Jordan Michael Smith

Why Diversity Matters

From the late 1960s well into the 1980s, much of the Left's energies focused on increasing diversity in the workplace, in the media and in the political realm. The 1972 Democratic convention's mandating quotas for minorites and women among delegates is perhaps the most salient example of this. Beginning with the late 1980s, however, a reversal started to take place, as some groups and intellectuals argued that talking about diversity (misleadingly called "identity politics") instead of economic inequality was dooming the Left to political irrelevance.

But a new study shows how short-sighted de-emphasizing diversity is, however. The Families and Work Institute interviewed 1100 companies over a ten-year period, and found that inequality are diversity are intertwined. Simply put, employers with more women and minorities in top positions are more likely to offer flexible workplaces and benefits. Caregiving leave benefits, child and elder care assistance, health care--in every area, diverse companies scored higher.

In other words, increasing diversity helps all workers, and ignoring the issue to zone in on inequality doesn't make much sense. In the end, diversity and equality are like Frank Sinatra's "Love and Marriage": You can't have one without the other.

Cross-Posted at TAPPED

Kristol Watch

William Kristol produces another fact-challenged column today. In this one he says that the California Supreme Court "made social policy from the bench" in its recent gay marriage ruling.

In 2003, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court redefined marriage in that state, helping to highlight the issues of same-sex marriage and judicial activism for the 2004 presidential campaign. Now the California court has conveniently stepped up to the plate.

Except that, as Think Progress pointed out, California Supreme Court justices aren't activists at all. They're confirmed by the public at elections and also go before voters at the end of their 12-year terms. Each of the seven judges involved in the same-sex marriage ruling was confirmed by over 65% of the vote. Details, details... 

Cross-Posted at TAPPED

Iran: The New China

Kevin Drum points out that hawks who pronounce today's Iran to be more irrational than the Soviet Union are conveniently forgetting their apocalyptic Cold War ideas. But it wasn't just the Soviets that hawks believed unstoppable. In the 1990s, they said that talking to China was leading to World War III.

"American policies these days are starting to look a lot like the kind of appeasement that eventually leads to disaster," Robert Kagan wrote in 1996. In a 2000 article titled "East Wind: The Threat That Blows From China," Mark Helprin said America's policy had been "capitulationist by action and by default. It has been cowardly, craven, and venal." When President George W. Bush apologized to China for an American plane landing without permission on an island in the South China Sea in April of 2001, the editors of the New Republic declared it a "sweet triumph for the philologists of appeasement ... one day we really will be sorry."

Since that day has not yet arrived, I think a little skepticism about a new unappeasable nation is in order.

Cross-Posted at TAPPED

More Pro-Israel Than Israel?

When House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited Syria in April of 2007, President Bush attacked her. "They are state sponsors of terrorism, of both Hezbollah and Hamas, and they support Palestinian terrorism," the White House said. "People should take a stop back and think about the message it sends and the message it sends to our allies."

Israel, however, doesn't seem as bothered by Syria's support for Hamas and Hezbollah as America is. The two countries have been talking for months and report having made significant progress.

This begs the question: If Israel is okay talking with countries that support terrorism against Israel, why isn't America okay talking with countries that support terrorism against Israel? See Gershom Gorenberg's last piece for more. 

Cross-Posted at TAPPED

Liberals and McCain

In an article on John McCain, former TAP bigwig Michael Tomasky reminds us of uncomfortable facts from McCain's run for the presidency in 1999 and 2000.

[McCain's call for national sacrifice] was something that I think many journalists and liberals and especially young people found appealing. David Foster Wallace certainly loved it, and he points out in his essay that the idea was part-and-parcel of the whole McCain package—the straight talk and the POW years conferred upon McCain a legitimacy to demand sacrifice of citizens, and his credentials made the call real and not "just one more piece of the carefully scripted bullshit that presidential candidates hand us as they go about the self-interested business of trying to become" president...McCain says he believes in the "beautiful fatalism" of noble lost causes, and he confounded reporters in 2000 by exhibiting apprehension after his New Hampshire win and relief after his South Carolina defeat. Such responses captivated many people.

Indeed, there were many liberals who liked McCain. It was not just the press and independents who fell in love with the guy. So here's the question: did liberals change, or did McCain?

I think both are true. Foreign policy was not a big issue in the 2000 election, so McCain's calls for "rogue state rollback" didn't attract a lot of attention or seem worrisome. Since then, however, we've seen the consequences of McCain's ideas in Iraq. As a result, many liberals have become much more averse to the use of force abroad. On the other hand, McCain has just abandoned his once-cherished position on a host of issues: the danger of the religious right, campaign finance reform, tax cuts, even torture. So it's only natural that liberals see McCain as something worse than a genuine conservative: they see him as a sellout. There's no denying, however, that many of us really did once have a thing for the Arizona senator.

