Ask "Them": "Why Don't You Feel an Obligation to Protect the Poor"?

Seriously. This was my biggest problem with this whole post, too.

(But I can wait to see how many crazy/nonsensical Barea comments it gets! /baiting)

You don't know me…where's Doctor Disaster's avatar – need to John Mayer really bad.

Ask and ye shall receive (my ninjas)!

Agreed. Pleated pants make fat people look fatter, normal people look like they have fat to hide, and skinny people look silly.

I have yet to see anyone pull pleats off outside of old movies, and even then, I think that they would be better off without.

I think the weight of the old-timey fabrics, i.e. heavy wool etc., somehow made the pleats acceptable but lightweight cotton just doesn't hang correctly.
Also, as for the rest of the post, feh. They need a re-hash tag 'cause it ain't nothin' I've not heard before.

I haven't owned a pair of pleated pants since I was in Junior High (because back then, those were the only style available unless you wanted Sansabelt slacks like your Math Teacher/Coach wore.) Never, ever again.

Was it possible that the author was being sarcastic about the properties of pleated pants? Come on.

Surely, after apologizing for his previous missteps in thinking that sarcasm worked well on the internet, he was not so dense as to attempt it again? Plus, his incorrect defense that "[t]hey're slimming" is unfortunately conventional wisdom. Have you ever shopped for dress pants at a standard department store or talked to the sales clerks?

That the first thread on this post was about pleated pants is only one of the zillion reasons I love The Awl. Smooches!

Mar is right; that was definitely a joke. It was even a touch self-deprecating about conservatives' waistlines! I laughed, anyway.

As someone who was a little put off by the tone of the intro piece, I'd also like to mention that this installment allayed my fears that this was going to be a smug-off between a smug conservative and the smuggest of our commenters, ending in a disastrous smugularity that would be better avoided by all concerned.

I also think it's worth mentioning that most conscientious liberals are all in favor of private charitable enterprises. Those accomplish a lot, and can help in areas where public funding has historically not made much progress.

They just recognize the inverse of this: that government programs have strengths private charities lack. For example, a government-run program can provide a baseline safety net to all citizens; private charity is, by comparison, a spotty patchwork, varying over time, location, and even individual cases due to limited resources.

So, it's accepted on both sides that private work on behalf of the poor is valuable. Individuals might debate whether private or public funding is more valuable, while still generally agreeing that both are needed. The stance most liberals take issue with – and it's not an uncommon line to hear! – is that public programs for the poor are worthless and should be scrapped.

well played.

Does Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation count? (It's not "industry" but it's also not gubmint.)

Just trying to think up an example.

Yeah, what Abe said. Why would one write "I had some experiences" as (partial) justification for an ideology and then not describe, even generally, what those experiences were? I want to like this feature but this is either bald-faced evasion or disinterest on the writer's part in his own ostensible point, and it seems at best disrespectful to readers.

@KenWheaton – I would assume he's talking about things like microfinance and Grameen Bank, but I don't want to give him any answers. And experiences with poverty reduction in the developing world aren't exactly transferable to US policy.

Abe, if a man can delude himself into thinking pleated pants are slimming he can delude himself into anything.

@KenWheaton — no, since Gates, like Buffett, is pretty staunchly against large bequests to children and are fairly supportive of steep inheritance taxes — which encourage private giving. So even if you argue private giving is the preferred method, there are still tax structures that both enable and encourage this. There's a positive correlation between progressive taxation and private giving (which undermines the argument that absent government interference people are predisposed to aid the downtrodden).

Maybe I wasn't reading closely enough, but it seemed like the argument would be made that aiding the less fortunate wasn't, strictly speaking, a Christian value. As someone raised Catholic, I've pretty much always looked down my nose (sorry, I went to confession after) at most Christian faiths as being intentionally dodgy on this point, be it Calvinists or Prosperity Gospel types.

I'm no theologian when it comes to this point, particularly on Mormonism, but I'd always understood gospel literalists to have a finger in the ear stance when it comes to Jesus gettin' all socialist-y about the eye of the needle.

Thanks for the replies, folks.

I completely agree with 99 on the Gates etc. assessment.

