Hillary is Boring

There is an interesting article in Salon today, entitled "The Kim Kardashian Exception: Why her Empire is Constantly Questioned -- and Donald Trump's Isn't."  First, a confession.  I have never seen so much as five nano-seconds of Kim Kardashian on any screen.  Though YouTube, in their infinite algorithmic wisdom, has recommended her to me a couple of times, I have not clicked on the link.  Likewise, Donald Trump.  I have never watched, nor do I intend to watch, so much as a nano-second of the "Apprentice."  I have no way of judging whether either the Kardashians or Trump were worth watching.

That said, the writer, Silpa Kovveli, quotes a producer from the Trump show saying, “It’s guys like him, narcissists with dark Machiavellian traits, who dominate in our culture, on TV, and in the political realm.”  I could suggest the producer doesn't get around much, because "narcissists with dark Machiavellian traits" dominate the top rungs of just about any substantial enterprise.  My last collegiate boss would fit the description.  She (yes, she -- neither narcissim nor dark Machiavellian traits are gender specific) couldn't be wrong, on even the most trivial matter, and once bullied a VP into admitting that Emerson wrote Walden, though he, and I, and almost everyone else at the table absolutely knew better.  Not, I admit, one of my better moments.   Having been there, we all maintained a "wise silence" heads bowed.  One can imagine the "wise silence" around many executive tables.  It shouldn't be surprising that narcissists want to be in top positions, nor should it be surprising that some do actually have the "dark skills" necessary to achieve or maintain those positions.   Indeed, "narcissism with dark Machiavellian traits" may be a necessary, if not sufficient, condition for attaining high level success in our "market dominated" culture.

Here's the thing.  We have all heard the lament that those who do the most "good" in our culture are the one's often least rewarded -- the dedicated elementary school teacher who transforms the lives of inner city kids earns less  than ... well, almost everyone, including those elementary school teachers in more posh suburban districts.   Money, however, isn't everything.   Although I have no doubt that the dedicated elementary school teacher would like to earn a better living, and hopes that her union is successful in the next round of negotiations, one doubts that she entered the profession with visions of great wealth.  Indeed, if there were suddenly the possibility of great wealth, it would quickly dissipate the aura of moral and ethical superiority the profession because it would begin to attract "narcissists with dark Machiavellian traits."   It is probably "good" that those professions that do the most "good" are poorly compensated, and that we have reserved the highest compensation for those professions where "dark Machiavellian traits" may do the least harm -- professional athletes, entertainers ...

I almost said "corporate executives, and politicians," but of course both can do considerable "harm."  The last recession is a case in point.  The corporate executives of some of the biggest banks in the nation almost brought the economy to its knees, and were it not for good old socialism, in the form of Keynesian economics and the bail out, we might likely be discussing the current presidential run in the midst of a real depression.   It probably goes without saying, but I'll say it anyway, those same corporate executives were not harmed in quite the same way or to quite the same extent as those they scammed with unsustainable mortgages.  Indeed, they came out of it rather well, thank you very much, and the bail out may well have been the biggest corporate scam of all, one in which any number of politicians, including our President, may well have been tacitly, if not explicitly, complicit.  Of course, that is now ancient history, almost a decade old, but there you have it, "evidence to the contrary" -- that is to say, to quote Kovelli, "despite every indication to the contrary, many continue to believe that if people are rewarded for behaviors then those behaviors have inherent value to our society. This kind of circular reasoning has pundits tying themselves up in knots to give Trump credit for savvily exploiting our political system, when Trump has never given us any indication that he possesses any savvy at all."  

This "inherent value to our society" is the foundational myth of the so-called "free market."  As I have written elsewhere, "free markets" is not "free for all."  They resemble games, with well defined rules, and those who can "play within (or around) the rules most successfully" will achieve the most "success."  Again, I confess, I am a Cubs fan.  I watch each and every one of their games, and I know that a very select few of the athletes will earn more in a game than most will earn in a life time, but I cannot help myself.  It's an addiction of sorts.  I tune in the game, knowing that few if any of the attributes necessary to hit 30 home runs in a season has much in the way of "inherent value to our society."   I suppose, likewise, that many follow the Kardashians for much the same reason.  They have become an addiction of sorts, and they tune into their antics, knowing that few if any of the attributes necessary to be a "Kardashian" have much in the way of "inherent value to society."  One could argue, of course, that "entertainment" may have some "inherent value"-- that literature, cinema, music, even television can be "edifying," challenging us to better understand ourselves and others -- but the same "income" disparity exists.   Good literature, good cinema, good music, even good television -- that with the most potential for "edification," that which actually does challenge our vision of the world -- often is rather poorly compensated compared to the Kardashians.  There are exceptions, but here again, for the sake of its moral and ethical "superiority," it's probably a good thing that good entertainment is poorly compensated in comparison to athletics and trash TV. 

Nevertheless, the "inherent value to our society" is a foundational myth.  When the bail out occurred and people were somewhat aghast that the very corporate executives received "big bonuses," one hears it in the assertion that the high salaries and exorbitant bonuses are necessary to attract and retain the "best and the brightest," those with the most "inherent value" to the game being played.  In a very limited sense, of course, this may well be true.  Anyone capable of hitting .350 with 30 home runs and over 90 RBIs will command an enormous salary, in part because people like me will want to watch him play, driving up gate receipts and advertising revenue.  They are a valuable commodity, their agents know they are a valuable commodity, and so the salaries climb because they are "worth it."  I am sure, in a very limited sense, that the same holds true for bankers and other corporate executives, though one suspects (I suspect) that it is more a matter of self perpetuating culture and demeanor than anything quite so demonstrable as actually hitting 30 home runs or driving up corporate profits.  There are those to the manor born, and those who do not have (as one college president put it of me) the right pedigree.  This pedigree comes with all the attitudinal pheromones that signal one's attractiveness -- a strong sense of one's inherent superiority, followed by a equally strong sense of entitlement that overwhelms normal compassion.  All it takes from there is a sufficient machiavellian cunning that leads one to desire personal profit within a game that values personal profit above all else, and you have a rising star within the corporate heavens.  The dark machiavellian cunning without the pedigree gives you Gatsby, the perpetual wanna be despite his ostentatious accumulation of wealth, while the pedigree and the cunning together give you Tom and Daisy, the unacknowledged American aristocracy, "careless people ... [who] smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness ... and let other people clean up the mess they had made."  The corporate executives of the banking industry, who did so much to smash up the economy, retreated back into their money, demanding even greater scope for their carelessness, and left the American people to clean up the mess they had made while they went on playing on the fields of the lord.  

The shift, for those who caught it, between "inherent value to our society" and "inherent value to the game being played" is subtle but important, and the one shouldn't be mistaken for the other.  Democracy, for all its imperfections, leans toward that which has "inherent value to our society."  Capitalism leans toward  those that have "inherent value to the game being played," and the wealth producing game of capitalism is inherently predatory.  I have often thought that capitalism is epitomized by the drug cartels.  In their defense, the drug cartels are not so much immoral as amoral, a distinction captured in the ubiquitous phrase, "it's not personal, it's business."  They have a product and that product is desirable despite the social damage caused by that product.  The drug cartel exists for one purpose and one purpose only -- to increase the wealth of the cartel owners by maximizing profits from the sale and distribution of that desirable product.  There are those who "share" in the profits, those associated with the production and distribution of the drugs, but their "share," per individual, is substantially less than those who control the cartel.  Although the cartel owners flout the legal impositions on their product, they don't actually abhor them as one might suppose, in part because those same legal restrictions insure that demand will outstrip supply and drive up prices.  The cartel business is nasty and competitive, and leaves a trail of smashed up lives in its wake as they seek to monopolize and eliminate competition.  It is perhaps not surprising that the "leadership" of most cartels are sociopaths with "dark machiavellian traits," but almost all of the risk generated by that brutish competition is borne, not by the cartel owners themselves, not by those who profit from it so enormously, but rather by those who do go about doing its day to day business, by those who those who produce and distribute and ultimately consume the product.  Again, although the cartel owners flout the legal impositions on their "business," they do not abhor them with one exception -- the tax code.   Taxes are a direct imposition on profits, an expense unrelated to the actual cost of doing business, and an impediment to the singular purpose of the cartel -- to increase the wealth of the cartel owners by maximizing profits from the sale and distribution of that desirable product. 

