Are black people really abandoning Obama?

Fairly frequently, the Sentinel prints editorials by Star Parker. They're always pretty full of self-delusion and crazy god-babbling nonsense. I suspect that her main appeal is that she's an ultraconservative black woman, which allows other conservatives to claim they're not racist or sexist if they agree with her. That's just my theory, though. She might just be cheaper to syndicate or something, due to sucking.

Today we get a prime example of just how flawed her thinking is. It's actually pretty remarkable. The editorial in question is entitled Blacks are changing their minds about President Obama, and as we'll soon see, even the title is wrong.

Let's begin with the quoting!

Americans of all political persuasions agree that the nation has problems. Big problems.

And here's where we all part company. The political left, who now control our government, thinks we need more government -- a lot more. Those on the right see our problems as the result of excess government and want to move things in the opposite direction.

That's about the most superficial and inaccurate assessment of the political divide that I've ever seen, but whatever.

The important part, and the premise of the editorial, is the idea that blacks are abandoning the president. Here's what Star argues:

According to the Pew Research Center, the president's approval rating nationwide is now 10 points lower than last April. Included in this is a three-point drop in his approval among blacks.

You might say, Star, a drop in approval ratings among blacks from 95 percent to 92 percent is trivial. But I say not so.

If we assume this reflects the 16 million blacks who voted for Obama last November, a three-point shift means there are about a half-million blacks who now have buyer's remorse.

Star Parker does not understand polling at all.

You can see the study she's talking about here (pdf). If you go down to the race part, you do see that Obama's approval has dropped from 95% to 92%.

Of course, if you go down to the bottom of the whole thing, you find this:

For the total sample, the margin of error attributable to sampling that would be expected at the 95% level of confidence is plus or minus 2 percentage points. The margin of error for subgroups will be higher.

So we've got a 2% margin of error on the whole thing, and higher than 2% on subgroups, one of which is race. Which means a 3% "drop" is utterly meaningless. It could be an actual 3% drop, or it could be no drop at all, or it could be an increase. There is no discernible change that you can detect from this poll.

It sure as hell doesn't mean there are half a million blacks with "buyer's remorse."

So, Parker's entire premise is fundamentally flawed, because she either doesn't know how to interpret polling data or chooses to misrepresent it in order to promote her own deluded thinking. With such a faulty premise already debunked, it's almost unfair to continue to point out how dumb this editorial is, but there's a part that just can't be ignored.

Parker babbles on for awhile about how blacks supposedly can't not be Democrats, because the big Democratic goon-squads will make fun of them. Or something like that, anyway. She apparently thinks that it's social pressures that keep them in the Democratic party, and not the fact that it's always Republicans who do shit like this (view the whole slideshow, it's fun!).

Here's the part that really gets me, though.

According to a Pew Research Center report, almost a third of blacks consider themselves conservative. [*]

However, these folks have always been inclined to be quiet because of the social pressures and intimidation.

But this is changing.

Despite slurs, intimidation and widely reported physical attacks from union thugs, a few brave black souls have shown up at tea party protest rallies.

What. The. Fuck?

Parker is actually suggesting that it's the left keeping black people from going teabagging? I had to read it a few times to make sure that's what she was suggesting, but it must be. She's not blaming the right for intimidation or slurs, and she certainly doesn't consider unions to be conservative, so she must be blaming the left.

That picture up at the top of this post is from a teabagger event. The following pictures are also from teabagger events:





These are the people that Parker thinks blacks are being prevented from hanging out with, by those nasty liberals in the unions.

Doesn't that look like an inviting environment? If I were a black man, I'd definitely want to run right out to teabag with all those people! No damn union thugs could keep me away from the warm and loving embrace of people who think that a tax decrease for the middle class equals "white slavery"!

Ms. Parker, after you finish reading "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Understanding Margins of Error" you might want to consider the idea that the people keeping blacks away from teabag parties are the teabaggers themselves. Most people don't seek out locations where they're going to be treated like shit by a bunch of racist assholes.

Parker craps out some closing bullshit about abortion and Israelites and so forth at the end, but it's the same impenetrable drivel she usually produces and not really worth commenting on. This is a mind not in touch with reality. Not even close to it.

That's really all you need to know about this editorial. It has a false premise and ridiculous conclusions, and my dog has a better understanding of race relations than Parker does.

No, black people are not abandoning Obama. Star Parker has simply abandoned reality.



* While 32% of blacks do indeed self-identify as conservative, it's worth noting that this Pew study makes no differentiation between social and fiscal conservatism. Generally, the black community tends to skew towards social conservatism, with more liberal economic views.

Yet More Streetlight Nonsense

Ha.

Just yesterday I was complaining about the lack of stupid scaremongering articles in the S&E of late. I even said I wanted "something about scary loud noises caused by kids exploding soda bottles, or about unlit streetlamps coming to life and killing everyone."

Obviously, Jeff McMenemy is a devoted reader, because today he delivers another steaming pile of stupid about streetlights. To wit: Editorial: No fiscally bright side to turning off streetlights.

