mrshl | blog

Did a bit of tech support for Jordan's parents this weekend. Couldn't figure out why their computers were running so slowly, especially when surfing the Web. I checked for spyware using Search and Destroy. And the computer was clean...so then I unsintalled Norton Internet Seurity. Presto.

It was like taking a giant weight from everything the computer was doing. All that real-time internet protection was bringing the computer to a stand-still. But does that mean I leave the computer free of any protection? Hell no. You can't do that. Not with your parents' machine. Instead, I used the FREE Microsoft Security Essentials. It's much more lightweight, and it's better.

Americans are simply unaware of the fact that we’ve had 195 convictions of suspected terrorists in U.S. courts since 2001. The terrorists who bombed the World Trade Center in 1993 were tried and convicted in U.S. courts and are now locked away in a federal supermax prison. The harshest critics — the ones who are braying the loudest that the sky is going to fall and Americans are all in danger — were totally silent when terrorist suspects were brought to trial in the United States by the Bush administration. You heard no outcry from Senator McConnell or Senator Lieberman when Bush did it. That’s the very definition of hypocrisy.

I knew they had tried a few. Didn't realize the number was that high.

What's the big deal? We're not talking about Superman and Spiderman and Incredible Hulk here. We're not even talking about Ted Bundy. These people aren't supercriminals. They're just murderers. And we try murderers all the time in our court system.

And yet, our bizarre, partisan, talking-points culture means all the jackasses who formerly supported bringing terrorists to the US to stand trial must now be against it.

I've always been in favor of using our court system to try those who have committed grave crimes against our citizens. Worked pretty well against Tim McVeigh. And the dudes who bombed WTC the first time. It will work this time. Assuming we haven't fatally compromised all the evidence with torture.

It seems all too easy to paint Heene as the crazed villain. But truth: it's stranger than fiction. In this case, it's the story of a guy with a dream that's become too common: quickfire fame, notoriety, a reality television show. Heene had tasted that nasty once-forbidden fruit of easy notoriety on Wife Swap. Twice. And the Heene family didn't look great then, either: Heene was a father with a short temper who couldn't discipline his kids. He was eccentric and a guy of questionable stability, but when you score it with music, sound effects, and frame it between commercials, it looks a lot less harmless than it actually is. We want to think all reality television is edited down to make some of these people look like more exaggerated characters than they are. In some cases, that's absolutely the case. In the case of shows like Wife Swap, it isn't.

Last night, at a bar — where all good points are made — someone put it out there: If this guy loved his wife, would he have swapped her on TV? Nobody can speak for Richard Heene, but you know: this thing goes deep into murky waters, to say the least. Here's a guy who wanted fame so badly, he'd make America think his kid was on a balloon. He was okay with the perception — even if it was just for a moment — that he'd somehow neglected to keep his kid from floating away. I don't have kids, just parents. And if I thought they felt that way for a second, I'd probably hate them for a very, very long time.

This thoughtful essay (from Gawker!) hints at the right answer. If you loved your family you wouldn't put them on TV.

I guess I'd go a little further. If we loved ourselves, we wouldn't watch this crap. Still, people sort of half-heartedly defend their favorite shows. "Yes, Super Nanny/Jon and Kate is terrible, but [American Idol, Survivor, Amazing Race, Big Brother] is okay because _____." As a huge fan of Project Runway, I do this myself.

And maybe there is a principled line to be drawn (e.g., avoiding shows where jackass parents exploit their kids for money). But on some level, the constant meta-ness of reality television, whatever its possible virtues, is creating a shameful cultural legacy.

My parents enjoyed 12 seasons of M*A*S*H. We're handing our kids nearly 20 seasons of Survivor and 23 seasons of The Real World.

At least we'll always have Springfield.

An eloquent mixture of parody-fueled exaggeration and ad hominem attacks tells us what they're against, but there's very little indication of what they're for.

I get the Beck-ian narrative, which argues that neither party can satisfy the voter who truly desires liberty and limited government. In part, this is a nifty rhetorical spring enabling conservatives to escape Bush's wretched legacy of individual rights, nation-building wars, and unchecked spending.

But of course, while most conservatives cheered on Bush without reservation, there are a few people (I would include myself) who genuinely feel there's not a party that matches up well with what I would call a moderate/faux libertarianism. Which is to say, I WOULD like to see a genuine small-government, belt-tightening approach to the problems we're facing (although genuine belt-tightening would initially have to involve raising taxes to pay debt—cuts alone can't do it).

If that's what these tea-baggers were advocating, I'd be all for it. But I'm not sure what they're advocating, because they aren't saying. And neither are Republicans. No policy proposals. No grand plans. Just 100% anti-Obama/anti-Pelosi. Why do I think that angle will fail? It's awfully similar to John Kerry's I'm-not-Bush message.

Not being Obama isn't going to be enough to win. Especially, when, as was the case with Bush after his first term, there are clear advantages to being a charismatic, popular president who hasn't yet had a full 8 years to fail.

Right now, it's a lot of fun to throw tomatos at the President. But eventually, Fox News Nation is going to have to select a champion, and it's going to be awfully hard to find someone who can appease the tea partiers without sounding too crazy for the general electorate.

McArdle doesn't offer any solutions, but she does a very persuasive job explaining how political and cultural factors unique to the United States prevent us from enjoying the more cost-effective healthcare systems we see overseas.

To people who say, "yes we can" she offers a depressing retort: Then why are costs exploding in Medicare and in Massachusetts? The answer has much to do with those structural factors she mentions at the beginning of her post.

If you support healthcare reform, as I do, this is sobering food for thought.

This video actually caught my attention because it echoed exactly the advice I had given a conservative friend of mine who emailed me the other day. He told me that as a small business owner, he's genuinely concerned about Obama expanding the size of government, the enormous cost of healthcare reform, and his general tilt toward higher taxes.

Here's what I said in response:

Nothing. Is. Happening. Right. Now. At. All.

There's a lot more talking than action. When Obama is actually able to get something through Congress, then we'll have something to talk about. Until then, it's just so much Fox News and Drudge Report speculating about the apocalypse.

If the Republicans would just stop whining and start campaigning with actual proposals and ideas, they'd win back congress easily. Because the Democratic congress is weak and fractured. Instead, they're coming dangerously close to aligning themselves with a very small minority of racist whackos. Which, I'd argue makes it much less likely they'll actually be able to pursue the growth-oriented, limited government policies they claim to support (I say claim because there were very few tea parties under Bush, who was a pretty big spender himself).

They're doing the same thing they did against Clinton (and the lefties did against Bush) they're becoming so unhinged with hatred that they appear kooky to the average voter. It's a bad strategy that will strengthen rather than weaken Obama.

I'll be glad to talk with you at greater length about all this stuff. But really, apart from the various bailouts and the Iraq/Afghanistan wars, Obama hasn't actually done anything yet. When he does, I will talk about whether I agree with what he did.

So basically, I agreed 100% with SNL's sketch. It's one of the most insightful things I've seen them do.