Objective? Maybe not

Hot Air has an interesting exchange on Fox News, in which reporter Adam Housley calls New York City Councilman Charles Barron a "son of a bitch" on air during a segment of Neil Cavuto's show.

Truth be told, Barron seems to be a full-blown Chavez apologist, at one point calling him a "hero for humanity." So on the merits I find myself on Cavuto's side. That said, Housley's unprofessional tirade is totally unjournalistic. I don't know if that's par for the course for Cavuto's show; if all the field reporters are transparently commentators, fine. But if Housley is presented as a "reporter", it's no wonder Fox has credibility problems.

Cavuto, Fox News, media, politics, midtopia

Jefferson indicted -- finally

I was getting tired of waiting for this.

Louisiana congressman William Jefferson received more than $500,000 in bribes and sought millions more in nearly a dozen separate schemes to enrich himself by using his office to broker business deals in Africa, according to a federal indictment Monday.

The charges came almost two years after investigators raided Jefferson's home in Washington and found $90,000 in cash stuffed in his freezer.

The indictment lists 16 counts, including racketeering, soliciting bribes, wire fraud, money laundering, obstruction of justice and conspiracy. He faces a possible maximum sentence of 235 years.

At least now we know why an indictment took so long: the case was complicated and extensive, with front companies, international contacts and the like.

I have to point out that charges do not equal guilt, and Jefferson vehemently maintains his innocence. But IMO the evidence against him is pretty overwhelming. Not to mention the two associates that have already pleaded guilty to handling bribes -- and fingered Jefferson in the process.

Now that he's actually been indicted, Democrats can punish him more completely. After the FBI raids he lost his seat on the powerful Ways and Means committee; now House Speaker Nancy Pelosi plans to move quickly to take away his one remaining committee seat, on the Small Business Committee. At that point he would essentially be powerless and irrelevant. If and when he is convicted, he would almost certainly be expelled from Congress.

Repellently gleeful noises from certain quarters aside, there is probably nobody happier than Congressional Democrats that indictments have finally surfaced. For months they were saddled with Jefferson's "we all know he's guilty" presence, while being unable to do anything about it. But now they can actually do something to say "we don't condone this."

That said, I'm very interested to see what the Congressional Black Caucus -- the group that gave Jefferson a standing ovation after he was re-elected -- will say. They'll probably just raise the "innocent until proven guilty" trope to avoid either supporting or condemning him. But it's something of a sad commentary that I'm not confident of that.

Finally, let's cross into partisanland and examine the ridiculous standards writers like Mark at Red State think should be applied here.

It’s early in the life of this latest political scandal, but thus far, the silence from Capitol Hill has been deafening.

Um, no on all counts. This isn't the "latest political scandal"; it's a year old. And what silence is he talking about? Pelosi immediately called a press conference to denounce the behavior described in the indictments.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi boldly promised to run the “most open and ethical Congress” in the nation’s history.

I think what really bugs partisan Republicans is that even if Pelosi falls short of that standard, she'll still do better than the most recent Republican-led Congress.

The numbers aren’t in yet, but if a Congress can be judged on the length of time it takes from its installation to the first indictment of a member of the controlling party, than this Congress must have set a new record.

More partisan irrelevance; "length of time from installation to first indictment" is a stupid standard to apply, especially for a scandal that is a year old.

Mark goes on to make some good points about the sluggish operation of the Ethics Committee. But then he launches this whopper.

Pelosi has had her head firmly planted in the sand over Jefferson from the very beginning of the investigation. He was allowed to stand for re-election in November despite being under Federal investigation. He was allowed to keep his seat on the powerful tax law writing House Ways and Means committee in the last Congress, despite being under investigation for accepting bribes. And he was seated by this Congress in January, despite the ongoing investigation.

Let's just list the fatuous nonsense and outright falsehoods.

1. Apparently Pelosi is supposed to decide who can run for office and who can't.

2. Jefferson lost his seat on Ways and Means back in June 2006.

3. The House apparently was supposed to prevent the democratically elected Jefferson from being seated, even though he had not been charged with any wrongdoing.

Note that the standard being applied here is that merely being suspected of wrongdoing should be enough to get you expelled from Congress.

Let's be clear: I think Jefferson is guilty as hell. But we do have this legal thing called "innocent until proven guilty." Further, while the House has the right to decide who it will seat and who it won't, there should be a very high standard for nullifying the will of the voters.

Historically, that has meant resignation from leadership and important positions upon investigation, suspension of nearly all privileges upon indictment and resignation (or expulsion) upon conviction.

And indeed, that's exactly how it played out in the cases of Randy "Duke" Cunningham and Bob Ney, Republicans who resigned soon after cutting plea deals with prosecutors.

Ney, for instance, resigned from the House Administration Committee after he became a target of an investigation related to Jack Abramoff. But he stood for re-election and won the primary race in May, only withdrawing from the general election in August after it became clear he might lose. In September he said he would plead guilty to federal charges, something he actually did in mid-October. But he didn't actually resign until Nov. 3.

According to Red State's brain-dead standard, Republicans should have kicked Ney out of Congress at the beginning of 2006. Instead they let him remain for 11 months more.

I agree that the Ethics Committee should get its butt in gear and start justifying its existence. But beyond that, the thing to recognize and accept is that these sorts of cases take time and follow a predictable arc. Jefferson will eventually get what's coming to him. And while it would be satisfying for the hand of justice to take him down tomorrow, justice is supposed to be both swift and sure. And "sure" takes time if you care at all about individual rights and respecting the will of the people.

