The disordered soul

Fr. Schall had his own peculiar way of trying to prove I was not "self-sufficient" at Georgetown.

When he found out I did not brook his conservative line, he tried (and failed) to have me thrown out of the Hilltop on (false) plagiarism charges.

True story.

"we" can't even "govern ourselves" with a balanced budget...
"our insatiable appetites" go beyond common personal excesses...
even our leadership governs with immaturity...
since of course they are as much "disordered souls" as the common folk...
so...
if the few ever come to realize that they are "self-insufficient"...
what's to stop the vast majority from continuing their insatiable ways?
besides a miracle, that is...

faith hope love joy peace to all...

Rock said, "We can blather all we want about SUVs and McMansions. But most human beings don't want to live like the homeless, even if this might please the enviromentalists."

This is true; but isn't there a happy medium somewhere? Are our only choices the street corner or the McMansion, the SUV or the horse and buggy? It seems like we're quick to reject the notion of even reasonable restraint, which seems to bolster the notion "...that we are destroying ourselves by degree because we refuse to govern our appetites or even see these appetites as problematic."

I think the point is, to paraphrase the National Lampoon Radio Hour, "All power to the correct appetites!" ;-)

Erin Manning wrote:

This is true; but isn't there a happy medium somewhere? Are our only choices the street corner or the McMansion, the SUV or the horse and buggy? It seems like we're quick to reject the notion of even reasonable restraint, which seems to bolster the notion "...that we are destroying ourselves by degree because we refuse to govern our appetites or even see these appetites as problematic."

I suppose we could analyze why not everyone owns an SUV or a McMansion. Cost is probably a big considerations for many people. Sometimes I think that I might like to have a larger house with a larger kitchen and more living space, given the somewhat cramped housing arrangement I have right now. I also can see the advantages of owning an SUV. I can't afford the mortgate payment on a McMansion and I can't afford the payment or the gasoline cost of an SUV. So, I do without both.

But this has more to do with not earning enough money than it does believing in some abstract principle of "governing our appetites."

Most people who have money spend the money on their appetites. This is true for Al Gore and others.

I think we are fooling ourselves if we think that human beings aren't hard-wired to want things that make their lives more comfortable. This dosen't mean that every super-rich movie star is going to own 8 sports cars or a 30,000 square foot home. The super-rich might eventually satisfy most of their appetities.

The other 99 percent of the human population, however, is going to try to satisfy their appetites whenever they can afford to and aren't going to restrain their appetites for reasons other than "I can't afford to satisfy that appetities of mine for a larger house."

We might wish human beings had a different nature. But human nature is what it is and it won't change.

Nothing is more pointless than issuing grand sweeping generalizations about the naughty, naughty things that "disordered" people do. Especially when "we" refer to the lamentable acts as things that "we" do, even though the speaker in no way includes him or herself in that group, but in point of fact considers him/herself to be far superior to naughty "us" and "our" disordered appetites. I guess I've listened to too many sermons by Catholic priests in my day, many of which took this form. "Father" was frequently heard to talk of "our" materialism, and "our" selfishness in "our" marriages, and "our" lack of appreciation for the sacraments. He didn't mean himself, of course. He meant "alla y'all."

Meanwhile, I think Larry makes an excellent point. If a teacher can't behave decently to students and exercise his daily authority with integrity, why the heck should we listen to his grandiose pronouncements about "us"? To exercise moral suasion, you have to have moral standing.

...we are destroying ourselves by degree because we refuse to govern our appetites or even see these appetites as problematic...it's whether or not we will govern ourselves and our insatiable appetites.

Ah, peak oil. Finally it's hit the mainstream after years of hiding in the blogs and forums of 9/11 truthers, survivalist kooks and Bush-bashers.

Now I expect to see the same bitter arguments in Rod's blog that I've read since 9-11 in Mike Ruppert's web site, Kunstler's blog, the Oil Drum, and dozens of Google Groups and Yahoo Groups. Is peak oil real? What do I do? Buy gold, build a shelter, plant a garden, etc?

One thing's for sure, our "non-negotiable American way of life" just became negotiable. Bush's advice to "go shopping" to teach the terrorists a lesson will go down in history as one of the most idiotic pronouncements ever made by a US president.

There's no need to wonder why we refuse to govern our appetites. Everywhere we look we're told to buy, and our leaders either have no clue or are intent on destroying all traces of American government.

Problem is, what happens when the apocalypse fails, as it will, to arrive on schedule?

Peak oil isn't philosophy, it's geology and statistics. King Hubbert accurately predicted that US oil production would peak in 1970, and his prediction was spot-on correct. Predicting the peak of global oil production is more difficult for a number of reasons, but the process is essentially the same.

