The New York Times reported, in a long special yesterday,
          that the dogs are baying for the blood of the Director of
          the Air and Space Museum (my editorial interpretation, or
          "contextualization" if you will.) He seems, according to the
          Newtonians quoted in the article, unwilling to revise the
          exhibit based upon the veterans' concerns. The final straw,
          the capital offense, that these congresspeople described was
          his bullheaded insistence on using a very low number
          estimate (as I recall 63,000) of the American lives saved by
          the bombing, as opposed to the 2 or 3 hundred thousand
          preferred by the veterans groups. And this *despite* the
          well-informed congresspeople's insistence on the use of the
          higher number.
 
          To summarize, the congresspeople want him fired because he
          is presenting a point of view that is disconcerting to some
          Americans.
 
          What a bunch of depressing crapola. If I may editorialize
          again, I personally find this ideological simplemindedness
          to be one of the low points of American ways of thinking in
          my lifetime, and I've seen a few lows.
 
          The article says that the Smithsonian Board will be meeting
          this week to consider his dismissal.
 
          Eric Siegel
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