1, 2, 3: Vote No, No, No

Most voters who go to the polls today in Virginia will be surprised to find, in addition to candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives and a smattering of local office, three ballot measures asking for their permission to amend the Constitution of Virginia.

Two of the measures deal with creating conditions for exempting certain classes of individuals from local real estate property taxes, and the other permits the General Assembly to increase by as much as 50 percent the amount of tax revenue set aside in the so-called "rainy day" fund.

When it comes to amending the basic law of any jurisdiction, it is up to the proponents of the change to provide a compelling reason to do so.

In the case of these three amendments, it has been difficult to find any proponents at all, much less enthusiastic proponents who have laid out a persuasive argument in favor of change.

On the other hand, there have been those who have analyzed the three proposals and found them severely wanting.  One of those is Charlottesville radio show host and former city councilor Rob Schilling, who has recommended to his listeners on WINA-AM and the readers of his blog that they vote "no" on each of the measures on the November 2 ballot.

I agree with him.

With regard to the two property-tax measures, it is not a good precedent to set to allow any discretely defined group to be exempted from the common responsibility to pay taxes.  While I strongly support across-the-board tax cuts and accompanying cuts in government expenditures, carving out exemptions for politically well-connected or popular minority groups (in this case, disabled old people and disabled veterans) casts a very bad example.  First, it encourages other groups -- narrowly- or broadly-defined -- to seek similar exemptions for themselves.  Second, it means that all other taxpayers will have to pay a higher amount when their tax bills are assessed and collected.

With regard to expanding the "rainy day" fund, I would have less of a problem with it if "rainy day" were more specifically and narrowly defined.  If it were designed, for instance, to be used in the case of natural disasters like hurricanes, blizzards, or earthquakes that create large areas of destruction or, in another instance, in the case of a terrorist attack or conditions of armed rebellion, my objections would be muted.

The problem with the "rainy day" fund, as it is currently used, is that it gives legislators an excuse to dip into savings whenever there is a revenue shortfall, rather than finding ways to cut spending.

If there is a surplus in revenue, it should be returned to the taxpayers as a refund or tax cut, not added to a supply of "mad money" for members of the General Assembly to play with.

I believe that the default vote for any referendum or other type of ballot measure is "no."  So my recommendation for today's election:  Vote no on each and every proposed constitutional amendment. 

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Guest Blogger Tim Hulsey Reviews 'Sanctified' and 'Locomotion'

Sanctified satisfies at Lincoln Theatre; Locomotion derails at Kennedy Center

Tim Hulsey

Special to The Metro Herald

“Democracy,” said H.L. Mencken, “is the theory that the common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard.”

If that's true, then the new musical Sanctified, now playing through November 14 at the historic Lincoln Theatre, is theatrical democracy in action.  A potent brew of shout-and-holler gospel music, country comedy, Sunday-school piety, and aw-shucks know-nothingism, Sanctified knows exactly what its audience wants, and gives it to them good and hard.

The plot, what there is of it, involves the East Piney Grove Baptist Church, a dwindling African-American congregation in deep but otherwise unspecified financial trouble.  The young pastor (John McClure, Jr.) has pinned his church's last hope on a 30th anniversary Gospel Revival, and brought in his opera-diva cousin (Mary Millben) to assist with the proceedings.  A lay minister, Deacon (Frederick Strother), respectable to the marrow but lacking spiritual fervor, schemes to remove the pastor from his post.

Meanwhile, two mysterious “delivery men” (William T. Newman, Jr., and Joshua Nelson) work behind the scenes to ensure the revival's success – and it hardly counts a “spoiler” to reveal that these delivery men are actually angels in disguise.  Of course, the pastor's plans for this revival will go awry in a most amusing and heartwarming – if predictable -- manner.

Still, scene-stealing turns from Almonica Caldwell as a gossipy church lady and Ellis Foster as a doddering, unintelligible elderly chorister keep the proceedings lively, even through Sanctified's overlong, overstuffed second act. 

Moreover, playwright Javon Johnson provides a generous helping of strong comic business – most of it amusing, and all instantly recognizable -- for the squabbling, backbiting members of the East Piney Grove Gospel Choir.  But Bernadine Mitchell, as elderly Sister Sarah, walks away with the heart of the show, delivering her character's Christian homilies with world-weariness and absolute sincerity.

Then there is the score, a blend of traditional gospel tunes and original material by Rollo Dilworth and Raymond Reeder.  For a patchwork score like this, the music of Sanctified holds together fairly well, and the original title tune, “Sanctified,” is an instant Sunday-morning classic, guaranteed to linger in the mind for days.  Mary Millben, a Leontyne Price-soundalike (with showy coloratura to match), gets top honors for solo vocals, though gospel-music veteran John McClure, Jr., a top-five finalist on BET's Sunday Best, takes a strong second place: Their first-act duet “Come Out the Wilderness” is far and away the vocal highlight of the show.  Only the treacly second-act love ballad “A Miracle in Your Eyes” and the rap number “Tougher Than My God” feel out of place here; the style and subject matter of these pieces are not in keeping with the rest of the show.  (As an added bonus, for several nights of the run, the promoters of Sanctified have asked a “guest artist” to perform the next-to-last number of the evening.)

