The Democratic Message

I finally started receiving the paper copies of The New Republic last Friday, and was a little bit discouraged when I read this:

STEP ONE: ADMIT THE PROBLEM. WHEN DO WE GET TO STEP TWO? "There was not a national message." --Representative Calvin M. Dooley, Democrat, after Democrats lost the presidency in 2000 "[T]here obviously must be a change in Democrat leadership and change the course with a clearer message." --Jesse Jackson, after Democrats lost seats in the House and the Senate in November 2002 "[Democrats] need a clear national message." --Bill Clinton, after Democrats lost the presidential race, as well as seats in the House and Senate, in November 2004

I don't really like "this pretty much speaks for itself" posts, but this is one of those. One could make arguments that you could find trends all of the place if you take quotes from three different people over a period of four years. But what these people are saying is true. I wasn't involved in political campaigns in the past, so I don't know if there was as much discussion after the last two elections about what the Democrats need to do to win. (My feeling is that there was more focus on distractions--the feeling that Gore actually won the election in 2000, and the bitter feelings about being tarred as unpatriotic by Republicans in 2002.) This time, there are no such easy distractions; it seems like most Democrats really do see the need for a more clear vision of what it wants for America. How's this one: "Compassion, Equality, Cooperation, Fiscal Discipline." It doesn't acronymize (yes, I made that word up), but those four things seem to summarize what the Democrats stand for (or, at least, what I want them to stand for):

• Compassion. Caring about each other. The social safety net falls in here, but it's also just a moral sense of caring for each other and wanting to provide an environment where strong communities can grow.
• Equality. The notion that people have equal rights and responsibilities. This doesn't mean everyone is the same, and does not mean that everyone has to have the same material wealth. I would obviously put gay marriage in here.
• Cooperation. Domestically, this would be similar to compassion. After 9/11, I felt a sense of the nation wanting to work together towards common goals, helping out in the community, etc. Unfortunately, the dominant political message tended to be "Go and shop!" and "Let's come together and fight in Iraq." That sense of common purpose can be rebuilt. Cooperation also means cooperating with foreign powers. A lot of issues are bigger than any individual country--environmental issues and terrorism, for example. It might feel good and right in the short term to do things our way all of the time, but in the long term it would be better to have the cooperation of other countries.
• Fiscal Discipline. This wasn't always a Democratic ideal, but under Clinton it became one. And now, it is the Republicans who are the "borrow-and-spend" spendthrifts. There are valid things the government should spend money on, but there is little doubt there is a lot of waste thrown into the budgets. Democrats must promise to make an honest effort to spend money only where it is truly needed to live up to America's promise.

I know these may seem a bit naive and ambiguous. I'm sure they can use refining. But if someone were to ask me "what do the Democrats stand for" this is what I would say. Knowing what you really stand for--not just a list of policies that you support--will help in crafting a message that Americans can internalize.

