Port 80

The latest dispatch from the Flyer News is most disheartening. Apparently, a vocally anti-war graduate student found his door vandalized after he spent a weekend off-campus working with the homeless:

… Standing with my homelessness handouts and sleeping bag at my door I read a note that said, “we protect your ass and my buddies die and all you can be is an ungreatful [sic] bi*** f*** you! U.S.M.C. cause you will never know US Marine CORPS!!!”

In addition, other derogatory words were written across my door covering my St. Francis prayer for peace, Safe Place sign, and an image of Iraqi children who have lost arms and legs from bombings. The text on this image was rendered to contrast the original message.

I could nitpick other elements of the article, but I’m not going to. Frankly, dissecting the author’s reasoning serves no possible purpose: If nothing else, the author’s entirely justifiable anger means that this piece will not be a paragon of clear and rational argument. Instead, I’m only going to say two things.

First, although the author suggests that the perpetrators may have been members of the UD ROTC program, I very much doubt that this is the case. I have known a number of ROTC students and a few ROTC instructors, and all have struck me as being disciplined and professional. Furthermore, I very much doubt that members of an Army ROTC program would be writing the praises of the Marine Corps on the door of a graduate student. In fact, it would greatly surprise me if the perpetrators of this act were members of the military at all.

Secondly, to whoever did this: Although I have been a vocal critic of the stance of UD Campus Ministry on the war in Iraq, don’t even think of trying to cite anything I’ve written in some halfhearted defense of your actions. My goal in criticizing Campus Ministry has been to increase debate - the goal of your actions was to stifle it. Those who resort to intimidation to win an argument have had many names throughout history. In Germany, they were called the Sturm Abteilung, or SA, or simply the brownshirts. In Iraq, they now being called Al-Tawhid wal Jihad. Presumably, you would consider yourselves allies of democracy. Consider that you are adopting the tactics of its bitterest enemies.

Why am I so focused on this point? There are two reasons. First of all, the last incident of door vandalism on this campus led to the establishment of an anti-bias program at UD. This incident, as public as it now is, is sure to spark some form of official reaction and quite a bit of unofficial ire.

This brings me to my other reason: I am the most recent, most visible, and most vocal critic of UD Campus Ministry at the moment. (Which is a somewhat surprising thing given the traffic, or lack thereof, that this site gets.) If someone should decide to make this act of vandalism worse with an intemperate response, I am the low-hanging fruit on the tree. Let me say, therefore, that my ire at being tied to this incident by supporters of Campus Ministry will hardly be less than my ire at being cited by the vandals. My opinions have been blatantly misrepresented before by supporters of Campus Ministry who did not take the trouble to respond to my central arguments, read my work correctly, quote me accurately, or represent their status as authors honestly. I did not respond to this misrepresentation because I did not feel it was necessary. However, I will forcefully respond to any attempts to tie my criticism to the actions of these thugs. They are no compatriots of mine. My arguments derive from the classical desire for rational debate, while their actions stem from a different historical inspiration.

All opposition must be stamped into the ground. — Slogan of the Sturm Abteilung

Today, I submitted a lengthy editorial to the Flyer News for publication. This is the post I mentioned I was working on in my last entry.

I could just link to the online version of the piece when it’s published - and I probably will eventually - but I’m going to try to use a few of the advantages that weblogging offers over print media. The most important of these is the lack of length restrictions - I’m almost certain that this piece will be trimmed for publication, but what I’m submitting here is the original work. The other advantage that posting online offers me is the ability to provide my sources - just work your way through the hyperlinks in the article.

This won’t be the last from me on this topic - I plan to blog any responses I get to the editorial. I will be detailing a little bit more of the connection between International ANSWER and the Workers World Party in future postings. In researching this editorial, I’ve come across many small tidbits which haven’t been linked together. With any luck, I can save someone else a little research.

It amuses me to no end that, if printed, this editorial will be the closest thing to investigative journalism that’s shown up in the Flyer News in several years. Even University papers now get to worry about the pajamaheddin.

Update: As of 14 January, the Flyer News has posted the editorial on their website. I’ve also started receiving some mail on the piece - some negative, some positive, all thoughful. Most interestingly, the Flyer News has made their online opinion poll question of the week “Do you agree with the actions of the Center for Social Concern in regards to the protest at Ft. Benning?” It will be interesting to see the results as students weigh in.

Full Editorial Text

In the final December issue of the Flyer News, the arrests of Brian DeRouen and Megan Doty at Ft. Benning were given lengthy and highly favorable coverage. While this reporting dealt with the consequences of these arrests in Georgia, it did not discuss the issues raised by these arrests here in Dayton. These arrests are the current high-water mark in a long stream of events supported by the Center for Social Concern (CSC) which have been at best questionable, and at worst criminal.

By design, the CSC is an organization meant to unabashedly embrace and promote Catholic social teachings. It is unsurprising that some of these teachings will be controversial. What is surprising and unsettling, however, is the CSC’s tendency to jump to conclusions and engage in actions that appear to be ideologically, rather than religiously, motivated.

Consider the “Week of Student Action Against the War” hosted by the CSC in March 2003 during the buildup to the war in Iraq. Although the US Council of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) had stated, “people of good will may differ on how to apply just war norms in particular cases,” this was not the message promoted by the CSC. The political overtones of this “Week of Action” were strong enough that a student band pulled out of a CSC-planned concert on the grounds that they had been misinformed about the purpose of the event. The CSC website also briefly advertised a student walkout from classes: an odd protest tactic for an official arm of the University. The student walkout was pulled from the website once CSC’s director was notified of its presence, but the tendency of some elements of the CSC to embrace poorly considered tactics had been established.

The CSC’s tactics were even more ill-considered later that year, when they advertised an October 27th protest in Washington DC against the use of depleted uranium in Iraq. What the CSC did not advertise is that their attendance was only part of a much larger anti-war and anti-administration protest co-sponsored by International ANSWER. International ANSWER is not a garden-variety peace group: in fact, it is widely considered to be little more than a front for the Workers World Party (WWP). [Recommended: Tracking Down a Fifth Column Front, Edward Immler. Alternate sources: FrontPage Magazine (Right Wing), Boston IndyMedia (Left Wing/Mixed), Infoshop.org (Anarchist), International Socialist Review (Marxist)] The WWP has, among other things, publicly defended the Chinese government’s actions in the Tiananmen Square massacre, compared the Dalai Lama to Southern slave owners, and expressed fawning adulation for Kim Jong-Il’s rule in North Korea.

The problems with ANSWER are not limited to their connections to the WWP: ANSWER itself has not ruled out violence as a means of opposition to US actions in Iraq. In May 2003, ANSWER published a brochure declaring that “the anti-war movement … must give its unconditional support to the Iraqi anti-colonial resistance.” Even after such gruesome events as the assassination of aid worker Margaret Hassan, countless beheadings of civilians, and the car-bombing of a high school in Samarra, ANSWER has not retracted this statement. To an outside observer, the CSC’s attendance at an ANSWER protest implies tacit support of ANSWER’s positions. The CSC’s failure – to this day – to publicly disclose the sponsors of the October protest lends further credence to such a belief. Does the CSC wish to tacitly condone the car-bombing of high schools?

In the CSC’s recent protest at Ft. Benning, their tactics moved from the morally and ethically questionable to the flatly illegal. Mr. DeRouen and Ms. Doty have stated that their arrest and upcoming trial is the “whole reason” they went to Ft. Benning. Were any of the staffers or students at the CSC who supported this trip aware of Mr. DeRouen or Ms. Doty’s reasons for going to Ft. Benning? If so, did they consider that they could easily be prosecuted under conspiracy charges? Did any member of the CSC staff make more than a token effort to establish the possible legal consequences of this protest for the University?

How was the Ft. Benning trip funded? The Flyer News stated that 70 students participated in the trip to Ft. Benning. Such a large group requires substantial logistical support – hotel reservations, transportation arrangements, and the like. Were any university funds – especially funds derived from student fees – used to support this protest? Were any of the paid staffers of the CSC “on the clock” when they organized this protest? There is no requirement that tuition only be used for programs that students like, but surely the line can be drawn at using student fees to fund violations of federal law. Civil disobedience may be a worthwhile tactic for some causes, but should the University be sponsoring these actions?

I bring up these issues in such a public forum only because I have raised them before, privately, with the CSC. Since I have discussed my concerns with them, the CSC has moved from supporting protests that are unethical to supporting protests that are illegal. Clearly, back-channel discussions of the CSC’s tactics are not productive. The time has come for the University as a whole to take a long, hard, look of the behavior of the CSC. Does a university with strong relations with the local Air Force base want to fund the arrest of its students on an Army base? Does the University want an official arm of Campus Ministry lending support to groups that see no problem with the slaughter of aid workers and civilians?

If so, then let the status quo continue. If not, then it is time for a full and public accounting of the funds, activities, and external ties of the Center for Social Concern. The students of this University should learn of the CSC’s activities from the Flyer News, not from a court transcript.

It’s official: The FBI thinks that there is an elevated risk of terrorist attacks this summer.

In the words of Gomer Pyle: Surprise, surprise, surprise.

This is the precise reason that many were so dismayed at the actions of the Spanish electorate after the Madrid railway bombings: By supporting Zapatero as the Prime Minister, the Spanish taught al Qaeda that a mass-casualty attack immediately prior to an election could influence the result of that election to benefit al Qaeda. The ousted Anzar had committed troops to Iraq, the incoming Zapatero immediately withdrew all Spanish forces from the region, causing the withdrawal of the Honduran contingent as well.

Now, with US elections coming up in November, is it any shock that al Qaeda might try the same tactic again? They have learned that it is costly to engage US troops on the battlefield, but by attempting to influence the American elections, they may succeed in having the American forces in Iraq withdrawn quickly (or at least ahead of schedule) for a far lower cost. If the new Iraqi government can be collapsed after a US withdrawal, al Qaeda will not only have removed a major American base of operations in the Middle East, they will have created a new base of operations for themselves.

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Before I begin this post, I’m going to say up front that it discusses race relations. (Hence the title.) This is by nature a difficult discussion that can make a person a lot of enemies very quickly, so I will lay all my cards on the table: I am a Caucasian. The racial incidents occurring at my college have been perpetrated by Caucasians against African-Americans. I find these incidents abhorrent and despicable in the extreme. However, I feel that the University’s reaction to these events must be open to discussion. Righteous anger has caused many people to do wholly unrighteous things, and I do not want to see the University step down that path.

At my school, the University of Dayton, we’ve been having a decent-sized flap over race relations. The key incident that sparked the current conflagration was the circulation of racist flyers through Marycrest residence halls in October. Although that incident itself hasn’t been that heavily covered, a lot of general discussion about the issue has been going on in the campus. (Diversity Group Ups Awareness, Intolerance Editorial, Racial Intolerance Concerns Community)

The latest item in the fight against racism is the new website that has been launched at the University of Dayton to let students report incidents of racism or intolerance. However, I fear that this website marks the beginning of the pendulum reversing its swing: The University may be crossing the line to stop any appearance of racism. What really worries me is this quote on the “Definitions” page of the “Stop Hate” website:

Hate Crime

A hate crime is a criminal offense committed against persons, property or society that is motivated, in whole or in part, by an offender’s bias against an individual’s or a group’s race, religion, ethnic/national origin, gender, age, disability or sexual orientation. (International Association of Chiefs of Police)

The page then goes on to separate hate crimes from “bias-related conduct” or “Hate Incidents,” which differ from hate crimes because “they are not illegal.” The only problem with this definition of a “hate crime” is that the University of Dayton is located in Ohio, and that the Ohio Revised Code does not, anywhere, define a hate crime. In short, the term “hate crime” has no meaning in the criminal justice system in Ohio. It is important to note that Ohio does have a related law. This is the prohibition against “Ethnic intimidation,” which is defined in ORC § 2927.12:

(A) No person shall violate section 2903.21, 2903.22, 2909.06, or 2909.07, or division (A)(3), (4), or (5) of section 2917.21 of the Revised Code by reason of the race, color, religion, or national origin of another person or group of persons.

(B) Whoever violates this section is guilty of ethnic intimidation. Ethnic intimidation is an offense of the next higher degree than the offense the commission of which is a necessary element of ethnic intimidation.

