Dartmouth's Valedictorian

Heartiest congratulations to Latchezar L. Benatov '03 of Sofia, Bulgaria, valedictorian for the class of 2003.

My sources tell me that another Bulgarian could very well be at the head of the 2004 class.



Posted by Chien Wen Kung at 10:45 PM |

 
The title, "Torches to Set the World on Fire", of the retrospective by Meredith Brooks, not to be confused with the popular songwriter of the charttopping hit "Bitch", in the latest issue of the Free Press reminds me of the myth of Phaethon, a fitting allegory for what ensues when freepers ascend to positions of political responsibility. Favorite thought: "I became consumed by an overwhelming guilt for being at Dartmouth. Things were comfortable here; living was generally easy and everyone around me seemed relatively happy." Procul absit the very idea!


Posted by Ryan at 5:50 AM |

 
An Unsolicited and Admittededly ad Hominem Attack

Alessandroni unwittingly concedes bias in American higher education and proves that young radicals really only hate their parents, as unconscious elitism belies his egalitarian pretensions in someone so pharisaically concerned "about the 100,000 children under 14 who will die of malnutrition in Ethiopia alone this year," and all in one sentence no less: "My self-termed realist parents, spent $144,000 on an education that would preempt my even considering, now or ever, voting for a conservative, no matter how outwardly compassionate the candidate." I would not waste your well intentioned breath, Chien Wen, with counterexamples of Nazis on someone who calls Joseph Lieberman a "Jewpublican" and considers Israel "a country that seeks incessantly to expand its borders into land to which it is not entitled." A prediction: Within 20 years, nay 15, Jared will find himself to the right of David Horowitz along with Robert Southey, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, William Wordsworth, Arthur Koestler, Whittaker Chambers, Irving Kristol, Jack Kerouac, Jerry Rubin and the rest of the long list of former radicals whom history has mercifully forgot to name.


Posted by Ryan at 5:21 AM |

 
Moving Forward Looking Back, II: Giving Back to the World

Many of the articles in the latest Free Press talk about making the world a better place after graduation by doing volunteer work in developing countries, etc. Now of course, this is great to hear. But none of the articles mention going into investment banking or any other forms of big business. Or at least I don't get the sense that corporate finance is a career choice for many of the writers. And I have to ask, why not? Money matters. If you want to make a difference in this world, it seems only logical that you possess the resources to make that difference. (Having a lot of money means that you're able to do things like buy a whole load of AIDS vaccines for children in Africa.) None of this is to belittle what any of the writers have to say, of course: I take my hat off to them for what they've done, and what they will continue do. But I dare say that the world would be a better place if more people like them went into Wall Street.

Posted by Chien Wen Kung at 12:29 AM |

 
Moving Forward Looking Back, I: The Problem of Evil

Picking my way through the latest Free Press, I find myself pondering the following remarks by Jared Alessandroni:

Steadily and calmly, I respond that I have never seen evil, and ask for examples.

Beyond the realm of fantasy, though, there is no evil, just situations.

I propose a simple game: show me a person who is evil, and I will show you a person whose society has forgotten them.

To begin with, I'm no Christian, as I imagine neither is Mr. Alessandroni. But I believe in evil (and that's why I have problems believing in an all-powerful, all-benevolent God). Atheist though I may be, I remain convinced - mostly due to studying the past - that evil exists. The examples that Mr. Alessandroni gives to disprove the existence of evil are inadequate. To be sure, society influences individuals, and society's neglect can lead to people committing all manner of heinous deeds. But to argue that "society" and "situations" can explain completely some of what goes on today and what has gone on in the past is, well, absurd. There are many, many people disaffected by society, but only a few of them (thank goodness) are mass murderers. Some deeds and some individuals remain beyond the realm of human intellect to completely rationalize. Since he has asked for examples, I'll give some examples. Try to demonstrate that each of the following individuals committed the crimes that they did because they were "neglected by society." Then try to imagine yourself as one of the millions killed by these men, or the millions more affected by what these men did, and ask whether or not you might possibly change your mind then:

Hitler
Eichmann
Himmler
Stalin
Mao
Pol Pot
Idi Amin
Mengele

Posted by Chien Wen Kung at 11:18 PM |

 
The "white man from Alabama" resigned.

Posted by Ryan at 10:30 AM |

 
When I posted Andrew Sullivan's initial comments about Sontag's Commencement speech at Vassar, I did so not because I wanted to indict Sontag for anything, but simply because Sullivan had linked to it in the first place. My purpose was informational. So I was pretty surprised - offended, almost - to find myself called an "idiot" and a "demagogue" the very next day. I could have just kept quiet and moved on, but I thought it interesting to open up a debate on Sontag and the question of anti-Americanism. Unfortunately, Mr. Waligore has found it necessary to launch - unapologetically, it would seem - even further attacks on me. I can understand the need for enthusiasm when posting, but I don't appreciate the "name-calling." There's no need to go around accusing me of "little intelligence," implying that I "does [sic] even know, consider, acknowledge, and/or understand other points of view," and then demanding that I "better show some contrition and apologize for his previous lack of thought."

To be fair to Mr. Waligore, when you sidestep the personal attacks and the implied personal attacks, he raises some points that are worth discussing:

1. The word "egregious," which appears to be central to this debate, was in fact not the word used by Sullivan to describe his Susan Sontag Award. The word in fact was "visceral," which is different from egregious. For putting words in Sullivan's mouth, I apologize. That said, it occured to me that anti-Americanism is by definition egregious, since it describes a general, irrational sentiment that, among Americans at least, exaggerates or overemphasizes the problems in American society, ignores what redeeming aspects there are, and idealizes countries like Cuba and the Soviet Union. I haven't even taken into consideration what Osama bin Laden thinks.

2. I didn't say that Susan Sontag was egregiously anti-American for not calling the terrorists cowards. My previous post contained the sentence, "I never said that everything of Sontag's was egregiously anti-American." But what she said in the 1960s and 70s, however, is egregiously anti-American, and racist too. That was what I emphasized, and which I'll continue to emphasize until she apologizes for it. (I am fairly certain Andrew Sullivan didn't create the Sontag Award based solely on what she said post-9/11.) And yes, I agree with parts of what she said in her post-9/11 essays, but only in a decontextualized way. I find myself in disagreement with each piece taken as a whole, particularly the earlier one. Here's why:

In her second, more recent piece, she acknowledges that the 9/11 perpetrators are vicious and abhorrent, and even says that America should protect the lives of its citizens by hunting down Al-Qaeda. So far, so good. But as for expanding American power, that's simply out of the question for her, hence the term "pseudo-declaration of pseudo-war." Why? She gives no compelling reasons. The terrorists certainly have declared war on America (by distorting the word "jihad" to mean "holy war" instead of "struggle"). Are civil liberties really that imperiled? Is America really alone in the world in seeking to defeat terrorism? She might want to consider the positive effects the expansion of American power might bring to the world: "democracy, pluralism, secularism, the equality of the sexes, beardless men, dancing (all kinds), skimpy clothing and, well, fun." It comes down to discriminating between intentions versus consequences. Furthermore, I regard all this talk about neo-imperialism exaggerated. If people think Bush is doing a bad job, if they find that his actions are producing negative results, they'll vote him out of office in a year.

Now for her first piece. According to her, public figures and TV commentators in the aftermath of 9/11 were trying to "infantilize the public." I find this remarkably cynical and contemptuous in light of the magnitude of what occured, and it is for this that I called it "pretty bad." I dare say the attack was on civilization, liberty, and humanity. Specific American actions, such as the support for Israel, would appear to be the motivation for the attacks. But there's more than that. Lots of countries and people oppose American support for Israel. None however seek to destroy America in the way al-Qaeda did. Their actions can justifiably be called cowardly because they were directed at innocent people, whom they hated. Sontag accuses public commentators of "sanctimonious, reality-concealing rhetoric." Look at what she's engaging in. In her third paragraph, she continues to dismiss attempts by people in public office to comfort those afflicted by the attacks, calling their actions "manipulative." Again, the cynicism is palpable. The reality was and is that 3,000-odd people died that day. She imagines that "psychotherapy" is all there is to it, when I am pretty sure behind the scenes, behind the public grief, policy makers were hard at work planning America's response.

One detects, carefully concealed within each of these two pieces, something disturbing about Sontag's attitude towards Americans. Nothing explicit of course, nothing egregious. In the second, later piece, there's that deep suspicion of American power, which appears to be even more deep-seated than her dislike of the terrorists. It's okay for them to declare war on America, but when America tries to reciprocate, she calls it "pseudo." In her earlier piece, as I've pointed out, there's that astonishing cynicism towards the outpouring of grief, a mere 13 days after 9/11. 13 days, for goodness sake!

3. So Dinesh D'Souza didn't call the terrorists cowards. Does that mean he's anti-American, as Mr. Waligore implies sarcastically? Of course not. What D'Souza said needs to be compared with what else he's said, in the same way that Sontag's recent two essays have to be seen in light of her earlier writings.

4. Is dissent really not being allowed post-9/11, as many leftists believe? This is more complicated than one would expect. What do we mean by "allowed?" Did the government send tanks to crush anti-war protesters over the past few months, ala. China in 1989? Have publications that opposed the war been gazetted or censured? Are prominent anti-war activists like Michael Moore and Susan Sontag being coerced into keeping silent? All this talk about not allowing dissent needs to be put into perspective. Of course it's silly to say things like, "how can you say that when we're at war?" But such statements don't prevent further criticism. (You live in places like Singapore and you learn what it means for dissent not being allowed.)

