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Father’s Day 2005

Sunday, June 19th, 2005

There is more than a small measure of truth in the cynical notion that Father’s Day is promoted less out of a reverence and respect for fathers and more as a means to generate sales in cards and gifts. It is also well-documented that Father’s Day generates far less enthusiasm than Mother’s Day. BusinessWeek reports that while consumers spend $11.25 billion on mothers, they manage to spend a substantially less $8.23 billion on dear old dad. By such a metric, fathers are honored 27% less than mothers. There is a scholarly paper to be written someday based on the observation that on Mother’s Day, there is a record number of phone calls made, while on Father’s Day, there is a record number of collect phone calls made. Why are things not as American as “fatherhood and apple pie” as well as “motherhood and apple pie?” While fathers receive less attention, there is ample evidence that they can be as important in child rearing as mothers. However, dwelling on such observations or slights is a little too self-centered and unbecoming for fathers. Father’s receive two important gifts they too often overlook. Mothers receive the same gifts, but they seem to need them less than fathers.

Children provide to fathers the gift of perpetual youth. Without children, fathers would likely not avail themselves of the opportunity to re-read the wealth of children’s literature they long ago forgot. The morality stories of fairy tales, the rhymes of Dr. Seuss, and wonders of Bill Peet books would otherwise be lost. Fathers get to look again at the world through the unjaded eyes of youth, to relive the joy of Christmas morning, to share the excitement of losing a first tooth, and to bask in the reflected glory of accomplishments from driver’s licenses to graduations. Without children, many fathers would have less of an opportunity to ride a skateboard down a hill, warm up an old mitt with a game of catch, or get a chance to explain the infield fly rule to a puzzled face. Children keep fathers from becoming grumpy old curmudgeons. It is no coincidence that the descent into curmudgeon-hood for fathers accelerates when children leave the home unless abated by the elevating presence of grandchildren.

Children create adults of out parents. It is too easy for those without children to indulge themselves in dissipating pursuits. The responsibility of children means creating a household that children can thrive in, and this requires work on the part of fathers. It also requires building neighborhoods by helping out at the school or coaching a ball team. More importantly, fathers provide an important example of behavior for children. Fathers learn to act in ways that teach the right lesson. Being a good father means becoming an adult and children hasten this process.

My children have already honored their father without the special attention of Father’s Day. Despite the fact that it is statistically true that conscientious fathers (and mothers) tend to produce better-adjusted children, that is by no means an absolute certainty. We all know of cases where children overcame rather abusive homes to become honorable and responsible adults. We all know of other cases where diligent parents have children who have severe emotional problems. Ultimately, children become adults and make their own choices. My gift from my children is that they have generally made good personal decisions, despite any mistakes I may have made. This, far more than any tie, or book, or dinner, says thank you.

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Anti-Military Bias in the Media

Monday, May 30th, 2005

Given the recently retracted report in Newsweek claiming that a Koran was deliberately flushed down the toilet to upset Muslim prisoners held a Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the question has arisen as to whether the American media dislikes the military and is all too anxious to believe the worst about them. Newsweek concedes that the report did not reach journalistic standards of credibility and should not have been published. Could an anti-military bias be at work?

For some members of the journalistic generation that grew up during the Vietnam War, there remains a deep and abiding distrust and even animosity towards the military. There is every indication that the younger journalists, especially those that were embedded with the troops actually report with far more empathy for the troops. Reporters traveling with the troops in Iraq shared their danger and two famous journalists even died. David Bloom of NBC died from a blood clot from sitting in a military vehicle for many hours. Michael Kelly of the Atlantic Monthly died when the Humvee he was riding in flipped while avoiding gunfire. Geraldo Rivera is an older reporter who seems to have transcended generations. He has history of support for “progressive” causes, while still largerly sympathetic to individual military soldiers.

For other older journalists, many of them in leadership positions, it may be another matter. Earlier this year, CNN news executive Eason Jordan, suggested at an open discussion that US troops had deliberately targeted journalists. Liberal Democrat Representative Barney Frank was present and was taken a back by the remarks, while Democratic Senator Christopher Dodd was “outraged by the comments.” Jordan tried to explain away his comments as a misinterpretation of his true feelings or the result of accidentally clumsy wording. However, the evidence of Jordan’s real feelings was too strong and he resigned from CNN.

Given Jordan’s fate, one might expect journalists, even those who might secretly agree with him about the US military, to be a little more circumspect in their remarks. However, in the company of like-minded people, it is possible for people let down their guard. This seems to have happened to Linda Foley, President of the Newspaper Guild. On May 13 at National Conference for Media Reform Foley claimed, “Journalists, by the way, are not just being targeted verbally or politically. They are also being targeted for real in places like Iraq. What outrages me as a representative of journalists is that there’s not more outrage about the number, and the brutality, and the cavalier nature of the US military toward the killing of journalists in Iraq.” The remarks elicited cheers from the crowd, suggesting that at least some present were in agreement with her allegations.

