This election year seems worse than usual in forcing voters to choose between unpalatable candidates. There seem any number of races where one’s political preferences preclude voting for the individual from one party, and the other person is so bad it’s morally debasing to vote for him or her. South Carolina, Delaware, Illinois, New York have made the headlines, but the ethical dilemma is everywhere at every level.
I live in a one-party county and our bad race is sheriff. The current man was prevented from running by term limits. Seven men ran in the Democratic primary in June, none in the Republican. The man who won earned 26% of the 8,135 votes cast. There are no run-offs.
Local newspapers provide no help. They said all the candidates had serious legal problems, but didn’t elaborate. Why they feel it cute to be coy I don’t know. No one trusts the newspapers or other local news media.
I gather the man I voted for had been convicted of state tax evasion, which I assume means our onerous and impossible to understand state gross receipts tax. I was pretty sure from my one contact with him through his business that he was incapable of managing a small office that depended on responding to emergency phone calls, and would have no ability to run two that are understaffed with 20 deputies protecting more than 40,500 people scattered over more than 5,000 square miles where heroin, cocaine and alcohol abuse are endemic.
I voted for him because my neighbor had his sign in his front yard. I wanted to vote for the man who had the best chance of defeating the one man I didn’t want to win. My choice came in second with 1,304 votes. Two others attracted similar numbers of voters.
The man I didn’t want to win was removed from his position as a Magistrate Court judge for corruption. He had personally released a friend arrested for drunk driving from jail. He was also accused of intervening in a domestic violence dispute by telling the woman she didn’t need to appear in court, even though she had been served with a subpoena.
Last spring his son was accused of theft by the owner of a local tattoo parlor. The next night his brothers went to the business to rough him up. Before the trial, all the witness’s statements were lost by the state police.
He got his office in the first place through his wife, who is the area’s state representative and the daughter of a politically powerful man.
There were no good choices running for sheriff. There are so many reports of violence, theft and general bad behavior by the deputies, I sometimes wonder if there are any decent men working in the office at all. One candidate was a former deputy had been arrested when he was young for drunk driving, and another had been investigated for protecting someone from a drunk driving charge.
The local state and city officers are no better. The candidate I opposed was investigated for fixing traffic tickets when he was a sergeant with the state police, and another was discharged for stealing evidence. Another was fired by the city police for unprofessional conduct and hired by the county, while one of the brothers involved in the tattoo incident worked as a city policeman at the time.
The problem isn’t simply our sheriff’s department. One learns to survive by avoiding any contact with them and assuming there will be no help in an emergency. Law and order depends of the values of one’s neighbors. There is no protection against gangs or intimidation.
The problem is what happens to a democracy when voters have no opportunity to choose between two good candidates. Even if one disagrees with them both, one likes to think they are at least qualified.
Instead, the act of voting has descended from picking the least bad option to playing odds on who can best prevent the worst outcome.
This leads to greater voter anger and apathy than any actions by politicians. Political parties that can’t field qualified candidates demonstrate contempt for the government they proport to represent.
With no opposition this Tuesday, I can at least abstain from voting for the man for sheriff. If the other party were running someone, I would face a serious problem - not of voting my convictions, but again of calculating the odds. Citizens should not have to ask themselves, is it safe to take a principled stand against corruption or must they vote no matter how reprehensible the outcome.
Sunday, October 31, 2010
Sunday, October 24, 2010
Cheap Media - A Screed
William Randolph Hearst knew it - control of cheap media gives you power. Why can’t the left remember this clear lesson?
When FM radio gave better music production in the 1960's, the young and hip changed their dials. AM remained, often relying on all-news and talk shows. When laws changed, and the ownership of AM radio stations consolidated, programs like those of Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck expanded their audience. Those without the money to buy FM radios heard only one side.
When cable appeared, the young and hip changed their habits. Network TV remained for those who couldn’t afford the monthly fees. Fox defined itself as a network and was there.
Then, came digital TV, and some of us have been left with nothing, but radio. Limbaugh and Beck are still there.
Now, just as an important election is approaching, websites seem to be upgrading their technology, leaving those of us with older machines behind. Pages take longer to load, even locking up my machine. Ads cover stories, locking up my machine.
There are sites I’ve abandoned - sight obscuring ads drove me away from Salon and The Nation, registration drove me away from the New Republic and the Washington Post, locking machines threaten Salon and The Daily Beast, bad internet transfers force me out of Slate and Huffington Post.
