A man of prodigious fortune, coming to add his opinion to some light discussion that was going on casually at his table, began precisely thus: "It can only be a liar or an ignoramus who will say otherwise than," and so on. Pursue that philosophical point, dagger in hand.

--Michel de Montaigne, Of the art of discussion.



Stab back: cmnewman99-at-yahoo.com


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WAIT, THERE'S MORE: And here's a post from the Corner. I for one will be running out to the bookstore at lunch to pick up this issue of Commentary.

Update: Commentary is hard to find on newsstands, unfortunately. But October is now online. They'll charge you $2 to read Caldwell's article on l'affaire Fallaci. It's well worth it.
posted by CMN at 10:08 AM
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MORE FALLACI NEWS:This site has a nice introduction that summarizes the reactions to Fallaci's book thus far. The linked commentaries are all in Italian, though. (No, I don't have time to translate them. I don't even have time to be writing this.) The following news is rather exciting:

For the American edition Oriana Fallaci has personally translated into English the Italian text and added several pages, also concerning the United States.

This is great, but I hope she's collaborating with a native speaker on the translation. There's a section in the Italian edition addressed to Blair where she writes in her own words in English. It's alright, but she definitely doesn't have the same mastery of English she does of Italian.


posted by CMN at 10:06 AM
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Here's a review of Fallaci's book by Santo L. Aricò, the author of a book about her that I have but haven't read yet. It's more of a synopsis than a review really, focusing (as does his book) on the construction of her persona rather than engaging critically with the content of her message.
posted by CMN at 8:32 PM
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"If you don't cooperate with us," Higazy recalled the agent saying, "the FBI will make your brother upstate live under scrutiny and will make sure Egyptian security gives your family hell."

Remember Bush telling the UN how in Iraq, "[t]ens of thousands of . . . ordinary citizens have been subjected to arbitrary arrest and imprisonment"? Go read this story and tell me exactly how we can take the high moral ground on that charge. Fine, it's not "tens of thousands." And no, we don't use summary execution or physical torture. No, Ashcroft is not "equivalent" to Saddam, either in motive or method. But damnit, the very fact I have to sit here and make these distinctions in order to stave off an objective judgment of American hypocrisy pisses me off! If you're going to publicly denounce a tyrant and urge military action against him, it behooves you to make sure that the distinction between your behavior and the acts you accuse him of is clear as a matter of principle, not just of degree. And when our agents are stooping to the level of threatening someone's family, there ain't a whole lot of degree left in my book. Mind you, I'm not against this kind of treatment--or worse--against people we know to be terrorists. Ramzi Binalshibh? The guy who was bragging about 9/11 on Al-Jazeera? Fine. Take him to a nice little suite in Yemen and break out the pliers and blow torches. But a freakin' exchange student? (One who actually goes to class, even.) Against whom all you have is a suspicion that he might possibly own a radio? Welcome to America, home of the free. By the way, you'd better sign this confession or we'll see to it that your mom gets a visit from the gestapo.

And even apart from these niceties of principle, how do these rights violations even help make us safer? We desperately need the intelligence and cooperation of our residents and citizens who have ties to the countries and communities from which these threats have emerged. But what person in their right mind would come forward voluntarily to report suspicion at the likely cost of indefinite incarceration? We should be thanking such people, making them media heroes. Not costing them their livelihoods. Damnit, this pisses me off.

Look, I know the feds are trying to prevent another 9/11. I know they have to make a lot of judgment calls and choices between lesser evils that are easy for someone like me to sit here and second-guess without any responsibility for what might happen if they screw up. That's why we need principles. That's why we need rules of law that bind even--no, particularly--the people who we send out there to do the dangerous and dirty work of chasing the bad guys. Of course in the heat of the moment the chance of preventing a catastrophe is going to feel like it outweighs the importance of following the pesky technicalities. But ultimately it's the pesky technicalities that separate us from Saddam. That's why the greatest thing about this country--the thing that makes all the other great things about us possible--is the amount of effort we put into discussing, enshrining, protecting, and enforcing them. That's why the understandable tendency to make exceptions to them in times like this is so dangerous. That's why, even though I'm inclined to think that in this instance the world will be a better place if we take out Saddam, I find myself leery of jumping on the "preemptive force" bandwagon without making some effort to discern exactly what the operative principle is. So we can make sure it is applied with integrity. So we have an airtight answer to the people who will ascribe to us the worst of motives. Because you don't have to be a knee-jerk pacifist or anti-American to think that's a valid question. And it doesn't help that here we have Ashcroft (who I also don't doubt means well) trying to "preempt" domestic violence by treating innocent people like criminals--worse than criminals, who at least have rights. Innocent people. Loyal American citizens. Ones who were trying to help.

