What to Do About the Intellectuals

BY JAMES TARANTO
Monday, October 29, 2001 3:13 p.m.

What to Do About the Intellectuals
In National Review Online, Victor Davis Hanson weighs in with a withering critique of America's intellectual class:

The usual explanations about the sociology of dissent do not quite make sense any more. So far, those who are fighting in Afghanistan--mostly highly trained pilots and special-forces operatives--are not from among the unwashed poor. The affluent Left, then, is not opposed to action because the less-privileged are dying in droves. Is it because the better educated are more sensitive to world opinion? To the nuances of Islam? To the "Other" in Afghanistan, who are not male WASPs? To the vagaries of the European press? Perhaps.

Perhaps not. Rather, I think fashionable anti-Americanism and pacifism have now become completely aristocratic pursuits, the dividends of limited experience with the muscular classes and the indulgence such studied distance breeds. Our pampered critics may be as clever as Odysseus, but they have lost his nerve, strength, and sense of morality. And so they have neither the ability nor desire to ram a hot stake into the eye of the savage Cyclops to save their comrades.

In another NRO piece, Stanley Kurtz writes that "with the attacks of September 11 and the ensuing public outrage over the vituperative and one-sided 'blame America first' response of the tenured radicals, the academy may finally be facing serious public questioning of its legitimacy--along with widespread dismissal of its relevance and credibility."

Who can disagree? And yet some caveats are in order. In the first place, there are plenty of intellectuals, even in the universities and even on the left, who have been quite sensible about the war. The anti-American fringe makes a lot of noise, but we're willing to bet its volume is far more impressive than its numbers. To combat these people, we need to begin with the civil-libertarian truism that the answer to offensive speech is more speech. If you work at or attend a university (or anywhere else intellectuals gather), resolve that if you hear someone badmouthing America or justifying the Sept. 11 atrocities, you'll answer back--politely, but firmly and confidently.

There's a distinction to be made among the anti-American intellectuals, too. Some of them are simply haters, people who genuinely loathe America. Such people are due exactly the degree of tolerance society extends to, say, members of the Ku Klux Klan: We respect their right to express their views, but we treat those views as beyond the pale of respectability. True America-haters deserve to be denounced and shunned.

On the other hand, many intellectuals are merely unserious people. David Brooks captures this nicely in a Weekly Standard essay: "The earnest conformity that does prevail in wartime drives intellectuals--who like to think of themselves as witty, skeptical, iconoclastic dissidents--batty. They grow sour, and alienated from mainstream life."

Of course the "earnest conformity" that accompanies a just war is entirely compatible with wit, skepticism, even iconoclasm. It is the product not of an ovine mentality but of the obvious rightness of the cause. The metaphor of "moral gravity" is instructive here. An atrocity of the magnitude of Sept. 11 pulls us all in and forces us to contend with it. Well, almost all of us. We've encountered, and maybe you have too, a few people who seem blithely oblivious to the horror of Sept. 11. Frank Rich's column this week (link requires registration) is a good example; less than seven weeks after Sept. 11, the New York Timesman returns to his usual partisan prattle, even blaming the anthrax scare on the "religious right" (no, he's not talking about the Taliban).

How, we've wondered when we hear such things, can anyone contemplate Sept. 11 and not be serious about it? We suppose moral gravity, like the physical kind, exerts its pull only on those that have some weight to begin with. If one's mind is filled with helium, even a brutal attack on his country won't stop him from floating off into the clouds.

A Religious War?
This is not a religious war--not for our side anyway. But the enemy sees it differently. Motorcycle-riding gunmen burst into a Catholic church in eastern Pakistan and opened fire, killing at least 16 people, including several children.

Nobel laureate V.S. Naipaul, in a New York Times magazine interview (link requires registration), offers this explanation when asked the "causes" of Sept. 11:

It had no cause. Religious hate, religious motivation, was the primary thing. I don't think it was because of American foreign policy. There is a passage in one of the Conrad short stories of the East Indies where the savage finds himself with his hands bare in the world, and he lets out a howl of anger. I think that, in its essence, is what is happening. The world is getting more and more out of reach of simple people who have only religion. . . .

It was as though up there was a divine supermarket, and at last it had become open to people in the Muslim world. They didn't understand that the goods that gave them power in the end were made by another civilization. That was intolerable to accept, and it remains intolerable.