Attempts by Hiawatha Bray, a member of the Newspaper Guild, to have Ms. Foley clarify her remarks have thus far not been successful. According to an article posted at the Newspaper Guild website, Foley claims her remarks were distorted. Perhaps she would be willing to clarify them by stating unequivocally that she does not know of the deliberate targeting of journalists by US troops. Click here to listen to the entire video of her remarks to determine for yourself, if her remarks were taken out of context.

If Ms. Foley has proof of her allegations she should share them so that any problems might be resolved. Without proof she should refrain from making charges lest she tar other journalists with any anti-military bias. So far, Ms. Foley’s allegations about military behavior reveal more about her than they do about the troops.

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Public Schools and Common Values

Saturday, May 21st, 2005

There used to be a less litigious time when public schools could more directly reflect local values and ideals of their community. Those times ended about the same time that Leave It To Beaver was canceled. Fifty years ago, there existed a narrower set of commonly held values and the few outliers outside the norms were certainly uncomfortable, perhaps even angry, but less prone seek court relief. People were conspicuously Christian and most at least outwardly comfortable with the Leave It To Beaver, Father Knows Best conventional morality where: children respected their parents; most people went to church on Sunday, the ideal family consisting of a father, mother, and a few freshly scrubbed children; and the “birds and the bees” was something you were supposed to learn about from your parents. Though these ideals many times often remained only aspirations, schools could leaven reading, ‘riting, and ‘rithmetic with the yeast of consensus values. If a teacher made a Biblical reference in a classroom, the American Civil Liberties judicial commando team was rarely sent in.

While direct religious instruction should not be subsidized by the state, the removal of Christian orthodoxy from public school curriculum has carried along with it a reluctance to teach mainstream values and predisposition to bow to the wishes of even the smallest minority. The only permitted value is tolerance of all beliefs except Christian ones. Of course, tolerance has no meaning if one has no strong beliefs against which the beliefs of others might clash.

Nonetheless, there is a natural drive among parents to their impart values to their children. Given the fact that modern life has atomized families as the father and mother run off to work and the children head off to sometimes different schools, many families, for better or worse, rely on the local public schools to act as parental surrogates. When the values of parents and schools diverge frustration sets in, both from Conservatives and Liberals.

This frustration manifests itself on battles over school curriculum. The Kansas State School Board is now listening to testimony from advocates of “Intelligent Design” on how schools ought present the Theory of Evolution in classrooms. In 2002, the Ohio State School Board amid much controversy instituted a policy to include Intelligent Design and other critiques of evolution in instruction.

In Montgomery County, Maryland, Liberals tried to introduce a sex education curriculum that mimics the values of “progressives” in the county. The curriculum went so far in pushing its agenda that even the reliably Liberal Federal District Judge, Alexander Williams Jr. could not swallow it. He issued an injunction temporarily halting, the imposition of the curriculum. He was uncomfortable with the conflict between the First Amendment and a curriculum that specifically criticized denominations that did not look favorably upon homosexual acts. The curriculum in effect was choosing preferred religions, when it “juxtaposes … [a] portrait of an intolerant and Biblically misguided Baptist Church against other, preferred Churches, which are more friendly towards the homosexual lifestyle.”

The point here is not to argue the merits of Intelligent Design or the new sex education curriculum, but rather to recognize that people with strongly held views will try to drive school systems to teach them or to at least be sympathetic to them. One should not expect less. Parents want their values reflected in the instruction of their children. At the very least, they do not want schools to be at war with their values. Pulls from all ends will force schools to avoid all controversy, always stepping gingerly lest one group or another rushes to court. The result is that children receive a blander and less demanding curriculum.

The most straightforward solution is to remove these decisions from school boards and empower parents directly. If school districts provided vouchers to pay for education rather than provide one monolithic school system, parents would be able to select the education and moral environment they want to raise their children in. Parents can choose those schools that reinforce rather than undermine what is taught at home.

Sure, some may find it uncomfortable when the children of others are instructed with different values, but such would be the cost of living in a pluralistic society. In truth, we would probably find that there is more consensus in child raising than might be apparent at first. If parents could choose schools via a voucher system we would likely find most parents gravitating to schools teaching a fairly broad set of Leave It To Beaver values taught with a true cultural tolerance. The extremes would tend to isolate themselves. Without vouchers or something akin to them, we are likely to see a lot more conflicts that enrich lawyers while polarizing neighbors.

Frank Monaldo Please e-mail comments to frank@monaldo.

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Clumsy Coverage by the Washington Post

Sunday, May 1st, 2005

That there is bias in media coverage is almost a axiomatic, regardless of one’s political perspective. By definition, writing or broadcasting the news means making value judgments as to what issues are important and relevant enough to claim scarce coverage resources. These decisions rely on value judgments, informed by political perspective. This sort of bias is sometimes referred to as “bias by agenda.” The potential for bias by agenda is the reason that news rooms ought to have real diversity, a diversity of viewpoint.