Technical aspects of the show are uneven.  The historic Lincoln Theatre, which hosted legendary performances by Duke Ellington and Ella Fitzgerald, may be the perfect venue for a show like Sanctified, but with Sanctified, problems with the sound mix along with the unpredictable acoustics of the venue occasionally make some of the voices (especially Millben's) shrill, tinny and unpleasant.  The crew seems to be working these problems out, slowly and gradually.  But visually, at least, the show is always striking, thanks to a stylishly evocative set by Tony Cisek and moody lighting from William H. Grant, III.

Playwright Javon Johnson seems to have conceived Sanctified as a Tyler Perry-esque response to the ever-popular Smoke on the Mountain series of country-gospel musicals.  The show strikes more than its share of false notes, particularly in its callous attitude toward the “hincty” college-educated opera singer, and in the impossibly trite angel subplot.  But like the East Piney Grove Gospel Choir itself, it overcomes its many problems through sheer good will.  This isn't highbrow theater by any standard, but at its best, Sanctified illuminates the triumphs and tribulations of a close-knit community of faith.  Sanctified is a mess, but it's a rousing, entertaining mess, guaranteed to leave the audience both sanctified and satisfied.

I wish I could say half as much for the world premiere of Jacqueline Woodson's Locomotion, which just finished a brief run at the Kennedy Center.  Woodson adapted this 70-minute children's drama from her Newbery Honor Award-winning book, chronicling a turbulent year in the life of an inner-city African-American orphan who finds a much-needed outlet for self-expression in his daily poetry journal.

 The book Locomotion has become middle-school required reading for all the right reasons, but few of its rough edges and hardly any of the narrative drive have made the transition from page to stage.  As eleven-year-old Lonnie Collins Motion (the “Lo-Co-Motion” of the title), Nickolas Vaughan sounds and acts more like a happy children's television host than the brooding, introverted character of the book.  Fatima Quander, playing all the women's roles in the show, is convincing in none of them.  Of the three-person cast, G. Alverez Reid makes the strongest impression, mostly in the role of Lonnie's classmate Enrique.

 As adapter and playwright, Woodson peppers her script with easy bromides, flat speeches, one-dimensional characters and crass tearjerker moments, in a manner that, ironically enough, betrays the tough-minded spirit of her original book.  Jennifer L. Nelson's broad direction condescends to her intended audience of children, most of whom seemed bored and restless at the performance I attended.  Production values are excellent, as one would expect from the Kennedy Center, but on the whole, this Locomotion goes nowhere fast.

Sanctified:  Book by Javon Johnson, original music by Rollo Dilworth and Raymond Reeder.  Directed by Derrick Sanders.  Lincoln Theatre (near U St./Cardozo Metro Station) through November 14.  Two hours and fifty minutes, including 15-minute intermission.  Tickets $37-$47 plus service and facility charges.  For tickets, call (202) 397-SEAT or visit www.ticketmaster.com.  For more information, call (202) 328-6000, or visit www.letsgetsanctified.com or www.thelincolntheatre.org.

Locomotion:  Adapted by Jacqueline Woodson from her Newbery Honor Award-winning book.  Directed by Jennifer l. Nelson.  Kennedy Center Family Theater, October 23-31.  70 minutes, no intermission.  For tickets to Kennedy Center performances, visit www.kennedy-center.org or call Instant Charge at (202) 467-4600.

Teachers' Union Cites Me in Anti-Robert Hurt TV Ad

When, wearing my "Charlottesville Libertarian Examiner" hat as a political writer for Examiner.com, I interviewed state Senator Robert Hurt (R-Chatham) a few days after he won the GOP nomination for Congress in Virginia's Fifth District, what was most striking about the candidate's replies to questions was their blandness.

When asked, for instance, to name three federal programs that he would favor eliminating or privatizing, Hurt could think of only one, the Department of Education, whose purpose, he said, was "not clear."

Such a response was both non-controversial and disappointing. Non-controversial, because eliminating the federal Department of Education has been a goal of the Republican Party since at least 1980. Disappointing, because his answers showed Hurt to lack bold thinking about how best to limit -- or shrink -- the size and scope of the federal government.

So it came as quite a surprise when, months later, the National Education Association began to air a TV ad favoring Hurt's opponent, incumbent Congressman Tom Perriello, and attacking Hurt for those very positions he took in his interview on Examiner.com.

In fact, the NEA cited the "Charlottesville Libertarian Examiner, 6/13/10" in its campaign commercial, which has been broadcast frequently on local Charlottesville television stations (NBC29, Newsplex) for about two weeks. In the meantime, it has had just 357 hits on YouTube since it was posted there on October 19.  (By comparison, a rough-hewn, meant-for-TV ad posted by independent candidate Jeff Clark has had 360 hits since September 28.  For contrast, check out Hurt's first on-the-air ad, which has had 1,435 hits on YouTube since August 24.)

