From the WSJ Opinion Archives

by JAMES TARANTO
Thursday, February 15, 2007 1:36 P.M. EST

Today's Video on WSJ.com: Inside the Editorial Page--Paul Gigot & Co. discuss the North Korean nuke deal.

Clothes Make the Man
The other day Annette Fuentes of the Columbia Journalism School published a USA Today op-ed in which she criticized journalists who report on how female politicians dress. "The question is whether focusing on the clothing choices of serious female political players risks rendering them less than serious," Fuentes opines. "Male politicians are seldom scrutinized for their choice of suits."

Like Fuentes, we have little interest in Nancy Pelosi's wardrobe, but we're not sure we agree that the press's interest in it reflects a sexist double standard, or at least one that disfavors women. After all, whereas women have wide choices over what to wear, men generally do not; and "Man Wears Suit" is a dog-bites-man story if ever there was one.

And consider the treatment a male politician gets when he puts on a dress. This is from Garrison Keillor's column in yesterday's Chicago Tribune:

Back in 2000, for a City Hall roast, Mr. Giuliani got himself dolled up in drag and made a video in which Donald Trump flirts with him and kisses his breasts. . . .

Say what you will about the Current Occupant [President Bush], there is no video out there of him waltzing around in a long lavender gown and a brassiere, and blond wig, while an aging tycoon nuzzles his chest. He may have sunk low back in his drinking days, but he managed to keep his adventures private. . . .

This is not a major issue. . . . But the video has a creepy fascination to it. . . .

Mr. Giuliani should put the issue behind him by answering a few questions: (1) How much did he have to drink that night, and what was he drinking? (2) Whose idea was it--his own or an aide's? If the latter, was there wagering involved and how much was bet? (3) Were the garments new or used, and who picked them out? And was he wearing male or female underthings? (4) On a scale of 1 to 10, how good did he feel in that dress?

The video is here, and we think it's pretty funny. The humor lies precisely in Giuliani's masculinity: He makes a totally unconvincing woman. Keillor either missed the joke or is hoping that Republican primary voters will be as humorless as he seems to be.

There's a more serious point here, which goes to the question of Giuliani's fitness to be president. See if you can imagine John McCain, Mitt Romney, Barack Obama or John Edwards pulling off a performance like this. We cannot (although it is amusing to try, especially with Edwards). None of them strike us as unselfconsciously masculine enough to do it.

One thing you know about Giuliani is that he has no need to prove his manhood. He is as confident as any politician since Reagan. This is as an excellent quality for a president, especially a president who will have to face down vicious and unpredictable enemies.

Keillor is right, though, to say that there is a "creepy fascination" with the video--namely, his. Whether Keillor is expressing his own prejudices or cynically trying to appeal to the prejudices of others, his effort to smear Giuliani by playing on fears of homosexuality is invidious and unseemly.

'A Slow-Bleed Strategy'
"Top House Democrats, working in concert with anti-war groups, have decided against using congressional power to force a quick end to U.S. involvement in Iraq, and instead will pursue a slow-bleed strategy designed to gradually limit the administration's options," reports The Politico:

Led by Rep. John P. Murtha, D-Pa., and supported by several well-funded anti-war groups, the coalition's goal is to limit or sharply reduce the number of U.S. troops available for the Iraq conflict, rather than to openly cut off funding for the war itself.

The legislative strategy will be supplemented by a multimillion-dollar TV ad campaign designed to pressure vulnerable GOP incumbents into breaking with President Bush and forcing the administration to admit that the war is politically unsustainable.

As described by participants, the goal is crafted to circumvent the biggest political vulnerability of the anti-war movement--the accusation that it is willing to abandon troops in the field. That fear is why many Democrats have remained timid in challenging Bush, even as public support for the president and his Iraq policies have plunged.

So the idea is to keep the troops in harm's way but take all steps possible to prevent them from prevailing, in the hope that the Democrats will benefit politically from American defeat. According to a press release this morning from the House Republican Conference, yesterday the Web site MoveCongress.org announcing an event this morning, declared:

Chairman Murtha will describe his strategy for not only limiting the deployment of troops to Iraq but undermining other aspects of the president's foreign and national security policy.

This language has since disappeared from the site, but a reader first alerted us to it late yesterday afternoon.

You don't have to agree with the president's policies to find this appalling. If Murtha thinks he has a better way, let him run for president next year and make the case. To pursue a strategy of subversion instead is cowardly and despicable.

Where's Waldo?
"Supporters of Muqtada al-Sadr insisted the Shiite militia leader was still in Iraq on Wednesday, denying U.S. claims that he is in Iran," USA Today reports from Baghdad:

Al-Sadr "would never leave his people in this difficult time, as the Americans want to make people think," said Abdul Razaq al-Nidawi, a spokesman for al-Sadr.

Nidawi claims Sadr is in an undisclosed location in Najaf. But the U.S. military still says he's in Iran, as we noted yesterday.

Sadr's skedaddling appears to have been anticipated by London's Guardian, which reported on Jan. 19 that "Sadr has moved his family to a secure location because of fears he will become the target of a security sweep of Baghdad."

Freedom's Just Another Word for . . . Higher Taxes?
"Patrick Seeks Tax Freedom for Cities, Towns," reads a headline in the Boston Globe. That would be Deval Patrick, who last month became Massachusetts' first Democratic governor since Michael Dukakis. Well, it's certainly encouraging to hear that even in what used to be called "Taxachusetts," a Democrat wants to free citizens from taxes.

Oh, wait:

Governor Deval Patrick's administration is preparing a push to give Massachusetts cities and towns more freedom to raise taxes and fees.

