6-42_Jul23_Hi 7/24/01 3:06 PM Page 1

AS THE

WORLD VOTES MICHAEL BARONE

JULY 23, 2001 $3.95

ConditCondit Unbecoming SAMUnbecomingDEALEY • NOEMIE EMERY • STEPHEN F. H AYES Iss42/Jul23 TOC 7/24/01 3:08 PM Page 1

Contents July 23, 2001 • Volume 6, Number 42

2 Scrapbook ...... 2008 Olympics in Beijing, and more. 6 Correspondence . . . On OxyContin and Allen Iverson. 4 Casual ...... J. Bottum, mourner. 11 Editorial...... No Defense

Articles

14 Where Were the Adults? They sure weren’t being judgmental...... BY NOEMIE EMERY 16 Condit Unbecoming A study in Washington, D.C., creepiness...... BY SAM DEALEY 18 Dear Abbe orld Photos Can the Democrats’ top ambulance chaser help Gary Condit?...... BY STEPHEN F. H AYES 20 No Salvation for the White House Congressional progress but a PR setback for Bush’s faith-based initiative...... BY TERRY EASTLAND 21 Is It Time for Arafat to Go? Cover photos: AP/Wide W More and more Israelis think so...... BY TOM ROSE Features

23 As the World Votes The era of big government does seem to be over...... BY MICHAEL BARONE

27 “Futile Care” and Its Friends They want to decide when your life is worthless...... BY WESLEY J. SMITH Books & Arts

31 The Great Bookie Mortimer Adler, 1902-2001...... BY JOSEPH EPSTEIN

36 Soldier and Citizen Thomas Ricks’s novel of civil-military relations...... BY MACKUBIN THOMAS OWENS

37 Writing Dangerously Journalism when it matters...... BY ALEXANDER C. KAFKA

40 Parody ...... What Nexis turns up on Gary Condit.

William Kristol, Editor Fred Barnes, Executive Editor David Tell, Opinion Editor David Brooks, Andrew Ferguson, Senior Editors Richard Starr, Claudia Winkler, Managing Editors J. Bottum, Books & Arts Editor Christopher Caldwell, Senior Writer Stephen F. Hayes, Matt Labash, Staff Writers Victorino Matus, David Skinner, Assistant Managing Editors Lee Bockhorn, Associate Editor Jonathan V. Last, Online Editor Beth Henary, Editorial Assistant Katherine Rybak Torres, Art Director Jan Forbes, Production Manager Kent Bain, Design Consultant Tucker Carlson, John J. DiIulio Jr. (on leave), Noemie Emery, Joseph Epstein, David Frum (on leave), David Gelernter, Brit Hume, Robert Kagan, Charles Krauthammer, Tod Lindberg, P. J. O’Rourke, John Podhoretz, Irwin M. Stelzer, Contributing Editors Terry Eastland, Publisher David H. Bass, Deputy Publisher Nicholas H.B. Swezey, Advertising & Marketing Manager John L. Mackall, Advertising Sales Manager Lauren Trotta Husted, Circulation Director Carolyn Wimmer, Executive Assistant Tina Winston, Finance Director Catherine Titus, Publicity Director Ian Slatter, Special Projects Taybor Cook, Angel Jones, Elizabeth Royal, Staff Assistants

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The Beijing Games People Play

ate last week, as expected, the or two during the marathon, for exam- None of this caused anyone in Wash- Lworld’s largest dictatorship was ple. And IOC aides acknowledge in pri- ington to blink. There was Clinton awarded the honor of hosting the 2008 vate that China’s housing and trans- administration national security adviser summer Olympic games. Friday in portation problems make the 2008 Sandy Berger on the op-ed page of the Moscow, the International Olympic Games a potential disaster. And some Washington Post, for example, urging us Committee made quick work of bids people continue to fuss about that, you to understand that the “world looks dif- from Toronto, Istanbul, Paris, and Osa- know, human rights stuff. ferent from China.” A “bifurcated poli- ka, and voted instead to hold the event But that’s all small potatoes. To have cy of economic engagement and politi- in Beijing. lost the games, Canadian Olympic offi- cal hostility is unsustainable,” Berger Sure, there’d been some concern cial Paul Henderson explained, “Bei- concluded. So we should never be hos- about China’s plan to stage the beach jing [would’ve] had to make a major tile, in other words. No matter what the volleyball competition in Tiananmen mistake.” Chinese do. Square, right where the bodies fell dur- Like antagonizing the United States Incidentally, the author of this little ing 1989’s massacre of pro-democracy into actively opposing its Olympic bid? appeasement essay, besides his govern- demonstrators. But—see how reason- Would that such a thing were possible. ment service, is a high-dollar adviser to able they are?—the Beijing organizing Amnesty International reports that corporations doing business in China, committee agreed to relocate the artifi- China has summarily executed nearly just back from a trip to Beijing. Repub- cial sand pit. 2,000 “undesirables” in the past three lican leaders of the House of Represen- True, too, there remain a few health months. Falun Gong representatives tatives, who last week blocked a vote on nuts among Olympic track and field report that China has recently mur- a non-binding resolution condemning athletes who worry that Beijing’s noto- dered several dozen of their colleagues. Beijing’s Olympic bid, do not get paid rious air pollution—more days than And Beijing itself announced that it will by the China lobby, of course. So THE not, you can hardly see a hundred yards try several falsely accused Americans for SCRAPBOOK wonders, What’s their in the smog—might, oh, collapse a lung the capital crime of espionage. excuse? ♦

its dedication to this goal in its efforts to Are you now, or have strengthen the labor movement, combat you ever been, from the critical situation of poverty, hunger, Milwaukee? unemployment and racial discrimina- tion as well as its efforts to save our ast week, the city that’s home to environment.” Lsome of America’s greatest symbols Yeah, right. The crowd of nearly 500 of capitalism and freedom (Miller beer, gave a standing ovation. Harley-Davidson) hosted the annual Steve Filmanowicz, Norquist’s convention of the Communist Party, spokesman, is eager to clarify. The wel- USA. The commies were pumped as come, he says, was written by an overen- they kicked things off with a spirited thusiastic staffer, and Norquist “wasn’t rendition of “Solidarity Forever.” The around to sign off on the letter.” excitement peaked when Daisy Cubais, Norquist is often to the right of most an aide to Milwaukee mayor John Democrats on issues, Filmanowicz con- Norquist, read to the gathering a wel- tinues, and the letter was basically sent come letter from Norquist. Wiscon- to recognize “work that some members sinites, Norquist writes, are “widely of the party have done on labor issues.” known for our socialist traditions.” decent life for working families.” Besides, he says, Norquist can’t be a And, he continues, “in that sense, we What’s more, “if we, the people, work commie-sympathizer because he wrote share many things in common with the together, we can win the struggle to bet- a book in which “he quotes Milton long history of the Communist Party ter the lives of ordinary working people. Friedman four times and Karl Marx not and all those engaged in the fight for a The Communist Party, USA has shown once.” ♦

2 / THE WEEKLY STANDARD JULY 23, 2001 Iss42/Jul23 scrapper 7/24/01 3:07 PM Page 3

Scrapbook

appears in the ad. This is what disin- genuousness looks like in the debate over embryonic stem cells. If you’d pre- fer that stem cells were obtained non- destructively from adults, if you think that there’s something creepy about cre- ating human embryos for the purpose of destroying them to extract their stem cells (the kind of research, according to the Wall Street Journal, that the Juvenile Diabetes Foundation has already given $650,000 to support in Spain), why, then, you must want little Samantha to suffer forever. Funny, the usual watch- dogs of political advertising haven’t barked on this one. ♦ Nightmare on Pennsylvania Avenue

n the most recent impartial contribu- Ition to human knowledge to emerge from Berkeley, California, a new study has found that Republicans have more nightmares. Noted dream researcher Kelly Bulkeley, Ph.D., presented his findings on July 11 to the 18th Annual International Conference of the Associa- tion for the Study of Dreams. His study, based on a poll of visitors to his website, found that half of the self-reported Stem Cell vent a breakthrough in medical sci- dreams of Republicans were classified as ence.” So we had all better telephone nightmares, while just 18 percent of lib- Demagogues President Bush this minute to record erals’ dreams were. As UPI reports, our support for stem cell research. Bulkeley, whose previous work includes he Juvenile Diabetes Foundation THE SCRAPBOOK could make that “Political Dreaming: Dreams of the Thas just produced a beautiful, mov- phone call. So could everybody else in 1992 Presidential Election,” claimed ing television ad. It’s about a pretty, America, because there isn’t anyone that “Democratic nightmares are tem- lively little girl named Samantha—and involved in the debate who opposes pered by the very principles Democrats the evil people who want her to keep stem cell research. Adult and other non- claim to espouse—hope, power, and pos- suffering from diabetes. You might embryonic stem cell research has shown itive action.” Republicans, on the other wonder who, exactly, is in favor of juve- potential for treating diabetes, and hand, “inhabit scarier dreamlands” nile diabetes. Well, the ad makes it everybody is glad. But that’s not what characterized by “aggression, misfor- clear: The people who oppose the use of the Samantha ad is really about. What tune, and physical threats.” stem cells. And even though “stem cell the Juvenile Diabetes Foundation We eagerly await further findings, in research has broad support . . . across wants you to do is phone the president which Republicans tend, on average, to the country,” these people are using to register your support for embryonic display an unusual degree of loathing “politics”—politics, mind you—to “pre- stem cell research, a word that never for bunnies and fuzzy kittens. ♦

JULY 23, 2001 THE WEEKLY STANDARD / 3 Casual July 23 7/24/01 3:06 PM Page 1

Besides, Catholic colleges have a particular duty to remember the gen- Casual eration of professors now passing away, the last group educated in the FUNERAL FOR A FRIEND old Scholastic ratio studiorum and sharpened, as young men, like arrows before the Jesuits loosed them on the world. No matter how far they meant to ask Aldo what he I didn’t understand it fully; he nev- later fell into modern thought, they thought about Restoration come- er produced a complete expression of never lost the intellectual tools in dy: Wycherly, Congreve, Steele, his thought. But it involved what which they were first schooled. It’s and Sheridan; all those sly, Hans Urs von Balthasar called “theo- not that they still lived in a Iquick-witted plays with titles like The drama,” and it filled his conversation. Thomistic world. It is, rather, that Way of the World and The School for “God is the playwright,” he’d say, their minds remained Thomistic Scandal. I meant to call him on the “and we’re the actors.” That’s not pre- minds, and you couldn’t listen to phone for a long conversation or determination, a denial of free will, them talk about anything—tulips, even—why not?—take a few hours off any more than Shakespeare predeter- Shakespeare, politics—without hear- one day and drive up to Baltimore for mines how Hamlet is performed. Still, ing them order the subject by genus lunch. Aldo seemed mostly to think that and species, mark the difference But one day always seemed to turn what God intends for us is a comedy. between form and matter, and point into some other day, and he slipped Life only looks like a tragedy because out the real distinction between away this winter while I was traveling. essence and existence. They had The sore throat that wouldn’t heal, the trained minds, and there was a logic, visit to the doctor, the discovery of a kind of mental cleanness, to the cancer, the massive medical interven- way they thought that, nowadays, tions, the heart that couldn’t stand up has almost disappeared. against them. Within weeks, he was In an odd way, that made them gone, at 67 years old. even better with other people’s ideas Aldo Tassi was a philosopher and a than with their own. To tell Aldo prize-winning playwright at Loyola what one was working on or think- College in Baltimore, Maryland. He ing about was to have one’s half- was a barrel-chested man with long thought notions lifted up, given a arms that would swing in big gestures good shake, put in the right order, as he talked, perpetually threatening, and offered back with far more clari- but never quite spilling, the wine ty than they originally possessed, glasses and coffee cups scattered across and often far more clarity than they the table. He had a thick mop of white deserved. It made for a rather breath- hair and one of those fine Italian less conversation. faces that seem to get only fin- I hadn’t seen Aldo Tassi and his er—handsomer, more filled wife Nina for more than a year with character—as they fall to before he died. I had thought, ruin. And his mind was like in my sloppy way, that there the attic in an old house, a Aldo Tassi would be time—time enough magnificent jumble stacked to run up to see him, time later with boxes of antique photographs, we flub our lines so badly, and in the to pass an idea or two by him, time towers of forgotten books, and ancient wings the Author stands, shaking his sometime or other to find out how steamer trunks you longed for an head in dismay. Restoration comedies fit in his sys- afternoon to rummage through. He deserved better than the feeble tem. “Can we come back?” my He had a philosophical system, as turnout of faculty members Loyola daughter asked as we drove home well, a metaphysical intuition that managed to pull together for his obse- from our last trip to Baltimore. And I somehow brought order to it all: the quies during the semester break. We said yes, but the answer was no. We playwriting, the Thomistic philoso- really have a duty to go to funerals—a can never come back to find things as phy in which he had been brought up, duty not just to the surviving family, we left them, unlost and unchanged the sociology that dominated intellec- but to the dead themselves. Funerals despite our absence. My failure was tual life in America when he came of are their last appearances, their posi- one Aldo could have helped me with, age, the Platonic dialogues that were tively final performances, before the for it was a failure to think clearly. his real love, and the endless stream of curtain comes down forever, and we novels he consumed. owe it to them to buy a ticket. J. BOTTUM