Having had several months to refine his arguments down into a light paste, let's see if he does any better with the scary "Unlit streetlights will doom us all!" rhetoric.

It doesn't start off very well:

Leominster Mayor Dean J. Mazzarella made it clear before he recently released his fiscal 2010 budget that he would not cut core city services, and we applauded the mayor for producing a budget that didn't call for any layoffs in the middle of a recession, although it did include a 2.5 percent tax hike.

That's why we were disappointed to learn that his budget does call for turning off about 200 of the city's 3,000 streetlights, in a move that would save about $20,000, according to Department of Public Works Director Patrick LaPointe, who talked about the plan during a budget hearing Monday.

Hilariously, McMenemy has just falsified his own title. Saving twenty grand is definitely a "fiscally bright side to turning off streetlights."

Following this poor start, the editorial includes quotes from Leominster city officials talking about how they're going to be careful about which lights are included in the less than 7% of the city's streetlights that they're considering shutting off. Which is reasonable, but I'm more interested in the arguments against turning them off at all.

Like this:

Turning off streetlights is a bad idea for many reasons. First, it makes the city less safe, both from a crime standpoint and just for kids playing at night or residents walking, jogging or bicycling.

Well, that's an interesting argument by assertion. Too bad it's not supported by facts. The evidence itself is inconclusive at best, which may be why the FBI doesn't list lighting under its review of variables affecting crime.

Two can play this game! I assert that leaving 93% of Leominster's streetlights on constitutes an attractive nuisance for invasion by space aliens. If they were to turn off all the streetlights, then the alien invaders would have more difficulty finding the town from their hiding place in the troposphere.

In other words, turn off all the streetlights or get ready for a lot of anal probes.

You've been warned!

When lights are turned off near homes, the value of the homes can also drop.

Can they?

I don't actually know, but probably. Lots of things can happen. That doesn't mean they do, and some quick searching didn't lead me to any evidence that turning off street lights makes home values drop. Admittedly, such evidence would be almost impossible to collect. Home values are affected by a lot of things, and I'm betting that an unlit street light is pretty unimportant in the bigger picture. But who knows?

It's probably not going out too far on a limb to assume that McMenemy didn't even bother with this sort of quick search, so we have another argument by assertion. There are few people whose fact-free assertions you should trust less than McMenemy's, so I guess this one fails too.

Perhaps another?

And even in great neighborhoods, fewer streetlights can encourage more property crimes, even if it's just car break-ins.

Okay, yeah, every one of these claims is an argument by assertion.

This one is a throwback to the first crappy argument. Less streetlights equals more crime. This assertion is still not supported by the evidence, so let's move on.

And turning off streetlights sends the clear message to residents and businesses that the city is in trouble, which Leominster is not.

No it doesn't. Most people wouldn't even notice this small number of streetlights being off. Futhermore, only a lunatic jumps from "the city shut off a few street lights to save money" to "OMG Leominster is DOOOOOOOOOOOOOMED!!!"

If streetlights and crime are as tightly connected as McMenemy seems to believe, then we should be able to eliminate crime just by adding ridiculous numbers of streetlights so that everything is lit up. After all, it's not like crimes ever occur during the day.

Oh, wait. The FBI disagrees.

# Offenses for which time of occurrence was known showed that 57.4 percent of burglaries took place during the day and 42.6 percent at night.

# Offenses for which time of occurrence was known showed that more residential burglaries (63.6 percent) occurred during the daytime while 56.4 percent of nonresidential burglaries occurred during nighttime hours.

Dang. I guess we'd better start keeping street lights on all day.

The GOP is clearly thriving

Call it schadenfreude if you like, but I really enjoy watching those on the far right as they flail around trying to convince everyone that the Republican party isn't dying. It's an even mix of delusion and desperation, which unfailingly serves to convince all watchers that yep, the Republican party sure is dying.

Today we have a fine example of that, in a Star Parker-penned editorial entitled No need for a GOP eulogy.

Poor Ms. Parker doesn't like the way people are saying the GOP is dead!

The columns are all over the place, and all the analyses seem to be the same.

The Republican Party is supposedly deader than a doornail. Except in a handful of states in mid-America and in the South, Americans, according to these columnists, see Republicans as irrelevant, out-of-touch, mean-spirited dinosaurs.

Well, that's probably because Republicans are irrelevant, out-of-touch, and mean-spirited. I wouldn't call them dinosaurs, though. Dinosaurs are pretty cool, and as far as I can tell the coolest Republican in the world is Kelsey Grammar. That's definitely a sub-dinosaur level of coolness.

But, may I remind folks, that we just had a presidential election in which 130 million voters cast ballots and the difference between the winner and the loser was 9 million votes. Not exactly what I would call an insurmountable divide.

Personally, I would call the difference between Obama's 69,498,215 votes and McCain's 59,948,240 votes 9.5 million. But maybe that's splitting hairs.

