Government | Bob Schwartz

May 16, 2013

Politics Usual or Unusual

Barack Obama
Most presidents, even the ones you love to hate, are idealists. At least at the start. For some, depending on the times, the makeup of Congress, and the skills of the national CEO , the presidency is where dreams go to die. Since the enemies of Obama–and he has bitter enemies in high places—have raised the ghost of Nixon, it is a good time to honestly set perspective.

The best way to measure the historic egregiousness of presidential misperformance is to count the friends who remained even as it was unfolding. There is a point at which that inchoate thing we might call the honor of the country is at stake, rather than just individual transgressions. Lying in office, either about sex or about phantom weapons, is apparently not enough to turn everybody against you. Killing the economy and then handing a near lifeless body to your successor isn’t either. Blowing up the Constitution is.

So what we have at this moment is not Nixonian by any stretch. What we have is the unpretty side of presidential pragmatism, the point at which feeling forced to play the game as it is played, rather than the way you had dreamed it could be played, is on unflattering display. Obama’s no good very bad week has led to a variety of dancing that no one should watch. There is Republican grave dancing, Obama supporter apologist dancing, and administration pretzel dancing. This last is exemplified by the Attorney General distancing himself from a possibly justifiable but absolutely controversial decision to monitor journalists to discover leaks, and at the same time pushing for a media shield law that would help make the particular investigation more difficult, less likely, or even impossible. That is, stop us before we kill again.

This all adds up to something not that spectacular, but for some a little disheartening in its plainness and obviousness. Politics is a life size business. Once in a while, some come along who stand taller, act more forthrightly, speak a little more inspiringly in ways that make us believe in the possible and in ourselves. We must have this because without vision, the people really do perish. Obama seems to be one of those. This week, though, he is stuck in a moment that is more usual, looking more usual. The unusual will be back, or at least it should, but right now, what it is is governing.

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May 8, 2013

Publius Speaks to Congress

Publius Valerius Publicola (“friend of the people”) was a Roman consul who helped found the Roman Republic circa 509 BCE. When James Madison, Alexander Hamilton and John Jay began publishing The Federalist Papers in 1787, they attached his name to their arguments for adoption of the Constitution.

We don’t know how many current members of Congress have read the Federalist Papers—not even all 85 papers, maybe just a few. We also don’t know how many senior members of the executive branch have done so. We can assume that all nine Supreme Court Justices have; these are, after all, an essential part of the legislative history of the Constitution.

Every time you see politicians brandishing the Constitution as a weapon, well-meaningly or just plain meanly; every time you hear a half-baked political argument or analysis that makes absolutely no sense, but is based mostly or entirely on emotion or ambition; every time you wonder whether a particular politician is taking the best interests of the country to heart or is just interested I getting ahead, the Federalist Papers are your talisman.

The Federalist Papers are a brilliant combination of careful philosophy and political realities—a balance between aspiration and actuality, between the way we want to be and the way we are.

When we hear today about “grand bargains” being struck in Congress—or often not being reached at all—you have to laugh. The very same founders who are treated as saints or even gods had to make the grandest of all bargains so that this nation could exist and endure. And in the Federalist Papers, we find the philosophical intelligence, the political courage and the candid self-awareness to expose how narrow interest and pettiness can stand in the way of solutions. If anything has changed in more than two centuries, it’s that we seem to have fewer Madisons, Hamiltons and Jays front and center in our national discourse:

A torrent of angry and malignant passions will be let loose. To judge from the conduct of the opposite parties, we shall be led to conclude that they will mutually hope to evince the justness of their opinions, and to increase the number of their converts by the loudness of their declamations and the bitterness of their invectives.

An enlightened zeal for the energy and efficiency of government will be stigmatized as the offspring of a temper fond of despotic power and hostile to the principles of liberty. An over-scrupulous jealousy of danger to the rights of the people, which is more commonly the fault of the head than of the heart, will be represented as mere pretense and artifice, the stale bait for popularity at the expense of the public good.

It will be forgotten, on the one hand, that jealousy is the usual concomitant of love, and that the noble enthusiasm of liberty is apt to be infected with a spirit of narrow and illiberal distrust. On the other hand, it will be equally forgotten that the vigor of government is essential to the security of liberty; that, in the contemplation of a sound and well-informed judgment, their interest can never be separated; and that a dangerous ambition more often lurks behind the specious mask of zeal for the rights of the people than under the forbidden appearance of zeal for the firmness and efficiency of government.

