whyroots

A new administration is taking over 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Who are you most excited about and who do you wish Obama had done without?

Daniela's take

I'll keep this short and sweet -- Super good: Hilda Solis; Super bad: Timothy Geithner.

Solis, appointed to head the Labor Department, is incredibly strong on the weighty issues she will oversee. For one, she is very supportive of the ever-important Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), which one friend aptly described to me once as "another New Deal, for labor." The most telling story I've heard about her? After the EFCA failed in the House in 2007, she didn't just forget about it as so many pols are prone to do—she wrote about it, she's continued to campaign for it, and has not let it go quietly into the night in the way of so many other important failed pieces of legislation. And speaking of important failed legislation that's been on the back-burner for way too long, I think she could be an important force in dealing with labor issues related to comprehensive immigration reform. Namely, of course, addressing the issues of millions of undocumented workers in America that we need (badly), whose only crime is entering and/or remaining in this country illegally, and who would pay taxes if only they were given a fair path to legalization.

Geithner, appointed to the dangerously important post of Secretary of the Treasury, is cut from the same cloth as the men who sowed the seeds of the economic crisis. A protégé of Robert Rubin and Larry B(S)ummers, there is little indication that he will be any different than they have been in the past and even how they've acted more recently. (At this point, of course, I should point out how disappointing it is that Greedy Gumdrops Summers is Obama's head economic adviser.) Check, too, his social, professional, and other important connections to Wall Street. Further, the fact that Geithner can't even do his own taxes properly—or hire someone to do them properly—simply indicates carelessness and over-confidence.

Solis spells change; Geithner spells stagnancy.

That being said, happy Inauguration to all. I'll leave you with this post-script --

Super good: Aretha's hat (and pipes!), Michelle's ball dress.

Super bad: John Roberts' fumbling of the most famous oath on Earth; Rick Warren looking as fat and virulently anti-gay as usual.

And I'm not sure where Cheney's final White House appearance on a wheelchair, pushed by a sour-looking nurse falls. Probably under super appropriate.

Danish's take

I can't claim to be exhaustively familiar with any of the members of the Obama team outside of the big names most of us are familiar with. Unfortunately, a lot of Obama's choices have been either seemingly politically motivated (Clinton/Richardson) or just downright dumb (Geithner/Holder).

From what I've been reading, though, I think one of the more welcomed appointments is Arne Duncan as Education Secretary. Sure, there was that grammatical error made during his introductory remarks -- then again I'm sure there are several in this post -- but what I like about the man is his genuine support for charter schools. The pros and cons of charter schools have been debated all over so I won't go in to why this is a good thing. Perhaps even more importantly though, Duncan has under his belt the major accomplishment of having implemented a system similar to San Francisco's "weighted-student formula under which kids can take their education dollars to any school - public or private" and includes extra weighted funds for students with additional needs like special education, poverty, and English as a second language. These strike me as progressive and non-partisan solutions to restoring the lustre to our nation's most important national resource.
Jacob's take

After the Senate confirmation hearings, I would say that Eric Holder goes right at the top of my list of Obama appointments.  This has nothing to do with his résumé or experience, but simply the clarity and honesty with which he faced his questioners during the confirmation.  Compare this performance to Alberto Gonzales and Michael Mukasey.  This type of directness and reasonableness is exactly what I expect from Barack Obama and his Cabinet; indeed, it is the principal reason I voted for him.

In response to what was really a rather pathetic line of questioning from Senator Orrin Hatch -- Some people have accused Cheney et al. of committing war crimes, but you wouldn't prosecute them, would you? -- Holder stated simply, "No one is above the law... We will follow the evidence... and let that take us where it should."  Remarkably absent from Holder's entire hearing was the double-
speak and selective amnesia we have come to expect from the  Justice Department.

Coming in at the bottom of my list, somewhat artificially in order to respond to this writing prompt, is the Nobel Laureate and now-Energy Secretary Steven Chu.
I must admit I am proud to see appointed someone who is a professor PhD recipient from the department that awarded me my first degree.  Unfortunately, though, his background and research are totally irrelevant to energy issues.  I am sure that Dr. Chu is smart enough to master the field of energy research, as well as the political issues related to energy policy, but it seems odd that Obama has chosen someone with literally no background in energy or government.  His physics background will bias him towards physical solutions (e.g. nuclear) and away from chemical (e.g. ethanol) or biological (e.g. engineered cells) solutions.  There were probably other, more qualified applicants, eager to solve the most important issue of our generation.

Kate's take

I spent a lot of the last year writing about the disaster that is the Justice Department, so I think I might be a little biased on this question. From the U.S. attorney firing scandal to the politicization of the civil rights division, it's pretty clear that the Bush years have not been kind to what was once a great, and unbiased vestige of the law.

We've gone through three attorneys general since 2000, and one of them is still having trouble getting a job thanks to his notorious tenure as AG. The next attorney general is going to have a lot to clean up, so this job has never been more important.

Last Thursday were the confirmation hearings for Eric Holder, President Barack Obama's nominee to head the Department of Justice. Prior to the hearings, much had been made about Sen. Arlen's specter's statements that Holder could potentially be another Gonzales -- that is a butt-boy to the president.  Despite these acrimonious statements, the hearings were anything but.  The minority's questioning of Holder was more or less empty and political. 

Holder held up beautifully and people from both sides of the aisle embrace his selection. His supporters ranged from the obvious Democratic supporters of Sen. Patrick Leahy and Sen. Chuck Schumer to former Sen. John Warner (R) and Sen. Orrin Hatch (R).

By noon on Friday, the hearings had concluded and Leahy had requested a vote to pass Holder's nomination from Committee to the Senate. That will happen around 9 a.m. tomorrow morning-- the first full day of Obama's presidency.  A quick headcount will find that the Senate Judiciary Committee will likely vote to recommend him for full Senate confirmation. By the end of this week, we should have a new man at the helm of the Department of Justice.

And not a moment too soon. Though I didn't know much of Holder before these hearings and the multitude of articles on him leading up to his confirmation, I found his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee excellent. He was calm and levelheaded, apologetic for past mistakes, and wise in speaking of howe he'd learned from them. He didn't strike me as partisan, and neither did his supporters.

In short, Holder has been my favorite appointment of the new presidency.  In his testimony, and the testimony of others, he came across as a smart, capable man with a wealth of integrity-- and that's something the Justice Department can't have too much of these days.
Nathan's take

Unlike some other Whyrooters, I am happy with Obama's picks for major economic posts. But I'm not going to name any of them as my favorite Obama cabinet nominee. Instead, I'm going with:

Steven Chu, Secretary of Energy. He is a Nobel Prize winning quantum physicist who, unlike the Bush administration, acknowledges that science actually has the ability to reveal truth, and that good policy requires we respond to those findings. The refusal to acknowledge reality is one of the more consistently baffling elements of the Bush administration, not because I'm shocked now by any of their misbehavior, but because of its dazzling brazenness. After all, it's reality, and readily observable. Chu's appointment also stands in stark contrast to Bush's fox in the henhouse strategy to filling cabinet positions. Spencer Abraham, his first Secretary of Energy, had sponsored a bill to abolish the department. So here's to Steven Chu, a man committed to solving the biggest problems that better energy policy can tackle and with experience in running largescale research programs. Hopefully he will leverage the admittedly meager powers of his office for good ends.

If Chu represents a distinct break from the Bush administration, my least favorite pick promises to continue of some of our worst policies:

Tom Vilsack, Secretary of Agriculture. Others have complained about Vilsack's support for ethanol and GMOs. It's neither of these stands that bother me all that much. I still believe there's likely to be some place for ethanol and other biofuels in our country's energy diet, especially cellulosic ethanol. And I like me some GMOs. My issue is agricultural subsidies -- those big, big payments made to farmers to keep them producing food. It's devastating for developing countries' agricultural sectors, and terribly inefficient. Obama has made like he's going to reassess these subsidies for budgetary reasons. Couple of problems with this. One, budgetary considerations are out the windo with the current economic conditions, and farmers will not want to be left out of a stimulus package. Two, Vilsack himself has received subsidies. Oops. Too much of the same -- a secretary with ties to some of the worst policies that remain from our country's past. It damages his credibility as a spokesman, and may stand in the way of much needed reform. Let's hope Obama manages to fight big ag along with saving the economy, stopping global warming, and healing our racial tensions.
Ottavio's take

I see Robert Gates as Obama’s most enlightened appointment.  Here is why:

In conflict management and resolution, whether the conflicts be wars or disagreements over defense policy or education reform, the relationship between the person who brings the conflict to an end and their opposition is often more important than their relationship to their own constituency.

Possibly the most extreme historical example of this is Gerry Adams, the leader of Sinn Fein (the political arm of the Irish Republican Army) and the de facto leader of the IRA. Among other violent acts Gerry Adams helped organize the “Bloody Friday” response bombings to the “Bloody Sunday” protester shootings made famous in U2’s Sunday Bloody Sunday. Despite his radical views (from the British perspective) on the necessity of violence he ended up being the one to successfully sell the peace to the IRA and their constituents.  Paradoxically this man of war succeeded in creating a lasting peace and it was his credibility with the IRA, not with the British Government, that allowed him to do that.

I see this principle running through many of Obama’s appointments, most of all evidenced by his appointment of Robert Gates as Secretary of Defense.  I think this principle will allow Gates, a very credible seemingly non-partisan pragmatist (see his recent piece in Foreign Affairs titled “A Balanced Strategy”), to be successful in selling Obama’s foreign policy agenda to a conservative defense apparatus.  How will conservatives buck the very guy they themselves chose?
  
This principle certainly has its limits.  Dick Cheney or Donald Rumsfeld would have been terrible choices.  You must agree on a certain level (Gerry Adams wanted peace at a base level after all) as Obama and Gates do on the need to close Guantanamo Bay and the central location of the war on terror, Afghanistan.  

That said though you may still be asking, “why appease conservatives with someone they like when we have 80% approval ratings and more political capital than we have seen since Kennedy?” As I mentioned in a previous piece (see Bush, Business School, and Bad Decisions) the Presidents role is a managerial one.  Obama gets to give orders from 10,000 feet but how they are carried out depends on the people he is delegating too.  If his appointments have credibility in their own organizations as Robert Gates certainly does they will be more successful in carrying out his foreign policy agenda.

I am too hopeful to choose a bad pick.  I’ll wait until January 21st for that.

Will's take

I'll keep this relatively short and sweet so we can all put our attention to properly celebrating the end of the Bush reign, and prepare ourselves for the inauguration festivities tomorrow. All in all, I've been very impressed by the seriousness and qualifications of the vast majority of the nominees for prominent positions in the Obama administration. But if we have to name names, here we go:

My favorite member of Obama's incoming team is Eric Shinseki, the presumptive Secretary of Veterans Affairs. After recently visiting Manzanar Historical Site (a recommended visit for any American, exposing a dark but important part of our history), the Owens Valley location of one of the largest internment camps for Japanese-Americans during World War II, I find it even more stunning an achievement for Shinseki, born in 1942, to have risen to such heights in the United States Army.

Like Obama, his own narrative tells of the power of America at its best, and also like the President, he's been right about many of the major issues during the Bush administration, including the handling of the Iraq war. As the Chief of Staff of the Army, Shinseki repeatedly clashed with Rumsfeld and others on the Bush team over the strategy behind our involvement in Iraq, famously and rightly predicting that it would take several hundred thousand American troops to stabilize the country after the war. I think Shinseki is a great choice to lead our overstretched veterans infrastructure as we adapt to thousands of soldiers returning from American commitments in Iraq and Afghanistan needing physical, psychological and social rehabilitation.

My least favorite, from a personal standpoint (I can think of others, like Ray LaHood, who are less qualified/more dubious), would have to be Tom Vilsack. Nothing too personal about the guy, but for a president known for his devotion to fitness and arugula, the idea of nominating the former governor of Iowa, the archetypal "corn state," to manage American agriculture, beseiged by a flood of cheap corn and derived products, is absurd.

With obesity and diabetes on the rise, industrial farming and monocultures threatening food safety and biodiversity, and local cultures being flattened by thousand-mile food supply chains, an Obama administration had the opportunity to fight for a new system, to treat organic and local farming as a key source of the "green jobs" the President-elect so prominently preaches.

Vilsack's strong ties to the biotech and genetically-modified food industries (and even ethanol), and his preference for large single-crop industrial agricultural holdings over smaller diversified family farms, reflect an antiquated notion that the main job of the Department of Agriculture is to produce more food calories for less money, (dating back to Nixon's Secretary of Agriculture, Earl Butz) not to manage our national food supply in a sustainable, healthy, and diverse fashion. There may still be significant change in this arena over the Obama term, but if the past is any guide, leadership won't come from Vilsack. The good news is that this, like all of my criticism of Obama appointees, feels like nitpicking after eight years of disagreeing with the majority of the administration's important decisions.

Good riddance, George W. Bush!

Sarah, Robin, & Walter are on vacation this week.

Pick a media item from the Bush era and analyze it with all the irony that hindsight provides.

Ed. note: These responses were media-heavy so instead of republishing the prompt responses in their entirety here, we're just gonna link off to them. Enjoy, and sorry for the delay in posting them here.

Daniela's take
Danish's take
Jacob's take
Kate's take
Nathan's take
Ottavio's take
Robin's take
Sarah's take
Walter's take
Will's take

With the unfolding of this drastic recession, and the shock of job cuts, bankruptcies and unprecedented investment scandals, the American dream of becoming wealthier than your parents seems almost hopelessly naive. The last time a generation our age faced a recession of this magnitude, they overcame economic hardship, faced down fascism, and created a baby boom. Does our generation have it in us? What sacrifices should we be prepared to make? Further, are we prepared to be the next "greatest generation"?

Daniela's take

Ever since the markets started crashing this autumn, and as I've felt the effects ripple through my own life and the lives of those close to me, I've thought a lot about what is in store for my generation. I do, in fact, believe that we may be very capable of doing great things, but I don't believe it's fair to frame a discussion of what Gen Y may or may not achieve as a comparison to the so-called Greatest Generation.

While there are certainly broad parallels to be drawn between the uphill battle we face now and the one faced by those who came of age during the 1930s and 40s, it should be immediately clear that the hardships of present are not on the same scale. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are not our generation's Second World War; the economic meltdown of today is not the Great Depression. In other words, things now are not as bad as they were then.

So if my generation is not set to be the Greater Generation or even the Next Greatest Generation, what will make us a simply Great Generation? In trying to answer this question I thought back to an incredible essay by George Packer titled "The New Liberalism" that I read about a month ago. Here's the excerpt relevant to this post—

(...) November 4, 2008, is one of those infrequent dates when one historical age and one generation, with a distinct political and economic and cultural character, gave way to another age, another generation. The new era that is about to begin under President Obama will be more about public good than about private goods. The meal will be smaller, and have less interesting flavors, but it will be shared more fairly. The great American improvisation called democracy still bends along the curve of history. It has not yet finished astounding the world.

I believe this. I believe that what is most likely to be the defining philosophy, the defining greatness, of our generation is our embrace of post-partisan rhetoric as the means and progressivism as the end.

To be sure, sacrifices will have to be made, but for each sacrifice there will be a corresponding positive change that we not only need, but want.

We won't be as wealthy as our parents because we won't be able to live off of credit and won't be able to count on cushy financial jobs. We will not be confident of our status as the most powerful country in the world. But in exchange, we'll spend more brain and manpower on technology and education, and we'll helm the transition into an international system comprised of inter-dependent powers who will have to work together to deal with international problems like poverty, disease, and global warming. Our definitions of prosperity, success, and happiness will change—but they will be more sustainable.

This is the wake-up call. And we're going to answer it.

Danish's take

This week's prompt states "the last time a generation our age faced a recession of this magnitude, they overcame economic hardship, faced down fascism, and created a baby boom. Does our generation have it in us?" I certainly hope not, since although the "Greatest Generation" faced down Hitler and survived the Great Depression, they also begat the Baby Boomers -- the "Lamest Generation" as I like to call them. As James Quinn, senior director of strategic planning at Wharton says—

"they rebelled against their parents, protested the Vietnam War, and settled down in 2,300 square foot cookie cutter McMansions with perfectly manicured lawns, in mall infested suburbia. They have raised overscheduled spoiled children, moved up the corporate ladder by pushing paper rather than making things, lived above their means in order to keep up with their neighbors, bought whatever they wanted using debt, and never worried about the future. Over optimism, unrealistic assumptions, selfishness and conspicuous consumption have been their defining characteristics."

And so here we are, with Bernard Madoff's sons having to turn in their own father.