Of course, when you consider that even 9 million votes is about 15% of the total votes for McCain, that seems a little more sizable than the way Ms. Parker frames it. Math is fun!

Nor should we forget that there was that window following the Republican convention when the McCain-Palin ticket was leading.

Yeah, for like two days after the Republican National Convention McCain was actually ahead!

If only people had voted back then, when half the country thought Sarah Palin was just some MILF-y governor and not the repugnant idiot they later recognized her to be, then the Republican ticket would have (possibly, and just barely) won. Informed electorates are bad news for the GOP, I guess.

Having exhausted the "Republicans are strong because we lost the election" line of reasoning, Parker turns to a recent poll to further strengthen undercut her argument.

A new Wall Street Journal/NBC poll shows 42 percent self-identifying as Democrats compared to 31 percent as Republicans. But the same poll shows 35 percent identifying as conservatives compared to 24 percent as liberals.

Umm, so? That conservative/liberal split doesn't really mean good news for the GOP. Unless she's just pleased that conservatives have done a fine job of convincing people that the word "liberal" is a pejorative.

Here's the source data (evil PDF link) for the poll. As you can see, Parker has her numbers right. But the implied interpretation that the GOP is doing okay because more people self-identify as conservatives than as liberals is just nutty.

It's not really surprising that more people self-identify as conservatives than as Republicans, since there are presumably at least a few conservative Independents and Democrats. But if we assume that the vast majority of Republicans identify themselves as either somewhat or very conservative (which I think is a fair assumption), then that means that very few Democrats or Independents think of themselves as conservative at all.

What's more, the 35% of the country that self-identifies as "moderate" therefore must lean heavily towards either the Democrats or "strictly independent." Mostly the former, since only 19% of respondents identified as strictly independent.

Was this supposed to be evidence that the GOP isn't a party of far-right kooks who are driving away moderates (and everyone else)? Because if anything it just suggests that yeah, the GOP is totally driving away moderates.

Of course, Parker may be happy about this. Segue to ranting about Arlen Specter...

According to Dick Polman of the Philadelphia Inquirer, Arlen Specter's switch to the Democratic Party shows what's wrong with Republicans -- they can't tolerate moderates -- and not what is wrong with Specter.

But there is little doubt that Specter changed parties because polls were showing him getting his clock cleaned in the Republican primary by conservative Pat Toomey.

Yes, he was going to get beaten by Toomey in the Republican primary. Because he's too moderate for the increasingly hard-line conservative Republican base which votes in the primaries.

Apparently Ms. Parker interprets that to mean that Specter is a weenie-head, not that moderates can't win election in the Republican party. Now, Specter is indeed a weenie-head, but he was clearly driven out by the far-right Republican base.

Of course his switch was all about self-interest. He's said as much. But the only reason it's in his self-interest to switch is because the Republican base wouldn't vote for a moderate. If they would, he would have no reason to leave.

At this point the editorial sinks into a boring mire of whining about how Arlen Specter is a big jerk who isn't as awesome as George Washington. I'll ignore most of that tedious nonsense (because who really gives a shit?) and just skip to the end.

We should also recall Washington's guidance in his farewell address that "Of all the dispensations and habits which led to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports."

It's a message as relevant to today as when Washington wrote it in 1796, and relevant to every American of every background.

I guess atheists aren't Americans. Maybe Sweden will take me.

This is, however, a nice example of just why the GOP is dying. They just can't resist any opportunity to tell other people how to live their lives. If they can do so by quoting someone who died before the advent of indoor plumbing, so much the better!

Okay, last couple of lines.

Republican Party problems started from straying from principles, not from sticking to them.

The party's future lies in principles, not in pandering. We need George Washingtons. Not Arlen Specters.

Yep, it's another Republican saying that the way to stop moderates from leaving the GOP is to focus even harder on "principles." Which is wingnut-speak for "become even more conservative and drive out all the moderates!"

Good luck with that, guys. It's been working great so far.

All you need to know about this idiotic pro-torture editorial

Unsurprisingly, another pro-torture editorial appears in the S&E. It's by syndicated columnist Deroy Murdock this time, and it's somehow even worse than McMenemy's evil nonsense from a few days ago.

It's not even worth reading, to be honest. So let's just gut it right at the outset, which is easy because the entire thing is premised on a total lie.

Here's how it starts. (All emphases mine.)

Library Tower looms 73 stories above Los Angeles. But the Pacific Coast's highest skyscraper could have become a smoldering pile of steel beams had CIA interrogators not waterboarded Khalid Sheik Mohammed 183 times in March 2003, as declassified memoranda reveal. Americans should be proud that our public servants had the patience and persistence to pressure al-Qaida's self-described military chief until he cracked, ratted out his homicidal conspirators, and prevented a bloody attack that could have murdered thousands of innocents and transformed much of downtown L.A. into Ground Zero West.

Simple enough. The claim is that the torture of Mohammed, who was arrested in March of 2003, prevented the Library Tower from being attacked. The entire editorial rests upon this premise.

