And the winner is...Sam Alito...losers to be determined.

You might remember I made a few predictions. So far, they're right on. Funny thing about predictions. I recently read a post from Tacitus who thought Bush would nominate a moderate. As a conservative, he was pretty upset about it, but I imagine he's happy now. JDB over at Charging RINO also thought there was a chance that a weakened Bush might look for a concensus judge. There are good political reasons why that wasn't likely (read my comments at RINO if you're really curious) but there's an even simpler reason to make the predictions I did.

I believe Bush is well intentioned and a visionary, but I also think that every decision he makes is a disaster. Whether that be the deficit spending, the Iraq war, the plans for social security, or the Miers fiasco, you can almost bet on GWB doing what is worst for the country.

The worst thing one could do with the Supreme Court would be to make it dangerously irrational by filling it with lickspittle idiots. Naturally, that was the 1st attempt. So the next worst-case scenario is not actually a conservative court. America will be ok whether the courts are conservative or liberal (though it would do best with what it will never have: a moderate/independent court). The new worst-case scenario is to force a nuclear showdown in the senate, and risk permanently marginalizing the senate's influence (because the senate is the only moderating force in this equation) . Sam Alito seems pretty much on track for that goal.

I'll repeat it when the issue looms larger, but here's a preview:
Weaker Senate = Stronger Executive = More Radical Courts = bad for America.

And that's not a partisan equation. Democrats will rule both the executive and the Senate someday. I expect they'd be as bad as modern Republicans. I hope there is bipartisan legislation against the nuclear option before then.

Starting today, it's going to get ugly.

(PS: Credit where due. Not all of Bush's decisions are disasters. Afghanistan and Roberts were both well done.)

Geek humor (not likely to make Reader's Digest)

When deep, probing, intelligent questions are really very stupid.

In the course of my research I generally use mES cells. The mES are mouse embyronic stem cells and happen to be male. Through the wonders of nature, male lines have only one copy of sex-linked genes, while females have 2. If you decide to work with those genes it's important to know whether there are 1 or 2 copies. Anyway, I was at a meeting with a professor I work for, and I was talking about switching to CHO cells instead of mES. I thought their sex might be important, and since I wasn't sure whether our CHOs were a male or female line, I asked the professor. The professor was kind enough to point out to me that CHO cells are "Chineese hamster ovary" cells, and only females have ovaries. Duh.

On Libby

Sometimes I'll be reading another's blog and wonder whythe author hasn't addressed a hot button issue. A good example would be the absence of posting at TigerHawk on Miers until her withdrawl, or Glenn Reynolds's rare comment on torture, or the way liberals don't blog about the UN oil-for-food scandal. Occasionally, I'm left wondering what these folks think of critical issues and why they're so silent. It's like I feel entilted to hear their opinion on whatever, which of course I'm not. Some of that translates to a silly feeling that I owe an opinion on matters. And thus I give you this post on Scooter Libby, not because it's interesting, but because it's topical:

I hope he's punished in accordance with whatever crimes he's committed, and I hope I don't have to hear to much about it, because I find it boring. I'm sure the press will beat this to death, making it more boring. Wake me if anything important develops.

Fun Fact: More Wal-mart employees than doctors.

Number of Active Medical Doctors in US 2002: 768,000 (of ~284 million=2.5 docs/1000)
Number of Wal-mart employees in US 2004: 1.2 million (of ~290 million = 4.1/1000)

Miers avoids Guantanamo bomb

So the news reporting in the UPenn paper isn't the fastest or best, but hey, it's free. Undergraduates don't care much about world news anyway. The DP usually only has 2 150-word columns on the National news. One of todays:

Miers will be asked about Guantanamo
The Chairman of the Senate judiciary Committee served notice yesterday he intends to question Harriet Miers about the Bush administration's policy of detaining suspected terrorists at Guantanamo Bay, injecting new uncertainty into a Supreme Court nomination already in doubt.

And of course, that very night she withdrew her candidacy. So was this the straw that broke the camel's back? Or was it the 2 ton weight that broke the camel's back? The most important thing to Bush is his Legacy, and there's no way he's going to risk the Senators anywhere near the torture issue. There's too many skeletons in that closet.

Anyway, the resignation pulled Specter's decision out of the news. If the DP weren't just a little slower than the average paper, I'd never have read about that final request. See if you can find it anywhere.

-----------------------------------
I feel kind of bad for Miers. She seems a nice woman, and is a victim in all this. But she wasn't significantly more qualified than any of my friends who went to law school (and while my friends are great, they aren't highest law in the country great). It had to be done, and I'll give full credit to conservative intellectuals for making it happen.
-----------------------------------

I'm not good with prognostication, but I'm going to try anyway. Next nominee:

Extreme conservative.
Male, White or Hispanic (not Gonzales for the above reasons).
Current or former judge.
Open member of Federalist society.
Will be fillibustered in Senate.

------------------------------------
Update: found a news link with the AP story

Improving public relations at Walmart...ps don't tell.

(links from Kevin Drum)

Walmartwatch has uncovered an extraordinarily unflattering memo detailing how to reduce benefits costs to their employees. While there are a few win-win proposals like educating the employees to untilize check-ups and prescriptions rather than emergency-room care, most of the suggestions fall into the "cut benefits" category. Dropping the 401(k) match is a simple cash saver, and the plan to move to "personal health accounts" is interesting. They suggest raising premiums on spousal coverage, because evidently spouses cost more than Associates. They advocate trying to get more part-time help, because their benefits are lower, and pushing the demographics from 10%/90% "high users" to <10%>Over the past 4 years, the average Associate tenure has increased by 0.2 months per calendar year. As a result, more Associates qualify for participation in benefits programs like the profit sharing and 401(k) plan and more paid-time off. An even more important factor is wages, which increase in lock-step with tenure and directly drive the cost of many benefits (e.g., 401(k) is a percentage of wages).

Given the impact of tenure on wages and benefits, the cost of an Associate with 7 years of tenure is almost 55 percent more than the cost of an Associate with 1 year of tenure, yet there is no difference in his or her productivity (Exhibit 2). Moreover, because we pay an Associate more in salary and benefits as his or her tenure increases, we are pricing that Associate out of the labor market, increasing the likelihood that he or she will stay with Wal-mart.

The idea here is that what Wal-mart really wants is a revolving door of low-tenure or part-time employees. Maybe they should just fire everyone after 5 years? I'm particularly interested in the way an average tenure increase of 20-odd days over 4 years is costing them a bundle in vacation time. I guess multiplied by a couple hundred thousand employees it becomes important. It is interesting though, how little they think of their more devout workers.

And the one Kevin Drum / NYT highlights:

Redesign benefits and other aspects of the Associate experience, such as job design, to attract a healthier, more productive workforce.

....

Design all jobs to include some physical activity (e.g., all cashiers do some cart
gathering.)

Offer savings via the Discount Card on healthy foods (e.g., fruits and vegetables)

Offer benefits that appeal to healthy Associates (e.g., an education offering targeted at students)

....It will be far easier to attract and retain a healthier workforce than it will be to change behavior in an existing one. These moves would also dissuade unhealthy people from coming to work at Wal-Mart. Even a modest shift in Wal-mart's ability to attract and retain a healthier workforce could result in significant savings

OK, it's morally reprehensible to intentionally exercise your employees so fat ones won't join you. On the other hand, structuring jobs such that your employees get some exercise does improve their quality of life. If nothing else, exercise is the most responsible way to deter obese employees. The least responsible one I've ever heard was the airline requirement of a high-heeled uniforms for female flight attendants. (rationale: Having smaller and sexier attendants is good for business and costs less in gas. High-heels cause physiological stress in proportion to one's weight, so the requirement of heels guarantees smaller attendants.) At least Wal-mart isn't being sexist.

That having been said, there are positive ways to encourage change. The health care insurer I once had used to give a $300 cash rebate if you phoned them from your gym 150 times a year. (not a huge incentive, but it was enough to cover the gym)

Anyway, some sad insight into how Walmart sees it's employees.

Oh, one final question: if they manage to attract and retain a healthier workforce, aren't they worried about retaining them longer and having to pay for more paid-time off?

UPDATE: I hate the way Blogger formats block quotes.

Conspiracy Theories

Many conspiracy theorys don't get published on the internet because conspiracy theoriticians are paranoid folks. This one is interesting. I'd add my thoughts on it, but I'm far too paranoid.

Sleep well Minister. I wouldn't.

PS: Someday I want a business card that says: "Conspiracy theoretician"

Persuasive tools and Judicial Nominations

The recurring argument for the nomination of Judge Roberts was his exemplary legal background. This is primarily a logos based argument of this form: Judge Roberts has performed to a high standard in the past, and therefore can be expected to perform to a high standard in the future. There is also an ethos component of that argument in that his qualifications build him up as more of an authority than the senators who might be judging him, and where they differ on opinions, Robert's views have more weight.

The arguments for Miers on the other hand, primarily target pathos. Miers is a nice person. Does that tug at your heartstrings? Pathos. Miers is a good evangelical. Since most people equate religion with benevolence, this is probably an appeal to ethos. The flip argument: "Democrats are opposed to an evangelical on the bench" is definitely an appeal to pathos. The painting of conservative opposition as mysoginists: definitely pathos. Accusations that Miers is a "crony": also pathos. Accusations that she is insuficently trained: logos.

And this brings us to the crux of the intellectual/populist conservative disagreement. The intellectuals aren't going to be swayed by anything other than logos, and right now logos is pointing to other, better candidates. But that isn't going to be the determining factor in the end, because the bulk of the country doesn't require much logos.

That is not to say the intellectual argument is hopeless. Attacks on Miers qualifications (as well as the cronyism charge) also impair the value of any ethos based arguments she might have while going toe-to-toe with the Senators. When Roberts said he didn't feel it was appropriate to answer a question he was making an ethos argument (I, as a knowlegeable judge, feel it would be irresponsible to answer that question). Miers will try to do the same thing, and everything rests on whether or not she will be able to pull it off.

Persuasion and Rhetoric

One of my goals with Cognitive Apostate is to pick at logical non-sequitirs that people routinely maintain, to mull over issues and try to decide whether they really make sense, and how one ought to think. But here the method is as important as the result. How should we think? How should we come to conclusions? How do we currently think and come to conclusions? We learn based on our inputs, occasionally through unbiased raw data, but more often through some persuasive event.

Fortunately, people have been studying this for millenia and have come to define the art of persuasion and rhetoric (see rhetoric or fallacy links on the sidebar). The three basic elements of persuasion stem from logos, pathos, and ethos. As explained by Gideon Burton at Sliva Rhetoricae.

Logos names the appeal to reason. Aristotle wished that all communication could be transacted only through this appeal, but given the weaknesses of humanity, he laments, we must resort to the use of the other two appeals. The Greek term logos is laden with many more meanings than simply "reason," and is in fact the term used for "oration.

Pathos names the appeal to emotion. Cicero encouraged the use of pathos at the conclusion of an oration, but emotional appeals are of course more widely viable. Aristotle's Rhetoric contains a great deal of discussion of affecting the emotions, categorizing the kinds of responses of different demographic groups. Thus, we see the close relations between assessment of pathos and of audience. Pathos is also the category by which we can understand the psychological aspects of rhetoric. Criticism of rhetoric tends to focus on the overemphasis of pathos, emotion, at the expense of logos, the message.

Ethos names the persuasive appeal of one's character, especially how this character is established by means of the speech or discourse. Aristotle claimed that one needs to appear both knowledgeable about one's subject and benevolent. Cicero said that in classical oratory the initial portion of a speech (its exordium or introduction) was the place to establish one's credibility with the audience.

Good orators will mix and match the three forms. I haven't yet looked at my writing, but I suspect my engineering and scientific training (as well as having been raised by an engineer) make me heavy on logos. Scientists codified logos by institutionalizing the scientific method. They rarely entertain arguments of pathos or ethos (though it does happen in animal testing and a few other places). The downside of too much logos is that it is pretty darn boring. (Wait did I say engineers and scientists are boring?) Logos has driven technology to new heights and is the backbone of impartiality and proof in law. Anyway, I'm a big advocate of logos. So my thought is to track how these three tools are used in arguments of the day, and maybe pull apart arguments that pesuade me and try to figure out how they do it.

Go waitress!

Lanky (upon getting 2 'Jack and Cokes' at last call): "You're my hero."
Waitress: "Yes, I am."

Conservative Schism

One of the few pleasures of being libertarian is you get to pick on both major parties. Whoever is in power is likely to abuse it. It's like watching a football game and perpetually rooting for the underdog. (The downside is you only win when there's a tie.) I say this, because a lot of bloggers (ie most political bloggers) are rabid partisans and like to sling mud over the fence. Me on the other hand, I like to sling mud at the biggest yard. It's true that I give contemporary conservatives a hard time, and also true that I enjoy deflating them some. But I want to explain that my reasons for it are not that I universally despite Republicans and advocate Democrats. What I want most is for there to be a balance of power and a consensus government. I'd also like to see more traditional conservatism, though I'm not holding my breath. In the meantime, yes, I'm happy when the paper trail finally catches up with people who abuse power. Abusers and criminals don't deserve to be our leaders. And I'm happy when people stop regurgitating talking points, take off the blinders, and assess for themselves the actual state of the union. Like it says up top: "You think for yourself." I think a lot of the contemporary conservatives issues stem from the fact that some of them are waking up and starting to think for themselves.

Without further ado here's a funny tidbit with respect to the rift between old-school conservatives (fiscal) and the evangelical wing (social): (via Carpetbagger)

Uber-activist Grover Norquist has driven the right-wing agenda for many years, all the while pushing legal and ethical envelopes, enraging Democrats with some of the most inflammatory rhetoric imaginable, and viciously attacking anyone who gets in his way. In many Republican circles, this makes Norquist a hero.
But Norquist is not untouchable. In fact, some of his recent political outreach efforts have led to bitter criticisms from some of Norquist's own right-wing allies. You'll never guess why.
....
The Texas Eagle Forum called Norquist's presence at the gay Republican group's fundraiser "traitorous," adding, "If he was a serious economic conservative, Grover Norquist would not have accepted the invitation or the honorarium for speaking at a fund-raiser for a group bent on the destruction of traditional families."

Now I confess, I don't know the first thing about Norquist. But I do think it's hillarious that "a serious economic conservative" can't talk to homosexuals. Hello people. Even I know that homosexuality is a social conservative issue, not an economic conservative one. These stories in which one conservative blasts another conservative for talking to a third conservative really make me wonder...
Q: How did these people come to be on the same team?
A: The enemy of my enemy is my friend?
Another argument for the Dems to go Truman Doctrine.

Democrats: Planless or following the Truman doctrine?

Up until a few weeks ago it was vogue to claim the the Democrats had no leadership and no plan. In the past few weeks this lede has been buried benieth the Rove/Libby, Delay, Frist, and Ambramoff scandals. Suffice to say Republican leadership is going through some tough times. If I were a conservative, I'd be more than a little unhappy. Our optional war has neither brought enlightenment to the Middle-East, nor reduced the threat of Islamic extremists. Social security reform was a bust. Deficits soar as we take billions and billions in loans from China. And the president has appointed a crony to the supreme court. Add in the price of gas (for which I blame Reagan/BushI/Clinton more than BushII) and you've got an electorate that's pretty peeved at it's government.

It's enough to make me wonder whether Democrats have been advocating the cold-war policies of "containment". They may not have a plan, but conservatives need them to get one soon. someone to fight against. They need loud and proud big-government tax-and-spent liberals to demonize. They need scary stories to tell people so that the martyrs of fiscal conservatism and the martyrs of social conservatism (often very different people) can unite. With Democrats failing to show any backbone (over the last several years) the Republican party is disintegrating like the former USSR. The fact is, Bush's presidency has not held up to conservative expectations on either the fiscal or social wings. And with control of both branches of Congress, people wonder why.

The central thrust of the Cold War was that capitalism was a more competitive model, and in an evolutionary sense, more capable of surviving. Capitalisms only needed to stem the spread of communism and then wait for it to collapse under its own inefficiency. Perhaps the Democrats have a similar plan. Perhaps they feel the country is secretly liberal and will return to those roots after some flirtation with conservative mores. Rather than propsing changes or fixes or having a global plan they have chosen to simply limit long-term conservative damage (on issues like social security) and otherwise let the Republicans run the country into the ground.

Or they could be as inept as their Republican counterparts and simply have no plan. Either way containment looks like a viable plan for the nearby future.

Bush and Rove: Big news of the day.

I don't have time to do this justice, but here's a quickie anyway. Today's New York Daily News has Tom DeFrank writing:

An angry President Bush rebuked chief political guru Karl Rove two years ago for his role in the Valerie Plame affair, sources told the Daily News.

Wow. So then all that stuff about Bush wanting to know who the leaker is was kinda like OJ looking for the "real killer". The questions:

1. Has Bush been lying to the American people all along?
2. If so, was he dumb enough to lie to the feds doing the investigation? (and did Rove?)
3. If so, are they smart enough to prove the lie (and also inclined to prove it publically)
4. Who leaked this story to DeFrank? And is it true?
5. If this leak proves not true, will the leak story collapse (ala Rathergate)?

Personally, I always thought Bush was a good person hoodwinked by a bad crowd. Ok, "good" isn't the adjective I want, but at least not a manipulative liar. If he has been lying all this time, well... I'll be a little more impressed, and a lot more ticked off.

This new tidbit has caused quite a fervor about the blogosphere. Poor Josh Marshall actually has 17 posts in today (4 were late posts last night, but still...). My absolute favorite is the letter from Shumer to GWB. I'll write about it in another post if I have time, but it's really hilarious. It's this over-extention that makes me wonder whether there's any truth to DeFrank's column. It would be a great set-up.

On the other hand, there's been a lot of pressure this week, and it may be that some parties have sold others down the river. Say Rove fingered Libby and Cheney. Maybe Scott/Dick decided to play hardball back. It's plausible.

Tom Delay to be fingerprinted

Tom Delay's lawyer was hoping he wouldn't have to go through the shame of being fingerprinted and processed, but even conservative bloggers agree that the law is the law.

Still, Iraq did just have a referendum, maybe Tom can claim his inky fingers are just solidarity with brave Iraqis.

Or he could claim it as part of the up-or-down vote campaign (which Tom will support 10 times more than most people). See, there's lots of ways to spin it besides looking like an ordinary criminal. (Aside: ordinary criminals get chased down by cops, not grand juries)

Iraqi Constitution

It passes, of course. To fail it would need 2/3 rds of the voters to vote it down in 3 of the 18 provinces. To put that in prespective: Out of 50 states, only one (Utah) mustered over 2/3rds vote for Bush. Zero scraped together 2/3rds for Kerry (though he did 78% in the DC consolation prize) .

All in all, passing with 55% of the overall vote is kind of like getting a C in algebra. Not anything to really celebrate, but at least you don't have to go through it again.

No longer popular in Texas!?

Never thought I'd see this. Only 6 states give consistent approval. (credit to Kos)

Bill Maher Rocks

[Belated post: found a saved draft from October 8 that I'd meant to post....oh well...better late than never...pretend it's the 8th.]

Without a doubt my favorite show. Last night's had Andrew Sullivan, Ben Affleck and Salmon Rushdie. It was pretty good. All of the participants were intelligent and articulate. (really Affleck was the only one in question, but he aquitted himself very well. Rumors of his political savy are pretty well founded. Don't expect a Senate run though. Politicians don't drop the F-bomb on TV...not even Dick Cheney.)

One of the satellite interviews was Ann Coulter. Ordinarily I'm not a big Ann Coulter fan. Yesterday she was tolerable, because she spent most of the time ripping on Miers. Her main objection to Miers is not that she might be too moderate, but rather her lack of qualification. She looked a little queasy when Maher tried to direct her angry towards Bush for appointing her. That part was awesome...I almost felt bad when she was forced to admit, that, yes it was Bush's fault. Poor Ann. I don't know what wretched twists of fate have caused her to hold the philosophies she does, but the idea of Conservatism being conflated with Cronyism and Idiocy is genuinely painful to her. On the other hand, as Sullivan points out it was her and hers who put Bush in office (the second time) and they're reaping what they sowed.

Speaking of Sullivan, I watched the show with my girlfriend, who had never heard of Andrew Sullivan. I prepped her by saying he was a conservative, gay, HIV positive, English blogger. Towards the end of the show she leans over and asks why Sullivan hates Bush so much (after one of Sullivan's longer rants). I imagine it's a once-bitten twice shy effect. Sullivan went to bat for Bush in 2000 and feels a bit responsible for what we ended up with (but that's just my cheap psychoanalysis).

Anyway, the interaction between Bill Maher and Ann Coulter is even more precious if you're familiar with their backstory. Bill is about as libertarian as they come and possibly the most aggressive anti-Bush voice on tv, and Ann is an uber-conservative who wrote a book "How to talk to a Liberal if you absolutely have to". Of course when Ann speaks of "liberals" she doesn't really mean libertarians, but imagining the two of them together is still hilarious. It was a good show.

A few weeks ago Maher had an interview with Kurt Vonnegut which was also very entertaining. Vonnegut and Maher have a similar cynical pessimistic wit and it was cool to see them talk. Anyway Maher has a way of finding unique voices.

[And now I realize why this was saved as a draft and never posted...it definitely lacks something...like a conclusive point. Sorry. Watch Bill Maher if you have HBO. This past week's was pretty good too. Max Cleland was hilarious: he was funnier than the "comedian" guest.]

Thoughts and observations on Nursing

Here's a cheap observation on the nature of our medical system. Notice the layout of the medical buildings at UPenn. The majority of them are in a cluster towards the Southern end of campus. What you probably can't tell from the map is that many of the buildings in that cluster are connected either physically or by skywalks. On a rainy day you can walk from the entrance in Johnson Pavilion to John Morgan and from there to Richards, Goddard, Liedy, or Anatomy/Chemistry. Anat/Chem has a skywalk to Stellar Chance which is connected to Blockley and has a skywalk to the Biomedical Research Building 2 (BRBII). BRBII has a skywalk to the Clinical Research Building which has skywalks to both the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, the Children's Hospital of Pennsylvania, and Stemmler Hall. Stemmler is connected to Johnson, closing this 1/2 mile indoor circuit.

Ironically, the one place you can't get to indoors is right in the center: The Nursing Education Building. Surrounded by medical buildings, no one ever bothered to build a skywalk to them. Central to everything and yet continually overlooked and unrecognized. A pretty decent microcosm for nursing in general. Are the poor nursing students who have to endure a bit more rain simply victims of unintended neglect? Or is the layout designed that way to mentally prepare them for being under-appreciated in their careers?

Another staged Bush event

So Bush had a chit-chat by satellite with 11 soldiers in Iraq. The initial claim was that this was an unscripted pow-pow, and we were getting real people's spontaneous views. That claim had to alter somewhat when rehersal tapes were made public. oops.

As a scandal it's small potatoes. It's pretty funny though, and for 5 glorious minutes, regular news channels get to be The Daily Show. It's enough to make one wonder whether the Daily Show can even improve on it.

Anyway I wouldn't have commented, except the post-spin is just too funny:

"No one intended to tell them what to think or how to express themselves" (italics added)

That's not a denial that they were told what to say. (It was some sort of accident?)

"...we certainly regret the perception that they were told what to say." (again my italics)

Perhaps the most backwards (and yet sincere) remorse ever. They don't regret any of their actions, but do regret that we were able to perceive them. Incidentally, they could have said: "...we certainly regret the misperception that they were told what to say." However the stated version is likely correct.

Modest Proposal: Gerrymandering

Gerrymandering is a process political districts are redrawn to suit the political party curently in power. It is generally considered a fairly underhanded way to increase one's advantage over one's political opponents...and sadly, it's pretty widely practiced. Currently there is a proposition on board to regulate or isolate the gerrymandering process, California's proposition 77. (apologies for the biased web-site, but that's what google pulled up and I concur with some of their analysis).

There are two issues with anti-gerrymandering legislation. First, it is never in the interest of the governing power to reduce their influence. (Although, occassionally you'll have a party split between the Executive and Legislative branches... like California). Second, why should any individual state take effort to reduce its national clout? This is fundamentally the same problem with fixing the electoral college to be more representative...no one wants to do it first. However gerrymandering propotes bad things, such as:

1: Cronyism and abuse of power. Certain people otherwise at risk can be "protected" while opponents districts can be split or two opponents can be moved into the same district and forced to run against each other. Obviously this does not result in better government.

2: Reduction of the number of competitive seats: Redistricting tends to create strongholds, wherein people are guaranteed reelection (because officals like guaranteeing reelections). The downside is this makes them less competitive, less responsive, and generally less acountable. Obviously this does not result in better government.

Here's a slightly unique proposal for state legislatures: I propose a bill that turns the gorvernance of electoral districts over to some impartial body (and by impartial, I'm thinking a computer algorithm that divides the population as evenly as possible), BUT...explicitly write the bill to not go into effect until anti-gerrymandering bills are established in 35 other states. Ditto for splitting electoral college votes.

Maybe once freed from the onerous responsibility of being the first person to do the right thing, state politicians can level the playing field in a bi-partisan manner.

It sure is a Smurfy war...

Via Wonkette:

How about a Smurf-filled reality trip?

You know what's sad about this? If Unicef or the Belgians made a movie with a real orphaned child, whose parents were killed by bombs it wouldn't get this much attention. Collectively, we're more attached to fictitious blue caricatures that we are to real human beings in war zones.

Slumming it at the NRO

I think diversity is important in one's thought, and thus it is important to read the opinions of others who might be different. If you ever what to take in the splendor of conservative egghead thought, check out the National Review online. At the very least, most of them can frame a good argument.

Jonah Goldberg was recently nominated by Andrew Sullivan for speaking his mind and standing up to his own. (of course he got noticed because he spelled it out) In fact, most of the conservative intellectuals at NRO seem opposed to the non-intellectual (possibly conservative) Miers nomination. My personal favorite is this bit from George Will:

It is not important that she be confirmed because there is no evidence that she is among the leading lights of American jurisprudence, or that she possesses talents commensurate with the Supreme Court's tasks. The president's "argument" for her amounts to: Trust me. There is no reason to, for several reasons....

So that's the intellectual conservative voice-not happy.
And then today the Note has this byline for the president's schedule.

The President will participate in a tribute to National Review magazine at 11:40 am ET in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, which is when we would expect him to celebrate Miers and judicial restraint.

Will the honor of his visit soothe those frisky NRO members and cause them to be nicer? I bet it does...but I'm not really willing to read enough of their stuff to say for certain. Anyway, it's good timing to check in and make sure the loyalists are staying loyal.

Implications of Mier's 23rd chromosome pair

Some of the spin coming out of the White House and the RNC is that these arch-conservatives are opposing Miers because she is a woman. Now I don't know if that's true, but it's an easy shot to take at these Federalist founding-father types...because well they don't really revere our founding-mothers, do they? And these guys do have that anti-feminst, anti-abortion, barefoot and pregnant aura about them. So while there may be an element of truth to that concern, there is a corresponding danger.

The danger is that we disregard valid concerns merely because the people voicing them have been painted as bigots. Especially worrisome to progressives, is the fact that Ms Miers is in the spotlight as a female. People will judge her behavior as indicative of women: the gold standard of women in law. If she is arbitrary, people will see women as arbitrary. If she is slavishly devoted to Bush, people will view women as holding personal loyalties above thought. If she is insipid in her jurisprudence people will view women as stupid.

Women have a vested interest in making sure GWB doesn't add a mediocre woman to a group of brilliant men (and of course, the equally gifted Ginsburg). The inevitable comparisons will cause sterotypes. It's not like there's a shortage of brilliant women, they just don't happen to be close personal friends of GWB. I'm not saying Miers is a mental lightwieght (atm she's an enigma), nor that Bush is intentionally setting women up, but it's a far cry from the current gold standard.

Is Miers Smart Enough?

In my last post I made the claim that prudence is more important than sapience, and I believe it is for politics. However there are cases where sapience is more valuable than prudence. If your bag is mathematics and you're as smart as Einstein, people won't care if you have wild hair or even if you can't tie your own shoes. If you're a thrill-seeking day-trader who races sports cars as a hobby, chances are you're short on prudence but if you're smart enough to pull in the bucks, no one will bother you. For most of us though, we're better off being wise than smart. Which brings us to a difficult juncture: it is easy to determine someone's sapience. We have all manner of means and measurements. However it is difficult to measure someone's prudence. Perhaps that excuses the Democrats somewhat for their presidential candidates, perhaps not. Let's just say that prudence is hard to judge.

I'd like to tie this into the recent Supreme Court Nomination of Harriet Miers. Being a justice there strikes me as a reasonably elite position. These are the people whom we task with judging laws. Obviously prudence is essential. Furthermore, the justices are supposed to discuss the law and each cast a single vote. Effectively, that makes them equals. Now ideally the way the system is supposed to work, folks will prepare briefs and argue their case before the supreme court. The justices will ask questions and come to the best decision they can. The judges are supposed to make decisions based on the content and context of the law, not on their personal beliefs. That immediately makes it different than politics. In its most basic form, it should be a clinical evaluation of the law. It is an exercise in thought, ie sapience.

Regarding Ms. Miers, her background has not demonstrated any superlative skills. There is a lot of debate among the conservative base whether she is sufficiently socially conservative. Democrats seem to be warming up to her in the way that an unknown is not yet an enemy. However I'm going to go out on a limb here and say I would not vote for her unless she was able to demonstrate a solid mental fitness for the job. My views are (mostly) socially liberal and governmentally conservative - which means I'm not likely to see a justice I like from this administration. But, I firmly believe this: no one wins with stupid. And I'm not saying Miers isnt a great legal mind, because I dont know, but if she is, she should be forced to demonstrate it. Unlike other candidates, she does not have a background that guarantees competence. In fact, the little data we have leans the other way. How many supreme court caliber intellectuals do you know who would call GWB the smartest man theyve ever known?

Conservatives, this one's on you. Take a deep look at your president as he asks you to trust him again and look around. Look at the state of the GOP. Look at the budget, the Iraq war, Katrina, the increased lobbying, the competence of homeland security, the resistance to torture legislation, the medicare entitlements, our debt to China, the tangible lack of congressional oversight. Watch as everything conservatives have fought for gets flushed down the drain, and ask yourself do you trust that this president will pick a solid conservative? Do you trust that this president will pick a capable person? Remember...no one wins with stupid.

Further insights from Gore the Bore

If you can suffer through another moderately dry essay read this one by Al Gore. In it he points out the devolution of our general media from the literate marketplace of ideas it used to be (I'll take that on faith) to the WWE cagematch it is today.

Al Gore is one of the finest minds in politics and through this well-crafted essay he explains why he managed to put us all to sleep 5 years ago. He's still very intelligent, and he's still dry as hell. Oh Al, you're good at picking out these insights in Americana, why are you utterly incapable of using them to your advantage?

Philosophy's not really my bag, but I read a little Leviathan the other day (it helped me to get a nap on the train). Here's Hobbes's take on well-learned folk who just don't get it.

As much experience is prudence, so is much science sapience. For though we usually have one name of wisdom for them both; yet the Latins did always distinguish between prudentia and sapientia; ascribing the former to experience, the latter to science...

...But they that, trusting only to the authority of books, follow the blind blindly, are like him that, trusting to the false rules of a master of fence, ventures presumptuously upon an adversary that either kills or disgraces him.

I like hearing Al Gore, and I respect him as an academic. (Jury's still out on Hobbes) But as an academic he should recognize what is needed: Prudence first, and then sapience. That's why Bush can mispronounce his way into 2 presidencies. He lets Rove (who has both prudence and sapience) mold his image into what the people want. And (with some exceptions) what they want isn't a hold out from the bygone "marketplace of ideas". Liberals need to ditch the academics and find someone who can speak to the people. It's an old stunt, but given today's media circus I suggest finding a guy who can rip off his shirt off like Hulk Hogan (lest I be sexist, it also works for Mia Hamm types).

Being Reasonable

I should have posted this last week, but I'm way behind...

This is an excellent essay by Senator Obama in which he tries to passify rabid liberals and justify why some Democratic senators chose to vote for Robberts. He generally seems to be arguing against ridgid othodox mentalities. Imagine a Senate of 100 elected officials with each serving their constituents and making up their own minds on important decisions...yeah right.

Just the same, I wish you luck Senator.

Notice to all Congress. I support your right to think for yourself and not cave to special interests. In fact, I think we should require thought.

Of course this perspective is lost on some. Watch out for those echo-boxes.