Dirty Hippies » Media

Another Journalist Revels in Ignorance about Dominionism

Frederick Clarkson — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 21:37:47 +0000

In recent weeks, we have seen an odd flurry of articles and conservative op-ed columns attacking a number of authors and journalists who write about the Christian Right. Religion writer Mark I. Pinsky has issued the latest scurrilous screed, this time in USA Today. It is remarkable that so much prime real estate on the op-ed pages of the leading newspapers in the country has been devoted to downplaying or denying the significance of dominionism and related subjects, or to seeking to discredit some of us who have written about these things. So much ink, so few facts.

Mr. Pinsky makes three main charges I would like to address.

The first of these is his complaint that left-wing Jewish writers are primarily responsible for critical work about the role of dominionism and Christian Reconstructionism in evangelical Christianity. Those he names: Sara Diamond, Michelle Goldberg, Rabbi James Rudin, and Rachel Tabachnick do indeed hail from Jewish backgrounds, but there are many non-Jews, including evangelicals, who have prominently written about these subjects. I have written extensively about them myself, notably in my 1997 book Eternal Hostility: The Struggle Between Theocracy and Democracy. Chip Berlet, Senior Analyst at Political Research Associates in Somerville, MA has written widely about these things in books and articles. Although we did not coin the term, he and I certainly popularized the use of the term dominionism in the early 90s. But evangelical seminary professors Wayne House and Thomas Ice predated all of our books in this area, in their 1988 book Dominion Theology: Blessing or Curse?. Steve Clapp wrote an influential feature article in Christianity Today magazine about Christian Reconstructionism in 1987. Bill Moyers did a TV documentary in 1987. More recently, Rev. Dr. Bruce Prescott a national leader in the moderate Baptist movement published a six-part series at Talk to Action on dominionism based in part on his personal experiences in the right wing takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention; and when the Religious Right, led by a well-known Christian Reconstructionist named Steven Hotze, took over the his local Republican Party in Houston in the early 90s. There are many, many such examples. The fact is that these matters have been prominently written about by journalists and scholars, Christian and non-Christian, evangelical and non-evangelical for decades. In any case, writing about these things did not begin in 2006 nor has writing in this area been dominated by Jews.

(For a primer on dominionism and Christian Reconstructionism in the context of the current controversy, see Berlet’s essay “Inside the Christian Right Dominionist Movement That’s Undermining Democracy.”)

Second, Pinsky claims that various liberal “exposes” about dominionism are of “a splinter, marginal figure, such as David Barton or John Haggee [sic]“. But neither Barton or Hagee are in fact, marginal figures in evangelical Christianity or in wider public life. We could say much about both of them but suffice to say that Barton was named one of the nation’s “25 Most Influential Evangelicals” by Time magazine in 2005 and for many years served as the vice-chair of the Texas GOP. Barton was repeatedly featured on Glenn Beck’s Fox News show at its height. His books are widely used in evangelical Christian schools and home schools. For his part, Hagee is one of the best known evangelists in the world. His show is seen by millions each week around the world and is carried by several networks. His organization Christians United for Israel remains a powerful if controversial entity, and its annual Washington conferences are routinely addressed by senior pols such as Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT). His support was courted and received by 2008 presidential contender John McCain until a controversy led to their mutual renunciation, making headlines around the country. Controversial? Yes. Marginal? Far from it.

Finally, I would ordinarily be glad to join Pinsky in criticizing people who make sweeping, factually unsupported generalizations about evangelicals. Good reporting and scholarship requires using fair terms, making reasonable distinctions, and drawing well-founded conclusions based on facts. But I cannot join Pinsky in this case, because none of the writers he names engage in the behavior he complains about. In fact, he does not cite a single example in support of his inflammatory charge. Yet Pinsky would have us believe that these writers are trying to smear all evangelical Christians by using an unfair “caricature” of evangelicals as “dark conspirators trying to worm their way back into political power at the highest levels.”

He claims it all began in 2006

“and every two years since in the run-up to the presidential and off-year congressional elections, books and articles suddenly appear — often written by Jews — about the menace and weirdness of evangelical Christianity.”

He further claims:

The thrust of the writing is that these exotic wackos — some escaped from a theological and ideological freak show — are coming to take our rights and freedom.

He goes so far as to call all this “demonization” and compares the work of the aforementioned writers with anti-semitic smears suffered by Jews over the centuries.

