Two of my biggest political disapppointments of the new century

I thought Arnold would follow somewhat in the steps of Reagan.  I thought Crist was ideologically conservative.

OK, so I was wrong.

Sam Harris on morality (Updated)

I sometimes offer atheists and agnostics the advice that atheism's great shortcoming is its inability to offer a plausible grounding for moral realism. Apparently "new atheist" Sam Harris also perceived a glaring need in that area. Harris has written a book ("The Moral Landscape") intended to fill the void.

And here's a video of Harris giving a talk on the subject:



I'm afraid that Harris' approach to the issue is all too familiar.
He tries to make the point that science can address morality because science is about facts and morality, if it exists, is a fact. That's all well and good, but even if you assume that there is an existent morality how do you detect it using science? And that's where Harris falls flat on his face:

Now, to speak about the conditions of well being in this life, for human beings, we know there is a continuum of such facts. We know that it's possible to live in a failed state. Where everything that can go wrong does go wrong. Where mothers cannot feed their children. Where strangers cannot find the basis for peaceful collaboration. Where people are murdered indiscriminately.

How do we know? We just know! What could be more convenient?

And we know that it's possible to move along this continuum, toward something quite a bit more idyllic, to a place where a conference like this is even conceivable.  And we know, we know, that there are right and wrong answers to how to move in this space.  Would adding cholera to the water be a good idea.  Well probably not.

Apparently we don't know quite enough about the cholera question to answer definitively!

Seriously, a guy with a degree in philosophy from Stanford can't do any better than this?  It's not even difficult to illustrate the problem.

Suppose for the sake of argument that morality is an illusion.  We have ideas of morality but moral precepts are not real.  Now suppose in that scenario we know--we know--there is a continuum of moral facts.  If that subjective impression of knowledge is sufficient to make morals real then this scenario results in a contradiction.

In the end, Harris adopts a strategy akin to that used by Ayn Rand and George Smith:  assume that something basic ("well being") is an objective moral good and then propose that science can help figure out certain things that result in well being.  Then claim that science can answer moral questions while ignoring the fact that the finding of science is utterly reliant on the axiomatic moral precept ("well being is good").

Update:

Though not on precisely the same subject, a just-published story by Michael Gerson about the brothers Hitchens seems like a good companion to the above.

Cliff of despair

Unh.

Lefty Cliff Lee pitched the Texas Rangers past the Tampa Bay Rays last night, allowing just one run in a 5-1 victory.

The Rays performance in the playoffs encapsulated their season in some ways.  The team played well in spurts and the offense underperformed.  In the fifth game the Rays made defensive mistakes that were rare during the regular season.  And of course the big difference was the Rays experienced regular season success to the tune of the AL East title and the best record in the AL while playing in baseball's toughest division.

All in all it was a disappointing end to the season, but not the type of end that should surprise Rays fans who often had to watch the offense sputter.

Of course a substantial amount of credit for the Rays' troubles goes to the Texas Rangers, who played with alacrity and enthusiasm.  Plus they had ace-for-hire Cliff Lee, who deserves the MVP award for the series in light of his two wins in two games with only two runs allowed.

Best of luck to the Rangers.  May they disappoint the World Series hopes of the well-hated New York Yankees.

***

Next year:  The Rays will again play in baseball's toughest division.  The Baltimore Orioles and the Toronto Blue Jays are both on the upswing.  The Red Sox figure to have a better year with fewer injuries, and the Yankees have the dough to finish the season with a good team no matter what they start out with.  And they'll start out with a good team.  The Rays could experience a slight drop-off and fail to make the postseason.  That's probably what will happen as the team will say adios to Carl Crawford and a handful of other key players perhaps including pitchers James Shields and Matt Garza, 1B Carlos Pena, SS Jason Bartlett and closer Rafael Soriano. 

The team will continue to compete for a playoff spot if it fills almost every hole with a comparable replacement.  Only time will tell.  Desmond Jennings has a huge upside and may be able to replace Carl Crawford adequately.  Reid Brignac plays shortstop well but needs to learn to handle the high fastball.  Dan Johnson may be the solution at first base, though Pena's defensive skills will certainly be missed.

Hopefully J. P. Howell will make a successful return from injury.

Grading PolitiFact: Alan Grayson defines his opponent

Alan Grayson doesn't know when to quit.  Neither does PolitiFact.


The issue:

The fact checkers:

Louis Jacobson:  writer, researcher
Aaron Sharockman:  writer, researcher
John Bartosek:  editor

Analysis:

PolitiFact:

Here's a full transcript of the new ad:

Daniel Webster's Washington backers are attacking Alan Grayson on women's issues. The facts on Webster's record:

Fact: Webster sponsored a bill to create a form of marriage that would trap women in abusive relationships.

Fact: Webster is an advocate for a group that teaches that mothers should not work outside the home.

Fact: Webster would force victims of rape and incest to bear their attacker's child.

Those are the facts. Don't let Daniel Webster make the laws we will have to live with.

The story is obviously concerned with the third supposed "fact."

We checked with his campaign to confirm whether he is opposed to abortion even in cases of rape and incest, and a spokeswoman confirmed it.

Good move.  And from a pro-life standpoint an abortion is always a moral wrong.  Kathy Mears was apparently the "spokeswoman."  I'm not sure why she goes unnamed in the story.  The specific words of her statement on behalf of Webster may be important.  We do get specific words from Webster's campaign website: (under "Sanctity of Life"):

• As affirmed in the Declaration of Independence, the right to life is our first right.  Daniel Webster would support legislation that the Constitutional protections of life and liberty extend to the unborn.
• Dan would oppose any use of public revenues to promote or perform abortions or to support organizations that promote or perform abortions.

PolitiFact mentions the first part but not the second.  And the two bullet points seem mismatched to some degree.  Isn't the second one needless in light of the first?  The first is probably best understood as a legislative ideal with little chance of passage.  The latter represents a realistic goal.  But it doesn't sound quite as scary to claim that "Webster wants to prevent public revenues from being used to provide or support abortion services!"

PolitiFact:

So Grayson's ad is correct on Webster's philosophical beliefs about abortion. But does that mean that Webster "would force victims of rape and incest to bear their attacker's child"?

Grayson's ad provides an ambiguous take on Webster's philosophical beliefs about abortion.  One can oppose something philosophically without thinking it is the government's role to enforce that opposition.  Legislation recognizing rights of life and liberty for the unborn might fill that bill.  But then again it might not.  Credit goes to PolitiFact for asking the right question.

In trying to reach the answer to that question, the story goes over Webster's legislative career and notes a fairly consistent pragmatic streak, including Webster saying that Florida isn't ready for a broad abortion ban such as that proposed in Kansas.  Not ready in what way?

So where does this leave us? There is no question that Webster believes that abortion should be banned except to save the life of the mother, and that gives the Grayson campaign a lot of cover for its charge.

Is it true that there "is no question that Webster believes that abortion should be banned except to save the life of the mother"?  If there is no question on that point then PolitiFact should have settled it with evidence rather than with a statement lacking the benefit of clear evidential support.  Webster's legislative history did not offer that kind of support.

To review:

• Parental consent for minors seeking abortion (1988)
• Woman's Right To Know Act (1997)
• State ban on "partial birth" abortion (1997)
• Voted in favor of parental notification bill (1998)
• Guardians for unborn children (2004)
• Requirement that parents receive notification if minor child sought abortion (2005)
• Ultrasound requirement prior to abortion (2008)

That simply doesn't add up to "There is no question that Webster believes that abortion should be banned except to save the life of the mother."  Nowhere in the story does PolitiFact unequivocally support that claim with evidence.  Yet that supposed finding gives Grayson his cover.

Grayson's charge has a substantial grounding in the truth, so we rate it Mostly True.

Huh?

Mostly True – The statement is accurate but needs clarification or additional information.
Half True – The statement is accurate but leaves out important details or takes things out of context.
Barely True – The statement contains some element of truth but ignores critical facts that would give a different impression.

The PolitiFact analysis found that it could not be known how Webster would act on abortion legislation.

It's impossible to know precisely what abortion bills Webster would propose or support if he were to be elected to the U.S. House.

So how can it follow that Grayson's "statement is accurate"?  Grayson's ad claims to know how Webster would legislate.  That was another PolitiFact finding:

So Grayson's ad is correct on Webster's philosophical beliefs about abortion. But does that mean that Webster "would force victims of rape and incest to bear their attacker's child"?

