Friday LA Pilli blogging

Going to finish essay and blog more this weekend.

San Diego

I love the Chicano PERK.... in National City... its cool.

Side effects

Funny this is the effect California has on me.

Wedding picture from September

cry baby

goodbyes

Got Job

I think I do.

Napoleon Dynamite

heres's the napoleon dance

and beneath it is the technology love song

World Cup Headbutt

Zidane apologizes

I'm sorry but no regrets - Zidane

Zinedine Zidane has apologised for his headbutt on Italian defender Marco Materazzi in Sunday's World Cup final.

But the French legend does not regret his actions, alleging on television that Materazzi provoked him by insulting both his mother and sister.

"It was inexcusable. I apologise," said the 34-year-old Zidane. "But I can't regret what I did because it would mean that he was right to say all that."

Materazzi responded by denying he said anything about Zidane's mother.

"I didn't mention anything about religion, politics or racism," said the Italian on Wednesday.

"Naturally, I didn't know that his mother was in hospital but I wish her all the best.

"Zidane is my hero and I have always admired him a lot."

Zidane was sent off for headbutting Materazzi in the chest in the second period of extra-time in the final in Berlin.

The Frenchman claimed he had been provoked by the Italian and appeared on French TV station Canal Plus on Wednesday to explain his actions.

"It was seen by two or three billion people on television and millions and millions of children were watching," he said.

"It was an inexcusable gesture and to them, and the people in education whose job it is to show children what they should and shouldn't do, I want to apologise."

Asked what had caused to react so violently, he said Materazzi had directed some "very hard words" at him.

"You hear them once and you try to move away. But then you hear them twice, and then a third time," said Zidane.

"I am a man and some words are harder to hear than actions. I would rather have taken a blow to the face than hear that."

Zidane, who retired from football after Sunday's final, also called for Materazzi to be punished for his part in the incident.

"We always talk about the reaction, and obviously it must be punished. But if there is no provocation, there is no need to react," said the former Real Madrid and Juventus player

Without question, this had to do with race.

I mean, this was in the World Cup final. You would either have to be the biggest asshole on the planet or have a very good reason for acting that way.

And if people didn't think he was provoked, they would be after his head. People take losing a World Cup on a mistake normally unforgivable.

The fact that he wouldn't apologize for what he did is not just over a loss of temper. Because unless it's happened to you, you'd never understand it. Somethings you recognize right away, and that reaction looked all too familiar.

As Thurgood Marshall said "My father said when a man calls you a nigger, you have some business to settle right there."

A lot of people may not see it, but I've lived through a couple of those moments and that's how you react.

posted by Steve @ 12:22:00 AM

Rove booed...

Two posts coming from Steve Gillard he was on a roll today.


Hey, we didn't mean it, honest

You can't treat us like
this chicken

Rove Tells of 'Shared Values' With Latinos
The GOP strategist cites faith, family and Bush's immigration plan at a La Raza conference in L.A.
By Teresa Watanabe and Michael Finnegan, Times Staff Writers
July 12, 2006

White House political strategist Karl Rove touted "shared values" of faith and family and reiterated President Bush's support of broad immigration reform in a Los Angeles address Tuesday to one of the nation's largest Latino civil rights organizations.

In a lunchtime talk at the National Council of La Raza's annual conference, the Republican advisor outlined Bush's plan for stronger border security, workplace enforcement, a guest worker program and earned legalization for undocumented immigrants.

"He understands immigration is a positive force in this country … vital to keep this country going," Rove said, prompting applause from the crowd of a few thousand.

But he drew scattered boos when he highlighted Bush's recent approval of $1.9 billion in funding for more border security, including deployment of National Guard troops, and was disrupted twice by hecklers who unfurled antiwar and anti-Bush banners.

Rove, who shared his own family story of Norwegian immigrants, also told the crowd that assimilating by learning English was critical to both national unity and boosting the pay and career potential of immigrants. "English binds us together as Americans and enables us to share our common life," he said.

Speaking after Rove, New Mexico's Democratic Gov. Bill Richardson outlined his own immigration plan — which was strikingly similar to Bush's. Unlike Rove, however, he was not booed when he promoted tougher border security to crack down not only on illegal immigrants, he said, but also on drugs and violence.

Rove's appearance comes as both parties try to tap the fast-growing Latino electorate, which is becoming more independent. About 40% of Latinos voted for Bush in the 2004 election, compared with 56% for Democratic candidate John F. Kerry.

I bet he wants to hit Josh Bolten over the head with a brick every day he sees him. The GOP won't see the damage their Final Solution to the Mexican Problem has led to until they start losing races in Hispanic districts. No one knows how severe it will be, but Rove getting booed, and remember, Bush wasn't on the extreme side of this is a hint.

The Spring's antics and the incredibly racist fallout from it was both avoidable and sadly predictable. The only question is the punishment they exact in the election

posted by Steve @ 4:50:00 PM

NCLR que haces?!

I'm not sure how I feel about Karl Rove speaking at the NCLR.... read this post.



Karl Rove will speak to a Latino group in California on Wednesday. Let's remind everyone of where the Bush administration stands on Latino issues
by John in DC - 7/11/2006 10:01:00 PM

Karl Rove is planning on address one of the largest Latino organizations, La Raza, tomorrow in California. In commemoration of the Bush administration's new-found love for the same Latinos they wanted to kick out of the country last week, with the help of a friend who put the following list together, let's take a way down memory lane, shall we:

Rove’s Outreach to Hispanic Voters

Today, Karl Rove will address the National Council of La Raza. Unfortunately, his grand strategy to attract Hispanic voters to the Republican Party is in jeopardy because of a revolt of House Republicans on immigration. Will the Bush Administration be able to go beyond their campaign rhetoric and really reach out to Hispanic voters? Accomplishing this task will require standing up to the right wing of the Republican Party. Unfortunately, Bush and his Administration have been better at talking the talk of reaching out than they have been of walking the walk.

THEN: Bush Campaigned in Spanish

In Davenport, Iowa: ''La Sueño Americano.” “Over a breakfast of burritos and beans at a neon-colored Jalapeño Mexican Cuisine in Davenport, Iowa, this summer, Bush spoke of his goal that everyone share in ''la sueño Americano.'' [The Miami Herald, 10/9/99]

In Los Angeles, California: Ingles y Mas: “As Bush addressed a crowd of 3,000 last week at the Latin Business Association in Los Angeles, he signaled his sensitivity. 'Ingles solamente' isn't the way, Bush said. Instead of English only, the goal is Ingles y mas, English and more. 'Children of any background should not be used as pawns in bitter debates on education and immigration.’'' [The Miami Herald, 9/9/99]

In Chicago, Milwaukee, and Philadelphia, Bush Sang the National Anthem in Spanish. "When visiting cities like Chicago, Milwaukee, or Philadelphia, in pivotal states, Bush would drop in at Hispanic festivals and parties, sometimes joining in singing 'The Star-Spangled Banner' in Spanish, sometimes partying with a 'Viva Bush’ mariachi band flown in from Texas." [American Dynasty, Kevin Phillips]

NOW: Bush Says the National Anthem Ought to Be Sung in English.

Bush: “I think the national anthem ought to be sung in English, and I think people who want to be a citizen of this country ought to learn English and they ought to learn to sing the national anthem in English.” [4/28/06]

THEN: Undocumented Mexicans Who Had Crossed Illegally Were “Hard-Working Citizens”.

Bush: “We share values with Mexico. They’re common values — values that unite people, whether they live in the United States or whether they live in Mexico. And what are those values? … The willingness to work hard. America is known for our ability to work hard. Think about the Mexican worker who walks 500 miles across a desert to find work. Those are hard-working citizens. We share that very important value of people willing to roll up their sleeves and work hard.” [White House, 9/6/01]

NOW: Terrorists, Drug Dealers, and Criminals Sneak into the United States.

Bush: “To defend this country, we have to enforce our borders. When our borders are not secure, terrorists, drug dealers, and criminals find it easier to sneak into America. My administration has a clear strategy for dealing with this problem: We want to stop people from crossing into America illegally, and to quickly return the illegal immigrants we catch back to their home countries.” [White House, 10/22/05]

THEN: Bush Floated the Idea of Amnesty.