Admitting When I Am Wrong

I posted an analysis on my website (mrjoro.org) regarding what I thought might be over-representation of Republicans in the 109th Congress. (The 109th Congress starts in January 2005.) It turned out that I was wrong. You can see all of the details there, but essentially I was trying to see if the 53% of seats that Republicans will hold in the next Congress means that they will represent 53% of the population. My theory that there were a bunch of smaller Republican states with a single Representative where the population was less than the population of the "average" Congressional district. I went through the numbers, figuring out how many people each party actually represented. To my initial surprise, the percentage of population represented by Republicans roughly matches the percentage of seats they hold in the House. (Of course, this is how the House is supposed to operate, unlike the Senate which is purposely designed to give states with less population more power.) Looking back, it should have been immediately obvious this was going to happen; you can read the analysis to find out why. In essence, my assumptions were just wrong, and there were things that someone a bit quicker than me would have realized right away. But the important thing I learned about myself in doing this exercise is that satisfying a curiosity is, well, satisfying even if I don't get the results I expect (or want). It reminds me of Junior High science classes, where the teachers tried to emphasize that you were supposed to come up with a hypothesis before doing your experiments, and it didn't even matter if you were wrong. That was a surprisingly difficult lesson for me to grasp (I hated being wrong.) Fortunately, I've grown a bit since Junior High. I don't mind so much learning that I am wrong, especially when it helps remove distraction. Really, suppose I had been right about the Republican's being over-represented. I would have some smug satisfaction that Republicans really only represented, say, 51% of the population, not the 53% that it seemed like. But what would that gain me? It would simply be a distraction. It is much better to focus on the substance of how the Democrats are going to retake the House and Senate in 2006. Beyond realizing I was wrong, I had to decide whether or not to share the information with everyone else. It would have been easy for me to say "Well, no one has to know how bad my assumptions were," delete the spreadsheet, and forget about it. But why not put it out there just in case someone else is thinking the same thing I was. Plus, the spreadsheet could be useful for some other analysis. (I had to create the list of how many Representatives from each party made up the Congressional delegation for each state by counting them myself--I couldn't find the data anywhere on the web. Now it's out there, and maybe someone else will stumble upon it.) Finally (and this goes to the heart of what may have been visible in a few earlier entries), I have learned over the years that I am not right all of the time. I like having my assumptions challenged. When I was making the assumption that the "moral values" voters were being hypocritical, I was chastened (but gladly so) when it turned out that many of the people also did consider poverty and the environment to be moral issues as well. This is not to say that I do not have core beliefs. There are things I believe fundamentally, and I don't expect people will be able to show me that I am wrong. For example, I believe strongly in the civil rights for gays, including all of the benefits of marriage that the government offers. I will not be convinced otherwise. (Whether the government should be in the business of offering these benefits is a separate question.) It is for these reasons that I do not just read liberal news sources or websites. As I describe in my earlier entry on magazines, I'm currently subscribing to several magazines that have a more libertarian or conservative perspective. As long as the source is principled and well-articulated, I am open to a little assumption-challenging. (If the source is shrill and antagonistic--such as, say, Fox News--then I will tune it out.)

Am I Becoming A Schwarzenegger Democrat?

Well, probably not. Schwarzenegger lost a lot of points for me when he allowed himself to be used as the facade the Republicans put up at their convention in September. (If nothing else, the fact that the Republicans felt the need to portray their party as a centrist one shows that there is no huge conservative mandate, but I digress.) But there have been a couple of things that Schwarzenegger supports that I support, against the wishes of many Democrats. What sparked this entry was an article in the Chronicle by John Wildermuth regarding the Constitutional amendment some are proposing to citizens who weren't "natural born" to be President. This would amend Article 2, Section 1 which reads in part:

"No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States."

This is primarily designed to help Schwarzenegger. Some pull in Madeleine Albright and Michigan governor Jen Granholm, but it is obvious from the website of the group pushing the amendment, Amend for Arnold&Jen, that Schwarzenegger is the primary motivation. Aside from the name of the group (mentioning Jen Granholm), I can find no mention of anyone aside from Schwarzenegger. One of the prominent links is "Join Arnold's Team." Regardless of the motivations for the amendment, and who will truly benefit from it, the constitutional requirement seems simply archaic to me. Ultimately, the voters should decide if someone is qualified to be President--including deciding if he or she is loyal enough. If some new Citizen is a member of a club that wants to give control over the United States to the French, then the people will find out about that. I don't even favor a time requirement, though some think the amendment should require a person to have been a citizen for at least 20 years. People will be naturally suspicious of someone who became a citizen just a few years ago, so it is unlikely that person would be able to win the White House. When in doubt, let the voters decide. (Trust me, it is hard to say that after the last election, but that feeling is just superficial agitation; when I take a step back and think about what makes this country great, one of the things is that the voice of the people ultimately does control things--even if there are some bumps along the way.) Another big thing that Schwarzenegger is pushing is to move redistricting in California to a nonpartisan group. From the Schwarzenegger's "official website":

Fair Redistricting – To get politicians out of the process of drawing legislative district boundaries, Schwarzenegger’s proposal includes a constitutional amendment that would direct the Judicial Council – the administrative arm of California’s court system – to select three retired judges by lottery to serve as “Special Masters” who would draw district boundaries. “Reapportionment of state Assembly and state Senate seats should be done fairly, so that no political party uses the process to distort democracy,” Schwarzenegger said. “Electoral districts should be drawn for the benefit of voters, not political intrigue and advantage.”

