politics
California's Disney History Thanks to my Dad for sending this clipping from the Sacramento Bee editorial page. California was long seen as the "antidote" to Texas' reactionary textbook adoption board. It was responsible for nearly as much purchasing as the Texas board, an it leaned the other way. But two wrongs don't make a right. I think I agree with Lehrer: mandating that diverse groups are "accurately portrayed" and then saying those portrayals "must not reflect adversely" on anyone is absurd. And it certainly shouldn't go by the name of history. I don't completely agree with Lehrer's argument against what he calls history as therapy (and quoting Schlesinger Jr. opens a pretty big can of worms). Of course, I wouldn't call it therapy. I'd call it setting the ethnocentric record straight, and I'd say that's an important role of history. "Revisionist" isn't a dirty word. If we're not revising our histories, we're not learning anything. The question Lincoln didn't ask in the passage quoted, although I suspect he was aware of it, was: Whose history? Whose truth?
07/13/2011 10:13
Thanks to my Dad for sending this clipping from the Sacramento Bee editorial page. California was long seen as the "antidote" to Texas' reactionary textbook adoption board. It was responsible for nearly as much purchasing as the Texas board, an it leaned the other way. But two wrongs don't make a right. I think I agree with Lehrer: mandating that diverse groups are "accurately portrayed" and then saying those portrayals "must not reflect adversely" on anyone is absurd. And it certainly shouldn't go by the name of history.
I don't completely agree with Lehrer's argument against what he calls history as therapy (and quoting Schlesinger Jr. opens a pretty big can of worms). Of course, I wouldn't call it therapy. I'd call it setting the ethnocentric record straight, and I'd say that's an important role of history. "Revisionist" isn't a dirty word. If we're not revising our histories, we're not learning anything.
The question Lincoln didn't ask in the passage quoted, although I suspect he was aware of it, was: Whose history? Whose truth?
Food Deserts
05/11/2011 07:35
When I was visiting upstate New York, on a research trip, I was surprised to find there was nowhere to buy food. Living in an affluent, populated area in the Northeast, I have access to three supermarkets I use (Hannafords, Price Chopper, and Market Basket), as well as several I avoid (Shaws and Walmart). And there are a number of neighborhood stores that sell more than just beer and candy — one even has a New York style sandwich shop in the rear!
The USDA has just published an interactive Food Desert Locator on its ERS website, which gives a detailed graphical perspective on this issue. Interestingly, the areas along route 90 seem to be desert-free on their map. Does this suggest that their data are on the conservative side? That there are places (maybe a lot of them) where rural people have to go to a nearby, bigger town to buy groceries once a week, and feel a lack of options in their food choices? In rural Minnesota and the Dakotas, people seem to lack options, unless they can get to a decent-sized city. The food desert ends at eastern Wyoming, not because there are a lot of food stores, but because there aren’t a lot of people. Another artifact of the statistics.
When I have time, I’ll look at the discussion the UDSA attaches to this. Do they talk about WHY there are fewer choices for rural (and poor urban) people? Consolidation of the food processing, marketing, and distribution systems? Box stores putting local mom & pop shops out of business? Food assistance programs that have historically made it difficult for local (and often more natural/organic) producers to compete? There seem to be some concerned , aware people working at ERS. I wonder if they have any input into the USDA’s overall program?
Mind the Gap
02/24/2011 20:07
Saw some interesting graphs today, from Mother Jones. Courtesy of Boing Boing. One of the commenters said something about how all Americans need to see this stuff every year, and ask themselves why they're still letting this happen. Problem is, only the same small group of people like Mother Jones subscribers see the info every year. Somehow, the message has to get out a little farther. So, I'm doing my share and posting it here for the dozen people who might see it here who hadn't seen it already. Enjoy!
End of the Post-Ideological Generation
12/11/2010 11:44
Neo-consensus revisionism
11/29/2010 18:38
Something I find weird is histories that tell you more than you would ever want to know about a subject, except how it fits in its time. I just read David Trask’s The War with Spain in 1898, which goes into the military history of the Spanish-American War in great detail, but gives less than a page (out of 600, including notes) to the war’s social or cultural context, and doesn’t even say much about politics. Trask portrays McKinley as reluctant to go to war (although remarkably efficient once he is forced to do so), but goaded on by an irresistible but unaccounted-for popular movement.
This text fills a generation-long gap in coverage of the Spanish-American war, and was hailed as a magisterial account that will be read for generations. I suppose this is true, and that it will be read closely by people interested in the details of the military and diplomatic engagements. But what it doesn’t say may be as important as what it does. I think it’s remarkable that in nearly 500 pages of narrative, William Randolph Hearst is mentioned in passing on pages 27 and 30. Trask apparently believes either that yellow journalism was not an influence on the decision to go to war or on the prosecution of the war, or that he can blame irrational public opinion for pushing McKinley into war and inadvertent empire, and leave it at that. Actually, he seems to believe that by simply ignoring the fact that the prior generation's history is all about Hearst and the splendid little war, he can make everybody forget. Maybe this is possible, if Trask's book becomes the standard text many of his reviewers seem to hope it will be. Is this how history gets revised?
The question, I guess, is: what’s more important? The details of the war, or its motivations, context, and consequences?
This text fills a generation-long gap in coverage of the Spanish-American war, and was hailed as a magisterial account that will be read for generations. I suppose this is true, and that it will be read closely by people interested in the details of the military and diplomatic engagements. But what it doesn’t say may be as important as what it does. I think it’s remarkable that in nearly 500 pages of narrative, William Randolph Hearst is mentioned in passing on pages 27 and 30. Trask apparently believes either that yellow journalism was not an influence on the decision to go to war or on the prosecution of the war, or that he can blame irrational public opinion for pushing McKinley into war and inadvertent empire, and leave it at that. Actually, he seems to believe that by simply ignoring the fact that the prior generation's history is all about Hearst and the splendid little war, he can make everybody forget. Maybe this is possible, if Trask's book becomes the standard text many of his reviewers seem to hope it will be. Is this how history gets revised?
