Month: December 2004

“I like your blog, warts and all, and have read it and contributed a few small tips for a few years now. It’s passionate. And well written. And experimental. But this is an experiment gone wrong.” More feedback on the Letters Page.

— Reihan Salam

Charles Clarke has embraced a national ID card for Britain. It will be a miserable failure. I’m constantly surprised and disappointed by the otherwise incredibly sharp people who’ve fallen for this awful idea. My objections aren’t those of the civil liberties left, I promise you. Any attempt to build a “foolproof” national ID card for the US will backfire. We’re better off with data-mining technologies, like the unfortunately named, and now dead, “Total Information Awareness.”

— Reihan Salam

Curtis Sittenfeld breaks the bad news. It seems that publishing a book, even if it is, simply put, the best, most groundbreaking work written in a generation-or at least since Andrew’s latest-is not the way to “score” with “babes.” (Or, in Sittenfeld’s case, with dudes.) So why write books at all? Why not communicate via smoke signals, or tattooed passenger pigeons? Thanks to the pleasing visual properties of pulp, book-writing (not to be confused with “book-larnin’,” which has no place in the future anarchistic “Badlands” civilization Ross, Steve, and I hope to build through Social Security privatization and massive tax cuts, though they’re sure to deny it) remains the best way to transmit “mad knowledge” concerning the meritocracy and American life. I’m going to write at great length about Ross’s book, mainly because it’s officially one of my all-time favorites. For now, I’ll just point you to it. It’ll arrive too late for this Christmas, but not for next Christmas. Or, for the nontraditional spiritual practitioners among you, “All Hail Various Lovable Animals Day,” which conveniently falls of March 3rd, the day after the release of “Privilege: Harvard and the Education of the Ruling Class.” Buy it now. Buy ten copies for your friends, ten more for your enemies. To college admissions officers, I say buy a copy for yourself, for junior, and for every last one of your students, all of whom ought to know what the hell it is they’re getting into. High school students, I promise you, this book was literally written with you in mind. I mean, it probably wasn’t “literally,” but it may as well have been. (Ask Ross.) If you want the straight dope, the inside skinny, the real deal, you will get it here, I promise you.

Lastly*, there’s just one book I’d mention in the same breath as “Privilege.” It’s “Goodbye, Columbus.” Trust me. Ross’s book is nonfiction, but it has all the pathos, the warmth, the keen intellect, and the gut-busting hilarity that made Roth’s outsider story an affecting generational statement in the non-lame sense.

* By “lastly,” I mean only that this first of many, many plugs is drawing to a close. And yes, all of these links are going to the same place. Take the hint, Mack.

A SPECIAL NOTE TO MY GENERATION: We’ve had differences in the past. Back in elementary school, I sensed that the New Kids on the Block presaged the Menudo-ization of our national life, and I chose to “stand athwart History yelling ‘Stop!'” Being exceptionally small for my age, this did little good. History marched on. I kept it street. Sadly, this led others to treat me as a major thoroughfare. That is, I was trampled underfoot. Chuck Taylors, Doc Martens, Air Jordans, Birkenstocks, stylish leather Coach slip-ons, Adidas Sambas, and other generational footprints have left welts across my back and my chest. Suffice to say, I was, well, chagrined by all of this. But now, there’s a chance, however fleeting, for real reconciliation. If you name Douthat our generational spokesman, all will be forgiven. What, do you want it to be Gideon Yago? Hillary Duff? Jenna Bush? Seriously dude.

— Reihan Salam

I’m not sure which is weirder — that Maureen Dowd and William Safire both wrote alternate histories of the Iraq War on back-to-back days (in Dowd’s It’s a Wonderful Life takeoff, Donald Rumsfeld was never born; in Safire’s reboot of The Plot Against America, Iraq was never invaded) . . . or that Dowd’s is actually the more plausible of the two.

Yeah, I know what you’re going to say. In Dowd’s vision, relayed via Clarence the guardian angel, Saddam is forced from power by a combination of SecDef Sam Nunn, Veep Chuck Hagel, and the tender ministrations of Hans Brix — sorry, Blix. Not terribly believable, huh? But is it really any less absurd than Safire’s tale of how leaving Saddam in power leads to 1) an immediate Saddam-PLO-Al Qaeda alliance, 2) a Gulf-State-sponsored worldwide recession, and 3) the union of Libya and Egypt into a nuclear-armed, Islamist superstate (!!!!) . . . all within two years?

I report, you decide.

–Ross Douthat

Goodwin Liu, superstar, attempts to “debunk” Richard Sander’s work on the effects of racial preferences in law school admissions, described by Stuart Taylor Jr. in National Journal. Bizarrely, I don’t think Liu says anything of substance, which is surprising in that he’s written extensively on the subject. I can only assume this was rushed. Of course, Liu’s last foray into the subject was also pretty slight. In the Michigan Law Review, he demonstrated that racial preferences don’t appreciably harm the admissions chances of white applicants, which manages to be both blindingly obvious and irrelevant at the same time.

The most compelling reason to support racial preferences, and it’s the reason I don’t oppose them, was vividly described by Nathan Glazer several years ago in The New Republic. I imagine Glazer would put it differently, but here goes: The enduring achievement gap in the United States between students from underrepresented minorities and students from overrepresented minorities* (including, inter alia, immigrants and the children of immigrants from Asia, West Africa, the Anglophone Caribbean, and the former Soviet Union; Jewish Americans; Mayflower descendants) is an embarrassment. It is the result of a comprehensive failure to successfully integrate poor native-born black Americans into the mainstream of American life. Because selective institutions of higher education see themselves as a gatekeeper into the leadership class (a view that is self-serving and largely incorrect, excepting the upper echelons of journalism, academia, appellate law, and possibly medicine — a list that, believe it or not Ivy Leaguers, doesn’t represent the sum total of human existence), they must project a diverse image to preserve legitimacy. To this end, selective institutions of higher education will actively recruit students who resemble the class of persons that have been excluded. There will be some overlap between the truly excluded and the successfully recruited, but not much.

*If you’re going to have “underrepresented minorities,” you’re going to have “overrepresented minorities.” Which is why the term is creepy. Think about it.

THE OTHER CULTURE WAR: I imagine Liu isn’t pleased with this state of affairs. Somehow, he finds the time to champion the status quo, not to criticize it. Perhaps he feels that the barbarians at the gate must be tackled before progressives can get down to the real business of rebuilding elite institutions in a more just and equitable fashion. I’m reminded of the Tom Frank thesis: for Frank, the “culture war” is a mirage. Conservatives control the levers of power and are in a position to effect cultural change, but they don’t. I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that progressives are in a position of strength when it comes to gatekeeping elite institutions. And “the barbarians,” many of whom are dear friends deluded into believing that the war on preferences is anything other than a sideshow, will always be there. They can be safely ignored. So why not start now?

Well, that’s not possible-no, you need large-scale economic redistribution if you’re going to have any kind of meaningful change. So says the straw progressive man. I’m sympathetic, but also very suspicious. Racial preferences have been an unadulterated disaster for the left. Training this much firepower on the issue of elite admissions is a caricature-worthy mirror image of right-wing frothing over liberal elitism. Shrewd liberals (Jonathan Chait, best liberal columnist in America, among them) keep the following in mind: selective universities aren’t important. Incomes are. Because Goodwin Liu is genuinely brilliant, you want him focused on civil rights issues that don’t just affect the miniscule segment of the population that has the chance to attend any selective school.

But really, I can’t be trusted. Ask anyone. I’ve been known to go around sockless.

— Reihan Salam

I stand firmly behind any effort that has Frank Rich frothing, and I was on the “Merry Christmas!” bandwagon long before it became the right-wing cause du jour — the whole “happy holidays” meme always struck me as one of those silly inventions that begs more questions than it puts to rest. (It’s rather like “B.C.E.” in that regard. Sure, “Before the Common Era” sounds nice and inoffensive and all, but when does the Common Era start? Oh, yeah — with the birth of Jesus. And does that make the pre-Jesus epoch the Uncommon Era?)

Yet now that everyone from Bill O’Reilly on down is up in arms about it, I wonder if it’s actually worth all the fuss. There are plenty of times when traditional Christianity feels like it’s under siege in America, but I’m not sure that the Christmas season is actually one of them. It’s the season with the highest church attendance and, I suspect, the most charitable giving; the season when Britney and 50 Cent give way to songs about Our Dear Savior’s Birth (or ODSB, in shorthand); the season when you can even count on Time and Newsweek to put Jesus on the cover. (And yes, I know how bad the stories were . . . but you take what you can get.)

Sure, Christmas is over-commercialized and all — but again, compared to what? America is over-commercialized, or hasn’t anyone noticed? And at least during Christmas, people are channeling their rampant consumerism into generosity and good will toward their friends and family, rather than the usual self-centered buying habits that keep our economy humming so smoothly.

All of which suggests that the celebration of ODSB might be a good time for conservative culture warriors to take a break from hammering secularists (yes, even the excitable Mr. Rich) and actually show them a little of the Christmas spirit. After all, even if you’re spending the season purging your pageants of Christ-child references and freaking out over Jesusland, you’re probably still humming “Oh Holy Night” under your breath while you do it.
— Ross Douthat

Why do the teacher unions want to stop a promising charter school in Niagara County, New York? Ryan Sager explains.

SEPARATIONISTS?? The paranoia continues:

Well, some people – in my book I call them “separationists,” meaning people who positively celebrate parent-child separation – won’t entertain any evidence that parental/familial absence on today’s scale is hurting kids. These are the folks who have been busy for years turning bad news into good – arguing that kids getting colds in day care is good because it immunizes them down the road; that separating small children from parents, especially Moms, is positive because it will make them more ‘independent’; and so on.

That’s from Mary Eberstadt, National Review Online, the woman who invented the gay plot to legitimize child abuse.

I find Peter Khalil’s analysis persuasive. And as an inevitable consequence, Khalil is weeping tears of joy, ululating wildly and, from time to time, crying out, “Yes, Reihan approves! Yessssss!” At this point, I say, “Whoah there, captain. That’s why Allah invented Xanax, friend.”

Essentially, Khalil is calling for 25,000 crack Iraqi internal security commando strike battle attack unit force strike unit force squadron Alpha Beta ultimo team members to curb the insurgency, and bring said Baathist diehards, Islamist militants, speedfreaks, pimps, hoes (as in the gardening implements, used with deadly accuracy in menacing fashion), and other assorted criminal goons to heel. It is an excellent idea. The only problem is that Khalil has as yet to refer to these teams as “mobile hunter-killer groups.” He does, however, write of “mobile counterterrorism units, light-infantry police battalions and SWAT teams.”

BUT HOW?: But who will sign up, in the process risking life and limb? To make it happen, we need the throbbing brainpower of Madison Avenue-the geniuses behind the Skippy ads featuring the busty elephants, which have forever associated peanut butter in my head with good times and Caribbean rhythms, are more than capable of selling yours truly on the prospect of becoming a cyborg avenger for justice. Alas, said geniuses are unavailable. They’re busy hooking American kids on moral turpitude and the Nintendo DS (which often go hand in hand).

I am thus called upon to contribute my own battle force action plan pilot project: we will create a television program starring lovable Arab American (and peacenik) Tony Shalhoub called “Basra Vice,” in which Shalhoub and swarthy comrade Erik Estrada take on terrorist scum and the more insidious threats to a puritan Shia moral-ethical code, including songs with beats and dancing (which can only end in fornication). (The ACLU won’t like Islamic democracy.) The chief villain will be Swayze, who will portray a hip-shaking Sufi Muslim convert zealot from a small resort town where “dirty dancing” was strictly forbidden. In Basra, he aims to spread militancy, the power of dance, and the weed. He must be stopped with maximum force. The program will sell young people on the glitz and glamor involved in battling evil forces. They will come for the cherry-red blazers and the sockless “wet look.” They will stay for the satisfaction of a job well done.

A NOTE TO LETTER-WRITERS: By now, I feel like I know many of you very well, and I’ve learned an indescribably vast amount from certain associates at law firms who probably ought to be racking up billable hours but are instead writing incredibly thoughtful analyses of domestic politics and the Terror War, health care professionals who’ve sold me on the virtues of high deductibles, neoliberals from Chicago, a number of brilliant bloggers, homemakers from L.A., high school students from Tatarstan, military personnel risking their lives to defend our country and our shared values. It’s really something, and I feel very grateful. I hope I don’t let you down.
— Reihan Salam

Hi there — I’m Ross, and I’ll be one of your three guest-bloggers for the holiday season. (I mean, the Christmas season . . . sorry, Mr. O’Reilly, sir.) You can read all about us here — Reihan’s bio is particularly, um, unusual — but just in case things get confusing, I’m the theocon (of the Neuhaus, not the Falwell variety), Steve’s the neocon (as soon as we figure out what a neocon is), and Reihan’s the Kerry voter.

Also, so you’re warned, we tend to be obsessed with natalism, pop culture ephemera, and The New York Observer. But then, who isn’t?

Anyway, thanks so much to Andrew for giving us the chance to play in his sandbox, and hopefully we’ll manage to be at least half as entertaining as he is for the next week-and-a-half. So don’t go away — actual, non-trivial blogging will commence later on today.
— Ross Douthat

My take on 2004 over at Time.

THE FULL RUMSFELD: Greg Djerejian has an excellent post summarizing the latest state of play on the war and how Donald Rumsfeld is undermining it. Yes, most of the new critics are on the right. And the point of the criticism is that we are better positioned to win. My own Sunday Times column on Rummy’s problems can be read here.

THAT POLL: The one on attitudes toward American Muslims. Not good news, but maybe not as grim as advertized.