Chance or Intention

Our local Sunday paper had an extensive piece on the controversy over whether Intelligent Design is an appropriate topic for science classroom instruction in public schools. The article itself was well-done, but some of the individuals who were quoted in it made what I thought were somewhat misleading statements. The article can be found here and my response to it, which has been submitted to the paper for publication, follows:

The York Sunday News and Laurie Lebo are to be commended for compiling such a thorough and fair treatment of the controversy surrounding Intelligent Design and Darwinian evolution (9/5/04). I would like to say just a couple of things in response to the thoughts expressed by two of the gentlemen who were quoted in the article.

John Staver of Kansas State University argues that ID "requires faith which contradicts the critical thought demanded in science". This statement is very misleading. It implies, first of all, that there is no faith involved in science, which is completely untrue, as will be shown below, and it also implies that ID is based primarily upon faith with no critical thought or empirical component, which is also untrue.

Karl Kleiner of York College is quoted as saying that ID violates the scientific method because no experiment can prove or disprove God's existence. The implication here is that only ideas which can be confirmed by experiment are permissible in science classrooms. This, however, is a pretty stringent rule that no science teacher could possibly follow. If, for example, we wish to limit science to just what can be confirmed by experiment then we need to exclude any discussions of the existence of other universes, string theory, and much of quantum mechanics. If we cannot introduce non-empirical metaphysical assumptions into the science class then we cannot talk about a Grand Unified Theory in physics, the pursuit of which is motivated by an aesthetic preference for "elegance" or simplicity in our explanations. Nor can we examine the superiority of Copernicus' system over Ptolemy's which is based not upon different facts but upon the same preference for simplicity. Likewise, little could be said about cosmology since much about the subject relies upon the metaphysical assumption of uniformity, i.e. that the laws of physics are the same throughout the universe. Nor could we justify the commonplace assumption that every effect has a cause. Indeed, we cannot even talk about the material reality of an external world since our belief in one is an exercise of faith in the reliability of our senses. There appears to be a world independent of our minds, so we believe there is, but it's awfully difficult to demonstrate its existence. Moreover, the scientist's confidence in reason itself is empirically unjustifiable. Any attempt to demonstrate that reason is a reliable guide to knowledge founders on the inherent circularity of trying to reason our way to the reliability of reason. Yet no one objects to any of these metaphysical assumptions and hypotheses being employed in science classes. For some reason it is only when the metaphysics turns toward the possibility of intelligent agency that the defenders of Darwinian orthodoxy become aroused and agitated.

Furthermore, if we are not allowed to affirm the possibility that intelligence is behind the biological phenomena we see under our microscopes then neither should we be able to deny that it is. Yet that is what we tacitly do when we instruct students that natural processes are entirely adequate to explain life's complex and specified patterns, a claim which many students find counterintuitive and at least superficially implausible. We teach our students to assume that there is no need to posit intelligence, but this assumption itself displays another philosophical preference, in this case a preference for materialism.

It's true that no scientific experiment can prove God's existence, but it's also irrelevant. ID theorists aren't trying to prove God's existence. They're trying to show that the biosphere is a highly complex organization of information systems and to investigate whether such information systems could be the product of natural mechanisms alone or whether the best explanation for them must not include intelligence. As even materialists like Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett affirm, biological machines bear the impress of design. The question that arises, then, is what is the nature of the designer? Is the designer blind, purposeless, mechanical nature or is the designer an intelligent, intentional mind? To allow the first answer in our classrooms, but not the second, is an unwarranted and inexcusable act of philosophical prejudice. To suppress the question altogether because it leads us into the realm of metaphysics is hard to justify since so many other metaphysical notions are admitted into science. It is also a repudiation of the fundamental principle of scientific investigation that we should follow the evidence wherever it leads, even if it upsets our most cherished theories.

Professor Kleiner states that science tests theories by trying to prove them false but that advocates of ID are unable to do that. This is not quite correct. First, there are many hypotheses which scientists hold which they do not try to falsify because there is no way to do so. Scientists believe, for example, that life arose from non-life, some scientists believe that there has been, is, or will be, life existing elsewhere in the universe, some believe that life began in a primordial sea, some believe that there is a multitude of other universes, or that our universe somehow brought itself into being, or that mass/energy is infinitely old. None of these theories is even in principle falsifiable, but we don't therefore banish them from science classrooms.

Nevertheless, the claim that ID is not falsifiable is not correct anyway. If scientists ever manage to show how molecular machines like the much celebrated bacterial flagellum could have been produced in a non-teleological (i.e. purposeless) way, through the action of purely non-intelligent processes, then ID would be, if not technically falsified, at least deeply discredited. So far as I know, no one has done this satisfactorily. If it turns out that it can't be done then that would show that the Darwinian's conviction that natural mechanisms are adequate to generate biological complexity is not based on empirical evidence, but is, in fact, an act of faith. Indeed, the fact that many scientists believe that natural processes gave rise to the myriad of bio-molecular machines in any living cell, even though they have no idea how it happened, pretty much refutes Mr. Staver's suggestion above that faith has no place in science.

Professor Kleiner asserts that "evolution doesn't deny the existence of a God. It just doesn't require one". The implication is that Darwinism is neutral with respect to the question of God, but this is misleading. By insisting that the evolutionary process is impersonal, undirected, random, and mechanistic, and by insisting that this process prevails not only in the production of biological diversity but also in the biochemical origins of life, and by insisting that only materialistic processes be permitted in science, Darwinism eliminates any role for God in the universe and makes him irrelevant. For most people there's not much practical difference between an irrelevant God and one which doesn't exist.

Professor Kleiner also expresses the concern that ID could potentially curtail critical thinking and quash scientific curiosity. ID, however, is actually the result of critical thinking and curiosity. What stifles curiosity is institutional and philosophical dogmatism, revealing only one side of a story as though that side were the only side, or declaring to our children that certain kinds of explanations in the pursuit of truth are taboo because they might have religious implications. As William James wrote: "Any rule of thinking that would prevent me from finding a truth, if that truth were really there, is an irrational rule." Any rule which demands that our children not be permitted to hear the case for listing intelligence as among the causes of biological diversity while insisting, as the Darwinian paradigm does, that nature can do the job all by herself, is itself curtailing critical thinking and quashing curiosity.

Finally, Mr. Staver is quoted as saying that ID theorists "want to recast the paradigm of science to include God within it". It would be more precise to say that they want to admit intelligent agency as a possible causal factor in our accounts of the structure of the universe and of living things. Whether that intelligence is the God of traditional monotheism or not is not a question with which ID needs to deal.

Even so, why, if there is evidence to suggest that purely natural processes may not be up to the task of providing an adequate explanation for the phenomena we see in the world around us, should we nevertheless insist that those explanations be the only ones we be permitted to entertain in our science classes? It may be that the evidence that ID theorists cite is not best explained by intelligent agency, but let's at least have that debate. Let's let our children hear the arguments on both sides. To prevent them from seeing and considering the evidence for both sides of the issue is perhaps the surest, most effective way to curtail critical thinking and quash scientific curiosity.

Kerry's Woes

In addition to the double-digit lead Bush now enjoys over Kerry in both the Newsweek and Time Magazine polls and the seven point lead in the Gallup poll, NewsMax.com announces news which suggests that Senator Kerry's troubles with veterans are not yet at the high water mark. In an e-mail alert NewsMax claims that:

A new documentary will soon be released that may do more damage to John Kerry than even the devastating Swift Boat Veterans' ad.

It's called "Stolen Honor" - and remember, you heard it here first.

The documentary, just weeks from release, details what his Vietnam critics say was John Kerry's betrayal of America.

In a description of the new film, the producers explain that "when John Kerry appeared before the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee in the spring of 1971, his testimony sent shock waves throughout America and the world. ... Lt. Kerry's widely televised statements were dramatic and persuasive, made all the more credible by the fact he had been there, said he had witnessed many of these same atrocities."

This comes on the heels of news that the Navy has launched an investigation into his citations. They want to know how the recommendations were written up and by whom.

A couple of years ago an Admiral named Borda committed suicide when he was discovered to be wearing a "V" that he hadn't merited. The same charge has been levelled at Kerry, who, sources have alleged, has a "V" (for valor) with his silver star. The problem is, evidently, that the Navy never gave a "V" with a silver star and so questions, and eyebrows, have been raised in the Pentagon.

For an excellent update on the Kerry campaign's reaction to the Swiftvets go to Captain's Quarters. One of the many interesting points that the Captain makes is that it has become commonplace to hear Kerry supporters refer to the Swiftvets' charges as nothing but lies, and yet not a single one of their charges has been shown to be substantively false. On the other hand Kerry has had to back down on a number of the points in contention. The Kerry strategy seems to be to just call these men liars and maybe the voters will start to ignore them. It's a pretty despicable strategy but these are desparate people. The Captain adds:

The only factual refutations that have occurred so far apply to John Kerry's narrative, not that of the 250-plus Swiftvets with whom he served. So who's lied to the electorate so far? It doesn't appear to be the Swiftvets, which makes the only "egregious" liar in this campaign John Kerry.

