The Loyal Bushies' Excellent Debate Club

Ever since George W. Bush won the only vote that mattered — 5 to 4 in the Supreme Court — we’ve been told by those who support him that so many of the issues we thought were settled, aren’t.

When we were horrified at learning our government was engaged in the regular practice of torture, we were told that there’s a “debate” about what constitutes torture. So we debated.

When we demanded that our government do something about man-made global warming, we were told there’s a “debate” about whether global warming is man-made. So we debated this, too.

Now, we’re told by White House press secretary Dana Perino that there’s a “debate” about whether the vice president’s office is part of the executive branch.

At long last, instead of engaging in the so-called debate, our pundits and politicians are saying what they should have said about all along when the loyal Bushies pretended that settled information is mere hypothesis. Vice President Cheney is part of the executive branch. It says so right there in the U.S. Constitution. Go look, but don’t come back and waste our time with plans to debate about it.

These are fairly straightforward issues. If some folks insist they require debate, the reason is strategic. So long as the "debate" continues, accepted facts aren't acted upon.

STRATEGY: Insist that there's a debate about whether the globe is actually warming; or about whether the warming is man-made
RESULT: No action on this imminent global threat. Americans, instead of demanding change, get diverted into proving the false arguments false.

STRATEGY: Insist that there is a debate about whether waterboarding, stress positions, psychological torment, and other standard torture techniques in use by the U.S. government are torture.
RESULT: Instead of rallying to end torture, people are put on the defensive where first they must prove torture is torture. As long as the diversionary debate continues, so does the torture.

STRATEGY: Insisting that there’s a debate about whether the vice president is a part of the executive branch of government.
RESULT: This one isn’t working. We were supposed to get sidetracked into questioning the obvious here, too, but maybe there just aren’t as many loyal Cheney-ites as there are loyal Bushies. The result is we’re all staring at the naked vice-emperor, laughing our asses off.

But unless we reject all the phony arguments, without giving them the credence they strive for through debate, the joke is still on us.

Global warming is an imminent threat. Torture is torture. And Vice President Cheney, whatever else he is, belongs to the executive branch. For another 16 (looooooong) months, anyway.

Justice for me but not for thee

With all the ranting about tort reform that folks like the failed Bush I nominee for the Supreme Court, Robert Bork, do, you'd think they really believed that most lawsuits brought by individuals against corporations are scams. And, when they demand that the government cap punitive damages on medical malpractice and other claims, they do so with such fervor, it would be easy to assume that they are truly offended by large damage awards.

Well, now we know: Bork is offended when, say, the person whose healthy right foot is mistakenly amputated, instead of his gangrened left, gets compensation from the doctors and hospital that botched things. When it comes to compensation for his tiny bump on the head, however, the sky is no limit.

[Robert] Bork spoke at the Yale Club last year, and fell on his way to the dais, injuring his leg and bumping his head. Mr. Bork is not merely suing the club for failing to provide a set of stairs and a handrail between the floor and the dais. He has filed a suit that is so aggressive about the law that, if he had not filed it himself, we suspect he might regard it as, well, piratical.

Mr. Bork puts the actual damages for his apparently non-life-threatening injuries (after his fall, he was reportedly able to go on and deliver his speech) at “in excess of $1,000,000.” He is also claiming punitive damages. And he is demanding that the Yale Club pay his attorney’s fees.

The above would be non-news if not for the Op-Ed that Robert Bork co-authored back in 1995:

Our expensive, capricious and unpredictable civil justice systems present precisely the kind of conflicting and costly state regulation of commerce that the Commerce Clause was designed to solve. Lawsuits, verdicts, settlements and the insurance necessary to defend and indemnify against them, are driving up the cost of goods and services everywhere, and consumers are paying the bill. The litigation explosion has no respect for the state lines because commerce and insurance are now national. Interstate commerce and trade have become the principal victims of a runaway liability system.

Courts are now meccas for every conceivable unanswered grievance or perceived injury. Juries dispense lottery-like windfalls, attracting and rewarding imaginative claims and far-fetched legal theories. Today's merchant enters the marketplace with trepidation - anticipating from the civil justice system the treatment that his ancestors experienced with the Barbary pirates.

The last Sopranos episode

The web has been lit up today by reviews of the last episode of the hit HBO show. Most folks seem disappointed. I thought it proved itself as art with its "roll your own" ending, instead of wrapping up all the dangling story lines as would typical, forgettable entertainment.

It's also interesting to see how many reviewers claim it's odd for a thug to be embraced as the show's hero. I don't agree. I see Tony Soprano as sort of a cynic's everyman and his role — mob boss — as metaphor.

Tony Soprano tells his analyst that he's a good guy and believes it. He gets away with infractions that are extreme but he thinks of them the way anyone else who cuts corners here and there would think of their own infractions: the office worker who steal supplies, sneaking them out in her oversized purse; the pharmaceutical executive who hides research showing the company's latest drug is harming patients; the politician doing all the ugly things politicians do to get elected and keep power. All these people are likely pillars of their communities, too. Who's to say that, in Soprano's position, with his power, all the above would behave all that differently, seeing what they're already willing to do?

My favorite part of the last episode (don't read if you haven't seen it):

AJ's fantasies of saving the world, becoming a soldier, liaising with the civilian population in Afghanistan, and maybe going on to the CIA, are shown to be the mental meanderings of a spoiled child with no intention of doing anything, when his parents dangle a shiny new opportunity in front of him. They arrange for him to work for the porn movie producer who's branching into a better class of film (like Cleaver). And AJ, who, in theory, wants to save the world by not driving an SUV, rationalizes his new BMW by saying that there's no public transportation to the new gig.

I loved it.