A Real-Life X-File

(EDIT: as of 3/20, this is the most current finding.  The debris field IS in an area the plane could have reached...)
I have to admit the first few days I read up and chatted online about Malaysian Airlines Flight 370, it balanced between sadness - the most likely fate of a missing plane was an explosion or crash - and snark - making ill-advised comments about "aliens" or "that island from LOST".

The snark came from being a long-time aficionado of conspiracy theories and ghost stories.  Growing up, I read books in the 133 juvenile shelves rather than the standard fiction.  Getting into The X-Files TV show for me was easy, given my childhood interests in UFOs, Bigfoot, the Bell Witch, the Bermuda Triangle.

And here was Flight 370, disappearing off radar without a word.  Early searches for debris or a crash site turn up nothing.  The legendary black box(es), nowhere to be found.  Family and friends noting that their attempts to call their missing loved ones' cell phones were ringing: if the phones had been destroyed or completely cut off from cell signal, calls are known to revert immediately to voicemail.  Early research into the passengers and pilots didn't reveal warning signs outside of two illegal passports... except both passport users - Iranians - had no known terrorist ties, and one of them was following the standard behavior of someone seeking asylum.

But the last few days' revelations about what might have happened - that there was a deliberate switch-off of the plane's transponder and communications, that the plane changed course multiple times, that it avoided waypoints in such a way only a trained knowledgeable pilot could fly - has turned this mystery into a more serious and unsettling affair.  No more jokes.

There are now a ton of questions about Flight 370, above all: What the hell happened?

What was originally considered likely - mid-air explosion, or else mass decompression that froze/suffocated everyone on board - is no longer considered.  To be fair, if that had happened, we would have found wreckage by now.  That mid-flight course corrections were made, and that the Aircraft Communications Addressing and Reporting System (ACARS) and transponder (comm link to air traffic controllers) were turned off before the last contact makes this more deliberate than accidental.

So, if someone - someones - hijacked the plane, this unlocks these questions: Who did it, Why did they do it, and Where the hell did they think they could go?

Those Iranians seeking asylum using stolen passports are suspects again.  But if it's not them, that leaves 230 or so people (I'm subtracting the poor kids who were on-board).  Even the pilot and co-pilot are suspects, considering whoever commandeered the flight knew how to avoid certain waypoints and stuck to radar dead zones.

One thing we do know: whoever did this either could not or did not make the effort to turn off other tracking data coming from the plane.  The engines, for example, gave off signal data of a sort to satellite tracking systems (which is why we've found out there was no crash when and where we thought it would be), and those signals are not accessible from within the plane.  This was rarely reported information, so even the most highly trained hijacker might not have known...

Why did someone hijack this flight?  Usually it's done as a kind of Propaganda of the Deed, a violent act drawing attention to the person(s) committing that deed.  But there haven't been any valid claims or statements from known terror cells, no-one standing up with video evidence or otherwise.  Even if there was a vast conspiracy between nations and media outlets to not broadcast any terrorist demands or claims, there's too many sources that would have leaked by now.

Other reasons to do this would cover:

• someone on the flight was a target, although it begs the question why was the whole plane taken to do that.
• someone wanted a plane, any plane, for a future terror plot.
• there was something valuable on the plane that was needed, and for some reason this was the only way someone could get to it.
• there IS no reason: someone's doing this for kicks or a bizarre rational none of us can comprehend.

The question most confounding is the Where?  Given the location and circumstances, there's not a lot of Where to cover.  I've linked to that map above, showing an orange trail of possible plane paths after the last known satellite report from the plane's engines.

You'd think the northern path over Asia makes the most sense, considering this was a hijack and the hijackers would want a place to land.  There's places in China and central Asia past the Himalayas where that type of plane - even relatively small airports, even flattened desert - could land.  And this hijacking - with a plane full of Chinese citizens - is happening at a time of serious turmoil and mass terror attacks in West China involving Uighur separatists.