@KenWheaton: I also agree with what 99 said. I would also add that the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation works closely with public-sector institutions at the federal, state, and local level in the United States, and – to the extent that they are functional – the governmental institutions of developing countries. Grants and material contributions are often made directly to these institutions. So, while it is a private charity that often partners with the private sector to develop solutions, much of its emphasis is on supporting new or pre-existing government-based solutions to poverty, global health, and education.

@atlasfugged: Exactly, and that's why the statement "I had some experiences that made me think that markets and private initiatives in many cases offer better and more sustainable solutions than governments do for reducing poverty" is as asinine as it is vague.

I'm obliged to point out that Bill Gates practices what he preaches in re. inheritance. He plans to leave $10m (about 1.5% of his current net worth) to each of his children; everything else goes to the charitable foundation(s).

Not a member of the Democratic Party so I can't speak with authority about why someone would side with a party that, at its core (adding the comma you forgot), is about protecting wealth instead of humanity.

Can someone tell me where I mislaid all my oil? Did I leave it in the garage or the Gulf of Mexico?

Jeff, commas are conversational pauses. Read it out loud. If that is how Abe talks that is how he writes.

I imagine poor religious people align themselves with the republican party in a futile attempt to siphon off some of the spoils in their direction. The republican has been manipulating that fantasy for decades.

You answered your own condemnation…re: pauses as commas being written (they weren't written) so… what?

You imagine? YOU IMAGINE? What the fuck makes you think your IMAGINATION means shite to anyone?

Are you THAT MEGALOMANIAC, when I would really argue MONOMANIAC, to think that your IMAGINATION means shite to anyone but YOU?

Do you need like 5 or 10 friends to tut tut in agreement now to make you think that 5 billion people need to agree with your…YOUR…assumptions before you realize that you don't control the worlds depositery (meh figure out the right spelling of that) of knowledge may not actually include you?

In other words, you are fat and you're a Nazi. That's how you corporatist lefties roll right?

Well, the microfinance thing started out well, but now banks are making serious cash acting like loan sharks with these microloans. There was a long, rather even-handed show about how this industry is developing on NPR recently.

@Kakapo: Link, maybe? Or can you summarize?

Jeff, would you prefer "I hazard"?

Here you go:

http://www.thetakeaway.org/2010/apr/14/idea-micro-lending-better-its-reality/

Felix Salmon probably writes most regularly on microfinance in an even-handed way (it's an issue that makes generalized ideological differences calcify the debate quickly). The sore thumb of MF is Compartamos (which has pretty aggressively transformed itself to the developing world equivalent of payday lending).

The really hard thing to sort through (morally) is that even though some of the rates look usurious, they still compare favorably to what is typical in a given area (and when you try to roll up the loan portfolio, your risk profile is absurd relative to what is even typical emerging markets stuff — that might be cultural bias more than anything, or a lack of data over time). Add to that the hard cost (in western dollars) or sustaining a large lending facility that has reasonably fixed transactional costs that can't be recovered through interest (since the values were are talking is often a couple dollars at most over the life of the loan), and you have a system that is hard to make work relative to the places where commercial banks extract disproportionate fees for small balance accounts (which are always the most profitable).

That's why a lot of people advocate an IMF/World Bank type facility, where the servicing costs are basically subsidized as a development investment by public entities. Other options, like Kiva, where you basically offload default risk and processing to the individual might make more sense over the long run.

Maybe we could see someone like Rick Warren use church's assets as a backstop for a credit union for microfinance (I pick him not because of his convocation at the inauguration but because he already does more than most for AIDS treatment in Africa and poverty alleviation than a lot of the mega-churches)? That would answer the question as presented.

Thanks!

I think it's important to note that Davis didn't say that he would be defending all of the Republican party's positions. Instead, he said that he would be explaining why he, a fairly average Republican voter, would continue to support the Republican party. That's an important distinction. Very few people could give cogent, thorough explanations for how the Republican or Democratic parties could solve ALL THE PROBS, especially with a community of smart, angry wonks nit-picking at the angles of every permutation of every issue.
However, giving an explanation for why an intelligent, ethical person would support the Republican party is worthwhile. For all that libs like to cry out against Othering, there's some very classist, elitist Othering of Them What Live in Flyover Country & Don't Know What Life Is that goes on in pretty much every lib community. It's very hard for a lib to give a critique of Sarah Palin that doesn't use the term "white trash."
So, it would probably be a good idea (by which I mean, an idea consistent with most secular humanist ideals) to treat Davis as a Republican individual, rather than a symbol of all Republicanism, ever. The Republican party isn't just made up of hellghosts like Cheney and Beck; most Republicans are dotty grandmas who bake cookies from scratch; or incredibly lovable Friday Night Lights characters; or Elle Woods types who just read their first Ayn Rand novel got excited but who will later become Democrats; or autistic uncles who don't understand ambiguity or metaphor except when it comes to Myst. Quit othering them.

That said, I think the post could have been much longer and gone into more depth. The topic of Christian charity is really interesting. I've known a few Christian moms who volunteered 25-30 hours a week while cheerfully voting Republican (i.e., against the very social programs that would help alleviate the problems that they were donating so much of their time to working against.) This culture is worth looking at.

@ Mar
I think your 'Christian moms' subset is an example of what MissaA spoke of, above. Charity as volunteering creates the same type of community as religion, or is a result of the mores of a religious community. In that way it reflects the tenets of the faith rather than the politics of the tribe. It's something that puzzles me, too, as it seems both wrong-headed and hypocritical.

I don't find these "Christian moms" to be hypocritical, merely wildly optimistic and delusional in their assessment of themselves, their close peers, and society at large. Above, Davis says that the government is inefficient at providing charity and that the private market and charities are better-suited. The Republican "Christian moms" demographic likely feels the same way, and this viewpoint is bolstered by their own presumably fulfilling charity work.

HOWEVER, have you met people? I mean, seriously? Most people do not, and would not choose to, engage in meaningful volunteer work. In fact, even for many volunteers, charity work makes much less of an impact than the portion of their taxes that goes to transfer payments does. I mean, these are, to echo Davis, "well-intentioned" ideas, but really, they are simply wrong.

@spanish bombs I found your comments in this thread very insightful.

@ Jeff:
Since you may have had a bit too many Smirnoff Ices, I have done the public service for Awl readers to Google-translate your last comment, in hopes more people can understand it:

"…You answered your own doom … on: stay, and a comma is written (they weren 't "so to write) … what? Can you imagine? Can you imagine? Sex makes you think what it's shite media imagination who ? Are you mad that patients were exaggerated, when in fact talking about the person on the issue fanaticism that your imagination mean shite to anyone, but you? You as requiring 5 or 10 friends of the agreement, tut tut now so you think that 5 billion people must agree to it … it … assume that you realize that before you put 't control the "world's depositery (correct spelling meh imagined) knowledge may not really include you? This means that you are overweight and you are 'on the Nazis. That 's how you "left-handed combination of Marxism wheels right?…"

Now, that makes much more sense, doesn't it?

@ Abe: 1) You're the man, and I've really enjoyed your pieces for The Awl. (2) I kinda/sorta disagree with you on this one. Davis answered the question in a Davis sort of way, meaning that he used the discourse that was most ingrained in him, that of a white, religious, Republican. Discursive touchstones count for a lot with these sorts of arguments, much in the same way that if one person is a (theoretically) strict scientist, and one is a (theoretically) strict religionist (both parenthetically "theoretically" because being a 100 percenter on either side is unlikely), they will have difficulty finding common ground on much because their discursive projections are practically alien to one another. When Davis explains why he doesn't want government to solve the problem of poverty, he's discursively (most likely reflexively) putting the answer (and its question) in his own terms. In his way he did answer the question (rather, your rephrasing of his question (i.e., "Why do you, as a 'Christian,' side with a party . . . humanity?")). Buried implicitly in his answer, I find he's saying that Republicans are concerned with protecting humanity, they just have a different plan for doing so. Or maybe not! Davis will have to confirm this.
And, it may interest all to know that the Mormon church, which collects tithing from all active members, contributes about 1% of that (based on what scant evidence I could find) to non-Mormon humanitarian aid. That probably doesn't seem like much, but they pull in between 5 and 6 billion a year in tithing. Also, members are generally encouraged to give to charity personally. Social justice, despite what Glenn Beck says, is definitely a tenet of Mormonism. Yes, very good arguments can be made against their view of what exactly falls under the term "social justice" (esp. in light of Prop. 8 contributions), but hey, more discourse!
All of which being said, I disagree with Davis's pro-private charity argument on the grounds that countries with higher levels of economic regulation (and more social programs) generally produce happier, healthier citizenry. Which cannot be dismissed.
Anyway, I'm really liking this series, and The Awl is awesome for running it. Among a host of other reasons.

