New at Reason

David Weigel | July 25, 2006

Cathy Young makes a (doomed?) effort to save conservatives from, well, other conservatives.

Comments

|7.25.06 @ 2:16AM|#

Ms. Young, don't you ever get angry?

|7.25.06 @ 2:21AM|#

Good Intentions? What good intentions? The group that stole an election(s)? Lied about WMDs? That let conservative commentators lie about the administration, villify Democrats and others who voiced any complaints, or contrary opinions? Who let New Orleans drown simply because its people were poor, black and/or democrats? Who co-op Christianity and lied in the name of the Lord? I could gone on... ., but... .

What good intentions?

|7.25.06 @ 8:07AM|#

parts of that article seemed a bit familiar...

|7.25.06 @ 8:37AM|#

It seems likely to me that Bush and many of those around him are motivated by good intentions. They believe that the fight against terror calls for desperate measures, and that American power can enable the spread of freedom abroad.

This is where Ms Young loses me as well. In contrast to many on the left I do believe that many of Bush's supporters have good intentions, Powerline bloggers excepted. And I think people like Rice and Wolfowitz are motivated by good intentions. But it seems to me a ridiculous stretch to say the same for Cheney and Rumsfeld unless you are the kind of person who believes that American power is an absolute good no matter how that power is used simply because it is American power. All the evidence seems to be that Cheney in particular is motivated only by the desire to accumulate power for his little group, I ascribe no good to him whatsoever, he is probably one of the most sinister bastards in American politics. As far as the President, I accept that he basically has good intentions, but those intentions are so vague and abstract ("freedom", "democracy") that they are essentially meaningless and justify almost any kind of incompetency.

|7.25.06 @ 8:50AM|#

Frederic,

I can't tell if you're serious or a parody. Well done!

"let New Orleans drown simply because its people were poor, black and/or democrats?"

Nice!

|7.25.06 @ 9:07AM|#

There is a certain bread of professional conservative whiner. For this group, no President is ever conservative enough and every Republican who has ever won an election immediately stabs the real conservatives. Generally what makes you a part of this group is being someone who is left out of the spoils of a good government appointment when a Republican is in office. Basically if you don�t get a job or real access to the President, that President has �let the movement down�. Ripping on a sitting conservative President has always been a sure way for a conservative on the outside to get his name in the paper and seem relevant to a press corps looking for something, anything negative to say about a Republican president.

|7.25.06 @ 9:09AM|#

Frederick,

Bush did not "let New Orleans drown simply because its people were poor, black and/or democrats."

He let New Orleans drown because he didn't take seriously the government's responsibility to provide effective governance.

A lily white, conservative city would have been screwed over just as thoroughly by the incompetant cronies Bush put into positions meant to be filled by skilled professionals.

|7.25.06 @ 9:15AM|#

"A lily white, conservative city would have been screwed over just as thoroughly by the incompetant cronies Bush put into positions meant to be filled by skilled professionals."

Joe,

A lily white, conservative city would have had an effective state and local government rather than a corrupt Democratic machine that ran New Orleans. Rita was a bigger hurricane than Katrina yet Texas seemed to have come through just fine. The hardest hit areas of Katrina were in Mississippi, yet they seemed to have come through just fine. Andrew was a more powerful storm than Katrina and hit homestead Florida dead center, yet Florida came through fine.

What you saw in Katrina was the horrible crony corrupt city governments that the Democratic Party has been inflicting on African Americans for the last 40 years. The state of the education system and city governments in inner city areas is the biggest crime committed on the black community since slavery and the Democratic Party is responsible. Pass the buck all you want, but someone ought to be held responsible for the city government of the New Orleans and the numerous other poor, black inner cities like it and it sure as hell isn't the Republicans.

|7.25.06 @ 9:23AM|#

What you saw in Katrina was the horrible crony corrupt city governments that the Democratic Party has been inflicting on African Americans for the last 40 years.

Inflicting? Anyone (Whatever race you are, whatever group you are) who goes into the voting booth and time and again votes for a corrupt government didn't get it INFLICTED on them; they asked for it.