What makes the owners of liberal websites thing advertisers like General Motors or General Electric Money really care if they destroy their web site so long as they get their message out for a few seconds. What makes them think rivals like the New York Times or The Economist really care if they survive? Don’t they think it worth while to hire someone, even in India, to constantly monitor their sites on all platforms?
Don’t they realize they’re as captivated by the market philosophy that says they’ve finally succeeded when they make money as those who brought on the mortgage crisis? That they’re no different than those who wanted to stay with an idea only until they sold the patent or issued an IPO, didn’t think it worthwhile to actually build something?
When given the choice of money or audience, they’ve been trained to think the first is the real affirmation of value.
And, then they wonder why conservatives are more effective at reaching the disenfranchised.
Even if the Drudge Report is also loading slowly and Fox is feuding with cheap cable networks, there’s still radio and Beck and Limbaugh to explain it all to the unhappy whose marginality is defined by the poor media they can afford.
If you want power, you don’t try to unify the bickering choir, you reach out to the apostate where ever they reside.
When FM radio gave better music production in the 1960's, the young and hip changed their dials. AM remained, often relying on all-news and talk shows. When laws changed, and the ownership of AM radio stations consolidated, programs like those of Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck expanded their audience. Those without the money to buy FM radios heard only one side.
When cable appeared, the young and hip changed their habits. Network TV remained for those who couldn’t afford the monthly fees. Fox defined itself as a network and was there.
Then, came digital TV, and some of us have been left with nothing, but radio. Limbaugh and Beck are still there.
Now, just as an important election is approaching, websites seem to be upgrading their technology, leaving those of us with older machines behind. Pages take longer to load, even locking up my machine. Ads cover stories, locking up my machine.
There are sites I’ve abandoned - sight obscuring ads drove me away from Salon and The Nation, registration drove me away from the New Republic and the Washington Post, locking machines threaten Salon and The Daily Beast, bad internet transfers force me out of Slate and Huffington Post.
What makes the owners of liberal websites thing advertisers like General Motors or General Electric Money really care if they destroy their web site so long as they get their message out for a few seconds. What makes them think rivals like the New York Times or The Economist really care if they survive? Don’t they think it worth while to hire someone, even in India, to constantly monitor their sites on all platforms?
Don’t they realize they’re as captivated by the market philosophy that says they’ve finally succeeded when they make money as those who brought on the mortgage crisis? That they’re no different than those who wanted to stay with an idea only until they sold the patent or issued an IPO, didn’t think it worthwhile to actually build something?
When given the choice of money or audience, they’ve been trained to think the first is the real affirmation of value.
And, then they wonder why conservatives are more effective at reaching the disenfranchised.
Even if the Drudge Report is also loading slowly and Fox is feuding with cheap cable networks, there’s still radio and Beck and Limbaugh to explain it all to the unhappy whose marginality is defined by the poor media they can afford.
If you want power, you don’t try to unify the bickering choir, you reach out to the apostate where ever they reside.
Sunday, October 17, 2010
Milli Vanilli in Brighton
One of the most uncomfortable hours I’ve ever spent occurred in Brighton, Michigan, in the late 1980's.
I was taking ballet classes there. Most of the students were local high school students. The assistant instructor, a dance major at the University of Michigan, wanted us to wear costumes to class on Halloween. When I didn’t, I was derided and so wore my sweats for class.
I was startled when two girls showed up dressed like hoboes in black face.
I learned from those admiring their costumes that they were supposed to be Milli Vanilli, two European-born break dancers who had some hit songs at the time. A few months later, in January 1990, they were criticized for not actually singing on their records, but simply acting as a stage presence for others.
I was shocked. No one seemed to think black face was the least bit offensive.
I looked for an exit. I didn’t want to confront them. After all, they had probably picked these costumes because they admired the way the men moved. Dancers can be particularly myopic when movement is involved.
But, I wondered, what were their mothers thinking who must have helped them apply the make-up. It wasn’t simple dark make-up, like a white would use on stage to play a Black. It was minstrel show black face.
I wondered, did they wear these costumes to school, or simply spend that much time on make-up for a dance class? If they were in school, where was the teacher or administrator who should have taken them aside, explained the realities of modern social life, and asked them to wash their faces.
What about the college student leading the class? She was so interested in celebrating Halloween, she abandoned the standard center floor work for conga lines and other forms of free expression.
I knew about the area support for the Ku Klux Klan; the local dragon, Robert Miles, was still alive. I’d seen survivalists out on weekend exercises when I drove down some county roads. Weren’t any of the adults they met at all aware of what they were seeing?
I got increasingly angry, both from by my sense of helplessness in the face of innocent bigotry and at the way the teacher was conducting the class. More and more, I wanted to walk out in protest, but was restrained by my inbred manners.