The problem with this argument is that China - as well as India and Pakistan - are tightly protected airspaces.  Military radar and alert systems would have spotted the plane even at low altitudes, and those areas are well-populated areas.  People would have reported seeing a low-flying airliner by now.  And neither of these nations - China in particular - would have kept silent on the matter even if they shot down the plane.  They'd argue with good reason that a hijacked airliner is a flying weapon, and they'd have every right to shoot it down to avoid a bigger catastrophe.

The southern path into the Indian Ocean is the other likely direction... except that's mostly water.  There are no known island or landstrip locations that way.  If the plane circled back over Australia, again that's an airspace with a solid radar net protecting it.  And why hijack a plane to fly it out into an ocean when blowing it up is just as easy, if not easier to pull off?

One other question remains: What has happened to the passengers and crew?

This is the most terrifying part.  While it wasn't a comfortable thought if there had been an explosion or crash, the best that could have been said was that the deaths would have most likely been quick.

This as a hijacking is infinitely worse.  Some passengers were families.  Some were kids.  If they're taken as hostages, why aren't we hearing demands from the party responsible (even in a massive media lockdown, someone would have leaked by now)?  If someone on that flight was a target, what is happening to that person (or persons)?  What's happened to the poor victims deemed expendable...

This is a global mystery with a ton of clues and almost no solid leads.  This is scary and wrong and I'm afraid it's not gonna end well for everyone...

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The First Book I Kept From College

(EDIT: Hello, everyone from Crooks & Liars, thanks for visiting!)
I went for a Journalism degree at University of Florida, thinking of getting a career as a writer.  It didn't work out - reporting itself as a skill eluded me - but that's what I got my bachelors' degree (parents didn't back my request to switch majors to Poli Sci).

Of the textbooks I purchased over the semesters, when finished with the classes I traded most of them back in as I no longer needed them.  Except for a select few that caught my eye and became favorites for me to read and re-read as time went on.

One of the ones I kept - the first one, actually - was Joe McGinniss' Selling of the President.

The professor was using the book as an example of investigative, in-depth reporting covering a prolonged event: a Presidential campaign.  Specifically, Richard Nixon's 1968 return to politics as the Republican nominee.  But to me - with my interests in politics and history - there was a lot more to what it was about.

McGinniss was covering one of the key moments in the American political landscape.  During the 1960s, television had become the most powerful communications medium in the nation, surpassing radio which had been the dominant form since the 1930s and surpassing newspapers which had been the standard since the colonial era.  Before, most political campaigning relied on print ads, banners, crowds, speaking events, buttons, etc.  There'd been radio ads but they were easy to produce and ship out.  Television was different - a visual format that punished the unworthy and elevated the vain - and required a more cunning approach.  Advertising had by that time become a major profession using all of these mediums - print, radio, TV - to sell products: by 1968 with television leading the way, it was going to be used to sell politicians on a massive scale.

McGinniss lucked into the story by accident: his introduction to the 20th anniversary edition which I owned gave the details.  Hanging around New York City to interview Howard Cosell, a rising sports announcer, he met an advertising executive crowing about "landing the Humphrey account:"

The ad man was quick to explain.  Hubert Humphrey, who, now that Kennedy was dead, would almost certainly be the Democratic presidential nominee, had retained the agency to create a winning image for him... A week earlier, I'd been in Los Angeles because a leader of potentially heroic dimension had been slain. Now I was hearing an ad man say he'd be selling Hubert Humphrey to Americans like so much toothpaste or detergent... (p. xiii-xiv)

McGinniss, a young columnist for a Philadelphia paper who attracted the interest of a book publisher, conveyed the story he heard to the publishing agent meeting him later that week.  Intrigued, the publisher convinced McGinniss to pursue this as an investigatory piece for a book, one counter to the "official" historical tomes written by Theodore White (a respected author who wrote dry but impressive volumes about previous Presidential campaigns).  McGinniss even came up with a title mimicking White's usual Making of The President: this book about the ad campaign would be The Selling of the President.

