From our economics professor friend Steven Horwitz:

Jonah,

Couple of thoughts:

Unions like minimum wage laws because they make it harder for non-union labor to underprice them and bid work away from them. Raise the minimum wage and you reduce the wage differential between union and non-union workers, making union workers relatively more attractive (or less unattractive anwyay). It's hardly altruism; it's classic special interest.

The history of minimum wage laws is fascinating as well. In the US in the 30s and 40s, they were used as a weapon of xenophobia to prevent immigrant labor from underselling white American workers. The union proponents of minimum wage laws were shockingly explicit (to our ears anyway) about their reasons for doing so during the congressional debates when the first laws were passed. Today, of course, the minimum wage does the most damage to young people of color. You can track increases in the real value of the minimum wage very closely with increases in the black-to-white unemployment ratio, especially among the young.

One thing I always like to ask my leftist minimum wage supporting friends: why was establishing a "rate-for-the-work" law (the equivalent of minimum wage laws) one of the first priorities of the white apartheid government when they rose to power in the early 20th century in South Africa? If minimum wage laws really do help the poor, who are disproportionately of color, why would racist whites move so quickly to enact them in South Africa? The answer is that the left needs to check its premises.

From a reader:

Jonah, Don't you love when wacko's jump on Kerry's bandwagon? You think Doug really cares about the lessons Kerry learned from Vietnam, or does he just want to wave Kerry's non-thrown away medals in your face? Where was Doug in 1996 or 1992...not voting for war heroes, I guarantee that. I mean, does this guy really even like Kerry? Does anyone? I think "electable" is short-hand for "no one likes him, knows what he stands for, agrees with him or cares about him, but he has 'gotcha' points on Bush". Looks like Kerry will get the Dean-wacko vote after all. Edwards for Idaho and Utah! John B Columbus OH

From a reader, in response to my column:

Jonah, Like most right-wing wackos, you're skilled in lies of omission. The false conflation of bin Laden and Huessin, and Bush's pseudo "evidence" concerning WMD's were the foundation for Bush's war with Iraq that you find so laudable. It's clear from his record of personal integrity and intelligence, that Kerry would have only fought the appropriate war against terror( bin Laden) and not an additional one for the most callous and despicable of political reasons(Iraq). Let's see, what was Bush commenting on in 1970--"How many bottles of Lone Star are there in a case" and from that we can, of course, conclude that our current President is nothing but a dry drunk? There's nothing quite as amusing as when you and Will--the warrior wimp brothers--expound so cleverly about U.S. defense policies, analogous to Limbaugh's sage comments about NFL quarterbacks. Since you and Bush never served your country in combat I can understand that you can't begin to appreciate the lessons Kerry learned from VietNam. Your characterization of them is, to put it more politely than you deserve, assine. Speaking of excreable; you and Frum owe Senator Kerry an apology for attempling to "give legs" to a false bimbo story. Of course you've always been immune to even an approximation of truth when it got in the way of your ideology--as truth has a nasty habit of doing. Well, happy sliming. Doug

Nick Confessore over at Tapped takes exception to our recent discussion of unions and interest groups around here. He summarizes the conversation so far thus:

The folks over at The Corner, chiefly Jonah Goldberg and one of his correspondents, are arguing -- in response to an offhand comment in Peter Beinart's latest column -- that liberal interest groups, and particularly the labor movement, don't do much good for anyone except their own constituents, and thus are no more selfish than corporate special interests. I'm not going to engage the whole thing, but I think Goldberg and his correspondent go quite awry when discussing labor

He then goes on to detail all of the wonderful things labor does and has done for the non-union world. Now, before I get into all that, let me say I don't think all leftwing or liberal interest groups are selfish or don't do much good for others. Or at least I don't believe that, as an article of faith, that this is necessarily the case. Some unions were even very good in the Cold War (one of the accomplishments Nick oddly leaves out).

But, as for Confessore's direct point on how much good the labor movement has done -- fighting for health care, the minimum wage, even civil rights (a very mixed record if you ask me) -- I say: point taken. I tend not to assume bad motives in everyone I disagree with, so I'm sure many folks in the labor movement want to do good for everyone, not just their members.

However, the notion that the labor movement favors hikes in the minimum wage solely or even largely out of altruism -- which seems to be Confessore's point -- strikes me as pretty tendentious. I've always worked on the assumption that one of the main reasons that the labor movement favors such things is that, to quote JFK and Ronald Reagan, a rising tide lifts all boats. If the lowest paid people become better paid, this puts inflationary pressure -- political and/or economic -- on all wages. I'm not sure, but I wouldn't be surprised at all if many labor contracts actually included formulas which peg union jobs at certain multiples of the minimum wage.

And lastly, as Nick concedes, some of this argument is difficult because while labor may or may not have had the good of others when it pushed certain policies, most conservatives would argue that the policies themselves weren't good for people. But, as he says, that's a whole different argument.

An email from a cloning opponent:

Just saw your Corner post about the survey of genetics researchers on stem
cells and cloning. The numbers, as Wesley Smith says in that article, are
based on a survey published by a journal called Genetic Engineering News.
The survey itself is a classic example of the confusion mixed with
intentional distortion that we deal with on this subject. The survey asked
about "cell cloning" when it meant creating embryos through cloning, and it
said "cells" in the early stages from which stem cells are derived "are not
embryos." A totally inaccurate and incoherent description of what's
involved. It even created an artificial category "between the extremes of
support for therapy and opposition to whole human cloning" which it called
"human cloning research without implantation of the cloned embryo in a human
uterus" (which of course IS what they're calling "therapy") and said only
34% of the scientists supported this, though 92% supported "therapeutic
cloning of human stem cells." Just a mess.

Presumably, descriptions like these were in the actual questionnaire given
to these scientists, and they answered based on these definitions. That
doesn't help us see what they actually think, and whether they actually do
know that cloning creates embryos for research, and that all embryonic stem
cell research involves destroying embryos. So it's very hard to make heads
or tails of these numbers, and they basically don't mean anything.

WOODRUFF: Two other very quick things, Senator. One is, it's been reported that, well you're aware of this, Vietnam veterans upset with the fact that when you came back from the war, you went to Capitol Hill, and you testified in so many words against the kinds of things that U.S. soldiers were doing over there...

KERRY: Yes, I did.

WOODRUFF: To the Vietnamese.

KERRY: Yes, I did.

WOODRUFF: They are saying, in effect, you were accusing American troops of war crimes.

KERRY: No, I was accusing American leaders of abandoning the troops. And if you read what I said, it is very clearly an indictment of leadership. I said to the Senate, where is the leadership of our country? And it's the leaders who are responsible, not the soldiers. I never said that. I've always fought for the soldiers. In fact, not only did we oppose the war, but we proudly stood up and fought for the additions to the GI Bill so that vets would be able to use it. We fought for the V.A. Hospitals. I wrote the Agent Orange legislation with Tom Daschle. I helped with the post-Vietnam stress syndrome outreach centers.

I'm proud of the record of fighting for soldiers and for veterans. And the fact is if we want to redebate the war on Vietnam in 2004, I'm ready for that. It was a mistake, and I'm proud of having stood up and shared with America my perceptions of what was happening.

The groups insist that New York City is failing to obey Clinton Executive Order 13166, which requires translations in any language anyone speaks. Quoting from their report, "Denied at the Door:

All notices and materials going to parents must be provided in the native language of parents with limited English proficiency. The Department of Education should create a centralized translation unit providing translations in the major languages, with referrals for outside translation for those languages spoken by smaller segments of limited English proficient families. Each school must post signs informing parents of their rights to language assistance.

New York City taxpayers would not only get stuck with this whopping translation bill. They also paid to enable these leftist outfits to exist long enough to complain in the first place.

[Heading] The Big 'Keep Out' Sign

[First paragraph] In response to the Feb. 17 Letter to the Editor "Why Our Immigration Laws Must Be Enforced," signed by Rep. Tom Tancredo, Michael Reagan and seven other conservatives:

[Second paragraph] The authors strenuously complain about the lack of enforcement of our immigration laws. They accept "legal" immigrants and condemn "illegal" immigrants. But they don't say that the real reason for so many illegal immigrants today is that since the 1920s there has not been a legal way for most low-skilled immigrants to come here. Rep. Tancredo and his colleagues are fortunate that people like themselves weren't in power in the 19th century, otherwise their ancestors would have never been allowed to pass through Ellis Island.

[Signature] Susie L. Hoeller

Director, American Center for International Policy Studies

Van Alstyne, Texas

"This campaign, because of 9-11, is going to be about which guy is the more manly, which is the more macho guy. And the idea that John Kerry went and fought in the war and was shot at and saved someone's life gives him that. He's Mister Macho. He's the guy. And the President is going to have to be dealing with this problem. I keep thinking this is going to be a real bellwether. You're gonna be able to tell whether Bush is gonna win or lose by whether that picture of him on the aircraft carrier and the jumpsuit turns into an object of ridicule for him, or if we still continue to think it's attractive. If it becomes ridicule, he's finished, you know?"

BC-APNewsAlert WASHINGTON - President Bush will use a recess appointment to put Alabama Attorney General William Pryor on federal appeals court, sources say.

As some of you have suspected from Wednesday's syndicated column, the reaction to the San Francisco fiasco by the gay rights left has made me more sympathetic to a constitutional amendment, though not necessarily to the one(s) kicking around right now. Jonathan Rauch proposes one I could certainly live with in Nick Schulz's piece. Blogger Justin Katz makes the case a great many readers have made to me, which is that given current trends the case for federalism is in fact the case for a constitutional amendment. As I said, I'm becoming increasingly sympathetic to that idea. But I point out Katz's comments for another reason. He glibly asserts that my motives on this and, presumably, other issues is to appear "cool" in the eyes of others, particularly Andrew Sullivan.

I hear this every now and then, particularly from self-proclaimed conservative purists and I think this is nonsense and I generally take offense to it. (It is also flatly not true about Nick Schulz who I've known for years and is one of my closest friends). I'm not above attacking peoples' motives -- if there is evidence about what their motives are, otherwise, it smacks of Stalinist politics. But this criticism of me is generally asserted without fact or foundation. It assumes I argue in bad faith and with a really silly motive to boot. I mean if I were trying to seem "cool" by altering my views I'd certainly come out against the drug war, which is certainly the "cool" position on campuses and elsewhere. And if I really wanted to ingratiate myself with Andrew I would not only be in favor of gay marriage but -- even better -- I'd stop being chatty with the Derb and start denouncing him as a walking, talking crime against humanity.

Anyway, I told Katz this and he's responded with a gracious note so I've got no more grievance with him. But I have no doubt that this idea will stay around for a long time.

Jonah, *visiting* France / French Canada is wildly different from *working* with them. Spent some vacation time in Paris back in '02, and the food & service we had was excellent - they were dying for American tourist dollars (and I'm not one to "hide" my American-ness. At 6'7", how am I gonna hide *anything*?). On the other had, my company has an office in Montreal, and those b*stards make our lives difficult on a daily basis. It'd be nice if they'd just be *uncooperative*, but instead they are actively seeking our destruction. With co-workers like these, who needs enemies? It's like they're our own little UN security council veto, trying to block us from making a living (or defeating our corporate enemies) every day. Bah! Wimps? Traitorous feckless crapweasels is more like it. Regards, Big John San Diego, CA [feel free to use my name - a hug to Jess & a pet to Cosmo for me!]

I'm trying very hard not to share every interesting tidbit from my book in the Corner. But I agree entirely that Corporations are entirely selfish and non-ideological (anideological is too hard to say). One anecdote from my book (actually William Manchester's book) on this point.

When it was still unclear whether or not the Nazis would attain power in Germany, Gustav Krupp issued orders to his Berlin chauffeur: if Krupp left a building with his gloves in his right hand, the driver was to give him the traditional Prussian greeting (clicked heels and a tap of the bill of your hat). If Krupp had his gloves in his left hand, the chauffeur was expected to give him the full "Heil Hitler" salute, which Gustav would return with equal gusto. Such was the level of non-ideological opportunism of the most famously Nazi corporation.

(Special bonus if you noted that the left hand was reserved for the Nazis).

I think Steyn's piece is great. But, personally, I always kind of liked the French Canucks. Like many immigrant groups they got out of their home countries at the right time and therefore weren't affected when their native cultures went off a cliff. I love Quebec City where the French food I had was hardly nouvelle (French for "clever is more important than tasty"). Mark Steyn obviously knows a lot more about Canada than I do, but I'm not entirely ignorant on the subject. Isn't it possible that while Steyn is right about the "Francization" of the political culture of Canada, isn't it also possible that some of Quebec's French culture has been "Canadified"? -- i.e. the French Canadians have adopted the humorless, thin-skinned, bitter and defensive UN-o-phillic schtick of their Anglo bretheren? In my Canada cover story I noted that I found the country to be turning into a giant college campus where political correctness reigned supreme and the only "intelligent" position was stupid anti-Americanism. Well, maybe that attitude has infected Canada's French speaking dorm?

Regardless, as for as Triumph the Comic Dog goes, I'm on his side. Canada is up there for him to poop on.

SOOOOOOOOO different than a National Review cruise.

Here's an email sent out from Salon:

"ear Salon Premium Member:

If you're like me, you already feel that this year's U.S. presidential race isn't a routine election but a watershed event, one that will make a critical difference for the nation and the world.

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You'll want to join us September 4th through the 10th for a good old fashioned salon with some of the strongest voices in progressive politics:

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* Joe Wilson, the former U.S. ambassador who blew the whistle on President Bush's claims of an Iraq-Niger uranium connection -- and was rewarded for his honesty by having his wife's CIA cover illegally blown, in a controversy that is still dogging the Bush Administration

* Sidney Blumenthal, the Salon columnist and former White House official, whose recent book, "The Clinton Wars," took a bold stand against the conservative smear machine

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From a reader:

Jonah,

I would take it even a step farther. The argument that unions serve a broader interest than companies is absurd. Look at the NEA - they serve the interests of teachers, very often at the expense of students. Or union attempts to raise minimum wage - they are going to put some companies out of business - all to protect their members from competition - but this does not help a broad range of people, only union members. I never understand how people can believe companies are evil because they pursue their own self-interest can believe than unions are wholly benevolent and altruistic. Why is it so difficult to understand and accept that unions are out for themselves as much as any company is?

