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Tony Snow Subject Files
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Snow, Tony, Files
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18
29
2
3
THE EXPERTS WHO GOT THE GULF WAR ALL WRONG
MARCH 25, 1991$2.95
THE
NEW REPUBLIC
James J. Cramer: the markeťs rebound
Stephen Holmes: Christopher Lasch's Jeremiad
THE RAPE AND RESCUE
OF KUWAIT
By Michael Kelly
Kinsley, on the Kondracke,
political hangovernes
The self-inflicted disasters
12
of Palestinian politics
49140
BY MARTIN PERETZ
0 787445 1
"We've all had to work for years to make every surface of the B-2 so precise,
every curve SO carefully complex. Those intricate curves are part of the secret of
ORT
Stealth. And in the future, Stealth is going to make the difference, SO our pilots
can get their jobs done, safely." - Janet Toler, flight test engineer.
People making advanced technology work.
Engine inlet, B-2 Stealth bomber.
© 1991 Northrop Corporation.
NEW THE REPUBLIC
A Weekly Journal of Opinion
Editor-in-Chief and Chairman
MARCH 25, 1991
FOUNDED 1914
MARTIN PERETZ
WASHINGTON, D.C.
Editor
ISSUE 3,975
HENDRIK HERTZBERG
Literary Editor
LEON WIESELTIER
Managing Editor
DOROTHY WICKENDEN
Deputy Editor
ANDREW SULLIVAN
Senior Editors
Cover: Surrendering Iraqi troops march
FRED BARNES, SIDNEY BLUMENTHAL,
into Saudi Arabia, February 26, 1991.
ANN HULBERT, MICKEY KAUS,
Photo by Greg English/Wide World Photos.
MICHAEL KINSLEY, MORTON KONDRACKE,
JACOB WEISBERG, ROBERT WRIGHT
Article on page 20.
Editor, New Republic Books (Basic Books)
PETER BEJGER
Economics
4 MICHAEL KINSLEY TRB: FEAR OF '92 The Democrats' dilemma.
ROBERT KUTTNER
Films
Theater
6 CORRESPONDENCE Bubble-dwellers burst, &c.
STANLEY KAUFFMANN
ROBERT BRUSTEIN
Music
Poetry
EDWARD ROTHSTEIN
RICHARD HOWARD
7 THE EDITORS THE DEAD Iraq's appalling military casualties should suggest to Ameri-
Art
Architecture
cans that there is an important difference between being right and being innocent.
MARK STEVENS
HERBERT MUSCHAMP
NOTEBOOK Dennis DeConcini, fellow travelers in space, &c.
Contributing Editors
ELIOT A. COHEN, ROBERT COLES,
10 MORTON KONDRACKE PARTY POOPER What the Gulf war has done to the Democrats.
STANLEY CROUCH, JAMES K. GLASSMAN,
JOHN B. JUDIS, CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER,
VINT LAWRENCE, LOUIS MENAND, ADAM MICHNIK,
12 FRED BARNES WHITE HOUSE WATCH: WAR DIVIDEND Why Bush and his aides think the
ROBERT B. REICH, JONATHAN RIEDER,
MAGGIE SCARF, RONALD STEEL, E. V. THAW,
victory in the Gulf may enable them to avoid domestic policy altogether.
ANNE TYLER, NICHOLAS VON HOFFMAN,
MICHAEL WALZER, C. VANN WOODWARD
13 MARTIN PERETZ WORST ENEMY Meet the Palestinians' nemesis: themselves.
Editorial-Corporate Coordinator
LAURA E. OBOLENSKY
Assistant to the Editors
16 JAMES J. CRAMER SHORTED OUT How the stock market bears got the war all wrong.
JUNE HALEY
Assistant Editors
17 JACOB WEISBERG GULFBALLS Academy Awards for erroneous experts.
KAREN LEHRMAN, LEONA HIRAOKA ROTH
Production Director
BRUCE STEINKE
18 DAVID SEGAL SHRINK RAP Judith Kipper, pundit-psychoanalyst.
Production Manager
KRISTIN CONRADI
20 MICHAEL KELLY THE RAPE AND RESCUE OF KUWAIT CITY The fate of Kuwaitis at the
Production Associate
hands of the Iraqi invaders was worse than the grimmest prognostications. Our cor-
DON HARRIS
respondent reports from the streets, homes, and morgues of a ransacked capital.
Literary Assistant
AIMS McGUINNESS
Reporter-Researchers
28 STANLEY KAUFFMANN ON FILMS: POP ART AND BULLS Here's a surprise: an absorbing,
DAVID GREENBERG, JONATHAN KARL,
even amusing, documentary about the life of Andy Warhol.
JAMES WORKMAN
29 STEPHEN HOLMES THE WRONG AND WINDING ROAD The True and Only Heaven: Progress
President
and Its Critics by Christopher Lasch
JEFFREY L. DEARTH
Publisher
JOAN M. STAPLETON
34 EDWARD HIRSCH POEM In the Midwest
Associate Publisher-Marketing
PAULJ. VIZZA
36 CHRISTOPHER HOPE THE MAN WHO PRESUMED Dark Safari: The Life Behind the Legend of
Associate Publisher-Circulation
Henry Morton Stanley by John Bierman
H. EDWARD YOUNG
Controller
JEAN GANDY
42 WILLIAM PRITCHARD THE COMPLEAT POET-CRITIC Under Briggflatts: A History of Poetry in
Advertising Director
Great Britain, 1960-1988 and Collected Poems by Donald Davie
JENNIFER BARRETT
Accounting Manager
CHRISTINA R. OVERHOLSER
46 DAVID GREENBERG WASHINGTON DIARIST: SPIN-OFFS Clothes good enough to eat.
Circulation Manager
PATTI NAJDA
THE NEW REPUBLIC, Vol. 204, Number 12, Issue 3,975, March 25, 1991. (Printed in the U.S. on March 6, 1991.) Pub-
Advertising Assistant
lished weekly (except for combined issues dated Jan. 7 & 14, July 15 & 22, Aug. 19 & 26, and Sept. 16 & 23, 1991) at 1220
CECELIA M. STEPHENS
19th Street, NW, Washington, DC 20036. Telephone (202) 331-7494. Leadership Network advertising (212) 684-5500.
Yearly subscriptions, $69.97; foreign, $99.97; Canada, $84.97. Back issues, $3.50 (includes postage & handling). ©1991
Accounting Assistant
by The New Republic, Inc. (ISSN 0028-6583). Second-class postage paid at Washington, DC, and additional mailing
CHRISTINE SCHAUT
offices. Indexed in Readers' Guide, Media Review Digest. Microform, CD-ROM, issue and article copies are available
Back Issues and Reception
through University Microfilms Intnl., 300 N. Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, MI 48106. Telephone 1-800-521-0600. Member,
CAROLYN PARHAM
Audit Bureau of Circulations. Unsolicited manuscripts can be returned only if accompanied by a stamped, self-addressed
Leadership Network Advertising
envelope. Subscribers: Please send all remittances, changes of address, and subscription inquiries to Subscription Service
ROBERT F. SENNOTT JR.
Dept., The New Republic, P.O. Box 56515, Boulder, CO 80322. For subscription problems call 800-274-6686.
MARCH 25, 1991 THE NEW REPUBLIC 3
the last war. Now everyone looks at their
rading endless tiresome doubts of his
watches and says, "Where are the candi-
own worthiness. These gentlemen have
TRB
dates?"
just about persuaded me, at least, that
Nevertheless, it's a good question. If
their hesitation is justified. To counter
the difficulty is that George Bush now
the new giant-sized Bush will require
looks like a fearless, macho, leaderlike
some genuine enthusiasm. Perhaps I
kinda guy, while the Democrats look
speak for many potential Democratic vot-
weak and craven, the reluctance of all
ers in saying that we are not interested in
the big-name Democrats to take the man
delicacies at this moment. We want to be
on tends to confirm that sad impression.
thrown some raw meat.
The best proof that some Democrat has
Another defect of American politics is
FROM WASHINGTON
world-class guts would be a willingness to
the difficulty of running for president
challenge the former wimp while he
more than once. If you go for the nomi-
stands at over 90 percent in the polls.
nation and lose, you are often saddled
To be sure, next year's Democratic
with debts. If you get the nomination,
nominee will probably lose, and could
your debts can be paid (and your fall
Fear of '92
well lose big. They usually do. But think
campaign is federally funded). But if you
of all the things that might change the
lose the November election, the sys-
If your grandmother announced that she
landscape. To be grim, there is always
tem-the media, the opposition, your
was going to spend her entire Social Se-
the possibility that something could hap-
own party-chews you up and spits you
curity check on state lottery tickets, you'd
pen to Bush's health. Or the economy
out. Michael Dukakis is held in absurd
tell her it was a dumb idea. If she did it
could decline catastrophically. Or there
contempt for a man who got 46 percent
anyway and won, you weren't wrong: it
could be a horrendous Watergate-style
of the vote against a virtual incumbent.
was still a dumb idea. But saying so would
political scandal. Hoping for bad news is
The Democratic panjandrums could do
ring a bit hollow, and grandma would
unattractive and unhealthy, so consider
the political system and their own party a
have earned the right to gloat.
as well another possibility, however un-
big favor by making clear now that anyone
President Bush warned halfheartedly
likely: a charismatic Democrat might
who runs against George Bush in 1992 and
against national gloating in his victory
persuade voters to think about the fu-
does respectably will be the acknowledged
speech on February 28. But politically
ture, not the past, and inspire them with
head of the party and presumptive nomi-
Republicans can't help but gloat. The
a vision of a government they find prefer-
nee for 1996. That would immediately
widespread feeling is that-foolish or
able to the Republican one of the previ-
make next year's nomination more worth
courageous-President Bush's winning
ous twelve years. Stranger things have
having. Even barring a 1992 upset, it would
gamble on war has put him beyond all
happened. Don't ask me what.
also give some Democratic "shadow presi-
competition for 1992. People who op-
The chance of any one of these devel-
dent" four years to develop plausibility
posed the war, including most potential
opments occurring is small. Even adding
and gravitas. By 1996 he could seem more
Democratic presidential candidates, are
these remote chances together may not
"presidential" than whatever fresh face
left with little to say.
get you anywhere near a likelihood of 51
the Republicans might nominate.
It is annoying but politically useless to
percent. But adding them together surely
If the Democrats' strategy in '92 is go-
recall that Bush, against Democratic ob-
gets you up to 20 or 30 percent. Is there
ing to be "change the subject"-and
jections, was tilting toward Saddam at a
really no Democrat who is willing to gam-
what other strategy is there?-that dic-
time when one stern phone call would
ble on a one-in-five chance of being presi-
tates nominating someone who support-
have made the whole business unneces-
dent of the United States? Sad, if so.
ed Bush on the war. This won't eliminate
sary. It is mere irony that Bush's new-
To maximize that chance, this Demo-
the Bush advantage, of course, but it will
found foreign policy "vision"-a world
crat has got to speak up soon. Now that
help to neutralize the war as direct issue
order based on international law and the
Bush is such a towering figure, his Demo-
in the campaign. There are only two war
United Nations-is straight out of the
cratic challenger needs as much time as
supporters on the list of likelies: Al Gore
1988 Dukakis campaign. One Democrat
possible to become familiar to the public
and Chuck Robb. I won't reveal a prefer-
says the party ought to take the money
and plausible as a commander in chief. If
ence, except to say that Robb strikes me
that would ordinarily be spent on choos-
his strategy is the positive one of hoping to
as having no original thoughts or genu-
ing and running a presidential candi-
inspire people rather than the negative
ine principles. That may be a disadvan-
date, and give it to the homeless instead.
one of waiting for national catastrophe,
tage, though I'm not entirely sure. TNR
The likely candidates seem to be in a
that also takes time. Ideological territory
readers are familiar with Gore's tradi-
similar mood. Four years ago there was
needs to be staked out before it is occu-
tional virtues. In addition to these, he
already politico gridlock in Iowa and
pied by Bush's elite Republican guard. For
has the advantage of being named Al,
New Hampshire. All that has naturally
the party's good, too, the sooner there is
like SO many other players in the Bush-
been on hold for the past few months.
someone who can be identified as "lead-
created New World Order: Al Sabah, Al
But even before the war, the 1992 elec-
er" of the Democrats other than George
Anbari, and SO on.
tion was off to a slow start. The only lead-
Mitchell and Ron Brown, the better.
As for Democrats who opposed the
ing Democrat so far even to hint he
American politics is encumbered with
war, I suggest the dignified mantra: "We
might run for president next year is Ye
a convention, not shared by other demo-
were concerned above all not to sacrifice
Olde George McGovern.
cratic systems, that reluctance to run is
the lives of America's fighting men and
The complaint that 1992 political cam-
somehow becoming in a political candi-
women. We are delighted to have been
paigns haven't started yet might justly
date. The more one reveals an actual de-
proved wrong." Repeat after me: "We
elicit the response that there's no pleas-
sire for elected office, the less one is con-
were
concerned
And give up that
ing some people. After the 1988 election,
sidered worthy of it. Bill Bradley and
business about how we'll never know if
the pundits were all moaning about the
Mario Cuomo have made careers by now
the sanctions would have worked. It's
"permanent campaign": electioneering
of their preening hesitation about run-
profoundly true. Give it up anyway.
starts too early, lasts too long, and so on.
ning for president-Bradley perennially
That complaint, it seems, was fighting
honing himself to perfection, Cuomo pa-
MICHAEL KINSLEY
4 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
COME TRUCKING
COMPANIES
WANT THEM.
DO YOU?
Double and triple trailer trucks, almost half a
football field long and weighing more than
41 automobiles.
The trucking companies that want them
are trying very hard to persuade Congress
to clear the way for them to
run everywhere.
If these trucking companies have
their way, there will be a lot more
of these trucks on the highways
and a lot more traffic. That means
more accidents, more fuel con-
sumption, more congestion,
more pollution and more
damage to the roads.
If you don't want these
bigger trucks, you can
stop them.
To find out how,
call 1-800-592-2100
or send the
coupon.
I DON'T WANT LONGER, HEAVIER TRUCKS.
PLEASE SEND ME INFORMATION
ON HOW I CAN STOP THEM.
Mail to:
Association of American Railroads
P.O. Box 3407-Dept. B
Monticello, MN 55565-3407
Name:
Address:
City:
State:
Zip:
Phone: (
)
ASSOCIATION OF AMERICAN RAILROADS
NR
CORRESPONDENCE
against our perceived interests. Democ-
never visited the Biosphere 2 project or
racies in countries that have been histori-
met any of the people whose characters
cally emasculated can give rise to dema-
he flays so authoritatively.
goguery very easily. Demagogues in the
Scores of bona fide journalists-in-
Arab world would call for a war with Isra-
cluding leading science reporters-who
Vox populi
el, and probably for oil sanctions against
have seen Biosphere 2 and met staff
America and the European powers.
members discovered issues to discuss
Many in the Arab and Islamic world are
such as sustainable resource manage-
To the editors:
angry at Saddam Hussein because he
ment, wilderness preservation and res-
Do not be SO quick to criticize the lack
made war with Iran and Kuwait rather
toration, air and water recycling. By
of democracy in the Middle East
than on Israel.
contrast, what does Mr. Heard find sig-
("War of Nerves," March 4). If the
JOHN P. RITCHOTTE
nificant? Twenty years ago, it seems,
majority will of the Arab people were
Washington, D.C.
Biosphere 2's research director, John
expressed, it is quite possible that Isra-
Allen, irritated a history professor who
el as we know it today would cease to
exist.
Bioethics
objected to his temper and supposed
ability to influence others. Another staff
Between 1925 and 1960 the United
member, a master's level electrical engi-
States and/or Great Britain conspired
To the editors:
neer, once (before he worked for Bio-
to overthrow or destabilize democrati-
Alex Heard's article on Biosphere 2
sphere 2) lent a pistol to a sleight-of-
cally oriented governments in Egypt,
("Lost in Space," January 21) illustrates
hand stage magician who subsequently
Syria, Iraq, Jordan, and Iran. The ratio-
the first principle of prudent investiga-
was injured while target shooting in a
nales presented have included protec-
tive journalism-seek evil in the safest
junk yard.
tion of economic investments (oil),
possible place. Seek is perhaps too
Mr. Heard objects to the project hav-
World War II security concerns, and a
strong a word, however, since Mr. Heard
ing (1) written letters warning ex-
perceived Soviet threat. We have his-
employees of a subcontractor that mak-
torically supported traditional leaders
1-900-726-6671
ing false statements is actionable; (2)
who favor slow, measured change and
The New Republic welcomes correspondence
advised a Canadian current affairs pro-
from whom we do not perceive a
from its readers. A fast, new way of doing this
gram that certain statements possibly
threat, and we have opposed liberal or
is our new 900 line. Deliver your opinions—
intended for broadcast were untrue;
totalitarian leaders who promote rapid,
long-pondered or spontaneous-over the
and (3) offered documentation in sup-
chaotic change.
phone. They will be considered for publica-
port of the facts. Statements of opin-
I believe the United States will contin-
tion on this page along with regular letters to
ion-critical and supportive-are rou-
ue to try to prevent the creation of true
the editor. A call costs $1.25 a minute.
tinely included in hundreds of media
democracies because they may act
1-900-726-6671
reports on Biosphere 2. A literature
search would easily indicate that no
statement of opinion has ever been
contested. But any individual, corpora-
Old Rights and New
tion, or project has the right to chal-
lenge false and erroneous representa-
tions of fact.
Are They the Same?
Why does a privately funded ecologi-
cal research project deserve such a thor-
ough trashing, particularly on the basis
The second of three AEI seminars celebrating
of this kind of hearsay? Perhaps an ex-
the bicentennial of the Bill of Rights.
perimental biosphere and environmen-
tal research are safer targets than envi-
ronmental polluters.
Speakers: HARVEY C. MANSFIELD, Jr.
KATHLEEN A. DYHR
Harvard University
Oracle, Arizona
The writer is director of information systems at the Bio-
HENRY SHUE
sphere 2 project.
Cornell University
Network dues
Friday, March 22, 1991; 12:30-5:30 p.m.
To the editors:
American Enterprise Institute, 1150 17th Street, N.W.
In "Ad Nauseam" (February 18) James
Washington, D.C. 20036
Workman worries that TV advertisers,
skittish about the way their commercials
Admission free.
might be perceived when aired in the
To register, call Hilary Laytham at 202/862-5830.
midst of war coverage, could end up cre-
ating "the real censorship" in the Gulf
Presented by the American Enterprise Institute
war. But why is it apparently reasonable
AEI
assisted by a grant from
(if not necessarily desirable) for net-
works and their affiliates to truncate war
The National Endowment for the Humanities
coverage in the interest of preserving
commercial profits, while it is somehow
craven (if not downright sinister) for ad-
continued on page 45
6 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
NEW THE REPUBLIC
MARCH 25, 1991
THE DEAD
"Casualties were remarkably low," wrote one jubilant
and thereby sunder the coalition of Americans and Arabs
commentator in The New York Times last week, explaining
arrayed against him. If we were not tormented with pic-
the differences between the American war in the Gulf
tures of carnage in Baghdad, it may be because there was
and the American war in Vietnam. He wrote imprecisely.
not much carnage in Baghdad.
American casualties were remarkably low. Iraqis, though,
There are no such things as perfectly surgical strikes.
died by the scores of thousands, and mostly at American
And yet it seems safe to say that this war was the first war in
hands. Any attempt to pin down the number of Iraqi
which we saw the moral utility of the technology of preci-
casualties, to find the exact number of dead and wound-
sion guidance. The more precisely you target a weapon,
ed, has SO far been futile. Opponents of the war bandy
the less destructive the weapon has to be. The American
about hellishly large numbers and supporters of the war
air strikes against Baghdad seem to have been character-
bandy about heavenly small numbers. Neither Baghdad
ized by such a micro-proportionality of means to ends.
nor Washington has released official estimates. Still, we
We know less about the American strikes at nuclear,
cannot hide behind the absence of the arithmetic.
chemical, and biological production facilities around
Iraq has just suffered enormously. That is incontest-
the country; but if it seems safe to assume that civilians
able. The moral evaluation of Desert Shield, Desert
were killed in those strikes, it also seems safe to assume
Storm, and Desert Saber will not be complete until
that Saddam had "collocated" civilians, that is, held civil-
Americans speak candidly and carefully about these con-
ians hostage, at those targets. It is certainly the case that
sequences of our actions, too. The United States has
the United States did not target residential areas or civil-
much to celebrate, but our celebration must not be
ian centers. (There are those, some of them supporters
humanly obtuse, as if we feared to acknowledge the full
of the war, who argue that we destroyed too much of
picture of the desert battlefield, as if the acknowledg-
Baghdad's infrastructure, that we should have spared
ment of the costs of our victory is itself a threat to our
more power lines and the like, and thereby spared
sense of purpose, or to the support that Americans are
Baghdad some of its present hardship; but it is im-
showing for our reasons for fighting, and our methods of
possible to fight a war without diminishing the
fighting, this war.
enemy's communications, and in any event no
For a rudimentary analysis, let us break down the prob-
proof has been brought forward that those at-
lem into civilian casualties and military casualties. About
tacks were costly in lives.) It is ironic that some of
civilian casualties in Baghdad, we know almost nothing.
the people who are certain of massive civilian casual-
We must assume, of course, that there are dead and
ties are the same people who complain about the "Nin-
wounded-collateral damage, in the anesthetizing lan-
tendo war," about the eerie, dehumanizing, video-game
guage of the planners. And yet the fact that we know
quality of the air campaign. Either the air campaign was
nothing is itself evidence to support the view, or the hope,
chillingly precise or it wasn't.
that civilian casualties in Baghdad were not very great. It
About Iraqi military casualties, however, Americans
is hard to believe that Saddam would have refrained from
should pause. Again, there are no official figures, but the
making immediate and vivid use of whatever images of
military analyst Trevor N. Dupuy estimates that there
slaughtered innocents he could adduce. Indeed, when
were 100,000 to 150,000 Iraqi military casualties, includ-
the United States bombed the bunker in Baghdad, and
ing 25,000 to 50,000 deaths. Those are grim numbers.
discovered to its obviously sincere horror that the struc-
They reflect the magnitude of the American effort, and
ture held hundreds of women and children, reporters in
the strategy that guided it. The United States liberated
all the media were hospitably rushed to the scene. Propa-
Kuwait and destroyed the military might of Saddam Hus-
ganda was one of Saddam's most critical weapons in this
sein by applying overwhelming force. Our ground cam-
war, particularly propaganda that would inflame Arabs
paign was brilliant, but also blunt. We did what General
MARCH 25, 1991 THE NEW REPUBLIC 7
Colin Powell promised we would do: we isolated the
responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of Iraqi
Iraqi army and then we killed it.
soldiers. But we are also responsible for the end of Sad-
The extraordinary surrender with which the Iraqi
dam's endless war, for the elimination of the most threat-
troops met the American troops can be explained in two
ening and the most used arsenal in the developing world,
ways. Either Saddam's soldiers began the war defeated or
for the prospect of a new peace in the recalcitrant region.
they ended the war defeated. That is, they folded either
Our actions should be subjected to the scrutiny of our
because they were poor slobs terrorized by their com-
consciences. We believe that they will withstand such
manders, with nothing to fight for, who welcomed the
scrutiny. The United States and its allies have eliminated
Americans as their own liberators, too; or because they
an evil. Not all evil, just one evil; but quite a one it was.
were persuaded by American force that they had met their
match, and concluded that this time it was not in their
interest or in their power to inflict the kind of punishment
NOTEBOOK
that they had inflicted SO proudly on Iranian troops for
most of a decade. It is impossible to know which explana-
tion is the right one. But the issue is not only analytical.
P
HONE PHUN: Michael Kinsley (reluctantly) argues
For the American high command, it was also practical;
in this week's TRB column that for the Democrats to
and it would have been the height of irresponsibility, a
maximize their chances in next year's presidential
dereliction of his duty, for General Norman Schwarzkopf
election, they would be well advised to nominate
to premise his plans on the belief that the Iraqi army
someone who supported the use of force in the Per-
would not fight, that it had no wish to win the war or to do
sian Gulf. What do you think? You can register your
substantial damage to the coalition forces. In the event,
opinion by calling our Sound Off line, 1-900-726-6671.
the land war was a walkover. But it did not have to be one.
The results will be reported in this space two weeks
The Republican Guards were, after all, one of the most
hence.
feared forces in recent times. Their "softening up" from
the air was not an act of unjustifiable cruelty.
