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I don’t know where people get the ideas for this stuff, but this is worth a viewing:

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Have you seen any improvement in page loading speed lately?

I think we can all agree that atheists are an unpopular minority in the United States. We've seen countless examples of bigotry directed at us by Christians, including elected officials who are supposed to know better. And it is not just the Christians; the record is not much better for members of other mainstream religions. I suspect we can agree that there are multiple reasons for how we are perceived by many religious individuals. A number of prominent atheist bloggers, women and men whose work I respect, seem to share the opinion that one of the most important obstacles faced by modern atheists is our lousy public image. Some even appear to suggest that this image is largely of our own making. Again and again, we are cautioned against offending the religious. We are told, "Don't be a dick," and our tactics are criticized as too rude or too assertive. We are accused of picking the wrong battles, and some of our activism is labeled as counterproductive. Many of us are now seen as part of the problem because our particular brand of atheism contributes to bad PR. That is, we are not nice enough, tame enough, or passive enough. A Public Relations Fallacy Does atheism have a public relations problem? We know we are perceived negatively, but is this primarily because of our actions? Some in the atheist community seem to think so. I disagree, and I'm here to call bullshit on what I am labeling atheism's public relations fallacy. Here's how I define it:

Atheism's public relations fallacy refers to the claim that certain types of atheist activism are primarily responsible for how atheists are perceived or are key to changing how atheists are perceived.

I am not denying that our behavior is relevant; I am denying that it is primarily responsible for how we are perceived and that it is key to changing these perceptions. I find it relevant but comparatively trivial. Our presence and are willingness to speak our minds are sufficient to agitate many religious believers. Short of converting or remaining silent and scared, I do not believe that our church-state activism is the main reason we are hated. Erecting billboards with vanilla messages about how one can be good without god are perceived by many as assaults on Christianity. Speaking out is enough. Being visible is enough. Merely existing is enough. We do not have a public relations problem; we have a bigotry problem. Welcome Diverse Tactics, But Be Strategic To the degree that we embrace diverse tactics, the atheist movement is stronger. That does not mean we should not criticize each other - constructive criticism, disagreement, and dissent are vital to our progress. But it does mean that we should be reluctant to label each other as counterproductive simply because someone wants to try a different approach. I'm going to welcome any nonviolent approach for which someone can articulate a coherent strategy. Want to picket fundamentalist churches? Go for it. Want to place a crucified Santa in your yard? Be my guest. I may not agree with a method, but I'm willing to give it a shot because I may be wrong. As long as we are acting strategically and not purely out of emotion, we probably aren't going to screw things up too badly. In case you haven't noticed, we're already hated to a degree that few other groups have faced throughout history. And if we try new things and pay attention, we might just learn something useful. Reject Bigotry If toning down our "dickishness" is not going to dramatically improve our public image and reduce the bigotry we face, what will? Here's the short version: we must confront bigotry, stand up for ourselves, and refuse to be treated as second-class citizens. There have been many civil rights movements before ours, which while far from over, have been far more successful than we have. What has been common to the historic and current struggles of women, African Americans, and LGBT persons? They overcame the notion that how they were mistreated by other segments of society was primarily their fault. It is time for us to do the same. It is time for us to move beyond this public relations fallacy. Subscribe to Atheist Revolution

I’ve spoken in length about how sexist S2 and Heroes of Newerth is, which is not surprising given how bigoted their CEO is, and other have written about how Riot games and League of Legends is not far behind in providing fan service and all the other things that implies. But I still had some hope for DotA 2,which was being developed after all by Valve, which has at least somewhat a better record at how it presents women, as seen by the absolute top male nerd fantasy: Alyx Vance. Sure, their promo images of the game characters were obviously sexist and others have raised concerns about the direction the community was taking already, but hope dies last as they say, so despite all this, and despite the fact that MOBA communities are the absolute scum of the earth, I wanted to believe that some Valve guidelines and strong moderation might improve things

How wrong I was.

It seems that the DoTA2 community is shaping to be as bad, if not worse than the S2 community and the all-powerful report function isn’t having any effect whatsoever, especially given that the moderators are actually of the same shitty opinion as the rest of their scumfuck players.

There’s really not much else to say, that the community can’t say by itself. Some choice quotes

I’m not homophobic and I call people fags all the time.

george just come out of the closet already

Because, of course, only secretly members of marginalized communities might ever be against their oppression. This argument would be so bad if it wasn’t so fucking common.

