Prominent Blogger Renounces the Right | NJDC Blog.

My humble blog post on why I’m a left-libertarian drew the attention of the always-insightful Stephan Kinsella, who replied to me here. He catches me in a couple of errors (one of these days I’m going to start proofreading), and gives a good case for his view. I’m going to reply to the points that I think are important to the thrust of my post.

Still, I loosely agree with him so far, though I don’t think in my 25 or so years as a libertarian that I have ever thought of libertarianism as “a movement of the Right”–or even as a “movement,” really, since I don’t think it’s the same as politics or activism. It’s a political philosophy. But I will concede I for a while did believe, and it’s commonly believed, that we have more in common with some on the right. But even from the beginning, from Nolan Chart days, I thought of it as orthogonal to both left and right.

What I meant was that libertarianism appears, in my eyes, to be seen as a philosophy or movement of the Right to many, both libertarian and otherwise. For example, the Cato Institute and Ludwig von Mises Institute are often included in lists of “right-wing think tanks”, and many libertarian positions, such as being anti-tax, are seen as being “extreme right”. On a personal note, many social liberal acquaintances of mine hold the same view; that libertarianism is an inherently conservative or rightist position. All of this is rather secondary, though.

The Left is those who are for “peace, justice, and prosperity”? But that’s what libertarians are for (see my discussion of almost exactly this on p. 50 of my Knowledge, Calculation, Conflict, and Law, reviewing one of Randy Barnett’s libertarian books). I don’t agree that “leftists” are for prosperity, to be honest; or even for justice, unless you contort it to refer to “social justice” which is a misnomer; nor are they really for peace, since they are all breaking a few eggs to make an omelet. But this is just a semantical game at this point. If you define “Left” be include those for peace, prosperity, and justice, then all libertarians are left-libertarians, and the term loses its distinguishing capacity.

Here, Kinsella does catch me in a mistake. In my original post, I conflated 2 senses of “left”; the original sense that emerged in 18th Century France, and the sense in which libertarian socialists and the revolutionary Left uses it. In the first, “left” referred to the classical liberal and socialist elements that were opposed to the Ancien Regime, and “right” referred to royalists and conservatives (this is the sense used by Rothbard in his excellent “Left and Right: The Prospects for Liberty”. In the second, “left” refers to an admittedly fuzzy group of values, a rough list of which would include opposition to patriarchy, racism, and economic exploitation, and an emphasis on mutual aid and working outside of electoral politics. I think that the 2 senses are ultimately related, but they are distinct.

I don’t think this changes the thrust of my argument, though. Using left in the first sense, I was trying to illustrate that libertarianism should be seen as a leftist philosophy; in the second, I am saying that libertarians should advocate leftist norms and values. I see modern day libertarianism and leftism (2nd sense, although I think that there is at least some to be learned from mainstream social liberalism, in addition to the radical leftists) as being 2 parts of a unified “Left” philosophy that were separated by historical accident, and I think that both libertarians and leftists have a lot to learn from each other.

Anyway, later on Wombatron speaks of “the ‘leftist’ values of anti-authoritarianism, mutuality, and equality”: Now this sounds more like it. But this is not the same at all as being in favor of peace and prosperity. To favor peace, prosperity, and justice all you have to favor is private property rights and free markets. They do not imply these leftist values. So I’m a left-libertarian if left-means peace, prosperity…. but that does not mean I am necessarily for mutuality and equality and anti-authority. I think these “values” are frankly incompatible with libertarianism, and with peace, prosperity, and justice. Prosperity requires a free market and freedom to engage in capitalist acts among consenting adults. This leads to inequality (remember Nozick’s Wilt Chamberlain inequality example). There is nothing wrong whatsoever with inequality. Now if they merely mean “equality before the law,” then this is trivial and collapses into justice; but this is not what they mean.