While it's lovely to think our generation is in a position to make sacrifices to save our country, the sad truth is that old people are still running the world. Take for example the Detroit auto bailout. This is pure conjecture, but I'd wager that the proportion of people who support this (or any other bailout) increases with age. Here we on the brink of a global depression, and we're about to pour billions into a dying industry that has long been a drag on American productivity. If we can't let a decrepit, tottering industry succumb to its deserved fate in a time of intense economic crisis, then how can we be expected to make real sacrifices? 

What to do, what to do? Popular wisdom says massive public spending is the solution. That doesn't seem like much of a sacrifice to me. Let's start by updating our antiquated idea of what constitutes the "American dream." Let's stop subsidizing suburbanism and loading legislation with pork just to keep the red states afloat. If there are no jobs in small town America, maybe we don't need to "create" those jobs, maybe we need to make it easier for people to find jobs elsewhere and sacrifice the comfort of home for new opportunities. Let's sacrifice the idea that anyone anywhere can become a doctor or a lawyer or a CEO and start respecting work of every form, which means stop sending people to college who have no business going there.  

As far as having it in us to be the next "great generation," I can't really say. We certainly should be with all the information at our fingertips. Unfortunately, nobody knows what's going to happen in the next few years. While throwing money down black holes might seem like a surefire way to recovery, let's hope everyone keeps the law of unintended consequences in mind.

Jacob's take

No, there will be no greater generation. After all, it was the Greatest, not the Greatest So Far. There is nothing special about Americans, only their belief that there is, and America itself is decreasingly special. Americans, like anyone else, rise to the calls of leadership and necessity. The Greatest Generation was a response elicited by a vacuum in global power. "The American Century" was multi-determined and was not the expression of an inherently gifted hyperethical "generation".

Circumstance is not on the side of our generation. America is, after all, in relative decline. This means we will necessarily not make more money than our parents.  If trends are reliable, it seems we are entering an era of a multi-polar political world, which is most likely a good thing. So the confidence generated by American exceptionalism can no longer feedback to inspire Americans to greatness.

The best we ought to hope for is that we can be adequately cooperative with the world and not make horrible mistakes (cf. September 2001 – October 2008). But great leadership can get us halfway to "greatness." I think Obama's calls to a multi-faceted worldview may be this century's version of the calls to American world-stewardship. Thus, the sacrifice we should be prepared to make is to forgo the self-satisfaction of thinking too highly of ourselves. If we have a more modest view of ourselves, we may take government more seriously, allow it to provide services we earnestly need, and we may even care enough to hold our leaders accountable for their misdeeds.

Nathan's take

School's out for the holidays, so I get to feel like a real, live blogger, typing this post in my PJs. With the world collapsing around our ears and the weight of history on our shoulders, this might seem like an incredibly luxurious thing to do. But if our generation is to have any shot at solving any of the world’s problems, our approach will involve the interwebs.

Back when I was 14, my biggest problem was finding a girl to make out with, and AOL Instant Messenger was there. Back then, it was much easier to flirt from behind a keyboard than face-to-face. Sadly, we can’t spin-the-bottle our way out of the mess we’re in, but the interwebs are still the sea we swim in and can still be useful. We’re creating networks of friends that span the globe; we are constructing political coalitions that win elections; and we are spontaneously freaking out hundreds of people in Grand Central. I don’t really need to tell you how transformative the internet is – you know this -- I just wanted to tip my hat to the hero before moving on to the villain: irony.

Yes, irony, protector of hipsters, destroyer of worlds. Irony started as harmless fun, and a dash of irony is still preferred when opening a blog post with a saccharine ode to technology (see above ironic use of “interwebs”). But as the dominant mode of contemporary discourse, it’s completely bankrupt. Many of our generation’s brightest lights ran off to make big bucks as modern day alchemists in the financial sector. Irony came for many of those that were left, leading them off to wallow in ironic over-privileged gloom and designer T-shirts. Those that remain need some help in turning this thing around.

So, in these times of economic hardship, with bankers returning to grad school and hipsters too poor to silkscreen, I say let’s give irony a rest and stare the problems of the world and our own failings full in the face. That will be the only way to take up the mantle as the next "Greatest Generation." Seriously.

Ottavio's take

More often than not, opportunity, rather than intrinsic greatness, makes people great. America's current troubles, many of which are global, have provided our generation with the opportunity for greatness. The things that have made Americans successful in the past will make our generation successful and bring us through our current crisis.

We have concrete assets that will continue to make us prosperous: Our infrastructure (though in need of an update); our institutions (unfortunately not our financial regulatory institutions), public and private; and our land.

We have cultural assets that will continue to make us prosperous: The American belief in a meritocracy; American individualism, the American desire (not that it is unique to America) to be more successful than your parents; and American optimism.

As Winston Churchill said, "You can always count on Americans to do the right thing, after they've tried everything else."  A lot has been tried and the time for the right thing is here.

Robin's take

The coming economic and ecological down cycle is going to be a wild ride for our generation -- hopefully one that forces us to re-examine our ideas of wealth. In this context our generation's test is to prevent the collapse of these systems and doing so requires a significant sacrifice or a change in our lifestyles in terms of our consumption and production.

From my perspective, as an architect, the dual problem of the free-falling bourgeoisie's demand for architecture as a luxury service coupled with the foreseeable depletion or exhaustion of material resources on the planet sounds apocalyptic for my chosen profession. In developed nations, the built environment accounts for 70% of resource consumption (by weight), 60% of non industrial waste, and 40% of total energy consumption. I have to hope that the serious constraints that architecture will see in the near future regarding economies of material, energy and demand will be understood as an opportunity for us to do better.

In Natural Capitalism, Paul Hawken plainly states that capitalism is lazy, and that the success of a product economically rarely corresponds to to its quality or integrity. It's no surprise to him that the U.S. auto industry is seeking a $34 billion bailout when the most innovative development in automobile technology in the past 10 years has been to add more cup holders.

The success of our generation will be defined by our ability to innovate and perceive economic pressures as a catalyst for doing so. In addition, what will make us great is our ability to redefine wealth as something other than monetary accumulation.

Sarah's take

Generation “Y” -- the Internet generation, the Obamaphile generation, the gay-friendly generation. The YouTube generation, certainly. The “greatest generation”? Unfortunately, that one’s already taken -- claimed by the stalwarts of World War II, our grandparents, who are, it seems, none too modest about their achievements.

But really, there’s no comparing the challenges of our grandparents -- the Great Depression, World War II, and their lamentable offspring, our parents -- with the challenges facing Gen Y today. Our wars are much more confusing and are coming off poorly (can anyone imagine “V-I” day -- Victory in Iraq Day?). Indeed, donating one's pantyhose and scrap metal is no longer a useful contribution to our country’s international fortunes. And I somehow doubt Generation Y is destined to become the progenitor of another baby boom. 

However, our recession, should it become a depression, may yet resemble that of our grandfathers. Both are painful comedowns off dizzy speculation and loosey-goosey regulatory policies, though the current crisis is rooted in financial schemes made possible by modern technology. Sober observers of the economy have detected a creaking of the machine that is reminiscent of the early 1930s. It’s a scary proposition.

But conditions have changed, and it’s hard to see a single, noble path leading out of the forest. For the Greatest Generation, World War II provided a boost to the economy, while simultaneously defeating the Nazis. Why, we should be so lucky! Our struggles are more ambiguous and our suffering seems more like malaise in the absence of a single rallying cry (Obama notwithstanding).

Awash in this unhappy sea, let us recall the enduring images of the last Great Depression -- ramshackle Hoovervilles and beaten-down Oakies, starved and humiliated by the Dust Bowl. The poor always suffer most in any economic crisis -- a fact to be kept in mind as we attempt to stave off the current one. Taking care of our fellow citizens, particularly the worst-off among them: could it be our rallying cry?

Walter's take

Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. encouraged his writing students to make awful things happen to their characters to show the reader what they’re made of.  But this recession—and it will be bad—is not enough to prove our greatness.
 
First, this will be nothing compared to the Great Depression. Unemployment in some areas reached 40% and many people were unemployed for nearly a decade—breadlines and soup kitchens marked New York City and malnutrition was a serious concern. More than that, my grandparents' generation earned their greatness not simply by becoming wealthy again, but by leaving their depression-afflicted towns to fight in an enormous war and emerging in a world free of fascism as the singular super-power. They unlocked the power of nuclear chain reactions, rebuilt Europe and Japan, and—within a decade—saw the yokes of colonialism collapse. Sure, this was not entirely their doing. They watched historical trends come to fruition. But it was a time of greatness. It’s difficult to fathom the permanent and far-reaching consequences of their lives.

The point is greatness requires more than returning to 3% GDP growth. It is unlikely we will earn our greatness by expanding our geopolitical dominance. We have to offer permanent solutions to big problems and turn pages of history.  I can think of a few goals that might enable us to earn our greatness:

First, and perhaps this is obvious, we ought to make it our national business to pioneer great technological progress. There was a time when the brightest minds and organizations of a generation worked to cure polio or put men on the moon.  Now, they trade derivatives. I’ll be the first to argue that trading derivatives has social value up to a point, but only up to a point and maybe this depression will help us draw that line and reconsider the social norm of following all the other bright boys to Wall Street. There are great technological problems to be solved and it will take great-big subsidies, leadership, and creativity to solve them. Alternative energies, disease, climate change, global transportation are proper challenges for us to assert our greatness in a way that has a lasting impact around the world.

Second, our generation is well-positioned to earn its greatness bolstering international law. I am weakly optimistic that this will have renewed importance under the Obama administration and as the U.S. finds long-term solutions to our situation in Iraq. The first step to bolstering international law would be obeying it. And the first step there would be closing Guantanamo, which seems like it’s going to happen. The U.S. can hope to reclaim the moral high ground and strengthening international organizations—thinking beyond the pathetic shape of the UN or the IMF—would be an accomplishment we can point to in 60 years.

And third: I think the most important work Americans can do while we endure this depression is reflect on our lifestyles. We are the wealthiest nation around and we spend it living in great big houses in the suburbs, driving big pieces of steel that weigh thirty times our body weight to run quotidian errands. We support a medieval monarchy to afford this situation but even so it’s not easy to sustain what is probably the greatest misuse of resources in history. This model is being mimicked in the suburbs of Beijing today, Bombay tomorrow, and Brazzaville after that. It isn’t working and we need to admit it. Fixing this problem will require more than a miracle technology. We need to restructure the way we live and accomplish things.  

All signs point to major government works under this administration both because we need them and because we need a massive stimulus package. Jason Furman says it will be on the scale of Eisenhower’s interstate highway project. But please, let’s not build more roads.

Will's take

The question of our generation's character has been much on my mind in the past few weeks, as bad news turns to worse in the markets, and serious questions about our nation's ability to maintain such an extravagantly high standard of living remain. The historical precedent of the Great Depression has been dragged out in editorial after editorial as evidence of Americans' get-'er-done melting pot ingenuity in the face of crisis. While certainly a hopeful thought to hang above the fireplace with care this holiday season, the similarities aren't all they're cracked up to be.

For starters, while we face some of the same problems (unemployment, lack of credit, etc.), we do so against a drastically changed historical backdrop. Unlike their Depression-scarred grandparents, Millennials didn't overcome widespread familial poverty through thrift and hard work; we were brought up with Super Nintendos and summer camps (well, I didn't have a Super Nintendo, but all my friends did...). Consumption has been part of our DNA for so long that cutbacks on luxury items like consumer electronics and designer clothing feel like unspeakable privation. If this recession gets worse, it's the children in grade school now who will truly internalize it into their worldview; it's far too late for us.

We also lack the shared experience of the World War that followed and ended the first Depression, a war that brought millions of Americans into the middle class through manufacturing jobs and G.I. Bill education. If the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have had any profound social effect, it's been in increasing the underclass of wounded and psychologically scarred soldiers with insufficient benefits, and shattering families in predominantly lower-income neighborhoods every time another body comes home.

Nevertheless, the parallels remain between us and those intrepid stormers of Normandy and organization men (and women, in the first truly widespread instance of American women working outside the home). We seem to be, like our grandparents before us, a pragmatic generation, more focused on getting things done than on the deep ideological struggles of the Boomer cohort. Both conservative and liberal Millennials tend to oppose President Bush's policies, (unlike in the 60s, when Young Republicans like Karl Rove counted on widespread support among mainstream youth) and the 2008 presidential election results among our demographic (66% Obama to 32% McCain) should be downright embarrassing to the Republicans.

But those who see Obama's electoral mandate and the Democrats' control of both houses of Congress as an excuse to push through a broadly progressive agenda (which I tend to support) should take note of another precedent set by the Greatest Generation. The buried resentments of the post-war "consensus years," during which coastal elites dictated a technocratic policy slate supposedly "beyond ideology," surfaced in the modern conservative movement, first in Barry Goldwater's failed presidential bid, later in Richard Nixon's political comeback, as decisions about race, government aid, and foreign policy that once seemed self-evident frayed and ultimately exploded in the protests and counter-protests of the 60s.

I, for one, intend to keep a close eye on the young followers of libertarian hero Ron Paul, defined by their fervent support for limited government, reinstating the gold standard, and isolationist foreign policy. Like Goldwater's conservatives, they have been alienated by both major parties. While their numbers have yet to impact national politics, the collapse of the global financial system could prove an unexpected boon to their cause.

We have been blessed, or cursed, to live in interesting times; the way we react to what may be the defining economic shift of our lifetime will prove whether we deserve to be the Greatest, Second Greatest, Worst, or "_____" Generation.

Evangelicals have played an active, frequently decisive role in American politics for decades. But a realignment seems to be in the works. More evangelicals are looking beyond the culture war issues and engaging in progressive movements for social justice and environmental protection. At the same time, liberals have long been distrustful of fundamentalism. How should the progressive movement change, if at all, to accommodate this cohort?

Daniela's take

I was raised an agnostic, have embraced atheism, and am pretty much entirely surrounded by other rejecters of religion. Throughout the 2008 presidential campaign I was awed—and not in a comfortable sense—by the way every candidate professed his or her adoration of Jesus Christ the Lord. Surely, I thought, they are merely being politically expedient. (This political expediency thesis makes it easier for me to understand how a man of Obama's intellect could say he believes in God despite being raised in a decidedly non-religious home and having remained non-religious until early adulthood.)

Despite the secular bubbles I travel in, I am not delusional about the existence of the god delusion in the United States. In this country—the most religious developed nation in the world —our dollar bills say it all: "In God We Trust."

I have no problem with others believing in Jesus, Allah, Xenu, Haley's Comet, what-have-you. I understand that religion is as old as mankind and even though I am certain we are trending toward secularization in the long-run, the United States is not there yet. If religion gets you through the night, the day, the life, so long as you don't impose it on me and the laws that govern my citizen life, then I absolutely respect your free-will choice to practice it just as I hope you respect my free-will choice to abstain from it.

All this meandering merely to say that if evangelicals and other believers want to work with progressives on issues ordinarily unassociated with the religious right, that's wonderful. Wonderful, indeed. But I don't believe that in order to attract their numbers, progressives have to pander to their religious beliefs. While it may be politically expedient in the short-term, it is neither politically nor morally expedient in the long-term to cater to fundamentalists' religious tenets, particularly not when those same beliefs have been often used to justify the stripping of others' rights.

If evangelicals are moving in our direction, it's because progressivism is inclusive where fundamentalism is exclusive. It would be wrong to exclude religious people from the progressive game but it also would be wrong to play by fundamentalism's failed rules and let religion referee.

Danish's take

Just to clarify, we're not talking about the band from Oklahoma, right? Because those dudes put out one heck of an album. 

In all seriousness, this week's prompt appears to ask two questions: are Evangelicals becoming more progressive, and if so, what should progressives do to make these Evangelicals feel more at home? While I can claim no expertise with respect to Evangelical political beliefs (if such a monolithic thing exists), it does appear at least anecdotally that some Evangelicals are growing increasingly uncomfortable with the dittohead nature of their movement. However, I can answer the second question somewhat more conclusively: nothing. I don't mean that with any contempt, but I'll explain below why the idea of "accomodation" is anathema to me as an unaffiliated progressive.  

I think of "progressive" as a label that is different from party affiliations like "Democrat" or "Republican." While candidates running for office may need to calculate centrist or mainstream positions and choose political stances based on focus groups with the hope of widening the tent, the political activists of the world should feel free to speak as openly and plainly as possible. Much like the avant-garde of the art world must serve as pioneers of the cultural terrain before more mainstream artists can reinterpret their work for a broader audience, so too must activists/progressives/ideologues advocate their positions in a vacuum void of public opinion. Once we figure out what we stand for and why, it's up to the people we choose to support for office to come up with a marketable political brand. In other words, if Evangelicals want to listen to our Steve Reich that's all well and good, but don't expect us to throw in some auto-tune to make it more palatable. 