A Base in Afghanistan?
USA Today reports America may soon establish a forward base in Northern Afghanistan. "A senior defense source with knowledge of military operations says such a base would support 200 to 300 commandos. "The source hinted that the first such base might be established in Northern Afghanistan to help the rebel Northern Alliance's stalled campaign to take the key town of Mazar-e Sharif. The base could be used to launch helicopter strikes against Taliban forces and to call in Navy fighter jets and AC-130 gunships. That represents a significant shift in strategy because Pentagon officials had suggested for weeks that they hoped to establish a base outside of that city, but only after it fell to Northern Alliance fighters."

Our Friends the Egyptians
Osama el-Baz, a top aide to Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak, says America should stop bombing the Taliban for the month of Ramadan, which this year begins in November. "Continuing to bomb Afghanistan at current levels during Ramadan would be an 'affront' to Muslims everywhere," the Associated Press quotes el-Baz as saying. Has he ever heard of the Ramadan War? More commonly known in the West as the Yom Kippur War, it began when Egypt and Syria launched a surprise attack on Israel on Oct. 6, during both Muslim and Jewish holy times.

Our Friends the Pakistanis
Thousands of Pakistanis are heading to Afghanistan, vowing to join the Taliban's jihad against America, the Associated Press reports. The wannabe mujahedeen were armed with "assault rifles, machine guns, even rocket launchers. A few even carried axes and swords." The Taliban's response? Thanks, but no thanks, according to London's Telegraph. "If they go there, there will be a lot of congestion and the probability of mass casualties will be higher," says Abdul Salam Zaeef, the Talib envoy in Islamabad. "If they are needed then we will tell them. With the air strikes in Afghanistan it is very dangerous for them to be in Afghanistan so we have not requested their presence at this stage."

The New York Times (link requires registration) reports that Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency "has had an indirect but longstanding relationship with Al Qaeda, turning a blind eye for years to the growing ties between Osama bin Laden and the Taliban." The ISI "even used Al Qaeda camps in Afghanistan to train covert operatives for use in a war of terror against India," according to American officials.

The Telegraph picks up a report by Seymour Hersh in The New Yorker (the Hersh piece isn't yet online), according to which "an elite American military unit is preparing for possible incursion into Pakistan in order to steal its nuclear weapons arsenal" in the event that Gen. Pervez Musharraf's military government falls and anti-American forces take over in Islamabad.

Our Friends the Saudis
The Times of London reports the 15 Saudis among the Sept. 11 hijackers were from wealthy families. Saad al-Fagih, a "moderate Saudi dissident" based in London, tells the paper the killers were "talented" and had "good communication skills."

The Times also reports that Carmen bin Laden, Osama's sister-in-law, "has outraged members of the family after claiming that they and sections of the Saudi royal family gave financial backing to the terrorist leader." Says Carmen: "What I have heard is he has the backing of some of the royal family. They think the same way. Not all of them, but some of them. You have to understand, I think in Saudi Arabia Osama Bin Laden has a little following. And in my opinion, this is what makes him dangerous. Because he has . . . the backing of a lot of people there."

Bellyaching Brits
American politicians are almost totally united in supporting the war against terrorists. But Britain's Financial Times reports that Britain's Labour Party is divided. Although Tony Blair has been steadfast, he "faced calls for a halt to the bombing from some Labour MPs concerned at reports of civilian casualties." The Drudge Report picks up on criticism in the British press, including an America-bashing front-page piece in the Mirror tabloid that shouts THIS WAR IS A FRAUD and urges "bold, imaginative non-violent initiatives that require real political courage." Yeah, that'll work.

Japanese Backups
The upper house of the Japanese Parliament has passed a bill that will allow Japanese troops to provide "rearguard support" to troops on foreign soil. The bill provides a way for Japan, whose constitution prohibits military action except if the country is attacked directly, to help America in the war. Japanese troops would not fight on the front lines, but they would be able to provide "medical services, humanitarian support for refugees, and the transportation of supplies for US and other troops in foreign soil," the Financial Times reports.

Now He Gets It
In an article on suspects and witnesses the FBI has been detaining since Sept. 11, the New York Times (link requires registration) quotes David Cole of the Center for Constitutional Rights as saying: "It begins to feel like those countries where they lock people up and don't tell anyone about it. That's not how this country was run until Sept. 11." Hey, good work there, David. It took you less than seven weeks to figure out that things changed on Sept. 11.

Looking for Things to Blow Up
The Palm Beach Post reports that head hijacker Mohamad Atta "was casing potential targets" in Florida in the year before Sept. 11. Among other things, "he flew into the crowded airspace of Miami International Airport and knocked on the door of a federal flight service station in Kendall, both within a short flight of the Turkey Point nuclear reactor south of Miami."

