Random Blogging – Page 34

A Digital Public Square?

Did we ever have a real public square? I’ve certainly used that phrase as shorthand for the sorts of public policy debates Americans conduct–debates that used to occur on newspaper editorial pages, and later by dueling television personalities. But the phrase itself calls up images of Greeks interacting in the Agora.

A column by Ezra Klein several months ago made me consider the realities of America’s approach to public argument, and our lack of anything that might be considered a replacement of that Greek Agora. As Elon Musk continues to destroy the utility of X (formerly Twitter) I’ve continued to mull over Klein’s observations.

As he began:

For what feels like ages, we’ve been told that Twitter is, or needs to be, the world’s town square. That was Dick Costolo’s line in 2013, when he was Twitter’s chief executive (“We think of it as the global town square”), and Jack Dorsey, one of Twitter’s founders, used it, too, in 2018 (“People use Twitter as a digital public square”). Now the line comes from the “chief twit,” Elon Musk (“The reason I acquired Twitter is because it is important to the future of civilization to have a common digital town square”).

Klein points out that the metaphor is inaccurate in at least three important ways: for one, there is not–and cannot be– a “global town square.” Public spaces are rooted in the communities and contexts in which they exist. (As Klein. notes, “What Twitter is for activists in Zimbabwe is not what it is for gamers in Britain.”)

Second, what makes a town square a public square is that it is governed by a public. It isn’t just a square in town, and it isn’t the playthings of a “whimsical billionaire.” It lacks a profit motive. As Klein says, “A town square controlled by one man isn’t a town square. It’s a storefront, an art project or possibly a game preserve.”

Third,

What matters for a polity isn’t the mere existence of a town square but the condition the townspeople are in when they arrive. Town squares can host debates. They can host craft fairs. They can host brawls. They can host lynchings. Civilization does not depend on a place to gather. It depends on what happens when people gather.

Klein reminds readers of the rosy predictions that accompanied the introduction of our digital communication systems. More democracy, better inter-group relations, broader understandings…I will readily admit to subscribing to rosy predictions that–as Klein reminds us–have utterly failed to materialize.

Instead, the cost of our enhanced connection and information “has been the deterioration of our capacity for attention and reflection. And it is the quality of our attention and reflection that matters most.”

In a recent paper, Benjamin Farrer, a political scientist at Knox College in Illinois, argues that we have mistaken the key resource upon which democracy, and perhaps civilization, depends. That resource is attention. But not your attention or my attention. Our attention. Attention, in this sense, is a collective resource; it is the depth of thought and consideration a society can bring to bear on its most pressing problems. And as with so many collective resources, from fresh air to clean water, it can be polluted or exhausted….

Our collective attention is like a public pasture: It is valuable, it is limited, and it is being depleted. Everyone from advertisers to politicians to newspapers to social media giants wants our attention. The competition is fierce, and it has led to more sensationalism, more outrageous or infuriating content, more algorithmic tricks, more of anything that might give a brand or a platform or a politician an edge, even as it leaves us harried, irritable and distracted.

Twitter and Facebook and a multitude of other digital platforms make it easy to talk–but incredibly hard to listen and reflect.

We do not make our best decisions, as individuals or as a collective, when our minds are most active and fretful. And yet “active and fretful” is about as precise a description as I can imagine of the Twitter mind. And having put us in an active, fretful mental state, Twitter then encourages us to fire off declarative statements on the most divisive possible issues, always with one eye to how quickly they will rack up likes and retweets and thus viral power. It’s insane.

It’s one of the thorniest issues we face: how do we create a viable we from so many diverse I’s…without imposing on the fundamental rights of those diverse individuals?

Klein’s essay–which I encourage you to read in its entirety–reinforced my belief that our current problems are exacerbated by the information environment we inhabit.

How do we fix that environment?

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On The Brink

What a time for Congress to be impotent.

