Flat Earth Society

Thomas Friedman has a column out arguing that a nuclear armed Iran is preferable to having the Bush administration use military means to stop them. A more competent administration would rally world support for the threat of force “or really severe sanctions” and the Ayatollahs would cave. Of course the Bushies are anything but competent. Maybe the best course might be to just let Iran have the bomb. Let them know in no uncertain terms that if they use it or give it to terrorists we would destroy their nuclear sites. That ought to be deterrence enough. He is careful to say we would use tactical nuclear weapons and only target nuclear facilities, presumably to minimize collateral damage. He doesn’t make his case very well. It doesn’t help that he devotes most of his space to Rummy bashing (Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld) with a few gratuitous swipes at George Bush and Condoleezza Rice. In the end Friedman doesn’t really make much of a point. Like most of the pundits who like to criticize the president, he’s just venting.
It’s the sort of shallow thinking typical of Friedman. The title of his latest book is a case in point, The World is Flat. There he makes the case that the Chinese and Indians are on the verge of global commercial hegemony. His economics aren’t any better than his geometry but I’ll let the book’s title make that point for me. This piece is about Iran and the bomb.
I think the Iranians will probably get their bomb, though I doubt it will happen while Bush is president. He’s not about to launch military strikes but they can’t be sure he won’t. He could even invade. After all, Saddam Hussein didn’t think he would invade Iraq. They will be more confident when there is a new American President. Friedman’s competence argument notwithstanding no amount of diplomacy is going to gain broad global support for either force or serious economic sanctions. The world doesn’t really feel threatened. They have all gotten used to living under an American protective umbrella. Iranian oil is more important to Europeans and to the Chinese. Commercial opportunities in Iran are the top priority for Russia. The Ayatollahs would never actually drop a bomb not because America might use Friedman’s tactical weapons but because they might obliterate the country and with it the Ayatollahs. These people are more than willing to send their followers out on suicide missions but they don’t go themselves and they don’t send their own sons and daughters. They aren’t likely to put themselves at risk and they aren’t likely to repeat Saddam’s mistake either. If they do the Americans will take care of it.
It isn’t hard to see why the Ayatollahs want the bomb. It will give them back the respect they have lost. Their revolution was supposed to sweep the Islamic world. Instead it has stalled and become unpopular even inside Iran. The bomb puts them back on center stage. They are twisting the lion’s tail. It is circular reasoning to think that Iran would be deterred from building a bomb by any threat that America might take it away without actually harming any one. That would put them in a position of having nothing to lose by trying. The only thing they might lose by dropping a bomb is their capacity to build more bombs. What they might gain is membership in the nuclear club with all the international prestige that goes with it.
By the way, Thomas, our planet is in roughly the shape of a sphere.

