Imagine consistent outrage over the use of slavery as a metaphor (disaggregating it from any lust to get Sarah Palin).

"It’s deplorable for people to work wages, slave wages, in the 21st century evolutionary country." That's a quote highlighted in this local CBS report, which is currently highlighted at the top of Drudge with the simple teaser "Slave wages."

Now, we were just talking about all the trouble Martin Bashir encountered after he went super-dramatic about how despicable it was for Sarah Palin to have used slavery as a metaphor, and I said:

Bashir — if he was ever worth having his own show — should be able to say very clearly that he intended to express the depth of the horror of slavery and therefore why it should never be used as a metaphor. Now, of course, he'd be open to the criticism that he only chose to go where he did because his target was Sarah Palin, but he could confess to that, say that was wrong, and dedicate himself to permanent across-the-board opposition to slavery as a metaphor.

So... imagine going Bashir over the use of the term "slave wages." Remember, all Sarah Palin did was use slavery as a metaphor, and she was grilled by Jake Tapper on CNN — here's the transcript — in what to me looks like an effort to make her say something off (as if Tapper wanted to be the new Katie Couric, ruining Sarah Palin all over again).

TAPPER: So, you obviously feel very passionate about the national debt. The other day, you gave a speech in which you compared it to slavery.

PALIN: To slavery. Yes. And that's not a racist thing to do, by the way, which I know somebody is going to claim it is.

TAPPER: Don't you ever fear that by using hyperbole like that -- obviously, you don't literally mean it's like slavery, which cost millions of people their lives and there was rape and torture. You're using it as a metaphor. But don't you ever worry that by using that kind of language, you -- you risk obscuring the point you're trying to make?

PALIN: There is another definition of slavery and that is being beholden to some kind of master that is not of your choosing. And, yes, the national debt will be like slavery when the note comes due.

More at the link. You see what Tapper is doing, playing the old game of Screwing with Sarah. And Bashir just came tripping after Tapper. He can get in there too. They want to tap her and bash her. Rape metaphor intended, because I'm trying to highlight the political use of metaphor and responsive arguments that this metaphor is not allowed. Bashir said:

Given her well-established reputation as a world class idiot, it’s hardly surprising that [Palin] should choose to mention slavery in a way that is abominable to anyone who knows anything about its barbaric history. So here’s an example. One of the most comprehensive first-person accounts of slavery comes from the personal diary of a man called Thomas Thistlewood, who kept copious notes for 39 years. Thistlewood was the son of a tenant farmer, who arrived on the island of Jamaica in April 1750, and assumed the position of overseer at a major plantation.

What is most shocking about Thistlewood’s diary is not simply the fact that he assumes the right to own and possess other human beings, but is the sheer cruelty and brutality of his regime. In 1756, he records that a slave named Darby ‘catched eating kanes; had him well flogged and pickled, then made Hector, another slave, s-h-i-t in his mouth.’ This became known as ‘Darby’s Dose,’ a punishment invented by Thistlewood that spoke only of inhumanity.

And he mentions a similar incident in 1756, his time in relation to a man he refers to as Punch. ‘Flogged Punch well, and then washed and rubbed salt pickle, lime juice and bird pepper. Made Negro Joe piss in his eyes and mouth.' I could go on, but you get the point....

When Mrs. Palin invokes slavery, she doesn’t just prove her rank ignorance. She confirms if anyone truly qualified for a dose of discipline from Thomas Thistlewood, she would be the outstanding candidate.

I'm asking you to imagine consistency about the use of metaphor, disaggregating it from the lust to get Sarah Palin or somebody else you think is asking for it. Imagine doing the Bashir routine when anyone talks about "slave wages" or being a "wage slave." That's what Bashir would have needed to do to prove his good faith in his outrage over the cheap deployment of the idea of slavery. It's not something you can realistically imagine, and that's why we know it was Bashir, even more than Sarah Palin, who carelessly appropriated the suffering of others to make a political point.

Bonus: Imagine what Bashir — in a quest for consistency — would have to say to Bryan Ferry:



By the way, Bashir's Thistlewood story was about torture, and torture can occur in many contexts other than slavery. True consistency would require him to rage against the use of torture as a metaphor. He ought to lose his cool whenever he sees, say, a headline like "Homework torture for some gifted students."

