[Politics] Rocking the Vote YouTube Style

From what I can tell, most of the major media outlets (other than CNN...I wonder why?), have treated the most recent Democratic debate, in which questions were submitted via video-sharing site YouTube, as if it were no different than the last. Certainly it was not as revolutionary as the pundits at CNN, co-sponsor of the debate, might have you believe, but if you watched the debate closely there were many facets that, through the traditional style, would have been much different. Watch the entire debate through CNN's website.

The most obvious difference is that, rather than questions being asked by a moderator working from cue cards, the questions were asked by real Americans with true concerns related to the problem. This puts a much needed face on the issue, not simply for the candidates, but for the audience as well. Too many people in the country believe that nothing really changes whether we elect a Democrat or Republican; this person or that, it is all politics as usual. The YouTube format helped speak to the way in which policies from the top effect people at the bottom (even if politics as usual persists). In other words, the issues were vacated of nearly all the abstractions of the traditional style that are so stodgy and that instill in the populace a sense that things don't really change with elections.

The format also pulled the curtain off what are often overlooked questions and perspectives with video submissions that put those ideas, challenges and inquiries directly to the candidates. There was not enough of this done this time around, but the display of it can certainly encourage more participation, especially from people across party lines. In that regard, the debate served as an important reminder that if you are elected president, you serve the people that did not vote for you as much as those who did. To me, the most memorable of these pointed questions, directed at Hillary Clinton, was "How would electing you and allowing the same two families to rule this country for the past 20 years instill the type of change you say we so desperately need?" Other great questions of the sort included one on nuclear energy and another on standardized balloting.

In some respects, the above had very little effect on the candidates in their responses (Hillary definitely did not field the above question very well). Much of the time, the candidates resorted to the same scripted responses they used in other debates, but, in some case, this scripted response suddenly took on an impassioned tone. "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" made light of a good example in which Chris Dodd responded to a question on gay marriage with virtually the same language as previously. Yet in this debate his words took on a more personally invested tone. To me, that is an affect the problem itself being removed from abstraction. That was certainly the case when one of the submission came from two people working in a Darfur refugee camp.

While it may be that many candidates were simply pressed for a more personal response, and therefore strategically gave one, it is also the case that a certain level of passion cannot be faked. So, it does make the argument that the more candidates are confronted with an issue, the more likely they are to feel strongly about it. Thus, the YouTube debate serves more than simply to give the candidates a chance to rehearese their responses; it actually forces them to elevate their political and emotional investment.

Finally, what made the debate so groundbreaking was Anderson Cooper (and not simply because he is CNN's resident hipster). Cooper actually held the candidates accountable for answering the question they were asked. There was, firstly, the aspect of the debate in which any candidate could, at anytime, be blindsided by the fact that the video questioner might also be in the audience with a follow-up to the candidate's response. But, beyond that, Cooper did something I never see moderators do: he blatantly pointed out when candidates were not answering the question and were instead resorting to their rehearsed rhetoric. That is important, if for no other reason to remind us all when a candidate is trying to give us the old debate slip. One of the reasons Americans have become soured by politics is the very real belief that you cannot get a straight answer from a politician. A presidential debate moderator should not just be responsible for asking questions, but also should hold the candidates accountable to answerin the specificities of those questions, to force them away from their rhetoric.

If the YouTube debate was truly revolutionary, I cannot say, but what seems clear is that if it was revolutionary, it was so because of its ability to bring the American public back into the political discourse, and not because it altered the course of election politics. Eventually, such a format could have a profound effect on election politics, but that change will come because it inspires the American public to become more involved and not because it inspires change in candidates specifically.

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Man-Animal War: Fox Attacks Salisbury Steak Eaters

Add foxes to the growing ranks of the animal army in the apocalyptic battle between man and animals. Last Thursday in Salisbury, Maryland a wild fox invaded Chef Fred's Chesapeake Steakhouse, Bar & Grill and went on a rampage clamping his teeth on the hand of one manager and sending patrons diving for cover. Read about here.

It appears that this was little more than a reconaissance mission aimed at infiltrating our fine-dining establishments. Cute bushy tails aside, these little beast are extremely dangerous...and they do invade cities too. Just a forewarning.

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Irony Is A Bitch: Christian Festivities and the Amusement Park Business

Just over a week ago at a Christian Festival called Lifest in OshKosh, Wisconsin, a girl fell to her death from a freefall swing ride dubbed "Air Glory." (Read the OshKosh Northwestern report) It is certainly a tragic death, but it does beg the question, what place does a freefall swing ride have at a Christian festival? The answer is that such a ride only serves to tempt an ironic fate. It is a curious challenge to the very faith the festival is meant to celebrate.

Let's just consider the name of the ride, "Air Glory." The term "Glory" seems to indicate a certain divination that can be achieved from the ride, a ride in which two people are attached by harnesses to a string 100 feet in the air and then dropped into a freefall. If only God can provide true glory, then how is such a ride anything but a tempt of fate.

The fact is amusement rides have no religious value, and marketing them as if they do is basically an affront to God because the secular life (of which amusement park rides are certainly a part) cannot, according to doctrine, provide glory or salvation.

Does that make Lifest, or simply the ride, an affront to God? I don't know, but if God has a plan for us all and does not take people in vain, we must then certainly consider the message of such a death in such a place. Suspending activities at Lifest only to resume music and activities only two-and-half-hours later does not seem like a valid consideration of those thoughts.

In any case, irony is a bitch that should not be tempted.

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[Politics] Robert Kaplan on Faith and War

This will only be a brief entry today as my main purpose in riting this blog is to get people to pick up a copy of this month's The American Interest, or, at least, to get them to read Robert Kaplan's article "On Forgetting the Obvious." In it, Kaplan, using his literary, historical and philosophical expertise in a profoundly synthetic manner, describes how faith, in both a religious and non-religious sense, informs our ability to effectively fight wars. In short, Kaplan proves the importance of faith in fighting, though his deliberation on the topic is far more interesting than the concept, and he concludes that the most important facet to future armies is not size, nor technological advancement, but rather the military-civilian relationship.

Below I have posted a series of questions, prompts really, to keep us thinking about what Kaplan says:

- To what extent do in-between wars create in-between faiths?

- What is the grey area between the warrior society and the humanitarian society in the 21st century? To what extent must our humanitarian goals be part of our warrior mentality (and vice versa)?

- How has our increased emphasis on the value of the private sector (and the de-emphasis on publicly-funded works) affected not just the number and class of people in the military, but the faith-driven warrior society as well? How does military privitization effect the mentality of the faithful warrior?

- To what extent has war technology (drones, smart bombs etc.) blunted our faith (or our perceived need for it)?

Please feel free to post thoughts, responses and comments. I'd love to hear what everyone has to say about Kaplan's ideas.

[Also, in further support of The American Interest, General David Petraus, the Commander of Multi-National Forces in Iraq, wrote a very good article on the need to support military leadership, military officers specifically, through civilian graduate programs.]

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[Politics] Technological Advancements in the Increasingly Moralistic Abyss

Discussing the morality of warfare is modern notion relegated to the last 100 years inasmuch as it has become a global policy to become familiar with the rules of warfare. And yet for every reason that we have found ourselves in the moral dilemnas of war because of technology, our rules and thoughts do not reflect the very dilemna of the technology itself.

With the introduction of the aerial bomb in World War I and more prominently in World War II, the question of how you kill your enemy in warfare became the difference between pride, honor and morality. Just yesterday, we entered ourselves into the next round of technological advances that have never, yet should always, give us pause about how we engage our enemies. AOL ran an Associated Press article detailing the latest air squandron headed for Iraq: a jet fighter, powered by a turboprop engine, able to fly at 300 mph and reach 50,000 feet; outfitted with infrared, laser and radar targeting, and with a ton and a half of guided bombs and missiles; controlled by a pilot at a video console in Nevada, 7,000 miles away. It is a robot.

I doubt, personally, that this latest advance will receive the kind of moralistic attention it deserves. Firstly, because this technology is not a giant leap from the spy drones and ballistic missiles we have used for some time. But we will also not rethink the moral dilemnas of war technology because we all still take pride in our military advances no matter what our views about certain wars are.

The reason we must ask ourselves whether this is a moralistic way to engage the enemy is not so much because of the technology itself, but because of where it is ultimately leading us: robotic forces on the ground engaging a human enemy on the other side. Is this an advancement we are willing to make?

In my opinion, such a step is the penultimate tragedy of our obsession with technology. It is, to me, the most morally degrading act conceivable to the art, honor and necessity of warfare. The fact is, we must see where our technology is taking us in the future, not just what it offers us in the present. We must question the value of technology as it leads us more and more towards complacency about the nature of our own existence.

That is part of what makes the day and age we live in so crucial. We are at the cusp of a time when technology can serve us to make a better world, or where we can serve our own obsession and plunge into a world where technology devoids any human engagement with the tragedy of our own making. If we do not see every advance made (not simply in the military realm, but everywhere) as an opportunity to question the value of life and the action the technology replaces, then we are bound to take the plunge into what has been, until now, dystopian science fiction.

