The Dish

“After half a lifetime of this kind of frustration, Bush decided to straighten up. Nursing a hangover at a 40th-birthday weekend, he gave up Wild Turkey, cold turkey. With the help of Billy Graham, he put himself in the hands of a higher power and began going to church. He became obsessed with punctuality and developed a rigid routine. Thus did Prince Hal molt into an evangelical King Henry. And it worked! Putting together a deal to buy the Texas Rangers, the ne’er-do-well finally tasted success. With success, he grew closer to his father, taking on the role of family avenger. This culminated in his 1994 challenge to Texas Gov. Ann Richards, who had twitted dad at the 1992 Democratic convention.
Curiously, this late arrival at adulthood did not involve Bush becoming in any way thoughtful. Having chosen stupidity as rebellion, he stuck with it out of conformity. The promise-keeper, reformed-alkie path he chose not only drastically curtailed personal choices he no longer wanted, it also supplied an all-encompassing order, offered guidance on policy, and prevented the need for much actual information. Bush’s old answer to hard questions was, ‘I don’t know and, who cares.’ His new answer was, ‘Wait a second while I check with Jesus.'” – Jake Weisberg, in old, vicious form (it’s the Jake I remember when we were fellow interns at TNR), in Slate.

“I was raised in the Archdiocese of Newark. Cardinal McCarrick, Archbishop Myers’ predecessor, is a down-to-earth but charismatic man who gay Catholics could live with. Through clergy in the family, I know the Cardinal, and the worst I’ve ever had to deal with from him are the repeated entreaties to consider the priesthood (he does that to all unmarried men, actually). I liked him. The faithful in the Newark Archdiocese adored him.

Myers is a totally different story. I’ve attended a few Masses he presided over, and he is an awful preacher: one Ash Wednesday Mass he went on for approximately an hour discussing how ashes make lye, which can be turned into soap, so, you see, the ashes are like soap, so they invite you to wash your sins away, etc. Uninspiring nonsense. Not that I’ve conducted a scientific survey, but my relatives in the Archdiocese (who are devout) think the new Archbishop is a pompous dullard. He has done a number of deeply unpopular things, surprise parish closing announcements and the like. Like McGreevey, he is an unpopular public figure. Forget the McGreevey communion flap. What Myers is loathed for is his recent decree that friends and loved ones are not permitted to give eulogies at their loved ones’ funeral masses.

While I think the refusal to give (essentially) Democratic politicians communion is mean-spirited and unfair (much like the eulogy decision) I think it reflects a deeper problem with today’s Church and her clergy. The Archbishops of Newark and St. Louis, and the Bishop of Camden are all poor public speakers. They are unsympathetic. They are unable to convey their positions with humility. Instead, they behave like members of the Curia (many of them were, of course). They don’t bother explaining, because they can’t be bothered to. So many members of the hierarchy never wanted to be priests, just bishops. They are concerned with doctrines and ecclesiastical politics and power. They did not cut their teeth as traditional parish priests, assisting their parishioners as they experienced the many joys and many devastating things about real life. Unfortunately, the Church in America doesn’t get the best and brightest anymore. They get the equivalent of lifelong government bureaucrats in the hierarchy. People who love having power over people but who lack empathy – or even feigned humility.

McCarrick – who is cordial with Senator Kerry – is a star. He could have been a politician himself. He gets it. Whether you agree with the Church’s bizarre positions on gay rights and capital punishment, or her (eminently defensible) opposition to abortion, the Cardinal knows that the bishops need to persuade people gently, and with humility. People like Archbishop Myers? They just don’t care. Do what I say, or don’t bother coming. The Church is so much the worse for it. And it’s why I’ve begun attending a wonderful and welcoming Episcopal church down the street.”

EMAIL OF THE DAY II: “It is rather telling that Jonah Goldberg finds your writings and opinions on same-sex marriage ‘radical.’ Though many in the African American civil rights movement are loathe to equate gay rights/same-sex marriage as a similar struggle in some ways, it was common for segregationists to call ’60’s-era forerunners radical for their simple quest for racial equity. If Goldberg’s purported ‘tunnel vision’ on this subject isn’t a cop out, how else to categorize the lack of attention he devotes to a blaringly overt latter-day civil rights struggle that is taking place across this country and around the globe? Radically disingenuous, perhaps?”

The governor of New Jersey, James McGreevey, under intense pressure from his bishops, has said he will no longer receive communion. McGreevey opposes abortion but does not believe the government should make it illegal in all cases. This topic is complicated in many ways. It’s no violation of the separation of church and state, in my view. It’s about how a church deals with its members in public life. But that doesn’t make this new shift any less momentous. What’s particularly stunning about the McGreevey case is that his withdrawal from Communion was not, apparently, simply about abortion. It was also about his support for domestic partnerships for gay couples and stem-cell research. To bar someone from Communion for that array of beliefs strikes me as new territory. Bottom line? From now on, I think, it will be harder and harder for any sincere public Catholic who is a Democrat to continue to be a part of the sacramental life of the church. The Democratic Party, after all, is institutionally supportive of stem-cell research, the right to abortion and at least some recognition of gay couples. Very few leading Democrats are pro-life. If those issues are the criteria for allowing someone in public life to receive Communion as a Catholic, then the Church, in effect, is endorsing one political party over another. The Archbishop of Newark goes further in this letter, released Wednesday. He writes: “As voters, Catholics are under an obligation to avoid implicating themselves in abortion, which is one of the gravest of injustices.” (My emphasis.) I can only infer from this that even voting for any pro-choice politician and receiving Communion is also, as he puts it, “objectively dishonest.” Do the bishops understand what they’re toying with here? Although the sacrament will remain formally open to anyone who sincerely wants to live a life in Christ, in effect only Republicans will be allowed. The bishops can say that this is not their fault. They are just upholding doctrine. It’s the Democrats who have made abortion rights a litmus test for membership. And there may be some truth to this in theory. But in practice, Catholicism’s precious detachment from partisanship could be threatened. This is the dream of the religious right: to destroy the Catholic base of the Democratic party, create a hard-right rump of true believers, and integrate the latter into the G.O.P. I can barely believe that the Catholic hierarchy is doing Karl Rove’s work for him. But then, as we have discovered, the current hierarchy is capable of almost anything.

Check out the following attempts to glean some deeper lesson from the Abu Ghraib obscenity. James Taranto blames the “academic left.” Hello? I cede to no one in feeling dismayed by the “academic left” but how did they get to be responsible for the sexual humiliation of Iraqi inmates? Here’s how. The soldiers who committed the abuses seem like rejects from the latest edition of “Cops.” Therefore, er, well I can’t really summarize Taranto’s argument. So here it is:

Many academic institutions have barred ROTC or military recruiters from campus for left-wing political reasons–first as a protest against the Vietnam War, and later over the Clinton-era “don’t ask, don’t tell” law. Whatever the merits of these positions, it’s time the academic left showed some patriotic responsibility and acknowledged that the defense of the country–which includes the defense of their own academic freedom–is more important than the issue du jour.

I think that means that Yalies wouldn’t do such things. Then Linda Chavez wants to blame women-in-the-military:

While some advocates of women in the military have argued that women’s presence would improve behavior, in fact, there is much evidence to suggest it has had the opposite effect. For years now, the military has ignored substantial evidence that the new sex-integrated military interferes with unit cohesion and results in less discipline.-Putting young men and women at their sexual prime in close proximity to each other 24 hours a day increases sexual tension. Allegations of sexual harassment, even rape, have become commonplace.

Look, I know what it’s like to have to write a column. You can’t always come up with a new angle. But please.

NUMB BY REPETITION: On the other hand, don’t you think the exposure of these photographs – especially on television – has become a little insistent? The visual point, of course, is that they do provide constant visceral shock, as they should. But at some point, it gets almost pornographic. Doesn’t there come a point at which the humiliation of these people is actually abetted by excessive exposure? Less is more sometimes. But then I’m not a TV executive.

EMAIL OF THE DAY: “I’m all for the ongoing insistence on showing those prison images as long as the media begins showing the World Trade Centers being immolated again. When was the last time we saw those? Think we’ll see them again, even once, on the mainstream media before November? No, that kind of visceral shock wouldn’t serve the left’s agenda.” We also need to see the full scope of the murder of Daniel Pearl, the corpses outside Fallujah, and the severed hands and bodies of those murdered by suicide bombers. Those victims deserve no more privacy than the victims of abuse at Abu Ghraib. And they can no longer be humiliated, because they’re dead. More feedback on the Letters Page.

BRITAIN’S TED RALL: He’s the Guardian cartoonist, Steve Bell. A hater, pure and simple. Here’s the latest.

He claims I have become a radical on this issue. I haven’t. My position remains what it was. It’s the Republican party that has become radicalized. Conservatives who are ambivalent about gay issues have every right to be so. But when a law is passed that bans even private contractual agreements between two gay people in a relationship, and when allegedly tolerant social conservatives ignore it, it’s fair to ask whether they can be believed when they say they have nothing against gay couples per se. And there is something deeply insulting when someone says that another minority’s interests and rights are beyond his concern. If I wrote that I really couldn’t care one way or another if laws were passed directly discriminating against Jews, since I’m not Jewish and it doesn’t really affect me, how would that sound? And if I told an angry Jew that he’s become radicalized and shouldn’t push it or he’ll merely ensure more hostility, how would that sound? If you think I’m exaggerating, here’s the law in question:

A civil union, partnership contract or other arrangement between persons of the same sex purporting to bestow the privileges or obligations of marriage is prohibited. Any such civil union, partnership contract or other arrangement entered into by persons of the same sex in another state or jurisdiction shall be void in all respects in Virginia and any contractual rights created thereby shall be void and unenforceable.

One of Jonah’s readers says this is no big deal. But by making even a “partnership contract or other arrangement … void and unenforceable,” Virginia is denying gay couples any legal protections at all in as broad and vague a fashion as possible. Jonah thinks I’ve become radicalized? Isn’t it time he looked at what is happening in his own party?

HERITAGE RESPONDS: They have apparently removed the pseudo-science of homophobe Paul Cameron from their database. Good for them.

This strikes me as a revealing comment by one of the most enlightened conservatives at National Review, Jonah Goldberg:

Most conservatives who don’t regularly write about “gay issues” refrain from doing so for a fairly simple reason: they don’t care about them very much one way or the other. Speaking solely for myself, I don’t track every event in the world of homosexually oriented public policy. The first time I hear about most of these sorts of things is from reading Andrew Sullivan’s site. I think this is a sign of my generally libertarian attitude toward gay stuff. I don’t think the silence of conservatives on such events as those in Virginia is a sign of our approval, my guess is it’s a sign of our ignorance.

This is a cop-out on many levels. National Review regularly and rightly publishes many, many articles on the issue of marriage rights and gays. They have recently run several pieces about the issue in Norway, Holland and Scandinavia – even down to nuances such as variations within Norway. They are covering the national debate as they should. How many pieces have you read about Massachusetts in NRO? But a major state has done something just as radical as Massachusetts in reverse. And Republicans who have said they do not seek to harm gays do not comment when Virginia does such a thing. This cannot be an oversight. It is deliberate blindness to their own extremes. Jonah’s second point is simply insulting. If one half of a gay couple cannot visit her spouse in hospital minutes away from where Jonah lives, he’s not interested enough to worry about it. And I repeat: Jonah is the best of them. Conservative opinion on gays ranges from boredom to outright hostility and animus. There are times when I prefer the animus. Hating someone at least takes that person seriously. Not being able to be bothered while a minority is persecuted (and that’s the only interpretation of the Virginia law) is the moment when inactivism becomes indistinguishable from moral abdication.

I mean in a simple, personal sense. This story says it all.

BUSH JOB APPROVAL AT 47 PERCENT: I wonder if Abu Ghraib isn’t a turning point. I was glad the president went on Arab television to explain. I’m befuddled why he cannot simply apologize. Rumsfeld’s blithe assertion that he hadn’t even bothered to read the full Taguba report before a major press conference also cannot quite dislodge itself from my consciousness. I don’t think Rummy gets it. Meanwhile, Peter Hart observes: “Voters see neither peace nor prosperity on the horizon.” And Rove has spent $60 million to see Bush’s ratings drop.

The conventional wisdom in Washington right now is that Kerry is such an awful candidate that he is doomed in the fall. If Bush can stay even after the last three, horrendous weeks – when he has shown that his administration has no real control over even the conduct of its own servicemembers and contractors in Iraq – then Kerry is toast. I’m not so sure. My instinct is that this election will not, in fact, be close. Either Bush will convince people that he is winning the war on terror and turning the economy around and win handsomely, or he won’t, and Kerry will win big. Recent history suggests that incumbent presidents either lose badly or win well. The crackhead Rasmussen tracking poll shows Kerry with a real lead again. My sense of the mood among Washington neocons is something bordering on real depression. Bush is campaigning in Ohio and Michigan as if he were in real trouble and knows it. Moreover, his approval numbers are now below 50 percent. In most critical states, the candidates are neck and neck, but Kerry keeps being nominally in the lead, as in New Hampshire, where he leads by four points. Maybe the new ads reintroducing Kerry will boost him some more (or maybe the more people see Kerry the more he will bore them to death). But he’s been retooling himself for the center, as David Brooks has shrewdly noted. Kerry also tends to finish well in campaigns, and has said exactly the right things on Iraq lately, if he wants to reassure voters that he is the man to finish the job there. The Democrats are also energized. It’s a long, long way to go, and I’m predicting nothing (except a massive gay-baiting campaign by Karl Rove in the summer). But I do think that Republicans who think they’re a shoo-in because Kerry is such a bad candidate are deluding themselves. This election will be about Bush.

