Reihan Caves? No, Reihan Moves
Andrew linked to this post and noted,
He also hasn’t responded to this comment:
She didn’t tell the congress anything about building or not building the bridge, but she kept the earmark money and Alaska built an approach road to where the bridge was going to be. So she supposedly said, “I don’t want your stinking money for the bridge, we’ll build it ourselves. Oh by the way, that only applies to the bridge, we’ll take your money to build the approach road.”
She does seem to have scaled back on earmarks, but she was very very earmark friendly earlier in her administration and as mayor of Wasaillia. Again, all this is available in news reports and on video.
Reihan, you are the last person I thought would be engaging in partisan spin. I thought you wanted a new party.
First, I’ll just note that it’s an honor to be linked by Andrew.
It’s very rare that I respond to comments. I actually didn’t even read the comments to that post, but I’m very glad Andrew flagged it for me. He is a careful and attentive reader, which is why he is so indispensable to the blogosphere. I happen to disagree with the thrust of the comment in question — I find the characterization I linked to reasonable and persuasive, which is why I linked to it. It’s not clear to me that cw, one of our favorite commenters around these parts, read Professor Ramey’s take. My summary was pretty crude. Zeroing out the project as governor was a big deal.
As for engaging in partisan spin, I’d submit that Professor Ramey was trying to add context — he acknowledged that Palin’s remarks are misleading, for example. Andrew writes that I’m defending Palin’s massive public lie. I wonder if this is an example of selective scrutiny. Was Obama lying about his views on preferential trade agreements during the primary campaign, for example? No. But as Obama acknowledged in an interview with Nina Easton, his views became overheated and amplified during the course of the campaign, which happens a great deal in campaign rhetoric. Palin’s role in rolling back the Bridge to Nowhere has clearly been “overheated and amplified” for purposes of political advantage.
But I had another reason for not responding: I was moving today. I’ve moved from the house I’ve lived for two and a half years to an apartment a few blocks south. I had the help of two really cool professional movers, one of whom is one of the masterminds behind T-Shirt Insurgency, a little company that makes great lefty T-shirts. (I particularly like “Do You Trust Your Children Alone with High Fructose Corn Syrup?”)
Daniel Larison also has a forceful, smart take here, which Andrew links in his post. Daniel also has a follow-up here, which uses my remarks as a jumping-off point. The nice thing about Daniel is that he consistently, rigorously applies his high standards of honesty and integrity to both campaigns. That’s not true of all critics of the presidential candidates.
Do I regret referring readers to Professor Ramey? Nope. I really do think “lying” isn’t the right way to characterize what’s happening here — flip-flopping, however, clearly is fair, and that’s been, to his credit, a key part of Obama’s critique of Palin. Palin’s approach to the Bridge to Nowhere smacks of rank opportunism, not unlike the use by some basically pro-trade candidates of harsh anti-trade rhetoric.
I have to say, anarchism is looking pretty good to me these days.
I mean crunchy anarchism, Malagasy style. The following is drawn from Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology, by David Graeber.
While people made rhetorical reference to Malagasy as equal and united “like hairs on a head,” ideals of economic equality were rarely, if ever, invoked; however, it was assumed that anyone who became too rich or powerful would be destroyed by witchcraft, and while witchcraft was the definition of evil, it was also seen as peculiarly Malagasy (charms were just charms but evil charms were called “Malagasy charms”). Insofar as rituals of moral solidarity did occur, and the ideal of equality was invoked, it was largely in the course of rituals held to suppress, expel, or destroy those witches who, perversely, were the twisted embodiment and practical enforcement of the egalitarian ethos of the society itself.
I think I’m going to curtail hasty political blogging, comrades.
I have to say, anarchism is looking pretty good to me these days.
If I could change a few things about our public intellectual life, I’d expand the ranks of ideologies and ideas that are considered politically serious or permissible. Baby, I’m not an anarchist, but there are many people who will tell you there’s no such thing as a serious anarchist, and I think that’s lame. Less excluded ideologies, more free-wheeling political thought, more “politics at play”.
— Freddie · Sep 12, 02:04 AM · #
Reihan,
I don’t think anyone suggested that you shouldn’t have linked to the Professor Ramey piece. It does provide some context regarding Palin’s overall record with regard to the issue (albeit a somewhat one sided picture). What if doesn’t provide is any support to the claim that she isn’t “lying.” If anything, while Prof. Ramey is too polite to use the word, it supports the conclusion that she is lying.
It isn’t complicated. In determining whether a person is “lying”, we need to answer two simple questions. Did the person make factual misstatements? Were those misstatements knowing? The available evidence clearly supports “yes” answers to both questions.
