FU - FairAndUNbalanced.com

It was shocking. The video showed a Presidential candidate standing before a conservative audience yelling to the crowd, "Who likes white people?" The crowd responds enthusiastically. Hoots and Hollers. "We are!" a faint voice can be heard.

The video of Michele Bachmann skips to her speech before the crowd, introducing herself to the audience as a Presidential candidate. But that's not why she's there. She explains that she just wants to give witness to her faith. Her faith? What sort of hypocrisy is that?

Boy, did that go viral in a hurry.

Here's the problem.

She didn't say it. She didn't imply it. What she said, and what she meant, didn't even touch on race or ethnicity.

The video was captured in Iowa at the Midwest Spirit Christian Music Festival earlier this month, then was deliberately edited to make her appear to be saying what she didn't say.

"Do you like whett people?" seems a bit ambiguous when you hear it. The caption "Do you like White People?" helps, now doesn't it? It is so thoughtfully provided by those who produced the video.

The full, unedited, version contains something else, something that puts a different cast on the viral video. Here's the part the "White People" video leaves out.

"Do you like wet people?" shouts Bachmann, without the helpful caption.

Hoots and hollers, and the faint "We are!"

Then she continues:

"Yeah, that's right. Because we have the God of the winds and the rain don't we? We serve a mighty god."

That part about winds and rain is a bit inconsistent with "Do you like white people" isn't it? The video was deliberately distorted.

When the shocking viral version came out, there was some speculation on a few liberal sites that perhaps she simply stepped on a more innocent line, referring to a rock group, the "White People Funk Band." But it turned out the band wasn't even there. It wasn't that liberal sites were anxious to defend her, but something didn't seem quite right about it. A serious Presidential contender can usually be counted upon to avoid deliberately sinking her candidacy with an overtly racist appeal. It was more than fishy.

Then someone came up with the real video, the one that was not deceptively edited and captioned. It was the honest version, the "wet people" version.

The technique of captioning to distort meaning is not an innovation. Andrew Breitbart used it to distort a question asked by CNN reporter, Norah O'Donnell, making her look like a self-confessed partisan operative.

Nor is it entirely unprecedented to find video editing used to make an innocent remark seem brutally racist. Breitbart is being sued for posting exactly that about another innocent speaker. The defamed person in that case briefly lost her job over the video lie. She can't really be considered a public figure, so she might prevail.

Lawsuits in these cases are difficult. Public figures must demonstrate a level of malice that ordinary folks don't need to prove. But national politicians do occasionally prevail. Barry Goldwater won in court against a minor publication that used a bogus survey to call into question his mental stability.

There are those for whom fidelity to the truth matters. They ought to object, and should be more than a little angry about the incident. If we are enraged about the breitbarting of non-conservative figures, we should be furious about breitbarting conservatives, even when it is not done by Breitbart.

Win or lose, here's hoping those responsible are exposed and that Bachmann sues them for several times any income they ever hope to have.

And here's praying she wins.

The lawsuit, not the Presidency.

From The Hill:

Former FEMA administrator Mike Brown, who headed the agency during Hurricane Katrina, said Tuesday that he agreed with House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) that the federal government should not allocate additional funds to the FEMA without offsetting budget cuts.

- More -

The unfortunate tendency of so many conservatives to ignore the basic strength of their own principles is a source of continuous wonder to me. It can certainly be argued that, as a non-conservative, I am not in a position to make a fair observation. And I am willing to increase my vulnerability on this very point by making three concessions.

• I speak as an outsider.

• My observation does not apply to everyone.

• Those to whom it does apply only succumb to a degree, and that degree varies from one individual to the next.

There.

In a recent piece, I suggest that the difference in focus between liberals and conservatives leads to an important difference in approach. I further suggest that acknowledging this difference would tend not only to make conservative arguments more honest, but also more compelling.

I gave an example.

Rick Perry was asked why, since there is a considerable body of evidence that abstinence-only sex education is ineffective, he still supports it. The interviewer pointed out that Texas has the third-highest teen-pregnancy rate in the country. Since clearly it doesn't work, why push it? The governor provoked laughter by responding "It works." The questioner repeated the point, including that Texas has a very high teen-pregnancy rate. The program doesn't work, so why invest resources in it? The governor repeated, "It works." He then suggested that he himself is an example of it working. His answer seemed to go down from there.

The problem is that the support of conservatives for this, as well as other issues, is not based on utility, but rather on principle. His rambling, somewhat silly, response went viral precisely because he demonstrated the greatest conservative weakness rather than embracing the greatest conservative strength.

I am not a supporter of abstinence-only sex education. But if I somehow found it in my heart to defend it, I think I could be more honest and effective. I suggested what Perry might have said.

