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Archive: August, 2010
The city, as you might imagine, was none too thrilled by our piece on its requirement that even small-time bloggers (and freelance writers) pay $300 for a business privilege license — and even more so after a bunch of far-right sites picked this thing up and sprinted away with it as some sort of "blogger tax" on free speech or whatever. The city's complaint, from spokeswoman Katie Martin, is presented below:
First, from the original story, Valerie writes:
Your response on Monday corrected:
"This is my bad. In the course of cutting the story to fit the page, I removed a line that had the answer: Basically, as I understand it, the city is sent letters to people who reported their earnings, no matter how meager, as income to the IRS, which the people mentioned in the story did."
The reason this individual (or any individual who) received a letter was because on her federal income taxes she claimed that these earnings not as a hobby but as a business. Therefore, for federal income taxes, an individual who claims these earnings as a business can receive deductions for their computer or web hosting as a business expense. However, these have implications for one's local taxes. That point is not stressed. These individuals claimed their blogs as businesses. There are consequences (such as receiving tax deductions as well as paying additional taxes) for making that claim.
Everyone needs to pay their taxes, and it is important for Philadelphia residents to understand when their hobbies become businesses. If you generate revenue ($1 or $1 billion) then you are a business and need to file (whether you take a loss or make a profit doesn't matter in determining if you file, just the fact that you had revenue). If whatever you are doing does not bring in any money, you are not in business.
Secondly, from the original story, Valerie writes:
"The city disagrees. Even though small-time bloggers aren't exactly raking in the dough, the city requires privilege licenses for any business engaged in any "activity for profit," says tax attorney Michael Mandale of Center City law firm Mandale Kaufmann. This applies "whether or not they earned a profit during the preceding year," he adds. So even if your blog collects a handful of hits a day, as long as there's the potential for it to be lucrative — and, as Mandale points out, most hosting sites set aside space for bloggers to sell advertising — the city thinks you should cut it a check. According to Andrea Mannino of the Philadelphia Department of Revenue, in fact, simply choosing the option to make money from ads — regardless of how much or little money is actually generated — qualifies a blog as a business. "
Your response on Monday wrote:
2.) The city does not tax all blogs; rather, just the ones make some money or, at least, have the potential to make some money. So, in that sense, it's not really an attack on speech, per se. "The "potential to be lucrative" phrase is misleading. If I own a blog that has the potential to include ads, but I don't have any, I am not required to register for a business license or the business privilege tax. I believe a lot of the misunderstanding is because individuals blogging without ads on the sites believe they must pay a tax on it.
CP — and I, personally — regret any misunderstanding. That said, it strikes me that the city's problem isn't with the facts as presented, but rather, with issues of tone, and also what we chose to emphasize vs. what they wished we would have emphasized. And you'll note that in part two of Martin's complaint, we were referencing an, um, actual city employee.
We have no disagreement with the idea that everyone has to pay taxes. The point of the piece, and often overlooked in the surrounding hullabaloo, was to question the propriety of making people who earn practically no money have to pay a $300 fee just because they chose to report those earnings to the IRS.
Only big businesses are exempt from paying taxes in Philly.
If this is a business and not a hobby, do you get the tax breaks associated? Write off for the use of the computer, rental of your home office space, a portion of electricity, office furniture, and most importantly- write off for a small business losing money
If this is a business then I not only have my first amendment right of speech but I get the protections afforded to the members of the press, like not backing away from a crime scene. Do they have press plates in philly that allow you to park anywhere you want.
The tax credit for a small business losing money used to be 5000 dollars. Is it still?
if this is a hobby, you do not get tax breaks, you can only deduct an amount less than, or equal to your revenue from hobby. so, maybe this lady overstated her income, I wonder if she deducted any of her expenses.
[...] The $300 bill is a business privilege tax and it applies to blogs like Marilyn’s because, according to the city: Therefore, for federal income taxes, an individual who claims these earnings as a business can [...]
[...] New Blog Tax May Foreshadow Other eTaxesAmericans for Tax ReformExaminer.com -Philadelphia Citypaper (blog) -National Ledgerall 285 news [...]
[...] and in the process was blown all out of proportion by right-wing antigovernment types. The city was none too pleased with the aftermath (and, to be fair, we conceded a few points, and edited the online version of the story to clarify [...]
Today's must-read comes from The Economist, which believes it owes Barack Obama an apology.
Once a symbol of American prosperity, GM collapsed into the government's arms last summer. Years of poor management and grabby unions had left it in wretched shape. Efforts to reform came too late. When the recession hit, demand for cars plummeted. GM was on the verge of running out of cash when Uncle Sam intervened, throwing the firm a lifeline of $50 billion in exchange for 61% of its shares.
