t lob their bombs at her financial hardships. We on the left should show restraint.
Saturday, September 18, 2010
The Pleasure of It
So I was taken back by a conversation I had with a friend. He is a lawyer, but he also is a philosopher by training. And he is a writer of (unpublished) letters to the editor. Sensing a Man with Things on his Mind, I solicited him to join the universe of bloggers. But he doubted that he had any recipe for a blog that would draw a hungry following.
A hungry following? Seriously? He says this to me, who, on any given day, doesn’t have enough blog visitors to serve as pallbearers at my funeral?
Yet here I go again.
I learned to love writing late in life. Starting in my fifties, I got excited about how some words mesh in a sentence, and I learned to enjoy manufacturing metaphors and similes. I now write with a thesaurus close by, to find the best word, and a dictionary, to make sure that it is the right word. I study what words are funny and what words are serious. (Pistachio is funny; almond is serious.) Late into the night, I read essays and books not just for the subject, but because the author takes me to school about the writing craft.
To say you will blog only if you know that you will attract a wide following is like saying that you will have children only if you know that they will grow up to be generals and senators. Accomplished offspring are a good thing. Acclaim is a good thing. But if fame never RSVPs me, that won’t shrink my joy in writing or burden me with a sense of failure.
It would be great to be a Joan Didion or a Maureen Dowd. But writing is like any occupation, pyramid-shaped, with the few and famous at the tapered top, down to the rest of us, unacclaimed, at the broad base.
I hope that people will visit my blog at least until nobody lives who has a living memory of me. When I am dust, my writings might provoke a thought or two.
And yet. Part of me hopes that my blog catches on. I even fantasize that a big-time website will discover me and invite me to post with them. And pay me to do it. As much as I love practicing law, I would be thrilled to earn a living by writing about ideas that interest me. We all have dreams.
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Lawyers who Lie
1. Lies: a true story.
A lawyer from [Orange County law firm] opposed my motion for attorney’s fees with a brief dense with lies. Five-lies-on-a-page dense. This-drains-me dense. Pull-back-the-refrigerator-and-watch-the-cockroaches-stream-up-the-wall dense. And he didn’t only lie about things beyond proof – like what motives percolated under his skull. He lied about record evidence.
He and my law partner had had a meeting at his office, and this lawyer had had a court reporter record the meeting. He claimed in his brief that my law partner had refused to engage the issues at hand, but instead had obsessed about the attorney’s fees my law partner wanted to win. This made my law partner look shallow and greedy, an impression sure to sour the judge on our cause.
The lawyer attached the transcript from the meeting to his brief. I examined it. His claim that my law partner had obsessed about attorney’s fees was no exaggeration. It was outright fabrication. There was no mention of attorney fees in the entire 20 pages of the transcript. Nada. Null. Nyet. Zero. Zip.
To be clear: this lawyer made corrupt claims that could be proved so just by reading a transcript. He himself supplied that transcript to the judge and to me precisely so that we could see whether he was telling the truth.
This is more than inexplicable. It is dead-hooker-in-the-freezer inexplicable.
2. Lies as a growth industry.
This is also increasingly common. There have always been lawyers willing to exploit your inability to prove them wrong. Increasingly, though, contrary proof doesn’t matter. It’s like the philanderer in caught in bed with his mistress, telling his wife, "Who are you going to believe, me or your eyes?"
Another example: a prosecutor named [name withheld] filed a brief to gain the opportunity to continue to prosecute my client. He lied in the brief. To prove his points, he cited page and line of a hearing transcript. The problem was that the evidence wasn’t there. It was nowhere in the transcript. His whole Statement of Facts, a page long, contained one – one – sentence without a falsehood. It wasn’t just lying. It was an orgy of misrepresentations.
It torments me that a prosecutor, with all of his power to ruin lives, would lie to try to put a man in prison. St. Augustine wrote the Christian classic Confessions. In it he regretted that in his early life he taught rhetoric to would-be lawyers. But by way of mitigation, he explained that he taught the tricks of rhetoric so that the guilty might go free, not so that the innocent might suffer.
I’ve given two examples, but I could go on.
3. Stabbing the heart of the profession.
As pernicious as lying is in a prosecutor, it is unpardonable in any lawyer. After all, truth and justice supposedly are our reason for being, our whole purpose. To think that we can grow justice from lies is like thinking that we can water plants with piss. And falsehoods poison the pursuit of truth.
So when a lawyer lies, he stabs the heart of our profession. Like when a pastor molests a young boy, afflicting him with a life-long spiritual malaise. Or when a doctor makes his patient sick. Or when a police officer arrests an innocent man.
Not only lawyers lie. But because the justice system is entrusted to our ministrations, lying is betrayal. And because the justice system is dedicated to the discovery of truth, and truth is sacred, lying lawyers desecrate that system.
4. Personal confession.
I don’t want to present painted-on piety. I have had clients whom I suspected of lying, or who were not completely honest. And falsehoods are not unknown to my own unclean lips. But I’m a amateur, a dilettante. I’m the guy in the weekend touch-football league watching a pro quarterback. I’m a rag-picker among dissemblers. But I know swami masters of mendacity. I know aristocrats of verbal embroidery.
5. Scruples leave, but sensitivity remains.
Lying might be more common and less cabined than before, but one thing hasn’t changed: sensitivity. People with no scruple about lying resent being called liars. Of two prosecutors whom I have called out for factual inventiveness in the last two years, neither now speaks to me. But if that is the price of speaking the truth, I welcome their hatred.
I suppose that these prosecutors have no choice. After all, if they let me call them liars, soon everybody would. Their life is the opposite of the aphorism: "Take care of your character, and your reputation will take care of itself." They think their reputations are under attack from me; but their reputations really are under attack from their characters.
6. Tracing origins.
Why the flood of falsehoods in these times? No easy answer presents itself. But I suspect that it has something to do with the ascent of lies in politics and the media. Lies stream from high office and from costly media centers. Success and status make mendacity appear to be the easy way to rise to the top.
And judges seem indifferent to dishonesty. I have never seen a judge penalize a lawyer for lying. This permissiveness emboldens the veracity-impaired. With judges unwilling to penalize dishonesty, the upside is winning, and there is no obvious downside.
Looking for a religious reason for this infernal trend, maybe we live in an era of cheap grace. We believe that salvation is easy. It’s all grace. At one time, the concept of grace-plus-nothing was a humble acknowledgment of our entire dependence on God for our salvation. That grace evoked gratitude, and that gratitude evoked effort to please the one who conferred salvation. But in this era of take-for-granted grace, we feed at the table of sin, and when the grim reaper presents the check, we jamb our thumb over our shoulder and say, "Give that to the guy over there, dying on the cross." So, to the modern American mind, lying or truth telling isn’t a matter of hell or heaven.
But the problem is not only a feeble theology of grace. Quasi-rigorous religious sensibility is increasingly rare. Truth be told, few among us care more to please God than to satisfy our craving for comfort, property, consumer goods, and stimulation.
7. Earthquake warning.
It drains me to deal with liars. I was drained to deal with this brief I talked about at the beginning. Facts and reality are the foundation of everything else. On a foundation of facts, we construct values, love, politics, future plans, finances, health-care decisions, family choices, friendships, and religion. When confronted not just with lies but with brazen lies that proclaim that truth doesn’t matter, it’s like fissures open up beneath me.
And these fissures threaten society’s foundation. Democracy depends upon debate. We debate values, ideas, the direction of our country, and who should lead it. But we can’t effectively debate these high matters if we lack agreement on basic facts. Ability to agree on basic facts cannot be assumed in these times.
8. The promise.
If lying succeeds, why tell the truth? Someone I respect recently said that if lying succeeds, it’s brilliant to lie. Why is he wrong? For two reasons. First, in God there is no shadow of turning; his adversary is the liar and the father of lies. When you chose to be a truth teller or a liar, you take sides. Second, if you tell the truth, you dwell in fellowship with other truth tellers. You live in their respect. That fellowship and that respect have innate value.
A lawyer from [Orange County law firm] opposed my motion for attorney’s fees with a brief dense with lies. Five-lies-on-a-page dense. This-drains-me dense. Pull-back-the-refrigerator-and-watch-the-cockroaches-stream-up-the-wall dense. And he didn’t only lie about things beyond proof – like what motives percolated under his skull. He lied about record evidence.
He and my law partner had had a meeting at his office, and this lawyer had had a court reporter record the meeting. He claimed in his brief that my law partner had refused to engage the issues at hand, but instead had obsessed about the attorney’s fees my law partner wanted to win. This made my law partner look shallow and greedy, an impression sure to sour the judge on our cause.
The lawyer attached the transcript from the meeting to his brief. I examined it. His claim that my law partner had obsessed about attorney’s fees was no exaggeration. It was outright fabrication. There was no mention of attorney fees in the entire 20 pages of the transcript. Nada. Null. Nyet. Zero. Zip.
To be clear: this lawyer made corrupt claims that could be proved so just by reading a transcript. He himself supplied that transcript to the judge and to me precisely so that we could see whether he was telling the truth.
This is more than inexplicable. It is dead-hooker-in-the-freezer inexplicable.
2. Lies as a growth industry.
This is also increasingly common. There have always been lawyers willing to exploit your inability to prove them wrong. Increasingly, though, contrary proof doesn’t matter. It’s like the philanderer in caught in bed with his mistress, telling his wife, "Who are you going to believe, me or your eyes?"
Another example: a prosecutor named [name withheld] filed a brief to gain the opportunity to continue to prosecute my client. He lied in the brief. To prove his points, he cited page and line of a hearing transcript. The problem was that the evidence wasn’t there. It was nowhere in the transcript. His whole Statement of Facts, a page long, contained one – one – sentence without a falsehood. It wasn’t just lying. It was an orgy of misrepresentations.
It torments me that a prosecutor, with all of his power to ruin lives, would lie to try to put a man in prison. St. Augustine wrote the Christian classic Confessions. In it he regretted that in his early life he taught rhetoric to would-be lawyers. But by way of mitigation, he explained that he taught the tricks of rhetoric so that the guilty might go free, not so that the innocent might suffer.
I’ve given two examples, but I could go on.
3. Stabbing the heart of the profession.
As pernicious as lying is in a prosecutor, it is unpardonable in any lawyer. After all, truth and justice supposedly are our reason for being, our whole purpose. To think that we can grow justice from lies is like thinking that we can water plants with piss. And falsehoods poison the pursuit of truth.
So when a lawyer lies, he stabs the heart of our profession. Like when a pastor molests a young boy, afflicting him with a life-long spiritual malaise. Or when a doctor makes his patient sick. Or when a police officer arrests an innocent man.
Not only lawyers lie. But because the justice system is entrusted to our ministrations, lying is betrayal. And because the justice system is dedicated to the discovery of truth, and truth is sacred, lying lawyers desecrate that system.
4. Personal confession.
I don’t want to present painted-on piety. I have had clients whom I suspected of lying, or who were not completely honest. And falsehoods are not unknown to my own unclean lips. But I’m a amateur, a dilettante. I’m the guy in the weekend touch-football league watching a pro quarterback. I’m a rag-picker among dissemblers. But I know swami masters of mendacity. I know aristocrats of verbal embroidery.
5. Scruples leave, but sensitivity remains.
Lying might be more common and less cabined than before, but one thing hasn’t changed: sensitivity. People with no scruple about lying resent being called liars. Of two prosecutors whom I have called out for factual inventiveness in the last two years, neither now speaks to me. But if that is the price of speaking the truth, I welcome their hatred.
I suppose that these prosecutors have no choice. After all, if they let me call them liars, soon everybody would. Their life is the opposite of the aphorism: "Take care of your character, and your reputation will take care of itself." They think their reputations are under attack from me; but their reputations really are under attack from their characters.
