Strenuous Casuistry

Mickey Kaus roasts Matt Yglesias' canard about firing incompetent teachers over a slow fire. (Mmm, Canard Roti, and on a Friday in Lent no less.)

Matthew Yglesias displays the strenuous casuistry loyal Democrats will employ to avoid the need for any confrontation with teachers' unions on the question Steve Jobs recently raised--firing lousy teachers. According to Yglesias the issue isn't firing bad teacher but attracting good ones:

... the reason politicians rarely push for it is that the actual payoff is very, very low. The issue is that there isn't this vast pool of highly effective potential hires out there. The schools with serious teacher-quality problems tend to have them because the better teachers, by and large, don't want to work there and schools have problems filling all the slots with minimally qualified people. The real action (also disliked by teacher unions, if pissing off unions is your goal) is in the certification process, who counts as a qualified teacher, and what counts as an effective teacher (here's where the accountability comes in). If in the future that created a situation where there were tons of people looking to break into the teaching field then it might make sense to expend political capital on making it easier to fire people.

Response:

a) It's easier to hire good teachers if you can fire bad ones. Competent people want to work for competent organizations. Which offer would you be more likely to take: "Come work for our school district. We weed out the deadwood and we're doing a great job preparing our kids," Or "Come work for our district and spend your life beating your head against a bureaucratic wall." Yes, teachers should be paid more--but it's weird that an idealistic liberal would think good candidates are only motivated by money. (And if you could fire bad and mediocre teachers then school districts wouldn't have to spend a big chunk of any pay raise boosting the salaries of ... bad and mediocre teachers).

b) You obviously want to do both-- weed out bad old teachers and expand the pool of potential good new teachers by allowing certification of people who haven't met the mindless credential requirements fiercely defended by the unions.** Yglesias conveniently pretends you can only do the former after the latter--"if" in the "future," after a couple of more generations have sloughed through mediocre or criminally lousy schools, we've managed to amass a huge pool of "tons" of people trying to break into teaching, then it "might" make sense to take on the union protection of incompetents. "Might." That's good of him!

c) Of course, if Yglesias shies from a confrontation now--by kicking the can off to some distant "future," and then only maybe--he'll shy from the confrontation ten years from now. Paul Glastris, in a recent bloggingheads debate on Yglesias' post, unexpectedly blurted out the real reason Dems like him don't want to confront the unions, no matter how sound and obvious the policy reasons for doing so.

**--as a means of protecting their members from uncredentialed hires who would do a better job!

Kaus doesn't address the issue of indoctrination into leftist ideology which is an essential part of the poor thinking skills of students, but his point is valid. It would be better to avoid public control of education in the same way we avoid public control of news media and other forms of thought formation. But if you are going to have government run schools it is essential to have competition or else the schools become a tool of special interests.

Are Gay People Sinners?

Pastorius has a typically thoughtful post on recent comments by someone named Tim Hardaway. Not being a sports geek, I really don't know who that is but his comments are pretty ugly:

I don't like gay people and I don't like to be around gay people. I am homophobic. I don't like it. It shouldn't be in the world or in the United States.

Read Pastorius' post for further details (including discussion of a rather interesting possible change of heart on the issue by Louis Farrakhan).

Pastorius and I have been friends for many years, and one of the things I like about him is that we can argue, often heatedly, and never get pissed off at each other. (Well, some times we do get pissed off, because we have that testosterone thing going. But we never hate each other, which is what I'm trying to say.) Here is my reaction to something Pastorius says about a quarter of the way down:
They are gay. And, they go to church. My church is not pro-gay. But, these men go anyway, because they believe that Christ was the Messiah, and that he died for their sins, and they are thankful for that fact.

And, so they go to church and contribute to our worship services, and their contributions are beautiful and appreciated.

Just as a thought experiment, substitute the word "sinners" for "gay" and see what you get:
They are sinners. And, they go to church. My church is not pro-sinners. But, these men go anyway, because they believe that Christ was the Messiah, and that he died for their sins, and they are thankful for that fact.

And, so they go to church and contribute to our worship services, and their contributions are beautiful and appreciated.
Still agree with that? Me too. And it applies to you and me both (except that my contributions are probably a lot less beautiful than yours, but whatever...)

But here is where I have a problem: when people say "my temptations are not really sins, or at least are not as sinful as yours." This is pharisaism, pure and simple, and Jesus had a much bigger beef with such people than he did with garden variety sinners who confessed their faults.

From Hardaway's quote, he seems to fall into that camp and a lot of people on the anti-gay-marriage band wagon do also. More's the pity. But my point is that gay Christians often do as well, and seem especially sensitive to have the term sinner applied to that particular part of their lives. Maybe the folks in your church don't think that way, which would be a great blessing, but there are enough out there who do that being clear on the issue is important.

I think gay people deserve to go to hell because I think I deserve to go to hell, as do all human beings, and I can't quite believe that gay people are not human. Christ's atonement is big enough for all of us, but the price of admission is confessing the sin.

NOTE: I left this comment on CUANAS but I have changed the last paragraph here for emphasis.

Tammy Bruce on the O'Reilly Factor

Tammy Bruce went on the O'Reilly Factor to talk about Bill Maher's vitriol against President Bush. (The video is at HotAir.)

For Maher and Hollywood and Leftist elites like him, President Bush represents a father figure who they resent and feel unable to please. They project their own hatred for their father or parents on who the Left traditionally sees as parents--the government. And unless they see themselves in the president (as they did Bill Clinton), their malevolence overwhelms any shred of decency or reason in the process. They resent him because he represents values they cannot match, and they're jealous of him because the American people embrace him and have given him power.

I agree with the substance of Tammy's point, but I want to amplify the bit about "father-figures". Here is the comment I left on her blog:

I don't think it is their father that most MalNars have a problem with but, rather, their Father. My evidence is admittedly circumstantial and anecdotal, but in my many conversations with such people, I find that if you let them talk they will pretty quickly turn the conversation to religion, long before the most zealous evangelist could have hoped to do so. Their objections seem to be:

1) They wish God didn't exist,
2) They are angry at God for not existing,
3) They are angry at God for not solving their personal problems, and
4) They wish God would just leave them alone.

Rational? No. But these points all come up often enough that the pattern is pretty predictable.

They often do have issues with their parents as well, but I find that they never have really good explanations for why. No specificity is what I mean. Just general "MyparentsdidnotunderstandmeandwerealwaystryingtoteachmeaboutGod" mumbo-jumbo.

I recognize that some people have legitimate and sincere questions about God and that not all atheists or agnostics fall into the MalNar mind-set. But it almost always does work the other way around.

NOTE: After reading Tammy's post and submitting that comment, I actually watched the video, and both she and O'Reilly bring up the religion angle.

Dhimmi Sawyer?

Pastorius catches this important point about Diane Sawyer's recent interview with Ahmadinejad:

Diane Sawyer wears an Islamic headress to interview Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. It is so important to her to get the interview, and promote her career, that she is willing to submit herself to Sharia.

Go here for the transcript.

In a world where muslims threaten violence if Westerners do not submit to their standards of behavior, Sawyer's capitulation does indeed send a dangerous signal and she ought to be ashamed. When "showing respect" can easily be interpreted as appeasement, there should be no question that an honest person should refuse.

Giuliani and Gun Control

Since the presidency will not have nearly as much power over the abortion issue as it will over gun control, this article about Giuliani's views is almost more disturbing to me than the one I discussed last week:

Rudy Giuliani addressed a potentially troublesome issue with conservative voters, saying his policies as mayor to get handguns off the street helped reduce crime in New York.

"I used gun control as mayor," he said at a news conference Saturday during a swing through California. But "I understand the Second Amendment. I understand the right to bear arms."

He said what he did as mayor would have no effect on hunting.

Look, "understanding" the Second Amendment isn't the same as defending it, and "using gun control" suggests that he doesn't really understand it all that well. There isn't really enough to this article to dissect, but if he really does think that gun control helped reduce crime in New York, he hasn't taken much time to review the statistics. Being tough on crime was probably the biggest change Giuliani made to the policies of New York, and he deserves full credit. But his approach will not translate well to the national scene (which doesn't have a police force, among other differences) and if he thinks that gun control was had a positive effect in New York, he is a very dangerous candidate indeed.

Schlussel vs Hannity

La Shawn Barber calls attention to this claim by Debbie Schlussel that Sean Hannity is using her work without attribution:

Readers of my work and of this site know that I risked my life to go undercover to Hezbollah events and rallies in Dearbornistan to bring you exclusive info on Al-Husainy, the man who delivered the invocation on Friday at the Democratic National Committee Winter Meeting. And that I've been writing about Al-Husainy since the beginning of year and before (in the Wall Street Journal).

[...]

The first night, Tuesday Night, I contacted Sean on his cellphone. He was, as usual, "too busy" and couldn't be bothered to do the right thing. He admitted he knew he used my work uncredited, and I managed to get him to promise to have me on to discuss my original work, he said, "if we talk about this again on the show." I also suggested having Al-Husainy, himself, on along with myself, since I'm only the single commentator who actually knows something--actually, a lot--about him. Sean promised that if they had the imam on, he and John Finley would have me on, too.

But, as is usual for Sean these days, he did not keep his word. Last night, not only did they rip my work off again, but they questioned it (without mentioning my name or allowing me to be on to defend it). Suddenly, Hannity was saying Al-Husainy "reportedly" was at pro-Hezbollah rallies, and Colmes claimed, "We've been unable to confirm that," and questioned my New York Post column's accuracy.

Well, that's interesting to me--they never attempted to "confirm" this in the least. Since I'm the source of the info--I WAS THERE AT THOSE RALLIES and wrote about it in the New York Post column they ripped off--why didn't they contact me? [...]

There is much more, but this is the substance of the claim. Since I don't watch TV, I didn't see the show (and probably wouldn't have been watching it anyway) and I can't see a link to a transcript on Hannity's site, I can't tell if these charges are accurate. La Shawn specifically says in her comments that she hasn't tried to contact Hannity for confirmation and strongly implies that she isn't inclined to do so. But this seems like a serious enough charge that a little more research is worthwhile.