Here's the NEA's ad, which runs 31 seconds in length (and seems interminable in its frequency on local television):

The NEA's television commercial does not cite my earlier interview with Hurt, in which he asserted that Tom Perriello "dances with Nancy," referring to the current Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).  Nor does it cite my interview with Perriello himself, in which he made strange claims to having a "libertarian undercurrent" in his political thinking, or the refutation (one might say "refudiation") of Perriello by actual, local libertarians.

Whether the NEA's ad discourages voters from casting a ballot for Hurt because they disagree with his position on the Department of Education, or whether it encourages other viewers to vote for him because they agree with that position, remains to be seen in the results of the election on November 2.

The fact that the nationwide teachers' union finds Examiner.com -- still a newcomer to the media stage -- a reliable and credible source speaks volumes about the positive potential of this publishing platform.

(This blog post is adapted slightly from an earlier article on Examiner.com.)

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Video from Albemarle GOP Rally for Robert Hurt

Halloween is more than just "trick or treat."  In most years, it's just a few days before an election and therefore is a last-minute opportunity for campaigning.

So it was in Charlottesville on Sunday, October 31, a bright, sunny, unseasonably warm day perfect for going door-to-door to beg for candy and votes.

Two of the candidates seeking election to Congress in Virginia's Fifth District also used the time to rally supporters.  Incumbent Congressman Tom Perriello (D-Ivy) visited the Grounds of the University of Virginia, where he was surrounded by children trick-or-treating on Mr. Jefferson's lawn -- and their voting-age parents.

His Republican opponent, state Senator Robert Hurt of Chatham, spoke at a gathering of GOP activists at Albemarle Square on Route 29 north of the city.  Hurt was introduced by Governor Bob McDonnell after speeches by RPV Chairman Pat Mullins, Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, Lieutenant Governor Bill Bolling, and House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA7), who, as several speakers pointed out, is poised to become Majority Leader of the House of Representatives when the current holder of that title, Ohio Congressman John Boehner, becomes Speaker next January.

I was able to capture the entire event on video, in five parts.

In the first part, Albemarle County Republican chair Rachel Schoenewald makes some introductions, followed by Pat Mullins and Ken Cuccinelli (who points out the presence of "Death himself" in the audience, admonishing "Death" not to vote on Tuesday).

In part two, Bill Bolling speaks and introduces Eric Cantor.

In part three, former Delegate and current Congressman Eric Cantor delivers remarks, and then introduces Bob McDonnell.

In part four, Cantor introduces "His Excellency, the Governor of Virginia, Bob McDonnell," who speaks and introduces Robert Hurt. McDonnell begins with a reference to the UVA defeat of the University of Miami in Saturday's football game, which stirs up the crowd.

In the fifth and last segment, Robert Hurt makes the case for his election on Tuesday and the defeat of Tom Perriello. The candidate naturally mentioned his endorsement by the local newspaper, The Daily Progress, which had been published early Sunday morning.  After Hurt finishes, Pat Mullins wraps it up with encouraging words for the crowd and an invitation to them to volunteer to work on the campaign for the next two days.

Photos of the rally can be seen on Facebook, here.

Interviews I have conducted with Robert Hurt are here and here; an interview with Tom Perriello, in which he cites a "libertarian undercurrent" for his vote in favor of Obamacare, is here. (Those interviews, and interviews I have done with other congressional candidates in the 2010 election, can be found on Examiner.com.)

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Tom Perriello and Barack Obama

It's not news -- at least not anymore -- that President Barack Obama attracted a crowd of more than 7,000 people when he came to Charlottesville on Friday to speak at a rally on behalf of incumbent Congressman Tom Perriello (D-Ivy).

The event was carried live on local television stations, from the landing of Air Force One at CHO through following the motorcade down a deserted Route 29 through the speech itself to the lift off of the President's airplane barely two hours later.

The question remains, however, as to why the President came to Charlottesville in the first place.  The appearance was, it seems, the only one at which Mr. Obama offered his campaign support to an individual Member of the House of Representatives.  (In other campaign appearances around the country, the President spoke on behalf of candidates -- some incumbents, some not -- for the U.S. Senate and for governor, but not for House Members.)

Here's my interpretation of the events of these past days, which must have been pretty heady for local Democrats.  People who live in Washington, D.C., can be cynical about presidential motorcade sitings, but such things are rare in Central Virginia.  (In the past 100 years or so, there have been scattered visits by Franklin Roosevelt, George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton [as president-elect], and George W. Bush.  Charlottesville is long past the days when three presidents called it home.)

So why did Obama come?  And why did Perriello accept his visit, considering that the Fifth Congressional District is far more conservative than Perriello himself is, or claims to be?

