Category: Blog

Sure, I’ll support Clinton. But I won’t be stupid about it.

Following her primary victory in New York this week, Hillary Clinton reached out to Bernie Sanders’ voters:

To all the people who supported Sen. Sanders, I believe there is much more that unites us than divides us.

I believe this is true. On a great many issues, Clinton lines up with Sanders just enough that I’m willing to submit to the twisted logic of the United States’ political duopoly and – should she end up the Democratic nominee – vote for her instead of a third party.

But just enough means differences remain. And boy, it is a doozy of a divide.

For me, Sanders’ entire campaign has been about breaking the power of the plutocrats – the rich – and restoring the power of the people in our democracy. That’s why there is the twin focus on the problem of excessive money polluting our politics and a lack of money diminishing the economic opportunity, security, and freedom of the typical American.

Before this primary season, I guess I still thought there was widespread agreement among people on the left, broadly speaking, that this was a worthy goal. Now I’m not so sure. What I now see in Clinton – and, by extension, her supporters – is a seeming acceptance of plutocracy – an acceptance that the best that we can hope for against the wealthy and their interests is to hustle, bargain, and plead for small changes, rather than take on their power directly and forcefully. This is, by the way, a charitable interpretation. I am sorely tempted to believe that Clinton-like centrist Democrats actually believe that the wealthy have a natural right to rule. After all, didn’t they clearly win the economic game? Sure, offset the losers somewhat, but not so as to upset the natural order. (This is, by the way, a variation on the themes put forward by Thomas Frank in his new book “Listen, Liberal”. I recommend it.)

Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe Clinton would prove to be the “fighter” she always claims to be against the power of the plutocrats. I would gladly be proven completely wrong. But I suspect I won’t be. Despite the relative success of Bernie Sanders and his campaign, I doubt very much that Clinton and her brand of liberal have gotten the message that we’re at the end of a decades-long experiment in bad policy. Better alternatives are out there. The Sanders campaign is not spouting some sort of utopian vision. We have the benefit of seeing that other countries have already experimented with other systems – the Nordic countries, in particular – which have far better social outcomes for most of their citizens. Are these systems perfect? Of course not. Would we have to put an American spin on them? Yes. But moving in the direction of a democratic socialist politics and economy remains a goal worth fighting for. I sincerely hope that Clinton and her supporters start showing that they share this vision.

On opponents and enemies

In a comment on a recent post of mine, I was called a “domestic enemy”.

I realize that emotions are running high in the presidential campaign, but we need to work hard to avoid this kind of thought and language on all sides of the political debate.

When you face enemies, you engage in war. War, ultimately, knows no bounds and always results in atrocities and deaths.

We cannot see our fellow Americans in this way.

Instead, despite all inclinations to do otherwise, we must see one another as opponents.

When you face opponents, you try to defeat them. Now, things can get heated when we face opponents. Sadly, there is always the possibility of violence. Politics is about things that deeply matter to people. It is about their identity. And defending that can lead to strained emotions. But your fellow Americans remain opponents. You try to defeat them. But you do not seek to kill them. You do not seek to destroy them.

Words have impact. While they can never hurt you physically, they can certainly incite behavior that does. We must choose our words carefully.

Shutting down Trump rallies and justifying our freedoms

I believe in freedom of speech. I believe in freedom of assembly. It’s an important part of liberalism that unpopular, obnoxious, and noxious views are allowed to be expressed and heard and that people who share them are allowed to gather together. Among the classic reasons given for this position are that it promotes individual liberty; it allows citizens to consider and dismiss failed and unjust viewpoints; and, in turn, it reinforces successful and just viewpoints. That’s the political theory.

However, I also applaud the protestors who are risking their safety by going to Donald Trump rallies and, yes, even causing some of them to be shut down.

How do I square that?

While it might be tempting for a liberal such as myself to simply see action against Trump as self-justifying, I think it’s important to articulate how rights should be exercised, and while die-hard Trump supporters might be unpersuaded, there are many other people who might have similar concerns and be open to justifications.

The answer is basically this: Because freedom of speech does not mean that you are completely free from the consequences of your speech.

