And some more:
11.) I wanted to say something about the Decline of the West, before I forget. I agree with
you that some conservatives denigrate American society too much, and I have said so in
several public forums. But for those of us who believe that Western Civilization is the
source of whatever is valid in the modern world, and that promoting Western Civilization
amounts to helping other societies learn the necessary underpinnings of modernization, the
continued denigration of the West which has become pervasive in academic and left- wing
circles is threatening to the progress of the world, and therefore to the peace and
prosperity of the United States, which has not only idealistic reasons to hope that other
countries adopt democratic capitalism, but which, as a trading nation, is dependent upon
stability and a broad prosperity.
On the home front, it is simply true that the fabric of family life has been frayed in the
liberationist era, to the detriment of children, and that ill- considered social policies have
created an underclass totally unprepared for the world of work and responsibility, and
frequently criminal. I live in the Washington metropolitan area, as you might have guessed,
and recently there were five separate instances of young men shooting other young men
over Eddie Bauer coats, two of them fatal. How many socio- paths can a society afford to
create?
12.) Although the primary issues are perjury and obstruction, I will not deny that it is also
about the sex, at least to me. I understand adultery, I have no problem with fellatio, but I
think it is so entirely disreputable to get precipitously involved with a young intern in what
appears to have been an exploitative relationship, even if she acquiesced, in the Oval
Office, getting serviced while talking to Congressmen on the phone, that it necessarily
colors my view. Furthermore, the recklessness, especially when the Jones suit was moving
forward, and also when he expressed anxiety about his phone being tapped, is stunning. I
think he should have resigned on the basis of exposing the affair alone, even if it did not
suffice for impeachment.
13.) Bill Clinton is as responsible as anybody else for the law that allowed his "private life"
to come under scrutiny. If you don't like it,take it up with the feminists who pushed it. I
would not mind pulling back on the over- broadness of sexual harassment law. As for
fairness, I am not sure what there is to complain about. Toughness is not inherently unfair,
although it may be unkind. You may say that it is unfair that so much should have been
publicized which is embarrassing to the President, but that practically goes with the job. If
you except that Linda Tripp felt threatened, and was trying to protect herself; that Starr
saw the pursuit of this as a way to crack the Clinton cover- up machine, and therefore
went forward; that the Judiciary Committee, fearing that leaks were inevitable, and that
there would be charges of selectivity, decided it was prudent to dump the report on the
public; and that Starr, after being vilified for years, felt it necessary to make as complete
and solid a presentation of the facts as possible, then I don't know that much was wrong.
It is the President who was responsible for floating stories that Monica was a stalker; who
caused loyalists like Betty Currie to run up legal bills, because he insisted upon denial;
who sent his Cabinet members out to make fools of themselves as character witnesses; and
who has dragged out the process, when many Republicans would have been happy to have
accepted genuine remorse, and instead got perfunctory apologies and renewed attacks on
the Special Prosecutor and the Judiciary Committee. My version may be wrong, but then it
may be right.
14.) 1.)The greater the degree of political interference in the economy, the less economic
efficiency and the more diluted is consumer sovereignty;
2.) The politicization of an economic sector will increase the power of the most interested
parties in the long run, who will use it to cartelize the sector, to the advantage of
established firms and the detriment of competition and innovation;
3.) Therefore, government should regulate minimally, merely establishing "rules of the
road" and helping with infra- structure, and should limit the use of taxes, tariffs, trade
missions, and the like to favor certain outcomes, since they distort the price structure,
which is the best means of determining the efficient allocation of resources.
15.) 1.) It is more democratic to allow those who are most affected by policy decisions to
make the decisions, as when imposing pollution controls on an area;
2.) It is not only more democratic, but it is more efficient, because those closest to the
situation are in the best position to calculate trade- offs--- for example, a rich locale might
be able to afford more stringent regulations than a poor one;
3.) Also, local control permits greater diversity among population centers, and therefore
allows individuals to locate in the most congenial environment;
4.) Finally, such diversity permits a greater degree of policy experimentation, so that we
have a better chance to see what works and what doesn't in such areas as crime control
and education;
5.) Therefore, decisions should be made at the lowest level of government feasible, and
only rise to the next level when it is unfeasible to contain them. And this is called the
principle of subsidiarity.
The previous argument goes with this as arguments for limited government, which
virtually all Republicans subscribe to.
