No Contradiction

Tyler Cowen asks if there's anything new to say about Barack Obama: "I, for one, have nothing new to say about Barack Obama, even though I am exposed to more news about him than any other single person. I wish I did, but I don't."

Doesn't it seem, though, that he has nothing new to say about Obama because we're exposed to more news about Obama than about anyone else rather than it being an "even though" issue? That's about all I've got -- meta-commentary on things people are saying about not having anything new to say about Obama.

Comments

Oh, but Matt. Obama is an unknown quanitity! We in the press haven't spent hours chatting over donuts and so the PERCEPTION still remains that he is unknown. Just ask David Broder or Cohen at the Post.

Posted by David | June 25, 2008 12:33 PM

If you need something to link to about Obama, how about this?

http://tnr.com/politics/story.html?id=d4faae88-2e0b-474f-aebe-c815fd3d21e9

The New Republic

Deconstructing Barry
by Andrew Delbanco
A literary critic reads Obama.
Post Date Wednesday, July 09, 2008

Posted by David | June 25, 2008 12:35 PM

I think there is a real point here, which is that Obama has in fact been very consistent in his approach to national politics, all the way back to his speech at the 2004 convention. So in a sense he really isn't making political news very often, which is by design--he thinks he has a winning formula, and he is sticking with it.

Posted by DTM | June 25, 2008 12:35 PM

Sorry to sort of hijack the thread, but I'm wondering on your thoughts on the following: The Supreme Court decided today (Kennedy v. Louisiana) that a child rapist whose victim did not die was not eligible for the death penalty. It was the usual 5-4 split with Justice Kennedy providing the swing vote. So the question is - to the extent that this "we don't know who Obama is" Broderism meme persists, how long before Republicans claim that Obama is soft on child rapists?

Posted by south side | June 25, 2008 12:37 PM

Here's something new to say about Barack Obama. Apparently Ralph Nader thinks he's not black enough, fortunately Nader intends to personally remedy this dearth of blackness in the presidential race.
Can we use "Black" as a political orientation like "right" and "left"? And can we therefore say that Nader is running to the Black of Obama?

Posted by taricha | June 25, 2008 12:57 PM

I shudder that we have 4 Justices who do think that executing a child rapist should be legal. Are we moving backwards? Considering how many innocent people have been saved from death row, it amazes me that people still seem to be all right with the death penalty.

Posted by Sammy | June 25, 2008 12:59 PM

The MSM is apparently unaware that Senator Osama is not a native born American and hence is not eligible to be president. In fact, when the fact that his birth certificate has been forged becomes known, he may be headed to the big house instead of the White House. I'm sure that Mr. Hack can give him some survival pointers.

http://web.israelinsider.com/Articles/Politics/12939.htm

Posted by SLC | June 25, 2008 1:01 PM

SLC: as Jewish as Matt's bike.

Posted by pseudonymous in nc | June 25, 2008 1:05 PM

If that post is really from SLC, you've officially fucking lost it. Your posts now suck about as much as your religion.

Posted by FreeBenoit | June 25, 2008 1:06 PM

I shudder that we have 4 Justices who do think that executing a child rapist should be legal.

Disgusted maybe, but you're certainly not surprised, right? I mean after all, Scalia said that torturing somebody who has not been prosecuted and convicted is not cruel and unusual punishment, because torturing for information isn't punishment. (If you're tried and convicted, you essentially would have more rights protecting you from torture.)

Scalia also helped annoint Bush in the first election, accepting the very ridiculous use of equal protection, but was outraged that the Texas homosexual sodomy law was struck down. (Heterosexual sodomy was OK. No equal protection problems there, eh Tony?)

Thomas is Scalia's butt boy, so that's no shock, and we already knew that Alito and Roberts have supported virtually anything that anybody involved with law enforcement wanted, not matter how over the top.

It seems that the more pro-life somebody describes themselves, the more they support death.

Posted by LFC | June 25, 2008 1:08 PM

Sammy,
No, not surprised, you're right. Its just kind of hard to wrap the mind around at times that this country allows the death penalty. Sure, its hard to come down in support of child rapists, but the very fact that we have surely executed innocent people should be enough to disgust anyone in this country.

Posted by Sammy | June 25, 2008 1:12 PM

The post above is not me. Strange. Fine, I will now go as Samantha.