Which means the entire editorial is based on an outright lie, since the plot was foiled in February of 2002.

From a White House Press briefing:

Q: Fran, just one other follow up. What we don't know is the time. Can you give us some more details on the timeline on this -- meaning, you know, when, exactly, was this plot scheduled for? Do we know that?

MS. TOWNSEND: We don't know exactly when the plot was scheduled for. The intelligence tells us that Khalid Shaykh Muhammad began to initiate it in October of 2001. We know that between then and when the lead operative was arrested in February of '02, between those two periods of time, they traveled through Afghanistan, they met with bin Laden, they swore biat, they came back, and the lead guy is arrested, which disrupts it in February of '02. So you see what I'm saying? It's during that short window of time, between October of 2001 and February of 2002, but we don't know when they planned -- we don't know when it was planned to actually be executed.

Want confirmation? Ok, how about this Fact Sheet put out in 2007 by the Bush administration?

In 2002, we broke up a plot by KSM to hijack an airplane and fly it into the tallest building on the West Coast. During a hearing at Guantanamo Bay two months ago, KSM stated that the intended target was the Library Tower in Los Angeles.

So the torture of KSM in March of 2003 retroactively led to the foiling of the Library Tower plot in February of 2002? That's quite a feat.

Is there any lie these monsters won't tell to justify their beloved torture?

Torture's dumbest apologist

Yesterday's Sentinel contained a particularly repugnant editorial (un-bylined, but presumably by editor Jeff McMenemy) about torture. It requires evisceration.

The editorial has the remarkably self-unaware title of Don't 'torture' us with half-truths.

Yes, there's a pun about torture in the headline, which shows you just how casually our shitsack editor views torture. As for the "half-truths"? Well, McMenemy mostly just lies, but maybe we can pick up on some of those too.

Sigh. Here we go.

Former U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney is right: If President Barack Obama wants transparency regarding the CIA's alleged harsh interrogation methods, he should release all the top-secret memos, including those detailing information learned that led to successful anti-terrorism efforts.

This first paragraph contains the one thing I can agree with Cheney and McMenemy about.* I want to see all the memos released too. Let's see just how much useful information really is contained within. I suspect it's a lot less than McMenemy believes, but would like to see for myself.

Now we go our separate ways.

Obama's release of the memos -- some leaked selectively to the media to embarrass the Bush administration -- has stirred considerable debate among former CIA directors and national security experts. Most believe the interests of the United States have been weakened by the disclosure. Even Leon Panetta, Obama's CIA director, questioned the motives behind the disclosures.

Shit, this is going to take awhile.

What was "leaked selectively to the media"? Not the torture memos, which are readily available to anyone who wants to look at them. So it's not selective, and since they're declassified and are available to anyone who wants them, they're not "leaked" either. **

And if these non-leaked, non-selective memos embarrass the Bush administration, who's to blame for that? They're Bush administration memos about Bush administration policies. If the Bush administration is truly embarrassed about them, then maybe they shouldn't have fucking used them in the first place.

As for "most" security experts thinking the US is "weakened" by the release of these memos about torture methods we don't even fucking use anymore, that's totally made up. I doubt there are good statistics on this, but I've certainly heard a lot more "experts" saying that this information was pretty much known anyway than pretending it will actually have an effect on the country's safety. But I don't exclusively consume right-wing news.

Concerning Panetta, who really gives a shit? Of course there were people who wanted to cover this up, and Panetta's one of them.

More lies...

At first, Obama said he would not prosecute any officials but now he is flip-flopping as Democrats seek revenge. But revenge from what? The country's safety?

First of all, you flaming asshole, it's not revenge, it's accountability. If you commit war crimes, you should fucking be held accountable. That's what it's about.

Also, Obama has been consistent in saying that the people who were "just following orders" should not be prosecuted. The people who gave those orders get no such leeway, and anyway the decision is not Obama's to make. He's not the one prosecuting anybody, it's up to the Justice Department.

The Obama administration is rapidly changing the rules on CIA procedures. Techniques that were legal just months ago are being ruled off limits while Holder develops new guidelines. But the call to prosecute CIA interrogators who were doing their jobs, legally, is absurd.

Who's calling for the prosecution of interrogators? Not Obama. There's not a lot of political support at all for prosecuting the people at the bottom of the chain. So way to argue against something that very few people are arguing for, dumbass.

The bigger question is how will the U.S. fare going forward when it comes to obtaining valuable intelligence from captured terrorists?

While we know very little about the intelligence gleaned from the CIA's efforts, one thing is perfectly clear: The Bush administration, after 9/11, kept America safe from foreign attack for seven years. Our allies also benefited from an exchange of information.

Anyone who believes that is pretty much an irredeemable idiot. So it's a standard right-wing talking point, natch.

Obviously, the fact that the US wasn't attacked on its own soil since 9/11 in no way means the Bush administration "kept America safe." It just means we weren't attacked.