Don't misunderstand me.  There are differences between legitimate business and the drug cartels, but they are ultimately differences of degree, not kind.   Every capitalist enterprise exists for one purpose and one purpose only -- to increase the wealth of the owners by maximizing profits from the sale and distribution of a desirable product.  Different "products" differ as well in the nature and degree of social damage they might cause.  Most might even be benign, but some are not -- the internal combustion engine and the burning of fossil fuels provide an obvious example of an "addiction" that causes considerable environmental damage -- the sale of guns provides another example of an "addiction" that causes considerable social damage -- the list goes on.  There are those who "share" in the enterprise, those who fill the various "jobs" that make it possible, the purpose of the enterprise is not "sharing" or "job creation."  Increasing the wealth of owners might create jobs, but it is an unfortunate side effect, not the purpose of the enterprise.   The purpose of the capitalist enterprise is to increase the wealth of the owners by maximizing profits, and any "sharing" through "jobs," particularly "high paying jobs," cuts into those profits.  Although most legitimate businesses do not flout legal impositions, if those restrictions impede the owner's ability to increase wealth by maximizing profits, they will do all they can to "legally" circumvent those same regulations and lobby to have them removed, to include the imposition of paying taxes.  Ultimately, of course, regulation and taxation are not intended to impede business, but to mitigate the damage.  The Department of Labor and its "overtime requirements," the EPA and its "emission standards," among others, are not intended to impede business, though they might have that effect, but to insist upon the broader social responsibility of business.  Democracy and the government institutions it puts into place are the ultimate restraint on unchecked capitalism, and so of course the taxes that fund such institutions are particularly onerous to business.   

Don't misunderstand me.   Democracy is indeed flawed.  On the one side, there is nothing sexy about government bureaucracy and the policy wonks who control it.  Despite Trumps assertions that Clinton is "crooked," when fact checked, she does have her moments, but she seems considerably less mendacious than most politicians.   Trump is simply projecting when he calls her "crooked," in the hopes perhaps that most voters won't notice his own crookedness.   No, Clinton is not crooked, at least not in the traditional sense.  She is a policy wonk, and while some of her positions might be argued, they are, in the end, simply modifications within an existing government bureaucracy that provide, yawn, checks on the rapacity of capitalism.  The real objection to Clinton is not that she "lies," as Trump would have it, but that she commits the ultimate sin of being, well, boring.  Nor is she in bed with the "big money" of Wall Street, at least not in the traditional sense of anything resembling quid pro quo.  If she were, I'm sure after thirty years in the public eye, the revelations would be more substantial than shadowy musings of tabloid conspiracy theorists.   No, if she is in bed with the "big money," it is more in the sense of the status quo, which, yawn, research indicates tends to favor those in positions of wealth and power because they have learned to work the existing system.  One can tilt the boat to the left, one can tilt the boat to the right, but one shouldn't rock the boat.  Unlike Bernie Sanders, or for that matter Elizabeth Warren, both of whom seem quite willing to be ostentatious in their own ways, she is a bureaucratic snooze -- a c-span feed of the latest EPA hearing where dialogue is replaced with the rustling of papers and the occasional reference to sub-paragraph 3(d) of chapter IV on page 3,682.   

On the other side, on the dark machiavellian side, unlike the herd he defeated in the primaries, unlike Clinton, Trump does not commit the post-modernist sin of lacking entertainment value.  Watching his campaign is like watching Saw IV,  the latest episode in the horror franchise that consistently receives negative reviews, is socially and morally and aesthetically repugnant, but has enough appeal to somehow come out ahead at the box office.   The Federalist Papers recognized without wholly resolving its flaws, and one could argue along with Plato and Andrew Sullivan, that a true philosopher king, a wise and compassionate elite, could correct for the outright stupidity that often emerges within the majoritarian mob -- the "selfie-celebrity" that becomes a "sensation" -- an angry binge at the polls that leaves one the next day hung-over, in bed with a lout, wondering how one will ever recover anything resembling self-respect.  Surely, the philosophical elite would save us from ourselves, from the likes of a Brexit vote, or the likes of a Trump presidency.  In the end, however, there must be a way to crown the philosopher king.  As Plato recognized, the true philosopher would have little desire to be king, and I have been around enough doctors of philosophy to suggest that each and every PhD knows, with absolute certainty, with unwavering conviction, that they would be a "better" college president or king, if only they could be bothered.  Those who actually aspire to be king, those who can be "bothered," are more likely to be "narcissists with dark machiavellian traits" than not, and so it is that so many of our elections are between dark and darker, the worst possible choice and an even worse choice, but it is nevertheless a choice.  It is an opportunity to "check" the carelessness of careless people, or at least an opportunity to minimize damage as they go about smashing things up, and on rare occasions it is an opportunity to "balance" the books, to get paid at least a maid's salary as we the people, the other 99%, go about cleaning up the mess they make. 

Here's a question

I am more than a bit puzzled by the descent into right wing politics across the world.  Before I go on, however, I should probably make a distinction that has been playing in the back of my mind for some time -- the difference between "conservatism" and what?  it seems glib to call it fascism, and in previous posts I struggled to find a suitable descriptor other than fascism, and made some distinctions within the conservative party between economic conservatives, evangelical conservatives, and a loose association of single issue distractions.  There is over-lap, and guns provide a case in point.  The issue of gun violence is really a "single issue," one that lends itself, like the fight against the Zika virus, to a rational discussion.  The congress has allocated 1.1 billion to the fight against Zika, but we have partisan congressmen and women staging a "sit in" like students in the 60s over congressional failure to act similarly on gun violence prevention.  Having said that, when it swirls up into the over-lap with economic conservatives, who wish to "de-regulate" almost all industries, to include the gun industry, it becomes something else again.  Congress, of course, does not need to face the day-to-day reality of those communities beset with gun violence, and when it swirls up into the overlap with the evangelical conservatives, it is quite easy to blame that violence on the moral failures within those communities, and so it becomes something else yet again.  Rational discussion becomes difficult, if not impossible.

The phenomenon that I've been thinking about lately, the one "revealed" or "mainstreamed" here by the Trump campaign is much more visceral.  I'm thinking of the Rick Tyler campaign in rural Tennessee, as Salon reported it, "a fringe independent candidate for Tennessee's 3rd Congressional District," who saw fit to erect a "giant 'Make America White Again' billboard this week that he claims was inspired by the signature tagline of presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump."  We could talk about the sorts of distorted nostalgia for a time when protestant whites were the dominant demographic in the US and things were good.  That "time," however, was a very brief window extending from the end of the second world war through the 50s to the early 60s.  One could argue, of course, that the blood bath of the second world war made the "happy days" possible.  The moral sense of having conquered the greatest evil the world had ever seen, personified in axis powers led by Hitler and Mussolini and Tito, along with the promise "never again."  Then too, there was the sense of unlimited economic possibility as the world began rebuilding on the ashes of Asia and Europe.  For the "greatest generation" in the US, meaning the middle and working class whites returning from the war or coming of age shortly after, it was "happy days."  Their prospects were better than their parents who had struggled through the great depression, and their children's prospects seemed even better yet, and all was good with the world until it all seemed to unravel.  

We should have enough distance to see the forest of history without the distractions of single trees.  It should be clear enough that the "happy days" of the 50s were indeed happy for the white middle and working class protestant men who ruled the roost, but the same promise of upward mobility and unlimited possibility was not extended to each and all.  Clearly the happy days of the 50s were not so happy for our African-American populations.  Burdened under the outright apartheid of Jim Crowe in the south, with limited prospects throughout, they did not share in the good fortune of the nation.  The disparities simply weren't "fair."  The civil rights movement, the rebellion against that "unfairness," the rebellion against a system rigged against a whole population based solely on race, brought the good people of Mayberry RFD face to face with the remnants of America's original sin.  It unsettled the psyche of nation.  Rick Tyler's sign tells us, if nothing more, that we haven't yet recovered.   Let's not kid ourselves.  Rick Tyler's sign is deeply American in its racism, and like most racists, he turns to a pseudo biology and religion to buttress is alarm that America is being over run with non-whites.  There is, of course, a half-truth in his assertion that birds of a feather tend to stick together, that "we are talking about someone who demonstrates greater affinity for his own racial family (your race is the extension of your biological family)" -- that "ethnocentricity is completely healthy and normal and all races, except the white race, are encouraged to engage in and express it."  He is, in effect, asserting the right of white American's to "identity politics," but he either willfully misses the point that one engaged in "identity politics," not to demonstrate one's ethnocentrism, but to demonstrate the systemic "unfairness," to undo the injustice of systemic ethnocentrism.  It may well be "normal," but it is not "healthy," particularly not in a system that professes, but does not provide, "justice for all."  

