The Dish

A fantastic web feature from the NYT. Gawker sums up one finding:

Netflix: Manhattan Mostly Occupied by Gays and Self-Loathing Alcoholics

Like they're mutually exclusive?

John McWhorter, a linguist by trade, gives Reid the benefit of the doubt:

First of all, we need not pretend that by “Negro dialect” Reid meant the cartoon minstrel talk of Amos n Andy. After all, why would Reid, a rational human being under any analysis, be under the impression that any black person talks like Uncle Remus, much less be surprised that one of them does not? My guess is that he said “negro” in a passing attempt to name Black English in a detached, professional way, randomly choosing a slightly arcane and outdated term. Or, consider that Negro English was what scholars called “Ebonics” until the early seventies. Reid likely caught wind of that terminology — he's been around a while, after all.

Second, yes there is a such thing as Black English.

Sometimes one hears a claim that Black English is the same as white Southern English. We must always beware of stereotyping and be open to the counterintuitive, but here is an instance where we can trust our senses: there is a “black sound.” It’s not just youth slang: it’s sentence patterns – Why you ain’t call me? (not a white Southernism, notice) – and a “sound,” such that you’d know Morgan Freeman was black even if he were reading the phone book. The combination is what we all feel – with uncanny accuracy even without seeing faces, as linguists have found – as “sounding black.” Of course not all blacks speak Black English or have The Sound, and those that do (which is most) do to varying extents. But they do. That’s what Reid meant, we all know it, and it’s okay to know it.

I think Reid's unfortunately worded statement was mainly an empirical description of the effects of racism on Obama's candidacy, but of course laced with something that rubbed me the wrong way. And his gaffe was empirically true. Minorities grapple with this all the time. Gay men in the public eye tend to be slightly less effeminate than others, as if people can only tolerate gayness if it is robbed of all its cultural diversity. Ditto lesbians. Most of the out ones are pretty fem. I think this is sad and prejudiced myself, but it remains a fact in majority-minority relations, and even within minorities. One of my own joke titles for an autobiography is "Butch Enough." And you will rarely see a personal ad touting a gay man's effeminacy. Au contraire.

We've found out it was a return ticket, not one-way. And the payment in cash would be suspicious in America, but how many people in Nigeria use credit cards? I'd imagine, however, that the privileged kid of a major banker would have had one, until his dad cut him off.

As the RNC chair plays racial politics with Harry Reid, Jonathan Martin shows how such politics are binding the GOP with regard to Steele:

“I don’t think there is any chance he’s going to be dumped before the next election for the obvious reason,” said one of the party’s most influential strategists and a key player on presidential campaigns. Asked why that would be, the Republican, who is not on the party committee, shot back: “You’re not going to dump the first African-American chairman. That’s the only reason. Otherwise, he’d be gone.”

Bristol, England, 8.30 am

From the "60 Minutes" interview:

Schmidt said he asked Palin about her serenity in the face of becoming "one of the most famous people in the world." He quoted her as saying, "It's God's plan."

This, of course, is open to interpretation. Is it an expression of religious and spiritual calm at a moment of high drama? Or is it exactly the use of religion to sanctify one's own ambition and a dangerous fusion of divine will and human action? My view is a mixture of the two, if the quote is exactly accurate.

But both interpretations are more than a little troubling in a secular politician.

Palin isn't a minister or priest. She isn't a bishop. She is a celebrity, who spent ten minutes trying to run a state much bigger than Texas with the population of the District of Columbia. When she says "it's God's will", she is saying, it seems to me, either that her destiny is foretold as a modern day Esther (which is a strong theme among her Christianist supporters); or that it doesn't matter what decisions she makes in office because God is in charge. So she is either filled with delusions of grandeur and prone to say things that believing Christians keep private out of humility; or she thinks she's some kind of Messiah figure.

A reader writes:

In fairness to Ms. Cheney, she did serve in some fairly high positions within the State Department during the Bush years, including some good old-fashioned neocon meddling with Iran which in retrospect seems to have made things much worse.  As is the case with much of the current Republican party, her celebrity is not due to competence.  However, her positions within the Bush Administration can reasonably be claimed as sufficient experience to discuss issues on foreign affairs.

Now, she certainly got that experience by pure nepotism, and I don't think she has ever expressed an opinion that wasn't shared with her father.  Her current relevance is due to the abhorrent fondness of the American right for the military state Cheney tried to create, along with the fact that Republicans have been shameful cowards regarding the threat of terrorism.  This has made her a big name in conservative circles, which has in turn led her to show up all over the Sunday talk shows.

This I know. But why Liz Cheney rather than, say, Condi Rice whom she worked for? Or congresswoman Jane Harman, who actually knows intelligence issues? Or a journalist whose job is to find things out rather than propagate pure propaganda?

My column yesterday focused on the impact of deep cultural and partisan polarization on the ability of the president to get things done:

Look. There is a real and vital role for political opposition, and a robust, healthy, even vicious critique of Obama’s policies and a clear alternative to them is not just legitimate but essential for a democracy to work. But these statements from key players at the very top of the Republican party do not reflect this. They reflect a partisanship that seeks to impugn the core motives of the president, implying that he is, in fact, something alien and destructive to America, and must be opposed in everything he does, whatever it is, because his success would mean the end of America itself. It is not a declaration of opposition; it’s a declaration of war.

That is why in the week before Obama’s inauguration the most influential voice on the right, Rush Limbaugh, openly said he hoped the president would fail. That is why, in the first real test of the opposition, Obama’s stimulus package — with vast tax cuts in the middle of the steepest downturn in memory — garnered zero Republican votes. Zero. That’s why a health insurance reform plan that is in many ways more conservative than the Republican leader Mitt Romney’s Massachusetts pilot, a reform that cut the deficit, ruled out a public option, and gave the health insurance and drug companies millions of new private sector clients, won zero Republican support in the Senate and one, yes, one, Republican vote in the House.

Now recall Bush’s first signature proposal, his massive 2001 tax cut. Unlike Obama, he came to office with fewer votes than his opponent. In the wake of that election, 12 Democratic senators voted for Bush’s campaign promise, and 28 Democrats followed suit in the House. McCain actually voted against his own party on this critical first test. Now look at him. That is a sign of how partisanship and polarisation have only deepened since 2000, and Obama’s attempt to overcome it has simply fallen on barren ground. The response of the Republicans to Obama’s open hand has been pretty close to that of the Iranian junta: a clenched fist.

An important factual correction on the undie-bomber story.