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Recent Beans

Looking Forward

Some of you have no doubt heard that Barack Obama won the most recent presidential election. What you may not know is that not every person, even among those that voted, cast a vote for Obama. Nearly fifty percent of Americans voted republican, despite the fact that Obama was running. These people were vociferously averse to Obama for a variety of reasons, many of which gradually transformed into new and unrelated reasons. Here's the punchline: the people who hate Obama are already looking forward to 2012, when they might depose him in favor of someone who is not so, shall we say, repellant because of his or her, shall we say, policies. If I understand their series of loud complaints correctly, here are some things that Obama should be on the lookout for if he's going to appeal to the skeptics:

1) Experience: a major motif in the arguments against Barry. Presumably, being the president for a while constitutes experience which might prepare you for a job in the oval office. At that point, however, it is possible that Palin may have served as Governor of Alaska for four more years. Given how quickly that title elevated from comically irrelevant to supremely respectable in a few months, she could be the most important person in Real America by then. On the plus side, it won't matter at all how good of a president Obama was, just that he's been in charge of something. It's good to have wiggle room.

2) Being a Muslim/Terrorist. The hardest rumors to battle are the ones that are so dumb to begin with that there's no more possible evidence to suggest that they are incorrect. When the going gets tough, however, the tough create distractions. Stage an event where Obama is faced with the decision of deporting an American citizen who is wearing a turban so that a friendly white woman can have his job. It would be bonus points if the turban guy wears a name tag with "Hussein" written on it, that way people realize that Barack is capable of demonstrating moral probity even in situations when his name might tempt him to do otherwise. Also, switch out Wright for a Christian pastor who hates most of America based on God's word, but still likes the white straight protestant part.

3) Positive attention from the media. This makes people who are suspicious of the media feel that you are guilty by association. Or maybe they just think that since celebrities are on the TV, being on the TV is like being a celebrity, which is bad. Actually, I can't explain why this is a bad thing. I only know that it is because the conservative half of the media insists that the entire media was too biased in Obama's favor. This didn't sit well with a whole lot of Joe Occupations, because they only pay attention to the conservative half.

4) Being an associate of Bill Ayers. For God's sake, don't deny this friendship based on its undeniable transparency. That obviously doesn't work. I'd say tell Ayers to bomb a few abortion clinics, maybe mix in a mosque or a gay bar (somewhere that there's no Murkns). Democrats will hate it, but they're capable of telling the difference between Obama and Ayers, so it's win-win.

5) Socialism. Technically, there's no chance whatsoever of this being a threat. It's complicated though, because Republican pundits don't know what it means (Hint: it's not the same thing as paying taxes, or even "spreading the wealth", which is something all market structures do). I'm afraid Barry's gonna take a hit on this one. Four years is a long time, though, and I'm sure there's some money left over from the campaign. Running some ads with subliminal word associations between socialism and nascar or beef jerky might tilt the board in his favor.

So as you can see, Obama's got a few things to address before he's secure for 2012. If he hits these points, though, I'd say he'll be sitting pretty among the dissenters. That is, of course, unless they really are just straight up racist.

SOS

There's a buzz going around the online that Barack Obama wants Hillary Clinton for Secretary of State. Here's a little roundup of opinion on that question.

Nate Silver: science indicates that hillary shouldn't take it

Matthew Yglesias: isnt this like the only policy sphere where they have starkly incompatible worldviews?

Andrew Sullivan: brilliant move, for she is the snake in obama's garden, and to defang the snake he must marry it.


My two cents are here.

Let's throw together some answers and questions out of order: What exactly does is this the change that we can believe in the drama quotient, how exactly are we gonna deal with what about the former President yes is this Lincoln's team of rivals, or is it, now but on the other hand she is world famous woman, ooh russia wants kiss, drink here is a toast to you!


A unity gesture is cool. I can't help but think of the one lonely hillary fanatic in my facebook circle of friends, who was bitterly anti-obama, rooted hard for mccain this november. how will she and the other PUMAs react when their Hillary herself says, "Well, actually, I like PU."
and I'm not snidely curious. It'll be honestly cool to see if these people come back to the fold.

I'll follow with more if she actually does in fact land the job. Until next time, I leave you with the first google image result for the words: until next time, I leave you with

Bush vs. Worst, Part IX

Welcome to the ninth installment of our series comparing George W. Bush to the worst U.S. Presidents in human history. This week, we take a look at a man whose shockingly proactive incompetence may surprise you: James Madison.

Madison arguably had one of the best pre-Presidencies. He wrote the Constitution and the Federalist Papers, came up with the Bill of Rights, did some solid work in Congress and, as Secretary of State under Jefferson, oversaw the Louisiana Purchase. Unfortunately, none of that stuff counts.

Foreign Policy: The main thing Madison did was the War of 1812, a comically poorly-handled fiasco. It started off as bad blood between the British and Americans. We felt that we should be able to trade with the French even if the British were desperately trying to ward off Napoleon, and the Brits felt that they should be able to pull people off our ships and conscript them into the Royal Navy. Madison decided the answer was to go to war against the most powerful nation on Earth. Naturally, pretty much everyone in America disagreed with him, noting that we didn't exactly have a "good military". According to this great Wikipedia sentence: "Madison carefully prepared public opinion for what everyone at the time called "Mr. Madison's War", but much less time and money was spent building up the army, navy, forts, and state militias."
Almost everything that followed was ludicrously terrible:

• Madison decided to get things started by invading Canada, which for some reason everyone thought would be easy. Jefferson called it "a matter of marching", and Madison tried to do it with a few small state militias. It turned out to be a matter of gross failure.
• The highlight of the war came when the British effortlessly marched into Washington D.C., ate the dinner that Madison had left when he fled the White House, burned down the White House, destroyed the Treasury, and scared the U.S. into setting our own naval yards on fire.
  
• Britain easily held us at bay even though they were also fighting the Napoleonic wars, one of the greatest military campaigns in world history.
  
• We started out with 12,000 troops. We tried to get more, but no one was interested. By contrast, Britain sent over 15,000 troops as a supplement, over a year into the war, after they had defeated Napoleon.
• Britain immediately set up a Naval blockade of the entire American coastline, destroying our economy. Total exports fell from $130 million in 1807 to $7 million in 1814.
• New England openly hated the war, smuggled goods to the enemy, and considered secession.
• We surrendered Detroit without even fighting, even though we probably had enough guys to win.
• One of our few victories came when we burned down a town near Niagra, causing all the inhabitants to freeze to death in the snow.
  
• We lost 40% more troops than the British.

Eventually everyone got tired of the war and quit. Under the terms of the peace, Britain made none of the concessions that we had demanded at the war's outset, and each country got exactly the same territory it had had before the war started. Our one gain was Mobile, AL, which had been owned by the Spanish. In Britain, according to another great Wikipedia sentence: "The war was scarcely noticed at the time and is scarcely remembered in Britain because it was overshadowed by the far larger conflict against Napoleon Bonaparte."
Did Bush Do Something Worse? No.

Domestic Policy: Technically a lot of the War of 1812 was domestic, since Madison elected to hold it on U.S. soil. But we only want to count it once. Even so, he is remarkably bad. For one thing, he let the charter for the National Bank expire and opposed renewing it for the next two years, until he realized he couldn't finance his war at all. The economy sucked when the British ended our trade with everyone (except for the illegal smuggling with the British), but that's foreign policy. He had dumb governing principles, refusing to fund roads, bridges and canals, which are the classic example of things that everyone agrees the government should fund.
DBDSW? Yeah, if we separate the War of 1812 from this, and consider Bush's own economic disasters on top of his wiretapping experiments, he takes this one.

Civil Rights: The British easily convinced tens of thousands of Native Americans and slaves to fight on their side. Also, Andrew Jackson killed a bunch of Creek.
DBDSW? No.

Corruption: Don't see much reported on Madison for this, though it's probably overshadowed by the War of 1812.
DBDSW? Easily yes.

Value of Replacement Player: For the first time, this is quite close. Jefferson and Clinton are similar tier Presidents, although Clinton is probably better. But I'd say the dropoff from the end of Clinton to now is greater than that from the end of Jefferson to the end of Madison. Madison had deeper lows, but ended better. So this goes to Bush in the closest contest yet.

