Sj at the blog, polis-Chicago, reflected yesterday about Howard Dean’s legacy. He concluded that the Vermont governor’s lasting impact on the Democratic Party will not be his use of the Internet, but rather the way his campaign showed disenfranchised Democrats, earthfirsters, and finicky academics that it is okay to step into the political ring. It has been said that the unintended results of history are often greater than the expected outcomes. I think Dean’s candidacy will prove to be a case in point.          

Most of the commentaries about Howard Dean’s lasting role in the future of Democratic politics has centered on his web-fundraising, but I think that his campaign did something much larger to the architecture of the party. Certainly it has been noted that the Dean campaign excited previously non-political groups (i.e., young people), but I don’t think enough has been made of the potential long-term benefits his efforts have germinated. His campaign has redefined the political for a large section of voters who were either apathetic or unattractive to the process, and this may have huge implications for future election cycles.

Yes, he was there at the right time: Bush’s domestic and foreign policies easily enraged even the mildest of liberals, and Dean was there to voice their anger by standing up to Bush when no other candidates would. But beyond just being a conduit for the left, Dean also taught far left liberals what it meant to be political. Yes, he would continue to lash out at Bush and the me-too Democrats, but he would also lay out a rather centrist fiscal and social agenda to make his campaign more than just a platform for minority views. And the amazing thing is that the far left ate this up: from the earthfirsters to the academics, his supporters learned to compromise their own agendas enough to get into the political ring and take a stand.

Being in academics, I know what an accomplishment this is. I’ve been frustrated for a long time with so many of my colleagues, who, despite their intelligence in the world of academia, refused to sully themselves in the world of politics. One of the brightest students in my department summarized his participation in the 2000 elections as voting for Nader “just to record his protest vote” (and not because he had any affinity with Nader’s message). What a waste of a mind, and that’s just one. Imagine if he took his smarts and applied them to the realm of politics, even just a little. And then multiply that by thousands of other bright people who don’t want to dirty their intellect with electoral politics.

Greens and Naderites often counter back that the Democratic Party doesn’t represent them, so why should they support the party’s candidates? Even beyond the fact that a third party vote is a vote for Bush, I think third party strategies are completely wrongheaded. If everyone who felt his or her voice wasn’t represented in the Democratic Party participated in the party, then accordingly, the party would shift its agenda, however so slightly. But the real problem is that this hasn’t been good enough for the far left. They haven’t been willing to get their hands dirty in the realm of politics, which requires that they concede that their position is not the only one on the table. Such political purity has produced an aloof left that has effectively neutered itself politically. And as they stand and watch, the Democratic Party has crept to the center more and more.

It’s obviously too early to tell at this point, but Dean’s campaign may have shaken that constituency out of its dogmatic slumber. Now the left is a potent force (both in terms of numbers and campaign dollars), and with Dean’s speech today, he is planning to employ them through to the general election. The results could be decisive. Hopefully, that effect can be one element of Dean’s legacy.

Benjamin Helphand

It’s a shift in city policy that could affect thousands of people and transform San Francisco’s image – and it doesn’t involve marriage licenses.

A new plan to combat homelessness was going to be the most ambitious undertaking by San Francisco’s city government before Mayor Gavin Newsom decided last week to dive head-first into the debate over gay marriages.

Newsom had a hand in crafting the homelessness policy. While a member of the city’s board of supervisors, he championed a voter initiative to cut welfare payments from up to $410 a month to $59 for 2,400 homeless people in San Francisco. The proposition, called Care Not Cash, was passed overwhelmingly by voters in 2002 but was ruled unenforceable by court order.

The idea was to funnel the money that would have gone to welfare checks toward housing, support services and drug rehabilitation programs for San Francisco’s most entrenched homeless people. The plan doesn’t address thousands of other street people who aren’t receiving money from San Francisco’s County Adult Assistance Programs.

Care Not Cash was seen by many as a political move by Newsom to scapegoat the homeless and use the issue to catapult him into the mayor’s office. It worked. He narrowly defeated a late, spirited campaign by Green Party candidate Matt Gonzalez to succeed Willie Brown as mayor in November.

The biggest criticism of Care Not Cash was that it did not guarantee housing, only a bed in an emergency shelter, for people who would have had their welfare payments slashed. Opponents sued, and a judge halted implementation, ruling that only the board of supervisors can set welfare policy.

The board of supervisors passed a revised proposal last year offered by Supervisor Chris Daly. The new measure still cuts welfare checks but only when the recipient receives permanent housing or a spot in a drug rehab program. The city is coming up with plans to implement the new policy in April.

