British Home Secretary Jacqui Smith, “defending proposals for 42-day detention”:http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/controversial-new-terror-laws-unveiled-773317.html :
Ms Smith said the Government could not afford to “sit on our hands” in preparing for potential future risks – but denied she was legislating for a hypothetical situation.
“We need to legislate now for that risk in the future,” she told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
“It won’t be hypothetical if and when it occurs. We are not legislating now on the basis that we are bringing it in now for something that might happen in the future; we are bringing in a position for if it becomes unhypothetical.”
Indeed, or indeed not …
{ 28 comments }
John Protevi 01.24.08 at 2:48 pm
Along these lines, Brian Massumi has an article in Theory & Event Volume 10, Issue 2, 2007 on “Potential Politics and the Primacy of Preemption.” Here’s a link, but subscription is required, via Project Muse (most university libraries subscribe).
John Quiggin 01.24.08 at 3:00 pm
Part of the problem here is the belief among journalists and politicians that “hypothetical” is inherently a pejorative term.
I guess this comes from the standard political interview tactic of refusing to answer “hypothetical questions”. The tactic is reasonable to some extent, since there are often good reasons not to constrain future options, but it seems to have created an idea that “hypothetical questions” are inherently illegitimate, and now it seems that legislating with respect to hypothetical events must also be denied.
The real problem here is not so much that the risks are hypothetical but that no hypothesis under which the draconian new powers would yield benefits commensurate with their obvious costs has been put forward to be tested.
Charles Pooter 01.24.08 at 3:22 pm
Indeed and journalists should never have allowed the precdent to be set of politicians not answering hypothetical questions. When a refusal is given the journalist should say: “I’m asking a hypothetical question to reveal what principle, if any, lies behind this policy. I assume you are not answering hypothetical questions because, in fact, you have no principles, but instead base all your policies on opinion polls which obviously you cannot predict.”
Jacob Christensen 01.24.08 at 3:31 pm
I occasionally have the feeling that the British government would find it easier just to round up everybody on the Isles and detain them indefinitely at Her Majesty’s Pleasure. I’m sure the prisons could be outsourced in one way or the other.
“Theoretical” and “Academic” are two other favourite pejorative terms among politicians, btw.
chris y 01.24.08 at 3:56 pm
I give up. And Oxford University gave her a degree. How did her civil servants allow this one through?
trane 01.24.08 at 4:07 pm
I think you ACADEMICS are all being very SPECULATIVE. We have to look at REALITY, to FACE THE FACTS. We do not need all these HYPOTHETICAL THEORIES!
Are we clear?
Sigh.
Xanthippas 01.24.08 at 4:23 pm
That’s amusingly convoluted.
someone 01.24.08 at 4:29 pm
From reading the quote I get the impression that she doesn’t want this law to be passed now, she just wants it to be prepared so that it can be easily approved if/when necessary.
Jay Conner 01.24.08 at 4:39 pm
Times have changed. We can no longer afford the liberal luxury of assuming someone is harmless just because they haven’t done anything yet. If you wait for the smoking gun, you invite the mushroom cloud.
ajay 01.24.08 at 4:49 pm
— It won’t be hypothetical if and when it occurs. We are not legislating now on the basis that we are bringing it in now for something that might happen in the future; we are bringing in a position for if it becomes unhypothetical.
— You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
c.l. ball 01.24.08 at 4:57 pm
I couldn’t find the graf quote in the BBC Radio-4 archives for 24 or 20 Jan. Her remarks in those interviews are, in general, quite cogent.
Of course, that doesn’t mean it is right to hold people for 28, let alone, 42 days without access to an attorney or being charged.
The US record bodes ill: judges approved “material witness” warrants that resulted in extensive detention, and such detainess were provided or had access to counsel. Nevertheless, they were in jail for weeks and often months without ever being charged with a crime. So much for safeguards.
Alex 01.24.08 at 5:01 pm
Next week, in our series of “Great Lost Civilisations”, we move on from the pathetic, drooling imbeciles wandering in the ruins of what was once Britain to the mysterious fate of Ceres’ subglacial cephalopods…
Chris Williams 01.24.08 at 5:03 pm
Fuck me, I went to the same college as her. Standards had obviously risen in the intervening couple of years.
“The question is, who is to be master”
Grand Moff Texan 01.24.08 at 5:13 pm
It won’t be hypothetical if and when it occurs.