The New Dragomans

At the beginning of the eighteenth century there was pressing need for increased diplomatic contact between the European Great Powers and the Devine Porte, the principal court of the Ottoman Sultan so named for the gates of the Topkapi Palace which served as the main entrance. There were a number of reasons. Constantinople controlled the Bosporus and with it access and egress between the Mediterranean and the Black Sea, one of the world’s most important trade routes and a critical factor in The Great Game, the maneuvering for empire between England and Russia. Ottomans also ruled the Holy Land and a large Christian population, all matters of growing interest to the Great Powers.
There was a problem. Hardly anyone outside the Ottoman Empire spoke Turkish. Inside the empire only a few Greeks spoke French, the diplomatic language of the day. Enter the office of official interpreter, the Dragoman. With virtually no one to challenge his version of what had been said or written the Dragoman became quite powerful and was not above shading correspondence in his own intrigue. Something like that seems to have happened in Iraq, not so much in official channels but in the vital sphere of media control and its impact on public perception. It is at least a partial explanation for the dreadful quality of reporting coming from there. I’ll make my case.
Every American President has his problems with the press but not since Lyndon Johnson have we seen an adversarial relationship quite so intense as the open warfare being waged by the present press corps. In Iraq it has the effect that many of the journalists there refuse to accept any official version of events unless it is critical of administration policy or can be interpreted as failure. Opportunities for independent assessment are quite limited. Reporters are all but under house arrest in their Baghdad hotels, unable to venture out for fear of kidnapping and assassination. A few embed themselves with American troops but to many of their peers this irreparably taints the product. So they turn to the one available alternative. They use Iraqi stringers. Apparently it hasn’t occurred to them to ask why Iraqis are safer than they are. Nor do they seem to question whether reports from stringers are more reliable than official accounts or the reporting from their embedded counterparts. This puts the stringer in a powerful position, able to influence public perceptions in ways that may or may not fairly reflect reality. Who knows what their true motives might be, or where their true loyalties might lie. I’m sure they have built trusting relationships with their employers but since many of us don’t trust the main stream media in the first place we have even less reason to trust the stringer.
The new Dragomans don’t wield the influence of their predecessors, largely because they control only one of several information sources. From the beginning returning service men and women have brought back an image at stark odds from the one being presented on television and the front pages. Still, they have had their effect. They have found willing listeners in the media. The message of failure and doom has been unrelenting for three years now and public support for operations in Iraq is at low ebb. But they haven’t been able to change the facts on the ground and they haven’t been able to affect American policy. They can deny the progress of the last three years but if it continues Iraq will emerge as a peaceful stable place and that will be a good thing.

Old Navy Justice

Herman Melville’s last great work was a morality tale about the fate of Billy Budd, an impressed seaman aboard HMS Indomitable bound for the Mediterranean at the close of the eighteenth century. Billy was a thoroughly likeable character generally regarded by officers and crew alike to be totally without malice or guile. Not so Claggart, the ship’s Master-at-arms. He thought Billy was secretly mocking him. Claggart went to the Captain and falsely accused Billy of plotting mutiny. Captain Vere didn’t believe a word of it and demanded Claggart confront Billy directly. Billy was escorted into the room where Claggart repeated his malicious charge. Billy was dumbstruck. He could not speak. After several attempts he reflexively lashed out at his accuser with a single fist to the forehead. Claggart fell dead.
Vere saw the dilemma. Billy had been falsely accused and hadn’t intended to kill. He had struck out in passion and frustration. Still the law was clear. He struck a superior and the man was dead. The Captain immediately convened a three member panel of officers and conducted a trial where he was the only witness. Billy had nothing to say in his own defense. After all evidence was presented Billy was dismissed and the court began its deliberations in Vere’s presence. It soon became evident that the three were inclined to clemency. The surgeon would have liked to confine Billy until he could be remanded to a shore based board of inquiry. He was intimidated into silence fearing the Captain’s disapproval. The marine Lieutenant asked aloud whether they might convict Billy of the crime but temper the sentence. Vere reverted to his role as Commander and lectured the panel at some length. He told them their duty as officers of the king was to the king’s law, regardless of personal feelings. He instructed them “That however pitilessly that law may operate, we nevertheless adhere to it and administer it.” Billy Budd was convicted and sentenced to hang from the yardarm. The sentence was carried out before Claggart’s body was even cold.
We’ve come a long way in two hundred years. Any civilized modern court, military or not, would consider mitigating circumstances. Other witnesses would be called. Billy would have counsel. His character would be a factor, as would his frustration, the passion of the moment, and the false accusation. Vere’s interference in deliberations would be a gross violation of fundamental human rights. His presence in the room would be intolerable. I doubt that today any reasonable jury or board would find Billy guilty of capital murder let alone condemn him to death. We are a better society for it.
We have a way to go yet. The law can still be pitiless. Innocent men and women can be and are wrongly convicted, witness the spate of DNA exonerations in recent years. The absence of such exonerations among those actually executed doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened. The death penalty is not uniformly applied. Only about one percent of California homicides are tried as capital punishment cases. It can be cruel. In January the Supreme Court stayed the execution of a Florida man after he had been strapped to a gurney. He will probably face death again unless the court rules lethal injection is unconstitutional. Last minute reprieves aren’t unusual. Some get more than one. This was just the extreme case. In other circumstances we would call it psychological torture.
We are a more advanced civilization than we were in Billy Budd’s day. We will be more advanced still when capital punishment is a thing of the past.

