[I’ll bump this up just a time or two more, and then it will be retired for a while.]
It’s that time again. Don’t feel too bad if you decide not to click on that Paypal “donate” button (hint hint: it’s on the right sidebar, above the Amazon widget, which is also a handy and helpful gadget to use). But I will be deeply grateful to every single one of you who does decide to contribute. Every bit— large or small—adds up, and helps me a great deal in continuing the blog.
I thank you all in advance.
Here’s a very interesting article from Lee Stranahan, a liberal who’s starting—just starting—to get the picture. I’m not sure how far he’ll go with his change experience, but at the moment he is surprised and perturbed that the liberal media has virtually ignored the death threats aimed at Republicans during the Wisconsin demonstrations.
This passage of his reminds me of the early stages of my own change:
My experience in the last few months tells me what I would not have believed possible; on any number of issues (including Pigford, by the way) I’ve seen liberals act much nastier and with less factual honesty than the conservatives… and this includes on issues where I disagree with conservatives.
Keep going, Mr. Stranahan, if you dare. You may be on the cusp of some more profound surprises. My change really began with the fact that, once I was exposed through the internet to conservative periodicals, I noticed they tended on the whole to be more factual and fair and be better prognosticators than the liberal press. It was a profound shock, and was followed by more shocks.
From this passage, it’s clear that this may be the first time in a long while—perhaps in his life—that Stranahan has had so much contact with conservatives [emphasis mine]:
I’m in an odd position. In the last few months, I’ve had one foot in the left wing news stream and one foot in the right. My media duality began when conservative publisher Andrew Breitbart hired me to work with him on the Pigford ”˜black farmers’ settlement story. I’m a pro-choice, pro-single payer, anti-war, pro-gay rights independent liberal with years of work in print and film backing those positions. Breitbart hired me to bring a different perspective to the non-partisan issue of corruption in Pigford.
Since then, I’ve written both here for the left-leaning Huffington Post and at Breitbart’s right leaning BigGovernment.com. I’ve ended up reading a lot more conservative sites and dealing firsthand with a lot more conservatives than any time since I attended a high school dedicated to the principles of Ayn Rand about 30 years ago.
That sounds like a rather unique high school, by the way.
Stranahan asks, “Is this really what liberalism has come to in 2011?” My answer is “yes, but it came to it quite some time ago, I’m afraid.”
Here’s another excellent Crichton speech, well worth reading.
[Hat tip: commenter “IgotBupkis.”]
Let’s hope this isn’t the answer to the question.
[ADDENDUM: I continue to find the Libyan situation puzzling, to say the least. Not only because of the shrouded identity of the rebels, but also the fact that France is taking the lead, something I can’t recall happening in a long, long while:
The initial stage of the military operation will be run by France and Britain with significant American help, including radar planes, command and control, and precision-guided munitions, including cruise missiles and B52 bombers, NATO officials said.
But Mrs. Clinton emphasized that the United States was not leading the effort. “We did not lead this,” she said. “We did not engage in unilateral actions in any way, but we strongly support the international community taking action against governments and leaders who behave as Qaddafi is unfortunately doing so now.”
Qaddafi has been a tyrant for decades. On that level, who wouldn’t want to see him go? The justification for this intervention is supposedly that he’s killing his own people (“behaving as Qaddafi is unfortunately doing now”). But does that mean that there will be international intervention against any head of state who fights back when threatened by rebels and a civil war?
In any civil war, the government kills its own people. What’s the difference here? Is it that it’s the hated Qaddafi they are fighting against? Is is that he is indiscriminately massacring innocent citizens rather than just rebel soldiers? How does one tell the difference? How do we know the truth of what’s happening there?]
Because as far as I can see, the situation is in complete confusion.
It seems that the US has finally gotten on board with action against Gaddafi. But why now? And is it a case of too little, too late?
Although we keep hearing about the Libyan rebels, I have yet to see a good description of who they are and what they are striving for, except the elimination of the current regime. I assume they’re better than Qaddafi (which would not too difficult), but such assumptions can be dangerous. I sincerely hope the State Department has more information on that than I do, but sometimes I wonder.
Here’s an article that purports to tell how the White House arrived at its new stance, and the gist of it is that it’s clear as mud. Here’s a quote:
“In the case of Libya, they just threw out their playbook,” said Steve Clemons, the foreign policy chief at the New America Foundation. “The fact that Obama pivoted on a dime shows that the White House is flying without a strategy and that we have a reactive presidency right now and not a strategic one.”
But what was Obama’s playbook in the first place? I’m not so sure this represents a change in the playbook as I’ve come to understand it, which is as follows:
(1) When in doubt (and one is always in doubt), do nothing except spout some words about what “must” happen. Otherwise, wait.