End of Rant. Release the hounds.

John: I completely agree. In fact I've had a similar argument with Beinart more than once. He seems thoroughly convinced that corporations are "right-wing" and I'm thoroughly convinced that's poppycock.

But on your specific point, I'd go even further. Not only do Big Businesses create wealth -- something I doubt Beinart would dispute -- but, thanks largely to the policies of lots of Democrats Beinart supports, corporations provide health care for millions and millions of Americans. And many consumer groups, I've always thought, are little more than propaganda arms of trial lawyers and the like. Without a doubt, a president that pleases, say, GM is doing far more to help average Americans than a president who pleases, say, the Center for Science in the Public Interest.

And when you think about it, except in the area of fighting pollution (an increasingly minor problem) conservation groups don't really try to help average Americans except in indirect or vaguely transcendental ways (saving green spaces for future generations and the like). The Teamsters, after all, support drilling in ANWR.

Not too exciting though.

Rick Kaplan is the perfect choice to take it over and turn MSNBC into something in which everyone associated with the network can (finally) take pride. He helped build Nightline into the best news show on network television--(and the second best, and the third best) by hiring a crack staff and letting them do their jobs. [Like putting the phony "October Surprise" slur on Reagan....] He paid attention both to news values and to production values. And CNN made a great deal more sense under his watch than it has in the recent past, though it's fair to say, not as much as it might have. At Harvard and at ABC during the war, Kaplan has had time to rethink what works and what doesn't and apply it to a place that has too much of the latter and precious little of the former. With MSNBC he's got a near clean slate and plenty of resources to work with. Not everything he tries will work, but I'm guessing the days of Faux-Fox are over.

From a reader:

Re your Corner posting at 9:07 a.m. Wed 18 Feb:

In North Dakota, Kerry got more votes for him than against him.

He got 5,316 votes out of 10,508 cast.

The tally:

John Kerry, 5,316 votes, 51 percent
Wesley Clark, 2,502 votes, 24 percent
Howard Dean, 1,231 votes, 12 percent
John Edwards, 1,025 votes, 10 percent
Dennis Kucinich, 308 votes, 3 percent
Joe Lieberman, 98 votes, 1 percent
Al Sharpton, 28 votes, 0 percent
Total votes: 10,508

An interesting question:

Jonah...Why is polygamy further down the slippery slope than same-sex marriage? Polygamy has actually been practiced in the United States before and is still practiced in much of the world. Same-sex unions of any kind have never had any legal recognition in any part of the world (though some societies have clearly been more tolerant of homosexuality --which has inevitably lead to pederasty in those societies). Further, polygamous marriages are still procreative relationships and fulfill the ultimate goal of marriage laws--a link between procreation and child-rearing. Same-sex relationships are inherently non-procreative.

From a reader:

These stories all revolve around Senator Kerry and his alleged need for special access and treatment. But doesn't this also point out how inefficient he and his staff are? Most people who are bringing an entourage to ski, or a Senator to dinner, would at least call ahead and even make arrangements for the skis, menu, etc. Hell, we did this for senior military officers you'd think a senator's staff would know this. Instead they rely on their muscle to push the little people around.

So, doesn't this mean that instead of the populist he claims to be, he's actually the archetype for the ugly American he claims GWB is?

Bonus: Remember the questions GWB got about the names of foreign leaders and Kerry's speech about "Gentlemen, Start your engines"? Someone should ask Kerry to name three living NASCAR drivers. Then he should kiss the Red States goodbye.

Even Dave Barry has a variant of the "Do you know who I am?" story about Kerry. (Nod to Donald Crankshaw of Back of the Envelope.) Here's the relevant passage:

In conclusion, I want to extend my sincere best wishes to all of my opponents, Republican and Democrat, and to state that, in the unlikely event I am not elected, I will support whoever is, even if it is Sen. John Kerry, who once came, with his entourage, into a ski-rental shop in Ketchum, Idaho, where I was waiting patiently with my family to rent snowboards, and Sen. Kerry used one of his lackeys to flagrantly barge in line ahead of us and everybody else, as if he had some urgent senatorial need for a snowboard, like there was about to be an emergency meeting, out on the slopes, of the Joint Halfpipe Committee. I say it's time for us, as a nation, to put this unpleasant incident behind us. I know that I, for one, have forgotten all about it. That is how fair and balanced I am.

Doesn't this attitude say...something interesting about the man? I think it does. One could argue that the first President Bush lost an election because of a fraudulent story about supermarket scanners. You certainly couldn't dispute that the media did considerable damage to George HW Bush by casting him as aloof and insensitive, especially since Bush was running against an empath. Well, here we have a guy who has a long-standing and established record of line-jumping, food grabbing and other arrrogant and aristocratic nastiness. Surely there is as much evidence that John Kerry has a low tolerance for inconvenient little people than there was for Bush in 1992. How is that less relevant than Bush's shock at a new-fangled supermarket scanner?

Update: Just to be clear, I don't think the scanner story was a legit story and if you read the link to my column above you'll see that. Please no more emails on how I'm giving credence to the scanner story.

From a reader:

As it stands the situation on the ground may be the final validation of the Gramscian school of Marxism-- sieze control of the instruments of culture and everything else follows. If nothing else the situation over gay marriage highlights the folly of the libertarian view of culture, which seeks to simply get along and allow everyone else to do the same, while the other side is fighting to win.

I still think Kerry will be the nominee, but I do think the fact that Edwards A) Kicked Howard Dean's but B) seems to have statistically tied Kerry C) did better among indepedents than Kerry D) did just as well as Kerry among veterans and E) had such a strong late surge shows:

A) The mantra that Kerry is the most electable -- or a particularly electable -- Democrat is hogwash
B) Howard Dean will go down as one of the most interesting footnotes in presidential history
C) The Vietnam vet angle is far less useful than the punditocracy claims. After all if Kerry can't sweep vets who vote in Democratic primaries, what makes us think he can sweep politically conservative vets in a general election?

From a reader:

As a Midwest kinda guy, I have a suggestion for what plays well in northern
Indiana: You need to be yourself.

Therefore, bring a couch, your laptop, beers, and Cosmo. Arrange for a
projection screen behind the stage and bring about 10 episodes of The Simpsons.

Wear a bathrobe and slippers. Come out and welcome the crowd to an evening
with Jonah Goldberg. Then crack the beer, make yourself comfortable, and order Cosmo to take his usual place on the rug beside you. Then have the AV guys roll the first episode....and repeat...and repeat...

Hey, similar methods worked for Andy Kauffman.

While certainly, you're correct that neither restriction is logically more obvious or less arbitrary than the other, in legal terms, one is significantly easier than the other. Allowing same-sex marriage only requires dropping the requirement that the two participants be of opposite sexes. All of the law surrounding marriage assumes two people, and in the more difficult cases like death of one person, or dissolution of the marriage, there is no logical difference whether there's a man and a woman, or two women.

However, if you extend the law to more than two, things get complicated. Some things are obvious, at least in this day and age - all parties to a marriage would have to give consent (but would a highly-patriarchal society like the polygamist Mormons actually require wives to consent to a new wife?), But other things are less so. What happens when one person wants to leave a plural marriage? What happens when a marriage of 4 or more splits into two groups? Is there still a presumption of paternity? How does one write income tax schedules for marriages of 3, 4, or n?

Plural marriage requires same-sex marriage, because any marriage of n>2
will have at least two people of the same sex involved, but same-sex marriage does not automatically imply plural marriage. While it does seem to be the politically logical next step, there is strong antipathy to polyamory among some segments of the gay/lesbian community, so that next step may be a long time in coming.

I'm starting to contemplate my speech at Valpo tomorrow and I'm looking at the paperwork for a guide to what I should talk about. It's billed as, "An Evening with Jonah Goldberg."

That doesn't give a lot of direction, now does it?

There are three things about "The Passion of Christ" controversy that I haven't seen much comment on:

I find it odd that so many Christians seem to think Gibson is peforming an important service to apologetics by visually documenting Christ's physical suffering, which is not, so far as I know, at the center of any current theological debate (though it was a pretty big deal in the fourth century). It's belief in the divinity, not the humanity, of Christ that separates most Christians from most secularists, and seeing a biblically literal depiction of that on the Silver Screen won't work any better than, say, the availability of the Bible itself all these years.

Some of you may recall Ingemar Bergman's film Winter Light, in which a minor character--a church sexton with some sort of debilitative bone or muscle disease--reflects on the suffering of Christ, and concludes it was His loneliness and estrangement from the Father, not physical pain, that made His death unique. I don't think some sort of Gibsonian bloodfest is likely to improve on that insight.

Second, the heavy marketing of Gibson's film to conservative evangelical Protestants strikes me as theologically perverse, if commercially smart. These are people, for the most part, who don't place much stock in the liturgical calendar, and the particular relevance of the Passion to the annual cycle of meditations about Christ. Moreover, these are people who often think St. Paul's comments on gender relations or homosexuality--or for that matter, the entire Old Testament--are as central to Revealed Truth as the gospels themselves. Presumably, most conservative evangelicals would be as interested in, say, a movie about the cursing of the Cities on the Plain as with anything specifically about the Passion.

And third, I'm a bit concerned, though not surprised, by the sort of Popular Front thinking that has so many conservatives from every religious background expressing total solidarity with Gibson's faith, which is by any standard a bit eccentric, and by Catholic standards specifically, heretical or at least schismatic. I realize that many conservatives share the Left's eagerness to transfer political and cultural ideological labels into every realm of life, including religion…conservatives should beware embracing just anyone who calls himself a conservative.

From the AP

NEW YORK - Advertising writers in Florida were planning to pitch hemorrhoid-relief products with a commercial featuring the Johnny Cash (news) classic "Ring of Fire," but Cash's family said there's no way they will let it happen.

"We would never allow the song to be demeaned like that," Cash's daughter, Rosanne, told the Tennessean of Nashville, Tenn.

From a reader:

Sir, you wrote:

"I don't want to get into the philosophy of mathematics -- not my expertise --..."

(My apologies then...)

"But aren't numbers more abstract than the actual flesh and blood typologies of man and woman?"

W/ all due resect, it seems to me that man and woman, as "typologies" go, (besides being arbitrary at conception) are a couple surgeries and some hormone therapy away from changing in to one another, whereas two is simply two. And we have a habit here of accepting limits set to specific numbers or percentages that are otherwise somewhat arbitrary.

The thornier question I think is why same-sex marriage is less moral or rational than serial marriage, marriage for TV ratings, marriage-on-a-whim, Bill-and-Hillary marriage, marriage at 60, etc.

Me: I think it's clear that if you read my post, my point was that two-ness is as arbitrary as man/woman. Moreover I disagree that sex is as malleable as this reader suggests. Surgery can help change gender but I'm unaware of any surgery that can make a man into a woman capable of having children or a woman into a man capable of producing viable sperm. In fact, it seems to me it's a lot easier to make 2 into 3 -- just add one! -- than it is to make a man into a mother. As for the rest of his points about the other problems marriage is facing, I think he makes fine points.

To McSorley's.

Rich - I generally agree with your point about the special interests issue being a loser for Bush. But I must say his ad was terrible on it.

As you note, the Bush campaign says the issue is Kerry's hypocrisy, not who takes how much from special interests. But that ad didn't make that point. It didn't show Kerry pounding the table about how he would drive the special interests from Washington. If it did that and then noted that he takes more special interest money than any other Senator, the issue of hypocrisy would have been clear. Instead the Bush ad assumed a lot of knowledge on the part of the public, never explicitly made the connection, and left a big opening for the Dems to counter-punch. I would have gone after Kerry on other hypocrisy vulnerabilities first -- voting every which way on Iraq, for example -- and then later on in the summer attacked on the special interest theme once Kerry's hypocrisy was already well-established in the public's mind.

It seems to have passed completely unnoticed in The Corner that during the pre-race ceremonies at the Daytona 500 on Sunday all of the singers could actually sing and both singers and dancers were wearing adequate clothing.

As a departure from the cultural norm this OUGHT to have been noted. ;-)

I cannot be the only NRO reader who cheers the stealth bomber and gets misty-eyed over F-15's even without the sight of President Bush shaking hands with Richard Petty.

I used to be a television producer, though I never wrote scripts for commercials. But I think it'd be fun to try. So for the next few months I'll occassionally drop a hypothetical script in the Corner which the Republicans are free to use. Maybe, I'll even try a couple for Kerry too. I invite my fellow Cornerites to do the same. Here's my first try:

Scene: In the caves of Tora Bora, Osama Bin Laden, Mullah Omar and their aides are watching TV. The cave is illuminated by the light from the screen.

Cut to clip from Wisconsin Democratic debate:

Questioner: Senator Kerry, President Bush … described himself as a war president. He said he's got war on his mind as he considers these policies and decisions he has to make. If you were elected, would you see yourself as a war president?

KERRY: I'd see myself first of all as a jobs president, as a health care president, as an education president and also an environmental president. ….So I would see myself as a very different kind of global leader than George Bush.

Cut to Omar and Bin Laden high-fiving each other and wearing John Kerry for President T-shirts.

Fade to black.
Graphic: Re-Elect George W. Bush. The leadership America needs now.

I bet if we ran a poll (and activists didn't spam it) asking the following question "B" would win in a landslide, or at least with a big plurality:

Are you:

A. Against gay marriage and think NRO should keep discussing it as much as possible?

B. Against gay marriage but really don't want to hear about it anymore?

C. For it and think the debate should continue?

D. For it, but really don't want to hear about it anymore?

From a philosophy prof reader:

Dear Jonah, I am surprised that critics of Same-Sex Marriage, while adopting the Reductio Ad Absurdum argument of Polygamy, don't go the next step and discuss how polygamy, as actually practiced in some parts of the world, as a matter of fact does promote social and economic stability.

