Return to the Latest on No Left Turns
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Hamas
David Warren thinks that the victory of Hamas, "the openly terrorist party" is kind of clarifying: The vast majority of Palestinians want Israel driven into the sea. Probably true. Yet, Warren doesn’t tell us what to do now. Inj a soft piece, Fareed Zakaria thinks we shouldn’t have been surprised, but we were. He thinks we will be surprised again, unless we start supporting the liberal, secular groups. That sort of goes without saying, but in the case of the Palestinians, what has become clear is that they are less interested inh having their own state than in ending the state of Israel.
The Belmont Club says that following the money will not necessarily make you into an optimist. Sixty percent of the Palestinian Authority’s money comes from foreign donors (see his chart), with $368 million coming from the U.S. and $ 338 from the European Union. He notes that since November ’05, the European Union has witheld
$42 million in aid payments to the PA as punishment for missed fiscal targets. That, combined with Fatah having padded its payroll with young militants to win their votes ahead of the polls, and you are at the start of a bankrupt "government." Read the whole of it to see what they he is driving at. Is it possible that Bush will hold fast on not deal with Hamas and be able to hold the Europeans, the U.N., as well as Jordan and Egypt, with him? Can they support Israel, and demand that the government ruled by Hamas accept the prior Israeli-Palestinian peace agreements? Hard decisions will have to be made. The hard distinctions between democracy and justice, still have to be worked out. We can incline them in a certain direction based on their interests, but they will--somehaow--have to walk the last miles by themselves, in their own way. I hope that walk will not include a civil war. Khaled Meshal, speaking from Damscus, said
asked the world to respect the democratic choice of the Palestinian people -- which he called an example for the Arab and Muslim world. And then, this:
"The world raised the slogan of democracy, and now it should respect the results of democracy. If you want to punish the Palestinian people for practicing democracy, then the American administration should punish Americans for choosing President Bush." Hard work, all this, but I haven’t thrown in the towel yet. Also note this.
Posted by Peter Schramm | Link to this Entry | Comments [3] | 1/29/2006 2:42 PM
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Politics as positioning
The Dems’ Left is pushing and shoving everyone around, by of preparing their party to lose in 2008. So Hillary will vote in favor of a filibuster against Alito tomorrow to show everyone that she is a woman of the Left. This is a good move on her part because, of course, her vote is meaningless, and she knows it. But today she is in San Francisco trying explain why she voted in favor of the war, a more meaningful vote than the one she will cast tomorrow. Code Pink may still not be impressed. Meanwhile, also in California, the famous and serious and articulate peace activist (is that what I should call her?) Cindy Sheehan is threatening to run against Dianne Feinstein because she voted for the war: "She voted for the war. She continues to vote for the funding. She won’t call for an immediate withdrawal of the troops...I think our senator needs to be held accountable for her support of George Bush and his war policies." (But note that Sheehan can be critical of Clinton, as well.) A spokesman for Feinstein said she "doesn’t support George Bush and his war policies." And Bush, according to some, has latched unto the NSA issue and made it his own, so far to his advantage.
Posted by Peter Schramm | Link to this Entry | Comments [2] | 1/29/2006 12:39 PM
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A book on France?
I’m not a Garrison Keillor fan by any means (actually, haven’t heard him in over ten years, didn’t know he is still around), but this review of Bernard-Henry Levy’s American Vertigo is very funny, and judging by the Atlantic articles I read that became the book, on the money. 
Posted by Peter Schramm | Link to this Entry | Comments [9] | 1/29/2006 10:13 AM
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Good Goliath
Rich Lowry reviews Michael Mandelbaum’s, The Case for Goliath: How America Acts as the World’s Government in the 21st Century. Mandelbaum is a liberal, who might overstate some aspects of U.S. internationalism. Example, we provide "public goods", security, economic stability, etc., to the world in much the same way a government provides these things to its citizens. Yet, Lowry writes that the book is important and even wise for it reminds everyone (should be required reading in France and Germany?) how important U.S. power is, and how good it is to have a bipartisan consensus in favor of it.
"But the core of Mandelbaum’s case -- that U.S. power is so important to the world that the international order would badly fray without it -- is provocative and valuable, given how pervasive the notion has become at home and abroad that the United States is the world’s parasite, or predator, or both. Strained analogies aside, Mandelbaum’s analysis is generally sure-footed and often original."
