Globally Rational

Two hundred and thirty-two years ago today, Thomas Jefferson announced the Americans’ future right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”  But people often forget the next part of the Declaration of Independence, where he states “that to preserve these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just power from the consent of the governed.

The term “consent of the governed,” unfortunately, was never defined.  Does it mean that everybody has to agree to the government?  Or that more than half of the people have to agree?  Or just that the people have the right to get rid of a government if we want?  Jefferson, of course, was insinuating a majority-rule democracy… but is that the only way to make it work?

As many of you already know, we don’t live in a truly democratic society.  In a true democracy, there would be no President or Congress… every decision would be made by majority rule.  There’s no way for us to make that work in such a big country, so we go for the closest thing we can: a representative democracy where we spend half of our time worrying about elections and the other half complaining about how our favorite candidate didn’t get elected.  So, I thought about it… is there any other way?

Well, I couldn’t think of anything good.  But I did think of an option that might work:

What if we just had official monthly approval ratings for our leaders?  Instead of doing the usual elections, we could require everybody to take an hour every six months to decide whether or not they approve of the current President or congressman or mayor or governor.  When the approval ratings drop below a given number (say, 40%), then it’s time for an election.  If the people are happy with their leader, then we don’t need to waste time replacing him.  That way, he won’t have to waste all of this time campaigning as long as he’s doing a good job.

Of course, it would have to be more complicated than that.  And it probably wouldn’t work… but why?

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Welcome to the 68th edition of Carnival of the Liberals! It was very difficult to choose a reasonable number of articles from the many submissions that I received, but I think I managed to cut it down to the point where it’s not overcrowded.

I also included some comments about each article. I’ll have to say that I was very happy with the quality of the posts, and I expect that you’ll find each of the next 15 articles to be a very interesting read.

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank the CotL people for letting me host this edition. Also, thanks to all of the bloggers who submitted articles; I hope to see more of your quality work in the future.

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current events

Timothy Martin presents Habeas What? posted at Mouthful of Politics, saying, “This article examines the recent Supreme Court decision returning habeas corpus to Guantanamo detainees.”

Shan’s comments It’s nice to see that the right-leaning Supreme Court still occasionally considers the spirit of the Constitution instead of always being politically charged.

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The Ridger presents Hiding the hate posted at The Greenbelt, saying, “”We don’t anyone to know we’re bigots - it might hurt our business.” You think? I hope!”

Shan’s comments I can’t say that I’m surprised. Bigots know that they’re bigots… and they don’t want everybody else to know about it

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liberalism

Madeleine Begun Kane presents Is Olbermann Turning Into O’Reilly? posted at Mad Kane’s Political Madness.

Shan’s comments: I liked this idea; although I agree with most of Olbermann’s ideas, I think he’s become just another angry ranter who always only presents one side of a debate. As long as you’re ignoring your opponents’ arguments, how do you expect to make any difference? It seems that Olbermann is just there to sell his show to fellow liberals… I wish he’s use his position of power to actually persuade some swing voters instead of (literally) yelling at his opponents

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Alonzo Fyfe presents Atheist Ethicist: The Pledge Project: A Memorial Day Dilemma posted at Atheist Ethicist.

Shan’s comments This article doesn’t fit with the usual theme of my blog (talking about issues with a rational, fact-based perspective), but it is a very interesting essay. It’s also a bit older than what the Carnival usually accepts, but I decided to accept it because it’s a great read.

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APH presents Urbanism Legend: Zoning Creates Density posted at Market Urbanism, saying, “In many different contexts, I have heard people argue that liberalizing zoning restrictions will cause “overdevelopment” or high density development filled with low income people. Even in relatively low density areas, people make the sensationalist argument that if zoning restrictions were lifted, high rises would be built in their community, creating congestion and overburdening infrastructure.”