Again, we should have enough distance to see the forest of history without the distraction of individual trees.  The sense of unlimited economic possibility was predicated on a false assumption, that the rapid growth following the war could be sustained indefinitely once the re-building after the calamities of the 20th century was complete.  If the war against Facism had pulled us from the great depression, we needed a new "stimulus," a new project,  and we found in the "cold war" against communism.  It was Eisenhower, a war-hero, a republican, who warned of the "military industrial complex," but the military industrial complex continued to serve us well, an artificial boost to the American ego and the American economy.   The ideological stand off between our own capitalism and an alien, un-American communism, a stand off that divided Europe once again into a "war zone" with the "iron curtain" serving as a front, required of us a continued massive government investment in the economy.  Then too, there was the emergence of China, with its own version of communism, that extended the European cold war into a new world war, and the military build-up picked up steam and continued unabated.  It was a war of "containment," at all costs, and as the third world emerged from the ashes of its own colonial past, the so-called super powers allowed themselves to become ideological pawns in their civil unrest, in Korea, and then disastrously in Vietnam.  As the conflict coughed and sputtered along, with more and more American bloodshed, with no apparent end in sight, with little or no evidence of a "moral" purpose except the containment of a political and economic ideology, with less and less evidence that the bloodshed was "buying" anything that might resemble a continuation of the prosperity of the 50's, it led to the anti-war movements that further unsettled the psyche of the nation.

And yet, here we are again.  There is nothing new in the fight against "terrorism."  If you read the transcripts of the defunct fight against communism, and substitute "radical islamic terrorism" in the place of communism, you see the same arguments revisited.  If there is anything in Trump's "America First" stance, or on the international stage in Britain's withdrawal from the EU, it's the inherent difficulty in answering the pre-eminent political question, "who benefits and how, from our continued involvement in conflict?"  That is a question worth answering, but the real answers are likely to be abstruse and difficult, and not as immediately gratifying as a religious crusade against the un-American islamic terrorists or the treacherous Syrian refugees.  The very notion that they could "impose" something on the order of Sharia law on the American populace is absurd on the face of it, but there it is nevertheless, and otherwise rational people seem to believe it, but why?  As Neal Gabler, writing for BillMoyers.com, put it,  

it’s a modern version of the medieval Crusades, and as the ancient Crusades did to Europe, it has inflicted untold damage on our country. Because it is deep in the bones of the Republicans, it won’t end with Trump, who is a non-believer himself when it comes to conservative orthodoxy. It can only end with the extinction of the party itself as presently constituted — Cruz, Ryan, Rubio, McConnell, et al. — and the rise of a new conservative party, not a cult.

And make no mistake, "Today’s GOP is closer to a religious cult than a political institution. It operates on dogma, sees compromise as a moral failing, views enemies as pagans who must be vanquished, and considers every policy skirmish another Götterdämmerung." One must give Sarah Palin some credit, because the "lame stream media" is indeed "lame."  Few in the mainstream media point out that,  taken at their word, given their way, they would impose an evangelical way of life as alien to a majority of the American people as Islam.  Otherwise rational people believe the Muslims are conspiring to impose Sharia law on a apostate America, because that is precisely what they are doing, conspiring to impose Biblical law on an apostate America.  It is a dogma that is deeply un-democratic, deeply antithetical to an inclusive secular state, deeply antithetical to our first amendment, and the list goes on.  No one in the "lame stream media" questions the values of evangelical right that plays such a large role shaping not only the social platform, but the tone of the republican party. 

As Gabler goes on to write, in the name of fairness, the "lame stream media" treats not only middle east conflicts like athletic contests.  I have confessed to being a Cubs fan, and I am in some despair lately because they have lost four in a row for the first time this season, but at the end of the day, little is at stake in their quest for the pennant.  At the end of the day, it is an entertainment, a distraction.  I wouldn't want to suggest that the islamic terrorists don't pose some threat to us, but even 9/11, as horrific as it was, didn't strike me as a call for military intervention.  It did strike me as a military action, but a criminal action subject to our law and international law.  One understands, of course, why there would be a call for immediate retribution, and there was perhaps some suspicion that the Saddam Hussein regime  in Iraq harbored the jihadist terrorist group that perpetrated the attack, Al Queda, but even so we had (or should have had) sufficient leverage within the middle east to locate, extradite, and bring the perpetrators to trial, if not in the US, in the Hague.  The Iraq war was justified by then President Bush on cold war grounds, the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, with international jihadist terrorism displacing communism as the new threat.  The troops were sent, gratifying the need for an immediate response to 9/11, while ostensibly serving some broader geo-political purpose that turned out to be a fabrication.  Not unlike the paid athletes that represent our favorite sports teams, the "troops," the "volunteer forces," who fight the wars are, in essence, little more than modestly paid mercenaries.  Unlike the Vietnam war, there is no draft, no influx of citizen soldiers, no threat that I or my children will be called to "serve" in a cause that was dubious from the outset.  Instead of a broad based call for accountability for the lives lost, as there was (finally) in Vietnam, we have instead the sanctimonious "thanking" of the "troops" for their "service."  We wouldn't want to appear ungrateful, as we did during Vietnam, but beneath the sanctimony there is a sense of better them than me.  They knew going in that their "jobs" were dangerous, that they might make "the ultimate sacrifice," but it was a job that they volunteered and are paid to do.  We root for the home team and we vilify the "enemy," but I'm not sure the American people can really answer the question, "who benefits and how from our continued engagement in the internecine conflicts in the middle east?" 

At the end of the day, the war on terror is entertainment, a distraction, bread and circuses, blood on the sand.  The real war against the American people has been fought and won.  The real war against the American people began with Reagan and the new conservatism that systematically began undoing the democratizing forces within American politics.  It may well be that the greatest threat to democracy may not be communism, may not be jihadist terrorism, but just may be capitalism itself.  Let me be clear from the outset that I do not believe for an instant that capitalism and democracy as economic and political systems are in any way mutually dependent.  One can have a socialist state that is democratic and one can have a socialist state that is autocratic.  Likewise we can have a capitalist state that is democratic and one can have a capitalist state that is autocratic, and we have been trending, over the past thirty years, more and more, toward the oligarchic structures that undermine democracy itself.  The capitalist war on democracy has not been an "all out war," with clearly defined sides.  It has been rather a drawn out war of attrition, death by a thousand cuts, and it has continued through the first Bush administration, the Clinton administration, the second Bush administration, and the Obama administration.  Did it begin with Reagan's deliberate targeting of the Air Traffic Controllers union?  Did it begin with NAFTA, a "free trade agreement" negotiated by the first Bush and signed into law by Clinton?  Did it begin with Clinton's repeal of the Glass-Steagall legislation and the passage of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act?  Did it begin with the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act passed under the Second Bush?  Did it begin with Obama's bail out of banks too big to fail?  Death by a thousand cuts, but the trend has been clear -- greater and greater concentration of wealth in the hands of a few, along with the political power that flows from the concentration of wealth.  

The economic agenda of the republican party simply doesn't work for the people.  It has been tried in Kansas, and it didn't produce anything like the economic growth or the influx of jobs promised.  As the Kansas City Star reported, the falling revenue for the state is "more evidence that the Brownback tax-cut 'experiment' is not working."  They go on to say, "in October, individual income tax receipts were almost $27 million below what the state had estimated it would take in, or a jarring 15 percent off expectations," and it matters "because this is the tax that Brownback and the Legislature cut in 2012. The promise then was that more jobs would flood Kansas, eventually pumping back up income tax collections.  That’s not working — at all."  In the end, "the tax cuts are bleeding the state of needed funds to pay for high-quality public services to the people of Kansas," and we shouldn't understand "high-quality public services" to mean "welfare."  We should understand it to mean things like good education, good policing, good infrastructure.  Nevertheless, the republican's double down, because, in the end, they are more like a religious cult than a political institution.  Despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, they cling to dogma, and they do so in part because the dogma benefits a select few.   I couldn't improve on Thomas Picketty's detailed account, or add much to the observations of Richard Wolff, but it seems clear enough that "tax cuts," while popular at the instant, don't benefit the people.  An extra four or five hundred dollars in the pocket of the average American is simply spent and gone, but an extra four or five hundred thousand dollars in the pocket of the rich certainly isn't invested in "good public services" and it isn't necessarily invested in new enterprises which create new jobs.   In the absence of economic growth, that extra four or five hundred thousand is simply "saved."  The not-so-rich scrabble along, with little in their pockets, while the rich accumulate more and more capital.  

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The rise in right wing political voices -- Brexit in the UK, Trumpism in the US -- builds on the anger of the losers.  It is perhaps not surprising that Brexit and Trumpism find their support in the more rural hinterlands, like Kansas. I can't speak with any authority about the UK, but in the US the rural areas have been devastated -- not figuratively, but literally devastated -- by the economic trends of the last thirty five year.   So too for the industrial midwest.  Leon Weiseltier has written a beautiful and moving editorial about the fate of the working class "white" entitled "How Voter's Personal Suffering Overtook Reason." Meth in the rural areas and heroin in the industrial cities are both a plague, but are more symptomatic of an even deeper plague.  Weiseltier writes, 

the world of these people ... has been shattered and lost.  The economic foundations of their way of life were destroyed by the unforgiving logic of globalization, and then by the recession and its scandalously uneven recovery.  The blandishments of the digital economy passed them by.  Their current rates of alcoholism, life expectancy and suicide are now notorious.  But only a little while ago, those measures of human breakdown and social collapse were not widely known.