It might not be risky for Perriello to be seen (figuratively) bumping fists with Obama at Charlottesville's downtown pavilion, in a city where Democrats show a routine 4-to-1 advantage in election returns.  But down toward Farmville and Bedford and Danville, associating with the highly unpopular president days before the election is quite risky.  It might make Charlottesville and Albemarle voters more enthusiastic about their candidate -- who they were going to cast a ballot for, anyway -- but it might also incite fence-sitting or complacent conservative voters farther south.

So, my take on all this:  Regardless of whether Perriello wins or loses next Tuesday, the new Democratic establishment is setting him up to be a favored candidate for statewide office in 2013.

Face it, after the Republican sweep of 2009, the Democrats don't have much of a bench of eager potential candidates for governor, lieutenant governor, or attorney general.  Terry McAuliffe may be up for a repeat run for the Democratic nomination for the top spot, but few others seem to want to go through the (political and personal) pain that plagued Creigh Deeds last year.

Democratic powerbrokers see Tom Perriello as a rising star within their party, an opinion shared by many in the party's grass roots.  He voted for Obamacare, cap-and-trade, and the failed stimulus package but kept his distance on the administration's budget, banking "reform," and other controversial issues. He has a great resume:  two degrees from Yale, experience as a humanitarian in combat zones overseas, and at least two years as a Member of Congress.  He's proven himself to be a hard worker and indefatigable campaigner. (It helps that he's unmarried and childless.)

My prediction is that, win or lose on November 2, Tom Perriello will be a candidate for Virginia Attorney General in 2013.  I also predict that the Democratic Party will give him a clear path to the nomination.  (Sorry, Senator McEachin!  You had your chance.)

I can't wait to talk to Ken Cuccinelli to ask him what he thinks of his re-election opponent.

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Book Review Blog Carnival Number 55 Is Now Live

As I foretold a few weeks ago, I am hosting the 55th edition of the Book Review Blog Carnival on my other blog, Book Reviews by Rick Sincere.

The carnival is a collection of submissions by various bloggers in categories like fiction, non-fiction, history, mysteries, children's and young adult (YA) books, "lists," and author interviews.

Check out the carnival today and consider submitting your own book reviews to future editions.

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Perriello's Perplexing 'Populist' Self-Identification

On more than one occasion, U.S. Representative Tom Perriello (D-VA5) has spoken of himself as a "populist."  He seems to think that is a good thing.

For example, in an article by Ray Reed for WSLS-TV in Roanoke, we find this:

Perriello said the Hurt campaign seeks to “falsely portray me as a liberal when I am a populist.”

Perriello told columnist E.J. Dionne of the Washington Post:

"First and foremost, I'm a populist."

In an article in The New Yorker, George Packer explains the origins of the term "populist" in American political discourse and applies it to Perriello:

Perriello is less a Progressive than a Populist. The Populists were agrarians, and when Perriello told an audience at a grant-giving ceremony in Martinsville, Virginia, that farm jobs could be the jobs of the future, he was sounding a very old chord in American discourse. In his language and sympathies, his frequent use of the word “elite,” his vilification of Wall Street bankers, Perriello is carrying the banner of the laid-off seamstress, the struggling truck-stop owner, the hard-pressed tobacco farmer. These were the constituents of the original Populists. They looked with anger upward rather than with sympathy downward. They didn’t come from the professional middle class, though some of their champions did, and they didn’t put their faith in the training and education of experts. If anything, expertise was suspect as a cover for the interests of the powerful. Hofstadter described the “dominant themes in Populist ideology” as “the idea of a golden age…the dualistic version of social struggles; the conspiracy theory of history; and the doctrine of the primacy of money.”

I was incredulous when I first heard Perriello use the word "populist" to describe himself. Did he not understand the history of the term? Did he not know who else in American politics is, or was, a "populist"?

For example, Huey "Kingfish" Long, the corrupt head of Louisiana's political machine, was proudly "populist." Social Security Online -- a U.S. government web site! -- describes Long as

A nominal Democrat, Huey Long was a radical populist, of a sort we are unfamiliar with in our day. As Governor, he sponsored many reforms that endeared him to the rural poor...

The Kingfish wanted the government to confiscate the wealth of the nation's rich and privileged. He called his program Share Our Wealth. It called upon the federal government to guarantee every family in the nation an annual income of $5,000, so they could have the necessities of life, including a home, a job, a radio and an automobile. He also proposed limiting private fortunes to $50 million, legacies to $5 million, and annual incomes to $1 million. Everyone over age 60 would receive an old-age pension. His slogan was "Every Man A King."

Alabama Governor George Wallace, the segregationist who ran for President in 1968 and 1972, was so much identified with populism that the subtitle of a made-for-TV biopic about him was "the rise & fall of an American populist." And journalist Stephan Lesher's book about him is titled George Wallace: American Populist.