(2) Go with world opinion; do not lead.
(3) Support our enemies and pull the rug out from under our friends.
If one looks at it this way, the only part of his previous playbook that Obama is violating here is #3, and probably only because he’s following #2. World opinion appears to be against Qaddafi and for intervention on behalf of the rebels. Once the UN Security Council showed cooperation and willingness to pass a no-fly-zone resolution, that was the signal that the US could act in a more decisive manner, too.
No, not really; she’s the interview.
And we all know everybody reads Playboy for the interviews.
In Playboy Thomas repeats and defends her historically ignorant and deeply offensive charge that the Jews of Israel should go “home” to Poland and Germany where they came from. I guess her earlier expression of “regret” about her remarks has worn off.
The only interesting thing about the interview, really, is that this woman was a highly respected member of the White House press corps for so long.
James Taranto once called Thomas “journalism’s crazy old aunt in the attic.” But here’s her resume:
She worked for the United Press International (UPI) for 57 years, first as a correspondent, and later as White House bureau chief. She was a columnist for Hearst Newspapers from 2000 to 2010, writing on national affairs and the White House. She covered every President of the United States from the last years of the Eisenhower administration until the second year of the Obama administration. She was the first female officer of the National Press Club, the first female member and president of the White House Correspondents’ Association, and the first female member of the Gridiron Club. She has written six books…
I think of a crazy aunt in the attic as harmless and isolated. Helen Thomas was neither.
We already know that being in the path of the tsunami was like a nightmare—the ocean coming swiftly to swallow you up along with everything in its path, inexorable, powerful, and deadly, and your only hope of survival to outrun it. But one of the details most of us probably didn’t think of was that the people most likely to be engulfed would be the elderly, who could not run fast enough.
This turns out to have been the case. The population of Japan is quite heavily weighted towards the older, too, especially in the coastal villages affected by the tsunami, where many young people have deserted the towns for the big city. It’s a ghastly thought, and it reminds me of something I always hate to watch on nature shows, even though I know it’s the way nature works: a predator eying a herd, looking for the vulnerable laggards—the old, the weak, the young—and singling them out for the kill.
I love these things (hat tip: Ace):
It seems that Hillary is tired of playing Ophelia to Obama’s Hamlet.
At least, that’s the story. I’m even inclined to believe it’s at least partially true. I’ve always felt that Hillary had more on the ball (and has more balls) than Obama in regard to foreign policy.
Her lament (and Ophelia’s) about Obamalet:
Oh, what a noble mind is here o’erthrown!””
The courtier’s, soldier’s, scholar’s, eye, tongue, sword,
Th’ expectancy and rose of the fair state,
The glass of fashion and the mould of form,
Th’ observed of all observers, quite, quite down!
And I, of ladies most deject and wretched,
That sucked the honey of his music vows,
Now see that noble and most sovereign reason
Like sweet bells jangled, out of tune and harsh;
That unmatched form and feature of blown youth
Blasted with ecstasy. Oh, woe is me,
T’ have seen what I have seen, see what I see!
Note that I did not have to change a single word.
We’ve been hearing the word “disaster” in connection with the nuclear reactors in Japan, usually in the context of phrases such as, “Japanese teams work mightily to avoid looming disaster.”
But what is the definition of a disaster these days? Surely, by any reasonable measure, the Japanese earthquake and tsunami qualify as an enormous disaster. The death toll will run into tens of thousands and perhaps even a hundred thousand or so before the work of rescue and discovery is over, and the rebuilding will take years and eat up enormous amounts of money. The psychological toll on Japan is hard to overestimate, although the people are remarkably resilient. But in an instant, whole villages were wiped away, and the shock must be profound. It’s frightening even to view it from afar, reduced to a small computer or TV image.
But what of the nuclear power plant problems? That is a projected disaster, a feared and dreaded one. The word “meltdown” is another that’s constantly used in news stories as a likely possibility, and it conjures up images of something cataclysmic. The specter of Chernobyl is raised again and again, even though that plant’s design was profoundly different in critical ways.
Chernobyl was by far the worst accident in the history of nuclear plants, but the initial incident claimed 57 lives. This is tragic and horrible, but not usually the sort of thing that enters into “disaster” territory, if sheer numbers are the measure.
But what of its residual long-term effects? The main Wiki article on the subject notes, “Estimates of the total number of deaths attributable to the accident vary enormously, from possibly 4,000 to close to a million.” That would certainly constitute a disaster—but are those figures correct?