Jacob's take

PROGRESSIVES SHOULD BE SKEPTICAL OF ANY PROPOSAL TO EMBRACE RELIGIOUS FUNDAMENTALISM. These people just destroyed the Republican Party – why should anyone take them on board? That said, there may be reasons such proposals could survive skepticism. Evangelicals are having some success marketing their own fundamentalism in the current environmentally-conscious market, and I do appreciate this unusual alliance in order to save planet Earth.  But for issues that don’t involve impending global disaster, I think fundamentalists should be left to brood over the End Times in the quiet comfort of their own organizations.

There is no question that when Christian organizations practice the actual moral teachings of Jesus Christ through various charitable activities and environmental activism, this is helpful to the recipients of said activities.  Should the government finance said practices?  Why on earth should it?

As I understand it, the presence of religious charitable organizations is an important justification for the horrors of free-market capitalism – a major constituent of a very small private sector of organizations that help those who are sacrificed to the creative destruction of a free-market system. So, why should they need any money from our secular government? The ‘moral sentiments’ of the capitalists ought to keep the churches bankrolled. Keep the government out of economics but subsidize the churches? Ridiculous.

Funding religious humanitarian activity gets us into some pretty awkward decisions about what churches can do with government money. And, as in the famous case of abstinence-based education for people dying of AIDS in Africa, funneling aid money through religious organizations can be fatally problematic.

I say we show our respect and appreciation for the charitable work of religious organizations by saying “Thank You!” After all, doesn’t something so cheap as money offend their lofty morals anyways?

Despite (or rather because of) his disturbingly adept ability to speak in tongues with his fellow Christians, I am put off by Obama’s ideas about religion. Obviously, I appreciate their sheer brilliant cunning. There was no question that his rhetoric was right for the time. But I hope that time will soon pass and religious fundamentalism will fall into another slumber, as it’s done before in America’s young history.

Jonah's take

Assuming this is true, who cares? I’m tired of Evangelicals. I’m tired of the way they close their eyes during Christian rock concerts, tired of their embroidered pillows with pithy heaven-y messages. But mostly I’m tired of politicians catering to and respecting (or pretending to) enthusiasts of magic and hocus-pocus.

The only reason we should tolerate evangelicals is if 1) they are actually progressive and 2) they got lots of dough. This whole Prop 8 situation certainly was a fundamentalist coup—just imagine if we had that kind of power on our side? Unfortunately that’s just more fairy tale hopefullery. It won’t happen.

When have evangelicals come out (with that frightening force and organization) for something positive? They only seem to come out against. The rule of thumb is that culture war issues are the only ones that will galvanize the crazy people. That’s why the clever Repubs constantly inflame them. You think environmental issues will jazz up armies of the righteously angry? Gross.

I can handle Evangelicals when they are angry and strange, hoisting Jesus to condemn minority groups—that's just standard stuff. But imagine if they wielded that same creepy smug God-love towards something positive? Cities would buckle under the sheer weight of their schmaltz.

Nathan's take

I spent three days a week this past semester discussing Faith and Globalization with Yale students from the business school, divinity school, law school, international relations program and college. This issue of religion's role in politics and public policy-making came up often. For the divinity school students and many of the other religious people in the class, modern liberalism had long alienated them, silencing their religious perspectives. For them, John Rawls' Political Liberalism was the epitome of the left's silencing of religious voices; his argument that one should only offer religious reasons for a position if they are backed up with other, commonly held values as justification limited debate and forced religious believers to artificially separate their private lives from their public ones. 

I tend to come down on Rawls' side of this question. First, I don't think the government should be in the business of legislating to fit anyone's religious idea of right and wrong. If your argument only makes sense to members of your own faith, then it shouldn't be the basis for governing everyone. Second, it's hard to distinguish between political speech and policy action in a democracy. One might say, "Sure, we don't want our government behaving that way, but what's wrong with citizens arguing for a policy on the basis of religion?" I'd say there's nothing strictly wrong with it, but I wouldn't ever want any government acting on the basis of that argument. That makes religio-political argumentation rather odd -- permissible only if it doesn't actually convince anyone in power. But of course it can -- and does -- and that's what unsettles me.

So how can progressives welcome the new, evangelical members of our coalition? With eyes wide open. These folks are going to be helpful allies when it comes to specific issues, but in the long-run their governing philosophy is to be avoided. But how hypocritical is this -- to say on one hand, "Use religion to convince your rank and file to support mutual ends," and on the other, "Don't bring your religion into the public square"? More importantly, how dangerous is it to legitimize religio-political argumentation from the left? Once the left and right agree on religion's place in political life, will it ever leave?

When religion enters politics, it's not a one-way street. A congregation seeped in political debate is an ugly thing, and it's one reason that even in the extremely liberal churches I've attended, the ministers shy away from overtly political statements. There's a fascinating scene from the 2006 film, The Wind that Shakes the Barley, in which politics intrudes on the church in a literal sense, with an argument breaking out between the priest and a parishioner (you can watch it here). So while some religious liberals might wish for their religious points of view legitimized by fellow, secular progressives, it might not be long before they find the diry work of politics spoils the harmony of religious communities. Rawls wanted to keep religion out of politics; it might not be long before religion agrees.

Ottavio's take

The progressive movement should change in emphasis only.  Let’s find and emphasize issues where the two movements agree, like social justice and environmental protection. With issues where there is a traditional disagreement, like abortion, let's emphasize the common ground that exists. Instead of emphasizing a woman's right to choose, we should emphasize the common goal of preventing unwanted pregnancies, for example. Avoiding ideological arguments and replacing them with pragmatic ones will more successfully court social conservative voters and more effectively make the progressive case.

This strategy has important electoral implications. In electoral contests broadening your appeal seems like a logical strategy to me. Remember, President Bush's first victory came on the back of campaign run on compassionate conservatism. If progressives can present themselves as candidates who social conservative voters are willing to lose too (people who will fight to reduce the number of abortions for example) then progressives will have a much easier time winning.

Sarah's take

I love when people look in the Bible and actually pick out the noble principles it contains, leaving aside the niggling examples of intolerance that are the vestige of Scripture’s human authorship. The Bible is at its best when it shows us at our best -- though, regrettably, it does contain fodder for our baser instincts. Ham, Onan, and Jezebel are just a few examples. I mean, here’s the Wikipedia summary of Jezebel’s downfall in Kings I and II:

“Jehu then confronts Jezebel in Jezreel and urges her eunuchs to kill the queen mother by throwing her out a window (defenestration). They comply, tossing her out the window and leaving her in the street to be eaten by dogs. Only Jezebel's skull, feet, and hands remained.”

The Old Testament is scary. But I digress. The point is that the Bible bursts with tolerance, forgiveness, love of one’s fellow man, and, hell, egalitarian economic and social policy. And it's a great thing when anyone -- evangelical or atheist -- can learn from it. So as for the "progressive evangelicals?" Let 'em in. Big tent.

Robin's take

Evangelicals have expressed a strong political agenda in recent history with involvement in Roe v. Wade, AIDS funding, and the culture wars of the 1990's. While they do hold influence in the political system and I can understand the strategy in catering to those demographics, let's be clear that culture and religion are two different things and the common attitude of cultural correctness expressed by Evangelicals and the Christian right is harmful to a healthy and diverse culture of contestation and growth. In no way should the progressives and/or the Democratic Party compromise its agendas to accommodate an organization that has made itself an enemy of culture.

"Piss Christ" is a color photograph by Andres Serrano depicting a crucifix submerged in a container of urine. After winning an award of $15,000 from the National Endowment of The Arts, it became the subject of a large controversy and served as a catalyst for the culture wars and a NEA budget cut from $180 million to $99.5 million in the early nineties. While the photograph's message is ambiguous and open to much interpretation, I personally believe there is no anti-Jesus or anti-Christian message embedded in the piece whatsoever. I will spare you an essay regarding these convictions and just say that it is quite labor intensive to get a hold of so much pristine urine in one container and that  this artistsjust simply isn't that dumb to go through all of that careful work unless there was more at stake, conceptually, than creating a sacrilegious one-liner.

Evangelicals and most of the Christian right who are so dogmatic that it makes it impossible for them to comprehend anything outside of their aesthetic and intellectual norms condemned the piece as blasphemy -- end of conversation. Really? Is it because Jesus is in urine? We all release urine from our bodies everyday -- are we all sinners for doing so? Is urine unholy and unclean? (Fun fact: Urine is sterile.)

I use this hyperbole with a full understanding of American notions regarding urine as gross à la R. Kelly sex scandal. I only want to make clear how the Christian right is unable to participate in any critique, challenge or reexamination of cultural values in America. This often leads to their misunderstanding of cultural artifacts and poses a threat to the qualities that foster the development of any kind of culture and avant-garde.

Will's take

The issue of whether evangelicals, or other strong believers, can be accommodated in the progressive "big tent" is contingent on the left's willingness to appreciate and even respect the role religion plays in their life, despite their own divergent philosophies.

Whether or not a political realignment of believers is at hand we have yet to see, but there have been liberal Christians devoted to social justice since Jesus himself associated himself with the weak and poor of his society (if he actually did any of this, or existed at all, is a question I won't even begin to tackle here). More recently, Christian groups like Jim Wallis' Sojourners magazine have taken up the mantle of combining God and progressive thought.

But there remains a serious gap of understanding between the bulk of reason-loving leftists and their faithful neighbors. Many of my friends, especially those who I met in and since college, characterize themselves as atheists, or at least indifferent agnostics. A significant minority of them find religious feeling so strange and negative an influence as to defy explanation. Drawing on the writings of acclaimed atheists like Richard Dawkins, they see religious theory and practice as little more than a "God delusion" obfuscating the rational truth about the world.

While I respect and often agree with the ideas and the rationales of these thinkers and their supporters, my lived experience of religion has kept me from discounting its potential for good. I grew up regularly attending Presbyterian and Congregational churches with my family, even serving as a deacon (board of around 15 congregants who help guide the running of the church) at the Trinitarian Congregational Church in Concord, Mass.

Before I go on, I should say that I wouldn't characterize myself as a "believer" by any measure. Many of the sermons at my church didn't even talk about faith all that much. The focus was on introspection, reexamination of life and relationships, and fellowship. I found in my youth group an open community, devoted to valuing each other as humans inherently worthy of such consideration, not as the disparate sets of talents and flaws we each carried through our high school hallways.

This was not a particularly "religious" group. The point was not, as in many similar evangelical groups (Young Life, in particular, which had a strong presence in our town), to deepen our personal relationship with Jesus. But we did meet every week to play games, talk about important things in our lives, go camping and hiking, and generally build a friend network outside the Balkanized world of the cafeteria. These were not my closest friends (many of them I seldom saw outside the group), but without them my adolescence would have been a far more difficult period.

If there was one coherent spiritual strain that resonated especially strongly with me then, it was a hearty skepticism regarding man's perfectability (one that many skeptics of religion would be well served to carry into their often rhapsodic musings on science and progress). One regular prayer at my church, one that has always stuck with me in the years past my frequent churchgoing, contains the line: "[g]ive me the courage to venture normal love with average people." I found, and still found, something refreshing and bold in the idea of it taking courage to acknowledge the battles you can't win, and the challenge of forging a good life out of imperfect material. The starkness of the task reminded me of Kierkegaard, but with sober judgment taking the role of his fear and trembling faith.

Progressives, and all of us, really, could use a dose of this kind of humility. Grant people their own inconsistencies and irrationalities, their failings and hypocrisies, from evangelicals to economists, and hope that they will accept you for yours. Once you accept this, politics can go back to the delicate dance of compromise and coalition-building, and past the confused resentment of irreconcilable worldviews.

"We must patiently explain why taxing or regulating noble things (like work, saving, and entrepreneurial risk-taking) means you’ll get less of what makes America great and why subsidizing other things (like idleness and single parenthood) means you’ll get more of the destructive behaviors that ultimately will drag us down."

— An excerpt from a piece in the National Review by the vice president of government relations for the Heritage Foundation.

Daniela's take

What struck me most as I read Franc's piece on the National Review's website, was how much of his prose could be turned around and used to make arguments that nullify his own.

For example, he writes: "All policy battles on Capitol Hill require an adult to temper the animal spirits and childishness that so often induce lawmakers to enact irrational and damaging laws." According to Franc, this "childishness" applies to people who believe in income taxes and providing temporary sustenance to those who can't find work. I can earnestly say the exact same thing about somebody who believes that single parenthood corrupts society and spreading wealth and opportunities destroys it. Further, I can't hesitate to call laws that tax the poorest people at the same rate as the richest or that make inheritances immune to taxation "irrational and damaging."

In a way, I could even write something like this, though in a less pompous tone: "We must demonstrate that, so long as our alternatives are grounded in a proper appreciation and understanding of human nature and demand the best from our citizens, Americans will rise to the challenges ahead." The difference, of course, would be that my understanding of human nature is completely different from his, because I don't frame my view of my fellow citizens in a binary, hard-coded moral spectrum.

Therein lies the problem with an argument like Franc's: It frames every policy discussion—including this economic debate over taxes and subsidies—in terms of moral inequalities, instead of in terms of structural inequalities. The fact of the matter is that issues like poverty, crime, and unemployment are the result of structural differences, not moral differences. One cannot vilify the poor, simultaneously lionize the rich, and expect the less fortunate to believe and fight for that old American Dream. Forgive me the Marxist tone, but this type of inequality in power and reward, quite obviously, leads to more of the same, more of the same.

The way I see it, Mr. Franc, the most "destructive behavior that ultimately will drag us down" is continuing to define our structural problems as moral problems. To continue to do so seems, frankly, immoral.

Danish's take

I wish I lived in the National Review universe, where life is as simple as choosing between noble and idle pursuits. While I can certainly get behind the idea of not taxing or regulating "work, saving, and entrepreneurial risk-taking," I'm less clear as to how idleness and single parenthood is being subsidized by our government. Despite my strong libertarian leanings, I am not blind to our current political realities. When -- not if -- universal health care becomes a reality, there will be no hope of turning back the tide of statist paleo-conservatives and libertarians fear. To be honest, this hope has been dead for quite some time. Recognizing this, it's important to consider what issues we classical liberals (I'm not speaking for Whyrooters here) can still have an impact on, and how best to direct the governing of a Europeanized America.

FDR once said, "Continued dependence on relief induces a spiritual and moral disintegration." I think that is what the NR piece is getting at with its suggestion of subsidizing "idleness and single parenthood." It seems pretty clear, though, that the need for things like welfare for single mothers isn't because we think it will really help improve the lives of the people receiving the benefits, but rather that the alternative is even worse than the maintenance of the status quo. Broken homes exist because the vicious cycle of poverty breeds broken homes from broken homes. Most poor women don't forgo a steady marriage to become single mothers because they want to cash in on welfare bucks. Neither the cure, nor the responsibility for "destructive behaviors" rests with welfare policy. The "pragmatic" classical liberal should instead admire the steps we took in the 90's with the passage of the PRWORA which aimed to create "reform policies attempted to condition employment behavior among single mothers by implementing policies that would make working wages more profitable than welfare benefits and provide incentives to work, disincentives to remain on welfare, and disincentives to remain single or to have children out of wedlock. PRWORA prohibited states from using federal TANF funds to provide benefits to adults for more than five years over a lifetime. Time limits provide direct and anticipatory incentives to work. The direct effect arises from inability to receive benefits; the anticipatory incentive results when a forward- looking person decides to conserve welfare eligibility for when truly necessary. While individuals could prefer welfare benefits to employment at any given time, the prospect of worse employment opportunities in the future would make future welfare benefits more attractive." 

As for the pros and cons of taxation and regulation, this is a debate that has been waged since the dawn of American government. I'm not sure what I can contribute with this blog post, but speaking as an advocate of free enterprise, I'd say our current system of rent-seeking and corporate welfare is far more loathsome than any well-intentioned re-distributions of wealth we might see from an Obama administration. 

Jacob's take

This quote is what you get when you have an imperialistic economic theory that you apply to every facet of life.  If you’re an overzealous economist, then all human behavior can be explained and predicted because human individuals obey one law: maximize economic gain. If this is true, then everywhere you put an incentive, law-abiding homo economicus will follow.

Can we agree this is a bit simplistic? It’s typical of scientists to choose models that are tractable, no matter how much they distort reality.

Show me the single mother who has chosen to raise her child on her own because there’s a tax incentive. Do these econo-zealots even stop to think about how ridiculous this sounds?

Furthermore, there should be no problem resulting from taxing noble things, so long as it’s noble people who do those things. Anyone who’s read Aristotle or Nietzsche should know that the ‘noble’ man would find economic disincentive quite beneath him as a deterrent of behavior.

The problem with this hyper-extension of economic theory is that human values are much more complex and multi-determined than these stimulus-reward laws can deal with.  That economics is largely built on a mythical foundation is one of our society’s greatest secrets.

Jonah's take

Huh. So should we flip it around? Tax single parenting and idleness? That doesn’t seem like it would yield much. If watching T.V.made me money, I’d be a wealthy man. And how does one tax idleness, anyway? Monetarily quantifying an intangible thing—how do I love thee? Let me count the ways in Euro, or Yen. Whichever currency has more festive, lovey-dovey colors.

We tax cigarettes, isn’t that a step in the right direction? If we legalized prostitution we could tax that, too. Ah, though I suppose that falls in the entrepreneurial side of things. And also, if we follow the logic of the quote above, taxation curbs behavior, and we don’t want to curb sex (not us liberals, that is!).

Perhaps we should tax moral platitudes—the US would make a fortune out of smarmy right-wing commentators making idiotic statements, par example:

Glen Beck: “Al Gore's not going to be rounding up Jews and exterminating them. It is the same tactic, however.” Snap!

Rush Limbaugh: "The NAACP should have riot rehearsal. They should get a liquor store and practice robberies." Sound of cash register opening.

Nathan's take

"We must patiently explain ..." Yes, you must. Because I don't get it. To aid in the patient explanation, I will lay out the ways in which I don't get it in handy list form.

1.  "Taxing or regulating noble things ... means you'll get less" of them. Really? What if we tax these "noble things" to overhaul our educational system? Some potential entrepreneurs will never start businesses due to slightly higher taxes, but as many if not more potential entrepreneurs could be created by access to quality primary and secondary education. I'd argue that one dollar more in taxes spent on education generates more entrepreneurship than it destroys -- at least in our current situation. 

2. Taxation and regulation give us "less of what makes America great." Great according to whom? I say America is greatest when equality of opportunity truly exists. I say America is greatest when corporations cannot pollute the environment, substitute marketing for innovation, and provide low quality services at high prices. America is rife with market failures -- failures to fully realize the productivity of our people and failures of corporations ignoring the true costs of their activities. Taxation and regulation are critical to fixing what the market can't, and America is greatest when those failures aren't in the way of progress.

3. "Subsidizing other things ... means you'll get more of the destructive behaviors." Show of hands: How many of you are unemployed, impoverished single mothers because of the wonders of food stamps and welfare? (Crickets.) As much as the left values the struggles of single mothers, the right demonizes recipients of welfare at a rate of two-to-one. Some people become convinced that hard work can't help them get ahead and they resign themselves to government support. But for many, there is real stigma attached to unemployment and underemployment, and if it can be avoided or minimized, it is. Conservatives often have a hard time figuring out what besides money motivates people. I'd argue the respect of one's children is a pretty powerful motivator.

4. Idleness and single parenthood "ultimately will drag us down." Probably not. I think the past five months have made it pretty darn clear what's dragging us down. Credit rating agencies that can't accurately rate credit. Executives tasked with maximizing shareholder value who destroyed all of it. An administration that has crowed about how low taxes spur growth while overseeing the weakest recovery and worst recession in a half century. It's hard to get more "ultimate" than destroying 37% of the equity in the stock market and jacking up the national debt by trillions of dollars. And it wasn't poor single mothers. It was rich married men.

So there. I've laid it out. I am happy to listen to a patient explanation.

Ottavio's take

Before beginning, I would like to re-publish an Adam Smith quote brought to my attention in Walter Lamberson’s response to last week's question: "Little else is requisite to carry a state to the highest degree of opulence from the lowest barbarism, but peace, easy taxes, and a tolerable administration of justice; all the rest being brought about by the natural course of things."  I find these two ideas to be the solid foundation from which most conservative arguments are made and the two ideas that most easily highlight the inconsistencies in the conservative agenda.  

Fiscally speaking, conservatives seemingly aspire to use the state and its coffers to accomplish a lot more than both of these principals suggest they should. Maybe it is just that the only Republican presidency I have truly experienced has been that of President Bush, but I do think that this cartoon is representative.

Furthermore, I find that these principles -- especially the second one -- suggest that people should be left with a great degree of freedom. Combining this notion with social conservatism seems completely inconsistent. The state should not tell you how to run you business, or spend you money but should tell you who to marry, how to make love, and structure your life? That doesn’t make sense to me. 

A further inconsistency in conservatives’ and the Republican Party’s agenda is their lack of support for excellent, free public education and health care. Let's assume that we do not subsidize these services and leave them to the free market, which seems to be the conservative position. Will the free market provide superb health care and education for all people?  Of course not, it will provide a tiered level of both with the better services costing more.  Therefore, if you are born into a poor family your education and health services will be worse than they will be for people with money, handicapping a portion of our population and squandering some of our human potential. If the first quote is correct, and we chose to subsidize them, won’t we have a healthier and ore educated population?  Won’t this population be more productive, and more able to carry a state to “the highest degree of opulence?”

Essentially, I am compelled by these arguments but I believe that conservatives and the Republican Party that they support fail to live up them.  If they begin to, as I hope they do, choosing whom to vote for might actually become a difficult task.

Robin's take

The idea of taxing and subsidizing activity seems like a simple and effective tactic to create incentives for people to engage in what is agreed upon as positive, and, as result, discourage what is negative. But is this one-to-one relationship really true? Does subsidizing mean supporting something and taxing means discouraging it?

Sometimes the issue can be more complicated. For example, the Zurich Canton of Switzerland implemented a radical strategy of intuitively supporting heroin addictions in order to hinder larger negative side effects such as drug-related crimes and overdoses on society. Its substitution of heroin with methadone has been a wild success story leading to the decline heroin users by 4% and the decline in new users by 8%. Paradoxically, by subsidizing addiction, Zurich has effectively fought against it.

More importantly, the story of Zurich and this quote both suggest that by setting aside a moral agenda about drug addiction or welfare or single parenthood, one can find a rational solution to those problems based on their overall negative effects on a society. Arguments that surround issues such as abortion or assisted suicide for example are clouded by moral implications when, in reality, the issues should be discussed in a much more pragmatic sense, taking into consideration the implications of these acts on society as a whole.

Sarah's take

Agh, what bullshit. While there’s a grain of truth in this quote -- that governments should incentivize productive behavior, such as work, saving, and entrepreneurship -- this is nothing more than the Right (capital “R”) using economic language to rationalize outmoded ideas about the traditional family and the familiar and still oversimplified notion of “pulling oneself up by one’s bootstraps.” This is pure propaganda, based on a kind of false patriotism (“what makes America great”) aimed at taking certain options off the table. I will not equivocate: bullshit.

Will's take

First of all, let me say that I'm heartened by the conservatives' urges to "patiently explain" their policies to the opposition. Now that the American public has shown their rejection of the past eight years of cronyism and stifled debate under a conservative Republican administration, and elected a charismatic Democrat known for his ability to listen, the Review and their peers realize that they need to make a broader case for their policies than Georgetown cocktail parties if conservative thought is going to retain any relevance.

This is a good thing. There are many strains to American civic thought, and all deserve an honest hearing. Many fiscal conservatives (not the wing in power of the Republican Party recently, alas) were and are right to point out the dangers of deficit spending, negative saving rates, and increased household debt that are making today's economic scene look so dismal.

The claim that our society "subsidizes" and thus encourages single parenthood and idleness clearly rings as false to anyone laid off (over 500,000 in the past month, with more likely soon), or raising a child on their own. A governmental safety net that helps people, and their dependent children, stay alive and healthy until they can contribute meaningfully to the economy prevents much higher social costs down the road, and enables the next generation to better their situation. Try telling the child whose school lunch program was cut that they deserve to suffer for their parents' lack of economic success (even if it was clearly their "fault").

The broader argument underlying this conservative rhetoric has to do with their inherent opposition to taxing income at all. This is a powerful argument, one that has resonated with voters from coast to coast in the "tax revolts" of the 1980s and 1990s (even in states like California, whose economy was and remains grounded by government largesse in water policy and contracting jobs; see Joan Didion's excellent memoir Where I Was From.)

Nevertheless, in a post-agricultural, post-industrial society, taxing land and property, or even consumption and trade, misses the bulk of individual economic activity. Taxing the "noble thing" of work is the best way our government has found so far to fulfill two goals: to fund government, and to correct rises in economic inequality brought about by differing income potential.

While economic libertarians may take offense to this dual purpose, claiming that (Rand, anyone?), their intellectual champions have by and large accepted some form of redistributive society.  In his 1962 book Capitalism and Freedom, conservative icon Milton Friedman proposed a "negative income tax" instead of the graduated income tax, under which all Americans (say 25%) .

Today's Republicans may seem shocked by the redistributive efforts of our taxation policy, but could John McCain really have spent so much time in Congress without realizing that many of the most popular government programs (from Social Security to Medicare and Medicaid) are devoted almost entirely to "spreading the wealth around"?

During his own presidency, none other than Richard Nixon proposed a Family Assistance Plan, a welfare plan with a guaranteed family income, not tied to employment. The plan was defeated in Congress, and the backlash from those more conservative than the President helped fuel later "welfare reform" efforts that have defanged so many anti-poverty campaigns.

Government does need to manage the incentives offered to people to work and create new jobs with the demands of government. But neither an Obama repeal (or simple lack of renewal) of Bush's tax cuts for the extremely wealthy, or his health care program, to pick two prominent examples of the new administration's drive for redistributive reform, seem likely to lead to distorted incentives for the many "Joe the Plumbers" of the world. The National Review is going to have to be more patient, and bring new facts to light, to convince Will the Blogger that Obama's welfare plans will lead to destructive behaviors that drag us down, rather than level the playing field enough to give more Americans a chance at living a comfortable middle-class life.

You have a budget of $5 billion to spend on any ONE issue, be it health care, education, the war, stem cell research, the war on steroid use in baseball—anything. What needs it the most and why?

Daniela's take

I admit that when faced with this hypothetical scenario, I am at a real loss. It's actually much more entertaining to think about what the last eight years of neo-conservatism have insanely over-funded, rather than think about what needs the money. Here are a few of my favorites: the War on Terror, the War on Stoners, the War on Undocumented Immigrants, the War on Pre-Marital Sex, the War on People Who Carry Liquids Onto a Plane, and, of course: the Crusade for Bridges to Nowhere.

The under-funded issues camp gets rather unwieldy: Public schools, sex education, all manner of medical and scientific research, market regulation, green technology, and essentially everything else.

I have to pick one issue that is deserving of an additional $5 billion in funding? The task is, regrettably, impossible. And frankly, just weeks after we handed a $700 billion bailout to Wall Street, the task is dwarfed to the point of being unimportant, which is unfair because $5 billion is more money than I'll ever really comprehend.

I know, I know, I should just play nice with the game here. I should remind myself that $5 billion is just a hypothetical number in a hypothetical scenario. I should forget the fact that it's obvious that this lame-duck administration has raped every important issue in the country all the while as it served champagne to causes that haven't brought any tangible long-term benefit to society at large. The task at hand, after all, is to simply pinpoint an important issue that is deserving of more funding and attention.

Well, if I'm going to put aside the impracticality of the hypothetical situation, then let me add onto the impossibility of the scenario by suggesting that the $5 billion be spent on something that would never, unfortunately, happen in the United States of America. Let's throw that money at a tribunal that would actually try the Bush Administration for its crimes against humanity, its violations of the U.S. Constitution, and its general swindling of the electorate.

In my hypothetical scenario, the tribunal would try Rumsfeld, Cheney, Gonzales, Rice, and all the rest of the W. minions—and George himself, of course—and they would be convicted of the crimes they committed in the name of all Americans. If this impossible tribunal actually wasn't impossible, these convictions would result in no sentences. But the crimes would be acknowledged in the public arena, and the convicted would acknowledge their convictions publicly.

You may wonder what the value of this amnesty-granting tribunal would be. In college I was particularly focused on and fascinated with the concept of nation-building in a divided society where human rights and the rule of law have been violated on a grand-scale. My argument then and now is that the first step in the nation-building process in such a place is to develop that absent appreciation for the rule of law so that the ensuing democratization process (whether it's a renewal or birth thereof) can take place. Particularized amnesty, which is what I described above, is the linchpin in establishing a strong human rights culture and respect for the rule of law. This kind of amnesty does not forsake justice because the justice to be gained from it is of a restorative kind; retributive justice does not work in a post-conflict, divided society setting—particularly given the language of hope that, with the election of Obama, has re-framed the White House. This scenario would forgive (and yes, that would be hard) but not forget, providing for the happiest medium between general amnesty and Nuremberg-style justice. And it's certainly better than what's definitely going to happen: Doing nothing, holding no one accountable, sweeping everything under the rug.

Too bad it will never happen, just as I'll never have $5 billion to spend on any one issue.
Danish's take

After living through the massive bailouts on Wall Street, a number like "five billion" seems pretty small to me in terms of government spending. With that in mind, I take this week's prompt to mean "what's the most important 'low hanging fruit.'" Personally this is a no-brainer: end the War on Drugs. Besides, after all is said and done we'd probably wind up making a lot more than we would spend during the legalization and regulation process.  

Our very own President-elect (and most probably his predecessor) has admitted to using "a little blow when [he] could afford it." We all know where this tragic tale leads: The Harvard Law Review, the U.S. Senate, and the Presidency. Clearly we need to make this stuff illegal (read: expensive) or else regular people will not be able to help themselves and will fall into equally drugged stupors. Seriously though, it's unlikely that many of you need to be informed of this but the War on Drugs has been a miserable failure. Drugs still exist, people still use them, criminals get rich off their illegal trade, and all of this begets incredible amounts of violence and wasted resources. 

"What would legalization look like?" you might ask. Great question. When I say legalization, I don't mean "decriminalization." In my ideal world, there would be no "controlled substances." Drugs would be treated like food and alcohol, subject to certain safety standards and taxation, but that's it. Licensed sellers would replace violent gangsters and could sell their goods at the market dictated prices just like alcohol. Contrast this to the current state of affairs, wherein criminalization drives some users to criminal activities to afford the sky-high prices sellers are able to demand by virtue of a "risk premium." Additionally, addicts of more serious drugs would be able to find dependency assistance without fear of going to jail and public health would improve through the use of sanitary products and delivery methods (the demand for truly horrendous drugs like methamphetamine would disappear with superior, cheaper, and safter alternatives). Perhaps most importantly though, government expenditures for enforcement would be reduced (e.g. the millions we spend fighting coca farmers in Columbia) while we'd simultaneously experience an enormous increase in our tax revenue via the taxation of these goods -- anywhere from $10 billion to $14 billion a year nationally according to Jeffrey Miron, a visiting professor of economics at Harvard.

All of this does not even touch upon the tremendous environmental impact the illegal drug trade has on our country, the racist and classist ways in which our drug laws impact Americans, and the destruction these laws cause to families of non-violent offenders. Barack Obama has previously implied he would support the decriminalization or marijuana, which is an important first step that a majority of Americans support, but to truly create lasting change we need to go even further.

Jacob's take

Well, it’s only less than a percent of the amount we've put into "rescuing" the financial sector, so I'm sure that $5 billion is not enough for the task. So I may not be answering the question, but I think there is one major priority for government money right now, no matter how small the amount: A public works project to build a new infrastructure for green transportation.

Ironically, this is the perfect time for an auto industry crisis. We need a major effort to not modify but reorganize the transportation infrastructure in the US. In order to replace petroleum as the energy source for our cars, we need cars that don't use petroleum and gas stations that don't pump gas. The transformation has to be concerted: the infrastructure and the cars each need the other in order to exist.

Only government and not private enterprise—at least in the real world—can orchestrate something that requires this degree of coordination.

Of course, there’s this problem: Once you have the infrastructure, what do you plug it into? That is, we still need a green source for all that energy. I am actually not too concerned about this. I think creating the infrastructure is the primary priority, because once it exists it will create the competitive space for forthcoming solutions. Coming up with clever ways to move energy around is actually not very difficult. Creating a structural-economic framework in which technological development can be instantiated is the real, pressing challenge.

Jonah's take

Last week a team of scientists successfully grafted a windpipe fabricated from a woman’s own stem cells. This is big news if you have diabetes.

For years researchers have made promising strides in treating diabetes, and those in the field are constantly extolling the virtues of their studies, promising a cure within our lifetime. But being told a cure is around the corner is no solace for someone who is living daily with the disease. Though because of the progress made recently and advances in stem cell research lurking around the corner, I think our fantasy $5 billion will really be used well in this field. Some mandates can wait, others cannot.

Obama says he’ll reverse a bunch of the dumb-shit Bush laws. Thank god. Bush's veto of expanding stem cell research based on religious convictions is costing lives. Treating this disease now and in early stages in a person’s life is a good preventative measure, both for the spleen and for the economy. After all, managing and fighting this disease is costing Americans over $200 billion annually. 

If you live in New York, you’ll find couched next to ‘benefits of sleep’ stories in the paper too often an "everyone is getting diabetes" story. In New York, one in eight adults have the disease and the rate of new cases is increasing. These are staggering numbers. If we threw some cash at this problem and lifted the ban on embryonic stem cell research, we could actually make a difference.