The Encyclopedia of Alabama begins its entry on Wallace like this:

He was elected governor for an unprecedented four terms in 1962, 1970, 1974, and 1982, and was de facto governor during the administration of his first wife, Lurleen Burns Wallace, from 1967 to 1968. Wallace also launched four unsuccessful bids for the presidency on platforms that opposed the expansion of federal power and appealed to white populist sentiments. During each election cycle, he modified his racial views to suit the times. Despite his support for road construction, education, and industrial development, Wallace is widely known for his resistance to civil rights, limited economic vision, failure to reform the tax code, and total focus on campaigning, at the expense of running the state.

Then there's David Duke, the former Ku Klux Klan leader, racist, and anti-semite who ran for president on the Populist Party's ticket in 1988.

Perriello certainly has a lot in common with Pat Buchanan, the pundit and failed presidential candidate described by Alexander Cockburn as a "populist outsider" in the same category as Jesse Jackson and Jerry Brown. Jonathan Alter called Buchanan a "Beltway populist" in a 1996 Newsweek cover story. Like Buchanan, Perriello opposes free trade with potential purchasers of American products overseas.

Whether these sordid associations are what Perriello seeks when he calls himself a "populist" is somewhat beside the point, because populism is, at its core, opposed to individual liberty and personal responsibility.

When I used to man libertarian booths at county fairs and gay pride celebrations, we used the World's Smallest Political Quiz and the Nolan Chart to explain how people really think about politics. The Nolan Chart turns the inadequate, one-dimensional left/right political spectrum into a two-dimensional grid that is better for identifying how people think.

Basically, the chart (using the quiz) measures how people view economic and personal liberty. People who score high on the economic liberty scale tend to be conservatives; people who score high on the personal liberty scale tend to be liberals.

People who score high on both scales tend to be libertarians.

People who score low on both scales, however, tend to be authoritarians or populists.

A commenter on an article called "Notes Toward a New Political Taxonomy" on The American Scene explained it similarly:

The Nolan chart is the simplest/most precise way to show this. It is a two dimensional chart, that thus has four corners.

The two dimensions are: Economic, Social.

Economic means the role of government in economic policy in taxes, spending on social programs, education, health care, etc. regulation.

Social means role of government in drugs, homosexuality, abortion, the draft, etc.

Those who favor social freedom but not economic are left/liberal

Those who favor economic freedom but not social are right/conservative

Those who favor all freedom, libertarian

Those who favor none, populist/authoritarian

Based on this taxonomy, a "populist" is someone who wants the government to intervene in people's economic decisions and also wants it to intervene in their social and personal decisions.

Put another way, if a "libertarian" is someone who wants to keep government "out of the bedroom and out of the boardroom," a "populist" is someone who wants to make sure government stays in the boardroom and stays in the bedroom.

Giving Tom Perriello the benefit of the doubt, perhaps he thinks "populist" is a synonym for "popular" or means simply that he wants to do things "for the people."

Even so, does he really want to be associated with the likes of Huey Long, George Wallace, David Duke, and Pat Buchanan? If not, why does he use the same word to describe himself when that word is applied so commonly to these figures from the dark side of American politics?

Either Perriello is ignorant of the nomenclature and ignorant of history or he's conscientiously linking himself to an anti-freedom political philosophy.

That's both odd and disturbing for a politician who thinks he has libertarian leanings.

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Are Lindsay Lohan and Justin Bieber Necessary?

It turns out that writing about Justin Bieber's alleged assault of a 12-year-old boy who (allegedly) called him a "faggot," Lindsay Lohan's choices of nail polish and her evolving mug shots, Paris Hilton's cocaine arrest, or Perez Hilton's oscillating mean spirits is no longer necessary to attract money-earning Web traffic -- if it was ever necessary at all.

Celebrity stories may raise the numbers of visitors, but those visitors are less likely to buy anything, or even look at advertising on a web site or blog.  It's as if a passerby noticed Shia LaBeouf at a sidewalk cafe in Dupont Circle but didn't bother to stroll into the place and order an espresso and a muffin.

The New York Times reports that an analysis by Perfect Market, a media consulting company, finds that hard news stories attract the most profitable traffic to newspaper web sites (and, I would hazard to extrapolate, to news-and-opinion blogs, as well).

According to the Times:

Using data from newspapers including The Chicago Tribune, The Los Angeles Times, The San Francisco Chronicle and The Orlando Sentinel, Perfect Market found that the most profitable articles were the ones readers were most engaged with. Topics like unemployment, the egg recall and mortgage rates topped the list.

The reason, Perfect Market analysts explained, was that advertising is more effective when it is paired with news content that is relevant to the product, especially when the subject of the news is something in which readers have a personal interest.

Reporting on the same story, with the alliterative headline "Lindsay Lohan Less Lucrative for News Sites Than Hard News," Advertising Age added:

Newspaper websites get more ad revenue from articles about serious stuff like the Gulf oil spill than from traffic bait like stories on celebrity scandals, according to an analysis by Perfect Market, a company that aims to help publishers become more visible and profitable on the web.

Advertising Age's Nat Ives explained why celebrity-driven stories lack the profit potential of nuts-and-bolts, bread-and-butter topics.