Perry might have answered that statistics are not the only measure, that if it works in just one case, it works. He might have elaborated that what matters more than if it works is whether it is right, that a society should stand for something, that the benefit of a moral stand goes beyond it's immediate utility.

Of several responses, two came from conservatives.

The first was so well stated, we asked permission to publish it as a separate guest article. The Heathen Republican was gracious in his assent. His site is a place where conservatives seem to welcome liberal debaters, the better for them to demolish. It is an entertaining and enlightening place, well worth a visit or two or many.

Sadly, our guest began, not with a philosophical approach, but with precisely the approach I advise against.

Mr Deming, this is simply a lie. You confuse Republicans with libertarians and/or anarchists. As in the rest of life, the differences are a matter of degree. Since you offer no specific examples, let me suggest some:

And he certainly did, illustrating data point by data point a moderate position rejecting his imagined extreme opposition. Oh my. I can see the evidence of my lack of clarity. He thought I was simply attacking Republicans for their apathy about social issues. This enraged him to the extent that my real point failed to take root. It was sowing on rock hardened ground.

The second response conceded that conservatives could do a better job of articulation, and combined that with a bit of a debt reduction slam.

I get your point, Mr. Deming, and I think those folks that are pro-abstinence need to articulate their positions better than most have done in the past. Simply repeating the mantra without elaborating upon why one thinks it is true doesn't typically convince others that are doubtful or on the fence regarding the subject. In other words, one does nothing to help his cause with that tactic. That is akin to repeating that “it is just a revenue problem” when we all know it really isn’t.

That came from one of our favorites, T. Paine. Mr. Paine's own web site, Saving Common Sense is worth exploring for his writing ability and for his thoughtful defense of conservatism. Sadly, I also failed to make my point apparent to him. He thought I was advancing the cause of better articulation.

My point was this. Liberals seek to solve problems. Most not all, but the overwhelming majority, are indifferent to whether the solutions involve expanding government. If a private solution can be found to solve a problem, we are all for it. If government is needed, we are all for that. This approach tends toward the utilitarian, the non-philosophical. As long as basic liberties are intact and the price is right, government is fine. It is not preferred. It is not to be avoided, either. Conservatives who call us "statists" are almost always mistaken. At most we tend toward apathy about statism.

Conservatives tend toward a more philosophical approach. They tend, on principal, to oppose government involvement. They are not opposed to solving social problems, but they tend toward guiding principles.

That means data, facts, matter more to liberals than to conservatives. What is the problem? How can it be solved? What is the measurement of the solution?

It means that certain principles, especially that of non-government interference, matter more to conservatives than to liberals. On what basis do you tax me? What gives you the right to regulate me? How dare you restrict my income and my freedom to produce more of it?

None of this is hard and fast. In fact, my own example of Perry's muddled answer blurs the line. We can see any sort of educational policy as government intervention. But I suggested that Perry's approach was typical of a conservative weakness.

That weakness comes when conservatives mis-translate principle into fact. Instead of articulating principle, conservatives (to my delight) attempt to fight on liberal ground. They try to deny the factual data that matter to liberals. It makes them look a little silly. They are strongest when articulating principle.

Suppose a Republican candidate wants to dramatically increase the size of one of his mansions? If he is criticized, why not simply say that every American should try to live within the means of income, and should try to increase that income if the desire is there to use it? That the poor and the well off are not economically equal is obvious. And there is an active debate is ongoing as to what obligations each have. But in the right to use what they earn as they see fit, wealthy, poor, and middle class are and should be forever equal. If I want to expand my home, why must I seek the approval of those not impacted? Why is it your concern? More specifically, why is it your business?

On the other hand, a Republican candidate might go the weaker route. He might have a press aide feebly explain that the size of his home is "inadequate to his needs." Or, he might point out that the press is wrong, wrong, wrong. He is not quadrupling the size of his house. He is only doubling it, as long as you don't ... you know ... count the new basement space and expanded garage.

Say hello to Mitt Romney.

Good grief.

Republicans do better to argue about principles. If Mitt Romney were to do that, he might be able to demonstrate that principled argument is not, to him, a difficult foreign language.

At the beginning of 2011 there were over 400 sawmills in Missouri. Now, because of legislation signed into law in July, there are none.

Oh, there are places that look like sawmills. They do all the things that sawmills used to do. But they are not sawmills. Depending on your point of view, they are farms or flower shops.

Stay with me here.

Missouri has been blessed with a lot of woods. In rural parts of the state, you can't swing a cat without hitting a tree. The practice is not legal in Missouri because that sort of animal experimentation is cruel. Especially in southeastern Missouri, where there are lots of trees.

That meant that back in the good old pre-Bush/Cheney days, when folks still bought houses, lots and lots of wood was sold for those houses. And the cutting, planing, and general preparation for that wood had to be done by sawmills. So more than 400 sawmills arose in response to the demand. There were big sawmills, small sawmills, and cut-for-profit-in-the-back-of-the-garage sawmills. Especially in southeastern Missouri, where there are lots and lots of trees.

The recession hit hard in 2008 during the last part of the Bush/Cheney administration when families began switching from large wooden structures to much smaller on-the-street cardboard boxes. Missouri was third hardest hit of all 50 states. That's over 400 sawmills in some economic trouble.

Most states give tax breaks to farmers. They pay less in property taxes than other businesses. It's part of a series of programs to preserve small family farms. It turned out to help large mega-farms the most, buts that's life in these times. In Missouri, flower shops somehow got slipped into the mix, being classified as a sort of farm, if you squint and look sideways.

Missouri legislatures wanted to give similar tax breaks to sawmills to tide them over until the recession ended. That would be the recession that started in 2008. In the last part of the Bush/Cheney administration.

School districts had a bit of a problem with that, since educating kids will tend to suffer without the funding that comes from property taxes. So a lot of procedural obstructions would likely come up with the major revision of adding a new property classification to the property tax code. So David Dey, a Republican from Dixon, came up with a solution. It got bi-partisan support, and it was signed into law by the Democratic governor. We would just change all the sawmills to flower shops, or maybe farms.

So now, all Missouri sawmills, all 400 plus, have flashed out of existence. They are all transformed, Cinderella style, into farm/flower shops. Especially in southeastern Missouri, where there are lots and lots of trees. If you want wood to be professionally cut and ready for use, you now go down to your local flower shop, the one everyone thinks is a sawmill.

I was thinking about those flower shops that are not really flower shops when I happened upon one of the persistent Republican myths about Bush/Cheney tax cuts for the extremely wealthy. This one is stated eloquently by our own T. Paine who, sadly, seems to watch FoxNews. "...only 15% of Bush' tax cuts went to the fabulously wealthy. (Those making $250K or more) The rest went to us middle class guys."

He's absolute right, if you make two minor adjustments.

• First, it wasn't 15%, it was 38%. Now, where I took arithmetic classes, 38 is a little more than 1½ times more than 15.
• And you can't define middle class as $250,000, as conservatives do. You have to increase it to $645,000. Those numbers are bigger, so I have to think longer. let's see. $645,000 is 1½ times more than $250,000. You have to be impressed if you take my word that I did that in my head.

That $645,000 mark happens to be the top 1% of economic beneficiaries in America. That may not be middle class by everyone's standards.

To get those figures, you have to go beyond the Heritage foundation, Austrian economists who don't really like measurements and figures, and Fox News, all of whom actually have a single source. They rely almost exclusively on claims made by the Bush administration in April 2001, when the first tax cut for the wealthy was proposed, and on claims made a couple of years later as the administration sold a second round of cuts.

The real figures aren't classified. Lots of folks have been looking at them. One group out of many, the Economic Policy Institute (pdf), performed an exhaustive analysis.

Part of the conservative miscalculation goes beyond the "1½" errors. It is flat out omission. You see, conservatives don't talk about all the cuts. Cuts in, then elimination of, estate taxes, for example, are left out of the calculation. So are tax breaks on capital gains.

That's how you find out that a waitress gets enough reduction to buy a coke during her workday while the average billionaire sees a drop of over a third.

What everyone leaves out is the effect of Federal cuts on local taxes. As aid for police, schools, emergency responders, and block grants have dropped, sales and property taxes have risen. Even taxes on onetime sawmills that have become flower shops that cut wood.

So conservatives come up with bogus figures by aggressive redefinition.

• The middle-class earn a high six figure annual income.
• Estate and other taxes are not really part of tax cuts for the wealthy.
• A Republican sales pitch made in 2001 is more real than actual measurements since then.

You can win almost any argument if you simply define what you don't like into something else.

You can buy your wood from the same place. But call it a flower shop.

Republican Dean Koldenhoven was the Mayor of Palos Heights, just outside of Chicago, when a group of Muslims decided in 2000 they wanted to worship closer to home. They began working on a mosque.

Anti-Muslim activism is the Bigotry Du Jour in America at the moment. So, as might be expected, there was a community uproar. Mosques are a symbol to conservatives who want to strike a blow against the terrorists who flew planes into buildings on September 11, 2001. Collective punishment may have been condemned during Truman's time, but emotional shortcuts are never out of style for those who hate. But the lizard part of the human mind can't account for this case. That bit of mitigation does not apply here. It happened before those terrorist attacks.

Opponents tried to get the city to pay Muslims to stay out of town, but Mayor Koldenhoven vetoed the bill as an embarrassment to the community and an insult to Muslims. “Government has no place in this issue,” he said. Muslims decided to stay out anyway, so the mosque wasn't built after all. Voters tossed the Republican mayor out of office the next year, 5 months before bin Laden went, in our minds, from distant comic book villain to clear and present danger.

