America is in danger “of becoming something of a legal backwater,” a justice of the High Court of Australia, Michael Kirby, is quoted as telling the New York Times . His comment is in a scoop that ran under the headline “?’We the People’ Loses Appeal With People Around the World.” The story follows up on an interview Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg gave to Al-Hayat TV in Egypt. In the interview she said that were she drafting a constitution in the year 2012, “I would not look to the United States Constitution.” Instead she commended to her viewers the constitution of South Africa, the European Convention on Human Rights, and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms of Canada. Justice Ginsburg’s remarks went viral on the web among those who thought they were inappropriate for a justice bound by oath—as every American official must be*—to support the Constitution. The New York Sun commented on them in an editorial, “Lost in Egypt,” suggesting she had missed an opportunity to take the discussion of law-giving all the way back to Sinai. But the New York Times’ dispatch opens up the question of how popular an example our Constitution is these days. The Times reporter, Adam Liptak, gained an advance look at a new study on precisely that topic. He quotes its authors, two law professors, as reporting that our Constitution “appears to be losing its appeal as a model for constitutional drafters elsewhere.” Mr. Liptak, in my view, is onto an important story here. One of the key features of these newfangled constitutions with which everyone is so smitten is that they are much longer than America’s parchment. In Canada’s constitution, which our friendly neighbor got around to writing only in 1982, the Charter of Rights and Freedoms is, at more than 1,000 words, twice as long as our Bill of Rights, which has 482 words. The curious thing is that with all that verbiage, the Canadians failed to find space to provide for the right that one of our greatest constitutional commentators, St. George Tucker, called the “true palladium** of our liberty”—namely, the right to keep and bear arms. “Why, that’s impossible!” you might exclaim. “No constitution writer could forget such a right.” But feature this. The South African bill of rights is more than ten times the length of ours. And in that vast verbiage there’s not one syllable protecting the right to keep and bear arms. The document covers equality, dignity, life, security of person, slavery, privacy, religion, expression, picketing, association, politics, citizenship, movement, occupation, labor relations, the environment, property, housing, health care, education, language, culture, and arrest, among other rights. But not so much as a peep about the palladium of our liberty. Oh, and South Africa’s constitution states that the whole list of rights can be thrown into a cocked hat if there’s a state of emergency. But never mind, the European Convention on Human Rights appears to be even longer than South Africa’s—running to more than 5,000 words. Yet the Europeans couldn’t find room for the palladium of liberty, either. Mr. Liptak of the Times reports that only 2 percent of the world’s constitutions feature this one of the most basic rights. I cite this right only as an example of the problem with these hyper-long and detailed constitutions. When something is left out of a long list of rights, it tends to look less like an accident—given that they thought to list so much else. If the American constitution is a rich painting done in simple, elegant strokes, the new constitutions à la mode are something out of Breugel, crowded with so many little, crabbed figures one has to hunt for any particular one of them. Finding a right becomes a constitutional version of “Where’s Waldo?” Yet the great attraction to the left in these long constitutions is that they are built less around one of our Founders’ most famous modi operandi , the idea of negative rights or restrictions on the government. These new constitutions are riddled with positive rights, meaning things the government must provide. Our negative rights are worded like this: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press…” etc., etc. Positive rights are worded like this from the South African Constitution: “Everyone has the right to have access to a) health care services, including reproductive health care; b) sufficient food and water; and c) social security, including, if they are unable to support themselves and their dependants, appropriate social assistance. The state must take reasonable legislative and other measures, within its available resources, to achieve the progressive realization of each of these rights.” No wonder a member of President Obama’s brain trust, Cass Sunstein, a law professor at Harvard, has called South Africa’s foundational law “the most admirable constitution in the world.” It’s just what the left is looking for these days, a system under which the government is not only permitted to do what the left wants but, at least in principle, required to do it. This is a feature of the so-called communitarian movement, in which the community outranks the individual. It is just breathtaking to see a paean to it coming from a justice of our own Supreme Court on the airwaves of another country. THIS IS NOT TO SUGGEST that Justice Ginsburg lacks for patriotism. I would not want to do that, even for a nanosecond. Some of the clips of her remarks that are rocketing around the web exclude a number of profound observations by her that are contained in the full interview. One is an essential point about constitutions generally, which is that, as she put it, “a constitution, as important as it is, will mean nothing unless the people are yearning for liberty and freedom. If the people don’t care, then the best constitution in the world won’t make any difference.” She also spoke about the Constitution’s preamble and the intention to form “a more perfect union.” She stressed the enduring nature of that quest. No one suggests that America’s Constitution could not be improved. The Bill of Rights, after all, was itself a series of amendments. All the more admirable our Constitution has become. Editorializing on Justice Ginsburg’s interview, the Sun said it has nothing against South Africa, Canada, Europe, and Australia. America may turn out to be a legal backwater, the Sun said in respect of Justice Kirby of Australia, “but if you want to take away our Constitution, you’ll have to pry it out of our cold, dead hands.”