However, I soon stopped taking classes in Brighton.
I was taking ballet classes there. Most of the students were local high school students. The assistant instructor, a dance major at the University of Michigan, wanted us to wear costumes to class on Halloween. When I didn’t, I was derided and so wore my sweats for class.
I was startled when two girls showed up dressed like hoboes in black face.
I learned from those admiring their costumes that they were supposed to be Milli Vanilli, two European-born break dancers who had some hit songs at the time. A few months later, in January 1990, they were criticized for not actually singing on their records, but simply acting as a stage presence for others.
I was shocked. No one seemed to think black face was the least bit offensive.
I looked for an exit. I didn’t want to confront them. After all, they had probably picked these costumes because they admired the way the men moved. Dancers can be particularly myopic when movement is involved.
But, I wondered, what were their mothers thinking who must have helped them apply the make-up. It wasn’t simple dark make-up, like a white would use on stage to play a Black. It was minstrel show black face.
I wondered, did they wear these costumes to school, or simply spend that much time on make-up for a dance class? If they were in school, where was the teacher or administrator who should have taken them aside, explained the realities of modern social life, and asked them to wash their faces.
What about the college student leading the class? She was so interested in celebrating Halloween, she abandoned the standard center floor work for conga lines and other forms of free expression.
I knew about the area support for the Ku Klux Klan; the local dragon, Robert Miles, was still alive. I’d seen survivalists out on weekend exercises when I drove down some county roads. Weren’t any of the adults they met at all aware of what they were seeing?
I got increasingly angry, both from by my sense of helplessness in the face of innocent bigotry and at the way the teacher was conducting the class. More and more, I wanted to walk out in protest, but was restrained by my inbred manners.
However, I soon stopped taking classes in Brighton.
Sunday, October 10, 2010
Joe Klein - Right
Joe Klein recently interviewed nine people in Brighton, Michigan, whose mortgages were greater than the current values of their homes.
They were mainly people dependent on municipal budgets for their income (fire fighters, policemen, emergency response workers, lawyers) and they were angry that people they knew were able to benefit from the system when they could not or would not.
Such people have been squeezed from the right for years. When cities grew, some more vocal taxpayers were unwilling to subsidize the growth. They talked about economies of scale, which meant when a community doubled in size, area or population density, the number of people who provided essential services could not double.
People had to do more work for wages that were constantly under public attack.
When people cannot alter the pressures from above, they take solace from the gradations of status that separate them from others below. They only know the rich live in Grosse Pointe and send their children to ivy-league colleges; they don’t see the differences the wealthier do between different addresses or between Yale on the one hand, and Dartmouth on the other.
The differences they see are the ones that separate those making it from those living on the edge of poverty. They could buy their homes, not rent. They could eat meat without depending on food stamps. They could occasionally provide their families with small luxuries.
These status gradations have been under attack from the left, as government programs that provided safety nets tried to do so without stigma.
The anger they expressed to Klein arose from the elimination of such status markers. One person, a lawyer, was angry at a neighbor who used a scheduled layoff as the excuse to apply successfully for mortgage relief. She complained: "It was like she got a raise. She bought her kids a swing set."
When I checked Walmart’s website, simple metal swing sets begin at $129 and nicer wooden ones start at $249 and increase quickly. When I lived near Brighton, you shopped at Meijer’s Thrifty Acres. Their website advertises a metal set with some features of the wooden ones for $139.
A hundred dollars is half a day’s pay, before taxes, if you make $25 an hour.
A cheap swing set is a luxury for a family with a mortgage. A fancy one would indeed arouse the envy and anger Klein heard.
The important point Klein is reporting is that people have not just been squeezed by the economy. They’re also losing their sense of themselves when their social markers are destroyed.
Mortgages are the clearest example, because these people know when their neighbors walk away and banks foreclose, they, not the banks, are the ones who suffer when their homes lose value. Another of his sources, a deputy fire chief, said "It’s immoral," but isn’t punished. He added:
"You've got to figure that our parents wouldn't have walked away from a mortgage. I'm not walking away from mine. But people I know well, friends, are taking a hike, and I wonder, What has happened to us as people?"
What indeed, when a man squeezed by the economy loses whatever remains that makes him feel important?
He can’t see or influence the institutions or special interests who’ve been destroying the economy, but he does see the others every day, the ones who benefit from government programs intended to help. The loss they cause is personal.
Notes:
Klein, Joe. "On the Road: Underwater in Detroit," posted on Time website 16 September 2010; there were ten at the meeting.
