Letters to the Editor
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
‘George H. W. Kerry’
President George H. W. Bush, as The New York Sun correctly points out, “left Saddam Hussein in power and failed to make clear that America stood strong around the world for freedom” [“George H. W. Kerry” Editorial, October 1, 2004]. I have never understood why there has been no discussion of the events leading up to the first Gulf War. Did President Bush-41 tell Ambassador April Glaspie to assure Saddam that he could invade Kuwait with impunity?
If he did not, what did he do when he found out about her conversation with Saddam? Was President Bush-41 aware that he was encouraging the Kurds and Shiites to revolt and was then going to abandon them?
I was living and teaching in China in 1989, during Beijing Spring. My students asked me, “Why doesn’t President Bush say anything?” Perhaps it would have made no difference had the president publicly told the leaders of China not to use violence against the demonstrators in Tiananmen Square.
We can never answer a question beginning with the words, “What would have happened if….” Be that as it may, it seems that George H.W. Bush, unlike his son, did not understand that democracy always leads to stability and prosperity.
GEORGE JOCHNOWITZ
Manhattan
‘Bill O’Reilly’s Odd Moment’
As columnist Laura Ingraham rightly points out, Bill O’Reilly did pick an odd moment to demonstrate that he is “fair and balanced” by attacking talk radio hosts who blasted Dan Rather [“Bill O’Reilly’s Odd Moment,” Opinion, September 17, 2004].
But the crucial point that the Rather episode illustrates is that bias-free reporting by any individual or any single news organization is impossible and may not even be desirable. This is because no human being can be free of having one ideology or another, and with ideology always comes the possibility of bias.
As William James and other philosophers have pointed out, ideology is what gives life its meaning. Even people who are atheists or solipsists believe in something, i.e., there is no God; reality only exists in our perceptions of it. The average person walks around probably unaware that he subscribes to one ideology or another.
Those who oppose capital punishment under any circumstances and who believe that inequality of income is a greater evil than the loss of personal freedom have left-wing, liberal ideologies. While those who favor capital punishment even if it has no deterrent effect and who think that personal freedom is more important than inequality of income have right-wing conservative ideologies. To deny the existence of these ideologies is to evade the question of where our moral beliefs and feelings come from.
But if we accept that we all have ideologies inside us we must accept that we all can be biased in some of our activities, especially those having to do with political judgments about freedom, justice and equality, etc. From this it follows that competition among individuals and organizations with different ideologies is the only road to reducing the overall amount of bias coming out of our press outlets. For example the New York Times is run by people with a liberal ideology while The New York Sun has a conservative ideology.
These ideologies lead to different ways of reporting the news. In the Times, those who fight against the Israelis are militants and suicide bombers, while in the Sun they are terrorists and homicide bombers. The only way to get relatively biasfree coverage of the issue is to read both papers. Which brings us to Mr. O’Reilly’s makeover.
I seldom watch the O’Reilly show any more because I think he has recognized that he is trying to pose as an impossible human being – a totally unbiased reporter – and this is why he finds himself attacking the people attacking Mr. Rather, when he should be attacking Rather.
At the beginning of all my courses in economics, I tell my students what my ideologies are and that I will try my utmost to keep them out of my teaching. But they should be on their guard and question me about it at any time. I also tell them what two famous economists used to tell their students.
Alfred Marshall, the late 19thcentury economist who founded modern economics, would say: “Beware of the man who says ‘let the facts speak for themselves’ without saying how he has selected them and marshaled their presentation.”
Joseph Schumpeter, a great early 20th-century Austrian economist, would say: “We progress more slowly because of our ideologies, but we might not progress at all without them.”
DAVID M. O’NEILL
Adjunct professor of economics
Hunter College The City University of New York
Please address letters intended for publication to the Editor of The New York Sun. Letters may be sent by e-mail to editor@nysun.com, facsimile to 212-608-7348, or post to 105 Chambers Street, New York City 10007. Please include a return address and daytime telephone number. Letters may be edited.