While it can be disheartening to contemplate a world without cheap, ubiquitous oil, that doesn't change the simple fact that oil is finite, and we will indeed reach a peak point in production and then descend into depletion.

You could be right, we could apply technical band-aids in the form of coal, wind, solar and nuclear energy. But none of those is portable like oil, and as we see, our current "leaders" would much rather fight ineffably expensive oil wars for decades to come than propose the band-aids you're hoping for.

Peak Oil/Global Warming enthusiasts

The two are nothing alike.

Man-made Global Warming is more religion than science. It has never been modeled to a level to convince reasonable skeptics who actually examine the data (less than 1% have). It's a scientific wet-dream: you can't disprove it and you just keep tweeking models and moving your dates out. It's a golden goose that keeps on delivering research dollars, and secularist liberals need a new religion, so it's perfect!

Peak oil, however is nothing like this. There is no government or scientific motivation to want it to be true. It is NOT a kook issue. It's already proven to be predictable - it was predicted for U.S. Land 50 over years ago, and it came in right on schedule (peaked in 1971). We can't get a good date worldwide because OPEC/Russia hides their data, be we can get close guesses. And we are close.

The world WILL peak unless we slow consumption through very high prices. And this means a recession until a replacement is obtained. The price must rise to painful levels (and Europe/Oz pay about $10/gal right now w/ tax at the pump without flinching, so I mean *well* over $10/gal) to get a meaningful drop in consumption. Remember, oil needs to be $135/bbl to even equal 1970-80 percentage of GDP. We need $300-$500 bbl oil to seriously dampen worldwide consumption. We are not replacing current reserves with $100/bbl oil right now: not because we are not drilling like crazy, but because it just ain't there.

It's all about discovery of new oil. Look at the data yourself. Oil companies are sitting awash billions in cash due to high prices because they have nowhere good to drill and are putting the money into solar and that junk. Remember, it takes years even after discovery to extract new oil even if it's found later. Rig rates are 2-4 times what they were a few years ago - every dang junky rig (and every old loser retired drilling guy) is being concripted right now, yet with little new oil forthcoming, and few new rigs are being built because there is nowhere good to drill except the Middle East and Russia. Does that warm your heart?

I repeat, as an Adam Smith guy (Hayek is my hero) and someone who knows a little bit about drilling: peak oil is nothing like global warming. It's solid economic reality, supply and demand. Don't let a bunch of liberal kooks hijack this issue. We will peak, and we need conservative policies (read: free market) to deal with it. If we let liberals claim this issue, high oil prices will wreck our economy due to libs non-free market solutions.

M_David--what would a free-market solution look like for the US, considering that the vast majority of the world's oil is not under our control? What free market sets the rules, and how would it work without some government regulation? I'm not snarking--I'm genuinely interested. I've just started reading about the subject, and it's pretty scary.

what would a free-market solution look like for the US, considering that the vast majority of the world's oil is not under our control?

Iraq.

Brian, either you're joking, or your grasp of geological timescales is laughable. It will take literally millions of years for nature to replace the oil drilled in the last century. I have every confidence that homo sapiens will be long extinct by then.

Thanks, sig.

Ironically, for our extraordinarily different politics and theologies, Fr. Schall was a fantastic teacher. But, needless to say, I lost all respect for him after that.

For Will:

That there is some finite amount of oil in the world is a reasonable enough proposition, beyond that Peak Oil is a speculative endeavor based on fragmentary evidence of variable reliability and accuracy. If I believed I had the world oil supply calculated down to the hour, day or even decade my first call would be to a commodities broker rather than an ASPO conference.

I'm not hoping for Band-Aids but I'm not rejecting them out of hand in the manner of Jim Kunstler. Technical solutions seem as plausible as total collapse. As it happens, I live my life fairly close to Kunstler's prescriptions but not because I believe in the 'long emergency'. If you'll re-read my original post you will find that I am asking, absent the big stick of doom, why should we want to live any other way? I can think of spiritual answers to that question, and that accounts for my own choices, but what might be the secular case, if any?

For M_David:

I agree the two (peak oil and global warming) are nothing alike but they do attract a same certain type of individual into their camps. For those folks the chief value of peak oil or global warming is that it serves as a pretext for them to proscribe the behavior of others. In this case, benighted McMansion dwellers and SUV drivers.

Cheers,

Basil

Objectively disordered.
(Is this the right thread?)

Jim, I agree with you about the benefits of owning up honestly to my own mistakes and being willing to take a good look at myself, make amends, and change. (See the recent book, Mistakes Were Made, But Not By Me, by Carol Tavris and Elliot Abramson. The first chapter is up on buzzle.com.) What I'm kvetching about is the tendency by self-anointed pundits to piously and publicly confess the sins of others. If Schall, for instance, had written an article in which he spoke of his own participation in social behavior that's greedy and wasteful, and what he thought might be done to improve the situation, I would have found that much more useful.

