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December 17, 1999 5:30PM
SANCTIONING PAT
When Pat Buchanan opposed the Gulf War in 1991, he urged the Bush
administration to use sanctions instead of bombs against Iraq. Yesterday,
speaking at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Buchanan
soured on sanctions. He said it's time to lift restrictions "on the sale or
transfer of U.S. food, medicine, or goods essential to a decent life or a
civilian economy, now in force against Cuba, North Korea, Iran, Iraq,
[Burma], Sudan, and all other targeted nations of U.S. sanctions policy."
Not only are prohibitions bad for the people of those countries, currently
suffering under sinister regimes, but they're harmful to Americans as well
because they "deny our businessmen and farmers access to markets our rivals
rush to capture."
Buchanan at times sounded like a dyed-in-the-wool free trader. He is no such
thing, of course, and wasn't pretending to be yesterday. He's still Trade
Barrier Pat. And he apparently doesn't understand that there's really no
real difference between a trade barrier and a trade sanction. Trade
sanctions may hurt Iraqi kids; won't trade barriers erected in one of his
protectionist wars also hurt Mexican ones?
SMEAR JOB
"Madonna Painting Is Defaced In a Disputed Brooklyn Show," declares the New
York Times today in a front-page headline. Um, that Madonna was actually
defaced before the show, when its creater, British artist Chris Ofili,
decided to place elephant dung all over an image of Mary. Art snobs have
defended the blasphemy; USA Today notes this morning that the painting is
"decorated with elephant dung." (Definition of "decorate": "to add honor
to.")
Yesterday, a 72-year-old retiree, Dennis Heiner, smeared white paint over
Ofili's masterpiece (thus the headlines). There's a great photo of him at
work on the front-page to today's New York Post. We're not art critics, but
he looks like a real talent to us. Get that man an NEA grant!
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Updated By:
Ramesh Ponnuru - Senior Editor
John J. Miller - National Political Reporter
Kate Dwyer - Editorial Associate
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