Best of the Web Today - June 23, 2005
By JAMES TARANTO
Eat Our Dust, PETA
We're kicking off the summer in grand carnivorous fashion with a fishing trip and a pig roast, so we won't be filing a column tomorrow. Instead, watch for a free preview of OpinionJournal's Political Diary, our premium e-newsletter, to which you can subscribe now by clicking here. See you Monday.
Mullah Coddlers
The past few months, the Democrats seem to have been trying to make political hay about claims of "torture" and "abuse" at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, where the U.S. military has been running a prison camp for Taliban and al Qaeda terrorists captured on the battlefield in Afghanistan.
Dick Durbin, of course, famously likened the troops there to Nazis and, as we noted last week, made the case that al Qaeda terrorists are entitled to be treated as civilians under the Geneva Conventions. (In fairness, Durbin was vague on this point; it's not clear if he understood that this was what he was arguing.)
Earlier, Democrats on the Judiciary Committee roughly interrogated Alberto Gonzales about his supposed approval of "torture," and the vast majority of Democrats (36-6, including Jeffords, with three not voting) voted against the confirmation of the first Hispanic attorney general.
Of course it is legitimate to criticize government policies, even in times of war. But the Democratic attacks on Guantanamo are so hysterical and unmoored from reality that they have the feel of gotcha politics. The over-the-top rhetoric and accusations are reminiscent of Democratic attacks on Republican judicial nominees. As Ryan Sager writes:
There's an important debate to be had in this country about just how far we're willing to go in our interrogations. But it's a difficult debate to even get started when one side thinks that we should be extremely concerned with the possibility that someone, somewhere might have desecrated the Korans of the people responsible for the murders of Daniel Pearl, Nick Berg, Fabrizio Quattrocchi, three-thousand Americans and now hundreds upon hundreds of Iraqi civilians.
A Rasmussen poll out yesterday suggests that this is terrible politics. Only 20% of the 1,000 likely voters in the survey "believe prisoners at Guantanamo Bay have been treated unfairly." Thirty-four percent think the treatment of the prisoners is "about right," and 36% think America is treating them "better than they deserve":
The survey also found that just 14% agree with people who say that prisoner treatment at Guantanamo Bay is similar to Nazi tactics. Sixty-nine percent disagree with that comparison. This helps explain why Illinois Senator Dick Durbin apologized for making such a comparison.
Even among Democrats, only 30% think the Guantanamo prisoners are being treated unfairly. In other words, many Democratic elected officials are out of touch not only with Americans in general but with a majority of their own supporters.
What are we to make of all this? The most hopeful interpretation is that the Democrats are politically incompetent--that they are stupidly trying to whip up hysteria over Guantanamo in hope of scoring political points. The other possibility is that one of America's two major political parties is led by people who are genuinely passionate about the "rights" of terrorists and correspondingly blasé about the dangers of terrorism.
In light of all this, Durbin's politically expedient "apology"--even if unsatisfactory as an apology--is a good sign. It suggests that Democrats are playing politics and coming to realize it isn't working.
What Would We Do Without Rove?
"Rove: Democrats Didn't Understand 9/11 Consequences"--headline, Associated Press, June 23
Steady as She Goes . . .