Moral and Mental Idiots

Viewpoint has asked where the expressions of soul-searching are in the Muslim community and is gratified to find a particularly good example of it here. It would, however, be a little bit more credible if the writer, Abdel Rahman al-Rashed, were not general manager of the Al-Arabiya News Channel which has not been particularly hostile to the jihadis. Nevertheless, the article sets a salutary example for the rest of the Muslim world. Here are some excerpts from Al-Rashed's column:

It is a certain fact that not all Muslims are terrorists, but it is equally certain, and exceptionally painful, that almost all terrorists are Muslims.

We can't call those who take schoolchildren as hostages our own.

We cannot tolerate in our midst those who abduct journalists, murder civilians, explode buses; we cannot accept them as related to us, whatever the sufferings they claim to justify their criminal deeds. These are the people who have smeared Islam and stained its image.

We cannot clear our names unless we own up to the shameful fact that terrorism has become an Islamic enterprise; an almost exclusive monopoly, implemented by Muslim men and women.

We cannot redeem our extremist youths, who commit all these heinous crimes, without confronting the Sheikhs who thought it ennobling to re-invent themselves as revolutionary ideologues, sending other people's sons and daughters to certain death, while sending their own children to European and American schools and colleges.

The entire piece is worth reading and one hopes it receives a wide audience. It's evidently needed in London where the disease of radical Islam infects simple-minded clerics like Omar Bakri Mohammed. Mohammed, The Sunday Telegraph informs us, supports the targeting of children in terror attacks although he draws fine but ridiculous distinctions, as befits a cleric of the religion of peace. Here are a couple of his observations:

In an interview with The Sunday Telegraph, Mr Mohammed said: "If an Iraqi Muslim carried out an attack like that in Britain, it would be justified because Britain has carried out acts of terrorism in Iraq. The Mujahideen [Chechen rebels] would not have wanted to kill those people, because it is strictly forbidden as a Muslim to deliberately kill women and children. It is the fault of the Russians," he said.

I'm sure this is news to the Israelis whose women and children have been deliberately targeted by pious Muslims for decades now. I'm sure it's news to the survivors of the horror at Beslan who watched their tormentors wire bombs to the basketball rims and laugh at the agonies of their children that this was all a big accident. It must have been an accident, too, that fleeing children were shot in the back. Mr. Mohammed is a moral and mental idiot.

The Telegraph tells us that the cleric made the remarks to promote a "celebratory" conference in London next Saturday to commemorate the third anniversary of the September 11 attacks. Why this man is allowed to walk the streets in London is not clear as of this writing. For that matter, it's not clear that he is any longer walking the streets.

Then we came across this pathetic piece of human detritus who has difficulty taking comfort in the fact that he has found favor with Allah for his participation in the heroic deeds at Beslan.

"Of course I pitied the children, I swear to Allah. I have children myself. I didn't shoot. I swear to Allah," he said. "I don't want to die. I swear to Allah, I want to live."

Anybody feel sorry for him?

Do the Right Thing

Not that the President would ever see, much less heed, Viewpoint's advice, but we think it would be a wonderful thing for him to personally travel to Russia, if there is a memorial service for the slaughtered children of Beslan, and carry with him the sincere and profound sympathies of the American people.

To grieve with them in their devastation, to symbolically wrap our arms around them in a gesture of sympathy and consolation, would not only be the right thing to do, it would bond our two peoples together to an extent that words could never accomplish.

Some have pointed out that Putin is not to be mistaken for a friend of the U.S., that he feels we are partly responsible for Russian weakness and for Islamic antipathy toward Russia itself. This may be nonsense, but be that as it may, a visit from George Bush to identify with the citizens of Beslan in their bereavement would go a long way toward diminishing those kinds of suspicions.

It would be a wonderful expression of compassion and solidarity, and we hope he does it.

Feel free to forward this suggestion to the White House if you agree.

Intelligent Design and the Pursuit of Truth

Stephen Meyer of the Discovery Institute is a philosopher of science who has published a paper on Intelligent Design in the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington. According to The Scientist this provoked Eugenie Scott, the director of the National Center for Science Education, to lament that: "It's too bad the Proceedings published it. The article doesn't fit the type of content of the journal. The bottom line is that this article is substandard science."

The article was peer-reviewed, however, by three reviewers who each hold faculty positions in biological disciplines at prominent universities and research institutions, one at an Ivy League university, one at a major U.S. public university, and another at a major overseas research institute. All found the paper meritorious, warranting publication, according to Richard Sternberg an editor of the Proceedings.

Reaction to the publication of the paper is interesting. Opponents of ID have always been quick to point out that ID theorists have never been able to publish their work in peer-reviewed journals, implying that their work is of poor quality. ID theorists have responded to this charge by arguing that it's very hard to overcome the bias that editors have against any work that challenges the neo-Darwinian orthodoxy. Now a paper has passed muster and rather than welcome the opportunity to engage ideas which may help us move closer to the truth, the Darwinians are in a snit because the journal didn't reject the paper out of hand.

So much for the unfettered pursuit of truth that scientists are supposed to be engaged in.

John Stuart Mill wrote in his masterful work On Liberty, perhaps the finest statement of the advantages of free speech and free inquiry ever written, that when a belief system is protected from criticism and challenge "the creed remains, as it were, outside the mind, incrusting and petrifying it against all other influences addressed to the higher parts of our nature; manifesting its power by not suffering any fresh or living conviction to get in, but itself doing nothing for the mind or heart, except standing sentinel to keep them vacant." Those who are outraged that the Proceedings published Meyer's paper could do worse than spend a couple of hours with On Liberty.

Reflecting on the reaction to his paper, Meyer notes that: "I have received a number of private communications from scientists expressing their agreement or intrigue with the arguments that I develop in my article. Public reaction to the article, however, has been mainly characterized by hysteria, name-calling and personal attack."

Viewpoint wonders if the three peer reviewers have changed their phone numbers yet and if they still even have their jobs. If you're interested in reading Meyer's paper itself go here, but the reader should be aware that it's a technical work.

Dr. Freud, Call Your Office

Viewpoint has long thought that the political left in this country had lost it's sanity and certainly lost whatever class it might ever have had. Three reports from Mark Steyn reinforce the conclusion. The first tells of a play, first published in The Nation, which subjects both George and Laura Bush to withering ridicule. Steyn's description includes this passage:

As the play goes on, however, Mrs. Bush becomes increasingly distressed by the children's deaths - and the brutality of her husband's acts, both in Texas and the White House. She tells the children about her favorite author, Dostoyevsky, and how he narrowly escaped execution. "If my husband had been in charge back then, Dostoyevsky would've been dead for sure," she says. "My husband, he executed everyone they told him to, everyone they let him, I should say, my God, a hundred-and-something people and he never even missed his early, early bedtime, nor for that matter, from what I could see as I sat up reading and rereading Dostoyevsky, ever even stirred in his sleep!"

No doubt this was boffo with the East-Side crowd that was in attendance and for whom serious thinking about moral questions just makes their heads hurt. Admittedly, it's much easier and lots more fun to have one's own superficial judgments reinforced by collectively holding the man who does have to make difficult decisions in derision. Small people have always tried to tear down their betters in order to make themselves feel more important.

The second report was on a Paul Krugman article for the New York Times. Krugman's columns during this election cycle have often bordered on the bizarre and have frequently been well across the border of nasty and vile. This one manages to be both, a not uncommon achievement for Mr. Krugman.

Krugman says he believes the United States needs a "mega-Watergate" scandal to uncover a far-reaching right-wing conspiracy, going back forty years, to gain control of the U.S. government and roll back civil rights....Krugman told the crowd that the president is simply a front man for larger and more sinister forces.

"There's complete continuity going back, really, I think - but this is my next book - you really need to go back to Goldwater. A lot of this has to do with civil rights, and the people who don't like them."...Krugman described the conspiracy as "the coalition between the malefactors of great wealth and the religious right." He offered no further details about who, precisely, is in the conspiracy but said that "substantial chunks of the media are part of this same movement."

"The answer, I think, my great hope now, is that we need an enormous unearthing of the scandals that we know have taken place," Krugman said. "We need a mega-Watergate that rocks them back."

Krugman offers no evidence to support his claims, but of course, even if he did, and someone refuted it, that would only prove that the skeptic is part of the conspiracy and that the conspiracy is too insidiously clever to allow itself to be exposed by evidence. Besides, as among true believers of any stripe, evidence is irrelevant. One knows in one's heart that it's true, and in a post-modern world where truth is subjectively justified that's the only proof one needs. This is all so nutty as to be absolutely hilarious if it weren't impolite to laugh at the tragedy of a man losing his sanity before our very eyes.

The third report is yet another illustration of the coarseness of those on the left who seem to be incapable of engaging in political discourse without wallowing in verbal sewage. The event was called The Big Tent Extravaganza sponsored by Planned Parenthood. It was billed as a celebration of unity between members of both parties who support a woman's right to an abortion. Steyn writes:

Comedian Lewis Black, had a message for GOP delegates who might hold other views. It is un-fu**ing-believable that since the time I was 15 we have been having to argue this sh**," Black said. "There comes a point where you say, f**k you, enough is enough. There is no argument. It's not your body, a**hole. Shut the f**k up."

The lesbian comedian Suzanne Westenhoefer said of religious conservatives, "I support any religion that brings people up. Anything that brings people down, your ass is mine. That's f**king bullsh**." Westenhoefer also described her fundamentalist sister as "a whack-job Christian," and added that "Mormons are whack jobs, too." And she launched into an extended discussion of the actor Mel Gibson and his movie The Passion, saying, "He's a f**king a**hole."

Singer Lou Reed, who played an elegiac song on the death of John F. Kennedy, wore a BUCK FUSH t-shirt. And the crowd wildly cheered criticism of the president and yelled out slogans like "Fox News sucks!" - all standard fare at protest events this week.

These are the sort of individuals who despise Bush and support John Kerry. This fact by itself should tell us almost all we need to know about both men.

Our Sexualized Culture

One can scarcely open the newspapers in this enlightened age without reading about some celebrity being charged with sexual misconduct of one form or another. Kobe Bryant, Mike McGreevy, William Kennedy Smith, Charles Barkley, Mike Tyson, Bill Clinton and perhaps tens of thousands of lesser known figures all share in common that they have been charged with sexual crimes. Perhaps things were always thus, but I doubt it.

Until relatively recently there was a wall, porous perhaps, but a wall nonetheless between men and women. The wall consisted of a complex of psychological, social, and moral inhibitions that served to protect young women from being treated by young men as though they were little more than receptacles for male passion. Today the wall is scarcely more than a speed bump.

Our highly sexualized culture has persuaded many young men that women are just as lascivious and willing as they are. Women have been complicit in this by not insisting that men refrain from sexual expression in their presence, by behaving and dressing provocatively, and by eagerly participating in the sexually relaxed atmosphere of the last three decades and the consequent general coarsening of the culture. Whereas women in previous generations strove to give the impression that they were sexually inaccessible absent an enduring matrimonial commitment, whereas they strove to give the impression, however misleading, that sex was not even something they thought about, today's woman tacitly sends the message in dozens of ways that she is indeed sexually available to the any man who knows how to go about claiming the prize. Celebrities young and old, brimming with the swagger of self-confidence, have no doubt in their minds that such women really want to be won by them, and there's no reason they can think of why they shouldn't possess that which one is convinced wants to be possessed.

Modern society has taken the cookie jar down from an inaccessible shelf, placed it directly under the child's nose, and admonished him with a wink not to take any cookies. If the child finds the temptation irresistible the fault is not entirely his.

In a culture saturated with messages about how eager women are to jump into the sack on the first date, a young man who encounters a woman who is not sufficiently compliant draws the reasonable conclusion that his only problem is that he must be insufficiently forceful. She wants to be taken, he assumes, she wants to be given no choice, it's part of the game.

After all, he knows, if only subliminally, that there are few young men who would not succumb to the seductions of a woman who was insistent, persistent, and forceful. This is especially true of young single men, most of whom would fall like ripe fruit into the hands of any reasonably attractive woman intent on bedding him, so why shouldn't he draw the conclusion that women share the same human vulnerability and yearning? He's heard from feminists and social commentators ever since he was young that in terms of their sexual needs men and women are pretty much the same. Isn't that the message of Sex in the City and countless movies, novels, music videos, and songs?

He's genuinely surprised when the charges are filed to realize that she didn't welcome his advances after all. He'd been totally unprepared by the environment in which he grew up for the possibility that one or two of the cookies in the jar might really be forbidden.

Sexual assault will not soon abate in a culture which treats sex as little more than a form of recreation or as just another appetite to be satisfied no matter how draconian the laws against it might become. Nor will it abate in a relativistic culture which can offer no moral sanction against it. Nor will it subside in a politically correct culture which insists upon throwing young men and women in the midst of hormonal frenzy into close contact with each other in school, in the military, or on the job as if sex were the furthest thing from their minds when in fact it's almost all they're thinking about. Sexual offenses will only diminish when sex is returned to the status of a sacred prerogative of the marriage union and when society rebuilds the wall by teaching young men from childhood on that sex has a moral dimension no matter what confusing and contradictory messages our culture might convey.

Sex needs to be seen as an enjoyment reserved for the culmination of a long period of courtship and commitment. Apart from that commitment it is a distortion and violation of the will of God. Apart from that commitment women will be increasingly victimized by young men who have never been given any serious reason to restrain and discipline their libido.

Imagine If

Let us imagine for a moment that two female Christians blew up a couple of airliners and killed everyone on board. Imagine further that another Christian woman blew herself up in a subway station and killed nine people, that Christians were systematically murdering thousands of black Africans, and that they kidnap a thousand people and slaughter several hundred terrified children. What would the world be saying about Christians? If Christians themselves remained silent, or even if they didn't, would there not be demands from every quarter of the globe to rid ourselves of a religion which motivates and countenances such atrocities? How, people would ask, can anyone accept a faith that justifies such horrors? Christianity and Christians would be justly treated with the contempt and disgust they would so richly deserve.

So why do Muslims get a pass? Why do we think that somehow all this terror, all this killing is aberrational? Why is Islam not held to account for the crimes being committed in its name? If it were Christians who were guilty of such savagery we would be deafened by outraged voices accusing the Faith of being systemically rotten, and those voices would be correct. It was Jesus, after all, who instructed us that the quality of any belief system, like the quality of a life, can be told by the fruit that it bears.

Hundreds of children are put through the darkest hell for three days by incredibly cruel Muslims acting on the conviction that they are doing Allah's will, and what do we hear from the Islamic community? Where is the anger and outrage? Where are the cries from Muslims for repentance, for introspection, for prayer and fasting in the Muslim communities? Where are the anguished pleas from Muslims for forgiveness for a religion which is apparently so deeply sick in its soul? Don't they feel that as co-religionists they share in the guilt of the crimes committed by their brothers and sisters? Christians would, and they would be expected to. Christians are still disparaged for the Inquisition, the Crusades, and the internecine strife in Ireland, and still even now periodically ask forgiveness for offenses committed by our fathers and our brothers. Maybe the anger, outrage, and cries of repentance and pleas for forgiveness are out there, but, if so, they haven't come to our attention.

Meanwhile, while we're waiting, let's have no more post-modern twaddle about the equal moral and spiritual legitimacy of all religions. Let's have no more nonsense about Muslim tolerance, mercy, and peace. Let's not hide from unpleasant realities. Any religion that would permit the atrocities that have occured in Russia to take place in its name without sending mosques all over the world into paroxysms of remorse, self-doubt, and a resolve to eliminate the evil scourge from their midst, is a barbaric, savage creed that has no place in a civilized world. Any religion which accepts the mass murders of terrified children with equanimity, satisfied, evidently, that the will of God is being done is truly Satanic.

Let's Get it Right

One expects distortions and tendentiousness from the secular left because the secular left holds to a pragmatic view of morality. For them whatever works is right and if one has to lie about one's opponent, distort his words, or smear his reputation such acts are justified by the end result of bringing about his defeat. From the Christian left, however, we expect a principled comittment to truth and fairness. Thus we're a little disappointed in the response by evangelical writer Jim Wallis of Sojourners magazine to President Bush's convention speech. Wallis makes a number of claims in his essay which are either unfair, completely mistaken, or simply ludicrous. He opens, for example with this:

After the scurrilous (one could say vicious) attacks on John Kerry by Republican convert Zell Miller at Wednesday night's Republican convention...,

This statement is, in my opinion, completely unsupportable which is why, evidently, Wallis doesn't support it. I challenge Wallis to cite anything in Miller's speech which was scurrilous, let alone vicious. The only way he could honestly see Miller's speech as either of these is if his definition of these words is synonomous with "angry". Miller was indeed angry, but what's wrong with that? Wallis' description implies that MIller was untruthful and slanderous. If Miller was indeed untruthful then Wallis should tell us exactly how he was instead of just letting the charge hang in mid-air. As it is Wallis' statement gratuitously tarnishes a good man and that's inexcusable coming from a representative of the body of Christ.

He goes on:

But what the president failed to deal with was how his central domestic priority, "making permanent" his tax cuts that most benefit the wealthy, will simply not allow such positive government initiatives - because of a lack of resources. Nor did the president acknowledge or take any responsibility for the largest net job loss in any presidential administration since Herbert Hoover; the country's record deficits; the rise in the number of Americans living in poverty in each of the last three years (now one in eight of us); or the one million Americans who have lost their health care insurance each year he has been in office.

Wallis criticizes the president for not issuing a mea culpa in a convention acceptance speech. This is a little silly. And it's more than a little unfair since not only did he not take Kerry to task for not even discussing his senate record in his own nominating speech, he didn't even write a response to Kerry's speech like he did for Bush. In other words, Bush is faulted for not saying everything, and Kerry is given a pass for not saying anything. Even so, Wallis should know that the recession which caused the job losses he mentions began under Clinton and was exacerbated by 9/11, so it's misleading to cite this as though Bush had caused the problem through presidential mis-management.

He goes on to say:

But the visioning of new domestic possibilities was followed by yet another personal attack on John Kerry (as opposed to clear distinctions to his record), attacks that stained this whole convention.

This claim is absolutely baseless. There were no personal attacks on Kerry in the entire convention, at least not in prime time. Not one. Wallis acknowledges that criticism of one's opponent's record is legitimate, so I urge him to provide a single instance of any speaker attacking anything about Kerry other than his record.