And both parties have been complicit, though for different reasons.   Weiseltier also writes,
  
Republicans have been indifferent to them because Republicans revere winners and they are losers.  Democrats have been indifferent to them because they are culturally embarrassing (and because many Democrats, too, have had little time for losers). Now they finally command the attention of the country — they have been discovered — which is itself a victory for fairness in America; but a large portion of them have gained this recognition by debasing American politics with a desperate preference for a strongman. It is one of the lowest ironies of this low time.

I am not the first, nor will I be the last to suggest that the working class white is a "loser," but they are losing in a game that has been rigged against them, not by the influx of immigrants, not by racial preferences, but by the rise of the global corporation and the triumph of capital.    I am not the first, nor will I be that last to suggest that the "democratizing" institutions, particularly the unions, have all but disappeared.  The republicans have never had much of an affinity with "democratizing" institutions, in part because they inevitably end up advocating the redistribution of capital away from the few toward the many.  Economically it would make utter sense for the working class white to align with other disenfranchised group and advocate for such re-alignments, but in the end, identity trumps economy, pun intended.  The democrats have lost their affinity with the working class "white" in part because they are, indeed, "culturally embarrassing."  Weiseltier writes:

It was inevitable that we would not escape the political consequences of our economic dislocations, but those consequences now include the darkest forces of reaction. These downtrodden demand sympathy, and they deserve sympathy, but they do not give sympathy. They kindle, in the myopia of their pain, to racism and nativism and xenophobia and misogyny and homophobia and anti-Semitism. 

As I have written elsewhere, Trump's campaign, and one suspects the campaigns for "leave" in Britain, are more about "identity politics" than "economics."  Unlike a rational identity politics of the sort advocated by Stanley Fish, where racial and cultural identities are invoked to reveal systemic injustice -- the over-incarcertation of blacks, the under-payment of women -- Trump has tapped into a wholly irrational "identity politics."  I will give Weiseltier the last word:

Liberals and socialists have been wondering for a hundred years why people in economic distress do not vote according to their economic interests. The answer should have been obvious long ago: People in adversity turn not to economics but to culture. They are fortified not by policy but by identity. They seek saviors, not programs. And as the direness of their circumstances appears to imperil their identity, they affirm it by asserting it ferociously against others. Hurt people hurt people. Against these hurt people, therefore, and against the profiteer of pain who shabbily champions them, it must be insisted that no amount of sympathy for their plight justifies the introduction of a version of fascism into American life. No grievance, however true, warrants the fouling of American politics by the bigotry and the brutishness peddled by Donald Trump. Either he wins or America does.

As a Matter of Fact

Yesterday, the New York Daily News, in response to the Senate vote on gun control measures, ran a picture of the capital drenched in blood over the headline "Slaughter House: Senate Votes in Favor of Continued Mass Killings."  While I might agree with the sentiment, as a simple matter of fact, the Senate did not vote in favor of continued mass killings, they simply stalled as they have always stalled on additional gun control measures.  While I might question the motives, here I have to agree with the conservatives and the NRA.  Simply being on the "terrorist watch list" (in much the same way that simply being a muslim) does not constitute sufficient probable cause to deny someone their "rights."  It might be "common sense" to prevent someone on the terrorist watch list from purchasing an assault style rifle, but it is  ultimately "common sense" of the sort espoused by Trump when he advocates profiling muslims, a different set of rules for a different set of people.

The Post cover is the liberal version of the same bullshit, to use Jon Stewart's technical term, that has John McCain proclaiming that Obama is "directly responsible" for the Orlando shooting because one thing led to another thing, led to another thing, which led to ISIS, whose cause the shooter used to justify what was very likely just a projection of self-loathing onto a crowd at a gay night club.  Given the accepted meaning of words, Obama was not "directly responsible."  He did not pull the trigger himself, nor did he conspire with the killer to have him pull the trigger, and so, despite Trump's dark musing to the contrary, as a matter of fact, he was not "directly responsible."  When he walked it back, I'm not sure that he made the case that Obama was even "indirectly" responsible, except insofar as Obama has been dealing with middle east conflict for the last eight years, just as Bush had dealt with the middle east for eight years before.

I could go back and forth like this between liberal and conservative versions of bullshit for quite some time, but it all remains just bullshit.   We have lost (or never had) the ability to make some very basic distinctions in our political discourse, the first of which is the distinction between "fact" and "fabrication."  In the election cycle, political discourse is expected to be "persuasive discourse," and one expects opposing sides in an argument to select out the facts that best support their argument and their election, but nothing justifies the wholesale fabrication of faux facts.  Even in the election cycle, however, there are a whole host of reasons why the fabrication of faux facts is not only intellectually, but morally reprehensible.  It is the same host of reasons that prevent sales people from "mis-representing" their product during sale.  It is one thing to persuade the electorate, even if one stretches and selects the facts, another to con them, and the wholesale fabrication of faux facts is ultimately just a con.  And it matters.  In the post election cycle, the actual governing cycle, political discourse is also expected to be "problem-solving discourse." While there is plenty of room for disagreement on how best to solve a problem, one must ultimately confront the facts, all the facts, otherwise solutions will be at best tenuous and untenable.

Or unachievable.  We seem to have entered a faux fact era.  Trump is not the first, nor will he be last, to predicate a whole campaign on faux facts, but he is certainly the most egregious.  He has been fact checked in so many ways, against so many claims, and he is so clearly brimming over with bullshit in almost everything he says.   His business cons are right there, on the surface.  Trump University being a case in point.  The promises of charitable contributions that never occurred (from Trump University profits, from sales on the book, Crippled America, among others).  Unpaid contractors on his construction projects being another case in point.  All of which establish a pattern of lying for personal, not even political, gain.   So far as the Orlando shooting goes, FactCheck.org has run a full piece on his claims relative to the shooting, almost all of which constitute faux facts.  Regardless, his supporters do not seem to care, and that is perhaps the most disturbing aspect of this campaign.  It is not political discourse as usual, where facts are selected and sometimes stretched.  It is an outright disregard for the facts, which will, if it continues, make it impossible for him to actually govern, to actually solve the problems confronting us.

Here's why.  According to FactCheck.org,

A Republican senator said known or suspected terrorists “cannot just walk in and buy a firearm” at a gun store. Not that same day, but 91 percent of individuals on terrorist watch lists who have attempted to buy a firearm or explosives since 2004 were able to complete the sale — typically in three days.

They go on to say:

Since the National Instant Criminal Background Check System began checking prospective gun buyers against terrorist watch list records in February 2004, “individuals on the terrorist watch list were involved in firearm or explosives background checks 2,477 times, of which 2,265 (about 91 percent) of the transactions were allowed to proceed and 212 were denied,” according to the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office.

On the one hand, the Senator, Lankford, is correct in one respect.  Not just anyone can purchase a firearm.  There have been 212 instances of attempted purchases that have been identified and stopped by background checks.  On the other hand, the majority of attempted purchases are successful, in part because there was insufficient probable cause to deny the purchase.  If we look at each individual case, I am virtually certain there is plenty of room for the second-guessing of hindsight among the 2,265 cases where the purchase was allowed.  I am equally certain there is plenty of room for the second-guessing of hindsight among the cases where the purchase was not allowed.  

The bottom line, however, is this: even if all 2477 cases had been denied, outright, it would have had a negligible effect.   I can say this because the number is so minuscule compared to the over-all prevalence of guns, and because "terrorism" itself is so minuscule compared to the over-all instance of gun violence.   Moreover, so long as gun ownership is a right, protected by the constitution, we cannot suspend those rights without "due process."  The NRA is correct when they assert that there are several on the "watch list" that simply shouldn't be there.  As FactCheck points out, "FBI guidelines say a preliminary investigation may be opened 'on the basis of any ‘allegation or information’ indicative of possible criminal activity or threats to the national security.'"  We cannot deny rights on the basis of any "allegation or information" without suspending the due process that substantiates those allegations, and that would mean living in a "snitch-state" where the allegation is as good as the act.   Although allegations had been made against the Orlando shooter, for example, the FBI found insufficient evidence to carry forward a case, and so he made a perfectly legal purchase.  While there is plenty of room for second-guessing in hindsight, and we always want to scapegoat someone, it remains just that, second-guessing in hindsight.

