Becoming Singular

Christopher Hitchens provides an answer to a long-standing question of mine in his article "Jefferson Versus the Muslim Pirates." He quotes James Madison:

"It is a settled policy of America, that as peace is better than war, war is better than tribute. The United States, while they wish for war with no nation, will buy peace with none."

Then Hitchens adds: "The expression 'the United States is' did not come into usage until after Gettysburg."

I've always said that there is a great linguistics paper to be written on this topic—perhaps it has been written already.

Auden as an intellectual reference point

It almost does not count when Christopher Hitchens uses poems as reference points for his discussions of issues—he does it ALL the time. I know of no other journalist who so frequently refers to poetry and clearly has vast swathes of it memorized.

But he does it again in an article on Ayaan Hirsi Ali in Slate: this time with not Yeats, but Auden. And yes, it is "September 1, 1939." The line that he uses as a motif in his article is "the enlightenment driven away."

The article is one of many responding to Timothy Garton Ash and Ian Buruma, who independently wrote about Ali (see links provided by Pierre Joris).

The part that really struck me about Hitchens's argument is a passage from Ali herself:

"I left the world of faith, of genital cutting and forced marriage for the world of reason and sexual emancipation. After making this voyage I know that one of these two worlds is simply better than the other. Not for its gaudy gadgetry, but for its fundamental values."

Those who criticize Ali for the vehemence of her critique of Islam should keep this in mind.

(See also "Auslandsreise oder Flucht?" in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung: Nawal as-Saadawi has been forced to leave Egypt because of serious threats to her life. She, too, grew up in the "world of faith [and] genital cutting.")

Hitchens on Ford

Here's some more grist for the mill of my previous post on Paul Constant's article about the death of Gerald Ford: Christopher Hitchens on the same.

Hitchens on Cartoons

Christopher Hitchens, in Slate:

As well as being a small masterpiece of inarticulacy and self-abnegation, the statement from the State Department about this week's international Muslim pogrom against the free press was also accidentally accurate.

"Anti-Muslim images are as unacceptable as anti-Semitic images, as anti-Christian images, or any other religious belief."

Thus the hapless Sean McCormack, reading painfully slowly from what was reported as a prepared government statement.

(Christopher Hitchens)