A lot of the difference had to do with automated text ads that are keyed to the content on a page, ads that can be overshadowed by the big display units that newspapers' sales teams typically sell directly. Articles about immigration, for example, are magnets for text ads promoting immigration lawyers.

"The rates paid by advertisers on Google AdSense for immigration-related terms are higher than the celebrity-related stuff like Lindsay Lohan," said Robertson Barrett, chief strategy officer at Perfect Market. Mortgage lenders want to put text ads in front of people reading about mortgages, he said, but there aren't as many advertisers trying to sell celebrity memorabilia.

Jeremy W. Peters in the New York Times offered some actual numbers that demonstrate the profitability of stories about the economy and other "kitchen table" issues.

Perfect Market measured revenue per page view and found that articles about Social Security were the most valuable, generating an average of $129 for 1,000 page views. Articles about mortgage rates made $93 for every 1,000 page views. On other topics, values for every 1,000 page views were $28 for items about unemployment, $33 for articles on jobs, $20 for articles on the egg recall and $26 for pieces on immigration reform.

To be perfectly candid, I still haven't made a dime from Google AdSense in the nearly six years I've been blogging. But at least I know now that I don't have to make gratuitous references to Lady Gaga in order to increase my traffic volume and click-through rates.  (I'll still Tweet about Glee, even though there's no profit in it.)

To my readers, however: please feel free to click on the ads below. Google and I will both be grateful (me more than the Big G).

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Rick Santorum's Views on Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan

Speaking at a press conference during the Virginia Tea Party Patriots Convention in Richmond on October 9, former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum claimed that Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan “are certainly two of the shoulders that we stand upon as the Republican Party.”

Goldwater and Reagan, he said, “would be preeminent figures in the party” today.

Santorum’s claim was in response to a question I posed: “Would there be a role in the Republican party today for Barry Goldwater or Ronald Reagan?”

The question was relevant because Santorum has, in the past, rejected the libertarian values that Goldwater and Reagan stood for.

In a famous 1975 interview with Reason magazine, Reagan had identified libertarianism as the “very heart and soul of conservatism.”

Santorum, on the other hand, told Steve Inskeep of National Public Radio in 2005 that “one of the criticisms I make is to what I refer to as more of a libertarianish right,” arguing that some conservatives “have this idea that people should be left alone, be able to do whatever they want to do. Government should keep our taxes down and keep our regulation low and that we shouldn't get involved in the bedroom, we shouldn't get involved in cultural issues, you know, people should do whatever they want. Well, that is not how traditional conservatives view the world.”

Reviewing Santorum’s book, It Takes a Family, Jonathan Rauch of the Brookings Institution concluded that “As Goldwater [in The Conscience of a Conservative] repudiated Dwight Eisenhower and Richard Nixon, so Santorum repudiates Goldwater and Ronald Reagan.”

That’s why it’s doubly strange that, in his Richmond press conference, Santorum both embraced Goldwater as a “preeminent figure” and then denied the historical truth of Goldwater’s libertarianism.

(A "Washington read" of the It Takes a Family's index reveals that while Home Depot merits at least four mentions in the book, Goldwater is never mentioned at all, and Reagan is mentioned just twice -- as many times as twins Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen.)

In response to a follow-up question, as to whether Barry Goldwater’s libertarian viewpoints would [bear] a leadership role today, Santorum said, “Barry Goldwater evolved into a libertarian. I don’t think you would say that Barry Goldwater in 1964 was a libertarian. I think a lot of his libertarianist [sic] views developed over time and actually later in his life.”

That view is wrong, film critic Scott Galupo pointed out in a 2006 Washington Times review of a documentary of Goldwater’s life:

If you had one of those think tanky graphs that expand on the simplistic left-right spectrum, Mr. Goldwater's libertarian politics were remarkably consistent.

Not unlike his more successful legatee, President Ronald Reagan, he held fast to a few principles -- essentially, that the federal government should stay out of people's personal lives, but still be strong enough to kick the commies in the groin.

Later in his career, he took the same laissez-faire view on abortion and homosexual rights (issues, [George] Will notes, that didn't figure on the national agenda in the 1960s) that he took on economic entrepreneurship.

Despite his previous criticism of Goldwater (and, by extension, “Goldwater Republicans”) as out-of-step with the conservative movement and the modern-day Republican Party, Santorum told the Tea Party press conference that “I think the Goldwater conservatism of limited government [and] personal responsibility, is certainly still the core of the Republican party and I think the Reagan expansion of that into a broader-based coalition was something that has been important evolution.”

Yet as the Cato Institute’s David Boaz told me after he watched the video of Santorum’s most recent remarks, "Santorum in Richmond speaks of freedom, individual rights, and the dignity of the human person. But he has demonstrated in the past that he doesn't really mean the freedom to live your own life as you choose. He has denounced 'this whole idea of personal autonomy ... this idea that people should be left alone, be able to do whatever they want to do.' That's the American idea of freedom, but it's not Rick Santorum's idea.”

