From Harper’s:
Monday, March 09, 2009
Sunday, March 08, 2009
The pitter patter III
Of rats' feet over broken glass.
THREE
Welcome back, Spotty!
Thank you grasshopper, although Spot has to say that he drove though a hair-raising (or should that be hackle-raising?) snowstorm in Wisconsin on the way home. Not much of a post tonight, other than to respond to a couple of comments to The pitter patter II, a series which, in just two episodes so far, has proven a gold mine for discussion.
One commenter asks where does it say in the Constitution that “Every person has a fundamental right to life and a right to those things required for human decency – starting with food, shelter and clothing, employment, health care, and education?”
Well, it says it in Articles 25 and 26 of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights:
Article 25
1. Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.
2. Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. All children, whether born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection.Article 26
1. Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. Technical and professional education shall be made generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit.
2. Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. It shall promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religious groups, and shall further the activities of the United Nations for the maintenance of peace.
3. Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children.
Granted, conservatives, this is a declaration by the dumbass General Assembly of the dumbass United Nations, but nevertheless, the United States is a member of the UN — a local boy, Harold Stassen, helped negotiate and draft the original charter of the UN, and he signed it on behalf of the US. Spot says that by virtue of Article VI, paragraph 2, the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution (which provides that Treaties are the law of the land), although not self executing, the pronouncement of an international institution that we have voluntarily joined is at least entitled to some consideration by domestic law makers.
Frankly, the idea that the answer to every public policy question is found in the Constitution, is well, puerile. There are some questions that come up that just aren’t answerable by an examination of the entrails of the Founders. Or if they are, the answers are found in the broad grants of power in the General Welfare Clause, the Interstate Commerce Clause, and so on.
If we democratically decide that as a half-way-enlightened country that everyone ought to have health care, that’s the end of it, the spittle-flecked rantings of the Captains Fishsticks notwithstanding.
Another commenter says that private parties are just much more efficient at distributing aid, relief, whatever. A word that the commenter may be searching for is subsidiarity, a word rejected by even Spot’s spell checker:
Subsidiarity is an organizing principle that matters ought to be handled by the smallest, lowest or least centralised competent authority.
Subsidiarity lays aside the whole question of whether the smaller unit will get off its arse and do what is required, which, as history has often shown us, it won’t. This is true perhaps especially in the realm of charity. Maybe the key word is “competent,” or perhaps willing.
And on the issue of health care in particular, the idea flies in the face of the fact that Medicare and the VA are orders of magnitude more efficient than the private market in delivering services to end users, that is patients.
More later.
Friday, March 06, 2009
The pitter patter II
Of rats' feet over broken glass.
TWO
This series didn’t start out to be a discussion of the Christian religion nor musings about the temporal obligations it imposes on adherents. But it veered that way in the first post in the series. Sometimes you go with the flow.
A couple of commenters leapt to the defense of Governor Pepsodent. One email correspondent — who Spot will cheerfully admit he taunted by sending a copy of the post to said correspondent — said that Spot had gotten faith and acts all bollixed up and that’s what the Reformation was about.
In other words, a surfeit of material.
It is probably unfair and inaccurate to lay the entire controversy of whether the justification of believers is through acts or through faith at the feet of the Reformation. But that was hardly Spot’s point. It was just to note the hypocrisy involved in calling yourself a Christian while describing the robbing of nearly a billion dollars from the cookie jar of money for health care for the poor as “belt tightening.”
One commenter scolded Spot for trying to bring religion into the public sphere and raised the parade of horribles (a lawyers’ term of art) that might flow from doing so: polygamy, a jihad against Christians, or the imposition of dietary laws. Now, aside from the fact that the comment’s “horribles” all happened to be — imagine — Muslim, it is really rich for conservatives to whine about religion in the public square.
Live the sword, die by the sword, pal.
This is the same crew that’s been yammering for years about abortion, stem cell research, gay marriage and rights, ad nauseum, claiming very noisily that religion should be the basis for public policy. Tell you what, conservatives: show a little compassion for existing sentient human beings, and then maybe your other braying wouldn’t at least sound so hollow.
Then, the commenter also says, “Judge not, lest ye be judged.” [hysterical laughter] Sorry, this is irony almost too rich for an old dog to digest. They can sure dish it out, but they can’t take it, as Spot’s dad might have said. Really, what’s needed is a little liberal judgmentalism to confront some of these bozos on their own terms.
Another commenter wants to compare Spot’s charitable giving with the governor’s. That’s a silly “my dad can beat your dad” kind of a taunt, but Spot says it raises an issue that the commenter never thought about. Conservatives like to brag about how charitable they are, but in truth a lot of their giving is to churches, and a lot of that goes to staff and maintain the clubhouse and for marketing to prospective members. The percentage dedicated to actual relief is an entirely, and much smaller, figure.
There are exceptions such as UMCOR – the United Methodist Committee on Relief – which spends every nickel it gets on humanitarian relief, getting its funds for administration from the national church organization.
But you can’t say that just because someone gives a bunch of money to say, The First Church of Getting out of Jail Free, that they’re really generous and charitable; it might be just the opposite.
And now, boys and girls, Spot will be gone for a few days. Family matter.
Thursday, March 05, 2009
The pitter patter
Of rats’ feet over broken glass.
ONE
Tim Pawlenty, our dear Governor Pepsodent: “We must tighten our belts.” One of the ways Governor Pepsodent wants to tighten his belt is around the necks of people insured under Minnesota Care – or ought to be. In six years of Pepsodent-era budget solutions (the last biennium, the current one that ends June 30th, and the next one) nearly a billion dollars will have been raided from the health care access fund. As Spot’s post at the link recounts, the state’s Medicaid recipients won’t see a similar decrease in funding because we’ll be getting some extra Medicaid money from the feds with strings attached that restrict the ability of the state to reduce Medicaid coverage. But that’s the only reason.
And don’t say that the budgets are the Legislature’s fault. Unless you mean the part led by Marty “the comb over” Seifert:
House Minority Leader Marty Seifert, R-Marshall, vowed that his House GOP caucus would uphold any gubernatorial vetoes on tax increases, with no reprise of the override DFLers pulled off last year on the gasoline tax.
Yes, the apostates have been purged. Oh, and speaking of apostates.
Spot has never questioned – on the blog, anyway – the sincerity of anybody’s religious belief. Until now. If Pepsodent’s a Christian, Spot is the Sun King. Oh, we’re not talking about whether Pepsodent believes that Jesus will save his quivering, puckered arse when he dies. His is the faith of the Get Out of Jail Free, Rapture Ready crowd. Never mind the social gospel of Jesus: the Beatitudes or attending to the hungry, thirsty and the imprisoned as though they were Jesus himself. And never mind Jesus’ instructions to Peter in the Gospel of John: “If you love me, feed my sheep.” In other words, don’t just say it: do something about it.
It is also written in James, another book of the New Testament, “Faith without works is dead.” That’s not a passage that’s very popular with the Good News tribes of Christians like dear Pepsodent. But it’s high time that some of the members of the other tribes began to rub the noses of sanctimonious moral ciphers like Pepsodent and his fellow travelers in the temporal obligations of Christians.
Governor Pawlenty, Spot’s calling you out for the cardboard Christian you are. Want to debate it? Spot says anywhere, anytime.
Wednesday, March 04, 2009
J.S. Bach: F# Minor Toccata
A little poem by Bill Holm that seems elegiac under the circumstances:
The music weeps, not for sin
but rather for the black fact
that we all must die, but not one
of us knows what comes after.
This music leaps from key to key
as if it has no clear place to arrive,
making up its life, one bar at a time.
But when you come at last to the real theme,
strict, inexorable, and bleak,
you must play it slow and sad,
with melancholy dignity, or you miss
all its grim wisdom.
In three pages, it says, the universe collapses,
and you — still only halfway home.
From Playing the Black Piano, Milkweed Editions 2004.
Thanks to Milkweed Editions for permission to reprint this poem.
Tuesday, March 03, 2009
Drinking Liberally Thursday 2/5
We’ll meet starting at six on Thursday evening at the 331 Club in northeast Minneapolis. Around seven or so, Spot expects, we start a conversation with our guest for the evening, Dave Thune the Second Ward Councilman in St. Paul.
Dave may offer a few remarks; we’ll have some Q & A, and, of course, some skillful cross examination by Spot.
Monday, March 02, 2009
Spoliation redux
Saturday, February 28, 2009
A wake for a big Icelander
Yet another update: The video of the memorial can be found here.
Further update: Spot knows that some people are checking back here periodically for the promised video. Sorry; it's not done, but Spot hopes to finish editing in a day or so. Hope it will be worth the wait.
Update: Thanks to all of you who came last night, and thanks especially to those who came to read. There will be a short video after it gets edited.
Note: We'll begin at around 6:30 tonight, rather than the usual 6:00 for DL. Sorry for any misunderstanding.
On Monday night, the second of March, there will be an informal wake (it will be the day after his funeral, but never mind) for Bill Holm, the ethnic Icelander Minnesotan who died last Wednesday at sixty five. Bill was known for a lot of things: his writing, teaching, love of music, and as a political essayist. We’ll start around six thirty; there’s really no formal program, but there will be an opportunity to read a few words of Bill’s that you especially admire.
And there will be opportunity to toast Bill’s memory and pledge that his name not be lost to memory. We’ll try to have some Icelandic vodka around.
Many of Bill’s admirers never had the chance to meet him; if you did, please come and share your recollections of Bill.
We’ll be at the 331 Club in northeast Minneapolis, the usual spot for Drinking Liberally.
The picture, incidentally, is from the McKnight Foundation and is posted in an obituary of Bill Holm on the MPR website.
Friday, February 27, 2009
Yikes

This is truly amazing:
All hell just broke loose in the Minnesota courtroom, with Al Franken's lawyers catching Team Coleman in the act of yet more concealing of evidence -- and they've now made a motion to totally strike the Coleman camp's claims about double-counting of ballots, which the Coleman camp has hoped to use to subtract over 100 votes from Franken's lead.
* * *
This morning, Franken lawyer David Lillehaug was restarting his cross-examination of Howell, and inquired as to whether there had been any further communications between herself and Coleman. The answer was yes -- and Coleman lawyer Tony Trimble then had to cough up some private e-mails he'd sent to Howell in early January.
"Pam, the legal team and campaign have made a strategic litigation decision to hold off from having you sign and us file your affidavit at this time," Trimble (or possibly his assistant, Matt Hapooja) wrote on January 6, "to avoid tying you down to any particular testimony and to avoid having to disclose your name and statement."
Trimble assured Howell in the e-mail that she shouldn't worry -- that the campaign would be calling her at a later date and incorporating her into this case, just not at this time, and they were keeping her name private.
Howell wrote to them in late January to seek further clarification -- whether she would be coached, how much the Franken camp knew, etc. Trimble answered that there would be no further coaching, and the Franken camp didn't know about her statement.
Lillehaug demanded that not only should Howell's testimony be re-stricken, but that Coleman's entire claim about double-counting be tossed.
"And it is clear from contestants strategy in this regard that Ms. Howell was their star witness on the issue of original and duplicate ballots," Lillehaug said. "They picked out one election judge from one precinct -- she's the only election judge they're presenting on this claim - and then yesterday documents were offered and admitted into evidence based on that precinct and nine other precincts. It is clear that her testimony was the linchpin for the Coleman original and duplicate ballots claim."
Lillehaug said they should not have to go back to the drawing board to figure out how to cross-examine her, and thus her testimony must be struck, and with it the entire double-counting claim for all precincts.
Lead Coleman attorney Joe Friedberg got up to mount a defense -- and totally threw Trimble, Hapooja, and fellow lawyer James Langdon under the bus. He said he'd asked them on Wednesday if there were other things going on, and he didn't know about it: "I can tell you that if I'd have known these things existed, I would have disclosed them."
Are they trying to lose this case and look like fools? Maybe it's all just part of their "strategic litigation decisions."
Eric Cantor saves the Republic!
From Talk Radio News Service:
Representative Eric Cantor (R-Va) was one of the Republicans that held a press conference today and presented the House-Senate Fiscal Responsibility Group. Canitor said that the group was created to monitor how tax payers money is being spent.
And a photograph of the event from the New York Times:
Where do we find men like these?
Don’t answer that, grasshopper.
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Beating cars into windmills
Barack Obama had a little to say about the automobile industry in his address on Tuesday night:
What he said was certainly popular with the Congress. But is it even achievable?
Probably not.
Jeepers, Spatty, that’s kind of negative.
Yes, grasshopper, it is. But even if the economy was healthy, we wouldn’t need so many cars, especially the large high-margin ones that Detroit is accustomed to building. The Happy Motoring Fiesta, as James Kunstler calls it, is almost certainly over. Obama talked about a “retooled and re-imagined auto industry,” but the auto industry can be retooled and re-imagined until the cows come home and it won’t employ the people or be the the economic engine it once was. But his insight to try to save the industrial capacity of the auto sector is a good one.
Spot, couldn’t we just retrain all the people in the auto industry to be, say, investment bankers?
Very funny, grasshopper. But you do make a point.
I know, Spotty.
Maybe Henry Ford — or his descendents, anyway — need to go solar. That’s what Spot’s DL pal techno said fifteen years ago:
This leaves [after discussing the environmental effects of the carbon economy and the inherent dangers of nuclear power] solar power as the only remaining contender. The modern Ford would probably not be tempted by photovoltaic electrical generation. Concerned with the environmental hazards involved in the production of PV cells, Ford would not be convinced that they produce as much energy as they require to make, and is worried about the useful life and recycling problems of square miles of PV cells.
On the other hand, a new Ford would probably be fascinated with the possibilities of solar power's great manifestation--the wind. Harnessing the wind would draw upon Ford's great strengths. Windmills are mechanical and they can be mass produced. They can be designed to be easily maintained and when maintenance is no longer possible, recycled into new windmills.
Spot think probably not only windmills, but new and more efficient ways to transmit energy, rolling stock for light rail trains for carrying people and freight trains for the carrying of raw materials and finished goods, and so on. It would be tragic, in terms of loss of industrial capacity to the economy, not to mention the loss of employment, to let it all just crumble in an act of “creative destruction,” thinking something new and shiny will magically arise to take its place. Here’s more of techno on the scope of the undertaking:
Even if one believes that Ford was a one-in-a-million kind of guy, statistically the USA should have 250 modern "Fords" hiding somewhere in the society. If it requires a new Ford to go solar, it should be possible to find one. Yet Ford was a product of his times and today's Zeitgeist is quite different. There could be a thousand new Fords and they would never be identified because the social environment has changed so radically, the potential Fords are not developing into the real thing.
If the Zeitgeist can be changed, the people necessary to build a solar infrastructure will emerge from the woodwork. A serious conversion to a solar future is possible technologically but so far, the institutional requirements have not been met. The great social questions have not even been asked--Do we have the social will to trade energy convenience for a less-damaged atmosphere? Do we have the social organization to plan and execute a project that will require at least 25 years? What will it take to acquire permanent funding for such a project? Is it possible to build a solar-powered infrastructure with preindustrial economic assumptions of what is profitable? Does anyone with political power understand how large and difficult this project will be? Can a society that glorifies individualism ever understand that genuine environmental solutions require new industrial and social designs?
One of the principal instruments of social organization is, naturally, the government. But we have been in the thrall of the nihilists and the moral ciphers — masquerading as conservatives and libertarians — for thirty years. And they’re not giving up easily, as Bobby Jindal and his acolytes like Rush Limbaugh and Jason Lewis demonstrate. It is funny — no; we’ll have to settle for tragically ironic — that the pikers who are squealing the loudest about the economic rescue mounted by President Obama are the same people who are responsible for the catastrophe in the first place.
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Other than that, David,
How did you like Bobby Jindal’s response to Barack Obama?
From the PBS coverage.
Spot’s favorite moment
Spot watched President Obama’s address to the Congress and to the nation last night. This stood out as Spot’s favorite moment of the evening.
When trying to think of appropriate music, Spot first thought of a few bars of “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” from the Rolling Stones. Okay. Then, he tried something from "Carmina Burana.” Better. But what he decided on was a few fair use bars of “Dies Irae,” or Days of Wrath, from the Mozart “Requiem.” Just seemed to fit. This one is from the “Amadeus” soundtrack.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Keith Downey is off to a great start!
On the floor of the Minnesota House:
The chair recognizes the member from . . . who are you again; you’re new, right?
[rather pompously] I’m Representative Keith Downey from Edina, Minnesota.
Minnesota? Well, imagine that. Go ahead.
I rise to offer an amendment to H.F. 886, the bill to accept stimulus money from the Great Satan, the federal government.
And?
My amendment would require the State of Minnesota to put a third of that money, or a half a billion dollars, whichever is more, into reserves.
You mean bank it?
Yes.
You do know, don’t you, that the stimulus money is supposed to be spent to stimulate the economy?
Really?
[the Chair nods] That’s why the federal government is going into further hock to distribute money to the states. [you putz, says the Chair under her breath] The Chair recognizes the member from Minneapolis.
[Rep. from Minneapolis] Are you out of your freakin’ mind?
[bangs the gavel, but smiles] Order. [turns back to Rep. Downey] Did you come up with this idea all by yourself?
No, Reps. Hoppe and Emmer, especially, helped me.
Okay, Hoppe and Emmer. Very funny. You know, your were freshmen once, too. The Chair admonishes you to remember what it was like.
* * *
The colloquy is imagined, but Keith Downey did in fact author an amendment to bank a half a billion dollars of whatever stimulus money that Minnesota receives. And the sad thing is, the amendment received over fifty votes, as you can see in the linked pages of the House Journal. The amendment was offered, after a Republican initiative to refuse any stimulus money was rejected by the House. Even Governor “Grooming Myself for a Run at the White House” Pepsodent wants to take the stimulus money.
Monday, February 23, 2009
The Law of Comparative Shitholes
Pat Anderson, the new diva at the Minnesota Free Market Institute, writing in the Strib on Monday:
It is an iron law of economics that given a choice between two shitholes, the wealthy will always flee to the larger one.
Jeepers, Spot, did she really say that?
Well, Spot is paraphrasing:
Taxes on the "wealthy," like so many progressive policies, actually work against the stated objective. If the tax burden gets too high, the "wealthy" simply pick up and leave for warmer climates. Homes are cheap in Florida, and a dollar stretches a lot further when there are no state income taxes. When these people move, they take the jobs they provide and the taxes they pay along with them. And, ironically, to woo new high-earners with job mobility to the state, companies must offer higher wages to offset higher income taxes, in effect increasing, not decreasing, the wage gap that seems so "unfair." Mobility is much easier for citizens and businesses in the 21st century.
Pat’s law does explain why Somalia and Pakistan, for example, are such hotbeds of entrepreneurial activity. It also explains why Jason Lewis and Bill Cooper left the state.
Uh, Spot, they both moved back to Minnesota.
Really, grasshopper? Fancy that.
But Pat’s complaint about wages is clearly a powerful one. Median incomes in places like Texas and Florida and Alabama must be much higher than incomes in Massachusetts, Minnesota, or New York. Right?
Median incomes are way higher in the higher tax states, Spot.
Well, Spot’s a monkey’s uncle! [Spot like to give the grasshopper the good lines once in a while, too.]
Anyway, Pat ends her monograph on the Law of Comparative Shitholes with this fervent prayer:
I would hope that before any legislators consider a class-warfare offensive, they remember who pays for state programs. Punishing hard work and ingenuity does not bode well for the long-term health of our economy.
Spot’s first question, Pat, is why, if you “would hope” it, why don’t you just go ahead and hope it? Or does the Minnesota Free Market Institute pay you by the word for the tripe you get in print?
And Pat’s a cheeky little anti-tax trollop, too: the only class warfare in this country since about the day that Ronald Reagan was elected has been against the poor and the middle class, although many of the latter have become the former.
Put a bullet in the beast
Paul Krugman's column this morning makes the case for nationalizing some banks. And he says that Alan Greenspan agrees:
Comrade Greenspan wants us to seize the economy's commanding heights.
O.K., not exactly. What Alan Greenspan, the former Federal Reserve chairman — and a staunch defender of free markets — actually said was, "It may be necessary to temporarily nationalize some banks in order to facilitate a swift and orderly restructuring." I agree.
There are some really, really big banks – such as Citibank and Bank of America – that could, probably would, fail without further intervention:
Third, while banks must be rescued, the U.S. government can't afford, fiscally or politically, to bestow huge gifts on bank shareholders.
Let's be concrete here. There's a reasonable chance — not a certainty — that Citi and BofA, together, will lose hundreds of billions over the next few years. And their capital, the excess of their assets over their liabilities, isn't remotely large enough to cover those potential losses.
Arguably, the only reason they haven't already failed is that the government is acting as a backstop, implicitly guaranteeing their obligations. But they're zombie banks, unable to supply the credit the economy needs.
To end their zombiehood the banks need more capital. But they can't raise more capital from private investors. So the government has to supply the necessary funds.
But here's the thing: the funds needed to bring these banks fully back to life would greatly exceed what they're currently worth. Citi and BofA have a combined market value of less than $30 billion, and even that value is mainly if not entirely based on the hope that stockholders will get a piece of a government handout. And if it's basically putting up all the money, the government should get ownership in return.
Spot absolutely has to say that he told you the same thing. Okay, that was shameless. Sorry.
Spotty, didn’t Krugman talk about bank recapitalization, a step just short of nationalization, even before that?
We can discuss it later, grasshopper; Spot is busy.
The alternatives are let the banks alone to stumble along aggregating losses until they fail, unable to be a source of credit to the economy, increasing the government’s FDIC risk all along the way, OR put a federal bullet in these beasts, giving the existing capital in the bank a haircut, because it isn’t worth anything anyway, really. Then selling the good assets off to new investment. Receivership is just as good a word as nationalization.
You did it again, Spot.
What?
Mixed your metaphors.
You miss Katie, too, don’t you grasshopper?
It's Monday morning in America

And I am finding myself actually missing my regular dose of Katherine Kersten, delivered like clockwork to the doorstep of Chez Observer.
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Some boob named John Helberger
Helberger repeats a canard and libels Charles Darwin in one breath. Nice job, John!
Who’s John Helberger, Spotty?
He’s a member of the medieval and antediluvian association of boobs known as the Minnesota Family Council. On Charles Darwin’s birthday, Helberger trots out the prevarication that Darwin was the genesis of the Nazis. Actually, it is said that Hitler was a student of the eugenics movement in the United States:
America’s experimentation with genetics as a tool for social change is not new. In the 1920s the United States became the world center of eugenic activity and social policy. From 1907-1960 more than 100,000 innocent Americans were sterilized in more than 30 states. In the 1930s and 1940s Hitler’s scientists took eugenics to the extreme - establishing human breeding farms for "Aryans," large-scale sterilization and euthanasia programs for the mentally and physically disabled, and death camps for the races they deemed "genetically inferior" or "unworthy life."
Both the American and German eugenics movements of the 1920s and 30s identified human beings as either hereditarily valuable or inferior. They established programs to purify the "race" of "lower grade" and "degenerate" groups, thus extending racism to include a new generic classification - the "genetically inferior." Not surprisingly, the targets always turned out to be the traditional victims of racism - Jews, Gypsies, Blacks, Indians, and other minorities.
After Hitler’s defeat, the American eugenics movement fell into disfavor, appealing primarily to the KKK, neo-Nazis, and a small groups of old-line scientists steeped in the racist theories of the pre-war period. In the 1960s their key spokesman was Stanford physicist William Shockley, who was the first to suggest offering cash incentives to people with low IQ scores who would agree to sterilization. He called his proposal the "voluntary sterilization bonus plan." Despite his status as a Noble laureate, Professor Shockley was widely regarded as a racist and a kook within the academic community. Nevertheless, he laid the foundation upon which the new eugenics movement would eventually be resurrected.
But Darwinism has nothing to do with eugenics or “Social Darwinism.” Darwin is biology; “Social Darwinism” is just racist claptrap most often supported by the same people who deny biological Darwinism, like the Minnesota Family Council coven of Christian evangelicals.
A thump of the tail to Lloydletta.