Shan’s comments This article, unlike the last one, fits perfectly with the Globally Rational spirit. I wish more people actually looked at the real economic analysis behind their political decisions… but instead, politicians just try to appeal to people’s emotions

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Greta Christina presents The Messed-Up Teachings of Jesus posted at Greta Christina’s Blog, saying, “A critique of the liberal Christian idea that the teachings of Jesus support progressive ideals, such as peace and tolerance. It provides an extensive list of Jesus’s teachings from the New Testament that run completely counter to some of the most treasured principles of most modern progressives… such as free speech, independent thought, sexual and marital privacy, resisting oppression, and respecting people with different beliefs.”

Shan’s comments I like this article, but you should be sure to take it for what it’s worth. I’m not Christian, but I do like many of Jesus’s original teachings… what this article reminds us is that many of those “original teachings” have evolved and been bastardized by some modern Christian sects

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opinion

Educatorblog presents Do Teachers Influence Blackness? posted at An (aspiring) Educator’s Blog, saying, “A post about race in the classroom.”

Shan’s comments A great idea and a well-developed post. I think many people underestimate the value of teachers in a person’s life… I can definitely say that some of my teachers had a huge impact on the way that I look at the world today. This is one of my favorite articles in this carnival

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Mike Haubrich, FCD presents Detainees Deserve Trials posted at Tangled Up in Blue Guy, saying, “So, what is the deal with Habeas Corpus and the Supreme Court?”

Shan’s comments I couldn’t decide which Guantanamo Habeas Corpus post was better (this one or Timothy Martin’s post earlier in this carnival), so I included them both

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Matthew presents Justice posted at Conservatives and Normals . Com - The Blog, saying, “What is justice and is it individual or social?”

Shan’s comments This post explores one of my favorites topics: the use (and distortion) of semantics to justify people’s pointless ideas. Before we go around throwing around powerful buzzwords like “justice”, we should realize exactly what we’re trying to say

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vjack presents Atheist Revolution: Strengthening American Infrastructure is a Matter of National Security posted at Atheist Revolution.

Shan’s comments People often forget that there’s much more to national security than just killing all of the bad guys. This post is a nice reminder that there are plenty of important ideas within the broader field.

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Doctor Biobrain presents What I Learned From Rush Limbaugh posted at And Doctor Biobrain’s Response Is…

Shan’s comments Quality piece about what Limbaugh (and others like him) seem to be trying to accomplish

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politics

Jeffrey Stingerstein presents » Oh No! John McCain Is Trying to Lose My Vote! Disillusioned Words: atheism, art and politics posted at Disillusioned Words.

Shan’s comments Apparently, John McCain hasn’t read the Constitution. I’m not surprised… he graduated at the bottom of his class, so I doubt that he got an ‘A’ in Political Science 101

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Mike Haubrich, FCD presents Bush is Not the Decider posted at Tangled Up in Blue Guy, saying, “Bush doesn’t want to open an e-mail. Leadership FAIL”

Shan’s comments When I first heard about this, I was astonished. I guess that, after almost 8 years of Bush, I shouldn’t be surprised

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Mike Haubrich, FCD also presents I Would Rather Be Anywhere Else posted at Tangled Up in Blue Guy, saying, “Power in the hands of an imperialist, even if the intentions are initially good, leads to abuse of power. The rule of law should supercede the rule of man.”

Shan’s comments This is another article referring to the Guantanamo Habeas Corpus issue, but this one draws an important parallel between the present and the past. It’s always depressing to see us repeating the past

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opinion

larryniven presents What’s that first step, again? posted at Rust Belt Philosophy, saying, “My blog examines arguments in mass media for argumentative fallacies. In this post, I deconstruct yet another conservative op/ed piece designed to downplay global warming.”

Shan’s comments A good reminder of how to respond to some of the pointless anti-environment arguments.

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And that’s it. Thanks to everybody who submitted articles and, of course, to the carnival staff for allowing me to host this edition. Hopefully, you’ll be seeing this carnival at Globally Rational again sometime in the future.