Bias by agenda is hard to guard against, but incompetent or slanted coverage of any story, once chosen is inexcusable and one of the reasons there has been a flight from conventional news sources, the major papers and networks, toward the Internet and various alternative cable news networks.

Although the Washington Post has, and would probably concede in a moment of candor, a bias of agenda that leans to the Left, they are typically carefully balanced and fair within a story. Unfortunately, they have been guilty of such conspicuous coverage errors recently, that it is difficult to blame it on inadvertence or incompetence.

The first example concerns the confirmation hearings of John Bolton as ambassador to the United Nations. Bolton has been harshly, sarcastically, and even undiplomatically critical of the UN. Indeed, Bolton has been so critical that many Democrats would like to prevent President George Bush’s nominee from becoming the UN ambassador. Given the general unpopularity of the UN and the recent UN scandal involving billions of dollars in the UN-managed Oil-for-Food Program, many Americans might just believe that the UN ought to be sharply criticized. This makes it politically inconvenient for Democrats to attack Bolton on the merits of his positions, so instead there is a frantic effort to seek out character issues that might disqualify Bolton.

The Democrats found an issue in one Melody Townsel who had a decade-old dispute with Bolton about a project in Kyrgyzstan. For the Washington Post to report the charge on April 20, 2005 was entirely appropriate. However, they neglected to mention that Ms. Townsel is an anti-Bush partisan who founded the Dallas-chapter of “Mothers Against Bush.” This does not make her charges necessarily false, but Washington Post readers were entitled to know Townsel’s background as part of their overall assessment of the credibility of her story. This was not a small oversight, it was a key neglected fact. It was not until Howard Kurtz cited a National Review passage about Townsel that the Post’s dedicated readers were made aware of Townsel’s partisanship. The Los Angeles Times and the New York Times also failed to mention Townsel’s partisan affiliation, but one had come to expect more from the Washington Post.

Perhaps a more damaging recent failure of the Washington Post is its reporting on a Washington Post-ABC poll. At present, there is a dispute on the use of the filibuster by Senate Democrats to block Bush judicial nominees. The use of the filibuster for this purpose is not traditional and the issue is a cause of a political confrontation between Republicans and Democrats. Republicans are considering using their majority status to change the Senate rules to prevent the use of the filibuster against judicial nominees. Democrats argue that they are defending the rights of the minority party and Republicans argue that any president deserves an up-or-a-down vote on his nominees. The state of public opinion on this issue is important politically. Polling and coverage by the Post on this is necessary and proper.

On April 26, 2005, the Washington Post ran the page-one headline Filibuster Rule Change Opposed: 66% in Poll Reject Senate GOP Plans to Ease Confirmation of Bush’s Judicial Nominees. The headline and the article definitely gave the impression that Republicans are in political trouble over the issue.

However, consider the exact wording of the poll question: “Would you support or oppose changing Senate rules to make it easier for the Republicans to confirm Bush’s judicial nominees?” The question does not mention the word filibuster and definitely paints the picture of special rules changes on Bush’s behalf without reference to the unprecedented use of the filibuster to block judicial nominees. It would not have been a fair question, but one could imagine different results for the poll if the question were: “Would you support or oppose a minority of Senators preventing an up-or-down vote on Presidential judicial nominees.” The Washington Post poll was a classic example of a poll designed to obtain a specific result.

Nonetheless, publishing the results of the poll, without a misleading headline would have been good journalistic practice, if the poll was put in the context of other polls yielding different results. For example, a plurality by a 2-1 ratio in a Rasmussen poll suggested that people believe the presidential nominees ought to receive an up-or-a-down vote on the Senate floor. Giving readers a broad perspective is good journalism and in this case the Post did not meet their obligation to their readers.

The most revealing fact is that in the week after the poll, Republicans moved more directly to changing the Senate rules and Democrats backed off trying to seek a compromise. This would not have been the case, if internal private polls commissioned by both parties did not contradict the Washington Post headline. Readers of the Washington Post were thus misinformed.

As a general rule, it is best never to assume maliciousness when incompetence is a sufficient explanation. Arguing the case for incompetence in the Washington Post’s coverage is becoming more and more difficult.

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New Questions on Long-Term Care

Sunday, March 27th, 2005

Conservatives and Liberals tend to have different ideas about the sphere within which individuals ought to be allowed free rein for their discretion. Liberals believe that young teenage girls have the moral insight and experience as well as the right to decide to undergo abortions without parental notification. At the same time, they hold that adults are incapable of managing a portion of their social security payments in private retirement accounts. The decisions of teenage girls on an issue of intense moral significance are sacrosanct, while adults require government supervision to manage their retirement.

On the other hand, Conservatives are eager to extend freedom by lowering tax rates and allowing taxpayers to keep more of their own money. The Conservative intuition holds that control of personal resources broadens the scope of personal discretion and thus freedom. But, woe to anyone who wishes to spend their money on recreational drugs.

