Using Holocaust Analogies Appropriately - Yes it CAN be done!

The Holocaust remains one of History's greatest lessons about propaganda and the manipulation of people for political goals. It CAN be used without calling someone a Nazi and without people always thinking they are being called Nazi's.

This past week, Representative Steve Cohen (D-Tenn) has been blasted all over the bloggosphere and the cable news networks. From both the right and the left, there is a strange consensus that his comparison of Republican distortions about Health Care Reform to the technique used by Nazi's called "The Big Lie." This technique of course, is that if one repeats a lie or distortion over and over again, with full conviction, it may eventually be believed and become "truth." It is a similar theme to what you may remember in George Orwell's book 1984 where history books were changed routinely according to the political leanings of the state. Truth was what they wanted you to believe - not actual truth.

Even Jon Stewart in this episode of the Daily Show (click HERE) takes Cohen to task. Stewart has been extremely articulate in calling people out for playing the "Nazi Card" in inappropriate situations. Rachel Maddow went even further in stating that the Holocaust should never be used as a comparison. She took Stewart's "Only Nazi's are Nazi's" comment a step further and expressed that it is actually morally wrong to compare anyone to what the Nazi's did.

In this situation, and in this over-reaching by Maddow, I must reject this version of the argument. Stewart and Maddow are basically right. Far too many analogies to Nazi's are thrown around these days - and mostly by the right in describing liberal figures they think will lead us down a path toward totalitarianism or communism. In this case however, Steve Cohen was doing the opposite. He was using the APPROPRIATE lessons of the Holocaust to try to prevent a very similar repeating of its style, approach, and goals. He may not have done it as articulately as he could have. (He could have for example said explicitly that he was not calling anyone a Nazi, but that he was using the Holocaust as a lens to view an important lesson - something History classes do every year.)

Yes - the "Big Lie" as he presented it, is the way Nazi's and numerous political movements have tried to shape the political debate their way. There have been few political issues in our lifetimes that have been as warped as the Health Reform movement has been. And this particular effort has a few too many similarities to more nefarious efforts (rather than just politicians making arguments in the press). This effort was driven be calculated businessmen, lobbyists, politicians, and pundits and has changed what should be an important debate to a South Park like temper tantrum where people get all the facts wrong, get their opinion from the repetitious pounding of talking heads, and do the bidding of others who have interests clearly opposite from theirs. If this does not deserve at least a quick mention of how the most stark example in History also used, demonization, disinformation, and eventually violence to get its way - then I don't know what does.

The Holocaust remains one of History's greatest lessons about propaganda and the manipulation of people for political goals. It CAN be used without calling someone a Nazi and without people always thinking they are being called Nazi's.

Let's not run too far away from the the use of the Holocaust as a lesson for fear that we forget its lessons entirely. Lets not dismiss its use for fear that those using similar propaganda tools prevail in turning our eyes from their damning connection to the same demonization and fear mongering central to the success that most vial of political movements.

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"It's a Wonderful Life": Underneath the Warm Fuzzies, A Tale of Greed and a Troubled America

In this timely piece by Rich Cohen on Salon.com, '"It's a Wonderful Life": The most terrifying movie ever,' we are given an appropriate dose of reality this holiday season.

His subtitle hits the mark hard by saying, "Underneath the warm fuzzies, Frank Capra's holiday classic is a tale of hunger, greed and a troubled America."

It may be a bit hyperbolic to claim that "It's a Wonderful Life", one of my favorite movies of all time, is 'The most terrifying movie ever.' But it is by no means an exaggeration to say that the main story line in the movie - sans the Angel coming down from heaven - is a very stark "Grapes of Wrath" analysis of what's wrong with the American economic system. At its heart, the story is about a man who had some obstacles in his life, and despite doing an enviable job to raise a family and run a business on a modest income, saw fate step in to toss his "just getting by" success story into an all to common story of crisis, failure, and maddening powerlessness.

In the movie, George Bailey entrusts his weekly deposit to an absent minded employee (his uncle). Without any malice, the uncle misplaces the deposit. So on one level, George, through an amazingly harsh twist of fate (like a Tsunami, Hurricane, Tornado, or lets say a crash to the economic system) was now not only in severe debt, but at risk of going to jail and losing his family and his freedom.

And now we bring ourselves into the present to reflect on just HOW MANY people in this country find themselves in predicaments just like this - predicaments NOT OF THEIR OWN DOING. We throw around words these days like responsibility and phrases like "the jobs are there if people want them" - without ANY conception of what we are talking about. There but for the grace of god folks. Anyone who is judging others in this economy; anyone who claims they KNOW how many months of unemployment insurance is TOO much, well they can just go to hell. It's infuriating and revealing of how little people with money know about the world of people without much.

I'd like to think that when the Democrats took the House and Senate and Presidency in 2008 it was because of how many people voted who do have a clue about such things. I'd also like to think that the reason Democrats lost the House this time around is because most of the people who voted were people who have no clue about "how the other half lives." (Although Jacob Riis would probably have to change the title of his book today to how the other 3/4 live)

As we head back to the movie, we can also look at the Mr. Potter character in the story who had money from the start, and made even more in the "alternative reality" where George Bailey wasn't looking out for the poor and middling income folks giving them a "fair" deal on land and a future. According to the story, one could say, runaway capitalism gave people less and asked for more. A more fair capitalism, one where squeezing the most money out of an opportunity was not the goal, gave more people more, and yes got less profit for the "Savings and Loan" business that George ran.

The is an additional irony of course, in that had George Bailey gouged his tenants and gave them less for their money as Mr. Potter would have, the story would have been completely different. George's uncle would have misplaced the deposit, but George would have had PLENTY of money in the bank to cover it. So when people say to me that concepts like "fairness" are socialist or anti-capitalist and that "redistribution" of wealth is what you call a progressive tax system, I say HELL YEAH. If we know that on a daily basis we cannot entrust business to look out for the consumer as much as he does for the investor, we know there is a system in place that continually - and perpetually - rewards those who have money with more money. DO PEOPLE NOT GET THAT THE UNITED STATES ECONOMY IS ONLY ONE STEP REMOVED FROM BEING VEGAS IN MACROCOSM? The system is rigged and the HOUSE ALWAYS WINS!

Think about it. In this latest crisis (yes we're now back in the real world) it was the pure greed of those who knew the housing bubble was about to burst that sent our economy reeling. Lets be clear, it was NOT the natural downturn in the housing market that caused this. It was the accelerated selling of mortgages by those who KNEW the window was closing on the golden goose that caused this crash. For those who want to accuse the government and blame those who could not afford the mortgages for this crisis - tell them to go to hell too. When everyone has a TV or computer you have to come up with a new innovation right? Well everyone that could reasonably afford houses had houses and so when the bankers who had bet a ton on this housing market began to see returns and profits slow, they ORDERED new products to be rolled out. Those new products were the riskier mortgages to those who had less collateral.

Follow me here. The bankers NEEDED the continued infusion of cash that the down payments at least would give them. Bank A provides down payment (loan to buyer) to the property owner (bank B). Bank B has all it needs and sells rights to property/mortgage to unwitting rube bank C. New owner of the mortgage is thrilled to get in on the housing boom (that it doesn't know is about to end) but guess what, once ALL of these ill advised loans start struggling to be paid back (and there were a ton) the banking system, which was heavily invested in the returns on these loans starts to fail like dominoes. And as we all know, a ton of these mid level banks failed (or were bought at a premium by larger banks) but the big guys were bailed out by the government. And you know what, they HAD to be bailed out. They had it made in the shade. Had we let them fail, we go into MEGA DEPRESSION of the ages.

Did you see the picture I just painted. Large banks not impacted as much by the crisis (the George Bailey who had been gauging his tenants all along -or Mr. Potter) were not only in a position to by smaller banks at a premium, but the really large banks put a gun to the head of the government for loans and have since made out like bandits. The system folks - its a wonderful thing.

So all those people who had a personal business and didn't lose it, and all those with a good nest egg in the bank, how dare you claim you know what the real George Baileys are going through. The real George Bailey, the one with no Angel to step in, was driven mad by the prospect of his life being boiled down to his business ledger and a system he had tried to fight against but work within his whole life. Lets be clear, it is not often that allegations of wrongdoing and extramarital affairs (yes a real part of the story) get wiped away by a party fundraiser. Maybe it would have paid the legal bills. But there is no way in hell the police come in the room, have some egg nogg - and throw the arrest warrant away (yes another part of the story.)

SO as we focus on the positives on this Christmas day, lets remember what this Christmas classic was really about. It was about the little guy getting beaten down by big business and bad luck and how that doesn't actually have to be the end of the story. But of course that was the Hollywood message that makes us want to watch the movie. The Hollywood message that should make us think and watch the movie is that WE have to BE the CHANGE we want to see on the big screen. Angels do not come down to save us, parties don't make dept and arrest warrants disappear.

No man is alone who has friends, yes. But the community of "friends" in the story is the people. If you look deeper at that meaning - and then go ahead and actually watch "The Grapes of Wrath" afterward, you will see that government, society, and a kinder gentler capitalism are all what is really needed for George Bailey to spend Christmas with his family, not in debt, not in jail, and not the villain that unrestrained capitalism clearly is at the end.

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Two halves leave a hole - The Boston Globe

Two halves leave a hole - The Boston Globe

A fairly balanced analysis of Patrick and Baker - both the good and the bad. Refreshing since each side has reduced the election to "higher taxes" vs. "lower taxes". Truth be told, Patrick has lost direction and Baker has shown no signs he is willing to take risks to protect those most vulnerable in our society. Kin...d of a "cliff notes" version for every election this November.

A candidate named Patrick Baker would run away with this governor’s race.

Please don’t get me wrong. It’s not that both candidates, Deval Patrick and Charlie Baker, are so good that it’s tough to pick between the two. It’s not that both are so bad, either. It’s that each candidate carries into this race roughly half the package to be a truly great governor during tumultuous economic times. In this unusual race, what one candidate lacks, the other has.

But together, there are endless possibilities. Patrick Baker would be both decisive and empathetic. Patrick Baker would be forceful but not angry. Patrick Baker would be as polite as he is firm.

Patrick Baker would try novel approaches while always understanding the plight of those in need.

I was considering this as Reilly, a retired state attorney general I happen to admire, was telling me why he was crossing party lines and supporting Baker.

He had just said his piece at the podium about Baker’s good work turning around Harvard Pilgrim when, in private, he added: “Do I believe in everything he does? No, I don’t. But if he tells you he’s going to do something, he will.’’

Which is what bothers me, given Baker’s proposals to axe 5,000 state workers in this miserable economy and roll the state income, corporate, and sales taxes back to 5 percent, creating a further $2.5 billion deficit in a budget held together with masking tape and paper clips.

Baker is bold. Baker is decisive. Baker is an innovator. He speaks often about the difficult decisions he pushed in the Weld and Cellucci administrations and made as the CEO of Harvard Pilgrim.

But there’s an essential truth that needs to be considered carefully: All those tough decisions never actually affect people like him. As for the people they do affect, Baker has shown no particular facility or desire to understand them.

In short, in Baker, we get someone steeped in action, but in need of more compassion.

Counter this with Patrick, possibly the most empathetic politician I’ve ever covered. He came up through the ghetto of Chicago, took every possible advantage of programs designed to give people a boost, and understands in his bones what it means to be someone in need.

His problem, though, is the relatively low metabolism of too much of his governorship. He floundered through a freshman year of controversy over office decorations and cars and an ill-advised call on behalf of a mortgage giant. Then he accepted a book deal. He pushed casinos, twice, with nothing to show for it. He muddied himself in a patronage play that made him look like the hacks he used to criticize.

In the last 18 months or so, he’s achieved an impressive roster of reforms — of state ethics, pensions, transportation agencies, and especially education. At the same time, he has surgically cut the state budget with an eye toward preserving services for the people who most need them. He has taken the politically untenable stance of pushing for tax hikes to pay for the things he believes in.

In short, in Patrick, we have gotten an uncommonly thoughtful leader, but not a bold, glass-breaking innovator.

In Patrick Baker, we would get both. Yes, I understand that the two will never become one. But the point is, it’s the candidate that ranges beyond his comfort zone in the final two weeks and learns from his opponent that will win this race.

Baker needs to be more empathetic and thoughtful rather than strident and clinical, to demonstrate an understanding that his actions will have real consequences on real people. And Patrick needs to raise the temperature and pound the podium not only on what he’s done, but the innovative things he wants to do.

Patrick Baker may be a myth, but it’s also a goal.

A User's Guide for Responding to Anti-Tax, Faux Populists

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"What Do We Mean When We Say We Hate Taxes" is an excellent piece on our irrational attitude toward taxes - and our vulnerability to manipulation by some well meaning, and some not so well meaning folks on the right.

One of the best aspects of the article is they way in which it provides almost a blueprint of what to emphasize around our dinner tables, with our friends, and among our colleagues - in short that "this is a .... country that expects to be left alone while at the same time expecting a certain level of services."

It is during hard times like these that most people forget about those services - both on a personal and an abstract level. Much like the gentleman who absurdly stated that he wanted the government's hands of his medicare, it always amazes me how many people who are DIRECTLY benefited by services, never reflect on that hypocrisy.

As Pierce writes, "Quite simply, if you love [or need] a particular government service - that your bridges are repaired, for example, or you emergency calls answered - you ought to love [or at least appreciate] the taxes that pay for it. Yet, that is rarely the case."

When there was a fledgling movement in Massachusetts to eliminate the income tax, it was defeated largely because most people understood this - on a private, practical level. Yet, when it comes to electing or supporting people who would move us in that same direction (some programs cut, just not all) we jump at the chance to voice our anger. Yet, philosophically, the votes would seem incongruous. As Stephen Crawford goes on to explain in the article about defeating the above mentioned initiative, "What I found surprising ... was the other side's refusal to identify a single thing they would cut. One person's cut is another person's benefit."

Pierce also includes comments from Barney Frank who also puts the situation in excellent perspective. “Taxes” are viewed by many as “my money going to things or people of which I disapprove,” which makes any political appeal in favor of raising them, even for the purpose of funding people and things of which you might approve, a dodgy matter at best. Navigating that predicament is so tricky that, over the past 30 years or so, many politicians -- most notably conservative ones in Washington -- have simply declined to do so at all, relying on former vice president Dick Cheney’s now-famous dictum that Ronald Reagan “proved deficits don’t matter." Frank expresses correctly that "The problem is that government got so unpopular in the last few years that the anti-tax side has an easy out, they don’t have to argue that we have to cut services anymore.”

In my own debates with people on the "cut" side of the argument, I have also found this to be true. They don't ever have to give any detail about cuts. The routine responses are all straw men: "Come on, can you honestly say you don't think government is too bloated." or "You don't think they can't find areas to cut that are clearly wasteful?" They all think there is this imaginary pie of "wasteful" spending that would be the only thing effected. And you know what ... people are buying it hook line and sinker.

A similar problem exists when people think they know how much things are "suppose" to cost. Schools are a perfect example. Using percentages and big numbers, the assumption has already been sold that too much money is spent on education or schools and that they are failing despite the money spent. For the most part, outside of struggling inner city or rural schools, most schools do an excellent job with the situation they are placed in. No one wants to talk about how schools are doing more in 2010 than anyone ever envisioned under the current funding structure or that more money is spent on special "services" for students than on the average student who simply comes to school, goes to class, plays a sport and does their homework. Ahh - but there is that magic word again. Schools provide incredible "services" that no one would want cut for "their" child but that in the abstract - everyone IS ACTUALLY ASKING FOR IT TO BE CUT when they vote down prop 2 1/2 overrides.

Schools should be cathedrals. They should be the thing we spend the most on and be proud of it. I think Newton should spend an exorbitant amount on a school and set a standard that all schools in Massachusetts want to emulate. How about that thought - a race to build the best schools - and with it - a "profit sharing" arrangement like they have in major league baseball so the poorer "markets" can be supported in some way by the more affluent who have more money than they seem to know what to do with. (how socialist of baseball - oh my)

But the culture of indignance to taxes and indifference to what that really means is with us and goes over the top in tough economic times. The faux populists find more receptive audiences for their messages these days, but that is not new. But what would be new is if knowledgeable, influential people actually used articles like this to turn the tide.

Even just using this section on the "Death Tax" would be a great first step to bring up at the water cooler or at the coffee shop ...

"Calling it the “death tax” gave its opponents a huge advantage in perception. Through this, and through taking advantage of the revamped terrain on which any discussion of taxes now must take place, the people seeking the elimination of the estate tax -- and, one can fairly conclude, the concept of progressive taxation generally -- have managed to make allies out of people whose estates never had a chance of being taxed at all.

In Death by a Thousand Cuts: The Fight Over Taxing Inherited Wealth, their 2005 book about the political battle over the estate tax, Michael Graetz, a Yale professor who worked for the Treasury Department in the first administration of George W. Bush, and Ian Shapiro, also a Yale professor, tell the story of Chester Thigpen, an elderly Mississippi tree farmer who testified before Congress in favor of repealing the tax despite the fact that his estate was too small to be taxed.

“My father recently died,” recalls Elizabeth Warren, a Harvard Law professor and the chairwoman of the Congressional Oversight Panel monitoring the Troubled Asset Relief Program, which bailed out banks at the expense of (yes) the taxpayer. “He worked all of his life, and at the end of the day he had a modest home that was paid off, Social Security, and a few bucks in the bank, and he was worried about paying ‘death taxes.’ That man would have had to make 100 times more than he’d made, he was so far away from ever paying a dollar of the so-called ‘death tax.’

There was something heartbreaking about it. Where should his interests have aligned? Toward a much more populist notion of a progressive tax structure. He saw his interests in avoiding ‘death taxes.’ It broke my heart.”The battle over the estate tax -- which is ongoing in Washington -- is a nearly perfect prism through which to look at the consistently problematic view Americans have of the concept of taxes.

Ultimately, no matter which side of the political aisle you find yourself on, taxes are a public demonstration of the kind of political commonwealth we desire for ourselves. And there is a terrible price to be paid for believing that we can get something for nothing. The way we look at taxes is the way we look at ourselves, even if we choose to look away."



Full article and link below...


Our Love-Hate Relationship With Taxes
The fight over taxes -- in Massachusetts and across the country -- is as furious as ever. But what is the battle really about?

Charles Pierce - Boston Globe Magazine - February 7, 2010


It’s hard not to wonder about them, as they drive north to New Hampshire, blinded by plasma screens and home furnishings. As we are all painfully aware, Massachusetts -- “Taxachusetts” to political consultants and other public people on the dodge -- raised its sales tax to 6.25 percent back in May. This sent folks scattering northward, at $2.75 a gallon or more, mind you. People even told reporters that they were going to New Hampshire to shop for groceries, which are not taxed at all in Massachusetts, and apparel, which is not taxed here either until the purchase goes above $175. Nevertheless, they heard all the radio commercials asking them to come shop in “tax-free” New Hampshire, and they were on the road before they knew it. They were running away from ghosts.

Put simply, this state is fairly average when it comes to taxing its citizens. According to data from the Tax Foundation, a nonpartisan tax research group in Washington, D.C., the state and local tax burden in Massachusetts is 9.5 percent, 0.2 points below the national average, placing Massachusetts 23d among the 50 states. The personal income tax system is the 29th highest. On the other hand, the data show that the state’s corporate tax structure ranks it fourth among those states that have corporate income taxes, and property taxes here are the eighth highest in the country. In short, by any empirical measure, calling this state “Taxachusetts” in 2010 is no more accurate than calling it “Massachusetts Bay.”

“That’s been the case since 1991,” says one veteran analyst who declined to be identified and who worked on the state’s tax structure under both Republican and Democratic administrations. “There’ve been about 50 tax reductions enacted by governors and the Legislature since then.”
Nevertheless, the cars still drive north, and the arguments continue, exacerbated over the past year by the national economic downturn and the angry, inchoate populist politics that resulted from both the downturn itself and the occasionally erratic attempts to solve it. The arguments were most clearly evident in the upset victory of Republican and former state senator Scott Brown in the race to replace the late US senator Ted Kennedy. Brown ran on the vague, but eminently salable, notion that he would lower our taxes, even though, as the member of a legislative minority with the least seniority, what he could actually do about them remained unclear. Indeed, some interviews with voters prior to the election led one to believe that people voted for Brown because he would somehow reduce all their taxes, state and federal.
However, we can be ambivalent about taxes. In Dedham last month, voters passed property tax hikes totaling more than $15 million and earmarked for a new elementary school and improvements to another school. At the same time, the town gave 55 percent of its vote to tax-cutting Brown. If nothing else, the results prove that, on a local level, if a proposal to raise taxes is tightly drawn as to the purpose of the increase, it has a better chance of succeeding, even amidst a seismic event elsewhere on the ballot.

More clearly than ever, the issue of taxes must be seen as something far beyond pure economics, and well beyond simple dollars and sense. Taxes have become the way we define ourselves as a political commonwealth, or a way of determining whether we still see ourselves as such at all. There’s a strong -- and occasionally successful -- school of political thought that sees very little in government or in society that belongs to us all. “Right now,” says Robert Borosage, the president of the Institute for America’s Future, a nonpartisan research and education center in Washington, D.C., “when you say ‘taxes,’ it’s a substitute for government, and in some contexts that means Big Government, which is oppressive, and taxes represent the intrusion of Big Government into our lives.”

Of course, as with so many things in our politics, in the discussion of what taxes represent, inexactitude is everybody’s friend. Last summer, when the Tea Party movement hit high tide, there was some very loose and unformed talk about keeping the hands of “government” off people’s Medicare. This is a state -- and beyond it, a country -- that expects to be left alone while simultaneously expecting a certain level of service from its government. One that expects, in the words of its founding document, to provide for the common defense and promote the general welfare, but to do it, at best, on the cheap. Quite simply, if you love a particular government service -- that your bridges are repaired, for example, or your emergency calls answered -- you ought to love the taxes that pay for it. That, however, is rarely the case.
“What I found surprising during our debate,” explains Stephen Crawford, the Arlington-based public relations executive hired as the spokesman for the successful opposition in 2008 to a ballot question that would have eliminated the state income tax, “was the other side’s refusal to identify a single thing they would cut. One person’s cut is another person’s benefit. That’s why we were successful.”

The drive to repeal the income tax was led by perennial libertarian candidate for everything Carla Howell of Wayland. Her next project takes aim at the state sales tax: This November, Massachusetts voters will likely see a proposal on the ballot that would slash it to 3 percent.
“Taxes” are viewed by many as “my money going to things or people of which I disapprove,” which makes any political appeal in favor of raising them, even for the purpose of funding people and things of which you might approve, a dodgy matter at best. Navigating that predicament is so tricky that, over the past 30 years or so, many politicians -- most notably conservative ones in Washington -- have simply declined to do so at all, relying on former vice president Dick Cheney’s now-famous dictum that Ronald Reagan “proved deficits don’t matter.”

“The problem is that government got so unpopular in the last few years that the anti-tax side has an easy out,” says US Representative Barney Frank, the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee. “They don’t have to argue that we have to cut services anymore.”

Part of that is the thrall that the theories of supply-side economics have held over Republican leaders through the years of conservative ascendancy that began with the election of Reagan in 1980. Much of supply-side theory holds that lower taxes eventually translate to higher government revenues. Over the years, this morphed into a kind of reflexive and general anti-tax fervor so pronounced that Jonathan Chait, a reliably centrist senior editor at The New Republic, wrote a book in which he called supply-siders, among other things, “sheer loons.” Even so, they succeeded so well politically that the entire national debate on taxes changed and, with it, the way we looked at ourselves as a self-governing people with certain institutions and values that we hold in common. Right about the time Reagan brought the theory into the federal government a similar thing was happening in Massachusetts, and, unlike in Washington, it was happening from the ground up.

Thirty years ago, she was a noisy voice from the sidelines, a bleacher-creature heckler in Massachusetts politics. She was loud and raucous and far too easily dismissed by people in the state’s political establishment who should have felt the ground shifting beneath their feet, but who had been standing in the same place so long that their legs had gone numb. She was pounding away on the subject of taxes -- not merely on how much they cost, but on what they had come to represent -- in the same relentless catechism with which William Lloyd Garrison once blessed himself here: She was in earnest; she would not equivocate; she would not excuse; she would not retreat a single inch. And, Lord knows, she would be heard. In this, Barbara Anderson probably has affected Massachusetts politics more than anyone ever has who’s never been elected to anything.

“To me,” she says, “taxes have never been about the money. It’s been about power and who’s in charge and who’s in control.” A native of western Pennsylvania, where her parents ran a hardware store, the former Barbara Hervatin enrolled in the DuBois campus of Penn State, where friends introduced her to the work of Ayn Rand. By 1980 and two husbands later, she found herself here, working as the executive director of Citizens for Limited Taxation. CLT was six years old then, a creature of the state’s lively, if powerless, conservative libertarian political subculture. (At the time, the national headquarters of the John Birch Society was tucked into the leafy streets of Belmont, across from the public library.) By the time Anderson took over from Greg Hyatt -- who, in 1986, would become briefly notorious for abandoning his gubernatorial campaign when he was said to have been spotted naked in his office -- CLT was struggling and nearly broke. But it had been paying attention to what had been going on in California, where in 1978 a tax revolt led by a man named Howard Jarvis had resulted in an amendment to the state constitution severely limiting property taxes. In 1979, CLT launched an initiative petition in Massachusetts called Proposition 2½ that would limit a municipality’s total annual property tax revenues to 2½ percent of the assessed value of all the municipality’s property and would cap a municipality’s ability to raise its property taxes at that same 2½ percent. It also would reduce the excise tax on automobiles.

At the same time, a court decision in Massachusetts had stopped the practice of taxing businesses more and more and had forced a shift in the property tax from industrial property to residential property. “Prop. 2½ really was a money problem back then,” Anderson recalls. “People were generally angry about the concept that we had gotten sales taxes, income taxes, and the Lottery on promises to lower the property taxes, and it didn’t happen. People saw that they had to do it themselves.”

The campaign for Proposition 2½ wasn’t entirely a people’s crusade. The Massachusetts High-Tech Council, furious at the state Legislature for ignoring a milder tax-limitation amendment in July 1980, threw itself and its money behind the CLT’s ballot question. Anderson, however, was the public face of the campaign. She was uncompromising. Once, when countering an argument that passing the measure would cause the closures of public libraries all over the state -- which it did -- she responded with a discussion of how cheaply people could buy paperback books. Nonetheless, the message got through, and an unlikely coalition of technology millionaires, small-business owners, and put-upon homeowners gave the ballot question a whopping 59 percent of the vote that November.

Making the new law work, then, became the problem. The Legislature’s taxation committee took up the job. The underlying question remained what the passage of Proposition 2½ meant beyond simple budgetary mathematics. Did it represent anything more than abandoned wrath? Was it a plea purely for lower taxes and the devil take the hindmost, or was it really a kind of angry call for better and more responsive government? And if it was all of those, then its implementation was a very complicated thing.

“The bill, as it was drafted, was really Draconian,” recalls US Representative Michael Capuano, who at the time was chief counsel to that committee. “Even its proponents knew that. We asked them, ‘Is this really what you want?’ Barbara and I worked together. The answer was that we agree that, in general, we want significant tax cuts. If we implemented the whole thing right away, one community could have had 50 percent tax cuts that year. The state couldn’t command that. The internal argument was, even if you do this, you’re not living up to the spirit of what you said you wanted -- which was thoughtful tax policies.”

One thing the Legislature declined to do was to substitute its judgment for that of the voters, which was in its power to do. (Proposition 13 in California was different. It was a constitutional amendment and not simply a new law, the way Prop. 2½ was here.) “Right after it passed,” Anderson says, “there were a stack of bills to amend or repeal 2½. The Legislature, to its credit, decided that somebody had to do something about property taxes and we’re never going to do it. There were some people you could trust up there then.”

Proposition 2½ is now an established part of how the state governs itself. (There have been sporadic attempts to repeal it, which rarely got beyond the talking stages.) Other tax rollback attempts have not fared so well. In 2000, voters overwhelmingly passed another Anderson-led petition, this time to rescind state income tax increases that had been passed in 1989 and 1990 that would have brought the tax rate back to 5 percent, but the Legislature froze the rollback at 5.3 percent. The howls that greeted that action had little to do with money. “That was the whole motivation of the campaign in 2000, when we didn’t even talk about how they spend most of the money,” explains Anderson. “It was, ‘Aren’t you sick of politicians who lie to you and then break their word?’ People in this state have long memories about ‘temporary’ taxes.”

Within the context of Prop. 2½, the fight over what taxes really mean has moved to Massachusetts’s cities and towns. Whenever a municipality wants to override the provisions of the law, it must do so at the ballot box. This can range from the $6.2 million override for the town library that passed by eight votes last June in Walpole, to the crowded ballot in Winthrop last May, when the town passed eight of 10 overrides. (Up with the library and trash collection, down with the town planning and grants office.) Between 1990 and 2005, 224 communities passed a Proposition 2½ override. The more affluent the community, the more often an override seems to pass. Cape Cod seems to have been one of the more enthusiastic spots; in that same 15-year period, Chatham passed a whopping 55 overrides and West Tisbury passed 46, while Eastham, Tisbury, and Truro passed 34, 32, and 30, respectively.
“Government has gotten so big that it’s hard to track where the money goes,” says Capuano. “When people know where the money’s going, they like it better. At least you know with the gas tax that the money is going to roads and bridges. They’re more accepting of that than they are of general taxation.” At the very least, Proposition 2½ forces municipalities wishing to override it to say precisely why they are doing so.

“Nobody likes paying taxes,” Crawford says, “but nobody likes potholes in their roads or myriad other impacts that we’re just starting to see in this state. The other change in our culture here has been a deep commitment to provide local aid that was not there before Proposition 2½. [Prop.] 2½ is there, but it also required the state to provide state aid not provided at that level before.” On the 2008 income tax ballot question, Crawford’s interpretation prevailed, but it is significant that the campaign was fought on the terrain that Barbara Anderson had helped define 30 years ago.

Long ago, in the days before supply-side economics and Propositions 13 and 2½ and the supremacy of what taxes have come to mean over what they actually are, it was a Republican named Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. who, when asked by a young secretary whether he hated paying taxes, replied, “No, young fellow. I like paying taxes. With them I buy civilization.” And it was another Republican named Theodore Roosevelt, arguing for the implementation of what we now call the estate tax -- and what conservative politicians frame as the “death tax” -- who argued: “The man of great wealth owes a peculiar obligation to the state, because he derives special advantages from the mere existence of government.”

