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BY JAMES TARANTO
Monday, March 7, 2005 4:24 p.m.
A Test for the Dems
"President George W. Bush on Monday nominated John Bolton, a longtime critic of the United Nations, to be the new U.S. ambassador to the world body," Reuters reports:
Bolton, a leading hawk against Iran and North Korea as the top U.S. arms control policies diplomat, has complained U.N. bodies fail to take strong enough action against such nations and has strongly criticized some international treaties.
Bolton's nomination, which shocked some diplomats at the United Nations, must be confirmed by the U.S. Senate, where Democrats were expected to bring up previous harsh criticism Bolton has aimed at the world body.
This will be an interesting test for the Democrats. In 2001, when Bolton won Senate confirmation as undersecretary of state, the vote was only 57-43 in his favor, with all but seven Democrats--including today's leading hawk, Hillary Clinton--voting "no." That vote came in May, and it will be interesting to see how many Democrats take the side of the U.N. and complain about "harsh criticism" in light of the Sept. 11 attacks, the liberation of Iraq, and all the other events of the past four years.
On Any Given Sunday
Everyone knows that liberals are smarter than regular people--only sometimes we harbor doubts. Could this be one of those things that "everybody knows" but that turn out not to be true? What prompts this observation is a roundtable on "the present state of liberalism in America, and its future," which appeared yesterday in the New York Times book review. Among the participants was Michael Tomasky of The American Prospect, who had this to say in answer to the question, "Can the Democrats become the majority party in America again?":
One of the Democratic Party's problems is that it doesn't have enough contact with its rank and file. Right-wing people in this country have a place to meet and talk politics--their churches, increasingly the megachurches in the exurbs. There's not a meeting place like that for liberals and for Democrats.
If this is true, and if liberals are so smart, why don't they start going to church?
A Counterculture No More
A generation ago, the Washington Post famously described evangelical Christians as "poor, uneducated and easily led." In those days the "religious right" was something of a counterculture, but a piece in yesterday's Post suggests that has changed:
The conservative Christian political movement that burst on Washington in the '80s, the activists with their aborted-fetus placards and their heady plans to colonize school boards and their here-and-now visions of the Apocalypse, their early years are now a source of embarrassment to themselves.
Amen to them. No more thundering sermons on Wiccans and floods and child molesters, caught on tape and leaked by a political opponent. No more pronouncements about "signs" showing up in California. No more horrors from the Book of Revelation.
It's what Ralph Reed dreamed of, and now it's finally here. Christians in politics are ready to trade in their guerrilla fatigues for business suits and a day job. This year evangelicals in public office have finally become so numerous that they've blended in to the permanent Washington backdrop, a new establishment that has absorbed the local habits and mores.
The Post describes South Dakota's Sen. John Thune as "the movement's new David" for having defeated Tom Daschle last year:
To secular humanists or even your average Democrat, Thune Land is a scary, scary frontier. "He is this new kind of Republican creature who puts an innocuous face on the religious right," says a Daschle aide who worked on the campaign. "Behind this cheerful frat-boy basketball-star persona is just the same old beast of the far right."
Some on the left remain positively unhinged at the idea of Christians participating in politics. In the New York Review of Books, LBJ aide turned public-television mogul Bill Moyers has a paranoid screed in which he says that "fundamentalists" and "corporations" are "united" behind "President Bush's master plan for rolling back environmental protections." Even to someone who isn't religious, Moyers seems a lot more fanatical than the Christians described in the Post article.
The New York Times, meanwhile, looks at another interesting development involving the intersection between religion and politics:
A tug of war is under way inside black churches over who speaks for African-Americans and what role to play in politics, spurred by conservative black clergy members who are looking to align themselves more closely with President Bush. . . .
At the heart of the debate, church leaders say, is whether to stay focused primarily on issues like job creation, education, affirmative action, prison reform and health care, which have drawn blacks closer to the Democratic Party, or whether to put more emphasis on issues of personal morality, like opposition to abortion and same-sex marriage, which would place them deeper in the Republican camp.
In other words, black ministers are debating the same issues that concern all Americans--surely a sign of progress toward racial equality.
The Roe Effect Goes Mad
We know the Roe effect has arrived now that Mad magazine has recognized it. The humor mag's March issue has a comic strip (not available online; on page 24 of the magazine) that depicts a mother and daughter having the following dialogue (emphasis omitted):
Daughter: I'm going to a pro-choice rally.
Mother: Really? You know, when I found out I was pregnant with you I actually considered having an abortion.
Daughter: WHAT?
Mother: But I couldn't find a doctor, because back then abortion was outlawed.
Daughter: Why are you telling me this now?
Mother: Because if abortion was legal then, you wouldn't be around to go to the pro-choice rally today!
The girl in the Mad strip appears to be no more than 20, which means in real life she actually would have been aborted, since abortion has been legal everywhere in America for at least 32 years. Imagine how big those pro-choice rallies would have been in the absence of Roe v. Wade.
Survival of the Fetus
There's another reason beside the Roe effect to think abortion politics may gradually move in a more pro-life direction: Call it the ultrasound effect. Last night National Geographic Channel featured a documentary called "In the Womb" on the latest prenatal technology:
The new generation of three- and four-dimensional ultrasound imagery provides striking views of fetuses inside the womb. . . . "It's almost a new science, in a way. It's taught us so much about how the fetus develops at an early stage," said Professor Stuart Campbell of the Create Health Clinic in London. . . . Four-dimensional imagery shows objects in 3-D moving in something close to real time. . . .
