Two little tidbits from my morning’s reading that strike me as a kind of commentary on the state of much of Missouri’s political elite:

The deluded:  Phyllis Schlafly is worried that cap-and-trade may not be dead enough to suit wingnutlandians given the statutory obligation of the EPA to enforce the Clean Air Act. She bases her fears on the insights of Oklahoma Senator Jim Inhofe whom – get this – she considers to be “the Senate’s environmentalism expert.” Let’s see  … isn’t Jim “global-warming-is-a-hoax” Inhofe the guy who tried to debunk the “hockey stick” model of global warming in a Senate speech by citing research that actually supported it? Hard to believe that there are any people in this state who take Schlafly seriously.

The doofus: “Just call me Billy” Long (R-7 elect) who ran on a “fed up” platform pledging to “make a difference,” has found a way to do just that: Long, who seems to have a cowboy hat glued to his head, wants Speaker John Boehner to relax the House rules about wearing hats on the floor. And guess what? It’s a bipartisan effort since he and Florida’s Democratic Rep. Frederica Wilson have banded together as the sole members of the “cowboy hat caucus.” I guess he could be up to much worse – and he probably will be soon enough.

The three reasons:  the Missouri Tea Party, Phyllis Schlafly and Joe the Plumber. I don’t normally advocate arguments based on an appeal to authority, but in this case the temptation to argue negatively based on an appeal to (anti?) authority is just too strong. Doesn’t the fact that the Tea Party, Phyllis Schlafly and Joe the Plumber have jumped into the fray against the “Puppy Mill Cruelty Prevention Act” (Proposition B) make you want to run out and vote for it immediately?

Animal cruelty is not a liberal or conservative issue per se. Many good, conservative Republicans in my neighborhood signed the petition to get Prop. B on the ballot. However, the anti-Prop. B lobbying efforts on the part of the Tea Party and the two media personalities is more or less predictable. The Tea Party, for instance, seems so worked up that a new group in Mexico, Mo. will devote it’s first meeting to figuring out how they can fight Prop. B. One can only imagine what frothing displays we will be gifted  with if they manage to get their bad-tempered act together.

The Tea Party involvement is easy to explain. The organization formed to fight Prop B, the misnamed Alliance for Truth (they claim that anti-animal cruelty activists “don’t like animals”), for lack of a better tack, is pushing all kinds of far-fetched conspiracy stories – catnip for Tea Party paranoia.

The Alliance has managed to distort the simple and straightforward provisions of Prop. 6 into a “radical” plot that reaches into (where else?) the White House. According to Alliance for Truth spokesperson, Anita Andrews, the main instigator of this plot is the Humane Society of the Unitd States (HSUS) which:

… seeks only to raise the cost of breeding dogs, making it ever-more difficult for middle-class American families to be dog-owners.”

[…]

Andrews  also explained that Cass Sunstein, “one of the biggest animal rights activists,” and President Obama’s Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, is tied to the Humane Society, and is helping them give Obama “a punch list” of the animals rights activists’ agenda.

It would take its own separate post to go into all that’s wrong with this little gem.

The involvement of Joe the Plumber requires no explanation beyond the fact that taking up the fight against Prop. B offers one more avenue for expanding his fifteen minutes of fame. This explanation also helps us understand his incoherent, over-the-top statement on the Alliance for Truth site, which proclaims Prop. B proponents to be:

…cowardly hiding behind animal cruelty, lying to our citizens and taking our constitutional rights away – one state at a time.

Ahhh! The constitutional right to be cruel abuse animals! I knew there had to be a constitutional issue in there somewhere. Since Prop B doesn’t involve the federal government, but simply a state deciding for itself about whether or not it wants to allow longstanding abuses to continue, the constitutional card loses some of the old Tea Party punch. But never fear, it does its job with the target audience; all you have to do is repeat the word “constitutional” enough and they end up drooling on the rug.

Phyllis Schlafly’s Eagle Forum, of course, opposes government regulation on principle. The weakness of this position in cases like that of Missouri’s scandalous puppy mill industry is revealed by her tactics.  Instead of principled arguments about regulation, even poor, old, hardline Phyllis is reduced to advocating conspiracy theories to make her opposition to anti-cruelty legislation palatable:

HSUS has attacked modern livestock production practices in several other states and, while the first battle in Missouri is targeted to dog breeders, this is the precursor to subsequent fight involving our Missouri farm families

Can’t these bozos get it through their heads that this legislation deals exclusively with dog breeders, and that it has been proposed because the puppy mill industry has been a blight on Missouri’s reputation for years? Any legislation, for good or ill, directed at other livestock will have to be passed or defeated on its own terms.

Read the provisions of Prop.B yourself. They are straightforward and describe minimal improvements in the welfare of dogs used for large-scale breeding purposes. TPM quotes Humane Society spokesperson Michael Markarian who summarizes Prop. B  as follows:

This measure would provide common sense standards for the care of dogs,” he told TPM, including sufficient food and clean water, vet care, regular exercise, and adequate rest between breeding cycles, among other things. Markarian said the measure only applies to “commercial dog breeding facilities” that have more than 10 breeding females who they use for “producing puppies for the pet trade.

If conforming to these very basic requirements would bankrupt a breeder, as some have argued, then that breeder should not be in the business in the first place. We don’t condone forced child labor because paying adults a living wage would bankrupt the manufacturer – do we?

It should tell us something when the opponents of proposed legislation resort to manufacturing non-existent conspiracies, imagining impossible constitutional encroachments, and projecting their own dishonest agendas on a clear-as-water initiative. The “slippery slope” argument that gets them so worked up has always been a loser that has hurt “us” more than “them.” In this case it will only serve to perpetuate unnecessary animal suffering.

Tea Party photo by Sage Ross from Wikimedia Commons; Joe the Plumber photo from Wikimedia Commons.

Chancellor Wrighton just sent out an e-mail to everyone at Washington University to confirm that the university will confer an honorary doctorate to Phyllis Schlafly at the commencement ceremony on Friday. The only “concession” he made was to state that trustee Margaret Bush Wilson will read Schlafly’s citation. As “the first woman of color to serve as the national chair of the NAACP” and “the second woman of color admitted to practice law in Missouri,” her inclusion will supposedly show the university’s commitment to diversity and tolerance.

But the chancellor is missing the point. The issue isn’t just the inflammatory statements that Phyllis Schlafly has made, it’s the fact that she’s an anti-intellectual, someone who has made a career out of opposing the very reasoned discourse that should be the foundation of a respected university. Allowing an advocate of tolerance and diversity legitimizes not only the extreme views of Phyllis Schlafly but also her approach to inquiry.

Wrighton also stated that the university would make unspecified changes to the honorary degree selection process. Here’s hoping they will block out future nominees who approach the offensiveness of Phyllis Schlafly.

The full text of the letter is below the fold.

Dear Members of the Washington University Community,

I write to address the controversy surrounding the decision to award

Phyllis Schlafly an honorary degree at Commencement this Friday, May 16,

2008. I am sorry that this controversy may detract from Commencement.

However, the Trustees, the University administration and I fully support

the rights of our students and others within this community to express

their concerns on this issue.

Our long-standing process for awarding the honorary degree was followed:

Mrs. Schlafly was nominated by a member of the community and was reviewed

by the Board’s Honorary Degree Committee.  The Committee included faculty,

students, trustees and administrators. After two meetings, Mrs. Schlafly

and other nominees were recommended unanimously for consideration at the

full Board meeting.  The full Board voted to award the honorary degree at

the May 2007 meeting.

Following the public announcement of the honorary degrees, many in the

University community have called for the University to rescind that offer,

stating that Mrs. Schlafly is associated with some views, opinions and

statements that are inconsistent with the tolerant and inclusive values of

the Washington University community. Personally, I do not endorse her

views or opinions, and in many instances, I strongly disagree with them.

However, after further consultation with members of the University’s Board

of Trustees, the University has concluded that it will fulfill its

commitment to award the degree to Mrs. Schlafly.  I apologize for the

anguish this decision has caused to many members of our community.

In bestowing this degree, the University is not endorsing Mrs. Schlafly’s

views or opinions; rather, it is recognizing an alumna of the University

whose life and work have had a broad impact on American life and have

sparked widespread debate and controversies that in many cases have helped

people better formulate and articulate their own views about the values

they hold.

At Commencement, Trustee Emerita Margaret Bush Wilson has volunteered to

read the citation to award the degree to Mrs. Schlafly. As the first woman

of color to serve as the national chair of the NAACP, the second woman of

color admitted to practice law in Missouri, and as a prominent St. Louis

civil rights attorney for more than 40 years, she provides a strong voice

for the importance of tolerance and discourse as hallmarks of the

Washington University community.

In the midst of this controversy, I want to affirm my personal and the

University’s institutional commitment to strengthening diversity and

inclusiveness and to improving gender balance. Additionally, I have made a

commitment that the University will review the process for awarding

honorary degrees and will propose appropriate changes.