The U.S. and its people allow an incredible amount and range of free speech. Take a look around the world, and you’ll quickly get a sense of how tolerant, lenient, and forgiving of a people we are.

But some speech simply breaches the limit that Americans are willing to tolerate. They then exercise their right to free speech and assembly to rise up in opposition. The citizens who are protesting Trump’s racist, xenophobic, violence-inciting speech are doing precisely that. This is how our system wrestles with extremes. I abhor the violence that’s taken place in these events. I especially regret that police officers have gotten hurt. But in other countries, these issues would be settled through the barrel of a gun. I’d trade our chaos for open war any day.

By the way, Donald Trump seems to understand very well that there are consequences to speech. After all, he routinely threatens to sue people who criticize him. And he even wants to “open up” well-established law regarding the freedom of speech and the press. Sometimes the consequences of Trump’s speech come in forms that don’t work in his favor.

The U.S. Needs More Political Parties. Here’s How.

U.S. politics seems to be at pivotal moment in which the traditional political duopoly is being openly questioned. Over the objections of party leaders, Donald Trump is running away with the Republican nomination by using authoritarian appeals to attract new and old nativist, xenophobic supporters. Bernie Sanders is activating many new, young voters and others with a vision of making the U.S. more like the social democracies of the Nordic countries, over the objections of centrist Democrats.

In the end, only one candidate will win in each primary, of course, thanks to our use of so-called “winner-take-all”  or “first-past-the-post” voting systems. The metaphorical post in this case is the formula of 50% plus one. If any given party’s candidate gets half of the total plus one more vote, that candidate and her or his voters get everything – all of the voice, all of the privileges, all of the power. The other nearly half of the people? They get nothing.

This kind of voting system is often praised for creating a form of political stability. It forces voters with diverse and sometimes contradictory views to compromise and rally behind one party and candidate in hope of making the magic number. Now, I have no problem with compromise. In fact, no democracy can function without it. But this system also has the effect of driving us into having only two large, viable parties. By viable, I mean a party has enough of a reasonable, fair shot at winning elections that the other parties have to take its existence into account. Yes, I know, we have a variety of small parties and occasionally a third-party presidential run, but their chances of success are slim to none.

So why is the two-party system such a big problem? I believe it causes many people to give up on politics because they feel like their viewpoint, their values, their policies can never get a hearing in our representative institutions. Many voters are being energized because of the very real possibility of seeing their voice finally expressed through one of the major parties – for good and for ill. But, inevitably, because of winner-take-all systems, many of them will go home disappointed.

So, what’s the solution? There are three parts.

Ranked-Choice Voting

The first part goes by two names: either “ranked-choice” or “instant run-off” voting. Here’s a short (1:30) video from Minnesota Public Radio – via the electoral reform group FairVote – that will give you a quick outline:

To summarize, you get to vote for, say, your top three choices of candidate in ranked order. If no candidate gets a clear majority of first-choice votes, the candidate with the fewest first-choice votes gets tossed out. But that candidate’s voters still have influence! Their second-choice votes now flow to that candidate, who could then get the majority. If not, the process continues until you have a winner that most people saw as being one of their top choices. (Such a process, by the way, might have helped stop Donald Trump from taking over the Republican primary by allowing the “establishment” candidates to coalesce their fractured support in each primary.)

Proportional Representation

Even with ranked-choice voting, you don’t necessarily get more political parties. For that you need a form of proportional representation. Again, I turn to FairVote for one example of such a system:

As a quick summary, instead of single-winner, smaller districts, you would have multiple winners in bigger districts. If there is a sizable political minority within an area, their chances are pretty good that they would get at least one representative.

Easier Ballot Access

But even ranked-choice and proportional representation don’t get you more parties. You also need easier ballot access. Laws in many states make it very hard for a new party to win the right to get on the ballot. And, of course, who makes the laws? The already established parties. Let’s be honest. Practically no one really wants truly stiff competition – not in business, not in life, not in politics. And once they have power, fewer people still are readily willing to give it up. Both parties are content to hold on to what they have and keep the contest simple.

