Category: The Dish

"I’m personally grateful that the American Constitution is an essentially secular document – not because it protects atheists from rampaging Christianists, but because it allows orthodox Christians like myself to be loyal to America’s government without requiring us to accept, whole hog, the not-quite-Christian political theology that has infused American political life from the Declaration of Independence onward. That’s the beauty of our Constitutional order: It allows one to be American without being an Americanist," – Ross Douthat.

I should also respond to Ross’ point about the threat of Christianism, that I elaborate in my book. It is not a threat to the Constitution as such, unlike, say, Cheney’s views on neo-monarchical executive power. It is a threat to conservatism because it introduces religious fundamentalism as the core characteristic of the right and so distorts our politics into ever more uncivil culture wars. And its resistance to empirical debate, its assertion of constant absolutes, its unquestioning deference to authority, and its contempt for judicial checks on majority rule are threats to liberty and sound governance. The use of Christianism as a term – to repeat myself yet again – is not designed to suggest that James Dobson is a terrorist; it is to suggest that he sees the Gospels as political fodder for one political party and its agenda, and has interpreted the Gospels to include such matters as abortion, gay rights and end-of-life issues that the Gospels do not address and that are subject to much more doubt and nuance than the Christianists want. Although the Christianist interpretation of the founding of America can lead to a terribly distorted view of what America means, by and large, the Christianists’ approach to the Constitution has been … Constitutional. I.e. they need to amend it – and have tried on the matters of gay equality and abortion. I think that’s a sign of how incompatible the Constitution is with religious fundamentalism writ large, but the Christianists in no way threaten the constitution in the way that Cheney, Bush and Giuliani do, in their eccentric views of total executive power in a war that is officially without end.

The country increasingly feels like a police state if you come and go as a non-citizen. If you’re an artist trying to get a visa, good luck. Maybe once Americans have to deal with the agonies of entering and exiting this country, they will begin to see how sealed off and hostile America increasingly feels to foreigners.

His latest poll suggests that a Clinton nomination could be dire news for the Dems:

The online survey of 9,718 likely voters nationwide showed that 50% said Clinton would never get their presidential vote. This is up from 46% who said they could never vote for Clinton in a Zogby International telephone survey conducted in early March. Older voters are most resistant to Clinton – 59% of those age 65 and older said they would never vote for the New York senator, but she is much more acceptable to younger voters: 42% of those age 18–29 said they would never vote for Clinton for President.

Obama, Huckabee and Richardson are the least polarizing candidates in the poll.

Port Lorne, Nova Scotia, 1.09 pm.

False life! a foil and no more, when
              Wilt thou be gone?
Thou foul deception of all men,
That would not have the true come on!

Thou art a moon-like toil; a blind
              Self-posing state;
A dark contest of waves and wind;
A mere tempestuous debate.

Life is a fix’d, discerning light,
              A knowing joy;
No chance, or fit: but ever bright,
And calm, and full, yet doth not cloy.

‘Tis such a blissful thing, that still
              Doth vivify,
And shine and smile, and hath the skill
To please without eternity.

Thou art a toilsome mole, or less,
              A moving mist.
But life is, what none can express,
A quickness, which my God hath kiss’d.

– "Quickness" by Henry Vaughan.

An English rugby icon says that Buddhism has helped his life and career.

Some fascinating new research suggests that the pachyderms have learned to distinguish between two different tribes of potential human predators – depending on the humans’ smell and even clothing.

A reader writes:

The latest flap with James Watson appears to be playing bigger in England than the US, and I think you are picking up on that. I was really surprised that Wikipedia had the scoop locally. Normally a story like this would be covered by all the MSM and the columnist would have material for weeks. But there is a caution here that traces itself back to the Bell Curve. I read The New Republic Bell Curve edition that you edited and had not read the book or been familiar with the authors. TNR pretty much ripped the book down and kept it out of the discussion for a long time. I have not seen in the 13 years since then, another book with such an intense reception or discussion.

So I finally had to get the book and read it. It was relatively cheap in paperback and had been updated. It was a lot more complex and nuanced than I expected. Murray and Herrnstein were careful in their conclusions. It was hard to argue with a lot of their data and examples. What wasn’t hard to understand was the reaction to the discussion. You were not allowed to appear discuss this. It was off the table and a reinforcement of the ‘Political Correctness’ movement gathering steam.

I took the New Republic’s criticism as a little deeper analysis of social policy in general. In science the Uncertainty Principle places limits on what we can know and what we can do at the Sub-Atomic Level. The Bell Curve was suggesting the Social Policy had limits, and that is really what the rage was about.  For the last 100 years America had seen explosive growth in the standard of living and the distribution of wealth.  We’ve spent generously to help the middle class succeed.  Not just welfare, but GI Bill, Education, Immunizations and Social Work.  Especially with the Civil Rights movement as these benefits were expanded to the last Americans.

My theory was partially reinforced when Welfare Reform was initiated. If anything in the book was to be taken up as something worth changing in social policy it was the encouragement of young poor mothers to have more children via Aid to Dependant Children. Clinton, at Gingrich’s urging, practically implemented the changes in social policy advocated in the Bell Curve. Add the University of Michigan Admissions Policy challenge to the Supreme Court and America was certainly implementing a lot of Bell Curve corrections to our social policies.

And Charles Murray was gaining in stature. On C-Span you could not get through the phone lines to comment on his latest work. I did not see any substantial criticism of his work.  Other studies on Meritocracy seemed to reinforce the ideas in the book. As more genetics was understood, the book held up. Murray was correct that not all well intentioned ideas are going to succeed.  They need to be reviewed and examined in details.  As Dr. Watson said last week:

"Our wanting to reserve equal powers of reason as some universal heritage of humanity will not be enough to make it so."

Yes there are dangers in starting the dialog about race and intelligence. Patricia Berne is correct that new ideas like this get twisted to conform to political views.  But there is a greater danger. The Conservative Movement in America has read the Bell Curve and watched social policy and is implementing a lot of it’s policies. The Left is ignoring them and pretending they will go away. Murray and Hernstien may be correct, and Watson’s work may confirm it. The Left should be looking to see how they can adapt to this reality, before they get left behind.

As always, your intuition on the subject is correct. Something has to give.

A GOP uniter? Ahem:

"Except the economic conservatives, restrictionists, libertarians and conservative opponents of the war. Other than that, he’s golden."

Reihan comments here; Ross here. Larison unpacks his thoughts at greater length here. (Serious issue: Ross likes Gary Bauer! I watched him at the FRC shindig. Shudder.) I can see the problems with the fair tax. But some kind of radical simplification of our insane tax system is overdue. At least Huckabee is raising the issue. He is, alas, a big government Christianist. But unlike the big government Christianists in the Bush administration, he actually paid for his paternalist largess in Arkansas with … taxes. I thought the current GOP argument is that the Lord will provide.

"Are Democrats so cynical that they would stir an already boiling pot in hopes that it would negate whatever success America may finally be having in quelling terrorist acts in Iraq? One would hope that is not the case, but given their leadership’s rhetoric about the war already being lost and their refusal to acknowledge even the slightest progress in Iraq as positive lest it reflect well on the Bush administration, cynicism about their cynical actions might be justified." – Cal Thomas, picking up from Charles Krauthammer.