Right now, the incumbents in the Assembly and State Senate create the districts that control not only the state legislature but also representation in Congress. They create districts that are "safe" for the incumbent or incumbent party. This leads to something of an entitlement culture, where whoever wins the primary for the dominant party in a district wins the general election. This currently gives the Democrats an advantage, so I would be inclined to support the status quo. But I've become pissed off. In this last election campaign, the Democratic primary for State Assembly in my district was particularly nasty because the Democrat who won knew that he or she would easily win the seat. In the general election, I was researching to find who I should support between the Democrat and the Green. When I went to the "issues page" of the Democrat (Joe Coto), I found a bland paragraph with no real discussion of any issues. He was so confident he would win, he did not have to bother campaigning. I was (and am) disgusted. I ended up voting for the Green, the first time in my life I have done that. The dangers of this type of political gerrymandering was most evident in the recent redistricting that happened in Texas. Once the Republicans got control of the legislature there, they performed what some considered to be an illegal mid-census redistricting that heavily favored Republicans, engineered by Tom Delay. The result: in the last election, the balance went from 17-15 with the Democrats in the majority to 22-10 with the Republicans in control. The entire gain of the Republicans in the US House can be accounted for by this redistricting. (So the Republican mandate that came in part from gaining seats in the House is bull.) I could be a "realist" and say that "well, if they play dirty in Texas, we should play dirty in California." But I won't. I don't believe districts should be drawn to keep people safe. There is little incentive for representatives to actually represent if they know they are going to win. Would I be happier if every state went to non-partisan redistricting? Absolutely. But I think it is healthier for democracy in California to no longer gerrymander these districts. So on these two issues, I'm on Schwarzenegger's side. Does that make me a Schwarzenegger Democrat? Of course not. I'd be worried about myself if I just parroted the Democratic party line on all issues. I like to think of myself as a "Democratic-leaning independent," though I'm sure none of my friends would describe me that way. The recall made me angry. I didn't care too much for Davis, but he'd won the previous election. It seemed like a disgusting example of how money can twist supposedly democratic tools to serve a particular end (just like the Clinton impeachment). I couldn't believe that a majority of those who voted for any candidate in the second question of the recall voted for Schwarzenegger. But once he became governor, I gave him a chance. I don't disagree with things he proposes just to be contrary. Fortunately he knows that he can't be far-right in California, so his positions are mostly moderate. And that means that I find myself supporting him more often that I would have though possible--and much more often than I support Bush.