Dreaming Big

Are any of these reforms to our political system actually going to happen? Probably not. Entrenched interests are very powerful, so we’re likely stuck – for a long time, at least – with a system from which many, if not most, American citizens feel alienated. But this appears to be the year of big dreams – whether it’s Medicare for All or Mexican walls – so what’s the harm in adding one more to the mix? All that’s at stake is a true representative democracy that’s actually worthy of the name.

P.S.

By the way, it is possible to have perhaps too many parties. Like the U.S., other representative democracies, like India (the world’s largest, remember) and Norway (as a recent Norwegian acquaintance told me) also have political paralysis either because of the number of parties or enough parties won’t come together to create a viable coalition under their parliamentary systems. There is no magic solution to the design of political systems – only occasional tweaking when it’s clear that one system has run its course.

P.P.S.

Here are a couple of defenses of the two-party system.

How you, poor Republican, can have your cake and eat it, too.

So, you’re a self-identified Republican. You see membership in the Republican party as a deep part of who you are. Frankly, I have a hard time with that kind of party loyalty. While I tend to vote for Democrats, I don’t self-identify as one.  But, regardless, that’s not you. For you, being a Republican, matters.

Republicanlogo.svgThat’s too bad, because, man, this is a hard time to be a Republican. Your party has gone bat sh*t crazy over Donald Trump. The rest of your presidential contenders aren’t exactly inspiring. And a Clinton – a Clinton! – is the front-runner for the Democrats. Sad times.

But tell you what, here’s my plan for how you can avoid the crazy, but still get to be a loyal Republican. It starts with just writing off the presidential race. This is tough to swallow, I know, but unless something dramatic happens, Trump will be your nominee. Join with other Republicans who have already said they will not support a Trump candidacy, although you can prove you’re better than your cowardly other presidential contenders by actually meaning it. And let your friends know what you’re doing.

Now, I’m not saying you have to vote for a Democrat. No, I know you better than that. Just don’t vote in the presidential race. Instead, just keep the U.S. House. That should be easy because there’s very little chance the Democrats can win that back, and with the U.S. system of government, it only takes one branch of elected government to shut the whole thing down. You’ve proven that. Also, you can make yourself feel better by retaining your lock on state legislatures and governorships. Boy, if there’s something you know how to do, it’s prove the incompetence of the Democrats at the state level. And of course, with that, you get your lock on the U.S. House through gerrymandering.

See, you have so much to be proud of. Yes, it’s true that your party became the vehicle for a xenophobic, KKK-attracting, Constitution-shredding, authoritarian demagogue who likes to use presidential debates to brag about the size of his dick and is already degrading our reputation internationally. But that’s not your Republican party. You can do a service to your party, your country, and your world by just sitting this presidential race out. Take your lumps. And revel in the still considerable power you have.

Flee to Canada? Nope, I’m not going anywhere.

Look, I realize when people talk of moving to Canada should Donald Trump become president that it’s often meant all in good fun. But let me say, quite seriously, that I have no intention of going anywhere. I will remain an American citizen and, to co-opt the phrasing of the Tea Party buffoons, take my country back — back from the bigots, plutocrats, and warmongers who are a threat to my nation and the world.

Don’t get me wrong. I certainly see a lot of room for improvement in the United States. But living overseas for my spouse’s work, as I do now, has only made me better appreciate America’s promise — a promise that includes a relatively free and stable society, economic opportunity, and a government that does a pretty good job of respecting individual liberties. (Believe me, if the armed militants in Oregon had tried something like that in many countries, they would have gotten a real sense of what “tyranny” feels like.) It’s not for nothing that roughly 138 million people want to move to the U.S.

And even for those that don’t want to move to the U.S., what it does matters tremendously. It remains, for now, the leading nation of the world. Again, living overseas, I have had many detailed, knowledgeable conversations about American politics with citizens of other countries. Frankly, it’s shocking how well informed they are. And they get no voice whatsoever in deciding who the leaders of the U.S. will be, even though they have to live with the consequences.

The fact is that being a citizen of the United States is a precious gift — a powerful gift— most likely bestowed upon you simply as an accident of your birth. Personally, I will not surrender that gift to reactionaries. And that’s no joke.

