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"The stream of Time, irresistible, ever moving, carries off and bears away all things that come to birth and plunges them into utter darkness, both deeds of no account and deeds which are mighty and worthy of commemoration. . .Nevertheless, the science of History is a great bulwark against the stream of Time; in a way it checks this irresistible flood, it holds in a tight grasp whatever it can seize floating on the surface and will not allow it to slip away into the depths of Oblivion. "
- Anna Comnena (1083-1153), The Alexiad
"I have taken all knowledge to be my province."
- Francis Bacon, 1592
Friday, July 4, 2003
On Voting
I want to clarify one thing in the post just below this one.
I still believe people should vote. But I believe it is everyone's civic duty to be an informed voter. I don't urge anyone to go into the booth and yank a lever for the candidate they find cutest or most warm-and-fuzzy or about which they've heard the most vaguely positive (as opposed to vaguely negative) things when waiting for the sports segment (or feature on the cute bunny that got rescued from the bottom of a well).
If you're ignorant, it's your civic duty to keep your ass at home on election day and spend the next two years getting yourself informed. Then vote (for better or worse I don't expect too many people who are oblivious about political topics will be reading this blog, so this post won't be reaching that audience). No one has any excuse to be uninformed - lack of money is no excuse (there are books, magazines, newspapers, and computers at every public library. Use them. Libraries can't even ban smelly, obnoxious bums who pester other patrons from the premises. Get a friend to read to you. If you can't read and can't make a friend, then at least watch TV; C-SPAN and PBSU and video courses are better than nothing). It takes time to make yourself informed, but no money.
The only excuse anyone in this country has for being an uninformed voter anymore boils down to simple laziness, and I don't consider that a valid excuse. So if you have a friend who finds themselves at a loss on election day, not knowing who they want to vote for (or against) and why (you don't have to agree with their reasons, but their reasons should be better than "I like his smile" or "she's got a nice butt" or "sounds good"), encourage that friend - for his or her sake, for all our sakes - to stay home on election day.
Deflate, rather than reinforce, the pep-squad "I don't care what you know, I'll feel I succeeded if only you vote" garbage their teacher taught them, and go ahead and shame them so they'll make themselves informed by the time the next election day rolls around.
And that's my 4th of July post.
(Oh, and yes; this does mean that I don't think Howard Dean should vote. But I guess a guy can vote in race where his name appears on the ballot, and ignorance has never disqualified a politician for any public office).
There is, in political circles, seemingly endless talk of the "gender gap" - the relative difficulty Republicans have in attracting women voters. There is also similar discussion of racial gaps: the difficulties Republicans have in wooing Black or Latino voters, and the connection with Republican policies on race.
But some "gaps" are taboo. As with most subjects that embarrass the Left (for example, one can rather cavalierly toss about accusations of fascism or Nazism - or racism, sexism, and homophobia. But even calling someone who is self-described as a Communist - such as Angela Davis or Eric Foner - a Communist carries the "whiff of McCarthyism"), there is a taboo on the discussion of a Patriotism Gap; you're just not supposed to bring up (or "question") the extent of someone else's patriotic feelings or the partisan differences on the subject. Well, here's Gallup Poll of Americans and patriotism:
The June 27-29 Gallup Poll asked Americans: "How proud are you to be an American?" A solid 70% of respondents say they are "extremely" proud, with an additional 20% saying they are "very" proud. . .
They further found that
Eighty percent of conservatives are extremely proud of the country, compared with 68% of moderates and 56% of liberals.
Likewise, more than 8 in 10 Republicans are extremely proud to be Americans, while two-thirds of Democrats feel this way.
Based on this I would surmise that as one travels further Left on the political spectrum, patriotic feelings go down. This is supported (not proven, but supported) by the fact that two thirds of Democrats say they are extremely patriotic (your typical blue-collar Union Democrat is as patriotic as anyone), with just over a majority of Liberals saying they are extremely patriotic; a number I would guess is somewhat skewed (more moderate Liberals likely answered that they felt extremely patriotic, while I would guess that considerably fewer than half of all "progressives" and Leftists said they felt extremely patriotic).
What does all this mean? Well, I wouldn't make too much of it; IMO, one does much better arguing the merits and demerits of something than responding with, for example, "anyone who believes X is a racist, sexist, homophobe". The Left has, for decades, gotten away with that sort of "argument" and it has made them intellectually lazy. To the extent to which the Right relies upon "if you say or believe X, you're not a patriot", they may likewise fall into intellectual laziness. Sure, some assertions and arguments are and IMO it's not unfair to point that out. But then one still needs to show why and argue things on the merits.
On the other hand, though, whenever confronted with the assertion that there is no difference, no gap between Conservatives and Liberals, between Republicans and Democrats, on questions of patriotism, well, that's factually incorrect; a convenient fiction for some (a "Noble Lie") - the gap here is as real as the gender gap, as real as the race gap, and no less meaningful for all that the other side will attempt to delegitimize it as a subject of acceptable inquiry (we could, for example, ask why this is, in just the same way people study why Republicans have a problem with women and the like) and preserve its taboo status.
Also notable, fewer younger Americans feel extremely patriotic than older Americans. Could it be because of what they are - or aren't - learning in school? You bet yer ass:
Apparently the truths in the Declaration of Independence aren't so self-evident.
When Rep. Roger Wicker (news, bio, voting record) asked high school seniors in his Mississippi district to name some unalienable rights, he got silence. So the Republican congressman gave the advanced-placement history students some help.
"Among these are life," Wicker said, "and...."
"Death?" one student said. So much for liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
"It's not so much that they don't know the rote phrases and facts," said Wicker, the sponsor of a House bill to improve civics instruction. "It just demonstrates a real gap in the education of young Americans."
And this is the advanced placement class, not the dummies.
But I bet any one of the students, picked at random, could give a two hour lecture (without notes or prompting) on the evils of this country (of course, they would completely lack the intellectual resources to put those evils in context or compare the extent to which it was and remains the unique province of Western Civilization to oppose these evils while others perpetuate them; they don't know enough to realize how prevalent nasty things are throughout world history and the degree to which Anglo-American civilization has been at the forefront not of creating or initiating these things but in fighting them, both internally and externally; they are ignorant of what is unique and good about America).
Here's another reason for their ignorance. Ignorance on parade:
"I always tell my students: If I see you in the grocery store five years from now, I will not measure my success on can you tell me Hamilton's financial plan, but can you tell me if you voted," Meredith Elliott, an American studies teacher in Utah, said during a round-table discussion at the NEA convention. "If you answer yes, then I've succeeded as a teacher."
I used to think that way, too. I used to encourage every one of my friends to go out and vote, regardless of whether they were informed on the issues or not (indeed, when some would reply to the effect that they didn't feel they knew enough about things to vote, I'd prod them to do it anyhow, exercise their democratic right and duty. This was back when I was a Democrat. I wonder if there's any connection between that and the stance I took then).
Yep, Meredith Elliott is so right: she will have done her job well if we have more uninformed voters. Do I demand that people know Hamiltonian economic policy as a precondition to voting? No. It would be nice if our teachers felt they were successful not simply because their students managed to avoid drooling on the lever in the election booth as they voted, though, but felt they were successful if they taught them something; familiarity with the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, the basic history of the country and its origins and why and how its history is exceptional not so much in the negative things we have done (and we have done them, but those evils have been prevalent throughout human history) but in standing for, fighting for, the positive - we're exceptional in learning from and leaving behind evils that have plagued humanity throughout its history.
Note that this problem isn't due to a lack of "resources" ($$$) - we spend more per student than at any time in our history, and get less for it. Why?
In no small part because those who teach tend to lack confidence in the country and tend to lack respect for its legacy and heritage ("Nowhere at present is there such a measureless loathing of their country by educated people as in America," Eric Hoffer said). So is it that surprising that their students would mirror this? It is also because they tend to focus on the ethereal, on esteem issues (I'll feel happy and successful as a teacher if you feel you can go vote with confidence, regardless of whether you know anything or not. That's how I measure success). The "Educators" solution? The Blind will lead the Blind:
"If we could involve the kids more in the decision-making at the school, where they would see immediate impact and the ability to influence, that would put more of the message in them: They can actually do something," she said.
Note that the teacher's solution has nothing to do with, um, teaching and everything to do with a process to make the students feel more included. Well, in some odd sense this has some merit. The teachers (Oh, sorry: educators) have already proven over an extended period that the decisions they make on their own have created disaster and they should not be trusted with decision making anymore. However, I'm not sure that handing the reins over to the product of their mis-education will prove to work any better. Going back to the Thomas Sowell column:
Eric Hoffer called it "soul raping" -- an apt term for what goes on in too many schools today, where half-educated teachers treat the classroom as a place for them to shape children's attitudes and beliefs in a politically correct direction.
This is creating the next generation of "true believers," indoctrinated with ideologies that provide "fact-proof screens from reality" in Hoffer's words. It is the antithesis of education.
(aside: I heard on the radio a report of a local story about some schools in the area that were using textbooks that dated back to the '70s. My reaction? Well, good. They might actually contain some knowledge then!)
(And yes, I know that the second part of this post is an extended rant).
To make this a post that has everything, here's Fouad Ajami on why they hate us:
Running through the Pew survey is the explicit assumption that it had been better for America before the "unilateralism," and our campaign in Iraq: We called up this anti-Americanism. But leave the false empiricism of these numbers, and there is nothing new in Amman, and Cairo, and Paris. No one said good things about America in Egypt in the 1990s, either. It was then that the Islamists of Egypt had taken to the road, to Hamburg and Kandahar, to hatch a monstrous conspiracy against the U.S. And it was then, during our fabled stock market run, when globalizers were celebrating the triumph of our economic model over the protected versions in places like France, when anti-Americanism became the uncontested ideology of French public life. We were barbarous, a threat to their cuisine, to their language. Our pension funds were acquiring their assets. We executed too many criminals. All this during a decade when we were told that we were loved abroad.
Much has been made of the sympathy that the French expressed for America in the immediate aftermath of Sept. 11, and of the speed with which America presumably squandered that sympathy. Much has been made of that editorial in Le Monde, "Nous Sommes Tous Americains"--We Are All Americans--penned after Sept. 11. But it took the paper precious little time to revoke the sympathy it had expressed on Sept. 12. To maintain France's sympathy, and that of Le Monde, we would have had to turn the other cheek to al Qaeda, and engage the Muslim world in some high civilizational dialogue. Anti-Americanism flatters France, and gives its unwanted Muslims a claim on the political life of a country that knows not what to do with them.
"America is everywhere," Ignazio Silone once observed. An idea of it, a fantasy of it, hovers over distant lands. In the days that followed the attacks of Sept. 11, a young Palestinian gave expression to the image America holds out in places where its shadow falls: the boy passing out sweets in celebration of America's grief wondered aloud as to the impact of the bombings on his ability to get a U.S. visa. He felt no great contradiction. He had no feeling of affection or loyalty for the land he yearned to migrate to. He grew up to the familiar drums of anti-Americanism. He had implicated America in his life's circumstances. You can't reason with his worldview. You can only wish for him deliverance from his incoherence--or go there, questionnaire in hand, and return with dispatches of people at odds with American policies. You can make foreigners say the sort of things about America you wanted to say yourself. It is an old literary trick. Everyone knew that Montesquieu's "Persian Letters" were indeed Parisian letters, a writer's device to chronicle France's foibles in the early 18th century. His "Persians," Rhedi and Usbek, spoke of France. It is our American pollsters we hear speaking to us through those Turks and Arabs and Frenchmen who, on cue, were ready to speak of America's alienation from the rest of the world.
Here's a follow up to this post. Note that this isn't Part IV, this is just a Case Study in one of the options America has. This is Howard Dean, endorsing the "Let A Mule Do It For You" option:
Dean argued his position on the use of force is not out of line with his opposition to the war in Iraq.
"The situation in Liberia is significantly different from the situation in Iraq," he said.
Some are going to call Dean a hypocrite, I'm sure, but that would miss the mark. Given Dean's premises, what he says here is true: the situation, for Dean, is significantly different.
Dean argued there's no inconsistency in opposing the war in Iraq while backing intervention in Africa. He said Bush never made the case that Iraq posed a threat to the world.
"The situation in Liberia is exactly the opposite," Dean said. "There is an imminent threat of serious human catastrophe and the world community is asking the United States to exercise its leadership."
The key part here is the second half of Dean's statement. The first half is intellectually incoherent (the situation in Liberia poses less serious a threat to the world as a whole than the situation in Iraq did; likewise, Saddam Hussein's government was as much of a humanitarian catastrophe, if not more, than that of Charles Taylor's in Liberia).
The key difference is that the "world community" did not want the U.S. to do anything about the situation in Iraq (for those who say the "world community" just didn't want us to do what we did, but that they supported sanctions and inspections - pull my other leg. We know how enthusiastic they were about the maintenance of both. Now, it is true that they would have happily supported a program of keeping American troops in the region to "contain" Iraq indefinitely. But that's the point here):
For Dean and those who agree with him, when the "world community" says jump, we are under a moral imperative to say "how high?" If they want us to leave Saddam alone, then it's morally appalling for us to not do as they wish. If they want us to go to Liberia, we show "leadership" by doing what they say: we're under a moral obligation to go.
Now, intervening in Liberia may or may not be a good idea (my opinion is it depends on what the intervention consists of; if it is like the last time, in the '90s, where "the world" went in briefly, separated the warring parties, then left - allowing things to devolve again to where they are now but feeling warm and fuzzy over what great humanitarians the "world community" is, that's useless. If we go in and eliminate the problem and work to insure a stable aftermath, that's different. But that will take more than the few months and then fobbing it off on the UN Transition-Back-to-Chaos-and-Civil-Unrest Team as Dean proposes doing).
Well, Dean already did demonstrate a couple weeks ago, on Russert's program, that he was more than happy to let others do his foreign policy thinking for him (and yet, unlike that ignoramus, Bush, all these Dems are such deep, thoughtful people. . .); so it's not really that surprising that he would favor an option that cedes to others the development of our policies and then he will simply implement what they tell us to do.
Update: Speaking of Presidential Candidates, when Hillary runs, do you think this endorcement will feature prominently in her ads?
David, writing from Calgary/Alberta/Canada expounds upon this post from yesterday:
I have always been amazed at the American governments’ willingness to let the American public subsidize drugs for the rest of the world (this is my view as a Canadian). If a drug is sold for much less in Canada than in the US that amounts to a direct subsidy from US consumers to Canadian consumers.
I could make a snide remark about how this is a form of foreign aid, but one that usually doesn't get counted in any of those studies about how miserly America is. But the problem is more serious than that, because here (in the States) folks have been mislead to believe (by the usual suspects in media and politics) that the price of drugs in other countries is the "normal" price, the one we should be paying, and we're getting hosed not by free-riding countries that impose price caps and thus insure that we subsidize their drug research for them, but that we're getting screwed by the drug companies.
So the "solution" (working its way through Congress now; I can't recall if it's part of the "Prescription Drug Bill" or a separate Bill) is to allow reimportation of drugs - in essence, importation of your price caps.
Instead of a price cap why not simply legislate that no drug can be sold in America at a price higher than it is sold anywhere else in the world – or at least in the G8 or OECD. Thiswould allow drug companies to charge rates in the US that would recoup their investment cost but – should they desire to sell here in Canada for example – they would either have to sell at equivalent rates or not sell at all. Then Canadians who want/need the drug would have to buy from US suppliers at US prices or force their governments to either subsidize the drug (still paying the drug companies full price) or remove the price controls. The net result would probably be that US consumers end up paying less in the end because outside demand for necessary drugs would force the rest of the world to pay the unsubsidized price.
People have made suggestions along those lines; usually the premise is as I mentioned above, though (the evil drug companies are ripping us off, not various countries are free-riding through centrally planned heath programs).
Lets say I'm a drug company mogul and the current "reimport" bill passes through the American Congress. I might be tempted, then, to only export to a given country (say, Canada) enough of Drug X sufficient to serve the population there that needs it (there are ways of calculating it) - meaning that sure, Canadians can re-export it, but then there will be a shortage of Drug X in Canada, and people who need it will go without (I would do that because I know that there is absolutely no chance in he. . .ck. . .that the Liberal government in Toronto would remove or reform the price cap structure).
So what's the result? On both sides of the border, I get demonized as heartless and greedy. (This already happens, btw; you should see - or hear, rather - the way the BBC characterizes drug companies and the American government that is seen as protecting their interests whenever the subject comes up on the BBC's World Newshour radio reports).
Well, the end result for American industry is going to be the end result for drug research companies in Europe and Canada; the guys (and a few gals) who run these companies go to parties. They're human, subject to the same peer pressures as other humans (yah, I know the Left tends to see them as characters out of a Thomas Nast cartoon; bloated humanoids resembling humans but not really human, wearing stovepipe hats and conspiring over a Bacon Trust. But that's not the case). They hang out with a set that tends to be wealthy, media-savvy but ignorant of economics (you know the type - the elites of the 21st century West), and don't like to be looked at as scum. I mean, they're in a business that they think of as doing good things - developing drugs that help people live longer, with less suffering, improving people's lives. It's not a charity but they think they're doing good and like anyone they don't like to be considered nasty simply for running a business rather than a Collective or Commune.
So what they do is they bite the bullet. They eat it. But they also direct considerably less research into areas that they know will be subjected to price controls (and thus unprofitable; the cost of workable drugs, btw, includes the cost of research into lines that don't work out for whatever reason. Oh, and the cost of jumping through regulatory hoops to get the drugs approved once they are developed. Don't forget that).
So what happens is, twenty years down the line people look back and they wonder why the development of new life-saving drugs has slowed to a crawl compared to earlier, compared with, say, the mid-20th Century. They come up with all sorts of rationalizations but it's unlikely they'll make the connection to government policies, democratically enacted, which have unintended consequences. (People just don't blame themselves).
We can actually see that at work already. A couple months ago there was a report focusing on that on the BBC. They had expert guests making all sorts of speculation over what the causes might be for why it seems that fewer and fewer life saving drugs were reaching the market.
Government regulation and price controls didn't come up. They didn't imagine that this could be a contributing factor. I do not believe that they considered it but then for propagandistic reasons chose not to include that as a possible cause. It wasn't some sort of conspiracy to keep that out of the public eye or anything. It's just that, given their mindset, neither the BBC anchors nor producers nor the people who book their guests nor the type of guests they turn to think along those lines (see, government regulation good; price caps good - after all, people "need" heath care so it's unseemly - uncouth - for anyone to profit off something someone really needs. So these are obviously good things and the problem may be that we don't have enough. The idea that we have too much, well, that's unpossible!)
So they just bemoan the fact that companies are focusing more and more on developing "cosmetic" drugs, drugs aimed at fairly healthy, fairly well-off people, and less and less on "life saving" drugs that could keep people alive or help people in poor countries (and the resulting drugs from such research immediately fall under the controls of socialized medicine). As for why that might be, oh, it's just chalked up to greed and selfishness. Likewise, the fact that right now the country with a still-vibrant drug research sector is the United States is just chalked up to how those nasty Americans with their ruthless model of capitalism are pushing the rest of the world around, arrogantly dominating their poor EUropean rivals.
(Many also point to the research funded by governments as a rationale/excuse for why things should be this way, but that argument doesn't really fly. Once one gets into the details - as with a lot of this enlightened conventional wisdom stuff - that argument falls apart).
However, as long as we're also needed to perform basic security tasks (tamping down on street crime & looting, traffic control type jobs, and the like), it's hard to see how this could be implemented. When we're able to hand over those tasks to Iraqis on a larger scale, then we'll be able to minimize our presence and should go about things exactly the way Greg Buete outlines.
However, this situation reminds me of the old saw about how you make Rabbit Stew - "first, catch the rabbit". Reducing our presence and thus offering fewer targets (while becoming the hunter rather than the hunted) is something that can only happen once a level of civil security has already been achieved and can then be maintained by Iraqi civil authorities (police and the like) trained by us. That won't happen all at once, so here we are.
The good news is that by and large and for the most part, the sniping & skirmishing is confined to the region northwest of Baghdad (where Saddam had his greatest support). It's not really unexpected (I predicted before the war that the aftermath would be more dangerous for our troops than the war itself). It's just frustrating. But also, as Andrew Sullivan notes today, having the hotheads of the Arab world fight us in Iraq rather than form up terrorist cells, has a value for us.
Note that this situation is also why I was unconvinced by arguments that we should create units consisting of combat support elements (MPs and the like) but without combat elements of their own to undertake these missions; we need riflemen in these situations. We arguably need more, not fewer, (well-trained) infantry (this is also one of the reasons, among several, that I was and remained unconvinced that the solution is a draft. The solution is to make the military more attractive, again, to the type of people who are typically interested in joining and serving. We were able to sustain a much larger volunteer force in the '80s with far fewer recruiting difficulties than we had with the smaller force in the '90s, so it is possible to fill our needs from a pool of volunteers. IMO, one of the problems with current recruiting is they design recruiting techniques - and then in some ways military life in general - for broad appeal, rather than, as the Marines do, design recruiting campaigns to target the audience most likely to consider military life attractive. I mean, ok, Monica liked black berets but Monica isn't likely to join the Army just because everyone gets one now).
The answer to this is "scarcity" - assuming, that is, one asks the real question here. What's that question?
"What do price controls create?"
It's a question of more than "will" (which was sort of the Leni Riefenstahl answer to problems, too) - it is recognizing the extent to which bad public policy (of which more is promoted here) is contributing to these problems. Those who wonder why drug companies are devoting more and more resources to "lifestyle" drugs and why research into life-saving drugs has cratered in Europe and elsewhere need look no further than the unintended (?) consequences of public policies. What drug company is going to devote billions of dollars to develop new drugs that can overcome tropical diseases, only to have the Good People of the World (NGO activists and government officials) heap scorn and abuse on them for refusing to give it away at a loss?
Meanwhile, no one tries to put price caps on viagra and other "life style" (as opposed to "life saving") drugs. By the way, this is something to have real concern over as the juggernaut of "Free" Prescription Drugs moves through the American political process: some States are already more-than-flirting with imposing price controls on drugs sold through State programs. America's about the last place with a healthy pharmaceutical research sector, but demands for price "caps" on drugs will follow any Federal drug program as inevitably as night follows day. Just watch and see.
In other heath-related news, the day may soon arrive when you will be able to say "go screw yourself" to someone and it will be literally possible.
The Iraqi National Museum opened its doors briefly to show world media all the treasures that had been looted because of American negligence.
A select group of foreign dignitaries and journalists were allowed to see what was tragically lost as a result of the American invasion. Seeing such looted treasures as the Treasures of Nimrud, now lost for all time, brought into stark relief the extent of the cultural catastrophe.
I've muttered about this before, but during the handover of Hong Kong to Britain, many commentators were saying that everything would be alright because the Chinese government wouldn't want to "kill the goose that laid the golden egg" - a formulation that does not adress whether or not their is an understanding on their part of what keeps the goose alive in the first place, and that if they knew what it took to make the goose not only live but prosper then they (the clique governing China) wouldn't have been Communists in the first place.
No one thought they'd go in with tanks and roll over the place, but there would be a bit by bit rollback over time, and that's what we're seeing.
Oh, Those Honest, Straightforward Democratic Candidates
Well, the Democratic Presidential Candidates are going to attempt to draw a distinction between their oh-so-honest selves and the (supposedly) deceitful Bush.
If that's so, then stories like this deserve wider play than they'll get:
In April, the House voted 421-1 to pass the HEROES Act, which essentially would defer student loans for soldiers called into action. The only dissenting vote was cast accidentally by one of the bill's sponsors.
The bill is stalled in the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee under a "secret hold," said Sen. Judd Gregg, New Hampshire Republican and chairman of the committee.
Senate tradition allows members to lodge secret, or "anonymous," holds against a bill and block it indefinitely.
Supporters of the bill, the Higher Education Relief Opportunities for Students Act, were mystified for months that anyone would hold up such popular legislation, but couldn't pinpoint the culprit. . .
Capitol Hill speculation about the secret hold eventually centered on Mr. Edwards, one of four senators seeking the Democratic nomination for president.
"Apparently, presidential politics got involved," Mr. Kline said.
One Republican staffer on the Senate education panel said Mr. Edwards is holding up the bill so that he can take top credit for passing it later.
"Edwards likes this issue and he wants to see his name on it," the staffer said. Mr. Edwards and his office initially denied responsibility for blocking the bill at all.
"I just talked to Senator Edwards," Mr. Graham said as he stepped off the Senate floor last week. "He said if he has a hold on it, he didn't know about it. He didn't even know about the bill." Told last week that everyone involved with the legislation adamantly said that Mr. Edwards put the hold on it, Edwards spokesman Mike Briggs replied, "They're adamantly wrong."
Yesterday, however, Mr. Briggs acknowledged that his boss was stalling the bill.
Well, at least when Democrats do it, they do it in a good cause: the advancement of their election prospects and wresting power from Republicans. So I guess it's ok then.
File this under "News You Can Use - but probably shouldn't." Here we go:
Scientists claim that the first human baby could be born from a transplanted womb within three years. . .
The Swedish expert behind the research says that one of the best candidates to be an organ donor would be the patient's own mother - raising the prospect of carrying your children in the same womb that carried you.
He says that it may even be technically possible one day to transplant a womb into a man, and use hormone injections to allow a pregnancy to succeed.
Ok, so lets say you're a woman who feels more like a man and gets a sex change operation (oh no, I can see where this is going. . .). You later decide that, well, you'd like to give birth after all, so you get your mother to donate her womb to you and have it transplanted.
You then get yourself artificially inseminated with your own clone, and give birth to yourself in the same womb that gave you birth.
"Yah, but how much is this all gonna cost me?" you're asking:
*In my best Matthew Lesko voice*
Remarkably little! In fact, by the time this procedure is perfected there should be a government policy to pay for all these procedures! So for you, it'll be at the low, low price of absolutely nothing!
"Free" medical care! (Paid for by everybody else, that is). Everybody deserves to "explore the mysteries of human life on their own terms, however they define it", as Justice Kennedy might write in the Majority Opinion deciding the Law of the Land on this issue.
Roll over Narcissus, and tell Nietzche the news.
(Alternative title for this post: "Womb With A View". What? Too cheesy? This post is cheesy by nature).
Oh, reporting doesn't get any better than this; U.S. forces "attacked" (scare quotes), an American armored car "blew up" (random spontaneous combustion plagues U.S. equipment), however,
an attack on a mosque in the flashpoint town of Falluja that killed at least five Iraqis.
However, while the BBC depicts this as an attack (rather than an "attack"), the here's another account:
-- A massive explosion rocked a mosque in this restive Iraqi town, killing at least five Iraqi civilians and injuring four others, witnesses and hospital officials said Tuesday.
Iraqi civilians said the blast was caused by a missile or bomb strike, but American soldiers at the scene disputed that account, saying it was likely caused when explosives hidden at the site went off.
At least the BBC knows what side it is on.
Update: David writes (via e-mail) that the BBC changed the article. Nelson Ascher preserved (saved) the page before they slipped it down the memory hole. If anyone's interested in the original version, let me know and I'll fwd it via e-mail.
In some previous posts I've muttered/mused about the sort of bomber we need more of (inexpensive, robust, available & affordable in fairly large numbers, with a solid bomb capacity). Here's the bomber the air force wants.
It sounds very cool and all. Won't be ready for two decades. High-tech. Very fast, but smallish payload capacity. I have to wonder how much each one will cost once they get done with it (and how much it will cost to operate, relative to the operating costs of other bombers). Very futuristic and kewl, though.
This is the follow up to this post and this one. The long delay in posting it wasn't just laziness; it took awhile for some threads to come together in my mind and some of that happened just last night.
We actually have considerably more options than most of us usually think of, not because we're dumb (or "ignorant" "redneck" "fools"), but because all of us mentally (and unconsciously) discard ones that don't fit within our broader views, unless they're pushed into consideration (and then ones that clash with our philosophical principles are seen as, well, dumb at best if not malevolent or destructive if implemented). This is pretty much irrespective of what those preferences might be. I certainly have strongly-held and advocated stances, but for all that the other side often acts as if they are above al that, are thoughtful and open-minded and eschew "Manichaean" dichotomies - well, the venom they use to describe the vision (and those who hold it) that they disagree with at least rivals and often surpasses anything I might express (there is a reason I picked the words "ignorant", "redneck", and "fools" as this was how the writer of this site was described by a Salon blogger who, I am quite sure, had not read more than one of my posts but of course that is all that is needed for the "non-judgmental" set to come to a judgement). Here are some of the options, ending with the one I favor (since the "putting the band back together" option was covered in Part I, I'm not going to cover it again here. It's not exactly a realistic option in the end).
America's Options and Competing World Visions
The International Community: So you agree with Part II's conclusion that some entity (or forum or whatever) is needed to set and enforce certain standards especially on the United States (but certainly not by the United States). This is a job for the international community!
Now, I characterize it that way, but far more than the sort of people who view a global system of governance as needed to reign in the U.S. hyperpower often go for things like this. Here's Robert Bartley advocating a global currency to replace the dollar, presumably to be supervised by a board of international bankers who will put particular interests to one side and decide everything on the merits. We know how likely that is in the real world.
Indeed (to steal Glenn's favorite word), when one scratches the surface of most of the advocates of this method of international governance it becomes clear that they also, at bottom, don't believe that it will involve an ideal of disinterested decision-making on the merits of a case, but as a tool to get their (partisan) policies enacted when they cannot get them enacted otherwise.
In these schemes, decision-making would be weighted in ways to insure their preferences dominated and would be imposed. They would also have it be far more intrusive than is really necessary or than an American hegemon would be (see here and here for the ambitious scope of these plans.
However, there remain major obstacles.
For one thing, the "international community" generates no resources of its own. It would have to plunder or extort from others in order to get any. The people who favor this kind of thing naturally believe that it is not they, but the nation they oppose (America) that should foot the bill and give them what they need to carry out their vision. That's really a significant difference from having the "international community" do it, so it amounts to a separate option (see "Let a Mule Do It For You", below).
Likewise, many of them envision this international democracy as strongly influenced by "civil society" groups: which would consist of NGOs (selectively; the "wrong" sort of group would be right out). They would be involved in decision-making processes. The model here is one of Corporatism (also here) rather than "one man, one vote" democracy. In the scheme of things, these organizations - even the largest - have memberships that are tiny compared with national populations (and the memberships of the groups that will be selected to be graced with a voice tend to, um, overlap; someone might be a member of both the World Wildlife Fund, for example, and Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch - so the total of people "represented" by such groups is less than a sum of their memberships).
This is often presented as a option that is more universal and less self-interested than one dominated by a single power or group of powers is. However, that's not really true. When will one see the ICC (an instrument favored by people subscribing to this vision) indict Fidel Castro, Kim Jong Il, or Hugo Chavez for crimes against humanity?
They tend to want to "promote dialogue" and accept that "well, they have a different definition of democracy and human rights than we do and we should accept that, and perhaps exchange views in a dialogue that doesn't presume that we have nothing to learn from them" with some, while reserving their indignance for the likes of Pinochet or Margaret Thatcher.
So while they have rather large ambitions it is easy to see that the general application of principles and a Rule of Law properly understood is not present. Further discussion of the flaws of this system can be found here (also, for gluttons, here and this more personal one).
