badlydrawnjeff: Monday Links

Jeff (

badlydrawnjeff) wrote,
@ 2008-04-28 08:10:00

Entry tags:

2008 election, barack obama, conservatism, constitution, economics, government interference, hillary clinton, history, john mccain, mccain, media, obama, politics, supreme court, taxes

Monday Links

Originally published at The International House of Bacon. You can comment here or there.

* A great interview with Antonin Scalia on 60 Minutes last night. I’m a big Scalia fan, even if I don’t agree 100% with his brand of originalism, but this interview gives a good idea as to how thoughtful he is as opposed to the public perception.

* The growing cigarette black market in Massachusetts. I’d say “what are they thinking,” but that implies there’s any serious thought going on at the state level of government in Massachusetts.

* Power Line covers another source of discomfort with me regarding McCain. It has nothing to do with him criticizing the President and everything to do with his apparent acceptance of how opponents of the right perceive the right - note to McCain: being like Teddy Roosevelt isn’t really something to embrace. In a way, it’s a decent campaign tool - use the names of revered Americans to try and counter the more insane quarters of the left when securing the center, but it’s obviously at the extent of the solid right, the ideological base that needs more solidification at this point. It’s especially infuriating when he can have that and this in the same campaign cycle.

* There’s only one word I can use to describe this post: Yes.

* Joystiq’s Mario Kart Retrospective. I haven’t played about half of these, actually.

* 10 reasons the superdelegates should pick Clinton.

* Finally, this must have been uncomfortable.

(Post a new comment)

	drewmg 2008-04-28 01:21 pm UTC (link)
	i enjoy the mario kart franchise well enough, i suppose, but it's pretty hard to deny that every iteration is pretty damned similar. i'll probably pick it up, but i doubt i'll be in a rush to do so. (Reply to this)(Thread)

	wyrrlen 2008-04-28 02:39 pm UTC (link)
	I was kind of surprised that they panned Double Dash as much as they did, seeing as how it did have the most notable differences of the iteration since 64 originally came out. But I guess not everybody liked the co-op.... (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	drewmg 2008-04-28 02:41 pm UTC (link)
	i was always under the impression that the lackluster reception for doubledash had more to do with the track selection than the co-op cart thing. most of the negative reviews i read basically just said the game played too slow, and the tracks were more boring. personally, kart DS is my favorite iteration of the franchise. (Reply to this)(Parent)

csp
2008-04-28 02:58 pm UTC (link)

I'm all for hiking cigarette taxes as high as possible. Anything that makes smoking less desirable is a good thing. I don't have a problem with MA, I have a problem with other areas that don't have high taxes.

I'm sure there are some, uh, GREAT reasons why the superdelegates should pick Hillary, but the site is blocked. Here's a reason why they shouldn't: it will destroy many people's faith in the Democratic party once and for all.

(Reply to this)(Thread)

	ken37 2008-04-28 03:55 pm UTC (link)
	I can smell what Barack is cooking. (Reply to this)(Parent)

greyseal
2008-04-28 05:37 pm UTC (link)

Um, if the government really wanted people not to smoke, they could just ban them. Cigarette taxes fund all sorts of government programs, making it so that government has a vested interest in keeping people smoking (like, say, recent efforts to increase S-CHIP funding -- ironic, isn't it?).

You shouldn't have a problem with states with low cigarette taxation, because those states have less incentive to keep people smoking. Duh.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

csp
2008-04-28 06:11 pm UTC (link)

Banning cigarettes is not politically feasable. Highly taxing them is much easier to get into law.

On one hand, yes, governments seem to have vested interests in keeping people smoking, but they don't seem to realize it, or else they wouldn't always be pushing laws that ban smoking more and more places. So, I'm for anything that makes smoking harder or more expensive for the individual smoker.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

greyseal
2008-04-28 06:29 pm UTC (link)

It's called "the law of unintended consequences," which is why less-intrusive government (read: SMALL government) is always better.

Highly taxing cigarettes is, indeed, much easier to get into law. However, high cigarette taxes are (at least not here in WA) sold to the public as punitive for the sake of suppressing smoking. They're sold as a measure to fund some government nonsense or other, that will need other avenues of funding when smoking inevitably decreases. Taxing activities you wish to suppress at punitive levels is simple legislating morality, it's just legislating the morality YOU like.

Additionally, cigarette taxes disproportionally victimize low-income earners, so the economic morality is questionable. It's like lotteries.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

csp
2008-04-28 06:40 pm UTC (link)

Right, I know all that, I just generally don't really care. Basically, I hate smoking, so I want it to hurt as much as possible. I want cigarette taxes as high as possible, and if that means less people smoke and tax revenues go down and so other taxes have to be raised, so be it. As for your last point, I don't care how much income a person has, if they smoke, they should be punished. And, yes, as we seem to go through every week, I'm a horrible person. But, this isn't a case where I'm trying to justify some policy Obama has or something - it's just my opinion, so I see no need to really defend it.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	greyseal 2008-04-28 06:45 pm UTC (link)
	I'm not asking you to defend it; you put your opinion out there in Jeff's journal to read, and I'm telling you why I think it is misguided, because I think anti-smoking zealots need a hobby. Aren't we the martyr today, Mr. Horrible Person! (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	csp 2008-04-28 07:03 pm UTC (link)
	No, I need a new job so I don't have time to sit around posting anti-smoking things here. Or some sleep. That might help, too. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	greyseal 2008-04-28 07:59 pm UTC (link)
	I used to have a job where I got paid to waste time online. It wasn't so bad, really! Now I'm ruled by the nap schedule of a 9-month-old. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	dexeron 2008-04-28 06:12 pm UTC (link)
	That Scalia interview was great. Agree or disagree with the man, you can't deny he's a brilliant guy. Even though I'm no originalist, and even when I disagree vehemently with it, I can't help but love to read what he has to say. (Reply to this)(Thread)

	paft 2008-04-29 08:12 pm UTC (link)
	Yeah, I gotta tell yah, his rationalization of torture because it's "not punishment" is pretty astounding. For sheer gall, he deserves a medal for it. That cheery smile at the end of it too -- hey, who can resist a guy like that? I bet Jules Streicher was almost as cute a big ol' teddy bear. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

dexeron
2008-04-29 09:02 pm UTC (link)

Mea Cupla. I had forgotten about that part of the interview, honestly. I agree, he came across as intentionally semantic, at best and just misleadingly dishonest at worst there. Speaking from an overly semantic point of view, yes, it's not "punishment." But it evades the question he was being asked. I don't like he used said semantics to sidestep the question of whether torture ought to be allowed, or to justify it.

That all being said, I'd hesitate in comparing Scalia with someone like Streicher. I'm not speaking about Scalia specifically, but it's all too easy to fall into the trap of vilifying one's opponents like that, and we have to be careful when throwing those sorts of labels around. I disagree morally and practically with torture as an information gathering tool - it provides inaccurate intel, and it harms the so-called "War on Terror" by justifying in the minds of our enemies their convictions that we are evil, bolstering their ability to recruit. But that doesn't mean I think that all people who feel it is sometimes justified - OR who may disagree with my definition of what is, and is not torture - are neccesarily Nazi-esque. I do think that such people are wrong, and terribly misguided when it comes to what is best for this country. I'd hesitate on calling everyone who holds those views evil though. Painting one's ideological foes as evil and morally bankrupt is a trick Conservatives use, as we all know how fundamentally dishonest and overly simplistic such tactics are.

As for Scalia, I don't know enough about him personally to paint him as some kind of Nazi, and reading his opinions doesn't really support that portrayal of him in my eyes. Reading his opinions, and based on the balance of that interview and what else I've read of him: he's somene I just happen to disagree with on almost every level, but whose opinions I can respect for their intentions, if not for their quality.

But yes, I'll admit that Scalia does deserve harsh criticism for that portion of the interview. He evaded the question by invoking technicalities, and by doing so gave implied consent to the practice. That's not enough for me to justify comparing him to someone like Streicher, but I do think he needs to answer that question - and depending on his answer, we can see if maybe such a comparison is not entirely unjustified.

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(Anonymous)
2008-04-30 03:17 pm UTC (link)

I agree that it's not a very good analogy in that Scalia seems to be intelligent. Streicher was notable mainly for his thudding mediocrity.

But I'm sorry, I don't consider torture a matter upon which rational and decent people can disagree. It certainly wasn't considered such before the Bush administration. Ten, fifteen years ago, If I had suggested to anyone that water-boarding wasn't torture, that sleep deprivation wasn't torture, that sexual humiliation wasn't torture, I"d have been rightly considered by anyone who heard me, conservative or liberal, as some sort of moral idiot. When Solzhenitsyn's favorite chapter on torture from THE GULAG ARCHIPELAGO was published in Harpers, I don't recall anyone questioning that the sleep deprivation, sexual humiliation, etc. that he described qualified as torture.

So I'm not going to chuckle along with Scalia when he utters atrocities and smiles at the camera. I'm not even going to smile back. I'm not going to act as though the merits or demerits of torture were an issue to be discussed in the manner we discuss differences of opinion about taxes, speed limits, etc.

Scalia and others like him are comparable to Nazis, Stalinists, etc in that reject the very basics of human rights. They rationalize torture, murder, secret and indefinite detention, and the brutal mistreatment of prisoners. Right and wrong in their minds is unrelated to human consequences and entirely dependent upon who is committing the wrong, and who is being victimized by it.

In that sense, the comparison is merited.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Ooops paft 2008-04-30 03:17 pm UTC (link)
	The above reply is from me. Didn't mean to post it anonymously. (Reply to this)(Parent)

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