Matthew: even if that time is 20 years from now (and not even peak oil people are saying that)

A person I greatly respect on oil issues believes we are already at peak. So what you are saying regarding peak oil folk simply isn't true. I have no idea when we will peak (not enough Saudi or deepwater data), but the market certainly doesn't like the current supply chain: $100/bbl oil makes no sense based upon current production rates. This means people that know what's going on are looking into the future of proven reserves and don't like what they see. This makes me uncomforable.

the market will take care of the situation. Prices will rise, consumption will drop, and alternatives will replace oil.

Yeah...sure. Just like that. Let's go over oil shortages in the past:

+ The 1930's, when we America was the world's largest producer and we cut off Japan's oil supply...and they responded by bombing us and getting us into WWII.

+ The 1970's, America peaked in oil production...and Nixon started rationing oil.

Oil feeds the wolf. When the world believes we've hit peak production, it's not going to be fun and games. Oil is not like Twinkies where we can just leave out the Creamy Filling and keep on porking. It is the world highest return-on-energy product ever discovered. The entire world's transportation fleet uses it. We've used it for 100 years. We can't just change this kind of thing overnight, so there simply is no known ceiling to where prices could raise if peak oil hits quickly due to people burying their head in the Saudi sands. Sure, I agree the market works. But prepare to grow through pain, that's all I'm saying.

Tokamak:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tokamak

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_nuclear_fusion

Simon:

You know I was a student at Georgetown from 1987 to 1990. We've talked about it numerous times on CC.

IT HAPPENED. (Believe me, I was as shocked as anyone given how Fr. Schall treated me before.)

Trust me on this one.

Larry, I'm not disputing what did or didn't happen. How would I know?

But that's the whole point. In largely anonymous comboxes, there is no way of verifying anyone's accounts of their personal experiences. Unless you're able/willing to offer up some details that could be independently evaluated, it is not fair to post a one-sided indictment here of Fr. Schall (I, too, am a Hoya and am a friend of Schall), particularly given that the maliciousness you attribute to him is completely out of character.

Random thoughts:

1. The US military's oil consumption of 300-400k bbl/day (*) over the past decade is a rounding error compared with overall US oil consumption of ~20e6 bbl/day. Ditto federal vehicle fleet fuel consumption of 21k bbl/day (**).

2. Turn federal office buildings into "demonstration projects" for conservation technologies like cogeneration, wind-powered HVAC (***), geothermal heat pumps, telecommuting, etc. Replace the entire federal vehicle fleet with PHEV's.

3. Not terribly impressed by CAFE requirements; perhaps they reduce gas consumption...or perhaps they increase miles driven. Supply & demand: If you want to reduce demand for a commodity (gasoline), raise its price (via gas taxes if necessary). Then watch the invisible hand increase average MPG's as market shares for hybrids & SUV's gradually reverse.

4. Mass transit is nice, but the major cultural changes necessitated by intra-city use suggest (to me) that PHEVs may be a more likely solution. As for intercity...medium-haul routes like the Northeast Corridor or SF-to-LA would probably give airlines a run for their money. NYC to LA (or the like)...probably not.

If we want to get a head start on peak oil, I still think we'd need an oil tariff, or gas taxes, or the like, to provide the necessary exploration/conservation incentives. Then let the free market do the rest. The Cato Institute tells me oil futures will save us, but I'm not sure I trust the market to properly price the risks from peak oil & politics 'till it's too late. I could be wrong, however.

(*) See http://www.energybulletin.net/26194.html

(**) "Federal Fleet Report", GSA, Table 1-4, p. 14. Includes USPS.

(***) http://ergosphere.blogspot.com/2005/03/forty-two.html

Erin writes: This is true; but isn't there a happy medium somewhere? Are our only choices the street corner or the McMansion, the SUV or the horse and buggy?

The happy medium is getting squeezed ever tighter. Consider the following.

Not all new houses are "McMansions." But even new houses are built (mostly) in the same way, with particle board, cheap mouldings, ugly design, cheap carpeting - often for a premium price. So the next question is, why do people buy these new houses? Why do they buy SUVs to commute from these ugly, overpriced new houses to their jobs?

There are distinct reasons beyond the "consumerism," "materialism," and "selfishness" which Rod and others decry. For one thing, the inner cities are not the centers of employment anymore. Where I live, for instance, or Chicago, this is really obvious. More and more companies are moving farther and farther away from the inner city cores. Why? All sorts of reasons. For one, costs are lower (especially insurance.) Construction costs are lower, too - it's easier to build from scratch in many cases, than retrofit an old, asbestos-filled building for modern technology wiring / electrical requirements.

