Brew City Brawler

Shark and Shepherd's Rick Esenberg is teh funny

Recently, Rick Esenberg had this to say:

My second post ("Being serious ...) was prompted by commenters who repeated the slander that "Bush lied and people died." If you believe that, I do think that you are either misinformed or hopelessly partisan; even not serious.

He had this to say of Charlie Sykes:

 I do listen regularly to Sykes and I think your description of him is just wrong. He needs to be entertaining so he gets polemical but, for a general audience talk show, I think the discussion on his show takes place on a remarkably high level.

So let's see..."Bush Lied, People Died" -- a slogan based on the absolutely correct premise that the Bush administration deliberately misrepresented and overhyped the intelligence on Iraq to justify the invasion -- is slander. While Sykes -- who has cast Jim Doyle as a segregationist, a criminal or just calls him "despicable;" who insinuates that the people who voted for Michael McGee were thugs themselves; who routinely calls liberals unpatriotic or worse; who routinely twists facts to make his "point" -- somehow represents a "high level" of discussion.

Got it.

Also on the topic of Sykes, Esenberg seems wildly overgenerous in his interpretation of how Sykes discusses issues in the "central city"(i.e. black people).

But so is every conservative I know - even the dread Charlie Sykes who I have yet to hear, as Mike claims, give a lecture about "racism being understandable and black people getting what they deserve." To the contrary, what underlies his concern - and mine - about street violence is a strong conviction that black people - who are overwhelmingly its victims - don't "deserve it."

I don't know ... but when I listen to Charlie Sykes I hear him:

• call people lined up at the Coggs Center for free food vouchers moochers and suggest they're all chiselers
• say Milwaukee voters (i.e. blacks) will vote to require private employers offer sick days because they're shiftless
• read a story of some teens robbing a Wauwatosa family and conclude by asking if people seriously believes a summer jobs program would have stopped them (this was some years ago)
• categorically reject any argument that economics have played a role in the central city's meltdown and instead blame it on the "culture" or people just not taking responsibility for their lives
• use the tragic drowning of a child at a family pool party at a downtown hotel to riff on the sickness of the "culture" yet ignore the story of a Waterford girl who nearly drowned at a house party

And so on.

The Brawler allows that Charlie Sykes has some compassion for inner city crime victims. But the Brawler also suggests that he's more concerned with trundling out right wing talking points (Charles Murray, your office is calling) or stoking the flames of self-righteous indignation among his listeners in Oconomowoc. You know: entertainment.

UPDATE: The Brawler realizes he has been whinging on about Esenberg for some time now ... All the Brawler can say that the whole myth of  "Bush acted in good faith/everyone else got it wrong" is so well-established now that it's going to enter into the rightwing canon of big lies along with "the media lost Vietnam," "The New Deal dragged out the Depression" and "Wisconsin's generous welfare benefits attracted shiftless African Americans up from Chicago."

This despite the facts that, as the Brawler has been whinging, the Bush Administration made claims about Iraqi and WMDs that went far beyond what the intelligence showed; that the Bush Administration was packed with proven prevaricators; and that people in the intelligence community at the time -- including a Marine general -- believed the Administration was cherry-picking intelligence.

The Shark is by all reports a mensch (the Brawler wouldn't use the world "soulless" to describe him), but his embrace of arguments that are only going to be more threadbare with the passing of time is disappointing.

Who’s Being Serious About Iraq?

"Being Serious About Iraq" Rick Esenberg thundered over at Shark and Shepherd on Monday, in an effort to rebut Mike Mathias' assertion that "peace activists" were right about Iraq (an assertion about as controversial as saying the earth orbits the sun). Ese goes on to make a gooey argument that Bill Clinton bears part of the blame (credit?) for going into Iraq because he made regime change in Iraq part of U.S. policy, plus a bunch of intelligence agencies thought he had WMDs, etc. So it's not just Bush's fault.

 

Plus, don't say Bush lied because that's not nice.

 

Being serious apparently means ignoring that the administration stretched intelligence to fit its ends (given the stakes, the Brawler would say this falls under "lying"), something Dick Cheney literally cannot stop himself from doing. Being serious means eliding that the Bush Administration hyped the threat of nukes far beyond what most credible observers, who saw a potential risk of chemical/bio weapons, would support (aluminum tubes, anyone?). Being serious apparently means ignoring Hans Blix's reports that he found nothing and that, with some exceptions, the Iraq regime was cooperating with inspections. Being "serious" apparently means ignoring that people familiar with Iraq's weapons program spoke out against the buildup (Ritter, Butler). Being serious also means ignoring that Bush's rush to war came under serious criticism on diplomatic/procedural/political grounds (Gore being the most notable) as well as moral (Pope John Paul II, who said it didn't meet the criteria for a just war).