“We didn’t like it, when people said we had horns and tails, ate the blood of Christian children and poisoned the wells of Europe with plague, much less conspired to rule the world through our Protocols.”

But Pinsky is engaging in a false equivalence to hype a case he has not made. Again, he offers not a single fact in support of his charges.

Perhaps most remarkably, he writes all this in the service of an article headlined “The Truth About Evangelicals.”

If truth was Pinsky’s aim, he missed by a mile.

Reflections on Lake of Fire

Frederick Clarkson — Thu, 18 Aug 2011 02:16:12 +0000

As the presidential campaign season got underway four years ago, a Hollywood documentary about abortion hit the theaters. Lake of Fire was critically acclaimed but was a lot less than a box office smash. I watched it again recently, and am glad I did. The film is an exceptionally thoughtful — and volatile — consideration of both sides. And it is now available on You Tube.

Lake of Fire was many years in the making, although much of it was filmed in the 90′s when the first wave of the assassination of doctors and attendant controversies were making headlines. Director Tony Kaye interviewed leading antiabortion militants and murderers as well as such victims of their crimes as nurse Emily Lyons, who was maimed by a pipe-bomb. Kaye unflinchingly shows burning clinics and the bodies of dead doctors. He interviewed a very wide range of people — as well as some expert talking heads, including among others, Fran Kissling, Noam Chomsky, Nat Hentoff, Kate Michaelman and the late Professor Dallas Blanchard. I was and am deeply honored to be among them.

The film opens with a discussion of the then-recently passed ban on all abortions in South Dakota. The bill was later overturned by the voters in a referendum. If that opening now seems a bit dated, the film could just as easily now open with the massive sets of restrictions on access to abortion in many states. And if the murder of doctors in the mid-90′s seems historical, those sections could easily be replaced by the story of the assassination of Dr. Tiller. I think it stands up well.

People who are serious about understanding the dynamic role of the Religious Right in America owe it to themselves to check it out. A few words of warning. Lake of Fire can be hard to watch. It may force you out of your comfort zone in considering things you had rather not no matter which side you are on. Additionally, the graphic depiction of abortions can be hard to watch for many people. (Personally, I did not find it so.) Shocking though the film can be in its many dimensions, it is not in any way gratuitous. I wrote at the time:

The film deliberately fits none of the well established narratives about abortion. It is apparently such a powerful, well-made film that even at two and a half hours, reviewers say amazingly enough — it’s not too long. The film is shot in black and white in part, Kaye says, because with this issue, there are only shades of gray.

I wrote this based on what I had read, not based on having seen the film. But the reviewers were right. The film will hold your interest, and may even leave you wanting more.

Stop Calling This A “Debt Crisis” — It Isn’t

Dave Johnson — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 15:15:38 +0000

You have probably been hearing about “the debt crisis.” I can’t open a newspaper or turn on the radio or TV without hearing about “the debt crisis.” Well stop calling it that, because that isn’t what is going on. There is no debt crisis; the only crisis going on is the threat of several members of the House to vote against raising the debt ceiling if they don’t get what their way, thereby sending our country into default. They are trying to get around the rules of democracy and force deep cuts in the things We, the People do for each other while keeping taxes really low for the wealthy.

The Fight

There is a fight going on in Washington over whether we should have a democracy that works for all of us, or a plutocracy that runs things for the benefit of the already-wealthy. Unable to change public opinion, the conservative Republicans are trying to force changes in who our government is for and who gets to have a say in how things are decided. These ideological conservatives say government “takes money out of the economy” by spending on education, infrastructure, health care, etc. for you and me and our small businesses and startups, and they want that money to instead go to the billionaires and large, multinational corporations that fund their campaigns. As you know, they already voted to eliminate Medicare, and voted for cuts in Social Security, education, infrastructure spending, and all the other things We, the People have decided to do for each other, so we know they are serious about this. They say if they can’t have a country that is run their way then we can’t have a country at all.

“Debt Crisis”

The “mainstream media” has decided to name this fight a “debt crisis.” This leads people to think that somehow the country is in crisis over debt, when the crisis is over a few people forcing default if they don’t get their cuts. There is no debt crisis. There is a lot of debt, the result of tax cuts, increases in military spending, wars and giveaways to large corporations that have occurred under the Bushes and Reagan. But the way to solve a problem that resulted from tax cuts and military spending increases is to put taxes back where they were before Reagan, and cut the military back at least to where it was when we were fighting the Soviet Union, even though the Soviet Union is long gone.

