A New Years Thought

I was talking with a friend recently about thinking and doubt. My friend told me that he has been questioning ideas and beliefs that he's held for a very long time.

Personally, I agree with Socrates, who insisted that the "unexamined life is not worth living." And lest anyone think he didn't really mean that, Socrates uttered those words while explaining why he couldn't abandon his practice of questioning prominent Athenian citizens as an alternative to execution.

I, of course, am not as courageous as Socrates. But I agree that examining one's beliefs is, on the whole, a good thing. A scary and dangerous thing. But in the end, a good thing.

So I commended my friend.

He then added that, because he no longer feels as certain as he once did about traditional theological teachings, many people in his church fear that he has gone off the deep end. In response, and off the top of my head - while pumping gas no less - I replied:

"No one goes off the deep end by not believing something."

The more I think about that statement, the more convinced I am that it is true. The deep end and beyond is for believers, not skeptics. Unbelievers may be many things, but they rarely become nut jobs. Believers, on the other hand, frequently do somersaults with a twist off the ten-meter board and plunge into deep waters. Some of them never come up for air.

Even more interesting is the fact that in American politics, "people of faith" tend to be associated with what we call "conservativism," whereas secular people tend to be "liberals." The reason this is interesting is that skepticism is the conservative epistemological posture. Belief is the wild-eyed liberal practice.

Don't get me wrong - I'm not criticising people for believing things - I believe many things myself. I just think we ought to acknowledge that belief, not doubt, is the path to crazytown, and the less skepticism we bring to the practice of forming our beliefs, the more likely we are to arrive at that destination.

Happy New Year

Joe H.

Move Your Money

I think this is a great idea. If any of you have money invested in one of the big Wall Street investment banks, bust a move.

Joe H.

Republican Nihilism

This is a pretty fair explanatory treatment of conservative resistance to progressive change and the crippling effect an inflexible anti-government ideology has on the conservatives' ability to address social problems. The article is a bit long, but it will provide you with insight and perspective on the reasons, and methods by which, conservatives resist progressive change. Apocalyptic hysteria - what I call the "the sky is falling, we do this at our peril" strategy, is not new. It greets all major reform efforts.

"Death Panels," anyone?

The authors have also traced and reprinted conservative predictions of the doom to come after the enactment of each major reform - going back as far as the enactment of restrictions on child labor in the early 1900's. The alarmism is remarkably similar in each case.

And it always turns out to be dead wrong!

Note - as a caveat, let me say that I respect the conservative impulse to go slow and change incrementally. There is wisdom in recognizing that human reason is limited and fallible, particularly in its ability to predict the effects of interference with complex organic systems. Thank God we have a food and drug administration.

That being said, I think the article definitively establishes that we should ignore the entirely predictable alarmism that precedes all political efforts to reform broken systems and/or end injustices.

I am upset that there is no public option - and that insurance will be mandatory albiet with no effective price control - except community pricing, which I favor. I think that is a big give away to the insurance industry that was unnecessary.

Nonetheless, the legislation is a major step in the right direction.

Merry Christmas!

Joe H.

Death Panel Redux

For those of you who refuse to believe that Sarah Palin is a pathological liar, I give you death panel redux.

What's remarkable is that even when she's caught red - handed in a lie, her supporters suffer no cognitive dissonence, and the press continues to take her seriously.

Actually, that is not merely remarkable - it is terrifying.

Joe

Decade of the Con

In this column, Frank Rich gets the last decade exactly right. 2000-2009 was the decade of the "Con."

Consider the disasters wrought by our credulity. Rich lays them out for us to behold. I have already confessed that I am among those taken in by Obama's con - not his timidity, as Frank describes it, but his rank dishonesty and/or political cowardice in refusing to do what he promised.

My wife and I watched "Invictus" yesterday afternoon. At one point in the movie, Nelson Mandela, who has become the president of South Africa after a 30 year imprisonment for his opposition to apartheid, opposes his political party's plan to rename the national rugby team and replace its traditional Green and Gold colors - a name and emblem revered by by white Afrikaners, but despised by the black majority as symbols of their former oppressors. Knowing that this would confirm the worst fears of White Afrikaners, Mandela risks his political standing to challenge his supporters to rise above their legitimate grievances and hatred and be better than than they are expected to be - and he succeeds. But the most moving part of the scene is when he is travelling to meet with his supporters and his aid is urging him to not to intervene and risk losing their support. Mandela responds with "the moment I am not willing to risk losing their support is the moment that I am unfit to lead." Enough said.

By the way, all of the disasters of 2000-2009 will pale in comparison to the disaster we'll visit on our children if we do nothing about global warming. Consider this scenario.

At any rate, I know that emotion is far more powerful than reason. But the only way humanity is going to survive is if it develops a passion for the truth, the capacity for critical analysis, and a clear headed appreciation of the inexhaustible willingness of people - even our erstwhile allies - to deceive us for personal gain.

Over 100 years ago, William Kingdom Clifford penned this short article - "The Ethics of Belief." His conclusion is overstated and surely wrong. But his basic point - that each and every one of us has a moral obligation to exercise our faculty of belief responsibly - and the arguments he he invokes in support of that conviction - are our only hope of survival.

Joe H.

What Drives Me Crazy

Do you know what drives me crazy? I am a Christian. I believe in one God, the father, the almighty, the maker of heaven and earth, and of all things seen and unseen. I believe in one lord and savior, Jesus Christ, . . .

And yet I have far more in common with Rachel Maddow than I do with the yahoos she's making fun of for their "prayercast" efforts to defeat healthcare reform. Health care reform that will save tens of thousands of lives and provide security against bankruptcy - medical bills are the leading cause of bankruptcy in the United States -is opposed by Christian leaders.

How did we get to this point?

Joe

"Health Care Reform Please - and hold the Crap!"

Regarding his opposition to the current senate healthcare reform bill, and his relationship to Obama - some have speculated, and I have even wondered, whether he might mount a primary challenge to Obama in 2012 - Howard Dean responded:

"I remember what it was like to have George Bush as president and I'm not on a mission to destroy the Democratic Party, having rebuilt it. But we didn't elect Democrats to pass crap. We elected Democrats to make a difference"

Here here!

Joe H.

Substance vs. Lunacy

This is from Steve Benen of the Washington Monthly. His Blog is called "Political Animal." Its a great blog for politcos. I agree with him entirely on this issue.

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THE KIND OF DEBATE THAT'S LONG OVERDUE.... Maybe this is an esoteric point, but it occurs to me that the quality of the policy debate between competing progressive contingents is infinitely better and more interesting than the policy debate between Democrats and Republicans we witnessed over the last eight or nine months. It's probably an inconsequential observation, but I think it nevertheless speaks to a larger truth.

The thought came to me after reading two op-eds this morning -- Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) attacking health care reform from the right in the Wall Street Journal, and former Gov. Howard Dean (D-Vt.) going after reform from the left in the Washington Post. Both called for the defeat of the Senate Democratic plan, and both were written by leading figures on their respective side of the ideological fence, but only one had something sensible to offer.

Coburn's piece was absurd, wildly misleading, and included arguments that seemed oddly detached from the substantive reality of the debate. Dean's piece, which I personally disagree with, was nevertheless policy focused, serious, and credible. Dean's piece conveys the concerns of someone who cares deeply about health care and improving the dysfunctional system, while Coburn's piece reads like someone auditioning to be Sean Hannity's fill-in guest host.

Of course, it's not just two op-eds on a Thursday that bolster the point. Much has been made this week of the often-intense dispute between activists and wonks -- progressive reform advocates who think the Democratic plan has merit and is worth passing, and progressive reform advocates who think the Democratic plan is a failure and should be defeated. It's an important dispute, with significant implications.

But notice the quality of the debate. Note that Howard Dean, Markos Moulitsas, much of the FireDogLake team and others are raising important questions and pointing to real flaws. At the same time, note that Ezra Klein, Jonathan Cohn, Nate Silver and others are offering meaningful defenses of the Democratic plan, based on substantive evaluations.

Progressive Activists and Progressive Wonks are at each other's throats this week, but they want largely the same goals. Their differences are sincere and significant, but the intensity of their dispute is matched by the potency of their arguments.

And then turn your attention to the other side of the divide, and notice the quality of the arguments conservatives and Republicans have offered -- and continue to offer -- in this debate. Death panels. Socialism. Hitler. Government takeover. Socialized medicine. Incomprehensible charts. Incessant whining about the number of pages in a proposal.

The United States could have had a great debate this year about one of the most important domestic policies of them all. But Americans were denied that debate, because the right didn't have an A game to bring. Intellectual bankruptcy left conservatives with empty rhetorical quivers.

But as it turns out, it's not too late for the debate, we were just looking in the wrong place. We expected the fight of the generation to occur between the right and left, when the more relevant and interesting dispute was between left and left.

Time will tell who'll win, and no matter what happens, the argument will continue beyond this one piece of legislation. But regardless what side of the dispute you're on, it's worth appreciating the vibrancy, energy, and seriousness with which progressives are engaging in the debate, as compared to the incoherent, ridiculous, and dull qualities our friends on the right have brought to the table.

Joe H.

Storms of Stupitity

Climate change and mass stupidity. This may be a lethal combination.

Joe H.

If I Were a Senator - Update

Although the other Democratic senators appear to be angry with Joe Lieberman for preventing a medicare buy in for people aged 55-64, or a genuine public option that would compete with private insurers, I'm pretty sure its feigned anger, entirely contrived.

Why?

Well, if I were a senator, I would immediately announce my intention to join a Republican filibuster unless one of these two options was included in a final bill -and I'm pretty sure Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Sherrod Brown of Ohio could be coaxed into joining me.

What then? Harry Reid has expressed strong support for the Public Option in the past - so he should be open to forcing the Senate to have an actual debate - a real filibuster - going on 24 hours a day, until somebody blinks.

Joe Lieberman is currently under a lot of pressure for opposing a measure that he has long endorsed, purely out of spite. There is no evidence whatsoever that he believes any of the factually false and ever changing arguments he's given for his opposition to lowering the age for Medicare eligibility, or creating a public option. There is lots of evidence to the contrary.

How long would it take for Lieberman to blink? Not long, I suspect, particularly if Harry Reid simply refused to allow the Senate to move on to new business until cloture was achieved (cloture is a vote to end debate and vote on the underlying bill). If Reid had any perspective, and he surely does, he'd see that a month of wasted Senate time now, could give him a legacy rivaling progressive giants of the past. If he really wanted it, he'd use his power to get it.

Paying homage to an idea is one thing - fighting for it with all the tools at your disposal is another. So I think this is all an act. We're getting the bill that the insurance companies wanted - mandates for individuals to buy insurance, government subsidies for poor people to buy insurance, but no limits on premiums (community pricing assures that high risk individuals will not be priced out of the market, but there is no control on the community price that everyone will pay, as there is no effective competition).

So, we have a Democratic Congress and Administration herding American citizens into the loving arms of private insurance companies. Who would have believed this was possible?

And to think - someone my age and with my education believed that "yes we can" bullshit.

Joe H.

Update: Nobody says it better than Olberman.

Dear Nobodies

This was sobering - but I suspect it accurately describes the state of American Democracy.

Joe H.

Holy Joe - UPDate

Each year, ten's of thousands of people suffer and/or die in the United States prematurely, due to their lack of access to health care. The House of Representatives recently passed a reform bill that (1) disallows insurers from screening applicants for preexisting conditions, or charging higher rates for health insurance to select high risk groups;(2) prevents insurers from dumping insureds once they become ill; (3)mandates that everyone purchase health insurance and provides tax payer funded subsidies to poor people for this purpose - a real "win win win" for poor people who get health care, insurance companies who get millions of new customers, and the public at large who get healthier more productive fellow citizens; and (4) creates a public insurance option that will not be tax payer subsidized - except for the subsidies for the poor, which can go to all of the health plans.

The Senate is debating health care reform right now. Joe Lieberman insists that there be no public insurance option. He threatened to join a Republican led filibuster - senators must continue to debate a bill unless 60 of them agree to end debate and vote on the bill - if a public option is in the final senate legislation.

Okay, Joe's a senator from Connecticut, the insurance capital of the world. And he's bitter at the Democrats for a variety of reasons - despite the fact that they let him keep the chairmanship of the Committee on Homeland Security - despite his campaigning for John McCain in the general election. But threatening to join an opposition led filibuster on your caucus' signature domestic issue? That's too much.

Hold the phone - some crafty senator or staffer comes up with a compromise alternative - expand the eligibility to buy into medicare to age 55. No new government run insurance program - which was Lieberman's big problem with the House's bill. Not only that, it is an idea that Lieberman himself endorsed just three months ago. Wait . . . turns out he's endorsed the idea for years!

I guess that solves the problem.

Eh . . . no, not really. Lieberman has says he will filibuster that compromise as well. He is joining the opposition to fight a proposal he's championed for years!

What kind person holds up major legislation that will save thousands of lives out of narcissistic spite? It has, after all, been definitively established that Lieberman is not holding things up out of principle - the compromise is the one he has championed in the past. That means he's either acting out of greed, or spite, or the need to draw attention to himself.

Throw his ass out of the caucus. He's evil and we don't need him.

Joe H.

Update: Ta-nehisi Coates put the point perfectly. Liberman is has utterly dishonored himself.

Fundamentalism

I have previously described "fundamentalism" as the inability to seriously entertain the possibility that your belief in a particular proposition, or collection of propositions, is wrong. I adopted this view after reading "Kindly Inquisitors" by conservative author Jonathan Rauch - a book I cannot recommend more highly, despite the fact that it is over 20 years old.

Anyway, in today's New York Times, Paul Krugman suggests an equally apt definition - the inability to be persuaded or dissuaded by evidence. Krugman is discussing the United States experiment with financial deregulation, beginning in the 1980's, and the corresponding financial calamities that it has spawned. His discussion is highly worth the time it will take you to read it.

The interesting thing is that not a single Republican voted for the reform bill last Friday, modest though it was in its re regulatory efforts. Not one!

Amazing.

Joe H.

American Exceptionalism

I recently saw a clip of Karl Rove criticizing President Obama for not believing in "American Exceptionalism." That term, of course, means different things to different people. But the basic idea is that America and Americans are "exceptional," in one way or another and, because we are exceptional, America has a special role to play in world affairs.

Exceptionalism, or a belief in the superiority of one's "kind," is a universal phenomenon. Much of the time, it remains an unspoken assumption among the members of a population. And when it is stated, it is usually stated indirectly. "God Bless the USA" - when spoken by an American, or displayed on a car bumper - translates roughly as "we're better than anyone else."

Here's a little secret. I've long believed that America, as a nation, is superior to every nation on earth. Individual Americans fall along a wide spectrum ranging from truly extraordinary to vile. But America, as a nation, is, or at least was, exceptional.

But given that Karl Rove has publicly endorsed government sponsored torture - or what amounts to it - and participated in an administration that lied and/or scared the nation into invading a country that was not threatening us, and criticized every Supreme Court Decision limiting the Bush Administration's power to detain "suspected terrorists" without due process, I'm pretty sure Karl Rove understands that term in a very different way than I do.

America, as I understand it, is a social contract. America is an agreement of a population to govern themselves according to certain key political ideals - the rule of law, due process, equality before the law, political equality, governmental respect for individual rights, respect for property rights, liberty and justice for all, and so forth.

We have never lived up to these ideals perfectly - we have never even fully understood what they require of us. But we have tried live up to these ideals. And to the extent that we have lived up to them, we have prospered and benefited ourselves and the rest of the world like no other nation before us.

Karl Rove speaks of "American exceptionalism" and yet endorses state sponsored torture, indefinite detention without due process, government spying without judicial warrants, and so forth.

Come to think of it, so does 47% of the population of this country.

Devotion to a political movement or agenda (or to a leader) often overwhelms devotion to overarching political ideals. We've seen that time and time again. It is very dangerous when people overwhelmed in this manner come to control the power accumulated by those who came before them and who remained faithful, albeit imperfectly, to our overarching political ideals.

Karl Rove is no patriot. His understanding of America and American exceptionalism is very different from mine. He doesn't love our country. He loves power, pure and simple.

Joe H

Group identity and Corruption - Follow Up

In my previous post titled "Group Identity and Corruption," I noted that the tendency of Obama supporters to excuse Obama's adoption of noxious and unamerican Bush administration policies on civil liberties - policies that Obama and they rightly denounced the Bush administration for - was a product of celebrity and/or hero worship.

Apparently I was right.

Joe H.

The Importance of Obeying the Constitution

This short article by Owen Fiss, crystallizes in clear, unequivocal prose, the damage to our constitutional system that a program of indefinite detention without trial for terrorism suspects would cause. I hope you'll take the time to read it.

I used to teach political philosophy. The most fundamental issue in political philosophy is power - who may legitimately exercise coercive power over others, and under what conditions? What renders the exercise of coercive power against the unwilling legitimate?

Our answer, courtesy of John Locke, has always been, "the consent of the governed." The constitution, and in particular, the Bill of Rights, including Amendments 13, 14, and 15, is a statement of the terms of our consent. It is the agreement, and more importantly, the moral commitment, that our founders, and all subsequent Americans, have made with each other to limit the power of our government to act against any person in the world. Adherence to the constitution's limitations is a necessary condition of the legitimacy of our government. Period!

We must not forget this most basic fact because we are afraid, or because cynical political opponents will accuse us of "endangering the homeland," if we don't abandon the constitution. We must remember that "America" is only worth dying for to the extent that we remain committed to the basic ideals of Due Process, Equal Protection, and Liberty and Justice for all.

Abandon these ideals and you've abandoned America.

Joe H.

A Good Question

Regarding the new Pew Poll showing the 47% of AMERICANS believe it is permissible to torture SUSPECTED terrorists, Glen Greenwald asks:

"[H]ow is it possible to credibly maintain that we believe torture is some sort of extreme crime and absolute evil when we sat by while our political leaders did it and now refuse to comply with our obligations to prosecute it?"

Good question Glen. I really don't know:

"By doing that, aren't we implicitly though unambiguously conveying that, whatever our rhetoric, we don't really think torture is all that bad?"

Another good question Glen. I guess so:

"We don't "Look Forward" when we think truly awful crimes have been committed; we Look Backwards (sometimes very far backwards) and prosecute them. Whatever else is true, that's the message most Americans have received and embraced: torture is not really worth prosecuting so it must not be truly heinous."

Precisely. And now this view has gained near majority approval.

What's amazing to me is that we did what we did to defend ourselves from terrorists. We seem incapable of understanding that a terrorist's main purpose is to create fear sufficient to cause its objects to harm themselves. I'd have to agree that when a terrorist succeeds in getting half the population of a constitutional democracy to abandon the core principles of that democracy out of fear, they've accomplished their purpose.

Joe H

Group Identity and Corruption

I used to tell my students that labeling themselves was the quickest way to develop a knee-jerk belief system. Identifying with a group, any group, creates psychological pressure to adopt that group's belief system. This pressure, coupled with our inherent laziness, leads us to adopt beliefs that we have not investigated, scrutinized, or critically assessed. I'm a liberal. Liberals oppose the death penalty. I oppose the death penalty. Jeez, that was easy.

The reason I mention this is that group devotion may be destroying our ability to govern ourselves while maintaining our moral bearings. Today I read that a new Pew Research poll found that 47% of Americans believe that it is acceptable to torture suspected terrorists in order to keep the country safe.

FORTY-SEVEN PERCENT! SUSPECTED TERRORISTS!

I know, I know. We shouldn't torture anyone - ever. But I am slightly more sympathetic, just slightly, to the idea of torturing confirmed terrorists in contrast to suspected terrorists. Is that wrong?

Anyway, I've also noted recently that most of Obama's supporters are making excuses for his reversals on key civil liberty issues, despite the fact that both THEY AND HE repeatedly and categorically denounced these policies during the Bush administration and during Obama's campaign.

What's happening is clear. Identity is trumping moral appraisal. Bush and Cheeny set up a torture regime. They're my guys - they're on my team - my team needs to win - I guess I support torture (or at least am willing to overlook it). Indefinite detention without due process - or even after due process acquits one of wrongdoing -is unconstitutional and tyrannical - wait . . . say what? . . . Obama now wants to implement a system of indefinite detention - oh well, he's on my team - my team needs to win - I guess I'm down for indefinite detention after all.

That's why I find these kinds of statements so refreshing - we need more public rejections of this sort.

Joe H.

On Tiger Woods - UPDATE

Considering the Tiger Woods fiasco, I'm reminded of the scene in The Princess Bride during the duel between Wesley and Inego Montoya. Inego, astonished at Wesley's swordsmanship, asks him, forthrightly, "who are you?" When Wesley replied "no one of consequence," Inego insisted "I must know." To this Wesley coyly replied:

"Better get used to disappointment"

I admired Tiger Woods, just as I once admired Barack Obama, Eliot Spitzer, and Michael Jordon. Admiration seems to be a one way ticket to disappointment.

Still, there's really little room for stone throwing. In the immortal words of Oscar Wilde:

"Every saint has a past. Every sinner has a future."

Joe H.

UPDATE - This article by Jack Shafer explains my disappointment with Tiger Woods pretty well. And to think that if you'd have asked me if I was a sucker for marketing just two weeks ago, I'd have said "no."

Tom Tomorrow and the Stupidity Crisis

This is an idea worth pursuing!

Joe H.

Shameless

Karl Rove writing a deficit hawk column for the Wall Street Journal? What's next -Sarah Palin writing an animal rights column for the PETA newsletter?

Sullivan has it exactly right. Utterly shameless!

Joe H.

Faith and Doubt

Lest any of you think I'm now a hater of all things Obama because I've withdrawn my political support, let me share with you an excerpt from his speech last May at the Notre Dame Commencement that I couldn't agree with more:

"[T]he ultimate irony of faith is that it necessarily admits doubt. It is the belief in things not seen. It is beyond our capacity as human beings to know with certainty what God has planned for us or what He asks of us, and those of us who believe must trust that His wisdom is greater than our own.

This doubt should not push us away from our faith. But it should humble us. It should temper our passions, and cause us to be wary of self-righteousness. It should compel us to remain open, and curious, and eager to continue the moral and spiritual debate that began for so many of you within the walls of Notre Dame."

If anything ever needed to be said to Christians in America, it was this. Ironically, the majority of American evangelicals would not listen to Mr. Obama - they think he's secretly a Muslim.

I suppose my criticism of Obama's embrace of policies and practices that he once rightly denounced could be interpreted as an expression of self righteousness. So could my criticism of his character. The more I think about it, the more certain I am that my strongest feeling about Obama is utter disappointment.

Joe H.

Obama and Civil Liberties

As those of you who read this blog know, I have been appalled at Obama's record on civil liberties and his hiding of government misconduct. On issue after issue, from indefinite detention, to the use of the State's secrets privilege to block evidence of American torture, to retroactive immunity for the telecoms' participation in illegal spying, to the Justice Department's continuing illegal refusal to investigate and prosecute Bush Administration officials for war crimes - based on actions that they themselves have publicly admitted, Obama has been on the wrong side of each issue.

But it is not just that he's been on the wrong side of each issue. He's been on the wrong side of each of these issues after repeatedly and categorically announcing that he was opposed to all of these policies during his campaign. Either he intended all along to abandon these positions after he obtained office - in which case he is despicable, or he bowed to perceived political pressure and/or expediency - in which case he lacks the character that drew me to him as a candidate. Either way, I can't support him any longer. It is not that I disagree with him about most things - I don't. But he has embraced policies that he explicitly, repeatedly, and rightly denounced during his campaign, and still refuses to perform his legal duties out of political calculation. That I can't stomach.

Also, regarding Democrats and progressives that continue to make excuses for Obama on these issues, Glen Greenwald recently noted:

"I could understand and accept a lot more easily this blithe acquiescence [by progressives] to Obama's record if it weren't for the fact that progressives and Democrats spent so many years screaming bloody murder over Bush's use of indefinite detention, military commissions, state secrets, renditions, and extreme secrecy -- policies Obama has largely and/or completely adopted as his own. One can't help but wonder, at least in some cases, how genuine those objections were, as opposed to their just having been effective tools to discredit a Republican president for partisan and political gain."

I suspect Greenwald is wrong - I suspect this phenomenon is the same phenomenon that we saw in so many people who supported President Bush for so long. Cult like worship of a particular person drives people to excuse admittedly horrific conduct by that person. It takes people awhile to admit they were betrayed - or worse yet, had! I'm beggining to think it might be good for Obama to cave on his health care position. It might accellorate the falling of the scales from progressives' eyes.

If something doesn't happen to change our celebrity culture, our democracy cannot endure - it is just a matter of time.

Joe H.

Bad Law

This article makes a compelling case against trying terrorism suspects in federal court - the resulting bad law that will be made in the process.

Given the fact that we're not willing to try all of the "war on terror" detainees in Federal Court - out of fear that some of them might be acquitted - and given the fact we're not going to release any of these men if their "trials" miraculously result in acquittal, the trials are nothing but show trials. That's reason enough not to have them.

We shouldn't lie to ourselves about our commitment the fundamental principles of Western jurisprudence. Providing full precedural protections only to suspects that we know we can convict, and refusing to provide any process to those we think are dangerous but can't convict - because we have no evidence against them or because we tortured them - is about as contrary to the fundamental principles of Western jurisprudence as we can get. Let's face up to that. Trials with preordained outcomes are not trials. Their delusions.

But to make bad law on top of that. Please!

When are we going to wake up?

Joe H.

The State of Texas Bans Marriage

Just in. In an attempt to ban gay marriages, voters in the State of Texas accidentally banned marriage itself. That is hilarious.

In 2005, Texas voters approved the following amendment to their State's constitution:

Marriage in this state shall consist only of the union of one man and one woman. . . . This state or a political subdivision of this state may not create or recognize any legal status identical or similar to marriage."

The second part of the Amendment was designed to prevent future Texas courts or legislatures from creating an alternative institution for gays - like civil unions - that would mimic marriage. But the unmistakable implication of the chosen language is that neither the State of Texas, nor any of its political subdivisions, may create or recognize any legal status identical to marriage.

Marriage is identical to marriage, so marriage is out. The people of Texas have spoken!

The moral of this story? Chose your lawyer in Texas carefully. Bozo the attorney who drafted this language should also take a bow.

Serves'em right if you ask me.

Joe

Interesting Development in Salt Lake City

I thought Salt Lake City would be behind the curve in the evolving efforts to see gay people treated as equal citizens. I was wrong. I also agree with Andrew Sullivan that their actions cast a very poor light on Catholic and Protestant Christians.

Way to go SLC!

Joe H.

Self Correction

This article offers an interesting reflection on the interaction of ideology and human psychology. Those of us who have undergone slow conversions from hard line positions do experience the desire for "a time machine" as Marty calls it. I'd Like to walk a few comments back myself. Glad I didn't have a soap box like he did.

I say no one should feel responsible for opinions they held and/or expressed twenty or more years ago.

Obama's New Self Appointed Where to Go and What to Kiss CZAR

I'm pretty sure Wanda Sykes is going to be a big it. I laughed pretty hard.

Joe

Immigration, Emmigration and Illegal Immigrants - Update

This week I learned the difference between "immigration" and "emigration." Turns out it is entirely a matter of perspective. "Immigration" refers to people moving into a country. "Emigration" refers to people leaving a country. The person doing the moving does both, simultaneously.