Being serious also means making statements like this:

 

Even if Saddam was in check in 2003, it seemed unlikely that he could be kept there.

 

with a straight face. Seriously? How would he have gotten out of "check"? Coalition air patrols had the run of the skies. Does Esenberg seriously believe that Saddam could have rebuilt a conventional army or WMD program without it getting blown up? (And if Saddam was such a threat, why were his neighbors cool or opposed to U.S. action while they supported Desert Storm?)

 

Being "serious" about Iraq also means citing an essay by a noted McCarthy apologist and proponent of invading Iran (who's wargamed bat-shit scenarios of said invasion) title "Why Iraq Was Inevitable." That seems a bit of a determinist, if not a vulgar Marxist, theme for the non-materialist Esenberg, but when you're hard-pressed to defend a war that's killed tens of thousands, you gotta grab whatever reed you can.

 

As one might expect, McCarthy apologist Arthur Herman's essay is bulging with manure. The Brawler doesn't have time to divert a river through  it, so he'll just tend to a few bits, selected almost at random.

 

Herman tries to argue that the U.S. was doing the hard work that the UN wouldn't do. The UN didn't have the stones to follow up on its Resolutions so it was up to the U.S. to do so.  

 

“The case against Saddam, even by the UN’s own rules, was rock solid, and in November 2002 the Security Council did unanimously issue Resolution 1441, ordering him to disarm his WMD’s or face “serious consequences.” Everyone understood that “serious consequences” meant the use of force, including on Iraq's territory."

Actually, the people who hammered out 1441 said -- explicitly -- it was not an authorization for war. Said one: “[T]his resolution contains no "hidden triggers" and no "automaticity" with respect to the use of force. If there is a further Iraqi breach, reported to the Council by UNMOVIC, the IAEA or a Member State, the matter will return to the Council for discussions as required in paragraph 12." That'd be dovish U.S. Ambassador to the UN John Negroponte (who, arrogating to the U.S. the right to preemptive war, said that the resolution did not "constrain any member state from acting defend itself against the threat posted by Iraq or to enforce relevant United Nation as resolutions and protect world peace and security." That didn't work out too well, did it.)

 

Later, Herman distorts the record on Hans Blix's search for WMDs:

 

The president held back until Blix's interim report on January 27, 2003,which even the New York Times labeled "grim." There was nothing in it to suggest that Iraq had accepted the principle of complying with UN resolutions or intended to take any of the steps that, in Blix's words, "it needs to carry out to win the confidence of the world and to live in peace."

 

From theinterim report (which did include some complaints about Iraqi behavior):

 

It has regard to the procedures, mechanisms, infrastructure and practical arrangements to pursue inspections and seek verifiable disarmament. While inspection is not built on the premise of confidence but may lead to confidence if it is successful, there must nevertheless be a measure of mutual confidence from the very beginning in running the operation of inspection.

 Iraq has on the whole cooperated rather well so far with UNMOVIC in this field.  The most important point to make is that access has been provided to all sites we have wanted to inspect and with one exception it has been prompt. We have further had great help in building up the infrastructure of our office in Baghdad and the field office in Mosul.  Arrangements and services for our plane and our helicopters have been good.  The environment has been workable.

 Our inspections have included universities, military bases, presidential sites and private residences.  Inspections have also taken place on Fridays, the Muslim day of rest, on Christmas day and New Years day.  These inspections have been conducted in the same manner as all other inspections.  We seek to be both effective and correct.

Quick -- is Herman's characterization of Blix's report a "lie"? And should he have noted that Blix would subsequently argue the invasion of Iraq was illegal? Or should have have cited these words from a March 2008 columnn penned by Blix:

 

The elimination of weapons of mass destruction was the declared main aim of the war. It is improbable that the governments of the alliance could have sold the war to their parliaments on any other grounds. That they believed in the weapons' existence in the autumn of 2002 is understandable. Why had the Iraqis stopped UN inspectors during the 90s if they had nothing to hide? Responsibility for the war must rest, though, on what those launching it knew by March 2003.