I'd really like to see more focus on this in the blogosphere. I'm not saying there hasn't been any. But it always seems more fun to dole out yet another fisking to some "idiotarian." That served a purpose, but it's getting old. I'm starting to feel like remaining true to the title of my site will require me to start going around fisking fiskings just because they're getting too complacent. I think we've dragged Chomsky's body around Troy a sufficient number of times. How about we put some of that energy into actually making sure our government doesn't vindicate him?

(Well, this was definitely a post. But I suspect Adam will give me a dispensation for it.)

Update: One response leads me to believe I wasn't sufficiently clear. I am NOT trying to make the "our-hands-are-not-clean-therefore-we-can't-do-anything-about-Saddam" argument. Rather, I'm saying, "Since we have to do something about Saddam, it would really help if our hands were cleaner. Can we please refrain from sticking them where the sun don't shine?"

posted by CMN at 10:19 AM
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BIENVENUE: For the convenience of those sent here by Emmanuelle, the most meaty (though far from only) Fallaci-related posts are the following:

This is a response to a rabid anti-Fallaci review by Rana Kabbani in the Guardian.

This is an account of a lawsuit Fallaci filed in Italy that involves the (somewhat overblown) claim that death threats were made against her by a certain Muslim writer.

I don't have any translations posted on this website. Mine were unauthorized, and there is now an authorized one, entitled The Rage and the Pride. It's available for preorder on amazon, and they're now giving October as the publication date. If you're interested in the article Fallaci wrote about the response to her book in France, send me an email.

By the way, I don't recall the "a billion rats" quote appearing in Fallaci's book. (I'm certain it wasn't in the original article.) I know Kabbani quoted a passage purportedly describing Muslim immigrants as "breeding like rats." I'm going to have to go back and look at the book to check these passages. There were definitely things in there that I wish she hadn't said, or hadn't said quite the way she did, things that threatened to detract from the moral force of her message and provide gratuitous and easy targets for those who'd like to dismiss her completely. Fallaci is right to reject the claim that it is racist to condemn Islamist oppression and violence. Nor is it necessarily racist to excoriate illegal immigrants when they invoke the legal protections granted them by a society while showing flagrant disrespect for its culture and citizenry. Nevertheless, Fallaci paints with a brush rather broader than might be desired of one trying to maintain these distinctions, and one need not accept the strictures of political correctness to wince at some of her rhetorical choices. The ironic point, however, is that we have to take these flaws seriously only because our culture, the culture Fallaci is trying to defend, believes in tolerance, objectivity, individualism, freedom. I find it unbearably grotesque to imagine her being haled into court to answer for the "crime" of a tactless metaphor to victims whose cries of outrage will no sooner have died down than they are back at home repeating the blood libel to their children.


(No, this doesn't really count as a post, Adam.)
posted by CMN at 1:56 PM
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Alright, Adam's been needling me for failing to respond to his little critique of my riff on the pledge decision. It's true, I've been letting myself be distracted. That will be my next post, I swear. Don't hold your breath, though.
posted by CMN at 1:13 AM
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This morning Paola and I went driving along the Malibu coast together in a convertible, though neither of us really had time to. Sometimes you just have to take time for things.
posted by CMN at 3:43 PM
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The below post really ought to contain a bunch of links. Eventually it will. Promise. I was also just struck at the irony of me responding to Diane, given that the one thing of mine to have garnered any significant notice in the blogosphere was a translation of something written a woman.

FOLLOW UP: Having taken some time to go beyond the superficial glance, I see what Meryl means. Definitely worth reading. And much more pungent style than SDB. Better? I think it's like comparing apples and oranges--their approaches to thinking and writing are way different. I'll say this though. I suspect that she could kick his ass.

Oh, and Diane? Since you're getting into the Williams sisters, here's something that will no-doubt enhance your admiration.


posted by CMN at 4:10 PM
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Diane E. thinks she's a victim of sexism:

Now back to sexism, I can't prove this, but I make the following charge.

Sexism doesn't lie in the fact that there are more male bloggers, and more linked male bloggers, but the fact that there is a huge double standard: whatever certain male bloggers say is accepted and worthy of the blogosphere richochet; whereas if a woman were to say it, it would have been dismissed or ignored. And--when a woman speaks with knowledge on a subject, using logic and evidence, she is ignored.

Well, I can't prove that Diane is wrong, but I think she is, and I think she definitely needs to provide some anecdotal evidence more suggestive of her charge. The only thing Diane offers is a comparison between her influence and that of Den Beste. She says that she knows (and I don't doubt that she's right) "tons" more about the middle east than he does, but doesn't get linked to nearly as often as he does. If this example supports her charge, it must be because the following two premises are true: 1) An expectation that links will be strongly correllated with one's level of knowledge about the subject one is posting on; and 2) an absence of factors other than sexism to explain the deviation from this rule in the case of DE and SDB. Stated like that, I doubt Diane would seriously defend either premise. There are obviously lots of factors that go into a site's popularity besides the writer's knowledge (even assuming most readers are in a position to judge the writer's knowledge, which is a big assumption.) And it's pretty easy to speculate why SDB became so popular. For one thing, he's pretty unique in terms of the consistent length and thoughtfulness of his posts. I don't buy everything he argues, I don't impute any superior wisdom or (apart from engineering and military history) knowledge to him--I just regard him as an intelligent, largely self-educated guy who shares many of my basic values, has a hell of a lot more time than I do to sit and develop trains of thought on issues that are of interest to me, tends to do so with more thoroughness than one generally finds elsewhere, and is usually a profitable read. There are a gazillion blogs out there written by smart, well-informed people, but his stands out--not because he's necessarily smarter or better-informed, but just because he provides a different reading experience than most of what's out there. When you go to his site you often get a single long piece on a single coherent topic rather than a deluge of random thoughts as on most sites. Random thoughts, of course, are the joy of blogging, but they're also a dime a dozen and can get numbing after a while. Sometimes the mind wants to grapple with something a little more fleshed out, and I'd bet that explains much of SDB's relative popularity. Nor is it really the case that he's getting a free ride because of that thing between his legs--in fact he's attracted a virtual cottage industry of people dedicated to cutting his influence down to size because, like Diane, they think he's acquired a voice more authoritative than his credentials warrant. (In fact, I'd say Demosthenes treats the illustrious Ms. McArdle--who I currently read, by the way, more often than I do SDB--with rather more deference than he does his "friend" Steven.) Now Meryl asserts that Diane's stuff is better quality than SDB's. And maybe it is. I haven't read enough of it to judge, though I shall now try to, given that I regard an endorsement like that from Meryl as at least worth looking into (even though she's just a girl...go figure.) But on a totally superficial level, I can say that Diane's site looks very much like a million others out there. And that alone might explain the difference between her and SDB's influence without recourse to sexism. In a packed market like this, product differentiation, branding, and even a smidgeon of path dependency are all factors in market share. (One of the reasons everyone reads Instapundit, after all, is that everyone reads Instapundit.) Much of it is random chance--what site did I happen to click on for some random reason that led me to something else? But there obviously is a spontaneous order out there, and for what it's worth Diane, even though I haven't spent much time at your site yet, I've seen enough complimentary references to it in various places that it was probably only a matter of time before I did. And as one of those benighted male surfers, I will make a confession to you. Yes, the knowledge that you are a woman, despite my best pretenses at disembodied intellectual objectivity, probably will have a subliminal effect on the way I react to your writing. But it won't make me take you less seriously. Quite the opposite. When I agree with and admire it, that agreement and admiration will be tinged with something extra, a certain thrill of attraction that isn't there when I read Lileks no matter how much I love his stuff. If I read something by you that disparages or repudiates things I hold dear, the cut will be incrementally unkinder. If I ever get a message from you in response to anything I write, it will affect my ego just a little bit more. There's no good reason for this. You might even term it a form of sexism. And since we're dealing in unsubstantiable conjectures, I'll offer one of my own: I suspect I'm not the only male to suffer from this form of prejudice.



posted by CMN at 3:16 PM
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MORE ON RITTER: As Her Janeship points out, there are some questions about Ritter's credibility. Ultimately, of course, it doesn't turn on his credibility. The government has the burden of proof on the issue of whether Saddam poses the kind of threat that justifies preemptive military force. This has two components, neither of which I've managed to answer to my satisfaction. The first is the abstract issue: what kind of threat does justify the use of preemptive force? I buy the idea in theory--the doctrine of violence only in self-defense can't mean that I have to wait until the thug has taken careful aim and begun to pull the trigger before I act to disarm him. But how early can I act? At what point can I say I have a moral certainty that failure to act preemptively is tantamount to surrending my right to self-defense? And what sort of evidence do I need to present to third parties if I expect them to agree that I am acting in self-defense and not as an aggressor? Mind you, I don't think obtaining the actual agreement of the third parties (and we all know who we're talking about) is a necessary prerequisite to action. But I do think we owe it ourselves and the world to articulate a justification for our actions that an objective, reasonable third party could be expected to accept as valid, whether or not they do.

And Tapped agrees with my skepticism about the idea that war helps Congressional Republicans in the midterms. Of course, this doesn't necessarily disprove Ritter's assertion that this is what's really motivating the administration. As Bill Sherman (my former editor-in-chief) points out, the question isn't really whether it will help the GOP; it's whether the GOP thinks it will help them. Again though, I think ultimately the case for war has to be evaluated on its own merits. I take it as a given that there are always ulterior motives for such action. The state wants to preserve its health. Those helming it at the time tend to get a boost and a diversion from other failures. Just look at FDR, who should by rights have gone down with a worse reputation than Hoover had he not been handed the great role of fighting fear itself. That doesn't necessarily mean it was wrong for us to get involved in WWII. Nor does the existence of ulterior motives necessarily mean that those expressed are insincere.
posted by CMN at 6:11 PM
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Now I know what to get everyone for Christmas. (Besides Lileks' book, that is.)
posted by CMN at 1:42 PM
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There also seem to have been a few visitors who came here recently by searching for Fallaci's 9/11 article. To them (and everyone else) I say: GO BUY THE BOOK! It was supposed to have shipped last month according to amazon, but I suspect the plan is to have it appear all over the bookstores on 9/11. Anyway, it's finally being made available in English in a complete, authorized translation, so that's where you should look.
posted by CMN at 8:46 PM
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I've been getting a lot of hits lately (relatively speaking; my hits are miniscule in absolute terms) from people doing google searches for "Visionary Philosopher." What's that about? Are other people taking the test and then searching for spiritual brethren? Probably not a good idea. I mean, how many VPs can you think of who could have stayed in the same room together without winding up at each other's throats? In fact, the claymation guys who do "Celebrity Death Match" really ought to do a special series called "Visionary Philosopher Death Match." As John Goodman said in his greatest role, "I'll show you the life of the mind!!!" Just imagine Aristotle assisting Plato's contemplation of the eidos of pain. Hobbes bodyslamming Descartes. "Doubt this, Frenchy boy!" (The correspondence between those two, by the way, has got to be the greatest classic example of two smart people arguing without really communicating.) Newton v. Leibniz ("Monads, schmonads, here's one to the gonads!"). Rand v. ... oh hell, anybody. This would be fun to spin out at greater length, but I really do have work to do. Besides, maybe these people just want to get together and binge on chocolate.
posted by CMN at 8:39 PM
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