No Straw MenEnlightened discourse proscribes arguments that are weak or imaginary, like straw, set up only to be confuted summarily.

The Power of Faith

In an editorial observer in today’s Times, Verlyn Klinkenborg asserts (rather than argues) that creationists are simply dumb. Of the 2004 poll showing that 45% of Americans believe that the Earth’s creation proceeded according to the description in the book of Genesis, he writes, “This isn’t a triumph of faith. It’s a failure of education.”

The implication is that with a little more schooling, creationists will turn the corner and embrace evolution.

Unfortunately, most will not, for Klinkenborg underestimates the power of faith.

Moreover, the real failure of education here is Klinkenborg’s attribution of ignorance to creationists. For instance, my conservative Christian friends not uninformed; they understand evolution, but reject it. Why? Simply put, because they’re ideologues, and, like all ideologues, no amount of textbooks, lectures or secular conversations will change their core values.

Footnote: For a brilliant analysis of “intelligent design,” read William Saletan’s essay, ”Unintelligible Redesign.”

Addendum (9/4/2005): Another excellent article on I.D.: Daniel C. Dennett’s “Show Me the Science.”

Behind the Scenes Responsibility

Those who berate Judy Miller for her coverage of Iraq’s alleged W.M.D. should remember that Miller’s copy was only one aspect of any final article, which, as former New York Times Public Editor Daniel Okrent wrote in a different context, “is the collaborative product of reporter, editor, copy editor, desk or department head, and sometimes, the anointing ministrations of a masthead editor.”

Addendum: Steve Engleberg, former head of investigations at the Times, tells Editor and Publisher that he puts primary blame on the papers’ editors for printing Miller’s stories on WMD.

We should also remember that some of Miller’s worst articles were coauthored; see here and here.

Addendum (12/16/2005): Ken Auletta:

Miller, for her part, asked why no one blamed editors like [former executive editor Howell] Raines, and others, “who knew all of my sources.” (Raines, in an e-mail, said, “I did not know Judy’s sources. At the time, I followed the customary Times practice of relying on the supervising desk editor—in this case, most often the Washington editor and the foreign editor—to make sure the sourcing on the stories they handled was correct. I questioned reporters directly on some stories out of the Pentagon, but, to my regret, I did not do so on these stories. As many journalism critics have noted, the Times has yet to reveal what editors among present staff members were directly involved in assigning and editing Judy Miller’s stories. Scapegoating Judy or anyone else does not erase their responsibility to tell their readers the full truth in this matter.”)

The Value of Blogging

Since I started blogging, I read more thoroughly. Not necessarily because I read with an eye toward how I can blog the given text, but because if I do, I need to be more familiar with it than I would be for a conversation over dinner.

Take, for instance, my posts about the Valerie Plame affair, specifically, whether Plame was undercover when Novak outed her. Before I became a blogger, I would have known the gist of the story—that Plame worked for the C.I.A.—but probably would have lacked sufficient knowledge to form a sold answer. Now, because blogging, like studying for a test, forces you to focus and to understand, I can credibly contribute to the discussion.

To put it another way, blogging sharpens the mind. As the New York Times observed in an editorial today, what bloggers call “fisking,” or dissecting another’s argument, is “a way of expanding and, in some sense, reifying the ephemeral daily conversation that humans engage in.”

Indeed, since democracy thrives on an informed and engaged populace, blogs enhance democracy.

Addendum (1/19/2005): As Ana Marie Cox, the blogger formerly known as Wonkette, recently put it, “Blogs in general have democratized the debate about politics.”

Addendum (3/24/2006): Jessica Cutler, aka the Washingtonienne, agrees: “Everyone should have a blog. It’s the most democratic thing ever.”

Judicial Review by Mitt Romney

In an op-ed last week, Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney argued that the litmus test for judicial restraint is “controversy,” that courts should intervene only in issues that are not controversial.

The federal system left to us by the Constitution allows people of different states to make their own choices on matters of controversy, thus avoiding the bitter battles engendered by “one size fits all” judicial pronouncements. A federalist approach would allow such disputes to be settled by the citizens and elected representatives of each state, and appropriately defer to democratic governance.

Romney’s words contain too much empirical evidence to be dismissed lightly. As Robert McCloskey shows in The American Supreme Court, with a few exceptions, justices have historically followed the political winds, lest a backlash against judicial activism ensue. As FDR put it while trying to pack the Court in 1937, the American people expect the unelected third branch of government to fall in line behind the elected other two.

Of course, the Constitution sets up the judiciary, the third branch of government, as a deliberately antidemocratic bulwark against the other two. Checks and balances Mr. Romney?

Second, what constitutes “controversy”? When polls show Americans are divided at least 60-40?

Third, rightly or wrongly, many denounce Roe v. Wade not so much for its verdict but for the process by which the Court reached it: through a so-called penumbra crystal establishing the right to “privacy.” Isn’t Romney’s view of the role of the courts just another such implicit crystal?