Asymmetrical Information

From the desk of Mindles H. Dreck:

They just don't make 'em like they used to.

Don't you love a NJ gubernatorial campaign? Forrester and Corzine have been running negative ads for weeks, and the recent lot from Forrester have gone pretty personal, raising a morality charge dressed up as a conflict of interest (well-OK it is a conflict of interest, but that's not why it's airing).

It reminds me of the good old days when the Florio campaign ran an ad saying Jim Courter had 'toxic waste in his backyard'.

It helps to be the kind of person who ignores all sense of decency when running for office.

From the desk of Mindles H. Dreck:

Stranger than True

I watched all but the last 15 minutes of the debates. I did not see them as a drubbing. Immediately after Edwards said "Mr. Vice President, you are still not being straight with the American people" (Transcript), both candidates went for each others' jugulars for the rest of the evening, rarely pausing to defend themselves. Edwards on the attack, mixing broad smiles and broader accusations, is very unpleasant, and the V.P.'s phlegmatic delivery is hardly moving. I think most of the country will conclude they are both unpleasant, but Cheney's more experienced. I don't think it will move the needle.

The strangest few minutes of the evening followed the question on gay marriage. What I heard was the Vice President make a technical argument and then open a bit of daylight between himself and the President:

And the fact is that the president felt that it was important to make it clear that that's the wrong way to go, as far as he's concerned.

Now, he sets the policy for this administration, and I support the president.

He really couldn't have made it clearer he disagrees.

But then Edwards comes on and sticks his thumb in Cheney's wound with a completely insincere discussion of the V.P.'s daughter.

Now, as to this question, let me say first that I think the vice president and his wife love their daughter. I think they love her very much. And you can't have anything but respect for the fact that they're willing to talk about the fact that they have a gay daughter, the fact that they embrace her. It's a wonderful thing. And there are millions of parents like that who love their children, who want their children to be happy.

It was entirely transparent that Edwards was making fun of Cheney for not talking about his daughter and implicitly questioning their love for her. Cheney must have been fuming. I suspect Edwards was hoping he'd blow his cool.

For this and the follow-up question, Edwards was completely incoherent. Cheney tried to put them both out of their misery by yielding back his time with nothing but a perfunctory 'thank you' (what you?) for the 'kind' remarks about his family. Edwards then dug in, but failed to be coherent or persuasive:

But we also believe that gay and lesbians and gay and lesbian couples, those who have been in long-term relationships, deserve to be treated respectfully, they deserve to have benefits.

For example, a gay couple now has a very difficult time, one, visiting the other when they're in the hospital, or, for example, if, heaven forbid, one of them were to pass away, they have trouble even arranging the funeral.

I mean, those are not the kind of things that John Kerry and I believe in. I suspect the vice president himself does not believe in that.

But we don't — we do believe that marriage should be between a man and a woman.

EDWARDS: And I want to go back, if I can, to the question you just asked, which is this constitutional amendment.

I want to make sure people understand that the president is proposing a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage that is completely unnecessary.

Under the law of this country for the last 200 years, no state has been required to recognize another state's marriage.

Let me just be simple about this. My state of North Carolina would not be required to recognize a marriage from Massachusetts, which you just asked about.

There is absolutely no purpose in the law and in reality for this amendment. It's nothing but a political tool. And it's being used in an effort to divide this country on an issue that we should not be dividing America on.

We ought to be talking about issues like health care and jobs and what's happening in Iraq, not using an issue to divide this country in a way that's solely for political purposes. It's wrong.

They were both threading legalistic needles and both so clearly uncomfortable with their own tickets' arguments.

From the desk of Mindles H. Dreck:

Everybody into the pool, stupid!

I don't think criticizing allies for standing with us is an effective strategy for bringing more nations into Iraq. Hopefully John is reining in the younger sister as we speak.

From the desk of Mindles H. Dreck:

Another Litella Moment

How dare you all attack my patriotism? I'm appalled.

UPDATE: This is OK, apparently:

But the vitriol also reflects the fact that many of the people at that convention, for all their flag-waving, hate America. They want a controlled, monolithic society; they fear and loathe our nation's freedom, diversity and complexity.

Try to act surprised when you see the author.

From the desk of Mindles H. Dreck:

A quick reaction to Bush's speech

1. His delivery seemed better than any time over the last year. The emotional parts, such as describing his meetings with family members of 911 victims and fallen soldiers, were genuine an heartfelt. The 'swagger' line and the comparison of his own treatment of English to Schwarzenegger were likeable moments.

