I disagree.

Obviously, the most important thing is how Obama performs in office. But regardless, history has already been made and renaming landmarks, institutions, and such is already appropriate.

I think you are suggesting that because X is more important than Y, and we don't know how X will turn out, we shouldn't celebrate Y yet. That doesn't make sense if Y is important enough on its own to justify such a celebration.

In this case, I believe that Y, namely Obama's election as the first black President of a nation that has had a legacy of slavery, counting blacks as three-fifths of a whole person, and Jim Crow is significant enough for celebration on its own.

RPT - Not sure about anyone else, but I appreciate the attempt to put things in perspective, and hardly think it negative to suggest that such honors are premature. I didn't vote for Obama, but all along admitted that he might make a great president. All the important issues will not be well addressed without some healthy skepticism.

On the other hand, realizing that this world is not blind to race, Obama is a positive role model who resonates especially well with non-white students.

I am of the opinion that people should be dead or at least have the bulk of their life's works completed before they have things named after them.

And it isn't that I don't think there shouldn't be schools etc named after the first black president-because I think it is the kind of first that deserves a few schools and other buildings and roads named for it, but I do think the man should at least serve one term in office before the naming begins.

Obama's accomplishments to date already exceed those of Clear Stream Avenue, and probably exceed those of the Ludlum and the Clark for whom the other schools are named.

In fact, Obama's accomplishments also exceed those of William McKinley at the time his name attached to the tallest mountain in North America. He was a mere Republican candidate for President when the mountain was named. Mt. Obama, at 395 or 403 meters depending on which wikipedia page you favor, is a pimple on the earth compared to Mount McKinley.

But there hasn't been as clear sighted a president in office since Clinton

1) Huh? Aside from the fact that many of us regard Clinton as a failure ("a soft man for a soft time"), there's been only one president since he waddled off the stage.

2) What exactly have been Obama's "achievements"? Getting elected to office? Top of the greasy pole.

3) Were any schools renamed after Richard Nixon following his landslide victory in 1972? I sure hope not. That really wouldn't look good on one's resume.

The school's decision is juvenile.

Considering it was the kids' idea in the first place to rename Ludlum Elementary School I suppose they have a ready made defense to the charge of being "juvenile."

I think 20 years after leaving office and 10 years after death, whichever is later, is a suitable time period to wait before naming things after politicians. However, if they change the name earlier and the guy turns out to be a bad politician, they can always rename it again, so no great loss.

The only naming scenario I find really obnoxious is the spectacle of an incumbent politician using the power of his office to get things named after himself. See, e.g. the multitude of buildings and highways in West Virginia named after Sen. Robert Byrd.

To be fair, several of these schools are in some need of a rename. "Clark K-8 at Binnsmead" hints to me that there are so many Clark schools in the area that they needed the ugly qualifier, and Clear Stream Avenue School vaguely sounds like a corporation bought the naming rights.

But I agree with the poster who thought things should only be named after dead people. I'm especially negative towards the hundreds of bridges and roads named after the politicians who allocated other people's taxes for them.

"Mount McKinley" is a travesty, foisted on Alaska by ignorant lower-48ers. The name of that mountain is "Denali".

I say wait until they're dead. I don't think we should have a U.S.S. Clinton sailing around while Secretary of State Clinton and Senator Bill Clinton are in office. Every time I've landed at the baronial Ted Stevens International Airport I've thought, "geez, that guy knows how to porkbarrel" (although Frank Murkowski International is nice). Norm Mineta International is convenient but undistinguished with a broken runway. Even unofficial namescan come back to haunt, think about "the Mark Foley Boy Scout Bill".

I wonder if the kids at Obama Elementary are going to change their mascot? They could be "the Weathermen". If they were really smart, they'd change the name of their school to "Grandpa Hank's Elementary School" and see if they can't get a share of the TARP. Their athletic teams could be called "the Handouts" or "Hank's Handouts."

Eugene,

I agree 100%. This is remarkably premature. What if it turns out that Obama gets himself involved in a major scandal that leads to impeachment? What if the Obama legacy turns out to be negative? It's stupid to name something after him so soon.

"More than that, it illustrates what a lot of us have been saying for two years. The "Change" Obama promised had nothing to do with policies. The complete and barely-implicit rationale of his entire candidacy was that the mere act of electing a black person president would solve many of America's problems.
"

Sadly, based on some of the comments here, I have to agree. It's all about race to these folks.

The renaming's not really a big deal, but it makes me a little concerned about these kids and their parents. About the only thing I would have wanted to rename my elementary school to was "Luke Skywalker Academy."

Sadly, based on some of the comments here, I have to agree. It's all about race to these folks.

That is ridiculous. Just because one is aware of races undeniable historical significance in this country, that does not mean you are "all about race."

It seems to me that to deny the importance of this event, when its historical significance is obvious, is actually more race obsessed than to simply acknowledge something that is enormously significant as a historical matter.

We have transitioned from a nation where blacks were slaves, to a nation where blacks were oppressed by Jim Crow and "separate but [not really] equal" to a nation where a black man can hold the highest and most important office in the land.

Let us not forget that we a Civil War was precipitated by the controversies surrounding slavery.

For a long time, it has theoretically been possible for an African American to hold the Presidency. Now it has actually happened. Seeing is believing. Practice matters as much as theory.

Let me be clear. If I didn't agree with Obama's policies, I wouldn't have voted for him merely because of his race. However, at the same time, I think it is absurd and in a way truly "race obsessed" to go out of your way to deny something that is of such clear historical significance. How many other things of obvious historical significance do you go out of your way to deny?

Having just held a conference on the bicentennial of the federal prohibition on the slave trade, I can assure you that the fact of a black American being elected President in this country is something that is astounding. This post simply does not understand the long history on all this. Rather than making a comment like this I would have hoped that you would have tried to comprehend more deeply the emotion and feeling of those kids. Many of them may grow up to be in your classes.
Best,
Ben

Not at all similar cases, really, but I'm nevertheless reminded of the stadium the Houston Astros play in, for a few years known as "Enron Field". They dropped that name like it's hot when it became, let's say, unfashionable.

"How many other things of obvious historical significance do you go out of your way to deny?"

Gee, I wonder what this is trying to suggest? (/ sarcasm) Many of us have evolved beyond being "race-obsessed". You should try it.

"Premature" is an understatement. What's next-- parades carrying immense pictures of The Anointed One? This is a wholly Un-American display of character worship. Let's recall that George Washington set the example-- no cult of personality. And BTW we didn't celebrate his birthday until long after he was dead.

David Welker said:

It seems to me that to deny the importance of this event, when its historical significance is obvious, is actually more race obsessed than to simply acknowledge something that is enormously significant as a historical matter.

Don't worry, at least some people have recognized the historical significance of Obama's eleection:

Barely three weeks after Americans elected their first black president amid a wave of interracial good feeling, a spasm of noose hangings, racist graffiti, vandalism and death threats is convulsing dozens of towns across the country as white extremists lash out at the new political order.

More than 200 hate-related incidents, including cross burnings, assassination betting pools and effigies of President-elect Barack Obama, have been reported so far, according to law enforcement authorities and the Southern Poverty Law Center, which monitors hate groups. Racist websites, meanwhile, have been boasting that their servers are crashing under the weight of an exponential increase in page views.

White extremists lash out over election of first black president

Is is, of course, merely a matter of relative importance and newsworthiness. The fact that the community "at [a] largely black and Hispanic school" named their grade school after President Elect Obama in order to celebrate his historic achievement is a Big Deal, and clearly deserves not only attention, and criticism, but also snide references to "the Peoples' Supreme Soviet of Obamaland. The resulting wave of hate crimes? Not so much.

The Middle School is named after George Washington Bush, the founder of Tumwater. There's no excuse for the elementary school in Stockton.

But, by not waiting, we can also end up with the absurdities of "Norman Y. Mineta San José International Airport". Seriously, does anyone think that school kids fifty years from now will have ever heard of Mineta (unless, of course, they happened to live around SJC or fly through it) or that any but a handful of "professional" historians will remember the name 100 years from now?

Seriously, does anyone think that school kids fifty years from now will have not heard of Barack Obama? Does anyone think that only "a handful of 'professional' historians" will remember Barack Obama's name 100 years from now?

I like the ten years dead rule. Mineta International Airport was a shameless bit of pandering to the Sec'y of Transportation. Further, one swallow does not make a summer. Out of sympathy for her loss, my own hometown named their at-that-time new junior high after Jackie Kennedy, before she scandalously took up with that rich old Greek. But that school district had set an unfortunate precedent by naming one of their schools for baby boomers after John Foster Dulles.

simply nothing [Obama] might do as President that would "measure up" to have a school named after him.

To honor an earlier President, why not the William Jefferson Clinton Home for Wayward Girls?

While I'm partial to the idea that we should wait until politicians are dead before we should start naming things after them, I'd be perfectly content to wait until they're out of office.

To wit, Memorial Drive in metro Atlanta was renamed "Cynthia McKinney Parkway in 2000, after the district's infamous Congressional Representative. Two years later, McKinney lost her seat following some 9/11 conspiracy talk, then won her seat back in 2004, only to lose it again in 2006. This year she made a spectacularly unimpressive run for President as the Green candidate. She's now a laughingstock nationwide, her name is a punchline, and yet one of the most significant roads in her former district still bears that name.

To paraphrase a famous quote: I always knew the first black president would be white kid from kansas.

Bottom line, the whole thing is tacky. I'd be embarrassed if something were named after me before I'd achieved anything and even within a couple of decades of any justifying achievement that I did have.

I regard the naming of SJC to "Norm Mineta International Airport" to be more a badge of shame than anything else. Mineta is an incompetent dufus who I'd tend to forget about entirely except that I keep seeing his name associated with the airport. Then I remember once again what a tool the guy is.

And the more that Obama is deified in this way, the more likely it is that the gods will have the last laugh. If there is any justice this will turn out to be so much hubristic jinxitude.

Now I realize this is not Obama's doing but that of his fans, but have you ever heard him publicly ask his fans to freakin' tone it down a little?

Who would want their kids to attend Jimmy Carter High School? How do we know at this time, absent of any evidence at all to the contrary, that Obama will not eventually be considered to be in the same league? People going overboard with praise now can end up eventually regarding the guy in an even worse light later on if he doesn't do well, due to the need to distance themselves from their "foolish crush"...

