Alex Ross noted a couple months ago that the Metropolitan Opera’s new $16m Ring cycle was beginning . Is this a good use of resources in tough times? he asks. He makes a good try at arguing that Wagner, at least, is opera for everyone (Wagner’s views on the relationship of art to society were [...]
Archive for the ‘Rhetoric and Framing’ Category
The Third Way’s brilliant idea: sending taxpayers a receipt for what they’ve bought.
A plea for charity alone is not, I’ll admit, compelling reading. Here, then, are some actual reasons to believe we may be less inclined to help Pakistan after the floods than we should be.
Unemployment is over 9 percent, independents are souring on the President, and the Presidency is looking like a failure. Welcome to 1982—except for one small thing: the current president and his party are supposed to care.
The politics of blame strategy for Democrats looks even better when compared to the politics of fear.
You can say it, Mr. President: the bad guys are called “Republicans.”
Democrats often think they face a choice between making politics an argument about whom to blame and making it about forward-looking policies. In fact, the second requires the first—especially now.
What distinguishes responsible libertarianism from the kind that says “buy more guns, more bullets”? Bentham helps us out here: it’s the difference between arguing that the government should not do something and asserting that it cannot. The latter isn’t an argument; it’s an appeal to violence.
It’s a little early, but Steve Benen may have uncorked the classic line of the 2010s.
ACA’s “mandates” revisited: fallacies of choice and honesty about benefits.



