Jay Reding.com

Over at Concurring Opinions Daniel Solove has a series of audio interviews with the creators of Battlestar Galactica that touch on the legal and ethical question raised by the series. As both a BSG geek and a law geek, this is like encountering Nerdvana.

Galactica has offered some interesting grounds for philosophical debate about issues like the nature of law, terrorism, morality and how they all interact with society. What makes the show so attractive, especially to lawyers, is the depth of the show and how well it does what science-fiction should do—say something profound not about some fictional world, but get people to think about our world. Galactica threw out plenty of SF clichés in favor of a grittier and more realistic approach.

The New York Times’s rather weak story linking John McCain to a female lobbyist seems to say a lot more about the internal politics of The New York Times than it does about John McCain. The story, which contains a few paragraphs of innuendo and a lot of old news, seems to be the least interesting part of the story. The more interesting part is the internal deliberations that went on before it was published:

Beyond its revelations, however, what’s most remarkable about the article is that it appeared in the paper at all: The new information it reveals focuses on the private matters of the candidate, and relies entirely on the anecdotal evidence of McCain’s former staffers to justify the piece–both personal and anecdotal elements unusual in the Gray Lady. The story is filled with awkward journalistic moves–the piece contains a collection of decade-old stories about McCain and Iseman appearing at functions together and concerns voiced by McCain’s aides that the Senator shouldn’t be seen in public with Iseman–and departs from the Times’ usual authoritative voice. At one point, the piece suggestively states: “In 1999 she began showing up so frequently in his offices and at campaign events that staff members took notice. One recalled asking, ‘Why is she always around?’” In the absence of concrete, printable proof that McCain and Iseman were an item, the piece delicately steps around purported romance and instead reports on the debate within the McCain campaign about the alleged affair.

What happened? The publication of the article capped three months of intense internal deliberations at the Times over whether to publish the negative piece and its most explosive charge about the affair. It pitted the reporters investigating the story, who believed they had nailed it, against executive editor Bill Keller, who believed they hadn’t. It likely cost the paper one investigative reporter, who decided to leave in frustration. And the Times ended up publishing a piece in which the institutional tensions about just what the story should be are palpable.

Here’s what’s particularly telling about this piece. The New York Times knew of these allegations since at least late November of last year. Yet in late January, they decided to endorse McCain for the GOP nomination, and didn’t give so much as a breath that would imply that the contents of this story had any impact on that choice. If the Times had any problems with the Senator’s ethics, one would think that they’d at least hint at them in their endorsement. Yet there is not even the slightest insinuation of any ethical concern in the Times‘ op-ed.

The timing here is deeply suspect. Why did the Times choose to publish a story that was clearly not ready for publication?

The question to be asked here is cui bono—who benefits from this story coming out now?

The Times may have been pressured to get the story out by The New Republic piece. That seems the most logical explanation, even if it doesn’t involve a great deal of common sense on the part of the Times‘ editorial board. They were facing pressure to run the story and they didn’t want to get scooped, so they went ahead when they shouldn’t have.

Of course, they’re not the only ones who could benefit. Could the Huckabee camp have pushed the story to give Huckabee some bounce in Texas? Perhaps, but that seems to be an unlikely scenario. Unless Huckabee thinks that he can force a brokered convention, he’s got no chance, and if the connection were to come out, he’d be toast.

Could it be Hillary Clinton? If she can get McCain down in the polls, her electability argument gets stronger. Even though the Clintons are capable of all sorts of Machiavellian maneuvers, I’m not so sure this is one of them. For one, it’s far too subtle, and far too indirect. It’s not implausible, but still unlikely.

Of course, when one examines anything that The New York Times does, it should be viewed in light of how helpful that would be to the Democratic Party. The Times is their Pravda, and their primary source of received wisdom. Yet even then the timing still seems suspect. Why break this story now? Yes, McCain has the nomination virtually in hand, but if you want to make McCain look good in the eyes of conservatives an attack by the Times will help rally the troops. The effect of this would have much more impact in the general election, not months away.

My guess is that the Times knew they had no story, but didn’t want to take the risk of someone else scooping them. Ultimately, McCain has plenty of time to deny what is clearly a weak story, helping to rally Times-hating conservatives to his side. Meanwhile, the Times gets caught in yet another case of poor journalistic ethics and political hackery. If this is a scandal, it seems to be a scandal that backfired on those who launched it.

Michelle Obama recently gave a speech at UCLA in which she said some things which went far beyond normal political rhetoric and ended up sounding like something you’d hear from a Scientology presentation:

Barack Obama will require you to work. He is going to demand that you shed your cynicism. That you put down your divisions. That you come out of your isolation, that you move out of your comfort zones. That you push yourselves to be better. And that you engage. Barack will never allow you to go back to your lives as usual, uninvolved, uninformed.

