How Sad

I'm really weeping over the investigation into whether Spokane mayor Jim West used his office computer to chat on online gay sites.

Via Americablog

Spokane Mayor Jim West's votes on gay-rights and human-rights issues:

On Christmas Eve 1985, Gov. Booth Gardner signed an executive order banning discrimination in state hiring based on sexual orientation. West and 14 other Republicans responded by introducing a bill in January 1986 that would have barred gay men and lesbians from working in schools, day-care centers and some state agencies. The bill called for screening prospective employees for sexual orientation and firing state workers whose sexual identities became known. The bill failed.

Also in 1986, West voted to bar the state from distributing pamphlets telling people how to protect themselves from AIDS during sex.

West opposed gay rights bills introduced in 1985 and 1987.In 1989, West opposed a proposal to expand a needle exchange program to protect people from AIDS from Pierce County to the entire state.

In 1990, as part of a bill on AIDS education, West proposed that teen sex be criminalized. The bill, written by the abstinence group Teen Aid, would have made sexual contact a misdemeanor for unmarried teenagers under 18. Sexual contact was defined as "any touching of the sexual or other intimate parts of a person" for sexual gratification.

West voted in 1998 for the Defense of Marriage Act, which defined marriage as between a man and a woman. Gov. Gary Locke vetoed the bill, but the Legislature overrode his veto.

As Senate majority leader, West and other Republicans in 2003 bottled up the gay-rights bill in committee and it died.

As Spokane's incoming mayor in November 2003, West said he's opposed to extending City Hall benefits to domestic partners, citing the cost. In April 2005, the City Council approved domestic partner benefits in a 5-2 vote, enough to withstand a mayoral veto.

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You know, maybe I should feel sorry for someone who's been so deep in the closet that he's destroyed his own people. But I don't. People like West have done a lot of damage and they deserve whatever they have coming to them.

JESUS ROCKS MOROCCO!!!!!!!!!!!!

This story on a Christian rock concert in Morocco absolutely kills me for a lot of reasons. First of all, is there any way that Christians could offend conservative Muslims more than combining prosletyzing with rock music? I'm not really sure that they could unless they were to burn a copy of the Koran or something.

Then there's the idea that singing really crappy music in a language that the people don't understand is going to convert the heathens. Very good method.

But what really makes me laugh is how gullible Christians can be. To give the Christian movement some credit, they've played a role in promoting human rights in Africa. They've been far more effective there than say, the Bush administration. They really put the pressure on Bush to force the Sudanese government to stop killing the people in the southern part of their country. And they've also pushed for Morocco to stop occupying Western Sahara and leave the people there in peace. So Morocco invites evangelical bands and their pastors over to their nation and proceed to take advantage of their stupidity. See below:

"In fact, one of the evangelical leaders who was behind the Christian rock festival, the Rev. Rob Schenck, who leads the conservative Christian lobbying group Faith and Action in Washington, said that after what he had seen in his meetings with Moroccan officials he would now seek to get evangelicals to reassess their position on Western Sahara and the Sahwaris' political leadership, the Polisario Front. "Evangelical Christians have to be extremely cautious about supporting any group that would sympathize with a socialist or Communist philosophy or world view, which is completely in conflict with an evangelical or Christian worldview," Mr. Schenck said in an interview. He said Moroccan officials had told the evangelical leaders that the Polisario had received Cuban training and aid."

Well then, they told us that the Western Saharan leadership has relations with Cuba and are communists. They must be telling us the truth. After all, why would they fudge on this? They certainly have no self-interest here.

I mean, come on! Are Christian leaders that incredibly gullible that they'll just believe anyone is a communist if someone else just tells them that they are. You would think that most of them would be smarter than that. But you'd be wrong.

Tammy

On Sunday I watched part of CMT's top 40 women in the history of country music. Given that it's CMT, there are a lot of grotesque selections, namely Shania Fucking Twain at #6. Well anyway, #2 is Tammy Wynette. I was truly amazed that when they told her story, they said "Her life reads like a fairy tale." My wife and I just looked at each other in amazement. All I could think was, how many marriages did she have? How many trips to rehab? How did she die again?

Is there any real reason to gloss over the life of Tammy Wynette? Does anyone have a stake in creating a myth about her that erases her actual life? George Jones maybe, but everyone already knows their history. Really really bizarre.

Michael Restovich

Is it just me, or does the Mariners making a trade for Michael Restovich, who Colorado just designated for assignment, make perfect sense. He would be a corner outfielder with power they could use off the bench. Right now, let's see, they don't have a decent reserve OF on the bench nor do they have anyone with HR power. I don't think he can really play CF but hey, we'll still have Willie Bloomquist to do that! Seriously, why would they not give Colorado a pittance for Restovich and then get rid of Greg Dobbs?

One Reason I Hate The Yankees

I think part of why I hate the Yankees so much is that everytime I watch a Yankees game the announcers proceed to suck off every single Yankee no matter how meaningless the game and no matter how bad the team is. I just watched the Yankees beat the Mariners and I was just sickened at how often Dave O'Brien and Rick Sutcliffe talked about how great the Yankees are, how many hall of famers they have, how they are going to come back and be in the playoffs, etc. This despite the fact that the Yankees are an average team and getting older by the day. The bottom of the 9th was the worst when they basically said that the Mariners had no chance against Mariano Rivera. Now they didn't have much of a chance, but the announcers saying that had little to do with the Mariner batters Raul Ibanez, Wiki Gonzalez, and Greg Dobbs (Dobbs?!#&*). They would have said that against any batters he faced on any team, despite the fact that the guy is 35 or so, walks more batters than he ever has and just isn't as good as he used to be. The Yankees have a mediocre rotation that is one Randy Johnson muscle pull from being a bad one, a poor bullpen, and horrific defense.

Of course the announcers clearly believed that the Yankees 3 game winning streak was a sign that they are on the way back to contending in the AL East. This despite the fact that these 3 wins are against 2 of the worst offfensive teams in baseball. I just loathe how everything the Yankees do is golden and if any other team does them, it's not even worth mentioning. A 3 game winning streak against Oakland and Seattle. BFD. And fuck the Yankees.

Cuban Terrorist

So according to the New York Times, the arrival in the US of anti-Castro terrorist Luis Posada gives the Bush administration 3 options.

1. Grant him asylum and look like the hypocrites on terrorism that they are. Posada after all only blew up a Cuban airliner klling 73 people. The Bush administration would look like hypocrites to the world and would of course be pandering to the Miami Cubans. This is especially hard in a post-9/11 world.

2. They could deny Posada his asylum request and jail him here, thereby giving Fidel Castro an enormous victory. This would piss off the Gusanos and could cost the Republicans dearly in 2008.

3. They could send Posada to Venezuela where Hugo Chavez wants to try him for the bombing. Same result as #2.

So looks like ol' W is between a rock and a hard place on this one. I imagine they'll go for the first option since they don't really care what the rest of the world thinks anyway. But it's going to be awfully fun to watch the Republicans squirm here.

Modernist Versus Alternative Medicine

I've been thinking a lot lately about the debate between modern and so-called "traditional" or homeopathic medicine. I guess I'm not sure why this is but I have long found it an interesting issue. I think the roots of my interest came when my bullshit indicator first went off over what I considered the romanticization of homeopathic medicines by so many of the health-conscious and progressive people I have known. By romanticization, I mean a couple of things. First the embrace of these medicines without any real knowledge about what they do for you. I mean, how do people know that this extract from a tree is supposed to cure X? They read it somewhere of course, but usually this reading can be traced to very intelligent marketers advertising to a specific demographic. Second, people get a certain anti-modernist appeal from the idea that some indigenous group has used this plant for millennia to cure X and so we can too and by doing so we can get more in touch with a primitive nature, even if it's through buying it at Whole Foods.