By then, Unmovic inspectors had carried out some 700 inspections at 500 sites without finding prohibited weapons. The contract that George Bush held up before Congress to show that Iraq was purchasing uranium oxide was proved to be a forgery. The allied powers were on thin ice, but they preferred to replace question marks with exclamation marks.

Esenberg, no doubt, finds these words unserious.

 

Then, Herman just wanders into the bizarre:

 

Should we have backed off after the Blix report on January 27, 2003, even as the American troop buildup in Kuwait was in full swing? That would have devastated Bush's reputation as a war leader after his resounding success in Afghanistan, and guaranteed that he would never be more than a one-term president (which may have been the real objective of his critics anyway).

 

Is it me or is Herman conflating the national interest with Bush's reputation? Truly, the mind reels.

 

Esenberg says he savored Herman's essay as he swigged some Oregon Pinot Noir. Seems like a waste, as articles like this are best complemented by grape MD 20/20.

 

Over at the blog Balloon Juice, Army vet/war-supporter-turned-Obamaton John Cole says:

 

In a just world, people like me who cheerleaded this disaster would have to pay a price for our foolishness. As it is, I have learned a horrible lesson at the expense of thousands American dead and tens of thousands of American wounded and hundreds of billions of dollars. It isn’t right.

 

One awaits the day when Esenberg can find it in himself to make this leap rather than turn to a McCarthy apologist to make a point that's long since gone past indefensible.

 

For more Esenberg ear-plugging, check out this classic Brawler post.

In re Esenberg: No smear intended

I want to make clear that, in some previous posts, I was not attempting to smear Rick Esenberg as a racist. I realize a fair-minded reader could walk away from those posts with that impression. So I want to set the record straight (to the extent it matters from a lowly blogger).

Indeed, Esenberg is, to my eyes, one of the few local voices on the right that takes urban and racial issues seriously. I disagree, fundamentally, with some of his analyses and his prescriptions. Just as I believe he protests a bit too much in his critiques of Obama – a point made at great length by Seth Zlotocha in comment strings at Shark and Shepherd. But if anyone were to suggest to me that Esenberg’s positions were motivated by racism, I’d say they were high.

That said, I was genuinely surprised back in November that Esenberg deemed “interesting” and apparently worth serious engagement a series of stories in Slate speculating whether intelligence might be unequally distributed among the “races.”  The Brawler deemed it “hokum” – and not without reason.

I was also surprised that Esenberg deemed “faith-based” the “nature of the reaction against” Nobel prize winning biologist (and one of the finders of the DNA double helix) James Watson for making “comments on the distribution of innate intelligence among Africans.” (Watson actually said African intelligence “wasn’t like ours” – and a good bit more, including disparaging comments about non-African blacks).

Surprised because Watson’s remarks – let alone Saletan’s extrapolations – weren’t backed up by science. So speaking against them was something different than acting on faith. (One should note that Watson significantly walked back his comments.)

And I confess, in the current climate of discussion about race – with righties breaking their backs to make Obama look bad for his “typical white person” comment – I thought I could make a clever point by pointing out how one of the right’s leading lights got sunk in a debate he might have wished he hadn’t entered.

I confess to still being somewhat perplexed by Esenberg’s initial post. He may have been musing on the philosophical and social implications of uncomfortable scientific questions. But I don’t see the underlying science that inspires those questions.

All that said, Esenberg was not coming from (to use a phrase I’m sure he, like I, despise) a “place” of racism. And I apologize to him and to my readers if that was implied.

(Addendum: Esenberg responded to the two posts mentioned here.)

Race and intelligence or How dumb can some white people be?

The Brawler noted a few days ago that conservative blogger Rick "Shark and Shepherd" Esenberg -- who is very concerned about Barack Obama's use of the phrase "typical white person" -- a few months ago expressed sympathy (though not necessasrily agreement) with a series of stories in Slate exploring whether white folks, as a group, were smarter than blacks, and the concept of equality of intelligence among the "races" is a sort of "liberal creationism." (paragraph slightly edited)

Of course, the Slate series depended on research co-authored by one J. Philippe Rushton, who has links to some racist groups. Will Saletan, who penned the stories, issued a semi-retraction.

(Thought experiment: Imagine Esenberg's critique if Obama said,  in response to bogus research demonstrating the intellectual superiority of blacks to whites: "If one is a materialist and believes that evolutionary biology as expressed in our genes explains much about us, how can one exclude the possibility that certain attributes, like intelligence, may be unevenly spread among groups with some greater proportion of common genetic material?" Give him credit for being a free thinker?

