Correspondence

...The review by Herbert Schlossberg (TAS, September 1987) of Tom Sowell's A Conflict of Visions is much more thoughtful...

...As such, it is consistent with a wide range of views on religion, personal behavior, and most other issues...

...For libertarians, it is important to distinguish between a virtue and a requirement, between a sin and a crime, in part because there is no consensuson what constitutes virtuous or sinful behavior...

...I still suspect, however, that there may be other, more substantial problems with, the book whose chief conclusion is that the American political system is one of "participatory fascism," different "only in degree" from Hitler's Germany, willing—to quote but one additional statement from the closing paragraph—to send "tens of thousands of men to their deaths bound in involuntary servitude as conscripts in the military adventures embarked upon by ruling elites...

...Martin Morse Wooster Silver Spring, Maryland Ernest van den Haag replies: Perhaps Mr...

...Buck's letter compels me to review the sordid history of Rep...

...If he does he will find that I feel that it cannot be proved that pornography causes crime although it is likely that it does so in the same sense in which alcohol may...

...It is amazing that with such simple lines and hatchings the artist was able to present not only the appearance but the characters of those three people...

...Such activities proceed in the open because they are overlooked or tacitly endorsed by inquisitors in Congress and the media...

...Buck told the Washington Times in April that Rep...

...The smirk with which many of the interrogators questioned North was disgusting...

...What's the beef...

...The review nowhere mentions my friend and coauthor Richard Nickson, whose collaboration in writing the book, from first to last, was total...

...And surely a piece which lavishes strong praise on Sowell's work and the particular book under review should not be regarded with such hostility by a libertarian spokesman...

...Herbert Schlossberg replies: Mr...

...This is careless writing...

...Customs also started looking into several [Sandinista support] groups' operations, investigating a charge that there were weapons in some shipments, but dropped the probe in the face of Congressional complaints...

...Conservatives bothered by the size and power of the state should be troubled by van den Haag's proposal to create a new agency (the Federal Sex Regulatory Commission, perhaps...

...My name was put on the fundraising thing by staff, and when I found out about it I wrote and told them to take it off...

...I do understand Mr...

...J. Michael Waller and Joseph Sobran report in the National Review of July 31 that, among other instances of malfeasance, "One Democrat who gets furious about shady contributions to the contras is said to have taken a $500 campaign contribution from a pair of Soviet spies on whose behalf he had interceded...

...unwise, unnecessary, and...

...The other review reflects a substantial misunderstanding of the libertarian perspective...

...Further, I would direct him to several other important reports on the "scurrilous knaves" published recently...

...Far from excluding libertarians from the discourse, as Mr...

...Schroeder, confronted by interviewer Peter Boyles on Denver radio Station KNUS on March 21, asserted that she had never been aware of the endorsements...

...Men's magazines like Penthouse and novels like Sweet Sweater Sluts may be dumb, but they don't cause people to commit crimes...

...Publish more Brock, more insight...

...He skips up and down the great chain of being like a trapeze artist and talks oracularly of Plato, Rousseau, and Nietzsche...

...Schroeder resigned her association with Nicaragua Network in October 1985...

...In one case, the main thesis of the book reviewed is grossly misrepresented...

...In reading it I was (continued on page 57) 12 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR OCTOBER 1987 (continued from page 12) reminded quite often of Charles Reich's The Greening of America...

...For different reasons, both Schambra and Schlossberg would exclude libertarians from conservative political discourse...

...If either Schambra or Schlossberg has his way, I wonder who would be left...

...foreign policy in Central America have taken our case before the American people...

...To pretend the differences aren't there, which he apparently favors, is not the way to do it...

...Schambra, however, does not address the main thesis of this book and ignores these issues...

...Buck suggesting some sort of moral equivalence between the victims of the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan and the Sandinistas...

...That same year, by the way, Rep...

...His letter here appears to be consistent with that explanation...

...All of which brings me to the conclusion that the Spectator has lost its bite, its capacity to deliberately offend, enthrall, and enlighten...

...I fear higher education has not failed democracy so much as Bloom's book has...

...They felt it made unreasonable, indeed impossible, demands upon ordinary people...

...Bernard Murchland Professor of Philosophy Ohio Wesleyan University Delaware, Ohio Porn Padrone The most telling thing about Ernest van den Haag's smutstomping rant ("Outlaw Porn," TAS, July 1987) is that nowhere in the piece does he cite any psychologist or social scientist to support his claim that pornography somehow "causes" crime...

...Sowell's religious beliefs are not obvious, but that is irrelevant...