According to a study by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a nonpartisan institute in Washington, D.C., eliminating the estate tax would blow a $1.3 trillion hole in the federal budget over 10 years. Meanwhile, the tax itself in 2009 only applied to an estimated 0.24 percent of all the people who died that year. And according to another study, this one by the Urban Institute-Brookings Institution Tax Policy Center, more than 99.7 percent of estates owe no estate tax at all. The estate tax revenues in the United States as a share of our gross domestic product are below the international average for such taxes. In a country that believed in progressive taxation, the issue likely would not even arise. But the brawl over the estate tax is not strictly a matter of money and percentages. It is also deeply, profoundly political. Opponents of the estate tax have argued against it on an issue of “fairness.” They contend that the estate tax penalizes people by “making them pay taxes twice.” As journalist Peter Beinart pointed out in The New Republic four years ago, they have managed to cast the estate tax as a millstone tied to the American dream. “Ultimately,” Beinart wrote, “the argument against the estate tax . . . is moral. It is about right and wrong.”

Calling it the “death tax” gave its opponents a huge advantage in perception. Through this, and through taking advantage of the revamped terrain on which any discussion of taxes now must take place, the people seeking the elimination of the estate tax -- and, one can fairly conclude, the concept of progressive taxation generally -- have managed to make allies out of people whose estates never had a chance of being taxed at all. In Death by a Thousand Cuts: The Fight Over Taxing Inherited Wealth, their 2005 book about the political battle over the estate tax, Michael Graetz, a Yale professor who worked for the Treasury Department in the first administration of George W. Bush, and Ian Shapiro, also a Yale professor, tell the story of Chester Thigpen, an elderly Mississippi tree farmer who testified before Congress in favor of repealing the tax despite the fact that his estate was too small to be taxed.

“My father recently died,” recalls Elizabeth Warren, a Harvard Law professor and the chairwoman of the Congressional Oversight Panel monitoring the Troubled Asset Relief Program, which bailed out banks at the expense of (yes) the taxpayer. “He worked all of his life, and at the end of the day he had a modest home that was paid off, Social Security, and a few bucks in the bank, and he was worried about paying ‘death taxes.’ That man would have had to make 100 times more than he’d made, he was so far away from ever paying a dollar of the so-called ‘death tax.’ There was something heartbreaking about it. Where should his interests have aligned? Toward a much more populist notion of a progressive tax structure. He saw his interests in avoiding ‘death taxes.’ It broke my heart.”

The battle over the estate tax -- which is ongoing in Washington -- is a nearly perfect prism through which to look at the consistently problematic view Americans have of the concept of taxes. Ultimately, no matter which side of the political aisle you find yourself on, taxes are a public demonstration of the kind of political commonwealth we desire for ourselves. Even the most radical anti-taxers -- and they have moved far away from anything like what Barbara Anderson was pushing in 1980 -- believe that. (Remember, the fundamental principal behind supply-side economics was that cutting taxes would increase government revenue.) At the same time, anyone on the other side who believes in progressive taxation has a deep and abiding responsibility to make sure the money is neither wasted nor grafted away. “Taxes have become a litmus test,” says Capuano. “Maybe they always were, I don’t know. But my argument is that what you can’t do on the local level we can do on the national level. You can cut taxes and then just increase the debt ceiling. Borrow and spend is just as bad [as], if not worse than, tax and spend. You can have anything you want and you don’t have to pay for it.”

Like them or don’t like them, taxes are the statement of what we freely choose to be, and not what we wish we were. “We have a badly structured society, a decrepit infrastructure, and we’re now seeing the collapse of the university system that was our pride and joy because tuition costs are rising so much faster than the cost of living,” says Borosage, referring to the whole nation. “There is a terrible price to be paid for believing that we can get something for nothing.” The way we look at taxes is the way we look at ourselves, even if we choose to look away.

© Copyright 2010 Globe Newspaper Company.

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National Politics - After Scott ... A Revolution or a "Market Correction"

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And so it is that Massachusetts Democrats - and the country - are left pondering what to make of the Scott Brown victory over Democratic Uber-Favorite Martha Coakley. Without re-hashing the details of Coakley's missteps, we really do need to examine the two theories being tossed around. The question is whether the more right wing elements in Massachusetts had their day and can claim a victorious "revolution" or whether this was a clarion call for fear, confusion, mistrust, and the ever-present "it's the economy stupid" phenomenon.

As you can probably tell from my tone - and from the attached photo - I do not believe this was a revolution of any kind. I think the proper analogy would be "Market Correction." People are clearly hurting economically and were scared to death by the mischaracterization and distortions surrounding Obama's Health Care Reform. Massachusetts has a fine tradition of using high profile positions to send messages (to whom we will never know) that it is time for some good old fashion fiscal conservatism. That is how we routinely get Republicans on Beacon Hill. The Weld and Romney elections, in many ways, were similar to what we just experienced. It really doesn't matter that the policies of these conservative politicos will not help the daily lives of any of the people most angry and scared - but so be it - they got their message across. Again - what exactly the message is - is never clear.

While this is a vague point - it is an important one. It is critical that we understand the confusion of the electorate so that the more right leaning elements can't claim undue victory. With all due respect to my friends and colleagues across the aisle, and to those who man the "Tea Party" boats -with crates in hand, this was not a victory for that philosophy. If the "T.P" folks had a rally tomorrow on their next issue of the day, there would still be 5 guys and a dog who show up. No, this was a victory for the Reagan Democrats. The ones who are just sick and tired of something and want to see - well - they're really not sure what they want to see - they just want to see and hear less of the Democrats right now. If you are a Colbert Report fan, think of his mantra of the way people FEEL information instead of THINKING it. This election is the latest case in point of that very real political philosophy.

To be sure, people want less money spent on "things" because, well, they have less money so spending money by the government must be bad - right? Well - kind of. If we look at the history of the other side of these "market corrections" in Massachusetts, we can see exactly how they boomerang. When people lift their heads out of the sand, they see that the fiscal conservatives that "got" elected (how on earth did they every get elected Mary) actually want to cut vital programs that impact the daily lives of, well, everyone. Trust me, I've seen it. Parents of students who have x program cut, or people getting a certain subsidy all get impacted and then bam - right out with the conservatives. Yes - for doing exactly what they were elected to do. Just like Obama.

And so it is with the fickle electorate here in the Bay-State. The only problem now is that Scott Brown will not have the kind of impact that a Governor would. If he plays his cards right, and votes socially liberal and economically conservative, he could have a long career in the Senate. If, however, he starts voting with those who want to limit abortion rights and going down those roads - his Senate career could be just a blip on the radar screen - just waiting for a Democrat with some verve and passion to get back the seat that the late Senator Kennedy used so effectively to fight injustice and economic disparity his entire life. Good luck Scott. With this electorate, you'll need it.

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Israel Focus - In Support of Nadav Tamir

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There is so much to be frustrated about in this latest episode involving Israeli Policy and the conflicting attitudes of the American Jewish community.

Looking at the press coverage and the reactions of conservatives in both this country and in Israel, one would think Consul General Nadav Tamir sold military secrets to Iran.

So before I even mention how much I admire, respect, and commend Nadav Tamir, it must be made clear that his words of advice and counsel to the Foreign Ministry were nothing more than sound, rational analysis.

As one commentator has already mentioned, the fact that so many are out of sorts by what he wrote is a clear indication of how disconnected some conservatives are from reality and rationality of any kind. Let's also be clear about a couple of other things. The current Foreign Minister - and Likud government - did not get to power on anything close to a majority in Israel. That being the case, towing this party's line with some on-the-record reservations is not necessarily the worst career move. They will be out of power very soon, trust me. And when they are, diplomats like Nadav Tamir can still be able to hold their heads high. Next, the critics of Tamir in Boston listed by the Globe - namely the Russian Immigrant community, Tom Mountain, and Mark Solomon are so far to the right, you might as well give credibility to that wacko in New Hampshire who still doesn't recognize the US Government. Tom Mountain and Mark Solomon mean well, but they are not representative of any major portion of the American Jewish community. They are the fringe - without question. In fact they are part of the very problem that Nadav describes - people who never think Israel does anything wrong and thinks anyone who says so - like Tamir and President Obama - are traitors in some way.

For background on the story, please see these two globe articles. One from Monday and one from Tuesday.

(I am including at the end of this blog what is apparently the full text of Nadav Tamir's memo.)

But what we are really in the middle of here, I believe, can be explained by politics and by an ongoing misunderstanding in Israel of how average Americans react to what the Israeli government does and says.

It seems clear that this memo was leaked precisely because someone wants any critique of Israeli policy stifled. It also seems clear that this could open the door for the removal of a centrist Consul General as opposed to the right wing bozos running the show right now.

As Tamir indicated, and as I will echo, the problem has never really been what Israel DOES or HAS THE RIGHT TO DO. The problem has always been HOW they go about doing things and HOW they go about communicating them. American Jewish community leaders who have looked to information coming out of Israel to reflect something called TACT, and DIPLOMACY have routinely been disappointed. Just last year I sat in on a meeting with the Israeli Ambassador to the UN and an interfaith group in Boston and couldn't believe some of the things he said. Its not that he was wrong about anything, but it was just the words he decided to use and the rhetoric he thought would go over well. This is an old story and it is part of the reason there is often a disconnect between what Israel thinks they are saying to the world and what the world hears. That is largely what Tamir was talking about.

Now to be fair, one needs to understand that this is the way of things. The culture of language in the Middle East is less "burdened" with the nuances and niceties of Western language. Their world is harsher and more direct and so is the way they speak about it. If Israel doesn't feel they neeed to explain why a "complete settlement freeze" is actually a straw man in the current situation where Hamas and Fatah are at war, well they won't. That is exactly why Israel needs diplomats like Nadav Tamir. He is an unequivocal supprter of Israel - but knows how to speak to other communities and diverse constituencies about what that means. If any of you have ever heard him speak you would know that. And if you truly understood the complexities of Israel's situation and the challenges of how that situation is distorted around the globe, you would completely understand his memo.

In summary, Nadav Tamir is an astute diplomat who knows the difference between public opinion and the opinion of conservative Jewry in the US. The American public is a diverse group and it is the goal of many in the Jewish community to try and INCREASE their support of Israel. To do this requires strategy, subtlety, and a knowledge of what they need to hear. None of those has ever been high on the list of what Israel has used in the past to communicate with America. And this is not just my opinion. This has been studied by marketing experts, high profile diplomats, and many community leaders. Even people who support Israel completely believe they are horrible at communicating to the American public.

Specifically, if you look at the memo, Tamir compares the public perception in the US of the Gaza ware versus this latest flare up over settlements. He is absolutely right to say that this situation is causing Israel to lose more support. During Gaza - you had the missiles falling into Sderot and AVERAGE Americans could relate to that and support the retaliation. In this situation, like many others, you have misinformation about settlements the prevailing context and Israel is doing nothing to dispel the misinformation. They are seemingly standing their ground on an issue that, to many Americans, brings sympathy to the Palestinians. Tamir was not reinforcing the misperceptions in America, but simply acknowledging it, and saying how difficult they are to overcome.

Then of course you have his VERY accurate assessment of the way in which MANY in America want to accentuate the APPARENT differences between the Obama administration and the current Israeli government simply because of their politics. If you do not believe this is the case, you are the naive ones not Obama. Look the real story is that if you look at a recent CohenSide blog - you will see the way in which Ehud Barak did exactly what Tamir was talking about. He gave an official response that was a way to frame a POSSIBLE settlement freeze with conditions. And instead of THAT being the consistent message of the government, you have ultra conservatives like Lieberman putting out adamant black and white statements. THAT is what Tamir, as a responsible underling, would like to see end.

As I wrote above, diplomacy requires a strategy. Diplomacy with the US requires strategy and tact. Not only has Israel never been great at that in the past (and they will admit this) the current leadership takes this to a new level.

Once again, based on the reaction, you would think Nadav publicly disagreed with the policy on settlements. He did not. But he does see that issue not being handled well - diplomatically - and he also sees that it is beginning to gain traction in the US with AVERAGE Americans who only see Israel as the bad guy in so many of these situations.

All those who don't see that are sadly insulated in their own conservatism and will never understand what it is going to take to improve public opinion of Israel in the United States. As someone who studies that very issue and has seen its deterioration first hand, to question Nadav Tamir's correct analysis of this growing disconnect is both disturbing and unfortunate.

Reports indicate that Tamir will leave Israel with only a slap on the wrist before he comes back to Boston. But stranger things have happened in situations like this - and it would be a terrible shame if in fact he is asked to resign. People like Nadav Tamir are central to any possible future of peace and security for Israel.

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Pondering American-Israeli relations

In Brief:

During a visit to Israel, I became more aware that we have a damaging misunderstanding regarding the intentions and policies of the American administration. I must note that even if I am wrong in my assessment of the American administration, the way in which we manage our relations nowadays is causing strategic damage to two very important aspects that make up our special relationship and they are the level of intimacy in coordinating policies, and the support of US public opinion towards Israel.

Details:

Many who read this telegram have a more extensive perspective than I do regarding the history of these relations. However, at least during the 16 years in which I have been following the relations, the Israeli attitude was characterized and rightly so by emphasizing the partnership of values and interests among both countries. This attitude favored downplaying tactical differences, and dealing with them in private, in order to create an atmosphere of strategic partnership in the administrations and public opinion.

This attitude has resulted in a high level of trust and a willingness of the [US] administration to coordinate various policies with an effort to overcome differences behind closed doors. The Israeli attitude always favored saying Yes to the Americans, rather than a strict No. It was clear to the [Israeli] decision makers that we were dealing with the most important superpower on earth, as well as our closest ally, which meant making sacrifices in favor of strategic relations on various tactical issues. For example, one might mention Prime Minister Sharon's positive answer to the Road Map despite a long list of reservations, in order to preserve the level of intimacy and coordination. One must note that the two countries have always had differences of opinion regarding the settlements, for example, or the issue of Hamas participating in the Palestinian elections, but the level of coordination between administrations and US public perception of the special relationship were maintained.

The damage to US public opinion is already evident from recently held opinion polls, and is expected to worsen. In my estimation, the media coverage, which presents an image of conflict between the Israeli government and the Obama Administration, damages Israeli support in the public eye more than the criticism due to violence and harming civilians during Cast Lead or during the conflict with Hizbullah in 2006.

Throughout the years, opinion polls have shown that the two most significant factors in US public support are the perception of a partnership in values and interests, and the perception that Israel seeks to end the conflict with its neighbors (hence the consistent public support of our right to self defense). These two parameters have suffered greatly recently. In many American circles, there is a feeling these days, that while the Obama administration tries to resolve global conflicts, it must deal with the refusal to cooperate by governments in Iran, North Korea, and Israel. Aaron Miller's words, spoken after the Obama-Netanyahu meeting, clearly show this feeling. He said it was a meeting between Obama yes we can and Netanyahu no you won't.

The sense of conflict between the Israeli government and the Obama administration places the American Jewish community, which we care so much about, in a problematic position, in which they are forced to choose between the two. You must remember that most of the American Jewish community supported Obama (78 percent), and this conflict distances many of them from the State of Israel.

There are, of course, players in American and Israeli politics who oppose Obama ideologically and are willing to sacrifice the special relationship between the countries to further their own political agenda, but we cannot let these players damage the bipartisan attitude that rightly characterized the conduct of Israeli governments toward the US. In this context, we should look at a positive example, like the success of PM Tony Blair, who was an ideological partner of Clinton, and managed to maintain the strategic alliance between the US and the UK despite the change of governments in the US, due to an understanding that this alliance is more important than minor differences between a Labour-led UK and the Conservative Bush administration.

The distance that emerged between us and the American administration has clear consequences regarding Israeli deterrence in our region, and our global status. The astonishing fact that only 8 percent of Israelis see the Obama administration as friendly, while in the rest of the world he enjoys unprecedented popularity, is very disconcerting. This is no doubt a failure by the Obama administration to communicate with the Israeli public, but we at the Foreign Ministry have an interest in changing this situation, which jeopardizes our ability to present ourselves as the US's only true friend in the Middle East.

Some claim it was the Obama administration that preferred to distance itself from us in order to better its relations with the Muslim world. In my estimation, the administration indeed emphasized these differences before the Cairo address in order to get more attention in the Muslim world. However, since then, they have been making an effort to downplay our disagreements, and we have become the source of public displays of disagreement. Even if those who claim that the Obama administration is trying to distance itself from Israel are right, it is unclear to me why we are doing everything in our power to assist it.

As for our suspicions towards the Obama administrations intentions and willingness to supposedly sacrifice Israeli interests in order to appeal to the Muslim world I do not see any indication of this. In my estimation, the Obama administration realizes that the most significant challenge to American interests stems from the Middle East. Their analysis of the Middle East situation matches the one we have heard from our intelligence community in recent years, namely that during the Bush administration, the US lost its influence and levers in the region for various reasons. The intention of the engagement policy is to renew those levers in order to reverse the decline of US influence in the Middle East in the face of a rise in radical influence, led by Iran and Al-Qaeda.

I do not detect any naivte in the attitudes of the Obama administration. On the contrary, I believe they are much more realistic than their Neoconservative predecessors. An example of this is Obama's refusal to fully support the post-election protesters in Iran and speak out against human rights violations, knowing that these statements will only help the [Iranian] regime, and his preference to focus on a response that will preserve American options regarding the Iranian nuclear program.

The Obama administration is determined to take leadership and create influence levers in order to deal with the two most significant strategic challenges to the State of Israel -- the threat posed by Iran and its minions, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The fact that they are unresolved poses a threat to our way of life as a Jewish and Democratic state.

There is no country on earth that has more to benefit from the American move than us, and I am surprised that we would rather emphasize negative tactical issues over the positive strategic move, and that we focus on the trees instead of the forest (evident in the Israeli responses to various utterances in the Cairo address). Despite the fact that it is hard to isolate the influence of various factors in foreign policy, I think that the engagement policy deserves at least partial credit for the sorry state of the Iranian Mullah regime, and the fact that the Lebanese elections were at least a departure from recent negative trends.

Recommendation:

In order to restore the intimacy and coordination between us and the American administration, and in order to restore our status in public opinion, I suggest that we dramatically change our conduct regarding the Obama administration. Even those of us who suspect the administration's intent (as stated, I am not one of those people) must be reminded that we do not have strategic substitutes for the US, at least not in the foreseeable future.

I suggest that we declare publically that we share the Obama administrations world view and that we are interested in helping promote the policies of empowering moderate forces in the Middle East via an honest attempt at engagement, which will restore American hegemony in the Middle East, and deny radical forces the popularity they enjoyed during the Bush administration.

I suggest that we talk of our ambition for peace and our support of the two state solution more convincingly, and not like we are bowing to American pressure, but like those who understand that this is first and foremost an Israeli interest. I recommend we deal with disagreements regarding construction in the [disputed] territories away from the eyes of the media. History proves that when we present a political initiative, we do not have to deal with other problematic or uncoordinated initiatives.

This does not mean surrendering to every American dictate. As you remember, Prime Minister Sharon refused to promise that we would not respond to missile attacks from Iraq, which meant that the Americans favored destroying rocket launchers placed in Western Iraq in the early days of the American invasion. We shouldn't promise that we won't attack Iran if we feel that all other options have run out because it is indeed a strategic matter, but we must save these discussions for intimate meetings, not the media.

We can continue influencing American policies on Iran, Syria, and the Palestinians far better if we restore our status as partners in the administration's moves, and not a country with which to communicate through State Department briefings, as is done with Venezuela and North Korea.

Sincerely,

Nadav Tamir.

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National Politics/Race Relations Focus - The Gates Arrest, Police Work, and the Politics of Race

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CRASH!

That's my take on last weeks arrest in Cambridge of Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr.

This was a Crash of epic proportions. But unlike the Titanic, when we knew the factors and markers (Iceberg, Large Ship Steaming Too Fast) this Crash was not what most people expected.

What was expected was the all to quick jumping on the bandwagon that took place. Most people immediately got sucked into the comfortable Left-Right paradigm. Liberals immediately claimed of "Racial Profiling" and conservatives jumped right to "Stop Playing the Race Card - That Doesn't Happen Anymore."

As usual, both extremes were very, very wrong. And as usual, the truth lied somewhere in the middle. In the movie CRASH. There is a heart wrenching scene where a fairly wealthy African American is stopped by a clearly racist caricature of a cop. The cop, played by Matt Dillon, has clear hostility toward blacks and we know this because we hear stories about how his dad lost a job to a black person due to affirmative action. Most times, we are not lucky enough to get into some one's head, but that's the beauty of movies - they give it right too us. Sad part about the Gates saga is that after about a day - we DID have the answers right in front of us. In the movie, the police officer clearly abuses his power, pulls over the well dressed black man because he is black and proceeds to insult and physically/sexually harass his wife. Its horrible, it black and white, and we get it. But that is NOT what happened here. Not even close.

What began to emerge after reading the police reports and watching the interviews with officer Crowley, was a story that had a touch of racial bias - MAYBE - and a ton of overreacting to police presence, attitude, and procedure. Lets start with the bias first. To be fair, who knows if the elderly woman who pointed out to her neighbor that the break-in was occurring would have done so had the occupant (Gates) been white? Who knows if she would have known him better had he been white. What we do know by listening to the tapes and matching them with the reports is that Professor Gates seemed to be upset at the very presence of the Police and not really by anything they did or said. It would appear that because they did not leave when he said it was his house, that he truly believed being black was the reason. That's the baggage. It is baggage that I don't have and its the baggage that I can only imagine.

But here's what I do know - when I was younger I used to resent being stopped by the Police. Of course I always thought I was right and was always innocent of any traffic violation the police may have thought they saw or invented. I grew up with many kids who were schoolyard bullies-turned-guys with a badge and a gun and really resented that. But after I got more experience with the Law and what police have the right and ability to do - to ANYONE - things changed. From that moment on, if I am stopped, BOTH my hands go to the 10 o'clock position on the steering wheel, in plain sight, and I don't move a muscle until the police tell me too. And I have never really had anything bad done to me, I just don't like the absolute power police have and I'll be damned if I'll "give them a reason."

Now I brought up the scene from the movie "Crash" because most likely, the character in the scene who was stopped knows full well what the police have the power to do and probably did do all the time in his community. Professor Gates is knowledgeable enough to know all of that as well. So why would he act more like an impetuous 18 year old then a mature, responsible Harvard Professor who, without any real provocation, could put up with a little police machismo and procedure and not blame it all on race so quickly. The answer to that can only be one thing - baggage - and the probability that Gates is a pompous Harvard professor who feels he is DUE a disproportionate amount of respect. (that's what an 18 year old would think anyway) He even specifically used the "do you know who I am" phrase. How many poor minority kids in the projects all over the country get to use that one (and mean it)? And how many actually say things like "this is because I'm black - give me your badge number" (and expect to either get BETTER treatment after that or expect NOT to eat some pavement.)

This is the real world where real police do real things. I know that and I am amused that Professor Gates did not. You DON'T MOUTH OFF TO POLICE - period. Black or white. Especially if you want to end things amicably. But to be fair, if I heard ONE thing, in Gates' accounts or on the tapes that made me think for a second the police did something overtly racist to deserve this, believe me I would be acknowledging it. But I didn't and I don't think its there.

But here's what's interesting. I will bet anyone any amount of money that had Gates been wearing a three piece suit and was clean shaven, things would have gone a little differently. And here is why. No one ever wants to talk about the class issue. In this case - and in many, many others - it trumps race. I was clearly not at the house, but based on the tapes and interviews, I am willing to bet the dialogue went something like this.

CP - (Loud knocks or bangs) Cambridge Police, identify yourself (no guns drawn I believe).
HLG - What - what are you doing here? This is my house (said like Eddie Murphy in Raw) now get out of here.
CP - We have a a report of a break-in, please come out on the porch and identify yourself.
HLG - I am Henry Lewis Gates Jr. a Harvard Professor and this is my house, please get out of here. (Please is not said in a nice way).
CP - For the last time sir, I am asking you to cooperate and follow me out of the house.
HLG - Why, because I'm black? If I were white, you wouldn't be asking me to leave my house. I'm not leaving and you can't make me - and you don't have a warrant.

Now I am going to stop there and give some analysis. But right after this point is where I believe things went really bad. Gates, not being a lawyer, didn't realize that because of the reported break in, the Police could come in. I believe they did and then all hell broke loose with Gates yelling.

As reported by officer Crowley, his only intention was to see who this guy was. But his worry was that 1) This guy may not be telling the truth (that's never happened before right) 2) If the report was correct, there may be other's in the house and GATES may be in danger. That is why he was asking him to come out on the porch and I BELIEVE HIM. IT MAKES SENSE. NOTHING THAT GATES SAYS DOES.

Now I want to depart from the story line to talk about three things related to police procedure.

1) In ALL cases if the police just said why they were doing something, even the short version, things would ALWAYS go better. But they never feel they need to. And because of that they often HEIGHTEN tensions instead of diffuse them. In this case, it was not clear to Gates why he should go out on the porch of his own house. In Gates' mind, history shows that coming out of the house is the beginning of the end for an accused black person - resulting in arrest or violence. And while that CAN be true , even in 2009 (my conservative friends would say that's crap) it probably wasn't going to be true outside a 3 million dollar home in Cambridge just outside of Harvard. So in that case - JUST DO WHAT THE POLICE ASK. How complicated is that? I wish they were always more polite and explained things more, but until that changes and until you put your life on the line every day like they do to understand why they do what they do - just do what they ask. I know that. Why does Professor Gates not? And please don't think that just because he is a College Professor he is an expert on in-the-trenches encounters like this.

2) From the sounds of the tapes, it does also not seem like the proper doubt about the situation being a robbery got communicated to the police on the scenes. The woman calling in was SO equivocal about whether this was a break-in or the owners returning from vacation. She actually said that last part. And why? Because she saw suitcases and wondered out loud to the police on the phone whether that might mean they were in fact the owners returning home. She even admitted that she was only calling because her elderly neighbor saw this happen. This was in man ways a second hand account. As for the bags, the officer on the phone responded with "what do you mean they had bags, what does that even mean, why is that important." Well it may have changed the opening line to "Cambridge Police, we got a call about a break-in, are you the owner sir?" Now why that did not happen is partly because of a problem I have with police procedure that can easily contribute and make worse even a small HINT of racial/class bias. I truly believe the above line is often the more conciliatory one delivered in places like WAYLAND and SUDBURY and especially if the person was clean-shaven, wearing an expensive watch and a three piece suit. But this is Cambridge, a fairly urban setting, and this guy looked like anyone, and he was "maybe Hispanic" according to the call.

Now I know that last part will ruffle some feathers. Some will say "Its just for identification". But I say that's crap. Any student of anti-Bias education knows that the more we label and the more we diminish the totality of identity, the more we spread bias. And who knows how someone processes that information. You plant the idea of Hispanic and you can't help but have preconceived notions enter you brain. Its human nature. That wouldn't stop if we used other terms, but it would at least let the person fill in the blanks. No need for us to help them out. These days what does that even mean for purposes of identification. Is he light skin or dark skinned. Is he tan or as black as night (the color). There are so many mixed marriages these days someone on the cream side could be about 5 different nationalities or of a million ethnic backgrounds. Let just agree to use distinguishing marks, clothes, and color pigmentation in shades - instead of what the office on the phone asked fro abruptly. "Is he white, Hispanic or black man" As if any of us really know. And clearly, she did not.

In talking to a friend, he said that using race in this case was no problem at all, it was that "easiest, most efficient way to communicate identity in that situation." I have already dispelled that myth above, but my point here is that YES, NOT using race is not as easy. We are programmed to do it from years of common practice. We don't even ask why when clearly another way would actually help us be MORE careful about what people look like and whether they were the perpetrator or not. Isn't a pink striped Izod and a receding hairline with, light brown skin a lot better then "I think he's Hispanic." The very question is both out of date and becoming more and more USELESS.

3) But here's the last part. Please listen to the 911 call . You'll get my point about what REALLY contributed to this situation.(http://www1.whdh.com/news/articles/local/BO120131/) It was not race. It was the over-reaction of Gates spurred on by an attitude that police carry into EVERY situation. The Globe had an interesting story about this the other day. They took the one sided view that "suspicion" save lives. Not once did they ask police to be a little better in at least trying to identify situations where they do not need as much bravado. But that's the way police do things. In this same way, police look at every person - not like they are suspicious, but like they are scum. I'm sorry but that's what it feels like with EVERY interaction - and that needs to stop. If it is a strategy to put people on the defensive, then fine, but be more careful about how you use it. There are more good people out there then scumbags, and just because you see more scumbags on a daily basis does not mean you get to unload that baggage on everyone else. Yes, yes, just like my "who is really a terrorist" argument goes, one could ask how police can possibly separate the wheat from the chaffe, the good from the scum. Well I don't know exactly, but we won't know until they try. And why is this important? Did you LISTEN to the 911 call? I have been that person - made to feel like an idiot and a 2 yr old as I am talked to like I am bothering the person on the other end. The woman was clearly trying to do her civic duty and this guy was grilling her. And because of that grilling and supposition of superiority, or some other testosterone driven reason, he LEFT OUT THE CRITICAL FACT ABOUT THE SUITCASES. He didn't think it was important because the goal is NOT to exonerate but to suspect. The woman was trying to explain "barged in" - something you and I really can picture in our minds. Did the officer even somewhat politely ask her to explain further in this way - "Mam when you say barged in, was the door already open, was the lock broken or was the door broken down" Instead he scoffed and said, "barged - what does that mean, what is .. barged in.." in the most - you are just so horrible at relating to me what I want to know in the way I want to hear it" manner of speaking. I think my mom use to call my dad on that same 'tone'. You all know what I'm talking about.

And the best part was at the end of the call with the laughing exhale by the woman who made the call. Its the same sound I have made after calling the police. It is the sound of "You - A-hole! I'm trying to HELP YOU! No wonder people don't like the police and I'm wondering if I I'll ever call to report a crime again if I'm going to be treated this way."

To be fair, Police provide a necessary service and we should all kiss the ground they walk on. But too many walk around with that very phrase practically tattooed to their faces and flowing in their voice. I can't explain it, I only know it when I see it. Take a look at the guy standing to the right of Crowley in that video of the Police responding in solidarity to Obama's comment. This may be tantamount to racial bias itself, but that's the face. The face of "I don't have to justify my actions to you." Its the face of Jack Nicholson's Nathan Jessup - the face of "you should just thank your lucky stars I'm on that wall, eat your breakfast and say thank you." I really think that was the face that Professor Gates saw, and I really think that was the tone he heard. And frankly, if I were as prominent as him and sensed for one second I would be talked to differently if I were white, I may have reacted similarly. And that's what I want to end with. I think Gates over-reacted. But every bone in my body wonders how much of the tone I am describing here and the way police don't ever feel the need to explain themselves plays a role in all of these kinds of encounters. And that's what I think Obama was responding to. It's like in baseball when we say the umpire should have walked away. At some point, even though Gates was belligerent, someone should have walked away. And since the guys with the guns and the cuffs have the power, I'm putting that ball in their court. Gates gets the "Dude, not everyone is a racist" ball put in his court. It will be interesting to see if this blue ribbon panel they've put together agrees with me. I doubt it, but you never know.

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