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Saturday, May 12, 2007
Vive La Resistance
12 May 2007 04:36 pm
Vic Gold lets today's GOP have it - at the CATO Institute, headquarters for the conservative insurgency.
Girls Gone Mild
12 May 2007 03:31 pm
A modest proposal to raise the age of consent for participating in porn movies:
Can a girl of 21 really know what she is consenting to when she signs a release form for a pornographer? Does she really understand what the ramifications might be later in life? That is why I propose that we raise the minimum age of consent to participate in pornography to 65.
I think by 65 a woman has finally attained the maturity necessary to weigh the pros and cons of participating in pornography. Since she will most likely be retired or on the way to retirement by that age, there is little danger that such images will come back to haunt her in her career.
The View From Your Window
12 May 2007 02:08 pm
Naples, Florida, dusk. For an interactive gallery of Dish readers' window views across the world, click here.
Quote for the Day
12 May 2007 01:35 pm
"To visit the US at present, as I have done, is to experience an overwhelming sensation of drastic impending change. It's not merely that President Bush, to whom Blair so disastrously tethered himself, is "in office but not in power". Most Americans can't wait for him to go, Congress is beyond his control, and the Senate majority leader, Senator Harry Reid, has told him that the war in Iraq is lost - for which statement of the obvious Reid was accused of "defeatism" by the vice-president, Dick Cheney.
Besides that the portents range from Paul Wolfowitz's travails at the World Bank to the Senate interrogation of Alberto Gonzales, the attorney general, and the trial of Conrad Black. This might sound like the "succession of small disasters, oh trifling in themselves", in Alan Bennett's Forty Years On ("a Foreign Secretary's sudden attack of dysentery at the funeral of George V, an American ambassador found strangled in his own gym-slip...") And yet there really is an observable pattern.
Along with the collapse of Bush's authority, all these episodes are connected to the great disaster in Iraq. And all illustrate the hubristic, impenitent arrogance of the people who have been guiding America's destiny - as well as ours, alas - for the past six years. What one senses so acutely are the conditions building for a political perfect storm, which will engulf and destroy the whole neoconservative project," - Geoffrey Wheatcroft, the Guardian.
The Politics of Univision
12 May 2007 12:27 pm
Lou Dobbs and Mickey Kaus will get the heebie-jeebies, but Univision is using its massive media clout to get eligible Hispanic immigrants to get citizenship and get registered. Money WSJ quote:
The citizenship drive began in January, when Univision's largest station -- Los Angeles's KMEX 34 -- began bombarding Southern California airwaves with a campaign designed to steer eligible viewers to become U.S. citizens.
The impact was immediate: In Los Angeles and surrounding counties, the number of citizenship applications filed to the U.S. government more than doubled for the three months ended March 2007 compared with the same period last year. It typically takes six or seven months for green-card holders to complete the citizenship process.
Now, the campaign is spreading quickly to big cities including Miami, Houston, Dallas, San Antonio and Phoenix. After the yearlong campaign is complete, a second phase is slated for 2008 that will focus on getting the new citizens to register to vote.
"I have never seen anything like it in my career. It's big," said Jane Arellano, a 39-year veteran of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services who is district director in L.A.
If a strongly anti-illegal candidate wins the Republican nomination, and if he alienates many Latino voters, the 2008 momentum for the Democrats could get stronger.
Military Linguists
12 May 2007 10:42 am
We desperately need many, many more of them. We desperately need not to be firing them because they're gay, as has happened many times. The fact that this still hasn't happened almost six years after 9/11 shows the degree of seriousness with which this administration is fighting the global war. Max Boot explains.
The Netroots and Joe Klein
12 May 2007 08:24 am
Man, do they hate him.
Obesity Prejudice
12 May 2007 06:07 am
A reader writes:
Regarding obesity prejudice, it is a conundrum. I am convinced there is a gene/heredity aspect to it. I have two sons. One is built like me (or at least like I was when I was 19. I've put on a few pounds myself in the last 30 years), tending to be slender. The other is built like my father in law, thick throughout, from the shoulders, through the chest and hips, right down to his calves. He is overweight, but not obese. Both grew up in the same house eating the same food.