...More than any political thinkers heretofore, they attempted to tame men's passions by giving disciplined rein to his interests...

...Have you become chic...

...But those who were actively promoting democracy in Central America—Oliver North, John Poindexter, Carl Channell—were forced to operate secretly by a political culture that treats anti-Communism as a crime...

...If, as Kesler suggests, Bloom had paid more attention to how political and philosophical principles have become embodied in the American character and in our institutions and more attention to the civic dimension of education he would no doubt have come up with a more positive view of our estate and been more optimistic about the potential of today's students to realize a meaningful life...

...The left indeed has conducted an "open" campaign on behalf of the Sandinista junta and the Communist FMLN guerrillas in El Salvador...

...But that is not what education in a democracy means...

...But it isn't clear what he is saying about these worthies...

...I can only assume that such imagery is meant as a warning for the elected officials and anti-war activists whom Mr...

...One might also observe that religion has sometimes been the origin, and the church the agent, of an unconstrained vision...

...Harold Alderman Cotati, California David Brock replies: Mr...

...It is salutary to remind ourselves in this bicentennial year of the Constitution that one of the principal reasons why it has worked so well and for so long is precisely that the Framers rejected the transcendental ethic of the classical tradition for which Bloom aspires with such heavy breathing...

...The August 1987 issue is a bit out of focus, apparently unable to distinguish between vital reporting and sophomoric satire...

...Schroeder also lent her name to a fundraising effort for the Committee for a Free Afghanistan Dinner for Afghan Relief...

...One need not view history " . . . through the lens of doctrinaire libertarianism" (again, Schambra's words) to question whether some of these powers were unnecessary or unwise during the crises or to worry about the accumulation of these powers...

...Wooster should have read what I wrote before attacking it...

...on the September cover are masterpieces...

...My review made precisely that point in speaking of the World Council of Churches...

...Alderman for his comments...

...He is incorrect, however, to attribute these differences to " . . . the social atomism of that [libertarian] philosophy...

...Libertarianism is a political philosophy about the relation of individuals and the state, not a comprehensive philosophy...

...In the past I've been critical of such conservatives as George Will, who link their agenda with the fortunes of the idol state...

...I suggested that this is not a good argument for prohibiting either...

...3. You should simply have done a special edition of Current Wisdom, devoting the whole to the Carters' compilation of nincompoopery...

...In 1971 I wrote a review of that book in which I said: "The book is defective, marred by the exceeding vagueness of its central categories, a confusion of historical perspective, gross generalizations, annoying question-begging, and windy rhetoric...

...Specifically, I refer to the editorial decision to emphasize one of the world's safest, most irrelevant sports—Carter bashing—while at the same time downplaying David Brock's timely and trenchant "Democrat Foreign Policy Scandals," one of the most important essays ever published in The American Spectator...

...Schroeder agreed to the endorsement of the Network and joined the group's advisory board but had not done her "homework" on the group before allowing it to use her name...

...A Former Communist Corrects Having just read a review of the book Cause at Heart: A Former Communist Remembers (University of Georgia Press) by Harvey Klehr in your July issue, I write not to take issue with a considerate review but to provide a substantial correction of fact...

...That's why he believes "cornmunitarian dimensions of social life" are all voluntary, whereas I would say many of them—family, citizenship, and so on—are not, having an organic quality...

...Brock portrays as traitors and communist agents...

...But Kesler puts his finger on the basic flaw in Bloom's book when he calls attention to its anti-democratic and, more specifically, its anti-American character...

...to decide what Americans will be allowed to read and see...

...Critics will puzzle over van den Haag's effortless ability to determine what is and is not a proper subject to criticize...

...more often than not, unconstitutional" (Schambra's words), his primary objective was to explain the level and character of federal powers after each successive crisis...

...William Schambra replies: I thank Mr...

...But Bloom ignores all of this...

...Moreover, Schambra grossly misrepresents this book as a crude Marxist-like explanation of the origins of these crises in the desire for power and profits...

...But the way of Plato and Rousseau is not the way of Madison and Jefferson...

...A book involving taxing work over many years merits proper credit...

...Schlossberg uses the word "libertarian" to describe those who share a constrained vision but who do not necessarily come to this vision from a religious perspective...

...Libertarians acknowledge the communitarian dimensions of social life but insist that these relations be voluntary, rather than be imposed by the state...

...For Schlossberg, libertarians are "good pagans" because they do not derive their political views from some true religion...

...Niskanen misrepresents both the spirit and letter of my review...

...Mutatis mutandis, I could use similar language to characterize Bloom's book...

...Kesler caught that point very well in his article...