Posted by Sammy | June 25, 2008 1:14 PM

Well, Samantha, at least there aren't like 8 different people here who post with your name.

I really should start doing something to differentiate myself.

Posted by Michael | June 25, 2008 1:23 PM

Hey ... here's a novel idea. Let's not talk about Obama, but rather talk about his policies and how he plans to run his administration. Sure it's not as fun as talking about nipple-rings and rock-hard abs, but it's kind of useful in determining a President.

Posted by DanF | June 25, 2008 1:25 PM

The MSM is apparently unaware that Senator Osama is not a native born American and hence is not eligible to be president.

I feel underdressed for this discussion. It seems that I (and just about everybody else) have forgotten to wear my tin foil hat.

Hey, SLC, did you bring enough for everybody?

Posted by LFC | June 25, 2008 1:26 PM

If you're in the cocoon like MattY or Cowen, then there's nothing new to write about.

Should MattY want to break out of the cocoon, these three issues will probably be new to most, since the MSM refuses to discuss them. The reader is urged to try to ask BHO one of those and then upload his response to Youtube.

And, here's another issue the MSM won't discuss; the reader should create a follow-up or two and then ask BHO about it as well.

There's a lot more to come.

Posted by TLB | June 25, 2008 1:33 PM

Re pseudonymous in nc

North Carolina consists of wall to wall white trash. I don't know about Mr. Yglesias' bicycle but mine is definitely Italian (Colnago).

Re Free Benoit

As an atheist, I have no religion.

Re LFC

Ho, ho, ho, and need I say ha, ha, ha.

Posted by SLC | June 25, 2008 1:41 PM

Do you bleeding hearts know what that rapist did to an 8 year old girl?

When police arrived at petitioner’s home between 9:20 and 9:30 a.m., they found L. H. on her bed, wearing a T-shirt and wrapped in a bloody blanket. She was bleeding
profusely from the vaginal area. Petitioner told policehe had carried her from the yard to the bathtub and thento the bed. Consistent with this explanation, police founda thin line of blood drops in the garage on the way to the house and then up the stairs. Once in the bedroom, petitioner
had used a basin of water and a cloth to wipe blood from the victim. This later prevented medical personnelfrom collecting a reliable DNA sample.
L. H. was transported to the Children’s Hospital. An expert in pediatric forensic medicine testified that L. H.’s injuries were the most severe he had seen from a sexualassault in his four years of practice. A laceration to the left wall of the vagina had separated her cervix from the back of her vagina, causing her rectum to protrude intothe vaginal structure. Her entire perineum was torn fromthe posterior fourchette to the anus. The injuries required emergency surgery.

Why should this bastard live?

Posted by Vigilante | June 25, 2008 1:47 PM

Vigilante,
Typical response. Of course the dude deserves to die. I'm certainly not debating that a child rapist probably deserves to die. But that completely misses the point. Try again.

Posted by Samantha | June 25, 2008 1:57 PM

Samantha's logic:

"Sure, its hard to come down in support of child rapists, but the very fact that we have surely executed innocent people should be enough to disgust anyone in this country."

And your point is that because other innocent people were executed that this guilty person should not be subject to to capital punishment?

Apparently it's not that hard for you to come down in support of child rapists. Talk about typical responses.

Posted by Vigilante | June 25, 2008 2:07 PM

Re Vigilante

Mr. Vigilante is apparently unaware of the fact that child rapists and child killers are rather unpopular with the general prison population. I, for one, would greatly prefer that the gentleman in question be sentenced to life in a hard core prison and placement in the general population. Recalling what happened to Jeffery Dahmer, Albert DiSalvo, and and John Goeghan, I suspect that the gentleman in question would not be around too long and his demise would not be in any way, shape, form, or regard humane.

Posted by SLC | June 25, 2008 2:10 PM

Maureen Dowd plugs the Atlantic.

Posted by Peter K. | June 25, 2008 2:17 PM

"And your point is that because other innocent people were executed that this guilty person should not be subject to to capital punishment?"

No. My point is that this country has failed to show that they can execute people in a just or responsible manner. Therefore, they should lose the "privilege" to do so. If for no other reason, that should be sufficient. The severity of the crime has nothing to do with it. Try again.

Posted by Samantha | June 25, 2008 2:26 PM

Shorter Samantha:

We cannot execute anyone unless the system is perfect. We'll never have a perfect system. Therefore, we cannot execute anyone.

Posted by Samantha Hearts Child Rapists | June 25, 2008 2:43 PM

Shorter Samantha:

We cannot execute anyone unless the system is perfect. We'll never have a perfect system. Therefore, we cannot execute anyone.

Posted by Samantha Hearts Child Rapists | June 25, 2008 2:46 PM

Dear Mr. Hearts.

That indeed sums up the logic against capital punishment quite nicely.

Now may I invite you to shut the fuck up?

Posted by dbt | June 25, 2008 2:58 PM

Uh, yeah, that's pretty much it. Thanks.

Posted by Samantha | June 25, 2008 3:28 PM

That's Ms. Hearts to you, dbt.

And you may invite me, but no, I won't stfu because you did not say please. So rude.

Your heart bleeds for child rapists and you want them to have expansive eighth amendment protections, yet you wish to deny and suppres free expression to those who have different opinions? So inconsistent. So disappointing.

I have an idea to cheer you up and channel that hostility --maybe you can be pen pals with the child rapist, who probably needs a few friends right now. Maybe he can contemplate his expanded eighth amendment rights at the same time he contemplates his expanded sphincter.

Posted by SHCR | June 25, 2008 3:33 PM

SHCR,
I know your last post was an attempt at humor, but I was being serious for my reasons against the death penalty. I'm pretty far from a bleeding heart. I just don't have any confidence in our justice system. How easy for you to just say that anyone who doesn't think the state of LA should execute the child rapist must 'heart' the child rapist. Again, I know you're not being serious, but you also kind of sound like an idiot. Sphincter jokes? Seriously?

Posted by Samantha | June 25, 2008 3:48 PM

SHCR,
I know your last post was an attempt at humor, but I was being serious for my reasons against the death penalty. I'm pretty far from a bleeding heart. I just don't have any confidence in our justice system. How easy for you to just say that anyone who doesn't think the state of LA should execute the child rapist must 'heart' the child rapist. Again, I know you're not being serious, but you also kind of sound like an idiot. Sphincter jokes? Seriously?

Posted by Samantha | June 25, 2008 3:48 PM

And I don't apologize for the double post!

Posted by Samantha | June 25, 2008 3:51 PM

Well, Samantha, I see the world as it is. You don't think capital punishment is appropriate in any situation because we don't have a perfect system. Fine. That's not what the supreme court said. It said that executing child rapists was a violation of the 8th amendment because, in essence, the punishment does not fit the crime. I completely disagree.

But under your system, the rapist needs to go somewhere for the remainder of his days, away from children, and I presume you agree that should be prison. Prison has its own realities for child rapists, and he probably has more worries about his sphincter than before. i'd say that's cruel and unusual punishment, but it's not the state administering the retribution and his fellow travelers probably are not as worried about constitutional niceties as polite society. That is the reality of what you are advocating for him. He was the predator, and now he's the prey. Maybe he'll better understand the pain he inflicted on that innocent 8 year old girl.

So whose punishment is more cruel?

Posted by S(Doesn't Really)HCR | June 25, 2008 4:10 PM

Well, I'm also fairly disgusted at the amount of rape and sodomy that's allowed to take place in our prisons as well. Our entire justice system and penal system are complete jokes. I never said anything about cruel or unusual punishment.

Posted by Samantha | June 25, 2008 4:24 PM

"If that post is really from SLC, you've officially fucking lost it. Your posts now suck about as much as your religion."

You're late to the game. His posts have always sucked. And the fact that he denies he follows the Jewish religion just means he's not a religious bigot, he's just a straight up racial bigot.

As for crime and punishment, the posts here reflect the primate animal rage rather than any logic. Objectively, there is no advantage to anyone in using either prison or execution to treat the problem of coercive behavior.

The Transhumanist position is that only people who are so deranged as to be an immediate threat should be incarcerated. Everyone else should be "supervised" and "re-educated" to correct the psychological deficiencies that caused their criminal behavior.

And of course, the goal should be prevention rather than treatment in the first place. The Transhumanist position is that the social methods of raising, training and educating young humans is pathetic at present. We know how to correct all these problems - we just don't do it.

In a rational society, this would be done.

In the society we have, never happen.

Which is why the society we have needs to be destroyed, one way or the other.

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | June 25, 2008 6:19 PM

Re Richard Steven Hack

Mr. Hack apparently feels that he didn't deserve to be locked up for 9 years for his armed robbery of a bank. I am afraid that all the other commentors on this blog, except maybe Don Williams, who hasn't been heard from lately, would take exception to that point of view. People that stick guns in other peoples faces deserve to be locked up permanently. Mr. Hack is fortunate I was not the judge at his trial as I would have given him a life sentence. Mr. hack is not a trans-human, he is a sub-human.

Posted by SLC | June 25, 2008 7:40 PM

Cross-posted at Mr. Douthat's blog:

"The rape of a child most certainly does merit the death penalty. Several countries including liberal democracies like India and Mexico are currently consideirng reinstating the death penalty for child rape.

"As is suggested in Plato, submission to death can serve as an invaluable mechanism of repentance and atonement for the criminal. The story of the thief on the cross would tend to lend support to that claim. The purpose of the death penalty, properly understood, is redemption through suffering. Whether it reduces crime is an important side benefit but not the ultimate ground on which the death penalty is defensible. It is shameful and intolerable that fools like Anthony Kennedy want to close off that avenue of repentance and redemption so that a bunch of liberal law school professors, who probably don't believe in the story of the Cross anyway, can feel good about themselves.

"It's particularly ironic given that Dilan feels no compunction about the mass slaughter that takes place in the name of Roe vs. Wade. Apparently killing babies in the name of "women's rights to excel in the boardroom and in the bedroom" is perfectly OK, but executing pederasts in the name of justice and moral norms is not. But actually, on second thought it's perfectly explicable. It's a paradox of history and theology that since death is a necessary part of life, those who begin by hating death will end by hating life. Those people who have been the bitterest enemies of war and execution have also often been the bitterest enemies of procreation- Tolstoy is simply one case in point, as are many Buddhists and Christian heresies.

"Oh well. Screw Dilan and Anthony Kennedy. Their absurdities are simply hastening the day when the liberal order falls of its own contradictions- whether violently or peacefully- and it will be replaced by something substantially less "free" and substantially more sane and healthy."

Posted by Hector | June 25, 2008 8:02 PM

And people who threaten to apply "Hama Rules" to innocent civilians - like certain racist, fascist, imperialist, Zionist freak scum - deserve a bullet in the head - in the absence of a rational society of course.

Don't worry about me ever being on a jury of your "peers", SLC - not that Zionist scum like you have any "peers" in being assholes. I get out of jury duty by telling the judge I'm an anarchist and thus must always find for the defendant in every case.

Hector: "The purpose of the death penalty, properly understood, is redemption through suffering."

This is why Christian asshats like you should not have the vote, but should have the death penalty. We Transhumans will give Christians "redemption through suffering" - except we won't make you suffer. We'll just waste your asses quickly and efficiently. No pain. No waiting.

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | June 25, 2008 9:49 PM

Re Matthew Yglesias

It should be obvious by now that Mr. Hack, who apparently has been sending Mr. Yglesias emails as well as submitting comments of a threatening nature to this blog (most recently concerning myself and Mr. Hector) is not mentally stable. Given his previous record of violence it appears to me that he is a potentially dangerous individual. I would suggest that Mr. Yglesias get in touch with the FBI and turn over his emails and the comments he has made on this blog. What is most troubling is his apparent obsession with Mr. Yglesias as evidenced by the emails. I don't think we can assume that Mr. Hack is just another harmless loudmouth like Mr. Trevor.

Posted by SLC | June 26, 2008 8:57 AM

SLC,

Seriously, I think that would be bad. I rather suspect that Mr. Hack is on parole right now and that reporting him to the FBI would result in him being booked for a parole violation. Mr. Hack is a jackass but I don't necessarily want to see him back in Leavenworth.

Posted by Hector | June 26, 2008 1:24 PM

Re Hector

I don't think that Mr. Hack is on parole as it was abolished in the federal system a number of years ago. I agree with Mr. Hector that Mr. Hack is a Jackass. The question is, is he a dangerous jackass. Actually, I am more concerned about his sending emails to Mr. Yglesias (which I just found out about today from one of his comments) then with his not very specific threats of physical violence as they may indicate an unhealthy obsession with the latter. Given his willingness to use a loaded gun in the commission of an armed robbery, I think we have to consider the possibility that he is not only deranged but dangerously so.

Posted by SLC | June 26, 2008 6:09 PM