Ich bin ein Amerikaner

Say what you will about Obama's Berlin speech--I found the contents humdrum and the delivery droning and monotonous--it proves that American Exceptionalism remains alive and well. A few years ago, Lech Walesa, one of the great heroes of the Cold War, visited Boston, and delivered his speech at some beer hall in Dorchester. Most foreign heads of state would be lucky to do as well. The only ones I can imagine filling Boston Common are Nelson Mandela, the Dalai Lama, and the Pope.

Obama's appeal to Ze Chermins--free beer and bratwurst aside--is no less spiritual. They came because for all the talk of the rise of China, Russia, and India, America still matters to the world, and especially to Europe, in a profoundly different way. While they would no doubt be pleased if Hu Jintao or Dmitry Medvedev visited and said how much he liked them, I cannot think they would be terribly excited either. Russia and China do not represent anything to the world except lakes of vodka and cheap manufactured goods.

In their enthusiasm for the Democratic candidate, the Germans demonstrate that they do not merely want Americans to like them, they really want to like us as well. I cannot think of any other nation for which this is true, for it is not a matter just of trade policies and other dry diplomacy, but a transcendant, moral imperative. The US has, for its entire history, represented something profoundly radical in the world, and it remains so today. For all his manifold flaws, Obama does embody many of our deepest ideals.

Dear Joe

Years and years ago, my father hired a little-known graphic designer for a freelance job, and when the material didn't quite work out, he fired him, and threw away the sketches. The designer's name was Andy Warhol. I point this out for the benefit of my good friend Joe Keohane, who one day will be telling people at parties about the time he fired me.

Anyway, Joe was nice enough to leave a comment on my recent post explaining why bicycles are the Devil's mode of transportation in which he raised a number of important issues.

First, he is entirely right to point out that the T is an entirely horrid mode of transit. In fact I have often reflected that the most obvious difference between the subway and the sewer system is that they do not charge you a fare to flush the toilet. I will refrain from commenting on the buses because I am entirely happy to report that I have not been on one in years. As Margaret Thatcher sagely observed, any man past the age of 30 who rides the bus to work can count himself a failure. The fact is that the T provides mobility for a great multitude of people who, as Joe's comment suggests, really have no business leaving the house.

Second, Joe says that I cannot be right because he cuts a most distinguished figure riding around town atop his velocipede. In so arguing he demonstrates a skillful command of the converse accident fallacy. I would no sooner question Joe's dignity than my mother's love, Scarlett Johannson's pulchritude, or Madonna's dietician. The mathematical proof is too complicated to present here, so, like Fermat's Last Theorem, I can only scribble in the margin that it can be proven that Joe could be videotaped and YouTubed mud-wrestling the Holyoke rugby A-side while wearing a tutu, and still win election as chairman of the chamber of commerce in Birmingham, Ala. with nary an eyebrow raised. Just because he can do it does not mean others should dare.

All of which brings us to our last and most important point, which is his statement about my "fondness for garish Hawaiian shirts...." In so saying, Joe joins a long and undistinguished list of hecklers who, confronted with the unassailability of my position, are left sputtering about my shirt. Whether striped, checked, or lush with tropical gaiety, my sartorial splendor is sufficiently imposing that few try to imitate it. And for Joe of all people to say so is rich beyond delight. I have heard it said that Joe wears sock-garters while running on the treadmill, and has several pairs of wingtips solely for use while showering. This is above and beyond the fact that if that crazy Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio required inmates to wear shirts and ties like Joe K's, it might be considered a step too far.

That being said, I respect Joe's opinions highly, so if he is willing to be seen wearing one of my bolder shirts, then I would allow myself to be photographed on a bicycle.

A Scientific Analysis of the Op-Ed Kerfuffle



The purpose of this post is to explore the NYT's reasons that the McCain op-ed response to the earlier Obama op-ed was rejected. At its core, the objection seemed to be that while Obama's op-ed laid out substantive policy proposals, McCain's submission was more of a de rigueur talking points rebuttal. While I believe that their rejection was made in good faith, I conclude that it says more about the editorial board's sensibilities than it does about the merits of McCain's article.

My process was to break each article down sentence by sentence, and to classify it as belonging to one of four categories:

• Statement of Fact: A sourced statistic, direct quote, or other objective material evidence.


• Statement of Strategy: A concrete policy proposal, or statement of principle based primarily on statements of fact.


• Opinion: An assertion based heavily on debatable premises.


• Hyperbole: Tautologies, platitudes, false dichotomies, and other assorted rhetorical refuse.

This naturally involves some hair-splitting, so at the end I include all my data and work for interested readers to run their own protocols and publish results. I think my choices will ultimately withstand scrutiny. For instance:

• Fact: "Today, 18 months later, violence has fallen by up to 80% to the lowest levels in four years, and Sunni and Shiite terrorists are reeling from a string of defeats." While this contains a little opinion (how does one measure "reeling?"), the rest of it presents sourced, objective, refutable claims.


• Strategy: "Iraq is not the central front in the war on terrorism, and it never has been." While many would debate this, it generally serves as a useful statement of policy and principle.


• Opinion: "Nearly every threat we face — from Afghanistan to Al Qaeda to Iran — has grown." A sweeping statement riddled with unjustified assertions. At the very least you need to be more specific about what constitutes "nearly every threat we face" and what "grown" means. Al Qaeda, for instance, has not attacked the US mainland since 9/11--which to many observers would suggest it is in fact less of a threat.


• Hyperbole: "A triumph for the terrorists would be a disaster for us."

After running the numbers, I came up with the totals below. For your playing along at home, you can download the full Excel spreadsheet--the mechanics should be fairly self-explanatory.

The weighting of the op-eds is different, and yet not dramatically so. Both engage in closely-comparable amounts of the politics of Hope (Fact and Strategy) and Fear (Opinion and Hyperbole). I score McCain a little higher in the Opinion department, and Obama a little higher in Hyperbole, which may primarily represent my own bias. Switch them if you want--it doesn't change much.

The really interesting thing I see, though, and what I think would stand up to scrutiny, is that McCain's article has substantially more statements of Fact, which Obama's has more which are statements of Strategy.

This is not a value statement on my part. Obama's platform seeks to change the status quo, and so there is a lot for him to explain what the new policy would look like. He makes a few statements of fact and opinion to suggest why we need to change, and then focuses on what that change would look like. McCain, by contrast, does not have anything new to propose--he believes the current policy is still the correct one, and so has relatively less to say about what that policy is, and more as to why it is still the correct path.

NY Times editor David Shipley's rejection note stated that,

"It would be terrific to have an article from Senator McCain that mirrors
Senator Obama’s piece. To that end, the article would have to articulate, in
concrete terms, how Senator McCain defines victory in Iraq."

And yet there is no evidence to suggest that any similar ritual mortifications were required of Sen. Obama, whose views are largely coincident with those of the Times' editors. This is certainly not for want of possible tough probing questions. Shipley could, for instance, have asked Obama to justify his opposition to the surge in 2007, given that its success is the primary reason a general withdrawal today might result in something less than an unmitigated apocalypse.

At this point it is hard to complain, given that the McCain campaign will probably get far more value out of the rejection than it would ever have gotten from the published op-ed. But it does suggest that the Times ought to drop all remaining pretense and simply display an Obama '08 logo on the editorial page through election day.