Eye on the Watcher’s Council

As you may know the members of the Watcher’s Council each nominate one of his or her own posts and one non-Council post for consideration by the whole Council. The complete list of this week’s Council nominations is here. BTW a position has opened up on the Watcher’s Council. If you have a blog of your own and you want to promote it and posts on other great blogs, this is a wonderful opportunity. For the details see here. Marc? Are you listening? Here’s what the Council members nominated this week.

Dr. Sanity, “Why Kant Couldn’t and Still Can’t”

Pat Santy castigates Kant as a progenitor of postmodernism. I believe that her criticism is misplaced: I don’t see Kant as rejecting reason outright—quite the contrary. And, as a creature of the Enlightenment myself, I see his work in moral philosophy as foundational for the political thinking that led to our own American Revolution and Constitution. As I understand it, the bases of Kant’s moral philosophy are the formulae of universal law, humanity, and autonomy. Wouldn’t a postmodernist reject both the formulae of universal law and humanity?

New World Man, “Harvard needs a legal ethics class”

Matt Barr critiques law firm Ropes & Gray’s decision to sever its relationship with Catholic Charities (at least in part at the behest of an organization of LGBT students at Harvard Law School) and the subsequent decision of Catholic Charities to terminate its involvement in adoptions in Massachusetts.

Done With Mirrors, “Civil War or Not”

Blog-friend Callimachus considers whether what’s going on in Iraq is a civil war or whether that’s a media invention. This post on Winds of Change considers the same question. Here’s the (rather broad) definition I’d use of “civil war”: any organized political violence is a civil war. By that standard, yes, what’s going on in Iraq is, indeed, a civil war. But it’s a civil war that is sufficiently limited in scope that it doesn’t make a smidgeon’s worth of difference in what the current U. S. posture towards Iraq should be. I’d also like to take this opportunity to mention that I believe that the current civil war was a completely foreseeable consequence of the removal of Saddam Hussein and I’ve been writing that same thing since 2003 all over the blogosphere. You’ve got to consider the motivations of the parties involved. The Sunni Arabs want to restore the status quo ante. They’re defending their way of life which depended in part on political dominance of the Kurds and Shi’a Arabs. Their continuing resistance should not come as a surprise and won’t change until the system of motivations changes. Merely involving them in the political process won’t effect that: the insurgency will continue to resist and participate in the political process.

The Glittering Eye, “Baffled”

This is my submission for this week and, yes, I’m still baffled by what I see going on around me.

Right Wing Nut House, “A Tale of Two Fathers”

Rick Moran considers the third anniversary of the invasion of Iraq through the prism of the reactions of two fathers to their sons (and, in one case, their own) service there. A better title, Rick, would have been “Fathers and Children” from Turgenev’s novel.

ShrinkWrapped, “On Clients and Patients: Part V”

ShrinkWrapped continues his series on the evolution of the model of the physician’s role and finds that contemporary trends are perverse. I agree. I tend to see this as a change in the class and upbringing of people in the practice of medicine. They’ve brought their own perspectives with them and that has engendered a change over time from viewing their roles as professionals (in the original sense of the word), to retailers, to, ultimately, clock-punching nine-to-fivers. A change will require a substantial change in both doctors’ and patients’ attitudes and motivations. Unfortunately, I believe that the die is cast.

There are still professionals out there. My brother-in-law is one of them. He’s a second generation (I believe) doctor and he neither does nor wants to do anything but work. He’s arrives before anyone else gets there and leaves after everyone else has gone.

Rhymes With Right, “Homosexual Marriage and Polygamy”

Greg cites Charles Krauthammer’s recent column and follows up with a consideration of the libertarian argument. My own view is that a rolling back of the vast array of state support mechanisms for traditional marriage (if such a thing be desireable) is a necessary precondition for the adoption of state-sanctioned homosexual marriage. While it’s arguable that the current state of things is tyrannical, compelling all citizens to continue subsidizing a vision of marriage that’s dramatically different that the one that’s prevailed for so many years is tyranny, too.

The Education Wonks, “Autum Ashante: Child Prodigy or Something Else?”

Edwonk frequently draws our attention to stories from the wacky world of education that we certainly wouldn’t have seen otherwise. In this case we’ve got a 7 year old kid reciting her poem characterizing Christopher Columbus, John Morgan, and Charles Darwin as “pirates” and “vampires”.

I think that her criticism of Darwin is misplaced. Darwin’s grandfather, Josiah Wedgwood, helped to support and fund the Anti-Slavery Society which in turn was instrumental in ending slavery in the Western world. Darwin himself grew up in an anti-slavery home, despised slavery, and wrote against it.

I don’t believe that 7 year old kids make up ideas like this on their own (or use words like “paradigm” however bright they may be). But I do believe that they hear what their parents say.

The Gates of Vienna, “The Elephant on Campus”

Dymphna wonders about the intellectual climate in universities today with a particular focus on a series of incidents at the College of William and Mary.

The Strata-Sphere, “ACLU Consumed by Anti-Americanism”

AJ Strata comments on a post at Stop the ACLU and rants about the ACLU. This reminds me of a friend of mine who had contributed for years to the ACLU. Until he became a police officer and learned first hand what the consequences of the actions of the organization that he’d contributed to actually were.

The Sundries Shack, “Can We Get Some Real Journalists Out There?”

Jimmie Bise complains about The New York Times’s reluctance to check facts in covering the Abu Ghraib story. I don’t think the problem here is about the debasement of a formerly noble profession. Journalism has always been a craft, never a profession. The real journalists are not the professionals i.e. those who publish for money or influence. The real journalists are the amateurs, those who publish for love of writing and of the truth. And, as we’re seeing from dozens of bloggers, the amateurs are the real journalists.

Well, with a little difficulty this week, I’ve made my choices. Which post would you choose for the best Council post of the week?