There is a new blog post, entitled On violence, in which I explain more fully my thinking on violence that I touched on in the last issue.
Updates
April 30, 10:57 am:
Lest we think the problem of political correctness is limited to college campuses, New York Times readers are canceling their subscriptions not over the paper’s appallingly biased coverage of last year’s election but because the paper hired a climate science-denier for its op-ed pages.[1] (Political Correctness)
With the Republicans in power, net neutrality is under renewed attack.[1] (Net Neutrality)
The American Civil Liberties Union explains clearly what it thinks the judge meant in issuing a temporary injunction against Donald Trump’s order on sanctuary cities.[2] (Unauthorized Migration)
Barack Obama has apparently decided to take a page from the Clinton playbook, giving a speech to financiers for $400,000.[3] (Democrats)
April 27, 12:43 pm:
The Left is making an ass of itself (as Bernie Sanders recognized[4]) again, this time over now-aborted plans for Ann Coulter to speak at the University of California, Berkeley.[5] (Political Correctness)
April 28, 5:13 am:
Republicans are still having trouble coming up with the votes to pass a “repeal and replace” plan for Obamacare[6] and even if they do, their bill still appears dead on arrival at the Senate.[7]
Jonathan Haidt condemns the violence perpetrated by the Left against conservative speakers on campuses and argues for enforcement of policies that he says, in most cases, already exist.[8] (Political Correctness)
Fortunately, the aforementioned violence mostly did not materialize Thursday in Berkeley.[9] (Political Correctness)
Democrats think they can channel the anti-Trump resistance.[10]
Science has published a research article showing that social mobility has substantially decreased in correlation with increased income inequality.[12] (Social Inequality)
The Uber executive at the center of Waymo’s lawsuit alleging stolen intellectual property is stepping aside pending the case’s outcome.[13]
April 28, 11:51 am:
An economist reduces the U.S. economy to two classes, one well-educated, tech-savvy, well-off, and politically influential, and the other none of the above and effectively condemned to poverty in service to the well-off.[14] (Social Inequality)
April 29, 01:24 am:
A citation on my skepticism about nonviolence movements has been corrected. (Political Correctness)
I admire and respect Cornel West for his heart, which I think is clearly in the right place. His is one of the very few voices on the political Left that seriously advocates for economic justice as indispensable in the quest for social justice. But it’s time to admit he’s a little slow on the uptake.
I realized that Barack Obama was not really a progressive even before he was elected and I have long been skeptical of the Democratic Party.[15] West continued to express confidence in Obama in his memoir[16] but, years later, eventually came to realize that Obama was a “counterfeit.”[17] Now West is recognizing that the Democratic Party is hopelessly in bed with neoliberals and corporations.[18]
Credit where credit is due: West does eventually get there. This is much, much further than most folks ever get. But he consistently expresses a misguided and wholly undeserved patience with people and institutions that lasts years until at some arbitrary point he suddenly sees what I have been seeing for a long time and loses that patience. And when he loses that patience he says some very astute things. My disappointment is with the patience he expresses in the first place.
Probably a good general rule for emotion-laden and vaguely-defined terms such as “freedom” is that their use should be interrogated: “Free” for whom, to do what to whom?
Net neutrality is an outstanding example of the problem. According to Margaret McGill’s article,
“For decades before 2015, we had a free and open Internet,” the [FCC Chairman Ajit Pai] said in a speech at the Newseum in Washington co-hosted by FreedomWorks, a limited-government group. “Indeed, the free and open Internet developed and flourished under light-touch regulation. We were not living in some digital dystopia before the partisan imposition of a massive plan hatched in Washington saved all of us.”[19]
The insinuation that the Internet is not now “free and open” must be interrogated. Not “free and open” for whom? The answer, obviously, is the Internet service providers, whose “freedom” to throttle traffic to and from various sites was infringed.
Conversely, the present rules protect small, underfunded sites, including mine. This guarantees my (and other small sites’) freedom of speech (but not an audience). The rules changes being proposed would infringe that freedom. So an obvious question is why Pai values the “freedom” of rich corporations like Comcast over that of sites like my own. And the answer to that, alas, is probably entirely too obvious.
In the past, “political correctness” has been a dubious term. Free speech is not—and never has been—an unlimited right. Classically, you can’t yell “fire” in a crowded theater (unless there really is one). But more to the point, there is a point when speech shuts other voices down and I accept that it is possible to argue that Ann Coulter reaches that threshold.
However, the folks objecting to Coulter’s speech are supposed to be students (unfortunately, it appears that not all are[20]) in a university which is supposed to value critical inquiry (and which the University of California at Berkeley has arguably failed to do[21]). Audience members—whether students or not—in this setting are supposed to be able to do just what Bernie Sanders suggests, which is indeed to “ask Ann Coulter in a polite way questions which expose the weakness of her arguments.”[22]
While I have my own skepticism about nonviolent tactics,[23] to justify violence against speakers requires, in my view, that their speech poses an imminent physical danger to the audience or other human or nonhuman beings, a conclusion which is, I think, in this case, a few too many steps removed from any factual premises. Nor do I endorse violence as a method of protest—if employed, violence must be proportionate to the threat and strictly directed at and limited to averting that threat. (Note that this formulation in no way immunizes the politically or economically powerful from whatever means are necessary to avert the lethal or injurious consequences of social inequality.)
So I absolutely agree with Jonathan Haidt,[24] Sanders,[25] and Peter Van Buren[26] that protesters absolutely should not resort to violence to suppress speakers they disagree with.
[P]ersons who believe that in Trump’s America violence to silence speech they do not agree with is justified . . . probably are unaware their tactics were once used to silence civil-rights marchers, anti-war protesters, abortion-rights advocates, and the women’s movement. Because the law that now shames Berkeley and NYU comes from earlier efforts to protect those groups’ right to speak.[27]
We have reached a point with the Left where there is one correct way of thinking and if you commit any heresy against this allegedly correct way of thinking or even abstain from condemning such heresy, you are a fascist subject to violence[28] (which fortunately mostly did not materialize in Berkeley on Thursday[29]). Which is to say that the Left has itself become fascist.
Republicans are trying to be mean, by cutting coverage, and nice, by not cutting coverage, at the same time. It might be possible to resolve a paradox, but this looks like a contradiction and, if so, until they agree on one course of action—which they probably can’t do—the “repeal and replace” effort is almost certainly doomed.
Raj Chetty et al., “The fading American dream: Trends in absolute income mobility since 1940,” Science 28 (April, 2017): 398-406, doi:10.1126/science.aal4617
[12]Raj Chetty et al., “The fading American dream: Trends in absolute income mobility since 1940,” Science 28 (April, 2017): 398-406, doi:10.1126/science.aal4617↩
It appears Laura Poitras was detained over fifty times at airports because
Members of a U.S. Army National Guard unit from Oregon reported seeing a “white female” holding a camera on a rooftop just before they were attacked. David Roustum, 22, an Army National Guardsman from West Seneca, New York, was killed. Several troops were wounded. Some guardsmen who saw Poitras suspected she had a heads-up about the attack and didn’t share that information with American forces because she wanted to film it. If true, Poitras would have broken U.S. criminal law.[2]
This, of course, is the problem with this kind of system: There was apparently never a proper identification of that “white female,” but soldiers and the keepers of the watch lists just decided it was Poitras.
In Germany, [Poitras] was told her name lights up “like a Christmas tree” when security officials scan flight rosters. In Austria, she was told her threat score was “400 out of 400.”[3]
Poitras had to sue to find out what the fuck was going on and it wasn’t until she took action that the detentions ceased. Short of that, she had been presumed guilty and never even allowed the opportunity to prove her innocence. Which, in case you hadn’t noticed, is a reversal of the normal presumption that the accused is innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
Poitras called the allegation false and said she didn’t film the attack.