4/ THE WEEKLY STANDARD JULY 23, 2001 Letters 7/23 7/24/01 3:08 PM Page 2

Correspondencepp

OXYCONTIN CAUTION tice. Neither the CSA nor its implement- ber of oxycodone-related incidents was ing regulations define “legitimate med- relatively stable. Following OxyContin’s N “A B AD PRESCRIPTION FROM THE ical purpose.” Additionally, they do not debut, DAWN data for 20 metropolitan I DEA” (June 4), Eric Chevlen charac- set standards as to what constitutes “the areas indicate that emergency room terizes the Drug Enforcement Adminis- usual course of professional practice.” episodes and medical examiner reports tration’s stance against the widespread DEA relies upon the medical community involving oxycodone have increased 400 abuse of OxyContin as “misguided and to make these determinations. In fact, percent and 100 percent, respectively. wrongheaded.” He further questions DEA has strongly supported the Federa- Unfortunately, this information does not “DEA’s authority to act” and the strate- tion of State Medical Boards’ “Model reflect the full extent of problems attrib- gies being implemented to address this Guidelines for the Use of Controlled uted to OxyContin‚ since most deaths problem. Substances in Pain Management.” DEA have occurred in areas outside the Oversight for approval, marketing, recognizes that these guidelines reflect DAWN system, such as Maine, West Vir- and handling of controlled substances is currently accepted standards that may be ginia, and rural Kentucky, where officials the responsibility of two federal agencies, used by both medical professionals and describe the trend as an epidemic. the Food and Drug Administration and regulators in determining the appropri- Another indicator of the magnitude of DEA. FDA is responsible for approving ateness of opioid prescribing. OxyContin abuse is the increased num- drugs for medical use and setting drug In his article, Dr. Chevlen downplays ber of individuals seeking assistance for marketing regulations. These responsi- the dangers of OxyContin abuse. He cites addiction problems. Drug treatment pro- bilities cover all drugs, including con- grams in the hardest hit states report that trolled substances. DEA is mandated by 50 to 90 percent of newly admitted the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) to patients identified OxyContin as their prevent the diversion of pharmaceutical primary drug of abuse. controlled substances, while ensuring Considerable attention has been given that supplies are adequate to meet legiti- to reports that DEA is planning to mate medical needs in the United States. restrict the prescribing of OxyContin to While DEA does not directly regulate pain specialists, and to limit its distribu- the marketing of controlled substances, tion to a few pharmacies. Throughout we become concerned when tactics DEA’s examination of the abuse of Oxy- appear to create an increased possibility Contin, numerous options have been for diversion. If aggressive marketing explored and discussed with interested seems to lead to oversupply or maximize parties. None of these options will be the abuse potential of a controlled sub- employed unilaterally without consider- stance, DEA endeavors to work with ing the effects they may have on public pharmaceutical companies and FDA to health. DEA has engaged in numerous find appropriate solutions. dialogues with Purdue Pharmaceutical, To enable DEA to pursue its mandate, OxyContin’s manufacturer, and the med- the CSA established five schedules into ical community to address diversion and which controlled substances are separat- abuse problems that arise when medical ed according to their approved medical practitioners lack sufficient training in use and abuse potential. Schedule I sub- data from the Drug Abuse Warning Net- pain management. As Dr. Chevlen stances have no approved medical use. work (DAWN) indicating that aceta- admits in his article, “I learned virtually Substances in Schedule II, including minophen (Tylenol), a product available nothing in medical school about pain, OxyContin, are approved for medical use on the shelves of every convenience store and most of what I was taught as an and have the highest potential for abuse. and pharmacy in the United States, is intern and resident was wrong.” The CSA also established a closed system more than three times as likely to result DEA agrees with pain management of distribution that includes the registra- in an emergency room visit as OxyCon- specialists’ assertions that many general tion of controlled substance handlers, tin. However, it is not merely the num- practitioners have not received the train- production quotas, recordkeeping, and bers that have raised concerns of the ing necessary to address complex chronic security requirements. This closed sys- health care community and law enforce- pain syndromes. These specialists tem allows DEA to track and safeguard ment agencies, but the speed with which emphasize that Schedule II opioids are potentially dangerous controlled sub- the abuse trend continues to spread. The best used as treatments of last resort, and stances as they are transferred from the spread has continued despite restrictions that when used, they should be part of a manufacturer to the user. placed on OxyContin as a Schedule II multi-disciplinary approach, to include The CSA requires that controlled sub- controlled substance by the CSA. physical and psychological therapy. It is stances be prescribed, dispensed, or Since its 1996 introduction, the num- feared that in the well-intentioned push administered only for legitimate medical ber of OxyContin prescriptions dis- to ensure adequate pain treatment by purposes by practitioners acting in the pensed increased twenty-fold to about 6 some less experienced practitioners, the usual course of their professional prac- million in 2000. Prior to this, the num- terms “pain treatment” and “opioid

6 / THE WEEKLY STANDARD JULY 23, 2001 Letters 7/23 7/24/01 3:08 PM Page 4

Correspondencepp

treatment” have become synonymous. number of cases of addiction-related that he knows better than they how DEA recognizes that the best means events, but rather their rate of increase many people are “really” in pain, that he of preventing the diversion of OxyCon- since the year of the drug’s introduction. knows better than they which medicines tin is to increase awareness of the proper A moment’s reflection will reveal the should be used to treat the pain, and use and potential dangers of the product. obvious: All useful medications newly which should not. Even more arrogant: Training programs must assist practi- introduced to the market experience a He is telling millions in pain that 95 per- tioners in distinguishing between rapid increase in sales. When one starts cent of them will just have to put up patients truly in need and individuals with a small number of initial sales, then with it. engaged in drug-seeking behavior. the percent increase will always be great. “The American people should be Despite implications by Dr. Chevlen The same will be true of adverse events assured,” says Nagel. I don’t think so. to the contrary, DEA is taking a mea- associated with the drug. sured, reasonable approach to dealing One bureaucrat’s mistaken notions with OxyContin abuse that is consistent might seem of little consequence. But the KILL THE GANGSTER LOVE with methods normally used in combat- untrammeled power of the DEA to inter- ing the diversion of pharmaceutical con- fere with pain relief makes the idea quite LEASE TELL ME that the “Parody” trolled substances. It includes liaison dangerous. The DEA has the authority Ppage has now expanded to include with the health care community and the to set quotas for how much oxycodone the “Casual” page, as there is no other pharmaceutical industry, education of may be imported, manufactured, and way to understand Jonathan V. Last’s cel- medical professionals regarding scams processed into OxyContin. It is a com- ebration of the Philadelphia 76ers used to obtain these products for illicit mand economy, and Marshall is the com- (“We’re All Philadelphians Now,” purposes, and the investigation of sus- mander. While Laura Nagel assures us July 2/July 9). But then again, every pected diverters. that no drastic action will be “employed chance Last gets, he blasts everyone who The American people should be unilaterally by the DEA without consid- lives in southern California, particularly assured that DEA is committed to their ering the effects they may have on public in Los Angeles. His classic loser, anti- safety. As part of this commitment, DEA health,” we must keep in mind that this Yankee-like diatribe could be overlooked, will ensure that adequate supplies of pain is a police agency whose primary mission except for the Allen Iverson tribute. medications are available for those with is drug control, not a health agency He can’t be serious about proclaiming legitimate needs and that the public is whose mission is pain control. While she this gangster as “pro-life [and] pro-mar- protected from the consequences of pre- says that the DEA will “ensure that ade- riage.” Surrounded by illegitimate, scription drug abuse. quate supplies of pain medications [are multi-mothered children, this tattooed, LAURA M. NAGEL available] for those with legitimate multi-millionaire, obscenity-spewing, Deputy Assistant Administrator needs,” it is clear that the agency has no wannabe rap artist appears on national Office of Diversion Control idea what those legitimate needs are. television to whine about his fate in life. Drug Enforcement Administration We are not differing over small quan- A “profound respect for law and order”? Washington, DC tities here. In his subcommittee testimo- Get serious. This is akin to the NBC ny, Marshall stated, “I am seriously con- announcers screaming, “Three more 3 sidering rolling back the quotas that pointers, another bucket, and Philly will ERIC CHEVLEN RESPONDS: The funda- DEA sets and rolling back those quotas only be down by 12!” mental question on which the DEA and to the 1996 level until we do find ways to Publishing poor-loser comments from pain management specialists disagree is control this. That’s a drastic step and it eastern fans is one thing, but how do you this: Does abuse and diversion represent would be a very controversial step, justify tearing down a clean-cut, model a tiny portion of the OxyContin and oth- because there is the need for this drug citizen like Kobe Bryant to hold up a er opioids now being prescribed, or does out there. But I am very seriously consid- scowling, poor sportsman like Iverson as it represent a substantial part or even a ering that.” Drastic step indeed. Such a a hero? Can we have a little more consis- majority of it? reduction is fully 95 percent of the cur- tency with the rest of the magazine’s Unfortunately for the millions of rent demand for OxyContin. Can Mar- content? Americans who have finally achieved a shall really believe that 19 out of 20 pre- WARREN STITT modicum of pain relief, and the millions scriptions for OxyContin are illegiti- Dana Point, CA more who are still inadequately treated, mate? On reflection, “misguided and the DEA’s actions and threats reflect the wrongheaded” seems too mild a term to ••• latter belief. For example, Donnie Mar- apply to a single uninformed bureaucrat- shall, the administrator of the DEA, ic action that would result in untold mis- THE WEEKLY STANDARD recently told a congressional panel that ery for literally millions of people. welcomes letters to the editor. “it’s very, very obvious to me that a good Here we see the arrogance of power. A All letters should be addressed: Correspondence Editor part of the increase [in OxyContin pro- man whose only medical experience was THE WEEKLY STANDARD duction] is stuff that’s going . . . into the a stint as a firefighter/EMT over 30 years 1150 17th St., NW, Suite 505 black market.” The only evidence offered ago is telling thousands of doctors who Washington, DC 20036. for this conclusion is not the absolute see the patients standing before them E-mail: [email protected].

8 / THE WEEKLY STANDARD JULY 23, 2001 Iss. 42 editorial 7/24/01 3:06 PM Page 1

EDITORIAL No Defense

ere’s some unsolicited advice for two old ing to administration sources he even got a promise from friends, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz: Bush that the Pentagon would get at least $10 billion. HResign. Right now that may be the best service But then OMB stiffed Rumsfeld again. The Pentagon got they could perform for their country, for it may be the only $5.6 billion, which Democratic congressman Ike only way to focus the attention of the American people— Skelton pointed out would leave the military short of and the Bush administration—on the impending evis- operating funds before the end of the fiscal year. ceration of the American military. If our suggestion Those of us who expressed concern about the Bush sounds extreme, consider the following. administration’s shorting of the military were told not According to well-informed sources in the Bush to worry. Bush had to pass his tax cut first. Then the administration, a few weeks ago Secretary of Defense damage would be repaired in the FY 2002 and FY 2003 Rumsfeld went to the White House to present his Fiscal budgets. But that’s not the way things have turned out. Year 2002 budget request. After some five months of Now it’s clear that there is no real prospect for a mean- review, Rumsfeld had concluded that he needed approxi- ingful defense increase—this year, next year, or for the mately $35 billion in additional funds for FY 2002, with remainder of Bush’s first term. And instead of repair- more to come in FY 2003. Rumsfeld was not high- ing the damage, with each passing defense budget deci- balling. His $35 billion was the minimum necessary to sion, the Bush administration has dug a deeper hole keep the armed forces in one piece in the near term and for the military. take a few baby steps toward transforming the military Some may find it puzzling that Bush’s proposed $18 for the medium and long term. This was actually well billion increase isn’t enough to meet our security needs below what serious studies have shown is needed, but at now and in the future. Here’s why it isn’t even close. least it would have been a start. Half the money will go to pay for already approved pay Rumsfeld was mauled. The Office of Management increases, housing, and health benefits, and won’t go to and Budget demanded that Defense receive only a $15 weapons, training, and the like. That leaves at most billion increase over the Clinton baseline. They “com- $9 billion to be spent on maintaining real defense promised” at $18 billion. President Bush duly approved capability. the halving of his defense secretary’s request and moved The key word here is “maintaining.” We’re not talk- on to more pressing business. As for the FY 2003 budget, ing about building up, about improving our capabilities, according to our sources, OMB has let it be known that about investing money to transform the military for the it will oppose any increase over $10 billion. future. The fact is that the military lacks the funds to This was the third time in six months that Rumsfeld carry out its current missions around the world. This was had had his head handed to him by the White House. a major theme of Bush’s campaign. As then-candidate The first time was back in early February when White Cheney pointed out in his memorable “Help is on the House spokesman Ari Fleischer suddenly announced Way” speech, the serious “budget shortfalls” of the Clin- that there would be no significant defense supplemental ton years were damaging troop morale, forcing the mili- for the rest of FY 2001, and that we would live for the tary to cut back on training and exercises, and creating next nine months—the first nine months of the Bush dangerous “shortages of spare parts and equipment.” A administration—under Bill Clinton’s defense budget. No $9 billion increase over the Clinton budget is not nearly one had informed Rumsfeld of the decision; no one had enough to address these shortfalls, let alone pay for any- even asked his opinion. If anyone had, Rumsfeld would thing else. In fact, last week the vice chiefs of staff of the have said the military needed at least $8 billion more for services testified that the budget shortfall amounted to spare parts, equipment, and training—enough to keep $9.5 billion for the Army, $12.4 billion for the Navy, $9.1 planes flying and tanks rolling for the rest of the year. billion for the Air Force, and $1.4 billion for the Over the next four months Rumsfeld struggled to get Marines—for a total of $32.4 billion. And we repeat: some new money in an FY 2001 supplemental. Accord- This would only cover the cost of maintaining the mili-

JULY 23, 2001 THE WEEKLY STANDARD / 11 Iss. 42 editorial 7/24/01 3:06 PM Page 2

tary’s current readiness to perform its mission, not new powerful Saddam Hussein and Iran threaten Israel and weapons or military transformation. moderate Arab nations, as well as our access to oil; and Only President Claude Rains could claim to be in Europe, where an expanding NATO remains the best shocked to discover upon taking office that the mini- guarantor of democracy and stability. mum defense increase truly necessary turns out to be at So call it a two-war standard or call it a banana: To least $50 billion—not $35 billion, much less $18 billion. preserve our superpower status, to remain the guarantor For two years now, defense experts both inside and out- of international peace and stability, and to defend our side the Pentagon have been nearly unanimous in esti- own vital interests, the United States must be able to mating that an annual increase of $50 billion or more fight and defeat different aggressors in different parts of was required to meet our current security requirements the world—and at the same time. For a “one-war” strate- and prepare for the future. Last year, former secretaries gy is really a “no-war” strategy. An American president of defense Harold Brown and James Schlesinger called will be reluctant to commit forces in one part of the for an increase of more than $50 billion annually. The world if he knows that by doing so he leaves the United Congressional Budget Office also identified the shortfall States and its allies defenseless against aggression in as $50 billion, as did outgoing Pentagon officials from another. Is it so far-fetched to imagine that a Saddam the Clinton administration. A study by the Center for Hussein, seeing the United States throw its entire force Strategic and International Studies, entitled “The Com- into some conflict in East Asia, might choose that ing Defense Train-Wreck,” found that the military need- moment to launch a new aggression in the Middle East? ed $100 billion more just to keep doing what it is doing As the Clinton Pentagon’s 1997 Quadrennial Defense and to replace aging and worn out equipment. Now, in a Review stated: “If the United States were to forgo its manner that can only be described as Clintonian, the ability to defeat aggression in more than one theater at a Bush administration is doing the dance of the seven veils time, our standing as a global power, as the security part- to convince us that it has got the problem in hand. ner of choice, and [as] the leader of the international These continuing defense budget shortfalls will have community would be called into question. Indeed, some real implications. If President Bush and the Congress allies would undoubtedly read a one-war capability as a refuse to fund the military sufficiently to perform its cur- signal that the United States, if heavily engaged else- rent missions around the world, guess what? The mili- where, would no longer be able to defend their inter- tary will gradually cease performing those missions. ests.” Some may think this just means no more peacekeeping Unfortunately, that is precisely where the Bush in the Balkans. But the consequence of an underfunded administration is now headed. According to administra- military will be the steady erosion of our ability to tion sources, Rumsfeld adviser Stephen Cambone has defend all of America’s vital interests, not only in Europe been telling the Army that over the coming years the but in Asia and in the Persian Gulf as well. Bush administration plans to cut two or more active- Rumsfeld and his team have already given us a duty divisions. Never mind that such cuts would practi- glimpse of the future—a future of American retreat and cally require an end to all U.S. military missions in retrenchment. It now seems certain that the Bush Europe. Think about what it means for the administra- administration will officially abandon the so-called tion’s Iraq policy. During last year’s campaign, Cheney “two-war” standard that has served since the end of the correctly warned that, thanks to Clinton’s cuts, if the Cold War as the rule of thumb for what is needed for United States had to fight Iraq again the military would American global preeminence. The administration will have a much riskier time than it did in Desert Storm. In claim that the two-war strategy has become outmoded in 1991 Colin Powell threw nearly 8 Army divisions—out an era of proliferating threats from smaller nations and of a total American force of 18 divisions—against Sad- terrorist groups armed with unconventional weapons. dam’s army. A decade later, the Army has been cut to a But don’t be fooled by fancy, defense whiz-kid explana- total of 10 divisions. Soon it will have 8 or fewer divi- tions. The real reason they’re abandoning the two-war sions to meet potential threats everywhere—in East Asia, strategy is that, under the current budget constraints, Europe, and in the Persian Gulf. In practice, assembling they can’t afford it. a heavy armored force of even 4 divisions to defeat Sad- Perhaps there is a better way to calculate America’s dam’s army and then occupy Iraq would require every military requirements than the two-war standard. But heavy unit based in Korea, Europe, and the United that standard at least reflects fundamental and States. Would an American president be willing to inescapable realities. The United States is a global super- respond to aggression from Saddam if it meant leaving power with allies and vital interests in far-flung strategic the American military so thinly stretched everywhere theaters: in East Asia, where China threatens Taiwan and else around the globe? other American allies, and where North Korea threatens The Bush administration has added money for mis- South Korea; in the Persian Gulf, where an increasingly sile defense, and that’s a good thing. But if America’s