What I mean by “equality” (and I think I speak for most LLs here) is “equality of authority”, as expounded by Roderick T. Long in “Equality: The Unknown Ideal”.

Mutualism is also unlibertarian, in my view, as it supports the taking of property from valid owners by mere possessors (see my A Critique of Mutualist Occupancy).

I see mutualist and Lockean property rules as being on a spectrum of possibilities, rather than being mutually exclusive, but this argument has been had before, and isn’t essential to the discussion at hand.

As for anti-authoritarianism: the left is not anti-authoritarian; they flock to the state to use it to impose their authority on society, to pay for others’ healthcare, and so on.

The mainstream left is definitely statist, as well as the Marxists and other state-socialists. The same can’t be said of libertarian socialism or classical social anarchism; these philosophies are anti-authoritarian. Even if they aren’t entirely consistent in their views, the same can be said of many libertarians (say, Objectivists or minarchists).

And as for opposing natural authority: libertarianism does not compel this at all. If anything, the “thick” view would say that to have a thriving society we need natural authority, hierarchies, and so on–from families, respected thinkers and religious and business leaders, churches, culture, and so on–in the absence of the state (see, e.g., Hoppe’s Natural Elites, Intellectuals, and the State).

Here we are using 2 different senses of the word authority. In the way that Kinsella and Hoppe uses it, I would agree, although I think the idea of hereditary natural elites is flawed and a rightist deviation. I think this Bakunin quote is a good demonstration of this view:

Does it follow that I reject all authority? Far from me such a thought. In the matter of boots, I refer to the authority of the bootmaker; concerning houses, canals, or railroads, I consult that of the architect or the engineer. For such or such special knowledge I apply to such or such a savant. But I allow neither the bootmaker nor the architect nor the savant to impose his authority upon me. I listen to them freely and with all the respect merited by their intelligence, their character, their knowledge, reserving always my incontestable right of criticism and censure. I do not content myself with consulting a single authority in any special branch; I consult several; I compare their opinions, and choose that which seems to me the soundest. But I recognise no infallible authority, even in special questions; consequently, whatever respect I may have for the honesty and the sincerity of such or such an individual, I have no absolute faith in any person. Such a faith would be fatal to my reason, to my liberty, and even to the success of my undertakings; it would immediately transform me into a stupid slave, an instrument of the will and interests of others.

If I bow before the authority of the specialists and avow my readiness to follow, to a certain extent and as long as may seem to me necessary, their indications and even their directions, it is because their authority is imposed on me by no one, neither by men nor by God. Otherwise I would repel them with horror, and bid the devil take their counsels, their directions, and their services, certain that they would make me pay, by the loss of my liberty and self-respect, for such scraps of truth, wrapped in a multitude of lies, as they might give me.

I bow before the authority of special men because it is imposed on me by my own reason. I am conscious of my own inability to grasp, in all its detail, and positive development, any very large portion of human knowledge. The greatest intelligence would not be equal to a comprehension of the whole. Thence results, for science as well as for industry, the necessity of the division and association of labour. I receive and I give – such is human life. Each directs and is directed in his turn. Therefore there is no fixed and constant authority, but a continual exchange of mutual, temporary, and, above all, voluntary authority and subordination.

I have no problem with “authority” in this sense of the word. What I have a problem with is when authority is used in an elitist sense; when someone presumes to know how someone else should live their lives, without it being the person’s decision. This includes aggression, but also other forms of hierarchy and oppression, variously propped up by the state and/or irrational collectivism. In his dissertation, Geoffrey Plauche distinguishes between different forms of autonomy, all of which are constitutive of an individual’s flourishing. Political autonomy, which corresponds to the libertarian and classical liberal idea of “liberty” is one; social autonomy, the freedom from constraints imposed by others in ways other than the use or the threat of the use of force:

There are any number of social influences that can lead a person astray from the life
appropriate for him. Some social influences are more pervasive and powerful than others. Some
such influences are in and of themselves malignant, but others are for the most part neutral or
benign. Among the more malignant are certain sorts of behaviors and institutions that discourage
or actively seek to suppress rationality, individuality, self-responsibility, productivity, and other
virtues. Cultures that encourage unquestioning obedience to authority and subordination of the
individual to the collective are prime examples. Other problematic cultural institutions are
paternalism, racism, and sexism.