You can see that as being because of the Bush administration if you're so inclined, and rather stupid. I see it as being despite the Bush administration, who in reality made America far less safe than we would have otherwise been.

To then make the jump from "we weren't attacked" to "torture is good!" requires a special kind of malicious stupidity. It's highly prevalent in this editorial.

What we find unsettling is that the administration seems bent on "correcting" America's values and character on the world stage, as if the global perception of what America did and didn't do is worth more than its national security.

This is a foolhardy agenda that can only lead to soft spots in our diplomacy and defenses.

Once again, stupid binary thinking rears its head. The worldwide perception of "America's values and character" has a significant effect on America's security. Alienating the rest of the world isn't exactly a great way to increase security, but it's a fantastic way to ensure everybody is out to get us. Artificially separating the two makes no sense.

And what's this "soft spots in our diplomacy and defenses" nonsense? Does that even mean anything? Other than that the editor wants us to torture even more brown people?

America is not a monster, and it bows to no one. While we have made mistakes -- and acknowledged them in public -- we have set a standard for human rights, charitable aid and the cause for freedom. There is little to be ashamed of in the course of our accomplished history.

Jingoistic rubbish.

Genocide of the Native Americans, slavery, internment camps, the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment, the My Lai massacre, the continuing shitty way anyone who's not a straight white Protestant male is treated, and the fact that we fucking torture people are just a few of the many shameful things in the course of American history.

America has much to be proud of too, of course. But ignoring the bad things benefits nobody.

The world is a dangerous place. Threats exist against America, and there is no justification for letting down our guard or coddling terrorists.

Apparently in McMenemy's mind, "not torturing" equals "coddling." Be glad you're not his kid.

If President Obama wanted to prove something to the world in disclosing the CIA's top-secret memos he has failed, largely because his selectivity has tarnished the work of dedicated agents following orders to protect America against its worst enemies.

What? How the fuck can you "tarnish" torturing people? It's pretty much as tarnished as anything can possibly get.

That's all I'm going to bother with. McMenemy is a ghoul. His "defense" of torture doesn't even attempt to offer a moral or practical justification for using it. His concern isn't whether torture is right or wrong (NB: it's wrong), this editorial is all about public relations damage control for the Bush administration. It's a bitch-fest that the truth has finally been told.

But yeah, let's release everything we can. Let's get the whole truth out there. Not that people like McMenemy will ever pay attention to it, but let's get it out for the rest of us.

Then let's hold the monsters who were in charge of it accountable for their actions. And let's let apologists for torture (like McMenemy) know that they don't speak for us.

Ghouls like these called the shots for eight years. Their time is over, and we need to make sure they never have the opportunity to practice their twisted brand of ethically-insupportable "justice" ever again.


* I don't for a second believe that Cheney really wants all the memos released. It's political wrangling, because he knows full well that most of them won't be released and as long as something remains classified he can claim that the Obama administration is just not releasing the stuff that justifies the Bush administration's actions.

** I recognize that McMenemy was likely trying to claim that the memos were selected to embarrass the Bush administration and that claiming they were "leaked selectively" was just his usual incompetent writing. It doesn't matter. Of course they were selective on what memos were declassified. They couldn't possibly release them all at once, for reasons that are obvious to everyone but McMenemy.

Conservative columnist approaches truth, runs away screaming

Ooh, there's a fun syndicated editorial in the Sentinel today!

It's by the execrable Star Parker, who, along with the similarly braindead Jay Ambrose, is a favorite of the S&E's editorial board when they're too lazy to write something themselves.

It asks the question Are voters moving to the left?. I bet you can guess Parker's answer already, but let's see how she gets there. It's a fun journey!

Might as well start at the beginning:

Now that Democrats have won the White House and have widened their margin of control in Congress, does this signify that American voters have moved to the left?

Many Republicans question this claim. And a new report from the Pew Research Center seems to verify that America is still a right of center as a country.

But the picture gets murky when you look at the details. And this murkiness presents a considerable challenge for Republicans who are trying to figure out where to steer their party.

See, Star, this is why Republicans generally don't bother looking at the details. It just screws everything up. You'd be much happier sticking with your first impression and making up reasons to believe it. Pretend you're Bill O'Reilly, he has this technique mastered.

Still, this "looking at the details" idea appeals to me. So let's see what's up.

Oh, here's the Pew report in question. Just in case you want reference material. I'll stick with Star's column.

First, she finds one bit of news that makes her happy!

According to the just published report, more Americans today call themselves conservative than liberal, and the relative percentages in each category has hardly changed since George W. Bush was elected to his first term in 2000.

Yep, the report does show people self-identify in mostly the same ways they did 8 years ago. So where does it get tricky?

When asked if the Bush tax cuts should be made permanent, only 38 percent of those who said they are "conservative" said yes.

And 50 percent of "conservatives" said they favor government guaranteeing health care "even if it means raising taxes."

Although 71 percent of "conservatives" said they oppose gay marriage, only slightly more than half, 52 percent, said that abortion should be illegal.

