Time For A Real Offensive Against Terrorism  Obama keeps talking sense.

"Today, we will focus on nuclear, biological, and cyber threats -- three 21st century threats that have been neglected for the last eight years."

McToughLovin’ Funny video making points.

More below.

Punishment in a forced labor camp
Georgia -- 1930s

Determined to bring to a blessed end my three day journey into the painful miasma explored by Douglas A. Blackmon in his extraordinary Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of African Americans from the Civil War to World War II, I chose sleep deprivation last night and read long past dawn.

Nothing related to race, African Americans, American history, political "facts" or sociological issues in America will ever be the same again for me.

At least, so says a report from the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute .  The report, signed by several adoption advocacy groups, basically says, "White people don't understand black babies."  So the answer?  Make white people undergo lots of training!

Maybe I don't understand, since I'm A) white and B) not adopted.  But I see this through two lenses: first, what's best for an individual child; and second, what sort of adoption policy furthers our efforts to create a just and egalitarian society?

As to the second goal, I think it's obvious that more "transracial" adoption, as the Institute calls it when the child is of one race and the parents are of another, is an important step in eliminating the racial divides that are still between us.  One of the most effective ways to defeat prejudice is to humanize the population that is the object of the prejudice, and that, quite simply, requires interaction.

But that goal has to be subordinate.  No matter the social ramifications or the positive effects on society, transracial adoption should be avoided if it's bad for the individual child in the given case.  Unfortunately, there's no time or money to provide individualized consideration for each child (even though that should be the goal).  So, let me offer a quick-and-dirty "rule of wrist" to analyze the problem.

Basically, the idea behind the report is that "all children deserve to be raised in families that respect their cultural heritage."  But to my mind, that's only a problem if the child is old enough to have been affected by their cultural heritage.  What I'm thinking is that maybe a system that examines at what age has a child been sufficiently effected (or in the case of my family's culture, warped) that their "cultural heritage" becomes a factor in their personality.  

What does this mean?  My best guess is that a six-month-old baby isn't yet shaped by its "cultural heritage," but a ten-year-old might be.  And a fifteen-year-old definitely is.  Everything make sense?

Good, 'cause none of this makes sense to me.  Why can't we just magically get babies to people who will care for them?

McCain ‘kind of like Jesus Christ on the cross’

There’s been talk for years that many Bush supporters believe he was literally chosen by God to be president. We don’t hear as much about this lately — God wanted a U.S. president who would screw up everything he touches? — but the notion of divine intervention on behalf of Republicans has been a relatively common sentiment in far-right circles for quite a while.

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/0...

More headache-inducing stupidity below...

Another timely, spot-on sermon from a very brave pastor way up nort' in Wisconsin's woods.

There is something to this unity, this “oneness” that Jesus so emphatically urges.  And yet, despite the urgings, we seem intent on focusing on what separates us, not that which draws us together.

Aw cripes, duh wife seen it comin' donchaknow:

Obama has won in swing states; but in West Virginia and Kentucky, white voters were given permission to not vote for Obama and give Hillary R. Clinton a big win, based on whites voting against Obama not as much for Hillary.

Not surprisingly, Jeremiah Wright divides voters:

In network exit polling, about the same number of voters in each state said they considered the situation with the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. "very important" to their vote as those who said it was "not at all important." And most who gave the issue a heavy weight voted for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.), while those who said it was not a factor went for Obama, the Illinois senator, by wide margins.

In both states, frequent churchgoers were more apt to say they were influenced by Wright than were less actively religious voters. In North Carolina, among those who said they attend religious services weekly, nearly six in 10 called Wright important to their vote, almost double the figure among those who never attend services. Even among Obama's own supporters in the Tarheel state, 45 percent who attend services weekly called the controversy important to their vote; among those, a third who rated it "very important."

In Indiana, the issue also split voters: About half of those who attend services weekly or occasionally rated the Wright issue important, while only a third of those who never attend services said the same.

This reflects one pre-existing divide in American society and one emerging. The latter is that the most religious voters (as measured by frequency of participation) are becoming increasingly distinct from the rest of society. And by "distinct," I really mean " conservative." Most everybody else is headed in the opposite direction.

This frequent-flyer cadre has every right to their political opinions, of course. But I'm not clear why it is that they should be given control over our political discourse, especially since they continue to age and shrink. There's some kind of weird fetish that holds them up as the "real Americans," while everyone else is apparently French. (This is spoken by someone who works for them, by the way.)

Of course, by "weird fetish," I really mean " wankers like Michael Gerson obsess over them or their absence":

It is also a striking reversal of fortunes. Obama is easily the most religiously fluent and informed Democratic presidential candidate since Jimmy Carter. But, over time, Obama has assumed a much more familiar Democratic electoral profile -- the candidate of the young, the educated and the secular (he has consistently won religiously nonaligned voters), who also gets nearly universal support from African Americans. He increasingly resembles Bill Bradley or Gary Hart -- a candidate of new liberalism -- with this additional element of black enthusiasm.

What, exactly, is wrong with putting together a coalition of the young, the educated, the secular and the black? Why would Gerson assume that white regular church-goers should take precedence over everyone else?

I'm not just being snippy here: I honestly don't see why it is that one subculture should be prioritized over another or have its opinion on a pastor deferred to, especially when their numbers are on the wane. There are other religious people in the US, and simply showing up each week doesn't guarantee an intelligent opinion. Just ask the people who have to put up with my sermons.

So, what are the McCains hiding? Cindy McCain was asked about releasing her tax returns, on the Today show, and reiterated that she would never release them -- ever -- even if she becomes First Lady:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vZi6...

We're All Hacks Atrios is right

It's important to remember that none of us are above the fray, that we all have hackish tendencies to suppress information which doesn't fit our worldview and privilege information that does. We're more likely to excuse behavior from people we like and exaggerate the ills of people we don't like. I try to fight hackish tendencies especially during this intra-Dem battle, but I don't claim to have superhuman Nonhack powers.

For the record, I make no effort to be above the fray nor any pretense of being fair or balanced.  I'm not only a member of the Hack Club for Men, I'm the president.  It's good to know your own filters....

More hackery below.

This Newsweek piece on Barack Obama's faith - by which the reporter really means his campaign's faith - is mostly useless. It does contain a mini-profile of Josh DuBois, who's a swell guy. So that's welcome.

But the last few paragraphs are worth the price of admission:

The rift between the candidate and the pastor had been growing for months. Wright was wounded when Obama—already worried about stories questioning Wright's controversial views—disinvited him from delivering the opening prayer when Obama announced he was running for president. Obama knew the pastor was not pleased with his Philadelphia race speech, in which the candidate said he disagreed with Wright's controversial comments but could no more disown him than he could his grandmother, who had also held opinions he did not share. Obama reached out to Wright during the controversy surrounding his sermons and offered to help him manage the onslaught of reporters who were coming at him day and night. But Wright refused. The pastor didn't even bother to tell Obama about his upcoming trip to Washington. The campaign learned about it from reporters.

Aides and friends describe that night as the toughest of the entire campaign for Obama and his wife, Michelle. They were anguished and dismayed. Wright had been a friend and mentor. Obama had said before that he couldn't cut him off; but after this bitter performance, how could he not sever his ties? "It was a circus," says the senior Obama aide. "Not only was Wright repeating things that were objectionable, but he was also impugning Barack's sincerity."

This time, Obama did not try to temper his remarks or put them in a larger context, as he had done in his measured Philadelphia speech. On Tuesday, he called Wright's speeches "appalling" and a "show of disrespect to me." He said he had given Wright the benefit of the doubt before, but now said "there are no excuses. [His words] offend me, they rightly offend all Americans and they should be denounced. And that's what I'm doing very clearly and unequivocally here today." Now guys like Roemer and DuBois can give a simple answer when they're asked about Obama's relationship with the controversial preacher: it's over.

This opens for me an intriguing possibility that it was in fact Wright who threw Obama under the bus, not the other way around. Some folks have speculated that Wright might have been deliberately provocative to give Obama the opportunity to reject him. The thought had crossed my mind. But this article suggests something even beyond that: Wright didn't want his friendship with a middle-of-the-road politician gumming up his ability to critique American politics and society. So he came out guns a-blazing, making it clear that he wasn't going to let small details like Obama's electability get in his way.

It's worth a thought. And since Obama's stronger if anything post-Wright, if true, it was a gamble that seems to have paid off in the end.

Obama Romps in NC; Hillary Squeaks By in Indiana  The two primaries ended as many polls predicted: with Clinton winning Indiana and Obama winning North Carolina. But Obama won with a double digit lead, while Clinton eked out a very narrow victory. http://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/20...

Gas tax pandering didn't work, the arithmetic is even more stacked against her than ever, the cable talking heads have almost unanimously declared her dead, Tim Russert says she's cancelled her morning TV appearances, and speculation is rife that she might finally drop out. Maybe the game changed tonight after all.

It's been pretty clear for over a month that Hillary's only chance to win was to hope that Obama got hit by a meteor or something. In the end, though, he got hit by several meteors and it still didn't knock him out. Short of Obama literally keeling over from a stroke, I'm not sure what Hillary has left to hope for. Maybe she's finally figured that out.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/arc...

More of this, and anything else I can find, below.

From The 77% Weekly
The 40 Out Of 52 Weeks A Year Newsletter
of Rabbi Brian & Religion-Outside-The-Box

Stop!

Part of the human condition seems to be that we try to improve everything around us — that we are infrequently content with the realities of life.

We try to improve things... but why?

Often it’s because it makes us feel important and involved.

We needn't do so much.

Really.

I've read this a couple of times now. It's still stupid.

Even setting aside the usual asinine implication that the denomination leadership is responsible for every piece of less-than-glowing press that comes its way, nobody has ever said that Rev. Wright is a typical black church pastor. He is an admitted anomaly in the mostly-white UCC, and his views are aggressive, even if they're not extreme.

Nonetheless, he is representative of the black church in a way that even some blacks are at some pains to deny. He is forthrightly proud of his ethnic identity, as is his congregation. Somehow it always gets left out that Wright didn't create black liberation theology or Afro-centric worship all by himself. He was a student of a pre-existing tradition, and his congregation pushed him every bit as much as he pushed them.

Wright also speaks to a need for hope, liberation, and justice that persists in the black community. I know we've been over this territory before, but apparently it needs to be said again: some people apparently don't feel like they're getting free or a fair shake out there. There are thousands of them in Trinity UCC, and millions of them in black churches across the land. They're getting the shaft, and they know it. They may not agree with Rev. Wright on all the particulars, but I'll bet you dollars to donuts they think he's talking about things that need to be discussed.

Wright is a representative of the black church in that he articulates their belief that racial, social, and economic problems persist in the black community. That's what got to be denied, come hell or high water.