2. His domestic programs seem to consist of promising to open the store and let everyone come in and take what they want. Intervention for students, community health centers, community colleges

3. How, exactly, do you offer tax incentives for "economic opportunity zones" and home ownership and medical savings, etc. and at the same time simplify the tax code. Get rid of the cheese but keep the holes?

4. Lewis Lapham's crystal ball apparently revealed some other convention in a galaxy far far away..

government the problem, not the solution; the social contract a dead letter; the free market the answer to every maiden's prayer

5. Private Investment Accounts that " government can never take away". Just watch them.

6. His knocks on Kerry were a small part of a speech which was really about feeling safe with a side of pork in every pot. The swipes will be featured prominently in press coverage tomorrow. That and strange reasons to dislike programs that would be considered powerful wonkism or 'bridges to the 21st century' if they came from the other side of the aisle.

I listened to the speech on the radio* while driving up to Litchfield County Connecticut, and began to think of Robert Frost

The woods are lovely, dark and deep
George has many promises to keep
The price tag will be very steep
He says the other guy's a creep

Oh, and the two predictions/notes in the prior post were a complete bust. I'm not thinking 'big picture' enough, I guess - or maybe Frances is still too far away and the payroll number sucks?

UPDATE: No specifics? Restrain Spending? Ack! check out his specifics.

On the jobs front Bush had good news when he spoke - not only a good August number but an upward revision of past months:

U.S. employers added 144,000 workers to payrolls in August, the most since May and the first acceleration in five months, suggesting the economy is emerging from a midyear lull. The unemployment rate fell to 5.4 percent, the lowest since October 2001.

The increase follows a revised gain of 73,000 in July that was more than twice the number estimated last month. Manufacturing employment rose 22,000 and the jobless rate declined from 5.5 percent in July.

*good old AM, like having a dentist drill riding shotgun

From the desk of Mindles H. Dreck:

Prostitution Discovered

Boy, if he said this, he's wrong, but he may just have been Dowdified:

In his book tour, Bill Clinton has been defending the 60's, noting that the polarization of American politics began with the civil rights, women's rights, gay rights and abortion rights struggles of the 60's and the assassinations of Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King.

I happen to have in front of me Richard Brookhiser's introduction to the Hamilton edition of the New-York Journal of American History (gee whiz guys, take some of that Gilder money and update the site). It describes a scene immediately after John Jay's negotiation of a treaty with Britain (1795):

On July 18th, angry New York Republicans called a meeting at the intersections of Broad and Wall streets to condemn Jay and his handiwork. Five thousand people showed up - one out of every ten New Yorkers. Alexander Hamilton, who had retired as Treasury Secretary six months earlier, also came, along with Senator Rufus King and a few other Federalists, and tried to put in a good word for the treaty, but the crowd would have none of it; they heckled and booed him, and according to some accounts, stoned him.

The papers of Rufus King, held by the library of the N-YHS, contain a letter to King from the Massachusetts Federalist George Cabot commenting on the affair: "It was observed here that your Jacobins were prudent to endeavor to knock out Hamilton's brains, to reduce him to an equality with themselves." Cabot could joke about it, but barely. But to put the fracas in perspective, imagine an angry crowd of 800,000 New Yorkers; imagine that some former cabinet secretary, Henry Kissinger or Robert Rubin, tried to argue with them; and imagine that he was injured for his pains. That is how seriously the founding generation took war and peace.

I was at an Ivy League college when a considerably smaller group managed to keep Jeane Kirkpatrick from speaking on campus. Fortunately, no stones were involved.

At any rate, 'political polarization' is hardly a 20th Century invention. I might also observe that the most vituperative rhetoric tends to concern the smallest stakes while extraordinary compromise often marks the largest and most serious. I'm not a historian, but it does seem this is one reason slavery survived the Constitutional Convention even as smaller matters provoked several states to hold out on ratification.

From the desk of Mindles H. Dreck:

Clintome

I was happy to blow $25 (yes, it's being discounted) on Clinton's autobiography. I figured Kakutani's review erred on the catty side. I was wrong. I'm only 25 pages in and I can't stop putting it down. I keep thinking it was ghost-written by George W. Bush's caricature.

The editor's red pen must have been out of ink. Every page contains a useless phrase or sentences, such as "It was an interesting experience" or "it was an exciting time to me" or, despite a molehill of subsequent evidence to the contrary "A lot happened to me while I lived on Thirteenth Street." Yawn.