A year after the election loss, Caroline Kennedy called the ex-Mayor and asked if he would accept the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award for his resistance to religious prejudice.

When Koldenhoven accepted the award, he recalled another campaign in which religious bigotry played a part. When John F. Kennedy ran for President in 1960, West Virginia was a vital primary. Since West Virginia was an overwhelmingly Protestant state, Kennedy was advised to downplay the fact that he was Catholic. Instead, he he got mad, and confronted the issue.

Nobody asked me if I was Catholic when I joined the U.S. Navy. Nobody asked my brother if he was a Catholic or Protestant before he climbed into an American bomber plane to fly his last mission.

- John F. Kennedy, candidate for President, 1960

"I admired him," said Koldenhoven, "for his ability to step forward in courage and confront the issues head on."

I thought about President Kennedy last week as I read Pat Buchanan's latest attack on President Obama. While enraged that the President is following the lead of other Presidents and seeking to increase diversity in federal employment opportunities, Buchanan has developed another line of attack.

It seems Buchanan has been staring at photographs of combat casualties to get a sense of what, to him, is the most important fact about war.

White Americans were 75 percent of the dead, and from photos of the fallen in newspapers since, the ratios appear to hold.

Does this overrepresentation of white men in the body bags and caskets coming home bother our commander in chief, who wants fewer white men at the top level of his executive branch?

Oh boy. He does have a history of similar observations. Bill Buckley concluded that Buchanan was anti-Semitic after speculation about Jews in combat. In opposing the invasion of Iraq, Buchanan noted those proponents who were Jews. "There are only two groups that are beating the drums for war in the Middle East-the Israeli Defense Ministry and its amen corner in the United States" and that actual fighting would be done by "kids with names like McAllister, Murphy, Gonzales, and Leroy Brown."

But color seems a very special preoccupation.

75% white casualties might seem disproportionate to Pat Buchanan, but, despite Buchanan's endless defense of history's level of white privilege, the rate is roughly in line with the makeup of America, although such things are difficult to control in an all volunteer military.

Kennedy's "Nobody asked my brother" made an impression on West Virginia patriots in 1960. Jack's older brother Joe had died heroically in defense of his country. And, yeah, nobody asked him his religion. Kennedy won the primary that year, and did it decisively.

It is Buchanan's phrase "from photos of the fallen in newspapers" that I found striking. It presents an image of Pat pouring over daily pictures of fallen heroes, grunting his satisfaction at photos of minorities, grimacing in anger at the sacrifices of those sharing Pat's skin color.

I admit to a special interest.

We pray every day and every night for our own Marine, now in additional training before his assignment to Afghanistan. Nobody seemed to pay attention to his skin color as he applied for duty. When I drove to his training camp to pick him up as his initial combat training finally ended, his fellow Marines, white and black, politely prevented me from helping him with his gear. They insisted on carrying it for him themselves. The handshakes and embraces signified a connection that went deep, below any skin level.

From all I have read, from all he has told me, that same camaraderie, that same mutual loyalty, will extend itself to a mutual protectiveness in combat. I certainly hope so.

We fear for him on so very many levels. He is competent and capable, but worry is part of what parents do. If anything happens to him, we will be unlikely to care at all whether his newspaper photo might result in one more satisfied mark in the war-as-it-ought-to-be column of Pat Buchanan's grim nightly tally.

We celebrate an event
in an ancient, occupied land,
at a time of oppression and hardship,
for Jesus is risen. He walks with us again.

We celebrate a Truth for all time and places,
a Truth older than the universe,
and newer than today.

That betrayal cannot last. That denial is forgiven.
That the heaviest guilt can be laid down at last.
That what separates us from God can be put aside.
That light overcomes darkness.

That we are called to step out of the shadows
into the bright sunshine of God’s love,
to share that light with all the world,
to let healing begin.

Introduction for Worship Anthem,
St. Mark's United Methodist Church in Florissant, MO

A variation

• The Heathen Republican asks that liberals like me submit to a 15 month test of Keynesian economics. If the economy eventually rebounds without it, we'll admit it is wrong. The problem with that approach is that eventual recovery does not contradict Keynesianism. It's akin to saying that, if a smoker survives a cancer operation, we should promote smoking in elementary schools. Massive economic stimulus tends to speed recovery, avoiding severe hardship to real life people. The Bush stimulus, amplified by Obama, was too small to avoid hardship, but it did stop the slide to full blown depression.

  This chart has been making the rounds. A larger version is posted by Steve Benen. The red section is the economy with President Bush, the blue with President Obama. It's an eye test. If you can see a difference you are a Keynesian.

• At Mad Mike's America conservative Milton Thornridge suggests angry ways to make politicians shape up. I dunno. Term limits? I'd rather apply a reduction or elimination of pay until the economy improves.