Barack Obama is going to demand that we shed our cynicism? Sorry, Mrs. Obama, but you can pry my cynicism from my cold, dead hands. I don’t want to shed my cynicism, because this government was founded upon a justified skepticism of government. The founding principle of this state was not in holding up one man as National Cult Leader, but recognizing that no matter how high-minded any leader may claim to be, they’re still human, and the only way to control human passions is to systemically limit them.

The more I hear from the Obama campaign—especially Mrs. Obama—the more they start sounding less and less like a political movement and the more they start to sound like a religion. I can understand being inspired by Obama, but the way in which his rhetoric starts becoming almost messianic just makes my skin crawl. There’s something about the cult of personality that’s beginning to rise up around Obama that strikes me as fundamentally worrying.

Not only that, but this sort of thing is going to quickly engender a huge backlash against Obama. It’s one thing to talk about vague platitudes, but when a candidate uses a line like “we’re the ones we’ve been waiting for” without a hint of irony, it starts to sound like Mr. Obama is running not as a politician, but as a savior.

I suspect that Mrs. Obama will quickly be removed from the public stage by the Obama campaign, especially as Obama seems to be all but a lock for the nomination. Another couple of statements like the ones she’s made in the last few weeks and some uncomfortable questions will start getting asked about what kind of worldview the Obamas really have—and the last think that Barack Obama wants is for the American people to know where he really stands.

UPDATE: Over at Bloggingheads, Robert Wright and Mickey Kaus debate who Michelle Obama really is.

I just don’t see how Hillary Clinton can come back from a loss like this. If she loses Texas or Ohio, she’s toast, even with the superdelegates.

It will be a great day for the country to see the Clinton dynasty fall—except when the Obama hype meets the reality of a candidate far outside the American mainstream, all the platitudes in the world won’t account for much. And when that day comes, Hillary Clinton may ultimately be the benefactor. In some ways, if the Democrats wanted to rid themselves of Clintonism it would have been better to let her run and lose than potentially end up being able to say that she told them so…

John Derbyshire takes a highly critical look at “intelligent design” and leads to an interesting theological argument against it:

The Myers column points up a thing I’ve said before here, and repeated as politely as I could in panel discussions with creationists: they’re not just wrong, they’re shifty. In my opinion, they wandered off the straight and narrow when they started pushing this “intelligent design” stuff. My advice to them — frequently offered but, for reasons that are baffling to me, never taken up — is to drop the i-d b-s and go back to good old Biblical creationism. At least that’s an honest point of view founded in Scripture. I understand why the move to i-d was made: to try to get out from under current church-state jurisprudence (not all of which I agree with). However, the constant strain of keeping a straight face while insisting that theirs is not — no way! absolutely not!! — a religious campaign, and talking about the mysterious-but-definitely-not-supernatural “Designer,” has corrupted them irredeemably.

Now, I don’t believe in intelligent design mainly because there’s no scientific evidence for it, but also because it’s problematic theologically as well. A belief in evolution doesn’t immediately lead one to become an atheist—no matter what the atheists say. It does mean that you can’t take the Bible literally, but with all deference to my Fundamentalist readers (and I use the term “Fundamentalist” in its exact sense, not as a slur), the Bible is not a work designed to be taken literally. To take Intelligent Design seriously one has to predispose a God (or other “Intelligent Designer,” which I presume most ID supporters to not believe is Quetzalcoatl or Zeus) that acts like a cosmic tinkerer, constantly refining His creations over time. To me—and I claim no great understanding of theology—that seems like a rather limited view of God. Why would an omnipotent being free of the constraints of space and time need to constantly refine His Creation? By reducing God to such a role seems to be an effort to diminish the Divine to something humanly understandable. Theologically, that strikes me as incredibly presumptuous.

It’s one thing to see the face of God in the great beauty of the Universe—in everything from the glory of a sunset to the amazing symmetry of subatomic particles. Nothing requires a scientist to surrender all faith to the cold rationalism of science. At the same time, the view of Intelligent Design has a God which constantly guides everything from the structure of the universe to the development of the eye, and argues that God’s Creation was somehow less than what it should have been. At least Creationists can fall back on Biblical literalism to support their views—ID supporters have to find a balance that tends to satisfy neither science nor theology.

Ed Morrissey makes an interesting argument that the declaration of Kosovar independence signals a major shift in the international order. He argues:

The breakup of Serbia calls into question whether the concept of Westphalian sovereignty remains extant. Shall Burgundy go back to the Burgundians, if they so desire? Will Wales and Cornwall exit from Great Britain? Can Texas declare its independence? More pragmatically, are we seeing a return to the micronationalism that generated numerous wars on the European continent over the centuries before Westphalia?

This occurs in the shadow of the struggles in Africa and the Middle East over nationalism, sovereignty, and statehood. Just as we want to solidify the boundaries between nations in these regions to produce more stability, we seem to be supporting the breakdown of the exact same system in Europe. The end of the Age of Empire has left civilization struggling for a new model of political stability for almost a century — and the struggle continues today in Kosovo.

In 1647, after decades of brutal warfare during the Thirty Years War, the kings of Europe entered into the The Treaty of Westphalia, a document that essentially created the modern concept of the nation-state and settled long-running disputes over the religious and political makeup of Europe.

The Westphalian model shaped what we call “realism” today. States were sovereign entities that could apply their own laws to their people. They were equal to other states, and the principle of non-intervention between states was upheld as a goal (if not in practice). This model still exists today, although the trends towards globalization have started to diminish the concept of absolute sovereignty.

Putting aside the issue of Kosovo itself away for the moment, Mr. Morrissey’s question is a strong one. In Europe, there has been a trend towards regional devolution. Scotland has its own Parliament. Wales has recently been granted its own National Assembly. Belgium may yet split between its Flemish and French territories. It seems like everywhere in Europe, instead of the integration that the European Union was supposed to have brought, the seeds of division keep growing.

The Brussels Journal has a fascinating piece looking at the idea that the nation-state may be obsolete. Yet the problem is no one knows what should replace it: how can one have democracy without a demos? The paradox of European integration is that it’s empowering disparate interest groups to move away from each other rather than harmonizing them.

Ultimately, the Peace of Westphalia worked because it was the right compromise, and the European Union’s rash attempts to remake Europe in a new image—even if beneficial in some respects—is far too audacious for the good of Europe.

The crisis in Kosovo demonstrates that when you try to play games with national borders, the results are not always pretty. The breakup of Yugoslavia into ethnic enclaves has only partially reduced tensions. Serbia has longstanding historical claims on that region, and instead of successfully arbitrating those claims, the United Nations has spend over a decade without making much headway. Meanwhile, radical Saudi clerics have been steading radicalizing the Muslim majority in Kosovo, human traffickers have turned the region into a major center of the slave trade and smugglers of everything from arms to drugs are profiting from the chaos.

The Westphalian system may have its flaws, but the idea that some vague supranational system can supplant it has even deeper problems. We currently live in a world where another bloody European war seems impossible—the decimation of Europe in two world wars has had profound and lasting consequences. At the same time, the root causes of the last great European wars have not gone away. Those who would seek to redraw Europe’s borders should consider whether creating ethic states will lead Europe into the future or only open ancient wounds.

The Christian Science Monitor has the fascinating story of a man who did an experiment starting out with $25 in his pocket and ten months later had a job, an apartment, and a modest savings. His experiences suggest that the standard view of upward mobility and poverty in America may need revision:

During his first 70 days in Charleston, Shepard lived in a shelter and received food stamps. He also made new friends, finding work as a day laborer, which led to a steady job with a moving company.

Ten months into the experiment, he decided to quit after learning of an illness in his family. But by then he had moved into an apartment, bought a pickup truck, and had saved close to $5,000.

The effort, he says, was inspired after reading “Nickel and Dimed,” in which author Barbara Ehrenreich takes on a series of low-paying jobs. Unlike Ms. Ehrenreich, who chronicled the difficulty of advancing beyond the ranks of the working poor, Shepard found he was able to successfully climb out of his self-imposed poverty.

He tells his story in “Scratch Beginnings: Me, $25, and the Search for the American Dream.” The book, he says, is a testament to what ordinary Americans can achieve.

Shepard had it easier than most people in poverty—he hadn’t run up debt, he wasn’t chemically dependent and he had the benefit of an education. Yet he also demonstrated quite clearly that it’s possible to lift oneself out of poverty without extensive government subsidies. While he did use foot stamps and other welfare programs, eventually he ended up self-sufficient.

What this story also highlights is how much of poverty in America is based on social factors rather than economic ones. The conventional wisdom is that poverty can be “cured” through government intervention—yet studies have shown that poverty is most strongly linked to social factors. As a nation, we could eliminate nearly two thirds of our poverty problem by ensuring that every American graduated high school, stayed off drugs and did not have children out of wedlock.

The big problem is that the government can’t force people to do those things. However, if we start treating poverty as a largely societal problem rather than a problem of resource allocation, we can start making headway against poverty in America. The welfare reform initiatives of the 1990s worked precisely because they subsidized positive social factors&dmash;encouraging people to work rather than remaining on the dole. In order to really help America’s poor, we need to look at the problem not as something that can be bought away with taxpayer dollars, but as an symptom of a larger cause. Our society devalues hard work, entrepreneurialism and the family. Yet those values are the values that lift people out of poverty. We cannot just keep throwing money at the problem and expect it to go away—but we can give people the societal support they need to change their own lives around.

While there are certainly people who are poor for other reasons, the vast majority of poverty is social. Shepard’s story serves as a reminder that “Nickled and Dimed” doesn’t represent the totality of life as a poor person in America. It is possible to get ahead in America, even starting from virtually nothing. If we care about lifting people out of poverty, we have to understand how people can do it rather than merely focusing on the potential (and in the case of Ms. Ehrenreich’s experiment, largely artifical) roadblocks along the way. Shepard is an inspiration to those trying to get by in America today, and if more people in poverty followed his example we could make real headway in reducing poverty in this country in the next few years.