Anyone who’s been to San Francisco recently can’t help but notice how many people are living on the streets. Panhandlers ply their trade throughout the tourist districts, much to the chagrin of hotels and other businesses dependent on tourism. It can be a jarring sight for visitors used to a more suburban lifestyle.

Former Mayor Brown basically gave up on trying to solve the homeless problem during his administration. It will be interesting to see if this new approach can really make life better for some of San Francisco’s homeless people.

chinoloco

In perhaps the largest protest yet of President Bush’s support for a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage, thousands of queer couples from across the country flocked to San Francisco’s City Hall over the weekend to seek marriage licenses. On Friday, San Francisco Mayor Gavin C. Newsom instructed city and county officials to begin issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples, thereby giving thousands of couples an additional reason to celebrate Valentine’s Day.

Thanks to hundreds of city officials and police officers working throughout the holiday weekend without pay, over 2,400 same-sex couples have legally entered marriages with their partners since Newsom’s decree. However, despite the jovial mood on the streets of San Francisco, there is concern that San Francisco city officials are violating the terms of California state law that restricts marriage to a union between a woman and a man. City officials acknowledge that they may be forced to cease marrying same-sex couples at any moment when the state steps in, but until then, they are marrying as many couples as possible in the name of love and equal rights.

Although Robert Tyler, a lawyer for the Alliance Defense Fund said that San Francisco was making ”a mockery“ of what he called ”democracy,“ the significant number of people who have participated in San Francisco’s defiance of this law suggests that the problem might not be city officials and same-sex couples but rather democracy’s failure to practice what it preaches.

Protest of this magnitude proves that Bush & co. won’t have an easy time outlawing same-sex marriages as queer communities grow more determined to hold democracy accountable to all of its citizens. Given that these communities pay taxes and even register for the draft in accordance with the law, the ”because the law says so“ rationale for denying them the right to marry is laughable. The law of the land, after all, isn’t supposed to create two classes of citizens, but as of now, that is what the law seems to do. If California officials have any sense, they’ll recognize this — along with the marriages of thousands of same-sex couples.

Laura Nathan-Garner

Under the erroneously simplistic impression that national service will bridge racial divisions, Malaysia is now implementing a system of mandatory national service. The system is not a draft, since those who are called up will not engage in military training or be deployed overseas. Rather, the system is more like a bizarre marriage of boot camp and an Outward Bound course; this year, 85,000 eighteen-year-olds will undergo three months of training, which will include physical exercise, community service, and what the BBC ominously calls “lessons in nation-building.”
  
The official national service website eerily juxtaposes an image of uniformed and bereted young men engaging in physical training next to a photo of a young woman happily feeding tea and cakes to the elderly. This, apparently, is the face of tomorrow’s happily racially integrated Malaysia.

An article in today’s The Star, a Malaysian newspaper, was cautiously and diplomatically optimistic about the program.

The BBC, however, offers a more insightful analysis of the situation. The BBC notes that there are serious rifts that fall along racial lines between the nation’s Malay, Chinese, Indian and tribal communities, and that these racial and ethnic divisions are reinforced by race-based economic policies. The new system of national service will do nothing to speak to these race-based policies and the resultant atmosphere of tension and racial inequality.  

While it may be the case that the droves of teenagers corralled together during their national service will foster friendships that cross racial divides, the fact will remain that race-based economic policies still will be firmly in place when these teenagers return from their three-month hiatus from quotidian life. National service may foster personal relationships that are blind to race and ethnicity, but the government will continue to operate with an eye to racial differences.

Mimi Hanaoka

With the Justice Department demanding that at least six hospitals hand over the medical records of hundreds of abortions performed there, the debate over partial-birth abortions appears to be heating up again. Although Bush signed the Partial-Birth Abortion Act of 2003 into law in November, federal judges in Nebraska, New York and California issued temporary injunctions immediately thereafter, protecting physicians who perform this procedure until the courts hear both sides’ full arguments. Because they can be punished later for abortions performed during the injunction if the law is upheld, however, doctors are exercising precaution.

It is difficult to surmise whether such precaution is all for naught. Since the Supreme Court overturned a Nebraska partial-birth abortion law that failed to provide a medical exemption in Stenberg v. Carhart, and all twenty-one legal challenges to such laws at the state and federal level have succeeded, the law is likely to be overturned. But if one or two justices retire before the Court hears the case, the President’s judicial nominees could sway the vote.