Giving In To Hostage-Takers Is A Mistake

Last year these conservatives took the unemployed hostage, refusing to keep unemployment benefits going unless we extended the bush tax cuts for the wealthy. The hostage-taking succeeded.

So, having succeeded at taking hostages, the conservatives then took another, even bigger hostage. They demanded big spending cuts, outside of the normal budget process and decision-making mechanisms of our democracy, or they would “shut down the government.” The hostage-taking succeeded.

So, having succeeded at taking hostages, the conservatives have taken another, even bigger hostage. This one is the big kahuna of hostages. If they refuse to raise the debt limit the country could go into default, destroying our economy and the economy of much of the world.

The official policy of the US government on hostage-taking is as follows:

“Based upon past experience, the U.S. Government concluded that making concessions that benefit hostage takers in exchange for the release of hostages increased the danger that others will be taken hostage. U.S. Government policy is, therefore, to deny hostage takers the benefits of ransom, prisoner releases, policy changes, or other acts of concession.”

It says that past experience has shown that giving in to hostage-takers “increased the danger that others will be taken.” We gave in to hostage-takers, and the result was that more and bigger hostages have been taken. During these “negotiations” every single time Democrats have agreed to their demands it has resulted in their asking for even more.

It was a mistake to give in then, and it would be a mistake to let them get anything from taking hostages this time. If they get rewarded again next time is guaranteed to be even worse.

This post originally appeared at Campaign for America’s Future (CAF) at their Blog for OurFuture. I am a Fellow with CAF.

Sign up here for the CAF daily summary.

New York Times Columnist Pooh-Poohs His Own Story

Frederick Clarkson — Fri, 06 May 2011 21:24:09 +0000

While many journalists, scholars and activists have done serious writing about the theocratic Christian Reconstructionist movement and its influence on the development of the Religious Right — others have pooh-poohed it. In a recent column in The New York Times Mark Oppenheimer placed one foot firmly in the pooh-pooh camp.

Oppenheimer’s piece explores the influence of prominent Reconstructionist theorist Gary North on the recent anti-union surge. Sort of. He starts out by stating that North is prominent on the Christian Right, but not widely known elsewhere and is an important influence in the recent anti-union surge in Wisconsin and elsewhere. And then he spends much of the column undermining this idea.

He had read a blog post at Religion Dispatches by Julie Ingersoll, who has written a great deal of excellent material on Christian Reconstructionism. Ingersoll makes a matter-of-fact argument that Christian Reconstructionist writers have been decidedly anti-union, and that this very likely has has played a role in the wider Christian Right. She specifically names authors Gary North, David Chilton, and Gary DeMar.

And yet Oppenheimer, in an interview with Michael McVicar, another scholar of Reconstructionism, makes the matter mostly about just one of them, Gary North.

Mr. McVicar believes that Professor Ingersoll’s attempted connection between Christian economics and the rallies in Madison is a bit tenuous. “Her insight has to be in my mind so heavily qualified as to make it almost nothing,” he said. But he concedes that it “has the most basic essence of truth,” given how widely Mr. North’s teachings have been disseminated on the Christian right.

The problem with this is that Ingersoll was not attempting to make a direct connection, as any reasonable reading of her post would find. What’s more, Oppenheimer and McVicar agree with Ingersoll that North is a prolific author; that his works are widely used in conservative Christian educational settings and that his views are widely influential.

Thus this is a classic case of creating controversy where there actually is none, and undermining the thesis of the piece itself. The unfortunate result is a certain pooh poohing of the role of Christian Reconstructionism. Simply put, Reconstructionism and even Christian economics (North’s specialty) is not all about North.

Here is the relevant section of Ingersoll’s post:

There are now families in which multiple generations—grandparents, parents and children—have all been shaped in these contexts; contexts that include “Christian American history,” dominionism, creationism, and biblical economics. For Reconstructionist Doug Phillips’ organization Vision Forum, cultivating this kind of “multi-generational faithfulness” is an explicit goal. And when you look at tea party rallies and see all those white middle class fifty-somethings you are looking at many of them. Sarah [Posner] has also made the case for this at RD. We’re not arguing that this in the only influence… just that it is an important one.