Of course there is great value in indigenous medicine. Modern medicine is always a work in progress and there is much to be learned about healing from traditional uses of plants. The medical industry (obviously a huge problem in itself but not one that I'm going to explore here) is exploring these uses. And if you say that they are doing so to make money you are of course correct, but by placing their abstract in a liquid and selling it at the Whole Foods, the same process takes place.

What I want to do now is to make a strong case for western-style modernist medicine as the primary way that people can remain healthy. I want to first do this by debunking the idea of medicine as consumption. Because ultimately that is what people who either reject modernist medicine entirely or those many more who supplement modernist medicine with traditional medicine are doing. They think that they have the right to make choices surrounding the care of their body. And I don't believe that someone can negate those rights. However, why would you think that you have the knowledge and the ability to diagnose yourself? What is the knowledge basis to think that taking some plant extract is going to cure your X better than a trip to the old-fashioned doctor?

This idea of medicine as a consumable product has several problems and I am going to discuss two. First is of course the idea that everything in modern American life is something that we consume. And corporations and marketing experts have promoted this because they make a lot of money off of it. They have proven particularly effective by people who normally debunk the ideas of a consumer culture and conspicuous consumption, i.e. progressives. But of course buying organic, which is something that I support though more because why would you eat tasteless conventional broccoli or tomatoes instead of organic rather than for principled reasons, is participating a capitalist consumer culture just as much as buying your seeds from Monsanto. When we buy our alternative medicines, we are also supporting a particular brand of global capitalism.

Let's take a product that I know because it's around my house: tea tree oil. OK, we buy this for various reasons. I think it's good for burns or something like that as well as probably other things. Where do tea trees come from? Who traditionally uses these trees? What happens when an American market arises for tea tree oil? If this, like so many homeopathic medicines, comes from a tropical plant, how does the rapid rise in its harvesting and consumption affect native relationships to it? Can they still access it? Does the rise of a marketable product in their midst change their entire society?

The point of that series of questions is to point out the disconnect that we have, even those who are the most progressive and aware of the world around us, between the consumption of a product and its production. We rarely if ever think about production. And their are some ironic twists to this among many who value non-modernist forms of medicine. We (rightly) attack the hideous industrial process of turning cows into beef. We understand that the production of beef is revolting and we make our choices on whether or not to eat beef based on that knowledge. But we often take the next step and apply those relationships to other, non-animal products. I have read, though it was at least a couple of years ago and I don't remember the specific details, that the rise of homeopathic medicine had in fact cut off native peoples from their plants as government sponsored corporations go in and monopolize the species for the western market. I find this quite disturbing. Just as I don't want to eat beef that both degrades the environment and tortures the animal, I don't want to use a medicinal product that places the species at peril while undermining traditional cultures. Too often my friends, our consumption of medicine derived from the plants of the developing world is another form of imperialism. And I just don't think that very many people understand this.

I also want to discuss the suspicion of modern medicine in terms of the more general suspicion of expertise in modern America. In almost all sectors of American life, experts are under attack. The religious right attacks scientists who argue for evolution or global warming. Neoconservatives attack traditional foreign policy experts who disagree with their ideology. Right-wing students attack professors for not adhering to a conservative agenda. And progressives attack all kinds of traditional figures of power for a variety of reasons, from industrial figures who have polluted the environment to governments unresponsive to the needs of its minority citizens. At least in this latter case, I support the questioning of expertise. Much of this stems from the general rebellion of the 1960s and the attack on experts, particularly relating to people like Robert McNamara and the Vietnam War.

But while I am comfortable with questioning authority figures, I am very uncomfortable with the idea that I can do it better. Because I can't. In the case of medicine, I have no medical knowledge. I respect the value of education and I believe that someone with multiple years of education in medicine knows a hell of a lot more about my body than I do. When my stomach hurts for several days, I don't want to figure out what's wrong with myself. I don't want to place my life in my own hands. Why should I? Do I have the knowledge to properly diagnose myself? Not all licensed physicians may have proper knowledge either, but they have much more than I do and if my life is at stake, I want professional help, built upon decades if not centuries of experimentation, ethical standards, and professionalism.