“There is no ambush footage,” Poitras told the AP. “That’s the narrative that they created, but it doesn’t correspond with any facts.”[4]
The Justice Department has warned several jurisdictions that have designated themselves “sanctuaries” from immigration law enforcement to cooperate.[1] (Unauthorized Migration)
April 22, 1:54 am:
In a brief, attorneys general from sixteen states are supporting the state of Washington in its suit against Donald Trump’s revised Muslim Ban.[2]
A Truthdig article illustrates the typical local response to Homelessness.[4]
April 24, 2:01 am:
Some psychiatrists have decided that a “duty to warn” about Donald Trump supersedes the “Goldwater Rule” against offering public diagnoses of figures whom they have not examined personally.[5] (Donald Trump)
April 24, 11:01 pm:
Yes, Donald Trump and the Republicans are “out of touch” with the country, but a poll finds that people think the Democrats are even more so.[6]
How many of these “recreational vehicles” are being used for recreation? The bucolic background might seem misleading: This photograph (by David Benfell, April 21) was taken in an industrial section of one of Oakland’s remaining poorer neighborhoods.How many of these tents in Berkeley house activists? How many of these activists are “legitimately” (what defines “legitimacy” in this context?) homeless themselves? But also, how many homeless do they represent? If memory serves, this community was previously on a median strip, as a protest either on behalf of or by the homeless. (David Benfell, April 22)
As I’ve previously noted,
in denying the homeless a place even to legally be, the powers that be effectively deny the homeless their right to even exist. The homeless won’t stop being homeless because they’ve been evicted from yet more locations. But, perhaps, they’ll be less visible. And the needs of the homeless—and their rights—won’t be any less urgent because they’ve been evicted from yet more locations. But, perhaps, we’ll be able to pretend they don’t exist.[7]
This is a point underscored in the Truthdig article.[8] Ironically, Fountain Alley, which serves as a locus in that article, is near a vegan restaurant named Good Karma that has, in recent years, transformed itself into a hipster beer joint (that still serves vegan food). And please notice that this fascism of erasing human beings is occurring in west coast so-called liberal cities. I have little doubt that it also occurs in more conservative places, but the public policy response to homelessness illustrates that the entire mainstream political spectrum in this country is fascist.
It has, until now, always been a matter of speculation that the U.S. would seek Julian Assange’s extradition even though the fear that it would led to Ecuador’s decision to grant him asylum.[9] This is no longer a matter of speculation.[10]
Ignore Jeffrey Sessions’ attempt to defend his comments belittling Hawaii. Those comments, referring to “some island in the Pacific,” mean just what they sound like they mean. They 1) ignore Hawaii’s status both as an illegally colonized and conquered nation[11] and as a state, and 2) treat this illegally conquered nation and state as something foreign to the United States, all to 3) attack a judge who, inconveniently for the Trump administration, apparently recognizes Islamophobia when he sees it.
Theresa May is calling for an early election in a bid to increase her majority in the United Kingdom parliament.[1] (Brexit)
April 19, 1:49 am:
Timothy Stafford argues that in calling for an early election, Theresa May stands to substantially increase her party’s majority in Parliament.[2] (Brexit)
I drive around the San Francisco Bay Area a lot these days and it’s a rare freeway underpass that doesn’t have at least one homeless person with a tent set up. Often there are many tents, all pitched right next to each other, with chairs and other property set around them. I don’t know whether to call them Trumpvilles (it seems a bit early for that), Obamavilles, Bushvilles, or even Clintonvilles, but make no mistake, Hoovervilles have returned.[3]
I guess the homeless have become too visible for the powers that be. The Gilman underpass on I-80 now has a fence (that impedes visibility and makes an already-difficult intersection even more dangerous) to keep the homeless out. On an otherwise vacant lot adjacent to I-880 in Oakland, I noticed an eviction notice for an “illegal encampment.”
All of this underscores my longstanding point that in denying the homeless a place even to legally be, the powers that be effectively deny the homeless their right to even exist. The homeless won’t stop being homeless because they’ve been evicted from yet more locations. But, perhaps, they’ll be less visible. And the needs of the homeless—and their rights—won’t be any less urgent because they’ve been evicted from yet more locations. But, perhaps, we’ll be able to pretend they don’t exist.
We are erasing human beings here rather than helping them. And yes, that’s fascism.
If I’m understanding correctly, Theresa May is attempting to solve a problem with her own backbenchers, Tories who would advocate an even harder Brexit than the one she seems to be seeking.[4] Which would seem to assume that newly elected ministers would be more cooperative than the backbenchers she’s seeking to overcome. More seriously, if something goes wrong, it could backfire on May. But May is also seizing an apparent opportunity to substantially increase her party’s parliamentary majority.[5]
Lawmakers and their aides from both major parties say Susan Rice did nothing wrong in asking for the identities of U.S. citizens caught up in spying allegedly directed at foreign nationals.[1] (Golden Showers)
A rather thin silver lining to the Trump administration’s xenophobic policies is that Jeff Sessions is pushing for the hiring of more immigration judges.[2] (Unauthorized Migration)
April 12, 3:17 am:
The Federal Bureau of Investigation did obtain a FISA warrant on one of Donald Trump’s advisors.[3] (Golden Showers)
Yet another top executive is leaving Uber.[4] (Ride-sharing)
An article I forgot to include earlier: The New York Times editorial criticizing the “gig” economy.[5] (Ride-sharing)
The assertion that Barack Obama didn’t order wiretaps on Donald Trump’s campaign increasingly appears as a distinction without a difference.[12] (Golden Showers)
Any further attempt to repeal and replace Obamacare may be dead—so-called “centrist” Republicans say they won’t support it.[14]
April 14, 12:15 pm:
Donald Trump is going more mainstream (for which, read more neoconservative and—unsurprisingly since for neoconservatives, neoliberalism is a moral imperative, neoliberal) on foreign and economic policy.[15] (Authoritarian Populists and Donald Trump)
Another day (although, admittedly, I’ve gotten the scandals in reverse order chronologically), and yet again, another Uber scandal[16]—I mean really, now, when do you vulture capitalists pull the plug? (Ride-sharing)
A historically Black college is teaming up with University of Phoenix to offer online courses to college drop-outs. But “[South Carolina] State has a six-year graduation rate of 37 percent, slightly below the national average of 42 percent, according to the latest U.S. Department of Education data. University of Phoenix has a nationwide graduation rate of 16 percent, and an even lower rate of 11 percent at its campus in Columbia.” Skeptics (count me among them) argue that this is just a way to funnel money from a state-supported public institution to a for-profit scam. The latter could make up to nearly $1 million as “S.C. State has agreed to pay $395 to University of Phoenix for every online course in which each student enrolls, starting this fall.”[17]
If—admittedly, a big ‘if’—I’m understanding correctly, the judge’s ruling in Waymo’s suit against Uber is an early defeat for Cory Levandowski’s assertion of fifth amendment privilege that might not mean much in the end, as “[t]he judge is not at this time requiring that the report be opened up to the court, but is ordering it to be included in that list [of documents that a party in a lawsuit argues should not be opened up to the court because they contain privileged information] without basic details redacted.” Still, it seems striking, to me, at least that Levandowski seeks to assert the privilege against self-incrimination over “[a] due diligence report . . . conducted by a third party as part of an acquisition.”[18] What? Really?
There are a couple things about this that make absolutely no sense to me. First, how can a report prepared by a third party be self-incrimination? Second, how can a report on due diligence be self-incrimination? Which, admittedly, doesn’t leave much about this that does make any fucking sense at all. Something has to be deeply wrong here and people ought to be a more suspicious of and less acquiescent to the mysteries of an incomprehensible legal system. Especially when Uber is shedding executives like there’s no tomorrow.[19] Once upon a time we surely would have said something stinks to high heaven or something’s rotten in Denmark. But I guess we don’t do that anymore.
I drive around the San Francisco Bay Area a lot these days and it’s a rare freeway underpass that doesn’t have at least one homeless person with a tent set up. Often there are many tents, all pitched right next to each other, with chairs and other property set around them. I don’t know whether to call them Trumpvilles (it seems a bit early for that), Obamavilles, Bushvilles, or even Clintonvilles, but make no mistake, Hoovervilles have returned.