5. Chomsky. I guess we should drag him into this as well. According to Mr. Waligore, Chomsky is a consistent thinker. Consistently hypocritical, I say, consistent with his own warped version of reality. The man claims to be in favor of justice, democracy, free speech, human rights, etc. Then he says these sorts of things:

In 1967, he said that "China is an important example of a new society in which very interesting and positive things happened at the local level, in which a good deal of the collectivization and communization was really based on mass participation and took place after a level of understanding had been reached in the peasantry that led to this next step."

About the Cambodian genocide, he says that "the deaths in Cambodia were not the result of systematic slaughter and starvation organized by the state but rather attributable in large measure to peasant revenge, undisciplined military units out of government control, starvation and disease that are direct consequences of the US war, or other such factors."

On the National Liberation Front trying to take over South Vietnam: "I don’t accept the view that we can just condemn the NLF terror, period, because it was so horrible. I think we really have to ask questions of comparative costs, ugly as that may sound. And if we are going to take a moral position on this—and I think we should—we have to ask both what the consequences were of using terror and not using terror. If it were true that the consequences of not using terror would be that the peasantry in Vietnam would continue to live in the state of the peasantry of the Philippines, then I think the use of terror would be justified."

==

I hope I've cleared a few things up. To summarize: no, Sontag's last two remarks can't be considered egregiously anti-American, and I never said that they were. There's no need to apologize for non-existent backpedalling. This debate began when I posted information from Andrew Sullivan's blog without actually either agreeing or disagreeing with it. Mr. Waligore pounced on Sullivan's accusation of anti-Americanism (which by my definition is an egregious sentiment to have) and proceeded to berate me for supposedly agreeing with Sullivan. I responded not by agreeing with Sullivan, but by posting what Sontag said during the 60s and 70s. I then noted that since she hasn't retracted those statements, I must view whatever she says about America today in light of them.

Posted by Chien Wen Kung at 7:15 AM |

 
A Final Goodbye

A moment of silence should be observed for a great columnist who can no longer, as a student, submit what generally were excellent op.eds: Chris Curran. I will miss the common sense approach to issues at large. While I didn't always agree, his op.eds were always a pleasure to read.

Also, on a somewhat related note, please do read the lastest issue of the Free Press. A bit haughty and self-congradualatory at times (one can almost sense a childish 'I told you so') but all in all a great end of the term joke. Reading some of the columns definitely kept me laughing for several minutes.

Posted by John Stevenson at 5:20 PM |

 
Hats Off to Arik

It took Nixon to go to China; mirroring his 2000 campaign slogan I add 'Only Arik can bring us peace.' I think we should be giving Ariel Sharon his just due in beginning negotiations within the new Palestinian prime minister amidst the latest phase of what could be called the Oslo war. What makes this even more amusing is the fact that Sharon is using a center-right government to forward the peace process in the face of conventional wisdom which implies that the left was the only hope for peace in Israel. We must remember that it was Menachem Begin, Israel first rightist premier, who signed the first peace agreement with an Arab state, officially pulling Egypt out of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Sharon has the courage and will to resist elements of the parliament whose preeminent interest is not peace: he has flown in the face of the settler movement, the religious elements and the leftist elements of the Knesset to travel the road that may ultimately lead to peace. Considering that this man has been vilified among the Enlightened Europeans often, we should take our hats off to Sharon.

Posted by John Stevenson at 5:17 PM |

 
Lack of Imagination
Chien Wen has little intelligence if he thinks someone is egregiously anti-American because they don't think the terrorists were cowards. I'm glad Chien Wen admits that conservative idol Dinesh D'Souza is 'egregiously anti-american.' (He was the one who made the comments about the 9/11 bombers not being cowards on Politically Incorrect. Bill Maher reaction to that got the show cancelled, but D'Souza later said exactly the same thing in his book What's So Great About America?). So I'll continue my name-calling at Chien Wen for his lack of thought. That such banal thoughts, when said by leftists, get labelled 'egregiously anti-American' is why I have little sympathy to those who unthinkingly parrot crap on this blog. Particularly galling to me is the word "egregious" which implies that Chien Wen does even know, consider, acknowledge, and/or understand other points of view. I haven't read everything of Sontag's, but I will hold to saying that some of her stuff is labelled 'egregiously anti-American' in part because of hysterical reaction.