Honest comparisons between the candidate's policy proposals and records are, of course, valid in a political campaign, but the Republican Convention went over the top again and again (as Al Sharpton did at the Democratic Convention). The president's most offensive line in that regard was, "If you say the heart and soul of America is found in Hollywood, I'm afraid you are not the candidate of conservative values." Come on. I don't know anybody in America who believes that about Hollywood. (Emphasis ours)

Keep in mind that according to Wallis the Republicans went "over the top again and again". In support of this claim he offers a single example. He cites the most offensive thing the President said about Kerry, and Wallis finds it beyond the pale because he doesn't know anyone who "believes that about Hollywood". The implication here is that the President is just making stuff up about Kerry which would indeed be inexcusable if that's what he were doing. Apparently, though, Wallis hasn't been paying much attention to events in the campaign. Last July, Kerry attended a Hollywood fund raiser at which there were a number of celebrities in attendance and at which Whoopi Goldberg did an obscene "comedy" routine that was degrading to the President. One celebrity after another then rose to add their disparaging remarks to those of Goldberg. Finally Kerry concluded the show by thanking the crowd and making the claim himself that it is among such people that the soul of America resides. Here's the relevant description from CNN's account:

Other entertainers also made disparaging remarks about Bush at the event, but what has Republicans particularly critical of Kerry were his closing remarks in which he thanked them and said they "conveyed the heart and soul of our country."(Emphasis ours)

Wallis' best example of the offensiveness of the Republicans turns out to be an act of quoting Kerry himself. He needs to do his homework before he takes it upon himself to derogate others and he needs to offer a public apology to the President for his slander. I wonder whether Wallis wrote about the offensiveness of Fahrenheit 9/11 or the repugnant rhetoric of Al Gore who has called Bush a liar, a traitor, and a coward. I wonder if he's written about how maliciously over-the-top Ted Kennedy is in accusing Bush of concocting a war just to enrich his corporate buddies.

Maybe he has, and if so, his criticism of Bush for quoting Kerry is merely dumb and uninformed. But if he hasn't, his criticism of Bush is both foolish and hypocritical.

Polls and Debates

This news from Time magazine online reinforces what Viewpoint suggested Thursday night about the creeping sense of fatalism among Kerry supporters:

For the first time since the Presidential race became a two person contest last spring, there is a clear leader, the latest TIME poll shows. If the 2004 election for President were held today, 52% of likely voters surveyed would vote for President George W. Bush, 41% would vote for Democratic nominee John Kerry, and 3% would vote for Ralph Nader, according to a new TIME poll conducted from Aug. 31 to Sept. 2.

Other polls have the race much closer but a double-digit lead has to be giving the Kerry team heartburn. What do they do to reverse it at this point? They have two hopes. They can hope that something bad happens in the war or to the economy, hopes so ignoble that they would never dream of admitting to them, or they can hope that Kerry will devastate Bush in the debates.

This latter hope is realistic, but it shouldn't be. In Viewpoint's opinion presidential debates serve no useful purpose. They are a waste of time and resources in almost any election season but especially in this one. No one who has been paying attention is going to be swayed by what they hear and anyone who hasn't been paying attention to this campaign by now shouldn't vote in November anyway.

Both of this year's candidates have extensive records which are far more reliable predictors of what they would do as president than anything they say in a debate. Moreover, a good debate performance is no indicator at all as to what kind of president a man would be. We don't elect a debater-in-chief, we elect a commander-in-chief. A man may be an excellent debater but a terrible leader.

Presidential debates do not promote the national interest, they only cater to the media's appetite for attention. They give the narcissists in the elite media an opportunity to enhance their own sense of self-importance, but beyond that they accomplish almost nothing other than to provide an opportunity for one candidate or the other to get off a zinger at the expense of his opponent. Certainly they are not sincere attempts to learn the truth about the candidates. They are all about image and style, and scarcely at all about real substance. To get at the substance of a candidate we need only consult his record and the media can display that without the irrelevant trappings of a mano a mano gladiatorial contest.

Almost none of what is memorable from past debates tells us anything of importance about the candidates involved. Richard Nixon had five o'clock shadow. Gerald Ford "liberated" Poland. Reagan admonished Carter, "There you go again". Lloyd Bentson scorched Dan Quayle with, "You're no John Kennedy". George H.W. Bush glanced wearily at his watch. These are the things that the media found infinitely fascinating and worth going to the trouble and expense of having a national debate in order to witness and talk about, but none of them had any relevance at all to the question of whether the candidate deserved our vote.

The only image from any debate that revealed anything of importance to voters was when Al Gore stomped across the stage to hover menacingly above George W. Bush while Bush responded to a question. That bit of buffoonery announced to the world that Gore was a nitwit. Other than that debates have never revealed anything useful.

Even so, the media will insist that we undergo the ordeal so that the 5% of undecided citizens who have been living in a cave somewhere for the last three years can have one last chance to closely scrutinize the candidates. All this flummery for people who don't care, who probably won't vote anyway, and if they do, will doubtless base their vote on which candidate is cutest, is pretty hard to justify.

August Job Numbers

Good news on the economic front. The Labor Department reported today that employers added 144,000 payroll positions in August, and revised job totals for June and July upward by 59,000. Unemployment dropped from 5.5% to 5.4%. Viewpoint joins with Democrats all across the country in welcoming this news.

Media Bullies

Andrew C. McCarthy has a good piece at National Review Online on the Chris Matthews/Zell Miller contretemps the other night. McCarthy unmasks Matthews' motives pretty well.

In the Hardball shows we've seen, Matthews' guests serve the same function as the accused prisoners in the old communist show trials. They're trotted meekly onto the set and prevented by Matthews from saying anything in their defense while he berates them for things they don't believe and never said.

The seventy-two year old Miller, however, didn't sit docilely in the dock absorbing his punishment like he was expected to. He startled Matthews by actually refusing to suffer the harangue, and if the two had been in the same studio Miller probably would have turned the bully's lights out for him.

On the conservative side, Sean Hannity often behaves toward his guests the same way. The two of them ought to be put into a sound-proof room and left to shout over each other until they both pass out from exhaustion.

If you saw the dust-up with Zell you'll enjoy the article.

Reasons of the Heart

Joe Carter over at Evangelical Outpost has an interesting discussion of atheism triggered by the claim made by several of his correspondents that atheism is an epistemological default position, i.e. unless the theist can provide proof that God exists, or at least provide good reasons for believing that He does, the atheist is justified in believing that He does not. In other words, the burden of proof is on the one who affirms an existential proposition, it's on the person who affirms the existence of something.

Since we cannot prove that God exists, and since we cannot offer compelling evidence that He exists, the atheist is justified, he claims, in believing that there is no God and in holding that belief until such time as the theist can offer evidence to the contrary. The problem, as Carter points out, is in deciding what will count as reasonable or satisfactory evidence:

One difference we may have ... is in establishing what reasonable evidence of this entity's existence actually is. I may agree that Rob is a reasonable person and he may extend the same compliment to me. Yet we may still disagree on what is considered to be reasonable evidence in establishing the likely existence of God. Obviously, then, the problem is not with the evidence but with the openness to accepting the proof that is presented.

In the case of entities such as God, whether evidence is reasonable or compelling will often depend on the inner state of the observer's "heart". The individual who wants there to be a God will find certain arguments and evidence more persuasive than will the person who does not want God to exist. That is, the mind will embrace what the heart desires and will reject what the heart disdains. This is what Blaise Pascal had in mind when he said that "the heart has reasons that reasons cannot know."

For example, someone hopeful, but perhaps doubtful, of God's existence might find the plethora of biological information and irreducible complexity in the biological realm much more persuasive of the existence of a transcendent mind than someone who is hostile to the notion that such a being exists. One who would welcome the reality of a Creator might be more inclined to see Aquinas' cosmological argument as plausible even if it's not a proof in the strict sense, whereas one who would not be at all happy with news of God's existence would argue that since it's possible to quibble with one of the premises of the argument he's therefore justified in rejecting the whole thing.

Evidence and arguments are person-relative. We see this in our responses to recent arguments justifying the invasion of Iraq. Many people who are inclined to support the Bush administration found their arguments persuasive. Those who were disinclined to support the current leadership were unconvinced. How one reacts to the facts depends in large measure upon how one feels about what they entail.

The fact that two people can view the same facts and come to different conclusions illustrates that there is a non-logical component to our reasonings, and it is this non-rational aspect of our noetic structure that people are referring to when they talk about Faith. Belief in God is primarily a matter of the heart and secondarily a matter of reason. The person who does not want God to exist will never be persuaded that He does, even "should they see someone return from the dead," as Jesus put it. On the other hand, a person who is open and receptive to God's existence will find ample warrant for believing that He does.

Again, Pascal put it well. He said, "There is enough evidence to convince anyone who is not dead set against it." The corollary to that is that no amount of evidence would convince one who is dead set against it.

The Mouse and the Snake

Wretchard at Belmont Club talks about the recent terror in Russia. He offers this interesting insight into a nation's response to terrorism:

In many ways, the Russian policy is exactly the reverse of the American. They are less squeamish about retaliating but lack the Bush doctrine of creating functioning democracies to replace the chaotic sinkholes of Islamism. To a certain extent, the Russian and French policies are identical. They draw a curtain over the putrefaction fermenting in certain societies, dismissing them as a natural state or in terms of cultural relativism, as situations in which civilization - I use the word consciously - would be ill advised to interfere. But it has become apparent that terrorism is an externality of rotting societies, an effluent, which if unchecked will poison the whole world. No cologne, not even French perfume, will long prevail against it. Civilization cannot hang back but must step forward, if not for love then for survival.

We can either exterminate the Muslims or we can strive to bring them into the civilized world. Leaving them alone is suicide. George Bush, almost alone in the world, believes that we must try to bring them into the civilized world. The rest of the globe, especially the West, wants to essentially spray them with perfume.

When I was in college I kept a black rat snake in a glass aquarium. From time to time I would place a mouse in the enclosure. The mouse went about its business acting as if everything was normal. The snake lay coiled in the corner ignoring the mouse. The mouse, however, was living in denial. It was just a matter of time until the snake grew hungry. Sooner or later I would awake in the morning to find the mouse gone and a lump in the distended abdomen of the snake.

Europe is a mouse which finds a seething, pullulating mass of Arab Muslims living, like the snake, in their proximity. Every now and then the Europeans cast a nervous glance in the direction of the snake, but they live as if they believe that they and the snake can coexist. One day the world will wake up to find Europe gone and the belly of the Muslim world swollen with its corpse.

Europe can either wait like the mouse for this to happen or they can join the United States in trying to bring the democratic values of free elections, freedom of religion, and freedom of speech and ideas to the Muslim world. The alternatives to this course are too awful to contemplate.

Allahu Akbar, or Something

Viewpoint believes that if Satan were human there's a good chance he'd be an Islamic fundamentalist. The news carries the story of the horror in Russia where Islamists are holding hostage several hundred people, half of them terrified children. They've already killed some and threaten to kill more. We may think that adherents of a peaceful, compassionate religion like Islam could never follow through on threats to kill frightened children, but then as infidels doomed to hell we probably can't fathom Allah's inscrutable mercy.

Islamic morality has recently been on display elsewhere as well. In Najaf where Moqtada al-Sadr's holy warriors have recently made temporary peace with the Iraqi National Guard, ING soldiers moved into the buildings that al Sadr's pious disciples had vacated. They found:

"approximately 200 mutilated bodies taken by the Moqtada militia for speaking out against Moqtada al Sadr," said the intelligence report sent to the Pentagon and stamped 'secret.' Some of the prisoners had eyes and ears drilled out and others had their limbs and heads cut off. Some males had genitals cut off and shoved in their mouths. There was evidence of rape to men, women and children," according to the report.

The report continues:

The U.S. intelligence report obtained by The Times states that most of Sheik al-Sadr's recruits were criminals that Saddam released from prison weeks before the March 2003 invasion. The report states, "They slaughtered the innocent people. Most of the al-Mahdi were criminals jailed during the former regime and released by Saddam before his capture."

One wonders why the Iraqis wish to make peace with such savages. Ceasefires and truces only delay the inevitable and allow time for murderers to sacrifice more innocents to the glory of Allah. Najaf and Fallujah will have eventually to be cleansed of the human vermin which terrorize these cities, and Moqtada al Sadr will have to be "martyred", one way or another. To talk of allowing such a man to participate in the government is to spit on the memories of every Coalition soldier who served and died so that Iraqis can enjoy civilized life.

The Iraqi government is only fooling itself if it thinks that by pulling the insurgents' fat out of the fire these thugs will be grateful and loyal. So far from coveting the loyalty of people who commit such crimes, especially against children, government officials have a duty to punish them, and to punish them severely, and if the Iraqis and the Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani need a push in the right direction the Marines should give it to them.

The entire report can be read here.

Twenty Paces, Pistols Drawn

Senator Zel Miller's speech at last night's Republican convention was truly astonishing. A Democrat disgusted with the ideology of the leadership of his party, he has come out in full support of President Bush. He delivered a blistering keynote address at the convention and scalded the Democrat leadership in general, and Senator Kerry in particular with heavy doses of white-hot political rhetoric . How much damage he did to Kerry is impossible to tell at this point, although I suspect that it was not insignificant. Perhaps a more pressing question is how much damage the Georgia senator did to himself. His career in the Senate is coming to a close because he's retiring so his political future is not at issue, but he doubtless made some very serious personal enemies tonight. Maybe the Senator should stay away from Fort Marcey Park for a while.

If you watched the MSNBC Hardball segment after Vice-president Cheney's speech you received a rare treat. Chris Matthews had Senator Miller on and was peppering him with questions about his extraordinary speech earlier in the evening. As he often does with guests, Matthews would ask Miller a question and then interrupt him as he tried to answer. Miller finally got visibly angry with this rudeness and told Matthews that he didn't know why he was submitting to the interview. He also informed the startled host that he wouldn't be bullied like the "young lady" (Michelle Malkin) Matthews had on last week whom he also wouldn't allow speak. Then in frustration the fiery ex-Marine proclaimed that he wished he was in the studio with Matthews and that these were the old days so that he could face him in a duel!

It's not clear that Matthews understood what Miller was saying, but he could tell that Miller was angry with him and he grew considerably more subdued and deferential. He realized that Miller wasn't going to be pushed around like many of his other guests. It's one thing, after all, to browbeat demure young women, it's something else to take on a crusty ex-Marine from Georgia. It was surely one of the most fascinating and entertaining exchanges in the history of cable news television.

The last duel fought by a major political figure was, I think, fought by Andrew Jackson. Maybe Viewpoint should start a movement to get Zell Miller's face on the $20 bill.

Speaking of Hardball and shows like it, one gets the feeling watching and listening to the pundits who tend to lean toward Kerry that a certain fatalism is setting in. It's as if they know in their hearts that they have a deeply flawed candidate and they realize that his flaws will only receive increasing exposure as the campaign wears on. There was not much of a rebuttal to Miller's vigorous criticism of Kerry tonight, as if even the Kerry troopers in the media knew that Miller's indictment was too obviously true. Matthews tried to discredit some of Miller's allegations until he got all but challenged to a fight, much to the delight of the panelists in the studio, but the other lefties on cable had little to say by way of substantive criticism of Miller's performance.

We don't want to make too much of this, but it does seem as if some of these pundits are perhaps beginning to show signs of resigning themselves to four more years of a Bush presidency.

Holy Litigation, Batman!

Senator Edwards, who is playing Robin to John Kerry's Batman this electoral season, is a congressional non-entity who nevertheless has made a fortune extorting vast sums of money from hapless medical practitioners and insurance companies. He has, hearsay has it, almost single-handedly driven ob-gyn practitioners out of the state of North Carolina.

Jean Pearce lays out the history of this man who would, if elected, be a heartbeat from the presidency, and the picture she paints for us is deeply disturbing. Here are some excerpts:

The real story of Edwards' short political career is one of hypocrisy, cheap rip-offs, flip-flops and boneheaded moves. But in the media's version of the story, Edwards is the political prodigy who is going get John Kerry elected president, forgetting that had Kerry not picked him as his running mate last month, the tattered thread by which Edwards' political career had long been hanging would have snapped.

Much of Edwards' career has been based on bashing President George Bush for things that he himself voted for and advocated. Edwards voted for the No Child Left Behind Act in 2001, and then spent the next three years bashing Bush for the law.

"This 'No Child Left Behind'? This President is leaving millions of kids behind every single day," Edwards said at the Baltimore debate in 2003.

Like Kerry, Edwards came out against the war in Iraq after he had voted for it. But Edwards took it a step further. In the fall of 2002, Edwards was one of the most vocal members of Congress on the need to remove Saddam Hussein. In the hours after Bush's famous speech before the U.N., Edwards gave an impassioned oration on the Senate floor, demanding the president take unilateral military action to remove Hussein from power.

Then, just three weeks later, after voting to authorize the war, Edwards trashed Bush for taking unilateral military action in Iraq, referring to Bush's actions in a CBS interview as "gratuitous unilateralism, a determination to act alone for the sake of acting alone."

Edwards voted in 2001 to kill an amendment that would ensure that patients receive the majority of benefits from any new lawsuit allowed in the McCain-Kennedy-Edwards "Patient's Bill of Rights." He also led the fight against a liability exemption for doctors providing pro-bono services and helped kill medical malpractice reform in 2002 and 2003 that would have saved the federal government at least $6 billion in healthcare costs.

Edwards' campaign against the interests of the "little guy" didn't stop there. He also voted to kill a bill in committee that ensured that class action members receive the majority of the benefits of settlements instead of personal injury lawyers. Moreover, in 1999, he voted against a bill to limit lawsuits and damages from potential Y2K computer failures.

Edwards was also the only Democrat missing from debates on asbestos litigation reform. Perhaps that's because the co-finance chairman of Edwards' campaign was Fred Baron, who pioneered the practice of suing companies on behalf of supposed asbestos victims that resulted in the bankruptcy of 67 companies, $57 billion in economic losses and the loss of 60,000 jobs.

There's much more in Pearce's article to give us pause about this candidate. He strikes us as the sort of man that should be treated like a pariah rather than a messiah, but for reasons that Viewpoint finds excruciatingly perverse, millions of Americans will nevertheless vote for him.

It'll be interesting to see how much of Edwards' Senate record and professional history as a legal shake-down artist comes out in the vice-presidential debates. The elite media certainly can't be expected to trouble themselves to inform us about it. They'll be too busy trying to prove the really important stuff like that Bush did too say that we can't win the war on terror and searching under every rock to show some tenuous connection between Bush and the Swiftees. No wonder they're becoming increasingly irrelevant.

Meanwhile Viewpoint will be spending the evening reassessing the confidence we had placed in John O'Neill's judgment and integrity. O'Neill, the reader will recall, is the author of the Kerry expose Unfit For Command. There's nothing in the book which calls O'Neill's judgment into question, but he did make the statement a couple of weeks ago, while trying to explain that he was not working on behalf of Bush or the Republicans, that he would have indeed voted for John Edwards for president had he won his party's nomination.

We're flabbergasted.

Another New Blog

Here's another new blog that's just starting up. It's being managed by a couple of former students of mine, and I'll let them tell about it in their own words:

Dear Cleary Brothers,

After reading your weblog and linking it to my good friend D.W., both he and I were inspired by your commitment to providing a forum for expressing opinion. We decided to enter into a joint venture for our own weblog with commentary on culture, arts, and politics. While we can never pretend to have our site anywhere near the quality of yours, we're still quite proud of the work we've completed so far.

Our first article is up. The article process for our blog is unique. One of us drafts an article. It is then revised to include the voice of the other author. After two more revisions, the article is ready for publication.

Later this week we'll introduce our first political opinion, expressing our views on how the Republican Convention played out.

Hopefully you can take a look at our blog and find something to enjoy in it, much like we've found inspiration in your blog. Plus, a little publicity on your high-traffic site just might get us up and running a little faster!

Sincerely,

D.T.

Pay them a visit and wish them luck.

The Twilight of Atheism

Evangelical Outpost brings word that one of the most famous contemporary atheistic philosophers, Antony Flew, is apparently moving away from atheism toward some sort of deism.

Joe Carter explains the significance of the move:

So why does it matter that a retired philosopher is abandoning atheism for a Spinozian deism? The main reason is that few philosophers have thought longer or harder about atheism than Flew. When someone of his stature gives up the "faith" then it appears that we truly have entered what Alister McGrath refers to as "the twilight of atheism."

One shouldn't make too much of a single instance of a repudiation of atheism, if that's indeed what Flew is doing, but perhaps it isn't premature to suggest that naturalism, the view that nature is all there is, is in the early stages of terminal exhaustion. There are many atheists who will never give up the cause, of course, but there seem to be many others who are coming to realize that any view of life that leads to moral, epistemological, and metaphysical nihilism (see here, for example) is left with very little to commend it. When adherents of that same view find that it is also unable to offer a plausible explanation for the astonishing fine tuning of the universe, or a compelling explanation for the ubiquity on this planet of biological information, or any explanation at all for the existence of consciousness, they tend to become intellectually and spiritually restless.

Few people actually want to believe the things one is logically compelled to believe if he is an atheist, which is why most atheists don't follow their atheism to its logical conclusions. Some are beginning to realize, evidently, that there is something amiss with a worldview whose entailments are so repugnant to the human spirit. They're saying, like Flew, that we can no longer remain bound to the shibboleths of the nineteenth century but rather we need to go wherever the argument leads. For some (who knows how many) the argument is leading away from the sterile, arid deserts of naturalism to something brighter, richer, and more fertile.

It'll be interesting to trace this cultural development throughout the coming years. It may amount to nothing much, but on the other hand it may well presage a spiritual revolution.

Ninth Installment of Good News From Iraq

Don't miss Arthur Chrenkoff's ninth installment of Good News From Iraq. There's much cause for concern, of course, but much more cause for satisfaction and even rejoicing. When one reads what the United States is doing to bring the Iraqi people into the modern world it really does make one proud to be an American.

Bush's opponents want to challenge his foreign policy. They want to hammer him with the question "What have you actually accomplished in your four years as president?" This seems to me to be the most myopic of questions. George Bush has in three years liberated 50 million people from oppression and tyranny, and has perhaps eased the oppression on millions more through the subsequent ripple effect of his toughness. No president in history has accomplished more good for more people in the face of more criticism, except perhaps Ronald Reagan whose campaign against Soviet tyranny eventually resulted in several hundred million people being freed from the nightmare of communist totalitarianism.

If Bush hadn't gone to war in Afghanistan millions of people would still be groaning under the horribly cruel oppression of the Taliban, millions of women would still be treated like chattel, and terrorists would still have safe haven there. If he hadn't taken us to war in Iraq, the sanctions would still be in effect, and tens of thousands of Iraqis would be suffering the deprivations imposed by Saddam's misuse of the resources Iraq received under those sanctions. Tens of thousands more would have been tortured and/or murdered in the past year, and millions more would still be living in abject fear and crushing poverty.

History will show Bush's initiatives in Afghanistan and Iraq to be an unprecedented humanitarian endeavor, and as Rudy Guiliani said in his speech tonight at the Republican convention, whatever happens in the November election, George Bush has established himself as a truly great president. He has used American power and wealth to accomplish an amazing amount of good in that part of the world.

Now comes a television ad that criticizes Bush for spending too much of our resources on the Iraqis. This is certainly a strange criticism for the left to make. We have so much in this country and the Iraqis have so little, yet these putative champions of the poor and downtrodden are complaining because Bush is spending too much on them and not enough on us. With friends like these the world's poor need no more enemies.

The New Soldier

The controversial book compiled by John Kerry in the early seventies and which has subsequently almost disappeared from libraries and book stores can be read here. The book is called The New Soldier and is strongly anti-war. This in itself is unexceptional, but there are some things in the book which Senator Kerry apparently would rather not have publicized during the present election.

Chief among these, in our view, is his 1971 Senate testimony wherein he calls the Vietnam war "the biggest nothing in history." He also avers that "there is nothing in South Vietnam which could happen that realistically threatens the United States of America. And to attempt to justify the loss of one American life in Vietnam, Cambodia or Laos by linking such loss to the preservation of freedom...is to us the height of criminal hypocrisy."

Now these were, and are, legitimate opinions which good people may debate, but the problem they present for Kerry is that he has stated repeatedly throughout the current campaign that he "fought to defend this country as a young man," but, as the above quotes make plain, as a young man he evidently didn't see what he was doing as in any sense fighting for America. Quite the contrary.

His insistence now that his military service then was rendered for the defense of his country strikes us as patently false. The possibility that he is telling the truth, both then and now, about his convictions doesn't seem even remotely realistic unless the law of non-contradiction has somehow been suspended. Taken together with all of his other statements about his service which have come under question in recent weeks, some of which he himself has recently recanted, the picture we're getting of Senator Kerry is that of a man who is either delusional, grossly dishonest, or seriously confused. It doesn't much matter which it is, he's not presidential timber.

In the Absence of God

A couple of days ago Viewpoint posted a piece titled The Devil's Chaplain about Richard Dawkins, the well-known British biologist and anti-theist. Dawkins, we pointed out, finds it difficult, if not impossible, to live consistently with his atheism, denying the existence of God but living his political life as if there really were a transcendent moral law-giver.

I once heard someone say that the only real difference between a theist and an atheist is that the theist gets up and goes to church on Sunday whereas the atheist sleeps in. The remark was meant to be taken only half-seriously but the tongue-in-cheek delivery masked an attitude that is not uncommon among atheists. The feeling is that the benefits of theism are either bogus (e.g. eternal life) or that they (e.g. morality) can be had by the atheist without all the strictures of religious dogma. The Dawkins piece shows, I think, that this is deeply mistaken.

Whether there is a God or not is not some minor question, like whether there is a tenth planet at the edge of the solar system, which really makes no practical difference in our lives. The question of God's existence has the most far-reaching ramifications, not just for eternity, but for this life here and now, of any question we could possibly encounter in life. It makes an immeasurable difference whether God exists or not. To understand why, consider the logical implications of assuming that he does not exist.

First, let's stipulate that the world is, to borrow a term from the existentialist vernacular, absurd. That is to say that the world as it is is incompatible with man as he is. Both the theist and atheist can agree on this. Each of us is a complex bundle of yearnings and needs all of which must go unfulfilled and unsatisfied in a world without God. It is only if there is a God that the problem posed by the world's absurdity can ultimately be resolved.

Consider ten reasons why this is true:

1)As human beings we long to ground morality in something more solid than our own subjective preferences, but in the absence of God there is nothing else. Morality is whatever feels right to the individual. This leads to a might makes right egoism, either on the level of the individual or at the level of the state. In either case, whatever the individual does is not morally right or wrong; it just is. Likewise, whatever the state does is not morally right or wrong, even if it commits torture or genocide, it just is. In other words, in the absence of God morality is either arbitrary and subjective, or it doesn't exist at all.

2)As human beings we seek to base our notion of human rights in something beyond our own prejudices, but in the absence of God there is nothing to sustain those rights. We have the right to life and liberty because we are the children of the Creator of the universe and He has invested those rights in us. If there is no creator then there are no human rights, just arbitrary rules some people agree to follow but which could easily be revoked since they're merely words on paper.

3)As human beings we have a deep longing for justice. We want to see good rewarded and evil punished. Our hearts break when evil appears to triumph over good, but it's the common human experience that many good people live lives of terrible fear, pain and grief, and then they die. Meanwhile, many who were the cause of that suffering die peacefully and content after a long life of pleasure. In the absence of God there is no ultimate justice. Everybody dies in the end, and there's no reward or punishment, just nothingness.

4)As human beings we strongly desire union with our loved ones. The more we love someone the more closely we wish to be united with that person on every level of our being. Yet we are alienated, separated from them. No matter how close we are we can never achieve that complete oneness we desire. The other is always "other". This alienation holds not only in our relationships with other people but also in our love for the earth and the realm of nature. In nature we are always an outsider. We are foreign, alien, no matter how much we might long for it to be otherwise. In the absence of God, it will always be thus until the day of our death.

5)As human beings we want answers to life's deepest, most perplexing questions, but in the absence of God there are no answers, there's no certainty about anything that matters, except that we'll eventually die. We shout the "why" questions of human existence at the vast void of the cosmos - why am I here, why do we suffer, why do we want from life what we can't have - but there's no reply, only silence.

6)As human beings we crave meaning and purpose for our lives. We can't bear living a life we know to be pointless and insignificant, but death nullifies everything and renders it nugatory. In the absence of God there is no purpose or value to anything we do. Some day the earth will burn up in a solar explosion and there'll be not a trace that humans once existed. What will all of our striving matter then? Everything we do is just a footprint in the sand at the edge of the surf of space-time. Eventually all trace of our lives will be washed away as though we were never here.

7)As human beings we long for peace, but throughout the history of mankind there's been nothing but conflict - conflict between individuals and conflict between nations. When the Berlin wall fell some thought conflict was at an end. There would be no more war, hot or cold. Few foresaw the rise of Islamo-fascism and the beginning of the modern struggle to convert the entire world to Islam. This struggle will last until either radical Islam dies out or Christianity, and every Christian, is dead. In the absence of God there is little basis for hope that someday there will be a lasting peace in the world.

8)As human beings we need a sense of dignity, but modern science tells us that we are little more than flesh and bone machines. There is no soul, there is nothing about us that makes us much different than any other mammal. We are more intelligent, of course, but that only makes the difference between us and a cow about the same as the difference between a cow and a trout. In the absence of God there's no reason why someone who has the power should not use it to manipulate and exploit us like the farmer exploits his cattle for his own purposes, slaughtering them when he can profit from doing so. The universe tells us we're nothing but "dust in the wind" and there's no dignity in that.

9)As human beings we yearn to live and yet we know we're going to die. In the absence of God, the fate of each of us is annihilation. There's no basis for hope that loved ones we've lost still somehow exist or that we'll ever see them again. There's no consolation for the bereaved, no salve for grief. Many face this bravely, of course, but, if they're reflective, their bravery must serve to mask an inner despair.

10)As human beings we all strive for happiness. In the absence of God it's perhaps the only thing about life that makes it endurable. Yet happiness is elusive. The world is full of misery. Even if our own lives are free of the afflictions which plague most of those who've ever been born on this planet we're confronted with the irony that we can only be happy ourselves if we cease to care about others. It is at best unseemly, in the shadow of the awful anguish, pain, sorrow, tragedy, and other misfortunes which routinely occur in our communities to declare that "even so, I'm happy". To care about others is to identify with them in their suffering, and it's hard to imagine how an empathetic person can be happy in a world of so much sadness. The paradox is that in the absence of God the only person who can achieve happiness is the person who can shut out the cries of his neighbor and turn inward upon himself.

If the theist is correct, however, then all of this changes. We can find happiness in knowing that the tragic condition of the world and of our lives is only temporary, that death is not the end and that a beautiful future lies ahead. If God exists then we can assume that He made us for a reason, that there is, therefore, a purpose to existence and that we have dignity and inalienable rights as human beings because we are made in the image of God and loved by Him. If God exists then there is a transcendent moral authority which will ultimately mete out justice and who provides us in this life an objective standard upon which to base moral judgment. If God exists there is a basis for hope.

The atheist, if he's consistent with his assumption that there is no God, finds himself in a world which is completely at odds in almost every important way with the structure of his own psyche. He finds himself inexplicably out of synch with his world. He is alone, forlorn, abandoned in an empty, unfeeling universe that offers no solace nor hope that there might be meaning, morality, justice, dignity, peace, and solutions to the riddles of existence. The atheist lives without hope that any of the most profound yearnings of our hearts and minds can ever be fulfilled.

It's possible of course, that he is correct, that this is just the way things are, and we should simply make the best of a very bad situation. It's possible, but surely the atheist should hope that he's mistaken. It's incomprehensible that some, like philosopher Thomas Nagel, for instance, actually hope that there is no God. This is tantamount to hoping, bizarrely enough, that life really is a meaningless, senseless, absurd joke. Nagel says in his book The Last Word:

"I want atheism to be true and am made uneasy by the fact that some of the most intelligent and well-informed people I know are religious believers. It isn't just that I don't believe in God and, naturally, hope that I'm right in my belief. It's that I hope there is no God! I don't want there to be a God; I don't want the universe to be like that."

Nagel's ability to see his motivations clearly is uncommon, but his honesty and insight are little compensation for the profound sadness one feels at what he finds in his own heart. How anyone can actually want the universe to be the sort of place where meaning, morality, justice and all the rest are vain illusions, is very difficult to understand.

Government Trust Part II

My last post was totally influenced by my outrage of the statements from the Chairman of the Federal Reserve regarding Social Security and Medicare and I failed to follow through with an alternative recommendation or solution. Business 101 tells us if you declare a problem, you should offer a solution.

With that in mind, let's get one thing clear. The government has no business tinkering with things in the social arena. All you have to do to understand the previous statement is to look at the Social Security debacle. And if you can't see that clearly, then ask yourself why all members of the United States Congress don't pay into Social Security. In fact, they have their own plan that, upon retirement, pays them 100% of their salaries with complete health benefits after they retire. You, the tax payer pick up the tab. Isn't that nice?

Meanwhile, it is those very same congressmen that have robbed the funds from the Social Security program to pay for other programs and replaced them with I.O.U.s And now we're being told that the program will have to be "recalibrated".

All ranting aside, there can be no way any thinking person can believe that the Social Security program should ever have existed. It's a classical example of socialism gone wrong. It has sucked earnings from hard working Americans through their entire working lifetime and given it to others. Now when those very same Americans are coming to the time when they will need to rely on those same benefits, they will be told "Sorry, the system has been "recalibrated" and you can't collect for another 5, 10, or 20 years." Where is the outrage?!

The Bush plan to privatize Social Security is a non-starter. Redirecting contributions into the stock market will only enrich the brokerage firms of Wall Street and distort the markets in the process. More importantly, it fails to address the issue that the government has no right to take these funds from Americans in the first place. Why won't they give Americans the freedom to invest for their own future?

I see only one possible solution to the problem. First, the government must realize that they aren't in the "social" business. (Extremely unlikely given the almighty vote.) Next, they need to commit to grandfather the program out of existence. For example, if you are 60 years old, you get 90% of the benefits. If your 55 years old you get 75% of the benefits. And if you are 16 and are working your first job you pay nothing because you'll get nothing..

The problem is that, as I understand it, the system is truly broke in that it has only I.O.U.s from the government so the above plan simply can't be implemented. I'd like to offer a solution but, in fact, there is none.

In closing, I maintain you have been lied to by your government. Your only recourse is to:

1. Forget about the government taking care of you. It won't, it can't, and in my opinion, it shouldn't even try.
2. Get out of debt as soon as possible. Debt is slavery and the sooner you are out of it the sooner you are free.
3. Hedge against the government's proclivity to devalue the dollar through inflation by acquiring assets that have demonstrated an ability to maintain true value independently of the dollar.

Good luck.

Karma Chameleon 2004

The current campaign offers some fascinating irony. In order to get George Bush out of office, the left will abandon its principles and vote in overwhelming numbers for a man who has admitted to being a war criminal but who is running as a war hero. This might be a little understandable if he had at some point repented of his crimes and/or repudiated his war service, but Senator Kerry has actually done neither of these. In fact, when asked about how he would have handled the current situation in Iraq the only discernable distinction he offers between what he would have done and what George Bush actually did was to try a little harder to get France and Germany to help us.

The irony is especially acute when we consider the circumstance of the Christian left which is largely pacifistic and for whom morality, particularly concerning life issues, plays a significant role in forming political judgments. Not only does it turn out that Senator Kerry offers these people scant hope on the war questions, he is also very strongly in favor of abortion rights and embryonic stem cell research. He is ambiguous on capital punishment, as on most issues, and has repeatedly shown himself willing to say whatever he thinks his audience wants to hear on almost every matter he discusses. His performance at the DNC was the paradigmatic example of this, as he stood at the podium and all but sang the lyric from Boy George's Karma Chameleon:

"I'm a man without conviction, I'm a man who doesn't know, how to tell a contradiction, I come and go, I come and go."

Nevertheless, many Christian leftists, pacifists, and "seamless garment" advocates, rather than hold firm to their principles and abstain from voting for either presidential candidate, will, it seems, abandon those principles and vote for a man who opposes almost everything they claim to stand for, or who is at best unclear and unreliable about those issues the Christian left holds dear. If they do endorse and/or vote for Senator Kerry, however, they will lose, perhaps for decades, whatever moral credibility and authority they presently possess.

Government Trust

I don't post on the main page of viewpoint regularly as I feel I don't have that much to say that others would be interested in reading but recent developments have occurred that compel me to speak out.

Specifically, the Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Dr. Alan Greenspan, believes it's time, once again, to declare the need to "trim" the social security and medicare benefits for the baby boomer generation. See: Yahoo news

From the link above: "Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said Friday the country will face "abrupt and painful" choices unless Congress acts quickly to trim Social Security and Medicare benefits for the baby boom generation. He said the government has promised more than it can deliver."

The full text of the Chairman's speech can be read at:

Greenspan speach

Notable statements from the link above are:

"Early initiatives to address the economic effects of baby-boom retirements could smooth the transition to a new balance between workers and retirees. As a nation, we owe it to our retirees to promise only the benefits that can be delivered. If we have promised more than our economy has the ability to deliver to retirees without unduly diminishing real income gains of workers, as I fear we may have, we must recalibrate our public programs so that pending retirees have time to adjust through other channels. If we delay, the adjustments could be abrupt and painful. Because curbing benefits once bestowed has proved so difficult in the past, fiscal policymakers must be especially vigilant to create new benefits only when their sustainability under the most adverse projections is virtually ensured."

I particularly like the statements "Early initiatives" which translates into "the sooner we screw these people, the better off we'll be". As well as the statement: "we must recalibrate our public programs". He doesn't mention the fact that, for all their lives, people have paid into these programs, yet, by somebody's decree, the programs will be "recalibrated".

And this statement:

Aside from the comparatively lesser depth of required adjustment, our open labor markets should respond more easily to the changing needs and abilities of our population; our capital markets should allow for the creation and rapid adoption of new labor-saving technologies, and our open society should be receptive to immigrants. These supports should help us adjust to the inexorabilities of an aging population. Nonetheless, tough policy choices lie ahead.

And here's another subtle message: "and our open society should be receptive to immigrants". So we, as a nation, are going to rely on immigrants to bail us out simply because our government has mismanaged the programs to which all of the American citizens have contributed during their entire working lives. And I can't help but wonder why we need immigrants with thousands of Americans out of work.

Juxtaposed with this latest development is this article from Steven Roach of Morgan Stanley. From the link:

Saving is the sustenance of long-term growth for any economy. And yet America is lacking in saving as never before. It has finessed that shortfall by consuming the wealth generated by asset appreciation and by drawing heavily on the world's pool of surplus saving. In my view, there is nothing stable about this arrangement. In fact, there is a growing risk that America's saving shortfall will only intensify in the years ahead -- especially given Washington's total lack of fiscal integrity. As always, the flows will give the impression that this outcome is sustainable. In the end, nothing could be further from the truth.

So, it looks like we, as a nation, have no savings to speak of and, at the same time, Chairman Greenspan is declaring that congress pull the benefits rug out from under the baby boomer generation. Katy...bar the door!

What cracks me up about Chairman Greenspan's statements is that there is no mention of dealing with the current and future payments being made by the baby boomer generation. Only the reduction of the benefits they will receive for their contributions by, perhaps raising the eligibility age to 70 or 80 or 100. In other words, you will be expected to pay into the system until you drop dead.

Ironically, it looks like we are about to revert to an earlier time of self sufficiency when people took responsibility for their own welfare although we'll still be paying the taxes into a system that will probably never provide a return on our investment. This seems to make any discussion of government social programs moot, I would say.

New Philosophy Blog

A former student has a new blog for those who are interested in philosophy. You can access it here. It looks good and he has some interesting posts up. Caution: It's not for the philosophically unserious.

What's He Hiding?

Why, if Senator Kerry is telling the truth about his Vietnam service and has nothing to hide from the voters, will he not permit the reprinting of his book The New Soldier which is so hard to obtain that the single copy available on Amazon is selling for almost $2500? Why will he not sign a form to release his medical records which would help to settle the questions surrounding the awarding of his Purple Hearts? And why will he not permit release of the journal used by Douglas Brinkley in writing his book on Kerry, titled Tour of Duty?

The Democrats demanded that George Bush release his records from his National Guard service and he promptly complied. John Kerry told Tim Russert on Face the Nation that he had indeed released all of his records, but it turned out that he had released only a few pages of a much more copious account.

What other presidential candidate in the history of our nation has ever written a book whose contents he has subsequently done whatever he could to prevent people from seeing? If Kerry wants to repudiate the book now, fine. He should let us see it and then tell us why he no longer holds the positions and sentiments found in it.

What sense does it make to tout one's military service as the central qualification for serving one's country as president and then, when that record is called into question, refuse to make available the very records and journals which would silence the critics?

His refusal to allow the voters to see these documents is inexplicable unless he really is trying to hide something.

Demagoguing Stem Cell Research

The stem cell debate has been demogogued by the Democrats since before their convention, but John Leo puts his finger on exactly what is wrong with the way the left is addressing this issue. Leo writes:

John Kerry has repeatedly spoken of President Bush's "ban" on stem cell research. Kerry knows very well it isn't a "ban" or that Bush isn't "shutting down" research. But "ban" is a powerfully emotional word. It has more impact on swing voters than "allowing private research, but not using taxpayer money for work on stem cell lines derived after Aug. 9, 2001."

The fact is that stem cell research is swimming in readily available funds. With luck, the elite press corps will discover this some time in October, and maybe even ask Kerry about it. The federal government is providing $24.8 million in research funds, which is $24.8 million more than President Clinton offered. Money is pouring in from state governments, universities and pharmaceutical companies. If Kerry thinks this financial gusher still amounts to a ban, maybe he could get the Heinz Foundation or George Soros to pitch in.

Kerry spins the stem cell issue by saying, "Here in America, we don't sacrifice science for ideology." This is a line he has been using for weeks. It delivers two messages, both false: (1) there is no legitimate moral issue here (though plenty of bioethicists and plenty of Kerry supporters think there is); and therefore (2) this is a one-sided issue, pitting enlightened people against backward ideological types.

The lobby for embryonic stem cell funding is deeply dishonest. It involves a "ban" that isn't a ban, a claim of cures "right on our fingertips" (John Kerry) that falsely implies an early cure for Alzheimer's, and a discounting of promising stem cell research that doesn't involve the creation and destruction of embryos (cells from adult bone marrow, teeth and umbilical cords). Kerry and the Democrats have a case to make. They just don't want to make it honestly.

Why is it that the left seems unable to debate this issue or almost any other without distorting the facts? It's as if they believe that unless they twist the truth or mask it altogether they'd be unable to persuade anyone to vote for them. Well, maybe they're onto something.

Leo's column makes several other points about this debate which are very much worth reading.

Does Offshoring Create U.S.Jobs?

No Left Turns links us to an article that discusses a study commissioned in California on the economic impact of exporting jobs offshore. The counter-intuitive conclusions are that offshoring not only is good for the economy but it also creates more jobs than it costs. An excerpt:

How can offshoring preserve jobs? Consider the case of a company that's increasingly beset by foreign competition and can no longer turn a profit. Its choice might be to close down - taking all its jobs with it - or farm out some of its tasks to overseas workers, thus preserving the remaining positions.

"By sacrificing a small proportion of the jobs offered by the company, the other jobs remain," the paper said.

That's not all. The researchers also suggest that offshoring can even create new American jobs.

Companies looking to invest money in expansion base their decision on the projected rate of return. If, by offshoring some jobs those companies can earn a higher return, they are more likely to go ahead with the investment, which then will create more jobs at home.

That's not just economic theory. The numbers in the real world support this view. Between 1991 and 2001, wrote Haveman and Shatz, U.S. firms that expanded their employment abroad also increased their domestic employment by 5.5 million workers. Their share of overall U.S. employment also increased during this period.

This is interesting, but whether it's true or not I have no way to judge. Read the whole article and decide for yourself.

The Political Neutron Star

Senator Kerry's campaign may be beginning to deflate. A week ago Kerry was ahead in almost all the polls. Some of his leads were within the margin of error, but nevertheless, he was ahead. Now the situation is reversed. Bush seems to be moving out in almost every poll, and, with the Republican convention looming and more Swiftvet ads on the way, the likelihood is that his lead will continue to expand.

The latest national polls show the following:

NBC News/Wall St. Journal: Bush - 47; Kerry - 45; Nader - 3

Gallup: Bush - 50; Kerry - 47

Fox News: Kerry - 45; Bush - 44

LA Times: Bush - 49; Kerry - 46

The really bad news for Kerry is in the polling data from the battleground states. Kerry was ahead in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Florida coming out of the convention. He's now behind (though within the margin of error)in each of these states according to the LA Times' polls.

There are still some 65 days until the election and a lot can yet happen. The debates may be decisive. Even so, it appears that Bush has the "Mo", at least for now.

What can the Democrats do to get it back? The most effective way, assuming there's no drastic change in either the economy or Iraq is to try to attach Bush to some scandal or in some other way tarnish his image with the voters. They've been doing this for almost a year, of course, with uncertain results, but liberals tend to believe that if slime isn't sticking it's because you're not throwing it hard enough. No doubt the Democrats will get increasingly more personal in their attack ads and in the media. The liberals on television and in the print media will become increasingly more unrestrained, strident, and partisan. Whether it will work or not is anyone's guess.

The danger for the Democrats is that, like a collapsing star, the implosion will accelerate with time, and a point will ultimately be reached where it becomes impossible to reverse it. A dying star will sometimes compress into a super dense residue spinning wildly in space. These remnants of once brilliant stars are reduced to superdense masses called neutron stars which emit no light, just toxic emanations like gamma rays.

So it may turn out to be with the once brilliant promise of the Senator from Massachusetts. Perhaps ultimately all that will remain of the Kerry campaign will be a solid residue of bitter, hate-driven supporters, spewing a dark, toxic hatefulness, spinning lifelessly in a political void.

Check out RealClear Politics for more specifics on the latest polls.