Well, the battle in the Senate over the immigration bill is coming down to the wire, but is it a rush to justice or a rush to injustice? According to right-wing talk radio and many cable news programs, it is the latter, and they are marshaling the troops as never before. One interesting question is this. Are dittoheads (aka Limbaugh's loyal listeners) capable of independent thought, or are they just pawns in the hands of El Rushbo? Having listened to Limbaugh's show - less and less in recent years as he has gotten shriller and shriller - my answer to that question is a qualified "the latter." I will give an example. He rails against the "drive-by liberal media", but then he will quote them with approbation when they say something he agrees with. This inconsistency doesn't seem to bother the dittoheads. Well, as Ralph Waldo Emerson said, a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.
In my opinion, at the core of the immigration mess is the fact that illegals do menial jobs that can't be outsourced -in construction, agriculture, home maintenance, etc. - and often for low wages. So employers in these areas resort to "insourcing." For citizens affected by this, it is happening not in some far away third world country, but right in their own backyards!
What do I think about this? I think we should enforce existing immigration laws and secure our southern border, before anything else happens. And let's have price supports for agricultural products. We can afford it, and the workers deserve a living wage. Our grocer won't end up having to sing "Yes, we have no bananas, we have no bananas for sale."
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Ann Coulter - Hatemonger
Excerpts from an article in today's New York Times:
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) -- Elizabeth Edwards pleaded Tuesday with Ann Coulter to ''stop the personal attacks,'' a day after the conservative commentator said she wished Edwards' husband, Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards, had been killed by terrorists.
''The things she has said over the years, not just about John but about other candidates, lowers the political dialogue at precisely the time we need to raise it,'' Edwards said by phone on MSNBC's ''Hardball'' program, where Coulter was a guest. .....
Coulter responded with a laugh and charged that Edwards was calling on her to stop speaking altogether. ''I don't think I need to be told to stop writing by Elizabeth Edwards, thank you,'' Coulter said. ....
On ABC's ''Good Morning America'' on Monday, Coulter was asked about a March speech in which she used a gay slur to refer to Edwards. ''If I'm going to say anything about John Edwards in the future, I'll just wish he had been killed in a terrorist assassination plot,'' Coulter said, picking up on remarks made by HBO's Bill Maher. Maher suggested in March that ''people wouldn't be dying needlessly'' if Vice President Dick Cheney had been killed in an insurgent attack in Afghanistan.
(end of excerpts)
There are two points worth making. First, Maher is a comedian, which I suppose cuts him some slack. Second, and more importantly, he was referring to something that had actually happened (the insurgent attack) while Cheney was visiting Afghanistan. Coulter's wish, on the other hand, was for something that has not occurred, but was merely a figment of her imagination. This is inciting and hateful. She does not deserve a seat at the media table any more then Pat Buchanan does. (See my earlier post.)
My favorite story about comedians making threats concerns Groucho Marx. When Nixon was President, and Groucho was in his 80's, he evidently said that the only alternative left was assassination. The Secret Service considered whether to bring charges against him (Arrest Groucho Marx?), but finally decided to treat his remark as a joke.
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) -- Elizabeth Edwards pleaded Tuesday with Ann Coulter to ''stop the personal attacks,'' a day after the conservative commentator said she wished Edwards' husband, Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards, had been killed by terrorists.
''The things she has said over the years, not just about John but about other candidates, lowers the political dialogue at precisely the time we need to raise it,'' Edwards said by phone on MSNBC's ''Hardball'' program, where Coulter was a guest. .....
Coulter responded with a laugh and charged that Edwards was calling on her to stop speaking altogether. ''I don't think I need to be told to stop writing by Elizabeth Edwards, thank you,'' Coulter said. ....
On ABC's ''Good Morning America'' on Monday, Coulter was asked about a March speech in which she used a gay slur to refer to Edwards. ''If I'm going to say anything about John Edwards in the future, I'll just wish he had been killed in a terrorist assassination plot,'' Coulter said, picking up on remarks made by HBO's Bill Maher. Maher suggested in March that ''people wouldn't be dying needlessly'' if Vice President Dick Cheney had been killed in an insurgent attack in Afghanistan.
(end of excerpts)
There are two points worth making. First, Maher is a comedian, which I suppose cuts him some slack. Second, and more importantly, he was referring to something that had actually happened (the insurgent attack) while Cheney was visiting Afghanistan. Coulter's wish, on the other hand, was for something that has not occurred, but was merely a figment of her imagination. This is inciting and hateful. She does not deserve a seat at the media table any more then Pat Buchanan does. (See my earlier post.)
My favorite story about comedians making threats concerns Groucho Marx. When Nixon was President, and Groucho was in his 80's, he evidently said that the only alternative left was assassination. The Secret Service considered whether to bring charges against him (Arrest Groucho Marx?), but finally decided to treat his remark as a joke.
Monday, June 4, 2007
Making Salaries Public?
There was a fairly silly Op-Ed column "Show Us the Money" in today's New York Times, arguing that it is in the public interest that salaries be made public, and giving the Supreme Court as an example. Here is a letter to the editor I sent in response.
The author seems unable to distinguish between private corporations and publicly funded entities such as the Supreme Court, where salaries are not based on merit. Now it is true that in publicly traded companies, the salaries of the top officials are public knowledge, but do we want all salaries to be public? A lot of organizations use a "grade" or "rank" system, and usually one's grade or rank is known by fellow employees. School teachers are sometimes paid by a matrix method: If you have this or that degree, and if you have worked this or that many years, then your salary is X. This is totally transparent, but based more on longevity than on merit. If it is unfair to pay two people different salaries for the same job, do we now want to add humiliation into the mix by making this fact public? There must be better and more confidential remedies for this problem.
The author seems unable to distinguish between private corporations and publicly funded entities such as the Supreme Court, where salaries are not based on merit. Now it is true that in publicly traded companies, the salaries of the top officials are public knowledge, but do we want all salaries to be public? A lot of organizations use a "grade" or "rank" system, and usually one's grade or rank is known by fellow employees. School teachers are sometimes paid by a matrix method: If you have this or that degree, and if you have worked this or that many years, then your salary is X. This is totally transparent, but based more on longevity than on merit. If it is unfair to pay two people different salaries for the same job, do we now want to add humiliation into the mix by making this fact public? There must be better and more confidential remedies for this problem.
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