The Dish

"Wow!"

History professor and Alaskan David Noon corrects Palin for repeating the myth of "Seward's Folly" – the purchase of Alaska in 1867 by Secretary of State William Seward. From Going Rogue:

Critics ridiculed Seward for spending so much on a remote chunk of earth that some thought of as just a frozen, inhospitable wilderness that was dark half the year. The $7.2 million purchase became known as “Seward’s Folly” or “Seward’ Icebox.” Seward withstood the mocking and disdain because of his vision for Alaska. He knew her potential to help secure the nation with her resources and strategic position on the globe. . . . [D]ecades later, he was posthumously vindicated, as purveyors of unpopular common sense often are.

From the historian:

So far as public opinion was concerned, most newspapers actually supported the purchase. The major exception was the New York Tribune, which was owned by Horace Greeley, a Republican who was nevertheless one of William Seward’s avowed enemies.  (Greeley believed Seward had been too radical on the slavery issue, among other things).  Even Democratically-aligned papers in the North — while not missing the opportunity to crack wise about polar bears and walruses — tended to support the purchase, mainly because there was no compelling reason to oppose it.  And at the end of the day, the treaty with Russia passed the US Senate by a vote of 37-2, with no significant expressions of opposition during the floor debate.

[M]ost educated Alaskans are aware of all this, at least in its broad outline.  It’s taught in the schools, and the few textbooks that have been written about Alaskan history all incorporate Wright’s findings into their treatment of the Alaskan purchase.  Certainly someone who claims to know and love the state as much as the abdicated governor does should know that the “Seward’s Folly” myth survives because most people outside the state know very little about Alaska and are perfectly comfortable substituting fable for fact when thinking about its history, culture and geography.  But since Sarah Palin’s entire schtick requires an audience that believes the myth — that believes, for example, that we can drill the shit out of the state without wrecking its ecology — I’m not surprised that she believes it as well.

(Photo: The document United States government used to purchase Alaska from Russia in the 19th century. 30 March 1867)

Ed Pilkington tells the story:

George Patten, aged eight, […] boasted at school about having met Abraham Lincoln, having been introduced to the then presidential candidate with his journalist father. The boy's friends thought he had made the story up, and bullied him. To settle the matter, Patten's teacher wrote to the White House asking for clarification about whether there was any truth to the anecdote. On 19 March 1861, two weeks after his inauguration and despite being preoccupied with forming an administration and the early slide into civil war, Lincoln took the trouble to reply: "To whom it may concern: I did see and talk with Master George Evans Patten, last May, at Springfield, Illinois. Respectfully, A. Lincoln."

Jonah Lehrer posits:

[T]he only way we're ever going to reduce medical costs is to restrict procedures that haven't passed evidence-based efficacy tests. Maybe that means 40 year old women don't get mammograms, or that we treat prostrate cancer less aggressively, or that we stop performing spinal fusion surgeries. Although there's solid evidence to question all of these medical options, such changes provoke intense debate. Why? Because our emotions don't understand statistics. Because when we have back pain we want an MRI. Because when it's our father with prostate cancer we want the most aggressive possible treatments. And so on. The point is that there's often an indefatigable gap between the rigors of cost-benefit analyses and the emotional hunches that drive our decisions. We say we want to follow the evidence, but then the evidence rubs against a bias like loss aversion, and so we make an exception. We'll follow the evidence next time.

The grandmother of Tripp Johnston, Bristol Palin's infant and Sarah Palin's grandson, is headed to jail for three years plus three years of probation:

Johnston made a deal with prosecutors to plead to a single felony count in exchange for dropping five other felony drug dealing charges against her. The deal called for the 42-year-old Wasilla woman to be sentenced to three years of prison time plus three years of probation, which is what the judge gave her.

Johnston received less time than the normal five to eight years for a second-degree felony drug charge because the amount she was dealing was so small.

What impact this could have on the Palin-Johnston feud requires inside knowledge of those families that the Dish simply doesn't have. But I imagine it must be painful for Levi. I wonder if Palin will comment.

An amateur’s moment of glory in rugby: a $400,000 prize is awarded to any of a group of rugby fans to kick the ball and hit the crossbar. First up, Steve Tinner:

Clay Shirky tries to figure out how to save the bookstore as a social space.

Liz Cheney's terror-mongering advocacy group releases an ominous short documentary about how the citizens of Standish, Michigan, are supposedly dead set against the transfer of detainees to a nearby prison. Greg Sargent cuts through the deception:

But Standish’s City Manager tells us that local leaders and residents want the facility, and dismissed Cheney’s efforts as “fearmongering.” Cheney is “certainly not representing the views of our community,” the City Manager, Michael Moran, told our reporter, Amanda Erickson. While some local residents do appear to have expressed mixed feelings or opposition to the plan, Moran says that they’re an isolated minority that Ms. Cheney’s video elevates out of proportion in a way that’s “off base.” What’s more, the Standish city council recently passed a unanimous resolution expressing support for bringing Gitmo detainees, citing job losses in the wake of the closing of the facility.

Under-blogger Bodenner profiled the town for TNR last month and found the same findings. Noam Scheiber this week suggests that the scare tactics in Standish are working, and that similar tactics are showing up in Thompson, Illinois – the latest potential destination for detainees.

It's so bizarre that transferring prisoners to mainland jails in order to shut down the objective black eye of Gitmo is receiving so much resistance from the pro-torture right. We can argue about how to try these suspects, but their location should surely be a non-issue. 

What Cheney fears, I suspect, is that Gitmo will be shut down, that history will record it as the lowest point in US human rights ever, that the Cheney family will be tarred as the brand that destroyed America's moral standing, and that Dick Cheney will become one of the darkest figures in modern American history.

But if you can keep Gitmo open, if you prevent detainee transfer, if you can spin the next terror attack as caused by the refusal to torture … you have a chance to rescue the narrative again. And so America's cold civil war continues …

Suzanne Sena, former anchor for the Fox News Channel, joins the Onion News Network. Her starring in this particular segment is apt – and very funny: