SciFi Weekend: The Cape; A Baby Timelord; Torchwood Casting and Filming News; The Voldemort Effect

January 16, 2011 — Ron Chusid

With the limited number of genre shows on this season, and No Ordinary Family taking a lighter approach to super heroes, there has been considerable anticipation for the premiere of The Cape. The show has been billed as a more serious and realistic superhero show. While there is a limit to how realistic such shows can possibly be, we have seen excellent results with such an approach with Iron Man and the latest Batman movies. Unfortunately it is unlikely that television will match the qualities of  Iron Man or The Dark Knight.

Like Iron Man and Batman, The Cape is an ordinary guy who learns tricks and utilizes gadgets as opposed to having true superpowers. The Cape learned his skills from a gang of criminal circus performers. Unfortunately we had all we wanted of mixing a circus and superheroes in the final season of Heroes.

The story would probably have been stronger if they used the full two hours of the premiere as an origin story instead of cramming in a weak follow up story. It is hard to judge shows such as this entirely by their first episodes as there is often room for improvement after initially setting up the situation. Even the last few episodes No Ordinary Family have been much better than the initial stories.

The best thing about The Cape is the return of Summer Glau as super-hacker Orwell. While I welcome her presence, I also fear that her character risks providing easy solutions to any problems. There is also an exaggerated view of the powers of technology in the show. Besides Orwell’s hacking abilities, having Vince Faraday (The Cape) have a card which opens multiple safes and is never canceled was far-fetched.

Besides Orwell, the show provides other supporting characters such as Faraday’s wife. Faraday is forced to take on a secret identity when framed for crimes committed by Chess/Peter Fleming, and when Fleming threatened Faraday’s family. While I can accept the situation of having Fleming keep secret the fact that he is still alive from the public and from Fleming, there is no reason why he can’t secretly see his wife.

Both Faraday and Fleming were pretty careless with their secret identities. The worst mistake was for Fleming to continue to appear as Chess after making it appear not only that Faraday was Chess but that he had been killed.

It is hard to evaluate the show without seeing future episodes. The weekly format of the show does place limitations on it, such as the need to keep Peter Fleming around  for further episodes as opposed to resolving that conflict as a stand alone movie might. James Frain, who plays the title role,  has provided hints as to where the series is going:

Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, Frain teased that Vince (David Lyons) and Peter will be involved in a number of confrontations in the future.

“They have to go head-to-head,” Frain said. “Vince has to confront this guy but he’s in a very unusual position of not being able to destroy him.

“The obvious thing to do is to take your revenge and go get the guy who framed you, but he can’t do that. He needs to keep this guy alive because he can’t prove his real identity without him, and so he realises that to really be free, he has to frame this guy and flip the tables on him. And so it’s not just a straightforward combat – it’s more psychological warfare.”

Frain also suggested that viewers will learn more about Peter as the series continues, saying: “We start to find out that Peter is a little bit more of a ladies’ man than we first thought. As the show goes on, the guy who he is by daytime, the guy who he is in the mask, becomes more and more separate and this conflict starts opening up.”

He added: “There’s going to be some action with a young woman that comes up that’s very interesting.”

I am glad that they will be expanding more upon Peter’s character. Having him be the head of a corporation who turns out to be evil was far too much of a television cliche.

Series creator TomWheeler has provided more background on where he wants to go with the series:

Wheeler says that the cape in The Cape also has its own backstory, and it will be explored throughout the life of the series. “In episode three, you get a big chunk of it,” he says. “One of our writers is getting his doctorate in mythology, and one of the things we talk about is the cape has a lot of primal symbolism. There’s the blanket you tie around your neck as a kid. That’s your first contact with being a superhero, so as a symbol, the cape connects you to childhood. But there’s also the cape in Jungian mythology/psychology that represents the shadow. So we are setting up a history for the cape that is quite dark. Even though the cape has no supernatural ability to do something to the wearer, we do get into what it means to embody your shadow; we explore the question ‘Do you wear the cape or does the cape wear you?’ That becomes an issue. We will be planting clues and mysteries along the way about the cape because there’s a big story to be told about the cape and what Vince is destined for.”

Another aspect of the superhero mythos that The Cape indulges is the super-villain. We’re not talking garden-variety crooks–we’re talking diabolical masterminds and high strange baddies. Wheeler’s ambition is to give The Cape a large rogues gallery, though Vince’s ongoing conflict with Chess provides the narrative spine of season 1. “Chess is a psychotic James Bond and we deal a lot with him and his alter-ego, Peter Fleming,” says Wheeler. “But we will see that while Peter is awful, he has a complicated life. In total, we’ll introduce seven new villains in the first season, including one that’ll be the center of a two-parter in the middle of the season.”

Wheeler says viewers can expect a show that will span a range of genres. There’s an episode that’ll be more sci-fi. There’s an episode that’s more “gothic” and scary. He believes non-geeks will be able to connect with emotional heart of the show–a story of a husband and father trying to reconnect with his wife and family. For all its old fashionedness, Wheeler believes The Cape is as entertaining as other state-of-the-art superhero action fantasies–even the ones of the grim and gritty stripe. “I think there’s a thirst out there for something that can marry the old and the new, something everyone to sit down and watch together as a family,” he says. “But we are very aware of the other entertainments that are out there and we believe we can be a compliment to them. God willing, we can be considered a branch on the tree of the great things Chris Nolan is doing or Zack Snyder or Jon Favreau have done–all the great adult stuff that’s out there.”

More from Wheeler here.

Doctor Who, which has had many inconsistencies during its near fifty-year run, has both had stories stating both that Timelord children do and do not exist. If the British tabloids are to be believed, we might have a Timelord child born on Earth this spring. Reportedly Georgia Moffat, who already has an eight year old son, is pregnant. News was recently released that Moffat is engaged to David Tennant. Tennant played the tenth Doctor, including staring in The Doctor’s Daughter where he met Georgia Moffat. Besides playing the Doctor’s daughter in the 2008 episode, Moffat is the daughter of Peter Davison, who played the fifth Doctor from 1981 to 1984.

