Year: 2005

Those interested in the New York City marriage rights case – where a judge has ruled that the city must grant civil marriage licenses to qualified gay couples within thirty days barring an appeal – should check this piece out. It’s a very thorough and interesting analysis. One small detail: the parents of one of the plaintiffs had to move from Texas to California to get married. Texas banned inter-racial marriage at the time. This year may also see legislative support for marriage rights in Canada and Massachusetts. If the Massachusetts legislature decides to punt on a state amendment, the national situation changes dramatically. We will then have one state that has decided through legislative, democratic means to keep marriage rights for all its citizens. Any federal amendment would then be geared directly to thwarting an individual state’s right to choose what marriage is for itself. And the evolution of the GOP into an anti-states’ rights, big federal government party will be complete. (More interesting legal discussion here.)

It would be extremely churlish of me not to offer some praise for at least the aspirations of Bush’s new budget. Cutting non-defense, non-homeland security discretionary spending by one percent in real terms is admirable. The question, however, is: how much of this is grandstanding? The biggest problems are obviously Medicare (which Bush has made far, far worse), Medicaid, and Social Security. Give Bush credit for at least raising the odds of some benefit cuts in the latter (regardless of the personal accounts debate, why the hell not peg future benefits to prices rather than wages?) But the underlying picture is still one of growing debt and future big tax hikes. The tax hikes will be Bush’s legacy – whenever they come. Or as one commentator put it today: “President Bush would never admit this, but he has transformed the party into the party of permanent big deficits.” You can say that again. I’ll take the president truly seriously if he vetoes any spending bill that ducks his farm subsidy cuts, and if he raises the cap on payroll taxes for social security reform. That’s one very telling marker for his earnestness. For my part I simply don’t believe in Bush’s conviction on this. He has never spoken passionately about shrinking government; he has rarely attacked the idea that government itself shouldn’t be the cure for everyone’s problems; he has never vetoed a spending bill. I’d like to trust him, but after four years of fiscal abandon, why should anyone? So: distrust and verify.

“At least 12,000 American troops and probably more should leave at once, to send a stronger signal about our intentions and to ease the pervasive sense of occupation.” (Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.), January 27, 2005).

“America’s willful defeatists – led by Senator Ted Kennedy, who chose to declare our cause all but lost just days before this historic vote – look particularly puny in light of the millions who turned out to vote because they believe in the new Iraq.” (National Review Online, January 31, 2005.)

“WASHINGTON (AP) — Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz says that with the election in Iraq over he believes 15,000 U.S. troops can be withdrawn, reducing the American military force to 135,000.” (Associated Press, February 4, 2005).

I too was heartened by what seemed a newly vigorous pledge to rein in spending in the SOTU. And then I read this.

ABOUT LAST NIGHT:

Conversation chez moi:

Me: “I keep getting anxiety attacks that I haven’t blogged. Then I have to remind myself: it’s ok.”

Boyfriend: “Honey, you’re a nerd.”

A challenging piece from Brian Riedl.

ANOTHER STORY: I keep posting these emails not simply because they obviously make me feel that four and a half years of daily work was well worth it, but because they give me hope in general about the future of discourse in this country. Here’s one that is also testimony to what blogs have been able to do in dislodging some settled prejudices:

As I read the letter you posted today (“One more” February 3) I decided that I, too, must tell you about the difference your writing has made in my life. I hope I’m not too late–I’ve been thinking about writing to you for over a year, but I always talked myself out of it. Today I find myself compelled to tell you my own humble story.

While I was raised in a fairly conservative family, I came of age during the ’60s. I met my husband while we were both campaigning for Eugene McCarthy for president. We were married the week of the Democratic convention in Chicago. I changed from being oblivious about politics to being a serious left-wing, anti-war, Republican-hating straight party-line Democrat. I believed every word that Noam Chomsky wrote. It was all so simple: Republicans wore black hats; Democrats wore white hats. All of my friends believed unquestioningly that peace, love, agnosticism, secularism, enlarged federal programs, and reduced military budgets would save the world form the evil American empire.

After 9/11, I reacted the same way as all my friends. I blamed America. Wasn’t it clear from history that America was an evil aggressor trying to take over the world and that, as Ward Churchill has so famously written, the “chickens were coming home to roost”? America asked for it, and we deserved what we got. It wasn’t until Paul Wellstone died that I started looking for answers.

Wellstone’s death occurred just before the Republican victory in the 2002 elections, and I was bereft at the loss of Wellstone and the sharp turn to the right nationally. I was outraged about the building discussion about war in Iraq. I made jokes (half seriously) about moving to Canada. I listened religiously to Amy Goodman’s show “Democracy Now” on the radio and would try to contain my moral outrage at the the Republican agenda. I was seriously depressed.

Then I read a column by Ariana Huffington which talked about Weblogs and explained how the blogs worked to bring down Trent Lott. In her article, she specifically mentioned the your name and the Daily Dish. I started reading your blog and following your links to other bloggers. That’s when my life started to change.

