Best of the Web Today - January 6, 2004
By JAMES TARANTO
Dumb and Dumber
Is Neal Starkman as smart as he seems to think he is? If so, his article in yesterday's Seattle Post-Intelligencer ("intelligent as a post") is a spoof. And in that case, hooray for Starkman for a hilarious jape at the expense of the P-I's editors. In a deadpan tone, Starkman poses the question: Why do people like President Bush? Here's his answer:
It's the "Stupid factor," the S factor: Some people--sometimes through no fault of their own--are just not very bright.
It's not merely that some people are insufficiently intelligent to grasp the nuances of foreign policy, of constitutional law, of macroeconomics or of the variegated interplay of humans and the environment. These aren't the people I'm referring to. The people I'm referring to cannot understand the phenomenon of cause and effect. They're perplexed by issues comprising more than two sides. They don't have the wherewithal to expand the sources of their information. And above all--far above all--they don't think.
You know these people; they're all around you (they're not you, else you would not be reading this article this far). They're the ones who keep the puerile shows on TV, who appear as regular recipients of the Darwin Awards, who raise our insurance rates by doing dumb things, who generally make life much more miserable for all of us than it ought to be. Sad to say, they comprise a substantial minority--perhaps even a majority--of the populace.
This article has received a fair amount of attention from conservative bloggers, and the assumption seems to be that it's on the level. It may well be; certainly, as we've noted before, those on the political left flatter themselves that they represent the cognitive elite.
But the reference to the Darwin Awards makes us wonder. "The Darwin Awards honor those who improve our gene pool by removing themselves from it," according to the awards' Web site. In other words, they "honor" people who die as the result of their own stupidity.
Might Starkman have meant this as a sly reference to terror advocate Rachel Corrie, and thus a dig at the Post-Intelligencer, which lionized her last month? Corrie's story, of course, is classic Darwin Award material; she got herself killed because she thought standing in front of a moving bulldozer would be a good way to make a political statement. We don't know for sure what she thought of President Bush, but she did like to burn the American flag, so we're going to go out on a limb and guess she wasn't a fan of his.
Anyway, spoof or not, can't you just imagine the excitement Starkman's manuscript must have generated when it arrived in the Post-Intelligencer newsroom? We picture the editors sitting around, open-mouthed, exclaiming: "Duh, wow! This article is awesome! We really are intelligencer than everyone else!"
It's Your Fault We Called You Hitler!
The far-left group MoveOn.org has been holding a contest for anti-Bush television ads, and it's come under fire for a pair of ads posted to its Web site that compared the president to Hitler. Now MoveOn founder Wes Boyd has issued a statement. While he acknowledges that "we agree that the two ads in question were in poor taste and deeply regret that they slipped through our screening process," he says the real blame lies with the Republicans for drawing attention to them:
The Republican National Committee and its chairman have falsely accused MoveOn.org of sponsoring ads on its website which compare President Bush to Adolf Hitler. The claim is deliberately and maliciously misleading. . . . None of these was our ad, nor did their appearance constitute endorsement or sponsorship by MoveOn.org Voter Fund.
There's a theme here, isn't there? First we have these ads comparing Bush to Hitler, which show a childish ignorance of history. They seem to be based on the syllogism: Bush is bad, Hitler was bad, therefore Bush was Hitler. (The S factor indeed.) The ads get posted to the MoveOn Web site because of a now-acknowledged lack of adult supervision--and then, rather than simply accept responsibility for this rather grievous error, Boyd lashes out at Republicans, as if his incompetence and his members' stupidity and viciousness were their fault.
This is politics as it might be conducted by 12-year-old boys. No wonder MoveOn types have latched onto Howard Dean, known for such juvenile utterances as "I am somewhat of a street fighter. If someone punches me I am apt to chase them down and I need to be restrained by the people who know better and have been in the game longer than I have." Is the Democratic primary race a political campaign or is it "Lord of the Flies"?
Bike Paths Yes, Jews No
From Franklin Foer of The New Republic, here's another interesting tidbit about Howard Dean's church:
Last June, a sermon at Dean's own Congregationalist church blared, "The real violence is the violence of the occupation of Israel to over three million Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem."
Dean left an Episcopal church because he was outraged that it opposed a bike path. Is he untroubled that his current congregation does not view mass murder of Jewish civilians as "real violence"?
Good News Watch
About a third of Congress has visited Iraq since May, "and the trips are shifting the political dynamic on Capitol Hill about the war," reports the Christian Science Monitor:
Unlike during Vietnam, when congressional visits often fueled lawmakers' opposition to the war, these tours of Iraq are tending, if anything, to blunt antiwar sentiment. In many cases, they are solidifying support in Congress for the military effort.
One example:
Sen. Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, the lone GOP senator to oppose the war in Iraq in 2002, returned from a two-day visit last October convinced that US action had been justified. . . . "It's important to see for yourself and to get some sense of what's going on," says Senator Chafee, who voted for President Bush's $87 billion supplemental request a week after his return from Iraq. He says that his visit convinced him that Iraqis were relieved to see Saddam Hussein toppled.