There will be another reunion of cast members from Doctor Who. John Sim (who has played The Master, in addition to staring in the BBC version of Life on Mars) will be staring with Marc Warren (Elton Pope in a 2006 episode of Doctor Who entitled Love & Monsters) in Mad Dogs:

Woody (Beesley), Quinn (Glenister), Baxter (Simm) and Rick (Warren) have been friends since sixth form. The fifth member of their gang is Alvo (Ben Chaplin, Dorian Gray), a risk-taking opportunist who, having made his fortune in property, leads a luxurious lifestyle in Majorca.

Now in their 40s, they’ve all taken different paths in life with varying degrees of success. When Alvo flies them to his extravagant villa to celebrate his early retirement, they enjoy a trip down memory lane.
However, all does not go to plan and they find themselves entangled in a web of deception and murder involving beautiful police women, large yachts, Speedos and a rather short assassin in a Tony Blair mask…

Continuing Sky 1 HD’s dedication to homegrown high definition drama, Mad Dogs is a dark and twisted comic tale in which four ordinary guys discover how easily the line between friend and foe can be blurred.

The Doctor Who News Page has a report on the first week of filming Torchwood: Miracle Day. TV Squad has more information from Russel T. Davies on the series.  Lauren Ambrose, who played Claire Fisher on Six Feet Under, has been added to the cast. She will play Jilly Kitzinger, “a sweet-talking PR genius with a heart of stone who’s just cornered the most important client of her career … and maybe of all time.”

Julian Sanchez has blogged about The Voldemort Effect:

…as Harry’s sage mentor Dumbledore notes at one point, it was Voldemort’s choice to regard Harry as his predestined foe that made it true.

There’s a similar phenomenon in American politics, which I long ago mentally dubbed The Voldemort Effect. Maybe it’s always been this way, but it seems like especially recently, if you ask a strong political partisan—conservatives in particular, in my experience—which political figures they like or admire, and why, they’ll enthusiastically cite the ability to “drive the other side crazy.” Judging by online commentary, this seems to be an enormous part of Sarah Palin’s appeal. Palin herself certainty seems to understand this. Her favorite schtick, the well to which she returns again and again, is: “Look how all the mean liberals are attacking me!” Weekly Standard writer Matt Continetti even titled his book about the ex-governor “The Persecution of Sarah Palin.” Perversely, liberals end up playing a significant role in anointing conservative leaders.

This is, I think, a bipartisan phenomenon everyone at least subconsciously recognizes: A political figure—though more often a pundit than an actual candidate or elected official—gains prominence largely as a function of being attacked or loathed with special vehemence by the other side. Which means it’s crying out for a convenient shorthand so we can talk about it more easily; I propose “The Voldemort Effect.”

Matthew Yglesias responded:

I think the equivalence here is not only mistaken, but actually 180 degrees off base. You do see this Voldemort Effect in a lot of conservative thinking, but if liberals go awry it’s more likely to be in the reverse way—a lot of Team Blue’s thinking about politics is dominated by a kind of desperate search for leaders who won’t drive the other side crazy. Hence Bill Clinton, southern good ol’ boy. Hence John Kerry, decorated war hero. Hence calm, rational compromising Barack Obama instead of polarizing meanie Hillary Clinton. And that goes back to war hero George McGovern, southern good ol’ boy Jimmy Carter, Massachusetts Miracle technocrat mastermind Michael Dukakis, etc. In retrospect all of these people are hated by the right and “obviously” represent just another strain of out of touch liberalism, but in advance each and every one appealed to the rank and file as somehow “different” from his predecessors in some key way.

Posted in Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Blogs & Social Media, Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, Sarah Palin, Science Fiction, Television. Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . 2 Comments »

John Kerry on Civility

January 11, 2011 — Ron Chusid

While the facts are still not entirely clear, the recent shooting of Gabrielle Giffords appears to have  been motivated by delusional and extremist views which transcend the political spectrum. Jared Loughner echoed the anti-government sentiment common on the right mixed with far left wing extremism, including Marxism. The idea that all government is evil, accompanied by the frequent calls for revolution, calls for “Second Amendment remedies” by Sharon Angle, and calls to “reload” accompanied by a graphical representation of a rifle’s crosshairs by Sarah Palin, can inspire the deranged to commit acts of violence. This is true regardless of whether such specific hate speech inspired this particular murderer.

John Kerry gave an excellent speech at the Center for American Progress countering the extreme anti-government philosophy of the far right.Kerry spoke of the danger of a government which is too limited:

Do they want a government too limited to have invented the Internet, now a vital part of our commerce and communications?  A government too small to give America’s auto industry and all its workers a second chance to fight for their survival?  Taxes too low to invest in the research that creates jobs and industries and fills the Treasury with the revenue that educates our children, cures disease, and defends our country?  We have to get past slogans and soundbites, reason together, and talk in real terms about how America can do its best.

Kerry spoke of the dangers of failing to spend the money necessary to restore our infrastructure and of how this places us at risk of a lower standard of living and of falling behind countries such as China. He pointed out how many of the ideas now proposed by Democrats and opposed by Republicans were previously supported by Republicans.  He discussed the unwillingness of Republicans to work on bipartisan solutions to problems as Ronald Reagan had:

Folks, you won’t find a Republican today who would dare criticize Ronald Reagan. Last week, when the candidates for chairman of the Republican National Committee had their debate, Grover Norquist asked each of them to name their favorite Republican other than Ronald Reagan. He said he had to add that caveat so everyone didn’t give the same answer. But we’d all be better off if some of these Republicans remembered that Ronald Reagan worked across the aisle to solve big problems. And we’d all be better off if Grover Norquist thought of THAT Ronald Reagan before he announced that “bipartisanship is just another word for date rape.”

That’s the difference today. Ideology isn’t new to the American political arena and ideology isn’t unhealthy. The biggest breakthroughs in American politics have been brokered not by a mushy middle or by splitting the difference but by people who had a pretty healthy sense of ideology. Ted Kennedy and Orrin Hatch were a powerful team precisely because they didn’t agree on that much and they spent a lot of time fighting each other –and  so the Senate leaned in and listened on those occasions when somehow this ultimate odd couple found things they were willing to fight for together.

The entire speech is well worth reading and is posted under the fold.

