Week of January 8, 2001
[Note: Some now-dead links have been removed from archived items.]

IMPATIENS MAN: I'm a week late, but I can't let Michael Pollan's feature on Claude Hope in the New York Times Magazine's annual obit issue pass without comment. Pollan, a Times Magazine editor who has written several books on gardening, doesn't like Hope's legacy. In the 1960s, Hope developed the impatiens, through old-fashioned breeding and hybridizing, into into the colorful blooms that brighten so many American gardens. It's "a plant with the durability and bright relentlessness of plastic," sniffs Pollan. He writes, "There's something synthetic about the flat, Day-Glo hues they come in; also, the sheer relentlessness of an impatiens in bloom seems somehow suspect, and very quickly wearies. Planting a bed of impatiens is a step up from putting out plastic plants, I'll grant you, but it seems to me the two acts exist on the same aesthetic continuum." It's all so crass and obvious--both the flower's sturdy brilliance and Pollan's bobo snobbery. Far more interesting was the quote from Hope in the original Times obituary: "A survey can't tell you what people might buy in the future, if it happened to be available. So the hybridizer, the seedsman who has his eye cocked to the future, has got to take risks, to use his imagination to dream up something new, and then work his tail off trying to make it a reality." Hope took a chance on making the world more beautiful, and he succeeded. [Posted 1/14.]

PRESS NOTICES: Big media finally begin paying serious attention to environmental hate group attacks. A story on the front page of The Washington Post's Style section and a feature on Sixty Minutes show better news judgment than The New York Times approach of burying the story in local news. The Post story contains this nice passage: "For ELF, the tract houses are symbols. For homeowners, they are places that will someday have kitchen doorjambs covered with pencil marks, charting the growth of their children."

What's really scary about these terrorists is that, unlike the French resistance and African National Congress to which they compare themselves or the IRA and PLO to which others might compare them, they aren't just trying to win control of particular, limited territory. Their quest to wipe out "anyone who is destroying the environment for the sake of profit" is essentially open-ended--or at least as ambitious as the extermination goals of the Nazis or the social engineering of the Khmer Rouge. They may honestly believe they'll only attack buildings, but they're crusading against ordinary people's modern lives and they can't win without wiping them out. This hate campaign won't end of its own accord. [Posted 1/13.]

HIGH-TECH POWER PLAY: The California power crisis has focused attention on an unsavory--and potent--combination of corporate clout and aesthetic sensibilities. Cisco Systems has thrown its considerable weight around to block a new power plant proposed for a site near a new Cisco campus, as this Los Angeles Times story details. In December, the San Jose City Council voted 11-0 to keep the plant out of town. Accounts in local papers say Cisco has intimidated potential plant supporters, including Hewlett Packard, for whom Cisco is a big customer. (This background story in an alternative weekly includes the delightful detail that state Sen. Steve Peace, the legislative brains behind the state's disastrous utility scheme, produced the cult film, Attack of the Killer Tomatoes, a fact confirmed by his official bio [which has gotten a lot more boring and less Killer Tomato-oriented since I originally posted this. In fact, his separate site at www.stevepeace.org has disappeared, redirecting visitors to his state senate site.]) The story is one of odd alliances. Cisco's own campus project was opposed by environmentalists, who argued that its 20,000 employees would crowd freeways and pollute the air, causing even more impacts than the power plant. But other local activists like Cisco and hate the plant. It's a classic Silicon Valley fight. The dominant culture there likes to imagine that nice industries like theirs have no relation to the icky, old smokestack economy. Given the breath-taking beauty of their open spaces, I can't entirely blame them. (There's nothing like a homesick Californian exiled in the unrelieved ugliness of North Texas.) But, as they're learning at a cost of millions of dollars, high tech runs on electricity, and electricity doesn't come from the outlet in the wall. [Posted 1/12.]

MORE MILKEN: A pardon appears imminent, reports The New York Times.

OLD BUT GOOD: It's too late to help Linda Chavez, but columnist Ruben Navarette set her record on Latino issues straight in an excellent piece in today's Dallas Morning News. [Posted 1/12.]

VERTICAL DISINTEGRATION: The AOL-Time Warner scares the bejesus out of those who fear media concentration. They shouldn't worry. This behemoth makes no business sense. There's no particular reason for all these businesses to be under one roof, rather than contracting with each other in the marketplace. The merger is just the first stage of restructuring. Look for lots of spinoffs over the next few years. Oh yeah, and as a long-time and soon to be former customer, I have no long-term faith in AOL. Bad customer service and too many annoying features. They were a great entryway, but depending on newbies and inertia won't work as a long-term strategy. [Posted 1/12.]

MOUNTAIN BIKES: Here's an issue that could win Gale Norton some friends in an environmental constituency: Does she think mountain bikers should be kept off federal lands? (Wild guess says no.) Bikers are up in arms over a Bureau of Land Management proposal to treat bikes more like motorized vehicles. The final policy is due January 19, the last day of the Clinton administration. This is part of a trend toward restricting recreational access to public lands. It started with loud, motorized vehicles, but it won't end there. Once recreation was the green alternative to the dirty business of mining or logging. Now it intrudes on wilderness purity. This puts environmental groups in a bind. Attacking recreation attacks their popular base. For a Forbes column I wrote on the subject, click here. For the Sierra Club's response, see here. The most striking aspect of the response is Carl Pope's outrage at the idea that wealth and pleasure--an affluent society and enjoyment of the outdoors--might have something to do with the environmental movement's success. He might try telling the bikers that their fun is not environmentally correct. [Posted 1/12.]

NOVEL IDEA: The zest for central control of "truth" never dies. Best-selling novelist Caleb Carr, author of The Alienist, plugs his latest book--an attempt at dystopic science fiction--with a call for government control of the Internet. "I do not see the government playing a moral role so much as a verification and attribution assurance role--regulating the Internet should be like regulating food and drugs as much as it should be like regulating books, TV and movies," he writes in Salon. "A hundred years ago, people had no way of determining the quality of the food and drugs that went into their bodies. Now they cannot determine what sources or forces may be behind the information that goes into their minds. Regulation is desperately needed to prevent widespread, even general, mental and intellectual poisoning of the public." For a historical novelist, Carr is remarkably ignorant of history. Policing truth and avoiding the "mental and intellectual poisoning of the public" was the great justification for censorship back in the pre-liberal days of religious wars. And, of course, it was, and is in some countries, the argument for communist thought control. One consolation: Judging from the Amazon reviews, including the company's unsigned summary (not the sort of real review they'd run if they could find an editor who liked the book), Killing Time is a real stinker written in Hardy Boys style. [Posted 1/12.]

MORE ENVIRONMENTAL HATE: The arson is spreading. The environmental hate group Earth Liberation Front claims responsibility for another terrorist attack, this time against a timber company's buildings. And an apparently independent arsonist burned down nine new homes outside Phoenix. When are we going to hear national environmental leaders loudly condemn these crimes? And when will the national media start covering them prominently, consistently, and unsympathetically? [Posted 1/11.]

MS. FIRECRACKER: Miracle of miracle, Bush actually interviewed Eloise Anderson for the Labor secretary job. From the punditry that followed, it's clear that D.C. commentators don't have a clue who she is or what, other than a vague notion called "welfare reform," she stands for. All they see is a black face, which leads them to intone that she "opposes affirmative action." Her views on race and politics are a good bit more complex--and a lot blunter--than that sound bite suggests. Anderson is a smart, tough woman who speaks without a filter about the realities of racism and the difficult lives of the working poor. You won't find any Confederate sympathies in her opposition-research files. But you won't find any liberal pieties either. With welfare reform up for reauthorization, she'd be a valuable voice in the cabinet. [Posted 1/11.]

MONOPOLY POLICY: Ralph Nader and his troops are advocating an international body to regulate the Internet. In a speech today, reports Declan McCullough of Wired News, Nader fretted that "the technology of the Internet is far ahead of any legal framework, any ethical framework or global framework." His solution: a "World Consumer Protection Organization" that would do for e-commerce what the World Intellectual Property Organization has been doing to trademark and copyright protection--enforce a single, worldwide standard. Nader's point man on Internet policy, Jamie Love of the Consumer Project on Technology, described the range of such regulation in a 1999 speech at a European Commission forum: "There would seem to be no shortage of issues that could be discussed--regulation of unsolicited commercial email, marketing of pharmaceutical and medical products on the Internet, standard disclosures for credit terms, privacy protections, and countless other items."

The world has no lack of Internet regulators. Even the relatively tolerant U.S. government is requiring Web sites to alter their content to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act. But there's no regulatory monopoly that can enforce its one-best-way worldwide. So, for instance, the French are having trouble forcing Yahoo! to stop offering Nazi artifacts on its U.S.-based auction site. By allowing individuals and enterprises to choose the legal regime they prefer for a particular purpose, the Internet forces authorities to compete for legitimacy. And there's nothing comfortable monopolies hate more than competition. Jamie Love slammed opponents of monolithic regulation as "utopian libertarians," a sentiment that undoubtedly won him warm feelings in Rome. But the real utopians are those who think they know the best way for everyone.

Having cost Al Gore the presidency, Ralph Nader has few friends in Washington. But the push for a global commercial regulator doesn't have to come from these shores. In fact, this might be an opportune time for Ralph to take an extended European tour. [Posted 1/11.]

CLINTON'S LEGACY: He really is a political miracle worker. Bill Clinton's legacy chasing is about to make Ariel Sharon prime minister of Israel in what looks like it will be a landslide. [Posted 1/11.]

PROGRAM NOTE: In case you're wondering when to check in, I generally post new material between 10 and midnight Central Time. And the reason you didn't see anything new 1/4-7 was that I was attending the American Economic Association's annual meetings, gathering material for my New York Times column and seeing a lot of old friends. [Posted 1/10, 12:15 a.m.]

story to the press and let her know with deafening silence that they wouldn't fight for her. Too loyal to fight for herself without Bush's active backing, she held her press conference and gave her interview to CNN's Wolf Blitzer after she'd already withdrawn. Both were effective--and infuriating. Chavez missed the chance to articulate her nuanced, well-developed views on immigration, and we all lost the opportunity to watch "liberals" like Ted Kennedy and assorted union bosses orate on the evils of taking in battered Latino women fleeing civil wars. The GOP maintained its reputation as the party of legalism, rather than the party of freedom, but without forcing its opponents to give up their claims to represent both freedom and compassion. On the plus side, maybe the system worked. The cabinet is no place for a lady, and Linda Chavez may just be too nice for the job. [Posted 1/9.]

BACKBONE: Among the names being mentioned to fill Chavez's spot is Eloise Anderson, former head of social services in California and, before that, in Wisconsin. A welfare-reform pioneer, Anderson does not mince words and she does not back down. As she told Reason in a 1997 interview, her heroes are Mark Twain and Sojourner Truth--not a prescription for going away nicely when you become inconvenient to the boss. For a sample of her views on labor, consider her answer to a question about "dead-end" jobs: "Dead-end jobs. You know, this is a new philosophy. It's a job. If you want to go somewhere else, go somewhere else. We're supposed to be a free people. If that job doesn't take you where you want to go, move to another job. We don't do slavery anymore. So you don't have to stay on that job. If you go there and there's no movement in that organization, then you're free to go get another one." It would certainly be delightful to see a woman with that attitude face down pious senators. I'll be shocked if Bush gives her the Labor post--she's more HHS material--but if he did, it would demonstrate he's no wimp. And at this point, that's an open question. [Posted 1/9.]

AMERICAN POLITICS: The Chavez flap reminded me of a dumbfounding question I faced when I was in New Zealand a couple of months ago. A member of Parliament asked me about the political future of an American she greatly admires. Did I think Camille Paglia would ever run for Congress? Now there's an alternate reality for you. [Posted 1/9.]

BLAST FROM THE PAST: California Gov. Gray Davis has gone nuts. After cultivating an image as a boring centrist, he turns out to be a mid-century socialist with states-rights sentiments worthy of a Confederate general. In his State of the State address, he threatens to use eminent domain to seize power plants and keeps ranting about the evils of out-of-state generators. "We will regain control over the power that's generated in California and commit it to the public good," he says. "Never again can we allow out-of-state profiteers to hold Californians hostage." Legislators quoted in the Los Angeles Times say he's no kidder. The California power crisis is serious--too serious for this sort of nonsense. [Posted 1/9.]

DERAILED? Light rail is glamorous, but almost always a boondoggle--especially compared to buses. A few people are starting to notice. The Arizona Republic reports that a $100 million light-rail system at the Grand Canyon is on hold while the National Park Service studies whether buses would be cheaper and better. The study was requested by Arizona Republicans Sen. John Kyl and Rep. John Shadegg. Meanwhile, the Seattle Times reports that opponents dominated a public hearing on a proposed $3.8 billion light-rail system there. [Posted 1/9.]

MORE ON THE MONOLITH: After a few moves, Seattle's mysterious monument will return to its original spot until at least mid-March, with the approval of park authorities. It was created by an artists' cooperative called Some People. [Posted 1/9.]

ABOUT TIMES: In a one-paragraph Week in Review summary The New York Times finally let national readers know about an environmental hate group's arson campaign against new homes on Long Island. The paper's national edition also ran a feature on the terrorist Earth Liberation Front today, but I missed the URL. (I'm working on Central Time, but the Times Web site is on Eastern, where it's already Tuesday.) If anyone has the link, please let me know. [Posted 1/8.]