A quick Google News search on "Al-Husainy" yeilds several stories, most of which credit Schlussel. Just counting the first page of 10 results, I found the following breakdown:
4 by Cal Thomas who cites Schlussel.
2 by Paul Barrett who supports Al-Husainy and is therefore irrelevant to our topic.
2 by David Limbaugh who cites Schlussel (but links to a story that does not).
1 by Robert Spencer who does.
1 by News Hounds blogger Ellen who attacks Hannity but doesn't mention Schlussel.

So, out of 10 or 11 stories that popped up on a 0.14 second search, only one comes from a relevant source that doesn't cite Schlussel. It seems that we can conclude two things: 1) Major conservative commentators (Cal Thomas, Robert Spencer and David Limbaugh, to say nothing of La Shawn herself) recognize Debbbie Schlussel as a prime source on this subject and 2) Hannity's failure to acknowledge this is at least a breach of courtesy. It may be that he is getting his info from sources that are not themselves properly attributed, but that is no excuse for someone with Sean Hannity's resources. If I can find this out in a few minutes, he certainly can.

I have tried contacting Hannity, but so far have (unsurprisingly) not received a reply. Others with more clout should take up the question. It must be admitted that Debbie Schlussel's posts on this subject are shrill and abrasive, which may be counter productive in generating sympathy for her complaint. But there is a principle of conservative integrity here that I think it is in all of our interests to defend.

UPDATE: Evidently my idea of posting comments on this issue in the hannity.com forum has been blocked by the moderators:

And Reader Paul tells me that the chat portion of his site, Hannity.com, has been erasing threads where plenty of my readers (a/k/a Sean Vanity's former, now-disenchanted fans) are posting about how Sean ripped me off. All of those readers are getting banned for the reason of "Contempt of Host."

She only cites one instance, so I can't tell if this is indeed a pattern, but here is the email:

[...]
THREAD: CONTROVERSY
"I just signed up for this forum and noticed no postings about Debbie Schlussel and her complaints against Sean? Curious if they're being removed or I'm simply missing them? It'd be interesting to hear Sean's comments regarding the issue."

ONE PERSON REPLIED AND THEY SAID SOMETHING ALONG THE LINES OF: No one other then Debbies family and friends pay any attention to her.

I THEN REPLIED BACK: Evidentally Sean does and he's not a family member. Rush gives her credit for her work. I'll save you further embarassment by not mentioning others. Let's stick to the Sean issue. Your reply was cute but flawed.

All within a half hour I checked back again and I couldn't access the site. Check out the message I got:

You have been banned for the following reason:
contempt of host
Date the ban will be lifted: Never
Hannity.com[Unnecessary line breaks removed.]

I still haven't been able to get my account validated on hannity.com so I can't do any primary research, but this doesn't look good. I am having a hard time understanding Hannity's motivation in all of this. How much would it cost him to give a simple acknowledgment of his sources? Even if, per my speculation above, he didn't originally get the information directly from Schlussel, it only makes sense to give her credit after the fact, especially compared to the cost in credibility and good will for failing to do so. Pride goeth before a fall...

UPDATE: Michael Reagan gives proper credit on the Hannity show. Well, this is better than nothing, but I am still disappointed.

Global Warming Fears Cause Local Freezing

From the WSJ:

Some school districts are blaming a recent federal mandate to switch to a less-polluting diesel fuel for a spate of school-bus breakdowns that left thousands of kids stranded and shivering in the extreme cold this week.

On Monday, when temperatures dipped below zero in East Allen County, Ind., 36 of the county's 155 school buses started up fine but soon conked out because the new fuel, thickening in the cold, clogged fuel filters. That same day, 30 miles outside of Pittsburgh, Hempfield area schools had the same problem with 26 of their 80 buses.

The malfunction is evidently caused by ultra-low-sulphur fuel, which has 15 parts per million sulphur compared to the normal 500 ppm. Below the fold (which requires subscription) the article admits that there are additives to the fuel which can prevent these sorts of problems, but those additives add $0.37/gallon to an already subsidized cost of $1.93/gallon (nearly a 20% increase). In other words, as usual, the attempt to solve existing problems entails other problems with unforseen costs.

But the real story here is that we have traded real suffering in the present to achieve a slight future impact on an ephemeral and unproven global "crisis". Any one of those kids could have gotten seriously ill or, God forbid, died due to standing out in sub-zero weather. The astute reader will note that this is the same sort of tradeoff we saw with the DDT ban. I still say it is not worth it.

(This post would not be complete without a totally gratuitous mention of the fact that school buses would not be nearly as vulnerable to bad government policy if the schools were privatized.)