Even the Libertarian position has its problems. Liberations claim to want to maximize freedom of choice and believe drug use ought to be a matter of personal choice. However, if abused, recreational drug use certainly curtails the freedom of the user. It is an open question as to which policy concerning drug use effectively maximizes freedom

The Terry Schiavo case also raises interesting and important questions about the extent and limits of personal sovereignty. There appear to be two questions that are at issue here. The issues are separate but abrade against one another. The first question is: What level of treatment would Ms. Schiavo have wanted? In the absence, of clear documentation of her preferences, who should decide on her behalf? At this point, her husband and her parents are at odds as to Ms. Schiavo’s wishes and the law gives the spouse presumptive guardians status. The second issue is the determination of the mental status of Ms. Schiavo. Is she in “permanent vegetative state” with no consciousness and no realistic prospects of consciousness returning? Is she is a semi-conscious state with some awareness of her surroundings and some ability to interact?

Let us lay aside for a moment the particulars of this case and ask more general questions about the limits of personal sovereignty and autonomy? Do we wish to grant people personal sovereignty in all cases? When we are not considering palliative care in the terminal stage of life, but long term care, do we expect others to grant all our wishes with respect to care? Christopher Reeve, the actor made famous in the Superman movies who was paralyzed in an accident, required medical care to stay alive, but lived many years before his final illness. He could not feed himself or take care of other needs, but was perfectly conscious and aware. If he asked that his medical care be stopped because he did not want to accept the quality of life afforded a quadriplegic, would we be obliged to honor and assist in this request? Ought we refuse and thereby limit his personal discretion? Can the state step in and prevent assisted suicide by someone who decided that he does not like the quality of his life? Is a person’s life and existence entirely his own, or do we all have an important interest in everyone else’s life?

If a person is in a persistent vegetative state, if he has no conscious, should that person be considered dead? While we would all concede the necessity to exercise extreme caution in coming to this diagnosis and the necessity to resolve any doubt by presumptively asserting that there is latent consciousness, it is possible to conceive of situation where all are morally certain that there is no “there” there. In such a case, is there any obligation to maintain life even if that person had earlier requested such extraordinary treatment? Are we obliged to honor the wishes of someone who would have directed us to maintain their bodily functions, even after brain death?

Much has been made as to what Terry Schiavo would have wanted. However, few are asking broader questions that have escaped noticed as people have argued about the facts of this case. Do individuals have the right to refuse long-term care because of quality of life issues? Do individuals have the right to ask that life sustaining care be continued after a careful diagnosis of brain death? With ever more capable and expensive medical care and with the Baby Boom generation entering the last third of third lives, these questions are sure to be asked more and more frequently.

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Just Slow Down

Sunday, March 20th, 2005

“The case of Terri Schiavo raises complex issues. Yet in instances like this one, where there are serious questions and substantial doubts, our society, our laws, and our courts should have a presumption in favor of life. Those who live at the mercy of others deserve our special care and concern. It should be our goal as a nation to build a culture of life, where all Americans are valued, welcomed, and protected and that culture of life must extend to individuals with disabilities.” White House Press Release, March 17, 2005.Terri Schiavo and the question as to whether her feeding tube ought to be disconnected touches on so many issues of morality, law, and family, that is often difficult to sort out the conflicting issues so that they may be carefully and precisely weighed. The White House statement above is just a restatement of the common sense notion that on matters of life and death one ought to act with reasonable caution. As this is being written, Ms. Schiavo’s feeding tube has been removed and unless it is restored, she will likely die of starvation and dehydration in two weeks. At the same time, both houses of Congress are scrambling to open up the possibility of a review by the Federal courts of the decision by state Judge George Greer to allow the removal of the feeding tube.

About 15 years ago, Terri Schiavo suffered a stroke that left her severely disabled. The degree of her mental impairment is at the center of this case. Presently, Ms. Schiavo’s parents and siblings wish to care for her and maintain her life, while her husband, de jure if not de facto, insists the his wife would have wanted the feed tube removed. Ms. Schiavo has no living will stating her preferences for treatment. By both common law and state law, the discretion in this case is given to the husband.

Part of the popular confusion of the case derives from the fact that many of us have or will be faced with ostensibly similar situations with respect to ailing relatives. In the last week of her life, as my aunt was dying of pancreatic cancer, she asked not to be fed. As her body was shutting down, the addition of more food and water was her causing extreme discomfort. The lack of food was less uncomfortable than being fed. She insisted that she not be fed in the final days of her life. Her express wishes were honored.

This and similar situations should not be confused with Ms. Schiavo’s circumstances. Until the feeding tube was removed and despite the fact that her husband placed her in a hospice facility, Ms. Schiavo was not a terminally ill patient. She is being killed by starvation because the state court of Florida has determined that in her “persistent vegetative state” it is permissible for her husband to decide that her life is not worth living.