16.) 1.) Self- government requires the discipline of the citizenry, to prevent the wholesale
descent into faction, or the absorption in private pleasures to the detriment of public
duties;
2.) Furthermore, at least a modicum of decency is required to maintain the level of
political judgment necessary to elect candidates for office, and to discern the qualities
necessary to make a good leader;
3.) Finally, it is necessary to limit the matters that are the subject of political debate, or the
polity will never get beyond debates on first principles, or will deteriorate into civil strife.
Therefore, there must be a substantial consensus underpinning public life, shared values
that are not continually the subject of debate;
4.) Therefore, it is necessary to instill the values of our culture in our children, at home
and in school, and to encourage self- discipline as a virtue, rather than glorifying self-
expression and the attitude of "whatever floats your boat", and to uphold our fundamental
values and the virtue of self- discipline in all relevant forums.
17.) 1.) The absolute right of a woman to terminate her pregnancy at any point does
violence to the whole concept of paternity. Since it is her decision to carry the baby, it is
her baby. The law has not caught up with the logical implications yet, but it will;
2.) Therefore, abortion weakens the connections between fathers and their progeny, and
weakens the male concern with the consequences of sex, making men even more inclined
to predatory behavior and abandonment;
3.) Furthermore, a liberal abortion regime invites abuse, since it denies that there is any
hurdle that must be passed to obtain an abortion. Thus, it has been documented that many
women use abortion as a means of sex selection--- ironically, primarily to abort females. It
also creates the moral hazard of laxity with birth control, which has also been documented;
4.) Additionally, a liberal abortion regime makes it likely that genetic defects, such as
Down's syndrome, will become less acceptable, since those who give birth to such people
will be viewed as irresponsible for not having had an abortion;
5.) Abortion necessarily damages the sense of the sacredness of maternity, because unborn
children are at any moment disposable should the woman choose to do so. That may not
matter when the woman is fully committed to the birth, but what about those who are
ambivalent, and may decide that they should have aborted after the child is born? Has
abortion impacted on the rise of child abuse and abandonment?;
6.) The existence of late term, and especially partial birth, abortion obliterates any
distinction between the unborn child and the neonate, except condition of dependency, and
legitimizes infanticide, such as the couple of incidents where middle class girls gave birth
at proms and dumped the babies;
7.) The widespread prevalence of abortion threatens to rend the social fabric, given the
depth of feeling on both sides, and should not depend on a flawed Supreme Court
decision;
8.) Therefore Roe v Wade should be overturned, and the matter should go back to the
states, where conservatives should work to enact as many restrictions on abortion as are
politically feasible, and ban it if possible, except in instances of rape, incest, or serious
health risk
18.) Is affirmative action racist? It creates a dependent class, and enshrines the notion that
they are incapable of competing. Instead of creating diversity in colleges, it has become
typical for racial tensions to become more bitter, and for there to be even less inter- racial
interaction than when I was in college in the '70's. Furthermore, it encourages cynicism
about black achievement, since it is presumed that the game has been rigged in their favor.
Is the United States so racist as to require pervasive affirmative action programs? It has
been documented that West Indian immigrants, also the descendants of slaves, and also
black, fare much better than indigenous blacks. Some of the explanation is the self-
selection involved in immigration, but it certainly demonstrates that racism, while it exists,
is not the sole reason for black under achievement.
Has the victimization narrative undermined black achievement, reenforced by the belief
that they cannot compete, but must have someone give them things? Is the liberal
establishment in fact patronizing blacks by holding them to different standards, as when it
embraces an anti- semite and UFO theorist like Farrakhan? Are blacks demeaning
themselves when they embrace politicians like Marion Barry, and should liberals indulge
them? Food for thought.....
19.) If you were to install a security system in your plant, you would call it a capital
expenditure, and rightly so, not cavil over whether or not it was "productive".
Since I consider the military to be in a dangerous state of unreadiness, I think the peace
dividend has been pretty large. Most people thought that it was pretty large, actually,
regardless of political affiliation, but I guess if you think it should have been larger, the
perspective is different.
