Am I Too Negative on Facebook? Oops, My Bad!

I often read my Facebook friends' posts, finding a great satisfaction that people I've known over the years reveal in their postings political and social views very much in tune with mine.

As for my own views, based on the "likes" and comments I receive when I share my blog posts, I notice what draws approval and what, usually through lack of reaction, doesn't interest them. I have a friend or two that decidedly do not share my positions on, say, politics. war, foreign policy, whatever. One friend posts his opinion and I'll often demur in a response comment, which is fine. When we run into each other around town, we're quite amiable with each other. Politics truly doesn't have to interfere with friendship.

But after reading this very interesting and thought-provoking article in Slate about how your social media presence offers to the world a window into who you are -- or how you're perceived to be -- I became worried that I might, because of my often heated views on the politics of the right, be appearing considerably grumpy, if not worse.

I am a happy guy with a pretty fulfilling life, despite how much Ted Cruz drives me up a wall, but you might not get that after reading one of my pieces. I use my blog to ruminate on things that a humanist like myself might find important in life. Beyond being an atheist, I find religion often to be a negative force in this world. For brevity, let me say that my views on religion are nuanced, but I can see how I may appear negative on the subject.

I make an effort to express positive policy outlooks, but all too often it's easier to say "Paul Ryan sucks!" than to explain in detail where our differences lie.

So let me apologize if anyone finds me to have a nasty disposition. It goes with the territory when one believes that the lives of our citizens could be improved by adopting policies that run counter to a certain, shall we say conservative, mainstream that is still all too dominant in our public sphere.

I think they're the bad guys, but hating on them doesn't make me look good. But there you are.

Read the Slate article if you haven't already. I was fascinated with the idea that courts might use social-media "faces" as evidence against you in a civil case. If we hide our unhappy lives from others, we might inadvertently misrepresent ourselves. We can't then say, "But Your Honor, I'm so much more miserable than that!" Your Facebook face is the face you've presented to the world, and you just might have to live with it.

Again, sorry, I'm a happy guy. Just keep Rand Paul away from me.

Just thinking about these people and the wars they started
can ruin my whole day on Facebook.

Policy Perspective: The GOP Likes Predatory Lending to Troops?

Yes, yes they do. Predatory lending should be banned -- and post offices should offer basic banking so the poor and minority have banking services that don't bleed them dry. But that would deny people the "freedom" to get screwed.

Here's the GOP policy choice in the matter:

WASHINGTON -- House Republicans are pushing legislation to block predatory lending protections for American soldiers, under pressure from the banking lobby.

GOP lawmakers tucked the deregulation item into the National Defense Authorization Act -- a major bill setting the military's funding, along with a number of other controversial terms on Guantanamo Bay and other issues. If the banking item is enacted, it would impose a one-year delay on new Department of Defense rules meant to shield military families from abusive terms on payday loans and other forms of high-interest credit. The bill is being considered Wednesday before the House Armed Services Committee.

Hiding distasteful riders in bills is the way the GOP rolls. Hopefully, they'll change their minds simply by being outed. Or maybe the Senate will stuff the move. In any event, this is yet another window into the policy choices Republicans make.

Stop.

Obama on Baltimore: We Like Him When We Need Him

I find it funny -- or tragic -- that Barack Obama has been addressing systemic problems about race, war, justice, and, yes, guns, since before he was elected. It's rather odd when someone says "On Baltimore, we finally have the president we need."

No, since Baltimore we have the president we need on Baltimore. And by the reaction of some in the press, he once again delivered in the ways we have come to expect during times of trouble and turbulence.

Case in point is the Daily Beast article in praise of his Baltimore remarks, all the more remarkable because they were delivered impromptu at a news conference:

Addressing Baltimore’s systemic poverty and lack of opportunity, Obama suddenly was the president we’ve needed all along.

Suddenly, President Obama did not need an anger translator.

Suddenly, he seemed exactly himself, power speaking truth.