East San Jose And Big Boxes

There's an article by Jessie Mangaliman in the Merc (the San Jose Mercury News) today about the coming arrival of a new shopping center in East San Jose (my neighborhood) at King and Story Roads, named Plaza de San Jose. The shopping center will be anchored by Target and FAMSA, a retail chain from Mexico. As a liberal, I feel like I should have mixed feelings about this. I generally hate the arrival of "big box" stores because they drive out smaller and more local businesses, making everywhere in America the same. The problem is, I can't remember the last time I shopped at a local store for anything. Frankly, most of the things I buy from a store are household goods and groceries. For household goods, it is simply easier and cheaper to shop at a bigger store--and they have more selection. We just bought a new High-Efficiency washer and dryer from Best Buy. I can't imagine going to a local store to get those--maybe a local store exists that sells them, but I haven't heard of them. I can understand the desire not to have big boxes in the middle of a vibrant community with a lot of local businesses. But this is East San Jose. The intersection this is being built on is rather decrepit, and it would be nice to have a good place for people to go to in the heart of East San Jose. (There is a nicer little shopping center, anchored by the local grocery store Lunardi's, but it is in the much more expensive Evergreen neighborhood.) If this shopping center takes business away from other companies, it is more likely to be from the Target 15 minutes away or the relatively close Eastridge mall, which itself has big boxes. Probably the biggest losers would be any small Mexican oriented shops, because there aren't any stores like FAMSA around here. So, am I a hypocrite or a realist? Is it okay for me to hate the idea of big boxes, but welcome them when they help out my community? This seems to be the opposite of "Not In My Backyard." Perhaps it is "Not In Your Backyard?" (I imagine NIYBYism is something a lot of people in rural parts of the Western US could accuse environmentalists of.)

Do Democrats Think You're Dumb?

George Will has an interesting, if wrong and dangerous, editorial in the November 22nd issue of Newsweek, entitled Validation By Defeat.

A small but significant, because articulate, sliver of the Democratic Party seems to relish interpreting the party's defeat as validation. This preening faction reasons as follows: the re-election of George W. Bush proves that 51 percent of the electorate are homophobic, gun-obsessed, economically suicidal, antiscience, theocratic dunces. Therefore to be rejected by them is to have one's intellectual and moral superiority affirmed.

His argument is that Democrats will continue to lose because they misunderstand an intelligent public that chooses to vote how it votes based on an intelligent decision-making process. He is wrong. I don't think most Americans are dumb. While there certainly are "homophobic, gun-obsessed, economically suicidal, antiscience, theocratic dunces" out there, they do not make up 51% of the people who voted. I do think that many of the people who voted for Bush are misinformed. It would be one thing if this was just my gut feeling. But George Will ignores the poll performed just before the election that showed that the majority of Bush supporters believed things that were simply not true. I'm not talking about debatable things like religious beliefs. I mean the fact that a majority of Bush supporters believe he supports the Kyoto protocol. I mean the fact that a majority of Bush supporters believe that Iraq was directly involved in the 9/11 attacks, despite even Bush's muted admission that it wasn't so. I mean the fact that a majority of Bush supporters believe that world opinion supported the US invasion of Iraq. 74% of his supporters believed that he supports environmental and labor standards in trade agreements--something Bush and the Republicans are completely opposed to. Again, I do not think that 51% of Americans are misinformed. I have some friends who are quite intelligent and just as informed as I consider myself to be, and they supported Bush. My Dad (and probably his whole family) supported Bush; I certainly don't think they are dumb and they are also well informed. Their belief systems are just different from mine; they see the facts and they reach different conclusions. But I think that there are a lot of Bush supporters who don't think much differently than me, and a significant number who would have supported Kerry if they knew all of the facts. Even if just 6% of Bush people were misinformed to the extent that they would switch their votes if they had been told the truth (a sliver of them being in Ohio), then all of these people saying what the Democrats did wrong would be trying to figure out what the Republicans did wrong. (George Lakoff, whose book Don't think of an elephant!" I have mentioned here before, says the problem goes deeper--it's not just a problem of being misinformed, it's a problem of the right wing being more successful at creating terminology and frames that goes to a person's emotions instead of his or her intellect. He is not arguing that people are dumb, just that people can react to politics on both an emotional as well as an intellectual level.) George even stretches his argument to conveniently support Bush's partial privatization of Social Security:

However, some Democrats may oppose Bush's plan on the ground that it presupposes more intelligence than the average American possesses—that the average American cannot be trusted to invest competently. So part of the "pro choice" party believes that the average American should not be trusted to make choices about providing for his or her retirement.