When he followed up with the Humphrey ad exec to see about doing it, the ad man was obviously horrified. What he said was off-the-record, and above all the thing about advertising is how some ad men don't like revealing trade secrets: it's akin to pulling the curtain back on the All-Powerful Oz to realize people have been sold a humbug (Humphrey as the pro-war candidate in 1968 was not the most popular choice in his own party for the job).

McGinniss, stuck with an idea but not a subject to cover, decided to give Nixon's campaign - since at that time he'd sewn up the GOP nomination - a call to see if their ad execs were more accommodating.  He was put in touch with a Harry Treleaven, who "was most congenial.  He said he'd be happy to meet with me at ten o'clock..."

So that was it.  A dime in a pay phone was the genesis of this book...  He said he had no problem with that, but protocol required that such an arrangement be approved by his superior, Len Garment, whose own office was at Nixon headquarters.

That afternoon, Garment said no problem, with one stipulation: that nothing I observed would be printed until after the campaign was over.  I told him, as I'd told the man from Doyle Dane, that I would not even start writing until November and that it would be months after that before a book would be published...

...I asked Humphrey's people and they said no and I asked Nixon's people and they said yes...

As it was, when first published the book was widely perceived as being an attack upon Richard Nixon rather than a report on a very nearly apolitical process which promised (or threatened) to forever alter the way national campaigns would be conducted...

...It was fashionable in the season of the book's first publication... to lament the amorality of the process of selling the President and to bemoan as tragic the surrender of something so sacred as our method of choosing our leader to cynical, mercenary... soldiers of fortune.

But, look: who were the Watergate villains?  Haldeman, Ehrlichman, Mitchell, Magruder, Dean, Colson, Liddy, Hunt, and of course Nixon himself.  These were the people (excepting Nixon) whom even Harry Treleaven (my note: Treleaven is pretty much the hero of the book) considered the forces of darkness...  As for the supposedly venal ad men... their hands are clean, their souls unsullied (my note, again: this was written before Roger Ailes committed the deadly sin of producing Fox Not-News)...  What's more, every one of them was absolutely correct about Spiro Agnew. (introduction)

I liked the writing: wordy but not showing off, leavened with a dash of self-deprecation and awareness, an attempt at objective analysis while letting the author's bias show up in bits of levity.

The book itself then dives into the actual mechanics of what a modern Presidential campaign is anymore: a series of staged, well-managed media events staggered by a round of making televised ad snippets.  Interwoven into the scenes of Richard Nixon - not the most comfortable of souls - doing what he could to be both dignified (his only saving grace as a figure at that point) and (formally) informal, McGinniss wrote about the ad men themselves, dedicated to an increasingly demanding job of marketing to an electorate whose moods and whims shifted with each changing news story.

I loved McGinniss' introductory chapter to Treleaven: a rather middle-class guy who worked in L.A. for the Times and wrote radio scripts for a few years and grew to loathe it out there:

One night he and his wife were having dinner in a restaurant in L.A. with a couple he did not like.  Halfway through the meal, he turned to his wife.  

"Do you like it here?"  

"You mean the restaurant?"  

"I mean Los Angeles."  

"No, not especially."  

"Then let's go." (p.42)

At which point Treleaven left that night to New York City to find another job and never looked back.

It's a brilliant way to write a descriptive of your subject.  It highlighted Treleaven's sense of self, and an impulsive earnest willingness to break the routine when realizing the routine was killing his soul.  Elsewhere, McGinniss noted how Treleaven was annoyed that a newspaper misspelled his name, but found out later it wasn't about a sense of pride, it was Treleaven being disappointed someone didn't do their job right.

It was Treleaven, working on a 1966 Congressional campaign in Texas for this businessman named George HW Bush, who noted that "logical persuasion" was difficult to sell because he found "probably more people vote for irrational, emotional reasons than professional politicians suspect." (p.45)  He found that image worked wonders, as long as he presented Bush as likable, hard-working, and expressing empathy for the voter.  Bush won in heavily-leaning conservative Democratic Texas beating the incumbent 58 percent to 42, an unheard-of victory margin in that day and age (and even remarkable in this one where incumbents are even harder to defeat).

