Testing your commitment to freedom of speech.

This is been the single best week in years for the cause of limiting free expression and free discourse at colleges.

Anyone who claims they believe in free speech - while they cheer the union of hedge fund billionaire and DC politicians to impose speech limits - is a fraud. https://t.co/PVBoMZy9o1

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) December 8, 2023

This is the free speech group -- the only one -- doing what ACLU once did. I's so glad they exist.

What makes them extra impressive is that they grew because conservatives applauded them for defending right-wing students' speech, but now do the same for pro-Palestinian speech: https://t.co/aRJdBZCI3D

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) December 8, 2023

AND:

Before we get too deeply into mocking Kirsten Gillibrand for her expansive definition of "infrastructure," we need to look into the history of how "infrastructure" found its way into political jargon.

You've probably seen articles like "‘Unicorns are infrastructure’: Sen. Gillibrand mocked for definition of Biden plan" (NY Post): 

[I]n a push for President Biden’s massive $2.3 trillion tax-and-spend plan, the New York Democrat attempted to pave a new meaning, tweeting: “Paid leave is infrastructure. Child care is infrastructure. Caregiving is infrastructure.” ...

“Unicorns are infrastructure. Love is infrastructure. Herpes is infrastructure. Everything is infrastructure,” Daily Wire founder Ben Shapiro wrote on Twitter....

Ben Domenech, publisher of The Federalist, wrote: “Brunch is infrastructure. Kendall Jenner is infrastructure. The Snyder Cut is infrastructure.”

Biden argued... [infrastructure] “has always evolved to meet the aspirations of the American people and their needs. And it is evolving again today.”

The mocking is funny, but it takes for granted that the word "infrastructure" has a solid meaning. But it's an abstract concoction, made up of a prefix, "infra-," that just means "beneath," and the familiar word “structure.” So “infrastructure” is, literally, a structure under a structure, a substructure. Quite abstract and generic. The only reason the scope of the word matters is because it's taken on power within political discourse. So the question needs to be how and why. 

It's not as though there's a constitutional text that says the federal government can or should spend money on infrastructure. It's just a word that makes people feel something about the proposed spending. Then it seems to be a shortcut to arguing that we need to buy these things. Oh? It's infrastructure? Then, yes, we need it. It's a propaganda word. 

I searched the New York Times archive to see how this word took hold in American political discourse. Interestingly, it appeared for the first time in July 1950, then did not appear again until July 1951. Starting at that point, it became a very frequent word, and its new buzziness was remarked upon. 

There was a piece by Arthur Krock in September 1951, "In The Nation; Bringing the Political Lexicon Up to Date Among the Administrators At the Capitol." Krock wanted to alert readers words politicians used to con people. He wrote: “Infrastructure. An N.A.T.O. term designed to make sure that the United States will foot the entire bill.”

And in February 1952, there was "Use of 'Infrastructure" Is Baffling to Acheson": “One thing I can’t explain to you is how these facilities came to be called by the name ‘infrastructure.’” [ADDED: That little article also calls "infrastructure" "a favorite bureaucratic morsel in the language of European defense."]

It’s a propaganda word to the core. Don’t give it special power to immunize spending proposals from scrutiny — whether they fit in the broad or the narrow sense of the word.

***

There is no comments section anymore, but you can email me here. Unless you say otherwise, I will presume you'd enjoy an update to this post with a quote from your email.

"Back in late 2017, it looked like Franken was going to weather the charges of inappropriate conduct against him, until Democrats apparently decided to sacrifice him..."

"... presumably in part to demonstrate that they could police their own.... The coup was quick and brutal. First, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand posted on Facebook a call for him to resign. Then, in quick succession, 13 more Democratic women senators (and a majority of the entire caucus) joined her. Whether Franken was guilty or innocent -- and he'd asked for a hearing -- his position became untenable. The day after Gillibrand’s shiv, he announced his intention to resign. (Chuck Schumer had told him to be out by 5 P.M.) If it looked like an orchestrated takeout, that's because it probably was. Biden -- even if innocent -- is now in a position where he must constantly worry about getting Frankened. By whom? Well, by the same sorts of powerful Democrats who helped him win the nomination (perhaps by helping orchestrate the well-timed withdrawals of Amy Klobuchar and Pete Buttigieg).... I'm also not saying 'they' want to replace Biden now.... But they could change their mind, and quickly, if he gives enough of them enough reason -- either by faltering, or pissing them off, or a combination of the two.... Biden probably wasn’t about to forge bold new directions.... But now Biden’s really in no position to step on anyone’s toes. Power has shifted away from the candidate."

From "The Frankening" by Mickey Kaus.

That could be read to say that Biden's position is stronger than ever. The Party wanted Biden because he would do what they want, and now there's even more reason for them to believe he will. He's boxed in.

"No one will miss her. A self-promoter who destroyed Al Franken’s political career for no reason whatsoever. Good riddance."