Washington University is home to students and faculty from all walks of

life, from most systems of religious belief and political thought, and

from all corners of the world. Yet we do not require these widely diverse

individuals to agree with one another. We are stronger because

disagreement allows us the opportunity to speak as individuals and as

advocates for sometimes widely divergent agendas. Collegial dialogue and

discourse inform us as to our feelings and help guide an institution that

nurtures debate and tolerance.  A university is strengthened by exchanges

that may be strongly worded, and that may have been born from the passions

and rhetoric of disagreement.

Washington University – or any other university – is neither perfect nor

are all its processes for making decisions.  We can always do better.  In

the aftermath of Commencement, I am deeply committed to whatever work

needs to be done to rebuild damaged relationships with members of our

community — faculty, students, alumni, parents, trustees and staff.  I

thank you for all that you do to make this a community so open, tolerant

and inclusive, and I ask for your assistance as we work together to build

the very best environment for all who live, learn, discover and create

here.

Sincerely,

Mark S. Wrighton

Chancellor

Following up on Blue Girl’s recent report of some really bad journalism, I’d like to point out this gem from St. Louis’s Channel 5 news on the Phyllis Schlafly debacle, which is either blatantly adopting a right wing frame or is pure laziness incarnate:

So “some students and staff” (ie, DFHs) are upset about Schlafly getting an honorary doctorate.  But, of course, the objective way of describing the situation is claiming that Schlafly is a lifelong advocate of “family values.”  Then, you might as well throw in a couple choice quotes from Schlafly like “I think the role  of the full-time homemaker should be honored and respected” (yeah, that’s what this whole controversy is about) and the old “I’m not worried about myself, I just hope the university is OK” thing,  and one from the university about how any honorary doctorate is going to be controversial.

Finally, to show that they are fair and balanced, they include one quote from the head of the Women’s Studies Department.  This basically presents this as a “she said, she said” issue; one side thinks this, the other side thinks that (framed all the while around the imaginary question of whether one should be pro-family or not).  But would it kill Ryan Dean to actually do some research on the reasons why people are actually upset?  For example, would it be that hard to  list one of these quotes from Schlafly so that people can make up their own mind on what they think of her views:

“I suspect that the picture of the woman soldier with a noose around the Iraqi man’s neck will soon show up on the bulletin boards of women’s studies centers and feminist college professors.  That picture is the radical feminists’ ultimate fantasy of how they dream of treating men.” (Schlafly’s Eagle Forum newsletter, 19 May 2004)

“By getting married, the woman has consented to sex, and I don’t think you can call it rape.” (speech at Bates College, 28 March 2007; WashU’s Student Life, 12 May 2008)

Sexual harassment on the job is not a problem for virtuous women, except in the rarest of cases. Men hardly ever ask sexual favors of women from whom the certain answer is no. Virtuous women are seldom accosted. (TIME Magazine, 4 May 1981)

“The flight from the home is a flight from yourself, from responsibility, from the nature of woman, in pursuit of false hopes and fading illusions.” (www.CampusProgress.org)

“ERA means abortion funding, means homosexual privileges, means whatever else.” (www.brainyquote.com)

“The atomic bomb is a marvelous gift that was given to our country by a wise God.” (N.Y. Times, 9 July 1982)

“Sex education classes are like in-home sales parties for abortions.” (Eagle Forum newsletter)

On Harvard president Larry Summer’s assertion that women are not cut out for science: “The outburst by feminist professors simply confirms the stereotype … that they are too emotional to handle intellectual or scientific debate.” (Eagle Forum newsletter, 9 March 2005)

Oh wait, I just did it; I guess it must not be that hard.

I had started a post about Phyllis Schlafly and her honorary degree at Wash U, but after reading this post by Kathy G, I gave up, because she absolutely nails it.

I am in complete agreement with Wolfe here-Phyllis Schlafly is indeed probably “one of the two or three most important Americans of the last half of the twentieth century.” That is a bitter and painful truth, but a truth nonetheless. Wolfe again:

Critchlow [author of the Schlafly biography Wolfe is reviewing] is right to insist on Schlafly’s influence-but influence is a neutral category. It may be a force for good or a force for ill, depending upon the ideas that animate it. Let it be said of Phyllis Schlafly that every idea she had was scatter-brained, dangerous, and hateful. The more influential she became, the worse off America became.

The officials at Washington U. can piously murmur all the bland words they please about “difficult issues where differences of opinion are profound and passionate,” but let’s get real: when you award someone with an honorary degree, you are making a value judgment[…]

But very rarely-in fact, almost never-do you see a great university honor someone who, throughout her public life has shown nothing but contempt for the values of the academia, values such as intellectual honesty and integrity, rational discourse, and the dispassionate pursuit of knowledge.

It gets better from there. As they say, read the rest.