How Economists Think of Lawyers: The Way Cats Think of Small Birds: Archive Entry From Brad DeLong's Webjournal

June 13, 2002

How Economists Think of Lawyers: The Way Cats Think of Small Birds

So I open my email inbox Thursday afternoon to discover that Glenn Reynolds, Tom Maguire, and company have elevated me to the high and mighty rank of Democratic Party Hack. Alas! The real ideological partisans scorn me: I have too great a tendency to think about what I should say and then say what I think, rather than to simply jerk my knee and line up in my assigned place on some ideology- or patronage-based team.

My take on why I have been elevated to this rank? I think that Reynolds and company want very badly to say something critical about New York Times columnist Paul Krugman. Unfortunately for them, Krugman's recent column has nothing to take exception to: who denies that, when Bill Clinton lined up against Gephardt and Bonior and on the same side as Gingrich on issues of international economic policy, he did so not out of political calculation but because he really thought it was the right thing to do?

So since they can't argue substance, they decide to try to argue procedure. I can imagine what they thought: "Paul Krugman quotes Brad DeLong! And he doesn't say that DeLong was Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Clinton administration!! That's 'material nondisclosure'!!! Krugman has done a bad thing!!!!" Never you mind that this isn't an issue on which there is any partisan dispute, and thus that 'disclosure' of the partisan allegiance of one's sources is not relevant.

To an economist like me this style of--let's be polite, and call it "lawyerlike"--discourse is sad. It's a style of argument common in America--I think because we have so many, many lawyers. If the substance of the issue is against you you drop the substance--try your best to make the listener forget what the big issue is (in this case, is Krugman right?)--and, instead, argue that there is something wrong with your adversary's procedure.

This is, I think, the reason that we economists regard most lawyers like cats regard small birds: Flighty things. Unable to keep their minds focused on what matters. And our lawful prey.

Here is the Krugman column at issue:

The Rove Doctrine

By PAUL KRUGMAN

Some months ago an academic colleague -- a man with strong Democratic connections -- urged me to write a couple of columns praising the Bush administration. "What should I praise?" I asked.

There was a long pause -- funny, isn't it, how "balance" becomes a goal in itself? -- but eventually he came up with something: "How about its commitment to free trade?"

Ahem. In fact, George W. Bush has turned out to be quite protectionist. The steel tariff and the farm bill attracted the most attention, but they are part of a broader picture that includes the punitive (and almost completely unjustified) tariff on Canadian softwood lumber and the revocation of Caribbean trade privileges. When it comes to free trade, the Bush administration is all for it -- unless there is some political cost, however small, to honoring its alleged principles.

Which brings me to the story that has Washington's political groupies twittering: that Esquire article in which the White House chief of staff, Andy Card, frets that with the moderating influence of Karen Hughes gone, the hard-liner Karl Rove will run the show. If the past 18 months have been what policy looks like with Mr. Rove only partly in control, one shudders to think what comes next.

For the most distinctive feature of Mr. Rove's modus operandi is not his conservatism; it's his view that the administration should do whatever gives it a political advantage. This includes, of course, exploiting the war on terrorism -- something Mr. Rove has actually boasted about. But it also includes coddling special interests.

One of Bill Clinton's underappreciated virtues was his considerable idealism when it came to economic policy. The Berkeley economist Brad DeLong lauded Mr. Clinton's "record of being willing to take major political risks in order to do what he thinks is right for the country as far as international economic policy is concerned." What he had in mind was the way Mr. Clinton went out on a limb, defying the polls and reaching across party lines, to pass the North American Free Trade Agreement in 1993, and the even bigger risks he took to rescue Mexico from its financial crisis in 1995. Like Mr. DeLong, I know some of the key players in both of those decisions, and I'm sure that they were taken on the merits: the Clintonites really, truly believed they were doing the right thing.

That scrupulousness continued to the end. If Bill Clinton had given the steel industry the tariffs it wanted, Al Gore would probably be living in the White House. But administration officials actually worried about the consequences -- for the nation, and for the world economy -- of giving in to special interests.

Mr. Rove's administration has no use for such niceties. The deals don't stop with trade and farm subsidies. As analysts at the Cato Institute point out, the Bush-Cheney energy plan may have been conservative in the sense that it was anti-environmentalist, but otherwise it was stuffed full of things free-marketeers are supposed to abhor: expanded government power to seize private land (for transmission lines), large tax incentives for energy sources that don't pay their way at market prices (nuclear power, in particular). The energy plan wasn't about principles; it was about payback.

And if the administration won't take a stand on principle, who will? I was particularly struck by a story in the newspaper The Hill titled "Unions taking fresh look at G.O.P." It quoted the U.A.W. spokesman saying his union was "looking beyond party labels" to where politicians stand "on certain issues." In other words, his union will go with whoever caters to its special interests.

To some extent we've been here before. Paula Stern, the former head of the International Trade Commission, matter-of-factly describes Ronald Reagan as "the most protectionist president since Herbert Hoover," and says that he "legitimized efforts by powerful industries to use political muscle -- not necessarily economic merit or legal criteria" to get what they wanted. So in a way Mr. Bush is following in Mr. Reagan's footsteps.

But it seems to me that it's worse this time -- that we are witnessing a race to the bottom in interest-driven politics, taking us to depths not seen since before the New Deal. And if that Esquire story is to be believed, it's about to get even worse. Smoot-Hawley, anyone?

Posted by DeLong at June 13, 2002 05:53 PM

Brad, don't assume that economists are higher on the food chain than lawyers. I'd see it the other way - the most significant aspect of economics from the mid-1970's to now is that the GOP can always find a couple of top eocnomists to go along with their doctrines, no matter how silly. And that the rest of the economics profession is not as willing to publicly oppose this.

IMHO, the WSJ editorial page alone scored a few hundred hits on the integrity of the economics profession in the past quarter-century.

And considering how quickly the Clinton administration's performance has been consigned to the dustbin of political history, the points that good, non-partisan economics can score seem to be erased very easily.

Barry

Posted by: Barry on June 14, 2002 09:55 AM

Well, now I feel bad. Did I call the Professor a "Democratic Party Hack?" It doesn't sound like me, and I can't find such a characterization anywhere in my post. Nor in the Reynolds post, and we are the only two cited. Possibly this is a rhetorical ploy to demonize the opponent in a debate by exagerating their positions, thereby eliciting sympathy from the audience - naaah, that would be a lawyer's trick.

Oh, but let's not trust my memory. Let's go to the videotape:

"...if Prof. DeLong had been further identified as a Deputy Assistant Secretary of the United States Treasury for Economic Policy, from 1993 to 1995, and as an expert witness who testified on behalf of the Gore campaign in the Florida 2000 election."

"...disclose the source's full background so that readers can assess the **possibility** of an otherwise hidden agenda at work..

"DeLong's role in the Florida vote trial was a bit more nuanced"

"I believe it is fair to say that both Democrats and Republicans knew which side of the suit they were on, and DeLong certainly knew which side he was testifying for..."

"the **possible** concealment of a **possible** partisan tilt by DeLong is at issue here"

And that seems to be it for the Professor. And I daresay, my comments sound even more guarded taken in context.

So, Democratic Party Hack? I'm certainly sorry that you took it that way. Does that help? I'm also sorry that I'm not sorry for what I posted, so that's two apologies. And I'm sorry to get hung up on actually reading what I wrote, rather than just grasping some ethereal substance, so that's three apologies. Sort of.

Actually, I suspect that the Professor's ire was inspired by the Brothers Judd post, which was a bit less flattering. I had to link them, since they broke the story, but I don't think it would be fair to say that I adopted their characterization, if in fact they were offensive.

As to the substance of the Professor's post, hey, if Krugman doesn't want to follow the rules at the Times, fine. Put a disclaimer at the bottom of the column, describing it as unedited half-truths, or stop writing it (we should live so long). The rest of us follow rules all day long.

Have a nice weekend, all.

Oh, and did you hear the one about the lawyer, the economist, and the priest....

Regards,

Regards

Posted by: Tom Maguire on June 14, 2002 02:01 PM

> To an economist like me this style of--let's be polite,
> and call it "lawyerlike"--discourse is sad.

Gosh, how is it polite to attribute to innocent lawyers the rhetorical ethics of newspaper opinion writers and various political partisans? It's not like we're at the absolute bottom of the ethical pile. (I mean, look at what people in polls say about journalists and politicians...).

I come here an innocent visitor and find myself slurred.

[Prof. Krugman wrote:]
>Some months ago an academic colleague -- a man with strong Democratic
>connections -- urged me to write a couple of columns praising the
>Bush administration.
>"What should I praise?" I asked.

How about its getting "fast track" trade negotiation authority passed by the House?

After all, fast track is the big enchilada of trade issues. If everything else is going to get called up, it seems only reasonable to mention the big one.

And getting it through the House (and on to the friendlier Senate) would seem to be something of an accomplishment -- especially in light of the highly-praised prior administration's inability to do so. As singularly dedicated to free trade as it no doubt was, it got only 29 of 199 votes from it's own Democratic congress people in support the last time fast track went down.
But the ever-compromising Bushies get it through. Do results count?

Perhaps in fairness one might also have mentioned the Bush administration's own explanation for all its admitted expedient concessions to the protectionists -- that in the world of politics one has to give on secondary issues to get on primary ones.

Of course, when politicians' lips move they can be suspected of lying, and I suspect Prof. Krugman takes that as given with Republicans, so maybe he just took this as a disingenuous excuse that he didn't want to dignify by repeating.

OTOH, fast track passed by only one vote, and there was a lot of arm twisting involved, so it's plausible to believe that every deal was necessary. (And since it has to be voted upon again, still is. The marginal vote carries some power.)

And this line of thinking could suggest that all the bemoaned concessions wouldn't have been necessary to begin with if the prior administration hadn't been the first to lose fast track authority in 24 years. But that would imply a sort of shared responsibility that doesn't seem really consistent with the tone of the rest of the piece.

Anyhow, it's always an issue in politics as to what's more important, keeping high principles or getting things done.

Fast track isn't through yet by a long shot. But if it survives the conference committee in substance I'll score this round for the Bushies.

OTOH, if it doesn't they'll have given up a hell of a lot for nothing.

Here's a thought for future discussion: With the fate of fast track still so close and uncertain, could it realistically been passed without the deals with the special interests that Prof. Krugman so condemns?

> It's a style of argument common in America--I think because we have
> so many, many lawyers. If the substance of the issue is against you
> you drop the *substance*...

Oh, that's rhetoric and politics 101 back to ancient times -- please don't blame human nature on us lawyers.

Prof. Krugman once was the champion of cutting through afactual political rhetoric with economic substance. If the claim was that cheap foreign labor unfairly undercuts the US, he revealed the the data that shows foreign wages worldwide really do run with productivity. If the claim was that a population can't survive continually importing more goods than it exports, he showed that NYC does. If the claim was that everyone was richer in the golden age of the 1950s, he had the data showing that Ozzie and Harriet's income was barely above today's poverty line.

So it pains me to now read him proclaiming "global warming could end civilization" when the IPCC estimates that, if unchecked, it will reduce world GDP by 3% in 2100 ... and to read him wondering whether the Bushies want corporate tax shelters to continue growing until corporate taxes are eliminted -- without first checking to see if the trend line in the national accounts for the effective corporate tax rate gives any support to the notion that such a trend exists, etc., etc. As a reader I feel something has been lost since _Slate_ days.

I apologize for running on so long here, sometimes we lawyers can't help ourselves. It's a character thing.

But I did enjoy the idea of a cat imagining its natural prey is vultures.
;-)

Posted by: Jim Glass on June 14, 2002 03:29 PM

Mr. Glass wrote:

>if the prior administration hadn't been the
>first to lose fast track authority in 24 years

Surely Mr. Glass is not blaming President Clinton for the fact that Newt Gingrich failed to rally his troops for fast track in 1998? There is enough to blame Clinton for, without adding to his bill the deeds of Newt Gingrich.

It is a truth of rhetoric that adding a weak point like this to an argument puts the entire argument in danger: readers think as follows, "if the writer believed in his case, he wouldn't think he had to pile Pelion upon Ossa by reinforcing his case with every weak and dodgy argument he can think of."

Adam Smith

Posted by: Adam Smith on June 15, 2002 04:31 PM

Adam Smith wrote:

>"Surely Mr. Glass is not blaming President Clinton for the fact
> that Newt Gingrich failed to rally his troops for fast track in
>1998?

Republican troops voted 151-71 on fast track.
Democratic troops voted 29-170 on fast track.

Who failed to rally the troops?

(I'll keep it short from now on.)

Posted by: Jim Glass on June 15, 2002 09:09 PM

1998: 29 Democratic votes for fast track, 151 Republican votes

2001: 21 Democratic votes for fast track, 194 Republican votes

Given the extent to which Democratic House members rely on the AFL-CIO for campaign workers and campaign financing, and given the AFL-CIO's self-destructive opposition to free trade, it is highly unlikely that any president will ever get significant numbers of Democrats to vote for any fast track bill.

Thus whether a president gets fast track authority seems to depend on whether the (Republican) Speaker of the House turns the faucet on, or leaves it alone.

Posted by: Adam Smith on June 15, 2002 10:30 PM

On reflection, there is a sense in which Mr. Glass is correct. As Barney Frank once told my next-door-office-neighbor Barry Eichengreen at a hearing, "The end of the Cold War has robbed you [economic internationalists] of 50 votes in this chamber." Before the end of the Cold War, you could expect a lot--perhaps 80 to 100--Democrats to vote for free trade and other internationalist economic measures as part of our Grand Strategy for containing the Soviet Union.

Given where the Democrats' funding and campaign foot-soldiers come from, and given the AFL-CIO's beliefs, you are as likely these days to get large numbers of House Democrats voting for freer trade as you are likely to get them voting to restrict opportunities for trial lawyers, or to put all media productions in the public domain five years after their creation.

But I don't think this excuses Ole' Newt's failure to round up the votes back in 1998. It's one thing to assume political postures when it doesn't matter for the future of the country--when the issue is going to go your way anyway. It's quite another when it does matter, and when your assuming a political posture is going to cause serious damage.

Brad DeLong

Posted by: Brad DeLong on June 16, 2002 06:49 AM

Fair enough: Democrats are captives of special interests when it comes to trade. But what about Republicans? Are there no anti-trade interests to whom they are beholden? If there aren't, then why does Paul Krugman portray Bush's trade policy as a capitulation to political expediency? And if there are, why is any sort of special explanation needed for the fact that a Speaker who was six weeks away from resigning could only get 68% of his members to deliver fast-track authority to a President of the opposite party?

Posted by: Paul Zrimsek on June 16, 2002 10:15 AM

Re. comments by Prof. DeLong and Mr. Zrimsek:

My intention in my logorrheic comments above was not to throw stones about what happened in 1998, but to point out that there is heavy politics to fast track.
Moreover, fast track is the trade issue that matters. The U.S. needs it for the Doha Round to succeed. If the Doha round fails, that could be an historical turning point for the worse. (I don't want to get melodramatic, but IMHO.) All the other stuff is small stuff, relatively.
Fast track hangs by just one vote in the House, literally. Which gives a whole lot of bargaining (extortion) power to a whole lot of special interests working through both parties.

When one condemns all the protectionist deals going down without mentioning fast track at all it seems to me one is skipping past the real issue on trade policy today. Which is: are the deals necessary to secure fast track? If not, they're just bad. If so, they're the necessary cost for a greater good.

I don't know if the deals are necessary, or will work. Maybe fast track now is politically impossible, so we should give up on it and stick to principle on the other issues instead of futilely giving away the store.
But how can we discuss trade policy without talking about it? If we want fast track *and* to stick to principle too, can we avoid making payoffs on a host of other trade issues to secure that marginal vote?
I really don't know. But if so, how, what's the better strategy? That's what I'd like to read an "insider" writing about.

Condemning deals on secondary issues while ignoring their relation to the prime issue and being generally aghast that there is politics in Washington is an approach that I don't find particulary enlightening.

Posted by: Jim Glass on June 16, 2002 01:46 PM

Gee, all I did was link to Tom Maguire's piece criticizing Krugman for not disclosing. Somehow this has morphed into me calling DeLong a Democratic hack. But I'm not sure how, exactly.

Posted by: Glenn Reynolds on June 16, 2002 06:43 PM

While I'm still suspicious of Bush's motives, I will admit that the case for the steel tariff as a piece of good-faith bargaining towards a more important goal is stronger than it looked at first. But even if it was honest, it still looks to me like an honest mistake. Fast-track authority is not an end in itself; it's useful only insofar as it results in concrete achievements in freeing trade-- and if we're lucky, the next round of talks might produce just enough progress to counterbalance the damage done by the steel tariff. Considering that any agreement will still have to be ratified by the same selfless defenders of the public interest who passed the farm bill and had to be bribed into granting fast-track authority, it might not even do that.

Posted by: Paul Zrimsek on June 17, 2002 05:45 AM

Two comments on the vote totals for fat-track in 1998 and 2000. First, the end result can be deceptive - once a bill is known to be headed for defeat, or victory, people vote their expediency rather than their principle. Once this bill looked like a loser, many Demoocrats probably hopped off, and no doubt some Republicans did too.

Secondly, I appled my amazing "quote shifter" to this:

"But I don't think this excuses Ole' Newt's failure to round up the votes back in 1998. It's one thing to assume political postures when it doesn't matter for the future of the country--when the issue is going to go your way anyway. It's quite another when it does matter, and when your assuming a political posture is going to cause serious damage."

When I struck "Ole Newt" and replaced it with "Dick Gephardt" or "Bill Clinton", it read just the same way. Didn't it?

Or are we saying that it is not fair to expect Democrats to put the country first?

Posted by: Tom Maguire on June 17, 2002 06:36 AM

>>When I struck "Ole Newt" and replaced it with "Dick Gephardt" or "Bill Clinton", it read just the same way. Didn't it? Or are we saying that it is not fair to expect Democrats to put the country first?<<

This is somewhat bizarre. Remember: the original point that Paul Krugman was making was the--true--claim that on international economic policy Clinton *did* put the country first.

Posted by: Brad DeLong on June 17, 2002 07:00 AM

That is a fair point re: Clinton. But it would be a lawyer's trick to pretend that rebutting an opponent's weaker argument rebuts the whole, so set Clinton aside, if that helps, and let's focus on the substance of my question.

Was Gephardt putting the country first? Was the Democratic party generally putting the country first? Or again, is that only the responsibility of "Ole Newt" and the Republicans?

Posted by: Tom Maguire on June 17, 2002 08:26 AM

>>Was Gephardt putting the country first?<<

Yes. Gephardt's not a believer in free trade. He believes the U.S. should limit imports to increase union power in order to achieve a fairer distribution of income.

The moments when Gephardt sounds "internationalist" are the moments when Gephardt is sacrificing what he sees as policy principle for the political advantage of making himself more attractive to the free-trade remnants of the "wise men" Democratic international relations establishment.

Many of Gephardt's principles aren't my principles, but he is a strong and principled guy.

Posted by: Brad DeLong on June 17, 2002 09:45 AM

" Yes. Gephardt's not a believer in free trade. He believes the U.S. should limit imports to increase union power in order to achieve a fairer distribution of income."

Ooh! We can make good use of this argument.

How about, Bush is a believer in lower marginal tax rates for the rich, privatizing social security, 15 mpg SUVs, the elimination of the death tax, free market pricing for electricity....

Because Bush believes that these policies promote economic growth, and that is good for the country. Thus Bush is "putting the country first", and Krugman should lay off him?

Posted by: Patrick R. Sullivan on June 17, 2002 03:37 PM

'After all, fast track is the big enchilada of trade issues. If everything else is going to get called up, it seems only reasonable to mention the big one.'

What, exactly, is so damned wonderful about fast track? I'm all for free trade, but I have no idea how cutting the constitutionally-implied participation of the legislative branch in the process improves things.

'While I'm still suspicious of Bush's motives, I will admit that the case for the steel tariff as a piece of good-faith bargaining towards a more important goal is stronger than it looked at first. But even if it was honest, it still looks to me like an honest mistake.'

Would this argument make sense to you if 'Bush' is replaced with 'Clinton?' Have you seen that leaked Rove powerpoint with "Steel workers" listed in the "gain votes" column?

'How about, Bush is a believer in lower marginal tax rates for the rich, privatizing social security, 15 mpg SUVs, the elimination of the death tax, free market pricing for electricity....'

Bush is empirically and theoretically wrong; so is Gephardt, but both believe that it's politically advantages and Good For The Country to propose their respective positions.

Back to the actual original discussion: Clinton made a politically damaging, technically correct decision that he thought was beneficial to the nation to support trade on a bunch of issues (NAFTA, GATT, steel). Bush made a politically helpful, technically wrong decision that he thought was *not* beneficial to the nation to oppose trade, in the steel case. Their actions were the complete opposite of each other, unless Bush really doesn't think free trade is good, which I haven't seen argued anywhere.

The issue is selling out your own principles for political profit, regardless of the syntatic hand-waving. One of the few things I *like* about the GOP is their principled stand on trade, and what do they do? Whore it out for a few pieces of silver.

Whew, maybe that Judas comparision is over the top.

Posted by: Jason McCullough on June 17, 2002 07:35 PM

"In a letter to [United Steelworkers of America George] Becker Thursday, White House Chief of Staff John Podesta cited several unprecedented actions the Administration has launched to limit steel imports, which have again surged significantly in recent months.

"Podesta’s letter said President Clinton has:

*Directed the Secretary of Commerce -- for the first time ever – to examine the unfair trade impact on the U.S. steel industry being created by the absence of environmental regulations on steel producers in developing countries, and to consider the implications of Wall Street’s unwillingness to finance modernization being sought by several major U.S. steel producers.
*Directed Treasury to seek a moratorium on any lending by the World Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development that would increase current levels of over-capacity in steel production globally.
*Already ordered Under Secretary of Commerce Robert LaRussa to meet with the Ukrainian government, as well as directing the Secretary of Commerce to immediately contact senior-level officials in Taiwan, India and China -–countries responsible for recent surges in imports of steel products."

-- USWA press release, 10/26/00

Posted by: Paul Zrimsek on June 18, 2002 05:02 AM

I'm with Jason on this one - fast track is like the communion wafer for free traders and nobody else knows why. They say stupid things like "we can't negotiate without it." Like any rational being is going to say to the world's largest market "Hey, if I can't have this agreement in exactly this form by Monday then I'll have to do my business with Zimbabwe instead. Sorry."

Give me a break.

Bush wants fast track so bad because he can bring ugly trade agreements to the country and then demagogue (you're for growth or against growth!!) when the Democrats refuse to give them the thumbs up. Since the bad parts will be highly technical and buried in the back he knows that the average Joe won't understand (or more truthfully, since I have great respect for the average Joe, the media won't even properly explain) the objections.

Instead he'll hear statistics pulled completely out of some friendly economist's a$$ like how this will increase GDP by 3.27458% (+/- .00003%) and decrease the rate of growth of the deficit by 9.76231% like they even have a clue.

Jesus.

Posted by: on June 18, 2002 07:06 AM

'"Podesta’s letter said President Clinton has:'

.....in other words, he pretended to be doing something about it while doing no such thing.

'Bush wants fast track so bad because he can bring ugly trade agreements to the country and then demagogue (you're for growth or against growth!!) when the Democrats refuse to give them the thumbs up.'

Ah, I wouldn't say that; I just think it's an executive branch power grab. Clinton was for it too.

Ironically, the biggest loser under fast-track might be GOP contributers; the domestic textile industry (Roger Milliken?), for example, has ridiculously stiff protections, contributes almost entirely to the Republicans, and has the most to lose.

Posted by: Jason McCullough on June 18, 2002 11:11 AM

The problem with us lawyers, as opposed to economists, is that lawyers focus on procedure rather than substance?

But Professor, procedure is what keeps the substance honest! How can we know whether someone like Padilla is really guilty if we don't give him a fair trial? Or how can we know whether an economist's conclusions are correct if we don't critically examine his methodology?

Posted by: rea on June 18, 2002 05:18 PM

> Professor, procedure is what keeps the substance honest!

"Of course Charlie speaks highly of Og -- Charlie worked for Og!" is hardly an argument invented by us lawyers. People threw that around and about their caves.

And it's actually a fair point both ways.
* If Charlie worked for Og and did well, he may be predisposed to speak in Og's favor and not be impartial.
* If Charlie is a known good guy and voluntarily worked for Og and speaks well of the experience, this may indicate that Og is a good guy too.

Larger context is needed to make any judgment.

Now, the difference between lawyers using this argument and it being used in journalism-and- blogs-and-politics is that in the latter world it is going to go round-and-round with people crying 'deceit!', 'character assassin!', 'you're acting like a goddamed lawyer!' and so on.

While in a legal venue the judge -- who is just a lawyer with a regular salary -- will quickly say "That's enough, you made your point, move on", and the folks will have to get on with dealing with the larger context.

Posted by: Jim Glass on June 19, 2002 10:45 PM