Or: What if Obama, in response to denunication of a black scientist who said "European intelligence is not like ours," said the outcry seemed "faith based"?

The quoted positions were ones, of course, taken by Esenberg ... if you switch around the "races" described.)

Anyway, revisiting this stuff brought to mind a post on the topic by the great Daniel Davies. Here's an excerpt:

There are two claims which are being twisted together here:

1. That there is a genetic component to intelligence.

Status: Not proven, a lot of the measuring techniques being used to try to prove it are irredeemably fucked up, but not entirely ridiculous either. Denial of this proposition is not actually a strawman "Darwinism-below-the-neck", but it does involve you in asserting that if and when we get a useable (almost certainly multi-factor) metric for something that is reasonably described by the English word "intelligence", the individual-to-individual variability in this will be large enough relative to the inherited variability to mean that there is no practical significance to inherited brain characteristics.

2. This genetic component for intelligence is tied together with the specific genes that make black people black.

Status: On the same sort of level as the proposition that MMR vaccine causes autism. Believed by basically nobody who knows what they're talking about, on the basis of massive amounts of evidence. A theory that is constantly being resurrected on the basis of new crank analysis, but which has been knocked smack down on its arse every time.

Furthermore, anyone believing in 2 is, by that token, a racist. If you believe that black people are genetically inferior, then you need to be arguing that it's OK to be a racist, not that racists are terrible but you aren't one. According to the "Savage Love" advice column, there are a surprisingly large number of men who regularly have oral and anal sex with other men but nevertheless insist that they are straight and even hate gays. Anyone who claims to be "anti-racist", but takes seriously the proposition that black people are genetically less intelligent (or more prone to criminal behaviour, etc) than white people is in a similar state of denial. William Saletan's series of articles aimed at "seriously discussing the research on intelligence and race" appear to me to be exactly in this vein; he may think he's looking for fucking Narnia but he's actually just in the closet.

Read the whole thing.

Just in: Rick Esenberg, whose appreciation for Alison Krauss reflects some sound judgment, says "Give me a break."

Just in: No smear intended against Esenberg.

Rick "Shark and Shepherd" Esenberg gets freaky on race

Here's a shocker: Rick Esenberg, proprietor of Shark and Shepherd, was not a fan of Barack Obama's speech on race in America.

His concluding statement:

One of the reasons that we don't talk about race in this country is that we have adotped an elaborate etiquette designed to assuage white guilt and black suspicion that makes anything approaching candor impossible. Obama has been more than willing to enforce that etiquette.

What are the components of that etiquette? How does it assuage white guilt? How does one define candor? Dunno. Esenberg, McIlheran-like, shrouds his meaning in a cloud of ink and jets away.

But the Brawler wondered. What might depart from that etiquette? Could entertaining (though not endorsing, never explicitly taking a side) the thought that, as a race, blacks are less intelligent than whites be a way be "candid"?

Could be.

OK, the Brawler didn't wonder that out of the blue. He wondered that because back in November, Esenberg, following a columnist in Slate, entertained -- entertained, not endorsed -- that idea. The Slate columnist raised the subject based on comments made by biologist James Watson.

Here's how Slate columnist Will Saletan kicked off his series of stories:

Last month, James Watson, the legendary biologist, was condemned and forced into retirement after claiming that African intelligence wasn't "the same as ours." "Racist, vicious and unsupported by science," said the Federation of American Scientists. "Utterly unsupported by scientific evidence," declared the U.S. government's supervisor of genetic research. The New York Times told readers that when Watson implied "that black Africans are less intelligent than whites, he hadn't a scientific leg to stand on."

Huh. Maybe James Watson is full of shit?

No, that's not counterintuitive enough for Herr Saletan!

I wish these assurances were true. They aren't. Tests do show an IQ deficit, not just for Africans relative to Europeans, but for Europeans relative to Asians. Economic and cultural theories have failed to explain most of the pattern, and there's strong preliminary evidence that part of it is genetic. It's time to prepare for the possibility that equality of intelligence, in the sense of racial averages on tests, will turn out not to be true.

Thing is, Saletan subsequently issued a semi-retraction (if he were a man, it would have been a full retraction). And had his ass handed to him. You might not believe it, but some of the research Saletan based his conclusion on ... it was the work of crazed racists. Whoda thunk?