There's plenty of awkward usage as well:

Once, when I was mowing the lawn, I looked down to see a rattlesnake sliding along with the lawn mower, apparently captivated by the vibrations. I didn't like the vibes, so I ran like crazy and escaped unscathed. (p. 24)

Didn't like the vibes? I guess that rattler wasn't groovy after all.

Then there's the useless detail, piled high like some aging rock star screaming city names. Apparently, he didn't want to leave anyone out, even if they play almost no part in the following narrative*:

My grandmother's brother, Uncle Buddy and his wife, Ollie, were the primary members of my extended family. Buddy and Ollie had four children, three of whom were gone from Hope by the time I came along. Dwayne was an executive with a shoe manufacturer in New Hampshire. Conrad and Falba were living in Dallas, though they both came back to Hope often and live there today. Myra, the youngest, was a rodeo queen. She could ride like a pro, and she later ran off with a cowboy, had two boys, divorced, and moved home, where she ran the local housing authority. Myra and Falba are great women who laugh through their tears and never quit on family and friends. I'm glad they are still part of my life. I spent a lot of time at Buffy and Ollie's house, not just in my first six years in Hope, but for forty more years until Ollie died and Buddy sold the house and moved in with Falba.(p.14)

On top of all that detail, we have a hefty helping of cliches and bromides:

I learned a lot from the stories my uncle, aunts, and grandparents told me: that no one is perfect but most people are good; that people can't be judged only by their worst or weakest moments; that harsh judgments can make hypocrites of us all; that a lot of life is just showing up and hanging on; that laughter is often the best, and sometimes the only response to pain. Perhaps most important, I learned that everyone has a story - of dreams and nightmares, hope and heartache, love and loss, courage and fear, sacrifice and selfishness All my life I've been interested in other people's stories. I've wanted to know them, understand them, feel them. When I grew up and got into politics, I always felt the main point of my work was to give people a chance to have better stories. (p.15)

Perhaps, as our final thanks to this surprising President, we could give him a better story. Or at least an editor worth a damn.

____

* Clinton's insistence on throwing in a good word for everyone reminds me of a "Little Bit of Fry and Laurie" skit (called "The Burt") where Hugh Laurie plays a relatively unknown showbiz hack who pretends to know everyone Every woman is a 'fascinating woman, fascinating" and every guy is an "amazing character with a derived nickname:

S: Did you actually know Richard Burton?
H: Oh yes, yes. I knew him, yes. Well, in as much as anyone really KNEW Burton. Aah, yes. I was very fond of 'the Burt'. He was an amazing character, amazing character.
S: Mmmm, now Elizabeth Taylor, of course...
H: Well now, Liz you see, was a joy... a dream... a treasure... marvelous. If you could have seen them together... wuh huh!
S: Did you ever...
H: Oh good lord yes, yes. As a matter of fact I was, uh, I was, uh, best man at their wedding.
S: Really?
H: Hmmm.
S: Which one?
H: All of them.
S: Now Geilguld and Richardson were...
H: Yes. They never married, of course.
S: No.
H: No.
S: Did you know them?
H: Oh good lord yes, yes I knew. Yes, yes. Amazing characters, yes. "The Geil" and "the Rich" used to ask me for advice. They used to call me their "guru". Huh huh huh huh.
S: Now, around this time you must have met...
H: Well, just about everyone, really.
S: Really?
H: Yes. I knew everyone, and everyone knew me.
S: You knew everyone?
H: I knew absolutely everyone, yes.
S: And everyone knew you.
H: And absolutely EVERYONE knew me. Yes, yes.
S: Right. What did you think of Simon Condywust?
H: Simon...?
S: Condywust. Didn't you know him?
H: Oh yes, yes, I knew him. Oh yes, yes. Well, everyone knew "the Condy". Yes, he was an amazing character, amazing.
S: Mmm hmmm. What about Maureen Limpwippypippydodo?
H: Oh well now, yes. She was a fascinating woman. Fascinating. I was fascinated by Maureen for, oh, many years.
S: Mmm hmmm. Was she an amazing character?
H: Well no. She was a woman. The men were amazing characters, the women were fascinating. Yes.
S: Colin FenchmosleythinkIhave?
H: Oh, oh lord, yes. What a charac... yes. What, "the Fench"? Yes, yes, knew him terribly well, terribly well. Yeah.
S: What did you think of Fenella HaHaHaHaHaHaHa-spuit?
H: Fascinating woman, fascinating... yeah, yeah.
S: And what about Peter Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee?
H: Well yes. Well, you see... ha ha ha ha. They broke the mold when they made Peter. Ha ha.
S: And Evelyn Brokethemoldwhentheymadepeter?
H: Delightful... woman?
S: Anthony Delightfulwoman?
H: Oh, splendid chap.
S: Dick van Dyke?
H: You just made that up!

I definitely recommend the tape if you can get your hands on it. Don't miss the "locust' sketch.

From the desk of Mindles H. Dreck:

ASS-U-ME

Note: some revisions. This was a 'speed-blog' and it shows. Here's more on the same subject.

Regular commenter 'somecallmetim' offers an olive branch (scroll down in the comments) I'd like to stop and appreciate:

More honestly, though, I think the sad fact is that more and more often there is little for people on either side of the Iraq issue to do but be snarky to each other. We seem to be looking at two entirely different worlds. I step outside, point up and say, "It's the sun." You say, "No, of course not, it's the moon."

...I'd almost like to believe that its bad faith on your part, or that you guys are mindles(s) idiots who can be shepherded away from the important decision with promises of pie. But I don't. You and Jane (standing in here for the many on the right like you) are clearly bright and well-educated and decent people. You guys honestly believe Bush has done a great job - and I can't fathom how you could think that. It's as if when I say "Up" you hear "Down." (Or vice-versa).

'Tim' points at a phenomenon that is even worse in person than on the internet (unusually). Living where we do I have the experience, at least once a week, of someone who just assumes that I would never dream of voting for a Republican. Most recently, a friend of my mother's called me and began a lengthy description of an important fund-raiser that would finance campaigners to go out to the swing states and register voters and make the case. No party or candidate is mentioned. Finally, after ten minutes I ask, simply out of amusement - "this is for Kerry, right?".

"Yes, well of course."

"That may be problematic."

"Why? You're not..."

And I experience, yet again, that paralyzing moment when my interrogator acts as if I just dropped in from Gopzork on a winged elephant. I explained that I didn't want to spend the evening discussing politics, but was unlikely to actively campaign for or give money to either candidate, as both parties' platforms are seriously flawed.

It's a critical moment, one where a number of assumptions are made. One is that if I'm not necessarily for Kerry, I must be a card-carrying member of the G.O.P., in favor of everything any Republican ever proposed.

The hysterically funny part of this is that my mother heard about this and asked me to 'please not upset her friends'! (by not being a Democrat when they call to ask me to fund raisers?) I'm a very unusual animal where I come from, sort of like a large reptile or rodent. Just a mild-mannered profession of non-Democratness is very disturbing to the equilibrium. For some reason, it's OK to wax polemic for a half-hour at a time if you are dissing Bush, but non-Democrats must stay in the closet. There's a special exemption for 'Neo-Marxists' who are considered nobly idealistic and kinda cute.

In a similar moment with my cousin recently, I had only told him (after listening to about twenty minutes of Bush-haranguing) that I thought the war was a risky but worthwhile experiment and that establishing democracy in the Middle East was probably the only permanent way to reduce the risk of terrorism for the next generation. He just began screaming at me about every Republican program he'd heard of. For some reason we were off war and on tax cuts in a nanosecond. Actually, he never even let me speak to clarify my views. Seriously. I didn't get a word in edgewise for an hour.

Point being, Tim spins mighty big assumptions about Jane and me from a few comments (in my case, very few in months). "You guys honestly believe Bush has done a great job", he says. Jane and I are far from card-carrying Bush boosters. Neither of us share his views or endorse the GOP platform on abortion, gay marriage, government spending or a variety of personal freedom issues. While we like the idea of a very limited government, we both would prefer a different direction for taxation than the Bush tax cuts. There is plenty of evidence in these pages. Jane has called for Rumsfeld's resignation, and even when I was just starting blogging, I pointed out that Bush was an awful lot like Clinton, lacking firm principles and co-opting the other party's issues.

We have devoted a lot of space to defending the President/administration from over-the-top rhetoric. In some sense we've felt almost forced to. I wonder occasionally whether addressing partisan polemics makes you partisan yourself. That's actually one of the thoughts that's diminished my enthusiasm about posting. I know I'll be backed into some argument where fierce partisans insist that if I don't share their wildly unreasonable demonization of the other side I must be....one of them!.

I know many people were backed up into the same corner defending Clinton. I hope I didn't do it to them. Actually, I'm pretty sure I didn't.

So for the record:

Both parties are chickenshit on gay marriage. I don't think the state should have anything to say about it. On the other hand, it's sad to me that anybody thinks state recognition should be important to their own sense of worth. This is what becomes of subsidies (which the legal status of marriage is). They are inherently discriminatory. It's appalling that people think marriage has to be 'defended' with subsidies or other attempts at social engineering.

Free trade is incredibly important to the growth of the world economy and the distribution of wealth to the far corners of the earth. Steel and agricultural subsidies are inexcusable even if the other guys are doing it. These protections simply slow us down and screw the little guy - in Africa or South America, that is.

The FCC's actions are just chilling to free speech. The new fines are restrictively punitive, and create at least the moral hazard of using them to shape political speech.

Bush never saw a spending bill or entitlement he didn't like, all small government rhetoric aside. Descriptions of his spending policy as some kind of fiscal rope-a-dope defy imagination.

As I mentioned a few posts ago, the decision to transplant Gitmo's prisoner treatment guidelines to Iraq is a textbook example of bureaucratic stupidity. The lack of control of potential WMD sites immediately after the invasion is a major screw-up - one that made the world a MORE dangerous place (remember the 'one vial' argument? Since we really thought they were there, job one should have been lockdown, regardless of the invasion pace).

I'm tired of people who think that businespeople are automatically immoral actors, or that the mere existence of profit or business self-interest signifies a problem. In my experience, the profit motive often protects us from the human instinct to control others when we gather in groups. Without the more objective monetary yardstick, it seems like the unspoken prime directive of groups (read:bureaucracies) is to control others, despite the best intentions of the individuals involved. I sit on a nonprofit board and I've seen it in action.

I endorse the mission in Iraq, which WAS, contrary to much invective, about bringing democracy to the Middle East. Or did I just imagine all the pre-war criticism of the administration being in the thrall of a 'cabal' of Straussian Neo-cons with precisely that mission? You remember, back when everyone thought WMDs were a lock? I understand some people thought Saddam could be deterred. I don't understand people who think it is all about oil or Halliburton. An immense good has been done getting rid of Saddam. It is beyond me why people are so vested in portraying that as entirely venal. Counter-tribalism, I guess.

Given the formidable risks and obstacles undertaken, the situation in Iraq does not appear to be as bad as critics paint it. If we had outlined these conditions as success criteria before the war, many would have been glad to accept them (or bet against them). The desire to make Bush look bad has gotten the better of many folks' judgement, and a high-stakes mission is evaluated in hindsight on distinctly unrealistic terms. Incidentally, I don't think our popularity on the continent is the right indicator for success, they tend to be quite hostile to change. I spent plenty of time in Europe during the Reagan era, and I'm quite pleased he didn't use Continental opinion to keep score.

Given the sea-change in the Republican and Democratic parties over the last 40 years, it's not clear to me how non-politicians can actually harbor such strong us-or-them team allegiances to one party or the other. By definition, if you agreed with one party's platform over the whole time, you've changed your mind on any number of issues. Or you just believe in the intrinsic nobility of one party.

Finally, to return to the subject of the commented post, traffic jams mean people have cars, money and opportunity to buy fuel, places to go, and the freedom to do so when they like. Disparaging traffic in Iraq is like New Yorkers getting upset because it's hard to find an empty taxicab. Commenters didn't even seem to notice I generally approved of the cited article.

I consider it my duty to keep my mind open through the election, especially since I don't fit in either party neatly (does any thinking person?). The rhetoric is annoying, but most of it is backward-looking. What matters now is what the candidate WILL do. This is hard enough to figure given that the last two presidents have governed in a way entirely dissimilar to their campaign positioning, and these two won't say what's next.

Bush needs to be much more articulate about the U.S. role in the Middle East. In my mind he will always suffer from a lack of principles on the domestic front. No second chance there, just a question as to whether the other guy is worse (and Kerry plans to be even more profligate...)

Kerry needs to define the mission from here. He has the clear tactical advantage of using a fresh start with allies, but he hasn't made it clear how that will help. He also needs a domestic platform that isn't all bromides and 'rolling back'.

