Author Archives: Tod Lindberg

Rebirth of a Nation

04 Monday Mar 2002

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Valor and victimhood after September 11.

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THERE ARE no more yellow ribbons. For more than 20 years, in times of travail, the yellow ribbons have come out. The Iranian hostage crisis of 1979-80 called forth a nationwide flowering of yellow ribbons. And at one time or another since then–can this really all have been wrought by Tony Orlando and Dawn singing “Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree”?–the yellow ribbon has been pressed into service as a symbol of hope amid adversity, an expression of longing for the return of those who are not home. In accordance with past practice, the aftermath of the attack on the twin towers could surely have been an occasion for yellow ribbons: thousands lost and feared dead, the uncertainty of the families of the missing, the conclusion growing inevitable that even the bodies might never be recovered. And in fact, in the first day or two, one did see a few yellow ribbons, usually in a collage with a photograph of someone missing, held desperately by a loved one still in shock. But then, without comment, the yellow ribbons were gone. All the ribbons now are red, white, and blue.

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The president’s successful Asia tour

26 Tuesday Feb 2002

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The Washington Times

The Bush administration, and especially the president himself, is offering an interesting illustration of the political phenomenon of success feeding on itself. There is such a thing as pure luck in politics, and even a lucky streak. But there is usually a very different explanation for what is happening when things are going well politically – and it has the virtue of also explaining what is happening when things are going badly.

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Politics in a time of patriotism

19 Tuesday Feb 2002

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The Washington Post

It’s going to take some time to straighten out exactly what changed in American politics after September 11 and what didn’t change. Obviously, there is unity behind the war effort, and it looks like this unity will extend well beyond the first phase of Afghanistan “regime change.” What is striking in the foreign policy salons of Washington these days is the extent to which Iraq is a subject of debate not over whether to remove Saddam Hussein but only over how.

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Traffic cameras, unsafe at any speed

12 Tuesday Feb 2002

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The Washington Times

Dear Automated Traffic Enforcement: Thank you for your “Notice of Infraction” dated Jan. 16 accusing the driver of the Saturn station wagon we own of going 36 mph in a 25-mph zone in the 3000 block of Cleveland Avenue NW on Jan. 3 at 12:15 p.m. The photograph of the rear end of our vehicle, and especially the enlargement of the license plate clearly showing all six characters in it, is something our family will always treasure.

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About Those Detainees…

11 Monday Feb 2002

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The administration’s legal reasoning is open to question (but closed to scrutiny).

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TO DATE, THE BUSH administration’s handling of the war has been superb. Its handling of the law of war has not. From the president’s November 13 Military Order — calling for trial by military commission of certain non-citizens accused of terrorist activities — to the current dispute over the legal status of detainees at Guantanamo, the administration has drawn sustained criticism from civil rights and humanitarian organizations for its handling, proposed or actual, of those caught in the terrorist net the U.S. military has so effectively spread.

There is a sense in which humanitarian and civil rights groups exist in order not to be satisfied. And the administration’s supporters, of whom there are many, have risen to denounce the attackers. But while the ACLU and Human Rights Watch are never going to be friends of the Bush team, their animus doesn’t automatically make their legal arguments specious. As it happens, the administration has made a telling moral and political argument that the al Qaeda and Taliban detainees in Cuba are receiving the treatment they deserve. But legally, while it may have a plausible argument, the administration hasn’t bothered to make it.

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The future of the Democratic Party

22 Tuesday Jan 2002

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The Washington Times

When Bill Clinton convened a meeting of former officials and staff in his Harlem offices a couple weeks ago to talk about promoting the legacy of his administration, Republicans mainly saw it as another “Big He” moment: the latest egregious exercise in self-obsession by the master of modern megalomania. And in fact, the conclusion that some of the participants in the meeting were themselves a little embarrassed by it is hard to resist, given the leaks about it to the press that could only have come from them.

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