Saving Reno
Columnist Robert Novak reports that "efforts to launch a Pearl Harbor-style commission to investigate roots of the Sept. 11 disaster are being impeded by efforts to protect Janet Reno, who is running an uphill campaign for governor of Florida." If Congress appointed a blue-ribbon commission to figure out what went wrong, it would have to look at Reno's conduct as attorney general, and its report "would come six months from now, at the peak of Democrat Reno's efforts to defeat Republican Gov. Jeb Bush."

American Muslims
The Web site of the Council on American-Islamic Relations says the group was founded "to promote a positive image of Islam and Muslims in America." The group's actions, however, are undermining that goal. At a time when Americans are nearly unanimous in support of the war, CAIR is among a group of Muslim organizations that have endorsed a statement urging America "to cease the bombing campaign and other military actions."

Many American Muslim groups refused to sign the statement, including the American Muslim Council and the Muslim Public Affairs Council, whose executive director, Salam Al-Marayati, tells the New York Times (link requires registration): "We support the president's initiative to defeat terror. The country was attacked, and we want the perpetrators brought to justice."

The FBI's Hesitancy
"Fearing charges of religious persecution, the FBI for years has hesitated to investigate radical Islamic clerics in the United States despite evidence that their mosques have been used to recruit and fund suspected terrorists," the Washington Post reports. "Even after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, 'the veil of religion that has been draped over mosques . . . will be tough to move off,' an FBI official said last week. 'The Arab American community can become enraged and beat on the FBI.' " This is an odd thing to say, since, as InstaPundit.com points out, most Arab-Americans aren't even Muslims, let alone Muslim extremists; as many as 77% of them are Christian.

Stupidity Watch
AOL president Raymond J. Oglethorpe calls the anthrax attacks that have traumatized the postal system "incredibly positive for the Internet"--even if true, a stupid thing to say.

The Des Moines Register (fifth item) reports that "Maharishi Mahesh Yogi has called for the removal of President Bush, saying that his bellicose posture has opened the road to the gates of hell, followers said Saturday. Speaking from the Netherlands, the founder of the Transcendental Meditation movement told followers that many unintelligent people believe in arms. He said Bush's ignorance of science has led him to rashly go out and destroy the world, according to a statement by followers."

The Nashville Scene reports on an investigative journalist who doesn't know water from (ahem) Shinola:

After warning that terrorist saboteurs might try to poison Metro water with "anthrax" or "smallpox," WTVF-Channel 5 reporter Rob Manning thought he'd show viewers how easily that could happen by dramatically crawling under a wire fence just "a few hundred yards" from the city's "water supply."

While the camera focused ominously on some large, nearby water tanks, Manning reported from inside the fence, "It's not too hard to crawl underneath. . . . It took me less than 20 seconds." . . .

If only the terrorists were that dumb.

Instead of cracking security at one of Metro's water collection facilities, located several miles away, Manning had only managed to break into the sewage treatment plant.

And here's another gem from the indispensable Middle East Media and Research Institute:

Joining the attacks on Giuliani were columnists in the Palestinian Authority mouthpiece Al-Hayat Al-Jadida. Editor Hafez Al-Barghouthi wrote: "New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani was obsessed by his hatred of Arabs even before the terrorist attacks on New York. He hides his first name, chosen for him by his Italian father, so as not to remind the Jewish voters of the infamous Rudolph Hitler [sic]. This is why he prefers to shorten it to Rudy."

Al-Barghouthi must've been thinking of Adolf, the Red-Nosed Fuehrer.

Home Sweet Home
Several readers took exception to the New York chauvinism in our Friday item on the World Series between the New York Yankees and the Arizona Diamondbacks. Well, c'mon, guys, what do you expect? We work for The Wall Street Journal, not the Van Buren Street Journal. That said, we regret any implication that Arizonans or Diamondback fans are less patriotic than Yankee backers.

Yesterday's New York Times (link requires registration) had an inspiring article on Phoenix firemen, led by Capt. John Dwyer, who came to New York to serve at Ground Zero:

The Arizonans were in awe of their New York brothers. They were impressed by the way all work would stop when a fallen fireman was discovered, and the way the body was removed from the pile through a corridor of saluting, stiff-backed men.

"All you could do was show you were there and show your support," said Captain Dwyer. "You just said you were sorry, then you moved on."

What can we say but thanks, guys. As for the series, Dwyer says: "My heart goes out to New York City. Sure, I'd like to see the Diamondbacks win, but if the Diamondbacks weren't in it I could definitely see myself rooting for the Yanks."

We just have one question: Where the heck did they come up with the name "Diamondbacks"? Isn't a diamondback what a man gets from his fiancée when she cancels the engagement?

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