The most recent 20 comments posted to Making Light by Tad Brennan:

My final two lines (about hating) were a throw-away, and clearly caused more trouble than they were worth.

My main point was: the substantive/rhetorical distinction doesn't help here--doesn't help to see what Drum meant, or where and about what Drum and PNH are disagreeing.

What Drum meant was: Beinart is no longer disagreeing on *first-order* issues about how we should conduct our international policy.

Having said that, Drum could perfectly well turn around and agree with PNH on the *second-order* issue of Beinart's credibility.

Issues of credbility--of who gets listened to and whose opinions shape policy--are clearly and obviously momentous and substantive. PNH is 100% right about that. I'm just not sure (once again) that Drum was denying it, either as a general rule or in the case of Beinart. (In the context of Drum's post, "substantive" pretty clearly means "related to the substance of foreign policy". In the context of PNH's post, it bears a broader meaning. Both are perfectly legitimate. But the difference in scope is at the core of any apparent disagreement.)

My final throw-away line was not meant to say "ooh you're just bad old Drum-haters and Beinart-haters so shame on you." Far from it. I myself am deeply fed up with Beinart and his wing. And I get fed up with Drum's excessive mildness when the health of our Republic is in deep danger.

Instead, my point was just that my introduction of the first-order/second-order distinction was not trying to take any stand on whether B. or D. or PNH were good or bad or right or wrong. Just trying to shed some light on the debate.

If the issue that I'm missing is that the people who led us into this catastrophe should not be listened to again for a long time, then, believe me, it is a point I took long ago.

is this a substantive rather than a rhetorical disagreement?

I don't think so. Or rather, I don't think those are the most illuminating terms to use.

There are first-order questions of policy (invade or don't invade, negotiate or don't negotiate, etc.). And then there are second-order questions about those first-order questions (*who* is advancing this view? what other views have they advanced? what is their win/loss record over time? etc.)

I think Drum is making a reasonable point that Beinart has come around to the lefty consensus on the first-order questions.

I think you are also making a reasonable point: that the fact that Beinart has taken so long to come around, and that he did so much damage before coming around, and that he refuses to acknowledge how badly he screwed up before, should always be held against him on the second-order questions.

"It’s about a real question of political power: whose opinion matters? A good word for this kind of disagreement is substantive".

Yeah, I agree that the question of whose opinion matters is a substantive one. I just don't think that Drum was denying what you are asserting.

Drum was denying that there was *first-order* disagreement about policies. That is consistent with agreeing that there is second-order disagreement (which is also substantive) about whose opinions on first-order issues are taken to matter.

And you can go back to hating on Drum for any number of other reasons, if you like. Oh, and hating on Beinart, who deserves it far more than Drum.

oliviacw--

That is amazing. That, I have to tell you, has just taken this competition to a whole new level.

Bishop's poem is an old favorite--I first read it on the London tube in the early '90s, and memorized it within a few stops.

But your version--it runs some risk of actually being *better* than the original: more complex, more deftly woven, more richly resonant. The re-use of the inner-line end-rhyme as an internal rhyme in the third line of the tercet is something not in Bishop, which I think pays off.

This just strikes me as far and away the best thing done here. A lot of the renditions have been tortured (there's a lamentable pun for you), and I read them noting somewhat mechanically that, yes, they did convey the gist of the original, and, yes, all the words were monosyllabic (provided a free hand with dieresis). I read them, in other words, with all the joy with which one corrects a completed cross-word puzzle.

Yours and Tim Roger's Blake strike me as *new poems*, with new virtues not had by the originals. Tim's buoyant beat and voguing repetition reminded me of supermodels jumping double-dutch (there's innocence and experience for you). Not Blake, but really, really good. (Before I suggested a girl-group called the Blakettes. If you see boys instead, how about the Dark Satanic Mills Brothers?)

No knocks on Tim, but yours is just even *more* impressive--rhythmically, emotionally, imagistically, everything. Wow.

I want to put in a plug for the animated McGoo version of Dickens. Not all parts are good--my kids usually ff past Belle's long tear-jerker. But many other bits have become bywords--razzleberry dressing, and the song sung at the pawn-shop. And many of Jim Backus' line-readings are surprisingly sensitive.

Must say I have never liked Rowan Atkinson much, though more in Blackadder than anything else. Hugh Laurie as the Prince Regent is side-splitting. And the real genius is Baldric. Every scene a masterclass in underplaying for best effect.

Thanks, Serge. I was kinda kidding.

Will Entrekin:

Yes, and what really makes me livid is when people refer to the "metric system", when they mean the International System of Units.

I mean, every system of measurement is a metric system, right? Some metric systems employ grams, some employ ounces. A system of measurement that employs inches and feet is a metric system too!

And I'm sure I'm not a pedant either.

"And I must admit to being intrigued by Capgras' Syndrome - the belief that a close friend, relative or spouse has been abducted and replaced with an exact duplicate."

Yes--even worse than this is Capgras' Hypochondria: the belief that you have been cured of Capgras' Syndrome, but now have a different disease with an exactly indentical set of symptoms.

Here is Dr. Johnson, ridiculing an emendation proposed by an earlier Shakespearean scholar, Hanmer:

"For
---Dismay'd not this
Our captains Macbeth and Banquo?-Yes

[Hanmer proposed the emendation:]
---Dismay'd not this
Our captains brave Macbeth and Banquo?-Yes

[Johnson assesses Hanmer's editorial prowess:]

Such harmless industry may, surely, be forgiven, if it cannot be praised: may he therefore never want a monosyllable, who can use it with such wonderful dexterity."

This prompted by Sandy's reference to the lust for meddling. But I'd like to repeat Johnson's wish in a more charitable way, addressed to the amazing talents on display above:

may they never want a monosyllable, who can use it with such wonderful dexterity!

Also, on reading all--

man, too much brilliance here. I'm in awe.

My first prize to Tim Rogers, who turns Blake into a jump-rope rhyme sung by the coolest girl-group ever. "Fierce fierce" just gets better with every repetition.

Did the Blakettes ever record a B-side?

Although it is not poetry, I believe that many of you would enjoy a bit of virtuoso philosophy from the late George Boolos:
"Godel's second incompleteness theorem explained in words of one syllable".

This was an article published in MIND, the leading journal of academic philosophy, back in 1994 (when I had the honor of being on its editorial board, though at the time I thought it an honour).

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2346/is_n409_v103/ai_14916922

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