Whether or not the Soviets were as formidable as was commonly perceived, the supposed
strength of their forces fueled European neutralism, and the soviets themselves seemed to
have overestimated their own strength. Why do I say that? Because even after the decline
of the Soviet Union, Russian military officers were predicting that the Iraqis would prove
to be much more formidable opponents than they turned out to be, because the Soviets
had armed and trained them. A belligerent power that overestimates itself is also
dangerous, since much harm can ensue before it is vanquished. Look at Hitler: he
essentially doomed himself by declaring war on the United States, and opening the Eastern
front. But it was not only the German people who paid for his folly.
20.) Do you think that the President should be able to lie in a civil deposition? Do you
think that he should be involved with an intern in the workplace, especially when he is
under the kind of scrutiny such a lawsuit entails? Do you think that he should be entitled
to smear people (like the "stalker", Monica) and cause them to incur large legal bills (like
the hapless Betty Currie) in order to save his own skin? Do you think he has NOT
disgraced his office?
21.) As a smugly superior moralist, I wanted to go on record as saying that the American
people SHOULD vote Republican for the next thirty years because they are intelligent,
competent, and decent, and deserve a chance to run their own lives and to pass on their
values to their children. The Republican Party is the party of hard- work, responsibility,
and discipline. The Democrats are the party of welfare, quotas, and abortion on demand.
You, the American people, must choose...
22.) I haven't assured anyone of anything, nor have I said that Clinton will be a long term
albatross. Do you actually read my posts, Daniel? I have been at some pains to set forth
my view that even if we take a hit on this, it is worth doing, and I think we can recover in
time for 2000.
I do not think that politics is either a war, or blood sport, and I don't think that the
Republicans invented it, in any case. Remember Johnson's "little girl picks flower, goes
boom" commercial? Sometimes politics gets too rough, but if the Republicans were as bad
as you say, we would be singing "Hail to the Chief" to President Dole.
23.) I can understand those who want a relaxed abortion regime in the first trimester, and
accept it as a matter for legitimate disagreement and debate, I can at least give those who
favor it in the second trimester the benefit of the doubt, but by the third trimester, it is so
obviously indefensible that proponents show their moral bankruptcy, and only self- control
could prevent me from denouncing them rather than debating them. I don't know whether
you read my post on abortion from a couple of nights ago, but I think it is wrong and
dangerous to regard it as a "woman's issue". As for the morning after pill, I suppose I
think that it is preferable to many other alternatives, and therefore give it a qualified
acceptance. However, I admit to being against abortion in most circumstances, simply.
24.) Why do you think that Bill Clinton, who has been a great campaigner, but legislatively
one of the most inept Presidents to sit in the White House, and who has been forced to
live up to his supposed moderation by the Republican capture of the Congress, is
important enough to be the object of a vast right- wing conspiracy? I was at a gathering of
conservatives in Washington around the time he became President. The attitude was well
summed- up by Bill Kristol, who said that we should mostly wait for him to fail on his
own. A couple of years later, he did, and only managed to keep his job by the grace of
God and Dick Morris, through the strategy of triangulation. There are, indeed, those who
think he is a con artist who would like to expose him, and any President has political
opponents who will do things to hurt him, but there is no grand conspiracy, if only
because he hasn't mattered that much, nor has the Democratic Party, in recent years. Your
continual gloating over the possible change of fortunes between the two parties is the
gloat of someone with a deep resentment towards those who have basically run the
country for the last 18 years. Perhaps you are right that Republicans are in for a hard time,
but about little else.
25.) You are exactly right to point to the gays in the military initiative as a political bungle,
after having run as a centrist. The health care initiative was handled badly, too, especially
the flap over sunshine laws being violated (which they were found to be by a judge). In
any case, opposition is not the same as conspiracy, and the shambles of his first two years
led to the Republican Revolution, which put his very viability into question. It took all of
his energy to fight his way back to some kind of significance, and to retain the Presidency.
This is not Lyndon Johnson, who actually had a big agenda that he was capable of pushing
with some success.
The central Clinton hater is a guy in Arkansas who was at Oxford with Clinton. Yes, he is
a Republican, but the Washington Post did a profile of him a few years ago, and even they
thought it was not ideological, but personal. He just thinks that Clinton is a glad-handing
so-and-so who has gotten away with things his whole life long. I can't remember the guys
name, but he was the one who fed the media most of its leads on bimbos and the like.
By the way, not only is Chris Matthews still a Democrat, he voted for Clinton both times.