Verdict: This is a really tough one. It is difficult to overstate the failure of the War of 1812. It's like the peewee football team of lovable misfits in the movie "Little Giants" took on the actual New York Giants, during the Super Bowl, and had all their parents' houses burned down. It is as though the Iraq War had been relentlessly campaigned for by Saddam Hussein. But I think there are three mitigating factors here:

1. The scope of possible failure was greater for Madison. As a young country with a shakier economy and smaller military relative to a very powerful Europe, we could easily have collapsed entirely. I'd say Madison's failure was well within the realm of the conceivable for his era, whereas someone sitting in 2000 would never have envisioned America as it is today under Bush.
2. We were doing OK by the end of Madison's run. He oversaw a recovery and general swell in morale (so great that they call it the Era of Good Feelings) that you can't really imagine under Bush.
3. Bush has a greater breadth of failure. No one thing he did is worse than 1812, but when you add up our current recession, the wiretapping, Iran mishandling, Afghanistan mishandling, North Korea mishandling, egregious torture of prisoners and associated war crimes, PATRIOT act, Dept.of Justice scandal, Valerie Plame scandal, No Child Left Behind failures, provocation of Russia, general anti-environmentalism including abandoning the Kyoto Protocol, historically enormous budget and trade deficits, anti-stem cell research positions, support of the Federal Marriage Act, Katrina fiasco, undermining of the Constitution especially with signing statements, illegal victory against Gore and swift-boating of John Kerry and ruination of the Supreme Court, you get something in the same ballpark as 1812.

Yikes, after writing that list, it seems pretty clear that Bush gets this one.
Coming up next: Presidents who are even worse.

the speech that could have saved William Henry Harrison

(In 1841, William Henry Harrison gave the longest ever Inauguration speech, at 8,500 words. He died of pneumonia one month later- and popular folklore suggests that it was this 2 hour speech, delivered in the freezing rain, that did him in. The following is a line-by-line paraphrase of Harrison's speech, 1,350 words long.)

I’m coming out of retirement to be your President. Here’s what I think about that.

Back in Rome, they used to say that guys never did what they said they would, after they were elected. Ain’t it the truth?

You voted for me, so technically your work here is done. But you’re probably curious about what I’m gonna do as President. Maybe you’re cynical about if I’ll actually do what I say. There’s no point in worrying. Only time will tell whether I live up to this speech, or if I’m remembered as a liar and failure.

My job is to do the best I can for as many of you as I can. Our country is unique because of the limits our Constitution puts on power. For instance, there are certain rights that the Government can never take from the people. This reminds me of Rome and Athens- as in, we’re better. So far, our limited Government has worked pretty darn well. That said, there are occasional disagreements about what the branches of government, usually Congress, are actually supposed to do.
These disagreements arise because the Constitution is ambiguous, not because anyone is power hungry or sinister. What scares me is that one government branch might take too much power from the other branches. And people don’t seem to know or care about that risk.

Back when the Constitution was written, a lot of people were concerned about all the powers granted to the federal government and to the President. These men feared that someday we’d devolve into Monarchy. Looks like they might be right, but rest assured: I will do everything in my power to not be powerful.
For instance, you know what I hate? Second terms! The longer a man is in power, the more power hungry he gets. And when you’re power hungry- it’s like a horrible disease that you absolutely cannot stop, it completely destroys your soul. Here’s a fact: I won’t serve a second term.
Also, the President should have absolutely nothing to do with legislation. He can make a suggestion now and then, but legislation is Congress’s responsibility.
The Presidential veto is good. But I won’t use it to advise or control Congress; the veto is just for making sure that nothing hasty or unconstitutional gets passed into law.
Also, sometimes Congress gets a little too clouded by regional interests, but the President doesn’t. So the veto makes sure that no minority region is ever bullied by legislation.

This government’s been goin’ on for 50 years. We need more transparency, across the board. It would be kinda cool to see how our government’s systems have changed in the past 50 years, like, is this how the founders pictured it? For instance, a lot of them were probably paranoid that by now, the states would’ve lost all their rights to a strong central government. And guess what: it’s happening! It hasn’t been overt or contentious, but it’s happening, and it’s bad.
For instance, the President appoints almost everyone, and they’re all at his beck and call. If you thought this was bad when Jefferson was President, just imagine how much worse it is by now. The only difference between a President and a King is that the King controls the public treasury, and hell, our President appoints the people who administer the public treasury. They owe everything to him. He could take that money for himself if he wanted. This reminds me of Julius Caesar.
The Treasury is staffed with very smart, patriotic people and they’re doing really hard work. That’s all good. My problem is they’re getting too cozy with the President. We need to make the Treasury independent from the Executive branch.
Across the board, public servants shouldn’t be the President’s puppets. We’ll have none of that during my tenure. Oh, and we’re definitely keeping freedom of the press. The more they scrutinize us, the better.
As I’ve said before, it’s not the President’s job to come up with legislation, especially in matters of finance. Let’s respect Congress’s authority. Maybe in England the King submits his financial plans for Parliament to rubber-stamp, but that’s not how this country does it.

