The Need to Define the New War

I will cut President Barack Obama more slack than most of his critics right and left, but if he can lead his own party and articulate a coherent policy of intervention for the world's great superpower, it will be a great achievement.

It is not easy, however, when your party has spent most of the past generation trying to limit executive power and a Democratic president launches a war without authorization from Congress.

It is even harder if you take the American people for granted, start military operations in alliance with other countries, and do not address the citizens on television and radio from the Oval Office.

Mr. Obama is President of the United States, but he must grow quickly as a leader or he will be run out as a failure in 2012.

Another reason that churches should be beautiful...

"All these practical and utilitarian questions must, of course, be answered, but if they are the only considerations you will end up with a practical, inexpensive and ugly building."

We aspire to more in life than utility, and our churches (and liturgies) should reflect higher aspirations in design.

"For Sorrow There Is No Remedy"

Insightful piece about widowhood and grief.

War is a moral commitment reasoned upon self defense.

According to Saint Augustine. The burden is upon us to justify the risking and taking of human lives.

We are at war. There are seven million Libyans. They live under conditions similar to Romania under Nicolae Ceausescu. They live on the coasts. Unlike Afghanistan, our supply lines are relatively short, and we can use seaports. Let's hope this campaign is decisive without ground troops as we were in Serbia in 1999, but if you break something, you have to pay for it. Let's not kid ourselves. We need to define victory in order to achieve it.

We are providing most of the firepower, money, and risk, yet we do not want to be seen as the brains and brawn in these acts of war against Libya. President Barack Obama has treated this war in Libya as if he were a hospital administrator rather than a doctor.

I was critical of President George Bush's failure to define the "war on terror," and the current war suffers the same problems. More from David Warren.

Litany for Japan

I know little of these Japanese saints. Ora pro nobis.

Hat tip to Pentimento.

Manhattan!

Maps of Manhattan! Lots of them. Look at: a walking street view without a horizon,

what Manhattan might have looked like to Henry Hudson in 1609, and

1865 topography.

Olivier Roy's "Holy Ignorance"

As reviewed by Daniel Mahoney. An excerpt from the review:

'Part of the problem is that, for Mr. Roy, culture is not the deep inheritance of a civilization guided by higher values. It is the "production of symbolic systems," as he puts it—that is, a kind of neutral matrix of habits and beliefs and impulses. He cannot tell us what is most valuable about culture because culture rests, for him, on the shifting sands of symbol creation itself. Whether he intends to do so or not, he provides plenty of evidence that secular "ignorance" and dogmatism rival "holy ignorance" as a cultural force in the modern world.'


If man is created in God's image and the Incarnation is true, then some aspects of culture have divine attributes. To reduce culture to the "production of symbolic systems" is to acquiesce to the premises of radical relativism and therefore surrender any timeless relevance religion and faith have.

"Love and Death in Bohemia"

Thoughtful post by Pentimento about Suze Rotolo and Diane Di Prima in the 1960s.

The death of a Dominican sister

My coach told us to "leave everything on the field," and she did.

"Why do we let them dress like that?"

Jennifer Moses:

'So here we are, the feminist and postfeminist and postpill generation. We somehow survived our own teen and college years (except for those who didn't), and now, with the exception of some Mormons, evangelicals and Orthodox Jews, scads of us don't know how to teach our own sons and daughters not to give away their bodies so readily. We're embarrassed, and we don't want to be, God forbid, hypocrites.'

I recently saw an article about public education, and the comments were haughtily critical of homeschoolers. We were called anti-social, bigots, racists, and everything else. But no one I know really admires the cult of the peer group that destroys the character of our youth and postpones their true maturation by at least a decade. Bypassing the cult of the peer group is only possible if you keep your kids out of the "norm" (which never exists in adult life) of being herded daily with people exactly your age. To nurture a multi-generational environment for basic learning is crucial to human development as well as cultural survival. What wisdom are peers going to discover while their parents pay on credit for their stupidity, impetuousity, vanities, and lusts?

False sense of security so long as crony capitalism rules banking

Paul Singer has built an investment from nothing to $17 billion in assets since 1977 and correctly predicted the collapse of real-estate derivatives in 2007. In a WSJ piece by James Freeman, he is bearish about banks in these times:

'Central bankers, particularly at the Fed but also in Europe, "seem to be acting as if they have unlimited flexibility to ease monetary policy," he says.

'He specifically targets the Fed's "unprecedented" policy of sustaining near-zero interest rates and its exercise in money-printing, "Quantitative Easing 2," that has it buying medium- and longer-term securities from the Treasury. "In effect they're treating confidence in fiat money—in paper money—as inexhaustible, that it's a tool that's able to be used not just in the throes of crisis," but also as "a virtually complete substitute for sound fiscal, regulatory and taxing policy."

'Fed officials, he adds, "really seem to think that inflation is something they can deal with very easily and very quickly. I don't believe they're right." He notes that, in the late 1970s, inflation was only in the high single digits yet curing it required interest rates of 20% and a collapse of the bond market.

