Josh Marshall turns in a brilliant piece on the historical roots of Hillary Clinton’s victories in several eastern states: it’s not the whites, it’s the mountains. This post weaves together history and current demography to paint a compelling picture of the current primary race. It would be interesting to know if this same theory bears itself out in other voting records in other races, primary and general:

Talking Points Memo | Upcountry

. . . During the 18th and 19th centuries, in the middle Atlantic and particularly in the Southern states, there was a long-standing cleavage between the coastal and ‘piedmont’ regions on the one hand and the upcountry areas to the west on the other. It’s really the coastal lowlands and the Appalachian districts. On the other side of the Appalachian mountain range the pattern is flipped, with the Appalachians in the east and the lowlands in the west. . .

I’m not sure how many people out there have seen the Will.i.am video where he sets Barack Obama’s speech to music. It’s kind of interesting, and definitely a good video, so here you go:

Great stuff, and not to take away from it, I wanted to point out the historical roots of this piece. I’ve been hearing and reading people who insist on the amazing creativity and originality of Will’s song. Well, there’s certainly plenty of creativity, but as for originality, there are plenty of examples of where this has been done. In fact, liturgical music of the Catholic Church has often been created out of the prayers written by priests and even secular sources.

But of course, the real inspiration for this is, I suspect, Bob Marley’s War. War was written by Bob’s percussionist, Carlton “Carly” Barrett after having been inspired by the words of Haile Selassie I in a speech given to the U.N. in 1967.  Here is a primer and some excerpts from the song:

Just thought some of you would like to know.  Plus, it’s a really cool Marley song.  Hit me wit music, children!

Plus, have a look at the john.he.is video, poking a little fun at the Republican nominee to the Wet Blanket of the United States of America, John McCain:

Those of you who regularly stop back to this blog have no doubt noticed that a fair amount of the news updates are concerned with “DRM,” but many of you might not know what that means. You’ve seen Warner Brothers, Sony, Apple and iPod, along with lots of other big media names tied to those articles. I figured this morning would be a good opportunity to tackle some of the basic concepts surrounding “DRM,” and why I think they are important issues for progressives to be out in front of.

DRM means Digital Rights Management, but more importantly, it represents attempts by media conglomerates to use technological means to prevent users from copying content they’ve produced. Originally, it meant preventing CDs and DVDs from being copied, but with the digital age n full swing with MP3 players and digital downloads, it has meant a variety of other things in a variety of different venues all centered around the media industry’s “right” to make as much money as possible.

Concepts in this arena get messy quick, so I’m going to keep this post relatively short and leashed to only one relatively narrow topic: what is it about digital media that has so complicated copyright law?

» Continue Reading…

O.K., I have generally avoided the Ron Paul thing where possible. He’s a principled guy and says what he honestly believes, and for that, he is to be commended in this world of otherwise duplicitous politicians.  I can further understand the attraction for a guy who will not allow politics to dampen his beliefs or curb his message.  Normally, such backbone is a sign of intelligence.

It’s just unfortunate that, in this case, the guy’s fucking nuts. That’s the only down side, though I must admit it’s a formidable obstacle to the presidency. Have a look at this supposed bedrock Republican trashing the only Republican I’d consider voting for:

Folks, this one’s like shooting ducks in a barrel. Ducks with unusually large ears. But let’s line ‘em up, shall we?

» Continue Reading…

Former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan’s new book has the typical revelations we’ve come to expect from books written by once-loyal Republicans who are now fuming over the Bush Administration and the Republican-led Congress.  Turns out, he doesn’t like Bush, either.

But inside all that non-controversial controversy is an interesting compliment for President Bill Clinton, as backhanded as many of us who voted for Clinton might regard it:

Greenspan book: GOP ’swapped principle for power’ - CNN.com

Greenspan said Clinton and former President Nixon were “by far the smartest presidents I’ve worked with.”

I’m thinking this was said in absence of irony, as in my experience, Greenspan’s public persona has ever been without it.

Riffing off’ve this post, Lets go over this quote again:

We can no longer conduct 21st century politics with a 17th century understanding of the mind…. In thinking, the old view comes originally from Descartes’ 17th Century rationalism. A view of thought as symbolic logic was formalized by Bertrand Russell and Gottlob Frege around the turn of the 20th Century, and a rationalist interpretation was revived by Chomsky in the 1950’s. In that view, thought is a matter of (as Pinker puts it) “old-fashioned … universal disembodied reason.” Here reason is seen as the manipulation of meaningless symbols, as in symbolic logic.

The new view is that reason is embodied in a nontrivial way. The brain gives rise to thought in the form of conceptual frames, image-schemas, prototypes, conceptual metaphors, and conceptual blends. The process of thinking is not algorithmic symbol manipulation, but rather neural computation, using brain mechanisms…

These questions matter in progressive politics, because many progressives were brought up with the old 17th Century rationalist view of reason that implies that, if you just tell people the facts, they will reason to the right conclusion–since reason is universal. We know from recent elections that this is just false. “Old-fashioned … universal disembodied reason” also claims that everyone reasons the same way, that differences in world-view don’t matter. But anybody tuning in to contemporary talk shows will notice that not everybody reasons the same way and that world-view does matter.

AFAIK, cognitive scientists, psychologists, and others have known this for a long time: In fact, I think part of the point of those fields is exploring the extent in which people do not reason and are irrational.

So the basis of our political thought: competing on issues, a focus on facts, and the assumption that the checks and balances work, rely on people being reasonable and acting rationally.

That’s the mistake.

I remember a post on The Albany Project that, to summarize, agrued that the Bruno-Spitzer spat showed how checks and balances aught to work. Though Cuomo is a Democrat, he rationally seeks his own best interests and doesn’t pull the punches on Spitzer, shoring up his credentials and boosting his political standing. The problem with Congress these days, furthermore, is that Republicans in Congress aren’t acting rationally. They’re ceding their own power to the Executive, though they would rationally try to keep it for themselves.

So - we assume people act rationally and through reason. That model isn’t right, and our understanding of the mind has advanced. What model do we use now?

I’m no cognitive scientist, but the model I tend to favor is the Triune Brain model

Basically, we have three brains in one, the outer/neocortex, middle/limbric, and inside/reptilian brains. The Reptilian brain controls basic functions and instincts. It is

rigid, obsessive, compulsive, ritualistic and paranoid, it is “filled with ancestral memories”. It keeps repeating the same behaviours over and over again, never learning from past mistakes

This is your “fight or flight” brain, the instinctive, reflexive one.

The limbric (middle) brain is the one that concerns emotions and instincts, and deals with finding pleasure or avoiding pain.

The outer brain, or neocortex, is the “reasoning brain”. The brain that makes you human. The one that thinks in the abstract, has higher-order thinking, etc.

The battle between Limbric and Neocortex messaging

The neocortex, or our conscious brain, is really weaker/subservient to the lower two.

Therefore pure Reason is vulnerable: it has a positional disadvantage to flights of passion or the madness of fear.

Why do you think the Republicans foster a culture of fear? They want to influence voters by stimulating their powerful “reptile” brains.

We all know that charisma has a large role in the process of people choosing candidates. There’s a study (or more) out there that shows that voters generally pick a candidate using ephermeal “gut feelings”, and then justify it to themselves by trying to agree with said candidate on the issues.

The story-arc and the power of narrative use both the limbric brain and neocortex. Reason is all neo-cortex.

What Lakoff is saying is that framing uses the limbric brain, and if you frame an issue in a reasonable, truthful way, you’d use the limbric brain and neocortex against the fear-addled reptilian brain. Do it right, and the forces of “good” (those one Lakoff’s side) will prevail in the war of persuasion.

It’s interesting that the progressive online community has a similar idea, which they’ve been re-iterating for a while since the whole DLC/YearlyKos battle started heating up. These guys want proud Democrats to expound on their values, stick to their guns, and speak from the heart. The DLC, on the other hand, uses polling and focus groups and so on to find out how much candidates need to move to the right in order to appeal on the issues to the most people.

That’s why Democrats following the DLC advice (such as Harold Ford Jr) lose elections, and Democrats following the netroots’ model (such as Tester, Webb) win.

The DLC tries to find the perfect blend of issues to win. While this might work for the neocortex, the limbric brain sees things differently. If a candidate moves to the right, the limbric brain understands that the candidate is acknowledging that the conservative position is superior to the liberal position. Otherwise, why would the candidate back down?

The Progressive model, while still keeping a sound rational policy that pleases the neocortexes of voters, keeps the candidate in the ideological territory he/she is comfortable in, rather than an “alien” one that focus groups impose. A candidate comfortable in arguing and expanding on his/her beliefs sends a message of strength and resoluteness to the limbric brain.

It’s true that voters seek strength in their elected officials. But the strength they want is the strength of character that the limbric/reptilian brain picks up on, not the “strength” of caving in to political pressure and warping FISA, for example.

The progressive hope: Limbric vs Reptilian
There was a great post on RT by J a while ago, called “The Republican Culture of Fear”, or something or another. I think we can agree, however, that there is a modern Republican Fear Agenda

Fear of Gays, fear of Blacks, fear of Browns, fear of Athiests, fear of Arabs, fear of terrorists, fear of Muslims, fear of inner cities, fear of the future, fear of “the other”

As you read the obituaries of Rove floating around, you’ll find some writing about how he exploited fear. Some people say that Rove isn’t a political genius as much as unscrupulously underhanded: he’s not afraid to push those fear buttons as often as he wants.

Fear is great for Republicans. It unifies the party. It allows them to get away with quite a load of really bad stuff. Fear also is a great way to manipulate the powerful reptilian brain.

Aside: It’s telling that the Bene Gesserit in Frank Herberts Dune, a group that strove to elevate their reasoning over their “baser” brains and so forth, had this to say about fear:

I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain.

So, Republicans: Great with the fear. Watch Fox News sometimes. You’ll see what I mean.
Hate is another good reptilian trigger. Same deal. Especially regarding Fox News & Falafel Boy.

Democrats shouldn’t use the politics of fear. I don’t think it’s ethical.
However, they should be aware and utilize the limbric brain. Stuff like body language and charisma count. They should be aware of framing and so forth. But most importantly, they have to remember that communication goes much farther than the words they say. Show the Limbric brain that you’re the strong, honest communicator by being comfortable with your positions. Argue for them. Defend yourself and be aware of the Republican “bitch-slap” theory of politics.

I’m tired now. That’s enough thinking for today. Goodnight!

Hi, everyone. I’m frontpaging for the next while, while Thomas is on vacation.

It’s rather late at night, so I don’t trust myself to say anything important past midnight.
Random political cartoons, however, are great.

I just bought George Lakoff’s latest book, Whose Freedom? : the battle over America’s most important idea. Sounds like it would be interesting. George Lakoff, by the way, is the same guy who wrote Don’t Think of An Elephant, so this sounds like it’ll be good. Speaking of freedom:

Bob Marcotte turns in a fascinating piece about the problems between the once-great Rochester clothier industry and the immigrant poor that worked for them.  Its a glimpse into the windows of Rochester history I’m sure a lot of us do not know:

Unrest pressed clothing workers || Democrat & Chronicle: Bob Marcotte

“Heads bowed in silent sorrow, five thousand striking garment workers — the men with big badges of mourning on their coat sleeves and the women garbed in black” walked through the streets of Rochester. They followed a hearse in which lay the remains of 17-year-old Ida Braiman, a striking tailoress killed in a confrontation two days before.

Rochester has always been something of a moving target where political tastes are concerned.  We have a tremendous history of progressivism, with leaders like Frederick Douglass, Susan B. Anthony and many others.  At the same time, we have the union-busting George Eastman, who was himself more of an enigma than anything.

The above-linked piece also cites a number of works on Rochester’s history including Cracking an Anti-Union Town: The Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America in Rochester, N.Y. and another historian by the name of Blake McKelvey.  Unfortunately, I’ve had difficulty locating either a place to buy the book or to find works by the Mr. McKelvey, who was Rochester’s official historian until 2000 when he died.  I would love to read the work entitled A History of Penal and Correctional Institutions in the Rochester Area.

Powered by ScribeFire.

Well, this is going to do the Giuliani campaign no good whatsoever.

The IAFF, the International Association of Fire Fighters, has released a new website called rudy-urbanlegend.com. The site is dedicated to revealing some of the more ugly truths of September 11th and Mayor Giuliani’s unfortunate role in the events of that day. Broken radios, an emergency center in the only building in the entire state to have ever been hit by terrorists (twice), dumping debris before firefighters were able to collect the remains of the fallen. . . . the list goes on. Those of us on the Liberal blog circuit, especially in New York, will be unsurprised by all of this. But, as the phrase goes in politics, how does this play in Iowa?

There’s nothing I find more tiresome than a blog post harping on patriotic holidays, regaling us with unique-yet-boring permutations of patriotism, calling us all to action. I know this because I’ve written plenty of them. It gets really boring, after a while. In fact, I’d even considered writing a post about Net Neutrality and CMCE, urging you to call your state Senators and such. Then I decided that was not for me, at least not this year. Feel free if it strikes your fancy, but I’d rather post something more helpful.

And so, I collected a few helpful hints to make your Independence Day celebration much more American:

1. So, this Independence Day, don’t forget to drink beer.
2. Lots of it.
3. Be sure to wait till you are good and drunk before you start after the mini-explosives with the campfire lighter.
4. Campfire lighters tend to run out of fuel while sitting idle, so don’t be afraid to turn that bugger all the way up.
5. Keep the fireworks out of the hands of children: aim for the face.
6. Everyone loves Lynard Skynard at a cookout. Don’t be afraid to blast it. Your neighbors will appreciate your good taste.
7. Just because you’re a little tipsy and live in the suburbs is no reason not to show off your new gun with a little target practice. Besides, there’s all those beer cans just waiting to be shot off a fence!
8. If you’re having a problem getting the grill prepared for cooking, remember this simple rule: bar-b-que uses charcoal, but anything burns in a camp fire. One way or another, there will be fire.
9. Remember: fireworks are important, cookouts are important, beer is critical, but so is the 12am Airing of Grievances.
10. As a final salute to your independence, why not sleep naked in a lawn chair overnight? The wife’s definitely not letting you sleep in the bed, anyway. . . .