6. Tracing origins.
Why the flood of falsehoods in these times? No easy answer presents itself. But I suspect that it has something to do with the ascent of lies in politics and the media. Lies stream from high office and from costly media centers. Success and status make mendacity appear to be the easy way to rise to the top.
And judges seem indifferent to dishonesty. I have never seen a judge penalize a lawyer for lying. This permissiveness emboldens the veracity-impaired. With judges unwilling to penalize dishonesty, the upside is winning, and there is no obvious downside.
Looking for a religious reason for this infernal trend, maybe we live in an era of cheap grace. We believe that salvation is easy. It’s all grace. At one time, the concept of grace-plus-nothing was a humble acknowledgment of our entire dependence on God for our salvation. That grace evoked gratitude, and that gratitude evoked effort to please the one who conferred salvation. But in this era of take-for-granted grace, we feed at the table of sin, and when the grim reaper presents the check, we jamb our thumb over our shoulder and say, "Give that to the guy over there, dying on the cross." So, to the modern American mind, lying or truth telling isn’t a matter of hell or heaven.
But the problem is not only a feeble theology of grace. Quasi-rigorous religious sensibility is increasingly rare. Truth be told, few among us care more to please God than to satisfy our craving for comfort, property, consumer goods, and stimulation.
7. Earthquake warning.
It drains me to deal with liars. I was drained to deal with this brief I talked about at the beginning. Facts and reality are the foundation of everything else. On a foundation of facts, we construct values, love, politics, future plans, finances, health-care decisions, family choices, friendships, and religion. When confronted not just with lies but with brazen lies that proclaim that truth doesn’t matter, it’s like fissures open up beneath me.
And these fissures threaten society’s foundation. Democracy depends upon debate. We debate values, ideas, the direction of our country, and who should lead it. But we can’t effectively debate these high matters if we lack agreement on basic facts. Ability to agree on basic facts cannot be assumed in these times.
8. The promise.
If lying succeeds, why tell the truth? Someone I respect recently said that if lying succeeds, it’s brilliant to lie. Why is he wrong? For two reasons. First, in God there is no shadow of turning; his adversary is the liar and the father of lies. When you chose to be a truth teller or a liar, you take sides. Second, if you tell the truth, you dwell in fellowship with other truth tellers. You live in their respect. That fellowship and that respect have innate value.
Saturday, September 11, 2010
"The Great Burning", a Short Film
“The Great Burning”Title.
Screen text:
“The World thinks that the Koran burning in Gainesville, Florida did not take place. But we have discovered a videotape, made public here for the first time.”
A close-up of a roadside municipal sign:
Gainesville, Florida
Population 125,904
“Sports drinks started here.”
A close-up of a Bible with a cross prominent on its cover. Fingers holding the Bible are visible. The person holding the Bible pulls it back, revealing the Pastor’s stern face staring into the camera. He has a pink face, a white ex-pro-wrestler-turned-biker mustache, and a white over-forested pompadour.
Pastor:
"Today we stand up ‘n’ stand out. Stand up for what we believe. [Holds up the Bible.] Stand out from the ways of the World. [Makes sweeping gesture as if to brush away the World.] Today, we’re burnin’ us a table-ful o’ Korans. [Pronounced KO - RANS.]"
Medium shot. The Pastor looks away from the camera, over his right shoulder, and points to a table behind him. The table is filled with stacked books. Next to the books is a portly, blank-faced congregant. The Pastor returns to looking into the camera.
Pastor:
"And the high and the mighty, they said, 'Oh, no, no, no! You can’t do that! What about peaceful Allah worshipers? What about our so-called friends in the Middle East?'”
The Pastor looks back at the table, then back at the camera.
Pastor:
"But we say, 'Who’s gonna start somethin’, if we don’t?' Today we make us some history. The fuel is primed, and the bonfire is ready to be lit."
The Pastor looks over his right shoulder at the table behind him while extending his left hand the other way to a person off screen.
Pastor:
"Rufus?"
The Pastor starts moving his reaching left hand in a circle, as if impatient. As he does so, a hand appears from off screen, near his left hand, holding a lit cigarette lighter. The Pastor is still looking behind him at the table. The hand with the flame circles, as if trying to dock with the Pastor’s circling hand. The portly congregant lifts his hands in mute warning, looking anxious.
Suddenly, the flame touches the Pastor’s sleeve, and the Pastor’s sleeve ignites. The congregant in the background looks aghast. As flame travels up the Pastor’s arm, the Pastor turns his head and sees it, surprised.
Pastor:
"What ’n Gideon’s grapes?!"
The Pastor hollers and spins as the portly man goes off camera and comes back with a broom. He starts to beat the Pastor with the broom, to put out the flame. Other people, with various sticks, etc, join in beating the Pastor to put out the fire.
Pastor:
"Put it out! Put it out! Do somethin’! I’m a walkin’ trash fire here! Hose me! Get the flame off! For the love of Peter’s pepper, somebody put me out before I incinerate!"
The Pastor goes down, below camera. Another person joins in, beating the pastor with a shoe, to put out the fire. Someone comes in with a fire extinguisher and fires it down at the Pastor. The Pastor continues to holler.
Pastor:
"Put it out! Put it out! I’m fricasseeing here! Put it out! It burns, dang it, it burns! Now quit hittin’ me, boys, that ain’t doin’ no good! Ya’ think you’re helpin’, do ya?! Call the fire department! Call an ambulance! Who’s hittin’ me with that dang shoe?!"
Suddenly, the pastor stands. He is engulfed in flames. He flees to the right. Most follow him, but the portly congregant stays back, watching everybody else go.
Pastor:
"I’m a burnt biscuit! I’m a scorched fritter! I’m a toasted toadstool!"
Off-screen voice:
"Stay still, will ya’! Stupid bitch, now I’m on fire!"
A gate slams, followed by silence.
The remaining congregant picks up a Koran from the table and opens it, glances in it, and glances in the direction of the Pastor.
Credits.
