Shady Dealings

“It is the classic lesser-of-two-evils rationale, the key being that it explicitly recognizes that both sides are 'evil': meaning it is not a Good v. Evil contest but a More Evil v. Less Evil contest. But that is not the discussion that takes place because few progressives want to acknowledge that the candidate they are supporting — again — is someone who will continue to do these evil things with their blessing.”
Glen Greenwald “Progressives and the Ron Paul fallacies”

"Why Progressives?" I wonder. Haven't Conservatives engaged is just such lesser-of-two-evils thinking, and then told themselves that the "lesser evil" was actually a good? Haven't Moderates given evil things their blessing in return for things that were more important to them? Why should Progressives be any less susceptible to the psychology of Faustian bargains and denial than anyone else? I mean, wasn't this just as much an issue during the Bush Administration? Or was there some strain of Conservatism that found an expansion of government, the demolition of civil liberties and massive deficit spending to be a feature, not a bug? (Although according to one radio news story I heard on the way home, Rick Santorum seemed to be of the opinion that dumping cash into the Money Pit that was Iraq was a perfectly Conservative thing to do, so maybe they didn't have that much of a conflict, after all.)

It seems to me that the United States has never really had a problem with making people unlike us, that we don't like and/or live in faraway places bear the costs for whatever our political class as chosen to bribe us with today. The Atomic Bomb was dropped on Japan not to end the war - the Japanese already knew they were boned - but to force them into unconditional surrender by blowing segments of the civilian population to smithereens and convincing them that we were prepared to annihilate the entire nation - because we found the potential alternatives, a high death toll among American soldiers or a peace with Japanese conditions attached, equally unacceptable. And in the post war period, the United States was very clear about the fact that an anti-American democracy would not be tolerated if a pro-American dictatorship was available. But how many candidates for office ran on platforms of the wholesale slaughter of civilians or the suppression of democracy in exchange for saving American lives or American interests? Once a successful bid for office signaled the end of a need for high-minded rhetoric, people did "what had to be done," the American public said "better them than us" and we about our business.

Perhaps Mr. Greenwald writes these columns every so often, pillorying different segments of the American populace in turn, and I just never found about them until his sort of endorsement of Representative Ron Paul as a Progressive's best bet during a campaign season generated a lot of buzz for this particular piece. But if this is the first, I hope it's the first of many. We've made a series of deals with the Devil over the years, and more are coming. We should be reminded of them regularly.

Safe For Passivity

When I've spoken with people who feel that it's important to "get the money out of politics," it doesn't normally take very long to maneuver them into getting to the actual point - protecting voters they view as less sophisticated than themselves from harmful political messages and candidates. While I understand the intent, I think an effort to do something that perhaps we don't really want to do - namely making representative democracy safe for people for whom representative democracy is most demonstrably unsafe.

If "government of the people, by the people and for the people, shall not perish from the earth;" at some level the people are going to have to be active participants in their government. Apathy and passivity just aren't good things to have in a republic. I, for my part, am of the school that says that incentives matter - the more you give people a reason (or, quite frankly the necessity) to be active participants in their government, they more active, engaged and educated they become. When you dial back the need, people re-purpose the time they would have spent on other pursuits, and it becomes hard to get that time back later.

It sucks, because the extra effort that I'm asking that people expend in keeping up with government translates to a direct hit to their standard of living - either they have less time to work, or they have less leisure time. And when you look at people who have enough money that they can simple buy their way out of having to make that choice, it all becomes a pretty in-your-face reminder of how unequal our society has become. But I don't really see any other viable way around it. It's tempting to limit people's ability to participate, either directly or by proxy. But then will come an enforcement mechanism, and that enforcement mechanism will be VERY powerful - after all, it will have a high level of control over what messages are available to the public. If it becomes captured by one faction or another, the sorts of issues that we're dealing with now will seem like child's play.

Our government now is driven by lobbying for a very simple reason. Lobbyists promise money to get messages out. And our society has shifted from evaluating the content and the origin of a message to evaluating the ubiquity and slickness of a message, and so more money buys more effective messaging. But just because someone can put up the biggest, splashiest billboard doesn't mean that I should simply do as it says. And that, in the end, is how to remove the money from politics. Enough of the public has to be involved enough that one can't simply shout one's way to victory, regardless of the message. It won't be a sure thing. There's no reasonable way to get complete participation, but I suppose it's like vaccines. Get enough people onboard, and herd immunity will take care of the rest.

It certainly can't hurt.

Praying For Peace

Control

I was puttering around on Slate, when I came across an old Human Nature column from 2005. In it, William Saletan recounts a meeting of the President's Council on Bioethics concerning "legalized assisted suicide and euthanasia in Oregon and the Netherlands." It's the kind of interesting and thought-generating column that I so enjoyed reading back in the day.

If you're interested, you can read the column yourself, so I'm not going to bore you with an attempt to recapitulate the substance of it here. But one of the very interesting points that Mr. Saletan deals with is that of autonomy and control. Seeing parallels in the abortion debate, he warns against "deny[ing] autonomy in the name of protecting it," - blocking a person's attempts to make certain choices, under the idea that no-one would ever freely make THAT choice. (Not mentioned is the next step, in which people cast certain choices as indicative of some sort of threat to autonomy - in other words, the very fact that you have made a certain choice indicates coercion or mental distress or defect, and therefore, your autonomy must be suspended until you have been returned to "right thinking.")

During the column, Mr. Saletan brings up three ways that people have used or advocated to steer people clear of wanting to end their own lives. One) Stalling. Hospitals simply ignore laws that require compliance with a patient's wish to be taken off artificial respiration, until such time as the need for same has passed. Two) Moralizing. One of the council members favors an approach that tells patients "that while it's natural to wish for death, they ought not act on that wish." Three) Improved (and improved information about, and access to) palliative care. "Once you show that suffering can be relieved without killing, almost nobody chooses killing." When the Netherlands began to improve hospice and palliative care, the suicide rate dropped.

Bit if it's true that "No suicide prevention measure for the elderly would be more effective than good end-of-life care," as one council member put it, what's the best way of promoting good end-of-life care? Perhaps paradoxically, my first thought is the broader legalization of assisted suicide. Of the three ways discussed to prevent the suicides of the grievously injured and gravely ill, one of them costs money and requires specially trained people to be effective. If you can simply stall people or base laws on moral strictures that prevent suicide, where is the incentive to improve the palliative care infrastructure?

But, alas, the real world proves me wrong. Legalized abortion has done little to get staunch pro-life activists on board with initiatives for better prevention of unwanted pregnancies. People who feel that you have no right to something often have a hard time accepting the idea that desirable alternatives to that something should be advanced. Look at the case of the Bush and then Obama administrations dealing with North Korea and/or Iran - in neither case does the administration want to make it worth Pyongyang's or Tehran's while to go along; instead they both insist that the governments are acting illegitimately and seem to fear a future pattern of blackmail.

One of the council members cited an Oregon study that found that patients who seek assisted suicide when it is illegal have "an inordinate need for control." But I doubt that they're the only ones. Stalling and moralizing both seek to exercise control over the patient. Perhaps the issue of control needs to take a back seat, leaving more room for people to have options.

Old Acquaintance Be Forgot

Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't see you there.

Have we met? Oh, you're 2012? What happened to 2011? He did? Really? So soon. Where do they all go?

Thanks, I'd always wondered about that. Well, are you sure he's not coming back?

Oh. I guess they never do, do they?

Yeah, we had some unfinished business. It wouldn't help if I said I owed him a hundred bucks, would it? Yeah, I thought not.

No, not really. But I guess if 2011's moved on, there's no chance of getting a hold of 2000 or 1992, is there?

Well, I should have done the entire early 90s differently. I made a lot of mistakes back then. Too bad I couldn't have gotten paid for screwing things up. I'd be a rich man by now.

What did I do wrong? Do you have a year? Oh... crap - I shouldn't have said that. I'm really sorry - that was insenstive of me.

Why thank you, 2012, you're quite gracious. And I really am sorry... I wasn't thinking. They're all out of reach, huh? A pity, that. 1992 was good, you know. Are you sure you can't put me in touch with her? Just for a few minutes? I only want to make a couple of -

Of course. Rules are rules. Story of my life.

What? I'm sorry. I was daydreaming. Have you ever met 2003? He was pretty cool. I was just hoping to run into him again.

Yes, yes, you're absolutely right. I don't mean to ignore you, it's just that I'm -

Yes, exactly. Living in the past. Well, hoping to, anyway. But you're right. That is unfair to you. Let's try this again. Hello, 2012. I'm pleased to meet you.

Hmmm.... You're right. We'd better get started. There's plenty to be done, and 12 months really isn't that long a time. Although I didn't think that 1975 would ever - OW!

No, no, you're absolutely right. One at a time. One at a time.