Not only are the jobs moving out in concentric rings, but the people are too. Why? #1 reason for many families: schools. Only a tiny fraction of Americans homeschool. Less than 10% use private schools. So for many people, that means public school - and it means public school in places where people *perceive* the public schools to be both safe and good. I don't want to get into an argument about the evilgodlessatheist public schools - just mentioning that for many people, that *is* their choice, and they will organize their lives around it.

Of course, not everyone works out in the way-out burbs. Which is where commuting comes into play. Commutes are increasingly long and arduous. Cars are not only means of transportation; they're an extension of peoples' living rooms. If you have to spend 10-15 hours a week in the car, many people are going to pay for one that's comfortable.

Telecommuting was supposed to be the "last best hope" of ending suburban sprawl and long commutes, but for many people, it's not realistic. Neither is public transit, especially when many light rail lines go through areas where the jobs *aren't* - and where people still have to shop, pick up the kids, or run other errands on the way home. Nor do many people leave work at the same time, which makes carpooling difficult.

I seriously feel for young people starting out, having hard decisions to make about where to live and work. Many people have to make a choice between a "crunchy" old house and a long commute, and have to balance out the school issue. It's not easy, and IMO it's not productive to condemn the standard new house/SUV choices as automatically morally depraved.

MI: Good points all.

I would simply point out by the government moving away from liquid fuels will put in place the technology needed to get started for the rest of us. Sort of like the internet.

But I think we need to slow down the process of high gas prices to allow for orderly change, not speed them up with taxes. It all depends on when you think peak oil is hitting. It all depends on if PO is hitting soon (need to ease the pain), or much later (need to prepare).

Rock: First, we can't drill hundreds of miles below the earth's surface, too hot. Right now five miles is a deep well. Several hundred miles can be lava-time!

Second, there is physics of energy involved here, not just economics. There is a point of energy-in energy-out, where your energy invested is more than you get out. This is what happens when you get too deep or too far in the drilling process. The worry is short term disruptions, and it's a big worry.

stefanie: Many people have to make a choice between a "crunchy" old house and a long commute, and have to balance out the school issue. It's not easy, and IMO it's not productive to condemn the standard new house/SUV choices as automatically morally depraved.

Sure, forget the morals. But if costs do get high enough, we will change regardless of morals. Living out of cars like we do is a luxury, not a necessity. It's something to think about.

Back to the original thread,

It is easy and true for that matter to consider "overconsumption" to be a vice. The devil is in the details however. People tend to see the consumption of others as "excessive" and their own as reasonable. Where somebody has a big kitchen, somebody else has a big car or perhaps were somebody treasures their speedboat, someone else considers world travel to be essential. It's best to look at our own consumption and be critical before finding the fault with others. IMHO.

M. David either didn't know that the Oregon Petition was bogus, or doesn't want to believe it -- that's why he truncated that part of my response to his claim that thousands of climate scientists question the IPCC consensus. In fact, a vanishingly small number of climate scientists doubt the existence or the seriousness of the phenomenon.

And one doesn't need a physics degree to know that the climate is changing, with serious consequences. All one needs do is have a good relationship with the natural world. This is why most hunters and fisherman have already noticed the phenomenon, and are concerned about it.

http://www.fieldandstream.com/fieldstream/columnists/conservation/article/0,13199,1194071,00.html

M. David also claims that I wish to decide questions of science by polling, which is, of course, more b.s. I wouldn't spend time reading scientific papers and talking to these folks if that was true. But since he has vowed to shelve his ignorance on this subject, I'll spare you more discussion of recent research.

I think we need to slow down the process of high gas prices to allow for orderly change, not speed them up with taxes. It all depends on when you think peak oil is hitting. It all depends on if PO is hitting soon (need to ease the pain), or much later (need to prepare).

M_David - Agreed; WRT peak oil, it does depend on timing. Admittedly, I have a second agenda WRT preparedness (i.e., weaning the US off dependence on energy imports), but we've already had that discussion, so I'll not go there again. I would much prefer to see the oil markets render tariffs, etc., unnecessary by accurately pricing both political risk & peak oil.

It is easy and true for that matter to consider "overconsumption" to be a vice. The devil is in the details however. People tend to see the consumption of others as "excessive" and their own as reasonable.

SVS - Agreed, overconsumption is often in the eye of the beholder. Condemnations of "overconsumption" sometimes strike me as less a matter of morality, and more one of personal preference. De gustibus no est disputandum.

IMHO, many "peakniks" (nice term, Will) erroneously see peak oil as a vehicle for "stealth" condemnation of "overconsumption" (actual or perceived), and for promoting social-reform agendas that _just so happen_ to have the welcome side-effect of reducing oil consumption.

For instance, assume (arguendo) that it would be more cost-effective to retrofit existing McMansions with cogeneration, better insulation, heat pumps than to move suburbanites into smaller houses; and to replace SUVs with PHEVs in lieu of mass transit.

How many peakniks would support this? And how many would gnash their teeth at the idea of suburbia & the car culture surviving peak oil? That the latter might well outnumber the former is foolish, but unfortunately not implausible. First priority should be to deal with the impending energy shortage. If social reform must take a back seat, oh well.

"There is still an authentic Catholic priest at Georgetown?" Cleveland

"If you judge trying to throw out students unfairly as 'an authentic Catholic priest,' sure." Larry Parker

Let's see, who do I believe, a conservative priest or Larry; Father Schall or Larry? Gosh, that's a tough one!
---------------------------------------

"Nothing is more pointless than issuing grand sweeping generalizations about the naughty, naughty things that 'disordered' people do....Larry makes an excellent point...why the heck should we listen to [Fr. Schall's] grandiose pronouncements about 'us? To exercise moral suasion, you have to have moral standing."

Yeah, right, Sig. Fr. Schall has no moral standing, nor did the man who said:
"You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how shall it be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trodden under foot by men."

What a pointless, sweeping generalization!

Simon and Cleveland:

I agree the maliciousness was totally out of Fr. Schall's character. All the more reason I was so stunned by the experience.

BTW, it was a paper in his Introduction to Platonic Philosophy class comparing Plato to George Berkeley. Now, why on earth would I remember something that trivial unless it caused something (almost) that destructive in my own life?

"...by their fruits you shall know them." Sig

Bingo!

Yawn. There they go again.

Charles,

After your nap, maybe you could tell us about Psionics!

BTW, it was a paper in his Introduction to Platonic Philosophy class comparing Plato to George Berkeley. Now, why on earth would I remember something that trivial unless it caused something (almost) that destructive in my own life?

Larry,

Taking your allegation at face value, there are obviously many possible explanations (e.g., Schall made a mistake which had nothing to do with an ideological vendetta; or, there was some appropriation of someone else's work but not enough to meet the burden of proof, or not enough to merit disciplinary sanctions).

I'm not accusing you of anything, but we don't really "know" anyone via blog comboxes. Knowing both Schall and his character (not to mention the almost comical notion of someone being railroaded out of Georgetown University for having insufficiently right wing views), I'm not able to accept your side of the story as definitive. Honestly, this isn't anything personal against you, but posting unverifiable innuendo against Fr. Schall -- or anybody else -- in this forum is simply not fair.

Simon:

Your attacks are completely personal against me. And you have forced me to tell the entire, ugly story to defend my own integrity. I was trying to shield Fr. Schall from the worst of it, but I no longer can.

I had heard rumors that winter of 1990 (unverifiable, I grant you) that Fr. Schall was upset at me because I had participated in an anti-Gulf War rally (I know, I know -- it was the wrong war for the right reason or the right war for the wrong reason in retrospect, take your pick). But of course, you know how he conducts his courses -- the only things that count for the grade are at the very end of the semester -- the final paper and the final exam, which of course is one essay question. That's it. So he was inscrutable about it at the time.

Finally, I had turned in my final paper on Plato and Berkeley and was taking my final exam -- my last exam at Georgetown, since I had run out of money and was trying to graduate in 3-1/2 semesters (something Fr. Schall well knew, BTW). It was December 21, 1990.

In his inimitable manner, Fr. Schall liked to come up to you during the final exam to distract you with some idle remark. Only his remark to me wasn't so idle.

"Mr. Parker," he said (all of Fr. Schall's students are "Mr. Smith" or "Ms. Jones"), "I'm afraid I'm going to have to bring you up for plagiarism charges for your final paper. We can discuss how you might contest it after the exam."

I hyperventilated for the next 10 minutes as I saw my future destroyed. Without credit for this class, I would need to re-enroll in the spring (and give up my lined-up job) for thousands of dollars I didn't have. If Georgetown would even allow me back, with a plagiarism charge on my record.

Then I realized -- IF I FAILED THE FINAL EXAM, NONE OF IT WOULD MATTER. I could contest the plagiarism charge later, but an F grade for the exam would almost certainly leave me with an F in the course regardless.

Which may, with 17 years' hindsight, have been his intention. (I realize this is speculation, though well-founded IMHO given the malice
I encountered that day.)