[As an added afterthought (and self-promotion), check this interview I did with JBOT, from the band Captured! By Robots, for The Wave Magazine in 2004. JBOT, who built an ensemble of robots to play with, doesn't just question the morals we violate unto ourselves, but unto the technology we create as well]

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[Politics] Understanding The White House's Middle East Strategy

In the June 2007 issue of The Atlantic, David Samuels takes an behind-the-scenes look at the strategy and ideaology behind Condoleeza Rice's State Department and how it informs the Bush administrations course in dealing with the Middle East. The article, "Grand Illusions," is not available online (except for this excerpt) without a subscription, but it is a very insightful and fascinating read.

For one thing, it is even handed and draws on many analysts and peers to comment on how effective they believe Condi and Bush's ideas can be. It makes very clear, that, at this point, Rice, more than anyone else in the administration, represents Bush's ideology most faithfully. It also gives the reader a good sense of how the administration views the cohesiveness of its Middle East strategy while using such disparate methods for different problems in the region.

I think one of the more fascinating insights is about Rice's passionate optimism that democracy can and will transform the region. There is no doubt that part of that optimism stems from a religious sensibility, from the idea that progress is inevitable, but it is also her passion for the transformative power of democracy that remind us about the leaps and bounds it has made in the past. She sums that up best when she aks, "Not that long ago–say, 1946– would anybody have said that France and Germany would never go to war again? Anyone?"

It is ironic because the duality between our most idealistic desires and those most fearful outcomes often seem to amount to what many see as this administration's bungling of its Middle East strategy. Rice was one of those that adamantly insisted that democratic elections be held in Palestine, much against the wishes of Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas among many others. To her, it was "the right thing," and yet it resulted in the election of Hamas to majority of the Palestinian Parliament.

In dealing with Iran, the strategy has been quite different, as more covert tactics, such as providing logistical support to liberal Iranian factions, have been employed as means of routing out the extremist leadership. And this method stands in stark contrast to Iraq where a full military invasion was used in an effort to foster democracy.

In my opinion (and I think in the view of the article as well) the administration has been blinded by its optimism. In a way, it is profoundly American for such optimism to guide us. And it is traditionally a very liberal belief that democratic rights should be provided at all costs. In that sense, liberals should feel a bit uneasy about their view of the administration's Middle East policy because that policy is rooted in the idea that liberal democracy is righteous.

So we are caught between a rock and a hard place. The idealogues that have mismanaged this war in a way represent the exact same things George Washington did: a universal ideology of liberal democracy that does not recognize the subjectivity of ethnic experience. We are caught between believing in the righteousness of liberalism and democracy, and recognizing the unique perspective and experience that informs the Middle East conscience and prevent it from being influenced by such righteous politics.

Rice believes what we'd all like to believe, and really what Western thought from 1789 to 1989 have taught us. But in the 21st century, one of the most imperative revelations we must have is that democracy, self-determination and the will of the people are three very different things, far beyond their semantics. Without that realization we are left in an endless strategy of political improvisation.

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Man-Animal War: Mice Strike in China

An army of 2 billion mice have invaded central China after the June 23rd flooding on the Yangtze River raised water levels of the Dongting Lake so much that the rodents were forced to evacuate their mouse holes along the lake's islands in search of food and shelter among central China's unsuspecting population. Read about it at TheState.com.

Yes, mice are slightly cuter than rats, but no less dangerous. And at 2 billion strong they can certainly ravage a good portion of the land, as to, if nothing else, make the humans unprepared for further attacks.

So far, residents have killed 2.3 million field mice, and yet that only represents one percent of the invading army. The mice are devastating crop fields are an even damaging much needed dikes that prevent further flooding. Damn those conniving mice!

To further hypothesize on their abilities, look in my "Shared Feeds" for a story about how sex makes mice brains grow. With an 2 billion-strong invasion, it would certainly seem that the mice are having a lot of sex...and getting smarter with each coitus.

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Obvious Study Report: Alcoholics Don't Seek Treatment

The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism has released a survey that astonishingly reports that the majority of people suffering from alcoholism (about 75%) do not seek out treatment, and in cases when they do, it is usually at least 8-10 years following the onset of the addiction/affliction. Newsday.com has the report.

Firstly, of course alcoholics don't seek out treatment, that's what addiction is. If you seek out treatment, then you just really aren't committed to your addiction. To be a true addict you have to stick to the juice for awhile, otherwise, how would you ever know you are an alcoholic in the first place? These revelations take time; time and many embarassing, and often belligerent, misdeeds. There is a fine line between a moron whose had a few too many and an alcoholic, just ask any college student.

Secondly, alcoholics seek treatment everyday. Just ask one, and I'm sure they will tell you all about their regular visits to Dr. Hennessy and Nurse Smirnoff.

But in all seriousness, this survey leaves me with one (alcohol) burning question: What the hell are you going to do about it? Conduct a study? You didn't really think your survey was going to reveal that alcoholics have a good track record of giving up the bottle did you?

