DavidScottWritings.com: Occasional Writings

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Occasional Writings

	What history cannot absolve “Throughout the week Castro looked like a stranger in his own land. With every word and gesture, Pope John Paul II seemed to underscore that alienation.”
	At the ambiguous end of the ‘American Century’ “We are becoming a land of lone rangers, isolated individuals without a sense of our common obligations ... slowly hollowing out the virtues that made this country free and prosperous.”
	What Bobos want “The political slogans of recent years—‘getting beyond tired old labels of left and right that just divide us,’ ‘a kinder, gentler nation’—both express and speak to the soul of the Bobo.”
	Remote patrol in Borneo “The plot turns on the same radically individualistic values that have made America a land of partial-birth abortions, and ‘mercy’ killings. On ‘Survivor’ it’s a winner-takes-all world.”
	A new Gandhi needed in India “In the name of ‘cleansing’ India of all that is not Hindu, churches have been bulldozed to the ground, priests have been beaten, and nuns gang-raped.”
	Making religion a trivial pursuit? “Sometimes a book’s importance depends more on who is talking about it than what it actually says. That explains the celebration of Stephen Carter’s The Culture of Disbelief.”
	A ‘Howl’ for Allen Ginsberg “With apologies to Allen Ginsberg, who died on April 5: We see the best minds of our generation destroyed / by the madness of living in a society without moral guardrails.”
	Giving up the ghost of ‘Generation X’ “What does it mean when ‘the voice of a generation’ puts a shotgun under his chin and pulls the trigger? ... ‘We lack something; we have no core,’ one fan told the Washington Post. ”
	Death be not so chic “With its edgy photos depicting killers on death row as noble savages who got a raw deal, Benneton’s $20-million ‘We, on Death Row’ campaign is the kind of help we don’t need.”
	Tenure-track positions “At one time, Western culture would’ve branded Peter Singer a lunatic, maybe even a criminal. Princeton instead gives him a platform to mold the best and the brightest.”
	Ending specious reasoning “There is much that evolutionary theory explains, and there is much that it hasn’t been able to explain. And true scientists aren’t afraid to say so.”
	Thomas Jefferson in Beijing “In China they do it the old-fashioned way. The dictators decreed ‘one child per family’ and set up an elaborate network of mandarins, snitches, and thugs to enforce it.”
	The big lie “The abortion lie in America is so big that it hardly comes as a surprise when one of the builders of that lie now admits that he deceived the country about partial-birth abortion.”
	Confirming anti-Catholicism “It is not that Dr. Elders disagrees with the Church on issues of teenage sexuality, abortion and birth control. What troubles is her pattern of religious intolerance.”
	‘Defenders of Women, Defenders of Life’ “But in what many regard as a remarkable show of patriarchal ingratitude, Congress decided to stash the statue in the basement, where it has rested unceremoniously since.”
	What's left out of the ‘Left Behind’ books “These Protestant publishers see no irony or hypocrisy that they’re selling indulgences in paranoid fantasies in order to rake in what the Scriptures might call ‘filthy lucre.’”
	On Washington ethics “We have become a people beyond outrage, as we hear daily tales of political aides curled up at the feet of prostitutes and politicians selling ‘access’ to the highest bidder.”
	Some reservations about gambling “Politicians are hiding behind ‘jackpots’ and ‘daily numbers’ because they lack the spine to cut useless programs or confront voters with needed tax increases.”
	We are not e-beings “Bill Joy’s new manifesto is a strange view of apocalyptic prophecy mixed with personal confession, overlaid with a nonreligious hope.”
	The shock of the not-so-new “While the art world and the civil-liberties crowd is atwitter over Mayor Giuliani’s threats to cut off state funding for the Brooklyn Museum, Saatchi is laughing all the way to the bank.”
	Benedict XVI: No Grand Inquisitor “The honeymoon was over before it began for the new Pope. Minutes after the conclave curtain lifted, the airwaves and internet were clogged with the new conventional wisdom.”
	Stopping the human harvest before it begins “The administration’s announcement will open the door to a black market in human embryos for stem-cell research purposes.”
	Unwitting organ donors “The AMA’s Council on Ethical and Judicial Affairs has concluded that it is ethical to strip the organs out of living anencephalic children.”
	A whitewash on assisted suicide “For all its air of administrative objectivity, this new report on the first year of legalized assisted suicide in Oregon is a highly political document.”
	A sick choice for Oregon’s poor “Despite their lofty claims, the commissioners sounded like a claque of managed-care technocrats who think the state would manage better if it didn’t have to care for the poor.”
	A nation of roommates “At times, ‘The State of Our Unions’ reads like anthropology, as if it is describing the habits of some exotic, perhaps near-extinct species.”
	Trial by accusation “Even months later, we still know precious little about the cardinal’s accuser. Important clues as to his motivations and mental state were left uninvestigated.”
	Zach and his dangerous book “Instead, a classroom full of children were sent the message that the Bible is something to be afraid of, something infectious, to be guarded against. And a young boy was humiliated.”
	Dion: New Masters “Among the parade of talent from the early rock era, Dion alone has remained a creative force, a street poet giving voice to all that makes our hearts light and sets our spirits free.”
	A storyteller with the eyes of a child “Her letters stopped coming last Christmas; for the first time, she was forced to send a form letter. ‘I still try to use the computer but my fingers tremble and fly off the keys.’”
	Remembering a ‘great life’ “Truth is, I was always intimidated and a bit tongue-tied around him. I shouldn’t have been. He was gentle and funny, with a sharp mind and a sharp wit, and a serious sweet tooth.”