(more…)

Posted in Economy, John Kerry, Republicans. Tags: , , , , , , , . 10 Comments »

Michael Kinsley’s Review of Decision Points

December 19, 2010 — Ron Chusid

Michael Kinsley has reviewed George Bush’s book Decision Points for The New York Times Sunday Book Review. At times I felt Kinsley was going soft on Bush, considering how much damage the former president did to the country. I imagine it is acceptable to point out that there were two things Bush tried to do right:

While George the elder talked a good “kinder, gentler,” but did little about it, George the younger has two real achievements along those lines: first, his many efforts, only partly successful but starting immediately after 9/11 (and therefore, it seems, instinctive) to prevent an explosion of anti-Muslim prejudice; and his leadership in the fight against AIDS in Africa.

Seeing the degree of Islamophobia being spread by the right wing, it is notable that Bush was preferable on this issue to the current conservative position.

Bush did concede two errors on the war, but Kinsley was far too soft on him here:

Which brings us to Iraq. Bush admits to just two errors in prosecuting that war. One was to have been unprepared for the “contingency” of a law-and-order breakdown in Baghdad after the Hussein government was toppled. This surely was closer to a certainty than a contingency. “Saddam had warped the psychology of Iraqis in ways we didn’t fully understand,” Bush says. But what country’s capital would not descend into chaos and anarchy if it had no government and a steady rain of bombs was destroying its infrastructure?

Bush’s other error, of course, was those weapons of mass destruction. His defense is that virtually everyone — including his predecessor, Bill Clinton, and his 2004 rival, John Kerry — also believed there were such weapons, or the ability to build them. Bush is enraged by the slogan “Bush lied. People died.” He wasn’t lying! He honestly believed that Hussein had these weapons hidden away somewhere — believed it just like everyone else. Furthermore, Hussein was a stinker whether or not he had W.M.D. He deserved his fate. And wasn’t bringing freedom and democracy to the people of Iraq reason enough for our actions?

So if Bush wasn’t  lying, he was utterly incompetent for going to war based on such flimsy evidence. Saying that others such as John Kerry thought there was WMD at one time is hardly justification for going to war considering that in the run up to the war Kerry repeatedly urged Bush not to rush to go to war. Kerry insisted on only going to war as a last resort, and argued it was not necessary at the time. Kerry even called for regime change in Washington at the onset of the war–something Kerry unfortunately came just a little short of accomplishing in 2004.

Kinsley did far better in discussing Bush’s opposition to stem cell research:

There is one big issue during Bush’s presidency that he not only got wrong, but seems to have totally misunderstood. That is stem cells. “At its core,” Bush writes ponderously, “the stem cell question harked back to the philosophical clash between science and morality.” He announced to his aides that “I considered this a far-reaching decision,” and “I laid out a process for making it. I would clarify my guiding principles, listen to experts on all sides of the debate, reach a tentative conclusion and run it past knowledgeable people. After finalizing a decision, I would explain it to the American people. Finally, I would set up a process to ensure that my policy was implemented.”

To call this a question of science versus morality is to stack the deck. Obviously morality wins. But what is immoral about stem cell research? Bush talks about how “new technologies like 3-D ultrasounds” will help “more Americans recognize the humanity of unborn babies.” He seems to think an embryo is like a fetus — a tiny human being — rather than what it is: a clump of a few dozen cells, invisible without a microscope, unthinking and unfeeling. Nature itself — or God himself, if you’re a believer — destroys most of the embryos it creates every year in miscarriages (usually before a woman even knows she’s pregnant). Thousands more are created and destroyed or frozen in fertility clinics — which Bush has no problem with and may even have used himself. (He and Laura, he says, tried unsuccessfully to have a baby and were ready to adopt when suddenly they had twins.) A very few of those surplus embryos from fertility clinics are used in stem cell research. By what logic do you bar the use of those few to do some real good, while ignoring all the others that come and go without doing any good for anyone?

Although President Obama lifted the ban on ­government-subsidized stem cell research, Bush’s policy continues to do damage by leaving the impression that stem cells are controversial and require some sort of compromise between science and morality. They don’t. And Bush seems to think that the advent of adult stem cells offers a morally uncomplicated alternative that vindicates his policy. It doesn’t. You don’t shut down one promising area of research just because another one has opened up.

The stem cell decision came early in Bush’s presidency. It would be nice to say that Bush grew in office — like Henry V, the wastrel youth and son of a famous father to whom he was often compared. But judging from this book, it didn’t happen. Although Bush is admirable for stopping, he probably was more fun when he drank.

Posted in George Bush, Iraq, John Kerry, Stem Cell Research, Terrorism. Tags: , , , . No Comments »

Quote of the Day: John Kerry on Meet the Press

December 6, 2010 — Ron Chusid

“I think it’s critical for people to understand what the Republican–how bankrupt, how fundamentally reckless their position is and has been.  And the fact is–I mean, let me go a little bigger here for a minute. Our country is challenged economically as never before.  You know, people talk about American exceptionalism and how there’s sort of this automatic for America.  Yes, we are exceptional, but we’re exceptional when we do exceptional things, when we behave exceptionally.  We’re not doing that today. We’re locked down into a gridlock status where other countries are racing by us.  I’ll give you an example.  Over the next 20 years, $600 billion is going to be invested in green technology and green energy.  New jobs.  New jobs that could be for Americans.  Ninety percent of that investment’s going to be in other countries, David.”–John Kerry on Meet the Press

Two more excerpts from the interview:

“The president of the United States came into office with a president who’d left him with a $5 trillion add-on to the debt of this country, an unprecedented financial crisis.  The fact is that the TARP that we passed that everybody hates–they hate the word, they hate the concept–it saved, it saved countless numbers of jobs in this country.  The Recovery Act saved millions of jobs in this country and brought our financial system back from the brink.  Wall Street ought to be singing this president’s praises.  We’ve had a 60 percent increase in the stock market in two years.  How often does that happen?  You have a $3 trillion increase in the net value of the Fortune 500 companies, $3 trillion increase in two years.  Under George Bush, in eight years, it only increased by several hundred billion.  You’ve had the Hire Act, the Republicans opposed it.  It created hundreds of thousands of jobs.  The Recovery Act, the Small Business Act.”

“Here’s what the president is doing.  The president is fighting to get unemployment insurance that they have held hostage.  This is the point. People need to focus in America.  The Republicans have been willing to hold unemployment insurance hostage to this bonus tax cut that has the least impact and adds to the deficit.  And the phony recklessness of their position is this, they’ve said for months, “We can’t give you unemployment compensation because it’s unpaid for and it will add to the deficit.” But yesterday they were willing to vote for a $4 trillion increase that wipes out everything the debt commission is doing, in order to give a tax cut to the wealthiest people. Now, the president’s prepared to compromise to get unemployment insurance, to get the work for pay tax cut, to get a child care credit tax cut, to get additional tax cuts that go to average people and will create jobs.  But he wants to do more than that, and this is the most important difference between us and them.  The Republican agenda is tax cut and cut spending.  We cannot cut our way to competition with these other countries.  If we’re going to be a great power, if we’re going to project in the world, if we’re going to put America back to work and be part of the $6 trillion market that is the new energy market of the future with six billion users, we need to invest in America’s future.”

Posted in Barack Obama, Congress, Economy, Environment, John Kerry, Republicans. Tags: , , , . No Comments »

The Polarizing Republicans

September 6, 2010 — Ron Chusid

Barack Obama ran for president expressing his desire to transcend partisan differences. Dan Balz has written about those who see him as a polarizing president. While it is true that polarization is greater than was hoped for by Obama supporters. the real problem is not a polarizing president but increased polarization caused by the right wing noise machine.

Polarization is being created not by Barack Obama but by those on the right who were determined to oppose him regardless of his policies. They aren’t going to tone done their attacks no matter how much Obama has moved to the center and incorporated Republican ideas in his policies. During the 2008 campaign we heard the absurd claims that Obama was a socialist, and we would have heard the same regardless of who the Democratic nominee was. Obama’s background presented the right wing with even additional avenues for creating polarization with their bogus claims that he is a Muslim and is not a native born American citizen.

The right wing was determined to oppose any form of health care reform, regardless of how moderate. They erroneously attacked Obama’s plan as a government take over of health care–the exact same phrase used in their attacks on John Kerry’s even more conservative plan in 2004. When the Democrats modeled their plan on the Republican counter-proposal to Hillary Clinton’s plan, Republicans attacked the same ideas they promoted in the 1993.

Democrats did make a political mistake in passing the health care plan without first obtaining more public support, but the lack of support is due to the misinformation spread by the Republicans. Just last Friday NPR’s morning edition had a story on the outlandish myths being spread about health care reform. Typically these claims begin with a small amount of truth which is distorted by conservatives so that it no longer has any relationship to what is in the plan. The full story specifically cites Fox and Ron Paul as distorting the facts, but many other conservatives are responsible for creating polarization with misinformation.

Similarly we see misinformation in many other areas. We’ve seen Tea Party demonstrations against Barack Obama for increasing taxes when he actually cut taxes on 95 percent of Americans. They protest against Obama for bail outs which were started by George Bush. Government assistance to General Motors, designed to ultimately get it back on its feet as a private business, is nefariously described as an attempt to socialize American industry. We’ve even seen the Tea Party attack Obama with demands that government stay out of their Medicare, oblivious to the fact that Medicare is a government program, and failing to understand that Obama’s goal is to strengthen Medicare.

We are a polarized country, but the president is not the one to blame when we have the Republican Party, and their mouth pieces at Fox and on talk radio, constantly spreading both misinformation and hatred.

Posted in Barack Obama, Economy, George Bush, Health Care, Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, Republicans, Ron Paul. Tags: , , , , , , , , , . 3 Comments »

WikiLeaks Reports on Afghanistan Might Not Be The Pentagon Papers, But They Might Influence Policy

July 26, 2010 — Ron Chusid

So far it appears that the release of reports on Afghanistan by WikiLeaks has no smoking guns and contains nothing which will harm U.S. national security or harm the troops. A comparison to the Pentagon Papers was inevitable, even if there are major differences here. The leaked papers do not demonstrate dishonesty on the part of either George Bush or Barack Obama regarding Afghanistan comparable to what was revealed about American leaders regarding Vietnam. The Obama administration might complain about the leaks (as we would expect any administration to) but we are not going to see the type of battle to suppress them which Richard Nixon engaged in over the Pentagon Papers.

This does not mean that the leaks will not have an effect. The publicity might still revive the debate over why we are in Afghanistan and whether it serves U.S. interests to remain. John Kerry, a leading critic of the Vietnam war (as well as an opponent of the Iraq war before it began, despite the attempt of 2004 primary opponents to distort his record), had this comment:

Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry (D-MA) released the following statement this evening in response to the New York Times story on the leak of classified documents concerning Afghanistan and Pakistan:

“However illegally these documents came to light, they raise serious questions about the reality of America’s policy toward Pakistan and Afghanistan. Those policies are at a critical stage and these documents may very well underscore the stakes and make the calibrations needed to get the policy right more urgent.”

I doubt we will see open battle between the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the Obama administration as there was been Democrats and the Nixon administration in the later days of the Vietnam war, although the committee might raise some uncomfortable questions for the administration. I suspect it is more likely that if Kerry turns against this war he might have some success in making Obama reconsider.

Posted in Afghanistan, Barack Obama, George Bush, John Kerry, National Security, Richard Nixon. Tags: , , , , , . 2 Comments »

GOP Candidate Warns Democrats Will Take Away Your Freedom To Find The Lord And Get Your Salvation

July 15, 2010 — Ron Chusid

We’ve become accustomed to Republicans using scare tactics such as claims that Democrats will take away your guns. Sometimes, such as in a GOP mailer in West Virginia in 2004 attacking John Kerry, they have claimed Democrats will take away your bibles. Now we have a new twist. Ed Martin, a Republican Congressional candidate in Missouri warns that Obama and his Democratic opponent Russ Carnahan will take away your freedom to find god and get your salvation. Here is a portion of an interview:

MARTIN: One thing I like to say is: America is great, not because of our genetics. We’re great because we created a place and space where people can be free. And they can choose Christ, they can choose to be faithful.  They can worship, and they find their way to the Lord. And — or some of them don’t. We sure want them all to, but some of them don’t.

And part of that freedom — when you take a government and you impose, and take away all your choices. One of the choices you take away is to find the Lord.  And find your savior.

And that’s one of the things that’s most destructive about the growth of government. It’s this taking away that freedom. The freedom — the ultimate freedom, to find your salvation, to get your salvation. And to find Christ, for me and you.

And I think that’s one of the things that we have to be very, very aware of that the Obama Administration and Congressman Carnahan are doing to us.

In the past Martin has accused Carnahan’s sister, Missouri Secretary of State Robin Carnahan, of being “the devil.”

Russ Carnahan has responded:

It is shameful that Ed Martin would use faith to divide rather than unite. This is a baseless attack on my faith and my family.

My own Christian faith has guided me throughout my life. My wife and I have raised our family with the strong values faith has taught me including service to the community, standing up for civil rights and working to protect religious freedom for all faiths.

Ed Martin’s campaign of personal destruction and fear mongering reveals much more about his true character than anything else. This attack demonstrates his willingness to say or do anything to score political points. Ed Martin has crossed the line and this new low is exactly the kind of campaigning that turns voters off from the importance of public service.

Posted in Barack Obama, John Kerry, Religion, Republicans. Tags: , , , , , . 6 Comments »

Academic Study of Ideologues Ignoring The Facts

July 12, 2010 — Ron Chusid

The Boston Globe has an article which describes a phenomenon which has been clear for a long time as a new discovery. They reported on studies which found that people, especially ideologues, often ignore facts which contradict their views:

Recently, a few political scientists have begun to discover a human tendency deeply discouraging to anyone with faith in the power of information. It’s this: Facts don’t necessarily have the power to change our minds. In fact, quite the opposite. In a series of studies in 2005 and 2006, researchers at the University of Michigan found that when misinformed people, particularly political partisans, were exposed to corrected facts in news stories, they rarely changed their minds. In fact, they often became even more strongly set in their beliefs. Facts, they found, were not curing misinformation. Like an underpowered antibiotic, facts could actually make misinformation even stronger.

This bodes ill for a democracy, because most voters — the people making decisions about how the country runs — aren’t blank slates. They already have beliefs, and a set of facts lodged in their minds. The problem is that sometimes the things they think they know are objectively, provably false. And in the presence of the correct information, such people react very, very differently than the merely uninformed. Instead of changing their minds to reflect the correct information, they can entrench themselves even deeper.

“The general idea is that it’s absolutely threatening to admit you’re wrong,” says political scientist Brendan Nyhan, the lead researcher on the Michigan study. The phenomenon — known as “backfire” — is “a natural defense mechanism to avoid that cognitive dissonance.”

This is hardly surprising. We’ve seen this during the Iraq war as many conservatives held onto beliefs that there was WMD in Iraq or that Saddam was involved in the 9/11 attack. In addition, we see conservatives expressing numerous beliefs which are counter to fact. In economics we see conservatives hold onto the same erroneous economic views regardless of how often they lead to disaster. In science this includes belief in creationism and denial of the human role in climate change. In history we see a growing number of conservatives deny the fact that the Founding Fathers supported separation of church and state despite all the historical documentation that this is what they intended.

The conservative movement, with its disconnect from reality, is also prone to spreading unfounded conspiracy theories. In recent elections we’ve seen them hold onto disputed claims such as those from the Swift Boat Liars and the Birthers. Many conservatives continue to claim that neither John Kerry’s military record or Barack Obama’s birth certificate have been released. In reality, not only have both documents been made public but they have also been posted on line. Then we have the Tea Party movement which is totally disconnected from reality.

Of course there are also some nutty views held on the far left too. The difference is that  the left in this country is dominated by people who are generally pragmatic and even moderate by international standards. Those with views which are contrary to fact on the left tend to have little influence, while the conservative movement has become dominated by ideologues who deny the facts whenever they contradict their extremist views.

The researchers looked at a few specific issues:

New research, published in the journal Political Behavior last month, suggests that once those facts — or “facts” — are internalized, they are very difficult to budge. In 2005, amid the strident calls for better media fact-checking in the wake of the Iraq war, Michigan’s Nyhan and a colleague devised an experiment in which participants were given mock news stories, each of which contained a provably false, though nonetheless widespread, claim made by a political figure: that there were WMDs found in Iraq (there weren’t), that the Bush tax cuts increased government revenues (revenues actually fell), and that the Bush administration imposed a total ban on stem cell research (only certain federal funding was restricted). Nyhan inserted a clear, direct correction after each piece of misinformation, and then measured the study participants to see if the correction took.

For the most part, it didn’t. The participants who self-identified as conservative believed the misinformation on WMD and taxes even more strongly after being given the correction. With those two issues, the more strongly the participant cared about the topic — a factor known as salience — the stronger the backfire. The effect was slightly different on self-identified liberals: When they read corrected stories about stem cells, the corrections didn’t backfire, but the readers did still ignore the inconvenient fact that the Bush administration’s restrictions weren’t total.

Incorrect views on the right, such as on WMD and the effect of tax cuts, are fairly widespread. I imagine that there are some on the left who believe that Bush supported total restrictions on stem cell research, but most liberal writings have been more specific in criticizing Bush for the federal restrictions on funding of stem cell research. Articles frequently noted that, while the ban was not total, Bush’s limitations on the stem cell lines on which research was allowed wound up crippling stem cell research.

This phenomenon described is hardly surprising or anything new, but there might be some value in publicizing such academic research. This might help a bit in countering the misinformation which commonly comes from Fox and the Tea Party rallies. Of course the research also demonstrates what we already knew–those who believe these claims are unlikely to change their minds based upon the facts.

Posted in Barack Obama, Economy, George Bush, Iraq, John Kerry, Republicans, Science, Stem Cell Research. Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . 19 Comments »

Another Investigation Clears Climate Scientists and CBO Finds Climate Bill Will Reduce Deficit

July 8, 2010 — Ron Chusid

Conservatives who have been duped by the misinformation from the petroleum industry to support denialism of climate change have recently based much of their case upon stolen email from climate scientists. While the hacked email did raise some questions related to the conduct of some scientists, it did not provide anything which altered the scientific consensus on climate change. Therefore, never letting the facts get in their way, the denialists distorted the content of the email. Several investigations have now debunked the claims about the email made by the denialists. The report of a fifth investigation was released today:

All five investigations have come down largely on the side of the climate researchers, rejecting a number of criticisms raised by global-warming skeptics. Still, mainstream climate science has not emerged from the turmoil unscathed.

Some polls suggest that the recent controversy has eroded public support for action on climate change, complicating the politics of that issue in Washington and other world capitals. And leading climate researchers have come in for criticism of their deportment, of their episodic reluctance to share data with climate skeptics, and for not always responding well to critical analysis of their work.

“The e-mails don’t at all change the fundamental tenets of the science,” said Roger Pielke Jr., a professor of environmental studies at the University of Colorado. “But they changed the notion that people could blindly trust one authoritative group, when it turns out they’re just like everybody else.”

Another common claim from denialists is that reducing our reliance on fossil fuels is part of a left-wing plot to destroy our industrialized society. They often claim that climate legislation is economically destructive. A CBO report has found that, “Senator John F. Kerry’s signature energy and climate change legislation would cut the deficit by $19 billion.”

The CBO report estimates that the deficit would be reduced by $19 billion over the first 10 years, and that it would also not increase the deficit over the following 40 years.

The cost of the legislation, which includes various tax credits, would be more than offset by revenues collected through a cap-and-trade system, according to the report. The bill, which was released in May, would put a price on carbon emissions that opponents have attacked as a carbon tax that would hurt businesses.

Will the deficit hawks, who have generally ignored Republican fiscal responsibility and generally deny the more sound fiscal policies of the Democrats now come out and support the plan? Not very likely.

Posted in Economy, Environment, John Kerry, Republicans. Tags: , , , , , . No Comments »

Conservatives Gone Mad

April 23, 2010 — Ron Chusid

Marc Ambinder is wondering about something which most of us noticed quite a while ago in asking, Have Conservatives Gone Mad? He provides some examples:

It is absolutely a condition of the age of the triumph of conservative personality politics, where entertainers shouting slogans are taken seriously as political actors, and where the incentive structures exist to stomp on dissent and nuance, causing experimental voices to retrench and allowing a lot of people to pretend that the world around them is not changing. The obsession with ACORN, Climategate, death panels, the militarization of rhetoric, Saul Alinsky, Chicago-style politics,   that TAXPAYERS will fund the bailout of banks – these aren’t meaningful or interesting or even relevant things to focus on. (The banks will fund their own bailouts.)

There are far more examples. For example, climategate is just one example of the rejection of science by many conservatives (accompanied by a conspiracy theory based upon their creative misinterpretation of stolen email). There’s also their rejection of evolution, along with cosmology or any other branch of science which conflicts with a fundamentalist interpretation of the Bible.  Plenty of other conspiracy theories, along with rejection of science, are also popular on the far right, especially if we extend to the Ron Paul crowd. At least the Paul supporters don’t accept the beliefs still held by many on the right that Saddam was involved in the 9/11 attack and that Iraq had WMD at the start of the war.

Hatred of Obama has brought about a new set of reliefs which are unteathered from reality, from the claims that he was born outside of the United States to the claims he is a Muslim or a Marxist. Of course this is nothing new. The current bogus claims about Obama are as absurd as the discredited claims of the Swift Boat Liars. Right wingers continue to base conspiracy theories upon claims that both John Kerry’s war records and Barack Obama’s birth certificate are being kept secret. It is hardly a secret when both documents  have been posted on the internet.

Ambinder speculates as to the causes of this insanity:

Conor Friedersdorf thinks the problem lies with the conservative movement’s major spokespeople  – its radio/net news nexus — and the “overwhelming evidence that their very existence as popular entertainers hinges on an ability to persuade listeners that they are “‘worth taking seriously as political and intellectual actors.’” That is why the constant failures of these men to live up to their billing is so offensive, destructive, and ruinous to conservatives. There are plenty of women, too, is all I’ll say.

The right wing noise machine is certainly responsible for much of the problem. In many cases it isn’t even clear if the clowns who spread their insane beliefs even believe what they are saying, or are just doing this because it is an easy way to make a good living. Scott Adams has speculated about this and written, “I find it mind boggling that anyone believes a TV talk host is expressing his own true views.” We’ve had Glenn Beck say “I could give a flying crap about the political process.” Beck has also described himself as “a rodeo clown” and conceded, “If you take what I say as gospel, you’re an idiot.”

Unfortunately there are a lot of idiots who actually believe the things that people like Glenn Beck say, regardless of how much evidence there is that he makes it up. Ambinder has a suggestion for the media as to how to respond:

I think this sensibility is pervasive throughout the smart media — old and new. I think it’s one reason why, say, Jake Tapper and other good reporters are very keen about direct fact-challenging — why the media is reasserting itself as gatekeepers. (CNN might want to think about branding themselves here, even at the risk (well, the reality) of calling out Republicans more.) I think it’s because there’s so much misinformation out there — most of it spread by the conservative echo-chamber. With the advent of Fox News and the power of that echo-chamber, complaints about liberal media bias are quite irrelevant — the reaction to it being like lupus’s reaction to the body, as Jon Stewart correctly noted.

It would certainly be useful to have Jake Tapper of ABC, CNN, and others devote more time to fact checking. The far right will just write off the facts as liberal bias but maybe having the facts out there more will do some good. Fact checking will definitely play into the belief that CNN is a liberal counterpart to Fox which is absurd when you look at how many Republicans they have hired in recent years  since the network was sold by Ted Turner. There is no doubt that they will have far more to fact check with Republican than Democratic statements, plus the Republican falsehoods are much further from reality than the errors coming from the Democrats.

Posted in Barack Obama, John Kerry, News Media, Republicans, Science. Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . 1 Comment »

GOP Fundraising Documents Cost Them A Donor

March 6, 2010 — Ron Chusid

The recent accidental release of a presentation for donors prepared by the Republican National Committee continues to create embarrassment. The presentation shows how the GOP, lacking any real policies, tries to fool donors with appeals based upon fear. Ben Smith reports on one former donor who has decided not to contribute to the party:

A prominent Evangelical figure and Republican donor says he will end his contributions to the organized Republican Party in reaction to the leaked fundraising presentation that advised using “fear” to solicit contributions and displayed an image of President Obama as the Joker from Batman.

Mark DeMoss, who heads a major Christian public relations firm in Atlanta and served as a liaison to the Evangelical community for Mitt Romney in 2008, wrote Chairman Michael Steele yesterday that he was “ashamed” of the presentation, calling depictions of Obama, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and Majority Leader Harry Reid “shameful, immature and uncivil, at best.”

“I’m afraid the presentation is representative of a culture and mindset within the Republican National Committee,” DeMoss, a past member of the RNC’s “Eagle” program for top donors who gave the party $15,000 in 2008, wrote in the letter to Steele, which he shared with POLITICO. “Consequently, I will no longer contribute to any fundraising entity of our Party—but will contribute only to individual candidates I choose to support.”

Personally I think people should have become wise to the minset of the Republican National Committee when they sent out fund raising letters in 2004 trying to scare people by saying John Kerry would take away their bibles. Better late than never. The full text of the letter is under the fold:

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Posted in Barack Obama, Harry Reid, John Kerry, Mitch McConnell, Nancy Pelosi, Republicans, Scandals. Tags: , , , , , , . 3 Comments »

Acorn Cleared By Brooklyn Prosecutors; Tape Found To Be Edited

March 2, 2010 — Ron Chusid

ACORN was cleared of criminal wrongdoing by Brooklyn prosecutors and the supposedly incriminating tape was found to have been edited. New York Daily News reports:

Brooklyn prosecutors on Monday cleared ACORN of criminal wrongdoing after a four-month probe that began when undercover conservative activists filmed workers giving what appeared to be illegal advice on how to hide money.

While the video by James O’Keefe and Hannah Giles seemed to show three ACORN workers advising a prostitute how to hide ill-gotten gains, the unedited version was not as clear, according to a law enforcement source.

“They edited the tape to meet their agenda,” said the source.

O’Keefe and Giles – who visited ACORN offices in several cities, including its Brooklyn headquarters – stirred controversy when they posted the videos on their Web site.

They were hailed as heroes by the likes of Rush Limbaugh and their footage led several government agencies to temporarily cut funding for ACORN as the prosecutors opened an investigation.

“On Sept. 15, 2009, my office began an investigation into possible criminality on the part of three ACORN employees,” Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes said in a one-paragraph statement issued Monday afternoon.

“That investigation is now concluded and no criminality has been found.”

Update: Many of the attacks on Acorn from the right wing were based upon false information spread by Andrew Breitbart. Media Matters reports that Breitbart has walked back his claims of criminality on the part of ACORN.

Even though the evidence against ACORN has been shown to have been fabricated my bet is that this will not change the attitude of most on the right. They enjoy  living  in their fantasy world and have far too many defenses built up to protect them from facing reality.

The American right wing has become an authoritarian movement which operates by fabricating false evidence to demonize their opponents.  They will hold to their fantasies about ACORN just as many on the right still think that Saddam was involved with the 9/11 attack, there was WMD in Iraq at the time of the war, that the claims of the Swift Boat Liars about John Kerry were anything other than politically motivated lies, and that Barack Obama is a Muslim born outside of the United States.

Posted in In The News. Tags: , , , , , , , , . 5 Comments »

Barack Obama Addresses U.S.-Islamic World Forum

February 14, 2010 — Ron Chusid

The previous post features John Kerry’s speech at the U.S.-Islamic World Forum. Barack Obama has also spoken at the forum. Obama acknowledged that “the United States and Muslims around the world have often slipped into a cycle of misunderstanding and mistrust that can lead to conflict rather than cooperation.” He called for “a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world, one based on mutual interest and mutual respect.” He outlined some of the initiatives which are underway:

We’re partnering to promote education. We’re expanding exchange programs and pursuing new opportunities for online learning, connecting students in America with those in Qatar and other Muslim communities. Because knowledge is the currency of the 21st century, and countries that educate their children-including their daughters-are more likely to prosper.

We’re partnering to broaden economic development. We’re working to ensure that the global economic recovery creates jobs and prosperity in all regions of the world. And to help foster innovation and job-creation, I’ll host a Summit on Entrepreneurship in April with business leaders and entrepreneurs from Muslim communities around the world.

We’re partnering to increase collaboration on science and technology. We’ve launched a Global Technology and Innovation Fund that will invest in technological development across the Middle East, Africa and Asia. And the first of our distinguished Science Envoys have begun visiting countries to deepen science and technology cooperation over the long-term.

And we’re partnering to promote global health. We worked together to address H1N1, which was a concern of many Muslims during the hajj. We’ve joined with the Organization of the Islamic Conference to eradicate polio. And as part of our increased commitment to foreign assistance, we’ve launched major initiatives to promote global health and food security around the world.

The full text follows below the fold:

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Posted in Barack Obama, International. Tags: , , , . No Comments »

John Kerry Addresses U.S.-Islamic World Forum

February 14, 2010 — Ron Chusid

John Kerry, currently Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the man who might have become president in 2004 if only there were more voting machines available in some urban areas of Ohio, gave an excellent speech before the U.S.-Islamic World Forum. Spencer Ackerman writes, “This is the speech that should have been given to the Muslim world by President John Kerry in 2005.”

Kerry noted how the world is changing:

For a decade, our relationship was framed by trauma and terrorism, by two ongoing wars and political conflict—and the fallout only polarized us further. Many Muslims perceived the United States as an aggressor – projecting its power solely to protect its own security and economic interests, usually at the expense of Muslim countries. Too many in western societies implicitly, and at times explicitly, blamed an entire religion for the unholy violence of a few. This left many Muslims angry and alienated and complicated the task for leaders in the region.

At the same time, suicide bombers and extremists dominated the daily news. While credible and respected Muslim voices did publicly condemn the fanaticism and violence, their actions received little attention from the media and policymakers. Too often, the extremists defined an “us versus them” discourse, and all of us suffered for it.

Since President Obama took office, we have witnessed a dramatic shift. While expectations were perhaps too high that the world would change overnight, we know that his words and our subsequent actions were just the beginning of a long road.

