US Supreme Court Upholds Affordable Health Care Act

[kandrathe]

Anyone who decides that their reactionary values should be enforced with state power is, in the sense that I meant it, a fascist. Clearly, the term also means other things, but here, it mostly refers to the obsession with the "moral health" of some reified "people" or "nation".

Agreed. I am far from wanting the state to enforce more. Quite the opposite, I'd like them to get out of meddling in our private affairs.

As far as prudes go, insofar as "expressing" a standard of "modesty" means judgmental attitudes towards other peoples' harmless personal choices? Yes, that's pretty much what it means.

That's a steep leap from having moral views to foisting them upon others. And, certainly, when it comes to society and law, we would only be concerned with harms and not "harmless personal choices". In some areas, such as prohibition, we've been down that road even when there is a demonstrable harm to society. However, that morality proved unenforceable. With others, such as legal slavery, we've been able to outlaw (but not eliminate). In other areas (typically local), e.g. Blue, or vice laws, I'm a bit ambivalent -- on one hand I think it's an assault on freedoms, and on the other I uphold the rights of local people to make local laws that uphold their local values (as long as they don't violate state or federal constitutional rights).

... this is an extraordinarily, maddeningly generous reading of Charles Murray. It frankly astounds me that, for someone so interested in the between-the-lines connections on other topics, that you'd be willing to excuse or ignore that he has, in apparently unconnected arguments, decided that 1) Black people are stupider than other people, and 2) Black culture is infecting white culture, and it's ruining America.

Your conclusions 1 & 2 are the distortions portrayed in the media, and don't reflect what actually was said in his work. I think the problem is that the research asked the questions, and people didn't like what the data revealed. I'd be the first to poke holes into the methodology. The important factor here is that the book always qualifies that intelligence (as measured by IQ tests) is both genetic and environmental. Why is it a surprise that through "social class" segregation we perpetuate a divide between those with above average intelligence (who have more earning power), with those with below average intelligence (who don't earn as much)? His conclusion was that this was a dangerous social trend. Is that outrageous? I tend to reject IQ testing as somewhat limited in measuring potential, but it is a common measure.

I don't think single parenthood is "black culture" -- I think he attempts to draw a distinction between those things that uplift society from those things that tear it down. How is it racist to believe (regardless of race) that we need to promote stable and loving families, not absentee parents who are disconnected from their children's lives (i.e. Columbine)?

Now, I don't know about you, but I'd be tempted to think, at first cut, that such a person was a racist. It would require a whole lot more than a few denials to talk me out of such a position.

You might. I work with demographers who necessarily need to tippy toe around research where race is a factor. If we are going to have an open dialog about racism and equality, then we need to get all this crap out on the table and discuss it openly. Shouting him down as a racist does not reveal the flaws in his research -- whereas, I believe Stephan Gould's "The Mismeasure of Man" is a more appropriate academic response. But, we all should be careful of bias and prejudice in both Murray and Gould. I believe both were fairly biased going into their works, and as such probably suffer from a fair amount of confirmation bias.

Or, that he wants to stop the transfer of resources from the advantaged to the disadvantaged, and impose his preferred cultural norms on everyone else. The man is an unreconstructed reactionary, and represents the best traditions of liberty about as well as the Washington Generals represented professional Basketball.

First, as you know, I'm pretty much against the transfer of resources in the first place. Robin Hood is mostly a myth vilifying wealth and justifying robbery. And, yet in our age we still have the chorus of "They should pay their fair share!" when the top 50% of earners pay 95% of income tax revenue, and the top 1% pay 34% of income tax revenue. But... in regards to welfare reform... My understanding was that Murray recommended the government stop subsidizing those factors that lead to more poverty, such as increasing the amount of aid based on the number of children you have. We've discussed these freakanomic factors before, but extending unemployment or welfare benefits leads to more dependence and higher unemployment. Paying women more money for having more children results in more impoverished children. Now, you can take a cruel uncaring approach, or you can create policies that encourage the kinds of behaviors we would really want, such as subsidizing poor peoples educations, or not punishing them for getting work, while still needing some welfare.

Vintage Douthat. Add some hand waving to a moralizing narrative, and hope nobody who actually understands these things checks your work. ... (And so on, and so forth.) Meaningless blather, wishful thinking, and naked prejudice.

It is amazing to me how you can trivialize most anyone you disagree with as anti-intellectual blather.

Almost everything he mentions in his list is a non-causal correlate of success. It's not that going to church makes you successful, it's that miserable failures tend not to go to church. It's not that marrying your partner makes you successful, it's that being left by your partner is a serious problem if you were reliant on them, causing crisis.

Sometimes it is the action that actually precipitates the result, and in this case perhaps it's not merely church that would reflect positively, but any meaningful periodic social interaction. So, in a way, I think you are right, but also wrong. Getting someone to connect with their society will have beneficial outcomes for both. As for marriage, also, yes, and no. I don't think it is the sacrament, or the license that correlates with success, but the commitment (to someone other than oneself). When children are involved, it takes a village right? And, if you can't get the village involved, sharing it with at least one other parent is a close second. Single parenthood, and divorce can result in issues for the children -- so wherever possible we should aspire to have healthy relationships as models for our children (lest they be as F'd up as we are).