Blogcritics Author: Margaret Romao Toigo

Announcement: Short-content feeds

Phillip Winn — Sun, 26 Aug 2007 12:00:00 EDT

Sunday, August 26, 2007, marks the switch of all Blogcritics.org article feeds from full-content to short-content. This is the result of several converging factors, and is unfortunately a permanent decision (as permanent as any decision can be on the web, that is). We are aware of all of the reasons that this is a Bad Idea, and we are aware that some of you will be quite upset about having to click on something to read the free content, and we're sorry. Unfortunately, despite great effort, full-content feeds are not currently economically viable. Two other factors are involved: full-content feeds have resulted in an unprecedented level of content theft, with BC content appearing on many websites, usually spam sites, without attribution or permission. This duplicate content causes a cascading set of problems, not the least of which is that search engines generally aren't favorable to duplicate content, and don't always guess correctly. Finally, our RSS advertising partner is strongly in favor of short-content feeds. We hope that you'll continue to subscribe to BC via RSS, and when an article grabs your eye, it's only a click away, still free on the BC website. Thank you for your understanding.

The Politics of Autism

Margaret Romao Toigo — Mon, 23 Apr 2007 10:04:22 EDT

April is Autism Awareness Month and I have chosen to make folks aware of the complexities and conundrums surrounding its politics, which are replete with divisions, debates, and diatribes fueled by self-advocates, special interests, activists, militants, and conspiracy theorists. The two main camps -- though each has its own sub-groups, factions, and radical element -- consist of people who view autism as a devastating neurological disorder that must be cured, prevented, and eradicated, and those who see autistic people as having a natural variation of human neurological wiring that must be tolerated, accommodated, and respected.The main reason why the politics of autism are so polarized is that nobody knows very much about autism, so individual perceptions and experiences, as well as popular conjecture and tendentious groupthink, are often used to bridge the rather wide gaps that modern scientific research has yet to definitively fill. In the province of the politics of autism, partisanship often appears to fall within the realm of constitution, character, and coping skills in dealing with having a child or other family member who is autistic, accepting the fact that some people are autistic, or being autistic in a society that marginalizes autistic people.Autism is a permanent, life-long disability that presents in a wide variety of manifestations, which are diagnosed along a broad spectrum of dysfunctions and disorders. Typical features of autism are impaired communication and/or social skills, repetitive motions and/or behaviors, and obsession with rituals and/or routines. The cause is unknown and there is no cure. Hypotheses currently competing to become the emerging theory of autism's origins are; that autism is very likely genetic, that there is a small chance autism could be caused by environmental factors, and that autism may be the result of some as yet unknown serendipitous convocation of nature and nurture.The only widely accepted, standard treatments for autism consist of modalities that help autistic people to function in society according to their individual abilities. The most common intervention for autistic children is enrollment in an exceptional education program that includes speech and occupational therapy. Medication is usually not prescribed to treat autism itself, but appropriate drug therapy can be helpful to autistic people who suffer from comorbid conditions, such as difficulties with digestion, allergies, or seizures.Although autism can be very hard for families to confront, and is sometimes difficult for autistic individuals themselves, autistic people of nearly every apparent ability can lead satisfying lives; attend college, earn a living, get married, have children, etc -- if they so choose. Some autistics have used their exceptional perspicacity to make innovative contributions to society, and a number are published authors, and/or respected authorities in their individual areas of expertise.The Autism Rights MovementThe advent of the Internet has made it possible for autistic people to communicate their perspective with one another and the world. Some autistic adults can write very well despite being mute, and they are quite able to effectively, and often rather eloquently, present their case for the recognition of autistics' rights and societal acceptance of autism. A number of autistic people also express their point of view via Internet video.The Autism Rights Movement, which was started by autistic adults who feel marginalized by characterizations of autism as a tragedy, a disease, and an epidemic, demands acceptance for neurodiversity, the concept of atypical neurological wiring being a naturally occurring variation of the human condition that should be tolerated and respected like any other form of human diversity. It is for this reason that autistic people usually avoid the word "normal" when describing people with conventional neurological wiring, instead preferring to use the term "neurotypical."Many autistic people have articulated that they are very offended by the idea of curing and preventing autism, a notion which a number of them consider tantamount to genocide. They believe a cure for autism would destroy autistic people, and their culture, in a misguided attempt to replace them with different, neurotypical, people. The vast majority of autistic people who can communicate their sentiments via the written or spoken word do not desire a cure, but rather to be afforded opportunities to use their unique skills and perceptions in useful and productive ways.In addition to challenging descriptions of autism they consider incorrect, and/or insulting, the goals of the movement are to question the ethics and science of new and/or experimental treatments for autism, expose quackery and fraud, persuade autism charities, schools, and other organizations to invite autistic adults to serve on their advisory boards, and appeal to governments for better public education programs for autistic children and improved social services for autistic adults.The view that autism is not a disorder but simply a different way of being is presently a controversial idea that is strongly criticized by parents who hope to someday see their autistic children become neurotypical, as well as by the individuals and organizations that capitalize on families who are, for better or worse, possessed of such wishes.The controversy does not originate from the practice of treating severe manifestations of autism -- self-injurious behaviors, seizures, allergies, etc -- as most people agree that that such problems should be addressed to the best ability of medical science, and that no halfway decent parent would allow a child to suffer sickness or injury if there was proven medication or therapy available to ease that child's pain.What causes most of the friction between autistic people and the neurotypical folks they sometimes refer to as "curebies," is the belief that the non-medical, non-injurious aspects of autism, such as arm flapping, toe-walking, spinning, repetitious behaviors, narrow interests, withdrawal in social situations, etc, should be treated aggressively, sometimes by experimental or scientifically questionable means, in the hope that the autistic child will eventually appear/become neurotypical.This is also where the neurotypical families of autistic children are divided into those who can accept and cope with the cold facts of autism's prognosis (and accept and cope with their autistic children as they are, understanding that any extraordinary efforts to change them into neurotypical children could very well cause those autistic children to grow up into autistic adults who blog about neurodiversity and autistics' rights, or what it's like to live in a society that frequently treats them like hopeless freaks, or maybe even how terrible it was to endure being the subjects of experimental autism treatments), and those who, for various reasons, cannot.The Autism Cure ConstituencyThe pro-cure side of autism's political spectrum consists of two symbiotic entities; tragic families who need to believe in the hope that their autistic children can be cured, and the people who exploit them, and their autistic children, with questionable science, inspiring yet unverifiable anecdotes, and conspiracy theories.When a child is diagnosed as autistic, some families go into a state of shock and denial, disparaging doctors and other experts who tell them that autism is incurable, and seeking practitioners who will tell them differently. Such families are usually in mourning for a neurotypical child they believe is "trapped" inside, behind, or under the autism; a conviction which not only keeps them from learning to accept and cope with the autistic children they actually have, but also makes them vulnerable to the specious claims of unscrupulous purveyors, of "alternative" treatments, who purport to have had some measure of success in "recovering" children from autism.Some families are willing to sacrifice everything, and pay whatever it takes to whoever presents a convincing case for some miracle treatment or cure, which usually involves methodologies the mainstream medical community has either sharply questioned or completely rejected. These unfortunate people periodically become consumed with guilt that they are not doing enough, and/or fear that their child will not progress if they do not completely dedicate themselves to his or her recovery, an endeavor in desperation and futility, which sometimes leads to indebtedness, divorce, alcoholism, and depression.Today's medical con artists do not fit the ubiquitous historical image of the 19th century "snake oil salesman," peddling elixirs out of his horse-drawn wagon. They know that, if they want to make the big money, they will have to appeal to the intellects of sophisticated people who are highly educated. Their literature, which has even fooled a few MDs, contains scientific terminology and selective quotes from valid medical references. Once they convince parents on an intellectual level, it then becomes a simple matter of exuding geniality and confidence while manipulating the family's wishful thinking, because what these swindlers are ultimately selling is false hope, which can be more addictive than any drug.The current trend in the pseudoscience of experimental autism treatments administered to live human pediatric subjects is chelation therapy, which has a valid medical use in some cases of heavy metal poisoning (most commonly people exposed to the effects of industrial and laboratory accidents), but is also falsely claimed to be effective against autism, and several other conditions, such as cardiovascular disease, arthritis, multiple sclerosis, psoriasis, and erectile dysfunction.Chelation practitioners often make the unfounded assertion that autism is caused by lead, mercury, environmental toxins, and/or childhood vaccines that contained thimerosal, a preservative that was discontinued in 2000, mostly due to specious fear mongering that had the effect of frightening parents about having their children vaccinated against dangerous and deadly diseases.Regardless of the fact that autism is not mercury poisoning (autistic children do not exhibit the peripheral nerve damage or other physical symptoms that are characteristic of mercury poisoning, there is no scientific evidence to support speculation that autism has a toxic cause, and no link between mercury poisoning, thimerosal, and autism has ever been proven with scientific research that withstood the scrutiny of legitimate peer-review) bright and well-read parents nonetheless continue to fall for chelation and give it substantial credit for their autistic children's developmental progress -- despite the fact that, as autistic children mature, they learn new skills and their abilities naturally improve, without any sort of extraordinary intervention.The "Debate"Autism cure debates are hotly contested in certain circles of cyberspace where all the families want "what's best" for their autistic children, which is usually the main point of contention. The flames are ignited when those who think it's best to embrace their autistic children's unique neurological wiring try to warn parents who think it would be better to somehow "fix" it, that they are wasting their time, energy, and money on false hopes peddled by quacks.Firm in their conviction that simply accepting autism as part of their children and their lives would be like giving up on the children they feel they lost to autism (and also inferring that they are being judged as rubes), the pro-cure parents respond, with fervent certitude, using their extensive knowledge of pretentiously written, but seriously flawed, scientific literature about discredited and/or untested hypotheses, and experimental therapies that can only be validated by testimonials, and popular conjecture about some ambiguous relationship between vaccines, toxins, and autism.When autistics and their neurotypical advocates subsequently attempt to lecture these mostly intelligent and well-educated people in scientific methodology, the difference between hypotheses, scientific studies, clinical trials, emerging theories, and accepted theories, and how correlation and causality are not one and the same concept, the pro-cure families respond with their theories about how the international mainstream medical community, and the governments of several nations, in cahoots with the pharmaceutical industry and various and sundry regulatory agencies of the industrialized world, have conspired to hide the "truth," in which they have so vainly placed their hope and faith.Lamentably, these debates are mostly unproductive. Regardless of their religious persuasions, most people naturally put their faith in whatever notions or sentiments lend them reassurance and comfort, irrespective of plausibility. When challenges to their beliefs make people feel uncomfortable, it is a matter of the faith and/or doubt in their hearts and minds, but their vanity usually keeps them from contemplating that possibility, thus the flame wars continue.Paving the Parkway to PerditionParents and families who have survived all of the stages of adaptation and learned accept that their children are autistic, and autistic people -- whose firsthand perspective on autism should be considered invaluable to any discussion of the topic -- want very much to offer their comfort and guidance to families who are struggling with the challenges of adjusting to the knowledge that their children are autistic. They do not intend to make these families feel guilt or shame about their parenting choices (though that methodology is sometimes employed after appeals to reason and logic inevitably fail).Because it is ordinarily less difficult to get the attention of an autistic toddler engaged in stimming activities than it is to break through the wall of injudicious and tenacious pride that encircles neurotypical people who have become intoxicated with false hopes, some neurodiversity advocates eventually become frustrated and make insensitive, and even hostile, remarks that offend and agitate the people they are sincerely trying to rescue, in the hope that those people might finally wake up and perhaps try to learn how to communicate with their autistic children instead of trying to force them to talk like a neurotypical.The genuine intent of autistic and neurotypical people who promote the acceptance of neurodiversity is to help people who appear to be having difficulty dealing with the fact that their children are autistic by attempting to convince them that giving up their fight against their children's autism is not an act of submission or surrender, but rather a simple matter of choosing one's battles wisely and carefully. Once families understand and come to terms with autism and the realization that their autistic children will grow up to become autistic adults, their lives become less stressful, they save a lot of time and money, and they learn to enjoy life on the autistic spectrum.Meanwhile, the folks who refuse to give up on their war against their children's autism do not see themselves as unable to cope, for they truly believe that they are, indeed coping, by taking the initiative, and being proactive and determined to prevail by any means, even if the struggle entails allowing practitioners of alternative autism treatments to conduct medical experiments upon their autistic children. They are not "evil" people, they are loving parents and families doing what they believe is best for their autistic children because they understand the prejudices that people who are "different" must face, and they want their children to have a chance at blending into neurotypical society so that they can attain the happiness, independence, and success most parents want for their children.Neurodiversity "converts" are hard to win because people must ultimately recover their own reason and rationality from inside, behind, or under their own anguished pride and prejudice before they see the light for themselves. Conversion is seldom a sudden revelation, for most people must first reflect upon the observations they make while traveling the path they have chosen, and contemplate the repercussion and ramifications of their choices over time, before they will be able to see the inconsistencies in the rubric and rationale of those who misled them.No Autistics AllowedThere is one issue that both the neurodiversity and curebie crowds can agree upon; they do not care very much for the prominent autism charities that have cropped up over the past few years -- though each group has very different reasons for their disapproval.The majority of well-recognized autism charities dedicated to finding the cause and cure are motivated by the sincere altruism of notable and wealthy people, many of whom have autistic children or grandchildren. They tend to stay on the periphery of the politics of autism, and are generally neutral regarding popular speculation about the cause of autism and the efficacy of experimental treatments. The primary mission of these organizations is, after all, to raise money for research into the "puzzle" of autism, not to make claims of having already solved it.People who believe that they already know the cause of autism, and how to recover their children from it, object to the way that autism charities refer to autism as a mystery, instead of disseminating literature about mercury, vaccines, and chelation (and lobby to get it covered by health insurance). Some even go so far as to accuse these non-profit organizations of being in on the vast conspiracy to hide this "knowledge."Meanwhile, autistic people and their neurotypical advocates do not understand why supposed autism "charities" do not appear to be interested in actually helping autistic people, or asking autistic people and neurodiverse families how they feel about autism and what kind of services and support they might need to cope. Autistic people also resent that autism charities do not invite autistic adults to serve on their advisory boards, for they are disabled and they do want and need benefactors who will fund research into how to best educate autistic children so they can reach their full potential, and how to assist and accommodate autistic adults so they can be productive and welcomed members of society.Instead of reaching out to autistic people, however, these autism charities put up web sites and televise public service announcements that are extremely offensive to autistic people who cannot comprehend how so-called autism "philanthropists" could promote such patently negative images of autism and autistic people.It is a fact of the economics of human nature that charitable organizations must first elicit pity before that can solicit money. Autism charities looking to raise funds for research into the cause and cure have produced, among other works, documentary-style films highlighting the worst aspects of autism; with loud, chaotic scenes of autistic children screaming, running around in circles, and throwing tantrums, intercut with shots of mothers tearfully telling the camera how difficult and hopeless their lives are. Indeed, raising autistic children presents many challenges that the parents of neurotypical children could not possibly imagine, but it never has to be anywhere near as awful as it is portrayed in these docu-melodramas. These short movies may raise a lot of money, but they can be very troubling to watch for parents whose autistic children were only just recently diagnosed. A few parents have reported setbacks in their adjustment and coping processes after having viewed these short films. Some neurodiversity advocates have asserted that these materials are partly to blame when parents are misled into subjecting their autistic children to questionable autism "treatments," because these promotional devices depict autistics as "unpersons," whose caregivers could ostensibly be considered exempt from ethical questions about conducting medical experiments upon live human children. A few autistics have expressed that they view autism fundraising collaterals as hateful "autism-phobic" propaganda that features cruel stereotypes, bigoted mischaracterizations, and the specter of eugenics.The worst part of all this, for those who wish to help autistic people and their families to cope, rather than making people terrified of autism and autistic people, is that the very large autism charities have celebrity endorsements that get far more media attention and airtime for their pernicious point of view than actual autistic people who frequently articulate that "autism cure charities" do not represent, or speak for, them.Autism AwarenessApril is Autism Awareness Month and I hope that I have made some folks aware that there is a lot more to autism and autistic people than some old Dustin Hoffman movie, and those awful PSAs with the scary statistics (by the way, 1 in 166 is less than 0.5%). There are real people behind those numbers and they do not care for the way autism and autistic people are inaccurately depicted in the media, and how the only autism organizations that are well-known to people outside of the autistic community are charities that don't appear to be very helpful to autistic people.The politics of autism will, of course, continue to remain divided as long as con artists and conspiracy theorists can keep long-dead scientific hypotheses alive in the imaginations of families who have experienced great difficulty coming to terms with autism as a part of their lives. Scientific research into autism is ongoing and new discoveries are being made, especially in the area of genetics. Once more is known about autism, perhaps the lines may be re-drawn, or they could be erased entirely. However, those possibilities currently lie in the distant future. Right now, autism is still a permanent, lifelong disability whose cause is unknown. Some people can deal with that, others cannot; thus the current state of the politics of autism. (Full Disclosure: The author of the above commentary is a neurodiversity advocate and the neurotypical mother of four children; one diagnosed as autistic, one who is very likely to be diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, and two who are neurotypical.)

