Jim Manzi redeemed!

Mr. Manzi redeems himself with a powerful argument against Waterboarding.

Long, but very well worth the read: http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NWZhNjg4MTQzZjUxNjBiNjczNzVmNmMxMTMzOGI2YWY=

It's not torture if we do it.

As Andrew Sullivan notes, this seems to be the U.S. stance:

Does anyone believe that if Iran, say, captured an American soldier, kept him awake for eleven days straight, bashed his head and body against plywood walls with a towel around his neck, forced him to stand and sit in stress positions finessed by the Communist Chinese, stuck him in a dark coffin for hours, and then waterboarded him, that the NYT would describe him as a victim of "harsh interrogation techniques"? Do you think Mike Allen would give anonymity to a top Iranian official who defended these techniques as vital to Iran's national security?
The last seven years have revealed that almost the entire American establishment views itself as immune to the moral and ethical rules it applies to every other country in the world. Now we know, at least. And you can be sure they will protecting each other to the bitter end.

Stunning case of judicial corruption

Two judges pleaded guilty to a kickback scheme that sent hundreds, maybe thousands of kids to privately run juvenile lockups for minor offenses.

Details here: http://www.thetimes-tribune.com/articles/2009/01/27/news/sc_times_trib.20090127.a.pg1.tt27judgesmain_s1.2261119_top2.txt

I'm very wary of "privatizing" core governmental functions, including incarceration. I don't think the state should delegate police, fire, prison or military functions to private entities. No one should be in a position to profit from exercising power over other people.

P.J. O'Rourke on how conservatives blew it

Long, but worth the read: http://www.weeklystandard.com/Utilities/printer_preview.asp?idArticle=15791&R=13CD722B2E

Obsiadin Wings makes a good point

There's a story going around about how Treasury essentially repealed, perhaps illegally, a part of the tax code resulting in a $140 billion tax windfall for banks.

Like the Obsidian Wings poster, I don't have the legal understanding to know if this was legal, nor the economic background to know if it was a good idea. But it sure doesn't smell right, so Treasury had better explain why this was a good idea. As Obsidian Wings noted:

Third, giving banks a huge unilateral tax break is the sort of thing that might as well have been designed to deprive the bailout of whatever popular support it might ever have had. We live in a democracy. People's opinions matter. The Treasury should remember that, and act accordingly.

Greenwald on the responsibility of the elites for the Bush horrors

Greenwald is rarely succinct, but here is one of the highlights:

As the Bush administration comes to a close, one overarching question is this: how were the transgressions and abuses of the last eight years allowed to be unleashed with so little backlash and resistance? Just consider -- with no hyperbole -- what our Government, our country, has done. We systematically tortured people in our custody using techniques approved at the highest levels, many of whom died as a result. We created secret prisons -- "black site" gulags -- beyond the reach of international monitoring groups. We abducted and imprisoned even U.S. citizens and legal residents without any trial, holding them incommunicado and without even the right to access lawyers for years, while we tortured them to the point of insanity. We disappeared innocent people off the streets, sent them to countries where we knew they'd be tortured, and then closed off our courts to them once it was clear they had done nothing wrong. We adopted the very policies and techniques long considered to be the very definition of "war crimes".
Our Government turned the NSA apparatus inward -- something that was never supposed to happen -- spying on our conversations in secret and without warrants or oversight, all in violation of the law, and then, once revealed, acted to immunize the private-sector lawbreakers. And that's to say nothing about the hundreds of thousands of people we killed and the millions more we displaced with a war launched on false pretense. And on and on and on.
Prime responsibility for those actions may lie with the administration which implemented them and with the Congress that thereafter acquiesced to and even endorsed much of it, but it also lies with much of our opinion-making elite and expert class. Even when they politely disagreed, they treated most of this -- and still do -- as though it were reasonable and customary, eschewing strong language and emphatic condemnation and moral outrage, while perversely and self-servingly construing their constraint as some sort of a virtue -- a hallmark of dignified Seriousness. That created the impression that these were just garden-variety political conflicts to be batted about in pretty conference rooms by mutually regarding elites on both sides of these "debates." Meanwhile, those who objected too strongly and in disrespectful tones, who described the extremism and lawlessness taking place, were dismissed by these same elites as overheated, fringe hysterics.
Some political issues, including ones that provoke intense passion, have many sides, but not all do. Not all positions are worthy of respect. Some actions and policies require outrage and condemnation, to the point where it becomes irresponsible to comment on them without expressing that. Some ideas are so corrupted and dangerous and indefensible that they do reflect negatively on the character and credibility of their advocates, on the propriety of treating those advocates as though they're respectable and honorable. Most of all, elites who seek out an opinion platform have a responsibility to accept that their ideas and arguments have consequences and they should be held accountable for what their actions spawn.

Not enough room in the GOP big tent, or is it a pup tent now?

Gun company president forced to resign by Internet hate because he revealed he was voting for Obama in a newspaper interview. Mostly because of the war, he says.

Os is the Republican "big tent" now a pup tent?

http://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2008/10/31/Gun_firm_head_resigns_over_Obama_support/UPI-19331225496140/

A comment on Afro-mercial

I left this comment on http://www.riehlworldview.com/carnivorous_conservative/2008/10/lil-obama.html?cid=137189631#comments in response to Riehl asking if anyone saw the "Afro-merical" on TV.

And after calling it an "afro-mercial" you expect:

1) To be taken seriously

2) To recruit non-white people into the conservative movement someday

3) Someone to believe your self-delusion that it wasn't a racist remark

Well, I know it's completely fruitless to tell you this, because your blindness is impenetrable, but it is, indeed, a racist remark. The fact that you can't see it is no evidence that it isn't actually racist, merely evidence that you don't understand.

Given that the country is inexorably becoming more diverse by the minute, consvervatives are going to have to come to terms with the question of race and ethnicity if conservative philosophy is to survive in American politics.

There's nothing inherently racist in a conservative politics, although its particular history in America on that score is not a happy one. There are left-wing racists and many individuals from minority groups have conservative personal philosophy and conduct. If conservatives became self-aware enough about racism to purge it from their polotics they may find it possible to connect political conservatism with the personal conservatism of many minority people.

Instead we have a black Republican women in tears because her Party mailed out "Obamabucks" with images of watermeleon and fried chicken and the party official professing ignorance of its racial implications.

If she was, indeed, ignorant (giving her far more than the benefit of the coubt) than she needs to educate herself. Ignorance is a poor defense on this topic.

America's longest war

A Sullivan reader writes an insightful analysis of what is really at stake.

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/10/the-end-of-amer.html#more

The Mills of God

From this post: http://open.salon.com/content.php?cid=34961

But in full: Though the mills of God grind slowly,

Yet they grind exceeding small;

Though with patience He stands waiting,

With exactness grinds He all.

--Longfellow

After 60 yrs, justice is now. In '48 when Truman, though facing sweeping defeat, decreed a robust civil rights plank for the Dem platform and Humphrey intoned that we must, in Lincoln's words, "do the right, as God has given us to know the right," the racists decamped. A body formerly known as the Party of Lincoln gave them succor, crafted a cynical "southern strategy," and perennially prevailed.

This unholy union has now corroded into a mash-up of Old Dixie, prairie gunslingers, anti-tax fetishists, end times Rapturists, militiamen and Millenarians, jingoists and misanthropes, survivalists and cranks, and the odd secessionist witch doctor. Soon there will be a reckoning between the cerebral cons (who've been long content to pal up with vermin) and the wingnut residuum that has found its avatar in Bible Spice.

Meanwhile, the Dems have a nation to rebuild. Pretty that this came to pass through the strivings of an unassuming black American, a legacy of what Truman, Humphrey, and numberless others went to their political graves for. Thanks, God, you’re ok after all.