I think the prejudice comes from seeing obese people who appear to not even be trying. You see them at the store driving around in the parking lot waiting for that close-in spot so they don't have walk an extra 50 or 100 feet. You see them in the restaurants eating chicken fried steak with gravy and fries instead of grilled chicken and a salad. You see a lot of them wearing ill-fitting clothes that accentuate their weight. You wonder if they have given up, and many probably have. On the other hand, I know many people who are overweight or bordering on obese. They are active (including walking, running or some other form of exercise). They dress in clothes that fit properly, and have an air of self-confidence. Those people aren't, to my observation, discriminated against.
So, maybe the discrimination is against sloppy, poorly dressed people, who don't seem to care about their appearance. For example, the photo you posted of the very large lady wearing a bikini. When I'm at the beach, I wear a loose fitting swim suit, and know body pays any attention to me. If I wore a Speedo, everyone would be saying "look at that fat guy wearing the Speedo." So, the conundrum is that there are some aspects of obesity that can't be helped, but there are others that can. I think the discrimination is against those who don't seem to care about their appearance or health.
Friday, May 11, 2007
Judging A Book By Its Cover
11 May 2007 07:22 pm
When it's this bad, why the hell not? There's even a blog devoted entirely to the genre.
Email of the Day II
11 May 2007 06:07 pm
A reader writes:
Thanks for your mention of Ron Paul in today's Daily Dish.
I arrived in the US almost 10 years ago now. Born and raised in Holland, I was about as liberal as you can get, but after only a few years of visiting political online sites, I found myself a libertarian. In the 2000 presidential election, listening to the debates between Gore and Bush, I honestly believed that the Republican Party could finally bring out the true potential of the United States. It didn't take long for me to see the truth, that the current crop of Republicans has done more damage to the United States than I could've ever imagined.
I do not believe the Democratic Party has what it takes to undo the damage. Their socialist ideology of fairness goes against my core belief of liberty, and the best they had to offer in '04 was John Kerry. The Libertarian Party just doesn't seem to be able to reach an audience in the US. I still support them, but don't believe that they have a chance to accomplish anything until things get really, really bad in the US. I was so disappointed with politics that I simply stopped caring.
And then came the Republican debate last week. The format was horrible, most of the questions were lame, and the three main candidates got most of the airtime, but it gave me, for the first time in a long while, a glimmer of hope. There was this one candidate that seemed to say everything I wanted a candidate to say. The next day, I went online to do some research about this candidate, and the more I read, the more passionate I became about this candidate.
The Republican party needs root and branch reform. Maybe a Paul candidacy is the best way to express this sentiment.
The View From Your Window
11 May 2007 05:07 pm
Yangshuo, China, 10.23 am.
For an interactive gallery of Dish readers' window views across the world, click here.
Crack For Marty
11 May 2007 04:44 pm
Has George Soros been dating Queen Noor?
Contempt
11 May 2007 04:21 pm
It's the only word to describe Alberto Gonzales' relationship to the truth and the constitution.
Face of the Day
11 May 2007 04:01 pm
A Palestinian peace activist shows his fist to an Israeli soldier as he and other Israeli and foreign activists protest against the building of the controversial Israeli separation barrier in the West Bank village of Umm Salamuna south of the West Bank city of Bethlehem 11 May 2007. By Musa Al-Shaer/AFP/Getty.
A Recruit for Ron Paul
11 May 2007 03:48 pm
A reader writes:
Thank you for the plug for Ron Paul. I had no idea he existed and I have been looking for a replacement for McCain since he sold his soul to the Christian Right. Thank heavens we have a candidate that espouses the philosophies of Reagan, Goldwater, and true libertarian conservatism. I was also gladdened when I visited Paul’s site and read his congressional record. He is the man for me:
He has never voted to raise taxes.
He has never voted for an unbalanced budget.
He has never voted for a federal restriction on gun ownership.
He has never voted to raise congressional pay.
He has never taken a government-paid junket.
He has never voted to increase the power of the executive branch.He voted against the Patriot Act.
He voted against regulating the Internet.
He voted against the Iraq war.He does not participate in the lucrative congressional pension program.
He returns a portion of his annual congressional office budget to the U.S. treasury every year.
Wht's not to like? Maybe he's the Howard Dean of the truly conservative right.
Flannery O'Connor and Sexuality
11 May 2007 03:36 pm
300 letters between the great Catholic writer and a lesbian friend are set to be released tomorrow. Money quote:
"Enniss expects the letters to reveal an O'Connor who was surprisingly open-minded about sexuality, considering her strong Catholic faith."