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ability to project force abroad continues to decline, the $30 billion. But the president said we couldn’t afford that gradual construction of a missile shield will be of little much—$15 billion was as much as we could afford. Six help in deterring our adversaries. Missile defense or no, months later, we were suddenly in a war in Korea. Just as if the Bush administration proceeds down the path of suddenly we found we had no choice other than to bud- underfunding the military, the future of American for- get some $48 billion—a 300 percent increase. How much eign policy will be one of curtailed commitments, grad- better it would have been to have made the investment ual withdrawal, and appeasement. Perhaps it’s an isola- earlier. If we had done so, Dean Acheson might not have tionist’s dream. For everyone else, it’s a nightmare. been forced to define Korea as being outside the defense It ought to be George W. Bush’s nightmare. For if the perimeter of the United States—on the grounds that we president does not reverse course now, he may go down did not have the forces to defend it.” in history as the man who let American military power Wolfowitz went on to say that it was “reckless to atrophy and America’s post-Cold War preeminence slip press our luck or gamble with our children’s future” by away—the president who fiddled with tax cuts while the spending only 3 percent of GDP on defense. He argued military burned. that the United States should be spending 3.5 percent as Surely George W. Bush did not seek office to preside “an insurance policy”—“to deter the adversaries of over the retrenchment of American power and influence. tomorrow and underpin our prosperity, and by exten- Surely Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz did not sion, peace and stability around the globe.” We couldn’t come back to the Pentagon to preside over the decline of agree more, of course. The problem is, the president the American military. Wolfowitz serves has approved a defense budget that In testimony before the Senate Armed Services Com- amounts to 3 percent of GDP this year, and may well fall mittee last week, Wolfowitz seemed to take a swipe at the under 3 percent next year. way the White House has handled the defense budget All honor to Wolfowitz for telling the truth about his issue so far. He did so by means of a historical analogy. own administration’s “reckless” defense budget. Does “In 1950,” Wolfowitz noted, “General Omar Bradley Rumsfeld agree with his deputy? Does Vice President urged President Truman to spend at least $18 billion on Cheney? And what about the commander in chief, defense. The Joint Chiefs gave an even higher estimate at George W. Bush? $23 billion, and the services’ estimate was higher still at —Robert Kagan and William Kristol

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fear and shame that had once shad- owed the girl who had ‘done it,’ and that they would be confident enough Where Were to admit it. . . . This generation hoped that they would demystify sex, free it from the control of the the Adults? church ladies. . . . In this world, sex would be better, and so would kids.” They sure weren’t being judgmental. There’s nothing worse than being called “square” by your children or BY NOEMIE EMERY neighbors. They might think you’re not being their friend. ONICA LEWINSKY is alive color-coordinate everything.” Lewinsky père, who should have and well, and Chandra Lewinsky and Levy both come wrung Clinton’s neck, was as compli- MLevy, one must now fear, is from well-to-do California Jewish ant as any father at the court of most likely neither, but these two families and have physician fathers. Charles II or Louis XIV. Lewinsky young women seem to have a lot in Both confided in an aunt, and the mère, who showed concern mainly common. What most stands out is aunts were first to learn of the affairs. in retrospect, was angry only at Clin- that neither seems to have benefited Chandra Levy’s confidante was Lin- ton aide Evelyn Lieberman, who for from any controlling moral authori- da Zamsky. Monica’s was Debra Fin- good reason threw Monica out of the ty, or to have been well served by the erman (the sister of Marcia Lewis, White House. When Lewinsky told adults in her life. They were not cold Monica’s mother), who sometimes her aunt she was trying to return to a or cruel; they were just non-judg- was a bridge between the two. As the job at the White House, Finerman mental. Starr Report noted, “Finerman did not seize the chance to get her to Almost no one in whom Lewin- advised that Marcia Lewis knew reconsider. “I didn’t discourage her,” sky confided—her mother, her aunt, about Lewinsky’s relationship . . . she said. “I didn’t say anything.” her therapist—warned her that she Finerman told Lewis about the Spoken like a pal. was being a fool. No one, including physical relationship. Lewis may not But the problem is that young Lewinsky’s father, seems to have have known the details before Finer- people have enough pals. They need been greatly put out by the news that man told her, but she knew Lewin- parents—or some well-meaning old- the 24-year-old intern had been ser- sky was emotionally involved.” Fin- er person—to impart the lessons of vicing the very married 50-plus pres- erman was told in detail of only one experience and then set some limits, ident in his off moments, or as he sexual incident between Lewinsky and rules. As Hymowitz reminds us, discussed troop movements with and Clinton, to which she “respond- “Children are ignorant. They look to congressmen. ed by saying something to the effect those who have been here a while to Similarly, Chandra Levy’s aunt of ‘yuck.’” That aesthetic recoil is as tell them what they should do and was told last Thanksgiving by her close as we get to a judgment in how to make sense of the world. . . . 24-year-old niece that she was all but either of the intern sagas. Children do not naturally know how living with a married congressman These, of course, are all well- to shape their lives according to 30 years older, that he insisted on meaning people, and the Levys are their own vision. . . . The sense of complete and fanatical secrecy, that suffering terribly. But they seem to adult purpose that was inspired by he went out with her in semi- be victims of the prevailing cultural these truths is largely lost.” disguise, and that she planned on winds, according to which trying to Lost indeed, these dewy things five years of living like this before discipline, judge, or even guide one’s were allowed to drift into their “getting married, having a baby,” young charges is wrong. The grown- amours with their lying and long- and settling down. The aunt’s ups want to be cool; they want to be toothed Lotharios, without a chorus response was not the normal one, hip; they want to be with it; they being raised by their elders to tell which would have been something want to be friends with their chil- them that what they were doing was like “Are you out of your senses?” dren; they want to avoid being not only wrong—perish such stuffi- Instead, as the Washington Post has prudes. As Kay Hymowitz writes in ness—but also short-sighted and stu- reported, she advised the girl to “get Ready or Not, her 1999 book on how pid and dangerous. Wrong because a a terrarium” for his apartment (he not to raise children, “That genera- culture makes rules for good reasons, liked cacti), “make dinner . . . be tion . . . hoped that by escaping that should not be crossed without helpful. Organize his closet . . . Puritan hangups . . . their kids other reasons that are overpowering. would have ‘healthy’ sexual atti- Wrong because they might some day Noemie Emery is a contributing editor to THE tudes. They hoped that their daugh- be 53-year-old women, seeing their WEEKLY STANDARD. ters would no longer experience the husbands go off to the office. Stupid

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because this compulsive Don Juan is ance. Fahey’s parents were dead, but ered, but the ice chest that carried it likely to have sequential affairs, and her five siblings relentlessly did the was. According to journalist George even concurrent ones. Stupid same things. Connections to politics Anastasia, in The Summer Wind, his because the hard-faced blonde wife drove these stories: Levy, as the book about the crime, police from will stay with and defend him, to world now knows, had an affair with the start thought that Fahey was protect their arrangement, to which a congressman. Fahey was the sched- dead and Capano had killed her, but she is accustomed. Stupid and dan- uling secretary to Tom Carper when it took two years to find the evidence gerous, because when you pose a he was governor of Delaware. (He to make the case. In 1999 Capano threat to someone with a great deal was at one point sus- was convicted of first-degree to lose, you become murder. He is now on death expendable. Your privacy, row. your reputation, or you As Anastasia writes, yourself may disappear. “Before it was over, Capano, Exactly how dangerous the well-regarded lawyer and this has been to Chandra local celebrity, would be Ann Levy is something we unmasked as a philanderer may soon discover. It is at who had cheated on his wife this point that her story almost from the day they diverges from the Monica were married, as a libertine channel—an intern used by who enjoyed watching his an aging roué, who then lies mistress have sex with other repeatedly—and heads men, as a control freak . . . down a track far more sinis- and as a self-centered indi- ter. She starts to sound a lot vidual who wouldn’t take no less like Monica—now ped- for an answer. . . . Some- dling handbags in lower where along the way, like Manhattan—and a great many other politicians, deal more like Anne Marie sports figures and celebri- Fahey, the object of a sex- ties, he came to believe that politics-and-missing-person the right thing was whatev- story that was a media sensa- er he chose to do.” Two tion in the latter part of years from now, we may still 1996. For awhile, you could be discussing Chandra Ann not drive down the I-95 cor- Levy. And does this sound ridor between New York and like people we know? Washington, especially in the In view of this, and the Delaware area, without pass- less dire fate of Monica, the ing through a forest of time to be judgmental has posters showing pictures of Fahey, pected, as her diary referred to an surely arrived. It is time to tell chil- like Levy a pale-faced young woman older, married “Thomas C.”) Fahey dren—and young adults—that the with the same curly mass of black had an affair, not with Carper, but rules of the culture are there for a hair. with Thomas Capano, a very rich, reason; and that some things are Levy vanished from her apart- well-connected, Wilmington lawyer wrong and foolish and dangerous. It ment in Dupont Circle taking her and businessman, who had multiple is time to remember that the real keys but leaving her purse and her mistresses and fairly strange tastes. role of guardians is to warn and train credit cards; leaving clothes in the Like Levy, Fahey at first blush children, and not to watch as they do bedroom, and dishes and food in the was starstruck, but later came to see as they please. sink. Fahey vanished from her apart- her older swain as a “controlling, It is too soon to know what befell ment in Wilmington, taking her manipulative, insecure jealous mani- Chandra Levy, what happened to her keys, but leaving her purse and her ac.” She decided to dump him. After and why. It is not too soon, however, credit cards, leaving clothes and gro- a tense dinner date, though, he to realize that the kind of affair that ceries about. Levy’s case is being talked her into coming back briefly she entered into has led to a situa- pushed by her parents, who have to his house, where, during an emo- tion in which both murder and sui- sought out the media, distributed tional quarrel, he shot her once in cide seem plausible outcomes. It is posters, and pressed relentlessly on the head. He dumped her body from not certain that anyone could have the man they think holds the clues his brother’s boat 60 miles out in the talked her out of it. But it seems now to solve her mysterious disappear- Atlantic: The body was never recov- that no one really tried. ♦

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Condit Unbecoming A study in Washington, D.C., creepiness. BY SAM DEALEY

EORGETOWN DOYENNE Sally Two years later, he joined the Quinn is Washington. Which county board of supervisors. And Gis why when Mrs. Benjamin in 1982, at 34, he moved up to Bradlee deigned to advise a belea- the state assembly. He made guered congressman a week ago Sun- national headlines in the late ’80s day in the Washington Post, everyone as a member of the “Gang of Five,” listened. a cabal of moderate Democratic “Gary, Gary, Gary,” she admon- state legislators who staged an unsuc- ished Rep. Condit. “Most people cessful coup against liberal House don’t care whether you or any other speaker Willie Brown. Then Condit’s congressman has an affair. We would political career got a jump-start from have no Congress if we cared a lot. another scandal. And besides, we have been through In 1989, Condit won a special elec- so much with Clinton that the last tion to replace Tony Coelho, the U.S. thing anyone is going to get exer- House majority whip who was knee- cised about is the extramarital sex deep in allegations of financial life of a politician.” impropriety. Condit has been reelect- How Gary Condit came to be the ed by wide margins ever since—most object of such attentions some must recently, by 67 percent in 2000, when still be wondering. On the face of it, George W. Bush carried the increas- there’s little in the background of the ingly conservative district. In his six-term congressman from the Cen- early years in Congress, Condit tral Valley of California to mark him refused to stay in lock step with the out as a candidate for the police blot- Democratic majority, and sniping ters and scandal sheets. occasionally appeared in the press Born in 1948 to a Baptist preacher questioning his party affiliation. of modest means, Condit grew up in With the Republican Revolution Tulsa, Oklahoma. By the age of 18, of 1994, the moderate Condit had a when his father moved the family to chance to be a major player. the rural town of Ceres, California, Although he helped found what Condit already had a son by his high- became the conservative Blue Dog school sweetheart and wife. A daugh- Democratic caucus and remained a

ter would follow eight years later; go-to person for bipartisan legisla- Gary Condit riedman both now work for California gover- tion, he never became a well-known nor Gray Davis. power broker and made little person- Drew F He attended the California State al impression. Both the American University junior college in Stanis- Conservative Union and the liberal Indian bachelorhood. He drove a laus County, and worked variously as Americans for Democratic Action Harley. The neighborhood where he a roughneck in an oil field and a tool- give him moderate marks—half chose to buy a condo was trendy, arty and-die machinist. He seems to have good, half bad. Other than modest Adams Morgan. “I just ended up entered politics for reasons less of homes in D.C. and his district, his there, and it’s a terrific place to be,” ideology than public service. At 24, financial disclosure forms show no Condit told the San Francisco Chroni- he won a seat on the city council of assets or investments. His nickname cle in 1996. “Everything is 93 percent Ceres. At 26, he was elected mayor. is Mr. Blow Dry. predictable” back in Ceres, he said. But below the public radar, it But “Adams Morgan is very differ- Sam Dealey is a writer in Washington, D.C. seems that Condit was enjoying an ent. I enjoy it a lot.”