Top 10 C reasons for Obama

Sullivan lists 10 reasons why conservatives should vote for Obama: http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/10/the-top-ten-rea.html#more

Last Week

I'm cautiously optimistic at this point that things will come out alright on election day.

A lot can happen in a week, of course, but every day provides less chance for something dramatic to occur that will change things. Indeed, at this point, with so many people having already voted, it's possible that a late event will not change things enough to make a difference.

That said, there are powerful forces at work that will not go quietly.

Obama, despite being a fairly conventional politician, represents a real danger to some of the people who have been a disaster over the last eight years.

One suspects that there is a lot of crony capitalism that would be in danger of exposure and prosecution by a professional and depoliticized Justice Department. One knows that there are many individuals who have a real exposure for war crimes prosecutions in the wake of the torture regime. And there's no telling what vile secrets may lurk in the secret surveillance programs, but I think it would be a truly shocking development if an administration that has shown so little respect for law and limits in everything else had turned out to be restrained and scrupulous in this one area.

Drudge simply IGNORES Palin report

The Drudge Report is a useful resource, but hardly an unbiased one. While finding room for a Washington Times story alleging some Obama thing or other with the Iraqis he completely ignores the report that found that Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin abused her power by trying to get her former brother-in-law fired from being a state trooper.

The report is here: http://community.adn.com/adn/node/132565

Evidently you won't get linked to it off of Drudge.

Baffle them with Warfare link

An amusing, yet accurate read on the problem of winning a war against terrorists:

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/10/9/9813/16416/597/624860

So the market tanked for most of the day

Only to recover much of the lost ground this afternoon.

I'd find little solace in that recovery, however, because there's no indication that things are improving. Indeed. there's every indication that things are about to get substantially worse.

We didn't get into the mess overnight and I see no reason to think that anything useful will happen until sometime next spring or summer after the new administration takes office.

IF this is just a regular downturn, albeit a little worse than most, we'll know it by then. There will be many indicators that things are starting to get better. Typical recession last 9 months to a year and next summer will be outside that time frame.

If. on the other hand, things are getting worse they'll most likely be really bad by then and the country will be ready for some drastic action.

A tiny voice of reason

From the American Conservative site blog Eunomia:

I rehash all of this not to dwell on Palin’s problems, which are increasingly irrelevant as McCain heads towards defeat, but to implore conservatives to stop ignoring reality just because they happen to like a candidate’s personality and biography. Besides being bad for the quality of conservative thought, it embraces the caricature that conservatives are indifferent to knowledge and have no use for expertise, which has become an all too legitimate critique of how conservatives have responded to the misrule of the Bush administration. That was not always the case, but if conservatives insist on making elaborate arguments that understanding and knowledge are not significant criteria when choosing our top elected officials they will lose whatever credibility they may still have. More than that, they will be crippled by their embrace of cheerful ignorance when it comes time to oppose the policies of the Democratic administration that is surely about to be elected.

Rep. Brad Sherman explains why the bailout IS a bailout

TAXPAYERS HIGHLY UNLIKELY TO RECOUP ANY OF THE COSTS -- Brad Sherman 9/29/08
We know that the Bailout Bill allows million-dollar-a-month salaries to executives of bailed-out firms, and it allows hundreds of billions to be used to buy toxic assets currently held by foreign investors. But we are told: "don't worry, this $700 billion bill won't cost us anything. We will get it all back next decade through a revenue bill."

I. Section 134 of the Bailout Bill merely says that the President must submit a revenue bill to Congress in 2013 that recoups from the financial industry the taxpayers' net losses.
a. If the President has any revenue ideas he actually likes, he would submit them to us anyway.b. If the President submits revenue ideas only because he is forced to by Section 134, he will send it to us with a note saying that he believes they are bad for the country, and reserves the right to veto.c. The Bailout Bill does not automatically enact any revenue increases, nor protect a revenue bill from filibuster or veto.