'Mr. Singer further warns that investors shouldn't misinterpret apparently bullish signals from a rising market. "Of course printing money is going to support asset prices," but "it's very dangerous" and is not a substitute for trade, tax and regulatory reforms that make America an attractive place for job creation.'

Amen. And he is particularly critical of bail-outs for bankers deemed to be critical to the system which allow the biggest players to survive without reform and divestiture of toxic assets.

"All Things Shining: The Gods Are Calling"

A thoughtful piece by agnostic searcher Norman Pattis. An excerpt from the review:

'All Things Shining is an ambitious little book, a prolegomenon, really, to a much larger project: put simply, it argues that western civilization has spent its moral capital and is bankrupt. The ironist is our new patron saint, but all he can offer is mockery. Life requires engagement in something other than amused detachment, the authors suggest. Scoffing is our new pastime, and we are scoffing all the way to the grave.'

Japan and America

Victor Davis Hanson reflects on Japan and its centralized urban living compared to America:

'Japan’s high density, central planning, mass transit, demographic uniformity, and a culture of mutual dependence allow millions to live humanely and successfully in quite crowded conditions (in areas of Tokyo at 6,000 persons and more per square kilometer). And compared to other Asian and African cities (Mumbai or Lagos) even Tokyo is relatively not so dense, though far more successful. Yet such urban societies are extremely vulnerable to the effects of earthquakes, tsunamis, “man-caused disasters” and other assorted catastrophes, analogous in nature perhaps to tightly knit bee colonies that have lost their queens.'

Where do we go from here in Afghanistan?

Peggy Noonan began her discussion last week with where we have been, and it is not pretty:

'The failure to find bin Laden was a seminal moment in the history of the war in Afghanistan. And it was a catastrophe. From that moment—the moment he escaped his apparent hideout in Tora Bora and went on to make his sneering speeches and send them out to the world—from that moment everything about the Afghanistan war became unclear, unfocused, murky and confused. The administration in Washington, emboldened by what it called its victory over the Taliban, decided to move on Iraq. Its focus shifted, it took its eye off the ball, and Afghanistan is now what it is.'

Upon returning from a tour of Iraq and Afghanistan this week, she discusses how this lack of vision and definition continues:

'Two points worth noting: You are aware in Kabul and elsewhere that the war is the work of a coalition, that the Brits are there and the French, and they fight. Everyone seems to have admired the Aussies; there is sympathy for the Poles, who were treated particularly badly by Afghans because their uniforms and faces reminded them of the Russians. And the logistical challenge of the surge—the scale, scope and speed of the movement of men and matériel—has the look of a small managerial masterpiece.

'But in terms of a fully believable long-term strategy, the U.S. seems to be scrambling to find a thread that was lost somewhere between 2003 and 2009. We are nation-building in a nation that shows little sign of wanting us to build it. The military surge has been accompanied by a “civilian surge”—representatives of State, U.S. Agency for International Development and provincial reconstruction teams—that the Army, in an Orwellian locution, has taken to calling “The Uplift,” in hope you will too.'

Michael Yon remains cautiously optimistic about Afghanistan, largely because of the high quality of our military personnel, but his posts can be rather grim, such as "War Stories & Rumors." The locals are not friendly in many places: "Dead Taliban in Chora" and "Panjwai."

In one sobering story, a suicide bomber was shot dead downtown with his suicide-bomb vest on. Rather than risk removing his booby-trapped body, the bomb squad covered him with explosives and detonated him, leaving a "Scorch & Puddle."

With this background in mind, Ms. Noonan's piece today is appropriately titled "You Can't Go Home Again." Wars are easier to start than finish.

"Why Saint Patrick's Day Matters for Everybody"

Pat McNamara.

Do we believe there are limits to our exploitation of nature?

I don't have a religious faith in technological progress, even though I believe in man. Right now we have a strange split in American attitudes towards scientific progress. Republicans believe in nuclear energy and are skeptical of the promise of "green jobs." Democrats are skeptical of all forms of energy use from fossil fuels to nuclear power. I do not see much healthy scepticism within either party, that is, a scepticism of its own presumptions almost as strong as its scepticism for the presumptions of the other party.

"Ideologue" is too strong a word to pin on most of our political class, considering the violent history of ideologues. "Idiot" might be a more apt description.

"It's Time to Face the Budgetary Reality"

A liberal's argument for deficit cutting as set forth by The Washington Post's Ruth Marcus:

'Then there is the group about which we deficit pandas care most: the poor and working poor. They are at the greatest risk from a fiscal crisis, not merely because of the prospect of losing jobs. Higher interest rates would drive up housing costs, while budget pressures would further squeeze funds for public housing. Spending on education, from preschool through college, would be threatened. Income inequality would increase. Educational failures would slow economic growth.'

When I was studying economics in college, the government's borrowing from the private sector in order to finance its spending was called "crowding out," that is, higher interest rates and diverted resources crowded out private investment as driven by markets. Ms. Marcus is correct: If our children inherit debt instead of capital, the poor will suffer the most.

Godzilla Is Still Around

If you are over forty and can remember B-movies in theaters and on television before Star Wars made their special effects completely obsolete, you remember Godzilla (b. 1954), now sentenced to selling cars and furniture as an inflatable.