Scouting and Atheism – Part 2 of 2

Yesterday, I wrote about how Boy Scouts of America is a quasi-church and how, regardless of BSA’s position on homosexual members, its biggest customers view “duty to God” as the central premise of Scouting.

I also mentioned that I’m a secular humanist – and yes, that means atheist – but that I support the values of Scouting and gladly was a registered Scout leader for five years.

How did that work?

First off, during my time as a Scout leader, my Pack was chartered by a public school PTO. (That’s changing.) It had to abide by the same restrictions on discrimination as any other public entity, so religion didn’t come up in the leader application process. Yes, it’s a form of “don’t ask, don’t tell“. Given the state of the world today, sometimes secular humanists just have to live by their own version of “passing“.

Second, I knew very well that there was religious content in Scouting when I took on the job of leading my son’s den. After all, every year’s badge has a “duty to God” component in its requirements. However, being a publicly sponsored Pack, it wasn’t appropriate to discuss religion anyway. So I simply assigned that part to be done at home.

As an aside, I don’t see how having churches sponsor Scouting units gets around this problem. The Scouting units with which I’ve been familiar accept all comers, regardless of whether their religious denomination matches that of the chartering church. (I suppose some Scouting units are exclusive, but that hasn’t been my experience.) Now, I was raised Roman Catholic, and my boys are being raised Roman Catholic. Suppose I still adhered to that religion and had begun teaching the “duty to God” sections according to strictly Catholic dogma. I doubt that would have gone over well. It seems to me that fulfilling the “duty to God” requirements would have to be done by families at home, anyway.

Third, I had no intention of proselytizing during Scouting events. Anyone who knows a secular humanist knows that’s not really in our nature. We don’t want people hassling us regarding religious affiliation, so we tend not to hassle others. (Of course, we still advocate for public policies that preserve the secular nature of our government, but that’s one step removed and not a direct attempt to convert another individual to your religious worldview.) Furthermore, I made a point of following the rules and customs of Scouts, despite my disagreements with them. For example, I taught the Pledge of Allegiance as required, complete with its reference to “under God”, and I always recruited a person to say grace at meals.

Fourth, and most important, I do really support the values and virtues promoted by Scouting. If we all tried to live by the Scout Oath and Scout Law, the world would be a much better place. In fact, the Oath and Law are very much in line with secular humanist values, with the exception of duty to God. During my time as a Scout leader, I did my best to teach and model these values and virtues for my Scouts. Scouting is an excellent program if you just follow what’s in the handbooks. The various controversies surrounding Scouting are separate from that. For example, no where in any handbook that I used did it say discriminate against homosexuals. That’s a separate BSA policy that interprets what’s in the handbooks.

So, that’s how I got through my time as a Scout leader being a secular humanist. To finish up, here are a few more thoughts on Scouting and atheism:

This might be surprising, but I don’t oppose the right of Boy Scouts of America to bar atheists from being leaders. I wish it was different, of course. As I’ve tried to make clear, Scouting has much to offer young people and much of its content is in line with secular humanist values. But secular humanism is a worldview. I don’t see it as an in-born trait. And I am leery of forcing private groups to accept people of all worldviews. I hope BSA will eventually come around – and I will advocate for that – but that’s not going to happen anytime soon.

Regarding my reference to “passing” above, is passing a form of dishonesty? A key value of Scouting – and of mine, as well – is honesty. Should I have publicly declared my secular humanism and risked getting thrown out as a registered Scouting leader? Perhaps.

Finally, with BSA formally taking steps to dissociate itself from public institutions so that it can discriminate in the ways it sees fit, should it still be allowed to recruit in public schools and use their facilities? My Pack owes much of its recruitment success to being able to talk directly to boys at school, usually during lunchtime. And it regularly uses school facilities for its major events. I’m now very uncomfortable with it doing these things. But don’t worry. I’m not going to press the issue.

Scouting and atheism – Part 1 of 2

As I wrote yesterday, after five years, I have resigned as a registered adult leader with Boy Scouts of America. The local BSA council is currently taking proactive steps to sever the ties between local public school PTOs and Scouting units so that it can freely implement its discriminatory policies targeting homosexual adults. This will effect my local Pack, and I decided I just couldn’t stand by anymore.

That said, I also wrote about how I support the values of Scouting. I still stand by that – mostly.

I say mostly because I am a secular humanist, and yes, that also means I’m an atheist. And atheists are also unwelcome in Scouting. In fact, they are more unwelcome than homosexuals.

The evidence for that comes from the reactions by national church groups when BSA released its revised policy back in May. While some national churches condemned the change to allow openly homosexual youth to become Scouts, others were quite fine with it. Of special importance was the reaction by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the Mormons). Writing in the The Washington Post, Michael Otterson of the LDS Church explained that it could accept the change because the BSA’s resolution explicitly re-affirms “duty to God” as a central tenet of Scouting. He goes on to quote a speech by the Presiding Bishop of the LDS Church, Gary E. Stevenson:

It is this common belief in duty to God that has forged the iron-strong connection with Boy Scouts of America we (i.e. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) have shared over the last 100 years. One hundred years of evidence has shown that this impact-proof, non-rusting core principle works better than whatever has been, historically, the next-best idea. Duty to God is where the power lies. Duty to God is what changes lives…

Some may not see the sacred gatekeeping role scouting plays. They may see only fundraising and not a foundation. Others may brand scouting activities as merely outdoor recreation, but it can and must be shown that BSA is not a camping club; it is a character university centered on duty to God. I quote again from Robert Baden-Powell: ‘The whole of [scouting] is based on religion, that is, on the realization and service of God.’

Had God been written out of Scouts – had secularism and atheism been let in – the LDS church would have bolted.

To understand why that’s important to the BSA, you have to understand that local units are chartered – kind of “owned” – by local groups. Mostly these are churches. It’s a bit like a franchise agreement between BSA and the local groups. But it’s even more like a customer relationship. The churches are BSA’s largest customers, and if national churches stop buying what BSA is offering, it would crumble overnight.

So, according to its biggest sponsors, Scouts is first and foremost a quasi-church, with duty to God being its supreme purpose. Yes, it will accept just about any kind of theism. But it’s theism or nothing.

But I said I was an atheist. And that I still support Scouting’s values. And I was a registered leader for five years. How did that work? I’ll expand upon that in part 2 tomorrow.

I’m resigning as a Boy Scouts registered leader. Here’s why.

I believe in Scouting. I believe in the values and skills it teaches. I believe in the experiences it provides. Both of my boys have participated in Scouts. I have gladly volunteered as a registered leader with Boy Scouts of America for more than five years. I led a Cub Scout den for most of that time, and for two of those years, I also served as a Cubmaster. I was all in.

This week, I resigned.

This past May, as was widely reported and discussed, the Boy Scouts of America reconsidered its policies toward homosexual individuals. Wonderfully, it chose to allow openly homosexual children to participate in Scouts. However, it also chose to continue to discriminate against openly homosexual adults by barring them from serving as leaders.

Now, the local BSA council – W.D. Boyce – is taking proactive steps to ensure that it can implement these discriminatory policies free from challenge or interference.

The council is approaching Scouting units that are chartered by public school parent-teacher organizations (PTOs) and giving them advice that will lead to their severing their relationships with BSA.

Every Scouting unit is technically “owned” by a chartered organization. That chartered organization signs a contract with BSA that says, in part, that it will abide by all of BSA’s policies. The problem, from the council’s perspective, is that PTOs can’t discriminate since they are affiliated with public institutions. So, BSA wants to get PTOs out of the chartering business somehow. It’s doing that by advising the PTOs that, if they approve a homosexual leader, the charter contract is void, and the PTOs won’t be protected by BSA’s insurance policies should anything go wrong in their Scouting programs. The council is portraying this as each PTO’s choice, but of course, it’s really no choice at all. Once the PTO is out of the way, the council is helping the Scouting units find churches or private civic organizations that are still legally allowed to discriminate. My local Pack in Morton is one of the effected Packs, and these steps by BSA to proactively seek out a path to discriminate are steps too far for me.