The question, I guess, is: what’s more important? The details of the war, or its motivations, context, and consequences?
$50 billion for infrastructure
09/14/2010 08:11
This thought started as I was thinking about the stuff I was reading yesterday. In the fight over the Obama infrastructure boondoggle, does the $50 billion that goes to pork barrel jobs really matter, in the face of the nearly Trillion dollars that went to “bail out” the richest corporations in America? Maybe, if you’ve given up on the Trillion dollars, and feel like the only thing left to fight for is the $50 billion. So maybe what we should be trying to do is stop fighting over the $50 billion of crumbs the elite was willing to throw to the workers, and refocus ourselves on that Trillion dollars they just stole from us.
But that’s the thing. Too often, the liberal intellectuals talk as if anyone who disagrees with them is either stupid or evil. They’re not convincing anybody, and they’re not generating a lot of good will with that approach. What if the liberals assumed, instead, that a lot of the people they write off as tea-party cranks are honestly concerned about the way things are going in America. But they’ve given up on fighting the corporations and their lobbies. They’re making a sensible decision and choosing their battles.
Ultimately, the guys I talked with didn’t disagree that the bailout was robbery. They just apparently don’t feel that we can get any traction on that issue. And I don’t disagree that the infrastructure bill is probably a boondoggle. I just think we’re wasting our time over pennies if we fight about that, and losing sight of the dollars. Rather than fighting each other for the leftovers, maybe we could all go after our common enemy.
But that’s the thing. Too often, the liberal intellectuals talk as if anyone who disagrees with them is either stupid or evil. They’re not convincing anybody, and they’re not generating a lot of good will with that approach. What if the liberals assumed, instead, that a lot of the people they write off as tea-party cranks are honestly concerned about the way things are going in America. But they’ve given up on fighting the corporations and their lobbies. They’re making a sensible decision and choosing their battles.
Ultimately, the guys I talked with didn’t disagree that the bailout was robbery. They just apparently don’t feel that we can get any traction on that issue. And I don’t disagree that the infrastructure bill is probably a boondoggle. I just think we’re wasting our time over pennies if we fight about that, and losing sight of the dollars. Rather than fighting each other for the leftovers, maybe we could all go after our common enemy.
Carnegie & contemporary excuses
09/16/2009 21:15
Carnegie (1835-1919) was a self-made industrialist, possibly the original “rags to riches” story. He was also worth $298 billion (in 2007 dollars) at his death. “The man who dies…rich, dies disgraced,” he said at the end of “Wealth.”
The essay was written for the June 1889 North American Review (Boston, est. 1815 to “foster a genuine American culture”). On July 1 1889, the Amalgamated Association of Iron & Steel Workers struck at the Homestead steel mill July 1, 1889 after manager (Frick) cut wages, arguing that better technology (paid for by company) allowed them to produce 2x the steel as before. Some of Carnegie’s arguments are annoyingly paternalistic, but also funny. Higher wages, he suggests, would be squandered by workers. Better to retain them as corporate profits, so the industrialist can use them to endow a park, and art museum, or a library. Wait a minute! What happened to property rights? Isn’t this socialism directed by the oligarchy? Don’t we have a word for that? Oh, yeah. Fascism.
Of course, he does have a point. A bump in wages would probably put more beer in the bellies of industrial workers. So there’s a question behind all this, about public and private spending, and who decides what constitutes the “public good.” But is it credible that a guy like Carnegie, living when he did, knowing who he knew, could say the rich are more virtuous than the poor, or better qualified to decide on, then manage programs for the public good? “If thou dost not sow, thou shalt not reap,” Carnegie warns all the ne’er-do-wells who’d like a piece of that public pie. He forgets to mention, “oh, by the way: I fenced in all the fields.”
It’ll be interesting to see what the undergrads do with this piece. It couldn’t be much more contemporary – all the language, assumptions, and arguments are in play every night on the news. “Imperfect as they may appear to the idealist, [capitalist ideals] are…the best and most valuable of all that humanity has yet accomplished.” Leads directly to “don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good…” Thanks anyway, Mr. Obama. I’m not buying your false choices.
blah blah Middle Class blah blah
02/22/2009 17:06
I checked out the Vice President’s MiddlleClass Task Force, because it’s always hovering there on the top right of the screen at whitehouse.gov. I read Jared Bernstein's introductory blog post. (he’s the Executive Director and Joe Biden’s chief economic advisor) It was all well and good, as far as it went. But that was the problem.
35,000 people have already emailed the Task Force with questions and comments, so i went ahead and left mine. I think they're trying to paper over the big rift in American society. It isn't the split between the rich and the middle class, who often see eye to eye (as an example, the recent CNBC rant about not wanting to help fix the housing crisis). The big problem in America is the split between the rich/middle alliance (the administration and its main allies) and the working class.
The government and the media can pretend all they want that "the poor" are just people who've lost their “middle class” jobs. But I think deep down they know this isn't true, and at some point they're going to have to deal with the fact that they not talking to working people. Because the Repubs are going back to race-bating, using country and now hip-hop music to try to fool working-class people into thinking that just because the Dems can't see them, the Repubs are the party of the workers. That is a big mistake. It will come back to bite the administration and the Dems in general. They're institutionalizing the new class war.
