The Last 24 Notes MATT LABASH on Bugles Across America
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WHAT TO DO ABOUT SYRIA BARNES • GERECHT • KAGAN KRISTOL • SCHMITT • SMITH SEPTEMBER 16, 2013 $4.95 The Last 24 Notes MATT LABASH on Bugles Across America WWEEKLYSTANDARD.COMEEKLYSTANDARD.COM Contents September 16, 2013 • Volume 19, Number 2 2 The Scrapbook We’ll take the disposable Post, the march of science, & more 5 Casual Joseph Bottum gets stuck in the land of honey 7 Editorial The Right Vote BY WILLIAM KRISTOL Articles 9 I Came, I Saw, I Skedaddled BY P. J. O’ROURKE Decisive moments in Barack Obama history 7 10 Do It for the Presidency BY GARY SCHMITT Congress, this time at least, shouldn’t say no to Obama 12 What to Do About Syria BY FREDERICK W. K AGAN Vital U.S. interests are at stake 14 Sorting Out the Opposition to Assad BY LEE SMITH They’re not all jihadist dead-enders 16 Hesitation, Delay, and Unreliability BY FRED BARNES Not the qualities one looks for in a war president 17 The Louisiana GOP Gains a Convert BY MICHAEL WARREN Elbert Lee Guillory, Cajun noir Features 20 The Last 24 Notes BY MATT LABASH Tom Day and the volunteer buglers who play ‘Taps’ at veterans’ funerals across America 26 The Muddle East BY REUEL MARC GERECHT Every idea Obama had about pacifying the Muslim world turned out to be wrong Books & Arts 9 30 Winston in Focus BY ANDREW ROBERTS A great man gets a second look 32 Indivisible Man BY EDWIN M. YODER JR. Albert Murray, 1916-2013 33 Classical Revival BY MARK FALCOFF Germany breaks from its past to embrace the past 36 Living in Vein BY JOSHUA GELERNTER Remember the man who invented modern medicine 37 With a Grain of Salt BY ELI LEHRER Who and what, exactly, is the chef du jour? 39 Still Small Voice BY JOHN PODHORETZ Sundance gives birth to yet another meh-sterpiece 20 40 Parody And in Russia, the sun revolves around us COVER: An honor guard bugler plays at the burial of U.S. Marine Cpl. Mark David Kidd of Milford, Michigan, at Arlington National Cemetery, August 14, 2007. (Mark Wilson / Getty Images) THE SCRAPBOOK We’ll Take the Disposable Post eaders will, we hope, forgive THE 5) we’ve grown accustomed lately to those 20 reporters—“20 hard-bitten R SCRAPBOOK for the undue pleasure reading in the Post. journalists,” in the words of one Post we have taken in Washington Post sto- To be sure, given the New York editor—must have seemed especially ries about the impending sale of the Times’s own fi nancial peril and self- formidable to the Amazon CEO. Post to Amazon founder Jeffrey Bezos. aggrandizing family-owner, this For the Post, as its readers are fre- In one sense, it has been something should come as no surprise. But back quently reminded, employs some of of a relief for long-suffering Post read- to the story. Jeff Bezos began his visit the toughest, most penetratingly inci- ers. After decades of worshipful cov- to the Post with an hourlong breakfast sive, ink-stained wretches in the news erage of the Meyer/Graham business, men and women of family—which purchased the deep experience, and all races, Post in 1933—the soon-to-be- creeds, and sexual orienta- ex-proprietors are already vir- tions, who have covered Water- tual nonpersons in the pages gate, the Federal Home Loan of the newspaper they bought Bank Board, Watergate, the at auction 80 years ago and Kennedy Center, Watergate, seem to be abandoning at the the Washington Redskins, Wa- edge of oblivion. tergate, the Arlington County Instead of multiple (favor- (Va.) Board, and Watergate. able) reviews of the late Katha- And yet, unexpectedly, rine Graham’s ghostwritten Bezos “charmed the room,” memoirs—which, believe it or according to Jeffrey Leen, the not, won the Pulitzer Prize for Post’s investigations editor. biography in 1998!—we have Leen continued: lately been reading a lot about Jeff Bezos. He was a big supporter of Some of these essays have investigative reporting, which been thinly veiled warnings warmed my heart. He already has a very good grasp of our to the effect that Bezos has Subscribing to the Washington Post should be this easy. business. It was, all in all, a very purchased a near-perfect in- impressive performance. stitution, and that he tampers with its (“fruit plate, poached eggs, spinach, magical formula at his peril. But most coffee and orange juice”) with Bob Almost as impressive, in THE SCRAP- have been friendly accounts of a suc- Woodward himself, who later emailed BOOK’s estimation, as Jeffrey Leen’s cessful businessman who, like most colleagues, “I was struck by how wide- spontaneous comments, which some- successful businessmen, has seldom ranging and methodical [Bezos] is. He how failed to mention the other Jef- been the subject of friendly