The Bosque Boys

As a happy consequence of the Okie Gardener's recent post, Obama's Church, I entered into a productive dialogue with a reader/commenter.

Here is a portion of the reader's comment on the post (see the full comment here from "JC") :

"A candidate's church shouldn't be an issue unless it is something truly weird or cultish... something that would indicate that the candidate is not of sound mind or character."

After which, in an offline exchange with JC, I recommended the Gardener's latest post on Rudy's Church (which I feel clarifies what we were aiming for). I also expressed my belief that a candidate's church and his/her relationship with his/her church is a meaningful consideration among many when choosing a president.

JC responded:

Thanks for the note. Actually, I read the post on Rudy's Church, and it didn't address my concerns. It is disturbing to me, that Rudy's estrangement from his church would not be an issue while Obama's Church would become an issue. The Catholic Church has had some huge problems, which I would not consider a problem for Rudy, any more than I would make Obama's black church an issue for him. The only question I might ask, is whether white families would be turned away if they chose to attend.

I in no way meant to suggest that it is inappropriate to consider the church of a presidential candidate, only that we shouldn't hold Obama accountable for the mission statement of his church... especially when, in reality, black Americans face challenges that whites do not. It really bothered me that this reality was ignored (particularly in the comment by Joab), and I actually find it admirable that the church states clearly its "commitment to God", that the church is "unapologetically Christian", and that the church wants to specifically address issues of the black family.

Obama has been impressive in that he does not ask blacks to focus on ways they may have been oppressed in the past... but what they can do now to solve problems in the black community. I don't know enough about him yet... to know for sure whether I think he'd make a good president. I already know that I don't want to vote for Rudy or Hillary, regardless of religious issues, based on what I know of their character traits at this point.

Just to mention something we agree on... I share your admiration for Brian Lamb!

~~Thanks again,
JC

Waco Farmer again: Anybody who admires Brian Lamb is always welcome to this conversation.

Note: As this post concerns race as much as politics, I am classifying it under "Race in America."

Was the conviction of I. Lewis Libby on charges of perjury, making false statements and obstruction of justice grounded in strong evidence and what appeared to be careful deliberation by a jury ?

Or, was the fall of a skilled and long-respected public servant...propelled not by actual wrongdoing but by inflated and frequently false claims, and by the aggressive and occasionally reckless response of senior Bush administration officials -- culminating in Mr. Libby's perjury ?

Last Wednesday, the Washington Post answered that "either/or" question with a resounding "YES."

Portions of the Post editorial were everywhere on the conservative blogosphere this week (read the full opinion here).

Perhaps the most quoted line: [The Libby tragedy] is particularly sobering because it arose from a Washington scandal remarkable for its lack of substance.

The least quoted portion:

The former chief of staff...told the FBI and a grand jury that he had not leaked the identity of CIA employee Valerie Plame to journalists but rather had learned it from them. But abundant testimony at his trial showed that he had found out about Ms. Plame from official sources and was dedicated to discrediting her husband, former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV. Particularly for a senior government official, lying under oath is a serious offense.

An assertion I made three weeks ago: I have no sympathy for public officials who lie to grand juries. If Libby lied, regardless of the rationales or extenuating circumstances, justice will be served with his conviction for that offense (read my entire post here).

I stand by my statement. Moreover, from everything I can discern, Libby was brilliant and tough-minded. I am forty-two years old, and I have an appreciation for the limits of memory that increases every day. Notwithstanding, to accept the Libby memory defense, one must imagine the vice president's office as a madcap 1950s sitcom: "Don't Leave it to Scooter."

On the other hand, does Mr. Libby deserve to rot in jail for his crimes against the state?

Robert Novak, not an impartial observer but whose proximity to this scandal makes him a columnist of interest, reinforced an emerging consensus that the tragedy of this conviction is that it arises from a misguided prosecution (read entire column here).

What Now? The President has three choices:

1. Abide by the eventual verdict of the American justice system.

2. Pardon Libby at the least vulnerable political moment.

3. Pardon Libby now.

Today, Bill Kristol argues forcefully for an immediate pardon (here), which is not a huge surprise as he is extremely personally connected to Libby and the Cheney gang. In addition, he argued for a presidential pardon before the court proceeding began.

Not withstanding, Kristol is on the right track. Here's why:

The President must weigh the possibility of vindication for Libby and the White House through appeal. However, even victory on appeal has its downside. As Kristol argues, the process will keep the story on the front page of the American political consciousness for months to come. And, without a shadow of a doubt, a reversal will not attract the wall-to-wall media coverage that this conviction garnered.

I recommend a Presidential Pardon plus.

The plus? The plus is a full-court media press. For months, the White House has been mute, refusing to comment publicly on an ongoing legal proceeding.

A pardon would end that self-imposed silence. The President should come clean with everything he knows. Now is the time for the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. If the White House has a story to tell, let them tell it. If this is a travesty, then let the President and his administration make that case. Let the facts be submitted to a candid world.

Conceivably, the President would lay out the real story of what happened. He would admit wrong doing in the White House on some levels, but he would expose the malfeasance of the prosecution, partisan opposition, unfriendly media and other persecutors. A Presidential Pardon in that vein would be honest and straightforward. And it just might work. The American people are often shocked into sympathy by that brand of openness.

I will be away from the blog for most of the day, but I am currently watching C-SPAN's Washington Journal (3-9-07). The Pam Hess segment is the most remarkable piece of reportage and analysis I have seen in years. The archive will be up later today. Watch this segment, if at all possible.

Nobody knows anything.

Why? We have never done anything like this before.

For all the historians who point out historic parallels to this presidential election (Michael Kazin here), I say: rubbish!

Yes. Andrew Jackson started positioning himself for the 1828 race as soon as the dust cleared following the Corrupt Bargain election of 1824. Yes. William Jennings Bryan started campaigning for 1900 only weeks after he lost in 1896. Notwithstanding, those examples are of a completely different character.

This campaign is unlike anything we have ever seen. Even more modern comparisons are meaningless. Yes. Jimmy Carter began his 1976 campaign for the presidency in 1974. But Jimmy Carter toiled in obscurity for a full year. Howard Dean: similar story arc.

Never in the history of the American presidency have we had this kind of campaign, with so many candidates, with so much money and media attention on this kind of scale at this point in the cycle. Never. Therefore, there are no historical parallels. There are no good models. Nobody knows anything.

This week's rush to anoint Rudy is premature. We are just getting started. Rudy may win; he may prove a wonderful, resilient and tireless campaigner--but right now he is a two-week wonder. He is a novice at this level of competition. He has not even weathered his first media crisis. He is a great prospect, but only in the same way a triple-A phenom is a great prospect in spring training for a major league club. This is going to be a long season. Sometimes rookies win twenty games. More often they don't. Sometimes they don't even make it out of camp.

This week's storyline is the demise of John McCain. It may prove true. On the other hand, McCain survived eight years in the Hanoi Hilton, and seven years in the on-deck circle waiting for his final at-bat. I would not underestimate his patience or discipline. He strikes me as unlikely to get depressed and go home in the face of this most recent adversity. But we'll see.

Nobody knows anything, and I count myself in that category--but my sense is that Mitt Romney does not have IT. I wouldn't count Newt out--but he is still a long shot. He has a lot to overcome. We'll see.

Nobody knows anything, but George Will is awfully damned smart. Read his latest column here. He makes a lot of sense.

We tend to look up to the wrong people. Those you would do well to emulate may live next door. Larry Elder writes today's must read essay. From Jewish World Review.

Back in June, during the last kerfuffle, I offered this brief assessment of Ann Coulter:

Quoting myself quoting myself:

Back on March 2 (on the ancien regime blog--and before the current kerfuffle), I offered this brief assessment of Ann Coulter:

Quoting Myself: "I think she is often uproariously funny and sometimes very insightful, but I also think she can be crude and mean-spirited. Although I give her credit for outwitting Katie Couric (in all seriousness, that was a bravura performance), I think Coulter is something akin to our Maureen Dowd (funny, attractive, possessing a rapier wit but lacking compassion and judgment). Ann Coulter, for me, will forever be the woman who judged John Roberts unfit for the Supreme Court and attempted to reinvent Joe McCarthy as a great American hero."

You get the point: we have been here before.

Ann Coulter is serially inappropriate and often completely erroneous. Last summer, detractors presented evidence against her charging plagiarism.

Having said that, I will refrain from the feeding frenzy fueled by conservative self-righteous indignation.

Why?

1. Our vigilance in pursuit of this hysterical exercise proves correct her assertion that we are all becoming zealots in persecuting semantic transgressions. Joe Biden? George Allen? We are a community of glass-house residents; we ought to discourage stone-chunking mobs.

2. There are plenty of reasons to disown Ann Coulter. I did it long ago. But this posse, formed as a result of a singularly offensive remark, is disproportionate and cowardly. Evaluate Ann Coulter on her body of work. Dissociate yourself from her brand of politics and provocation. Bravo. But let us renounce this increasingly prevalent practice of purging veteran public figures from the body politic because of a momentary albeit egregious lapse in public etiquette.

This Open Letter to CPAC Sponsors and Organizers Regarding Ann Coulter doesn't pass the "ick" test for me. Gentleman, you will have to ride without me on this necktie party.

As the 2008 presidential campaign is now underway, we begin a series on the religion of the candidates.

Some clarifications: (1) we do not rank or recommend candidates based on religious membership; (2) we are not presuming to label candidates saved or unsaved; (3) the full task of relating a politician's religious beliefs and his/her political positions and actions is the work of biographers a generation hence. These things said, we offer some provisional thoughts on each candidate.

In a previous post I briefly raised the question whether Obama's church membership would be an issue. In summary: he belongs to a very Afro-centric congregation belonging to the liberal United Church of Christ denomination. I concluded that it would not be an issue in seeking the nomination, but probably would be in the general election.

Today, Rudy. Official biographical sketch here. TIME magazine profile.

Rudy is Roman Catholic, and earlier in his life considered the priesthood. His public comments refer to a belief in God. His private and public life, however, have estranged him from his church--he is on his third marriage; his public support of abortion rights and gay rights also stands at odds with church teaching and has led to controversy. Perhaps Giuliani is best described as a nominal Catholic.

Will this matter in the nomination process, or in a general election? Probably not. Rudy is like a lot of American Catholics, shaped by their church in significant ways, but picking and choosing which parts to abide by in private and public life.

American conservatives already can see his Law-and-Order record as mayor of New York City, his strong support of the war against militant Islam, and his transformation of the welfare culture of NYC. If conservatives believe that he will nominate and fight for the kind of judges they want, the fact that he is a nominal Catholic will not bother them. They overlooked Reagan's divorce and spotty church attendance.

With the attempt to challenge the Bush Administration's Faith-Based Initiaitive before the Supreme Court, I continue some background on the relation of government to religion in the U.S. This topic often is referred to as Church and State.

In part 1, I briefly surveyed the situation from the founding of the United States into the 20th century. Summary: by the 1830s we had a de facto Protestant establishment that was supported by the courts. Things changed in the 20th century. In part 2 I highlighted the cultural shifts that form the background for these changes. Summary: religious diversification of the population, secularization of the elites, and the expansion of the role and power of the federal government, vis-a-vis state and local governments, gradually removed court support from the de facto Protestant Establishment. In part 3 I wish to summarize specific cases that brought us to the present situation. Part 3 will take multiple posts. (There are many helpful books on these things. For specific cases I recommend a good handbook such as The Oxford Companion to the Supreme Court of the United States.) (cont. below)

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Powerline has this post today linking to Gabriel Shoenfeld's review of Henry Kissinger's third-volume of memoirs. Important reading for many reasons.

This portion of the review is worth pondering:

In the beginning, middle, and end of this episode, Kissinger shows to telling effect, the barbaric nature of the Communist Khmer Rouge was painted over in soothing tones by much of the American press. The New York Times was the most flagrant offender. In one dispatch, its correspondent Sydney Schanberg described a ranking Khmer Rouge leader as a "French-educated intellectual" who wanted nothing more than "to fight aginst feudal privileges and social inequities." A bloodbath was unlikely, Schanberg reported: "since all are Cambodians, an accomodation will be found." As the last Americans were withdrawn, another upbeat article by Schanberg appeared under the headline, "Indochina Without Americans: For Most, a Better Life." In short order, the Khmer Rouge proceeded to march nearly two million of their fellow Cambodians to their deaths in the killing fields. Also, in short order, Schanberg went on to greater glory and a Pulitzer prize.*

*Although tucking them away in a footnote, Kissinger also provides the later and second thoughts of the journalist William Shawcross, whose highly influential book, Sideshow: Kissinger, Nixon, and the Destruction of Cambodia, had placed the blame for the Cambodian tragedy squarely on the United States. Wrote a repentant Shawcross in 1994: "[T]hose of us who opposed the American war in Indochina should be extremely humble in the face of the appalling aftermath: a form of genocide in Cambodia and horrific tyranny in both Vietnam and Laos. Looking back on my own coverage for the [London] Sunday Times of the South Vietnamese war effort of 1970-75, I think I concentrated too easily on the corruption and incompetence of the South Vietnamese and their American allies, was too ignorant of the inhuman Hanoi regime, and far too willing to believe that a victory by the Communists would provide a better future."

Media writers are not necessarily smarter or more informed than their readers. In their comments and in their slanting of the news, media writers can be horribly mistaken, with tragic results. Keep that in mind when reading the New York Times on Iraq.

Much has been said about Barack Obama's clumsy chronology in crediting the 1965 "March to Freedom" in Selma with producing the interracial courtship of his parents that preceded his birth in 1961. The Obama campaign explained later that the candidate was speaking metaphorically and broadly.

However, I have not heard anyone question Hillary's description of the events of Bloody Sunday, March 7, 1965:

Now, my friends, we must never forget the blows they took. Let's never forget the dogs and the horses and the hoses that were turned on them, driving them back, treating them not as human beings (full text here).

The intro to the Newshour on PBS report tonight even went so far as to show archival footage of police dogs attacking protesters and teenagers in the park dodging high-pressure hoses.

Indeed, Bull Connor was the master of the German Shepherd attack dogs, cattle prods and fire hoses. There is only one problem. Bull Connor was the villain of Birmingham. The news footage was of Birmingham--not Selma.

Hillary and the Newshour conflated Bloody Sunday with the images from Birmingham during the spring of 1963. In March of 1965, Sheriff Jim Clark and other local and state law enforcement confronted civil rights protesters on the Edmund Pettis Bridge with tear gas and mounted police. The images of Bloody Sunday are equally gruesome and the stories are just as harrowing--but they are two distinct events.

Perhaps I am being too fastidious? Perhaps Mrs. Clinton, like Senator Obama, was speaking in larger terms, compressing events into one dramatic narrative. But, after she exerted such effort to insert herself into the Selma commemoration, one could hope that the Senator from New York could have at least made a similar effort to get her facts straight.