The article doesn't mention if any of the Democratic presidential candidates have visited, but if the ultimate nominee turns out to be an antiwar candidate who hasn't been there (especially if he holds a degree from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine), President Bush will be able to make an issue of his ignorance.
Our Friday item on Howard Dean lying about Saddam Hussein's capture making America safer was based on a Washington Times article that cited what seems to have been a premature count of the number of U.S. servicemen killed in Iraq during December. According to Lunaville.org, which keeps watch on the casualty count, the actual number was 41, not 38. which means December deaths were just over half the November total of 81, not just under as we had said.
A look at this breakdown, however, shows that the news was actually better than we'd thought. The total number of coalition troops (including those from outside the U.S.) who died of hostile action plummeted to 32 in December from 94 in November, a 65% decrease. The number of nonhostile deaths--from illness, accidents and so forth--increased slightly, to 17 from 15. Obviously Saddam's capture doesn't make anyone less likely to get sick (well, apart from head lice), but it does seem to have dramatically calmed the hostilities.
Osama bin Writin'?
Today's London Guardian features an op-ed piece by . . . Osama bin Laden? Yes, believe it or not. The left-wing paper couldn't even get bin Laden to do an exclusive; the piece turns out to be merely an excerpt of the latest tape attributed to the al Qaeda honcho.
You're Under Arrest, Mister
"Two members of Turkey's main pro-Kurdish party have been arrested for calling Kurdish rebel leader Abdullah Ocalan 'Mr Ocalan,' " the BBC reports:
The remark came on Saturday in a press statement about prison conditions by two local officials of the Democratic People's Party. They referred to Abdulllah Ocalan as "sayin," which also means "respected and esteemed" in Turkish. They are now accused of "propaganda in favour of a terrorist organisation."
Imagine what would happen if the U.S. had similar laws. Recent New York Times articles refer to both "Mr. bin Laden" and "Mr. Hussein"; under Turkish law the gray lady would be doing hard time.
What Would We Do Without Experts?--I
"Aircraft Not the Only Security Risk: Expert"--headline, CTV.ca (Canada), Jan. 2
What Would We Do Without Experts?--II
"Experts Doubt Terror Threat Ended With Holidays"--headline, Seattle Times, Jan. 5
Inherit the Wind
On the San Francisco Chronicle's Web site Jennifer Nelson, a young mother who lives in Oakland, Calif., reports that bigotry against "breeders"--a disparaging term for parents--is rife in the Bay Area:
My favorite story is this one: When I was getting physical therapy when I was six months pregnant (after falling and breaking my wrist), the therapist asked me whether I was pregnant with my first child (she had already told me that she had one child and planned to have only one). When I said, no, this was actually my third child, she immediately asked me whether I was going to have my tubes tied after the birth.
After my baby was born, the hostile looks and mutterings continued. While I was waiting in line for coffee one day with the kids in tow, one woman offered to me that she thought three children constituted a big family. When I told her it really isn't considered a large family in many other parts of the country, including the Midwest town I had recently moved from, she asked me with disdain, "Where was that, a religious community?" Then there was the woman who said to me as she pushed by my stroller, "Three? Don't you think you have enough?" It's not like I was asking her to contribute to their college fund! I was just taking my kids to the bathroom.
Oh well, you reap what you sow. These jerks may have the upper hand now, but the Roe effect ensures Jennifer Nelson's children will outnumber her tormentors'.
New Competition for UPS
"Deliveries May Be Better Handled by Academic MDs"--headline, Reuters, Jan. 5
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It Wasn't a Burial at Sea After All
"Nabokov Leaves Sharks to Attend Funeral"--headline, San Jose Mercury News, Jan. 5
They'll Do Anything to Raise Revenue
"County Gains Ground on Scams of Elderly"--headline, San Diego Union-Tribune, Jan. 5
Ghost Rider in the Machine
Yesterday's item on the legal problems of the guitarist for the rock band Rush prompted several readers to ask, as Louis Abbott put it: "Is it just a coincidence that you use the phrase 'hopeful yet discontent' immediately after a story about Alex Lifeson? It is in the lyrics of the Rush hit 'Tom Sawyer.' "
Actually, it was syncronicity. But it was mere coincidence that the Lifeson item also mentioned the police.
Let's Roll
The New York Times profiles Pete Correll, CEO of Georgia Pacific, who's known as the "King of Toilet Paper":
As Mr. Correll attends product introductions and other events promoting the changes, he says, he is always asked the same question: "How does it feel to sell toilet paper for a living?" . . .
Mr. Correll's stock answer: "Toilet paper is a wonderful product. Ninety-eight percent of the American public uses it."
And what about the other 2%? "We don't have any research on that." Here's one possibility: We seem to remember from our teen years that when we didn't use toilet paper, we threw eggs at houses instead. |