• Our own T. Paine at Saving Common Sense attacks President Obama for attacking the explosion in National Debt as candidate while presiding over deficits while in office. Query. Since the Bush recession and the Bush tax cuts for the fabulously wealthy turned a surplus into a deficit, would efforts to end said recession and let the Bush tax cuts expire count at all?

• Tommy Christopher of Mediaite fame introduces us to a Jack Cafferty rant against the mental vacuity of Republican front runners. I take what I think is a more sympathetic view but, as can be seen by the comments and by an acerbic response from guest Heathen Republican, I manage to offend anyway.

• James Wigderson speculates on the next Senator from Wisconsin. He seems impatient with Republican possibilities and he has about given up on Democrats. These are the times that try the souls of Wisconsin conservatives.

• Infidel753 has a wonderful video about an intrepid reporter who journeys out to confront a bigot and finds a bit of a surprise.

• Class warfare is turning against the poor and middle class. Jack Jodell, friend of the working blogger at THE SATURDAY AFTERNOON POST, has nothing but admiration for many wealthy individuals.

• Nancy Hanks at The Hankster conducts an informal poll on how political parties are listed on ballots.

• Independent Daily finds a bit of satire that was inspired by Nancy's piece.

• Our favorite spiritual leader at Why do we have to do this, Sir? talks to a Sunday group about the identity of Jesus and our relationship with God and demonstrates one reason he is our favorite spiritual leader.

• Slant Right's John Houk has found himself captivated by a book theorizing that a KGB operative plotted with the FBI and the CIA and President Clinton to elect a stealth spy named Obama whose job it is to turn America into a Marxist-Socialist society. It is a breathtakingly astonishing account of John Houk reading a book.

• Chuck Thinks Right thinks it unfair that so many pundits speculate about how Governor Chris Christie will handle the coming hurricane. John Houk, who has recently learned to read, might point Chuck to news reports of the last natural emergency to hit New Jersey. Seems the Governor took a vacation to Disneyland while his Lieutenant Governor ran off to Mexico. However, the capable state Senate presiding officer, a Democrat, handled the emergency very well in their absence. Do you suppose he is available for hurricane duty?

• Manifesto Joe of Texas Blues recounts a Texas scheme from a few years ago in which Governor Perry almost closed a deal with a huge insurance company to insure teachers, have the state take the proceeds if they died, leaving families with nothing. Government at its best. The very flower of conservative governance.

Things are looking good for Texas Governor Rick Perry in his quest for the Presidency. He has now overtaken and passed the hapless Mitt Romney, who has been unable to answer accusations that he had once committed governance of Massachusetts.

In fact, Perry is substantially ahead, according to the most recent Gallup poll. Here's the breakdown among Republicans:

• 29% Perry
• 17% Romney
• 64% Any Republican in the known universe besides Romney

It isn't over, of course. Perry faces a hard, hard year ahead and must perform the arduous task of watching Romney shake, rattle, decompose, and do it without giggling out loud. Then he will still face the general election.

If Republicans succeed in making the economy perform at the same level as Romney, it will plausibly produce a President Perry beginning in 2013. He will take office the year following the end of the world, as the Mayan Mesoamerican Long Count Calendar ends and the Earth collides with the hidden planet Nibiru.

Okay, that last part depends on the accuracy of ancient Aztec weather forecasts. The first part, the part about the economy sinking like a stone, depends on filibusters and future debt ceiling hostage negotiations.

A lot for Perry depends on that economic strategy.

That's because, in the battle of ideas, he is a work in progress. He hasn't yet hit his stride. His reservoir of solutions is in the process of completion. The construction of his mindset is an anticipated future accomplishment. He has a lot of potential. In fact, in the world of intellect, his potential is pretty much based on potential.

For example:

On gay rights, he draws a straight (so to speak) line to alcoholism. “Even if an alcoholic is powerless over alcohol once it enters his body, he still makes a choice to drink.” He says the same thing is true of gay practices. Once it enters his body, he still makes a choice. He's still talking about alcohol, right?

Perry believes Social Security is an “illegal Ponzi scheme” and doesn't much care for Medicare either. In fact, if he has his way he promises that in the future he envisions “there’s not going to be a Social Security and Medicare program.” But he doesn't want to dwell on abolishing them at the moment because we have to look forward, not backward. It is an election campaign, after all.

He wants to change the U.S. Constitution to abolish the income tax because it puts too large a burden on the wealthy. He will replace it with a 30% sales tax on everything to be paid by everyone. This will be more fair. In fact it is called the "Fair Tax" which is all the proof most people ought to need. Analysts say it will be closer to 53%, but Perry points out that it will be fair.

As Sarah Palin discovered, the press is always ready to pounce with gotcha questions like "name a newspaper." And most of the Governor's ideas, the Governor being Perry not Palin, are in a period of gestation, development, formation, construction, germination. Hey, does anyone know where we can find another word for "Thesaurus" ?

But he is creative, and some of his ideas are sound and well considered. Take for instance, his idea on solving illegal immigration, protecting our borders. You don't have to be xenophobic to want secure borders. If you hate immigrants, especially those who look like ... you know ... minorities, you'll for sure want secure borders. But there are other reasons besides hate. For example, the fact is terrorists don't all look like bin Laden before his last long swim.

Perry would combine a dramatic increase in border patrolling government agents with the best American technology. He would use drones. After all, President Obama has ordered the use of drones as part of his successful efforts in killing terrorists. Why couldn't it work in securing our borders?

Here's how Perry puts it:

I mean, we know that there are Predator drones being flown for practice every day because we're seeing them, we're preparing these young people to fly missions in these war zones that we have. But some of those, they have all the equipment, they're obviously unarmed, they've got the downward-looking radar, they've got the ability to do night work and through clouds.

Why not be flying those missions and using (that) real-time information to help our law-enforcement? Because if we will commit to that, I will suggest to you that we will be able to drive the drug cartels away from our border.

In fact, Perry is right. Using drones to augment a dramatically increased border patrol, providing real time information, could be an effective way to drive drug cartels away from the border and reduce illegal immigration.

There is considerable and growing body of evidence that Perry's new idea will work. We know this because President Obama ordered the Department of Homeland Security to hire more than 1200 more border patrol and customs agents, and an additional 1200 temporary agents, all augmented by a technological program that includes the use of drones to gather information.

The program has run into some snags, since Congress refuses to fund it directly. Homeland Security and the Defense Department have managed to come up with funds temporarily until Republicans see the light.

It's all been part of a much, much larger and well coordinated effort for about two years. Initial figures seem to indicate success. Illegal immigration is way down, although final figures have not yet been totaled.

Governor Perry can't be expected to follow every development in every department of the United States government. He has his hands full keeping track of everything that happens in his own state.

The important thing is that Governor Perry's ideas have proven to be an effective part of that larger effort. The larger effort that has been going on ever since 2009. When Secretary Janet Napolitano announced the program in a major speech.

In El Paso.

The El Paso in Texas.

Rick Perry, the Governor of Texas, the Texas in which El Paso is located, has come up with a really good idea. It is such a good idea, President Obama thought of it and put it into effect two years ago.

In response to Burr Deming's
Don't Tell Me "Abstinence-Only" Doesn't Work - It Works

On the Republican view:

Government intervention in the form of public safety, pollution control, employment compensation, a healthy economic environment, even nuclear safety, is rejected.

- Burr Deming, August 25, 2011

Mr Deming, this is simply a lie. You confuse Republicans with libertarians and/or anarchists. As in the rest of life, the differences are a matter of degree. Since you offer no specific examples, let me suggest some:

Public Safety: Republicans support public safety measures, but reject nanny-statism that would, for example, require every new car to include a rear camera. The left believes in most areas that "saving just one life" is justification for over regulating public safety.

Pollution Control: Republicans hate pollution as much as Democrats. There are points of diminishing return where, for example, microscopic amounts of arsenic in water are acceptable. Democrats prefer to turn this into a campaign commercial that "Republicans want your kids to drink arsenic."

Employment Compensation: I assume you mean unemployment compensation. Republicans support most social safety nets, including unemployment compensation. Republicans reject indefinite extensions of benefits (for example, 99 weeks) because it creates an incentive not to work and keeps the unemployment rate high. If Obama agreed with us, the unemployment rate would already be under 8%.

Healthy Economy: More than Democrats, Republicans want a healthy economy. We want free flowing capital, efficient businesses, and low prices. Democrats prefer over-regulation, red tape, and inflationary policy.

Nuclear Safety: Republicans support nuclear power because it is cleaner and cheaper than fossil fuels or so-called green energy. We see that it's easy to safely operate nuclear plants, while Democrats fear the remote possibility of a disaster and shut down the industry and prevent the construction of new plants.

Because you are right and John Myste is wrong (that "over time, evidence does tend to affect enough folks to bend the arc") it is worth the time of the growing population of conservatives to repeat conservative ideas. We're winning the public debate... again.

We are honored to have as our guest, a noteworthy blogger, The Heathen Republican to tear apart Mr. Deming's muddled liberal brain.

As might be expected, The Heathen Republican also demolishes the mindset of the left on his own website.

Please visit The Heathen Republican

From Florida Capital News:

U.S. Rep. Steve Southerland told retirees Wednesday that serving in Congress is a great honor and privilege, but not cushy job with lavish insurance and pension benefits that many disgruntled taxpayers seem to think it is.

He said his $174,000 salary is not so much, considering the hours a member of the House puts in, and that he had to sever ties with his family business in Panama City. Southerland also said there are no instant pensions or free health insurance, as some of his constituents often ask him about in Congress.

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There were certain issues in the past that have graduated to non-issues. They are now considered by most of us to be settled questions.

In some cases, it is because the weight of accumulated evidence has pretty much crushed any doubt. Very few of us take seriously any debate on whether the sun goes around the earth. Those who wonder if President Obama was actually born in America seem to be split between those who think he was born in Kenya and those who do not realize that Hawaii is a part of the the United States.

In other cases, settled questions are settled because simple fairness has become obvious over time. Gay rights, in at least some form, has gone a long way toward being a universal view. There are some who simply regard a same sex romantic relationship as a perversion that should be outlawed. But the number of adherents to that view has shrunk to the point of near non-existence. There is still debate over actual equal rights. Equality in marriage is less controversial than it was even a year ago. Even Republicans are beginning to dodge questions they once demagogued.

Racial equality once was controversial. Now the denigration of minorities is distasteful to even die hard conservatives. We have a philosophical objection to discrimination that goes beyond argument. It is a settled question.

Many things that were once open to debate are now settled simply because people thought about them enough to approach them with a very solid point of view. Slavery. Death camps. President Nixon.

But on most issues, those before the public, people are swayed by evidence. My friend John Myste disagrees with me on this, and his view holds up to observation to a point. In a single discussion, in even multiple discussions, most folks do not want to concede an argument. But, over time, evidence does tend to affect enough folks to bend the arc.

The difficulty with the shrinking minority that consider themselves Republican is that the most influential consider the very basic fabric of social organization to be a closed question. Government intervention in the form of public safety, pollution control, employment compensation, a healthy economic environment, even nuclear safety, is rejected.

Those Republicans who reject government activism do not, for the most part, reject government solutions because they believe these problems do not exist. They believe these problems do not exist because they reject government solutions. At least on most things.

There are some issues on which most Republicans favor governmental activism. Sex education is favored as long as it is "abstinence only" sex education. Immigration restriction is favored. But, for most, even these issues are closed questions.

Their point of view is philosophical in nature. When they formulate it that way, this can be quite legitimate. In fact, most of us apply a philosophical conclusion to many of life's situations.

"My mind's made up. Don't confuse me with the facts." That is the caricature, but it is only a caricature to a valid approach. We do not challenge the logic of an argument. We challenge the premise.

Consider a recent viral video of an interview with Texas Governor and recently announced Presidential candidate Rick Perry.

Steven Benen summarizes:

I can’t find a full transcript, but to offer a flavor, the clip shows a reporter passing along a question from the audience to the governor: “Why does Texas continue with abstinence education programs, when they don’t seem to be working? In fact, I think we [in Texas] have the third-highest teen-pregnancy rate in the country right now.” Perry responds, “Abstinence works.”

So, the reporter tries again. “But we have the third-highest teen teen-pregnancy rate among all states in the country. The questioner’s point is, it doesn’t seem to be working.” The governor answers again, “It — it works.” Perry then spends two-and-a-half minutes on a meandering answer that doesn’t really make any sense.

Perry might have answered that statistics are not the only measure, that if it works in just one case, it works. He might have elaborated that what matters more than if it works is whether it is right, that a society should stand for something, that the benefit of a moral stand goes beyond it's immediate utility.

Challenge the premise.
Philosophical objection.
Closed question.
Legitimate approach.

The problem is this: Most Republicans do not seem to have the patience. And so we end up with a reflexive denial of even the most obvious facts. Queen of Hearts reasoning drags at the mind.

It works!
Hey, I'm telling you.
It works!

We can look at it as a test of governmental power when an individual is accused of terrorism. In some ways, this is a classic case.

He was on a temporary visa. He had developed a reputation as a religious fanatic. When he was arrested, in 2006, he was in possession of assault rifles and ammunition. He was supposedly accused, in the beginning, of working with others in a plan to kidnap some political figure. The details are a little murky and are unconfirmed. The government is not releasing official information.

But law enforcement people did hold a press conference. The man was accused of acting as an agent of international terrorist groups. He was involved in a plot that went way beyond one kidnapping. He had illusions of helping to set up an transnational theocracy. In his fervent imagination, secular law would be replaced by religious tribunals.

He was subjected to "enhanced" interrogation. He was held without trial, without official charges. Days of harsh treatment stretched to weeks.

Naturally, an outcry was raised on his behalf by a few international groups. They claimed he had been arrested and tortured just in case he might have information. They accused "secret police" of persecuting him because of a religious intolerance that, frankly, we all know has been growing for a while.

I believe him. The government, in 2006, arrested an innocent man, accused him of terrorism, tortured him, and held him without trial, without even charging him with an actual crime.

Yes, he was picked out for arrest because he was from an unpopular country and worshiped God as part of an unpopular religion. He was no more a terrorist than I am. And, although I am guilty of many sins, terrorism is not among them.

It is not the mark of a civilized society that an individual may be arrested on the basis of unsubstantiated suspicion, held without trial, without even being formally charged, and subjected to "enhanced interrogation." How many ways does it have to be wrong before we say no?

We expect that sort of thing from certain pariah nations. North Korea comes to mind. Harsher religion-based theocracies, governments similar to what he was accused of trying to establish, are willing to toss aside rights in the service of God. But such activities are not to be expected outside of such primitive social structures.

In every respect, this case was an outrage, much too typical to be called unique. But there was an outcome that was happier than some.

Political pressure became intense enough to bring results. After 37 days in Luriza Prison outside Kampala, the government of Uganda released the American.

The name of the alleged terrorist is Peter E. Waldron. He currently works as an evangelical organizer. He recently helped Michele Bachmann win the Ames Straw Poll in Iowa.

His story can be found online in the Atlantic Monthly.

We should be glad such a thing could never have happened here in America.

Just when you thought Republican positions couldn't get more mendacious, this happens in New Jersey.

The pattern has been well established for a while. Someone in the Party of Lincoln would send a blatantly racist email. It might be a crude joke about the President or his children. It might be a Photoshopped bit of hilarity casting him and his family as half-clothed primitives, as Americans sometimes view Africans.

Occasionally it is presented as a scientific or psychological analysis by some journalist or politician, presenting the President as inheriting a tribesman's view of the United States as an oppressive colonial power, with a white elite that must be overthrown.

Sometimes it is presented in a sympathetic tone. The President favors governmental dependency, but he can't help it. He's black.

At least those in the first category, the racist emails, usually provoke some feeble attempt at apology. The variations of "I'm sorry if anyone was offended" or "I regret that overly sensitive souls took it the wrong way" or "I apologize for trusting that my small group of friends would not respect my privacy and released my little joke to the public" do all get a bit tiring.

But we eventually grow to accept it. It becomes such a regular occurrence that it is almost no longer news. Dog bites man.

And, when it seems like it simply cannot get any worse, that the fluoride in the GOP water has been replaced with some sort of bizarre hallucinogen, something so off-the-wall happens that we are left with a mental buzz that won't go away.

In New Jersey, an Assemblyman destroyed his public career last month. Here's how he did it.

Carl Lewis, an Olympic gold medalist, grew up and lives in New Jersey. His fame and accomplishments have made him a wealthy individual by most standards. He owns a house and a business in California. But he bought a home and moved to New Jersey years ago, and became involved in the community. Among other things, he donates his time to helping a local high school track team.

When he decided to run for a local state assembly seat, the partisan Republican Lieutenant Governor, who also serves as Secretary of State decided that Lewis was not a real resident of New Jersey. She ordered his name to be kept off the election ballot. So Lewis went to court and got the decision temporarily reversed, and won the Democratic primary unopposed.

That should end it, right, at least for a while? Well no. The Lieutenant Governor said the court decision did not matter to her. She felt strongly about it and ordered the name of Carl Lewis be kept off the ballot anyway.

In the middle of all this, the Republican against whom Lewis wants to run, the incumbent Assemblyman, Patrick Delaney, revealed something about his personal character.

Delaney's wife sent an email to Lewis. The message in part, read this way:

It must be nice. Imagine getting a court ruling overturned so your name could get put on the ballot. Imagine having dark skin and name recognition and the nerve to think that equalled knowing something about politics.

It is a bit shocking that someone in the public eye would send a message, knowing that it would undoubtedly become public, and do so without spelling "equaled" correctly. Beyond that, it was an attack on Lewis essentially for being black.

Naturally, the Assemblyman apologized for the email his wife had sent. The way he apologized is what is so revealing:

I am deeply disappointed in my wife's decision to send that email to Mr. Lewis' campaign; it does not reflect my personal beliefs whatsoever. In an attempt to repair the serious damage this has caused to our marriage, and to protect our kids from public humiliation, I decided to leave public life. On behalf of my family, we sincerely apologize to Mr. Lewis for any pain this caused him.

Huh?

The Assemblyman had tried to quietly resign, not wanting to put a further strain on his marriage and his family, but word of the email message leaked out, so he made a public statement.

So let's get this straight. The official had every right to separate himself from the actions of his spouse. They are married, but surely we can see that nobody should be held responsible for the impulsive actions of another, even a spouse. Instead, he explained, apologized, and resigned. Resigned?

Resigned. And his apology was about as straightforward as could be imagined.

The local GOP chair says the party would have withdrawn their support anyway. The Lewis campaign won't comment, aside from confirming they received the email message. It's a Republican matter.

Bottom line: It seems we have discovered a Republican with personal integrity, possibly one of many.

Somebody quick. Draft this fellow back into public life.