Citing two quotations from Barry Goldwater – “Every man, for his individual good and for the good of his society, is responsible for his own development” and “The conservative’s first concern will always be: Are we maximizing freedom?” – Boaz concluded:

“It's true, as Santorum says, that Goldwater's libertarianism on issues like gay rights and the separation of church and state became more pronounced as he grew older and wiser. Too bad most politicians only get older."

Given that Santorum has declared his interest in pursuing a bid for the GOP presidential nomination in 2012, he needs to take some time to reconcile his contradictory views and ask himself, are Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan’s shoulders those of giants upon which Republicans stand, or are their old-fashion views about individual autonomy, personal responsibility, and human freedom at odds with the 21st century’s Republican Party?

One hopes he will choose to stand on the shoulders of giants and that he himself has "evolved."

* * * * *

Santorum's complete remarks can be seen in this video:

Other articles I have written based on interviews and events at the Virginia Tea Party Patriots Convention include these, which can all be found at Examiner.com:

Rick Santorum assesses the Tea Party movement and ‘the moral challenge we face’
GOP candidate Chuck Smith says ‘our country is heading in the wrong direction’
Libertarian James Quigley takes on Rep. Bobby Scott in Virginia’s 3rd District

Radio host Herman Cain thinks ‘the Tea Party movement is awesome’
WSJ’s John Fund: Tea Party movement is ‘essence of American individualism’
Va. Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling: ‘pro-free market policies are pro-business policies'

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From the Archives: 1988's 'The why of teen-age suicides'

The topic of suicide by gay teenagers is in the news again, illustrated most vividly by the death of a Rutgers University student, Tyler Clementi, who leapt from the George Washington Bridge last month.  (The circumstances of Clementi's suicide are fraught with questions and not a little hyperbole, so I will not be commenting directly on that particular case.)

Some gay activists have called four suicides by gay teenagers in the past month an "epidemic," although it does not appear that any of them were related to each other.  (They occurred in California, Indiana, and Texas, in addition to Clementi's death in New Jersey.)

David Link on the Independent Gay Forum and conservative columnist (and, as of today, Eliot Spitzer's sparring partner on CNN) Kathleen Parker in the Washington Post both draw attention to a new project on YouTube called "It Gets Better," initiated by advice columnist Dan Savage and supported by talk-show host Ellen DeGeneres.

The aim of the It Gets Better Project is to showcase the personal stories of gay men and lesbians who used to be gay and lesbian children or teenagers. In short video clips, today's young (and some not-so-young) adults explain, from their own perspective, that bullying, disrespect, alienation, and disorientation are temporary phenomena that can be overcome with time, patience, and effort. In a phrase, "it gets better" -- life gets better, and it's worthwhile to stick around to find out where it takes us.

Although it is not a topic I have followed closely in recent years, I first wrote about gay teen suicide in 1988 -- about two years before I came out to more than my close circle of friends and classmates.  The article appeared in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and, although the statistics cited may be different (and probably more accurate) today, the general theme remains solid.

I am grateful to an email correspondent (and old friend) who reminded me of this article and gave me a reason to repost it as an archival piece on this blog.  (I do not believe the article, given its age, is available in any easily accessible electronic format on-line.)

Here it is as it appeared in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on Saturday, December 10, 1988.

The why of teen-age suicides

WASHINGTON
The drama is played out again and again in towns and cities across the country.

A young man of 16 or 17, good-looking. personable, popular, intelligent, often the captain of the football team or president of his class, takes his own life.

This tragedy grips family and friends, who question: “Why?” There seems to be no explanation for this senseless act. “No warning signs,” “every reason to live,” “not even his girlfriend had a clue” — these phrases are numbly repeated, in vain.

Wherever you turn, the tragedy of teen suicide has attracted enormous attention. Each year 5,000 people between the ages of 15 and 24 kill themselves. The rate has tripled over the past 30 years and doubled since 1960, so that today suicide Is the third leading cause of death in this age group.

Why do so many of our young people consider suicide, attempt it, and sometimes succeed at it?

Multiple causes are likely. Certainly the familiar woes of adolescence are a part of it, as are parental and peer-group pressures toward often contradictory goals — the drive for high grades or a well-paying job and the abuse of drugs and alcohol. Yet one factor deserves special attention, perhaps most of all because fear and prejudice have prevented our taking it fully into account.

This factor has been illuminated by films that portray the suicide of adolescents with sexual problems. In "Another Country," an English schoolboy hangs himself in the chapel after a teacher catches him in the passionate embrace of a fellow student. In "Ode to Billy Joe," the title character leaps off the Tallahatchee Bridge, unable to deal with the fact that he had been seduced by an older man.

These gripping images may help explain the deaths of so many “handsome young men” with “every reason to live.”

Contemporary discussions of teen-age suicide generally neglect to touch on the contributing factor of adolescent homosexuality. Reasons for this are vague. Society’s taboos against discussing teen sexuality In general and homosexuality in particular have hindered full examinations of adolescent suicide. In fact, outside the medical literature, only publications with primarily gay and lesbian readers do the story justice.

In 1986, sociologist Joseph Harry of Northern Illinois University reported that young people who are homosexual are six times more likely to attempt suicide than their heterosexual peers. Dr. Harry’s research indicates that as many as half the males in the 15-24 age group who try to kill themselves are gay. His conclusions were partially confirmed in the prestigious Journal of the American Medical Association in July 1987.

Future studies of the teen-suicide problem must explore this factor more thoroughly. Shervert Frazier of the National Institute of Mental Health insists: “There’s no question that the issue of gay and lesbian adolescents who have suicidal behavior has to be considered.”

Statistics dictate such an examination: While only 3 percent of heterosexual men and 14 percent of heterosexual women attempt suicide, as many as 18 percent of gay men and 23 percent of lesbians do so. This is a striking comparison.

Considering that gay men constitute at most 10 percent of the male population, and lesbians an even smaller percentage of women, this attempted suicide rate is significantly out of proportion. It suggests that gay people encounter social pressures that undermine their sense of self-worth and undercut their basic human dignity unlike anything heterosexuals experience.

Our society continues to castigate and condemn gay and lesbian youth. In spite of the constant teaching of most religions that homosexuals should be treated with the same compassion as all other people, some Christians and Jews still ostracize gay men and women — teenagers, too — not so much for what they do but for who they are.

According to family counselor Wayne Pawlowski, young homosexuals have a lot of unique worries: “condemnation, rejection by family, friends, society at large; forced isolation from the family and/or peers; physical abuse; discrimination, legal problems; constraints on educational and career goals. In addition to these realistic fears, the same adolescents lack positive role models.”

As a result, he writes, gay teen-agers suffer “low self-esteem, poor self-image, guilt, loneliness, confusion, fear of being sick and different, depression, anxiety, suicidal thoughts.”

Society’s treatment of homosexual youth contributes to the high incidence of runaways and their prostitution, exploitation and drug abuse. Many families discard gay and lesbian teenagers when their sexual orientation surfaces. Directly or indirectly, these children are told by their families that they are unwanted and unloved — so they choose to run away or commit suicide. Either risk seems better than the real pain they encounter.

Coming to terms with one’s sexuality is always stressful. To return to Dr. Harry’s report, gay young people have experiences and characteristics that “may create special difficulties for them. And for some, suicide may seem preferable to other solutions.”

Suicide can be an escape from painful schoolyard taunts of “faggot” and “dyke” — and, worse than taunts, threats and assaults as well. Such intolerance is not limited to junior high or high school. It continues ever among “mature” college students.

Parents, friends, siblings and teachers who have had to face the suicide or attempted suicide of a young person should not be ashamed or afraid to consider the combination of homosexuality and homophobia (the irrational fear and hatred of homosexuals) as a motivation for this drastic act. There is much more to fear from covering it up, and much more shame in ignorance.

The captain of the football team or class president who kills himself is only the most visible and attractive example of a phenomenon that is much more far-reaching. Having hidden their sexual orientation for most of their lives from those closest to them, it was easy to hide the most recent troubles that have pushed them over the brink. That is why there were no clues. In almost every one of these cases, a little digging will reveal that the victim was either gay or thought he was or, sometimes, he had had an isolated homosexual experience — in either case, death appeared to be preferable to lifelong humiliation.

To combat this phenomenon, adults and teens alike must be more compassionate toward those who are or who think they may be gay. As one doctor urged in the Journal of the American Medical Association, we must all treat each other in a way “that promotes self-acceptance and tolerance of individual differences.” Only then can we fully grapple with the tragedy of teen suicide.

Richard Sincere is a Washington-based policy analyst and writer.

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Watch for the Book Review Blog Carnival on Halloween

The 53rd Book Review Blog Carnival was published today at Man of La Book.

The latest carnival includes two reviews of The Path to Tyranny by Michael E. Newton as well as a review of the classic, This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald, in addition to reviews of 15 other individual books and two review essays, one called 10 Books About Real World Crime and the other called 10 Books with Homeland Security Threats.

The next carnival will be hosted by Proud Book Nerd on October 17th. Bloggers can submit their book review posts at the Book Review Blog Carnival page.

At the end of the month -- on Halloween, as it happens -- one of my other blogs, (Book Reviews by Rick Sincere) will be hosting the 55th Book Review Blog Carnival, followed by number 56 on November 14 at Homespun Honolulu.

Just for the record, previously published book reviews of mine have been featured in Book Review Blog Carnival #51, Book Review Blog Carnival #37, Book Review Blog Carnival - 35th Edition, The 23rd Book Review Blog Carnival, and 19th Edition of the Book Review Blog Carnival.

I previously hosted Carnival of Liberty LXII.  This will be my first time hosting the Book Review Blog Carnival.  I'll be sure to post a reminder and a link here once the carnival is on line.

(Partially reposted from Book Reviews by Rick Sincere.)



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