Despite the years of litigation, there are important issues that ought to be resolved before the state permits Ms. Schiavo’s life to be taken. Consider the following two important questions:

Is Ms. Schiavo in truly in a persistent vegetate state? There are apparently important medical tests, including MRI’s and PET (Positron Emission Tomography) that have not been performed that can more clearly assess the actual extent of Ms. Schiavo’s brain damage. Surely, if we can delay the execution of convicted criminals pending the results of DNA tests, we can wait for more dispositive tests in the case of Ms. Schiavo. The state judge in the case refused to allow the new tests.
Michael Schiavo, Terri’s husband, long ago moved in with another woman and has fathered two children by her. It is possible to understand how a person might decide to move on with his life. However, after having done so, should this person’s discretion now take precedence over parents in determining what is to happen to Terri Schiavo? In addition, given the fact that physical and other therapy that might have improved Ms. Schiavo’s condition were not permitted by her husband, there seems to be evidence that he may not have his wife’s best interests at heart.

There is no pressing need to kill Ms. Schiavo now. If she is really mentally dead and incapable of feeling pain, then a little more time connected to a feeding tube should not be an issue. A headline at MSNBC opines that “The time has come to let Terri Schiavo die.” This mode of thought perfectly misunderstands the situation. Until it can be unequivocally stated that Ms. Schiavo has no brain function and it will not return, the removal of her feeding tube is not letting her die. It is killing her, just as surely as if the feeding tube were pulled from any number of other disabled people, like the late Christopher Reeves.

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Signs in 1976

Sunday, March 13th, 2005

The 2002 movie Signs is about a minister, Graham Hess, played by Mel Gibson, who looses his faith when his wife dies in an automobile accident for apparently no reason. The story is about how this minister comes to see a greater, transcendent purpose in the loss of his wife. In the course of the movie the character Hess lays out two views of the world, when lights from UFOs, presaging an invasion, appear over Mexico City:

“People break down into two groups. When they experience something lucky, group number one sees it as more than luck, more than coincidence. They see it as a sign … evidence that there is someone up there watching out for them.

Group number two sees it just as pure lucky, happy turn of chance. I’m sure that the people in group number two are looking at those 14 lights in a very suspicious way. For them, this situation is a 50/50. It could be bad. It could be good. But deep down they feel that whatever happens … they’re on their own. That fills them with fear. Yeah. There are those people.”

But there’s a whole lot of people in group number one and they see those 14 lights and they’re looking at a miracle. And deep down they feel that whatever’s going to happen, there will be someone there to help them. And that fills them with hope. And what you have to ask yourself is what kind of person are you? Are you the kind that sees signs or sees miracles? Or do you believe people just get lucky? Or look at the question this way. Is it possible that there are no coincidences?”

For Reagan Conservatives (Is there another variety?), Craig Shirley’s new book Reagan’s Revolution: The Untold Story of the Campaign That Started it All, offers powerful evidence for people in group number one people who believe “that there are no coincidences.”

For most Reagan supporters, 1976 was a devastating year. Gerald Ford had squeaked by Ronald Reagan in the most contested Republican nomination process in contemporary memory to win the Republican nomination. Ford did not formally secure the nomination during the roll call of states at the convention until the West Virginia delegation, the second-to-last state in alphabetical order, cast their vote. Even worse, the conventional wisdom foresaw the marginalization of the Republican Party. Eric Sevareid, in an editorial piece on CBS News, argued that Republican Conservatives were killing the election prospects of Republicans. Others predicted that Republicans would soon go the way of the Whig Party from which they arose just prior to the American Civil War. The New York Times happily concluded that, “Mr. Reagan presumably grows too old to run again…” Jimmy Carter, who camouflaged himself in Conservative vocabulary to hide the soul of a Liberal, had just been elected president. It just doesn’t get any worse for Reagan Republicans.

Adding to this frustration was a certainty that but for a few small turns of chance, Reagan would have won the Republican nomination. If Reagan had won the New Hampshire primary, it would have changed the dynamics of the nomination process. Given the eventual extremely tight outcome, it is highly likely that a New Hampshire primary win would have given Reagan the nomination.

Shirley reminds us of just how close the New Hampshire primary was in 1976. Ford won unexpectedly by a little more than 1,000 votes. Reagan’s campaign made the tactical mistake of leaving New Hampshire a day early certainly costing Reagan votes. Moreover, 2,000 ballots were disallowed because the voters had selected all 24 Reagan delegates even though they were allowed to select only 21. The Reagan campaign had tried to limit the number of Reagan delegates on the ballot, but too many true believers were eager to be formal Reagan delegates and refused to pull themselves from the ballot.

