The mirror with a memory

There’s an interesting op-ed in the Washington Post today (link is behind a paywall; sorry!). And it’s about something I’ve been thinking about for a while and have wanted to opine on for nearly as long.

The writer comments on some of the features of the latest Google Pixel phone, the ad for which has been ubiquitous during the baseball playoffs this year, and argues that it portends doom and disaster, about how it takes the act of blurring reality to a whole new level.

But does it, really?

Before I get too far into this, I should point out that (1) misinformation online is a problem that’s not going to go away anytime soon, and that (2) FOMO is a real phenomenon that can have deleterious impact on us, psychologically. Especially children. And all of the ways we can edit or alter our photographs are a part of that.

But both of these are problems with social media first and foremost. Modifying a photograph — be it through the artificial intelligence in our phones, photoshop, or cutting them up with a scissors and taping them back together — is a subset of that dishonesty.

I have written before about the Advanced Placement US History course I took in high school. One of the textbooks of that class was a relatively small paperback book whose exact title and authorship escapes me, but it was dedicated to debunking myths and illustrating forgotten aspects of history. I recall essays in this book about how the Founding Fathers were anything but united in just about anything that mattered, about how native Americans weren’t the greatest stewards of the land before Europeans arrived., and how we should not forget the Tulsa race massacre.

There was one article in this text, called The Mirror with a Memory, and I have shamelessly copied that title into this essay. It was about the invention of the daguerreotype and its successor technology, the camera. There is no question that the camera was a disruptive technology: it could capture images more quickly and more realistically than even the best painters could dream. It remains to this day the only technology that forced an art form to truly reimagine itself. When it comes to changes in technology and art, most of the time it’s about the distribution of the art and doesn’t force the art to redefine itself to survive.

Sure, the synthesizer changed the way recorded music is produced but at the end of the day, the synthesizer is just another instrument. And sure, movies have changed the way we view the theatre, but the greater process of writing a script and acting it out are essentially the same whether that’s on a stage or on a screen. We would not have had the art movements in the late nineteenth century and the twentieth century were it not for the camera forcing the painters to come to grips with the message of their art.

But just like the paintings commissioned by the wealthy prior to the advent of the photograph, it also could not be trusted to tell the truth. Any time you take a picture of two or more people and tell them to smile for the camera, you’re forcing them to put on a certain expression without regard to how they really feel. And you can never truly tell what’s outside the boundaries of the picture. That happy family staring straight at the camera? Who knows what they’re really feeling or what horrible props aren’t there…

Just ask any nature photographer. In order to get that one awesome shot of a hummingbird sipping on the nectar of a flower, they probably took at least a hundred less awesome pictures before they got that one good one. (And probably another hundred after too…)

That was the overarching thesis of that essay in my high school textbook. The camera was very good and very efficient at capturing not the truth, but the version of the truth that either the photographer or his subjects (or both) wanted to convey. Think of any famous photograph from any point in the history of the camera. Doesn’t the fact that it’s famous say as much about the narrative the picture is trying to convey?

In the more than 150 years since the camera was invented, the tools we have to convey a specific version of the truth have grown more sophisticated, that’s true. And Google’s latest phone builds on those tools, to be sure.

But I think any pushback against opening someone’s eyes or making them smile in a picture, when the intent was for that person to have their eyes open and smiling, is misplacing our anger.

A follow-up and some other thoughts on the state of the US House

At the beginning of this week I wrote to my representative in Congress and asked him not to vote for Rep Jim Jordan (R-OH) as speaker of the house. I intentionally didn’t offer my opinion of who should get his vote (primarily because I don’t see anyone in his party as worthy of the honor…)

Since then, the house has held three votes to elect a speaker in which Rep. Jordan was the GOP’s nominee for the position. None of them yielded a result of an actual new speaker. My representative voted for Jordan in the first two votes but on the third vote, he was one of six votes for Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-NC). Let’s ignore the fact that Rep. McHenry, despite holding the placeholder title of Speaker Pro Tempore, has stated that he doesn’t really want the position.

Given the current disarray of the Republican Party, I can’t really blame Rep. McHenry for not wanting it. Since Dennis Hastert gave up the gavel, Republican speakers of the house haven’t exactly fared well, to wit:

• John Boehner was forced out of the position by the same forces that ousted Kevin McCarthy earlier this month, with the only real difference being that Boehner resigned
• Paul Ryan served out the term until the democrats took the majority in the house, but he chose not to seek reelection because of the disarray that was the Republican Party on his watch
• Kevin McCarthy. ‘Nuff said.

It should be noted that in this same time period, the democrats had the majority of the house between Hastert and Boehner, and then again between Ryan and McCarthy. During both of these periods, the speaker was Nancy Pelosi, who, when the history books are written, will almost definitely be regarded as one of the best speakers in US history (and possibly THE best since the end of World War II. She was just that effective as a leader, uniter, and legislator).