Bull. This has nothing to do with whether people can make the right choices; there are no calls that I am aware of to get rid of 401(k) plans. Democrats realize that it is just a fact that a lot of people can lose their money in the stock market. It's not a question of intelligence, it is just a fact of life. (Ask all of those people at Enron whose 401(k)'s plummeted.) It is easy to say callously "if people invest their money wrong, and become homeless when they get old because of it, then it is their own damn fault." It's also short-sited. People who lose their money and become homeless do have some social cost. And, ultimately, it is just not the moral (dare I say "Christian?") thing to do. Will tries to hedge by saying that only a small portion of the Democratic party really thinks people are dumb. But then he goes on to say how it spells doom for the Democrats. This will only be the case if people like Will keep trying to hold up a tiny minority as the "heart" of the Democratic party, or somehow representative of it.

Europe As Superpower and the Frustration of Unoriginality

One of the recent topics in my "American Foreign Policy in a Post-9/11 World" class was how the US relationship with Europe has changed. The main essay we read for this was Power and Weakness by Robert Kagan. Essentially, the essay argued that the US is strong military and destined to provide a "Kantian paradise" for the world. Europe, military weak and without the real desire to become otherwise, is left to reap the benefits of this paradise. At the same time, the Europeans have come to mistrust the same power that has brought them here:

American power made it possible for Europeans to believe that power was no longer important. And now, in the final irony, the fact that United States military power has solved the European problem, especially the “German problem,” allows Europeans today to believe that American military power, and the “strategic culture” that has created and sustained it, are outmoded and dangerous.

The essay is a very interesting read, and provides a lucid explanation for how we arrived at the current situation. But in the end it seems to assume that the world is relatively static. There are some Europeans trying to make Europe a stronger military power to balance out the US; perhaps eventually they will convince enough people to do so. We have to write a single paper for this class, and I chose to write mine on what I thought was a somewhat orthogonal topic. In my paper, I argue that a European superpower would actually be beneficial to the United States without going into detail on whether a European superpower would actually develop. (I finished a draft yesterday; I'll post it on my website when its in the final form.) But then one of the most frustrating things happened. After having this great idea and thinking so highly of myself for being able to think this through, it turns out just about everyone else is doing (or has done) the same thing. In Salon today, "Welcome to the new cold war" by Andrew O'Hehir, explores this very topic. More than that, the article is actually in part a book review of two entire books on the topic, Jeremy Rifkin's The European Dream and T. R. Reid's The United States of Europe. This goes back to something I used to think about a lot--is there anything I can think of that someone else hasn't already thought of? More importantly, do I have the skills to do something that someone else couldn't do better? I'm thinking about these questions now in terms of public policy, foreign affairs and the like. Perhaps, though, I just need to temper my expectations. I'm near the end of a 20-hour course. Should I really be expected to be as well-informed and as eloquent as people who think about topics like this for a living? The answer to the first question is likely to always be "no"--only true geniuses could honestly answer "yes" to that. But the answer to the second question is almost definitely "yes." I need to take the time to become better informed, to practice exercising my mind and wrapping them around these topics and, perhaps, to specialize on something (though this last one is up for debate and, of course, more thought).

More on "Moral Values" and the Election

In this post, a tying together of my first post (which referenced "moral values") and my second post (about the magazines I read). I was catching up on my magazine reading of The Economist's November 13-19 issue. Right near the front there was an article that confirmed for me that I was right in subscribing to this magazine. (For those who are not familiar with The Economist, it is a news magazine published in England but with mostly American readers. It covers world news. Despite the title, there are a lot of non-business stories. The magazine is generally considered libertarian. This is one of the magazines to which Bert Patenaude, my Post 9/11 professor, encouraged me to subscribe.) The article, The triumph of the religious right again refutes the notion that this last election was really about "moral values," however one defines it. It turns out that in 2000, 35% of people listed moral or ethical issues as the top issue. And in 1996, the year that Clinton won, 40% did so. (This compares to 22% who listed it as the most important issue this time.) The significant decline in the number of people who listed this as their number one issue was likely a result of more big choices--terrorism, the Iraq war, and a stumbling (though admittedly improving) economy. Regardless, though, it is hard to see how the media could spin this issue as a new phenomenon when in fact it was a signicant decline. Furthermore, the story that Karl Rove did an amazing job turing out evangelicals simply is not accurate. In 2004, 23% of the electorate said they were evangelical. In 2000, 23% said they were evangelical. The percentage remained constant, while the absolute number went up (since more people in general turned out). Now, while it feels good to see these stories that the media trumpeted torn apart with facts, what makes the subscription worth it is this passage:

In all the religious groups substantial majorities agree that the disadvantaged need government help “to obtain their rightful place in America”. All favour increasing anti-poverty programmes, even if it means higher taxes. All support stricter environmental regulation. Large majorities say that America should give a high priority to fighting HIV/AIDS abroad. Religious conservatives have been among the strongest backers of intervening in Sudan and increasing AIDS spending in poor countries. If the Bush administration wanted to, it could find plenty of religious support for increased welfare programmes, tougher environmental standards and more foreign aid. The differences between the religious groups are equally striking. The Protestant traditionalists favour less government spending. But all the Catholics—traditionalist, mainline and modernist alike—favour more.

This passage tempers one of the things that had made me angry--the notion that so many people who said they supported "moral values" were hypocrites because they really only cared about a small set of moral values. I have more respect for these people now, and I should not have been so quick to judge based on a personal bias. (There is the line at the end about the Protestant traditionalists, but there really aren't enough details for me to draw any conclusions.) I still can be angry at the hypocrisy of the Bush administration itself, though. Bush has a "mandate" to support an anti-gay agenda. Why isn't he using the same mandate he apparently achieved to support welfare and the environment? Why isn't he getting involved in the genocide in Sudan? If anything, I am even more angry at the administration than I was before this article.

Catching Up On Magazines & The Only Thing That Changed the World

I spent much of yesterday catching up on my unread magazines--the old-fashioned ones printed on paper. Before a couple of weeks ago, Benson and I had subscriptions to Newsweek, US News & World Report, Wired, San Francisco Magazine, The Advocate, Out, National Geographic Adventure, Men's Health, Cargo and Mother Jones. You know you have a problem when a new magazine in your mailbox leads to a sinking feeling. I'd fallen way behind on reading these magazines because I just didn't have time to read them. Partly, this was because I spent so much time that I could have used to read magazines visiting Daily Kos and online news sites (cnn.com, nytimes.com and salon.com) leading up to the election. On top of this, I have my two classes that I'm taking in Stanford's Continuing Studies Program, and they entail a lot of reading. Once the election was over, I was too tired and depressed to do much aside from work, classwork, and sleeping. Then, I spent the following weekend in Vegas for my Mom's birthday (meaning out of the 10 days from the Saturday before the election, I spent 7 in Vegas). So, during this time, the magazines piled up. I feel too guilty just throwing a magazine out without at least glancing through them--what if I miss something inspirational or something that makes me see something in a new way??? It's the possibility of what the magazines contain that draws me to them. So I set aside some time last night to go through the stack that I had. The job was a bit easier than I had expected. I didn't feel like reading much more about the election, so the news magazines went by quickly. I've discovered that I'm just not that fascinated with most of what passes for "gay culture" according to the Advocate, so those finished up quickly. The Mother Jones was the one that took the longest--this is one magazine that I can read cover to cover. (I admit that I still haven't finished it.) I realized three things. First, what is the point in collecting all of this information? A week from now, am I really going to remember everything (or anything) I read in the magazines? When I get through them just to get through them, am I really taking the time to digest anything? More importantly, is there really much to digest? Second, I realized that on the list of magazines above, the only ones that I will keep subscribing to are Wired and Mother Jones. The news magazines feel like they are going the same way of the cable news networks--a lot of fluff without much news that I don't get from my daily visits to nytimes.com (and, grudgingly, cnn.com and msnbc.com; I visited foxnews.com regularly before the election to see what the other side thinks, but I just get too annoyed at them now). The other magazines just don't have anything that makes me think, something that breaks me out of my rut a little bit. Third, so many magazines have information that I already learn from websites before the magazine