Posted by Peter Schramm | Link to this Entry | Comments [3] | 1/29/2006 9:34 AM
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Tunnels and dangers
The discovery of a 2,400 yard tunnel from a warehouse in Mexico to one in the U.S. a few days ago was dramatic. Although this half-mile tunnel is not the first that has been discovered, it is the longest. This was not made by a couple of guys with spoons. Then add the incident of men in military type uniforms (said to be Mexican military, by some observers and reporters) unloading marijuana from an SUV in broad daylight within the U.S., and the mind begins to focus. Border security and illegal immigration will become political issues for the 2006 elections and beyond.
Posted by Peter Schramm | Link to this Entry | Comments [23] | 1/29/2006 9:18 AM
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The boring Left
Sam Graham-Felsen writes a long and boring article in The Nation titled, "The New Face of the Campus Left." Kind of a rah-rah-rah, we’re finally getting organized, by something called Campusprogress, from the living-wage campaign (cleverly renamed the 1 John 3 Campaign when it wasn’t getting anywhere; it still isn’t), to anti-war, to guilt-free caffeine. It’s all kind of pathetic, really. This sentence near the start of the story amused me; they really want to pretend that university campuses are not overwhelmingly liberal: "The assumption that America’s campuses are impenetrable bastions of liberalism--where left-leaning faculty predominate, progressive student activism flourishes and conservatism is fiercely marginalized--still rules the day. But in reality, since the 1970s the conservative movement has become the dominant political force on many American campuses." Since the 1970’s? Are you kidding? I could help figure out their meaning with the following example. The day we went into Iraq a dozen or so Ashland faculty (all my age, have been on the Left their whole life, I am betting) picketed against the war on the corner of Claremont and College. The next day a dozen or so students were picketing in favor of the war. Still no students on the anti-war side. What is most irritating to the Left professors--the ones that dominate the humanities and social sciences--and The Nation mag, is that they are not persuading the youth. They are there, but they can’t reproduce themselves. Frustration sets in and the result is a focus on guilt-free coffee and other such serious causes.
Posted by Peter Schramm | Link to this Entry | Comments [11] | 1/28/2006 10:03 PM
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IPod degree from iTunes U?
Apple has launched something called iTunes U. Not sure I like it, but we have crossed another line. We know you can get a degree on-line, but now your degree will be portable; get it on an iPod. You can now listen to lectures on your iPod, and, I suppose, the degree will be an iBA. Not that I don’t like my iPod; I just finished listening to Huck Finn, and it was either lighting out for the Territory or listening to Tom Sawyer. I chose the latter. Listen to this, as Tom reflects on his captivity:
"Tom appeared on the sidewalk with a bucket of whitewash and a long-handled brush. He surveyed the fence, and all gladness left him and a deep melancholy settled down upon his spirit. Thirty yards of board fence nine feet high. Life to him seemed hollow, and existence but a burden. Sighing, he dipped his brush and passed it along the topmost plank; repeated the operation; did it again; compared the insignificant whitewashed streak with the far-reaching continent of unwhitewashed fence, and sat down on a tree-box discouraged."
Posted by Peter Schramm | Link to this Entry | Comments [2] | 1/28/2006 9:29 PM
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Propositions and axioms
Alexander Hamilton starts Federalist 31 like this:
"IN DISQUISITIONS of every kind there are certain primary truths, or first principles, upon which all subsequent reasonings must depend. These contain an internal evidence which, antecedent to all reflection or combination, commands the assent of the mind."
And he continues by noting this:
"Of this nature are the maxims in geometry that the whole is greater than its part; that things equal to the same are equal to one another; that two straight lines cannot enclose a space; and that all right angles are equal to each other."
More could be said on self-evident truths, but note Lincoln’s use of Euclid in a letter to H.L. Pierce, just before he famously writes "All honor to Jefferson."
"But soberly, it is now no child’s play to save the principles of Jefferson from total overthrow in this nation.