But before Saletan issued a mea culpa, Esenberg waded into this pestilential pool. Here, then -- in their full glory -- are some candid thoughts by Esenberg on race:

(Brawler's bolds throughout)

On Slate, William Saletan is posting an interesting series on liberal "creationism." He was apparently struck,as I was, by the nature of the reaction to James Watson's comments on the distribution of innate intelligence among Africans.

If one is a materialist and believes that evolutionary biology as expressed in our genes explains much about us, how can one exclude the possibility that certain attributes, like intelligence, may be unevenly spread among groups with some greater proportion of common genetic material?

I have no idea whether there is any support for the idea that intelligence may not be evenly distributed among racial groups (BRAWLER: But that won't stop me from speculating! Just because I can't spell doesn't mean I can't play scientist!), but the reaction to Watson seemed decidedly faith-based. We don't want to believe such a thing because we fear the implications of its truth. (BRAWLER: i.e. I don't know what I'm talking about, but let's take a flier!)

Saletan argues that one cannot dismiss the possibility and tries to dispassionately review the evidence (BRAWLER: Sadly, Saletan was not equipped to dispassionately review the evidence). The key thing, it seems to me, is understanding what it means to say that something like intelligence is unevenly distributed among racial groups. This is where the popular misunderstanding of things statistical gets us in trouble.

To say that one group is more likely to exhibit high intelligence than another tells us nothing about the intelligence of any person. There will be so many counterexamples that it would make no sense to base any decisions about any person on such a claim (BRAWLER: In other words, "My black friends are really smart!").

As an example, I have heard it claimed that women are more likely to possess high verbal skills and men more likely to have higher spatial skills. (I suspect that sex differences present different issues than racial ones, but that doesn't undermine my use of them here. (BRAWLER: Given I have no idea of what I'm talking about, why stop here?)Assuming that this is true (and I have no idea), I stand before you as a counterexample. I have high verbal skills but when it comes to understanding how things fit together, I am (and I think the Reddess will back me up here) a moron. There are a lot of guys like me and a lot of girls who defy the norm in the other direction (BRAWLER: Could a brother get some data here?). Averages apply to groups and not to individuals (BRAWLER: Huh?).

But we are understandably concerned that people won't understand that so we are reluctant to "follow the science" to wherever it leads. (BRAWLER: That said, we're not qualified to discuss the science, let alone where it leads) Thus, in Saletan's view, we have liberal creationism. He writes:

I wish these assurances {that Watson's statements hadn't "a scietific leg to stand on] were true. They aren't. Tests do show an IQ deficit, not just for Africans relative to Europeans, but for Europeans relative to Asians. Economic and cultural theories have failed to explain most of the pattern, and there's strong preliminary evidence that part of it is genetic. It's time to prepare for the possibility that equality of intelligence, in the sense of racial averages on tests, will turn out not to be true.

If this suggestion makes you angry—if you find the idea of genetic racial advantages outrageous, socially corrosive, and unthinkable—you're not the first to feel that way. Many Christians are going through a similar struggle over evolution. Their faith in human dignity rests on a literal belief in Genesis. To them, evolution isn't just another fact; it's a threat to their whole value system. As William Jennings Bryan put it during the Scopes trial, evolution meant elevating "supposedly superior intellects," "eliminating the weak," "paralyzing the hope of reform," jeopardizing "the doctrine of brotherhood," and undermining "the sympathetic activities of a civilized society."

And, so far as the Brawler can tell, Esenberg never let his readers know that Saletan issued a retraction.

And please remember: Barack Obama is dangerous.

Just in: No smear intended against Esenberg.

Rick Esenberg's embarrassing version of Iraq War history

Rick Esenberg, the proprietor of Shark and Shepherd, wonders whether Barack Obama supporters are embarrassed by the manner in which others express their support.

One wonders if Esenberg is embarrassed by a Tuesday post in which he says, in so many words: "Sure Obama opposed the war in Iraq -- but his reasons for doing so were inferior to my, ultimately false, justifications for going to war."

Dig:

Two administrations thought that Iraq was a state sponsor of terrorism (it was) and that it had an ongoing WMD program. This view was largely shared by intelligence agencies around the world. Saddam had a history of aggression and the sanctions regime was, for a variety of reasons, problematic. 9-11 had made terrorism a more salient issue - it had shown what these groups will and can do - and had highlighted the particular evil that runs through the Middle East - call it Islamofascism, Militant Islam, etc. That evil is not limited to the person of Osama Bin Laden and his associates.

In light of that, Bush and many Democrats chose to take Saddam out. We can debate the wisdom of that (at the time I thought it was an exceptionally close call) and, in hindsight, can argue that certain things that everyone believed to be true were not and that we "should have" known this. (The argument that "Bush lied" is specious.) Quite possibly, that knowledge would have tipped the balance against invasion.

But Illinois State Senator Barack Obama had no access to any information that anyone else did not have. His suggestion over the weekend that Hillary Clinton "did not read" the NIE and his implication that, if anyone had, they would have voted "no" is silly (and, as it turns out, was inaccurate in other ways.) The available intelligence and then current circumstances suggested that Saddam posed a serious problem in a number of ways (WMDs being one of them) and Illinois State Senator Obama knew no more about that - and probably a good deal less - than others who came to the conclusion that the invasion was warranted.

Obama's "early" opposition to the war seems far more likely to reflect a greater predisposition against the use of force than superior judgment. As a general matter, candidates with that predisposition have not done well in US presidential elections or, for that matter, as foreign policy Presidents.

There is a great deal to unpack here. Esenberg calling Saddam a "state sponsor of terrorism" -- without noting it wasn't a sponsor of al Qaeda, for instance, a classic bit of rightwing innuendo by distraction.  But some facts are not in dispute. There were quite a few people with an understanding of Iraq's capabilities -- Scott Ritter and Hans Blix to name two -- who said Iraq did not have WMDs. There were excellent reasons to question why Hussein -- who, if nothing else, loved power -- would embark on a path that would only end in his destruction. There is no question that the Administration racked up every conceivable casus belli it could against Iraq with reckless disregard for their underlying truth. There is no question the administration was looking for reasons to go to war with Iraq within hours of the attacks on 9/11.

And insofar as Esenberg sniffing "the argument that "Bush lied" is specious":  please, please, please Rick: explain to us how the White House's line about the dreaded aluminum tubes that proved Iraq was building nukes -- even though that claim was vociferously denounced inside the administration at the time -- is anything but a lie.  Or is it a different species of untruth? Please, explain what difference it makes with thousands of Americans killed, tens of thousands wounded and God knows how many Iraqis dead.

And let's repeat that fatuous last paragraph:

Obama's "early" opposition to the war seems far more likely to reflect a greater predisposition against the use of force than superior judgment. As a general matter, candidates with that predisposition have not done well in US presidential elections or, for that matter, as foreign policy Presidents.

I dunno. I think we as a nation regret the wars we get into for our predisposition for the use of force than the wars we avoided. Ike was no saint, but he recognized Vietnam was not a winner and he kept at bay the crazies who wanted us to invade Hungray in '56. Are there some wars that Rick wishes had been fought that he could have been a part of?

Barack Obama and "Hard Left"

Apparently hoping he's landed on a good search phrase, Rick Esenberg frequently decries Barack Obama -- who's been supported or advised by Trotskyists including Paul Volcker and Warren Buffett -- as being "hard left."

The use of this phrase puts the thoughtful professor in the company of unrepentant, batshit crazy hack Hugh Hewitt.

Andrew Sullivan addressed Hewitt's use of the term here.

But not so "hard left" as to add $32 trillion to the national debt and engage on a century-long nation-bulding project in the most divided "country" in the Arab Middle East. Not so "hard left" as to argue that the role of government is to act whenever anyone is "hurting." That kind of hard left politics we leave to Republicans, don't we? And inexperience:

Senator Barack is, in short, a rookie. The sort of rookie the fans love, then turn against, realizing he isn't up to the job. The sort of rookie that makes huge mistakes, which while merely disappointing on the football field, are deadly on the field of international conflict.

This from a Bush champion - arguably the rookie who made the biggest military blunder in American foreign policy  - and with far worse consequences - since the Bay of Pigs. Look: I made the same mistake. But at least I've dealt with it.

What's that word? Oh yeah: Heh.

Rick Esenberg's embarrassing lack of embarrassment

Rick Esenberg, proprietor of the Shark and Shepherd, once again tells us he finds some people's enthusiasm for Barack Obama "creepy," once again calls Obama "hard left," and once again suggests something sinister lies in his appeal. (No explanation as to why ex-Fed chief Paul Volcker have come out in support of Obama, however.)

Sayeth the Shark:

Reagan did not move the country around incremental reform, but by a paragigm shift. He did not do that, contrary to Democrat myths, by the strength of his personality but by the fact that these ideas were right for his time.