I take a more leftist view than Plauche, but my approach is essentially the same. Authority, even voluntary authority, is not necessarily a neutral thing.

To be honest I am not sure what this even means. I am not sure that anyone is or can be a “thin” libertarian; and thus it is a mystery what it adds to call yourself a “thick” libertarian. It seems to me to be nothing but stating trite and obvious things and giving it a label, as if this is some significant, systematic, rigorous new field of study. We are not “only” libertarians. Yeah. Yawn. We do not live in isolation. Check. Ideas of libertarianism are interrelated with other ideas. Duh. You know, there are relations between philosophy and mathematics, but they are still distinct disciplines. As far as I can tell, “thickism” just names the obvious, and then acts as if it’s more profound than it is

I agree that it is probably impossible to be a consistent thin libertarian; if I recall correctly, even Walter Block, its greatest exponent, has since backed off from the position. However, I think that it is still useful to talk about thick libertarianism, because the connections between liberty and other values is often not explored.

Well, any social norms that are not aggressive are, well, not aggressive, and do not violate rights. But you can imagine any number of possible societies and associated norms that would not be good “from the libertarian point of view”–say, one dominated by ignoramuses or (private) censorship–after all, libertarianism is based on ideas discerned by reason; most people who are libertarian would be stultified and not lead a good life in such a society. And we could not expect it to last long either, because liberty does require reason to be free to defend it. But this does not mean that libertarianism–the idea that aggression is unjustified–automatically says anything about any given set of cultural norms. Not that this is not a field worth studying: meta-libertarianism, or libertarians with outside or related interests, might well want to study not only want interpersonal force-related norms are justifiable, but what societal preconditions are necessary to preserve it or likely to accompany it, just as others might specialize in researching tactics and strategy–just as some lawyers specialize in knowing an area of law really well, while others study legal theory itself.

Here I disagree; I think that the social preconditions for a free society are an essential part of libertarianism. Perhaps we are just using libertarianism in different ways; while Kinsella is calling libertarianism a “political philosophy defined by our opposition to the use of aggression in social interaction”, I see it as being my complete political philosophy. We may even be using “political philosophy” in a different way: fundamentally, I think that politics is the joint pursuit of eudaimonia by equals (to use Plauche’s phrasing). Liberty is not my highest political value; flourishing is. Should this view be called “libertarianism”, then? I am not sure. It is definitely “libertarian”, though.

This is a problem I have with leftism: it uses vague, nonrigorous statements like this–which are okay as far as they go–and then builds on them as if they are rigorous, operationa, and profound. They are not. They are just fairly obvious, unenlightening observations. Sure, liberty is “fundamentally intertwined” with other “concerns”. I guess. My libertarianism is fundamentally intertwined with the concern of clear and concise communication, but maybe that’s just me. So if this statement is construed in a normal way, it doesn’t say that much, and once again, “thick” adds nothing since by this uncontroversial standard all libertarians are “thick.” What libertarian can deny that liberty (I assume he doesn’t mean liberty itself, but rather libertarian philsophy, or libertarians themselves?) is “fundamentally intertwined with other concerns”?

I think that thick libertarianism is a useful term because the intertwining of concerns isn’t always as obvious or trivial as the communication example Kinsella gives. It is not necessarily obvious that libertarians should also be feminists or anti-racists, for example, but upon further examination, one might indeed (and I do) conclude so.

I think what happens is we have a disagreement over what those concerns are. The leftists get frustrated that libertarians dismiss their incessant, vague complaining about “hierarchies” and so on, so they try to argue something like this: look, Mr. Libertarian, surely you don’t deny that we should, “qua libertarian,” hold “other values,” do you? Answer: “uh, no, I guess not–after all I think honesty is important; if I didn’t believe in honesty I would not be a libertarian.” Right. And you don’t like aggression do you? Because it’s wrong to push people around, right? “Uh, okayyy”. So, you see that we are really not about aggression, but we are “against pushing people around.” But there’s many ways to push people around, right? You don’t think it’s nice to be abusive to your employees, do you? Isn’t that pushing them around, hmm? Isn’t that liek aggression, then, really? So if you are a libertarian, you should be against bossing people around. Libertarianism is about so much more than just opposing mere crime, silly!

I think this is very slippery and disingenuous. Look, the leftists should argue like this, in my view. If they are talking to a libertarian, and you want to persuade him to oppose (in some moral sense?) a given institution like … wage slavery or “pushing people around” or whatever, just come up with a reason. Appeal to shared values. Analogize it to common libertarian ones. Fine. Try to find mutual shared values you are likely to (or even necessarily) hold by virtue of being a libertarian. There is nothing wrong with this. But it doesn’t require any goofy appeal to something officially labeled “thick libertarianism” (or “thick humanism”) or pretending that all these other things are “really part of” libertarianism. I might argue against some racism I detect in a the private views of a libertarian friend, say, by observing that racism is incompatible with individualism, fairness, decency, “due process,” whatever–some of which I know he holds because he pretty much has to hold them to be a libertarian. In other words: we are complex humans, with a variety of interactions, relationships, interests, activities, and values. And we interact with each other. Newsflash.

I think that Kinsella is essentially arguing the thick libertarian case for me, without calling it “thick libertarianism”. The values that he mentions (individualism, fairness, decency) are indeed essential to a successful free and just society, which I think should be of vast concern to libertarians qua libertarians. As Kinsella stated earlier, we don’t live a vacuum. Our political philosophy should not be disconnected from the rest of our lives, or from the real world. Charles Johnson argues at length the case for thick libertarianism, as well as distinguishing between different kinds of thickness, in Libertarianism Through Thick and Thin. Instead of quoting him, I will just refer anyone who wants to see a deeper and more rigorous case for thick libertarianism to him.

Well if justice is “more than” non-aggression, then we are talking about justice in a broader sense than justice in terms of rights. Now we are going with some idea of unfairness or immorality or wrongness, where aggression is just a subset of this. But libertarians have from time immemorial recognized that just because you have a right to do something, it does not mean you should do it or that it is moral to do it. This is implied by our view that the only way to violate rights is to use force. To try to blur this opens the door to the use of force against not only aggression, but other forms of “injustice” or unfairness. That is the statist view of things. Not the libertarian one.

I am talking about justice in a broader sense than in terms of rights. By justice, I mean the sum of the expressions of the virtue of justice, which is, roughly, given everyone what they are due, whether in a legal sense or a more personal moral sense. Now, rights are the only norms that can be backed by legitimate force. But that does not mean that other norms are not associated with justice.

If you want to argue against “patriarchy” and “being subject to the arbitrary whims of others” (whatever that means), you are going to have to do more than just assert that if you are for peace, you already favor these things. You need to carefully define these things, and offer coherent reasons for them. I think that’s what traditional leftists have tried to do, and they have failed–in part, because they mix these things in with statist-socialist means, so corrupt their message. I do not doubt that a libertarian, with clean politics, and with a better understanding of sound economics, can make a far more coherent argument for why decent people, and those interested in liberty, should be opposed to patriarchy etc. But just make it. Don’t be so frustrated by your failure to win adherents to leftism that you try to pretend that it’s all a built-in, natural part of libertarianism, to try to twist liberarians’ arms to make them come along.

I found this passage especially interesting. To a point, I agree. However, I see various other concerns as being logically implied by libertarianism. Similar to Hoppe’s claim that ideal argumentation implies that one is committed to a libertarian view of rights, on pain of contradiction, I think that libertarians are committed to opposition to forms of oppression other than aggression.

I think that Kinsella made some good points. But, I still think it is useful to talk about thick libertarianism, and that a libertarian qua libertarian should recognize that various norms and values that are thought of as “leftist” are essential to libertarianism.

I probably disagree with him on more thing than I agree, but Charles Johnson, of Little Green Footballs, when presented with a post dated cheque from a crashing bank, rejected it when he saw it. Read his post, and read Andrew Sullivan’s response too.

As I have covered several times before, extremist wingnuts is what the problem with the US Republican Party is. Theocratic, authoritarian, homophobic, and misogynist wingnuts are not interested in governing a country; they are interested in governing you.

I am certain that most right–wingers are not wingnutsthe same way most left wingers are not moonbats. And yet the reasonable right–wingers are drowned out by a rabid base that is solidly us–versus–them, where wingnuts think that the “them” are absolute evil and while they hide behind empty words and doublespeaking rhetoric. And they hold the party hostage with political life or death over any moderate who dares to be moderate.

A real party would have principles. Some conservative principles are perfectly reasonable: respect for institutions, personal responsibility, intellectualism, incrementalism, fiscal responsibility; there is absolutely nothing wrong with those. What there is wrong with is denialism, extremism, hostility towards certain groups, misogyny, homophobia, theocracy, and torture are not good principles to stand for.

Charles Johnson over at Little Green Footballs is once again demonstrating his usual level of moral candor and intellectual honesty with a deep, bold cut to the GOP’s jugular:

Why I Parted Ways With the Right

1. Support for fascists, both in America (see: Pat Buchanan, Robert Stacy McCain, etc.) and in Europe (see: Vlaams Belang, BNP, SIOE, Pat Buchanan, etc.)

2. Support for bigotry, hatred, and white supremacism (see: Pat Buchanan, Ann Coulter, Robert Stacy McCain, Lew Rockwell, etc.)

3. Support for throwing women back into the Dark Ages, and general religious fanaticism (see: Operation Rescue, anti-abortion groups, James Dobson, Pat Robertson, Tony Perkins, the entire religious right, etc.)

4. Support for anti-science bad craziness (see: creationism, climate change denialism, Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann, James Inhofe, etc.)

5. Support for homophobic bigotry (see: Sarah Palin, Dobson, the entire religious right, etc.)

6. Support for anti-government lunacy (see: tea parties, militias, Fox News, Glenn Beck, etc.)

7. Support for conspiracy theories and hate speech (see: Alex Jones, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Birthers, creationists, climate deniers, etc.)

8. A right-wing blogosphere that is almost universally dominated by raging hate speech (see: Hot Air, Free Republic, Ace of Spades, etc.)

9. Anti-Islamic bigotry that goes far beyond simply criticizing radical Islam, into support for fascism, violence, and genocide (see: Pamela Geller, Robert Spencer, etc.)

10. Hatred for President Obama that goes far beyond simply criticizing his policies, into racism, hate speech, and bizarre conspiracy theories (see: witch doctor pictures, tea parties, Birthers, Michelle Malkin, Fox News, World Net Daily, Newsmax, and every other right wing source)

And much, much more. The American right wing has gone off the rails, into the bushes, and off the cliff.

I won’t be going over the cliff with them.

As expected, his post early this morning prompted a predictable response from the right: shrieks of outrage, howls of indignation, venomous attacks on his character and accusations of betrayal and liberal leftism all across the right wing blogosphere… a veritible shitstorm of abuse and hostility, all set to the tune of seriously bad crazy.

Which prompted Charles to follow up on his original post here:

The funny thing is, that post about “Why I Parted Ways with the Right?” I wrote it in about three minutes last night. It’s been brewing in my cortex for years, and something triggered the release; exactly what, I don’t really know. Guess it was time.

Here’s an open thread while I try to get through the 437 emails that came in overnight and this morning. Lots of hate mail as you might expect, dripping with venom and serving as object examples of exactly what I wrote about.

To the surprise of absolutely no-one, the usual mob of venomous frothing Johnson haters are out in force tonight, trying to downplay the post and discredit Johnson’s character on every venue that will allow them the bandwidth to do so, and on every blog post where the writer displays even a modicum of support for Mr. Johnson.

Too late, of course: the mainstream media has taken note. The cats’ out of the bag, and it’s not going back in.

Sigmund, Carl and Alfred have responded to Johnson’s post today with an opinion piece that is absolutely spot on:

Charles Johnson Rides Off Into The Sunrise

Charles Johnson’s critique of the political Right serves to highlight the mess in which the GOP and much of the Right find themselves. His critique is equally applicable to the Left. They have their own set of ugly baggage.

Time has shown that when it comes to politics, Charles Johnson travels light. It is a lesson that Americans of all stripes need to learn.

More support coming in from Andrew Sullivan, here.

UPDATE: I’m feeling generous today. Just for the helluvit, I’ve decided to turn moderation off on this one so that my readers and visitors can see the morally upstanding and highly principaled right-wing that Charles speaks of in full flower.

So spew your filth, folks… rant and rave, spray your venom, get it all out of your system. And don’t say that I didn’t give you anything for Christmas.

The former logo for LGF

Charles Johnson of the popular blog Little Green Footballs has finally explained, in a convenient top 10 list, why he parted ways with the rightwing blogosphere and condemned many of his former allies and friends for their views. The site has been around for almost a decade, and was initially nothing more than a routine blog about bicycle racing, programming, and web design. That all changed after the September 11 attacks, when he redirected his commentary to include the War on Terror, Islam and the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Charles initially found many allies on the right, because blogs that promoted an active role in the War on Terror, confronting the enemy in Afghanistan, Iraq, and other rogue states, were key foreign policy planks of the Bush administration. But the real claim to his fame came in the role of exposing the authenticity of the Killian documents pertaining to President George W.Bush’s service records that culminated in the ruination of CBS’s Dan Rather. LGF won the Washington Post’s reader poll for Best International Blog in 2004, and has enjoyed a following of 100,000 unique visitors a day.

Little Green Footballs began to swim against the mainstream right almost a year ago, however, when Charles decided that the political right in America were controlled by racists, fascists, religious demagogues, and bigots. In his list, he explains why he could no longer tolerate being associated with them.

The rightwing movement in the U.S. has been careless in some of their associations with the far-right, and in particular by conflating the War on Terror with a war on Muslims. I see the BNP in Great Britain and Velaams Belang in Holland as being a response to the leftwing multicultural policies enacted over the past several decades that has created this backlash. These countries have seen the face of their nation change practically overnight. But embracing these parties are not the solution.

The only means of bringing about immigration reform and protection of culture and tradition is not through an alliance with the white supremacists and fascists, but through moderate political change that identifies the weaknesses in the current leftwing multicultural state.

There are some very ardent and vociferous groups out there which represent what one might call the “religious right” in America: anti-abortionists, creationists, anti-same-sex-marriage. It’s particularly disturbing to see the War on Terror being articulated as a war on Islam, with some on the religious right calling the Qu’ran a poison like Hitler’s Mein Kampf.

Finally, the Obama-derangement-syndrome is evident, even right here in Canada. I think President Obama has done a rather underwhelming job as leader of the free world, marked by embarrassing gaffes and not-so subtle revelations that he isn’t quite the savior he presented himself as. But the amount of out-and-out hatred against him seems, with everything from the absolutely freakish “birthers”, to the accusations he’s actually a fundamentalist Muslim, is at least as ridiculous as the derangement aimed at George W.Bush by the political left.

Charles Johnson now focuses on attacking those things he doesn’t like on the right, particularly with his condemnation of “climate change deniers”, and the description of former allies who criticize Islam as being Islamophobes and fascists. He has become notorious in his control of dissenting opinion, banning thousands of people he calls “trolls” from his site, and deleting the comments of people who disagree with his views. Some call his careful screening of comments and registration as “paranoia” and a sign he has lost his credibility as a serious political commentator. Perhaps this focus on attacking his former supporters so assiduously is the reason why.

But I suppose to understand where he’s truly coming from, one would have to have been immersed in the heart of the rightwing movement in America during the height of avarice for Islam following the invasion of Iraq. I’m not very surprised that he’s tried to distance himself from the anti-democratic elements of the rightwing movement which, it would appear lately, have become indistinguishable from the moderates.

I think that Charles highlights one more problem with the left/right dichotomy in the United States. The middle ground has been left bereft by the polarizing effects of left and rightwing commentators who use emotion, instead of reason, to make their arguments. Whether it’s Rachel Maddow and Keith Olbermann, or Sean Hannity and Ann Coulter, the more extreme and offensive the statements, the more people tune in. If Little Green Footballs no longer belongs on the right, perhaps it can become the voice in the centre.

Charles Johnson just confirmed it.  Basically, Little Green Footballs has gone into lockdown mode because his ideology is driven his own petty hatreds.  It’s a shame; a couple years back, LGF was a decent site with a free exchange of ideas.  Now, the slightest peep of dissent becomes a ban three minutes later.

Plenty of more interesting sites out there, but it’s a shame to see one descend into darkness…

Update : the folks over at Blogmocracy do a pretty good review of The List of Evil.

Not really too surprising given the overall tone of LGF the last year or so, but in a sense the right wing blogosphere lost something of a rock star with this announcement and ten part list of exactly why Johnson is no longer affiliated with right wing politics.

From the link:

And much, much more. The American right wing has gone off the rails, into the bushes, and off the cliff.

I won’t be going over the cliff with them.

Your decade in 7 minutes from Newsweek

Lou Dobbs: Explains decision to leave CNN; Most scandalous moments

BastaDobbs.com announces victory

Jon Stewart: Hannity faked protest footage; Breaks stories ‘real’ media can’t

Obama helping lobbyists weaken offshore tax crackdown by David Sirota

John Yoo’s lawyers warn of flood of political suits

Current TV cuts 80 workers, shifts programming

Can we trust Google’s WiFi gift? from The Big Money

Prosecutor pushes smear campaign against students from Salon

Rachel Maddow on child labor, slavery trade laws opponents

Google poised to become your phone company from Wired

Evolution of blogging: Interview with Charles Johnson

Black unemployment at 40%, where’s the jobs stimulus? by Jesse Jackson

Israeli Jews and the one-state solution by Ali Abunimah

Pharma deal with White House to net industry billions by Sam Stein

Lack of health care killed 2,266 US vets last year

I’m Back!!!!

Back into the game of TTM autograph collecting that is…

It took some time to get organized, and I still have a ton of shopping to do for the next few rounds of cards I want to send out for autographs this off-season, but these 5 letters along with the 3 TTM/Interview requests I sent out a few days ago have gotten the ball rolling.

I’ve got a pretty exciting list of guys that I want to go after and I will do my best to chronicle this journey as the mail goes out and hopefully autographs come back home.

For this round, we have:  Charles Johnson, Jim Palmer, Bobby Richardson, Roberto Alomar, and Duke Snider!!!

Wish me luck!!!

Nice to see the Wee King Charlie now gets his talking points (with Extra Snark!) from dKos.

Funny – 1993 doesn’t seem like >100 years ago.

Somehow birtherblogger Charles doesn’t find time to comment on the NJ and Virgina outcomes.  Interesting, that.