Do the GOP's Stars Have to Weigh In on Barring the Stars and Bars?
The New York Times has a front-page story on the most important issue of the GOP presidential primary: whether South Carolina should have a Confederate flag on the grounds of its state capitol. Like some of their predecessors seeking to win the state's primary, the first in the South, the leading Republican candidates for 2016 are treading delicately. They do not want to risk offending the conservative white voters who venerate the most recognizable emblem of the Confederacy and who say it is a symbol of their heritage. Jeb Bush issued a statement on Saturday saying he was confident that South Carolina "will do the right thing." As Florida's governor, Mr. Bush in 2001 ordered the Confederate flag to be taken from its display outside his state's Capitol "to a museum where it belonged." Senator Marco Rubio, also of Florida, told reporters that he thought the state would "make the right choice for the people of South Carolina." . . . Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin begged off from questions about what to do with the flag in South Carolina or whether it represents racism, saying he would not address any such matters until the victims of the mass shooting were buried. A few points: First, there's a lot of talk about the Confederate battle flag flying "over the South Carolina state capitol." It doesn't: It used to, but was taken off the capitol building itself in 2000, and was moved to a Confederate battle memorial that's on the grounds of the capitol. Second, the hand-wringing over Rubio's and Jeb's answers seems a little overwrought. Jeb removed the flag from his own state capitol and Rubio said that had been the right thing to do, and that marginalizing it in 2000 was a good idea, too. What are they supposed to do, shimmy up the flag pole in Columbia and rip it down themselves? (Note: George Pataki would have the least distance to climb of all the candidates.) And further, even if you feel that having a Confederate flag fly over a prominent war memorial there is still offensive and unsettling (which is a reasonable position), is having Republican presidential candidates weigh in on the issue really the way to get it fixed? Yes, there's a primary in South Carolina, and other states face the issue, too. But as Charlie Cooke just pointed out to me at NR HQ (fresh off a dawn appearance on Morning Joe), this hardly seems like the most effective way to persuade people in South Carolina to forswear memorializing their ancestors with the flag. It might actually go further toward making it a symbol of state resistance and Southern recalcitrance again, when at most it ought to be displayed in a nonpolitical way, to remember the conflict and its human cost. Neoconfederacy is not really a pressing concern in South Carolina or anywhere else, and it's not about to become one, either. There are more important problems to solve in the South and for blacks in America than tearing down a few battle standards. In fact, it'd be nice if both the Left and the Right could focus on them instead. Greece Defaults Emotionally People are probably pretty sick of following every new twist and turn in the battle over how the European Union will solve Greece's fiscal woes. There are no gyros involved, and it's disappointing. But the past couple weeks have seen the situation get a lot worse. Representatives of Greece's far-Left government, Europe's central bank, and the International Monetary Fund are meeting in Brussels today to hash out an extension of the current bailout program. The bailout expires June 30, and Greece's creditors -- the European central bank and the IMF -- want tax hikes and pension changes that will improve the country's budget picture over the next few years. Even if that works out, though, the latest impasse is a sign things for the euro have gotten irreparably worse, Clive Crook of Bloomberg View argues: On the eve of the summit, the economic distance between Greece and its creditors is small. Differences over fiscal targets have narrowed down to timing -- what happens next year rather than the year after -- and fractions of a percentage point of gross domestic product. . . . The problem is that the creditors don't trust [Greek prime minister] Alexis Tsipras and his Syriza ministers to hit the targets they might sign up to. The creditors don't even trust them to try. They want firm commitments to specific policy changes -- tax increases and new retirement rules to cut pension spending -- that Tsipras has promised not to accept. . . . Monetary union, if it's going to work, has to infringe the sovereignty of creditors and borrowers alike. Without national currencies and interest rates to act as shock absorbers, fiscal flows across borders are necessary to help smooth out economic fluctuations. This needn't mean a permanent flow of subsidy in one direction; it does mean temporary reversible flows from countries with low unemployment to countries in recession. In the particular case of Greece, it requires from the creditors further patience and fiscal support. . . . Greece isn't willing to do what it takes. Nor is Germany. Nor, after four months of being called pillagers and criminals by Tsipras, are the other creditors. Yet don't say they disagree. All through this crisis, there has been more agreement than meets the eye: They have agreed, it seems to me, on the impossibility of making this system work. Things are looking up, in the very short term: It's rumored that Greece has agreed to the pension changes the EU wants, and Athens stocks opened today up 6 percent. The rate the government pays on its debt, which had crept up substantially in recent weeks (that of other "periphery" countries, like Spain and Italy, had too), has fallen. But like Clive says, a technical solution does little to fix the damage done by this round's heightening of contradictions. One of the Most Important Policy Issues Conservatives Are Right About and No One Pays Attention To Forgive an extended plug for an NR article, but this issue is that important and that neglected. Our Molly Powell has a piece today on recounting a summit she attended for the Treatment Advocacy Center, which pushes for evidence-based treatment for the seriously mentally ill. Family members of those with severe mental illness recounted some of their experiences with how the system, which (ostensibly) prizes the autonomy of the mentally ill over their safety, and spreads its resources across huge swaths of the population with less serious problems. She writes: "I came home to find all our pets dead." So said one of the family members attending the "Families of the 4%" summit on the Hill last month in Washington, D.C. . . . "He loved those animals. Absolutely loved them. I know he did." He was weeping as he told me this. That son is now one of the lucky few — he is receiving medication and ongoing treatment and is stable enough to hold a part-time job. About 4 percent of Americans are afflicted with a severe mental illness, and most are not so fortunate as his son to get treatment. Having arrived from all over the country, at the invitation of the Treatment Advocacy Center, and assembled in front of lawmakers and their staffs, family members told their stories. One father told of the son who, while delusional, stabbed him, yelling, "Die, Dad, die! Go to heaven!" The father, himself a doctor, had tried desperately to get help for his son; he and his wife had warned authorities that they did not feel safe. To no avail. Their son is now in jail, still without psychiatric care. The catch-22 in the mental-health system is that psychiatrists, by law, often cannot medicate or in any way restrain a mentally ill person unless he is an "immediate" danger to himself or others — "immediate" being defined in many cases as within a window of three or four hours. In practice, this typically means that violence, sometimes lethal, occurs before treatment is mandated. But there is hope: Representative Tim Murphy, a Republican psychologist from Pennsylvania, has a bill in the House right now that will help undo some of the seriously flawed federal mental-health policy. If, that is, it makes it through the gantlet of "patient advocates," spineless liberals, and the mental-health industry's lobby. (Last year, it looked like it might not.) This is an issue NR has covered for a long time, and I'm not sure people know that it goes well beyond being what the Left might glibly claim is the conservative answer to mass shootings. There are millions of Americans with serious mental illness on our streets, in our prisons, or anywhere else, very, very, sick. Our system fails them and their families. Molly has a poignant personal connection to this issue, and I urge you to read her clarifying, powerful piece. ADDENDA: Is there a fatwa against talking about Islamic State Fight Club? | 
Comments
Post a Comment