The best public 15 minutes of his presidency came on Tuesday in response to a question about Baltimore at a joint press conference with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
“In those environments, if we think that we’re just gonna send the police to do the dirty work of containing the problems that arise there, without as a nation and as a society saying what can we do to change those communities, to help lift up those communities and give those kids opportunity, then we’re not gonna solve this problem,” he said as he stood in the sunshine in the Rose Garden 43 miles from the epicenter of the previous night’s riot.

He went on, “And we’ll go through the same cycles of periodic conflicts between the police and communities and the occasional riots in the streets. And everybody will feign concern until it goes away and then we go about our business as usual.”

Read the rest of this excellent article by Michael Daly on Obama's remarks. But don't be confused by the "president we've needed all along." Obama has been there in so many ways that we've needed for so long -- and in a few ways we wish he hadn't -- that we forget the gift he's been, on balance, to this nation.

No, he's not perfect. FDR could be a power-mad prick, and Lincoln could dissemble with the best of them, it appears. But I'll take this Barack Obama any day over the pricks and dissemblers that are the Republican leaders of our day. They bring nothing, nothing. It's why Clinton is trashing them in the polls and likely will trash them in November, 2016.

I leave you with Obama's remarks, and Hillary's, too.

Sorry I can't edit a line break between videos. Weird code. And here's the complete text of Clinton's speech.

How the Bulls**t War Against Hillary Works

Who should get the Three Pinocchios, WaPo or the Clinton Foundation?

More details are now out about the Clinton Foundation's connection to a Canadian charity that works close enough with Bill Clinton to have his imprimatur on it, the Clinton Giustra Enterprise Partnership, and they are spurring another round of gotcha ruminations full of caveats and hedges. The hedges don't stop the Washington Post Fact Checker for throwing Three Pinocchios Hillary's way.

Here's the deal: The Clinton Foundation took contributions from CGEP, then didn't disclose the 1,100-some donors to CGEP (the vast majority of which are one-time donors attending a charity event), claiming now that Canadian law precludes releasing the donor's names, though the CGEP donations are common knowledge (yes, the G in CGEP is for Frank Giustra, who has broad interests in mining, including, yes, uranium).

Fact Checker looks at this and sees that federal Canadian law probably doesn't ban donor disclosure in the absence of commercial motives to do so, such as selling email lists. Then Fact Checker notes that British Columbian law may protect donor IDs. Here is the key statement:

British Columbia’s privacy law is stricter than the federal law, though substantially similar. It requires organizations to get donor permission when they collect, use or disclose their personal information. The province does not have a public database that shows which charities are subject to this law, and its spokeswoman could not immediately confirm whether CGEPartnership was subject to provincial law. This law does not apply to federally-regulated organizations already governed by PEPIDA.

It is not entirely clear which law applies to CGEPartnership. [...]

The Clinton Foundation said “all charities are prohibited from disclosing individual donors without prior permission from each donor” under Canadian law. It is unclear whether the foundation is referring to federal or provincial law. If it is the later, the statement would be accurate.

Got that? It's not clear which law applies, the one that permits but doesn't require disclosure or the one that may in fact prohibit disclosure. That doesn't stop Fact Checker from tossing Three Pinocchios -- the second-highest liar rating -- at Hillary.

Typical bullshit that won't hold up under examination. Plus, it's the usual not-much-there-there that enters the realm of meaninglessness.

Am I being a little kind to Hillary here? Yes, I am. Is WaPo being needlessly unkind to Hillary on an arcane point about transparency? You betcha, and it's unendingly boring. But it needs to be called out.

The Obama Effect: A Staggeringly High Rate of Cultural and Political Change

Barack Obama has triumphed not just by surviving but by thriving
against an opposition driven by hate and racism. Oh, and a dislike
of his economic and foreign policy ideas, as well.

Barack Obama has not won all his battles, not by a long shot. But where he has been successful is in the ways our society has changed so far during his tenure, often against long odds that it could happen at all. He has played a a vital role in helping to engineer it.

His very blackness has been a particular driver. As the first African-American president, he owned his special role as an outsider. Sure, he played the inside game with Wall Street, but like Bill Clinton before him, he picked his battles wisely. Busting Wall Street's chops was a non-starter. Wall Street, for one thing, is stronger and more dangerous than the Republican Party. Mitch McConnell wanted Obama to be a one-term president. McConnell couldn't deliver. Wall Street could but chose not to.

As an outsider, one with more than modest gifts of rhetoric and imagination, Barack Obama could help usher in change that colorless, less imaginative people might not be able to. George W. Bush could be brash -- and dangerous -- as a freewheeling decider with a penchant for invading countries. But change at home? Wasn't up to it, beyond making government less capable after rounds of tax cuts.

What Barack Obama could do, and did, was to lead our nation through periods of self-reflection. He was in part responsible for the new looks we gave to systemic problems. GLBT concerns were not going to be addressed under a George W. Bush climate. It could under an Obama. So, too, with the changes the country is undergoing with its examination of policing. Blacks are done with how they've been policed and incarcerated literally to death since basically back to the close of the Civil War. Progressive, self-aware whites are ready to help them.

We don't yet know what will come of some of this self-reflection. Obama was able to do little to stem the gun insanity this country seems intent on enduring. In fact, gun control or the lack thereof is a singular triumph of the right during the time of Obama. Fear of the BLACK triggered a rush to arm, primarily by rural and southern whites. No triumph for Barack there. The policing crisis may recede without real change. But I don't feel that. I feel, across the country, an anger, even among whites, that we've lost control of our justice system. When 12-year-olds are shot dead after less than two seconds of consideration -- for waving a toy gun -- something is terribly broken.

Don't forget the ongoing curtailment of property confiscation by law enforcement. Chalk up another one. Add to that the move away from criminalizing marijuana. I can see that movement beginning to dismantle the war-on-drugs infrastructure, which will chip away at our absurd incarceration rate. While we're talking about changing policing styles, add the abandonment of stop-and-frisk as well as the whole "broken windows" zero tolerance game. We need real community policing in this country. Boy, does Baltimore need it right now.

Women are winning rights -- and better pay, albeit slowly -- in this environment. Republicans have fought hard to keep women and their bodies under the control of father-knows-best paternalistic authoritarianism, but there are new cracks in that wall, as well.

Bill Clinton approached his presidency in very much the same way. Within days of his inauguration, he was set to welcome gays in the military. One of his own party, Georgian senator Sam Nunn, put the kibosh on that one. Maybe the country wasn't ready until 2009, but a less gifted leader than Obama might not have shepherded the radical changes through.

One critical feature of note: I suspect I'm not the first to figure this out -- though I've yet to hear anyone else suggest it -- but one thing has been obvious about Barack Obama. He's been the Jackie Robinson of presidents. He instinctively knew he'd get nowhere as the angry black man. His grace under fire during his presidency has been quite nearly heroic. In that, he'll leave a lasting mark as one whose dignity was more powerful that the opprobrium he was forced to endure.

We also shouldn't forget that, even with his drone strikes and failed ventures in Libya and elsewhere, he has essentially tried to reign in America's penchant for warmongering. We don't know yet how his foreign policy ventures will turn out, but he'll be remembered as a man of peace, not of war. And that's a start I hope succeeding presidents will continue.

All that and I didn't even mention Obamacare. It wasn't enough, but it was something, and probably all we could hope for in the environment he was working in.

I'd mention the steadily improving economy, but that signified no particular cultural shift, in spite of its being something that burnishes his legacy.

Here's to change, and more of it. We do have Barack Obama, in part, to thank for it.

Note. There's a lot that appears unchanged. The tea party, for example, looks very much like a cultural consolidation around a conservative ideology, one that will be difficult to dislodge. But I see a silver lining. I see it as the continual marginalization of a continually shrinking tribe of white evangelicals, mostly in the South -- with their frightened, white senior citizens in tow -- who have found themselves boxed in and increasingly irrelevant. If that happened on Obama's watch, too, then we have him to thank for that likely enduring political shift.

The Swift-Boating of Hillary Clinton: The Anatomy of a Non-Scandal, Infinity Edition

What a real scandal looks like: Cheney's Halliburton and its subsidiaries
profited greatly from the Iraq War. Where was the Republican outrage?

Does Hillary Clinton look good when set next to the piles of cash that goes through a charitable foundation on the best of days? Of course not. Greater charities -- remember the United Way or Komen for the Cure? -- have collapsed under the abuse that can simmer around actions with the apparently best intentions. So giving Hillary a complete pass is hard to do and shouldn't be done.

But -- and this is a fundamental but -- the scandal du jour that the Clinton Foundation has morphed into has a terrific amount of no-there-there, something even its promoters spend quite a bit of time admitting.

Take the classic case of WaPo pundit and former George W. Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson and his piece, typically titled "The Heavy Baggage Hillary Clinton Brings." After all the sturm und drang, Gerson gets to the part of the article all articles about Hillary contain:

The Clintons, no doubt, are confident of their own virtue in this matter. No quid pro quo has been demonstrated. I am equally confident that donors thought they were gaining access and a vague sort of influence during a high-stakes, politically sensitive business takeover.

Once again, there is probably not enough here to derail the Clinton presidential freight train. But the timing and content of this controversy are damaging. Democrats are beginning to recognize that the first few weeks of the Clinton candidacy have been a disaster, opening up several lines of Republican attack. [...]

What classic hedges did Gerson put in that you see in so many articles about Hillary "scandals?" The lines "No quid pro quo has been demonstrated" and "there is probably not enough here" are in all but the most scurrilous attack pieces. Gerson, after all, prides himself on being reasonable, hence the qualifiers.

Gerson also links to an article that he claims "would have placed the Rosatom uranium power play in the outbox labeled 'stinks to high heaven'." Fine. But was was the context of the deal, after all is said and done?

The national security issue at stake in the Uranium One deal was not primarily about nuclear weapons proliferation; the United States and Russia had for years cooperated on that front, with Russia sending enriched fuel from decommissioned warheads to be used in American nuclear power plants in return for raw uranium.

So the US and the Russkies have been making nice with uranium, even weapons-grade uranium, for years. That's some serious context.

Gerson rightly points out that the "reset" with Russia looks like a failure in hindsight, but it also demonstrates that during a time of rapprochement with Putin, a typical make-nice deal would look, in the rear-view mirror, a little shady after relations had fallen apart because of the Ukrainian and Crimean affairs. But that's a different kettle of fish.

Again, remember the context. Newly elected president Barack Obama was trying resets all over the place, what with the Russian reset and the Cairo speech, among others. Obama has been busy with these resets, which include Cuba and Iran, which may in fact be major game changers when viewed as legacy items. Success is not assured, but these are real accomplishments-in-waiting. Why are the Republicans so against them? We know why.

So, Hillary's foundation that she shares with Bill gets entangled in an international deal that six federal agencies and the Canadian government signed off on. Big whoop. Oh Noes!!

We're going to get pretty tired of these retread scandals. At least I am already. And you should be, too. The Clinton "narrative" that "stinks to high heaven" is being written by beltway fiction writers. And it's pretty boring, tepid stuff. Stop already.

Is she tough enough? After all she's been through, oh yeah. Whitewater off a duck's back.

Same-Sex Marriage Will Likely Prevail at SCOTUS. What Happened 149 Years Ago Made All the Difference.

Rep. John Bingham, the "Madison" of the 14th Amendment.

I've always felt that the 14th Amendment was as important as any piece of the Constitution and would be the key to the Supreme Court making same-sex marriage legal and apply in all 50 states. What I didn't know was how close we came as a country to not having the key clause in the 14th Amendment that has made it the powerful force it's been through the ages of jurisprudence.

John Bingham was the hero, and Slate tells the story well here. Read it and celebrate. And, hopefully, get ready to celebrate its application in Obergefell v. Hodges.