I still remember the day I read one of your articles: This is a Religious War. I sat in stunned silence. That one article was the beginning of my transformation. I started to question everything I believed. I vowed to re-educate myself. From that day forward, I started to read intelligent conservative writers to try and understand a world-view totally unlike anything I had learned in my politically correct ’60s college education. One by one, my tired old beliefs began to crumble and then to collapse. I began to understand the danger of fundamental Islamic terrorism. I learned to believe more in the what conservatives call equality of opportunity, not equality of outcomes. I began to understand the problem of long-term government entitlements. Your testimony of faith allowed me to revisit my decision to dismiss religion as simple superstition. I managed to remain something of a liberal on social issues, while moving to the right on issues like fighting terrorism and reigning in domestic government programs.

I would like to tell you this journey to a new world-view has been easy. In most ways, it has been the most difficult thing I have ever done. My close friends cut me some slack at first. Now they think I live in some parallel, crazy universe of fascist neocons. They still invite me to parties, but I keep quiet about my views. There is never any open discussion of ideas. No curiosity about why I have changed. Once I dared to say that I thougt there might be moral justification for the war in Iraq, and I was shouted down. I have left my book club which allowed only one filter for interpreting writers: ’70s leftish, hard feminist. anti-American, peacenik, bigger government, internationalism, etc. (The amazing thing to me is that members of the bookclub are not even aware that they see the world through a siingle lens. ) I teach English in a community college in the Midwest, and the atmosphere is so thick with political correctness (something I never noticed before) that sometimes it almost takes my breath away. The most difficult thing for me has been the tension in my marriage. My husband is still stuck in the ’60s, and every night he watches the news and is outraged by the power of conservatives to move America in a direction he hates. It is a constant wedge between us. I would like to say that all of this doesn’t bother me, but it is personally painful.

On the other hand, I feel more alive and engaged and excited about the world than I have for years. I have grown in knowledge and understanding beyond my wildest expectations, and I am driven to learn and understand more about history, religion, politics,geography, history, journalism, science. I feel that the great issues are worthy of open minds and fair debate. History, indeed, is not dead.

In short, I am a new person. I see the world through new eyes. Isn’t it amazing? Think about it. You changed my life.

It doesn’t get much better for a writer than that, does it?

I guess this is becoming self-serving, but here’s an email that makes me happy. It’s odd that many emails I’ve received have said that I’ve helped people who were very conservative to see some good things about some “liberal” positions – like marriage rights, or torture, or fiscal balance (yes, the latter is now a “liberal” position!). And the other half are from liberals saying that this blog helped them see some “conservative” truths, like the need to liberate some people from tyranny when we can and when it also serves our national security interests. The “eagle” mix, I suppose. Anyway, one last email from you:

When I started reading you a few years ago during the run-up to the war, I was, at that point, a 23 year-old Democrat who had never really thought much about foreign policy, the U.S. role in the world, etc., but who was fairly strident in his partisanship and thus reflexively hostile to any idea stemming from the Republican party, particularly George W. Bush (to illustrate my zealotry, I cried on election day 2000, when the big issue was prescription drugs, and when I was 21 years old). Naturally I supported the war in Afghanistan, as did most of my fellow Democratic friends. But when the debate over Iraq was starting to simmer and those around me instinctively became indignant, fuming about a war for oil, praying at the altar of multilateralism, pointing always to the supposed efficacy of the UN sanctions regime, I just didn’t feel it. I thought at first it was because I was a relative amateur when it came to foreign affairs and my views weren’t sufficiently developed, but deep down I felt that something was missing from the Democratic “line” this time. I know this sounds extremely hyperbolic, but reading your postings on Iraq were truly transformative for me. In the narrow sense they gave voice to my repressed and muddled thoughts on an incredibly complex and consequential debate, maybe the defining debate of our generation. But they also highlighted what seemed to be “missing” in the rantings of my friends (and Democratic leaders) — values, reflection, and foresight — three things that I had always associated with Democrats and liberals. This time, they were the ones who seemed reactionary. And from this minor revelation — maybe simply because I stopped hating Bush and deifying Democrats — I no longer saw other issues through a hyper-partisan lens. So thank you for that, but above all thank you for having the guts to write about big ideas during these weighty times.

Cheers.

A “Marshall plan for America”? Could these people be lamer? More out of touch? More pathetically pandering? Just when you thought you couldn’t get any worse than Tom Daschle, you get this … Jeez. “Groundhog day”??? “We can do better”?? Who writes this guff?

How more eloquent an image than the mother of a fallen soldier and a woman who was able to vote because of his sacrifice? Better than any words. Powerful, memorable iconography. Far, far better than the words the president was given tonight.

How extraordinary, in a way, that this so-far pedestrian address should be saved by the Iraq section. That Iraqi woman in the balcony brings a lump to my throat. I’ve thrown much criticism the way of this president because of missteps in the occupation. But it remains true and undeniable that without him, Saddam’s tyranny would still be in place, terror would still have the initiative, and hope would be dim. His obstinacy is better described in this context as alloyed with something more profound: steadfastness. This president deserves the applause. And his insistence on no artificial time-table is exactly right. No surrender.

In general, a nice and subtle encouragment of the dictators to become more democratic. But: “The government of Saudi Arabia can demonstrate its leadership in the region …”? Excuse me? Tough words for Syria; not-so-tough for Iran. I don’t hear a call for more military intervention. I hear a desire to solidify progress in Iraq and use that as a pivot for broader change. A pretty solid balance, I’d say. Especially the direct words to the people of Iran. They are the future – not their rulers.