One would start with great confidence that he could convince any sane child that the simpler propositions of Euclid are true; but, nevertheless, he would fail, utterly, with one who should deny the definitions and axioms. The principles of Jefferson are the definitions and axioms of free society. And yet they are denied, and evaded, with no small show of success. One dashingly calls them "glittering generalities" another bluntly calls them ’self evident lies’ and still others insidiously argue that they apply only to ’superior races.’"
All this brought to mind by this short article on Pythagoras. Why do I read Physicsweb? Playing cath-up, flunked physics a couple of times in college. Along with Lincoln, I also regret my want of education, and do what I can to supply the want. Also see this.
Posted by Peter Schramm | Link to this Entry | Comments [16] | 1/28/2006 12:09 PM
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Podcast advice
A reader sends this advice on how to connect to our Podcasts, for those who don’t fully understand. I quote him in full, hoping this helps.
When clicking on the "subscribe" link for the podcasts on the
Ashbrook website, a page comes up
with XML code (which is basically a bunch of
gibberish), and the following directions are
displayed:
"IF YOU ARE VIEWING THIS PAGE OF XML CODE, BUT THOUGHT YOU WERE CLICKING TO
SUBSCRIBE TO OUR PODCAST, then please copy the URL from the address bar
window above, and paste it into the subscription function of your podcast
application."
However, some people might not know what to do after copying the URL from
the address bar. Here are the step-by-step instructions of what to do
afterwards:
1.) Open iTunes
2.) On the left hand side of iTunes, click on the tab entitled "Podcasts"
3.) At the top of the window (iTunes), click on the tab called "Advanced"
4.) Scroll down to the button called "Subscribe to Podcast..."
5.) Paste the URL from the address bar into the window which comes up. There
are two ways to paste something: push and hold the "control" key on the
keyboard, and then hit "v"; or just right click with the mouse and click on
"Paste"
6.) The podcast will then be put into your list of podcasts within iTunes.
Double click on the podcast, and iTunes will download it. The longer the
podcast, the more time it will take to download. However, that time is
virtually insubstantial.
7.) This should be all that is needed to be done. Enjoy!
Posted by Peter Schramm | Link to this Entry | Comments | 1/28/2006 11:28 AM
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Military chaplains
Get Religion calls our attention to this story about military chaplains and the free exercise of religion. The temptation is to regard military and legislative chaplaincy as somehow equivalent, but they’re not. The latter can readily be assimilated under the somewhat problematical rubric of "ceremonial deism." The former is essential to provide for the free exercise of religion for soldiers who serve their country in places where they don’t readily have access to their own churches. Calling for purely "sectarian" prayer is a harder (but not impossible) case to make in the first instance. In the second, while a chaplain signs on to minister to people of all faiths, he or she also plays a traditional pastoral and ministerial role. Praying in Jesus’ name is part and parcel of that for those who feel called to do so. Prohibiting or discouraging that limits their free exercise of religion. Accommodating it doesn’t amount to an establishment by any reasonable definition.
Posted by Joseph Knippenberg | Link to this Entry | Comments [4] | 1/28/2006 11:16 AM
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Filibustering Alito
HRC has joined John Kerry’s posse, demonstrating the importance of the Kos-sack base to presidential aspirants. We need to remember this in 2008, and to remember, as well, that Kerry and Clinton seem not to be overly concerned with the prospect of winning a Senate majority in 2006. They’re willing to trade the adulation of that base for the possibility of commanding enough votes in the Senate to prevent in ’07 and ’08 all the damage that they now say President Bush can do to the country and the Constitution. These are not serious human beings; they’re poseurs.
Posted by Joseph Knippenberg | Link to this Entry | Comments [1] | 1/28/2006 9:59 AM
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Robert Kagan is not a Straussian
Contrary to what a lot of people say, including the execrable Anne Norton, who should know better, Robert Kagan persuasively affirms that he is not a Straussian. I still like his writing and many of his opinions, which seem to me more incisive and better informed than his opinions about Leo Strauss, Allan Bloom, and Straussianism. Hat tip: Scott Johnson at Power Line.
