AUSTIN BAY looks at the seventh anniversary of the Kenyan and Tanzanian embassy bombings by Al Qaeda and bravely reprints his column from that week.
Archive for 2005
August 2, 2005
STEPHEN BAINBRIDGE: Bloggers just wanna have fun. Well, yeah.
EUGENE VOLOKH: “So what exactly is wrong with profanity?”
RON COLEMAN writes that the State Department shouldn’t be backing ABC against the Russians. Read the whole thing.
WELL, HE DID PUT LEON KASS IN CHARGE OF BIOETHICS: Bush wants to teach Intelligent Design in schools. That’s just pathetic.
It’s not going over well in some places on the right, either. Rick Moran at Right-Wing Nuthouse writes:
Alright then, I’ve got a few more “ideas” that students should probably be exposed to as long as we’re talking about filling their heads with a bunch of nonsense like ID:.
1. The earth is actually a bowl sitting on the back of elephants. Hey! If its good enough for the Hindus, why not us?
2. The God Manitou took pity on a mother bear who had lost her cubs while swimming across Lake Michigan and turned the cubs into islands (the Manitou islands) and the mother into a sand dune (Sleeping Bear Sand Dune). The Ojibwa’s believe it…I did too until I was about 5 years old. . . .
6. Gerry Thomas, who recently passed away, invented the TV Dinner. Hell, the MSM believed it, why not teach it?
One can go on and on.
Who the devil cares if some people believe that “Intelligent Design” is the “correct” interpretation for the massive amount of fossil and anthropological evidence showing how human beings evolved? If it were up to you Mr. President and the right wing idiotarians who are pushing this “theory” humans would still believe that the earth was the center of the universe and that stars were fixed in the sky in a series of crystal spheres.
Ouch. And The Politburo observes: “Sheesh. Trying to prove the Dems right, one stupid f*cking statement at a time. Is Bush ‘playing to the base’ or does he believe it? I don’t know which is worse.”
Of course, if Bush were more than a fair-weather federalist, his answer would be that the President shouldn’t have anything to say about what’s taught in schools anyway.
Hmm. Maybe he’s trying to convince everyone of that? This just might do it . . . .
UPDATE: Don Surber is quoting Billy Carter.
ANOTHER UPDATE: Reader Andrew Hazlett emails a link to the full transcript, which he says is a bit more — dare I say it? — nuanced. And it does begin this way:
Then, I said that, first of all, that decision should be made to local school districts . . .
But more context doesn’t necessarily help. Here’s the full passage:
Q I wanted to ask you about the — what seems to be a growing debate over evolution versus intelligent design. What are your personal views on that, and do you think both should be taught in public schools?
THE PRESIDENT: I think — as I said, harking back to my days as my governor — both you and Herman are doing a fine job of dragging me back to the past. (Laughter.) Then, I said that, first of all, that decision should be made to local school districts, but I felt like both sides ought to be properly taught.
Q Both sides should be properly taught?
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, people — so people can understand what the debate is about.
Q So the answer accepts the validity of intelligent design as an alternative to evolution?
THE PRESIDENT: I think that part of education is to expose people to different schools of thought, and I’m not suggesting — you’re asking me whether or not people ought to be exposed to different ideas, and the answer is yes.
Now if I were a White House spinmeister I’d say this was just about teaching children the shape of the debate. But I feel sure that Bush wouldn’t be satisfied by a curriculum that exposed the many fallacies of Intelligent Design (the biggest being that its proponents start with a particular Designer in mind and then try to marshal the evidence). And certainly the constituency that he’s trying to satisfy wouldn’t be.
Nor would various other hypotheses (e.g., that our universe is actually a computer model itself, being run by unknown others for unknown purposes) satisfy, I suspect, even though there’s more evidence for them — we see computer models every day — than for creation by a deity.
As I said earlier, if only the Democrats weren’t so lame . . . .
ANOTHER UPDATE: Jeff Goldstein argues that Bush is being misunderstood:
I have no problem with Intelligent Design being taught alongside evolution in the context of questions concerning the origin of life—which, whether the President meant to do so or not, is in fact the context into which he placed the question. The origin of life—or first cause—is properly asked within the realm of philosophy or religious studies. And in that context, evolution is simply another theory (materialism) that competes with metaphysical theories that posit intent or active creation at some point in time (ID, Deism).
Personally, this CITIZEN JOURNALIST would have pressed the President on the question and asked him if he was indeed advocating the teaching of Intelligent Design in science classes specifically, and if so, how—and to what degree (in relation to microevolution? macro? how?). I would further follow-up and ask those on the right who have been so quick to howl over this vague news item if they support the teaching of the “origins of life” (which I take to be different than the evolution of life) in science classes. As it stands though—using my best Scalia-type textualism—what the president said is unproblematic and, on its face, at least, eminently reasonable.
Nicely argued, but I’m still not buying it.