Bush – as Part of an Effort to Woo Latino Voters – Floated the idea of an Amnesty. “Since arriving in Washington, President George W. Bush has persisted in believing that the GOP can engineer a major shift in US. electoral politics and seize a sizable chunk of a voting bloc that the Democrats have come to assume is solidly loyal. Using Cabinet picks and tailoring policy -- including floating the idea of granting an amnesty to more than 3 million Mexicans living in the United States illegally -- the president has continued with a high-profile effort to woo skeptical Latinos away from the Democrats.” [Washington Times, 10/1/01]

NOW: Bush Wavers on Comprehensive Reform

The Bush Administration Issued a Statement of Administration Policy in Support of the Sensenbrenner Immigration Bill – a Bill that Would Make Felons of Undocumented Workers.

Bush Shows Signs of Wavering on Comprehensive Reform. “Republicans both inside and outside the White House say Mr. Bush, who has long insisted on comprehensive reform, is now open to a so-called enforcement-first approach that would put new border security programs in place before creating a guest worker program or path to citizenship for people living in the United States illegally.” [New York Times, 7/5/06]

Republicans Predict Bush Will Abandon the Path to Citizenship. “But one Republican close to the White House, granted anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, predicted that Mr. Bush would ultimately abandon the idea of a path to citizenship.” [New York Times, 7/5/06]

THEN: Karl Rove Outlined a Strategy to Attract Hispanic Voters

Karl Rove Outlines the Strategy: “Mission and Goal” is to Attract Latino Voters. “The broad statistics and the doubts, though, aren't deterring the White House. Earlier in the year Karl Rove, the president's senior political adviser, told reporters in Washington that grabbing a bigger share of the Latino vote is "our mission and our goal" and that it will require the effort of all Republicans "in every way and every day working to get that done." [Washington Times, 10/1/01]

For Rove – It’s about the Math. “Rove sees the math as simple: For the president to get re-elected the Republicans need to keep competitive in voter-rich states such as Illinois, where an increasing Latino presence threatens to make the political environment friendlier for Democratic candidates, RNC campaign strategists tell Insight. Bush needs to ensure a win in Florida and focus on several smaller states where Latino numbers are gaining -- states such as North Carolina, Iowa and Oregon.” [Washington Times, 10/01/01]

Bush Political Operation Understands the Importance of the Hispanic Vote. "We got 35 percent of the Hispanic vote" in the last election, RNC spokesman Trent Duffy recently told Insight. ‘If we don't get that up to 38 or 40 percent, it's all over.’ Matthew Dowd, a Bush adviser in last year's election campaign, has chorused regularly in sessions with Rove that more must be done on the Hispanic front, White House sources say. [Washington Times, 10/01/01]

Rove Set the Strategy. “Going into the campaign, chief White House political strategist Karl Rove stated he wanted to increase the President’s share of the Hispanic electorate from 35% in 2000 to at least 40% in 2004.” [Washington Times, 11/10/04]

In 2004, Rove’s Political Operation Met its Goal for Attracting the Hispanic Vote. “In the 2004 election, the Hispanic vote really did matter—particularly in the race for the White House. An estimated 9 million Hispanics cast ballots—more than ever before. According to exit polls, President Bush won as much as 44 percent of the Hispanic vote—improving on the 35 percent he received in 2000 and breezing past the stated goal of White House senior adviser Karl Rove, who had said he’d be happy with 40 percent.” [Dallas Morning News, Editorial, 11/9/04]

NOW: Because of House Republicans, Rove’s Strategy is in Jeopardy

Immigration Threatens Bush Inroads with Hispanic Voters. “If Hispanics bolt the GOP because of immigration, it would erase the inroads George W. Bush has made in opening the party to the group, both as Texas governor and president. What's more, a strong Latino turnout could help Democrats win control of Congress in the November elections and change the landscape in the next presidential race.” [Dallas Morning News, 5/6/06]

House Republicans Jeopardize Bush’s Plans to Draw Latino Voters to the Republican Party. “By pushing English-only policies and tough measures against illegal immigrants, House conservatives are endangering President Bush's goal of drawing millions of Latino voters to the Republican Party and helping realign ethnic politics for years to come, according to an array of analysts and officials.” [Washington Post, 6/30/06]

House Republicans Are Blocking the Renewal of the Voting Rights Act. “The latest blow to Bush's efforts to woo Hispanics came last week, when a band of House Republicans unexpectedly balked at renewing the 1965 Voting Rights Act, partly because of a 30-year-old requirement that many local governments provide bilingual ballots. The revolt, which forced House GOP leaders to abruptly postpone a vote, came as House Republicans are stiffening their resistance to Bush's bid to allow pathways to legal status for millions of illegal immigrants while also strengthening borders and deportation efforts. [Washington Post, 6/30/06]

Bottom Line: The Rove Strategy Isn’t Working

According to the Latino Policy Coalition, Bush has a 28 percent approval rate among Latinos and the GOP Congress has a 23 percent approval rate. “Latino voters are making up their minds earlier in the mid-term election cycle and trust Democrats to do a better job than Republicans on issues such as health care, economic issues facing families, education and immigration, according to a survey released today by the non-partisan Latino Policy Coalition (LPC). The extensive survey, conducted by Lake Research Partners in 23 states across the U.S., also found Latino voters overwhelmingly dissatisfied with the job performances of both President Bush and the Republican-led Congress.”

World Cup

The games were good the refs sucked. and Mexico was soo close yet soo far. Here is an intresting representation of what this brazilian comic termed the new Dia de los Muertos.

El Gran Silencio

I love this band... my favoritist in the world. this biography from their EMI webpage actually does a good job of explaining why. They have a new record coming out or it already did in Mexico... soo excited.!!


Super Riddim Internacional

Con machaca y mitote...

Lo que hoy, para unos es una forma de vivir y ver el mundo, ayer, para muchos, era motivo de burlas y estigma, sin embargo, con la aparición del El Gran Silencio, los "El Chúntaros" como forma de expresión de cultura popular de miles y miles de jóvenes del noreste de México ha logrado reconocimiento entre la gente, dentro y fuera de nuestro país. Lo que antes era una cultura marginal, poco a poco se ha convertido en la punta lanza de un movimiento musical encabezado por El Gran Silencio. Este movimiento musical sin lugar a dudas es el fenómeno cultural más importante en Monterrey en los últimos cincuenta años, y en este milenio que comienza, parce ser el eje gravitatorio de un mundo que aglutina modas, modos y estilos musicales. Compuesto por músicos nacidos y criados dentro del bullicio de Monterrey, El Gran Silencio descubre, difunde y masifica, una forma de vida de miles y miles de jóvenes regiomontanos. "El Chúntaro", que de alguna manera identifica a cierta forma de ser de los jóvenes de los barrios marginados de Monterrey, es de alguna manera el equivalente a la "Chilanga Banda" de la Ciudad de México.

Haciendo un poco de historia, la presencia de la música colombiana en Monterrey se remonta a los años sesentas, cuando los sonideros de la Colonia Independencia eran los encargados de llevar las buenas nuevas musicales a los habitantes de los barrios populares en la Sultana del Norte. Como si se tratara de una especie de correo musical, la música sonidera fue adoptada al paso de los años se transformó en una especie de folklore urbano con los que se identificaba a los habitantes de los sectores marginales de la población regiomontana. Poco a poco, nuevas generaciones fueron llegando y la memoria musical de los barrios se fue combinando con el rock, el rap, el ska y otras expresiones musicales.

De esa mayoría silenciosa, de esos barrios olvidados, surge el estilo del Gran Silencio, como una respuesta lógica, como un grito de reivindicación de una generación plural que hizo de las voces del silencio, de aquellos que sólo tienen la pared como único medio de expresión, una corriente musical que ha trascendido en todo el mundo. Las melodías del Gran Silencio son como fotografías habladas de un universo en el que la música de la caja, guacharaca y acordeón toman su lugar para ritmicamente relacionarse con otras formas musicales, pero sin perder la cadencia y la sabrosura. Estampas musicales, testimonios que hablan de la vida cotidiana en los barrios olvidados, escenas de ancianitos que llevan su acordeón a cuestas cantando viejas canciones regionales casa por casa, para ellos el folklore norestense es defendido más por convicción que por necesidad. Retratos hablados de grupos de chavos regiomontanos que han hecho de los camiones urbanos, esquinas y plazas, sus escenarios principales para entonar sus melodías.

Precisamente este es el universo donde surge El Gran Silencio, como un grito que ha dado vida y movimiento, que ha hecho despertar las voces del silencio, aquellas que han sido condenas por el hecho mismo de existir. Podríamos decir que ese herencia sonidera de cumbias y vallenatos, en combinación con otras formas musicales ha sido la llave maestra que ha permitido a los integrantes de El Gran Silencio ser actualmente la punta lanza de lo que se conoce como "El Chúntarismo", teniendo a Monterrey y su área metropolitana su principal centro de difusión en México.

Sin lugar a dudas la música del Gran Silencio es el primer y principal exponente de la expansión y reconocimiento del "Chúntarismo" en México, donde música, canto, moda y baile van de la mano. Música de los barrios, lo cierto es que hoy por hoy, en algunos puntos de nuestro país y de América Latina, se vive un boom el cual es encabezado por El Gran Silencio, agrupación, que se han convertido en el mayor exportador de cultura popular regiomontana.

En sus producciones musicales el Gran Silencio retrata escenas de la vida urbana, sus videos de alguna forma son testimonios de un universo cultural con una dinámica cultural propia, con vida y movimiento. Las imágenes de un mundo olvidado lleno de ritmo y baile fue retratado en el video "Chúntaro Style" una fotografía hablada que retrata el ambiente de las reuniones entre los chavos banda y por supuesto su peculiar estilo de bailar conocido como "El Paso del Gavilán".

Gracias al Gran Silencio, lo que antes era un baile considerado exclusivo para cholos, es decir, para los integrantes de las pandillas, poco a poco se ha ido convirtiendo en una moda que ha sido adoptada por sectores muy distintos a los chavos banda. Hoy por hoy, El Gran Silencio con su "Free Style Norteño" es el principal exponente se un estilo musical de modos y modas, de un ritmo que lejos de diferenciar a las tribus juveniles urbanas, las une a a través de su ritmo plural y no excluyente. Cinco libres y locos, con sangre del norte, que han impuesto una moda, cinco chavos de barrio que han puesto a bailar a la gente, cinco rostros conocidos de un mundo desconocido, donde la gente tiene corazones con forma de acordeón.

Poison

A house divided

Read this post and thought it both intresting commentary about the US relations and also more recently the Mexican political situation, where the house my be divided more after this presidental election. Although I"m hopeful it will not be I do believe either candidate in mexico would do a fine job especially with a divided congress. Please let the PRI die.



A House Divided

John Tierney, the right-leaning New York Times columnist, celebrated Independence Day with a column posing the classic what-if question: What if the South had won the Civil War and there were now two republics sharing the slice of continent between Canada and Mexico, instead of only one?

On Independence Day, would we all be happier with even more independence? What if government of the people meant that the Red people in the South and the Blue people in the North had a border between them?

I never read Tierney even before the Times firewall went up, so what I know about his column ("The Disunited States of America") is what Steve Gilliard excerpted and posted on his blog. Steve points out that the scenario itself isn't very plausible, given that an independent Dixie would have been a weak, politically fractured state with deep racial and class divisions. Ingrained hostilities and conflicting strategic interests between the rival republics probably would have led in relatively short order to another war, one the rapidly industrializing North almost certainly would have won.

I think this probably right, although it's possible an alliance with Britain and/or France might have allowed the CSA to fend off a a repeat of what my Southern ancestors liked to call the War of Northern Aggression. But modern historians, like the University of Kentucky's William Freehling (Road to Disunion, The South vs. the South) stress how the social tensions inherent in the South's version of "herrenvolk democracy," plus the racial hysteria of Deep South slaveholders terrified of being trapped in a new Haiti, drove the desperate gamble of secession. That being the case, it seems likely to me that an independent South would have fallen prey to internal unrest (perhaps including a civil war within a civil war between the Border and the Deep South states.) Or it might easily have been drawn into reckless imperial adventures in the Caribbean and Latin America, eventually leading to economic exhaustion and collapse. In the end, the North might have been forced to intervene simply to prevent the emergence of what we would now call a failed state -- or states.

But it appears to me that Tierney wasn't so much making a historical argument as he was crafting a subtle, Swiftian proposal for disunion now. Thus his reference to Southern "red people" and Northern "blue people." He seems to be arguing that both colors would be less angry and antagonistic if they could go their separate national ways:

If the South were a separate country, Northern liberals wouldn't be ranting at George W. Bush and Pat Robertson. They wouldn't be frantically trying to find a candidate who appealed to the Bible Belt and pretended to enjoy Nascar races. They might never hear a Garth Brooks song or have to stop at a Cracker Barrel Old Country Store.

Southern conservatives wouldn't have to fight for moral values against godless Yankees. They wouldn't have to watch John Kerry go hunting. Michael Moore would be an obscure foreign filmmaker . . . Politics in both countries might be less partisan, even civil.

As you can see, Tierney is every bit as fond of shallow, trivial cultural metaphors as his editorial neighbor David Brooks. He does, however, have a point -- although it's not the point he thinks he's making. Tierney's notion of the Two Americas is certainly correct, as we discover daily. But the union doesn't come close to dividing along the geographic and cultural lines he proposes.

To begin with the obvious, the blue and the red is not the same color scheme as the blue and the gray. It's a product of the disputed election of 2000, not the bitter contest of 1860, and the political divide it straddles only partially overlaps the economic and sectional conflict that produced the American Civil War.

Geographically, the Mason Dixon line doesn't slice nearly as cleanly as it did 150 years ago. The South is no longer purely southern (ask the average Miami resident what he or she thinks about Stonewall Jackson, and you'll see what I mean) and up North about the only true Yankees these days are the ones wearing pinstripes and playing baseball in the Bronx.

On the other hand, that America is now divided neatly into increasingly hostile cultural camps is generally treated as received wisdom. But culture is a tricky word, hard to define, and not really amenable to the kind of short-hand stereotypes (rural rednecks listen to Garth Brooks while urban liberals sip mocha lattes) that journalists like Tierney exist to propagate.

In his book The Cousins' Wars, Kevin Phillips suggested that there is indeed a deep-seated duality to Ango-American politics and culture that can be traced back as far the English Civil War. It separates high church Anglicans from low church dissenters, Puritans from Cavaliers, and merchant and financial elites from landowning and military ones. Every hundred years or so (1642, 1776, 1861) these opposing tendencies have a go at each other.

One could, I suppose, add the domestic disturbances of the late 1960s to that list. But, as the '60s demonstrated (in both senses of the word) American society and culture have changed radically since the days when British and American cousins fought their wars. So have the opposing camps. The great influx of eastern and southern immigrants in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the New Deal, the civil rights movement, the realignment of the South, the Vietnam War, feminism, gay liberation -- all these have stirred the melting pot, creating new alliances, new interests and, not least, new hatreds and resentments.

If I had to boil our modern kulturkampf down to two words, they wouldn't be blue and red, they would be "traditionalist" and "modern." On one side are the believers in the old ways -- patriarchy, hierarchy, faith, a reflexive nationalism, and a puritanical, if usually hypocritical, attitude towards sexual morality. On the other are the rootless cosmopolitians -- secular, skeptical (although at times susceptible to New Age mythology) libertine (although some of us aren't nearly as libertine as we'd like to be) and less willing to equate patriotism with blind allegiance, either to a flag or a government.

Those are still crude oversimplifications -- although at least they avoid the inanity of making musical taste into a political philosophy. But I think they capture something essential about modern Amerrican society, which has been transformed from a still heavily agrarian provincial backwater (circa 1930 or even 1950) into the post-industrialized center of a global empire in a historical blink of time.

Rapid social changes often produce cultural reaction, which in turn spawns angry political movements. Post Civil War industrialization and financial colonization produced the Populists -- both good (Mother Jones) and bad (Tom Watson and Pitchfork Ben Tilman.) The waves of 19th and early 20th century immigration spurred the rise of the Know Nothings and the modern Klu Klux Klan. The New Deal and the civil rights era incited the John Birch Society and Goldwater conservatism. And now the blowback effects of globalization (what conservative ideologues sneeringly deride as "multiculturalism") coupled with the patriotic and xenophobic passions unleashed by the war against Al Qaeda, have turbocharged the traditionalists into declaring something close to all-out war on the modernists -- as symbolized, at the moment, by the traitorous New York Times.

But two things complicate the schematic. One is the fact that the modern American political dialectic is superimposed on older but still extant divisions: geographic (North and South), religious (Catholic and Protestant), ethnic (WASPs and everybody else) and of course class (with the great divide in American politics usually falling between the middle class and the poor.)

These geographic layers of conflict -- some still active, others now almost dormant) vastly complicate the political landscape and create major headaches for partisans on the opposing sides. And so we get books like What's the Matter With Kansas?, and have Weekly Standard editors who wonder whether Big Business economic policies won't eventually wreck the GOP coalition.

These underlying fractures, however, don't ameliorate the kulturkampf, they aggravate it. They force politicians on both sides to tune their messages to hit the most incendiary hot button issues -- abortion, gay rights, immigration, terrorism -- in order to hold their disparate coalitions together.

The right, in particular, needs the culture war like a paralytic needs his iron lung. It reinforces a simplistic sense of tribal identity (us against the other) that is essential to the paranoid political style -- as Richard Hofstadter dubbed it -- but that increasingly doesn't exist in American society as a whole. The reality (and this brings me to my second point) is that there are not two cultural camps in America but three: the traditionalists, the modernists, and those in the middle, who may be pulled in one direction or another by their ethnic backgrounds, religious faiths, personal life histories or any or all of a thousand other factors.

But this too puts a premium on hot button politics -- in order to pull what would otherwise be a diverse collection of individuals with diverse interests and opinions (conservative on gun control, for example, or liberal on the environment) into one politico-cultural camp or the other. I don't think it's any coincidence that one of the biggest political success stories for the traditionalists lately has been the rise of the megachurches, which often draw from a broad cross section of suburban society, generally offer an extremely generic brand of Protestantism, but indoctrinate their members in a very specific brand of conservative politics, usually built around abortion, homophobia and hyper-patriotism.

The result of all this is a political conflict that grows steadily more vituperative, uncivil and tinged with overtones of violence -- a dynamic which, given the emotional and philosophical tendencies of the two camps, definitely favors the authoritarian right (i.e. the traditionalists.)

Which is why, when I look at this map:

I'm not really reminded of this map:

Nearly so much as I am of this map:

It's a portrait of Spain, about six months into its civil war, which resulted in the overthrow of a fragile republic and the rise to power of the nationalist dictator Francisco Franco. (And yes, he's still dead.) The territory held by the nationalists at this stage of the war is shown in red; the blue is the area still controlled by the republic and its virtually autonomous Basque and Catalan allies.

This division somewhat distorts the actual political loyalties of the country, since some areas, such as western Andalusia, that were generally pro-republic were overrun by the nationalists at the start of the war. But otherwise the geographic analogy is rather strong -- in Spain then, as in America now, the central heartland (particularly Castile and Navarra) was staunchly conservative, while the coasts, north and east, were liberal or even socialist and anarchist. The army and the Catholic hierarchy were largely drawn from the "red states," while the professions, the urban middle class and the industrial working class were heavily concentrated in the "blue states." The largest and most developed urban centers -- Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia -- were in the Republican zone, while the Nationalists controlled the historic cities of Old Spain: Toledo, Burgos and Valladolid.

What makes the comparison most apt, though, is not geography but culture. Spain in the '30s, like America in the '00s, was deeply torn between the modern and the traditional. The big cities, Madrid and Barcelona in particular, were being "Europeanized" -- drawn into a cosmopolitan culture in which fashions, ideas and lifestyles were imported from Paris and London, not the Spanish countryside. Secular and anti-clerical attitudes were spreading. The lifting of censorship under the republic had unleashed art and political expression. Radical and avant-guard publications flourished. Hollywood movies glorified sex and crime (some conservative complaints never change.) Homosexuals, like the poet Gabriel Garcia Lorca, even stuck a toe out of the closet.

To the traditionalists of Old Spain, these were abominations, made even worse by the economic changes that industrializiation and democracy had wrought. Of the old sacred trinity of church, army and crown, the latter had been overthrown while the first two appeared in mortal danger. Foreign doctrines -- socialism, anarchism, communism -- were infecting the national soul. The republic was viewed as an instrument of Spain's enemies, one that had to be destroyed. Or, as the leader of the Falange (Spain's quasi-fascist traditionalist movement) put it:

"We must kill the old soul of the liberal, decadent, masonic, materialist and Frenchified nineteenth century, and return to impregnate ourselves with the spirit of the imperial, heroic, sober, Castilian, spiritual, legendary and knightly sixteenth century."

You know, I think he would have made an excellent speaker at the last Justice Sunday rally.

As in America, though, the Spanish cultural divide was superimposed on long-standing geographic, ethnic and economic fault lines. The Basques and the Catalans had always aspired to greater autonomy if not outright independence. Landless Andalusian farm laborers were in a perpetual state of revolt against feudal landowners. And the industrial working class was organizing both in the Cortes (the Spanish parliament) and on the shop floor. Socialist and anarchist trade unions and political parties were growing more powerful, and the Comintern had gained a foothold.

The point is obviously not that all these conditions exist in America today (I haven't seen any Comintern organizers around my office lately, and if there are any separatist movements out there looking to peel off a few states they're keeping it pretty quiet.) But the fundamental political dynamic of a society polarized between two broad cultural coalitions, deeply hostile to each other, but also riven by internal contradictions, does seems highly comparable. And, as in Spain, the growing paranoia of the traditionalists is being fed by an almost obsessive fear of external enemies -- Al Qaeda and immigrants instead of the Comintern and socialism.

What's most sobering about all this is what happened in Spain when the moment of truth came. Because the two sides didn't begin the war with neat geographical boundaries between them -- e.g. the blue states and the gray -- the result was a chaotic bloodbath. Every city, town and village in Spain became a battlefield where old scores were settled and new ones made. Priests and nuns, union leaders and policemen, peasant activists and local landowners were slaughtered by the thousands. Those who happened to find themselves in the wrong place at the wrong time (like Lorca) were imprisoned, tortured and/or executed by the tens or hundreds of thousands.

The terrors and crazed hatreds of those early weeks basically ensured the entire war would be conducted with exquisite cruelty (of which Picasso's Guernica was only a shadow) and would end in a victory without mercy. It left scars on the Spanish people and nation that are visible to this day.

It's probably not a bad idea to keep those scars in mind when contemplating the current state of the two Americas. There have certainly been times over the past few years when I've wondered whether a separation -- a velvet divorce, like the one that partitioned the old Czechoslovakia -- wouldn't ultimately be best for both sides of our increasingly disfunctional domestic partnership arrangement. It definitely makes for some interesting what-if scenarios, along the lines of Tierney's Confederate day dream. But the hard reality is that political conflicts like ours don't lend themselves to velvet divorces. They're too messy, too vicious, too . . . existential.

The problem is not so much that there are two Americas, but that each of them -- particularly "red" America -- believes they constitute the only true America. Thus all the talk on both sides about "taking back the country." The only way to reach a property settlement in a divorce like that would be to wade though an ocean of blood.

Talk of disunion and civil war may seem like hyperbole. I'm sure it would certainly seem so to the vast majority of Americans who don't think much about politics or culture and just want to get on with their lives. I'm sure most Spaniards felt the same way in the summer of 1936, just as most Americans did in the winter of 1860.

But the historical truth is that civil wars aren't made by vast majorities, but by enraged and fearful minorities. Looking at America's traditionalists and the modernists today, I see plenty of rage and fear, most, though hardly all, of it eminating from the authoritarian right. For now, these primal passions are still being contained within the boundaries of the conventional political process. But that process -- essentially a system for brokering the demands of competing interest groups -- isn't designed to handle the stresses of a full-blown culture war.

Compared to most countries, America has been very lucky so far -- those kind of passions have only erupted in massive bloodshed once (well, twice if you count the original revolution.) By definition, however, something that has already happened is no longer impossible. It's easy for newspaper columnists to fantasize about disunited states, but only madmen would actually try to make them so. Unfortunately, the madmen are out there. It's up to the rest of us to keep them under control.

Posted by billmon at 08:57 PM

pilli

going to LA and california for most of this week

pancho

Viva NACHO!

Fathers day themed Ciuapilli blogging

who's this?

back in 1994 I was straight up gangsta. -please no comments.

The power of SI ! That's the word

I found this special so take a second to read all my cynical friends.

He closed his speech on an apparently semi-serious note, urging the grads to learn how to say "yes." He noted that saying yes will sometimes get them in trouble or make them look like a fool. But he added: "Remember, you cannot be both young and wise. Young people who pretend to be wise to the ways of the world are mostly cynics. Cynicism masquerades as wisdom, but it is the farthest thing from it. Because cynics don't learn anything. Because cynicism is a self-imposed blinder, a rejection of the world because we are afraid it will hurt us or disappoint us.


"Cynics always say no. But saying yes begins things. Saying yes is how things grow. Saying yes leads to knowledge. Yes is for young people. So for as long as you have the strength to, say yes.

"And that's The Word."