[15]Tracy Wilkinson and Brian Bennett, “President Trump has backed off many of his provocative foreign policy promises” target=”_blank”>President Trump has backed off many of his provocative foreign policy promises↩
A Wall Street Journal columnist warns that companies are replacing equity with debt and that if the assumptions that underlie this move prove wrong, the results could be “ugly.”[1] (Bubbles)
April 8, 03:47 am:
Uber is being sued for allegedly charging riders for long trips while paying drivers for short trips.[2]
People in the U.S. might finally be wising up to the reality that hard work does not pay off.[3] (Capitalist Mythology)
The U.S. Senate confirmed Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court.[4]
California Governor Jerry Brown has declared the drought emergency over.[5] (California Drought)
The Washington Post tells the story of a pregnant woman who went to work driving for Uber.[6] (Ride-Sharing)
April 9, 1:55 am:
Some possibly gullible people might actually believe that Donald Trump has burnished some sort of anti-Russian credential by striking at Syria.[7] (Golden Showers)
April 9, 11:23 am:
Republicans are balking at the cost of Donald Trump’s proposed border wall.[8]
Fig. 1. Bloom County by Berkeley Breathed, April 7, 2017, on Facebook (fair use).
Lyft has managed to keep whatever troubles it has mostly quiet. In stark contrast to Uber.[9] So investors reward Lyft with a higher than expected valuation in their latest fundraising round.[10]
As to Uber, however, on top of all their other problems, somebody needs to explain to them that if they’ve got to be capitalist libertarians, they should at least be honest capitalist libertarians. Because between the problems with Waymo over allegedly stolen intellectual property[11] and, now, with allegedly paying drivers for short rides while charging riders for long rides,[12] now they just look like thieves. And the vulture venture capitalists who are funding Uber look like complicit idiots.
In essence, the way unemployment is coming down is by driving people out of the labor market. When they’re no longer in the labor market, the Bureau of Labor Statistics no longer counts them as unemployed. All this is based on BLS data, released April 7. See here for more.
I’m actually hearing more about San Francisco Bay Area rents, which are well into the realm of not making sense. And I have no idea how a rent bubble bursts.
I guess it just wouldn’t be an issue without another installment of the Golden Showers scandal.
This piece by Nahal Toosi is especially lovely because it surrounds an accusation that can’t be effectively denied. If the Trump administration or its defenders deny that its intent in striking Syria following yet more civilian poison gas deaths was to show that Donald Trump is not Vladimir Putin’s puppet, well of course it would! Which, of course, is just a small step short of confirmation that he really is and and that Putin and Trump plotted all this to shore up Trump’s credibility in the face of the long-running scandal.
As a scholar, I have to be more careful than that. A lot more careful. I don’t want to call the questions of whether this allegation or any other allegation in the Trump-Russia scandal is true bullshit—they aren’t. But questions surrounding Trump’s relationship with Russia need to remain questions until we have actual evidence. It’s when people—especially journalists, who sure as fuck should know better—treat the questions as answers that we veer into bullshit. (To her credit, Toosi does stop short of crossing that line, at least on this occasion, but the implication is there.)
I think Donald Trump may find himself in real trouble with authoritarian populists if, as now seems possible, Republicans don’t deliver them their precious Mexican border wall.[13] But it seems a lot easier to underestimate Trump’s support than it is to overestimate it.
I think George Monbiot correctly captures the paradox of Theresa May’s arguments against a Scottish referendum on independence. What May alleges is good for the United Kingdom, for which we might actually read little England, with Brexit, she seems to argue, is not good for Scotland with regard to a referendum on independence.[2]
And I certainly agree that neoliberalism, as practiced in the U.K. (and the U.S.) is a humanitarian catastrophe. Finally, I think a major problem with our present system of social organization is that we have centralized too much authority in too few hands, so I favor decentralization, which leads me to sympathize with the drive for Scottish independence.
The trouble I see with Monbiot’s argument is that if we think neoliberalism is terrible, leaving the U.K. to rejoin the European Union, dominated by Germany and ordoliberalism (a less insane—which doesn’t say much—version of neoliberalism), really isn’t an answer, as we see with the northern European attitude toward southern Europe—especially Greece.[3]