MORE: John Cole: “I have no problem with a brief fifteen minute discussion of intelligent design as part of a religious/philosophy class, provided schools offer those courses. But I don;t think that is what Bush meant.” Neither do I. He also notes, however, that Bush’s position polls well — even among Kerry voters.
MORE STILL: Cole did note that, but he was quoting this post.
THIS WEEK’S CARNIVAL OF THE VANITIES is up!
DO I LOOK FAT? Discussed over at GlennReynolds.com. The tilapia, by the way, was excellent.
HEH. Great photo.
LANCE FRIZZELL has more photos of troops in Iraq. “I’m still looking for pictures of us guarding oil so I can send them to Congressman Ford.”
HERE’S ANOTHER ROUNDUP on the BlogHer conference, from Denise Howell.
A BOMBING IN TEHRAN: Jim Hoft has the roundup, with video links.
AND I AM MARIE OF ROMANIA: The latest edition of The Cotillion is up!
IN THE MAIL: Rights In Exile: Janus-faced Humanitarianism,
This is a painful book. The central argument is that the international and humanitarian organizations that are in charge of looking after refugees are responsible for extensive and avoidable violations of the rights of those dependent upon them.
Of the estimated 12 million refugees in the world, more than 7 million have been confined to camps, effectively “warehoused,” in some cases for 10 years or more. Holding refugees in camps was anathema to the founders of the refugee protection regime. Today, with most refugees encamped in the less developed part of the world, the humanitarian apparatus has been transformed into a custodial regime for innocent people. . . .
International organizations, NGOs, donors, and humanitarian agencies generally exercise great power over the lives of refugees. At the same time they are subjected to only minimal levels of accountability, either legal or political.
I suspect that this book will make something of a splash.
A LOADED TOWN-MEETING AUDIENCE: The BBC has admitted stuffing the studio audience of a program on terror with a wildly disproportionate number of Muslims.
Next: Loading the studio audience of a show on Israel with Jews! Right? . . . .
A PODCAST INTERVIEW with aging-research star Aubrey de Grey — link and information here.
MARK TAPSCOTT WONDERS why Bill Keller’s confession (“even sophisticated readers of The New York Times sometimes find it hard to distinguish between news coverage and commentary in our pages”) hasn’t gotten more attention.
THIS WEEK’S CARNIVAL OF LIBERTY is up!
ROGER SIMON IS UNIMPRESSED by reports that Iran isn’t approaching nuclear capabilities.
RIOTS IN THE SUDAN after Garang’s death. Trey Jackson has a roundup, with video.
IN THE COURSE OF AN INTERESTING POST ON IRAQ Greyhawk points out something else that I had missed:
On a side note – kudos to Newsweek for an innovation. Each of their on-line stories now includes technorati links to every blog that comments on that story – here’s the link page for those writing on the above piece. The “front page” of the Newsweek site also includes a list of their “most-blogged about articles”. Few blogs offer that much trackback so easily accessible – well done.
Cool. Newsweek (and, I suspect, Technorati’s marketing department!) deserves praise for this. Now put a staffer in charge of reading those posts and making corrections when they turn up errors. . . .
And yes, another advantage to Newsweek is that this will encourage bloggers to link its stories, which will drive a significant amount of additional traffic to its site.
YET ANOTHER NEGATIVE REVIEW for FX’s show Over There. “[A] smorgasbord of stupid, replete with every cliche and every simplistic and cartoonish characterization of the military imaginable. . . . While the combat inexplicably starts and stops to allow the characters to have time for idle banter, the pain from the crappy dialogue is never-ending. Then you have the real silliness that is bound to offend anyone who ever served in the military.” Ouch.
UPDATE: Okay, okay, I have to quote this part, too:
I couldn’t even finish the show, and as I write this it is playing in the background, and I hear someone screaming in agony. I wasn’t aware the show was filmed in front of a live studio audience.
Ouch, again.
ANOTHER UPDATE: In the comments — It’s the Cop Rock of the 21st Century! Did I say “ouch?” I think that I did.
EMERGENCY REPAIRS for the Space Shuttle.
Do the Rove-bashers who populate the Huffingsphere know that their leader is objectively aiding Rove by popularizing the leading theory that exculpates him? … Hollywood libs always worried she’d go back to the other side! … P.S.: The real explanation, I suspect, is that Huffington’s staying near Sag Harbor and the Judy-as-source theory–even though it seems less simple and straightforward than the competing ‘Libby-leaked’ scenario–is in fact what vacationing media types are buzzing about, as Huffington herself reports.
Memo to Slate: Pay Kaus enough so that he can vacation in Sag Harbor too! Er, and health insurance would be nice, too, I imagine . . .
UPDATE: Is that where Ed Morrissey is vacationing?
A RARE, YET EFFECTIVE, photo-Fisking.
MARK DANIELS OFFERS advice on marriage after 31 years.