Maybe I feel this way because I am both unhealthily aware and utterly terrified of my own mortality and also because I when I look at my immediate family, at least 3 out of the 4 of us would be dead if not for modern medicine. I would have died of appendicitis when I was 15. My brother would likely have died from severe asthma when he was about 6. And it wouldn't have mattered anyway because my Mom would have died as an infant in a fall which even with the best techniques of late 1940s medicine she barely survived. Now I know that few people, other than certain religious groups, really completely reject modernist medicine. But many millions more have their suspicions of it and would rather treat themselves through alternative forms of medicine. And while that's generally OK, we should at least think about what the consequences of the consumption of alternative medicine are for the world. We should also think about how many people we know who are still alive today only because of modernist medicine and we should thank our lucky stars that we have access to it. I know that I do.

Now Why Would We Have A Cold War With China Again?

Robert Kaplan's long piece in the June issue of the Atlantic about fighting a Cold War with China left me rather perplexed. Because, you know, why would that happen again? Kaplan argues that such a situation is almost an inevitability without ever really giving a good reason why. He talks about China wanting to extend its hegemony across Asia and the US resisting that. And of course he talks about Taiwan. But the first situation is not only somewhat questionable and very long-term, but is also not necessarily directly oppositional to US interests as I see them.

Really I don't see any good reason for China to become our enemy unless they invade Taiwan. And if that happens, it's probably because the Taiwanese decided to declare their independence from the mainland. But why would that happen? Would the US really be stupid enough to let that happen? God, I would hope not.

But let's look at all the factors that Kaplan leaves out that make a China-US Cold War unlikely. First, the Chinese economy. The Chinese economy is growing like crazy, it's true. But how long can that economic growth hold out? They need that sustained economic growth to continue their investments in the military that is allowing that military to become a world power. Moreover, the need that growth to continue for a long time because their military is very far away from being even a distant competitor to that of the US. Right now all they have is their population, something that is aging with the child limitations and in another 20 years when China is maybe ready to compete with the US, is in fact very old and men of military age will be much more limited than we would think today.

Second, China holds a lot of US dollars. That is a double-edged sword. We may not want the Chinese to have such an important bargaining chip on us. But on the other hand, why would the Chinese want to use such a bargaining chip? Why would they risk those investments, not to mention a very important trading partner, to start some sort of scenario that could lead to a cold or even a hot war? This just doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

Third, we have limited oil supplies. The growth of the Chinese economy is predicated on continuing oil supplies. Chinese demand adding to American demand is what has caused the price of oil to go up so fast. Let's say this keeps happening. Whose economy falters first? Clearly, it would be the Chinese. If that happens, they don't keep growing their military at the same rate.

Fourth, Kaplan argues that both China and the US will be wanting to extend control over the islands of the Pacific. Unfortunately for both those islands and for Kaplan's arguments, global warming will erase many of these, perhaps within 50 years.

Finally, and in something of an aside from his main arguments, Kaplan talks rather revoltingly about how we won't be able to rely on Europe in our fight with China over vague issues because the EU will make Europe less democratic and less interested in helping us out. He talks about how EU functionaries will move Europe closer to China on issues such as human rights over the next few decades. Ah, nothing like some Europe-bashing to make your arguments.

Now I'm no China expert. But this argument seems unlikely and almost nonsensical to me. I know nothing about Kaplan. But I am wondering if he is not experiencing Cold War nostalgia. I wonder if he, as is the case with others, spent his early career in a Cold War world, and then when it ended didn't know how else to look at things. Let's face it, American foreign policy since 1991 has not been kind to cold warriors. The free trade foreign policy of the Clinton administration certainly didn't work. Of course after September 11, the Bush administration tried to make terrorism related to specific states to fit their ideas, but that obviously didn't work well since Iraq didn't have relations with Al Qaeda and because many of our allies did. So maybe a Cold War with China makes certain foreign policy analysts feel comfortable.

Bobo and Lincoln

I wonder if David Brooks understands the fundamental flaw in his editorial today saying that since Lincoln evoked God that spirituality has a place in American politics. He may have a reasonable argument that there is room for spirituality in the state--I would disagree with that, but I can understand it. But Brooks' problem is that few people in American politics today think or act like Lincoln did concerning spiritual matters in the 1860s. Who is Brooks talking about that would play the role of a religious skeptic who believes in God on some level and will talk about that God in a vague way during times of crisis? No one. There may be politicians who believe this way today but none will talk of it. Instead, they become like John Kerry who clearly doesn't want to talk about religion but nonetheless does so in order to pander to our religion obsessed culture. The problem with the lack of spirituality in American politics is not the ACLU, as Brooks suggests. Rather it's with the lunatics who want to reject science, modernism, and women's rights. If that's what religion in American politics is going to look like, the ACLU looks pretty damn right on.

So what spiritual figures does Brooks want accepted in today's politics? James Dobson? Does he want prayer in schools? Does he want creationism taught? He avoids all of these questions, probably because he is smart enough to know that he has no answers except to cave to the religious right.

Runaway Bride

God knows that I don't care at all about that damned runaway bride story. But I swear it seemed predestined that New Mexico would somehow play a role in a story like that. It's almost like people doing weird things are drawn here. It must be the aliens who landed at Roswell.

Blogger Spellcheck

Let me express how amusing I find it that the dictionary on the blogger spellcheck does not have the word blog in it.

Leftist Radio And The Need To Have Your Opinions Confirmed

Over the past several months, I've listened to Air America and the Sirius left talk radio station quite a bit. And I have to say that I haven't been particularly impressed. Al Franken is usually a pretty funny guy, but I have rarely laughed at his show, thinking the skits forced and just unfunny. Generally the political commentary is knee-jerk and underinformed. I suppose that isn't any different from right-wing talk radio.

I was listening to the Sirius station a few days ago and heard a pretty stupid rant about how the US was researching some nuclear program and how stupid that was because we already had enough nuclear weapons. Of course this was in an almost shouting voice. And I thought a couple of things at once. First I thought that while we do have enough nuclear weapons to do all the damage we ever could want to, it's more complicated than that. There are reasons that new nuclear systems are researched and developed. They may not be good reasons, but at least we should try to understand them instead of going on a knee-jerk rant. Then I thought, "why the hell am I listening to this." Finally I began to wonder why anyone listens to this kind of radio.

Why do we need our views repeated to us? What is it about this kind of radio, both on the right and on the left, that people find appealing? Is it a sense of security? Do people feel better knowing that not only do other people share their beliefs, but they share them on radio? Do these kind of programs provide a sense of community to their listeners? I suppose that the blogosphere gives me a (limited since this is a pretty under the radar blog) sense of community. But at least it's a community of thinkers that, while they generally agree with each other on most views, are also not afraid to challenge other bloggers and to try and expand the horizon of thoughts and theories on politics and other matters. Talk radio just seems to me a droning repeat of liberal or conservative mantras. I suppose it's good that Air America is on in order to maybe snag some young people or others without fully formed views, but for me, it's a waste of my time to listen to.

The Colbert Report

I wonder what effect Stephen Colbert leaving The Daily Show for his own show will have on the former. It does make me nervous that The Daily Show will suffer without him and that Colbert's show will have some trouble getting its legs. After all, Colbert's fake gravitas is a major part of the show. But at the same time, I feel optimistic for a couple of reasons. First, Colbert is a really funny guy and I imagine he can make a show pretty strong all on his own. Second, if The Daily Show is to remain as funny and fresh as it is today for the next several years, change is going to be necessary. Maybe bringing in some new correspondants will help in the long term. There are a lot of funny people out there and certainly there is more than one that can fill Colbert's slot.

