Year: 2013

Joyner calls for transparency and checks and balances:

The notion that the government can compile a list of citizens for killing, not tell anyone who’s on it or how they got there, is simply un–American. Surely, a modern version of a WANTED: DEAD OR ALIVE notice could be publicly circulated, with a listing of the particulars. Maybe the named individual would turn himself in rather than wait for the drones to find him. Or maybe he’d hire an attorney to present evidence he’s not actually an imminent threat to American citizens.

For centuries, civilized societies have understood that even wars must be fought according to rules, which have developed over time in response to changing realities. Rules are even more important in endless, murky wars such as the fight against Islamist terror groups. Currently, we’re letting whomever is in the Oval Office pick and choose from among the existing rules, applying and redefining them based on his own judgment and that of his advisers. We can do better.

A reader hits the nail on the head, in my opinion:

What struck me about the proposal of Marc Ambinder’s you linked to was how well it fit with the way the executive’s “prerogative power” has been conceived in the history of political thought, starting, at least, with Locke. This notion received particularly powerful articulation in Federalist 70:

“That unity is conducive to energy will not be disputed. Decision, activity, secrecy, and dispatch will generally characterise the proceedings of one man, in a much more eminent degree, than the proceedings of any greater number; and in proportion as the number is increased, these qualities will be diminished.”

Part of the reason the executive exists is to make decisions that require “dispatch,” especially in the realm of foreign affairs. Secrecy here does not mean a lack of transparency — its referring to the type of deliberations compatible with brisk, decisive national security choices. Congress, especially our pathetically dysfunctional one, couldn’t possible be counted on to meet, debate, and then decide with the urgency that emergencies or time-sensitive situations require. This was all the more true in 18th century, of course, when travel was so burdensome.

But if you go on to read the rest of Federalist 70, note the other feature of “unity” in the executive: it allows for accountability, especially post-hoc accountability. Because one person is president, there can be no passing of the blame as there might be in some manner of executive council (an option debated at the Constitutional convention). So a corollary to prerogative power the executive can deploy, the “dispatch” at his disposal, is that after the fact we know exactly who to praise or blame. It is a recognition that sometimes difficult, timely decisions need to be made, and there must be a mechanism to undertake those decisions — and that the executive is the only one in a position to make those. Structurally, it couldn’t really be otherwise.

The Framers, though, also seemed to invest that authority with the burden of post-hoc responsibility. The very unity that allows for “secrecy, energy, and dispatch” is the unity that allows us to render judgment on those activities in a very particular way. As Hamilton put it this very paper:

“[O]ne of the weightiest objections to a plurality in the executive…is that it tends to conceal faults, and destroy responsibility…It often becomes impossible, amidst mutual accusations, to determine on whom the blame or the punishment of a pernicious measure, or series of pernicious measures ought really to fall. It is shifted from one to another with so much dexterity, and under such plausible appearances, that the public opinion is left in suspense about the real author.”

The Framers wanted us to know the “real author” of these difficult decisions. The virtue of Ambinder’s proposal is it allows for that. I think keeping in mind these distinctive features of the executive is particularly helpful as we consider this vexing issue. Transparency and accountability — making sure “faults” are not “concealed” — is the heart of the matter. Give the President his power to make these wrenching decisions. But let us not shrink from exercising judgment, informed by all the relevant information, about those decisions.

Which means some kind of post-hoc judicial process of some sort. And I can see that, when it comes to those moments when the executive branch needs to act expeditiously (e.g. an enemy target has just been spotted and could easily be lost unless killed immediately), this is the best option we have. But I don’t see why a court cannot be involved in vetting the selection of targets beforehand, and weighing the government’s evidence against them.

My initial thoughts are here.

A reader quotes another:

“So this is dorky, but I got a weird rush of pride and community upon signing into the Dish on my devices and seeing that light blue ”Subscriber” block appear atop the screen.” This is one reason I will never join. It is sad that this person or any person thinks that reading the Dish makes her a part of a community. I could never be a member of anything where people were so sad. It might be different if you took comments, but how can someone passively and anonymously eating the meal you serve (made up mostly of other people’s work, by the way) make one a member of a community? But you do promote that idea, don’t you?

I have liked this site less and less since you went to memberships. I feel about as negative towards you as I did back in the early Bush years where you were promoting the idea of a new pro-war party of young patriots called the “Eagles.” Putting up all those positive reviews and the dollar totals like this is some kind of cheesy telethon. I can’t tell how cynical you are about your marketing tactics. I would respect you more if you were cynical, but I’m afraid you actually believe that you are providing some kind of community and are something more valuable than just a daily best of the web on a two-week delay with an overlay of Oprah-level spirituality.

We’ve been airing reader reactions, positive and negative, because we are a community. Why else would so many people send us links or write emails like yours or send in their window views or vote for awards and so on if they were not part of a community? Why would they care? And when a million or so people have visited a site every month for years, it is not unreasonable to assume that many are the same people. I call that a community. And you are welcome to be a part of it, harsh criticism and all. Yes, letting our readers know how this experiment is going may be seen as marketing. But it’s also called transparency, and we promised it.

Another reader spells out why we don’t have a comments section and why readers have repeatedly voted one down:

I subscribed last week in prep for this week’s launch. Very happy with all aspects of the site so far. I almost sent a support email for the embedded links (they were not opening in new tab in the first day), but guessed correctly thatothers would make that suggestion – love it.

I love this community, which is why I subscribed. I have NEVER subscribed to anything on the Internet (except anti-virus software). One of the biggest reasons that this is the first site I visit and why I subscribed is for the lack of a comments section. As Jay Rosen so eloquently put it (and I would not have seen this quote if not for the Dish): “Untended, online comment sections have become sewers, protectorates for the deranged, depraved and deluded.”

I am thrilled to make a small contribution to your staff, which does the hard work of finding the best comments (possibly the best part of Dish) and the best thinking across the net! I have done IT contracting and I am more than happy to pay for your team’s efforts each day. I wish more people understood that actual, hard work is how sites get built, software gets built and the net would collapse without it. We should all be willing to pay for that hard work!

Another sent the above image earlier this week and wrote:

This was taken on January 7 in my hospital room after a successful 5-hour surgery that day.  I’m doing great and this pictures show’s how lucky I am to have people who love me and access to the best medical care and generous health insurance to cover most of the 70K in bills from surgery/one night stay, pathology etc.  So I’m really happy to be able to support the Dish!  It’s my favorite “coffee break.”

Update from a reader:

I’m tempted to subscribe, but the lack of a comment section holds me back. The ability to comment in real time in a public forum was one of the things that drew me to online news and commentary and away from the printed newspaper years ago.

I’m perplexed by your readership’s hostility to a comment section. I haven’t run across a website yet that requires anyone to read comments, but every now and again I feel the need to add my two cents. If some of your readers don’t like comments, let them skip over them. Are comment sections a cesspool? Sure, sometimes. And sometimes they’re perceptive, and sometimes they’re more entertaining than the article they’re attached to. And sometimes the allow me, the reader, to point out a glaring error or omission in a public forum in real time.

Want my 20 bucks? Allow me to add my two cents from time to time.

Two cents for 20 bucks is a great exchange rate.

A reader disagrees with me:

Richard was a medieval Catholic Christian, not a modern Roman Catholic. Would he have agreed with Trent on transubstantiation or justification? Would he have agreed with the first Vatican council about papal infallibility or with the second Vatican council on religious freedom? Would Richard recognize an English-language service—held in a multi-purpose room with guitars strumming—as the Mass?

We will never know what Richard would think of  these changes. But attacking the Church of England for changes since the Middle Ages begs the question because it assumes that Roman Catholicism is a constant, consistent, and never-changing fortress of unerring orthodoxy. It’s a nice fable that warms the hearts of paleo-Catholics, but it just isn’t true.

He was an English king. Bury him in the Church of England.

He was an English king when Catholicism was thriving in England, when England was one of the most devout Catholic countries in Europe. The Church of England was instituted by the dynasty, the Tudors, that killed him off – the son of the man whose warriors killed him! Fuck that and fuck them. And I say that in the spirit of Shakespeare’s Richard.  Another writes:

Funny that the first email I would feel moved to send you would be about reburying someone who has been dead for 500 years, but here goes:

I understand the feeling that he should be buried in a Catholic church.  I also understand Leicester’s desire for him to be reburied in their cathedral (the pilgrims it will bring!).  But I find myself sad for him that he will not be reinterred where he wanted to be laid to rest, in York Minster.  That was and is the great church of his home, where the people always loved him.  When he died it was a Catholic cathedral and 500 years later… well, no one is talking about moving the Venerable Bede or St. Cuthbert just because Durham Cathedral has become Anglican.

I think in many ways for those who are dead, and who have, according to their beliefs, moved on to better or worse permanent places, the place where their earthly body rests should be, as much as can be ascertained, where their earthly selves wanted their body to rest.  After all, as a famous Catholic once said, “God will know his own.”

Another:

Stop slandering Richard III! How do you know he killed the princes in the tower?  How do you know they were not killed by the Duke of Buckingham to foment rebellion and bring in Henry Tudor to take the crown?  Shakespeare was a playwright, not a historian.  He based his play on a biography by Thomas More, a man who never knew Richard III and was influenced by Tudor propaganda. And since everyone was a Catholic in 1485, the denomination of the church where he gets reinterred is irrelevant.

So there.

Another:

You do realize – surely you must! – that Shakespeare’s “Richard III” is nothing but Tudor propaganda intended to destroy the reputation of the last Plantagenet king and Henry Tudor’s (Henry VII) #1 rival.  For all that your post (with Ian McKellan doing justice to Shakespeare, if not Richard himself) is well thought out, with a point we agree on (that Richard was indeed a Catholic, as the Henry VIII had not yet been born to instigate all that religious drivel that we won’t go into now), your words seem to focus on the literary character of “Richard III,” and ignores the HISTORICAL Richard (“Dickon”?), who was, in fact, quite a progressive fellow.  Read up! I did, when I was in high school, and I ended up having a semi-crush on him, so that the discovery and identification of his bones recently is sort of like a “reunion” … with the so-obvious curvature of his spine somehow much more poignant and real in death than any live actor of that Shakespearean character could ever portray …

And another:

I’m sure you’re quite familiar with the fascinating array of historical disputes involving Richard III (was he a disfigured weakling or a stout warrior? Did he usurp his nephew’s throne, or were Tudor allies behind the plot to invalidate his older brother’s marriage?) but some readers may be confused by your reference to Shakespeare’s play as “Tudor propaganda”.  Since Richard is in the news, you ought to take the opportunity to direct your readers to Josephine Tey’s absorbing 1951 account of the mysteries surrounding his reign, The Daughter of Time. Until reading it, I – like most Americans, I think – had no idea who the Princes in the Tower were, and only knew Richard as the guy who would trade his kingdom for a horse.

(Cartoon created by Dish reader James MacLeod, used with permission)