VIRTUE UNREWARDED: I guess it figures that Linda Chavez's tolerant attitudes toward immigrants would turn into ammunition for Ted Kennedy and the AFL-CIO. These self-proclaimed representatives of the poor and downtrodden are trying to do to Chavez what populist talk radio did to Zoë Baird and Kimba Wood. (And didn't we get a great cabinet appointment out of that little brouhaha--one of the worst attorneys general in history. As Dave Barry said in his Reason interview, "When you're basically going through the entire phone book trying to find women lawyers who don't have maids to pick the attorney general of the United States, how well can you do?")

In case you've been out of touch, Chavez's nomination as Labor secretary is in trouble because she let an illegal Guatemalan immigrant live in her house and occasionally gave the woman money. It appears to have been the sort of generous act most of us busy yuppies would find inconceivable. That may explain why--in addition to partisanship--so many people assume it must have been an employment relationship. (Here's the New York Times account.) My friend John Miller, a person of good sense and serious integrity, worked regularly at Chavez's house during the same period. He writes for National Review Online that no observer would have considered the woman an employee of Chavez's, much as her enemies want to characterize it that way. Chavez did employ housekeepers and, unlike many otherwise upstanding Americans, did pay their Social Security taxes. She also has a long history of helping out individuals in trouble. Her claim that this wasn't an under-the-table way of hiring an illegal employee rings true.

The issue, then, isn't whether she broke the law. It's whether she was insufficiently upset that someone else broke the law by fleeing destitution and dictatorship to come to America. And, perhaps, that she applied "don't ask, don't tell" to illegal immigration.

The two political parties are not only internally divided in their attitudes toward legal immigration. They're divided over how Americans ought to behave when confronted with oppressive or ridiculous laws. This reflects a divide not only in the population as a whole but within individual Americans. We want to believe that it's virtuous to be law-abiding, that the law is just, and that any good person will always obey the law. Yet at the same time, we're a rambunctiously free-spirited people who want to make our own decisions about justice--and to ignore the law when it seems to be an ass.

The self-styled representatives of American Latinos are all for helping illegal Guatemalan immigrants stay in the United States. Groups like MALDEF and the National Council of La Raza fought like crazy to get the last Congress to extend to them the generous standards extended to Cubans and Nicaraguans, and they were furious when it failed. But these allegedly pro-immigrant groups hate Chavez and love the AFL-CIO. They'll be happy to ostracize illegal Central American immigrants if it will keep Chavez out of the cabinet. [Posted 1/8.]

NO PUNDITRY ALLOWED: One of the strangest aspects of the Chavez flap is the spin reporters are putting on a neutral assessment she made during the Baird controversy. She said at the time, "I think most of the American people were upset during the Zoë Baird nomination that she had hired an illegal alien. That was what upset them more than the fact that she did not pay Social Security taxes." This has been characterized as a denunciation of Baird. Chavez is in particular trouble, says NBC's Andrea Mitchell (a.k.a. Mrs. Alan Greenspan), because "she had been so outspoken when Zoë Baird had this problem"

Outspoken? I thought the Baird flap was ridiculous, but I completely agreed with the notion that the red flag was illegal immigration, not tax dodging. Chavez wasn't saying she agreed that Baird should be in trouble. She was analyzing the political situation, and doing so quite intelligently. Anyone attuned to the anti-immigrant, especially anti-illegal immigrant, brewing in early 1993 would have said the same thing.

Something similar is going on with the much less prominent controversy over Donald Rumsfeld's conversations with Richard Nixon about the politics of race. Tapes reported by the Chicago Tribune supposedly show Rumsfeld agreeing with Nixon's overt racism. Here's a sample. The subject is Vice President Agnew's comment that African blacks are smarter than American blacks:

Here, and throughout the conversation as reported by MSNBC, Rumsfeld isn't agreeing with a racist statement about blacks. He's agreeing with statements about what racist southern whites think about blacks. He appears to be looking for opportunities to kiss up to the boss without actually agreeing to racist statements.

From these two examples, one thing is clear: Washington reporters don't read very carefully. [Posted 1/8.]

CREATIVITY CULT: Ingenuity fans are making The Learning Channel's Junkyard Wars one of cable's cult shows. Competing teams use junkyard pickings to build machines to do such things as cross rivers, hurl pumpkins at a mini-castle, and grind coffee with windmills. It's a humor-filled celebration of mechanical creativity. "I realize I'm smiling the whole way through the show," says my husband. Check it out Wednesday nights at 9 and midnight Eastern and Pacific Time. To enter your own team, apply here. [Posted 1/8.]

Buy Virginia Postrel's The Future and Its Enemies in hardback or paperback.