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Condit began to enjoy a lot of office are tongue-tied. A host of con- young woman’s family not fueled things a lot. At 50, he went with servative organizations have yet to coverage, the case might have gone then-representative John Kasich to weigh in on Condit. “If we were to nowhere. Rolling Stones and Pearl Jam con- focus on the inappropriate relation- Just what Gary Condit’s role was certs—at the latter of which he threw ships that are probably true or may in the disappearance of Chandra himself into the mosh pit. According be true for members of Congress, it Levy, if any, we do not now know, to a long-time aide, Condit attended would be a full-time job,” says Paul but one thing is certain: In post- a 50,000-strong Hell’s Angels birth- Hetrick of Focus on the Family. Of Monica Washington, if you want to day bash for a convicted cop-killer. It course, there is a world of difference keep the critics and investigators at now emerges that he was enjoying between playing the chambermaid bay, have a tawdry affair. ♦ other things, as well, that belie his looking for dirty sheets and con- Nazarene façade: Thai and Chinese demning already obvious impropri- food, Ben & Jerry’s low-fat chocolate ety. chip cookie dough ice cream, body- So why the hesitation? As Sally oil massages, and ladies of all Quinn made official in the Post, stripes—an intern, a barely legal inside the Beltway it’s wrong to be preacher’s daughter, and a flight judgmental. The gravest sin is not to attendant among them. His favorite dally with girls half your age but to You D.C. bar is a joint named Tryst; his frown on those who do. “It’s almost favorite tie-rack is his headboard. as if Clinton ultimately won that Needless to say, the private Gary debate, that it’s somehow inappro- can Condit has caught most people by priate to comment on these gross surprise. moral failings,” says Gary Bauer of And yet, given these revelations, American Values. “The biggest secu- take official Washington—Democrats and lar sin in the country today is to pro- Republicans alike—reflexively lent claim the behavior of someone else as Condit a hand. Take Dick Gephardt. either right or wrong. That is getting it “I have enormous respect for Gary more ingrained among average Condit,” the House minority leader Americans, but it long since won said June 15, by which time it was among elites.” with obvious Condit was misleading the It’s only when directly asked that police and the public by denying his the Rev. Lou Sheldon of the Tradi- adulterous affair with Chandra Levy. tional Values Coalition will com- you. “I think he’s a wonderful public ser- ment. “If the accusations hold to be vant and a wonderful human being.” true concerning the kinky sex and Even after credible reports of the adulterous affairs—” he starts, more philandering and suborning then tries again. “I can understand Before moving, perjury, colleagues like Republican he might have had one, but not mul- please call Chris Shays went out of their way to ti. And I can’t even justify having praise Condit on the Sunday morn- just one. But it’s easier to forgive one 1-800-274-7293 ing talk shows. “He’s a great man, slip, like David and Bathsheba. But to assure that and I love the guy,” Shays told one, he’s got a whole harem of Bathshe- calling Condit “a close friend and bas.” Sheldon, who thought he knew there are no someone I have a lot of respect for.” Condit for 20 years, now calls for the interruptions Said Jack Kingston, Republican congressman’s resignation. in your from Georgia, “He’s an honorable The enlightened position Quinn man.” The list goes on. Explaining propounds—that sex doesn’t mat- subscription her colleagues’ impulse to circle the ter—is only an evolved version of to THE WEEKLY wagons, Anna Eshoo, Condit’s fellow Clinton’s defense—that sex is pri- TANDARD California Democrat, told a reporter, vate. The implication is that the S . “None of us here, Republican or media and others should feel Democrat, kick people when they’re ashamed for calling attention to down.” Tell that to Newt. To date, these affairs. The problem, though, is only Georgia representative Bob Barr that without their attention, the case has demanded that Condit resign for of the missing intern languished. disgracing his office. The D.C. police trod lightly because Even those not elected to public of the nature of the case, and had the

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meeting he said he had facilitated between D.C. police and Condit, and Dear Abbe he held the press conference an- nouncing Condit’s willingness to have Can the Democrats’ top ambulance chaser help his apartment searched, and to con- sider DNA and polygraph tests. Gary Condit? BY STEPHEN F. H AYES Next, Lowell has tried to invent a second bad guy, the media. That way, BBE LOWELL walked with con- secretary Henry Cisneros; ex-House whatever time pundits and media- fidence to the horde of journal- speaker Jim Wright. Lowell also types spend navel-gazing about their Aists gathered outside his down- served as counsel for House Demo- coverage of the case, they’re not town Washington, D.C., offices last crats on the Judiciary Committee spending in discussions of Condit’s week. He was relaxed, comfortable, a throughout President Clinton’s im- evasiveness. Journalists being held in man in charge. peachment. When a Democrat gets in even lower esteem than politicians, Lowell, who had volunteered to high-profile legal trouble, it’s a good the public is inclined to sympathize become the lead attorney for Gary bet Lowell will soon be at his side. with those on the receiving end of Condit, adjusted his suit jacket, glared The Condit case, though, is the media scrutiny. at the reporters, and opened his state- first to feature a missing person—it That’s the idea, anyway. The prob- ment by scolding the media. It is a has been two and a half months since lem with Lowell’s efforts is that they theme he pounds home in near- come some nine weeks after ly every statement he makes, Levy disappeared. In that time and one that he returned to sev- it has become increasingly eral times in the 15-minute apparent that Condit has not press conference, held ostensi- been forthcoming with any- bly to emphasize Condit’s will- one—his family, his staff, Wash- ingness to cooperate with D.C. ington, D.C., police, the Levy police. family. His lies have begotten Thin, slightly balding, and lies, his distortions more distor- well-manicured, Lowell led the tions. And perhaps the only session with reporters—broad- thing that has become obvious cast live across the country—as in the hazy weeks since Levy’s one might conduct an orchestra, disappearance is this: Gary waving off questions, inviting Condit has little concern for others, turning methodically to Chandra Levy and much con- the various cameras. For most cern for Gary Condit. Any Americans—who rank public attempt now to cast Condit as a speaking as their top fear—this truth-teller interested only in would be terrifying. For Abbe finding Chandra Levy is Lowell, it is routine. absurd. Lowell has made a career The same is true of efforts to (and a fortune) helping the demonize the media. Too late. politicians who give public ser- orld Photos When Chandra Levy was first

vice a bad name. Besides his Abbe Lowell ide W reported missing, even scandal-

work for his friend Condit— AP/W hungry Washington journalists who represents California’s showed restraint. Despite the Central Valley in Congress—Lowell’s anyone saw 24-year-old Chandra intensifying Washington buzz about clients read like a Who’s Who of Levy—and thus marks something of Condit’s shadowy existence since the Democratic bad boys: There’s anoth- a departure for Lowell. Nonetheless, disappearance, much of the media er longtime friend, senator Robert his approach has been straight out of proceeded slowly, even reluctantly. Torricelli of New Jersey, who is under Public Relations 101. The frenzy—and it is now a frenzy— federal investigation for illegally First, Lowell has tried to chip away began in earnest only after Chandra’s accepting money and gifts; represen- at the public’s growing suspicion that mother and her aunt confirmed tative Patrick Kennedy; convicted Condit has something to hide. Con- reports about the intimate nature of Clinton donor James Riady; ex-HUD dit’s shifting stories—first denying, the relationship. More important, then acknowledging an affair with Levy’s parents want the media Stephen F. Hayes is a staff writer for THE Levy—have made this difficult, to say involved. WEEKLY STANDARD. the least. So Lowell trumpeted a third The constant reporting on the case,

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after all, led directly to Condit’s dis- tice Department’s Campaign Finance what does that mean?—I don’t think closure—in his third police interview Task Force that investigated Torricel- that helps anybody. I think it certain- —that, yes, he did have a sexual rela- li. “I dealt with no one other than ly doesn’t help anybody find her right tionship with Levy. Lowell himself Abbe on the Torricelli matter, and I now.” admitted that such information is not really had a very positive experience His statements often conflict with only relevant, but crucial to police. with him. I found him to be a very one another, and even more often con- Lowell to Face the Nation host Bob smart, aggressive defense attorney.” flict with the truth. Schieffer on Sunday, July 8: “It’s not For a smart guy, though, he says To wit: “Congressman Condit has important that you know the nature some dumb things. Mostly, he says told the police from the beginning of the relationship. It’s important that lots and lots of words that mean very everything, has never misled any- the police do.” But seconds earlier, in little. Lowell, asked by ABC’s Claire body,” Lowell said on an appearance the same response, Lowell offered one Shipman whether the denials of an on CNN’s Late Edition with Wolf of what has become a series of lies: affair by Condit’s office were inaccu- Blitzer. He later added, “From the “What [Condit] has done and said rate: “Well, I don’t want to say that, beginning, while he has not been throughout is that he’ll cooperate because that’s not exactly what I forthcoming to [the media], not want- with police and he’s going to help find think. What I think is that the press ing to be on camera and answer the Chandra Levy, if he can possibly do has glommed onto what’s the nature questions about his private life, he has that.” of the relationship very early on, and I been totally forthcoming with police.” Lowell’s colleagues and even some think the congressman and the staff Lowell’s public comments have adversaries praise his keen legal mind and others are saying, ‘Hey, let’s talk contradicted those of the police on and sharp reasoning, and he is cer- about what might actually help find everything from who arranged the tainly an improvement over Joe her, as opposed to getting to some- third interview to whether police had Cotchett, the Condit attorney who thing that may be of interest to you,’ previously requested a search of Con- sent an affidavit to stewardess/para- and I think, therefore, people wanted dit’s apartment, both key points in mour Anne Marie Smith, encourag- to start playing games of wordsman- trying to demonstrate that Condit has ing her to lie about her sexual rela- ship, and I don’t think that’s appro- been forthcoming. tionship with the congressman. “Abbe priate. So, rather than sitting here and As to whether he really intends to is really an outstanding lawyer,” says saying what was she—and if I say she help police answer questions about Alan Gershel, the former deputy assis- was a friend, what does that mean? Chandra Levy, that may not be in the tant attorney general who led the Jus- And if I say she was something else, interest of his client. ♦

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tial campaign. But it has always had critics, including many on the left who say that charitable choice No Salvation for encourages discrimination. This accusation had not made it much beyond the websites of left-wing the White House activists until July 10, when the Wash- ington Post, citing “an internal Salva- Congressional progress but a PR setback for tion Army document,” reported that the administration “is working with Bush’s faith-based initiative. BY TERRY EASTLAND the nation’s largest charity, the Salva- tion Army, to make it easier for gov- N JULY 11, the House Ways less of their beliefs. On several occa- ernment-funded religious groups to and Means Committee sions since 1996, Congress has insert- practice hiring discrimination against Oapproved one part of Presi- ed charitable choice into social-ser- gay people.” dent Bush’s faith-based initiative According to the document, the when it passed a measure permit- White House had made a “firm ting those who don’t itemize their commitment” to the Army that it taxes to deduct charitable contribu- would write a regulation protecting tions. In a statement, the president charities receiving federal funds praised the committee for its vote from local efforts to prevent dis- and predicted the legislation would crimination against gays in hiring stimulate more charitable giving, and to mandate domestic-partner thus enabling faith-based organiza- benefits. “In turn,” said the Post, tions to “help those in need.” Bush the Army had agreed to promote said he would “continue to work the administration’s faith-based on a bipartisan basis with Members initiative by spending as much as of the House and the Senate” to $110,000 monthly to lobby in its make his initiative a reality. behalf. Surely, on this particular policy The Post treated the Army’s effort, things must be going well internal document as an authorita- for the Bush administration? Actu- tive representation of the story, fail- ally, no. For even as Ways and ing to note that the document may Means was acting (in support of a have been merely the enthusiastic much smaller deduction than the product of, as a spokesman for the administration wants), the White Army told me it was, “an overly House was still reeling from the hopeful” author. Nor did the Post public-affairs disaster that had try to illumine the motives of the befallen a different aspect of the source whence the document was president’s initiative—one involv- “obtained”—whose identity is pre- ing “charitable choice.” cisely what you’d most like to Charitable choice is a policy that know when reading this kind of recognizes the potential utility of story. In a conspicuous wink to the faith-based social services in leaker(s), the Post noted the docu- addressing the nation’s most press- ment’s statements that “the Salva- ing social problems. Under charita- tion Army’s role will be a surprise

ble choice, the government may orld Photos to many in the media” and thus not discriminate on the basis of efforts should be made to “mini- religion against otherwise qualified ide W mize the possibility of any ‘leak’ to providers applying for social-ser- AP/W the media.” vice funds, nor may it intrude upon The Post did include the com- the religious autonomy of faith-based vice programs. Bush is seeking legis- ment of a White House spokeswoman organizations that receive such funds, lation that would extend the principle disputing the document’s claim that which must serve all comers regard- to such programs generally. the administration had made a “firm Charitable choice enjoys broad commitment.” But the paper left the Terry Eastland is publisher of THE WEEKLY support; both Al Gore and George W. clear impression that there had been a STANDARD. Bush endorsed it during the presiden- transaction between the Salvation

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Army and the White House, a quid or not (and arguably, for technical rea- become something they are not and pro quo that required a devious sons of law, it was not), administra- thus lose their unique capacities. Ulti- course of action on the part of the tion officials failed to explain why mately, the issue here is, or at least president. “The document,” declared faith-based providers should not be ought to be, not “discrimination” but the Post, assuming full interpretive asked to act in ways that violate their helping the poor and needy with the mode, “suggests President Bush is own religious beliefs—as would hap- most effective programs. And it willing to achieve through regulation pen, for example, if the Salvation would be foolish to assume that secu- ends too controversial to survive the Army were asked to pay health or dis- lar providers do a better job than legislative process.” ability benefits for a “domestic part- faith-based ones. Substantively, the story was incom- ner.” (In fact, the Army was asked to As Congress takes up charitable plete on issues of law, failing to do just that—by San Francisco. The choice legislation in coming weeks, explore the technical merits, or lack Army said it wouldn’t, citing its doc- administration officials doubtless will thereof, of the Salvation Army’s pro- trines, and eventually decided to quit be asked to offer their views on these posed regulation. No matter. The providing services in the city.) Faith- matters. Obviously, the administra- story drew thundering reaction from based providers are unlikely to do tion will have to be better prepared to Democrats on Capitol Hill. Senate their good works unless they main- argue crucial legal and philosophical Democrats warned that issuance of tain their religious identity. Necessar- points than it was the day the Post sto- the regulation described in the Post ily, the nation is unlikely to benefit as ry broke. If it is, that story, tenden- story “might terminally wound” (sen- much as it might if those providers, tious though it was, will have served a ator Joseph Lieberman’s words) the upon the insistence of government, useful purpose. ♦ president’s charitable-choice legisla- tion. House Democrats called for an investigation, no less. Bad faith on the part of a White House willing to engage in “secret deals,” as Senate Is It Time for majority leader Tom Daschle put it, was widely presumed. White House officials denied any “deals” with the Army and said they Arafat to Go? were merely considering the kind of regulation the group had proposed. More and more Israelis think so. Shortly before the network anchors BY TOM ROSE could read the day’s news, however, officials announced that there was no need for the regulation. It would have Jerusalem than 70 percent of Israelis opposed the denied assistance to local and state HE FIRST CRISIS to threaten Peres-Arafat meeting, which dominat- authorities that required religious Israel’s four-month-old na- ed public debate for days. Condemned charities to (in the document’s words) Ttional unity government was by nearly every newspaper and “adopt terms or practices for those caused by a handshake: Israeli foreign attacked even by leading members of with religious responsibilities” or pro- minister Shimon Peres and Palestin- his own Labor party, the beleaguered vide employment benefits, if doing so ian leader Yasser Arafat were pho- Peres threatened to resign and bring was “inconsistent with the beliefs and tographed shaking hands at the the government down. practices” of the organization. White Socialist International Conference in And yet mere months ago, the Lis- House officials said, however, that Lisbon on July 1. How could Israel bon meeting would have been consid- current law, together with that which expect President Bush and other ered routine for any Israeli leader, left the administration is now seeking, Western leaders to refuse to meet or right. For the past ten years, while would be enough to ensure that faith- Arafat, critics asked, when its own there was bitter disagreement about based providers could hire whom foreign minister was greeting him exactly what to say to him, main- they wished. warmly? stream Israelis agreed that their gov- You can argue that the administra- Israeli prime minister Ariel ernment had no choice but to negoti- tion had no other choice than to act as Sharon, leader of the right-wing ate with Arafat. Today, a sea change it did and cut its losses quickly. Yet Likud party, was widely criticized for has taken place. For the first time the episode revealed a White House permitting the encounter, but the since the Madrid Conference of 1991, unable or perhaps even unwilling to harshest censure was saved for Peres Israelis are seriously looking at argue an important case. himself. Opinion polls showed more options other than Arafat, and clamor Leaving aside whether the regula- for military action is heard on all tion the Army sought was advisable Tom Rose is publisher of the Jerusalem Post. sides.

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After a contentious cabinet meet- precisely because he has aided, abet- the Palestinian Authority and disar- ing on July 9, ministers present ted, and armed the terrorists who mament of all armed forces”—have described Sharon facing down threaten to engulf the region once been excerpted in Israeli newspapers demands for war against the Palestin- again in war. and cited in the British publication ian Authority. “You’re all big heroes Among those who favor looking Foreign Report. with all your advice,” snapped the beyond Arafat are most of the senior Since it is now the position of prime minister and famously hard- officers of the Israeli Defense Forces, Israel’s leading political and military line former general. “At the end of the the very people who encouraged figures that the Palestinian Authority day, the responsibility is mine. This Rabin to engage Arafat in the first is not a functioning interlocutor but region is not going to war.” place. Defense minister Benjamin rather a well-financed terrorist orga- But they also reported a pointed Ben-Eliezer, one of nization, some suggest that it would exchange between Sharon and Peres, two candidates be better to disable and disarm it and an architect of the 1993 Oslo Accord for leader of deal separately with the various mili- for which he won the Nobel prize, tias and atomized terrorist cells likely along with the late prime minister to replace Arafat. IDF comman- Yitzhak Rabin and Arafat. “Anyone ders seem increasingly of the who thought we could place our secu- mind that decentralized Pales- rity in Arafat’s hands was mistaken,” tinian terror will be easier to said Sharon, to which Peres replied, combat than centralized “Without Arafat, the situation will Palestinian terror, but also only be more difficult.” that eliminating the Peres speaks for some on the left Palestinian Authority’s who say that, detestable and untrust- oppressive presence in worthy though Arafat may be, it isn’t the life of nearly every up to Israelis to decide who should Palestinian might allow lead the Palestinians. Increasingly, more moderate figures Israeli policymakers counter that it is to emerge. very much Israelis’ place, in fact their For all its intensity, responsibility, to decide with whom the new talk of disen- they will negotiate. Just as three U.S. gaging from Arafat is administrations have refused to nego- still just talk. Foreign tiate with Saddam Hussein, Israel Minister Peres has not must refuse to deal with Arafat. backed away from his Lis- Besides, if the last Israeli govern- bon meeting. On July 11, he ment already made Arafat the told the Jerusalem Post that most generous offer conceiv- Israelis could “once again trust” able and was violently Arafat. The government of rejected, why resume a Israel remains committed to process that leads back to “restraint” in the face of the same endgame? Palestinian terror. And it While most Israelis has affirmed its intention seem to have concluded to implement the recom- that the Arafat era is over, mendations of the their uncertainty and fear Mitchell Commission, about what comes next are which calls upon Israel to his best hope for political sur- return to the negotiating vival. Those who reject the new table and reach a final status “post-Arafatism” charge that casting peace agreement—with none oth- off Arafat, either by forcing him into er than Arafat. exile or, should Israeli security deteri- the Labor party, is the most promi- Yet if public pressure continues to orate further, destroying his regime, nent advocate of disengaging from grow, this policy may become unten- would bring chaos in the Palestinian Arafat, although he too has yet to able. “If everyone in Israel comes to a Authority and the rise of radical specify how. Some military planners conclusion that the elimination of riedman Islamic leaders in his place. Advo- are less reticent. What purport to be Arafat is the only way to stop vio- cates of a new Israeli approach say it updated top secret national security lence,” said communications minister has become necessary to isolate and plans for an all-out assault—one doc- Reuven Rivlin the other day, “then ultimately remove Arafat from power ument is entitled “The destruction of we will be forced to do so.” ♦ Illustration by Drew F

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As the World Votes The Reagan-Thatcher era may be passing, but the era of big government does seem to be over.

BY MICHAEL BARONE Today it does not seem plain which way democracies are heading. Writers like E.J. Dionne proclaim the triumph alf a century ago it was plain which way of “Third Way” parties of the left—Bill Clinton’s Democ- democracies were heading: left. In the rats, Tony Blair’s Labour, Gerhard Schröder’s and Lionel United States, the Democrats held the Jospin’s Socialists—and declare the Third Way the wave of White House for the nineteenth straight the future. Former Communists have been swept back into year. In Britain, the Labour party had just office in several countries in Eastern Europe, and Russia’s createdH the National Health Service and nationalized the president is a veteran of the KGB. Yet the Third Way has commanding heights of the economy. Europe’s Christian not everywhere been successful. Al Gore was not elected Democratic parties were creating president in 2000, despite represent- welfare states hardly less ambitious ing the incumbent party in a time of than those advocated by their social peace and prosperity. Spain and democratic rivals. Parties of the Italy have switched from left to right won only when they were led right. In Latin America, free market by national icons who promised not policies are under attack in Brazil to dismantle the welfare state— and Argentina and under siege in Winston Churchill, Dwight Eisen- Colombia and Venezuela. hower, Charles de Gaulle. What are we to make of these Ten years ago it was plain which conflicting trends? In the last 15 way democracies were heading: months I have covered elections in right. The domestic revolutions five major democracies, interview- inaugurated by Margaret Thatcher ing candidates and key strategists and Ronald Reagan seemed to be and voters on the street, analyzing sweeping all before them. Republi- preelection polls and election

cans held the White House for the orld Photos returns. Four of these countries are eleventh straight year and had a the four arguably most important to president with a 91 percent job Americans: the United States, Mex- approval rating. Thatcher had led Putin ico, Russia, and Britain. The fifth,

the Conservatives to three straight All photos: AP / Wide W Italy, I have included because— general election victories, and her well, because I like to visit Italy. successor, John Major, would lead them the next year to a Now the burst of electoral activity is over (the next sched- fourth. Parties of the right held office in most of Western uled general elections in these countries won’t occur until Europe, and in Eastern Europe and Russia the voters were 2004-06), so it’s a fine time to look back and take stock. starting to oust the Communists and former Communists First, some notes on individual countries. and to install in their places those who had advocated or assisted the overthrow of communism in 1989-91. In Latin *RUSSIA, MARCH 2000. This was less in the nature of a dem- America voters elected leaders who promised hard curren- ocratic election and more in the nature of a coronation. In cy, privatization of government firms, freer trade. August 1999, President Boris Yeltsin had installed former KGB officer Vladimir Putin as prime minister. Then, Michael Barone is senior writer at U.S. News & World Report claiming that the September bombing of apartment build- and author of The New Americans: How the Melting Pot ings in Moscow was the work of Chechens, Putin had Can Work Again. relaunched the war against Chechnya, to enormous popular

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applause. And at the end of December, Yeltsin had that Mexico City is built on an earthquake-prone swamp resigned, making Putin president, and a presidential elec- and that its political firmament was changing beyond tion had been scheduled for March 26. The only serious recognition. competition came from the bedraggled Communist Gen- Fox’s victory was anything but assured. He had trailed nady Zyuganov. or at best run even in public polls; it turned out that pro- Behind the façade of this turnover of power were widely PRI news media had been suppressing pro-Fox numbers. circulated rumors that the apartment bombings were the The PRI had run a candidate, Francisco Labadista, who work of the FSB (the renamed KGB); the modus operandi could plausibly claim to be a reformer himself, and the was not typical of Chechen operations, the explosive used incumbent president, Ernesto Zedillo, had led an adminis- was difficult to obtain, and the bombs were planted in a tration that had helped produce economic recovery and in way that maximized casualties. The possibility that Putin important ways had reformed law enforcement and freed was part of a cynically planned murder for political gain is up the political system. Fox’s PAN party had long been chilling. So is Putin’s crackdown, begun before the election associated with the Catholic Church and with pro-U.S. feel- and continued with vigor ever since, ing, while PRI with its anticlerical to silence critical publications and and anti-yanqui traditions claimed the independent NTV network. to embody Mexican nationalism. Putin won with 53 percent of (The PRI’s trademark colors were the vote, just over the 50 percent always those of the Mexican flag; required to avoid a runoff. Voters ordered to change them, the party interviewed on the street seemed to traded the white for a very light know little about the man; Putin gray.) voters said he was young and ener- Fox’s victory should not be por- getic, meaning he was not infirm trayed as an undiluted victory for and drunk, like Yeltsin. It was as if free market capitalism. He declined they were saying, “We hope the next to oppose the constitution’s require- czar turns out to be a good czar,” in ment that oil production and mar- a fatalistic tone that suggested they keting be monopolized by the state- feared he would. owned company Pemex. He But there were some good brought into his campaign and later things about Putin’s victory. He into his government social democ- beat the Communists. They are a rats like Jorge Castaneda, now for- ragtag bunch, but it has never been Fox eign minister. He called for cleaning certain that Russians would not up law enforcement and selling off vote them back in. In much of the other state companies. And only runup to the 1996 election, Zyuganov had led Yeltsin, one candidate, the leftist PRD’s Cuauhtemoc Cardenas, though he lost the election, and in 2000 he lost more repudiated the North American Free Trade Agreement; he ground. Putin promised to promote the rule of law and finished third. hired free marketeer German Gref as his economic adviser. Fox’s victory was contingent on many factors: his per- In office, he has moved successfully to allow the sale of land sonal stature, allowing him to rise above the baggage of his and to impose some certainty on legal rules. If he has perse- party; an electoral system that is now more transparent and cuted NTV owner Victor Gusinsky, he has also driven out honest than that of, say, St. Louis; Cardenas’s weak perfor- another oligarch, Boris Berezovsky. His victory represented mance as mayor of Mexico City, which pushed him down a move toward free markets. from first to third in polls. But it is also evidence of a basic change in the thinking of the Mexican people, and in par- *MEXICO, JULY 2000. “¡Hoy! ¡Hoy! ¡Hoy!” shouted the ticular of the younger generation. Up through 1982, at least crowd awaiting Vicente Fox at the Angel of Independence 66 percent of Mexicans voted PRI for president. But in statue on Mexico City’s Paseo de la Reforma on Election 2000, of the 60 percent of Mexicans who were under 40, Night 2000. It was a reference to a mistake Fox had made only 31 percent gave their votes to PRI. The ruling party during the campaign, but also a declaration that “Today! no longer embodied the nation. Today! Today!” the ruling PRI party had been defeated for the first time in 71 years. As the crowd jumped up and *THE UNITED STATES, NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2000. down in unison, I could feel the ground shake—a reminder George W. Bush won despite running against the incum-

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bent vice president in a time of peace and prosperity. He try where voters strongly support the European Union won despite proposing individual investment accounts in and feel no affection for the weak lira. The strongest force Social Security. He won despite taking stands on abortion behind Berlusconi’s victory was a desire to reduce the size and gun control that the mainstream media proclaimed and power of government: Italians speak of lo stato ladro— vote-losers. He won despite the bad luck of losing by a few literally, the state-thief. As one of Italy’s richest men and thousand votes Iowa, Wisconsin, and Oregon, which have the owner of three of its six television networks, Berlus- 25 electoral votes between them—enough to make the coni seemed to have the ability and the brio to get the job Florida controversy moot, had those few thousand votes done. gone the other way. And, it should be added, Republicans Counterattacking was the Italian and European held the House of Representatives, winning more votes for press—Le Monde of France, El Mundo of Spain, The Econo- the House than the Democrats for the fourth election in a mist of Britain—which seized on the prosecutions brought row. against Berlusconi to argue that he was unfit for power. As I have written elsewhere (National Journal, June 9, But Gianni Agnelli, a kind of uncrowned king, came to 2001, and in the forthcoming Berlusconi’s defense, charging that Almanac of American Politics 2002), foreigners were treating Italy like a the critical demographic divide in “banana republic.” So Berlusconi this election was religion. Ameri- became a focus of national pride, cans tend to vote as they pray, or and it didn’t hurt that he was pro- don’t pray. Voters who attended American—supportive of missile religious services weekly or more defense, dismissive of the Kyoto often voted 59 percent to 39 percent treaty—at a time when George W. for Bush. Voters who attended reli- Bush was the object of scorn in gious services less often or not at all most European media. Center-right voted 56 percent to 39 percent for voters interviewed on the street Al Gore. During the 1990s the showed genuine enthusiasm for Clinton-Gore Democrats, through Berlusconi, and little interest in the the success of their economic poli- charges against him (it is thought cies and their stands on issues like that any entrepreneur dealing with gun control and abortion, did make Italy’s hyperregulatory state must some gains for their party, almost break the rules). Center-left voters entirely in major metropolitan showed little enthusiasm for the areas among cynical, relativistic, Berlusconi government or interest in the Ulivo secular voters. But Republicans also candidate, the Green former mayor made countervailing, though small- of Rome, Francesco Rutelli. Young er gains, in rural areas and in fast-growing counties at the voters were especially likely to support Berlusconi. edge of metropolitan areas, among tradition-minded, Berlusconi’s government will probably last a full five- moralistic, and religious voters. As a result, Gore easily year term: He emerged with solid majorities in the Cham- carried states like New Jersey and California, which the ber of Deputies and the Senate. In 1994 his government elder George Bush had won in 1988, but Bush easily car- was brought down by the defection of the Northern ried states like West Virginia, Tennessee, Arkansas, Ken- League’s Umberto Bossi, and in 1996 his coalition failed tucky, Georgia, and Colorado, which Bill Clinton had car- to win because the Northern League ran separate candi- ried in 1992. And note that Bush’s states are growing dates for the three-quarters of the seats that are elected by faster: The 30 states that gave Bush his 271 electoral votes district. But in 2001 the Northern League was allied with in 2000 will cast 278 electoral votes in 2004. Berlusconi, and it won too few seats for any future defec- tion to bring Berlusconi down. *ITALY, MAY 2001. This was the biggest victory for the political Right in these five elections. Silvio Berlusconi, *BRITAIN, JUNE 2001. There was never any suspense about whose coalition had lost to the left-wing Ulivo coalition in who would win in Britain. In September 2000 Tony Blair’s 1996, won a convincing victory. And this despite the Labour party fell behind the Conservatives in polls during arguably successful record of the Ulivo governments, the “petrol” crisis, when motorists couldn’t buy gas. But which had cut Italy’s budget deficits enough for the coun- the moment passed, and Labour quickly rebounded. try to qualify to join the euro—an electoral plus in a coun- Except for that one episode, it has led the Tories by wide

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margins in polls ever since September 1992, when Britain tries the winners accepted the idea that the state should went off the European Rate Mechanism and in effect not grow indefinitely and that the market provides solu- devalued the pound. Yet views of Labour have changed. tions for many problems. Russians rejected the Commu- Voters interviewed before the May 1997 election showed nists for Putin; Mexicans rejected PRI for Vicente Fox; great enthusiasm for Blair and his “new” Labour party. Americans elected Bush; Italians rejected Ulivo for Voters interviewed this year grumbled about public ser- Berlusconi; the British voted for a New Labour party vices, especially the National Health Service, but had little that promises convincingly not to undo the 1980s. The interest in the Conservatives and treated a Labour victory Third Way has some appeal; where it had been adhered as inevitable. to rigorously, by Blair in Britain, it seemed unbeatable. Blair tried to gin up enthusiasm and boost turnout in But not in Italy—and not in the United States, where heavy Labour areas, but turnout dropped from 71 percent the Clinton-Gore Democratic party, though the incum- to 58 percent of eligibles. Very few of the 659 seats in the bent during peace and prosperity, won 49 percent of the House of Commons changed hands; there was a swing to vote in 1996 and 48 percent in 2000. the Conservatives in most Labour seats, and to Labour or True, arguments for less government do not always the Liberal Democrats in many prevail either, and some proposals Conservative seats, plus plenty of for more government prove popu- tactical voting, in which large num- lar. But even Tony Blair was at bers of Labour supporters voted pains to say that he would supple- Liberal Democrat or vice versa to ment the National Health Service keep the Tories out. with private medical services, Blair touted Labour’s compe- much to the fury of public tence at managing the macroecono- employees’ unions. Proposals for my and hailed chancellor of the less government are not hooted off exchequer Gordon Brown’s deci- the stage and are not politically sion to free the Bank of England fatal. Fifty years ago politicians of from government control; the almost all parties agreed that there prime minister also promised that must be more government and Labour would improve the Health argued only about the extent of it. Service and secondary education Today politicians of almost all par- (the government has significantly ties express faith in the operation improved elementary schools) and of free markets and argue only argued that the Conservatives’ about just how far that should go. tepid tax cuts would savage ser- Blair Fifty years ago more government vices. But he constantly empha- seemed the wave of the future. sized that New Labour was not Today we may get a little bit more rejecting the reforms of the 1980s—Margaret Thatcher’s government here, but we also get quite a bit less of it reforms. Conservative leader William Hague argued that a there. We are no longer in Franklin Roosevelt and Blair victory would result in Britain’s joining the euro and Clement Attlee’s world. going off the pound, something which 70 percent of Something else these elections tell us is that voters in British voters in polls oppose. But Blair promised, as he many very different countries have no visceral mistrust had in 1997, that Britain would join the euro only if the of the United States. Rather, they tend to see America as voters agreed in a referendum. Blair was also at great pains a friend and an example. European elites may sneer at to show that his Third Way government could get along as George W. Bush and decry his support of capital punish- well with George W. Bush’s Republican administration as ment and opposition to the Kyoto treaty. But many or it did with Bill Clinton’s Third Way administration. He most European voters support capital punishment, and made it plain that Britain would support the United States no European government except Romania’s has ratified on missile defense and would not vocally oppose it on Kyoto. Vladimir Putin and Vicente Fox, Tony Blair and Kyoto. Silvio Berlusconi, in their different ways, want to make their countries more like America. So do the voters who hat do these five elections tell us? First of all, elected them—especially the young, who voted heavily we are still living in the world of Margaret for Fox and Berlusconi. The future, it seems, does not W Thatcher and Ronald Reagan. In all five coun- belong to the Left. ♦

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“Futile Care” and Its Friends Hospitals—and legislators—want to decide when your life is no longer worth living.

African children breakfast 365 days a year. But had Camp- Y ESLEY MITH B W J. S bell not successfully pressured the doctor into saving hen John Campbell’s teenage son Christopher’s life, none of that would have happened. Christopher became comatose after a Christopher Campbell would be a cherished memory car accident in 1994, the last problem instead of a living son. Campbell expected was obtaining prop- The physician’s refusal to provide Christopher desired er medical treatment for his son. Camp- life-sustaining treatment was an early application of a rela- bell,W a corporate executive, had excellent health insurance tively new bioethical theory that has since swept the West- and was convinced Christopher would receive the best of ern medical world. “Futile care theory” holds that when a care. But then something awful happened. One month after physician believes the quality of a patient’s life is too low to the accident, Christopher developed a burning fever. When justify life-sustaining treatment, the doctor is entitled to his temperature reached 105—and rising—Campbell asked refuse care as “inappropriate”—even if the treatment is the attending nurses why his son was not being treated for wanted. It is the equivalent of a hospital putting a sign over the condition that now threatened his life. He soon found its entrance stating, “We reserve the right to refuse service.” out: Christopher’s doctor was out of town and the on-call Of course, doctors should not be required to provide physician had refused to order care. The nurses told Camp- physiologically futile treatment. For example, if an ulcer bell they were helpless to act on their own. patient demands chemotherapy, doctors should refuse, Campbell demanded to speak with the doctor. It took since the desired “treatment” would not improve the ulcer hours before the nurses were able to reach him on the at all. But “physiological futility” of this sort is not the phone. By then Christopher’s fever had worsened to 107 essence of contemporary futile care theory. Rather, in med- degrees. “He was literally burning up,” Campbell recalls. “I ical futility bioethicists and doctors unilaterally determine knew that if something was not done, he would die.” when the quality of a human life, or the cost of sustaining Campbell demanded treatment to reduce his son’s fever. it, makes it not worth living. At first, the doctor refused. “He actually laughed,” Camp- Proponents of futile care theory often cite tube feeding bell recalls. But the distraught father wouldn’t give up: “I for patients in a persistent vegetative state as an example of raised holy hell. I used every ounce of persuasion I had in “futile” or “inappropriate” treatment. Let’s analyze this. me.” Finally, reluctantly, the doctor ordered the nurses to What is the medical purpose of “artificial nutrition”? It provide fever-reducing medicine, and the fever subsided. keeps the body functioning. Why do many futilitarians (as Christopher was completely unresponsive for more than they are sometimes called) wish to authorize doctors to four months after the fever incident. Then, against medical refuse such treatment? Not because it doesn’t work—as in expectations, he awakened. Today, after years of arduous the example of the demand for chemotherapy to treat an rehabilitation, he lives with his parents, a disabled young ulcer—but because it does. Thus in futile care theory the man who counsels troubled teenagers and who, with his treatment itself isn’t denigrated as futile—the patient is. father’s help, created a foundation that feeds 30 hungry One way patients or families currently thwart futile care impositions is by threatening to sue. To counter this threat, Wesley J. Smith, a frequent contributor to THE WEEKLY STANDARD, futilitarians are moving on two fronts to all but guarantee is the author of Culture of Death: The Assault on Medical that courts will ultimately acquiesce to futile care theory. Ethics in America (Encounter Books). First, in hospitals nationwide they are quietly promulgat-

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ing formal, written futile care protocols that establish pro- may demand, medical treatment which the health care cedures under which wanted treatment can be refused. Sec- provider does not have available, or which is, under prevail- ing medical standards, either futile or otherwise not medically ond, they are beginning to place language in federal and indicated. [Emphasis added.] state legislation that would stamp the government’s impri- matur upon the core principles of futile care theory. As currently written, the bill would be a disaster for the For obvious reasons, hospitals don’t hold press confer- most vulnerable and defenseless among us: patients who ences to announce the institution of futile care protocols. are dehumanized and viewed as parasitic drains on limited Thus no one actually knows how many institutions across health care resources. Indeed, imagine the different fate the nation have decided to impose futile care theory on that would have befallen Christopher Campbell had the unsuspecting patients, but there is little doubt that many doctor who refused to treat his fever been empowered by have. In 1996, the Journal of the American Medical Association federal law to tell his father that sustaining the life of a per- reported that several Houston hospitals had cooperatively sistently comatose patient was “not medically indicated created a medical futility policy designed to establish “pro- under prevailing medical standards.” fessional integrity and institutional integrity” as a counter- The New York state legislature also has two bills pend- balance to “patient autonomy.” Ethics committees were ing that would implement futile care theory. The “Health granted the power to decide whether life-sustaining treat- Care Decisions Act for Persons with Mental Retardation” ment should be provided as requested or withdrawn over would permit physicians and hospitals to refuse treatment patient/family objection. Once the ethics committee rules, requests by the guardians of mentally retarded patients, if the matter is settled, and all further “inappropriate” care the doctor would not have honored an identical request may be terminated unilaterally. The Mercy Health System, from a competent patient “because the decision is contrary a group of Philadelphia-area Catholic hospitals, instituted a to a formally adopted written policy of the hospital express- similar futility program last year, described in “Time for a ly based on religious beliefs or sincerely held moral convic- Formalized Medical Futility Policy,” published in the tions central to the hospital’s operating principles.” A for- July/August 2000 Health Progress. And in an article on med- mally adopted futile care protocol would clearly fall into ical futility in the Fall 2000 Cambridge Quarterly of Health this category. Care Ethics, the authors reported that 24 out of 26 Califor- A similar policy in AB 5523, legislation establishing the nia hospitals they surveyed “defined nonobligatory treat- rights of surrogate health care decision-makers, would per- ment” in terms that were not “physiology based.” mit a hospital ethics committee to “approve or disapprove” One of the stated purposes behind these hospital proto- a request to render wanted life-sustaining treatment. cols is to thwart patients’ ability to obtain a judicial order Adding to the potential for abuse, the workings of the requiring the continuation of life-sustaining care. As the ethics committee would not be “subject to disclosure or Cambridge Quarterly authors put it, “Hospitals are likely to inspection,” nor would any committee member be allowed find the legal system willing (and even eager) to defer to to “testify as to the proceedings or records of an ethics well-defined and procedurally scrupulous processes for review committee, nor shall such proceedings and records internal resolution of futility disputes.” In other words, the otherwise be admissible as evidence in any action or pro- strategy is to convince judges that, as mere lawyers, they are ceeding of any kind in any court . . . ” In short, ethics com- ill-equipped to gainsay what doctors and bioethicists have mittee adjudications could become the moral equivalent of already decided is best. Star Chamber proceedings, with members empowered lit- As if that weren’t enough cause for alarm, federal and erally to decide issues of life and death in an atmosphere of state legislation is now being introduced that would explic- secrecy and unaccountability. itly empower doctors to deny life-sustaining treatment Under both pieces of New York legislation, caregivers against the will of patients or their families. The most bla- who disagreed with futile care impositions would have the tant example is found in Senator Arlen Specter’s 171-page option of changing hospitals. But in these days of managed “Health Care Assurance Act,” which seeks to expand care, when the sickest patients generally cost hospitals health coverage for children and disabled people, among money rather than bring profits, this option is more mirage many other provisions. Buried deep in the bill is Title VI, than reality. which authorizes patients to consent or refuse medical Should a hospital transfer prove unavailable, the legisla- treatment. That’s fine. But the kicker comes in subsection tion requires the hospital to “seek judicial relief or honor B(ii), which is steeped in the lexicon of futile care theory: the [patient/family’s] decision.” But families would face a badly stacked deck when sued: State law and the written TREATMENT WHICH IS NOT MEDICALLY INDICATED.—Noth- ing in this subsection shall be construed to require that hospital protocol would already have formally legitimized any individual be offered, or to state that any individual futile care theory, making a hospital victory far more likely.

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Moreover, hospitals have deep pockets from which to pay for imposing medical futility on defenseless patients is “dis- $500-per-hour lawyers, the substantial fees of doctors, and tributive justice”—i.e., a Montana hospital should deny bioethicists who would testify that refusing wanted care is Grandma Jones wanted life-sustaining antibiotics or respi- both ethical and standard medical practice. Patients or rator care so society can provide health benefits to unin- caregivers, on the other hand, would have to pay lawyers sured Little Suzy in Appalachia. Thus it is hardly surpris- and experts out of their own pockets, potentially leading to ing that Senator Specter included an explicit futile care financial ruin. provision in legislation designed to expand access to health In California, futile care theory has already been legal- care. ized. A review of language recently put into the Probate Yet ironically, imposing futile care theory on patients Code finds that a “health care provider or health care insti- will not save much money, since end-of-life care constitutes tution may decline to comply with an individual health only about 10 percent of total health care expenditures. care instruction or health care decision that requires med- Futilitarians know this, of course—which is why some ically ineffective health care [physiological futility] or already advocate restricting access to “marginally beneficial health care contrary to generally accepted health care standards care” once the futile care fight is won. And what is margin- applicable to the health care provider or institution.” [Emphasis ally beneficial care? A few years ago Dr. Donald J. Murphy, added.] In other words, if an institution defines certain a leader of the futile care movement, gave me the example types of wanted life-sustaining treatment as contrary to of an 80-year-old woman requesting a mammogram. their internal standards, doctors can refuse to render the Thus medical futility is not an end but rather the care. At that point, the doctor must cooperate with the beginning of a thousand-mile journey leading directly to transfer of the patient to another institution and continue society-wide health care rationing—a euphemistic term to provide the care until transfer “or until it appears that a for medical discrimination, based on subjective quality-of- transfer cannot be accomplished.” Presumably, if no other life criteria, against patients who are elderly, expensive to hospital agrees to take the patient, the non-treatment deci- care for, disabled, or dying. Eventually, this will include sion can be imposed unilaterally. all of us. We ignore the threat of futile care theory at our Why is this happening? The usual bioethical rationale own peril. ♦ Michael Ramirez

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TheThe GreatGreat BookieBookie MortimerMortimer Adler,Adler, 1902-20011902-2001 ByBy JJOSEPHOSEPH EEPSTEINPSTEIN Corbis-Bettmann. All other photos Macmillan.

n June 28, Mortimer J. out to be wild, and the job put me back theoretical. We were asked to write Adler, propagandist for in Chicago, city of my birth. papers suggesting themes around the reading of great books, Apologies to Diderot, D’Alembert, which the new Encyclopaedia Britanni- indexer extraordinaire, and & Co., but the making of encyclope- ca might best be organized. I wrote one theO world’s highest-salaried philoso- dias has never seemed to me of much on “struggle” as a possible theme—a pher, died at the age of ninety-eight. interest. I felt no more affinity for paper that, if I have any luck at all, will I worked for Mortimer, as we all cross-referencing than I did for cross- long ago have been shredded, lost, or called him, in the late 1960s. After a dressing. Etymologically buried within disintegrated. An entire week, some- year-long stint as the director of an the word “encyclopedia” is the notion times two, would go by without having anti-poverty program in Little Rock, that all knowledge is a great, linked anything to do. Meanwhile, the unter- Arkansas, I had acquired, through the circle. Not at all my idea of a good werkers, the subject editors and the pic- good offices of Harry Ashmore, a job as time: altogether too intertwined, vast, ture editors, working in the hard grav- something called “senior editor” at grandiose. But it was something to do el of fact on which any good reference Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., in until I felt the need to escape this job, work depends, kept things going on Chicago. As with every other job I too, which four years later I did. Britannica, doing the real work of run- have ever had, I was not so much eager I was hired not by Mortimer Adler, ning an encyclopedia. for this job as I was to escape the job I but by a man named Warren Preece, a then held. (White flags were shooting former journalist who had been execu- fter a year or so of this high-level up everywhere in what was unhappily tive secretary at the Center for the A dithering, Mortimer Adler was called “The War on Poverty.”) So I was Study of Democratic Institutions, then brought in to organize the new set. His hired, along with ten or twelve others, a very slow-moving and luxuriously energy and stamina were greater than to design a vast, genuinely radical revi- run think tank in Santa Barbara, Cali- those of anyone I have ever known. I sion of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. fornia, which was said handsomely to have seen him lecture—browbeat is The pay was high, the comedy turned illustrate nothing so much as the closer to it—a room of specialists on Leisure of the Theory Class. Things at each of their own subjects for ten Joseph Epstein is a contributing editor to THE Britannica, Inc., at the outset certainly hours, do a two-hour call-in radio WEEKLY STANDARD. couldn’t have been more leisurely or show interview afterwards, return

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home to work on a book (he liked to Mortimer was sixty-five when I first encyclopedia with no mere source of turn out one a year), and, I should not encountered him, and looked more information but the means to a liberal have been in the least shocked to learn, like fifty. Stocky, perhaps five foot six, education. end the day by making vigorous love rosy rather than ruddy of complexion, Two members of Mortimer’s old to his thirty-odd-years-younger wife, jowly, broad chested, short legged, Columbia University connection, and at last fall asleep doubtless while expensively dressed, he was built, as Charlie Van Doren and Clifton Fadi- attempting to draw a bead on some they used to say of a certain kind of man, joined the group. Fadiman easily tangled epistemological problem. automobile of the era, to hold the road. won the prize for the most pretentious After a tumultuous career as a He had a slight lisp, notable when say- outlines. (Seeing Fadiman and Adler teacher at the University of Chicago, ing the word “perspicacious,” which together, I used to think: two Sanchos where he had offended everyone but he said a lot. A racing mind caused Panza and no Don Quixote in sight.) I the janitorial staff, Adler departed to him to stammer, especially in argu- seem to remember Fadiman’s compos- form Great Books Clubs and to pub- ment, where he preferred to kill off ing for his outline on popular culture a lish, under the auspices of Encyclopae- opponents quickly. A broadsword not a rubric about the origin of the movies dia Britannica, Inc., a set of fifty-four rapier man, he once debated Bertrand that ran: “The beginning of cinema: volumes called, collectively, The Great Russell on the subject of the right ends the curious confluence of an emerging Books of the Western World, with two of education, and after Adler spoke, technology and a surgent ethnic thick index volumes he christened the Russell began his rejoinder by saying: group.” After reading this, I passed “Syntopicon,” which must constitute “I greatly admire Dr. Adler’s rugged along a note to the editor sitting next the world’s largest and most difficult to simplicity.” People who heard the de- to me that read, “I think he means that use index of ideas. the Jews got there first.” Mortimer claimed to be a propo- hrough lucubrations nent of arriving at positions Ttoo elaborate and through reasoned dis- boring to go into here, cussion—he was on re- Adler decided that there cord approving “intellec- are 102 great ideas—run- tually well-mannered dis- ning alphabetically from putation”—but somehow Angel to World—and was things didn’t quite work able to hire a staff of out that way. The combi- unemployed intellectual nation of deadlines and his workers to plow through impatience quickly forced the fifty-four volumes, con- him into intellectual bully- stituting roughly 32,000 ing. He did not suffer subtlety pages, to discover 163,000 refer- gladly. To hold his brief attention, ents in them to the 102 great ideas. one had to develop to a high power the The project took eight years and bate judged that Mortimer won but art of quick blunt statement. He also roughly a million dollars, back in the had sustained so many rhetorical lacer- erected a number of distinctions— 1950s, when a million dollars really ations that the victory wasn’t worth it. “first-intentional and second-inten- was a million dollars. Sitting in a room around an tional knowledge” was a notorious Nobody, apparently, was around immense conference table, we senior one—that served as barbed wire to within Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., editors, now that Mortimer was in keep everyone at bay. “I know nothing with sufficient authority to tell Adler charge, were put to the task of design- more stupid and indeed vulgar than that, far from being a great idea, the ing what our chief called a “topical” wanting to be right,” wrote Paul Va- Syntopicon didn’t even qualify as a table of contents, a device that, once up léry, who wouldn’t have done at all well dopey notion. After the books’ publica- and running, would organize the sub- in our meetings, and to whom Adler tion, the intellectual journalist Dwight ject matter of the new Britannica with a wouldn’t have listened in any case. Macdonald didn’t mind doing so, and logic and efficiency of extra- in a fine devastation he amusingly ordinary . . . well, perspicacity. World recall a scruffy sub-editor who was dubbed the entire project “The Book knowledge was neatly divided up into Iinvited in on the day we discussed of the Millennium Club.” After mak- ten parts, and each of the editors was to psychology, his specialty. Tieless, he ing the crucial point that the Syntopi- design outlines for these parts, or parts put his feet up on the table and con failed to distinguish between of the parts, that would form Adler’s announced, “The main thing here is major and minor references, Macdon- table of contents. From these extended that you don’t want to pigeonhole this ald called it “one of the most expensive outlines, the design of the article in material.” But pigeonholing, feathers toy railroads any philosopher was ever Britannica would be dictated. The larg- and guano all over the joint, was of given to play with.” er aim was to supply readers of the new course the whole intent and meaning

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of our job. At the break, Mortimer said that he never wanted to see this man at another of our meetings, and he was banished from the project. Never big on civility, Mortimer was an imperialist of the ego. The best, often the only, way to keep his interest was to talk to him about himself. Even then he would abandon you in mid- sentence if a more important person entered the room. He would tromp over people who disagreed with him, especially if they were employees, while lavishing sycophantic attention on the very rich or on people he need- ed at the moment. Mortimer often enraged me, until I came to view him, I believe rightly, as an essentially comic character—not an idiot but a clown-savant. The comedy, as old as Aristophanes, was that of the inept philosopher: the man with his eyes on the heavens who, missing everything in front of him, falls into the mud. His physical ineptitude was considerable. All mechanical objects deranged him. He was famous as a non-swimmer, failing to get his bache- lor’s degree at Columbia because he couldn’t pass the then-compulsory swimming requirement, where he also Adler poses with John Locke in 1974 dropped out of gym classes; and was excused, owing to a want of coordina- much luck with women. In the first ing him off. Adler’s friends had her tion, from the student army training volume of his autobiography, Philoso- followed by a detective, and when the corps. You have to imagine a Diogenes pher at Large (1977), he claims to have plot was revealed, he didn’t at first whose lamp is unlit not to make a married his first wife because both had want to believe it, then spent months philosophical point but because he had their hearts broken by earlier rela- of depression trying to get over it. The doesn’t know how to light it. tionships and provides no other reason world was not too much with our for what he portrays as a loveless mar- philosopher, but frequently too much ortimer’s ineptitude carried on riage beyond his avowed immaturity. for him. Mwell into his adulthood. In one The marriage dragged on for thirty- story, his wife wished to hang a small three years, at the end of which Adler dler apparently didn’t care all that painting, and, there being no hammer called in, from a hotel in San Francis- A much about money, as long as he in their Chicago Gold Coast apartment co, that he wasn’t coming home again. had enough of it to go absolutely first near the Drake Hotel, she sent him out In the middle of this marriage, he fell class, which he always did. “I must to buy one. Since there were no hard- in love with a secretary at the Universi- confess I have the propensities of a ware stores on posh Michigan Avenue ty of Chicago, and his ardent pursuit of sybarite,” he wrote in Philosopher at nearby, he went directly to Dunhill’s her nearly caused his dismissal from Large, adding in his second volume of where, mirabile dictu, no hammers the university for behavior regarded, as autobiography, A Second Look in the being available, he brought back a he puts it, as “intolerable.” Rearview Mirror, “Get over the folly of gold-plated shower head which he Between his first and second mar- thinking that there is any conflict used to hammer in the nail. riage, Adler became engaged to a between high living and high think- A friend of mine who worked for woman who, with her boyfriend, had ing: Asceticism is for the birds.” him recalls a love letter Mortimer been hatching a plot which called for Impossible to imagine him traveling wrote that contained the sentence: “I insuring him into the stratosphere and coach. In Chicago he lunched at the love you with all the passions atten- then, with the aid of her boyfriend, Tavern Club, bought his cigars—along dant thereto.” Mortimer didn’t have shaking him down and possibly bump- with his hardware—at Dunhill’s. At

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The fight at the University of Chica- go over what constitutes the right cur- riculum for undergraduates—which Adler even forty years later falsely characterized as the “controversy over facts and ideas, and intellectualism and anti-intellectualism”—need never have reached the level of furor it did had Hutchins conducted it on his own and not allowed Mortimer to serve as his point man. One of Hutchins’s great weaknesses was absolute loyalty to the wrong people. Edward Shils, who was on the scene at the University of Chicago during these years, described the relation of Robert Hutchins and Mortimer Adler by saying that “at least Prince Hal had the good sense, once he became king, to get rid of Falstaff.”

do not know of any genuine contri- Ibution that Mortimer Adler made to Above: Adler arguing with William F. Buckley Jr. in 1967. Opposite: Adler in 1988. serious philosophy, though before he went into big-time indexing he was Britannica, he hired roomfuls of peo- From the outset Adler practiced a form thought a serious Thomist. He also in ple for jobs that later turned out to be of intellectual tactlessness that made several of his books insisted on the quite unnecessary. He resembled that him enemies throughout the universi- continuing relevance of ancient Hollywood director who was given an ty. He let it be known that he thought philosophers to modern problems, unlimited budget and exceeded it, and the philosophy department a bunch of questions, and issues, chief among he came close to sinking Britannica, clucks. He wrote papers demeaning them Aristotle and St. Thomas. Inc. He and Robert Hutchins were social science’s pretensions to being (“Should auld Aquinas be forgot,” America’s first six-figure intellectuals. legitimate learning, when social sci- Hutchins used to joke.) Like a gila ence was what the University of Chica- monster, who is said never to let go, he utchins and Adler were, in fact, go was most famous for. “I continued was a persistent attacker of pragma- Han intellectual Abbott and to challenge my colleagues instead of tism, from his days in John Dewey’s Costello act, the one tall, elegant, suave trying to persuade them,” he wrote. lectures to the end of his life. Sidney to the highest power, the other short, Confident of his possession of the Hook once told me that it was proof of nervous, bumptious without peer. I truth, he always took out his trusty Dewey’s honorableness that not even once saw Adler present no fewer than blunderbuss and fired away. “I can see Mortimer Adler could drive him into eleven reasons to “Bob,” as he called that you are the kind of young man anti-Semitism. him, for adapting a certain policy for who is accustomed to winning argu- Perhaps Adler’s major contribution the new Britannica, at the end of which ments,” Gertrude Stein said to him has been in spreading the gospel of the Hutchins, removing his pipe from his one night during a visit to Chicago. great books. Hutchins and Adler, along sensuous lips, replied, “I do not con- Winning arguments but, Miss Stein with Scott Buchanan and Stringfellow sider that an adequate statement of the might have added, losing battles. Barr, took over the dying St. John’s alternatives,” promptly reinserting the Hutchins allowed that Adler did much College in Annapolis, Maryland, where pipe in his mouth, leaving Adler in a to educate him, chiefly through intro- in 1937 they established an undergrad- condition of pure speechless stammer. ducing him to the great-books curricu- uate program based exclusively on Adler referred to his meeting in lum that he had acquired in John great books, with works on ancient and 1927 with Hutchins, who was then at Erskine’s General Honors Seminar at modern mathematics and science twenty-eight acting dean of the Yale Columbia in the early 1920s. But Adler added; less intensive programs went Law School, as changing “the whole also did much to complicate Hutch- into operation for a limited portion of course of my life.” It changed ins’s life as president of the University the student body at the University of Hutchins’s quite as much. When of Chicago by alienating large seg- Notre Dame and at St. Mary’s College Hutchins became president of the Uni- ments of the faculty. Adler could get an in California. versity of Chicago in 1929 at the age of argument to the shouting stage quicker I was myself the recipient of a par- thirty, he took Adler along with him. than a World Federation wrestler. tial great-books education at the Uni-

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versity of Chicago, which Hutchins Adler is asking here not to be was able to install after the smog of judged by his life but by his works. controversy had cleared. Mine was “An interest in human beings is one assuredly better than a bad-books edu- thing; an interest in thought another; cation, such as is nowadays offered at and one should not be allowed to get in almost every school in the land, but the way of the other,” he wrote as a education, I have come to conclude, is young man in an attack on Will mostly luck in finding good teachers. I Durant’s The Story of Philosophy. Yet, myself never found any at Chicago. despite Adler’s admonitions, would (They were there in the persons of anyone doubt it matters that Nietzsche Frank Knight, Edward Shils, Joseph went mad or that Socrates accepted his Schwab, and a few others, but I didn’t unjust death with serenity? In Adler’s search them out.) What I did discover case, his own lack of interest in human at Chicago was an atmosphere where beings and their idiosyncrasies erudition was taken seriously. Because destroys much of what passes for his all the books taught were first class— philosophy, especially his educational no textbooks were allowed, no conces- philosophy. sions were made to the second-rate for Adler’s ignorance of human psy- political reasons, and one was graded chology—of human nature tout court— not by one’s teachers but by a college led him to believe that everyone is edu- examiner—I gradually learned on my cable. In his extreme egotism, he own the important writers and eternal believed that, in his work on the Syn- issues, and where to go if one wished to topicon and in revising Encyclopaedia stay with the unending work in Britannica, he had supplied the tools progress called one’s education. for the perfection of humanity. “The two sets of books together,” he wrote in dler remained a lifelong advocate A Second Look in the Rearview Mirror, A for the great books. Through an “covered the waterfront; neither alone outfit called the Great Books Founda- sufficed.” He apparently went to his tion, he helped set up seminars in death with no notion that, in the Syn- many of the major cities of America, topicon, he merely created something and himself taught in certain such useless—and with no idea that in his seminars for decades—particularly the work on the Encyclopaedia Britannica, Aspen Institute, where, as I like to ripping it up every which way, allow- think, he ruined the holidays of many ing a maniacal Lego-set structure to a corporation executive by forcing him distort content and make information to read John Locke. I have met a few more difficult to find, he had a major people who have sat in these seminars hand in helping to destroy something for several years; they seem greatly to excellent. have enjoyed it. What is less clear is what they get out of it. After years of hen I was working for Britannica, reading Plato, they seem no closer to Whe called me one morning, and escaping the cave than the rest of us. within himself. Yet insight and under- in much perturbation asked if I “Participants in the Aspen experi- standing are precisely the two qualities thought novels could contain ideas. An ence,” Adler wrote, “were awakened to most absent from Mortimer Adler’s amazing question, really, from the a realization that, in the scale of values, character. Throughout Philosopher at great impresario of The Great Books of the Platonic triad of the true, the Large, Adler abjures any interest in the Western World. Style was simply good, and the beautiful takes prece- human personality or behavior. “If I unavailable to him; he had an active dence over the Machiavellian triad of had as much interest in human beings dislike of it, believing that in a thinker money, fame, and power.” The least as I do in human thought, this [his such as Santayana it covered up lack of cynical of men, Adler probably actual- autobiography] would be a different substance. His own writing has a deep ly believed this. story....Throughout my life it has dryness—there, I believe, by delibera- In a self-congratulatory mode, Adler been human thought to which I have tion. The last time we spoke, he told spoke of himself getting more and reacted with the kind of concern that me that his newest book contained ten more out of repeated rereadings of his others have for human beings. I have typos, and he sent me a copy with a Great Books, finding, as he put it, “a given hurt sometimes because of this, note asking if I could find them. But to growth of understanding and insight” and sometimes I have suffered it.” do that I would, of course, have had to

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read the book, which was not some- Makes, he argued that it was the power mire, and some engage in anonymous thing I felt could be done. of “propositional speech” and concep- protest. At the beginning, the dissent Mortimer’s was a powerful and tual thought that distinguished human is limited to anonymous e-mails sent lucid yet coarse and deeply vulgar beings from all other animals. If dol- to officers and civilians from a group mind. His must have been an astonish- phins could utter coherent sentences, I calling itself the “Sons of Liberty.” But ingly high IQ, but his brain functioned asked him after one of these lectures, as casualties mount among the ill- in him like a bicep: a large and showy would this make them human? “Yes, trained troops, the protest escalates, thing with which one cannot finally do absolutely,” he replied, without a trace first as organized acts of disrespect all that much but menace and beat of irony. I don’t know where Mortimer against the president and senior offi- down other people. He took logic, Adler might be just now, but I like to cers, and finally as actual sabotage of upon which he prided himself, all the think he is being lectured to inter- military operations. way out. When he gave the lectures minably by a very severe and humor- As the military confronts the threat that resulted in the book he called The less dolphin with an IQ much higher within, Lewis and Sherman must Difference of Man and the Difference It than his own. ♦ answer the central question of military service: What is a soldier’s duty? Or, to put it a different way, to what does a B&A soldier owe primary allegiance—to the Constitution, the military as an institu- tion, one’s superiors, or one’s subordi- nates? And what happens if these loy- Soldier and Citizen alties come into conflict? Thomas Ricks’s novel of civil-military relations. Lewis and Sherman belong to the post-Clinton military. During the years BY MACKUBIN THOMAS OWENS of the Clinton administration, many in uniform saw the military as an institu- mericans take good civil- social, political, and technological tion under siege by those who neither military relations for grant- change. Set in the year 2004, it tells the understood nor respected it. So wide- ed. The Constitution, mili- story of two young Army majors, Bud- spread was their contempt for Presi- tary officers’ strongly in- dy Lewis and Cindy Sherman. Sher- dent Clinton that officers who once Agrained acceptance of the principle of man works for the Army chief of staff, would have kept their negative opinion civilian control, and the fact that the General John Shillingsworth, an old- of the commander-in-chief to them- services get their personnel from a school officer whose sense of duty was selves now felt free to denounce him in broad range of the pop- formed in the changes front of their peers and often their sub- ulation have combined after Vietnam. Lewis ordinates as well. A Soldier’s Duty to give the United by Thomas E. Ricks serves as aide de camp But the reaction to Clinton was States a military stabili- Random House, 320 pp., $24.95 to the vice chairman of unorganized. The response of the mili- ty most other countries the Joint Chiefs of Staff, tary to President Jim Shick and his can only envy. General B.Z. Ames, policies in A Soldier’s Duty is orches- But over the last few years, a num- who comes from the Army’s special trated—and made more dangerous by ber of commentators have suggested forces and has an understanding of the Internet, a technology that already that relations between American soci- duty that differs considerably from has begun to undermine the hierarchi- ety and the military are in serious dis- Shillingsworth’s. cal structure of the military. array. Thomas Ricks, now the Penta- The officer corps holds the presi- gon correspondent for the Washington dent of the United States in contempt. he novel A Soldier’s Duty is remi- Post, contributed to that debate in his Despite being a Republican, he has Tniscent of Seven Days in May, excellent 1997 book, Making the Corps, committed two Clinton-like betrayals Fletcher Kneble’s 1962 tale of a mili- which argued that there was a growing in the eyes of the officer corps: He has tary conspiracy to seize the govern- gap between the military and the soci- issued an executive order that permits ment. In Seven Days in May, a cabal of ety it is sworn to protect. anyone, including homosexuals and high-ranking officers, led by Air Force Now, in A Soldier’s Duty, Ricks the disabled, to serve in the military; General James Mattoon Scott, is en- makes much the same point in a first- and he has stretched military commit- raged by a nuclear disarmament treaty rate novel about the contemporary ments to the breaking point. Shortly with the Soviet Union and plots a American military and its response to after the two majors are posted to the coup. They are stopped when a Marine Pentagon, the president commits the colonel named Jiggs Casey stumbles Mackubin Thomas Owens is professor of military to yet another peacekeeping onto some clues that alarm him strategy and force planning at the Naval War operation, this time in Afghanistan. enough to contact a friend who works College in Newport, Rhode Island. Critics in all ranks see this as a quag- for the president. Despite the fact that

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he, too, dislikes the treaty, Casey is Chiefs of Staff—created the most influ- ly professional and apolitical, increas- firmly committed to civilian control of ential military officer in the history of ingly identify themselves as politically the military. Addressing the president, the Republic. active Republicans and conservatives. Casey says the treaty is “your business, That is fine as long as the officer Some have asked what would happen yours and the Senate’s. You did it, and who holds the position is above if a conservative officer corps were to they agreed, so I don’t see how we in reproach. But the character in A Sol- discover that Republican politicians the military can question it. I mean we dier’s Duty isn’t, and an unscrupulous were not necessarily pro-military or can question it, but we can’t fight it. chairman, exercising undue influence had other priorities. The current anger Well, we shouldn’t anyway.” over a militarily inexperienced presi- on the part of the uniformed military Seven Days in May was a product of dent, constitutes a serious threat. And at the perceived failure of the Bush the Cold War and raised the question this danger is exacerbated by the emer- administration to keep its campaign of whether a liberal democracy can gence of a politicized military. As a promises is one answer. The scenario survive in the nuclear age. A Soldier’s number of commentators have Thomas Ricks outlines in A Soldier’s Duty is more a product of our own observed, military officers, traditional- Duty is another. ♦ time: It doesn’t claim we are close to a coup, but it does suggest that a restless military is close to repudiating civilian B&A control because those in uniform think the policies of the civilian leaders are destroying the military as an institu- tion. Writing Dangerously In Seven Days in May, both Presi- Journalism when it matters. dent Jordan and his closest friend are veterans of ground combat. In A Sol- BY ALEXANDER C. KAFKA dier’s Duty, President Shick doesn’t “know much more about the military national business reporter learned that China was planning to sell than Clinton did.” The civil-military gets a scoop: The Treasury gold reserves on the foreign-exchange problem Ricks observes in A Soldier’s Department, in consultation market. Central bank chairman and Duty is what might be called the “par- with the Federal Reserve, is future prime minister Zhu Rongji, ticipation gap”—the fact that the civil- planningA to sell dollars for yen on the outraged by Xi’s reports, apparently ian elite has largely forsaken military foreign-exchange market in order to had him arrested by agents of the service. strengthen Japan’s currency and stabi- State Security Bureau. Xi was compar- This participation gap is dangerous. lize exchange rates. atively lucky: Pro- Policymakers, ignorant of the require- The treasury secre- tests by human- Words of Fire ments of military culture, may subor- tary, outraged at the Independent Journalists Who rights groups world- dinate the military’s functional imper- publication of the Challenge Dictators, Druglords, wide, as China’s ative—fighting and winning America’s story, urges friends and Other Enemies of a Free Press takeover of Hong wars—to such social imperatives as at the FBI to arrest by Anthony Collings Kong neared, pres- NYU Press, 265 pp., $28.95 equal opportunity for homosexuals the reporter and sured Beijing to and “gender equity.” At the same time, charge him with es- release him on pro- policymakers without military experi- pionage for revealing a state economic bation in 1997 after he’d served three ence may be overawed by generals and secret, a crime punishable by death. and a half years. But to remind jour- admirals. The reporter is held incommunicado, nalists that they’d better watch their At first glance, the stakes seem to tried secretly without benefit of a step, China denied parole to another have diminished. In Seven Days in lawyer, and sentenced to twelve years journalist, Gao Yu, who was serving a May, Scott wants to replace Jordan in prison. His source is sentenced to six-year sentence for reporting “state because he believes the president’s fifteen years. secrets” such as that Deng Xiaoping policies are threatening the security of A ridiculous scenario? Here, yes; in continued to influence economic poli- the nation. In A Soldier’s Duty, the China, not at all, especially not to Xi cy after his retirement. senior officer who poses the threat to Yang, who in 1993 got an analogous The cases of Xi and Gao are among civil-military relations wants merely to scoop from a source at the People’s dozens brought to us by Anthony become chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Bank of China. Xi, a Hong Kong- Collings in Words of Fire, a compelling, Staff. based reporter for the paper Ming Pao, dispiriting, and much-needed reality As a number of critics noted at the check on the state of press freedom time, however, the 1986 Goldwater- Alexander C. Kafka is an editor at the around the world. There’s been a Nichols Act—which established the Chronicle Review magazine of the steady drumbeat of usually convincing, power of the chairman of the Joint Chronicle of Higher Education. always predictable, books condemning

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the market-driven prurience and/or killed, 448 were kidnapped or disap- It is these “battleground countries,” the docility of American journalism, peared, and 4,450 were arrested or where liberties fluctuate year to year, among them The Elements of Journalism detained. that are the focus of Words of Fire. by Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel, Yet Collings argues that press free- Among the most populous are Indone- Bad News by Robert Shogan, and dom is actually growing. “The cold sia, Brazil, Russia, Pakistan, Nigeria, Mediapolitik by Lee Edwards. Against war is over,” he writes. “With it has and Mexico. While their cultures vary the backdrop of all this journalistic gone much of the brutal suppression of widely, Collings points out, the coun- self-flagellation comes Collings—a for- press freedom by forces on both sides, tries in this middle category are by and mer foreign correspondent for the Wall right and left, ranging from virulent large “developing nations emerging Street Journal, the Associated Press, anticommunist military regimes in from decades of one-party or military Newsweek, and CNN, now a journalism Latin America to communist dictator- dictatorship. Often their independent professor at the University of Michi- ships in what was once the Soviet journalists in the past have been asso- gan—to remind us how much journal- sphere.” ciated with opposition parties or dissi- ists elsewhere sacrifice to do their jobs. He correlates the growing number dent groups. . . . Neither side—neither of democracies—two-thirds of world government nor independent press— ollings cites figures from groups governments, under which live three- enjoys unqualified support from all Clike the Committee to Protect fifths of the global population—with a major sectors of society. In many cases, Journalists and Freedom House, both rise in literacy and a growing demand the government controls radio and in New York. In 1999, 34 journalists for objective news. He divides coun- television but not all the newspapers lost their lives because of, or in the tries into three groups, those with and magazines.” course of, their reporting. In 1994, the strong press freedoms (like the United number was 72. The total for the 1990s States, Canada, Western Europe, South he battleground countries present was 458. And even more journalists Africa, Japan, Hong Kong, and Tai- Ta paradox—increased press free- were imprisoned as a result of their wan), those essentially without press dom, but continuing violence against work: 181 in 1996, 87 in 1999. To freedom (such as China, Cuba, Iraq, journalists. While free nations and dic- widen the frame a bit, from 1982 Iran, North Korea, and Singapore), tatorships are relatively stable, partly through 1999, 892 journalists were and a volatile middle group. free nations are often in the throes of social change. “The more movement toward open societies,” writes Collings, “the more journalists who try out their newfound freedom.” The danger to journalists is greatest in countries where press freedom exists nominally Visit but is severely restricted in practice, either by weak institutions, especially a weeklystandard.com weak judiciary, as in Peru, Nigeria, and Pakistan, or by pervasive corruption. Consider the case of J. Jesus Blan- cornelas, a newspaper publisher and editor in Tijuana, Mexico, engaged in a long-running campaign to expose cocaine trafficking by the powerful Arellano brothers. In 1997, soon after his government-supplied bodyguards were removed without explanation, the sixty-one-year-old Blancornelas and his driver, heading to the newspaper office in their Ford Explorer, were ambushed by ten gunmen. Blancor- Website for the nation’s nelas, severely wounded, survived, but his driver, hit by thirty-eight bullets, foremost political weekly. was not so lucky. Nine years before, Blancornelas’s copublisher, Hector Felix Miranda, had been assassinated by shotgun. Blancornelas spoke of his experience with an understatement typical of the crusading journalists

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Collings interviewed. “I was doing my Ireland’s president, prime minister, job,” he said. The Arellano brothers and the chief of the armed forces, as “are the news. I am a journalist.” well as Dublin’s archbishop. Leading The book’s most heartbreaking case Irish and British journalists vowed to of a fearless reporter battling organized carry on her brand of reporting. But crime and, one presumes, corrupt gov- elsewhere attempts at such profession- ernment elements, is that of Irish al solidarity have fared poorly. The investigative reporter Veronica Guerin, Mexican Society of Journalists, for who covered Dublin’s underworld for instance, has had a negligible effect on the Sunday Independent. In 1994, after the prosecution of crimes against she wrote about the assassination of members of the press. More than two gangster Martin Cahill (“the Gener- years after the attack on Blancornelas, al”), shots were fired at her home. Sev- prosecutors had brought no charges. eral months later, she profiled the lead- ing suspect in the largest robbery in ollings’s accounts of these and Irish history, and the next day a Cother cases are gripping. If he can masked gunman broke into her home be faulted, it is for being too hopeful. and shot her in the thigh. He is oddly intent, particularly for a Though no arrests were made, man held at gunpoint while reporting Guerin persisted, writing simply, “I am from Beirut in the 1980s, on drawing a letting the public know exactly how partly sunny conclusion from his this society operates.” According to research. Thus, he too eagerly takes colleague Alan Byrne, when Guerin heart from Internet-facilitated resis- found out who had ordered her shoot- tance to Milosevic during Serbia’s ing, “she went, on crutches, to see the implosion. He attributes journalists’ person to let them know she wasn’t defiance of the censors to “that univer- scared.” Soon after, when she met a sal human trait of refusing to be beaten crime-linked businessman for an inter- down into silence,” despite his own view, he “slammed her head against ample evidence that self-censorship in her car and threatened to kill her if she the face of dictators and ruthless crimi- wrote anything about him.” nals is actually commonplace. For Interestingly, Guerin’s confronta- every crusader who communicates a tional methods were not just a gutsy dangerous truth, Collings gives us a means of gathering information— journalist beaten, bought, or cowed Guerin is not portrayed as flamboyant into silence in one of the hot spots of or self-aggrandizing—but a way Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe, the Mid- around the country’s Official Secrets dle East, or Latin America. Many, at Act, which barred sourcing from gov- the border between courage and self- ernment documents. By confronting destruction, understandably find the criminals face to face, she hoped to cost of crossing too high. provoke them into commenting on the If journalistic freedom has expand- record about allegations against them ed since the end of the Cold War, the —in order to get their names into print trend is endangered by even the mild without exposing her paper to lawsuits. economic downturn and political tur- You know how this story ends. As bulence since the book went to press. she was on the verge of naming Collings’s own illustrations suggest Dublin’s three biggest heroin dealers, that nationalism, civil war, and ethnic on June 26, 1996, Guerin was attacked strife will take as great a toll on jour- in her car at a traffic light. Two men nalists as did the Cold War. The cases drove up on a motorcycle. One of them he presents inspire more fear than smashed her window and shot her in hope. His work reminds jaded Western the face and chest six times. Guerin, journalists that more is at stake in thirty-seven years old, died almost delivering the news than scoops about instantly. She left behind a husband Rudy Giuliani’s mistress troubles. It and six-year-old son. reminds all of us that in most of the Her murder was greeted with out- world freedom of the press remains a rage, and her funeral was attended by principle under siege. ♦

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Parody

ARCHITECTURAL DIGEST June 13, 1998

Length: 1459 words Headline: DC Comfort With California Sizzle: Way, With Killer Results! A Powerful Pol Redecorates his Apartment His

Body: Washing- Condit realized he just had to redecorate his One day a few years ago, Congressman Gary , like it was 24 or 25 years old,” says the dashing politi- ton apartment. “It was looking aged and saggy cian, who bears a striking resemblance to Harrison Ford. “I wanted something professional yet sensual, but which could bear a lot of foot traffic. I’m a night owl and I mix work and pleasure quite a bit, and so I needed sturdy, sound proof beams, in case I wanted to tie anything to the walls.” Condit decided to hire young design- Instead of going to one of the established interior design firms, ers, fresh out of college, high school, and in some cases, even the Girl Scouts, to help him realize his dream. And after running through 35 of them, his masterpiece was complete. “Mentoring is really what I’m all about. Some of those gals gave their heart and soul to the project.” He presented them with some design challenges. “I really love cactus,” the dashingAlso closets. member I have confess- tons es. “And people are always giving me terrariums. So I need a place for them. of shirts and I really like it when they’re color coordinated. So walk in closets were essential.” The results, say his friend, Marina Ein, are “a home run.” f, The entry alcove, where Condit greets his political staf A home run with some surprising features. Condit has a changing room and black lights illuminating a glowing shag carpet. For the kitchen, ordered a special fridge that delivers whipped cream at the touch of a button. “My favorite movie is explains, “It’s really what motivated me to go into politics.” 9 1/2 Weeks with Kim Basinger,” Condit And it’s rare that you find a home office with its own Jacuzzi and ceiling mirrors. The highlight of the apartment is without question the bedroom, with its raised heart-shapedThe waterbed, the mirrored disco ball hanging from the ceiling and the built, a in feature bleachers fashionable for spectators. in Clinton- bedroom has its own separate exit, leading straight to a secluded alley era Washington. The rawhide door- Condit and his designers also came up with a string of creative design solutions. The built-in maga- The speckled bathroom floor masks dirt and stains. knobs really hide fingerprints. een Beat and Seventeen. And best of all are Condit’s voluminous collections of T zine racks neatly hold Condit exults. the smudge-proof countertops. “My problems just disappear!” Load-Date: June 20, 1998

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