They do not appear to be. Chernobyl is not only a word that strikes fear into the heart, but it is one of the most-studied environmental incidents ever in terms of its possible effects. The following is what UNSCEAR, the United Nations Scientific Committee of the Effects of Atomic Radiation, has learned over the twenty-five years since Chernobyl occurred:
Among the residents of Belaruss 09, the Russian Federation and Ukraine there had been, up to 2002, about 4,000 cases of thyroid cancer reported in children and adolescents who were exposed at the time of the accident, and more cases are to be expected during the next decades. Notwithstanding problems associated with screening, many of those cancers were most likely caused by radiation exposures shortly after the accident. Apart from this increase, there is no evidence of a major public health impact attributable to radiation exposure 20 years after the accident. There is no scientific evidence of increases in overall cancer incidence or mortality rates or in rates of non-malignant disorders that could be related to radiation exposure. The risk of leukaemia in the general population, one of the main concerns owing to its short latency time, does not appear to be elevated. Although those most highly exposed individuals are at an increased risk of radiation-associated effects, the great majority of the population is not likely to experience serious health consequences as a result of radiation from the Chernobyl accident. Many other health problems have been noted in the populations that are not related to radiation exposure.
Wiki also notes that “thyroid cancer is generally treatable. With proper treatment, the five-year survival rate of thyroid cancer is 96%, and 92% after 30 years.” This is not to make light of the stress of having a child thus diagnosed, but in general we can say that the number of additional deaths beyond the original 57 that could be attributable to Chernobyl is small. We can be fairly certain of this because there has been no lack of effort to find them, and no dearth of studies that would be likely to have detected them if they had existed.
But such reports have not eradicated the idea that Chernobyl was a dreadful disaster that caused an enormous number of deaths. For example, Greenpeace jumped into the arena, speculating so wildly based on suspect and non-peer-reviewed studies that even Gregory Hé¤rtl, a spokesman for WHO, “expressed concern that the conclusions were motivated by ideology.”
There is little doubt that the accident had a negative effect on the flora and fauna in the area. But again, it was less than in the popular imagination.
Speaking of imagination: paradoxically, that is what has been responsible for a fair amount of harm. Not only has fear of nuclear power reduced our willingness to build nuclear power plants and continued the world’s dependency on imported oil from the Middle East and all its attendant woes, but this fear may have had an indirectly deleterious effect on the emotional health of the population around Chernobyl:
It also concluded that a greater risk than the long-term effects of radiation exposure is the risk to mental health of exaggerated fears about the effects of radiation:
“The designation of the affected population as “victims” rather than “survivors” has led them to perceive themselves as helpless, weak and lacking control over their future. This, in turn, has led either to over cautious behavior and exaggerated health concerns, or to reckless conduct, such as consumption of mushrooms, berries and game from areas still designated as highly contaminated, overuse of alcohol and tobacco, and unprotected promiscuous sexual activity.”
That is not to say that Chernobyl was nothing. It was most definitely something: a frightening event that shone a light on a large number of mistakes (especially in Soviet power plants) that needed to be righted, and a tragedy from which people and the environment suffered and many lives were lost.
But “disaster” is a word that has been too freely used. It is not exactly clear how best to define disaster—whether by number of deaths, amount of property destroyed, human suffering, environmental damage, or some complex combination of all or some of them. But on the worldwide scale of events, an argument could be made that Chernobyl only qualifies as a major disaster in its lasting legacy of hyper-fear bestowed by those who exaggerated its effects in order to further their own political ends.
[NOTE: For example, the NY Times today has a piece entitled “Scientists Project Path of Radiation Plume.” And although the article makes it clear in the second paragraph that the radiation will be essentially negligible almost as soon as it begins to make that worldwide journey, the headline and the lede (“A United Nations forecast of the possible movement of the radioactive plume coming from crippled Japanese reactors shows it churning across the Pacific, and touching the Aleutian Islands on Thursday before hitting Southern California late Friday”), which is probably all many people read, are designed to stir up anxiety. Why not put the word “harmless” in the headline, right before the word “plume?” Funny question, I know. Perhaps the Times has stock in iodine pills.]
[ADDENDUM: The Christian Science Monitor also attempts to set the record straight. Good luck.]
Here’s something to relieve the gloom.
Many years ago I watched a documentary entitled “The Treble.” It was about Welsh boy soprano Aled Jones and the crisis he faced on the brink of puberty with an imminent change of voice looming. Only a kid, and about to become a has-been!
I’ve never been a big fan of boy sopranos, but there was something very special about Aled, and his story stuck with me all these years. Here’s a clip from the original documentary and you might see what I mean:
Well, a great many years have passed, and Aled is a 40-year-old married man with two children.
And he’s still singing, although he sounds a wee bit different: