Category: Quick Hits

Being young(ish) and living in college towns among people who tend toward the less lucrative college degrees, a high percentage of my friends would make good case studies for a Quarterlife Crisis reality show. To be blunt, I don't know many people who are terribly successful, financial or otherwise (and I certainly am not either). Let me put it this way: it's the kind of social group in which having health insurance is a cause for great envy.

Even my friends and acquaintances who are gainfully employed in something more rewarding than the service industry live with a lot of anxiety and the sense that the world is crumbling around them. Basically, I have a very large social circle spanning most of the country and I can honestly say (anec-data!
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) that most people I know are at least somewhat depressed. To be in one's 20s and 30s today is to be overwhelmed by debt, overworked and underpaid (or not working at all), and constantly second-guessing every choice that led to this outcome. It's a biased sample, but not totally unrepresentative of the problems facing people in this age bracket.

The explanations for this are numerous and we could spend weeks discussing them all; everything from parenting techniques to macroeconomics to technological advances is relevant to understanding the predicament of the first generation of Americans to do worse than its parents. One specific explanation that has been very interesting to me lately is the psychology of indecision and the consequences of making too many choices among too many options.

It doesn't matter that many of these choices are of minor importance – Where should we go for dinner tonight? Am I eating too much wheat gluten? Which toothpaste is right for me? – because the psychological cost is a function of volume as well as intensity. And there are reams of research providing evidence that it leads to depression, anxiety, lack of focus, and other problems.

The toothpaste aisle is my favorite example of this phenomenon. The next time you are in the Box Store or whatnot, stop and take a look at it. I mean, really look at it. There are, what, 75-100 different kinds of toothpaste? Maybe more. God only knows what the difference among them could be. There are dozens of flavors (all essentially identical but with creative naming variations on "mint") and all kinds of pseudoscience claiming different benefits as a marketing angle. The truth, of course, is that you can probably grab any tube of toothpaste approved for sale in the U.S. and, provided it's used regularly, reap exactly the same rewards. Your teeth will be clean and your breath will smell half-decent. But there's something about the experience that is paralyzing; we always worry, "Am I buying the right one? Which one is the best value for the money?" And then we worry about the consequences of choosing the wrong one (70s commercial voiceover guy haunts your dreams: "Gingiviiiiiitissss….")

The problem is not simply that we have trouble choosing from a large number of options, but that we A) are made to fret endlessly about the consequences of the "wrong" choices – How is your kid going to get into Harvard if you don't pick the right diapers? – and B) the choice often provides very little benefit for the cost.
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What do 100 kinds of shampoo or 50 different TVs get us? It gets us propaganda about how we live in the Greatest Bastion of Freedom in the history of the world. Try getting the TV you want in Soviet Russia! Everyone gets the same TV there…if they're lucky!

This was somewhat rambling, and for that I apologize. But this has been on my mind quite often lately, and the social, political, and economic ramifications are pretty clear. More choices in more areas are more likely to make us feel depressed, indecisive, and anxious than to make us feel fulfilled, happy, or successful. Sometimes I think it would be just great if the toothpaste aisle consisted of a single plain white box labeled "TOOTHPASTE." Would any of us really be worse off in that case?

Dispatches from the Oh for fuck's sake file: apparently "Purity Balls" are a thing. They are not popular like soccer, but more like polo – a niche interest unknown to most of us but wildly popular with a small, deeply disturbed segment of the population.

As a feminist, I found the purity balls themselves the most difficult to watch. Young women and girls are dressed in ballgowns, their hair professionally done. They pose with their fathers under white arches decorated with flowers, like prom dates. And the midst of all this revelry, they promise to remain virgins and their fathers, in turn, pledge to be the protector of that "purity." Some are given rings – it reminds me of a wedding ceremony.

Go ahead and read the whole piece, and if you're not sufficiently disturbed you can check out a recent documentary or some shorter clips on YouTube.

The insularity and the narrowness of worldview that are necessary to make this sort of thing seem normal are staggering. Examples like this one make clear why homeschooling is so popular among Evangelicals and other far-right Christian sects. Only by completely controlling (and shrinking) the world to which a child is allowed exposure can a tween girl have a pseudo-wedding to her dad for the purpose of remanding her hoo-hah into his custody until it Dad gives it away to whatever 19 year old chronic masturbator she meets on her field trip to the Creation Museum. How else does a spectacle like this unfold without someone, if not everyone, stopping in their tracks and loudly asking no one in particular what in the hell is going on. Hell, an emotionally healthy person might even veto this clusterfuck in the planning stage.