Yankees

Boy do I feel bad for the Yankees. It's really tearing me up watching them suck.

If you had told me that Seattle would have a better record than the Yankees, I would have said, "Wow, the Mariners really turned it around." Oh well.

Fish

Vegetarians often have a hierarchy of meat if they have to eat it. Usually fish and seafood is the first choice, then chicken or some other kind of poultry, and then beef or pork only if absolutely necessary for some reason. I have generally followed these guidelines, but lately I've been seriously rethinking them. In part, I've been rethinking this because they don't actually make any intrinsic sense to me and thus I can't think of any actual good reason to continue this. But also I am deeply bothered by the consumption of fish. Much more so than cows or pigs. I think part of the reason that vegetarians or near-vegetarians will eat fish is because they are not generally raised in a farm setting. Or at least you can get wild fish.

But is this a good reason? Increasingly, I am thinking that in fact it is a very bad reason. Fish stocks across the world are plummeting. Cows and pigs may be raised in terrible conditions and that's a bad thing. But at least they aren't going extinct. World fish consumption continues to rise, in no small part because of what Americans eat. This New York Times article from yesterday on increasing consumption and declining populations of bluefin tuna made me think even more about this.

The idea that catching and eating fish is more humane that factory farming beef is probably true. This shouldn't take away from the pretty damn brutal way that fish are killed, a process usually far worse than hunting assuming the shooter gets a clean shot and knows what they're doing. But nonetheless, how can we use this as justification for eating fish? I think this gets back to our veneration of a wild nature over human-controlled landscapes. The fact is that every landscape is deeply human controlled at this point in history. As wild as a place seems, it's always changing due to humans. Eating wild caught fish does not bring us closer to come kind of nature. For one thing, it's highly unusual for us to actually catch these fish. Second, when fish like the bluefin or sea bass are caught at a rate that leads to depletion, aren't we in fact hurting the world far more than we are if we eat factory-farm produced cows? That is not to say that factory farming isn't bad; in fact it is very bad. But to send an animal, and particularly one that lives in a extraordinarily complex and poorly understood ecosystem like the ocean, toward extinction seems to me to both be stupid for humans, because it eliminates a future food source, and yet another human-caused depletion of the earth's diversity.

So as for me, though I'd generally prefer to eat no meat, I think it's more responsible to eat either farm-raised fish or even farm-raised beef than a tasty piece of bluefin sushi. It's contrary to a lot of vegetarian and environmental norms, but I think it just makes sense.

Russian Beer

For the first time in my life, I had a Russian beer last night. There was a deal on it at the store I was shopping at and I figured, what the hell. It was surprisingly decent, especially for a lager. It was called Baltika. It had a pretty full flavor for a lager, certainly much better than your standard crappy American lager. Russia's not exactly known for its beer so I was leery. But I was quite surprised. Has anyone else had experiences with Russian beers? Are they sometime I've been missing?

Country Porn

Yes, I heard one of David Allen Coe's classic country porn songs today. Never had before. Can't say I want to again. Heard it on Mojo Nixon's show on Sirius' Outlaw Country station. A great show and a great station. Never would have heard it otherwise. However...

Here's some of the classic (and classy) lyrics from this song. I don't have the title because I was driving down a mountain at 50mph which doesn't lend itself to looking at the radio screen that gives you all the titles.

"You have to prick it, lick it, stick it between her thighs"

Followed by:

"You have to suck it, fuck it..."

Wow.

This is a classic example of thinking you are breaking new ground by talking/writing/singing about sex freely when in fact you are just producing shit. I mean imagine yourself writing a song. You're thinking, I need something to rhyme with suck. Hmmm... What could work? I know. Fuck!! Brillant.