They were mainly people dependent on municipal budgets for their income (fire fighters, policemen, emergency response workers, lawyers) and they were angry that people they knew were able to benefit from the system when they could not or would not.
Such people have been squeezed from the right for years. When cities grew, some more vocal taxpayers were unwilling to subsidize the growth. They talked about economies of scale, which meant when a community doubled in size, area or population density, the number of people who provided essential services could not double.
People had to do more work for wages that were constantly under public attack.
When people cannot alter the pressures from above, they take solace from the gradations of status that separate them from others below. They only know the rich live in Grosse Pointe and send their children to ivy-league colleges; they don’t see the differences the wealthier do between different addresses or between Yale on the one hand, and Dartmouth on the other.
The differences they see are the ones that separate those making it from those living on the edge of poverty. They could buy their homes, not rent. They could eat meat without depending on food stamps. They could occasionally provide their families with small luxuries.
These status gradations have been under attack from the left, as government programs that provided safety nets tried to do so without stigma.
The anger they expressed to Klein arose from the elimination of such status markers. One person, a lawyer, was angry at a neighbor who used a scheduled layoff as the excuse to apply successfully for mortgage relief. She complained: "It was like she got a raise. She bought her kids a swing set."
When I checked Walmart’s website, simple metal swing sets begin at $129 and nicer wooden ones start at $249 and increase quickly. When I lived near Brighton, you shopped at Meijer’s Thrifty Acres. Their website advertises a metal set with some features of the wooden ones for $139.
A hundred dollars is half a day’s pay, before taxes, if you make $25 an hour.
A cheap swing set is a luxury for a family with a mortgage. A fancy one would indeed arouse the envy and anger Klein heard.
The important point Klein is reporting is that people have not just been squeezed by the economy. They’re also losing their sense of themselves when their social markers are destroyed.
Mortgages are the clearest example, because these people know when their neighbors walk away and banks foreclose, they, not the banks, are the ones who suffer when their homes lose value. Another of his sources, a deputy fire chief, said "It’s immoral," but isn’t punished. He added:
"You've got to figure that our parents wouldn't have walked away from a mortgage. I'm not walking away from mine. But people I know well, friends, are taking a hike, and I wonder, What has happened to us as people?"
What indeed, when a man squeezed by the economy loses whatever remains that makes him feel important?
He can’t see or influence the institutions or special interests who’ve been destroying the economy, but he does see the others every day, the ones who benefit from government programs intended to help. The loss they cause is personal.
Notes:
Klein, Joe. "On the Road: Underwater in Detroit," posted on Time website 16 September 2010; there were ten at the meeting.
Sunday, October 03, 2010
Joe Klein - Wrong
Every once in a while, someone will write something that calls into question his or her credibility as a reporter. Joe Klein had such a moment with a September 16 blog entry that Time headlined "On the Road: Underwater in Detroit."
The article was drawn from a conversation with ten people he met in a restaurant in Brighton, described as a Detroit exurb, 40 miles from the city.
The Detroit metropolitan area is usually considered to include the city and Wayne County, along with Macomb County to the north, used by political reporters to represent auto workers, and Oakland County to the northwest, home of the more affluent.
Brighton’s in Livingston County.
When Michigan was settled, people moved to the best lands for farming. Roads and railroads followed, and with them more economic development. The state had been covered by glaciers that left moraines and swamps. Places like Livingston County were avoided as too rocky or wet.
It’s more representative of the under developed areas that exist between major metropolitan areas. It lies on the road from Detroit to Lansing, the capital and home of Oldsmobile. Similar land lies between Detroit and Flint to the north, between Detroit and Toledo to the south, and Detroit and Battle Creek to the west.
Bad lands have always nurtured malcontents. Livingston County was the home of Robert Miles, grand dragon of the Ku Klux Klan. The modern militia movement thrives in Livingston County along with Lenawee County to the south and Jackson County to the west.
The opinions of people from such areas are important to understand, but they should not be considered representative of places like Detroit suffering from deindustrialization. They are from areas that never accepted large factories, even when they had them.
Not only were Klein’s sources not from the Detroit geographic area, only one was associated with industry: John McGraw, described as "the former president of a small division of a power-tool company that was closed down by its European owners." He lives in Rolling Meadows, Illinois, and was not at the meeting in Brighton. Klein met him separately.
The rest were "cops, firefighters, emergency responders and a few lawyers." These people could be found in any small town, suburb or city in the country. They represent the middling class in nineteenth century small town life displaced by factory towns. Even when they live in large cities, they do not inhabit the industrial world signified by the word "Detroit."
Klein was traveling cross country to learn more about the roots of the Tea Party anger. The success of his trip depended on the quality of the people who arranged his interviews. This one was done by Kevin Gentry, a "deputy fire chief and adjunct law professor at Michigan State" who practices law in Brighton.
The problem with Klein’s piece isn’t the sources or what he reports; it’s the context he provides, the repetition of the word Detroit in the first two paragraphs. The comments may well represent the views of people in Detroit or the auto industry, but they are not part of world he visited, and Klein doesn’t provide any quotes from such people to confirm that their experiences are shared.
Indeed, the only people he quoted were the former executive, a lawyer and a deputy police chief. If any of the people he met were commoners, or if any of them had opinions, we don’t know what they were. If they had differing views, they may not have expressed them in this gathering.
It was the job of Klein, or the people prepping him for these interviews, to learn more about the sociology of the area he was visiting.
The unwary reader could finish the article with a wrong impression.
For those like me, who grew up in areas that bordered one of the badlands or lived near Brighton for several years, the failure to know simple facts about the community is the failure that plants a seed of doubt about Klein’s reliability.
One may dismiss this as quibbling over details, but details are the very thing we use to judge reporters.
Notes: An Anti-Defamation League website lists events sponsored in 2010 by the Lenawee Militia, the Southeast Michigan Volunteer Militia in Brighton, and a neo-Nazi group, Battalion 14, in Jackson.
The article was drawn from a conversation with ten people he met in a restaurant in Brighton, described as a Detroit exurb, 40 miles from the city.
The Detroit metropolitan area is usually considered to include the city and Wayne County, along with Macomb County to the north, used by political reporters to represent auto workers, and Oakland County to the northwest, home of the more affluent.
Brighton’s in Livingston County.
When Michigan was settled, people moved to the best lands for farming. Roads and railroads followed, and with them more economic development. The state had been covered by glaciers that left moraines and swamps. Places like Livingston County were avoided as too rocky or wet.
It’s more representative of the under developed areas that exist between major metropolitan areas. It lies on the road from Detroit to Lansing, the capital and home of Oldsmobile. Similar land lies between Detroit and Flint to the north, between Detroit and Toledo to the south, and Detroit and Battle Creek to the west.
Bad lands have always nurtured malcontents. Livingston County was the home of Robert Miles, grand dragon of the Ku Klux Klan. The modern militia movement thrives in Livingston County along with Lenawee County to the south and Jackson County to the west.
The opinions of people from such areas are important to understand, but they should not be considered representative of places like Detroit suffering from deindustrialization. They are from areas that never accepted large factories, even when they had them.
Not only were Klein’s sources not from the Detroit geographic area, only one was associated with industry: John McGraw, described as "the former president of a small division of a power-tool company that was closed down by its European owners." He lives in Rolling Meadows, Illinois, and was not at the meeting in Brighton. Klein met him separately.
The rest were "cops, firefighters, emergency responders and a few lawyers." These people could be found in any small town, suburb or city in the country. They represent the middling class in nineteenth century small town life displaced by factory towns. Even when they live in large cities, they do not inhabit the industrial world signified by the word "Detroit."
Klein was traveling cross country to learn more about the roots of the Tea Party anger. The success of his trip depended on the quality of the people who arranged his interviews. This one was done by Kevin Gentry, a "deputy fire chief and adjunct law professor at Michigan State" who practices law in Brighton.
The problem with Klein’s piece isn’t the sources or what he reports; it’s the context he provides, the repetition of the word Detroit in the first two paragraphs. The comments may well represent the views of people in Detroit or the auto industry, but they are not part of world he visited, and Klein doesn’t provide any quotes from such people to confirm that their experiences are shared.
Indeed, the only people he quoted were the former executive, a lawyer and a deputy police chief. If any of the people he met were commoners, or if any of them had opinions, we don’t know what they were. If they had differing views, they may not have expressed them in this gathering.
It was the job of Klein, or the people prepping him for these interviews, to learn more about the sociology of the area he was visiting.
The unwary reader could finish the article with a wrong impression.
For those like me, who grew up in areas that bordered one of the badlands or lived near Brighton for several years, the failure to know simple facts about the community is the failure that plants a seed of doubt about Klein’s reliability.
One may dismiss this as quibbling over details, but details are the very thing we use to judge reporters.
Notes: An Anti-Defamation League website lists events sponsored in 2010 by the Lenawee Militia, the Southeast Michigan Volunteer Militia in Brighton, and a neo-Nazi group, Battalion 14, in Jackson.
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