Pope John Paul II

Pope John Paul II has passed away. Though I am not Catholic, am not Christian, and have had some significant quibbles with some of his acts as Pope, I have rarely seen a man who has done so much good in his tenure here on earth. God rest his soul.

The Washington Monthly and Slate opine on who the next Pope will be.

Where to, Professor Zywicki?

Todd Zywicki of the VC puts together a long post on Academic Diversity, kindly linking to my previous post in the process. I just want to give a few reflections on his latest piece, the vast bulk of which I agree with.

The only true quibble I have is Prof. Zywicki's protest of the "ethnic studies" type courses. As he puts it:

While there are many good professors who create an open and balanced forum for a true exchange of ideas, there are many situations where this plainly is not the case. Most obviously, the entire point of many courses today is to present a particular viewpoint, not to create a balanced discussion, such as Women's Studies, African-American Studies, and GLBT Studies (for instance, when Dartmouth added a GLBT Studies program a few years ago, its first course was taught by a local activist, rather than a properly-qualified professor)

I obviously wouldn't defend having a class taught by a random activist pulled from the street. I do, however, see the value in those sorts of classes (Women's studies, GLBT studies, Jewish studies, et al). The primary objection to these sorts of classes is that they are not "neutral," that is, while a generic philosophy class teaches precepts common to all mankind (or at least, makes the effort to), ethnic studies courses are explicitly within the perspective of a single group. Conservatives tend to object to this from two angles: first, that it is needlessly divisive and leads to ethnic strife (by accentuating differences rather than bringing people together as one) and second, that it is unequal, since there isn't a "Men's Studies," or "Christian History" class. Advocates of Ethnic Studies classes have a single response that addresses both: that "generic" classes aren't neutral but actually coming from the perspective of the dominant group (in America, White Christian Males). Ethnic studies classes thus are no more perspectivized than any other class, it just is explicit about where it is coming from. The classes aren't "unequal" because every other class IS taught from the WCM perspective; it's just that White Christian Males have spoken alone for so long that they mistake the sound of their own voice for silence. Ethnic Studies classes thus give equal time to voices and perspectives that are marginalized in the dominant discourse that every person hears.

This isn't to say that Zywicki doesn't have a valid argument here. At some point, there has to be a cross-over, where so many persons are articulating the "marginalized" views that it ceases to be marginal anymore. The question is, have we reached that point? I'd venture no, because a) these views, despite their prevalence in academia, still have yet to gain much penetration into mainstream political discourse and b) these views are virtually non-existent in secondary school education, so incoming college students still have had far more exposure to the dominant views than to marginal ones. In this respect, having Ethnic Studies classes aids the quest (indeed, one might say is a pre-requisite) for an educational experience which "exposes students to a variety of ideas and perspectives, and through that develops critical thinking skills and an understanding of different ways of seeing the world which is necessary for living in a free and democratic society." However, as Zywicki and his allies will surely rejoin, diversity cuts both ways, and it is as important to expose students to conservative views as it is to liberal ones. I agree whole-heartedly, and while I think that Ethnic Studies classes should be preserved, I'd submit it should be part of a broader educational experience that presents conservative views as well as liberal ones.

Now that we've gotten past that little detour, where to? In other words, how to we get to that lovely panacea of diversity we lust so for so much? In my previous posts on the topic, I've argued that there are other explanations beyond bias that help explain the underrepresentation of conservatives in academia. The first of these is self-selection; conservatives may be less prone to the desire of academic life in the first place. For example, they might prefer jobs which offer more financial rewards, or ones that have more practical opportunities for influence (such as at Think Tanks or in politics, for example). Since that problem is on the end of the conservatives, I'll leave it up to them to fix it. The second potential bar I saw was the emphasis by universities on "novel" scholarship, which I argued in the last post was detrimental to conservatives who, by definition, are more likely to believe and be arguing for something that has already been said. Since this is an institutional problem, it seems, to me, to be ripe for resolution (and all you conservatives out there note: the thought-process I used to come to this idea came directly out of my exposure and enjoyment of critical theory and post-modernism. Just goes to show you that it is a tool that can be used by all ends of the political spectrum).

Professor Zywicki and I have been exchanging emails, and trading some ideas on how this institutional flaw can be rectified. This was the solution I came up with:

Perhaps an alternative would be recasting the norm about what "acceptable" (esp. for tenure review) scholarship is. If academia was changed to be more debate oriented, with the expectation that professors would not just construct arguments but also actively engage in debate with their philosophical opponents, that could help conservatives immensely by astronomically increasing the worth of their at-present less valuable defenses of prior claims, and by giving an alternative path to academic success beyond just making new claims and blissfully ignoring the scathing criticism coming from the other side of the political divide.

By making participation in Symposia and paneled debates either an independent requirement or a partial substitution for novel scholarship in the tenure process, we can give conservative scholars a leg up by end-running the institutional barrier to success posed by novel scholarship requirements. As an ex-high school debater who seriously believes in the value of discourse and argumentation as an integral part of the intellectual process, this holds a lot of appeal for me personally.

PLO Judgment Affirmed

Way back in the early days of the blog, I wrote a brief post on a $116 million judgment a Rhode Island district court slapped on the PLO for violating the Anti-Terrorism Act, which authorizes any "national of the United States injured in his or her person, property, or business by reason of an act of international terrorism, or his or her estate, survivors, or heirs" to sue in US courts and collect damages.

Via How Appealing, I find today that the 1st Circuit Court of Appeals has affirmed the judgment over "sovereign immunity" and "political question" protests by the Palestinean Authority.

Schiavo Dies

Terri Schiavo finally passed away this morning, in her Florida hospice. May God rest her soul.

The Family Research Council offers its condolences and uses this opportunity to rally the troops against the "culture of death" which is "still very much alive in our society." I just hope they live up to their word.

Novelty and the Liberal Academia

Much hay has been made over the purported liberal slant of academia. A study by GMU Professor Robert Lichtler concludes that:

By their own description, 72 percent of those teaching at American universities and colleges are liberal and 15 percent are conservative, says the study being published this week. The imbalance is almost as striking in partisan terms, with 50 percent of the faculty members surveyed identifying themselves as Democrats and 11 percent as Republicans.

The disparity is even more pronounced at the most elite schools, where, according to the study, 87 percent of faculty are liberal and 13 percent are conservative.
[...]
The researchers say that liberals, men and non-regular churchgoers are more likely to be teaching at top schools, while conservatives, women and more religious faculty are more likely to be relegated to lower-tier colleges and universities.

Top-tier schools, roughly a third of the total, are defined as highly ranked liberal arts colleges and research universities that grant PhDs.

The most liberal faculties are those devoted to the humanities (81 percent) and social sciences (75 percent), according to the study. But liberals outnumbered conservatives even among engineering faculty (51 percent to 19 percent) and business faculty (49 percent to 39 percent).

The most left-leaning departments are English literature, philosophy, political science and religious studies, where at least 80 percent of the faculty say they are liberal and no more than 5 percent call themselves conservative, the study says.

The Volokh Conspiracy has done a lot of thinking on this topic, most recently here and earlier here, which prompted my own musings as well. Kevin Drum, by contrast, mocks conservative commentators for whom the absence of women in academia is a clear indicator of inherent difference, while screaming the exact opposite when it comes to their own underrepresentation in the nation's universities.

In my first foray into this loaded topic, I agreed that the statistics showed a pretty clear liberal skew, but argued that more information was needed in order to determine whether there was bias at work, or whether there was, to some degree, self-selection. I claimed that, all else being equal, it made more sense to ascribe underrepresentation amongst a racial or gender group to bias than it did for a political group, since the latter has far more "essential" characteristics to it that might lead it away from academia than the former, whose "essential characteristics" are often merely stereotypes or products of past discrimination and lack of opportunity. I then said that in order to prove discrimination against conservative persons, we'd have to find "significant numbers of Republicans who wish to enter Academia but either a) face institutional obstacles to doing so (such as biased administrators) or b) feel academia is a "hostile environment" to persons with their views." In my opinion, the jury is still out on both of those questions.

However, there is another factor that may act as a barrier to conservatives in academia: innovation and novelty. The basic philosophy behind conservatism is preservation of the past. Generally, their policy preferences involve either preserving the status quo, or reverting society to the near (or not so near) past. Either way, the point is, their advocacy has already happened. And having already happened, it has almost definitely already been analyzed, explained, and justified, at least to some degree. Liberals, by contrast, tend to look toward change. They want to see a shift in the status quo, the creation of something new. And in looking for the new, liberals are more likely to be, well, novel. This is not to say that conservatives have no ground for original argumentation. They can still make responses and refutations to proposed liberal changes, or advocate new procedures or warrants for old claims. However, this is far narrower footing than what is available to the left. For example, a talented conservative professor might write a law review article demolishing Catherine MacKinnon's theories on sex discrimination and anti-subordination theory. That's all well and good, except that as Eugene Volokh notes in his book Academic Legal Writing, an article framed as a response to another piece generally limits ones audience to those who have read the original, a far smaller pool than those who might be interested in the topic as a whole.

This also helps explain why conservative professors, when they get a job at all, are stacked at the bottom of the professorial totem-pole. Novel arguments with broad appeal get published in more popular journals, get more attention, and look better on resumes. Liberals have more opportunities to do this than conservatives, because they are more likely to be writing on topics which have undergone less prior explication and analysis. Sure, occasionally you get a wunderkind like Richard Posner who says something truly revolutionary in support of conservative principles, but such persons are few and far between. Universities know this, and thus, consciously or not, will proceed with caution when evaluating even talented conservative scholars. Meanwhile, with liberals, there is always the chance that your university will be the one boasting the founder of the Critical Post-Colonialist Womyn and Hermeneutics Movement, or whatever, giving your school much attention and a reputation as "path-breaking" or "cutting edge." Say what you will about its merits, but the CPCWH movement certainly sounds more distinctive and will probably get more notice than the fifty-second defense of and expansion the theories of Sir Edmund Burke--no matter how excellent (or even unique) the work might be.

In some respects, one might claim that this focus by universities (unique scholarship as opposed to solid argumentation) is a bias in of itself. Certainly the critical theorist in me would challenge whether or not that particular pattern of hierarchy is natural or inevitable, or reflects the cultural and institutional biases of prevailingly liberal colleges, who wish to preserve their liberal status quo by creating standards which reify their dominance (I shouldn't mock post-modernists like I did above, indeed, if there was a CPCWH movement, I'm the type who would eat it all up, most likely). That's a whole other debate by itself, and one that, as of now, I'm not really ready to opine on. However, leaving that aside for now, it seems that the particular focus of colleges on innovation and novelty itself acts as a structural bar to increased conservative participation in the academia, wholly independent of the particular biases of its current practitioners.

UPDATE: Welcome Volokh-ers!. Hope you enjoyed the post, and check out my latest one on the subject here (reflecting on the post that brought you here).

Grand Rove Party

A great, if wholly depressing, column on the architect of the current GOP majority, Karl Rove (thanks to Andrew Sullivan, who's been surprisingly spry in his "retirement"). It notes that Rove has positioned the GOP so it can lose the battles while winning the war. For example, on Social Security, it looks like Private Accounts are going down in flames. Good news for Democrats? Well, let's see: Democrats get to go into next election saying...they preserved the status quo. Lovely. Terri Schiavo? Same thing, and I expect an outburst of support for the keep-her-alive side when she finally dies. Two years from now, most Americans will forget both issues. The partisans, however, will not forget, and the far right is far more invested in both Social Security and Ms. Schiavo than is the far left.

The thing about Rove is that he really doesn't care about "traditional" conservative values. He's willing to use them as cover fire to achieve other ends (Social Security taking the hits while an atrocious bankruptcy bill passes unscathed), or utterly suppress them so they don't fracture his precious coalition (Immigration "reform" a la Tom Tancredo). As the article notes:

Here in Blue America, Rove is typically caricatured as an ideologue, a hard-right-winger of the Cheney-Ashcroft genre. But as those who've closely followed his career will tell you, he is in fact a pragmatist, an apostle of patronage with a keen sense of factional politics and the spoils system.

Politics for Rove isn't about principles. It is about winning, and dispensing rewards to favored constituencies in the process. Unfortunately, as the GOP drifts further and further away from anything remotely resembling a principle, they become harder and harder to check. The virtues of small government and the protest against the patronage system--one of the few noble aspirations of the Gingrich revolution, have been utterly abandoned by Tom DeLay, who has emerged as the elected incarnation of what Rove does behind the scenes. As the DeLay congress continues to undercut procedural constraints, and Rove and his pragmatist disciples strip away ideological constraints, there is no telling where the GOP will go. Daniel Drezner's noticed, as has die-hard conservative Bill Quick (though obviously he wants the GOP to go in a different direction than I do). On the left end of things (relatively speaking), The New Republic nobly asks DeLay to quit it for the good of the country--while admitting that his continued presence in the House is a walking campaign ad for anti-corruption Democrats. Bull Moose slightly less nobly hopes that the GOP continues to back DeLay, et al, on the grounds that overreach will eventually kick the Republicans out of power.

Power unchecked by scruples. That is the future (and arguably present) of the Republican Party.

I Got a Job!

I got a Job! I got a Job! Cool things deserve repetition (and capital letters). So, starting this summer, I'll be working in the law library at Williams & Connelly. Very exciting.

That Harvard Law Chair is just a hop, skip, and jump away.

Back to the Dead

I earlier linked to TNR's Iraq'd blog's description of the Sunni Persecution Strategy (see here as well). Essentially, it goes like this: Sunni leaders who wish to prolong the insurgency "gather recruits, material, and political support for the insurgency by aggravating the sense among Sunnis that they have no future in the U.S.-sponsored political process."

After the great success that was the Iraqi election, we though this sort of grievance had subsided. Well, it's baaaackkk, and with a vengeance. More ominously, however, this time the bone the Sunnis have to pick is with the Kurds. The Boston Globe has the scoop:

"The Americans aren't the problem; we're living under an occupation of Kurds and Shi'ites," Sattar Abdulhalik Adburahman, a Sunni leader from the northern city of Kirkuk, told a gathering of tribal leaders last week, to deafening applause. "It's time to fight back." ...

"The Kurds are asking for Kirkuk. Later on they will start asking for Baghdad," said Sheik Abu D'ham, a Sunni tribal leader from Kirkuk who fears assassination if his full name is published. "It was Saddam Hussein who gave the Kurds too much, more than they deserved."

Sooner rather than later, he said, the city's Arabs would rise up. "The last remedy is burning," he said. "There will be fighting."

Obviously, we shouldn't jump to conclusions too quickly. As Iraq'd notes, we don't have a full cross-section of Sunni community opinion, and the rejection of sectarian violence by the Sunni Association of Muslim Scholars also is a positive note. Still..."deafening" applause for a speaker who advocates an uprising against the Kurds, and who claims Saddam Hussein was too good for them, does not bode well (note: Saddam killed 182,000 innocent Kurds in the Anfal Genocide from 1986-1989. Deterring future leaders from advocating genocide, by showing the international community will not consent to it, was one of my primary justifications for the Iraq war). Leaders like this need to be undermined, and fast, if Iraq has any chance for a continued, unified, and (relatively) blood-free existence.

This Is Why Trials are a Good Thing

Liberals get awfully nervous about military tribunals. For whatever reason, the idea of unrestrained authority, lack of meaningful checks, little due process, no civilian oversight, and President Bush as the ultimate determiner of justice doesn't sit well with us. Why on earth could that be?

Well, today's Washington Post offers a clue. Murnat Kurnaz, a German Muslim of
Turkish descent, was detained by the government for two years after 9/11 after a military tribunal determined there was "some evidence" that he was an al-Qaeda member. That would be nice, except that recently declassified evidence showed that the overwhelming weight of military opinion was that he had no ties to terrorism whatsoever. In all the files relating to Kurnaz's case, precisely one document, a brief unsigned memo by an unknown military official, argued he was a terrorist. As for the rest,

"in nearly 100 pages of documents, now declassified by the government, U.S. military investigators and German law enforcement authorities said they had no such evidence. The Command Intelligence Task Force, the investigative arm of the U.S. Southern Command, which oversees the Guantanamo Bay facility, repeatedly suggested that it may have been a mistake to take Kurnaz off a bus of Islamic missionaries traveling through Pakistan in October 2001.

"CITF has no definite link/evidence of detainee having an association with Al Qaida or making any specific threat against the U.S.," one document says. 'CITF is not aware of evidence that Kurnaz was or is a member of Al Qaeda.'

Another newly declassified document reports that the 'Germans confirmed this detainee has no connection to an al-Qaida cell in Germany.'"

Reaction by the Bush administration to what US District Court Judge Joyce Hens Green called "one of the most troubling military abuses of due process among the many cases of Guantanamo detainees that she has reviewed" was swift.

"Justice Department lawyers told [Kurnaz's lawyer] last week that the information may have been improperly declassified and should be treated in the foreseeable future as classified."

Amazing. The Bush administration detains someone even when the overwhelming body of evidence and analysis says he was wrongfully arrested. Then, when they're caught, their response is to try and hide their mistake by reclassifying the evidence that proves their malfeasance . Simply outrageous.

That, my conservative friends, is why military tribunals cannot be used to fight the war on terror. As applied, they are illegal under American law and international law. The disrespect for constitutional guarantees and the rule of law is simply astounding. Yet somehow, not surprising.

Pledge Dispute in the 4th Circuit

How Appealing links to a report that the 4th Circuit is hearing an establishment clause challenge to the Pledge of Allegiance. Interestingly, the challenge is to the entire pledge, not just the "Under God" clause, and it is being made by a Mennonite Christian, not an atheist as in the Newdow case. The gist of the argument is that the Pledge creates a "civic religion" (buttressed by the intermingling of religious and patriotic messages in the text), which violates the first amendment. Furthermore, as applied in the district, the pledge coerces the students by, among other things, rewarding those who say it with coupons and other perks (which discriminates against conscentious objectors by virtue of omission).

To me, the district court's opinion seemed to give the pledge an awfully leinant standard of review. I do think the "under God" clause of the pledge is unconstitutional--although not the whole pledge. I think that the system of "rewards" tied to reciting the pledge is problematic as well. Still, the odds that the most conservative appeals court in the land (the 4th) will follow in the steps of the most liberal (the 9th) seems unlikely.

Culture of Death

Wall Street Journal Columnist Peggy Noonan caused quite a stir on the blogosphere when she alleged that persons who wanted to remove Schiavo's feeding tube were promoting a "Culture of Death" (helpfully linked to, summed up, and taken down by The Moderate Voice). Persons of good will and moral values can disagree over the right choices for Terri's plight (see, for example, this guest editorial by William Stothers, and Dahilia Lithwick for Slate). But, as TMV says, to allege that all those who wish to see her die with dignity wish to construct a "Culture of Death" is grossly demeaning and a hideously inaccurate ad hominem.

If Ms. Noonan wishes to see a real "culture of death," perhaps she might take a look at our inner cities. A nine year old boy is currently in a coma after being shot while playing on the sidewalk in Northwest D.C.. Easy access to firearms, mixed with inadequate policing and non-existent economic opportunities create an environment where criminal activity flourishes. Young men turn to crime at epidemic levels, not because they are inherently prone to illicit activity, but because there is often literally no other choice. Social isolation is a severe barrier to economic advancement, and unstable foundations make corporations reluctant to invest. This creates a feedback loop of poverty, desperation, and despair. And even the innocents, those who have taken "personal responsibility," or worse, never grew old enough to get the chance to do it, still are victimized. Oh, and I'd be very surprised if this boy's family could afford to pay for his medical care without some form of the government assistance "pro-life" legislators want to cut. An outcry over this would strike a greater blow to the "culture of death" in our society than 1,000 Terri Schiavo marches ever could. And yet, I'm waiting to hear a word from the "pro-life" crowd.

Waiting, waiting, waiting...

The Real Conservative Jew

Poor David Bernstein. He keeps forgetting that even amongst "Conservative Jews" he's still likely to be the only actual Conservative. For better or for worse, Jewish law places a heavy emphasis on care for the poor and underprivileged, and is not the slightest bit statephobic--part of which makes the religion so overwhelmingly liberal. The grogger to Hilary Clinton was a nice riposte (though I have to ask again, why the Conservative anathema to a relatively hawkish, centrist Senator?). But alas, you are still wanderers in an unholy land (or from my perspective, deniers of the True Path to political enlightment).

Hope everyone had a happy Purim, though if you did you're probably too drunk to read this post. Back to Carleton on the 27th (can't hardly wait)!

Death's Bad Rap

Andrew Sullivan's Quote of the Day consists of the following statement by the Jesuit Theologian Rev. John J. Paris:

"Here's the question I ask of these right-to-lifers, including Vatican bishops: as we enter into Holy Week and we proclaim that death is not triumphant and that with the power of resurrection and the glory of Easter we have the triumph of Christ over death, what are they talking about by presenting death as an unmitigated evil? It doesn’t fit Christian context. Richard McCormick, who was the great Catholic moral theologian of the last 25 years, wrote a brilliant article in the Journal of the American Medical Association in 1974 called "To Save or Let Die." He said there are two great heresies in our age (and heresy is a strong word in theology — these are false doctrines). One is that life is an absolute good and the other is that death is an absolute evil. We believe that life was created and is a good, but a limited good. Therefore the obligation to sustain it is a limited one. The parameters that mark off those limits are your capacities to function as a human."

Now, this really doesn't impact to me in any way, because I'm not Christian. But it does give me at least some pause in terms of my theological debates with Christians. I often ask them explain the clear-cut murdering of innocents God engages in throughout the bible (the "two year old first born son" in the 10th plague, the Book of Job). One of the common responses (though not the only) is that death isn't the ultimate evil--all that is happening is these innocents are returning to God. However, then when we get back down to the modern world, abortion and euthanasia become the ultimate of moral evils. How do those two issues co-exist? Sure, one could argue that the actions in the bible are God's and thus beyond reproach, but I think that dodges the question--the "good" caused by death (returning to God) is caused regardless of whether the source is God, or an illness, or a freak accident, or the hand of mankind. Perversely, it seems this logic could be used to justify murder on a grand-scale--which is worse: letting humans continue to live in the stench of sin, or returning them to their merciful and just God?

As a Jew, I don't believe in the primacy of the immortal kingdom over the one established here on earth. So I can happily believe death is the great moral evil, guilt-free. But for those who do, this strikes me as a fundamental tension in the moral doctrine of Christianity. Millions of persons have died on Christian crusades, at least in part motivated because they were doing God's will and that their mortal life was a mere crucible for the world-to-come. It seems difficult to pick and choose where death is okay, and where it isn't.

This isn't to indict Rev. Paris. I think his point--that life, in the moral sense, means a functioning life, and when life is not functioning it can be killed. Nor do I think he means this in a callous sense. If you believe in reincarnation, it gives what must be a tortured soul "take two," another chance at life. If you don't believe in that, but still believe in an afterlife, it allows a soul the immediate chance to experience the life-as-afterlife, something an incapacitated, non-functioning human being cannot. And if you don't believe in any form of religion, surely the prospect of an entirely non-conscious existence, divorced from the capability of rational thought, is a scary prospect. There is a reason why polls overwhelmingly say, if in the same situation as Schiavo, the vast majority of American's would not want to be artificially kept alive. Regardless of whether they want to meet their maker, or just be released from a life not worth living, they same to agree that Schiavo's situation isn't really a life at all.

Obstruction of Justice

I joined the Coalition for Darfur a little while ago, but never got a chance to do anything about it. The CfD is a multipartisan blog dedicated to exposing the horrific atrocities in the Darfur region and provoking the international community to action.

Today, the CfD links to a report of a USAID volunteer shot in the face by unknown assailants, in broad daylight, while traveling in a clearly marked humanitarian convoy. Sudan expert Eric Reeves (who spoke at Carleton, see my thoughts on his incredible lecture here) believes that this is part of a strategy by Khartoum to obstruct humanitarian aid, thus starving the Darfur refugees to death in a slow, but equally lethal, genocide. As CfD reports:

"If such a plan is truly in the works, it will have dire consequences for the people of Darfur. Last year, Jan Egeland, the UN Undersecretary General for Humanitarian Affairs, warned that as many as 100,000 people could die in Darfur every month if those providing humanitarian assistance were forced to withdraw due to insecurity."

When even the notoriously "even-handed" UN starts mentioning death tolls of 100,000 people per month, we should admit there is a crisis.

Meanwhile, yesterday's Washington Post contained a...interesting...interview with Sudanese Vice President (and architect of the cease-fire that ended the 30 year civil war between the northern and southern regions of Sudan--that's a separate conflict) Ali Uthman Muhammad Taha. He essentially denied there was any genocide taking place, and said that the international community needed to put more pressure on the rebels to lay down their arms. As CfD notes, the AU has estimated 90% of the cease-fire violations in the Darfur region have been instigated by the Janjaweed militias. But sure, let's blame the victim. Meanwhile, Joseph Goebbels is demanding that resistance fighters in Warsaw lay down their weapons before there is any talk of dismantling the concentration camps.

CNN Weighs In on DeLay

CNN runs a piece on Tom DeLay's growing political radioactivity. This lends some credance to Etc.'s claim that DeLay's grandstanding on the Schiavo issue will backfire by bringing attention to his plethora of ethical shortcomings. And if you feel like indulging in more GOP scandals, check out this David Brooks editorial in the New York Times.

As always, be sure to check out the uncomparable Daily DeLay for the latest on this walking embarassment to our nation.

Killing Them Softly

The Daily Kos uses the terms "Bush" and "lie" a bit too often in my opinion. But they certainly nailed it here. The law Bush signed in Texas allows patients to die no matter what their family wants--the only pertinent issue is whether the family can pay (see here for an example). For Scott McClellan to describe it as "ensur[ing] that actions were being taken that were in accordance with the wishes of the patient or the patient's family" is flatly untrue. The media's lack of attention to this--while giving a veritable orgy of attention to Ms. Schiavo's plight--is outrageous.

More on Schiavo here and here. Also, check out The Moderate Voice, Southern Appeal, and Professor Bainbridge.

Oh, and while looking up links for this post, it appears the spectacular Legal Fiction blog is hanging up the spikes. Publius will be sorely missed as a superb commentator and a sharp analyst.

Politics of Schiavo

I just blogged on what I thought should be done regarding Terry Schiavo's tragic situation. Specifically, I said that in absence of a clear indication that she'd desire otherwise (which I don't believe is present here), I think we should default to saving her life. To be honest, I think President Bush hit the right note here: "This is a complex case with serious issues. But in extraordinary circumstances like this, it is wise to always err on the side of life."

The politics of the situation, however, are another matter entirely. Conservatives are up to their eyeballs in hypocrisy here, and Democrats should make them put their money where their mouth is. As Barbara O'Brien noted (tip: Kevin Drum), somehow all this support for "life" flies out the window once the government has to step in and make sure the poor have access to the care necessary to sustaining and protecting their lives.

"We need a list of politicians and commentators, including bloggers, who have been calling for cuts in Medicaid but who now have joined in the 'save Terri Schiavo' cult. These people need to be challenged to take her off Medicaid and pay for her maintenance themselves. If you know of any such people, please add their names to the comments.

The righties are going to say, it's not about money, it's about principle. But the principle is that there are people right now who are not receiving health care that they need because they can't afford it, and their lives may be shortened as a result. But there is plenty of taxpayer money to keep Terri Schiavo alive, even though she has no hope of ever being conscious.

Why? Because she's politically useful, that's why. That's your 'principle.'"

Even the American public, notoriously gullible with regards to GOP culture war putsches, isn't buying the facade that DeLay and Company actually care about Schiavo and others like her. Indeed, when the choice is between saving money and prolonging life, Conservative activists have been mysteriously silent. Much hay has been made over the fact that Schiavo's parents are willing and able to pay for her care. That's wonderful, but what of those who don't have the bankroll to care for their loved ones? Apparently, the answer is: pull the plug.

Nobody should die simply because they cannot afford to live. If there is one, basic obligation of our society, it is to ensure life to all citizens. We can debate about the other stuff later, but life has to be a baseline. It's why I consider myself pro-life on abortion, and why I consider programs like Medicare/Medicaid to be moral imperatives on society, not just "liberal entitlement programs."

Schiavo Thoughts

CNN reports that the House has just passed a bill authorizing federal courts to reinsert a feeding tube into Terry Schiavo while Court cases are pending. My own thoughts are very similar to Ross Douthat of The American Scene: Since there is someone willing to take care of Terry (her parents), and her husband could get a divorce easily enough, we should default to prolonging her life in absence of clear proof showing that she would not want to be kept in such a state (IE, a living will). I do agree with Will Baude's admonishment that we should consider the wishes of the dead or dying--and indeed, if Schiavo had put down, on paper, that she did not want to live in such conditions I'd support her being removed from the feeding tube. But with the evidence unclear, I think we should err on the side of keeping her alive. That seems to be the path dictated by the precautionary principle and the Hippocratic Oath: "First, do no harm." Baude is right that completely ignoring the clear wishes of a suffering patient is a harm. However, I think in this case it is still speculative, versus the very real harm of having her dead.

Incidentally, I just saw former New Jersey Governor Christie Todd Whitman on "Real Time With Bill Maher." She very, very briefly, so quickly you might have missed it, registered her opposition to the GOP's use of a Congressional subpoena to keep Schiavo alive (which is different than the bill just passed). From the context of her statement, it was impossible to tell whether she opposed just that procedural tactic, or whether she felt that in general Schiavo should be allowed to die. If it's the former, I agree with her, the use of a subpoena here is way beyond the scope of congressional powers. If it's the latter, I obviously disagree as noted above.

Sorry for the paucity of blogging lately. I've been very, very stressed out. Hopefully I'll get back on track soon. In case y'all care, my latest debate column is out on Victory Briefs, though you probably won't get the references unless you have some relation to HS debate.

Not "Excruiating" Enough

Marty Lederman of Balkinization links to an NPR broadcast on torture. It quotes Harvard Law Professor (and noted civil rights zealot) Alan Dershowitz as saying

"When you torture somebody to death--that is, when you kill somebody and use grave pain to aggravate the killing of that person--everybody would acknowledge that’s torture. But placing a sterilized needle under somebody’s fingernails for fifteen minutes, causing excruciating pain but no permanent physical damage--is that torture?"

As Lederman notes, yes, it is torture, you dolt.

"Just for the record: Even under the constricted definition of "torture" in current U.S. law, intentionally causing "excruiating" (i.e., severe) pain to a person in one's custody is, unequivocally, torture, and is a felony under all circumstances. Perhaps it's open to argument whether that law should be changed. But I don't really see how there's any ambiguity about whether that technique is, in fact, "torture" as things now stand."

I'm very disappointed in Prof. Dershowitz. It is sad to see such a zealous defender of American Civil Liberties seeking to whitewash such practices by questioning whether they even rise to the level of "torture." To be fair, Lederman points out that Dershowitz wants to allow torture "because as an empirical matter the U.S. does and will continue to use torture as a technique, the law should expressly indicate when and under what circumstances it is to be permitted, rather than purporting to categorically proscribe it." Whether or not pervasive lawbreaking by our government means we should just change the laws that restrain them remains to be justified.

Judging a debate tournament this weekend. Be back Saturday night.

Innocence Lost?

CNN reports on the execution of a Jimmy Ray Slaughter, sentenced to death for the 1991 murder of a women and her daughter. Slaughter proclaimed his innocence until the moment of his death, and submitted himself to a new test by neuroscientist Larry Farwell called "brain fingerprinting." The test is relatively new and unproven, but its practitioners say its accurate (see the article for details on how it works). The test results indicated that Slaughter did not commit the crime, however, the Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board refused to grant him clemency.

I don't know if Brain Fingerprinting is accurate or not. But I remain disturbed by the execution of someone who appeared to have at least a strong case of innocence. This is yet another case which casts doubt upon the entire death penalty enterprise and shows how our system appears agnostic to even credible claims of innocence by the condemned.