For example, I have multiple homosexual friends including one who enjoys dressing up in feminine clothing and a wig, putting on make-up, to become his alternate persona “Greere Grimes”. He has 2 or 3 friends that do this as well regularly. When we see each other at the gym and talk to each other, and he says something such as (This is a true story), “Did you see the guy at the check-in? OH MY GOD I couldn’t breathe!” and I laugh and go “Dan you’re such a fag ahahah”, he chuckles and says “Oh I know! I’m gonna go talk to him” and viola. There is no offense taken because he understands that while society attaches negativity to the word, he knows I personally do not and as well, he is in fact a faggot and is fully comfortable with it.

This is the same person who as Greere Grimes was at a bar and left early without his friends, while 3 men followed him outside and broke multiple ribs as well as giving him many bruises including a black eye. These was a hate crime and the 3 men are still at large. He was in the hospital for 4 days.

Someone who understands the hate that people can have in their hearts, and HE is comfortable with someone calling him a faggot?

[...]

I will continue to call people faggots until nobody is offended. And then I will use the word to refer to homosexuals. Because that’s what it’s already supposed to be doing.

 

There are no words…

I don’t get offended at asian jokes being asian myself

Nor do I get hurt by random t2s randomly throwing out racial slurs and happen to hit one

Never will be and never have been.

If I talk to my mexican friend and say something about her getting smuggled over the border she will just laugh.

If I talk to my blonde friend and tell her a really crappy dumb blonde joke she wont care.

Someone please bring out the Special Snowflake award.

This is like black people still crying about shit all the time. “Yo we can say nigger but if you white people say it that shit racist yo”

^ THIS WAS A GAME MODERATOR SPEAKING ^

Same game moderator went ahead to complain about how hard straight white mailes have it. Seriously.

Anyone who actually posts in here and tries to defend it saying that its hurtful are gay. Straight up I want your wiener in my mouth gay. Now get your ass outa the closet and stop being a white knight of the internet.

Quality

I gave up shortly after the last quote.

Insightful? Funny? Informative? Convincing? Helpful?

---

Other similar posts you might also enjoy: Some reactions from HoN neckbeards. Racist Apologia Gallore! | You’re not an underdog fighting “political correctness”. You’re just a bigot. | Scumfuck gamers

I’ve come to the conclusion that Republicans who are sincerely calling for Mitch Daniels to enter the race--not the ones who wish he had, the ones who want him to do so now--actually want to kill off their party’s chances in 2012. The deep and not entirely known flaws of a Daniels run, in my opinion, dwarf those of Romney’s bid. Any thinking person would come to the conclusion that the whole thing is a bad idea for Republicans, and while that description doesn’t include Bill Kristol, I would think Jay Cost (via Daniel Larison) is more rational than this:

While [Daniels] could not win an outright majority of delegates because of the passing of too many filing deadlines, he could do what Bobby Kennedy attempted in 1968: get in late, do well in the latter contests, win some big states, and make the case that, early primaries aside, he is the true choice of the party, the one who could unify everybody around a common cause. If nobody has won a majority of delegates by June, that could very well be enough for a dark horse victory for Daniels.

I actually disagree with Larison that Daniels is well-positioned to make the case for deficit cutting/entitlement reform. Yeah, Daniels doesn’t have Swiss accounts and Cayman Island shelters to drag him down, but on the other hand Obama would be able to dismiss his rhetoric out of hand by pointing to the inconvenient fact that Daniels was the budget chief who okayed both rounds of the Bush Tax Cuts and the Iraq War, not to mention Medicare Part D. These are four big holes punched through the deficit on Daniels’s watch, making him one of the key architects of our deficit. Mitt Romney, on the other hand, has not raised the federal deficit by a single cent. Shifting from making Romney into the bad guy of the past ten years to making Daniels the bad guy of the past ten years would be easy, because it’s right there in the public record. And that alone should be enough.

It’s also entirely nuts to nominate a top Bush Administration economic official for president in an environment where the majority still blames the bad economy on George W. Bush, where the president intends to run for another term on not returning to old, unpopular Bush policies (that Daniels helped implement). Blaming Daniels solely for these policies is demagogic, but it’s not as though he resigned in protest over them, or even disowned them afterward.

What’s more, it’s even nuttier when you think about the inevitable results of doing this:

1. A successful Daniels candidacy would ensure a deadlocked convention. That’s the definition of success in this case, which should be a first clue. It’s unlikely that anything in the universe would be able to make Paul, Gingrich or Romney drop out ahead of time, the latter two especially if they even have a chance of winning. Such a convention hasn’t happened since primaries became de rigeur, and having one would bring about, as Larison puts it, “…disaffection of the voting base that feels that its choice has been hijacked.” Which, great timing for that, two months before the election.
2. A Daniels nomination, were it accepted, would mean elevating a candidate who hasn’t been vetted and might have embarrassing surprises in his closet.
3. Daniels has no experience on the national stage, and could well have a Rick Perry-style cultureshock in such a different arena.
4. Daniels is a far less effective communicator than Romney, and a far less dynamic presence in general. My guess is that Obama would run circles around him in debates. And I don’t subscribe to the “hip to be square” concept either.