Many people thought this bail-out (and a smaller one involving Chrysler, an even sicker firm) unwise. Governments have historically been lousy stewards of industry. Lovers of free markets (including The Economist) feared that Mr Obama might use GM as a political tool: perhaps favouring the unions who donate to Democrats or forcing the firm to build smaller, greener cars than consumers want to buy. The label âGovernment Motorsâ quickly stuck, evoking images of clunky committee-built cars that burned banknotes instead of petrol—all run by what Sarah Palin might call the socialist-in-chief.
Yet the doomsayers were wrong.
â¦
That does not mean, however, that bail-outs are always or often justified. Straightforward bankruptcy is usually the most efficient way to allow floundering firms to restructure or fail. The state should step in only when a firm's collapse poses a systemic risk. Propping up the financial system in 2008 clearly qualified. Saving GM was a harder call, but, with the benefit of hindsight, the right one. The lesson for governments is that for a bail-out to work, it must be brutal and temporary. The lesson for American voters is that their president, for all his flaws, has no desire to own the commanding heights of industry. A gambler, yes. An interventionist, yes. A socialist, no.
Oh, and the Congressional Budget Office would like you to know, once again, that the stimulus saved us from the Great Depression Part 2. So, you know, shut up John Boehner.
[...] MUST READ: The auto bailout worked (also, so did the stimulus … [...]
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CP's breaking news and analysis of the natural gas industry in Pennsylvania. Click here to join the "Frack Track" Google group and receive email updates.
This isn't quite breaking news â it's been covered by a few papers in western Pa. and I mentioned it briefly in a recent "Man Overboard" column â but it's gotten surprisingly little play in the media, considering the severity of the claims being made.
The Allegheny Defense Project, a grassroots group dedicated to preserving the environment, ecology, and wilderness of the Allegheny mountains, has charged the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection with illegally permitting water withdrawals.
Here's the breakdown: Hydraulic fracturing, the process used to extract natural gas from the Marcellus Shale formation underlying much of Pa., requires water â lots and lots of water. In eastern and central Pennsylvania (the Delaware and Susquehanna river basins, respectively), that water can be drawn from Pa streams and rivers only with the permission of that watershed's river basin commission.
But in the part of western Pa. which lies in the Ohio River Basin, there is no basin commission to permit water withdrawals. Instead, argues the ADP, those rivers and streams are governed by riparian rights: governed, in other words, by the property owners themselves.
The group charges that DEP has been illegally giving drilling companies permission to withdraw water â charges which they outlined in a letter to DEP Secretary John Hanger (download the full letter here).
According to Board Director Bill Belitskus, the DEP â more than a month later â has yet to respond.
From the Allegheny Defense Project press release:
âThe fact is, the DEP has absolutely no authority to permit water withdrawals in Pennsylvania,â said Cathy Pedler, ADP's forest watch coordinator. âOutside of the Delaware and Susquehanna River watersheds, water withdrawals are governed by riparian rights common law, which means only those who live adjacent to the water can make reasonable use of the water on their land. A gas company cannot take water that flows through property it does not own.â
Nevertheless, documents obtained by ADP reveal that the DEP is unlawfully authorizing water withdrawals from western Pennsylvania streams and rivers. On March 31, 2010 the DEP approved a Water Management Plan for Hanley & Bird, Inc. The Water Management Plan allows Hanley & Bird to withdraw 1.44 million gallons of water a day from the Redbank Creek in Jefferson County for five years.
[...] DEP is illegally permitting gas company water withdrawals, says watchdog group :: The Clog :: Blog A... [...]
[...] DEP is illegally permitting gas company water withdrawals, says watchdog group :: The Clog :: Blog A... [...]
So, our favorite frothy mixture of lube and fecal matter was on Fox News last night — because, seriously, no one else gives a shit what he thinks — to weigh in on this not-mosque at not-Ground Zero nontroversy we and everyone else have been following for a little while. And, as always seems to happen with Santorum, a guy delusional enough to think he might be president in a couple years, he opened his mouth and stupid popped out.
SANTORUM: My thinking was all along if he made the statements that he made, he probably had a lot more that are going to be found out. This man [Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, the lead organizer of the planned Islamic community center in Lower Manhattan] is not a moderate Muslim. This is someone who believes the United States has blood on their hands, that the United States is responsible for this. He is a jihadist, he's just not a violent jihadist. That does not make him a moderate.
Thanks, Rick, for making that distinction. Of course, it's a little muddled, since jihad means "holy war" — though it's most common use confers a religious struggle rather than actual military war — but I'm pretty sure Rick meant it in the Al Qaida kind of way, in which case he means Rauf is a nonviolent warrior, which means, I suppose, that he has a differing view of American foreign policy, which is, I guess, bad. Anyway.
