StraussBlog

I’m writing this on a lunch break from campaigning for Barack Obama in Henderson, NV. My friends Robi, Jenni, and I flew out from San Francisco (*early*) Saturday morning, and have been knocking on doors pretty much non-stop since.

It’s finally Election Day, and we’re each coping with the anxiety/excitement in our own ways.
When we got up at 5am, I was pretty freaked out about all the things that could go wrong today. But, getting out there knocking on doors has been a great (and productive) distraction.  

Now as we sit here with MSNBC on 3 tvs at the bar, it’s impossible to avoid the significance of the historical moment soon at hand. Obviously, I have a tremendously vested interest in the outcome of the presidential election. And, I strongly urge everyone to act still today - if you haven’t voted, do it; if you’ve voted, phone bank or just call or text your friends and remind them to vote.

However, I feel we’ve already won a great victory for democracy in this country just by getting to this point:

• First of all, Obama’s candidacy and his campaign’s focus on the youth vote has succeeded in engaging a generation of voters who have spent their entire lives aliented by the political process. This is a momentous shift that’s impact will resonate for many election cycles to come. 
• Secondly, the nature of Obama’s (largely) issue-oriented and positive campaign (and for that matter, the early part of McCain’s campaign as well) has pulled us back from the antagonistic campaigning armageddon brought about by the disciples of Karl Rove. Though we still have a long way to go in raising campaign discourse back to the level such an important process deserves, I see this election as the first step in the electorate repudiating the political conventional wisdom that negative campaigning is an effective tactic. 
• And finally, I am relieved that a candidate like Obama, who talks *up* to his audience (as does his wife), has overcome both the anti-intellectual attacks of the W. era and defied the sound bite-centric campaigning that has been on the rise since Reagan (and greatly accelerated by Bill Clinton). Not dumbing down the message and talking to voters like adults is the first step to restoring constructive political discourse in this country. <update>Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times echoes this sentiment in a much deeper analysis of anti-intellectualism in America.</update>

I’m extremely happy all of this has already been achieved. And to be honest, I’m not sure I would have believed that even these things were possible just a few years ago. But I’m greedy, and as great as these achievements are, they’re not nearly enough!

Now, let’s get out there and use the rest of this day to do what we can to elect Barack Obama and defeat CA Prop 8!!!

I just returned from doing some volunteer work for No on Prop 8 at their SF office. Other than the presidential election, this is the most important issue for me this election day. For those who aren’t aware, Proposition 8 is a California statewide ballot initiative that would amend the state constitution to ban gay marriage.

While this wouldn’t affect me personally, I have many friends who it would. And, I have a serious problem with denying a certain group of citizens the same rights as everyone else. If you don’t have a position on this issue, you should. To stand silently by while someone else is deprived of their rights is to be complicit in that act.

Here is a poem that pretty well captures my motivations:

When the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.

When they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.

When they came for the trade unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.

When they came for the Jews,
I remained silent;
I was not a Jew.

When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.

- “First the came…” by Martin Niemöller

There is plenty of time left to help, and this is going to be a very contentious race. So, please do what you can to help stop the codification of discrimination. The campaign can use your money, your time, or just your voice.

DON’T REMAIN SILENT!

I received an email forward from my mom this morning with the Subject: Surprising Facts, which claimed the hard to believe conclusion that there were more deaths of military personnel under the Clinton administration than that of George W. Bush. The conclusion was backed up with convincing looking “facts” in the email, but it still violated common sense. So, I decided to go to the source and see for myself. Unfortunately, what I found wasn’t much of a surprise — the supposed “facts” were lies and the conclusion they supported was simply not true.

Instead of 14,107 deaths under Clinton and 7,932 deaths under George W. Bush as claimed in the email, the actual totals from the Department of Defense are 7,500 for Clinton and 10,946 for W. More on the actual numbers in a minute, but first I’d like to talk about one of the worst (and most potent) forms of disinformation — the email chain-letter.

Chain emails are totally unaccountable, and thus a favorite tool of slimy political operatives to spread disinformation (deliberately false or misleading information) they can’t be caught spreading. It is a horribly underhanded tactic, and a special place in Hell should be reserved for those who make use of it.