We don't think that's so clear-cut, since Webster's legislative efforts on abortion, while extensive, have stopped well short of what Grayson's ad suggests.

Taking into consideration PolitiFact's description of its grading system, this story is logically incoherent.  Grayson's claim cannot be ruled accurate and impossible to judge at the same time and in the same sense.  That is a contradiction.


A literalism interlude

Now a brief digression into my initial interest in this PolitiFact story.

Look again at the claim Grayson makes of Webster:

Fact: Webster would force victims of rape and incest to bear their attacker's child.

If I'm playing dumb as PolitiFact occasionally does (think Rudy Giuliani and his claim that no terrorist attacks happened under Bush), I can take Grayson as saying that if a woman is attacked then her attacker has the right to have her bear his children.  So let's say Joe Smith rapes Jane Doe.  After doing his time, Smith decides he wants to have kids.  So, thanks to the Webster Act of 2013, Smith's victim must then receive his seed and bear his child(ren).

Of course that's not what Grayson meant.  But it is the literal meaning of what he said, just as surely as when Giuliani was taken to task over the 9-11 attacks occurring during the Bush administration.

Everyone deserves charitable interpretation.  PolitiFact acted properly in not taking Grayson in wooden-literal fashion.  I look forward to the extension of that courtesy to all subjects of PolitiFact stories.

The grades:

Louis Jacobson:  F
Aaron Sharockman:  F
John Bartosek:  F

Internal inconsistency is one of the worst possible features of a journalistic account.  The problem is worse when the inconsistency represents the main point of the story.

Extremism apparently now mainstream

Barack Obama rode popular sentiment to his election as president of the United States.  Obama ran on the unpopularity of Republicans and a message of bipartisan change that transformed shortly after election day to a message of partisan change.

Campaign messaging is different today, and Robyn "Blumñata" Blumner of the St. Petersburg Times is here to explain it to us.

Will someone please wake me from this bad dream that is the coming election? No matter how kooky, mean or incoherent Republican candidates get, voters seem willing to support them. Maybe former witchcraft dabbler and perennial deadbeat Christine O'Donnell won't be taking a U.S. Senate seat in Delaware, but there are plenty of other congressional races from Florida to Colorado to Utah in which radical tea party-backed Republicans have a good (or certain) chance of victory. Extremism is the new Republican must-have accessory for fall, and it's working for them.

Think about her thesis seriously for a moment.

Is it possible to forge a successful national political strategy based on an appeal to extremism?

Electoral politics is about forging coalitions.  It cannot succeed at the national level through the appeal to any brand of extremism which a majority strongly opposes.

Blumner's sentiment reminds me of Democratic gubernatorial candidate Alex Sink's impression that nearly half of all Floridians are extremists.  Both ladies need to get out of the office more often.

Extremism with majority appeal is an oxymoron minus very special circumstances (a majority of extremists are extremists, for example).

Blumner's column brought us more of the usual silliness, including a bizarre claim involving Jack Kemp:

Where is the next Jack Kemp, a self-described "bleeding-heart conservative"? He's a Democrat. The Republicans no longer want him.

The majority of conservatives are quite compassionate.  Survey data confirm again and again that conservatives tend to give more generously to charity, for example.  Conservatives just don't want the government in charge of charity.  We see that as a poisonous arrangement.

Divisional playoff returns to St. Petersburg

Yes, I granted the Texas Rangers the advantage over the Rays when I made predictions for the AL playoffs.

I just didn't know if the starting pitching would come through, nor if the Rays' bats would return to life from late-season slumber.

It took long enough.

Texas pitching gave Rays batters fits through almost three full games, coming within two innings of a sweep.  Since then the Rays look like the team that won 96 games with many of those games against the toughest division in baseball, the AL East.

So now it comes down to a Tuesday night showdown rematch between the Rangers and the Rays and between aces Cliff Lee and David Price.

Lee is a terrific veteran pitcher.  Price is a terrific young pitcher.

The advantage again belongs to Texas based on that matchup.  But the Rays have spent much of the season producing wins against great pitching.  Just ask Cliff Lee and C. C. Sabathia.

I don't know who will win, though I'll naturally root for the Rays.  But in any case the full five game series has done more to fulfill my hopes for the Rays than a three game sweep by Texas would have done.