The outcome of the war in Ukraine will have enormous consequences for global democracy, and requires unflagging support that MAGA Republicans oppose. The war just launched by Hamas against Israel threatens to strengthen Netanyahu, a corrupt, anti-democratic autocrat embraced by Trump who has caused immense damage to Israel’s reputation, both at home and abroad, and to further destabilize one of the world’s most dangerous areas. Climate change is accelerating, while MAGA Republicans continue to deny its reality. The gap between the rich and the rest is accurately characterized as a new and massively unfair Gilded Age. American lifespans are declining…The list goes on.

And the Republicans in Congress are clowns, utterly unable to rise to any occasion, or to make even the most feeble efforts to do their jobs. The GOP has picked a very unfortunate time to disintegrate ala the Whigs.

As Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo has observed, McCarthy’s downfall is another symptom of the same underlying pathologies: a cultish GOP in thrall to a would-be autocrat, anti-majoritarian structural impediments, a surge in right-wing extremism, and White resentments and grievances channeled into a burn-it-all-down fever.

Unfortunately, McCarthy’s ouster.doesn’t change those underlying systemic problems. Republicans in the House are deeply divided between an outdated and unrealistic Right wing and a full-blown lunatic Right. The two candidates who’ve emerged as frontrunners in the contest to succeed McCarthy would be unacceptable in any rational legislative body. (Jim Jordan is so unhinged that one Democratic strategist has been quoted for the observation that elevating him would give Democrats 14 additional House seats. Steve Scalise is best known for his claim to be “David Duke without the baggage.”)

All this would be bad enough in a saner, more peaceful world. Now, it’s terrifying–sort of like being stuck in place with a broken leg while watching an avalanche descending on you .

Jennifer Rubin recently summed up where we are, and she echoed my own feelings:

After Hamas is defeated, there will be a reckoning in Israel to match anything we have ever seen. Evidence of warnings to the Israeli government about insufficient deterrence, recriminations about putting a racist ideologue in the Defense Ministry post and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s misguided assault on democracy will all be reviewed. Careers will end. History will convict many of grotesque negligence.

Here in the United States, I have less patience than usual (which is often none) for inane right-wing rhetoric in the United States. No, there were no humanitarian funds released to Iran that might have put money in the mullahs’ pockets to be spent on Hamas. No, the Biden administration did not invite any of this. Republicans used to denounce the urge to “blame America first” for monstrous evil perpetrated by others. No more.

This should, but likely will not, inject some sobriety into the Republican Party, which has held up U.S. military promotions and confirmations and State Department postings; brought the House to a state of collapse under the weight of MAGA hysteria; carried water for Russia (an ally of Iran); and generally reminded us that adults are needed in government.

Voters need to wise up: We cannot tolerate the return to power of the egregiously unfit four-times indicted former president (who gleefully spread around intelligence information) nor allow MAGA nihilists to hold the country hostage. The stakes here and around the world are far too grave.

And those stakes are “around the world.” Russia’s invasion of Ukraine began the largest war in Europe since World War II. Meanwhile, China has become more bellicose toward Taiwan, India is experiencing an eruption of virulent nationalism, and Israel has formed the most extreme government in its history. Populism is growing in otherwise democratic countries like France and Spain.

If the chaos caused in large measure by the “stop the world, I want to get off” Republcans in Congress ends up adding fuel to a meltdown of civilization and stability across the globe, if the wars that keep breaking out engulf us in another worldwide conflict, a significant cause will be the fact that far too many Americans have reverted to an unthinking and reflexive tribalism while they wallow in an utter lack of interest in –or desire for–adult governance.

The only bright spot in any of this is the fact that we have a seasoned, wise and statesmanlike President at the helm, and not the preceding ignoramus.

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An Accurate Diagnosis

Last week, President Biden spoke at the opening of the John McCain library. In an impassioned address, he drew a bright line between the Republican Party of John McCain and others with whom he’d worked in a bipartisan fashion, and the MAGA crazies who now dominate the party.

The entire speech was excellent, and if time permits, it’s worth clicking through and reading it all, but a couple of paragraphs really stood out to me–striking me as especially accurate diagnoses of where we find ourselves today.

“[T]here is no question that today’s Republican Party is driven and intimidated by MAGA Republican extremists. Their extreme agenda, if carried out, would fundamentally alter the institutions of American democracy as we know it.”

The MAGA Republicans, Biden said, are openly “attacking the free press as the enemy of the people, attacking the rule of law as an impediment, fomenting voter suppression and election subversion.” They are “banning books and burying history.” “Extremists in Congress [are] more determined to shut down the government, to burn the place down than to let the people’s business be done.” They are attacking the military—the strongest military in the history of the world—as being “weak and ‘woke’.”

They are “pushing a notion the defeated former President expressed when he was in office and believes applies only to him: This president is above the law, with no limits on power. Trump says the Constitution gave him…’the right to do whatever he wants as President.’ I’ve never even heard a president say that in jest. Not guided by the Constitution or by common service and decency toward our fellow Americans but by vengeance and vindictiveness.”

Biden spoke at a time when rational Americans were facing the intransigence of MAGA House Republicans who were clearly enthusiastic about forcing a government shutdown (and later, furious with McCarthy for working with Democrats to avoid it.), Their “impeachment hearing”–a hearing at which their own witnesses testified that they had no evidence of wrongdoing–was a pathetic attempt to distract the public from their refusal to do the jobs they were elected to do.

Those who read and comment on this blog probably share my reaction to the utter insanity of all this: disbelief. Who are the people who still support these extremists? How is it possible that any American citizen listens to Trump’s increasingly demented word salads and thinks, yep, that’s the guy who ought to have control of the nuclear codes?

How is it possible that roughly a third of Americans remain Trumpers?

The answer is pretty chilling. It turns out that–in addition to racism– a lot of Americans are nuts.

Back in 2016, polling found that twelve million Americans believed alien lizard people rule us.

According to a Public Policy Polling survey, around 12 million people in the US believe that interstellar lizards in people suits rule our country. We imported that particular belief from across the pond, where professional conspiracy theorist David Icke has long maintained that the Queen of England is a blood-drinking, shape-shifting alien.

That research was conducted in April. In November, Trump was elected…

As the article pointed out, there are a number of equally…let’s just say unsupported…beliefs endorsed by millions of Americans.

Around 66 million Americans believe that aliens landed at Roswell, New Mexico; around 22 million people believe that the government faked the moon landing; and around 160 million believe that there is a conspiracy surrounding the assassination of former US president John F Kennedy.

In the years since 2016, we’ve seen the growth of various QAnon conspiracy theories, Bill Gates’ chips in Covid vaccines, vaccines causing autism…etc. etc.

Who are the people most susceptible to these beliefs?

Researchers say feelings of powerlessness and uncertainty trigger a need to believe in conspiracies. Or, as one scholar is quoted,

Conspiracies are for losers …

“I don’t mean it in the pejorative sense, but people who are out of power use conspiracy theories to strategically alert their side to danger, to close ranks, to salve their wounds,” Uscinski explains.

According to another researcher, belief in a conspiracy theory–alien lizards, the existence of Q, the ‘real purpose’ of vaccination– is a strategy fearful people use to regain a sense of control, even if the conspiracy theory is unrelated to what caused the lack of control in the first place. Conspiracy theories allow a person to make sense of what they see as otherwise senseless or unfair in the world they inhabit, and allow them to restore some sense of control.

Bottom line, there are millions of Americans for whom logic, evidence and demonstrable facts are irrelevant. And they vote.

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John Kelly: Late, But Better Than Never

At lunch a few days ago, a friend and I shared our distress over the current chaos of America’s political landscape. Both of us are women of “a certain age,” and both of us have difficulty wrapping our heads around the loyalty of MAGA Republicans to a man who is quite clearly–and dangerously–mentally ill.