Huh. Now that I’ve spent my fantasy money, I feel sort of... sad. I miss it, I suppose. I feel like I want to throw it at a million other issues, but there are rules to this fantasy. No hard feelings, sustainable energy.

Nathan's take

If only all non-profits and donors cared first and foremost about the impact of their work and money. Unfortunately, they don't. Instead, considerations like legacy and prestige and power all influence decision-making. What results is a rush of money to the cause of the day, whether it's AIDS in Africa or micro-lending. New catastrophes as well as new solutions tend to receive vast attention and resources from donors, while persistent problems and tried-and-true approaches drift off the radar. When it comes to resource allocation, it seems the discount rate of many in the non-profit sphere is much higher than it ought to be, resulting in an emphasis on the near-term rather than the long.

I'm painting in broad strokes. But these tendencies do exist and they have real consequences, like spending on preventing and treating AIDS in Africa while access to water and nutrition improvement go underfunded. It is definitely a good thing that we don't need to spend vastly larger amounts of money on certain causes. But now that I have this $5 billion to spend, I need to consider where my dollars will have the greatest social return. As such, I'll be (anonymously) donating my $5 billion to prenatal and early childhood nutrition programs in developing countries.

What of that old proverb, "Give a man a fish, feed him for a day; teach a man to fish, feed him for a lifetime?" The proverb makes intuitive sense and it tickles all of our moral pleasure centers—hard work's important, pull-yourself-up-by-your-own-bootstraps, etc. But, depending on how hungry our aspiring fisherman is, he may find it very difficult to learn how to fish. Just like education early in life can create a stock of skills that generate higher returns over an entire lifetime, getting the sufficient caloric intake early in development helps to determine future health and lifetime capacity for learning and work. Well-fed pregnant mothers will give birth to healthy children who, if they get the nutrients they need, will have a greater capacity to take advantage of the opportunities that come their way—like learning how to fish. Just like profits reinvested by the firm will promote growth, calories invested by the body will increase a person’s productive capacity significantly.

Not only this, but even if our friend learns how to fish, he will need a fish or two to get him started. Without sufficient caloric intake, the body’s ability to sustain work is severely strained. Fixing this shortage can pay huge dividends. By one estimate made by Nobel prize winner Robert W. Fogel, 50% of the economic growth in Britain from 1800 through 1980 can be attributed to increases in the availability of calories, which both brought more people into the labor force and allowed those already in it to work more strenuously. And that is likely to be an underestimation, since it overlooks the interactions between nutrition and education I sketched. Such astounding results are hard to overlook.

Social innovation like micro-lending ought to be funded, and we should cheer for the good work done in much of Africa to contain the spread of AIDS. But I'll be giving my $5 billion to a cause that could pay dividends for decades—full bellies.
Ottavio's take

If I were Obama (yes, I added that to the question), I would use the money to publicly close Guantanamo Bay. I would try the people still held at Guantanamo Bay in U.S. courts and run the risk of releasing potential terrorists due to lack of evidence. I would offer compensation to those who are not proven guilty and consequently released. I would hold a public denunciation of torture and make an epic speech about the thin line between darkness and the light of civilization. I would even drop at least one heavy-handed Heart of Darkness reference. (For example: We must not "surrender during that supreme moment of complete knowledge" and let "the horror... the horror" of extremism push us away from the light into the dark corners of our humanity.)

Today's most pressing issues—the economic crisis, Islamic extremism, rebuilding Iraq and Afghanistan, and global warming—are global issues. Not a single one of these issues can or should be solved unilaterally. To successfully tackle these problems, we need support. We need to make sure that when we make sacrifices, as we already have and will continue to do, their benefits are compounded. Guantanamo Bay gives credence, for good reason, to the view that the United States' only true objective is to get and keep power. Shutting it down and admitting our errors would go a long way to restoring our much-needed credibility.

Sarah's take
How much is $5 billion? If we're going to be throwing thousands of millions of (hypothetical) dollars around, let's pause to apprehend the scale. Is $5 billion dollars a lot, or very little? The laws governing such difficult-to-fathom sums are Einsteinian: their value is relative.

According to the Forbes list of billionaires, only 203 people in the world know the feeling of possessing $5 billion fortunes. The rest of us can just wonder. Viewed from this perspective, having $5 billion is like catching a rare glimpse of the phoenix. We're talking big money. Type five billion into a calculator and turn it upside down: ooooooooo’s. Indeed.

Jest aside, let's parse a few comparisons. In the universe of U.S. government spending, $5 billion is nothing compared to budget monsters like national defense ($607 billion in 2008) or Medicare ($396 billion). Lower on the priority list, international aid comes in at $14 billion. And down in the $5 billion range, we find the National Science Foundation budget and that of the Judiciary branch. Reason, it seems, is inexpensive.

The 2008 election, the most expensive in history, cost a total of $5.3 billion. Each year, Americans spend approximately $5 billion on Halloween accoutrements, according to the Halloween Consumer Intentions and Actions survey. Five billion remains to be spent of the total Hurricane Katrina aid package ($13.4 billion) -- a rare example in which $5 billion buys nothing at all.  

So, is $5 billion a budget bonanza or piddling pocket change? What about at the international level -- what does a $5 billion nation look like? The annual GDP for Fiji, the idyllic honeymoon destination, is about $5 billion. But so is the annual GDP of another nation, also ringed by white sands and azure water, but somewhat less picturesque: Haiti. Five billion dollars is the value of the IMF loan to prop up Iceland's failing currency. Five billion dollars is what Charles Taylor smuggled out of Liberia. Five billion dollars is what one rogue trader cost French banking giant Société Générale. 

Reader, let's be honest -- this meditation on the worth of $5 billion has hardly been fruitful. I'm scarcely any clearer on the matter than I was before. And yet I haven't even proposed a single use for our hypothetical vault full of cash. I suppose I'll leave that unresolved, pending an epiphany on the $5 billion, the $5 billion, the $5 billion...
Walter's take

We are better at identifying problems than solutions. Many—perhaps most—of the people I know share the Bono-Jeff-Sachs consensus that the best, most humanitarian way to spend a dollar is in foreign aid; they would privately admit to feeling guilt for all the other causes we fund—health care for Americans, the arts, NASA—when they contrast them with the importance of foreign aid. There is an excellent reason: The biggest human problem is obviously the enormous share of humanity (~2 billion people) that struggles to maintain its very existence. It's compelling. But we need to consider the price of solving the problem before we decide not to fund other worthy causes.

I'm not optimistic about foreign aid generally. Countries that benefit from it don't need it and countries that need it don't benefit from it. Theoretically, foreign aid donations are small even relative to the savings of those we aim to help (the economist Hernando de Soto estimates that all foreign aid given by all nations since WWII—including the Marshall Plan—amounts to 1/40th of the savings of the poorest billion people on earth). Even the very poor save—the problem is they don’t have an infrastructure to make use of their savings. In rural China, I had tea in the home of villagers in Jianxi Province. The home was full everywhere with bags of rice, which is how they saved their income. In Bogotá it was bricks, in India gold, and in East Africa they save in cattle (note: the word "capital" comes "cattle"). These are not productive investments—they reflect the bad access to capital markets, which is a reflection of developing societies’ weak institutions.

Two-hundred forty years ago Adam Smith proposed a startlingly simple recipe for economic development. As he put it, "Little else is requisite to carry a state to the highest degree of opulence from the lowest barbarism, but peace, easy taxes, and a tolerable administration of justice; all the rest being brought about by the natural course of things." He was right. We in the developed world are not so different from the individuals in the developing world. Most of them would do just fine among first-world institutions, especially after a generation. The difference is in our institutions—we have secure property rights, peace, and low taxes, which translate into opportunities for trade and investment and access to capital, which is everything any developing society needs. Last week I said I was grateful for our institutions.

I'm not saying there isn't work to do—this is the biggest problem in the world—but it needs a more radical solution than giving bags of beans to bureaucrats. Those radical solutions may be risky and intolerable to many.

So this is a plea for all the causes that my friends privately resent: Health care and education for comparatively wealthy people, the arts, science. One can argue that these also are attempts to solve problems that won't be solved by throwing money at them. This is wrong: The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is a problem that won't be solved by throwing money at it. The Oakland Unified School District? Let’s throw the money that way and not look back.
Will's take

While $5 billion dollars could be spent well on any number of policy priorities in Obama's first term, I think that an investment in science and technology, specifically focusing on energy efficiency and innovation around alternative energy, would provide the most concentrated set of benefits, as well as spill-over effects in a variety of other areas. I agree with Barack Obama that we need a new Space Race, in which the enormous economic and educational power spent by previous generations of American leaders on competing with the Soviets is channeled into solving the twin problems of fossil fuel depletion and global warming. I would like to emphasize, though, the importance of competition and innovation (free market ideas put towards progress in addition to profit) in making sure this money is well spent.

More specifically, an increase in scholarship money for the sciences is needed, especially for lower-income children. An investment in technological entrepreneurship is a way to ensure future job growth; by tying awards to both performance and need, in much that same way that wealthy private universities pay full tuition for qualified lower-income applicants, the brunt of this job creation will be in the neediest sectors. This would leave existing federal financial aid in place, but supplement it to  provide opportunity for economically-disadvantaged students to enroll in elite science and technology schools. In 21st-century America, there should never be a "ghetto Einstein," unable to get the support and training he or she needs due to inadequate education funding.

A similarly entrepreneurial approach, on a grander scale, would be creating a series of government-funded "prizes" for various modeled after the Ansari X-Prize for private spacecraft development. This has already been started; House legislation creating the hydrogen fuel cell "H Prizes" has been signed into law, though it has yet to be awarded. Here, instead of subsidizing underperforming technology (a common criticism of many green jobs schemes), the government can step in and raise aspirations beyond what's conceivable today. Such a scheme could not only reward excellence and create jobs, it could lead to whole new industries opening up.

Luckily, while making no specific mention of the prize idea in their agendas on change.gov in energy and technology policy, the Obama administration already seems to be taking these sorts of initiatives seriously, and many other common sense policy proposals in this field (weatherizing houses, subsidizing energy-efficient appliances, etc.). Besides the prize idea, these are all ideas widely held as beneficial in his circle of advisors. Let's just hope that in working to create "Green Jobs," the administration focuses on rewarding excellence and innovation, and less on political sops like corn ethanol and "clean coal," or broad subsidies that use taxpayer money to increase market inefficiencies.

It's 2008. We have a black president set to take over the White House, but we also are facing the beginning of what may be the worst recession since, well, that great one. This Thanksgiving, what are you thankful for and what could you do without?

Daniela's take

I was telling a friend recently that all historical artifices aside, Thanksgiving is a pretty great holiday. After all, there aren't many these days that instead of manifesting themselves through the consumption of inane Hallmark cards and shopping mall trifles, call, instead, for communal thanks—and the company of those near and dear. I didn't grow up with Thanksgiving, so I've always viewed it through the (bemused) lens of an anthropologist. I admit I've never fully celebrated either—this is the first year I plan to actively participate. Bring on the stuffing!

The 12 months that have passed since this time last year have been rather momentous for me personally, and while there were certainly trying times, overall, this has been a pretty fantastic year. I'm particularly thankful for the hard-earned lessons I've learned in this first year of adult independence.

In this rather public forum, though, it's probably a better use of my time to share that which I am thankful for that has affected us all. This past year of political campaigning has brought to the forefront of national discourse a kind of civic engagement among all echelons of American society that's unparalleled in our generation, and from what I can tell, most other recent generations. There's something to be said about the fact that no matter which side you were on (and it must be said that I don't believe there are just two sides, divided along partisan lines; there are many more nuanced sides to align ourselves with) change, progress, and hope were defining mantras. I am thankful that America got caught up in a web of idealism. While I don't believe that's the web we want to be stuck in now that the election is over, allowing ourselves to cast cynicism aside for a short while, after these eight terrible years of Bush-Cheney, showed that at its core, America still yearns and is willing to work for the progress it so dearly needs.

I am thankful, then, that we know what the United States is capable of, idealistically. I am thankful for this because as we sit at the brink—or, more likely, the deepening depths—of an economic recession that has already knocked over every pillar that was expected to be among the last to fall, we're going to need to remember what we want and need so that we can actually fight for it to happen, particularly as a new president and Congress take the reins of our new course.

I wonder where the hell we're going to be in Thanksgiving 2009. I'd like to say the worst will be over by then, but my economically-inclined friends have given me little reason to believe that that will be the case. I think this country, and every other nation in this increasingly interconnected world, is set to face trying times for quite a while.

I want to believe, however, that even though for many Thanksgivings to come, more of us will be giving thanks for things most of us haven't had to consider in the past—stable employment, for one—good will come from this. Just as the last eight years of governmental incompetence paved the way for the idealism of the 2008 presidential campaign and the election of Barack Obama, the economic recession will, I hope, breed the ingenuity necessary to redirect our efforts to the most pressing issues. We might just emerge from this crisis with many of our other long-brewing crises solved.

Danish's take

I understand that Thanksgiving is basically just a harvest festival with some feel good racial friendship themes attached, yet I'm loathe to participate in a Thanksgiving themed prompt as I feel like celebrating this day is throwing salt in the wounds of Native Americans. I'd ask a Native American how he/she feels about Thanksgiving, but for some reason these people are hard to find. Sure, America's a great place but that doesn't mean we need to gloss over our troubled history. Celebrating Thanksgiving the way we currently do would be like Jews in Israel eating "peace falafel" on Naqba Day. Having said all that, we live in the greatest country in the world, and as the child of immigrants I feel especially thankful for a great number of things afforded to me by simply having been born here.

My father came to the United States with a mechanical engineering degree and fluency in English, yet was forced to drive a cab to make enough money to bring my mother, brother, and sister over from Pakistan. He was able to save up enough money to start a small business, at which point he and my mother felt comfortable enough to have another child -- me. I'm thankful that I had the opportunity to be the only family member born in the United States, which I can only assume is the reason I am both the tallest and highest SAT-scoring Aziz.

I'm spending my Thanksgiving on the beautiful coast of Oregon where my parents run a small coffee shop in their semi-retirement. Having grown up in Iowa, small-town Oregon is strikingly familiar. These are the parts of America that seem to have been left behind despite the great economic advances seen in other parts of the country. Every other day or so, some soul will wander into my parents' shop and ask if we're hiring and I can't help but be reminded of those heart-wrenching scenes recounted in The Grapes of Wrath. The unemployment rate in Oregon is rapidly approaching eight percent and is on its way to nine percent in neighboring California. It's not just blue-collar and rural workers who are feeling the brunt. Recently a number of my friends were laid off from their jobs in San Francisco. These were all hard-working, well-educated young people who find themselves in the same situation as the laid off lumber industry workers in Oregon for example.

This will indeed be the "the worst recession in a generation," and I fear it could last longer than the two years some are saying it will take for our economy to start growing again. In times like these I'm just thankful that I and my family are all currently employed and that we now have people in charge of this country who will hopefully tackle this issue with the urgency that is required.

Jacob's take

This year, in addition to the obvious sense of gratitude that comes with being part of the first ever white majority to put a black guy in charge, I am thankful for public transportation. 

Having been in London for two months now, the integration of my daily life with the transport system is thorough. The tube is not simply a track where an occasional train shows up to give you a ride (cf. San Francisco Muni); it is an ever-flowing current that within seconds or minutes of your arrival sweeps you up and thrusts you toward your destination. Besides being remarkably efficient, the tube does something bigger. It's an integral experience of the daily lives of most Londoners and in that way unifies the consciousness of the city. It's a shared space where people, rather than seal themselves off in capsules at the end of the day, are in constant contact, for better or worse.

Also, while the unforeseen state of global economics may have thrown a wrench in this plan, there is word that Ryan Air will be offering transatlantic flights for £6 by 2009. That would be amazing.

Jonah's take

The Good (inter-web links judged not by moral or righteous good, but by highest level of absurdity or artistic merit):

1)      The gorgeous irony of Palin pardoning turkeys in front of a turkey slaughter.

2)      This photo of Charlie Rangel as a sun-tanning walrus.

3)      Young swedish vampire love: Let The Right One In was a beautiful movie. A love story between two twelve-year-old's in the 70’s. One happens to be a vampire. No, it’s not like Twilight.

4)      I’m Gonna Kick Some Ass With My Own Pipe Wrench

5)      Rachel Maddow <3!!

6)      Somali pirate culture and their swinging luxurious lifestyle. Will somebody make a Somali-pirates-dancing-on-a-yacht video already?

7)      Jamie Livingston took a Polaroid every single day from March 1979 to Ocotober 25th, 1997, the day of his death. The website of a man who documented his own death deserves to be perused obsessively.

 8) And, of course, baby cheetahs.

The Bad:

1. The Media Holiday Party Recession--so the media industry is dying, but now we can't make out with coworkers and cry in the coat-check room? Is nothing sacred?

2. Bloomie Forces Third Term on NY: This could have easily been avoided with a referendum, but no.

3. Hillary as Secretary of State. I don’t know. We are slightly concerned. But I do enjoy the return of the headband look.

4. George Bush is nothing like the Dark Knight. I would know. I made a useless video about it.

5. "Bush 'very pleased' with Iraq war outcome " [Anguished yelp of rage].


The Ugly (Physically and otherwise)

1. Ashley Dupre. Maybe her trashy borderline learning disability shtick would fly if she were a fox, but she is not a fox. And no, I refuse to put an accent on the -e in her fake name.

2. See Charlie Rangel picture.

Nathan's take

On Thursday, my mother will force us all to say what we're thankful for ahead of our meal. But, like fasting before a feast, I am going to complain before Thanksgiving. This year, here are a few things I am not thankful for, from pointless gripes to deep concerns:

1.  My fantasy football team. It’s horrible, and it's my own fault for not knowing anything about football. Also, my league is filled with bankers. The amount of time they spend managing their teams and trash-talking suggests they should be part of any root-cause analysis undertaken by the Obama administration as they investigate the financial crisis.
  
In truth, fantasy football and investing are not so different. Fantasy football, like investing, rewards intense information-gathering. I think this season definitively proves that watching every football game in a week is a far superior method of managing a fantasy football team (banker’s method) than using ESPN's weekly stat projections (my cable TV-less method). Furthermore, I think future generations of bankers would do well to consider this lesson as applied to financial markets. The "watch-every-game-of-the-week" method is like studying a balance sheet, or asking tough questions about the mortgages that make up a mortgage-backed security. The "follow-ESPN-stat-projections" method is like listening uncritically to the AAA ratings that the rating agencies were flinging around, and neither of those tactics works well.
  
2. What the financial crisis will mean for everyone graduating this year. I, thankfully, have a couple of job offers. Many, however, could spend the next year or two unemployed, or employed in a job they wouldn't have even thought about in most other years. (The exception being anyone going into government, where this administration will be a boon for serious-thinking, ambitious policy wonks.)

Unfortunately, the result could be much more than a one- or two-year reduction in earnings. In a few years, when the economy begins growing at a normal pace, class of ‘09ers won’t be that much better positioned than those future graduates to take advantage of growth. They will have spent two years in the wrong industry, or in the wrong field. While the academic evidence is somewhat mixed, there is good reason to believe that this will reduce people's lifetime earnings by a few percent. Talk about poor timing.

Not only that, but those worst affected will be those already on the edge. As competition for jobs grows more intense, people will find themselves working below their pay-grade, and those people with fewer skills will find it hard to get work at all. Those already struggling will only see it become harder to get ahead. Education is one of those areas where early advantages tend to translate into big differences over the course of a career, which is why education is so valuable for individuals and society.

3. That more evangelical Christians don’t think like Jim Wallis. Last week, Ottavio pointed out that hating gays wasn't one of Jesus' priorities. Evangelicals like Wallis look at the Bible and see a call to action, to raise up the poor and achieve justice at the expense of the powerful. Cholera in Zimbabwe and violence in the Congo should be on everyone’s mind, and be everyone’s priority -- not fantasy football, not job prospects, not keeping the gays from marrying. Never last, and never least, even if it makes for a life lived in broken places, or a hypocritical blog post.

Ottavio's take

I am thankful for peaceful transitions. We just witnessed a 2-year battle for the title of most powerful person in the world, all the while as we faced one of our country's most trying times (wars, economic collapse, etc.) without a single bullet fired or a single punch thrown. Mean things were said, no doubt, but, it turns out, our political system and those who run it can handle these verbal attacks and act like adults.

My continued contact with a young man from Tanzania, discussions with Guatemalans about the violence involved in their election process, and general awareness of how violent a government transition can be, have led me to an immense feeling of gratitude for the American democratic system and the people that make it function.

I could do without the disconnect between what America preaches and what it practices. I want us to work for international law, order, and justice.I want us to follow through on our promises -- renouncing torture, closing Guantanamo Bay, making trade free, tackling climate change, truly saying "never again" to genocide, and building a stable democratic regime in Iraq are all examples.

I could do without our current developmental and moral stagnation. I want us to have the fastest trains, the coolest cars, and the most impressive computers.I want us to have the best schools, the most impressive companies, and the most powerful workforce.And I want the U.S. to be on the forefront of granting people equal rights, leading by example and making the rest of the world play catch up.

Robin's take

If I have to be honest, I am really thankful for my teachers. Through a profession of sacrifice they have really had a strong effect on me. The longer I stay in school, the more seriously I take it, and the feeling of regret about not paying attention in a single math class in high school grows stronger.    

At some point one starts to realize parents and teachers are real people who make mistakes, and are just as selfish and immature as you are and yet they carry themselves with the wisdom for which they are held accountable. They are required to behave sagely, yet reach and inspire people personally every day, often in heartbreaking conditions of backwards bureaucracy. How thankful am I to be a student and not a teacher. So this Thanksgiving I want to give it up to the teachers and parents as teachers, who are rarely given enough credit. Go call or write your favorite teacher and tell them thanks.

*   *   *

As for what I don't give thanks for, I know this is rather abstract, but I could do with less greed and corruption in the world. I have a love-hate relationship with the fundamentals of capitalism. On the one hand, I believe it's a flawed system that depends on the exploitation of people and resources or the oppression of people as consumers. (Not to mention awful side-effects such as the homogenization of cultural production through commodification.)

At the same time, though, I grant that it is a pretty ingenious system that fundamentally doesn't do too much more than monetize and organize the concept of value or wealth. Theoretically relative to the cruel forces of survival in the natural world, it is fair. So why has this system produced such an unfair and inefficient distribution of wealth and power? Of inequity? Witness the ridiculous globe-trotting abilities of some versus the total lack of economic freedom of others. It is only when the system is cheated or manipulated through corruption -- and this is not rare, sadly -- that we see the terrible conditions it is capable of creating.

So this Thanksgiving, on the cusp of an economic recession, material resource depletion, and a James Bond film lacking suaveness or actual dialogue, take a moment to think about what wealth really means. If the most powerful people were much more rigorous capitalists, they would understand that behaving solely in economic self-interest is not in anyone's long term interest—not even theirs.

Sarah's take

This week, I’m thankful for the great cornucopia of American cuisine. And I don’t mean haute cuisine, nothing Alice Waters-like, nothing organic, artisanal, or macrobiotic. These things may be good, or even very good, but they are not what I’m thankful for this Thanksgiving. I’m thankful for chili cheese fries, cheeseburgers, cheesecake, and grilled cheese. I’m thankful for Kraft singles, writ large.

Before I lived in Paris, I disdained these foods as not being “gourmet”; or if I did enjoy them, it was as a guilty pleasure. Now, these foods have become my Proustian madeleines. “Get over yourself,” says my friend Val. But oh! One mouthful of delicious pancakes, made with Bisquick smuggled across the Atlantic, conjures up fondest memories of the pancakes my mother made in the shape of Mickey Mouse’s head. Yes, the Disney conglomerate even made it to my family breakfast table -- a poignant addition to my patriotic remembrance.

But this being the week of Thanksgiving, the most important part of which is the eating, I’m thankful for pumpkin pie, turkey, sweet potatoes with marshmallows, and of course, glistening cylinders of cranberry sauce.


Walter's take

Generally speaking, anyone alive and using the Internet today is among the wealthiest fraction of human beings ever to walk the earth. We have so much stuff but our gratitude is often misplaced.
 
A college professor and mentor liked to put things into perspective by asking me to imagine the typical day of a medieval royal, a person who, in his time, counted himself among the most fortunate mammals in history. Take a royal in medieval England, who might wake up in a September morning cold. For breakfast, he may eat his fill of salted herring and wash it down with wine--the only beverage he could trust not to give him cholera (only the most wretched drank water). I am no royal, but I will wake up tomorrow to shower in some of the cleanest water known to man, heated effortlessly with fuel pulled from deep underground and shipped across the sea. I enjoy a cup of coffee from another climate and ride a bicycle down a beautiful network of streets and stop-lights--hundreds of thousands of us running in all different directions each day with virtually no problems. I trust--not naively--that everyone respects the rule of the red lights, and ride ceaselessly through the green without concern for my life. I ride to a job that secures my livelihood with little risk or effort (Imagine what it would mean to hunt these hills or till these fields or fish this bay.). And if I fail at my job--or if my job fails me--I am comforted by a safety net that ensures that I will live better than the royals of yesterday could imagine. Compared to almost anyone who has ever lived, my life is indulgent... and I still haven't told you about the iPhone. 

If we are not grateful to our parents for their sacrifices and investments then we are either ingrates or fools. But the true source of our material wealth is our good fortune to live in a place where a civil order prevails. It's only in the comforts of that order that we make progress. All of my gratitude comes back to this. I live in a place where I have the comfort of knowing that you will stop on your red light; the comfort of knowing that a primitive lock will protect my bicycle while I work; the comfort of knowing that if I loose my job the safety net will save me; the comfort of knowing that if my bank fails, my savings are secure; the comfort of knowing that even when the fiber of our economy is rattled by crisis, the greatest intellectual resources are coming to the helm to restore it because I live in a place where I have the comfort of knowing that when I vote the old order out of office, they will leave peacefully on January 20th.

Will's take

With rising unemployment, a spiraling credit crisis, and two foreign wars keeping Americans in danger far away, it's easy to despair for uplifting conversation topics this Thursday. While the prices of food for the Thanksgiving dinner, and the gas to travel to far-flung family have stayed within reason so far, any more increases could send millions of Americans into poverty.

I don't want to diminish the suffering that many are feeling right now, or fear of the midterm future. Dozens of my close friends have lost their jobs in the past two weeks, and no doubt there will be more turmoil before this is all resolved.

But when we look at the larger picture, there are indicators that the cliché about failure being an opportunity for learning may well apply to nations as well as individuals. The historic election of Barack Obama might never have been possible had a negative economy not buoyed his candidacy as a reform-minded Democrat. Nevertheless, the incoming administration has the mandate and the opportunity to shift course in a way that accomplishes

Once in office, his task will be difficult, but the disastrous state of financial and political affairs left by President Bush provides the opportunity for national consensus on broad initiatives to stem the bleeding, and build a better future by reassessing our priorities, as a country and a people.

This New York Times article outlines Obama's plan to use his proposed huge ($750 million plus) stimulus package to accomplish two goals simultaneously: To revive the country's economy, and to shift large amounts of resources towards the infrastructure enhancement and "green jobs" he and his supporters maintain are key to making America competitive and self-sufficient in the future.

In California, the recent passing of Proposition 1A provides a clear example of the potential for large government spending to fulfill these dual mandates. Surely the building of a high-speed rail line through hundreds of miles of the state, and the attendant station building and upgrades, will help alleviate the pressure on construction workers made by the precipitous decline in housing prices and thus residential development.

Sometimes it takes blows to force overdue innovation and adaptation. The automakers in Detroit are learning this now, and as they should have in the 1980s (read David Halberstam's The Reckoning for a fuller account of this process). Let's give thanks to America in advance for learning from our mistakes.

In light of the gay marriage bans passed in California, Arkansas, and Florida on Nov. 4, the question is: What happens now?

Daniela's take

I readily admit it: I don't know how to do it. Perhaps it's because I live four blocks from The Gayest Place on Earth; or because I went to a top 20 gay-friendly college; or because homosexuality—like everything pertaining to sex—was explained to me early on in purely biological (and rational) terms by my parents. No matter the reason, the fact of the matter is that I don't understand how to reason with people who vote against granting equal marriage rights to all citizens on moral grounds.

I can rationalize the legal reasons for why these bans may have passed. (For example: Why should government involve itself in "marriage," an institution born of religion? Marry no one in City Hall—grant only civil partnerships!) So that's no problem. My issue is I don't know how, or even whether it's possible, to argue with someone who holds such extreme moral views about homosexuality. I can say the same thing, really, for someone who believes a zygote to be a human being; or someone who literally interprets the Beatitudes.

It's one thing to dismiss extreme moral views as the result of ignorance, it's another to try to grapple with an otherwise well-informed individual who holds these sorts of views. I read, recently, a blog post by a smart, college-educated girl who went to grade school with me. A week before Election Day, in a blog post titled "What I Stand For," she wrote—

"I believe that legal marriage should only be between a man and a woman. I do not believe it discriminates against homosexual people to defend that time-honored definition. I do not dislike homosexuals; I will not stop being any of their friends. I will not call them names; I will not belittle them. But I will do all that I can to stop them and those who are for it from changing the definition of marriage that is the very basis of society and everything I believe in. A person does not have the right to marry anyone he or she wishes to. We do not have the right to choose anything or anyone. Men cannot marry men. Women cannot marry women. People cannot marry animals. A 40 year-old cannot marry a 12 year-old. A man cannot marry more than one woman, and a woman cannot marry more than one man. Marriage is a privilege, not a right. It is a word with a definition that I do not want to have changed."

The equating of consensual, mature, homosexual love to pedophilia, polygamy, and bestiality! The irrational fear that another person's marriage defines your own! I'm at a loss.

Some have asked me why I trouble with trying to decipher such views, and the reason is that I have been trying to decide whether it's of any use to even try to argue with such people, so as to try to get them to vote differently. Perhaps we ought to explain to them that a gay marriage ban is not really a ban on gay marriage, it's a rejection of marriage equality and a dismissal of human rights.

Over the past few days, I've decided that I will not try to argue with these people. Fortunately for all those who embrace rational thinking and who not only laud but actually enshrine equality, the arc of history and progress is bending in the right direction. The younger generation—my generation!—is overwhelmingly, by 2 to 1, for marriage equality. Every day, more people who grew up ignorant of or prejudiced towards homosexuality are turning around and either discarding those views, or simply acknowledging that this is a human rights issue. While this year California, Arkansas, and Florida did not move forward with the tide of progress, they will. Soon.

Danish's take

That California, this bastion of tolerance, passed Proposition 8 was certainly a bummer. Ultimately though, we will look back at this embarrassment as merely a minor hurdle on the road towards the inevitable recognition of same-sex marriages across the civilized world (although I understand why the thousands of people being told their marriages no longer exist might think otherwise).

The gay marriage debate is no longer a debate about homosexuality but is now squarely a debate about the institution of marriage, and that debate in turn is about family policy. The suggestion that the redefinition of marriage to include same sex couples could lead to even further redefinitions is not unfounded. However, as long as any redefinitions draw more people into marriage, it's hard to understand why anyone would oppose them. From a policy standpoint, "married people are healthier, happier, more prosperous, and more secure. They have fewer problems with depression and crime, they lead longer lives—by every measure we can calculate, married people do better on average, and that's even after you account for the differences in the married and unmarried populations." It seems to me the more the merrier!

So besides gay marriage, what further iterations are anti-gay marriage people worried about? One legitimate concern that comes to mind is polygamy. The legalization of gay marriage could certainly pave the way for polygamous marriages, but when you consider the positive impact marriage has on people I don't see what's so horrifying about this prospect. As long as everyone involved is a consenting adult, I can't see how forcing them to choose non-marriage "lifestyle alternatives" is better for anyone. This is easy for me to say as a progressive young person living in San Francisco, but how could politicians in the "Real America" ever vote for anything that even remotely suggests that people living outside of the norm deserve the same rights afforded everyone else? The sad truth is that they probably couldn't, and that is why the solution rests not with new legislation but with the removal of old legislation. That is to say, take the power of recognizing marriages out of the hands of the state. Make marriage a contract between consenting adults (enforceable by law like any other contract) and "It would put gay [or polygamous] relationships on the same footing as straight ones, without implying official government sanction. No one's private life would have official government sanction—which is how it should be."  

Jacob's take

Any self-identified progressive must have had mixed feelings about the ballot returns on November 4. While the new left-of-center governing majority achieved an unprecedented landmark in racial equity, another majority rejected progressives’ attempts to achieve marriage equality for homosexual couples. It is thought that this other majority was decisively composed of religious Obama supporters. This very fact exposes an interesting tension in the new "Obama coalition."

A lot of people find this disconcerting but I don’t see it that way. I think this is a chance to redefine the progressive outlook on the issue of civil marriage and gay rights. I’ll state my position quite clearly: I don’t think civil marriage ought to be extended to homosexual couples; rather, it should be dissolved completely.

I am not nor do I pretend to be an expert on California Family Code or other relevant statutes, so this is an argument based on principle. As I understand it, California domestic partnerships allow all the rights and responsibilities of heterosexual civil marriage and are treated as equivalent to same-sex civil unions by Vermont, the United Kingdom, and Switzerland, to name a few. Domestic partners in California are able to take one another's last name, file a joint tax form, and adopt a baby. As far as I can tell, the controversy over gay marriage (in California) is less about "gay" and more about "marriage." Opponents of gay marriage find it outrageous that the government would tyrannically redefine "marriage," a word whose definition their religions invented, of whose use they want to be sole guardians.

I don't see why anyone objects to religion retaining the unique right to define marriage. Regardless of whether it should be, this is a religious concept before it is a civic one. If churches wish to allow same-sex marriages, good for them. If you are a religious gay couple and wish to be married by a church that refuses, that is between you and your superstitions. The point is this: Marriage as a religious pact in contradistinction to partnership as a legal structure ought to be kept as separate as possible. Regardless of the issue of same-sex marriage, there is something uncomfortably close about the relationship between civil and legal code in the domain of marriage. That the marriage certificate is a legal document made valid by the signature of a priest is, to me, inconsistent with the principles that guide so many other aspects of our government.

The argument about the separation of church and state cuts both ways: If government can’t tell religion what marriage is (as the argument for Prop 8 goes), then religion can’t be the basis for a legal definition of marriage. Opponents of gay marriage who grant the latter often cite research on societal benefits of the nuclear family to support their definition of marriage. However, this research falls quite short of the burden of proof if one weighs the claims of its proponents against the questionable effects and problematic validity that those studies show. Furthermore, government cannot use empirical research, valid or not, without applying it consistently. For example, no one has sought to prohibit alcoholics from getting married and having children, despite research that might suggest it would be better for society if they didn’t.

The last right not afforded by California domestic partnership is the right to have the same legal appellation as civil marriage. Symbolic as it is, I think this lack is a far cry from the rights lacked by racial minorities before and since the Civil Rights Act. Nevertheless, I do believe this problem should be solved.

There are two solutions: Expand the definition of civil marriage to include homosexual couples; or expand the definition of domestic partnership to include all heterosexual couples and do away with civil marriage. Each option requires a compromise. Either opponents of gay marriage give up their definition of marriage, or gays give up their aspirations to have their unions called marriage. With the latter option, the sacrifice is shared -- everyone gives up the notion of civil marriage -- but the right of religious sovereignty over the definition of marriage is not infringed and the legal rights of homosexual couples are indistinguishable from those of heterosexuals.

Jonah's take

What are we debating again? What is the debate? Really? And what scientific evidence are we weighing for or against this? How many millions of dollars of taxpayer money is spent studying the benefits of marriage? Isn't there cancer to be cured or wars to win? Instead of spending cash trying to find correlations that prove outdated religious bigotry, can't we be more creative? Here are some programs that could use these millions in research more than anti-gay marriage studies:  

1) The Study on the Benefits of Cute Dog Collars on Dogs, and Whether They Make a Dog Gay
2) Old Library Books: Why Do They Smell So Good? And Is Smelling Them Patriotic?
3) Has It Been Long Enough That We Are Now Allowed To Wear Roller Blades?  

Yes, there are correlations to a child's upbringing and the state of his parent's marriage, undoubtedly. Marriage is good for kids, ok, fine. We get it. Can we move on, now?  Oh, no? We can't? Still debating this? There are times to pretend you are listening to your opponent, feigning objectivity when your burning subjectivity is itching to burst through. But now is not one of those times. When somebody says, "I like Matchbox 20," I keep my opinions to myself. That's fine, I say. I don't, but you are allowed to like them. Though when someone tells me they love Britney Spears' new single, I stand firm. "No, you can't. You cannot. You are wrong. And this is not a matter of opinion." There are times when we must lose the mantle of "debate" and say, "Sorry, no. Not this time. Not gonna debate it. You are absolutely, objectively wrong."  

In the future we'll look back and shake our heads and roll our eyes at the enormity of ignorance we've had to put up with. To even engage the debate is pure idiocy, see. But what should we do? What is needed is a true shift in language. You can't change the minds of the staunchly religious, but if you confuse them maybe we have a shot. First ask them to ban straight marriage. They will say, "That is crazy talk." You agree. But this is the old foot-in-the-door trick. Ask for too much and then, after you have primed them for compromise, go in for the kill. "OK, fine. Don't ban straight marriage. Just ban gay marriage banning." Say the last "banning" under your breath so that they don't hear it, and in confusion they will lift the ban. It's the only way.

Nathan's take

The New York Times has decided that Mormons tipped the balance in favor of Proposition 8. The Economist has (lamely) proclaimed that the Mormon work ethic has insulated Utah from the economic storm. What should we, proponents of equal marriage rights, do to counter the homophobic economic engine running in the mountains? Organize, march, sue, convince. Make a ton of money.

Economists argue that bias is irrational -- not a great way to make money. A company that makes hiring decisions for reasons other than competence and talent is going to be punished by competitors who take advantage of that talent for their own gain. Now, proponents of same-sex marriage have an opportunity to punish states that deny marriage rights, and reward those that do. Move to Connecticut and Massachusetts! Revel in our New English autumns. Bring your entrepreneurial spirits and wallets. Fill state coffers with income and sales tax receipts. At least vacation here!

Of course this will happen on its own, as same-sex couples come to live in a place that will recognize their unions. And a mass exodus from California would cripple efforts to turn this year’s Proposition 8 near-loss into next year’s victory. However, as we we attend political rallies and speeches, we can and should make decisions about where to live and work and what we buy with an eye towards punishing bias.

In response to pro-gay marriage boycotts in California -- some more sensible than others -- Prop 8 supporters have called the efforts "intolerable," and "mob justice." I don't understand this. The free market’s definitional quality is right there in the title -- it’s free! If I’m free to make a purchasing decision based on something as insubstantial and unrelated to underlying quality as a celebrity endorsement or witty advertising campaign, then I am damned well free to make a purchasing decision based on whether my money's going to keep my friends from getting married.

Respond to fear-mongering and bias by moving to (or vacationing in) Connecticut and Massachusetts. Earn a ton of money. Spend it on businesses that support equal rights. Make the Economist write an article marveling at the economic benefits of justice.

Ottavio's take

Gay people do not deserve the same rights as straight people. Their morals are compromised as their sexual orientation clearly demonstrates. We must shelter our children from their example and the scary prospect of being raised in one of their morally decrepit families. Even though we have won this last battle against liberal America, we should still all move to Iran where Mahmud Ahmadinejad has assured me there are absolutely no gay people. Death to the Great Satan. All hail the union of the penis and the vagina.

But seriously, if we want to take more cues on how to govern our country from the Bible, I suggest we start with the issues that Christ emphasized the most and work our way down towards the issues he emphasized the least. Lets deal with the poor, the weak and the suffering and then, once there are no more poor people, no more weak people, and no more suffering people, we can get to the issue he mentioned vaguely, a few times.  

Robin's take

Immaculate Conception
Graphite on Vellum

The gay marriage ban is a clear example of religious prejudice/discrimination/bigotry. I don’t know which is more outrageous: That a gay couple cannot get married in California or that they do not have the right to adopt a child in Utah?

Thomas Beatie, a man who used to be a woman, is married to a woman and is pregnant for the second time. His situation raises a lot questions about parenting a child. Is he a father or is he a mother?

One thing is certain: As scientific advances permit people to inhabit the outskirts of nature, the literal interpretation of religious texts becomes more problematic. I am so relieved that in 2004, 42.6% of people in America believed God created man in his present but only 29.1% believe that God is angered by human sin.

That's why I drew this piece.

Sarah's take

Is it overly optimistic to think that one day we’ll look back on the era when gays couldn't marry with the same uneasy pride and respect for progress that marks our understanding of the pre-civil rights period? First, Massachusetts and Connecticut, then California, then not -- and soon enough, there will be a Loving v. Virginia, if there isn’t a Plessy v. Ferguson-type misstep along the way. I'm taking the long view here.

Still, that future day is hard to imagine. Welcoming gays into the institution of marriage is quite radical: no civilization in history has done so, aside from the handful of countries that allow it today (Belgium, Canada, Norway, South Africa, and Spain) and a few scattered Roman and Native American examples. From a removed perspective, it is even an amusing paradox that so radical a proposition can stem from such conventional desires -- namely, the desire to pair up for life, and possibly raise children together. We are humans, and these are our ways -- for homosexuals as for heterosexuals. Will justice not prevail at least in those areas where it coincides with human nature?

Indeed, I feel a strange passivity toward this struggle because I think it cannot but succeed. This is an impulse to be resisted: Progress can’t come soon enough for people enduring injustice now. I'm reminded of the observation of Reverend Joseph Lowery, co-founder of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, on his colleague Martin Luther King in a recent New Yorker article: "Martin said the people who were saying 'later' were really saying 'never' … The time to do right is always right now."

How trite; how true.

Walter's take

I should begin by clarifying that I advocate same-sex marriage on a normative basis and as the correct interpretation of the Equal Protection clause of the Constitution. I was therefore disappointed by Proposition 8's success in California.  While plenty of arguments have been offered to defend Proposition 8 on moral, natural, and familial grounds, it seems clear that the only honest motivation was religion (and perhaps the popular defense, "yuck").

The most common religious defense is that homosexual marriage threatens the institution itself. The tragedy is that many people do feel that the state recognition of homosexual marriage changes the nature of their own marriages, they have good reasons, and it's our fault for not being crystal-clear about the separation of church and state.

American Protestants have enjoyed centuries as the cultural and political heirs to the United States: The nation was founded and (until this century) owned and operated by White Protestants. And while Protestantism is hardly the only religion to blur the distinction between church and state (the Catholic Church is just as active in lobbying to change public school curricula, for example), I believe marriage is an issue over which Protestants feel uniquely entitled because they have no need to distinguish a political marriage from a religious marriage: the United States has largely codified into law the Protestant institution.

Other groups—for example Catholics and Orthodox Jews—have religious practices which are not codified into statute (Catholics do not believe in divorce but have their own church process for Annulment, Orthodox Jews have no divorce but men may grant a get). These differences remind those groups that a political marriage differs from a religious marriage.

Catholics and Protestants had very different opinions about Proposition 8. Most White Catholics in California opposed Proposition 8; White Protestants supported it with an overwhelming 85%. My explanation is that Protestants understandably feel that the recognition of homosexual marriage threatens their institution of marriage because they are rarely reminded that these two institutions are not the same thing. I believe them when they say that this will change the foundation of their marriage from one with a basis in a moral code to one with a basis in civic bureaucracy. Protestants, in short, grew too comfortable with the idea that a political and a religious marriage where the same thing.

This is hardly a decent argument against gay marriage; it has no more merit than the argument that the U.S. is a Protestant nation—or California a Protestant state—and we are therefore committed to Protestant traditions. Instead, it should be a reminder of the political problems that are created when we allow church and state to be blurred. Generally speaking, it's easy to disparage a strict secular tradition: I don't think a nativity scene in a public school in a 100% Christian community offends anyone subjected to it. That's not why I would oppose it. I oppose it because we confuse people.

When we mix religious and political traditions and space, we allow people to forget which traditions are religious and which are political. This can lead even the most liberal of electorates to deprive individuals of basic human rights.

Will's take

Maybe the disappointment of the Prop 8 failure can serve as a reminder of the amount of work left to be done to reach mainstream acceptance of homosexuality. Living in coastal enclaves where gay people are often thought of purely as aesthetically-gifted brunchers who like to party a lot and live in trendy, expensive neighborhoods, makes it easy to forget the huge amount of misunderstanding and hatred that still exists toward homosexuals across this country.

Earlier today at an In-N-Out Burger in Pleasanton, Calif., I saw a young University of Oregon hockey player enjoying a Double-Double with a group of his teammates, sporting a bootleg "Army: No Homo" T-shirt. The Mission District hipster in me (and yes, there is quite a bit, though not quite at the tattoo/barista/thrash drummer level) wanted to take this as an ironic protest against the "Don't ask, don't tell" policy, but given his general demeanor, I'm willing to wager that wasn't the case. Unfortunately for this post, I didn't have the balls to ask him about the shirt, nor did I want to ruin my own Double-Double experience by sharing the venue with a confirmed homophobe.

While the spread of the Internet has dramatically opened up the diversity of information accessible about the world outside one's own life, it can often serve to only accentuate discriminatory behavior through the mask of anonymity. The world of online video gaming is full of anti-gay banter and deliberately hateful attacks on the "gaymer" community. Elsewhere on the web, I've seen message board posts recently lamenting the trend that "every TV show these days has to have a gay or lesbian character" and other such "pervasions" of modern American life by the "gay agenda."

I'm not a completely guiltless observer of these trends either. In years past, I've been guilty of not challenging the use of "gay" as a pejorative adjective referring to stereotypically effeminate activities and attitudes, though not as an out-and-out insult like many young Americans do. Example: Liking pop opera quartet Il Divo is "gay," but a teacher who gives you a bad grade on a test isn't. Unless they are. Not that there's anything wrong with that—to quote the Seinfeld episode that most accurately reflects the lingering unease of homosexuality and PC leanings common in my peer group.

Being a committed Boy Scout brought me some of the most meaningful experiences of my life, from cultivating my love of the outdoors early on to anchoring some of the more subtle traits of personal discipline and integrity in relationships that I rely on every day. Nevertheless, the very Mormons who broke the bank funding Yes on Prop 8 ads provide the bulk of the funding to the Boy Scouts of America, resulting in the infamous policy banning gay Scouts and adult leaders from participation. My own council in high school (Boston Minuteman) took a firm stance against this discriminatory practice, allowing members of all persuasions, but the shame of the national ruling remains with me.

The situation may still be bleak, but there's good reason to believe that it is steadily improving, though not at the pace that those of us sympathetic to the plight of gay rights activists may like. The fact that Prop 8 succeeded by a much thinner margin than the earlier vote banning gay marriage is encouraging. Ultimately though, perhaps the biggest driver of broader mainstream tolerance of homosexuality has been the courageous "coming out" of many of the past several generations of gay people, leading millions of Americans to realize that gay people aren't the one-dimensional threats of their imagination, but cousins, siblings, and children of people much like themselves.

My uncle and his partner, who live and work in St. Paul, Minn., have been together in a stable and loving relationship for most of my life, though until I was at least 13 I just thought they were business partners and good friends, and it wasn't until late in my childhood that the started attending family gatherings as a proud and open couple. My second cousin grew up in upstate New York with a pair of extremely loving grandparents who happened to be devout and culturally conservative Christians; their continued love of him even after learning that he was gay no doubt led to some serious soul-searching and reexamination of old beliefs.

Across the country, gay people in "red states" and smaller cities have gradually been moving into the light, quietly changing opinions and staking a claim that their life need be no different than any other American's, regardless of who they choose as their objects of love and lust. Though it won't be easy, and could fail if our society turned away from openness and acceptance as a value, it is here that I think the battles for gay rights will be won, not in "gay ghettos" like West Hollywood, the West Village, and the Castro.

The terms "progressive," "progressivism," and their variants are ubiquitous in American policy discussions today. When appropriated by just about every group out there, do they lose all significance or become all the more relevant?

Daniela's take

The problem with a word like progress, and its derivatives, is that it's necessarily relative. While I believe in the significance of progressivism, I worry about the congratulatory, doe-eyed mood that's taken over the electorate. I worry that we'll settle and fall short of the most progressive progress possible.

The code word for progress in today's political lingua franca is, of course, change. It's been the theme of the past two years of presidential campaigning, as Barack Obama re-framed partisan politics into a choice between Washington-as-usual and Washington-as-it-could-be. After eight years of cronyism, bellicosity, and the debasement of civil liberties, Obama's resounding electoral success last week was as much a rejection of political sameness as it was a genuine confirmation of the need for change.

Yet despite messianic "Change Has Come" headlines, it is not enough to have voted in the first black president, or to be satisfied that Obama's White House will be more progressive than the one the neo-conservatives are about to vacate. (The former is, indeed, progress; the latter is simply obvious.) We can't accept the mainstream definition of progress as simply better-than-Bush. We need to demand that our elected officials seize this unique opportunity in American political discourse to progress significantly further to the left, and quit pandering to the center-right.

This is necessary because there's a stark difference between change we can believe in and change I believe will actually be enacted—

I believe in universal health care; but I believe what we'll get is an opt-in system that still panders to insurance companies' profit margins. I believe in energy independence; but I believe that we'll continue to heed inefficient, home-grown corn ethanol and so-called "clean coal" lobbies on our way there. I believe in the separation of church and state; but I believe that taxpayers' money will continue to be funneled to faith-based initiatives. The list goes on.

I harbor no illusions that all my progressive ideals will be met under an Obama presidency. He is, pundits' claims notwithstanding, decidedly not the herald of American progressivism (See: stances on death penalty, marriage equality, etc.), but he is the most liberal politician ever elected to the highest executive office. The political capital garnered by this election is an ideological mandate for progressivism that we've never had before. Gone is the need for Clintonian incrementalism—we can actually bet big.

The difference between progress I believe in and the progress I believe is most likely to actually occur under the forty-fourth presidency and one-hundred-eleventh Congress need not be so stark. More-than-better-than-Bush progress requires action: We must demand the most progress, not just enough progress.

Danish's take

The label progressive, when taken literally, would ostensibly be self-applied by anyone concerned with politics. After all, who would stand in the way of progress? That being said, I think the question that begs to be answered when determining who or what is progressive is what do we deem to be progress?

It's a testament to the unifying power of George W. Bush that at this moment large swaths of people of various political stripes can agree on just what progress means. Progress now means upholding the constitution, progress now means respecting the civil liberties of American citizens, and progress now means balancing the budget. It's only slight exaggeration to say that these ideas are now considered radical. We find ourselves in the midst of an America where libertarians and leftists alike are howling at the ease with which our federal government doles out public cash to irresponsible corporations. In a way, progress means going back to what we had before eight years of corporatism, cronyism, and neo-conservatism almost bankrupted our country in every sense of the word.

So just how useful is the term progressive now that it's been "appropriated by just about every group out there?" In my view, while the utility of the label may be waning, the idea of progress is now more important than ever. That we have reached a consensus on the direction our nation has been headed is an important milestone. Clichés often become clichés because they hold kernels of truth. The idea that it's darkest before it's light has never been more aptly demonstrated than when our nation voted Barack Hussein Obama into the land's highest office, only two short years after our troops handed over Saddam Hussein to his ignoble fate at the hands of a Shia mob. We know that where we were headed was the wrong place, so where do we, as progressives, want to go now?

The answer to that question somewhat depends on what kind of progressive you consider yourself to be. Yet, regardless of where you stand on the political spectrum, it's hard to overstate just how transformative the period we're entering in is going to be. Like it or not, Barack Obama has been handed a mandate for change during a time when the very ground on which we stand is shifting. Whether President-elect Obama will use that mandate to enact a truly progressive agenda of reform or if he will pursue more self-serving Clintonesque triangulations remains to be seen, but that's where the "roots" come in.

The level of civic youth engagement hasn't ever been this high in our lifetimes, and the ability to participate has never been easier. It's up to us to set the course, and that's a huge part of why Whyroots chose to launch after the glamor of the election had already passed. A lot of people have been asking, "Now what?" The answer is clearly, "Now us."

Jacob's take

Untying the string that holds together the concepts in the word progressive, as it has been variously used, I find that these are what spill out: Increased government efficiency and benevolence through techno-scientific enlightenment; increased direct influence of citizens on government; increased leftward direction of policy towards socialism; change we can believe in. The string holding them together is apparently the notion of increase toward some final hopeful asymptote.

Historically, the word is definitely more than a synonym for leftism, given its bipartisan introduction to American politics led by Theodore Roosevelt. Reforms associated with early progressivism range from the left (women’s suffrage) to the right (prohibition). Perhaps the sixteenth amendment is most characteristic of this movement: by taking the power to elect Senators from the House and giving it to voters, progressives expressed their faith in the ability of the expanding middle class to use knowledge to govern itself rationally. There was supposed to be something good about this.

In the early twentieth century, progressivism was often a synonym for applied positivism—the notion that scientific knowledge is absolute, infallible, and ought to be used by government to perfect social order. The concept of social perfectibility via scientific rationality would eventually lend itself to eugenics movements in Europe and the United States, ironically culminating in unspeakable human rights violations and that death of positivism which we call post-modernism.

Since the end of the Second World War, progressive has been used more vaguely. As in its previous incarnations, it is closely tied to the notion of changing the status quo, though now we judge the way to change more reluctantly. Only when conservatives have control over the status quo do we think of progressivism as anti-conservative.

After twenty-eight years of manifest conservative desire for government failure, progressives can change government simply by making it work -- not necessarily by moving it left. Maybe the model for late progressivism is another policy we inherited from Theodore Roosevelt -- progressive taxation (which was also endorsed by famed communist Adam Smith). As Roosevelt said, progressive taxation implies "not the slightest sympathy" for socialism, but seeks simply to restructure and level the playing field of our capitalist economy.

I think progressive taxation shows that the critical concept for progressivism is that government should be reflexive, responding to evidence of its own effectiveness or lack thereof. To summarize verbosely, late progressivism entails the reflexive use of empirical principles to build effective government support structures that promote capitalist competition and provide basic services for an individualistic society.

Jonah's take

Let us not forget that "progressive" was the word liberals chose after the word "liberal" was so thoroughly vilified by all the Limbaughs and Coulters.  We liberals were constantly portrayed as 'effete academics' with our arugula and espressos and for some reason our mascot was little Michael Dukakis in his stupid little tank.

But now we are not liberals, no, but progressives.  Liberals believe in what's right, but they are whiny and have weak biceps and therefore don't actually do anything.  But progressives!  Progressives are driving a steam-powered locomotive through the dark heart of the country, hauling a load of Change in its cab.  Yes, the word choice is much, much better. Progress intimates movement, action while liberal is now just a conversation over white wine.  But what kind of 'progress' is to be made?  We must look at the word in terms of application, of how best to act, and quick!  Or else Coulter will condemn our shiny new rubrick before we've used it!

Martin Luther King, Jr. famously said, "Let us realize the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice."  Really Martin?  Because until last week it seemed the arc of history was actually a straight line bent towards conservative Armageddon.  I had resigned myself to the idea that each liberal state would eventually secede and become part of Sweden.

It's ironic that King believed this, given all he did to ensure that arc stay bent. 
There are moments when, as progressives, we must lead the country to better itself, not simply wait for it to change, when it's our moral prerogative to accelerate the rate of progress with a little nudge.  In the Brown v. Board ruling, Chief Justice Earl Warren did not simply rule against segregation but added that is must happen "with all deliberate speed."  Was he the kind of "radical judge" the Bush administration is so fond of condemning?  In their eyes, perhaps. Because he did not wait for the wrong to be righted.  He chose his position of power to change that. Years after his decision, Warren explained his choice: "There were so many blocks preventing an immediate solution of the thing in reality that the best we could look for would be a progression of action."

A progression of action.  Yes.

So the party of Dukakis and Carter are now "progressives."  What does that mean?  We are looking to the future.  We are not content to rest on the laurels of our backwards and bigoted past.  Unlike conservatives, who preach about so-called non-interventionist government (except of course when it comes to marriage and abortion and sending citizens to die in needless wars), we view the government as a machine that can protect and improve the lives of our citizens.  And for once progressives are in charge of that machine.  Let's see what happens.

Nathan's take

Last spring, one of the consultants at my management consulting firm won an election for part-time office in a south western state. He was elected on a progressive platform. During one of his first post-election meetings back at the firm, a senior executive and one of our clients joked with him that he wasn't sure how he felt about having someone so liberal and "pro-union" consulting for him. Meanwhile, over the course of the election, which included a primary contest, this consultant was criticized for his corporate ties by an opponent on the left. Seems as though no one is comfortable with a progressive in the corporate world.

Naturally so, you might say, given the amount of time prominent progressives spend railing against corporate power, and the huge sums of money corporations have spent lobbying against progressive government reforms. But many self-described progressives have collected a corporate paycheck, or had a parent's corporate paycheck pay their way through school, or at the very least spent money on corporate products. (Your outfit might be head-to-toe American Apparel, but your Converse kicks are as corporate as it gets.) So many progressive Dr. Jekyls with a lurking, corporate Mr. Hyde, eh?

I don't think it can really be any other way. There are bills to be paid, and there are only so many plum non-profit jobs to go around. Besides, someone has to donate something to make those NGOs run. Like it or not, corporations are extremely efficient engines of economic growth (financial meltdown or no meltdown, this point stands). Progressives have every reason to be wary of corporate ambitions to twist public servants to serve their self-interest at the expense of the public good. But corporate self-interest is very often aligned with the public good, not opposed. 

Progressives need to avoid dogmatic opposition to corporations and businesses more generally. Society has too much to gain from efficient, well-run firms of all sizes, small and big alike. Progress demands pragmatism, not tribalism. So when considering the meaning of progressivism, let us define it by its successes, not its conflicts, by its ideals, and not by its caricatured enemies.

Ottavio's take

Here's what "progressive" should not mean.

In Guatemala there is a corporate slogan painted on billboards on the new but incomplete section of the inter-American highway by Cemento Progreso, the largest cement company in Central America. It reads: “Donde pasa el cemento pasa el progreso!” Where the cement goes progress follows! What kind of progress do they mean? Is their excitement justified?

Once the road is finished progress of a kind will come (the idea of the road alone has already spurred development). Finishing the road will benefit many.  Any business relying on automotive transportation, which is to say almost every business, will benefit.  Farmers will be able to transport their goods to markets with higher prices more easily.  Many small businesses will see an increase in sales, as the number of visitors to the regions alongside the highway will increase.  Inventory costs should go down due to lower transportation costs.  Anyone who has to use the road will enjoy shorter travel times and a safer and smoother ride. 

That said, contained in this Aldous Huxley-esque slogan are myriad known and unknown dangers.  A few people have already died in landslides and other construction accidents in the name of this project. Many international chains that are bad for small businesses (Walmart and McDonald's, for example) have yet to expand throughout Guatemala due to lack of infrastructure. They will now be able to move into new areas and compete with local small businesses more easily.  Real estate prices will increase in many beautiful locations that are now newly accessible by luxury cars forcing local people off of pieces of property that their families have lived on for generations.

In this slogan the word progress fails to acknowledge the numerous negative effects of development.  It uses the positive connotation we have with the word progress to smooth over the nasty side effects.  The political use of the word "progress" or "progressive" does the same thing. Progress is good but only if it is of a certain kind.  Its important not to lose sight of the fact that it is much easier to cut down a forest, remove a mountain side and lay concrete than it is to remove concrete, build a mountainside, and plant a forest. 

Robin's take

Progressive is a word that has come to define some of the greatest and worst rock bands (the Beatles and Kansas), a brand name for insurance (Progressive), and has largely been accepted as a synonym for "alternative" (as in: "My daughter attends a progressive school.").

But embodied in the word is and always has been the idea of moving forward. If I take a step forward towards a door, I am one step close and I have progressed towards it. However the one-dimensional aspect of the word and its binary implications of backwards and forwards is misleading. It assumes there is a door in front of me and a straight line to progress towards it. (What's behind that crazy door anyway?) In reality, the idea of moving forward is much more complicated, The axis of history and development is multi-dimensional and defined by a variety of values giving different directions and orientation to what progress is and isn't.

Moving backwards, in fact, can be a form of progress. A person who rides a bike or the train or even a horse today could be considered a much more forward-thinking person than the one who drives a car every day, even though the automobile, freeway systems, and the suburbs were all once hailed as signs of progressive living. So keeping in mind that the definition of progressive is largely determinate on one's own personal or collective values. Now is the time for our generation, through conversation and debate, to define our problems and aspirations and progress accordingly.

Sarah's take

In medicine, a progressive disease is one that continually increases in extent or severity. This is rather the opposite of what is meant by progressive politics, at least by those who adhere to its philosophy. Yet the comparison is not empty -- both uses of the word indicate a hot, unyielding move in one direction, ineluctable and necessary.

Boiled down to its essence, the nature of progressivism is contained in president-elect Barack Obama’s campaign slogan, “Change.” Progressivism looks forward, to the future, to a better time, to a future paradise not altogether dissimilar to communism as imagined by socialists.  Progressivism is not so doctrinaire, however; the belief in gradual but steady human improvement is rooted in the Enlightenment, of which Cartesian skepticism is an essential element. This orientation toward the future is inseparable from the leftist viewpoint, just as romanticism of the past, of traditional values, is characteristic of the right. Yes, progressivism is rightly the mantle of the left. While a “Republican progressive” is not an oxymoron, a “conservative progressive” certainly is.

But progressivism is also a philosophy of dissatisfaction -- how could it be otherwise? Behind the optimism of “we can do better,” lies the less pleasant, “what we have presently is flawed.” And criticizing one’s country is paramount to criticizing oneself -- a disagreeable exercise if ever there were one. Thus the very philosophical power of progressivism belies a practical pitfall. Americans are positive thinkers if nothing else. Is this why progressivism has flourished most during times of true hardship in America -- for example, following the two greatest financial crises of the past century? Perhaps things must be undeniably in the toilet for Americans to truly embrace “change.”

For our country's progressive ills, is progressivism the remedy?

Walter's take

I can think of two possible origins of "progressive" as an ideology. First, Theodore Roosevelt’s “Progressive Party,” which was founded on egalitarian principles in 1912. The second comes from economics: a “progressive” tax is a tax scheme that burdens in the wealthy more heavily than a proportional tax. These two uses are consistent, and this etymology speaks to the unifying progressive principle: active egalitarianism.

In America, two major principles have emerged as touchstones for egalitarian progress. The first comes from the 18th to the late 19th century, the equality of opportunity. That principle accepted inequality of income, health, and other circumstances as natural but maintained that people of low-status could rise to the top through industry. Abraham Lincoln, before his first inauguration, said that that the principle that held the union together was the promise that “all should have an equal chance.” This principle was appropriate for a nation that was largely agrarian and in which an empire of land lay unexploited, cheaply available on the frontier.

Three constraints ultimately limited the upward mobility of Americans. First, owing to new technology and larger markets, the scale of American industry expanded dramatically with the rise of the steel, railroad, and oil industries and new workers could no longer expect to one day own their businesses. Second, increased immigration from Europe lowered wages in cities. Most importantly, the Frontier was declared closed in the 1890s and with that went the once infinite source of possibility--the West, which had enabled opportunity for centuries. Equality of opportunity was a false promise shortly after the civil war.

These constraints gave raise to a new principle whose touchstone was equality of condition rather than of opportunity: this was the birth of the progressive movement, in my mind. Greater equality of conditions was largely to be achieved through government policy (restricting child labor, limiting the work week, restricting immigration, and strengthening unions). Income was also to be transferred from the rich to the poor through progressive income tax. Abraham Lincoln signed Revenue Act of 1862, which instituted the first federal income tax--before being overturned by the Supreme Court some thirty years later. William Jennings Bryan and his Populist Party fought for a more progressive income tax in the late 1890s, Theodore Roosevelt founded the Progressive Party (Bull Moose Party) in the election of 1912, and in 1913 Congress passed the 16th Amendment, which enabled a non-apportioned federal income tax.

The progressive movement’s legacy is not simply an emphasis on redistribution; it was the realization that the old ethos did not work for the modern economy. So to me, what distinguishes a progressive is not the lonely and simple goal of “more redistribution” to the extent of the modern welfare state (that’s not Theodore Roosevelt’s Progressivism), nor even a strict defense of equality of condition. Rather unifying principle is an adapted notion of egalitarianism that recognizes that the promise of equality of opportunity will no longer be fulfilled by an abundance of wealth and capital beyond the frontier. Rather, the state must actively enable equality of opportunities.

More recently, the older, do-it-yourself version of egalitarianism has come back to favor, enabled by a marriage of convenience between a wealthy elite who are not interested in egalitarianism, and a coalition of evangelicals whose faith emphasizes personal responsibility. All I can say for the former group is that their politics are consistent with their interests. As for latter, who have become the most powerful political coalition in American politics, their emphasis on personal responsibility is based on the insane and willfully-dishonest notion that equal opportunity is possible without government support. The most important plank of progressive ideology rejects this laissez-faire approach to egalitarianism.

Will's take

I think the essence of progressivism is contained in the simple ideal of human progress, that of moving from a society characterized by scarcity and fear toward one of sustenance and acceptance. From trust-busting, to the New Deal, to civil rights, women's rights, and now gay rights. This last issue is sadly still on the vanguard of American society, as evidenced by the pass of the gay marriage ban in California last week, no matter how dastardly the tactics of its supporters.

Note that this progress is an ideal, one that never comes automatically. Living in San Francisco, it's easy to fall prey to a sort of techno-utopianism in which the march of science and knowledge (from Graham Bell to Google) inevitably lead to more freedom and prosperity for society. This is a common enough trope (dating back at least to the Enlightenment, in the West) that remains surprisingly resilient in the face of all the 20th century's industrially-fueled terror. While this may be true for the educationally mobile and stock-holding upper middle class (all bets are off if this credit crisis really picks up steam), income inequality in America today is higher than at any time since the time of the very trusts Teddy Roosevelt notoriously busted.

One thing that the Progressive Party and their spiritual heirs have always taken to heart is the contrary warning that without a fight, power tends to beget more power, and that the increased wealth of our modern society doesn't necessarily result in material changes for the mass of Americans. Whether this makes all the competing groups vying for the title of "progressive" worthy of the charge is debatable, but the idea remains a useful, even necessary one in November of 2008.