What passes for political discourse these days is so debased, so irrational, that we no longer even think about the real meanings of the words we throw around. So “socialist” is conflated with “Nazi” (and used without any obvious understanding of what the term describes) and “conservative” is used to describe positions that are anything but.
To be conservative is to “conserve”–to protect elements of the past.
Now, there are times when wholesale change is necessary or advantageous. There are other times when dramatic, radical reinvention is profoundly harmful. In a democratic system, it is up to the voters to decide whether they want to replace what they have with something radically different. But in order to make that decision, voters need to understand what is really being proposed–and in an era where propaganda has displaced much of the news, where a pitiful minority know enough about America’s history or constitutional system to recognize the magnitude of the changes the current GOP field is advocating, the significance of the 2012 election is not obvious to many–perhaps most–voters.
What was that old Chinese curse? May you live in interesting times?
They say the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.
In the wake of Judge Rosenberg’s ruling that Charlie White was ineligible when he ran for Secretary of State, his father posted a series of highly inflammatory, anti-Semitic rants on his Facebook page. Subsequently, he must have realized how damaging they were, and took them down.
Lesson One: in cyberspace, nothing is ever erased. (Just ask George Allen, he of the “Macaca moment.”)
Lesson Two: when people are angry, all too often their real nature emerges. In this case, it isn’t pretty.
Lesson Three: when you are really puzzled by an individual’s seemingly bizarre behavior, sometimes looking at nature and nurture will supply a hint.
I received a call from a reporter with the Indianapolis Star, inquiring about this sordid little rant. One of her questions was “As a former ACLU Executive Director, do you think he had the right to post such things?” The answer, of course, is an unequivocal yes. People have the right to be bigots and to utter hateful nonsense. And the rest of us have the right to criticize and judge them for it.
I’ve tried to copy the screenshot, below, so you can judge for yourselves.
Update: the Star is reporting Darrell White’s claim that his account was hacked. As ‘proof,’ he says he reported the matter to the local sheriff–a somewhat bizarre thing to do when no identity theft is involved. The Star quoted Mike Delph as saying he’d never known the Whites to be hateful. (Yes, that Mike Delph…) At this point, people can choose to believe he was the innocent victim of a Facebook hacking, or that he was the author of what certainly seem to be heartfelt, if revolting, posts.
It appears that We The People have received a needed bit of holiday cheer after all. The Republicans in the U.S. House had to back down and agree with the bipartisan agreement reached in the Senate to extend the middle-class tax cut by two months, in order to give negotiators time to work out a longer-term agreement. And here in Indiana, embarrassing buffoon Charlie White was declared ineligible to serve as Secretary of State.
The House GOP may finally have worn out any remaining patience of even members of their own party; it was clear that they were being intransigent simply because they could be. None of their explanations made any sense, and even their usual defenders deserted them. (I almost felt sorry for Boehner, who was evidently backed into this particular corner by his own party’s most extreme elements.) The “crazy caucus” is rather clearly motivated only by one thing: animus to Obama. It will be interesting to see how many of these sorry excuses for public servants survive the 2012 election.
Speaking of sorry excuses, how do we even try to understand Charlie White?
It is one thing to be ethically obtuse. We have a lot of that in Indiana these days, as Matt Tully noted in this morning’s column. It is quite another to defy calls for your resignation by leaders of your own party and virtually every newspaper in the state. The job of Secretary of State includes administration of the voting laws; the irony of having a Secretary of State who was guilty of voter fraud was obvious to everyone except Charlie White. By refusing to resign when he might have done so, White didn’t just give Indiana politics a black eye; if appellate courts uphold Judge Rosenberg’s (well-reasoned) decision, he may end up costing his own party automatic ballot access, among other things.
However satisfying it may be to see the House reluctantly do the right thing, and to see not just Charlie White but several other elected officials get their “just deserts” (Paul Bateman, Lincoln Plowman, etc.), the only thing that will ultimately fix our sorry politics is us. We The People elected these sorry specimens. We are the ones who didn’t pay attention, who shrugged off ethical lapses because “all politicians are dirty.” (They aren’t, but we are creating an environment that is pretty off-putting to the good people who want to serve.)