Federalist No. 1

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April 12, 2013

Your Congressional District on Drugs

Brain on Drugs
This is your geography.

NEO

This is your Congressional District on drugs.

Ohio 13th District

Any questions?

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April 3, 2013

198 Ways to Make Change

The Albert Einstein Institution may be the most important organization you’ve never heard of, and Gene Sharp may be the most important person. Since 1983, he has dedicated himself to advancing the study and use of strategic nonviolent action in conflicts throughout the world.

These are just a few of the headlines he has garnered in the past year or so:

The New Statesman – Gene Sharp: The Machiavelli of non-violence.
The Progressive – Nonviolence Strategist Gets Deserved Recognition.
Deutsche Welle – Alternative Nobel Winner says non-violence works.
The New York Times – The Quiet American.
CNN – Gene Sharp: A dictator’s worst nightmare.
The Nation – Gene Sharp, Nonviolent Warrior.
The Boston Globe – Sharp: The man who changed the world.

His book From Dictatorship to Democracy is an introduction to the use of nonviolent action to change regimes. It has been translated into seventeen languages and has served as a pro-democracy guide for movements around the world. This and other books are available free for download on the website.

Even if you are not living in a dictatorship and are not planning to topple a government, you will find a very small and very valuable item at AEI. Think of it as a jewel of social action. It is a two-page list of 198 Methods of Nonviolent Action. You will find the list below.

For those who want to make change, big or small, the keys are commitment and creativity. We’ve seen some inspired actions take hold. We’ve also seen some well-meaning initiatives pop-up and die almost as quickly. There is no blame in this. Sometimes all that’s needed is a fresh spring wind to revive the spirit of change.

This list is that spring wind. Look it over. This may go without saying, but be well aware that a number of these actions are obviously aimed at a serious lack of or breach of democracy, and are appropriately serious for those situations. All of them necessarily involve social, economic, legal, moral and ethical issues that must be considered. Maybe you will find something to do. Maybe you won’t do anything, but will be uplifted by knowing that such things can be done, have been done, and have moved communities and whole nations—today, in this very world—a little way along a path to freedom and justice.

198 Methods of Nonviolent Action
Albert Einstein Institution

The Methods of Nonviolent Protest and Persuasion

Formal Statements
1. Public Speeches
2. Letters of opposition or support
3. Declarations by organizations and institutions
4. Signed public statements
5. Declarations of indictment and intention
6. Group or mass petitions

Communications with a Wider Audience
7. Slogans, caricatures, and symbols
8. Banners, posters, displayed communications
9. Leaflets, pamphlets, and books
10. Newspapers and journals
11. Records, radio, and television
12. Skywriting and earthwriting

Group Representations
13. Deputations
14. Mock awards
15. Group lobbying
16. Picketing
17. Mock elections

Symbolic Public Acts
18. Displays of flags and symbolic colors
19. Wearing of symbols
20. Prayer and worship
21. Delivering symbolic objects
22. Protest disrobings
23. Destruction of own property
24. Symbolic lights
25. Displays of portraits
26. Paint as protest
27. New signs and names
28. Symbolic sounds
29. Symbolic reclamations
30. Rude gestures

Pressures on Individuals
31. “Haunting” officials
32. Taunting officials
33. Fraternization
34. Vigils

Drama and Music
35. Humorous skits and pranks
36. Performances of plays and music
37. Singing

Processions
38. Marches
39. Parades
40. Religious processions
41. Pilgrimages
42. Motorcades

Honoring the Dead
43. Political mourning
44. Mock funerals
45. Demonstrative funerals
46. Homage at burial places

Public Assemblies
47. Assemblies of protest or support
48. Protest meetings
49. Camouflaged meetings of protest
50. Teach-ins

Withdrawal and Renunciation
51. Walk-outs
52. Silence
53. Renouncing honors
54. Turning one’s back

The Methods Of Social Noncooperation

Ostracism of Persons
55. Social boycott
56. Selective social boycott
57. Lysistratic nonaction
58. Excommunication
59. Interdict

Noncooperation with Social Events, Customs, and Institutions
60. Suspension of social and sports activities
61. Boycott of social affairs
62. Student strike
63. Social disobedience
64. Withdrawal from social institutions

Withdrawal from the Social System
65. Stay-at-home
66. Total personal noncooperation
67. “Flight” of workers
68. Sanctuary
69. Collective disappearance
70. Protest emigration (hijrat)

The Methods of Economic Noncooperation: Economic Boycotts

Actions by Consumers
71. Consumers’ boycott
72. Nonconsumption of boycotted goods
73. Policy of austerity
74. Rent withholding
75. Refusal to rent
76. National consumers’ boycott
77. International consumers’ boycott

Action by Workers and Producers
78. Workmen’s boycott
79. Producers’ boycott

Action by Middlemen
80. Suppliers’ and handlers’ boycott

Action by Owners and Management
81. Traders’ boycott
82. Refusal to let or sell property
83. Lockout
84. Refusal of industrial assistance
85. Merchants’ “general strike”

Action by Holders of Financial Resources
86. Withdrawal of bank deposits
87. Refusal to pay fees, dues, and assessments
88. Refusal to pay debts or interest
89. Severance of funds and credit
90. Revenue refusal
91. Refusal of a government’s money

Action by Governments
92. Domestic embargo
93. Blacklisting of traders
94. International sellers’ embargo
95. International buyers’ embargo
96. International trade embargo

The Methods Of Economic Noncooperation: The Strike

Symbolic Strikes
97. Protest strike
98. Quickie walkout (lightning strike)

Agricultural Strikes
99. Peasant strike
100. Farm Workers’ strike

Strikes by Special Groups
101. Refusal of impressed labor
102. Prisoners’ strike
103. Craft strike
104. Professional strike

Ordinary Industrial Strikes
105. Establishment strike
106. Industry strike
107. Sympathetic strike

Restricted Strikes
108. Detailed strike
109. Bumper strike
110. Slowdown strike
111. Working-to-rule strike
112. Reporting “sick” (sick-in)
113. Strike by resignation
114. Limited strike
115. Selective strike

Multi-Industry Strikes
116. Generalized strike
117. General strike

Combination of Strikes and Economic Closures
118. Hartal
119. Economic shutdown

The Methods Of Political Noncooperation

Rejection of Authority
120. Withholding or withdrawal of allegiance
121. Refusal of public support
122. Literature and speeches advocating resistance

Citizens’ Noncooperation with Government
123. Boycott of legislative bodies
124. Boycott of elections
125. Boycott of government employment and positions
126. Boycott of government depts., agencies, and other bodies
127. Withdrawal from government educational institutions
128. Boycott of government-supported organizations
129. Refusal of assistance to enforcement agents
130. Removal of own signs and placemarks
131. Refusal to accept appointed officials
132. Refusal to dissolve existing institutions

Citizens’ Alternatives to Obedience
133. Reluctant and slow compliance
134. Nonobedience in absence of direct supervision
135. Popular nonobedience
136. Disguised disobedience
137. Refusal of an assemblage or meeting to disperse
138. Sitdown
139. Noncooperation with conscription and deportation
140. Hiding, escape, and false identities
141. Civil disobedience of “illegitimate” laws

Action by Government Personnel
142. Selective refusal of assistance by government aides
143. Blocking of lines of command and information
144. Stalling and obstruction
145. General administrative noncooperation
146. Judicial noncooperation
147. Deliberate inefficiency and selective noncooperation by enforcement agents
148. Mutiny

Domestic Governmental Action
149. Quasi-legal evasions and delays
150. Noncooperation by constituent governmental units

International Governmental Action
151. Changes in diplomatic and other representations
152. Delay and cancellation of diplomatic events
153. Withholding of diplomatic recognition
154. Severance of diplomatic relations
155. Withdrawal from international organizations
156. Refusal of membership in international bodies
157. Expulsion from international organizations

The Methods Of Nonviolent Intervention

Psychological Intervention
158. Self-exposure to the elements
159. The fast
a) Fast of moral pressure
b) Hunger strike
c) Satyagrahic fast
160. Reverse trial
161. Nonviolent harassment

Physical Intervention
162. Sit-in
163. Stand-in
164. Ride-in
165. Wade-in
166. Mill-in
167. Pray-in
168. Nonviolent raids
169. Nonviolent air raids
170. Nonviolent invasion
171. Nonviolent interjection
172. Nonviolent obstruction
173. Nonviolent occupation

Social Intervention
174. Establishing new social patterns
175. Overloading of facilities
176. Stall-in
177. Speak-in
178. Guerrilla theater
179. Alternative social institutions
180. Alternative communication system