Some excerpts have already been published and show O'Connor's humane and ready wit:
"You don't look anything like I expected you to as I always take people at their word and I was prepared for white hair, horn-rimmed spectacles, nose of eagle and shape of ginger-beer bottle. Seek the truth and pursue it: you ain't even passably ugly."
Petraeus and the Pro-Torture Right
11 May 2007 03:14 pm
His important and moving letter against torture and abuse gets total radio silence on the bloggy right (just like the Pentagon's own internal report showing high support and widespread acceptance of torture among U.S. soldiers in Iraq). Beyond depressing - but at least consistent with their craven record. A reader comments:
So does this mean that General Petraeus Hates America and Wants the Terrorists to Win? Or that he's Not a Real Man, like Mark Levin, Rich Lowry, Jonah Goldberg and Andrew McCarthy are?
He obviously doesn't have the stomach to do what's necessary against our enemies. I await calls for his firing from those who argue that we cannot protect the U.S. without torturing and abusing prisoners in wartime. Dr Krauthammer, where's the outrage? Mr Levin, demand a change at the top. Mr Limbaugh, clear your throat. The general is putting the country in grave danger, isn't he? Or so you have argued.
Losing Or Lost?
11 May 2007 03:04 pm
Mark Blumenthal parses the polls of Americans' shifting views of the Iraq war.
Anti-Europeanism
11 May 2007 03:02 pm
Clive Davis laments:
I like the Weekly Standard. I've written for it in the past. But the tone of its coverage of life over here is, well, a little eccentric.
Marriage News
11 May 2007 02:52 pm
In the two decades that same-sex marriage has been on the radar screen in the US, heterosexual divorce rates have declined. Do I think there's a direct correlation? No I don't. I think the factors driving 99 percent of marriages vastly outweigh the impact of an extra 1 percent. It's worth noting, however, that the only state with equal marriage rights has the lowest divorce rate in the country. Somehow I think these facts will weigh more with most people than hysterical claims that my and others' decision to settle down and commit to another person will destroy marriage as an institution.
Five Great Silences
11 May 2007 02:30 pm
Michael Novak unloads on the Catholic social left; and he gets some blowback here and here.
The Greenness of Trains
11 May 2007 01:27 pm
You can make the tracks out of recycled garbage bags - and they last centuries; and you can turn old train carriages into offices. The Brits lead the way.
Petraeus Comes Through
11 May 2007 12:53 pm
It's a stunning letter. And it's one of the most important letters to come from a senior military official in a very long time. The very fact that it is necessary reveals the extent of the damage that Bush and Rumsfeld and Cheney have done. But the fact that it is addressed to every servicemember in the field from their commander in the field shows that honor is not dead in the US military, and that repair is possible. Marty Lederman is right to detect some political interference. I suspect that Cheney insisted on inserting the word "frequently," to insist that torture is not always useless and unnecessary. But Petraeus is finally doing what no one has yet done in this war: he is asserting the immorality, illegality and dishonor of torture and abuse from a position of authority. It has taken six years to hear that clarity again, after the shameful stain of this president's record. Here's the letter in full:
10 May 2007
Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines, and Coast Guardsmen serving in Multi-National Force—Iraq:
Our values and the laws governing warfare teach us to respect human dignity, maintain our integrity, and do what is right. Adherence to our values distinguishes us from our enemy. This fight depends on securing the population, which must understand that we—not our enemies—occupy the moral high ground. This strategy has shown results in recent months. Al Qaeda’s indiscriminate attacks, for example, have finally started to turn a substantial portion of the Iraqi population against it.
In view of this, I was concerned by the results of a recently released survey conducted last fall in Iraq that revealed an apparent unwillingness on the part of some US personnel to report illegal actions taken by fellow members of their units. The study also indicated that a small percentage of those surveyed may have mistreated noncombatants. This survey should spur reflection on our conduct in combat.
I fully appreciate the emotions that one experiences in Iraq.
Continue reading "Petraeus Comes Through" »
Age and the War
11 May 2007 12:21 pm
The older you are, the likelier it is you believe the Iraq war was a mistake.