Giuliani and Abortion

Ann Althouse discusses Sean Hannity's interview with Rudy Giuliani and the latter's aparent attempt to apeal to social conservatives. His points are fairly unremarkable and pretty much what we have heard from centrists for the past few decades. Easy to ignore, actually. But pay a little attention to what he says about whether Roe v. Wade was a good decision:

Where I stand on abortion is: I oppose it. I don't like it. I hate it. I think abortion is something that, as a personal matter, I would advise somebody against. However, I believe in a woman's right to choose. I think you have to ultimately not put a woman in jail for that, and I think, ultimately, you have to leave that to a disagreement of conscience, and you have to respect the choice that somebody makes.

Note, first of all, that he did not answer the question. But the disturbing thing about Giuliani's statement is not what it reveals about his policy preference -- which we knew and could be persuaded to accomodate for reasons of expediency -- but what it shows about his view of conservatives. The mere suggestion that conservatives would like to see women thrown into jail for seeking an abortion is insulting and shows a disturbing lack of engagement with conservative principles.

If Giuliani had been trying to appeal to liberal voters and had said, "Of course, I believe in a woman's right to choose, but I think women ought to be prevented from actually eating their babies," wouldn't that make you want to scream? But that is only slightly more exagerated than what he implies about the conservative position.

This is precisely the problem that Bush had with the Miers nomination. He wants to appeal to conservatives but he does not have a clear idea about what conservatives find appealing or, more importantly, why.

Note, also, that this proves that Sean Hannity is not a conservative ideologue but merely a republican tool. If he were the former, he would not have let Giuliani's slur go unrebuked. At least he could have made some comment to counteract the proliferation of this facile caricature. If you watch his show regularly, it quickly becomes aparent that he is only good at rebutting the Cynthia McKinney faction of the crazy-left. If he is confronted with a liberal (or centrist) that has a modicum of sense, he retreats to his list of talking points and waits for the commercial break. Maybe that is all we can expect of media pundits, but I confess that I have long since lost my patience with the lot of them.

Burma's Plan to Eradicate Christianity

I have mentioned before the fact that Burma is one of the worst persecutors of Christians (and how little attention the MSM pays to this fact). Previously this persecution has been harrassing but unofficial, but now even that line has been crossed:

The military junta of Burma has created a strategy to eradicate Christianity from the country. Entitled “Programme to Destroy the Christian Religion in Burma,” the leaked government memo, possibly drafted by a state-supported Buddhist group, delineates measures to be enacted to decrease and terminate the Christian faith within Burma.

In this latest outrageous abuse of fundamental rights, the document explicitly sights [sic - cites?] Christianity’s peaceful message as a source of exploitation, stating, “The Christian religion is very gentle – identify and utilize its weakness.” Evangelization is to be punished with imprisonment, with the end goal being that, “There shall be no home where the Christian religion is practiced.”

A roughly five percent minority, Christians have long faced religious persecution, which has often been endorsed, if not directed, by the military regime. Churches have been burned down, and Christian children have been banned from attending schools. The government has allegedly supported Buddhist monks in setting houses of worship aflame and forcibly converting citizens in predominantly Christian regions. Some 27,000 Karen, a largely Christian tribe in eastern Burma, have been forced from their homes in the past year.

The Burmese government has an extensive track record of human rights violations. The junta disregarded democratic elections of 1990 and arrested the winning party’s leader, Nobel peace prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi of the opposition party National League for Democracy. Kyi currently remains under house arrest, despite international advocacy on her behalf.

Joseph K. Grieboski, President of the Institute on Religion and Public Policy, expressed his indignation over the military junta’s intentions, stating, “This is proof once more that Burma is one of the world’s worst suppressors of fundamental rights. The junta’s blatant disregard for the beliefs of its people demonstrates its complete disregard for anything but its own power. We call on the international community to continue its pressure on the junta to release Aung San Suu Kyi and to begin a process of liberalization.”

World wide, Islam is the worst offender in persecuting Christians, but it is wise to remember that Buddhists and Hindus also get in on the act.

Biden Says ...

...what everyone was already thinking:

Mr. Biden is equally skeptical—albeit in a slightly more backhanded way—about Mr. Obama. "I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy," he said. "I mean, that’s a storybook, man."

So naturally he gets in trouble.

Look, I have no love for Joe Biden and I hope his career really is over. But this comment seems pretty innocuous to me. The first word that comes to mind when I look at Barack Obama is "clean". (Clean-cut would probably be better, but no one says that anymore. Sounds too naive, too dorky.) And Obama's campaign has tried to project that image... clean as in wholesome, honest, not corrupted by the system. Does anyone honestly think that Biden meant to imply that all other black people are dirty? Or even all other black candidates? Only in Washington DC.

Any stick will do to beat a dog, and Joe Biden can use a good beating. But, really, is this the sort of discourse that we want in our political culture? Seems it wasn't too long ago that conservatives were complaining about the loss of decorum in politics. This is not the sort of thing that will restore it, if it was ever there.

Update: Obama responds graciously and comes off looking ... clean:

Asked about Mr. Biden's comments, Mr. Obama said in an interview, "I didn't take it personally and I don't think he intended to offend." Mr. Obama, who serves with Mr. Biden on the Foreign Relations Committee, added, "But the way he constructed the statement was probably a little unfortunate."

But later in the day, with Mr. Biden coming under fire from some black leaders, Mr. Obama issued a statement that approached a condemnation. "I didn't take Senator Biden's comments personally, but obviously they were historically inaccurate," he said. "African-American presidential candidates like Jesse Jackson, Shirley Chisholm, Carol Moseley Braun and Al Sharpton gave a voice to many important issues through their campaigns, and no one would call them inarticulate."

Good job! Focus on the issue of articulateness and just pretend the C-word never happened. This, people, is how you present an image of honesty and integrity.

By contrast look at Sharpton's comment:

Mr. Sharpton said that when Mr. Biden called him to apologize, Mr. Sharpton started off the conversation reassuring Mr. Biden about his hygienic practices. "I told him I take a bath every day," Mr. Sharpton said.

Probably more likely to get repeated than Obama's response, but ultimately lowering the discourse. I don't care how many baths Sharpton takes, he's still dirty and this sort of comment just proves it.

Update: Biden attempts to explain what he really meant and digs himself even deeper:

"The word that got me in trouble is using the word 'clean.' I should have said 'fresh.' What I meant is: he's got new ideas."

Sorry, Joe, but no one is going to buy this. If you had followed my advice and stuck with clean-cut, you'd have been better off. Everyone understood what you meant the first time, but now you not only look like a bigger idiot and a dishonest one at that.

Last Sunday in Epiphany

File under neat stuff I didn't know:

This Sunday is the final Sunday in the Epiphany Season. [...]

It has been the custom of the Church for many, many years to sing hymn 54 "Alleluia! Song of Gladness" as the Recessional on the Last Sunday after the Epiphany. (The hymn dates from the 11th century.) This will be the last time the word "Alleluia" is said or sung in the Church until Easter Day. In Medieval times, it was the custom to write the word "Alleluia" on a piece of vellum or papyrus, put it in a small coffin and bury it in the church yard, where it stayed until the coffin was dug up and opened on Easter morning.

(Via email from Rev. Robert Bowman, Interim Rector at St. Luke's)

Armey, Dobson and Major Barbara

Ryan Sager posts an important email from Dick Armey criticizing the religious right and the temptation of power. Read the whole thing but this paragraph stood out as emblematic:

Today, the national Christian Coalition has joined forces with MoveOn.org in another government grab of private property dealing specifically with ownership of the Internet. They are wrong on the specifics of the issue, and they are wrong to associate with and comfort radical liberals who have demonstrated nothing but disdain for conservative values. Armey’s Axiom: Make a deal with the Devil, and you are the junior partner.

This brings into focus something that I have been concerned about from the very begining of this blog: during the Clinton years many Republicans were making a lot of good points about conservative principles but now that they have gained power, not so much. I was dismayed at Gary Bauer's meltdown during the 2000 primary but I chalked it up to his own inexperience with political thinking. But now I begin to wonder if the Christian right as a whole is unprepared for serious political discourse. I have to do a bit more thinking about this before I can make a coherent comment, but my initial reaction is that this goes a long way toward explaining something I have had a hard time putting my finger on.

Condi Talks Sense

Unfortunately it is in the context of responding to Clinton's criticism but this NY Post article has some worthwhile arguments. (The first half of the article is a waste of time, but read it if you think Clinton's opinion of the war on terror is worth noting or rebutting. It gets good after the bullet points.)

Asked about recently leaked internal U.S. intelligence estimates that claimed the Iraq war was fueling terrorist recruiting, Rice said: "Now that we're fighting back, of course they are fighting back, too."

"I find it just extraordinary that the argument is, all right, so they're using the fact they're being challenged in the Middle East and challenged in Iraq to recruit, therefore you've made the war on terrorism worse.

"It's as if we were in a good place on Sept. 11. Clearly, we weren't," she added.

"These are people who want to fight against us, and they're going to find a reason. And yes, they will recruit, but it doesn't mean you stop pursuing strategies that are ultimately going to stop them," Rice said.

She insisted U.S. forces must finish the job in Iraq and the wider Middle East to wipe out the "root cause" of violent extremism - not just the terror thugs who carry out the attacks.

"It's a longer-term strategy, and it may even have some short-term down side, but if you don't look at the longer term, you're just leaving the problem to somebody else," she said.

She also said Middle East countries like Saudi Arabia and Pakistan have a "major educational reform" effort under way to root out propaganda literature and extremist brainwashing.

In Latin America, home to outrageous Venezuelan bomb thrower Hugo Chavez, Rice said the U.S. approach is to "spend as little time possible in talking about Chavez and more time talking about our positive agenda in Latin America," including several trade agreements.

My biggest beef with the Bush administration is not that they've mishandled the war on terror (everyone makes mistakes) but that they've consistently failed to argue the cause. Yes, there have been many talking points, but the times when we have been offered an actual argument like the one above have been few and usually, as in this case, in response to someone else's criticism. In fact that doesn't only apply to justifying the war. This administration has had many missed opportunities to make the conservative case for any of its positions.

This may seem like a minor peeve, but consider that the alternative to persuasion is force. In a democracy, the failure to make a persuasive case leads ultimately to tyranny or to civil war. We have a lot of intellectual capital to squander yet before either of those alternatives becomes immanent, but still we have squandered too much of it over the last few decades for my comfort.

A Demolition Company Rebuts 9/11 Conspiracy Claims

I really don't want to get involved in the whole debate about the supposed "Controlled Demolition" of the twin towers, but a couple of recent friends have been talking about this lately and I am often willing to read things that otherwise don't interest me for friendship's sake. So, for those of you who want a concise and readable refutation of some of the claims of the 9/11 conspiracy theorists, go here.

(Via 9/11 Conspiracy Smasher)

(Note: The article linked by Smasher was evidently an earlier one that has since been updated and the name and link has been changed. The link I have provided is current as of 9/7/06 but may change due to future updates. Go to Protec's home page if that happens and search for the paper on the World Trade Center.)

Upgrading Vietnam

Evidently the US is on the verge of removing Vietnam from its list of violators of religious liberty. (I received this story via email from Voice of the Martyrs but it is also posted here.)

Following an August 15-18 visit to Vietnam by U.S. Ambassador for International Religious Freedom John Hanford, indications are that Vietnam will be taken off the U.S. list of the world's worst religious liberty offenders. With the planned September 2nd release from prison of key Hmong Christian leader Ma Van Bay -- described as "propaganda exercises" by one human rights advocate -- various releases by the Vietnam News Agency signal that Vietnamese officials expected Ambassador Hanford to take good news of religious liberty progress back to Washington. Vietnam's presence on the list of "Countries of Particular Concern" has remained a barrier to its membership in the World Trade Organization. According to representatives of the majority of Protestants in Vietnam -- who remain unregistered and thus illegal -- while there have been some modest and spotty improvements, there is still no clear indication of a breakthrough or even that reform is uniform and systematic. They also note that not one of the many officials who have broken Vietnam's laws in mistreating Christians has yet been charged.

[Emphasis mine]

I am not sure how much of an incentive membership in the WTO is for Vietnam. Most likely the theory here is that we can use the carrot of membership to get them to clean up their act. The question is, once they are in, will there be any incentive to maintain even such limited human rights concessions? I think not and it will be difficult to get any other world leaders to make noise since they will all be too busy patting themselves on the back over this success.

But, in the short term, evangelists like Ma Van Bay will be free to do their work which, in turn, will have a much greater impact on the long-term than that of diplomats like Hanford. It is one evidence of God's grace that dictators nearly always underestimate the power of the Gospel. Communist regimes like Vietnam, being blind to all but material causes, can tell that Christianity is dangerous to their pathetic little tyrranies, but they have no idea how dangerous. They are selling their future for a mess of pottage like the WTO, and don't even know it.

Playing with Poverty

Mickey Kaus disects Eric Alterman's complaints about the newly released poverty numbers. (Go to Kaus' site for more links.):

Again, moreover, "although the numbers living below the poverty line held steady between 2004 and 2005, there has been a sharp increase in those living in extreme poverty."

That's funny, because if you look at the Census numbers, they show that the percent of people living in extreme poverty--defined as below 50 percent of the poverty line--was 5.4 percent in 2005, a jump of ... well, zero from 2004, when the rate was also 5.4 percent. I contend that "zero" is not a "sharp increase." ...

That sounds about right to me. But there's more:

So how did Alterman get his bogus spin? What he's quoting is NYT reporter Rick Lyman paraphrasing "advocates for the poor"--specifically Robert Greenstein, whose influential outfit (Center on Budget and Policy Priorities) specializes in devising esoteric measurements to suggest that good poverty news is really bad poverty news. Lyman's next paragraph reported:

And 43 percent of the poor earned less than half of the poverty limit, Mr. Greenstein said, again the highest such percentage ever recorded.

Those may be the highest percentages of the poor ever recorded, but what does that mean if the absolute number of people in "deep poverty" didn't really increase? I think it means that there were fewer other kinds of poor people!

Read the whole thing for the details. What this essentially means is that the upper half of the poor population ceased being poor but the bottom half remained where they were. It is commonly accepted (although not publicly admitted by people in the poverty industry) that a certain percent of poor people can't be helped because they don't want to change the factors -- such as drug use or sexual promiscuity -- that are keeping them poor. If this percent "rises" with respect to the total number of poor, that essentially means that the system is helping everyone that can be helped.

By analogy, if you have three people in a boat adrift at sea and one dead body, the percentage of people that can't be saved is 25%. If someone rescues the other three, that percent "jumps" to 100%. Without seeing the raw numbers in Lyman's figures, I am inclined to believe something like this is happening with the poverty numbers.

IDF Hacks Hizbollah TV

Gotta love this:

After repeated Israeli efforts to destroy Hizbullah's al-Manar television station have failed, an IDF intelligence unit succeeded this week in hacking the station's live broadcasts, planting Israeli PR messages in the transmissions..

The al-Manar channel regularly airs juicy propaganda against Israel, including reports of "heroic" and "successful" operations by Hizbullah fighters against IDF special forces.

However, this weekend the IDF prepared a surprise for the Lebanese and Arab viewers of the channel: The broadcast was interrupted and caricatures of Nasrallah appeared on the screen, accompanied by captions reading: "Your days are numbered" and "Nasrallah, your time is up. Soon you won't be with us anymore."

Additionally, Hizbullah and al-Manar internet sites also received "special treatment" by Israeli technical specialists, and several were erased from the internet.

(Via LGF)

Persecution and Derrida's Cat

In response to my earlier post about persecution of Christians in Pakistan and Turkey, Rene of Life, the Universe and Everything feels that I am contributing to "the cause of much of the problems we have today, certainly not the solution". While I don't kid myself that everyone will agree with my opinions (and Rene and I have been debating politics, religion and philosophy for years) I am somewhat surprised that he picked this particular article for special refutation. I would have thought my piece defending the Israeli incursion into Lebanon would have been more to his point. Pointing out examples of persecution would seem pretty tame by comparison, but I'll take whatever response I can get.

First, let me answer a couple of his criticisms specifically, then I will add some further commentary at the end. I don't particularly like this format, since it makes further responses somewhat complicated, but I don't want to give the impression that I am ignoring any of his points..

First of all I think this type of post is completely single sided. Guilty, as charged. I make no attempt on this blog to pretend that I am completely objective and I generally do not trust people who claim to be.

Extreme intolerance or aggression is a serious problem in the world today. It exists and it should be countered and eradicated. But Here he is acknowledging that I have a point. He isn't, therefore in the category of knee-jerk leftists who disagree with any conservative just because he is a conservative. I note this only to point out that I do indeed appreciate the carefulness with which he argues, even though I ultimately disagree with his argument. Yet, note that "but". The real point follows:

the suggestion by examples like this that the problem is an exponent of a single cultural or religious group is absolutely ridiculous. I don't think I made that suggestion. Relating this to the previous sentence, he seems to think that I am blaming all of the intolerance in the world on Islam. My point was much humbler: to point out that some minorities are persecuted with impunity and don't get the attention that they deserve. Even among our "allies", Christianity is treated far worse than, on balance, Christians have treated others.

Too easily do we forget similar tendensies that exist in our own culture, or that of our other neighbours. Have we forgotten the crimes of Nazi and KKK sympathisers? Of extreme black power groups? of violence between Sikhs and Hindus or the aggression that is displayed by Zionist militants? Some people might forget this, but I certainly do not. But the Nazis and KKK have not been in power for a long time, and the other groups he mentions, though perfectly legitimate targets, are not my particular concern. This is the heart of our disagreement, but I will wait until the end to say more about it.

Furthermore, are we forgetting that even in the case of looking at Muslim fundamentalism, that there is no such thing as Islam versus Christianity? There are similar problems between Islam and Hindus, or even within Islam (Shia and Sunni for instance). This whole construct of "them versus us" with "them" as the evil aggressor just does not exist. This is patently false as my two examples prove. Muslim hostility to Christianity may not be the only problem in the world, but it is a problem and it is as worthy of discussion as any other. The fact that I am a Christian (and therefore part of the "us") does not exclude me from having a valid interest in pointing this out.

As to the suggestion that there are conflicts within Islam itself, I am well aware of the fact and my posts on the crisis in Darfur (here, here, here and here for instance) should absolve me of the charge that I have ignored this fact.

Even worse it is the exact same type of propaganda tat is used by extremists in the Islam camps or elsewhere to incite hatred to other groups. If you want an example of Christians abusing a Muslim, or any other combination of ethnic groups, you will have no problem in finding it. Well, I for one have not found too many examples recently. It is true that sectarian violence often involves bad behavior on both sides, but when the violence is one-sided as in the examples I cited, it is usually not the Christians who are the aggressors. If Rene thinks these examples are easy to find, perhaps he can furnish some.

And that is the second major problem. Incidents like this do not even have a proper reference or clear link to facts or truth. Did this happen? Was this the whole story? We don't know. I admit that I cannot verify the truth of the claims, nor even link to a post by Voice of the Martyrs. But these stories are first-hand accounts by people who were treated by VoM representatives. I get three or four such stories via email every week. Some of them may be inaccurate, but that is the nature of after-the-fact reporting.

Even if it happened exactly like this, then the question of how representative of a whole culture / religion or ethnic group this is still remains. Again, I said nothing about these stories being representative. But the fact that they occurred should color our evaluation of the societies in which they took place, even if total condemnation would be inappropriate. If Rene needs me to make a black vs white argument in order to make his point, he should know by now that I am not going to oblige. But neither should unpleasant data be dismissed just because it is not "representative".