II. Congress is unlikely to pass a tax increase bill of hundreds of billions of dollars in 2013.
a. Tax increase bills are anathema to many.b. 41 Senators can block the plan. We're giving Wall Street enough money to hire 4100 lobbyists.c. In recent years, Wall Street has easily defeated every attempt to close every loophole that they exploit, no matter how pernicious-even the abusive use of Cayman Island tax havens by hedge fund managers, who thereby pay zero tax.

III. Any tax on the financial industry would make the good banks pay a huge tax so we can recoup what we gave to the bad banks.
a. Section 134 says the tax will be on "the financial industry." It does not provide for a tax on just those firms that received bailout payments.b. A bank that doesn't get a bailout payment still pays the tax.c. Community banks and perhaps credit unions will also be subject to the tax, so we can recoup what we gave to Wall Street.

IV. It is impossible to draft a tax that hits only those firms that received bailout payments, and even more impossible to draft one that taxes each bank in proportion to how much money we lost on its toxic assets.
a. There are no provisions to even keep track of losses on each asset purchased as it is managed over the years. Assets purchased from several banks will be pooled, managed, and sold together, and we can never know how much we lost on assets purchased from any one bank.b. If three banks in the year 2013 have the same income and size and operations, they will all pay the same tax-even if one got no bailout payments, a second got a million dollars, and a third got a billion dollars.c. Many bailed-out firms won't exist in 2013.
1. Some will go under.2. Some bailed-out firms are only shell companies. Example: Assume the Bank of Shanghai has $30 billion in toxic assets. It will sell these to the tiny subsidiary it has incorporated in California. The subsidiary will then sell these to the Treasury in 2009, and will be dissolved long before 2013.3. Many bailed-out firms will still be unprofitable in 2013.4. Some bailed-out firms will move offshore before 2013.
d. The whole purpose of the bill is to improve the balance sheets of the bailed-out firms. If particular bailed-out firms owe us the money they receive, they would have to list this as a liability, and the bill would fail to improve their balance sheets.
In 2013 we will not pass a tax bill that imposes hundreds of billions of dollars of taxes on the financial services industry, including those banks that got no bailouts, community banks, and credit unions. A tax bill imposed only on those entities that got bailout payments is impossible to draft, and contrary to the purposes of the Bill.
If it were easy to pass a bill to recoup hundreds of billions of dollars through taxes to be imposed in 2013 and thereafter, then provisions imposing such taxes would be in today's bill.

Wall Street gets their money now, and we get it back never.

The Vote

I'll admit I was a bit surprised that the "bailout" bill failed, but not shocked. I've felt that the chances that something would be done this time were slimmer than the conventional wisdom suggested. Not based on any analysis, of course, just on a gut feeling that they were going to the well one too many times.

The entire unfolding of this crisis has caught most of the mainstream figures by surprise, although there have been no shortage of voices in the wilderness warming that trouble was ahead. Checkout http://housingpanic.blogspot.com/ for example.

While the exact course of things has been hard to predict, there has been one constant, and that is whatever the government says and does will be too little and too late. This "bailout" seems to be just another chapter in that story.

I don't have the expertise to judge the plan on its details, but if past performance is any guide, time will prove that this plan will be inadequate.

It's certainly possible that there is nothing the government can do that would actually stop the meltdown, of course. It may be that some future Bernanke-like scholar will determine that the last chance for effective intervention passed many years ago.

George Will on McCain being ill-suited to the presidency

As always, well said:

Conservatives who insist that electing McCain is crucial usually start, and increasingly end, by saying he would make excellent judicial selections. But the more one sees of his impulsive, intensely personal reactions to people and events, the less confidence one has that he would select judges by calm reflection and clear principles, having neither patience nor aptitude for either.

It is arguable that, because of his inexperience, Obama is not ready for the presidency. It is arguable that McCain, because of his boiling moralism and bottomless reservoir of certitudes, is not suited to the presidency. Unreadiness can be corrected, although perhaps at great cost, by experience. Can a dismaying temperament be fixed?

As usual, Balkinization has good coverage

http://balkin.blogspot.com/2008/09/bush-administration-give-us-more.html