A Word from London

Herbert London

      Herbert London is president of the Hudson Institute, John M. Olin Professor of Humanities at N.Y.U. and the author of the recently published book Decade of Denial, Lexington Books.

Artistic Tastelessness and the American Flag

      There is virtually no end to lunacy for a portion of the brain-dulled public. Those afflicted with a radical sensibility rarely find humor in their actions, but funny and pathetic responses usually emanate from the well of ideological gesturing.

      Very recently the library director, Marcelee Gralapp, of the Boulder Colorado Public Library refused to display an American flag. She gave as her reason the belief that a flag would compromise the library's objectivity. However, after a number of protests Ms. Gralapp relented by placing a small flag on a pole at the library entrance.

      A week after this incident Ms. Gralapp put twenty-one sculptures on display in the library art gallery. The exhibit was called "Hung Out to Dry." In it ceramic penises were hung from knitted cozies clothes-pinned to a cord strung between a wall and a column. One end of the cord is tied to a noose.

      Boulder spokesman Jana Peterson asked, how can you balk at showing the American flag but think it's appropriate to display ceramic penises? Good question, for which there wasn't a response.

      The Rocky Mountain News of November 8, 2001 reported that an unidentified mother said to her son who was staring at the exhibit, "No dear, they're corn cobs."

      What they are of course is bad taste. Perhaps most significantly this event suggests something about the degradation of taste for those who can confuse shock value with artistic expression.

      But what is the relationship between the flag and the depraved art exhibit? Although I can only surmise, I think there is a relationship.

      For many radicals the American flag embodies everything they hate. It is the embodiment of racism, colonialism, class consciousness and the commodification of culture. The hate-America crowd views the flag as bourgeois culture, the detestable middle class and its provincial values.

      By contrast, avant-garde art decries the bourgeoisie. The art is designed to shock the middle class from its provincialism. Its aesthetic position-to the extent it has one-is challenge at every turn.

      Needless to say, the Marcelee Gralapps are in a small minority, made even smaller since September 11. Yet it is instructive that a small minority can have a profound effect on public opinion, especially if it is recognized. Ms. Gralapp represents a public institution, one supported by taxpayer funding. Her actions have received attention in large part because the library is a public institution. Had the exhibit been organized in a private gallery, it would certainly not be a matter of public debate.

      It is ironic that the flag-a symbol of liberty-was not flown because it would compromise objectivity. Yet the display of objectionable art protected by that liberty is a condition of which the librarian readily took advantage. Surely it has not occurred to her that the symbol of the flag protects artistic expression.

      Even in Boulder, sometimes thought of as Moscow West, the Gralapp position is not acceptable. However university towns do have a gravitational pull for disgruntled leftists.

      I would hope that at some point Ms. Gralapp might be asked to defend her position. Invariably, the radical stance is that tastelessness is permitted in a free society. But that argument presupposes the existence and defense of freedom. And whether Ms. Gralapp agrees or not, the stars and stripes represent that liberty.

      If anything should be "hung out to dry" it is patently absurd arguments that are neither defensible nor sensible. Yet that too is an outcome liberty affords.

Civil Rights in the New Age

      The media panjandrums have found what they consider to be legal vulnerability in the stand taken by the Bush administration on possible terrorists in our midst. Claims are now routinely made that habeas corpus is being abandoned and people are held without valid criteria for detainment.
      Overlooked in this overheated commentary are the obvious facts that this nation was attacked, there are known radical cells with evil intent in the United States and every effort must be made to avoid a replay of September 11.

      It is therefore ironic that at the very moment critics declaim the alleged reduction in civil liberties, there are other efforts underway to expand or interpret civil rights in a manner that is at once perverse and risible.
      The London Guardian recently reported that an obsessive and violent barrister was jailed for a second time after subjecting his former lover to a terrifying stalking campaign of mental abuse and death threats. According to court reports he had subjected the former object of his affections to up to one hundred daily phone calls and abusive letters.
      After his first arrest for harassment and three months in jail, he was allowed to phone the target of his obsession on several occasions. In fact, prison authorities could not prevent him from making these calls or sending abusive letters since the Human Rights Act permitted-so it was noted-the very conditions that led to his incarceration in the first place.

      The London Daily Mail reported a similarly absurd case. Serial killer Dennis Nilsen has used the human rights law to demand pornographic magazines in prison. He notes that the discussion to refuse him hardcore material is "inhuman and degrading" and claims as well this decision violates his "freedom of expression."

      Nilsen, who was found guilty of murdering twelve people, wants to read an explicit homosexual magazine called Vulcan. His barrister contends that "To deny the claimant expression of his sexuality because it is of a homosexual nature is cruel and made more so by the fact that he will never have the opportunity, so long as this stance is maintained, to have access to materials which enable him to express his sexuality." While a judge did not rule on this matter, he did allow for judicial review of the ban on publishing Nilsen's autobiography, which contains graphic sexual pictures and scenes of mutilation.

      According to Nilsen's barrister, prison authorities are in violation of Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which was made part of English law by Labor's flagship Human Rights Act. Whatever the prison authorities have withheld pales compared to the grisly murder of twelve people and the anguish these murders have caused their families. Moreover, it is hardly surprising that the Human Rights Act is seen as an ally of the criminal and an enemy of his victims.
      Obviously in these two examples common sense is in absentia. In a curious way these cases are the other side of the civil rights controversy in the United States. Here critics contend alleged terrorists have had their rights traduced and in England and the continent some have expanded rights to incorporate the most absurd conditions.
      Surely rights have become fungible. The contention that a convicted murderer has the right to profit from his crime is grotesque. Moreover, the view that a prisoner cannot be restrained from engaging in the acts that brought him to prison is equally perverse.
      What these cases and the associated American examples suggest is the confusion that results from moral relativism. War, particularly a war fought on your soil, will necessarily result in some legal safeguard against domestic violence.
      It should also be obvious-but apparently isn't-that crime should be punished, not rewarded. Convicted felons concede some of their civil rights the moment a judge and jury find them culpable of a crime.
      There was a time not very long ago when these matters were well understood. Unfortunately that isn't the case now and, as a consequence, we are all the worse for it.

Is There a Campaign to Stifle Speech on Campus?

      Fire breathing campus activists have declared war on America's war. They will say such absurd things as the attack on the Pentagon and the World Trade Center was payback for the nation's misguided foreign policy. Some innocents will believe them; most will not.
      Yet what is most instructive is that at the first whiff of criticism, the radicals claim "McCarthyism," which is-as they say on Broadway-a "show stopper."
      What the charge of McCarthyism does is put the critic in the position of being criticized. Moreover, since these battles invariably take place on campus, the allied argument of stifling academic freedom is made.
      Recently, in response to a report about anti-war statements on campus compiled by ACTA (The American Council of Trustees and Alumni), the New York Times charged that a campaign to diminish academic freedom was underway.
      Yet this claim is neither true nor legitimate. Academic freedom does not inoculate anyone against criticism. Faculty members should be free to express their opinions and critics should be free to express their disagreement.

      In fact, this has nothing to do with McCarthyism since I cannot cite one example of a professor being fired for this anti-war stance or a student being expelled from campus because of his unpopular opinions.
      The irresponsible use of such terms as McCarthyism and academic freedom is chilling.
      If one refers to the authoritative 1940 A.A.U.P. (American Association of University Professors) statement on academic freedom, the professor's right to express his opinion was related to professional competence and responsible behavior. Hence, the music instructor who expresses an opinion about American foreign policy has the right of free speech, but not the privilege of academic freedom unless, of course, he can demonstrate competence in a field different from his stated area of expertise.
      No one-in my judgment-should stop Noam Chomsky-a well-known critic of the war on terrorism and the world's leading expert on linguistics-from expressing an opinion about the war. He has, after all, written widely on American foreign policy.
      However, Professor Chomsky's stature does not insulate him from criticism of his patently ridiculous positions. Rebuttals challenging his position are not McCarthyite and are not in any way limits on Chomsky's freedom of expression.
      In sober times these reflections would be unimpeachable. But these are not sober times for the "hate America" crowd that has gravitated to American campuses.
      What the radicals use as defense mechanisms are the sacred cows of the liberal imagination: free speech and academic freedom. And astonishingly some pundits-already inclined to support this argument-opt for paranoid explanations.
      Notwithstanding all of the Owellian claims of "repressive tolerance" American universities are among the most free institutions on the globe.
      At a time of war, in the aftermath of September 11, it is not surprising that there are bitter verbal reprisals against anti-war activists. But it would be a terrible mistake to claim this is rampaging McCarthyism or a systematic effort to curtail academic freedom.
      If those claims have any meaning it is in the protective shield of national symbols and the extent to which they have penetrated the public imagination. The radicals on campus may have overlooked the lessons of war and peace, but they sure know how to protect themselves against criticism.

Kofi Annan, the U.N. and the Nobel Prize

      For the Nobel Committee a strange and elusive logic is at work. Members of this august body seem to believe that reaching an agreement-however dangerous-is worthy of international recognition.
      Most students of international affairs know that in many instances agreements are broken before the ink is dry or they understand that agreements are part of a strategy to buy time or sucker an opponent into acquiescence.
      Unfortunately these thoughts never crossed the mind of Nobel Committee members. These people assume that intention and result are indistinguishable. Because enemies sign an agreement, peace is at hand.
      It is precisely the reason why Henry Kissinger and LeDuc Tho received the Nobel Prize after signing the 1973 Paris Peace Accords. Anyone who bothered to look would now realize that this agreement gave the North Vietnamese army time to mobilize its forces for the final assault on South Vietnam and it hastened the calamitous massacre in Cambodia.
      Similarly, the Oslo Accord of 1993, which generated another round of Nobel Prizes, created the illusion among Israelis that peace was at hand and generated among Palestinians the belief that Israeli will was weakening. Rather than produce peace or even stability, it prompted Intifada II.
      It is with these events as prologue that the latest Nobel Prize should be considered. On October 12 the centennial Peace Prize was given to Kofi Annan and the United Nations generally. In the words of the Nobel citation:

He has risen to such new challenges as HIV/AIDS and international terrorism, and brought about more efficient utilization of the UN's modest resources.

      While Mr. Annan is an elegant spokesman for the United Nations and even had the courage to criticize UN peacekeeping operations in Bosnia and Rwanda, he has certainly not shown a similar forthrightness when it comes to fighting terrorism. How can anyone forget his praise for Saddam Hussein as a "decisive leader" with whom he could "do business"?
      Moreover, it was Secretary General Annan who "secured" a commitment to allow disarmament inspectors to continue their work in Iraq as long as the country's "security, sovereignty and dignity" were assured. Of course, the inspectors were soon expelled and the agreement was quickly forgotten.
      That brings me to the second misguided Nobel committee notion: honoring the United Nations for its actions against terrorism. Surely someone should have noticed that the UN is institutionally incapable of making moral distinctions among its member states. How could this be done without a caucus of democratic nations or a mechanism for challenging states that promote terrorism, e.g. Iraq, Cuba, Iran, Algeria, Afghanistan, etc.?
      As long as some states promote and house terrorist groups with impunity and the ambassadors of these states are treated with the dignity accorded all others, relativism will remain the prevailing sentiment in the organization.
      In its citation the Nobel Committee noted that "the only negotiated route to global peace and cooperation goes by way of the United Nations." If ever there was a false claim, this is it. Global peace occurs when and only when the United States and her allies unleash their weapons of destruction against proponents of aggression. It isn't self-satisfied ambassadors from rogue states who work for peace, it is F-14s and helicopter gunships and special operation forces.
      As a litmus test the United Nations is effective when it follows America's lead as it did in the Korean and Gulf Wars. When it does not do so, it fails.
      Clearly the Nobel Committee has learned very little from the last half century. What the members might well have argued is that the prize will be conferred after the war on terrorism is winding down and the role of secretary general and the UN as a whole can be assessed.
      Until then I'm afraid the prize is without meaning, except for its assertion that an international agreement has intrinsic value even when it leads to a deadly conclusion.

      Drug Patents and the Future

      A worldwide campaign is now well underway to demonize pharmaceutical companies and champion generic drugs. Former Vice President Al Gore employed this argument in his last presidential campaign as do various organizations including Doctors Without Borders, Act-Up, the AARP and a host of others.
      The supposition is that drug companies with a license to market a certain pharmaceutical use their limited monopoly to milk the public. That this isn't the case is beside the point since the perception is gaining widespread acceptance.
      The U.S. trade representative and the European Union have been at loggerheads over the United Nation's role in regulating or influencing drug prices with European states eager to eliminate or ease the property rights of American drug companies so that they can enter the generic market. "Put lives ahead of profits" has become the calling card of the generic drug interests.
      Overlooked in this glib assertion of humanitarianism is the extraordinary medical miracles wrought by the pharmaceutical industry. Since it takes roughly a billion dollars to take a new drug from the lab through trials and approval and into the market, company pricing invariably reflects a wish to recoup costs and generate some profit for its stockholders. Needless to say generic manufacturers have no expense in research and development; they merely produce formulas of known drugs when licensing provisions mature.
      In addition, major companies often discount drugs in poor nations. Last year, five drug companies offered the UN World Health Organization and developing nations in Africa anti-HIV retroviral drugs at prices reduced by as much as ninety percent.
      As Pfizer spokesman Brian McGlynn noted,

Everyone-senior citizens, AIDS activists-always accuses us of being profiteers . . . they say we'd rather give a rich white guy an erection than help an African with AIDS.

Perceptions die hard. Last year the Pfizer company offered its AIDS drugs free of charge to Kenyan patients.

      What the activists generally do not appreciate is that unauthorized copycat drugs may reduce cost, but such practices amount to the stealing of intellectual property. Without the profit motive-critics decry-to fund new drugs, many sick or diseased people could not obtain the miracle pharmaceuticals that reduce and often eliminate their misery. Pfizer-to cite one example-has a research budget of $4.7 billion and the company does not recoup its investment on about thirty percent of its medicines.
      In order to bypass patent laws, activists have urged many nations to engage in parallel importation, which involves importing brand name drugs from countries where they are selling at a discount or importing generic drugs. In either case patent rights are being violated.
      What the activists contend is that human rights should trump commercial rights. While this assertion doesn't take into account the correlation between commercial and human rights, it has a global appeal.
      In fact, many nations have been encouraged to engage in patent violations in an effort to deal with the AIDS pandemic, the anthrax and smallpox scares and other diseases. Yusef Hamied, owner of the Indian generic drug company Cipla, argues that medical discoveries should be free of patents. Of course, he would be the direct beneficiary of such a policy shift.
      The pressure for generic drugs comes from many quarters, including the United States. President Clinton signed the Medicine Equity and Drug Safety Act of 2000, which allows U.S. wholesalers to import discounted drugs from other countries.
      But this gesture and others like it do not negate the incentive necessary for new drugs and the capital investment needed for laboratories and research.
      Should the drug industry deal only with issues of the moment? Should patents be obviated for political gain? Should the future be discounted for the present? And should the free market be a casualty of immediate global needs?
      The AIDS crisis and other diseases are not the result of high drug prices, notwithstanding exaggerated rhetoric that suggests as much. If the world wants health miracles, it has to pay for them. If it can't or won't, the miracles won't be generated. If the U.S. and other nations refuse to challenge countries that violate drug patents we will move rapidly down a path of biological stasis where only what is known will be available and progress will be stalled. As I see it, the future is better served through market solutions than any regulatory apparatus the activists want to put in place.