But, they continue to do it because it works. And it works because people are too lazy to check the facts. If you know how to use email, you know how to use Google (or Yahoo! Search). But, even smart people, like my mom and her friends, blindly forward this crap on — thereby personally endorsing the lies and becoming complicit in their creators’ attempts to deceive the American public. In this case, a quick web search for “military fatalities” returns two pages debunking this specific email as well as the real data from the Department of Defense, all above the fold. Sites like the non-partisan http://www.factcheck.org exist for just this purpose, and it really only takes a minute to check these things out before forwarding them on and spreading lies to your friends.

So next time before you hit that Forward button in your email, please do yourself, your friends, and this country a favor by taking two minutes to check the facts you’re about to put your name on.

I found this email particularly repugnant because it appeals to our appreciation for the ultimate sacrifice made by brave American servicemen and women and then dishonors their memories by distorting the truth about their lives lost. So, I wanted to dig deeper than someone else’s response to the email and do my own analysis.

All the official data I accumulated is direct from the Department of Defense, and here is the full spreadsheet I put together to come up with the below conclusions. (DataVis geeks, knock yourselves out!)

Ronald Reagan (1981-1988):
Total Military Deaths - 17,201
Deaths as % of Total Military - 0.09%
Deaths from Hostile Action or Terrorist Attack - 353 

George H. W. Bush (1989-1992):
Total Military Deaths - 6,223
Deaths as % of Total Military - 0.07%
Deaths from Hostile Action or Terrorist Attack - 172

Bill Clinton (1993-2000):
Total Military Deaths - 7,500
Deaths as % of Total Military - 0.06%
Deaths from Hostile Action or Terrorist Attack - 76 

George W. Bush (2001-2007):
Total Military Deaths - 10,946
Deaths as % of Total Military - 0.10%
Deaths from Hostile Action or Terrorist Attack - 3,513 

However, the absolute total numbers aren’t particularly illustrative of policy differences. Over the 28 year period for which there is data, only 9.30% of the military fatalities were classified as resulting from Hostile Action or Terrorist Attack. Since the vast majority of deaths in this period are classified as Accidents (53.22% ) followed by Illness (17.54%) and Self Inflicted (13.61%), the total number of deaths in a given year is more an indication of the total size of the military at that time than anything else. What is most likely the best metric for understanding the effect of policy differences is deaths as a percentage of the total military, which was an average of 0.08% over the entire period. By this metric, George W. Bush’s policies have been the most costly (0.10%), followed by Ronald Reagan (0.09%), then George H. W. Bush (0.07%), and finally Bill Clinton (0.06%).

But, I think the best measure is to look at the total human cost of each individual conflict, which the Department of Defense also provides. 

Iranian Hostage Rescue Mission (April 25, 1980):
President: Jimmy Carter
Total Casualties: 8*

Lebanon Peacekeeping (1982-1984):
President: Ronald Reagan
Total Casualties: 265*

Urgent Fury, Grenada (1983)*:
President: Ronald Reagan
Total Casualties: 19*

Just Cause, Panama (1989)*:
President: George H. W. Bush
Total Casualties: 23*

Persian Gulf War (1990-1991)*:
President: George H. W. Bush
Total Casualties: 383*
Total Wounded: 467**

Restore Hope, Somalia (1992-1994):
President: Bill Clinton
Total Casualties: 43*

Uphold Democracy, Haiti (1994-1996):
President: Bill Clinton
Total Casualties: 4*

Enduring Freedom, Afghanistan (2001-2008):
President: George W. Bush
Total Casualties: 606***
Total Seriously Wounded****: 8,601***

Iraqi Freedom, Iraq (2003-2008):
President: George W. Bush
Total Casualties: 4,169*****
Total Seriously Wounded****: 43,787*****

Afghanistan and Iraq have cost 4,775 lives and 52,388 serious injuries from 2001-2008, while all other major military engagements since 1980 (including the Persian Gulf War) had a combined total of 745 casualties. In comparison, the Vietnam Conflict resulted in 58,220 American military personnel dead and 153,303 seriously injured from 1964-1973 (** above). So, the Global War on Terror thus far has resulted 8.2% as many deaths and 33.7% as many serious injuries as Vietnam.

