In today's Seattle Post-Intelligencer, editorial page editor Mark Trahant responds to his critics (including the Shark Blog, Xrlq , Jim Miller and James Taranto) who blasted his fabrication last month that
The constitutional standard for warfare is for the United States to face a "clear and present danger."Trahant acknowledges that
Clear and present danger are not words found in the text of the Constitution(he earlier claimed that they were) and chides his critics for being too literal
Some see the truth only in literal terms and dismiss any attempt to include what's not literally there.He points out, after all, that
As a matter of literal interpretation, there's nothing in the Constitution about privacy or sexual liberty. But as a matter of fairness, and principle based on the ideas in the Constitution, the justices found reason enough to justify their conclusion.Well yes. But "constitutional standards", as that term is normally used, are created by the, Supreme Court's interpretation of the Constitution, not by editorial writers.
If Mark Trahant wants "clear and present danger" to become a constitutional standard for warfare he can sue the Bush administration in federal court and wait to see how the Supreme Court will rule. In the meantime, "clear and present danger" is not a constitutional standard for warfare, it is merely a catchphrase that Mark Trahant is free to advocate as his proposal for a public policy standard.
The P-I would have an easier time regaining its vanishing credibility if instead of digging in its heels on this issue, it would simply admit: "We made a mistake. 'Clear and present danger' is not a constitutional standard for warfare after all, but we still wish it were."
Tomorrow, more on the P-I's shameful fabrications in the Rachel Corrie affair.
Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at July 06, 2003 11:43 AMIt's even more sad that he appropriated the "clear and danger" line from reasoning from a First Amendment decision.
What a nitwit.
Posted by: kevin whited on July 6, 2003 08:15 PMThe Constitution as personal narrative; postmodern constitutionalism. Pitiful. Compelling, though, in a perverse way: he's issued you a very direct challenge -- I'm utterly shameless (he's saying), now go ahead and shame me, I dare you.
Hey, I'll be interested myself in seeing how you finesse this little problem. Me, I try to live by the code that the worst thing you can do is reinforce the village idiot by giving him attention; but your friend Trahant stands that caution on its head, too. He's not merely the village idiot, he's making the whole village out to be idiotic. (It takes a village to raise an idiot?)
Beyond shame, beyond idiocy. But that just brings us back to Rachel Corrie and the state-funded terrorism factory that produced her. And so, like the law, postmodernism is a seamless web.
Posted by: wm. tyroler on July 6, 2003 09:15 PM