But wait, there's more! Aside from the perverse theology underpinning something like this, there's a healthy dose of good ol' American materialism involved:

That's why purity balls are so effective, not just because they rely on religious and cultural indoctrination—that would be too easy. Purity balls sell young women the idea of love. This is how your father will love you. This is the way to get a man who will love you and is worthy of your love. This is how you get God's love. It's a powerful message, one that resonates because it promises what we all want: an amazing love story.

The problem, of course, is that it's not really about love. Sitting outside of a purity ball, in black-tie attire, Lisa tears up as she explains the events aren't just about the party.

"It's a beautiful moment with their father to say, 'I care enough about you to invest in an expensive hotel and expensive meal and a lovely dress for you.' To say that you’re valued."

The number of levels on which this is twisted and demeaning can hardly be counted. In its defense, however, it is just one of a dozen different ways little girls have fake "weddings" at various points in childhood and adolescence in our society. Actually…no, scratch that. We endure some messed up rituals when we are too young to resist, but at least we don't have to marry our dads.

I don't think there's enough therapy and pharmaceuticals in the world to save any of these kids. I guess that's the advantage of filling their heads with this insanity before they're old enough to think or push back.

You know how much I love propaganda as art and comedy. And history has shown us repeatedly that there's no propaganda as consistently hilarious as what we get from the military.

On a weekend road trip to see a spectacular example of a Usonian house, I drove through Huntsville, AL and couldn't resist stopping at the NASA Space and Rocket Center (home of Space Camp and the descendants of a lot of amnestied Nazis). Among the many interesting exhibits about the space program and rocketry was the gratuitous, thoroughly modern Army PR/Recruitment/Propaganda display. Not dwelling in the past, the exhibit focused heavily on ultra-modern technologies like drone aircraft. Since the home of Space Camp is a place that generally draws a lot of young people, the placards for this display (one of which I had to photograph so you might believe that it existed) was aimed at kids and teens. I always wondered how one might go about explaining the concept of a legion of flying death robots to a prepubescent audience. And now I know:

The text reads, "Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) are small planes similar to, but a little larger than, the remotely controlled toy planes one might purchase at a local mall."

Yes, Billy. That is exactly what UAVs are. They're currently engaged in some pretty heavy "nation building" in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Maybe you can fly one too someday!

Rough night on Tuesday, including some internet/power outages, so this will be somewhat brief and the second installment of the Supreme Court rant will wait one more day.

ProPublica has a great piece on the exaggeration, inflation, and flat-out fabrication of terrorist threats for political purposes. The maligned NYPD has made a habit of boasting about the "14 terrorist attacks" it has thwarted since 9/11, and since it comes straight from the mouth of the police and the mayor, why would the media do anything other than repeat it unquestioningly?
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Even a cursory analysis – which, again, no one seems to have bothered to do – reveals what ProPublica generously estimates as three sorta-legitimate threats.
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The remainder are mentally unstable people who made vague threats but took no real action or, more problematically, suspects who were only able to make progress toward an attack with the assistance of undercover law enforcement. Some nutjob(s) who couldn't plan and execute a gas station robbery decide to plot a terrorist attack and they get absolutely nowhere (because they're idiots, remember) until an informant cooperating with law enforcement or an undercover agent steps in and offers them materials and assistance to advance the threat. Then they are arrested and we are all told about the big, scary threat they presented. Look! They had bomb-making materials! That they got from, uh…well, that's not important.

Describing this kind of rhetoric as dishonest or these terrorist threats as manufactured seems almost too lenient.

Aside from celebrating American independence from whatever country we won independence from – about 25% of American adults don't know – I have been overcome with some sort of sleeping sickness over the past week or two. I've always been a six-hours-per-night-will-do kind of guy and a nite owl to boot, but lately I sleep like it pays by the hour. That and the poorly placed holiday have combined to make this week a total blog fail. I'll get back on the ball tomorrow.

For now, check out this little gem from Mitt Romney last week (emphasis mine):

I think this is a land of opportunity for every single person, every single citizen of this great nation. And I want to make sure that we keep America a place of opportunity, where everyone has a fair shot. They get as much education as they can afford and with their time they're able to get and if they have a willingness to work hard and the right values, they ought to be able to provide for their family and have a shot of realizing their dreams.

I used to think Mittens got something of an unfair rap for making tactless statements depicting him as an out-of-touch plutocrat who doesn't understand the little people.

That's unfair in the sense that it describes so many of our elected officials that I saw no real reason to single out Romney.
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The more he talks, however, the more apparent it becomes that his "misstatements" stem from some combination of his privileged life and his Randian ideology. He should probably know better than to say things like this in public, and he doesn't because he's completely tone deaf.

Make no mistake, though: this reflects his underlying belief system. He believes in an America in which everyone gets to succeed in life based on what they can afford, as befits a man who has been trying to buy the presidency for half a decade.

