Month: June 2007

The Supreme Court Justice cites Jack Bauer and the Hollywood torture show "24" as relevant background for constitutional jurisprudence:

"Jack Bauer saved Los Angeles. … He saved hundreds of thousands of lives," Judge Scalia said. Then, recalling Season 2, where the agent’s rough interrogation tactics saved California from a terrorist nuke, the Supreme Court judge etched a line in the sand.
"Are you going to convict Jack Bauer?" Judge Scalia challenged his fellow judges. "Say that criminal law is against him? ‘You have the right to a jury trial?’ Is any jury going to convict Jack Bauer? I don’t think so.

"So the question is really whether we believe in these absolutes. And ought we believe in these absolutes."

Earth to Justice Scalia: Jack Bauer does not exist. But the assumption that he does can lead to a lot of unusual places:

"I don’t care about holding people. I really don’t," Judge Scalia said.

Even if a real terrorist who suffered mistreatment is released because of complaints of abuse, Judge Scalia said, the interruption to the terrorist’s plot would have ensured "in Los Angeles everyone is safe." During a break from the panel, Judge Scalia specifically mentioned the segment in Season 2 when Jack Bauer finally figures out how to break the die-hard terrorist intent on nuking L.A. The real genius, the judge said, is that this is primarily done with mental leverage. "There’s a great scene where he told a guy that he was going to have his family killed," Judge Scalia said. "They had it on closed circuit television – and it was all staged. … They really didn’t kill the family."

But they pretended to. Am I supposed not to feel shock at this stuff any more? This celebration of lawlessness is not conservative. It’s something much more radical.

"A population armed to the teeth and long in the throes of disorder can’t be pacified by outsiders," – Fouad Ajami on the Palestinians.

Ajami nonetheless favors an indefinite occupation of Iraq, a society with more weaponry, more historical disorder and much more oil revenues to finance civil warfare than Palestine. Why the double standard? Just asking.

From a conservative constantly being called a liberal:

"My wife and I had this discussion over the weekend. As I told her, I think my "left-wing" positions on abortion, end-of-life matters, and gay rights actually make me more "right wing," more Republican, than those who would use the blunt force of government to dictate the most personal choices any of us will ever make."

I know the feeling.

Ross has found one. And we all know how picky he is. On the movie front, we rented "Adam’s Rib" the other night. I don’t know why I keep being surprised, but every time I see a Hepburn-Tracy movie, I feel as if I live in a terribly unsophisticated time. The movie is about women’s equality – and it does its job. But the dynamics between husband and wife, the paradoxes of the gender war, the hate that is never far from love, and all of it with such knowingness and fun: this is an artefact of a Hollywood culture far more intelligent than anything we have now. This is not, of course, to detract from the talent and chemistry of the two stars. Has any movie figure been more of a woman – a full, accomplished, witty, funny woman – than Hepburn?

The Atlantic‘s special issue on China is now on the stands. Jim Fallow’s cover-essay is worth the full price alone. Here’s an online slide-show highlighting some of the more striking artists and visionaries emerging from the world’s next super-power. It illustrates the article here (sub req.). You can, of course, subscribe to the Atlantic at a special Dish-reader discount here.

Paul O’Donnell has a great first paragraph in yet another diverting review of Hitch’s book:

One of Western civilization’s worst follies involves men in robes — women too — chanting and gesticulating like they’re trying to lure the Great Kong — only what they’re up to is even more bizarre: acting out myths bastardized from the pagans and Zoasterians and the like, all to the glory of, let’s face, the elite. Power and wealth are what’s being worshipped — which is why all this goes on in glittering showplaces, temples to their financial prowess and power. Oh, there’s constant talk among devotees of reaching out to the young – lest the ancient lore and practices die out – and the poor, since the higher planes are not for the privileged alone. But please: the faithful participate precisely so they can feel superior to those who don’t "get it." They spend on one ritually repeated performance what could feed hundreds. As for the young, particularly young boys, this elite famously sacrificed them, even castrated them once upon a time, for the sake of their pleasure.

I refer of course to opera.

Obama takes the Christianist route, citing religion as the base for his old-school liberalism:

Obama attacked leaders of the "Christian Right" who he accused of exploiting issues like abortion and gay marriage to divide Evangelical Christians from those who attend so-called "mainline" churches. "Of course, it goes a little further than that. There was a period of time when the Christian Coalition determined that its number one legislative priority was tax cuts for the rich…I don’t know what Bible they are reading," Obama said, as the crowd applauded. "Didn’t jive with my version."

Obama said "in the public square" politicians must speak of their faith in "universal terms, so that everybody can understand." …

Later, during a stop in Webster City, Obama returned briefly to the theme of religion. "There are some things that we all agree to, some common values that we share and we’ve got to express those not just in our churches or our families, but we’ve also got to express them through our government," Obama told a crowd of about 300 who turned out for a potluck picnic.

What Obama might represent is a twist on Bush’s "compassionate conservatism." That label was always a way to disguise well-meaning big government liberalism. Obama, unlike Bush, need not pretend otherwise. He can raise taxes on the successful as a Biblical injunction. He can increase even further the reach of the welfare state because Jesus is calling him to. It may be that history records the Bush presidency as the breakthrough for a revival of domestic liberalism – because Bush conceded that "when someone’s hurt, government has got to move." I’m not surprised many Democrats are now exploiting that concession.

(Photo: Obama by Jeff Haynes/AFP/Getty.)

A different set of rules?

The president’s responsibility for authorizing torture techniques that were implemented at Abu Ghraib prison and in many other places is beginning to come into sharper focus. Sy Hersh today on CNN:

"HERSH: The question you have to ask about the president is this: No matter when he learned — and certainly he learned before it became public — and no matter how detailed it was, is there any evidence that the president of the United States said to Rumsfeld, ‘What’s going on there, Don? Let’s get an investigation going.’ Did he do anything? Did he ask for a — did he want to have the generals come in and talk to him about it? Did he want to change the rules? Did he want to improve the conditions?

"BLITZER: And what’s the answer?

"HERSH: Nada. He did nothing…

The White House keeps changing the subject to when Bush saw the actual photographs. There’s a reason they have to change the subject. Bush is formally responsible for the torture and abuse and murder and rape at Abu Ghraib, Bagram, Cropper and Gitmo as commander-in-chief, period. We know he was told of the leak of his authorized torture techniques long before he claimed to be shocked by them. And when as president, you have rescinded two centuries of humane American warfare, sent the chief torture-innovator from Gitmo to Abu Ghraib, and then get caught red-handed on digital cameras, your responsibility is more than formal. It’s personal.

After Norm Geras’ take on Italian train schedules, a short animated film on why some believe Italy doesn’t really belong in the rational, Germanic, orderly EU.