"We see the earliest movements at 8 weeks," [Stuart] Campbell said. "By 12 weeks or so they are seen yawning and performing individual finger movements that are often more complex than you'll see in a newborn," he said. "It may be due to the effects of gravity after birth."
The images reveal facial expressions, like smiling, at 20 weeks. Beyond 24 weeks fetuses may suck their thumbs, stick their tongues out (perhaps using newly developed taste buds to sample amniotic fluid imbued with the flavors of the mother's food), and make apparently emotional faces.
Many of the reflexes seem designed to help the fetus with tasks it will need after birth, such as opening its eyes and sucking.
Campbell says the real-time images are far more vivid than old-fashioned flat ultrasounds. When parents see the images, he says, "you just see the whoops of joy when the fetus does something like blink."
Virginia Heffernan, reviewing the program for the New York Times, gets awfully defensive:
"In the Womb" is actually a cool, beautiful movie, a celebration of computer imaging and the 4-D ultrasound. It exhibits a minimum of politics, probably because it appears to have been made in England, where the acknowledgement that humans in the womb are complex, dreaming, pain-experiencing, memory-having, walk-practicing, music-enjoying entities does not instantly put you in the same camp as doctor assassins and purveyors of "The Silent Scream."
And little wonder. It would be ridiculous to suggest that vivid prenatal images will somehow settle the abortion debate, but it's hard to see how, in light of them, the absolutist pro-choice position--that a "fetus" is nothing but a parasitic clump of tissue--can remain tenable.
Party Like It's 1969
This is from MoveOn.org's list of upcoming "house parties":
Conscientious Objection- resisting the draft (2 registered participants)
[address omitted]
New York, NY
This gathering will provide information about Conscientious Objection: what it is, how to prepare a CO file, and how people of all ages can participate in resisting the draft. If there is time at the end we can discuss other MoveOn agenda issues, but the focus will be on the main topic.
West Village, just south of meatpacking district.
Thursday, March 10, 07:00 PM
Maybe when the partygoers are done opposing the draft, they can work on other pressing issues of contemporary concern, such as repealing Prohibition.
The First One Was a Warning Shot
"The chief of Ukraine's security service said Saturday that the country's former interior minister, Yuri F. Kravchenko, had shot himself twice in the head on Friday, refuting speculation that he had been killed by someone else."--New York Times, March 6
Zero-Tolerance Watch
An editorial in the Daily Herald of Provo, Utah, describes the plight of an unnamed ninth-grader at Pleasant Grove Junior High:
According to the boy's stepfather, it all started when the boy confronted a classmate who was harassing a girl. Responding to taunts--"What are you going to do about it, put me on your list?"--the boy wrote down the offender's name. The list lengthened during successive class periods as friends suggested other classmates they didn't like. In the end around 90 names were listed under the heading "special friends."
Administrators scurried into action when one student on the list complained. The ninth-grader was suspended and a formal hearing was set for today. Indicative of just how seriously the school is taking this, counseling sessions were set up for students named on the list and notes were sent home to their parents.
This would all be perfectly understandable if a real threat existed. But it's just the opposite. Administrators have already admitted it was all just kid stuff with no malicious intent. "There was no evidence of a plan or danger," said Jerrilyn Mortensen, a district spokeswoman.
Isn't That What Got Him in Trouble in the First Place?
"After Rather Departs, 'News' Ready to Forge On"--headline, USA Today, March 7
And You Thought Punch Cards Were Hit-and-Miss
"South Florida to Vote on Slot Machines"--headline, Associated Press, March 6
What Would We Do Without Groups?
"Tigers Shouldn't Be House Pets, Says Group"--headline, Salt Lake Tribune, March 7
Much to the Disappointment of the Gruesome Chimps
"Gruesome Chimp Attack Doesn't Surprise Experts"--headline, Arizona Republic, March 5
Another Reason to Become a Carno-Vegetarian
"New Research Opens a Window on the Minds of Plants"--headline, Christian Science Monitor, March 3
High-Steaks Politics
"Renew your membership today at the most generous level you can afford and help me stop Rove's mignons [sic] in their tracks."--Paul Berendt, Washington state Democratic Party chairman, in a fund-raising letter, quoted in the Seattle Times, March 5
We Have a Winner
The essay called "How to Win an Argument," which we quoted Thursday, was indeed written by Dave Barry. A PDF copy of the 1981 piece, titled "How to Argue Effectively," appears on Barry's Web site.
It also seems that the Appleton (Wis.) Post-Crescent, which published a plagiarized version of the column in 2003, as we noted in our Friday follow-up, has already dealt with the problem. "It was Dave Barry himself who contacted me several months ago in reference to the column you are citing," writes executive editor Andrew Oppmann in an e-mail to reader Brian Collar. "Following Mr. Barry's notification, and working in concert with him, we printed an Editor's Note that detailed to readers the problems with the column."
Lockstep Diversity
"WE WELCOME DIVERSITY" proclaims the Web site of Ocean Haven, an Oregon inn. "Respecting the interdependence & diversity of all life."
Well, maybe not all life. The homepage offers some qualifications:
FOR REASONS OF HEALTH & SAFETY OCEAN HAVEN CANNOT ACCOMMODATE SMOKERS, PETS, FOLKS TRAVELING IN A HUMMER, OR FOLKS WHO VOTED FOR BUSH & HIS NATURE DESTRUCTIVE POLICIES
Wow, this place sounds almost as diverse as a college campus! |