Both candidates need to be realistic and 'fess up to the fact that we can't protect ourselves from terrorism through domestic policing without giving up civil liberties as we know them. I favor the one who describes this as a long term confrontation where we can use our substantial power and resources to make sure my kids won't have to worry about terrorism. Bush is that guy now, but lord knows there is plenty of room in front of him if the opposition would stop the nonsense and run.

I must admit, it's a weird feeling of power to be able to stun an entire room simply by saying "I was in favor of the war..." then watch the sputtering amazed indignation emerge without a shred of actual argument.

But I just don't think these positions deserve that level of surprise and discomfort.

UPDATE: and for those who don't think I don't stand up for what I believe in - I don't think a guns-blazing preaching-to-the choir rhetoric changes any minds, and I think most of the gaps between the parties here are narrower than they are portrayed. Polemics are fun (and I have indulged), but it may well be MORE loyal to one's beliefs to work at being open-minded - you might actually provoke some re-thinking.

From the desk of Mindles H. Dreck:

Bush's Credibility

Cats and Dogs living together! In another well-crafted essay, David Warren questions the credibility of the Bush administration. It is, however, not exactly Krugman's complaint:

As a journalist digging for information in the departments of the Bush administration, I have often enough found myself asking a pointedly naïve question -- even more for my own curiosity than from any journalistic need -- "Why do you agree to lies?"

And not very sophisticated lies, but lies anyone with a small amount of hard information can immediately see through. Why, for instance, do they allow the most astonishing untruths to pass into public information from countries such as Syria and Saudi Arabia, which claim to be assisting in the struggle against terrorism, when they are more obviously abetting terrorism? Why are the most outrageous bluffs from Europe not called -- such as requests for proofs of Saddam's illicit weapons programmes, from the two countries whose pharmaceutical and chemical industries are his principal suppliers?

In many cases, the immediate tactical, the "diplomatic" reason for avoiding a confrontation over fact, is clear enough to see. But in almost every case, a little further thinking shows that an interest of the longer term is being sacrificed to an interest of the shorter.

How much of what we chalk up as "politics/diplomacy as usual" amounts to being stuck in a rut?

From the desk of Jane Galt:

An Open Letter to the Republican Party

Tee-hee! I just got a fundraising letter from the Republican Party:

Dear Friend,

I don't want to believe you've abandoned the Republican Party, but I have to ask. . . have you given up?

Our records show we have not yet received your 2003 RNC membership contribution!

Put your mind at ease, friends, I haven't abandoned you. Abandonment would imply that I had at some point been a member, which is not the case. Indeed, if you check those records, I believe that you will find that not only are you missing my 2003 membership contribution, but my 1990-2002 contributions, inclusive.

But I haven't given up. I'm just waiting for congress to cut some spending, now that you have the legislative and executive branches, and give me back some of my taxes so I can send it on to y'all. Say y'all cut domestic spending by 20% and send me a 20% rebate on my taxes, I'm going to take 5% of that and forward it to you. You don't even have to send me a membership card. And remember -- the more you cut, the more I send.

It's even funnier because I just got done throwing out my fundraiser for the Democrats, which started out, I believe:

Dear Friend,

Is it possible that you have overlooked your 2003 membership contribution to the DNC? With Republicans in control of the congress, our rights are endangered as never before: a woman's right to choose, a family's right to affordable prescription drugs, the right of Chuck Schumer's staffers to go on all-expenses-paid junkets to France to find out why their health care is so good. With the Republicans preparing to sell minority-americans into slavery and cut social security so that their rich contributors can use impoverished seniors to tie thousands of little knots in their carpet factories, now more than ever it is crucial that we have your support!

Okay, so I wasn't reading that carefully. But since you asked, no it isn't possible that I've overlooked it. Try the holistic plumber next door.

This is what I get for subscribing to the National Review and the Nation.

From the desk of Mindles H. Dreck:

How to Say You're Sorry

John DiIulio Jr. on apologizing:

My dad died in my arms in August after a three-year battle with illness. I thought mainly of him on Monday. He always taught me that when you apologize to people, you apologize "with no half-smile, with all your heart, and on your knees, or not at all."

In other words, whether completely culpable or not, and whether there are complicated mitigating if not exonerating motivations and circumstances or not, you do not express honest, heartfelt remorse for wrong by quibbling over how the wronged person or persons characterize it. In this case, my cultural-paternal conditioning, plus my Catholic self-examination of conscience, accounts for my repeat of Mr. Fleisher's words.

Calling Mr. Lott...