Margaret Romao Toigo is a retired stripper, beauty school dropout, and wannabe intellectual who dabbles in a wide variety of fleeting endeavors and life-long obsessions. Although Ms. Toigo is not a real writer, she nonetheless has her very own web site: Land of the Free, Home of the Brave

Religious Conservatives Righteously Indignant Over Apparently Gay-Friendly Old Party

Margaret Romao Toigo — Sat, 28 Oct 2006 11:24:36 EDT

In the midst of the media coverage and ongoing investigations regarding the Mark Foley scandal -- during which several key Republicans have been questioned about what they knew and when they knew about the disgraced former Congressman who sent sexually explicit internet messages to young, male Congressional pages -- the GOP has been revealed to be far more "gay-friendly" than religious conservatives have previously been lead to believe.A number of social conservatives, who have been loyally voting Republican in the hope the GOP will work to preserve America's moral fabric and fiber, have been shocked and surprised to learn several key people in their beloved political party (Jim Kolbe, a Republican congressman from Arizona; Jeff Trandahl, the House clerk in charge of the page program; and Kirk Fordham, Mr. Foley's chief of staff, to name just three) are openly gay. The revelation that there are more than just a few "token" gay Republican staffers on Capitol Hill has shaken Christian conservatives, who feel homosexuality -- which the Bible tells them, in Leviticus 18:22, is an "abomination" -- should not be so openly accepted in the party supposedly championing the Federal Marriage Amendment, which would enshrine, in the Constitution, the exclusive definition of marriage as the union of one man and one woman. Former Congressman Foley resigned from the House of Representatives on September 29, after the messages he sent to the pages were made public. Mr. Foley has since confessed he is gay; disclosed he is an alcoholic with behavioral problems, and divulged he was molested by a priest when he was an adolescent.Gay-Friendliness in ProtocolThe Religious Right was fittingly vexed by remarks made by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice at the swearing-in ceremony of Ambassador Mark Dybul, the new U.S. Global AIDS Coordinator.As First Lady Laura Bush looked on, Dr. Dybul was sworn in by Secretary Rice on October 10, while his partner, Jason Claire, held the Bible. However, what was most disturbing to the sensibilities of religious conservatives was that both State Department Deputy Chief of Protocol, Raymond Martinez, and Secretary Rice recognized Mr. Claire's mother as Dr. Dybul's "mother-in-law." Peter Sprigg, vice president for policy at the Family Research Council, said the secretary's comments were "profoundly offensive" and fly in the face of the Bush administration's endorsement of the Federal Marriage Amendment."We have to face the fact that putting a homosexual in charge of AIDS policy is a bit like putting the fox in charge of the henhouse," said Mr. Sprigg. "But even beyond that, the deferential treatment that was given not only to him but his partner and his partner's family by the Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is very distressing."Mr. Sprigg said, in light of the Mark Foley scandal, "it's inexplicable that a conservative administration would do such things." After reading many news stories about Mr. Foley, in which the number of gay staffers on the Republican payroll have been discussed, the "pro-family" movement is starting to wonder about the party's lack of action on conservative social issues. FRC President Tony Perkins said one of the questions that needs to be asked is: "Has the social agenda of the GOP been stalled by homosexual members or staffers?"The ongoing Foley investigation and Secretary Rice's perceived faux pas at Dr. Dybul's swearing-in ceremony are revealing the politically awkward fact some GOP leaders are practicing a sort of tolerance other Republicans have not conveyed on the campaign trail -- and lending credence to the charges made in a new book by David Kuo, the former second-in-command of the Office of Faith-Based Initiatives, about how the White House has used conservative Christians for their votes, but has consistently given them nothing in return.In the book, Tempting Faith: An Inside Story of Political Seduction, released on October 16, Mr. Kuo wrote, in the office of presidential political strategist Karl Rove, some of the nation’s most prominent religious leaders were known as "the nuts.""National Christian leaders received hugs and smiles in person and then were dismissed behind their backs and described as 'ridiculous,' 'out of control,' and just plain 'goofy,'" Mr. Kuo writes. Mr. Kuo also alleges then-White House political affairs director Ken Mehlman knowingly participated in a plan to use the Office of Faith-Based Initiatives, as well as the taxpayers' money, for ostensibly "nonpartisan" events actually intended to mobilize religious voters in 20 targeted races -- 19 of those 20 races were won by Republicans. Where's the Love?It is widely believed Republicans owe their 2004 election victories to the Religious Right, whose highly motivated "values voters" went to the polls, in droves, to vote for anti-gay-marriage measures in 11 swing states -- and to cast their ballots for GOP candidates while they were at it.However, the Republicans Party blatantly neglects the issues most important to its largest voting bloc. The GOP leadership talks mostly about terrorism and economics while paying just enough lip service to social issues to ensure evangelicals will campaign and vote for Republican candidates.The controversial events of the last year, especially those of the past few weeks, have begun to cause the GOP's carefully constructed image as the party of "family values" to crack and crumble to the point where an increasing number of religious conservative voters are beginning to suspect they've been duped by Republican platitudes.Greg Cain, in an October 17 Chattanoogan article entitled, "It Is Time For Christians To Leave The Republican Party - And Replies" writes, "Jesus wasn’t riding an elephant into town." Mr. Cain then goes on to suggest "it is time to build an ark. It is time to leave the Republican Party." It has become increasingly apparent to Mr. Cain the core values of the Republican Party are not Tennessean or Christian values. "The Mark Foley Branch of the Log Cabin Republicans has seen to that," he wrote. An Opportunity for Redemption?On October 25, New Jersey's Supreme Court ruled that homosexuals are entitled to the same rights as heterosexuals, but left it up to lawmakers to either rewrite the state's marriage laws to include same-sex couples, or to create a new system of civil unions for them.Before the decision was handed down, conservative Christian groups were meeting with far less success in trying to motivate their supporters with the issue of same-sex marriage than they had during the 2004 election cycle. Focus on the Family founder Dr. James C. Dobson held "Stand for the Family" rallies in three cities, but the turnout was much lower than anticipated, with only 3,000 people attending a Pittsburgh rally held in a 17,000-seat arena. The next two rallies had to be moved from stadium-sized venues to smaller auditoriums, and the tickets, which had been on sale for $7, were given away. Now the leaders of the Religious Right are holding out hope the 4-3 court ruling will re-energize disillusioned and battle-weary social conservatives in the 10 days before the November 7 midterm elections, especially in those eight states with constitutional amendments against same-sex marriage on their ballots -- five are currently expected to pass in Idaho, Virginia, South Carolina, South Dakota and Tennessee, while three appear close in Colorado, Arizona and Wisconsin.Dr. Richard Land, head of the public policy arm of the Southern Baptist Convention said, "Pro-traditional-marriage organizations ought to give a distinguished service award to the New Jersey Supreme Court." Republican Congressional candidates who are in competitive races in conservative states and districts are likely grateful to have something with which to re-energize their religious conservative base, but the GOP itself has lately met with disapproval from an increasing number of those fickle moderates, who are quite displeased with the progress of the war in Iraq, worried about the stability of our economy, and disturbed by the state of our health care system. Those masses of moderates -- a 54%-65% majority, depending upon which poll one consults -- also think "civil unions" for same-sex couples are a reasonable compromise (they can have the civil rights, as long as they don't get to use the word "marriage"), and place the issue very low upon their lists of priorities when deciding their votes -- and they, of course, greatly outnumber the Religious Right. The GOP's balancing act, in which it tries to please its evangelical base while, at the same time, trying to avoid offending the sensibilities of moderates, is not as easy today as it was in 2004, when the war in Iraq was still popular. Republicans who are in close races in moderate districts and states are likely to ignore the subject of same-sex marriage and/or civil unions as they face constituencies that don't like the way things are going in Iraq, are afraid that the economy will not improve, and are concerned about the high cost of health care.Turn to GodMaybe it's time for the good people of the Religious Right to get out of this sinful business known as "politics," and to acknowledge, once and for all, the GOP is not ever going to create the sort of Heaven on Earth it keeps promising, but has failed to even marginally deliver to the earnest, hard-working bloc of people who helped to elect them because they were lead to believe a Republican government would work to alleviate the temptation of humankind's ungodly perversions, vices, and weaknesses. The Scriptures say: "Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves." (Matthew 7:15)The trouble with a government of the people, by the people, and for the people is that it is ultimately comprised of our fellow sinners whose mortal flesh is just as susceptible to temptation as anybody else's.

300 Million American Souls

Margaret Romao Toigo — Sat, 21 Oct 2006 15:49:33 EDT

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the population of the land of the free and the home of the brave officially hit 300 million at 7:46 a.m. EDT on Tuesday, October 16, 2006. The Census Bureau, which uses administrative records and surveys to estimate monthly averages for the births, deaths, and net immigration that occur between its decennial surveys, has a "population clock" that estimates a birth every 7 seconds, a death every 13 seconds, and a new immigrant every 31 seconds, for a total of one new American every 11 seconds.The growth rate of the United States is less than one percent, with the population increasing by about 2.8 million people per year. Around 40 percent of our growth comes from immigration -- the Census Bureau includes illegal immigrants in its official population estimates -- while the rest comes from births outnumbering deaths. America's population reached 100 million in 1915, and 200 million in 1967. During the last 39 years in which the U.S. population increased by 100 million souls, the entire world population grew from 3.5 billion to 6.5 billion.In its population growth, the U.S.A. stands alone among industrialized nations, having grown by 13% during the 1990s, which is five times the average of other developed countries. We are the world's third most populous nation, behind the burgeoning economic superpowers of China (1.31 billion) and India (1.09 billion).According to Census Bureau estimates, the U.S. population is expected to reach 400 million by 2043. CelebrationWhen America's population reached 100 million in 1915, the milestone was celebrated as a sign of the nation's economic and geopolitical might in the world.When our population surpassed 200 million in 1967, cheers rang through the lobby of the Commerce Department, and President Lyndon B. Johnson's celebratory speech was interrupted by many bursts of enthusiastic applause. Life magazine found a baby boy born in Atlanta at the exact moment, and dispatched photographers and reporters to anoint him as the 200 millionth American.Now that we've reached the 300 million mark, Census Bureau employees observed the occasion with cake and punch. Today's population growth is driven by immigration almost as much as by births and many are speculating that the 300 millionth American did not arrive in a maternity ward, but from across the Mexican border.In light of the past year's controversy over how to handle the estimated 11 to 12 million immigrants here illegally, and the midterm elections being only weeks away, the lack of government-sponsored hoopla is somewhat understandable.DoomsayersEnvironmentalist and anti-immigration groups do not see America as a robust and flourishing nation, but rather as one whose growth and consumption are spiraling out of control, threatening the purity of our air, water, and food -- and the complexion of our demographics.The environmentalists lament that our wildernesses are being paved over to make room for "urban sprawl." They are concerned that more traffic burning fossil fuels will cause an increase of greenhouse gas emissions that are widely believed to be a cause of global warming. Anti-immigration groups complain that many of our communities appear to be changing almost overnight as schools and roads become increasingly crowded with Spanish-speaking people. They are worried because immigrants, legal and illegal, account for about 40% of our population growth, and that Hispanics from Latin America account for the largest share of immigrants. Some fear that these trends could result in "Anglos" becoming a minority here -- as if that would be a Bad Thing.Internecine Immigration IncongruenceThe ongoing immigration controversy is a product of politics, not economic pragmatism, which is why there are between 11 and 12 million illegal immigrants working here, regardless of immigration policies that serve the ambitions of politicians whose constituencies are not quite ready to embrace the ethnic and cultural and plurality that is America.Few people will argue that illegal immigration isn't a problem that needs to be reduced, not only for the sake of the rule of law, but for the welfare of the workers who are exploited by unscrupulous businesses looking for cheap labor that is unregulated, undocumented, and unprotected. Dealing with the 11-12 million illegal immigrants who are already here filling 11-12 million jobs should, in theory, be a manageable problem, considering the basic laws of supply and demand, and the fact that when America absorbed large waves of immigrants in the past, our economy and culture were enriched.However, the notion of granting some form of amnesty to illegal immigrants -- no matter how economically beneficial that could be -- presents a moral conundrum. Is it fair and just to show clemency toward those who broke the law to enter America after so many other people immigrated here via the proper, legal channels? Of course it isn't fair! But that doesn't solve the actual economic problem at hand, which is that our immigration policies are in need of realistic and practical reform so that jobs that need to be filled can be filled legally, and with workers who enjoy the protections and benefits of documented work. A workable compromise would be a system in which illegal immigrants and the businesses that hire them are fined, and then given a chance to comply with the law or face increasingly severe penalties for repeat offenses. But that idea is unappealing to those whose pride, prejudice, and pretentiousness make them more concerned with demographics than current economic realities. For such people, the ingredients in America's melting pot have taken on too much of a Latino flavor. Thus the ongoing immigration controversy that actually has very little to do with securing our borders against a surplus of labor, and more to do with fear of the minority-majority state.Environmental EfficiencyThe hand-wringing pessimism of environmentalists and city dwellers who complain that humanity is crowding out and paving over Mother Nature belies the fact that America still has plenty of wide-open spaces. A mere 84 people per square mile means we have a lot of room left for growth inside our 3,537,438.44 square miles of land area. Considering that there are about 300 people per square mile in the European Union, and almost 900 people per square mile in Japan, the U.S. is comparatively under populated. It's not the actual size of our population that causes environmental problems, but rather how people are distributed. A little more than half of the U.S. population is clustered in cities and along the coasts, while large swaths of the country are struggling to keep their populations from shrinking. For example, there are 6 million people living in the Dallas-Fort Worth area of Texas, which is nearly twice the entire population of the nearby state of Oklahoma.As more people move away from crowded cities and into the suburbs, land use is becoming less efficient. Single-use zoning and low-density land use have created car dependent communities, which have lead to more traffic and emissions.The solution to the environmental impact of our increasing population is not the limitation of growth, but more efficient planning, such as the implementation of "smart growth," policies that encourage compact land use patterns, optimal access to public transportation, pedestrian-friendly and bicycle-friendly roads, and mixed-use development.Smart growth principles are focused upon the total long-term economics of development, rather than the short term profits of improving individual parcels of land, so they are a hard sell to developers whose priorities are minimizing costs and maximizing revenues for their investors, not preparing environmental impact assessments that may oblige them to cover the potentially high expense of mitigating the environmental impact of their development projects. Policy-makers, in their efforts to challenge obsolete ideas of urban planning (such as the need for more single-family homes that necessitate more prevalent automobile usage), must provide financial incentives to developers in order to negate any perceived need for authoritarian restrictions on free enterprise.If smart growth is profitable to developers, they will not only implement those techniques in their future projects, they will promote the idea in their marketing collaterals. Auspicious AbundanceContrary to popular pessimism, America's growth is a Good Thing. Many demographers believe that our reaching the 300 million milestone shows that America, in spite of our image around the world being momentarily tarnished by the inconsistent progress of the war in Iraq, is an economically powerful republic that is admired in most of the world."As almost nothing else can, immigration-led growth signals the attractiveness of the American economy and polity," says Kenneth Prewitt, a former head of the Census Bureau and now professor of public affairs at Columbia University. "You don't see large numbers of immigrants clamoring to move to China."Stagnant populations, such as those of Japan and some European countries, will face severe retirement crises in the future. Sub-replacement fertility rates are leading to a situation in which there will not be enough young workers to support retirees. It should also be noted that their populations are not growing as fast as ours through immigration because they are not creating as many jobs.The fact that the U.S. population is growing faster via immigration than other developed nations will allow us to better deal with the financial pressures of an aging population whose life expectancy has climbed from 71 to 78 years since 1967. Immigrants and their children will help reduce funding shortfalls for Social Security, Medicare, and other social programs that benefit older people. In the past 80 years, America has experienced both explosive population growth and unprecedented prosperity, in spite of major wars and a decade-long economic depression. In more recent times, our resilient economy has survived the September 11 attacks, rising oil and commodity prices, increased global competition, corporate scandals, and the geopolitical risks associated with the war in Iraq and nuclear proliferation.On Wednesday October 18, 2006 the Dow Jones industrial average rose above 12,000 for the first time in its 110-year history. And if history is any indication, the stock market will continue to grow at a significantly faster rate than the population because businesses and workers are steadily becoming more productive due to the accelerating rate of our technological progress. American innovation, a product of our ever-expanding diversity, has brought us prosperity, even through the toughest of times. Our technology has improved our overall quality of life, with advances in medical science that have increased our longevity while decreasing our infant mortality rate, and exponential progress in transportation and telecommunications that has made us smarter and more efficient and productive.In the future, it will be our inventiveness and entrepreneurial spirit that will see us through to the 400 million milestone, and beyond -- regardless of the foreboding exhortations of doomsayers, crepehangers, defeatists, and cynics who think pessimism is synonymous with realism. So here's to 300-plus American souls, among whom could be the doctors who will discover the cures for cancer, diabetes, and AIDS; the engineers who will negate our need for fossil fuels, and the national leaders who will diplomatically and peacefully spread the American vision of freedom and prosperity throughout the world.