Originally posted here:
‘A Legal Backwater’
The economist Thomas Sowell has just released the second edition of his book Intellectuals and Society . The American Spectator sat down with him recently for a lengthy interview. In this first part of the interview, we discuss the impact intellectuals have on society, why the second edition contains chapters on race while the first edition did not, and how intellectuals affect the issue of race. AmSpec: How do you define an intellectual? Sowell: An intellectual is someone whose end product is ideas. Not everybody who produces an idea is an intellectual because there are many intellectually demanding ideas that end up as products or services such as brain surgery or computer operating systems, etc. But those kinds of things differ in the sense in that there is an external test of the validity of the ideas, other than the approval of one’s peers. For deconstructionists, the only test is whether other deconstructionists like what he is saying. But for a financial wizard, he may be held in awe by his contemporaries and yet if he goes broke his ideas are regarded as failures. Consider that between the two World Wars, intellectuals promoted pacifism to the point they impeded the military build up of any military deterrents against Hitler or Japan, and yet men paid with their lives in the beginning of the war especially because Britain and America had far inferior military equipment. Men died needlessly but no one ever held them accountable for what they said. AmSpec: How does that affect the incentives and constraints that intellectuals face? Sowell: The crucial thing is there is virtually no external constraint on what the intellectuals do. They may believe in anything, say anything, and the consequences don’t matter. One of the books that people no longer know much about but was very influential at the time, was a 1916 bestseller called The Passing of the Great Race by Madison Grant. It was really a shallow book by a dilettante. But it was bestseller, it got translated into several languages including German, and Hitler called it his bible. And six million people were murdered on the strength of that. Madison Grant died before that happened, but had he lived I doubt he would have had to pay the price of unpopularity. AmSpec: What is the ” Vision of the Anointed ?” Sowell: It is the idea that third parties should preempt the decisions of ordinary people. Especially when those third parties are intellectuals or are operating on the prevailing ideas promoted by intellectuals AmSpec: Obviously this affects the issue of race. But why did the first edition of Intellectuals and Society not have any sections on race, and why did you add them into the second edition? Sowell: Very simple. I learned from the history of the book The Bell Curve . It was not a book about race. There were only two chapters on race and intelligence out of twenty-two chapters. Yet when the book was published, those two chapters became the tail that wagged the dog. And the whole major thrust of the book was lost in all the controversy and hysteria over those two chapters. So I decided that if the message I was trying to get out in Intellectuals and Society was to have any chance of being examined it would be by leaving out any chapters on race. AmSpec: Have you gotten any critical feedback on including the chapters on race this time? Sowell: No. And I would say more generally I seldom get any critical feedback on my writings on race, and the reason is the people who run the civil rights movements and “black leaders” and so on, they’re following what is their best strategy which is to ignore what I say and even if it gets a certain amount of attention just wait until that blows over and then resume saying what they’ve always said. AmSpec: If they’re not out there stirring up trouble, the money stops coming in. Sowell: I should have included a section on race as an industry. It’s really poisonous. I’ve recently been reading some writings by the late Derrick Bell, who has been in the news lately. I remember talking to Derrick Bell years and years ago when he was just a civil rights lawyer saying sensible things about civil rights. And to read his later writings you realize how he degenerated into a totally irresponsible charlatan. I attribute that to the fact that he was put into situations where he had nothing to gain by playing it straight. Whatever significance he might have would come from his ability to stir thing up and to appeal to a racial constituency on and off campus. AmSpec: Could you give a general overview of how intellectuals impact the issue of race? Sowell: Intellectuals can predetermine the whole position on race. One of the peculiar things of the 20th century is that for the first two decades, intellectuals, by which I mean primarily progressive intellectuals, were the biggest promoters of racism in the country. The seized upon evidence that was emerging from IQ tests, studies of difference in crime rates and rates of advancing and not advancing in the schools and so on, in order to argue that there were superior and inferior races, that they were genetically predetermined. And they were pushing very hard for a ban on or severe restrictions on immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe that actually became law in the 1920s. They were also for eugenics, with any number of them calling for the sterilization of people. Our only president with a PhD, Woodrow Wilson, was right in the middle of all that. People who are admirers of Wilson try to portray this as an odd aberration of his, but by no means was it. He was absolutely in the mainstream of progressive thought at the time. He became president. There were government agencies that were unsegregated. He segregated them. When the movie Birth of a Nation , glorifying the Ku Klux Klan, came out, he had it played privately at the White House, and he invited political dignitaries to come and watch it with him. In the later decades of the 20th century the intellectuals went to the other end of the spectrum. And now all differences in racial or ethnic groups were attributed to how they were mistreated by the larger society. So all the problems of the minorities were due to the minorities in the view of the intellectuals at the beginning of the 20th century, and all of the problems of the minorities were caused by the majority as the intellectuals saw it at the end of the 20th century. AmSpec: Yet you note that there are patterns among the intelligentsia that are constant regarding what they do to protect their prevailing vision. Sowell: In both eras, they would not even engage in any serious discussion with people who went against the prevailing vision. Madison Grant called people who disagreed with genetic determinism “sentimentalists,” and someone else called it the “Pollyanna School.” Of course, toward the end of the 20th century, those who dared disagree with the prevailing vision were called “racists” or at minimum people who were “blaming the victim,” which of course is a great phrase that begs all questions. AmSpec: Why do they behave that way? Why won’t they subject their vision to tests of logic and fact? Sowell: I’m convinced it is because they have a huge “ego stake” in the vision of the anointed. Contrast it with the “Tragic Vision” of human nature — people with the Tragic Vision might believe in judicial restraint, free markets, families, and all that. That doesn’t exalt them in any way. But if you believe in the Vision of the Anointed, you become one of the Anointed. You’re for social justice, you’re for protecting the environment, you’re anti-war. You are an exalted person. People with that vision have a lot more to lose if anything seriously challenges that vision than do people on the other side. AmSpec: Let’s talk a bit about race and disparities in income and their causes. How do intellectuals look at that, and given all the research you’ve done over the years, what would you say are the likely causes of those disparities? Sowell: The great tendency of intellectuals is to look for a single, overriding cause, and in particular a cause which allows them to be the side of the angels against the forces of evil. I would go about it an entirely different way. I would ask the question, what would lead you to believe that various causes, and there are an enormous range of causes, would come together in such a way that all groups, or even a substantial number of the groups, would have identical achievements, would have identical capacity to generate wealth? When you run through some of the ramifications of geography, climate, and history — if, say, the Siege of Vienna (1529) had gone the other way Europe would be an Islamic continent now — and it could gone one way or the other. So these are just the happenstances of military events. So all the factors that go into achievement — if you just begin to enumerate those factors, you begin to wonder if it was ever possible. But if you go beyond the theoretical things like that, where on this planet or when in history over thousands of years have we found groups that were the same, that were equally distributed in occupations, income levels and so forth? The studies that I’ve seen and conducted myself, have turned up no such groups One example: In a worldwide study of military forces, the author was unable to find any multi-ethnic society in which the military forces were even approximately representative of the ethnic makeup of the society. AmSpec: How does the intelligentsia often respond to disparities? What are some of their ways to address them? In particular, there was this phrase in one of your