The top-rated comment — with 1141 up votes — at "Kirsten Gillibrand Drops Out of 2020 Democratic Presidential Race/The New York senator anchored her candidacy in issues of women’s equality, but she was unable to gain traction and her failure to qualify for the next debate convinced her to withdraw" (NYT).

I keep reading comments, in order of up votes, and every single one is about Al Franken:

1073 Recommend: "She thought that taking down Al Franken would springboard her to national office. Not only was she wrong to silence one of the most effective progressive voices in the Senate, she badly miscalculated its effect on her political career."

998 Recommend: "Gillibrand’s insistence that denying due process to Al Franken was the right path demonstrates what a poor senator she is, and what a terrible president she would be. Franken deserved a hearing, not a lynch mob. He may have been found culpable, in which case he should have resigned. But Gillibrand instead forced fellow Democrats to pile on to her rush to judgement. I’m so glad to see her go."

994 Recommend: "To some this will sound terrible, but most likely, her assault on Al Franken doomed her candidacy from day one. In my ultra liberal household where both my wife and I plan to vote for Elisabefh [sic] Warren, we just did not believe her when she claimed that she felt morally obligated to insist on Franken resign from the senate. We both believe that her motivation was to make a national name for herself and Al Franken was nothing more than collateral damage. If you can’t convince people like us, the north east liberals that we are, of your authenticity, I don’t see how you stand a chance in a national contest."

835 Recommend: "Her entire career is now defined by what she did to Al Franken. So long Senator, don't let the door hit you on the way out."

669 Recommend: "Al Franken should move to New York State and primary her."

I read 15 more comments that are about Al Franken before I get to the first one that doesn't mention him.

Kirsten Gillibrand: "So the first thing that I'm going to do when I'm president is I'm going to Clorox the Oval Office."

From last night's debate, and I've got to think that was a scripted joke, because it was a response to an invitation to explain how the Green New Deal — "which includes the guarantee of a job with medical leave, paid vacations, and retirement security for everyone in America" — is realistic

It seems as though she had a joke and had no compunction about sticking it in where it didn't belong:

So the first thing that I'm going to do when I'm president is I'm going to Clorox the Oval Office. The second thing I'm going to do is I will reengage on global climate change. And I will not only sign the Paris global climate accords, but I will lead a worldwide conversation about the urgency of this crisis.

Maybe that Clorox stuff is there to separate her answer from the question — which is about the realism of guaranteeing everyone medical leave, paid vacations, and retirement security — not simply getting back to the Paris accord and having a conversation. I want to talk about the Clorox, but I've got to stop and say I'm so tired of hearing that what we need is "a conversation." It sounds like no solution at all and a way to delay. But "conversation about the urgency" is quite special — delaying by talking about how delay is not an option. And if dealing with climate change is all important, why is the Green New Deal cluttered with guarantees of medical leave, paid vacations, and retirement security?

Gillibrand settles in to expatiate about climate change. Here's something that drives me nuts. There's always time to say the name of some specific individual in Iowa:

The greatest threat to humanity is global climate change. I visited a family in Iowa who -- water spewed into her home, Fran Parr, it tossed her refrigerator upend, all the furniture was broken, all the dishes were broken, and mud was everywhere. That is the impact of severe weather right now on families' lives.

So, this Fran Parr character, did she live on a flood plain? I notice that her house was a mess and admire the thematic unity of Gillibrand's little speech, which on first hearing felt like a mishmash. The theme is: a dirty house that needs cleaning up. But this answer is a jumble. I feel like it needs tidying up. There's the ludicrous phrase, "her home, Fran Parr." There's "upend" used as an adverb. There's the muddling of "climate" and "weather" and "water spew[ing]" (which I have to guess was a flood).

She devolves into all-purpose blather about doing things:

And so the truth is, we need a robust solution. When John F. Kennedy said I want to put a man on the moon in the next 10 years, not because it's easy, but because it's hard, he knew it was going to be a measure of our innovation, our success, our ability to galvanize worldwide competition. He wanted to have a space race with Russia. Why not have a green energy race with China? Why not have clean air and clean water for all Americans? Why not rebuild our infrastructure? Why not actually invest in the green jobs? That's what the Green New Deal is about. Not only will I pass it, but I will put a price on carbon to make market forces help us.

The question was how is it realistic to guarantee a job with medical leave, paid vacations, and retirement security for everyone in America. That sounds like just imposing requirements — burdensome requirements — on private businesses, which is nothing like sending a man to the moon, where government itself performs the task. Gillibrand never addresses those requirements at all. She switches to "green energy" and clean air and water. She declares "That's what the Green New Deal is about" as if to exclude the very things that were the subject of the question — requiring private businesses to provide medical leave, paid vacations, and retirement security.

With all that disorder — like broken dishes and furniture in a mud-splattered house in Iowa — let me get back to the Clorox. Clorox — do all listeners know? — is bleach. Do you clean with bleach? You can, but most people think of bleach as a whitener. We're so prodded to think of racism these days that I got sidetracked wondering whether the use of bleach will be regarded as racist. Will some people hear the white woman promising to whiten things up?