There were a number of similar moments in 1976 that could have easily tipped the Republican nomination to Reagan. However, if Reagan had won the nomination there never would have been the speech when a victorious Ford prompted a Reagan to come to the podium and make extemporaneous remarks. There might never have been the moment when Reagan could speak directly to a Republican convention and seal both himself and Conservatism in their hearts. In a speech that was uncalculated, unprepared, and sprang free from Reagan’s heart, Reagan spoke of the challenge of our generation to stand up to forces of totalitarianism and for freedom. But for his nomination loss in 1976, Reagan might never have had the chance to explain that containment and coexistence with the Soviets was not enough; that “there is no substitute for victory.”

Had Reagan won the won the nomination in 1976, he probably would have lost the presidential election in the shadow of the Watergate scandal. There likely would not have been a Reagan presidency. The Republican Party may have remained mired forever in the limbo between Conservative and Liberal wings. Without a Reagan presidency, the liberation of the Russians and Soviet captive states might have required an additional generation, if it occurred at all. Without a Reagan presidency there might never have been the tax cuts that unleashed an economic boom that reduced inflation, slashed unemployment, and restored hope. But for a few small events, there would never have been a Reagan Revolution.

In 1976, Reagan sought to win a political nomination. He was denied, but as a consequence he later won a presidency that changed the world. Perhaps there are no coincidences.

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The Case of Ward Churchill and Academic Tenure

Sunday, February 13th, 2005

For people with a politically Conservative perspective, Ward Churchill is just one of those gifts that keep on giving. For many years, Conservatives have been pointing out to a largely indifferent country, that parts of universities, particularly the humanities departments, have become tenured bastions for the far-Left, largely out of touch with most Americans and only loosely connected to serious scholarship.

Enter Ward Churchill, chairman of the Department of Ethnic Studies at the University of Colorado. Professor Churchill was to be a speaker at Hamilton College. Churchill probably believed that this was to be one of many speaking engagements at an American university where one can get paid to spew vicious, hateful statements, rally radical students, and pass largely unnoticed by not only a majority of students on campus, but by the world at large.

However, this time before his speech at Hamilton College what Churchill had been saying for some time about 9/11 came to popular attention before he could speek at Hamilton College. Bill O’Reilly at FoxNews perhaps deserves credit for bring Churchill to national attention.

The people who died in the 9/11 attacks represented people from all walks of American life and insulting them was the same as insulting all of America. Churchill compared the people working at the World Trade Center on 9/11 to functionaries of a Fascist system, specifically calling them “little Eichmanns.” Adolph Eichmann was technocrat in the Nazi regime who managed the logistics of the Holocaust. Ward Churchill was suggesting that those that died on 9/11 were not innocent and somehow deserved what happened to them.

Every serious person now recognizes Churchill as a scheming charlatan who plays up a fictitious American Indian background and relies on the generosity of the taxpayers of the Colorado to subsidize his speech and provide him the patina of legitimacy. There is little to be gained here by towering yet one more one silly statement of his upon another. To do so would be grant him more credibility than he deserves. Churchill’s cruel and hateful speech, however, has shined a light upon other questions about academia.

Churchill is a tenured professor at the University of Colorado and as such can not and should not be dismissed for making irresponsibly foolish statements. The real question is by what criteria is the University of Colorado granting tenure. Mr. Churchill does not have a PhD, the usually required credential. However, a university might overlook that particular credential if Churchill had an exemplary publication record in peer-reviewed journals. It seems that Mr. Churchill is lacking in that area as well.

The truth is that there are some departments at some universities that are not really scholarly departments, but rather paid centers of advocacy that universities tolerate lest they be considered less than tolerant. The support of such departments is protection money to keep campus peace. Ask yourself whether any science or engineering department at the University of Colorado would have hired as a professor, much less granted tenure to and make chairman of a department, anyone with as few scholarly credentials as Churchill.

Of course, there are exceptions to the rule that angry anti-Americanism comes from non-scholarly, indeed anti-scholarly enclaves at universities. Noam Chomsky is a broadly recognized expert in linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who vocally spews far Left, largely anti-American politics. In some sense, Chomsky has earned the right (that is tenure) by his scholarship to enter the university dialogue.

Yet in the case of Churchill, a mistake is a mistake, and to support the concept of tenure, the University of Colorado will have to tolerate Churchill for at least a little while longer. The Rocky Mountain News in Denver is now lavishing on Churchill the scrutiny the University of Colorado should have devoted before granting Churchill tenure. According to the Rocky Mountain News, there is some question as to whether Churchill has committed plagiarism. It is too soon to tell, but the University of Colorado may yet find a way to use possibly fraudulent scholarship on the part of Churchill as a cause for dismissal and a way to circumvent tenure.

Somewhere at the University of Colorado, there must have been an academic dean who signed off on Churchill’s tenure. If that person is still at the university, he or she ought to be dismissed for allowing a person without sufficient scholarly credentials to be granted tenured.

It is unfortunate that it is only under the pressure of public embarrassment, that the University of Colorado may do the right thing. What of all the other Churchill’s holed up in ivory towers, not pursuing scholarship put political advocacy?