In my opinion posting this post contributes to the same problem that it tries to identify and condemn: The aggression of one ethnic group to another. It puts the poster on a same level as the extremist imams that try to convince their followers that Christians are evil, or the Zionist calling for the eradication of Palestinians. As long as we keep hating people, and condemning their beliefs and values, we cannot expect anything else in return. Note in the first sentence that he is careful to say "contributes to" not "causes". This is an example of the carefulness I noted earlier. But in the second sentence he abandons this nuance by the sort of moral equivalence that is emblematic of liberalism. How, exactly, is pointing to specific acts of violence by a specific group of Muslims (in the Pakistan story) or pointing out that certain other Muslims are trying to get a particular church outlawed (in the Turkey story) the same as calling them "evil" or calling for their "eradication"? Is criticism always an act of violence? By that logic, Rene's post is essentially a death threat against me (since he calls my ideas "extremely dangerous") which no reasonable person would conclude. But if there is a hierarchy of disagreement, why is my pointing out specific cases of persecution out of bounds?

So what is my overall response? I happen to believe that Islam is a false religion and Christianity is a true one and that these facts have consequences in the real world. Therefore, I am more inclined to point out abuses of the one against the other. But I have never shied away from pointing out the failings of people I would like to support, as noted by my early comments on the Abu Ghraib scandal. But selecting what stories to talk about is not the same as denying that there are other stories. I pick stories that strike me as interesting and, when I can, that seem to be under-reported.

In The Gift of Death, Jacques Derrida famously discussed the problem of feeding your own cat while not feeding all of the other starving cats. According to Derrida, the act of doing good in one instance is inseparably connected to the guilt of not doing other possible goods. I think that is the fallacy that Rene is committing here. In pointing out these particular abuses, I am guilty of not discussing other, equally abusive situations. But my answer to both Derrida and Rene is that I will do what good I can and allow others the opportunity to fill in the gaps. This is sort of an extension of the principle of the free market to the realm of ethics.

Ultimately, of course, I believe that God will sort all of this out and dispense perfect justice, but until then we frail humans have the responsibility to point out injustice when we see it and fix it when we can.

Bringing a Knife to a Gunfight

I saw this story yesterday in another paper, but didn't have time to post about it:

A knife-wielding grocery store employee attacked eight co-workers Friday, seriously injuring four before a witness pulled a gun and stopped him, police said.

I think it was in Washington Times, but I can't find the link. In any event, Clayton Cramer has noticed that the USA Today version is substantially different:

The suspect was tackled by a witness as he tried to run from the building and was held until officers arrived, Higgins said.

That has an original byline of 7/21 at 1:55 PM. Evidently enough people complained about the omission since the following morning 7/22 at 9:52 a follow-up story mentions the gun:

Two victims of a knife-wielding grocery store employee remained hospitalized Saturday after the man attacked eight co-workers and was finally stopped by a witness who pulled a gun, authorities said.

Note that this guy was stopped without the gun being fired. Remember that the next time someone says the only things handguns are good for is killing people.

With Friends Like These...

Two stories of persecution of Christians by our Muslim "allies" from Voice of the Martyrs (via email, sorry no link available).

Pakistan:

On June 6, 2006, Nasir Ashraf, a Christian stone mason, was brutally attacked just outside Lahore. While working while working on the construction of a room at a school near Manga Mandi in Pakistan, Nasir became thirsty and took a break. He drew water and drank from a glass chained to a cemented public water tank next to a mosque which was reserved for "all" poor people. Returning to the construction site, a Muslim man asked him, "Why did you drink water from this glass since you are a Christian?" The man accused Nasir of polluting the glass. The Muslim man yanked the glass off the iron chain, broke it and threw it in a garbage can. The man summoned other militant Muslims to the scene, furiously saying, "This Christian polluted our glass." Hearing this, the incensed mob began beating Nasir, yelling that a Christian dog drank water from their glass. The militant Muslims encouraged bystanders to beat Nasir because it would be a "good" deed that would benefit them in heaven. The attackers pushed Nasir off a ledge onto the ground. The impact of the fall dislocated his shoulder and broke his collar bone in two places. Nasir was knocked unconscious and he did not regain his senses until he reached a clinic. A doctor told Nasir that some people had brought him there. The doctor advised Nasir to never make this kind of mistake again.

Note, for the record, that these were just average Muslim citizens, not necessarily terrorists.

Turkey:

Nationalists in Turkey's Northern city of Samsun have stepped up a two-year campaign against a Protestant church, denouncing in the media the legally registered congregation's right to exist. Izzet Altunbas, chairman of the Samsun Association of Balkan Turks, and a prominent member of the local Nationalist Movement Party, publicly attacked the Agape Protestant Church in vicious terms in mid-June. In speeches broadcast over three local TV channels on June 16th, Altunbas declared that establishment of the church, officially registered as the Agape Church Association, revealed "extensive damage" to the nation in that it reflected Turkey's compliance with European Union legal norms strengthening a dangerous "assimilation" drive against both Turkish ethnicity and Islam. "I find this association and its secret activities a huge danger for Samsun and for Islam," Altunbas said. "This is treason against our Muslim and Turkish identity."

I agree with the nationalists on one point: as long as this kind of crap continues, Turkey does not belong in the EU. (And, as a side note, they need to get out of Cyprus before they are allowed into Europe.)