Obama and trade? His statements were “overheated and amplified.” Maybe even misleading. Maybe. But were there any specific, knowingly wrong factual claims? No. (And, of course, it’s significant that he DID pay a political price, arguably a steep one (the primary might have been over two months earlier if he won Ohio, and he might have won Ohio without the trade gaffe), for his comments on trade – or at least for the contrast between his comments and the comments of his economic advisor. If Palin pays even half as much of a price over her bridge to nowhere lies, I’m sure the Dems will be thrilled).
Now, one can argue that the lie is inconsequential, but one cannot, credibly, argue that she is telling the truth. Credibility is a currency difficult to earn but easy to spend. You are burning through your credibility on this one. When you’re in a hole, the first rule is: stop digging. That’s my advice to you.
— LarryM · Sep 12, 02:11 AM · #
Reihan, thanks for the nice complement. You are right, I didn’t read that link. I just did and I don’t think it changes my opinion much, which I already knew it wouldn’t so that’s why I didn’t need to read it. I think she could have talked about the bridge differently and be correct and claim some credit, but as stated, it gives very much the incorrect impression, which is her intent.
So anyway, I think a better headline would have been: Reihan Moves to a Cave In Malagasy.
And you know what? You got to get some of your old mojo back. This campaign has been tough on you. You are on the wrong side of the attack-respond cycle. You got to go on the offensive with something offensive. I think it’s time for a new video. Maybe not right exactly now—you need to do some healing first, maybe a few days at a spa to recenter yourself—but in a few days. Come back with something that wows all your critics and reestablishes your credentials as a manly agent for change. You and Barack Obama both. No pressure.
— cw · Sep 12, 02:12 AM · #
One more thing – I DID read the Ramey piece. Now Reihan, despite some harsh comments from time to time, I do respect your thinking most of the time, while almost never agreeing for it. But to read the Ramey piece, and come away from it with the impression that it proved that Palin wasn’t lying, suggests that you have completely lost your objectivity with regard to this election.
Though kudos to you for linking to the critical posts. Larison in particular is a treasure, and I think every hawkish social conservative (well, not just them, everybody!) would do well to read him every day as a reality check on their views.
— LarryM · Sep 12, 02:24 AM · #
I think I’m going to curtail hasty political blogging, comrades.
Not a good idea. You’re a pleasure to read both as a blogger and as a long-form writer, so you may as well make a distinction between the two. I love no blog so much as Kausfiles, largely for the charm of Kaus’ always-surprising neuroses but also because I recognize another guy deeply enamoured of the late ’80’s/early ’90s DLC/neolib ideas [But you roll your eyes when he writes about immigration! -ed. I didn’t say I agreed with him about everything.] But I really fell for that blog, and blogs in general, during the California recall election, when Kaus and Dan Weintraub and other people really shone, becuase the pacing was so compressed that the blog “insta-takes” were really the best way to figure out what was going on — indeed I can’t think of anything else since where I felt nearly as strongly that I valued weblog coverage. That “insta-take” property is the saving grace of the medium for me, though, and I’d rather read with the understanding that anything you blog is a bit half-assed (whereas the long-form stuff is more considered), frankly.
— Sanjay · Sep 12, 02:30 PM · #
bqflip-flopping
Your new solution to the problem of having to deal with Palin’s dissembling is equally wanting. The problem with the analogy between Palin’s bridge support and Obama’s trade support is that Obama is (to grant the entirety of your criticism arguendo) opportunistically changing his views and positions. Palin, on the other hand, is making a statement of fact about a past event.
She is not switching her support for the bridge to nowhere, flip-floppishly, because there is no such remaining cause to support. The event happened in the past and she is claiming that she opposed it, when in fact she did not. That’s not flip-flopping, that’s just lying. She has made the specific factual claim that she “told Congress ‘Thanks, but no thanks, for that bridge to Nowhere” (I can quote it without reference because she repeats it by rote. I find that creepy, but that’s neither here nor there). Not only did she never tell Congress any such thing, she was in fact told by Congress that the Bridge to Nowhere was not coming, and she then told Congress “Thanks for the cash anyway” and she built a road to the Lack of a Bridge to Nowhere.
Thanks for the Tshirt Insurgency link. I can’t decide between Some Blood For Oil and Melancholy Ninja.
— sidereal · Sep 12, 06:15 PM · #
How much are those t-shirts? I’m not going to follow the link becasue I probably already know: $23, something like that. Much too much, much too hip. What song am I paraphrasing?
— cw · Sep 12, 11:28 PM · #
shirts are 17.99. sometimes you actually don’t know, cw…
— joe. · Sep 18, 02:13 PM · #