Until we are ready to engage, to work for a government that will work for us, we’ll continue to get politicians who serve their contributors and cronies. Self-government requires participation. Voting is important, but it isn’t sufficient.
Maybe Santa will bring us some civic engagement this year. We can hope.
Governor Daniels was the “hands on” manager responsible for Indiana’s failed effort to privatize welfare eligibility determinations in the state. He originally bragged that the move was his idea, and when it proved to be a huge mess, he was admirably forthright about taking the blame. While I’ve not read his book, friends who have read it say that those admissions and regrets made it into print as well.
So why is he doing everything he can to avoid testifying about it?
IBM has sued the state over the termination of their part of the contract (ACS, as usual, escaped the consequences and continues to feed at the public trough). IBM wants to depose the Governor. Seems reasonable–Daniels is clearly “in the know” about a number of issues critical to the litigation. But he’s fighting tooth and nail to avoid being deposed, and it’s hard not to wonder why.
The American system of justice depends upon the compliance of parties and witnesses in order to function. In our system–at least theoretically–no one is “too busy” or “too important” to discharge this civic duty. If I receive a subpoena, I have to respond; so should the Governor.
The Supreme Court insisted that Bill Clinton had to give testimony in the tawdry Paula Jones case, even though he was President and the litigation had absolutely nothing to do with the conduct of the government. Daniels, on the other hand, is being asked to testify about the use of tax dollars and the delivery of critical public services.
The continued stonewalling makes one wonder what the Governor doesn’t want us to know.
Republicans in the House of Representatives send an “up yours” message to the middle class, while explaining that “job creators” must be protected.
Rick Santorum is quoted as saying that today’s massive inequality is a reflection of the fact that some people work harder than others.
These are just a couple of the the more recent expressions of a persistent sub-text in American life, a perversion of early Calvinism that leads people to justify privilege by diminishing the value of those who have less. The poor, they believe, are poor because they are somehow morally flawed. They don’t put it quite that way, of course–instead, there is talk of “work ethic” and “middle class values” that “those people” lack.
I am a believer in the market. If everyone is playing by the rules, some people will do better than others. Society will value the contribution of some people over others. When markets are properly regulated–when no one can game the system–we all benefit from the efforts of the guy who invents a better widget, the artist whose work adds beauty to our lives, even (she says through gritted teeth) the athlete whose prowess we admire.
When the system is broken, when rewards are distributed on the basis of cronyism and influence-peddling, when those rewards are wildly disproportionate to the social or other value of the work involved (to investment bankers who invent credit default swaps, for example), I suppose it is understandable that the recipients would want to justify their good fortune by claiming that they really have earned their millions. When that self-justification takes the form of dismissing the value of those who’ve been less fortunate, however, is when it becomes truly obscene.
I’ve been haunted by a segment that aired on 60 Minutes last Sunday. The report focused upon the foreclosure crisis, and in particular, on the 11+ million homeowners who–despite being “underwater” on their mortgages–stubbornly continue to make their payments. There were people who had lost jobs, people living paycheck to paycheck, who refused to walk away from mortgages on which they owed twice what their homes are currently worth. In one interview, a woman who was barely eking out a living was asked why she continued to pay when others were abandoning their properties. Her response? “I signed the contract. I’m not the sort of person who fails to live up to my obligations.”
It may come as a shock to the bankers and assorted plutocrats whose gated communities and social circles protect them from interaction with the American middle and lower classes, but most people–including poor people–work forty or more hours a week.(That’s why we call them the working poor.) They try to pay their bills, help their neighbors, and educate their children. A thousand dollars doesn’t represent a really fancy meal; it makes an enormous difference in their lives.
It’s bad enough when elected officials pursue policies that protect their cronies and contributors at the expense of their constituents. It’s unforgivable when they dismiss those constituents as unworthy of their concern.