...above all, it isn't clear how they are relevant to any reform in education...

...If pornography must be "fought," the proper way to do it is by local boycotts, not by the iron hand of the Justice Department...

...It should be noted that Mr...

...Does your advertising department really think rape, torture, and death threats are amusing...

...The usual right-wing hysteria over communism has dwelled upon its supposed closed and secretive nature...

...We don't need a "temporary truce...

...Further, I find Mr...

...Michael Hersh National Lawyers Guild Georgetown University Law Center Washington, D.C...

...I point out his skewed selection of sources, speculate on why the bias is there, and place the work in the context of modern cultural history...

...Part of my problem with Bloom is trying to 'determine what he is talking about at any given point...

...For Schambra, libertarians are "profoundly subversive!' because they favor limits on the powers of government...

...Brock and his fellow disinformers is the opposite: It is the honest and open way that those of us opposed to U.S...

...I'm especially appreciative of the creative use some of them have made of economic thinking, in particular the ideas of the Austrian school, to show the damage that the dominant statist mentality has done to American life...

...To have done so would have been to miss one of its wonders—that it could have been written by a non-Marxist...

...Wooster's preference for battling strawmen of his own invention rather than the arguments I presented...

...There is no doubt democracy tends to be boring...

...Say it isn't so...

...It was a carefully calibrated calculus that has produced many gains in the social order...

...I did not suggest anywhere that this book was "Marxist-like," though...

...Schroeder said...

...Edgar Bissantz Santa Barbara, California Outrage Express I am writing to express my outrage at the reference to the Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador on page 2 of your August 87 issue...

...I did not give them authority to use it...

...In light of the recent threats and acts of violence against Salvadoran refugees in Los Angeles, a joke which names CISPES as a group with which one does not want to be associated is in very poor taste...

...Several months later, when it became clear that such was not the case, we terminated our association...

...He recognizes that conservatives and libertarians often disagree on some issues, such as defense, abortion, and victimless crimes...

...Hard on Bloom I write to applaud Charles Kesler's "The Closing of Allan Bloom's Mind" (TAS, August...

...I did not propose any "new agency" to determine "what Americans will be allowed to read and see...

...Hersh's characterization of those funding the Sandinistas and the FMLN as "antiwar activists" and "truly humanitarian" to be "incredible, chilling, mindboggling," to quote Sen...

...As to the specific criticisms, I don't "admonish" Sowell for not grounding his convictions in religious ideas...

...Although Higgs also makes a reasonable case that many of the powers exercised during these crises were...

...We need to have a prolonged conversation with mutual respect and no attempt to sweep differences under the rug, and at the same time work out strategies for dealing with our mutual adversaries...

...Maybe you should move back to Indiana, where it is apparently safe to be unabashedly iconoclastic...

...It is the best critique of Bloom's best-selling book I have seen...

...But Rep...

...Hersh misses a central point of my argument...

...Surely that's the job of anyone who reviews an important book like A Conflict of Visions...

...Send P. J. O'Rourke back to places where people apparently find him witty...

...This was your cover story, and you shied away from giving it the prominence it deserves...

...Compliments to the Artist Elliott Banfield's portraits of Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North, Arthur Liman, and John W. Nields, Jr...

...Niskanen alleges, I intended to highlight the differences within which the discourse exists, differences which his letter acknowledges...

...As to the Afghan relief endorsement, is Mr...

...This may become a scandal yet...

...Pamela Fendt Milwaukee, Wisconsin 58 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR OCTOBER 1987...

...In contrast, Brock has brought together a compendium of indictments against some of the most scurrilous knaves ever to get on the congressional dole...

...Are you going to merge with Cosmopolitan or Rolling Stone...

...2. P. J. O'Rourke's prose is breathless and his thinking altogether thin...

...Van den Haag admits that the Meese Commission couldn't find any conclusive proof that looking at nonviolent pornography causes a viewer to commit violent crimes...

...What seems to upset Mr...

...Daniel Inouye from another context...

...Schroeder also maintained that Sister Agnes, her Denver aide, was not involved in Nicaragua Network fundraising or lobbying activities...

...He thinks a political philosophy can be abstracted from other philosophical issues and.treated in isolation...

...I never knew I was on that letter and the Nicaragua Network advisory board," Rep...

...Brock's friends, the Contras and Death Squads, prefer more graphic forms of murder, such as dismemberment and mutilation...

...Schroeder's involvement with the Nicaraguan Network...

...Let me propose a temporary truce to sort out these issues...

...Whether this is because van den Haag has not read the literature or because he considers his opinions so perfect that they need not be supported by facts is a question readers must answer for themselves...

...William A. Niskanen Chairman, Cato Institute Washington, DC...

...Before I address the lack of substance in David Brock's "Democrat Foreign Policy Scandals," I would like to point out that the graphics which accompany the piece (gentlemen before firing squads) are an excellent example of the violence emanating from the frustrated right in its sad decline...

...I may have made mistakes in conducting that operation, but my critic doesn't point out what they were...

...Niskanen for pointing out some additional, technical difficulties with Robert Higgs's thesis...

...Niskanen and me that emerges from his letter is the nub of the problem between conservatives and libertarians...

...My point about the Carter piece is really three-fold: 1. The Carters are not worth the ink...

...The Network was originally represented to us in early 1985 as a politically independent, people-topeople organization, and on that basis we agreed to assist them...

...The main thesis of the Higgs book is that the major national crises of this century, combined with a change in political ideology, have led to a progressive increase in the powers of the federal government, a thesis for which Higgs provides substantial documentation...

...There are some problems with the Higgs thesis, specifically why some crises have not led to a significant increase in federal powers_ and why some of these powers have not been exercised in the subsequent periods...

...I feel very angry that they're using my name, but what can you do...

...He makes a convincing case, however, that one may distill a constrained vision from the lessons of history, a perspective that does not deserve Schlossberg's dismissal as " . . . a sort of ancestor worship...

...The question is how we can build bridges based on shared convictions with people with whom we also have strong disagreements...

...If all the "Reagan Revolution" boils down to is howling in ecstasy as the federal sex police (led by Henry Hudson or Andrea Dworkin) kicks down the front doors of America and rips up Playboys, why was Ronald Reagan elected in the first place...

...We cannot afford to keep Archbishops, publishers, and retired Coca-Cola barons in the imperial style they desire, but we can con-tribute educational materials, medical supplies, and farm implements to a fellow people of the Americas who have shared with us the tragedy of the Reagan years...

...The one substantive disagreement between Mr...

...But Sister Agnes was in fact the Rocky Mountain regional director and a national board member of the Nicaraguan Network during the time she served on Rep...

...It doesn't produce souls as finely woven or as highly tuned as Bloom would like...

...Schroeder's staff...

...Far from thinking of libertarianism as "an exotic disease," I value the contribution libertarians have made to some aspects of the political debate...

...and two authors are clearly listed, not myself alone...

...Parents should be bothered by van den Haag's belief that the state is a better authority over children than they are...

...Schlossberg admonishes Sowell, however, for not grounding the "constrained vision" in religion...

...While I doubt that material about the hapless Carters could ever wearthin, I thank Mr...

...Have you at the ripe old age of twenty become respectable...

...Maybe they could argue with each other...

...Everyone already knows about their sublime fatuity...

...The book is clearly stated to be a memoir—not, as Professor Klehr writes, an autobiography...

...There are occasions, as Higgs recognizes, during which a temporary reduction of some liberties is necessary to preserve the potential for future liberty...

...We of the left did not need to sell weapons to Iran, hand cash through car windows, hire mercenaries, or beg foreign dictators when we raised funds for our truly humanitarian aid to the people of Central America...

...Schambra, however, appears to rationalize any use of power in the name of duty, honor, and country, and he expresses no concern about the accumulation of these powers over successive crises...

...His idea of higher education seems to be an erotic tumble in the metaphysical hay for the chosen few who can decode the proper texts in the proper way...

...Junius Scales New York, New York Libertarians Are Conservatives, Too In two recent issues, book reviewers have used the word "libertarian" as if to describe an exotic disease that threatens the health of their own (different) versions of true conservatism...

...He doesn't believe a political philosophy is derived from or at least closely related to an anthropology, an ethic, a metaphysic, and so on...

...Of course, democracy isn't as exciting as the alternative he proposes, not as heroic or as erotically charged...

...And Newsweek, in a July 27 dispatch on "The Other Aid Network," says that "agents from U.S...

...Has the eastern establishment co-opted you...

...Daniel Buck Administrative Assistant Office of Patricia Schroeder House of Representatives Washington, D.C...

...Niskanen's approach trivializes the importance of the differences and makes it more difficult to capitalize on the agreements...

...The more egregious of these reviews is William Schambra's review (TAS, July 1987) of Robert Higgs's Crisis and THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR OCTOBER 1987 11 Leviathan...

...And is he adding something new by saying that religion may be the engine of the unconstrained vision...

...Democracy, in short, is not the kind of society a Plato or a Rousseau dreamed of in their blueprints...