Moderate is the ideal

This is in response to comments I posted on the nomination of Harriet Miers for the position of Associate Justice in the US Supreme Court, and comments and the response appear here.

Moderation is a standard

I would like to see it the way you have expressed your views, so succinctly without a hint of prejudice in terms of Justice O'Connor.

However, the standard of objectivity I am asking for is simple and summarised in the fundamental of letting everything be done in moderation - which is to lessen in intensity or extremeness according to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary. [1]

That virtue I cannot argue against, a judge should be level-headed, able to balance opinion and again objectively provide guidance and interpretation. You can call that both liberal and conservative depending on what angle you view that from.

If a judge then passes the test of Philippians 4:8

"Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things." [2] They have excelled.

I see no ideology or slant of either conservativeness or liberality in those virtues, rather, it is more of moderation, truth being first, followed by being noble and then just.

This is looking more like a question of good character than anything else.

Hypothetical after the fact

On the issue of Bennett, his choice of words whatever preceded them would not pass test of the moderation I have inferred in any sense, the intensity and extremeness are off the scale. [3]

He only came up with the hypothetical defence after the uproar, [4] that did not occur in the talk-show.

The transcripts I have obtained suggest that it was hardly hypothetical when he started with "But I do know that it's true that if you wanted to reduce crime", that set the context of what he said afterwards and everything else.

Just because he said it would be morally reprehensible does not absolve him from the fact that his poor use of expression left his comments ambiguous and subject to varied interpretation.

The simple reason why everyone can get a part to take away from his comments, from praise to outright condemnation. I think I covered that in my blog yesterday.

Basically, we do need to explore the facts ourselves regardless of what the media offers us. In this case, the facts speak for themselves in context and intent any other slant is disingenuous as best and plain dishonest at worst.

References

[1] Moderation

[2] Meditate on these

[3] Bill Bennett transcripts 1 | Bill Bennett transcripts 2

[4] The hypothetical rebuttal

Abort all black babies

Abort all black babies

Hold it! Before you go for my neck with a vengeance, this is just a hypothetical proposition from a passing comment in a simple radio talk-show exchange.

"If you wanted to reduce crime, you could, if that were your sole purpose; you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down." [1] [2]

My interest in this subject is hardly significant; I was once a black baby born at 26 weeks - probably, if I was disposed of then, I would not be here making comments about this issue.

More so, a term of 26 weeks gestation was just barely viable 40 years ago, it must be a matter of good fortune that I was conceived and born in the UK, not America when the civil rights movement was on the boil or the Netherlands now where the question of viability is more clinical than empathetic. [3]

For instance, if one were to make that arrival in America where there would have been probably too few doctors to cater for the black race; someone might have considered, I might become a Martin Luther King, so extinguish him now before his first breath.

No, one cannot countenance that thought, it is evil; well, really how evil? Probably to the extent of the experiments that were conducted at the Tuskegee Institute where black men suffering from syphilis were given the impression they were being treated when in fact the activity could just have rivalled that of the Nazi Dr Mengele. [5] [6]

Hypothesis of the hypothetical

Am I dissolving into untrammelled histrionics? Watch me...

"I was putting forward a hypothetical proposition. Put that forward. Examined it. And then said about it that it's morally reprehensible. To recommend abortion of an entire group of people in order to lower your crime rate is morally reprehensible. But this is what happens when you argue that the ends can justify the means" he told CNN. [2]

If my science was taught me right, I do remember that the process of any scientific idea becoming fundamental flows from thought to hypothesis to theory and then law. Maybe, we are just halfway there.

The proposition gains more import when you realise that this commentator was once the Education Secretary during the government of the "Great Communicator" who I think was Ronald Reagan. [7] [8]

Having once been the "drug czar" one might contend without prejudice that this was some drug-induced diatribe but that would be a little far-fetched.

Inappropriate inappropriateness

Once again, I am utterly perturbed and driven to distraction by the inappropriateness of the response of the White House to such comments. [9]

After Hurricane Katrina, the question of race and deprivation loomed large in the American landscape.

Inappropriate must be a euphemism for something I still seeking knowledge of, in the hope that it is a lot stronger than the expression and far from diplomatic bullshit.

The events are just too vivid to countenance an insensitive arrangement of words and thoughts from someone of no particular significance as Pat Robertson of the "Take out Hugo Chavez fame".

I beg to differ; these commentators are part of the unacknowledged opinion elite whose commentary is pushing the "Freedom of Speech" envelope beyond the limits of acceptable discourse.

Everyone can have an opinion but all opinions should be expressed with responsibility, sensitivity and consideration - this means some opinions regardless of the freedoms we so cherish just cannot be expressed for the good of community and society. There must be a valid point somewhere in the preceding statement.

A failed Education Secretary

That said, what is most interesting is the frenzied prognostication that suggests that a black child is already labelled a criminal before he has had the opportunity to realise if his country would participate in providing opportunities that would make that prophecy a false statement worthy of grovelling contrition, penance and apology.

Without doubt, all those past years after he was Education Secretary he has declared himself an utter failure, he laid no foundations to prevent the ascendancy of that thought in the first place and would we have to wait for another few years to find out that it was really a policy in the Reagan years?

May the souls of those black babies rest in peace. Amen!

References

[1] Abort all black babies and cut crime, says Republican

[2] Bennett under fire for remarks on blacks, crime

[3] Premature birth

[4] Robertson apologizes for assassination call

[5] Tuskegee Syphilis Study

[6] Josef Mengele

[7] William Bennett

[8] Ronald Reagan – “Great Communicator”

[9] White House: Bill Bennett's Comments Inappropriate

Hypothesis

Theory

Law (disambiguation)