Given how many of our public institutions are now named after pork-barrelling politicians, I wouldn't be surprised if Obama quietly puts the kibosh on this sort of thing himself. He should hold out for things like Mt. Rushmore, money, state names, et. al...

Seriously, does anyone think that school kids fifty years from now will have not heard of Barack Obama?

Seriously, do you think that school kids today know a damned thing about Dwight D. Eisenhower? Let alone Adlai Stevenson.

They will be lucky to be able to read 50 years from now.

smokey:

The old timey rule that someone had to be dead for ten years, before naming anything after them that had been paid for with public money, was a damn good rule. But with 0, we should make an exception, right?

George Bush Intercontinental Airport was named after Bush I in 1997. So does that mean he died in 1987? I guess not, which means they made an "exception" for him. But you had no complaints about that, right?

By the way, I have a feeling lots of people assume the airport is named after Bush II, since all the basic signage and promotional information does nothing to indicate otherwise.

Apparently Obama has been invited to the school for the renaming ceremony.

A more interesting question--will he attend?

I hope not. I love him, but yes, it's premature.

"Presumably you don't really expect him to do mostly B. And if he did mostly A, you'd be complaining that an allegedly inexperienced person is hiring other inexperienced people. So it's damned if you do, damned if you don't."

OK. So where's the change?

This doesn't seem so bad. After all, check out why Mt. McKinley was named after Mt. McKinley, and schools are named after much less illustrious characters. Everest, for example. Then there's a Lord Sydney who kept naming things for me...

For a long time, one of the buildings on campus was named for a grand dragon of the Ku Klux Klan. (That's not why it was named for him. He was also one of the founders of the University of Oklahoma and taught chemistry and physics. He still has a nearby street named after him. Debarr himself was dismissed in the 1920s because of his Klannish activities.)

The street east of me becomes James Garner Avenue a little bit north of here. There's also a part of Main Street named James Garner Corridor. I thoroughly approve of the avenue but the corridor is an odd thing.

For real overkill, look up the name MacQuarie in Wikipedia. At least Obama will be a President.

elliot:

So where's the change?

At the top, where it counts.

But you're going to gripe no matter what (as I explained), so it's hard to take your question seriously.

Obama's recycling of his whole cabinet into a third Clinton term

I wonder who his intern's going to be?

"But you're going to gripe no matter what (as I explained), so it's hard to take your question seriously."

Actually, I waited to gripe until he started recycling for Clinton's third term. So, I ask again. Where is the change? The guy at the top isn't showing much evidence of change when he staffs with the old Clinton folks and keeps Bush's SecDef. Gates, Richardson, Hillary, Geithner, Holder, Emanuael... The first pass isn't change at all. He's even balking at Don't Ask Don't Tell. Are these the ones the world has been waiting for?

For what it is worth, the UK practice is that public buildings may be named after the Monarch or a member of the Royal Family - but only with permission - otherwise the convention is that names are given to public edifices "in memoriam" only.

In his book "Up the Organisation", Robert Townsend suggested that the best way for a large organisation to move an office is to put one person, say one Snooks, in charge and tell him that if within 30 days of moving the whole thing works and the cries of outraged personal dignity have died down, the building will be named "the Snooks Building", otherwise "the Snooks Memorial Building".

BTW to add to the list of edifices named after Republicans, I understand California residents voted to name a sewage treatment plant after George W. Bush

I understand California residents voted to name a sewage treatment plant after George W. Bush.

Proposition R in San Francisco lost 30% to 70%.

My son goes to Laura Bush Elementary. It was named after her in Feb. 2002. Anyone care to bet whether laura or barry is more relevant in 50 years?

Having watched the Obama-baiting in this space for all of the election period, I suspect that for some of you there is simply nothing he might do as President that would "measure up" to have a school named after him.

Well, it would sure help to have the administration actually begun, or the electoral college fully wrapped up, or for adults to have been the deciding factor in the school's naming, or for there not to have a continuing stink of personality cult around any discussion about the man.

Your 'what could he do to measure up to this recognition' comment is senseless; it implicitly, but loudly, says that ad hominem is an entirely appropriate basis for judgement of a political figure. That's disgusting.

shelby:

I wonder who his intern's going to be?

I think you're confused. The presidential candidate with the history of adultery was the one who lost, not the one who won.

Where is the change?

The change is from the current brain trust running the government, genius.

"I think there are many people who live in the middle-class or upper-class world who really don't understand how much of an effect the election of a black man has on people who thought they were barred from the American dream."

Were these people not paying attention the past thirty years or so?

And count me doubtful on how much we'll see crime rates and illegitimacy go down, and test scores and employment rates go up, in these groups you claim so inspired by the election. There will always be excuses, and people like Benjamin Davis to make them.

Benjamin Davis said:

Rather than making a comment like this I would have hoped that you would have tried to comprehend more deeply the emotion and feeling of those kids

I would think at that age their emotions and feelings would be more attuned to fun and recreational things, not politics and national policies - as important as they might be. Do I detect so-called adult manipulation at work here? Nah, couldn't happen.

constantin:

And count me doubtful on how much we'll see crime rates and illegitimacy go down

It turns out that "crime rates and illegitimacy" tend to be higher in red states. So do you think maybe those problems will get worse, because they're sad about their guy and gal losing the election?

forty:

Do I detect so-called adult manipulation at work here? Nah, couldn't happen.

Good point. No way Americans would ever be seen teaching kids to worship a president.

<blockquote>
I would think at that age their emotions and feelings would be more attuned to fun and recreational things, not politics and national policies - as important as they might be.
</blockquote>

Talk about "damned if you do and damned if you don't"...

Charles Chapman:

Seriously, does anyone think that school kids fifty years from now will have not heard of Barack Obama? Does anyone think that only "a handful of 'professional' historians" will remember Barack Obama's name 100 years from now?

Yes. It's possible and we won't know for many years.

If Obama's term turns out to unremarkably mundane (well, to account for double negatives, perhaps I should say "remarkably mundane") and we've elected three "minority" Presidents in the intervening years (including, for example, Bobby Jindal), Obama's name might have limited recognition among school kids fifty years from now. I wonder if today, less than fifty years after he was elected, school kids would tell you or know that "JFK was the first Catholic President" - I suspect (perhaps hope) that instead they recall "Bay of Pigs", "Cuban Missile Crisis", "man-on-the-moon", "Lee Harvey Oswald", and "dad's bankroll" when JFK comes up rather than "cool Catholic in the right place at the right time". Actually, since I think few voted for JFK because he was Catholic but I fear that a significant percentage voted for Obama because he was "African-American" maybe there is some history lesson here that I hope 50 years from now is written dispassionately.

Similar argument apply to professional historians in 100 years. Of course, because it's their passion and job, a Presidential Historian 100 years from now will recall Obama as a President, just as they recall Bush 41 as a (unremarkable) President or Clinton 42 as a (unremarkable except for impeachment) President.

As you should note elsewhere in my post, I think any President probably is worthy of recognition (either as an example of what not to do, or what to do) but based on accomplishments in office (which, in Obama's case, I hope, but am not hopeful, are substantial) rather than race, religion, or gender.

jukeboxgrad:

"I don't recall you complaining about that "wholly Un-American display of character worship."

I never saw that billboard or any reference to it. I would certainly have complained if I had known about it. Ditto for your other examples. But those are the acts of private parties, and are a far cry from naming public schools and public streets after someone who hasn't even taken office yet.

"I think there are many people who live in the middle-class or upper-class world who really don't understand how much of an effect the election of a black man ..."

Biologically Obama is as much white as he is black. Moreover his father was from Kenya, and therefore not the descendant of the slaves brought to America or the Caribbean. He was raised by his white grandparents, sent to a private college prep school, and attended Ivy League Universities. As such he has little in common either educationally or biologically with the 12% of the American population called "African-Americans," except for having had his black father abandon him as a young child. Compare and contrast to someone like Colin Powell, who was born in Harlem to black Jamaican parents.

WTF?

Guy wins a Presidential election and gets a school in Long Island named after him and the Professor protests. I'm hoping that if he does this "important job well[]" like the Professor suggests he'll get a lot more than a freaking school named after him.

If we were renaming Mt. McKinley and already carving his face into Mt. Rushmore, then OK, I'd see the point in complaining, but a school in Long Island seems out of proportion for a guy who won a Presidential election? Really? Who are the schools named for where you're from?

"But important as getting a job might be, especially under the circumstances, the ultimate goal of getting the job has to be to do the job well. That's long been the premise of antidiscrimination law, and even many supporters of race- and sex-based affirmative action endorse it: The goal is to give blacks and members of other groups the same opportunity to do important jobs well -- and to help others through doing the job well -- that others have. "

- Could we try to avoid bringing up affirmative action every time President-elect Obama's name is mentioned the next eight years? I like grinding axes as much as the next guy, but it doesn't exactly scream class.

David Warner wrote at 11.23.2008 12:03am:

He should hold out for things like Mt. Rushmore, money, state names, et. al...

Mt. Rushmore was named for Charles E. Rushmore, a lawyer whose major claim to fame is that the mountain is named after him.

Seriously, does anyone think that school kids fifty years from now will have not heard of Barack Obama?

Of course they'll have heard of him. The point is, we haven't a clue WHAT they'll have heard of him. It could be something truly awful.

Naming anything after him at THIS point is juvenile, but I suppose juveniles did it.

My first thought: Five years from retirement seems to have worked pretty well for Cooperstown. It would probably also give enough perspective to name a school or a bridge. But if we never named anything after a politician, that would be fine with me too.

All of that said, to the authors of the petty sniping at the re-naming described in EV's post, just what country do you live in anyway? Are you really that blind to the value of school kids being inspired by the POTUS? Or are Hitler and Stalin really the only associations you can tolerate for a leader who doesn't share your ideology?

Do not speech negatively of our Dear Leader. The Chosen One is all knowing and shortly you will be picked up and sent to the reeducation center to learn how wonderful our Dear Leader is and learn of all the great things he will do. Isn't it enough for you to know the the Chosen One has potential even if he hasn't accomplished anything?