Posted by Joseph Knippenberg | Link to this Entry | Comments [1] | 1/28/2006 9:45 AM
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Statements of faith
I was reminded this week of the story of Joshua Hochschild, the erstwhile Wheaton College professor, who was terminated when he converted to Roman Catholicism. Wheaton, an evangelical school, says that Roman Catholicism is inconsistent with its statement of faith. Hochschild begs to differ, not because he thinks Wheaton should be tolerant, but because as he understands Roman Catholicism, he could in good conscience have continued to sign the statement of faith. I read a bit of the early commentary on the Hochschild kerfuffle, but didn’t have the energy then, in the early stages of my recovery, to write anything. The more common, and essentially uninteresting, response to Hochschild’s termination is to invoke the shade of academic freedom, identifying liberal education simply with untrammeled inquiry and arguing that any statement of faith is illiberal, retrogressive, intolerant, and hence contrary to the goals of education, properly understood. This conventional wisdom reflexively and uncritically identifies the goals of education with the goals of progressivism. It denies the possibility that an educational community could be organized around the preservation and exploration of a truth revealed in the past. A rather more interesting line of argument begins from the claim that statements of faith like Wheaton’s may well serve to exclude Catholics, but has a harder time ruling out liberalizing and ultimately secularizing tendencies within evangelicalism. An exclusive reliance on Scripture, so the argument goes, isn’t necessarily proof against "creative" interpretations of Scripture. A statement of faith that accommodates Jim Wallis but excludes J.R.R. Tolkien isn’t a good guardian of orthodoxy. The current issue of the AAUP’s journal Academe has several articles devoted to this theme. One simply identifies liberal democratic citizenship with tolerance and denies that communities that make faith demands of their members can cultivate it. I’d like a little more nuance, please. Another defends a pluralism of academic communities against the hegemony of liberal tolerance. Most interesting, however, is this piece, written by a Calvin College philosophy professor: A religious community is formed by a creed that affirms what that community takes to be the best distillation we have to date of the truth that has been delivered to us about ourselves and the world in which we live. In it, we derive a sense of our origin and destiny, our condition before God, our status in the universe, the virtues that befit a human being, and the basis of human hope and solidarity. We do not take this body of belief to be the simple product of human reflection, poetic invention, psychological need, or social interests. Rather, we take it to be a response to God’s self-disclosure, delivered to us through the agency of the church, so that our ignorance about fundamental matters might be overcome. We receive it gratefully, as one would receive a map and compass in the wilderness.
Clearly, the acceptance of a creed is not irrelevant to the aims of the academy. The academy is dedicated to the pursuit of truth. In expressing and aligning our beliefs about fundamental matters, the creeds—if they are right—can enhance our ability to track the truth about the rest of the world. That is, they can enhance our positive freedom to know the truth by removing a key internal constraint: our striking ignorance of how things stand concerning the ultimate status of God, ourselves, and the world we inhabit. The creeds can therefore be seen as an academic asset, not a liability, as an intellectual resource, not a restriction. There’s more in the article and in the issue. I have additional reflections about this general issue that I’ll save for another post.
Posted by Joseph Knippenberg | Link to this Entry | Comments [4] | 1/27/2006 10:42 PM
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Von Heyking’s fifteen seconds
Peter and I have both noted Al Gore’s characteristically intemperate comments about the Canadian election. So has the WSJ’s James Taranto, as you’ll see if you scroll to the last item. And if you look at his acknowledgements below that, you’ll find JvH’s name. This puts JvH in the quite rarefied company of David Foster, whose post on Mark Twain and the Middle East attracted similar attention from the master of the snark. All hail von Heyking and Foster! Update: In the comments, we’ve moved from congratulating JvH and DF to debating the role of intellectuals in Canadian politics. Inquiring minds want to know: is Michael Ignatieff a potential philosopher-king?
Posted by Joseph Knippenberg | Link to this Entry | Comments [5] | 1/27/2006 3:59 PM
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There He Goes Again...
While attending the Sundance Film Festival yesterday, Al Gore accused Canadian Prime Minister-elect Stephen Harper of being "an ultra-conservative" who won the election because the oil industry "poured a lot of money and support behind" Harper. This despite the fact that Canadian law prevents corporations from donating more than $1000 per year to a political party and holds individuals to $5000 per year. Furthermore, Gore asserts that the issue of the oil companies’ influence didn’t get much press during the election because "media concentration has taken a toll on democratic principles around the world, and Canada is no exception."