Regardless of how you feel about any or all of these military operations, it is important that we all recognize and value the very real costs paid by the men and women of our armed forces. So if you received or forwarded this erroneous email, I sincerely hope you will take the time to follow up with the correct information and make sure we properly honor the sacrifices of these brave soldiers.

Rock on Colin Powell!

I think the most important aspect of the General’s much talked about endorsement of Barack Obama on Meet the Press today was his head-on repudiation of the despicable whisper campaign to spread the misconception that Obama is a Muslim (ironically — or not — enough, similar to another presidential disinformation campaign in recent memory):

I’m also troubled by, not what Senator McCain says, but what members of the party say and it is permitted to be said. Such things as: “Well, you know that Mr. Obama is a Muslim.”

Well, the correct answer is he is not a Muslim, he’s a Christian. He has always been a Christian.

But, the really right answer is, what if he is? Is there something wrong with being Muslim in this country?

The answer is no, that’s not America.

Amen! If you haven’t watched the whole thing, you really should — it’ll make you want to write in Colin Powell in November. 

In the immortal words of Sarah Silverman: “Yes, Barack Hussein Obama, it’s a super-fucking-shitty name. But, you’d think that somebody named Manischewitz Guberman might understand that.” Otherwise put, we are a nation of immigrants, a conglomeration of people who represent ethnicities, cultures, and religions from all over the world. This country began as a safe-haven from religious persecution, and made history by being the first to enshrine measures against intolerance (i.e. separation of church and state) in its founding documents. The sad irony of the long and violent history of xenophobia in America is that it is generally the last people to be shit on who are first in line to shit on the new arrivals. It’s like the frat boys (full disclosure: I was in a fraternity ) who haze the pledges because they had themselves been hazed.

But in this case, this latent anti-Muslim sentiment being exploited isn’t just un-American, it is a threat to our national security. Not just our nation, but our entire way of life, is under siege by Islamic Fundamentalism. However, the operative word here is the second, fundamentalism, *not* the first. We are not being attacked by Muslims, we are being attacked by fundamentalists, who happen to be hiding behind the banner of Islam. They are painting the western world, led by the US, as modern day Crusaders intent on wiping Islamic culture from the earth. We, they argue, are the ones who have made this an all-or-nothing battle for the very survival of Islam — it is *our* intolerance and need for Judeo-Christian culture to dominate that dictates the inability for our two worlds to peacefully coexist. So, for Americans to let the heinous acts of extremists foment mainstream intolerance of Muslims in our country is truly to let the terrorists win.

I believe the true front-line in the “War on Terror” is not on the ground in Iraq or Tora Bora, it is ideological. There is no doubt that we must find and bring to justice the leaders of these terrorist organizations. That is absolutely necessary, but it is also far from sufficient. Because without winning the ideological battle, new leaders will spring up to replace them. The only way to truly win the war for the possibility of peaceful coexistence is to starve these organizations of their oxygen — to take away the support of the people. It is not Osama Bin Laden who is blowing himself up at US checkpoints in Iraq, and it is not true believers who are providing food and supplies to the Al Qaida leadership hiding in the mountains of Pakistan. The Fundamentalists have successfully convinced an ever growing portion of the Muslim world — the individual people, not the governments — that it is us or them, and the support of those people is the true source of their strength.

More than 20% of the world’s population is Muslim, including over 150M Muslims in each Pakistan and India, both with nuclear weapons, and 70M in Turkey, which is likely to become a member of the EU in the next 15 years. And in France, the Muslim population is estimated to be as high as 10% (the French census doesn’t ask religion). Our way of life cannot survive if we continue to let the Fundamentalists’ campaign of disinformation persist, or even worse, if we contribute to it. We must demonstrate to the people of the Muslim world, with our words and our deeds, that ours is a culture of tolerance and that there is another choice beyond having their culture destroyed or supporting terrorists. And, the responsibility to spread this message of coexistence does not just lie with our governments, it is ours as citizens as well.

Some links of note:

• More information on the Muslim US soldier, Kareem Khan, Powell mentions
• The photo of Kareem Khan’s mother that inspired Powell
• Full transcript of Powell on Meet the Press

<update>
Credit where credit’s due. As much as I like to malign cable news, props to CNN’s Campbell Brown for tackling this issue (with an almost identical title) before Colin Powell (and even before The Daily Show!). Thanks Sean for the find.
</update>

[Originally posted on my 360 Blog]

I found out on Friday night that my best friend from grade school had committed suicide. His funeral is in a couple of hours and I’m trying to write a eulogy right now. I’ve got a bit of experience dealing with death — too much for my tastes. When I was a junior in high-school, my paternal grandmother passed away followed by my father’s sister and his uncle all in the same year. And then the next year, one of my best friends had a skiing accident right in front of me that required 14 hours of brain surgery and put him in a coma for 3 days. Mercifully, he survived and is largely ok now. But, the confrontation with mortality was as jarring I have ever experienced. Subsequently, I’ve lost a fraternity brother to a car accident, a friend to a shooting, and more family, including three uncles with whom I was close and my maternal grandfather.

Everyone has their own ways of dealing with death. But, I think there are some consistent things we all feel when our own mortality pulls back the curtain and stares us in the face. Life is fragile and fleeting, and if we truly grasped that fact on a daily basis, we wouldn’t be able to function. And so most of the time, we live in a state of willing delusion — we refuse to confront ourselves with the reality of the human situation, that the life that is the center of our being can and will terminate. And that’s why death is always such a shock to us. It’s the finality of it all; the reality that sometimes there are no more tomorrows invading our necessary fantasy that the sun will still rise no matter what (or, more accurately, that we will be around to see it when it does).

I remember what I felt when my paternal grandmother died. I was 16 and it was the first time I really had to deal with death. There were two main sources of sadness, and I realized later that they were both rather selfish. It was the shock of the absolute finality that made me cry. I cried about the fact that *I* would never see my Grandma Lu again and that she wouldn’t be there to chide me and impart her pointed wisdom. I cried from the realization that there were no more fond memories to make and that the existing ones would inevitably dull and fade with time. And I cried from regret, and the fact that there was no longer any way for *me* to right those wrongs. I regretted every time I had been a brat to her (and there were a lot), and I most regretted not going to visit her (she lived in Chicago) the last time my parents went before she died. Of course they didn’t tell me quite how sick she was, but it was football season and if I missed a game I might lose my starting position. The fact that I chose high-school sports over my family was not as much a statement of selfishness as it was of obliviousness — it never entered into my mind that she wouldn’t be around when football season ended. The only unselfish reason I cried during that time was for my father. For knowing that he must be feeling those same things I was feeling only stronger. 

I never actually cried for my grandmother. She was a dignified woman, who lived a long and full life, and she wouldn’t have been happy living on in a state that required constant care. When my Grandpa Wolfi passed away several years later after a long hospitalization, I was actually happy for him. I cried a little for myself, but mostly for my mom and grandma. Of course, it is quite different when someone passes away as young in life as the friend whose grave I will be standing over later today. The prospect of a life cut short and opportunities not lived is a tragedy. But it is a tragedy with no possible remediation. That is the finality of death that we struggle not to grasp. There is nothing we can do to change things now, and so there is nothing gained in crying for what will not be.

If you want to truly mourn, don’t do it for yourself. Don’t cry over memories that won’t be made, put that energy into cherishing the memories that you already have and making them last as long as possible. Don’t cry over regrets you won’t be able to make right, put that energy into righting the wrongs against others with whom you still have that chance, and do it in the memory of your friend who reminded you that you might not be able to fix things tomorrow. And don’t cry for the life not lead and the opportunities not realized, put that energy into honoring your friend’s loss by living your own life to the fullest. But do miss your friend. Miss him every day, because that is the highest honor you can show someone who is gone. But do it with happiness and laughter and with friends, because that’s what he would want.