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“Democracy” is a popular buzzword here in the US.  Everybody assumes that if a country is “democratic”, they are also automatically “free”.  While I don’t oppose the idea of freedom and liberty, I don’t think that they should be naturally associated with the word “democracy”.

In America, democracy and freedom both showed up at the same time.  As far back as I can remember, I’ve been taught that we must agree with the Declaration of Independence’s suggestion that “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” just spur automatically from the fact that “to preserve these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just power from the consent of the governed.”  But in fact, that’s not what Jefferson was saying… he didn’t say that democracy creates freedom, but rather that free societies should be democratic.

So why is it that the US pushes the world to create “democratic” societies instead of creating “free” societies?  That’s what we’ve been advocating in Pakistan, Iraq, Eritrea, and many other countries where the elected government is (or soon will be) unimaginably corrupt and self-serving.  Meanwhile, here in the US, everybody assumes that an elected government must have the interests of the people in mind… after all, they want to get re-elected, right?

Maybe not… case in point: Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe.  After rigging the first election to make it seem like he didn’t lose clearly, he intimidated the rest of the country to the point where his opponent was forced to withdraw from the run-off election.  Now, Mugabe is declaring victory despite the fact that he obviously distorted the results of the voting to a point where he seemed like a landslide winner when everybody knows that he is highly unpopular.

So why do we try to enforce democracy instead of freedom in countries like Iraq?  Well, I think the reason is obvious… Americans don’t really understand that there is a difference.  Democracy can be enforced by guns, while freedom can only be enforced by schools.  As long as you can convince the American population that you’re doing one or the other, they’ll be happy… so why not just put in a nominal government based on a superficial popular vote?  After all, it’s much easier to buy guns than it is to build schools.

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And the answer is Nelson Mandela.  Apparently, the US was against the anti-Apartheid movement because the South African white supremacists were our friends.  After it became apparent that South Africa’s racist philosophies were bad, the world came to accept Mandela as a hero… but we still never got around to taking Mandela off the US terrorist list.  In fact, some people still think he’s a terrorist, even after the US gave him a Medal of Honor in 2003.

I think it’s interesting to consider how much things change over the years.  Sure, Mandela was a little violent during the 1960’s… but he wasn’t anywhere near as bad as the Apartheid government.  Years later, people unanimously hail him as a leader in the fight against racism and global harmony.  40 years from now, what will we be saying about some of the people who are seen as questionable today?

There are a lot of people who are generally very influential.  Some of them, such as Hitler and Milosevic, are obviously bad.  Others, such as Mandela and Jimmy Carter, are obviously good.  But what about the people who are still too fresh in our memories to make any solid conclusions (for instance, much of the current players in Pakistani politics)?  What will we think about them in the future?

I want to make a suggestion.  Before you decide that a person is evil (like we said about Mandela), think about what they do and why they do it.  It’ll tell you a lot about the person… for instance, some Pakistani politicians are motivated by greed and power struggles, while others are motivated by a true dedication to making the world a better place.  Similar things can be said about more violent figures (including people who are actually terrorists)… if we actually try to look at things from their perspective, even if we don’t agree with it, we can go much farther in our attempts to make peace.

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Back in February 2007, USA Today/Gallup asked Americans the following question:

“Between now and the 2008 political conventions, there will be discussion about the qualifications of presidential candidates — their education, age, religion, race, and so on. If your party nominated a generally well-qualified person for president who happened to be 72 years old, would you vote for that person?“

42% of people said “no” and 15% were undecided.  That means that if their party nominated a 72 year-old, 3 out of 7 people would vote for somebody else.  In the same poll, 48-50% of people supported Obama or Hillary in a November election against McCain.  That would lead a person to believe that, since 42% of people should technically vote against McCain solely because of his age, only 6-8% of people actually supported Obama or Hillary.  In fact, I think it’s much easier to vote for McCain when you attach a name to his age… people were averse to voting for a 72 year-old, but plenty of people were willing to vote for McCain.

