Black Candidates and the Presidency

It's a question I've been asking my students all year: Can a black candidate win the White House in 2008?

The phenomenal rise of Barack Obama in presidential politics is the obvious catalyst for such thinking. I've been paying close attention to Obama since his mercurial speech to the 2004 Democratic National Convention. I'm attracted to his calls for greater individual responsibility in the black community, and I find his own personal charisma to be astonishing.

Can Obama win the presidency next year? He's moving closer to that goal than any African-American in history. Today's Washington Post examines what the authors call "The Steepest Climb," the long struggle for black candidates seeking the presidency:

Whether enough voters can envision Barack Obama in the Oval Office will be revealed shortly. But some black politicians believe the time is right, as the country has witnessed the gradual rise of African Americans in leadership roles -- from coaching major sports franchises to presiding over corporate boardrooms. Breakthroughs in the popular culture, where many Americans form their impressions of each other, have been among the hardest to achieve.

Norman Jewison, who directed the 1967 hit movie "In the Heat of the Night," recalled that some newspapers refused to take ads for the film, which featured Sidney Poitier as a sharp-minded detective from Philadelphia investigating a murder in a Southern town. The movie went on to earn five Oscars, including one for Best Picture. "I think [the film] woke up a lot of people in the Deep South," Jewison says. "I don't think they'd ever seen a black character on the screen as smart and talented as Sidney."

More than three decades later, actor Dennis Haysbert was cast as David Palmer, a U.S. senator who is elected the nation's first black president in the television drama "24." When Haysbert encounters strangers who recognize him, it is often this role that they want to discuss. "I've lost track of how many times people have asked me to run for president," Haysbert says, adding that he believes the role had "a major impact" on how black politicians are perceived, "simply from the feedback I get from people from all walks of life."

And yet there are statistics that are not so heartening. Less than 4 percent of the nation's elected officials are black, and 90 percent of them represent predominantly black or predominantly black-and-Hispanic constituencies. Thus, not many black politicians have won elections when the majority of voters were white. Only three black U.S. senators and two black governors have been elected since Reconstruction.

As a consequence, only a handful of blacks have even dared to run for president, and virtually all them are civic activists such as comedian Dick Gregory, whose 1968 write-in campaign garnered just over 47,000 votes, perennial third-party candidate Lenora Fulani, and the Rev. Al Sharpton, whose 2004 Democratic campaign fizzled. The Rev. Jesse Jackson? We'll get to him in a minute.

"We've always been conflicted about this issue of running, because the heavy hanging cloud has been that a black can't win," says University of Maryland political scientist Ron Walters, who was Jackson's top issues adviser during his 1984 campaign.

Read the whole thing.

What's interesting about Obama's campaign is that we've yet to see the kind of subterranean racial politics that surrounds black candidates at some point in every election year, especially when victory seems close at hand. In 2006 we saw that kind of controversy surrounding Harold Ford, who ran for the Senate from Tennessee:

The Tennessee Senate race, one of the most competitive and potentially decisive battles of the midterm election, became even more unpredictable this week after a furor over a Republican television commercial that stood out even in a year of negative advertising.

The commercial, financed by the Republican National Committee, was aimed at Representative Harold E. Ford Jr., the black Democrat from Memphis whose campaign for the Senate this year has kept the Republicans on the defensive in a state where they never expected to have trouble holding the seat.

The spot, which was first broadcast last week and was disappearing from the air on Wednesday, featured a series of people in mock man-on-the street interviews talking sarcastically about Mr. Ford and his stands on issues including the estate tax and national security.

The controversy erupted over one of the people featured: an attractive white woman, bare-shouldered, who declares that she met Mr. Ford at a “Playboy party,” and closes the commercial by looking into the camera and saying, with a wink, “Harold, call me.”

A spokeswoman for Mr. Ford, who is single, said he was one of 3,000 people who attended a Playboy party at the Super Bowl last year in Jacksonville, Fla.

Critics asserted that the advertisement was a clear effort to play to racial stereotypes and fears, essentially, playing the race card in an election where Mr. Ford is trying to break a century of history and become the first black senator from the South since Reconstruction.

Will we see a new round of racial politics in 2008? So far the Democratic primary race has avoided such politics, but often GOP-aligned groups mount racially-tinged advertisements in the general election (remember Willie Horton?)

Have voters tired of such racial politics? Keith Reeves, a political scientist at Swarthmore College, has written on black candidates in Voting Hopes Or Fears?: White Voters, Black Candidates & Racial Politics.

Reeves wrote a brief essay folllowing the 2006 election, which recaps his thesis and looks to the future of black electoral politics:

Ten years ago, I published Voting Hopes or Fears? a path-breaking, albeit controversial, book that examines the thorny subject of how black candidates competing in majority-white settings fare, especially against the backdrop of the kind of racially charged campaigns we've seen this election cycle. In it, I argued that decades after passage of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, whites, by and large, remain resistant to the election of blacks to public office. That widespread resistance can be explained, in large part, by election campaign appeals to whites' racial fears and sentiments. Based on fresh empirical evidence examining white voters' attitudes towards black candidates and the racial framing of campaign news coverage, I documented that racial discrimination against black candidates is contemporary, specific, and identifiable....

A significantly changed electoral landscape in 2006 produced something of a political avalanche of opposition - against just about all things Republican (including three high-profile black candidates who ran under the GOP-banner: football-great Lynn Swann of Pennsylvania and Kenneth Blackwell of Ohio, running for governor in their respective states; and Michael Steele who ran a well-orchestrated campaign for a Senate seat in Maryland).

"Have we witnessed the long-awaited death of the Willie Hortonesque political commercial?"

Perhaps, "yes."

For one, changing demographics in both states - and in the country, at large - have a lot to do with voters' disgust of "Swift-Boating" of the racial kind. Meanwhile, moderate, Independent voters appear especially turned off by the racial undercurrents in political advertising.

And then there is the political pressure being brought to bear in the financial marketplace. Reportedly, black leaders and union groups pressured Wal-Mart to cut ties with one of its consultants whose brainchild was the incendiary anti-Ford ad.

But I strongly suspect that there is one other latent factor at work: the looming presence of Illinois senator Barack Obama, a potential candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008.

In Harold Ford, Jr. and Deval Patrick, white voters saw a bit of Senator Obama in each man: Ivy-League, moderate, articulate, non-threatening, charismatic black men who excite cross-racial appeal while moving past the racial divisions of the civil rights generation.

If there is a broader lesson to be gleaned from Patrick's overwhelming victory and Ford's narrow defeat, it is that, finally, white voters no longer have the appetite for the nasty racial politics historically served up by political campaign operatives.

And to that I say: "Run, Barack! Run!"

I respect Reeves' research, and I hope he's correct that voters will reject subterranean racial politics in 2008.

Barack Obama's rise is extremely promising. Indeed, the Obama campaign's one of the most important developments in American politics since Jesse Jackson's presidential campaign of 1988. Of course, Obama's going to have to get back to the language of personal responsibility if he hopes to have more cross-racial, cross-party appeal. But if anyone can do it, he's the one.

The Real Media Story on Iraq

I've put up a fair number of entries covering public opinion on the Iraq war, but this entry from Wordsmith over at Sparks from the Anvil is excellent:

Curt writes:

brutally Honest wonders why this isn't front page news. I think we all know the answer to that one...

Yes, and the latest Pew Research Center findings, based upon a study of more than 1,100 news articles from January through October of 2007, confirms what we've pointed out on a regular basis:

Through the first 10 months of the year, the picture of Iraq that Americans received from the news media was, in considerable measure, a grim one. Roughly half of the reporting has consisted of accounts of daily violence. And stories that explicitly assessed the direction of the war have tended toward pessimism, according to a new study of press coverage of events on the ground in Iraq from January through October of 2007.

In what Defense Department statistics show to be the deadliest year so far for U.S. forces in Iraq, journalists have responded to the challenge of covering the continuing violence by keeping many of the accounts of these attacks brief and limiting the interpretation they contain.

As the year went on, the narrative from Iraq brightened in some ways. The drumbeat of reports about daily attacks declined in late summer and fall, and with that came a decline in the amount of coverage from Iraq overall.

This shift in coverage beginning in June, in turn, coincided with a rising sense among the American public that military efforts in Iraq were going "very" or "fairly well."

Amy Proctor cites a Pew research poll that charts how Americans have had a sense of improvement on Iraq. Although this seems to contradict a recent Gallup poll that states "Americans are generally negative on the status of the war right now", and that 6 in 10 Americans still want a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq, the survey also reveals that 71% of Americans believe Iraq will be better off as a result of the U.S.-led invasion and overthrow of Saddam's regime.

35% of Americans say the troops should stay until the job is done or until the United States wins, while 29% say the troops should be removed immediately. Eleven percent say the troops should be withdrawn as soon as possible, and 5% endorse a gradual withdrawal. About one in six Americans advise a specific time period -- 11% within the next year, 4% between one and two years, and 1% three years or longer.

Republicans and Democrats differ significantly in what they would advise the president and Congress to do about U.S. troops in Iraq: the vast majority of Republicans say the troops should stay until the job is done or until the United States wins, while Democrats most frequently say the troops should be removed immediately.

Amy Proctor also makes the following observation:

Essentially, as public opinion of the war shifted from a negative opinion to a more positive one by September 2007, the overall media coverage declined along with terrorist attacks.

You would expect the opposite to happen. That is, with a safer environment, more embedded reporters would be able to travel with the troops and more reporting made available to the public, whereas a volatile environment would accomodate fewer embedded journalists resulting in fewer stories. In reality, the opposite occurred.

Recall, from Michael Totten's Anbar Awakening Part II:

Violence has declined so sharply in Ramadi that few journalists bother to visit these days. It’s “boring,” most say, and it’s hard to get a story out there – especially for daily news reporters who need fresh scoops every day. Unlike most journalists, I am not a slave to the daily news grind and took the time to embed with the Army and Marines in late summer.

There is no good excuse for the way in which the media has reported, misreported, and misrepresented the story on Iraq. They, as much as the news itself, have shaped the war (and public opinion and perceptions of it) and become active participants in the course of events.

As I noted, I've put up a couple of pretty good entries of this variety (see here, here, and here), but Wordsmith's post here is a real beauty!

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UPDATE: Don't miss this end-of-the-year posting extravaganza: Juan Cole's "Top Ten Myths about Iraq 2007," which is lauded by Andrew Sullivan, who in turn is eviscerated by Karl over at Protein Wisdom.

Mike Huckabee and American Foreign Policy

I noted in an earlier post the increased media attention to foreign policy among the GOP presidential hopefuls. At lot of the focus is on Mike Huckabee, especially his essay in the January/February edition of Foreign Affairs.

Huckabee applies his famous "homespun" spin to international relations, although this approach might not work so well in the analysis of world politics. Here's the introduction:

The United States, as the world's only superpower, is less vulnerable to military defeat. But it is more vulnerable to the animosity of other countries. Much like a top high school student, if it is modest about its abilities and achievements, if it is generous in helping others, it is loved. But if it attempts to dominate others, it is despised.

American foreign policy needs to change its tone and attitude, open up, and reach out. The Bush administration's arrogant bunker mentality has been counterproductive at home and abroad. My administration will recognize that the United States' main fight today does not pit us against the world but pits the world against the terrorists. At the same time, my administration will never surrender any of our sovereignty, which is why I was the first presidential candidate to oppose ratification of the Law of the Sea Treaty, which would endanger both our national security and our economic interests.

A more successful U.S. foreign policy needs to better explain Islamic jihadism to the American people. Given how Americans have thrived on diversity -- religious, ethnic, racial -- it takes an enormous leap of imagination to understand what Islamic terrorists are about, that they really do want to kill every last one of us and destroy civilization as we know it. If they are willing to kill their own children by letting them detonate suicide bombs, then they will also be willing to kill our children for their misguided cause. The Bush administration has never adequately explained the theology and ideology behind Islamic terrorism or convinced us of its ruthless fanaticism. The first rule of war is "know your enemy," and most Americans do not know theirs. To grasp the magnitude of the threat, we first have to understand what makes Islamic terrorists tick. Very few Americans are familiar with the writings of Sayyid Qutb, the Egyptian radical executed in 1966, or the Muslim Brotherhood, whose call to active jihad influenced Osama bin Laden and the rise of al Qaeda. Qutb raged against the decadence and sin he saw around him and sought to restore the "pure" Islam of the seventh century through a theocratic caliphate without national borders. He saw nothing decadent or sinful in murdering in order to achieve that end. America's culture of life stands in stark contrast to the jihadists' culture of death.

The United States' biggest challenge in the Arab and Muslim worlds is the lack of a viable moderate alternative to radicalism. On the one hand, there are radical Islamists willing to fight dictators with terrorist tactics that moderates are too humane to use. On the other, there are repressive regimes that stay in power by force and through the suppression of basic human rights -- many of which we support by buying oil, such as the Saudi government, or with foreign aid, such as the Egyptian government, our second-largest recipient of aid.

Although we cannot export democracy as if it were Coca-Cola or KFC, we can nurture moderate forces in places where al Qaeda is seeking to replace modern evil with medieval evil. Such moderation may not look or function like our system -- it may be a benevolent oligarchy or more tribal than individualistic -- but both for us and for the peoples of those countries, it will be better than the dictatorships they have now or the theocracy they would have under radical Islamists. The potential for such moderation to emerge is visible in the way that Sunni tribal leaders in Iraq have turned against al Qaeda to work with us; they could not stand the thought of living under such fundamentalism and brutality. The people of Afghanistan turned against the Taliban for the same reason. To know these extremists is not to love them.

As president, my goal in the Arab and Muslim worlds will be to calibrate a course between maintaining stability and promoting democracy. It is self-defeating to attempt too much too soon: doing so could mean holding elections that the extremists would win. But it is also self-defeating to do nothing. We must first destroy existing terrorist groups and then attack the underlying conditions that breed them: the lack of basic sanitation, health care, education, jobs, a free press, fair courts -- which all translates into a lack of opportunity and hope. The United States' strategic interests as the world's most powerful country coincide with its moral obligations as the richest. If we do not do the right thing to improve life in the Muslim world, the terrorists will step in and do the wrong thing.

This is the first time I've heard the United States - the world's hegemonic power - compared to a "top high school student." Yet, while Huckabee's off-beat (even over-the-top) and strident his criticism of the administration, I thought his piece hit the right tone overall.

That said, let me share some other views on Huckabee's foreign policy. Here's Daniel Drezner on Huckabee and the "bunker mentality" declaration:

Really, you just have to stand back and marvel at the contradiction of sentiments contained in that paragraph. It's endemic to the entire essay -- for someone who claims he wants to get rid of the bunker mentality, Huckabee offers no concrete ideas for how to do that, and a lot of policies (rejecting the Law of the Sea Treaty, using force in Pakistan, boosting defense spending by 50%) that will ensure anti-Americanism for years to come.

Drezner also hammers Huckabee on his call for a diplomatic opening to Iran.

But see also James Joyner's critique over at Outside the Beltway, "Huckabee’s Sunday School Foreign Policy." Here's Joyner's response to the "top high school student" line, and how the U.S. needs more humility and generousity:

Apparently, Huckabee hasn’t read Machiavelli. While these platitudes sound nice and are befitting a Baptist preacher, they’re almost certainly wrong. Not so much that we ought to be modest and generous, which are worthwhile attributes for their own sake, but that the world’s only superpower is ever going to be loved. The world just doesn’t work that way.

Joyner's perhaps too eager to belittle Huckabee's statements, for example, in his attack on Huckabee's criticism of the Bush adminsration's inadequacy in explaining the terror threat:

Gee whiz, they’ve been doing this for more than six years now. Does Huckabee really think that Americans need to be convinced that the terrorists want to kill us?

That's a simple characterization of Huckabee's statements. I see Huckabee calling for better public relations overall - that is, not just hyping the terror threat, but a more clear and consistent effort at public relations in marketing our mission (see Melvin Laird on this point in relation to Iraq).

Joyner's also critical of Huckabee's call to increase the Pentagon budget, for example, where Huckabee notes defense spending - at 3.9 percent of GDP - is too low:

We already spend more than all the nations on the planet, combined, on national defense and we need to up it by a third? Or, actually, much more sense current military functions will be pawned off to other agencies?

I think Huckabee's right about this. If the U.S. hopes to continue with a robust defense of our interests overseas, we need to consider more public sacrifice, not less.

I would agree though - as both Drezner and Joyner stress - that Huckabee comes off soft at times, with his proposals sounding more like Democratic Party talking points than a vigorous GOP foreign policy. Still, Huckabee probably deserves more respect than ridicule (Joyner takes some cheap shots on otherwise reasonable points - for example, on how Huckabee would defer to commanders on the ground in Iraq).

Huckabee's foreign policy is far from my first pick - especially with regard to Iran - but his commitment to continuing the mission in Iraq is in line the preferences of the Republican voting majority.

See also my earlier posts on Foreign Affairs' "Campaign 2008" series, in order of publication: Barack Obama, Mitt Romney, John Edwards, Rudy Giuliani, Hillary Clinton, and John McCain.

Will Last Minute Shoppers Help the Economy?

Will last minute holiday spending help the economy avoid a recession next year? This New York Times story is pessimistic:

American consumers, uneasy about the economy and unimpressed by the merchandise in stores, delivered the bleak holiday shopping season retailers had expected, if not feared, according to one early but influential projection.

Spending from Thanksgiving to Christmas rose just 3.6 percent over last year, the weakest performance in at least four years, according to MasterCard Advisors, a division of the credit card company. By comparison, sales grew 6.6 percent in 2006 and 8.7 percent in 2005.

“There was not a recipe for a pickup in sales growth,” said Michael McNamara, vice president for research and analysis at MasterCard Advisors, citing higher gas prices, a slowing housing market and a tight credit market.

Strong demand at the start of the season for a handful of must-have electronics, like digital frames and portable G.P.S. navigation systems, trailed off in December. And robust sales of luxury products could not make up for sluggish sales of jewelry and women’s clothing.

What did eventually sell was generally marked down — once, if not twice — which could hurt retailers’ profits in the final three months of year. “Stores are buying those sales at a cost,” said Sherif Mityas, a partner at the consulting firm A. T. Kearney, who specializes in retailing.

Here's more of an upbeat take, from the Los Angeles Times:

A last minute surge of holiday shoppers helped blunt what was looking like a dismal Christmas for retailers.

Sales from the Friday, Saturday and Sunday before Christmas were up 18.7% over the same period last year, according to a report from ShopperTrak RCT Corp., which monitors more than 45,000 retail stores. Sales for the week ended Saturday were up 33% over the previous week.

"Last-minute shoppers swamped stores over the weekend, allowing retailers to breathe a sigh of relief," said Bill Martin, co-founder of ShopperTrak. Martin said the busy shopping weekend helped put sales on track with his firm's forecast of a 3.6% sales gain for the holiday season over the previous year.

Those last-minute shoppers included John Shin, a 29-year-old graphic designer who was rushing around the Grove shopping mall in the Fairfax district. With Christmas Eve fast approaching, Shin needed a present for his girlfriend.

He waited until the last minute because "they didn't have sales on the things I wanted to buy," he said.

Representatives from popular retail hubs such as the Beverly Center and Westfield Century City and mall owner Santa Monica-based Macerich Co. said they had seen an increase in traffic over the weekend as shoppers who had procrastinated finally hit the stores.

That's been the case for retailers across the country, especially those selling electronics.

"It has been very busy with lots of last-minute shoppers," said Kirsten Whipple, a spokeswoman for Sears Holding Corp. "We've had very good traffic, especially today."

Some Macerich centers reported more traffic than they did on Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving that is traditionally one of the busiest days of the year, said Phil Vise, vice president of consumer marketing for Macerich Southern California.

"It certainly has been a season of procrastination," he said. "It's really come down to the last few days."

Still, some believe all those shoppers hitting the malls this last weekend might not be enough to boost sales by any significant amount.

The International Council of Shopping Centers predicts only a 2.5% gain in holiday season sales at stores open at least a year, and Brit Beemer, chairman of America's Research Group, forecast last week that same-store sales would rise only 1.8% over the previous year. That's his lowest forecast in a decade.

Target Corp. said Monday that same-store sales for December might fall as much as 1% from a year ago. The Minneapolis-based company had previously predicted sales would rise 3% to 5%.

Actually, the figures for Target are being viewed as a larger bellwhether of the 2007 shopping season:

It was supposed to be a Target Christmas.

Buffeted by high energy costs and a slowing housing market, consumers were expected to trade down from midpriced department stores, like Macy’s and Nordstrom, to discount retailers with designer cachet — Target’s undisputed terrain.

But instead of dominating this holiday season, Target is muddling through it, perplexing rival merchants and Wall Street analysts, who consider the chain a bellwether and are scrutinizing its performance for clues on the health of the economy.

In two of the last three months — September and November — Target’s sales growth has slipped below 1.5 percent, well under its historical average and lower than its biggest rival, Wal-Mart Stores.

The chief executive of Target, Robert J. Ulrich, has warned that the company may not meet its earnings forecast for the final three months of the year, on the heels of a third-quarter performance that he described as “disappointing.”

Behind the slowdown, analysts suspect, is a pullback on routine purchases of housewares and clothing, Target’s traditional strengths — and, in general, the most profitable merchandise in its stores.

In flusher times, Americans snapped up Target’s $40 taffeta dresses designed by Isaac Mizrahi and $9.99 plush towels from Thomas O’Brien. But with shoppers anxious about the economy, they appear to be skipping the splurges.

Linda Shannon, 56, a retired nurse in North Bergen, N.J., adores Target’s sheets and towels, but she walked right by them last week at her local store. “In this economy, what we have at home is good enough,” she said.

Target is by no means losing money; it remains one of the most profitable chains in the country. But in retailing, analysts and investors are hungry not just for profits, but for growth. They tend to gauge success by monthly sales increases at stores open at least a year. And by that yardstick, Target is lagging.

For the first time in years, in fact, the chain that devotees refer to as Tar-zhay, because of its fashion flare, looks vulnerable. In November, sales at Target stores open a year rose 1.1 percent, when adjusted for a quirk in this year’s calendar. The company will provide a glimpse into sales so far this December in a conference call Monday.

Lazard Capital Markets predicts that Target’s average monthly sales growth for 2007 will be the lowest in four years. And that is raising broader questions about the American consumer: If the store that America’s middle class loves to love is experiencing turbulence, analysts say, it bodes poorly for all retailers.

There is some dispute about exactly what ails Target. Many analysts said consumers are cutting back on optional products, like a new bath mat, and spending their money on essentials, like cleaning supplies, which are less profitable for stores.

Adrianne Shapira, a retail analyst at Goldman Sachs, said that “in the past, what Target has done so well is capitalize on discretionary spending. Shoppers walked around the store and tossed a few things they did not need into the basket.” Now, she said, “that is falling by the wayside.”

Rosa Setkiewicz, 50, stopped at the Target in Jersey City, N.J., recently to stock up on Arm & Hammer baking soda, Clorox bleach and Downy laundry detergent — “things that are cheap,” she said as she loaded the trunk of her Toyota Corolla. “I have cut back a lot on clothing and things that are not necessary.”

Bill Dreher, an analyst at Deutsche Bank Securities, dubbed this phenomenon “trading down within the store.”

Target executives acknowledge there is some truth to the theory. But the bigger issue, in their view, is that the number of customers walking into Target’s stores has dropped. They see that as a sign not of any tactical failure on Target’s part, but of rising doubts among consumers about the economy.

Such rising doubts can have significant political implications. According to the notion of "pocketbook voting," economic conditions are the single best predictor of a president's job approval, and while President Bush is not on the ballot in 2008, his administration's economic legacy might be a significant factor determining the election-year results .

As Michael S. Lewis-Beck and Mary Stegmaier note in the abstract to their article, "Economic Determinants of Electoral Outcomes" :

Economic conditions shape election outcomes in the world's democracies. Good times keep parties in office, bad times cast them out. This proposition is robust, as the voluminous body of research reviewed here demonstrates. The strong findings at the macro level are founded on the economic voter, who holds the government responsible for economic performance, rewarding or punishing it at the ballot box. Although voters do not look exclusively at economic issues, they generally weigh those more heavily than any others, regardless of the democracy they vote in.

I'll be keeping my eye on economic developments in upcoming months.

The Democrats already have the edge in public opinion polls heading into 2008; and as I've noted before, economic concerns are becoming more important to voters.

Don't Forget the Love at Christmas

I sent out Christmas wishes to dozens of bloggers yesterday, and visitors may have noticed the nice response in the comment thread to my entry for Christmas 2007.

Let me follow up now with some additional words on Christmas, and especially on the deeper meaning of the holiday, from this editorial at the Charlotte Observer:

Christmas season moves at a frenetic pace, and most of us move with it, dashing from chore to chore, place to place, event to event. The obsession to do it all is driven in part by the urge to make the most out of a joyful time that only comes once a year. Every moment must be the best, every gift letter-perfect and every get-together a lasting memory.

That's why many of us will go about our Christmas Eve today at a pace more suitable for winning the pole at a NASCAR race than savoring satisfying moments. Boxes must be wrapped, last-minute do-dads secured, gift sacks stuffed ... along with a thousand other trivial things we won't remember after the season is gone. By the time Rudolph and Santa take flight and the voices of church choirs warm the night, many of us will blink and say "What happened? Did we miss it?"

Yet it doesn't have to be that way. Perhaps we're old-fashioned, but it's up to each of us to decide what's most important, and pursue it, throughout what's left of this season.

How? Lasting memories require a willingness to set aside some time for people and things that are special, and won't go away when the glow of Christmas fades.

Forget about gift-wrapping. It'll keep. Instead, spend a couple of hours destroying the kitchen baking cookies with the kids.

Ditch the cleaning. That'll keep, too. Sit down, put on your favorite carols, turn on the gas logs and sing. The dog may howl, but you'll be more the merrier for it.

Finally, nix the search for last-minute trinkets. Make a pot of hot chocolate, call a friend and walk the neighborhood at dusk, watching the Christmas lights blink on.

There, feel better? We thought so.

Now you're ready for the next level.

Beneath the commercial prodding, the deep-seated urge to seek the perfect Christmas, there's really a very simple holiday.

It doesn't matter what you believe, Christmas is about the gift of love. A God who loved the world enough to send his only son. A man -- that son -- who loved perfect strangers so much he gave his life to pay for their sinful deeds.

Christians or otherwise, many of us can relate. There's likely somebody and some ideal that precious to most of us this season. If we're lucky, we can give the person a squeeze, and vow to uphold the ideal throughout the coming year.

The point is this: There's only so much time in normal lives at Christmas to pursue the perfect remembrance, mingle at parties and shop. But that's not what the season really is about. If we do too much, we'll miss the gift of love. All we'll have is an ache to do something different.

Think about that today before things get too busy.

I hope everyone had a peaceful and loving Christmas holiday.

Christmas 2007

Here's to wishing everyone a Merry Christmas!

May your holiday season be the finest ever, and best wishes for a great '08!

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UPDATE: I'm adding another YouTube for a bit more Christmas spirit, via Liberty Pundit:

I hope everyone's having a wonderful Christmas Day.

My wife's gone back down for a nap. We were up at 3:30am to meet Santa by the tree (arranging gifts). My youngest boy, who's 6, didn't fall asleep until close to midnight!

But what joy upon awakening! We opened our presents and had some cinnamon rolls (and I'm having a little snifter right now!). I received books, movies, and music, and my wife and kids loved their gifts (a laptop and Wii, among many other things).

More on Christmas giving tomorrow with some updated holiday posting. Until then!

And don't forget to honor Christ today in our bounty of joy. If you're not celebrating Christmas today, Ann Althouse welcomes you to share your experience on her page.

And to all a good night!

Hard Life (and Death) in Los Angeles

It's good news that Los Angeles saw a decline in homicides in 2007, the lowest level in almost forty years:

Los Angeles is on track to end the year with fewer than 400 homicides for the first time in nearly four decades -- a hopeful milestone for a city so long associated with gangs, drive-by shootings and sometimes random violence.

With 386 killings recorded as of this morning, the city has experienced one-third the number of homicides it did in 1992. The last year with a comparably low figure was 1970, when Los Angeles had a million fewer residents, guns were far less prevalent and street gangs were a much smaller part of life in urban neighborhoods.

Experts and Los Angeles Police Department officials have offered a wide range of theories for the drop, including the gentrification of once-tough neighborhoods, improved emergency medical care and better policing....

So far this year, homicides in Los Angeles are down about 17%. The number of shooting victims is down by 14% compared to last year. Overall violent crime -- including rape, robbery and assault -- is down 8%.

The trend extends to other parts of Los Angeles County. As of Dec. 1, the last date for which figures are available, the number of homicides had dropped about 17% in the more than 40 communities patrolled by the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department and in cities such as Pasadena. The total for those communities was 303 as of Dec. 1, down from 369 during the same period last year. Long Beach has recorded 39 homicides this year, the lowest number since 1971.

"It's not just a number. It means a whole lot," said Betty Day, 68, who moved to Watts in the 1950s and has seen the homicide rate rise and fall. "You know, I'm very proud. People should feel good about it because it's been a long time coming."

The declining crime numbers come amid demographic shifts that are rapidly changing some neighborhoods. Venice, Echo Park and Hollywood, once significant crime areas, have become trendy addresses.

In the early 1990s, a gang war in Venice left nearly two dozen people dead and scores wounded. Gang violence has lessened considerably as the district has become far more expensive, with multimillion-dollar homes replacing fading bungalows.

The Figueroa Street corridor near Century Boulevard in the early 1990s was a drug and prostitution bazaar and the scene of numerous slayings. Now, bungalows in the area are being refurbished for first-time home buyers. Even downtown L.A.'s skid row has seen major changes with the addition of luxury lofts and fashionable eateries. Homicides there have fallen to seven so far this year, down from 12 last year.

Yet while declining murder numbers are encouraging, the nearly 400 killings annually should still be seen as a calamity.

To appreciate this point requires some street-level perspective on the killings. Yesterday's Los Angeles Times provided a powerful reminder of the crisis of crime and social disorganization among the urban underclass, with a complex story of black-on-black murder in the inner-city (see here and here):

Timothy Johnson, 37, a black man, was shot multiple times at 939 E. 92nd Street in Watts at about 3:23 a.m. Sunday, Nov. 25, and died at the scene. Police officers had received a "shots fired" call and found him. He had been visiting friends in the area.

He had gone to a party that night, then had stopped on his way home to socialize with friends outside. His shooters came by walking or driving. He was hit multiple times. When officers arrived, he was alone, dead on the ground, and the people who had been outside with him had disappeared. A pit-bull puppy chained in the yard was curled on his body.

The story of Johnson's murder was the lead commentary piece at the Time's Sunday opinion section. The Times' Jill Leovy, who edits the "Homocide Report," also added this:

Johnson's killing, like most others described in the Los Angeles Times' online Homicide Report, drew scant attention from media accustomed to a metronome beat of black-on-black killings. But such killings in South Los Angeles often contain within them interlocking strands of other murders - other cases of thwarted justice. When the bare details of Johnson's murder were posted on the blog, more than 100 people commented. The excerpts below - cut for space, but otherwise unedited - encapsulate the effect of one such murder cluster in a small community.

The blog link is here. The newpaper excerpted some comments for publication yesterday, here. Leovy's right to note the significance of this microcosm of opinion, and I'm pleased that the Times' editors placed this on page one of the Sunday op-ed. It's a lengthy thread, but a few of the comments are penetrating in their brutal honesty and revelatory importance on the nature of life in the 'hood:

My sincere thoughts and prayers go out to the Johnson family. I have known the family for over twenty years, through good times and bad. Being the detective supervisor overseeing the investigation, I can honestly tell you that we would appreciate any information regarding the tragic death of Timothy....

Citizens can telephone the detectives at (213) 485-4341 or anonymously at 877 LAW-FULL

Posted by: Sal LaBarbera November 26, 2007 at 06:37 PM

*****

The life of an African American Man in LA has proven to be a fight till the death. I am struggling now as I sit here looking at your picture. All the years we spent growing up together, supporting each other and just loving one another. I Love you!! You were my cousin by birth but my brother at heart.

Love Kim

Posted by: Khaleelah Muhammad November 28, 2007 at 04:50 PM

*****

Street justice has been served". I never personally met or seen timothy johnson, a.k.a. "sinister" but my complete understanding of this guy is that he had blood on his hands. He lived by the gun and he died by the gun. It has been confirmed by the lead detective that "sinister" killed a dear friend of mine about 3 yrs. ago, and the police identified "sinister" as the killer. they never charged him for the murder because all of the witnesses were reluctant to come forward ... prayers to "sinister's" wife and kids, but to "sinister", you lived as a coward and you died as a coward. you killed innocent people in broad day light, is it not ironic that you we're gunned down by the shadows of darkness? only god can judge us so i wont ....

Posted by: STREET JUSTICE November 29, 2007 at 11:46 AM

*****

... My cousin wanted me to meet tim ( sinister as you call him) how ever i was uncomfortable with it because of the things people said about this young man .... my cousin wanted me to talk to him about god and see if he'll come to church. however i was not with it but one day while sit'n at her house this guy came over, not know n who he was it was tim (sinister) he came in with a big smile i'll never forget he was respectful when he came in by speak n to everyone when he took my hand and asked my name then told me his my heart drop... but we all talked, passed a few jokes, told each other old stories he was so kick back. he was nothing like what people said!!!!!!! He was respectful, kind, really funny lol... never judge the book by its cover ....

Posted by: monique December 01, 2007 at 12:04 PM

*****

... you speak of what a stand up "Man" he was well if that was the case he would have realized long ago that life is precious. He was not a "Real Friend" I am a mother who has losted her Son to death with sinister as the trigger man. He took my son's life, Nov. 12, 2004 and he was right there beside him professing to be his friend. well what I say now is that my Son's death has been "vendicated" all vengences belong to God and it doesn't bring my Son back, he too have children that will never have the comfort of their "DAD" one baby he never got chance to see. God is the maker & creator of "Blessings & Rewards" my "Heart & Soul" has a "little" satisfaction because when I lost my Son to murder by the hand of Timothy Johnson no one would speak up to help stop the senseless killings., because everyone was afraid, well this is what I say to that, Our lives begin to end when we don't speak up about things that matter. God is good, and The Wrath of God is no joke. when he see God & my Son on that "GREAT DAY" that's when Eternal damnation will take place

Posted by: Mrs. Cozette Hallman December 02, 2007 at 01:21 PM

*****

As I read all of the postings, I am very saddened. It sounds like my cousin caused a lot of pain and anger for a lot of people and families and especially one mother. I hurt because of how my loved one affected so many people in such a negative way while he affected our family in such a positive way. We don't know, nor will we ever know, if he actually did what many say he did. But now ... that is neither here nor there. He is gone! Never to return .... The botton line is ... ENOUGH! The family knows you are out there. You have made your point. We are aware you are in pain. Now let us greive! RIP cousin. I will miss you!

Love, Your little cousin

Posted by: Little Cousin December 04, 2007 at 07:46 PM

*****

It's always funny to me how the friends and family of thugs and gangbangers feel bad when something happens to one of the "homies," but they couldn't care less about the loved ones of the person that their homie hurt or killed. ... Now you are feeling the same thing the loved ones of Sinister's victims felt. It don't feel good ... does it?... I'm not going to hate on a dead man, because God don't like ugly. But when you're out here killing people, messing with people, mobbing on people for NO REASON ... just remember that; God don't like ugly.

Posted by: Truth hurts sometimes December 05, 2007 at 08:00 AM

*****

Have your empty heads absorbed and learned nothing from what you have read on this post, even if untrue? So many idiotic names like bad boys ygs, 20gangbl27d and baby bookie 84 and others whose names indicate you haven't learned a damn thing from your homie's death ... ... I am downright angry with my people for trampling the fruits of our forefathers and foremothers into the ground while their greatest thrill is robbing and killing one another. You are the reason why Blacks are falling faster than flies! You are the reason why there are more minimum wage jobs in our communities than those that actually pay a decent and livable wage. You are the reason why Mexican Americans are passing us in terms of political astuteness. You are the reason why Whites could care less about fighting gun control ....

Posted by: ... to live or ... to die December 07, 2007 at 04:04 PM

*****

Truthfully I would love for someone to help me understand the whole premise of gang bangin, because for the life of me I can't figure out how the hell you can see another brother who you've NEVER EVER seen before in your life and because he is wearing a certain color you feel compelled to kill him. Or how the hell you see someone in your neighborhood who doesn't live there and you feel compelled to kill him, the ironic part of this is that most of these folks don't even OWN the homes they're living in in these neighborhoods, so what part of this neighbor "HOOD" is really yours???? ... Please wakeup people and let's stop the black on black genocide. God bless you all and us as a people

Posted by: Ken R December 13, 2007 at 02:46 AM

*****

... The real question is, is this criminal's death enough to wake up those who signed this post as his homies? Are they ready to make the necessary changes in their lives? Pull up your pants and wear clothes that fit so that you aren't putting yourself out there as a wanna be gangsta if you ain't one. Put away the slang speak unless you are addressing your peers and know when to speak like you have some common sense. No one wants to hear you in the mall, in fast food places, and other neighborhood frequents, cussing and using language that disrespects everyone within hearing distance ... Do yourself a favor and get out because the "game" is played and the graveyard is your end! Simple changes can go a long way to drastically reduce your chances of being targeted....

Posted by: cmoreclearly December 13, 2007 at 11:50 AM

Read the whole post here.

I've often noted - in my posts on black politics - the vital importance for African-Americans to escape the crime, violence, poverty, and social disorganization of the inner-cities - blacks must get out of the 'hood.

I've seen few academic or news articles better able to demonstrate the point than the Johnson homicide post here.

So, while the statistical reduction in killings is indeed promising - especially in the way better law enforcement has contributed to the decline in homicides - there remains much to be done in social welfare poliicy to increase the hope and mobility of those still looking for a better life.

Political leaders of both parties (see here and here) have much work to do.

New Hampshire is Up For Grabs

Readers at American Power know I'm pulling for John McCain in the Republican primaries. So it's probably no revelation to know that I'm giddily intrigued by the recent tightening of the race in New Hampshire, where voting takes place on January 8.

The good news keeps coming out of the Granite State, in any case, as major media reporting this morning indicates that McCain's chances continue to improve, at the expense of Mitt Romney.

Here's a bit on Romney's evaporation in New Hampshire, from the Los Angeles Times:

As recently as last week, Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney seemed to be holding a secure lead in New Hampshire, even as he was losing ground to former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee in Iowa.

But a Boston Globe survey released Sunday showed that the former Massachusetts governor's numbers were slipping in the Northeast as well: Romney, the poll said, now holds a 3 percentage point lead over Arizona Sen. John McCain in New Hampshire, down from 15 points in November.

The threat to Romney's early state strategy -- which aimed for a one-two win in Iowa on Jan. 3 and in New Hampshire on Jan. 8 -- appears serious enough that Romney has started criticizing McCain by name at a time when most campaigns are trying to stay positive.

At a Peterborough town hall Sunday, Romney tried to differentiate himself by telling voters that he wanted to make President Bush's tax cuts permanent.

"Right now, Sen. McCain and I are both battling for your support and your vote. He's a good man, but we have differing views on this," Romney said. "He voted against the Bush tax cuts, he voted against eliminating the [inheritance] tax forever. . . . I believe in pushing taxes down."

In 2001 and 2003, McCain did reject the Bush tax cuts as too tilted toward wealthy Americans but now says he would make them permanent.

McCain's senior advisor, Mark Salter, fired back that Romney's remarks stemmed from his angst over McCain's gains.

"Welcome to Mitt Romney's bizzaro world, where everyone is guilty of his sins," Salter said in a statement. ". . . Give it a rest. It's Christmas."

At an "Ask Mitt Anything" forum Friday night in Rochester, the candidate was questioned about whether his position on the Bush tax cuts had shifted. In 2003, the Boston Globe reported that he had told Massachusetts lawmakers he would neither support or oppose the Bush tax cuts.

Romney told the audience that as governor, he did not weigh in "on federal issues."

"Sen. McCain is different. He voted against tax cuts twice. I was the governor of a state, not a senator," Romney said.

McCain, who won the 2000 New Hampshire primary, was heavily favored here going into the 2008 presidential contest. But many conservatives were angered by his moderate position on immigration, and some liberal supporters were troubled by his close association with the Bush administration's Iraq war strategy.

Romney's well-organized campaign took advantage early on, going on the air with his first television ads in February.

But McCain's campaign has gained momentum of late with several newspaper endorsements, including the conservative Union Leader newspaper in Manchester, the Portsmouth Herald on the state's coast, and the Salmon Press, which publishes 11 smaller newspapers throughout the state. He also won the backing of Romney's hometown newspaper, the Boston Globe, and the Des Moines Register in Iowa.

The Wall Street Journal has more:

The Republican primary in New Hampshire next month is shaping up to be as frantic and unpredictable as the race in Iowa, though focusing on a different set of issues and cast of characters.

Mitt Romney remains a contender in both states. But while his closest rival in Iowa is former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, in New Hampshire, Arizona Sen. John McCain is closing in quickly. The increased competition, especially from Mr. McCain, is a blow to Mr. Romney, who has invested more time and resources in both states than his rivals.

A Boston Globe poll released yesterday shows the Arizona lawmaker threatening Mr. Romney's lead in New Hampshire, with 25% of voters supporting Mr. McCain compared with 28% for Mr. Romney, the former governor of neighboring Massachusetts and a part-time resident of New Hampshire. With the poll having a margin of plus or minus 4.9 percentage points, that is a virtual dead heat and a dramatic shift from just a few weeks ago, when a Zogby poll put Mr. Romney 18 points ahead of Mr. McCain there.

At least some of Mr. McCain's success seems to have come at the expense of former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who has dropped in the New Hampshire polls from the mid 20s to the mid-teens.

The Globe poll shows changes in the Democratic camp as well, with Illinois Sen. Barack Obama gaining the support of 30% of voters, putting him neck and neck with the 28% supporting New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, who has led for much of the year. Former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards trailed with 14% of the vote, followed by New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson with 7%.

But the upheaval in the Republican race is particularly notable, and is requiring Mr. Romney to attack his opponents differently in the two states. New Hampshire's Jan. 8 primary comes just after the Jan. 3 Iowa caucuses.

The Boston Globe story is here:

Senator John McCain of Arizona, whose bid for the Republican presidential nomination was all but dead this summer, has made a dramatic recovery in the Granite State 2 1/2 weeks before the 2008 vote, pulling within 3 percentage points of front-runner Mitt Romney, a new Boston Globe poll indicates.McCain, the darling of New Hampshire voters in the 2000 primary, has the support of 25 percent of likely Republican voters, compared with 28 percent for Romney. Former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani has slid into third place, with 14 percent. A Globe poll of New Hampshire voters last month had Romney at 32 percent, Giuliani at 20 percent, and McCain at 17 percent.

A McCain win in New Hampshire might give the Arizona Senator enough momentum to cruise into the South Carolina primary for a win in the Palmetto State, or a strong second place showing. In that case, McCain could wrap-up the nomination with a series of big wins on February 5, where about 20 states are voting in what likens to be a "national primary."

Trolling the Clinton Campaign

Bloggers know all too well the trouble with trolls. It turns out the Clinton campaign's learning about web trolls as well, according to this Wall Street Journal article:

In Norse mythology, trolls steal babies and leave their own shape-shifting offspring behind. On the Internet, they just steal attention.

As candidates increasingly use the Internet to build political bridges, their message boards have become homes for trolls, users of an online community who leave messages that are ideologically opposed, off-topic or off-color.

Brian O'Neill, a 33-year-old part-time bartender and full-time college student, has been marauding on Sen. Hillary Clinton's Web site for the past few months, even though his posts attacking the candidate are frequently scrubbed from the site within hours. Mr. O'Neill turned to Mrs. Clinton's site after being booted from online forums of former Sen. John Edwards, Sen. Barack Obama and the Democratic National Committee.

Although Mr. O'Neill says he isn't familiar with the term "troll," he has been labeled as one -- and not just once. "I thought they were calling me like the, you know, little garden trolls," Mr. O'Neill says, "and I'm, like, 'I'm not a garden item.' "

Mr. O'Neill, who lives in this small town outside Cincinnati, has a "special blogging place" two levels underground at the library on the campus of Northern Kentucky University in nearby Highland Heights. On a break between classes, he sits down at a bank of computers in the back corner of the stacks, places his large cup of nutmeg-seasoned French roast coffee on the table and logs on.

While many of the students browse the social-networking site MySpace, Mr. O'Neill gets right to work posting an unfavorable article from the online Drudge Report to a bulletin board on Mrs. Clinton's site. He keeps looking for disparaging news before finding a link to her personal financial disclosure filing. He adjusts his chair and leans in toward the screen, muttering, "Let's get me some dirt." Grabbing a piece of unlined copier paper left on the desk next to him, he begins scribbling notes about her stock holdings for his next raid.

Mr. O'Neill is hardly alone. Although the number of trolls can't be measured, they regularly haunt online political sites, which have mushroomed in recent years. Technorati, which follows blogging trends, now tracks 40,000 English-language politics blogs. "The ability of trolls to gain attention, to secure an audience, if ever briefly, is much greater than before," says Derek Gordon, a former vice president at the company.

Sites try various weapons to combat trolls. Campaign trolls popped up en masse in 2004 on Democratic presidential hopeful Howard Dean's Web site. Dean supporters batted them back with a "troll goal," donating money to the campaign's coffers each time they spotted an offending post. The supporters crowed about each sighting, eliminating the trolls' incentive to disrupt.

Most campaigns and individual bloggers invite readers to report offensive comments, and others approve each comment before it appears. At the liberal discussion Web site Daily Kos, "trusted users" can block people whose comments regularly offend members.

Daily Kos has another tactic: the recipe. When a troll attempts to start a conversation at that site, loyalists post recipes instead of engaging them. With so many trolls, the recipes have proliferated -- enough so that Daily Kos compiled a 144-page "Trollhouse Cookbook," including crab bisque inspired by President Bush's second inauguration and "Liberal Elite Cranberry Glazed Brie."

While that approach seems comical, the problem is real. Michael Lazzaro, a Daily Kos contributing editor who goes by "Hunter," says about 10 people are banned each week, but many return by setting up new accounts. One person, easily identified by his writing, has opened more than 100 accounts since 2005, he says. "He basically comments for awhile really nicely and then out of the blue he'll start ranting about women or Jews or something like that," Mr. Lazzaro says.

The Clinton campaign simply yanks the posts of Mr. O'Neill and others. "We have very clear-cut terms of service that we ask people to read before posting to the site," says Peter Daou, the Clinton campaign's Internet director. The terms of service prohibit content that is "harmful" or "defamatory," among other things, and lets the campaign delete comments for any reason. Mr. Daou declined to comment on Mr. O'Neill's posts or the extent of the abuse at the site.

This guy Brian O'Neill cracks me up! I love the part where it says:

While many of the students browse the social-networking site MySpace, Mr. O'Neill gets right to work posting an unfavorable article from the online Drudge Report to a bulletin board on Mrs. Clinton's site.

As readers of American Power know, I'm a regular commenter at opposition blogs. I used to comment at the nasty old Fire Dog Lake, but Hamsher's henchmen switched to a new blogging platform which requires site registration, blocking trolls on the front end. (Daily Kos requires registration, and if they didn't I'd be trolling up a storm over at that place!)

I've certainly had my own experience with trolls. The nastiest by far are the Paulites, who're know to perform blog searches for Ron Paul blog posts before descending in for the kill!

What's a blogger to do?

Little Green Footballs tried out a new system recently that deletes troll posts on the reader's side, but leaves the comments available to the poster, so they think their comments are being read. That's giddily diabolical, or at least the LGF guys think so:

As we noted earlier today, the San Francisco Chronicle is using a sneaky trick in their commenting software; if you post a comment at the SFGate.com web site, and the administrators delete it, you will not know it’s been deleted—because it still shows up when you look at the page, as long as you’re signed in to your SFGate account.

In other words, your comment is not read by anyone else. To you, it appears as if your comment is posted and visible. But everyone else sees a message like, “This comment has been deleted”....

It’s a diabolically clever bit of social software engineering.

I'm not in the big leagues with the like of FDL or LGF, but I can see the need to bleed these trollers dry! The posse from Lawyers, Guns and Money certainly proved the point!

Holiday Spending May Bode Well for Economy

As I've noted earlier, the economy's emerging as a top issue for election '08. While some news reports have noted significant concerns among workers, I'm not to gloomy about our prospects for 2008 (although the shakeout in the housing market is indeed troubling).

In any case, I always look to December retail sales as a fairly reliable (or at least interesting) bellwether for the coming year. As it turns out, this season's holiday sales are looking pretty good, as this Wall Street Journal article notes:

Early indications that Christmas sales have been decent - though not spectacular - suggest that Americans may be opening their wallets wider than consumer-confidence barometers have been signaling they would.

With the economy sending mixed signals, the issue of how well those barometers predict consumer behavior has taken on greater-than-usual significance this holiday season. Amid widespread concerns that a credit crunch will tip the nation into recession, economists have been poring over sentiment indicators and retail-sales data, looking for clues about consumer spending - by far the biggest contributor to the U.S. economy. (See related article.)

Their recent interest underscores a long-running debate about whether confidence numbers are useful in predicting how freely consumers will spend -- or anything at all. Indeed, while the surveys show confidence has plunged in recent months, a resurgence in spending during the final weekend of the holiday shopping season appears likely to bring a sigh of relief to many of the nation's retailers.

Data released Friday show why many economists have reservations about the surveys. At 8:30 a.m. in Washington, the Commerce Department reported that consumer spending rose in November at the fastest clip in 3½ years. Ninety minutes later, the Reuters/University of Michigan survey reported that consumer sentiment in December had fallen to a two-year low - and, excluding the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, had hit its lowest level in more than 15 years.

The monthly survey by the Conference Board, a New York business-research group, has also suggested an upswing in pessimism. The group's index of consumer confidence sank in November by 7.9 points - its largest point change in two years - to a two-year low of 87.3. But it isn't clear what the low readings mean, other than that consumers are worried.

Although holiday sales estimates won't be available until today at the earliest, retail-industry observers who track seasonal sales were upbeat yesterday. "We had projected a 3.6% increase [in dollars spent] this holiday season, and we expect that number will be hit and, potentially, could go a little bit higher," said Bill Martin, co-founder of ShopperTrak RCT Corp.

The apparent resilience of consumer spending only adds to the growing skepticism about the usefulness of consumer surveys. Part of the problem is the age-old debate between causation and correlation.

Jeremy Piger, an assistant professor of economics at the University of Oregon who studied consumer sentiment while working at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, explained that early academic studies of consumer surveys found that there was a correlation between the level of consumer confidence and future economic activity.

But, he said, later studies "got more sophisticated." They took a close look at other economic data released each month to see whether the confidence surveys, in and of themselves, had any predictive power. "The answer has pretty uniformly been, 'No,'" he said. The consumer numbers reflected other developments, on jobs and prices, for example.

Note the conclusion:

A drop in consumer confidence was one of the first signs that the U.S. was headed for recession in 1990, but sentiment also sank after the stock market crashed in 1987, and there was no follow-on recession. More recently, confidence dropped in 2003, and again in 2005 after Hurricane Katrina hit the U.S. Gulf Coast. There weren't recessions following those declines.

Whether recent nose dives in confidence will translate into a recession remains to be seen, but one thing is clear: Apprehension alone doesn't mean consumers will stop spending.

Sounds good to me - to the mall!

Political Books: The Ultimate Christmas Gift

Books are always my favorite Christmas gifts. But they say it's better to give than to receive, so I thought I'd post this article from the Los Angeles Times on the season's hot political books!

It was an almost perfect media firestorm, with a literary twist: Political daggers began flying recently when rumors spread that Scott McClellan, former White House press secretary, was going to confess in a new book that he had unknowingly made false public statements about the outing of CIA operative Valerie Plame. And he claimed he wasn't acting alone -- he had done so with the involvement of top officials, including the president himself.

Pundits wondered darkly who leaked the juicy tidbit, but there was no conspiracy. The brouhaha was sparked by a blurb that the publisher had posted online. Although some were amazed by the furor over a title still months from publication, they were hardly surprised that a political book could have such a dramatic impact.

As publishers get ready to unleash a flood of titles geared to the 2008 presidential election, they are mindful of the extraordinary influence a handful of books have had in recent years. Bestselling titles about the war in Iraq, political celebrities and the Bush White House have shaped the national debate. Barack Obama's "The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream" helped launch his candidacy; "The Looming Tower: Al Qaeda and the Road to 9/11" by Lawrence Wright illuminated the origins of the terrorist attacks; "Imperial Life in the Emerald City: Inside Iraq's Green Zone" by Rajiv Chandrasekaran offered a scathing portrait of the U.S. presence in Iraq.

"These books have become part of a larger national conversation, especially with regard to the Iraq war," said Peter Osnos, founder and editor at large of PublicAffairs, which is publishing McClellan's memoir, "What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and What's Wrong With Washington." Osnos, who wrote about the uproar over the book in Editor & Publisher, added that these titles have an impact "because they can be produced more quickly now -- and they draw on the expertise of journalists and others in the field more than ever."

The Times notes some new books coming out in time for the election:

9/11 and Terrorism:

New York Times reporter Philip Shenon's "The Commission" will suggest that the White House was inappropriately involved in manipulating and controlling information given to the 9/11 commission. Other books include "After 9/11: America's War on Terror" by Sid Jacobson and Ernie Colon, a journalistic work written in the form of a graphic novel, and "War and Decision" by Douglas Feith, an analysis of the war on terrorism by a former high-ranking Pentagon insider. Journalist Robert Scheer has penned "The Pornography of Power: How Defense Hawks Hijacked 9/11 and Weakened America."

The War in Iraq:

Two new titles with similar themes but different cost estimates include "The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Cost of the Iraq Conflict" by Joseph E. Stiglitz and Linda J. Bilmes and "What We Could Have Done With the Money: 50 Ways to Spend the Trillion Dollars We've Spent on Iraq" by Robert Simpson. "The Culture of Torture" by Josh Phillips will probe allegations of post-Abu Ghraib torture in Afghanistan and Iraq, including interviews with U.S. soldiers. "No End in Sight: Iraq's Descent Into Chaos" by filmmaker Charles Ferguson (PublicAffairs) will include dozens of interviews and notes culled from over 200 hours of footage that did not make it into his award-winning documentary about the origins and conduct of the Iraq war. Among the books offering a very different point of view include TV commentator Oliver North's "American Heroes in the Fight Against Radical Islam" and "God Willing: My Wild Ride With the New Iraqi Army" by Marine Corps Reserve Capt. Eric Navarro.

The Bush White House:

Bob Woodward has written the fourth in his series of behind-the-scenes glimpses of the Bush administration; Woodward's publisher, Simon & Schuster, describes it as an exhaustive look at the president's waning years in office. Other books include political analyst Jacob Weisberg's "The Bush Tragedy" and TV commentator Keith Olbermann's "Truth and Consequences: Special Comments on the Bush Administration's War on American Values." Reporters Lou Cannon and Carl M. Cannon have written "Reagan's Disciple: Has George W. Bush Advanced the Reagan Revolution -- or Derailed It?"

Political Celebrities:

Former GOP House Speaker Newt Gingrich penned "Real Change," which Regnery's Ross described as a critique of Republicans and Democrats for losing touch with Americans. Meanwhile, Democrats are putting out a flurry of books: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has written "Open House," Virginia Sen. Jim Webb "A Time to Fight," and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid "The Good Fight." Former U.S. Secretary of State Madeline Albright is releasing "Memo to the President-Elect," and former White House Press Secretary Dee Dee Myers has written "Why Women Should Rule the World: A Memoir." Nobel Prize winner Al Gore will publish another environmental title, "The Path to Survival," on Earth Day.

Books on the Clintons have become a publishing niche unto themselves, and new titles include "Thirty Ways of Looking at Hillary," a collection of essays edited by Susan Morrison; "Clinton in Exile," a look at Bill Clinton's post-presidential years by Carol Felsenthal; and "Clintonisms: The Amusing, Confusing and Even Suspect Musing of Billary" edited by Julia Gorin.

Grass-Roots Activism:

On the left: Pacifica radio hosts Amy Goodman and David Goodman have written "Standing Up to the Madness: Ordinary Heroes in Extraordinary Times." On the right, David Frum, an American Enterprise Institute fellow, has penned "Comeback: Conservatism That Can Win Again."

Other books include "Grand Illusion: The Fantasy of Voter Choice in a Two-Party Tyranny" by Theresa Amato, Ralph Nader's campaign manager; "Gaming the Vote: Why Elections Aren't Fair (and What We Can Do About It) by William Poundstone; and "How to Rig an Election: Confessions of a Republican Operative" by Allen Raymond and Ian Spiegelman. Also coming are "Onward, Christian Soldiers: The Growing Political Power of Catholics and Evangelicals in the United States" by Deal W. Hudson and "The Vast Rightwing Conspiracy 2008 Election Handbook," which tracks the top 10 issues recorded at the conservative Human Events website.

Most of these books are by liberals, so I'm not making any strong recommendations (although Douglas Feith's War and Decision looks like it might be interesting).

I don't see mentioned Jacob Heilbrunn, however, and his new book, They Knew They Were Right: The Rise of the Neocons. I know what I'll be reading come January!

Merry Christmas to everyone. Get out those reading glasses!

The Politics of Political Polarization

Evan Thomas has a fascinating new essay over at Newsweek, "The Closing of the American Mind."

He's looking at the question of political polarization: Is politics nastier today than was true for earlier eras? It's a common perception, and Thomas provides an interesting analysis:

There are, as they say, two Americas. There is the America of the rich and the America of the poor, as Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards likes to point out. There is the America of Red States and Blue States, populated, as columnist Dave Barry likes to joke, by "ignorant racist fascist knuckle-dragging NASCAR-obsessed cousin-marrying road-kill-eating tobacco-juice-dribbling gun-fondling religious fanatic rednecks" and "godless unpatriotic pierced-nose Volvo-driving France-loving leftwing Communist latte-sucking tofu-chomping holistic-wacko neurotic vegan weenie perverts."

These divisions seem to grow, and to grow more antagonistic, by the year. But the real divide, the separation that may matter more to the future of American democracy, is between the political junkies and everyone else. The junkies watch endless cable-TV news shows and listen to angry talk radio and feel passionate about their political views. They number roughly 20 percent of the population, according to Princeton professor Markus Prior, who tracks political preferences and the media. Then there's all the rest: the people who prefer ESPN or old movies or videogames or Facebook or almost anything on the air or online to politics. Once upon a time, these people tended to be political moderates; now they are turned off or tuned out. Aside from an uptick in the 2004 presidential election, voter turnout has drifted downward since its modern peak in 1960 (from 63 percent to the low 50s), despite much easier rules on voter registration and expensive efforts to get out voters, writes Thomas Patterson, a professor at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government and the author of "The Vanishing Voter." For all the press hoopla over the coming presidential primaries, turnout rates are likely to dip way below 30 percent, he predicts.

It's axiomatic that democracies need an informed and engaged citizenry. But America's is indifferent or angry. Washington has entered an age of what Ken Mehlman, President Bush's campaign manager in 2004, calls "hyperpartisanship." Partisanship is nothing new, or necessarily bad—after all, it can offer voters clear choices. But it has become poisonous. In "How Divided Are We?," a 2006 essay in the journal Commentary, conservative thinker James Q. Wilson writes about candidates who regard their competitors "not simply as wrong but as corrupt and wicked." There is in modern political polarization a strong whiff of the old paranoid style of American politics: the left imagines big corporations plotting with neocons to protect Big Oil, while the right imagines a conspiracy of big media, Hollywood and academe to subvert traditional values.

What happened to the "vital center," the necessary glue to getting anything done in a system that is premised on checks and balances? It's hard to imagine the leaders of the two parties sitting down at the end of the day to share a drink and a joke, as President Reagan was able to do with Democratic House Speaker Thomas P. (Tip) O'Neill in the 1980s or President Johnson was able to do with Republican Senate Minority Leader Everett Dirksen in the 1960s. Recently, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has referred to President Bush as a "liar" and a "loser." The popular debate is no more civilized: just read the comments posted by ordinary citizens on the Web sites of the mainstream media (much less partisan blogs). They often run along the lines of "Hillary is the Devil" and "Bush is a baby killer."

The causes of this divide—between the angry and the indifferent, the news junkies and the politically disaffected—are varied, deep-seated and, unfortunately, hard to cure. The evolution of the two parties has hardened ideological divisions and driven away moderates.

The historically minded tend to dismiss, or at least downplay, such observations about the present, arguing that it has been ever thus. Jefferson and Adams fought over religion; Aaron Burr killed Alexander Hamilton; on the floor of Congress members occasionally struck each other with fists and canes. All true, but just because the past had its dismal chapters does not mean the division of the moment is any less important, and it is the case that we are in a particularly bleak phase of partisanship.

But how do know we're in "a particularly bleak phase of partisanship"?

As seen in the passage above, Thomas cites the research of political scientist Markus Prior, who has a new book out, Post-Broadcast Democracy.

Prior's thesis holds that the dramatic diversification of the mass media marketplace has created a small but extremely polarized class of political junkies who feed on the endless stream of political news, and subsequently participate in the political system with a substantially more combative style of partisan competition.

It's an interesting notion. I haven't read Prior's book, although his work both challenges and supplements some established research in public opinion which questions the idea of a newer, more profound degree of political polarization in the electorate.

For example, Morris Fiorina's book, Culture War? The Myth of a Polarized America, argues that we're not in the midst of a broad-scale culture war in American politics. We do have more intensity in the political system, Fiorina argues, but such intense polarization is found among small minorities - indeed, extremists - and thus such views are not characteristic of the larger mass American electorate.

I might add, however, that (1) Fiorina concedes his analysis is of the traditional, narrow academic variety (and thus might not fully capture the contemporary "political" nature of partisan conflict; and (2) the degree to which the new media - and especially the political blogosphere - influences politics and public policy remains an empirical question.

I'm of the belief that Prior's research points to some deeper conclusions about political dialog and participation in the 21st century. The internet, for example, is new, but as a political medium it has the effect of distributing and amplifying a wide variety of intense views, be they ideological, racist, religious-fundmentalist, sexist, you name it.

In this sense I think we are in a new era, although the scope and significance for the broader American electorate still remains to be seen.

Daily Kos and Moral Equivalence

Via Little Green Footballs, check out this post from Daily Kos, "A Picture You Really Need To See":

Bibles and guns. Copies of the Koran and guns...

Could it be any plainer ?

You might call the image, to the right, the ghost of Christmas future. Let me suggest a productive frame for the picture which depicts a parallel that is both real but which has not yet fully emerged as a dominant dynamic.

The dynamic is that of religious war, a phenomenon that has an old and evil history especially in the Middle East.

But, that future - religious war - does not have to prevail. It is a danger as long as there are US troops in Iraq, because US troops in basic training, as detailed in a new Military Religious Freedom Foundation report, are being indoctrinated in the ideology of religious war and the cultivation of the mentality of religious war, between Christianity and Islam, is exactly what many leaders on the American Christian right and Islamic religious extremists including those of Al Qaeda want more than anything - to provoke a full blown religious war between Islam and Christianity.

Readers can see the pictures above, or go directly to the Kos entry.

I don't think we need to "provoke a full-blown war between Islam and Christianity." Radical Islam's already declared war on the West, September 11 was the opening engagement, and the notion that America and its Western allies provoked the struggle is a bunch of baloney.

As LGF put it, the Kos entry is one more case of "crackpot moral equivalence."

(Oh, and don't forget, Markos Moulitsas, the Daily Kos founder, calls his netroots movement the true center of Democratic Party politics today.)