A much-criticized WaPo headline: "What motivates a lawyer to defend a Tsarnaev, a Castro or a Zimmerman?"

That still runs atop an article by lawprof Abbe Smith which explains the role of the defense lawyer within the criminal justice system. The explanation is familiar to anyone who's considered the topic beyond the shallowest level, but the article appears in the Washington Post because of all the attention to the Zimmerman trial, which explains the presence of the acquitted neighborhood watchman alongside the names of the evil Castro and the accused terrorist Tsarnaev.

The headline drew fire. At Breitbart.com: "the Washington Post outlandishly sought to equate the acquitted Robert [sic] Zimmerman to accused serial rapist Ariel Castro and Boston bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev." At Instapundit: "Which one of these things is not like the others?... 'Tsarnaez = Castro = Zimmerman? Why not just throw in a Hitler? That’s usually how the question is posed at cocktail parties.'"

So look at how this article is teased on the front page at WaPo right now:



Quick! Roll out the Kaczynski!

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"I'm trying my best not to be cynical, but: Is subtracting context par for the course for NYT editorialists?"

"In this case it was almost as if the columnist was so eager to seize upon the Godwin's reference that she failed to even attempt to comprehend why Scalia said what he did, and instead relied on knee-jerk preconceptions to inform her judgement. If that's not the epitome of bias there, I don't know what is."

A comment, at an Instapundit post about my supplying the NYT with the context it missed. But I only had the context because when I wrote about the NYT piece, someone who was at the conference emailed me with a detailed account. That information wanted to be heard, and somehow I was the portal for it. I think the NYT had to be actively looking for crap to throw at Scalia and keeping its door shut to the flow of information. And I think my blogging the context only resulted in a correction because it was picked up by the Wall Street Journal's James Taranto, and that got the NYT's attention, but initially only to try to shrug off the problem:

@jamestaranto @joshtpm What's the correction? Joking about Godwin's Law?
— Juliet Lapidos (@julietlapidos) July 24, 2013

Only joking. Ha ha. Get it. Joking about the Holocaust. Heh heh. What's the problem?

Taranto kept up the pressure: "Ahhh, I did not realize your post was comedy!" And the NYT thought better of its don't-you-get-the-Holocaust-jokes stance and put up the correction.

Meanwhile, Josh Marshall, the other target of Taranto's tweet, stood his ground: "Again, anything in the Althouse post that in any way contradicts my post? Or are you just trolling?" And: "Hey Jim, You might want to read what I actually wrote since nothing in that post contradicts it." That is: So what if I left out the context as long as I didn't have any incorrect statements?

Context is a funny topic. Remember when Andrew Breitbart was pilloried for quoting Shirley Sherrod out of context?

Context itself must be understood in context. If your rules about putting quotes in context depend on whether you're quoting people you like or people you hate, then you are a hack. I think both Marshall and Lapidos showed themselves to be hacks here, but at least Lapidos or the organization that controls her is ashamed when exposed and tries to cover its tracks. Marshall is out and proud.

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The NYT accepts my correction on its attack on Justice Scalia.

Juliet Lapidos's item on the NYT Editorial Page Editor's Blog, titled "Scalia’s Latest Outburst," has an update added this morning:

Ann Althouse puts Justice Scalia’s remarks in context. He spoke on day 3 of a convention. The day before, William F. Meinecke of the Holocaust Memorial Museum gave a presentation on law, justice and the holocaust. Justice Scalia’s musings appear to have grown out of that talk. The Godwin’s Law joke, then, was inapt.

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"Scalia opened his talk with a reference to the Holocaust, which happened to occur in a society that was, at the time, 'the most advanced country in the world.'"

"One of the many mistakes that Germany made in the 1930s was that judges began to interpret the law in ways that reflected 'the spirit of the age.' When judges accept this sort of moral authority, as Scalia claims they’re doing now in the U.S., they get themselves and society into trouble."

The Aspen Times reports. That's linked in the NYT, by Juliet Lapidos, who says "Justice Scalia brought Godwin’s Law to Snowmass, suggesting in an address to the Utah State Bar Association that activist judges helped bring about the Holocaust."

Was Scalia within Godwin's Law? At The Atlantic, Abby Ohlheiser says he "approaches Godwin's Law," and takes the trouble to explain the law: "Eventually, as Godwin's law scholars are well aware, any online discussion will produce a comparison to Hitler or the Nazis."

Here's the Wikipedia article on Godwin's law. Excerpt:

Godwin's law applies especially to inappropriate, inordinate, or hyperbolic comparisons of other situations (or one's opponent) with Nazis – often referred to as "playing the Hitler card."...

While falling afoul of Godwin's law tends to cause the individual making the comparison to lose his argument or credibility, Godwin's law itself can be abused as a distraction, diversion or even as censorship, fallaciously miscasting an opponent's argument as hyperbole when the comparisons made by the argument are actually appropriate.

So: Was Scalia's reference an exaggerated playing of the Hitler card or are his critics guilty of abusively invoking Godwin? I wouldn't answer without the full transcript of the speech. It would also be interesting to know whether these Godwin-invoking critics, who also don't have the transcript, just don't like Scalia anyway.

ADDED: An emailer who attended the Scalia event puts the remarks into context and makes the NYT and others look quite foolish for handling this matter the way they did:

I heard the entirety of Justice Scalia’s talk.  The Nazi discussion consisted of some unprepared remarks that he made at the beginning of his speech.  The context is vital. Here is the Utah State Bar Summer Convention agenda.

As you can see Justice Scalia was the principal speaker on Saturday morning—Day 3 of programming.  On Friday morning (Day 2 of the meeting), the principal speaker was Dr. William F. Meinecke of the Holocaust Memorial Museum giving his presentation “Law, Justice, and the Holocaust:  How the Courts Failed Germany.”  It is a fascinating presentation of how the Nazi party co-opted the Courts and lawyers to further its agenda against the Jews and used the judiciary to “legalize” its conduct.

Justice Scalia opened his remarks by noting that, at the previous evening’s Utah State Bar’s Past Presidents Dinner, there had been a great deal of discussion about Dr. Meinecke’s talk. Justice Scalia then indicated that, prior to beginning his prepared remarks, he had some observations about Nazi Germany and the law.  He observed that Germany in those times was “the most advanced country in the world” citing its sciences, philosophy, music, and theater (and probably some other examples).  He commented that the Nazi agenda was assisted by judges who read laws that facially would have outlawed certain abuses not as written but “in the spirit of the times.”   He did not call any judge “Hitler” or a “Nazi.” 

While the Nazi discussion did weave into his prepared remarks of about judicial “mullahs," he offered a single conclusion that is unreported by the press account before he commenced his planned speech.  He stated that educating to improve intelligence or advance culture was not education’s highest calling.  Rather, he contended that pinnacles of intellectualism, culture, and learning were meaningless unless education also instilled “virtue.”  His position was that the lack of virtue in the German elite (who were as cultured and educated as any group in the world) was their failing when confronted with the evil of the Nazis.

ADDED: The emailer is Drew Cloutier.

UPDATE: The NYT piece now has an update, linking to this post.

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Does anyone in the Bible ever say "hello"?

It's all translation, if it's in English, and "hello" is a pretty recent English word. (The OED puts its earliest use in the year 1827.) I spent some time with the various translations at BibleGateway, and I found at least one that has "hello" — the Contemporary English Version, within which "hello" appears exactly twice:

Job 17:14 Then I could greet the grave as my father and say to the worms, “Hello, mother and sisters!”

Matthew 26:49 Judas walked right up to Jesus and said, “Hello, teacher.” Then Judas kissed him.

Great material! Job and Judas come across as a couple of darkly edgy comedians.

Why was I looking for "hello" in the Bible? I got caught up — after writing this post — in the meaning of "hail" in "Hail Mary." I was puzzling over whether or not there should be a comma between "hail" and "Mary," which I was reading to mean basically "Hello, Mary." But the Contemporary English Version of the Bible doesn't use "Hello, Mary" in the relevant verse (which is Luke 1:28). (It has: "The angel greeted Mary and said, 'You are truly blessed! The Lord is with you.'")

A common alternative word for "hail" in that verse is "rejoice." I'm also seeing "Greetings!" which seems pretty close to Hello. I thought about other uses of "hail." Meade — who grew up in West Lafayette, home of Purdue — brought up "Hail Purdue." That made me, an alumna of the University of Michigan, think of "Hail! to the victors valiant." And then there's "Hail to the Chief" and "Hail to thee, blithe spirit!" (beginning Shelley's "To a Skylark").

What does "hail" mean beyond "hello"?

"Heil Hitler" is translated as "Hail Hitler." It's not "Hello Hitler," which seems edgily absurd. You could sing it to the tune of "Hello, Dolly," which has a comma, I might note, unlike Hello Kitty.

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