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BY JAMES TARANTO
Tuesday, September 4, 2007 3:19 p.m. EDT
Just What the Lawyer Ordered
Who does John Edwards think he is, our mother? The Associated Press reports from Tipton, Iowa, on the lovely and talented one's latest brainstorm:
Edwards said on Sunday that his universal health care proposal would require that Americans go to the doctor for preventive care.
"It requires that everybody be covered. It requires that everybody get preventive care," he told a crowd sitting in lawn chairs in front of the Cedar County Courthouse. "If you are going to be in the system, you can't choose not to go to the doctor for 20 years. You have to go in and be checked and make sure that you are OK."
He noted, for example, that women would be required to have regular mammograms in an effort to find and treat "the first trace of problem." Edwards and his wife, Elizabeth, announced earlier this year that her breast cancer had returned and spread.
Edwards said his mandatory health care plan would cover preventive, chronic and long-term health care. The plan would include mental health care as well as dental and vision coverage for all Americans.
"The whole idea is a continuum of care, basically from birth to death," he said.
Aside from its obvious creepiness, there is something dissonant on several levels about a liberal politician in this day and age calling for government to police everyone's medical care.
For one thing, liberals, who these days are more or less uniformly pro-abortion, invariably speak of that practice in terms of "privacy" and "choice." But how in the world can anyone who values privacy and choice more than life itself possibly countenance a policy of forcing women to have mammograms?
For another, we live in a time when liberals often sound like antigovernment kooks, making far-fetched claims that the government is spying on all of us, torturing innocent terrorists, deliberately letting hurricane victims die, etc. Of course the object of this paranoia isn't government per se but the Republican Party and especially the current administration. Some have even asserted (see, for example, this 2005 item about former Enron adviser Paul Krugman) that conservative ideology precludes competent governance.
For the sake of argument, let's assume this assertion is true. It is also true that Americans in recent decades have shown a preference for conservative ideology, electing conservative Republicans in four or five of the past seven presidential elections (and, in the other two, choosing a Democrat who proclaimed "the era of big government is over"). If only liberals can handle big government, and Americans can't be trusted to elect liberals, expanding the government in the way Edwards proposes is a dreadful idea regardless of where you stand politically.
The question would-be Edwards supporters should be asking is: Would you want George W. Bush making medical decisions for you? Is there anyone who would answer in the affirmative?
'Night Having Fallen'
President Bush made a surprise visit to Iraq yesterday, meeting with that country's leaders as well as Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker at the Al Asad Air Base in Anbar Province, site of recent military successes. And the New York Times came up with its most clumsy description yet of the enemy:
[National Security Adviser Stephen] Hadley, briefing reporters, recalled a military intelligence officer's dire warning a year ago that Al Qaeda controlled the provincial capital, Ramadi, and other towns in the region. "Anbar Province is lost," he quoted the analyst as saying then. Mr. Hadley was apparently referring to Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, the homegrown Sunni Arab extremist group that American intelligence agencies have concluded is foreign led. The extent of its links to Osama bin Laden's network is not clear.
It was much simpler when they just called it "al Qaeda Which Has Nothing to Do With Iraq in Mesopotamia Which Also Has Nothing to Do With Iraq Even Though It's Another, More Poetic Name for Iraq Which Has Nothing to Do With al Qaeda, a Homegrown Iraqi Group That Has Nothing to Do With Iraq Even Though It Is Mostly Iraqi, Albeit With Some Foreign Involvement Which Has Nothing to Do With Iraq." But we suppose that didn't make it clear that the extent of its links to Osama bin Laden's network is not clear.
The Times story has some other choice passages, including this one:
"When you stand on the ground here in Anbar and hear from the people who live here, you can see what the future of Iraq can look like," [the president] said, night having fallen at the base.
The awkwardness of that "night having fallen" construction makes obvious the implication that Iraq's future is dark. And stop the presses for this revelation:
Administration officials rejected the notion that the trip was a publicity stunt.
The Times doesn't get around to telling us whose "notion" that was, exactly.
Is There a Draft in Here?