GLENN ON IRAQ: Instapundit writes a cogent, sane and eloquent case for staying the course in Iraq. How does he do it? So many links and yet he also writes so well. I endorse all of it. I do feel that, in some ways, our setbacks are also opportunities – that the notion that this was all going to be perfect and easy is as foolish as the notion that it is doomed. Two recent things: the fact that the imposition of a Saddamite general on Falluja spurred the Shi’a leadership in the South to isolate al Sadr further shows how some bad things can lead to good things. Ditto the horrors at Abu Ghraib. What they reveal is something true: Americans are no better and no worse as human beings than anyone else. They can become savages as well. But our system – the open press, the internal reviews, the democratic accountability – minimizes the damage of our flawed human nature. I hope that this incident demonstrates to the Iraqi people that it’s the system that we’re trying to help them build. This system is not American. It is simply the best of the worst options for human government there is. They deserve it, after the terror of so long a tyranny. We need to hang in there. Through the inevitable mess and mistakes, the goal is clear and noble and essential.

“I was indeed stationed at Abu Ghuraib prison from October 2003 thru late March 2004. I was in the 870th MP Company. The one listed as having had its Commander relieved for snapping photos of female soldiers naked in the shower.
I do not excuse what went on whatsoever. All of us who served honorably over there want to see these idiots fry.
I’ve read the 15-6 investigation report and all of the problems we identified and reported up thru the chain of command show up in that report. Lack of staffing, training and written guidance. Most of the latter we had to write ourselves, based on Rules of Engagement (ROE) and what we learned in the battlefield hand off from the preceding units and what we could apply doctrinally. Our unit, being a Combat Support Company, had no prior experience in or training in Internment/Resettlement (I/R) operations. Our preMob training had nothing to do with it either, as it was more focused on basic soldier skills and survivability and Combat Operations, such as car searches, convoy escort, building clearing, prisoner search. In fact, our fist mission was in Karbala from June 2003 to the end of September 2003 and involved the above listed missions as well as runing the Karbala Police Station and training new Iraqi Police Officers. But I digress…
One of the points brought up in the 15-6 regards morale. One has to have been there to fully appreciate just how far morale had sunk. Here’s what the report said about factors affecting morale:

(U) Reserve Component units do not have an individual replacement system to mitigate medical or other losses. Over time, the 800th MP Brigade clearly suffered from personnel shortages through release from active duty (REFRAD) actions, medical evacuation, and demobilization. In addition to being severely undermanned, the quality of life for Soldiers assigned to Abu Ghraib (BCCF) was extremely poor. There was no DFAC, PX, barbershop, or MWR facilities. There were numerous mortar attacks, random rifle and RPG attacks, and a serious threat to Soldiers and detainees in the facility. The prison complex was also severely overcrowded and the Brigade lacked adequate resources and personnel to resolve serious logistical problems. Finally, because of past associations and familiarity of Soldiers within the Brigade, it appears that friendship often took precedence over appropriate leader and subordinate relationships.

The undermanning led to 12 to 16 hour days, sometimes working 2 shifts per day with no days off. The report doesn’t mention that there were periods of months where a mortar attack took place every day! Soldier going out on patrol at night were blown up with IEDs and rockets. Prior to the Fallujah Battle that started in late March, Abu Ghuraib prison had the distinction of being the most attacked place in Iraq.
The stress of living under constant threat of mortar attack plus the lack of downtime, coupled with an obviously broken Command structure and dismal environment…imagine being stationed at Dachau for the year after the liberation of Europe, living in a cell that was host to God knows how many executed and tortured human beings before you got there. Then add all the stress from all that other crap. Words cannot describe the effects of the combination of it all.
That so few soldiers abused Iraqis is testament to the discipline and strength of the vast majority of the 1000 soldiers stationed at Abu Ghuraib at the time.” I checked this guy’s credentials out (military i.d., email, etc, even a photograph). In so far as I can vet these emails without personal, face-to-face interviews, I do. But this is a blog, not the NYT. More feedback – including a defense of Ted Rall – on the Letters Page.

It has become routine for many conservatives opposed to civil marriage for gays to say that they are not homophobic as such, that their arguments are about the need to preserve marriage rather than rooted in hostility to gay people. I do not have a window into people’s souls, so I cannot judge these protestations. My view is that people should not be viewed as bigots unless proven otherwise. But there’s the rub. Take the Heritage Foundation, a critical institution in Washington conservatism. Their research database on the family includes several research papers by one Paul Cameron, a man who is to gay studies what Holocaust deniers are to historians of Nazi Germany. To check out who Cameron is, and what his methodologies are, read this piece and this one by yours truly. Money quote:

Over the years [Cameron] has also argued that gay men are responsible for up to one half of all child abuse cases (despite making up maybe two percent of the population), that they are ten to 20 times more likely to molest children than heterosexuals, and that fully half of all sex murderers are homosexuals. One of Cameron’s “studies” included 41 gay men out of a total sample of 4,340 adults. Another was based on interviews with 34 serial killers. One of his “pamphlets” is illustrated by a photograph of an adult male arm dragging a small boy into a public restroom.

If we rightly ask the left to disown someone like Ted Rall, then why should the right be allowed to propagate the poison of Cameron and expect to be given the benefit of the doubt on homophobia?