If the goal is the prevention or the reduction of gun violence, then "banning" ownership of those on "terror watch list" is ultimately a red-herring.   Here's another set of facts, and they seem indisputable, though I would love to hear the counter arguments. There is the notion that "guns don't kill people, people kill people."  Absolutely.   This is a simple argument that differentiates between intentionality and instrumentality.   Guns, of course, are inanimate objects and do not have the intent to kill.  People do, on occasion, develop the intent to kill.  Given the intent to kill, there are various means instrumental to that end.  One can poison, stab, bludgeon, drown, suffocate, starve, blow-up, burn, or shoot a person to death.  Guns, in other words, are simply one among many means instrumental to intent to kill, and one intent on killing will, no doubt, find the means to do so.  

Having said that, however, there are significant differences between the means, and to ignore them is another form of willful ignorance of facts.  Of those listed, shooting is a quicker, easier, and more effective means to the end of killing, and it is perhaps not surprising.  If we go through the list, most poisons were developed with another intent in mind -- e.g. to poison insect pests.  With the possible exception of the sword, most knives have multiple good uses beyond killing other people and are designed with that purpose in mind.  Although I can bludgeon someone to death with my hammer, I have it to drive nails.  So on and so forth.  The gun, however, is designed to kill large animals, to include primates of our own species, and there is no other purpose.  Until the alien invasion of giant insects, I cannot use it to kill insects.  I cannot use it chop vegetables.  I cannot use it to drive nails.  I cannot think of another purpose for guns, except perhaps "target shooting," which aims at improvement in one's ability to kill large animals effectively.  Moreover, some guns, like assault rifles, are designed principally to kill other primates of our own species, in large numbers, quickly.  Though he could have, of course, the Orlando shooter didn't rush into the night club with a hammer intent on bludgeoning people to death, nor did he rush in with a kitchen knife intent on chopping people to death.  He rushed in with an assault rifle with the intent of shooting them to death, and the assault rifle provided a very efficient means of doing so.   

Given that people will occasionally develop the intent to kill and will find the means to do so, no reasonable person would assert that banning or heavily regulating the availability of assault rifles will prevent killing,.  Those with the driving intent  to do so will find a way.  Moreover, no reasonable person would assert that banning or heavily regulating the availability of assault rifles will prevent even mass killings.  Those with terror in mind will find a way, even if it includes flying an aircraft into a building.  It would, however,  remove ready access to one of the most efficient means to that end.   Flying an aircraft into a building requires years of planning, but buying an assault rifle for most is instant, for other takes 72 hours.  Background checks, while a step in the right direction, will do little to prevent shootings so long as we insist on due process, and we should, of course, insist on due process.   Nevertheless, as we go for new records in the number of dead and injured in a single incident, we might want to consider limiting the efficiency of potential mass killers, and a universal ban (or very strict limitations) on assault rifles might be a good start.  

Sunday Morning Anti-Sermon

It is perhaps not surprising that our response to the mass shooting in Orlando falls out rather predictably along party lines.  A recent Gallup poll shows that 79% of republicans feel that the incident was islamic terrorism, while only 16% think of it as domestic gun violence.  Conversely, 60% of democrats think of it as domestic gun violence, with only 29% thinking of it as islamic terrorism.  This leads RedState to post a headline reads, "Turns Out 29% of Democrats Aren't as Dumb as We Thought."  In the body of the article they say, "the first reaction is probably disbelief that anyone could consider this anything other than an act of radical Islamic terror given the overwhelming proof that it was exactly that."  First off, I'm not sure there is overwhelming proof.  Other than a connection to the muslim religion itself, and his Facebook declaration of support for ISIS, there seems to be little connection to actual, radicalized muslim factions, including ISIS.  That the besieged and faltering ISIS would declare their "responsibility" for the attack, though they seemed to have no "planning" or "execution" role in the actual attack, seems little more than a propaganda ploy to maintain some semblance of status.   Perhaps more will come out as the "FBI interviews another of Orlando Terrorist's Mosque," but one suspects that it will reveal more of the same, a deeply conflicted individual, with a desire for grandeur, who happened to be muslim and had access to the sorts of guns that maximize potential damage.

There is implicit in all of this a "chicken or egg" question.  When there is a mass shooting of this sort, I am not sure which comes first, a social and religious context that radicalizes alienated  individuals or alienated individuals who seeks out and find affirmation in a social and religious context.  Those who see it as an act of "radical Islamic terror" would, like Sam Harris, point the finger of blame at the religion itself  as the radicalizing context.   The republican insistence that we call it out as radical islamic terror would seem to suggest that the chicken of the religious context lays the terrorist egg, but the recommendations tend to stop there.  Ask yourself, if we grant this argument, then what?   Perhaps it is a failure of imagination, but I can't think of a single answer that would not infringe the first amendment rights to freely worship as one chooses.  Even with increased surveillance, the sorts of profiling advocated as "common sense" by the presumptive republican nominee, there is a fine line between keeping an eye on known threats and violating rights to due process as protected under the fourth amendment.  It suggests that merely being a muslim, and worshipping as a muslim, itself provides sufficient cause for surveillance, which in turn leads, inevitably, to the paranoid style of a Joseph McCarthy, where all muslims, including those who "sympathize" with muslims, are potential radical islamic terrorists seeking the destruction of the American way.  Consequently, just as Joseph McCarthy sought the destruction of  "communism," it leads inevitably to calls for the eradication of the muslim religion, at least on our shores. 

There is more than a whiff of hypocrisy in the republican stance as well.  There has been little mention of the assassination of Jo Cox on the conservative blogs, none in Red State.   This seems, more clearly than not, a real act of terror, by definition, insofar as a political figure was targeted for political reasons.  As reported in the World Post, "prosecutors said [the assassin] told police he is a "political activist" and that officers found far-right materials in his house.  [The assassin] reported had contacts with far-right groups in South Africa and the U.S. in the past.  His family said he has a history of mental illness."  Here again, which comes first, the chicken of the radicalizing context, right wing thought, which radicalizes a disturbed individual.  Or is it the egg of a disturbed individual that seeks affirmation and inclusion in a social and religious context?  I suspect that the radical right wing terrorist that assassinated Jo Cox bears about the same relation to right wing thought in general as the radical islamic terrorist bears to the general practitioners of the muslim religion, but the conservative press is not indignantly demanding we call it "an act of radical right wing terror given the overwhelming proof that it was exactly that."  First off, of course, it's not our problem.  It's Britain's problem.  Except, we seem to be in the business, not unlike ISIS, of "exporting" a terrorist ideology.  In this particular case, better, it seems, to see him as the democrats saw the Orlando shooter, as first and foremost a disturbed individual who found affirmation in a radical ideology, lest we go down the path of demonizing all "right wing" thought, particularly the sort expressed by the presumptive republican nominee for president. 

Let me be frank.  I have little truck with the muslim religion.  Likewise, I have little truck with the christian religion.  Both espouse comprehensive world views that proclaim "peace" as their goal, but it is the "peace" that comes only with a universal capitulation to a particular world view, one that by command of god himself excludes and condemns and encourages the elimination of non-believers and apostates.  When pushed to the far extreme, both lead to the sorts of violence and "terrorist tactics" that we see represented by ISIS and the National Alliance, and in their world view it is a violence "justified" and "sanctified" by religion.  At the extreme, both become havens for "disturbed" individuals, for the alienated and isolated "with a history of mental illness."  Both provide "explanations" and assign culpability for their alienation and isolation to a society that has fallen from grace, whether that "grace" is worship of Mohammed or Jesus.   At the extreme, both espouse an ideology that would "make society great again," and it would do so first and foremost by destroying all progress toward a more inclusive, a more secular society.    

But, and its a big but, I do value an inclusive secular society.  I am perfectly willing to talk about radical islamic terrorism as a threat to inclusive secular society, but I am also perfectly willing to talk about radical neo-nationalist christian terrorism as an equal threat to a inclusive secular society.  I will let you guess who said this:

I see a future which is red with blood because of the accumulated foolishness of decades, and I hardly think this grim picture is one which the public today wants to look at, nor do I think it will help our cause to try to force them to look at it or at a political program based on it. They would reject it. They do not have sufficient understanding. They do not have the spiritual basis required to understand and accept it.  

A "future red with blood," indeed.  The "spiritual basis required to understand and accept it," indeed, and lest we think this "spiritual basis" is a mere toss off, I will let you guess who said this:

our program is directed almost entirely toward the accomplishment of this spiritual prerequisite for our political goals. Our program is concerned now, and will be concerned for the foreseeable future, with awakening a consciousness of identity and mission in an elite minority of our people, a minority in whom the Divine Spark, the Universal Urge, the Creator’s immanent Self-consciousness, burns brighter than it does in the rest, and when welding this awakened elite into a growing community of blood and consciousness, a spiritual community primarily rather than a political one, a community imbued with an understanding of our Truth and unconditionally dedicated to our Purpose, which is the Creator’s Purpose.