And when was bleach just in the news? Oh! Jussie Smollett!

“There’s bleach on me. They poured bleach on me,” Jussie Smollett told police the night of the alleged attack in Chicago. “Do you want to take it off or anything?” Chicago police officer asks Jussie Smollett about the rope around his neck. https://t.co/4mmKwNVaBb pic.twitter.com/WfsuKc3PrW

— CBS Chicago (@cbschicago) June 24, 2019

In the staged attack, the meaningful liquid allegedly thrown was bleach.

And then there's BleachBit — the method Hillary Clinton used to thoroughly destroy her 33,000 emails.

I wouldn't have brought up bleach. And why would a woman candidate present herself in the metaphor of housecleaning? "I'm going to Clorox the Oval Office." Why would you need to Clorox the Oval Office? The question makes me think of Bill Clinton and his famous bodily fluids. Donald Trump is known for posh interiors, not dirtying a place up. Of course, it's metaphorical dirt — the person as filth. Isn't it morally wrong to talk about human beings as filth? Well, maybe not. I'm sure many Trump-haters routinely refer to him in scatological terms. But this is a presidential debate, and Gillibrand seems to be appealing to our desire for cleanliness. I guess you stimulate that desire by making people feel uneasy about excrement and germs.

Elsewhere in the debate, Gillibrand called herself "a white woman of privilege" who "can talk to those white women in the suburbs." You know those women, always worrying about tidiness and warding away infection with chemical sprays on household surfaces. She can "explain to them what white privilege actually is, that when their son is walking down a street with a bag of M&Ms in his pocket, wearing a hoodie, his whiteness is what protects him from not being shot."

Protects him from not being shot?

The mind of Kirsten Gillbrand is like a bag of M&M rattling around in the pocket of a hoodie.

"Holding his head in his hands, he said, 'I don’t think people who have been sexually assaulted, and those kinds of things, want to hear from people who have been #MeToo’d that they’re victims.'"

"Yet, he added, being on the losing side of the #MeToo movement, which he fervently supports, has led him to spend time thinking about such matters as due process, proportionality of punishment, and the consequences of Internet-fuelled outrage. He told me that his therapist had likened his experience to 'what happens when primates are shunned and humiliated by the rest of the other primates.' Their reaction, Franken said, with a mirthless laugh, 'is I’m going to die alone in the jungle.'... 'I can’t go anywhere without people reminding me of this, usually with some version of You shouldn’t have resigned,' Franken said. He appreciates the support, but such comments torment him about his departure from the Senate. He tends to respond curtly, 'Yup.' When I asked him if he truly regretted his decision to resign, he said, 'Oh, yeah. Absolutely.' He wishes that he had appeared before a Senate Ethics Committee hearing, as he had requested, allowing him to marshal facts that countered the narrative aired in the press.... A remarkable number of Franken’s Senate colleagues have regrets about their own roles in his fall."

Writes Jane Mayer in "The Case of Al Franken/A close look at the accusations against the former senator" (The New Yorker). Seven  of Franken’s Senate colleagues went on record with Mayer: Patrick Leahy, Heidi Heitkamp, Tammy Duckworth, Angus King, Jeff Merkley, Bill Nelson (“I realized almost right away I’d made a mistake. I felt terrible. I should have stood up for due process to render what it’s supposed to—the truth”), Tom Udall, Harry Reid (“It’s terrible what happened to him. It was unfair. It took the legs out from under him. He was a very fine senator”).

This is a long article. Let me just also excerpt the part where Franken weeps and Kirsten Gillibrand's new statements:

"In her 2014 memoir... Gillibrand described her childhood self as 'a massive kiss-ass [who] lived for positive reinforcement.' When I ask if that little kiss-ass lives on inside of her, Gillibrand tells me, 'Yeah, she’s still there.'"

"Perhaps it’s that instinct to people-please that’s led to accusations of corelessness. During Gillibrand’s tenure in the House of Representatives, she catered to the primarily white, Republican towns and farming communities that made up New York’s 20th Congressional District.... Gillibrand frames her leftward tilt with appealing, party-neutral language. Our children should be safe. We should be able to afford to live....  Gillibrand may have drastically changed positions on guns and immigration, but from the beginning, she’s bolstered women.... At the apex of the Me Too reckoning in November 2017, then-Sen. Al Franken was accused of sexual misconduct by radio host Leeann Tweeden; subsequently, a photograph of Franken pretending to grab Tweeden’s breasts was released, and seven other women came forward, including a congressional staffer, saying Franken kissed or touched them inappropriately. Other future 2020 candidates encouraged Franken to resign — Harris, Sanders, Warren, Gillibrand’s friend Cory Booker — but Gillibrand was, by 16 minutes, the first to publicly say he should step down. Consequently, much of the coverage focused on her.... Gillibrand has been accused — by what has turned out to be a vocal lobby of forced-kissing apologists — of overreacting to the mostly pre-governmental behavior of a popular senator, of enforcing standards of behavior that Republicans would never agree to follow, of hurting her political chances and, of course, of capitalizing on a cultural moment for publicity."

From "The Ignoring of Kirsten Gillibrand/In 2019, it’s unforgivable for a presidential candidate to be boring. Maybe that’s our loss" by Anna Peele (WaPo).

When the self-proclaimed kiss-ass met the self-satisfied forced-kisser...

Time for Part 2 of the first Democratic Candidates' Debate.

1. I don't know if I'll have much to say. I can see my son John is set up and ready to live blog, so I point you over there. He's sure to have substance. I will, at most, have transitory feelings and stray observations. I hope something interesting happens. I don't care to hear them trot out their plans and policies. I prefer to consume that in writing. I'm only interested in seeing debating style and behavior and finding things weird or funny. But you can say what you like in the comments.

2. Joe is trying to intimidate Bernie by looking at him.

3. Kirsten Gillibrand gets away with interrupting... for a while, and then she's cut off. I don't listen to what she says because I'm noticing she's got the same mascara problem Amy Klobuchar had last night — just a few blots in the center of the lower lid. I assume that's accidental transfer of upper lash mascara. She also seems uncomfortable with her false eyelashes. She's blinking furiously. Oh, now she's interrupting again. So annoying. I'm literally getting a headache.

4. Andrew Yang is not wearing a tie. He's asked a question and he acts like he hasn't heard it.

5. Swalwell picked out his orange tie. He's also got an orange ribbon. Must mean something. I'm reading the Wikipedia article on the meaning of the orange ribbon. There are a lot of possibilities, including: "In the 1920s, an orange ribbon was used [in Sweden] for the national association of overallklubbar, clubs promoting a radical change in fashion meaning everyone should wear jumpsuits."

6. They're all talking at once! It reminds me of last night's audio snafu. Pure chaos. Kamala Harris gets off a joke: "America does not want to witness a food fight. They want to know how we're going to put food on their table."

7. The tension and anger is cranking up, and I blame Bernie Sanders. It's catching, and several of the others are infected, notably Joe Biden. When they yell, I can barely listen.

8. The subject of health care is going on and on. I consider this mainly a legislative matter. I'd rather hear them talk about things that are specific to the executive power.

9. On the hand-raising question, Biden has a halfway gesture, holding up an index finger at nose level. Is he trying to say: I have a special statement to make. I guess that's okay. Why force people to accept or reject a dictated statement?

10. The Democrats are embracing completely open immigration, as far as I can tell. It seems that anyone can decide to move here and be welcomed and supported. I can't believe that is what Americans will vote for, and neither can Trump:

All Democrats just raised their hands for giving millions of illegal aliens unlimited healthcare. How about taking care of American Citizens first!? That’s the end of that race!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 28, 2019

11. Marianne Williamson is weird, but I find her eerily fascinating. And I love her outfit.

12. Kamala Harris is doing pretty well, but I didn't like her yelling at Biden. She did kind of get under his skin though.

13. Bennet looks like Karl Malden. And he speaks in a voice that's the voice most people use when saying the word "duh" sarcastically.

14. Biden is doing a good job of not looking like an old man. And it's late.

The things you have to do to get elected... how do you do them when everybody's always watching and has access to Twitter?

Ok which one of you animals gave her MDMA pic.twitter.com/iv6acM5Bnd

— Will (@Oil_Guns_Merica) June 8, 2019

"Is Kirsten Gillibrand right that she's more open to changing her mind than Trump?"

John asks, after watching her CNN forum, where she claimed to be "able to admit when you're wrong and ... to grow and learn and listen and be better and be stronger," which "is something that Donald Trump is unwilling to do."

John writes:

So, Gillibrand says she's changed her mind again and again, while Trump is unwilling to change his mind. But wait — by her own account, she changed her mind because her job changed from representing a relatively conservative district in upstate New York to representing the whole state, which is more liberal.

Well, Trump has also changed his views. He used to be pro-choice. Trump admitted in 2015: "At one point, I was a Democrat. As Ronald Reagan changed, I also changed. I became much more conservative. I also became a Republican."

In 1999, Trump said he wouldn't want to ban "partial-birth abortion": "I'm very pro-choice. . . . I am pro-choice in every respect."

Trump said in 2004: "In many cases, I probably identify more as a Democrat. . . . It just seems that the economy does better under the Democrats than under the Republicans." As you can see in that video, he said in another video (I'm not sure when) that he was "liberal on health care."

John observes that both Gillibrand and Trump have changed their minds and it seems as though in both cases, it was to suit their political ambition. I agree. It's just politics, not some aspiration — as Gillibrand insipidly put — to "be better and be stronger."

"Be better" reminds me of the Melania Trump slogan "Be best," which I see she was accused to stealing from Michelle Obama, who said "Be better." So Gillibrand uses the Democratic version of the maddeningly generic exhortation.

Kirsten Gillibrand is working very hard on her arms and to show you she has a sense of humor.

Good to be back in Iowa. Do you like my new workout shirt? pic.twitter.com/0YVX0zZCvj

— Kirsten Gillibrand (@SenGillibrand) March 20, 2019

Here's the background story on that "ranch" thing, in case you've forgotten. It was embarrassing but not as embarrassing as that comb-as-fork story was for Amy Klobuchar. Strangely, both embarrassments were salad-related. Is that absurdly sexist?

Books with talking animals as characters that are written for adults.

I went looking for this because, in the comments to a post about Meade saying he found Kirsten Gillibrand "rabbity," Bob Boyd said, "Meade's right and it occurs to me, if Gillibrand gets the nomination, Althouse may finally be forced to read 'Watership Down.'"

I reacted, "When's the last time I read a book with animals for characters? I did contemplate rereading 'Animal Farm,' but that aside, unless I was reading with a child, I can't picture it happening.... And I mean talking animals that are the main characters, not stuff like a guy goes looking for his lost cat (which I did read recently — 'The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle')."

So I easily found this list of 11 quite respectable books written for adults and featuring talking animals. #1 is the one I thought of on my own, "Animal Farm."

There's also Mikhail Bulgakov's "Master and Margarita" — with a "hog-sized talking cat... who sneers and snickers and entertains the Devil, pistol in paw, as they wreak havoc in Bulgakov’s Moscow." "Maus," which I have read. And "Kafka on the Shore," by the author of "The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle," Haruki Murakami:

It’s not that the cats in this novel can talk to just anyone; it’s that Nakata can talk to them—though that’s not to say they always entertain him, or that he can always understand them, not when they’re telling him things like “it’s a tuna, to the very end” and “Kawara’s shouting tied.” Or, let’s put it this way: some cats are more intelligible than others. 

"Kafka on the Shore" has been on my list of books I'm going to read soon, so I have to withdraw my snooty response to Bob Boyd. But I'm no more ashamed of being snooty than a cat is, and I'm never going to read that "Watership Down" thing.

"She makes me nervous and I'm not even listening to what she's saying. I'm just hearing her rabbityness."

Says Meade, from the next room, as I'm playing this video:



Kirsten Gillibrand was struggling with or awkwardly evading a question from Chris Wallace about whether she would go through with a fundraiser hosted by a Pfizer executive — with tickets at $1,000 to $2,700 — now that Elizabeth Warren has announced today that she won't do any fundraisers with high-priced tickets.

I'm watching that after JRoberts, in the comments to an earlier post today, mentioned it, and said:

My wife and I were laughing at her most of the time. She seemed unable to present her ideas coherently and settled for filibustering Wallace. I've not taken her too seriously for 2020, but in my mind she has even less creditability as a result of that interview.

Gillibrand tries so hard and so unconvincingly to act as if Wallace is preventing her from answering. How many times did she say "let me finish"? I need the transcript:

Should we try to understand Governor Northam or demand that he Al Franken himself?

Is the Democratic Party the party of no forgiveness? Does it need its own guy to kill himself because they want to be able to kill other people? Unquestionably, if a picture like this...



... had shown up from President Trump's old yearbook, Democrats would yell that he must resign. How can they retain their credibility to ruin Republicans if they don't destroy their own? I see Kamala Harris jumped right in to lead the pack. Harris is to Northam what Gillibrand was to Franken. Instant death. No pausing to reflect on human frailty. No empathy for the the imperfect judgment of young people. No contextualizing, even so soon after people misread what they saw in the photograph of the Covington Catholic boy and the Native American elder.

What was the context? Is asking for the context extending white privilege and contributing to the ravages of racism? I want to read Northham's own statement. Does that make me complicit in historical evil? The Democratic frontrunner for President, Kamala Harris, didn't sound interested in context, understanding, or empathy. She performed snap judgment. Northam must resign.

But let's read. Let's see what Northam gives us to think about.

Earlier today, a website published a photograph of me from my 1984 medical school yearbook in a costume that is clearly racist and offensive.

So we know that is him in the photograph... but which one is he? And why isn't he telling us?! Maybe if I could figure out which costume is worse, I'd know why he isn't telling. The KKK character is the evil one, but the other one is blackface, and everyone knows that a white person must never, ever put on blackface. I mean, Ted Danson didn't know in 1993 (and Whoopi Goldberg dared him to do it (he said)) but young Ralph Northam was supposed to know in 1983.

What was the occasion? A costume party of some sort? Is there anything to be said about the apparent camaraderie between the Klansman and the black man? Some vision of the peaceable kingdom: "The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together..."



But a white man put on blackface and another white man put on a KKK outfit and that's all the there is: Northam's statement, adding nothing but a confession that he was inside one of those costumes, implicitly says, there is no context to consider. To contextualize would be to minimize guilt, when he wants to take on full guilt... except for the little detail of costume was his. (Is he waiting to hear which costume is worse? Which one does he want to be, given that he has to be one?)