Well, and further, isn't the downfall of government run poverty-alleviation programs in less wealthy nations generally corruption and/or lack of capacity to operate them, not the systems themselves?

There is a complicated school of thought that suggests that, especially in Africa, what the West calls corruption is in fact "institutionalized neo-patrimonialism" and merely a different yet semi-effective method of wealth redistribution, but essentially yes.

So as a criminal that got busted for violent behavior you became a member of the Democratic Party?

Sounds about right based on Chicago Politics. Rahm, that you?

Thinking chicago is in california would be the result of a Southern educational system. Bobby Jindal, is that you?

@ baduncle. this was the best response to him i've seen!

Yes, good. Also, the private sector is incentivized to drill wells as cheaply as possible. Which is not to say that they are incentivized to destroy delicious shrimp and redfish, but that they will always try to get as close to the profit side of the profit/safety equation as possible. Theoretically, an active regulatory agency would act on behalf of all stakeholders — whether the stakes they hold coincide with those of the oil extraction company or not. So how could the free-market deal with that? And if you think it could then shouldn't all liability caps be removed?

I haven't been this mad about something IN A LONG TIME.

But now the government has formed a commission! Jesus, what does it take to make you people happy? A COMMISSION! It doesn't get much more problem-solvey than that.

I've been in a rage about this for the entire last month. And I'm not an angry gay..most of the time.

Like, some Achilles type shit I kid you not.

Sucks being single don't it?

@HiredGoons and other angry folk – please sign my employer's petition at http://www.stopthedrill.org. And if you have any questions about what we're doing to try to prevent this from happening again, as well as encourage renewables, please ask me. And don't be cynical about signing a petition. We are going to make a change. /sincerity

@Goons: The glib, patronizing News coverage ("aw, isn't that sad!") coming from national and ESPECIALLY local outlets is nauseating. "This is so hopeless, let's just quit giving a shit in advance! But mostly, we STILL NEED MORE OIL. Cause GAS IS GETTING EXPENSIVE!"

This is a historically and commercially treasured region of the United States we're talking about, and it's going to be fucking ecologically ruined for the rest of our lifetimes. Hurricane damage is one thing, but this spill is quite another.

I feel like smashing the TV, drenching it with a bottle of SAE10W-30, and leaving it at the doorstep of a local affiliate. Pick one- doesn't matter which.

italics fail, sorry-

And what have you contributed to the effort to solve this disaster, or to prevent another? Tone note: sincere, not snide and certainly not judgmental. It feel that all the petitions in the world will make no difference. Oil always wins.

I think you mean child labor laws, not child labor. :)

Well, of course. Kids are really crappy workers anyways. All that begging for more gruel and all.

You mean you've got a gun and you keep driving past the Republican party's house and all the places you used to go to together ?

WE HAVE RECONCILIATION ISSUES.

what's Sweden for me, Somalia is for you

I didn't even pick up on the implication of that quip when I read it, so I'm glad you pointed it out.

So, conservatives actually point to Somalia as an exemplar?

Plus, Finnish is a WAY harder language.

Dutch is the WORST.

So, conservatives actually point to Somalia as an exemplar?

If they had any integrity, they would. But you know how it is: they don't hate Iran because Iran hangs thieves and doesn't separate the religion and the state. No, they don't hate the game that Iran is playing. They just hate Iran because Iran is an opposing team in the game!

See, their "every man for himself" ideology is not concerned about the the rules as much as it is concerned about defeating the other man. They want a Christian state, but not because they are such devout Christians (they often don't know shit about Christianity), but because they happen to be holding a banner that says "Jesus Christ" on it and they feel that by raising it they can claim the victory over others for themselves.

Plus, Finnish is a WAY harder language.

True, but well educated Fins speak very good English, and don't mind it spoken at work.

But the point is: we can speak for examples of Finland, Sweden, Canada, Denmark… but which foreign country could the conservatives speak for? None. Because US is already at the extreme conservative end of the "western civilization". If you look in the direction they are pulling in, all you can see is Saudi, Iran, Somalia (depending on the aspect).

See, their "every man for himself" ideology is not concerned about the the rules as much as it is concerned about defeating the other man. They want a Christian state, but not because they are such devout Christians (they often don't know shit about Christianity), but because they happen to be holding a banner that says "Jesus Christ" on it and they feel that by raising it they can claim the victory over others for themselves.

I think that's the inevitable result of fusing free-market neo-conservativism with religious social conservativism. The two ideologies intermingle, and we end up with the worst of both.

. Because US is already at the extreme conservative end of the "western civilization".

YES! That's another way in which the conservative failure to look around them becomes really frustrating. They don't realize how skewed to the right the American political spectrum is. And then start complaining that their right-of-centre, conservative president is a socialist and a communist.

Which I find offensive. Communism is not socialism. Communists don't gain power by instituting universal health care. Communism is violent. Tea Partiers insult the millions who were victims of the purges, genocide, ethnic cleansing, and general oppression committed by communist governments, when they claim that the current US administration in any way resembles communism.

I just have one comment to make about the lovely European and Scandanavian nations that are held up as great examples of socialism at work. They do a great job and have many benefits available to their citizens that most Americans do not have, but they are nations comprised almost entirely of one class, one religion, and one race. They are also very small compared to the US, in both population and in geographic size. I'm not saying this makes it impossible that the same strategies would work here, but I'd like to propose that the more manageable size and relative uniformity of those countries makes it a bit easier to put those systems in place effectively.

They're "one class" because of the level of taxing and entitlement benefits. That's kind of a chicken-egg thing. There are people of colour in Scandanavian countries, and I'm sure there is a good amount of racism too. The difference is that they don't have the "black welfare queen" myth; social spending isn't framed as a racial issue like it is in the USA.

To clarify: I don't see what religion or race have to do with it. That shouldn't effect people's basic needs. As I said, it would only matter if opponents started framing it as, "the government is sending all your tax dollars to these other people!" Racial diversity is not the problem; racism is.

Geography is one thing that is a problem. More money would have to be spent on making services available to people in less populated areas.

nicole, have you been to Europe recently? It's just as much a smorgasbord of humanity as the US. Probably more so in some places.

Awww, hey babycakes! Where ya been hiding all evening? Everyone was hoping you'd show up!

Um, show Doctor Disaster's avatar or just fuck off with your famininie smelly shite that we geigh boyz ran from already.

Do you see trolling as a type of performance art? Because your commitment here to total idiocy is pretty inspiring – as is your spelling.

Stupid to the point if moranic much?

Yeah you just achieved that.;

Oh no, you guys, Jeff is having a stroke!

It happened to Barbara Stanwyck..

@MikeBarthel How can you tell?

I consider myself fiscally conservative & "socially liberal." And yet, even though I'm still registered Republican (yes yes, I shouldn't make such confessions here after having been drinking for about 9 hours), I haven't actually voted Republican in about 15 years! So it can happen, jack!

(And also? I weep for the current state of the Republican party. Truly.)

Now this is discourse!

I am fiscally irresponsible and socially ultra liberal and I vote D only to negate some silly R out there – I weep for the current state of these United States and the two terrible options offered at the ballot box.

The options at the ballot box are too often far too glum, yes.
(Though I definitely wept — no itals for beyond-the-internets sincerity — with joy at Obama's election.)

Far as Davis goes, and your comment above, it's pretty much a conservative mantra that government should only be concerned with few things — of those probably the greatest being national defense. This particular iteration of that mantra with the current Republican party is WAY on the proactive (rather than reactive, I fear I must clarify) side of that "mandate." And I, as I know many other fellow "conservatives" do, disagree strongly with that stance.

oh for heaven's sake, EVERYBODY is fiscally conservative and socially liberal! do you like wasting money? do you like people suffering? no to both? guess what, welcome to the same opinion as everybody!

@Mantooth: I'm not weeping. They've done it to themselves. McCarthy and Goldwater created the populist monsters as we know them today, Nixon utilized the beast for votes and paid limited lip-service, Reagan started putting the policy where the mouth was, etc.etc. -you know the rest of the story! As far as the decent relics of Republican yesteryear who've been tossed overboard and are covered with bus tire-tracks (AHEM Olympia Snowe you're next!), it's like- OK, well, that's settled! What did you think they were going to do with you?
There's always room for one more over here on the other side, but way things shake out in this day and age, there are no guarantees that the Dem tent will provide safe haven for a "decent, pragmatic" career politician, either.
Moderates and ex-Republicans are either going to have to either eke out an existence with the Democratic party or go for broke and form some sort of 3rd party. Either way, the political gridlock and the constant spew of Ideological diarrhea from the Right aren't going to get any better.