Liberal Democracy in a Federal System

It’s one of those bad ideas that just won’t go away. Advocates for electing presidents by direct popular vote know they can’t get it through the constitutional amendment process so they have come up with a scheme to circumvent that process. Former Senator Birch Bayh of Indiana and Independent presidential candidate John Anderson of Illinois are proposing the most populous states agree among themselves they will cast their electoral votes for whichever candidate wins the most votes nationally, without regard to how their own state voted. The sponsors call themselves majoritarians. In reality only a plurality is required. There is no provision for a runoff. Incredibly they appear to be attracting wide support. The proposal has been endorsed by the New York Times and New Yorker magazine among others. A number of state legislatures have reportedly expressed interest. As few as eleven large states with more than 270 electoral votes among them could at a stroke undo the Great Compromise, one of the most fundamental agreements in the founding of the republic. The remaining 39 states would have no say in the matter.
First a little history; at the Constitutional Convention of 1787 delegates were at an impasse. The question was just how much sovereignty each of the newly independent states would cede to a national government, and how the powers they were to retain were to be protected. In the old Continental Congress each former colony had a single vote, much as in the UN General Assembly of today. The more populous states were not about to tolerate such an arrangement in a new federation but if there was to be a union the smaller states would not allow their views to be easily overridden. The compromise was the bicameral congress and it included provisions for how the presiding officer would be selected. Each legislature would appoint a number of electors corresponding to their representation in the congress. Since each state has the same number of senators this means the population of Nevada is given slightly more weight than the equivalent population in California. This is an exception to the one man one vote principle but then so is the composition of the senate. Without it there would be no United States. The proposition that eleven states should arbitrarily undo that agreement is unconscionable.
I’m obviously not in favor of such a power grab. I am a believer in representative liberal democracy as opposed to direct majority rule. That means among other things that the power of the majority should be strictly limited. The rights of minorities are protected and that includes the right of minority states to a disproportionate voice in presidential elections. It also means however that when the majority makes its wishes known through the vote, elected officials ignore them at their peril. The thought that electors from Texas might brush aside the vote in their own state in favor of a national plurality is one I find abhorrent.
The New York Times has described the Electoral College as an “antidemocratic relic.” To replace it they propose a process that is at once profoundly undemocratic and unprincipled. Narrow majorities in a few states would dictate to the nation how its chief executive is to be chosen. This is wrong. If Pennsylvania wishes to surrender more of its authority to a national electorate it should not be allowed to do it at the expense of the other states without their acquiescence. Under the terms of the constitution there are several ways to obtain the requisite approval. This isn’t one of them.

Where are the Adults with Autism?

One of the many controversies surrounding autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is whether it represents an epidemic. The CDC created a furor a couple of years ago when it estimated that 6 in every 1000 American children now have ASD, a dramatic increase over fifteen years earlier. A firestorm of criticism followed with ASD advocates demanding a national emergency be declared and massive research projects funded. Childhood vaccine defenders who don’t want any such research pointing fingers at their program responded just as vigorously to contest the estimate. Challengers maintain that not only is the CDC’s estimate inflated; there has been no real increase in the rate. The apparent rise is due to increased awareness. Many children who a few years ago would have been diagnosed with something else are now being diagnosed with ASD. This week health headlines are filled with reports of a new study which at least partly supports the latter view. The CDC had already bowed to pressure and hedged. It now says the number is somewhere between 2 and 6 in every 1000 children. The author of the new study, Dr. Paul Shattuck, used Department of Education data to reach his conclusion but cautions that the data are inconsistent. He also notes the “diagnostic substitution” hypothesis has been examined and rejected by a number of other scientific studies. The water just gets murkier.
This shouldn’t be that hard. There are two schools of thought about the nature of ASD. One is that it is a lifelong incurable disorder. The other is that with the right intervention, begun early enough, a child can be moved up the spectrum to the point where she no longer exhibits the clinical symptoms to be classified as having the disorder. Those who accept the idea that ASD can be effectively treated concede that very few children get the sort of intensive care required to move them completely off the spectrum. Until very recently that sort of success was practically unheard of. Assuming there are four million children born in the United States every year there should be somewhere between 8000 and 24000 ten year olds with ASD. We really ought to be able to find them and count them, or at least get the estimate to a more reasonable range. Which is it? The difference represents an astounding financial impact on school districts alone. Let’s assume for the sake of argument that the rate has been relatively constant over the years. That would mean there are a comparable number of thirty year old men and women with ASD, many of them institutionalized by now since there was so little effective treatment available when they were children. We ought to be able to find and count them too, if they are there.
I don’t think they are there. I don’t think they were in the schools twenty years ago. The idea that the typical teacher in the 1980s would not have noticed a pattern in these children is hard to accept. The numbers are too large and the characteristic behaviors too evident. I suspect if you asked a long time teacher he would agree. If they weren’t in school where were they? Where are they now? Several hundred thousand adults with autism would represent a very large percentage of the nation’s institutionalized population. These places are staffed with professionals. If they were seeing large numbers of patients with ASD they would notice and be saying something. We hear about an adult with autism occasionally but not with the frequency we might expect. They just aren’t there.

Is Anyone Listening?

Last year I attended an anti-death penalty rally in Austin. I decided it was an exercise in futility though the speakers were quite good. There was a celebrity human rights advocate, a pair of Texas State Representatives, a sister of a death row inmate, and the husband of a murdered woman. But they were preaching to the choir. The rally wasn’t well attended and the people who were there came because they were already death penalty opponents. The local press was there too but not in force. I doubt the event got much play on the evening news. If it did they would in fairness have had to report a sparse crowd, warm maybe but not wildly enthusiastic. Calls to action were vague and I thought a little hollow. Since then I have taken several opportunities to write my state representatives, my congressman, both my senators, the governor, and the Dallas Morning News urging that, if not abolished altogether, the death penalty at least be applied more sparingly. Not much response there either though the DMN did print a pair of my opinion pieces (predating the rally.) The governor, one US Senator, and my State Senator eventually wrote back to thank me for my concern but effectively saying their minds were made up; not surprising since most of the electorate is more concerned with crime than with the fate of criminals. The others didn’t respond at all. That did surprise me. They must be really secure in their seats.
It makes me wonder what it will take to get a genuinely serious discussion going on this subject. It won’t be me writing elected officials, though I will continue to do that. They don’t forge public opinion. In a democratic system they are products and servants of it. Something will have to happen to draw the public’s attention, something on a national level that doesn’t focus on failures of a single state. Texans get their backs up when the outside press tries to point fingers. I can do that because I’m a Texan. If the New York Times tries it we will most likely tell them to mind their own business. Holier than thou attitudes are counter productive. It will have to be some kind of gross miscarriage of justice that exposes flaws in the whole system, something that forces us all to take collective responsibility for what we do as a society. Dostoyevsky observed that one measure of civilization is how society treats its prisoners. Something has to make us ask what kind of people we want to be.
Maybe it isn’t in the cards. There may be nothing out there that will have the impact of Emil Zola’s J’accuse, thought by many to be the greatest newspaper article in history. That was the 1898 open letter to the President of France accusing the army of covering up the Dreyfus affair. Dreyfus had been wrongfully convicted. The army knowingly acquitted the man they knew had actually committed the crime. They had a reputation to protect and if Dreyfus had to be sacrificed so be it. In a precursor to the European Holocaust the affair provoked a wave of anti-Semitism not seen in France since the Middle Ages but it also caused enough public soul searching to force serious reform. Maybe we don’t have those kinds of abuses in modern American administration of capital punishment. Maybe our system is too transparent. Maybe the public passion for better justice isn’t there. It wasn’t there in France either until J’accuse came along. Where is Emil Zola when we need him?