December 2008 Archives

The world mourns us Jews when we die. It's so sorry about the Holocaust and the 6 million slaughtered simply for being Jews. The world regretted the killing of the Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics, and it was too bad about Leon Klinghofer. Yes, the world feels for us when we die, but not when we fight back.

Rockets pouring into Israel is a small story for the world. But for Israelis, it's not so small. The United States would be unlikely to tolerate 30, 40, 50 rockets a day coming into our territory from Cuba--particularly if Cuba denied our right to exist.

The world mourns for Palestinians when Israelis kill them, but strangely not when they kill each other or are slaughtered by the Jordanian military--as they were on Black September. The Arab World mourns their tragic plight--as they should--but they do not take them in and assimilate them. They're imprisoned in Gaza and in camps in Lebanon in order to keep the festering wound open.

One of the many troubling pictures in my head is that when Palestinians blow up Israelis, they celebrate. When Israelis bomb Palestinians, there is neither joy nor celebration. The dead are just as dead and the mourners' grief is just as great...yet it is a disturbing distinction.

For a moment let's assume that both sides are right. Israel can't tolerate rockets coming in from a land sworn to destroy the nation. And Palestinians are right that their lives are untenable. Let's stipulate that everyone has a perfectly understandable right to be furious.

Now, let's ask the Dr. Phil question: So how's this working for everyone? We've been doing this for over 40 years and who is safer, more secure and living better? If insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results, this is indeed crazy.

The future is clear if we continue like this. More Palestinians are willing to die than Israel is willing to kill. Becoming more willing to kill might not be the right answer. Breaking this tragic chain of inevitability is the only hope. The chain is strong--forged by years of death, and hope is weak. But it is real.

©2008 Jonathan Dobrer
www.Dobrer.org

The by now standard paradox about virtually all Israeli Defense Force operations is that legions of Israeli writers, analysts, labor and government officials ask two questions that Israeli generals never seem to ask. And that is what will a military assault ultimately cost politically and militarily and just plain from a lives lost standpoint and what will it really achieve?

Those are the questions being asked again by the legion of Israelis who plainly worry that bombing and a military incursion into Gaza will be failed, flawed, and ultimately self-defeating. It will once more prove that these attacks don't equal peace but war that leads to more war. The more war syndrome perpetuates a bloodletting cycle that leads to greater misery for Israel.

The passions, hatred, bitterness, and thirst for revenge by the Palestinians who have lost loved ones many of them innocent women, children and old people and the Israelis who have also lost loved ones many of them just as innocent is never ending. The hope as always for something that resembles a stable peace is that there are just enough sane and responsible Israelis and Palestinians who genuinely believe that peace comes from diplomacy and not out of the muzzle of a tank or the missile tube of an F16 aimed at a Gaza home or from a missile launch pad or mortars aimed at an Israeli home.

Gail, I'll happily concede that the Palestinians and larger Arab world have been irresponsible jerks, acting like victims of little Israel. But because there are so many explosive issues of religious identity between an angry Muslim populace and a self-proclaimed Jewish nation, that's precisely why America -- the most powerful nation on earth, which functions as an avowed secular democracy -- should be neutral regarding this holy mess.

The Holy Land has been a holy mess ever since God ordered the first act of terrorism in Deuteronomy against Canaanite women, children and livestock. The Stern gang and Arabs extended that tradition. Anger seems to be the only manner of dialogue there, and that is seen in Israeli approaches to impose day-to-day misery on average Palestinians (as with the Gaza economic blockade that preceded this debacle). As for the UN partition in 1948, that seems to be the only time that Israel respected UN wishes.

Both sides are at fault, and neither Arab fanatics nor Israeli settlers want peace. But the U.S. loses global credibility (and does no favors for Israel ultimately) when it acts as if one side is totally at fault.

If someone ever invents a "Does Not Take Responsibility for Anything Award" to be given to a people, I am going to recommend that the Palestinians top the list of nominees. In fact, my list would look like this:

1. Palestinians
2. Palestinians and their predecessors
3. Terrorists (along with the aforementioned)
4. Arabs living in the West Bank of Israel and Gaza (see the above)
5. Those jerks living in other countries who grow and harvest them.
6. The French for letting them in en masse

For years now, the Palestinians have been lobbing rockets and grenades into Israel and what do they do now that Israel has performed one little military operation back? They cry victim. Judging by some people's comments, it seems to be working, too. Here's a recap of some classics.

"It's not fair. The Israelis have killed more Palestinians than the Palestinians have Israelis."

Einstein, it's not a dance where someone taps you and you tap him back. These are terrorists we're talking about here. Not society debutantes.

"Israel stole the land."

Repeat after me:
The UN partitioned the land and declared Israel a state in 1948. The UN partitioned the land and declared Israel a state in 1948. The UN partitioned the land and declared Israel a state in 1948. Oh, never mind.

"The Israelis target children and civilians."

Hello out there in TV Land. Has it even occurred to you that the terrorists hide among their own people thus putting them in harm's way?

And my number one, all-time favorite, "Israel is the aggressor."

Global warming must be taking a bigger toll than I thought. If anything, the Israeli people have exercised restraint while they have had grenades and rockets rained in on them. It's one of the few places in the world where that kind of thing is tolerated.

Oh, never mind. We'll start all over again later on.

Caroline Kennedy eyeing Hillary Clinton's Senate seat without having run for something, even the president of the PTA, smacks of hubris, audacity and braggadocio.

The truth be told, she wouldn't have generated all the media hype had last name been Marley, Reynolds or another name along those lines. Even so, the unenlightened feel that her resume has provided her with ample experience including a three-hour a week fundraising stint for the New York City public school system and board positions on non-profit organizations like the Kennedy Library, the Commission on Presidential Debates and the New York City Ballet. (Guess how she got those.)

If it really is her resume, then I'd like to toss my hat in the ring as well because mine includes the following:

Wrangled a bus for a fieldtrip that produced one diesel-burning coach and one short-tempered driver.