Chien Wen also says that "not calling 9/11 an attack on humanity, liberty, and civilization" is pretty bad. Many New York leftists say it was exactly that, that 9/11 was primarily an attack on humanity (many different nationals were killed). Of course, many Americans don't accept a further extension of that argument: if 9/11 was a crime against humanity, Bin Laden and Al Qeada should have been tried by humanity in an international forum. Heh, maybe Chien Wen is anti-American for not wanting to turn those in Guantanomo Bay over the International Criminal Court. (Would turning them over to the ICC be a good idea? That's debateable, but it does not seem to be "pretty bad" or "egregiously Anti-American" even on Chien Wen's standards. And Chien Wen's immediate labelling of things is why so many on the left say dissent isn't being allowed to be heard). Finally, maybe Sontag is wrong to say that 9/11 was an attack on the U.S. as a superpower, but is that egregiously anti-american of her to say? Is it egregiously anti-american when a conservative or George Bush says something like it?

And it is VERY different to say that the war on terrorism, as oppossed to the 9/11 attacks, have been about humanity as a whole (I hope and trust that Chien Wen is not one of those looney conservatives who buys into Karl Roves' line that Iraq was merely a 'battle' in the War on Terror). One of the complaints of many on the left around the world is that the Bush administration has squandered the unity and sympathy from around the world in order to fight for American I thank Chien Wen for posting Sontag's articles. So far his analysis of that article seems either demonstably wrong (or at best, empty). I wonder if he might post his thoughts (a link to Andrew Sullivan, the creator of the Sontag award, isn't the best stragedy. Sullivan can say interesting things, but also says ridiculous things there, so what does Chien Wen think?) In any case, Sontag is right that calling something a war on terrorism when there is no clear end does have implications; why else do we hear crap like, how can you say that when we're at war? or how can you be concerned with civil liberties at a time of war? (or even worse, and this is just too tragic... how can you criticize the President on his domestic agenda in a time of war?)

And I hope to God that Chien Wen thinks that the paragraph ending Sontag's article immediately below is an emimently reasonable statment, rather than an egregious anti-American one: "America has every right to hunt down the perpetrators of these crimes and their accomplices. But this determination is not necessarily a war. Limited, focused military engagements do not translate into "wartime" at home. There are better ways to check America's enemies, less destructive of constitutional rights and of international agreements that serve the public interest of all, than continuing to invoke the dangerous, lobotomizing notion of endless war."

Chien Wen says: "Others, like Sontag and Noam Chomsky, are crafty enough to be able to adopt themselves to contemporary discourse."
Ummm... how exactly has Noam hidden or changed his views? I'm not a big fan of Chomsky, but consistency over time seems to be one of his virtues (he didn't exactly hold back in his book 9-11 nor pander to the hawkish left during Kosovo). It's entirely possible that Chien Wen knows more about the arc of Chomsky's thought than what I do, but this sort of statement doesn't help Chien Wen's credibility with me. So I'm sure it is right to equate Sontag and Chomsky.
One other point: Sontag is not really being condemned for her past statements in the 70s. It was the article(s) she wrote in the 21st century that have earned her her reputation, much to her suprise. But people are awarded Sontag awards based on similarity not to Sontag's stated views in the 1970s, but to her stated views in the past 2 years. If Sontag has mererely adapted herself "to contemporary discourse" than contemporary discourse is also being condemned. Rather mild statements, not simply egregious anti-American ones, are being given Sontag awards. So if Sontag adjusted herself to what is appropriate to say today, it seems it makes no sense to condemn her and others for saying things that vaguely echo her statements in 2001 and 2002. Again her reputation comes from the perception of her recent discourse, so I apparently haven't read Sontag close enough to quite comphrehend how that recent discourse itself is 'egregiously anti-American.' I'm again clarifying that's what I'm concerned with, that others have been labeled as 'egregiously anti-american' for echoing non-egregious statements about America. And if Chien Wen is talking about apologies, he had better show some contrition and apologize for his previous lack of thought, particularly in his 'analysis' post. He's backpedalled some, by implying recent Sontag's statements which were labelled earlier as egregiously anti-American are not (as much) so, but maybe he's just adopting to contemporary discourse.

Posted by Timothy at 4:18 PM |

 
Analysis

Neither of Sontag's two pieces below are as egregious as "the white race is the cancer of human history." Still, in the context of post-Sixties, post-Cold War, post-9/11 America, not calling 9/11 an attack on humanity, liberty, and civilization and not calling the terrorists cowards is pretty bad. Some radicals mellow with age; some even switch sides entirely. Others, like Sontag and Noam Chomsky, are crafty enough to be able to adopt themselves to contemporary discourse. I never said that everything of Susan Sontag's was "egregiously anti-American" (she does write on arts and literature as well). But she's on record as saying some pretty ridiculous things that she hasn't retracted or apologized for, and which discredit her in my view.

Posted by Chien Wen Kung at 12:25 AM |

 
A more recent Sontag offering

Waligore asked me to post Sontag's post-9/11 New Yorker comments, so here they are. Sontag also has a piece in the September 10, 2002 New York Times, but it's not available anymore in the original. I'm reconstructing it based on Andrew Sullivan's line-by-line analysis of it in Salon:

"Since last Sept. 11, the Bush administration has told the American people that America is at war. But this war is of a peculiar nature. It seems to be, given the nature of the enemy, a war with no foreseeable end. What kind of war is that?

There are precedents. Wars on such enemies as cancer, poverty and drugs are understood to be endless wars. There will always be cancer, poverty and drugs. And there will always be despicable terrorists, mass murderers like those who perpetrated the attack a year ago tomorrow -- as well as freedom fighters (like the French Resistance and the African National Congress) who were once called terrorists by those they opposed but were relabeled by history.

When a president of the United States declares war on cancer or poverty or drugs, we know that "war" is a metaphor. Does anyone think that this war -- the war that America has declared on terrorism -- is a metaphor? But it is, and one with powerful consequences. War has been disclosed, not actually declared, since the threat is deemed to be self-evident.

Real wars are not metaphors. And real wars have a beginning and an end. Even the horrendous, intractable conflict between Israel and Palestine will end one day.

But this antiterror war can never end.

That is one sign that it is not a war but, rather, a mandate for expanding the use of American power.

When the government declares war on cancer or poverty or drugs it means the government is asking that new forces be mobilized to address the problem. It also means that the government cannot do a whole lot to solve it. When the government declares war on terrorism -- terrorism being a multinational, largely clandestine network of enemies -- it means that the government is giving itself permission to do what it wants. When it wants to intervene somewhere, it will. It will brook no limits on its power.

The American suspicion of foreign "entanglements" is very old. But this administration has taken the radical position that all international treaties are potentially inimical to the interests of the United States -- since by signing a treaty on anything (whether environmental issues or the conduct of war and the treatment of prisoners) the United States is binding itself to obey conventions that might one day be invoked to limit America's freedom of action to do whatever the government thinks is in the country's interests. Indeed, that's what a treaty is: it limits the right of its signatories to complete freedom of action on the subject of the treaty. Up to now, it has not been the avowed position of any respectable nation-state that this is a reason for eschewing treaties.

Describing America's new foreign policy as actions undertaken in wartime is a powerful disincentive to having a mainstream debate about what is actually happening. This reluctance to ask questions was already apparent in the immediate aftermath of the attacks last Sept. 11. Those who objected to the jihad language used by the American government (good versus evil, civilization versus barbarism) were accused of condoning the attacks, or at least the legitimacy of the grievances behind the attacks.

Under the slogan United We Stand, the call to reflectiveness was equated with dissent, dissent with lack of patriotism. The indignation suited those who have taken charge of the Bush administration's foreign policy. The aversion to debate among the principal figures in the two parties continues to be apparent in the run-up to the commemorative ceremonies on the anniversary of the attacks -- ceremonies that are viewed as part of the continuing affirmation of American solidarity against the enemy. The comparison between Sept. 11, 2001, and Dec. 7, 1941, has never been far from mind. Once again, America was the object of a lethal surprise attack that cost many -- in this case, civilian -- lives, more than the number of soldiers and sailors who died at Pearl Harbor. However, I doubt that great commemorative ceremonies were felt to be needed to keep up morale and unite the country on Dec. 7, 1942. That was a real war, and one year later it was very much still going on.

This is a phantom war and therefore in need of an anniversary.

Such an anniversary serves a number of purposes. It is a day of mourning. It is an affirmation of national solidarity. But of one thing we can be sure. It is not a day of national reflection. Reflection, it has been said, might impair our "moral clarity."

It is necessary to be simple, clear, united. Hence, there will be borrowed words, like the Gettysburg Address, from that bygone era when great rhetoric was possible.

Abraham Lincoln's speeches were not just inspirational prose. They were bold statements of new national goals in a time of real, terrible war. The Second Inaugural Address dared to herald the reconciliation that must follow Northern victory in the Civil War. The primacy of the commitment to end slavery was the point of Lincoln's exaltation of freedom in the Gettysburg Address. But when the great Lincoln speeches are ritually cited, or recycled for commemoration, they have become completely emptied of meaning. They are now gestures of nobility, of greatness of spirit. The reasons for their greatness are irrelevant.