‘Reconstructionism as one important influence among others’ is a perfectly reasonable hypothesis. I have no idea why Oppenheimer and McVicar tried to make it seem like it is not. (On the other hand, Oppenheimer has had trouble discussing the Religious Right accurately in the past.)

The fact is that Reconstructionism’s claim that all areas of life must be brought under a decidedly conservative and theocratic “Biblical worldview” plays a deeply influential role on the Religious Right. While reasonable people may differ on the matter of degree, I have also argued that Christian Reconstruction is central, rather than peripheral, to the ongoing ideological development of the Christian Right. So far, I think history is bearing me out.

An excellent example was a 2007 conference organized by Christian Reconstructionist Gary DeMar, attended by 800 people, and co-sponsored by a number of leading organizations of the Christian Right. Gary North was among the featured speakers.

I wrote at the time:

The conference, titled “Preparing This Generation to Capture the Future,” was organized by the Powder Springs, Georgia-based American Vision, a Christian Reconstructionist think tank and publishing house founded in 1978 and headed by Gary DeMar. The event was sponsored, which is to say, bankrolled by such major organizations as the Alliance Defense Fund, a legal strategy organization which was created by top evangelical broadcasters including James Dobson (Focus on the Family political honcho Tom Minnery is on the board ; Liberty University School of Law (where Newt Gingrich recent gave the commencement address), Home School Legal Defense Association, Summit Ministries and World magazine, edited by former Bush adviser Marvin Olasky. Time was, when leaders of the religious right, including the Falwell empire, were afraid to too publicly associate with Reconstructionists like American Vision honcho Gary DeMar and Gary North. But apparently, the days of worrying about associating with overt advocates of Biblical theocracy are over.

Jeremy Leaming reported in Church & State magazine:

The event was promoted heavily by the Rev. Lou Sheldon of the Traditional Values Coalition, and it was held in a facility owned by the Southern Baptist Convention, the nation’s largest non-Catholic denomination and a religious body closely aligned with the Bush administration.

For his part, Gary North writes at LewRockwell.com that when Oppenheimer got him on the line at his unlisted phone number, he refused to talk to him. North was concerned about the risks of “selective quotation.”

I choose not to give interviews, except on rare occasions…

If he has some published quotations from me, he can cite them. They are public. They are for citing. But the “phone interview” game I will not tolerate. I would have no record of what I said. The reader has no way to be sure I said it. The writer will not run the article by me to make sure that I approve.

He said he would say I refused to talk. Fair enough. I surely did.

He had to invade my privacy to get even that much out of me. He has the ethics of a telemarketer, but without the respect for sales.

The Times is slowly going bankrupt. Print media are dying. The Times is flailing around, desperately trying to find a revenue model that will work. It won’t find it.

I can’t speak to the relative fortunes of the Times’ business model. And in fairness, Oppenheimer by addressing it at all, has flagged as an important matter the role of Christian Reconstructionism and how it relates to the wider politics and economics of the Religious Right and of the Tea Party — even though his journalism got shaky with a little too much ‘on the one hand, but on the other hand’, hesitancy.

[Crossposted from Talk to Action]

Day One of Fox News North: Pardon Our Inflammatory Views, Eh?

Daniel Tencer — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 02:40:04 +0000

Canada’s Sun News Network, dubbed “Fox News North” by the media, is barely on the air for half an hour when Ezra Levant, icon of the Canadian right, starts off the debut edition of his show, The Source, by broadcasting images of the Danish Mohammed cartoons.

“What’s the big deal? We just showed it. Nothing bad happened,” Levant tells his audience as a magazine spread of the cartoons appears on screen.

For Levant, this is more than what must to him seem like a spectacular opening to Sun News (if it causes riots in the Middle East, all the better for ratings, eh?), it’s also something of a personal issue. Levant was dragged in front of the Alberta Human Rights Tribunal in 2006 when the magazine he ran at the time, the Western Standard, ran that very cartoon spread. He became something of a hero to free speech advocates with his bravado performance in front of that tribunal, challenging both its notions of human rights and its legitimacy. These days, Levant prefers to parrot Glenn Beck with accusations that George Soros is a Nazi collaborator, so it’s nice to see him harken back to a time when he had more substantial things to add to the political debate.

