Here's a point that may bewilder foreigners about American inactivism. In most parts of the world, big, angry public demonstrations are a traditional way of responding to provocations. We have grown accustomed to seeing "the Arab street," for example, staging big rallies with banners and burning effegies and the like. Meanwhile, here in the U.S., there was remarkably little of that even after September 11 - a bunch of memorials and prayer services and bumper stickers and hanging flags, but Americans were remarkably united in their disinterest in carrying "death to bin Laden" placards, let alone stringing up the first Muslim they could lay hands on. Terrorists blew up my office, and I spent more time over the next week on conference calls than demonstrating in the street.

As a result, I suspect that the rest of the world tends to underestimate the depth of rage that still simmers here, seeing as most of us have just gone back to our jobs and families, and in November a lot of Americans won't even bother to vote. Part of that, of course, is the supreme confidence of the American people from Day 1 that our military would find whoever did this, wherever they were in the world, and kick their ass. But it's also a matter of most Americans feeling like it's not worth the effort to take time away from their own lives to make a stink about something, even something really, really big. And that is, for the most part, a healthy instinct. But people who think it will translate into Americans wanting nothing done about a problem that DOES demand a solution are invariably in for an ugly surprise.

PJ O'Rourke? Please. This stealthy movement started with Sam Johnson --it's just taken this long to pick up momentum for some reason. I had meant to get this to you sooner, but, well, you know...

"Idleness predominates in many lives where it is not suspected; for, being a vice which terminates in itself, it may be enjoyed without injury to others; and it is therefore not watched like fraud, which endangers property; or like pride, which naturally seeks its gratifications in another's inferiority. Idleness is a silent and peaceful quality, that neither raises envy by ostentation, nor hatred by opposition; and therefore nobody is busy to censure or detect it.... Nothing is to be expected from the workman whose tools are for ever to be sought."
Johnson: Idler #31 (November 18, 1752)

I like your columns that deal with the wisdom of doing nothing. Instead of being referred to as a "columnist", you should adopt the title "inactivist." You could lead a grass-roots movement toward your way thinkng and be the first "inactivist activist."

I suppose that my ill-defined hostility to Warren Christopher is grounded in my very brief service some fifteen years ago as a speechwriter for him and his patron Cyrus Vance. Having observed the horrors of Democratic policymaking up close, I was allowed on this occasion to watch Christopher at some distance, both spiritual and physical. At first glance, he appears to be a character in one of those low-budget cartoons of the 1960s -- "Clutch Cargo," for instance -- where the figures are inert but the eyes and lips move. At second glance, he has the look of an Indian on exhibit at the Smithsonian: Chief Warren, of the now-extinct Christopher tribe, who was brought to the capital in 1910 to be examined but died in the harsh winter of 1911, was embalmed, and whose brown, waxy, deeply-lined countenance (clothed in western garb) now stares out at visitors in the final month before he is moved off display and buried with dignity in his ancestral
lands.

"Being a 23 year-old with a dual French citizenship who lives in Manhattan, I have only four words for you: The French are a**holes. (I forget whom I am quoting)

Keep up the good work."

Dear Mr. Goldberg:

I would like to express my disappointment regarding your recent column "Frogs in Our Midst".

Firstly, I would like to share with you that I am indeed a conservative both in my native Britain and here in the United States. I disagree with policies taken by the French Left especially regarding employment laws and other aspects of their social agenda.

However, your initial comments in your article surrounding the assassination attempt of Jacques Chirac were inexcusable. The commentary in your first two paragraphs would have seen you asked to leave the most jingoistic British tabloid.

Unfortunately, your arguments went down hill from there. As a piece of political writing you contradicted yourself within three paragraphs. You state that "France increasingly defines being "French" as disagreeing with the United States. We support Israel, so the French hate Israel. You then subsequently comment "When politicians (French ones I presume) start making apologies for the murder of Jews because they want Arab votes". I believe part of the rational answer to be placed in your latter point and it is perhaps.

You go on to note that if the French had their way when the Berlin Wall fell, East Germany would have remained a separate, and socialist, country. This would also have been the case if British Conservatives such as Margaret Thatcher and Nick Ridley had there way, but I digress.

You further claim that the terrorists who blew up the World Trade Center came from the most French-coddled and French-influenced region of the globe. This I am afraid is ignorance.

Your glee at "French-hating" being so popular today. I challenge you to revel in such sentiment for any other nationality or race. I dare you to write an article in a similar tone about the Hispanics/Jews/Americans as you did about the French/ Gauls. No I thought not.

I am no leftie whiner Mr. Goldberg. I have read Boris Johnson for years, throughly enjoyed it and never wrote to him once!

I expect a higher standard from National Review than such xenophobic ranting.

Jonah, ok, that one hurt. I would like to point out the following:

Boston Red Sox (1907-2001) - 4 World Championships, 8 Pennants, and 13 Playoff Appearances
Boston Pilgrims (1903-1906) - 1 World Championship, 2 Pennants, and 2 Playoff Appearances

Last WS win: 1918

Cubs:

Chicago Cubs (1903-2001) - 2 World Championships, 10 Pennants, and 13 Playoff Appearances

Last WR win: 1908

So there.

The most likely reason why 'so many' (just how many, anyway?) Arab clerics are blind is because in most traditional (pre-industrial) societies the role of town reciter and/or memorizer is given to someone who is disabled, and/or has a good auditory memory. Such people are frequently blind. In most Arab communities as well the Koran is primarily recited, not read. Just watch the beginning of Lawrence of Arabia.

Compare West African griots, Serbian rhapsodes, or Ancient Greek storytellers. In that respect, it is usual to say that both Homer and Aesop were blind: but NO ONE has ever attempted to link their blindness either to social dysfunction, sexual repression, or venereal disease. The fact that Jonah Goldberg is willing to be the mouthpiece for such views just goes to show the kind of rather sleazy anti-Arab hatred the National Review has chosen to indulge.

The car bomb may not be related to the current Middle East security crisis, Detective Chief Inspector Ollie Torahs told The Associated Press.
"We are treating this as an isolated incident," said Detective Chief Inspector Ollie Torahs. "We don't believe there are any terrorism or political links."

"I've got two solutions," Schilling said. "One, increase the rosters and just tell guys that some of them won't play unless the game goes extra innings. Or two, play nine innings no matter what. Tell everybody from the start. And then, if it's tied, each team picks one guy, and you decide it with a Home Run Derby. How great would THAT be?"