For reference, ORC § 2903.21 defines aggravated menacing, ORC § 2903.22 defines menacing, ORC § 2909.06 defines criminal damaging or endangering, ORC § 2909.07 defines criminal mischief, and ORC § 2917.21, divisions (A)(3), (4), and (5) covers threatening telephone calls. In other words, the ethnic intimidation law does not cover crimes against “society,” it does not cover a great number of crimes against persons or property, and it does not cover any crimes based on “gender, age, disability, or sexual orientation.”

There are also several sections of federal law that deal with hate crimes. The most notable for our purposes is Section 280003 of the mammoth Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994. This section defines a hate crime as follows:

(a) DEFINITION- In this section, “hate crime” means a crime in which the defendant intentionally selects a victim, or in the case of a property crime, the property that is the object of the crime, because of the actual or perceived race, color, religion, national origin, ethnicity, gender, disability, or sexual orientation of any person.

This is certainly closer to the UD statement - but again, there’s no mention of age, or of crimes against “society.” This definition is also a bit tighter. While the UD definition requires that the offense be motivated “in whole or in part” by bias, this definition requires that a victim be “intentionally select[ed]” based on bias, limiting the crimes it applies to somewhat more. Furthermore, this is a federal definition, and unless a defendant is prosecuted in a federal court, I do not believe that it applies. (I am not entirely certain on this point, however. If you can confirm or deny, leave a comment.)

Now, before my inbox turns into a river of flame, let’s make one thing perfectly clear: I do not support any of the activities which the “Stop Hate” webpage is condemning. However, when officials with control of coercive force (such as the UD police department) stop looking at “what the law really says” and start reading “what I would like the law to say,” I start getting worried. Perhaps the definitions page is simply a bit muddled — after all, the “Hate Crimes” definition refers to acts that are illegal in and of themselves, beyond their possible motivations. However, from where I sit, it sure looks like UD has decided to “simplify” the law —- and, in the process, accidentally distort its meaning.

Now, this is all well and good. But here’s the real question: How does one best approach the UD administration to inform them of this problem in the midst of a campus-wide crusade against racism? If you have a good idea, leave it in the comments or e-mail me — I’m looking for suggestions.

Update

I erred in my previous iteration of this post, and failed to cite the federal hate crimes statute. The appropriate references and commentary have been added inline to this post. (And this, ladies and gentlemen, is why a man who defends himself in court has a fool for a client. The law is complex — which is why I worry when it is simplified.)

The UD website also links to the University of Miami’s “No Hate” website, which lays out a refreshingly complete definition of a hate crime. It’s this sort of precise definition that I would like to see on UD’s “Stop Hate” page. Incidentally, their version is close in a hybrid in wording between UD’s definition and the definition in the United States Code. However, I’ve quoted entirely enough law in this post - you can read it yourself if you’re interested.

Another update: Just to make my position perfectly clear on this subject, I have added the disclaimer at the beginning of this post.

Ignorance of the law excuses no man; not that all men know the law, but because it is an excuse every man will plead, and no man can tell how to refute him. — John Selden

Before I begin this post, I’m going to say up front that it discusses race relations. (Hence the title.) This is by nature a difficult discussion that can make a person a lot of enemies very quickly, so I will lay all my cards on the table: I am a Caucasian. The racial incidents occurring at my college have been perpetrated by Caucasians against African-Americans. I find these incidents abhorrent and despicable in the extreme. However, I feel that the University’s reaction to these events must be open to discussion. Righteous anger has caused many people to do wholly unrighteous things, and I do not want to see the University step down that path.

At my school, the University of Dayton, we’ve been having a decent-sized flap over race relations. The key incident that sparked the current conflagration was the circulation of racist flyers through Marycrest residence halls in October. Although that incident itself hasn’t been that heavily covered, a lot of general discussion about the issue has been going on in the campus. (Diversity Group Ups Awareness, Intolerance Editorial, Racial Intolerance Concerns Community)

The latest item in the fight against racism is the new website that has been launched at the University of Dayton to let students report incidents of racism or intolerance. However, I fear that this website marks the beginning of the pendulum reversing its swing: The University may be crossing the line to stop any appearance of racism. What really worries me is this quote on the “Definitions” page of the “Stop Hate” website:

(more…)

Or, How to Write a Post Which Criticizes Two of the Most Powerful Special Interest Groups in Existence.

We have, without a doubt, all heard about the driver in California who has killed ten (at last count) people at a farmers market. Some of the data becoming available on this driver is extremely interesting, such as the fact that he hit a retaining wall outside a relative’s birthday party ten years ago and has been denting his car regularly ever since. The result of this, after the immediate tragedy is dealt with, is sure to be a cry for easier review and revocation of drivers licenses when there is suspicion that a currently licensed driver cannot safely control a vehicle. Any proposed measure will not mention any group in particular, but those among the elderly who can no longer drive safely will be one of the main, if unspoken, targets of this change.

This will, of course, probably go over like a lead balloon with the AARP. In no particular order, I expect to see cries of ageism, videos of mournful grandmothers who are afraid that they won’t be able to drive to see their grandchildren, videos of grandfathers who are afraid that they won’t be able to drive to buy food or medicine, and at least one accusation that the proponents of the change are trying to kill or starve seniors. What the AARP will not mention is the fact that driving is a privilege, not a right; the fact that any driver takes the lives of all those on the road into his or her hands; and that by taking upon itself the task of licensing drivers, the state has accepted some responsibility to ensure that those drivers licensed by the state are capable of controlling a motor vehicle safely. These are the same basic tactics that have led Congress to enact a prescription drug plan that will have the federal government paying Bill Gates when he reaches retirement age. They work, and we will see them trotted out again.

Why do I suspect that this will happen? This sort of approach fits the pattern of behaviour of the AARP — gross overreaction to any appearance of threat to the AARP’s constituency, even when the good of society at large may suffer as a result of their overreaction. However, it’s not just the AARP that is guilty of this. Here in Dayton, the NAACP is up in arms over a Dayton Daily News article that noted that the chairwoman of the RTA had spent upwards of 250 days on taxpayer-funded travel over the last several years. The Dayton Daily News article was remarkably generous considering the nature of the evidence — one of the chairwoman’s trips was to Brazil, ostensibly for the purpose of examining local public transportation systems. Combine that with news of a planned $500,000 RTA boardroom, and I smell the sweet scent of waste, fraud, and abuse. The NAACP, however, ignored all this, noted that the chairwoman was black, and declared that the article was the result of racial bias. To their credit, they did suggest a way to avoid bias - simply audit nearly every major public organization in the city, rather than narrowly focusing on those organizations which happen to appear massively corrupt. How efficient.

Why do some organizations exhibit this virulent zeal? My initial suspicion is based on the nature of these organizations - both the AARP and the NAACP (not to mention the NEA) are designed to “defend” groups of people, rather than promoting particular issues. Declaring the welfare of a particular group of people as one’s paramount interest is always a dangerous thing, as the natural consequence of that action is an indifference to the welfare of other groups of people. To some degree, this philosophy can be extended beyond groups of people — some of the more extreme environmentalist groups have taken a distinct “Earth First (Humanity Second)” approach to the issues they address.

However, this explanation appears to be missing some details. All human beings have a paramount interest of some sort. Are there certain paramount interests – the welfare of humanity, for example – that are acceptable? Alternately, is it possible that not all human beings have a single overriding interest that will trump all others? Could the difference simply be one of degree of devotion to an issue rather than the nature of an issue? In other words, is it possible to retain all the principles and values of an organization such as the AARP while introducing a degree of reasonability into the pursuit of the goals dictated by those values? I’m still working this one over myself – I may post more on this topic later if I come up with anything interesting. In the meanwhile, I am open to suggestions if anyone has any insights on the matter that they would like to throw out. (Don’t worry about the “polish” of the idea or any other such issues — I will not post or paraphrase anything sent without getting explicit permission.)

This weekend, I got the chance to read through In Code: A Young Woman’s Mathematical Journey. The book is the autobiographical story of Sarah Flannery, an Irish secondary school student who won international acclaim (and the 1999 Young Scientist Award) for her research into public key cryptography. After more than a year of research, she devised a cryptographic system that was substantially faster than the standard RSA method. Although the system eventually proved vulnerable to attack, her research was impressive, to say the least.

Throughout the entire book, Flannery remains professionally modest, giving credit to those who inspired her and downplaying her own abilities:

I have no doubt that I am not a genius. I am not being falsely modest. Through my father’s classes I have seen examples of true genius, and I know that I do not possess that “insight” that distinguishes geniuses from those regarded as merely intelligent.

Sarah Flannery, In Code, page 243

This modesty and lack of pretension stands in sharp contrast to another book I read this weekend, namely Stupid White Men by Michael Moore. Although Moore is clearly a man of intelligence, he is certainly not a man of modesty. (In fact, intellectual honestly isn’t one of Moore’s strong points, either.) Throughout Stupid White Men, Moore portrays himself as unmasking conspiracies that involve countless parties, including, but not limited to:

• The Bush family
• Haliburton and Enron
• Florida election commissions
• The Miami Herald
• The United States Supreme Court
• The entire Republican party
• Most of the Democratic party (for knuckling under to Republicans)
• The entire Caucasian race (except for Michael Moore)

At first glance, this list appears to be the work of a delusional paranoid, not an Oscar-winning director. If one switches races and political parties in the above list, one could accurately describe a member of the Aryan Nation or the Klu Klux Klan. Is Moore really this vitriolic, biased, or simply out of touch with reality?

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Previously, I commented on the controversial speech given by Columbia professor Nicholas DeGenova. Now, the Chronicle of Higher Education is running an interview with the professor. (Hat tip: InstaPundit) This interview has resolved much of the uncertainty surrounding his previous speech: Not only does Mr. DeGenova hold political views that are so far left that they are not on the recognized political spectrum, he also appears to have lost touch with reality. Consider this segment:

Q. Your comment about wishing for “a million Mogadishus” has attracted the most attention. I read your letter in the “Columbia Daily Spectator,” which gave some more context, but I have to confess I don’t see how the context changes the meaning of that statement.

A. I was referring to what Mogadishu symbolizes politically. The U.S. invasion of Somalia was humiliated in an excruciating way by the Somali people. And Mogadishu was the premier symbol of that. What I was really emphasizing in the larger context of my comments was the question of Vietnam and that historical lesson. … What I was intent to emphasize was that the importance of Vietnam is that it was a defeat for the U.S. war machine and a victory for the cause of human self-determination.

Mr. DeGenova has an interesting definition of “a defeat for the U.S.” Yes, America lost 18 soldiers in Mogadishu. However, during the course of that battle, the Americans managed to inflict upwards of 500 casualties on the Somalis. Mr. DeGenova’s definition of an American defeat appears to be a battle in which the United States inflicts massively disproportionate casualties, decides that it’s had enough of this humanitarian-nation-building business, and eventually goes home. The end result of all of this, of course, is that Somalia is still ruled by local warlords and few Americans are chomping at the bit to change that. If that’s a victory against the United States, I would hate to see a defeat.

(Likewise, Mr. DeGenova’s example of Vietnam. Certainly, it was a defeat for the United States. However, I am interested to know how this was a victory for “human self-determination,” especially if the humans in question are the South Vietnamese.)

The other interesting point raised by this interview is the fact that Mr. DeGenova does not have tenure. Given that Columbia hasn’t dismissed this man outright, this does raise the question: What do we need tenure for anymore? It doesn’t appear to be required for the protection of academic freedom, as even untenured professors can voice views that are not only politically controversial but woefully out of touch with reality with relative impunity. If Mr. DeGenova keeps his job after this, I’d be interested to see what a tenured professor could get away with.

Had I known that there was a devious yellow journalist from a tabloid newspaper among the audience, I certainly would have selected my words somewhat more carefully. - Nicholas DeGenova

Despite my previous commentary about the Center for Social Concern at UD, I have to admit that things could be far worse. The current flap at Columbia University, when a teach-in there went sour. Let’s just say that it’s a bad sign when the sentence “Vietnam was a stunning defeat for U.S. imperialism; as such, it was also a victory for the cause of human self-determination,” is part of your defense. But then again, when the comment that prompted this defense was the same professor’s remark that he would like to see “a million Mogadishus”, defending the forceful takeover of an at least marginally democratic state by an authoritarian dictatorship as a “victory for the cause of human self-determination” seems fairly minor. The above link is worth reading, but is not recommended for those with heart difficulties or high blood pressure.

In public, we always pledge our allegiance to Saddam, but in our hearts we feel something else. - Iraqi citizen, speaking to Arab News