The fact of the matter is, it's pretty hard to argue with Rauf's point: Sure, Muslim radicals killed 3,000 of our people on 9/11 — a horrific tragedy, it goes without saying — and Muslim insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan killed thousands of our soldiers. Again, tragic and sad.
But. The Iraqi sanctions killed millions of Muslim civilians in the 1990s, including 500,000 children; the Iraq War led to thousands more civilian deaths. And that's not even mentioning the various dictators we've propped up over the years. Rauf is, by any factual definition, correct. Undeniably so.
In fact, someone please try to explain to me how this isn't a factually accurate statement. Oh, never mind: Never let inconvenient realities get in the way of cheap political points, eh Rick?
Also, right-wingers have plainly taking to making shit up about this guy and slandering him as a terrorist, even though, as Media Matters and others have ably illustrated, Glenn Beck and the Bush administration were all too happy to embrace him just a few years ago. Yes, Rick, he is a moderate. You moron. In fact, he's the vice chair of the Interfaith Center of New York. One of his primary funders, as The Daily Show hilariously pointed out last night, is Fox News' second-biggest financier. Oh yeah, and Rupert Murdoch published his freaking book.
About that book:
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Radical, indeed.
Actually, let's just watch TDS, because it lays bare the hypocrisy of the frothing right-wing mouthpieces better than anything I've seen to date.
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| The Parent Company Trap | ||||
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[...] UPDATE: Rick Santorum is still an idiot :: The Clog :: Blog Archive :: Staff Blog :: Philadelphia Ci... [...]
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| Casino-related child abandonment: the Simpsons saw it coming (S05E10, 1993) |
As casino gambling in Pennsylvania amps up, so too, apparently, do instances of parents leaving children unattended - sometimes for hours - in casino parking lots while they gamble.
It's happened â that is, the parents have been caught â at least five times in the last two months at Parx casino alone. In one case, a man left a 15-month baby in a running car.
Most recently, Sharon Belek, 35:
... was charged Thursday with child endangerment for leaving her 8- and 15-year old daughters in the parking lot on Aug. 1 while she played the slot machines - for six hours.
The teenage daughter - stuck with a nonworking cell phone - flagged down a passerby at about 12:30 a.m. and borrowed a phone to call her father.
Enter the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board, which announced at a meeting this month its displeasure with the instances of child abandonment.
The Board might have used this as an opportunity to reexamine how much of casino activity is, in fact, what most of us would consider problem or compulsive gambling (a prominent study suggests as much as two-thirds).
But that would be, well, un-Board-like. The PGCB, after all, has the dual mission of regulating gambling on the one hand and ensuring its profitibility and success on the other.
Instead, the Board focused on parking lot security â which is well and good â but not, Parx claims, its responsibility.
Parx is apparently only responsible according to state law for security inside its facility. And so the casino pointed its finger, in turn, at local police, who, in turn, said they cannot patrol Parx' 7,000-car lot.
Commented Bensalem public safety chief Fred Harran:
"We've had calls through the years with kids left in shopping center, but what's making this hot is that we've had five in just a two-month period," said Fred Harran, public safety director in Bensalem. "The gambling addiction, the glitter of it all, people go into gamble and forget the kids. I just don't get it."
It's a revealing statement, and one of the first times we've seen public officials come out and say that casinos are attracting (perhaps creating?) addicts.
While the Gaming Board and casinos try to figure out how to make this ugly little problemo disappear, maybe the rest of us ought to start asking if the problem isn't so much what's happening in casino parking lots as inside slot parlors.
Child abandonment is child abandonment, whether the child is ignored while mommy gambles or while mommy empties a bottle of vodka. The state's responsibility is to punish the offender, and when it comes to kids, the best move is to take the kids away, first offense.
Child abondonment isn't a "first-time" crime. These lovely parents just didn't abondon their kids for the first-time in a casino parking lot. Its been going on for years at home and now we have an opportunity to find the offenders and correct the actions. You would silly to believe otherwise. I say this is a BOON, not a bane.
[...] casino in Gettsyburg grows between locals and outsidersPennLive.comCasino Gambling Web -Philadelphia Citypaper (blog)all 160 news [...]
[...] license Philadelphia InquirerResort casinos license applications available for review PoconoNews.net Philadelphia Citypaper (blog) - Casino Gambling Weball 167 news [...]
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So, this little story intern Valerie Rubinsky wrote about the city hitting up small-time bloggers for a $300 business privilege license has sort of exploded on the Interwebs, from the New York Daily News to Yahoo to Michelle Malkin to freaking nutball conspiracy site Infowars (!) to Fox 29 — which did a piece on it without, you know, mentioning where their brilliant story idea came from. (What's that word for ripping off a story without attribution again?)
