Best of the Web Today - January 25, 2005
By JAMES TARANTO
Great Moments in Higher Education
Here's an interesting angle on the Larry Summers kerfuffle. The Santa Cruz (Calif.) Sentinel notes that one of the Harvard president's harshest foes is Denice Dee Denton, the new chancellor of the University of California at Santa Cruz:
Denton is making headlines . . . for challenging controversial statements made by Harvard University President Larry Summers, who suggested that innate differences between the sexes could help explain why fewer women succeed in science and math careers.
Summers made the comments . . . at an economic conference attended by Denton. Denton questioned Summers sharply during the conference, saying she needed to "speak truth to power." She told the Harvard president that she believed his assertions had been contradicted by research materials presented at the conference.
The Sentinel reports that the alliterative administrator has taken a very personal interest in the advancement of female scientists:
The University of California created a $192,000-a-year job for the partner of the new UC Santa Cruz chancellor, a move that is being criticized by employee unions. . . .
UC officials defended hiring Gretchen Kalonji, the longtime partner of incoming Santa Cruz Chancellor Denice Dee Denton. They described Kalonji as a highly qualified professor who will be an asset in her new job as director of international strategy development.
Kalonji, a professor of materials science at the University of Washington in Seattle and an expert in international education, also is getting a tenured professorship, perhaps at UCSC.
In case the meaning isn't clear, that's "partner" as in a Boston marriage. A Sentinel editorial takes the unions' side, saying UC owes "a public accounting of why this job is so important," and noting: "So far as we can figure out, UCSC has never had a 'director of international development,' and a reasonable person would ask why that's so important now."
Sticks and Stones
"Using a young readers' novel called 'The Misfits' as its centerpiece, middle schools nationwide will participate in a 'No Name-Calling Week' initiative starting Monday," the Associated Press reported yesterday:
The program, now in its second year, has the backing of groups from the Girl Scouts to Amnesty International but has also drawn complaints that it overemphasizes harassment of gay youths.
The initiative was developed by the New York-based Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network, which seeks to ensure that schools safely accommodate students of all sexual orientations. GLSEN worked with James Howe, the openly gay author of "The Misfits" and many other popular children's books.
"Gay students aren't the only kids targeted--this isn't about special rights for them," Howe said. "But the fact is that 'faggot' is probably the most common insult at schools."
OK, first off, we're a little confused here. Back during the presidential campaign, Kedwards kept calling Dick Cheney's daughter names, and many in the gay-rights crowd thought that was just peachy. What we really love about this story, though, is the quote from Jerald Newberry of the teachers union: "People who would criticize this, regardless of who came out [!] with it, are people with bad hearts."
We guess some name-calling is all right then. So here's our belated response to Kedwards for bullying Miss Cheney: You guys have bad hearts, nyah nanny nyah nyah!
Ford Family Values
John Ford, who lives in Memphis, Tenn., has, shall we say, an interesting personal life. The Memphis Commercial Appeal describes his testimony at a recent Juvenile Court hearing:
Some days, Ford said, he lives with ex-wife Tamara Mitchell-Ford and the three children they had together. On others, he stays with his longtime girlfriend, Connie Mathews, and their two children.
This, despite a raucous 2002 divorce that led to Mitchell-Ford's jailing after she plowed her Jaguar through the French doors of Mathews's Collierville home.
Ford said he pays nearly all bills for both families. They stay in houses he owns and where he also lives.
Wait, it gets better. The reason Ford was in court was that he is "battling a suit by a third woman, Dana Smith, who is trying to increase his court-ordered support of a 10-year-old girl he fathered." In his defense, Ford cites a state law "that keeps court-ordered support lower when a father is financially responsible for other children."
But here's the kicker: Ford wrote the law whose protection he now seeks. He is a member of the Tennessee Senate and chairman of its Child Welfare Committee.
The Facts of Choice
Sunday was the 32nd anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court decision mandating abortion on demand, and as always this was the occasion for much commentary on the subject. Here's a particularly odd quote, from a Fox News report:
"Regardless of what people say in the polls, there are very few people in this country who want us to go back to the days of our grandmothers and our great grandmothers, where women had 10, 12, 15, 18 children," said National Organization of Women President Kim Gandy.
Is Gandy really suggesting that there are large numbers of American women whose abortion count is in the double digits? Is she not aware that there are other ways besides abortion of regulating childbearing? Well, it's possible. Consider this passage from a New York Times account of a speech Sen. Hillary Clinton delivered "to about 1,000 abortion rights supporters at the [New York] state Capitol":
At one point, for instance, she drew gasps from some in the audience by mentioning that 7 percent of American women who do not use contraception account for 53 percent of all unintended pregnancies.
Not using contraception leads to pregnancy? Gasp, what a shocker! Apparently being pro-choice often means being oblivious about the facts of life.
A Journalistic Miscarriage--II
Two weeks ago we took New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof to task for a column in which he attempted to make America look bad by citing the U.S. infant-mortality rate, which is relatively high by the standards of industrialized nations and supposedly "worse" than communist Cuba's. In his "Kristof Responds" blog, he answered one of the criticisms we made (though he was responding to one of his readers, not us):
Even if [it] were true that the U.S. is hobbled by its heroic efforts to save premature babies, that wouldn't explain the deterioration in our IMR [infant-mortality rate]. Some experts have wondered if increasing fertility treatments and hazardous pregnancies could be a factor, but the consensus seems to be probably not, in part because European countries are going through the same tech revolution and their IMR's have improved rather than deteriorated.
Well, here's a Reuters report from yesterday:
A jump in the number of babies born at abnormally low birth weights was the main reason why the U.S. infant mortality rate rose in 2002 for the first time in 44 years, according to a federal study released Monday.
Almost 500 more babies weighing less than 1 pound, 10.5 ounces, or 750 grams, were born in 2002, compared to 2001, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a report.
Kristof has been traveling in Cambodia, publishing fascinating accounts of two prostitutes he liberated from slavery (see here and here). We hope when he returns he'll take the time to set the record straight about the infant-mortality canard.
'If You Agree to Stop Stopping Us, We'll Stop'
"Militant groups have agreed to temporarily halt attacks on Israel, a trial period before a formal truce agreement, to give Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas time to appeal to Israel to stop targeting militants, Palestinian officials said Monday."--Associated Press, Jan. 25
Palestinian Custody Dispute
The Jerusalem Post reports a weird battle is brewing over Yasser Arafat's daughter:
Jarir al-Kidwa, one of Arafat's prominent cousins in Gaza City, said the family wants the two [Arafat's widow, Suha, and his daughter, Zahwa] to return home because "life in Paris contravenes with Islamic morals and traditions."
Suha and Zahwa, who turns 10 next July, had been living in Paris before they moved to Tunis a year ago. The two were invited by the wife of the Tunisian president to stay in the country, where Zahwa attends a private school.
"We don't want Zahwa to live in Paris and be affected by the climate there," Kidwa added, claiming that Arafat's daughter was a descendant of one of the nephews of the Prophet Mohammed.
Kidwa, 80, said the family set up a 10-member committee to seek custody over Arafat's daughter so that she could be raised in an Islamic and Arabic environment. He said the team had contacted a number of lawyers in France to file a lawsuit against Suha, asking that she hand her daughter over to them.
If only Janet Reno were still around to "reunite" the little girl with her father (who is in stable condition after dying in a Paris hospital).
Would They Have Gotten 1,656 Virgins if They Succeeded?
"23 at Guantanamo Attempted Suicide in 2003"--headline, Associated Press, Jan. 24
What Makes Democrats Tick?
"A map showing results from the last presidential election is 'remarkably similar' to a map of the distribution of cases of Lyme disease, a brief article in the current Lancet medical journal points out," the New York Times reports:
The 19 "blue states"--those won by Senator John Kerry--account for 95 percent of the cases of Lyme disease reported in 2002, they wrote. The disease, caused by bacteria that are carried by deer ticks, is concentrated in the Northeast and Midwest.
Red states are prone to another illness, informally called "southern tick-associated rash illness" or Stari, which is caused by the bite of the Lone Star tick. But although "Lyme disease is spreading faster than Stari," Robert Nadelman, one of the study's authors, says, "We do not believe . . . that tick-borne diseases are likely to be a major factor in the 2008 presidential election."
Not the First Time He's Tried to Sink a Woman
"Kennedy Vows to Oppose Rice Nomination"--headline, Associated Press, Jan. 25 (hat tip: blogger Scott Jordan)
Loose Ends
A few follow-ups on items yesterday: First, Tim Blair's blog went offline shortly after we encouraged everyone to visit it to read his hilarious take on an inane Washington Post report from Iraq. Blair's site has returned, and you can read the item here.
Apparently the estimate of two billion Muslims world-wide we cited in an another item is on the high side. Most estimates seem to be in the range of 1.2 billion to 1.3 billion. Still, our point stands: That's a lot of Muslims, and only a reconciliation between Islam and democracy can produce victory against Islamist terrorists.
And that National Business Review article we cited in our Reuters item now is available online.
What Would We Do Without Experts?
"Experts Urge Precautions to Prevent HIV Exposure"--headline, Daily Sentinel (Nagodoches, Texas), Jan. 23
This Just In
"Nobel Opens Doors for Science Laureates"--headline, Baltimore Sun, Jan. 22
Won't It All Boil Away by Then?
"Phoenix to Residents: Boil Water Until Noon Wednesday"--headline, Arizona Republic, Jan. 25
Stupid Blue States
Yesterday's "Stupid Blue States" item (since corrected) spelled the name of Maryland's biggest city "Balitmore."
John Kerry outpolled Bush 78.7% to 16.2%--a margin of 62.5%--in Manhattan, a borough whose hotshot editors can't spell "Baltimore." |