Worked 40 hours a week, though some may say it is only really three. As of now, those people will not get any holiday cards from me.

Tolerated coworkers who always hold meetings over with one last question when it is time to go home. (They're not getting any cards, either.)

Minded my manners and didn't eat more than two slices of pizza at the luncheon hosted by some financial advisors to promote their services.

Basically, I am patient, a nice dresser and don't have any files at the DMV, and I would be willing to move to NYC as long as I could get discounted theatre tickets. So what do you say, Al Sharpton and the New York union honchos? Want to go for some grub?

Looks like the GOP still struggles to be inclusive, as can be seen in this story about a GOP operative who mailed out a CD of such holiday hits as "Barack the Magic Negro."

Of course, most Republicans will frown on such behavior. But the reason such behavior hasn't yet evaporated altogether is because the GOP's leaders have for decades exploited racial resentment and, um, "Southern srategies," just enough to squeeze out an electoral win here and there. We seem to be moving past that now, although this story seems to show that not all of us are moving at the same pace.

The smile on Eartha Kitt's face was unforgettable. It belied the pain, ridicule and turmoil that she had endured after she was unceremoniously shoved at or near the top of then President Lyndon Johnson's enemies list. But that seemed to be the furthest thing from her mind that late spring afternoon in 1978 when she greeted me at the old Aquarius Theater in Hollywood. Kitt was in Los Angeles starring in her tour production of the musical Timbuktu. I was assigned to do a brief interview and a review of the production.
Kitt's smile and infectious energy melted the awe and nervousness that I felt at being up close too and actually talking with an entertainment legend. Then there was the "incident." That was the furor that Kitt ignited when she denounced the Vietnam War and poverty to Johnson at that White House luncheon in January, 1968. A decade later the controversy still got the tongues wagging.

Her performance in Los Angeles was in part Kitt's American scene entertainment rehabilitation after being virtually banned in the U.S. after her Johnson White House outburst. Her performance was also in part a brash effort to reclaim the luster that had made her virtually a household name and an icon in the entertainment world in the 1950s and early 1960s. By then Kitt had firmly established her legacy as an award winning internationally acclaimed singer, dancer, film, stage and TV actress. Kitt was tagged as sultry, sensual, and sexual alluring. But that was the surface stuff. Kitt's brash, sassy, and high energy style and persona sent the clear message that she was her own woman. She refused to be relegated to the stereotypical stage and film roles, and turned her sensuality into a badge of fierce independence and pride, the trademark of defiance. Kitt's pioneer independence and sense of self influenced the coming generation of young female entertainers and personalities from Oprah to Beyonce to Madonna. They owe her a debt of gratitude.

But even that side of Kitt obscured the Kitt who was passionately devoted to and supported peace and civil rights causes. The clash with Johnson, really the Johnson's, Lyndon and Lady Bird Johnson, at the celebrity women's luncheon in January 1968 gave the first public hint of that.

Lady Bird Johnson had invited Kitt to the luncheon and in an innocent moment asked Kitt what she thought about the problems of inner city youth. Kitt didn't mince words and lambasted the Johnson administration for not doing more about poverty, joblessness, and drugs in black communities. Kitt didn't stop there, she tied her outburst directly into an attack on the Vietnam War, a war she said was without reason or explanation. Kitt's verbal assault on the war and racial problems made headline news. A badly shaken first lady and an enraged LBJ denounced her. The next few years she was hounded and harassed by the FBI, the IRS and Secret Service agents. The CIA even compiled a gossipy, intrusive dossier on her that attempted to paint her as a sex starved malcontent. The public storm and the negative press proved too much.

Kitt's career was effectively dead in the United States. But she stuck by her guns and did not apologize, retract or soften her criticism of Johnson's war and racial policies. Kitt in fact hadn't said anything at that luncheon that thousands of others hadn't said about Johnson's hopelessly failed, flawed and losing war and racial problems. The difference was who said it; namely a celebrated star, and where it was said at the White House. Kitt took the heat and paid the price for giving an honest opinion and her deep felt belief about the cause of peace and social justice. She was branded as a racial agitator.
Missed in the overreaching hysteria and the vindictive bashing was that underneath the glitter and carefully crafted sexpot image, Kitt had given time and money to the NAACP and other civil rights organizations. She supported and participated in the March on Washington. During her wilderness years when she was forced to work outside the U.S. she took heat for performing before all white audiences in South Africa. But like so much about Kitt that went unnoticed, she broke barriers by insisting that her cast was integrated. She also quietly raised money for black schools in the country.

During our brief talk before her stage performance in Los Angeles, Kitt spent as much time talking about her devotion to the civil rights movement and the injustice of apartheid in South Africa, than about the production she was in. She did not mince words when I gingerly asked her about the "incident." She laughed but did not express any regret about what she said and did that day at the White House. She expressed no bitterness about the years of media and public ostracism.

This is the Eartha Kitt, the impassioned contributor to peace and civil rights, that I knew, remember, and pay homage to.
C'est si bon"
Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. His forthcoming book is How Obama Won (Middle Passage Press, January 2009).

It was fun to see Earl on CNN recently, debating with David Gergen and some other distinguished talking heads!

Jonathan says that Obama's choice of Rick Warren for I-Day will backfire. I still believe that both Obama and Warren are shrewdly taking a risk because they realize they each represent the sole opening that the other one needs to expand their reach. That's noble for both of them, but it could take ten years for people to realize that.

It's called creative compromise. If you look back at what the Great Emancipator actually said about black equality in the 1850s, it wasn't terribly complimentary. We look back on it now as a case of Lincoln pushing his agenda gently, in accordance with the times. At a moment when gay marriage got hammered at the ballot box, I think the gay community can see that creative compromise, and creative engagement, can do more to achieve their long-term goals than by rubbing every last evangelical's nose in it.

On another note, Gail-T says that the shoe-tossing Iraqi was out of bounds. I totally agree. I don't think anyone needs to praise the shoe-tosser for his "courage," but I think it's a blackly comic icon of the President's relationship with much of the world.

The soon to be release of a report on the contacts that President-elect Barack Obama or any of his staff members may have had with scandal-plagued Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich will likely quiet the rumors and gossip about Obama and the governor. That's because Obama will release the report and it would defy credulity to think that he would release a report that showed anything inappropriate or worse in whatever dealings he had with the governor.

This is probably not a case of a politician circling the wagon and sanitizing a report to avoid scandal. The FBI wiretap transcripts at least the ones that have been reported don't show that the president-elect did anything that could even be remotely construed as an attempt to cut any deals or influence peddle with the governor over his senate seat.

Yet, there are still some nagging questions that the report will attempt to answer. And those answers may not be the right answers. The one obvious question is the known and acknowledged contact that Obama's chief of staff Rahm Emanuel had with Blago. There's only the faintest hint that Emanuel may have lobbied Blago to appoint a key Obama staffer to the senate seat. An informant claims the motive in making the contact supposedly was to eliminate her as a potential rival for Obama's ear in the White House. We only have the informant's word for that and since this person is unnamed and given that Blago's credibility is zilch the hint of an impropriety in the contact isn't likely to go much further than that. The report will likely say that.

However, the fact is that Emanuel did talk with Blago about the appointment, innocent or not, and this raises this question," Was this his idea, or did he do it with a wink and a nod from Obama? That raises yet another question. That is whether Obama knew or didn't know about his talk with Blago. Even if he didn't, why did Emanuel talk with Blago about it or any other matter that even remotely could have dredged up questions about Obama's involvement in a matter that presumably had nothing to do with him.

That's not all. When the allegation first broke that Blago demanded a payment for the seat from Jesse Jackson, Jr. Obama issued a categorical denial that no one on his staff had anything to do with the Jackson flap, or had any dealings at all with Blago about the seat. This obviously was not exactly the case, or was it? It's another loose end question dangling. The FBI wiretap transcripts when fully made public can and probably will shed much more light on the Emanuel-Blago tie.

The Blago-Emanuel and by extension Obama connect in itself would normally be little more than a pinprick distraction except for the long history of corrupt Chicago style wheeling and dealing. During the campaign Obama took occasional hits for his alleged dubious dealings with convicted financier Tony Rezko. There was no proof of any wrongdoing in those dealings. But it did toss an ugly glare on corruption in Chicago politics and how some Chicago politicians aren't averse to trading favors, legal or otherwise, for gain. However, trading favors may be fine for some in Chicago since it's widely assumed that that's the way business is done in some political circles there anyway. But that style would and should have no place in an Obama White House.
Now that raises yet another question. Can Emanuel assure that he and other Obama staff members will play it by the book when it comes to doing business in the White House? That's not a small question. Obama's major election appeal was that he promised to be a politician of a different sort. Millions who backed him took that to mean that transparency will be the watchword in an Obama White House and that the back room conniving, special interest influence peddling, deal making MO of his predecessors will be a thing of the past. Obama needs to reassure that indeed that will be the case. This makes the question what did he know and when did he know it more than a passing academic question.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. His forthcoming book is How Obama Won (Middle Passage Press, January 2009). http://www.learnhowobamawon.blogspot.com

The instant that Caroline Kennedy faintly hinted that she was interested in Hillary Clinton's possibly soon vacant senate seat she got pounded. Kennedy was take your pick, just an inexperienced part time education consultant, an Obama shoulder rubber, a Park Avenue dilettante, and her senate bid was nothing more than a crass and naked grab to cash in her JFK blood tie. The point in the attacks was that she was a political novice using her famed name to vault over a pack of far more worthy, seasoned, and political dues paying elected officials to get the seat. None of the other presumed more deserving candidates would need OJT in the senate seat. Kennedy would.

The attacks, rightly or wrongly, stung, and Kennedy quickly looked around the political landscape to find the right someone to burnish her admittedly paper thin political resume. The someone she latched onto was the Reverend Al Sharpton. This brought a fresh volley of criticism of Kennedy for picking Sharpton. He is to some critics the wrong someone to give her the needed political luster.

He's still widely regarded as an ego driven, media hogging race baiting agitator and opportunist who will jump on any cause to get some TV face time. Some news blogs took giddy delight in skewering Sharpton for emailing a public statement puffing himself up as so important that Kennedy would personally call him and ask for a meeting presumably to talk politics and her candidacy. There were more guffaws when Sharpton cracked that his meal jaunt with Obama during the presidential campaign somehow helped him win the White House. Obama dined with him at Sylvia's, the famed black restaurant spot in Harlem.

The personal hits on Sharpton are nothing more than the ritual anti-Sharpton name calling stuff. They tell nothing about why a Kennedy met and dined with Sharpton at Sylvia's let alone what she felt Sharpton could do to help her nab Clinton's seat.

This is a hard pill for some to swallow but Sharpton has been a pathway for a lot of Democrats and would be Democratic politicians to go through for years to get and stay on the political radar scope. That's in part because of who many perceive Sharpton to be and the influence that he has on the street with many blacks, Latinos, the poor and community activists. This is a constituency that no liberal or moderate Democrat can afford to ignore or alienate.

In other part Sharpton's appeal is his media pull and image. The lines between the two are hopelessly blurred. A sound bite, photo-op, rock star and Hollywood celebrity allure can mean as much if not more in determining a candidate's political fate than what they have to say about global warming, the deficit, the Iraq war, campaign reform, or the Wall Street meltdown.

Sharpton is instant media and image. Kennedy's meal with him at Sylvia's was a paparrazi's delight. The bank of TV cameras and photographers elbowing each other to get a quote, quip, and shots of Kennedy and Sharpton coming, going and sitting inside Sylvia's was the best proof of that.

This is not to say that Sharpton is the consummate political king or queen maker. Kennedy will still have to sell herself. She'll have to kiss the obligatory rings of the political and financial deal makers, spell out to voters what her vision and program is, and how she'll arm twist Congress and the Obama administration to help New York dig out of its crushing revenue shortfall. Sharpton can't help her there. She's on her own. This is the true test of whether her senate talk is just a whimsical fling, or if she really wants it and has the right stuff to handle the job.

This is the only way that she can stand the inexperience rap against her on its head and maybe even in a quirky way turn that into an asset. Legions of voters hold their nose in disgust at the sex, corruption and deal making antics of career politicians. Oddly, in between the photo ops and food munching Sharpton didn't actually say that Kennedy's the one. He touted her as an attorney and praised her for her work on behalf of children. That hardly qualifies her for the seat.

But that didn't much matter in the glare of the cameras. A beaming Kennedy standing before the bank of TV cameras with Sharpton in tow was a win win for both. It showed for the moment at least that the man that many love and many more love to hate is in her camp. It was a win win for Sharpton in that it showed that he was important enough for her to want him in her camp.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. His new book is How Obama Won (Middle Passage Press, January 2009).

Obama's choice of Rick Warren to give his inauguration invocation strikes chords of "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn" in this journalist's heart.

While some may think that Obama is a turncoat, and a modern-day Benedict Arnold, what he does after the inauguration, as in during the next four years, is more important than who's been invited to give the kick-off speech. Warren may be uber- conservative, but some homosexuals liken anyone who opposes their agenda to the new Public Enemy who must be stripped of all means of support and sent to live in a little grass hut.

It would be different had he chosen Osama bin Laden, a rank and file member of the PLO or a skinhead for the slot, but Warren is hardly frothing at the mouth and appears to be nothing of the sort. He is merely someone who has a different opinion from some of Obama's supporters, and the president-elect has said that he chose him to bring divergent sides together.

After all, his cabinet is composed of those from different creeds and ethnicities, and the reverend could just be another piece in the set. All he needs now is an openly gay person to have a matching set.

Obama's selection of Rev Rick Warren to give the invocation at his inauguration is dispiriting. Though I am neither female nor gay, the choice of an anti-choice pastor feels like a personal betrayal. Most of the analysis so far has centered on Warren being pro Prop 8, because it's safer to focus on the gay issue than choice.

The symbolism of Obama beginning his presidency with an invocation by a person who stands in opposition to his most loyal base is insulting. Progressives have been relatively silent about Obama's Republican and center right appointments--so far. This however is a big deal, a shoe hurled in the faces of pro-choice people and gays.

Yes, Obama wants to reach out across our many divides, and Evangelicals are important. How many will Obama attract with this gesture as against how many of his core constituency will he disappoint? The optics, the symbolism and the politics are wrong and clumsy. This is not cynicism but a miscalculation.

Warren, however, is no monster. He's an old fashioned Social Gospel Christian, who, like Huckabee, feels for the poor. He represents a part of the Evangelical movement that should be wooed and not alienated. Center stage on opening day is just not appropriate.

I foresee big trouble between now and the inauguration as well as protests during the invocation. I can see members of the crowd rising and turning their backs on Warren. I believe the choice of Warren and the protests of attendees will do exactly the opposite of Obama's intent. This will exacerbate the width and depth of a divide that needs healing.

©2008 Jonathan Dobrer
www.Dobrer.org

I don't care what anyone says. No one has a right to throw anything at anyone unless it is a bouquet at a wedding or something else of value, and it is the same for President Bush and the shoe-throwing incident. This includes all forms of hurling the things across the room, too whether it is in person or in a video game.

I know it is a freedom of speech issue founded by the non shoe-throwing founding fathers but that doesn't mean that common decency should go flailing across the room, too. Besides, there are other ways of registering disdain for another person like confiding in a friend, posting an entry in a journal or in the case of a public figure, writing a letter or staging a protest or demonstration.

While I don't like to see people getting killed (except for terrorists, Nazis or skinheads, which are pretty much the same thing) I was one of the .000876% of the population who thought that we should have gone into Iraq and deposed Saddam Hussein just for being a lunatic, a madman and one heck of a nutty guy.

I'm with Earl on Obama picking Rick Warren for his inaugural invocation. Obama said it best when he said that this is about maintaining the unifying dialogue that he's been championing.

Liberal activists need to be reminded, time and again, that this conservative country didn't suddenly turn liberal, it simply rejected some conservatives that it deemed to be incompetent. That provides an opening for a pragmatic progressive like Obama. But activists will have to remember that he's a pragmatist first. And that, frankly, may be their best hope for the future.

I've heard some wiseacres say that the only thing that the Iraqi shoe thrower should be jailed for is missing Bush. I'm not going there with that. After all, Nikita Khrushchev simply banged his shoe in 1960 on a table at a United Nations General Assembly meeting, to protest discussion of Soviet Union policy toward Eastern Europe. But the tossed shoe was emblematic of the sad, sorry, pathetic depth that Bush has sunk too. A couple of weeks earlier at the summit of world leaders not one of them shook his hand as he passed them by in the receiving line.

Bush knew he was a pariah among his peers. If this shame insult and public humiliation wasn't bad enough. Word leaked out shortly after that not one major publisher would touch the obligatory self-serving, scrubbed memoirs that ex presidents like to dump on the public (and that largely gather dust on book store shelves) Of course, the world, and Bush in a quiet moment, knows that there's only one person to blame for his much deserved ignominy and that person is named Bush. That didn't take a lousy aimed shoe too drive that point home.

President elect Barack Obama almost certainly knew that he'd take some heavy flack from gay rights and abortion rights groups for picking mega preacher Rick Warren to give his inaugural invocation. Warren backed the anti gay marriage Prop 8 in California to the hilt and rails against abortion. But Obama picked Warren for shrewd political and apparently heartfelt personal reasons. A tip of that came back in mid-August when he traipsed to Warren's Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, California to talk to his evangelical flock.