I’ll readily admit it took me a long time – probably too long – to get to this point. It hasn’t been a secret that BSA has had a long-standing discriminatory policy toward homosexuals. But as I expressed before, I believe in Scouting. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have invested so much time and energy into it. I did try investigating other youth programs that are similar to Scouts. But in downstate Illinois, those programs really don’t exist. Also, thankfully, the issue of discrimination never came up. And I always comforted myself that, even if it did, somehow my Pack was in a special position because of its chartering by a public institution. Now, that’s ending. Like so many things with people, it’s different when it comes home.

I continue to hope that BSA will realize its error and further correct its policies. But for now, I can no longer be party to such institutionalized and active intolerance.

Why I quit mainstream journalism and embraced liberal politics

The debate over whether to bomb Syria feels just like run-up to the invasion of Iraq. It’s on a much smaller scale, and some of the facts are different. But the similarities are enough to make me think back to why I left mainstream journalism and openly embraced liberalism.

Mainstream journalism was once a comfortable fit for me. I grew up in a newspaperman’s household. My father spent three decades in the business, eventually rising to become an editor at major dailies. I started to follow that path, getting a journalism degree. I worked in public radio and TV journalism for about six-and-a-half years, mostly covering business issues and filing reports for a program called Marketplace and occasionally for NPR.

I long had a vague sense that something was wrong with the conservative story of the world and that I was more of a political, social, and economic liberal. But I was born in 1969. I grew up in Reagan’s America and in the decades of conservative ascendancy. The liberal vision and story had been under attack and in decline nearly my entire life.

I was also content to remain in non-partisan, “objective” journalism. Being a good, liberally educated person, it appealed to my need for evidence and multiple, contradictory voices. Also, having known a few journalists in my time, I think it’s a way to burnish your ego. There’s a pox on everyone else’s house, but hey, you’re an objective journalist. You’re better than all that.

Then, in the early 2000s, I was radicalized into politics by the Bush administration and the national media that enabled it.

I supported the war in Afghanistan as a way to bring to justice those who attacked us on 9/11. But after that, it’s obvious to me that the Bush administration was willing to do anything it could to get us into the war with Iraq, including lying and bullying. They also laid the ground work for the ongoing “War on Terror” – the endless war – with its drone attacks, privacy violations, and civil liberties abuses. For goodness sake, my country became a nation that systematically tortured people!

At the same time I saw the top practitioners – the so-called leaders – of my chosen profession of journalism roll over. They became cheerleaders to war. They covered torture with euphemisms. My pet theory is that they were overcome by fear. The places where these journalistic leaders lived – New York and Washington, D.C. – were attacked. Anyone would be afraid after that. But they were also supposed to have some professional distance. That turned out not to be so.

I gladly left mainstream journalism in 2006. I became a stay-at-home dad. I had every intention of doing some writing, but with my new political perspective, I still hadn’t sorted out what that would be.

Then along came the bursting of the housing bubble, the financial system crisis, the bailouts, and the ongoing economic crisis of unemployment and falling wages. To me, this has left naked the power the plutocrats. The wealthiest have recovered while the economic lives of most people in the country have stagnated.

So, due to war and economic collapse and the people who made it possible, I’ve become a liberal activist. Sometimes I felt like I had no choice. As the saying goes, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”

So where does this leave me as a journalist? I would guess that the keepers of the profession would say I’ve gone beyond all redemption. They’d say you can’t openly espouse liberal values and causes and be a journalist.

I partly agree with that. Some journalism is just plain, old factual reporting. Sometimes you just want to know what someone said or what the numbers are, and you want to be confident that the details are reported faithfully. Also, evidence still matters to journalism. Journalists should demand evidence and be skeptical when they receive it. The rules of good journalism never change.

But meaningful journalism comes from a perspective – more specifically, from a moral perspective – from a perspective of what is right and wrong. This is true whether the moral perspective is openly acknowledged by the journalist or not. By writing this, I’m making my perspective clear. And from here, I hope I can start producing some journalism worth reading.