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Better Angels of Our Nature

Tuesday, January 18th, 2005

With the following words in late in 2001, John Ashcroft strongly criticized those he believed were exaggerating civil libertarian concerns about the Bush Administration’s efforts to protect us from terrorism:

“We need honest, reasoned debate; not fear mongering. To those who pit Americans against immigrants, and citizens against non-citizens; to those who scare peace-loving people with phantoms of lost liberty; my message is this: Your tactics only aid terrorists for they erode our national unity and diminish our resolve. They give ammunition to America’s enemies, and pause to America’s friends. They encourage people of good will to remain silent in the face of evil.”

Never a favorite of the Left, John Ashcroft immediately became to de facto poster boy for the rabid anti-Bush Left. The paragraph was seized upon as one more piece of evidence that Ashcroft seeks to crush dissent and paint anyone who disagrees with the Bush Administration as “unpatriotic.” Though the Bush Administration has been careful never to use these terms, we constantly hear and read the faux concern for stifling of honest dissent.

Indeed, the statement does suggest that we need “unity” and some people who disagree with the Administration must be aligning themselves with the interests of terrorists. To then extent that such suggestions are conveyed they are grossly unfair. The judicious use of a single word would have rendered the entire paragraph far less controversial. One need change, “Your tactics only aid terrorists…” to “Your tactics only unintentionally aid terrorists…” The use of the word “unintentionally” concedes that critics retain the same goals with perhaps different approaches.

Now suppose someone on the Left has used the same rhetorical logic and argued:

“We need honest, reasoned debate; not fear mongering. To those who pit Americans against immigrants, and citizens against non-citizens; to those who scare peace-loving into yielding personal liberty; my message is this: Your tactics only aid terrorists for they erode our national unity and diminish our resolve. They give ammunition to America’s enemies, and pause to America’s friends. They encourage people of good will to remain silent in the face of evil.”

Would there have been calls on the Left to tone down the rhetoric and not depict opposition as mean spirited? The evidence suggests not. There have been far more egregious statements than Ashcroft’s by serious people on the Left with nary a yawn of concern and usually accompanied by smiles of support. The Left has been exquisitely and deliberately sensitive to even subtle indirect implications that they are less than patriotic, though they seem to have few qualms about making such direct charges themselves.

Senator Edward Kennedy rightly suggests that “In this serious time for America and many American families, no one should poison the public square by attacking the patriotism of opponents.” However, with little evidence he then asserts that “Republican leaders are avoiding key questions about the Administration’s policies by attacking the patriotism of those who question them.” Democratic hopeful General Wesley Clark whines, “How dare this administration make the charge that if you disagree with its policies, you are somewhat unpatriotic!”

Yet, it is the Left who has done the most lately to foster and nurture an us-against-them attitude. We can forgive the easy way that all candidates wrap themselves in values we all embrace. Although the web site for Presidential aspirant Howard Dean is called “Dean for America,” it would far too obsessive to believe that he is suggesting that those who do not agree with him are not for America. It is Nixon-level paranoia to suggest that naming the Liberal advocacy group “People for the American Way” suggests that others are not for the American Way. It is hard to even be upset with the Dean’s purile projection, “This president [Bush] is not interested in being a good president. He’s interested in some complicated psychological situation that he has with his father.” Such statements by Dean are more self revelatory than credible.

What coarsens the public discourse is the reference by Dean to Bush as the “enemy” or the assertion that “John Ashcroft is not a patriot.” What serves to “poison the public square” are remarks by Clark such as “I don’t think it was a patriotic war. I think it was a mistake, a strategic mistake, and I think that the president of the United States wasn’t patriotic in going after Saddam Hussein. He simply misled America and cost us casualties and killed and injured America’s reputation around the world without valid reason for doing so. It’s not patriotic; it’s wrong.”

For the Democratic Party who beats its breasts about keeping religion and politics separate and sometimes ridicules Bush’s conspicuous faith, it is particularly disheartening to hear Clark suggest that as far as Christianity goes, “there’s only one party that lives that faith in America, and that’s our party, the Democratic party.” That’s a pretty amazing assertion from someone who admits voting for Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan. If the difference between parties is so morally stark, what took Clark so long to declare as a Democrat?

It is not clear how much such rhetoric Dean and Clark really believe. Certainly candidates like Senator Joe Lieberman, Richard Gephardt, or John Edwards have not seen the need to resort to such tactics. Such flame-throwing rhetoric ignites the dry-tinder partisans who populate the halls and auditoriums of pre-primary America. However, people who wish to lead have an obligation to eschew such anger. As Lincoln enjoined in a far more contentious and dangerous time, “We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies.Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection.” Rather than rally around anger, we must summon forth “the better angels of our nature.”

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Shaper than a Serpent’s Tooth

Sunday, January 2nd, 2005

There is probably no coincidence in the observation that genuine humanitarians lead by example and by addressing the “better angles of our nature,” rather than by perpetual harangue. A Mother Teresa, Albert Schweitzer, or Dali Lama might on occasion chide the rest of us by appealing to our conscience. However, they would rarely resort to the sort of whining and shameless exploitation of the tragedy of thousands (over a 120,000 now and growing) of tsunami deaths in southern Asia as did United Nations Undersecretary Jan Egeland.

According to news reports, Egeland said, “It is beyond me why are we so stingy, really.” He went on to criticize western politicians who “believe that they are really burdening the taxpayers too much, and the taxpayers want to give less. It’s not true. They want to give more.” I guess Mr. Egeland needs to learn the difference between the verbs “give” and “take.”

Egeland’s argument carries with it the seeds of its own refutation. Anyone eager to “give” more to the government or any relief organization can. Moreover, in democratic societies people control the level of taxation. Egeland’s not so hidden conviction is that governments ought “take” more and ”give” it to people like himself to dispense according to the judgment of his finely-tune humanitarian discretion.

Egeland later had to back track on his statement, but not before damage was done. While US military planes were dispatched for search and rescue operations and US Navy ships diverted to affected areas to provide fresh water and helicopters to deliver supplies to victims of the tsunami, Egeland managed to divide rather than unite the world’s humanitarian efforts. His complaint was a classic example of the difference between doing something constructive and incessant complaining.

This critique is especially misplaced coming from a UN official. The UN’s bumbling efforts in managing the Iraq sanctions squandered $20 billion in humanitarian aid. This amount is several times the amount necessary to deal with the tsunami tragedy.

What about the merits of the assertion that the West and the US in particular is stingy? Ever anxious to criticize the United States, especially if it rebounds on Bush Administration, the NY Times concluded that the US is indeed “stingy” with foreign aid. The damage to the US’s reputation for generosity from this critique was magnified as it was cited by the foreign press, particularly in affected areas. For example, The Express India headline ran, “Tsuanmi disaster: NY Times say US is `stingy.”’

The United States gives more foreign aid than any other country, about $16.2 billion a year (year 2003) and 40% of the entire world’s emergency relief aid, but some argue that this is insufficient. The argument is that the US’s parsimony is revealed be that the fact it gives a smaller fraction of its Gross National Product (GNP) than do other industrialized countries. However, a key omission in this computation is that it only includes “official development assistance” and not all US aid. Even more importantly, a large fraction of US foreign aid is not dispensed through the government at all but through private agencies. The NY Times ignored private giving in its editorial. They did not mention that according to US AID, yearly private foreign aid amounts to $33 billion dollars (year 2000), many times that funneled through official development assistance and given by other countries. Though the table below, reproduced from US AID, is for the year 2000, it shows a more complete picture of US foreign aid. Not only does the US give more, it is almost certainly the case that its private donations are allocated more efficiently and consequently do more good.

US Foreign Aid in 2000.

	US$ billions	Share of total (%)
US official development assistance	9.9	18
All other U.S. government assistance	12.7	22
U.S. private assistance	33.6	60
Foundations	1.5
Corporations	2.8
Private and voluntary organizations	6.6
Universities and colleges	1.3
Religious congregations	3.4
Individual remittances	18.0
Total U.S. international assistance	56.2	100

Given that the supplemental foreign aid outside of the official development assistance is so large, it is difficult to explain why the NY Times did not provide through a more complete assessment of total giving before arriving at the conclusion of stinginess. Is the NY Times simply not competent enough to check with US AID to get the complete number, or did it simply cease searching for more information when it found some evidence consistent with its own preconceived notions?

The squabble at the UN was a distraction. The more disgraceful event of the week was the rejection of aid from Israel by the Sri Lanka government. The Israeli army had planned to send medical staff to aid in the recovery, but the Sri Lanka government would apparently rather see more of its own citizens die than accept help from Jews.

At the end of this week, when governments were beginning to implement relief efforts, the former UN International Development Secretary Clare Short provided yet another distraction by complaining that the US was bypassing the UN and joining directly with Japan, India, and Australia to coordinate relief efforts. Clare believes that only the “UN can do that job” and it is “the only body that has the moral authority.” Ms. Short should realize that this is not about the United Nations, but it is about getting relief to people in the most efficient way possible. It is not about making the UN feel good about itself. Given the billion dollar bungle of the United Nations in the Iraq Oil-for-Food Program, the acknowledged sexual exploitation and abuse of refugees in the Democratic Republic of the Congo by UN peacekeepers and staff, the inability to stop the genocides in Rwanda and Sudan, the abandonment of 5,000 Muslims under UN protection in Srebrenica, and the inability of the UN to contribute in a meaningful way to elections in Iraq, one is hard pressed to discern what moral authority Ms. Short is referring to.

The question of providing aid directly to tsunami victims rather than going through the United Nations can be answered in a simple way. If you were to write a check to help in Tsunami relief efforts would your first choice be to write it in care of the United Nations? Would one rather send money to the United Nations or to the Salvation Army?

Here is your choice:
UNICEF Relief | Salvation Army

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