At the time Warren reportedly had to arm twist some of his more recalcitrant members into accepting Obama's appearance. But accept they did. Or at least they didn't publicly grouse about it. But Obama also did his part to make the sell. He flatly said that he'd do more than any other presumed liberal Democrat had done in recent times to get an ear from evangelicals even if that meant breaking bread with preachers who were hardnosed opponents of gay rights and abortion.

The Warren visit wasn't really anything new in Obama's drive to court the evangelicals. In January when he needed to snatch the legions of black voters away from backing Hillary Clinton in the South Carolina Democratic primary he did the politically expedient thing and grabbed at the hugely popular gospel crooner Donnie McClurkin. He ignored the loud shouts that McClurkin was a gay bashing homophobe and headlined him at a giant part revival part campaign rally in the state.

Obama understood the power of religion, the evangelical appeal that is, to lure thousands of doubting and hostile believers to his fold. He has written and repeatedly talked about his professed testament of faith and deep belief in traditional religious values.

The Warren church visit and picking him for his inaugural invocation fit in perfectly with his evangelical court.

But the Warren pick is more than a crass political move. It's about numbers and influence. The surge in mega churches such as Warren's Saddleback Church with membership that tops 30,000 and the proliferation of televangelist programs, and Christian broadcast networks nationally and in local areas has made it easier to spread the evangelical message and subtly influence political causes. The Association of Evangelicals has been on the frontline in fulfilling that mission. The NAE had nearly 50,000 member congregations with 30 million members in 2005.

In a survey by the Detroit News in 2005 following Bush's reelection the question was asked whether the church should have more influence in politics. Nearly sixty percent agreed. Though the majority of Christian evangelicals are Republican leaning, many of them are Democrats too (about thirty percent in some surveys), and that boded well for Obama during the election. They would vote for Democratic candidates as long as they are conservative and adhere to the moral values tenets. Obama just had to make sure that he toed just close enough to their line on faith and morals values issues to not have them dash to the barricades to vote against him as would have been the case if Hillary had been the nominee.

Obama spotted a small opening to the evangelicals with the death of Jerry Falwell in May 2007. The evangelicals no longer had a nationally known name leader of stature to rally, inflame, implore, and energize them, and with the abysmal failure of the Bush and the GOP congress to get any thing done on their agenda opposing abortion and gay marriage evangelicals had hopelessly soured on them. The talk then and now is that many young evangelicals aren't totally consumed by these issues and are more worried about the economy, the war, poverty, HIV/AIDS and global warming.

There is some truth to that and Warren has certainly harped on those themes to help push his following off the charts. The larger truth, though, is that not all evangelicals share the same politics, ideology, and or hardly uniform in their thinking on abortion, gay marriage, and family values issues. Many are liberal, moderate, and even solid Democrats. They do care about the economy, education, health care. Some are even supportive of abortion and gay rights, deeply opposed to the Iraq war, and backed Obama.
But millions more didn't and still have no hesitation in describing and identifying as evangelicals and loyally backing GOP candidates with their votes and organizing for them. Christian evangelical leaders have long known that if they could galvanize the faithful they could not only elect local and state officials but presidents as well. They also knew that they could influence if not outright dictate public policy, namely passing legislation, initiatives, and amendments, and influencing public opinion.

The sixty to eighty million Christian evangelicals are still too big, too important, and to politically strategic to ignore. Obama knows that and that's a big reason Warren will pray at his inaugural and will get Obama's ear after the prayers end.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. His forthcoming book is How Obama Won (Middle Passage Press January 2009)

Bush is certainly an easy target for jokes--but a slightly harder target for shoes. He does get points for moving to his left (a first for him) and avoiding two hard thrown shoes from close range. Baseball seems to have paid off for him.

But this story is actually more important than it may seem. It is about more than an angry journalist, an offended Iraqi and an affronted Muslim--all rolled into one guy. Yes, we all know by now that throwing shoes is deeply insulting in the Arab World. Even showing someone the sole of your shoe is an affront. Having lived in the Arab World, I'll tell you a smart executive does not put his feet up on the desk or even on an ottoman. Shoes are, after all, covered with dirt and all kinds of things found on streets and in alleys. Exposing someone to the sole of a shoe is symbolically to smear their faces with dirt and excrement.

Aside from the symbolism and the rage it expresses, this shoe story has, well, legs. It captures in a few seconds the microcosm of Bush and Iraq. At one level, everyone involved looks bad. Bush is a target of disrespect while on his legacy tour. The Secret Service is caught flatfooted and it is left to al-Maliki to try to ward off the second shoe. Al-Maliki looks bad for having his hospitality sullied by such disrespect to his personal guest. The laws of hospitality are taken seriously in the Arab World. The Iraqi justice system (is this term an oxymoron?) also looks bad. The pitcher is not only taken out of the game but then is beaten senseless by the police.

If this were not enough to make this iconic moment live in history, the shoe-thrower has become a hero--not only amongst his fellow Shiites in Iraq but also all across the Muslim World. He has brought warring rival nations and Muslim sects together in a precious, if precarious, moment of agreement. They agree that Bush has not brought peace, justice or the American way to the still violent and dysfunctional land of Iraq or to the Middle East.

You can duck a shoe, but history is harder to avoid.

©2008 Jonathan Dobrer
www.dobrer.org

Some more thoughts, here.

For those people who take such pride in American might that they feel immune to the rest of the world's concerns, I wonder if this story, and this image that will likely become iconic, would even give pause for thought. Probably not, though.

Yes, once more the messianic expectations work their way towards fulfillment. Both Republicans and Democrats have remarked on the Messianic expectations being heaped on Obama--some with scorn and irony and others with actual hope. Candidate Obama referenced these comparisons with his Al Smith Banquet joke about being born in a manger. And so now...

The Obama family seeks to leave Chicago early to escape: 1. The winter. 2. Blagojevich. 3. The media circus. 4. Blagojevich. 5. The ice storms. 6. Blagojevich.

They seek the restful quiet of Washington DC . They also want to get the kids into school after the winter break.

Normally, they would be put up in Blair House--a secure, if disclosed, location. But, alas, once again there is no room at the inn for the second time in 2,000 years. The Obamas will have to find lodging elsewhere. To keep the theme rolling along: It should not be difficult to find a place in DC between an ox and an ass. Finding three wise men. Ah, that could present a problem.

©2008 Jonathan Dobrer
www.Dobrer.org

Stupid, vulgar and corrupt are a pretty good summation of a pretty bad man. Putting a senate seat on eBay raises chutzpah to a new level. Holding a children's hospital hostage to ones greed is despicable. Trying to get editors fired is...well, that's a political tradition going back to John Adam's. Blago deserves to share a cell in that special wing of the prison system consecrated for former governors of Illinois.

John McCain was correct when he spoke of the toxic effect of money on the body politick. Of course, selling a senate seat is wrong on all kinds of levels from legal to moral, but the line between selling a position and the acceptable doling out of patronage is legally complex. We do allow money to influence our elected officials.

Bribery is wrong and against the law. And yet, there is a big, fat fuzzy line in the financing of our political system separating bribery from a campaign contribution. People who give big money expect something in return. Politicians say that a contribution only buys access not results. Do we, uh, buy this? Access is influence. How do people get to be ambassadors in London, Paris or Tokyo? They are really good friends of the president--and have shown their friendship in concrete ways. The other road to an ambassadorship is through the Foreign Service, and with that you get Baghdad, Cairo, Kabul and Caracas. Pays to be a friend--and as a friend you indeed do pay.

So, do honest politicians take money and give out positions? Yes. Blago went way too far with too much vulgarity and a reckless disregard for the subtle corruption we tolerate.

I'm fascinated by Earl seeing a link between politics Illinois-style and politics L.A.-style. At first I'm tempted to differentiate between a guy brazenly selling a seat for personal gain and a PAC giving money for influence. But the key here is that money and power and influence do go together.

We're okay with that, to an extent. The Supreme Court says that spending money on politics is a form of free speech, in many cases. But drawing the line is harder than it might seem.

I worked a few years in the mortgage industry, where it was natural for lenders to competitively woo brokers through wine and song. In the legal profession, that sort of conduct would have been a scandalous conflict of interest. And looking back at how mortgages turned out, we should have been more like the lawyers. Our society is still rife with conflicts of interest, and we could all do well to see a little of ourselves in Blagovayovagebecic or whatzizname.

I too am a native child of Chicago, and the antics of Rod Blagojevich are enough to make even this native daughter want to blush.

It's known that dirty politics and Chicago go hand-in-hand like hot dogs with the works at Wrigley Field or our beloved Cubs and an eventual losing streak. Chicagoans come to know and expect it, but it doesn't tarnish our loyalty to the city because there is something about that place that we love in spite of everything - the weather, the politics, the backroom deals... and we would no more abandon it than most people would a sick or dying relative.

But Blagojevich went above and beyond. He knew he was under surveillance yet continued to let it rip. This not only caused him to lose his place in the Illinois politicial club but landed him squarely in the "America's Dumbest Criminals" hit parade. He knew they were onto him, so he should have shut his mouth and made nice.

The way it now stands, one of three things will happen. 1.) He will get convicted and go to jail; 2.) His lawyer will find a psychiatrist to declare him nutso, or 3.) Hollywood will make a movie about him.

Either way, the LA politicians have nothing on Blagojevich, his wife or their cronies, but that's because Chicago is a much older city, so they have had more time to hone their craft and their trade. But I find comfort in it all because I know that when I move back, it will all be just like home.

I was born and raised in Chicago. My father was a ward captain ( OK boss) in the late 1950's and early 1960's and if you know anything about Chicago machine politics a ward boss is the closest thing to being a Mafia capo or a made man. You are untouchable. If you want your trash removed, a light or a traffic ticket fixed, a visit by a cop to a noisy neighbor, a dead man's vote or two, and yes a contract, or a sweetheart business deal you talked to the ward captain. All of this came with a price. It was a legalized racket, the fix, play for pay. It was old, deep, blatant and institutional in Chicago. Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich and the string of his gubernatorial predecessors who got popped were only following the well-honed dirty business script.

But lest we be too quick in L.A. to wag the moral blame finger at Chicago bossism. The pack of fat cat donors, developers, bankers, labor and corporate PACs, and a Billboard conglomerate haven't exactly been pikers when it comes to getting their way at City Hall and at the County board. Money screams in politics and it doesn't make much difference whether it's the old school crude Chicago stuff or the thinly cloaked play for pay L.A. stuff. Blagojevich might not have been marched off in FBI handcuffs if he paid a little more attention how it's done out here.

The vivisection of the once mighty Los Angeles Times is sad to watch. Aside from the writing and editing talent bought out, sold out and now betrayed, there is a cost to our city--and even our nation.

Sam Zell characterized himself as a "grave dancer," buying up sick companies and selling off their assets. He had no interest in news and the media, he admitted privately, before his highly leveraged and highly questionable purchase of the Times and Tribune. His careless care-taking proves him truthful in this regard.

How he was allowed to leverage the pension funds, I cannot understand, and some pretty smart people have tried explaining it to me. What happens to the employees I do understand. Those who took buy outs have had their payments stopped by the Chapter 11 filing. Those with deferred compensation, are seeing nothing. And freelancers are not, as of this moment, being paid. The pensions, already devalued like virtually every pension, are now part of the bankruptcy and a vulnerable asset that may be used to pay off creditors.

Meanwhile, old talent was shown the door. They were too expensive. Some were moved to free lance (or Special to) and others just canned. Some were squeezed and cut back to nearly nothing. New talent too was sent packing. Bureaus were closed. The Times has entered the death spiral. As profits go down, content and quality are compromised and both readership and advertising abandon the sinking ship.

Not all of this is Zell's fault--just the wanton disregard of both the people and the news. He did hit the trifecta of disasters. The real estate market tanked and so selling off the Tribune Tower in Chicago, Times-Mirror Square in LA and Wrigley Field were not viable options and could not supply the money to keep the ship afloat. Then Mark Cuban getting investigated for insider trading messed up the sale of the Cubs. All of this as advertising moved to the web and finances crashed and credit disappeared. Yes, there was bad luck and bad timing involved.

But this is more than the sad story of unemployed journalists. Times are tough all over. This is also a national issue. Our democracy depends on an informed electorate. As papers and other media outlets consolidate, their debt services grow and their ability to pay people to gather, write, edit and produce news is compromised. The health of our body politic is also compromised. The Los Angeles Times, an institution not always beloved but certainly important, is not simply dying in plain sight. It is being vivisected, cut up while still living.

Consider me a big fan of the partly opened LA Live complex downtown, where I dined with friends last night. Even before most of its restaurants and stores have been completed, it already sports a superstar quality.

Three years ago, I moved to downtown Long Beach, feeling that its reinvigorated Pine Avenue, Pike complex and convention center had more potential than downtown LA, due to their proximity to the ocean. Having watched Long Beach stagnate for those three years, I'm ready to finally make the move to downtown LA. The public and private investment in the area is stupendous. The tipping point for me, though, is that LA Live has some of the best urban energy that I've seen -- and energy is what downtown has needed to truly arrive. I suspect the best is to come.

If the proof is in the pudding (or in LA Unified's award-winning coffee cake), then Brewer has got to go. One reason is because the district is heavy not only with administrators but with consultants who are reeling in six figures.

Now if they did something for their six figures, then that would be one thing, but at a reported 150K a pop, they are little more than overpaid lackeys who mainly circulate around the office, drink coffee and gargle, brush and floss.

Most schools are also top heavy with administrators and quasi-administrators whose positions should be combined and probably would be except that most would return to teaching only if carried in on a stake. And let's not forget the malfunctioning payroll system that cost the district and the taxpayers 95 million dollars, or the money that was earmarked for teachers' professional development days in September and was mysteriously siphoned off to places unknown.

These things all happened all under Brewer's command. Try and get him to leave? Fine, but then we're all going to have to watch while he rides off on a golden parachute.

LAUSD Superintendent David L. Brewer fits the classic saw about framing a guilty man. The frame comes from City Hall, or more specifically Mayor Tony. It's hardly the revelation of the ages that Tony has hungered for control of the LAUSD. He squandered tens of thousands of taxpayer dollars in political arm twisting and legal summersaults in his borderline legal grab at the district. He got smacked down by the courts. But that didn't make Tony's hunger for school control go away.

He now has four seemingly willing accomplices on the Board to try to sneak in a backdoor grab again at control. The sticking point is Brewer. The Admiral simply doesn't fit into the plan. Now here's where the guilt comes in. Brewer is a well-meaning, sincere, and committed guy. But he's been an ill fit for the District. The string of failings are well known- payroll computer glitches, the teacher sexual scandal, failure to put a solid management team in place, the spike in school violence, black and brown school tensions, and the always chronic achievement levels.

That's not to say that any other outsider (or insider for that matter) who stepped to the helm of L.A.'s well deservedly branded "dysfunctional" district could do any better. But the hard reality is that the school problems fester on Brewer's watch. As any general or admiral knows buck passing for failure will get you busted.

Admiral Brewer was picked to fail, I observed on these pages on October 22, 2006. The Board, so eager to throw him well, overboard, knew this day was coming. They went out of their way to select someone without educational experience so that it would take two years for him to learn. Meanwhile, they could continue to exercise their own authority.

Brewer caught on faster than anticipated and filled in the holes in his experience by selecting former Interim Superintendant Ramon Cortines to manage the educational part of our vast dysfunctional system. Brewer immediately went to work in the area of his competency--contracts and systems. He cleaned up a lot of bidding and contracting fraud and waste. He is still going after serial contracting abusers, which may be why they are trying to can him

The shameful lack of building and maintenance that former Superintendent Romer began to remedy, Brewer has continued with excellence. LAUSD had not opened a high school in over two decades! The dearth of classrooms, at all levels, made us pack kids into buses, jam freeways, waste the time and energy of students, pump pollutants into the air and throw away billions of dollars. None of this was for integration. That boat sailed long ago. This was lack of classrooms.

He is doing so well that, of course, the Board wants to waste money by buying him out and then picking another fall guy who can be blamed for not knowing what is going on and then fired when he or she finally figures it out.

One of the rules of the universe is you dance to the music you pay the piper. Of course, the kind of payment depends on who and what happens to be dancing.

If it is a group of terrorists or any other band of marauding thugs, then they should pay with their lives because that is what they made their victims pay. It also sends a message to other terrorist thugs and helps thwart the chances having them do it ever again.

Talking and reasoning with them doesn't work any more than reasoning with a swarm of killer bees. So the thing to do is to revert to the bug spray or some other form of insecticide. This would cut down on the birth rate of any future killer bee colonies that some nimrods may one day want to nurture because they see their supposed point-of-view and feel sorry for them.

"In a world wracked by angry rivalry," the trailer voice-over could go, "one man stepped forward to forge a better way. That man is.... OBAMA."

India isn't the only place where restraint is needed. It's needed within contemporary American politics, which Fareed Zakaria, in The Post-American World, denounced as dysfunctionally partisan at exactly the wrong time in our history.

So Obama's choices of deputies show great restraint. Staunch liberals will be disappointed, but they need to be realistic. America is a moderate-to-slightly-conservative nation. Even if Obama intends to take it to the left, he'd need to do so in savvy and measured steps. The way you do that is by finding middle ground and by finding lieutenants who are palatable for the opposition.

So far, his transition has been very impressive.

****

On another note, I continue to fume about the various government plans to stabilize home prices. Let's get personal: Home prices were out of my reach for many years, because I did not have $60,000 handy to serve as a 20% down payment on a $300,000 house. Credit loosened up enough that other people got into such houses for almost nothing. That helped drive the prices up to $600,000.

I now want those prices to come back down to $300,000, because I'm now ready to put down 20%. But the government wants to use my tax money to keep prices up. I can't win, can I?

That's one main reason why I'm skeptical that bailouts will help the fundamentals of American productivity. These sorts of bailouts violate principles of responsibility and discipline.

Nothing is more human than the desire for aggressive vengeance. As the Financial Times' astute writer Gideon Rachman notes, there is a downside as it relates to India's response to the Mumbai attacks:

[T]he "war on terrorism" will not be won by killing terrorists. That was certainly the view of most of the Indian politicians and security experts that I spoke to last September. They were sceptical about US strikes inside Pakistan and advanced the usual arguments. Bombing suspected terrorist bases was bound to cause civilian casualties. That would only bring fresh recruits for the jihadist cause. The received opinion in Delhi, at the time, was that the problem was still best dealt with by Pakistan.

Ironically, the Indians are now under huge pressure to emulate the US tactics that they were criticising. Some sort of Indian military response to the Mumbai horrors may be unavoidable. But the Indians should hang on to their restraint as far as possible.

A military confrontation between India and Pakistan - two nuclear-armed neighbours - would obviously be extremely dangerous. A confrontation with India would also strengthen all the most sinister forces in Pakistan - the Islamists and the elements in the security establishment that back them.

Having said that, I exhorted my mother, who's still in Islamabad, to get back to the States soon. The political black hole in South Asia is pulsing more menacingly than ever.

The guns, grenades and bombs in the former Bombay, now Mumbai, are bad news for the entire world. This is a personal tragedy for those killed or injured, and an insult added to the injuries of those Americans, English, Israelis and Jews who were targeted in particular. This is a wake up call to every one in every city of every nation of our vulnerability to the wanton acts of deadly destruction that technology allows when combined with people who not are not afraid to die. Our vulnerability increases when perpetrated by those who may welcome death as a reward.

The Indians, of course, will soul search and place blame--both on their own security and the alleged malign intent of Pakistan. There must always be blame. But the truth is there is no real security in an age that does not distinguish between civilians and combatants.

I remember a time when some hardcore Americans wore T-shirts saying, "Kill them all and let God sort them out." I took this as a macabre joke and display of macho braggadocio. I am no longer laughing. There is a large segment of the world that displays exactly this attitude. Without conscience or remorse they will kill men, women and children in the name of God.

Now, obviously, right now I'm referring to Muslims. But it is important to remember a couple of things: All peoples and religions have gone through periods of vicious killing and destruction is the name of their gods. Secondly: Most Muslims, like most Christians, Jews, Buddhists and yes, humanists, want nothing more than to live in peace and not kill either their neighbor or the strangers amongst them.

As humans, however, we are easily driven mad and violent by fear--and fear can quickly spiral out of control till the mob, inflamed by bitter righteousness, goes on a killing spree. From the sacking of Troy with the children thrown from the walls, to the taking of Canaan and the utter destruction of their orchards and shrines, from the Crusades to the Inquisition, from the Holocaust to Pol Pot's killing fields, to Rwanda, we go too easily violently mad.

There are no good places for our madness, but the Indian sub continent is particularly bad. These two nuclear powers have fought a series of wars over religion, nationalism and disputed territories. India, despite the stereotypes (and wishful thinking) of the 60s, is a not a pacifist power. And Pakistan is not quite a nation. It is made up of tribes, ethnicities and factions.
I wrote long ago that India and Pakistan were the nations most likely to employ nuclear weapons post Nagasaki. This is still true. They have a very bad history and it is made more complicated by the ironic fact that India is the second largest Muslim nation in the world--with more Muslims than Pakistan or all the Arab nations combined. They have a large, and not particularly happy, Muslim minority amongst their majority Hindu population. Both groups within India are increasingly self-segregating and withdrawing from social intercourse. A war between India and Pakistan, whether nuclear or conventional, would inevitably become a civil war within India.

Smart people who are looking at the outrage in Mumbai don't know what to hope for. If this was perpetrated by domestic Muslims, it would be a disaster for the mostly innocent Muslim population of India. If it was done by Pakistanis--as it presently appears--it will still hurt domestic Muslims and create calls for revenge and suspicions of official Pakistani complicity. The fact that this attack does not advance Pakistani interests means little in such a volatile situation when the blood runs hot and revenge masquerades as justice.

This is being called "India's 9-11." This is not a terrible analogy. It was a violent shock to the system, an insult delivered to the financial heart of the nation and the destruction of the national illusion of security. As with our own 9-11, they want to do something. They want to know who did this and bring them to justice--or just kill them. We had a return address on our 9-11. It was Bin Laden and Al Qaeda, and the Taliban regime of Afghanistan was giving aid, refuge and comfort. We began with an appropriate response against Afghanistan and Al Qaeda. Where will India strike and what will it mean to their massive Muslim population?

I believe it is likely that this attack on India came from Pakistanis, not the government of Pakistan. I believe that it was fulminated by Al Qaeda and the Taliban based in the Wild West areas of Waziristan and Swat. Some elements of Pakistani intelligence were likely used and Kashmiri nationalists employed. In other words, there are no good targets upon which to focus revenge. This leaves only bad targets and the potential for tragic escalation, regional war and civil war.

The great threat to civilization in every nation and of every faith is not Islam or any Axis of Evil. It was the good old days when we faced our greatest threats from the Soviet Union and Red China. The greatest threat to all of us is manifest in what we call Non-State Actors. These are people from all nations and any faith who can find each other on the Net, organize their grievance and give our all for their cause. Yes, some nations placate these forces and enable them, and we must act to stop such aid. But the whole world has a common interest in fighting these free agents of righteous rage. India bombing Pakistan would not be helpful. Had we bombed Saudi Arabia, where most of the 9-11 hijackers came from, or Egypt that supplied the rest, we would not have helped ourselves or our world. Hard as it will be for India to resist the temptation to cry Havoc and loose the dogs of war, they should refrain.

©2008 Jonathan Dobrer JonDobrer@mac.com
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