"HOW THEY DISTORT: You've got to hand it to the partisan right. Here is what James Taranto did to yours truly yesterday. He cites four different quotes from my blog over the past few years and implies inconsistency or what Glenn Reynolds calls 'spin.' . . . How is any of it 'excitable,' unless it is somehow now unacceptable to be shocked to the core by what we have discovered about the treatment of many detainees by U.S. forces? There is a distinction between how we deal with the enemy in the field of battle and how we deal with prisoners of war captured in such a battle. You can be ruthless in the former and humane in the latter. In fact, this was once the defining characteristic of the Western way of war. Now it is a subject of mockery from the defend-anything-smear-anyone right."--Andrew Sullivan, June 22, 2005
"THE SURRENDER? I've been well lashed by readers for losing faith in this president. For the record: I haven't. But I'm worried. . . . I'm also worried by further news of his going soft. The Times of London has just published an account of the terrorist Club Med at Guantanamo Bay. . . . Here's the claim: 'Overreacting to the initial outcry at the apparently tough conditions in the Camp X-Ray detention centre--with its images of cages, chains and kneeling prisoners, and rumours of truth drugs and sensory deprivation--the Pentagon has set up a kid-glove regime. . . . Guantanamo has been nicknamed "Eggshell City" by interrogators because of the political sensitivities. . . . Washington has become known as "Hand-Wringers' Central" because the Pentagon worries constantly about international reactions. In the first breach of the military secrecy shrouding the interrogation process, William Tierney, an Arabic speaker who spent six weeks as an interpreter at Camp X-Ray, revealed the combination of inexperienced interrogators and stifling political correctness that has hampered efforts to extract intelligence about Al-Qaeda.' If we are being put in any danger because we are treating these detainees with the kind of concern only Guardian editorialists would muster, then we are simply not serious about this war."--Andrew Sulivan, May 28, 2002
"Torture and abuse haven't made us safer. . . . Fake menstrual blood? If it weren't so disgusting, it would be risible. But it's true. Remember that, whatever the Tarantos of this world want to deflect the conversation to."--Andrew Sullivan, June 22, 2005
Blue Genes?
The New York Times reports on a study of political attitudes that, while interesting, is probably dubious. It argues "that people's gut-level reaction to issues like the death penalty, taxes and abortion is strongly influenced by genetic inheritance":
Three political scientists . . . combed survey data from two large continuing studies including more than 8,000 sets of twins.
From an extensive battery of surveys on personality traits, religious beliefs and other psychological factors, the researchers selected 28 questions most relevant to political behavior. The questions asked people "to please indicate whether or not you agree with each topic," or are uncertain on issues like property taxes, capitalism, unions and X-rated movies. Most of the twins had a mixture of conservative and progressive views. But over all, they leaned slightly one way or the other.
The researchers then compared dizygotic or fraternal twins, who, like any biological siblings, share 50 percent of their genes, with monozygotic, or identical, twins, who share 100 percent of their genes.
Calculating how often identical twins agree on an issue and subtracting the rate at which fraternal twins agree on the same item provides a rough measure of genes' influence on that attitude. A shared family environment for twins reared together is assumed.
On school prayer, for example, the identical twins' opinions correlated at a rate of 0.66, a measure of how often they agreed. The correlation rate for fraternal twins was 0.46. This translated into a 41 percent contribution from inheritance. . . . In the twins' overall score, derived from 28 questions, genes accounted for 53 percent of the differences.
There's an obvious flaw in this reasoning: While all sets of twins raised together may have "a shared family environment," growing up with an identical twin is itself a highly unusual environmental circumstance. If identical twins raised apart turned out to be more politically similar than fraternal twins raised together, the argument would be much more persuasive.
In any case, the study prompted Ken Schram of Seattle's KOMO-AM to file the following commentary:
I've long wondered how an otherwise seemingly rational person could adhere so strictly to stilted ideologies; how they could be so consistently willing to smother a sense of social well-being.
It's merely a matter of having been dumped in the shallow end of the gene pool.
They're sorta like the puppy who piddles in the middle of the floor: They just don't know any better.
Ah, those wonderful open-minded Seattle liberals!
Hey Brussels, Shut Up!
"Over 30 Dead in Baghdad Bombs After Brussels Talks"--headline, Reuters, June 23
Kerfuffle Watch
"Ed Klein's Canoodle Kerfuffle"--headline, New York magazine, June 22 issue
This Is America--He Should Speak in English
"Senator Bill Nelson to Speak in Tarpon"--headline, St. Petersburg Times, June 23
'I've Got a Feeling We're Not in Shandong Anymore'
"Chinese Defector Gets Temporary Stay in Oz"--headline, United Press International, June 22
You Don't Say
"Pressure Is On for Spurs and Pistons in Decisive Game 7"--headline, San Jose Mercury News, June 22
Steel and Concrete Would Probably Work Better
"Bush Supports More Nuclear Power Plants"--headline, Los Angeles Times, June 22
Doesn't Everyone?
"BTK Suspect Complains About Attorneys"--headline, Associated Press, June 22
What Would Women Do Without Studies?
"Study: Women's Orgasms Relieve Stress, Anxiety"--headline, Associated Press, June 20
When Tigers Attack
"Claude Organ, Acclaimed Surgeon, Dies"--headline, Oakland Tribune, June 22
'I'm Melting! I'm Melting!'
"The Alpine glaciers are shrinking," reports Der Spiegel. "But new research suggests that in the time of the Roman Empire, they were smaller than today. And 7,000 years ago they probably weren't around at all."
So much for global warming? Not necessarily. The Associated Press brings us the alarming news that "an attempt to erect the world's largest Popsicle in a city square ended with a scene straight out of a disaster film--but much stickier":
The 25-foot-tall, 17 1/2-ton treat of frozen Snapple juice melted faster than expected Tuesday, flooding Union Square in downtown Manhattan with kiwi-strawberry-flavored fluid that sent pedestrians scurrying for higher ground.
Firefighters closed off several streets and used hoses to wash away the sugary goo.
Snapple had been trying to promote a new line of frozen treats by setting a record for the world's largest popsicle, but called off the stunt before the it was pulled fully upright by a construction crane. Authorities said they were worried the thing would collapse in the 80-degree, first-day-of-summer heat.
"What was unsettling was that the fluid just kept coming," Stuart Claxton of the Guinness Book of World Records told the Daily News. "It was quite a lot of fluid. On a hot day like this, you have to move fast."
Sure, there might once have been forests where the Alpine glaciers are, but Manhattan was never covered in sugary goo. Al Gore, call your office!
Mirth in the Balance
Speaking of Al Gore, in a New York Times op-ed piece, Fatina Abdrabboh, a student at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, tells a heartwarming story of a random act of kindness.
It begins with Fatina feeling down on America: First, the local yokels in Cambridge looked at her funny because (well, she assumes because) she was wearing a hijab, a Muslim headscarf. As if that weren't bad enough, when she went to the gym, "every television" there "highlighted some aspect of America's conflict with the Muslim world. . . . I was not sure if the blood rushing to my head was caused by the elliptical trainer or by the news coverage."
She got on a treadmill and started running--hard. Perspiration ensued, and tragedy loomed: "I reached for my towel, accidentally dropping my keys in the process. . . . As they slid down the rolling belt and fell to the carpet, my faith in the United States seemed to fall with them."
Enter our hero:
Suddenly a man, out of breath, but still smiling and friendly, tapped me on my shoulder and said, "Ma'am, here are your keys." It was Al Gore, former vice president of the United States. Mr. Gore had gotten off his machine behind me, picked up my keys, handed them to me and then resumed his workout.
It was nothing more than a kind gesture, but at that moment Mr. Gore's act represented all that I yearned for--acceptance and acknowledgment.
There in front of me, he stood for a part of America that has not made itself well known to 10 million Arab and Muslim-Americans, many of whom are becoming increasingly withdrawn and reclusive because of the everyday hostility they feel.
Now, this may seem like just a feel-good story, but consider how lucky we are that it happened at all. In 2000 Al Gore lost one of the closest presidential elections in recent memory--and he would have won if the U.S. Supreme Court had not stopped the Florida Supreme Court from manufacturing a few hundred more "votes" for him.
Had that happened, it's conceivable Gore would still be in the White House today--and even if not, he certainly would not be wandering around in public unaccompanied by his Secret Service detail. If Fatina Abdrabboh had her keys handed to her at all, it might have been by a gruff law-enforcement agent rather than by the suave erstwhile veep.
There's no way of knowing how much such an encounter would have deepened Fatina Abdrabboh's alienation and intensified her anger, or how those feelings might eventually have expressed themselves. What we do know is that thanks to Al Gore--with a little help from William Rehnquist, Sandra Day O'Connor, Antonin Scalia, Anthony Kennedy and Clarence Thomas--we'll never have to find out. |