They Wants it, They Gets it (said in my best Strother Martin voice which, admittedly, isn't that good. But it's mine). The promoters of the EU keep talking about how it has a larger economy and greater population than the U.S. and they clearly think they know better how to run things and we're simply screwing up. So why not let them - they who are, after all, by definition "multilateral" and thus would, by definition avoid the most horrible crime against humanity imaginable, the sin of "unilateralism" (and for that reason and none other they and those who also think Europe knows better have been at the forefront of spreading the meme that "unilateralism" is such a dastardly crime).
Sure, why not? Americans by and large prefer home and even many those of us who think we need to do certain things are reluctant and if we really believed it wasn't necessary for us to take up this role we'd be happy to "bring the troops {et al} home". Folks like Romano Prodi are clearly more enthusiastic hegemons. Why not let them do it?
Well, there are a number of reasons why Americans might not want to (and the world would regret such a preference in the end). I'll discuss two here and the rest in the following option ("Let a Mule Do it For You"). One is that it's actually good all around that Americans are reluctant hegemons (if you disagree that we are, you don't know Americans very well, and I refer you back to the explanation of this aspect of our national character in Part I). If you think we're bad, just wait till we're exchanged for an "enthusiastic" hegemon that loves tinkering with everything (the EU Option and the "International Community" option overlap greatly in underlaying philosophy, as we'll see in the stunning conclusion of this post).
But more to the point, the reason this won't work is that while the "opinion leaders" of the EU (and their like-minded friends in the U.S. and elsewhere) want the EU to have the authoritah, they aren't so keen on the responsibility. They'd rather do the planning and deciding but aren't going to commit the resources and effort, the means to implement things. So they've come up with a creative solution, and that solution is
Let a Mule Do It For You: They claim not to want to do it alone, but rather seek partnership with the U.S. - but it would be a partnership with a distinctive division of labor. In this vision, they undersell the wealth of the EU. The EU is old and wise, the U.S. young and strong. They will be the mind, we will be the arms and legs (it isn't put so explicitly, but this is what is understood). Or, to put it another way, they'll be in the saddle and we'll be in the harness. Now, as with all such generalizations, it's less stark than that; the EU would contribute some material resources, and the right sort of Americans would be allowed to contribute some policy ideas. But broadly speaking, this would be the terms of the partnership. We see it come out in talk about how the EU has the advantage in "soft" power (over which their sovereignity should be respected and U.S. "bullying" interference should be kept at a minimum to avoid alienating our good friends) and the U.S. in "hard" power (the use of which our EU friends should be given a say, consulted with, and the like; no worries about sovereignity or alienation - unless they're "excluded from the policy process").
It is usually advocated in passive-aggressive terms. We need to listen more and consult with our allies. If we say we've listened but disagree then the retort (including from Americans who promote this vision of the world order) is to the effect that maybe we didn't listen enough, in any case we're not giving enough respect to the views of our friends who just want what's best for us and have, after all, a lot of experience (most of it bad - as we'll get to). American diplomacy is crude and doesn't see the nuances the way the Europeans do. Shouldn't they get a say?
When that is raised, what they really mean is the decisive say. Now, I'm sure that people reading that who might sympathize with this position will shake their head vigorously in disagreement with that assertion.
But anyone who's observed this phenomenon long enough knows that if the U.S. listens, consults, lets everyone have their say, but still disagrees with, say, France, Germany, and Russia (nations noted for their foreign policy catastrophes) - well, then the consultation wasn't "real" - it is delegitimized. We just "went through the motions" but didn't really listen to and consider their views. It only "counts" if we go along with what they want. Anything else is therefore tainted (those who go along with our policy in the face of EU opposition are "bullied and bribed" - things that, by definition, the French with their corrupt deals with foreign leaders are never really guilty of. They are only acting out of concern for the general will, the good of all, in this view of things).
So the point here isn't simply that we'll listen to the views of others and consider them, but that we'll listen in the imperitive sense (such as when your - older and wiser, of course - parents tell you that you need to listen more and mean by it obey).
The underlaying assumption of the very smart, non-ignorant redneck fools who hold this view is that the Europeans (whom they tend to agree with) really do know more and we'd all be better off if the blundering oaf in the White House would sign onto multilateral processes that contain decision-making processes heavily tilted towards the European view of things. The conventional wisdom tends to be that America has difficulty crafting and creating a successful foreign policy, at least compared to the experiences of European nations that have a long legacy of diplomacy and foreign policies guided by experts. Like most such things, this assumption doesn't withstand close scrutiny (so it is rarely put in terms that allow close scrutiny). After all, as I mentioned in Part I, America's foreign policy has been relatively successful and produced far fewer disasters than the foreign policies and alliance systems crafted by these supposedly wiser European powers. The most diplomatically successful of which is also the one that most closely resembles us, or which we most closely resemble: Britain. The records of the others range from the merely ineffectual to the calamitous to the outright disastrous (you can go back as far as the ratification of the U.S. Constitution in 1789, which is also the year of the French Revolution, and compare and contrast). Especially the "wiser" heads we are most strongly advised by people favoring this vision to listen to and allow to be our guides. Have the foreign policy legacies of Russia, France, and *ahem* Germany been such smashing successes that they should serve as our tutors in what path to follow?
Setting aside more distant historical examples, if we had taken council of the fears of France and Germany during the later stages of the Cold War, instead of the policies set out by Reagan and Thatcher, that era would probably still be going on today and Eastern Europe would not have undertaken a democratic transformation. When we let Continental Europe take the lead in Bosnia in the early and mid '90s (the infamous "Hour of Europe" arrived in the form of Luxembourger Hegemony under Jacques Poos); that "Hour" created UN "Safe Zones" that became free-fire zones for ethnic cleansing and lasted until we (finally) became sick enough of the slaughter to take the reins back and do it our way.
The real problem is that though it seems, on the surface, that EUropeans have become Wilsonians, at bottom they mouth the platitudes insincerely and go through the motions without intending the substance but are really playing their same old game. This was seen most recently when they, and their like-minded friends in America, used Wilsonian self-determination arguments not to "make the world safe for Democracy", but to keep it safe for its remaining despotisms.
Given the results of empirical experience it is more apt to say that when European opinion differs from Anglo-American opinion on a policy, it is they who need to convince us and not the other way around, and the assumption of superior European wisdom and experience in these things persists only because of a lack of reflection on the historical record. Sure, they have a lot of experience - but most of it is bad experience, lessons forgotten and mistakes repeated. Yes, we have had our own misadventures, but nothing approaching the grand scale of European foreign policy catastrophes. The two major crises where European Powers took the lead resulted in the most destructive wars in human history. In the third major crisis of the 20th Century, the one America took the lead in managing, war between major powers was avoided entirely and victory was achieved without a Great Power War.
The track record speaks for itself. Unfortunately (for those holding the "wise European sage counselling the strong America youth, Europe thinks up the policy and America enacts it" vision) it leads to conclusions at odds with this option. It's still not safe to let the world be guided by EUrope.
(Read more about this option starting here and then here and here and here).
America as the New Rome: This option is the boogieman of many, and has oddly (in my opinion) become one championed by some. The underlaying reason it has found fans may be the track record of those who raise the specter of America as a Rome-style Imperium as a negative; because these people have so often opposed sensible policies and made dire predictions that don't come true, it's seemed to some that the corollary to this is that anything they oppose with so much vigor must have much to recommend it.
Also, it has superficial appeal because it is taken as a given that Rome was successful in managing an Empire for a fairly long time. However, there are really several Imperial models in the history of Rome; there is the Imperium of the Republic, which grew to dominate the Mediterranean world long before there was a Princeps, there was the Rome of the Principate and the "Five Good Emperors", which is the one most people are thinking of when they talk in terms of America being (or becoming) the New Rome, there is the Rome of the Tetrarchy (which followed on the heels of the Crisis of the Third Century), the New Rome of Constantine that lasted in the East until the reign of Phocas, the Rome of the agrarian soldier and provincial armies (Themes) that lasted until Manzikurt's aftermath, and finally the Rome of the Comnenian system that lasted until The City fell to the Ottomans in 1453.
There are some common features we can observe about this. One is the adaptability of the Romans. The other is that fans and foes together pick the most superficially attractive but most fragile of the Roman Imperial models as the one we are to (or should) follow. In this the opponents are, in my opinion, closer to correct. This era is attractive to those who are clasissicts for other reasons, as it is the period of the last "real" flowering of the classical era, and of the "Roman Peace". However, this system was personality-based (an Empire of men, not laws - it was entirely dependent upon the competence or lack thereof of one man, the Emperor). Likewise and perhaps more to the point no, I do not particularly think that we should treat our allies as the Romans of this era (and the preceding one) treated its Clientela, nor do I think it is particularly helpful to envision our military as having the role of the Roman Legions (with all that this implies, including the involvement in political affairs and the selection of the Imperator - which was, remember, a military and not a civil office and the creation of the Empire meant the subordination of civil authorities to military authority, whereas we should preserve the reverse). And, yah - not treat our allies like Clientela. I cannot emphasize that enough so I'm willing to repeat it to drive the point home.
America as Britain's Successor: Note that the difference between this formulation and the above isn't simply the substitution of Britain as a model instead of Rome, but it is "America as Britain's Successor", not as "the New Britain".
We have succeeded to Britain's position in the world, as it was evolving (and as it has since evolved under our influence) - there is much to learn from Britain in this continuity, but this is not the Raj reborn anymore that is the Empire of the Newest of New Romes. The policy isn't to recreate the British Empire but to continue to carry the torch forward from where they passed it (however reluctantly) to us.
Since this post is already long, we'll go into this option in greater detail and what the future holds, and the dilemmas that come with it (all things, good and bad must, for good or ill, come to an end) in Part IV. But lets note here that this policy is characterized by fostering the voluntary cooperation of free, democratic republics more than by forging (and enforcing) a global consensus (of the type more commonly associated with the "International Community" and "They Wants It, They Gets It" options). The distinctive characteristic is coalitions (link via Winds which in turn got it from Laughing Wolf), not conformity. (Note that even the '91 Gulf War was of this character - the involvement of the UN masks, rather than illuminates. It wasn't the "International Community" that pushed Iraq out of Kuwait, it was a coalition centered around the U.S. and Britain, and only those two members maintained their commitment after the immediate crisis ended. The "International Community" was a phantasm).
The amazing thing about this is it would foster an environment where a diverse array of policy environments in distinct nations could coexist, each with their own democratic system and social policies, rather than the one-size-fits-all aproach that is favored by advocates of the "International Community" model (interestingly and ironically, the people with this view tend to be the ones that go on and on about the wonders of diversity and the evils of us imposing our system on others, but when push comes to shove their diversity means everyone looks different on the surface but must be brought around to adopting the same policies - those of Social Democracy or just plain Socialism, Anarcho- or whatever the flavor-of-the-month happens to be. Their only problem with imposing a system on others is that they aren't doing the imposing). This brings us to the big finish of this post:
A Centralized or Decentralized Global Commonwealth?
What we're seeing in these debates is really a clash between those preferring collective decision-making and (enforced) consensus, along the lines of the EU model, and one that instead fosters cooperation among independent states which, to the largest degree possible commensurate with a reasonably ordered (that is, mostly peaceful) world, are able to make their own policy decisions, joining together in "coalitions of the willing" when their interests overlap but neither compelling others to participate nor being prevented by others from making their own policies - except where agreements that they consented to explicitly prevent them, but such cannot be imposed on them without their consent by, say, "democracy" in the form of a majority of other nations.
Put this way, it might be clearer that what we're seeing is a rather old clash of competing visions of democracy and liberty. It then becomes perhaps less surprising that Continental Europe, which has long embodied more collective ("social") forms is, on balance, on one side of this clash while the Anglo-American world, which has more often emphasized individual freedom and consent, is, on balance, on the other side. It also is clearer why people within countries stand more to one or the other side in these debates; it's typically a reflection of their ideological or philosophical views on the relationship of the individual to society and the scope of democratic choice and personal choice. (See especially here and On Corporatism).
Also, to give them their due, this also highlights the underlaying, rarely articulated rationale behind accusations of "U.S bullying" - sure, the U.S. isn't forcing other countries to join then in sending soldiers to Iraq when they don't want to, but that's part of the "problem" - the U.S. is standing in the way of "international democracy" of the type that would follow the model of the EU Constitution (where a decision, once arrived at, is supposed to be followed in a spirit of mutual solidarity and loyalty by all members). America is seen by such people as threatening humanity's destiny to the extent to which our influence prevents this vision from being realized. The fact that no one was "bullied" into going with us into Iraq is beside the point, because we do not accept that all decisions must be collectively arrived at and the decision obeyed by all (well, except dictatorships of the Leftist sorts, and the vanguard of course has greater leeway than the reactionaries who need the guidance of said vanguard). It is usually expounded in what amounts to "communitarian" type terms (since everyone is going to be affected by what you do, everyone should have a say in what you do. Well, not everyone - just certain enlightened members of the community, self-selected or selected by the persons advocating this method, and you don't necessarily get a say over what those selected entities do - they are, after all, the vanguard - though the reasoning behind these distinctions is usually left murky, even in the mind of those advocating them. See the "Mooraq" posts, here and then here and here and here, for an example of this).
This difference in underlaying philosophical visions is ultimately why so many of the discussions between people with opposing positions on how to handle international crises and how policies should be formed have been so frustratingly fruitless and circular. It's been rare that anyone grappled with the larger division, which is a clash of philosophies and world views - really just the same clash that dominated so much of the 20th Century, in a new form.
This also explains why the EU, ostensably to avoid "U.S. bullying", is proposing imposing a mechanism of policy (international and intra-national) formulation far more intrusive into national policy making and demanding of obedience to its policies (Are You Happy, Citizen? Support the EU Policy Unreservedly In a Spirit of Solidarity and Loyalty. Trust the EU. The EU is Your Friend) and much more centralized and centralizing than anything the U.S. would try to impose on its allies. The reason is that such collective, "consensus-building" mechanisms are what they feel we've "bullied" them from, prevented them from having and which is their dream of an international order - one that is at stark odds with that favored by Americans (again, one can find opponents of that system and people who prefer something along the lines I'm talking about here in European countries, and one can find admirers of the EU model in America. But broadly speaking, this is the division, the classical division between the Continental outlook of the relationship of the individual to society and the Anglo-American outlook; one can see this in the row over Berlusconi becoming EU President; it isn't really about corruption - after all, Chirac has the same problem, in spades, and he's lionized. It isn't even about "Left" and "Right"; again, Chirac is what passes for the "Right" in Continental Europe. It's because Berlusconi is not "European" enough in his views - he falls closer to the Anglo-American position in this divide than to the EUropean ideal).
As with most such armchair military reorganizations, upon further reflection this post of mine is a mixture of insight and ignorance.
The thing I want to get back to briefly is this: we probably need at least twice as many active "heavy" divisions as I mentioned us needing.
We could probably make do with the current ten division force, but what I mean is we should add significant additional non-division units (brigades, regiments) and also two Divisional HQs without the three maneuver brigades but with all the usual division-level combat support elements; these could then serve as foundations that "separate" brigades would rotate in and out of in deployments (such as Iraq). The added units would all be of the sort for low-intensity and reconstruction-oriented deployments, mentioned here in a comment on a post by Trent Telenko.
Folks can't say that Rumsfeld, for one, is incapable of learning. Because they are looking into options (link via Winds).
Allow me to indulge in one more cringe at all the comparisons with how Rome managed its Empire. I must remark again that I am something of a student of Rome and Romania, and much of the rather loose talk regarding what we should learn from the Romans in managing things I find off-putting. Especially since those doing the talking usually look to the period from the 1st to 2nd Centuries as the model to emulate or learn from.
That's because that period had the appearance of success and strength and is the image most people have of Rome. But it was an instable, brittle foundation and it tottered when stresses (internal and external) were put on it, leading directly to the Crisis of the Third Century, the "Barracks Emperors", and Diocletianism (which restored some stability but at a societal cost that I wouldn't want us to pay).
There are more positive models, even in Roman experience. But the model for us to look to and learn the most from (both in its successes and in what to avoid) remains the British model, the model we are indeed proceeding from (it is a post-Imperial model and a model that encourages the spread of liberty combined with the rule of law rather than autocracy, benign and not).
(Oh, for those tempted to reply "well, the Romans invented the rule of law; sort of. The period people are looking to really more aptly embodied the arbitrary whim of the Princeps though - when he was "Good" that went fine, as in all monarchical systems, and when he was bad, it did not. Systems dependent on the strength of the monarch are also not really what we want to emulate. They look good, but too often produce notable disasters. In any case, what we consider the body of Roman Law - well, people often forget, but it wasn't codified in the 1st or 2nd Century in Rome, it was codified in the 6th in Constantinople).
Do we really want to think of allies as Clientela, and treat them as such? Or as having the friendship and cooperation of independent states with shared interests? The former represents the Roman mindset (and so I suppose Australian, British, Polish, and other various countries would be contributing "auxillia"), the later is much closer to the spirit (Genius) that I want us to embody (the accusations of our EUropean non-friends to the contrary notwithstanding).
*Mutter* Problem with too many people is they've unconsciously adopted Gibbon's prejudices and this in the back of their thoughts is the belief that the 2nd Century A.D. represented the height of civilization and it's been all downhill from there - while refusing to remember why the 2nd Century led directly to the catastrophes of the 3rd and beyond.
Also, even German Social Democrats are realizing that tax cuts are a better spur to economic growth than government-directed spending. Schroeder's even proposing lowering taxes on "the rich" (!).
Interesting world when Social Democrats are ahead of the curve and the American Democratic party remains stuck in the failed policies of the past. (Germany's Christian Democrats seem to have adopted the Tom Daschle - Nancy Pelosi - Herbert Hoover Economic Program, though).
In not-entirely-unrelated news, the predictions of "Population Bomb" scare-mongers receive yey another body-blow. The "dying earth" crowd tends to be arrogant, bullying know-it-alls, frequently in error but for some reason their track record never catches up with them.
There are none that really come after them as Stars. Those that are called stars now are, with few exceptions, pale and ethereal imitations, wan successors.
Katherine Hepburn had what amounted to three great, Oscar-nominated and Oscar-winning careers. This in the face of several characteristics that may have held someone of lesser talent and inner strength from having any success whatsoever in Hollywood:
For half a century, from her screen debut in 1932 to her last major role in " On Golden Pond" (1982), Katharine Hepburn was Hollywood's most assertive and unconventional female star. No actress depended less on the supposed characteristics of her gender. The brusque, abrasive personality ridiculed the notion of a 'weaker sex.' Though she was an attractive romantic lead - especially in romantic comedy - she showed no interest in the arts of sexual beguilement. Her screen attributes were a yapping New England voice, a bossy manner and a high-boned angular face that when not lit by a sensitive cameraman could seem harsh and skull-like.
This is not really a non-sequeter, but I noticed the other day when watching a movie staring Fay Wray (The Finger Points, with Clark Gable) that no one is really allowed to have a distinctive regional American accent in movies anymore unless it's to be ridiculed (or in "look at the quaint local color of the colorful regional characters" pictures).
Well, no one could mistake Hepburn's for anyone else's, and no one in today's era of interchangeable actors and actresses (again, with a few exceptions) will make such memorable impressions as she.