Nearly a hundred years ago Comedian Will Rogers said, “I belong to no organized political party. I’m a democrat.” Oh how things have changed since then…. That’s not to say there aren’t divisions within the Democratic Party that rival the ones playing out for everyone to see in the GOP (any Democratic speaker will have to deal with the far left wing of political views the same way a Republican speaker has to deal with the far right), but at least in the current stage of history, that disunity is more pronounced on the conservative side of the aisle.

But why?

A few months ago, Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg, in an interview, asked why republicans even go into public service if, in this day and age, all they want to do is obstruct, rather than trying to make life better for their constituents. I wasn’t able to find the exact clip because too many of his interviews tend to go viral.

Even without the clip (and seriously don’t google “Pete Buttigieg viral interview clip” if you value your free time; there’s only 773000 hits on that now. I can only imagine how much larger those results will be when his political career is over), it’s a good question to ask.

Since the dawn of government, there has been legitimate debate as to what the correct size of the government should be. That doesn’t even have to be representative government, to be fair. Complaints about some absolute monarch collecting too much in taxes are engrained in popular culture and mythology. Alexander Hamilton’s critics and detractors felt that his plans to centralize government debt was an overreach comparable to the various laws passed by Britain’s parliament and which helped to cement support for the independence movement.

That’s not an easy question to answer, if you think about it: what role should the government play in the daily affairs of the running of any city / state / nation? Can you answer that question without quoting the preamble of the US constitution? (Makes you wonder how much argument and debate over the exact wording there was…. We generally only see the final product and the linked Wikipedia article doesn’t say much on that particular topic.)

And let’s face it: the Republican Party was not exactly founded on a vision of limited government. If you’re willing to look away from the fact that slavery, both as a concept and as an institution, is a morally reprehensible idea that can only be defended if you can accept the idea that some people are somehow morally inferior (or worse, not even human), then a political party dedicated to (depending on whom you ask) curtailing or ending its spread can not really be thought of as a party of limited government. Especially since the economic vision of the Democratic Party at the time was a Jacksonian laissez-faire policy.

I think the Republican vision of limited government goes back at least to the 1920 presidential election campaign of Warren G Harding and his “Return to normalcy” after the end of World War I. This is also, perhaps coincidentally, perhaps not, one of the most corrupt presidential administrations the United States has ever seen. We saw it again in the administrations of Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, and Donald Trump. Maybe there’s a correlation between less government oversight of things and government officials behaving badly.

But the real blame for the dysfunction within the GOP today falls squarely at the feet of Ronald Reagan, who actively campaigned on an anti-government platform. Remember “The nine most frightening words in the English language are ‘I’m from the government and I’m here to help.’”? The overall basis of Reagan’s electoral victory in 1980 was a platform of getting government off of our backs.

Although the evangelical base of the Republican Party seems to have no problems being in people’s bedrooms with their opposition to abortion and LGBTQ rights. And that was true in Reagan’s day, too. I guess it wouldn’t have sounded right if he’d said “We’ll get government off of your back and into your uterus.”

Fundamentally, that’s the real problem: deep down, most people can see the hypocrisy of saying they want less regulation over everything but sex and sexuality. In approximately the past ten years, there have really been three kinds of conservatives, only two of which still call themselves republicans: the small government conservatives who can trace their roots back to Harding, the evangelical Christians who want to rewrite history to make it seem like Jesus himself founded the United States, and the people who were so repulsed by Donald Trump’s behavior and rhetoric that they left the Republican Party.

So now, here we are, more than four decades after Ronald Reagan rode a wave into power, and you’ve got two generations of Republican politicians who have dedicated themselves to the notion of government service being the same as trying to curtail government functions from within. Is it any wonder, then, that people who went into government to destroy it, are now making it dysfunctional or worse? Trump didn’t cause it, but he did normalize the bullying, cajoling, and coarseness that are so prevalent in the extremes of the Republican Party of today.

Even the most perfunctory reading of the constitution would recognize that Congress is supposed to be a deliberative body. Between Trump’s tactics and the evangelical “my way or the highway” attitude, that makes deliberation either counterintuitive or impossible, depending on whom you ask. How else can someone like Paul Ryan — an extremist who, if left to his own devices, would undo the entire social safety net that’s been in place since FDR’s administration — end up being labeled a RINO (republican in name only)?

In my last blog entry, I said that the ascension of Jim Jordan to speaker of the house would basically mean that the Republican Party will have crossed the thin line that separates unconscionable and irredeemable. Even though he will not be speaker, it may have already crossed that line.

So the obvious question is: what happens next? Between the US Civil War and World War I, the Democratic Party only won two presidential elections (Grover Cleveland both times). The rest of the time, it was basically rudderless and without any real vision for the country. If it means that the Republican Party will be locked out of the White House for nearly a half century while they get their shit together, so be it.

A letter to my congressman

I just submitted a letter to Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick via his website. The original text is below, but I had to edit it down to just the first two paragraphs because of character limits built into the web form.

Dear Congressman Fitzpatrick. You often speak of how you are one of the most bipartisan — if not the most bipartisan — member of Congress, and this is often backed up by independent agencies dedicated to this kind of assessment.

It is for this reason that I, as a constituent of yours, strongly encourage you not to vote for Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) as Speaker of the House when the vote comes up.

Rep. Jordan has sponsored no meaningful legislation in his entire tenure in the government, defied subpoenas that were issued in pursuit of justice during the investigation into the riots of January 6, 2021, and in his tenure as chair of the House Juduciary Committee, has turned it into a vehicle for partisanship, grandstanding, and weaponization of the government. It is my hope that the good people of his district recognize the fact that he is a national embarrassment and vote him out.

This is not a man who deserves the promotion he seeks. I therefore implore you to reject his candidacy for Speaker of the House.

Sincerely,

Jim Phynn

I could have easily written more, since I said nothing about how Jim Jordan credibly enabled pedophilia while a wrestling coach at Ohio State.

The simple truth is that I have often said that I haven’t been able to vote republican in good conscience since 2004. If Jim Jordan is elected speaker, the GOP will have crossed the line from unconscionable to irredeemable.

Yet something else to worry about

My opinion of Benjamin Netanyahu hasn’t changed much in the more than six years (closer to seven) when I wrote that I consider him one of the most dangerous people in the world. Indeed, his attempts to “reform” Israel’s judicial system to be more favorable to his actions bespeak an authoritarianism that should be anathema to anyone who cares about allowing the people their voice.

Which brings me to the events of the past couple of days. As I said in my earlier blog entry, Israel has every right to defend itself against attacks on her sovereignty. So when a massive attack was instigated by Hamas, Netanyahu responded as can and should be expected of any leader.

I concede that I’m writing these words from as far away from the carnage and chaos as is possible, so I can’t help but wonder how bad things must have gotten in the Gaza Strip that made the Palestinians feel that this was a step worth taking.

I also wonder about the massive intelligence failure that allowed this to happen in the first place. Israeli intelligence forces are usually pretty good at picking up on these kinds of things so that makes this doubly a surprise.

One or both of two things must be true: either Israeli intelligence missed some major clue that this was about to happen (including the scope of the attack), or Netanyahu let it happen in order to further his own political goals.

If it’s the former possibility, this is something that can be laid at the feet of Donald Trump. Two years ago, the CIA admitted that they had lost a lot of informants, largely because something about them was compromised. Compromised intelligence on Trump’s part goes back to nearly the start of his term in the White House, and is apparently still happening. Note that that earlier article speaks specifically of intel from Israel.

If it’s the latter possibility, there’s nothing like a good disaster that will allow a leader with flagging poll numbers to burnish his image and maybe allow him to pursue his otherwise unpopular agenda without much resistance. Even if this isn’t true (I’m not claiming to know the truth), I wouldn’t be surprised if Netanyahu manages to pass his judicial reforms now, while he’s waging his counteroffensive. After all, that’s how George W Bush was able to get support for the Iraq invasion.

Of course, resentment of Israel by the Palestinians is nothing new, but it does raise the question of why now? Here are some possibilities that may have been a factor:

• Iran. They’ve supported the Palestinians for years. Perhaps they are worrying about their status if Israel and Saudi Arabia actually do manage to negotiate a treaty, as has been widely reported.
• Chaos in Washington. Between Tommy Tuberville endangering military readiness and politicizing the military in extremely harmful ways, and the lack of a Speaker of the House, it’s entirely possible that Hamas is banking on Washington not being able to fully support Israel.
• Deteriorating conditions. There have been reports of Israel cutting off electricity to Palestinian settlements. Global warming is probably affecting them pretty badly, as other countries in the area have been slammed by harsh weather.
• Russia, hoping for a distraction from its own military push into Ukraine.
• Just a general lack of progress.

Already we are seeing the Republican Party starting to blame Joe Biden for this, but I don’t see how this can possibly stick. I’m not blaming the republicans for it but they do have more culpability at the way this wasn’t prevented, than Biden does.

Here’s hoping for a peaceful, speedy resolution to this violence. Netanyahu deserves support but that support should be limited just to the defense of his country and not to any other aspects of his leadership; not the continued settlements and certainly not what he’s trying to do with the judiciary.