Economic Intervention
181. Reverse strike
182. Stay-in strike
183. Nonviolent land seizure
184. Defiance of blockades
185. Politically motivated counterfeiting
186. Preclusive purchasing
187. Seizure of assets
188. Dumping
189. Selective patronage
190. Alternative markets
191. Alternative transportation systems
192. Alternative economic institutions

Political Intervention
193. Overloading of administrative systems
194. Disclosing identities of secret agents
195. Seeking imprisonment
196. Civil disobedience of “neutral” laws
197. Work-on without collaboration
198. Dual sovereignty and parallel government

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March 22, 2013

The Iraq War and the Ryan Budget: A Modest Proposal

Paul Ryan Budget
We have two budget crises. One is the budget itself, which is clearly in need of work to make concrete our priorities and the willingness of citizens to support those priorities in the form of taxes. The second crisis is political dysfunction, where real and constructive talk about those priorities and that support is transformed and devolved into useless politalk. One way that uselessness is hidden is by obfuscation and throwing around lots of numbers, details, and core American principles.

Simplify, simplify.

We just marked the 10th anniversary of the Iraq War. There is going to be disagreement about many aspects of that war for generations.

But there is consensus on two things.

The war was financially expensive. How expensive is another matter of contention. The Costs of War Project pegs it at a few trillion dollars, give or take. So how expensive? Very expensive.

The war was not paid for. More precisely, the war was paid for by debt, not by taxes. The United States had never done this before. There are two perfectly good reasons to ask Americans to pay for and sacrifice for wars. Wars are expensive. And taxing for war asks all citizens at all economic levels to make real sacrifice, even if they or their loved ones are not in harm’s way. As a political matter, when the sacrifice outweighs support for the war, there may be pressure to question or even end the war.

It is uncontested that George W. Bush and Congress did not ask for that sacrifice. Without arguing about how that happened, it is the fact. There is no argument about the result. In the midst of this massive borrowing to pay for the war, the economy fell down, and is still having trouble getting up.

With a sense of humility, and standing in the shadow of today’s esteemed Congress, here is a simple and modest proposal.

1. Agree on the financial cost of the Iraq War. For purposes of discussion, let’s say $3 trillion, though it is certainly more.

2. Agree to taxes that will generate that amount of revenue, not a cent more or less. That revenue would then be spent on all the important things that would otherwise be underfunded or unfunded, including every possible entitlement for veterans.

3. Once that money is raised and spent, taxes will revert to the earlier levels, and some members of Congress can go back to babbling, bickering and posturing.

Simple, maybe even naïve. Certainly too naive for the sophisticated politicians who are busy building a budgetary hall of mirrors that only they can navigate, where they think they can hide themselves and some simple, inconvenient truths.

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March 5, 2013

The Postal Service Loves Modern Art

Postal Service - Modern Art
We are becoming inconstant cultural historians. History, cultural and otherwise, requires more than knowing what happened when, or even knowing its significance. Real history is about an overwhelming sense of appreciation for just how major something was, both in its time and as a precursor of today.

This trajectory is unwelcome but not surprising. We have never lived in a time when the trip from new to newer to newest is as breathtakingly fast, which means that the past exists as a distant dot, visited on a need to know, need to show basis.

One hundred years ago, an art exhibition was held in New York that changed America. The International Exhibition of Modern Art, better known as the Armory Show, took place in February and March of 1913. It is the most important art exhibition in American history and an inspirational watershed for culture of all types.

Armory Show

The exhibition was organized to showcase the state of the art—the contemporary work that was being done by European and American artists, work that was well ahead of what most American audiences were familiar with and had yet seen. It would be years before a major American museum took up the mission: the Museum of Modern Art in New York did not open until 1929.

This is from the New York Sun newspaper in 1912, announcing the upcoming event:

Show of Advance Art Promises a Sensation

Futurists and Cubists Will Be Featured Here in February

Whole Room of Cezannes

Founder of Post Impressionism Is Hardly Known in New York

Cezanne is virtually unknown in America except by his name, and there will be great curiosity…

Matisse has been seen and shuddered at in the little New York gallery of Photo-Seresston…

Every art museum and art program should be giving at least a nod to this, if not a full-blown celebration. Some are, some aren’t.

Here comes the U.S. Postal Service to the cultural rescue. Ironic, because the Postal Service itself is in dire need of rescuing. But when it comes to celebrating modern art, and this particular moment, there it is.

On March 7, the Postal Service will issue a set of stamps called Modern Art in America 1913-1931. They explain, “In celebration of the triumph of modern art in America, the U.S. Postal Service commemorates 12 important modern artists and their works, 100 years after the groundbreaking Armory Show opened in New York in 1913.” On the full sheet of stamps is a quote from Marcel Duchamp, one of the more than 300 artists who exhibited at the Armory Show: “American is the country of the art of the future.”

The set includes stunning reproductions of works by Stuart Davis (House and Street), Charles Demuth (I Saw the Figure 5 in Gold), Aaron Douglas (The Prodigal Son), Arthur Dove (Fog Horns), Marcel Duchamp (Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2), Marsden Hartley (Painting, Number 5), John Marin (Sunset, Maine Coast), Gerald Murphy (Razor), Georgia O’Keeffe (Black Mesa Landscape, New Mexico / Out Back of Marie’s II), Man Ray (Noire et Blanche), Charles Sheeler (American Landscape), Joseph Stella (Brooklyn Bridge).

Through its stamps, the Postal Service has served for decades as a chronicler of culture, well-known and less-known. This year alone we have muscle cars, Johnny Cash, Rosa Parks, Grand Central Terminal and Lydia Mendoza (one of the greatest stars of Tejano music). And, of course, the Armory Show.

Marchel Duchamp - Nude Descending A Staircase

Celebrate the Armory Show this month. Revel in art, its past and its present. Visit galleries. Buy some art. Visit an art museum. Join an art museum. And then go to the post office (yes, there are still post offices). Buy a couple of sheets of the Modern Art in America stamps ($5.20). Keep one, and maybe frame it and hang it on a wall. Use the other stamps on letters or even bill payments. It’s an easy way to make the world more beautiful and interesting, and to show that art still and always matters.

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February 21, 2013

Plows. Guns.

Plow - Dorothea Lange
Above is one of the photos taken by Dorothea Lange for the Farm Services Administration during the Depression. Shot in 1937, it is captioned “The cotton sharecropper’s unit is one mule and the land he can cultivate with a one-horse plow. Greene County, Georgia.”

The plow is a thing that made America what it is. Whether pushed by hand, or pulled by an animal or an engine, it embodies the hard work that helps bring food from the earth to feed a family or a nation, especially during hard times.

The gun is also a thing that made America what it is. Unlike the plow, about which there is little controversy, guns have played an equivocal role, sometimes for good, sometimes not.

There is no constitutional amendment about plows.

There is no biblical passage about guns.

There is, as is often pointed out, a very famous biblical verse about plows. And about pruning hooks. And about their value relative to swords and spears.

Isaiah seems certain that plows and pruning hooks are good. He seems less enthusiastic about the downside of swords, spears and, presumably, guns.

Nothing absolute or definitive, no unconditional endorsement of pacifism or non-violence, unless maybe you are someone who takes the Bible seriously or even literally. Just a little something to think about.

They will beat their swords into plowshares
and their spears into pruning hooks.
Nation will not take up sword against nation,
nor will they train for war anymore.
Isaiah 2:4

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February 19, 2013

Howard Finster on the Day after Washington’s Fake Birthday

Howard Finster - George Washington in Another World

This is about Howard Finster, “Man of Visions”, not strictly about George Washington. But Finster, America’s greatest modern folk/self-taught artist, loved Washington and frequently pictured him (above is Washington in Another World, where Finster believed he would meet the great man one day).

Finster also liked Abraham Lincoln, and some of the artist’s more than 10,000 works featured that former President.

Howard Finster - Abraham from a Penny

Knowing Finster’s biography and back story is interesting and helpful, but looking at his pictures (and there are plenty to be found online) is much more enlightening and uplifting. This is from Artnet:

Howard Finster (American, December 2, 1916–October 22, 2001) was a Modern Folk artist from Summerville, GA. He was one of 13 children raised on a farm, and he attended school only until the sixth grade. Finster’s interest in the gospel began at a Baptist revival when he was just 13 years old. A preacher at age 16, he wrote articles for the local newspaper while giving sermons in churches. In the late 1940s, Finster built his first garden park museum, featuring the exhibit The Inventions of Mankind.

The exhibit was intended to be a representation of all the inventions ever created, and it included a duck pond and a flock of pigeons. In 1961, Finster ran out of space and decided to purchase four additional acres of land in Pennville, GA. This is where he envisioned the Plant Farm Museum, a collection of Garden of Eden-like creations featuring attractions such as The Mirror House, Bible House, and the Folk Art Chapel. Scattered throughout were signs containing Bible verses, because Finster believed that “They stuck in people’s heads better that way.”

Finster did not learn how to paint in a university; instead he was self-taught, and most of his work was inspired by visions. He believed he was sent to Earth to spread the word of God, and he retired from preaching in 1965 to improve his Plant Farm Museum. This lasted until 1976, when he was inspired to paint only sacred art of religious inspiration that was intended to uplift and inspire. These images ranged from Pop icons to religious figures, such as his interpretation of John the Baptist. A year earlier, Finster was featured in Esquire magazine, and was eventually asked to create four paintings for the Library of Congress in 1977, one of which was titled He Could Not Be Hid.

Finster often created images on flat picture planes with Bible verses squeezed in. Each one also included a number because, under God’s direction, he felt he had to generate a total of 5,000 paintings. Finster finished this feat in 1985, but continued to paint until his death in 2001. By then, he had created over 10,000 works of art.

You can think real hard about how we celebrate Washington’s birthday on a day that isn’t his birthday, and how some people mistakenly call it President’s Day, and how we don’t celebrate Lincoln’s birthday at all, despite the fact that he might win an Oscar this year.

Save yourself the trouble. Immerse yourself in the visions of Howard Finster, and everything will make sense to you.

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January 30, 2013

If We Could See the Children of Sandy Hook

Sandy Hook School
Early in the Iraq War, President Bush tried to block taking pictures of the arrival of the coffins of fallen soldiers at Dover Air Force Base. The proposal was couched as a gesture of respect to the families, but the real point was to shield citizens from the ultimate cost of war.

There are different opinions on the impact of viewing carnage, fictional and real. Does constant exposure immunize us from taking violence seriously? Would we pursue wars so readily, or at least try to better distinguish the necessary from the chosen, if we were bombarded by those images? If we saw footage of the early days of the camps in real time, would we have allowed the Holocaust to proceed?

The images of the children killed at Sandy Hook School in Newtown are blocked from us. This choice is almost beyond argument. We have heard the reaction of those who did witness the aftermath, and even those who have participated in war said that scene was worse. We are protecting the dignity of those lives unlived and respecting the immeasurable grief of the families. Our imaginations are already enough to rend our hearts.

And so instead we have pictures of those children as they are remembered, beautiful angels, joy and potential, and we have the testimony and imploring of their parents. But somehow, this doesn’t seem to be quite enough to stop abstract arguments about the essential value of the Second Amendment, how it must continue unconditioned even by sensible restrictions that meet moral, practical and constitutional muster. First they come for my AR-15, this line goes, and next the deer and the police will be hunting me.

There is a way to end this argument, though for good reasons we will not do it. If we ever get to see the killing field at Sandy Hook, there will be little more talk of a free trade in assault weapons and big ammunition clips. There may be talk, but it will be silenced by a new and more powerful outrage. The NRA might try to keep repeating a mantra that is already falling on more deaf ears, and some of their political operatives will follow. But the vast majority of Americans will move from just saying the right thing to a pollster to demanding that the right thing be done. Now.

If we could, as we won’t, see the children.

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January 25, 2013

Assault Weapons: The Art of the Art of the Possible

Bushmaster ACR
Watching Joe Biden back off the primacy of an assault weapons ban in the curbing of gun violence—following Senator Diane Feinstein’s introduction of exactly that legislation—is discouraging. And it brings to mind Picasso and Pollock, among others.

Politics is said to be the art of the possible. The motto is roughly “we fight the fights we can win.” Very pragmatic, and there is something to commend pragmatism. That won’t be much comfort, though, when well-meaning politicians have to show up at the next inevitable massacre and solemnly announce that they aimed at the possible, and even then settled for half.

Exactly what kind of art is politics?

Here’s a style of art, the kind everybody finds acceptable and can endorse. Who is going to argue about Rembrandt?

Rembrandt - Self Portrait
Then again, over time there were a number who wanted to argue about and with Rembrandt. By the time the twentieth century rolled around, artists wondered why they had to pay slavish homage to ideas that no longer suited the times. They determined that new ways were not only possible, but that they must be possible.

And so Picasso

Picasso - Les Demoiselles D'Avignon

and Jackson Pollock

Pollock - No. 5
Maybe every progressive politician who is wavering on support for an assault weapons ban needs to visit some museums with modern art; there are plenty in Washington. Then maybe they will discover what real courageous progress is. The possible is limited only by our imagination, spirit and will. That’s the real art.