Oh no!

Apparently these self-identified "conservatives" aren't conservative in the way this conservative columnist wants them to be conservative! What jerks!

It gets worse!

[P]ro-life initiatives lost in all three states where they were on ballots -- California, South Dakota, and Colorado.

Well, obviously liberal California wouldn't go for it, but South Dakota? These "conservatives" are traitors!

So Star Parker is confused. People call themselves conservative, yet they don't believe the things that she thinks conservatives are supposed to believe? What's a girl to do?

Maybe give some bad advice to Republicans?

[I]t should be obvious from the above, that if conservatives are rooted anywhere, it's more in the social agenda than in the fiscal and limited government agenda.

Where in the world would the party be if the leadership tried to uproot from social conservatism?

That's right, Republicans. In this time of economic we're-all-fucked-ness, you should be focusing extra hard on your dumbass social agenda that will do nothing to help anyone.

That's just common sense!

She then goes on to jabber about some other things for a bit. And ends by.. umm... telling people what to think?

When most Americans say they are conservative, they mean it. Too many, however, are forgetting that this means limited government as well as traditional values.

We need new, energetic Republican leaders to get this message across.

Okay....

Parker seems to have reached the conclusion that most Americans are being honest when they call themselves conservative, and have just forgotten what that word means. Perhaps she's right.

The part where this all turns to crap is that she wants to use it to suggest that people who call themselves "conservative" actually are conservative, in whatever way she defines that word. Which is nonsense.

If I don't know what a kangaroo is, but am convinced that I'm a kangaroo, that still doesn't make me a kangaroo!

Put more plainly, the label people choose to assign to themselves tells you nothing about what they actually think.

The Right has spent the last few decades trying (mostly successfully) to turn "liberal" into a dirty word. Why do you think we liberals have taken to calling ourselves "progressives"?

It's not because we're trying to hide our beliefs, it's just that the word "liberal" has been dragged through the mud for so long that all it conjures in the minds of most people is an image of Ted Kennedy, or maybe some corduroy-jacketed college professor with a ratty beard and a deep love of Marxist ideology.

So yeah, a lot of people aren't going to self-identify as liberals even if everything they believe makes them a liberal. There's too much baggage associated with the word. You find the same thing with people who are actually atheists but will only self-identify as agnostics or "spiritual but not religious".

They believe the same things, they just don't want the label. And who can blame them, when the label has been given a negative connotation? *

See, Star Parker got close to this truth. Somewhere deep inside that lizard-brain of hers she started to realize that just because people call themselves conservatives doesn't make it true.

But since more people call themselves conservatives than call themselves liberals, it's a nice myth to believe. So Parker chooses to believe it. After all, it allows conservative pundits to say "America is a center-right country", which keeps them employed. Never mind that it's not true.

The reality of the matter is that America is becoming a little bit more liberal every day. It's a slow process, especially since the driving principle behind conservatism is to stifle that progress, and conservatives control an awful lot of stuff in this country. But it's going to happen one way or another.

That being said, I totally support Parker's assertion that Republican leaders should firmly embrace social conservatism. I like voting for the winning side.



* Me.

Street Lights and Psychoses

Ha, I totally called it!

The dumbasses at the Sentinel have puked out an editorial about turning off streetlights and it's as full of stupid as you'd expect.

But is it the particular flavor of stupid we were expecting? Let's find out!

First a little clarification though. On that earlier post a commenter mentioned that she has been informed that all these crappy (but byline-lacking) editorials are written by Jeff McMenemy, the S&E's editor. I have no trouble believing this, as Mr. McMenemy has written many similarly terrible editorials with an actual byline included.

However, I don't want to attribute such idiocy to an innocent party if it isn't actually Mr. McMenemy. He could have a really dumb acolyte doing the writing or something. So I will just refer to the person behind this editorial as "the editor".

Anyway, the editor pulled a switcharoo on me! I was fully prepared to debunk a claim that turning off some streetlights would cause an increase in crime. Maybe the editor read my earlier post mentioning that, because he didn't go so far as to make that claim. He does dance around it quite a bit though. So let's dance!

First, consider the opening paragraph...

Fitchburg Mayor Lisa Wong's decision to consider implementing a plan as a "last resort" that calls for turning off every fifth street light, except major intersections, in the city is equally farfetched as it is ill-conceived.

Umm.. what?

Her decision is "farfetched" and "ill-conceived"? That doesn't even make sense. You can call a plan "ill-conceived" or "farfetched," but you can't call the "decision to consider implementing a plan" those words.

Or you can, but everyone reading it will laugh at you and call you dumb.

Let's pause a moment to take special note that the editor recognizes that this plan is a "last resort," is by no means guaranteed to happen, and would affect only every fifth streetlight. Remember these things, because the editor will shortly forget them.

Here's paragraph two!

We can't think of a time or place where it would ever make sense for a mayor to call for turning off street lights -- it sends all the wrong signals about your city -- but this is especially true in Fitchburg.