Who's responsible for their plight? The people themselves, no matter the race or party, John.

|7.25.06 @ 9:35AM|#

"Who's responsible for their plight? The people themselves, no matter the race or party, John"

To some degree yes. But the fact that they were elected doesn't let the crooks completly off the hook. Just because the people were dumb enough to vote for me, doesn't releive me of the responsibility for being a scandrel once I am in office.

G. Hamid|7.25.06 @ 9:35AM|#

History seems to show that groups that are out of power tend to rally together while those in power tend to break apart.

If you really want a story, Cathy, why do the out-of-power Dems continue to fall apart like a cheap suit?

|7.25.06 @ 9:37AM|#

"There is a certain bread of professional conservative whiner."

Lemme take a crack at this'n. It's gotta be Wonder Bread. None a that Elitist East Coast marble rye shit.

|7.25.06 @ 9:45AM|#

"He let New Orleans drown because he didn't take seriously the government's responsibility to provide effective governance."

Wow! That's something else! I like how GW Bush is personally held accountable for ineffective local governance. What happened to the government people elected in NO? Where were they? It's not their fault, it's no one's fault but Bush! Did Bush have a small part with his inexperienced cronies? Sure. Is that the only thing that went wrong? Did he 'let' NO drown? Simplistic partisan crap.

David|7.25.06 @ 9:47AM|#

"Who's responsible for their plight? The people themselves, no matter the race or party"

This is plain, if harsh truth, and more in line with what I understand as a practical application of libertarian thought. While I understand the reflexive distrust of government (whether Bushite cronyism or Democratic extortionist machine politics), in the end I see small-l libertariansm as the empowerment of individuals to succeed or fail based on their own merits and efforts (or as Rand would say, 'act in their own enlightened self-interest'). Distrust of the government (federal or local) is all well and good, but when one starts blaming the government's seemingly incompetent response for the fiasco over the victims' irresponsibility in not evacuating (at least those who apparently just sat on their asses and awaited the government's bounty)then it seems to me that one is in danger of definig one's stance simply as a negative, like the myriad extremists on left and right who are in the process of hijacking both major parties.

|7.25.06 @ 9:59AM|#

"If you really want a story, Cathy, why do the out-of-power Dems continue to fall apart like a cheap suit?"

Probably because they think they *are* in power in some meaningful sense. Perhaps it's the "power" of incumbency, if nothing else.

Dan T.|7.25.06 @ 10:09AM|#

A lily white, conservative city would have had an effective state and local government rather than a corrupt Democratic machine that ran New Orleans. Rita was a bigger hurricane than Katrina yet Texas seemed to have come through just fine. The hardest hit areas of Katrina were in Mississippi, yet they seemed to have come through just fine. Andrew was a more powerful storm than Katrina and hit homestead Florida dead center, yet Florida came through fine.

None of those areas were under 20 feet of water after the hurricane!

Blaming the victims is ugly - are you really saying NOLA wouldn't have flooded if Ray Nagin had still been a Republican?

|7.25.06 @ 10:12AM|#

Rita was a bigger hurricane than Katrina yet Texas seemed to have come through just fine. The hardest hit areas of Katrina were in Mississippi, yet they seemed to have come through just fine. Andrew was a more powerful storm than Katrina and hit homestead Florida dead center, yet Florida came through fine.

Perhaps, but those areas only suffered traditional hurricane-related damage. None of them got turned into disease-infested swamp bowls as a result of some broken levees. I still think that local and state officials bear a certain amount of responsibility for the comedy of horrors that took place in New Orleans, but it's not fair to pin all the blame on them simply because Homestead and Biloxi didn't devolve so terribly (though I do remember reading about looting in the aftermath of Andrew).

Dan T.|7.25.06 @ 10:12AM|#

in the end I see small-l libertariansm as the empowerment of individuals to succeed or fail based on their own merits and efforts

And this is why most people don't accept libertarianism - because nobody succeeds or fails based on their own merits and efforts.

It's mostly circumstance and fortune.

|7.25.06 @ 10:15AM|#

""There is a certain bread of professional conservative whiner.""