Really, anyone who knows all this and signs up for it anyway is either suicidal or a fool. Just ask Democrats: in 2004 we didn’t fall in love with John Kerry, but we voted for him anyway. We didn’t spend months on end panicking and wondering if we could somehow induce Gary Locke to hop in and derail the whole thing.

Interesting analysis from Noam Scheiber on Obama’s sorta-populist moment:

But there’s still another explanation, which has to do with racial stereotypes and double-standards. Simply put, a little-known African-American politician who dabbles in edgy populism risks alienating certain white voters, who will view his populism through the lens of race. However the candidate actually intends it, these voters will treat his rhetoric as evidence that he plans to take from white people and give to black people, and, needless to say, they’ll be nudged along in this assumption by the right-wing media. (Fox et al was pretty good at fanning these fears even when Obama’s rhetoric was about as far from populist as you can get).

Three years into his term, by contrast, most Americans have a fairly detailed portrait of the president. He’s no longer a black man they don’t know, but a person they have a relatively intimate relationship with, at least as public figures go. Many, if not most, probably don’t even think of the president in racial terms anymore.

Which is to say, Obama may have finally embraced populism because he finally can embrace populism, whereas it simply wasn’t politically possible before.

I think this is certainly a possibility, but…it’s not the simplest one, which is that the Democratic Party has a deep disdain for populism. To know why that is, I like to think about what would happen if the Democrats fully embraced an authentically populist approach as a party. This is impossible to predict, but I think the following four things would happen in short order:

1. Democrats would quickly increase their share of the fabled white, working-class vote by a decent margin.
2. Democrats would probably lose some percentage of the totebagger, Charlie Rose-viewer vote off the bat, though probably less on net.
3. The political establishment (and its political wing, the Blue Dog caucus) would go absolutely apeshit, attacking Democrats as reverting to the far-left McGovern days and such. Joe Lieberman would have a field day.
4. Corporate donations would fizzle, putting the party at (more of) a disadvantage when it comes to financing electioneering activities. And it’s hard to see how they make it up.

Now, I’m not necessarily certain that it’s not worth taking the plunge. In fact, post-Citizens United, I think it’s really the only choice. There’s a theory of politics (Jamie Court is pretty eloquent explaining  it) which basically states that the forces of reaction and propping up the status quo are always going to be better-funded than the ones arguing for progress, so instead of playing that game, you play a different one–use anger to mobilize people for change, to basically detonate existing points of pressure and then get out of the way. And this theory has a lot going for it: it’s essentially the dynamic that gets corporations to create safer products and designs a lot of the time, driving progress in that sphere. What’s more, it would effectively force Democrats to rely much more on strengthening unions to compete, which was really where I think the Democrats went wrong in the first place, in paying them lip service to get big corporate money.

But it’s unsurprising that a simple observer and activist would say, “Let’s do it!” while the people responsible for making the party a success do not. And it occurs to me that the Democrats can’t afford to become a populist-reformist party that only occasionally holds power for short periods of time to enact rapid bursts of change, when one considers the shambles that the would-be Republican Party of governance is in right now. There is, I think, little question that populism is a vastly more effective approach for Democrats operating outside of the Coasts. The establishment favored Blue Dog-ish Iraq Veteran Paul Hackett over liberal-populist Sherrod Brown for the Ohio Senate nomination in 2006, and Brown won a surprisingly wide victory that I strongly doubt Hackett would have enjoyed. Democrats strongly stood by doomed Sen. Blanche Lincoln in 2010 when polls showed that the populist alternative trailed by far less. Admittely, Lincoln was in incumbent, but there was no need to spend a single penny in favor of an unpopular, damaged incumbent who was obviously going to lose by Santorum margins in November. None of this is particularly new, and I’ve written about it before, but it still stands. It is my opinion that the Blue Dogs represent mostly the worst aspects of our establishment consensus–deficit peacockery, military hawkishness, wishy-washiness on social issues–but the reason they have stuck around is because the establishment provides them with enormous cover. The Democratic Party has come to rely on this dynamic. But it’s not a very strong foundation for a reformist party, in my opinion.

I typically agree with Fidel Castro very rarely, but this is a pretty on-the-money summary:

“The selection of a Republican candidate for the presidency of this globalized and expansive empire is — and I mean this seriously — the greatest competition of idiocy and ignorance that has ever been,” said the retired Cuban leader, who has dueled with 11 U.S. administrations since his 1959 revolution.

Also, these guys really need to stop with this stuff:

Another Republican candidate, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, said he would authorize increased covert operations to bring down the Cuban government.