Cross-Posted at TAPPED

The Politics of Demonization

George Packer has a long article in the current New Yorker examining the coming conservative crack-up. The GOP's success over the last 40 years is attributed to various issues and strategies: law and order, race, moral relativism, high taxation, etc. But I think Packer ignores perhaps the most crucial one: ressentiment. The Republicans perfected the art of portraying prominent liberals as representatives and causes of economic and social upheaval. Conservatism was in large part not hatred of liberalism as an ideology, but hatred of prominent liberals as people.

David Brooks, for instance, tells Packer that the conservative movement had lost steam by the mid-1990s: "The only thing that held the coalition together was hostility to government." No, the only thing that held the coalition together was hostility to the Clintons. There's a difference. After all, the impeachment, Whitewater, troopergate etc. had nothing to do with hostility to government. The Clintons were not Great Society liberals in the 1990s, but they were still portrayed by conservatives as immoral, America-hating, class-warring frauds. Likewise, John Kerry was a liar, a traitor and a fraud for his recollections about Vietnam, Al Gore was an out-of-touch hypocritical intellectual. From Ted Kennedy to George Clooney, simple liberal-hatred has played a crucial role in contemporary conservatism.

Cross-posted at TAPPED

More on McCain's Speech

When asked about his speech yesterday, John McCain says explicitly  that he was not setting a timetable for withdrawal -- he was "talking about victory." McCain said "[S]aying you are withdrawing" is "setting a date for surrender."

This should come as news to the Wall Street Journal, whose headline is "McCain Names Drawdown Date."

The No-Plan Plan

Desperate for campaign news, CNN is hyping John McCain's speech as a huge step for McCain on Iraq, as "for the first time it lays out benchmarks on which he could be judged." The LA Times agrees, saying that the senator "for the first time talk[s] about a specific date for when he envisions direct American military involvement to be over in Iraq."

But, as Robert pointed out, a cursory reading of the speech shows it has absolutely no substance. A single paragraph is devoted to Iraq and its just a fantasy of what the country will look like in five years. In McCain's world, five years from now most US troops will be home; Iraq will be stable and democratic; civil war will have been been averted; and violence will be down sharply.

There is no explanation of how McCain is going to magically transform the country. Also in the speech, McCain envisions the Taliban being nearly defeated, Osama bin Laden being captured or killed, Iran and North Korea giving up their nuclear weapons programs, Sudan allowing a multinational peacekeeping force to stop the genocide, improved public schools, "robust" economic growth in the US and a host of other dreams. It's not a speech, it's a wish list, but even Santa would have trouble delivering on it.

Cross-Posted at TAPPED

As Goes America

Torture is all over the headlines--in other countries. In England, the Ministry of Defense announced an inquiry into the death of Baha Mousa, who died from asphyxiation while in a British detention center in Basra in September 2003. The inquiry will look into the death of Mousa---who had 93 identifiable injuries when he died--as well as other civilian abuses by the British.

Up north, meanwhile, it emerged that the US gave $500,000 to the Pakistani military to apprehend Al Qaeda-linked CanadianAbdullah Khadr in 2004. Khadr was held in custody for nearly a year by the Pakistanis, where he says he was tortured repeatedly. His son, 15-year-old Omar Khadr, is still being held in Guantanamo Bay.

All of this shows that where America leads, others follow. When the U.S. tortures, allied nations follow suit. When the U.S. is cavalier in its human rights standards, other western democracies are, too. Americans should know that the soiling of justice in the land of liberty has destructive effects far beyond the shores of this country.

Cross-Posted at TAPPED

Obama on Israel

Jeffrey Goldberg conducts an interview with Barack Obama, who speaks, at least to this Jewish soul, movingly and persuasively about Israel and the Jewish experience. Among other things, Obama says the Zionist idea of wanting to return home and feeling unwanted in other countries has powerful resonance with any African-American.

It's not good enough for David Frum, though. When Obama is asked about the justice of the Zionist idea, Frum complains, it takes him "five long paragraphs--interrupted by two follow-up questions--before we get to 'yes.' That's a long time."

Heavens to Betsy, a politician who doesn't speak in sound-bite form! A presidential candidate who makes references to history and literature when making his points! Surely nothing says affection for Judaism like catch-phrases and cliches.

Cross-posted at TAPPED