Can we say Ann Coulter?
_______________________________________

Katrina

There is plenty of blame to pass around for Katrina, not one speck of it has to do with political affiliation, that concept is nothing but talk show fodder. In the early stages I give the city government some slack, they too were a victim of the storm. Many of the first responder profession abandoned post to ensure there family survived. Some just abandoned post. Some became victims of the storm directly. It's hard to expect quality when your police station is flooded to the point that it must be abandoned.
It's hard to take the lead when you resources are destroyed.

|7.25.06 @ 10:20AM|#

It's mostly circumstance and fortune.

What an ugly sense of life. You're saying that men are powerless victims in the face of powers beyond our control. Man is impotent in the face of nature and chance.

I choose my own destiny, Dan. Sorry you're a perpetual puppet.

|7.25.06 @ 10:23AM|#

Is there anything less useful that arguing over motives?

|7.25.06 @ 10:23AM|#

First to the silly comments about Katrina, Bush let that happen because there was no contested election hanging in the balance. Just compare the .gov reaction to the previous years Florida's hurricanes, only months before an election to NO's problems sortly afterwards. Comparing the two is something every American should do.


"Unlike many Bush critics on the left, I don't believe that this administration is made up of villains who want to rape the Constitution, slaughter and torture brown-skinned people in the Middle East, and reduce the American people to a mass of compliant sheep.

Actuallly, there is every evidence that this (minus the rhetorical flourishes that lift the statement to silly nonesense) that the Bush admin is directly attempting to weaken the counstitution and strengthen the "imperial presidency". And he would not be the first. In many ways Ms. Young is as disingenius as any defender of the Old Soviet Empire. The Bush admin has not passed up a single chance to undermine the bill of rights, and basic contstitutional liberties (this is the admin that believes they have the right to hold any American citizen indefinitely based exclusively on their desire to do so).

There is a great deal of evidence that contrary to the belief that Bush is fighting "radical" Islam, that he would rather encourage a kind of western fundamentalism here, a law based not on the constitution or the declaration of independence, but a government based on conservative fundamentilist imterpertations of the Bible. Amazingly similar to what the radical Islamisists want in their own countries. And that he has used the conflict to push legal interpertations that would allow an Imperial presidency with Religious law as its underpinnings.

All I can ask is if Ms. Young likes Putin? Because by Bush's own testimony, they are a lot alike.

|7.25.06 @ 10:29AM|#

Blaming the victims is ugly - are you really saying NOLA wouldn't have flooded if Ray Nagin had still been a Republican?

Dan, would you suggest that it flooded because he wasn't a republican? Of course not!

The victims are victims of the weather, their decision to live where they lived, and because they placed their trust in people who were unable or unwilling to meet their expectations.

Blaming the victims may be 'ugly', but noone is completely blameless for what happens to them. This ain't no party...this ain't no disco...this ain't no foolin' around...it's life.

Dan T.|7.25.06 @ 10:32AM|#

What an ugly sense of life. You're saying that men are powerless victims in the face of powers beyond our control. Man is impotent in the face of nature and chance.

I choose my own destiny, Dan. Sorry you're a perpetual puppet.

This is known as "hubris". I hope I'm wrong, but at some point fate will probably slam you back to Earth.

|7.25.06 @ 10:46AM|#

Believe what you like, Dan; I can already tell who will be happier with life and who will feel like an everlasting victim

"It's not my fault, it's fate/karma/the gods!"

|7.25.06 @ 10:46AM|#

""And this is why most people don't accept libertarianism - because nobody succeeds or fails based on their own merits and efforts.

It's mostly circumstance and fortune.""

Fortune favors the prepared.

Though circumstance and fortune has something to do with it, they is not the main "drivers" if you will. If you are right, prior planning would have little effect on outcome, why get an education if it's going to be mostly irrelevent. Circumstance and luck would be the higher order, planing would be secondary. If you plan something out, thoughtfully of course, it has a better chance of success than it you left it to circumstance and fortune.