accounts voiced strong, even intense, optimism frey’s good looks, exquisite wardrobe, in the Washington Post. about the future of the Post.” wide-ranging intellect, and astonish- Of course, most of the aforemen- This was followed by a question- ing success as a visionary business- tioned malicious pleasure has been and-answer session in the news- man. And how, by the way, does Jeff enjoyed at the expense of the Post. But room and, according to the Times, Bezos defi ne success? “It should be as last week we found ourselves indebted a private meeting “with about 20 re- easy,” he told his newsroom audience, to the New York Times. For there, on porters in a neighboring ninth-fl oor “to get a subscription to the Post as it is the front page of the Times Business conference room [where Bezos] talked to buy diapers on Amazon”—a curious section, was the kind of nervously up- about how he defi ned success.” This analogy, in THE SCRAPBOOK’s opinion, beat story (“Bezos Is a Hit in a Wash- particular encounter was, undoubt- given the uses to which the Post is oc- ington Post Newsroom Visit,” Sept. edly, Bezos’s greatest challenge, since casionally put. ♦ Unrehabilitated Bakers gay marriage? Don’t have one,” went there are real consequences to being the bumper-sticker-turned-rallying- publicly opposed to the practice. In s the debate over gay marriage cry. Of course, it was never going last week’s issue, Mark Hemingway A began heating up, supporters of to be that simple with regard to wrote of Christian businesses around the idea insisted that it was a matter something as foundational as mar- the country that have rankled state of basic libertarianism. “Don’t like riage, and now we are starting to see authorities for the crime of refus- 2 / THE WEEKLY STANDARD SEPTEMBER 16, 2013 ing to participate in gay weddings (“The ‘Human Rights’ Juggernaut,” Sept. 9, 2013). The most high-profi le case involves the seven-year legal battle of a New Mexico wedding photography busi- ness that was fi ned in excess of $6,000 for refusing to shoot a gay commit- ment ceremony. State and local au- thorities have also threatened or fi ned an inn in Vermont, a printer in Ken- tucky, a fl orist in Wash ington state, and a bakery in Oregon for declin- ing to provide their services in gay weddings and commitment ceremo- nies. The legal issues involved are not a simple matter of public accom- modation, as these businesses all willingly serve gay clients in every capacity other than matrimonial. They just don’t want to be com- pelled to participate in events of re- ligious signifi cance that run counter to their faith. Well, in the week since Heming- way’s article appeared, we are sad to report, Sweet Cakes, the bakery in Gresham, Oregon, that was men- tioned in the article, has closed its doors. Oregon labor commissioner Brad Avakian told the Oregonian that he hoped to “rehabilitate” Sweet Cakes as one outcome of the state investigation into the matter, but the family that owns the business had long been receiving threats, and activists were already pressur- ing local vendors not to do business with the bakery. After shuttering the clash between gay marriage and ple’s beliefs should not be threatened premises, the owners hung a sign on religious liberty: and that religious liberty should be the door that reads, “This fi ght is “defi ned as maximally as possible,” not over we will continue to stand I don’t want anybody’s religious the gay marriage movement has strong. Your religious freedom is be- liberty—I want that to be defi ned already gone off the rails. ♦ as maximally as possible. We do coming not free anymore. This is ri- not threaten and we should never diculous that we cannot practice our threaten the conscientious beliefs Sentences faith anymore. The LORD is good of those who disagree with us, but and we will continue to serve Him we should welcome their freedom We Didn’t Finish with all our heart.” because it’s our freedom too. And so ould this Labor Day mark the Upon hearing that the bakery had I’m very concerned, actually, that we comeback of movements for may become intolerant of people who ‘C shut its doors, THE SCRAPBOOK recalled workers’ rights and a turn toward believe homosexuality is still sinful. an appearance by Andrew Sullivan on innovation and a new militancy on CNN this past June. Sullivan, who We take Sullivan at his word that behalf of wage-earners? Suggesting through his essays for the New Repub- he’s very concerned that gay mar- this is not the same as a foolish and lic starting in the late 1980s arguably riage advocates “may become intol- romantic optimism that foresees an did more than any other individual erant,” so we hate to break it to him instant union revival.