What is at stake when the Court hears this case? More than the term ”partial-birth abortion“ might lead one to believe. By making the procedure seem wholly unnecessary, the ban appeared to be a negligible restriction on reproductive rights.  But it is telling that the American Medical Association and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG), which represents 90% of U.S. board-certified obstetrician/gynecologists, maintain that partial-birth abortion is not a medical term. Nevertheless, the ACOG assumes this legal term of art crafted by Congress refers to ”intact dilatation and extraction  .  .  .,  a rare variant of a more common midterm abortion procedure known as dilatation and evacuation“ which ”may be the best or most appropriate procedure in a particular circumstance to save the life or preserve the health of a woman.“ Significantly, the law never employs these medical terms, leaving it open to the discretion of the courts to interpret.

Insisting that the partial-birth abortion ban ”is not required to contain a ‘health’ exemption, because . . . a partial-birth abortion is never necessary to preserve the health of a woman, poses serious risks to a woman’s health, and lies outside the standard of medical care,“ the legislation restricts this procedure across the board. While the law includes a nominal medical exemption if a woman’s life is at stake, its failure to do so for her health belies previous partial-birth abortion rulings. Moreover, since permissibility of exemptions must be determined by State Medical Boards, whose members are typically appointed by the governor, doctors in more conservative states may never obtain medical exemptions, threatening a right that many women and their doctors have taken for granted for more than thirty years.

Laura Nathan-Garner

The morning Op/Ed page is democracy at work — a forum for exchanging ideas and a reflection of our values. But it can just as well reveal the naughty bits of our particular capitalist democracy, with its tendency toward partisan bluster and mindless cant.

If you read The Boston Globe Op/Ed page every day, you might assume that there are only two possible political perspectives: liberal and conservative. But you might start to wonder what, exactly, these terms mean. If “conservatism” means fiscal responsibility and “getting government off our backs,” you have to wonder whether, for example, President Bush’s policies really meet that definition.

Whatever accepted definitions the “conservative” and “liberal” labels once had are breaking down. Young people, especially, are shedding traditional party and “camp” affiliations. Ask a college student whether she’s a republican or a democrat, and you’re not likely to get a straight answer — half of college students describe themselves as “unaffiliated,” and less than a third describe their views as “moderate.”  

If young people are less inclined to stay inside these two particularly constrictive boxes, our political language is sadly trending in the opposite direction (maybe that helps explain declining student engagement in politics). While our marketplace of ideas slides into dogmatic, partisan silliness, opinions that can’t fit neatly on a bumper sticker become irrelevant.

Let the inane, breathless ranting typical of Sean Hannity or Michael Moore trickle down to us ordinary citizens, and our ability to reason through complex issues — like gay marriage or the Iraq War — trickles down with it. When you see your political landscape as being dominated by two fundamentally opposed, warring camps, it is easier to rally support for your side by appealing to emotion than by appealing to reason. If you’ve already taken sides, it makes no sense to ask why you’re fighting. You just put your head down and fight.

Seeing the world in this profoundly uncivilized way allows Republican Party spokesmodel Ann Coulter, for example, to write:

[T]he left’s anti—Americanism is intrinsic to their entire worldview. Liberals promote the rights of Islamic fanatics for the same reason they promote the rights of adulterers, pornographers, abortionists, criminals, and Communists. They instinctively root for anarchy and against civilization.

From Treason: Liberal Treachery from the Cold War to the War on Terrorism (Crown Forum,  2003).

  
To a sympathetic reader, Coulter gives emotional rant the appearance of logic by defining “America” as everything that is good and agreeable to me and “the left,” “liberals” or “democrats” (she uses the terms interchangeably) as everything that is bad and disagreeable to me.  When her terms are so defined, the above statement is perfectly logical. Coulter’s aim, though, is not to lead the reader toward knowledge or understanding or reason, but into a comfy tautological cul-de-sac, where, by definition, she is always right.

It’s this kind of intentional definitional confusion that allows Globe reader Bruce Cantwell to write, in a letter to the editor:

Liberalism has nothing to do with freedom. If I own a piece of land and want to build on it, who blocks my effort? If I want to own a gun, who stops me? If I want to smoke in a bar, who stops me? Who opposes freedom in all areas of trade and commerce? (The Boston Globe, Feb. 9, 2004).

  
In case it’s not clear, Mr. Cantwell means to suggest that “liberals” are the enemies of freedom. But in response, one might ask, as Globe  reader Dan Feinberg did the next day:

What if I own a home and I want to freely enjoy my neighborhood without commercial encroachment? What if I want to freely walk down the street without being threatened by a “sporting” handgun? What if I want to work or play in a bar free from toxic smoke? What if I want to eat fish free from the mercury taint that even a conservative-led FDA and EPA admit is dangerous and comes mostly from polluting coal “commerce?” (The Boston Globe, Feb. 10, 2004).

Are “conservatives” and “liberals” both enemies of freedom? Provided they can agree on a bar, maybe Bruce and Dan will get together and resolve the apparent paradox over a beer. If they do, they might ask a more productive question: Why talk about “liberals” and “conservatives” and their relation to “freedom” if we won’t even define our terms?

When we banish these labels to the proverbial dustbin, it gets harder to point out one side’s hypocrisies and the other’s ironies. Without the ability to level the opponent to one common denominator or another, Op/Ed sophistry becomes almost impossible. Just try answering Bruce or Dan’s questions without them. And when we refuse to use misleading generalizations, we might have to get down to the patriotic work of a well-functioning democratic citizenry: earnest, candid dialogue — on the issues.

henrypb

It’s no secret that the institution of marriage is going through a transition. Only twenty-six percent of American households are comprised of a traditional family, including a married heterosexual couple and their children. Between Bush promoting ”healthy“ heterosexual marriages and abstinence among low-income Americans and calls for a constitutional amendment to prohibit same-sex marriages, attempts to save this institution by resurrecting the 1950s are troubling — and oh so out of touch with reality. (And by the way, am I the only one who has noticed the double-standard in Bush’s promotion of ”healthy“ marriages for low-income Americans while his own brother, Neil, is caught up in a messy divorce drama, replete with adultery, an out-of-wedlock birth, and tons of riches?).

Initially an economic institution, marriage has only become a State-regulated institution in modern times. By attempting to respond to the transformation of this institution with more regulations, many conservatives are simply adding onto layers of contrived laws and social norms.

Scandinavia seems to have found a better solution, one which arose with the advent of gay marriage. In Scandinavia, marriage has essentially been deregulated, making love – rather than legal documents – the determining factor in defining the relationship between two people. As a result, all family forms (including out-of-wedlock parenthood and same-sex relationships) are legitimate.

With jobs and income guaranteed to all citizens — including children — each individual is independent. Consequently, people don’t have to feel obligated to get married. Since the government doesn’t condemn divorce and out-of-wedlock births, children born out-of-wedlock don’t suffer the stigma that their counterparts in the U.S. might. In fact, because parents are financially independent, they don’t bicker over many of the financial concerns that married couples here do, eliminating much emotional turmoil from the family.

With the U.S. economy in shambles and a wage gap between people of different genders and races, the economics of this model do not yet seem feasible. But if Bush spread the wealth and acknowledged the failure of contrived regulations to govern our desires, the U.S. could follow Scandinavia’s lead by deinstitutionalizing love and desire and enabling the expression of individualism. This may not be the most ideal solution. But it might be more beneficial for a larger group of people than political ploys to play ”marriage counselor.“

Laura Nathan-Garner

Regarding “Stereotypes translate well on screen“: I can see where some might think that the characterizations of Asians might be a bit offensive, particularly when seen through Western eyes.  However, you might also find it interesting to understand the real translations of the Japanese dialogue. The question then becomes which stereotypes do we really talk about?

Perhaps the title really does explain it.  Maybe it’s just a matter of which translation you are looking for.

A group of Asian American activists is criticizing the acclaimed movie Lost in Translation and urging Oscar voters to mark their ballots for other films. (Lost in Translation is nominated for best picture, best actor, best director and best screenplay).

Asianmediawatch.net contends that the film, set in Japan, portrays Japanese people as shallow stereotypes, and that the audience “laughs at the Japanese people and not with them,” according to a press release on a website the group has created.

I have not seen the film, but I have no doubt that in Hollywood tradition, Asians are used as a backdrop and as fodder for racist, or at the very least, insensitive jokes that milk every stereotype imaginable. Lost in Translation is just one in a long line of movies and TV shows in which Asians and Asian Americans are portrayed as, in the words of Asianmediawatch, “buffoons for the main (non-Asian) characters to ridicule.”

Asianmediawatch adroitly points out that had this film been set in Africa or Mexico, director Sophia Coppola would not have created “such an insensitive and racist portrayal of a people,” and that the movie is “indicative of a level of mainstream tolerance and acceptance of Asian American discrimination that would otherwise be unacceptable if directed towards African and Hispanic Americans.”

chinoloco

Regarding “The Chicken Hangers,” by Russell Cobb (Identify, February 2004)

After reading ”The Chicken Hangers,“ I find it disquieting that a union organizer would rather pitch in with illegal aliens who have cost his fellow legal state residents the opportunity to access jobs which are now occupied by illegal labor, than with those who are legally entitled to be in this country. It is also alarming that, knowing that the employer is delinquent, Cobb fails to denounce him to immigration authorities. The employment of legal laborers, in lieu of illegal aliens, would cause salaries and living standards to rise because illegal aliens are not looking for the same standard of living as U.S. citizens but for one better than the one they left in a developing nation.

Most unions, however, have fallen to the need of increasing their membership, even if this means betraying the future of American workers. The answer to the widespread use of illegal laborers would be to turn in every employer and landlord who is employing or sheltering any illegal aliens. Under Section 274 of the Immigration and Naturalization Act, it is unlawful to encourage, employ, import, transport, and shelter illegal aliens. These acts are penalized by fines and imprisonment. Why unions don’t force employers to adhere to the law is beyond logic.

With eight to fourteen million illegal aliens occupying jobs that should be held by American citizens, Mexican President Vicente Fox is encouraging farmworkers to come to the United States, and therefore condones the siphoning of over $60 billion per year in remittances out of our economy into those of the illegal workers’ various home countries. The present situation can only be described as an invasion by hostile forces. In addition, thanks to the Voter Registration Act, every state that issues driver’s licenses to illegal aliens is potentially enabling a criminal to vote in our domestic issues and leaders. I hope that we learn to act accordingly and vote to roll back the tide of criminals who are squatting on our jobs and land.

In The Fray Contributor

A striking and gruesome image of the crucified Jesus, taken from the upcoming Mel Gibson film, The Passion of the Christ, decorates this week’s cover of Newsweek, and the headline reads, “Who Really Killed Jesus?” Newsweek asks a tantalizing question but, unfortunately, it does not ask the most appropriate question.  

Mel Gibson’s film has gained a disproportionate amount of publicity prior to its opening on February 25 — Ash Wednesday — and there are plenty of reasons for its notoriety: the film has no subtitles, and the dialogue is entirely in Latin and Aramaic; the Anti-Defamation League has opposed the release of the film on the basis that it would spark a rise in anti-Semitism; Gibson, an ardent and extremely conservative Roman Catholic, has pumped $25 million of his own funds into the film. To further fan the flames of speculation and criticism, Gibson’s father is a Holocaust denier.

The Newsweek article appropriately considers The Passion of the Christ to be a deeply troubling movie. But in its sexy headline, the magazine inappropriately encourages readers to ask the wrong question. The audience should not be goaded into amateur speculation on who and what forces were ultimately responsible for Jesus’ death. If the audience desires a serious answer to that historical question, they should consult reputable sources in recent scholarship.

And here is another problematic aspect of the film — despite the presence of English subtitles accompanying the film, which is entirely in Latin and Aramaic, viewers are likely to be swayed by the shocking images of the crucified and tormented Christ. Ghastly images of Christ will naturally evoke a deeply emotional reaction from the audience, particularly if that audience is Christian. It will be preaching to the converted par excellence.    

Although Gibson, who co-wrote the script and directed and produced the film, is an ardent Roman Catholic, he is no scholar. This film must be seen as a meditative, devotional or artistic film, but it must not be understood as a depiction of historical fact.  

Mimi Hanaoka

Bush has recently and rightly been recognized as an international bully, and continuing in that vein, the Bush administration is hoping to convince European nations of its plan for the future of the Middle East. In the words of the BBC, the Bush administration plans to “promote democracy across the Middle East,” and hopes that Europe will support this plan.

What is most troubling about the likely Bush plan for democratizing the Middle East is that it would be modeled on the 1975 Helsinki Accords. While the Bush administration seems ready to happily bulldoze its way even further into the Middle East, the complex web of international and regional politics cannot adhere to a one-size-fits-all model. The Helsinki Accords were used in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. It should be common sense that if the Bush administration wants to propose a map for the political future of the Islamic Middle East, it should accommodate the cultural and religious nuances of the region. Bush is no doubt frightened that, through his war, he inadvertently paved the way for a new and more Islamically oriented government to take over the reigns. If Iraq is primed for a more religiously oriented form of government, that is not something Bush can or should ignore.    

Bush made few friends with his almost unilateral plunge into Iraq, and he has made even fewer friends in light of the recent comments made by David Kay, the former chief weapons inspector, that the White House was wrong and that Iraq did not possess weapons of mass destruction. Whether, in the months leading up to the war in Iraq, Bush was ignorant, lying or a spectacularly awful combination of both, he has found himself forced to fiercely defend his actions in Iraq. Convincing Europe to follow his lead again will be a very tough job indeed.  

Mimi Hanaoka