Maybe, people don't come to libertarianism because it holds you accountable for your own actions. Most people prefer to blame something else for their own problems. If one is either unemployed, in debt, in a foreclosure, living on the street, or all of the above, it's easier to blame Bush, or the government in general, than to accept your own faults.

The school system is a good example. It takes the heat for kids failures. It's easier to blame the system than your kid that never does his homework, never reads the text books, and does little in the classroom. The real problem with schools are the students, not the system, yet I never hear the kids getting the blame for it. It's almost taboo.

|7.25.06 @ 10:46AM|#

John,

A lily white, conservative city would have had an effective state and local government rather than a corrupt Democratic machine that ran New Orleans.

I have to call you on this. Surely you don't think the corruption in LA is a function of race, or even Political party?

|7.25.06 @ 10:47AM|#

None of those areas were under 20 feet of water after the hurricane!

If you build a house in a bowl(the bottom of which is below sea level) next to the sea in a region where catestrophic weather is common place, then it is certain (probability equals 100%) that your house will be destroyed at some point.

So tell me again, whose fault is this?

David|7.25.06 @ 10:50AM|#

"This is known as "hubris". I hope I'm wrong, but at some point fate will probably slam you back to Earth."

But then how one handles being slammed back to earth, whether by 'fate' or one's own choices, will tend to determine the scope of the consequencs of that slamming. For instance, if I lose my job under questionable circumstances, I can pour all my energy into a very likely fruitless lawsuit, becoming progressively embittered to the system, disconnected from (economic) reality, and ultimately unemployable. Or I can maintain a stiff upper lip and try my damndest to get another job, in a different field or specialty, or region or country if necessary. To be a slave to fate is in the end a choice, and a dispiritedly fatalistic one.

Dan T.|7.25.06 @ 10:53AM|#

The victims are victims of the weather, their decision to live where they lived, and because they placed their trust in people who were unable or unwilling to meet their expectations.

Blaming the victims may be 'ugly', but noone is completely blameless for what happens to them.


I suppose if I fired a gun at you, you would be to blame for being shot because you stood in the way of the bullet?

Dan T.|7.25.06 @ 11:05AM|#

Or I can maintain a stiff upper lip and try my damndest to get another job, in a different field or specialty, or region or country if necessary.

That's true, but getting a new job depends on there being somebody willing to hire you. So your fate is still not entirely in your own hands.

|7.25.06 @ 11:08AM|#

I suppose if I fired a gun at you, you would be to blame for being shot because you stood in the way of the bullet?

False analogy, but I shouldn't have to tell you that. Living in an area that is bowl-shaped, prone to rain and relying on an obviously corrupt and incompetent bureaucracy isn't akin to being spontaneously shot; it's akin to standing in traffic and then getting angry when you get hit by a car. You're the idiot who stood there and you had all the power in the world to extricate yourself from the situation.

|7.25.06 @ 11:10AM|#

I suppose if I fired a gun at you, you would be to blame for being shot because you stood in the way of the bullet?

False analogy.

As if any sane person would choose to stand in the way of a bullet!

Choosing to live in the path of a hurricane, in a bowl, on the other hand, involves a choice balancing perceived risk against reward (lifestyle, culture). In this regard, 'victims' in NOLA share some of the responsibility.

You'd do better to read more carefully. I don't beleive I was suggesting blame was an all or nothing proposition, but something that is shared.

To play with your argument, though, let's assume I knew that I was entering an area with criminals like you. And that armed robbery was a common occurrence. I choose to walk there anyway and you shoot me. Yeah, I share some responsibility for my fate. Of course, I might shoot you back and then yourdecision to fires mean you are also responsible for yours.

Dan T.|7.25.06 @ 11:11AM|#

If you build a house in a bowl(the bottom of which is below sea level) next to the sea in a region where catestrophic weather is common place, then it is certain (probability equals 100%) that your house will be destroyed at some point.

So tell me again, whose fault is this?


I suppose hindsight being 20/20 means that any house that is destroyed (or person killed) could have been avoided if circumstances had been different.

And let's not forget that the people of New Orleans depended on the levees which were built to prevent flooding. Had they not been neglected, the city would have gotten through Katrina okay.

Dan T.|7.25.06 @ 11:11AM|#

If you build a house in a bowl(the bottom of which is below sea level) next to the sea in a region where catestrophic weather is common place, then it is certain (probability equals 100%) that your house will be destroyed at some point.

So tell me again, whose fault is this?


I suppose hindsight being 20/20 means that any house that is destroyed (or person killed) could have been avoided if they had done something different.

And let's not forget that the people of New Orleans depended on the levees which were built to prevent flooding. Had they not been neglected, the city would have gotten through Katrina okay.

|7.25.06 @ 11:21AM|#

I suppose hindsight being 20/20 means that any house that is destroyed (or person killed) could have been avoided if they had done something different.

Are you being deliberately obtuse, Dan? Our whole point is that yes, these things CAN happen, but the people of NOLA did no risk/reward calculus; they felt like they were entitled to live wherever and rely on the levees. Guess what? If I build my home in the middle of the ocean on a raft, am I then entitled to whine and cry when it tips or floods and I lose everything? Or is it my fault for a) electing an irresponsible and corrupt government b) then relying on said government instead of myself to "rescue" me from a c)stupid situation I voluntarily put myself in?!

This passing the buck stuff has got to end somewhere; it ends with individual choice.

David|7.25.06 @ 11:25AM|#

"getting a new job depends on there being somebody willing to hire you. So your fate is still not entirely in your own hands"

Never said that one can simply create one's reality by sheer force of imagination or anything. But one's ability to compete for such hiring is a direct result of one's technical and social skills, as well as many more arbitrary factors. So while no one can create their fate simply by abstract force of will, one can prejudice the environment in one's own favor. Nothing in life is certain, least of all employment, but it is possible to stack the deck of 'fate' as it were; besides in this analogy finding a job is not a zero-sum game: if one has taken the trouble and has enough going for them to be at least competent in a field then someone out there will eventualy hire them (though such atrificial interferences as lawsuit abuse, credentialism, and politically correct oversensitivity distort the meritocratic model). So I contend that in this example one's fate is for all practical purposes in one's own hands.

Dan T.|7.25.06 @ 11:27AM|#

False analogy, but I shouldn't have to tell you that. Living in an area that is bowl-shaped, prone to rain and relying on an obviously corrupt and incompetent bureaucracy isn't akin to being spontaneously shot; it's akin to standing in traffic and then getting angry when you get hit by a car. You're the idiot who stood there and you had all the power in the world to extricate yourself from the situation.

Actually it's a good analogy - anybody can assign blame after the fact towards a victim who did not act as if they would have had they had perfect information about what was going to happen in the future.

|7.25.06 @ 11:27AM|#

I suppose hindsight being 20/20 means that any house that is destroyed (or person killed) could have been avoided if they had done something different.

National Geographic ran an article describing the devastation of New Orleans by hurricane a couple of years before it happened.

They have been building the levees for a hundred years or so. Everyone who lived there knew it was an issue long before the event occurred. Now they are just complaining that the federal government failed to stop the inevitable.

While we're at it, can we find a way to blame the Bush adminstration for the desctruction of Pompei?

|7.25.06 @ 11:28AM|#

Jesus H. Christ on a toothpick, people. Quit feeding the (fucking dumbass statist) Dan T[roll].

Dan T.|7.25.06 @ 11:31AM|#

Or is it my fault for a) electing an irresponsible and corrupt government b) then relying on said government instead of myself to "rescue" me from a c)stupid situation I voluntarily put myself in?!

What can I say?

Congratulations on being perfect.

|7.25.06 @ 11:32AM|#

Quit feeding the (fucking dumbass statist) Dan T[roll].

apologies

David|7.25.06 @ 11:37AM|#

'And let's not forget that the people of New Orleans depended on the levees which were built to prevent flooding. Had they not been neglected, the city would have gotten through Katrina okay'

Had the people not been neglected or the levies not been neglected? :)

The point with the New Orleans analogy is that many people rightly suspect that the bulk of the New Orleans flood victims expected the government to rescue them whatever their choices or efforts or attitudes: I'm sure that the idiots shooting at rescuers felt a suffocating sense of entitlement, just as most of the looters (not to mention FEMA debit card abusers)relished the opportunity to get 'something for nothing': perpetual losers getting one up on the system. Its this sense of entitlement that is most destructive to individual initiative (which is what creates wealth both socially and individually), and maintaining this attitude is a choice. If our initiative and independence are not hardwired into us by 'fate', genetics, etc. then we are indeed all directly & ultimately responsible for our actions. If they are indeed hardwired, then the next step is a welfare state or an inflexible caste-based system, or some combination thereof: a dystopia indeed to my thinking.

|7.25.06 @ 11:38AM|#

Congratulations on being perfect.

I don't know what on earth made you draw this conclusion. But Clean Hands is right; you're a troll and obviously ensnared in our own tiny-minded, impotent world. Begone, I shall feed you no more.

|7.25.06 @ 11:44AM|#

"It seems likely to me that Bush and many of those around him are motivated by good intentions."

This is beginning to look to me like an endorsement of open and honest tyranny.

----------------

And then, spontaneously, a Katrina Thread broke out-

I say we (America at Large and the federal gov't) were released from any obligation to provide sympathy or assistance to New Orleans the day Nagin was re-elected.

Further, I ask again why the members of the Levee Board have not been publicly executed.

Dan T.|7.25.06 @ 11:45AM|#

The point with the New Orleans analogy is that many people rightly suspect that the bulk of the New Orleans flood victims expected the government to rescue them whatever their choices or efforts or attitudes

Why, exactly, would the class of people most screwed over by our system suddenly "expect" that system to rescue them? Are you seriously suggesting that the victims of the flood in NOLA could have easily hopped in their cars and driven to a safe destination but decided that they'd rather perch on top of a roof in the blazing sun for a few days waiting for a government helicoptor to pick them up?

You libertarians are about the most smug, self-congratulatory people I've come across. It's as if you were all born on third base a wonder why everybody else can't hit a triple like you did.

|7.25.06 @ 11:56AM|#

"You libertarians are about the most smug, self-congratulatory people I've come across. It's as if you were all born on third base a wonder why everybody else can't hit a triple like you did."

Third base is for losers. I stay firmly planted on the bench and tell everybody I hit a home run when they weren't looking.

|7.25.06 @ 12:24PM|#

If you think that Dan T. is a troll, you can quietly ignore him.

Of course, that's not as fun as winning the thread with a "begone, i will feed you no more." It's reminiscent of Gunnels at his most insufferable.

|7.25.06 @ 12:44PM|#

"Why, exactly, would the class of people most screwed over by our system suddenly "expect" that system to rescue them? Are you seriously suggesting that the victims of the flood in NOLA could have easily hopped in their cars and driven to a safe destination but decided that they'd rather perch on top of a roof in the blazing sun for a few days waiting for a government helicoptor to pick them up?"

ACtually yes Dan. After Katrina was over, they did a study of the demographics of the victims and found that the victims were more likly to be white and well off than the demographics of the city indicated. Further, there was shelter offered in the Superdome, which many people took advantage of. The victims of Katrina were overwelmingly people who flat out refused to leave their homes or people who stayed behind in hopes of looting and committing crims. Yes, there werer horror stories of nursing home patients being left behind, the worst case of which was in Mississippi not NOLA. But, the view of poor people left behind unable to leave is just untrue.