But Godzilla is more than entertainment and commerce. He is the mythological monster of the atomic age. He was created by atomic fury and causes death and mayhem in his anger, and yet, as the years go by, he becomes somewhat benevolent though still terrible to behold. He is Japan's relationship with atomic power.

So this week we watch deadly videos of the Pacific Ocean surging into places it has not been in hundreds, if not thousands, of years and bringing Godzilla with it. Several of Japan's nuclear power plants are seriously damaged. At best, the nuclear reactors will not melt down but will be cooled with sea water and allowed to age in their radioactive housing for more than a little while. At worst, some will be reading On the Beach for last minute advice.

Thus, we learn that Godzilla is the genetic mutant child of Pandora. A newspaper often cited on this blog, The Wall Street Journal, is a consistent advocate of nuclear power, as is Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit. As a conservative though, I am not so optimistic.

The law of unintended consequences cannot be repealed. For less than a century, mankind has held the power of the atom in his creative but lusty hand. Likewise with DNA. Though I believe in God and therefore believe in man, Godzilla is here, and we are in for some nasty weather.

Dave Broder, R.I.P.

Ruth Marcus' tribute.

"Men Without Women"

Newsweek:

'When Sen first added up the missing women—women who would exist today if it were not for selective abortion, infanticide, and economic discrimination—he put the number at 100 million. It is surely higher now. For, even as living standards in Asian countries have soared, the gender gap has widened. That’s because a cultural preference for sons over daughters leads to selective abortion of female fetuses, a practice made possible by ultrasound scanning, and engaged in despite legal prohibitions. The American feminist Mary Anne Warren called it “gendercide.”'


History does not have many happy endings when men in a culture or region outnumber women.

"We have an upside-down religion..."

David Warren:

'[W]hat makes our own society unique, is not its freedom from religion but rather the peculiar nature of the religion upon which our theocracy rests. That is to say, we have an upside-down religion, in which there is no God, but that "Not God" commands an obedience more absolute than God ever required, stipulating everything from the sanctity of antinomian sexual behaviour, down to how we should sort our garbage.'

"Not God" is a jealous god.

Paul Johnson on America, the Middle East, people, and things...

An excerpt:

'Socrates is much more to Mr. Johnson's liking. Whereas, in Mr. Johnson's telling, Gandhi led hundreds of thousands to death by stirring up civil unrest in India, all the while maintaining a pretense of nonviolence, Socrates "thought people mattered more than ideas. . . . He loved people, and his ideas came from people, and he thought ideas existed for the benefit of people," not the other way around.

'In the popular imagination, Socrates may be the first deep thinker in Western civilization, but in Mr. Johnson's view he was also an anti-intellectual. Which is what makes him one of the good guys. "One of the categories of people I don't like much are intellectuals," Mr. Johnson says. "People say, 'Oh, you're an intellectual,' and I say, 'No!' What is an intellectual? An intellectual is somebody who thinks ideas are more important than people."'

What has happened to trade unions...

Peggy Noonan:

'This is a major perceptual change. In my lifetime, people have felt so supportive of unions. That great scene in the 1979 film "Norma Rae," in which the North Carolina cotton mill worker played by Sally Field holds up the sign that says UNION—people were moved by that scene because they believed in its underlying justice. When I was a child, kids bragged if their father had a union job because it meant he was part of something, someone was looking out for him, he was a citizen.'

But the unions today represent not the common man, but the workers with seniority who are least likely to be downsized, e.g., government employees.

As for the alleged "conspiracy" to take away collective bargaining, mutual interests do not make a conspiracy, and I cannot think of anyone who is not a public employee or dependent of a public employee who has any reason to favor collective bargaining for public employees.

Froma Harrop questions public pension policy

As you know, Tertium Quid enjoys hearing liberals say conservative things. He also enjoys it when a conservative talks like a Vincentian. Ms. Harrop: To this I ask, what makes public workers a species apart from everyone else? If 401(k)s are flawed and need fixing -- or another way to provide for retirement is superior -- shouldn't the remedy be available to all American workers?

Posts for Jeff

He is very ill. He is a Pittsburgher and a sports writer, so I am linking a few posts that might be of interest to those who know him:

I have posted twice on Roberto Clemente, and Bart Giamatti once told me what was wrong with baseball. The word baseball appears in dozens of posts, and even when they have little to do with baseball, they are among my best posts (not that I'm a good judge).

Run the race good friend. "The great cloud of witnesses" surrounds you.

UPDATE: Jeff died in hospice Friday evening. Requiescat in pace.

Death penalty for Kermit Gosnell?

It will be sought, and the Anchoress has a post on it.

Hard cases make bad law, and bad abortion doctors make controversial defendants. In this case, the pro-choicers are likely to turn on him as a bad egg and ignore the culture of death he lived in. If his life is spared, it will, ironically, be by the conscience of judges and jurors who have absorbed the underlying teachings of the Catholic Church he scorned.

Martyr in Pakistan

Shahbaz Bhatti.