Month: October 2009

Merton, Belief And Unbelief

A reader writes:

I've dipped in and out of the various discussions you've had on religion and belief but haven't participated because it seems to me the the believers and the nonbelievers can go only so far in finding common ground before a final failure in understanding and agreement. In the end, one either believes or not, and there is no rational path, virtually by definition, toward faith. "I believe" and "I know" are incompatible ways of seeing. The gap between reason and faith is unbridgeable.

Merton's statement seems a model of rationality and moderation, of reasonableness, but it won't hold.

The implication is that doubt is merely a way station, however difficult, toward believing, not an insuperable impediment. What he is saying is that doubt is inconvenient, even painful at times, but it can be overcome and faith established in the end. Faith will never, or almost never, be turned aside by doubt, only delayed. What the statement elides is that doubt, if genuine, must be seen as just as likely to demolish faith as sustain it. If not, then doubt is always a poor second to faith. Faith is able to overcome doubt in a way that Merton's formulation suggests doubt can never overcome faith. The ultimate power of faith is not a conclusion but an underlying assumption of what Merton is saying.

In Defense Of Breitbart

Matt Welch joins the fray and takes some pot shots at the Atlantic. His larger point:

[P]artisan media criticism is not "rapidly replacing journalism," it's supplementing journalism, forcing journalism to be sharper, and frequently committing acts of journalism in its own right, despite not being motivated by the same allegedly pristine Mission guiding postwar American newspaper types. That fact is not difficult for most consumers to grasp, but it's proven maddeningly elusive for keepers of the old flame. Here's the scoop: Media critics are more motivated by politics than journalistic purity, and in their extra motivation they can and will occasionally steal the old guard's lunch. They–and more importantly, their work–should be held to the same standard that people apply to alt-journalism from all sources, not just those whose politics seem yucky.

I don't disagree. I haven't attacked BigGovernment; in fact the Dish gave it mad props for its ACORN scoop. I like Andrew Breitbart and championed Drudge when it was really unpopular. More power to them. I've said the same thing over the years about Reynolds and Malkin and did all I could to promote Instapundit in the early days. I think my record in holding the MSM to account is pretty strong. And I do think their liberal bias and institutional cowardice has hurt them. The Dish tries to take strong positions, but also air dissent and opposing views. I do not pretend to be neutral but I do try to be fair and accountable. That's very difficult, but we should all aim for it. I don't blame people for failing; I do blame them for not trying.

Bob Dole, Actual Conservative

Thank God he can still speak out. I always loved the guy, endorsed him in 1996, admire his midwestern Toryism, and his Gen-X sense of humor. He's right about this:

"This is one of the most important measures members of Congress will vote on in their lifetimes," the former Republican Senate majority leader and presidential candidate told an audience in Kansas City today. "If we don't do it this year I don't know when we're gonna do it."

Once you put this together with the CBO report arguing that the Baucus model will actually save money and cut the deficit (and with a fair public option could cut it some more), I think Obama is winning this argument, as the polls increasingly show. And if the reform proves popular, then the GOP will for ever be tarred as the party that refused to help more people get health insurance or to tackle healthcare costs.

Or as the Dish has sometimes said: beep beep.

We Get A Gay Ambassador!

To New Zealand and Samoa! So we now have the slogan that sums up the Obama record on gay rights: Not much worse than Bush:

Obama's announcement is a gesture just days before he speaks to a gay rights fundraising dinner on Saturday and gay activists march on Washington on Sunday.

Look: I'm not a one-issue person and I respect a great deal of what the president is trying to do and have supported him on many issues and will continue to. I also know that the real action is in the states; and I know that we gays have to change the world ourselves and work harder to make our case for equality. But a lot of us have done all of that for a very long time, at great personal cost, and in sickness and in health. We have moved public opinion very quickly toward understanding how discrimination still operates and how equality will help all of us. And yet the Democratic party which takes our money and counts on our votes still thinks we can be fobbed off with gestures and symbols and a nice speech. And, of course, HRC loves nothing more than that and they will milk this for more money and even plusher buildings and higher salaries for their professional Washington careerists, even as they get nothing done or passed. They like it that way. It keeps them in business. And the love-fest Saturday night will be sick-making.

But the president needs to know that speaking to HRC, a tool of the Democratic establishment, and appointing Democratic donors and machers and suck-ups to jobs and sinecures … well, we all could have backed the Clintons again if that's what we were hoping for.

Some of us didn't back the Clintons (which cannot be said for most of the HRC board) when it was very unpopular to do so. Some of us went out on a limb for him, worked our asses off for him, and expected not miracles, but certainly not what we've gotten. And what we've gotten is not change we can believe in on civil rights, but the tired old Democratic party interest group cynicism that some of us thought he had left behind. On these issues, Obama reeks of fear. And he acts as if it's still 1993.

At best, gays are still safe victims in the Democratic party, protected from "hate crimes" by benevolent straight people, who love to brag about their gay friends and get us to decorate their homes. But we're not equals to this president or his party, whatever he says and however well he puts it. I'd much rather a president who stiffed the HRC and gave no speeches at all but actually did something for the non-coopted, non-elite, non-Washington, non-celebrity gay folks who actually voted for him and backed him when it was hard. He knows what to do. And he refuses to do it. That's more eloquent than any speech ever could be. 

The Japan Option

Juan Cole argues that Iran isn't pursing a nuclear bomb, just nuclear latency:

Those who insist that Iran is trying to get a bomb have a difficult time explaining why Khamenei forbids it as un-Islamic and why the president and others all deny it. It is possible that they are lying, but their denials at least have to be noted and analyzed. The skeptics also have to explain away why the 16 US intelligence agencies say after exhaustive espionage and investigation that there is no weapons program now and that there hasn't been one for some time.

Before the Iraq fiasco, I would have dismissed this as naive hooey. I still suspect it is. But anyone not open to debate on the basic thesis has not learned from history. His hypothesis:

Those who agree with the CIA and the Defense Intelligence Agency, as well as with the International Atomic Energy Agency, that there is no evidence for Iran having a nuclear weapons program have to explain Iran's insistence on closing the fuel cycle and being able to enrich uranium itself.

The answer I propose, which explains all the anomalies elegantly and concisely, is that Iran is seeking nuclear latency. Latency is the possession of a nuclear energy program and of reactors, which would allow the production of an atomic bomb on short notice if an extreme danger to national autonomy reared its ugly head. Nuclear latency is sometimes called the 'Japan option,' because given its sophisticated scientific establishment and enormous economy, Japan could clearly produce a nuclear weapon on short notice if its government decided to mount a crash program.

This is surely the smartest move Tehran can make. It doesn't cross the trip-wire of international sanctions; it bolsters national pride; yet it does act as an implicit guarantee if it is attacked. And it could then be used, if inspections are allowed, to highlight Israel's nuclear monopoly in the region, and engender wider support for Israel to live up to the NPT. Quite shrewd actually. But we need a through inspection regime and full engagement with the coup leaders to find out.