How, then, should Americans think, in the middle of
D
ENNIS THE MENACE: We need hardly add our
all their good feeling, about those 25,000 to 50,000 Iraqi
voice to the chorus attacking the Senate Ethics Commit-
soldiers? For a start, it is worth reminding ourselves,
tee for its craven verdict in the Keating Five case. But
though not for the purpose of avoiding the question, that
what really burns is the exoneration of Dennis DeConci-
the moral status of soldiers in war is different than the
ni. By any standard, DeConcini's lapses were as severe as
moral status of civilians in war. But there is a more funda-
Alan Cranston's, if not worse. Cranston took more of
mental consideration that must be entered into the dis-
Charles Keating's money, but DeConcini fought more
cussion, which goes to the heart of the American charac-
ruthlessly on his behalf. DeConcini led the efforts to lean
ter. It is that there is a difference between being right and
on federal regulators. The meetings organized to intimi-
being innocent. The Arab and American and European
date them were held in his office. When John McCain
forces that destroyed the power of Saddam were right,
decided to quit lobbying for Lincoln Savings and Loan,
but they were not innocent. There are just wars and there
he tendered his resignation to DeConcini-not to Keat-
are unjust wars, but no war, just or unjust, can be fought
ing. DeConcini was the driving force behind the ap-
without getting blood on the hands.
pointment of Keating stooge Lee Henkel to the Federal
In the discussion of American means, it is important
Home Loan Bank Board. Along with Cranston, DeCon-
not to lose sight of American ends. Saddam may look
cini continued lobbying long after knowing that Keating
pathetic now, but that is because we have made him pa-
was the target of a criminal investigation. During the
thetic. Before this war he was the figure in the contempo-
hearings DeConcini lobbied the Ethics Committee just
rary world who most perfectly combined the appetite for
as hard, parading his infant granddaughter before the
mass destruction with the tools for mass destruction.
cameras. At no point did he betray even an iota of shame.
Since he rose to power, he did nothing but invade his
That's also the case, apparently, with the committee.
neighbors. (The first invasion lasted an unexpected
eight years.) He was the first strongman about whose will-
ingness to use the chemical weapons he had acquired
S
TALINOIDS IN SPACE: Naming the craters on Ve-
there was no need to speculate. He was a man dead to
nus after women writers strikes us as a nice convention.
death, an expansionist completely indifferent to the stu-
Sappho, Emily Dickinson, Willa Cather, and Virginia
pefying human costs of his efforts to expand. If the peo-
Woolf, and many of the others so honored would even
ple of Iraq are now looking for a reason for what has
merit rings of Saturn or moons of Jupiter. But did the
happened to their state and their society, they should
U.S. Geological Survey have to name one after Lillian
look to Baghdad, not to Washington. It was Saddam who
Hellman? Are there really no anonymous black holes
invited Iraq's ruin. It was he who preferred delusions of
left?
Mesopotamian (and in the eleventh hour, Muslim) gran-
deur to the safety and the prosperity of his people.
So let us be frank with ourselves. Away with the illusion
S
AME SENATOR, SAME CONSTITUENT:
of American innocence. There were casualties. We are
"Thank you for contacting me to express your opposi-
8 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
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©Newbridge Communications, Inc.
New Republic 3/25/91
U-ZY5
tion
to the early use of military force by the US
erate Kuwait, in spite of the fact that it took five weeks
against Iraq. I share your concerns. On January 11, I
of non-stop bombing and the onset of a ground war for
voted in favor of a resolution that would have insisted
Saddam Hussein even to consider the idea. At that, the
that economic sanctions be given more time to work
Democrats were aiming at nothing more than an Iraqi
and against a resolution giving the president the imme-
withdrawal; Bush accomplished the greater mission of
diate authority to go to war."
demolishing Iraq's offensive military potential. Senator
-letter from Senator John Kerry to Wallace Carter of Newton Centre,
Bob Kerrey is on tape opposing the original deploy-
Massachusetts, dated January 22
ment of U.S. forces to the Gulf and accusing President
"Thank you very much for contacting me to express
Bush of resembling "a little league football coach more
your support for the actions of President Bush in
than a commander in chief" in threatening Iraq with
response to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. From the
war. And Richard Gephardt is there saying that Con-
outset of the invasion, I have strongly and unequiv-
gress could cut off funds for a war if Bush started it
ocally supported President Bush's response to the
without congressional approval.
crisis and the policy goals he has established with
The Republicans also have videotape of senators up
our military deployment in the Persian Gulf."
for re-election (six of whom were elected in 1986 with
-Senator Kerry to Wallace Carter, January 31
margins of less than five percent of the vote), including
Terry Sanford of North Carolina, who described the
Gulf conflict as "the most unnecessary war in the his-
The Democrats and the war.
tory of this nation," and Ernest Hollings of South Caro-
lina, who said that "within six months, every funda-
mentalist mullah, every Arab nationalist, will say, 'the
United States came here and invaded this Third World
country
for
oil.
And, face it, they will be speaking
PARTY POOPER
the truth!" Polls show a twelve-point drop in Hollings's
approval rating in South Carolina (to 44 percent) and
a twenty-point drop (to 38 percent) for Sanford in
North Carolina.
By Morton Kondracke
hat's worse, the Democrats seem to have
n the surface the Democratic Party's political
O
W
learned nothing from the Gulf war about one
of their basic political liabilities: the country
situation after the Gulf war looks pretty bad.
does not trust them to use force, if necessary,
Beneath the surface it looks even worse. Party
to protect the national interest. Since the war, not one
leaders deny they were wrong to oppose the
national Democratic officeholder has said that Bush was
war, say it's negative campaigning for Republicans to
right and he or she was wrong. (California Senate candi-
mention how people voted, and want to redirect the
date Dianne Feinstein did, and she was met with stunned
country's attention to domestic problems. The trouble
silence at the party's state convention.) Party chairman
is, the Democrats are split even on domestic policy. Put
Ron Brown said on CNN (echoing any number of other
it all together and the party could well be out of power
leaders) that overwhelming Democratic votes against
for the rest of this century.
Bush policy in January were "about timing, not on
The poll figures could hardly look worse. Bush's
whether to go to war," when in fact a Democratic victory
overall popularity is about 90 percent; 65 percent of
would have forced the United States to stand down from
the American people believe that the country is "on
the United Nations' January 15 deadline and, most like-
the right track"; Gallup shows Bush running ahead of a
ly, to withdraw troops from the Gulf area.
hypothetical Democratic rival by 65 percent to 22 per-
Brown also says that "it's wrong to make this a parti-
cent; and the Republicans lead the Democrats by 45 to
san issue. It's the lowest form of politics. It demeans the
28 percent on keeping the country safe (the biggest
valor of the troops and it divides the country when we
gap since 1964, when Democrats led Goldwater Repub-
should be united." The Democrats want credit for
licans 45 to 22 percent). Even on keeping the country
"supporting the troops" and for not opposing the war
prosperous, the Republicans lead, 51 to 27 percent.
once it started. One Democrat, Representative Frank
Then there is the ammunition the Democrats handed
McCloskey, voted against Bush, then got one of the
the Republicans in the debate over whether to go to
largest flags in the country shipped in from Indiana
war. Every plausible Democratic presidential candidate
and displayed on the Mall in Washington. Other Dem-
opposed war except for Senator Albert Gore Jr. of Ten-
ocrats claim credit for backing weapons systems that
nessee, who did a fair amount of public handwringing
worked and for favoring sanctions against Saddam Hus-
before supporting Bush. The Republicans have video-
sein when Bush, Republican chairman (and former ag-
tape on all that-including assertions after the war by
riculture secretary) Clayton Yeutter, and Senate Repub-
Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell and Armed
lican campaign chairman Phil Gramm were still
Services Chairman Sam Nunn that "we'll never know"
practicing "appeasement."
whether economic sanctions would have worked to lib-
The Democrats are entitled to investigate Bush poli-
10 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
cy prior to Saddam's August 2 invasion. But this will not
Polls indicate that support for Bush policy among Dem-
alter the fundamental fact that, when the chips were
ocrats was 70 percent, and among Republicans, 90 per-
down, the Republicans did what had to be done and
cent. But the groups that most actively opposed the
the Democrats were, as ever, force-averse.
war-left-wing unions, civil rights leaders, the peace
According to Democratic political analyst William
movement, the National Organization for Women, and
Galston, "It's been obvious for a long time that Demo-
some environmental groups-still hold disproportion-
crats lose on the foreign-policy/defense issue. The in-
ate sway over the Democratic nominating process. One
ability of the party's major leaders and its liberal funda-
Democratic constituency that favored the war was orga-
mentalists to learn this lesson means that we will suffer
nized American Jewry, which Democrats will try to hold
political defeat for as far as the eye can see." Galston
by fighting Bush administration pressure on Israel to
thinks the only answer is for Democrats to find totally
make unwelcome concessions to the Arabs.
new leaders to replace those who "had their dominant
Instead of confronting their fundamental problems,
policy outlook hardwired in twenty years ago" by Viet-
the Democrats want to shift national attention as quick-
nam. "To change would be to admit a fundamental
ly as possible to domestic issues. It's understandable.
error," he said. "It would require the moral recon-
Bush's approval ratings on economics are forty points
struction of the party and almost all of its key individ-
lower than they are on foreign policy, albeit still a ma-
uals." As Galston notes, almost all of the party's foreign
jority. Also, there are deep flaws in the nation's domes-
policy gurus (except for Representatives Les Aspin and
tic life that the Democrats can exploit: the recession,
Stephen Solarz) opposed the Bush policy, in spite of
public deficits and private debt, the underclass, rotting
the fact that Bush satisfied every one of the criteria laid
infrastructure, failing schools, and a stagnant living
down by former Senator Gary Hart and others as pre-
standard for the lower middle class. Prior to the war,
requisites for war, including public and international
with the nation entering a recession, Gallup found ba-
backing and the failure of diplomacy to accomplish
sic public satisfaction at around 30 percent, which
results.
Democrats regard as the level to which the public will
At a more practical level, according to Democratic
return once the Gulf war high wears off. The Demo-
Senator Joseph Lieberman, who voted with Bush, the
crats want to portray Bush as being attentive to foreign
danger to the party is that its elected officials were "out
policy but negligent of domestic concerns. There's
of touch with the vast majority of rank-and-file Demo-
truth in this, of course. (See "War Dividend" by Fred
crats, who knew that this war was just and necessary."
Barnes, page 12.) When Margaret Thatcher won the
JAGDISH BHAGWATI
Jagdish Bhagwati, one of the world's leading economists, offers a fascinating overview of
The World
the perils and promise facing the world trading system. That system is now being subjected
to powerful centrifugal forces. Concerns with unfair trade are rampant, managed trade is
Trading System
increasingly popular, and regionalism is spreading. To a consideration of these developments,
at Risk
Bhagwati brings a unique blend of economic theory, historical scholarship, and familiarity
with the institutions of world trade.
"All who follow international finance and trade policy will want to read this free-for-
all, no-holds-barred debate. Good fun but deadly serious at the same time."
-Paul A. Samuelson
Cloth: $16.95 ISBN 0-691-04284-5
Not available from Princeton in the U.K. and Europe
Updated and expanded
PERESTROIKA
paperback edition
The updated paperback edition of Padma Desai's
PERSPECTIVE
acclaimed analysis of Gorbachev's reform efforts
contains a lengthy new chapter that surveys the
THE DESIGN AND DILEMMAS
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OF SOVIET REFORM
published in early 1989. With the author's discerning assistance, readers can now chart
and understand the whirlwind of activities taking place throughout the Soviet economy.
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PERESTROIKA
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New York Times Book Review
Now in paper: $9.95 ISBN 0-691-00386-6
Not available from Princeton in the U.K.
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OR FROM YOUR LOCAL BOOKSTORE
PADMA DESAI
MARCH 25, 1991 THE NEW REPUBLIC 11
Falklands War, she used her prestige to force through a
tough domestic agenda. Bush doesn't have one.
WHITE HOUSE WATCH
But the Democrats don't have one either. They have
two, which Galston dubs the "recentralizer" and "de-
centralizer" schools: the 1991 update of Walter Mon-
dale's 1984 interest-group dinosaurs and Gary Hart's
1984 "new ideas" Atari liberals. The first group has as
its theorists Keynesian economists Jeff Faux and Gar
W
Alperovitz, who want to spend gobs of federal money
AR DIVIDEND
on infrastructure, health, and education, and restore
prosperity through industrial policy, protectionism,
and federal economic planning. The newly formed Co-
By Fred Barnes
alition for Democratic Values, headed by Senator How-
ard Metzenbaum, is the school's political rallying point,
resident Bush's speech to veterans on March 4
and its ideal presidential candidate would be Mario
Cuomo. Jesse Jackson presumably would favor similar
P
("it's a time to be proud"), the address to Con-
gress on March 6, and the White House ceremo-
economic policies.
ny on March 7 to award the Medal of Freedom
The "decentralizers" are spearheaded by the Demo-
to Margaret Thatcher are just the beginning. On
cratic Leadership Council and its think tank, the Pro-
March 14 it's off to Canada to chat with Prime Minister
gressive Policy Institute, plus theorist David Osborne.
Brian Mulroney, then quickly to Martinique to talk
Nunn is a key figure in the DLC, along with Lieberman.
about the Middle East with French President François
The decentralizers emphasize state-level experimenta-
Mitterrand. Shortly thereafter Bush will confer with
tion and "empowerment" strategies such as appren-
British Prime Minister John Major about the war, the
ticeship programs for the poor and parental choice in
Middle East, etc. "We'll also have meetings with [Ger-
education. This group's ideal standard-bearer would be
man Chancellor Helmut] Kohl and [Italian Prime Min-
Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton, who said after the fact
ister Giulio] Andreotti and God knows who else," says a
that he would have voted with Bush on the war, or
senior White House adviser. Next, a trip by Bush to the
Senator Chuck Robb, who did vote with the president.
Middle East is "probably in the works."
As Jonathan Rauch wrote in the January 26 National
Bush has a new role-War President, Part II-and he
Journal, Gephardt is the foremost bridge candidate be-
intends to play it to the hilt. With the fighting over,
tween the two schools. He is pushing an agenda that in-
Democrats and some Republicans (even a few adminis-
cludes an oil import fee, trade sanctions against Japan,
tration officials) are eager for Bush to concentrate on
more spending on energy research, corporate and high-
domestic policy. Not a chance. "Bush had two big deals
income tax increases, and grants to states that achieve
in 1990, the budget deal and the Persian Gulf," says a
education goals. Mitchell, meanwhile, backs a reduced
presidential aide. "Which one would you want to live
version of Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan's proposal
through again?" The answer is obvious. Bush is skillful
to cut Social Security taxes for the middle class.
in foreign and defense policy, clumsy in domestic. His
popularity soars when he dwells on national security
onflict between the two Democratic schools
matters, dips when he deals with domestic issues. "We
C
could produce some creative proposals, al-
should just have twenty-one months of Gulf war follow-
though it probably cannot produce an election-
up," says a White House official. Until Election Day
winning consensus by 1992. And neither group
1992, the strategy is to "keep the war alive."
deals with the most crucial single problem facing Ameri-
On February 27, the day before the war ended,
ca: lagging private saving and investment. Moynihan's
Bush's political advisers thrashed out the foreign/do-
tax cut might stimulate consumption and boost the
mestic question in a meeting in the office of John Su-
economy, but it will have to be paid for in higher taxes on
nunu, the White House chief of staff. There wasn't
the rich, who are more apt to invest than those below
much thrashing. Everyone-Sununu, Republican chair-
them on the income scale.
man Clayton Yeutter, pollster Robert Teeter, media
Meanwhile, the Bush White House can't be expected
consultant Roger Ailes, strategist Charles Black, Quayle
to sit idle while Democrats slam them on the domestic
adviser William Kristol-agreed Bush should downplay
front. Indeed, the administration has in the wings
his domestic agenda indefinitely. Richard Darman, as
modest alternatives to various Democratic ideas, ar-
mastermind of Bush domestic policy, might be expect-
guing that it's protecting the country from taxers
ed to balk at this. But he went along enthusiastically at
and spenders. It already has plans to cut defense to
the meeting. His chief interest, as budget director, is in
3.75 percent of GNP by 1995, and to means-test Medi-
protecting the budget agreement forged last year. Em-
care and other entitlement programs (thereby under-
phasis on domestic initiatives puts it in jeopardy.
cutting the Democratic "fairness" argument).
What emerged from the meeting was the idea of "so-
So the Democrats are left with little more than the
lidifying the capital" that Bush built up during the Gulf
prospect that the recession will plunge into a depres-
crisis. "We have the capacity to solidify the president's
sion. That's a sorry state for a party to be in.
capital SO we can succeed on both the domestic and
12 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
foreign policy agendas," says a senior official. That re-
you mean, a fifth star?" he asked. "Can I do that?" An
quires ignoring domestic issues for the time being.
aide responded, "Basically you can do what you want."
"Now we've got to let the public know that the result
Bush seemed disinclined to promote Powell and
[in the war] was not an accident," the official says.
Schwarzkopf, much as he likes them. But at the press
Bush doesn't have to claim personal credit. "It's not a
conference he ducked the question. "I think that's a
time to brag," he told leaders of veterans' organiza-
little early to answer," he said. Later, when Democrats
tions. In fact, Bush's job is to give credit to everyone
are pounding him on domestic issues, he'll have the
else. It's up to everyone else to give credit (much of
option of pinning fifth stars on the Desert Storm he-
which he deserves) to him. Events, including ceremo-
roes in a White House ceremony.
nies and parades, will tend to point up his central role.
Bush isn't blotting out domestic issues altogether. On
Both Bush and the Sununu group have concluded
the advice of Teeter, whose political counsel carries
that there may be domestic spillover from the war
enormous weight with Bush, the president will take care
sometime, strengthening the president's hand with
to "inoculate" himself on some. He'll pay enough atten-
Congress. But it hasn't happened yet. Nor is the public
tion to health care, the environment, crime, and educa-
demanding that Bush switch to domestic issues. "The
tion so that he can't be accused of neglecting them com-
pressure to go domestic comes from Cabinet agencies
pletely. In his first postwar trip outside Washington,
who want to get back in the game," says a White House
Bush goes to Cleveland on March 12 to tout efforts to
official. Labor Secretary Lynn Martin and Louis Sulli-
reduce infant mortality. Mostly, though, he'll pay lip ser-
van, the secretary of health and human services, wish to
vice. In his nine-minute speech to veterans, he devoted a
play up new programs. Some White House domestic
few seconds to domestic issues. "Much work remains to
policy advisers think Bush should press his "empower-
be done on the domestic scene," he said. "We've got to
ment" agenda. (Bush has already dropped the word
tackle that with a new determination." Only not now.
"empowerment" because Sununu and Darman dislike
The biggest phobia at the White House is rich versus
it.) Housing Secretary Jack Kemp would like Bush to
poor, the issue Democrats are flagging. It's not an issue
push for quick passage of a capital gains tax cut. All
that threatens Bush's re-election. But Bush finds it un-
these are non-starters at the postwar White House.
pleasant when Democrats denounce him as the cham-
There's another part to "solidifying the capital": pil-
pion of the wealthy. By promoting a capital gains tax
lorying Democrats. The White House, indeed, the en-
cut last year, "we gave them a hammer to hit us with,"
tire Republican Party, wants Democrats to suffer for
says a senior Bush adviser. That won't be repeated in
opposing Bush's decision to go to war. "We need to
1991. The only rich/poor issue Bush intends to broach
cement that vote as the vote," says a Bush aide. Again,
is Kuwait and the rest of the Arab world.
Bush isn't the one to do the dirty work. He stays "a
mile above all this," the aide adds. Yeutter and congres-
sional Republicans, especially House GOP Whip Newt
Gingrich, have the assignment. Sununu has a back-
The Palestinians defeat themselves.
handed way of joining in. "I think the Democrats are
afraid that it may be a productive issue" for Republi-
cans, he said on CNN's "Evans and Novak." "It will not
be an issue from the White House," he noted piously.
And he won't tell Republican candidates to raise it. Of
W
course they'll surely raise it on their own, he added.
ORST ENEMY
Teeter, the Bush pollster, believes that public expec-
tations play into Bush's hands. "Most people think
there's a lot of foreign policy work to be done now," he
By Martin Peretz
says. At his first postwar press conference on March 1,
Bush outlined an ambitious set of goals just for the
E
xcept when the West chooses to ignore the bru-
Middle East. Besides rebuilding Kuwait, he wants to
tality of the Arab world (which it chooses to do
deal with the Israeli-Palestinian issue, the "Lebanon
often), it is periodically shocked by the grisly
question," and the matter of bringing Iraq back "into
spectacles that are routine in the politics of Is-
the family of nations." Then there's the job of bringing
lam. And not only innocents are appalled. Men like Gen-
American troops home. They'll be returning in "a
eral Norman Schwarzkopf, who know from long experi-
steady stream over six months," an official says. "There
ence in war that cruelty may be at one and the same time
are going to be parades all over the country we can
cultural habit and military doctrine, are incredulous.
plug into, if we want to." Some troops are bound to
"Unspeakable atrocities" is what he called the deeds of
find their way to the White House for medal ceremo-
the Iraqis in Kuwait. Of those who committed them he
nies. General Schwarzkopf will do a drop-by.
said, "They're not a part of the same human race-the
If all else fails, events can be contrived, such as
people that did that-that the rest of us are."
awarding a fifth star to Schwarzkopf and General Colin
It's perhaps too comforting a thought that one can
Powell. As Bush boned up before his press conference,
so easily separate oneself from barbarians, but it is
he was told he might be asked about that. "What do
good to see that the U.S. commander has the sensibility
MARCH 25, 1991 THE NEW REPUBLIC 13
to draw lines that actually constrain. And constrain they
cant status among the royals. When last he went, cup in
did. The venture fought under Schwarzkopfs and
hand, to Kuwait, the Emir told him that Jordan would
George Bush's supervision more scrupulously avoided
have to stop living beyond its means. Well-spoken
civilian casualties than any other armed campaign in
though he is, Hussein is not immune to vengeance.
history. What Schwarzkopf thought "unspeakable" was
Hussein had lost the West Bank to Israel when Gamal
also for the American forces unthinkable.
Abdel Nasser seduced him into a war that was already
As the narrative of the Iraqi occupation is retrieved
lost. It was the same pan-Arab fantasy that enticed the
from the morgues and mass graves of Kuwait, it will be-
king in 1990, except this time all that Saddam wanted
come clearer just how little evil was actually forbidden to
was words. It was a cheap price, the last remaining
the holy warriors. Already the record is so laden with
Hashemite must have told himself, and it would play
human suffering that one wants to forget how many Dem-
well with the Palestinians who would otherwise do what
ocratic politicians worried more about allowing Saddam
they have wanted to do for decades-ship him off to
to save face than they did about the lives of his victims. But
Switzerland for a reunion with his bank accounts. Of
those who preferred sanctions to war may yet take plausi-
course, it could have turned out far worse. The Pales-
ble, if not very convincing, refuge in ignorance; and ref-
tinians might not have been satisfied by anything less
uge in forgetfulness of the war the Baath waged, with
than a regicide like the one that claimed Hussein's
chemical weapons, against Iranians and Kurds.
cousins in Iraq in 1958. The king, then, can count him-
The Arab leaders in Baghdad's camp, however, have
self lucky; he is still on his throne.
no such excuses; and their publics demand none. The
His throne, however, is shaky. Even though he joined
V.Lawrence'n
DRAWING BY VINT LAWRENCE FOR THE NEW REPUBLIC
butchery inflicted on Kuwait was precisely what they
the Palestinians of Jordan in their anticipation of an
expected. Indeed, it was what so excited those who
Iraqi victory, he has not acquired their loyalty, insofar as
took to the streets in support of Iraq in various Arab
their loyalty can ever be acquired. The Palestinians had
capitals. In this part of the world governments and
come to believe, in the way that they often believe the
movements are not a guard against bestiality, but its
unbelievable, that Saddam Hussein would, in Saddam's
provocateur. Indeed, a war that does not take frenzied
own words, "fry half of Israel" for them-and redistrib-
revenge for grievances real and imagined is hardly
ute the wealth of the Arabs besides. He did neither. The
deemed a war at all.
PLO's old patrons-the oil states-will give it nothing. In
King Hussein of Jordan is a case in point. Americans
Lebanon, where the Palestinians are still hated for the
were surprised by the king's enthusiasm for his neigh-
dictatorship they ran there from 1976 to 1982, the gov-
bor's rapacity, and indeed it was something of a devi-
ernment can't do much. But it can impede the PLO from
ation from his usual posture of interlocutor for the rich
firing rockets at Israel, and it has begun to do so, doubt-
Arabs who fuel his palace and feed his troops. Kings
less at the command of Hafez Assad. Squeezed on all
don't usually traffic in disorder; they don't want sub-
sides and true to their habit of courting disaster, the Pal-
jects to get bad ideas. But this king had historic resent-
estinians might yet gamble their last safe haven in Jordan
ments of his own: his family, which aspired to the stew-
and rebel. This is a battle, though, that the king-or at
ardship of Mecca and Medina, has always bristled at
least his indigenous Bedouin East Bank army-would
being relegated to a backwater like Amman. And the
win. Knowing that the migrant PLO would give no quar-
emoluments that have come to him from Saudi Arabia
ter, the army would give no quarter either. And the fact
and the Gulf were perpetual reminders of his mendi-
is, the army has the guns.
14 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
It is possible, of course, that the Palestinians won't
served whatever they got. The media have long patron-
rush into their fated revolt against the Hashemites.
ized Palestinian representatives by ignoring their fre-
Some in the West Bank and Gaza, according to an ac-
quent and willful denial of the truth. But the world gave
count by Sabra Chartrand in The New York Times, even
undivided attention to what happened in Kuwait and to
seem to believe that Iraq won the war. As one Palestin-
the complicity of the Palestinians in the frenzy that
ian put it, "We are proud of Saddam for having humili-
accompanied it. The evidence was, as the Arabs say,
ated President Bush and putting him in his place."
mahdura. It was well-attended. It could not be denied.
And another: Saddam "could retake Kuwait in a day."
The only explanation for the Palestinians' continued re-
Others, encouraged in their delusions by the empire-
fusal to face the truth is that they live in a trance.
nostalgic François Mitterrand, may imagine that Sad-
Why did the Palestinians resident in Kuwait join in
dam has put the Palestinian question decisively on the
the Iraqi debauch? Maybe they thought no one would
world's agenda. Of course, if the Palestinians in the
notice. It is true that they were enthralled with Saddam.
occupied territories were to come forward and say that
He did say, after all, that he had done it all for the sake
they were willing to negotiate for autonomy on the ba-
of Palestine, or, at least, that's what he said after the
sis of the 1978 Camp David agreements, they'd have
fact. But before he surrendered he had already forgot-
Israel trapped in its own treaty obligations. But the Is-
ten Palestine. In the meantime the Palestinians had
raeli right has nothing to fear: the Palestinians will for
been party to the looting spree. The revenge taken on
once eschew their habit of accepting today what they
them by the returning Kuwaitis will be moderated-as
could have had years ago. The prudent among them
Margaret Tutwiler's recent appeal for restraint evi-
are now saying that they can't negotiate from weakness.
denced-only by the Americans. But it will not, alas, be
They do not mention how long it will be before they
entirely prevented. Kuwaitis do not only feel betrayed
can negotiate from strength.
by the Palestinians; they were betrayed by the Palestin-
Despite the threat by its delegate in the territories to
ians. They read what the supine Palestinian intellectu-
plunge the region into instability, the PLO holds virtual-
als penned in praise of Saddam. They saw the placards
ly no cards. In fact, King Hussein seems already to have
and the mobs on CNN. It was all mahdura. The fortunate
offered himself as the alternative negotiator for the Pal-
Palestinians will be the ones whom the Kuwaitis expel.
estinians with Israel-he who only the day before yes-
As we shudder at these convulsions in the Arab world,
terday had washed his hands of the territories. More to
we remember, of course, that there is more than one
the point, none of the states that financed the PLO in-
Arab world, though none is truly democratic or even
frastructure and were its tribunes in international
constitutional; and none is really modernizing either.
councils will now lift a finger for the Palestinians. Some
This war was waged on behalf of those Arab societies
may make perfunctory rhetorical claims in behalf of
where it is assumed that people may die in their beds,
"Palestine," but they will do so purely to propitiate
where people are not awakened in the night and taken
their own restive mobs.
away only to disappear. The difference between such so-
cieties and one ruled by the Baath and exalted by the
there is any succor for the Palestinians it will have to
I
Palestinians is the difference between nascent decencies
come from Israel itself. But Israel is not much in the
and entrenched savagery. It is a difference glimpsed in
mood to be either generous or forgiving. There was
political theory. But in the lives of human beings it is the
linkage between the Gulf war and Israel's relations
difference between good and evil, hope and terror. The
with its neighbors. But the linkage was the opposite of
United States and its allies need not tremble that they
what the Arabs and most of the American pundits ex-
require further exertions to vindicate their stay in the
pected. The Israelis, especially dovish Israelis, realized
Gulf. Their rout of Iraq is its own ethical reward.
how perilous it would have been if the territories were
governed by a hostile state, aligned, for example, with
t would be good, of course, if the conflict between
Iraq. The prospect of chemical and biological arsenals in
the foothills of Jerusalem or eight miles from Tel Aviv is
I
Israel and the Arab states were to be pacified, if the
Israelis and the Palestinians could find a less tense
not comforting. Tanks on the western side of the Jordan
way of living side by side in cramped space. Were
are more dangerous than tanks on the other side. For all
armed Arab states to come to terms with Israel, it's
these strategic reasons, the doves are now in retreat. The
quite likely that Israel would be less vexed and hexed
Labor Party, like the Democratic Party here, is contem-
by ways of coming to terms with Palestinians. James
plating long years in the wilderness. But most of all what
Baker might productively explore the possibilities on
has SO jaundiced the Israeli body politic is the palpable
his Middle East tour, and after. But if he turns this
pathology of the Palestinian body politic.
modest undertaking into a major peace initiative, he
What do the Palestinians make of the barbaric treat-
will only rouse the passions now fatigued by the recent
ment by Iraq of the Kuwaitis who, whatever their vanities,
defeat. Worse than that, he will embarrass our Arab
had welcomed the Palestinians into their midst and al-
allies into taking positions from which they have just
lowed them to become incredibly rich? Listen carefully
and only tentatively begun to free themselves.
to the Palestinians on television; they answer in three
The administration is getting much advice about
parts. First, the barbarism didn't happen. Second, the
how and why it must now satisfy the Palestinian griev-
media exaggerate the barbarism. Third, the Kuwaitis de-
ance. This advice comes mostly, it should be remem-
MARCH 25, 1991 THE NEW REPUBLIC 15
bered, from those who also wanted the Iraqi grievance
"So's Chase at 11, and Many Hanny at 19." The editor
appeased. They were wrong then, and they are wrong
admitted he wanted to short all of the crummy weap-
now. In any case, what they mean by arguing that we
ons makers, but he had to stick to his knitting. He was
must vindicate the American intervention is that we
shorting a thousand shares of Time Warner, the media
must somehow compensate for the American interven-
conglomerate, at 79. He ticked off all the negatives: big
tion, that we must acquit ourselves of some wrong. And
debt, layoffs, trouble starting up new magazines, and
that's exactly how many of the Arabs would read an
fewer ad pages. His way to play the coming war? "Short
effort in this vein. It would surely-and fatally-send
Disney at 92: with all the Arab terrorism that lies ahead,
the wrong message.
and with a long ground war on television every night,
who is going to want to go see Mickey Mouse?"
As the two lawyers swapped futures contracts and
A market crash that never came.
strike prices for their puts-devices that allow you to
profit only if there is a steep decline in the market-my
stomach tightened. "We're dead," I whispered to my
wife. "We've gotta cover everything, every last short. If
we don't they're gonna carry us out of here."
SHORTED OUT
Unlike everyone else at brunch, my wife and I trade
stocks for a living. As professionals, we have to profit off
good and bad stock markets. By nature, we short con-
stantly, because as J. P. Morgan once stated, markets
tend to fluctuate. Shorting is dangerous business.
By James J. Cramer
When you buy stocks you can only lose what you've
spent. When you short, you can lose much, much
few weeks and 500 Dow Jones points ago, I sat
more, particularly if the stocks double or triple after
A
down for brunch with a group of my New York
you sell them.
contemporaries: a stock and commodities bro-
ker, a handful of lawyers, a budding real estate
oing into this brunch our firm was shorting Time
magnate, and an editor. As these wealthy, intelligent
individuals talked, a gloom shrouded every topic. The
G
Warner, Disney, Wells Fargo, a half-dozen North-
east banks, and just about every real estate and
table was nearly unanimous about how bitter and pro-
brokerage stock in the country. We owned puts
tracted the Gulf war would be. The editor questioned
on five retailers and a host of conglomerates from Gener-
whether any of our high-tech weapons would work,
al Electric to Westinghouse. All of these positions, put on
doubted our generals' plans, and chided our soldiers'
at much higher prices than were bandied at the brunch,
abilities to meet the vaunted Republican Guards.
were very profitable. But I knew at that brunch that I was
A sullen prognosis, but not as bearish as the economic
on the wrong side of the wager. When intelligent but ama-
outlook delivered by the New York builder, who said he
teurish speculators are swapping tales of short-selling fa-
could not name a bank or a developer not in trouble or
vorites, look out above, for the pain of a short going
contemplating bankruptcy. Surely all involved in real es-
against you is unequaled in the investing firmament.
tate would succumb, he insisted. The lawyers spoke elo-
That meal was 30 points ago for Wells Fargo and
quently about how poorly their clients were faring, par-
Disney, and 40 points for Time Warner. The New York
ticularly those with Japanese competitors. But no one
banks have all jumped between 20 and 30 percent, and
was nearly as negative as the stockbroker. Not only was
everyone knows how high the stock market traveled.
his own industry going down the tubes, so were all the
We're still in business, but only because we covered by
industries his firm analyzed. He worried about his ability
buying up stock wherever we had shorted. But had we
to survive, considering the low equity volume.
actually gone long on everything that got trashed that
As the meal drew to a close, the stock market loomed
day, we'd have made so much money we could have
larger in the conversation. As befitted the pessimism
retired.
dripping from the table, only one strategy merited at-
Since then I've read hundreds of articles about why
tention: short-selling. People sell stocks short when
the stock market skyrocketed: the Fed eased aggressive-
they believe the market will fall. If someone sells short
ly, the war went better than expected, inflation subsid-
1,000 shares of IBM at 130, he hopes to buy it back, or
ed-oh, all the usual standards. But I know better: the
"cover," at lower prices. If IBM subsequently declines
market went up in part because everybody got negative
to, say, 100, and the short-seller buys his 1,000 shares
at the bottom-everyone from this magazine with its
back, he's made $30,000 realizing his negative views.
fashionable "abyss" cover story to the two lawyers pat-
The bearish broker spoke fervently about his big bet
ting themselves on the back for a strategy that would
against Wells Fargo, the giant California bank then
lose them thousands of dollars in just a few days' time.
trading at around 45. "They've got so many bad loans
Others spotted this as just another trend, and started
they aren't even owning up to half of them," he stated
buying at the bottom. Unfortunately for the bears, the
knowingly. The New York developer laughed-he knew
system simply refused to collapse.
banks better: "Citicorp at 12 is a lay-up short," he said.
And the weapons worked. The banks didn't all fail,
16 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
the Fed's strategy of lowering interest rates started to
sus against Iraq. "The United States is likely to become
succeed. And even the lowly dollar, poor-mouthed for
estranged from many of its European allies, and it is
so long, finally bottomed, a function of the stunning
almost certain to become the object of widespread
reversal in America's trade fortunes. In brief, the stock
Arab hostility," he testified. He went on to predict that
market made quick frauds of all who had lost faith in
the war would be protracted, would be financially dev-
things American.
astating, and would deprive us of the fruits of our vic-
What happens now, after such a huge run? Certainly
tory in the cold war. He also warned that some Israeli
some industries are undeserving of these heady levels.
leaders might "seek to take advantage of an expanded
Most of the auto industry is still a shambles. Some of
war to effect the expulsion of all Palestinians from their
the technology stocks seem hopelessly inflated in light
homes on the West Bank." Ten days later he stated on
of the price wars we are now seeing in the personal
CNN, "We will be bogged down in a protracted mess in
computer stores. And commercial real estate shows no
the Middle East." On January 27 he predicted Saddam
turnabout, even as lower interest rates work their af-
would use chemical weapons as soon as ground fight-
fordability magic for new homebuyers.
ing started. By February 4 he was forecasting a "a glob-
But there are plenty of other stocks that will contin-
al wave of sympathy for Iraq," "a decline in domestic
ue to climb as Americans come to their senses about a
support for military action," and "a rise in bitter do-
simple fact: things simply aren't that bad out there.
mestic divisions." Oh, well, never mind.
The 400-point rise came as a rude slap in the face for
Best melodramatic monologuist. The winner in this cate-
the collective naysayers, but most still refuse to capitu-
gory is George Ball, the distinguished former U.S. am-
late, even as their shorts reach untenable levels for
bassador to the United Nations. Testifying before the
them. As long as the short-interest figures stay at record
Senate Foreign Relations Committee on December 20,
high levels-as they were just this week-higher prices
Ball predicted that Saddam, "conditioned by the psy-
lie ahead.
chology of the Middle Eastern bazaar," would try to
bargain his way out of his predicament. If the United
JAMES J. CRAMER is president of Cramer & Co., a New
States refused to bargain and precipitated a war, he
York investment management firm.
said, "First, the coalition would almost completely fall
apart overnight." Few coalition members, Ball warned
the senators, "would dare stand with the United States
How the experts blew it, big-time.
in a destructive war against an Arab state, particularly if
we began that war before the sanctions option had
been thoroughly exhausted. One would expect a war
also to leave the United States in the position of a pari-
GULFBALLS
ah in the whole Middle East, with not a single friend
except Israel." Arabs can fight other Arabs, Ball con-
cluded, but when a Western power brings its huge re-
sources to bear against an Arab nation "there will be
bitter talk of the Crusades and Western colonialism,
and all the occasions in history where the Western
By Jacob Weisberg
world has appeared to intervene in what the Arabs re-
gard as [their] own affairs."
f the authorities who have analyzed the Gulf crisis
I
Best fictional screenplay. In the category of pure inven-
for the past several months were doctors, their mal-
tion, the academy recognizes the achievement of Dan-
practice insurance premiums would be due for an
iel T. Plesch of the British American Security Informa-
increase. Were they baseball players, they'd be sent
tion Council. Plesch's February 8 New York Times op-ed
back to the minors. Were they samurai, they'd commit
played out an apocalyptic scenario in which a chemical
seppuku. Never in the field of human conflict have SO
attack causes U.S. troops to "panic and run," sand gets
many been SO wrong about so much, so publicly. Ex-
in our tank engines, and Iraqi troops push into Saudi
perts, however, pay no penalty for being wrong. Most
Arabia. The intifada resumes, causing Israel to attack
have already been back on the same TV shows and op-
Saddam. Our Arab allies switch sides. "After the Iraqis
ed pages offering fresh insights. So before memories of
use anthrax to halt a renewed coalition offensive, the
the crisis fade, it may be worth taking time out to hon-
U.S. resorts to nuclear weapons, outraging the Arab
or a few of the season's most remarkable performances.
world, which accuses the West of genocide. Iraqi-
As is the tradition of the National Academy of Opinion
backed terrorists then attack Western nuclear power
Arts, each winner will be presented with a "Zbig," a
plants and bomb Union Station in Washington." Pub-
lifelike, thirteen-inch bronze statue of former national
lic and congressional support for the war collapse, forc-
security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski with his foot in his
ing the United States to sue for peace and cede parts of
mouth.
Kuwait to Iraq.
The award is named for a true master. On December
Cecil B. DeMille Award. This prize honors gratuitous
5 Brzezinski assured the Senate Foreign Relations Com-
hyperbole in estimating ground war casualties. The
mittee that a war would split the international consen-
competition was stiff. With the aid of computer model-
MARCH 25, 1991 THE NEW REPUBLIC 17
Shrink rap
forum featured both sides of the con-
economy. In fact, the country's econo-
flict, but after a while the anti-Israel
my was stronger in 1990 than it had
bias became too obvious for the insti-
been for years, allowing Saddam to pay
f the erroneous Gulf pundits,
tute to tolerate. According to Herb
off some $3.4 billion in debt service. A
O
one perhaps deserves special
Stein, a senior fellow at AEI, a number
week later she saw signs that the Iraqis
appreciation. Judith Kipper,
of fellows complained. When AEI
were "willing to do business," and said
an associate at the Brookings Institu-
ousted Baroody in 1986, it sent Kipper
a deal would emerge from Egyptian
tion, is arguably the highest-profile
packing soon after, citing budgetary
President Hosni Mubarak's emergency
talking head to emerge from the crisis
constraints.
Arab summit. (The Iraqis showed not
in the Gulf. Since the start of the crisis
She was not unemployed for long.
even the slightest interest in a deal.)
she has been on "Nightline" several
Peter Jennings, another powerful pa-
On September 16 Kipper predicted
times, ABC's "World News Tonight" on
tron and by then close friend, helped
that sanctions would work in a matter
numerous occasions, CNN's "News-
her to land yet another job: a contract
of "weeks or months." On November
maker Sunday," the "MacNeil/Lehrer
with ABC News to consult on Middle
16 on NPR she invited America to take
NewsHour," National Public Radio,
Eastern affairs, beginning in October
Saddam at his word when he says that
C-SPAN, and the Discovery Channel.
1986. She is still a paid consultant for
"everything is negotiable, including
She's been quoted in newspapers
ABC and has an unpaid post at Brook-
withdrawal from Kuwait." (She didn't
throughout the country and testified
ings running another Middle East
mention the preconditions that made
before the Senate Foreign Relations
speaker's forum. She is paid for per-
this offer a non-starter.)
and House Armed Services commit-
forming the same service for the Coun-
Her analysis throughout the Gulf cri-
tees. She's also been the most consis-
cil on Foreign Relations.
sis said little about the politics of the
tently wrong about the conflict.
Middle East, but a great deal about the
Kipper is a special case because she
has no political, academic, diplomatic,
K
ipper's technique in writing
politics of Judith Kipper. It's not that
about the Middle East is singu-
she's anti-Israel-her criticism would
or military experience in the Middle
lar. As another member of the
put her not far from the center of the
East. Her graduate studies consist of a
Council on Foreign Relations put it,
Israeli Labor Party-or that she is pro-
master's degree in clinical psychology.
"She visits the heads of states of Arab
Arab. Rather, her politics stem from an
She doesn't speak Hebrew or Arabic,
countries and she talks to them, and
unwavering quasi-religious faith in the
and has never written anything on the
these men want to send messages to the
power of Dialogue. Having a poor
region much longer than an op-ed. In a
United States and to Israel and she
grasp of the cultural, economic, and
field in which a Ph.D., a book, or a
does it for them in the guise of
religious complexities of the region,
distinguished career in the foreign or
scholarship."
she clings to the idea that the Middle
armed services is essential, Kipper is an
In 1984, for instance, Kipper went to
East conflict would be over later to-
anomaly.
Syria, talked with "top government and
night if everyone in the region just sat
Her secret? She has long been a
Baath party officials," and argued in a
down, held hands, and talked out their
networker par excellence. In the late
New York Times op-ed that "Syria does
angst.
'60s Kipper managed to get Walter
have an interest in an independent
All the Middle East lacks, therefore,
Cronkite's attention (he does not recall
Lebanon sovereign over all its territory.
is a good clinical psychologist to facili-
how), prompting him to call Sandy So-
Why? Because that would be the best
tate discussion, a job Kipper pursues by
colow, then executive producer of
guarantee that Israel would not annex
networking with all the players in the
CBS's "Evening News." According to
Lebanon or threaten Syria militarily."
game. This includes Arab leaders, most
Socolow, "He asked me to find a place
Of course, President Assad's policy was
of whom scrupulously monitor what is
for her. So I did." She worked there for
then, as it is now, to keep factions in
being written and said about them and
a short time as a researcher. After leav-
the area armed and fighting each other
only grant visas and access to people
ing CBS, she was hired by Jean-Jacques
as a pretext for the Syrian army to "me-
with friendly faces. So though she tell
Servan-Schreiber, the publisher of
diate" the conflict it is helping to pro-
a friend that Assad is "the Middle East's
Express, doing public relations work.
long. Still, Kipper sticks to her thesis
biggest Godfather," the furthest she'll
She subsequently made a number of
even today, despite Syria's recent shell-
go in print is to call him a "tough cus-
trips to the Middle East and started
ing of General Aoun, the commander
tomer." (A week into the pillage of Ku-
free-lance writing. Her next big break
of the Lebanese army, into submission.
wait, Kipper called Saddam "a tough
came in 1980, when she was invited by
Damascus is also installing pliant gen-
cookie.")
her friend William Baroody Jr., then
erals to lead the Lebanese army, fur-
The Gulf crisis undid many of the
president of the American Enterprise
ther extending Syrian hegemony in the
myths dear to Kipper over the years:
Institute, to work at AEI as a journalist
country.
that Syria has no designs on Lebanon,
in residence. The appointment raised
The Gulf crisis, however, saw Kip-
that the PLO is moderate, that Israeli
some eyebrows because Kipper had
per's finest performance. Using the
intransigence is the greatest threat to
never been a staff writer in print jour-
platform of ABC News, Kipper aban-
peace, that a candid conversation is a
nalism. Today, when asked about it,
doned scholarly pretense and recast
panacea for the region's ills. Not that
Baroody cannot remember what writ-
herself as America's diplomat-at-large
this has stopped her reaching a pinna-
ing experience prompted him to give
to the Middle East. The gist of her pun-
cle of influence in the media. But given
her the job.
ditry was that though Saddam may be a
the record of the rest of them, perhaps
At AEI Kipper dropped journalism
little rough, he is first and foremost a
that's no great surprise.
and put to use the rolodex she had
pragmatic man. On the night of the
built through her trips to the Middle
invasion she argued on "Nightline"
DAVID SEGAL
East. She set up a lecture series for visit-
that Saddam had invaded for the emi-
ing Arab and Israeli dignitaries. The
nently practical purpose of saving his
David Segal is a Washington writer.
18 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
ing, Joshua Epstein, a military analyst at the Brookings
from time of war," and insisted sanctions would work
Institution, was able to determine that American casu-
in time. Saddam showed a "willingness, if not an eager-
alties would range between 3,344 and 16,059. He ne-
ness to compromise." And we'd better make a deal, he
glected to mention that his margin of error was plus or
said, because a war "may result in an enmity directed at
minus 10,000 percent. Zbig guessed 20,000 American
the United States for an extended period, not only by
deaths. Pat Buchanan forecast 30,000. More conserva-
Iraq and its present supporters, but ultimately among
tively, Ted Kennedy said there would be 3,000 casual-
the publics of some of the nations now allied to us."
ties a week. The Center for Defense Information pre-
On February 13 he was still warning, on "MacNeil/
dicted 45,000 casualties. "Now we have examined very
Lehrer": "Arab public opinion is turning against us."
carefully the data from the Iran-Iraq war and we are
Schlesinger's previous endeavor was as secretary of de-
absolutely convinced, all 100 of us military men at the
fense in the 1970s, when he tried to kill the Patriot
Center for Defense Information, that Iraq is going to
missile.
be a very powerful and determined foe," said Gene
The T.E. Lawrence Award. This special prize goes to
LaRoque of the CDI. But the prize goes to James Webb,
James Akins, former U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia,
former secretary of the Navy, who predicted the Army
for his repeated contention that our failure to under-
would be "bled dry" in three weeks.
stand the inscrutable Arab character would lead to a
Best sound editing. The Academy wishes to recognize
fiasco. Even now he insists that the Gulf will soon ex-
the achievement of Edward Luttwak, who told the Sen-
plode with anti-American fury. In a March 3 New York
ate Armed Services Committee that even with extended
Times op-ed he argued that Arabs compare George
preliminary "softening up" by air power and a non-
Bush to Hulagu Khan, commander of the Mongol
frontal attack, a best-case scenario would mean "several
Horde that destroyed Baghdad in 1258. Unless the
thousand killed in action and maimed." Luttwak, who
president plumps for an international peace confer-
repeated his dire warnings against a ground war in THE
ence to settle all the region's problems, he wrote, our
NEW REPUBLIC among other places, wins not for his pre-
presence will lead to disaster à la the Beirut Marine
diction, which was no more erroneous than many, but
barracks, and the Democrats will coast to victory in
for his subsequent effort to delete it from the sound
1992 on their opposition to the war.
track. "I was not going to give my real forecast of casu-
The Saddam Hussein Humanitarian Award. To negotia-
alties," Luttwak told The Washington Post. "As advocate,
tions specialist Roger Fisher, the author of Getting to
you only make forecasts when they are conducive to
Yes, who warned the Senate Foreign Relations Commit-
your advocacy."
tee in December that "victory would be a disaster."
Best special effects. This award honors spectacular and/
The reason: overthrowing dictators never solves prob-
or vivid predictions that domestic support for the war
lems. The mistake of what Fisher called our "lawless
would collapse. Republican Senator John McCain said in
policy" was failing to offer Saddam enticements to pull
September, "If you get involved in a major ground war in
out from Kuwait. In exchange for withdrawing, Iraq
the Saudi desert, I think support will erode significantly.
must expect "to receive recognition of its legitimate
Nor should it be supported. We cannot even contem-
grievances." As a carrot, Fisher suggested that we agree
plate, in my view, trading American blood for Iraqi
to start talking about the Palestinian problem to give
blood." John Wheeler, of the aptly named Center for the
Saddam a face-saving success.
Vietnam Generation, testified before the House Bank-
Best makeup. This category honors lurid overestimates
ing Committee in November that domestic support
of Saddam's strategic acumen. In December Michael
would evaporate with the first shot, if not sooner. "Confi-
Hudson, a professor of international affairs at George-
dence in our public institutions and elected representa-
town University, noted that Saddam was "going over
tives, already torn by S&L and budget controversies and
the heads of the Arab leaders and appealing directly to
still diminished by memories of Watergate and Vietnam,
the people. And he seems to be having some success."
will slip even more," he predicted. He added that the
Marshall Wiley, a former American ambassador to Iraq,
ground war would cost a trillion dollars. But the winner
said on January 17: "He has set a trap that we are walk-
in this category is Oliver Stone, who told The New York
ing into.
He expects to take a military defeat, but he
Timesjust before the ground war: "I see a parallel reality.
is willing to pay that price for what he sees as a political
There is a major time-warp going on here. The quicken-
victory." But Phebe Marr of the National Defense Uni-
ing of the American pulse. We all feel the '60s are com-
versity was the walkaway winner in this category. In Sad-
ing back." Come on baby, light my fire.
dam, she maintained, "we are dealing with a tough but
Best stunt work. This coveted award goes to James
pragmatic adversary," "a shrewd political practitio-
Schlesinger, the former two-time Cabinet secretary and
ner," a flexible man, who would leave Kuwait when he
CIA director, for his daring midair conversions. Schle-
felt his power base threatened. "To sum up," Marr told
singer began in August by arguing for a diplomatic set-
the House Armed Services Committee in December, "I
tlement on the grounds that the embargo wouldn't
believe that Saddam Hussein does not want war, and
work because other nations would cheat, and it would
will go to considerable lengths to avoid it."
be ruinous to us if it did work. In November he testified
The winners are invited to a banquet following the
before the Senate Armed Services Committee that the
ceremony. Crow will be served, garnished with ashes
embargo was "the most successful ever achieved aside
for flavoring.
MARCH 25, 1991 THE NEW REPUBLIC 19
Torture victims and tense victors.
THE RAPE AND RESCUE OF KUWAIT CITY
By Michael Kelly
KUWAIT CITY
One sunny afternoon in the week of liberation, I went
One of the new, post-liberation pieces of graffiti here
to the theater. The hall at Kuwait University's school of
is a two-foot-high, three-foot-long message in red spray
music and drama is a place of conspicuous civilization,
paint on a concrete wall, along the formerly lovely Gulf
a big cantilevered room with modestly elegant blue
Street, amid the debris of the Iraqi army's elaborate
cloth seats trimmed in gold, rich wood-paneled walls,
and worthless beachfront defenses. It reads: "Diarty
and a deep, broad stage set above a large orchestra pit.
Iraqis." Apart from the slight misspelling, it is a com-
I expected to be alone there but instead found a Brit-
mendable statement: accurate, succinct, and re-
ish television crew videotaping the statement of 29-year-
strained. What the Iraqi forces did to this place was
old Abdullah Jasman, Kuwaiti citizen, University of
profoundly dirty; was filthy, vile, obscene; was one long,
Pittsburgh graduate, and victim of a torture session in
vast crime.
this unlikely place. He was standing in the balcony,
The city the Iraqis left behind appeared to have
talking and crying. Here and there, the tile floor was
been worked over by a huge army of drunken teen-
spotted with drops of dried blood, little trails that went
age vandals. They stole everything they could, from
no place in particular.
air conditioners to cigarettes, in a citywide smash
"On the stage," Jasman said, pointing to a large sec-
and grab. The huge and superb medical library at the
tion of steel set scaffolding, "you can see the metal
city's teaching hospital, Mubarak Al-Katib, was stolen
frame. They put you on that, naked, with both legs
in its entirety. So was the library at Kuwait Univer-
spread and they spread you open all the way.
They
sity, along with the school's big mainframe computers
raped one of my friends here. They raped him. They
and everything else worth a cent. Standing near the
were laughing. They said, "This is what your Emir did
library, where a few thousand bedraggled books (Hen-
to you.
There were a bunch of us brought here.
ry the Fifth, The Italian Renaissance and its Histori-
You sat in these chairs, waiting to be tortured, blind-
cal Background, etc.), along with hundreds of thou-
folded, and couldn't see anything. You'd hear the
sands of index cards, remained scattered on the
voices, loud, and the screaming and begging."
floor, Omar Samman, an 18-year-old student, de-
He pulled up his pant legs and showed the camera
scribed the looting: "They came in with lorries and
his calves, mottled with deep black burn wounds.
took everything-the computers, the books, the car-
"They put the wires on your legs and put your feet in
pets, the chairs, the keyboards, the carrels, the micro-
the water, so your whole body is electricity," he said.
phones, the podiums. It took them nearly a whole
"They would put you with the electricity in the water
month, with men in lorries every day, before they got
for twenty seconds, thirty seconds, and you would go
it all."
unconscious and they would throw water on you and
What the Iraqis could not steal, they destroyed, in an
revive you, and then do it again." He began crying, in
astonishingly savage and thorough rampage. They
short, harsh, shuddering sobs, and he could not stop
torched every major hotel, the banks, car dealerships,
for many long, videotaped seconds.
almost every store in the downtown shopping district, a
After it was over, the British reporter thanked him.
score of major office buildings, the fishing marina and
"It must have been terrible for you to go through
all its boats, the National Museum, and a great deal
this," he said. "But it is important. Your story is
more. They ruined the beachfront with lines of concer-
really something else." Actually, the terrible thing
tina wire, bunkers, pillboxes, and mines, and turned
is, it really wasn't. It was as common as sand in Ku-
Gulf Street's luxury apartment buildings into high-rise
wait. It was, in one variation or another, simply the
bunkers, cinderblocking the windows into gun ports.
story of living in Iraq's 19th Province for seven
They shot up and burned down the Emir's office and
months under the rule of Saddam Hussein.
residential palaces, as well as the parliament building,
smashing the windows and doors and breaking the fur-
MICHAEL KELLY is TNR's special correspondent in the
niture for kicks.
Gulf region.
Kuwaitis were stunned by the Iraqi soldiers' habit of
20 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
turning every place they went into a sty. At Kuwait Uni-
pistol in the forehead, and one with a pistol in the
versity every office, it seemed, was ankle- to calf-deep in
back of the head. The boys died here."
debris; the contents of desks and files dumped on
Abdul Rahman Al-Awadi, Kuwait's minister of state
floors, paintings ripped from walls, chairs and tables
for cabinet affairs, claims that 33,000 people disap-
overturned. In one room was a great pile of gold- and
peared since August 2. The Iraqis are reliably estimated
azure-trimmed academic robes, sodden and stinking of
to have taken as many as 20,000 prisoners to Iraq to
urine. At the Al-Ahadat police station, which the Iraqis
serve as slave laborers, and another 3,000 to 5,000 as
converted into one of many makeshift prisons, as many
hostages and shields in the days just before the allied
as 200 men were locked in one 30-by-30-foot room, with
ground offensive. By the minister's reckoning, that
no beds or blankets. The prisoners slept on a filthy tile
would put the number of murdered between 8,000 and
floor and used scraps of styrofoam for pillows. As else-
10,000. This figure is improbable, but not wildly so.
where, the Iraqis' own living quarters in the prison
The precise number was still being worked out at the
contained layer on layer of grime; half-eaten, rotting
end of the first week of liberation, but it was clear by
plates of food flung into corners, trash and garbage
the evidence that it would amount to at least a couple
covering the floors, graffiti ("Hosni Mubarak is a Son
of thousand. The dead were everywhere.
of a Bitch") covering
In a cemetery in
the walls, the stench
the southern subur-
of feces and urine
ban district of Rigga,
heavy in the air.
mass graves, each re-
It is the human fac-
portedly containing
tor that hurt most,
seven or eight men
though. The Iraqi
or boys, stretched
forces treated the
for long rows. Ceme-
people here as they
tery workers said the
did the property.
slots contained about
They trashed them.
1,000 bodies. There
"They killed the peo-
are ten major hospi-
ple and threw their
tals in Kuwait City,
bodies in the dirt,"
and all report having
said District Attorney
handled atrocity vic-
Nassar Seleh. "They
tims. At Mubarak Hos-
killed the people like
pital, one of the
they were chickens."
city's largest, the chief
When I first got
of surgery, Dr. Abdul-
here, a day and a half
lah Behbehani, said
after most of the Iraqi
that from late August
troops had fled in the
through October his
middle of the night,
emergency room re-
and a day after Ku-
ceived groups of five
waiti troops had en-
to ten corpses almost
tered, I met on the
every day. At the
road into town a
IRAQI SOLDIERS SURRENDER TO U.S. MARINES
Al-Amira Hospital, Dr.
polite, middle-aged
INSIDE KUWAIT (ABC NEWS PHOTO)
Sabah Al-Hadeedi
newspaper writer named Abdullah Al-Khateeb. He led
said he can document, with photographs and finger-
me to a grubby little piece of ground, a few blocks from
prints, thirty-eight executions.
his home, and across the street from a building where
Subhi Younis, an ambulance driver and the chief
the Iraqi state security agents had one of their head-
morgue attendant at Sabah Hospital, said he had han-
quarters. We walked about twenty yards in from the
dled at least 400 and perhaps as many as 700 executed
sidewalk. Behind us, the street was filled, as it would be
bodies over the seven-month occupation. One day, he
for days, with uproarious celebration; gunshots, horns,
said, forty-five bodies came in; another day, seventy. On
shouts, and whistles, and dark-robed women ululat-
days like that, the twenty-two refrigerated steel drawers
ing-the high-pitched series of rapid tongue and glot-
in the morgue would fill quickly, and bodies would be
tal stops that is an Arab noise of public emotion. We
laid out in a bloody, twisted carpet on the tile floor and
stopped by a bloody red and white kefiyeh, the Arab
the courtyard outside. When I visited, the morgue was
man's commonwear headdress. Next to it were two sets
still home to seven or eight unclaimed victims.
of scuff marks in the dirt, and two big patches of rusty,
The corpse in drawer 12 had been burned to death
dried blood.
with some flammable liquid. The body was curled like a
"Here," said Khateeb, pointing, "is where the two
fetus, and what remained of the head was still barely
boys kneeled. And here, to the side, is where the
recognizable as a skull, but a skull that seemed to have
Iraqis stood. They shot the boys here, one with a
continued on page 24
MARCH 25, 1991 THE NEW REPUBLIC 21
We're
We'reAHous
AHous
ehold Word.
In household after household. In
every town regardless of its size.
In every city regardless of its eco-
nomic condition. And in every state
regardless of how its region is
faring- - the presence of Fannie Mae
ensures that there is a constant
flow of mortgage money at the lowest
possible cost.
Average American families-
in decent, affordable housing. That's
the reality of Fannie Mae-a reality
shared by millions of households
across the country.
As a congressionally chartered,
shareholder-owned corporation,
Fannie Mae raises billions of dollars
in mortgage capital more efficiently
and at a lower cost than would be
otherwise possible.
We then pass that savings on in
the form of a lower interest rate to
any family whose mortgage we buy.
And Fannie Mae does that at no cost
to the American taxpayer.
Fannie Mae, a household word to
seven million families. Many of whom
have never heard our name.
FannieMae
The USA's Housing Partner
been slathered in a brown viscous material and then
Alternatively, his body, with ankles and hands bound,
baked in a kiln. It was received by the hospital on Octo-
would be deposited near his home. The families were
ber 9, and its identity was unknown.
generally barred from retrieving the bodies from the
The corpse in drawer 16 was that of a handsome man
street or doorstep until the next day, so that many
with a full, proud black beard. His white shirt was
might see them, and fear.
stiff with clotted blood, as were his hair, beard, ears,
The third pattern was one of even worse brutality.
lips, and nostrils. He had been shot twice, execution-
"There started in late September something more se-
style, in the head and chest. He was brought in on
vere. We started getting mutilated and tortured bodies.
February 19, and he was also labeled unknown. Two
Not simply shot, but eyeballs taken out, heads smashed,
men looking for a lost relative peered down at him.
bones broken," said Dr. Behbehani. "You would see
"That's not who I want," said one of the men. "But I
heads that were completely unvaulted, with no brains
know him. I can't remember the name, but I know the
in the skull, or multiple fractures in each arm, or severe
face. He lived in the neighborhood." He sighed and
burns in the face and body, or fingernails removed."
shrugged. "What can you do?"
"The signs of torture I saw from the thirty-eight execu-
The corpse in drawer 3 had its yellowed hands tied
tions this hospital handled were electrical burns, where
behind its back with a strip of white rag. The body had
wires had been put on the chest wall and near the geni-
been beaten from the soles of the feet to the crown of the
tals, and cigarette burns anywhere on the body, massive
head, which had been stoved in by a club, the apparent
bruising, and non-lethal bullets in the shoulders, knee-
cause of death. The legs were covered with deep purple
caps, hip, and legs," he said. At about the same time, the
and black bruises, some six inches or more long, and the
doctors also began seeing more cases involving women,
chest was scored with a cross-hatch of purple welts.
often raped and mutilated before death. "In November
The corpse in drawer 17 had been so badly burned it
a woman I know personally was brought in," Dr. Behbe-
did not look like a body at all. It looked like something
hani recalled. "The top of her head was gone and bullets
you might find on the beach on an early morning walk,
were in her chest." Sitting at his desk, a neat, polished
in the smoldering remains of a driftwood fire. It came
man reflected in a neat, polished surface, the doctor
in on November 3; unknown.
wept. "She was-my God-she was completely mutilat-
Corpses 18 and 19 were two brothers, Amir Abbas and
ed. There was no brain inside her skull. Why should they
Hanza Abbas, brought in on January 20. Excited by the
take her brain? Why do such a thing?"
thought of the land war, the young Abbas men reported-
ly had led a small, bloody insurrection against an Iraqi
ape and torture not resulting in death were also
police station in their suburban neighborhood. Their
R
common. Almost everyone I talked to in four
bodies came in with those of five of their neighbors, who
days had a story of some friend or relative being
were rounded up and killed for good measure, hospital
so abused. One day a man handed me his busi-
officials said. Those men had been shot in the head, and
ness card, which said he was Bassam Find Abhool, assis-
Amir's eye sockets were bloody holes. "We believe the
tant electrical engineer at Kuwait Inter tional Airport.
eyeballs were plucked out with fingers while he was
His fingernails were perhaps one-eighth of an inch
alive," said Saba Hospital surgeon Ali Nassar Al-Serafi,
long; tiny, soft, fragile little strips of reged cuticle.
with a sorry little shake of his head.
"Ah, you see my fingers," said Abhoor. "Iraqis, of
course." His story was typical: picked up at random
rs. Behbehani and Hadeedi charted, in the pre-
walking in his neighborhood; taken to a police sta-
D
cise way of professional accountants of casual-
tion; hung upside down naked; beaten, tortured, inter-
ties, the patterns of death. The first pattern is
rogated; released with a warning. Much of the ques-
chronological, with the execution of civilians
tioning was political. "They would say, 'You know what
beginning several weeks after the August 2 invasion, in
your Emir do for your people? Marry 200 women and
response to resistance efforts, and drastically increasing
take all your money-is this not true?' I would say, 'I
from mid-September on, after Saddam Hussein's broth-
don't know.' They would say, "The Iraqi people have
er-in-law, Ali Hassan Majid, arrived as the new governor.
come to give freedom to people of Kuwait; is this not
Majid reportedly brought in squads of trained killers
true?' I would say, 'I don't know.''
from the Iraqi state security agency, the Mukhabarat.
On Abhool's second day in prison, his interrogators
"The executions began in earnest after they sent in the
got down to serious work. "Two guys take my hands and
special execution squads from Baghdad," said Dr. Beh-
they close my eyes, and they take the pliers and they take
behani. "We started seeing a lot of young men between
out, one by one, my fingernails. Then they put my fingers
the ages of 17 and 32. They arrived, not as patients to
in water with salt," Abhool recalled in a soft, dispassion-
care for, but as bodies to bury."
ate voice. On the third day, his captors crushed his fin-
The second pattern is one of style, identical in almost
gertips with the pliers, but on the fourth day they let him
every case. After arrest, a victim would be imprisoned
go. "Later, I see them in supermarket, and they say,
and interrogated for several days or weeks. Upon re-
'How are your fingers, are they good?' I say, 'No, they are
lease, sometimes secured with bribes solicited from the
not good.' They say, 'Come back to the police station, we
family, the prisoner would be returned home and shot
will make them good.' They laugh and laugh."
in the head, neck, or heart, in front of family members.
There was real resistance here, and it was never com-
24 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
pletely overcome. Dr. Hadeedi and his colleagues en-
effigies of Saddam by the neck through the streets, and a
tered wounded resistance fighters into the hospital as
group of laughing teenage boys led a skinny white don-
car accident victims to fool Iraqi watchers and hid an
key labeled "Saddam" down the boulevard.
entire fifty-bed ward and operating theater in three
At Al-Amiri Hospital a long line of cars queued up to
basement storerooms. Five-person resistance cells
take souvenir shells from an Iraqi anti-aircraft gun, and
worked in a loose food and money distribution network
families posed for pictures next to it. In a heavy rain
that provided those in need with staples and cash every
storm four young women sat in a row on the trunk of
week. Some people fought with arms up to the end,
an Impala, having made a seat by knocking out the rear
despite an Iraqi policy of collective reprisals that meant
window. They waved to the crowd like princesses, and
half a dozen Kuwaiti deaths for every Iraqi death. A
yelled over and over, "I am Kuwaiti! I am Kuwaiti!"
favored tactic was to invite a lonely Iraqi soldier home
For Americans the party offered the novel sensation
to dinner and at evening's end stab him and bury him.
of being adored in a foreign land. An American
But for most people here the seven months were
couldn't pay for anything that week in Kuwait, couldn't
mostly a time for hiding. The post-liberation boasts of
walk ten feet without being stopped to accept thanks,
opposition were often about how the rich hired cranes
couldn't talk to anyone without getting an invitation to
to put their Ferraris on their rooftops, how every neigh-
dinner or lunch. "Welcome, soldiers, you are wel-
borhood was stripped of street signs and house num-
come" three little girls in party frocks serenaded the
bers, how valuables were secreted in backyards and
U.S. Marines at the newly reopened American Embassy.
young men in cubbyholes.
"George Bush, very, very, very, very, very, very, very,
The liberation was, above all, a release from the grind-
very, very good," an old man offered. Two women
ing daily horror of hiding. I went to the street where the
jumped from a car to proffer a daisy and a tray of cook-
Iraqi governor, Ali Hassan Majid, had lived in a comman-
ies. "Thank you! Thank you! And thank Mr. Bush,"
deered mansion. The women who lived across the street
said one. "Welcome to your country," said the other.
hadn't been outside in months, because of fear of the
At one raucous do, centered on three Kuwaiti armored
Iraqi guards who leered at them. Two women, one older,
personnel carriers whose crews stood unusually erect in
the other just 18, showed photographs of themselves from
the manner of young men posing for posterity, four teen-
before the invasion, portrait shots in full hairdo and make-
age girls wearing sweaters covered with photos of Bush,
up. "Look at us now," said the older one. "We are ugly
John Major, and Margaret Thatcher (each framed with
now. Look at our clothes. We could not wash." "Look at
little red and gold and silver spangles) worked the crowd
my hair," said the younger one, holding out a tousled
of American soldiers and reporters with their autograph
rope of henna-rich auburn. "It is terrible, is it not?"
books. I wrote, self-consciously, "To Maha, on a wonder-
ful day, 3-1-91," under an inscription from a "Captain
he release from captivity took the form of that
Henry Douglas: "To a lovely Kuwaiti girl.'
T
most pleasant of releases, a party. The bash be-
gan unexpectedly, early in the morning of Feb-
here were few Iraqis left in Kuwait City against
ruary 26. "We woke up and saw the Kuwaiti flag
T
whom retribution could be exacted. But on the
flying from the police station," said Nassar Seleh. "You
outskirts of town I did see one scene of ven-
cannot imagine our feelings when we realized the Iraqi
geance-pretty much the last thing I saw there.
troops had gone from the city. In the night we had heard
Five days after liberation I drove up the road toward
the tanks moving in the street, and we had dared hope
southern Iraq, the route Saddam's soldiers had taken in
they were going. But to wake up and find all of them
flight. Every fifty or 100 yards there was a fresh kill from
gone-the city is ours again!"
the slaughter the allied forces visited on the fleeing Ira-
Suddenly everyone was a rebel. The streets were
qis. From each charred and trashed vehicle the belong-
filled with young men firing rifles and pistols, making
ings of the dead Iraqi driver and the dead Iraqi soldier-
the celebration almost as dangerouse as the battle for
passengers were spread in a dirty plume on the asphalt.
liberation itself. Early reports cited six such deaths in
Most of the bodies had been carted away, but a fair
the first two days; I know of three, whose fresh graves I
number remained. At every spot where there was still
visited in Sulaibikhat Cemetery. "Abdullah Jassim, Who
an Iraqi corpse, a crowd had gathered. Every few min-
Died For Kuwait," read the stone on the mound of a
utes a new group would approach, and someone would
man hit on top of the head by a falling round.
pull the blanket down to see the enemy's face. The
Suddenly everyone could be brave. People tore the
corpses were already decomposing, their faces yellow
Iraqi license plates from their cars; two days before, that
and black and green, their features melting together
had been a jailing offense. They displayed photographs
under a buzzing of flies. One by one the Kuwaitis
of the Emir, wrote anti-Saddam graffiti ("Saddam,
moved cautiously forward and paid their last re-
Pushed By Bush"), waved Kuwaiti flags, shouted "Kill
spects. One middle-aged man bent down, over half of a
Saddam!"; those had all formerly been hanging of-
machine-gunned body wedged upside down in the driv-
fenses. One car sported twenty-three photos of Kuwait's
er's seat of a stolen Toyota. He spat, carefully, on the
leader, his smiling face plastered on the trunk, hood,
face. His friend got it all on videotape. They pulled the
and windows, all of it festooned with bright gold and
blanket back up and got in their car, heading up the
silver Christmas tree garlands. Pick-up trucks dragged
road to spit on the next of the waiting dead.
MARCH 25, 1991 THE NEW REPUBLIC 25
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fancy him saying. "Well, I can paint. So
I'll stick it to them." The Warhol Factory
emerged, with Warhol the hard-working
one-man factory within it.
TheArts
He characterized himself cleverly. He
was always impassive in interviews, with
an absence of effort to impress that made
him seem superior rather than remote.
People asked him long complicated
questions, and after a pause he would
answer "Yes" or "No" or "What?" But
to this coolness he added an avidity for
high-life party-going, usually in the com-
pany of glitzy celebrities like Liza or Liz
or Jackie. The combination of cold per-
sona and hot activity worked perfectly.
Cameras couldn't keep off him.
Workman's film, though it goes on a
Stanley Kauffmann on Films
bit longer than necessary, digs deftly into
every aspect of the life. He quotes from
TV clips; he interviews Warhol's very dif-
ferent and quite appealing family back
home, also colleagues, critics, dealers,
Pop Art and Bulls
technicians, and performers in Warhol
films-those who are still alive. A good
many of them died relatively young.
hose who are wary of Andy
Pearlstein, who is interviewed pleasantly
(Warhol himself died in 1987 at 59, ap-
T
Warhol as artist and as sub-
in this film, he came to New York for, it
parently of inadequate hospital care af-
ject may be (like me) sur-
would seem, a crack at a conventional
ter a routine operation.) Those deaths in
prised at their interest in a
career.
the last two decades lugubriously under-
new documentary about him. This is be-
But something was triggered in him,
score that Warhol's best period was the
cause Chuck Workman, who made Super-
possibly by his early need to do advertis-
1960s.
star: The Life and Times of Andy Warhol (Aries),
ing work (shoes), something that sensi-
Labeling by decades is dubious, but it
is neither an idolator nor a debunker; he
tized him to the currents between art
seems to fit him. He and his friends and
is an intelligent investigator, sympathetic
and commerce, something in his talent
his followers made of the 1960s, allowing
and fair, of a somewhat serious, some-
and his dry wit that produced a series of
for changes, a facsimile of the 1920s. The
what humorous, audacious episode in
stances toward art and the world around
later era took longer to arrive after a
American cultural history.
it that, relatively quickly, made him a suc-
World War, but it shared the same des-
Warhol's basic grip on us, as Work-
cess. He certainly wasn't the first Pop Art-
perate belief in hedonism as the one reli-
man's film helps us to see, is that he an-
ist. Why should this provincial slum kid
able truth and exacted the same price of
ticipated us. Everything that can be said
have been the one to do so very well by it?
talent as admission to the circus. The
about him, every attitude that he might
The question itself is integral to the hu-
Warhol decade hasn't left us as much of
provoke, he foresaw. This is irritating, yet
mor of his story.
a legacy as the earlier era, but that may
ultimately winning. He knew what he was
Robert Benchley once said, "After I
be partly because the 1920s were fol-
doing and said so before we could. In
had been writing about fifteen years, I
lowed by hungry, black Depression and
this documentary, for instance, he is
realized I had no talent. But by then I was
the 1960s were followed by blithe
asked why he started to make films. He
too famous to quit." The first part of that
yuppiedom.
replies that it's easier than painting: you
remark (quoted from memory) is even
Another difference. Finally, there's
just have to turn on the camera, then
more of a joke in Warhol's case, and the
something vaguely embarrassing in the
walk away. The fact that, for his films, this
time should of course be his own fifteen
Warhol story. Besides and despite his tal-
is both true and sardonically modest is
minutes; still, over the beginnings of his
ent, he leaves us with the feeling that he
disarming, and it's topped by an addi-
career hangs a similar aura of surprise.
outwitted us. And is still doing it.
tional fact: he knew that both the truth
and the distortion in his statement were
part of a game he was playing, more with
the wise than with the gullible.
Where did that knowledge, that one-
FILMS WORTH SEEING
step-ahead-of-everybody gift come from?
The question is unanswerable, of course,
The Godfather: Part III. If you enjoyed the first two installments about this very rich family of
but it persists because of his background.
moral degenerates, carry on with the acceptable new chapter. (Reviewed 1/21/91) Larks
He was from a very poor Polish family in
on a String. This Czech tragicomedy, about the Stalinist 1950s, was finished just when the
Pittsburgh, an environment that could
Soviets arrived in 1969. Locked up for twenty years, it now exercises reticent charm and
hardly have been more remote in every
poignancy. (3/18/91) The Silence of the Lambs. Sacrifices sense and credibility for the sake
sense from the milieu in which he
of sheer scare, but it does scare. Anthony Hopkins is smoothly bestial. Tak Fujimoto's
flowered. He managed to study art at
lighting is exceptional. Most of Jonathan Demme's direction is smart. (2/18/91) The
Carnegie-Mellon because his father died
Vanishing. A Dutch thriller by George Sluizer. Highly intelligent, fiendishly subtle. We
and the life insurance educated the son.
know most of the facts from the start and are still gripped by mystery. (3/4/91) -SK
Taught there by the estimable Philip
28 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
Stuart Rosenberg hasn't been a mark-
boxing, baseball, even pool-as an epit-
human freedom. People can no longer
edly fluent director, but he has some-
ome of human agon. Often we can re-
see a wall without trying to scale it, a limit
times chosen exceptionally good scripts,
spond. But not here-except perhaps
without trying to step beyond it. To the
such as Cool Hand Luke and-one of my
for residents of cattle country. Others
litany of general complaints he attaches
favorites among disregarded American
may have my reaction. The sight of a
a bill of particulars: his attack on televi-
gems-Pocket Money, a lovely ambling
grown man practicing for the event of his
sion, for example, according to which
modern Western. Now Rosenberg's flu-
life by striding an empty oil barrel strung
the principal instrument of contempo-
ency has increased, and he returns to the
in midair with four ropes while two men
rary cultural transmission "destroys the
modern West (Southwest, actually); but
yank at the ropes was too much for me.
capacity for respect." Such unqualified
this time the script stumbles.
Too little, I mean.
chastisement of modern times sounds
My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys is the
The dialogue doesn't always help. It's
remarkably like Allan Bloom or some
story of an aging rodeo rider, and thus
hard to believe in a rodeo rider who talks
other philosopher of the right. No sur-
may remind some of J. W. Coopand Junior
about "something magic" happening in
prise, then, that Lasch is periodically
Bonner. In this screenplay by Joel Don
the arena and who says that the bull is
unmasked as a cultural conservative
Humphreys, the rider is played by Scott
"wild and free" and so, for a few mo-
cloaked in a leftish fleece.
Glenn, who is just OK in the part. He rides
ments, is the rider.
bulls, is gored by one, and comes home
But it takes a while to get discour-
asch struggles to distance
to his Texas town, for the first time in five
aged with this picture because of three
L
himself from his conserva-
years, to recuperate. He finds that his
elements. Dennis M. Hill's acute edit-
tive look-alikes. He does so
father has been moved to a retirement
ing suggests an intelligence that the
by uncovering the capitalist
home by his sister and brother-in-law;
film doesn't live up to. Bernd Heinl's
roots of most modern ills. What Ameri-
that his ex-girlfriend, now conveniently
cinematography is fine; he understands,
can right-wingers typically fail to see,
widowed, can still be kindled in his direc-
for instance, that shadowing a face is
he asserts, is the all-corrosive power of a
tion; that there's a rodeo scheduled soon
one way to give it prominence. And Ro-
free market economy: "capitalism itself,
in which he might win $100,000 and
senberg's directing is far better than
thanks to its growing dependence on
solve all his problems.
anything of his I can remember. He
consumerism, promotes an ethic of he-
Much of the story is cut to pattern, but
used to have trouble with camera place-
donism," enfeebling character, under-
the film could overcome that fact if it
ment, but here he looks at everything
mining the work ethic, shattering com-
successfully exalted its subject. Often we
justly. I wish he had a better story to
munal bonds. He even holds "capi-
are asked to take some sport or game-
look at.
talism" accountable for the contagious
spread of narcotics: "The need for
drugs-that is, for commodities that alle-
viate boredom and satisfy the socially
stimulated desire for novelty and ex-
The Wrong and Winding Road
citement-grows out of the very nature
of a consumerist economy." Bombarded
with advertising designed to titillate the
senses, teenagers and others naturally
BY STEPHEN HOLMES
gravitate toward addictive substances. As
a causal analysis, this statement leaves
something to be desired (evidence, for
The True and Only Heaven: Progress and Its Critics
example), but it nicely displays Lasch's
penchant for eye-catching, speculative
by Christopher Lasch
sociological generalizations based on
(W. W. Norton, 591 pp., $25)
vague intuitions.
Guilt for the crisis lies most heavily,
hristopher Lasch yields no
series of commentaries on writers, main-
then, on economic growth and natural
C
ground to our self-love. In
ly American, from Jonathan Edwards to
science. We have dragged our society to
The Culture of Narcissism
Barbara Ehrenreich. The ease with
the brink of ruin because we are commit-
(1979) and The Minimal Self
which he couples the history of ideas to
ted to the base goal of unlimited abun-
(1984), he trained a censorious eye on
the debates on social policy is genuinely
dance or "prosperity for all." The follow-
America's condition, and the social pa-
impressive. Tending to blur his own
ers of Adam Smith and Karl Marx
thologist's report that he issued about
voice with that of the authors discussed,
quarrel heatedly over tactics, but they
his decadent compatriots was almost cru-
he is sometimes cryptic. Still, his dislikes
concur on mankind's ultimate aim: a cos-
el. In his new book, he affects a similarly
are intense and impossible to miss. Pro-
mopolitan society in which technology is
churlish tone. Once again he broods mo-
gress, imagined and real, is the main ob-
freely deployed to satisfy human needs.
rosely over "our darkening prospects."
ject of his ire. Among the most galling
Both liberals and socialists maintain that
He believes that "our society has taken a
features of "progressive" society are sex-
scarcity can be abolished and "the reign
wrong turn" and that we have fallen into
ual permissiveness, moral relativism,
of want" overcome. Lasch, by contrast,
"moral and cultural disorder." To his
contempt for authority, the ethic of en-
does not expect that, for most people,
eyes, "the social fabric seems to be un-
joyment, open-mindedness, irreligion,
material conditions will improve. In fact,
ravelling." Wherever he looks, he sees
the decay of the family, the breakdown of
he does not want them to improve. He
"spiritual disrepair," "moral chaos,"
traditional communities, drug addiction,
dissents from the ideal of a universal and
"spiritual torpor," and "the loss of mor-
the tendency to shirk responsibility,
prosperous world order.
al purpose." These are dispiriting obser-
and "a general collapse of common
He locates himself, therefore, outside
vations. Are they accurate? Do they make
decency."
the conventional political spectrum. For
sense? What do they imply?
What finally disturbs Lasch is his con-
neither the left nor the right under-
Lasch weaves his account of the con-
temporaries' restlessness, their impa-
stands that the planet's resources are fi-
temporary catastrophe into an engaging
tience with any and every constraint on
nite. (Only the Greens understand that.)
MARCH 25, 1991 THE NEW REPUBLIC 29
The Earth is already groaning under the
The eighteenth century's positive eval-
man. Baconian megalomania will inevita-
onslaught of "development." The fool-
uation of ever expanding wants was his-
bly bring punishment down upon our
hardiness of the modern attempt to
torically unprecedented. It provided the
heads (through holes in the ozone, for
achieve prosperity for all is revealed by
psychological foundation for the takeoff
instance).
"the environmental limits to economic
of surplus economies in modern Europe,
And the wholly unoriginal allegations
growth." If we continue to extend West-
and for a new ideology of progress. The
do not stop here. Technology is also
ern lifestyles to the rest of humanity,
energy released by the uncorking of hu-
alienating. It erects barriers between us
nature will literally buckle and disin-
man desires pulled Western society out
and our environment: for example, in
tegrate beneath our feet. Never con-
of an age-old pattern. Subsistence econo-
modern times, "air conditioning and
vincingly explained, Lasch's ecological
mies limping along pathetically from
central heating" protected the educated
alarmism is more ornamental than fun-
famine to famine were replaced by econ-
classes from the elements, but also "cut
damental; he views environmental dam-
omies of growth and abundance. Yester-
them off from the vivid knowledge of na-
age basically as a confirmation of what
day's luxuries became today's necessities.
ture that comes only to those who expose
he had already concluded on other
The regime of pleasure was born. History
themselves to her harsher moods." (A
grounds, that commercialism and sci-
no longer seemed ruled by fatal cycles of
reader can't help wondering whether
ence are dire mistakes.
rise and fall. Humanity began to soar
Lasch puts his preaching into practice.
He seems almost gratified that nature
shortsightedly in a single direction.
In winter does he do his writing at fifty-
is about to punish human beings for pur-
five degrees?) Heidegger's homilies
suing material prosperity. He, Lasch, did
rogress" was motored
against technology are nowhere cited,
not want mankind to embrace "pro-
"P
by the capitalist engine,
but Lasch reveals a debt to Heidegger,
gress" in the first place. In fact, his prin-
but behind capitalism
too, when he tells us that the proper atti-
cipal objection to economic growth and
lurked the second cata-
tude toward nature is not mastery and
technical innovation concerns their ef-
clysmic blunder of modern times: natu-
manipulation but, instead, "grateful
fect not on the natural environment, but
ral science. Scientific curiosity proved to
acceptance."
on the human soul. They inculcate ava-
be a social acid. Without Mephistophe-
rice, an addiction to novelty, an instru-
lian science, modern economies would
O give his analysis a politi-
mental attitude toward others. Associat-
never have been able to stay atop the
rising tide of human desires. Technolo-
T
cal twist, Lasch describes
ed with advanced economies, the "love
"the vision of men and
of comfort" erodes virility, heroism, ar-
gy alone makes plausible the modern
women released from out-
dor, loyalty, asceticism, the ability to suf-
hope of eliminating scarcity; the "prom-
ward constraints" not only as "the core
fer, the spirit of responsibility, the long-
ise of universal abundance" was a prom-
of the belief in progress," but also as
ing for martyrdom, moral discipline, and
ise made, if not kept, by science. To be
"the essence of liberalism." He offers
the capacity for devotion. Progress pro-
sure, the apple of knowledge was hard
one or two grudging words of praise for
motes "the spirit of hedonism and self-
to resist. Those modern European phi-
the liberal tradition. For the most part,
indulgence." As a consequence, it makes
losophers who committed the unpar-
though, he regards liberal politics as a
people incapable of "a tragic under-
donable transgression of saying "yes"
sinister accomplice to economic growth
standing of life." Most shocking of all,
to science were seduced by "the intoxi-
and technical innovation. Armed with
the age of abundance frustrates our pro-
cating prospect of man's conquest of
"an excessive confidence in reason," lib-
found yearning for an altar on which we
the natural world." Not satisfied with
erals aim to free mankind from hardship
can sacrifice our lives.
improvements in warfare, navigation,
and adversity. They promote atheism,
and medicine, they were charmed by
distrust of authority, moral relativism, ex-
o what went wrong? Why did
the expectation that technology might
cessive tolerance, contempt for tradi-
S
mankind set off on the un-
eliminate all constraints on human
tions, anti-patriarchalism, and a cosmo-
healthy pathway toward pro-
freedom.
politan world-view. They support gay
gress? Like other enemies of
Lasch sees eye-to-eye, in short, with the
rights, women's rights, non-punitive
technical and economic modernization,
more despondent members of the
child-rearing practices, and a "flexible"
Lasch traces the current crisis to a philo-
Frankfurt School. He, too, believes that
attitude toward sex roles. They favor
sophical misstep-more precisely, to two
the Enlightenment "gave rise to the dan-
educational opportunities and social
grave theoretical errors committed at the
gerous fantasy that man could remodel
mobility. They ridicule patriotism. And
outset of the modern age. The first blun-
both the natural world and human na-
they display a "humanitarian horror of
der was the emancipation of desire. In
ture itself." He conceives science as an
violence." (This is meant as a criticism.)
earlier periods, human desires were wise-
expression of impiety, of hubris. Science
They see every demand for law and or-
ly viewed as a source of endless frustra-
is a rebellion against natural limitations.
der as another symptom of the fascist
tion. Desires can never be assuaged into
It rashly denies "our dependence on
mind, of which they are unreasonably
quiescence. Once satisfied, human be-
higher powers." It embodies humanity's
afraid.
ings invariably clamor for more. Defined
blasphemous hankering to play God. It
Liberals also assert the right to kill fe-
as a coincidence of capacities and needs,
fosters the illusion of human self-
tuses. And, of course, they scorn mother-
happiness can be achieved only by an
sufficiency: "In the modern world, this
hood as an unworthy profession. His
ascetic discipline that restricts wants to a
illusion finds its characteristic expression
indignation about "the feminist dispar-
bare minimum. In the modern age, how-
in the machines by means of which man-
agement of motherhood," in fact, pro-
ever, humanity's traditional abstemious-
kind seeks to liberate itself from toil-
vides a good example of the way that
ness was rudely thrust aside, by Adam
that is, from the inescapable constraints
Lasch brings his ontological lucubra-
Smith especially. Rather than trying to
of human existence." Enthroning man-
tions down to the level of the op-ed page.
squelch human wants, Smith celebrated
kind as nature's proud master and pos-
Pro-choice activists, he explains, are sim-
their unlimited multiplication. Happi-
sessor, science destroys our "reverence"
ply the latest heirs to the modern ideolo-
ness could still be guaranteed, despite
for the cosmos. It teaches us to "see the
gy of progress:
the dizzying proliferation of desires, so
world as something that exists only to
Their insistence that women ought to as-
long as technological and economic ca-
gratify human desires." It reduces the
sume "control over their bodies" evinced
pacities grew apace.
Earth itself to a tool of that earthworm,
an impatience with biological constraints of
30 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
any kind, together with a belief that mod-
"sometimes sacrificed their children to
The lower middle classes have their
ern technology had liberated humanity
their passion for home ownership, forc-
darker side, of course. Lasch mentions
from those constraints and made it possible
ing them into the workplace instead of
narrowness, servility, envy, resentment,
for the first time to engineer a better life for
sending them to school." A teacher by
parochialism, racism, nativism, and anti-
the human race as a whole.
profession, Lasch implies that this was
intellectualism. But unlike other classes,
His summary of pro-choice thinking
not as "irrational" as liberals might as-
this class can be trusted to keep its de-
here is astonishing. Why should couples
sume. What some would deplore as a fail-
structive impulses under control. (What
who discover that their unborn progeny
ure of imagination, he views as a sign of
about Bensonhurst and Howard Beach?)
has severe and irreversible brain damage
psychic health. The petite bourgeoisie
At the opposite pole from the ethnic
be legally permitted to make the tragic
he holds up for our admiration, in any
workers are the liberal intellectuals. The
choice for abortion? Those who support
case, is locally entrenched, morally con-
most dangerous political enemy of the
the right to choose, according to Lasch,
servative, committed to family life, re-
lower middle class, they are wholly inca-
do SO because they hope to prevent the
spectful of craftsmanship. Its members
pable of accepting limits or repressing
arrival of children unfit for "success" in
are staunchly loyal to fellow ethnics. All
their malevolent urges. One group is no-
the bourgeois rat race. (How does he
they want is to be self-employed again,
ble. The other group is base.
know this?)
which is precisely what hyperactive capi-
Lasch explains the subtle difference
His principal concern is not the fetus
talism will never allow them to become.
with a mystifying detail: "Liberals saw the
at all. What offends him about the pro-
choice movement is not its heedlessness
of fetal life, but its indifference to the
WINNER OF THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD
will of nature. This is why he can let his
NOW IN PAPERBACK
critique of abortion slide smoothly into a
critique of the contraceptive mentality:
"The objection that sex and procreation
cannot be severed without losing sight of
"As
the mystery surrounding both struck lib-
a portrait of finance, politics and the
erals as the worst kind of theological ob-
world of avarice and ambition on Wall Street,
scurantism." Lasch, be it noted, urges
compliance with the will of nature from a
the book has the movement and tension of an
purely secular point of view. A limit is a
limit. Those who transgress one will
epic novel. It is, quite simply, a tour de force."
transgress them all. Because he believes
this, he even implies, in a bewildering
-The New York Times Book Review
passage, that those favoring birth control
are one step away from "far-reaching
WINNER OF THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD
"Brilliantly
programs of eugenic engineering."
researched and
asch treats Alasdair Mac-
written."
L
Intyre, the Catholic com-
munitarian philosopher, as
-Wall Street Journal
"AS A PORTRAIT OF FINANCE, POLITICS AND THE WORLD OF
something of an authority.
AVARICE AND AMBITION ON WALL STREET, THE BOOK HAS THE
Unfortunately he doesn't proceed in a
MOVEMENT AND TENSION OF AN EPIC NOVEL. IT IS, QUITE SIMPLY,
"A fascinating
MacIntyrish way, defending traditional
A TOUR DE FORCE.". THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW
values against the purported nihilism of
historical
modern times. Rather than making a
THE HOUSE
journey from
philosophical case for premodern ideals,
Charles Dickens'
Lasch poses as the voice of a neglected,
scorned, and humiliated social class. His
London to Tom
ideas don't simply rattle around in his
Wolfe's New York."
head, they have social roots. He is a self-
appointed spokesman for "the ethnic
AN AMERICAN BANKING
-The Atlantic
worker." And this is surely one of the
most worrisome aspects of his book: to
DYNASTY AND THE RISE
OF
"Packed with
attack the reigning orthodoxy, Lasch
hopes to tap the smoldering discontent
OF MODERN FINANCE
revelations
of lower-middle-class whites.
demystifies the
Those who were once self-employed
producers do not swallow the prevailing
myth of progress, he explains, for they
were the principal victims of economic
change. Unlike the rest of us, ethnic
MORGAN
inner workings of
COVER DESIGN: RICHARD PRACHER
the secretive
Morgan banking
workers are comfortable with limits.
empire."
They are immune to modern restless-
RON CHERNOW
-Publisher's Weekly
ness. They feel no irresistible compul-
sion to leap across the next horizon.
They are ambitionless. Indifferent to the
A TOUCHSTONE BOOK
cult of individual achievement, they want
A Division of Simon & Schuster
nothing more than to retain their way of
A Paramount Communications Company
life. In the nineteenth century, they
MARCH 25, 1991 THE NEW REPUBLIC 31
graffiti scrawled on the subway cars as a
munities whose only crime, as far as any-
thies lie instead with those "advocates of
vibrant new form of folk art, while ethnic
one could see, was their sense of ethnic
particularism" who "challenged one of
workers saw them as part of the crisis of
solidarity." King is explicitly taken to
the central tenets of enlightened ideolo-
civility." But liberals do not merely poeti-
task for "his distaste of anything smack-
gy, the equation of progress with the
cize the defacement of public property.
ing of separatism." If you think this
eradication of tribal loyalties and their
They also pour scorn on religion and
sounds like a defense of ethnic and racial
replacement by an all-embracing love for
family values. They live in the suburbs,
fragmentation, a tower-of-Babel version
the whole human race." The heartless
drive foreign cars, frequent museums
of the American dream, you are not far
assault on tribalism may be progress's
and concerts, fly around the world, and
off the mark. Black communities should
greatest crime.
eat in fancy restaurants where they can
be strengthened internally, not dis-
be seen. They celebrate self-expression
persed by integration. Lasch's thesis,
omewhat unexpectedly,
and self-advancement. All this helps to
then, is that "the advantages of commu-
explain their hopeless failure to sympa-
nity cohesion" far outweigh "the dan-
S
Lasch tries to distinguish his
position from a "vague and
thize with the petite bourgeoisie. They
gers of racial separatism." That liberals
milky communitarianism."
view white ethnic solidarity condescend-
oppose balkanization shows how little
Indeed, he devotes two important chap-
ingly, as an expression of atavistic im-
they understand human nature and its
ters to vague and milky criticisms of ordi-
pulses destined to pale in the sunlight of
limits.
nary nostalgia for gemeinschaft. He
reason.
King's earlier activism had been suc-
draws a distinction between himself and
For their unbearable arrogance, how-
cessful, Lasch opines, because it was firm-
other communitarian enemies of moder-
ever, liberals have paid a heavy price.
ly rooted in "the regional culture of the
nity by emphasizing "honest labor" as
Their very language has degenerated:
South." The farther he moved from tri-
well as ethnic solidarity. He sometimes
they speak an "academic English" that
bal politics, the more pitiably his efforts
calls his philosophy "populist producer-
has lost touch with common speech, and
misfired. Thus King made a terrible mis-
ism." This separates him not only from
they can barely understand the regional
take in trying to transplant the civil rights
liberals, who distrust working-class radi-
dialects and "earthy idioms" characteris-
movement from Southern black commu-
calism and see human beings exclusively
tic of ethnic workers. (This is pure Mac-
nities to the secularized and urbanized
as consumers, but also from namby-
Intyre.) Put simply, the typical liberal is a
North. Equally inept was his attempt to
pamby communitarians who leave no
rootless cosmopolitan-an old term of
forge "an interracial coalition" of disad-
room for "proprietary independence"
abuse that Lasch finds apt, and that he
vantaged groups. This liberal tactic was
and manly work. His goal is "the reha-
hopes, unbelievably, to rescue from its
"morally flawed" because, among other
bilitation of work, not the democratiza-
wholly accidental association with fascist
things, it diluted the ethnic solidarity
tion of consumption." He is fascinated
and Stalinist anti-Semitism.
necessary to make the civil rights move-
by "the ideal of a society composed of
ment succeed. (Lasch is admittedly un-
small producers" or "a society of small
o the suggestion that
clear on this point, since a few pages later
workshops, in which effective control
T
lower-middle-class resent-
he blames King for having failed to create
over production remained at the local
ment against liberalism is
"a biracial coalition" based on joint re-
level." And he is not simply looking
an expression of racism,
sponsibility instead of common victim-
backward; a "populism for the twenty-
Lasch strongly objects. Willie Horton was
ization.) This seems especially egregious.
first century," otherwise undescribed,
not the tip of an iceberg. The centerpiece
Surely race relations and communal co-
will give pride of place to "the self-
of the argument here is the anti-busing
hesion in the North might be in a better
governing workshop" and, more gener-
movement. Lasch sees busing, correctly,
state today if King had not died before
ally, to the democratization of work."
as an issue on which liberals are politi-
he was able to work for long in the
Dazzled by J. Pocock's account
cally vulnerable. He rehearses all the
Northern cities.
of the civic virtue tradition, Lasch is
stock arguments, deploring the way that
tempted to project his own version of it
" 'limousine liberals' in the suburbs ex-
asch endorses group loyal-
into America's preindustrial past. The
pect the cities to carry the whole burden
L
ty. He sniffs at social mobil-
key figure in this idealized world (where
of desegregation." The white working
ity. He favors local unifor-
slavery and rural poverty, apparently, did
classes viewed liberal busing policy not
mity and ethnic homogene-
not loom large) was the self-employed
only as patronizing, but also as an in-
ity. He hints that "cultural assimilation"
producer, the moral equivalent to the
tolerable invasion of their ethnic en-
may be a mistake. He even casts doubt,
militiaman-at-arms. Proprietorship gave
claves, an attempt to destroy their com-
by indirection, on the wisdom of "racial
dignity, responsibility, and manliness to
munities. The fact is, "The burden of
and ethnic intermarriage." Liberals em-
the owner. Unfortunately, Lasch tells us
busing notoriously fell on ethnic neigh-
brace assimilationism, he claims, be-
next to nothing about the people he has
borhoods in the cities, not on suburban
cause of an exaggerated fear of factional
in mind, who they were and how they
liberals whose schools remained effec-
strife and a naive faith that human be-
actually lived. So we get no sense of the
tively segregated or on wealthy practi-
ings are capable of universal sympathies.
kinds of problems that they had to face.
tioners of 'compassion' whose children
They made "the misguided attempt to
What he lets us know, by way of compen-
did not attend public schools at all."
remove the sources of social conflict by
sation, is that self-employed artisans and
Liberals are hypocrites, do-gooders at
discouraging particularism, in the hope
farmers viewed labor as a joyful activity,
the expense of other people's loyalties,
that brotherly love would then come into
an end in itself. They had "callings," not
and on the backs of other people's
its own." But, as could have been pre-
jobs. This explains their hostile response
children.
dicted, this attempt "killed the very pos-
to economic development, technical
But they are not alone in their mis-
sibility of brotherly love by cutting off its
change, and especially the rise of factory
deeds. Martin Luther King Jr. is also
roots." Benevolence beyond the bound-
production; "populists condemned in-
guilty for "his ill-conceived campaign for
aries of one's ethnic group is a bloodless
novation because it undermined propri-
open housing in Chicago." What King
ideal, typical of the Enlightenment. Cos-
etary independence and gave rise to
failed to see was that "blacks could not
mopolitans and universalists offer us the
'wage slavery.' He even ventures the
hope to achieve their objectives by de-
"watery fellowship of humanity in gener-
bold generalization that most or all
manding the dissolution of white com-
al." This is tasteless gruel. Lasch's sympa-
"democratic movements in the nine-
32 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
teenth century took shape in opposition
shockingly low? What kind of control
makes one wonder how seriously Lasch
to innovation." (By exaggerating popu-
over their lives have most of humanity
wants to be taken after all).
lar hostility to technical change, he
ever had?
His sacralization of "limits" makes it
makes it difficult to understand the uni-
His hostility toward science and
impossible for him to distinguish sensi-
versal enthusiasm with which all Ameri-
technology, to the extent that it reflects
bly between the limits that deserve to be
cans greeted, say, Samuel Morse's fabu-
ecological anxiety, is pointless. The more
respected and those that deserve to be
lous invention.)
serious our environmental problems be-
disrespected. And it lures him into reck-
It should now be clear why Lasch is
come, the more we need science and
less causal claims (contraception today,
almost more hostile to the welfare state
technology to help us deal with them.
eugenics tomorrow).
than to the economics of laissez-faire.
You don't sop up an oil slick with natural
His portrayal of the lower middle
Classical liberalism invented the "cult
sponges.
class reveals a highly selective vision of
of consumption." Transfer programs
His protest against "the substitution
the past. For one thing, the American
changed nothing essential, accomplish-
of human choice for the blind workings
petite bourgeoisie is filled with people
ing merely "a more equitable distribu-
of nature," if taken seriously, suggests
who originally came to this country in
tion of consumer goods." Under the de-
that we should, say, stop vaccinating chil-
pursuit of "progress." For another, no
rogatory term "consumer goods," Lasch
dren or, for that matter, simply close
social class is as harmless or self-
apparently includes housing, health
down our hospitals. (This suggestion
correcting as Lasch makes his ethnic
care, education, and child nutrition. For
him, welfare programs represent just
one more encroachment of shameful
Enlightenment ideals. Like advocates of
the untrammeled market, welfare-state
Inside Iran-Contra:
liberals see human beings exclusively as
consumers of utility, not as exercisers of
virtue. This is why Enlightenment do-
the book that couldn't
gooders have always supported automa-
tion; they consider work inherently defil-
ing and seek relief from it by means of
be suppressed
improved productivity, which generates
abundance and thereby cuts down the
need for labor.
For Lasch, the gradual abatement of
toil is just another strike against econom-
OPENING
ic growth. The reduction of the workday
is a "paltry vision" that deserves "con-
tempt." Aghast at physical suffering, lib-
eral intellectuals have betrayed the
ARGUMENTS
promise of American life. They have con-
spired to corrupt and unman the worker,
stealing away his (and her?) responsibil-
ities and popularizing their own leisure-
AYOUNG LAWYER'S FIRST CASE
class values. And predictably enough, the
working class's new addiction to material
UNITED STATES V. OLIVER NORTH
comfort has already extinguished older
and more strenuous ideals. ("Popu-
lism," it should be said, has seldom been
JEFFREY TOOBIN
SO suffused with contempt for ordinary
men and women.)
he True and Only Heaven
T
is something of a mood
Angering partisans on both sides of the case, this insider's
piece, and the mood is
account of the Iran-Contra prosecution has been released
glum. Lasch's antipathy to
for publication by U.S. District Judge John F: Keenan in a
progress seems to have preconceptual
landmark decision overruling the objections of Independent
roots. This puts his critic at a disad-
Counsel Lawrence E. Walsh.
vantage; you cannot argue with a state
of mind. Still, his approach has some
"Provides the strongest evidence yet that the United
remarkable flaws that deserve to be
States used its money and influence in Central
pointed out.
America to persuade governments there to assist
His cultural pessimism is wholly un-
the Contras." -New York Times
mitigated by a genuinely comparative
perspective. Things are bad, compared
"A valuable account of how politics and law
with when and where? Despite our pre-
entwined in the Iran-Contra trials. It is also the
sumptuous search for mastery, he claims,
story of a young lawyer's education in the ways
we are now more insecure and less in
of Washington, where justice can be as elusive
control of our lives than ever. But what
as truth."-Bill Moyers
about the greater part of human history
At bookstores now
VIKING
when disease was rampant, famines peri-
PENGUIN USA
odic, peace rare, and life expectancy
MARCH 25, 1991 THE NEW REPUBLIC 33
workers appear. A good look at Pouja-
lopsided assessment is especially exas-
in the context of a liberal system capable
disme, the French populist producer's
perating since he repeatedly warns us
of protecting individual rights and fos-
movement of the 1950s, which had left-
that, when it comes to tribal loyalties,
tering national discussion and cross-
ish origins but ended up on the xeno-
religious superstitions, and martial vir-
ethnic cooperation. Yet that is precisely
phobic and anti-Semitic right, might cor-
tues, we must not let the bad blind us
the kind of system that he purports to
rect this one-sided account.
to the good.
distrust.
His unbalanced view of "develop-
His criticism of nostalgia and the
His suggestion that fanaticism, intol-
ment" neglects the beneficial effect of
pastoral tradition, while a clever ploy,
erance, and superstition are a price
economic prosperity on population
is theoretically unconvincing. Despite
worth paying to avoid flabbiness, insipid-
growth. The richer people become, the
Lasch's emphasis on endangered crafts
ity, and spiritual desiccation is far-
fewer children they tend to have. The
and the dignity of labor, his thinking
fetched. Only an affluent American
Earth's carrying capacity is certainly lim-
remains more infected by backward-
could write this way. Only a Westerner
ited; but a slide into backwardness would
looking communitarian platitudes than
could dismiss (and even then one won-
probably increase our problems in this
he would have us believe.
ders how) the problems of disease, fam-
regard.
His sympathy with "cultural plu-
ine, poverty, and violence as an obsession
His unwillingness to weigh the ad-
ralism" and his doubts about "the as-
of the decadent liberal mind. And, in a
vantages of economic growth and tech-
similationist ideal" remain nebulous in
world full of Tamils and Sinhalese, Serbs
nological innovation against their disad-
their implications. But it sometimes
and Croatians, Israelis and Palestinians,
vantages is perverse. Progress may have
seems that he would favor turning
Northern Irish Catholics and Northern
many unpalatable side effects, but it is
America into an ethnically diverse col-
Irish Protestants, only an American
not this vile. Think of literacy. Even
lection of internally homogeneous sub-
could become larmoyant about the weak-
"consumerism," the desire for beauti-
units. That this is an ill-considered idea
ening of tribal loyalties and ethnic
ful or useful objects, may have some-
is the least that might be said. Strong-
identifications.
thing to do with human dignity. Lasch's
group pluralism would be tolerable only
n the end, Lasch's moral per-
In the Midwest
I
spective is afflicted with deep
and irresolvable inconsisten-
cies. It sometimes seems as if
the communication lines among his vari-
He saw the iron wings of daybreak struggling
ous chapters have been cut. In retro-
to rise over the warehouses stacked along the river.
spect, we can see that he condemns "the
progressive mind" on the basis of four
Rotting wharves and bulkheads. Dead tracks
wholly distinct traditions or ideals: mar-
leading to railroad yards on the edge of nowhere,
tial, religious, ethnic, and artisanal/pro-
prietary. The relations among these four
the sun toiling in gray smoke on the horizon.
value-clusters are never explained or
As if God had crumbled bits of charcoal
even discussed. But the tensions among
them are obvious. Consider Lasch's si-
in the air and dusted the earth with ashes—
multaneous praise of the meek and the
Eyelids of silt, thou shalt not open!
bold. Did progress destroy dauntless
Scourge of asphalt and carbon, of slag heaps
heroism or passive acquiescence? Has
the economy of abundance dampened
and oil-stained piers, of soot and smog.
"virility" or shattered "grateful accep-
He was not a real prophet, I suppose,
tance"? Does mankind need a "taste of
not the biblical kind, like Habakkuk or Amos,
battle" or a renewed sense of "sin"?
That he draws equally on Georges Sorel
and yet he wandered through the heartland alone
and Jonathan Edwards reveals the
and saw the shattered spine of a bridge
breadth of his sympathies, not to men-
tion the disheveled eclecticism of his
collapsing in Gary; he saw the ruined breath
mind.
and gaping windows of a factory choking
Lasch's oscillation between religious
and heroic perspectives contributes to
in Youngstown; he saw the stench of history
the length, but not to the clarity, of his
seeping out of Sandusky and Calumet City.
book. He sometimes defines virtue as
self-abnegation and sometimes as self-
Stops on the highway, stains on a dark map.
affirmation. In one chapter he tells us
Foundries, industrial waste. Stripped quarries,
to submit passively to the universe. In
stripped land, what we've done to the sky
the next he urges us to adopt a "heroic
curdling over two drunks sleeping on an embankment
conception of life." We must strive for
self-sufficiency, he says, and also accept
and waking up to a late day in the empire.
our totally helpless dependence on a
He kept speaking of Byzantium, of Constantinople.
higher power. The Emersonian ideal of
self-reliance is noble; the struggle for
He saw gulls feasting on garbage.
human autonomy reflected in modern
He saw the gouged bodies of the unborn.
science is base. We must seize back the
"control" of our own lives wrested away
EDWARD HIRSCH
by capitalism and also admit that the
desire for "control" is blasphemous and
even satanic. We must throw off wage
34 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
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slavery while embracing mortality and
we applaud the moral advance? Lasch
vague, dream of further progress for
pain, the wages of sin. We must honor
concludes with the usual swirl of demur-
mankind?
both limits and the heroes who auda-
rers, to distract us, I think, from the ulti-
ciously transgress them. This whipsaw
mate paradox of his approach. For what
STEPHEN HOLMES is professor of political
pattern is easier to identify than to
does this bitter enemy of improvement
science and law at the University of
understand.
have to offer but a renewed, if hopelessly
Chicago.
hat would a politics of
W
limits actually look like?
What concrete alterna-
tives, in other words,
The Man Who Presumed
does Lasch propose? He tells us to
adopt "a tragic sense of life," but he has
no practical suggestions about how to
democratize work or to revivify ethnic
BY CHRISTOPHER HOPE
passions. At one point he remarks that
we ought to "try to transform the ghetto
into a real community," but he is natu-
Dark Safari:
rally silent about how this alchemy is to
The Life Behind the Legend of Henry Morton Stanley
proceed. He believes that "a drastic re-
duction of the standard of living en-
by John Bierman
joyed by the rich nations and the privi-
(Knopf, 402 pp., $24.95)
leged classes" is inevitable, but he
doesn't tell us how to get there with the
enry Morton Stanley, as
ing down a vanished Pasha (who did
least (or the most?) possible pain. He
H
every schoolchild used to
want to be found but then refused to
detests large corporations, financial in-
know, was the American
come home after all), or carving out, in
stitutions, and national and state bu-
journalist who discovered
what is now Zaire and was then the Con-
reaucracies, but he doesn't explain how
the African explorer David Livingstone,
go, a great Free State at the behest of
we could cope with the consequences of
who was lost in "darkest Africa." On
King Leopold of the Belgians-Stanley
abolishing them or how they might be
November 3, 1871, he greeted Living-
was unstoppable. Watching him dyna-
replaced.
stone with that stupendous understate-
mite his way through the African bush
A brief autobiographical chapter is ti-
ment: "Dr. Livingstone, I presume?"
on his Belgian adventure, his awe-
tled "The Making of a Malcontent," no
In fact, Henry Morton Stanley was nev-
struck native servants dubbed him
irony intended. But disaffection is one
er what he seemed. For a start, he was not
"Bula Matari," or "The Smasher of
thing, legal implementation another.
even Henry Morton Stanley. He was
Rocks."
Does Lasch want to punish disloyalty and
someone who made himself up as he
He was born on January 28, 1841, the
disbelief? Does he favor a less equitable
went along. He was, in the piquant
illegitimate child of a Welsh housemaid
distribution of consumer goods? Is all
phrase of John Bierman, his latest and
and the village drunk. His name was en-
criticism of authority to be suppressed?
best biographer, "a self-invented man."
tered in the records of the little Welsh
Would he ban interracial marriage, pro-
He became one of the greatest African
town of Denbigh as "John Rowlands,
hibit social mobility, and make contra-
explorers, a rival even to Livingstone,
Bastard." All his life John Rowlands
ception illegal? Should television sets
by dint of ferocious effort and a com-
struggled to escape the stigma attached
and credit cards be confiscated and kero-
plete inability to tell the truth. He was a
to his birth. Abandoned by his mother
sened? Must we revert to small-scale pro-
man in love with his own lies, and he
and rejected by his family, worse was to
duction and abolish paper money?
lived his life in revised versions. As Bier-
come. The boy was sent away to the work-
Should all central heaters and air condi-
man shows in this utterly absorbing dis-
house, a place of confinement as cold as
tioners be shut down?
section of the Stanley phenomenon,
the public charity on which it was
In every case, surely, the answer is no.
the life of the man outstrips the legend.
founded.
But what, then, is the upshot of these
This is surely the best and fullest ac-
Although Bierman doubts that the
ruminations? Lasch's concluding state-
count of the monster who loved uni-
place could have been as hideously aw-
ment is disappointingly academic: "The
forms, guns, fame, and women-and
ful as Stanley painted it in his mem-
populist tradition offers no panacea for
failed to achieve, at least to his own sat-
oirs, the man himself recalled it as
all the ills that afflict the modern world.
isfaction, true success in any of these
"a house of slow death" in which
It asks the right questions, but it does not
loves.
boys and girls were mixed with the
provide a ready-made set of answers."
He was also a magnificent example of
aged, the derelict, and the defeated
He is so reticent here that he doesn't
the Victorian virtue of self-improvement.
poor. In this place the 5-year-old
even tell us what these "right questions"
He was extraordinarily brave and sick-
boy was abandoned. Stanley's later
might be. Still, his evasiveness is easy to
eningly brutal, cutting great swathes
and very dark recollections of his aban-
understand. Answering questions, solv-
through the African continent, leaving
donment owe much, Bierman con-
ing problems, curing ills-those are dan-
behind him the dead and the impressed.
tends, to Dickens. Indeed, they may;
gerous activities. They might make
He moved with what he once called "rail-
but surely Stanley did not need Dick-
things better than they are. They might
way celerity." (It should be remembered
ens to teach him the meaning of utter
even threaten to improve our lives. Just
that in the mid-nineteenth century there
desolation. The boy was taken to this
imagine people taking the lesson of this
was no finer metaphor for swift, iron-
place by a relative who pretended to
book to heart. They might suddenly ac-
clad progress.) Once set on a course-
be delivering him into the care of an
knowledge that material abundance is
whether determined to be the first man
aunt in a nearby village, only to have
not humanity's greatest good. They
to discover the famed Dr. Livingstone
the boy suddenly and savagely impris-
might even try to resurrect tribal connec-
(who in the opinion of his friends did
oned. Stanley recalled the moment in
tions and bygone crafts. If so, shouldn't
not wish to be found at all), or hunt-
his memoirs:
36 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
A somber-faced stranger appeared at the
tion of Stanley, it cannot be equaled.
disturbance between brothers was a puz-
door who, despite my remonstrances,
He was also indefatigable in pursuit of
zle to me."
seized me by the hand and drew me with-
the blessed good fortune that seemed al-
Puzzle it may have been, but impelled
in, while Dick tried to soothe my fears
ways to elude him. But now at least he
forever onward it did not stop Stanley
with glib promises that he was going to
was in possession of a new name and a
from enlisting in the Confederate army
bring Aunt Mary to me. The door closed
on him and, with the echoing sound, I
new confidence and hungry for every-
to prove his love for a Southern belle.
experienced for the first time the awful
thing. Time spent in the swamplands of
Stanley saw action with the Dixie Grays
feeling of utter desolateness.
Arkansas gave him a taste of swamp fever
in the ferocious battle of Shiloh in 1862,
and the time to learn to shoot. As Africa
where he distinguished himself by his
The boy survived the workhouse. In-
would discover, Stanley was a deadly
extraordinary coolness under fire. At
deed, he became one of its brightest ad-
shot. His time in the South also sharp-
the height of the battle, feeling himself
vertisements, and in later life he was not
ened his eye for the typical life of the
to have been chided for lagging in the
above commending the hard virtues of
planter: proud, fractious, and liverish.
face of murderous enemy fire, Stanley
self-reliance that he had learned. By his
He had nothing but scorn for the in-
moved forward SO fast and so far that he
own account he escaped at 15, after
creasing bellicosity between the South
found himself behind enemy lines. Cap-
knocking down the director, a one-
and the North: "Why a sooty Negro from
tured by the Union troops, he turned
armed ex-miner who beat the children
a distant land should be an element of
coat and prepared to fight his former
regularly and ended his days in a lunatic
asylum. Bierman, who has studied the
workhouse records, thinks the story of
his dramatic departure owes much to
Stanley's imagination and, again, to his
reading of Dickens. Bierman suggests
"I want to get somewhere,'
that the young Rowlands left peacefully
said Alice to the Cat, and the
to attempt to rejoin his family. Either
way, the boy Stanley showed a capacity
most somewhere place
for impulsive action and a gritty determi-
imaginable is The Graduate
nation to make his way and his fortune,
Faculty. It is small in size but
whatever the odds.
tall in intellectual stature.
Starting with its exiled founders, it has pioneered
hen his family rejected
W
him once more, in 1859,
international perspectives on political economy
at the age of 18, young
which help us peer at American society and
John Rowlands signed
history more closely through the looking glass."
up on a Yankee merchantman bound
for New Orleans, where he promptly
jumped ship. If ever an immigrant were
Alice Amsden: Economist
to make his way in the New World, it was
this boy. Young Rowlands was entranced
by New Orleans. The Southern sensuous
Alice Amsden is a respected economist and Professor of
appeal of it, together with the realization
Economics in The Graduate Faculty.
that this was indeed an utterly new place
She is author of a number of works, including Asia's Next
filled with people who in no way resem-
bled his British countrymen, profoundly
Giant: South Korea and Late Industrialization. Her current
impressed him. Stanley wrote later of the
research focuses on the financial liberalization in South Korea,
Americans he met: "These people know
the Taiwanese economy and the public sector.
no master and had no more awe of their
employers than they had of their fellow-
In 1989, fifty-six years after it was born as the University
employees." And in New Orleans Stanley
in Exile, Amsden joined The Graduate Faculty. The University
got lucky, for it was there that he met the
in Exile started with fewer than a dozen emigré escapees from
man whom he later claimed had adopted
him, one Henry Hope Stanley, a cotton
Fascism. It has evolved into a renowned institution attracting
broker.
scholars from around the world.
Much has been made of this miracu-
Amsden teaches M.A. and Ph.D. level students in
lous adoption. Bierman's patient sleuth-
economics. If you would like to study with her, or any
ing shows that, although the two men
formed a partnership for a time, Stan-
of our other distinguished
Graduate Faculty
ley's account of his life with his bene-
scholars, call toll-free:
of Political
factor had very little basis in fact. Stan-
1-800-523-5411 (in N.Y.C.:
and Social Science
ley was making it up, just as he was
making himself up, as he went along.
212-741-5710), or write: 65
New School
Long after Stanley had made his name
Fifth Avenue, N.Y.C. 10003. for Social Research
as the man who found Livingstone, the
New Orleans Daily States interviewed an
The New School for Social Research is a university of seven academic divi-
old lady who remembered the Welsh
sions including The Graduate Faculty, the Graduate School of Management and
youngster back in 1859. He was, she
Urban Policy, Eugene Lang College, Parsons School of Design, Mannes Col-
lege of Music, The New School and Otis Art Institute of Parsons in Los Angeles.
told the paper, "smart as a whip and
much given to bragging, big talk, and
telling stories." As a succinct descrip-
MARCH 25, 1991 THE NEW REPUBLIC 37
friends. Perhaps luckily for Stanley, dys-
wild prairie, and when I do it I feel free and
more likely that he swung between those
entery intervened, and when he survived
happy, but when we settle we grow pale and
two extremes not uncommon among
that he was off and moving again with
die.
My heart feels like bursting with sor-
headlong Victorian adventurers, death
"railway celerity." In 1863 he was in
row. I have spoken.
and glory.
New York working for an attorney. In
There was to follow, almost by way of
All of this was really no more than a
1864 he was back in the Civil War as a
a taster, Stanley's first visit to Africa. He
prologue to a swelling theme, mere bril-
ship's writer on the frigate Minnesota,
accompanied General Sir Robert Napi-
liant and dangerous preparations for the
where he witnessed the successful as-
er's punitive expedition against Theo-
great adventure by which Stanley found
sault on Fort Fisher.
dore, the "mad" emperor of Abyssinia,
the huge celebrity after which he panted.