chapters, “the surplus of intellectuals.” How can that factor into it? Sowell: In countries around the world newly emerging intellectuals from groups that are lagging behind, they almost always study in soft subjects. They do not study in subjects that would give them marketable skills, or for that matter great intellectual advantages in the sense of rigorous thinking and so forth. Moreover they’re usually produced in numbers vastly greater than there is any demand for in the market. And so they are almost invariably disgruntled from both a personal point of view and from the point of view of being part of a group that is lagging and is not as highly regarded as other groups that are more advanced. So they launch attacks against groups that are more advanced. In a sense, it’s insane. I cited one counter-example. David Hume urged his fellow Scots in the 18th century to learn the English language, which they did. All over Scotland there were courses on the English language. What Hume was trying to do was to get the Scots to avail themselves of the same culture that had allowed the English to advance, so the Scots could advance themselves. And as they did, the Scots became wholly disproportionately represented among the leading British intellectuals from about the middle of 18th century until the middle of the 19th century. But that is not the course taken by most intellectuals from most groups that are lagging in most countries around the world. On the contrary, they argue they must cling to their own culture. They must fight against those who have a different culture. And they must blame those who have a different culture for the gap that exists. AmSpec: Is that one the reasons why multiculturalism is so damaging? Sowell: Multiculturalism is absolutely fatal if you follow it to its conclusions, because its advocates are saying that you don’t have to change your culture. AmSpec: First off, what is your definition of multiculturalism? Sowell: It’s not simply that there are different cultures. We already knew that long before the word was coined. It is the idea that all cultures in some metaphysical sense are equal or entitled to equal respect. But in practical terms, it means you should not be trying to change people’s cultures. For example, the schoolteachers in Harlem shouldn’t be trying to change the English of the students there because their English is just as valid again in some metaphysical or even linguistic sense as any other type of English. But the fact of the matter is that it is not the language spoken by 90 percent of the people in this country. And since the whole purpose of language is to communicate, those students damn well better know how to communicate with the other 90 percent if they want to get somewhere in life. There are no books in physics that are in “Black English.” There are no books in higher mathematics written in Black English. There are no books about brain surgery written in Black English. If you want to become something that requires more skill that just sweeping floors, then you are going to have to learn the language in which the skills of those professions are taught. AmSpec: So what you are saying here is that cultures that lag behind, they basically have to absorb the aspects of other cultures that have found ways to succeed? Sowell: Absolutely. Monday: Sowell discusses bilingual education, race and intelligence, and the upcoming presidential election.
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Thomas Sowell Live
In promoting this book giveaway , I realized I had another book I wanted to bring to your attention: the Patheos Book Club is taking a look at Matthew Levering’s Jesus and the Demise of Death — which seems like excellent reading for the season, particularly for this week and next week, if this chapter is any indication! In his intro, Levering writes: I seek to contribute to the “robust recovery of apocalyptic teaching and preaching” by setting forth a theology of resurrection and eternal life (Christ’s and ours). By means of a constructive retrieval of Thomas Aquinas’ theology of resurrection and eternal life, I argue that the Church’s traditional eschatology has a biblical perspicacity that has been missed by its critics. Since we learn about resurrection and eternal life from Scripture, I also examine in some detail the approaches of biblical scholars to these topics. This exegetical engagement provides the basis for appropriating Aquinas’ theological insights in a contemporary fashion. In this regard I agree with Joseph Ratzinger that theological insights “must be capable of holding up in biblical terms, but it would be false to treat them as exegetical conclusions because the way we have decided in their favor is that appropriate to systematic thought.” Don’t get scared. It sounds over-brainy, perhaps, but having