The statement continues:

I am deeply sorry for the decision I made to appear as I did in this photo...

You mean as a Klansman or as a black man? I'd like to know, even as I'm unsure which is worse.

... and for the hurt that decision caused then and now. This behavior is not in keeping with who I am today...

But who were you then? What did the costume mean? Were you actually a racist at the time? I'd like to know what he remembers thinking and what other people said. Maybe he isn't talking about it because there was some garish racial foolery or even bigotry, but I suspect he's keeping it short because he's been advised that any attempt to explain will be taken as a failure to take racism seriously. You'll be making it worse.

... and the values I have fought for throughout my career in the military, in medicine, and in public service. But I want to be clear, I understand how this decision shakes Virginians’ faith in that commitment. I recognize that it will take time and serious effort to heal the damage this conduct has caused. I am ready to do that important work. The first step is to offer my sincerest apology and to state my absolute commitment to living up to the expectations Virginians set for me when they elected me to be their Governor.

The elements of an apology are thus firmly in place. Must he also resign? This isn't the Senate. He can't be expelled by a bunch of Senators like Al Franken. But Al Franken ousted himself when the Senators banded together against him. Will Northam take himself out? If he does, what will it mean?

Let's look to Kamala Harris as a source of meaning. Her tweet:

Leaders are called to a higher standard, and the stain of racism should have no place in the halls of government. The Governor of Virginia should step aside so the public can heal and move forward together.

Northam did something 30 years ago. How is his presence in the "halls of government" the presence of the "stain of racism"? This is grandiose and severe language. And yet it purports to give priority to healing and moving forward. If we really cared about healing and moving forward, wouldn't we believe that a man may have moved forward over the course of 30 years and not insist that he is stained forever?

If we are stained forever by what is in the past, then there is no healing, no moving forward — ever, no matter what. So how could Northam's resignation help us do what cannot be done? And, most absurdly, how are we moving forward "together" if the main thing that must be done is to leave one of us behind? There is no "together," no "healing," no "moving forward," just relentless stain, rejection, and punishment.

I'm concentrating on Kamala Harris, because she seems to be the Democratic Party frontrunner for President and because her call for Northam's resignation is the first one I've heard, but others have followed the same path of no forgiveness. The candidates for President look desperate not to be left behind. They see which way things seem to be going and they rush to get there too. Julian Castro, Elizabeth Warren, Kirsten Gillibrand, Sherrod Brown,  John Hickenlooper,  Eric Swalwell (who?), Terry McAuliffe. I see why they have to do it, to preserve the Democratic Party brand, and yet I think it's an awful brand — relentless, unforgiving, without context, without careful consideration.

And (most ironically) it makes it harder to say that racism is pervasive and runs throughout humanity. We're stuck in a shallow ritual of identifying scapegoats and imagining that we could emerge from that ritual stainless and whole.

Kirsten Gillibrand — earnestly enacting passion — stumbles over "breastplate" and "sword."

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand started preaching this morning during her remarks at NAN’s King Day Public Policy Forum. #NANMLK19 pic.twitter.com/Zp756P4uwD

— Reverend Al Sharpton (@TheRevAl) January 21, 2019

I put some effort into looking for the text of the MLK speech I think she was quoting, but it is easy to find the Biblical passages that King must have been preaching:

1. Isaiah 59:

The Lord looked and was displeased
that there was no justice.
16 He saw that there was no one,
he was appalled that there was no one to intervene;
so his own arm achieved salvation for him,
and his own righteousness sustained him.
17 He put on righteousness as his breastplate,
and the helmet of salvation on his head;
he put on the garments of vengeance
and wrapped himself in zeal as in a cloak.
18 According to what they have done,
so will he repay
wrath to his enemies
and retribution to his foes;
he will repay the islands their due.

2. Ephesians 6:

10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. 11 Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. 12 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. 13 Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. 14 Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, 15 and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. 16 In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. 17 Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

Martin Luther King Jr. was a minister, and he was — or believed or pretended to believe he was — channeling the word of God. Beautiful for him. But I'm wary of politicians adopting rhetoric like "the breastplate of righteousness," and maybe Kristen Gillibrand was too. Honestly, I don't know how you can stand up in front of everyone and pompously intone the syllable "breast" if you're not sure you can say it crisply.

"My goal is to turn 50 in some of the best shape of my life. It has nothing to do with any other plans."

Said Cory Booker, quoted in "The 2020 Field Is Growing. Some Waistlines Are Shrinking" (NYT).

And Kristen Gillibrand wants you to see this:

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Kirsten Gillibrand (@kirstengillibrand) on Dec 3, 2018 at 6:19am PST

Here's the clip from Colbert's talk show last night, where Gillibrand announced that she was forming an exploratory committee.

TONIGHT: @SenGillibrand stops by @colbertlateshow to announce that she is forming an exploratory committee to run for President of the United States! #LSSC pic.twitter.com/vPUpF1gs8z

— The Late Show (@colbertlateshow) January 15, 2019

Colbert asked her the classic question (the one Ted Kennedy famously flubbed), "Why do you want to be President of the United States?" The question was, it appears rather obviously, planned, and even if it wasn't, it was utterly predictable. Ever since Ted's screw-up, presidential candidates have known they must nail this question.

Here's what she said:

Well, I'm going to run for President of the United States, because as a young mom, I'm going to fight for other people's kids as hard as I would fight for my own...

As a young mom? She's 52.

... which is why I believe that health care should be a right, not a privilege [audience cheers], it's why I believe we should have better public schools for our kids because it shouldn't matter what block you grow up on, and I believe that anybody who wants to work hard enough should be able to get whatever job training they need to earn their way into the middle class, but you are never going to accomplish any of these things if you don't take on the system of power that make all of that impossible...

There's an unnatural break between "take" and "on" that makes me think this answer was scripted and memorized and is now coming out robotically. And then there's the grammatical error "the system of power that make all of that impossible." How does a mistake like that happen? I'm just going to guess that she got the idea, as she rambled along, that "things" was the subject. It can't be, of course, because "things" referred to the accomplishments that she wants to have, not what is making them impossible to reach.

... which is taking on institutional racism, it's taking on the corruption and greed in Washington, taking on the special interests that write legislation in the dead of night, and I know [chokes up] that I have the compassion [holds up finger], the courage, and the fearless determination to get that done.

I'm not terribly hopeful that KEG will be able to reach people with that kind of rhetoric. She seems both over-prepped and under-prepped. I'd like to feel that the words a candidate speaks are really coming from their brain as they speak. But if you're going to deliver scripted remarks, have some well-shaped sentences, a memorable phrase or two, and get to the point and stop.

IN THE COMMENTS: Ralph L said:

Did she grope Colbert's hands at the beginning, or was that faked for the camera?

I noticed that she did presume she could swoop down on his hand with her 2 hands, without asking for permission.



Or do you want to say his hand was right there, asking for it?

As Kirsten Gillibrand enters the presidential race, Nate Silver seems to push for the NYT to use its "agenda-setting power" to keep Al Franken out of the "conversation" of "normal people."

It's definitely a part of the conversation, but let's keep in mind that the NYT, and frankly even (to a lesser magnitude) 538, have a lot of agenda-setting power for what's part of the conversation. So Twitter isn't an exogenous measure of what normal people care about. https://t.co/A8oHUPYJPo

— Nate Silver (@NateSilver538) January 16, 2019

You can peruse the current tweets about Gillibrand and Franken here. Two examples:

"Holding Gillibrand accountable for her statements and actions IS NOT the same as 'blaming her for Franken’s problems.' Using the #metoo movement to grab some spotlight, her instinct to govern through political theater are legitimate points of debate and criticism" (link).

"Lukewarm on Gillibrand atm, but credit must be given for alienating Clintonworld by saying Bill should've resigned, and standing her ground on Al Franken" (link).

Anyway, I'm very interested in Silver's out-and-proud encouragement of mainstream-media "agenda-setting" and his resistance to the notion that Twitter is "an exogenous measure of what normal people care about." I love that phrase! It's so weird and revelatory of anxiety.

Exogenous — it makes you think! The oldest usage of "exogenous" is in botany. It means "Growing by additions on the outside" (OED). Can that be the metaphor Silver wants? In pathology and psychiatry, it means "having a cause outside the body." What is the relevant body that Twitter could be outside of and measuring? In geology, it means "Formed or occurring outside some structure or mass of rock."

So... Twitter is on the outside... of what?... doing what? I think "exogenous" should at least have to do with something growing or forming on the outside of something, but Silver is talking about Twitter measuring, so it can't be the right word, and I'm still questioning what Twitter would be exogenous to.

The best I can do to save Silver from the conclusion that he's just tossing out a fancy word without thinking it through is that some people imagine that the normal public mind expresses itself through Twitter, and since "Twitter isn't an exogenous measure of what normal people care about," those people are wrong.

IN THE COMMENTS: rehajm said:

Nate is quantitative and is using exogenous in the quantitative, statistical sense...

Exogenous Variable

A factor in a causal model or causal system whose value is independent from the states of other variables in the system; a factor whose value is determined by factors or variables outside the causal system under study.

They are discussing the meaning of why Franken tweets are trending in NY, and his point is twitter trending is not an independent variable from which we can draw conclusions since much of what trends is a result of what NYT and 538 and others choose to promote.

He didn't say "exogenous variable" or "exogenous factor." He said "exogenous measure." A factor is causal. A measure isn't a cause. I get that it's a jargon word for a statistician, but I still don't understand how it works in his statement.

The NYT looks for the Democratic Party candidate who "matches the moment," tells us what this "moment" is, and nudges the non-moment-matching would-bes to stay out of the way.

"It is hard to recall a recent presidential primary where, at the outset of the race, there was this much genuine mystery — not only about who would eventually emerge as the nominee, but who planned to run at all," write Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns in "2020 Democratic Presidential Candidates Are Lining Up. Who Matches the Moment?" (NYT):

Ms. Warren’s announcement Monday was expected. And it will not be a surprise when Senators Cory Booker of New Jersey and Kamala Harris of California enter the race in the coming weeks. But the number of would-be candidates who may ultimately stay out of the race is larger than the list of contenders who are certain to run.

There are the well-known, or at least much-buzzed-about, Democrats who are still deliberating: Former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. is the most prominent of this group, and leads the field in initial polling in Iowa. But there is also great anticipation over Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, the runner-up for the Democratic nomination in 2016, and Representative Beto O’Rourke of Texas, whose losing Senate bid this year electrified many grass-roots Democrats.

It is unclear if any of these men will enter the race — particularly Mr. Biden, who, associates say, is ambivalent about running after over three decades of presidential fits and starts.

It's a subtle pushback to the Bernie-Beto-Biden triad, but it is — as I see it — another NYT pushback to the 3 white men who ought to know better than to clutter the path of The Foursome. And we can see who the expendable member of The Foursome is, because they've left her name out of this article altogether.

Martin and Burns home in on Warren, who just announced she's in the running. She's early, but she's late:

Would she be the president today if she had run in 2016, as some liberal activists and admirers urged her to? Mr. Sanders ended up filling the void on the populist left and ran a surprisingly strong campaign against Hillary Clinton....

[T]he more recent history of presidential calculations suggests that candidates are wiser to run when the moment presents itself. That is what Mr. Obama did in 2008 after just four years in the Senate, the same period Ms. Warren would have served by 2016. Some Democrats think 2020 is Mr. O’Rourke’s moment: He has been in the House for just six years, but many liberals see his energy and freshness as inspiring.

One reason Ms. Warren announced on Monday and declared so early, her allies suggested, was to erase any uncertainty about her intentions among supporters whom she kept waiting — and ultimately disappointed — in 2016....

Timing is also crucial in presidential races because the issues can change so quickly. Mr. Trump’s incendiary rhetoric and policies around race and immigration have shifted the political conversation away from matters of economic inequality, which has been the life’s work of Ms. Warren and which defined much of the 2016 Democratic primary.

I think the reason why the NYT didn't mention the fourth member of The Foursome (Kirsten Gillibrand) was because they had to focus on Warren, given her announcement, and there's this idea that the "political conversation" has shifted from class consciousness to race consciousness. It's not a white-person "moment" anymore. "Who Matches the Moment?" says the headline, and the "moment" is, apparently, what Trump made it, with his "incendiary rhetoric and policies around race and immigration."

So Warren had her time, 2016, and she missed it, and let's not even mention that other white woman — or get derailed into the icky inquiry whether Warren is white — because the path needs clearing. Who knows how much white-person clutter could fall on the path the NYT would like to clear for — let's be honest — Kamala Harris?

The NYT is trying to be somewhat subtle, but it seems so obvious to me.

By the way, whatever happened to the rise of women, and why isn't the "moment" about #MeToo, which would vault Kirsten Gillibrand to the front?

The NYT makes its 2020 presidential choice obvious.

On the front page:



Inside, the text is clear. There's Kamala Harris and there are 3 other decent choices... and those 3 other guys need to step back and get out of the way:

Senator Kamala Harris of California.... Elizabeth Warren, the Massachusetts senator... Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey... And Senator Kirsten Gillibrand.... These four high-profile Democratic senators are poised to enter the 2020 presidential race in the next several weeks...

The speed of the senators’ efforts reflects intense political pressure to establish themselves as leading candidates in a Democratic field that could get crowded, fast.... and they don’t want to lose a step to a rival fresh face, such as Representative Beto O’Rourke, the former Texas Senate candidate who has been the focus of intense speculation in recent weeks as a potential presidential candidate....

For the Senate foursome, moving quickly into the race is also a pre-emptive effort to undercut the early advantages of a duo of universally known contenders, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, who may enter the race in the coming months. Mr. Biden and Mr. Sanders would start off with important advantages, including existing networks of support among early-state activists and party donors, and the stature to generate impressive displays of support at early rallies.

But as white men, Mr. Biden, Mr. Sanders and Mr. O’Rourke do not reflect the gender and racial diversity of many Democratic candidates and swaths of the electorate that dominated the 2018 midterms. Ms. Harris, Ms. Warren, Ms. Gillibrand and Mr. Booker, by contrast, would instantly make the 2020 Democratic field the most diverse array of presidential candidates in history. And they might well scramble the early polling leads held by Mr. Biden and Mr. Sanders, who benefit from strong name recognition but would be in their late 70s by Election Day 2020, at a moment when some in the party are agitating for generational change....

The number of male operatives under consideration for campaign manager posts has raised concerns among some female Democratic strategists who hoped the diversity of the 2020 field would prompt more hiring of female and minority staffers for senior roles.... The focus on staff diversity reflects not only the influence of the #MeToo movement on Democratic politics but the demands of a party that has shifted to the left during the Trump era....