Christianism Watch
11 May 2007 11:57 am
"This message today is not about Mitt Romney. Romney is an unashamed and proud member of the Mormon cult founded by a murdering polygamist pedophile named Joseph Smith nearly 200 years ago. The teachings of the Mormon cult are doctrinally and theologically in complete opposition to the Absolute Truth of God's Word. There is no common ground. If Mormonism is true, then the Christian faith is a complete lie. There has never been any question from the moment Smith's cult began that it was a work of Satan and those who follow their false teachings will die and spend eternity in hell... There is no excuse, no justification for supporting and voting for a man who will be used by satan to lead the souls of millions into the eternal flames of hell!" - Bill Keller, host of the Florida-based Live Prayer TV program as well as LivePrayer.com.
Romney's Draft-Deferment
11 May 2007 11:51 am
Another changed story. He makes Bill Clinton look like a rock of principle.
Email of the Day
11 May 2007 11:49 am
A reader writes:
I agree with the RedState blogger who is disgusted by Romney's "mountain of political opportunism and reckless vacillation," yet in that interview you posted with his wife, I found myself nodding approvingly when he asked if I wanted some banana.
Fat and Prejudice
11 May 2007 11:33 am
One of my favorite moments on the just-concluded season of South Park was Eric Cartman's unstoppable laughter and mockery of a "little person" aka a midget. The genius of the cartoon is that it's perfectly clear that Cartman is vile, that his prejudice is disgusting, and yet Cartman also represents our collective id. We can't help ourselves at times. That's partly why I'm a skeptic of hate crime laws. They imply that prejudice is some kind of optional state of being which can be removed or deterred by law. At its core, it cannot. It is integral to being human. We dislike each other, often for random reasons, but sometimes for pure "ick" motivations. We can and should legally penalize criminal acts, regardless of their target. We can and should stigmatize proud expressions of bigotry. But we will never erase it.
Which brings me to fat people. I mean really fat people. Wayne Meredith notes the modern conundrum:
The way morbidly obese people are treated in our society is an interesting can of worms, indeed...
Continue reading "Fat and Prejudice" »
Vegetarianism Peaking?
11 May 2007 11:03 am
The data suggest so.
Taking Ron Paul Seriously
11 May 2007 10:17 am
The condescension to and mockery of the sole Republican candidate who seems to care about individual liberty has begun to tick me off. Chris Matthews can be heard groaning "Oh, God," after Paul spoke of the "original intent" of the Founders with respect to the Constitution. And in the YouTube clip below, Rudy Giuliani actually seems to be guffawing after Paul's defense of habeas corpus. I'm glad Paul's supporters are fighting back on the web. He deserves more respect than he has gotten thus far, not least because compared to the pandering of his competitors, Paul actually seems to believe what he says. And what he says has more to do with conservatism than the crap the rest of them are peddling. Here's a clip worth watching again:
Quote for the Day
11 May 2007 09:28 am
"The only religious aspect of Qutb’s thought is his belief that the Koran is the unmediated word of God, a belief that he does not, because he cannot, justify. For him, the will of God is indisputably known without any need of interpretation, and in fact he knows it. It isn’t difficult to see, then, that in the name of the destruction of all political authority and of the lordship of man over man in obedience to God’s will, Qutb thinks he ought to be total dictator, and that he is as obsessed with the here and now as any Marxist.
It is the same old story. As Dostoyevsky said, starting out from limitless freedom, we end up with total despotism," - Theodore Dalrymple in an essay whose title is engraved on Karl Rove's heart, "There Is No God But Politics."
Blair and Responsibility
11 May 2007 09:02 am
A fitting assessment in some respects:
A responsible politician not only grasps the fact that even the purest of motives may necessarily have unintended consequences but is aware that outcomes are the ultimate arbiter of any political decision. The mark of a responsible politician is the ability to appreciate the inherent ambiguity of consequences and suffer in silence, because, as Runciman points out, 'the test of politics is whether you can cope with the knowledge that you are not as good as you would like to be.'
Tony Blair thus becomes the antithesis of a responsible politician, not only asking for validation on the basis of intention but making his public struggle with guilt a part of the justification itself.
Bush, of course, has evinced no sign of any struggle with guilt. It seems a concept utterly alien to him.
(Photo: Peter McDiarmid/Getty.)
An Executive Order
11 May 2007 07:56 am
Is the Bush administration phasing out reconstruction in Iraq? Headline Junky finds something suspicious.