The Force of The Foley Factor: Polls Show Democratic Candidates Gaining on Republicans

Margaret Romao Toigo — Fri, 13 Oct 2006 04:23:41 EDT

Because a small, but significant, number of conservatives have become frustrated with Republican governance and independent swing voters are turning against GOP candidates, Democrats appear to be edging closer to gaining a majority of House seats.Just four weeks before Election Day, numerous polls -- all taken after the surfacing of the Capitol Hill page sex scandal involving former Republican congressman Mark Foley, but before North Korea's announcement of its first nuclear test -- show Democratic candidates with huge leads over Republicans. Going into the final 26 days of the midterm-election campaigns, the pundits and the analysts are moving more and more Republican-held congressional seats out of the "safe" column, and laying improving odds upon the Democratic Party's chances of seizing control of at least the House of Representatives. Republican campaign officials are now saying that they expect to lose at least seven House seats, and perhaps as many as 30 in the November 7 elections. In order to achieve majority control of Congress, the Democrats must pick up 15 seats in the House, and six in the Senate. Amazingly, and very much unlike most past elections, every Democratic incumbent is favored to win re-election and the Democrats are spending money to defend only a few seats, which means that their party's candidates are far less vulnerable to the GOP's campaign finance advantage.An October 6-8 USA TODAY/Gallup poll showed that Democrats had a 23-point lead over Republicans on which party's House candidate would get their vote - the Democrats' greatest advantage among registered voters since 1978, and twice the lead the GOP had one month before they gained control of Congress in 1994.However, a Democratic Party takeover of the House is not a foregone conclusion because of congressional redistricting plans that have given huge advantages to Republican incumbents. Additionally, internal Democratic polls show that the effects of the "Foley Factor" are confined to only a half-dozen races.Less than 50 of the 435 House seats are actually competitive, and House races are usually shaped by local issues and personalities, with the closest often being decided upon which party can turn out more of its loyal voters.The Republican Party is urging its candidates to stress local issues that could make their Democratic opponents into unpalatable alternatives; while the GOP leaders attempt to mitigate the “Foley Factor” by accusing Democrats of trying to politicize it.In the hope of shifting the national conversation away from congressional controversies and war casualties, the White House plans to highlight national security, especially terrorism, after North Korea’s reported nuclear test. DownfallThe plummeting poll ratings appear to have befallen the GOP due to an ill-timed series of unfortunate events and revelations. It's a situation that gives Democratic candidates the opportunity to argue that the Republicans have bollixed things up, that the country needs a new direction and they are the viable alternatives. Reports of increased violence and mounting U.S. casualties in Iraq were already adding to the American people's doubts about the progress of the war. Making matters worse was the widespread publication of leaked conclusions from a classified National Intelligence Estimate that said the Iraq war had actually increased terrorism in the region. Then, on September 28, a CNN poll revealed that nearly two-thirds of Americans believe Iraq to be in a "civil war." That same day, the Republican chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Sen. John Warner of Virginia -- upon returning from his eighth trip there -- said that Iraq is "simply drifting sideways," and that he believes the new government is trying, but its departments and agencies "are simply not living up or not able to meet just the fundamental responsibilities of a government."While he urged Americans not to give up hope, Sen. Warner described a critical two to three month period ahead, and said if the Iraqi government can't perform better and reduce sectarian violence, the U.S. government ought to determine, "Is there a change of course that we should take?"Then the news of Mr. Foley's resignation over his misadventures in cyberspace hit the airwaves on September 29, just in time to upstage -- but not completely overshadow -- the September 30 release of Bob Woodward's new book that, according to its Amazon.com description, "examines how the Bush administration avoided telling the truth about Iraq to the public, to Congress, and often to themselves." Foley PollingAccording to a New York Times/CBS News poll, conducted October 5-8, almost 80% of Americans think the Republican Congressional leadership put the protection of their political standings ahead of the safety of teenage pages, and 62% believe the GOP leaders knew about Mr. Foley’s sexually explicit messages to pages long before they were made public.Two-thirds of the respondents to the USA TODAY/Gallup poll said they were following the page scandal very or somewhat closely, and 54% believed that the GOP leadership knew about Mr. Foley's inappropriate communications with congressional pages for months or years and did not act against Mr. Foley sooner "for political reasons." Forty-three percent said that House Speaker Dennis Hastert should resign.A Washington Post/ABC News poll revealed that 7 in 10 Americans are following the Foley scandal very or somewhat closely, but only 2 in 10 said it would be very important in deciding their votes on November 7. The poll also showed voters were evenly split over whether Speaker Hastert should step down. The political fallout appears to be mixed, with almost two-thirds saying that the Republican leadership tried to cover up the scandal, but about the same percentage say they believe that the Democratic leaders would have done the same - and more than 3 in 5 thought the Democrats were criticizing the GOP leaders for political advantage. Evaluating Moral ValuesWhile the Republican Party has been scurrying, scrambling, and scuttling about in its efforts to contain the fallout from the "Foley Factor," the polls are finding that support for the GOP on its familiar winning issues, such as moral values and the war against terrorism, is deteriorating under the duress of a national and international political climate that has become increasingly hostile toward the status quo (3 in 10 registered voters in the USA TODAY/Gallup poll said their representatives don't deserve re-election).A new group of "values voters" seems to be emerging as the American people, likely having heard their fill of news about corruption and malfeasance in government, are beginning to value honesty and responsibility over piousness and passing the buck.Forty-seven percent of the respondents to the New York Times/CBS News poll named the Democratic Party as coming closer to sharing their moral values, and only 38% named Republicans. Surprisingly, 43% of people who live in the South, and 26% of conservatives, believed that Democrats come closer to sharing their values than the GOP.That poll also found that 69% of Americans think members of Congress do not live by the same rules of behavior as they do, and 69% believe that members of Congress consider themselves above the law. The USA TODAY/Gallup poll showed Democrats as having a 21-point advantage on government corruption, one of the three most important issues, along with Iraq and terrorism, according to the poll.Iraq, Terrorism, Taxes, and The EconomyThe war in Iraq continues to take its toll on President Bush and the GOP, with two-thirds of respondents to the New York Times/CBS News poll saying it is going somewhat or very badly, and only 3% saying it is going very well. Two-thirds said they disapprove of Mr. Bush's handling of Iraq, and 83% thought Mr. Bush was either hiding something or mostly lying about how the war was going.The USA TODAY/Gallup poll showed, for the first time in Mr. Bush's presidency, that Democrats have surpassed Republicans on the issue of handling terrorism, 46% to 41%, and have a 17-point advantage on Iraq.When asked whether the war in Iraq has been worth fighting, 63% of the respondents to the Washington Post/ABC News poll said, "No." But only one-fifth of those surveyed said they support the immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq, and 51% agreed that Iraq is a front in the global war against terrorism. Mr. Bush's ratings on terrorism, his signature issue, are at the lowest of his presidency, with 53% saying that they disapprove of his performance. Fifty percent believe that America is safer now than it was before the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, but 42% think the nation is less safe today. The "Foley Factor" appears to have also derailed the GOP's messages regarding taxes and the economy. Republicans had sought to discredit Democrats as big spending advocates for high taxes, but 52% percent of respondents to the New York Times/CBS News poll thought that Democrats would make the right decisions on how to spend taxpayers’ money, and only 29% said Republicans would.In the Washington Post/ABC News poll, 41% said they approve of how Mr. Bush has handled economic issues, which is about the same rating he received in August. Americans appear to be somewhat positive about the economy, likely due to the recent decline in gasoline prices, with 47% of respondents describing the economy as good or excellent, and 53% saying it is not so good or poor. Final FundamentalsIt is widely believed and hoped, among many Republicans and some Democrats, that the "Foley Factor" will soon turn into "Foley Fatigue," that the scandal will not have the legs to last four weeks, and that everybody will find something else to talk about - like the news that North Korea conducted an underground nuclear test on October 6. The U.S. Geological Survey said it had detected a 4.2 magnitude tremor in North Korea at 10:35 local time. However, thus far, there has been no independent confirmation that it was caused by a nuclear device. And now, U.S. hopes are waning for a quick United Nations vote on North Korea, which has called U.S. pressure to rein in its nuclear program tantamount to a "declaration of war." White House spokesman Tony Snow stated the obvious very well when he said: "It's pretty clear that the Foley story has had an impact on public opinion but whether it is going to have an impact on the elections is something the voters will have to decide." Indeed, there is no magic crystal ball that foretells a future that is four weeks away, poll numbers are well-known for their volatility, not their usefulness in forecasting close races, and the "Foley Factor" is a prime example of how the fickle finger of fate can cause fortunes to fluctuate in a flash. References:Foley Hurting Congress’s Image, Poll Shows, Adam Nagourney and Janet Elder, October 10, 2006, New York Times.How the Poll Was Conducted, October 10, 2006, New York Times. Complete Poll Results (pdf), New York Times. Poll: Dems Gain Big Lead, Jill Lawrence, October 10, 2006, USA TODAYUSA TODAY/GALLUP POLL, Part 1, Congress: Which party is better?USA TODAY/GALLUP POLL, Part 2, Congress: Is re-election deserved? Which issues are most important?Poll Shows Strong Shift Of Support to Democrats, David S. Broder and Dan Balz, October 10, 2006, The Washington Post.Washington Post-ABC News Poll, October 9, 2006, The Washington Post.Poll: Nearly two-thirds of Americans say Iraq in civil war, September 28, 2006, CNN.com. War, Sex Scandal Sinking GOP in Polls, John Whitesides, October 11, 2006, Reuters.GOP Officials Brace for Loss Of Seven to 30 House Seats, Jim VandeHei and Chris Cillizza, October 10, 2006, The Washington PostN. Korea Claims Nuclear Test, Anthony Faiola, Glenn Kessler and Dafna Linzer, October 9, 2006, The Washington Post.U.S. hopes wane for quick U.N. vote on N. Korea, Evelyn Leopold, October 12, 2006, Reuters.

Dizzy From The Foleygate Spin: As The World Of Pundits, Partisans, And Paranoids Turns

Margaret Romao Toigo — Wed, 4 Oct 2006 06:45:47 EDT

The "October Surprise" set to go down in history for Election Year 2006 is a lurid sex scandal, the unseemly and unsavory sort of profligacy that cannot be spin-scrubbed away. It is the dreaded stain of pedophilia, an atrocity many Americans fear and loath as much as (or maybe even a little more than) they do terrorism. ScandalThe bell that can't be un-rung -- at least not in the precious few weeks left before the November 7 vote -- began clanging, very loudly, when six-term Congressman Mark Foley (R-FL 16th), 52, resigned Friday, September 29, after the revelation he had exchanged inappropriate emails with a former 16-year old congressional page. On Sunday, October 1, the FBI announced it is looking into whether Mr. Foley broke federal law by sending the inappropriate emails in question. Meanwhile, the disgraced ex-Congressman announced he has been battling alcoholism and checked himself into a rehabilitation clinic. Republicans, on Monday, picked Florida State Rep. Joe Negron in the hope of salvaging the abandoned House seat for the GOP. Mr. Foley's name will remain on the ballot in the largely Republican West Palm Beach district, but Mr. Negron will receive any votes cast for Mr. Foley.The question of what the GOP leadership knew about Mr. Foley's inappropriate emails to former pages, and when they knew it, is firmly fixed in the minds and mouths of the Democratic Party, whose leaders must be simply beside themselves with the indescribable (and unspeakable) emotions associated with the outrageous fortune of unforeseen opportunity.As the scandal festers and grows, so do the opinions, angles, and deflections, all blending into a cacophony of partisan balderdash that is only just beginning to build into a roaring crescendo of muckraking and mudslinging threatening to drown out any and all efforts at damage control. Loyalty and DevotionSome people are going beyond damage control. They are trying their level best to un-ring that bell before its reverberations send shock waves through the ranks of the GOP leaders who are suspected of having engineered a cover up, something which could bring down more than just one Republican politician who grappled with his alcoholism and "other behavioral problems," and lost.Die-hard GOP loyalists, bright-red red-staters, the faithful, and the righteous, are in an almost out-of-control spin cycle, pumping out conspiracy theories, paranoid hypotheses, and just about every other sort of rhetorical contrivance, in what appear to be vain attempts to fan the stench of what is now being called "Foleygate," away from the Republican Party and onto the Democratic Party. The effort is an earnest one, even if much of the rhetoric is a strain upon the credulity of all but the most faithful and righteous. Such loyalty and devotion are admirable, regardless of their motivations. Right Back Atcha, Lusty Liberals!The Democrats have had their fair share of sex scandals and some folks seem to know just about all of them. Armed with this knowledge, they have engaged in the tried and true tactic of criticizing the critics, charging them with hypocrisy on the proposition that, with what judgments the Democrats judge Republicans, they shall be judged. And with what measure the Democrats mete to Republicans, it shall be measured to them again -- even if it's not very likely to happen in what's left of this election cycle.Randy of Rightwinged.com, after the obligatory acknowledgement that, "Foley is a sicko," reminds us about "Democrat after Democrat who've been wrapped up in REAL sexual scandals."Randy reiterates that he won't excuse Mr. Foley's behavior, but he does "need to make clear what he did," which was that, "He said some sick stuff in instant messages to some kid in Louisiana who used to be a page in DC. Unless there is some explosive development yet to come out, as far as we know there wasn't any type of physical contact here." Apparently, sex scandals don't become REAL sex scandals unless it can be proven people are actually touching each other, even when minors might be involved. Democrats, it seems, have done a lot of touching, and Gateway Pundit demonstrates this with an ostensibly humorous look at what did not happen:Representative Foley did not have sex with the minor, did not have sex with the young man in the Oval office, did not put him in a high level security position he was not qualified to handle after a major terrorist attack on the country, was not married at the time, did not run a prostitution ring from his apartment, did not turn his back on Congress when he was accused of having sex with a minor, did not run and get re-elected several times in a democratic stronghold after this news broke, Representative Foley no longer sits in Congress, and the page did not disappear and end up dead after an ongoing relationship with Representative Foley.Gateway Pundit concludes, "the fact that Democrats are pointing fingers shows that they are only politicizing this very serious issue."I think Gateway Pundit is absolutely right. Conspiracy!Clarice Feldman of The American Thinker, "smell[ed] something very peculiar in the way we have learned of the disgrace of Rep. Mark Foley."Before she gets into the emerging background detail of "an attack strategy has been devised by parties anxious to damage the GOP and swing the coming election," Ms. Feldman requisitely mentions a Democratic Congressman's "taped phone conversations lusting for 15-year old Catholic school girls in their uniforms." A blog called Stop Sex Predators, which was started in July of this year, has fallen under the scrutiny of Ms. Feldman and others because it had only a few posts about stories several years old until this September 21 post about "Shocking Emails". The article was a re-posting of several emails, allegedly from former congressional pages and interns who were propositioned by Congressmen. Ms. Feldman asks, "How likely is it that this site with virtually no readership, few posts and hardly any history or posts of interest suddenly receives this bombshell?"Tom Maguire of JustOneMinute has questions about how the story broke and is also skeptical about the sudden materialization of the Stop Sex Predators blog, which apparently, "brought down the Congressional leadership with its sixth, seventh and eighth posts." Mr. Maguire writes that he, "would want some assurance that this was not simply a successful attempt to promote a story that wasn't quite ready for the Mainstream Media by laundering it through some blogs," and part of his "suspicion arises because the blog posted emails about gay Congressmen in response to a post about 'skinterns,' scantily clad young women." The St. Petersburg Times' handling of the story has raised even more questions in the minds of Mr. Maguire and others. The editors of The Buzz, a blog and public forum sponsored and maintained by the St. Petersburg Times, were given copies, last November, of an email exchange Mr. Foley had with a former page from Louisiana. However, the editors concluded the information they had at the time didn't meet their standard for publication. The Buzz revisited the question on several occasions, but did not learn anything new until last week, when the emails were posted on Stop Sex Predators. Later that same week, a news blog at the website of ABC News broke the story, and, soon after, someone contacted ABC and provided a detailed, overtly sexual email exchange between Mr. Foley and at least one other page. Those revelations, which could not be credibly dismissed as misinterpreted friendliness, caused Mr. Foley to resign. Mr. Maguire wants to know, "how did ABC round up the follow-up emails and IMs so quickly?" He also wants to know if it was, "the page in Louisiana who sent his Foley emails to an unknown web-site after declining to push this story with the St. Petersburg Times," and, if it was not, "[he] who sent the emails to Stop Sex Predators, who did?"Mr. Maguire speculates and hypothesizes, "Maybe -- the St. Petersburg Times would not let him make an anonymous accusation. On the other hand, if the former page was so determined to get Foley, why didn’t he try another news organization -- ABC, for example, didn’t seem to have a problem with anonymously sourcing this."The folks over at justbarkingmad.com are asking about an organization called, "CREW," which stands for Citzens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. justbarkingmad complains that CREW has been releasing "damning information and statements," such as Mr. Foley’s electronic sexual exchange with a minor, and the only Democrats on its list of the Top 55 most corrupt members of Congress are those who are currently under investigation.Looking into the people who run CREW, justbarkingmad found "virtually every listed member of CREW’s staff has been formerly associated with a Leftist, or left leaning organization." "In other words," justbarkingmad writes, "it’s a DNC hit squad." Macranger of Macsmind hits back: Several sources are telling me that there is an extreme amount of “nervousness” in the Democratic side of the aisle that this so-called “Republican Scandal” may actually bite them in the ass in November. Seems that although Foley played the willing pervert, he might have actually been enabled a bit, not by Republicans but by those sympathetic for the Democrat cause.So we now know that George Soros funded CREW and knowingly withheld possibly criminal information just so it could have the greatest political effect. Moreover, we know that a leftist “Gay Republican Outer,” actually played a material part in the plot as well, even going so far we believe as to pose as one of the chatters.Macranger, who believes the Democratic Party's response to the scandal was "far too orchestrated," reports Stop Sex Predators this morning removed "damaging comments," and the FBI is looking into who started the blog. The question Macranger wants to see "ratchet[ed] up now," is the potentially tables-turning, "What did DEMOCRATS know, and more importantly, WHAT part did they play?"Just in case the approach fails because it turns out most people are too caught up in the salacious details to care about what the Democrats knew or when they knew it, several bloggers, apparently taking their cues from an editorial in today's Washington Times, are today imploring Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert to fall upon his sword and resign his leadership position.ConclusionI am now very dizzy and getting nauseous, not so much from the scandal itself (the shock has worn off), but from the continuous spinning of pundits, partisans, and paranoids seeking to turn one man's exposed weaknesses into their own strengths.My little trip into the far right spectrum was a most interesting venture into the minds of the faithful and the righteous. Some may wish to ridicule the contrived efforts of those good folks, but I will not, for I believe the ability to hold one's head high under the compounding duress of progressive cognitive dissonance requires a lot of fortitude. References:Mark Foley Flashback: If I Were One Of Those Sickos, Jay, October 1, 2006, Stop The ACLU.Shameful Democratic Hypocrisy Regarding Foley Situation, Randy, October 2, 2006 03:51 AM, RedWinged.com. Foley Fallout: What We Know Now, Gateway Pundit, Sunday, October 01, 2006, Gateway Pundit, Observations of the World from the Heart of Jesusland!Foley and the Blame Game, Clarice Feldman, October 1st, 2006, The American Thinker. Shocking Emails, Stop Sex Predators, Thursday, September 21, 2006, Stop Sex Predators.How The Foley Story Broke - I Find This Puzzling, Tom Maguire, October 01, 2006, JustOneMinute.A Note From the Editors, Scott Montgomery, September 30, 2006, The Buzz. Sixteen-Year-Old Who Worked as Capitol Hill Page Concerned About E-mail Exchange with Congressman, Rhonda Schwartz and Maddy Sauer, September 28, 2006, ABC News web site, The Blotter.Who is CREW?, October 1st, 2006, justbarkingmad.com.Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW)Foleygate: The Democrats’ October surprise? (UPDATE V - 3:51 PM), Sister Toldjah, October 2, 2006, Sister Toldja.Foley setup? - Part I, Macranger, October 2, 2006, Macsmind.Foley Setup? - Part II - Hitting a Nerve, Macranger, October 3, 2006, Macsmind.Foley Setup? - Part III - Did the Democratic Party Leadership know about Foley? Macranger, October 3, 2006, Macsmind.Resign, Mr. Speaker, Today's Editorial, October 3, 2006, Washington Times.Mr. Speaker, You Must Resign, La Shawn, October 2, 2006, La Shawn Barber's Corner.Blankley Says Hastert Must Go, Captain Ed, October 3, 2006, Captain's Quarters.Should Hastert and Frist Go?, James Joyner, October 3, 2006, Outside the Beltway.

The Great Marijuana Debate: Heads vs. Feds

Margaret Romao Toigo — Fri, 22 Sep 2006 01:29:18 EDT

Because prohibitionists are usually rather averse to participating in any sort of debate in which the untenability of the drug war -- a.k.a. Prohibition II, the sequel with a much bigger budget, a lot more hype, and a far higher body count -- might be exposed, I thought I was onto something interesting when I ran across an Orlando Sentinel article entitled, "Should Marijuana be Legalized?" The September 8, 2006 report heralded the news of "The Great Debate: Heads vs. Feds," in which Steven Hager, editor-in-chief of High Times magazine, and Bob Stutman, a retired Drug Enforcement Administration agent, discuss both sides of the issue of whether marijuana should be "legalized." I was soon disappointed, however, when I learned that this "Great Debate" is not really a debate at all. High Times has some exclusive video highlights of "Heads vs. Feds" and, if they are an example of what transpires at these events, then they are not truly debates, but rather exhibition matches between two gentlemen who have been, for a number of years, performing a very popular routine before standing-room-only crowds.It’s a road show, an intellectual “concert” tour that can be booked through a company called Wolfman Productions, which has in its roster a wide variety of speakers and debaters who are available to perform discussions of numerous topics. Now, entertainment is all well and fine, and fun is a Good Thing, but it does not truly raise awareness about just how deadly and destructive our prohibitionist drug policy really is, no matter how many thoughts this "Heads vs. Feds" production might promote in the minds of its audiences.Of course, the "Heads vs. Feds" show would likely not be nearly as entertaining if it was presented as an honest debate about the principles of prohibition, instead of as a tiresome litany of the same questionable science and skewed statistics of which drug war propaganda has consisted for decades, being "refuted" with anachronistic "hippie" rhetoric and an impassioned defense of the "counterculture."Clearly, this "Great Debate" is not intended to produce a "winner" as that would likely diminish its amusement value as a thought-provoking spectacle for its largely "pro-legalization" audiences – not to mention that Mr. Stutman might not care to play his "Fed" role opposite a "Head" who exposes the preposterousness of the boondoggle known as the "war on drugs," instead of pulling punches and leveling the playing field with weak and uninspired arguments that are even more feckless today than they were back in the 1970s.Mr. Hager’s best one-sentence arguments for “legalizing” marijuana are:"It's good medicine" "Hemp is good for the environment" "We need to stop expanding and privatizing prisons" "We need to stop funding corruption with prohibition prices" "It's the sacrament of my culture"The medical marijuana and industrial hemp issues are important and they are related to the larger goals of drug policy reform, but they should be left out of a debate about the merits of interdicting certain human behaviors and habits as they cloud the issue with facts and ideas that distract listeners from the core argument against drug prohibition, which is that it is, in fact, the "drug problem," and it has been masquerading as a solution to itself for almost a century.I believe it is a given that adults have the right to ingest whatever substances they may find relaxing and/or enjoyable, so long as they do not infringe upon the rights of others. But this assertion does not win friends or influence people, it is proselytization that is usually aimed, as a rallying cry, toward the already converted. Nobody who has been taught by decades of drug war propaganda to fear the potential consequences of drug policy reform really cares that potheads feel oppressed because they might go to jail for breaking laws that are currently on the books in all 50 states. Marijuana laws might not pass the old "laugh test" for those of us who know better, but most people don't know better and their attitudes toward those dark and frightening things of which they wish to remain ignorant are deeply ingrained. Plus, they don't want to touch anything called "counterculture" with one of those proverbial ten-foot poles, let alone make an effort to understand it, or to attempt to cultivate some sort of grudging respect for it.Indeed, we should stop expanding and privatizing prisons. We should also stop funding corruption with the artificial inflation and price supports that prohibitionist policies unintentionally provide to the criminal element.These are the issues with which reformers should go on the offensive because the only way to be perceived as winning a debate is to put your opponents on the defensive and keep them there for the duration.Harsh on the drug warriors! Don't let them back you into a corner, in which you become obliged to defend recreational drug use, the counterculture, and all manner of scary crime and overdose statistics that are laid squarely at the feet of your opposing viewpoint as the consequence of your failure to conform to the fears, uncertainties, and doubts of teeming masses of brainwashed asses!Make the drug prohibitionists defend drug prohibition!A few choice harshing points for the thoughtful reformer's arsenal:If you support the war on drugs, you are in favor of our children having easy access (black market dealers do not ask for I.D.) to drugs that have gotten steadily purer, cheaper and more plentiful since the 1970s. If you support the war on drugs, you also support the cartels, kingpins, mobsters and gangs. Politics making for strange bedfellows, those whose livelihoods depend upon the protections and benefits of prohibitionist policies, are among the staunchest prohibitionists. If you support the war on drugs, you must want yet another generation of our inner city youth to grow up fast and die young in an atmosphere of crime, degradation and fear, for the benefits of the long-established retail drug trade far outweigh any possible risks to those who are born into circumstances of limited opportunity. If you support the war on drugs, you also support organized crime and all the violence of gangsterism, which prohibition has enabled to become a highly diversified, multicultural enterprise.Don't let drug warriors get away with that "soft on crime" routine that frightens so many of our politicians. Prohibition is not just soft on crime, it creates it and it's helpful to it because the "war on drugs" is the ultimate de-regulation policy. To the proprietors of an underground economy that is worth hundreds of billions of dollars, interdiction is nothing but a small line item in their loss columns, part of the cost of doing business, which barely affects their huge, tax-free, bottom lines.Don't fall into the "alcohol trap" in which the prohibitionist agrees that perfectly legal alcohol is, by far, the most widely abused drug whose irresponsible use causes much death and destruction, but then follows up with rhetoric about how this is the best example of "why we don't need another legal drug," as if millions of people are not already using the illegal drug, and as if the drug laws are all that stand between a sober, productive society and a nation of "stoned-out zombies."Don’t be intimidated by the alcohol death statistics, for not only do they include a wide array of alcohol-related illnesses, accidents, and crimes, they are not representative of the vast majority of alcohol users who enjoy alcohol responsibly and moderately, and without incident. It’s the two-percenters who get all the attention, especially when they die of alcohol poisoning, which is a euphemism for an overdose. (While we’re on the subject of overdoses, this seems a fit place to mention that, during the course of over 5000 years of recorded history, there has never been a single overdose death attributed to marijuana alone – and that is most decidedly not due to the lack of an honest effort.)Comparisons of the modern drug war with Prohibition (1920-1933) can be a drug warrior’s worst nightmare because, when they are effectively and accurately applied, they become very convincing arguments that render any and all possible defenses of modern drug prohibition baseless and vulnerable. Never mind whether or not Prohibition reduced alcohol use, there is no way to tell anyway because, just like it is with the modern "drug war," nobody knew who was selling what to whom, or for how much. The Prohibition era statistic that matters most is the murder rate, which began to climb steadily with the ratification of the 18th Amendment in 1920, and did not begin to fall again until several years after the ratification of the 21st Amendment in 1933.Ask a drug warrior to describe the difference between Al Capone and Pablo Escobar and see how he or she changes the subject, dismisses the question as irrelevant, or tries to dance around the obvious similarities with arbitrary rhetoric about "nowadays."Try to avoid using the words "legalize" and "decriminalize" as not only have these terms become propagandized, they never really made any logical sense at all because the solution is not to "legalize" illegal drugs, but rather to regulate unregulated drugs. Advocates of drug policy reform — whom prohibitionists sometimes refer to as "drug legalizers" — understand the true intent behind those words, but the larger society has been well-trained to equate them with chaos and anarchy.A large, but shrinking, majority still believes that drug prohibition acts as a deterrent to the black market. In order to dispel this drug war myth that is so deeply ingrained into the public sentiment, reformers will need to clearly demonstrate how drug prohibition created and continues to enable the black market.Simply demonizing the black market is not enough; prohibitionists already do that when they defend the drug war as "the solution" to it when the fact of the matter is that the black market in unregulated drugs became a low-risk, high profit business because of — not in spite of — the "war on drugs."Drug prohibition prevents the regulation of the drug business, but not the manufacture, sale and use of drugs. No authority or agency really knows who is selling what to whom, where they are selling it, or for how much.Prohibitionist policies have never produced results that justify their cost to taxpayers, but they did create and continue to support a wealthy class of tax-exempt black market profiteers.The black market drug business thrives without taxes, regulations or restrictions. The black market considers interdiction mere "spillage," which can be easily minimized by producing and moving more product. (And so what if quality and purity might suffer in the process? It is not as if any recalls would be imposed.) The black market does not have to comply with any labeling or packaging requirements. Unregulated drugs usually come packaged in plain plastic bags, but millions of people buy them anyway. The black market is not subject to zoning restrictions or licensing or regulatory inspections. Black market businesses do not collect sales taxes or pay income or property taxes. Black market drug dealers sell drugs to anyone, regardless of age, making it easier for kids to buy drugs.The black market drug business has no consumer advocacy agencies or fair business practice and pricing associations. Black market drug dealers, growers, manufacturers, and consumers who have grievances cannot go to a court of law to settle their differences or turn to law enforcement in the event of theft or fraud, so they settle their disputes with violence, which is the primary reason why we must regulate these currently unregulated drugs. In a contest of "Heads vs. Feds," the "Heads" should always win, not so much because we are entitled as citizens of the land of the free and the home of the brave, but because history and pragmatism are on our side.References:"Heads vs. Feds: Drug War Another Regulatory Failure," by Ralph Shnelvar, May 1, 2003, The Colorado Freedom Report."Heads vs. Feds Misses the Point," by Brian Schwartz, May 1, 2003, The Colorado Freedom Report."Board Finds Success with Heads vs. Feds Debate," by Shawn Rice, November 19, 2004, LOQUITUR, The Weekly Student Newspaper of Cabrini College, Pennsylvania. "The Greatest Debate: Heads vs. Feds," posted by CN Staff (source: BG News), December 11, 2002, Cannabis News."Wednesday 'Heads vs. Feds' Debate at MCC," submitted by jmw, April 2, 2005, Rochester Cannabis Coalition (NORML)."Marijuana Debated by Speakers," by Lena Acheson, April 1, 2005, The Online Rocket, Slippery Rock University."Pot Talk: Student (sic) Flock to 'Smoking' Debate," by Matt Perkins, March 28, 2006, The New Hampshire, The Student Publication of the University of New Hampshire.Bureau of Justice Statistics, Homicide Rate, 1900-2002. Source: National Center for Health Statistics, Vital Statistics.

