McCain: It's Bad Enough He's Black—What if He Were Blond?

The latest ad from John McCain (or, as my dad calls him, "Maclaine," and I don't think he's trying to be funny):



Ask yourself this: Why use images of Britney Spears and Paris Hilton to illustrate international superstardom? Why not Brad Pitt? Why not George Clooney? Why not Will Smith? Or, if you're looking for someone with high unfavorable ratings ... Tom Cruise?

Some believe that McCain juxtaposed images of blonde women with Barack Obama to raise the threat of miscegenation—sexuality between races—in a subliminal racist scare tactic. My own analysis is that the McCain campaign wanted to evoke emptiness, stupidity, media manipulation. Hence: blonde women. Because we're, like, so vapid.

Big Circles

From an article published in 1889 titled "The Intellectual Effects of Electricity":

All men are compelled to think of all things at the same time, on imperfect information, and with too little interval for reflection. ... The constant diffusion of statements in snippets, the constant excitements of feeling unjustified by fact, the constant formation of hasty or erroneous opinions, must in the end, one would think, deteriorate the intelligence of all to whom the telegraph appeals.

Ha. I love stuff like this.

Why Bury Rove?

Why is this buried in the Metro briefs of today's DM Register?

Four protesters were arrested outside the Wakonda Country Club on Friday in Des Moines when they tried to place a citizens' arrest on former Republican strategist Karl Rove.

Retired minister the Rev. Chet Guinn, 80, was arrested for trespassing, along with three Catholic Workers -- Edward Bloomer, Kirk Brown and Mona Shaw. All four were released after being cited.

So many questions. What was Rove doing at Wakonda? Why was he in town at all? On what grounds were the protesters trying to arrest him—perhaps Rove's defiance of a congressional subpoena? What's the story behind the protesters? How does their faith influence their politics? How did they know where Rove would be? (I also love how the brief refers to him as a former Republican strategist. Um, he's still strategizing—he just doesn't work at the White House anymore.)

But instead of that juicy—and newsworthy—story about a small group of Iowans confronting one of the country's most influential people, on the front page of today's paper we get "Clown Wins Award." Seriously.

Finally!

Isn't it funny how when women leave the workforce, the know-it-all pundits say it's because they've rediscovered their true calling as mothers, but when men leave the workforce, they say it's for economic reasons?

Finally, a report indicates what most of us already knew: All that business about "security moms" seeking comfort with their homes and families after 9/11 was a bunch of crap. Here are the key graphs from a blog post by Judith Warner of the NY Times (emphasis mine):

This week, Congress issued a report, titled “Equality in Job Loss: Women are Increasingly Vulnerable to Layoffs During Recessions,” that may — if read in its entirety — finally, officially and definitively sound a death knell for the story of the Opt-Out Revolution. The report, commissioned by Congresswoman Carolyn B. Maloney of New York, states categorically that mothers are not leaving the workforce to stay home with their kids. They’re being forced out.

Women — all women, mothers or not — were hit “especially hard” hard by the recession of 2001 and the recovery-that-never-really-was, the report states. “Unlike in the recessions of the early 1980s and 1990s, during the 2001 recession, the percent of jobs lost by women often exceeded that of men in the industries hardest hit by the downturn. The lackluster recovery of the 2000s made it difficult for women to regain their jobs — women’s employment rates never returned to their pre-recession peak.”

While prior recessions tended to spare women’s jobs relative to men’s, that trend has been reversed in the current downturn, thanks in part to women’s progress in entering formerly male industries and occupations, and in part to the fact that job sectors like service and retail, which still employ disproportionate numbers of women, have suffered disproportionate losses. And this — not a calling to motherhood — accounts for the fall, starting in 2000, of women’s labor force participation rates.

Here We Go

Just as they did a Hillary Clinton sexism watch, the awesome bloggers at Shakesville are doing an Obama racism watch, where you can see stuff like this:


Seriously. What's the matter with people? I try and I try to understand this. It must be fear, right? The people who peddle this garbage are afraid of The Other, afraid of anyone who doesn't look like their cigar-smoking, back-slapping, red-meat-lovin', boys-will-be-boys uncle ... right?

I finally read What's the Matter with Kansas? this year. The author examines how Republicans get many working-class white people—who are economically disadvantaged by Republican policies—to vote against their financial interests by exploiting cultural disillusionment and fear. I just can't believe people keep falling for it.

The nation as a whole is a thousand times worse off than it was eight years ago. But rather than work collectively to solve the country's problems, these people make a T-shirt calling one party's candidate for the presidency a terrorist. Seriously. Were these people dropped on their heads as children? I really wish I understood this.

Mixed Message of the Day

I was just about to end my morning blog reading and go about my actual work when I caught this on MSN and couldn't resist a quick screen capture. Ladies, you'll learn how to emphasize your curves AND slim your hips! And look taller! In other words, MSN will teach you how to be both acceptably feminine and boyishly tall and thin. Head ... exploding ... from ... impossible ... standards ...

Coke vs. Pepsi

I have long found it discouraging that all rational discourse in this country is being reduced to consumerist dichotomies like Coke vs. Pepsi. You know, the way some people argue about which sports team is better: "The Yankees are the best." "No, the Red Sox are." "Your team sucks." "My team is awesome; your team sucks."

There's no reasoning involved; people pick an allegiance for irrational reasons and stick to it without reflection. It becomes part of their identity, as in: I'm a Yankees fan. That's who I am. Or: I'm a Republican/Democrat. That's who I am. In other words: It doesn't matter what that team says or does, whether it's winning or losing, whether it's right or wrong. It's simply a persona that people wear, and they'll defend it no matter what because nobody likes a flip-flopper and admitting to being wrong, at any point in life, is a sign of weakness.

Now it appears the Coke vs. Pepsi framework implicit in political discussion is becoming explicit. Read an article in Salon about Obama's sophisticated data-mining operation here. Grassroots effort, or consumer marketing? The lines are becoming blurred. I'm not sure what this means for future political discourse, but I can't imagine it's good.

Kyle Payne

Iowa Independent reports that Kyle Payne, 22, a former resident adviser and graduate of Buena Vista University--and self-described feminist and anti-pornography activist--pleaded guilty last week of photographing and filming a drunk, unconscious female student's breasts for his sexual gratification in 2007.

Actually, according to Iowa Independent, police reports indicate Kyle Payne physically assaulted the woman while she was passed out and taped himself doing it; police found the files on his hard drive following a tip and arrested him in February. (I need to mention that the BVU administration was totally on top of this situation and cooperated fully with police. I think they even contacted the police themselves.)

The fact that Kyle Payne got away with a guilty plea to second-degree attempted burglary and invasion of privacy shows what a joke the court system can be. But this is not really the point.

The point is what Kyle Payne says about himself on his blog:

Kyle is a social justice educator, writer, and activist. Much of his work is concerned with putting a stop to violence against women. For years Kyle has served as an advocate for survivors of sexual violence and other forms of abuse, in addition to promoting what he calls 'a more just and life-affirming culture of sexuality' through activism and education.

Jeff Fecke at Shakesville writes poignantly about how dirtbags like this screw things up for all men who call themselves feminists, dredging up the inevitable question: Can men really be feminist allies? Personally, I know they can. I'm married to one. But still, stuff like this makes me sick.

UPDATE: Said feminist-ally-hubby points out that accused people like Kyle Payne work really hard to plea down their charges so they don't have to put their names on the Sex Offender Registry. Hence the attempted-burglary charge. Again showing how the criminal justice system is often a joke. Kyle Payne is white. Would his lawyers have been so successful in getting a plea bargain if he were black or Latino? I think not.

What Comes After

Mindy McAdams has a great post here about the future of journalism. She basically says newspapers are dying, the old business model of news is broken, and if only the best minds in journalism would get together and stop debating this reality, they might come up with an online model that works.

My worry is that the best minds are leaving journalism—or at least striking out on their own, as this new Web site encourages—because their longtime employers showed them so little loyalty and regard and just messed things up generally in order to spit out unbelievable profits year after year. So my hunch is that whatever new model rises to the top won't come from one of the old giants. I don't know if newspapers will go away completely, but I do know a new business model for journalism will emerge. I just don't know where it will come from.