Joel Achenbach and Marjorie Williams
Dear Joel,
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StumbleUponI share your total disgust over the Elián developments. There is a special corner of hell waiting for adults who so deeply confuse their own needs and wishes with the needs of a child. (Some reports say this corner of hell looks like Chuck E. Cheese.) That the Miami relatives' confusion seems entirely sincere doesn't make them an inch less culpable in what they're doing to this boy. It's playing out with such grim inevitability ... One of the things that really interests me about it is that only Juan Miguel Gonzáles (or perhaps his lawyer) has pressed a completely clear negotiating strategy in the week he's been here: He's acted with the knowledge that any concession (yes, I'll come to Miami; yes, I'll let the uncles dictate the terms of the transfer) will undermine his rights in the matter, which are all premised on the law's absolute recognition of a parent's power to speak for his child. Whereas the government keeps acting in the apparent hope that if it's just a little nicer and ties itself into an even knottier pretzel, this will all work itself out.
I don't know what to make of Janet Reno in all this. I want to like her for her willingness to invest herself personally in the problem, if there's any chance it will help. But there's also something sort of foolhardy, even vain, about it. This may be one of those times that calls for the law's magisterial detachment (combined, of course, with some top-notch riot-control expertise). To place the government's full might at the service of sitting down and letting Elián climb in your lap and empathizing with his uncles' "pain" is to legitimize all the elements of the case that the government is supposed to set aside.
Still, Reno's vilification strikes me as a really sad thing. Some of it, obviously, is an extension of the madness that makes Clinton's opponents foam at the mouth. But it's all mixed with strands of traditional Washington looking down on her and criticizing her because she doesn't play the game with the requisite smoothness. The main thing, I think, is that her sliming was an inevitable by-product of Clinton's dangerous games. There was no way she could have made him feel that she was doing enough to support him and still have held on to a shred of honor; on the other hand, there was no way she could ever make his critics feel that her justice department was monitoring him with enough zeal. You can look at the evidence about her handling of things like the campaign-finance scandals and come up with a non-laughable argument in either direction (she was in the tank; she did the best anyone could have done under the circumstances). But there is no middle ground in the Clinton wars, and so she made exactly no one happy. She will always embody, for me, the sad truth that sincerity and honorable intentions count for only so much. They are Old Economy stocks.
I'm totally with you on the pleasures of watching the Nasdaq slide. I'm one of those fogies who've been sitting around for the past year with a sour face, muttering bitterly about people who bought Nokia at the right time. I like picturing Michael Saylor sitting down with the architect who's designing his 50-acre Xanadu, and deciding they'd better ratchet down to laminate floors instead of the heart pine. ... A girl can dream, right?
Best,
Marjorie
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Reader Response from The Fray--to be read after the final entry:
Let me get this straight: they give out Pulitzer's for criticism [Monday]? Please--my heart is pounding, my blood pressure is rocketing, my hands now shake, please dear, please, please tell me, where do I sign up?
--Old Timer [who is well-known in The Fray for his expertise in this area.]
(To reply, click here.)
Re: Elian Gonzales. I believe that immigration laws should be as open and welcoming as possible. But at the same time we need to look at the long-term situation of the country the people are fleeing. There is not always a whole lot we can do, and we also run the risk of becoming control freak America with it's thumb in every pie--oh, hang on, we already are that. Well, anyway, my point is that instead of trying to pass a bill to make Elian a citizen, why don't we lift the embargo and make life a little better for all Cubans?
--Anne
(To reply, click here.)
"That's exactly what Castro wants us to do", I believe, is the stock response to either ending or continuing the embargo.
--Steve Dowling
(To reply, click here.)
[This response almost silenced David Edelstein, but not quite:]
The embargo is a 40-year hissy fit, and it's time to give it a rest. Say what you will against Castro (I can say plenty), he'd have been long gone if the embargo had been lifted 25 years ago and Disney and all the other U.S. corporations had moved in with their sundry inducements to free (sic) enterprise.
--David Edelstein
(To reply, click here.)
The question of why people hate Janet Reno [Thursday] is a bit intricate and since I do hate her, I'd like to take a stab at it--the question, not her (I don't hate anybody that much). Reno reminds me of the Greek tragedy Antigone which shows us that strict enforcement of the law, by the book, isn't always the best thing. The Waco invasion wasn't the best thing, for example. I believe the law justified her actions, that the operation was by the book. But that doesn't mean it was a good thing. With Elian, there's that potential again that Reno will embark on the legal course, but that it won't be the morally right course.
Reno does not respect people who defy her. She assumes they are wrong and she acts on that and she has a tremendous amount of power to enforce her interpretation of law. This is the crux of my anti-Renoism: She doesn't talk to people, she barks orders at them. When people ignore the lectures they get punished. Hey, that's her job. But it'd be nice to have a more philosophical sort wielding all that power--someone with a better sense of proportion who realizes that every act of defiance is unique and deserves unique treatment.
--Michael Maiello
(To reply, click here.)
Don Porges writes in The Fray about Thursday's entry:
The definition and connotations of "dice" are much more precise in naming the objects in question. My old TI-99 had a "random number generator" command in its BASIC programming. Since it was just code, it resembled nothing that would help baby get a new pair of shoes. Besides "dice" fits into a headline nicely.
--Charles
(To reply, click here.)
[No proposals this week. But that doesn't mean the Breakfast Table went unappreciated:]
These guys were the best. And that's granting that there were some close competitors. But Joel and Marjorie are the BT gold standard. The King and Queen are dead! Bring on next week's random number generators!
--Mike
(To reply, click here.)
(4/14)