Look, the whole point of plausible deniability is that you can fucking deny it! If you tell people you’re going to do it, it’s not covert. It’s just openly breaking the law at that point. Also, it means that other countries that want to hurt America could stage some sort of false flag mission to increase tensions with Cuba. I don’t expect much from Newt Gingrich--respect for other countries’ sovereignty, certainly not--but at the very least he could stop fucking up American security, now, couldn’t he?

This really ought to be the Gingrich campaign song, if he can’t get the rights to “Crackdown” by The Clash:

(h/t: Pwire)

He delivered his speech slightly better than I figured he would, and while I didn’t care much for the content I can’t argue that some of his points were presented well (starting out with a firm defense of the safety net, and presenting what are presumably Paul Ryan-style reforms to save it = smart). But the speech suffered from a schizophrenic focus and tone. Daniels was clearly trying to throw out red meat and make nods to the center, in the same speech, sometimes consecutively. I’m not sure who his audience was, but it felt sort of like that hacky old sitcom plot where the guy goes on two dates at the same time. I’m not qualified to judge whether the red meat was successful. The centrist-style appeals were more so, though in a qualified way. In general, I don’t find Republican rhetoric on entitlement reform very compelling, as it tends to obscure the real choices we need to make there, and Daniels particularly is the man who masterminded the Bush Tax Cuts. He starts out with a serious deficit of trust from this observer, and I doubt he’ll ever reverse it. No doubt if Daniels had run for president, he’d have advocated the exact same supply-side cuts that Romney, Gingrich and Santorum do, and oppose the same “defense” cuts. Until the party’s structure and attitudes change, there’s little point of hoping they’ll start caring about the deficit.

As for the style, Daniels’s overall tone was fairly gloomy, set by this early line: “On these evenings, Presidents naturally seek to find the sunny side of our national condition.  But when President Obama claims that the state of our union is anything but grave, he must know in his heart that this is not true.” And, later, this: “So 2012 is a year of true opportunity, maybe our last, to restore an America of hope and upward mobility, and greater equality.” Daniels started here and pretty much ended here. The speech as written tried to shift toward a more hopeful vision of the future if we just got the danged fiscal house in order, but Daniels’s limits as a speaker insured he’d fail to get that across verbally. The whole thing was low energy and one-note, and felt defeated above all else, which I think is not really the message Republicans want to send in 2012. The difference between President Barack Obama, a man who has taken more abuse than any president probably since Lincoln, going up there and still being able to swing for the fences, get people fired up, and show some genuine passion and idealism up there, and the man Republicans seem to think would be best-suited to replace him was just incredibly stark. And Daniels’s speech smacked very much of a Romneyesque tendency to reach for the right-wing rhetorical jugular insincerely, in fact he’s much less natural at delivering the red meat than Romney is (though I will admit that the “lightbulb” line was delivered pretty well, I reacted to it in spite of knowing it was horseshit). All in all, a speech with significant content and major presentational deficits, the latter of which suggest a limited political skill set that would probably have led to a Rick Perry-like result Daniels moved onto the national stage. If there was any doubt that Mitch Daniels should have run for president, this speech really ought to extinguish it.

Oh, yeah, and Obama did quite well too. But there hasn’t been an occasion that needed outstanding rhetoric and delivery where Obama didn’t rise to the challenge. It was amazing how Romney-centric it was, actually. He’s got his eyes on the ball. And the gestalt is encouraging. Onto November!

(P.S. I can’t resist taking a victory lap for my first-ever Andrew Sullivan link, which I’ve always likened to a stand-up comedian getting a shot on Carson’s Tonight Show. I’m very pleased with it!)

Recently, I’ve been flexing the old activist muscles (been too busy with life changes to really do much before) with the SAFE California group that is working to put a question to the voters on dropping the death penalty in favor of life without parole. It’ll save the state as much as $100 million off of an $8 billion deficit, which isn’t going to fix everything but it’s a patch at no cost to anyone. Anyway, I’ve mostly just been asking people I know as well as asking in friendly venues to gather them, and so far it’s been going pretty well. As of last Friday we need about 190,000 signatures to get the question on the ballot, averaging over 50k per week. With a bit less than four weeks left it seems doable, though obviously some signatures are going to be invalid. It’s going to be close is what I’m saying.

I reckon, if we can get it on the ballot, it has a decent chance of coming to pass. I’m not sure which interests would really be threatened by ending capital punishment in the state. Sure, perhaps there’ll be some nutty right-wing billionaire who will bankroll a vicious smear campaign (there always seems to be one of those), but in terms of the stakeholders I don’t see it. The one company that manufactures the chemicals used for lethal injections went bankrupt a while ago, and to the extent that law enforcement considers execution a useful tool (not a universal view), I’m not sure they want to miss out on the part of the initiative that redirects some of the money used on executions to fund cash-strapped police departments (a savvy inclusion on the part of the organizers). If law enforcement signs on to ending the thing when put to the voters, I’d go so far as to say it’s favored. And, certainly, Governor (and former Attorney General) Jerry Brown and current AG Kamala Harris can make a strong argument for why it’s not needed to keep people safe (both oppose capital punishment). Looking at the polling, this really seems like the best chance to drop the practice in the state, and take one step toward humane correctional practices.

Also, on a related note, Jerry Brown really has been doing a pretty good job in office, much better than Schwarzenegger ever did. Arnie can keep his swaggering macho bullshit, it takes real guts to stand up to the prison guard unions in this state. Or to stake his political capital on a tax hike initiative (to forestall even more spending cuts, of course). Arnie was deathly afraid of doing either one back during his days in office, and Ol’ Moonbeam took him to toughness school on both. Pretty impressive, actually.

None of us has as much money as we'd probably like. Even if you reject the "consumer culture" of the United States and many other Western nations, you could probably think of some genuinely good things you'd like to do if you could afford it (e.g., funding secular organizations to the point where they could be truly influential). But there are things each and every one of us can do with our money that do not require us to spend any more of it than we already do. Yes, I'm talking about using our power as consumers to influence our world. I'm not Mittens Romney. Earning $374,000 a year, a figure he considers to be "not very much" money is more than five times the amount I will ever earn in a year. And yet, that does not mean I cannot use what I have to make a difference. I don't even have to spend more to do so. By becoming an educated and thoughtful consumer, I can learn about the companies I am thinking of supporting. When I am considering a purchase, no matter how small, I can ask myself about what other causes I might be indirectly sponsoring. For example, I will not give Chick-fil-A a dime because the causes they support are vile. A religious influence can be found in many companies. This does not necessarily mean that atheists should avoid every one of them. Not every company on this list is equal. It is far easier for me to imagine buying a Timberland product than shopping at Hobby Lobby. However, I do think that the degree to which religious belief is part of a company may be a relevant consideration for many atheists when trying to decide which companies to support. Subscribe to Atheist Revolution

Newt rants about cable movies he doesn’t like, and flips out when Herman tries to seize control. Catch all the fun here. And the main site is here, as always.

We’re going to be doing some work on Library Grape’s technical bits over the next day or two. Once finished, the speed and responsiveness of the site should increase significantly. We hope the changes will be seamless, but if anything comes up please bear with us as we iron out the kinks.

Mitt’s apparent intention to turn himself into the New Newt has made him, well, about as popular as Newt. Not all that surprising I guess. But interesting.

I’ve long been skeptical that Mitt Romney would win the nomination easily, despite a truly awful field of competitors. Romney may or may not be a great policy mind when he wants to, but he’s a second-rate political talent who has lost exactly twice as many elections as he’s won. Lately I’ve been thinking about why Romney’s campaign has been so lousy considering the circumstances (lest we forget, he’s locked in an epic battle for first with Newt fucking Gingrich!), and I think I’ve figured it out. It’s simple: Romney thinks it’s all about him. In 2008, Barack Obama consistently (and wisely) did everything he could to minimize his own significance in the election, arguing that he was merely a vehicle for change. His presence dominated the election process, but he connected himself to the larger trends of the moment and thus made the election about something much bigger than himself. It helped that his biography and profile symbolized change so totally, but he was perfectly willing to step aside and let the winds of change blow. Had he spent weeks furiously trying to smack down Jeremiah Wright and Tony Rezko attacks, say, or mounted a spirited defense of the legal profession, I suspect his brand would have suffered. That stuff was beside the point because of how Obama handled himself, and he won. In a funny way, George W. Bush did something similar in 2000, presenting himself (hilariously) as an outsider to a nation that was tired of scandal and not sold on Al Gore. I wasn’t persuaded by the whole rough-hewn Texan image, partly because it was so evidently fabricated, but one has to admit that he presented himself as part of something larger and acted as basically a medium for it.

Mitt Romney, though, is much more narcissistic than those two candidates. Through his over-the-top and inaccurate criticisms of Obama, he’s tried to make himself a conduit for the free-floating anger at Obama, but in a calculated and forced way that hasn’t gone over with the party’s rank-and-file. Newt Gingrich, though, has been very successful at this game. He gives Republicans something bigger to connect to, something they believe deeply in: fear of change and deep resentment at Obama for making it. Romney, though, mostly chooses to make the election about himself. About his taxes, his wealth, his business expertise, his experience. That he’s the right person to lead. Admittedly, these arguments have to be made in order to win support. But the simple fact is that people don’t love the guy, and while he can attack Obama’s record he can’t quite get out of the damn way to let peoples’ feelings flow through. He’s obviously the best-qualified candidate in the field to have the job, but he’s struggling. At the moment, Newt leads Mitt by four points in Gallup’s five-day rolling average. Romney could still turn it around, but the question is: with what? He’s already unloaded most of his best material on the guy and Newt’s still not dead. (New movie idea: Mitt Romney running for president against a bunch of zombies. Could be a winner!). The numbers are in:

When you get down to it, Romney has every advantage in this race except for one. He can’t channel the white-hot rage of the Republican base convincingly. Newt Gingrich, on the other hand, has nearly everything against him except that he can channel that rage. As it turns out, being able to channel that rage has lately been the key to this race, which is why Newt has the edge at the moment. Romney could still win, there are plenty of factors for why that could come to pass, not the least of which is that Newt Gingrich is insane. But the simple fact is that the Something Larger that he’s advocating people connect to is basically Mitt Romney’s Awesomeness, and if people don’t like Mitt Romney, what does he have?

Mitch Daniels is the man of the moment—he’s been selected to respond to Barack Obama’s State Of The Union address, which essentially means that he’s about to kiss any sort of rising star status goodbye if history is any guide. And it should be: Daniels is soft-spoken and not terribly magnetic, and my hunch is that the Republicans devoutly wishing he’d gotten in will not be wishing it this time tomorrow. SOTU responses are a lose-lose situation, the only decent ones in recent years were (1) the one given by Sen. Jim Webb in 2007, which was packed with gravitas, toughness, and dignity, and (2) the one given by Gov. Bob McDonnell last year, which ramped up the cheesy atmospherics (cheering crowds, speaker walking down the aisle and shaking hands) to turn the whole thing into an ersatz State Of The Union, but which somehow worked because it turned the whole thing into a joke that McDonnell was entirely in on. It was actually kind of amazing to watch. Daniels, though, will likely shoot for the first and see his buzz evaporate faster than Bobby Jindal’s did, and let’s not forget that then-Gov. Kathleen Sebelius’s 2008 address arguably killed her prospects of landing a VP nod with her lifeless speech. I’m not sure why they didn’t give this year’s to Chris Christie, who at least has shown himself to have a strong personality, which is the key ingredient here (and is the subtle connecting thread between Webb and McDonnell that led to their speeches working). Christie can talk, he’s younger and his record in office is much less horrifying than Daniels’s. It’s baffling to me why he wasn’t chosen.

But the weird esteem that Daniels lucked into makes me think of something else. It’s become an article of faith that Daniels not only should have run, but that he’d have done well if he had. Daniel Larison put that notion to rest yesterday. The emerging image of Daniels as a thoughtful, moderate statesman is utterly baffling to me, and is a sign of…something. Let’s do a quick jog down memory lane. During the 1990s, the establishment had plenty of moderate Republicans around to bestow praise upon to show their centrism: George H. W. Bush, Bob Dole, Susan Molinari, etc. Then the 2000s came around, and suddenly those ranks were severely depleted. Dubya was moderate in some respects, but the establishment was always ambivalent about the guy, simultaneously portraying him as a real ‘merikan and a drunk dolt, and later simultaneously as a True Hero and an incompetent dolt. He never hit the sweet spot for them, so John McCain became their favorite Republican. This made some sense since McCain actually was moderate during this time, opposing the Bush Tax Cuts and so forth. Yes, he supported the Iraq War, but so did every Republican aside from Lincoln Chafee (who, ironically, was booted out in 2006 thanks to public scorn about the Iraq War). But being an iconoclast (and likely an actual Vice President under Kerry had he accepted) simply wasn’t enough for him, he wanted to be president and thus made peace with Bush. From then until now, the centrist establishment’s love for the guy has slowly but steadily dwindled—sure, he still gets on the Sunday shows all the time, but nobody talks about him in elevated terms anymore. Gone forever are the days of the Bipartisan Maverick Centrist War Hero with Courage—these days he’s indulged mostly with vague embarrassment, sort of like Joe Biden without the likability (and with much less knowledge about foreign policy).

This, of course, has left a vacuum for the establishment. Who’s going to be the next maverick, unorthodox Republican for them all to unite around and elevate into a national hero? It’s an open question. Paul Ryan looked certain to be that figure for a time, but the push didn’t work. Too partisan, too bitter, too beholden to wingnut influences, and ultimately while the D.C. crowd loved the idea of a Medicare shredder as a transpartisan hero, the public shockingly refused to go along with it. Chris Christie is the obvious contender for the role, and might well get it, but his style is a hard sell to people outside Jersey. Which leaves us with Mitch Daniels, in many ways the most bizarre figure in this story. Daniels has gotten a lot of mainstream credibility, even though he’s not demonstrably moderate on much of anything. As Kay explains here, he’s a reliable big business crony on the environment, labor rights, taxes, and just about anything else you can name domestically. On foreign policy, he buys into the most dubious assumptions of Fox/Rush/Drudgedom, repeating silly rumors about Obama’s nonexistent apology tour. Daniels does refrain from angry yelling and does present a thoughtful mien, I’ll admit. But it’s either a sign of Daniels’s media savvy that he’s been able to become a “moderate” despite not being moderate in any visible way, or it shows the establishment’s desperation in trying to find a non-horrible Republican that they’ve puffed up someone who gives them very little moderation at all. Or both! Of course, the centrist establishment loves “civility,” which Daniels has I suppose, but this has nothing to do with moderation. McCain during the early aughts was never a civil figure and Christie certainly isn’t. Both are much more moderate than Daniels. Perhaps the establishment has conflated centrism and civility (wouldn’t be the first time!), but someone should tell them that the current state of the Republican Party is such that they can have someone who’s quiet or they can have someone who’s moderate. But today’s Republican Party isn’t going to elevate someone who’s both.

In any event, it’s not going to matter, as Daniels isn’t noted for being an electrifying speaker or much of a master of atmospherics, and can be counted on to give a dull, low-energy Republican speech tonight that will quickly lower the heat on his star. I give it a 95% chance of happening.

As always, this song asks pertinent questions:

Sexism and misogyny are loaded terms in that nobody wants to be accused of either of them. But what do they mean? I have seen many prominent atheist bloggers using these terms interchangeably. This was a surprise, as I've always understood them to be related but distinct concepts. I think it may be helpful to define these terms and determine whether they mean the same thing or not. Misogyny I'll start with misogyny because I think it is easier to define in some ways. I've always understood misogyny as referring to the strong dislike or hatred of women. In the social sciences, it is generally viewed as an attitude where an entire class of people (i.e., women) are hated because of their gender. It can be expressed in many ways, ranging from mild forms like jokes or insults to extreme forms like rape. When women are targeted for a particular type of brutal treatment, we look to misogyny and generally find it present in that culture or subculture (e.g., witch-related scares). Sexism Like misogyny, sexism is primarily an attitude. However, the sexist attitude is not rooted in hatred but involves a variety of discriminatory attitudes. In essence, differences between women and men, real or imagined, are amplified and enforced. Expressions of sexism tend to involve efforts at social control rather than hatred. In fact, it has been suggested that much of what we label as sexist today may have evolutionary roots in control tactics. Sexism vs. Misogyny As I understand it, sexism and misogyny are distinct. They reflect different attitudes; however, they may be impossible to distinguish based solely on their behavioral expressions. That is, the same behavior could be sexist or misogynist depending on the attitude driving it. We would need more information about the underlying attitudes and intent of the speaker. Take some of the insults Rebecca Watson has received as an example. I have seen some that look blatantly misogynist in that they almost certainly reflect hatred of women. Others seem more likely to be sexist but not misogynistic, and still others could be sexist or misogynistic. We really cannot tell without more information. In these cases, perhaps labeling the behavior "sexist/misogynistic" makes the most sense. Some have argued that all casual sexism is driven by misogyny. I have trouble accepting this claim. Having worked with male perpetrators of domestic violence, I believe that true misogyny is distinct from sexism. The degree to which many of these men hated women was qualitatively different from most of the sexist attitudes I've encountered. Some of them genuinely hated women. I realize this is extremely vague, but this sort of misogyny always seemed to have a very different feel to it. It seems to me that sexism and misogyny are distinct, but I acknowledge that these constructs have fuzzy boundaries. Many examples could belong to both categories simultaneously, and we may be unable to classify behaviors correctly without insight into someone's motives or intent. Implications I find misogyny to be a more serious problem than sexism, one rooted in hatred as opposed to ignorance or culture. My suggestion, then, is that we reserve the misogynist label for the clear-cut instances. I do not believe that most instances of sexism are motivated by misogynistic attitudes. In essence, calling everyone who engages in sexist behavior a misogynist dilutes the meaning of misogyny to the point where it is no longer useful. The distinction may also have utility as we consider remedial approaches. In my experience, sexism can often be addressed through education. Many people hold sexist attitudes because they've never thought through the issues and just accepted cultural messages. It is not that different from religious belief in this way. Raising awareness and other educational approaches are often helpful. Misogyny, on the other hand, tends to require some more than education. These attitudes are much harder to change and something closer to therapy may be needed. Subscribe to Atheist Revolution

Leave it to TBogg:

Rick Santorum Suggests That When Life Gives You Rape, You Should Make Rapeanade

The Guardian has a great article on the successful rebranding of the French National Front under its new young leader, Marine Le Pen:

The French political elite was given a short, sharp lesson in not underestimating the FN in 2002. In a completely unexpected scenario, Jean-Marie Le Pen knocked the Socialist candidate out. He lost in the second-round run-off, but the incident provoked a bout of national shame and self-loathing that left deep scars.