We know freedom isn't free, but the Globe seems to be having difficulty distinguishing between the cost of freedom and the thing itself.

Another odd take on freedom comes from a letter to the editor of the San Francisco Chronicle, written by one Rose Braz, campaign director of something called Critical Resistance, a group that apparently advocates the abolition of prisons (third letter):

I was thrilled to read that the head of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation has finally concluded that California's unprecedented prison building boom was a mistake ("Plan would move inmates closer to urban areas," Feb. 12). I was disheartened, however, to read that his remedy to this costly mistake was simply to build some more.

History has shown us that new prisons--no matter what size or location--don't reduce the number of people in prison. If you build them, you fill them.

Well, yeah. The purpose of building prisons isn't to reduce the number of people in prison, it's to reduce the number of criminals on the streets! Even a journalist could probably figure that out.

Frequent Flower Miles
Many readers yesterday were confused by the claim in a Daily Telegraph piece we cited that "the flowers that make up the average bunch have flown 33,800 miles to reach Britain." Given that the circumference of the Earth is less than 25,000 miles, how could this be?

No, Brits aren't sending their sweethearts native-grown Venus flytraps. Rather, the environmentalists who are making this claim refer to something called "flower miles," which, as near as we can figure, is a multiplicative measure like man-hours.

If, say, a staff of 10 work the same eight-hour shift, they've worked 80 man-hours. If, say, two dozen roses are transported 150 miles from a warehouse to the lucky recipient, they've traveled 3,600 "flower miles," even though the vehicle conveying them has only gone the same 150 miles as each individual flower.

If this is really how environmentalists measure things, they should be against carpooling. After all, if you drive to work with three passengers, you're quadrupling the number of man-miles traveled. The Earth can't take that kind of abuse!

The White Stuff
We heard from a few readers who misunderstood or were confused by the following passage--particularly the clause we've put in bold--in our item yesterday on Linda Quiquivix:

Her description of [her ex-boyfriend] as "white but [with] tendencies for black supremacy" is a head-scratcher. If someone black had "tendencies for white supremacy," most people would view him with pity, perhaps mixed with contempt. Yet to hear Miss Quiquivix tell it, her ex's tendency to see himself as belonging to an inferior race was an attraction.

Since "inferior race" is such an explosive phrase, we thought we'd better spell this out:

  • According to Miss Quiquivix, her ex-boyfriend (we'll call him "X") has "tendencies for black supremacy."

  • We understand this, by analogy to "white supremacy," to mean that X believes (or tends to believe) that blacks are a superior race.

  • X is white.

  • Therefore, X tends to see himself as belonging to an inferior race--i.e., the white race.

We suppose it would have been more precise to say "her ex's tendency to see his own race as inferior."

It's the Eponymy, Stupid
A headline writer at Denver's Rocky Mountain News had some fun with a crime story: "Knight and Day Stabbed in Breckenridge":

Michael Day and Justin Knight were taken to the Summit Medical Center in Breckenridge yesterday after they were attacked by a man wielding a knife outside a Main Street bar. . . .

Knight, 26, came to Day's aid when he saw him go down.

And what a beautiful sunset it was! Meanwhile, the Associated Press reports on a domestic disturbance in Riverview, Fla.:

[A woman] had asked her boyfriend of three years for money Friday night, and he refused. The two started arguing in their home at Haverhill Ridge Drive, Hillsborough County sheriff's spokeswoman Debbie Carter said.

[She] picked up a shoe with a wooden high heel and swung it several times against the left side of Stephen Burgess' head, Carter said.

You're going to think us a heel for this, and we'll admit we're being arch, but the name of the alleged assailant is Kari Barefoot.

Los Perros Mexicanos Calvos de Charles Schumer
"Bald Mexican Dogs Defied Daggers"--headline, Reuters, Feb. 14

Eagles 23, Giants 20
"Giants Meet to Counter US Power"--headline, Times (London), Feb. 15

What Would We Do Without New Yorkers?
"French Have Attitude Problem Says New Yorker"--headline, Financial Times, Feb. 14

What Would We Do Without Documentaries?
"Documentary: Nixon Was an Odd Fellow"--headline, Indianapolis Star, Feb. 15

What Would We Do Without Terror Experts?
"Terror Expert: Terrorists Will Stop at Nothing"--headline, Naples (Fla.) News, Feb. 15

'It Was So Smooth, and It Stuck to the Roof of My Mouth'
"Peanut Butter Recalled"--headline, KOMU-TV Web site (Columbia, Mo.), Feb. 15

Someone Must've Brought a Suit
"Cross-Dressing Lawyer Hangs Up His Dress"--headline, Associated Press, Feb. 15

Bottom Stories of the Day

Plus Ça Change
"The newest $1 coin, bearing the likeness of George Washington, is going into circulation around the country just in time for next week's celebration of the first president's birthday," the Associated Press reports from Washington:

U.S. Mint officials hope they have overcome problems that doomed its two predecessors, but coin experts are still skeptical.

On this one, we have to say the coin experts are wrong. This time, they're finally going to get us to use a dollar coin. No doubt you, like us, have had a conversation like this with a cashier or bartender:

"That'll be $4."

"Here you go."

"I said four dollars. This is four quarters."

"Those are dollars. See, they have Sacagawea on them."

"Sack-a what?"

But everyone recognizes George Washington. Now that his face is on the dollar, there's no way anyone will mix it up with the quarter.

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Today on OpinionJournal:

  • Review & Outlook: Congress "supports the troops" while emboldening the enemy.
  • Daniel Henninger: The House debates Iraq. Hillary and Barack should review the tape.
  • John Fund: Libertarians in America: Free to choose, and a good thing too.

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