I know that David Allen Coe doesn't give a damn what I or anyone think. But that doesn't preclude me from saying that this stuff is just garbage.

Redeveloping Thailand

In one of Mike Davis' books, I think City of Quartz but possibly Ecology of Fear (and I'm not going to do the research to find out which one) he says that each time places like Malibu burn, it's a boon to real estate developers. More land is redeveloped for extremely upscale housing and the city becomes even more stratified.

The same thing seems to be happening in Thailand. Check out this story from CNN about how Thais who live on beaches are being forced out by developers wanting to not only rebuild the Thai tourist structure but in fact expand it greatly.

Let's face it, natural disasters are great times if you're a capitalist. Throughout American history at least, the impact of natural disasters have been placed on the backs of the poor while the rich make mucho dinero off of it. This may sound like an simplistic Marxist interpretation of natural disasters but the evidence really backs this up. Not only does Davis provide a convincing argument but Ted Steinberg's Acts of God is devoted entirely to this phenomenon.

Although Thailand doesn't have the long term history of capitalism that the United States does, now that tourist capitalism has arrived, it has done so in force. The impact of this, both positive and negative, had already greatly changed Thai society. Now one of the most negative aspects of tourism is coming down like a hammer. Investors, both Thai and foreign, are taking full advantage of the tsunami to build more tourist infrastructure and more high scale resorts. They are using the disaster to consolidate their control over the coastline, driving out traditional fishing families and other coastal dwellers.

Selig

Was anyone else disgusted by Bud Selig's pandering new plan yesterday on steroids? Responding to the nice reception Paul Tagliabue got in Congress, Selig decided to toughen up baseball's steroid plan with a 50 game suspension for a 1st offense, 100 games for a 2nd, and a lifetime ban for a 3rd.

Not only is this plan absurdly harsh but of course it doesn't actually deal with drugs in baseball, saying nothing about the use of speed by players, nor of other drugs that could also make a difference in player performance.

Even worse is that Selig is so obviously pandering to Congress and the public. He clearly never cared about steroids in baseball until it became a public issue, nor does he really care about the game itself. When was the last time there was a more wretched commissioner of a major league sport. Well, maybe we should exclude hockey so that we don't have to discuss Gary Bettmann. But regardless, Selig is just disgusting.

Is Censorship Worth Worrying About?

Reading Frank Rich's column in the Times today made me thing whether censorship is something that we need to be overly worried about? On some level of course we should always be vigilant against censorship. But how likely is it that legislators like Bill First, Ted Stevens, and James Sensenbrenner will be able to legislate censorship. Rich seems to believe it's unlikely as discusses how the Right is overplaying its hand. I have to believe that this is true. After all, Republicans like their trashy, sexually oriented TV as much as Democrats do and while they may loathe the Daily Show, if there were a right-leaning Jon Stewart they would embrace him as they might a long-lost son. That will never happen because conservatives are almost never funny, but that's another issue.

I am slightly concerned though that this push for censorship will have more effects that it deserves. Part of this has to do with legislative redistricting. The Republicans in the House don't have to have a majority of the nation's support to get legislation passed. They simply have to have the majority of legislative districts. They could, and increasingly are, using technology to determine where to draw lines for them to win consistent victories. With enough 53-47 victories, a lot of people well to the right of the American public at large can gain power, as we see today. Also of concern is self-censorship as television executives, college administrators, and publishers could, and are, trying not to draw attention to themselves. Thus the Right wins through bullying. Finally, there are millions of Americans who actively do want censorship and they vote. That kind of movement can make a real difference in American life, something we are already seeing.

Ultimately though, even if the Republicans were to pass some kind of censorship bill, it would take one highly publicized trial to blow it all up. Jon Stewart getting prosecuted for obscenity would be a classic moment in American history. But even before this would happen, if Desperate Housewives were cancelled and Americans found out that the Republicans were directly responsible, what would the backlash be? I have to think it would be significant and immediate.