I lived for three years in a very small village in Sierra Leone in the late 1970's and can attest--as can many of NRO readers who have similar experiences--that polygamy has a rational basis in poor, agrarian and autonomous regions of the world, where only half of all offspring live to their 5th birthday, where there is a strong need for children to work the fields and, in later years, to care for dying parents, and where there is no social safety net, let along opportunities for employment for young women, to cushion the blows of illness and old age.

The point is, Polygamy does have a rational basis, even if on occasion the multiple wives may bicker among themselves and with the husband. So if the proponents of Same-Sex Marriage consider stability a virtue, then they should also be in favor of polygamy. The only reason for Rep. Frank et al. to oppose it is to suggest that monogamy is culturally superior. But they wouldn't want to say THAT, would they?

Barney Frank was on Fox News Sunday talking about gay marriage last Sunday. He was up against Sen. Jon Cornyn. I think Frank got the better of Cornyn time and again (Frank is indisputably smart, if not necessarily always wise). But Frank trotted out an argument I've heard countless times and I still don't get it.

Chris Wallace asked, "If you're going to argue for the right of gays to marry, why stop there? Why not, say, polygamy or any other personal choice?"

Frank ressponded

"Because society has, I think, a right to make certain decisions. They ought to make them fairly.

Deciding that a relationship between two people promotes stability, is likely to help society, is a rational decision. And two versus three is a very clear thing. You have a three-way situation, the likelihood of dissension, et cetera, is greater.

Now, Frank didn't continue on this point, but I've heard it elaborated any number of times. The gist seems to be: defining marriage as a bond between two people is rational but defining marriage as a bond between a man and a woman is arbitrary and rooted in bigoted abstraction.

I just don't get that. I don't want to get into the philosophy of mathematics -- not my expertise -- but aren't numbers more abstract than the actual flesh and blood typologies of man and woman? How is confining marriage to one man and one woman more arbitrary or irrational than confining it to two people? Of course, I think confining marriage to two people and to one man and one woman is rational. But even if I didn't, purely as a matter of reasoning, I think I would find the argument that one criteria is obviously more arbitrary than the other to be unpersuasive. The only difference between the two -- and this is a real difference -- is political and/or moral; lots of people are demanding that one of the criteria be dropped.

Andrew Sullivan writes: "Just as we can now get real pictures from liberation in Iraq, so we can get real pics of the first gay Americans to have their love and commitment solemnized by their own government. Thousands of them. In an act of civil disobedience. Yes, I know this is breaking the law. But Rosa Parks broke the law as well."

Andrew's support for law-breaking has already been addressed by Stanley (though when a school in Kentucky or Alabama or wherever decides to defy the state and teach creationism or the "curability" of homosexuality, I somehow doubt he'll be as jazzed for civil disobedience).

But, I should also point out that from the stories I've seen, a great many (I don't know if it's a majority or not) of the couples getting "married" in San Francisco are from out of town and out of state. So when Andrew says their love and commitment are being solemnized by their own government he's factually wrong. These couples are having their love and commitment solemnized by "a government" -- illegally. This isn't a trivial point, since Andrew and others -- including me -- place so much importance on Federalism and the ability of people to determine the rules for their own communities. Well, the couples from North Carolina aren't moving to San Francisco. They're grabbing some paperwork to press their case in Raleigh or Durham. That's a different scenario.

Via Andrew Sullivan, here’s a 2002 letter from Duke’s professor emeritus of physics:

”In seeking faculty, universities look for people who can analyze and discuss matters of some complexity, who are unafraid to challenge the wisdom of simple solutions, and who have a sense of social responsibility toward those who cannot buy influence. Such people tend to be put off by a political party dominated by those who believe dogmatically in the infallibility of the marketplace as a solution to all economic problems, or else in the infallibility of scripture as a guide to morality. In short, universities want people of some depth, subtlety and intelligence. People like that usually vote for the Democrats. So what?”

I’m told that people actually spend money to go to Duke. Why?

Brandishing pikes, thumbscrews and placards made of vellum, mavens of the medieval have emerged from their scriptoria to email denunciations of my comments on the philosophy of that gloomy and primitive era. Well, I was writing somewhat tongue in cheek (can one write tongue in cheek?).

I’m happy, however, to put it on record that, to the best of my belief, Duns Scotus was never a member of the Communist Party.

A reader sent me the following. He made every number a link to his source. I will not be spending the next fifteen minutes coding each one. But take my word for it, he seems to have done his due dilligence:

I hate to ruin "numbers too good to be checked" with internet-verified facts (if it ain't on the internet, it ain't the truth!), but here's the real scoop, all documented with semi-reliable citations. And don't despair! The end result is even better than letting the original numbers go unchallenged.

a. The population of this country is 281 million.

b. 40 million are retired and disabled, leaving 241 million to do the work.

c. There are 72 million children, which leaves 169 million to do the work.

d. There are 15 million in college, leaving 154 million to do the work.

e. Of this there are 4.21 million employed by the federal government, including military and post office employees, leaving 149.79 million to do the work.

f. Take from the total the 18.6 million people who work for state and city governments, and that leaves 131.19 million to do the work.

g. There are 2 million people in prisons.