So I steeled up every ounce of concentration I had left and finished the exam, just in time. Then I literally hounded Fr. Schall back to his office in the Intercultural Center (the famous Georgetown building with the solar panels).

"You can't just tell me in the middle of an exam I've committed plagiarism," I told him, angry but mostly out of breath. "Besides, the paper is fully footnoted."

"The problem isn't with your footnotes," he said. "I feel the paper is different enough from our class subject matter that you must have submitted it previously to another class. That's plagiarism. So I'm refusing to grade it."

Let's go back a second. This is 1990. I didn't even have a computer -- I had a Selectric-type typewriter. So unless there were carbon marks on the paper (which there weren't) or it was on copy paper (which it wasn't, it was on that onion-skin-type bond paper you can't even use in a copier), that was impossible for Fr. Schall to detect on its face.

"Fr. Schall," I said with increasing desperation, "the Registrar's office is right across the courtyard at White-Gravenor. I will be glad to run over there and get my full transcript with a list of my professors. And I will be glad to have you call every single one of my professors the last three-and-a-half years to ask if they have previously graded this paper."

Fr. Schall stood there pensively for what seemed like forever, but was probably only 2 or 3 minutes.

"I'll grade your paper," he said, with a note of contempt.

But only, of course, when my final grade for the course was posted could I be sure he hadn't turned me in for an investigation.

Ironically, he liked the paper, sort of. I got a B+. I have never been more thankful for a B+ in my life.

I have been the victim of pranks from teachers over the years. I solemnly assure you, Cleveland and anyone else who doubts my integrity simply because of my ideology (as far too many conservatives do, IMHO), this was no prank.

PS -- If someone doubts whether Fr. Schall would hold a grudge against a student for attending an anti-war rally, consider his most recent commentary on Iraq just a couple of months ago (HTTP://):

crisismagazine.com/sense.htm

Simon: Your attacks are completely personal against me. And you have forced me to tell the entire, ugly story to defend my own integrity. I was trying to shield Fr. Schall from the worst of it, but I no longer can.

Cry me a river, Larry.

YOU brought this up with the very first post on this thread, libelling Fr. Schall. If you're going to hurl inuendo at someone who isn't a public figure about an incident that no one else was privy to, you're not entitled to have everyone else accept your account at face value just because you're a regular poster here.

I know Schall. I do not know you (no one "knows" anyone by interacting simply through comboxes). I didn't force you to tell any story, and your account above does nothing to substantiate your charges. It's just your side of a story, something no one else can verify.

And as it turns out now -- by your own account -- what Fr. Schall actually did was not, in fact, to try to have you expelled on false plagiarism charges because of your political views. He simply threatened -- briefly -- to have you investigated for plagiarism (with no indication that he was motivated by your views about anything), and then relented when you indicated a willingness to let him call other professors.

Not quite the Right Wing Jackboots kicking in your door.

I might add that my time on the Hilltop predates yours, and that in the pre-computer era the practice of recycling term papers for different professors wasn't exactly uncommon.

If I dictated the full details of the story, which are indeed verifiable, it can't be libel.

Besides, there IS someone who can verify it -- Fr. Schall. You're acting as if I didn't know Fr. Schall, either. Sheesh.

PS -- The plagiarism charges were indeed false; and if they had mistakenly been held true, I probably would have been expelled. If not, it certainly would have taken me years more and thousands of dollars more to graduate Georgetown over something that incontrovertibly, despite what you say, was more than a mere "mistake."

You're right in that I have no idea what his true motivations were -- they can only be guesses. But he certainly had them, given the maliciousness of his act.

(And your idea that I had been suspected of cheating before at Georgetown is preposterous. First of all, as you yourself say, you don't know me as anything but a combox poster. Secondly, I had been accepted to Phi Beta Kappa the semester before -- rare for a junior -- which requires not only high grades but a record of honor. Speaking of libel ...)

PPS -- Fr. Schall most certainly is a public figure. Anyone who has written and spoken as much in his career as he has (he is an brilliant scholar and professor, that I've never denied) qualifies.

there IS someone who can verify it -- Fr. Schall.

And he hasn't verified it, has he?

(And your idea that I had been suspected of cheating before at Georgetown is preposterous.

That isn't "my idea" at all. I have no reason to believe you plagiarized anything, and frankly couldn't care less.

I merely point out that there's obviously more than one side to the story, as there is to almost EVERY story. Your account -- even if we assume for the sake of argument that every word of it is true -- doesn't demonstrate that a reasonable person in Schall's position might not have suspected you of plagiarism. It certainly doesn't demonstrate that Schall was motivated by any political or personal animus against you.

Since this was a purely private dispute (though your later posts suggests it was really no more than a brief suggestion by Schall), no one besides you and Schall is in a position to verify any of it. Which is exactly why you shouldn't have posted it here.

Simon:

"Suggestions" don't threaten to ruin people's lives.

Unless they're given by the Mafia.

I wasn't comparing Fr. Schall to the Mafia, Simon.

I was comparing YOU with your ridiculous use of the word "suggestion." Fr. Schall didn't "suggest" I had plagiarized; he outright accused me of it.

PS -- Regardless of Fr. Schall's intentions -- and he had to have had SOME intentions, as far as I can tell, under the circumstances -- my life would have been brought to a catastrophic halt if his original charge had held.

And that, contrary to what you seem to believe, is no lie.

Simon:

It was far more than a probe. It was an accusation. (In the middle of my final exam, no less.)

And you and I both know Fr. Schall is a titan of Georgetown. He could have pushed the charge through had he chosen.

And if he had, you're saying my life would have been okey-dokey? I don't THINK so.

Wow, sig, thanks.

David:

I've calmed down overnight, so let's assess this rationally.

Fr. Schall is a brilliant scholar, a prolific writer, an unbelievable teacher, a dedicated priest, and overall (yes) a good man. The very fact his act was so out of character was what shocked me and rocked me to my core -- along with, of course, the timing at the very, and I mean VERY, end of my studies at Georgetown. (I admit I can think of Georgetown professors where such an act wouldn't have surprised me.)

Do I bear a grudge against him? Yes. I'm human. But it doesn't change any of the facts above.

He is also a man who, on the date of December 21, 1990, committed an egregious act of professorial misconduct (NOT priestly misconduct, although his status as a Jesuit made it all the more shocking). The idea that it was simply a matter of incompetence, as Simon suggests, given Fr. Schall's deserved reputation as a man with a steel trap of a mind, is ludicrous.

What were his motivations? He backed down very quickly from the charge I had actually committed plagiarism, an accusation preposterous on its face given my own (previously) outstanding academic reputation and the facts of the work at hand. I gave my own theory above -- that he was trying to shake me into failing his final exam. Why he would have such a grudge against me, I have admitted, I can only speculate. But I have a couple of good ideas -- and if you feel it was irresponsible of me to share them, so be it.

And the fact is undeniable that, given my particular circumstances at the time of the exam, if the charge had stuck despite my protests, my academic career would have been destroyed.

Simon, you seem to think the two sets of facts above cannot be reconciled. Quite the contrary -- OF COURSE they can be reconciled. Humans are complex animals, as Fr. Schall most of all would acknowledge.

Have you ever read or seen a David Mamet play? Heck, David Mamet has written plays about parallel conflicts between college professors and students ... the key, of course, as sig wonderfully stated above, being the power imbalance.

Which goes back to the issue of "self-sufficiency" which started this whole debate.

He is also a man who, on the date of December 21, 1990, committed an egregious act of professorial misconduct (NOT priestly misconduct, although his status as a Jesuit made it all the more shocking). The idea that it was simply a matter of incompetence, as Simon suggests, given Fr. Schall's deserved reputation as a man with a steel trap of a mind, is ludicrous.

I have not suggested that any incompetence was involved.

I have suggested that, for all anyone else can tell, Schall MAY have made a mistake, OR he MAY have had a reasonable basis for his supposition that your work was plagiarized (which could be true even if your work was not, in fact, plagiarized).

Frankly, I don't care. And nothing in your account gives credence to the notion that this fleeting conversation with Schall involved misconduct, much less "egregious" misconduct, or even that it was particularly noteworthy.

What I do care about is your coming on here and announcing, as though it were a fact to be acknowledged by all, that Fr. Schall "tried" to have you thrown out of Georgetown (even though you later admit he did not, in fact, try), and that he did so because you refused to "brook his conservative line" (when your own account includes not a scintilla of evidence that politics or personality had anything to do with the matter). That's libel.

"It's a really interesting demonstration of how to silence someone, and I'll bet it worked really well when applied in other cases." Sig

There are people--indeed, an entire culture and its political party and media--who developed the despicable "political correctness" tactic to silence people who don't think or believe as they do; baseless accusations, straw man arguments, putting words in peoples' mouths, etc., all designed to change the focus of the debate from the stated facts. It never works.

As with the thread peripherally invloving another controversy, I wasn't going to comment (and in fairness, this thread is very far off topic from its peak-oil theme and I wish Rod had been able to intervene; I understand very well that this isn't his full-time job, but I prefer more active moderation), but: I don't assume that anyone posting on an Internet forum is necessarily who they say they are, unless they post under their real full name (which I wouldn't do). From research, Larry Parker appears to be very real, and posts forthrightly under his full name. (I don't think this thread was the place for the plagiarism dispute, though, and I agree with some of Simon's points.) I have no connection with anyone involved in this story, nor with Georgetown University.