Be consistent and principled about metaphor or eat shit and die.

That's a clown suit question, bro.

Did you see the comment by Patrick that Glenn linked to?

“I think it would be the ultimate act of honesty to dress the Secretary of the Treasury in a clown costume. I have no objection to that at all.”

Well that gave me an idea. What would be the value of having all 14.5 2.1 million federal government employees — starting at the top with the President — made to wear clown suits every day for, say, the next four years? Would it be worth as much as a trillion dollar coin? More? I propose we find out:

Step 1: Purchase 14.5 2.1 million clown suits through the Althouse Amazon Associates portal, natch.

Step 2: Make federal government employees wear them every day for 4 years.

Step 3: ???

Step 4: Pay off national debt!

Hope and change... into a clown costume.

Paul Krugman responds to the pushback he's received on "the trillion-dollar-coin thing":

There seem to be two kinds of objections. One is that it would be undignified. Here’s how to think about that....

The professor is about to teach us how to think. Get ready!

... we have a situation in which a terrorist may be about to walk into a crowded room and threaten to blow up a bomb he’s holding. 

Okay. A hypothetical. I'm up for hypotheticals. And it's an analogy, because the trillion-dollar-coin thing isn't promoted as a solution to terrorism. But terrorism is something that you can picture quite concretely and you understand it as very real and scary — unlike the debt ceiling problem which is awfully abstract. (Even to say "ceiling" is to resort to metaphor.)

So, anyway:

It turns out, however, that the Secret Service has figured out a way to disarm this maniac — a way that for some reason will require that the Secretary of the Treasury briefly wear a clown suit. (My fictional plotting skills have let me down, but there has to be some way to work this in). 

In this hypothetical, you have to accept that the Secret Service has found "a way." It will work. The professor is telling you how to think, so you're going off track if you want an explanation for why that would work or if you — much more likely — would be thinking what the hell is going on in this country when the people in charge are figuring out solutions involving clown suits and believing that clown-suit solutions work? Krugman reveals that he knows his hypothetical is horribly flawed, and he tries to paper it over by confessing to second-rate "plotting skills." There has to be some way to work this it. The professor is teaching us how to think — use this analogy — but he can't piece together the hypothetical. How's that supposed to help us think?

He continues:

And the response of the nervous Nellies is, “My god, we can’t dress the secretary up as a clown!” Even when it will make him a hero who saves the day?

Wait. The normal people who go with the working theory that the government has gone mad are "nervous Nellies"? Yes, because Krugman's hypothetical locks it in that the solution works. So the people aren't supposed to be thinking that sounds crazy. It's posited that they know it will work, so all they can realistically be concerned with is that the secretary will look undignified dressed like a clown.

Krugman turns to the second objection, as if it's unconnected to the first one:

The other objection is the apparently primordial fear that mocking the monetary gods will bring terrible retribution.

Why weren't the people who say it looks crazy credited with having some fear that it wouldn't work? Because in the clown-suit hypothetical it was posited that it would work? These "nervous Nellies" were mocked in Part I of Krugman's krushing of all adversaries. In Part II, we see troglodytes who imagine a "god" who will punish us for doing something wrong.

What the hysterics see is a terrible, outrageous attempt to pay the government’s bills out of thin air. This is utterly wrong, and in fact is wrong on two levels.

The first level is that in practice minting the coin would be nothing but an accounting fiction, enabling the government to continue doing exactly what it would have done if the debt limit were raised....

So it's a trick, but it's not that different from other tricks. It's just weirder looking. Like a clown suit. Which gets back to the point I made when I criticized Krugman a couple days ago:

It's strange that it's come to this, but I don't believe the President of the United States would choose to do something that will strike the people as so bizarre, even if he feels capable of articulating the legal theory with a straight face. The President must maintain the people's trust and confidence. He must be comprehensible as normal, sound, and sane to ordinary folks.

Krugman's response to these ordinary folks — the people upon whom the President's power depends — is: They're hysterical and ill-informed. Well, how did this President — how does any President — get elected in the first place? It was by generating confidence. He's a con man. Let's say the management of the national debt has been a lot of trickery for a long, long time. What then does it matter if we do something that is quite obviously a trick, that everyone will see as a trick?

Does the trick work if the magician points to the hand that's doing the sleight?