To be sure, “Fox News North” has nothing to do with Fox News. It’s the new broadcast arm of the Sun newspapers, a chain of low-brow tabloids in Toronto, Ottawa, Calgary and elsewhere, basically a Canuck version of the UK Sun tabloid (right down to the scantily-clad page three girl), and similar in tone to the New York Post. But while both the UK Sun and the NY Post are Murdoch properties, the Sun papers in Canada aren’t. The Sun chain has been annoying Canadian progressives for nearly four decades now, and the papers have largely settled into a secondary role in the Canadian media landscape. The tabloids, along with the new network and a local TV station in Toronto called Sun TV, are owned by a Montreal-based company called Quebecor, and Rupert Murdoch has no part in it.

But right off the bat we get a sense that this network has more than a little in common with the ethos of those Murdoch properties when Krista Erickson (think “Gretchen Carlson North”), one of its anchors, appears as a page three girl in the Sun papers Monday morning. Clever marketing gimmick (maybe, if you’re not particularly interested in women viewers), but not exactly inspiring for those of us looking for evidence of serious journalism. So for me the question is just how well these stale, economically challenged and increasingly irrelevant tabloids will be able to make the jump to the brash, attention-grabbing, almost hypnosis-inducing style of Fox News.

At first glance, pretty damn well. It looks like Fox News; it feels like Fox News. The chyrons look like Fox News chyrons. The hosts are dressed like Fox News hosts. It all looks like Fox News, right down to the mild orange filter that gives the guests and hosts a healthy, tanned look. And make no mistake — right off the bat we’re engaging in the culture war. The Daily Brief, 6 p.m., hosted by David Akin, has as its first topic health care reform. “Report: Canada’s System Broken,” the chyron warns. Here we go. Time for an all-out attack on Canada’s universal health care system.

But wait a minute. What am I hearing here? Could this be a sound, rational argument about spiraling health care costs and the options available? Hold on a sec. Did someone mention raising taxes as a way of continuing to fund the system as it exists? My ears can hardly believe what they’re hearing, but I’m pretty sure someone has just made the sober point that we are probably doing ourselves a disservice by setting up a false “binary” view of health care (the Canadian system versus the US system) and that we should look to Europe for better ways to operate universal health care schemes.

Nobody mentioned “socialism.” Nobody screamed “class warfare.” For a moment, I closed my eyes and just listened, and it could have been “NPR North.”

Okay, so maybe it was just that one issue. After all, privatizing health care is a hard sell in Canada. Up next on Daily Brief is a report on Vancouver’s government-sanctioned heroin injection site. Now things are getting juicy. Sun News is clearly hitting all the big culture-war issues for conservatives. Now the sparks will fly.

But wait, what’s this? The report begins with the correspondent (blonde, attractive, well dressed) informing us of a study saying the safe injection site has reduced drug deaths in Vancouver. And I’m pretty sure that, through the fog of shock now engulfing me, I can hear Akin mention that some three-quarters of the people living around the site support its continued existence. Case closed. “Fox News North” is against the drug war.

So, hmm. Maybe it’s just their first day. Maybe they haven’t got the hang of it just yet.

Not all is lost for the culture warriors, though: No fewer than three prime time shows devote a segment to attacking the CBC, Canada’s state broadcaster, with Levant popping up to accuse CBC’s Vote Compass interactive graphic of trying to fool conservatives into thinking they’re liberals. Add to that the Sun tabloids running the same stories criticizing the CBC, and this all begins to look more like a concerted attack on a competing broadcaster than actual reporting….

But even with all that it all comes off a little too … sane. The oil sands are good, Ezra says, because we can use the profits to build schools. Almost makes sense to me. It’s all seems actually thought out in advance, too calm and too… well, Canadian. In a whole evening of viewing, the expression “government bolshevism” only grabs my attention once. So maybe this is more “Fox News Lite” than “Fox News North.” Can you even do a (somewhat) polite, (mostly) respectful, (sometimes) thoughtful version of Fox News? These hosers are damn well going to try.

So far they’ve only hit on the big hot-button issues that resonate among Canadian conservatives; tomorrow they’re going to have to start covering the election. And when they do, the Canadian political establishment will start paying attention.

But will I? Watching Sun News tonight was fun, in the sort of way watching a car wreck on the freeway is fun. But Ezra’s going to have to do better than a lame attempt at angering Muslims if he wants me to tune in again.

NPR, Hairy Dogs and the Federal Budget: EXPLAINED!

Sandi Behrns — Wed, 16 Mar 2011 17:54:59 +0000

Exactly how much does our federal government spend to fund National Public Radio? And how does that compare to other things we spend money on? And how is the federal budget like a hairy dog?

The answers to these questions and many more can be found in this fabulous video produced by Sally Kohn. Though unlikely to change many minds on the right, Sally beautifully displays the absurdity of GOP arguments to defund NPR and PBS. Enjoy!

Tweeting the Outrage

Frederick Clarkson — Tue, 08 Mar 2011 22:46:45 +0000

Twitter is ablaze with outrage over a tweet by Megyn Kelly the host of Fox’s “America Live.” Kelly wonders whether a woman who was beaten into a coma by a man in a dispute over a parking space “deserves it.”

Here is a news snippet about the assault:

Oscar Fuller was so angry that Lana Rosas, a 25-year-old, was saving a parking space in New York’s East Village that he got out and punched the 4-foot-11 woman twice, knocking her off her feet. Rosas is now in a coma and has suffered permanent brain damage, reports the New York Post. Fuller drove off but was later arrested by police

Here is Kelly’s tweet:

@megynkelly: A man beats a 100 pound woman into a coma over a parking space. He claims she deserves it. Could he be right? In Kelly’s Court!

The outrage generated by Kelly’s amoral ratings chasing provocation may not go away anytime soon, if GottaLaff’s post about the despicable tweet at Political Carnival is any indication:

My buddy drdigipol posted a Twitpic of a Megyn Kelly tweet (see below) in his own tweet:

ON THE RECORD: JPG of @megynkelly‘s horrid tweet on a beaten woman: http://twitpic.com/47jocs #internationalwomensday #fem2

Here’s one more tweet from Center for American Progress Action Fund:

@CAPAction: HORRID: Wretched 2 even pose this question on #InternationalWomensDay @megynkelly. SHAME ON YOU! http://cap.af/ev18lD #p2 #fem2 #npr pls RT

There is a lot of re-tweeting going on and the story is spreading fast. I don’t know if there is an organized effort to keep Kelly’s feet to the fire on this. If there isn’t, there ought to be.

The Rich Are Laughing at Us and the Tea Party People

Spocko — Thu, 24 Feb 2011 00:40:23 +0000

Remember the Enron recording where two traders were joking about how they crewed the people of California and then “Grandma Millie” was trying to get her money back?

“Yeah, now she wants her f——g money back for all the power you’ve charged right up, jammed right up her a—— for f——g $250 a megawatt hour.”

– CBS News June 1, 2004

Every time I hear a quote from someone resenting what a great deal the public employees unions have I remember that quote. It reminds me of who we are not hearing from in this prearranged crisis in Wisconsin. We are not hearing the voices of the people who set up the financial crisis in the state.

Today Ian Murphy, editor of the Buffalo Beast, called Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, pretending to be billionaire industrialist and secretive conservative political activist David Koch. Koch (pronounced “coke”) is one of the big money people behind Walker. Walker’s office admits the call is real and for a brief period of time the media will be forced to move the focus of the story from unions and their supporters fighting Walker and conservatives.

In the call we got to hear how Walker sounds when he talks to big money. Now I’d love to hear how rich people like Koch actual talk to each other about these protests. Are they laughing at everyone? Do they chuckle when the media miss their role in this? Do they smirk watching tea partiers play their role? There will be a lot of press calling Walker’s office about the Fake Koch call, but how many will call the Real Kochs? Even if some do, Koch will be on guard.

I want to hear more unguarded conversations like this, to hear the real emotional tone behind the words. Radio is a powerful medium because while it might take listeners some time to process the meanings of the words, the tone and emotional context behind the words is deduced almost immediately. Video can also give us lots of information, as anyone who has watched Lie To Me can attest to; but it requires more focus than listening, which can slip into people’s mind almost everywhere they go.

Why do I want more people to hear how the rich say things? Because I’d like to activate certain groups of people on an emotional level. Emotions, like anger, need to be directed at the right entities. As Silivo said to Tony in the Sopranos, “Our true enemy has yet to reveal himself”.

If the Tea Party people are directing their anger and resentment at the public union employees that means they are not mad at the rich corporate persons who are actually behind making their life less rich. I suppose it is easier to be mad at someone who has a slightly better life than you than with someone who has a wildly better life than you. But if you heard these rich people laughing at you as they talk about their schemes to keep beating you down I would think that even many tea partiers would get upset.

It’s too bad that we won’t hear the conversations of people who were responsible for driving states into deficits via unproductive corporate tax breaks. Wouldn’t you love to hear the conversations of the people responsible for the financial meltdown? Do they joke about our inability to prosecute them for their economic treason? Do they laugh as the media moves on to the crisis of the day without looking for the true cause of people’s pain? Do they breath a sigh of contented relief as we turn on each other? What would it sound like?

If we heard them in all their cackling glory or insensitive obliviousness perhaps we all would want to take the fight to them. Not physically, of course, but financially. The UK Uncut movement has been showing us the way. One of the funniest and most profound movies of the eighties has a quote that I think applies here. In Trading Places Eddie Murphy’s Bill Ray Valentine finds Dan Aykroyd’s Louis Winthorpe III character cleaning a gun and explains why that is a spectacularly bad idea.

Louis Winthorpe III: Listen, do you have any better ideas?

Billy Ray Valentine: Yeah. You know, it occurs to me that the best way you hurt rich people is by turning them into poor people.

Coleman: You have to admit, sir, you didn’t like it yourself a bit.

The rich are laughing at us, both dirty hippies and tea partiers. But when you cost your true enemies money, they don’t find it a bit funny.

Cross posted at Spocko’s Brain

Journalism Accomplished: Why aren’t news organizations telling the whole truth in Wisconsin and why aren’t the state’s conservatives demanding secession?

Sam Smith — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 00:23:41 +0000

I tend to avoid programs produced by major network news divisions like I would the galloping herpes, but I do occasionally tune into CBS Sunday Morning. In its better moments, Charles Osgood helms a tranquil, reflective magazine foregrounding the people, places and things that define what’s best about American culture. At its worst, of course, it’s just another fair and balanced mainstream media medicine show, with a comment from Ben Stein.

This morning we got a frustrating dose of worst, as the producers decided to have a look at what’s happening in Wisconsin. You could have written the script without knowing any of the important details, because coverage like this isn’t informational, it’s ritual. Predictable tough-guy posing from Governor Scott Walker, Tea Party Darling, and then some comment from teachers and union members, the people in the crosshairs. There – “both” sides have been told. Journalism accomplished.

Except…except…CBS didn’t provide some important details, nor did they put a microphone in the face of anyone likely to do so for them. So, let me try to add a little texture, with a couple of caveats: first, yes, it’s complex; second, I’m not an economics expert, so I’m going to link and quote to those who know more than I do. In the end, my purpose isn’t to prove that X is definitively true about Wisconsin, but instead, to ask how come you aren’t hearing these details. How come you’re watching “balanced” news reports that omit such critical facts?

In a nutshell, Walker transformed a $120M surplus into a deficit through special interest spending for his political friends and tax cuts for businesses. As The Cap Times explains:

To the extent that there is an imbalance — Walker claims there is a $137 million deficit — it is not because of a drop in revenues or increases in the cost of state employee contracts, benefits or pensions. It is because Walker and his allies pushed through $140 million in new spending for special-interest groups in January. If the Legislature were simply to rescind Walker’s new spending schemes — or delay their implementation until they are offset by fresh revenues — the “crisis” would not exist.

More specifically, TPM notes that “more than half of the new shortfall comes from three of Walker’s initiatives”:

$25 million for an economic development fund for job creation, which still holds $73 million because of anemic job growth.

$48 million for private health savings accounts — a perennial Republican favorite.

$67 million for a tax incentive plan that benefits employers, but at levels too low to spur hiring.

Not only that, Walker has chased investment out of the state to the tune of at least $810M.
In an e-mail exchange earlier this morning, Paul Rosenberg of Random Lengths News explained that “[a]pparently these measures don’t take effect until next fiscal year, so they actually AREN’T increasing the current year shortfall. But, as I noted, the Cap Times commentary highlights an unused cache of $73 million, more than twice what’s being sought from public sector workers.”
The idea of Walker and the legislature teeing up corporate tax cuts is especially remarkable, given that “the share of corporate tax revenue funding the state government has fallen by half since 1981 and, according to Wisconsin Department of Revenue, two-thirds of corporations pay no taxes.”

Rosenberg, who shares my frustrations with the state of the press, also backtracks the governor’s original press release, uncovering some important double dealing. Let me go ahead and plug in a longish section from Paul’s e-mail on this subject.