even arrives. For this reason, general news magazines just aren't that relevant anymore. They have to be magazines that go more in depth or cover subjects from a different angle--something that both Wired and Mother Jones tend to do. An example of why I like Mother Jones is the article Grandmothers on Guard. This article made me think about the way Israelis sometimes treat the Palestinians, and how it is okay for Jews to criticize it. The article describes the Machsom Watch, a group of Israeli women who monitor the Israeli soldiers at checkpoints and who try to mediate in some egregious situations. This piece is particulary important because I have learned to shut out my feelings on this matter; I feel uncomfortable as a Jew criticizing Israeli policies, but I also feel uncomfortable with the policies towards the Palestinians. It's easier to just not think about it. Even typical news reports don't make me think about it--just hearing the facts about another suicide bombing or another incursion are too routine. A story like this that personalizes the political makes me think about where I actually do stand. (It helps that the article is from the perspective that I already had.) One magazine that I didn't include above is Salon. There's really no reason that I shouldn't have--it is a magazine in its own right. Also, like Mother Jones, it can be quite thought-provoking. For a time, I thought there would be no need to get paper magazines anymore, because I could get all of my information online. But I've realized I like the paper format better. I can read Mother Jones entirely online if I wanted to, but I just wouldn't do it. It's easier, more comfortable, and more natural for me to flip through the real thing. I can also easily write comments and highlight parts of the magazine if I feel so inclined--something that requires a bit more effort to do online. This struggle between the digital and the physical is something I face all the time though--do I keep a personal journal or a blog? But that's a story for another entry (or perhaps for me to forget about). Ultimately, the point of reading a magazine is to stay informed, and to think. The thinking is the most important part--it's all too easy to just read news reports and think "okay, I've collected facts." Being able to tie these facts together, to think critically about them, to modify my world-view, and to ultimately use them to make me more effective in helping America be as good as it can be (should I trademark that phrase?) are what makes reading a magazine worthwhile. Who would have thought magazines were so important? It reminds me of an ad I saw for Al Franken's The O'Franken Factor Factor CD in Mother Jones: "Never doubt that a single compact disc can change the world. Indeed it's the only thing that ever has." Part of staying informed are the classes I'm taking--the ones that are huge time sinks. I started taking these classes to get my mind thinking in a Liberal Arts kind of way again after feeling it atrophy in the world of computer programming that my job entails. My classes--politically oriented, of course--are about the Supreme Court and American Foreign Policy After 9/11. Though each class only meets one night a week, it is an enormous drain on my time because there is also a lot of readings for each class, including the text of Supreme Court opinions and essays from foreign affairs journals. Unlike when I was in college, I actually take the time to read everything we are assigned and, more than that, to think about them and try to make everything cohesive in my mind. That takes more time than you would expect. In some ways, then, these classes have actually trained me to appreciate reading again while reducing the amount of time I have to read. Unfortunately, my Post 9/11 class professor, Bert Patenaude, also introduced a new time sink by convincing me to subscribe to five new magazines--well, three magazines and two journals. Now, I'm subscribed to The Economist, The New Republic, The New Yorker, The National Interest and Foreign Affairs. We've read articles and essays from these five in class, and it is clear that these magazines are going to be thought-provoking--more along the lines of Mother Jones than, say, Newsweek. I'm also looking forward to the variety of perspectives--The Economist is generally libertarian, National Interest and Foreign Affairs are a bit neoconservative, the New Yorker and The New Republic tend to be liberal. Thus far, only the Economist started up, and I haven't been disappointed. I read it nearly straight through, skipping only the more dry business parts. Now, don't get me started on the books I have sitting around waiting to be read...

Introduction And The Election

I created this account on blogger a few weeks ago, but haven't posted anything until now. To be honest, I was too busy worrying about the Presidential campaign until November 3rd, and after that I was too depressed and tired (a self-feeding loop) to commit my thoughts to a blog. I was in Las Vegas helping out with America Coming Together (ACT), hoping to "turn Nevada blue." The experience was great, and even more extensive than my earlier trip to Reno. But unfortunately, this one ended at a "Democratic victory party" at the Rio. That was probably one of the most depressing places I've been in a while. After the election, there were two dominant themes bouncing around my head:

• I was angry at the media portrayal of the election as being about "moral values." Articles like one at the Washington Times said the big surprise of the election was that moral values was surprisingly the most important issue to voters. The implication in all of these articles is that "moral values" means "right-wing Christian values." I voted on moral values. I believe that it is not moral to start a war for false reasons. I believe that it is immoral to allow a large number of people to live in poverty. I believe that it is immoral for so many people to not have access to adequate health care. But this story was gobbled up by the lazy media, which doesn't like to think too much about information before coming to a conclusion. It took a little while, but fortunately the narrative shifted somewhat. The Human Rights Campaign (of which I'm a member) posted other results from the same exit poll showing that, in fact, 60% of the electorate supports gay marriage or civil unions. So much for a resounding victory for right-wing, hypocritical "moral values" surging in America. There is also a great Frank Rich article along these lines, On "Moral Values," It's Blue in a Landslide. Rich points out that even if 22% of Americans said that "moral values" was the number one issue to them, that is the same percentage of Americans that call themselves evangelical. They have a right to their opinion, but the other 78% of Americans are by far in the majority.
• The bigger, and perhaps more constructive idea rattling around my brain is an internal debate on how I can best help the Democrats win back Congress in 2006. My primary focus in this area has been on message development. I honestly believe that if each American could hear an eloquent Democrat and and eloquent Republican debate, the large majority would support the Democratic ideals. Since that obviously is not going to happen, we need to find a better way to communicate our ideals. One thing we do not need to do is "move to the right." George Lakoff has a book Don't Think of an Elephant (which I first heard of through a recommendation by dailykos founder Markos Moulitsas Zúniga). The basic premise of the book is that you can't just throw facts at people to convince them, you need to break them out of "frames," or ways of thinking, that the right-wing has been masterful at creating. One of the most egregious examples of this is the "War on Terror" (or "War on Terrorism" depending on whom you are speaking to). This is a ridiculous and expansive name for a war--terrorism is a tactic, not an enemy. It's like having a "War on Bombs." I do not disagree that we are in a war (even if there are some who aren't even willing to concede that). I think of it as a War on Anti-Western Islamic Fundamentalists Who Use Terrorism as a Tactic. Of course, this is the main problem--no one is going to actually use that phrase. A shorter form could be "War on Islamists," though I think some people would be uncomfortable using that phrase because it sounds vaguely racist. Regardless, the Democrats are afraid to make sense, and to stop using the term "War on Terror," because then the Republicans can accuse them of being "soft," "unpatriotic" and Osama-lovers. And many Americans would agree with them. There are, of course, other ways to help out in 2006. Unlike this year, when I didn't really get involved in the political campaign until October, I intend to get involved much earlier. I had an unfounded fear of helping out, worried that I would be too nervous or shy. But fortunately, I was wrong. I loved helping out; I actually enjoyed knocking on doors to encourage people to get out and vote. I don't have solid plans for helping out in terms of message in general or helping individual political campaigns. I reckon this blog will be a good place for me to put down ideas as they become more concrete.

So that brings me to the end of my first post. My intention is for this blog to convey my thoughts on the fight to make America as good a country as it can possibly be. But this blog will also contain other things as well--whatever I feel like writing about. I'm fully aware that I am likely the only person who will ever read this blog. But that is okay--the exercise of writing down thoughts helps to solidfy them and makes taking action a bit easier.