read Levering’s The Betrayal of Charity; the Sins that Sabotague Divine Love I can tell you he’s a very accessible and readable chap and as demonstrated here in this interview with Patheos’ Kathleen Mulhern , a very thoughtful theologian: Describe the beatific vision. Is this something that can really have an impact in modern life? How? It is a simple thing, really. We are made for God, which is to say we are made for intimate personal communion in holiness. We are made for the joy and peace of charity and the adventure of wisdom. We are made to know Him as He is. Our earthly lives rightly entail many projects, but none of them fully fits us. The project that we want is actually to be known and loved by Him in such a way that we fully reciprocate that knowledge and love, so that we can really share in His life. Can God enable us to share in His life? Yes. And this is going to be an amazing thing. Jesus’ risen body shows us, too, that our glorified bodies will be able to take part in the communion of charity or true friendship with the triune God—the communion that is what we mean when we talk about beatific vision. Very timely reading, I think! See original here: Levering: Jesus and the Demise of Death
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Levering: Jesus and the Demise of Death
Would-have-been First Daughter Meghan McCain really wants you to know that she is not a lesbian. She appears in the current issue of Playboy in pumps, earrings, and a red sequined dress. She is staring glassily right into the camera in a failed attempt at a come-hither look. The pumps kick out behind her. She is partially propped up in bed, pressing her ample chest against white satin sheets. Red nails on her left hand help to highlight a Mississippi jobs report, but she pays it no attention. The lesbian thing comes up pretty early in the interview that accompanies the photo. Meghan tells the melodramatic story of how the 2008 election nearly finished her off. She “almost overdosed on Xanax”! Her figure increased four sizes! Rather than appear by John McCain’s side to help him weather the storm on election day, she drove with a bunch of her “girlfriends” to the McCain residence in Sedona, Arizona, where all they did was “play Rock band for days and days and eat and sleep and hang out in bed watching TV.” Interviewer David Hochman lightly teases her to “say a little more about the hanging-out-in-bed-with-girlfriends part” and it all comes tumbling out. She is “not a lesbian, if that’s what you’re asking.” Meghan insists she would be the very “first person to tell the world” she was queer because she is “not private about anything.” But you see she is “strictly dickly” — I swear to Ayn Rand I am quoting that phrase accurately — and just can’t help herself. She loves sex, with men. Granted, Miss McCain has “been hit on by women from time to time” and her life might be simpler if she were gay, “but no.” And sure, she loves hanging out with Rachel Maddow and Tila Tequila, but that’s because they are “just great people.” Meghan has been the subject of a “gay rumor” or two but she shrugs that one right off, explaining, “Honey, you’re nobody unless you’ve had a gay rumor about you.” Unbidden, she tells us about her interesting choice of watering holes. If she frequents gay bars, it’s only because “they play the best music” and all of Meghan’s gay friends like to cut a rug. Gay men love her, she explains, because of the “big boobs and blond hair.” As for how things are going with straight guys, we get conflicting reports. The story that she wants to tell is of the ugly duckling blossoming into a beautiful, independent, top-heavy swan. As a high schooler, Meghan was “uncool” and didn’t get to do much but the second she “hit college” she “started dating up a storm.” She’s not in a “serious relationship” these days but that’s fine by her. This way there is “no one to check in with.” Yet Meghan drops broad hints that maybe she’s not so happy. On a recent outing “like, a week ago” her date “just wanted to talk policy and strategy the entire time,” which was a real “mood killer.” She complains that guys “think if they Google you and talk about stuff you’ve said, they get to make out with you at the end of the date.” Future dating tip gents: You’ve got to do more than pretend to take Meghan McCain’s political opinions seriously. You should focus on telling her about the music you enjoy, what you do for fun and, above all, she wants you to make her laugh out loud. That is an “instant turn-on,” she explains, even if you happen to look “like Zach Galifianakis.” So get a pizza, rent The Hangover , lean in close at the right moment, and whisper, “You know, sometimes I read Playboy for the pictures…”
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Won’t Someone Please Ask Meghan McCain to the Prom?
Army Staff Sergeant Robert Bales stands accused of murdering 17 Afghani civilians in two different villages on the night of 11 March. From the charges themselves (which include six counts of assault, bringing the total number of civilians believed hurt to 23) we know the army believes it has sufficient evidence to support the charges of premeditated murder which, under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, can carry the death penalty. And there is much we do not know. Bales’ civilian lawyer has said several times that his client has no memory of the events of that night, obviously thinking of an insanity plea. Under the UCMJ, that requires the defense to prove the insanity by “clear and convincing” evidence, a much lower standard than the “beyond reasonable doubt” standard by which Bales would or would not be found guilty. There is a cacophony of other facts we — and probably the defense and prosecution — still don’t know, and all will likely affect the results of the continuing investigation and probable trial. What did Bales say when he turned himself in after the incidents? What did he do when he supposedly returned to his base between the two killing sprees — if two there were — and did anyone speak to him or even know he was there? This is no “CSI Miami” episode. We don’t know if any bullets matching Bales’ weapons were recovered, what other forensic evidence there may be or what witnesses there may be who can positively identify Bales. The army has reportedly paid $50,000 in compensation to the family of each of the dead and $11,000 to each of the wounded. How does that affect the witnesses’ credibility? The ongoing investigation will continue for weeks or months after which an Article 32 hearing — the military equivalent of a grand jury — will be convened before a military judge. That hearing will result in a decision on whether Bales will be brought to trial. There is every reason to be confident in the military justice system. It is equal to or better than the civilian criminal justice system in every way, not the least of which is that the members of a court martial panel are drawn from the military not the random civilian population. Justice will be done and it must be our highest priority . The context of Bales’ case is important. First, this is not another My Lai. From everything we know now, this is the act of one man not a group or unit. Second, it does not appear to be a politically created media event such as the Fallujah shootings in Iraq years ago that resulted in the courts martial of several Marines, all of whom were acquitted. Third, it’s also nothing like some of the inevitable and trivial incidents in war, such as the widely reported case of some Marines urinating on Taliban corpses some months ago. This is different. This is, apparently, the wanton killing of civilians. There are other issues we fail to consider at our peril, and at great peril to our military. These things can happen even among the most well-rested, battle-ready troops. But too many of ours, as great as they are, do not fall into that category. I still have my notes of a conversation that occurred one day in Baghdad. I was speaking to the general commanding an infantry division. (I can’t name him because of the rules established for the interview.) After we talked about a whole bunch of other things, I asked him about the strain on the force of repeated deployments and the very tough operating conditions in Iraq. He told me about a young captain who he said was one of his best young warriors. The man had been on active duty for only four years and was in the middle of his third year-long deployment, one in Afghanistan and then two in Iraq. The captain’s wife had left him and his personal life was a shambles. Yet he soldiered on, his general’s protective eye on him. That was in December 2005, about six and a half years ago. Our forces, already at war for four years, were wearing out. Now we’re past a decade and still at it. Too many Marines have served three, four or even more combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. There are many heroes among them, and many more who just keep slogging through endless patrols in the hills of Afghanistan because they are dedicated to each other and their nation’s chosen mission for them. But it’s not enough. Morale among our troops, we’re constantly told, is very high. And it probably is, especially among the fliers and the irrepressible special operations guys. But what about the grunts, the guys who slog through the heat every day on endless patrols, frequently fired on by Taliban and others but unable to return fire because absurd rules of engagement have to be complied with before anyone pulls a trigger or calls in an air strike? As I understand these rules, if a Taliban shoots at one of our guys and then runs away from his weapon, you can’t shoot him because he’s unarmed. The troops hear what their generals tell Congress. For how many years have we heard that our “progress” in Iraq and Afghanistan is “fragile and reversible”? If it’s fragile, why haven’t we done what it takes to solidify it? If it’s reversible, why are we sacrificing the lives and well-being of troops to an already-failed cause? I have another note from the Baghdad trip I need to relate. At a dinner hosted by Gen. Martin Dempsey, now Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, I sat with two young colonels whose names I shall omit. I asked them about how their troops were doing and what effects on them did they see from the long war in Iraq. How long was too long? One of them said, “If you want to break this army, break your word to it.” We promised our troops a mission they could accomplish, a war they could win and our comprehensive support. We’ve broken those promises in Iraq and Afghanistan. The futility of the way we have fought this war must be felt by everyone fighting it. As I’ve written here often, if you don’t fight a war in a manner calculated to win it decisively, you will lose it inevitably. The corollary to that is that you will also weaken the spirit and readiness of your forces to fight again. Not permanently. Americans are resilient, and our armed forces are still the best in the world. But it may be a long time before we can unbreak our promises to them and restore their readiness to fight again. No man can fight forever. It took Odysseus a decade to fight his way back from Troy. We are now in our eleventh year of war in Afghanistan. It’s now time to bring our men home.
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No Man Can Fight Forever