So, from the perspective of the people living in the country that you are departing, you are emigrating. From the perspective of the people living in the country that you are entering, you are immigrating. From the perspective of everyone else, including yourself, you're doing both.

For some reason, this kind of conceptual paradox fascinates me.

At any rate, I've decided that we shouldn't allow people to complain about "illegal immigration" anymore. We should instead ask them to clarify their objection. Are they objecting to the illegality of the presence of these people? Or are they complaining about their presence itself?

I've done this a few times. Each time the response was, "the illegality." I then explained that the law distinguishes between crimes constituting serious moral wrongs, and crimes that are solely the product of regulation. The former are called Malum In Se crimes. The latter are called Malum Prohibitum crimes

Murder, rape, and robbery are examples of Malum in se crimes. Malum prohibitum crimes, to the contrary, are crimes in which there is no intrinsic wrong being done, but society nonetheless feels it has an interest in regulating. Immigration - or emmigration for that matter - is precisely such a phenomenon. There's no better example of a malum prohibitum crime than an immigration violation. It is not morally problematic for people to move around. But we, for sound public policy purposes, need to keep track of where people are. So we regulate and keep track - as best we can.

Normally, non-violators don't get too worked up about malum prohibitum violations - "just pay your fine and get on with your life" is the general attitude. And that, in fact, has been proposed as a solution for illegal immigrants to become legal immigrants. But immigration is very different for millions of people, including the two I spoke with. They consider it a very serious offense - even when I explained that it was not.

The reason for this is obvious - their real objection is the presence of these people. They don't want them here.

Remarkably, the two people I talked to did not see themselves as wanting to keep people out, at all! They did not recognize the source for their strong feelings about the topic. That's because we've allowed them to talk about "illegal immigrants." Collapsing the two concepts into one classification allowed them to express their latent hostility as moral outrage regarding the importance of obeying the law. And it allowed them to do this without noticing what they were doing.

Well, no more! Enough with the "illegal immigrants" argument. I want people to break it down for me.

Joe H.

Update: My wife disagrees with my analysis. She noted that she does not want to keep different kinds of people out - Hawaii is the most intergrated mixed race place in the United States. People here don't think much about racial and/or ethic differences - which is admirable. Her position is that it is unfair to allow those who came in illegally to stay, while those who followed the rules and attempted to enter legally are kept out.

That's a fair point - but I'm hard pressed to think that justice for the law abiding foriegner is on many people's minds when they complain about illegal immigration.

Glen Beck is no Jon Stewart

Finally, someone with the talent to illustrate what a nut Glen Beck is. Comedy is wonderful. This is one of the funniest things I've seen in quite awhile. Thank you Jon Stewart.

Joe H.

U.S. Officials are Now Free to Torture - With Impunity - UPDATE

This is a pretty sad day in America. The Second Circuit Court of Appeals has upheld a Federal District Judge's ruling that Canadian citizen Maher Arar cannot sue our Federal officials for abducting him and rendering him to Syria FOR THE PURPOSE of being tortured. Yes, I said that right - we sent him there for the purpose of having him tortured.

The Court said that the State Secrets privilege precludes all such suits - even in cases where, as this one, all of the relevant details are already public knowledge because Canada, a mature democracy, made public the findings of its official investigation and paid Arar $9 million dollars compensation for its role in the incident. The only purpose for upholding the so called privilege now is protecting war criminals.

"One nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."

What kind of nation have we become? What kind of judges do we have? The dissent, by the way, is appropriately scathing. Cold comfort to those who endured torture.

Greenwald has an excellent piece on this as well.

My heart aches.

Joe H.

UPDATE

It is always dangerous to trust headlines. It turns out that the Court dismissed Arar's suit on other (equally noxious) grounds. Arar had stated what's known as a "Bevins" claim. A Bevins claim is a court created cause of action allowing tort victims to sue government officials personally, for tortious acts performed under the color of law.

Bevins claims are limited to a very few circumstances, and Courts are reluctant to extend them to new circumstances, particularly when the new circumstances implicate what the case law calls "complexities" - such as national security and international foreign policy. The Court argued that acknowledging a Bevin cause of action in a rendition case would insert the court into national security and foreign policy operations that are best left to the Executive.

Personally, given the facts of this case, I think the decision was horrific. The basic facts are that Arar was returning to his home in Canada from Tunisia. Acting on a tip from Canadian authorities that Arar was a member of Al Queda - a tip that turned out to be completely and utterly wrong - Arar was detained and mistreated by American authorities. Then, American officials working in the Justice Department and the White House arranged for Arar to be rendered to Syria - his place of birth - to be torture interrogated. Arar was then brutally tortured, with Americans participating indirectly, for months. Finally, he was released to a Canadian Consul and returned to Canada - a hollow shell of his former self.

Canadian officials subsequently conducted a full investigation, published a massive report making all of these facts public, apologized, and paid compensation.

Arar sued the American officials in Federal Court and was stymied at every turn. Read the stunning article for yourself. The misconduct of the American officials after the fact is breathtaking. And all of it was done to avoid legal and political accountability.

Warriors my ass. These men were cowards to the core. I am so ashamed that they represented me. I could puke.

And think about the Court's reasoning on the Bevin claim. The key fact of the case is that American officials conspired to send a person to a country for the express purpose of being tortured. If that isn't a violation of a person's 5th Amendment "Due Process" rights, what possibly could be? For the Court to refuse to extend the Bevins cause of action to these circumstances because they implicate national security and international relations complexities, is tantamount to the Court endorsing torture as a legitimate foreign policy option. Rendition is not the issue - the issue is a conspiracy to torture. How can allowing a suit to remedy a conspiracy to commit torture implicate any legitimate national security or foreign policy complexities, particularly when all the facts are already known.

Man have we lost our minds - and our souls.

Joe H.

A Cautionary Tale - Update

This article sums up the current state of American politics pretty nicely. The current state of the Republican Party is a cautionary tale as to what happens when a party turns itself over to Karl Rovian type strategists for eight years.

Lying about everything and demonizing anyone who opposes or disagrees with you isn't a very good strategy for staying in touch with reality.

Joe H.

UPDATE: The aforementioned references to "lying" and "demonizing" are directed to the National Leaders of the Republican Party. It goes without saying - but I'll say it anyway to avoid being misunderstood - that the vast majority of Republicans, politicians and otherwise, are sane, moral, and perfectly nice people - these are the one's suffering the "whiplash" described by the article's author.

Joe H.

John Stewart Destroys CNN's Credibility

Talk about making short work of the supposed premier news organization in the world. Wow!

And funny as hell to boot (as always). Enjoy!

Joe H.

Change We Can Believe In?

Perpetual war or change we can believe in. I hope it is the latter.

Joe H.

Value is The Key

Okay, I need one more post before I can lay out my theory of morality that (I believe) is: (1) compatible with the idea that God created morality; and (2) compatible with the non-existence of God. Recall also that if there is a plausible account of morality that does not require the existence of God, (3) Plantinga's "the existence of evil proves the existence of God" argument is refuted.

I need to do a post on "value."

Let's start with the obvious question: "What is value?" Think about this for any length of time and you will be thinking in circles. Is value an independently existing thing - like "moral values" or "family values?" Is value something that attaches to other things? Is it a property of things, or ideas, or circumstances? Is it a phenomenon - and if so, what sort of phenomenon? Is it a medium - like time?

After thinking about this question for a considerable period of time (prior to practicing law, of course), I concluded that the best understanding of "value" is that it is a "measurement of importance." Putting my thesis in the form of an SAT answer, I am proposing that "value" is to "importance" as "temperature" is to "molecular activity." The more important a thing is, the more value it has. The more molecular activity there is, the greater the temperature. In both cases, the inverse is equally true.

The "measurement of importance" conception of value unites all things to which we apply the term "value." Economic or market value, moral value, instrumental value, intrinsic value, sentimental value, and so forth, all refer to ways in which things are important to us. Importance, as Plato would say, is the characteristic common to all instances of value. Importance is the characteristic or quality that makes all valuable things valuable. When we say that something is "valuable," we are, without exception, saying that it is important.

Importance, in other words, is the essence of value.

The conception of value as a "measurement" also comports with our conviction that the various kinds of value can be quantified and compared - not perfectly or with certainty, but meaningfully and rationally. It is completely natural for us to gauge the relative importance of various sorts of things (or considerations) and to prioritize their [acquisition, performance, realization], with respect to our assessment of their relative significance.

There are, of course, numerous complexities associated with the idea of "importance." We think people can be mistaken about what is important - which implies that importance is, in some sense or other, an objective matter. Importance is also an undoubtedly subjective feature of our existence - none of us ranks the importance of things identically (although there is considerable culturally based agreement regarding what sorts of things are generally more important than others). Our commitments, interests, and personal circumstances also vest various things with importance - there is nothing important about a T.V. show, but it is important to fans or regular viewers.

Putting all these complexities aside (for now - philosophers spend all their time on these questions and others like them), if we agree that "value" is a "measurement of importance," we have a basis for answering the most basic of moral questions, which is "how should one live?" The answer recommended by these premises is, we should strive to achieve the most value possible - we should act in a manner that accomplishes or respects or preserves or realizes what is most important, both in the long and short term.

Living morally is maximizing value realization. It involves figuring out what is truly important, both in the context in which one is currently acting, in one's particular life circumstances, and for human existence generally, and then acting to insure that what is truly important - or most valuable - is achieved or preserved or respected . . .

In my next post I will explain how the nature of our existence as volitional beings, in combination with the circumstances of our existence: (1) consign us to be value realizers - or moral agents; and (2) prescribe the content of morality. I will further explain how our existence as moral agents is compatible with God's setting the terms of morality and with God's non-existence. And if I do that, particularly the part about showing that the existence of morality does not require God's existence, I will have refuted Plantinga.

Okay - enough with the preliminary information. As they sing during the introduction to Loony Tunes, "On with the show this is it!"

Joe H.

Pray for a Liberal!

A more profound display of Christian hubris and self-righteousness is hard to imagine.

I especially liked the "Helping Restore Poor Leaders to Right Thinking" statement of purpose - particularly because it is coming from the most ardent supporters of "Christian leaders" who turned the United States into a torture nation.

I will give these people one thing - they have "chutzpa!" They have the courage of their convictions. But as Bertrand Russell famously pointed out, the problem with the world is that those with knowledge are cautious, while utter fools are incurrably cocksure of themselves.

Joe H.

A Bit More on Plantinga's "Evil Proves the Existence of God" Argument

Upon further consideration, I've decided that a bit more background information is required before I can boldly offer my account of morality and my explanation as to how morality is compatible with the belief that: (1) God is responsible for the existence of each human being; and (2)morality would have authority over human conduct even if God did not exist and, for this reason, Plantinga failed to fight the "Argument from Evil" to a draw.

So, without further adieu, the additional background information.

Three approaches to moral reasoning/decision making dominate the history of moral philosophy. Listed in no implied order of priority, they are:

Consequentialism;

Deontology;

Eudaemonism.

Consequentialist moral theories hold that the moral status of any act, rule, practice, or policy (hereinafter "act"), is a function of the act's reasonably anticipated consequences. The basic idea is that acts calculated to generate beneficial or desirable outcomes are morally superior to acts expected to generate harmful (or undesirable) outcomes. Most consequentialists agree that our moral analysis must focus on what an actor had good reason to believe would happen as a result of his or her actions, rather than on what actually happened. This is because, as we all know, "shit happens."

Modern consequentialists fall into two main camps: (1) Egoists - those who think we have duties to maximize our own utility; and (2) Utilitarians - those who believe we should act in ways that increase the net aggregate utility. Both theories are traceable to the Ancient Greeks.

Aside from the myriad complexities - such as what kinds of things count as positive outcomes, how do we quantify and compare various kinds of benefits and harms in a consequentialist analysis, whose benefit counts (animals? future generations?) and how much each entity counts - the basic consequentialist idea is unassailable. To some extent, nearly everyone is a moral consequentialist. Virtually no one advocates a moral analysis that completely ignores expected outcomes.

However, virtually no one thinks that morality is entirely a matter of anticipated consequences. If you disagree, ask yourself whether your moral objection to prostitution - assuming you have one - and you should - would vanish if someone could waive a magic wand and immediately eliminate all the adverse consequences of prostitution? What if no one got hurt or sick, physically or emotionally, from prostitution? Would you still object to prostitution, based merely on the nature or character of the activity?

Most of us would. Similarly, most of us agree that "honesty is the best policy," but also believe that there is something morally problematic about lying, even when it creates good outcomes for everyone affected. Most people think it is immoral for a married person to cheat on his or her spouse, even when the cheating will never be discovered and will result in no negative consequences.

By admitting our non-consequentialist moral sentiments, we out ourselves as deontological moralists. Deontological moralists care about our duties, to ourselves and others. Such duties are deemed to be based on non-consequential considerations, such as the inherent dignity of human beings.

Modern deontology achieved its most definitive statement in the work of Imanual Kant. However, Kant's deontology was derived directly from the Ancient Greek and Roman Stoics.

Eudaemonism takes a differnt approach to moral reasoning - starting with the types of questions it asks. Consequentialism and Deontology are "act" oriented moral theories - they attempt to answer questions about the moral permissibility of specific acts. Eudaemonia, to the contrary, is an "agent" centered moral theory - it attempts to answer questions about what constitutes a well lived life. The basic idea is that human life can be lived well or poorly. The task of ethical reasoning is to: (1) identify the features of human well being - features like financial stability, a cultivated intellect, physical emotional health, satisfying and nurturing personal relationships, and so forth; and to then (2)identify and cultivate practices and habits that lead to these outcomes.

Think about the movie "Mr. Holland's Opus." The point of that movie was to celebrate a beautiful, albeit ordinary, life. Mr. Holland never finished his musical opus - his opus was his life! That's the central idea of eudaemonism - life as a work of art.

Eudaemonia is closely associated with the notion of "virtue." The ancient Greeks understood virtue as a "functional excellence." For the Greeks, a thing's virtue was whatever made it good at its function - e.g. the virtue of a race horse is its speed, while the virtue of a plow horse was its strength - different function, different virtues. According to Aristotle, the function of a human being was to live well - to live life in accordance with our rational natures. Thus, the human virtues were those acts or practices that constitute living well and lead to human well-being. These ideas are also closely connected to the notion of "habit."

Now, I'm sure you all realize that I have vastly oversimplified each of these moral traditions. I'll also admit that I am a eudaemonist (I believe eudaemonism subsumes and incorporates consequentialism and deontology). But these short summaries should provide at least the rudimentary theoretical information regarding how moral theorists have approached the subject of morality.

What is relevant to our analysis of the relationship between God and morality, and to the success or failure of Plantinga's "Evil proves the Existence of God" argument, is that the core insight of each theoretical approach is value realization. Proponents of each type of moral outlook are advocating the realization of, or the showing of respect for, certain types of value.

So in my next post on the subject, I'll examine the concept of "value" and the role it plays in human existence.

Stay tuned.

Joe H.

The Worst of the Worst

Andrew Sullivan provides us with a summary argument explaining why the practice of torture is so dangerous - a Federal Judge, let me say that again, a FEDERAL JUDGE , has found that the United States tortured a man it knew to be innocent solely to extract a confession that would allow our government maintain its claim that all of our Guantanamo detainees were terrorists. A summary report on the Court's decision in the habeus petition of Fouad Mahmoud Al Rabinah, written by journalist Andy Worthington, can be accessed here.

I highly encourage you to read each of these documents in their entirety - but if this is too much, at least read the introduction to the judge's decision. The entire opinion is truly an astonishing summary of government misconduct.

Thank God for the writ of habeus corpus and an independent judiciary. Were it not for a 5-4 ruling by our Supreme Court, the facts of this case would never have seen the light of day.

And lest any of you think that responsibility for this atrocity rests solely on the Bush Administration - although most of it does - the Obama administration is cleary implicated. It sought to prosecute Fouad Mahmoud Al Rabinah, based on the exact same torture produced evidence. Officials in the Obama Administration were apparently prepared to keep an innocent man in prison, indefinitely, based on confessions that the previous administration tortured out of him, which these same officials knew to be false, simply to protect the government's reputation.

This is a national disgrace.

Joe H.

Jamie Fox Singing "The Brady Bunch"

The Brady Bunch turns 40 this year. That's eye opening.

Here's a clip of Jamie Fox singing the Brady Bunch theme song in a manner designed to romance the ladies. Watch all the way to the end and you'll see him imitating Prince singing the Brady Bunch. Very entertaining.

Joe H.

More on Plantinga's "Evil Proves the Existence of God" Argument

Plantinga’s “Evil proves the existence of God” argument works only if the existence of God is required to create what we call “morality.” If there is a non theistic basis for morality, then we’re back to square one regarding our need to develop a theodicy.

In determining whether the existence of God is a necessary condition for morality, our first task is to define “morality.” This is not as easy as it might seem. Almost all proposed definitions of morality contain an element of circularity, and circular definitions are not definitions in any meaningful sense.

Fortunately, examining Plantinga’s argument does not require a philosophically airtight definition of morality. Therefore, we can think of morality as “the set of rules - including decision making rules, principles, practices and habits that, when applied correctly in the appropriate contexts, lead human beings to act as they should toward themselves, each other, and toward our environment.”

Did you see the circularity? The word “should.” . . . Anyway . . .

Assuming that morality exists and has real authority over human conduct, the first question to ask is, “what is its basis?” What makes right (or good, or permissible) acts right (or good, or permissible), and what makes wrong (or bad, or impermissible) acts wrong (or bad, or impermissible)?

The traditional Christian answer has been that God determines what is moral and immoral. The simple version of this answer, known as the “Divine Command theory” (“DCT”), proved difficult for Euthyphro in his discussion with Socrates - particularly when Socrates reminded Euthyphro that, by his own reckoning, there are numerous Gods constantly quarreling with each other about moral issues. But the answer fares no better when the Gods unite in agreement - e g., when they become one. I’ll leave you all to enjoy Plato’s argument for yourself and merely state that defining morality in terms of what God wants or commands, leads to the obvious question of why God wants or commands us as he does? God either has reasons for his commands, in which case morality is more accurately a product of those reasons. Or God has no reasons for his commands, in which case morality is a product of divine whim, changeable from moment to moment.

By the way, Christians often get angry when I point this out. What they fail to notice is that the DCT is refuted by the scriptures themselves. In the account of Abraham’s discussion with God about God’s plan to destroy the city of Sodom, Abraham immediately noted that God’s plan was morally flawed, given that it (potentially) punished the righteous with the wicked. Abraham then asks, “shall not the God of all the earth do justice?”

God eventually agreed with Abraham’s moral criticism, but that’s not the key point. Nor is it important that God, on most interpretations, was merely testing Abraham and knew what was right all along. The key point is that, if the DCT were correct, God’s plans - whatever they were - would be beyond moral critique. God could not act immorally under the DCT no matter how he acted, because the DCT holds that God’s acts (or commands) define morality. The fact that God can be portrayed as planning to do something immoral completely destroys the DCT. That Abraham can coherently ask whether God is going to do justice, similarly destroys the DCT.

So God himself has revealed that morality is not merely a function of God’s commands. That’s something! But it only helps us a little. It proves that God’s existence is not a sufficient condition for - or explanation of - morality. But it does not tell us what morality is or what supplies it with its authority over human conduct. Nor does it refute Plantinga, who argued that the existence of God was a necessary (rather than sufficient) condition of morality.

In my next post on this subject I will develop an account of morality that is: (1) compatible with the idea that morality ultimately comes from God and is anchored in God’s purposes; but (2) which is equally compatible with the belief that morality is not dependent on God for its existence. If I succeed, I will have refuted Plantinga - and broken the draw regarding the problem of evil. But I’ll also have given my fellow believers a more workable account of the relationship between God and morality.

Stay tuned.

Joe

Congress Does Good - By Accident - And the Media Stays Silent.

That the major news outlets have yet to acknowledge the corrupt contractor defunding story, including the fact that Congress, in a fit of hysteria and blind stupidity, accidentally enacted a law giving the executive real power to thwart government contractor corruption, is astonishing. Their silence illustrates just how beholden the media are to constituents other than the citizenry.

Here's a good summary of what I'm talking about.

Joe H.

ACORN Hysteria Bites Back! - UPDATE

Last week, considerable media attention was given to a "sting" performed by a couple of conservative activists, who presented themselves as a pimp and prostitute seeking tax assistance from ACORN employees. Conservatives have accused ACORN of being a criminal enterprise, and being engaged in all sorts of illegal and otherwise nefarious activities. The ethically questionable behavior of Acorn's employees that the "sting" exposed was presented as Exhibit "1" in support of the Conservatives' accusations.

Although I'm no ACORN expert, I recently read an 88 page "Staff Report" compiled by the office of Rep. Darrell Issa, the ranking republican member of the congressional committee having oversight over these matters. While the report pointed to clear instances of internal corruption and mismanagement, as well as low level wrongdoing, I saw precious little evidence of any criminal conspiracy. This may be why there is no Justice Department investigation of ACORN. Those who think the report proides compelling evidence supporting the "ACORN is Evil" thesis are hereby advised to research the distinction between "facts" and "evidence" on the one hand, and "conclusory allegations" on the other.

Enough said on that issue.

But what's truly remarkable about the ACORN hysteria is that it appears to have caused Congress to inadvertently defund the entire Military Industrial Complex!

I'm not kidding . . . just read this!

So, in a mass hysteria over a phantom enemy, Republicans lash out and, in the process, screw scores and scores of their corporate supporters.

I wish I had a Miller Lite right now because, entertainment wise, it doesn't get any better than this!

Joe H.

UPDATE: Here's an interesting comparison. The total amount of federal money that has gone to AACORN in the last 20 years is roughly equal to the amount of federal money paid to Haliburton and its subsidiaries each and every day of the Iraq war.

Also, for those of you who are wondering why Congress didn't simply vote to defund ACORN, the answer is that doing so would be unconstitutional. Our constitution forbids congress from passing "Bills of Attainder," or laws designed to punish a single entity. The idea behind the constitutional provision is that Congress is a legislative body, not a judicial body. Bills of Attainder allow the government to sanction individual entities without due process, so they are forbidden.

The irony is, in order to make what was clearly meant to be a Bill of Attainder constitutional, Congress had to write the law to address corruption and misuse of government funds in general - and this standard captures all of our nation's biggest defense contractors. Unlike ACORN, who has been accused but never charged, much less convicted, of fraud or making false statements to the government, each of our nation's top ten defense contractors have been convicted of such offenses.

And while I'm pretty sure that none of our biggest defense contractors will be defunded, it will get interesting if someone takes the government to Court to force it to comply with its own statutory requirements.

So how crazyily partisan (or craven and cowardly in the case of the Democrats who supported the bill) do you have to be to do something this (politically)stupid? Don't get me wrong, I think we should have such a law. But this clearly shows that there is no one thinking clearly among the Republican Congressional leadership - there is no one left who is able to say, "hold on a minute - let's think this through."

Very amusing.

Joe H

Argument from Evil to God - Does it Work? Part 1

In the book “Reason for God,” the author repeats an argument by Alvin Plantinga which amounts to a jiujitsu reversal of the standard argument from evil. This argument is worth exploring at some length.

The standard argument from evil is that the existence of evil, or pain, or suffering, or the existence of so much evil, pain, and suffering, is incompatible with the existence of an: (1) all-knowing; (2) all-loving; and (3) all-powerful God. If God exists, the argument goes, he lacks at least one of these three capacities. But if God lacks even one of these capacities, his existence is nothing to get excited about.

Plantinga responds, “fair enough, my atheist friend, but you’ve got a problem of your own.” If there is no God, and all events are simply natural events, unguided by any supernatural agency, then you have no basis for calling such events "evil." You may not like the phenomena you call evil, but in citing these phenomena as your basis for rejecting the traditional monotheistic deity, you are saying much more than ‘we don’t like these phenomena.’ You are saying that they are morally repugnant. But what is the basis for your MORAL judgment? How can you morally condemn purely natural phenomena? As Hume famously put it, no ought follows from an is. No moral obligations can be derived from a description of what is? “Ought” and “is” are entirely separate categories - the fact that the entire world should perish except I move my finger slightly produces no obligation that I act to save the world. If I have such an obligation, it has to be based on something other than the mere fact that the world is going to perish.

The truth, my atheist friend, is that, in making your argument from evil, you are relying on a moral foundation that is metaphysical, e.g., beyond nature. Your argument against God presupposes that the universe is subject to moral critique. But this can only be true if there is something beyond it - something supernatural that is capable of grounding moral judgments . . . something like . . . God.”

Go suck on that Atheists!

Now, if Plantinga is right, we have both a paradox and an argumentative “draw.” An argument that proves God can’t exist necessarily presupposes that he must exist. As we used to say in the seventies - which is the last time I smoked the wild weed - "WOW MAAAAAAAN!"

And I’m pretty sure Plantinga will settle for a draw on the argument from evil. A draw against theism's most dangerous threat . . . done!

Question is, does Plantings' argument work?

I don’t think so. I’ll explain why in a subsequent post.

Disclaimer - I did my best to reconstruct Plantinga’s argument. However, I did this from memory, which is faulty. I no longer have Plantinga’s book. Moreover, I am no longer teaching philosophy, so I’m not going to go to the university and retrieve it. I don’t remember Plantinga citing Hume, but Hume’s point is germane, so I included it.

My point is, I may have omitted something important, or something that would strengthen the argument. If so, feel free to point this out.

Joe H.

Fifth Column Of Insanity

A "Fifth Column of Insanity?" What an apt description!

Let me say up front that I am a Christian and nonetheless agree with every word of Mr. Schaeffer's criticism of American evangelicalism - except perhaps his belief that we're a lost cause "village idiot." We've become the village idiot - and we should be ridiculed for our stubborn refusal to embrace modern discovery and adjust our ancient faith accordingly. But I don't think things are as hopeless for us as Mr. Schaeffer argues - and neither does he, in his heart. Otherwise he wouldn't be risking his life trying to shake us up.

This is a prophet speaking. I hope he embarrasses some of us who regularly suppress our cognitive dissonance - and you guys know who you are!

Joe H.

Reason for God - Initial Thoughts

First, sorry about the dearth of posts. I've been moving and practicing law - a time consuming combination if there ever was one - with a lack of Internet access thrown in for good measure.

Yesterday I began reading a book titled Reason for God. This book attempts to engage atheists' and skeptics' arguments and provide a defense of the rationality of believing in God and Christianity.

Ordinarily, these kinds of books disappoint me. The arguments contained in them lack genuine philosophical rigor, but are still good enough to generate believer confidence that we are on solid philosophical grounds. This bothers me a great deal - perhaps because Jesus said "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life." Maybe I'm a "Truth worshiper?" I don't know.

For an example of what I'm talking about, the author of Reason for God has a central premise: he argues that every reason that a person can give for rejecting a faith based acceptance of Christianity presupposes an equally faith based acceptance of some other unprovable premise. The author then cites examples of reasons that people give for rejecting Christianity that do in fact presuppose some other faith based assumption.

Philosophers encountering such arguments will immediately suspect that straw men are afoot. This is because all the examples in the world won't save this premise from a single counter-example. And there is an obvious counter-example. What if someone claims to reject Christianity because it seems implausible - or because the evidence, as they see it, is insufficient to justify belief in Christianity?

I don't see any faith based unprovable assumption in this response - so there goes the book's central premise.

Okay, Okay. As Alvin Plantinga will insist, the atheist is still relying on one unprovable premise: he's relying on the assumption that his analytical faculties are reliable indicators of what constitutes a sound argument and/or sufficient evidence. And Plantinga will argue - in fact, has argued - that only a belief in God can justify that belief, given the possibility that evolved faculties could merely be leading us to conclusions that cause us to act in ways that keep us alive, without actually revealing "the truth."

I don't buy this argument. For one thing, it is a recognizable variant of skepticism. It presupposes that the only way we can know for sure that our senses and mental faculties are reliable (albeit fallible) is to believe in God; otherwise we have to refrain from any assertion on the matter, given that an evolutionarily produced faculties might be "successful" - they might present us with images that cause us to act in ways that keep us alive and aid reproduction - without giving us "accurate" information - Recall the movie "Shallow Hal" for reference.

But what if we don't equate knowing with certainty - which we don't? In that case the many successes of our senses and/or mental faculties are transformed into adequate evidentiary justifications for our conviction that they give us reliably accurate information about the world and/or the soundness of arguments (at least most of the time). If we don't need to "know for certain" in order to "know," Plantinga's argument falls apart.

But I digress. The point is that the central premise of the book is demolished by a single counter-example - and a counter-example which occurred to me less than one minute after reading the sentence. And why did it occur to me? Not because I am smarter than everyone else. It occurred to me because I have philosophical training. I was trained to read sentences like "every reason that a person can give for rejecting a faith based acceptance of Christianity presupposes an equally faith based acceptance of some other unprovable premise," and to then ask, "is that right?" I was also trained to recognize that, in my hope that it might be right, I will be inclined to accept its truth uncritically, and I should, therefore, increase my vigilance in such circumstances in order to avoid being taken in by bad arguments.

Another example is the author's take on the problem of evil. He initially derides those who argue that God's allowance of "pointless suffering" indicts the very idea of an all-loving, all-knowing, and all-powerful God. He points out, correctly, that what appears to be pointless to a particular observer may not be pointless at all. But he then accuses those of us who conclude that particular instances of suffering are pointless, of arrogance. He accuses us of being unjustifiably confident in our own judgment.

But that is utter nonsense. The fact that what appears to be pointless, based on all the available evidence, may not actually be pointless, is no reason for us not to conclude that certain cases of suffering are pointless unless proved otherwise. The underlying premise to the author's argument is that I'm not justified in concluding that X is Y, or using X is Y in an argument, until I'm absolutely certain that X is Y. But there is very little in the world that we can be absolutely certain about, so this premise would preclude belief, assertion and argument altogether.

What the author attempted to do was to shift the burden of proof. He argued that you can't assert the premise "God allows pointless suffering" unless you rule out every possible way in which each instance of suffering might be meaningful. But if there are instances of suffering that appear to be obviously gratuitous and/or pointless, shouldn't the presumption be that they are pointless and gratuitous unless shown to be otherwise?

Anyway, I did think the author's discussion of Plantinga's argument from "Evil to the existence of God" was interesting. I'll take that up in my next post.

Joe H

The Public Option in 70 Seconds

Click here for a short clear explanation of the proposed "public option" insurance plan.

Nothing to be scared of.

Joe H.

Dear President Bush

Dear President Bush . . .

To be an American

The other day I was interacting with someone and said, "President Obama is violating U.S. and international law by refusing to investigate and/or prosecute Bush administration officials for torture." The person with whom I was interacting responded, "that statement places you on the far edge of the looniest, most rabidly anti-American fringe in our history."

The fact that President Obama, or at least Attorney General Eric Holder, is violating U.S. and International law by refusing to investigate and/or prosecute Bush administration officials for torture, is easy to verify. The Convention on Torture ("Cot") is, by virtue of that treaty's ratification by the U.S. Senate, binding U.S. law pursuant to our Federal constitution. The COT makes investigation of credible allegations, and prosecution of provable cases, of torture, mandatory. And both President Bush and Vice President Cheney have admitted authorizing acts that constitute torture under the definition of torture provided by the COT and federal law.

That's all old news. What's interesting is that pointing any of this out now renders one a member of "the far edge of the looniest, most rabidly anti-American fringe in our history" in the minds of millions of Americans who consider themselves to be hyper patriotic.

When I hear things like that, I wonder what do these people think "America" is? How do they think about America? What does "being an American" mean to them? Don't they see the irony of calling a citizen who openly criticises a sitting American President for refusing to "faithfully execute the laws of the land" a member of "the far edge of the looniest, most rabidly anti-American fringe in our history."

I was thinking, how much more American could I be? What different planets we occupy.

Within a very short period of time, our understanding of "America" has dramatically deteriorated. "America" used to mean a North American political entity within which the citizens were united by their loyalty to very basic political ideals - the rule of law, separation of powers, a limitation on Government power against individuals (particularly those with unpopular views or practices or ethinic origins), pluralism, civil liberties, due process, equality before the law, representative government, a rebuttable presumption in favor of liberty, and so forth. No American in that sense would ever call someone acting the way I did "Anti-American."

I have no idea how to describe the "America" envisioned by these other Americans.

Joe H.

Why Euphemisms?

Enhanced Interrogations? Aggressive Interrogations? Brutal Interrogations?

It appears that few if any members of the American print media can bring themeselves to use the word "torture" to describe the conduct of Americans towards our Muslum detainees. Certainly not the New York Times. Certainly not the Washington Post.

And why? Andrew Sullivan explained this as well as anyone when he said:

"The minute you use the English language in defense of torture, you disgust yourself. Language matters, as Orwell understood. It is the first thing to be dispensed with in the defense of the indefensible."

So, no matter how much pain and suffering we inflict on the Muslim detainees that we suspect - notice the key qualifier "suspect" - might - notice the key qualifier "might" - be involved in terrorism, it cannot rise to the level of "torture." This holds, even when a terrorism suspect dies as a result of our "enhanced interrogations," as over 100 men have.

We can tolerate the behavior - but not if we utter the appropriate description of it.

That's a fascinating feature of our moral psychology, don't you think?

Joe

Half an Investigation? UPDATE

I, along with many others, have argued that it is a huge mistake to limit the investigation of detainee abuse to those who went beyond what was authorized by the Bush administration - to those who used excessive water in their waterboarding, or brandished a power drill. This article explains our position as clearly as any article has to date.

Joe H.

UPDATE: Andrew Sullivan's quote of the day provides the upside of Eric Holder's decision.

Christian Herd Mentality

In my previous post, I quoted Andrew Sullivan's observation regarding Bush and Cheney's accomplishments, in which he said:

"But what they did to the culture - how they systematically dismantled core American values like the prohibition on torture and respect for the rule of law - is the worst and most enduring of the legacies."

I utterly and completely agree with these sentiments. It is also worth noting that it was possible for Bush and Cheney to do so much cultural damage only because evangelical Christians became cult like worshipers of these men. Evangelical Christians remain largely supportive of Bush and Cheney - despite all that has been revealed about their conduct while in office. Had we had any concern for basic human decency, had we any Christian concern for our neighbor - whom Jesus told us to love as much as we love ourselves - we would have abandoned Bush and Cheney long ago and insisted on accountability. But because these were our guys, we supported them against the evil forces arrayed against them. Defending torture and a overlooking a lawless government were simply costs of our allegiance - and we paid these costs eagerly.

Think about it. We abandoned core American values rather than admit that we'd been duped by a religious con. And we continue to do so.

I'm completely and utterly embarrassed that Christians are still largely supportive of these men, and want them to be protected from prosecution. God help us - we've lost our minds.

Joe H.

New Torture Revelations

Hi everyone,

Blogspot locked up my blog for a few days - something made them think this was a spam blog. Anyway, I'm back.

I've been wanting to write something about the CIA report released yesterday. Its not so much that this information is new, although some of what the CIA did in our names is truly horrifying. However, I was reading Andrew Sullivan's blog this morning, and he expressed my feelings perfectly - so I'll let him speak for me.

Andrew Sullivan, August 25, 2009:

"This is what Bush and Cheney truly achieved in their tragic response to 9/11: two terribly failed, brutally expensive wars, the revival of sectarian warfare and genocide in the Middle East, the end of America's global moral authority, the empowerment of Iran's and North Korea's dictatorships, and the nightmares of Gitmo and Bagram still haunting the new administration.

But what they did to the culture - how they systematically dismantled core American values like the prohibition on torture and respect for the rule of law - is the worst and most enduring of the legacies.

One political party in this country is now explicitly pro-torture, and wants to restore a torture regime if it regains power. Decent conservatives for the most part simply looked the other way. Unless these cultural forces in defense of violence and torture are defeated - not appeased or excused, but defeated - America will never return the way it once was. Electing a new president was the start and not the end of this. He is flawed, as every president is, but in my view, the scale of the mess he inherited demands some slack. Any new criminal investigation which scapegoats those at the bottom while protecting the guilty men and women who made it happen is a travesty of justice. If it is the end and not the beginning of accountability, it will be worse than nothing.

But it need not be the end of the story. Indeed, it can be the beginning if we make it so. We cannot stop this sad and minuscule attempt to restore a scintilla of accountability to some individuals low down on the totem pole. Eric Holder is doing what he can. But we can continue to lobby and argue for the extension of accountability to the truly guilty men who made all this happen and still refuse to take responsibility for war crimes on a coordinated scale never before seen in American warfare, and initiated by a presidential decision to withdraw from the Geneva Conventions and refuse to abide by their plain meaning and intent.

Our job, in other words, is to raise the core moral baseline of Americans to that of Iranians. That's the depth of the hole Cheney dug. And it's a hole the current GOP wants to dig deeper and darker."

Thanks Andrew.

Let me also add that I wholeheartedly agree that Attorney General Eric Holder's decision to limit the special prosecutor's investigation to CIA officials who went beyond what was authorized by the OLC "torture memos" is a grave mistake. First, the memoranda produced by the office of legal counsel contained badly flawed legal analysis - so badly flawed that only a complete ignoramus could have relied on it in good faith. Consider just the fact that the memoranda authorized waterboarding without ever mentioning that this conduct had been repeatedly prosecuted by our own government. Not one government official, either within the CIA or without, genuinely believed that chaining people in stress positions, naked, in a 54 degree room, was legal conduct. The idea that they acted in good faith is absurd.

Not only is it absurd, it is refuted by the CIA report itself, which discusses the worries of particular CIA officials that the conduct they were engaged in would lead to future prosecutions. You only worry about prosecutions when you think what you're doing is illegal.

Second, and far more important, allowing the torture memoranda from the OLC to immunize government officials from prosecution, despite the fact that these memoranda were so obviously flawed, will cement the proposition that the President is a law unto himself - that the executive can exempt itself from any laws passed by congress simply by appointing a lackey to the OLC and instructing him or her to write a legal memorandum stating that whatever he wants to do is legal.

If we accept that precedent - we're done. Its just a matter of time.

Joe H.

Three Cheers for Non Ideological Sanity

Compare this clip to this clip and you have a starkly vivid illustration of the effect of ideology on a person's sanity. Three cheers for the secret service guy who, without yelling or calling anyone names, stated the obvious.

Joe H.

Progressive Revolt

I have experienced growing despair about Obama's presidency. Part of the reason, I think - I'm still sorting out my own psychology - is that I was so horrified by the Bush presidency, that I was willing to believe that Obama felt like I did when he said all the things that he said during his campaign. I believed that he genuinely opposed Bush's illegal spying program and immunity for the telecoms who participated in it. I believed that he understood the importance of the rule of law, and would hold Bush administration officials accountable for their numerous illegal acts, including warcrimes and abuses of power, just as he promised. I believed that he would champion reform of the health care system and, in particular, never compromise on the idea that there should be a public insurance option. I believed that he would end the use of the State Secrets privilege to squash lawsuits and cover up government participation in torture. On and on.

But none of this has happened. There is precious little change of the sort Obama promised in his campaign. What's more, no matter how intractable the political opposition is, no matter how clear it is that Republicans have no interest in cooperating with Obama and have, as their only goal, the destruction of his presidency, and no matter how truly insane their behavior is - Governor Palin warning, and Senator Grassley affirming, that seniors should be worried that health care reform will try to kill them - Obama still believes that working with Congressional Republicans is important.

What a sucker I was!

Turns out, I'm not alone in my despair. Read this article and this article and this article and especially this article and you'll get a sense of why it is so important that progressives assert themselves on the health care legislation. This betraying of the people who got Obama elected has got to stop. It is preceisely this sort of betrayal that led to Nader's third party run from the left in 2000 - which put President Bush in the whitehouse.

Digby summarized my feelings and worries about as well as anyone when she wrote:

"After 2000, what is it going to take for the Democrats to realize that constantly using their base as a doormat is not a good idea? It only takes a few defections or enough people staying home to make a difference. And there are people on the left who have proven they're willing to do it. The Democrats are playing with fire if they think they don't have to deliver anything at all to their liberal base --- and abandoning the public option, particularly in light of what we already know about the bailouts and the side deals, may be what breaks the bond.

It's really not too much to ask that they deliver at least one thing the left demands, it really isn't. And it's not going to take much more of this before their young base starts looking around for someone to deliver the hope and change they were promised."

If you're looking for people who are willing to defect - sign me up!

By the way, in Greenwald's post there is a link to a fund raising effort to embolden progressive legislators to stand firm on the public option - and, more importantly, to change the political dynamic of our politics. I fully support this effort - I gave $50 on the spot. I know, that's not a lot for a lawyer, but I live in Hawaii, so shut up!

Just kidding - If you agree I hope you'll contribute a small amount.

Joe H.

Christian America

This article by Cynthia Boaz is a must read for anyone who believes that the United States is a "Christian Nation" and/or was founded on Christian principles.

Excluding her pacifism argument, I agree with everything she said.

Joe

Remember When You Ran Away - Redux

Here is another good summary of the mental health breakdown of the Republican party since losing to President Obama. I think the political advice is spot on.

Joe H.

Using Informal Fallacies

This email advertisment for a legal publication just arrived in my email inbox"

"In litigation, an effective argument is essential to winning the case. Legal arguments, just like ordinary arguments, occur in patterns and recognizing these patterns, and understanding their strengths and weaknesses, are the keys to winning an effective argument.

This book uses the Legal Logic Flow Chart and the understanding and use of informal fallacies to help you craft your argument. No matter what area of law a lawyer practices, informal fallacies are readily applicable. Learning to use, and defend against, informal fallacies are the keys to effective argument, and this valuable resource will give you the tools you need. This book is ideal for any lawyer who wants to craft a flawless argument."

For the uninitiated, "informal fallacies" are arguments that are psychologically persuasive but logically unsound. The intentional use of an informal fallacy is known as a . . . manipulative lie.

Somebody should be embarrased by this ad.

Joe H.

Executing the Innocent - UPDATE

Yesterday, the US Supreme Court ordered a Federal District Court to conduct an evidentiary hearing to determine whether there is credible evidence exonerating Troy Davis, a man convicted of first degree murder in Georgia in 1979, and sentenced to die.

Rather than focus on the facts of this case, I want to focus on a statement made by Justice Scalia in his dissent. He noted:

"This court has never held that the Constitution forbids the execution of a convicted defendant who had a full and fair trial, but is later able to convince a habeas court that he is ‘actually’ innocent."

This is quite a remarkable statement. If I understand Scalia correctly, he seems to be willing to allow executions of convicted defendants who later prove that they are "actually innocent."

Some background. Our criminal justice system is a system of "imperfect procedural justice." This is in contrast to a system of "pure procedural justice" or "perfect procedural justice."

Pure procedural justice applies to circumstances where there is no identifiable just outcome. In such circumstances, the rules governing the relevant activity render the outcome that emerges just. There is no just outcome of a golf tournament. Any outcome is just - regardless of who wins or looses - if the rules are neutral and are applied fairly.

"Perfect Procedural Justice" applies to circumstances where a just outcome can be identified and there is a procedure guaranteeing the outcome. For example, if six equally hungry people pay equal amounts for a pizza, a just distribution of the pizza is equal shares. The procedure guaranteeing this outcome is letting the person who divides the pizza take the last slice - the best the slicer can do is an equal share.

"Imperfect Procedural Justice" is applicable in circumstances where a just outcome can be identified, but there is no procedure capable of guaranteeing the outcome. Justice would prescribe that the most efficient employee get the raise. But there is no way to guarantee this outcome, even if the boss wants it. The best a boss can do is set up a review procedure that makes the just outcome as likely as possible.

Criminal prosecutions fall into the last category. A just outcome is that all and only guilty people are convicted, and all and only innocent people are acquitted. Unfortunately, there is no procedure that can guarantee this outcome. Instead, we set up a system designed to generate this outcome as often as possible - while also protecting certain fundamental rights of accused persons. We then respect, as a matter of law, the results of this procedure, whatever they are, and count them as justice.

However, any system of imperfect procedural justice is going to face practical constraints, one of which is the need for finality. Our justice system incorporates numerous safeguards for criminal defendants, including the right to appeal and the right to file a writ of "Habeus Corpus" and present evidence to a court that you are being wrongfully imprisoned. However, judicial resources are finite. At some point the process must end. At some point we have to say, the process was fair so the result must stand - knowing full well that in many individual cases, the result will be incorrect.

I'm okay with all that. And I suppose that, as far as it concerns the issue of finality, Justice Scalia has a point.

Still, it is awfully disturbing that a sitting justice of the United States Supreme Court could coldly state, without even a hint of regret or remorse, that that there is no constitutional rule against the government executing a person who has new evidence sufficient to convince a federal judge that he is actually innocent.
One would think that, regarding executions, which are irrevocable, evidence of actual innocence in particular cases would trump our systemic and general need for finality. And if there's no constitutional rule preventing the execution of actually innocent people, there sure as hell ought to be.

In fairness to Scalia, he doesn't think Gray's evidence is any good. But that doesn't change the fact that Scalia apparently thinks that it is okay if manifestly innocent people are executed, if that serves the system's need for finality.

Joe H.

UPDATE: For those of you who are interested, here is an excellent discussion of Scalia's "actual innocence" remark. It relates to a specific legal application of the "imperfect procedural justice" analysis described above.