Inclusive secular society of the sort imagined by the framers of our constitution demand of us a duty to tolerate, and like most duties the duty to tolerate can at times be onerous.  I find the thinking represented by the National Vanguard above deeply repugnant, particularly when one comes to understand that they "want to safeguard [their] racial identity by putting an end to the present insanity of enforced racial integration, which is threatening all involved with social chaos, cultural dissolution, and racial death" -- by putting an end, that is, to an inclusive secular society.   Again, I find the thinking represented by the National Vanguard deeply repugnant, just as I find the thinking of islamic fundamentalism deeply repugnant, but I do have a duty, however onerous, to tolerate it.  If we desire a society where one is free to worship as one chooses, then I must tolerate your form of worship, just as I expect you to tolerate my own form of worship.  If we desire a society where one is free to express oneself, then I must tolerate your expression, just as I expect you to tolerate my expression.  We must have faith that the best way to silence ignorance and bigotry is to give it voice, allow it to fully reveal itself for ignorance and bigotry, and hope that the American people have the "spiritual basis" to reject it.  

The core difficulty, however, may well be just that -- the inclusive secular society, and the failing hope that the American people have the spiritual strength to reject ignorance and bigotry.   It is somewhat problematic when half the political spectrum within the US inches closer and closer to ideologies that openly espouse an end to the secular state -- ideologies that would install in its place a christian theocracy -- ideologies that openly espouse an end to gender, racial, ethnic, and religious inclusivity -- ideologies that would actively exclude "alien" populations, whether it be the "rapists and drug dealers" of Mexican heritage, the muslim refugees from "our" wars, and the list goes on.  When the presumptive republican nominee for our highest office openly connects the dots between calling the Orlando shooters "islamic terrorists" and "profiling" them as potential "terrorists" simply because they are muslim.  He and the republican party are using the real and unfortunate fear of "social chaos" and "cultural dissolution" to engage in the worst form of "identity politics." Despite their protestations to the contrary, despite their appeals to "common sense," they are taking us step by step closer to the social programs actively advocated by groups like the National Vanguard.  No, democrats are not as dumb as you thought, and I hope they have the spiritual strength to reject the path to ignorance and bigotry.          

The Plot to Eliminate (questions about) Guns

One could make a few observations about guns in the US, and I know it's a bit like pissing into the wind, but here goes.  RedState has a banner article entitled "To Attain a Gun Free America, You Would Have to Kill these Amendments."  The first paragraph of the article reads:

I'm going to skip explaining how the left's true intent is to take our guns away.  It's been written on ad nauseam, and proven through so many examples that I'm not sure why the left is still feigning innocence to the plot.

It just might be that we're not feigning innocence, that we actually are innocent, and there is no "plot" to completely eliminate guns.  I have no desire to own a gun, in small part because I have no desire to hunt, get no bang from target shooting, and know that the "self-protection" is too often a testosterone fueled fantasy that I could be a Jack Bauer "should the circumstances arise."  I have no desire to own a gun, in larger part because it would be yet one more expensive hobby that I can't afford.  For very similar reasons, I have no desire to own a motorcycle, a four-wheeler, a snow-mobile, and a very very long list of other potential adult toys.  I do not, however, project my priorities onto others or assume that they should share them.  I have a friend who does hunt and who do get a bang from target shooting, and who can differentiate between fantasy and reality.  I'm not sure, having come out of the closet as a progressive liberal, that I could convince my neighbors. The paranoid style in politics runs too deep, and they tend to see every step as a plot to push us down a very slippery slope.  Eliminate the AR-15 today, tomorrow it's hand guns, and before you know it's  squirt guns.  Nevertheless, I don't know how else to say it, but I do mean pretty much what I say -- that I want an evidence-based discussion of guns as a public health and safety issue and meaningful controls placed on the sale and use of guns consequent to that discussion, but I categorically do not want gun elimination.

So, first observation.  The second amendment right to "keep and bear arms" already has some limits, and they are no doubt limits that just about every rational human being would support.  "Arms" present us with what I call a "spectrum issue."  At one end of the "arms" spectrum we have red rider bb guns.  At the far other end of the "arms" spectrum we have intercontinental ballistic missiles with nuclear warheads.  There is quite a distance between the two extremes.  If the red rider bb gun represents the "white" end, the nuclear missile the "black" end of the spectrum, there is considerable "grey" in between.  At the dark end of the spectrum, it has been the official policy of the US government to exercise considerable "arms" control.  Just as it's a fantasy to think about gun elimination, it is equally a fantasy to think about the elimination of nuclear arms, but we nevertheless expend considerable effort to keep them out of civilian hands and to curtail their international proliferation.   I do believe every rational human being supports a ban on civilian ownership of nuclear weapons, in part because there are few if any "legitimate" civilian uses for such weapons and they would present a crystal clear public health and safety hazard should they fall into the wrong hands.  The risks for "civilian" ownership far outweigh any conceivable "benefits."

To a certain extent, I am, of course, belaboring the obvious and distorting the argument.  At the time the constitution was written, the word "arms" would not have meant much more than a sword and a gun, and a very rudimentary gun at that.  The "arms" that exist today would have been inconceivable to them, and it is unlikely that the framers, were they considering the constitution today, would have been so categorical and universal in their assertion that the right to keep and bear arms should not be infringed.  The controls placed on military weapons is a tacit recognition of this reality, but the spectrum issue is one that bedevils efforts at any "evidence-based" discussion of guns as a public health and safety issue.   "Guns" are a sub-set of the full spectrum of available "arms," and while few would argue that the constitution protects the individual's right to keep and bear nuclear arms, or for that matter the individual's right to keep and bear surface to air missiles, "guns" have been cordoned off and afforded a "special" status within that spectrum.   Those of us who want a discussion of "guns" as a public health and safety issue and meaningful controls placed on the same and use of "guns" consequent to that discussion simply want to place any particular "gun" on the spectrum and ask a series of questions:

Are there "legitimate" civilian uses for that particular gun?  And yes, though I tend to pooh-pooh it, self-protection is a legitimate civilian use.  

Does it present a public health and safety hazard, and if so, what measures should be put in place to ameliorate those hazards, to include measures that would prevent any particular gun falling into the "wrong hands?"   It is clear enough that "guns" are hazardous, particularly those who own the guns, but then so too are any number of things -- my pickup, example.  If I drive "aggressively" I place myself, my passengers, and others on the road in clear danger.  Though we can never eliminate the danger entirely, and people do die in automobile accidents, that hasn't prevented us from taking steps to ameliorate those dangers without "infringing" significantly on my "right to keep and drive pickups."

Do the risks of civilian ownership and control outweigh the legitimate civilian uses? The AR-15 is a case in point.  There may well be "legitimate" civilian uses for that particular gun, to include target shooting and the macho rush it provides for those who want to play at soldier but don't want to actually be soldiers (sorry, pooh-poohing again).  I won't argue its use for hunting, only to suggest that one must be a really bad shot and you need more time on the practice range if one needs an automatic weapon with a high capacity clip to bring down a single deer or elk (sorry, pooh-poohing yet again).   Assuming legitimate civilian uses, however, the question remains whether the "risks" associated with that particular weapon outweigh those uses should the gun fall into the "wrong hands."  It's a favorite argument against gun safety measure to say, "if guns are criminal, only criminals would have guns."  The statement is tautological, but I get the point.  The weapon WILL fall into the "wrong hands," and the greater the proliferation of the weapon, the more likely it is to fall into the "wrong hands."  We cannot eliminate the risk of its falling into the wrong hands, but we can certainly curtail its likelihood, and let us not speak falsely now, for the hour is getting late, it's a pretty "risky" gun in the "wrong hands."  I think it's a legitimate question to ask whether its associated risks outweigh the benefits that accrue to its use.

Second observation.  Right now, it's virtually impossible to have a meaningful "evidence-based" discussion of guns.  A good deal of the discussion now is pure supposition, what seems likely to be true or what we would like to be true, without much in the way of verifiable, repeatable data to support those suppositions.  The first step toward a meaningful "evidence-based" discussion is the relaxation of the congressional restrictions place on government funding of research into gun safety, through the CDC or a comparable agency.  (A complementary step would be the requirement of "insurance" for gun ownership.  They would do the actuarial research and while they wouldn't be in a position to "ban" certain guns, they would be in a position to make the premiums cost-prohibative if the guns do pose a substantial risk to the owner or others.)   The NRA supported restrictions amounting to a virtual ban on research into gun safety strikes me as a "cover-up."  One generally don't ban  "questions" unless we the answers are known and the answer isn't good.  So back to the opening salvo.  On the other side of the divide, on the light side of the force, I'm going to skip the right's true intent to conceal the truth and keep it from the american public.  It's been written on ad nauseam, and proven through so many examples that I'm not sure why the right is feigning innocence to the plot.  

Guns, Terror, and the Paranoid Style

With the Orlando shootings, there has been a spike in the rhetoric surrounding terrorism, its relation to religion and its relation to guns.  On the on side, there is a sense of denial that terrorist act are related to guns.  On the other side, there is a sense of denial that terrorist acts are related to religion.  The first is the peculiar denial of the right, the second the equally peculiar denial of the left.

Let me deal with the issue of guns first.  Let me say from the outset that I do not want to do away with the second amendment of the constitution, though I would not shed a single tear if it were repealed.  We could debate the meaning of the second amendment ad infinitum, and I won't engage in that debate, but simply suggest that there have been perhaps three emergent trends in the argument for nearly universal gun rights.  The first, of course, is the sportsman's argument, the one I am most attuned to defend.  Whether one engages in blood sports or not, I can understand its appeal and there should be few limitations on weapons designed for hunting which would include various forms of shot guns and rifles with limited capacity magazines.  The second is the "self-defense" argument.  Most arguments around self-defense are specious and beggar common sense, but here again I can understand the appeal and there should be few limitations on weapons designed for self-defense, which would include various handguns with limited capacity magazines.  The third is the "armed militia" argument.  Though it is not often openly articulated, it is the assumption that weapons are necessary to a military or police style operations to "defend the homeland," and the greatest threat to the homeland comes from the federal government itself, either through its inaction or its direct acton.

I say "few limitations on the ownership of guns" designed for hunting and self-defense, which implies, of course, that there should be some limitations created around "public safety."  My direct analogy, and it could be administered in almost exactly the same way, is the DMV.  Each weapon should be licensed, and while it might be cumbersome to affix a license plate to a hunting rifle or a handgun, the ownership of a weapon should nevertheless be "registered" and changes in ownership "tracked." This would not prevent the private transfer of a weapon from one individual to another,  and would place the burden of "registration" on the one receiving the weapon.  Failure to register a gun would be a criminal offense, not unlike the failure to register an automobile, and those in possession of "unregistered" guns would be subject to penalty.  Likewise, not unlike an automobile, each gun operator, in order to operate the gun, should be licensed.  This has the added benefit of registering the intent to own and operate weapons just as obtaining a driver's license registers the intent to drive automobiles, along with prior "testing" to determine one's ability to safely operate a weapon and "screening" to determine one's "fitness" to own weapons.  Not unlike a motorcycle "permit" or a commercial permit, special permissions beyond hunting and self-defense could be easily "stamped" on the license -- e.g. a permit to carry a "concealed weapon" or a "special use weapon" like the AR-15.  Moreover, each weapon should be individually insured by the owner in much the same way that automobiles are insured, both as property and as a liability.   Insofar as the "reckless" use of weapons is a public safety issue, not unlike the "reckless" use of an automobile, it is unfair for the general public to bear the cost of injury or death resulting from the improper use and/or storage of a weapon.  Bits and pieces of this are in place here and there, but it has not been "normalized" in the way that automobile registration and insurance has been "normalized" under interstate commerce assumptions and laws with national data-bases.

Who would object to this and why?  Administrative cost should not be a factor because fees could be structured to cover on-going costs.  It would create yet another government bureaucracy and those who object to "big" government might object on principled grounds, but once such a system were "normalized" private ownership of guns would be no different than private ownership of automobiles or real estate.  It wouldn't infringe on the right to "own" firearms, any more than it infringes the right to own real estate, but it would be different than, say, private ownership of a toaster.  I suppose that, given sufficient determination, one can imagine "murder by toaster," but it is difficult to imagine, even for the most determined, mass murder by toaster.  It isn't difficult to imagine mass murder by AR-15, and only the most willfully ignorant gun advocates can claim that guns themselves are NOT a public safety hazard.  It beggars my patience to explain to the willfully ignorant why a "good guy with a gun" is not an answer to the public safety concerns, and it does nothing to dispute a program  like that set out above, which would have the added benefit of additional "research" -- that is to say, the actuarial research and the profit margin of the insurance industry would begin to drive "rational," through the vaunted free market, limitations on the types of weapons available to the general public and at what cost.  Imagine, in other words, if the gun owner's insurance company that had to pay out claims related to the Sandy Hook or the Orlando shootings. Would it have issued insurance to either individual?  At what cost?

So again, who would object and why?  It could be argued that  it would not keep weapons out of the hands of "criminals" or those with malicious intent.  Of course not, but let's follow it through.  On the assumption that gun manufacturers will not engage in a black market, almost all gun sales will originate with a legitimate "dealer," who, by the way, should also be licensed just as liquor dealers are licensed.  One can assume that the original sale of any particular weapon will take place at a legitimate dealer.  Just as a legitimate liquor store dealer won't sell knowingly to minor, thus relieving himself of liability and criminal charges, a legitimate gun dealer won't sell knowingly to a potential customer who is unlicensed, thus relieving himself of liability and criminal charges.   If sufficient incentive were available, would a gun dealer willingly violate the law?  Of course, but he would be a criminal and subject to criminal sanctions, and he would have an "inventory" issue.  He would need to account for the missing "serial numbers" relative to a specific, licensed buyer.  Could he fake the license?  Of course, but routine cross-check audits would likely discover the fraud, particularly if the fraud were pervasive.  Could a "criminal" use a fake license to purchase from a legitimate dealer?  Of course, but the same cross checks would likely discover the fraud, particularly if the dealer had no intent to conceal it, and would alert law enforcement if nothing else.  Could a legitimate buyer use his license to buy a weapon with the intent of distributing it to criminals?  Of course, but that would make the legitimate buy a criminal with criminal intent and, when discovered, subject to criminal prosecution.  No law, or set of laws, is a perfect screen against criminality, but the vast majority of citizens might grumble about the bureaucracy necessary to enforce the law, just as I grumble about the DMV, but they would nevertheless comply and there would be numerous check points to keep the honest citizen honest.

So yet again, who would object and why?  Those who would object to any form of "government incursion and tracking?"  It shouldn't perhaps be surprising that Trevor Noah and others were able to find an Al Queda spokesperson, Adam Gahdan, pointing out the ready availability of guns within the US, an unchecked availability of which the Orlando shooter took full advantage.  Of course, with hindsight, no one would argue that he should have had the weapons he had, but the "licensing" prohibitions that would have prevented his purchase of the weapons was voted down by the republican majority in the Senate.  Sam Harris has been accused of islamaphobia, and I admit that there's something just a wee bit too preachy, something a wee bit too committed to the cause of debunking the notion that "islam is a religion of peace."  At some level, I prefer the urbanity of a Christopher Hitchens, who could quickly and easily debunk the notion that christianity, as it has been practiced historically, is a "religion of peace."  I would be the first to admit that the jihadist terrorist probably represents islam as a whole about as well as the white supremacist National Vanguard represents christianity as a whole.  Nevertheless, the doctrines professed by both the radical islamist and the radical christian have their fundamental roots in the religion practiced by a regional majority, particularly the regional majority of those on the evangelical right, a "demographic" steeped in and susceptible to what Richard Hofstader called the "paranoid style in politics."   Here, for example, is a snippet from the National Vanguard, a white supremacist group, that touches the core of the "paranoid style:"

Except for a relatively small minority of very sick persons who actually relish the idea of surrender and fantasize about being victimized, those who choose to give up their arms are hoping to be protected by the government. They trust the government. They believe the government has their best interests at heart. They think of the government as a friend and generally approve of the government’s policies.

I wouldn't want to suggest that this represents anything but an "extremist" point of view, but so long as we worry about "islamic extremists," we might as well worry about right wing extremists like the National Vanguard, the World Church of the Creator, and the Aryan Nation, all of whom profess to be Christian and all of whom, according to the FBI, represent "a continuing terrorist threat."  They are as virulently anti-government as the most radical "islamic extremist," and lest we forget, an emerging terrorist threat of special interest terrorists or those who occupy "extreme fringes of the animal rights [leftist], pro-life [right], environmental [left], and anti-nuclear [left]."  Though the animal rights and environmental "extremists" tend to resort to vandalism, those who support the "pro-life" movement have shown their willingness to take up arms to demonstrate their support of life.  All are as virulently anti-government as the "islamic extremists."  Obama has received considerable heat for not calling out "radical islam," but the terrorist reality facing the FBI is not limited to islam, and it is a terrorist reality, particularly that from the right, adverse to any form of "government" tracking or control of firearms.

In the original Harper's article he tells us that "the basic elements of right wing thought can be reduced to three."  The first element of right wing thought concerns the familiar refrain around taxation -- i.e. that since the Roosevelt's new deal, there has been a "sustained conspiracy" to "undermine free capitalism, bring the economy under the control of the federal government, and to pave the way for socialism or communism."  Although there are clearly remnants of this line of thinking, particularly in the efforts to undermine social welfare programs and the federal taxation that supports them, the communist bug-a-boo has largely dissipated.  There is no real, external communist threat, and the communist nations that remain, particularly China, have become more "capitalist" threats than ideological threats. What to do when one's favorite bug-a-boo has been "defeated?"  One needs, more than anything else, a new "bug-a-boo,"  and 9/11 provided it -- the threat of "international terrorism," particularly that in support of "jihadist ideologies."  These same ideologies had undermined "stability" in the middle east for some time, and disrupted access to oil, but now the threat had been brought to our shores.  There were, of course, conspiracy theories that Bush himself had engineered the attacks for precisely this reason, to advance his own oil interests and provide a new bug-a-boo, but I find that no more credible than any other conspiracy theory.  It was, however, terribly convenient.  It not only provided a new bug-a-boo, but the ideology of "jihadism" and the muslim religion itself was a traditional enemy of christendom.  Substitute the "war on terror" for the "war on communism," and the rhetoric of the right can resume unabated, particularly since there was incontrovertible evidence that they were "out to get us."

The second element of right wing thought is the contention,  according to Hofstader,  that "top government officials have been so infiltrated by communists, that American policy, at least since the days leading up to Pearl Harbor, has been dominated by men who were consistently and shrewdly selling out American interests."   Here again, substitute the old bug-a-boo of communism with the new bug-a-boo of international terrorists.   With his election, Barack Hussein Obama, the top government official, bar none, became the man "consistently and shrewdly selling out American interests."  Trump's "birther" rants against Obama during the last election cycle, and the repeated claims that he was of  Kenyan descent provides a case in point.  As reported by the Huffington Post, "Trump appeared via telephone on CNBC, where he argued that questions about Obama's birthplace have not been adequately answered, despite Obama releasing a copy of his birth certificate over a year ago.  'Nothing has changed my mind,' he said." Such rhetoric has it's direct correspondence with white supremacist rhetoric, this a headline drawn from the web site of the National Vanguard, "a glimpse at the progressive element of Obama's homeland, Kenya."  Which came first might be difficult to prove, and it's not surprising that "nothing changed his mind," in part because evidence to the contrary, for the conspiracy theorist, is itself evidence of just how "shrewd" those engaged in the conspiracy have become and how effectively they "fake" evidence.  After the mass shooting in Orlando, essentially "I told you so," followed by "insinuations" of Obama's complicity with, or at least sympathy with, the terrorists was reiterated, though the message quickly became confused for reasons that I will touch below.

The third element of right wing thought, according to Hofstader, is that "country is infused with a network of communist agents ... so that the whole apparatus of education, religion, the press, and the mass media is engaged in a common effort to paralyze the resistance of loyal Americans."  The whole apparatus is "political correctness," or the on-going inability to "speak the truth."  In another headline from the white supremacist group, National Vanguard, we are told:

the whole Trump story is a simple one: black, “Muslim” president leads to natiivist backlash, with a consummate salesman-demagogue giving his followers permission to say what had previously been beyond the bounds of polite discourse.

They hold some suspicion of Trump, along with any republican support of Isreal, in part because, as the same author put it, "the high profile jews supporting Trump make me sick."  Nevertheless, they see in Trump's "anti-poitical correctness" campaign at least a partial vindication of their "ideology,"

Let’s take “white supremacy” out of the realm of insult. It is an ideology, after all, not simply a slur, and it is believed by tens of millions of Americans. It is the proposition that the real (“great”) America is white America, and while the “melting pot” can absorb some blacks, Asians and Latinos, the essential core of what America is remains the Christian, European iteration that prevailed for 200 years. It is English-speaking, Merry-Christmas-wishing, and ruled by “real” American men, not by women or people with the middle name Hussein.

I will not attempt to answer the question which comes first, the sorts of extreme paranoid "christian" religion espoused here or the tribal hatred of anyone outside the tribe -- it is ultimately a chicken and egg question.  I will suggest again that it is no different in kind than the extreme paranoid "muslim" religion that fears incursion of secular western culture and their tribal hatred of anyone outside their particular tribe.

It probably goes without saying, but I will say it anyway.  The paranoid style of politics is particularly amenable to the NRA messaging and the proliferation of firearms.  I do put some faith in the notion that my neighbors are mostly benign, regardless of their skin color, religion, or place of origin.  For the very few who are not, I do put some faith in the notion that our government has our "best interests at heart," and that we are "protected by the government" and its agencies.  Those who place their faith elsewhere, believe that their neighbors are malignant, who believe their government facilitates their malignancy, would probably feel the need to arm themselves for "protection."  At the farthest extremes, they would probably feel the need to arm themselves to combat the government itself, if not actively through acts of terrorism, then at least defensively against their incursions.  It is, perhaps, not surprising then that the NRA messaging has found it's natural home in a conservative party that has been "dog-whistling" paranoid political thought for some time, "dog-whistling" that has finally called forth Donald Trump, a hound that cannot seem to restrain its barking.

Here again, I do not believe for an instant that the NRA is in conspiracy with the likes of  Al Queda or the National Vanguard or their ilk.  I believe they are pretty much what they appear to be, representatives of the gun industry.  Ultimately, the ends of the gun industry is to make a profit from the manufacture and sale of firearms.  How they justify that profit to themselves and to others is another matter, and it is that justification (and defense) of the gun industry that leads to ideological statements of one sort or another.   Cynically, however, it is difficult to miss the point that mass shootings and the effectual calls to limit the manufacture and sale of firearms, have resulted in the increased sales of firearms.   Here, as reported by the NYT:

the business climate for gun makers has rarely been better. Firearms enthusiasts, whether they are hunters, target shooters or those concerned with their personal safety, buy more guns after mass shootings and the resulting appeals for stricter gun laws. After the call for sales restrictions after the San Bernardino attacks, more guns were sold in December than almost any other month in nearly two decades, according to federal data released this week.

The same is expected to happen (and is happening) as a result of the latest mass shooting in Orlando, Consequently, “Mr. Obama is the best gun salesman on the planet,” said Mr. Navellier, chairman of the Reno, Nev., investment firm Navellier & Associates, alluding to the notion that the White House’s push for stricter gun laws has driven sharp increases in firearm sales," and "since President Obama took office in 2009, shares of Smith & Wesson and Sturm, Ruger have each increased more than 900 percent, far surpassing the return of the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index (up 147 percent) and even outperforming the stock of Apple (up 800 percent)."  Again, I do not think the gun industry is in conspiracy with the likes of a mass shooter.  I would assert, rather forcefully, however, that they resemble the cigarette industry in the 50s and 60s, fully aware that their "product" is a public health and safety hazard, but doing nothing to ameliorate those hazards.   I would assert, rather forcefully, that the republican legislators, who have dog-whistled the most paranoid aspects of our society, who have voted in a block against even rational discussion of gun legislation, are complicit in a wide spread public health and safety debacle.  

Perhaps, however, we have an opening.  The shooting in Orlando has up-ended most of the conventional narratives.  Although a muslim, and despite a phone call to 911 declaring his allegiance to ISIS,  it would stretch the limits of credulity to declare him an ideologically committed terrorist, the bete noir of the right.   Trump, clearly, self indulgently, with his finger on the tweet-trigger, did not call it correctly, and his retreat has been embarrassingly ignominious.   Although the targets were gay, and initial testimony tended to portray him as a typical perpetrator of a hate crime against gays, the bete noir of the left, it is not clear that he perpetrated a "hate crime," at least not with the typical motives of religiously sanctified bigotry and a tribal hatred of the "other."  The more they dig, the more they find that he was himself, very likely, a "closeted-gay."  If there was fear and loathing, it was more likely the self loathing of being what his father and the religion of his father would have called an "abomination."   In a crowded place, with people elbow to elbow, with free-flowing spirits in all senses of the word, with music blaring and nearly everyone in motion, in the lighting of a night club, how exactly would another gun firing away have done anything except increase the number of casualties among the innocent?  Maybe, if the perpetrator had been a brown skinned muslim extremist shooting at white skinned christians at worship, he would have been easily identified.  Maybe, if the perpetrator had been a white skinned christian extremist shooting at a room full of brown and black skinned people.  But this was a brown skinned person shooting in loud, dimly lit room full to brim mostly of other brown skinned people.   Although many, too many, were quick to leap on ideological bandwagons, in the end, the mass shooting will likely turn out to be exactly what it appears to be, a deeply disturbed individual with an AR-15, in an arena where most of the shibboleth's of "self-defense" turn out to be utter non-sense.    Perhaps there is an opening for a rational discussion, and rational action on gun legislation that might affirm our faith that the government really does have the people's best interests at heart, and not simply the profits of the gun industry -- that might affirm its ability to take meaningful action to extend real protection, address issues of public health and safety, and not say, in effect, "every man for themselves.  If you want to protect yourself, buy a gun -- better yet, buy several. "