Investigation, indictment, trial, sentencing. We've reached the second step, with the third step just around the corner. Assuming the Feds have a solid case -- and I think they do -- step four isn't too far off.

corruption, William Jefferson, politics, midtopia

Now that's a typo

This is funny, though perhaps not for the staffer involved, Steve Wymer.

A staffer in Sen. Wayne Allard's office is wearing some serious egg on his face after dissing first responders in a release that was supposed to ballyhoo his boss's resolution to declare a national day of recognition for police, firefighters, and rescue personnel.

The paragraph in question:

"First responders in Colorado have recently provided critical services in the face of blizzards and tornados," added Allard. "Since I don’t think first responders have really done anything significant in comparison to their counterparts who have dealt with real natural disasters, I have no idea what else to say here…"

Whoops.

Within 19 minutes that was corrected to:

"First responders in Colorado have recently provided critical services in the face of blizzards and tornados," added Allard. "This resolution celebrates them and all first responders serving our nation."

As someone who works with dummy type all the time, I can attest that Wymer is not alone in making this mistake. Everybody in the business probably does it at some point in their career. It's fun and subversive -- until the inevitable screw-up. What you quickly learn is to use neutral words or -- better yet -- easily noticeable nonwords like "XXXXX" or "DGDGDGDGDG".

Wymer was clearly joking, so only the most humorless partisan would try to make a case that he was dissing emergency personnel. The question is whether this reflects poorly on his judgement or maturity. As someone who has done something similar, I'll give him the benefit of the doubt on that one. Hopefully Allard is the forgiving type and Wymer gets a chance to learn his lesson without losing his job.

Allard, humor, politics, midtopia

Bush and the Reagan Republicans

Peggy Noonan sizes up Bush: She doesn't like him, and thinks he's an existential threat to the Republican Party.

What conservatives and Republicans must recognize is that the White House has broken with them. What President Bush is doing, and has been doing for some time, is sundering a great political coalition. This is sad, and it holds implications not only for one political party but for the American future.

The White House doesn't need its traditional supporters anymore, because its problems are way beyond being solved by the base. And the people in the administration don't even much like the base. Desperate straits have left them liberated, and they are acting out their disdain. Leading Democrats often think their base is slightly mad but at least their heart is in the right place. This White House thinks its base is stupid and that its heart is in the wrong place....

Now conservatives and Republicans are going to have to win back their party. They are going to have to break from those who have already broken from them. This will require courage, serious thinking and an ability to do what psychologists used to call letting go. This will be painful, but it's time. It's more than time.

Bush likes to think himself as the inheritor of Reagan's mantle. But increasingly Reagan conservatives are saying the equivalent of "I knew Reagan, Mr. President, and you are no Reagan."

Yet another sign that Bush's isolation extends deep into his own party's base.

Meanwhile, White House counselor Dan Bartlett announced he will resign in July, becoming the latest official to depart as the Bush administration limps toward the finish. On the one hand, a slow and steady exodus is natural at the end of a two-term presidency. On the other hand, as discussed earlier, this particular exodus has begun a good six months or so earlier than expected. Isolation and impotence is not much fun.

Update: A new Rasmussen poll finds that the percent of voters identifying themselves as Republicans has fallen to 30.8%, the lowest number since they began asking the question in January 2004. Democrats have also fallen, but not as much: 36.5%. The number of unaffiliated voters has, as a consequence, hit an all-time high: 32.4%.

Update 2: Another conservative, Rod Dreher, weighs in in agreement, while pointing out that conservatives have only themselves to blame.

So yes, by all means let's turn our backs on this failed presidency, and save what we can, while we can. But let's not kid ourselves: Bush has failed conservatives, yes, but we have also failed ourselves. It doesn't take much courage to stand up for conservative principle to a president as weak as this one has become. It would have taken real courage to stand up for conservative principle in 2002, 2003, 2004, even early 2005. How many did? I know I didn't.

(h/t: Central Sanity)

Bartlett, Noonan, politics, midtopia

Is a recession in the cards?

Back in February I mused about the possibility of a mild recession this year, based on what I was hearing from economists I know.

It may arrive this summer.

The government cut in half its estimate of economic growth in the first quarter, reporting the slowest rate of expansion since the end of 2002....

Growth advanced just 0.6 percent, compared with an initial estimate of 1.3 percent. The chief reasons for the revisions were adjustments to the estimates of imports and business inventories. Imports, which subtract from the gross domestic product, were stronger than the government first thought. At the same time, businesses cut production and accumulated smaller inventory stockpiles.

If you glance at the accompanying graphic, you'll see that it's a big slowdown compared not just to a year ago but also compared to last quarter. And inflation remains a problem (rising at an annual rate of 2.2%), which limits what the Federal Reserve can do to stimulate the economy.

If the trend continues, the second quarter figures -- due out in July -- could show a contraction. The story notes, however, that most economists think the second quarter will show an improvement, thanks to positive news in consumer spending (up more than expected), the housing market (thus far, less bad news than expected), manufacturing output (expanding) and exports (thanks to a weakening dollar). In addition, employers added 157,000 jobs in May, up from 88,000 in April.