Oh my god I love this paragraph.

It starts off with that great "we lack the ability to think" bit. I can think of a lot of times and places where it would make sense for a mayor to call for the turning off of street lights. Here's a free one: daytime. You'll have to come up with others yourselves.

But the best part is that once again the editor has fallen back to the braindead non-argument of "sending the wrong signals." Only today we're not sending the wrong signals to kids, we're sending them to... ummm... well the editor hasn't bothered to tell us yet. Devious! He simply tells us that they're sent especially hard in Fitchburg.

Why especially in Fitchburg? I don't know, but the editor has some lies to tell!

Fitchburg is a city where police are fighting an escalating crime problem, particularly violent crime, which is fueled by a growing number of gang members and the illicit drug trade.

Jesus fuck people, how often do I have to point out that crime has been decreasing for the last few years? Just saying things are getting worse all the time doesn't make it true!

I am impressed that the editor has pinpointed the cause of crime though. I'd be curious to see the epidemiological studies he ran to discover that violent crime in Fitchburg is due to gangs and drugs. Good thing he knows just what causes it.

Anyway, what the fuck does that have to do with streetlights? Oh, nothing? Well okay. Let's continue...

Likewise, the city's residents also have to deal with a [sic] higher-than-normal property crimes, caused by the drug addicts who steal anything they can get their hands on to fuel their illegal and destructive habit.

Wow, down on the drug addicts! Those studies must have been really conclusive. Because there's no way that destitute people in a terrible economy would ever steal anything unless it was for drug money. Only those degenerate drug addicts would ever do such a thing!

Also, what's "higher-than-normal" when it comes to property crimes? Is there a normal level of property crime that the dickhead editor would consider fine? Seeing as Fitchburg ranks 6th out of 14 similar-sized cities in property crime, I'd call it pretty normal. Right smack in the middle.

The Sentinel lying about crime rates isn't really newsworthy though. Let's get back to the rest of this idiocy.

Turning off street lights sends the message to them, and everyone else inside and outside the city that your city is in dire straits, and it encourages lawlessness.

Sending messages again! And now we finally know who's getting this message: everybody. Wow!

I wonder what it's like to be Jeff McMenemy the editor. Constantly bombarded by "messages" from streetlights and pieces of legislation and space aliens (probably). It must be hard to live like that.

Maybe he has magic sunglasses like "Rowdy" Roddy Piper in They Live, but instead of seeing the secret authoritarian messages hidden in the environment and becoming a freedom fighter he has embraced them and wants to be one of the creepy skull people too.

The editor sees this and thinks "Well okay, whatever you say!"
We've also finally figured out just what the streetlights are saying when they talk to everyone: They're encouraging lawlessness! Man, streetlights sure are jerks. I mean the ones that are off. The ones that are on are okay I guess. Or at least they don't talk to Mr. Psychotic Editor Guy.

Wait, maybe he's just scared of the dark?

The city of Fitchburg needs more lights and more police on the streets to keep residents, business owners and their customers more safe, not less.

Yep, I think he's just scared of the dark.

Mr. Editor, I am sorry for making fun of you. Clearly your parents did something wrong when you were a child, and never addressed a very primal fear that most of us got past years ago.

You see, darkness can't actually hurt you. More lights don't equal more safety. Also, there are no monsters under your bed.

The last quote represents pretty much the end of even the pretense of an argument about streetlights. From here on the editor just goes into a rant about how Mayor Wong is so incredibly terrible for proposing this plan mentioning this idea as a remote possibility.

Frankly, that part isn't even interesting enough to respond to. After all, it's based on the faulty premise that there's something wrong with the plan. Since that hasn't been established, the ranting that depends on it can be safely ignored.

Finally, just a word of advice to the editor: If a streetlight talks to you or tries to send you a "message" or a "signal", for god's sake just ignore it!

How to write an editorial for the Sentinel

It must be pretty easy to write editorials for a hack newspaper. You can just make stuff up! As long as it fits with the ideological biases of the paper, anything goes!

There does seem to be one rule that applies at the Sentinel though. No matter how sensible the rest of your editorial is, it's not complete until you throw in a totally unsubstantiated bit of conservative bullshit.

Let's look at a few recent editorials for example!

First, Jeff McMenemy's editorial entitled Fathers deserve more credit than they get.

Pretty dull, uninspired stuff. Just what we've come to expect from the illustrious editor of the Sentinel!

It's also pretty uncontroversial, and is basically about how single fathers are okay guys and shouldn't be written off just based on their gender. Okay, no worries. But for some bizarre reason in the middle of it he throws out this gem:

To suggest, as many in the liberal family court system do, that a child will be harmed by spending equal amounts of time with both parents, is illogical and the worst kind of political correctness.

Whuh?

The family court system is liberal? Liberals think that spending time with both parents is bad? That's somehow "politically correct?" Huh?

