What are we to make of the US Supreme Court and Abortion?

The US Supreme Court has decided a case called Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, concerning a statute in Mississippi and concluded that “[t]he Constitution does not confer a right to abortion; Roe and Casey are overruled; and the authority to regulate abortion is returned to the people and their elected representatives.” So, regulating abortions (or not) is now a matter for each state to decide, or perhaps Congress.

In reaching this decision, the court overturns its prior decision in Roe v. Wade, 410 U. S. 113 (1973), which had famously held that there was a constitutional right to an abortion and that states could not prohibit it, and also overrules a later case called Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pa. v. Casey, 505 U. S. 833 (1992) that followed Roe but used a different analysis and test.  So, the consequence of Dobbs is that we are back to where we were before Roe was decided – its for the elected government in each state to decide how to handle the issue.

Here’s my initial take on the issue of abortion and the US courts:

Historical Perspective – The “right” to an abortion is a relatively new idea in western civilization.

• Abortions have always occurred, but usually on the fringes of legal and respectable medical practice.
• Abortions were prohibited or restricted in many places for centuries.  Before Roe, abortion was illegal in many, but not all US states.
• After Roe, abortion continued to be heavily regulated in most western countries.  Roe actually made the USA an outlier, with far more permissive abortion policy than western European countries (and in a camp with the likes of North Korea and a few other countries).
• The technology of abortions has changed the details over time, but the concepts were / are the same – some mechanical or chemical means to end an unwanted pregnancy.  Today in the USA, pharmaceutical or chemical abortions (e.g. – RU 486) are about equal to the number of surgical abortions.  Some say Plan B a/k/a the “morning after pill” is different and not an “abortion.”
• Abortion is common in the USA – 1990’s high was about 1.6 million abortions; today, best guesses are something less than a million a year today.  Since Roe, there have been ~60 million abortions in the USA.
• About one-half of US states have no laws about abortion or permissive laws; the other half prohibit or restrict abortions.

Strictly Legal Issues – On purely legal grounds, it looks to me like Dobbs was correctly decided.

• Roe was decided on the basis of an idea that the US constitution contains some sort of “right to privacy.”  There is no “right to privacy” in the text of the constitution, rather it is an idea that was created by the US Supreme Court, generally recognized in a 1965 case called Griswold, in which Mr. Justice Douglas said that there were “emanations” and “penumbras” from the 1st, 3rd, 4th, 5th and 9th amendments to the constitution that had the effect of protecting personal liberty with a “zone of privacy” for individuals.  In Griswold, the court found that this right to privacy meant that state laws regulating the sale of contraceptives to married couples were invalid.  Later cases looked at the 14th amendment.
• Roe held that, as a pregnancy developed, the state had an increasingly strong interest in regulating and prohibiting abortion, but in first trimester, the interests of the pregnant woman and her doctor were stronger than the interests of the state, and so the state could not regulate or prohibit abortions in the first trimester.  Not even Roe held that a person had a right to do whatever he or she wanted – the law never recognized political slogans like “my body, my choice” and “no one can tell me what to do with my body.”
• After Roe, Casey changed the test and criteria and made it even messier – rather than a classification based on trimesters, Casey said courts had to use the idea of “viability” to decide whether a regulation violated the constitution.  Since Casey, there have been a number of state laws and a number of cases trying to figure out how to draw the line between permissible and impermissible regulation.
• Roe and Casey have generally been recognized as being based on weak or faulty legal analysis.  Even pro-abortion lawyers recognized that Roe was poorly or wrongly decided, and so often based their arguments on other ideas.

Social and Cultural Considerations – Why did the Warren court dabble in emanations and penumbras? To push a social and cultural agenda.

• The 1960’s was a time of great social and cultural change in the USA.  Old ideas were being discredited and cast aside.  Activists used courts to press for changes in the legal arena, as well as the broader culture.
• During era of Warren court, the activism and breakdown of societal norms was mirrored in some ways by court decisions. The contraception cases before Roe reflected a desire by a certain segment of society to change norms.  The particular justices in the Warren court were open to using the court’s power to advance social changes that they thought were good, regardless of what legislatures and governors thought.
• Feminism of various kinds was in ascendency in the 1960s, and the legal ability to abort an unwanted pregnancy was part of women’s demands for “equality.”
• In the 1960s, and in the years since then, there has probably never been a clear and strong nationwide cultural consensus about abortion.  There are strong views on all sides of the debate.
• Even today, many people are uncomfortable with the issue and have subtle / inconsistent / confused positions.  For example, pro-abortion politicians have used slogans that abortion should be “safe, legal and rare”; anti-abortion politicians have supported laws that allowed abortions in cases of rape, incest or to save the life of the mother.  As a political matter, abortion has never been a black & white issue for most Americans.

Political Considerations Today – Since Roe , Democrats have become the pro-abortion party, and GOP has become the anti-abortion party. Constitutional protections are needed for really important topics to protect against the will of the majority; if the US constitution does not decide the issue, then some states will continue to have pro-abortion rules and other states will continue to have anti-abortion rules. It seems fair to expect that more attention will be given to these proposed laws now, since they won’t be struck down by a federal court. There are some other interesting indirect political consequences; for example, there is a reasonable empirical case to be made that a significant portion of the reduction in crime in the USA in the years since Roe was due to unwanted babies being aborted. If more unwanted babies are born going forward in states that limit abortion, will their crime rates rise 15-20 years from now when those unwanted children come of age?

Religious Considerations – As a Christian, I’m interested in what the Bible teaches about abortion.

• The Bible does not speak directly and clearly and authoritatively on abortion.
• There are, however, strong Biblical ideas relating to abortion – humans are created in the image of God and our inherent rights as a person arise out of this idea.  Because we are created in the image of God, human life has “sanctity” and “dignity.”  There is some Biblical support for the idea that life begins at conception.
• Infanticide – killing the baby after it was born, not before – was seen at various times in the Old Testament and was condemned.  By extension, ending the life of a baby in the womb can also be condemned.
• Nothing in the history of the early church suggests that it supported the crude methods of abortion then available or the old practice of infanticide.
• The Bible condemns promiscuity and honors the idea of having children and the role of the husband, wife and children.
• Today, the Roman Catholic church and the Orthodox church continue to oppose abortion, as do many US evangelical Protestant denominations and churches.  The declining and politically liberal wings of old mainline US Protestant denominations don’t oppose abortion.  Some forms of Islam also restrict abortion. 

What now? Its now up to citizens and elected leaders to decide how to regulate abortion. Consensus-building and compromise; victories and defeats, etc. All the usual stuff of political life. We are fortunate to live in a country where the voters can decide these matters.

What are we to make of the War in Ukraine?

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has changed the political and economic landscape in a few short weeks.  A lot has been written and said about it – much of it foolish – and we still don’t know where it will take us.  The only thing that seems certain is a lot of death and destruction for Ukraine and its people.

Some have said the invasion is solely or mostly the doing of Vladimir Putin, but others have noted that Putin’s decision to invade simply carries out a long-standing mindset and goal of many in Russia.  Some pundits have said the invasion was unprovoked; others disagree.  Some have blamed European and American government weakness; others disagree.  Some say we need to give Putin some sort of face-saving way out of the conflict; others say he doesn’t want an “off ramp” but rather a battlefield and political victory.  To a certain extent, none of that matters since Putin has invaded and the war is ongoing.

So, what now for America and the West?

• Widespread Condemnation – Many countries and businesses around the world have condemned Russia’s actions.  That’s good, and encouraging.  But many countries have either not condemned Russia, or have simply mildly disapproved of the conflict without indicating which party is wrong.  There was a UN resolution condemning the invasion:  “Ultimately, the resolution passed overwhelmingly by a vote of 141-5 with 35 abstentions. The five countries that voted against it were Russia, Belarus, Syria, North Korea and Eritrea.”  India & China, and others who we sometimes regard as our friends, have not strongly condemned Russia.  Those 35 countries who abstained are going to be helping Russia behind the scenes, and sometimes in public.
• Propaganda – Wartime brings lots of propaganda and media everywhere are playing their part, supporting who they think (or are required to say) are the good guys and demonizing the bad guys.  The Ukrainians are so very fortunate to have a president who has risen to the occasion and is very helpful in winning the propaganda war.  He’s inspiring and seems to be playing his cards as best he can.  The result so far is that public opinion in the West has been much more critical of Russia than when Putin invaded Crimea; then there was only very modest criticism and minor consequences for Russia.  However, we need to remember that what we’re seeing and hearing in the West is weighted in favor of pro-Ukraine propaganda, and that the truth is sometimes hard to see, particularly in the short run.
• NATO – What role does NATO have here?  Ukraine is not a member of NATO, but NATO – and the reason for NATO – is quite relevant.  This is a challenge for NATO and NATO needs to reassess the relative positions of Russia and NATO.  USA should not drop out of NATO, but the European members need to step up.  Any number of US leaders have been saying this for many years, to no effect.  The biggest problem seems to have been Germany.  Germany should lead, but because of a decades-long policy of building ties to Russia – the most prominent of which is dependence on Russian natural gas supplies – Germany refused to lead.  The invasion of Ukraine has changed that balance of opinion in Germany and among the NATO countries, at least in the short run.
• US Military – Direct US military intervention should only occur when it’s important to our own national security interests, and I have yet to hear responsible speakers say that Russia conquering Ukraine is in that category.  NATO has a different set of considerations, but so far, they too seem to have prudently held back since Ukraine is not a NATO member.
• Military Supplies – Although probably too little and too late, the West is supplying the Ukraine military.  I’m not sure how long it can continue, but its a key factor in allowing Ukraine to resist.  The risk, of course, is similar to to the risks of directly supporting military action – supplying the Ukraine military is akin to fighting directly against Russia, something the West has decided not to do.
• Intelligence – The very best thing I saw out of the Biden administration in the run-up to the invasion was to widely and consistently broadcast its intelligence assessment of what the Russians were up to.  It didn’t stop an invasion, but made it clear beyond doubt Putin is an evil aggressor.  I expect we’ll continue to try to keep the public pressure on in this way; this is another facet of the propaganda war.
• Cyberwar – I suspect there’s a fair bit of this underway, as well as sizing-up what could be done next.  Elon Musk’s Starlink makes the news, and we hear stories about hackers attacking Russian websites, etc., but we’re not likely to hear the details of the military stuff anytime soon.
• Economic Sanctions – I’ve been pleasantly surprised by the quickness and depth and breadth of the economic sanctions imposed by the West.  They may bite enough to change things over time, but by then, Ukraine may be under Russian control and then what do we do – leave Russia in the same political sanction doghouse as North Korea?  Until when?
• Oil & Gas – This may be the key factor.  Oil & gas revenue alone may be sufficient to keep the Russian government afloat and keep it from changing its course.  Direct oil & gas purchases by the West have not stopped yet.  US will halt purchases of Russian oil and gas, but the amounts are modest.  And, even if all direct purchases by the West of Russian oil were halted, it would filter out indirectly into world markets through friendly countries, as has been the case under Iraqi, Iranian and Venezuelan oil sanctions.  Few other countries can supply additional oil & gas immediately to replace Russian production and the one big exception – Saudi Arabia – has said its not interested in undercutting its economic ally, Russia.  (Not to mention the shame and humiliation of seeing our president and his administration begging the Saudi’s to take his call, or the longer-term kissing-up to Venezuela’s and Iran’s despots, hoping they’ll save our bacon.)
• Humanitarian Relief – Of course, we should be doing this, and lots of it.  I think we are, so far.  This is one area where individuals can “do something.”  Any number of religious and charitable groups are working to get supplies into the country and help with the millions of refugees, both in Ukraine and in neighboring countries.

There’s no particularly good and feasible US action or reaction here that will save Ukraine.  We live in a fallen and sinful world.  Evil is out there.  We must be smart.  We must act where we can.  We must pray for God to change hearts and bring peace.

Source of Morality?

Snowpiercer is a science fiction TV series set in a dystopian world where the entire earth has frozen over and the only survivors are on a train propelled by a perpetual motion engine. https://www.tntdrama.com/snowpiercer

The train is a miniature society, and the key question is what sort of Morality should govern the train?

A premise of the show is the struggle between the economic classes on the train – 1st, 2nd & 3rd class plus some stowaways called Tailies and a small group of technocrats actually running the train.  There’s another  struggle between the “order” of the train (as attributed to the train’s creator, Mr Wilford) vs the Marxist(?) Or anarchist (?) revolutionaries in the lower classes.

But why should any of that matter? As with many dystopian stories, there is no God (or Morality created by principles handed down by God) found in the Snowpiercer story. So, as Dostoevsky said “Without God, all things are permitted.”

Since all is permitted, why shouldn’t Wilford be permitted to design any “order” or Morality he saw fit? Melanie, Wilford’s lieutenant who runs the train day-to-day, may simply be applying or interpreting Wilford’s order or Morality, but why not? The Tailies don’t like the their lot in life but so what? This isn’t a democracy, and there’s no Morality in the show that says that a person should respect or look out for the well being of others. So, why shouldn’t the power structure created by Wilford’s order be utilized to protect the order, even if it’s violent and somewhat arbitrary?

Similarly, the poor and oppressed Tailies (who broke the rules by being stowaways) have no reason to respect Wilford’s order, and there’s no particular reason why they shouldn’t grab for everything they can, using whatever force and violence they can.

This is not civilization, but the state of nature, where each uses whatever power and means available. Why should we impose Judeo Christian values, or even weak, fuzzy and godless Enlightenment values onto these TV characters? Shouldn’t we just root for whatever character is most appealing to us?  We might cheer for the established order, or cheer for the revolutionaries, but without moral principles to guide the characters, why should we expect them to conform to our moral ideas?

The answer, of course, is that the writers have written a story in which the characters act in ways that cause the viewers to see them as “good” or “bad,” even though there’s no logical reason why the characters would be expected to adopt the viewers’ Morality.  In reality, viewers cannot accept an amoral world governed only by the “order” that Wilford created on the train.  We impose our own value structure on what we see happening to the characters.   When there are no overriding values or Morality in the story, we have to create them.

And in real life, if you don’t acknowledge God as the source of Morality, order, ethics and values, then it’s just every man for himself and eventually anarchy and the lawless state of nature / survival of the fittest takes over.

Outrage Fatigue

The social media as well as the traditional media love a juicy story.  They tell us every day about something that ought to make us mad.  We’re tired of being outraged, I suppose.

In this piece, Harry Scanlon surveyed the various areas in which interest groups and their media enablers seek to work us up into a righteous furor.  Except that the story is usually way out of proportion to the actual misdeed or comment.  2016 Presidential politics was the poster child for this phenomenon, but it was constant and many people tuned out.  Like the boy who cried wolf, we just stopped believing the hyperventilating “sky-is-falling” spin anymore.

Turns out, of course, that the outrage before the 2016 was just the warm-up for the post-election outrage.  Since then, the media has treated us to non-stop outrage about something Trump said or they claim he said.  (Curiously, they pay relatively little attention to what his administration actually does.  I suppose because they can’t provoke instant outrage if they actually have to investigate and report about an issue that just might – horrors – be complicated and have more than one side to it.)

The radical Green enviro movement is constantly outraged.  The #MeToo zealots were outraged.  The multitude of conspiracy hounds (from Russian interference with US elections, to the latest – 5G cell towers and Covid-19) scream non-stop.  And now, Black Lives Matter has made a multi-year, well-funded media campaign the focus of current outrage.  Actually, police misconduct SHOULD create outrage, but BLM has many other issues besides that one, and I expect we’re already weary of that outrage, too.

What to do?  Well, its tempting to tune-out completely, but the better route is to filter and curate and measure your daily dose of outrage.  Stay involved and stay informed.  Listen to your allies and your opponents, but do your best to avoid outrage of every kind.

Climate “Solutions” that don’t solve the problem

We would be better off focusing on the important issues and potential solutions that will make a difference. Subsidizing electric cars and outlawing natural gas appliances will not solve the problems they are intended to address.

https://nypost.com/2019/10/12/climate-change-activists-are-focused-on-all-the-wrong-solutions/

Where does the “alt-right” fit in?

Jeff Goldstein argues here that the so-called “alt-right” with its extremist and dangerous views is not alone on the political spectrum.  It has counterparts on the left that are perhaps equally extremist and dangerous.

He says the alt-right wrongly claims to represent conservatives:

The alt-right is a European-style right-wing movement that is at odds with the classical liberalism upon which our country was built, and which the Left has redefined as “Right.” That is to say, the European “Right” is mapped onto a political spectrum different than our own. Our “right” — conservatism or classical liberalism —is dead-center on our spectrum, no matter how persistently the Left tries to claim otherwise. It is constitutionalism, which incorporates federalism, republicanism, legal equity, and a separation of powers.

So, I suppose that the alt-right is, in fact, the far right in his way of viewing the spectrum.  And the traditional, classical liberal view – now called the “right” in US politics – is actually “dead-center,” he says.  That might be a helpful way to view it, but most of this noise is name-calling to try to discredit and marginalize opposing viewpoints.  I suppose conservatives could (and do) engage in similar name-calling / discrediting / marginalizing of the Bernie Sanders / socialist left.

We’re not really better off for having called each other these names, but its good to get a little more perspective.

The other reason that the left likes to label certain conservatives as alt-right is because it can then lump those folks in with neo-Nazis and fascists and white supremacists of various kinds.  Of course, these kooks have always been around and likely always will be, but based on what I’ve seen, their numbers are tiny and they would go almost totally unnoticed except for the attention that the left-of-center press lavishes on them.  They can be sensational, so covering the kooks feeds the ever present thirst of the press for something outrageous to get those ratings and clicks.  And reasonable people of all kinds can deplore them and condemn them.

So, we’ve got fringe groups on the far right and the far left, and by and large we should ignore them.  If and when you want a serious discussion of actual issues, you can get plenty of that without wasting time on what the kooks on the left or right are pushing at the moment.

A Complete Picture of the US War in Vietnam?

My wife and I have just finished watching all of Ken Burns’ and Lynn Novick’s 10-part documentary, “The War in Vietnam.”  (You can stream it from here.)  Of course, Burns is a pro at this sort of thing, having done a number of overview projects like this; the production is first-rate in many ways.  But is it a complete picture of the war?  Even from the American perspective at 40+ years after our involvement ended?

I was too young to have really appreciated the significance of events in the early and mid-1960’s as they were happening, but was still shaped in minor ways by the war.

When I Became Aware of the War – I grew up in a household that was politically aware and engaged.  My parents were conservative and as a teenager, I mostly accepted my father’s views that the war was a mess because the military were subject to political limitations on their ability to wage and win the war.  He was also an anti-communist and I mostly accepted the prevailing view that the so-called “domino theory” was valid.  Thus, even though Vietnam itself was not terribly significant to US national security interests, it was important that southeast Asia not be allowed to come under the control of communists.

My Draft Card – I turned 18 in 1973, and had a high 90’s draft number.  I believe that in 1972, anyone in the top 100 was likely to be called up.  So, I had a real-time, personal interest in the war and the winding-down of the war.  But, by the time I would have been called up, the sharply decreasing manpower requirements meant that I never received that letter ordering me to report for duty.

The End of US Involvement in Combat – While I was in college, we saw the winding down of the war and the fall of President Nixon in the Watergate scandal.  By then, the war was much less important on college campus’ than it had been 10 years earlier; I don’t remember very much attention being paid to the setbacks encountered by the South Vietnamese military, or the eventual fall of the South to the communists in April 1975.

Walt Rostow’s Visits? – In 1975, I took an economics class at college taught by Walt Rostow.  Rostow had been JFK’s and LBJ’s National Security Advisor and was a “hawk” with respect to the Vietnam war.  Around the time I was in that class, South Vietnam was in the process of falling militarily to the Communists.

(Even after Robert McNamara wrote a memoir in the 1990’s confessing to poor judgment, etc in Vietnam, Rostow wrote a rebuttal, maintaining that US policy and actions were right, but were implemented too timidly.  The NYT recently wrote that Rostow “never apologized”.)

Although I’ve never seen it confirmed, we heard rumors that Rostow was making trips that year back to Washington to urge policy-makers to intervene militarily to prop up South Vietnam.  So, we still had real-time reminders of how the war continued to impact the USA even though our involvement “ended.”

So, I watched Burn’s / Novick’s documentary from the somewhat distant perspective of one who had my own Vietnam-era memories and opinions, but was not scarred or haunted or deeply affected by them.

Strengths of the Burns’ Vietnam Series –

• long enough to at least touch briefly on many major themes and events – at 18 hours, there’s enough time to at least mention most everything of consequence
• presents the current views of around 80 people who participated in some way in the actual war or were closely tied to it – this is Burns’ traditional approach to history by looking at the micro stories and emotions, mixed in with a survey of the macro events
• focuses on events at home, that were reactions to or caused by, the war – we see the war’s impact on families, and hear how domestic political currents affected, and were affected by, the course of the war
• illustrates the divisions in US society that the war created – there’s a fair bit of emphasis on the anti-war movement, a deserter, families who had different opinions about the war
• includes extensive interviews with North Vietnamese and Viet Cong – they were our enemy, but show gives lots of time to their perspectives
• features recorded conversations between LBJ and Nixon with their respective advisors showing their assessments – showing how they agonized over how to reconcile various policy and political goals

Weaknesses of the Burns’ Vietnam Series –

• focuses excessively on the idea that the USA government “lied” to the public – they spend a lot of time illustrating the point that governments sugar-coat and lie to their public about progress and success in the war effort.  They suggest this is something new or unusual.  (Listen to one of the incomparable Alistair Cooke’s “Letters from America” where he talks about the importance of how a war is described by the media in countries – The Lessons of Potsdam – and wonders if a democratic country can wage a war if it sees on the TV news every day, the brutality of war.)
• is infused with Burns’ essential pacifist / anti-war bias – its a simple and plain bias.  Nothing wrong with that, but don’t imagine that he’s being “objective” about this.
• over-emphasis on soldiers who later came to oppose the war and under-emphasis on those who didn’t – as you would expect from someone with an anti-war bias, he favors the stories of those who agree with his views
• overstates the popularity of the anti-war movement in USA generally – although mentioning that US public opinion favored our goals and our participation in the war for many years, Burns and Novick paint views that are sympathetic to the anti-war left and leaves the viewer to wonder why the majority of Americans did not share those views
• understates the role of the press in criticizing the government and thus, eroding support for the war – in many ways, the Vietnam war was covered differently from prior wars such as the press’ ability to roam freely on the battlefield and report whatever they wanted, and publishing stolen material like the Pentagon Papers for the sole purpose of supporting the anti-war movement
• pays little credence to the domino theory and the importance it held in policy – of course, none of what Truman / Eisenhower / Kennedy / Johnson / Nixon did makes sense today unless you realize that the domino theory was widely accepted by both political parties and commentators of that era
• virtually omits any mention of how USSR and China featured in the decision-making – there is very little discussion of the fact that the Soviets and the Chinese played a role in the Vietnam war that was the reciprocal of the US role.  Instead, all the attention is on South + USA vs. the North.  Its highly unlikely that USA would have ever become involved in Vietnam had the Soviets and Chinese communists not been supporting the North Vietnamese.  I don’t recall one single interview with a Soviet or Chinese person describing their involvement; the overall impression is that USA was evil and aggressive
• focuses more on the perspectives / justifications of the Communists than the south Vietnamese fighting them – the documentary constantly emphasizes the corruption and incompetence of South Vietnam in civil and military affairs, and gives a lot less attention to the negative features of life in the North
• in general, glorifies the goals and sacrifices of the North Vietnamese and denigrates the goals and sacrifices of the South Vietnamese – we tend to forget how awful the Soviet and Chinese communists were, and why USA acted so strongly to oppose them and their proxies – a bit off topic, but listen to another of Alistair Cooke’s talks about comparing the evil of Hitler and the evil of Stalin and how the press coverage shapes those views – “The Maddest and Most Criminal of Tyrants”.
• suggests that American battlefield atrocities were more reprehensible than those of the enemy – the filmmakers spend a lot of time emphasizing the brutality and losses of warfare, but devote an excessive amount of time to Calley & Medina and the My Lai massacre.  Assuming the worst interpretation of those events, it represented the unjustified killing of 300-500 civilians.  Horrible, of course, but slaughtering innocents in guerilla warfare was hardly a one-sided affair and the amount of attention given to it is out of proportion.  (Americans tend to remember, naturally enough, that 58,000 American’s were killed, but we don’t remember quite as easily that as many as 3 million Vietnamese lost their lives.  And then war in Cambodia that followed between Soviet-backed Vietnam and China-backed Cambodia resulted in 1 to 3 million more deaths.)
• suggests that the US cultural revolution in the 1960’s was primarily about the war, when it was only a part – the disintegration of US society in the 1960’s featured an anti-war element, but one can argue that the size and popularity of the anti-war movement in some circles was more a product of the cultural revolution rather than the cause of it

So, is the Burns/Novick documentary the complete picture of the US war in Vietnam?  Not really, but no one piece could be.  You need other perspectives as well to gain a better sense of the war and the lessons that we should learn from it.

 

 

 

Trump’s Wall

Trump wants to build a wall along the border between Mexico and USA.  Its purpose is to restrain or reduce or eliminate illegal border crossings from the south to north.

What’s the Issue?  There is a widely held view that there are “too many” immigrants in the USA.  The percentage of immigrants in the USA population is very close to its previous all-time high in the early 1900’s (which was followed by severe restrictions on immigration beginning in 1920). When people say “too many immigrants,” they generally mean too many illegal immigrants.  Immigrants can be “illegal” for many reasons, such a overstaying their visas, but the immigrants that people focus on in this debate is those who cross without following border crossing laws and then remain in the USA in violation of those laws.  Because the Mexico / USA border is just under 2,000 miles long, much of it open, rough territory on both sides, it presents a relatively accessible, low-tech way to enter the USA (compared to arriving by sea or by air directly from another country).  So, those who want to build a wall, including Trump, are doing so to reduce or eliminate this type of illegal immigration.

What will it cost?  Who knows, but all big public projects are over budget and late, so we probably should not rely on any estimate at this point.  I’ve recently heard numbers of something around $15 billion.  About one-third of the border already has a fence of some kind from a wall-building program 10 years ago; some of that is probably good enough to stay in place.

Who will pay for it?  The USA, of course, will pay to build it.  That’s true even if we somehow impose a foolish tax on imports from Mexico to try to reimburse ourselves for those costs.

What’s the symbolic point?  The goal of building a wall is both symbolic and practical.  It’s symbolic because it is a clear and simple statement that USA intends to stop this type of illegal immigration.  It shows that USA is serious about the extent of the problem and is “doing something” about it.  Taking action can be viewed as preferable to just wringing our hands and complaining that “nothing can be done; there is no solution.” The wall is one visible aspect of Trump’s stated policy goal of reducing illegal immigration, but some of the other points are harder to visualize and explain.  Everyone understands a wall.

What’s the practical point?  The practical aspect is that walls like this might be somewhat effective.  The USA built a wall for a short distance in Southern California that you can see in these pictures.  By some measures, it has been effective in deterring drug trafficking and illegal crossings, although some of that traffic has just moved to other areas where there is no wall.  Walls and fortified borders are found around the world, and they generally work to stop or slow illegal crossings.  The fence/wall that Israel built along its defacto border has been effective in deterring attacks in Israel by Palestinians.

Will it work?  Critics point out that it is impossible to stop all illegal crossings, with a wall or any other means, but of course that isn’t really the point.  As long as the supply chains for illegal drugs run through Mexico into USA, there will be a strong incentive to cross the border.  As long as Mexican political and economic policies keep its population relatively poor, there will be a strong incentive to cross the border.  As long as Mexico allows poor Central Americans (and Cubans and others) to use Mexico as a conduit to reach the USA, there will be strong incentives to cross the border.  But the wall has a place in a new immigration and border security policy and program.

Will it be “worth it?”  This is a more difficult question.  Trump made illegal immigration from and through Mexico a signature issue of his campaign.  Of course, he’s done it in a way that is clumsy and offensive to Mexicans as well as Americans of Mexican descent.  He really has no political choice other than to follow through with a wall-building program. Charles Krauthammer has written persuasively that the only solution to the illegal immigration problem is enforcement first and then legalization of those already here.   The wall, in combination with other measures to actually reduce illegal immigration, will give Americans the confidence to then offer some means of legalization (although perhaps not citizenship) to the 11+ million illegal immigrants in the USA today.  If the wall enables comprehensive immigration reform to take place, then it will be worth it.

 

Do the Masses trust the Elites?

R.R. Reno looks at a recent column by Peggy Noonan in this piece from First Things.  The question is whether the political, economic and cultural elites in the USA and elsewhere have lost the trust and confidence of the masses.  Reno thinks the answer is “yes” and that it will lead to the end of democracy.

Taking a somewhat different route to the same conclusion, Prof Eric Posner concludes in this Freakonomics episode that the “Imperial Presidency” (remember when that disapproving term was widely used?) will, in fact, lead to a dictatorship since we have already strayed so far from the structure designed by Madison and the other drafters of the US Constitution.

Some part of me tends to dismiss this sort of talk as wild exaggeration in response to the passions of the political moment, but actually, there’s some truth in both this popular and academic analysis.