It's in these revelations that McGinniss details the shift in political science away from the logical to the emotional.  In some ways, politics had always been emotional and partisan.  But previous campaigns there were serious issues that had to be debated seriously.  The new method, due to television requiring an expressive empathic presence, needed to rely on emotional impact more than ever.  It stains the political discourse we have today, where actual facts and the complexity of real-world issues are drowned out by impulsive and inaccurate posturing.  Because of all the money that all this marketing requires, every candidate for every office has to campaign to the emotional impulse... nearly every minute of every day.

It was both eye-opening and horrifying to read the book when I was in college.  I keep re-reading every so often to compare it to the horrors of the political stage we see today 24/7.

But for more than just the outrage about the destruction of honest politics.  I kept this book because it's a great read.

McGinniss' skill as a writer-reporter comes through during the most compelling chapter in his book, the one where Nixon's campaign stages a "Question & Answer" broadcast where they actually bring on a fire-eating liberal radio show host, by the name of Jack McKinney (whom McGinniss suggested when Ailes asked him for any liberals they could bring onto the show).  McKinney goes after Nixon like a bulldog, and for half a chapter McGinniss details how Nixon works the stage, projecting somewhat Nixon's inner rage but also making you cheer Nixon on as he verbally spars with an opponent out to ruin his night.

Yeah.  Cheering Nixon on.  And this is an admitted Kennedy-following liberal reporter in McGinniss making you root for the sonofabitch.

I'm writing all this because McGinniss just passed away.  Andrew Sullivan at The Dish dedicated a decent-sized memorial to a fellow political writer/junkie:

...It’s not an exaggeration to say that Joe – at the tender age of 26! – transformed political journalism with The Selling Of The President, the legendary expose of the cynicism of media optics in presidential campaigns – and, by the by, a lovely, ornery rebuke to the magisterial tomes of Theodore H White... And the first thing to say is that the man could write. He couldn't write a bad sentence. His narratives powered along; his prose as clear as it was vivid; his innate skill at telling a story sometimes reaching rare moments in non-fiction when you’re lost in what is, in effect, a factual novel.

The book I keep from college over twenty years ago was itself twenty years old when I got it.  It was relevant in 1968 and 1988 and 2012 and will remain relevant.   Because it's that well-written.  And that important a topic.

You must read it.

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March 11th. GET THE DAMN VOTE OUT, PINELLAS COUNTY (w/ UPDATES)

It's the day of the special election to fill FL-13 for the US Congress.

It's the day to get out and vote for Alex Sink, so we can scare the crap out of the GOP wingnuts controlling the US House.

Go fight win, Democrats.  And to all my fellow moderate, ex-Republican Eisenhower/Roosevelt types, YOU GOTTA GET THE VOTE OUT TOO, JUST DON'T SIT THERE WITH YOUR NO-PARTY-AFFILIATE LABEL, VOTE DAMMIT.

I'll be updating this post as the day progresses, most likely after the polls close and the counting begins.

In the meantime, follow this link over to Vagabond Scholar where Batocchio has a list of CPAC responses.  Just a reminder, that THIS is what you're voting AGAINST.

More specifically, that CPAC still uses Sarah Palin as a major speaker, and the tone-deaf efforts she makes to stir up the Far Right base... as the Unitarians say, "Activate Facepalm Mode".  This is your modern Republican Party, folks... AVOID AVOID AVOID

GET THE VOTE OUT FOR SINK, PINELLAS COUNTY.  PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD...  Find your precinct and VOTE DAMMIT.

Update: as of 7:25 pm EDT, the Tampa Bay Times is reporting a slim Sink lead at 47.6 percent with Jolly at 47.2 percent and Libertarian Overby at 4.9.

The Pinellas County Supervisor of Elections estimated voter turnout at 39 percent through 6 p.m.

Dammit, Pinellas County.  39 PERCENT TURNOUT?!  I'm gonna disown the lot of you for failing to show up to vote!  /headdesk

Update (9:00 pm): I really think that poor turnout is what hurt Sink's chances, because the election's been called for Republican Jolly.  He's at 48 percent with Sink at 46 and Overby holding around 4 percent.

Well, f-ck.  This is pretty interesting because the GOP had been laying out an early narrative that Jolly had been mismanaging his campaign, but now they'll be crowing it as PROOF DEFINITIVE PROOF THAT AMERICANS HATE OBAMACARE AND OBAMA AND THE EVUL LIBRUL AGENDA.

The Dems ARE gonna be forced to go on the defensive about Obamacare now, and won't be able to stick to their narratives about hiking the minimum wage or protecting social aid programs like Food Stamps.

Dammit, Pinellas voters.

Here's your wake-up call, Democrats.  GET THE GODDAMN VOTE OUT THIS YEAR.

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Florida Special Election for the 13th District: Turnout Still Critical

So that means one thing, Democrats.  GET THE GODDAMN VOTE OUT.

From the Washington Post:

So far, Republicans have cast slightly more votes than Democrats. That doesn't bode well for Republican nominee David Jolly.

Say what?

You read that right. Republicans account for 42 percent of the ballots returned through Thursday, while Democrats account for 40 percent of the ballots cast. While that may seem at first blush like good news for Jolly, the reality is that it falls short of the mark Republicans were hoping to hit, for a few reasons.

GOP strategists have been hopeful that turnout would favor the GOP in a big way in this race. There's no presidential election at the top of the ticket, and problems with Obamacare have fired up the Republican base. In short, Republicans were hoping to build up a wider advantage than two points via absentee balloting, which is a very popular option in the district. (Two points is roughly on par with the GOP's registration advantage in the district.)

As Adam Smith noted in the Tampa Bay Times earlier this month, Republicans have outpaced Democrats in absentee balloting during the past couple of cycles by wider margins. In 2012, Republican voters outpaced Democrats by six points in absentee voting. (President Obama still won the district narrowly.) In 2010, as Smith noted, the GOP absentee advantage was 11 percent...

The actual election day is this March 11th.  Get the DAMN VOTE OUT THIS TUESDAY, PEOPLE...

Adam Smith's been tracking this story, and one of the other bits he's written is about how the independent, NPA voters are key this Tuesday:

As of Friday, Republicans had a nearly 3,800 vote advantage over Democrats in District 13 and likely will cast significantly more votes on election day than Democrats. It still may not be enough for Jolly, given the way swing voters ultimately pick the winner in this centrist district.

Consider that in 2012, Republicans had cast nearly 11,000 more votes than Democrats by election day and then on election day outperformed Democrats by more than 9,000 votes. Barack Obama still narrowly won that district. In 2010, Republicans had a nearly 12,400 vote lead prior to election day and then on election day cast more than 8,600 more votes than Democrats. Then-gubernatorial candidate Sink still narrowly beat Republican Rick Scott in the district.

It's shaping up to be a squeaker, but given the recent track record of District 13 voters, Jolly as of today has more to worry about looking at absentee ballot returns than Sink...

Tuesday.  March 11th.  Find your precinct.  You're allowed by law to take an hour off from work to go place your vote in an election.  GET.  THE.  DAMN VOTE.  OUT.

I'm sick and tired of seeing less than half of our registered voters not showing up for non-Presidential election days.  You made the effort to register, folks, MAKE THE EFFORT TO VOTE.  It's your POWER, it's YOUR voice.

I don't wanna hear any whining if the turnout's under 55 percent and your party's candidate doesn't win out.

P.S. Vote for Sink.  Jolly's sticking to the GOP script of banning Obamacare, refusing to fund any stimulus package, discriminating gays, and slashing on much-needed aid to our veterans and the poor.  Just stop voting Republican, people... Just stop...

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Things To Note About Russia, Ukraine, and The World

With the ongoing crisis in eastern Europe between Russia and the Ukraine over Crimea (and Ukraine itself should Russia all-out invade), there are a few things you'll need to know. This Slate article does a nice job about covering the current events, but there's a few bits of background info you'd need to consider:

1) Russia has historically been heavily involved in Eastern European affairs for centuries.  They consider it "their" stomping grounds the way we Americans would consider, well, the Western hemisphere.  To an outsider, Russia reacting to the Ukrainian uprising this past month seems a bit like overkill: however, just consider how the U.S. reacts/reacted to Cuba just 90 miles off our shores over the last 150 years (trying to annex it, fighting Spain for its' "independence"... going apesh-t when Castro took over and joined the Soviets).  And the Ukraine is right on Russia's border.