Larry, I'm sorry, but that's not a valid question and comparison. Rod is a journalist, and while one may presume that standards are a bit lax in a personal blog, he has greater responsibility for verifying his facts and faces greater consequences for posting something that either can't be confirmed. The rest of us, you, me, Sig, Simon, Cleveland, we all have no such standards for which we bear objective responsibility.

You have more than enough cause to take this tangent personally. I agree with that completely. Comparing it to something Rod posts on this blog -- where his motivations regularly include a devil's-advocate intention to spur discussion -- is just not valid.

Being the focus of skepticism is never easy and usually rather uncomfortable. I've sat in that seat many times.

Why is it that we automatically believe Rod's anecdotes about schools in Dallas (as he gave in one of his recent posts on illegal immigration) but we automatically disbelieve my anecdotes about schools in Washington, D.C. -- in fact, a specific school, so the anecdote is more verifiable?

I was going to let this thing drop, Larry, but since you persist, here's the deal:

Blogging is impersonal. Discussions and debates here are useful and interesting to the extent participants appeal to reason, or to facts that can be verified by everyone, usually through published reports. Personal anecdotes are helpful and appropriate to the extent they illustrate experiences which generally ring true with others. (e.g., "Thanks to sprawl, the roads in my area are so jammed with traffic that it takes me an hour to drive 10 miles to my home every night.).

What's not appropriate are (1) unverifiable allegations directed at a specific person, or (2) attempts to use one's unverifiable personal experience to clinch an argument and silence one's opponents.

if Simon hadn't been so concerned about destroying my reputation to fellow CCers, I wouldn't have wanted to escalate it, either.

You continue to use red herrings to shift away from the issue here. I have no interest in "destroying your reputation." I merely objected to YOUR patently unfair attempt to destroy Fr. Schall's reputation. That my objection was reasonable borne out by the fact that your original allegation now turns out to have been, to put it mildly, grossly exaggerated:

1. It is NOT TRUE that Fr. Schall "tried (and failed)" to have you thrown out of Georgetown. He told you he thought your paper was plagiarized, but then he relented and agreed not to press the issue before you even left the room.

2. It is NOT TRUE that Fr. Schall indicated (or gave a reasonable person grounds to believe) that his comments about possible plagiarism were improper or motivated by personal or political animus against you.

So since we're now in the business of doubting each other's identities here ... are YOU Fr. Schall

No, I am not. Nor am I in regular contact with him, nor have I spoken to him about this trifle.

It's another red herring to suggest (as sigilaris also does) that I doubt your identity. I have no reason to doubt it -- and couldn't care less.

My point is simply that, as illustrated by the horrific Megan Meiers story which you have (eloquently, BTW) blogged about elsewhere, anyone can say anything online about anyone. So when you hurl a specific charge of impropriety against a specific person -- you'd better be in a position to back it up. In this case, you aren't.

Larry and Simon,

I don't mean to belabor your conflict here, but I respect you both too much to not at least mention some things from a neutral POV. That's important to know here: I am not implying personal support for either of you. Sympathy for Larry, yes, having been in a similar situation myself several times, I can't avoid that sympathy. But Simon's general points are important, too.

The key usage in my previous post is "objective responsibility". I meant that to keep plenty of room for any individual's personal (subjective being the implied complement) commitment to integrity and honesty in written posts. I don't mean this to be at all gratuitous: you both demonstrate that commitment, and I honor you both for it.

Larry has the right to share his personal experience, and to do so assertively. The reader -- me, Simon, anyone -- has the right to be skeptical of the details of that experience as it has been expressed in text form.

There is a trap. It is ubiquitous and insidious. It's the natural tendency to fill in the gaps, and acquire assumptions about the unwritten aspects of anyone's stated points. We ascribe motive, attitude, underlying and attached beliefs and opinions. Often, our assumptions are correct. Often, our assumptions are dead wrong. It is easy to start out being civil in a discussion with strangers, but it becomes very difficult to maintain that civility in the roller coaster ride of assumptions and their proof and disproof.

I apologize if that comes across as lecturing. I am passionately interested in online community -- and all of the implications of that term as we compare ourselves here with real-life community -- and I am inspired to share my views on it at the drop of a hat (and I'm not wearing one). ;-)

Simon:

Which gets to my point above about the perennial conservative v. liberal conflict about whether the personal can ever be political. So if that's all this is, after umpteen posts, I'll gladly drop it. (Though I'm still disappointed you refuse to trust me on that personal basis -- we'll never agree politically, obviously.)

Franklin:

Your counsel is wise and appreciated. Ever thought of diplomacy?