Im-Politic: Ivy League Princeton Turns Bush League in the History Wars

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cancel culture, Christopher L. Eisgruber, Founding Fathers, history wars, Im-Politic, Ivy League, James Madison, Princeton University, race relations, racism, slavery, Washington Post, Woodrow Wilson, Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs

Full disclosure: Although I graduated from Princeton University and believe that I got a great education there (for a princely sum, to be sure), for various reasons, I never felt much affinity to the place (except for the basketball and other athletics teams – long story). As a result, I’ve never given it a dime . Even so, it’s depressing to learn that for the last seven years, the school as been run by a leadership team that’s full either of guilt-driven liberals, ignoramuses, utter ditzes, or some combination of the two.

I know this because the university’s president, Christopher L Eisgruber, has just explained in an op-ed in today’s Washington Post why he persuaded Princeton’s Board of Trustee to remove Woodrow Wilson’s name from the university’s School of Public and International Affairs.

My scorn for this move and those responsible for it has nothing to do with any doubt concerning the racist views and policies of a figure who was not only President of the United States, but president of Princeton. I’ve fully recognized Wilson as a racist here and here. Nor do I hold the former Woodrow Wilson School in any special regard. In fact, I’ve long considered “public and international affairs” as being about as legitimate a university course of study as sports communications.

Instead, I view the Wilson name removal as (to quote Eisgruber) “an excess of political correctness” precisely because he’s also expressed strong agreement with one of the few sensible notions that have emerged from America’s recent history wars – that there’s a crucial distinction between figures who are known only or mainly for supporting treasonous and racist and other odious views and policies, and those whose role in U.S. history entailed much much more. More.

In this vein, Eisgruber acknowledges explicitly that Wilson “is a far different figure than John C. Calhoun or Robert E. Lee, people whose pro-slavery commitments defined their careers and who were sometimes honored for the purpose of supporting segregation or racism.” He recognizes that many of Wilson’s achievements both at the university and in the White House can legitimately be called “genuine” and even “grand.” And he goes on to admit that “I do not pretend to know how to evaluate his life or his staggering combination of achievement and failure.”

Weirder still: As Eisgruber explains, responding in 2015 to student demands that the university “de-Wilson-ize” itself Eisgruber asked the Board to study how Princeton was presenting Wilson’s record and legacy, and the school ultimately decided to “recount its history, including Wilson’s racism, more honestly.”

In my view, that’s exactly the right way to handle the matter, and I’ve since urged that participants in the national debate to think harder about similarly thoughtful ways to deal with other historical figures who also deserve to be remembered as more than racists whatever flaws on the issue they demonstrated or embodied.

But Eisgruber and the Princeton board have taken the easy, and simplistic way out. Although nowadays the concept of “slippery slope” is abused way too often (because it too conveniently defines out of existence any need and ability to make intelligent choices or draw important distinctions), Princeton’s decision raises the question of why Abraham Lincoln or the Founding Fathers, with their own problematic racial records and actual slave-owning, shouldn’t be expunged from the nation’s public places as well (or from whatever private places honor them).

According to Eisgruber, he changed his mind because even with the 2015 changes, Princeton was still honoring Wilson

“without regard to, and perhaps even in ignorance of, his racism.

“And that, I now believe, is precisely the problem. Princeton is part of an America that has too often disregarded, ignored and turned a blind eye to racism, allowing the persistence of systems that discriminate against black people.”

But of course, the university had taken specific steps to (as Eisgruber told us) “recount its history, including Wilson’s racism, more honestly.” So what’s changed between then and now?

Similar questions arise from Eisgruber’s associated contention that “When a university names its public policy school for a political leader, it inevitably offers the honoree as a role model for its students. However grand some of Wilson’s achievements may have been, his racism disqualifies him from that role.”

If so, however, why keep Wilson’s name on one of its residential colleges and on it’s “highest award for undergraduate alumni”? (As Eisgruber calls the Woodrow Wilson Prize. Unless that, too, has changed? Eisgruber didn’t specify.)

Finally, why have Eisgruber and the Board stopped with Wilson? The university also still honors the slave-owning (and pretty consistent slavery supporter) Founding Father and former President of the United States James Madison in at least two ways: a scholarly program called the James Madison Society, and a dining option called “Madison Society”. What the heck is so special about him? Why not kick this racist SOB’s name off the campus, too? 

Nothing could be clearer than that Eisgruber has no rational answers to these questions – and may not have even asked them. In fact, the only intellectually honest or competent sentence in his entire article is his confession that “I do not pretend to know how to evaluate [Wilson’s] life or his staggering combination of achievement and failure.”

In other words, Princeton’s decision stands as a monument – to ignorance. And you can probably throw in intellectual cowardice and faddism as well.

Following Up: Another Confederate Statue Mess

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Albert Pike, Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Clarence Williams, Confederacy, Confederate monuments, D.C., D.C. Police, District of Columbia, Following Up, George H.W. Bush, George W. Bush, history wars, National Park Service, peaceful protests, Perry Stein, Peter Hermann, protests, Trump, U.S. Park Police, vandalism, Washington Post

There is so much shameful behavior by various government and law enforcement authorities reported in this morning’s Washington Post account of the illegal takedown of a statue of a Confederate general (Albert Pike) in the District of Columbia (D.C.) that it’s hard to know where to begin.

But let’s begin on a positive note: There was nothing shameful in the Post‘s own account. Quite the contrary:  reporters Perry Stein, Clarence Williams, and Peter Hermann – and their editors – provided an unusual amount of useful information. Hopefully we’ll see much more journalism like that going forward.

In fact, the Post article taught me something that shows I made a significant mistake in a tweet yesterday. When I learned of the statue’s removal by a mob, I tweeted, “Let me get this straight: The #DC government is so #racist that #peacefulprotest-ers had no choice but to take the law into their own hands & tear down the #AlbertPike statue. Plus, DC cops stand by and watch. Totally disgraceful #vandalism & vandalism coddling. #murielbowser.” (Bowser is D.C.’s Mayor.)

The mistake has to do with jurisdiction. As the Post reported, the D.C. police noted that “The statue in question sits in a federal park and therefore is within the jurisdiction of National Park Service and the United States Park Police.” So the District’s government didn’t, as I implied, have the authority to remove the statue.

Yet although I apologize for the D.C. government reference, I still stand behind mob point (about the need always to follow lawful procedures for removing such monuments) and the D.C. police point. Unless everyone should applaud officers who stand by and do absolutely nothing when flagrant lawbreaking is not only within plain sight, but scarcely a block away? What if the D.C. police saw a murder being threatened in a federal park? (By the way, as a longtime District resident, I can tell you that the parks in which these monuments stand are mostly vestpocket-size parks, and aren’t watched or patrolled regularly by anyone at any time of day.)

Moreover, there’s evidence that the D.C. police were aware that something was wrong – and weren’t even positive that they lacked the authority to act. The Post  quoted a National Park Service spokesman as claiming that “D.C. police had called U.S. Park Police dispatch to ask about jurisdiction. He said in an email that when Park Police officers arrived, ‘the statue was already down and on fire.’ The toppling of the statue is under investigation, he said. Litterst [the spokesman] did not address whether the Park Service thinks D.C. police should have intervened.”

Finally, if you believe, as I do, that monuments to traitors like Confederate generals have no place on public grounds, it’s clear that the federal government has been brain-dead on this issue (to put it kindly). But the Post account also reveals that this disgraceful neglect long predates the presidency of Donald Trump (who continues to oppose any changes in these statues’ placement or even renaming U.S. military bases named after such treasonous figures).

Specifically, “District officials have been trying to get the statue removed for several years. The D.C. Council petitioned the federal government to remove the statue in 1992.”

From then until Mr. Trump’s inauguration, four Presidents have served – including recent liberal and Mainstream Media darlings George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush, and Democrats Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. Why didn’t they remove the statue? Why haven’t they even commented on the matter? And why haven’t they been called on the carpet for their records on this matter, and for their silence?

But let’s close on a positive note, too. One question raised by this statue controversy – what to do with it – is pretty easily answered. Either stick it in a museum (with a full description provided of this minor Confederate figure) or throw it in the city or some federal dump.

Following Up: Clerics Who are Still Losing It

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D.C. riots, District of Columbia, Episcopalians, Followin g Up, George Floyd, Gregory T. Monahan, Lafayette Park, Lafayette Square, Marian Budde, political violence, protests, religion, St. John's Church, Trump, U.S. Park Police, violence, Washington Post

As ticked off as I was yesterday over the truly deranged reactions of the District of Columbia’s Episcopalian leaders to the torching of their own church and to President Trump’s decision to express support for the need to protect the entire nation from arsonists, I’m ever angrier today – and justifiably so.

For Episcopal Rev Bishop Marian Budde and her colleagues, along with many prominent clerics from other religions, not only apparently lack the instinct for self-preservation that’s a hallmark of minimal sanity. They’re intellectually dishonest and unethical as well – unless you think it’s perfectly OK for them or anyone else to jump to the most convenient conclusions possible about those you disagree with politically.

To start off, although the Episcopalians’ responses to the church fire were especially unhinged, they weren’t unique among the nation’s so called faith leaders. It’s easy to find statements from these clerics blasting Mr. Trump’s actions. Just Google the relevant words. But good luck trying to find these figures criticizing the St. John’s attack. (BTW, if you come across any, please let me know. No one would like to be proven wrong on this score more than I.) At least some clerics have done a better job denouncing the violence that erupted nationwide over the last week. (See here and here for examples.)

As for the St. John’s Church positions of many religious leaders, on top of singling out the so-called Trump photo op for their slings and arrows, they have uncritically swallowed the (widespread) claim that federal police used unjustifiable and excessive force when they cleared out supposedly peaceful protesters in Lafayette Square to make way for the President. (See, here for the Episcopalians, and e.g., here and here.)  

Here’s the problem: It’s clear that not all the protesters were peaceful the day of the Trump walk. In fact, not all of them were peaceful half an hour before the Trump walk. At least that’s the claim of United States Park Police (USPP) acting Chief Gregory T. Monahan. Yesterday, Monahan – whose agency was one among several involved in the clearing operation – released a statement contending:

“On Monday, June 1, the USPP worked with the United States Secret Service to have temporary fencing installed inside Lafayette Park.  At approximately 6:33 pm, violent protestors on H Street NW began throwing projectiles including bricks, frozen water bottles and caustic liquids. The protestors also climbed onto a historic building at the north end of Lafayette Park that was destroyed by arson days prior. Intelligence had revealed calls for violence against the police, and officers found caches of glass bottles, baseball bats and metal poles hidden along the street.”

P.S. Monahan is hardly your supposedly typical brutish cop. Before his appointment by President Trump, he was accused by the Fraternal Order of Police of being soft on defendants – including defendants who allegedly assaulted officers of the USPP San Francisco field office he then heads.

But maybe it’s likely that Monahan has undergone a Jekyll-Hyde-like transformation? Nothing’s impossible. But it’s certainly noteworthy that the Washington Post, whose news coverage of the clearing operation explicitly tarred it as “a show of aggression,” in literally its next breath proceeded to describe the victims as “ a crowd of largely peaceful protesters. Talk about weasel words. By the way – I’m pretty sure the bad guys (and gals?) weren’t wearing signs announcing, “We’re the crazies!”

The religious leaders who treated this episode as a latter-day Boston Massacre didn’t see Monahan’s statement – which came a day after theirs. But isn’t that the point? Is there any evidence that the clerics tried to confirm their suspicions – and apparently prejudices – before getting on their high horses? Again, let me know if you find some. In its absence, it’s clear they were determined to shoot first and ask questions later.

A book with which I trust all these clerics are familiar quotes someone who I trust they all revere as advising, “He that is without sin among you let him first cast a stone….” Time for these religious leaders to resume paying attention. Unless they view themselves as exceptions? 

Im-Politic: How Much Did the Lockdowns Really Help?

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African Americans, CCP Virus, coronavirus, COVID 19, economy, Georgia, hospitalizations, Im-Politic, lockdowns, public health, reopening, shutdown, Virginia, Washington Post, Wuhan virus

Is it time to start putting the CCP Virus economy-reopening debate shoe on the other foot, at least when it comes to one key measure of progress or backsliding against the pandemic? More specifically, is it time to put less emphasis on finding out whether states that have reopened relatively quickly have seen their virus situations worsening, and more on whether states that closed early and/or have stayed largely closed have achieved progress that’s been any better?

This question occurred to me this morning upon reading in my Washington Post that when it comes to new infections and fatalities, Virginia has just seen record highs recently whether we’re talking about single day totals or the more informative seven-day averages. That’s striking because Virginia has been one of those states that shutdown substantially quite early, and has reopened very slowly.

So I began wondering how Virginia’s record compares with a state that reopened very early – Georgia. And the numbers clearly show that their performances over the most relevant timeframes have been…pretty comparable. Which represents new evidence that the economically devastating lockdowns have been under-performers for containing the virus’ spread.

Virginia and Georgia are particularly interesting to compare because of their similarities. The latter’s total population is estimated this year at 8.63 million while the latter’s is a not greatly bigger 10.74 million.

Both states also have relatively big populations of African-Americans – who have been among the virus’ biggest victims. Blacks represent 31.03 percent of all Georgians, and 18.81 percent of all Virginians.

That Washington Post Virginia article did mention one area of continuing improvement for the state: new hospitalizations. They’re especially important both because fears of hospitals getting overwhelmed by the pandemic were prime justifications for the original shutdown orders, and because they’re the best measures of whether the virus is being contained or not. After all, numbers or new cases seem to depend heavily on increases in testing (which naturally reveal more and more infections). And controversies over identifying genuine CCP Virus-induced deaths remain heated – in large part because methodologies vary so greatly state-by-state.

By contrast, there have been no debates over how many patients with virus symptoms have been admitted to healthcare facilities. The only uncertainties are those stemming from how promptly these facilities report their admissions to state health departments.

That kind of uncertainty is still clouding Virginia’s data. As of today, (see this link and scroll down till you see the option for hospitalization data) the state has only reported new hospitalizations through May 20, and these data are divided between confirmed cases and probably cases. (The former are the great majority, though.)

Even so, because of Virginia’s lockdown policy – which began in earnest at the end of March, began easing in phases for the state’s least populous areas in mid-May, but which largely continue for its most populous areas (those closest to the District of Columbia)– it should be among the gold standard states for virus progress if turning off most economic activity is considered crucial. (Here’s an unusually informative lockdown timeline for Virginia, Maryland, and the District.)

Its interactive hospitalization chart is a little hard to read, but it seems to show that on March 31, the seven-day moving average of new admissions stood at just under 59, and through early May (when the lockdown began to be lifted). moved up steadily to a little over 81. So they rose by just under 39 percent. By May 20, this average had decreased all the way to just under 45. In other words, daily hospitalizations dropped by a little less than 45 percent. And for the entire period, the seven-day moving average for new hospitalizations dipped by 2.34 percent.

Georgia’s lockdown began only a bit later than Maryland’s (on April 2) but serious easing began much earlier (on April 24). Indeed, Governor Brian Kemp was widely pilloried for the decision.

During its three weeks of lockdown, Georgia’s seven-day average daily hospitalization numbers went from about 80 to about 130. (The non-interactive chart below is even harder to read precisely than Virginia’s interactive graphic, but check it out for yourself below.)

This roughly 62.50 percent rise in daily hospitalizations was much higher than Virginia’s during its lockdown period Did this discrepancy mean that Georgia ended its lockdown too soon? Or was its somewhat heavier African-American population density the major difference? Search me.

Georgia’s reopening has been more aggressive than Virginia’s, and that could well explain why its seven-day average hospitalization figure remained just about flat from the start of this phase through May 22.

But I’m not entirely persuaded that the lack of improvement during this period means that Georgia’s relatively fast reopening has flopped. Because for the first three weeks of this reopening, the state’s seven-day average new hospitalization figure fell by about half – faster than Virginia’s during its slower reopening. And as the Post has reported, despite Virginia’s caution, daily (although not yet seven-day averages) have been rising recently, too.

The fairest conclusion to me seems that the hospitalization data give an edge to Virginia’s more cautious lockdown-reopening strategy, but that the edge is on the modest side. And most important, it’s far from clear that this margin justifies both the economic and healthcare costs of relatively longer and/or more thorough lockdowns.

 

 

Our So-Called Foreign Policy: A Cheer and a Half for Trump’s New China Strategy Document

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alliances, allies, America First, CCP Virus, China, coronavirus, COVID 19, decoupling, globalism, Josh Rogin, liberal global order, Our So-Called Foreign Policy, Phase One, stock markets, technology, The National Interest, Trade, transactionalism, Trump, Washington Post, Wuhan virus

When over breakfast this morning I read Josh Rogin’s Washington Post column on the Trump administration’s new China strategy statement, I was pretty pleased. It’s been a long time since I viewed the intra-administration disagreements on the subject that its release has supposedly resolved as major problems in the China strategy overhaul that President Trump has sought, The tough and, more important, smart Phase One trade deal signed in mid-January was a convincing sign that the “doves” had been marginalized, but only one sign. The new statement itself describes many others. At the same time, the more basic agreement within Mr. Trump’s team, the better.

When I finally read the actual statement a little later, I was less pleased. It’s true that the President is both fully woke to the China threat, and that he’s reversed or overturned many of the disastrous mistakes made by his predecessors on a variety of fronts – including not only trade but technology, foreign investment, and exchange programs in particular. Moreover, the evidence is multiplying that the disaster created by the CCP Virus will lead to still tougher and, more important, still smarter measures. (A further crackdown on U.S. stock exchanges listings of Chinese entities is just one example.)

But the statement also made clear that Mr. Trump hasn’t made the clean break with previous globalist approaches to China and related aspects of American foreign policy that I’ve been advocating and that, as I’ve written, could lead to serious and needless dangers down the road. And as with much of the rest of the Trump framework, the big problem has to do with the role assigned to U.S. allies and alliances. Specifically, it’s still way too big, and not different enough from the globalist approach he’s rightly slammed verbally.

Not that “United States Strategic Approach to The People’s Republic of China” was devoid of America First-y ideas. It was great, for example, to see the administration reaffirm “Our approach is not premised on determining a particular end state for China. Rather, our goal is to protect United States vital national interests” (even though the United States keeps demanding, at least rhetorically, major structural reforms in China’s trade, technology, and other economic policies – demands I’ve explained are fruitless because of impossible monitoring and enforcement challenges).

Similarly encouraging, the top two vital interests identified: “(1) protect the American people, homeland, and way of life; (2) promote American prosperity….”

I also really liked “[T]he United States responds to the PRC’s [People’s Republic of China] actions rather than its stated commitments. Moreover, we do not cater to Beijing’s demands to create a proper ‘atmosphere’ or ‘conditions’ for dialogue. Likewise, the United States sees no value in engaging with Beijing for symbolism and pageantry; we instead demand tangible results and constructive outcomes.”

Indeed, the document adds, “We acknowledge and respond in kind to Beijing’s transactional approach with timely incentives and costs, or credible threats thereof.” This kind of transactionalism – expecting proposed foreign policy measures above all to create specific, measurable short-term benefits for the United States, rather than focusing on more ambitious steps that might turn out even better farther down the road, but whose success is far less certain – is a key tenet of America First foreign policies (as I’ve argued in the above linked National Interest article). Therefore, this explicit mention and endorsement of the term is most welcome (though it needs to be enshrined as a pillar of U.S. diplomacy elsewhere, too).

The statement’s treatment of transactionalism is closely related to its clear skepticism about another dubious globalist concept – though in this instance it’s more important for what it doesn’t say than for what it does: “[C]ompetition necessarily includes engagement with the PRC, but our engagements are selective and results-oriented, with each advancing our national interests….” I read this passage as an implicit announcement that the United States will no longer be seeking any particular kind of “relationship” with China, a gauzy goal that I’ve explained (on Twitter) creates powerful pressures to sacrifice concrete objectives in the here and now in the usually mistaken belief that the other party will feel obliged to make comparable sacrifices going forward – at some point.

And all this excellent material helps make clear why I’m so disappointed in the document’s numerous bow to globalism’s shibboleths. Two stand out in particular, and they’re so intimately intertwined as to be practically two sides of the same coin: the idea that it’s crucial for the United States to uphold something globalists (and the authors of this document) call a “rules-based international order,” and the maxim that critical building blocks of this order are America’s security alliances. The big problem from an America First standpoint with these notions? Once you buy into them, you’re back in Relationships-Uber-Alles-Land.

So I was distinctly unhappy to read passages like:

“[T]he United States does not and will not accommodate Beijing’s actions that weaken a free, open, and rules-based international order. We will continue to refute the CCP’s narrative that the United States is in strategic retreat or will shirk our international security commitments. The United States will work with our robust network of allies and likeminded partners to resist attacks on our shared norms and values, within our own governance institutions, around the world, and in international organizations.”

Indeed, the lionization of America’s international security commitments completely ignores problems that President Trump has rightly spotlighted – like flagrant defense free-riding, diplomatic fence-sitting, and trade policies that have ripped off America nearly as much as China’s. Just as thoroughly ignores problems that have largely escaped Mr. Trump’s notice – like the recent, rapidly growing nuclear war risks the United States has been running in places like the Korean peninsula and Eastern Europe precisely because its allies do so little to defend themselves. Does the Trump administration really believe it can count on these countries to help fight China if shooting starts?

Meanwhile, the similar shout-out to international organizations overlooks the administration’s warning in this very same document about the naivete of assuming that “engagement with rivals and their inclusion in international institutions and global commerce would turn them into benign actors and trustworthy partners.”

Another way to put this critique: The document pays no attention to the fundamental problem with rules-based order worship. In the last analysis, it’s never been based on adherence to rules – i.e., a consensus on what is and is not acceptable international behavior. It’s been based on a willingness of the so-called free world to allow the United States to bear most of the costs and risks of providing them with security and prosperity. Those costs and risks, however, have become unaffordable and unacceptable for the United States, and its allies have displayed no serious signs of helping carry the load.

Let’s end on a happier note: The new China document promises that the United States will judge China by its deeds and not by its words. And since despite the references to alliances and international orders, these considerations so far haven’t much inhibited the administration from hitting China ever harder, especially on the trade and technology fronts, focusing on its deeds seems like the best way to evaluate its China policy, too. 

In fact, here’s possibly the strongest proof of that pudding.  The document doesn’t once mention the aim or even the concept of “decoupling” – the notion that the United States should disengage economically from China as fast and as thoroughly as practicable.  But decoupling – indeed, big time decoupling – is exactly what’s been taking place during the age of Trump.

Im-Politic: A Media Watchdog Lets Chuck Todd Off the Hook

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Chuck Todd, Erik Wemple, Im-Politic, Mainstream Media, Meet the Press, Michael T. Flynn, MSM, NBC News CBS News, Trump, Washington Post, William P. Barr

If you heard two significantly different explanations for the same big mistake (and possible instance of wrongdoing) from the same organization, wouldn’t you at least think of investigating further, rather than simply leave the matter hanging? If so, congratulations. You have infinitely better journalistic instincts than Washington Post media columnist Erik Wemple – who’s supposed to earn a living trying to resolve such discrepancies, and who failed miserably in his coverage of a major recent journalism controversy.

The mistake and possible misdeed entail the treatment by NBC News’ Chuck Todd of an interview on another network with Attorney General William P. Barr. The film clip of that session – first broadcast on CBS News – used by Todd to kick off a panel discussion on the weekly Meet the Press program he hosts was missing a key passage. What Todd showed last Sunday morning depicted Barr answering in an apparently cynical way a question about his hotly debated decision to drop the Justice Department’s case against then senior Trump administration foreign policy appointee Michael T. Flynn.

Specifically, Barr was asked how he believed history would view his handling of the Flynn case. In the excerpt seen by Todd’s panelists and Meet the Press viewers, Barr’s answer stopped with the flip remark, “History is written by the winner, so it largely depends on who’s writing the history.”

As Todd noted, those words created the impression of Barr as a completely unscrupulous hack lacking any regard for his most solemn responsibility: “I was struck…by the cynicism of the answer. It’s a correct answer. But he’s the attorney general. He didn’t make the case that he was upholding the rule of law. He was almost admitting that, yeah, this is a political job.”

The problem is that Barr’s answer didn’t stop there. Wemple reported that he continued with the following points: “But I think a fair history would say that it was a good decision because it upheld the rule of law.  It helped, it upheld the standards of the Department of Justice, and it undid what was an injustice.” In other words, Todd’s comment, anel discussion, was utterly inaccurate.

And here’s where the conflicting explanations come in. That same evening, following a protest by the Justice Department’s chief press spokesperson (included in Wemple’s article), NBC responded with the following (also presented by Wemple):

“You’re correct. Earlier today, we inadvertently and inaccurately cut short a video clip of an interview with AG Barr before offering commentary and analysis. The remaining clip included important remarks from the attorney general that we missed, and we regret the error.”

That is, before sending the material to Todd and whoever helps him with these tasks, someone at NBC just happened to cut off a recording of the interview at exactly the point at which Barr transitioned from wisecrack mode to serious mode. I’m personally struggling to believe that this action was an innocent mistake, as NBC’s use of the word “inadvertently” clearly claims. After all, the deleted portion represented essential context. But maybe the scissor (or the digital  editing tool) slipped. So maybe the network’s expression of regret is totally sincere.

But Todd himself appears to disagree. Tuesday, in an on-the-air appearance, he gave viewers an entirely different version of events. According to Todd (and reported by Wemple),

“Now, we did not edit that [Barr material] out. That was not our edit. We didn’t include it because we only saw the shorter of two clips that CBS did air. We should have looked at both and checked for a full transcript. A mistake that I wish we hadn’t made and one I wish I hadn’t made. The second part of the attorney general’s answer would have put it in the proper context.”

He continued: “Had we seen that part of the CBS interview, I would not have framed the conversation the way I did, and I obviously am very sorry for that mistake. We strive to do better going forward.”

To his credit, Wemple raised disturbing questions about Todd’s account:

“The scope of these oversights bears some explanation. ‘Meet the Press’ aired on Sunday. CBS News published the transcript of the Barr interview in its entirety on Thursday, allowing ‘Meet the Press’ several days to evaluate it. A longer version of the interview video was available by Friday morning. The show’s mistake amounts to a stunning breakdown.”

But this partly helpful explanation was only partly helpful. For it missed the glaring contradiction between the two explanations. As I mentioned, it’s conceivable (despite Todd’s denial) that the crucial Barr passage was accidently snipped. It’s also possible that the Meet the Press staff was just lazy and incompetent, and failed to do the most elementary journalistic double-checking.

It is flatly impossible, however, for both explanations of the same set of events to be true. And yet Wemple not only overlooked this whopping inconsistency. He actually praised Todd’s apology for having “struck a tone consistent with the screw-up.”

Of course, that can’t simply be “end of story,” as Wemple clearly believes. Absent further investigation (“Wemple? Wemple?”) no one outside NBC News can know which of these versions of the Barr episode is true, or whether there’s still another explanation. So in the absence of definitive evidence, here are two alternatives that mustn’t be ruled out:

>If the snipping version is the more accurate, it wasn’t accidental at all. Instead, it may well have resulted from some zealous staffer who thought he or she could get away with an outright deception – largely because NBC has become a den of Never Trumpers, and because the other leading mainstream news organizations aren’t interested in seriously policing themselves even when unmistakable scams are uncovered, – as Wemple’s own performance has made clear. Sure Fox News might pick it up. But so what? Its findings usually get dismissed (by most outside ‘Fox Nation”) as raw partisanship anyway.

>If the lazy, incompetent version comes closest to the truth, it’s all too easy to imagine that everyone at Meet the Press is so devoted to the Resistance that as soon as someone spotted a Barr statement that made this also-loathed Attorney General look bad, no one saw no reason not to run with it.

And unless one of Wemple’s peers rises to the challenge, speculation is all that’s left. Because in this case, a so-called “media watchdog” lacked both bark and bite.

Following Up: More Data on America’s Dependence on Foreign Healthcare Goods

Tags

Barack Obama, Department of Health and Human Services, facemasks, Following Up, George W. Bush, health security, healthcare goods, imports, Lena H. Sun, manufacturing, masks, Mike Bowen, Prestige Ameritech, Rachel Siegel, supply chain, The American Conservative, Trump, Washington Post

Since news organizations can be so unreliable, I always do whatever I can to use information from primary sources instead of items in the media. I’m making an exception this morning, however, because I’ve failed to find a government document mentioned in several news articles, and reportedly it contains such important data that it deserves mention. Specifically, this document seems to add vital detail to my recent description in The American Conservative of how extensively the United States relies on foreign sources for crucial health care goods, and how long this gaping hole in the nation’s healthcare security has existed.

The document I can’t find has been described in this Washington Post piece as “a 2014 briefing released by the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.” Among its findings, according to Post correspondents Lena J. Sun and Rachel Siegel:

“Up to 95 percent of surgical masks are made outside the continental United States, in places like China and Mexico….”

The 2014 date, of course, is revealing in that it was two years before Donald Trump was elected President. Also revealing: The authors interviewed a domestic mask manufacturer who showed them letters he’s written to American Presidents warning that mask availability could be disrupted during a pandemic outbreak.

The first was written to Barack Obama in 2010. And apparently little or nothing was done. But the manufacturer, Mike Bowen of Texas-based Prestige Ameritech, says he reached out to George W. Bush’s administration as well – with the same results.

But just in case you think this is an establishment-bashing exercise, it’s important to note also that Bowen says he sent the same warning in 2017 – when Mr. Trump did occupy the Oval Office.

Contrary to much (self-serving) conventional wisdom, I’m not at all opposed to finger-pointing and blame-casting, even during a crisis. In fact, I view it as critical to ensuring that mistakes aren’t repeated. But I am opposed to cherry-picking finger-pointing. Because by now it should be abundantly clear that when it comes to U.S. national leaders and American health security, both Democrats and Republicans and liberals and conservatives and even populists have let the country down.

And the faster all partisans get off their high horses and focus on identifying lessons that need to be learned regardless of political effect, the faster Americans will overcome this crisis and the lower the chances of a rerun.

Im-Politic: The Latest Trump CCP Virus Fake News

Tags

Beth Cameron, CCP Virus, CDC, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, China, coronavirus, COVID 19, ebola, Im-Politic, National Security Council, NSC, Obama administration, pandemic, Politico, Tim Morrison, TIME, Trump, Washington Post, WHO, World Health Organization, Wuhan virus

I’m getting sick and tired of debunking Mainstream Media myths spread about the Trump administration’s failures in dealing with the CCP Virus (as I have now taken to calling it, in honor of the Chinese Communist Party regime’s role in covering it up and thereby preventing timely responses all over the world). And maybe you’re getting sick and tired of reading them.

All the same, the attacks keep coming, and three in particular that have appeared in the last week – which happen to be closely related to each other – are screaming out for pushback.

Off the bat, though, some essential context: As I’ve tweeted repeatedly, I agree that the President’s anti-Wuhan Virus (another monicker I’ve been using) policy has been flawed. Chiefly, Mr. Trump does deserve criticism for claiming until recently that everything’s under control – although I can’t help but continuing to note that the World Health Organization (WHO) didn’t declare the situation to be a global pandemic until March 11. That’s a grand total of nine days ago.

In addition, testing of course took off way too slowly. I strongly suspect that this stemmed from outmoded guidelines and manufacturing processes at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) that predated the Trump inauguration. But the buck in the U.S. government ultimately and rightly stops on the President’s desk, and a Chief Executive who’s described himself as a Can-do-type disrupter should have stopped the agency’s business-as-usual approach faster.

As for the broadsides with much less, if any, merit? The first concerns the claim that the administration foolishly abolished the National Security Council (NSC) office that it inherited from the Obama administration that focused on protecting the country from pandemics. This allegation, first made by that office’s first director, has been (to put it charitably) exposed as misleading by one of her NSC successors, Tim Morrison.

He’s explained that the office’s responsibilities were merged into a new office that looked at pandemics more holistically, because they’re closely related to challenges like those posed by weapons of mass destruction generally. And Morrison has contended – credibly – that thanks to various preparations made by this reorganized NSC, an Ebola outbreak was quashed quickly.

To be sure, as I’ve pointed out, the emergence of diseases in regions like Central Africa, which have scant connections with the global economy, and in places like China, which have extensive connections, pose dramatically different challenges. And I continue to think, as argued, that bureaucratic reforms involving such tiny government agencies are game-changers in real-world terms. But you’d think that the initial accuser, Beth Cameron, might consider apologizing. And that the Washington Post would acknowledge a huge fact-checking failure (though it did run the rejoinder).

What’s even less well known – and has gone even more scantily reported than the Morrison observations – is that Mr. Trump’s predecessors approved decisions that actually do look like genuine pandemic defense downgrades. According to this TIME magazine post:

“The Trump Administration has become the third White House in a row to downgrade or eliminate the senior White House personnel tasked with tracking disease and bioterrorism threats, according to Kenneth Bernard, a retired Rear Admiral and physician, who served as a special assistant to the president for security and health during the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations.”

TIME continues:

Bernard “served in the top role in the Clinton National Security Council, only to be ignored by the incoming George W. Bush Administration, which eliminated his special advisor position.

“But after the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington spurred fears Al-Qaeda would follow up with a bioweapons attack, and the anthrax attacks of 2001, the Bush Administration re-established the office, bringing Bernard back to serve as the first former Special Assistant to the President for Biodefense, as a subset of the White House’s Homeland Security Council (HSC), which later helped combat outbreaks of SARS and the Avian Influenza.”

And as for the Obama record:

“Under Obama’s NSC, Bernard says the office was downgraded again, until the 2014 Ebola crisis emerged, and President Barack Obama appointed ‘Ebola Czar’ Ron Klain. National Security Advisor Susan Rice later institutionalized the office in 2015, calling it the Directorate for Global Health and Security and Biodefense.”

Not exactly a model of foresight.

The next two myths were propagated (and weirdly invalidated at the same time) by this supposed Politico scoop about a transition-period Obama administration warning to the incoming Trump administration to ramp up for an inevitable big-time pandemic. The thrust of the article, written by Nahal Toosi, Daniel Lippman, and Dan Diamond, is that outgoing Obama officials held a briefing with soon-to-be Trump counterparts on the potential dangers of the kind of bio-threat being faced by the nation right now, and that the Trump-ers were decidedly uninterested.

The allegedly clear implication, as the article quoted former national security advisor Susan E. Rice as recently writing: “Rather than heed the warnings, embrace the planning and preserve the structures and budgets that had been bequeathed to him, the president ignored the risk of a pandemic.”

As noted above, the structures and budgets point is bogus. But so is the warnings point. And we know this in part because, as Politico stated (in paragraph 18), “None of the sources argued that one meeting three years ago could have dramatically altered events today.”

Also important to note: The authors presented documents presented at the meeting, and they make clear the phoniness of both the charge that Trump officials were (uniquely) caught flat-footed by CCP Virus testing requirements, and that the leadership vacuum they’ve created has given the states no choice but to fill a gap that’s not their responsibility.

Except the documents say absolutely nothing about boosting testing capabilities or modifying CDC guidelines. And they specify that “State and local governments lead public health response,” especially when it comes to “hospital preparedness and response.”

Recent news reports have created some optimism that effective anti-CCP Virus medicines may be developed sooner than initially expected.  Too bad there’s no reason to think that another serious malady – Trump Derangement Syndrome – will soon come under control.

Im-Politic: Bloomberg in China’s Pocket?

Tags

China, election 2020, Financial Times, Im-Politic, Ivanka Trump, Laura Ingraham, Michael Bloomberg, Michael Kranish, Trump, Washington Post, Xi JInPing

Boy! I thought Michael Bloomberg’s business’ dependence on China was worrisome when I first read this early January Financial Times report on the billionaire Democratic presidential candidate’s lucrative conference-holding business in the People’s Republic!

Then thanks to a segment last week on Laura Ingraham’s Fox News cable talk show, I checked out this Washington Post piece on the same subject – which I somehow missed – and I’ve gotten even more worried. And since Bloomberg has been rising steadily in the polls in recent weeks, and is spending a big chunk of his fortune on the campaign, you should be worried, too.

Now I know what at least some of you are thinking: President Trump and his family have done a lot of business with China, too. So why single out the former New York City mayor?

Here’s why: First, I strongly agreed that it was unacceptable for presidential daughter Ivanka Trump to stay involved in any way with her fashion business after her father’s election, especially since it sourced products from China and sought to sell in the Chinese market. She finally agreed with this (widespread) view and shut down the brand in mid-2018. So that’s one big difference between the Trumps and Bloomberg, since the latter is still making big bucks in China.

More important, though – with Trump tariffs still in place on literally hundreds of billions of dollars worth of prospective Chinese exports to the United States, and the President having made life tough for China in numerous other major ways ranging from prosecuting telecommunications giant Huawei to strongly supporting Taiwan in word and deed, can anyone seriously believe that Mr. Trump has been soft on Beijing?

Bloomberg, by contrast, clearly has, and his record of panda-hugging is not only several years old, but has continued unabated during his run for the White House. The aforementioned Post article spells out in detail the pro-China positions he’s taken, which include opposition to the Trump tariffs (without explaining how he’d deal with Chinese trade abuses he’s acknowledged) and the insistence that China’s communist leader Xi Jinping “is not a dictator” (made as Beijing was cracking down on Hong Kong’s democracy protests and imprisoning on a massive, concentration camp-like scale members of the country’s Muslim Uighur minority group.

And when his ongoing business dealings with the Chinese are examined in detail, it’s easy to see why Bloomberg has worked so hard to remain in Beijing’s good graces. For example, as the Post reported, Bloomberg ”expanded one of his company’s financial indexes, which could steer $150 billion into China while earning his firm an undisclosed amount in fees.”

In effect, this move awarded the Chinese government and the various commercial and financial entities it controls a Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval valued immensely by big institutional investors who control trillions of dollars worth of savings around the world.

Moreover, according to Post reporter Michael Kranish, “mainland China accounts for 1 percent of Bloomberg LP’s [$10 billion in annual] revenue and Hong Kong for another 4 percent.”

As for those China conferences, the Financial Times revealed that

“live events now make up nearly 15 per cent of all revenues for the news division that sits within the billionaire’s financial data company.

“This has grown from less than 1 per cent in 2014, thanks largely to the success of one event: the New Economy Forum. Mr Bloomberg launched the conference last year, aimed at connecting global business leaders with the Chinese elite.

“Only in its second year, the NEF already makes up about 65 per cent of all live events revenue for Bloomberg Media, according to a spokesperson.”

And if you still doubt China’s importance to Bloomberg’s coffers, consider that, as Kranish wrote, Bloomberg “has led efforts since 2015 to make it easier for U.S. companies to trade in Chinese currency, a move embraced by China’s largest banks” – which are of course all run by the state.

Bloomberg’s successes in public opinion surveys anyway has led to charges that he’s trying to buy the presidency. At least equally important to ask is whether the Chinese have bought Bloomberg.

Im-Politic: Media Bias Even in Impeachment Trial Basics

Tags

House managers, Im-Politic, impeachment, impeachment trial, Trump, Washington Post

Charges of media bias are so common nowadays that their simple volume can undercut their credibility. But at least from time to time some such instances are so flagrant that they should generate condemnation across the political or ideological spectra, and the latest came yesterday on the Washington Post website’s home page.

It’s no longer on-line (and didn’t appear in print), but it consisted of capsule descriptions of the House’s impeachment managers and Trump legal team, and I was so offended that I made sure to copy them as soon as I saw them. Here they are, starting with the managers (and they are indeed worth presenting in full):

Rep. Adam B. Schiff: “The California Democrat is known for distilling complicated subjects clearly and having a willingness to go after Trump’s soft spots.”

Rep. Jerry Nadler: “The New York Democrat leads the committee traditionally in charge of impeachment and shepherded the articles through Congress.”

Rep. Zoe Lofgren: “The California Democrat, who is serving her 13th term, is one of the most experienced members of Congress on impeachment.”

Rep. Hakeem Jeffries: “House Speaker Pelosi described the New York Democrat as ‘an accomplished litigator in private practice’ before seeking office.”

Rep. Val Demings: “The Florida Democrat was the first female police chief in Orlando, and Pelosi cited her law enforcement background as a strength.”

Rep. Jason Crow: “The Democrat from Colorado served as an Army Ranger and was partner in a law firm in Colorado.”

Rep. Sylvia Garcia: “The first-term Texas Democrat was a municipal judge in Houston and was one of the first Latinas elected to Congress from Texas.”

And here are the descriptions of the Trump team:

Pat Cipollone: “Republican lawmakers have described Cipollone as the ‘quarterback’ for Trump’s: legal strategy.”

Jay Sekulow: “Sekulow is the leader of the president’s personal legal team and he represented Trump during special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s Russia investigation.”

Ken Starr: “Starr is the independent counsel who investigated President Bill Clinton.”

Alan Dershowitz: “Dershowitz is the Harvard Law emeritus professor who advised the defense team in football star O.J. Simpson’s murder trial.”

Pam Bondi: “Bondi was the attorney general in Florida for eight years and has a number of ties to Trump.”

Robert Ray: “Ray is the former independent counsel, replacing Starr in October 1999, who oversaw the agreement with Clinton that averted a possible criminal trial.”

Pat Philbin: “Philbin is Cipollone’s right-hand man, his most senior deputy in the White House’s legal office.”

Michael Purpora: “Purpura took the lead on battling to prevent White House grand jury testimony from the Mueller investigation from being made public.”

You see the pattern here? Of the Post‘s seven House manager blurbs, four (those for Schiff, Lofgren, Jeffries, and Crow) contained flattering value judgments. And the favorable Crow description included experience that’s of course impressive militarily, but completely irrelevant to the impeachment trial, or any legal matters.

Of the seven Trump lawyer blurbs, none contained a flattering value judgment and three contained references arguably aimed at sliming their subjects (the link drawn between Dershowitz and O.J. Simpson; the observation of Bondi’s (unspecified) “ties to Trump”; and Purpura’s role in what’s all but dismissed as a cover-up.

As for Cipollone and Purpora and Philbin, it would be easy for Post readers to conclude from these otherwise straight factual portrayals that their careers have included no positions of consequence other than their Trump White House jobs – even though the first served as a senior aide to then Attorney General William P. Barr during the administration of George H.W. Bush (no fan of Mr. Trump’s); the second worked as a senior Justice Department official during the administration of George W. Bush (no Trump enthusiast, either), as well as a federal prosecutor in New York; and the third held jobs in Justice’s chain of command under Bush 43.

Everyone should be free to believe that the House managers are mainly legal eagles and/or paragons of virtue and even heroism, and that the Trump legal team is dominated by mere Trump flunkies. But such views don’t bear the slightest resemblance to facts, and if a newspaper fails to  keep this distinction straight for what should be a relatively uncontroversial informational feature, why should anyone trust it on anything less cut and dried?