Burning The Flag That Symbolizes The Freedom To Burn The Flag

Margaret Romao Toigo — Thu, 29 Jun 2006 11:29:40 EDT

The "flag burning" controversy has been a hotly debated issue of election-year political opportunism since the Supreme Court's 1989 decision, in Texas vs. Johnson, that burning the American flag is constitutionally protected free speech. On June 27, 2006, a proposed constitutional amendment banning the desecration of the flag was narrowly defeated in the Senate, 66-34, one vote shy of the two-thirds, or 67 votes, required to send it to the states for ratification. The last time the full Senate voted on it, in 2000, the measure came up four votes short. The amendment cleared the House, 286-130, last year.The Flag Protection Amendment, S.J. Res. 12, which was sponsored by Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), read: "The Congress shall have power to prohibit the physical desecration of the flag of the United States."The Flag Protection Amendment, had it passed, would not have directly prohibited the desecration of the flag. It would have required that Congress enact legislation defining the terms "flag" and "desecration" while also empowering that body with the option of imposing penalties upon the violators of any subsequent policies made against flag desecration.The Confounding Circumlocution of a Constitutional Non-ConundrumFlag burning is a phony paradox issue that stirs and exploits the passions of patriots while inspiring jingoistic hypocrisy that is often rationalized in emotional appeals to American sentiment and vanity. Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-California), who calls the flag "a vibrant symbol of our democracy, our shared values, our commitment to justice, and our eternal memory of those who have sacrificed to defend these principles," in a June 16, 2006 USA Today editorial, writes:Some opponents of the Flag Protection Amendment argue that we must choose between trampling on the flag and trampling on the First Amendment. I strongly disagree.There is no idea or thought expressed by the burning of the American flag that cannot be expressed equally well in another manner. This Amendment would leave both the flag and free speech safe.Senator Feinstein's point that ideas can be expressed just as well in other ways that don't involve burning the flag seems reasonable when taken at its face value. (After all, flag burning is not a terribly effective way to win friends and influence people because it tends to close minds and harden hearts against whatever idea or cause is being demonstrated in that manner.)However, a slight scratching of its surface reveals that carefully constructed rhetoric as a thin facade acting as a pretense for the limitation of the expression of political ideas that are often just as unpopular as the act of burning the flag. In democracy, all ideas are equally worthy of expression, regardless of their popularity, which is one of the essential values we share as we work toward fulfilling our commitment to justice. Principles mean nothing when they are rationalized away the moment they sting our sensibilities (and perhaps our pride, too) and become politically, or otherwise, uncomfortable or inconvenient to keep.Those who made sacrifices for our freedom did so to defend our actual principles, not the decorative symbols we use to represent them. A flag is nothing but a piece of cloth. No matter how many are burned, for whatever reasons, our principles, and our commitment to them, will remain.The choice between trampling on the flag or the First Amendment should not be much of a dilemma in light of the fact that the First Amendment protects the right to trample upon the flag and that nothing less than a constitutional amendment is required to restrict that right.We cannot have it both ways. By making the flag “safe," this "Flag Protection Amendment" – as well as the precedents it would set – would, by default, endanger our First Amendment right to the free expression of ideas.The people of a free country have the right to do and say all sorts of awful things that might be considered offensive in polite society, as long as they do not violate anybody else's rights in doing so. Like it or not, this is the way that it is and has to be because a "right" to limit unpopular speech, or the free expression thereof, that is an affront to the sensibilities of civilized society, but is not also a violation of the rights of the people, does not and cannot exist.

Senatorial Same-Sex Marriage Dog Act Disappoints Religious Conservatives

Margaret Romao Toigo — Thu, 8 Jun 2006 17:29:57 EDT

While I find Christian dominionism to be as dreadful a notion as "white power," (both ideologies promote the idea that one group of people is somehow superior and entitled to hold a higher status and greater authority than the people whom it perceives as their inferiors) I cannot help but admire religious conservatives' dedication to their causes and their ability to motivate themselves into action. The religious right is one of the most powerful of America's many and varied political movements and voting blocs because, while they make up just a little less than 10% of the population, nearly all of them vote. What other group can get the executive and legislative branches of our government to sit up and beg, jump through hoops, and wag their tails in anticipation of a reward by simply threatening to stay home on Election Day 2006? This week, our Senate wasted its time and energy debating the Federal Marriage Amendment, which would have prohibited states from recognizing same-sex marriages, knowing that it had no chance whatsoever of passing. President George W. Bush and our Senators performed a dog act just to placate religious conservatives who felt that their special interest in "protecting" the institution of marriage from gay and lesbian people who wish to enter into it had been ignored in favor of issues they deem less important such as the war in Iraq, the immigration controversy, the unstable price of gasoline, and spiraling federal spending.A Predictable EndingAs anticipated by every pundit and politician possessed of a clue (including the amendment's supporters and sponsors), the FMA was soundly rejected by the Senate, who voted 49-48, on Wednesday, June 7, to limit debate and bring an up-or-down vote, which was 11 fewer than the 60 required, effectively killing the measure in the Senate for this year. The House of Representatives is expected to consider its own version of the FMA later this summer. With the gain of four Republican seats since the FMA last came up for a vote, in 2004, proponents of the amendment had anticipated at least a 51-vote majority in the 100-member Senate. The 49 votes to keep the amendment alive were one more than the measure had previously received.The proposed constitutional amendment needs two-thirds support in both the Senate and the House and ratification by at least 38 state legislatures before it can become law. Wednesday's final tally was 18 votes short of the 67 required.Two Republicans, Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania and Judd Gregg of New Hampshire, changed their votes from yes, in 2004, to no. A total of seven Republicans voted to kill the amendment: Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, Susan Collins of Maine, John McCain of Arizona, Olympia Snowe of Maine, and John Sununu of New Hampshire. Chuck Hagel (R-Nebraska), who was traveling with President Bush on Wednesday, did not vote.Senator Gregg said that in 2004, he believed a Massachusetts Supreme Court decision that recognized homosexuals' right to marriage in that state would undermine the authority of other states to prohibit such recognition."Fortunately, such legal pandemonium has not ensued," Mr. Gregg said. "The past two years have shown that federalism, not more federal laws, is a viable and preferable approach."Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska was the only Democrat who supported the amendment. Senator Robert Byrd (D-West Virginia) voted "yes" on the motion to move forward with an up-or-down vote, but said he opposed the measure itself. Two Democrats, Christopher Dodd of Connecticut and John Rockefeller of West Virginia, did not vote.Senator James Jeffords, the independent from Vermont, also opposed cloture.The FalloutIn a statement, President Bush said, "I thank the senators who supported this amendment, but I am disappointed the Senate did not achieve the necessary number of votes to move the amendment process forward," remarking that the vote was, "the start of a new chapter in this important national debate."Mr. Bush also reiterated his position that, "Marriage is the most fundamental institution of our society, and it should not be redefined by activist judges," an obvious bow to the religious right's special interest in demonizing the one branch of government that cannot be trained to jump through political hoops in exchange for votes.Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, a likely 2008 presidential contender, offered his own version of that same song and dance, "For thousands of years, marriage -- the union between a man and a woman -- has been recognized as an essential cornerstone of society," he said. "We must continue fighting to ensure the constitution is amended by the will of the people rather than by judicial activism."The amendment's supporters angrily denounced the Senate for not putting the amendment to an up-or-down vote. Robert Knight, director of Concerned Women of America's Culture and Family Institute, said he was insulted by comments from some senators that gay marriage was not a pressing national issue. "There's nothing more important than protecting marriage and families, because without them the United States faces a bleak future in which government is daddy and mommy and the state keeps growing to pick up the pieces of the shattered social order," Mr. Knight said in a statement.An advertisement by the Family Research Council, a socially conservative advocacy group, targeted Senators John McCain and Hillary Clinton (D-New York), likely 2008 presidential candidates, declaring that "[They] are ignoring America on gay marriage." Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission president, Dr. Richard Land, said, "Defenders of marriage owe a debt of gratitude to Majority Leader Bill Frist and the other senators who insisted over the objections of many of their colleagues on both sides of the aisle that this issue come to the floor for a vote. They should also draw encouragement that we did get one more vote than in 2004." Dr. Land also remarked that, "They should be disgusted by the pathetic failure of the Senate to do far better on this issue than it did." Matt Daniels, president of The Alliance for Marriage, which drafted the FMA, pledged to continue its effort. "Today's vote was an important step in the democratic process to protect the future of marriage for our children and grandchildren." Mr. Daniels said, "The future of marriage in America is a race between the courts and [the amendment]."Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, called the Senate "grossly out of step with the American people" but added that "values voters" would work to elect candidates who support the amendment.While a majority of Americans still defines marriage as an exclusively heterosexual institution, an ABC News poll released this week revealed that an equal majority opposes amending the Constitution for that purpose.

Senate Debate on Same-sex Marriage Poses Risks to GOP

Margaret Romao Toigo — Mon, 5 Jun 2006 04:26:49 EDT

In a congressional election-year pitch to religious conservatives whose interests have been neglected in favor of far more pressing matters such as the war in Iraq, immigration, and the price of gasoline, President George W. Bush, in his weekly radio address, urged the Senate to pass the Federal Marriage Amendment, asserting that it is needed to prevent what he refers to as "activist judges" from overturning state legislation against same-sex marriage.The amendment would prohibit states from recognizing same-sex marriages while leaving state legislatures free to make their own decisions about what -- if any -- legal accommodations, other than marriage, they will make for same-sex couples. In order to become law, the proposed amendment needs two-thirds support in both the Senate and the House, after which it must be ratified by a minimum of 38 state legislatures.In spite of the widespread belief that the amendment has the proverbial snowball's chance of passing -- even the bill's sponsor, Senator Wayne Allard (R-Colorado), has acknowledged this political verisimilitude -- the Senate nonetheless plans to debate the proposed constitutional ban on same-sex marriage this week.Democrats have said that the upcoming debate on this issue is a waste of Senate floor time, and is nothing more than a pre-midterm election appeal to social conservatives whose votes were essential to Mr. Bush's re-election.The Unappreciated Religious Right Apparently Mr. Bush and several Congressional Republicans are beginning to take heed of recent threats from the religious right, hard-working political activists who, according to Gary Bauer of the Campaign for Working Families, "[are] a major reason why the president is sitting in the Oval Office today."Mr. Bauer had issued an earlier warning that, if Mr. Bush doesn't start crusading against same-sex marriage, "this is just going to be one more thing that keeps people at home on Election Day."Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council has also cautioned Mr. Bush, telling Fox News that the president faces "the very real potential of deflating what's left of the GOP base. They deflated the fiscal conservatives, because of [the increases in] spending, and now they risk deflating the social conservatives by failing to act on our interests."Enter The Moderates While Mr. Bush and several socially conservative Republican Senators have pushed for the marriage amendment, a number of other Republican voices have dissented. Senators John McCain (R-Arizona) and John Sununu (R-New Hampshire), oppose the amendment, saying that marriage is a matter that is best left to the states. Several other Republican Senators are also against the measure. Meanwhile, Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska is the only Democrat who has said that he will vote for the amendment.First Lady Laura Bush, in an interview on Fox News, advised against politicizing the issue, "I don't think it should be used as a campaign tool, obviously," she said. "It requires a lot of sensitivity to just talk about the issue -- a lot of sensitivity." Mary Cheney, daughter of Vice President Dick Cheney, said, on CNN, that "writing discrimination into the Constitution of the United States is fundamentally wrong." The vice president spelled out his position on the subject in August of 2004, "Lynne and I have a gay daughter, so it's an issue that our family is very familiar with. ... With respect to the question of relationships, my general view is that freedom means freedom for everyone. People ought to be able to free -- ought to be free to enter into any kind of relationship they want to." However, likely being mindful that the November 2004 presidential election had not yet taken place, Mr. Cheney added, "At this point ... my own preference is as I've stated. But the president makes basic policy for the administration. And he's made it. " Incumbents Beware Not only are the religious conservatives feeling neglected, moderate Republicans are also feeling somewhat alienated. A number of Republicans from both factions are troubled and confused by the Party's mixed messages on the subject of same-sex marriage.These fractures within the GOP have caused a disconcerting paradox for several vulnerable Republican incumbents whose political balancing acts will be judged at the polls this November. If they push hard on issues like the Federal Marriage Amendment, religious conservatives will likely respond favorably, but moderates who favor small government and states' rights will be turned off.Republican Party strategist Craig Shirley suggests that, "There is a fear, among some in the party, that the Republicans are being identified too much as a theological party."According to GOP pollster Tony Fabrizio, half of today's Republicans are "theocrats" who believe government should "promote traditional values by protecting traditional marriage." And the other half wants less government intrusion into the personal lives of the people.Mr. Fabrizio says, "We can't afford to alienate moderate voters any more than they are already alienated... . Issues have a shelf life. Gay marriage passed everywhere [on state ballots] in 2004, but today, a lot of people look at that issue and think, 'It is so over and done.' Our party base is already fracturing, and if we emphasize gay marriage now, it would create new divisions."What The Polls Say Recent polls show that there is far less support for amending the Constitution to ban same-sex marriage than there was in 2004. According to a March 22, 2006 report by Pew Research Center, 51% currently oppose the civil recognition of same-sex marriages, which is a dramatic change from the 63% who were against it in 2004. Two years ago, 59% of Republicans strongly opposed same-sex marriage, while only 41% take that position now.Likewise, the percentage who are in favor of same-sex marriage has increased greatly from 29% in 2004 to 39% today. In June of 1996, just 27% favored legalizing same-sex marriage. Support grew to 35% in March of 2001, and increased to 38% in the summer of 2003. That widening support fell away in February 2004, when the Massachusetts Supreme Court recognized homosexuals' right to marriage. The subsequent debates over that historic decision sparked a temporary resurgence in opposition, which did not last long after the 2004 election.A national debate on same-sex marriage could potentially cause a backlash against socially conservative Republicans, who may be perceived as giving priority to an issue moderates find unimportant when contrasted with serious matters like the war in Iraq, immigration, and the price of gasoline. Same-sex marriage didn't even make the top 20 in a recent Fox News poll of issues about which Americans are most concerned.Furthermore, a study by a conservative-leaning research center, the American Enterprise Institute, observed that public opinion has become increasingly more accepting of homosexuality. Pew Research has also found this to be the case. In addition to shifting public sentiment toward same-sex marriage, they report that 46% are in favor of allowing gay and lesbian people to adopt children, up from 38% in 1999. And the American people support, by a wide margin of 60% to 32%, a policy that allows homosexuals to serve openly in the military.