My friend has always been a Democrat, but I spent 35 years as a Republican, which adds to my bewilderment. The Republican Party I worked for had its problems (there was always a racist, anti-Semitic fringe), but it also had a set of principles that have now been totally abandoned. Today’s GOP –now controlled by what was once its fringe–is in thrall to a man who repudiates virtually everything the party once stood for.

That includes respect for the men and women who serve in the U.S. Military.

In an interview that has been labeled “better late than never,”John Kelly, Trump’s former Chief of Staff, confirmed what most observers have surmised–that Trump’s “it’s all about me” worldview made it impossible for him to understand why people might sacrifice themselves for their country.

Kelly set the record straight with on-the-record confirmation of a number of damning stories about statements Trump made behind closed doors attacking US service members and veterans, listing a number of objectionable comments Kelly witnessed Trump make firsthand.

“What can I add that has not already been said?” Kelly said, when asked if he wanted to weigh in on his former boss in light of recent comments made by other former Trump officials. “A person that thinks those who defend their country in uniform, or are shot down or seriously wounded in combat, or spend years being tortured as POWs are all ‘suckers’ because ‘there is nothing in it for them.’ A person that did not want to be seen in the presence of military amputees because ‘it doesn’t look good for me.’ A person who demonstrated open contempt for a Gold Star family – for all Gold Star families – on TV during the 2016 campaign, and rants that our most precious heroes who gave their lives in America’s defense are ‘losers’ and wouldn’t visit their graves in France.

“A person who is not truthful regarding his position on the protection of unborn life, on women, on minorities, on evangelical Christians, on Jews, on working men and women,” Kelly continued. “A person that has no idea what America stands for and has no idea what America is all about. A person who cavalierly suggests that a selfless warrior who has served his country for 40 years in peacetime and war should lose his life for treason – in expectation that someone will take action. A person who admires autocrats and murderous dictators. A person that has nothing but contempt for our democratic institutions, our Constitution, and the rule of law.”

Kelly confirmed the accuracy of earlier reports that Trump had refused to visit the graves of American soldiers buried in the Aisne-Marne American Cemetery near Paris, saying “Why should I go to that cemetery? It’s filled with losers.” Trump said the 1,800 US Marines killed in the Belleau Wood were “suckers” for getting killed.

Perhaps the most eloquent rejoinder to that despicable attitude was in the widely-quoted retirement speech delivered by General Mark Milley. Without mentioning Trump, Milley explained America’s military patriotism.

“We are unique among the world’s militaries. We don’t take an oath to a country. We don’t take an oath to a tribe. We don’t take an oath to a religion. We don’t take an oath to a king, or queen or a tyrant or a dictator. We don’t take an oath to a wannabe dictator. We don’t take an oath to an individual.”

“We take an oath to the Constitution, and we take an oath to the idea that is America, and we’re willing to die to protect it,” Milley continued. “Every soldier, sailor, airman, Marine, Guardian and Coast Guardsmen each of us commits our very life to protect and defend that document, regardless of personal price, and we are not easily intimidated.”

You don’t have to be a fan of America’s bloated defense budget or unfortunate history of international meddling to respect the men and women who put themselves in harm’s way to serve the American idea. To view these people as “suckers” and “losers”–to call General Milley a “traitor”– can only be understood as the ravings of a mentally-ill man who has become increasingly unstable as he faces accountability for his own past criminality.

I wonder–if John Kelly had “come clean” at the time about the ravings of the ignorant narcissist he served, would it have made any difference to the MAGA cult?

Probably not.

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A Case Study

Wisconsin is currently providing us with a lesson about the state of American democracy.

It isn’t just the arrogance of Republicans who are threatening to overturn the expressed will of the voters with a trumped-up impeachment of a state supreme court judge; the state is a case study for Democrats elsewhere whose voters face similarly manufactured limits on their ability to win elections.

Last December, just after the midterms, the Guardian ran a report on how Democrats had managed to fight back in what the article called “the nation’s most gerrymandered state.”

Ben Wikler spent so much time poring over polls ahead of the midterm elections that it eventually became too much to bear.

“I was throwing up with anxiety,” Wikler, the chair of Wisconsin’s Democratic party, confessed to the Guardian.

It wasn’t merely out of concern, common to Democrats nationwide in the run-up to the early November vote, that voters were set to give their candidates the traditional drubbing of the party in power, powered by Joe Biden’s unpopularity or the wobbly state of the economy.

Rather, Wikler feared that in Wisconsin his party was on the brink of something worse: permanent minority status in a state that is crucial to any presidential candidate’s path to the White House.

What the party faced in Wisconsin was dire: if Democratic Governor Tony Evers lost re-election, or if the state’s GOP achieved supermajority control of Wisconsin’s legislature, the GOP could have ensured that its electoral college votes never helped a Democrat win the White House.

As Wikler said, Wisconsin is “a state where Republicans have tried to engineer things to make it voter-proof.”

According to several studies, Wisconsin is the most gerrymandered state in the country, and the fourth most difficult state in which to cast a ballot. It also has laws that make it practically impossible to conduct voter registration drives.

But Wisconsin’s Republicans are looking to tighten access to polling places further, and passed a host of measures to do so, all of which fell to Evers’s veto pen. With a supermajority in the legislature, they would have been able to override his vetoes. In a speech to supporters, Tim Michels, the Republican candidate for governor, made it plain that if he was elected, the GOP “will never lose another election” in the state.

Amazingly, despite being faced with enormous structural barriers, Evers was re-elected, and Wisconsin Democrats narrowly managed to keep Republicans from a supermajority in both houses of the legislature. Democrats’ success at standing their ground in Wisconsin was one of the most pleasant surprises the party experienced in the midterms.

What accounted for Evers’ robust win?

The fact that statewide races can’t be gerrymandered is obviously key. And according to various news sources, Evers had a clear advantage over Michels among those age 18 to 44 years old, an age cohort that made up more than a third of voters in Wisconsin.

Evers also had stronger support for the issues he ran on than Michels did.

The AP VoteCast survey showed the most important issue facing the country for Wisconsin voters was overwhelmingly the economy and jobs. However, Evers focused much of his campaign on abortion, which was only slightly more important to voters than the issue of crime, something Michels made a prominent theme of his candidacy.

Voters who cared most about the economy split their votes between the parties–but Wisconsin voters who said the abortion issue was very important to them were lopsidedly pro-choice. Evers attributed the strength of his win to that issue.

There is a lesson here for Indiana in next year’s statewide elections.

As with Wisconsin, Indiana’s extreme gerrymandering will be irrelevant in the upcoming statewide races. And–mirroring the Wisconsin gubernatorial contest–the Hoosier electorate cares about economic and public safety issues, but is divided on which party is best able to address those issues.

As in Wisconsin, however, Hoosiers who care about reproductive rights are lopsidedly pro-choice.

All but one of the five Republicans running for Governor are running ads professing their “pro-life” and “Christian faith” credentials. The already-endorsed Republican Senate candidate (Indiana’s male version of Margery Taylor Green) is a flat-out culture warrior who supports a ban on abortion with no exceptions, along with a multitude of other far-Right positions. (He recently called President Biden the “most corrupt person to ever occupy the White House.” No kidding.)

I will grant that Indiana’s state Democratic party structure ranks somewhere between weak and “where the hell are you?” but the party has lucked out with strong and appealing statewide candidates–Jennifer McCormick for Governor and Marc Carmichael for U.S. Senate. Both are on the right side of the issues Hoosier voters care about, and–if adequately funded– both can win next November.

We can learn from Wisconsin.

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