Are we serious?  In a perfect world, I think we’d remove all of the faces from political elections.  If we only knew a candidate’s political stances and credentials (and we never saw their faces until after they get elected), I think more people would dismiss McCain just because they don’t want to vote for a guy who’d be 80 years old by the time he finishes his second term.  What do you think?

I like looking at data and studies… they cast a lot of light on reality.  I’ve noticed plenty of people say things like “I don’t care about the numbers, this is what my experience says”… but I don’t think that any single person’s experience is as valuable as the experience of the thousands of people involved in the study.  If we weren’t willing to vote for a 72 year-old, then why were we willing to vote for McCain?

I like McCain… I won’t vote for him (not because of his age, but because of his stance on the issues), but I do like him.  I think that he’s better than Hillary and that he’s not as good as Obama… but that’s irrelevant.  The question here is about numbers; if we weren’t willing to vote for a 72 year-old, then why were we willing to vote for McCain?

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We all complain about high gas prices… personally, I’m tired of seeing the complaints. Here’s why:

1. Prices aren’t determined by costs; they’re determined by supply and demand. Our demand for fuel is increasing (case in point: India/China) and the supply is decreasing. My only complaint is that the government wasn’t able to foster a gradual increase (rather than a sudden one, which was a major contributing factor to the recession)… the reason for this is because they were doing everything possible to avoid the inevitable increase, so when they ran out of resources, the prices catapulted to their rightful place.
2. Prices still haven’t increased to the point where we significantly reduce consumption. As long as demand doesn’t decrease, the prices will continue to increase… the only thing that can stabilize the prices is if we stop using as much gas. At that point, the supply and demand curves are intersecting and we’re at the perfect price.
3. Until prices get high enough so that we can’t get by anymore, we’ll never devote adequate resources to alternative energy. Last year, the government spent $200 million on solar power research, about $300 million on nuclear energy and on “other fossil fuels”, and about $400 million on coal. By contrast, we spent $102 billion (about 100 times as much) on the Iraq War. Also, we spend $1.6 billion every day on gasoline (almost $600 billion per year)… that means that we spend more money PER DAY on gas than we do PER YEAR on alternative energy.

As long as we’re spending 500 times as much on gas as we do on alternative energies, how do we expect to really fix our problems? Instead of reducing our gas taxes (like Hillary and McCain were suggesting), I think we should add a little bit of a tax and use it to pay for novel research. In the long run, it will save us money… even if we only increase prices by 1% (about 4 cents per gallon right now, which seems pretty inconsequential with the way that prices have been inflating), that’s enough to multiply our alternative energy research by a factor of 5.

But it seems like we’re stupid enough to demand lower gas prices, even though we know that it will hurt us in the long run. I say that we add a 2% tax to all gas purchases, which would amount to 8 cents a gallon, and use it to multiply alternative energy funding by 10.

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Today’s LA Times has already started to speculate as to Tim Russert’s replacement after his tragic death yesterday. Their selections are all the obvious ones… it’s mostly just NBC’s top political men, like Chris Matthews and David Gregory.

With all due respect to Matthews and Gregory, I don’t think that either of them will ever be able to fill Russert’s shoes. Although they are great correspondents and each maintains his own high-quality show, neither can match Russert’s ability to think on his feet and win a debate with a high-class politician. I have only seen one other person who can talk to a top Washington official and pose follow-up questions with confidence and purpose.

The problem? Well, he’s a comedian.

The only person who can even dream of rivaling Russert’s quick-thinking interview skills is Jon Stewart. He is the closest thing that I’ve ever seen, but he’ll never be taken seriously because… well, he doesn’t really take himself seriously. Instead of being thought of as a potential replacement for Tim Russert, NBC might be signing him as a replacement for Conan O’Brien. Just watch Stewart’s appearance on Crossfire during the 2004 election (especially the 3-minute mark of the following video)… I think he singlehandedly brought the demise of that show:

Now try to tell me that he’s not amazing.

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I’ve always wondered why people stay in a city that they hate.  I’ve met plenty of people in Boston or St. Louis or Columbia (Missouri) who complain about the weather or the costs or the people.  Why not just move to whatever place fits your lifestyle best?

This was a major part of my decision to move to Australia.  After looking at various surveys (like this one), I’ve come to the conclusion that it makes sense to move to one of the cities that offers the best possible quality of life.  If I didn’t want to leave the country, I’d seriously consider relocating to Cleveland, Ohio or Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; they did well in the survey too.  I know for a fact that my quality of life would be better in California than in Missouri (if for not other reason than the fact that the nice weather will entice me to exercise more often), so why not just pack up and go?

Of course, it’s hard to embrace change sometimes.  How is the job market in western Pennsylvania?  How hard is to go through the process of buying a home in Ohio?  But usually, the questions can be answered easily (see the links in the last two sentences).  When I decided to move to Australia, I found everything I needed from a quick Google search for “relocating to Australia”.  Why doesn’t everybody just go where they want to go?

I think encouraging such a diaspora might even help boost the real estate market.

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Yesterday, I outlined the best possible sequence of events that could follow from Israel’s recent prisoner exchange with Hezbollah. The best-case scenario required some forward thinking from the educated part of the population, which would (hopefully) eventually start to promote tolerance. However, here is what will happen if even the educated people let their emotions supersede their rationality (which seems pretty common for enemies):

• May/June 2008: Israel works out a prisoner exchange with Hezbollah (done).
• The next few months: The public, both Israelis and Palestinians, openly resent that their side is negotiating with the enemy.
• The next year or two: Public resentment makes it more difficult for politicians to justify any sort of communication between the two sides.
• The next 3-4 years: Violence continues as usual and open political talks become a distant memory. Public opinion remains irrationally heated.
• The next decade or so: Communication is impossible; each side’s general public sentiment is that the other side needs to be simply eradicated.
• Another 10-20 years later: One of the two sides achieves its goal of killing enough people so that the enemy is forced to abandon their homes.

Of course, we don’t want this scenario to come true. Whoever wins, the end result is bad. That’s why I think that the only solution to the problem is through education… Americans need to be educated about the world, locals need to be educated about tolerance, and everybody needs to learn that it’s really not that hard to live in harmony.

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Plenty of us have heard that over 60% of Americans aged 18-24 couldn’t find Iraq on a map of the Middle East (yes, a map of the Middle East… not even a map of the world) in a 2006 survey (that’s three years after the start of the war). I just took a look at that survey and found a few other interesting facts:

• Only 50% think that map-reading skills are “absolutely essential”
• Despite that fact, 75% couldn’t find Iran or Israel on the same Middle East map.
• 65% couldn’t find the UK on a world map.
• 88% couldn’t find Afghanistan on a map of Asia.
• Half of people couldn’t find India or Japan on the Asian map
• 70% couldn’t find North Korea, and only 37% knew that the North/South Korea border is more heavily fortified than the US/Mexico border and the China/Russia border (both of which are mostly barren).
• Only 35% knew about the huge earthquake in Pakistan, which had killed 70,000 people only a few months before the survey.
• 74% of people thought that English is a more common first language than Mandarin (which was picked by 18%).
• When asked to pick the country with a Muslim majority (between Indonesia, India, Armenia, and South Africa), 48% thought it was India (which is only 10% Muslim) and only 25% picked Indonesia (which is over 80% Muslim).
• More interestingly, people thought that the Mississippi’s flow had something to do with Hurricane Katrina.

Apparently, we don’t know anything about the world. This is why the rest of the world looks down on Americans… geography is no longer an important part of our school curricula. How do we expect to succeed through globalization if 90% of our youth don’t even know where Afghanistan is?

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