Rays extend divisional playoff in Texas

It was looking bleak.

The Texas Rangers took two from the Rays in St. Petersburg and had a late 2-1 lead in their home ballpark.

The Rays staged an 8th inning rally and ended up winning 6-3.  The teams hook up for game four later today, pitting Wade Davis against Tommy Hunter.

I had expected Cliff Lee to start after early reports had Texas leaning toward a three man rotation for their starting pitchers.

I like the idea of starting Davis.  Analysts for MLB TV questioned using Davis if Price feels ready to pitch.  But if somebody has watched Davis pitch this year then it is apparent that he has a type of veteran composure that is very rare in rookie pitchers.  He's been solid late in the season and I expect him to keep the Rays in the game.

As for Hunter, I haven't watched him pitch much.  I just hope the Rays' offense can get to him.

Go Rays.

My special interests are good. Yours ... not so much.

No in-depth fisking of the latest Robyn Blumner column from last week.  I'll simply observe for potential future reference that when T. Boone Pickens spends money promoting his special interest in alternative energy Blumner seems to think it's fine and dandy.

Rangers @ Rays game 2 (Updated)

Before the game starts, I wanted to make sure that I went on record as continuing to see the Rays as capable of winning the series with Texas.

OK, I'm kind of cheating by taking positions on all sides of this thing.  I gave Texas the advantage in the series by noting Tampa Bay's year long offensive underperformance. 

I dissed James Shields by supposing that both he and Matt Garza might be left off the starting rotation in the playoffs.

Garza gets the nod because you can't leave a guy off the staff who three a no-hitter earlier in the season.  And Garza's got great stuff.  It's just a matter of locating his pitches.

Shields I figured might be out because he gives up so many home runs.  Texas is a power hitting team (witness the three dingers yesterday).  The Yankees are a power hitting team.

But I'm just little old me.  I completely allow that Joe Maddon might have a statistical insight that makes it a good idea to send Shields to the hill against Texas.  And if Shields gives up fewer than two home runs while pitching five or more innings then I won't engage in any "I-told-you-so's."  He'd have done better than Price in that case.

***

Foul tip?

It looked like the umpire deprived the Rays of a run yesterday, as Carlos Pena was apparently nicked on the hand by an inside pitch with the bases loaded.  Would the Rays have won if they had scored an early run off Cliff Lee?  Nobody knows.  But the Rangers played a good game and collected three home runs so I won't grouse about the outcome.  I'll just stick with grousing about having the outcome influenced by faulty umpiring.


Update:

I'm barely done posting and Shields completes the first inning without surrendering a hit.  Here's to more of the same.  Go Rays!

The corrections game (Updated)

In the most recent entry from my long-running "Grading PolitiFact" series I noted an unambiguous error by PolitiFact Rhode Island (The Providence Journal) in a story about the comparison between Social Security and Ponzi financing.

PolitiFact failed in that instance to dig into the definition of "Ponzi" relevant to economic theory.  In economic theory it is not important whether or not deceit is used to perpetuate the financing scheme.  PolitiFact, with help of an economics professor used as an expert source, assumed that deceit or fraud was necessary to the understanding of a "Ponzi scheme."  The logic is apparent in this blurb from the PolitiFact website:

Note the text to the lower right:  "Not without intent to deceive."

PolitiFact's use of an equivocal definition was only partly excused through reliance on expert sources.  A better set of sources might have been used, and independent verification of the information would not have been difficult to accomplish.

PolitiFact Rhode Island made an error in its reporting.  So what now?  If the publishers of the error don't know about it then they have no moral responsibility to correct it.

Funny I should mention that (click image to enlarge).

It is reasonable to suppose based on the above visit record (along with a subsequent handful of other R.I. visits with "No referring link") that Journal staffers are aware of the criticism of the story.

Will it make a difference?  I'm still waiting for the St. Petersburg Times to correct two matching mistakes it made in reporting Charlie Crist's share of Florida's public campaign financing pie.

There's a threshold below which news organizations don't really care enough about the truth to make corrections.  I'm not sure what explains it.  Economics?  Ideology?  Some combination of the two?

Is is correction time for the Journal?  Or wait it out and hope nobody of note notices?


Update: