The level and quality of discourse in this U.S. presidential campaign has not been particularly high, especially in recent weeks. So I found former Gen. Powell’s recent analysis of the current state of affairs, as part of his widely publicised endorsement of Sen. Obama, to be a welcome and refreshing improvement in this regard:
It’s a shame that much of the rhetoric and commentary surrounding this campaign – from all sides – was not more like this. [In keeping with this, I would like to remind commenters to keep the discussion constructive, polite, and on-topic.]
[Update, Oct 22: Unfortunately, some of the more recent comments have not been as constructive, polite, and on-topic as I would have hoped. I am therefore closing this post to further comments, though anyone who wishes to discuss these issues on their own blog is welcome to leave a pingback to this post here.]
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71 comments
20 October, 2008 at 7:02 pm
Jonathan Vos Post
I appreciate what Colin Powell, Terry Tao, John Sidles, and Todd Trimble have said.
I also strongly endorse Cardster’s: “Anyone academically inclined who loves intellectual discourse should support Obama; the ‘dumbing down’ of education over the last 28 or so years is obvious. We who love mathematics must make our voices heard by supporting those who love intellectual rigor in public policy.”
My father and his father were extremely political Wall Street Conservative Republicans. Yet my father refused to vote for George W. Bush. Colin Powell is right: his party has discredited its own axioms.
As someone who has been quite politically involved himself, an elected Town Councilman in communities in two states, and who wrote speeches for a presidential candidate, I agree that academics are humans, too. I take especially seriously the ‘dumbing down’ of education, as someone who has taught on and off since 1973 in middle schools, high schools, college, and university. Until you are on the front lines of the battle against ignorance, you have no idea how horrendously anti-intellectual much of America is (or has become, the derivative is hard to evaluate).
Did Nancy Reagan’s astrologer — the one she consulted to schedule international trips for Ronald — warn her about falling and breaking her pelvis? Can someone really see Russia from Wasilla, Alaska? Why did more Mathematicians not object to George W. Bush’s usage of “fuzzy math” for plain arithmetic? Has there ever been a more anti-science administration than the one collapsing right now, shockingly in the face of Thomas Jefferson, Herbert Hoover, and Jimmy Carter (who used Laplace transforms)?
My wife was a volunteer poll worker in Australia when she was doing her post-doc at UNSW. I suspect that Terry Tao has the deeply democratic egalitarian decency characteristic of Australia, PLUS the best of America (whose best education is paradoxically unsurpassed globally, though the mean and median USA education has become 3rd World).
20 October, 2008 at 8:17 pm
Todd Trimble
John Sidles: I appreciate the references very much. Even if you say some of the thinkers/architects involved have been carefully apolitical up until now, political observers would probably do well to pay heed. Thanks again.
20 October, 2008 at 9:44 pm
Anonymous
Ben, go and put your propaganda in your own blog instead of polluting Terry’s blog with your ridiculous comments. You definitely have the right to disagree with Terry’s political views; but you should remember that he writes whatever he wants in his blog. Therefore, reporting your disappointment is simply foolish!
20 October, 2008 at 9:57 pm
Harald Helfgott
Question to the first poster and everybody else: is “right between the eyes” an allusion to Night of the Living Dead, or were you and George A. Romero quoting a common source?
20 October, 2008 at 10:23 pm
Paul
Wal-
Thank you for your clarification (20 October 2:45pm) regarding your comments 20 October 11:26am. It relieves me that you do not view Germany as a place where people with extreme views concerning “demographic transformation” ought to move.
(Note that I was not the only one with this mistaken impression of what you intended: see anonymous 4:14pm. Perhaps a bit more precision regarding language was in order.)
While I agree with your sentiment that bigoted opinions should be confronted, I am not convinced that “Taking offense is a sign of a closed mind.” Rather, I consider refusing to participate in dialogue to be a sign of a closed mind. If one finds certain remarks offensive, this should be noted in order to resolve, or at least clarify, the issue at hand. Too often I find that potentially-useful political dialogue is cut off as soon as someone is offended.
21 October, 2008 at 1:23 am
Nick
No offense but whenever great minds “mature” they find much comfort in politics and/or political affairs.
Dr Tao is certainly keen to see what and how people react regarding this post; while it is certainly healthy to have an interest and an opinion in current world affairs it somewhat dilutes the atmosphere of this otherwise very interesting mathematics blog.
21 October, 2008 at 2:26 am
Vishal Lama
According to GallUp WorldPoll, the world (70 countries, to be precise) certainly prefers Obama to McCain by nearly 4-to-1.
I am pretty sure that McCain’s campaign, if given a chance, would use the above poll numbers to argue that the whole world is conspiring against America (since they support Obama) and hence Obama should not be elected president!
21 October, 2008 at 2:56 am
びっくり
It is a shame that Powell isn’t running.
21 October, 2008 at 8:56 am
Michael Bacon
Terry,
This is what happens when you jump into the political fray. While I agree completely with the sentiments you expressed, I’m sorry that you’re skewered by some for merely requesting a bit of civility in political discourse. Anyway, like someone above said, it’s your blog and you can say what you want :)
21 October, 2008 at 9:56 am
anonymous
An interesting post. I enjoy it very much.
I would offer my encouragements rather than discouragments.
Great job!
21 October, 2008 at 11:28 am
Hany
Roger says: “You are joking, right? Those guys never did anything worthwhile again after polluting their minds with politics. Please don’t encourage Terry to go down that path”.
What about Laurent Schwartz (who was politically engaged all his life and mathematically productive for a good part of it)?
I agree that it’s easier for a mathematician to work in isolation from struggles; political or other, but sometimes this is just impossible.
Concerning the subject matter of Prof. Tao’s post, I do not agree that the level of discussion in the campaign was particularly low compared to US standards. Actually I always feel that US political discourse has ALWAYS been very poor and that most political figures are keen on looking more stupid and more vulgar than they actually are.
21 October, 2008 at 2:07 pm
Big Eclipse
No matter what side you are for, you have to admit that when McCain announced that Palin was his choice for a running mate, it took the winds out of the sails for that party. It was inevitable, following the initial excitement, that it was going to be seen for what it is — a poor choice; both in strategy and judgement.
21 October, 2008 at 3:56 pm
Thuris
Powell gives a measured and reasoned explanation of how he came to a conclusion. His style of speech is considered, his weighing of factors is humane. He speaks about the importance of intellectual curiosity. His discussion of the Muslim American serviceman provides a counterexample to some assumptions of the uninformed. I believe that reasons such as these are why Prof. Tao chose to post this video.
Is there any doubt that we need to move towards our better selves? The power that mathematics will give us in the coming decades (through AI, pattern recognition, biocomputation and so on) will project changes in our moral character or habits of thought onto the world around us with ever more force and immediacy. More and more vividly we will see thoughts made material, so it would be helpful to have some presentable thoughts scattered here and there among the appetitive and territorial ones.
I am not voting for either of the two candidates mentioned in the interview, so I do not have a stake in Powell’s endorsement. But I think we all stand to benefit from hearing examples of responsible speech, and I thank Prof. Tao for sharing something that speaks to his person ideals.
21 October, 2008 at 5:43 pm
A C
From a foreign policy point of view,I don’t think either candidate is going to be bad for America, they share a lot of common positions.
1. Both candidates are strongly committed to the defense of Israel, which is excellent.
2. Both candidates are equally committed in ensuring a Iran does not obtain WMDs.
3. Barack is clearly not a pacifist, his foreign policy views have been shaped by Zbigniew Brzezinski, and irrespective of the election results we are going to see an US administration which is not hesitant to defend US interests vigorously anywhere in the world.
4. Both candidates understand the threat emanating from states like Pakistan, and both of them will do their best to ensure a victory in Afghanistan.
21 October, 2008 at 10:35 pm
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22 October, 2008 at 3:36 am
Joshua Chamberlain
We have two despicable characters running for president who recently pledged their allegiance to the State of Israel at a AIPAC conference in NYC. Both McCain and Barack Obama pledged their allegiance to a nation that attacked a US naval ship-USS Liberty- in neutral waters that resulted in the death of over forty American teenagers-all non-Jewish of course.
If the US phantom fighting jets had got their in time, they would have blown the Israel aircraft out of the air. The US special relationship with Isarel would ave ended in 1967.
Israel has 200-400 nuclear weapons. Iran has none. However, if Iran had a few nuclear weapons the probability of an attack by the US on behalf of the state of Israel woud be very close to 0.
Have a look at Vincent Bugliosi’s new book where he makes a very tight legal that George W Bush should beindicted for mass murder. Colin Powell was the point man for the Bush adminstration at the UN. He was the one who told all the big lies of the Bush adminstration before the whole world.
Sarah Palin is an Evangelical Christian Zionist who blieves in the rapture. She has a flag of Israel in her office and wears a little Israel flag on her lapel. American politicians should give allegiance to America not to the State of Israel.
22 October, 2008 at 3:58 am
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22 October, 2008 at 4:23 am
Davy N.
“…to a nation that attacked a US naval ship-USS Liberty-”
This occurred 41 years ago, and was caused most probably by a tragic mistake. So this is completely irrelevant to the current situation.
Do you support also cutting off ties with Japan, Germany and Italy as well, they also attacked Americans in the past (and not by mistake)?
From Wikipedia:
Both the Israeli and American governments conducted inquiries into the incident, and issued reports concluding that the attack was a tragic mistake, caused by confusion about the identity of the USS Liberty. On December 17, 1987, the issue was officially closed by the two governments through an exchange of diplomatic notes. Israel eventually paid nearly US$13 million in humanitarian reparations to the United States and in compensation to the families of the victims.
22 October, 2008 at 5:01 am
Joshua Chamberlain
Davy N
The Israeli attack on the US liberty was a premeditated and deliberate attack on the USS Liberty. The suriviors of the USS liberty have set up their own web site refuting the lies of the Israeli goverment. Statements by both goverments don’t count for anything. In other words, what the Israeli’s did was premeditated murder. If any other nation had done this, they would have been attacked and invaded by the US. Can you imagine what would hae happned if China or Russianhad atacked the US liberty. It would have beeen seen as a declaration of war by the US and you and I wouldn’t be having this conversation right now.
In late 2008, If Iran attacked a US naval ship killing dozens of sailors-you can take this to the bank-the US would nuke Iran.
How far do you want to go with the WW11 analogy? The US would have been jusitifed in going to war with Israel back in 1967. If the Navy phantom jets had just gotten to the USS Liberty a few minutes earlier, they would have blown the Israeli attack helicopters and fighter jets-all paid for by the US tax payer, how ironic-and who knows what would have happened. One thing you can be sure of, the special relatinship with Israel would have ended. This would have taken the steam out the Evangelical Christian Zionist movement whose memebers include wierdos such as Sarah Palin.
A Barack Obama foriegn policy will include a lot of “humanaitarian” interventions. Clinton commited his very serious war crimes in Serbia. Humanitarian intervention was the excuse. There were several of these “humanitarian” interventions under Clinton. I should point out that Clintons invasion of the Balkans had the very real potetnial to start WW3. Thank God both the Chinese and Russians used restraint.
The Barack Obama worshipping I see going on is quite sickening. He is being made into a Christ-Like figure. His worshippers will cut him enormous slack to pursue an agressive criminal foreign policy.
In reality, Barack Obama is a man who lusts for power. This is recognized as one of the worst traits in a human being.
On the home front, Barack Obama will scale up the hated H1-B and L-1 B scab labor programs. He will also accelerate the ongoing Mexican invasion of America.
Barck Obama is nothing but the front man for several rackets which include:the State of Israel, the military industrial complex,Wall Street and corporations in general.
Colin Powell would be the perfect Secretary of State for Barack Obama.
22 October, 2008 at 7:07 am
Anonymous2
> Mrs.[!] Raoul Berger
Dear Anonymous,
Sorry for the OT squared, but since you seem to be surprised that a woman bears a male first name, let me give you an explanation.
Actually, it was quite customary in some countries for married women to adopt not only their husband’s family name, but also his first name. So when Miss Jeanne Dupont married Mr. Pierre Lefèbvre, today’s habit would be to call her Mrs. Jeanne Lefèbvre (née Dupont) (*), but in the past it would not have been uncommon to call her Mrs. Pierre Lefèbvre (née Jeanne Dupont).
So if you find it strange that a woman bears a male first name, it may be simply because it’s not *her* first name at all!
(*) Of course, in some countries, many married women now go one step further and keep her own (so-called “maiden”) name altogether (a welcome development in my view).
22 October, 2008 at 6:49 pm
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