The Daily Cannibal |
| Posted: 08 Jan 2013 12:37 AM PST To paraphrase Neal Stevenson, everybody has at least once in their life wondered if they were the biggest asshole in all creation. Even if only for a moment, or for longer, because of something they did, or said, or forgot to do, or did but didn’t mean to do, or did because they meant to, but didn’t realize — you know. If this bothered you, and still in a way comes back as a twinge of some kind, or if you are currently suffering from this perception — relax. You’re safe. You are not, and could not be, the biggest asshole in all creation. After Paul Krugman’s self-nomination for Secretary of the Treasury today, that position is filled. Permanently. Krugman wrote in his NY Times blog today:
It is a bad idea the same way the Macarena is a bad national anthem. But whose idea was it? Krugman is coy; he’s “heard about the notion.” One wonders if it was a still, small voice that seemed to emanate from deep within, because, as outlandish as this ”notion” may seem, Krugman then exceeds himself, achieving a kind of delusional dimensionality seldom encountered outside crackhouses. If offered the job, he would demur:
Okay, I’ll say it. Yes, I doubt the White House reads what he writes, because he has written the same column for several years now. Stimulate. The government can’t go broke because it prints its own money. People who worry about inflation are stupid; our currency is too important to be governed by market forces. But more important — does Krugman really expect us to swallow this balder-than-a-baby’s bottom codswallop? The president offers him the most powerful post in all finance — and he demurs? He’d rather be a columnist for a newspaper? The only person laughing harder than I am right now is most likely Obama.  |
| Posted: 07 Jan 2013 05:49 PM PST What impelled the Journal News — a little-known, small circulation newspaper in suburban Westchester County, New York — to publish a list of local gunowners, along with a map of their addresses? According to the New York Times:
Was it outrage and a sense of civic duty? Did the Newtown massacre persuade the editors that a clumsy attempt at public shaming of people exercising a constitutional right would act as an effective deterrent to violence? The explanation offered by Dwight Worley, the Journal News reporter who came up with the idea, was more than a little oblique: "The people have as much of a right to know who owns guns in their communities as gun owners have to own weapons." Technically, of course, he’s correct. The information is public record, and anyone who wants the data is entitled to see it. But we all have rights that we should try to exercise with some discretion. There is no law against farting in a elevator, but few people would endorse the practice. Similarly, we question with some skepticism the benefit of providing all and sundry with a road map of this nature. The gunowners are hardly likely to dispose of their weapons as a result. Did the Journal News think they would? Or, less probable still, that expressions of disapproval from their neighbors would somehow coerce them into disarming? One suspects that gunowners are already well aware of the distaste many Americans have for firearms; when the Speaker of the House and the President go on national television and demand the nullification of the 2nd Amendment, it’s hard not to notice. Here we await a mass condemnation of our own article as the output of a deranged primitive. But note that we have very carefully avoided taking any position on gun ownership. That is not where this essay takes issue. Our interest here is not with 2nd Amendment rights, but with 1st Amendment responsibility. We are somehow not impressed with the professions of the Journal News, which are more in the line of self-serving than public service, nor do we believe that their publication of this data was in any way driven by a desire for a better world. The New York Times noted in its article:
With no cupcake stands to defend, the Journal News did what any self-respecting publication in need of a shot in the arm would do: it took advantage of a national horror to sell newspapers. It cloaked itself in the traditional robes of righteous indignation. It pointed fingers. It said, “For shame! You are bad people!” And it got its wish, in a way. We doubt that it will see any meaningful real increase in readership from this silly little stunt, and we certainly don’t believe that it will have any impact whatever on gun owners, but when the Newtown event quickly morphed from a local tragedy into a global circus, it was only a matter of time before they sent in the clowns.  |
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