You guys think that there has to be a sinister reason for his being hard on Clinton, like
pandering or being a secret neocon. There isn't. Did you ever see Brian DePalma's "The
Untouchables"? It is like Andy Garcia's character, the Italian policeman who was so
offended that Capone and his boys were bringing the Italians into disrepute that he was
eager to sign on to the task force. Chris is trying to salvage the honor of the Democratic
Party.
26.) As I've said, Daniel, on the same basis that you draw conclusions about the lawyers, I
have an open-and-shut obstruction case against Clinton. No need for a trial, let's throw the
book at him.
In any event, it doesn't matter, because even if it were a trap, Clinton shouldn't have been
in a position to fall into it. You see, in order for the conspiracy to mean much, you have to
suppose that they could count on Clinton being a philanderer and a perjurer. If they could
count on his disreputable, reckless, and illegal behavior, then his fitness for office
reasonably comes into question, whatever sins others may have to answer for.
27.) Entrapment is discouraged because the government should not be inducing people to
commit crimes. Therefore, if someone can make a viable claim of entrapment, they can get
sprung, since the legal system, rather than punish the offender, has been operating for a
long time under the tainted fruit theory. Now, you can trap a person if you have sufficient
reason to believe that the propensity is well established, and you are merely gathering
evidence that they engage in such activity, as, for example, when a police officer poses as
a bar patron and plays along with a prostitute.
My point is that even if you were right it wouldn't matter:
1.) Because these people were not agents of the government;
2.) Because the tainted fruit exclusion is ridiculous anyway. If someone gets material
evidence of a crime, admit it. If they crossed some line, punish them;
3.) Because there was a propensity. No one induced him to get involved with Monica
during a case where he knew it might come to light, nor induced him to lie rather than
assert 5th amendment rights in the grand jury session, etc. He's just that kind of guy;
4.) But I do not even admit that the construction you have put on events,such as "planting
" the story, is true. Just because something reasonably could be so doesn't mean that it is,
and you have leapt to more than one conclusion. That's your right, but then it is a bit thick
to complain about everyone else.
28.) We are free to have an opinion, whether or not he is convicted. We are not under the
obligation to acquit if there is a reasonable doubt, and can form an opinion on the
preponderance of the evidence. We do not have to ignore testimony that might be
excluded at trial. A verdict of not guilty takes away legal jeopardy, but not even all of that,
as when OJ was found guilty in a civil trial of wrongful death, even though he had been
acquitted in a criminal trial of murder. And, as Democrats never tire of reminding us, the
President is still subject to indictment and trial on these counts after he leaves office. So
what you are saying is, not to put to fine a point on it, wrong, and your earlier invitation
to us to go to another country if we didn't like the American system was offensive
29.) Your attempts to bait me on this are pointless and tiresome. I will say, though, that
my feelings are not much different than what I described earlier about my reaction to
Clinton during the '92 primaries, except in confirming further my impression of him as
being unbelievably smarmy. This, you may note, was before he supposedly coopted us.
Further, like many neoconservatives, and despite my support of Reagan and increasing
conservatism during the '80s, I found it difficult to become a Republican, and dawdled
about changing my registration for some time, hoping that groups like the DLC would
prove viable. In fact, a lot of neocons were talked into endorsing Clinton, and then
(predictably) got screwed. I was too small a fish to get wooed, but an acquaintance of
mine was practically promised an important post at State that he would have been perfect
for, and then discovered he had been had. I partly switched parties because of Clinton. He
was supposed to represent our best hope for a centrist Democratic Party, but I found him
an intolerable lightweight, and stuck with Bush.
30.) Don't you understand that we are not all the Puritans of your nightmares? We
understand about human frailty, because we are human. I have not done what Hyde did,
but there have been occassions of strain in my marriage where "but for the grace of
God"..., and so it is with most of us. But I still think that failing to maintain fidelity over
the course of a long marriage is a far cry from compulsive womanizing, and that lying
under oath is worse than casual lying, and that obstruction is a crime.
Politics does, indeed, move through vote trading and compromise. Nevertheless, many
politicians have goals, right or wrong, and politics is merely a means to move the ball
forward. With only a couple of exceptions, it has seemed to many on both the Right and
Left that Clinton is an extreme example of the mere careerist politician. And those
exceptions were generally believed to be Hillary's contribution to the agenda. |
