Correspondence
Correspondence PRAISE FOR A GREAT SPEECH Bravo to Norman Podhoretz for his praise of Bob Dole’s acceptance speech (“A Great Speech and Its Critics,” Sept. 2). It was a magnificent speech—and...
...Neither dire warnings of doom nor celebrations of the end of the welfare state are reasonable reactions to a welfare “reform” bill that is likely to have little effect...
...12) reflects the same hyperbolic rhetoric used by critics of the recent welfare “reform” bill, who treat it as the end of compassion in America...
...MARC PAIGE CRANSTON, RI SMOKING PARODIES Congratulations on a great parody of Bill Clinton’s decision to regulate tobacco as a drug (Sept...
...ALBERT HENDERSON BRIDGEPORT, CT A BIGGER TAX CUT Regarding Fred Barnes’s “Bob and Jack Together” (Aug...
...We have come to defend our system as a Hobbesian democracy of desires, refereed by the state...
...I was not quite alone—some of the “ordinary citizens” in the CNN focus group were deeply moved...
...Even his specific policy proposals follow from the central vision, for they speak to the things that have put so many of us on a course away from our true callings...
...The 15 percent relief eventually offered as the campaign’s cynosure is too paltry and timid...
...26): That Dole “initially endorsed” a “rollback of the 1990 and 1993 tax hikes” demonstrates again his leaden feel for the public’s pulse...
...I don’t know whether it would please Podhoretz, as it does me, to know that at least one other listener had simultaneously discerned the same “images of great richness and coherence” in Dole’s address...
...No doubt he was taught that Galileo, Copernicus, Newton, Freud, and others caused revolutions in scientific knowledge...
...Bill Clinton knows this works based on his own admitted experience with other smoked addictive substances...
...It was a magnificent speech—and if it soared over the heads of most commentators, so much the worse for them...
...The only effect of the Republican budget is to make poor people a little bit poorer...
...Just before the tax-initiative proclamation, his handlers miraculously “discovered” those increases targeted six-digit earners...
...In forwarding reports of scientific news to the general public, journalists have an obligation to dwell on phrases such as “indicate,” “statistically significant,” and “suggest” that appear in reports of scientific research...
...It is, as Podhoretz painfully states, “the corruption of taste and the erosion of standards in America...
...The real issue is not the particular rules on welfare, but the amount of money budgeted to help poor people...
...Despite some disappointments in the president’s record on issues of concern to the gay community, Clinton is light-years ahead of Dole in his support of gay Americans...
...Most particularly, Podhoretz pointed out Dole’s “grace and style” in delivering the speech—his voice and demeanor touched me...
...Republicans want to pretend that they are revolutionaries...
...The citizen of the latter asks that he be allowed to try to fulfill the earthly vocation that heaven has for him...
...The truth is that welfare as we know it has not ended...
...Why has Bill Clinton not mentioned the approach that he himself took as a youth...
...It had been a long time since beautiful language was used to extol the greatness of our nation...
...Dole should have promised a 25 percent reduction over four years and dispensed with the capitalgains reform (except for housing) and tax credits for children...
...Bob Dole’s campaign initially refused a donation from the Log Cabin Club, an organization of gay Republicans, as though the money were somehow tainted...
...Our self-understanding as a society has fallen apart because of the first vision, and Dole offered a way to revive that self-understanding...
...Yet Dole spoke movingly about “right conduct”— challenging not just the character of the incumbent in the White House, but of the whole nation...
...They are so wedded to the thoughts of Hobbes and Bentham that they are deaf to a rethinking of the roots of the national idea, even when the frazzled and vulgar public space has made it necessary...
...The Democrats’ platform, and Bill Clinton, support efforts “to end discrimination against gay men and lesbians and further their full inclusion in the life of the nation...
...Both sides in the debate have political reasons for exaggerating the consequences of the welfare bill...
...The Republican-party platform calls employment non-discrimination based on sexual orientation a “distortion” of civilrights laws...
...The record shows that a great deal of science accepted for publication is seen as trivial and even wrong a few years later...
...Where were they in 1990 and 1993...
...The citizen of the former asks to have his desires legitimated and, if possible, granted...
...JAMES B. CONROY LANCASTER, VA GAY SUPPORT FOR DEMS It is incredible to me that Matt Labash (“We’ll Have a Gay Old Time,” Sept...
...Such rich quality certainly outshines many pessimistic, critical minds...
...It was also a brave speech...
...Anyone who really cares about the fate of the poor should not headline editorials about the welfare bill “Victory” or “Defeat,” but simply “Politics As Usual...
...Thank you to Norman Podhoretz for his inspired words concerning Bob Dole’s acceptance speech...
...I had begun to think I was in the first stages of senile dementia...
...One example of that insignificance is the provision allowing states to exempt one-fifth of welfare recipients from the overall five-year limit...
...Our pundits are so caught up in the minutiae of wrangling about plans and policies that they cannot hear such music...
...Our political arguments are about the fairness and scope of the referee’s calls...
...Moreover, Dole’s willingness, as a conservative, to say that America’s past was in many crucial respects better than its present is truly courageous...
...liberals want to dismiss conservatives as hateful child-abusers...
...The Democratic convention had nearly 150 openly gay delegates...
...Bill Clinton includes gay Americans in his acceptance speech for his party’s nomination...
...Dole asks us instead to recall, beginning with the reminder of our natural smallness, a more Lockean vision: a democracy of vocation...
...Today their work is considered historically significant but generally obsolete...
...Then I began to hear the critics and I wondered how I could have missed the flaws that almost everybody else had detected...
...JESSIE ADAMS WILSONVILLE, OR It was comforting to discover that I was not alone in believing the Dole speech was his best, and also the most noble political speech in my lifetime...
...JOHN K. WILSON CHICAGO, IL FORGET PEER REVIEW Neal B. Freeman, while agonizing over the failure of scientific peer review to produce ultra-reliability—or at least a democratic assurance—of scientific results should recall his highschool science, (“Peer Review and Its Discontents,” Aug...
...Polls, which guide every breath our chief executive draws, tend to suggest character is not important to voters...
...Instead of the many legally challengeable regulations that he has proposed, why hasn’t he suggested the simple solution that seemingly worked so well for him—smoke but don’t inhale...
...It wasn’t all preaching though...
...Here I would offer another explanation for the blindness of the intellectuals...
...I have heard them all since Roosevelt and had never before reacted with such unreserved admiration...
...Why should modern science be so different...
...As a 73-yearold, I recognized the “gracious compensations of age” that shone through the persona of this purportedly inarticulate man...
...But neither side acknowledges the welfare bill’s insignificance...
...ANN C. WOLLAN WILMETTE, IL NOT QUITE VICTORY The enormous “Victory” headline over the welfare editorial (Aug...
...The strength of the speech lay not in the grace and precision of its language, though both abounded, but in the depth and truth of its regnant idea...
...Conservatives these days are instructed to be resolutely “future oriented” and “optimistic,” lest they be scorned as reactionaries...
...Some of it, like Newton’s alchemy, was way off...
...Labash’s skepticism regarding gay support for Bill Clinton and the Democratic party is, at the very least, quite politically naive...
...There is a really serious way in which a parody of our president could save us all from the perils of cigarettes and addiction...
...It was uplifting...
...The weakness in our priorities has been a lack of support for library research, inadequate information resources for exhaustive reviews, and an attitude of “not sexy” on the part of the mass media...
...Their findings were rarely accepted without debate...
...It was the pundits who missed it, and not only because of their cultural vulgarity...
...The most accurate peer review takes place some time after publication, in articles that evaluate the literature of discovery on a comprehensive basis...
...MONA CHAREN GREAT FALLS, VA Could it be the graciousness of age and maturity that permits recognition of the exceptional...
...It is a brave politician who dares to note national decline...
...The lukewarm commentary on the speech reminds me of what has been done to the Episcopalian Book of Common Prayer—felicitous language and accurate, graceful phrases have been rejected...
...2) seems somehow baffled by gay America’s overwhelming support for President Clinton...
...After Dole’s final words, I said to my wife, who was in the next room not watching the convention, “That was the best acceptance speech I have ever heard...
...Except for physical absolutes like the boiling point of water, science makes few promises...
...It contained the promise of renewal...
...JOHN R. SCHOTTLAND MERIDIAN, MS What a relief to read Norman Podhoretz’s comments about Dole’s acceptance speech...
...For some scientists, the most terrifying moment in journalism is when some media yenta promises physical immortality based on an interesting correlation found in some lab, sending hordes of consumers out to buy the stuff...
...Since few welfare recipients are on welfare for more than five years, there will be no “end” to welfare if states grant the exemptions...
...Republican plans to cut spending mean that real welfare reform—which requires jobs programs, child care, and incentives to the working poor—will never happen...
...The Republican convention had three...
...THOMAS REYNOLDS BOCA RATON, FL...
...A poorly led party, which embraces Ted Kennedy-esque health-care reform and raises the minimum wage because it can’t say no, should pursue only simple, uniform rate reductions...
...It is true that I share his and Dole’s “gracious compensations of age,” but I would have admired that speech as much 60 years ago as I did in August 1996...
...JOHN R. CASSIDY FAIRFAX, VA Thank you, Norman Podhoretz, for voicing so very well what I felt about Bob Dole’s acceptance speech...
Vol. 2 • September 1996 • No. 1