The reason World War I escalated the way it did was because Russia inserted itself as a major player into the Eastern European Balkan nation-states like Serbia: when Austria-Hungary mobilized against Serbia in response to the Arch-Duke's assassination, Russia mobilized in response (which got Germany mobilizing against both Russia AND France, since France and Russia were allied via treaty already).  Just think of Russia still wanting to insert itself into Eastern European activities... whether those Eastern European states want Russia meddling or not.

2) What Putin is doing with sending troops into the Crimea may be an over-reaction because the Russians clearly didn't think their ally President Yanukovych would fall so quickly.  There's also the possibility Putin didn't figure on Europe or the United States over-reacting to his sending in the troops and getting his parliament to rubber-stamp the use of force against Ukraine.

A previous stir-up with a former Soviet state in 2008 - Georgia - ended up being lopsided in Russia's favor with few international repercussions.  But that was due more to Georgia's leadership being too aggressive towards Russia, hurting their stance with the U.S. and NATO nations.  Ukrainian protesters that overthrew Yanukovych may have been anti-Russian in their stance, but they were openly protesting in favor of joining the European Union.  That would make the EU nations - Germany, France and the UK in particular - more keen on providing political and economic support to Ukraine.

2a) Another reason for Putin's over-reaction: he's increasingly surrounded himself with yes-men and cronies (sounds familiar...) who only give him the news he wants to hear.  As such, he may have gotten separated from the real world and is operating on full Disconnect mode...

3) It's that pro-EU stance of the Ukrainians that's upsetting the Russian government.  Having a bordering nation go fully into the Western European sphere of influence would seem like a weakness to the Russians.  Again, see how Russia reacted to the start of WWI...

4) Crimea itself is relatively sparsely populated, but is mostly pro-Russian citizenry, which is why Russia moved so quickly and successfully in occupying it.  Save for the Tatar population, which is an Turkic-Arab minority that also happens to be very pro-Ukrainian and pro-Western.  What happens to them is a serious issue.

5) Crimea is key territory for Russia because of its' natural seaport geography in the Black Sea, a major aspect of Russian naval security.  There's a reason after the Soviet break-up that Ukraine and Russia made a series of treaties allowing the Russian navy access to Sevastopol: Russia needed that seaport, big time.

6) Western responses to Russia's takeover of Crimea has been limited.  Mostly diplomatic ties getting cut, a planned G8 meeting in Sochi in June now likely to get suspended, possibility of the other nation members kicking Russia out.  There's been a huge response already, however, to Russia's economy where their stock market's taken a huge hit, their currency's been devalued, and a lot of trade deals getting struck down.

6a) Which is why Putin may be talking tough, but it's increasingly unlikely Russia would fully invade Ukraine.  An actual invasion would be a huge blow to Russia's economy: they have few allies siding with them on this, and the nations that would line up on Ukraine's side are the major economic powers - the EU, Japan, the United States, even China - that could cripple Russia's finances and cause an internal economic depression that would anger up the Russian populace.

7) If Russia does invade, the Ukrainian forces may have fewer numbers than the Russian forces but will be better organized and fighting a defensive war, which favors them.  While NATO or the U.S. won't contribute ground troops or any overt support, they will back Ukraine as far as possible.  More than likely, Ukraine will find military support coming from Poland and other former Warsaw Pact nations not on good terms with Russia and terrified of a Putin-led government acting like a reborn Russian "empire".  It definitely won't be a swift curb-stomp fight like Russia had against Georgia.