Such an anachronistic borrowing of eloquence is in the grand tradition of American anti-intellectualism: the suspicion of thought, of words. Hiding behind the humbug that the attack of last Sept. 11 was too horrible, too devastating, too painful, too tragic for words, that words could not possibly express our grief and indignation, our leaders have a perfect excuse to drape themselves in others' words, now voided of content. To say something might be controversial. It might actually drift into some kind of statement and therefore invite rebuttal. Not saying anything is best.

I do not question that we have a vicious, abhorrent enemy that opposes most of what I cherish -- including democracy, pluralism, secularism, the equality of the sexes, beardless men, dancing (all kinds), skimpy clothing and, well, fun. And not for a moment do I question the obligation of the American government to protect the lives of its citizens.

What I do question is the pseudo-declaration of pseudo-war. These necessary actions should not be called a "war." There are no endless wars; but there are declarations of the extension of power by a state that believes it cannot be challenged.

America has every right to hunt down the perpetrators of these crimes and their accomplices. But this determination is not necessarily a war. Limited, focused military engagements do not translate into "wartime" at home. There are better ways to check America's enemies, less destructive of constitutional rights and of international agreements that serve the public interest of all, than continuing to invoke the dangerous, lobotomizing notion of endless war."

Posted by Chien Wen Kung at 11:33 PM |

 
A more recent Sontag offering

Waligore asked me to post Sontag's post-9/11 New Yorker comments, so here they are. Sontag also has a piece in the September 10, 2002 New York Times, but it's not available anymore in the original. I'm reconstructing it based on Andrew Sullivan's line-by-line analysis of it in Salon:

"Since last Sept. 11, the Bush administration has told the American people that America is at war. But this war is of a peculiar nature. It seems to be, given the nature of the enemy, a war with no foreseeable end. What kind of war is that?

There are precedents. Wars on such enemies as cancer, poverty and drugs are understood to be endless wars. There will always be cancer, poverty and drugs. And there will always be despicable terrorists, mass murderers like those who perpetrated the attack a year ago tomorrow -- as well as freedom fighters (like the French Resistance and the African National Congress) who were once called terrorists by those they opposed but were relabeled by history.

When a president of the United States declares war on cancer or poverty or drugs, we know that "war" is a metaphor. Does anyone think that this war -- the war that America has declared on terrorism -- is a metaphor? But it is, and one with powerful consequences. War has been disclosed, not actually declared, since the threat is deemed to be self-evident.

Real wars are not metaphors. And real wars have a beginning and an end. Even the horrendous, intractable conflict between Israel and Palestine will end one day.

But this antiterror war can never end.

That is one sign that it is not a war but, rather, a mandate for expanding the use of American power.

When the government declares war on cancer or poverty or drugs it means the government is asking that new forces be mobilized to address the problem. It also means that the government cannot do a whole lot to solve it. When the government declares war on terrorism -- terrorism being a multinational, largely clandestine network of enemies -- it means that the government is giving itself permission to do what it wants. When it wants to intervene somewhere, it will. It will brook no limits on its power.

The American suspicion of foreign "entanglements" is very old. But this administration has taken the radical position that all international treaties are potentially inimical to the interests of the United States -- since by signing a treaty on anything (whether environmental issues or the conduct of war and the treatment of prisoners) the United States is binding itself to obey conventions that might one day be invoked to limit America's freedom of action to do whatever the government thinks is in the country's interests. Indeed, that's what a treaty is: it limits the right of its signatories to complete freedom of action on the subject of the treaty. Up to now, it has not been the avowed position of any respectable nation-state that this is a reason for eschewing treaties.

Describing America's new foreign policy as actions undertaken in wartime is a powerful disincentive to having a mainstream debate about what is actually happening. This reluctance to ask questions was already apparent in the immediate aftermath of the attacks last Sept. 11. Those who objected to the jihad language used by the American government (good versus evil, civilization versus barbarism) were accused of condoning the attacks, or at least the legitimacy of the grievances behind the attacks.

Under the slogan United We Stand, the call to reflectiveness was equated with dissent, dissent with lack of patriotism. The indignation suited those who have taken charge of the Bush administration's foreign policy. The aversion to debate among the principal figures in the two parties continues to be apparent in the run-up to the commemorative ceremonies on the anniversary of the attacks -- ceremonies that are viewed as part of the continuing affirmation of American solidarity against the enemy. The comparison between Sept. 11, 2001, and Dec. 7, 1941, has never been far from mind. Once again, America was the object of a lethal surprise attack that cost many -- in this case, civilian -- lives, more than the number of soldiers and sailors who died at Pearl Harbor. However, I doubt that great commemorative ceremonies were felt to be needed to keep up morale and unite the country on Dec. 7, 1942. That was a real war, and one year later it was very much still going on.

This is a phantom war and therefore in need of an anniversary.