I strongly oppose an exclusively metal currency. Metal currency will eliminate upward mobility. Metal currency will make the rich richer and the poor poorer. Metal currency will destroy our national character of generosity and kindness.

Another thing the President handles: the Territories of the USA. They don’t have all the freedoms of a state, but they’ll be states pretty soon. It’s tough for those people, not having their full political rights, but they do have heroic frontier border patrols.
Oh, and the Constitution isn’t too specific about this, so let me make this clear: The people who live in DC are free American citizens. Yes, Congress is the official Governor of DC, and Congress serves at the behest of the states. But if people in the states think of DC residents as their “subjects,” then they are as stupid as the stupidest Englishmen from 1776. They’re not gonna be your slaves, okay?

  Constitutional disputes between Congress and the President are tough, but that’s nothing compared to disputes between states. Sometimes things get crazy. But this country doesn’t work unless we like each other. You can pretty much do anything in this country, just don’t infringe on another state’s rights.
Sure, you might give advice to another state, politely, but too many people making forceful advice to other states, well, that’s a slippery slope. This reminds me of Athens.
Look at Switzerland. The Swiss should fucking hate each other, but instead, they all get along because they respect the usefulness of a strong union. Let’s aim for that. When states try to force their interests on other states, it puts us on the path to civil war.
Instead of pushing your angry little regional interests, we should all be proud and focused on our unity.

The economy’s not doing so well, and some of our states are struggling to make ends meet. A lot of this is their own fault, but that’s okay. We’ll get back on our feet together.
Don’t let this talk of constitutional disputes get you down. As long as we are all deeply patriotic and generally moderate, we’re gonna be okay. Now, if we’re not, then we can have the smoothest government in the world but we’ll still be fucked. History shows this. And we need to be vigilant about avoiding smooth-talking, power hungry types. This reminds me of Caesar.

Maybe partisan factions consider themselves patriotic, but rabid partisanship is actually the opposite, even the downfall, of liberty. When people truly believe in liberty, things are good. But when you’re negative, angry and partisan, that’s when evil Kings, pretending to be patriotic, will take over the country.

My foreign policy: we’re gonna keep up the friendly, hands-off status quo. I don’t actually know any details yet, but I have a good hunch that other countries are cool with this. Look, I was a General, so you should trust that just because I make peace with other countries, doesn’t mean the USA is getting walked over. And we’ll keep up the status quo with Indians. We should be proud of treating these weak, uncivilized people with fairness and restraint.

Before I finish, let’s mention political parties. You political parties are crazy and you need to relax. Parties are good watchdogs, but That’s It. Otherwise they’re vicious and awful. It’s such a shame whenever a great country loses their patriotism in the mix of all this party nonsense. This reminds me of Rome.
Now that I’m President, I can say this: stop it! It’s up to the people to get the partisanship under control. I’ll definitely do what I can. Congress: do what you think is best, don’t ever do me any political favors.

This is a this very serious and important day; in fact, it’s so serious that I am comfortable sharing this with you: I’m a Christian. God bless America.

Aaaand I’m done. Thanks everybody.

Not only is he a Socialist...

In my opinion, there are few things in the world more important than making sure people remain stupid, or at least ignorant. The last thing I want to have to do is concede that other people have valid opinions, and the easiest way to do that is to make sure they never know what in the hell they are talking about on the issues I like lecturing to them about. That way, I get to ramble on about whatever I feel like, quickly ignore counter arguments, and win every argument through the clever usage of phrases like "well, once you actually look at the issue," "many experts agree," or "well, that may be true in theory."


That is why I am happy to see articles like this that keep America stupid, at least in regards to foreign policy. This article benefits my cause on three levels.First, it plays into the assumption that Republicans are strong on defense and Democrats are weak on defense. According to the article, now that Obama is elected, everyone is calling in their demands. It's as if people can just smell the pansy on him. Reading the article, you would never think that such demands were ever made on Bush. "Lets just make up shit-ass demands and see what we can get away with!" Most of these were already ideas and policies that many people thought should be implemented. Just because Bush perfected the "Fuck You" doesn't mean they were bad demands. It just means that somebody in the White House might actually pick up the phone.


Second, it does nothing to distinguish between good ideas and bad ideas. Lots of countries have requests. Some are bat-shit crazy (The Taliban: Please stop bombing us!), others are fine and dandy (Russia: You should not try to piss us off intentionally). Some of them are in our interest (Eurpope: It's a bad idea to piss off Iran intentionally). Just because another country wants us to pursue an issue doesn't mean it's a bad thing. For example, the first three issues they mention are all bad Bush policies that people want extended or ended.


Missile defense with Russia is a stupid idea. Only reckless hawks pursue it. It is wildly costly, it doesn't work ("I know, we'll shoot down their missiles. That's easy to do, right?"), and it pisses off Russia, who had been dismantling and disarming missiles until we started talking about bullshit missile defense issues. Missile defense is normally nothing more than a lame attempt to add another notch to the Reagan history of belligerency. I say, for old times sake, we start re-sponsoring Central American terrorism. Those were the days when you were truly proud to be an American.


Then, the Regime Change policy is also a terrible policy. It largely discredits the US as a beneficial force in the world, violates multitudes of international law and diplomacy precedents, and is an extreme policy that will never have a good outcome (see Iraq, Mossadeq in Iran, Arbenz in Guatamala, Allende in Chile, etc). In regards to Iran, keeping that policy makes future negotiation with them in good faith highly unlikely. "Just because we want to invade you doesn't mean we can't still be friends."


Then, on the same lines, listening to Israel tell us to be tougher on Iran is also a bad idea. Being tough on Iran hasn't gotten us anywhere, except to an angrier and more-armed Iran. By portraying all of these issues as demands, it makes US following any of them look like the actions of a weak-kneed pussy. "We're not going to give into their demands! We're Americans. We make demands." Some of these requests are really just people asking us to stop pursuing stupid policies that hurt both sides.



The third reason this article stupidifies is that it vilifies negotiation and diplomacy. Again, by portraying these issues as demands, or "requests," it automatically makes agreeing to them sound as if the US is coming from a position of weakness. Countries do just call each other to discuss important shit, you know. It isn't a bad thing either. It's actually the only way shit gets done that is beneficial to both sides.


Looks like I've got some bright days ahead of me.

Bush vs. Worst, pt. VIII

In this week's installment of our series comparing Bush to the worst Presidents in human history, we realize that Warren G. Harding isn't as bad as everyone says. Nonetheless, he is quite terrible, a preposterous inept clown if not quite a traitorous pro-slavery drunk. He's like a potato chip that everyone tells you is a vomit-inducing fecal abomination, and then you try it, and it's merely a horrible chip that you would never eat, the Doritos X-13D (this chip tastes exactly like a McDonald's hamburger) to John Tyler's Pringles Extreme Blazin' Buffalo Wing.
In addition to being like a Dorito, Harding is responsible for the greatest quote that any President ever said: "I am not fit for this office and should never have been here." Technically that's apocryphal, but it's the sort of thing that is true whether or not it happened.

Foreign Policy: Harding ran for President on a platform of isolationism, nativism, and turning away from reform. He signed the Treaty of Versailles, but the real credit for that goes to Ellen Wilson, who brokered peace in the free world after Woodrow had a massive stroke. Harding wasn't really a go-getter, or even really a do-anythinger, so he didn't have any big disasters here, although the Washington Naval Conference probably contributed to the riseof Japanese imperialism in the World War II era.
Did Bush Do Something Worse? His bumbling idiot approach to Iran alone would give him this one. We'll throw in the IRAQ WAR just to make his inferiority clearer.

Domestic Policy: Not much to speak of here. This guy really liked to take naps. It says here he invented the White House Press Conference. And he signed the Fordney-McCumber tariff, an asinine attempt to protect American economic interests. Basically he didn't like the "global economy" machinery, so he jambed the invisible hand into the gears, stopping them, but leaving the hand a soft bloody pulp. The resultant counter-tariffs helped cause the Great Depression.
DBDSW? The PATRIOT act. Also the economy. Wiretapping his own civilians. That's probably sufficient to give him this one without delving any deeper.

Civil Rights: Harding favored anti-lynching laws, which would have been a monumental achievement, but unfortunately he was Harding and he never did anything about it. He signed the 1924 Immigration Act, probably the most racist and horrible immigration policy since the Alien and Sedition Act.
DBDSW? Historically this is not Bush's weakest area, primarily because I've been treating this as a proxy for racism and not addressing the "spying on American citizens" aspect. So Harding wins.

Corruption: A truly amazing cavalcade of failure and outrage. The big one is the Teapot Dome Scandal, blatant thievery by his Secretary of the Interior that resulted in the first Presidential Cabinet jail sentence. His head of the Office of Alien Policy was convicted of accepting bribes. The personal aide to his Attorney General destroyed a bunch of papers and committed suicide. Charles Forbes, his director of the Veterans Bureau, skimmed profits, received large kickbacks, ran an underground alcohol and drug distribution network, was convicted of fraud and bribery, and had an aide who killed himself. Harding also had a well-documented affair with his friend's wife, which he lied about when the Republicans asked him if he had any big secrets before they nominated him for President, which resulted in them having to send her monthly payments for years. She's the only person known to have successfully extorted a major American political party.
DBDSW? Amazingly, someone has a more corrupt administration than Bush. Of course, Bush has more personal involvement in his corruption, and it hurts America more (lying about war, committing and covering up war crimes, etc.).

Value of Replacement Player: Will tells me I'm not using this term the way sports people do. So to be clear, what I mean here is basically: How much better or worse was this person than his predecessor? The idea is that a President receives the country in a certain condition and should lose points if he makes it much worse. So if Harding had followed Lincoln, that would have been a disaster. But he didn't. He followed the tattered remnants of Wilson, who was just kind of OK. A moderately competent person might have achieved, say, a thing, instead of sleeping through scandal, but Harding's failure isn't close to Bush squandering of Clinton's successes.

Verdict: Bush is way worse. Harding shouldn't be nearly this far down on the list. But that's OK because we've discovered that Madison was unspeakably awful. So we'll just reorganize:
10. Harding
9. Reagan
8. Pierce
7. Hoover
6. Tyler
5. Bush

John Adams is off the list! We'll fill in the founding father gap next time.

Bonus What the Hell Fact: Apparently a park in Seattle had a Harding memorial commemorating that one time he stopped there and led some boy scouts in the pledge of allegiance. But then in the 1970's they tore it down and buried it under the African Savanna exhibit in their zoo. Why did any of this happen? It is in the spirit of Harding that no one will try to find out.

Tuesday Beans

Gay Marriage and Unspeakable Filth in the Holy Word of God

Given that a large number of morons in California have just elected to go down in history as bigots who re-legalized discrimination, I thought it might be time for us all to turn to the Bible. Surely, no matter what creed one might profess, we can all agree that marriage is best defined by the infallible Christian word of God. So here is a brief anthology of Bible Heroes and Their Traditional Marriages.

Hebrew Bible (Old Testament):

Adam and Eve: Did you notice that she is not named Steve? This guy did. Often cited as the perfection of God’s plan for strong families, Adam and Eve lived together for almost a thousand years without ever officially getting married. In addition to raising a son who killed his own brother, this couple notably caused the fall of man. They worked as organic farmers and did not believe in Christ or democracy.

Noah: God’s mulligan, Noah had a more traditional marriage, though he also invented “passing out drunk” and cursed his own grandson into slavery. Fun fact: White people used this to justify African slavery for over a hundred years.

Abraham: His wife Sarah convinced him to bone his maid so he’d have a son, which worked, and, according to tradition, originated the conflict between Jews and Arabs. They proved that the family that prays together sends one son into the desert to die and attempts to sacrifice the other on an altar. Abraham also liked to pretend that his wife was his sister.

Isaac: Never really got his act together after his dad tried to kill him. His dad later sent a servant to go pick out a wife for him from his cousins, and Isaac married her at age 40. His sons hated each other.

Jacob: Met his wife in a land he fled to after stealing his brother’s inheritance by conning his blind father. His father-in-law pulled a fast one on him by slipping him the wrong daughter in the wedding, which Jacob didn’t even notice until the next day, so Jacob compromised by marrying both of them and having sex with sisters for the rest of their lives.

Moses: May or may not have had two wives, depending on whether you consider Zipporah from Midian and Unnamed Woman from Cush to be the same person.

Deborah: A strong working woman who may or may not have been married. Involved in some potential sexual intrigue.

Samson: Seems to have been sleeping with a woman who was not his wife, at least until she handed him over to be killed by the government.

Ruth: Married her relative in a weird economic transaction involving the exchange of a farm and a sandal removal ceremony.

Samuel: Bachelor.

King David: Multiple wives. Possible gay relationship for most of his youth. Once spied on a woman bathing and decided to sleep with her, but she was having none of it, so he sent her husband to be killed on the front lines in a war and married her. He felt bad about it, but he kept having sex with her. His son famously tried to kill him and usurp the throne, but David killed him first.

King Solomon: Multiple wives. By adopting their religions he helped cause the downfall of an entire nation. His son was a terrible king.

King Ahab: A horrible villain who killed indiscriminately, his marriage with Jezebel is arguably the strongest “one man, one woman” marriage in the Bible.

Elijah: Bachelor.

Elisha: Bachelor.

Jeremiah: Bachelor.

Esther: At the urging of her uncle, made herself look nice so the Persian king would add her to his harem. It worked. Strong hints that she used sex to get favors, although, to be fair, they were pretty good favors.

Ezra: Wrote a long screed against inter-religious (and, by implication, inter-ethnic) marriages.

Hosea: Married a prostitute. God told him to do this.

New Testament:

Mary and Joseph: Technically she got pregnant before they were married, but whatever, I’ll spot you this one.

Jesus: Bachelor. The only time he really mentioned marriage he mainly talked about how in paradise there is none, and on earth it seems fine for a brother to have to marry his sister-in-law if her husband dies.

Peter: Bachelor. Spent a lot of time hanging out at the docks.

Every other disciple: Marriage not mentioned; presumably bachelors for most of their discipling careers.

Paul: Said you shouldn’t get married unless you’re too much of a pansy to resist sexual urges. A big fan of women submitting to their husbands, though.

That’s about it. It seems we have a lot to learn in this country, but this much is clear: We cannot rest until the Constitution defines marriage as “something to avoid if possible, but, if you have to do it, between a man and one or more women, potentially sisters but at least your cousins, and preferably submissive Jews, and you have to marry your brother’s wife if he dies”. We should at least be able to get this on the ballot in Texas.

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Obama Win Causes Obsessive Supporters To Realize How Empty Their Lives Are


I just watched this video; my entire day so far was spent lounging in bed.

this is the moment

Barack Obama, floor: Jimmy Carter. Meek failure in the face of enormous challenges.

Barack Obama, probable outcome: Dwight Eisenhower. Stable, careful leadership; the boats unrocked, but life in America gets generally better.

Barack Obama, ceiling: Ten years from now, historians will no longer, as a broad, nonpartisan consensus, acknowledge Three best Presidents (Lincoln, Washington, FDR). They will acknowledge Four.




Four years ago, I knew Kerry would lose, and I was disappointed in a cynical, kinda apathetic way. I mainly felt relieved just to be in New York, which really felt like the last, lonely refuge for the things that I believe in. One of the exhilirating sensations that took over last night, running through the cheering crowds all over the city last night:

America shares my values again.

We said No to torture. We said No to senseless war. No to arbitrary, vicious hate and paranoia. We said Yes to science, and Yes to culture, and Yes to diplomacy, and Yes to intelligent leadership. Yes to respecting one another, Yes to seeing what we can do For other people, instead of just Against them. Yes to talking to the world. Yes to dignity, Yes to a campaign that treated us like adults and made an honest case for itself. Yes to eachother.

We said Yes to Barack Obama.


And now, ladies and gentlemen, it's all about the beans.

THE ENDORSEMENT ARRIVES

"Starting tomorrow, it's tomorrow." -notes from PA part 2

It's 10 pm and I'm in the downtown Philadelphia HQ. There are still about 20 or more people calling, working, talking. Today I worked at the office in the poor black neighborhood. At night I transferred to the downtown office, to be closer to my host.

A few notes from yesterday and today:


• I'm staying with this very eastern spiritual, vaguely hippie woman. She signed up via the Obama campaign to house out-of-state volunteers. Her boyfriend was over last night, and he mentioned- politely, modestly- that he was a solid Nader supporter. I held my tongue. She turned off a night light last night. "Isn't it beautiful? It's a Himalayan salt candle."

• This morning a few kids from the neighborhood- Curtis (age 13), Denise (11) and Otaia (8) came to the office and wanted to help canvass. So me and my pal Adam took them out. Adam went with Curtis, I went with the girls. They helped hand out Obama stickers and voting info literature, I talked to voters. They had a little bit of kid impatience- 'is this the last house? is this the last house?' but amazingly, they all volunteered to join us for a Second canvassing shift. I absolutely thought they were bored but they all wanted to go again. So we did. And we had a great time together. We're kindof low on buttons at the office, and we get asked for them all the time, but we made sure to give each of the kids a button after they headed home.

• Once again, everybody we've talked to is registered, wants to vote for Obama, and knows where their polling place is. This is a neighbprhood that badly underperformed their vote in the primary, and turnout in places like this is crucial to guarantee the win. I'll be here tuesday morning to make sure they show up to vote.

• "I'm 34 years old and I'm voting for the first time!"- this great, funny guy we met on a stoop. On my last canvassing trip, it was pretty quiet until the last house, we met about six people hanging out on the stoop. They were all very animated and funny, joking around with us and eachother. "Vote McCain!" they shouted. "Right on! Country first!" I shouted back. We all laughed and talked about Obama, and it was all very helpful, answering their questions about the voting laws.

• This was one of the darker moments, but it was also really special. A canvasser, just in from New York for the weekend, was taking the bus with me from the poor neighborhood to downtown. We're waiting for the bus by the street. All black neighborhood. A car pulls up across from us, at the red light. White guy, clearly drunk, yells at us from the passenger seat.

"What are You doing here?"

"We're volunteering for Obama," says my fellow canvasser.

"Obama!? Are you some kind of Nigger lover!?"

"Yeah, I am."

and that was it. (green light, car's gone).

I turn to the guy and say, "that was a really cool response, I really liked that."
He says, "I wish I could say I came up with it. Back when I was a kid, my mom's friend told me the story of when he was down south, back in the civil rights days. And when one of the white guys down there asked him the same question, that was his response."

... and you know, this is the next chapter, guys. This campaign, this moment in history… it's all on the same continuum with that struggle for equality and respect. Just like that retort is handed down to the next generation, so is the mission. And we're on the frontlines, man.

Dispatches from the Pennsylvania Ground Game

I'm in a Cosi in Philadelphia, lounging through my extra post-daylight-savings hour, before I head out to an Obama field office.

This is my third trip to Pennsylvania over the past month. Around October 4 I spent a day trip in the suburb of Jenkintown; a week later I spent a saturday in Lower Merion. This time, from yesterday until mid-Tuesday, I'm gonna be in Philadelphia proper.

The general media narrative is, this election is fought mostly on red-state territory, but McCain might have a shot in Pennsylvania. But everything I've seen has looked pretty good for Obama.

A few anecdotes, personal and political:

• There's a very impressive, seamless share-of-power dynamic between Obama's paid operation and the old-school local political networks. When I canvassed in Jenkintown, I first received training at the Obama office, and from there they dispatched me, and other volunteers, to a local organizer's home. The trust they had in eachother was very impressive.

The organizer was a wonderful, wealthy old woman who knew everybody in her neighborhood. Her husband was an NFL player in the '50s, and she exuded this quiet vibe of veteran influence- she was a particular person that every Democratic campaign wants on their side.

She had photos in her home with the Governor of PA, various mayors, and a very proudly displayed photo of herself with Hillary Clinton. She really loved Hillary, and was deeply disappointed by her loss, but ultimately decided that she needed to work for Obama, for the good of the party. And she was working- organizing and making calls and leading our neighborhood canvass. I tremendously admire the Hillary Democrats who are working hard for Obama. I know I couldn't do it if the situation was reversed, so the people who can actually put it behind them, and not just vote, but devote their time- that's really incredible.

• Jenkintown was mostly Democratic, but the undecideds were delightfully varied. 3 houses in a row I got undecideds of every stripe- high information ("I've read Obama's policy papers, and I'm not convinced"), generic ("Uh, I guess I'll vote for whoever's better on the economy and taxes") and cynical ("I dunno… they're both politicians")

• In Lower Merion, in a crucial Philadelphia suburb- the very place where these elections are won and lost- the Obama office was absolutely bustling. A large office filled with dozens and dozens of people, including about two-busloads worth of NYC volunteers. I passed the small McCain office twice that day. When I left to canvass in the morning, it was closed, with a "back in ten minutes!" sign on the door. When I came back, hours later, it was untouched. "Back in ten minutes!"

• I'm spending this last weekend in a poor, black neighborhood in Philadelphia. In earlier weekends we were trying to persuade voters; for the final push we're focusing on getting all of our ID'd supporters to the polls. Every person I talked to was voting for Obama (except one undecided). And they all knew where their polling place was.

• a 13 year old girl ran up to me while I was canvassing yesterday. "How old are you? My cousin thinks you're adorable," she said. The whole neighborhood was so animated- lots of kids on their bikes, lots of guys out just chatting and having a good time, a few old women relaxing on their porches.

• After about 8 pm we left that office and headed to a downtown Philly office, closer to where I'm spending the night. I left at 11 pm and there were still people working- preparing some yard signs, calling the west coast. There's a spirit of fun and purpose all over this campaign. It's pretty exhilirating.



And now it's time to grab a taxi and head back to the office. More notes will come tonight or tomorrow