Salient points:

(1) Stated Deficit:

“The state of Wisconsin is facing an immediate deficit of $137 million for the current fiscal year which ends July 1. In addition, bill collectors are waiting to collect over $225 million for a prior raid of the Patients’ Compensation Fund.”

(2) Piddling amount gained by raiding public employee benefits:

“First, it will require state employees to pay about 5.8% toward their pension (about the private sector national average) and about 12% of their healthcare benefits (about half the private sector national average). These changes will help the state save $30 million in the last three months of the current fiscal year.”

(3) ENTIRE deficit covered by single non-controversial item:

“The budget repair will also restructure the state debt, lowering the state’s interest rate, saving the state $165 million.”

(4) Which carries with it a severe time-constraint:

“Since the state is required to make debt service payments by March 15th, the bill must be enacted by February 25th to allow time to sell the refinancing bonds. This provision will reduce debt service costs by $165 million in fiscal year 2010-11.”

There are, of course, all manner of other bells and whistles in this bill, but the whole “fiscal emergency” narrative–which is clearly questionable at best on other ground–is put to bed with this simple set of facts.

To cop a phrase from Brad DeLong, “Oh why can’t we have a better press corps?”

If just ONE major news outlet knew how to CRITICALLY read a press release, none of this rightwing hysteria could have gotten off the ground. When I was managing editor at Random Lengths News, teaching interns to critically read press releases was one of the basics, since incoming press releases went into a file from which we drew potential “news briefs,” and it was always important to spot slant, spin and contradictions in order to assess what other information sources we might want to contact for a more accurate story–if, indeed, we were going to run anything at all. So when I say this is a basic skill, I mean a BASIC skill.

Oh yeah, and one more thing:

(5) The destruction of workers’ rights is not only fiscally irrelevant, it does not even come into effect until AFTER the end of the current fiscal year:

“Collective bargaining – The bill would make various changes to limit collective bargaining for most public employees to wages. Total wage increases could not exceed a cap based on the consumer price index (CPI) unless approved by referendum. Contracts would be limited to one year and wages would be frozen until the new contract is settled. Collective bargaining units are required to take annual votes to maintain certification as a union. Employers would be prohibited from collecting union dues and members of collective bargaining units would not be required to pay dues. These changes take effect upon the expiration of existing contracts.“

Right. And herein lies the piece that ought to have any good journalist scratching his/her head. To wit – why is so much energy being devoted to busting union power in Wisconsin? Even if Walker were able to completely annihilate all unions in the state, it would have zero effect on his ginned-up budget “crisis,” right?

Hmmmm.

As I allow above, this is a complex situation. And it’s an evolving situation, with more facts and analysis emerging as it unfolds. How much of this were you aware of? If the answer is somewhere between “none” and “not much,” why? Is it unfair to ask our nation’s largest and richest news organizations to present the details you need to make an intelligent decision? Are you not bright enough to process facts? Do they not think you’re bright enough? If the latter, what do you think about the journalism establishment’s decision to make your mind up for you like you’re a three year-old?

If Walker Really Wants to Solve the Problem, There’s an Obvious Solution He Isn’t Talking About

If you want to get serious about Wisconsin’s fiscal issues, you have to take a hard look at one of the biggest drains on the state economy: the United States of America. In 2007 (the most recent year for which we have data, I think), Wisconsin contributed $43,778,325,000 in taxpayer revenue to the federal government. Washington, however, only returns $.86 per dollar to the state in benefits and services. That comes to $37,649,359,500. If you don’t have a calculator handy, that means that the state is losing $6,128,965,500.

Whoa. Check that again – Wisconsin is losing better than $6 billion a year – that’s billion with a “B” – and we’re cluttering up the Capitol over $137 million?

What I want to know is why the Tea Party counter-protesters in Madison (what few there were) aren’t demanding that Walker and the legislature do the only fiscally responsible thing and begin talking secession. The case has already been made that California, Washington and Oregon have an incentive to secede, and the same should go for other donor states. Like Wisconsin.

Am I right? Well, Rosenberg observes that Walker’s “plan is to destroy public service unions that work for cities and counties as well as the state. So state supremacy over local governments is part of his mix, as is rejecting federal stimulus money. I don’t think you’re stretching things all that much.”

I’m sure we all look forward to the more penetrating follow-up story next Sunday morning.

______

Thanks to Jeremy Woodburn and Paul Rosenberg for their valuable contributions to this story.