But they don't call economics "the dismal science" for nothing: that good news has clouds. Consumer spending, besides being fueled largely by debt, is expected to slack off, the housing market fallout is expected to deepen, a weaker dollar makes things more costly for consumers, and even at 157,000 the number of new jobs is barely keeping up with population growth. And inflation-adjusted median household income has only recently started to rise (see Page 5 of this Census report (pdf))after falling for five straight years.

So as is often the case with economics, there's plenty of data to support whatever prediction you care to make. The economy is clearly slowing down; the question is how quickly it is doing so and how far it will go. And of course, there's the far-more-fun secondary game of "who's fault is it?"

I don't play that game too much. The economy tends to do what it will with only limited influence by the administration. But it seems safe to say that Bush's economic policy has not been an unqualified success: in exchange for massive tax cuts and soaring deficits, we've endured a recession, an anemic recovery and now a slowdown, with wages lagging far behind productivity and corporate profits. Perhaps we cannot blame Bush for those mediocre results, but we can certainly blame him for the huge deficits incurred to no particularly good effect.

Meanwhile, wait for the July economic numbers and hope for good news.

Update: Changed the post title to better reflect the content.

economy, politics, midtopia

Lina Joy may leave Malaysia

Lina Joy, the Malaysian Muslim who is being prevented from officially becoming Christian, is talking about leaving the country -- something of the standard solution for high-profile cases of religious persecution.

"I am disappointed that the Federal Court is not able to vindicate a simple but important fundamental right that exists in all persons: Namely, the right to believe in the religion of one's choice," Joy said in a statement released through her lawyer, Benjamin Dawson.

"The Federal Court has not only denied me that right but (denied it) to all Malaysians who value fundamental freedoms," she said....

[She has] the option to leave the country. Asked if she will take that option, Joy, 43, said in her statement: "It would be extremely difficult to exercise freedom of conscience in the present environment." Dawson, her lawyer, said the media are free to draw their conclusion from the statement.

So it's more a suggestion than an actual plan. But it's hardly surprising. Countries that deny freedom of conscience deserve to lose people, who will vote with their feet rather than live under injustice.

Malaysia, religion, Lina Joy, politics, midtopia

Bush the unhinged?

We're starting to see various "could be true, might not" stories being floated from various quarters, with one thing in common: Bush is losing it, and he's alienating Republicans while doing so. And they're not coming from DailyKos or Moveon.org.

First, in a column in the Dallas Morning News, columnist Georgie Ann Geyer reports the following:

But by all reports, President Bush is more convinced than ever of his righteousness.

Friends of his from Texas were shocked recently to find him nearly wild-eyed, thumping himself on the chest three times while he repeated "I am the president!" He also made it clear he was setting Iraq up so his successor could not get out of "our country's destiny."

A vivid picture, and it sounds eerily similar to this one from a few weeks back (indeed, it's possible they're describing the same event):

we're hearing that some big money players up from Texas recently paid a visit to their friend in the White House. The story goes that they got out exactly one question, and the rest of the meeting consisted of The President in an extended whine, a rant, actually, about no one understands him, the critics are all messed up, if only people would see what he's doing things would be OK...etc., etc.

This is called a "bunker mentality" and it's not attractive when a friend does it. When the friend is the President of the United States, it can be downright dangerous. Apparently the Texas friends were suitably appalled, hence the story now in circulation.

Note, however, another similarity between the two: the allegations are anonymously sourced and entirely uncorroborated.

Then there's this little doozy from the Washington Times:

The Republican National Committee, hit by a grass-roots donors' rebellion over President Bush's immigration policy, has fired all 65 of its telephone solicitors....

The solicitors were indeed fired, that much is true. But take this with a huge grain of salt, because it's anonymously sourced, the RNC denies it, and the Washington Times is not above little hit jobs like this on policies it doesn't like.

Are the stories true? It's impossible to tell, so unless some confirmation pops up the rational answer is "no." But a lot of people -- not all of them Bush haters -- will readily believe them because they're plausible. Bush's immigration policy isn't popular with a significant element of his base. Bush's Iraq misadventure has left him increasingly isolated and at odds with public opinion. The stories are appealing precisely because they're plausible.

But speaking as a frequent Bush critic, let's stick to provable facts. There are enough of those to work with; no sense in trafficking in rumor on top of it. Doing so is what gives rise to conspiracy theories and urban legends, and we have quite enough of those already.

Update: Mary Katharine Ham has a friend who lived the RNC donation story -- from the donor side.

Bush, politics, midtopia

Sex and religion

Slate's Hanna Rosin this week reviewed a provocative new book: "Forbidden Fruit: Sex & Religion in the lives of American teenagers."

What's so provocative about it? The author, Mark Regnerus, a sociology professor at the University of Texas in Austin, did a detailed survey as well as in-depth interviews to correlate religious belief with sexual behavior. And the results are surprising -- or not, depending on your point of view.

Teenagers who identify as "evangelical" or "born again" are highly likely to sound like the girl at the bar; 80 percent think sex should be saved for marriage. But thinking is not the same as doing. Evangelical teens are actually more likely to have lost their virginity than either mainline Protestants or Catholics. They tend to lose their virginity at a slightly younger age—16.3, compared with 16.7 for the other two faiths. And they are much more likely to have had three or more sexual partners by age 17: Regnerus reports that 13.7 percent of evangelicals have, compared with 8.9 percent for mainline Protestants.

And of course, there's the "not enough information" problem.

