What do you call yourself?

swallow tale at work in cambria

free to be...

      Next time you get a chance, slow down long enough to watch a butterfly at work. Their flight paths and industry are worth a few moments of your time.
      A slang term is "social butterfly" denoting someone who gets along with everyone, charismatic, charming and a good networker.
      Now is a great time to be a social butterfly, politically. 
However you labeled yourself a while ago is probably out of date. Whatever you may have thought about the Republican or Democrat party is also down the drain. Liberal and Conservative are old, and largely irrelevant identifiers.

       

      We are a culture stuck on labels. Maybe it helps, a kind of intellectual shortcut. You don't need to think about something if you can rely on a label. 
       "Oh she's a socialist. He's a right wing nut. That's a progressive for you! Liberals are that way. You know what Conservatives believe." But do you? Do the terms still apply?
      As a reporter I found using a label was a time saver. I didn't need to provide a deeper context than a word, but ideas and politics are shifting sands. Everything changes, including meaning and positions. 
       The Republican Party is no where close to where they were 4 years ago. The Democrat Party is in some kind of self imposed navel gazing and shoving match. Add generational perspectives and you have a kaleidoscope pretending to be a  telescope.
       Presently the Republicans are shot. Their historic core values dumped for an unpredictable President upon whom they are attached like leeches. 
       Do the Democrats rely on decades old patterns or will they embrace change, new ideas and listen to the abundance of youth in their number? Most of the old leadership is stale, ineffective and increasingly out of touch. 
       We wonder if the Democrats will heed a nudge the political cosmos seems to be suggesting; your women, especially veterans, a generation removed from Pelosi and Schumer?  
       It would be good for whatever is left of traditional Republicans to raise an insurrection against the President, who has stolen their party and turned it into a pack of weasels or opportunists.
      

     Party labels have a diminished significance now that candidates get most of their funding from special interests. As the importance of party shrank, politicians became less allegiant to platforms and principles and you see where that has lead us.
     As we've pondered here before, there's been such a shift in American politics classic liberalism and conservatism have disappeared. Today's divide is usually about something more mundane than philosophy or principles of rights and responsibilities of government.
     As the minority and possibly illegitimate President lays waste to a party, and frags American institutions, it would be a good time for political parties to get in sync with the true stakeholders and reshape themselves as something relevant and useful.  
      The system is broken, our sense of democracy is anemic
and most people don't seem to care.
       My friend Ray, the Historian in our group of Old Goats offers a novel ticket for 2020, Joe Biden and Mitt Romney.
       Now that's a creative thought!

       See you down the trail.

     

CROSS CURRENTS OF POLITICAL CORRECTNESS

     Sometimes it's all about how you see it.  

about the labels

     A preposterous misunderstanding is roiling through the American body politic, weaponizing words and good intentions. 

     The phrase is political correctness. If you are interested there is a study of the origins and how it has become a cudgel in cultural debate.

      The short course is this; at its origin it was used in the 1940's in debates about "proper" political dogma in communist discussions about Stalin. The point was to divine the "correct" party line. Stalin slaughtered "incorrect" opponents in massive purges. The phrase was a marginal concept known only to those who  studied communism or socialism. 

      Scholars say the phrase gained some usage in the early 1970's when Tony Cade Bambara wrote in The Black Woman:An Anthology "...a man cannot be politically correct and a male chauvinist too..." 

      In the early '70's progressives and feminists began to use the idea of political correctness as a way to avoid offensive speech, phrases and ideas. It was a kind of code to raise sensitivities about things that once had been acceptable but were no longer. It was an age of combating segregation, sexism, and speaking of people as "retarded," "cripples," "spics" "beaners" "Wops" "Jewing down the price" "chicks" and you can supply your own list. Old traditions and ways of speaking, seen in modern light, were as offensive as "colored" drinking fountains, red lining in banking, sexual harassment of women in the work place, sitting in the back of the bus or discrimination of any sort. Offensive and illegal traditions and old ways were considered politically incorrect.

       The phrase went from there to being almost a satire of itself. Sensitive and even insensitive people began to use it as a lighthearted lampoon about all manner of thing. It became a kind of sarcasm and joke, especially among those pushing for change. Still it was not widely used and certainly not part of the daily lexicon. 

       At the same time colleges and universities began to adjust curricula adding courses in feminism and the changing racial, ethnic and cultural diversity. Traditionalists, who did not like the way culture was changing, were unhappy. One of those was Allan Bloom who wrote The Closing of the American Mind in 1987. He railed against liberal philosophy and the changing of American education. In tying together the evolution of education and the change in the face of America he used the phrase political correctness as a pejorative. The phrase began to get more mileage, mostly from conservative or right wing ideologues who were opposed to the changing standards, culture and times.

       In the early 90's the word became weaponized. It became a code word for liberal, or liberal politics, progressives, changes in curriculum, education, or those who pushed against sexism, racism, and discrimination. What had been a word used mostly among academics became a red meat word and a political hammer used by conservatives. It was as if they had a flame thrower to scorch all ideas they opposed. Right wing think tanks dumped a lot of ink and time in using the word as a discrediting tool. Liberal ideas could be destroyed if they were labeled as "political correctness."

       It is only fair to mention there is also a conservative correctness. The most virulent form is book banning, or seeking to censor film, television, video games and other creative enterprise. As a small example, cafeterias in the US House of Representatives changed French Fries and French Toast to Freedom Fries and Freedom Toast when France opposed the US invasion of Iraq. Members of the Freedom Caucus in the House remain some of the most adamant attackers of ideas they oppose by means of condemnation using "politically correct." Trump has taken up the tool twisting it to "fake news" and "enemy of the people."

true words

    By most accepted definitions CONSERVATIVES are those committed to traditional values and ways of doing things and are opposed to change. Conservatives favor free enterprise, private ownership and socially conservative ideas. Conservatives favor as little government as possible, especially at the federal level. Conservatives are somewhat averse to change. They believe government should protect private property. Conservatives believe there are too many regulations and too much government interference in business. They oppose government changing culture.
          
       LIBERALS are open to new ideas, opinions and intellectual liberty. They favor progress and believe in the essential goodness of people. They favor protection of civil liberties and believe government is responsible for correcting social inequities in race, gender and class. Liberals believe government should protect individual liberty. They favor free trade. Liberals believe government regulations should protect individuals from the abuses of industry and corporations. 

       Now, I'm sure almost everyone, regardless of where you align, will find something you think I got wrong. I'm simplifying. And over the years the manifestations of liberal and conservative philosophy and politics have morphed.  

       free speech

       As an absolutist on the first amendment I understand that right wingers can zing liberals and if they choose liberals can zing back. That is part of the rough and tumble of our system. But as a journalist, I'm a stickler for getting it right and using the right words.  

       Even Bill Maher, a liberal snarkster, got it wrong. Like right wing ideologues he points to recent campus disturbances where a speaker has been barred, cancelled or denied a right to speak because, he said, of "liberals" in academia pushing political correctness.  Bull shit, to use a word understood on both sides of the spectrum. 
       Liberals don't deny free speech, fascists do. Anyone who advocates denial of a right to free speech, no matter how offensive or politically weighted, is not a liberal or an intellectual conservative. 

       Someone at a university who may fancy themselves a progressive or a liberal and who would agitate against the appearance of a speaker, film, production or whatever just lost the right to call themselves a liberal. The function of their behavior is fascism or totalitarianism. They would deny an individual civil liberty. They can gripe and protest, but not deny-that disqualifies them.

      A conservative who would seek to deny the right of someone to speak certainly betrays an adherence to traditional values. What can be a more traditional value than the bill of rights? Conservatives can gripe and protest as well, but not deny.
      The bottom line is simple. Those who seek to deny full access to the rights of the first amendment should be called what they are, fascists. Sorry if this pulls the steam out of a favorite conservative charge. Sorry if this unnerves some professor who fancies herself or himself a "progressive" or liberal. It's time for the media to get it right and to be precise. 
       This is the age of information. Accuracy matters. And besides that, there should be nothing considered off limits in the realm of academia or the church. If you can't consider or study something, controversial, challenging to your ideas, or even an evil, in the halls of academy or a place of faith, then what's the point? What's the value? You might as well turn off the lights, go home and devolve into superstitious, uninformed, science rejecting, close minded barbarians burning those books or dissertations in bonfires.

celebrating mother

    Pulling in an evening blanket...of fog.

     This years crop of fava beans. Frequent readers know of our fondness for this labor intensive crop. You can read Romancing the Fava here. With this fullness of growth it is for the first harvest. 

  Green Space Cambria celebrating mother earth in a beautiful green space. 

                         

O really?pt 2

     Bully mouth Bill O'Reilly may show up someplace else, but his banishment from Fox News was good to see. You have to wonder though when Fox News founder Roger Ailes and his superstar are dumped because of sexual harassment, how much can you trust what comes out of that sort of culture, especially on matters of women's rights, health, income equality and even sexual harassment in the work place? Fair and balanced?
      Then consider right wing radio and web screamer Alex Jones who has launched some of the most absurd theories and "facts" who now says it's only performance art. You wonder if those on the right who feed on Fox, O'Reilly, Jones and Limbaugh are feeling less secure in their "rightness" since their pantheon are dirty old men with feet of clay? 
And we include in that audience the predator in chief. Dirty Donny feeds on Fox and was a frequent guest on Alex Jones. That's no fake news. Just a fake president.

       See you down the trail.

SPLASH OF RED AND KEEPING SPEECH FREE

splash of red

Stolo Winery, Cambria CA

left overs

 "Griffin Park" Park Cambria

Free Speech?

      Speech is getting less free, a threat to our way of life.

      A federation of damnable causes conspire against free speech but stopping the repressive advance will be a challenge.

      First we must eliminate philosophical reference points. This is not a conservative vs liberal issue. Anyone who values the core of our democratic republic supports our Bill of Rights, including the First Amendment and its implications.

     Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or of the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. 

     If it is Constitutionally guaranteed then we must protect against attacks including those that come culturally. The threat exists in an attitude and a growing fascism, even if disguised.  

pc

     An example is PC, political correctness. Years ago it may have been born of a desire to be sensitive, to even recognize past discrimination, repression and accrued wrongs. But that was then. I heard a conservative friend observe recently "liberals and so called intellectuals especially college professors" were the greatest practitioners of political correctness to stifle free speech. He was partially right and largely wrong.

      No true liberal or no real academic would sign on to the silly practices underway in some of academia. Those who would impede speech are fascists, even if they shun that label.  

      In academia and in the church, nothing should be off the table, everything, regardless of its nature should be open for investigation, study and discussion. In a democratic republic we tolerate even the stupid and reprehensible. Wisdom and good judgment will be the antidote to that which is deplorable. We do not set up "guardians" of thought or study. That is what fascists do.

      In some places in America are those who demand a right not to be offended. Who do they think they are? 
      No one wants to be offended but in the rough and tumble of political debate, intellectual study or theology there are no restraints. Nothing is off limits. If these bright minds who whimper about "not being offended" would give it even a moment of thought they might see that under those rules almost nothing could be discussed or studied because about anything could offend someone. A right not to be offended means someone will control someone else's speech. That is fascism. 

     Schools, parents or academics who permit this mollycoddling are dong their children no good. The idea of "trigger alerts" or micro aggressions" are an intellectual dishonesty and a head in the sand self absorption, the practice of a weak and self indulgent society. Those who advocate such tripe need to speak with academics, clerics and journalists who try to leverage truth and reality in most nations on this planet, where it is not so free. 

religio fascism

     There is also the fascism that comes in a religious garb.

Perhaps the deadliest example are those practitioners of a virulent form of fundamentalist Islam. Writers, filmmakers, journalists and political activists have been targeted and killed because they dare "offend" Islam. Examples are the Charlie Hebdo killings, or the murder of Theo Van Gogh.        

     No one of faith wants to see their object of reverence or belief demeaned. While it may be repulsive, a standard of free speech demands the rights of speaking freely even if the intent is to offend. A democratic republic that values the freedoms that set us apart is strong enough to allow the profane and offensive, even if directed at our most sacred.    
     We don't condone merely because we tolerate. But the Islamist who stabbed to death the Dutch filmmaker who made a program about the abuse of Muslim women was quoted as saying he "could not live in any country where free speech is allowed."
     This is not an abstract problem. Satirists and more serious commentators are afraid to lampoon Islam. They are afraid of the violence that may befall them and they are afraid of being   labeled intolerant. For either reason there is a chilling effect on speech. No other religion practises such intimidation or intolerance to their critics-serious, comedic or even pathetic.

chilling or muting

    Controversial or dissenting theories or works are frequently held back in fear for one's career. To challenge a revisionist theory of history, or the self aggrandizing of someone in say a feminist or minority studies program for example could lead to scorn and crowd sourced derision. Look what happens when a Caucasian accuses an African American of being a racist. Preposterous perhaps, or not, but a serious discussion in a vein of free speech cannot ensue.
     Consider the damage done to the reputation of Duke athletes wrongly accused and maliciously prosecuted. Certain Duke professors jumped on and ganged up with a moral viciousness though they were dead wrong. The attempt to counter that rush to judgement got others in trouble with the fascist crowd. 
     This threat to free speech comes across several strands of American culture-politics, media, corporations and of course academia. The problem is not confined to the U.S.
The Economist says it is a British problem as well. Here's a quote from the Economist
       "Academics who think education requires the free flow of ideas are appalled. 'A university is not a "safe space,"' tweeted Richard Dawkins, a biologist at Oxford. 'If you need a safe space, leave, go home, hug your teddy and suck your thumb until ready for university.'"
     If a nation says it is free, then it must assure freedom and the liberty to speak one's mind, regardless of view. To quote a classical Greek idiom that has been around and oft quoted we need to "...call a spade a spade." Any attempt to control honest expression is dead wrong.

    See you down the trail.

TRUTH IS? NEWS AND REALITY ARE?

 EPHEMERAL

     It's hard work trying to surface truth, facts and reality. It's tougher when spin, malice and political motivation are part of the landscape. The years I spent as an investigative reporter were brutal. There was never a way to turn it off.
     Now a couple of new films reprise two of the most celebrated and controversial investigations of recent. I plan to see both, but I'm familiar with the reality behind the cinema.
     Spotlight, which details the ordeal of the Boston Globe in breaking the Priest sexual abuse and cover up and Truth, the troubled CBS News investigation of George W. Bush's special treatment as a slacker and no show in his air national guard duty, will give viewers a glimpse into the imperfect world of ferreting truth, or at least getting enough information to make the truth self evident.
     When media seems as devoted to Face book, Twitter and popular culture as it is to hard news, significant stories or investigations, it may be helpful these films open the door on what real journalism involves.
     Dan Rather wrote this weekend he's not happy that a low point in his career is the subject of a film, played by no less than Robert Redford. Though the report was flawed by fraudulent documents, the Truth remained the same. It took a toll on Rather. The members of the Boston Globe team also endured emotional trauma, for simply trying to tell the truth.
     Truth and honest facts can be dangerous. We live in an age when billions are spent to avert our gaze from the truth. Those who seek the facts and try to root out truth, remain my heroes.

MORE TRUTH

     Barry Goldwater, the 1964 Republican Presidential Candidate is in the pantheon of American Conservatives. There was a time when it was inconceivable you could get more far right than Goldwater. Those who knew or covered Goldwater may have questioned his policies, but everyone respected him for saying it like it was.
     The following graphic is making its way around Twitter.

    Well, on the other hand there have been countless Christians, even church leaders, who have been open minded and facile. Reinhold Niebuhr, Andrew Young, William Hudnut, John Danforth, Benjamin Hooks, Robert Drinan, (President) James Garfield, John Bull, John Witherspoon, Dean Johnson, Walter Mueller were all Christrian pastors or leaders and were capable of compromise and negotiation. Goldwater was right about the Christian Evangelical right.  It is worrisome to traditional, moderate, centrist or even "old fashioned conservative" Republicans. Does the word zealot fit?

LIBERTY AND JUSTICE

  There is a variation in the personality of this character amidst all of the Scarecrows on display this month all over Cambria.
    This may scare in a different way.

      Lana created a take on the Statue of Liberty and if you were able to look closely you would see it is made from pages of a Bible. For the record, it was an old Bible, from childhood and the binding was ruined. Here it is recycled as a statement that some Christian quarters are more open minded and loving than those Mr. Goldwater worried about.

      In the eye of the beholder, eh?

 PREENING

 Hemingway being fastidious.

Count the toes.  

Six on each paw

    See you down the trail  

THIS THING ABOUT "STUPIDITY" and MEN AT WORK and JON STEWART, DIRECTOR

HEAVY LIFTING

   New life is being built into the iconic Cayucos Pier with its bay view of Morro Rock.

   It was built in 1872 but a Pacific storm last year did damage that forced it closed.  

   People have raised $500 thousand to repair the Cayucos pier that includes putting in 14 new pilings. The original pilings were pine from Cambria, just up the coast.  

   Cayucos was the maritime capitol of the north coast as steamships made almost daily trips to and from San Francisco and Los Angeles. For years it was also the starting point of commercial fishing. It has been a recreational pier since the 1920's.

   Under gray velvet skies workers are installing new life to the popular tourist and recreational icon.

THROWBACK TO TENACIOUS

   It's the 1974 Indiana Democratic State Convention and there was a helluva credentials fight underway. This is the closed meeting of the credentials committee. It was closed until an Indianapolis Star photographer and I crashed the party.

    The African American man in the patterned jacket in the left of the frame was a certified delegate, one of many, who was being denied voting privileges on the convention floor. I was reporting live on the flap and decided that while the fate of many votes was being decided in a closed door room, I'd take my live microphone, giant headphones and the public's interest right to the spot. The Star photographer followed. I suspect he thought he'd get a shot of a journalist getting tossed out.

    The big man, third from the right, is the credentials chair, Tiny Hunt and he was cross checking lists and signatures. Earlier I had reported about dead phone banks, lack of access and other political chicanery that a well connected political machine had orchestrated against an opposition candidate. Ah, the good old days.

    By the way, the man was certified and so were several others. From my vantage it was obvious. I don't know how it might have turned out had there not been a pushy and nosy reporter looking over their shoulders.

THIS THING ABOUT STUPID AMERICANS

   Jonathan Gruber, an economist from MIT has evoked a hue and cry from some for a comment he made in 2013. He was quoted as saying the Affordable Health Care Act, aka Obama Care, was passed because of the stupidity of the  American people and because of a lack of transparency by the Obama administration.

   A few facts-Gruber was not on the staff of the White House or Health and Human Services or the Democratic Party. He was a consultant paid to measure and analyze the impact of something called the "adjusted community rating"--in essence it is the affect on prices based on pooling clusters of insured patients.

    Gruber is reported to have said the health care act was written in such a way as to hide these price variances.

     A couple of more facts. The President talked about that price variable in February of 2010.  The Congressional Budget Office wrote a letter to Indiana Senator Evan Bayh in November 2009 saying that the result could be increased premiums for younger and healthier workers. In fact there are several other instances where the price and premium variances were discussed openly by Democrats and Republicans.

     Gruber is probably not a stupid man, but he certainly acted like one with his own "stupidity" comment.  He was very well paid to perform his analysis.  He's entitled to his view, but it was stupid to say what he did because he was incorrect. There had been plenty of transparency even if many American voters were not paying attention.

     Now this will not go over well with some, but in fact many Americans display behavior that would indicate stupidity. Even with all of the news and information services available fewer people are spending time reading or consuming news. The majority of those who do choose their network or news outlet based on political or ideological leaning. Does preaching to the choir resonate here?  Americans are however very well entertained. 
     The streaming networks, premium cable, basic cable and the old fashioned broadcast networks do well in harvesting millions of viewers for a variety of entertainment programs. Gaming is reaching staggering new levels of popularity, but news programming continues to decline. Newspaper readership is also precarious. 

       Let me just drop these comparisons.  Honey Boo Boo and Duck Dynasty or Frontline and Charlie Rose. 

     Perhaps the drop in circulation and viewership reflects dissatisfaction with the quality of the product. Perhaps not! A friend who is a former newspaper syndication executive and who has a particular political preference will still consume a broad spectrum of national and international news sources. She comes to her views from a studied perspective and she, like people with intelligence, holds a variety of perspectives. Conservative on some, liberal on others. Sadly most people are not so discerning.

    A good case can be made that many Americans display signs of stupidity on issues of health, fitness, diet, public safety, diversity, cultural understanding, civility, standards, manners, understanding of history, distracted driving and etc. Now, when this pool is adjusted to political participation you are bound to get manipulation, exploitation, low information voters and stupidity.  Frankly I've heard comments from sitting members of the US Congress who convince me they are what I call "mouth breathers." And isn't it stupid to vote on a piece of legislation that you have not read?

     Back when Izzy Stone was alive and publishing I.F. Stone's Weekly, American Journalists would have known and read the full legislative package and would have raised hell if members of congress had not. Sadly American journalism misses that kind of determination, drive, attention to detail, even boring detail.  
    Tons of information and data are available now, but you have to go get it. Fortunately it's at the end of your finger tips thanks to the same digital age that is robbing us of privacy. I guess it's a trade off.

     So yes Mr Gruber and Mr and Mrs America, some of you are stupid. Maybe we are all stupid in our own way-but just not the way you think we are. Eh?

      By the way, the now notorious Jonathan Gruber had a 

previous client before he worked on Obamacare.  He 

performed the same role for Massachusetts. There its been called Romneycare.

JON STEWART-Director

    I understand why Rosewater is collecting so much acclaim. The story is important and compelling and Stewart has done a superb job of converting Maziar Bahari's book (and life changing event) into a screenplay and film. Gael Garcia Bernal is brilliant as Bahari and Kim Bodina is masterful as Rosewater, the interrogator. So much of the orbit of the film is around the interaction of these two and they deliver extraordinary performances.

   I had some of the same feelings in seeing Rosewater that I had in seeing Costa Gavras' 1969 classic Z, that dealt with repression in Greece. Heavy handed government thuggery still exists and the challenge of journalism, even in the 21st century, sometimes is to simply endure repression by idiots and zealots.

    Jon Stewart has moved into directing with talent, finesse and great chops.  

    

      See you down the trail.