Smokey:

Excuse me, foreigner, but our internal politics is none of your Euroweenie business. We don't need limp-wristed fops here. We're descendants of the pioneers, where, in the immortal words of John Wayne, the weak died along the way, and the cowards never started. You are in the latter subset.

Smokey, which part of our heritage teaches us to insult our guests and tell them to shut up?

The town in New Jersey where I grew up had an elementary school named, pre-resignation, after Nixon. It's never been changed, and remains Nixon School to this day.

The naming or re-naming of things after Obama isn't a big deal.

I am a non-European immigrant to the US and frankly, grow weary of sneering Euros. After the industrial revolution, these have been the recent European contributions to the human experience: colonialism, two World Wars, socialism, communism, Marxism, the holocaust, genocide and ethnic cleansing.

America is not a perfect country by any means, but its track records of sins pales in comparison to the above.

This is such bad news for Obama! It proves somehow that he's dumb. Speaking of Obama, he's a total Marxist.

In other news, it is also my mature opinion that America rules, and Europe is full of gaylords who shouldn't be gaying up this manly American discussion of school naming.

Recent examples of this are the Nobel prizes to Gore and Klugman which violate the old tradition of waiting almost twenty years so other scholars have some time to either disprove the work or replicate it.

Quincy went off the air in 1983, so Klugman's nobel meets your criteria.

Kevin P:

"After the industrial revolution, these have been the recent European contributions to the human experience: colonialism, two World Wars, socialism, ...".

I think you could add jukeboxgrad to that dubious list.

Actually the only thing that upsets me about the renaming of the school is that it is not called:

OUR SAVIOR Barack Obama Elementary School, which I think acurately reflects BO's rightful place in the lives of the 60+ million pathetic dupes who voted for him.

Living (if you can call it that) in Chicago as I do, the media here cannot stop talking about BO. BO did this, BO did that. BO healed the sick, BO raised the dead... ad nauseum and this is just the beginning. It is going to be a long four years.

my sympathies, BT.

I find if you write His name "BHO" it makes you feel a little bit better. "Hussein" works even better, if you can take the liberal whining!

I'll gladly agree that it's premature to name schools after Obama if the Republicans here will agree that it's too early to start judging his Presidency.

Any takers?

Seeing as we have as many as eight years ahead of us with O as president, there is plenty of chance for the school to be embarrassed.
Shame to rename it.
O might make a terrible error. He might turn out to be personally corrupt. He might turn out to be corrupt in the sense that Grant was, which was to allow by inattention corruption.
He might, instead, be a pretty good journeyman president who is so slandered by the republicans doing the BDS thing in return that nobody would name a dog pound after him.

Ought to wait.

And London-Litigator shows up again with his dainty knickers in a bunch, pontificating on the same vote and desperately hoping that our people would have named the same sewage plant after the American president he hates.


Actually, London-Litigator said exactly the opposite.

Perhaps, Smokey, the election of Obama will inspire you to learn how to read. You too, Kevin P.

Yorba Linda named an elementary school after Nixon at least as early as his first term.

In German, there is a phrase to the effect that one should not name anything after someone who "has not yet murdered his wife."

Yorba Linda named an elementary school after Nixon at least as early as his first term.

Actually, that school was named for Nixon in the 1950s. It doesn't exist anymore (torn down to make room for the presidential library), but there are at least two public schools extant today that are named for RMN.

(Thanks to beamish for correcting me on the Tumwater GWB school, by the way.)

This is wonderful. All Hail Dear Leader, the Obamafuhrer.

Mahan Atma: "I'll gladly agree that it's premature to name schools after Obama if the Republicans here will agree that it's too early to start judging his Presidency."

Even though I am not a Republican or a Democrat, rather a fiscally conservative and socially liberal independent, I will take you up on your offer. However, this agreement in no way disqualifies me from criticizing/judging the plans and proposals that are floated by his transition team before inauguration.

"Even though I am not a Republican or a Democrat, rather a fiscally conservative and socially liberal independent..."

Sorry -- I realize that nobody here is actually a Republican. Rather, I use that term generally to refer to people who voted for McCain and George Bush (twice).

rpt:

I remember hearing the stories of the exploits of John Wayne, Ronald Reagan, et al, leading the wagons across the plains. They built the railroads! They won the war! Wow.

Separating fiction from non-fiction is a chronic GOP problem.

mahan:

it's too early to start judging his Presidency

How can you say that? He already caused a major recession. It's even named after him. Hannity said so:

this is really the Obama recession

(Full transcript here.) And Rush said the same thing. (Full transcript here.)

Will they call the recovery that happens on his watch "the Obama recovery?" Fat chance. Credit for that will undoubtedly go to Reagan.

marion:

Another prematurely named school

They didn't just put his name on the school. They also put it on a very impressive t-shirt. And they gave him one! And here you can even find video of him getting choked up about it.

>And count me doubtful on how much we'll see crime rates and illegitimacy go down, and test scores and employment rates go up, in these groups you claim so inspired by the election. There will always be excuses, and people like Benjamin Davis to make them.

>>jukeboxgrad:

"It turns out that "crime rates and illegitimacy" tend to be higher in red states."

What does this have to do with anything. A guy made the claim that the ills of "black America" would be solved via a self-esteem boost from having a black president. I said I doubted it. And you respond with this evasion.

I'd be scared, too, if I was an Obamabot, now that all of his messianic promises and barely-sheathed appeals to racial politics must be fulfilled. His own team is out there scrambling to tamp down expectations, and it looks like that has seeped onto this comment thread, too.

Remember, Obama didn't say he'd try to fix all of America's problems. He said electing him meant they'd be fixed flat-out. That's the standard I'll be holding him to.

"Obama didn't say he'd try to fix all of America's problems. He said electing him meant they'd be fixed flat-out."

Care to point to an actual quote?

constantin:

you respond with this evasion

It's not an "evasion" to point out your evasion in choosing to focus on "the ills of 'black America' " when it turns out that red-state America is iller.

Obama didn't say he'd try to fix all of America's problems. He said electing him meant they'd be fixed flat-out.

He said that "all of America's problems" would be "fixed flat-out?" Really? Like Mahan, I'm hoping you can show us the quote. Especially the one with "all." And the one with "flat-out" (or a synonym of that).

I don't remember any promises like that. On the other hand, I do remember the people who promised that after six months only a "residual number" of troops would be needed. But you got very upset about that particular broken promise, right?

Mahan Atma,

I am a Republican--voted for George W. Bush twice. I think Reagan was probably the greatest President in my lifetime (which means he is compared only to Kennedy, LBJ, Nixon, Ford, Carter, the two Bushes, and Clinton).

But I also stand by my comments above about naming things after Presidents.

smokey:

I'll cut 0 exactly the same slack that Democrats and the media did for GWB

Are you referring to the Democrats who joined in and gave him a 90% approval rating after 9/11? Are you talking about the media that fell in line and helped him promote the war? Even though it meant helping Bush lie to us? Are you talking about those "Democrats and the media?"

And re: promises, the guy said he'd make the oceans recede. Isn't balancing the budget a shoe-in considering those powers?

That's shoo-in, of course. Obama's magical powers can't fix my spelling, it seems. So he's one in the hole already.

jukeboxgrad:

"I think the fact that you never heard of those incidents is sufficient to strongly suggest that there was no general outcry by conservatives..."

You're assuming that I speak for conservatives or in some way represent what they know and don't know. This is not the case.

jukeboxgrad:

"Could it be those people are protesting Obama's whiteness? I don't think so."

There are both Jews and non-Jews with the surname "Goodman." If someone thinks a Catholic Goodman is Jewish and makes anti-Semitic remarks, that doesn't make him Jewish. I don't think a person is defined by who insults him.

Yes, A. Zarkov, population genetics is super important to the electorate.

[I studied some population genetics in college as ancillary to some mathematical modeling classes. It can indeed be pretty interesting, though most of my studies were about elephants.

Not too much to do with how people act though.]

"It's not my definition. It's the accepted definition used in population genetics."

But when people on the street perceive a person's race, they aren't interested in population genetics. They see a person with dark skin and curly hair, and they think, "Oh, he's black." And then they treat him like a black person.

That's just a fact of life. Are you going to deny this?

Two observations on this story: (1) the absurd attribution of this decision to the children when it was obviously decided by school officials; and (2) it's a Captain Obvious political statement by what are presumably liberal-leaning public school officials.

"Sorry, merely Americans."

Ah - are those mutually exclusive categories now?

(Sorry, can't resist. I fully admit to my schadenfreude.)

constantin:

the guy said he'd make the oceans recede

This is what he actually said:

The journey will be difficult. The road will be long. I face this challenge with profound humility, and knowledge of my own limitations. But I also face it with limitless faith in the capacity of the American people. Because if we are willing to work for it, and fight for it, and believe in it, then I am absolutely certain that generations from now, we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless; this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal; this was the moment when we ended a war and secured our nation and restored our image as the last, best hope on earth. This was the moment—this was the time—when we came together to remake this great nation so that it may always reflect our very best selves and our highest ideals.

He didn't say "he'd" do it. He talked about what could happen if "we are willing to work for it." And he suggested that seeing real results might take "generations." And he didn't say the oceans would "recede." He made a more modest statement, about how the "rise of the oceans [might begin] to slow."

We learn a lot about both you and Obama by noticing how you can't manage to criticize him without pretending he said things he didn't actually say. And let's recall your earlier claim:

Obama didn't say he'd try to fix all of America's problems. He said electing him meant they'd be fixed flat-out.

Still waiting for you to show the quote to support your claim. You should probably pay more attention to what Obama has actually said, and less attention to Rush and Sean's fantasy of what Obama has said.

This post rests on two absurd assumptsions 1) that only "great presidents" deserve to have things named after them. As a graduate of schools named after Polk and Garfield, I don't believe that is the case. 2) schools should be named after presidents. There are tons of schools named after senators, astronauts, athletes, writers, etc. Even were he not about to be the 44th president, Obama's accomplishments thusfar in life are worth of recognition.

Well this is a very important issue. It scares me to think people have granted him a title of Christ, or Messiah. The man has not even had a day in the job.

If people want to honor someone for accomplishing something, how about his Grandmother, or his Mother? For he could not have accomplished as much as he did had it not been for them. That would be a proper use of an honorable title. Besides, I believe naming anything after someone who isn't retired is bad luck. If you don't believe me, ask Kennedy, Garfield, McKinley, and Lincoln.

I am with all of those who think that it is no big deal for an elementary school to be named for Barack Obama--in just a few seconds of googling, I found an elementary school named after Millard Fillmore, for crying out loud.

Aside to Eugene--the Marina Freeway, down in the Culver City area, is not the same segment of Highway 90 that was once known as the Richard Nixon Freeway. The latter is in Yorba Linda, near Tricky's birthplace, and is now known as the Richard Nixon Parkway.

It would interest me greatly if you can show a single example of a non-trivial error in this article.

1) They selected different years for their stats. Pick a year and compare. While I don't know if they cherry picked years where blue states had better numbers than red states, it seems curious that the point they want to make involves selecting statistics from over half a decade.
2) They selected arbitrary topics to compare. Meth, but no cocaine for example. According to this, in the one year, AR had 19 kg of cocaine seized and CA had 6,200 kg seized.
3) They ignore the under reporting of crime in low income, high population density neighborhoods.

Ignoring the bias evidenced by selecting statistics that reflect the desired outcome, the more fundamental fact is that you are discussing in 2008 and you picked an article from 2004 to support your case. Two of the states mentioned in that article as being worst case red states are now blue states as evidenced by the recent election.

As far has holding Obama to his campaign, I'm looking at 16 months to capture and kill bin Laden and crush Al Qaeda.

By the way, lay off the deflecting. It's childish. You sound like a four year hold with his hand caught in the cookie jar claiming that "Billy took one too." Grow up.

Obama won the general election, from here on out he gets judged by his on actions and claiming that Bush did something, or Carter did something, or Charles Manson did something, or John Gotti did something, it's a losing argument.

zarkov:

He's chosen to market himself as "African-American" for the obvious political advantages which he has so deftly exploited.

I've cited information regarding hundreds of racial incidents regarding Obama. Please let us know if you think those people are responding to the way Obama allegedly chose "to market himself," or if you think they are responding to what they see, think and feel when they look at the color of his skin.

And please show your evidence that he did something to "market himself as 'African-American.' " Are you referring to his failure to paint his skin white?

You're assuming that I speak for conservatives or in some way represent what they know and don't know. This is not the case.

I specifically acknowledged that you are speaking only for yourself (I said "there might individual exceptions, like you"). Nevertheless, the fact that you were unaware of those incidents (e.g., the Mao-style billboard with the giant photo of Bush) helps underline what's obvious: there was no conservative outcry when Bush was the object of "wholly Un-American display of character worship."

This point of mine has nothing to do with whether or not you're a conservative, or "in some way represent what they know and don't know." I'm simply observing that you're someone who is well-informed about current events. But you didn't know about those events, because they didn't make the news, because conservatives (and other people, generally) didn't make a fuss about those events. Even though they are fundamentally at least as remarkable as the Obama-related events that people (including you) are making a fuss about now.

There are both Jews and non-Jews with the surname "Goodman." If someone thinks a Catholic Goodman is Jewish and makes anti-Semitic remarks, that doesn't make him Jewish. I don't think a person is defined by who insults him.

(I'll mention in passing that the phenomenon you're describing is related to something Palin did when running for mayor against a Christian named Stein: she implied he was something other than a Christian.)

Hitler defined as "Jew" anyone who was 25% Jewish. And even though you undoubtedly believe in a different definition, it was Hitler's definition, not some other definition (like yours or mine) which ended up being the one that mattered, in that context. So even though you "don't think a person is defined by who insults him," it turns out that other parts of reality end up being more important and relevant than what you, individually, happen to "think." The fact that many people are expressing hatred toward Obama specifically in connection with his blackness is enough to indicate the silliness of describing him as something other than black. Especially in the context of a discussion about politics (as compared with, say, genetics).

It's the accepted definition used in population genetics.

Trouble is, this is not a discussion about "population genetics." It's a discussion about politics.

Just checking on the name of counties, many of them were named while the person was alive, often while he was President, and surprisingly often before. It's not surprising there are a lot of Jackson counties from the period 1815-28, but there are also a lot of Monroe counties dating from before Monroe's presidency, and three of the four Van Buren counties date from before Van Buren's presidency. (Michigan has a lot of counties named after Jackson's cabinet because they had a territorial dispute with Ohio at the time (the "Toledo War"). and they were probably also trying to convince the Jacksonites to support statehood.)

BTW, does anyone want to comment on all the schools named for Jefferson Davis or Robert E. Lee?

These men were traitors, weren't they? In fact by today's standards, they weren't just traitors, they were outright terrorists.

"In Hawaii racism is directed at whites"

Ah, so there were whites in Hawaii. Tell me, were they not racists towards blacks in the 1960s?

We learn a lot about both you and Obama by noticing how you can't manage to criticize him without pretending he said things he didn't actually say.

What he does say is that this is "the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless; this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal; this was the moment when we ended a war and secured our nation and restored our image as the last, best hope on earth."

Because this nation has never focused on providing jobs. It's never focused on providing medical care. I think there might be a few presidents, if they were alive now, who might wonder what the hell it was that their policies were aimed at if it wasn't jobs or medical care. I think there are a few countries in the world that might be a little shocked to know that they are already judged to not only not be the "best hope", but that they have been identified as not even a possible hope. A few geologists might wonder in what way the earth is sick or wounded and required healing. Finally I'm sure there are a few people who are wondering what exactly it is that the United States is the "last, best hope" of?

"In Hawaii racism is directed at whites". Oh yeah, right; 'cos after they swanned in and took all the land for plantations and bamboozled the monarchy out of existence, subjecting the native Hawai'ians to the rule of the US Federal Government, white people were just an oppressed minority... I suppose you'd argue that white people in South Africa in the 1960s were acting to protect themselves from all that 'racism' that the ANC were dishing out?

My favorite is Constantin who has decided to hold Obama to every bit of his campaign rhetoric based on how many people are hopeful. I wonder if he'd hold McCain to his promises to fix the economy first thing.

Yeah, I'm the moron for taking the guy at his word.

Jukeboxgrad, when people in "Red States" start naming schools after Obama, your digression will be relevant. A predominantly black school has decided to name itself after Obama. Some here have claimed that this is because his election is so meaningful for black Americans. I have responded that I suspect this is nonsense, and that things will not get any better tangibly for black people in America. In fact, they'll probably get worse, because a lot of white people will figure any debt is paid as of Nov. 4th and no longer will support the status quo of affirmative action, racial grievance, etc.

I believe this is because everyone except for some white liberals have known for decades deep down that The Man isn't keeping black people down; the celebration over Obama's win is more about these white liberals having a mascot for their own enlightenment than it is a harbinger of great things for black people in America.

Obama did not, of course, promise to fix every problem in America. I'm sure you can recognize my hyperbole in stating so. Having said that, I'd guess you also can recognize (again) that the explicit promise of Obama's campaign was that merely electing him would so change the country and the world that many of our problems--the world hating us and the partisan divide, to name two--would simply go away. That, having redeemed itself for the sin of racism by electing a black person to the presidency, these matters would disappear without any real policy effort. That people are naming schools and streets after him before he's even taken office, to me, tends to support that a lot of people took his words seriously.

Second History:

You miss my point -- even if the affection for Reagan can be considered a "cult of personality" (which it isn't), it is far more dangerous to have a cult of personality built around a current president than one built around a dead man.

First of all, "We should be able to...", not "I flat-out promise that..."

Second, in using the term "We", he was referring to America generally, not himself or his administration personally.

He was in a presidential debate talking about his proposed policies and strategies. He wasn't discussing metaphorical American military capabilities and strategies over beer with his buddies in some bar.

Second, of course he was referring to America. At what point in any part of the campaign did he say "I, personally, will solve problem X with no support from anyone anywhere."?

jukeboxgrad:

"It would interest me greatly if you can show a single example of a non-trivial error in this article. As far as I can tell, no one has ever done that. This tends to create the impression that the numbers are correct.

It would even help if you could show a single example of any significant uncorrected error anywhere in American Prospect (especially in an instance where it's clear that they were notified of the error and nevertheless failed to correct it). I have shown such examples regarding articles at VC, Power Line and NR. In the absence of proof that American Prospect has a track record of posting misinformation (the kind of track record I've personally proven for VC, Power Line and NR), it's reasonable to give them the benefit of the doubt. "


I guess I don't see things working that way. I've always believed that people who make assertions or advance a thesis have the intellectual obligation to provide the basis for those assertions or thesis. It doesn't make a difference who you are (American Prospect, Power Line, NR, college student working on research, etc). Not providing the sources for their claims does not seem to be particularly good scholarship and/or journalism on the part of the American Prospect.

But in 16 months we should be able to reduce our combat troops, put — provide some relief to military families and our troops and bolster our efforts in Afghanistan so that we can capture and kill bin Laden and crush al Qaeda.

At least hold him to his promises, not yours.

Are you arguing that he is saying we'll be ready to begin looking to capture and kill bin Laden in sixteen months? Otherwise I'm not sure what point you're making.

I can't believe this post has garnered 195+ comments. Geez. This group redefines argumentative.

In Hawaii racism is directed at whites and in Indonesia it's directed at the Chinese.

Your statement about Hawaii is utterly absurd. I suspect you have no clue how blacks were treated in Indonesia circa 1970, but you're welcome to provide evidence. Clock's ticking.

This statement is incorrect, and has been refuted in the medical and genetics literature. We can objectively determine someone's race in the sense of continental origins. We can make predictions about the frequency of certain diseases and drug reactions. Their are drugs which effective for treating blacks and not whites. We can predict IQ, and other personality traits.

Frankly, Zarkov, life is too short for me to spend it correcting your errors regarding race. Every statement you make in the above paragraph is false as to race (not necessarily populations, just race) or true only in a trivial sense. Rather than go through it, since by this point I suspect most people skip your race posts anyway, I'll quote the following from the DOE, which sponsors the Human Genome Project:

"DNA studies do not indicate that separate classifiable subspecies (races) exist within modern humans. While different genes for physical traits such as skin and hair color can be identified between individuals, no consistent patterns of genes across the human genome exist to distinguish one race from another. There also is no genetic basis for divisions of human ethnicity. People who have lived in the same geographic region for many generations may have some alleles in common, but no allele will be found in all members of one population and in no members of any other."

guest:

it seems curious that the point they want to make involves selecting statistics from over half a decade

There's nothing "curious" about the fact that various different years are mentioned. They are covering many different kinds of stats, and not every stat is going to be readily available for every single year.

And claiming you see something "curious" is a far cry from proving an error. That's what I challenged you to do. I guess this is your way of admitting that you can't. You have also failed to demonstrate that picking a different year would yield a different result (aside from the minor instance of NM flipping from red to blue).

They ignore the under reporting of crime in low income, high population density neighborhoods

Where is your evidence that they "ignore" this? There are plenty of "low income, high population density neighborhoods" in red states. If there's "under reporting," it happens there too. And most of the statistics are not about "crime." They're about sexual behavior and substance use.

They selected arbitrary topics to compare. Meth, but no cocaine for example.

Maybe they selected meth because it seems to be a bigger problem:

according to National Drug Threat Survey (NDTS) 2006 data, 38.8 percent of state and local law enforcement officials nationwide report methamphetamine as the greatest drug threat to their areas, a higher percentage than that for any other drug

If you want to prove that looking at cocaine would show a different result, then why don't you go ahead and do so. Citing a statistic for only two states doesn't quite make it. And coke seizures in CA are probably high because it's a port of entry, both land and sea. What's more relevant in this analysis is where the substance is consumed, not where it enters the country. Meth labs in Arkansas are probably not producing product for customers in CA:

clandestine methamphetamine production continues in Arkansas, south Alabama, and sections of Tennessee. Manufacturers in these areas tend to be rural, low-income whites. In Alabama, white supremacists are active in methamphetamine production, while in Tennessee some third generation bootleggers have taken to methamphetamine production as their grandfathers took to moonshining and their fathers took to the marijuana trade. Regional groups involved in methamphetamine production are increasingly violent, well-armed, and knowledgeable about explosives.

Those labs are probably producing for customers who aren't too far away.

the bias evidenced by selecting statistics that reflect the desired outcome

If you can show that there are some other statistics they ignored which would reveal a different "outcome," then why don't you go ahead and do so.

you are discussing in 2008 and you picked an article from 2004 to support your case

If you can show that more recent data would indicate a very different result, then why don't you go ahead and do so. There's no reason to think that these stats changed greatly since 12/20/04, when the article was published.

Two of the states mentioned in that article as being worst case red states are now blue states as evidenced by the recent election

Wrong. The article mentions 13 states by name. Only one of those states (New Mexico) has flipped. Why did you say "two?"

as far has holding Obama to his campaign, I'm looking at 16 months to capture and kill bin Laden and crush Al Qaeda.

These are the words he said:

in 16 months we should be able to reduce our combat troops ... provide some relief to military families and our troops and bolster our efforts in Afghanistan so that we can capture and kill bin Laden and crush al Qaeda

So he didn't promise to "kill bin Laden and crush Al Qaeda" within "16 months." He said he wanted to move our forces from Iraq to Afghanistan within "16 months." And this is for the purpose of ultimately being able to "kill bin Laden and crush Al Qaeda." Not the same thing.

Imagine if Bush had said this: 'in 16 months we will invade Iraq, so that we can bring democracy to Iraq, peace to the Middle East, and resolve the Palestinian problem.' No one would claim he promised to get all those things done before the 16 months were over. So you're misrepresenting what Obama actually said.

lay off the deflecting … claiming that Bush did something, or Carter did something, or Charles Manson did something, or John Gotti did something, it's a losing argument.

Now you tell us. I don't recall you speaking up when zillions of times over the last 8 years the constant mantra defending Bush was some sentence beginning with the words "but Clinton …"

"I think you need to decide which narrative you prefer:

A) He's a Marxist Muslim socialist fascist who's going to impose sharia law and force us all to have gay abortions.

B) What he's doing "isn't change at all."

We were hearing lots of A, and now we're hearing B. Trouble is, they're mutually exclusive. So I hope you can settle down and pick one."

Well, since I've only mentioned choice "B," so I'll go with "B."

So, where's the change? Are Gates, Richardson, Clinton, Holder, Geithner, and Emanuel going to start the waters receding and heal the planet? They were running things all the time the waters were rising and the planet was getting sicker.

Guest12345:

The prevailing racism in Hawaii is directed against whites. Obama would not have been a target of day-to-day racism.

So he isn't white?

I agree with the posters supporting a "wait until they die (or retire)" policy. My own preference is for post-mortem "honors" only for politicians (I'm less concerned about, and it may be appropriate to, for instance, name a school after a retired teacher who's inspired many students etc.). Essentially the more powerful the individual, the less they should have places/buildings named after them while alive. We are not in a monarchy (well, actually, I currently live in Canada so I am!).

The fact that many politicians get things named after them is beside the point, I object to the practice no matter who does it. In fairness, unlike most other examples of pork-barreling politicians, this has nothing to do with President-elect Obama.

I do wonder also, who was the person the school was originally named for? I get annoyed with renaming even when it's private business (I'll call a stadium or theatre whatever I want, I'm not obligated to stick the sponsor's name in as an adjective; I'll stick with the old name if I want no matter who's paid for the naming rights). I know that in Canada after former PM Pierre Trudeau died the government decided to rename a mountain for him (Mt. Logan?), which led to protests about forgetting the person it was already named for, especially given there were already other mountains around. A prior poster also noted the Alaskan McKinley/Denali mountain-name issue.

guest:

I think there are a few countries in the world that might be a little shocked to know that they are already judged to not only not be the "best hope", but that they have been identified as not even a possible hope … I'm sure there are a few people who are wondering what exactly it is that the United States is the "last, best hope" of?

You're whining about the fact that Obama said this:

this was the moment when we … restored our image as the last, best hope on earth.

Maybe you don't remember that Reagan said this:

The past few days when I've been at that window upstairs, I've thought a bit of the "shining city upon a hill." The phrase comes from John Winthrop, who wrote it to describe the America he imagined. What he imagined was important because he was an early Pilgrim, an early freedom man. He journeyed here on what today we'd call a little wooden boat; and like the other Pilgrims, he was looking for a home that would be free.

I've spoken of the shining city all my political life, but I don't know if I ever quite communicated what I saw when I said it. But in my mind it was a tall proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans, wind-swept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace, a city with free ports that hummed with commerce and creativity, and if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here. That's how I saw it and see it still.

And how stands the city on this winter night? More prosperous, more secure, and happier than it was eight years ago. But more than that; after 200 years, two centuries, she still stands strong and true on the granite ridge, and her glow has held steady no matter what storm. And she's still a beacon, still a magnet for all who must have freedom, for all the pilgrims from all the lost places who are hurtling through the darkness, toward home.

And these are the original words from Winthrop:

For we must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us. So that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken… we shall be made a story and a by-word throughout the world.

Is there really that much of a difference between what the three men said? I don't think so. And did you whine when Reagan spoke? I doubt it.

By the way, JFK also cited Winthrop in a similar manner.

MarkField, thanx for posting this:

"DNA studies do not indicate that separate classifiable subspecies (races) exist within modern humans. While different genes for physical traits such as skin and hair color can be identified between individuals, no consistent patterns of genes across the human genome exist to distinguish one race from another. There also is no genetic basis for divisions of human ethnicity. People who have lived in the same geographic region for many generations may have some alleles in common, but no allele will be found in all members of one population and in no members of any other."

It naturally follows from your definition that all race based Affirmative Action laws are wrong.

The Always Brilliant A. Zarkov:

Biologically Obama is as much white as he is black.

Sigh.

Explain, if you can, how someone (anyone) can be "biologically white." Given your handle, I think it's entirely likely that you would have been considered non-white at some point in American history, as would have Eugene, and myself. Further, the one-drop rule would have made your entire statement unintelligible to nine justices that decided Plessy.

Repeat after me, wingnuts: Race. Is. A. Social. And. Legal. Construct. Especially this silly idea of "whiteness." Quit it.

On the other hand, realizing that this world is not blind to race, Obama is a positive role model who resonates especially well with non-white students.

Four long years of this hooey... every day, every week, every month.

This is silly. All that matters is whether one looks like the poeple on the US currency.

Good heavens, people.

It's a couple of schools. And some mountain that isn't even in America.

Plenty of American schools are named after people whose life achievements are less notable than "elected first black president," even if Obama keels over tomorrow.

No big deal.

now that Obama has named....

Sorry, MarkField, but either you go with your definition or you don't.

If you go with it, then everything is subjective...

Which side of the line does an octaroon go? Or someone 1/16th black? Or 1/64th? Do they get to jump to the head of the line? If so, why? And who decides? Should a rich black man with average grades get Affirmative Actioned into Harvard ahead of a poor Asian woman with all A's? Again: Why?

Or how about someone who is 1/8 Navajo, 1/8 Hispanic, 1/8 Caucasian, 1/8 Negro, 1/8 Pacific Islander, 1/8 Asian, 1/8 Eskimo/Aleut, and 1/8 East Indian? Where is he on the social engineering spectrum?

When everything is subjective, then an unaccountable bureaucrat makes the decision, and then it's on to the next step: taxpayers pay the freight because a better qualified candidate gets bypassed for the job due to Affirmative Action. Isn't that what happens? Isn't A.A. the reason that Louis Farrakhan demanded a white jewish doctor to operate on him?

But if you don't in fact go with the definition you posted, and race is objectively quantifiable, then please explain why a wealthy and privileged person of a legally favored race can get into Harvard with mediocre grades and SAT/LSAT scores, going to the head of the line and bypassing lots of poor Asians and Caucasians with 4.25 GPA's and top 1% SAT scores? How do you justify race-based A.A., when Forbes magazine regularly reports on black billionaires, and a black man was just elected president by a country that is only one-eighth black?

I understand that you're trying to go both ways with your definition of race. And that's where liberals get tanglefooted -- when they reject common sense and rational thinking in favor of feelings.

I know you mean well. But when does A.A. end? We have a black president-elect, for crying out loud. Could there be any better time to end Affirmative Action??

Or how about someone who is 1/8 Navajo, 1/8 Hispanic, 1/8 Caucasian, 1/8 Negro, 1/8 Pacific Islander, 1/8 Asian, 1/8 Eskimo/Aleut, and 1/8 East Indian? Where is he on the social engineering spectrum?

I believe he would be the uebermensch, and the Constitution should probably be amended so that any such prodigy is automatically president-for-life.

In the event of 2 or more qualifiers, cage match to the death determines the winner.

And that's where liberals get tanglefooted -- when they reject common sense and rational thinking in favor of feelings.

[Contemplates past 8 years of Republican presidency; shakes head.]

I think the much more prudent move would be to wait to see what kind of commander-in-chief he proves to be.

But then, wisdom and discretion have not been the marks of the electorate who voted Barack Obama into office. The leftist illuminati are eager to celebrate the victory, and I'm proud that our country has voted a black man into the highest office.

But would there be Sarah Palin schools?

Somehow, just on the merits of her gender, I doubt it.

If Barack Obama didn't have enough pressure on him already, with international crises, a melting economy, and the D.C. elite at his throat, he has the additional "freight of being iconic" - let us hope, for his sake, and for that school's sake, that he lives up to it.

constantin:

Yeah, I'm the moron for taking the guy at his word

Except that you're not "taking the guy at his word." You're putting words in his mouth by inventing statements he never made.

Obama did not, of course, promise to fix every problem in America.

Now you tell us. Before you said something else. And now you're backpedaling, as follows:

I'm sure you can recognize my hyperbole in stating so.

No. My general rule for reading something is that I should be "taking the guy at his word." But I guess you're telling us that only a "moron" would do that.

So let's see if I'm getting this straight. You think it's OK for you to hold Obama accountable for things he didn't say, at the same time that you think you're not supposed to be accountable for things you actually did say. Makes perfect sense.

Because when you're caught saying something indefensible, you get to invoke the handy-dandy all-purpose "hyperbole" defense, which is another way of saying 'I didn't actually mean what I said.' Simple question: do you grant Obama the right to invoke the same defense? Or do different rules apply to him?

I'd guess you also can recognize (again) that the explicit promise of Obama's campaign was that merely electing him would so change the country and the world that many of our problems--the world hating us and the partisan divide, to name two--would simply go away

What you'd "guess" is wrong. Are you familiar with the actual meaning of the word "explicit?" It means stated clearly and in detail, leaving no room for confusion or doubt. So please show us the "explicit" statements issued by the Obama campaign that make the "explicit" claim about certain problems that would "simply go away."

I guess you have two choices at this point: show us the quotes to justify the claim you just made, or invoke your handy "hyperbole" defense again.

That people are naming schools and streets after him before he's even taken office, to me, tends to support that a lot of people took his words seriously.

You need to show us which "words" you're talking about.

matt:

it is far more dangerous to have a cult of personality built around a current president than one built around a dead man

Now you tell us. Where were you when we were seeing the kind of stuff I noted here?

But would there be Sarah Palin schools?

Somehow, just on the merits of her gender, I doubt it.

Since there are apparently no Geraldine Ferraro schools (outside of fiction), you're probably right. But I would be happy to see a Sarah Palin school, or a Geraldine Ferraro school. Or a Madeleine Albright School, or a Condoleezza Rice school. Or a Jody Williams school. etc.

I wonder what percentage of schools are named for women vs men? In my county, I don't know of any schools named for women, but then, only a few schools are named after a person at all.

does anyone want to comment on all the schools named for Jefferson Davis or Robert E. Lee?
They led the opposition to a Republican president who curtailed civil liberties, worsened American relations with Europe, and ran up an enormous debt in the course of using American military power to improve the lives of millions of non-Caucasians.

By today's standards, they wouldn't be considered terrorists, they'd be considered Barack Obama.

Sorry, MarkField, but either you go with your definition or you don't.

If you go with it, then everything is subjective...

Which side of the line does an octaroon go? Or someone 1/16th black? Or 1/64th? Do they get to jump to the head of the line? If so, why? And who decides? Should a rich black man with average grades get Affirmative Actioned into Harvard ahead of a poor Asian woman with all A's? Again: Why?

As I said, I'm not going to divert this thread by debating AA. Your points are worth discussing, but all I'm saying is that there's no contradiction between (a) the fact that race is not a biological category; and (b) the use of race for AA purposes. That still leaves plenty of issues for AA to deal with, but it's not a contradiction per se. That's my very limited point.

We'll take up the more complicated issue on a thread dedicated to that topic which isn't already 230-odd (very odd, in some cases) comments long.

Hey, I'm still waiting to hear how hiring a bunch of retreads is change. Is this change we an believe in?

You must have missed my answer above.

For more, see here.

zarkov:

we demonstrate here that from both an objective and scientific (genetic and epidemiologic) perspective there is great validity in racial/ethnic self-categorizations, both from the research and public policy points of view

Maybe you're getting into concepts I'm not smart enough to grasp, but it seems that you're citing a statement that proves the opposite of what I thought you were trying to prove. Your authority seems to be saying that "there is great validity" in Obama's 'self-categorization' as black.

elliot:

since I've only mentioned choice "B," so I'll go with "B."

Really? You've "only mentioned" that what Obama represents "isn't change at all?" Then it must have been an entirely different elliot123 who said this:

I suspect any reasonable person listening to the audio would think Obama supported redistribution.

Let's see. There's elliot123 #1 who says Obama's going to do this horrible thing called "redistribution." And it must be something we're not already doing, because if so then elliot123 #1 would have complained about it a long time ago, right? And then we have elliot123 #2, who has "only mentioned" that what Obama represents "isn't change at all."

I think what we really need is elliot123 #3 to come along and sit down with the other two elliot123s, to see if he can convince them to choose one narrative and stick with it.

Then again, what we might have here is one useless crank who is determined to find a way to find something to complain about, no matter what.

syd:

"this was the moment when we ended a war and secured our nation and restored our image as the last, best hope on earth."

What's the problem here? I read this as an intentional reference to Abraham Lincoln's second message to Congress (who I think actually said "of")

Thanks, I didn't know. Here it is:

Fellow-citizens, we cannot escape history. We of this Congress and this administration, will be remembered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance, or insignificance, can spare one or another of us. The fiery trial through which we pass, will light us down, in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation. We say we are for the Union. The world will not forget that we say this. We know how to save the Union. The world knows we do know how to save it. We -- even we here -- hold the power, and bear the responsibility. In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free -- honorable alike in what we give, and what we preserve. We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth. Other means may succeed; this could not fail. The way is plain, peaceful, generous, just -- a way which, if followed, the world will forever applaud, and God must forever bless.

This also became the title of a book: "The Last Best Hope of Earth: Abraham Lincoln and the Promise of America."

So the commenter here was slamming Obama for using essentially the same rhetoric as John Winthrop, Lincoln, JFK and Reagan.

OK, MarkField, since you won't answer my questions, I shall have to turn you over to my capable assistant. Your dirty sex makes god send hurricanes.

guest:

Here's an error: New Mexico is a blue state. So is Colorado (part of their "all red mountain states".) That's two major errors.

Those aren't "errors." They're instances where the underlying data changed subsequent to the time the article was published. So it's not an "error." It's just a statement that was true at the time, but is no longer true. It's like if someone wrote in 2004 that 'there's never been a black president.' The statement is no longer true, but that doesn't make the statement an error. And it's also not "major." A couple of states flipping are a small portion of all the states that were analyzed and discussed.

According to the 2008 National Drug Threat Asseement, cocaine is a larger concern

Yes, barely. Cocaine scores 40.1%, and meth scores 35.0%. Hardly a huge difference. What you're doing now is a great example of nitpicking.

If you want to go back to the time of the article you posted, it's still cocaine

Duh. Of course it makes sense "to go back to the time of the article," because we're trying to understand why the article focused on meth, not cocaine. In trying to answer that question, it makes no sense whatsoever to consider data that appeared after the article was published. And the source you're citing shows that at the time, it was basically a tie, with cocaine at 37% and meth at 36.2%. So when we look at the year it actually makes sense to look at, it's even more obvious that you're nitpicking.

the article you linked is biased

You haven't shown bias. You're complaining that they looked at meth but not coke, and you're telling us why you suspect that the coke analysis would produce a different result, but you're not actually doing that analysis.

You're the one casting aspersions

I'm not "casting aspersions." I'm presenting data. And I'm challenging you to find errors in the data, and you've found this many: zero.

It just makes you look like a partisan hack who thinks that linking to random commentary in the internet somehow makes you a winner.

"Partisan hack" is a good way to describe someone who rejects facts they don't like, without being able to show that the facts are wrong.

I know what he said.

If you "know what he said," then you have no excuse for claiming Obama said something he didn't say.

I don't know that I've ever used Clinton or any other president as an excuse for Bush

That's good. It would be even better if you said that you spoke up to complain when you witnessed lots of people doing it. Then again, maybe you think it's something that's only worth complaining about when the shoe is on one particular foot.

quit following me around you sociopath

As far as I can tell, no one is holding a gun to your head forcing you to read my posts, or respond to them. So if you don't like what I say, too bad. Change the channel. And if you don't like it when someone comes along to point out the silliness in your statements, then you should avoid posting them on a blog that's open to the public. No one is holding a gun to your head forcing you to do that, either.

I'm not a big fan of Bush either.

But a big enough fan to vote for him twice, right?

Me:

"does anyone want to comment on all the schools named for Jefferson Davis or Robert E. Lee?"

Response:

"They led the opposition to a Republican president who curtailed civil liberties, worsened American relations with Europe, and ran up an enormous debt in the course of using American military power to improve the lives of millions of non-Caucasians.

By today's standards, they wouldn't be considered terrorists, they'd be considered Barack Obama."

Wow. This has to be the greatest piece of up-is-down-ism I've ever seen in my life. Not only have you (1) equated the country's first black president with the champions of slavery, you've also (2) equated George Bush with Abraham Lincoln.

And frankly, I'm not sure which comparison is more preposterous.

That's it, I'm at a loss. I give up. We are in two completely different universes, and there is no hope for reasonably communication, ever.

Those aren't "errors." They're instances where the underlying data changed subsequent to the time the article was published.

They are clearly errors for purposes of supporting your argument We're having this discussion in 2008. The article is from 2004 and describes a situation that doesn't exist today. Therefore it's an error for you to bring it up as some kind of proof. It's also an error for them to categorize New Mexico as a red state given that it went blue four out of five of the last elections. (Three out of four at the time of the article.)

Duh. Of course it makes sense "to go back to the time of the article," because we're trying to understand why the article focused on meth, not cocaine. In trying to answer that question, it makes no sense whatsoever to consider data that appeared after the article was published. And the source you're citing shows that at the time, it was basically a tie, with cocaine at 37% and meth at 36.2%. So when we look at the year it actually makes sense to look at, it's even more obvious that you're nitpicking.

And yet instead of going back to the time of the article you went to 2006, when the 2004 data was easily available. Eighty percent or point eight percent, cocaine was the larger concern and yet you wrongly claimed meth was. Seriously, if you're going to get all uppity about data after the time of the article, why did you bring up 2006? You were wrong, you know you were wrong, and now you're acting superior and trying to pretend you weren't. Arguing with you is like arguing with a four year old.

You haven't shown bias. You're complaining that they looked at meth but not coke, and you're telling us why you suspect that the coke analysis would produce a different result, but you're not actually doing that analysis.

I'll explain the bias one more time: they mentioned meth and not cocaine. According to law enforcement cocaine was the greater concern in 2004 and yet your source ignored it and went for the number two issue. Sure is handy to be able to pick which criteria you are going to skip over when painting your opponent as a sinner and yourself as a saint.

And one more fact for the crowd to consider: The American Prospect is subtitled "Liberal Intelligence." And their mission: "The American Prospect was founded in 1990 as an authoritative magazine of liberal ideas, committed to a just society, an enriched democracy, and effective liberal politics." Yeah, no bias there.

What analysis do you want to see? I presented a comparison of one year's number of cocaine seizures in the two states that the article brought up in regards to meth. That's exactly the analysis presented in your source.

If you want more information, here you go. I'll include 2007's numbers so you can see how those trends The American Prospect was mentioning are holding up:

California:

2002: 9,551.1 kg cocaine seized. 311.2 kg meth seized. 1718 meth lab incidents.
2003: 4,640.7 kg cocaine seized. 1,576.0 kg meth seized. 1,239 meth lab incidents.
2004: 3,186.6 kg cocaine seized. 786.5 kg meth seized. 764 meth lab incidents.
2007: 10,548.3 kg cocaine seized. 1,958.2 kg meth seized. 221 meth lab incidents.

Arkansas:

2002: 58.1 kg cocaine seized. 9.5 kg meth seized. 397 meth lab incidents.
2003: 219.5 kg cocaine seized. 54.0 kg meth seized. 714 meth lab incidents.
2004: 714.8 kg cocaine seized. 12.9 kg meth seized. 800 meth lab incidents.
2007: 181.6 kg cocaine seized. 17.9 kg meth seized. 240 meth lab incidents.

(BTW, there's a factual error for you, in none of 2002, 2003, or 2004 was the number of labs seized 20 per hundred thousand people.)

New York:

2002: 3,765.9 kg cocaine seized. 6.1 kg meth seized. 26 meth lab incidents.
2003: 5,056 kg cocaine seized. 2.1 kg meth seized. 18 meth lab incidents.
2004: 1921.4 kg cocaine seized. 10.7 kg meth seized. 48 meth lab incidents.
2007: 2099 kg cocaine seized. 2.1 kg meth seized. 12 meth lab incidents.

Utah (included because meth is known as a problem there):

2002: 0.9 kg cocaine seized. 10.4 kg meth seized. 109 meth lab incidents.
2003: 138.7 kg cocaine seized. 13.6 kg meth seized. 77 meth lab incidents.
2004: 176.3 kg cocaine seized. 18.1 kg meth seized. 72 meth lab incidents.
2007: 18.2 kg cocaine seized. 31.9 kg meth seized. 3 meth lab incidents.

Tell me again how those blue states don't have any kind of drug problems. It sure is a good thing TAP went to all the trouble of reporting the number of labs per capita. I mean, it'd be a travesty for us to know that there was five times as much meth per person in California than in Arkansas in 2004.

I'm not "casting aspersions." I'm presenting data. And I'm challenging you to find errors in the data, and you've found this many: zero.

You're not presenting data. You're presenting hearsay. Let's see their citations for the data they present. Also, please tell me at what date did New Mexico become a red state for the purposes of their statistics. The 2004 general election was a whole 48 days before the publication of the article you linked.

As far as I can tell, no one is holding a gun to your head forcing you to read my posts, or respond to them. So if you don't like what I say, too bad. Change the channel. And if you don't like it when someone comes along to point out the silliness in your statements, then you should avoid posting them on a blog that's open to the public. No one is holding a gun to your head forcing you to do that, either.

Hey, you're the one who claimed to know that I haven't been calling people out for trying to deflect from the failings of their positions for the last eight years. Since you have that detailed knowledge of the last eight years of my life, you must be following me around.

As far as not liking what you have to say. It's true. I think your attitude is unappealing. Your posts over the last few months show that you have no interest in discussion. Before you ever post you're convinced of your position and you will not change it regardless of facts presented showing that you are wrong. You apply completely different standards to your side of the arguments than you apply to your opposition. Basically you're a fundamentalist. And other than the occasional fun to be gained from rubbing their face in their errors, fundies aren't interesting.

jukeboxgrad: "Rising Number of Racist Anti-Obama Actions in Small Towns."

The stories you link to are based on a report by the Southern Poverty Law Center, which is about as credulous as asking Dr. Dobson to report on anti-Christian bias. The study counts as "racist incidents" such heinous crimes as flying the American flag upside down.

Morris Dees depends for his livelihood on an endless supply of scare stories conjured up for urban juries and elderly red-diaper Jewish donors. He sees a Klansman under every rock south of the Mason-Dixon line. He is a liar and a huckster.

This report is garbage, just like the purported shouts of "Kill Him" at the Palin rallies, for which the Secret Service found no supporting evidence whatsoever.

The Obama camp and their media stenographers have found practically no actual bigotry in this campaign; so little indeed that the only way they could lay down the race card was with absurd claims that mentioning lily-white Bill Ayers or the word "socialism" was somehow racist. Pathetic. Is this how the lightweight poltroon plans to govern, with flimsy accusations of racism in response to all criticism? If so, it will be his own fault if racial animosities are stirred up.

Benjamin Davis:

Maybe the janitor's office might be permitted, but heavens not something more substantial.

Interesting you say that. If Barry had applied to be a janitor in the White House, with the same slimy associates and history of drug abuse, it's a near certainty he could not have obtained a high enough security clearance to do so.

Yee gads, jukeboxgrad. Seven posts in a row?

It's not like you weren't asked to refrain from doing this previously.

I'm not in favor of naming buildings, road, parks, etc. after people until they are gone from this earth, but I would make an exception if they wanted to rename Jacksonville, Florida's, Nathan Bedford Forrest High School after the president-elect.

guest:

We're having this discussion in 2008. The article is from 2004 and describes a situation that doesn't exist today.

The fact that a couple of states have flipped is not a basis to claim that the article is about "a situation that doesn't exist today." And if I showed you data from 10/08, you would probably whine that 'we're having this discussion in 11/08; your data is from 10/08.'

If you can show that more recent data would produce a different conclusion, then you should do so. What are you waiting for?

It's also an error for them to categorize New Mexico as a red state given that it went blue four out of five of the last elections.

If you want to call that an "error," then you need to account for all the states where the reverse is true. Have you done that? And what is the logic for saying they should look back five elections? Why not 10? 20? 2? 0? You're not pointing out an "error." You're pointing out that they made a reasonable judgment that you've decided to nitpick, in a highly arbitrary manner.

cocaine was the larger concern and yet you wrongly claimed meth was

Wrong. It's not that "cocaine was the larger concern." It's that the two were roughly tied, and you will see one or the other in the lead, depending on what source you look at, and what exact moment you pick.

why did you bring up 2006?

Because that was the first data I found. You don't like that? Sue me.

According to law enforcement cocaine was the greater concern in 2004

The source you provided showed these numbers: cocaine at 37% and meth at 36.2%. Does that mean cocaine is "greater?" Barely. It's more reasonable to view it as a tie. And they may have used another source that broke the tie in the other direction, which would explain why they picked meth and not cocaine. And why not do both? Because it would take more time, and more work, and they had to draw the line somewhere.

So thanks for doing such a nice job of proving that all you have is nitpicking.

By the way, it's interesting to compare 2003 and 2004. For 2004, the numbers are (as I just said) cocaine at 37% and meth at 36.2%. For 2003, the numbers are cocaine at 33.1% and meth at 31%. Notice the trend, at the time? Meth is overtaking cocaine. And now look at what your source said in 2004:

Cocaine. Cocaine trafficking and abuse represent a significant drug threat to the United States. Both powder and crack cocaine are readily available throughout the country, and overall availability appears to be stable.

Methamphetamine. The threat posed to the United States by the trafficking and abuse of methamphetamine is high and increasing.

(Emphasis added.) Those statements are consistent with the numbers I just highlighted, which show that meth was overtaking cocaine. If I have limited time to do an analysis, it makes sense to focus on the problem that is "high and increasing," in favor of focusing on the problem that "appears to be stable." Especially if they are roughly at the same level (36.2 vs 37).

Sure is handy to be able to pick which criteria you are going to skip over when painting your opponent as a sinner and yourself as a saint.

You are repeatedly suggesting that if they had done the analysis regarding cocaine instead of meth, the result would be different. Really? Prove it.

What analysis do you want to see?

An analysis that takes all 50 states into account. Because that's what they did to produce a statement like this:

The number of meth-lab seizures in red states increased by 38 percent from 1999 to 2003 … In the same time frame, it decreased by 38 percent in blue states

Let us know when you're ready to tell us what the corresponding statement would be, with regard to cocaine seizures. So far, you haven't come anywhere close to doing that.

BTW, there's a factual error for you, in none of 2002, 2003, or 2004 was the number of labs seized 20 per hundred thousand people.

Let's take a close look, since this is a nice example of how sloppy your work is. The article I cited said this:

The per capita rate of methamphetamine-lab seizures in California is 2 per 100,000 … In Arkansas, it's 20 per 100,000

You're saying that number 20 is wrong. Really? Let's take a look at the source you offered. If I open that source and click on Arkansas, I see that it has a population of 2,779,154. I also see that in 2003 it had 714 meth lab incidents. The number for 2002 is 397 (that number isn't on the same page, but you found it on a different page).

The average of those two numbers (397 and 714) is 555. 555 over a population of 2,779,154 works out to this: precisely 19.97 per 100,000.

So thanks to your source, we've just verified that their number is exactly right. They simply averaged the two most recent years. And this shows that they were trying to be fair, because if they had looked only at the number for 2003 (a reasonable choice, since that was the most current data), Arkansas would have come out looking even worse.

Nice job helping us prove exactly the opposite of what you're trying to prove.

Tell me again how those blue states don't have any kind of drug problems

Nice job with the straw man. That's not what anyone has said.

You're not presenting data. You're presenting hearsay. Let's see their citations for the data they present.

I just demonstrated an example of how their statements match up perfectly with the sources and data that was presented by you.

please tell me at what date did New Mexico become a red state for the purposes of their statistics. The 2004 general election was a whole 48 days before the publication of the article you linked

Please explain why using some other election as the benchmark makes more sense than using the election that just happened. Aren't you the one making a fuss about how all data must be ignored unless it's extremely recent?

you're the one who claimed to know that I haven't been calling people out for trying to deflect from the failings of their positions for the last eight years. Since you have that detailed knowledge of the last eight years of my life, you must be following me around.

No, it's not that I have "that detailed knowledge of the last eight years of [your] life." It's that google has a detailed memory of what you've said, so I know that you "haven't been calling people out for trying to deflect from the failings of their positions."

Then again, it's possible you've been doing exactly that, but I've missed it somehow. Is that it?

Before you ever post you're convinced of your position and you will not change it regardless of facts presented showing that you are wrong.

Wrong again. When facts are presented showing that I'm wrong, this is what I do, 100% of the time: admit that I'm wrong. I could show you examples.

The American Prospect was founded in 1990 as an authoritative magazine of liberal ideas

It's always extremely easy to dismiss any source you don't like. Trouble is, you haven't identified any problems with what they did.

But a big enough fan to vote for him twice, right?

When the choice is breaking a finger or chopping off your hand, only an idiot goes for the amputation.

Only an idiot thinks they've got a broken finger when actually they're missing both arms.

there's a lot of other racial stuff going on too (samoans hating tongans and vice versa, natives hating the japanese, etc.) but the anti-white racism is common.

This was my point. The original (absurd) claim was that all racism in Hawaii was anti-white. In 1970 or so, there was plenty of other racism in Hawaii, some of it directed against blacks.

Actually aren't Obama's experiences in this rather moot? It doesn't matter whether Obama came from Harlem or from some utopian society where there was no racism.

Obama's only historically notable accomplishment to date is to show that it is possible for the nation as a whole to elect a 'black' president. It is the nation's perception of his 'blackness' that counts not his personal experience.

To me this was the nation's accomplishment far more than it was Obama's. As such it doesn't seem like it is appropriate at this point to start naming things after him. Perhaps naming a school Obama '08 would be appropriate in noting the historical event not the man himself.

I've seen JBG post almost non-stop for as much as 22 hours a day [no exaggeration]. I've mentioned that to him before, and also his cluttering up the thread with minutiae that nobody else seems much concerned with. Those endless nitpicky details convince no one who is not already convinced.

JBG really needs to move out of his Mom's basement and get a life.

smokey:

I've seen JBG post almost non-stop for as much as 22 hours a day … get a life

Your irony impairment is severe. If you have the time and energy to carefully audit someone else's posting behavior, the one who needs to "get a life" is you.

Anyway, isn't it obvious that Soros has a whole team of JBG's working for him?
=======================
elliot:

retreads promise more of the same

The 'retread' is obviously you, and "more of the same" is obviously all we're ever going to get from you.
=======================
floridan:

What possible interest would that be to this crowd?

Exactly. Mark said it well with his snippet from Buffy.
=======================
colin:

What about calling other commenters "limp-wristed fops" and cowards?

You should give smokey more credit for trying to raise the level of discourse. It could be worse. Haven't you noticed how carefully he avoids saying "asswipe" and "jackass?"

fury:

It's not like you weren't asked to refrain from doing this previously.

EV is a big boy and he knows how to speak up. When did he appoint you as the thread police?

And you might want to look at my response to what he said to me. And you also might want to see if you notice any differences between the circumstances in the other thread, as compared with the circumstances here.

jukeboxgrad:


EV is a big boy and he knows how to speak up. When did he appoint you as the thread police?

And you might want to look at my response to what he said to me. And you also might want to see if you notice any differences between the circumstances in the other thread, as compared with the circumstances here


One need not be the "thread police" to point out that the VC functions best when there are dialogues versus monologues on threads. The circumstances of why one posts numerous posts in a row is not really relevant. It's seems to be a matter of VC courtesy.

Wow. EV basically says that Barack Obama is an affirmative action president. Some crazies have so opined, but I never thought I'd hear it from EV, despite his conservative leanings.

Wow. Just wow.

Also, I'd like to point out that tons of achievements have to do more with the fact of getting them than how you do in the job. Clerkships are a prime example. If you land a great clerkship, no one ever asks how you performed. It's the fact that the you got the clerkship that is deemed valuable in the legal market because it is a mark of other achievement (and a whole bunch of luck).

It would be better if they indicated their source. You're guessing at their source, and the results you get are going to vary, depending on what source you use, and depending on what period you look at. Look at the map for 2004 on this page. AR has 800 meth lab incidents. CA has 764. That works out to the following rates per 100,000: 28.8 vs. 2.1. So those numbers show AR as being even worse than what TAP said (20 vs. 2). And if you choose the numbers you highlighted, what you get is 20 vs. 4.3, which is still a very unfavorable result for AR.

So you're changing your argument again? First it was "There are no errors in this article. Prove there is an error." So I listed several possible flaws in their analysis that could change the results. You switched to "No error there. Show a factual error." So I showed a factual error. Then you changed to "I averaged over two years, there is no error." Of course it wasn't true when you applied the same math to the other half of their comparison. Now you're going with "They're not wrong because even though they're wrong it's O.K. because their number is too low."

Look, they have one proven error. That's what you asked for. How readers choose to weigh that error, and the selection bias I demonstrated, when looking at the other numbers in the TAP article will be up to the individual reader.

And as far as sources go, you are not going to get a better source than the people who are doing the lab and drug seizures. If TAP got their numbers from somewhere else, that's not the reader's problem, it's TAP's problem. They're still wrong.

So you haven't shown that their numbers are wrong, because I've just shown you data which indicates that they understated, rather than overstated, the problem in AR. And you also haven't shown that their basic premise is wrong, because even the numbers you came up with (20 vs. 4.3) are a very unfavorable result for AR.

Yes I have. TAP's numbers are wrong, I've shown that. I knew the Arkansas numbers when I said "this is an error", you didn't show anything I didn't already know. Unlike you, I even did the numbers for California. My goal was to verify correctness, not to find the statistic that supported my desired outcome like TAP obviously did.

But I did find that with a less end result oriented approach to the question, California has a larger meth problem than Arkansas. In the total number of labs, the total amount of the drug, and the total amount of the drug per capita, Californians are worse off. (Unless you're a meth addict, in which case California is the place for you!)

So yes, not only did I find a factual error, I demonstrated that their premise is wrong as well.

fury:

VC functions best when there are dialogues versus monologues on threads

Then I'm sure you'll be relieved to hear that over 100 different people have posted in this thread. So 'monologue' probably isn't the right word.

By the way, I think "VC functions best" when decisions regarding how "VC functions best" are left in the hands of those who are responsible for making sure that "VC functions best."

"W obviously missed a major opportunity when he failed to appoint you Secretary of Pointless Bullshit."

I admit it. I didn't make the SPB cut for Bush. But I'm honored to say I have been serving as SPB for Obama. I'm the one responsible for those podiums that say, "Office Of The President-Elect."

And we're planning a great speech on economic recovery. How's this for an opener?
"In the garden, growth has it seasons. First comes spring and summer, but then we have fall and winter. And then we get spring and summer again."
I think it meshes with the Gaia theme of receding waters and the planet healing itself.

elliot:

In the garden, growth has it seasons. First comes spring and summer, but then we have fall and winter. And then we get spring and summer again

The words of a fictional character can rarely match the words of a real one:

This thaw—took a while to thaw, it's going to take a while to unthaw

Or there's this:

I'll be long gone before some smart person ever figures out what happened inside this Oval Office

But there are so many others it's really hard to choose. You should tell us some of your favorites.

I think it meshes with the Gaia theme of receding waters and the planet healing itself.

But here's the more important question: does it mesh with the theme of you getting a clue?

All you've proven is that things in AR, according to one source, are even worse than the article said.

I've proven that according to the source, TAP's numbers are wrong. Additionally, if you want to continue this conversation, define "worse" for me as you are using it in that sentence. Because, I don't know anyone who will be more concerned over more labs per capita producing a much lower quantity of drugs, than fewer labs per capita, but more labs total, producing an order of magnitude larger quantity of drugs.

Yes, by the whopping, eye-popping margin of 0.8%. As if a "lead" that small has any significance whatsoever, in this context.

But it was right. As compared to your statement, which was wrong and your supporting evidence was inapplicable.

Which means nothing, because even when you do it that way, AR is still way worse than CA, which means the underlying premise does not change.

So now you're acknowledging that the number is wrong, but you're saying it doesn't matter. You say "worse" and now you're adding in an "underlying premise." Please tell me the premise of "Arkansas had 20 meth labs seized per 100,000 people, California had 2 meth labs seized per 100,000 people." Because that statistic doesn't provide enough information for a reader to discern any meaning.

Except that I didn't say I knew that for sure. I just said I couldn't find any evidence to the contrary, even though I looked.

You said you didn't recall. Not that you couldn't find evidence. You're trying to retroactively change your position, moving the goal posts on this just like you are on the "show me one error" challenge.

The numbers in the article are wrong. Any meaningful "underlying premise" is not supported by all of the evidence available to describe the situation.

I've shown the error in the article. I've shown your crappy approach to interpretation and analysis. Unless you can define your positions beyond implication ("underlying premise"/"worse"), I'm done with you.