“If and when” indicate that it’s still hypothetical, which means that when she “denied she was legislating for a hypothetical situation,” she was being a fucking moron.
Glad to know that US officials have no monopoly on this sort of behavior.
To say that the alternative is to “sit on our hands” isn’t so much as a false option as it is undignified hysteria.
.
Kieran Healy 01.24.08 at 5:23 pm
Paging Sir Humphrey.
yoyo 01.24.08 at 6:29 pm
Not answering ‘hypotheticals’ is a damned good idea considering how central ‘flipflopping’ is to our political discourse.
mpowell 01.24.08 at 6:45 pm
It is true that this comes from journalists allowing politicians to refuse to answer ‘hypothetical’ questions. But frequently they use that tactic to say: I’m not answering that question b/c I’m running for this particular office and you’re asking me what I would do if I were in some other office. And the policy I would implement from that particular office might be different than the one I would implement in the office I’m currently running for and so answering this question will probably make me look bad for no good reason.
Or sometimes they’re just dodging the question. But with Tim Gotcha Russert asking the questions, you need easy ways to say: sorry, you’re a moron, next question, without offending the villager’s sensibilities.
On the other hand, it is entirely reasonable for legislators to pass laws for hypothetical situations if the law makes sense all things considered and those hypotheticals are, in fact, likely.
The Modesto Kid 01.24.08 at 6:55 pm
“become unhypothetical” is a neat construction.
Mike 01.24.08 at 6:59 pm
Tancredo said something close to this during a debate when talking about torture. After the other candidates had given their two cents, he said (something along these lines) “This debate so far has been too theoretical. Let’s take it into the real world: what if…”
I guess he meant the hypothetical real world.
Backword Dave 01.24.08 at 8:25 pm
Speaking of hypotheticals, what is our hypothetical suspect supposed to say or do on the 29th day that he or she would not have said or done in the previous 28? Are we interrogating them or asking them to submit an honours thesis?
Helen 01.24.08 at 10:49 pm
This reminds me of Rumsfeldt and his Known Unknowns quote.
Chris Williams 01.25.08 at 9:30 am
Actually, Rumsfeld’s known unknowns quote makes sense to me. Perhaps because I went to the same college as La Smith, I admit.
Adrienne 01.26.08 at 2:07 pm
Philosophy to the rescue?
the antecedent of a conditional is true –> the statement is not a conditional
Now naturally:
the antecedent is true –> antecedent exists
further, by definition:
antecedent exists the statement containing it is a conditional
this last premise can be restated as:
the antecedent exists AND the statement containing it is a conditional
But the first assumption can be restated as:
the antecedent exists –> the statement is not a conditional (substitution)
equivalently,
NOT (the antecedent exists AND the statement is a conditional)
Her claim is a contradiction. Do you think I should kindly send her a letter?
shteve 01.26.08 at 9:46 pm
The “Known unknowns …” concept is sound and makes sense – but not from Rumsfeld’s mouth.
Wouldn’t it be better if governments chose to “sit on their hands” more often? But then their salaries are paid from taxes, so they have to appear to be doing something. Otherwise, who could be bothered voting? Oh, wait …
smaug 01.27.08 at 5:00 am
This reminds me of Rumsfeldt and his Known Unknowns quote
Grrr. Argh.
Does anybody read anymore!
Rumsfeld’s “known unknowns” derives from Shermn Kent’s A Crucial Estimate Revisited”, one of the best writings on “intelligence”, quoted above.
Some things we know we know: the known knowns
Some things we know don’t know: the known unknowns. (Today that would be, Does Iran want to construct a nuclear weapon?”)
What worries analysts are the unknown unknowns — this we don’t know that we don’t know. These are things we should be trying to find out but don’t realize we should be trying to find out. This is a variant of Thomas Friedman’s rule of journalism that the people that don’t want to talk to you are the people you most want to talk to.
bi 01.27.08 at 9:06 am
Well, yeah, but it still didn’t make sense when it came from Rumsfeld’s mouth.
almostinfamous 01.28.08 at 1:05 pm
the list of unknown unknowns usually stretches to infinity. i always understood that ‘known unknowns’ are what we generally refer to as ‘unknowns’, and there was no reason to add an adjective, which led to the humour.
PS: you know what they say about jokes that need explanation
John Quiggin 01.29.08 at 6:28 am
We covered Rumsfeld at the time, coming to much the same conclusion as shteve and bi.
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