http://www.dhh.louisiana.gov/news.asp?ID=145&Detail=751

|7.25.06 @ 1:14PM|#

I'm curious to know if Ms.(?) Randian has spent much, or any, time in the hellhole that is most of the rest of the world . If we were to drop her by parachute into , say, Southern Beirut, would what happens next be determined by her spunk & get up and go, or by massive events far beyond her (?) power? If she was time-transported to a "free fire zone" in "south" Viet Nam, would what happens next be of her own choosing?
People make decisions, those decisions can bite them on the ass. But this notion that we are captains of our own fate, universally, is rubbish in the presence of the violent madness that passes for government in most places.
Ive seen a lifetime of vile human misery in Asia and the Spanish lands, and I cant say Ive met anyone who deserved it, or bought it upon themselves, other than by being born......
The NOLA levys were/are the responsibility of the Army Corps of Engineers. As far as I know, they aint members of the NOLA City Council, or report to the Mayor. THEY report to SecDef, who reports to CinC. And responsible parties have pointed out the Corps misfeasance on the job for decades.
Yup, everybody is free to move. And they will, once they realize they cant rebuild, are bought out by speculators-for pennies, if that, on the dollar- who represent interests wealthy enough to buy pols, wholl see to it the levys are bought up to standard, & go on to make a killing selling condos in nola. You know: the "invisible hand".

|7.25.06 @ 1:57PM|#

I say we (America at Large and the federal gov't) were released from any obligation to provide sympathy or assistance to New Orleans the day Nagin was re-elected.

Further, I ask again why the members of the Levee Board have not been publicly executed.

Hear, hear!

|7.25.06 @ 1:58PM|#

The NeoCon-stitution

We the Republicrats of the disUnited States, in order to form a more perfect regime, establish social control by global market influence, insure Government servant tranquility and provide for our common legal defense, promote the general political power structure, secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity entirely at taxpayer expense, do ordain and establish this federal authority's NeoCon-stitution for these disUnited States of America.

God Bless the Republicrats!

|7.25.06 @ 3:09PM|#

An interesting notion, John, but third-parties have never really worked in American politics, excepts as momentary cults of personality (T. Roosevelt, Ross Perot) or as brief splinters from the main parties (Dixiecrats).

What you have are loads of small but loud activist groups on either end of the left-right spectrum--often just single-issue activists--combined with a largely apathetic mushy middle. The majority of folks really don't care that much about politics unless they are directly affecte by a given issue. They simply don't form a basis for a third party.

The key to changing things is rearranging one of the major parties, which necessarily means cutting loose some members of the existing coalitions. I would love to see the GOP dump the fundies and go after minorities and ACLU-types with an agressively libertarian "stay the fuck out of my business" message. But I doubt such could happen unless both parties were go into major crises.

|7.25.06 @ 6:47PM|#

Okay, I got out of a meeting and spent ten minutes reading a couple of threads. I should really stop now and do some work.

Unfortunately, as Dan T. tells me, it is beyond my power to make such decisions.

If I don't go back to work, I may miss a deadline tomorrow. However, such a fate is beyond my control. I am only a bit of flotsam upon the tides of history. Whether I succeed or fail, in matters great or small, is beyond my meager means to influence.

I gotta remember to tell that to my boss tomorrow.

Gene Berkman|7.25.06 @ 7:35PM|#

A couple of points about New Orleans:
The levees are built and maintained by the US Army Corps of Engineers, and their budget for maintenance of the levies was cut by the Bush administration, presumably because they were spending so much on other military activities.

As for Ray Nagin, he was a Republican until he decided to run for Mayor in very Democratic New Orleans. But even as a Democrat, he endorsed George W Bush for President. Not atypical for Louisiana, where party labels matter less than some places.

|7.25.06 @ 8:10PM|#

"As for Ray Nagin, he was a Republican until he decided to run for Mayor in very Democratic New Orleans. But even as a Democrat, he endorsed George W Bush for President."

And, er, so what? (just for fun, search google news for "nagin" as I did) If he was re-elected, that can only mean that the people of New Orleans are happy with the situation. If they're happy, I'm happy.

|7.26.06 @ 2:52AM|#

what's interesting is how quickly it occurred as compared to the New Deal/Great Society coalition of the '30s-'60s. Perhaps the Depression and WWII created artificial conditions that made such a long-lasting coalition possible.

Or maybe, it's because there's a cohesiveness in the Democratic platform that unites them more effectively. It's simple: all this capitalism shit has to go, one way or another. When the Dems disintegrate it's because they can't agree what to put in place of what they're all working so hard to tear down.

And now all the Democrat-leaners can tell me that they really aren't anti-capitalists.

And once again, I won't believe them.


Not that this is any defense of Republicans, just an observation. Without religion, the Reps really don't have anything holding them together these days.