Deconstructing a Defense of Drug Prohibition

Margaret Romao Toigo — Sat, 3 Jun 2006 22:28:09 EDT

The "war on drugs" was lost the moment it was declared. As we should have learned from the results of that "Noble Experiment" that was conducted between 1920 and 1933, outlawing things that the people, for the most part, usually enjoy without violating the rights of others does not result in orderly and unquestioning compliance, but rather in gangsterism and the corruption and violence of the black markets that naturally form to supply the demand for those outlawed things. Nonetheless, prohibitionists continue to insist that interdiction can eventually work, "if only..."In a May 29, 2006 commentary for the St. Louis Post Dispatch, Daniel K. Duncan and Edward F. Tasch of the St. Louis area chapter of the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Abuse made yet another weak and logically flawed case for the continuation of a ridiculously ineffective policy of drug interdiction that creates more problems than it solves while masquerading as a solution to itself.The title of the editorial in question is, "Legalization is a Terrible Idea," which, ironically enough, is a concept with which I heartily agree. "Legalizing" currently illegal drugs will only serve to unclog our criminal justice system and eventually reduce our prison populations, but it will do nothing about the vast underground economy that supplies the never-ending demand for certain uncontrolled substances. If we are to ever have any hope of eliminating the black markets and the gangsterism, corruption, and violence that go with them, we must face the reality of our human nature, abandon the pipe dream of a "Drug Free America," and take control of the market, bringing it out of the shadows and into the light so that we can know who is selling what to whom and for how much. For this purpose, "legalizing" illegal drugs is not enough. We must go several steps farther and regulate unregulated drugs.Strangely enough, Mr. Duncan and Mr. Tasch opened their editorial with a quotation from H.L. Mencken, "For every problem there is one solution: simple, neat, and wrong," an axiom that is congruent with regard to prohibitionist policies as well as the notion of "legalization."UntenableDefending an untenable position is impossible if one plays by the strict rules of logic. Prohibitionists, knowing that such contests almost invariably serve to reveal the numerous weaknesses of their position, do not often engage in actual debates with tangible opponents, but rather with themselves, acting in both roles so that they may avoid the embarrassment of being faced with the inevitable exposure of the untenability of the boondoggle known as the war on drugs. When prohibitionists implement this strategy of debating with themselves, they make numerous tactical errors, such as opening with a concession that the very policy they are attempting to defend is a failure:So, the war on drugs is not working. Agreed. But the question to ask is, "Why?" Is it not working because using drugs is really a fine idea, and we've been unjust and unreasonable in not letting everyone do whatever they want to do? Or is it not working because the way we've gone about waging this war set us up for failure?Without a doubt, we think it's the latter. Indeed, having set up a nifty little false dichotomy, Mr. Duncan and Mr. Tasch appear to have hit the nail on the head with that one, thereby sucking us into the illusion that the failure of the war on drugs is a matter of methodology, not the policy itself. I am not fooled -- and neither is anybody else who does not take comfort in the 80-plus year-old status quo.Ostensibly predicting that such proclamations carry no weight withoutsubsequent proposals of ideas for more effective implementations, Mr. Duncan and Mr. Tasch go on to hypothesize that the trouble with the institution of drug prohibition is that it focuses upon supply instead of demand:The premise underlying these approaches is the idea that supply drives demand: The more drugs there are, the more people use them. It is a fatally flawed assumption. The truth is just the opposite: Demand drives supply, and until we accept the significance of this fundamental failure of understanding, the strategies we come up with will continue to fail. In other words, the failure of the war on drugs is no justification for legalizing these harmful substances.The quotation above belies the fact that we already have numerous laws and policies that are intended to address demand, such as drug courts and other "harm reduction" measures.And nevermind the oversimplification of the complex economic theory known as supply and demand, for it is quite obviously a clumsy propagandistic segue into an emotional appeal to ignorance-supported fears of outlaw drugs -- as well as the old implied threat of anarchy behind the notion of "legalization," which is actually a prohibitionist term for a sensible drug policy that involves regulation rather than interdiction (it is for this very reason that drug policy reform activists and advocates should avoid using the "L" word and the "D" word).Cue The Straw Men!What would a defense of the drug war be without those thatched bamboozlers? Mr. Duncan and Mr. Tasch apparently understand their usefulness:People still steal, so let's legalize stealing. People still speed, so let's remove all the speed limits. People still drink and drive, so let's legalize drinking and driving. Date-rape continues; let's legalize date-rape. The point? Shifting from one flawed premise to another solves nothing.The classic sophism contained within the above paragraph is almost unworthy of a response, but it must nonetheless be addressed for the sake of folks who might be unfamiliar with the concept of "red herrings."Mr. Duncan and Mr. Tasch have submitted a proposition that is not logically relevant to its "conclusion." The vast majority of outlaw drug consumers do not actually violate the rights of others while they are enjoying their favored inebriants. However, thieves, speeders, drunk drivers and date rapists most decidedly do violate the rights of their victims when they steal, speed, drive while intoxicated and rape their dates.In what could be construed as an homage to the 18th Amendment, Mr. Duncan and Mr. Tasch address the question of why alcohol is legal when it is our nation's most abused drug:Incredibly, advocates of legalizing drugs often point to alcohol as an example of a successfully legalized drug. This is a terribly weak argument. Do they really not understand that -- in terms of lives disrupted, ruined and ended before their time -- the legal drug alcohol is by far a bigger problem than any other drug?Don't Mr. Duncan and Mr. Tasch understand why the 21st Amendment was ratified after only 13 years of Prohibition? Apparently not.The Good StuffAside form the fact that drug policy reformers are much better dressed nowadays than we were back in the 1960s and 70s, the toughest obstacle facing today's drug prohibitionists is, by far, our very own American history. Juxtapositions of the modern drug war with Prohibition (1920-1933) are a drug warriors' worst nightmare because they are the most effective and convincing arguments in the reformers' arsenal. It is these historical comparisons that have rendered any and all possible defenses of the war on drugs baseless, ineffective and vulnerable. Some say that by legalizing drugs, the gangs that subsist on the revenue from trafficking will cease to be a problem. Nonsense. Kids don't join gangs to sell drugs; they join gangs to belong to something, to gain a sense of identity and to feel protected.While it is indeed true that kids often join gangs for a sense of identity and belonging that they may not get in their homes, that sense of identity and belonging springs from the central purpose of the gang's business interests, which do include the high risk undertaking of theft (cars, jewelry, electronics and prescription drugs), but are comprised mostly of the low risk enterprise of "dealing," the manufacture, distribution and sale of unregulated drugs.How about the argument that legalizing drugs would eliminate the black market in drugs and, thus, reduce the number of crimes committed to support the habits of addicts. Really? So once drugs were legalized, all the addicts suddenly would get good-paying jobs to earn the money they need to buy their drugs legally? Ridiculous.Our policy of drug prohibition and interdiction provides the untaxed and unregulated black market with artificial inflation and price supports that sustain the high market value of certain unpatentable drugs, which would become very inexpensive under a policy of regulation and taxation. However, while some addicts do commit crimes in order to support their habits, they are usually non-violent offenses such as, shoplifting, panhandling, and prostitution. Meanwhile, the violent crimes are most often committed by the dealers, not their customers. The violence associated with the drug trade almost always springs from business disputes between drug dealers, their associates, and competitors because, in the realm of the anarchical underground economy, the manufacturers, distributors and sellers of unregulated drugs do not have access to courts of law and must therefore "settle" their business disputes with guns, knives and bombs instead of lawyers, mediators and judges. Meet the New Solutions, Same as the Old SolutionsMr. Duncan's and Mr. Tasch's proposed solutions involve three basic strategies: preventing young people from starting to use drugs, making sure that these prevention programs work by requiring "follow-up public education and awareness campaigns of extremely high quality and sophistication," and a combination of a "degree of decriminalization" (the old "D" word rears its semantically ugly head) and "greater access to quality treatment programs." Rounding out that third "strategy," of course, is the old prohibitionist standby: "and much more stringent enforcement of anti-trafficking laws." This one's been tried numerous times before only to be eschewed in favor of less draconian measures once the classic dynamic of "getting tough on drugs" is rediscovered: increases in drug law enforcement are always followed by increases in corruption and violent crime.And let's not forget that, in Saudi Arabia, the punishment for drug dealing is beheading -- and, yet, they still have addicts.ConclusionDrug abuse is a public health problem that will never be fully solved because it is not a condition in and of itself, it is a side effect that has been attributed to a myriad of disorders, conditions, diseases, dysfunctions and syndromes, which are associated with self-destructive behaviors. People don't abuse drugs (legal, illegal, prescription or over-the-counter) simply because they exist and have addictive properties, but because the drugs mask their pain and make them feel better -- until they wear off, at least. If we are to address drug abuse and addiction as a public health problem rather than as an issue of law enforcement, then we must take our focus away from drugs themselves, regardless of their various legal statuses, for they are not truly relevant to the underlying causes of self-destructive behavior. Mr. Duncan and Mr. Tasch believe that the public health problem of drug abuse can be solved "by honestly acknowledging what we've learned about what works and what doesn't." While I wholeheartedly agree with this sentiment, I do not understand why they have not applied this formula to that other "drug problem" that causes more troubles than it solves while pretending to be the one and only solution to itself.