‘On empirical grounds it does seem we have another reason for thinking Piketty’s central claim isn’t quite right, at least not for the reasons he sets out, and perhaps not quite right altogether.’
Still unfolding.
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And just some writing perhaps worth revisiting.
Old news I know, but it seems that the Yale Press was genuinely afraid that publishing this book could potentially lead to violence, and that they would be responsible for the consequences of such potential violence:
On empirical grounds it does seem we have another reason for thinking Piketty’s central claim isn’t quite right, at least not for the reasons he sets out, and perhaps not quite right altogether. – See more at: http://marginalrevolution.com/#sthash.578zkt6w.dpuf
Christopher Hitchens’ post here suggesting this was an act of institutionalized cowardice and a nod to the thuggish demands of those who need to be stood up against. He did have a first-hand look at Salman Rushdie’s ordeal, and the responses to it from those in the West.
“…Yale had consulted a range of experts before making its decision and that “[a]ll confirmed that the republication of the cartoons by the Yale University Press ran a serious risk of instigating violence.”
Walter Russell Mead has been pushing for a new Russia policy, and a foreign policy reboot with an eye towards Asia. As for some of his thoughts on the current administration: ‘Obama Tip-Toes Past The Graveyard Of His Foreign Policy:’
‘That the President and a top aide offered a defense of the administration’s international agenda that tip toed past the misreading Russia issue suggests that despite their evident discomfort and concern, the President’s foreign policy inner circle hasn’t yet come up with a strategy for national much less international leadership in our increasingly tumultuous world’
‘The Obama Administration cannot escape its share of the responsibility for what has gone wrong with U.S. foreign policy. And the result is unwelcome news both for the world, which largely depends upon the United States to promote order in the absence of any other country able and willing to do so, and for the United States, which cannot insulate itself from developments beyond its borders’
I’m guessing many in the Obama administration already know themselves to be in possession of many of the right ideals and far as peace and democratic activism go, so we’re not going to be seeing much change.
The world just wasn’t ready for it.
***As posted previously-It might be worth revisiting that Cairo Speech to see how rhetoric is meeting reality.
I’ve also been referred to Obama’s Nobel Prize acceptance speech to show the framework upon which he hangs his foreign policy. He’s been called a realist, or one who generally deals with the world as it is, not as he’d like it to be. In the speech, Obama sets an expectation of using force against evil in the world if necessary. He’s willing to part company with Gandhi and MLK in the face of a genuine possible evil and the grim choices events may require.
According to this view, Obama has rejected the Hillary Clinton/Samantha Power wing of humanitarian interventionism as idealists to his realism. He split the difference in Libya to the operation they wanted (like Bosnia) because of hisrealism.He later thought Syria wasn’t worth the risk because of his realism (it has since devolved into a near worse-case scenario into which Putin had to step-in). He approved, then withdrew, the surge in Afghanistan after he didn’t see the gains he wanted because of his realism.
No further comment….
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What about activism at home?: Well, FIRE (The Foundation For Individual Rights In Education) has its hands full, intelligently pushing back against the coalitions of activists that have taken root in our colleges and universities for some time now, but which find special expression through White House task-forces under this administration:
‘Perhaps most worryingly, the Task Force appears to be enthusiastic about essentially eliminating hearings altogether for students accused of assault and harassment. The Task Force is exploring a “single investigator” model, where a sole administrator would be empowered to serve as detective, judge and jury, affording the accused no chance to challenge his or her accuser’s testimony.’
Yes, feminists and anti-rape activists make moral claims, and they take them very seriously, so seriously in fact that they can work themselves into a frenzy:
Greg Lukianoff:
‘If those of us who defend civil liberties had to name our greatest historical adversary, the leading candidate could be summed up in two words: moral panic. Moral panic is a sudden, powerful, and often highly exaggerated perception within a society that people or their values are facing a dire threat.’
Here’s a further example of Left activism leading to potentially extra-judicial, quasi-official task-forces and councils and suspect bodies that can interfere with 1st amendment protections, Perhaps we can take a note from Canada, which has no such protections:
Ezra Levant’s opening statements during a lengthy investigation after he published those Danish cartoons of Mohammed:
Originally, a letter was written by Syed Soharwardy, an imam living in Alberta, to the Alberta Human Rights Commission. Soharwardy claimed that the cartoons were morally offensive to the religion of Islam. Levant believed his decision to publish the cartoons was protected by Canadian law, and that Soharwardy found a path to legal action (at the expense of Canadian taxpayers) through the Human Rights Commission because no one else would take Soharwardy’s claims seriously.
One of Levant’s main concerns seems to be the the way in which someone like Soharwardy, (with unchallenged religious beliefs, and illiberal ideas of social freedom), has infringed upon his freedoms through an institution like the Alberta Human Rights Commission.
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Admit it, even if you came to learn that Christopher Hitchens started out a Marxist materialist, and ended up a contrarian, eventually tethering himself to the New Atheists, you probably enjoyed it when he defended freedom of speech against its erosion by the politically correct multiculturalists, or perhaps when he wrote his polemics supporting the Iraq war.
I don’t believe that we can appease Islamic extremists, which is the whole premise of this administration’s approach…blunt American power and incentivize Muslim societies to drive the extreme elements out through international cooperation: Via Youtube-Uncommon Knowledge With Fouad Ajami And Charles Hill
After the outrage and faux outrage (so hard to tell these days) eventually cools down, and Brandon Eich, fired from Mozilla, boxes-up his belongings from work: After Ayan Hirsi Ali likely nods and clicks ‘End Call’, a blander, more conformist society remains.
Malik, as a British Muslim, is still looking for a more classical liberalism instead of the standard Leftist fare:
‘There is a difference between creating a society in which we have genuinely reduced or removed certain forms of hatreds and demanding that people shut up because they have to conform to other people’s expectations of what is acceptable. To demand that something is unsayable is not to make it unsaid, still less unthought. It is merely to create a world in which social conversation becomes greyer and more timid, in which people are less willing to say anything distinctive or outrageous, in which in Jon Lovett’s words, ‘fewer and fewer people talk more and more about less and less’…’
The thoughts we so often think, often-times true, many times not, often with at least some truth in them, remain that much less likely to be brought-out and tested, challenged, joined in common cause, scoffed-at, ignored, laughed-at, endorsed, dismissed, etc.
Ayan Hirsi Ali responds to having an honorary degree from Brandeis…not bestowed, as it turns out:
‘What did surprise me was the behavior of Brandeis. Having spent many months planning for me to speak to its students at Commencement, the university yesterday announced that it could not “overlook certain of my past statements,” which it had not previously been aware of. Yet my critics have long specialized in selective quotation – lines from interviews taken out of context – designed to misrepresent me and my work. It is scarcely credible that Brandeis did not know this when they initially offered me the degree. ‘
Malik disagrees with Hirsi Ali on many issues, but doesn’t want her to simply to shut up:
‘I know Hirsi Ali and I admire her courage. I also trenchantly disagree with many of her views. She has, for instance, opposed Muslim immigration to Europe, supported the Swiss ban on the building of minarets and declared that ‘we are at war with Islam’. Such views I find deeply objectionable. But equally objectionable is the insistence that her anti-Islamic and pro-Israel views are of themselves reasons to deny her an academic award.’
On a related note, here’s a debate from Intelligence Squared with Ayan Hirsi Ali on one side, arguing that Islam is the problem (the same absolutism in Islam that will not tolerate questioning of its tenets, its many violent passages, and its unreformed worldview which has a prescription for pretty much all aspects of the culture and public square). A member of the opposing side suggests that Muslim alienation in British life, combined with a European influenced fascist inspired-Islamism is the problem, not Islam itself (yes, it’s colonialist Europe’s fault).
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And Hitchens, no fan of religion, still makes for compelling and interesting listening on speech:
And also one more video from here at home: Comedian Patrice O’Neal defends the aim of comedians simply aiming to be funny and saying some of those things we all think out loud:
A protected class of journalists doesn’t sound like a great idea for a free and open society:
Volokh quoting the Ninth Circuit ruling:
‘The protections of the First Amendment do not turn on whether the defendant was a trained journalist, formally affiliated with traditional news entities, engaged in conflict-of-interest disclosure, went beyond just assembling others’ writings, or tried to get both sides of a story. As the Supreme Court has accurately warned, a First Amendment distinction between the institutional press and other speakers is unworkable: “With the advent of the Internet and the decline of print and broadcast media … the line between the media and others who wish to comment on political and social issues becomes far more blurred.” Citizens United, 558 U.S. at 352. In defamation cases, the public-figure status of a plaintiff and the public importance of the statement at issue — not the identity of the speaker — provide the First Amendment touchstones.’
It may just be me, but I think we can do better than an institutionalized class of journalists formed around a guild structure, agreeing generally upon a basic worldview while following around our political class and generally quoting the ‘proper’ public intellectuals.
Of course, a lot of people say this until they get in the majority, or have their ideas and interests in power or in favor.
Remember The Maine! The good old days…by malik2moon
Do you remember the Juan Williams’ firing? He’s got a new book out and is making the rounds.
As regular readers know, my criticism of NPR usually stems from this insight: The 60’s coalition of feminists, civil-rights activists, multiculturalists and environmentalists often represented on NPR’s airwaves are guided by ideas which unite some people while dividing and excluding others. Ideas have limitations, and ideas often set-up by well-meaning, morally serious, well-educated people can also lead, over time, to a very different system of incentives and very different behavior than was intended.
‘Pournelle’s Iron Law of Bureaucracy states that in any bureaucratic organization there will be two kinds of people”:
First, there will be those who are devoted to the goals of the organization. Examples are dedicated classroom teachers in an educational bureaucracy, many of the engineers and launch technicians and scientists at NASA, even some agricultural scientists and advisors in the former Soviet Union collective farming administration.
Secondly, there will be those dedicated to the organization itself. Examples are many of the administrators in the education system, many professors of education, many teachers union officials, much of the NASA headquarters staff, etc.
The Iron Law states that in every case the second group will gain and keep control of the organization. It will write the rules, and control promotions within the organization’
I certainly see a lot of good in people trying to work to expand their horizons, understand and listen to other points of view while representing them in the public sphere through the arts, literature, politics and a mission of education. NPR certainly maintains high-standards for journalism and has much broader public support. I like NOVA as much as the next guy.
But all of the public? Which single person or group do you trust to speak for all of the public?
Juan Williams, despite what was going on behind the scenes, seems to have stepped on the NPR mission statement. The ironic thing is he’s still pretty invested in liberalism and the civil rights movement, it’s just that he ran too far afield from NPR’s boundaries, and ran into intolerance and illiberalism, and now he’s making it the central issue of his new book.
Here are his original comments:
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Here was then NPR CEO Vivian Schiller discussing his firing:
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*I’ve always got people telling me I’m too negative and harsh on the one hand, and not critical, negative and harsh enough on the other. You can’t please ’em all.
Taranto details his formative journalistic experience as a college newspaper editor, which eventually blossomed into an ACLU legal battle over the 1st amendment. The culprit: A comic strip published at the UCLA college newspaper (where Taranto didn’t attend, and wasn’t involved in publishing, but became involved with nonetheless).
In that strip, a chicken admitted to having been admitted to UCLA due to affirmative action. The offending chicken roused a few hurt feelings, but also the cries of victimhood and the need for retribution. Shut up, they explained.
This was back in 1989:
‘Our suspension from the Sundial was a disillusioning experience. If you’d asked us before it happened to characterize our political views, we’d have said libertarian. We were on the side of the “left,” we thought, when it came to questions of personal freedom, especially freedom of expression. It turned out the left wasn’t necessarily on our side. Liberals could be shockingly illiberal’
It’s been the operating theory of this blog that Leftism, progressivism, and the secular ‘-isms’ that generally spring from a Left-of-Center political philosophy (multiculturalism, feminism, environmentalism), now firmly part of public opinion and much of mainstream American culture, have not hammered out core philosophical issues surrounding relationships between the individual and collective. There are always new victims to round-up, and new injustices to be found and exploited for political and ideological gain. This ought to make all clear thinking individuals take pause.
The roots of what is fast becoming modern liberalism can be quite illiberal.
Of course, Taranto’s adventure happened in Southern California, where there is much more sentiment for this kind of thinking (it’s produced Ronald Reagan, Andrew Breitbart, and Reason Magazine in opposition). But as Taranto argues, it’s been more widespread in our culture:
‘That, it seems to us, is the central story of our time. The left-liberal elite that attained cultural dominance between the 1960s and the 1980s–and that since 2008 has seen itself as being on the cusp of political dominance as well–is undergoing a crisis of authority, and its defenses are increasingly ferocious and unprincipled’
It’s an important story of our time, no doubt. In my experience, even many old school liberals deep down tend to think people aren’t much good, and are in need of constant supervision. Many tend to promote, or go along with, expanded definitions of the public good, and public institutions, and ever more programs to supervise and make more ‘equal,’ more ‘just,’ and more ‘fair.’ Eventually, they wall themselves off.
On a related note, I don’t know if it’s a law of nature (if it is, I’ve also seen it in every office I’ve been in, but those offices have to answer to the market). Pournelle’s Iron Law of Bureaucracy:
‘Pournelle’s Iron Law of Bureaucracy states that in any bureaucratic organization there will be two kinds of people”:
First, there will be those who are devoted to the goals of the organization. Examples are dedicated classroom teachers in an educational bureaucracy, many of the engineers and launch technicians and scientists at NASA, even some agricultural scientists and advisors in the former Soviet Union collective farming administration.
Secondly, there will be those dedicated to the organization itself. Examples are many of the administrators in the education system, many professors of education, many teachers union officials, much of the NASA headquarters staff, etc.
The Iron Law states that in every case the second group will gain and keep control of the organization. It will write the rules, and control promotions within the organization’
Is our culture becoming like California’s culture?
Our government has grown steadily for decades, yet it functions more poorly and is divided as ever. Do people fight more over the less there is?:
Related On This Site: Mead takes a look at the blue model (the old progressive model) from the ground up in NYC to argue that it’s simply not working. Check out his series at The American Interest.
