Jim Miller on Politics

Sudan and Israel:  Charles Jacobs, president of the American Anti-Slavery Group, asks an obvious question:   Why is there a world wide obsession with Israel, where the problems are small, and an indifference to the catastrophe in Sudan.   This is a comparison I will have more to say about in the next week or so.

The Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations:  That was the phrase Bush used during the 2000 campaign to describe the way schools often let down minority kids.  The invaluable Stanley Crouch, though he doesn't use the term, finds a similar phenomena in New Jersey's choice of a poet laureate.   There are many other examples of this same soft bigotry, like the comic strip "Boondocks", which offers racist paranoia in a badly drawn and unimaginative format.  It would never be published if the author were white.

The Temptation of the Middle Alternative:  One standard trick bureaucrats use to manipulate their superiors, especially political appointees, is the middle alternative.  The bureaucrat presents three alternative courses of action, one too extreme in one direction, another too extreme in the other direction, and one in between, that the bureaucrat favors.  Bureaucrats do this because they know how tempting middle solutions are, apparently offering a way to avoid the worst outcomes.  There are times, however, when the middle alternative is the worst choice, when either extreme is more likely to be successful.  So it is now on Iraq, as Charles Krauthammer explains.  A plausible argument can be made for relying on deterrence and time.  An even better argument can be made for ending any threat from Saddam now.  But there is no plausible argument for an in between solution of delaying while Saddam develops nuclear weapons.

Genetically Enhanced?  Several weeks ago, blogger Joanne Jacobs suggested that we should substitute "genetically enhanced" for "genetically modified" to reduce the fear factor.  Now, we have the first evidence that "genetically enhanced" may actually be the correct term.

Republicans and the Stock Market:  This Slate article makes two claims, one correct, and one false.  Carol Vinzant is right that, during most of the 20th century, the stock market has risen faster when Democrats were president.  She is wrong, however, to think that the odds against this happening by chance are great.  She errs by not allowing for what econometricians call "serial correlation", a common problem in time series.  When we flip a fair coin several times in a row, we can assume that the coin has no memory, that, each time it is flipped, it has equal chances of coming up heads or tails.  This is almost never true for consecutive years of economic data, whether it is the stock market or GDP growth.  What happens in one year obviously affects what happens in another year.  The data is said to be "serially correlated" because, unlike a fair coin, the consecutive years are statistically related.

Vinzant tries to provide an explanation for the relationship between Republican presidents and the stock market and fails there, too.  The best general explanation I have found for the relationship between public policies and economic growth in democracies is Mancur Olson's The Rise and Decline of Nations.  The famed economist showed that the spread of regulations and the special privileges for interest groups gradually slowed an economy down, like barnacles.  On the whole, though there are many exceptions, the Republicans have been less attracted to those barnacles than the Democrats.  Since Olson published his book, there have been many international comparisons that support his argument.  Those who want economic growth should, in most elections, favor the Republican candidate.

Inspector Blix, or Inspector Clouseau?  This Daily Telegraph column recounts the sorry record of the chief UN weapons inspector, Hans Blix, who has been duped, time after time, by Saddam Hussein.  

Falwell, Half Right:  Professor Volokh criticized Jerry Falwell for claiming that Mohammed was a terrorist, and that Moses and Jesus were men of peace.  The professor goes too far in his argument.   Although Mohammed can not accurately be called a "terrorist", he can accurately be a called a "warlord", another term Falwell used.  For a brief historical summary of Mohammed's violent career, see this essay.  Nor is it fair to equate Moses with Mohammed; Moses led his people out of slavery, and Mohammed enslaved many of his neighbors.  (You can fairly compare conquerors like Joshua to Mohammed, however.)

Professor Volokh misses one intriguing aspect of the Falwell interview, his motivation.   In equating Moses and Jesus, Falwell was trying, against much Christian tradition, to put Jews and Christians together against Muslims.  This is now standard among most evangelicals and helps explain why anti-Semitism is falling among them, while it is rising on university campuses, like, perhaps, Professor Volokh's own UCLA.

Bias at ABC?  Media Research investigators find a suspicious pattern in ABC's coverage of the Middle East.   One can't help wondering about connections to Peter Jennings' refusal to become an American citizen, after years working and living here, and his one time involvement with Palestinian spokeswoman, Hanan Ashwari

Chomsky Cult Radio Program, Part 4:  Last weekend, Alternative Radio had former UN arms inspector Scott Ritter speaking on "Target Iraq".  He began by claiming that the Bush administration policy toward Iraq was about domestic politics, not national security.   He claims that a handful of neoconservatives have "hijacked" the nation's policies for their own purposes.   Then, he made a suprising admission.  If Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, and he was linked to terrorists, Ritter believes that a preemptive strike would be justified.  His argument from there followed a strange path.  First, he agreed that Saddam had many chemical and biological weapons in the past, but claimed that most of them had been destroyed.  He then admitted that Saddam would be able to rebuild much of his capabilities to produce such weapons in just months.  In spite of this, he is convinced that Saddam does not have such weapons, because the evidence of such facilities would be unmistakable.  Nonetheless, he wants to send in UN inspectors to find weapons that he thinks do not exist.  At this point, my mind began to spin, and I began to wonder what this strange man would do if he were confronted with still more evidence on Iraqi weapons programs.   Deny the evidence?  Follow through on his argument and offer to lead a preemptive attack?   I honestly have no idea what he would do.

Since this was Alternative Radio, I expect factual errors and was not disappointed.  He claimed that the administration blamed the anthrax attacks on Iraq, which will come as a surprise to Steven Hatfill, among others.  He also repeated the claim made in the previous week that "no one" supported an attack on Iraq.  This drew the biggest round of applause from the audience.   I must disappoint, though not surprise, anyone who has followed Ritter's twists and turns, by telling you that he did not explain his 180 degree change of position.  Not this time, and not ever, I expect.  (Note: For your convenience, there is now an index to all the posts on the Chomsky cult radio program, bottom right.)  

Water, Water, Everywhere:  Astronomers now think that many of the moons around the gas giant planets, Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune, and Uranus, may have oceans underneath layers of ice.   Where there is liquid water, there may be life.

Torricelli and Terrorism:  Senator Torricelli's withdrawal, ending his political career, is a good time to consider how he damaged the fight on terrorism.  As political analyst Michael Barone explains in this Wall Street Journal column, Torricelli saw everything, including foreign policy, as a way to raise campaign funds.  His positions on foreign policy issues were inconsistent, if you looked for a common philosophy, but consistent if you looked for fund raising opportunities.  Torricelli was tough on Castro, which pleased the Cuban community in New Jersey, but he opposed the Contra rebels in Nicaragua, who were attacking Castro's ally.  The second stand helped him raise money from Hollywood leftists. The danger in all this corruption is obvious.  If you are for sale, like Torricelli, you can be bought by the bad guys, as he was in some cases.  Or, by the naive, who haven't thought through the consequences of a decision.  The infamous "Torricelli amendment" restricted, or was intended to restrict (there is some disagreement about its effects), the ability of the CIA to recruit operatives with nasty pasts, just the kind of operatives, unfortunately, that you often need.  The amendment was quite popular with the Hollywood left, and those who share their uninformed views.  Torricelli's career demonstrates that excusing corruption, as so many Democrats did, weakens the fight against terrorism.

Don't Help Poor Pregnant Women:  That's the message from the pro-abortion lobby, after the Bush administration extended benefits for prenatal care.   Kathleen Parker describes, with some relish, just how the Bush administration trapped its opponents in this untenable position.  

First Sighting of "Bush Haters":  Through much of Clinton's two terms, his supporters, and many mainstream journalists, often called opponents of Clinton "Clinton haters".  Some did, in fact hate him, others, like Newt Gingrich, seemed to actually like him, and still others were somewhere in between.  The phrase was used, in my opinion, to delegitimize the opponents, and to avoid an examination of Clinton's behavior.  The implied argument in "Clinton haters" is that the people who opposed him were doing so for personal reasons, not because they objected to his conduct or policies.  Logically, it is a false argument, of course.  That someone hates another person does not, by itself, make their criticisms false.   But it is a powerful argument emotionally, as the Clinton supporters knew very well.

There are now many people who can fairly be called "Bush haters", people who despise George W. Bush and everything about him.  Anyone who spends a little time looking political sites on the net will encounter them.  In some ways this is surprising.  Bush is not an especially partisan politician; he governed with the help of Democrats in Texas and refused to campaign against Democratic legislators who supported his programs.  The 2000 campaign created some Bush haters.  The outrageous charges made by Democratic allies like the Sierra Club and the NAACP, sometimes echoed by the Gore campaign, convinced some that he was a monster.  And the Florida recount created even more.  There are many on the left who honestly believe that the Bush victory there was illegitimate.  (To believe that, they have to ignore considerable evidence of cheating by Democrats in Florida, and elsewhere, but that is not hard for a partisan to do.  If you want to see some particulars, read this essay on the election.) One mainstream journalist, Jim Hoagland of the Washington Post, has finally noticed these Bush haters, as you can see in this column.   It is the only mention of "Bush haters" I could find in the last six months in either the Post, or the New York Times.

Full disclosure: I opposed Clinton from the start.  Just before the 1992 election, I wrote a letter to a newspaper noting Clinton's reckless promiscuity and predicting that the character flaws it revealed would cause problems for the country.  Despite this opposition, I don't believe I have ever actually hated Clinton.  He has often filled me with contempt and disgust, but not hate.  And, I must admit that sometimes I have given him the kind of admiration one gives a successful cat burglar.  You admire the skill, while feeling contempt for the immorality of the acts.

Tag Team Politics:  The New Jersey Supreme Court decision that allows the New Jersey Democratic party to replace losing candidate Senator Robert Torricelli with former Senator Frank Lautenberg opens up some entertaining possibilities.  Suppose that the next poll shows Republican candidate Douglas Forrester trailing Lautenberg.  Would not the Republicans have every right to replace Forrester with, for instance, former governor Christie Whitman?  And is there any reason to stop there if Whitman takes the lead over Lautenberg?  Why couldn't the Democrats bring in still another candidate, and so on?  Tag team wrestling, which relies on the same concept, has, as I understand it, some restrictions on substitutions.  Perhaps the New Jersey Court should seek advice on the rules from Minnesota governor (and former professional wrestler) Jesse Ventura.

Clinton's Failure:  The Guardian's Martin Kettle thinks that Bill Clinton should not receive a warm welcome from the British Labour party because he failed in an important task.  As you read the first part of the column, you might think that the important task was fighting terrorism.  You would be wrong, though Kettle does criticize the haphazard efforts Clinton made to pursue bin Laden.   No, rather it was that he did not keep George Bush out of office, and so "Clinton's most important current legacy to America and the world is the vengeful and driven administration that now occupies the White House."  Kettle might forgive failing in the war on terror, but he can not forgive allowing a Republican in the White House.  And, I should add, that "vengeful and determined" sound like absolutely the right qualities for an administration, after the 9/11 attack.

The Critics Dilemma:  This Washington Post editorial neatly summarizes the dilemma of the Democratic critics like Al Gore and Ted Kennedy: "In other words, these leading Democrats argued that the president should do exactly what he is doing . . . only not now, or not so fast."  This is not coherent as a policy, nor is it militarily practical.   The best time for a campaign against Iraq is, of course, in the cooler months, now approaching, when American soldiers can wear their chemical and biological protective gear.  A delay of a few months would give Saddam another year to develop nuclear weapons.

Quick McDermott Update:  This morning, having arrived in Seattle, Congressman McDermott admitted that fascist dictator Saddam is not trustworthy, contrary to what McDermott said in Baghdad.  In an airport press conference, however, he continued to make the bogus claims about the health effects of depleted uranium, and the effects of the sanctions, he had made in Baghdad.  From what I heard of the press conference (not all of it was on the air), he dodged the question of trusting President Bush, which does not surprise me.  This Friday, I plan to have a full report on McDermott and the reaction in Washington state to his Baghdad visit.