And since this story has now blown up, I wanted to clarify a couple of things that, based on the voluminous comments, might not have come through as clearly as we hoped:
1.) The price of a business license is not $300 a year; that's the cost of a lifetime license. You can get an annual license for $50 a year.
2.) The city does not tax all blogs; rather, just the ones make some money or, at least, have the potential to make some money. So, in that sense, it's not really an attack on speech, per se.
3.) I've seen in the comments a question as to how the city found these little bloggers. This is my bad. In the course of cutting the story to fit the page, I removed a line that had the answer: Basically, as I understand it, the city is sent letters to people who reported their earnings, no matter how meager, as income to the IRS, which the people mentioned in the story did. It works the same way for freelance writers: If another paper somewhere publishes a piece that I wrote, and that paper files a 1099, the city — because I live within its limits — will send me a letter demanding that I pay for a BPL because I am officially a business, or whatever. This is on top of my federal, state and city income taxes, of course.
Anyway, hope that helps. Now back to your regularly scheduled government bashing.
I'm not certain. but I suspect that the city notification workflow is more like this: Blogger uses built-in mechanisms of blog hosting service to add ads, figuring "Sure, why not?" without knowing or bothering to research the tax repercussions of doing so. They perhaps assume (not unreasonably) that the taxes (or fees, in this case) couldn't possibly exceed their earnings. Google or other ad network dutifully sends 1099-MISC to said blogger as part of their automated procedure. Blogger follows directions or asks paid tax preparer to handle filling out returns. Software spits out Philly tax returns based on filing address (School Income Tax or BPT); blogger signs and send them in as instructed. City processes return, realizes BPT has been paid in absence of a BPL, and notifies blogger that BPL must be obtained. In short, I doubt that there is information sharing between the IRS and Philly revenue; rather, information submitted directly to the Revenue department is what turns up the lack of a Biz Privilege License. Just to add to the clarification - this happens all the time, to people doing all kinds of work on the side, who happen to live in the city. Get a 1099, try to do the right thing, and end up finding out you have to pay this licensing fee, after the fact.
Nutball conspiracy website? You guys have just shown your true colors. Why dont you do some real reporting and actually look into the facts that infowars and others put forward? In case you didnt know that is wahat journalism is.
Nutball conspiracy website? You guys have just shown your true colors. Why dont you do some real reporting and actually look into the facts that infowars and others put forward? In case you didnt know that is what journalism is.
Why would you say infowars.com is a nutball conspiracy site? Their credibility is held up time and time again. Is this just because they discuss topics that are taboo to places like citypaper.net?
"Freaking nutball conspiracy site" was actually being kind! Yeesh! Hey Infowars people - there's this new thing out called facts! Google it!
In reply to @ThomasT-- I don't think you're correct about this. My partner does not have a blog, but he does have a small amount of self-employed income from book royalties. It's never been more than $500 per year, but he reports this income (less any money spent on legitimate business expenses like buying books related to his research, etc) on his IRS form 1040, Schedule C. (He also has a day job where he pays city wage taxes.) This year during the Philadelphia tax amnesty he got a letter from the city's revenue department telling him he needed a business license. He bought the license, and participated in the Tax Amnesty program to catch up on 9 years of back taxes, all on income of only a few hundred a year. So I think it's obvious that they are getting some info from the IRS, or perhaps the PA Department of Revenue, where my partner also reports his self-employed income. I think a big problem with Philly's BPT/NPT system is that many people don't know about it. I had freelance income for years after I moved to Philly before I found out I was supposed to be paying the BPT/NPT. I came clean, paid my interest and penalties, and I've been caught up every since. But I would have been paying the tax all along if I had known about it. I'm hoping that the tax amnesty program earlier this year and also this City Paper article will make the BPT/NPT more well-known. I also hope city council does seriously consider setting a minimum amount of income below which you don't have to pay BPT/NPT. It is ridiculous for a blogger making $11 per year, or a writer like my partner making a few hundred, to have to buy a spendy license and file yet another tax return every year. Congrats on a great article, Valerie Rubinsky and City Paper. Virginia C. McGuire Philadelphia-based freelance writer
[...] 167 articles. There was one minor thing that was left out of the initial article and posted in a follow up today. How were these bloggers identified? The City “sent letters to people who reported their [...]
So why would anyone live in Philadelphia? Is there a 10,000% tax to get out? You need to fire the people who even suggested this this tax on freedom of speech. Since when did the cradle of freedom become a Fascist hellhole? May be time to revive tar and feathers....
@Blue I would argue it is because of a focus on the facts that infowars.com credibility is held up time and time again. I am not sure where you get your so called "facts" about inforwars.com from, but you are obviously just regurgitating misinformation.
[...] later article had a few clarifications, but the story is still rather [...]
As I understand it, you apply for a business license in the place you conduct the business, not where you live. How does Philadelphia plan on following up on that? When I started my consulting business I was careful to place my address in a location that wasn't in a major borough, city or otherwise to ensure that I didn't conduct transactions (the actual exchange of funds) where I'd get taxed out the a**. Just because someone lives in Philly and submits income that came from a blog, freelancing or consulting doesn't mean the transaction happened in Philadelphia or that the "business" operates there, ergo, Philadelphia's wide net might end up grabbing up some lawsuits at the same time, if they actually engaged in this.
[...] Philly's 'blogger fee' goes viral (also, some clarifications … [...]
[...] Philly's 'blogger fee' goes viral (also, some clarifications … [...]
[...] commenters on the CP site have called this an attack on speech, but as Jeff Billman explains, it’s not, really — the city isn’t taxing the bloggers for blogging, but for [...]
[...] Philly's 'blogger fee' goes viral (also, some clarifications … [...]
[...] Philly's 'blogger fee' goes viral (also, some clarifications … [...]
[...] Philly's 'blogger fee' goes viral (also, some clarifications … [...]
[...] Philly's 'blogger fee' goes viral (also, some clarifications … [...]
[...] Philly's 'blogger fee' goes viral (also, some clarifications … [...]
[...] Philly's 'blogger fee' goes viral (also, some clarifications … [...]
I prepare city business tax returns.The City Revenue department is very aggressive about collecting the $300.00 from all city residents. I have had taxpayers tell me on numerous occasions that they could not get the license for $50.00 but had to pay the $300.00 That's the truth. What the city told you is spin. If you dig down deep on this you will out the truth. This license is too severe, especially on small amounts of income. The city deserves the bad viral publicity it is getting.
[...] Philly's 'blogger fee' goes viral (also, some clarifications … [...]
[...] Philly's 'blogger fee' goes viral (also, some clarifications … [...]
[...] the latter of which both Technically Philly and NEast Philly acquired as we brought on revenue. Philadelphia CityPaper reported that the city had begun reaching directly out to bloggers demanding they pay up, a reality first noted on web forum Philly Speaks and, admittedly, ignored by [...]
[...] Philly’s ‘blogger fee’ goes viral (also, some clarifications) :: The Clog :: Blog ... [...]
So why don't you have a link to this correction from the original article? People are still posting there without any knowledge of this disclosure. http://citypaper.net/articles/2010/08/19/blogging-business-privilege-tax-philadelphia
[...] thing: There is no blogger tax. Never was. This was an Internet meme that got carried away and blown the hell out of proportion [...]
How is it possible that Philly lawmakers are unfamiliar with the constitutional concept that forbids Taxation Without Representation? In Philly of all cities. If Philly lawmakers can put together a cogent op-ed piece on how they are representing the bloggers with this tax money, I'll read it with an open mind. Until then their knowledge of constitutional law is disgraceful. As it is with most politicians, sadly.
Passing this along without much comment: An interview with Peter Neufeld of the Innocence Project, which, thanks to DNA, just exonerated Prisoner No. 258.
How do most wrongful convictions come about?
The primary cause is mistaken identification. Actually, I wouldn't call it mistaken identification; I'd call it misidentification, because you often find that there was some sort of misconduct by the police. In a lot of cases, the victim initially wasn't so sure. And then the police say, "Oh, no, you got the right guy. In fact, we think he's done two others that we just couldn't get him for." Or: "Yup, that's who we thought it was all along, great call."
It's disturbing that misidentifications still play such a large role in wrongful convictions, given that we've known about the fallibility of eyewitness testimony for over a century.
In terms of empirical studies, that's right. And 30 or 40 years ago, the Supreme Court acknowledged that eyewitness identification is problematic and can lead to wrongful convictions. The trouble is, it instructed lower courts to determine the validity of eyewitness testimony based on a lot of factors that are irrelevant, like the certainty of the witness. But the certainty you express [in court] a year and half later has nothing to do with how certain you felt two days after the event when you picked the photograph out of the array or picked the guy out of the lineup. You become more certain over time; that's just the way the mind works. With the passage of time, your story becomes your reality. You get wedded to your own version.
And the police participate in this. They show the victim the same picture again and again to prepare her for the trial. So at a certain point you're no longer remembering the event; you're just remembering this picture that you keep seeing.
Other than misidentifications, what other factors play a role in wrongful convictions?
The second most common cause is the misuse of forensic science other than DNA. In most of our cases, DNA [identification] didn't exist at the time of the conviction, so prosecutors relied on other types of forensic science. It could be serology, which was the old A/B/O blood typing. It could be bite marks. It could be fingerprints. It could be other forensic disciplines: tire marks, shoe print comparisons, fiber comparisons. None of these is bulletproof—some of them aren't even credible—so we see a lot of wrongful convictions stemming from those.
And there are several other very common causes as well. You have police and prosecutor misconduct. You have incompetent defense attorneys. You have jailhouse snitches, who as you can imagine are not the most reliable sources. And you have false confessions. Twenty-five percent of wrongful convictions involve false confessions. Most people can't imagine why anyone would ever confess to a crime they didn't commit, unless they were beaten into it. But these people weren't beaten. They wouldn't even meet the legal definition of coercion. It's just that the [interrogation] methods that are effective for getting confessions from guilty persons are so powerful that they net innocent people as well—particularly innocent people who are juveniles or have some kind of intellectual impairment or mental health problem.
Communities that are whipped up into frenzies will also create climates that lead to wrongful convictions...we are very fortunate to have DNA testing.
[...] MUST READ. When cops and prosecutors screw up.Philadelphia Citypaper (blog)Passing this along without much comment: An interview with Peter Neufeld of the Innocence Project, which, thanks to DNA, just exonerated Prisoner No. 258. … [...]
Clearly, as the ever-resurgent the teabag-waving radical right demonstrates, the Culture War has not gone away, although, it has most certainly changed over the years. In part, I would imagine, that's because the writing is on the wall — progressives are winning, and will continue to win, especially in issues like gay rights, where the recent Prop 8 decision brought little more than a pathetic wimper from a once-mighty Christianists while the rest of us moved on with our lives — and the activists very much need to rebrand. From Politico:
At a moment that finds the right energized and seemingly ascendant, the battles over morality-based cultural issues such as gay rights, abortion and illegal drugs that did so much to drive the conservative movement and dominated the political conversation for more than 30 years have abated, giving way not just to broad economic anxiety but to a new set of emotionally charged issues.
â¦
For while Obama has avoided single-issue fights on issues such as gays in the military and federal funding of abortions — angering parts of his base, in the process — he has, in the minds of conservatives, pushed a comprehensive agenda, and that is far more threatening.
These people have, to my thinking, lost their freaking minds and any semblance of a grasp of historical context: Obama has, if anything, been far too accommodating, far too centrist, far too willing to water down and walk back important parts of his agenda — the stimulus, health care, climate change, gays in the military, etc. He is, in many ways, more of a Rockefeller Republican than a McGovern Democrat.
But that's all a matter of perspective, I suppose.
Anyway, this weekend's Must Read comes from Adam Serwer at American Prospect.
To the extent that this new culture war resembles the old one, it is in the reversal of roles--it is the right that is now largely defined by an identity politics which perceives persecution, and possible extinction, for a culturally constructed usually white, conservative, "real American." This isn't just about Obama or his agenda, which borrows heavily from earlier conservative ideas, it's also a response to anxiety over economic insecurity and fear of ideological annihilation through demographic change. Hence the burgeoning Islamophobia and calls to repeal birthright citizenship.
I think a large part of what appealed to liberals about Obama was his ability to acknowledge discrete strands of American culture as equally legitimate. His fundamental task in the 2008 election, with the wind at his back, was to persuade the American people that he was one of them-- his failure to do so would be the only thing to bring defeat. Obama didn't start that argument, but for the first time in a long time, he helped the left win it--and the right has been in a state of rage ever since.
But if Obama's election was a referendum on what it means to be an American, then the right's response can be seen as a large scale attempt to challenge the legitimacy of the results. This can be seen as an element of almost every genre of right wing criticism, from the birther fringe to the far more common accusations of "European-style socialism." Sadly, Obama didn't end the culture war, his election just ushered in a new one. To the right, Obama's election wasn't a call for truce, it was a deliberate escalation.
I come back to this time and time again, because I think it is a very seminal piece of modern political science, but if you really want to understand the dynamics at play, read Authoritarianism & Polarization in American Politics by Marc Hetherington and Jonathan Weiler. All of these issues — be they abortion, gay rights, race relations, defense spending, immigration, the hullabaloo over the deficit, the emergent Tea Partiers, and so on — are fruit of the same tree: authoritarianism* and the preservation of the existing social order, or rather, the fear that the social order is changing and leaving them behind.
*To clarify: The word "authoritarianism" is not in this sense a pejorative, though it is commonly associated with totalitarianism and fascism. Indeed, without some reverence for authority and social order, society would likely be chaotic. Think of authoritarianism more as a scale rather than a yes/no proposition. Conservatives, at least modern conservatives and especially social/religious conservatives, tend to have significantly higher than their liberal counterparts. Interestingly, inner-city African Americans are basically off the charts when it comes to authoritarianism, which complicates social science research into this subject, because they tend to vote for liberal, Democratic candidates, thanks largely to the perception of conservative racism — at least, according to the available data.)
[...] MUST READ. The evolution of a Culture War :: The Clog :: Blog … [...]
"....because they [African Americans] tend to vote for liberal, Democratic candidates, thanks largely to the perception of conservative racism — at least, according to the available data." Or is it because Democrats promise everything under the sun for nothing? Keep stirring up class envy, bash and smear the producers of society, create an entitlement/deserving mentality and an entire segment of the population with a dependency on government benefits...and bash those who would reduce those benefits as uncaring and insensitive. The problem is when your society turns into a house of cards and you have a government meltdown like Greece --- which is required by the world bank as part of its bailout to adopt "austerity measures". I wonder if they are proud of their socialism now.
"Or is it because Democrats promise everything under the sun for nothing?" No. BTW, the austerity measures that teatards love so much are destroying Greece's economy. Welcome to economics 101, idiots.
[...] MUST READ. The evolution of the Culture War :: The Clog :: Blog Archive :: Staff Blog :: Philadelphi... [...]
[...] MUST READ. The evolution of the Culture War :: The Clog :: Blog Archive :: Staff Blog :: Philadelphi... [...]
[...] MUST READ. The expansion of a Culture War :: The Clog :: Blog Archive :: Staff Blog :: Philadelphia ... [...]
The austerity measures are forcing the Greek government to live within its means, and giving the free market more room to operate. The only pain that is being felt is by people that shouldn't have been benefitting from the lavish government spending in the first place. It's like taking easy subprime loans for low income people away from the US housing market, or stopping irresponsible defense spending of $1000 toilet seats and $500 hammers.
[...] MUST READ. The evolution of the Culture War :: The Clog :: Blog … [...]
[...] MUST READ. The evolution of the Culture War :: The Clog :: Blog … [...]
[...] MUST READ. The evolution of the Culture War :: The Clog :: Blog … [...]
[...] Jeffrey Billman пиÑеÑ: … gay rights, race relations, defense spending, immigration, the hullabaloo over the deficit, the emergent Tea Partiers, and so on âÃî are fruit of the same tree: authoritarianism* and the preservation of the existing social order, or rather, …. LGBTQ, Mind/Body, Museums/Exhibits, Music, Classical, Folk/World, Jazz/Blues, Rock/Pop, Open Mic, Karaoke, Performance, Performing Arts, Cabaret, Dance, Opera, Theater, Readings/Book Signings, Repertory Film, Shopping/Style … [...]
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| Courtesy of Eric Ascalon | |
| BEFORE (left) and AFTER (right) | |
Earlier this week, the Clog told you about how artist David Ascalon, in a recently filed lawsuit, says that a piece of public art he created — a Holocaust memorial in Harrisburg — was "drastically altered" to the point of "bastardization" and "mutilation," all without his permission:
Ascalon claims that Grindle switched out the serpent's Cor-ten material for stainless steel, which doesn't sound like that big of a deal, until you consider that stainless steel was supposed to represent the Jews' tenacity, not the er ⦠Nazis'.
âThe modification of the sculpture has changed it so that now the same shiny stainless steel that represents the enduring Jewish people is also used to depict the Nazi regime and atrocities of the Holocaust,â reads the lawsuit. âThis alteration is abhorrent.â
At the time, none of the three defendants had responded to our calls. But the Jewish Federation of Greater Harrisburg called yesterday to tell their side of the story.
Harvey Freedenberg, the Federation's attorney, says that in the mid-aughts (the memorial was finished in 1996) it "became apparent that the spiral section of the work was deteriorating. Mr. Ascalon was called in and I don't think he disagreed. ⦠Where disagreement arose was over who was going to be responsible for restoring the work. All I can say is that it did not reach a satisfactory conclusion. So the Federation decided to move ahead with what was necessary construction."
When asked why the Federation didn't restore the spiral section with Cor-ten steel — that purposefully rusty, ugly material meant to represent the âoppression, decay and miseryâ under the Nazi regime, as Ascalon intended — and used stainless steel instead, Freedenberg is elusive.
"I can't comment on that because I was not privy to those discussions," he says. "The Federation decided on a restoration it felt was appropriate."
We'll update as we learn more.
I worked on Public Art Policy for the NYC Art Commission re: Richard Serra and this is a shame. The artist is correct that the work should not have been changed and his name should not have been removed.
I'm all for artists' rights and intent, but Cor-ten isn't supposed to deteriorate. If it did within a decade, the artist is at fault and should have been at least partly responsible for the restoration if not fully responsible. Because the Federation had to pay for the restoration, I think they can replace it with what they want and desiring to avoid having to restore it again 10 years down the road, I can see why they chose a different material. Ascalon should understand that instead of whining about his "bastardized" work.
From what I've read about this on other pages, the artist did step up and take responsibility. And why did the Federation grid his name off of his artwork? That is just plain wrong. I think any artist would rightfully be fuming about that.
I have been in the art restoration business for over 20 years and I have never heard of a restorer signing work, much less removing an original artist's signature. What the JF did was pretty clueless, but what the restorer did was malpractice. If the JF had competent legal advice, they would be siding with the artist against the restorer for defacing their art and clearly diminishing it's value. On top of being clearly morally indefensible, can you imagine removing a signature from a Monet or a Rembrandt and what that would do to its worth? The restorer should be required to redo all his work in the right materials, remove his signature, and allow the artist to come back and sign it again.
Today's must read comes from The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press.
A substantial and growing number of Americans say that Barack Obama is a Muslim, while the proportion saying he is a Christian has declined. More than a year and a half into his presidency, a plurality of the public says they do not know what religion Obama follows. A new national survey by the Pew Research Center finds that nearly one-in-five Americans (18%) now say Obama is a Muslim, up from 11% in March 2009. Only about one-third of adults (34%) say Obama is a Christian, down sharply from 48% in 2009. Fully 43% say they do not know what Obama's religion is.
It's not exactly groundbreaking to suggest that the average American voter isn't, well, all that attuned to politics. Noted political scientists — Philip Converse, UPenn's Michael X. Delli Carpini, Scott Keeter (who now apparently works for Pew, Richard R. Lau, David P. Redlawsk, Scott L. Althaus, Edward G. Carmines and James Stimson, to name just a few — have tackled the issues of how much voters know, and to what degree their opinions are manipulated by "elites", a term that in this usage refers to politicians and drivers of public opinion, who tend to be considerably more plugged in.
(Here, I linked to some of the pieces when I found them online for free.)
Converse's seminal 1964 piece, "The Nature of Belief Systems in Mass Publics," paints a pretty bleak picture for informed democracy. Converse breaks the public down into five fields of interest, and posits that the more engaged one is, the more logically consistent one's beliefs are. The lower on his scale you go, the more manipulatable you are. Unfortunately, Converse argues, most people fall toward the bottom. Based on 1950s survey data, the top-two groups only made up about 10 percent of the population. Those with absolutely no idea about anything make up nearly a quarter of the population.Of course, his research is now 46 years old, and maybe the Information Age has changed that (I haven't been reading the polisci journals like I did in grad school, but nothing I've seen suggests a massive change).
The question then becomes, what difference does it make? Lau and Redlawsk say not a lot: no matter how much info they have, voters will vote their interest 70 percent of the time. Althaus, in a controversial piece, argues that the more informed a voter is, the more likely he or she is to be progressive on social issues.
With that as background, let's get back to the Pew poll: The toplines are getting the attention — many people, especially Republicans, think (erroneously, of course) that Barack Obama is a Muslim. Here's the more interesting part, to me:
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| Pew |
Clearly, belief that Obama is a Muslim correlates with a disapproval of his policies. There are two ways to read that: One, is Ben Smith's view:"I'd speculate, telling a pollster that Obama is a Muslim is just another way of expressing disapproval." People who don't like Obama say he's Muslim, but their opinion of him wouldn't change if they got the answer right. The other is that more informed and engaged voters are more likely to approve of Obama's policies. If I had to guess, and it would only be a guess, I'd think it a combination of both.
All the same, you won't go broke underestimating the sophistication of the American voter.
Obama has stated that he is a Christian...but all of his comments and actions leave people wondering if he secretly prays to Allah... http://www.actforamerica.org/
Remember, it wasn't not too long ago when there were news reports that Obama had beaten GW Bush in usage of the word "Jesus". Maybe he'll now need to say it more often than Joel Osteen on a regular basis? http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0609/23510.html
My name Habib Halal Al-Sharif. I support mosque by ground zero. Next we build mosque in all american state capitals and DC, next to statehouses and white house OK? America muslim country soon! Muslims support muslim president!
[...] MUST READ: You won’t go broke underestimating the sophistication of the American voter :: The ... [...]
I am Sharif Mustaffa Al-Halal. I want mosque too. I want America to be muslim country with sharia law..."In Allah We Trust" should be on American money, and "One Nation, Under Allah" should be in Pledge of Allegiance. Women should be covered up, not drive cars, and not be allowed to speak unless allowed to speak by husband.
I am muslim. I support mosque and sharia. Women should not drive car and only speak when allowed by husband!
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