@bombs: You've read Davis' post, yes? I think we may be defining "socially liberal" in very different ways here.

@Art: I'm far less weepy sober. But all politics is, indeed, a very sad state of affairs. Fin.

Nice Fin.

EVERYBODY is defining "socially liberal" and "fiscally conservative" in different ways. That is the essence of my claim that they are meaningless labels, especially from oneself.

EVERYBODY is fiscally conservative and socially liberal! do you like wasting money? do you like people suffering? no to both? guess what, welcome to the same opinion as everybody!

I love this so much.

@bombs: So you really are saying that you think Davis here would self-define as "socially liberal." At the risk of putting words into his mouth, I do not think that is so.

EVERYBODY is fiscally conservative and socially liberal!… do you like people suffering?

The thing is, if certain groups are "othered" enough, then people don't relate to their suffering, and become indifferent to it, or even get a sense of satisfaction from it.

It's not necessarily a progressiv/conservative difference. I'm sure you could find many dickwad "fauxgressives" who react gleefully to news of personal misfortune befalling political opponents and red-state voters. But such an attitude is against the spirit of progressivism; and I don't think the same can be said for conservativism.

Please don't demean sex-workers.

Rand Paul and his dad aren't really Republicans. They're Libertarian fringe, and they're not entirely by-the-book Libertarians at that- if Ron P. was a true Libertarian in the logical sense, he wouldn't be opposed to abortion and womens' reproductive rights. I'm always amused at how, when he's called out on this, he stonewalls the question by responding with rhetorical questions apropos of nothing.

@MissaA: To clarify, not every sex worker is a dirty, filthy whore, but anyone who lays down with the likes of B,C,M & P is.

@Art Yucko: The Google blurb for his site describes him as "A Lifelong Republican running for the Senate seat being vacated by Jim Bunning."

And Wikipedia: "He is the third child of Republican Congressman Ron Paul of Texas."

Also from Wikipedia: "Known for: Republican nominee for U.S. Senate in Kentucky"

I gotta thank you, AY, for making me visit his website where I see no mention of Republican affiliation. *shudder*

@missdelite: ETA – closed italics after "thank you".

@MissD: well, I mean to say that he's as much a traditional Republican as Ben Nelson is a traditional Democrat. Which is to say, not very. He's a regional anomaly that hides under one label/umbrella or the other because it's convenient to do so. Also, the Tea Party movement? Erstwhile "Libertarians", highjacking the bankrupt and moribund Republican establishment because they have the opportunity to do so and it's politically expedient, given that we are a two-party system- let's not kid ourselves.

@Art Yucko: So he's sort of a Republican? How is that even possible?

Does he go to their conventions? Support their platforms? Can they nominate him for party leadership? Could he (technically) be a Republican presidential candidate?

Pardon me, but I haz confuzed.

-sigh-
Look, I don't expect you to be familiar with regional politics necessarily, but out here in Flyover Hell you'll find that a lot of the politically ambitious will pick party affiliation based on what's the most convenient avenue to a win. They'll say and do whatever it takes to get there… until it isn't convenient anymore, then they'll switch parties or go independent and start a whole new fictional biography. That's a reality.

You and Wikipedia and Google are correct in that yes, of course, they will readily identify as Republicans.

I don't believe Ron and Rand Paul are "Republicans" because they genuinely love the Republican party. They're "Republicans" because it was the more ideologically convenient label to choose to get themselves elected.

Rand Paul is supposedly vociferously in opposition to ideas such as a unified North American currency (can't disagree with him there!) and a Superhighway that would have extended from Mexico up through Texas, to Missouri… which, by the way, was a George Bush/Rick Perry brainchild!

When I say "traditional Republican", I'm talking about people like the guy Rand Paul ran against, Trey Grayson. Establishment types that put the good of Money and Commerce before the "Sacred Writ" of the Constitution.

My problem with Ron Paul is that he plays games with this stuff. He has no problem whipping out a copy of the constitution to insist that we should tie our currency to gold, or let markets go unregulated, or any number of ridiculous ideas. But when a Commercial entity (ohhh, let's say… The Insurance Industry?!) fucks with people in his district? He has absolutely no problem throwing his Congressional weight around to make sure said entity coughs up the settlement money. Noble, sure- but also quite disingenuous.

*his district, being in Southeast Texas- Galveston, LaMarque, etc.- which was heavily damaged by recent Hurricanes. Many, many insurance fiascos were afoot down there. He did his best to bring them to heel.

Oh, and then there's the whole thing about how he voted against going to war in both Afghanistan and Iraq. I wouldn't exactly call that an ideological Republican stance.

Yeah, I remember waking up one day, saying "I think I'll go and get intestinal cancer; that'll help my career."

You've put it all in a nice package, with a bow on top!

Thanks, Dr. Laura!

I think you would rather be smug and think that your current position is all due to how wise and industrious you've been, and are just afraid to acknowledge all the unearned advantages you have.

I'm comfortable. And I have worked for it, yes. But there are people who work a lot harder than I do, and don't get where I am. I got a head start. I have a friend who worked harder than I did in school, and is every bit as smart as I am, but did not have the advantage of having a supportive family, a well-off family, of being white, or speaking English without an accent. I don't deserve to have anything more than she does, but I do.

I've made some good choices, yes. But they were choices that my friend never even had the opportunity to make. And I've made some really bad choices, but have not felt the effects as much as I would have if I did not have money or was not white.

I know that racism, sexism and class difference hold people back, because I've watched it happen. Cause and effect happens on a societal level as well, in the form of patriarchy, institutionalized white supremacy, heteronormativity and other power structures.

The only difference between you and people who do not have a "comfortable" life is that you were lucky enough to be born to unearned advantage.

Conversely, I wonder if Davis has given any thought to how his water-balloon faux pas might have turned out if he was a black teenager.

WBWB (Water-Ballooning-While-Black) carries a mandatory 15 years in Alabama, I'll bet.

Also: Bored, you're obviously someone who's never had to deal with the crushing obliviousness of institutions (Commercial or Governmental) ceaselessly fucking with your day-to-day life if you had the misfortune to get entangled. Or maybe you're just one of those creeps who make a killing hawking your pseudo-New-Agey "personal responsibility" bullshit to a bunch of dupes at hotels and convention centers out in the sprawl.

The only good thing about this comment is proving that there are over 5K registered commenters… that's great.

Interesting, b/c when this debuted I thought, "I hope this isn't just reworded George Will columns." Now I kind of wish it was reworded George Will columns.

Yeah, I just reread this and thought, "Wow, any assessment that ends with a George Will recommendation can't be very well-considered."

Ha. we should get a beer.

Well said, Barthel. I would add only that Davis is just getting rolling with this thing. The comments this time are generally asking for a little more intellectual rigor, so maybe he'll heed that (and change his trousers) next time.

Judging from the Republicans I know, though, very few of 'em seem to go in for the intellectual rigor, so maybe that's going to be its own problem? (One worth addressing, I hasten to add.) In my family, at least, the Rs are faith-based in more ways than one.

btw the smartest christian conservative I read regularly is ross douthat. if you do manage to figure this one out, (don't be offended that I'm not exactly holding my breath) "be sure to give him a call."

it haunts me, day and night.

Sorry, this comment was intended as a reply to a thread about 10,000 comments above.

That was really well-put! But is strikes me as being a rather classically "conservative" position, actually. I don't know whether that was your intent? (FWIW, spanish bombs's comment seemed to contradict itself to me.)

Well, I am certainly not saying that charity is worthless. Mostly, I am saying that people are bad people and will not, in general, make the time and effort to engage in meaningful charity. (I also feel that the impact, both macro and micro, of much unstructured charity work is overestimated, but I am willing to withdraw this if it is too controversial.)

Further, I think that the Republican ideal of replacing transfer payments and social welfare with the kind efforts of nice people is kind of ridiculous. I would consider the idea of average people manning up (Mar's second paragraph) to be wishful thinking; to wit, most of human history. (Sorry about that last semi-colon; I wasn't really sure what to put in front of "to wit".)

To clarify "unstructured": Unfortunately, sometimes a person's well-being and opportunity may be constrained by the structure of society. One example of this is if someone has the bad luck of having disadvantaged parents. Social welfare is at its best when it evens the playing field, and well-designed program will seek to mitigate inequalities caused by unfairness.

Providing for basic survival and dignity is of course a given.

Actually all this sounds like great arguments for a community service type draft. Where everyone has to serve a certain number of hours per year, but not shooting people, helping their community and country and even other countries. This would really change how people feel about each other, their communities and would change how other nations feel about us.

Re: community service draft

In Ontario, you have to do 40 hours of community service to graduate from highschool. I don't know how well it works. There's some kids who are motivated and want to help the community, or want to build their CVs, and would have done that type of thing anyways. There's some kids who find a position where their supervisor will sign their forms without making them work the full 40 hours.

My law school has also started a 40 hour public interest requirement, but it's new, so I don't know what the impact is yet.

@Dorothy Mantooth: Thanks! As for my position being a conservative one, well . . . I'm always going to vote for more social programs, not less, unless said programs are incredibly ill-conceived. However, from having spent time in the non-profit sector, as well as with friends who do social work/teach, it seems clear that a lot of charities/governmental organizations exist because communities aren't doing their jobs. We do a lot of fantasizing about springing all the able-bodied seniors from their nursing homes and letting them loose to tutor and tend kids, thus eliminating a lot of work for literacy programs, subsidized daycare, "at-risk youth" programs, schools, elder visiting programs, etc. It seems like schools, charities, and the government are increasing required to replace functions that the extended family used to fill, and this seems like a dangerous social model to me. When elderly people feel useless, it has a negative effect on both their physical and mental faculties, so why not let them do some of the work that so desperately needs to be done? One engaged grandparent can accomplish a lot more with a given kid than even the most hardworking teacher or social worker, since the attention of teachers and social workers must be stretched across a number of students/clients.

Furthermore, adult social clubs like the Lions/Eagles/Shriners/etc. used to take on a lot of the work that people now start non-profits in order to address. Neighborhood associations used to start community gardens; Lions Clubs used to do Big Brothers/Big Sisters kinds of programs; theater guilds used to stage community events, etc. These associations not only contributed to the health of communities; they also helped married parents to have actual social lives, even in the smallest of towns, thus helping your average adult American to not be suffering from constant isolation-derived existential crises. A return of this kind of culture would be really positive.

However, unlike most conservatives, I realize this is an somewhat unrealistic scenario. It seems like Republicans base their votes on the premise that if everybody was morally perfect, social ills wouldn't exist, so therefore social ills are the fault of individuals. The argument then follows that since it's not their individual fault that other people aren't morally perfect, they're not going to compensate for them–instead, they're going to "vote their conscience" and base their political positions around what people ought to be doing, instead of around what people are actually doing. In other words, because abortions should almost never be "necessary", they should be illegal, even though they are frequently necessary. In Republican terms, "necessity" here is defined as totally and utterly unavoidable, i.e., "you shouldn't have an "oops" pregnancy, because you should have done family planning." However, pregnancies caused by rape aren't a viable exception either, because people shouldn't run around raping other people. Basically, in this scenario, social ills can always be traced back to the immorality of individuals, which should never be countenanced, so therefore any social programs that help victims of social ills are basically subsidizing immorality and making it easier for people to suck.

This is crap for a number of reasons (SOCIAL FORCES), the worst of which is that it's based on an imaginary reality. Spanish bombs is correct that "the Republican ideal of replacing transfer payments and social welfare with the kind efforts of nice people is kind of ridiculous."

But people can be trained to be nicer and kinder; we know that to be true because they have been. While there are still giant pockets of resistance, our culture has become progressively less sexist, racist and homophobic over time. The mentally and physically handicapped are treated with more consideration and respect than ever before in history (even if the levels of both still fall short.) It's not ridiculous to think that people can be socialized to be more conscientious; after all, they've been socialized to do things that are a lot more outlandish and illogical (like adjusting insurance or squeezing poison into their faces or anthropomorphizing operating systems that they could literally never explain the mechanics of.)

Nobody ever went broke hoping for the best and expecting the worst. Sometimes people rise to the occasion. Meanwhile, vote Democrat and institute Nicole's community service draft.

this.