Kerry also discussed what must be done in the future along with how conditions are changing:

First, America is striving to think and talk differently about Islam. We reject—publicly and categorically—the demonization of a religion and recognize our need for deeper understanding. Our values and our history remind us constantly that religious bigotry – whether it is anti-Semitism or Islamophobia – has no place in our public life. America was founded by those seeking freedom of religion, and all Western countries need to recognize that banning burqas or minarets is contrary to our shared values. It builds unnecessary walls between Muslims and the rest of society. It’s insulting, and it only exacerbates tensions.

Second, we must acknowledge that a serious debate is now underway within Muslim communities over how best to address extremism and combat prejudice. This is an important development because ultimately, it is those communities that are best positioned to find solutions that resonate. I want to commend His Majesty King Abdullah II of Jordan for his signature work in promoting Muslim-Christian dialogue through “A Common Word” initiative, which attracts more signatories every day. I want to also recognize His Majesty King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia for promoting interreligious dialogue. And of course, the Qataris deserve great credit for hosting forums like this one.

Third, the United States is reaching out to the next generation and cultivating people-to-people relationships. President Obama has created new science envoys and exchange programs. Our space program, NASA, is welcoming Muslim students from around the world and financing a research program in the Gulf. And Secretary of State Clinton has appointed a Special Representative to Muslim Communities who is focused on people-to-people engagement, Farah Pandith, who is here with us today. All of these initiatives add up to a different attitude and a different approach.

Kerry pointed out how there must be changes in the treatment of women:

But for societies to harness their full potential, we also need to address the aspirations of women. Countries cannot expect to be competitive if half the workforce is economically marginalized or denied rights and opportunities. While this effort sometimes runs hard up against cultures and traditions, as we in America learned with the election of our first African-American president, once a barrier has been broken, we wonder how it could ever have stood for so long.

Kerry concluded with a discussion of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process and conditions in Gaza. He pointed out that achieving peace alone will not solve all of the problems:

I know that everyone here understands the urgent need for peace. But peace alone will not solve all the region’s problems. Ask yourselves: If peace were delivered tomorrow, would it meet the job needs of the entire region? How many more children would it send to school? Who really believes that Iran would suddenly abandon its nuclear ambitions? So we know that Israel/Palestine is central but we must develop a much more practical partnership that extends well beyond regional conflicts.

The full text is under the fold:

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Posted in Bill Clinton, International, John Kerry, Religion, Terrorism. Tags: , , , , , , , , . No Comments »

How Could The Democrats Do So Poorly In Massachusetts?

January 16, 2010 — Ron Chusid

Here’s what I don’t understand. Ted Kennedy and John Kerry have tied up the two Massachusetts  Senate seats for years. I would think that there are many highly qualified Democrats in the state who didn’t get a shot at such a spot until now. How did the Democrats wind up with as weak a candidate as Martha Coakley?

Coakley’s campaign sounds a lot like Hillary Clinton’s primary campaign based upon inevitability and entitlement. That is not going to work, especially when Scott Brown is running as a moderate Republican. As The Christian Science Monitor points out, Massachusetts is not so Democratic that a moderate Republican can’t bring out the vote, especially with the amount of anti-incumbent sentiment at present:

…Massachusetts voters also gave Republicans the key to the governors’ office for 16 straight years, from 1990 to 2006.

Moreover, Senate races have historically been tight when the Republican candidate is moderate enough to appeal to centrist voters. Sen. John Kerry had close races against Ray Shamie in 1984, Jim Rappaport in 1990, and Bill Weld in 1996 – all of whom earned at least 40 percent of the vote.

Senator Kennedy saw his toughest challenge in 1994 against Mitt Romney, who would later be Massachusetts’ governor and an unsuccessful candidate for president. While Mr. Romney eventually shifted further to the right during his 2008 presidential bid, Massachusetts voters considered him a moderate Republican in his statewide campaigns. In fact, until 1993, Romney was registered as an independent.

For Coakley and Brown, it’s the state’s independents who will likely determine the outcome of the race.

“The majority of registered voters now are independents,” says David Paleologos, director of the Political Research Center at Suffolk University in Boston, which conducted Thursday’s poll. “Despite the fact that they are people who say … they don’t want to be tied to one party, independents have emerged as the political party in Massachusetts now. It’s really about the independent voter.”

Making matters worse, Coakley has committed a number of gaffes. Health care might fall in the Senate because of a dumb baseball comment–Coakley calling former Red Sox pitcher and Brown supporter Curt Schilling a Yankee fan. Even worse, she has resorted to the type of tactics which we see far more from Republicans, but which are not exclusive to them. For some reason Republicans do far better than Democrats in bringing out the vote by distorting the record of their opponent, as Coakley did in a recent ad and flier.

The race will be decided by independents, and Brown has positioned himself much better than Coakley to pick up their votes. He is also better able to run as a moderate as the far right has appeared to have learned their lesson in New York’s special election. In New York the far right condemned Dede Scozzafava as if she was on the far left and allowed the Democrats to win the seat. Even though Brown is more liberal than Scozzafava we are not hearing any complaints that he is a RINO at the moment.

The reason why Republicans are willing to accept a moderate in Massachusetts is that he could be the 41st vote to stop a health care reform bill. If not for these dynamics Republicans from out of state would not be giving Brown so much assistance, and I’m not sure that many Democrats would really mind seeing Coakley going down to defeat.

At the moment the race is too close to call based upon the polls. If Brown does win there are a few possible outcomes with regards to health care reform:

The House could very quickly pass the Senate version unchanged allowing this to be sent to President Obama for his signature without giving the Republicans a chance to filibuster a bill coming out of reconciliation. The problems here are that many House liberals would not accept the Senate bill, and the Senate bill should not be passed as it is.

If the race is close the Democrats might try to delay seating Brown should he win. Think back to Al Franken’s election.

Democrats might try to come up with even more compromises to try to get Olympia Snowe’s vote. This could cost them even more votes from House Democrats.

They might try to pass health care reform with a simple majority by using budget reconciliation, but this would require massive changes to the bill as only items affecting the budget can be passed in this manner.

These choices do not look good, making it very possible that it could be the loss of Ted Kennedy’s seat which  results in the blockage of health care reform.

Posted in Congress, Democrats, Health Care, Republicans. Tags: , , , , , , , , , . 4 Comments »
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