Posted by Peter Schramm | Link to this Entry | Comments [5] | 1/27/2006 10:51 AM
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Senate elections
Larry Sabato on the upcoming
Senate races. "It will be a surprise if 2006 is not a Democratic year, with the only question being how Democratic." His details are more interesting than such an overly careful statement considering the history of the "six year itch" in the the Senate, but file it and we’ll talk about it later. An L.A. Times Poll finds Bush’s popularity sinking to 43% and "he faces widespread discontent over his job performance and the nation’s direction that could threaten his party in the 2006 election." Sure, just note that Ron Brownstein is the writer. More later. Tough day.
Posted by Peter Schramm | Link to this Entry | Comments | 1/27/2006 10:18 AM
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Breyer on the First Amendment
Howard Friedman calls our attention to this report of Justice Stephen Breyer’s view of the First Amendment religion clauses. Two telling snippets: Author of Active Liberty: Interpreting Our Democratic Constitution, published last fall, Breyer said that justices have “six possible places to look” when deciding on a case.
He then cited the text of the Constitution, the history, the tradition, precedent, the purpose or values that underlie the text and the consequences to those values. He said that some justices emphasize the first four more than the latter two, and vice versa.
“One of the things that is very difficult to me,” Breyer said, is determining “what precisely are the values that underlie” the Establishment Clause, which states that Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion.
The idea behind the language “comes out of the wars of religion” between Catholics and Protestants in 17th-century Europe, he said, noting that the writers of the Constitution wanted only to ensure that Americans could practice their religion and teach it to their children. Of course, those, er, values have lost their mooring, such as it ever was, in history: The interpretation of the Establishment Clause has evolved in the 20th century, as the country changed and immigrants introduced dozens of new religions into the United States.
“The Founders did engage in a lot of activities that would be forbidden today under … current interpretations of the Establishment Clause,” said Breyer, because they lived in a generally homogenous nation.
As the nation has changed, the court’s view of the Establishment Clause has changed, but Breyer believes it has still stayed true to the original values that the Founders intended. It sounds to me like, for Breyer, values and consequences overshadow text, history, and tradition by a wide margin, with precedent serving as an authority so long as it squares with one’s contextual assessment of those wonderfully plastic values.
Posted by Joseph Knippenberg | Link to this Entry | Comments [222] | 1/26/2006 4:02 PM
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Rosie and Al and Michael on Canada
Our friends at The Politic have a delicious post about the reactions of the American Left to the Canadian election. Our other Canadian friend, John von Heyking, sends along this link and asks, "Who is this person, ’Al Gore’?" An interesting example of Gore’s mindset from the article is here: Gore believes the issue of the oilsands and the sway he contends the industry holds with Harper didn’t garner news coverage during the election because "media concentration has taken a toll on democratic principles around the world, and Canada is no exception." Now let me get this straight. The Tories won because of media concentration? Huh? Had it not been for the efforts of bloggers--one in particular, if Glenn Reynolds is to be believed--the Canadian MSM would likely have given the Liberals a free pass on their scandals.
Posted by Joseph Knippenberg | Link to this Entry | Comments [2] | 1/26/2006 3:08 PM
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Podcast, You Americans!
To my delight, I recently discovered that I can listen to books on my iPod while I walk with my dog. I then discovered that I can listen to lectures, talks, news programs, and other such stuff. Well, because there are so many benefits and uses to which Podcasts can be put, we decided to do it. The Ashbrook Center’s podcasting takes three forms. First, there is my weekly You Americans podcast. I will have a short conversation with someone interesting at least once a week. Conversations with Robert Alt and Bill Kristol are now up. Second, we are making available Ashbrook Events, lectures and seminars, in podcast form. We will add new ones each week. Talks by Karl Rove and Steve Hayward are now up. Third, we also have the Teaching American History Podcast in which we make available seminars conducted with high school teachers. Ones by James McPherson and David Hackett Fischer are now up. One of the great benefits of all this is that unlike with streaming audio, you can burn these talks onto a CD, and, you can play it on your MP3 player as you swagger down the street with your handsome lab. If you get it, you can access all three poscasts here. And if you don’t know what podcasts are, go here first.
Posted by Peter Schramm | Link to this Entry | Comments [252] | 1/26/2006 1:18 PM
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