So relax, Jonah. This still leaves 129.19 million diligent citizens, plus an increasing number of "undocumented workers," plus your Couch, to get everything done. Not only are you underworked -- you're totally superfluous! Take a break, for God's sake.

Your loyal fan,
Marc

From a prof:

Jonah-

The idea that ’if something isn't on the web it doesn't exist’ really is pervasive among college students. Students have access to a number of searchable databases for the scientific literature and I can usually tell which database was used to research a paper because there will be no references prior to the earliest date in the database. It’s as if there were no scientific studies worth reviewing prior to 1995 or 1987….

Curmudgeonly yours,

My last few blegs for academic stuff have revived one of my oldest peeves about the internet. It's still not nearly good enough and might never be.

If you think the internet has arrived as the be-all and end-all of research, I'm afraid you're still wrong and I'm still right. While researching my book, I've been amazed by how much stuff isn't on the web. And I don't just mean scholarly articles and essays, I mean even references to some major and a great many minor events, institutions, people etc. I'm working on some issues from the New Deal era and I'm astounded by how little there is out there on specific legislators, legislation etc. Even in Nexis, it's difficult to find useful articles on a vast swath of history. Except for -- I would guess -- the top .01% pretty much all of the important things ever written are still hidden away in books, on microfilm, or in bound journals. That's all fine, I suppose, except that I know for a fact that a huge number of college kids think that if something isn't on the web it doesn't exist. The internet is a wonderful thing, but I'm afraid it's also responsible for a lot of collective forgetting.

This is from a reader. This definitely falls under the "numbers which are too good to be checked" department:

Jonah,

For a couple years I've been blaming it on lack of sleep, not enough
sunshine, too much pressure from my job, poor blood circulation or
something else I could think of. But now I found out the real reason...

I'm tired is because I'm overworked. Here's why:

a. The population of this country is 273 million.

b. 140 million are retired.

c. That leaves 133 million to do the work.

d. There are 85 million in school, which leaves 48 million to do the work.

e. Of this there are 29 million employed by the federal government,

leaving 19 million to do the work.

f. 2.8 million are in the armed forces preoccupied with killing the
Taliban.

g. Which leaves 16.2 million to do the work.

h. Take from the total the 14,800,000 people who work for state and

city governments.

i. And that leaves 1.4 million to do the work.

j. At any given time there are 188,000 people in hospitals,

k. Leaving 1,212,000 to do the work.

l. Now, there are 1,211,998 people in prisons.

That leaves just two people to do the work. You and me.

And there you are...

Sitting on your ass, at your computer, reading jokes. Nice, real nice!!

From last night's debate:

GILBERT: Senator Kerry, President Bush a week ago on "Meet the Press" described himself as a war president. He said he's got war on his mind as he considers these policies and decisions he has to make. If you were elected, would you see yourself as a war president?

KERRY: I'd see myself first of all as a jobs president, as a health care president, as an education president and also an environmental president. And add them all together, you can't be safe at home today unless you are also safe abroad.

KERRY: So I would see myself as a very different kind of global leader than George Bush.

Another reader, meanwhile, wades in with this observation about the supposed inevitability of philosophy departments hiring on the Left:

“Spend any time surveying the great philosophers, and you…find a large number of conservatives - Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, Augustine, Aquinas, Pascal, Hume, Hegel, Kierkegaard, and a number who are… not liberals - Machiavelli, Hobbes, and Nietzsche, for example. The liberals are a smaller number - Locke, Spinoza, Rousseau, Kant, Mill. And of course, any of them would be conservatives by today's standards. "Left-leaning"? By whose standard?”

Well, I’m not so sure about Rousseau, and there’s always cranky Karl Marx, but he does have a point…

Duke President Nan Keohane “said most Duke professors are careful not to let their own ideologies color their teaching.”

OK, just one comment…

Ha ha ha ha

Tucked away in this depressing little story about sneak attempts to introduce a ban on public smoking in the UK is the revelation that Britain will be holding an "obesity summit" to discuss measures such as a prohibition on television advertisements for fast food and candies. What a waste of time. Sweden and Quebec have for years banned such ads (when directed at children) with no appreciable effect on rising levels of obesity. But if governments are going to ban any sort of food advertising (and they should not, of course), why not start with wicked pasta? A recent CDC report appears to show that the growth in Americans’ consumption of calories (which has, incidentally, leveled off) comes primarily not from fat (although Americans are consuming more of that naughty substance too), but from carbohydrates.

The answer is clear. We must protect ‘the children’ from ravioli. I call on Congress (if it can spare any time from its immensely important contemplation of Janet Jackson’s breast) to act at once against this threat to the nation’s young.