Treason is like a box of chocolates.

To Cable News Hosts:

Stop calling Edward Snowden a traitor. Treason is a crime defined in Article III of the U.S. Constitution and Snowden's actions have not been judged to meet that standard. While you are at it, stop defending America's "need" to illegally spy on THE ENTIRE WORLD in order to be "safe"...whatever that even means. Stop calling yourself a journalist when all you are doing is repeating the crap the political elites spout as gospel and helping to brain-scrub the masses into unwitting complicity. Stop selling out the free press so damned hard for your comfortable cable news seat. Take the member of corporate America from your lips long enough breathe the free air while it is still free, then use that breath to speak something closer to the truth of lived reality. 

 Stop hurting America.

On the Supposed Freedoms We Enjoy

So the supposedly liberal hosts of a supposedly liberal cable news show on a supposedly liberal network just finished what amounted to a near-blanket defense of the rights of the United States government to commit espionage trumping anything like transparency and privacy rights. One of the hosts did make a distinction between domestic spying on Americans and foreign espionage. I am not taking a specific stance on the Edward Snowden leaks at this time, but I will take a swing at answering the question "Who have these leaks benefited besides Edward Snowden?" that was posed by one of the hosts.

My answer as to "who benefited" is simple: the fundamental concept of free information in a free society benefited; every American benefited by the NSA being scrutinized under the rule of law we purport to cherish; the global community benefited by being brought into the loop on American activity that is antithetical to the idea of us being a fair player on the global stage.

 You know who has not benefited tremendously? One Edward Snowden. He is an exile, a fugitive, a man without a country, held at the mercy of nations with a human rights record we decry...and all this instead of the benefits he could have garnered from anonymous sale of the information. Shame on the supposedly liberal media for their supposed journalism on the actions of this supposed traitor.

Expecting anything less than functional support of the Big Brother State by commercial media was, I suppose, foolish on my part.

Civil War Part Two: This Time It's Personal

Perhaps we should just skip the sociopolitical evolution (or devolution) of the next 20 to 40 years and just set off Civil War Part II: This Time It's Personal immediately.

I'm only half-way joking.

We have a situation where there are 312 million Americans split nearly down the middle by politics and worldview, and the more I hear from both sides, the more I get the sense that neither wants to be countrymen to the other. So why keep up the charade? America is large enough to split in two. I'm not advocating sedition here, I am asking an honest question.

What is the point of an America that doesn't want half of it's citizens to vote? I say it may be time to cut the umbilical and see if the half that doesn't believe in science, government, public education, immigration and social mobility can fend for itself...

This Gerry Mander is one shady character.

So, have you heard the scoop on who is really running things over in the House of Representatives? As we all know, it's not the Speaker. No, the truth is much worse, much more insidious, and I'm afraid that the influence over the House is thoroughly unwholesome. I'm talking about that ultimate good ole boy, Gerry Mander. Do you want to know the worst part of this sad little comedy? Gerry Mander isn't even a person.

Gerrymandering is the process of redrawing electoral districts for purposes of partisan advantage. The resultant shapes can be quite convoluted, as they aren't being designed according to any natural geographic requirements, but rather strictly according to political strategy to increase leverage for certain voters and decrease it for others.

The practice is used by incumbents, as they have both the authority to change district boundaries and the motivation to do so, and generally involves a combination of two strategies - packing & cracking. Packing involves concentrating particular voters into certain districts to deny them influence in others, while cracking involves spreading the target voters out among several districts to deny them influence in particular areas.

Another nifty effect of the practice in some cases is the insulation of elected officials from the force of mainstream opinions by allowing them to remain safe in their own gerrymandered district, regardless of the opinion of the majority. We are seeing this effect operate in dramatic fashion in the House of Representatives right now, with a minority of radical Tea Party Congressman holding the entire democratic process hostage with a virtual assurance of immunity from repercussion. This situation makes it more than difficult for the compromises that are required for government to function rationally.

So as we enjoy the spectacle of the current government shutdown, as well as the daily media cycle of recrimination and accusation, and await the coming debt ceiling debacle, we should remember who we really have to thank for this most recent manifestation of the degeneration of the American Republic. After all, the most basic premise of our system is that when you lose an election, when your opponent's legislation has been vetted by two branches of government, when a law is passed...you back down. You regroup for the next election cycle. You follow the process. Anything less, and you invite the kind of lawless sentiment and eventual impetus to radical thought and action that is the stuff of history.

You know, like the Fall of the Roman Empire?

You get the government that you allow.