When evangelical parents say they talk to their kids about sex, they mean the morals, not the mechanics. In a quiz on pregnancy and health risks associated with sex, evangelicals scored very low. Evangelical teens don't accept themselves as people who will have sex until they've already had it. As a result, abstinence pledgers are considerably less likely than nonpledgers to use birth control the first time they have sex. "It just sort of happened," one girl told the researchers, in what could be a motto for this generation of evangelical teens.

Again, not surprising to any advocate of comprehensive sex education. Keeping kids ignorant about sex simply increases the risk to them when they eventually do have sex.

Which they will. Because while "save it for marriage" pledges and abstinence programs may slightly delay a teen's first premarital sexual experience, they do not generally prevent them. So the risk remains, unabated:

he fate of the True Love Waits movement, which began with the Southern Baptist Convention in the '90s, is a perfect example. Teenagers who signed the abstinence pledge belong to a subgroup of highly motivated virgins. But even they succumb. Follow-up surveys show that at best, pledges delayed premarital sex by 18 months -- a success by statistical standards but a disaster for Southern Baptist pastors.

Yowch.

Before getting all smug about short-sighted moralizing, however, consider a few of the book's caveats and other findings. First, a big caveat:

Partly, the problem lies in the definition of evangelical. Because of the explosion of megachurches, vast numbers of people who don't identify with mainstream denominations now call themselves evangelical. The demographic includes more teenagers of a lower socioeconomic class, who are more likely to have had sex at a younger age. It also includes African-American Protestant teenagers, who are vastly more likely to be sexually active.

There also are demographic splits: Southern teens are more likely to have sex than teens in the North, as are those who are less well-off and less well-educated.

Next, there is a group of teens for which abstinence pledges actually work.

Among the mass of typically promiscuous teenagers in the book, one group stands out: the 16 percent of American teens who describe religion as "extremely important" in their lives. When these guys pledge, they mean it. One study found that the pledge works better if not everyone in school takes it. The ideal conditions are a group of pledgers who form a self-conscious minority that perceives itself as special, even embattled.

So truly committed religious teens wait until marriage. This is hardly surprising; they are living out values they strongly believe in, so outside coercion is unnecessary. I would think such teens would abstain until marriage even without abstinence pledges and even if they attend comprehensive sex-ed classes.

For the same reasons -- strong social networks that reinforce the value system -- Mormons and church-going Asians also have high levels of abstinence.

I have not read the book, so I cannot comment on its methodology. But it seems safe to draw some general (and somewhat obvious) conclusions.

1. Teens are remarkably impervious to coercion that goes against their own values or desires.

2. Pressure to remain abstinent at best delays the onset of sex; there is still a need for comprehensive sex education.

3. If you want kids to avoid sex, you must get buy-in from them -- either as a moral value (wait until marriage or adulthood) or a practical matter (the reward isn't worth the risk). This takes more than threats, lectures and good intentions. It takes responsible, loving and frank parenting over a period of years so that your values become their values, too.

4. Comprehensive sex education, contrary to the claims of its moralistic critics, apparently hasn't been interpreted by teens as license to bang like rabbits.

Discussing healthy sexual behavior with your kids can be a tough road to walk, because there's a certain contradiction involved. You're trying to persuade them to wait until they're older while also trying to avoid going overboard and demonizing sex as "dirty" or bad.

But if you've got a good relationship with your teens, it should work out most of the time. Even with my young children, I've found that kids can handle complex issues and moral ambiguity if it's presented forthrightly. Just avoid rules that are oversimplified, overly draconian or simply not mentioned at all. All three approaches may be more comfortable for the parent, but in each case you're either not giving them information they need or the world you describe is so unlike the one they encounter that they'll conclude you're either lying or clueless.

RELATED LINKS
the Weekly Standard praises it. Interestingly, the conservative magazine notes that blue-state teens, while sexually progressive in attitude, actually have sex later than their red-state counterparts and are also more likely to use contraception when they finally do have sex. Yet having accepted that, the reviewer goes on to claim that the abstinence movement has played an important role -- citing the same True Love Waits data I quoted above. But at best that shows that encouraging abstinence only works as part of a comprehensive sex-education curriculum -- most of which have always included abstinence anyway.

On a blog run by his publisher, the author, Mark Regnerus, sounds off about the state of sexual learning in the United States. And in a review-plus-interview by the Austin American-Statesman, Regnerus makes some of the same points I do, specifically that "the idea of 'the talk' has to go away. It must be an ongoing dialogue."

And here's a Q&A he did with the Dallas Morning News, where again he sounds a bit like me: "We have to talk about facts, to be open about the beauty and pleasure of sex, and its mixed emotions and consequences. Tell them the complicated truth about the beauty and frustration of marital sex. Admit there is a gray area.... We all know it. No more hiding."

A Presbyterian minister and professor gives the book high marks, saying there's an interesting insight on every page.

sexuality, religion, politics, midtopia

Religious intolerance, here and abroad

Two examples of religious bigotry today, which helps illustrate the difference between individual and government discrimination.

First, in New Hampshire, an idiot confronted Mitt Romney.

Mitt Romney's visit to New Hampshire started on a sour note Tuesday when a restaurant patron declared he would not vote for the Republican presidential contender because of his faith.

"I'm one person who will not vote for a Mormon," Al Michaud of Dover shouted at Romney when the former Massachusetts governor approached him inside Harvey's Bakery.

The kicker? This wasn't someone from the religious right; it was a self-described "liberal" who said he plans to vote for Hillary Clinton.