8) Most likely scenario: Russia forces the annexation of the Crimea.  There'll be a fight - mostly political, possibly military - to force Russian concessions to Ukraine to make that annexation go over smoothly (especially something that would ensure the Tatars political and physical safety).  Russia may face some sanctions and their political leadership might find themselves persona non grata on the international scene for a few years, but it may stabilize matters over the long term.  That's only if they don't invade.

8a) If they do invade... it'll be like their 1979 invasion of Afghanistan (or the U.S. invasion of Iraq 2003) all over again: an occupying force in hostile territory while the rest of the world sits by in anger and open contempt.  With the added woes of a tanking economy as much-needed trade deals get wiped out.

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Why The Swift Push For Segregating Teh Gay Marrieds

There's been a sudden flux of Red States - first Kansas, then Arizona, lately a few others - trying to pass legislation under the guise of "religious liberty" that would allow business owners to cite their religious belief should they ever want to refuse service to anyone they believe is gay or "promoting gay marriage" in some form.

They're basically bringing back segregation.  Just not for Blacks, but for Teh Gays.

There's a couple of reasons for that:

1) The simplest, most obvious reason is competition between the various Far Right groups leading each state trying to one-up each other and prove their social conservative bona fides by getting an anti-gay bill passed.  If Far Right Kansas does it, so goes Far Right Arizona, Far Right Mississippi, Far Right Georgia, Far Right Texas, Far Right...

2) The growing realization among the Far Right social conservatives that they're running out of options trying to stop gay marriage from becoming a nationwide reality.

The courts at the federal level are striking down gay marriage bans one state at a time: they just struck down Texas' recently.  The federal ruling against DOMA was a huge blow as well to the Religious Right.  At some point, the economic, legal and social benefits of marriage will not be denied on the basis of race oh wait we solved that with Loving V. Virginia ... marriage will not be denied on the basis of gender preference.

So if the Far Right can't stop gay marriage, they'll go for their next weapon of choice: they'll want to punish people for marrying gay and they'll want to punish people for supporting gay marriage (these laws not only ban those suspected of being gay (or gay-married) but also anyone - family and friends - celebrating it).  And they'll do that by "allowing" businesses to discriminate just by looking at a customer (as though spotting gays and lesbians and those celebrating Teh Gay was that easy.  We do NOT wear pink triangles everywhere we go, haters).

That these Far Right legislators are arcing backwards to a world pre-1965 when businesses were "allowed" to discriminate against Blacks from eating or shopping at their venues - that they are hearkening back to the most odious elements of Jim Crow segregation - doesn't seem to register with them.  Then again, these are the same jokers who never saw a problem with segregation in the first place...

The most horrifying thing about this "religious liberty" excuse is that it's not really about liberty or even expression of faith: it's about using religion as an excuse to be biased, to be hateful towards a small number of fellow humans.  It's using Leviticus as an excuse to punish sexual conduct - specifically, homosexual conduct - all the while ignoring other sins and acts - tattoos, mixing of clothing fibers, working on Sabbath days, adultery - that are more common and yet left uncommented and unpunished.

You don't see anything in these "liberty" laws that allow businesses to discriminate against divorcees or people celebrating their second or third marriages.  That's because they'd be discriminating against, what, half the nation.  It's so much easier and more satisfying to pass moral judgment against the thousands of gays and lesbians instead of risking the wrath of millions of adulterers...

And they wonder why more young people are turning away from Christianity and faith in general in this nation?  It's because they more often than not associate Christianity with the Far Right, with the political ideologues, the hypocrites, the fear-mongers, the haters.  We've had thirty-plus years of the Moral Majority and their political descendants pose as the face of Christianity in this nation: thirty-plus years of evangelical hate-filled moralizers passing judgment on women and children and the poor and gays and everybody else not of their parish.  This is the House they've inherited: Empty not only of our nation's youth but empty of God's love and charity and Grace.  

The good news is that these "religious liberty" bills aren't going very far: the immediate outraged responses to them have made the Far Right haters back down (at least for now, in public).  The bad news?  They're still pursuing these types of laws in other states, and are more likely going to try some other gambit to stop gay marriage from becoming the same as hetero marriage.  This fight is not over, people: we are not wrestling against flesh and blood here but against the haters, the secret powers waging war against our families and friends in the name of their fear...

