US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 27, Catastrophic Failure: Enron, Katrina & Politics in the mid-2000s (Con't)

Bob Badeer: So the rumor's true? They're fuckin' takin' all the money back from you guys? All those money you guys stole from those poor grandmothers in California?
Kevin McGowan: Yeah, Grandma Millie, man. But she's the one who couldn't figure out how to fuckin' vote on the butterfly ballot.
Bob Badeer: Yeah, now she wants her fuckin' money back for all the power you've charged right up—jammed right up her ass for fuckin' $250 a megawatt hour.

—Enron Traders, November 30, 2000 (caught on tape)

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 27, Catastrophic Failure: Enron, Katrina & Politics in the mid-2000s (Con't)

In the Titanic, the captain went down with the ship. And Enron looks to me like the captain first gave himself and his friends a bonus, then lowered himself and the top folks down the lifeboat and then hollered up and said, 'By the way, everything is going to be just fine.'

—Sen. Byron Dorgan (D - ND)

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US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 27, Catastrophic Failure: Enron, Katrina & Politics in the mid-2000s

Enron, based in Houston, is in the vanguard of a powerful movement that hopes to "financialize" (Enron's term) just about everything—that is, trade almost everything as if it were stock options. That movement is as much about politics as it is about business... [L]et's hope that it doesn't take a string of catastrophes to teach us that there are limits to what markets can do.

—Paul Krugman, The New York Times, August 17, 2001

The broader goal of [Paul Krugman's] latest attack on Enron appears to be to discredit the free-market system, a system that entrusts people to make choices and enjoy the fruits of their labor, skill, intellect and heart.

—Kenneth Lay, Enron CEO, August 22, 2001

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 26, Gay Rights Since AIDS (Con't)

As far as this Court is concerned, no one should be fooled; it is just a matter of listening and waiting for the other shoe.

—Anton Scalia, dissent in United States v Windsor (2013)

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 26, Gay Rights Since AIDS (Con't)

Bowers was not correct when it was decided, and it is not correct today.

—Anthony Kennedy, majority opinion in Lawrence v Texas (2003)

This reasoning leaves on pretty shaky grounds state laws limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples.... Today’s opinion is the product of a Court, which is the product of a law-profession culture, that has largely signed on to the so-called homosexual agenda, by which I mean the agenda promoted by some homosexual activists directed at eliminating the moral opprobrium that has traditionally attached to homosexual conduct.... It is clear from this that the Court has taken sides in the culture war, departing from its role of assuring, as neutral observer, that the democratic rules of engagement are observed. Many Americans do not want persons who openly engage in homosexual conduct as partners in their business, as scoutmasters for their children, as teachers in their children’s schools, or as boarders in their home. They view this as protecting themselves and their families from a lifestyle that they believe to be immoral and destructive. The Court views it as “discrimination” which it is the function of our judgments to deter.

—Anton Scalia, dissent in Lawrence v Texas (2003)

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 26, Gay Rights Since AIDS (Con't)

Amendment 2 classifies homosexuals not to further a proper legislative end but to make them unequal to everyone else. This Colorado cannot do. A State cannot so deem a class of persons a stranger to its laws.

—Anthony Kennedy, majority opinion in Romer v Evans (1996)

This Court has no business imposing upon all Americans the resolution favored by the elite class from which the Members of this institution are selected, pronouncing that "animosity" toward homosexuality... Of course it is our moral heritage that one should not hate any human being or class of human beings. But I had thought that one could consider certain conduct reprehensible--murder, for example, or polygamy, or cruelty to animals--and could exhibit even "animus" toward such conduct. Surely that is the only sort of "animus" at issue here: moral disapproval of homosexual conduct, the same sort of moral disapproval that produced the centuries old criminal laws that we held constitutional in Bowers.

—Anton Scalia, dissent in Romer v Evans (1996)

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 26, Gay Rights Since AIDS

But the way to go about it is... to legalize old-style marriage for gays. The gay movement has ducked this issue primarily out of fear of division. Much of the gay leadership clings to notions of gay life as essentially outsider, anti-bourgeois, radical. Marriage, for them, is co-optation into straight society. For the Stonewall generation, it is hard to see how this vision of conflict will ever fundamentally change. But for many other gays--my guess, a majority--while they don't deny the importance of rebellion 20 years ago and are grateful for what was done, there's now the sense of a new opportunity. A need to rebel has quietly ceded to a desire to belong. To be gay and to be bourgeois no longer seems such an absurd proposition. Certainly since AIDS, to be gay and to be responsible has become a necessity.... If these arguments sound socially conservative, that's no accident. It's one of the richest ironies of our society's blind spot toward gays that essentially conservative social goals should have the appearance of being so radical. But gay marriage is not a radical step. It avoids the mess of domestic partnership; it is humane; it is conservative in the best sense of the word.

—Andrew Sullivan (1989)

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 25, The Iraq War (Con't)

Retrospectives:

As I think about this war and others the U.S. has contemplated or entered during my conscious life, I realize how strong is the recurrent pattern of threat inflation. Exactly once in the post-WW II era has the real threat been more ominous than officially portrayed. That was during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, when the world really came within moments of nuclear destruction. Otherwise: the "missile gap." The Gulf of Tonkin. The overall scale of the Soviet menace. Iraq. In each case, the public soberly received official warnings about the imminent threat. In cold retrospect, those warnings were wrong -- or contrived, or overblown, or misperceived. Official claims about the evils of these systems were many times justified. Claims about imminent threats were most of the times hyped.

—James Fallows, 2013

I am not a radical. But more than anything the Iraq War taught me the folly of mocking radicalism. It seemed, back then, that every "sensible" and "serious" person you knew -- left or right -- was for the war. And they were all wrong. Never forget that they were all wrong. And never forget that the radicals with their drum circles and their wild hair were right. Watching reasonable people assemble sober arguments for a disaster was, to put it mildly, searing.

—Ta-Nehisi Coates, 2013

As someone who was involved in day-to-day antiwar activism at the time, the visceral hatred of those opposing the war, and particularly the activists, was impossible to miss. It wasn't opposition. It wasn't disagreement. It was pure, irrational hatred, frequently devolving into accusations of antiwar activists being effectively part of the enemy.... A huge amount of the arguments in favor of the war were essentially genetic: look at the people opposing the war, dirty fucking hippies! How could you stand with them?

—Freddie deBoer, 2013

I was an integral part of the problem. I drank deeply of the neocon Kool-Aid. I was also, clearly countering the trauma of 9/11 by embracing a policy that somewhere in my psyche seemed the only appropriate response to the magnitude of the offense. Prudence, skepticism left me. I’d backed Bush in 2000. I knew Rummy as a friend. And my critical faculties were swamped by fear. These are not excuses. These are simply part of my attempt to understand how wrong I was – and why.

—Andrew Sullivan, 2013

What all of us [who opposed the Iraq war] had in common is probably a simple recognition: War is a big deal. It isn’t normal. It’s not something to take up casually. Any war you can describe as “a war of choice” is a crime. War feeds on and feeds the negative passions. It is to be shunned where possible and regretted when not. Various hawks occasionally protested that “of course” they didn’t enjoy war, but they were almost always lying. Anyone who saw invading foreign lands and ruling other countries by force as extraordinary was forearmed against the lies and delusions of the time.

—Jim Henley, March 2008

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 25, The Iraq War (Con't)

How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?

—Future Senator John Kerry, April, 1971

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US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 25, The Iraq War (Con't)

I always knew the Americans would bring electricity back to Baghdad. I just never thought they'd be shooting it up my ass.

—Young Iraqi translator, Baghdad, November 2003

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US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 25, The Iraq War (Con't)

The truth is that, for reasons that have a lot to do with the U.S. government bureaucracy, we settled on the one issue that everyone could agree on which was weapons of mass destruction as the core reason.

—Paul Wolfowitz, May, 2003

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 25, The Iraq War (Con't)

[There was a] terrorism bubble that built up over the 1990s... And what we needed to do was go over to that part of the world, I'm afraid, and burst that bubble... And what they needed to see was American boys and girls going house to house from Basra to Baghdad, and basically saying, "Which part of this sentence don’t you understand? You don’t think we care about our open society? You think this bubble fantasy, we’re going to just let it grow? Well, suck on this." That... was what this war was about. We could have hit Saudi Arabia. It was part of that bubble. We could have hit Pakistan, We hit Iraq because we could. That’s the real truth.

—Thomas Friedman (Pulitzer-prize winning New York Times columnist), in an interview, May 30, 2003

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 25, The Iraq War (Con't)

Facing clear evidence of peril, we cannot wait for the final proof, the smoking gun that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud.

—George W. Bush, October 7, 2002

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 25, The Iraq War (Con't)

You can't distinguish between Al Qaeda and Saddam when you talk about the war on terror.

—George W. Bush, September 25, 2002

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US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 25, The Iraq War (Con't)

From a marketing point of view, you don't introduce new products in August.

—White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card, September, 2002, explaining why the Bush administration did not begin hawking the Iraq war earlier

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

Francis Spufford on Scottish Independence

Francis Spufford — a truly fabulous writer I have recommended before — writes in the comments to this Crooked Timber thread about the origins of the present possibilities of Scottish independence, and why he cares:

My sense of where this comes from, fwiw, is that we’re seeing another of the long-run institution-shredding consequences of Thatcherism. She was very good at melting solid things into air, and the final thing dissolved may turn out to be the British state itself...

Why do I care about this? Because, in line with my above reading of the history of the last forty years, it seems like yet another victory for a politics in which shared possessions (the National Health Service, a public sector in the economy, a more-than-national citizenship, 300 years of history) are splintered, financialised, privatised, discarded. Because I feel about the potential departure of Scotland the way that a liberal Democrat in North Carolina would feel about Massachusetts buggering off out of the Union of the United States, and taking its electoral college votes with it, forever. Because Scotland – which I certainly do not regard with contempt – contributes a tough, undeferential, vinegary, self-sufficient, Puritan, civic, hardscrabble, emphasis to our shared British politics and culture, without which it would be very noticeably more dominated by smooth looters and PR-people. Because I don’t want Alasdair Gray or Ken Macleod to be foreigners.

The ellipsis above includes details on how Scottish dependence was transformed first by Thatcherism and then by Blair-style labor.  Click through for the whole thing.  And if you're interested, Spufford is an active participant in the whole thread, which includes in the original post a video of him discussing this along with SF writer Ken MacLeod.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 25, The Iraq War (Con't)

There is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction.

—Vice President Dick Cheney, August, 2002

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 25, The Iraq War (Con't)

Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy.

—Downing Street Memo, July, 2002 (made public, May, 2005)

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 25, The Iraq War (Con't)

I believe demolishing Hussein’s military power and liberating Iraq would be a cakewalk.

—Reagan-era national-security official Kenneth Adelman, February, 2002

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 25, The Iraq War (Con't)

I want you, as soon as you can, to go back over everything, everything. See if Saddam did this.

—George W. Bush to counterterrorism czar Richard Clarke, September 12, 2001

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 25, The Iraq War

...As we know, there are known knowns; there are things that we know that we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns, the ones we don't know we don't know.

—Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld (February, 2002)

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 24, 9/11 (Con't)

We can go to the country on this issue because they trust the Republican Party to do a better job of protecting and strengthening America's military might and thereby protecting America.

—Karl Rove, speaking to the RNC, January 18, 2002

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 24, 9/11 (Con't)

I bet it doesn't get any easier from here on.

—Harvey Pekar

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 24, 9/11 (Con't)

The sky was falling and streaked with blood
I heard you calling me, then you disappeared into the dust
Up the stairs, into the fire
Up the stairs, into the fire
I need your kiss, but love and duty called you someplace higher
Somewhere up the stairs, into the fire
May your strength give us strength
May your faith give us faith
May your hope give us hope
May your love give us love

—Bruce Springsteen, "Into the Fire" (2002)

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 24, 9/11 (Con't)

The middle part of the country - the great red zone that voted for Bush - is clearly ready for war. The decadent left in its enclaves on the coasts is not dead -and may well mount a fifth column.

—Andrew Sullivan, September 16, 2001

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 24, 9/11 (Con't)

I also want to speak tonight directly to Muslims throughout the world. We respect your faith. It's practiced freely by many millions of Americans and by millions more in countries that America counts as friends. Its teachings are good and peaceful, and those who commit evil in the name of Allah blaspheme the name of Allah. The terrorists are traitors to their own faith, trying, in effect, to hijack Islam itself. The enemy of America is not our many Muslim friends. It is not our many Arab friends. Our enemy is a radical network of terrorists and every government that supports them.

—George Bush, 20 September, 2001

Americans are asking ``Why do they hate us?'' They hate what they see right here in this chamber: a democratically elected government. Their leaders are self-appointed. They hate our freedoms: our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other.

—Ibid.

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 24, 9/11 (Con't)

Nous sommes tous Américains. ("We are all Americans")

—Headline in Le Monde, 13 September 2001

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 24, 9/11 (Con't)

A Shattered Nation Longs To Care About Stupid Bullshit Again

—Onion headline, October 3, 2001

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 24, 9/11 (Con't)

War Is a Force Which Gives Us Meaning

—Chris Hedges (book title)

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 24, 9/11 (Con't)

Tell the Taliban we're finished with them.

—George W. Bush, September 11, 2001, to the National Security Council

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.

US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 24, 9/11 (Con't)

We will make no distinction between the terrorists who committed these acts and those who harbor them.

—George W. Bush, September 11, 2001, addressing the public

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.