There are plenty of questions about Mr. Michaud. If he disagreed with Romney's politics, why make a point of criticizing his faith? Why shout it out in a small, crowded room? It's enough to make one wonder if his goal was actually to embarass Romney. And then there's the classic question of whether he's really a liberal -- and if he actually understands what that word means.

Regardless, I hope we can agree that his moment of fame was classless, rude, illiberal and violative of American values, even if it is in accord with much of American political history. And be glad that in this country a member of a minority faith is only subjected to such individual actions and not (generally) government persecution.

Now let's go to the other side of the globe, where that sadly is not the case.

Malaysia's best known Christian convert, Lina Joy, lost a six-year battle on Wednesday to have the word "Islam" removed from her identity card, after the country's highest court rejected the change.

The ruling threatens to further polarize Malaysian society between non-Muslims who feel that their constitutional right to religious freedom is being eroded, and Muslims who believe that civil courts have no right to meddle in Islamic affairs.

On the one hand, this is a fairly minor matter: words on an ID card. She was not actually prevented from converting, and is not in danger of being killed for doing so. And the legal point is minor, too: whether the secular courts have jurisdiction over such matters. They decided not, that only the country's Sharia courts can allow the removal of the words from Joy's card.

Let's put aside, too, the problem of having parallel legal systems. Listen instead to the words of the judge:

"You can't at whim and fancy convert from one religion to another," Federal Court Chief Justice Ahmad Fairuz Sheikh Abdul Halim said in delivering judgment in the case.

Or consider the reaction of the crowd outside:

About 200 mostly young Muslims welcomed the ruling outside the domed courthouse with shouts of "Allah-o-Akbar" (God is great).

And what fate awaits Joy in the sharia courts, if she goes that route?

In practice, sharia courts do not allow Muslims to formally renounce Islam, preferring to send apostates to counseling and, ultimately, fining or jailing them if they do not desist.

They often end up in legal limbo, unable to register their new religious affiliations or legally marry non-Muslims. Many keep silent about their choice or emigrate.

Fines and jailing, never mind the related legal prohibitions against marrying nonMuslims.

It always astonishes me that believers can justify coerced membership in religion, any religion, failing to understand that doing so not only grossly violates individual rights, but it undermines that religion's legitimacy. It's pure power politics, nothing more.

The world should continue to support Joy and express outrage not just at her treatment, but a legal system that allows such religious-based discrimination and disallows freedom of conscience. This is what true persecution looks like, and Malaysia should be pressured to change its laws to respect individual belief.

And for those of you inclined to ask "where are the moderate Muslims?", consider this very balanced article from Al-Jazeera. Or Sisters in Islam, a Malaysian Muslim women's group that is one of several that has sided with Joy in this case.

Malaysia, Lina Joy, Romney, religion, politics, midtopia

More obsessive administration secrecy

First we had the White House declaring that its visitor logs were classified. Now, in yet another example of the "none of your damn business" school of government, it turns out the vice president has done the same.

A lawyer for Vice President Dick Cheney told the Secret Service in September to eliminate data on who visited Cheney at his official residence, a newly disclosed letter states. The Sept. 13, 2006, letter from Cheney's lawyer says logs for Cheney's residence on the grounds of the Naval Observatory are subject to the Presidential Records Act.

Such a designation prevents the public from learning who visited the vice president.

Note that there is no high-minded principle involved here. The White House classified its logs to keep people from finding out how many times Jack Abramoff had visited. Cheney classified his logs to keep people from finding out how often he was visiting with leaders of the religious right.

The records are preserved and go into the presidential records of the Bush administration. But other Bush orders (facilitated by none other than Alberto Gonzales) give administrations the right to keep documents out of public view forever.

It's time for Congress to address such government records clearly and directly, spelling out that they are public documents that can only be withheld for certain narrow reasons -- and avoiding embarassment or the judgement of history are not among them.

secrecy, politics, midtopia

Corzine's public service ad

Maybe it's the only thing a politician in his situation could do, but kudos to New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine for doing a TV and radio ad that is frank, efficient and essentially says "I was an idiot."

He doesn't try to evade or lay blame, or defend the indefensible. He acknowledged his mistake and urged others not to do so. And the final scene of him walking off on his double crutches said more than any moralistic tagline could have.

This is how adults behave when they make mistakes.

Corzine, politics, midtopia

House bites bullet, does the right thing

In the several days late department: Thanks to pressure from Democratic freshmen, the House finally passed its ethics legislation on Thursday, overcoming earlier objections from some senior members.

The new proposals, which in the end passed overwhelmingly, would expand the information available about how business is done on Capitol Hill and make it available online. They would provide expanded, more frequent and Internet-accessible reporting of lobbyist-paid contributions and sponsorships, and would for the first time impose prison terms for criminal rule-breakers. They would also require strict new disclosure of "bundled" campaign contributions that lobbyists collect and pass on to lawmakers' campaigns. Yesterday's legislation passed 396 to 22.

The bundling provision was a big stumbling block, and perhaps the measure's most important aspect. But Democrats jettisoned several other provisions, including a two-year wait before legislators can become lobbyists (the wait currently is one year).

But all in all, the bill greatly improves transparency about money and access, which is the key to any sort of serious reform.

Now that the House and Senate have finally passed their respective ethics measures, they have to reconcile them in conference committee. The next thing to watch for is what gets kept and what gets tossed during those negotiations. Once the final bill emerges and passes, we'll be able to judge precisely how the Democrats fared on this central campaign promise.

ethics, <politics, midtopia

Zoellick named to head World Bank

The speculation is over: President Bush will nominate Robert Zoellick to succeed Paul Wolfowitz as the new head of the World Bank.

A seasoned veteran of politics both inside the Beltway and on the international stage, Zoellick, 53, has a knack for mastering intricate subject matter and translating it into policies. He is known for pulling facts and figures off the top of his head. He also has a reputation for being a demanding boss.

Bush's selection of Zoellick must be approved by the World Bank's 24-member board.

The White House expects Zoellick to gain the board's acceptance. The senior official, who spoke on condition of anonymity in advance of Bush's announcement, said so far other nations have had a positive reaction.

Bush would have been stupid to pick a controversial nominee, and he didn't. Zoellick's got experience and international credentials. He helped push through CAFTA, which might be an issue here at home but doesn't bother other countries too much -- with the exception of health-related groups like the Global AIDS Alliance, which don't like the drug patent protections Zoellick helped negotiate. In fact, he was so noncontroversial that he was the only rumored candidate I failed to discuss in my previous post on potential nominees! (Well, okay, that was just a boneheaded oversight on my part.)

The more interesting question is whether he will try to continue Wolfowitz's anticorruption drive, which (along with his Iraq war baggage) is what generated such antipathy for Wolfowitz. I hope so: Wolfowitz aside, I'd like to see things cleaned up a bit in that regard, as long as moral purity doesn't end up actually hindering the bank's main goal of reducing poverty.

Finally, for those of you who like suspense and intrigue, consider this statement from the World Bank:

The bank's executive directors, in a statement late Tuesday that made no mention of Zoellick by name, said it is essential the next president have a proven track record of leadership, experience managing a large international organization, a willingness to tackle governance reform and political objectivity and independence. While it had been informed that the United States will be nominating a candidate, the board also noted that nominations may be made by any executive director.

Allowing the United States to nominate the head of the World Bank is tradition and good politics, because the United States is the bank's biggest financial backer. But it's not a rule or a right. It would be interesting (though highly unlikely) if the directors decided to reject Zoellick for one of their own. First, it would be intriguing to see who their choice would be. Second, what would Bush's reaction be> Would he accept it if the person chosen is ideologically acceptable? Would he attempt to slash World Bank funding or even withdraw altogether?

That uncertainty -- and the turmoil that would likely ensue -- are the main reason Zoellick or some other U.S. nominee is a safe bet to run the place. It would be indicative of great disrespect for the Bush administration if the Bank decided to flout him.

World Bank, Zoellick, politics, midtopia

A follower, not a leader

Two items that are not a coincidence.

The United States has rejected the latest draft of a G8 plan for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, the blueprint for the successor to the Kyoto Accord, which was never ratified (thanks to U.S. resistance) but was nevertheless adopted as a goal (if not entirely implemented) in Europe.

Germany, backed by Britain and now Japan, has proposed cutting global greenhouse gas emissions by 50 percent by 2050. Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany, who will be the host of the meeting in the Baltic Sea resort of Heiligendamm next month, has been pushing hard to get the Group of 8 to take significant action on climate change.

It had been a foregone conclusion that the Western European members of the Group of 8 — Germany, Italy, France and Britain — would back the reductions. But on Thursday, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe of Japan threw his lot in with the Europeans...

And thus the United States, the world's largest emitter of greenhouse gases, remains an increasingly isolated outlier among western industrialized nations. The draft will form the basis of discussions at next week's G8 summit, setting up what will likely be an uncomfortable if not embarassing several days for the United States.

While I sympathize with the arguments aginst Kyoto -- that it would harm the economy, that developing giants like India and China are exempt -- such fears always struck me as exaggerated, and in any event didn't justify our replacement policy, which was essentially "do nothing and, maybe, hope that the market takes care of it." Emissions are a problem, and the world's largest emitter has a moral and practical obligation to be a large part of the solution.

Further, issues like greenhouse emissions and oil dependency point up the limits of the market in dealing with large, long-term issues.

Free market theory relies on the efficiency of millions of people making individual decisions, collectively developing efficient systems. The whole idea is to harness economic self-interest for the public good.

But that generally works best for short-term decisions, not long-term ones. Enlightened self-interest might lead a market system to invest in green energy and energy independence, but most self-interest isn't enlightened. Thus alternative energy is not competitive as long as oil remains cheap, and few builders are willing to spend the extra 10 percent up front to build a green building, even if the efficiencies will pay for themselves in a few years. Short term, unenlightened self interest means consumers will take the option that is cheapest at the moment, disregarding both long-term and externalized costs. Car buyers only care that gas is $3 a gallon; they rarely factor in the other costs we incur as a nation and as a society in order to deliver gasoline at that price.

In such situations, the market may work -- but only at the last possible minute and at the highest cost, with maximum dislocation.

Poor political leadership could produce equally bad results, of course. And even if the leadership is competent, our political system is focused on short-term results too, so it works much like the market: putting off the problem until it absolutely has to be addressed.

But the pressure point for politicians often arrives earlier than the same one for the market at large, thanks to pressure from advocacy groups and input, public and private, from long-term thinkers. So when it comes to such big, long-term issues, competent political leadership trumps blind faith in the magic of the market, addressing problems years before they become actual crises, and at lower cost.

Which helps explain my second item, a discussion (now behind the Times Select firewall) of the prevalence and outcome of green construction techniques in Europe and the United States. Thanks to actually attempting to follow Kyoto, Europe (and European architects) are way ahead of the United States in terms of environmentally friendly design. What's more, their innovative use of materials and design mean the green buildings don't have to be self-consciously green and don't have to cost an arm and a leg -- in other words, green is mainstream instead of a "personal virtue."

After more than a decade of tightening guidelines, Europe has made green architecture an everyday reality. In Germany and the Netherlands especially, a new generation of architects has expanded the definition of sustainable design beyond solar panels and sod roofs. As Matthias Sauerbruch put it to me: ''The eco-friendly projects you saw in the 1970s, with solar panels and recycled materials: they were so self-conscious. We call this Birkenstock architecture. Now we don't need to do this anymore. The basic technology is all pretty accepted.''

In the United States, architects cannot make the same claim with equal confidence. Despite the media attention showered on ''green'' issues, the federal government has yet to establish universal efficiency standards for buildings. Yet, according to some estimates, buildings consume nearly as much energy as industry and transportation combined. And the average building in the U.S. uses roughly a third more energy than its German counterpart.

The article also notes a difference in the regulatory environment. The European rules, while strict, are flexible: they care more about the final emissions total than how it is arrived at. In the United States, by contrast, the regulations are more of a checklist: if you have a high-efficiency air conditioner, for example, that's worth so many points. It's so specific and status quo that it has the effect of discouraging innovative technologies because they're not on the list.

So what's driving change in the United States -- and doing so years behind our European counterparts -- are clients. Our system depends on individual builders being interested in green energy and emissions reduction and willing to pay to achieve it. It's piecemeal, and relies on many of the innovations pioneered by Europeans.

I believe in harnessing the power of the free market. But in cases where the basic mechanism of the market -- individual short-term self-interest -- is a hindrance rather than a help, the market needs both help and leadership.

Raising gasoline taxes would both generate money for energy projects -- research or subsidies for alternative energy, for example, or funds to build mass transit -- and help account for the intangible and externalized costs of our dependence on gasoline. Then we could let the market work, as people grappled with the new environment of costly gas. We could lessen the pain without sacrificing much of the effect by raising the tax in installments, giving people a couple of years to adjust.

Mandating reductions in greenhouse gas emissions would do the same thing, producing an altered market that gives such emissions a presence in short-term self-interest calculations. We could then let the market do the rest of the work for us.

Would this destroy our economy? I don't see how. There would be expenses, true, but some of that would be offset by the economic opportunities inherent in a switch to greener living, not to mention the global competitiveness advantages of using less energy. Older, inefficient energy consumers would have trouble. But that "creative destruction" is a central point of market economics. And technologies made viable by the altered energy market would help alleviate yet more of the pain.

Should China and India be included? Sure, eventually. But that's no reason not to act now. If they want to keep destroying their environment, poisoning their population and risking world condemnation in pursuit of cheap energy, let them. They will learn the costs soon enough, and I for one am happy to let China become dependent on oil just as we're weaning ourselves off of it. Maybe then it will be Chinese soldiers dying in quagmires in the Middle East instead of ours.

Or maybe our leadership -- and global diplomatic pressure revolving around Kyoto III or whatever it will be called -- will push them to begin going green, creating a huge market for U.S. companies that developed the green technologies we used to reduce our own consumption.

Let's agree not to commit economic suicide. But let's also agree that it is worse to do nothing at all, that going green brings economic benefits as well as costs, that as the world's biggest emitter we have an obligation to lead, that there is a significant long-term cost to ceding such leadership to others, and that we are wealthy enough as a nation to absorb a certain amount of short-term costs in pursuit of the long-term good.

global warming, environment, politics, midtopia

A small step backward

It's open!

The Creation Museum I wrote about back in August is finally opening its doors.

The Christian creators of the sprawling museum, unveiled on Saturday, hope to draw as many as half a million people each year to their state-of-the-art project, which depicts the Bible's first book, Genesis, as literal truth.

While the $27 million museum near Cincinnati has drawn snickers from media and condemnation from U.S. scientists, those who believe God created the heavens and the Earth in six days about 6,000 years ago say their views are finally being represented.

The funny thing is that their views have always been represented -- they just lose, because not only is there zero evidence to support a 6,000-year-old Earth, but there's mounds of evidence to refute it.

People are free to believe in anything they like. But it's not too smart to believe in easily disprovable things.

I personally think opponents are overreacting:

Scientists, secularists and moderate Christians have pledged to protest the museum's public opening on Monday. An airplane trailing a "Thou Shalt Not Lie" banner buzzed overhead during the museum's opening news conference.

This is like getting worked up about flat-earth theorists. It's just not worth the effort.

Then again:

A Gallup poll last year showed almost half of Americans believe that humans did not evolve but were created by God in their present form within the last 10,000 years.

Three of 10 Republican presidential candidates said in a recent debate that they did not believe in evolution.

We can only hope that the museum loses its shirt, or exists as little more than a kitschy oddity.

evolution, politics, midtopia

30,000

Midtopia had it's 30,000th visitor today, thanks largely to a link from Salon's BlogReport to my rant about gay linguists being drummed out of the military.

The site is averaging nearly 3,000 visitors a month, which breaks down to more than 100 visitors a day during the week (they spiked to nearly 200 on Wednesday) and something less than that on weekends when I don't post.