I know a lot of liberals. I've discussed politics with a lot of liberals. I'm a liberal myself. Not once do I recall any of us ever having an issue with fathers spending time with their children. What's the point of even throwing this in the editorial, other than to further express the paper's massive conservative bias? It's not like it adds to the argument (which was otherwise not that bad, for McMenemy at least) in any way.

Now, I do worry about McMenemy's kids, but it's not because he's male. It's just because he's a douchebag.

Regardless, it follows the paper's golden rule of always having an unfounded attack on liberals in its editorials, so it passes!

Next, we'll move onto the somewhat less sensible but still okay Judges need more accountability, less secrecy.

Now, this is less of a clear-cut case, because the whole piece is pretty dumb. Personally, I don't feel the need to have judges spend all their time sucking up to the press and explaining their every decision (99% of which are totally uninteresting anyway). I'd rather they spend that time doing judge stuff.

But in general transparency is a good thing, so I'll let it pass.

Yet, once again we get a bit of weirdness:

The judiciary is not under attack; it is simply being scrutinized for fostering in the public's mind a perception that judges are liberal, elitist and arrogant.

Umm...

Damn those elitist liberal judges! Why could the public possibly view them that way? Actually, hold on a second; does the public even view them that way?

I don't. Most people I know don't. I went looking for polling figures saying this is what the public thinks and couldn't find any (maybe I missed something?). Still, I'd be willing to bet that most people generally don't spend a lot of time thinking about the political views or personality foibles of judges, they just want them to interpret the law correctly. Which is their job.

But if we accept that this perception maybe does in fact exist, do you really think it's the judges who are at fault? After all, they're not even the ones talking to the press (which is largely what the editorial is complaining about).

Maybe, just maybe, it's actually the press portraying the judges this way that would make people come to these erroneous conclusions. Case in point: this editorial. Some monkey behind a typewriter says that judges are liberal and elitist and blah blah blah so it must be true!

Never mind the fact that every last bit of legal reporting I've ever seen in a newspaper is totally superficial, doesn't explain the intricacies of the law, and generally belies a total misunderstanding of how the legal system even functions.

Also please disregard the fact that even if every judge in the country is an arrogant liberal elitist, that has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not they're a good judge. Their views and personalities don't matter if they do their job right.

Oh, but liberals are bad! Just like those arrogant elitists (none of which exist in the press corps, nosiree sir!).

So the editorial goes through.

Finally, let's go to the most recent example: State's auto insurance coverage still has a long way to go.

It's about the recent MassPIRG study (warning, that link is a PDF) showing that--in the words of the study--"'How You Drive' Takes a Backseat to 'Who You Are'".

It's an interesting study that I recommend reading (or at least skimming through) if you're interested in seeing the ways in which the insurance companies game the system to use socioeconomic factors in determining rates, despite the state attempting to prevent exactly that.

I don't think the editorialist actually bothered to read the study, but that's hardly surprising.

Anyway, here's the relevant bit from the editorial that had me scratching my head:

We think the report shows what happens when state government gets involved in business: They mess it up.

Well, now I know they didn't read the study.

On the other hand, at least they didn't use the word "liberal" this time. Instead, they just regurgitated a stupid conservative talking point that makes absolutely no sense in this context.

First off, the state is deregulating the auto insurance industry. It's getting less involved in business than it has been, and that's what's fucking things up. How hard is that to understand?

Here's a quote from the MassPIRG report that explains the old system (bold and italics are theirs):

Massachusetts policymakers over the years had become very aware that the competitively rated auto insurance markets in the other states served the interests of insurers – not of consumers – and were notably flawed in one vital respect: The other rating systems unfairly penalized many drivers with good records and rewarded many drivers with bad records. The Massachusetts rating system was highly regulated precisely to avoid the major failings of competitive auto insurance markets – in particular, that these other markets permitted insurers to use countless rating factors having nothing to do with the consumer’s driving record. These other factors dilute the importance of driving record, and to make matters worse, do so by discriminating against drivers based on their socio-economic status. And so, Massachusetts policymakers preserved a rigid rating system because that system gave more weight to driving record than any other rating system in the United States.

Well, that's pretty unequivocal. When the state was highly involved in regulating the auto insurers things were exactly as the Sentinel wants them to be. When the state removed (or lessened, anyway) its involvement we opened ourselves up to the same flaws that exist in the other 49 states. In fact, the whole point of regulation was to prevent this kind of shit from happening.

But somehow the Sentinel interprets that as the state getting involved with business and messing things up. What the hell?

Yeah, the state messed up. It messed up by deregulating. It should have kept the old, more heavily-regulated system in place. But then you'd have papers like the Sentinel writing editorials about how the state shouldn't interfere with business. Which they did anyway!

So there you have it. Three editorials. Three bullshit conservative talking points that are either totally irrelevant to the point of the article, unsubstantiated gibberish, or just plain illogical.

The only conclusion one can reasonably reach from this small sampling is that the Sentinel must have some sort of quota of conservative bullshit it has to include to consider an editorial fit for printing.

Or they're just totally incompetent boobs. Take your pick.