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Sotomayor, 'Empathy,' and the Defense of Principle

An enduring, if annoying article of liberal faith is that since average Americans are, by definition, behind the elitists' cultural curve, they're inherently in need of correction.  The latest instruction is being administered by President Obama and his leftist pals in Congress and their foot soldiers in the media, and the subject, in case you're the type to not pay attention class, is empathy.

I could choose any of dozens of news reports or editorials which are all part of the national curricula, but Gloria Borger, a "senior political analyst for CNN" has an illustrative piece at CNNPolitics.com, so we'll use that for our counter-culture lesson.  Well before Obama chose Sonia Sotomayor as his nominee, I wrote that he would target a "stealth" candidate, someone culturally difficult to pigeonhole, a person politically immune from rigorous scrutiny. 

The litmus test for such a candidate is that she (it had to be a 'she') would be so impervious to criticism that Republicans would be fighting among themselves, some seduced by the tacit argument that empathy and judicial impartiality aren't, in fact, mutually exclusive.  Well, of course they're not, but the question is whether a substantive reliance on "life experiences" versus a fidelity to law is what our Founders contemplated and what is enshrined in our Constitution?

In light of the cloud of civic confusion that hovers over America, Obama's choice was tactfully ingenious because it had the intended result of confounding Republicans and delighting Democrats.  Having successfully seeded identity politics into our cultural loam, the left now sits back and smirks, confident that we all implicitly avow the veracity of race and ethnicity as reflective of values and principles.  Add to that noxious mix the notion that gender makes the jurist, and you have just the right formula for a left-of-center legal temperament.

So, we have the practical Republicans among us cautioning conservatives not to lose sight of 2012, that our strategy in dealing with Sotomayor must be conditioned with an adroit understanding of the nuanced moderate or Independent voter, lest we cede electoral real estate to the Democrats.  In truth, for far too long many on the right have unwittingly adopted the left's duplicitous recommendation that bipartisanship requires them to accept disparately deep political concessions.  And, with their army of media flooding the zone and quick to characterize principled opposition as mean and uncaring, it's no wonder their arguments have achieved cultural traction.

A telling, early response by many liberal commentators and legal analysts was their pre-emptive shock that any Republican would see political advantage in challenging this nominee.  You see, it doesn't occur to these masterful political tacticians that we might just be opposing her on principle.  Indeed, that we sincerely believe that judicial activism--use empathy, or the euphemism of your choice--is anathema to our judicial system, is entirely lost on them.

The problem is that many Republicans are myopically subscribing to the same myth, fearful that a principled opposition to a candidate who is on record as asserting that a Caucasian male is innately less wise than a Latina female--i.e., herself--is ill-advised, that we should tone it down a bit.

Succinctly stated, although we should always be respectful and never harsh or shrill, principles shouldn't be conditioned by political expedience.

Sotomayor & The Bane of Judicial Activism

One of the fascinating developments since President Obama nominated Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court is the contrast between the deluge of conservative writers who are highlighting her astonishingly liberal record and the deafening silence from the mainstream media.  They and their leftist brethren in Congress are too busy celebrating the inevitability of Sotomayor's ascendancy to the highest court, riding the cultural coattails enshrined in judicial activism which has finally achieved its lifelong goal--an unfettered license to create law based on personal preferences.

Although it's not been widely published in the media, anyone perusing the center-right blogosphere couldn't have missed Sotomayor's racist comment that "I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion (as a judge) than a white male who hasn't lived that life."  Upon questioning by the Senate Judiciary Committee she'll doubtless find a deft way to deflect or minimize that starkly hostile comment, but it provides us average folks a window into the left's curious universe, a place where values and principles are presupposed based on skin color and ethnicity.

Conservative writers such as George Will have reflected on the torrent of front-page invective that would have obtained had a Samuel Alito stated the converse--that "I would hope that a white male with the richness of this traditional American values would reach a better conclusion than a Latina woman who hasn't had that life."  But the deeper paradox is that otherwise intelligent people such as Sotomayor sincerely believe that judicial decisions should often be predicated on one's life experiences versus the Constitution.

One of the key questions she must answer, therefore, is whether she truly believes that people's identity can be divined by their skin color or ethnicity?  And, have we run so far afield that a member of one ethnicity is deemed incapable of rendering a fair legal judgment concerning a member of another ethnicity?

The transparently craven motivation of this president is abundantly evident by this choice because were this individual neither a female nor an American of Hispanic ancestry, her rather unremarkable legal career would never qualify her for the highest court in America. 

As I've argued in numerous posts, culture is the civic engine of any society, which informs its character and plots its trajectory as a nation.  Its strength and resilience depends upon a vigilant adherence to a set of principles, one immune from the sway of fashion and the allure of values codified by relativism.  Tragically, Obama and millions like him in America today are convinced that the most superficial human traits--that is, pigment and ancestry--supersede the values and ideas we hold dear.

The president will likely have two more opportunities to put his stamp on the Supreme Court.  If this nomination is prelude to the next two, we can expect a grim resurgence of judicial activism which can only inhibit the guarantee of equality under the law. 

Memorial Day & The Timeless Nature of Evil

Memorial Day is a holiday that is becoming culturally perplexing for many Americans.  We instinctively know that thousands have given their lives and been wounded in service to their country, and when we try to imagine their heroism in horrific places, from the Battle of Trenton to Appomattox to Bataan, our throats swell and we become mute with profound respect.  Although the passage of time has blurred the contemporaneously contentious nature of wars America has fought, it's clear that today's engagements don't enjoy the same level of civic support.

Beyond the fact that time has provided a more candid reckoning of past wars--which is to say a more unequivocal justification of them--another compelling reason for that disparity is how we view the nature of good and evil, coupled with a collective reticence to sacrifice our blood and treasure.  In 1992, Francis Fukuyama published a seminal work titled "The End of History and the Last Man," which made the argument that human beings had reached the end of their ideological evolution, and that liberal democracy was its inevitable incarnation.  That view, of course, was met strong counter-arguments in the ensuing years, which have seen the rise of radical Islam as well as Russia's recidivist impulses towards autocracy, mirroring that of China.

Unfortunately, the unfinished nature of our human narrative has been painfully punctuated with these realities at the precise moment when the historical consensus regarding good and evil is fraying.  The fashionable introspection posited by the left, the kind that holds America to far higher standards than any other nation, conjures the argument for the moral equivalence among all nations.  That leads us to the foreign policy corollary, which is the perennial argument regarding the presumed justification of U.S. interventions, whether they use 'soft' or 'hard' power, to either encourage democratic principles or topple manifestly hostile despots.

In this context the efficacy of military intervention is also being seriously questioned.  One of the central tenants of President Obama's ascendancy is the alleged potency of diplomacy as a vital precursor to any threat of military action.  It's truly not a matter of a nascent isolationism sweeping the land than it is the tacit conviction that the military option is wholly unsuited to the complexities America faces, from North Korea to Iran, which is to say, a forced conclusion is less convincing than one underwritten by persuasion and patience.

Although history belies the practical application of such arguments, they ought not be dismissed out of hand.  Rather, it's what underlies them that is cause for concern.  Implicit in Obama's approach to foreign policy is a summary rejection of the doctrine employed by every previous president, which is a parsing of geopolitical problems based on their relative intransigence.  On one end we have China and Russia, ostensible if inconstant allies whose sketchy adherence to democratic principle are truly concerning; at the other end we have belligerent and unpredictable regimes such as North Korea and Iran. 

The Obama doctrine's premise is that there's an effectively untried way to positively influence all of these relationships, one that employs incentives and disincentives based on an algorithm known only to him.  This fundamental revision of common sense, one that presupposes the existence of an entirely new set of diplomatic tools, and one curiously undiscovered for the past two thousand years, is at once intriguing and deeply concerning.  Among other peculiarities, it suggests that such patently evil men as Kim Jong Il and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad are, in fact, acting rationally, defending their unique sense of justice against a world hostile and indifferent to its beliefs, as opposed to flouting international conventions and the will of the civilized world.

It's a fascinating, if somewhat academic argument, that is, one that can take us just so far.  Because, among other reasons, it stipulates that the behavioral paradigm in these regimes is amenable to reasonable intercourse, if we could just break its abstruse code.  That argument simply can't stand the test of history:  If we examine regional conflicts that evolved into war, from Thermopylae to the Punic Wars to the Hundred Years War, and the two world wars last century, the theme is consistent.  They each involve some combination of revanchist motivations and designs of economic or geographic hegemony.

We can dress them up in the vogue parlance of contemporary diplomatic parlor games, but the fundamentals are timeless and they apply no less persuasively with Iran than they did to Rome and Carthage in the Punic Wars.  The difference is the Obamaesque propensity to a dangerous intellectual hubris that downgrades evil to the status of a misdemeanor while naively supposing a reasonableness on the part of tyrants, one that's conspicuous by its absence.

Therefore, as we celebrate the valor and heroism of those whose sacrifice provided the foundations of the freedoms we too often take for granted, let's not forget that evil is, in fact, timeless, and, although candid discussions with our adversaries are an important component of American foreign policy, in the end, the only language despots understand is the kind written in blood--their own.

Published Letter: The Left's Myth-Making

See today's Colorado Springs Gazette where my letter to the editor appears (scroll down to "Left Ignores Facts in Debate").  As you'll see it focuses on two issues:  the first is the resilience of the liberals' revisionist instincts with respect to pre-Iraq war intelligence; the second, House Speaker Pelosi's pathetic prevarications concerning notification by the CIA of the enhanced interrogation techniques that had been implemented.

Now that Iraq is becoming a relatively stable nation, with the promise of being the first legitimate democracy in the Middle East (apart, of course, from Israel), the left remains intellectually mired in its fantasy land where conservatives misled a naive nation into war.  It will be fascinating to watch as their story is serially revised to include progressively candid admissions of success, which, for the common folk, is already impossible to ignore.

President Obama is leading that initiative with his occasional concessions made in unguarded moments, noting that the much maligned surge has worked.  It's kind of difficult not to admit it since he's using the exact same strategy in Afghanistan.

The Pelosi matter is a real delight and conservatives pray her speakership continues right up to the 2010 mid-term elections, with Congressional hearings sprinkled here and there to keep the issue front and center.  Political chameleons, who try to finesse their way out of every self-made contradiction, are an unsightly lot, and she's a textbook example.

Obama's Cynical Dishonesty on Abortion

Civic dissension and argument is a vital part of life in America, and, when the terms of engagement are reasonably equitable and people act in good faith, regardless of the outcome, both sides can take solace in the fact that it's only in totalitarian states where debates are summarily settled.

However, if we didn't have enough supporting evidence before President Obama's speech at Notre Dame, his remarks there made it unambiguously clear that the debate over abortion not being waged on a level playing field.  To listen to his speech, its lofty rhetoric about finding common ground notwithstanding, one might be inclined to conclude that a fetus isn't, in fact, a separate human being.  Indeed, it's the casual manner in which liberals such as Obama characterize the abortion decision, as though it's merely one of many on a narrow moral continuum, ranging from the annoying to the disconcerting, but never reaching the threshold of the morally noxious.

With the liberals' habitual defense of every creature in the animal kingdom, from the dolphin to the snail darter, not to mention their defense death row inmates, one might think their apparently limitless ethical reservoir would extend to an innocent unborn human--think again.  The reason the abortion debate is so contentious, Obama said, is that Americans hold no values more dear than "life" and "choice." 

We could proffer the argument about school choice as our first exhibit, but that would only further muddy the already murky liberal waters.  Rather, let's examine how we got to the point where 1.2 million innocent lives are snuffed each year.  Recall that back in the 1950s the incidence of pre-marital sex, abortion, and single parenthood was profoundly lower.  Enter the 60s with its myopic iconoclasm and insistence that God, love, and matrimony were quaint--read expendable--virtues that oppressed free expression and women's rights.

The marriage contract was annulled and sexuality was severed from procreation within relationships blessed by God, and the result was the incidence of single parenthood and abortion skyrocketed.  At that point a Supreme Court antagonistic to any semblance of Constitutional literacy crafted a right of privacy out of thin air, which provided a legal, if not moral license to slaughter the unborn.

The cruel and wholly disingenuous way in which liberals characterize this debate reflects an astonishing level of dishonesty and self-delusion:  They originally argued that a fetus wasn't a separate human being; then, with the advent of ultrasound, they conceded--duh!--it was, but that it was still the mother's "right" to murder it.  Obama has taken the argument to unprecedented amoral heights with his votes in the Illinois senate against legislation that would have proscribed "live birth abortion." 

Only those immune to the darker side of human nature should read about that savage proceduree, those who don't wince when viewing those gray photographs of emaciated bodies in Auschwitz piled high like cord wood.  But for most of us who are moved to visceral revulsion, suffice it to say it's a practice we would never, ever perform on a dog.

So, as Obama calls for a calm ecumenicalism in search of common ground, let's not forget that with the passing of every hour, another 137 innocent unborn humans are killed--all for the sake of "choice."

Revisiting Treaties & International Law

My recent post on Christie Brinkley's exposition on nuclear nonproliferation struck a nerve with a writer whose moniker is "Balance and Security," and who submitted a caustic comment.  Although this individual provides some informative historical context and a few curt rejoinders and admonitions, he fails to address the core contention of my post:  To wit:  In our age, which is witnessing a growing cohort of nuclearized belligerents, a call for universal disarmament is quixotic, because only the world's civilized nations would consider it.

Indeed, even if we stipulate that all 187 member nations of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) agreed to comply, what compliance leverage would that provide for rogue nations such as North Korea and Iran, not to mention a volatile one such as Pakistan?  The left's implied reliance on such agreements has produced checkered results at best, because there's only one language despots understand and that's the kind backed with the threat of military action.

Perhaps most convoluted is his statement concerning American values versus power:

The assymetrical (sic) foe is fear driven provincialism that thinks that people are different in the rest of the world and cannot live with the thought that we might actually be able to overcome threats with our core American values of rule of law backed by a strong military not the law of power and a mocking of international law.

The first challenge is parsing that sentence, but once it's digested the complaint seems to be that conservatives instinctively resort to the "law of power" and that they mock international law.  Actually, although we were deeply concerned with the balance of power and threat of regional hegemony by tyrants during the wars of the 20th century, it was ultimately American sovereignty and national security concerns that motivated our involvement. 

The same principles ought to obtain with respect to our decisions to back the NPT, which is to ask what, exactly, is the U.S. interest.  That's not to say we can't strive for world peace, only that we must have a defined course of action predicated on the recognition of the danger of nuclear disarmament by the world's civilized nations, which would leave only rogue nations with nukes.

The writer also excoriates the Bush Administration for its alleged violation of treaties, without offering a scintilla of evidence.  Is the charge related to our invasion of Iraq?  If so, does he forget that it was Democratic presidents who initiated or continued every major war in the last century?  And, was it a violation of international law when President Clinton ordered the attacks in the Balkans without U.N. approval?

This individual's assertions to the contrary notwithstanding, international law is largely a fiction, written and enforced by such moral exemplars as the United Nations.  In that regard it has no leverage and no functional authority, which means barbaric nations such as North Korea routinely flout it.  The same process is unfolding in Iran, so I would close by asking the likes of this writer how exactly the NPT would force Ahmadinejad to shut down its enrichment program?

He may "like Ms. Brinkley's love the (sic) land of the free and brave!", but in the end our Republic is free because of the brave--not because of international treaties.

The Slow Death of Freedom in America

A scene in the film classic The Grand Illusion is shot in a bistro and includes a sign that reads, "Alcohol kills slowly, but who's in a hurry."  We might use that quip as a metaphor for the incremental manner in which the grotesque expansion of the federal government in the past half a century has insidiously worked its way into every corner of our lives.

It's not merely the arrogant assumption that government can make wiser decisions, or that it's an expensive quid pro quo that only grows over time, but rather, that it slowly hollows out a place in our collective civic core and leaches the lifeblood of our Republic--freedom.  In an unprecedented report issued earlier this year by the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, professors William P. Ruger and Jason Sorens provide a state-by-state analysis titled Freedom in the 50 States:  An Index of Personal and Economic Freedom.

The except below from the Executive Summary explains the scope and content of their report:

This study improves on prior attempts to score economic freedom for American states in three primary ways:  (1) in includes measures of social and personal freedoms such as peaceable citizens' rights to education their own children, own and carry firearms, and be free from unreasonable search and seizure; (2) in includes far more variables, even on economic policies alone, than prior studies, and there are no missing data on any variable; and (3) it uses new, more accurate measurements of key variables, particularly state fiscal policies.

For many, this might seem like a quaint look at a problem of minimal magnitude.  But that view only has validity when glimpsed through the prism of modern culture, where rights and obligations have been slowly eroded by a lifeless bureaucracy at every level of government.  It's our tectonic adaptation to these encroachments that is arguably the most hostile aspect of their hegemonic designs, because, with the passing of each year our recollection of civic life sans a Leviathan government presence becomes more vague.  That renders the deepening penetration of government into our lives ever more plausible, and we become progressively more susceptible to larger doses.

Delving more deeply into this vile development we find something even more profound:  When decisions are pre-emptively made for us, from the lack of choice in K-12 education to the stranglehold taxation has on us, our choices are not only restricted, but our failure factor is restricted.  Indeed, beyond power acquisition and retention, the left's dream of mortal happiness at the hands of government focuses on the elimination of risk and the redaction of consequences.

Those, in turn, blunt motivation and inhibit our ability to learn by failure.  In contemporary civic parlance, no one should be allowed to fail and no one should be held accountable for mistakes.  Yet, that pounding in your chest when make a significant mistake is a kind of life marker, a moment indelibly stained with a lesson we'll carry which provides a vital, self-correcting mechanism.  It also creates the kind of resolve and resilience so crucial to charting a trajectory of professional success and personal happiness.

So, as you review the report, don't merely think about the discrete implications of the loss of freedom, but rather, how it leads to a more cossetted civilization, one where challenges are handicapped and adverse outcomes mitigated.  It's that creeping sense that we're ignorantly creating a civic and cultural landscape less robust than the last, where collectivism predicated on a liberal agenda has replaced individualism and accountability, that is most disturbing.

The early indications of the Obama administration, as well as our invertebrate Congress, provides convincing evidence that freedom is slowly moving from endangerment to obsolescence.