Correspondence
The Silent Squeam To take issue with anything in Matthew Scully's uncommonly generous review of my book (For the Sake of Argument: Essays and Minority Reports, TAS, June 1993) might seem paltry on...
...War is the essence of stupidity and hell but cannot or must not be assuaged in battle by flowers, tea, and teacups on the part of those participating...
...Abdelrahman (literally, "slave or servant of the Merciful") is a construct of several words in Arabic but really should be treated as one word in English...
...Ames's submission and finally by our letter to him explaining why we were unable to use his contribution, you have introduced no errors into the historical record...
...Only the contingency fee lawyer bears the risk of not getting paid if he does not prevail on behalf of his client...
...During his discussion of expert witness Byron Bloch, for example, the author makes much of the fact that Bloch "is trained in neither auto safety nor engineering...
...Christopher Hitchens Washington, D.C...
...Eastland, Mr...
...But on page 13, as concerns "The October Surprise," and on page 258, as concerns my own "squeamish" line on abortion, I hold tight to the views that he suspects me of concealing...
...That it may in fact be a troublesome assertion to some is likely the case—but it is very much not the case that we sought to censor Dr...
...It is no surprise that the essay was not accepted...
...Bloch must have some expertise in this area or the court would not permit him to testify...
...Although touching, it appears to be anomalous in your particular magazine...
...Because of the slight chance that he might, in a fit of apostasy, submit to the seductive pleasures of hyperregulation...
...Abdel" is not the Sheikh's middle name but the first part of his last name...
...Ames's article and the accompanying letters...
...to me...
...is absolutely right ("Public Radio's Anti-Semites," TAS, June 1993...
...This is especially true of the 1989 column I quoted ("In order to terminate a pregnancy, you have to still a heartbeat, switch off a developing brain and, whatever the method, break some bones and rupture some organs...
...Mark, his headquarters has been located in the Egyptian capital for the last several hundred years...
...Since I am a curmudgeon, I'll simply say it sounded like a bunch of B.S...
...Eastland righteously and rightfully complains about the disservice that NBCprovided its viewers, but then provides his reader the same disservice...
...Eastland complains that NBC made statements "so incomplete as to be false," and then writes in the same fashion...
...If one goes to a CPA for advice on how to handle the reporting of one's income and the IRS chooses to audit your return and demand more tax, the CPA is still paid his fee...
...Since I anticipate that the same accusations will recur in the correct press—especially on the abortion point—may I ask the hospitality of your pages to utter a premature clarification...
...Be fair, Mr...
...Ames to contribute to a collection of essays on how one might solve the world's environmental problems if given unlimited power to do so, followed by the text of Dr...
...However, I have no interests in products liability litigation, and I represent both plaintiffs and defendants in civil lawsuits...
...Ames's essay because it didn't answer the question we asked...
...Matthew Scully replies: Actually, all of Hitchens's eloquent pro-life writings failed to make the cut, which seems sad, given the courage it took for a man of the left to publish such things in the first place...
...But by prefacing these documents with the observation—borrowed from another publication—that an authoritative point of view such as Dr...
...I think anyone that knows that steadfastly pious and hard-working people would agree that their emigration from Egypt to the United States is America's gain and Egypt's loss...
...If he thinks this column is dated, "too much of its time and place" to belong in the collection, he underrates the power of his own words...
...My compliments to your typesetters and proofreaders...
...If one goes to a physician seeking a cure and the cure is not obtained, the fees of the doctor are still paid...
...Ames's expression of this view, and I cannot permit the suggestion to stand...
...Jonathan F. King Editor-in-Chief Sierra San Francisco, California The value of a magazine such as yours is the publication of items like Prof...
...At a time of massive deficits—when Congress is looking for government programs to eliminate—the shameful fumbling surrounding Pacifica's hate broadcasts should place the Corporation for Public Broadcasting at the top of everybody's list...
...Alberto M. Fernandez Burke, Virginia Pro Bono I write to take exception to "Keep on Truckin'," Terry Eastland's Presswatch column in the May issue...
...Let me assure him that I still firmly believe there was dirty work at the crossroads in the 1980 election, and that I still affirm the right of the unborn to be called a child...
...Your article offered sympathy and tears . . . for two soldiers who provided lovely flowers and effete stuff while men were dying and decomposing in the Burma campaign...
...Daniel F. Svidro Washington, Pennsylvania Airman R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr...
...Because we came across his name early in our perusal of some alphabetical directory of pundits, and wondered what he might say if asked...
...As for any assumed anti-conservative bias on our part, your readers deserve to know that we also sought contributions from, among others, Julian Simon, the late Warren Brookes (who told me he was delighted by the invitation, and who was working on his contribution the day he died), Reason magazine editor Virginia Postrel (whose promised essay never arrived), high-ranking members of the then-newsworthy Bush administration, and at least one member of your own editorial board...
...The Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) has an obligation under law to insure that taxpayer money is being spent wisely...
...Ames in the first place...
...Two minor quibbles: The Coptic Orthodox Patriarchate's "Vatican-like headquarters" is located in Cairo's Ezbekiyya section, not in Alexandria (although the Coptic Pope is called Patriarch of Alexandria and the See of St...
...Also, calling Muslim Fundamentalist leader Omar Abdelrahman "Sheikh Rahman" is like calling Mr...
...Bruce Ames of the University of California and Sierra, the Sierra Club's national magazine, which I edit...
...I will acknowledge that by publishing verbatim our invitation to Dr...
...It appears that you did so in the belief that these texts reveal a lamentable impulse on our part to censor ideas that might discomfit environmentalists...
...Gabriel Austin New York, New York Burmese Gays Your June 1993 issue, under "The Gay American Saloon Series," included an article entitled "Club El Malaria" (by Ian Forman...
...Why, do you suppose, did we approach Dr...
...If I Ruled the World In your June issue, you published a series of exchanges between Dr...
...Eastland also makes much of the fact that the attorney representing the Moseleys works on a contingency-fee basis...
...So that we might waste our time and his, for the anticipated pleasure of rejecting him...
...The author complains that if the attorney prevails he receives a net of one-third or more of huge damage awards...
...Robert Fairbank Tucson, Arizona If I was a kind individual I would characterize "Club El Malaria" as a highly embellished nostalgic tale...
...He was not alone in this oversight: several other potential contributors were politely turned away for the same failure...
...Eastland makes Bloch sound as though he were the equivalent of a science fiction writer testifying in court...
...Before you read any further, I admit that I am a lawyer...
...The Silent Squeam To take issue with anything in Matthew Scully's uncommonly generous review of my book (For the Sake of Argument: Essays and Minority Reports, TAS, June 1993) might seem paltry on my part...
...Which rejection—as happens often in dictatorships—draws attention to the essay...
...Den...
...Norden "Mr...
...As for the whole October Surprise business—again, mentioned in just the one passing sentence he cites—I suspect this omission was more the decision of his editors at Verso, squeamish in a less admirable way and willing to tolerate only so Much of Hitchens's dissenting spirit...
...Ames's "deserves to be known even if it is nonconformist and attacks preconceived ideas," you appear to suggest that we sought to censor Dr...
...Nor is a single, passing admission of squeamishness (the only such comment to make the cut, and that in a column deriding as a "ghoul" the world's best-known pro-lifer, Mother Teresa) my idea of "holding tight" to one's dearest convictions...
...Edward J. Makara Seattle, Washington Good Copt, Bad Copt I thoroughly enjoyed Edward Norden's article on the Copts in the United States ("America's Oldest (and Newest) Christians," TAS, June 1993...
...Some of the columns in which I said this did indeed fail to make the cut, being too much of their time and place...
...If it cannot do its job, the only solution taxpayers have is to cut off federal dollars...
...He doesn't mention that if the lawyer does not prevail the lawyer does not receive payment for his services...
...Come now, Mr...
...If one goes to a PR "flack" for his efforts to produce a particular result and the result is not obtained, the fees of the PR "flack" are still paid...
...But he suggests that, for the sake of my journalistic hide rather than for the sake of argument, I have dumped two positions that I once held dear...
...We made this effort in sincerity and in earnest, because we don't perceive our readers as susceptible to off-the-rack ideology-mongering, trusting them instead to sort through a variety of facts and opinions and make decisions for themselves...
...Anyone not already preconditioned to assume statist conspiracies fueling any public-interest endeavor will see that we declined to publish Dr...
...Period...
...Ames declined to do in this case, for reasons best known to him...
...Laurence Jarvik, Director Center for the Study of Popular Culture Washington, D.C...
...We are at a time when homosexuality, formerly referred to as sodomy, is being promoted in high places...
...All we ask of our contributors is that they conform in some meaningful way to the context we mutually agree upon for the presentation of their thoughts—something Dr...
...Ames because his essential thesis—that synthetic pesticides are not as harmful as many environmentalists believe, and do not warrant the huge expenditures of money and effort required to eliminate them—is anathema to True Believers in our movement...
...Eastland, point out the other side...
...Of great interest in the letter of invitation are the revealing terms, the equivalent of "Suppose you were dictator of the world . . ." The seductive appeal of dictatorship reveals much about the mindset of the editor of Sierra magazine...
Vol. 26 • August 1993 • No. 8