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
Do Texans Say the Pledge of Allegiance?
1. Introduction.
I want to watch Governor Rick Perry of Texas say the Pledge of Allegiance. I want to watch his lips as he does. What does he do when he comes to the part about “indivisible”? Does he pronounce the word, or does he let his lips go slack in the moment that others affirm national unity?
Because Perry famously spoke about Texas seceding from the Union. I’m just asking – does he believe in the Pledge of Allegiance, or is it just a ritual to him, like saying “bless you” when somebody sneezes?
2. A lot of talk.
In fact, it’s not just Governor Perry. It’s others, too. It’s still possible to find un-interred bones at Gettysburg, but some people will not shut up.
3. Pious rhetoric?
But I don’t want to be shallow or pious. Maybe I should ask – maybe we all should ask for ourselves – what it would take for my fidelity and my country to part ways. How far would the government have to go? I would be aghast if the government shuttered basic freedoms, like the right to vote or the right to a jury of one’s peers. I would be stricken if the government killed peaceful protesters.
4. Past and future.
But if these things alone made me stop being a stakeholder in my country, my allegiance would have left already. In 1970, Ohio Army National Guard troops at Kent State killed peaceful protesters. And southern states in times past denied African Americans the right to vote and the right to sit on juries. The South routinely, if grudgingly, conceded civil rights to persons of color only when forced to by federal law – federal law that the federal government had means to enforce. The cure for these ills was not insurrection; it was the rule of law.
But what if America became like a Phillip K Dick dystopia? What if freedoms were widely withheld? Or if one power so dominated media or means of income that democracy became farcical – like nominally-democratic modern Venezuela? How far could a moral person go to oppose such a government?
5. History’s (partial) answer.
History hints at an answer in the lives of Mahatma Gandhi, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and Nelson Mandela. These heroes changed history through self-sacrifice. In advancing their beliefs, they did not make others pay what they themselves were unwilling to pay. They paid with imprisonment. Some of their followers, and Dr. King himself, paid with their lives. It is powerful to lay down your life or liberty for your beliefs. And willingness to pay a high price gives those beliefs authenticity and legitimacy.
So you could argue that a moral person could go as far as the self-sacrificing practices of these heroes of non-violence. And to embrace suffering like they did confers legitimacy on a cause.
This willingness to embrace suffering is at least a partial answer. It distinguishes Gandhi, King, and Mandela from a Timothy McVeigh, the Oklahoma City Bomber, who shifted the burden of his beliefs to innocent victims.
6. Righteous murder?
But willing suffering, even willing death, is no perfect gage of the worth of the cause or the rightness of the act. If it were, it would legitimize suicide bombers.
Looking at Gandhi, King, and Mandela, those apostles of non-violence, and looking at the Timothy McVeighs of the world, and their murder and mayhem, maybe the moral is that murder is always a mistake. To quote Gandhi, "I am prepared to die, but there is no cause for which I am prepared to kill." Self-sacrifice and non-violence in this concept are inseparable.
But what about Dietrich Bonhoeffer? Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a German pastor and theologian. He was a pacifist, and he planned to study non-violence under Gandhi. But he felt called to endure World War II with his countrymen, so he returned to Germany from his place of safety in New York.
But Bonhoeffer could not bear what he found in Germany. This pacifist was so tormented by the slaughter of the Jews that he put aside his pacifism and plotted to kill Hitler. The plot failed, and Bonhoeffer’s part was discovered. He was arrested and hanged.
Though the plot failed, it is hard to say that Bonhoeffer was wrong to join it. But what guiding principle informs a would-be assassin about what camp he belongs in: whether he is, on the one hand, a Bonhoeffer? Or whether he is, on the other hand, a John Wilkes Booth; Charles J. Guiteau; Gavrilo Princip; Carl Austin Weiss; Lee Harvey Oswald; James Earl Ray; Sirhan Sirhan; John Hinckley, Jr.; Ali Agca; Khalid Ahmed Showky Al-Islambouli; Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme; Timothy McVeigh; Yigal Amir; the 9/11 plotters; Richard Reid; Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab; or Nidal Malik Hasan? All thought they did right. But political murder is more often planned or perpetrated by the wicked or the insane than by the good. We must reckon with that truth as a practical consequence of approving, even theoretically, violence against government.
This is particularly true in these times. Incendiary vogue words such as “tyrant” and “socialist” are exploited to incite voters, but they also lodge in fanatical minds and lead to fanatical plots. One hears of Second Amendment solutions, from a speaker who’s grudge is that she opposes the enacted policy of the elected majority. I have heard that there are more death threats against our present President than any other.
7. Conclusion.
This meditation un-eases me. What permits me to publish it is only that it’s highly, highly hypothetical. America shows no signs of becoming unrecognizably evil. If it ever did, I hope that I would do right.
Maybe, in the end, in large matters and small, all we can do is act on our best judgment, and hope that it is sound.
That’s as far as I take this mediation today. It’s not an answer. Maybe some questions are best left padlocked in a basement chest.
This essay is grimmer at the end than it was at the beginning. But it did start with talk of secession. Talk of secession led to our nation’s bloodiest toll of death. So if the grim direction of this essay was not inevitable from its beginning, neither was it unpredictable.
I want to watch Governor Rick Perry of Texas say the Pledge of Allegiance. I want to watch his lips as he does. What does he do when he comes to the part about “indivisible”? Does he pronounce the word, or does he let his lips go slack in the moment that others affirm national unity?
Because Perry famously spoke about Texas seceding from the Union. I’m just asking – does he believe in the Pledge of Allegiance, or is it just a ritual to him, like saying “bless you” when somebody sneezes?
2. A lot of talk.
In fact, it’s not just Governor Perry. It’s others, too. It’s still possible to find un-interred bones at Gettysburg, but some people will not shut up.
3. Pious rhetoric?
But I don’t want to be shallow or pious. Maybe I should ask – maybe we all should ask for ourselves – what it would take for my fidelity and my country to part ways. How far would the government have to go? I would be aghast if the government shuttered basic freedoms, like the right to vote or the right to a jury of one’s peers. I would be stricken if the government killed peaceful protesters.
4. Past and future.
But if these things alone made me stop being a stakeholder in my country, my allegiance would have left already. In 1970, Ohio Army National Guard troops at Kent State killed peaceful protesters. And southern states in times past denied African Americans the right to vote and the right to sit on juries. The South routinely, if grudgingly, conceded civil rights to persons of color only when forced to by federal law – federal law that the federal government had means to enforce. The cure for these ills was not insurrection; it was the rule of law.
But what if America became like a Phillip K Dick dystopia? What if freedoms were widely withheld? Or if one power so dominated media or means of income that democracy became farcical – like nominally-democratic modern Venezuela? How far could a moral person go to oppose such a government?
5. History’s (partial) answer.
History hints at an answer in the lives of Mahatma Gandhi, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and Nelson Mandela. These heroes changed history through self-sacrifice. In advancing their beliefs, they did not make others pay what they themselves were unwilling to pay. They paid with imprisonment. Some of their followers, and Dr. King himself, paid with their lives. It is powerful to lay down your life or liberty for your beliefs. And willingness to pay a high price gives those beliefs authenticity and legitimacy.
So you could argue that a moral person could go as far as the self-sacrificing practices of these heroes of non-violence. And to embrace suffering like they did confers legitimacy on a cause.
This willingness to embrace suffering is at least a partial answer. It distinguishes Gandhi, King, and Mandela from a Timothy McVeigh, the Oklahoma City Bomber, who shifted the burden of his beliefs to innocent victims.
6. Righteous murder?
But willing suffering, even willing death, is no perfect gage of the worth of the cause or the rightness of the act. If it were, it would legitimize suicide bombers.
Looking at Gandhi, King, and Mandela, those apostles of non-violence, and looking at the Timothy McVeighs of the world, and their murder and mayhem, maybe the moral is that murder is always a mistake. To quote Gandhi, "I am prepared to die, but there is no cause for which I am prepared to kill." Self-sacrifice and non-violence in this concept are inseparable.
But what about Dietrich Bonhoeffer? Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a German pastor and theologian. He was a pacifist, and he planned to study non-violence under Gandhi. But he felt called to endure World War II with his countrymen, so he returned to Germany from his place of safety in New York.
But Bonhoeffer could not bear what he found in Germany. This pacifist was so tormented by the slaughter of the Jews that he put aside his pacifism and plotted to kill Hitler. The plot failed, and Bonhoeffer’s part was discovered. He was arrested and hanged.
Though the plot failed, it is hard to say that Bonhoeffer was wrong to join it. But what guiding principle informs a would-be assassin about what camp he belongs in: whether he is, on the one hand, a Bonhoeffer? Or whether he is, on the other hand, a John Wilkes Booth; Charles J. Guiteau; Gavrilo Princip; Carl Austin Weiss; Lee Harvey Oswald; James Earl Ray; Sirhan Sirhan; John Hinckley, Jr.; Ali Agca; Khalid Ahmed Showky Al-Islambouli; Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme; Timothy McVeigh; Yigal Amir; the 9/11 plotters; Richard Reid; Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab; or Nidal Malik Hasan? All thought they did right. But political murder is more often planned or perpetrated by the wicked or the insane than by the good. We must reckon with that truth as a practical consequence of approving, even theoretically, violence against government.
This is particularly true in these times. Incendiary vogue words such as “tyrant” and “socialist” are exploited to incite voters, but they also lodge in fanatical minds and lead to fanatical plots. One hears of Second Amendment solutions, from a speaker who’s grudge is that she opposes the enacted policy of the elected majority. I have heard that there are more death threats against our present President than any other.
7. Conclusion.
This meditation un-eases me. What permits me to publish it is only that it’s highly, highly hypothetical. America shows no signs of becoming unrecognizably evil. If it ever did, I hope that I would do right.
Maybe, in the end, in large matters and small, all we can do is act on our best judgment, and hope that it is sound.
That’s as far as I take this mediation today. It’s not an answer. Maybe some questions are best left padlocked in a basement chest.
This essay is grimmer at the end than it was at the beginning. But it did start with talk of secession. Talk of secession led to our nation’s bloodiest toll of death. So if the grim direction of this essay was not inevitable from its beginning, neither was it unpredictable.
Saturday, September 4, 2010
Not Enemies but Friends
1. Introduction: perspective.
A Holocaust survivor explains why he rejected God:
This paragraph makes my blood freeze and my mouth gape. Such cruelty is unfathomable.
Of all the reactions this description evokes from me, the one I will write about is this: it puts our American era, troubled as it is, into perspective. In particular, the suffering of this unnamed woman, this tormented victim, rebukes a troubling political habit of our time (though one not unique to our time): namely, to harshly judge those on the far side of the political spectrum from us. There is a left/right divide; we are less willing to reach across its span as time goes by. We are becoming a nation of shouters. But harrowing manifestations of real evil like this forbid our overreaction to mere political disagreements.
I don’t say this to be trite. I say this because political disagreements grow into monsters of the mind -- in too many minds, at least. And this harms democracy in America.
2. The infernal politics of division.
Some politicians and media (large and small) so focus Americans on our intramural divisions that we lose sight of our common ground and even of our mutual humanity. This explains today’s highly divisive tactics. Here are some of the tactics that political dividers employ.
a. Wedge issues.
Political dividers resort to wedge issues. The term explains itself.
A premier example of a wedge issue is the demonization of Muslim-Americans. Muslims are only a means to an end in this scheme; though it afflicts them, its objective lies elsewhere. The scheme is in part a high-stakes dare to democratic politicians to stand up for Muslims – and either they gamble their political fortunes for this good purpose (too few do this), or they cave in and look craven. The scheme behind the demonization of Muslims is also to ignite ignorance, fear, and hatred to multiply political followers – in a word, demagoguery. And it succeeds like a lit match put to tinder.
Political dividers accuse the proposed Manhattan mosque's backers, and American Muslims generally, of seeking to impose sharia as the law of the land. http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/lee-smith-sharia/ (Sharia is the code of law based upon the Qur'an.) This is an utterly implausible objective, because it has no remote chance of success. Despite its implausibility, it provokes popular outrage.
Political dividers conflate moderate American Muslims with the murders of 9/11.
They assert, in defiance of fact, that the moderate Muslims behind the proposed Manhattan mosque plan it as a triumphal monument to the 9/11 attack.
http://boston.com/news/nation/articles/2010/05/25/nyc_community_board_oks_ground_zero_mosque_plans/ They portray these moderate Muslims as cartoonish villains sinisterly conniving to torment America in its midst.
They accuse the Muslims among us of plotting world hegemony. http://michellemalkin.com/2007/03/08/gingrichs-baggage-gotten-on-my-knees/ In fact, our Muslims neighbors mostly share more modest goals with the rest of us: to live in peace, to win such prosperity as we can, to raise and protect our families, and to worship the god of our forbears.
Making Muslims a wedge issue serves the politics of division.
Not only Muslims but any minority might be placed as a bet in the political game of wedge issues. Hispanic infants have become fabled “anchor babies” – not conceived for the usual reasons of love or family or slipshod birth control. According to this political urban legend, these babies are products of calculation, conduits when they achieve adulthood for their parents’ citizenship. This fable floats in an evidentiary vacuum. It inflames a certain kind of White voter.
And, of course, the joining in marriage of two persons of the same gender continues to sunder the nation.
b. Provocative language.
Political dividers deploy provocative language.
“Liberal” no longer evokes sufficient loathing. Now, they use “socialist”, evoking the Soviet Union’s Vladimir Lenin and Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez. Minimal familiarity with these tyrants illuminates these tyrants’ tactics, which go far beyond what any American politician could inflict upon an American public accustomed to freedom, due process, and electoral power. Anyone who knows of these tyrants cannot rationally equate them with any American political leader. But political dividers exploit an un-critical audience with their incendiary language.
“Tyranny” is a vogue word. In its current usage, it purports to describe the actions of the party in power, which exercises its prerogative after a majority of Americans democratically put them in the White House and in the majority in Congress. This definition of “tyranny” defies any dictionary. But it provokes loathing. It implies illegitimacy. It stokes a sense of grievance. So political dividers use it.
c. Lies.
Political dividers lie.
It is hard to argue against making health care universal, so that sick people don’t die because they are poor. So opponents of health-care reform invented “death panels”, because “death panels” sounds vile. Death panels were imagined, not legislated. The fabled “death panels” provision of the health-care-reform bill merely paid Medicare doctors when they performed an ordinary, otherwise-unpaid responsibility. That was to help seniors make advance end-of-life decisions, so not to burden their family with those decisions if they themselves became incapacitated. http://www.factcheck.org/2009/08/palin-vs-obama-death-panels/
d. Shouting down democracy.
The oracles of division disrupt democratic processes. Democracy can’t happen if its voices cannot be heard. So democracy suffered at open forums on health-care reform when speakers were shouted down. In miniature, the same thing happens when TV pundits loudly talk over each other to keep each other from expressing a point. This tactic divides us by ensuring that robust, open debate cannot anneal division. It insinuates that some opinions should not be heard.
3. De-legitimization.
One objective of these tactics is to de-legitimize the opposition.
People disagree. That is part of democracy. Though there is large consensus in our democracy – think about all the basic things we generally agree on – debates roll, and sometimes they rage. To say someone is wrong does no harm to democracy; debate nourishes democracy.
But de-legitimization repudiates nourishing democratic disagreement by repudiating those who disagree. It demonizes opponents. It divides and destroys.
De-legitimization lies beneath claims that the President is Kenyan by birth – even though his Honolulu-newspaper birth announcements can be examined by any blogger, citizen, news organization, or random rabble-rouser.
De-legitimization lies beneath claims of dreaded socialism.
De-legitimization lies beneath claims of tyranny.
Disagreement is an American tradition, as American as the Lincoln-Douglas debates. De-legitimization is the opposite of Lincoln-Douglas. It is House Committee on Un-American Activities territory – a territory to which political dividers would exile mainstream leaders, media, and innocent fellow-citizens.
4. A grassroots solution.
We must not tolerate these toxic practices in ourselves or in our own leaders. And we must take grassroots measures to moderate these practices.
a. Engaging.
We must engage our brother-and-sister Americans in non-judgmental civic discourse. We can do this in common areas of condominiums, over coffee in kitchens, in break areas at work, on social networks like Facebook, or in any other forum.
We must defy the temptation to mix only with the like-minded. That habit is reassuring, and it soothes the spirit, but ultimately it inhibits the grassroots free-flow of information and ideas. And that free-flow is oxygen to democracy.
When we participate in civic discourse, we necessarily imply that we are willing to be persuaded as well as to persuade.
And civic discourse serves a purpose beyond persuasion per se. Civil, respectful engagement interrupts the demagogues' claim that decency reposes in only one side. To civilly, respectfully engage undercuts demagogues and dividers.
b. De-legitimizing the de-legitimizers.
We must de-legitimize the de-legitimizers. We can do so in various ways.
I mentioned interrupting the claims of demagogues by practicing civil civic discourse. When we are reasonable and decent, we prove that we are not what the de-legitimizers say we are.
We also can de-legitimize the de-legitimizers by respectfully but firmly rejecting incendiary labels, for ourselves and for our leaders.
And we de-legitimize the de-ligitimizers by speaking the truth in the face of falsehoods. As Justice Louis Brandeis said: “Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants; electric light the most efficient policeman.”
c. Being informed.
We must be informed. Effective civic debate requires knowledge. We must be more than opinion.
This takes effort. Being an informed citizen requires more than listening to pundits opinionate. I don’t mean to hector. But sustained effort can convert a chore into a hobby. After a time, the pursuit of political knowledge begins to match the pleasure with which many of us hoard sports knowledge.
To stay informed, I like the New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/. I subscribe to magazines such as The Atlantic Monthly, The New Republic, The New Yorker, The Economist, Rolling Stone, and Foreign Affairs. Some of these are surprisingly cheap.
There are also non-partisan fact-checking websites that scrutinize political claims and counter-claims. For example, http://www.factcheck.org/ is published by the Annenberg Public Policy Center. Also, http://www.politifact.com/ is published by the St. Petersburg Times. It won a Pulitzer Prize in 2009.
d. Minding the higher objective.
We must keep in mind our higher objective. When we debate, of course we want to persuade. But in divisive times, the higher object must be to cultivate goodwill among people we disagree with. Goodwill among adversaries fortifies democracy, and the importance of a robust democracy dwarfs the importance of success on any particular issue or issues
A conservative friend of mine once boasted that, in Supreme Court case conferences among his fellow justices, conservative justice Antonin Scalia wins every argument. The rejoinder is the question: but did he persuade? The two are not the same. Scalia might undermine his powers of persuasion by his highly readable but highly scathing dissents. Contrast Scalia with epochal chief justices like John Marshall and Earl Warren. Their greatness lay in their ability among politically-divergent colleagues to produce unanimous opinions on controversial issues.
Goodwill is our goal; but goodwill and persuasion go together.
5. Conclusion.
No President presided over a more divided time than Abraham Lincoln. Nor did any President speak greater words of reconciliation than he did. These words are from Lincoln’s First Inaugural Address, delivered when hatred and opposition rent the nation:
We should also, of course, remember Abraham Lincoln’s resoluteness. Speaking reconciliation, he also waged war. Personal decency therefore does not imply weakness or tepid opinions.
We can have it both ways. We can dedicate ourselves to our principles, pursuing them relentlessly, modifying them only for good reason. But we can pursue our principles with decency, we can pursue our principles with civility, we can pursue our principles without breaking bonds of affection with our adversaries of good will. We can reforge broken bonds.
A Holocaust survivor explains why he rejected God:
God had allowed SS troops to snatch a baby from his mother and then use it as a football. When it was a torn lump of flesh they tossed it to their dogs. The mother was forced to watch. Then they ripped off her blouse and made her use it to clean the blood off their boots.http://www.economist.com/node/16886073?story_id=16886073
This paragraph makes my blood freeze and my mouth gape. Such cruelty is unfathomable.
Of all the reactions this description evokes from me, the one I will write about is this: it puts our American era, troubled as it is, into perspective. In particular, the suffering of this unnamed woman, this tormented victim, rebukes a troubling political habit of our time (though one not unique to our time): namely, to harshly judge those on the far side of the political spectrum from us. There is a left/right divide; we are less willing to reach across its span as time goes by. We are becoming a nation of shouters. But harrowing manifestations of real evil like this forbid our overreaction to mere political disagreements.
I don’t say this to be trite. I say this because political disagreements grow into monsters of the mind -- in too many minds, at least. And this harms democracy in America.
2. The infernal politics of division.
Some politicians and media (large and small) so focus Americans on our intramural divisions that we lose sight of our common ground and even of our mutual humanity. This explains today’s highly divisive tactics. Here are some of the tactics that political dividers employ.
a. Wedge issues.
Political dividers resort to wedge issues. The term explains itself.
A premier example of a wedge issue is the demonization of Muslim-Americans. Muslims are only a means to an end in this scheme; though it afflicts them, its objective lies elsewhere. The scheme is in part a high-stakes dare to democratic politicians to stand up for Muslims – and either they gamble their political fortunes for this good purpose (too few do this), or they cave in and look craven. The scheme behind the demonization of Muslims is also to ignite ignorance, fear, and hatred to multiply political followers – in a word, demagoguery. And it succeeds like a lit match put to tinder.
Political dividers accuse the proposed Manhattan mosque's backers, and American Muslims generally, of seeking to impose sharia as the law of the land. http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/lee-smith-sharia/ (Sharia is the code of law based upon the Qur'an.) This is an utterly implausible objective, because it has no remote chance of success. Despite its implausibility, it provokes popular outrage.
Political dividers conflate moderate American Muslims with the murders of 9/11.
They assert, in defiance of fact, that the moderate Muslims behind the proposed Manhattan mosque plan it as a triumphal monument to the 9/11 attack.
http://boston.com/news/nation/articles/2010/05/25/nyc_community_board_oks_ground_zero_mosque_plans/ They portray these moderate Muslims as cartoonish villains sinisterly conniving to torment America in its midst.
They accuse the Muslims among us of plotting world hegemony. http://michellemalkin.com/2007/03/08/gingrichs-baggage-gotten-on-my-knees/ In fact, our Muslims neighbors mostly share more modest goals with the rest of us: to live in peace, to win such prosperity as we can, to raise and protect our families, and to worship the god of our forbears.
Making Muslims a wedge issue serves the politics of division.
Not only Muslims but any minority might be placed as a bet in the political game of wedge issues. Hispanic infants have become fabled “anchor babies” – not conceived for the usual reasons of love or family or slipshod birth control. According to this political urban legend, these babies are products of calculation, conduits when they achieve adulthood for their parents’ citizenship. This fable floats in an evidentiary vacuum. It inflames a certain kind of White voter.
And, of course, the joining in marriage of two persons of the same gender continues to sunder the nation.
b. Provocative language.
Political dividers deploy provocative language.
“Liberal” no longer evokes sufficient loathing. Now, they use “socialist”, evoking the Soviet Union’s Vladimir Lenin and Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez. Minimal familiarity with these tyrants illuminates these tyrants’ tactics, which go far beyond what any American politician could inflict upon an American public accustomed to freedom, due process, and electoral power. Anyone who knows of these tyrants cannot rationally equate them with any American political leader. But political dividers exploit an un-critical audience with their incendiary language.
“Tyranny” is a vogue word. In its current usage, it purports to describe the actions of the party in power, which exercises its prerogative after a majority of Americans democratically put them in the White House and in the majority in Congress. This definition of “tyranny” defies any dictionary. But it provokes loathing. It implies illegitimacy. It stokes a sense of grievance. So political dividers use it.
c. Lies.
Political dividers lie.
It is hard to argue against making health care universal, so that sick people don’t die because they are poor. So opponents of health-care reform invented “death panels”, because “death panels” sounds vile. Death panels were imagined, not legislated. The fabled “death panels” provision of the health-care-reform bill merely paid Medicare doctors when they performed an ordinary, otherwise-unpaid responsibility. That was to help seniors make advance end-of-life decisions, so not to burden their family with those decisions if they themselves became incapacitated. http://www.factcheck.org/2009/08/palin-vs-obama-death-panels/
d. Shouting down democracy.
The oracles of division disrupt democratic processes. Democracy can’t happen if its voices cannot be heard. So democracy suffered at open forums on health-care reform when speakers were shouted down. In miniature, the same thing happens when TV pundits loudly talk over each other to keep each other from expressing a point. This tactic divides us by ensuring that robust, open debate cannot anneal division. It insinuates that some opinions should not be heard.
3. De-legitimization.
One objective of these tactics is to de-legitimize the opposition.
People disagree. That is part of democracy. Though there is large consensus in our democracy – think about all the basic things we generally agree on – debates roll, and sometimes they rage. To say someone is wrong does no harm to democracy; debate nourishes democracy.
But de-legitimization repudiates nourishing democratic disagreement by repudiating those who disagree. It demonizes opponents. It divides and destroys.
De-legitimization lies beneath claims that the President is Kenyan by birth – even though his Honolulu-newspaper birth announcements can be examined by any blogger, citizen, news organization, or random rabble-rouser.
De-legitimization lies beneath claims of dreaded socialism.
De-legitimization lies beneath claims of tyranny.
Disagreement is an American tradition, as American as the Lincoln-Douglas debates. De-legitimization is the opposite of Lincoln-Douglas. It is House Committee on Un-American Activities territory – a territory to which political dividers would exile mainstream leaders, media, and innocent fellow-citizens.
4. A grassroots solution.
We must not tolerate these toxic practices in ourselves or in our own leaders. And we must take grassroots measures to moderate these practices.
a. Engaging.
We must engage our brother-and-sister Americans in non-judgmental civic discourse. We can do this in common areas of condominiums, over coffee in kitchens, in break areas at work, on social networks like Facebook, or in any other forum.
We must defy the temptation to mix only with the like-minded. That habit is reassuring, and it soothes the spirit, but ultimately it inhibits the grassroots free-flow of information and ideas. And that free-flow is oxygen to democracy.
When we participate in civic discourse, we necessarily imply that we are willing to be persuaded as well as to persuade.
And civic discourse serves a purpose beyond persuasion per se. Civil, respectful engagement interrupts the demagogues' claim that decency reposes in only one side. To civilly, respectfully engage undercuts demagogues and dividers.
b. De-legitimizing the de-legitimizers.
We must de-legitimize the de-legitimizers. We can do so in various ways.
I mentioned interrupting the claims of demagogues by practicing civil civic discourse. When we are reasonable and decent, we prove that we are not what the de-legitimizers say we are.
We also can de-legitimize the de-legitimizers by respectfully but firmly rejecting incendiary labels, for ourselves and for our leaders.
And we de-legitimize the de-ligitimizers by speaking the truth in the face of falsehoods. As Justice Louis Brandeis said: “Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants; electric light the most efficient policeman.”
c. Being informed.
We must be informed. Effective civic debate requires knowledge. We must be more than opinion.
This takes effort. Being an informed citizen requires more than listening to pundits opinionate. I don’t mean to hector. But sustained effort can convert a chore into a hobby. After a time, the pursuit of political knowledge begins to match the pleasure with which many of us hoard sports knowledge.
To stay informed, I like the New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/. I subscribe to magazines such as The Atlantic Monthly, The New Republic, The New Yorker, The Economist, Rolling Stone, and Foreign Affairs. Some of these are surprisingly cheap.
There are also non-partisan fact-checking websites that scrutinize political claims and counter-claims. For example, http://www.factcheck.org/ is published by the Annenberg Public Policy Center. Also, http://www.politifact.com/ is published by the St. Petersburg Times. It won a Pulitzer Prize in 2009.
d. Minding the higher objective.
We must keep in mind our higher objective. When we debate, of course we want to persuade. But in divisive times, the higher object must be to cultivate goodwill among people we disagree with. Goodwill among adversaries fortifies democracy, and the importance of a robust democracy dwarfs the importance of success on any particular issue or issues
A conservative friend of mine once boasted that, in Supreme Court case conferences among his fellow justices, conservative justice Antonin Scalia wins every argument. The rejoinder is the question: but did he persuade? The two are not the same. Scalia might undermine his powers of persuasion by his highly readable but highly scathing dissents. Contrast Scalia with epochal chief justices like John Marshall and Earl Warren. Their greatness lay in their ability among politically-divergent colleagues to produce unanimous opinions on controversial issues.
Goodwill is our goal; but goodwill and persuasion go together.
5. Conclusion.
No President presided over a more divided time than Abraham Lincoln. Nor did any President speak greater words of reconciliation than he did. These words are from Lincoln’s First Inaugural Address, delivered when hatred and opposition rent the nation:
We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stre[t]ching from every battle-field, and patriot grave, to every living heart and hearthstone, all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.This must be our maxim.
We should also, of course, remember Abraham Lincoln’s resoluteness. Speaking reconciliation, he also waged war. Personal decency therefore does not imply weakness or tepid opinions.
We can have it both ways. We can dedicate ourselves to our principles, pursuing them relentlessly, modifying them only for good reason. But we can pursue our principles with decency, we can pursue our principles with civility, we can pursue our principles without breaking bonds of affection with our adversaries of good will. We can reforge broken bonds.
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