I haven’t read anything by Dahlia Lithwick for months, so, considering your defense of her work, I am reading her piece, in Slate, on Eric Holder. The writing isn’t bad, though it has the failings of Time-ese (e.g., short sentences, continued with a new sentence beginning w/ a conjunction, rather than simply combining or subordinating) along with Lithwick’s own tin ear, ending a paragraph on Michael Mukasey with a sentence about his recent collapse, though that event has no relation to the paragraph.

The piece, however, is too brief. If we really want to examine the challenges facing Holder’s Department of Justice, then we must do more than summarize them in a paragraph. Like many pieces in newsmagazines, this one sets up the problem superficially, and then drops it. Lithwick is simply a product of her product: She writes shallow pieces that are coveted by shallow content-providers. W/in the realm of this slightness, however, Lithwick does not struggle to include some depth but is satisfied to be one of the slight mediocrity supplying us with information.

At the same time, Lithwick shows a nice handling of avoiding the split infinitive.

To make another point, though, given that she describes the argument in the Court on a timely basis, it would be rather difficult for her to review the decisions, which don’t come out for months. I suppose she could review the decisions while referring back to her notes on what happened during arguments, but I prefer the latter to be a little more real time.

“We always had two choices for dinner: Take it or leave it.”

As to Powers’s end claims about Lithwick’s work, I would agree that, if you don’t mind semi-literate prose, the work is easy to read. Pithy analysis, however? No. It doesn’t really matter, though. Newsweek, Day To Day, Slate—Lithwick is on her way. Soon she’ll publish a book. Those of us interested in the Supreme Court will be putting up with her superficial thinking & writing for the next forty years.

CIDU Bill, I have three dictionaries around me. All of them claim that Hobson’s choice an apparently free choice that is actually no choice. “The customer can get his car in any color he wants as long as it’s black.” It’s not worth any more quibbling, however. We’re close enough.

“[This] forces physicians into a choice between providing patients with accurate medical information, and possible license suspension and misdemeanor charges.”

Well, hell, that’s not much of a choice. What physician would ever choose the second option?

Obviously, the choice described in the article is between providing *inaccurate* information and possible license suspension. Whether the error was in writing or in editing I could not begin to say, but there’s obviously an error here that goes beyond the use of the word “Hobson’s”.

Miss Appropriate’s suggestion may be what Lithwick was thinking, which then got corrupted accidentally in the editing or writing process. Or she might have been saying that the “license suspension/malpractice” route was no real option at all, thus creating a virtual Hobson’s choice.

Sigh.

All that said, I have to address Matthew’s post. I object to his insult of Lithwick, as well as to his objections to here Slate column. The point of the Jurisprudence column is not to analyze Supreme Court decisions, but to report on the goings on inside the courtroom. If you want legal analysis of the multi-page opinions issued by the Court, there are plenty of places to get that. But there are very few sources to report on the goings-on during arguments. Lithwick does a fine job of recording and distilling an hour of argument into a pithy and easy to read analysis.

So there.

Wouldn’t the sentence in question in the article have worked if it read, “This forces law-abiding physicians into a Hobson’s choice between providing patients with inaccurate medical information, and not performing abortions at all.” That makes it the same kind of “my way or the highway” choice, right?

a) choice between two equally bad alternatives (”pest or cholera”)
b) no choice at all (”just sugarcoating, you got no say in this”)
c) choice between yes and no. (”take it or leave it”)