Der Spiegel reports on an exhibition in a New York art gallery that "shows what the media doesn't--shocking photos of seriously wounded Iraq veterans." You can see some of the photos, by Nina Berman, here and possibly here, and they are disturbing.
Our first reaction to hearing about this was to be put off by what seems an exploitation of maimed servicemen in the service of anti-Iraq propaganda. Our second reaction was to feel bad about our first reaction. After all, these are powerful photos, and war is horrible, even when the cause is noble.
But the last paragraph of the Spiegel piece vindicated our first impulse:
Berman, for her part, found the experience of photographing the veterans profoundly moving. "Meeting so many severely disabled young men and women was deeply disturbing to me," she says. "I felt complicit because they had fought in my name. And I felt the divide of privilege because I did not have to make a similar sacrifice."
The men she photographed did not have to make such a sacrifice either. Surely Berman knows that America has an all-volunteer military, and has for more than a third of a century. These are men who freely chose to undertake dangerous work in the service of their country. By patronizing them, by portraying them as hapless victims, Berman betrays a profound disrespect for their sacrifice.
'I Think That's Something That I Have to Condemn'
"A Palestinian rocket landed in a courtyard next to a crowded day care center on Monday," the Associated Press reports from Sderot, Israel, a city of about 20,000 that has been under constant attack by Arab terrorists since Israel withdrew from the nearby Gaza Strip. Fortunately, no one was hurt, but parents are naturally "frantic." The attack drew a strong reaction from the European Union:
Visiting EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana condemned the attacks on Sderot, adding that on a previous trip to Israel he had been in the town as rockets fell.
"I'd like to show my solidarity with the people of Sderot," he said at a news conference in Jerusalem with Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni.
"I know what it means, and to see today again the same experience for the people, in particular at a time when kids are in school, I think it's something that I have to condemn," he said.
Wow, that is bold moral leadership. We guess.
Lucey-Goosey
Buried in a story about a car-repair shop that's closing, the (Madison) Wisconsin State Journal recalls a tale of political hypocrisy:
Former Gov. Patrick Lucey owned the Foreign Car Specialists building when [shop owner Chris] Beebe began working there and Lucey's campaign headquarters occupied an office. Beebe still has Lucey's desk stashed in a storage room. . . .
Beebe bought the business after working there a year and Lucey sold the building to the family of President Kennedy. Beebe said the Kennedys bought the building because they wanted a business reason to visit Wisconsin where the former president's sister, Rosemary Kennedy, who was mentally retarded and lobotomized at age 23, spent decades at St. Coletta's in Jefferson until her 2005 death at age 86.
They "wanted a business reason to visit Wisconsin"? What can this mean except that these superrich self-styled champions of the little guy were looking for a tax write-off for their personal trips?
Press Partisanship Turns Ugly
* "Democratic Faces That Could Launch Thousands of Votes: With a Parade of Attractive Candidates, the Party May Benefit From the Politics of Beauty"--headline and subheadline, Washington Post, Oct. 14, 2006
* "GOP Faces Growing Peril In 2008 Races: Senate Prospects Dimming"--headline and subheadline, Washington Post, Sept. 2, 2007
Zero-Tolerance Watch
For the second time in as many weeks, an Arizona eighth-grader has been suspended for drawing a gun--that is, for creating a visual representation of a gun, not for removing an actual gun from its holster. This time it happened in Florence, southeast of Phoenix:
The eighth grader at Florence's Walker Butte K-8 school was suspended for three days on Friday for sketching a gun during class.
Stephanie Vardarkis said her son, Joshua had drawn the images on index cards, sort of like a cartoon that included a stick figure holding a gun.
In one image, the boy included the name of the school resource officer. Rather than it being a threat, Vardarkis said the character was meant to be calling the officer for backup.
Larry Cline, a spokesman for the Florence Unified School District, said the student was told by the teacher to put the cards away. He didn't and the cards were confiscated.
Cline said the cartoon content warranted suspension "because it is the intent of the district to provide a safe environment in which to learn."
We guess a "school resource officer" is some sort of para-policeman. We noted the earlier suspension, not far away in Chandler, on Aug. 22.
In the Denver suburb of Centennial, meanwhile, "sheriff's deputies and bomb squad members searched Peakview Elementary School [Thursday] after a 10-year-old student reported receiving an image of an explosive device on a cell phone," reports the Rocky Mountain News:
The incident was reported about 9:30 a.m., and deputies locked down the perimeter of the school to make sure the building was safe, said Sheriff's Capt. Mark Fisher. . . .
A criminal investigation is continuing as authorities try to determine who sent the image to the student, he said.
Maybe we're missing something, but an "image" on a cell phone hardly sounds like a threat. In any case, we're a bit surprised they let kids bring cell phones to school, but we guess we'd better not say anything lest we give them ideas.
The Columbus Dispatch has an inspiring story from Ohio's state capital:
Take top poster and pass to the left.
Following those instructions, hundreds of Hilliard Darby High School football fans fell into an elaborate prank on Friday night.
When they stood up during a football game against cross-town rival Hilliard Davidson High School and held up squares of construction paper, they thought they were spelling out: "Go Darby."
But from across the field, Davidson fans read the actual message:
"We suck."
Hilliard Davidson senior Kyle Garchar masterminded the trick at Crew Stadium and suffered an in-school suspension for it.
YouTube has the video. According to the Dispatch, "Garchar isn't too concerned. 'If you're going to do a senior prank, you want it to be remembered.' " Three cheers for this clever young man; and his suspension doubtless will teach him a valuable lesson: not to take those in authority too seriously.
Wannabe Pundits
From the New York Times:
The manufacturer's suggested retail price, for those trying to keep up with the Joneses--or the Rollses and Royces, in this case--is now more than eight times Americans' annual median household income.
Are you still waiting for Reaganomics to trickle down to your level? Me too.
You probably figured out that's from a car review, of the latest Rolls-Royce. And this, obviously enough, is from a sports column, by one Norman Chad in the Washington Post:
If the [Arizona] Cardinals were an automobile, they'd be a Pinto; if they were a tree, they'd be a weeping willow; if they were a planet, they'd be Earth after gross human negligence destroyed the ozone and left our global landscape scorched, barren and uninhabitable.
If the world is uninhabitable, where exactly does Norman Chad live?
Metaphor Alert
Today brings a cornucopia of violently clashing images. First, from a New York Times editorial:
The Republican Party is in quite a rush to keelhaul Senator Larry Craig for his run-in with the vice squad in an airport men's room. . . . No similar leadership chorus for judgment has been heard about any number of other scandalous revelations on the party's plate. . . . Being stupid as a member of Congress is hardly a reason to be ridden on a rail from Washington. But Republican presidential campaigners are urging Mr. Craig to resign fast as a swift boat. . . . Underlying the hurry to disown the senator, of course, is the party's brutal agenda of trumpeting the gay-marriage issue. To the extent Senator Craig, a stalwart in the family values caucus, might morph into a blatant hypocrite before the voters' eyes, he reflects on the party's record in demonizing homosexuality. The rush to cast him out betrays the party's intolerance, which is on display for the public in all of its ugliness.
And this is from Todd Gitlin, describing his new book whose very title, which he describes as "evocative" is a mixed metaphor, "The Bulldozer and the Big Tent":
To win, the Democrats have to pitch a bigger tent. There will continue to be, if we're lucky, tussles--even soul strife--within the big tent. . . . The Republicans made the mistake of turning themselves into a bulldozer party, but they couldn't bulldoze reality fast enough to keep from falling into a ditch. Now, if we don't blow it, there's a new center of gravity coming into American politics--not a flabby center of splitting differences, not a blah-blah of bipartisanship, but a new story and replenished values. . . . The Bush catastrophe will not be easily mopped up. But we've started awakening from the nightmare.
Shouldn't he have called it "The Bulldozer, the Big Tent, the Tussle, the Ditch, the Center of Gravity That Is Not a Flabby Center of Splitting Differences, the Story, the Replenishment, the Mopping Up and the Awakening From the Nightmare"? You can't get more evocative than that!
At Her Age, Is That Really a Worry?
"Clinton Courts Labor at Iowa Picnic"--headline, Associated Press, Sept. 3
And We Know How Prone He Is to Distraction
"Bill Clinton's Challenge: Keep Focus on His Wife"--headline, New York Times, Sept. 4
New Mexico Must Grossly Underpay Its Governor
"Richardson Calls for College Loan Help"--headline, Associated Press, Sept. 1
Everything Is His Fault!
* "Bush War Leaves Central African Villages Deserted"--headline, Reuters, Aug. 30
* "Human Family Tree Now a Tangled, Messy Bush"--headline, LiveScience.com, Sept. 2
A Medical Miracle
"Iran Replaces Revolutionary Guards' Head"--headline, Forbes.com, Sept. 1
'Et Ego, Brute?'
"Actor Playing Brutus Stabs Himself"--headline, Associated Press, Aug. 30
Your Heart Will Go Pitter Pat
"Felix Upgraded to Very Dangerous Cat 5"--headline, Reuters, Sept. 4
We Fault Editors of Headline Writers
"State Faults Teachers of English Learners"--headline, Arizona Republic, Aug. 31
Shouldn't They Be Working Rather Than Talking and Running?
"Officers Shoot Bull Running on Freeway"--headline, Deseret Morning News (Salt Lake City), Aug. 31
Can the Species Hold Out Until Basketball Season Ends?
"Scientists Urge Gene Banks to Combat Species Extinction"--headline, Agence France-Presse, Sept. 3
ADHD, of Course, Stands for . . . Oh, Look! A Squirrel!
"9% of U.S. Kids Have ADHD"--headline, HealthDay.com, Sept. 4
Breaking News From 1270
"China's Influence Spreads Around World"--headline, Associated Press, Sept. 1
Breaking News From 1492
"First American Expects to Cut Another 1,300 Jobs"--headline, Reuters, Sept. 4
News You Can Use
* "Far East Taco Cabana Hiring"--headline, El Paso (Texas) Times, Aug. 30
* "Summer's Almost Over"--headline, New York Times, Aug. 31
* "Yard Art Is in Eye of Beholder and Court"--headline, Associated Press, Sept. 3
* "Study: Men Men [sic] Go for Good Looks"--headline, Associated Press, Aug. 3
Bottom Stories of the Day
* "Students Unaware of Report's Release"--headline, Collegiate Times (Virginia Tech), Aug. 30
* "Dutch Royal Couple Edited Own Wikipedia Entry"--headline, Reuters, Aug. 31
* "Chinese Woman, 103, Won't Be Torchbearer"--headline, Associated Press, Sept. 1
* "Hailed for 'Limitless Talent,' Clooney Given French Cultural Honor"--headline, CBC.ca, Sept. 3
* "Fish Found Dead in West Delray Lake"--headline, South Florida Sun-Sentinel (Fort Lauderdale), Sept. 2
* "Hillary Clinton Expresses Surprise at Big Money Donor's Wanted Status"--headline, FoxNews.com, Aug. 30
Falling Rocks
"Rock stars--notorious for their 'crash and burn' lifestyles--really are more likely than other people to die before reaching old age," Reuters reports:
A study of more than 1,000 mainly British and North American artists, spanning the era from Elvis Presley to rapper Eminem, found they were two to three times more likely to suffer a premature death than the general population.
Wow, we're glad someone decided to do a study, or we might never have known this! The study notes a divergence between British and American rockers:
Among British artists the risk of dying remains high until around 25 years after their first success, when they return to near normal life expectancy.
That bodes well for rock survivors like The Who's 63-year-old Roger Daltrey, who famously first sang "I hope I die before I get old" in the song "My Generation" back in 1965.
But this trend was not found in North America, where ageing rockers remain almost twice as likely to suffer a premature demise, particularly from heart attack or stroke.
American stars Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead, Carl Wilson of the Beach Boys and Johnny Ramone of the Ramones all died in their 50s.
Bellis suggested that the high death rate among older American musicians could be related to the continent's greater appetite for reunion tours, exposing the artists for more years to an unhealthy "rock'n'roll" lifestyle.
It could also be due to the poor medical outlook for impoverished American ex-pop stars who have no health insurance, he said.
We must admit, we've long been skeptical of socialized medicine. But anyone who isn't moved by the plight of "impoverished American ex-pop stars" just has no heart.
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