He may have spoken about hope but it was linked to something substantive. That substance was not about having the government change your life. He wanted the government out of your life. Is that what Obama has in mind? Because that's not what I hear.

I understand that there is a difference between recognizing a limited role for government in facilitating opportunity and overweening statism. I just wrote an op-ed about it. But the over the top rhetoric and response does not seem to point to anything that is so modest.

If Obama is offering a paradigm shift that is other than what his stump speeches suggest that it is, e.g, a significant increase in collectivization whether through increased governmental spending or reregulation of the economy in the guise of fighting global warming [talk about defining collectivization down! Bush increased spending -- does that make him a "collectivist"? -- Brawler], more protectionism as expressed by hostility to NAFTA and the imposition of costs on companies who respond to the pressures of global markets, or an increased willingness to subject American interests to some type of international system, I don't know what it is.

I think Esenberg, deliberately or otherwise, overlooks one of the reasons for Obama's popularity. It's that Bush and his policies -- from Iraq to health care to economics -- are wildly unpopular and Obama represents a  break from this legacy and the mindset behind it.

Planning to get out of Iraq rather than prolonging our presence; talking about meaningful health care reform and not HSAs; an end to pretending tax cuts to the rich represents meaningful economic policy...all these mark a "paradigm shif"...one that most American voters want.

Meanwhile, doesn't Esenberg find it creepy that John McCain assiduously sought the support and endorsement of John Hagee, the megachurch leader who calls the Roman Catholic Church a "great whore" and longs for a war in the Middle East that will result in the destruction of Israel and the coming of the End Times?

Isn't Rick Esenberg embarrassed?

Making fun of Obama supporters, Rick "Shark and Shepherd" Esenberg sniffs:

But don't you think that this kind of mindless hero worship is embarassing?

The real question is whether Rick is embarrassed by his increasingly outlandish -- and now hypocritical -- attacks on Obama. Specifically a piece last week chastising Obama for not dissing Louis Farrakhan (whose work with ex-cons was praised by the leader of Obama's church) in adequately strong terms:

Hillary tried to push him on it but gave up too soon. What she should have done is ask a follow-up: "Will Louis Farrakhan have a place at the table in the Obama administration? He will be persona non grata in mine."

Maybe she felt that, the Democrat coaliton being what it is, that would be going too far. That's hard to believe (I think she just blew it), but McCain won't hesitate to draw that line.

How would Obama answer? I don't see how he could do anything other than say that Farrakhan won't be invited to the White House. But, if David Duke endorsed McCain (he has, in fact, said he sees no difference between McCain, Clinton and Obama; they are all equally terrible in his view), you'd see no hesitation or equivocation about rejecting him, his support and his statements. His very existence would be regretted and McCain might even allow as he wishes that Duke had never uttered - or even heard - his name.

What gets embarrassing for Rick is that John McCain is being endorsed -- an endorsement he actively sought -- of the leader of a rightwing megachurch, one John Hagee, who combines homophobia with a dash of Catholic hatred. He also wants to bring about a cataclysmic war in the Middle East, which would fulfill the Book of Revelation ... and bring about the Destruction of Israel. The American Prospect profiled him here.

The difference is that while Obama has not sought the endorsement of Farrakhan -- the only way Farrakhan would have a seat at the table is by crashing the party -- McCain has actively courted Hagee.  And McCain's efforts to deal with his "Hagee problem" are far weaker than Obama's words on Farrakhan. At least that's according to that "hard left" group, the Catholic League.

From Matthew Yglesias:

The issue here has to do with the role of extremists in public life. Barack Obama never sought support from Louis Farrakhan, never appeared on stage with Farrakhan, never pronounced himself proud to be backed by Farrakhan, but was nonetheless asked on national television to specifically disavow the man. People don't want to put a political coalition that includes Farrakhan in office.

McCain and his staff actively sought out Hagee's endorsement, he appeared and campaigned with Hagee, he said he was proud to be backed by Hagee. Hagee is, in short, part of McCain's political strategy. Now he tells us he doesn't agree with Hagee about everything. Well, which things? Are we supposed to believe that McCain's not into the bigotry, or the foreign policy aimed at apocalypse, but just likes Hagee because of their shared opposition to gay marriage? Is McCain going to be courting Osama bin Laden's endorsement? It's reminiscent of McCain's on-again, off-again quest for the support of "agents of intolerance" like Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson. McCain's trying to wink with one eye to a segment of the electorate, wink with his other eye at his fans in the media, and somehow maintain a reputation for straight talk throughout all this.

What are those words of Esenberg's again?

But, if David Duke endorsed McCain ... you'd see no hesitation or equivocation about rejecting him, his support and his statements.

Hatemongers with zero political support? Rejected! Hatemongers with a broad reach in the evangelical community? Come aboard!

The Hagee problem was raised by commenters, including the intrepid Seth Zlotocha (who's apparently given up blogging for commenting at the Shark). And Esenberg reveals he's so busy bashing Obama that he has no idea what his own guy is up to:

As for Hagee, I don't know anything about him but it appears that he is a nutjob and McCain ought to dump his support.

Does a politician dump someone's support after actively seeking it out?

Rightwingers like Sykes and Esenberg like to assert Obama's "Farrakhan problem" is not going away. Probably not, because this invented problem is going to be thrown out by these hacks and others until election day.

But McCain's actual Hagee problem is the tip of the iceberg. The fact is, Hagee's views are hardly unique in the base of the Christian right. Hatred of the Catholic Church, i.e., the whore of Babylon, in particular is rife.

It's a reality that politically convenient papists like Patrick McIlheran, Charlie Sykes and John McAdams like to ignore, instead getting up in arms about bloggers for a Democratic candidate who've said unkind things about Catholicism. And while moderate Republicans like the Recess Supervisor like to think a McCain candidacy could pave he way for the GOP to offload the religious right (or the religious right to split off) that's apparently not McCain's plan.

Give Catholic haters a seat at the table -- Vote McCain!

Clarification: Post edited to make clear Hagee isn't so much an anti-Semite as a simple guy who wants to bring about a war that would destroy Israel...apparently in fulfillment of the scriptures.

MU Law prof/blogger Esenberg engages in politics of division and scapegoating

The Brawler was surprised and disappointed by Rick "Shark and Shepherd" Esenberg's article "Making Wisconsin the Health Care Migration Capital" in the latest issue of the WPRI's house organ, Wisconsin Interest.

He was surprised because when Esenberg made his central point on his blog -- that, if enacted,  Healthy Wisconsin would be a magnet for sick folks across the country -- it was shot down by Seth Zlotocha. Zlotocha effectively noted that BadgerCare already picked up the costs for kids of low-income parents -- and had not caused a massive influx of health care chiselers.

The Brawler was disappointed because in his piece Esenberg says this:

Wisconsin was once a welfare magnet, drawing people from states where benefits were, at the very most, several hundreds dollars per month lower than they were here. The stakes are much larger here as we run the risk of becoming a magnet for those who are likely to incur tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars in health care costs.

The Brawler was disappointed with this because there is no proof -- none -- that Wisconsin's welfare benefits were a magnet for poor people from other states. It was a fine bit of race baiting by Tommy Thompson. But there was no evidence that welfare benefits played any role in attracting people to Wisconsin.

From the 2/5/89 Los Angeles Times:

A study commissioned by the state three years ago concluded that, by and large, the answer was "no." Paul Voss, a University of Wisconsin demographer who authored the report, said interviews with thousands of newly arrived welfare recipients found that the overwhelming reasons most gave for moving were to be near family and friends. "Lowering welfare benefits is not going to make much of a dent in the flood of migrants," Voss predicted.

How little evidence was there that welfare bennies were drawing people to Wisconsin? So little that even the WPRI could insinuate, but it couldn't assert, a connection:

From the same story:

However, a recent study by the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute, a Milwaukee-based conservative think tank, hints that the answer may be "yes." According to the report, which analyzed three years of residency data for welfare applicants, newcomers accounted for 29% of all newly opened AFDC cases statewide and 43% of all the new cases in the Milwaukee area and other counties close to Illinois.

John Wahner, one of the authors, cautioned that his report made no attempt to conclude why welfare recipients were flocking here. Still, Wahner, a former Democratic leader in the state Assembly and until recently head of the Milwaukee County Department of Health and Human Services, said the study raised "disturbing" questions.

"I think it's honest to ask whether in addition to coping with our own poor, do we really have to be responsible for everybody who comes up the interstate," he said.

It's disappointing Esenberg would make this sort of unsubstantiated claim. You expect it from Sykes. You expect a little more from the Shark.

It's even more disappointing given that the Shark is one of the few conservative voices who actually engages in the issue of poverty and he passes along this bunk.