Author: Loquitur Veritatem

See https://politicsandprosperity.com/about/.

The World According to Journalists

When a journalist reports something, it’s true until proven false — as we’ve learned in the saga called Rathergate. Here’s the latest example of that thinking: a throwaway line at the end of an AP story carried by The Washington Times:

The authenticity of the CBS memos has been questioned by document specialists and by relatives of the late Lt. Col. Jerry Killian, who supervised Mr. Bush in 1972 and 1973.

Actually, the authenticity of the CBS memos has been questioned by many others not acknowledged there. In any event, the thrust of the sentence is wrong. It should read thus:

CBS has failed to prove the authenticity of the memos. Evidence that they are forgeries without foundation in fact has been provided by many sources, including…

More about Neolibertarianism

Yesterday I noted that QandO bills itself as neolibertarian, a term that seems to describe me. Today QandO has written more about neolibertarianism and linked to its previous posts on the subject. Here are some excerpts of the best posts (here, here, and here):

I consider myself a Neolibertarian for two main reasons:

1: Utility

Libertarians have no sense of pragmatism; no concept of “degrees of freedom”. While their goal is liberty, when they are actually faced with a choice between 80% liberty and 50% liberty, they invariably allow 50% liberty because they’re unwilling to vote for anything less than 100% liberty….

2: Foreign policy:

As Dale Franks wrote of Libertarian foreign policy…

..they really don’t have one. To them the foreigners are suspiciously heathen, and the best thing we can do is ignore them ’til they go away. […] So, I’m a libertarian, sure. Right up to the water’s edge. Then, all the sudden, I morph into Teddy Roosevelt.

Well, that’s where I am, too. Teddy Roosevelt’s foreign policy was Wilsonian Internationalism without all the naive faith in idealism and collectivism….

Meanwhile, in the real world, people who disavow the use of force to accomplish political ends will never be a match for people who are quite comfortable thankyouverymuch with using force to accomplish their ends.

To put it in simpler terms: human nature being what it is, a Party which promises just the right degree of bread and circuses will almost always beat a Party which promises no bread or circuses at all. Always, in the long term.

So, what’s the point in being a libertarian at all if we can’t “win”?…

Neolibertarianism is, essentially, a more pragmatic, results-oriented, version of libertarianism. It is not as ideologically rigid, to the exclusion of effectiveness. I believe that, if we truly want more liberty, then it is encumbent upon us to act in ways that actually work towards increasing liberty, rather than simply running off the cliff, flag flying high….then bitching about the fact that the world didn’t see things our way and repeal the laws of gravity out of respect for our strongly held views.

To be more specific: in my case, at least, I believe the concept of “Natural rights”–i.e., “rights” that people have as a function of their very nature–is silly. We have no more “natural rights” than does any given animal. And you see how well that works out for them. (or, at least, I did last night over a steak)

The universe makes no normative judgements on “right and wrong”. It’s simply matter and energy.

“Rights” are only “rights” insofar as they are enforceable. Which means “power” is the absolute, and not “rights”.

That’s the way I see the world. So, from now on I’m a neolibertarian who espouses neolibertarianism.

Speaking of Offensive War…This Is Wrong

In the previous post I explained (not for the first time) why I favor an offensive (pre-emptive) war on terror. But this, from John Derbyshire at The Corner is wrong. No, it’s sick. What is it? I hate to post it, but to save you the trouble of going there, here it is:

THE PUNITIVE APPROACH [John Derbyshire]

P.J. O’Rourke seems to be with me on Iraq — i.e. teach ’em a lesson, then clear out: “A mess was left behind. But it’s a mess without a military to fight aggressive wars; a mess without the facilities to develop dangerous weapons; a mess that cannot systematically kill, torture, and oppress millions of its citizens. It’s a mess with a message – don’t mess with us. As frightening as terrorism is, it’s the weapon of losers. When someone detonates a suicide bomb, that person does not have career prospects. And no matter how horrific the terrorist attack, it’s conducted by losers. Winners don’t need to hijack airplanes. Winners have an air force.”

Gentlemen, get a grip on yourselves. The “mess” affects a lot of people. Most of them aren’t terrorists. Your attitude smacks of racism.

Understanding Libertarian Hawks

Lee at verbum ipsum takes issue with my recent post about Libertarian hawks. In that post I took a shot at a point he had made:

Libertarian hawks want an all-powerful State that can preemptively crush its enemies abroad but will leave us in peace and freedom at home. The idea that foreign policy and domestic liberty can exist in hermetically sealed compartments seems willfully naïve given historical precedent.

About which I said:

I’m not sure about the historical precedent, but there’s plenty of peace and freedom abroad in the U.S. today, in spite of the present emergency. Just look at what went on in New York City during the Republican convention and what goes on daily in the media and across the internet. The crushing of dissent is confined almost exclusively to liberal-run academia. Moreover, Lee…chooses to overlook completely the strategic advantage of foreign intervention, which is to take the fight to the enemy and, in combination with other (clandestine) means, to distract him, to disrupt his plans, and to deny his access to resources. Perhaps Lee would rather fight it out in his living room.

Lee has responded thoughtfully, and so I will quote him at length:

First off, unlike some, I have never claimed that dissent is being “crushed” in present-day America. Of course, there’s still freedom in America. The relevant question is whether war is a threat to freedom. I merely pointed out that, as a matter of historical fact, war tends to increase the power, prestige and role of the State in people’s everyday lives. As James Madison put it:

Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few. In war, too, the discretionary power of the Executive is extended; its influence in dealing out offices, honors, and emoluments is multiplied; and all the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the force, of the people.

Whether it’s been justified on balance, it’s pretty hard to deny that the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have resulted in at least two items on Madison’s list, the increase of debt and the increase in the discretionary power of the Executive.

Now, I’m not saying that this shows war is always unjustified, but for libertarians I would think that, other things being equal, measures that tend to increase the power of the State are to be avoided whenever possible. At the very least, libertarians should not be eager to go to war. War will always require a shift from a relatively free liberal order to a more highly centralized one; resources must be allocated, troops must be marshaled, and lives and freedom will be lost.

Secondly,…who is “the enemy” here? As I stated before, I have no problem with “taking the fight” to al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and elsewhere if necessary. But I don’t see how this offers any justification for the invasion of Iraq, which it now seems safe to say, posed little or no threat to the U.S. Are libertarians of all people going to give the government a blank check to invade anyplace they think “the enemy” might be?

Look, I’m not a libertarian…but I am mystified at self-proclaimed libertarians who are so eager to embrace military interventionism. After all, what is this but another big-government program? Barring a clear and present threat, I would think they would want the government to show restraint. Isn’t that the whole point of their creed?

I’m not going to argue with Lee. I’m simply going to say how I, as a libertarian, can take positions that he, as a non-libertarian, seems to find inimical to libertarianism.

I’ll begin with my libertarian view of the state: The existence of the state is justified solely by its role as the protector of its citizens from predators, within and without, so that those citizens may be secure in their persons and in their enjoyment of the fruits of liberty. Defense isn’t just “another big-government program” — it’s one of the few government programs that’s consistent with libertarian principles. (Beware of “libertarians” who think that defense can be privatized. They’re actually anarcho-capitalists who reflexively reject the legitimacy of the state’s existence for any purpose.)

Thus the question for a libertarian is not whether the state should defend liberty and safety, but when and how it becomes necessary to defend liberty and safety. How much it costs depends on the when and how; there’s no arbitrary upper limit on defense spending.

Before I go any further, I must emphasize that I’m talking about the liberty and safety of Americans. We’re not a nation for nothing. In fact we’re a nation because the Founders fought for our liberty and safety. I am not a moral relativist when it comes to American’s liberty and safety. They take precedence over the liberty and safety of other nations. American’s liberty and safety may be served by the liberty and safety of other nations, but the liberty and safety of other nations are secondary to the liberty and safety of Americans.

The defense of liberty and safety sometimes requires us to relinquish some of the fruits of liberty, as in World War II, when soldiers were drafted, goods were rationed, and there was a wall of secrecy around much of what the government was doing. The present war is, by comparison, almost benign in its effects on Americans. But the real question isn’t whether we now have more or less liberty and (apparent) safety than we had on September 10, 2001, but how to maximize our liberty and safety in light of the threat that became blindingly visible to us on September 11, 2001.

For that’s when the war on terror began in earnest — when we were struck. The question then facing us was not whether to go to war but how to fight the war.

War can be fought defensively or offensively. Defensive war-fighting is like defensive football — it cedes the initiative to the opponent. You’re always trying to figure out what he’s going to do next instead of turning the tables on him and forcing him to figure out what you’re going to do next. A state that chooses to fight a defensive war is, in my view, a state that inadequately defends its citizens’ liberty and safety. Thus the preference of libertarian hawks for an offensive war on terror doesn’t arise from an eagerness for war but from an understanding of war and from a fundamental tenet of libertarianism: The state’s legitimate role is to protect its citizens from predators.

Fighting an offensive war on terror is a lot harder than fighting an offensive war against a nation-state with well-defined armed forces. There’s much less certainty about where the enemy is, where he’s going to strike next, and where to strike him — financially, and diplomatically, and through the courts, as well as militarily. But the state must proceed in the face of uncertainty, sometimes making mistakes and sometimes making progress toward defeating the enemy — or at least diminishing his ability to strike at us.

The uncertainty involved in fighting terrorism requires giving the government some degree of latitude, but that latitude hardly amounts to a blank check. The invasion of Iraq, for example, was specifically authorized by Congress and is constantly questioned in Congress and the media. There’s no blank check there, simply a reasonable degree of deference to the commander-in-chief whose responsibility it is to prosecute the war. That deference will end if and when Congress decides to end it.

Was the invasion of Iraq a mistake or a strategic move that — although costly — will in the end repay its cost? I believe that it was a good strategic move, but I’m willing to concede that it’s too soon to tell. And we’ll never know if we cut and run, as libertarian doves (among others) would have us do.

If we were to cut and run, what signal would that send to terrorists? And what signal would it send to other regimes — notably Syria and Iran — that support terrorists and have aggressive ambitions of their own? If history teaches us anything, it is that an aggressor moves quickly to fill a perceived vacuum.

Another thing that history teaches us is the resiliency of American’s civil liberties. They have advanced markedly during the past 228 years, in spite of wars. Our economic liberties haven’t fared as well, but the regulatory-welfare state that shackles those liberties arose and has grown independently of the guardian state that strives to defend all of our liberties. In fact, the proponents of the regulatory-welfare state have generally viewed the guardian state as a rival for resources.

Libertarians — even libertarian doves — would rather have some sort of guardian state than any sort of regulatory-welfare state. The argument within libertarian circles, insofar as I can tell, is an argument about just what the guardian state should do to protect our safety and liberty.

Time to Regulate the Blogosphere?

That thought must have crossed the minds of some highly placed Democrat sympathizers in the “mainstream” media when the blogosphere started shredding the threadbare remnants of Dan Rather’s reputation for honest reporting. But the blogosphere is protected by the First Amendment, isn’t it?

There’s stark evidence that the blogosphere can be regulated, if the feds want to do it. Look at the airwaves, which the feds seized long ago, and which the feds censor by intimidation. Look at the ever-tightening federal control of political speech, which has brought us to McCain-Feingold. It’s all in the name of protecting us, of course.

Here’s how the blogosphere might come under the “protection” of a regulatory body: Major blogging service providers (Blogspot, TypePad, etc.) and major internet service providers (SBC, AT&T, etc.) become the targets of a class-action lawsuit brought by the “victims” of a blogospheric assault — a group of persons more savory than Bill Burkett (suspected author of the forged National Guard documents used by Rather). The targets cut a deal with the FCC — protection in return for regulation. The FCC justifies the regulation of content on the same grounds that it justifies the regulation of the content of radio and TV transmissions — the transmissions are a “commodity” in interstate commerce, not “speech”. The FCC then begins monitoring blogospheric emissions (random monitoring would be sufficiently chilling) and entertaining complaints from offended readers of blogs (lefties who don’t like what righties write, and vice versa). You can guess the rest.

Of course, it might not happen with Congress and the White House in Republican hands. But look at who was in charge when McCain-Feingold became law.

Favorite Posts: Academic Freedom and Freedom of Speech

Moral Relativism, or Something Like It

REVISED AND RE-DATED

Eugene Volokh writes about “Moral Relativism“:

Conservatives often accuse liberals of “moral relativism.” Now I surely disagree with most liberals on many specific moral issues. But I’m puzzled about exactly what the commonly heard charge of moral relativism in general, as opposed to a charge of moral error on a particular issue, means.

I take it that it can’t be that liberals don’t believe in moral principles. They surely do: Most liberals, for instance, believe that race discrimination is wrong [not true, because they support discrimination in the form of aggressive “affirmative action”: ED], rape is wrong, murder is wrong [not true, because they support abortion — see next item: ED], legal interference with a woman’s right to get an abortion (at least until a certain gestational age) is wrong, and so on….

Liberals, conservatives, and libertarians…agree, for instance, that killing is generally bad, but the definition of when killing is evil and when it’s permissible (or even laudable) necessarily has to be pretty nuanced, so that it properly treats killing in self-defense, killing in war, and the like. In fact, some liberals of the pacifist stripe may employ a more nearly absolute prohibition on killing (at least of born humans) than conservatives do — in my view, that’s their moral error, but it’s not an error of moral relativism….[Yes it is, because it implies that aggressors are morally equal to those who would defend themselves against aggression: ED]

So is there anything to this charge about liberals being “moral relativists,” or at least being so materially more often than conservatives? (I’m not asking whether isolated liberals have at times made truly moral relativist arguments, whatever they may be, but rather whether liberals generally are more likely to endorse such views.)…

Yes, there is something to the charge.

Consider the usual liberal clamor to understand why “they” attacked us on 9/11 and why “they” hate us. I know there’s something to be said for understanding your enemy, in order to defeat him, but that’s not how it’s meant. Those who cry out for “understanding” mean (and sometimes baldly state) that it’s America’s fault when we are attacked and hated. That view emanates from the same, fairly large, body of liberals who see Palestinian terrorists as morally superior to Israel.

The same brand of moral relativism elevates the U.N. — which is dominated by corrupt, racist nations — to the status of a moral arbiter, imbued with the wisdom to dictate American foreign and defense policy. And guess which camp loves the U.N. — conservative or liberal?

In sum, there’s a form of reverse cultural-centrism common among liberals who reflexively believe in the moral inferiority of America. It’s moral relativism in the extreme: Not only are we not better than other countries and cultures — we’re worse, we are “corrupt” Americans. So “corrupt” that a liberal extremist like Michael Moore is free to spout venom about his native land, venom that large audiences of extreme and not-so-extreme liberals pay to hear and applaud.

If that isn’t moral relativism, I don’t know what is.

Scary Stuff — Revisited

POSTED SEPT. 15:

From Reuters via Yahoo! News: “Florida Top Court Intervenes in Nader Ballot Row.” Let’s see how the Florida Supremes rationalize keeping Nader off the ballot.

BREAKING NEWS, SEPT. 17:

Florida Supreme Court Puts Nader on Ballot
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: September 17, 2004

Filed at 8:47 p.m. ET

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — Ralph Nader is back on Florida’s ballot — probably for good this time.

The Florida Supreme Court ruled 6-1 Friday that he can run as the Reform Party presidential candidate in the November election.

Surprise, surprise. I guess the Florida Supremes didn’t want the embarrassment of being reversed again by the U.S. Supremes.

Neolibertarianism

I hadn’t seen the term before. QandO is about to relaunch, in a new, expanded incarnation. The term comes up in QandO‘s prospectus for its new venture:

A few notes on what we’re hoping to do:

* Neolibertarianism: we’d like to use this portal as a chance to explore the concept of Neolibertarianism further. To create a bit of an identity for the philosophy, and a website/blog for Neolibertarian thought. Ideally — and down the road, of course — we’d like QandO.net to be an intellectual alternative and counterpoint to Paleolibertarian sites like antiwar.com and lewrockwell.com.

* Blog: obviously, the blog will, essentially, be the same great writing (Dale), keen analysis (McQ) and assorted other nonsense. (hi!)

* Discussion forums: for those of you who would like to continue your own conversations, invite friends to discussion groups, etc. (I’d also like to create a chat room, but that may involve a bit more than we can do currently)

* Our articles: from time to time, we’ll post larger column-length articles, or turn a blog post into something more column-friendly.

* Contributors: at some point, we plan to solicit and/or accept column contributions from readers and interested writers. We’d like to build a real library of Neolibertarian thought, comparable to what the National Review does for Conservatism.

Does that sound like too much? Perhaps. But it’s become very apparent that blogs have a very important contribution to make to the national discourse, and I want QandO to be an important part of that for our fellow Neolibertarians.

Now I know what I am — a neolibertarian. I guess that’s a libertarian who thinks that self-defense doesn’t stop at the water’s edge. Or, don’t wait until you see the whites of their eyes.

Wisdom for America-Haters — Foreign and Domestic

Fareed Zakaria — Newsweek columnist and editor of Newsweek International — writes about “Hating America” in Foreign Policy:

On September 12, 2001, Jean-Marie Colombani, the editor of Le Monde, famously wrote, “Today we are all Americans.” Three years on, it seems that we are all anti-Americans. Hostility to the United States is deeper and broader than at any point in the last 50 years….

[A]nti-Americanism fills the void left by defunct belief systems. It has become a powerful trend in international politics today -— and perhaps the most dangerous. U.S. hegemony has its problems, but a world that reacts instinctively against the United States will be less peaceful, less cooperative, less prosperous, less open, and less stable.

The wave of anti-Americanism is, of course, partly a product of the current Bush administration’s policies and, as important, its style….

By crudely asserting U.S. power and disregarding international institutions and alliances, the Bush administration has pulled the curtain on decades of diplomacy and revealed that the United States’ constraints are self-imposed: America can, in fact, go it alone. Not surprisingly, the rest of the world resents this imbalance and searches for ways to place obstacles in America’s way….

There is always a market for an ideology of discontent -— it allows those outside the mainstream to relate to the world. These beliefs usually form in reaction to the world’s dominant reality. So the rise of capitalism and democracy over the last 200 years produced ideologies of opposition from the left (communism, socialism) and from the right (hypernationalism, fascism). Today, the dominant reality in the world is the power of the United States, currently being wielded in a particularly aggressive manner. Anti-Americanism is becoming the way people think about the world and position themselves within it….

Much has been written about what the United States can do to help arrest and reverse these trends. But it is worth putting the shoe on the other foot for a moment. Imagine a world without the United States as the global leader. Even short of the imaginative and intelligent scenario of chaos that British historian Niall Ferguson outlined in this magazine (see “A World Without Power,” July/August 2004), it would certainly look grim. There are many issues on which the United States is the crucial organizer of collective goods. Someone has to be concerned about terrorism and nuclear and biological proliferation. Other countries might bristle at certain U.S. policies, but would someone else really be willing to bully, threaten, cajole, and bribe countries such as Libya to renounce terror and dismantle their WMD programs? On terror, trade, AIDs, nuclear proliferation, U.N. reform, and foreign aid, U.S. leadership is indispensable.

The temptation to go its own way will be greatest for Europe, the only other player with the resources and tradition to play a global role. But if Europe defines its role as being different from the United States -— kinder, gentler, whatever —- will that really produce a more stable world? U.S. and European goals on most issues are quite similar. Both want a peaceful world free from terror, with open trade, growing freedom, and civilized codes of conduct. A Europe that charts its own course just to mark its differences from the United States threatens to fracture global efforts—whether on trade, proliferation, or the Middle East. Europe is too disunited to achieve its goals without the United States; it can only ensure that America’s plans don’t succeed. The result will be a world that muddles along, with the constant danger that unattended problems will flare up disastrously. Instead of win-win, it will be lose-lose -— for Europe, for the United States, and for the world.

After firing the obligatory anti-Bush missiles, Zakaria settles down to the task at hand. First, he notes that anti-Americanism has a natural market among the discontented. That’s certainly true in the U.S. as well as overseas. Discontented left-wingers in this country are about as anti-American as they come.

Then he observes two central truths that foreign and domestic anti-Americans ignore at their peril: The world would be a much worse place if America weren’t the hyperpower. And if Europeans, acting out of envious anti-Americanism, succeed in blocking America’s efforts to make the world a better place, the world will become a worse place — and Europe will suffer for it.

Amen to all that.

Here’s Another Way to Skin the Cat

From AP via The Washington Times:

Doctors object on moral grounds

NEW YORK (AP) — In Congress and states nationwide, pro-life activists are broadening efforts to support hospitals, doctors and pharmacists who — citing moral grounds — want to opt out of services linked to abortion and emergency contraception.

A little-noticed provision cleared the House of Representatives last week that would prohibit local, state or federal authorities from requiring any institution or health care professional to provide abortions, pay for them, or make abortion-related referrals, even in cases of rape or medical emergency….

At the federal level, abortion rights groups are alarmed by the provision that cleared the House last week, broadening protections for hospitals and insurers that seek to avoid any involvement with abortions. The provision would prevent government officials from using any coercive means — such as a funding cutoff or permit denial — to ensure abortion-related services are available.

Two years ago, the House passed a bill with the same goals, but it died in the Senate without a vote. Pro-life activists are pleased because the revived proposal was sent to the Senate as part of a broader appropriations bill and, at minimum, will go to a House-Senate conference committee….

Stay tuned. It will be interesting to see — if the bill becomes law — how the pro-murder forces argue against it in court, as surely they will. My guess is that they’ll try to convert the “negative right” recognized in Roe v. Wade (the government can’t prevent abortion) into a “positive right” (medical institutions must provide abortions, even if they don’t want to).

UPDATE:

Frank Conte at From the Ground Up says:

I don’t subscribe to the harsh “pro-murder” characterization. However, this debate will be a problem for liberals who have posited a right to abortion within a libertarian context, for example “keeping government out of our bedrooms.” Fair enough even though I am suspect of post-modern liberal reasoning. But now liberalism must answer to its egalitarian side and against whatever remains of its libertarian creed – forcing, let’s say a Catholic hospital, into performing abortions.

A good point about the dilemma that liberalism would face. Given the penchant of liberals to favor their preferred outcome over others’ rights, I think most of them would come down on the side of compelling medical institutions to provide abortions. That would be consistent with their stands on affirmative action and smoking in privately owned places (e.g., bars and restaurants), to name a few.

As for the “pro-murder” characterization, that comes from earlier posts in which I’ve explained that I oppose abortion because (1) it amounts to the murder of a defenseless, innocent being and (2) it’s a step down the slippery slope toward such things as involuntary euthanasia. It is harsh, but then I’m prone to calling a digging tool a shovel.

Understanding the Latest Intelligence Estimate for Iraq

UPDATED

If you can believe The New York Times, the outlook for Iraq is bleak. The Times‘s latest salvo of negativism can be found in “U.S. Intelligence Shows Pessimism on Iraq’s Future.” It’s hard to pick out the “facts” on which the article is based. If (a big if) the Times‘s sources are to be believed, here’s what I make of the the story:

A classified National Intelligence Estimate prepared for President Bush in late July spells out a[n] assessment of prospects for Iraq….

The estimate outlines three possibilities for Iraq through the end of 2005, with the worst case being developments that could lead to civil war….The most favorable outcome described is an Iraq whose stability would remain tenuous in political, economic and security terms.

The intelligence estimate, the first on Iraq since October 2002, was prepared by the National Intelligence Council….

The new estimate is the first on Iraq since the one completed in October 2002 on Iraq’s illicit weapons program….

The criticism over the [October 2002] document has left the C.I.A. and other agencies wary of being wrong again in judgments about Iraq….

So, Saddam may not have had his weapons ready to use, but he had programs in progress for producing weapons that would be ready to use. (UPDATE: For more about Saddam’s weapons programs, read this piece* in today’s NYT.) The CIA was wrong in detail but right on substance.

But, given the “gotcha” mentality of Washington, one can’t be wrong about anything more significant than the name of Saddam’s dog. The CIA is therefore trying to lower expectations about the future of Iraq. Thus its new — “pessimistic” — intelligence estimate.
__________
* The lead sentence: “A new report on Iraq’s illicit weapons program is expected to conclude that Saddam Hussein’s government had a clear intent to produce nuclear, chemical and biological weapons if United Nations sanctions were lifted….”

Judicial Interpretation

I’ve posted about judicial supremacy several times. The latest post is here and it links to my earlier posts. The cumulative thrust of the posts is twofold: First, the logic of the Constitution gives the Supreme Court the last say in the making of law. Second, I come to that conclusion reluctantly because of the tendency of the judiciary to make law rather than interpret it. The ways in which the judiciary justifies its legistlative tendencies are enumerated nicely here, in a piece by law professor Gene Straughan entitled “The Politics of Interpretation.” In it, Straughan enumerates the extra-constitutional bases of much judicial law-making (e.g., upholding “compelling government interests”) and analyzes the relationships between the Supreme Court’s decisions and its ideological makeup.

Isn’t That What I Said?

I love it when esteemed institutions endorse my ideas (even if they don’t know me from nobody). Adam Begley, writing in the latest issue of the New York Observer, reviews In the Shadow of No Towers, by Art Spiegelman:

Mr. Spiegelman’s new book…is…about surviving…9/11 -— but it fails to tell a story: not a whole one, anyway, and certainly not a coherent one. Michiko Kakutani, in her New York Times review, seems ready to forgive the disjunctions and amputations on the grounds that Mr. Spiegelman has at least “suggest[ed] one aesthetic approach for grappling with the enormity of 9/11.” She believes that with “[i]ts frantic, collage like juxtaposition of styles; its repudiation of traditional narrative; its noisy mix of images and words; its trippy combination of reportage, fantasy and paranoia,” In the Shadow of No Towers somehow captures the essence of that terrible morning when the terrorists struck.

I wish I could agree. Mr. Spiegelman dazzles with his artistry: He flashes his wit; he shows off his remarkable flair for design. But he never hooks his reader….He gives us only the very personal and the bitingly political (furious and by now familiar attacks on “the Bush cabal”)….

Mr. Spiegelman becomes some of the comic-strip characters—Happy Hooligan, for instance (with a dangling cigarette, naturally)—but though he morphs a half-dozen times, he’s always center stage, parading his panic, his paranoia, his politics. Self-aware in the extreme, he comes close to acknowledging that the trauma he needs to survive is his own tortured psyche….

If the 10 strips show us a self-absorbed man shocked into a more perfect self-absorption, the preface is just plain irritatingly egocentric….From the first sentence (“I tend to be easily unhinged”) to the last (“I still believe the world is ending, but I concede that it seems to be ending more slowly than I once thought … so I figured I’d make a book”), the preface echoes with the clamor of the first-person singular.

The headline sums it up: “Image of Twin Towers Ablaze Haunts Narcissistic Cartoonist.” Actually, I summed it up in a post way back on August 6, when I wrote this about a NYT interview of Spiegelman at the time of the publication of his atrocity:

He doesn’t talk about the innocents who were slaughtered on September 11, 2001. He doesn’t talk about the cretins who flew the planes into the twin towers of the World Trade Center, or about Osama bin Laden, or about terrorism in general. It’s all about him. It’s all about his hatred of the war in Iraq. But he’s going to make some money off September 11, by selling copies of his thing to like-minded Manhattan jerks.

Good Questions about RatherGate

Jefferey Blanco (Louisiana Conservative) asks:

When did CBS register as a 527? [My answer: At the same time as CNN and Error America.]

(Citing a New York Observer article with the headline “Dan Rather To Bush: ‘Answer The Questions’ “) And what is the question that Bush is supposed to answer? [My answer: When did you stop cheating on your income tax?]

What is Dan Rather trying to prove and what’s the point of the documents to begin with? [My answer: Rather was just making sure that bloggers hadn’t fallen asleep in their jammies.]

The Bush National Guard Document Forgeries: A Lone Typist or a Massive Conspiracy?

Conspiracy theorists like to say something like this about JFK’s murder: “How could a loony left-winger like Lee Harvey Oswald have pulled off the murder of the century by himself? He must have had outside help. It was really a right-wing plot, and Oswald was just the patsy.”

Well, conspiracy theorists will be trotting out a similar line if it turns out that the perpetrator of the Bush National Guard document forgeries was one Bill Burkett. Today’s Washington Post reports this:

Documents allegedly written by a deceased officer that raised questions about President Bush’s service with the Texas Air National Guard bore markings showing they had been faxed to CBS News from a Kinko’s copy shop in Abilene, Tex., according to another former Guard officer who was shown the records by the network.

The markings provide one piece of evidence suggesting a source for the documents, whose authenticity has been hotly disputed since CBS aired them in a “60 Minutes” broadcast Sept. 8. The network has declined to name the person who provided them, saying the source was confidential, or to explain how the documents came to light after more than three decades.

There is only one Kinko’s in Abilene, and it is 21 miles from the Baird, Tex., home of retired Texas National Guard officer Bill Burkett, who has been named by several news outlets as a possible source for the documents….

Who is Bill Burkett? Kevin Drum, writing way back on February 15 of this year, offers a sympathetic view:

Former Lt. Colonel Bill Burkett says that members of George Bush’s staff, along with senior officers at Texas National Guard Headquarters, purged Bush’s National Guard files of potentially embarrassing material back in 1997. Is his story true?…

To judge the truth of Burkett’s story, then, all we can do is ask certain questions: Is Burkett’s story internally consistent? Has it stayed consistent over time? Do other people corroborate it? Does Burkett have a track record of telling the truth? Does he have any axes to grind?….

….as far as I can tell it’s internally consistent. No part of his story seems to be directly contradicted by any other part….

Has his story stayed consistent over time?

Mostly yes, although the story here is mixed….

Do other people corroborate Burkett’s story? Other evidence?

Generally yes….

Does Burkett have a track record of telling the truth?

In 1997 Burkett discovered that there were “ghost soldiers” in the Texas Guard, soldiers who were still carried on the rolls even though they never showed up for drill and weren’t being paid. He tried unsuccessfully to blow the whistle on this and stop the practice.

In late 2001, Dave Moniz and Jim Drinkard of USA Today finished a lengthy investigation into the problem of ghost soldiers nationwide and published a 3-part story about it. Moniz told me that everything Burkett had told him had checked out and that several other people with no axe to grind find Burkett to be believable as well.

In addition to Moniz, Jim Moore, a longtime Texas reporter who has interviewed Burkett extensively for a forthcoming book, emailed me that he found Burkett “immensely credible.”

Does Burkett have an axe to grind?

This is the weakest link in Burkett’s story: he has a huge axe to grind, and so do the people who have corroborated his story.

Here’s what seems to have happened. Burkett uncovered the “ghost soldiers” problem in 1997 and tried unsuccessfully to get anyone to take it seriously. Then, in January 1998, after a trip to Panama for the Army, he collapsed in the Abilene airport and became seriously ill. For several months he was denied medical attention by the military and he blames this on retaliation from Bush aides who thought he was a troublemaker for pushing the ghost soldiers investigation.

All three people who have corroborated Burkett’s story are also people who got involved in trying to get him medical care, and all three were eventually either court martialed or otherwise removed from the Guard — possibly because of their parts in this. So they potentially have axes to grind as well.

And it gets worse. Burkett’s illness seemed life threatening at the time and he was apparently panicked by it. In an effort to get the medical attention he wanted, he says he called Bush’s office and talked to Dan Bartlett. During that conversation he came very close to threatening extortion over Bush’s file cleansing unless he got the medical help he needed. Burkett says now, “I was probably out of line in a way and yet I will tell you now that I was begging for what I at that point considered life saving help.”

According to Burkett, Conn was part of this as well. He was removed from the Guard in 1998 after officials discovered he had sent an email to Burkett advising him that in order to get medical help he might have to “play the card at the governor’s office.” In other words, threaten to go public with the file cleansing charges.

Needless to say, this provides plenty of evidence that Burkett might simply be a disgruntled guy who didn’t get some medical attention he thought he deserved and blamed it on retaliation from Bush. And it doesn’t help that he’s virtually admitted to extorting Dan Bartlett over this.

Conclusion

In summary, Burkett’s story is consistent; it has mostly stayed consistent over time; it’s been corroborated by his witnesses; it’s been corroborated by outside sources; his previous story about “ghost soldiers” has been found to be true; and he’s apparently considered pretty reliable by several people not associated with him.

On the other hand, he also has a big axe to grind. But whistleblowers often do, and while it’s important to keep motives in mind it’s more important to consider the actual evidence at hand. In this case, it supports his story….

Postscript

At the same time, it’s not clear to me that this story is going anywhere. Even if it’s true, Burkett is the only person making the charge. The others are merely corroborating that he told them about it back in 1997. They didn’t see it themselves.

Unless other actual eyewitnesses come forward to confirm Burkett’s account, it’s just his word against everyone else….

Kevin Drum is bending over backward to put Burkett in a favorable light, but even Drum has to admit some crucial facts: Burkett has a huge axe to grind. Burkett’s story isn’t corroborated by anyone else — merely his storytelling is corroborated. And those who corroborate his storytelling also have an axe to grind.

Now, what Drum doesn’t say in the piece I’ve quoted from is that Burkett also happens to be a rather extreme lefty. The axe he’s grinding isn’t just personal, it’s also political. Let’s turn now to Michael Friedman, writing on February 17:

As Kevin Drum explains in an exhaustively researched post, Burkett has a major axe to grind – he blames Bush for the military denying him medical care during an illness in 1998.

However, there is another reason to be skeptical about Burkett. Burkett has strongly held loony left political views. He has written numerous articles espousing his positions and clearly wishes to sway the electorate. This gives him another obvious motive to lie about Bush’s National Guard files….[Excerpts and links follow — truly loony, Michael Moor-ish stuff, and worse: ED]

The issue here is not that Bill Burkett is a liberal. It isn’t even that he is left wing. The issue is that he is loony left. We are in “precious bodily fluids” territory. I’m not calling Burkett a Democrat because I think he is too far left to be a Democrat. This is the left wing version of the John Birch Society.

Not only are Bill Burkett’s politics loony left but he is trying to be a political player, writing editorials and trying to sway the American people against George Bush and the Republican Party….

If Burkett is involved in the forgeries, did he create them himself or did he have help? Who saw to it that the forgeries got into the hands of CBS News? Burkett or other parties? There may well more people behind this than Burkett or someone like him. On the other hand, Dan Rather seems desperate to defeat George Bush. In his desperation he might have latched onto Burkett, in spite of Burkett’s notoriety as a loony Bush-hater — or perhaps because of that.

Dan Rather, having done all he could to push the story, now seems ready to abandon it, according to a story in today’s Washington Post:

CBS anchor Dan Rather acknowledged for the first time yesterday that there are serious questions about the authenticity of the documents he used to question President Bush’s National Guard record last week on “60 Minutes.”

“If the documents are not what we were led to believe, I’d like to break that story,” Rather said in an interview last night. “Any time I’m wrong, I want to be right out front and say, ‘Folks, this is what went wrong and how it went wrong.’ “…

Well, Dan, you’re too late. Hundreds of people were ahead of you — and it all started in the blogosphere. Hang ’em up, Dan.

Memo to CBS News: Quit While You’re Behind

CBS News’s latest attempt to cover up its big boo-boo on Bush’s National Guard records (see previous post) has driven up the price on Bush’s re-election at TradeSports.com.

A Bulletin from CBS News

From Drudge:

Statement by the President of CBS News, Andrew Heyward:

“We established to our satisfaction that the memos were accurate or we would not have put them on television. There was a great deal of coroborating [sic] evidence from people in a position to know. Having said that, given all the questions about them, we believe we should redouble our efforts to answer those questions, so that’s what we are doing.”

What exactly is it you’re doing? Finding more “experts”? Trying to get some “experts” to retract the damaging things they’ve said? Forging — oops, finding — more corroborating [non-sic] evidence? Asking the slick operator who sold you those forgeries to step forward and say that he’s really on Karl Rove’s payroll? Trying to get Dan Rather to admit the forgeries himself, then retire immediately? We can hardly wait to read the next installment of this thrilling serial mystery.

But wait, there’s more from Drudge:

TRANSCRIPT EVENING NEWS:

RATHER INTRO: CBS News .. “60 Minutes” .. and this reporter .. drew new fire today .. over our reports that raised questions about President Bush’s military service record .. including whether he fulfilled his obligations to the national guard.

CBS News correspondent Wyatt Andrews reports on the latest attack on the “60 Minutes” story .. and the CBS News response.

ANDREWS: Congressional republicans turned the high heat on CBS News, charging that last week’s revelations about Lt George Bush, which aired on “60 Minutes” were based on fake documents and demanding that 60 Minutes and Dan Rather retract the story.

Sot Bennet

Its very clear the documents were forged. They were laid on him and this time he bit.

ANDREWS: 40 members of the House signed a letter accusing the network of deception–in a letter asking CBS if the documents are authentic, why wont the network say how it got them .

Roy Blunt (R-Missouri)

I think at the very least CBS should characterize the source. I think it’s amazing that they haven’t already done that.

ANDREW:

The dispute surrounds memoranda 60 Minutes says came from the personal file of Lt. Bush’s Air National Guard Commander, Lt Col Jerry Killian. …. Memos that accuse Mr Bush of disobeying an order and of using connections to have Killian “sugarcoat” Mr Bush’s record. (out)

However some experts doubt the authenticity of the memos. Killian’s secretary–in an interview for tonight’s 60 Minutes tells Dan Rather she too believes the memos are fake –but– accurately reflect KIllian’s view of Lt. Bush.

Sot MARIAN KNOX:

I know that I didn’t type them however, the information in those is correct.

ANDREWS

Marian Knox says Col Killian liked Mr Bush but not his attitude.

Sot MARIAN KNOX

First of all Killian was very friendly with Bush they had fun together. And I think it upset him very much that he was being defied.

ANDREWS

CBS News officials say the memos came from a confidential source- and that they remain certain the content of the story is true.

ANDREW HEYWARD:

we would not have put the report on the air if we did not believe in every aspect of it.

Narr

However, News President Andrew Heyward also says the network will try to resolve what he calls the unresolved issues.

Sot ANDREW HEYWARD:

..enough questions have been raised that we are going redouble our efforts to answer those questions.

ANDREWS:

Some at this network believe the backlash against the 60 Minutes report is pure politcics. But that’s the critics’ point as well–that fake, or real, the fact that 60 Minutes got these documents during an election year was no accident. Wyatt Andrews CBS News Washington.

So, let’s see what we have here:

People who are questioning CBS’s story — in fact, have proved that it’s based on forgeries — are “attacking” CBS. And guess what, some of them are Republicans. Gee whillikers, imagine that!

Lt. Col. Killian’s secretary admits she didn’t type the forged memos. That’s an easy one, we all knew she didn’t type them, unless she typed them recently using Microsoft Word with Times New Roman.

Lt. Col. Killian’s secretary says the information in the memos is “correct.” Every last detail? Ah, the convenient, uncorroborated memory of an antiquated Bush-hater. CBS will just say that those who question her story are viciously attacking an old lady.

CBS News “believed” in the report. That is, CBS New ran a report consistent with what it wanted to believe.

Some at CBS believe the “backlash” is “pure politics”. Right, blame it on “politics” instead of your own shoddy, blatantly biased journalism.

It’s old hat: slippery logic, aggressive defense, and trying to shift the blame. It’s lame and it won’t work.

The Origin of Rights and the Essence of Modern Libertarianism

REVISED AND RE-DATED

I’ll begin with a standard definition of libertarianism, from Wikipedia:

Libertarianism…advocates individual rights and a limited government. Libertarians believe that individuals should be free to do anything they want, so long as they do not infringe upon what they believe to be the equal rights of others…For libertarians, there are no “positive rights” (such as to food or shelter or health care), only “negative rights” (such as to not be assaulted, abused, robbed or censored), including the right to personal property. Libertarians further believe that the only legitimate use of force, whether public or private, is to protect these rights.

I must add that the creation of positive rights amounts to a violation of negative rights, because the enforcement of positive rights involves taking from some persons in order to give to others.

Whence negative rights? Negative rights arise from experience and are the distilled lessons of that experience. Experience teaches those who seek to learn from it that the preservation of personal and economic freedoms serves the general good.

In particular, as John Stuart Mill understood, personal freedoms should be preserved because through them we become more knowledgeable, more self-reliant, and more productive. Friedrich A. Hayek elaborated on Mill’s insight by making the case that the personal and the economic are inseparable: We engage in economic activity to serve personal values and our personal values are reflected in our economic activity.

Moreover, as Hayek also tried to tell us, the state cannot make personal and economic decisions more effectively than individuals operating freely within an ever-evolving societal network. When the state intervenes in our lives it damages that network, to our detriment.

Thus, the general good — the increase of our knowledge, abilities, and wealth — is served best when the state recognizes our negative rights and acts to defend us and those rights from predators — without and within — and nothing more.

And that is the essence of modern libertarianism.

(This post is based on three earlier ones: here, here, and here. I should also acknowledge the foreshadowing of libertarianism in Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations:

As every individual, therefore, endeavours as much as he can both to employ his capital in the support of domestic industry, and so to direct that industry that its produce may be of the greatest value; every individual necessarily labours to render the annual revenue of the society as great as he can. He generally, indeed, neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it. By preferring the support of domestic to that of foreign industry, he intends only his own security; and by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention. Nor is it always the worse for the society that it was no part of it. By pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of the society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it. I have never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the public good. It is an affectation, indeed, not very common among merchants, and very few words need be employed in dissuading them from it. [Source: Wikipedia.]

Smith was describing the kind of learning from experience that is distilled in the tenets of libertarianism. Smith’s “invisible hand” is really the following mechanism at work: As long as A is left alone to discover how to make a good living (without harming, stealing from, or deceiving anyone), A will discover what he is capable of producing that is most desired by B. B will be made happier for being able to buy it from A, and A will be happier because B pays him a good price for it.

The visible and heavy hand of the state can never replicate the degree of happiness that results when free markets — operating through the invisible hand of self-interest — integrate the ever-changing knowledge, desires, and abilities of hundreds of millions of As and Bs.)

Validated by the Wall Street Journal

REVISED AND RE-DATED

A few days ago, in this post, I wrote:

The real problem with Democrats is that they think they’re still supposed to be in the White House and in charge of Congress….

[I]t seems that Democrats are suffering from a bizarre form of near-term memory loss. They remember 1933-1969, when they held the White House for all but Ike’s two terms. (And what kind of Republican was Ike, anyway?) They mistakenly thought their White House hegemony had been restored with Clinton’s ascendancy, but Clinton was really an accidental president. Democrats vividly remember having controlled both houses of Congress for most of the 62 years from 1933 to 1995, and they keep deluding themselves that they will retake Congress in the “next” election….

Today’s OpinionJournal carries an article by Brendan Miniter, “D Is for Descendancy,” with the subhead, “The Democrats are no longer the majority party. Is this the year they’ll finally admit it?” As Miniter puts it:

Democrats still seem to believe they can win back the White House without making any significant modification to their party’s policies — that they are the natural majority party just waiting to be given back control.

They’re wrong, but they don’t want to admit it. That’s why — as I said in my earlier post — they cry ” ‘nasty’ and ‘unfair’ whenever they lose to Republicans. It’s childish behavior. Get over it!”

More Old Presidents

REVISED (ADDITIONAL PHOTOS)

Several days ago I posted some photographs of Abraham Lincoln, including an early daguerreotype (taken when he was 31 or 32 years old) that looks entirely unlike the image of Lincoln we carry in our minds. That led me to remember the collection of presidents’ images at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C. (The Portrait Gallery is closed for major renovations but much of the collection is available for viewing online.) Here are two priceless photographs from the Portrait Gallery’s Hall of Presidents:

Daguerreotype of John Quincy Adams (1767-1848, president 1825-29), made in 1843 when Adams was 76 years old.

Daguerreotype of Martin Van Buren (1782-1862, president 1837-41), made ca. 1856 when Van Buren was about 74 years old.

Daguerreotype of Zachary Taylor (1784-1850, president 1849-50), with his aide and future son-in-law William S. Bliss, made ca. 1847 when Taylor was about 63 years old.

There’s a lot more from Presidential Hall here.