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From Ta-Nehisi, Not Just For the Lost Battalion But For Every American, Every Son

If I could repost this article in its entirety I would.  But it's better to follow the link and read it yourself.

Ta-Nehisi Coates interviews the mother of Jordan Davis.  For the interview, he brings along his own son, 13 years old and black and pretty much in the same unsettling reality that Jordan and Trayvon lived (and died).

Last Thursday, I took my son to meet Lucia McBath, because he is 13, about the age when a black boy begins to directly understand what his country thinks of him. His parents cannot save him. His parents cannot save both his person and his humanity. At 13, I learned that whole streets were prohibited to me, that ways of speaking, walking, and laughing made me a target. That is because within the relative peace of America, great violence—institutional, interpersonal, existential—marks the black experience. The progeny of the plundered were all around me in West Baltimore—were, in fact, me. No one was amused. If I were to carve out some peace myself, I could not be amused either. I think I lost some of myself out there, some of the softness that was rightfully mine, to a set of behavioral codes for addressing the block. I think these talks that we have with our sons—how to address the police, how not to be intimidating to white people, how to live among the singularly plundered—kill certain parts of them which are as wonderful as anything. I think the very tools which allow us to walk through the world, crush our wings and dash the dream of flight.

I am white.  I grew up getting The Talk on how to behave with girls and how to obey the traffic laws and how to avoid drunken fights and that was it.  I was never lectured to be afraid of being hunted by my own neighbors or other adults the way Ta-Nehisi and his son had to be lectured.

I told her that I was stunned by her grace after the verdict. I told her the verdict greatly angered me. I told her that the idea that someone on that jury thought it plausible there was a gun in the car baffled me. I told her it was appalling to consider the upshot of the verdict—had Michael Dunn simply stopped shooting and only fired the shots that killed Jordan Davis, he might be free today.

She said, "It baffles our mind too. Don’t think that we aren’t angry. Don’t think that I am not angry. Forgiving Michael Dunn doesn't negate what I’m feeling and my anger. And I am allowed to feel that way. But more than that I have a responsibility to God to walk the path He's laid. In spite of my anger, and my fear that we won’t get the verdict that we want, I am still called by the God I serve to walk this out."

What happened to Jordan Davis wasn't Jordan's fault.  It's not Jordan's fault Michael Dunn was carrying his gun, it's not Jordan's fault that Dunn couldn't control his own anger when he called on Jordan's friends to turn down that loud music, it wasn't Jordan who pulled a trigger it was an angry man with a gun and a crazy broken law giving him license to open fire.  There are kids playing loud music everywhere.  They are driving in their parents' cars up and down these roads with the windows down and laying out a bass that shakes the surrounding car windows.  Some of them are white.  I don't see anyone at the gas stations shouting at them to turn the damn music down.

She stood. It was time to go. I am not objective. I gave her a hug. I told her I wanted the world to see her, and to see Jordan. She said she thinks I want the world to see "him." She was nodding to my son. She added, "And him representing all of us." He was sitting there just as I have taught him—listening, not talking.

Now she addressed him, "You exist," she told him. "You matter. You have value. You have every right to wear your hoodie, to play your music as loud as you want. You have every right to be you. And no one should deter you from being you. You have to be you. And you can never be afraid of being you."

She gave my son a hug and then went upstairs to pack.

The only difference between me at 13 and Ta-Nehisi's son at 13 is the color of our skin.  That and maybe whatever geek thing he's into that I'm not.  The only difference between me and Trayvon Martin at 17 was the skin color, and that he preferred Skittles over M&Ms.  The only difference between me and Jordan Davis was the skin.  And that I had Led Zeppelin blasting at top volume instead of Beyonce.

I didn't have to live with the fear of some angry adult blasting away at me because of who I was.

What the hell is wrong with us as a nation that we let fear dictate what we do?  That we let our anger get the better of us?  That we have some people who think themselves privileged enough to sell that fear and anger to get away with it?

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