Some unknown other number of you (thousands, I'm sure....) haunt the site's RSS feeds.

Thanks to everyone who finds my musings worth reading, and make Midtopia part of their day.

politics, midtopia

Heffelfinger blows a gasket

You knew it was coming. Minnesota's former U.S. attorney Tom Heffelfinger -- who resigned while, unbeknownst to him, he was on a list of those that the administration was considering firing -- fired back Thursday after weeks of semisilence.

Heffelfinger, who says he had no idea anyone in Washington was thinking of firing him when he resigned his position as U.S. attorney in February 2006, has gradually become more open about his outrage over the controversy around the firing of U.S. attorneys as his name has been more publicly linked to it.

In remarks to the Bar Association in Minneapolis, he reached a new peak, saying among other things that "something is fundamentally broken within the Department of Justice."

And he read aloud from an e-mail, written by Kyle Sampson, then-chief of staff to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, to other Justice Department officials under pressure to explain how particular U.S. attorneys had become candidates for dismissal.

Sampson suggested the attorneys on the list -- including Heffelfinger -- "had no federal prosecution experience when they took the job."

This elicited a burst of shocked laughter from the audience, many of whom knew Heffelfinger had been a Hennepin County prosecutor, a federal prosecutor, and had served a previous term as U.S. attorney for Minnesota under the first President Bush before the second President Bush appointed him in 2001.

It's not encouraging that the people in charge of firing decisions were so unaware of his record. It's like it was Amateur Hour in the Justice Department executive offices.

Heffelfinger, Goodling, Gonzales, politics, midtopia

Goodling fallout

Following up on my original post, a couple of items from Monica Goodling's testimony on Wednesday appear destined to cause Alberto Gonzales further trouble.

First, Goodling said that Gonzales talked to her about the prosecutor case.

"It made me a little uncomfortable," Monica Goodling, Gonzales' former White House liaison, said of her conversation with the attorney general just before she took a leave of absence in March. "I just did not know if it was appropriate for us to both be discussing our recollections of what had happened."

Trouble is, Gonzales told Congress that he didn't.

Gonzales told the Senate Judiciary Committee last month that he didn't know the answers to some questions about the firings because he was steering clear of aides — such as Goodling — who were likely to be questioned.

"I haven't talked to witnesses because of the fact that I haven't wanted to interfere with this investigation and department investigations," Gonzales told the panel.

Hmmm....

Perhaps we should give Gonzales the benefit of the doubt on this one and accept the Justice Department explanation: "The attorney general has never attempted to influence or shape the testimony or public statements of any witness in this matter, including Ms. Goodling," said spokesman Brian Roehrkasse. "The statements made by the attorney general during this meeting were intended only to comfort her in a very difficult period of her life."

All well and good, although that's sort of an odd way to comfort someone. And perhaps he shouldn't lie to Congress about it afterward. And then there's the troubling little fact that he has done this repeatedly: Made a claim, been contradicted by the facts, then backpedaled. Once might be forgiven; but three or four times?

Secondly, the Justice Department is broadening its inquiry into Goodling's hiring practices based on her testimony.

The expanded inquiry, conducted by the department's inspector general and its Office of Professional Responsibility, comes after testimony Wednesday by former Gonzales aide Monica M. Goodling.

She told a House committee that she had considered party affiliation in screening applicants to become immigration judges.

Judges on top of career prosecutors. Lovely. But why is this a big deal? We already knew that she admitted "crossing the line."

The difference here is that Goodling says she was authorized to do so in this case.

She cited a conversation she had with another Gonzales aide, D. Kyle Sampson, who said the department's Office of Legal Counsel had declared the practice to be lawful.

The Justice Department denies it.

Justice Department officials said no such opinion existed.

They also denied Goodling's assertion that the hiring of immigration judges had been frozen after the department's civil division raised concerns about using a political litmus test.

We now get to play the "somebody's lying" game. Goodling claims she properly briefed James McNulty before his misleading Congressional testimony; he heatedly denies it.

Now she claims she had authorization to use political criteria in hiring; Justice denies it. In that case they could both be telling the truth, but only if Sampson was either lying or grossly mistaken.

Either way, expect more embarassing headlines for Gonzales.

Goodling, Gonzales, politics, midtopia

Koran wins in court

In a case that has some relevance to the resoundingly ignorant flap over whether Keith Ellison could swear on a Koran, a North Carolina judge has ruled that nonChristians can use their own holy book when called as witnesses in the courtroom.

The decision represents a victory for the American Civil Liberties Union of North Carolina, which sued the state after two Guilford County judges rejected an offer from an Islamic center to provide county courthouses with free copies.

"The highest aim of every legal contest is the search for truth," Wake Superior Court Judge Paul Ridgeway wrote in an 18-page opinion. "To require pious and faithful practitioners of religions other than Christianity to swear oaths in a form other than the form most meaningful to them would thwart the search for the truth.

"It would elevate form over substance."

The legality should have been beyond question; the judge's opinion simply notes the futility of swearing on a book you don't believe in.

Maybe now Prager et al will cease their hyperventilating about this and concede their point was flawed. But I'm not holding my breath.

religion, politics, midtopia

The funny side of dating

Well, it's funny as long as you're not one of these guys.

The site, "I Can't Believe He's Still Single," is a new project of a friend of mine. Check it out. And if you're like me, be glad you haven't had to venture into the dating scene for more than a decade.

humor, politics, midtopia