Such an anniversary serves a number of purposes. It is a day of mourning. It is an affirmation of national solidarity. But of one thing we can be sure. It is not a day of national reflection. Reflection, it has been said, might impair our "moral clarity."

It is necessary to be simple, clear, united. Hence, there will be borrowed words, like the Gettysburg Address, from that bygone era when great rhetoric was possible.

Abraham Lincoln's speeches were not just inspirational prose. They were bold statements of new national goals in a time of real, terrible war. The Second Inaugural Address dared to herald the reconciliation that must follow Northern victory in the Civil War. The primacy of the commitment to end slavery was the point of Lincoln's exaltation of freedom in the Gettysburg Address. But when the great Lincoln speeches are ritually cited, or recycled for commemoration, they have become completely emptied of meaning. They are now gestures of nobility, of greatness of spirit. The reasons for their greatness are irrelevant.

Such an anachronistic borrowing of eloquence is in the grand tradition of American anti-intellectualism: the suspicion of thought, of words. Hiding behind the humbug that the attack of last Sept. 11 was too horrible, too devastating, too painful, too tragic for words, that words could not possibly express our grief and indignation, our leaders have a perfect excuse to drape themselves in others' words, now voided of content. To say something might be controversial. It might actually drift into some kind of statement and therefore invite rebuttal. Not saying anything is best.

I do not question that we have a vicious, abhorrent enemy that opposes most of what I cherish -- including democracy, pluralism, secularism, the equality of the sexes, beardless men, dancing (all kinds), skimpy clothing and, well, fun. And not for a moment do I question the obligation of the American government to protect the lives of its citizens.

What I do question is the pseudo-declaration of pseudo-war. These necessary actions should not be called a "war." There are no endless wars; but there are declarations of the extension of power by a state that believes it cannot be challenged.

America has every right to hunt down the perpetrators of these crimes and their accomplices. But this determination is not necessarily a war. Limited, focused military engagements do not translate into "wartime" at home. There are better ways to check America's enemies, less destructive of constitutional rights and of international agreements that serve the public interest of all, than continuing to invoke the dangerous, lobotomizing notion of endless war."

Posted by Chien Wen Kung at 11:33 PM |

 
Sontag in the New Yorker (September 24, 2001)

"The disconnect between last Tuesday's monstrous dose of reality and the self-righteous drivel and outright deceptions being peddled by public figures and TV commentators is startling, depressing. The voices licensed to follow the event seem to have joined together in a campaign to infantilize the public. Where is the acknowledgement that this was not a "cowardly" attack on "civilization" or "liberty" or "humanity" or "the free world" but an attack on the world's self-proclaimed super-power, undertaken as a consequence of specific American alliances and actions? How many citizens are aware of the ongoing American bombing of Iraq? And if the word "cowardly" is to be used, it might be more aptly applied to those who kill from beyond the range of retaliation, high in the sky, than to those willing to die themselves in order to kill others. In the matter of courage (a morally neutral virtue): whatever may be said of the perpetrators of Tuesday's slaughter, they were not cowards.

Our leaders are bent on convincing us that everything is O.K. America is not afraid. Our spirit is unbroken, although this was a day that will live in infamy and America is now at war. But everything is not O.K. And this was not Pearl Harbor. We have a robotic president who assures us that America stands tall. A wide spectrum of public figures, in and out of office, who are strongly opposed to the policies being pursued abroad by this Administration apparently feel free to say nothing more than that they stand united behind President Bush. A lot of thinking needs to be done, and perhaps is being done in Washington and elsewhere, about the ineptitude of American intelligence and counter-intelligence, about options available to American foreign policy, particularly in the Middle East, and about what constitutes a smart program of military defense. But the public is not being asked to bear much of the burden of reality. The unanimously applauded, self-congratulatory bromides of a Soviet Party Congress seemed contemptible. The unanimity of the sanctimonious, reality-concealing rhetoric spouted by American officials and media commentators in recent days seems, well, unworthy of a mature democracy.

Those in public office have let us know that they consider their task to be a manipulative one: confidence-building and grief management. Politics, the politics of a democracy--which entails disagreement, which promotes candor--has been replaced by psychotherapy. Let's by all means grieve together. But let's not be stupid together. A few shreds of historical awareness might help us to understand what has just happened, and what may continue to happen. "Our country is strong", we are told again and again. I for one don't find this entirely consoling. Who doubts that America is strong? But that's not all America has to be."



Posted by Chien Wen Kung at 11:05 PM |

 
Sullivan on Sontag
Andrew Sullivan says something similar to what Chien Wen relegates to the comments:

SONTAG ETC: I feel a little bad for quoting one line from Susan Sontag's commencement address. It was self-parodic, but the rest of her speech struck me as sane and fresh. I linked, but I still feel sheepish.

Posted by Timothy at 8:36 PM |

 
The vast rightwing conspiracy opposing antiabortion activists, at the Supreme Court, and reported by Foxnews no less? What alarums will the Times have to ring on the editorial page tomorrow?

Posted by Ryan at 5:20 PM |

 
Those silly German pazifisten.

Posted by Ryan at 4:59 PM |

 
A whorehouse in Nevada is offering free sex to troops returning from Iraq. "Thirteen men and three women in uniform have shown up so far to claim their gifts." Don't ask, don't tell?

Posted by Ryan at 4:51 PM |

 
Susan Sontag

Tim Waligore implies that I am either an "idiot" or a "demagogue" for "blandly" accusing Susan Sontag of "Egregious Anti-Americanism." As usual, I appreciate the personal attacks.

I wonder what Mr. Waligore and other fair-minded people would make of the following remarks by Ms. Sontag:

In "Some Thoughts on the Right Way (for us) to Love the Cuban Revolution," published in the April 1969 edition of Ramparts, Sontag excoriates American culture as "inorganic, dead, coercive, authoritarian." America is "a cancerous society with a runaway rate of productivity that inundates the country with increasingly unnecessary commodities, services, gadgets, images, information." By way of contrast, she extols the virtues of Communist Cuba: "the Cuban revolution is astonishingly free of repression and bureaucratization." Writers like her would thrive in Cuba, because "No Cuban writer has been or is in jail, or is failing to get his work published."

Three years earlier, in "What's Happening in America," Sontag tells her readers that America "deserves" to have its wealth "taken away" by the Third World because "the truth is that Mozart, Pascal, Boolean algebra, Shakespeare, parliamentary government, baroque churches, Newton, the emancipation of women, Kant, Marx, and Balanchine ballets don't redeem what this particular civilization has wrought upon the world. The white race is the cancer of human history."

It's worth noting that Sontag emended this last observation after her bout with cancer in the 1970s because she thought she had been unfair - to cancer.

Anti-Americanism, by the way, is not an epithet one should use lightly. It describes a sentiment that is immoderate and hostile to all things American (save of course people like herself), one that exaggerates or overemphasizes the problems in American society, ignores what redeeming aspects there are, and idealizes countries like Cuba and the Soviet Union. It has to be distinguished from specific criticisms of American society and culture, which many responsible people on both the left and the right engage in. I'll have to regard whatever Susan Sontag says about America in light of these two (and many other similar) denunciations - unless of course she actually apologizes for them (which I don't think she will).

Posted by Chien Wen Kung at 2:10 AM |

 
The full Vanity Fair Paul Wolfowitz interview here.

Posted by Chien Wen Kung at 10:38 AM |

 
Commencement Speeches

The New York Times has the goods. Andrew Sullivan has nominated Susan Sontag's quip at Vassar, "Try to imagine at least once a day that you are not an American," for the Susan Sontag Award (for Egregious Anti-Americanism, I believe). Sorry Susie, but I don't even have to try...

Posted by Chien Wen Kung at 11:34 PM |

 
Cornel West has a rival

Why don't we have any professors like this?

Posted by Chien Wen Kung at 10:50 AM |

 
Political Discourse on Campus

Congratulations to the Dartmouth Free Press for winning COSO's Publication of the Year Award. Though always a good read, it is pretty much the only read when it comes to political issues on campus. The Dartmouth Review, by its own admission, isn't interested in reporting on big issues like the war in Iraq; its scope is local. Writes former TDR Editor-in-Chief Larry Scholer, "If students want to get the conservative bent on Iraq, for instance, they can read what experts think in journals like the National Review or the Weekly Standard, to name only a couple... the Review is a student publication that gives top billing to Dartmouth-related issues; other matters in higher education come in second; a few reviews of books, movies, and music are thrown in for good measure." Fair enough: articles on the library system and the college budget are also - and sometimes even more - interesting to read than those on GMOs in Europe. But students do need, contra what Mr. Scholer seems to think, a place to articulate their views on issues beyond the Dartmouth campus. One learns through both reading stuff in National Review and from researching and writing one's own articles. And at present, the only mouthpiece for political opinion is the Free Press, a left-liberal publication. The absence of a Dartmouth publication that offers centrist, center-right, and conservative perspectives on current affairs and public policy is not good for campus discourse, which is already left-leaning thanks to faculty and administrators. I'm surprised one doesn't exist, given that 1) there are many conservatives on campus who don't write for the Review, 2) the administration despises the Review, and would love to put it out of business by embracing an official conservative publication, and 3) Dartmouth students love to talk politics, as any regulars to Agora/WWIR/Politalk will tell you.

Posted by Chien Wen Kung at 1:27 AM |