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Obvious Study Report: Dirty Bomb Would Cause Panic, Cost Millions, Eh?

A new federal Canadian study examining the effects of a dirty bomb explosion near the CN Tower in Toronto finds that such a terrorist attack would result in mass civilian panic and an economic toll of up to $23.5 billion. A summary of the report, the final version of which is expected to be released next March, was made available this past June and can be read at TheStar.com.

A dirty bomb would have a devastatin' effect? You don't say, eh?

Maybe it is ignorant of me to assume the above is obvious, or, at least, superfluous, but wouldn't a report like this be more valuable if it layed out a. how to prevent such an attack, and/or b. what measures to take if such an attack occurred?

Let's just take a look at some of the quotes from TheStar.com's story:

Tom Cousins, who represented the Defense Research Agency on the study project, said about the spread of radioactive contamination, "There's no getting away from the fact that you will have areas of land that will have to be cleaned up." Duh! Glad we got that straightened out. So, how do we clean up?

"There are currently no Canadian standards for cleanup after a radiological or nuclear terrorist event," said the report. Oh, well, that's reassuring. Instead of coming up with standards, you've simply told us why we need cleanup standards. I guess it is time to draft another study then.

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[Politics] Hizzoner for Prez?

I want to conduct a poll. This week New York City mayor Mike Bloomberg announced that he has left the Republican party and has registered himself as an independent in a move that many see as a precursor to a bid for the presidency. I would like to find out if people outside of New York a. know who Bloomberg is, and b. would consider voting for a successful business man turned New York City mayor. My sense of things right now is that, despite all the media speculation, Bloomberg does not have the recognition or support outside of his city to make a true bid for the presidency.

One thing he does have is money. So, believe me when I say if he only needed recognition, he could get it in a matter of weeks. But he is going to have to more than get recognized; he needs to convince Americans that a third party candidate can get as much accomplished, if not more, than his GOP and Democrat counterparts. One thing that the fawning pundits do have correct is that if there is a time in history more ripe for a challenge to the two-party system, it is now, and if there is one qualified man to bridge that gap it is Michael Bloomberg. Nevertheless, those two facts do not make the hill any easier to climb. This week's issue of Newsweek has some good coverage on the issue.

Personally, I see a few good things that could come out of a Bloomberg run. For one thing, Bloomberg has, in his tenure at City Hall, has proven himself a consistent moderate willing to work beyond party allegiances. In that sense, his ideas and initiatives serve only to address the city's problems and not to fire up his base or pander to special interests or the media. He is a self made billionaire which means two good things for his political career: 1. he is not beholden to campaign donors on policy, and 2. he has already proven his ability to run a successful office.

What I like about the possibility of a Bloomberg campaign is that he could, and would, address issues in a way that the other candidates will not. He thinks big, but not without the businessman's acumen for real world ability. And he is certainly not afraid to push seemingly unpopular ideas when he thinks it is the right thing to do. In fact Americans are very mch craving the type of independently-minded politics he exemplifies.

George Will, in his Newsweek column from the most recent issue, suggests that Bloomberg's chances at a presidential bid are practically non-existent for lack of three things that have, in the past, given third party candidates some semblance of success: a vivid personality, a regional base and a burning issue. I concede that Bloomberg is lacking these qualities. However, a vivid personality, if the past is any idication, to me, simply means that the candidate is essentially a caricature: not a quality you want in a president even if in a campaign it gives you recognition. And seemingly Bloomberg's regional base is small, but with billions of dollars in hand, that base could grow rather quickly.

Finally, yes, Bloomberg does not have that burning issue to make a name for himself, but, as far as I can tell, the country will not allow the debate to be hijacked by a single issue in 2008. It is actually the Democrats that are doing a good job of making sure that this election is about several important issues. So for Bloomberg, a single burning issue to address would only make him look like a weak candidate. Will asks "He is said to represent 'post partisanship,' but if so - if he is not a partisan of any large cause - why is he needed?" This question, as far as I can tell, simply asks why Bloomberg is not willing to sacrifice himself for a single (controversial) cause. And in asking that question, Will shows his ignorance as to what a "post-partisan" third-party candidate is; it is someone that is everything past third-party contenders were not: He is not a novelty; he is not sexy, invigorating or nostalgic. He is like the partisan contenders, except that he is not beholden to the rhetoric of party lines. He shows an ability to tacklebig ideas through undramatic solutions and bipartisan consensus. In other words, he is boring; compromise always is, but after eight years of partisan bickering, America is looking for a boring compromise.

(As an end note, everyone should read Jonathan Alter's Newsweek column on why Bloomberg would make an ideal VP. For all the problems of him as president, I only see great things with him as second in command.)

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