I planned to do the first installment of the two part Big Healthcare Post for Monday, but the precarious health status of my best non-human friend has prevented me from devoting much time or mental energy to it this evening.

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Tuesday it is.

In the meantime, Glenn Beck is leading the totally predictable jihad against John Roberts. Part of me wonders about the odds that going full apeshit on Roberts will turn him into the next Anthony Kennedy – a swing vote despite being mostly shriveled and to the right of Goldwater on the inside.

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One thing I can't imagine, though, is that turning Roberts into persona non grata in conservative circles will not have some observable effect on the man.

NPF is cancelled for reasons that should be obvious.

I have a lot to say about the Supreme Court decision that handed a narrow victory to the proponents of the Affordable Care Act, and a potentially epic rant on it is already brewing for Monday. Nonetheless, while it is still fresh on everyone's mind let's take a quick whack at it. A few things:

1. My insurance provider sent out an email to every member this afternoon noting, and I'm paraphrasing only slightly here, "We know that you've heard a ton about the health care law and the Supreme Court today, and we'd like to remind you that absolutely nothing has changed about your coverage." That is an important point that is rapidly getting lost in the deluge of words in your email inbox and on your social networking sites. For the overwhelming majority of us, nothing is different. All this law really did from day one is create some new rules for insurance companies and require individuals to obtain coverage (with numerous exceptions, subsidies, and so on). One of my friends earnestly emailed me and asked if health care was free now. Lots of right wingers appear to believe that government-run medicine is now a reality.

Many people are going to be genuinely surprised to wake up and find out that nothing really happened.

2. That "I have no idea what I'm talking about, but goddammit am I angry" is a common theme among your friends and family right now was predictable, but I am stunned at the number of people who appear to have no earthly idea what "single payer" means. Apparently it is somewhat commonly believed that single payer means that each individual is responsible for his or her own healthcare costs. I don't know whether to laugh or cry, so I do both.

3. Two things about John Roberts and his mysterious motives:

First, the text of the dissent refers to Ginsburg's concurrence as "the dissent" several times. Unless that's some sort of bizarre typo or Freudian slip, I'm pretty sure Kennedy's dissent was written with the understanding that it was the majority. In fact, there are several clues suggesting that Roberts not only switched his vote unexpectedly but did so very late in the game…as in, nearly at the last second.

Second, one of the common criticisms of Roberts upon his appointment was that he is a tool of the healthcare industry.

I don't see his decision as pro-ACA or pro-government or pro-Congress so much as it is pro-insurance. It's worth keeping in mind over all the celebrating that the underlying law is a pretty lame excuse for healthcare "reform". While it contains a lot of provisions that will help a lot of people, its primary purpose is to funnel billions of dollars into the insurance industry's coffers. That the individual mandate survived is a splash of perfume on the reality that the individual mandate was and is a pretty stupid way to attempt to achieve near-universal access to healthcare.

That's all for now. More next week, possibly up to and beyond the point at which you will be sick of hearing about it.

If we're all very quiet, you can hear the synchronized pant-shitting of the entire Tea Party.

Two quick notes:

1. Shockingly, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals managed to evaluate the circumstances of a 2007 DEA drug raid and determine that holding a gun to an 11 year old girl's head constitutes excessive force:

Next they went to the 11-year-old's room. The girl was sleeping. Agents woke her up by shouting "Get down on the fucking ground." The girl's eyes shot open, but she was, according to her own testimony, "frozen in fear." So the agents dragged her onto the floor.
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While one agent handcuffed her, another held a gun to her head.

At least the DEA accomplished something in the end, though, despite its casual disregard of the law.

After 30 minutes, the agents removed the children's handcuffs. After two hours, the agents realized they had the wrong house — the product of a sloppy license plate transcription – and left.

Oh. It's a sad commentary on the War on Drugs mentality of militarized law enforcement that we have to take the fact that they managed not to kill anybody as a victory.

Did anyone else immediately think of Lard's "Drug Raid at 4 AM" with Jello Biafra's frantic description and killer full-stop ending?

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"Sorry! Wrong house."

2. From the archives, elections are pragmatic affairs for most voters. We generally realize that this is an exercise in choosing between the available options rather than clutching to principles and waiting for the perfect candidate. Enjoy one of my favorite FJM-style posts, responding to a Hillary Clinton dead-ender who argued, as many did, that Clinton's supporters would not support Obama. Actually, they seem to have gotten over it pretty quickly. This is worth keeping in mind when someone tells you that Republicans aren't going to vote for Romney. Are they excited about him? Of course not. Will they get over it? For the most part, yes.