After the war he was in St. Louis and
filing for Bennett's Herald. This now all
This was the search for the lost mission-
found a job with the Missouri Democrat,
but forgotten campaign was conducted
ary David Livingstone. The idea was not
where he kicked off his life of explora-
with brilliant dispatch across almost im-
Stanley's but Bennett's, who summoned
tion with a voyage of 600 miles down the
passable terrain. It is one of the fe-
the 28-year-old journalist to a meeting at
Platte River in a flat-bottomed boat. In
licities of Bierman's book that he re-
the Grand Hotel in Paris on October 28,
1866, for the sheer thrill of it, he led an
mains always aware of the colossal self-
1869, and came straight to the point. He
expedition to Turkey. Catastrophe befell
confidence of the great Victorians. Brit-
wished him to find Livingstone if he was
the party. The explorers were set upon
ish imperialism in the mid-nineteenth
alive, and give the New York Herald the
by angry locals and one of its members
century has about it always a grandeur
scoop of the century. Stanley pointed out
was raped by Turkish brigands. But be-
dizzying to contemplate. Was a distant
that the venture would prove expensive
fore it, and during it, and after it,
princeling to be punished for disrespect
and recorded, verbatim, Bennett's reac-
came the photographs. A short and in-
to Victoria, the queen empress? Well
tion: "Draw a thousand pounds now;
corrigibly vain little man, Stanley was
then, let no effort be spared. Facing a
and when you have gone through that,
forever having himself photographed
landing on the coast of Eritrea, to be
draw another thousand, and when that
in new uniforms, many of them of his
followed by a 400-mile march inland,
is spent draw another thousand, and
own design. He had a way of making
Napier laid his plans:
when you have finished that draw anoth-
catastrophe pay. His disastrous Turkish
er thousand, and so on; but FIND
journey took him on to the New York
An advance party of engineers identified a
LIVINGSTONE."
lecture circuit. Though it bombed bad-
ramshackle village named Zula standing on
ly, Stanley's self-advertisement, proudly
an open plain in Annesley Bay, as the ideal
point at which to land Napier's army. The
t was an extraordinary com-
printed at the time, suggests the strut-
derelict settlement had no port facilities so,
ting style of the man: "The American
I
mission. To many in England
with typical Victorian bravura, the British
at the time, Livingstone was a
Traveller, Henry Stanley, who was cruel-
built them, with two huge concrete piers,
faint memory. Reports from
ly robbed by the Turks on September
warehouses, lighthouses, and twenty miles
Lake Nyasa had reached Zanzibar in
18,
1866 gave a talk about his nar-
of railroad track to facilitate the landing of
1866 claiming that Livingstone had been
row escapes and brought the evening to
a mountain of supplies and Napier's 13,000
killed by hostile natives. Obituaries, fac-
a close by singing a Turkish song a la
troops, 20,000 camp followers-including
tual and showing little sign of sorrow,
Turque."
water carriers, prostitutes, and vendors of
other creature comforts-and 55,000 draft
appeared in British papers in 1867. The
and pack animals. These included mules,
same year an expedition funded by the
here was no stopping him
Royal Geographical Society concluded
T
camels, and 44 elephants to carry the artil-
now. Henry Stanley had
lery in the style of Hannibal crossing the
that Livingstone was still alive. But by the
found America to be not
Alps over the invasion route's precipitous
following year, reports of his death were
only the land of opportu-
mountain passes.
again current. It was only in 1869 that a
nity but also the source of bushels of
letter arrived in Zanzibar from Living-
fascinating and salable copy. Everything
his military extravaganza
stone himself and reopened yet again
was grist to his mill, and Stanley would
go anywhere to get it, as the editors of
T
was transported to Africa
the question of his fate.
in a fleet of no fewer than
By the time Stanley arrived on the is-
papers like the Democrat discovered. Lat-
280 ships-all this to deal
land of Zanzibar in 1871, no news had
er he found a welcome in the purple
with a bit of foreign difficulty. Napier's
reached the outside world about the
pages of James Gordon Bennett's New
expedition was an unqualified success,
sainted doctor for some two years. De-
York Herald. Did one want an account of
and SO was Stanley's part in it. By a bril-
spite discouragement from the British
the pacification of the Indians? Vi-
liant combination of organization, cour-
consul in Zanzibar, who considered the
gnettes of Wild Bill Hickok? Stanley,
age, and judicious bribery, Stanley
idea that Livingstone wished to be
with his arch, often overbearing prose,
scooped all his rivals, British and Ameri-
"found" to be quite absurd, Stanley was
"elephantine" in Bierman's word, was
can, and made his name as an outstand-
not to be denied. The oath he swore at
the man.
ing foreign correspondent.
the time signals his determination:
Yet he was capable of moments of
Up until this time he had been plain
an oath to be kept while the least hope
startling insight during these early trav-
Henry Stanley. Now he added a middle
of life remains in me, not to be tempted to
els. Consider the heart-wrenching dec-
name, a kind of euphonious, auditory
break the resolution I have made, not to
laration of the Kiowa chief, White
signature that he must have felt gave just
give up the search, until I find Livingstone
Bear, known also as Satanta, when
the right external ring to his tumultuous
alive, or find his dead body
only
death
faced by white settlers determined to
inner ambitions. He tried several alterna-
can prevent me. But death-not even this; I
"improve" his country with schools
tives, Bierman writes, including Morley,
shall not die, I will not, I cannot die!
and railways:
Morelake, Moreland, and settled finally
Remembering perhaps the meticulous
on Morton. Bierman speculates on a cer-
planning of Napier's expedition and
I love the land and the buffalo and will not
part with any.
I don't want any of these
tain morbid emphasis on the Latin root
trusting, though not always with a happy
medicine homes [schools] built in the
for death that he discerns at the heart of
heart, in Bennett's promise of thousands
country; I want the papooses brought up
the name and, I think, rightly dismisses
of pounds to finance his quest, Stanley
just exactly as I am.
I don't want to settle
it. Quite probably there was some deep
mounted one of the richest expeditions
[on the reservation I love to roam over the
desire for oblivion in Stanley, but it is
ever seen in Africa. He bought a million
38 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
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THE
NEW REPUBLIC
"A brief and perceptive
beads and twenty miles of cloth and 350
but it is difficult to think of anyone who
synthesis and analysis"*
pounds of brass wire for trading with the
did more to bring the trade in human
natives of the interior. In comparison
lives to an end. Livingstone believed that
with the thirty-five porters with whom
somehow his very presence in Africa
Livingstone had set out in 1866, Bierman
would put an end to the degradation.
A Concise
estimates that Stanley took 140. Other
Between himself and God, he felt, there
authorities, including Tim Jeal, perhaps
was an agreement-together they would
History of
the most levelheaded of Livingstone's bi-
put a stop to it. This mattered even more
ographers, put the number of porters at
than his dream of finding the source of
close to 200.
the Nile River. "The strangest disease I
GERMANY
have seen in this country seems really to
month after stepping
be broken-heartedness and it attacks free
A
ashore in Zanzibar, Stanley
men who have been captured and made
Mary Fulbrook
and his enormous expedi-
slaves."
tion, which included two
When Stanley arrived in Ujiji for his
other white men, neither of whom was to
momentous meeting with Livingstone,
Germany's problematic
survive the trek, set sail for the African
he was, as always, carefully prepared. For
history has provoked much
mainland. Once on the march, his pro-
his part, though he had no idea who had
debate and interpretation.
gress was phenomenal. Where other ex-
gone to so much trouble to seek him out,
This synthesis of extensive
plorers had taken five months to reach
Livingstone knew from the size and
historical material explores
Unyanyembe, 200 miles east of Lake
splendor of Stanley's entourage that
the interrelationships
Tanganyika and 500 miles inland, Stan-
here was "no poor Lazarus like me."
among social, political and
ley covered the distance in just three
Stanley's suit was pressed, his helmet bril-
months, and he did it in the rainy season.
liantly white as he stepped forward and
cultural factors in the light of
He knew he would have to travel a thou-
uttered the words that have gone down
scholarly controversy.
sand miles to Ujiji, where, best intelli-
in history. "Dr. Livingstone, I presume?"
*Ian Kershaw, University of Nottingham
gence suggested, Livingstone might be
The depths of that understatement may
found.
Cambridge Concise Histories
be gauged from the fact that Stanley was
$39.50/$10.95
Stanley let nothing and nobody stand
the first white man to clap eyes on Living-
in his way. His weapons were the whip
stone for six years in a country where
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
and more of the whip, and the gun, and
there were no other Europeans within
the whip again. His men deserted. They
thousands of miles.
Call toll-free 800-872-7423
rebelled. They died of fever or were
killed by hostile tribesmen, for the
he phrase has been so
country that Stanley was passing through
was thick with cannibals. Even more dan-
T
much mocked that even
Bierman feels uncomfort-
by David L. DiLeo
gerous were the murderous wars being
able with it. It was to be-
Foreword by Arthur M.
fought between the Arab slavers and the
come the butt of music hall comics and
Schlesinger, Jr.
tribes they preyed upon. Among the
the stuff of cartoons. It has been used to
most valuable qualities of Bierman's
name a piece of jazz, a cocktail, a Victori-
During his tenure as under
book are its constant reminders that Af-
an fashion boutique, and a discotheque.
secretary of state, George Ball
rica existed, to European and Arab,
What is sure is that Livingstone felt any-
George Ball, Vietnam,
and the Rethinking of Containment
was the only presidential ad-
merely to be plundered: Africans were
thing but amusement. Despite Stanley's
viser who systematically op-
caught between the gun-happy, whip-
fears about the meeting, and the rumors
wielding European explorers and the
of Livingstone's intense dislike of Euro-
posed military intervention in
death-dealing business of the Arab
pean busybodies dashing about the Afri-
Southeast Asia. DiLeo profiles
slavers. And despite the efforts of the
can bush, the two men took to each oth-
Ball's position and evaluates
Anti-Slavery Society in Britain, and the
er at once. And Stanley showed no
the impact of his dissent on the
success of the British government in
unseemly haste about leaving. They
Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon
forcing the Sultan of Zanzibar to sign
stayed together for five months, from
the anti-slavery agreement in 1845, the
November to April. The two men were
administrations.
business was rampant.
useful to each other. If Livingstone made
When Livingstone arrived in Zanzibar
Stanley's name, he was not above using
287 pp., 9 illus., $37.50 cloth,
in February 1866, he estimated that
the dangerous columns of the New York
$12.95 paper
somewhere between 80,000 and 100,000
Herald for a savage attack on slavery.
slaves were being dragged from their
When the two men finally parted, there
homes each year and readied for export.
were tears and declarations of undying
The slavers laid waste the land that they
affection.
available at
pillaged. Livingstone and Stanley con-
Bierman's embarrassment at Stanley's
bookstores or from
stantly came across dead villages, un-
character is one of the few things about
The University of
tilled fields, the scattered remnants of
his book that leave me uneasy. One may as
North Carolina Press
depopulated hamlets cowering in the
well be embarrassed by a forest fire. Even
forests. They watched helplessly the lines
that dread phrase really does no more
Post Office Box 2288
of chained captives wending their way to
than testify to the resonance of the four
Chapel Hill, NC 27515-2288
the slave ports.
words chosen, once heard never forgot-
Toll-free orders:
No one fought more fiercely against
ten, and to Stanley's perfect genius for
slavery than Livingstone. He may have
publicity. What mattered about Stanley
1-800-848-6224
been monstrously self-regarding, impla-
was not his endless self-aggrandizement,
cable, choleric, disablingly unforgiving,
but his unshakable belief that you got
40 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
through life, just as you got through Afri-
ca, by breaking the heads of those who
stood in your way.
Much the same thing applies to Stan-
"Inspiring"*
ley's technicolor racial views. His mix-
ture of brutality and patronizing moral-
ity enraged liberal missionaries back in
"Crystal-clear, well-reasoned,
England as reports of his methods began
supremely informed. Essays that
to reach the public. Stanley, quite literal-
go right to the heart of the mean-
ly, stuck to his guns. In a fine retort,
ing of the war and Abraham
which Bierman does not give, Stanley
Lincoln's role in it."
told the accusing missionaries that he
-The New York Times Book Review
would offer them "seven tons of bibles,
four tons of prayer books, any number of
surplices, and a church organ into the
"A brilliant collection of essays,
bargain" if they could advance swiftly
all of them soundly conceived,
through the African bush "without
gracefully written, and persua-
chucking some of those bibles at some of
sively argued." -Stephen B. Oates*
those negroes' heads." These attitudes,
of course, reflected widely prevalent no-
tions of African inferiority. It is interest-
ing to compare Livingstone's beliefs: "I
have no prejudice against their color,
JAMES M. McPHERSON
anyone who lives among them forgets
they are black and feels they are just fel-
low men." In fact, Livingstone went on
ABRAHAM LINCOLN AND THE
to prefer the company of his African
friends to the "assistance" of his col-
leagues at the Anthropological Society in
SECOND AMERICAN REVOLUTION
London.
At bookstores everywhere
n Europe the discoverer of
I
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
Livingstone ran into such
a chorus of abuse and deni-
gration that he must have
thought nostalgically of facing the poi-
soned arrows of hostile tribes. Large sec-
"Impressive
the human condition is observed-and kept watch
over-with scrupulous exactitude."
-The New York Times Book Review
tions of the British press at first simply
refused to believe that Stanley had found
"A provocative look into the mind of a 49-year-old former Israeli
Livingstone. When proof was provided in
espionage agent compelling Oz touches a universal chord in one
the form of Livingstone's journal, and its
man's anguished search for meaning in a country that is a microcosm of a
authenticity was verified beyond doubt,
chaotic, dangerous world."
-Publishers Weekly
recognition of his achievement was
grudging. The Royal Geographical Soci-
ety went so far as to suggest that Living-
stone had cooperated in Stanley's "dis-
AMOS OZ
covery." The real trouble was that they
saw him as an upstart, bigheaded, Yan-
kee adventurer who had had the gall to
beat the British at their own game.
Queen Victoria, it is true, presented him
TO
Eric Feinblatt
with a gold snuffbox, but she too put the
boot in later, describing him as "a deter-
mined, ugly little man-with a strong
American twang."
KNOW
Though the success of his book, How I
Found Livingstone, made him a wealthy
man, it was downhill all the way. On his
A
return from his Livingstone expedition
he looked, said a contemporary, as if he
WOMAN
had aged twenty years. From then on
Stanley returned to Africa time and
again. The Tribune dispatched him to
HARCOURT
cover a British punitive expedition
HBJ
BRACE
against the Ashanti in 1873. During his
expedition to Africa in 1874, his hair
JOVANOVICH
turned white and fever almost killed
A Helen and Kurt Wolff Book
him. The buccaneering nature of these
Available at bookstores everywhere.
expeditions also became more pro-
MARCH 25, 1991 THE NEW REPUBLIC 41
nounced. Consider his boast during his
Central African expedition intended to
trace the course of the Congo River to its
source:
The Compleat Poet-Critic
[I] attacked and destroyed 28 large towns
and three or four score villages, fought
32 battles on land and water, contended
BY WILLIAM PRITCHARD
with 52 Falls and Rapids, constructed
30 miles of tramways through Forests,
hauled our canoes and boat up a mountain
1500 feet high, then over mountains
Under Briggflatts:
6 miles, then lowered them down the slope
to the river
[and] obtained as booty in
A History of Poetry in Great Britain, 1960-1988
wars over $50,000 worth of ivory.
by Donald Davie
Stanley's last expedition was his worst.
(University of Chicago Press, 262 pp., $24.95)
He set out to create a new country, the
Congo Free State, which was to be
drained to its lees by the Belgians. The
Collected Poems
Congo Free State was an unrestrained
exercise in murder, rapine, and violence.
by Donald Davie
The lash, which was usually serrated hip-
(University of Chicago Press, 480 pp., $40, $14.95 paper)
popotamus hide, was an everyday instru-
ment of torture. Executions were sum-
OW approaching his seven-
readers who want to be "spurred into
mary. Women were punished by having
N
tieth year, Donald Davie,
feeling," since Gunn's meters and
their breasts cut off and being left to die.
who was once designated
rhymes draw attention to themselves:
Stanley condemned these excesses, but
by Christopher Ricks as
The art that refuses to conceal itself runs an
he could do so only from distant retire-
"the best literary critic in the post-
insurmountable wire fence between itself
ment in England. Frank Harris, a won-
Eliot-Leavis-Empson world," has retired
and the reader; the reader may look
derfully acute observer of the follies of
from a distinguished career as a universi-
through the wire mesh, but he cannot join
imperial adventurism in Africa, re-
ty teacher and simplified his Anglo-
in, except by the exercise of a sympathetic
marked of Stanley that he was "a force
American loyalties by becoming a perma-
imagination.
And that is an affront that
without a conscience."
nent resident of England. As a writer,
the reader finds too gross to stomach, if he
has been schooled in a rhetorical theory of
however, he is as active as ever (in addi-
literature so as to think that the writer's
tanley personified, then, the
tion to the two listed above, a third book,
prime duty is to him, the reader, rather
S
white man's assault upon Af-
Slavic Excursions: Essays on Russian and
than to the writer's own experience, his
rica. It has been an effect
Polish Literature, was also published last
own subject. Conceiving of poetry as a ser-
both momentous and la-
year).
vice industry, such a reader expects ser-
mentable. Africa existed in the Europe-
Davie has said of Leavis's style that its
vice.
an mind as an overheated fantasy, as the
"difficulty" and "corrugation" gave
Both passages involve a principled crit-
Dark Continent. In truth, the darkness
Leavis's criticism both substance and sa-
icism of certain ways of reading and writ-
lay in the minds of those who traveled
vor. What gives Davie's criticism its pecu-
ing, by comparison with other, more ad-
with whip, slaving chains, and rifles,
liar substance and savor may be glimpsed
mirable ways. Besides the lively and
burning, pillaging, and destroying, all
in two related passages about the art of
opinionated presence of its author, what
the time insisting, and believing, that this
poetry. In the first (from his essay "En-
holds Under Briggflatts together is its aim
was progress.
glish and American in Briggflatts," which
to celebrate some recent British poets
Certainly it might be said that whatev-
appeared in 1977), Davie attempts to ac-
who refuse to conceive of poetry as a
er Stanley accomplished in Africa, it was
count for the neglect that Basil Bunting's
"service industry," insisting instead on a
Africa that left its mark on Stanley in the
long poem has suffered at the hands of
more austere relation to their readers
end. He plundered it with a will and, in
English readers. It is a sad fact, he ob-
and on realizing a "subject," rather than
return, it never left him alone. After nu-
serves, that such readers of contempo-
charming and disarming through rhe-
merous unlucky loves, Stanley finally
rary poetry,
torical guile. As Davie puts it, the poem is
married Dorothy Tennant in a happy,
(or should be) a "transaction between
few as they are, and perhaps just because
probably platonic, union that endured
they are so few-have got used to being
the poet and his subject more than it is a
until his death in 1904. His wife felt
cajoled and coaxed, at all events sedulously
transaction between the poet and his
nothing but bitterness for what she
attended to, by their poets. Teachers in En-
readers."
called "the country that has taken so
glish classrooms have for decades now per-
The distinction is an important one,
much of his splendid vitality." The plain
suaded schoolchildren and students to con-
partly because it impinges on the way
fact is that Stanley needed Africa far
ceive of the reading of a poem as a matter
Davie, as a literary historian, views the
more than it ever needed him. In his
of responding to nudges that the poet, on
recent scene. He distinguishes, usefully,
biographer, at least, he has been fortu-
this showing debased into a rhetorician, is
between poets who have a "public" and
nate. This is a magnificent and appall-
supposedly at every point administering to
them.
those who merely have a "following";
ing Victorian life. Bierman knows him
and he proposes, convincingly, that of
to have been "a bully, a braggart, a hyp-
The second passage occurs in his new
recent British poets only Ted Hughes,
ocrite, and a liar," but he recognizes, he
book Under Briggflatts. (Does he mean
Philip Larkin, and the Irish Seamus
even celebrates, the achievements of
that poets write under the aegis of Bunt-
Heaney can be said to have a public. Yet
this haunted man.
ing's poem, or that the poem towers
on the evidence of those writers whose
above all other poetry written during the
works are most admiringly explored in
CHRISTOPHER HOPE is the author most re-
past thirty years?) Davie writes of how
the volume to hand, it is poets with a
cently of Moscow! Moscow! (Heinemann).
Thom Gunn's poems in Moly frustrate
mere following who most interest Davie.
42 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
Of these, the most prominent are
that, compared with Clarke's truly fierce
solely interested in tracing, through pa-
Charles Tomlinson, C. H. Sisson, and Ba-
and comic practice, Hughes's approach
tient detail, a particular work's imagina-
sil Bunting. As is usually the case with
typically consists in "setting us up for,
tive designs. In fact, he is in the best
Davie's critical writing, this is no impar-
and then delivering, a stagey punch
sense a theoretical critic (or historian),
tial survey of the field conducted on the
line," a practice that masks "a bleeding
insofar as his special gift is for drawing
old-time advice that if you can't say some-
heart." The judgment seems to me a tell-
out and turning around the moral, polit-
thing nice about a person or poet, don't
ing criticism of Hughes's rhetoric, even
ical, or aesthetic principles raised by this
say anything at all.
as it places Davie in the line of those who
or that poet or poem. As in the discus-
Davie claims, in his foreword, that
incline toward judicial criticism.
sion of Gunn's continuity with Renais-
there is a difference between literary his-
sance values, Davie's study of poetry al-
tory and criticism, and that the main
f course Davie has always
ways has its eye on something more or
function of literary history is commemo-
O
preferred some authors
other than poetry.
rative. Thus it is more indulgent than
and some poems to others.
At times, however, this idiosyncratic
criticism need be toward the writers it is
Did he not once begin a
energy feels perverse, or at least eccen-
concerned to preserve: "It is more anx-
review of Shelley's notebooks by asking,
tric, as when he declares his feelings
ious to ensure that no deserving name
"Wasn't Shelley by and large a rather
about the book's presiding figure:
falls out of the historical record, than to
bad poet?" In Under Briggflatts he is capa-
"There are those who think that after
make sure that undeserving ones do not
ble of similarly enlivening, even discon-
1945, the poetry of Bunting is manifestly
creep in." This distinction between
certing, surprises. For example, in dis-
better than any other poetry in English
history and criticism seems plausible
cussing Gunn's The Passages of Joy he
written in the same period. It is in a class
enough, though in practice the activities
notes, in a generally positive account of
overlap and mingle. Davie admits that
Gunn's poetry, that the poet's pro-
his book "seeks to promote certain Brit-
claimed homosexuality constitutes an ap-
HOW TO EXECUTE AN AGENCY
ish authors as, however modestly, canon-
peal to "experience" as the legitimat-
by E. Waterhouse Allen
ical," and that he does this "on the un-
ing test for "what is right.' This
derstanding that such judgments are
means, he goes on to argue, that whereas
Wicked, informed satire about Bureau-
cratic Types you should recognize! Dis-
disputable and ought to be disputed."
one could detect profound affinities with
tilled from 50 years work in human serv-
seventeenth-century English poets in
ice agencies. 1st edit., $3.95.
shall be doing some disputing
Gunn's earlier Moly, his later espousal of
I
before long, but first I want to
"Gay Liberationist" sentiments meant
BARK-BACK
describe the kind of historian
that his sympathies "with any period be-
P.O. Box 235, Glenshaw, PA 15116.
that Davie is in practice. Con-
fore the Enlightenment can never have
sider, by contrast, the practice of an aca-
been more than skin deep."
demic American literary historian like
Such a provocative charge borders on
TAINTED GREATNESS:
David Perkins, whose second volume of
sensationalism, or at least on overstate-
ANTISEMITISM, PREJUDICE &
A History of Modern Poetry, which ap-
ment. It also rouses any reader who
CULTURAL HEROES
peared in 1987, deals with postwar Brit-
might have been dozing. Just how un-
ish and American poets. Perkins's way is
academically daring Davie can be is
a conference on bigotry in the arts,
to parcel out the poets into different
clear when, after positing Gunn's neces-
in the university and in society
groups and schools, to survey individual
sary alienation from pre-Enlightenment
April 21-23, 1991
literary careers, to note outstanding indi-
("homophobic," in the going jargon)
vidual volumes and poems. The histori-
English literature, he takes another un-
Christopher Ricks on T.S. Eliot
an's tone is impartial, sometimes to the
expected leap, adding: "Of course it
Jeffrey Mehlman on French Literature
point of blandness; he plays few favorites
could always be maintained that for the
Sander Gilman on Franz Fanon
and he makes a fair case for each poet.
sake of achieving objectives so obviously
Bernard-Henri Levy on Celine
But Perkins's ideal reader is, I trust,
just and overdue [Gay Liberation], the
Edith Wyschograd on Genet
someone who doesn't exist, since this fig-
sacrifice of such resonances and conti-
Arnold Ages on Voltaire
ure is able, calmly and judiciously, to ap-
nuities was a small price to pay." It could
Nancy Harrowitz on Lombroso
William Flesch on De Man
preciate the most widely different poetic
be SO maintained, and though Davie
Robert Gibbs on Heidegger
styles and possesses a taste SO inclusive
doesn't exactly maintain it himself, he
Carter Lindberg on Luther
that it can happily accommodate, with-
gives prominence and conclusiveness to
Roslyn Mass on Riefenstahl
out choking, Kingsley Amis and Allen
the claim.
Paul Morrison on Pound
Ginsberg, Anne Sexton and Charles
Davie's procedure is rather like Ezra
Linda Munk on Hegel & Kafka
Olson.
Pound's. It is not quite the method of
Joseph Polak on Hypocrisy
Early in Davie's book he makes it clear
"juxtaposition-without-copula" (Pound's
Alan Rosen on Kittel
that such inclusiveness is not only un-
prescription for a desirable poetics),
usual, but probably undesirable. After
since Davie does provide occasional tran-
John Hoberman on Montherlant, Steven
comparing two poems about horses, Ed-
sitional links with and backward glances
Beller on Herzl and Wagner, Joshua Cohen
on Samuel and Saul, Shifra Armon on
win Muir's "The Horses" and Austin
at his previous remarks. Still, the move-
Medieval Spanish Literature, Allan Janik on
Clarke's "Forget Me Not," Davie points
ment from one writer or topic to the
Weininger & Wittgenstein, Renate Holub on
out "the awkward fact" that given poetry
next is extremely, sometimes bewilder-
Heidegger and Italy
SO different "no one's taste is, or can be
ingly, rapid. Such allusive discussions
expected to be, SO catholic and unpreju-
hold together only through the energet-
For program descriptions, applications, and
diced as to respond to both kinds with
ic, argumentative presence of a superb
conference information, please call Shoshana
equal ardor." Davie's comparative ap-
reader of poetry, exhibiting his respons-
Larkey at 617-353-3633, or write her at 233
proach tends to have a sharp edge to it,
es to a series of different challenges. Un-
Bay State Rd., Boston, MA 02215.
as when he juxtaposes Clarke's "fero-
like a comparably expert critic like Hel-
A PROGRAM OF THE B'NAI B'RITH HILLEL
cious banter" to that found in Hughes's
en Vendler, Davie never "reads" a poem
FOUNDATION AT BOSTON UNIVERSITY
Crow. His conclusion about banter is
simply for itself; he is never wholly and
MARCH 25, 1991 THE NEW REPUBLIC 43
of its own. But this was SO far from re-
There are fine effects in the poem, but it
Yet in the process of admonishing us,
ceived opinion that it could not be taken
is also open to Samuel Johnson's charge
Davie slightly devalues Larkin; the
seriously." I take it that the "those who
about Paradise Lost: "The want of human
"suave melancholy" and "poignantly
think" consist of Davie and a few other
interest is always felt." (That Johnson
managed dying fall" are presumed to be
readers, while received opinion votes in-
was arguably wrong in this judgment is
his stock in trade, and not all that admi-
stead for Larkin or Hughes or Heaney.
another matter.)
rable to boot. In 1972 Davie suggested, in
Davie then goes on to explain Bunt-
one of his sudden bursts of persuasive
ing's neglect by proposing that this poet
hat looks to me like an
conviction, that Thomas Gray was "the
wrote always for the ear, and that "writ-
ing with and for the ear had been not just
W
overvaluation of Bunt-
last serious and greatly gifted poet to
ing, the poet with only
practice a rhetorical art," adding that a
disregarded but positively disapproved
a following, goes along
rhetorical art can be great art and citing
of" in Britain. (He further adduces Wil-
with a tendency on Davie's part to cast a
Gray's "Elegy" as an example. But
liam Empson as "the only responsible
slightly baleful eye on the few British po-
even without considering any poets from
voice" raised against such auditory disre-
ets who, in his judgment, do command a
the intervening years, one can maintain
gard.) I find this unconvincing, even
public. In the case of Ted Hughes, I wel-
that Larkin, like Gray, is a serious and
melodramatically so. What were listeners
come Davie's strictures and would have
greatly gifted poet whose finest poems-
to Dylan Thomas's work listening to? To
been a good deal harder on the meretri-
"Church Going," "The Old Fools,"
the poet's voice, surely-but also to the
cious Gaudete than he cares to be. And
"Aubade"-do manifest a rhetorical art
music of the words as it revealed itself.
his adverse criticism of Heaney is di-
of great beauty that is as much "for the
Speaking as an ear reader (the term is
rected less at Heaney's poems than at
ear" as for the mind or heart. And the
Frost's), my own response to Briggflatts,
his "nimble" manipulation of "the po-
want of human interest is never felt.
no more and no less than to Larkin's
etry market and the poetry reading-
"The Whitsun Weddings," Hughes's
circuit." It is with respect to Larkin
t doesn't take an Americano-
"The Thought Fox," or Heaney's
that the balance seems to me wrongly
"Glanmore Sonnets," is first and fore-
tipped.
I
phile to make the case that as
far as poetry in the second half
most a response to something heard,
Davie has some very good pages that
of this century goes, we have
different though the music is in each
criticize Larkin's exclusions and inclu-
had the best of it-at least as compared
case.
sions from The Oxford Book of 20th-Century
with the British. It's also possible that
Bunting has insisted that sound rather
Verse, and he neatly points out contradic-
Davie might agree with the sentiment,
than meaning is what counts in his poet-
tions between the conception of poetry
though our lists of the premier American
ry, and Davie has directed us to admire,
expressed in some of Larkin's statements
poets would surely diverge. But the im-
as a kind of standard for British poetry,
about it and his actual practice of it. Yet
portant thing to register is that Under
lines like the following from Briggflatts
surely the literary historian should de-
Briggflatts contains, in his own words
about an ancient battlefield in the York-
vote some time to holding up for admi-
about Samuel Johnson, "page after lumi-
shire dales:
ration-for commemoration-what he
nous page" of "sharp and exact delinea-
sees as the finest work of one of his most
tions of what in one poet's work distin-
Grass caught in willow tells the flood's
height that has subsided;
important subjects. In Thomas Hardy and
guishes him from all others." One
Overfalls sketch a ledge to be bared
British Poetry, Davie provided discerning
absence, necessary though regrettable,
treatments of Larkin's "The Whitsun
tomorrow.
of a significant British poet from the
No angler homes with empty creel though
Weddings" and "Water," distinguishing
pages of Under Briggflatts: Donald Davie
mist dims day.
their use of landscape from that found in
himself.
I hear Aneurin number the dead, his
Hardy's poems. There is nothing compa-
On various occasions I have argued for
nipped voice.
rable in the new book, though Davie
Davie's insufficiently appreciated talents.
Slight moon limps after the sun. A closing
does drop this curious sentence about
He is himself a poet who combines mas-
door
Larkin: "The career, as distinct from the
tery of verse technique with what he once
stirs smoke's flow above the grate. Jangle
to skald, battle, journey; to priest Latin is
poetry (some of which will surely en-
called-in relation to Wordsworth's po-
bland.
dure), calls out for sensitive and search-
etry-"the reek of the human." His new
ing study." Why doesn't Larkin's poetry
(and third) Collected Poems displays the
And so on, in this vein. It seems to me
equally call out for such study, and what
work of forty years. It is a poetic career
fair to claim, as the critic Peter Dale has,
is the "some of it" that will "surely
remarkable for satisfying achievements
that Briggflatts is "tediously dominated
endure"?
in various forms and modes, along with a
by the simple sentence" and so, accord-
Davie treats Larkin less as a poet than
persistently restless dissatisfaction with
ingly, it satisfies the ear that much less.
as a portent of the reading public's di-
what he's just achieved-a refusal to set-
minished expectations, or even-be-
tle down into exploiting any particular
CLASSIC T-SHIRTS!
cause of his great success-as a force to
mode. In the 1950s and early 1960s, in
Beethoven, Confucius, Da Vinci, Jung, J.F.K.,
Mozart, Shakespeare, Cheshire Cat, Twain,
resist. If Larkin wrote a poetry of "lower-
such lyrics as "Woodpigeons at Ra-
Darwin, Van Gogh, Gandhi, Nietzsche, Poe,
ing apprehensions" (the phrase is John
henny," "Heigh-Ho on a Winter After-
Thoreau, Austen, Sherlock Holmes, others.
T-Shirt: (white or It. blue) $12.75, 4/$46.
Wain's), Davie cautions that to write in
noon," and the beautiful "Time Passing,
Sweatshirt: (white or grey) $23, 2/$44.
such a "sweetly formal way" and "to set
Beloved," he was a pure lyricist of excep-
Sizes: S, M, L, XL. Ship: $2.25 per order.
Illustrated brochure: 75¢
up that way of working as a norm runs
tional note. During that same period, in
Historical Products, Box 220 CL
Cambridge, MA 02238
the risk of overvaluing a suave melan-
"Remembering the Thirties," "Among
choly, the poignantly managed dying
Artisans' Houses," and "Hearing Rus-
ILLEGAL DRUG TESTING:
fall." And he adds: "It is a risk to which
sian Spoken," his critical and satiric eye
What Your Government and Your Employers
admirers of Larkin, that poet of very
fixed itself, in a poetry closer to witty ar-
Don't Want You To Know.
'lowering' apprehensions, are particular-
gument, on the self in relation to cul-
"TESTMATH 101," a fascinating, detailed, devastating
ly prone." Such admirers, then, were un-
ture, history, language-to "the moral
Special Report by a laboratory insider.
$10.00, postpaid, applicable sales taxes incl.
able to appreciate the more impersonal,
shape of politics," as one of his lines had
CAM3, Inc., Dept. 91-A, 5101 Chapman Hwy., Knoxville TN 37920
sterner transactions of Tomlinson or Sis-
it.
VISA/MC, 1-800-223-5086
son.
But as Davie has recently pointed out
44 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
in his foreword to Slavic Excursions, the
There are also reminiscences, historical
the temporary financial hit as a con-
style he had mastered in his first two
and personal (one wishes that he had
comitant of their public licensure than
books of poems had in fact mastered
provided some notes, since the refer-
to expect private companies to squan-
him: the example of Pasternak helped
ences are frequently obscure), some-
der millions in an attempt to court
him toward a more "open-ended" style.
times with the very moving weight of a
an understandably unreceptive wartime
At that point in his career Davie still
life in its later reaches. "A Measured
audience.
wanted to be, he tells us, "a lyric poet: an
Tread," dedicated to the recently dead
DAVID IDEMA
impassioned 'I' who, situating himself in
Kenneth Millar, begins with a sense of
New York, New York
a physical or psychological or mythologi-
troubled expectancy:
cal landscape, has emotions about it,
Walking about the emptied house I
which he then expresses." His readings
jangle softly at each heavyish step,
New paradigm
of Mickiewicz, Pushkin, and Milosz
an old plough-horse, some parts of his
taught him that "the lyric poet is only
harness upon him,
To the editors:
one sort of poet," and much of his later
who strays, tired out but happy with that,
In "The Virtues and the Interests"
career can be seen as consisting of at-
through musky
(February 11), a review of Isaac Kram-
tempts to engage in the more imperson-
honey-shot glooms of a barn where, though
nick's book Republicanism and Bourgeois
al, sterner "transactions" he admires in
he
Radicalism: Political Ideology in Late Eigh-
Tomlinson and Sisson. This is not to say
strays only idly towards it, sweet hay
teenth-Century England and America, Gor-
will be found in a crib.
that he has disdained satiric verse in
don S. Wood argues for the relevance
which he speaks out in the person of
Suddenly, in the "Hello Ken" with
of the "liberal" paradigm in the study
Donald Davie, poet ("Six Epistles to Eva
which the second stanza begins, there is
of the evolving societies in Eastern Eu-
Hesse" from 1970 is an example of such
an unlooked for, momentous meeting
rope. However, I would contend that,
verse). But much of the satire, often of a
with the dead.
in many ways, it is the attributes of the
fairly harsh sort, is directed at the poet's
These are not the sorts of poems that
other "paradigm"-classical republi-
self, and I can't help thinking that this
appeal to us through a persuasive rheto-
canism-that more clearly define the
inclination coincided roughly with Da-
ric. They are on the quiet side, often ca-
political motivations of many Eastern
vie's becoming an Anglican-or rather,
sual and musing in mood and tone; de-
Europeans and their political move-
as he has written, a member of the Epis-
termined to resist large gestures of assent
ments today.
copal Church of America.
or denial-very un-Yeatsian, though at
The republican paradigm holds that
moments they reminded me of qualities
concern for public virtues, a fear of
t any rate, the title poem of
in Yeats's Last Poems. Davie's poetry
corruption, and the belief in the per-
A
In the Stopping Train (1977)
will never command a public. Its knotty,
sonal sacrifice of private interests in fa-
takes on the burden of ad-
introspective energies, its allusiveness
vor of the public good motivates public
ministering correction and
to unfashionable names and places, its
political participation and fashions the
punishment to its protagonist, a poet
refusal of plangent eloquence on behalf
structures of government. Eastern Eu-
who has put everything into his art, to
of an appealing speaker-all these char-
ropean society today is very nearly ob-
the impoverishment of his life:
acteristics ensure that this poet will
sessed with concern over corruption
command only a following. Still, as a
and its punishment. Reacting against
He never needed to see,
member of that following for a good
the traditional motivations for involve-
not with his art to help him.
He never needed to use his
time now, I'd extend Christopher Ricks's
ment in Communist Party politics (the
nose, except for language.
claim by proposing that Donald Davie
perks and benefits accruing to a Party
may just be the best English poet-critic of
member), political participation today
Torment him with his hatreds,
our time.
is based upon the notion of perform-
torment him with his false
loves. Torment him with time
ing a duty to society. For most people
WILLIAM PRITCHARD is the author most re-
that has disclosed their falsehood.
in Czechoslovakia the only acceptable
cently of Randall Jarrell: A Literary Life
choice for president was Vaclav Havel,
Criticism of the self's pretensions, espe-
(Farrar, Straus, Giroux).
someone with no political connections
cially the self-as-poet, is an important mo-
who acted in the best tradition of a
tive of Davie's recent volume of religious
man sacrificing private interest for
meditations, To Scorch or Freeze:
public good. The recent elections in
I find nothing to say,
CORRESPONDENCE
continued
from
page
6
Poland indicate that a political insider
I am heavy as lead.
such as Tadeusz Mazowiecki, even if he
I take small satisfaction
vertisers to insist on protecting their own
has been an insider for only a short
in anything I have said.
profitability?
time, is doomed in Eastern European
God is perceived as shrugging off
In both cases, the decisions are
politics.
the poet's attempts at placation and
based on a determination of one's
The relevance of the republican para-
commendation:
probable return on investment. But
digm is further reinforced by the com-
How can he care
there is a crucial difference between
munal values hammered into Eastern
what billets-doux we send Him,
the advertisers' calculations on this
European heads for forty-five years. Al-
how much we applaud? Such coxcombs
point and those of the networks and
though in theory everyone is in favor of
inclined to commend him!
affiliate stations: the former pay for air-
individual rights and the ability of any-
It is the lament of "a ready writer / who
time in order to sell their products;
one to become a millionaire, most mod-
had been writing too long."
the latter receive the airtime virtually
ern socialist and post-socialist societies
But such self-reproach is not the only
gratis in the form of government li-
cling strongly to the concepts of egalitari-
or even the main motive of the poems
censes, then sell it for whatever the ad
anism. There is a lingering suspicion that
(titled "Uncollected Poems") that con-
market will bear.
those "individualists" who succeed are
clude this collection. There are songs
Given the inherently unequal nature
doing so at the expense of everyone else.
and balladlike pieces that represent as
of these "investments," it seems far
BRYAN H. WARD
pure a poetry as he has ever written.
more fair to ask broadcasters to take
Columbus, Ohio
MARCH 25, 1991 THE NEW REPUBLIC 45
WASHINGTON
the anti-war movement?). After two
exhibited in the spring Tweed's cata-
years behind bars Brown has now been
log. This sort of imaginative nomencla-
released, remarking as he returned to
ture from our mail-order friends has
DIARIST
domestic life: "I feel good!" (I knew
begun to grow irksome. It's one thing
that he would.) He has been deluged
to get creative in the name of specific-
with offers to tour the United States
ity; I mean, I can see wanting a scarf
and Japan, is planning a comeback
in French Vanilla instead of plain
concert with M. C. Hammer in July,
white. But Calcium? Tundra? Amish?
and boasts that he's at the height of
"Sky" no longer suffices to modify the
Spin-offs
his career. Oliver Stone, we can safely
blue of the heavens. Tweed's offers a
assume, will soon be negotiating for
plethora of meteorological and astro-
the movie rights.
nomical varieties: Dusk, High Noon,
ONE OF THE MANY HAPPY CONSE-
Blue Moon, Planet, Satellite Blue,
quences of the war's end will be a soft-
WHEN THE MEDIA GOT TIRED OF
Universe Blue, Ozone Blue, and the
ening of the market for Operation
Nixon the evil troll, they made him
synaesthetic Thunder. (Atmosphere,
Desert Storm paraphernalia. Serious
into Nixon the foreign policy sage.
though, looks purplish, and Cosmos, as
collectors will no longer have to elbow
Eisenhower was no
best I could deter-
their way past crowds of dilettantes to
longer fun as a
mine, seems to
get at T-shirts sporting such patriotic
clueless bumbler,
represent a red
images as the eagle swooping over the
so he got recast as
floral pattern.) It
"Support the Troops" logo, the map
a foxy schemer
is also a little un-
of Iraq leveled by nukes with "That's
who feigned be-
clear whether it's
All Folks" in day-glo pink, and the mis-
fuddlement to fur-
fashionably correct
sile about to rupture Saddam's viscera.
ther a progressive
to wear a tan
I'm giving these a miss-I'm still trying
agenda. The latest
windbreaker with
to get some wear out of the contents
beneficiary of the
a scarf of Herme-
of my Marion Barry T-shirt drawer-
media need to re-
lyn, Breen, or Aru-
but I do plan to hang on to my Desert
vise presidential
gula. Arugula? I al-
Storm trading cards. These are a lot
reputations is Jim-
ways thought that
like the baseball cards I used to col-
my Carter. His ineptitude stopped be-
was a Jewish cookie.
lect, except instead of pitchers and
ing newsworthy around 1979, and Rea-
outfielders they feature Cobra helicop-
gan's early troubles yielded a spate of
"YES, MY FIRST ISSUE ARRIVED
ters and AV-8B Harriers. For the philo-
"Let's Take Another Look" pieces
and I want my subscription canceled.
sophically inclined, there are also a few
touting Carter's prescient energy poli-
Your article 'Terms of Internment' did
concept cards, such as "Wings over
cy, Middle East diplomacy, etc. But
it. I will not subscribe to an anti-
Egypt" and "Preparing to Jump." For
that wore thin after a while, too. Then
Israel, anti-Semitic magazine." This an-
connoisseurs of minimalist aesthetics,
came a new spin: "Let's forget about
gry letter didn't make it onto our cor-
the "Sunset on the Desert" card shows
his tenure as president and focus on
respondence page. It did, however,
a large, black, rectangular structure (a
what a great ex-president he is." In
achieve the more distinguished honor
radar platform, it says on the back)
this incarnation he has emerged, some-
of a spot on the bulletin board of "the
against a dusky sky. Fortunately the
what more plausibly, as world peace-
pit," as we reporter-researchers proud-
war's brevity will spare us the second
maker, hands-on homebuilder, and all-
ly refer to our office area. The pit bul-
wave of souvenirs. No Stormin' Nor-
around champion of the downtrod-
letin board has become home to the
man lunch boxes, no Pentagon Press
den-a cross between Mahatma Gan-
most prized letters to the editor and
Pool water wings, no desert camouflage
dhi and Grandpa Walton. Now Carter
unsolicited manuscripts. Among the
limited edition BMWS, no Patriots 'n'
is being maneuvered into the revision-
gems: the professor who briefed us
Scuds breakfast cereal. Watch 'em fight
ism danger zone: he's been nominated
that his enclosed essay "argues that
in your own bowl!
for a Nobel Prize. The American
Marxism comes from the writings of
Friends Service Committee is responsi-
Marx," and the aspiring philosopher
THE 1960s-FROM MASS-PRODUCED
ble, praising Carter for spurning "self-
who wrote, "I propose in these two
tie-dye to the new Jim Morrison mov-
serving experience, to devote himself
ongoing essays to document the history
ie-are a marketing staple of today's
to public service on a global scale." I
of human evil and human good from
instant-nostalgia culture. An especial-
learned of this nomination the same
its very beginning until the present
ly content-free manifestation of this
day I received a thick, glossy press kit
moment." (Fine, but keep it under
history-repeated-as-farce has been the
plugging an upcoming cable-TV show
1,200 words.) Perhaps the all-time
Free James Brown movement, a spin-
called "Citizen Carter." Replete with
classic is the writer who informed
off of the Free Huey Newton and Free
color slides of Jimmy in shirtsleeves,
us that his submission "may well earn
Bobby Seale campaigns of twenty-plus
Jimmy and Rosalynn in Tijuana, Jimmy
a Pulitzer Prize," and listed five ad-
years ago. The Godfather of Soul sings
looking contemplative on a mountain
dresses where he wanted us to send
great, but he never cut that convincing
in Alaska, the promo touts Carter as
copies of the magazine after we'd pub-
a figure as a besieged political prison-
one of the "leading philosopher states-
lished it. And he added in the post-
er. He was, after all, arrested for trying
men" of our time. Next stop: post-
script: "I am not especially prosperous
to run over a policeman during a high-
Nobel tristesse.
and would appreciate a sizable check
speed interstate auto chase while he
immediately." The problem is, sizable
was on probation for possession of ille-
POP QUIZ: WHAT DO GRAPEFRUIT,
checks are kind of rare around here.
gal weapons and PCP. But the Free
Oatmeal, Burnt Orange, and Espresso
How about a couple of Desert Storm
James Brown movement is already
have in common? If you guessed
T-shirts instead?
more successful than other brave at-
breakfast in Berkeley, you're close-
tempts to re-create the era (remember
but wrong. They're all colors of clothes
DAVID GREENBERG
46 THE NEW REPUBLIC MARCH 25, 1991
WHERE WE STAND
BY ALBERT SHANKER, PRESIDENT OF THE AMERICAN FEDERATION OF TEACHERS
America the Multicultural
eople often see history as a set of immutable facts
founding fathers invoked. Paul Cuffee's success in 1783 at
P
and events that took place in the past. But it's really a
winning voting rights for the black citizens of Massachusetts
story we tell ourselves about these facts and events,
was another chapter in the struggle. So were the concerted
and we rewrite the story as we get new insights and
efforts of Chinese-Americans in the 1800s to use the courts to
develop new understanding of the past. This country always
gain civil rights and the battles for women's suffrage. Jews,
has been multicultural: Diverse peoples have been part of it
who challenged the quotas that denied them access to univer-
from the beginning. But as long as history focused mainly on
sities, were part of the struggle, as were Hispanics who chal-
the deeds of rulers, it did not tell the story of contributions
lenged school segregation in the 1940s and won.
made by people who never sat in the White House or led an
This struggle to define our democracy still continues, and it
army.
will as long as our country does. It also has had a profound
Now, historians also see history in terms of social, cultur-
influence on the rest of the world because it has helped turn
al, political and economic movements. This gives us a richer
abstract principles like equity, justice, individual rights and
and more accurate picture of how our country came to be
what it is-not because it excludes what we already knew but
equality of opportunity into political movements, laws, pro-
because it includes much more. And it will help us to under-
grams and institutions-concrete things. And if our children
stand and do justice to the multicultural nature of America's
walk away from an American history course without under-
history.
standing this, the history they have studied is a travesty.
But as some people rewrite our history to present the role
The point of all this is not to get more minorities and more
minorities have played in developing our democratic institu-
women mentioned in history textbooks. They are already
tions, other people are saying, "Forget it." These critics insist
"mentioned" constantly in sidebars and "special features,"
that the very idea of a history common to all Americans is
and pictures are carefully portioned out so each group gets its
meaningless and a sham. They say that the only history valid
share. If we take this mechanical and superficial approach to
for their children is the history of their own ethnic and cul-
the multicultural and multiracial aspect of American history,
tural group. Supporters often call this approach "multicul-
we'll never get it right.
tural," but "ethnocentric" would describe it more accurately.
And magnifying some figures and events in our history
It excludes instead of including-and it simplifies and dis-
while ignoring or damning others (whether in the name of
torts the history of our multicultural democracy.
history that is multicultural or Eurocentric or Afrocentric or
What would a history that does justice to our develop-
some other "centric") will only impoverish our students. All of
ment as a multicultural society look like? Legal historian
them need to learn about the lives and political ideals of
Robert Cottrol, writing in the Winter 1990 American
Washington, Jefferson and Lincoln. This is not because they
Educator, offers some straightforward ideas.
never made any mistakes, but because all our students, no
As Cottrol sees it, the history of our democracy is the story
matter what group they belong to, are equal heirs to the ideals
of democracy's transformation from a great idea into what
he calls "the most successful multi-ethnic and multiracial
of these men and to the nation they helped to create. To say
society of our time, perhaps of all time." But, as he points
otherwise is to limit and isolate students and deny them their
out, this continuing transformation did not take place with-
full heritage, as well as to deny them the means to participate
out a long, painful and sometimes ugly struggle in which
in and further democracy.
minorities played a central role.
But we also limit and deny students when we don't give
The civil rights movement of the 1960s, the most impor-
them a chance to learn about Paul Cuffee or Martin Luther
tant example of this struggle, is often taught as though it
King, Jr., or about Lee Yick, who fought for his right to get a
came out of nowhere. In fact, it was the climax of many bat-
license for his business all the way up to the U.S. Supreme
tles by many people who tried to turn the promises of
Court. These heroes are part of all of our students' legacy, too.
democracy into realities. The movement began when our
As Cottrol says, their stories cannot be "put to one side,
history began, with native Americans' resistance to being
reserved for students of some races, but not others, or
conquered, and went on to slave uprisings and slave peti-
marginalized as sidebars to American history," because what
tions for freedom, which cited the same natural rights our
these people achieved is American history."
MR. SHANKER'S COMMENTS APPEAR IN THIS AD UNDER THE AUSPICES OF THE AMERICAN FEDERATION OF TEACHERS. READER CORRESPONDENCE
IS INVITED. ADDRESS YOUR LETTERS TO MR. SHANKER AT THE AFT, 555 NEW JERSEY AVE., NW, WASHINGTON, DC 20001 © 1991 BY ALBERT SHANKER
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