Jean-Marie Le Pen’s hectoring antisemitism and bullying rhetoric could not sustain the success. But in January 2010 Marine Le Pen was elected the FN’s president and overhauled the party.

She dumped the shaven-haired bully boys nominally responsible for “security” at FN rallies for fresh-faced girls in jeans and crisp T-shirts, and abandoned the neo-Nazism and outdated references to the second world war. She even voiced support for homosexual marriage.

There were flashes of Le Pen senior in her railing against Muslims praying in the streets – which she likened to the Nazi occupation – “corrupt” politicians, European technocrats, and that old FN chestnut, immigration. And while it was generally agreed that she was softer and cleverer than her father, the fundamental ideology of the FN seemed to have changed little.

“She’s a young woman and she plays on that softer image. She’s also good at getting her message across, much, much better than her father,” said Nonna Mayer, who is an expert on France’s far right and a professor at the Paris Institute for Political Studies (Sciences Po).

“But it’s the same politics of scapegoating that it always has been. It’s still the extreme right. There’s no getting away from it.”

I used to think that Europe was way ahead of us. But these days, I’m starting to think we’re ahead of them. Our innate multiculturalism forced us to grapple with what everyone else will have to in the wake of globalization, and countries that once seemed like forward-looking, tolerant, and progressive are seeing the rise of sentiments that have been commonplace here for a long time. But the thing is, I’m actually relatively hopeful for America. Our young people just have little conception (for the most part) of race-based grievances, and the younger you get, the less there is. In the medium term, we should be fine. But a lot of these European countries are going to have to reckon with this stuff, and I have no idea how long it’s going to take. Hopefully shorter than it’s taken us.

In any event, let’s just hope Ms. Le Pen doesn’t get anywhere close to power this year.

Another bucketfull of irony poured into the bottomless well of Republican hypocrisy:

Senator Rand Paul [...] was detained [inconvenienced] at the airport in Nashville by the Transportation Security Administration on Monday, according to people close to the lawmaker, although the T.S.A. quickly disputed their account.

Instead, the agency said the senator had been denied entry to the secure part of the airport after refusing a pat-down,and was “escorted” from the screening area by local law enforcement, but had never been “detained.”

Mr. Paul was later rebooked on a different flight and was “re-screened without incident,” the agency said.

The T.S.A. said that Mr. Paul had been screened by a version of its millimeter-wave body imaging device that uses a generic image of a passenger and, if it detects any anomaly, puts a yellow box on the body area that requires greater scrutiny. An alarm was triggered when he was in the machine, which – under administration procedures – required a “targeted pat-down” to see what caused it. But Mr. Paul refused to submit to the pat-down, the agency said.

Get it?  Wingnut firebrand Rand Paul gets his panties in a bunch because the TSA was trying to pat down his God-given right to privacy.  Where does the irony come in?

A posting on the senator’s own Twitter account shortly before the incident announced that he was headed to Washington to speak at the “March for Life,” an anti-abortion rally.

Yep, Paul was off to join a bunch of anti-choice dead-enders in their quest to overturn Supreme Court decisions like Griswold v. Connecticut and Roe v. Wade, which served to establish a constitutional right to privacy when it came to things like contraception and abortion.

But far be it from me to ever expect any kind of consistency or logic to invade the bubble in which wingnuts spend all of their waking hours…

The latest from the guy who once told people to just “get over” the 2000 election/recount/SCOTUS decision:

U.S. Supreme Court justice Antonin Scalia has a simple solution for people who don’t like all the political advertisements unleashed by the court’s decision two years ago that ended limits on corporate contributions in political campaigns. Scalia says: Change the channel or turn off the TV.

Why not just answer all questions about the awful outcomes of his decisions by answering, “I don’t care,” and drop the last shred of pretense? Of course, he’s not much different from most ideologues in that he doesn’t let pesky things like “empirical observation” and “life experience” get in the way of his grand principles. But most are able to come up with more of a shrug when asked about it.

I think Marshall gets this just right:

I don’t think Newt would be able to deliver any kind of smackdown to President Obama in a debate — if we mean by a smackdown, anything that would make the voters who matter more likely to vote for Gingrich than Obama. But if you’re a base Republican, Newt might well tell Obama just what you’ve been wanting to tell him for years.

Wouldn’t it be deliciously perfect if Republicans’ demonization of Obama were to actually cost them the presidency?