"Blackle"
11 May 2007 06:54 am
The green version of Google.
Thursday, May 10, 2007
The Human Predicament
10 May 2007 10:05 pm
In a phrase:
We rebound from distress but we also rebound from joy.
Confession of the Day
10 May 2007 08:52 pm
"Why, only yesterday James Joyner and I were getting facials and talking about how Glenn Reynolds was using this awesome new foundation that really brought out his cheekbones (but what is the deal with this fashion choice?). Then it was off to a manny-peddy with Kevin Drum, who scored some cutting-edge Clinique products gratis because of his constant beauty blogging (though, man, could Drum be any bitchier about Andrew Sullivan's fashion choices?)," - Dan Drezner, on a roll. Yes, he's making fun of the MSM. So 2004 of him.
In Kafka's Court
10 May 2007 08:08 pm
The case of AP photographer Bilal Hussein really is a disgrace. Smeared by Michelle Malkin as a terrorist-supporter, defended by his bosses, we now hear this:
Paul Gardephe, the lawyer handling the case for the AP, said the military recently acknowledged to him that it has no evidence to support earlier allegations that Hussein was involved in a plot to kidnap two other journalists.
Kathleen Carroll, executive editor of the AP, said, "The sort of rolling set of allegations that arise and then disappear without the benefit of a trial ... or any kind of an official court proceeding is what is distressing to all of us here." She spoke during a panel discussion in connection with World Press Freedom Day. Officials have what they believe to be information that links Hussein to insurgent activity, but most of the evidence is classified and cannot be released publicly, said Col. Gary Keck, a Pentagon spokesman.
Orcinus has some choice comments.
The Case for Gitmo
10 May 2007 07:08 pm
It's made in a recent episode of Boston Legal. I second every sarcastic word.
Yglesias Award Nominee
10 May 2007 06:23 pm
"At the time I reviewed Hugh Hewitt's book, I wrote, "Like Hewitt, were the election held today, I would vote for Mitt Romney, but unlike Hewitt, I am not very passionate about the former governor and have, over time, developed some qualms about him." As late as last week, in email correspondence between friends, I said the same.
I can no longer say that. It is not because Ann Romney gave money to Planned Parenthood. It is because this is the straw that broke the camel's back -- one light piece of straw piled on a mountain of political opportunism and reckless vacillation," - Erick Erickson, RedState.
Jesus, For Jews
10 May 2007 05:49 pm
A new conference on a newly popular subject:
In taking Jesus and placing him in Jewish contexts, the conference was, in a sense, an attempt to take the foreign, the strange, and make it familiar. Ironically enough, though, the opposite was often the case. Mixing seemed to take the familiar and make it strange. In the eyes of some of the day’s speakers, this was a good thing. Fredriksen took pains to emphasize just how different Jesus’ Judaism was from even the Judaism of the fourth century, to say nothing of the Judaism of the 21st. “If we’re doing our job right,” she said, “we’ll hardly recognize the figure we’ve reconstructed.”
Wieseltier, who appeared with the author and onetime priest James Carroll, spoke in a similarly counterintuitive vein. Jewish messianism, he said, is not a radical idea. It’s not a form of utopianism. “It’s a correction, not a transformation,” he said. Messianism “was never as central as we think it was. What is central is living the present.”
Rudy In Iowa
10 May 2007 05:33 pm
Another awful blunder. I fear the wheels are coming off this candidacy.
Dissents of the Day
10 May 2007 05:29 pm
The feedback on the "continue reading ..." device is almost uniformly negative. I understand. Here's a typical email:
I think I will find myself reading less, rather than more. I just don't like the hiccup in the flow of what I am reading. I read to the break, and then stop. Only rarely do I find myself continuing with a number of other writers. My guess is that you might find yourself trying to 'hook' people with a catchy first paragraph now, and that could get annoying trying to sort of sell the rest of your piece every time you need to put in a break.
I never had a problem with the length of your pieces, nor the fact that they were all on one long page. Your archives are all there, and the page length never bothered me in the slightest. Hell, your pieces are much shorter than Glenn Greenwald’s, and I read his all the way through too.
Keep it the way it was.
Screw you, guys. Seriously, I'm going to keep it but use it sparingly - when a post is more than two paragraphs long.
Spitzer On Marriage Equality
10 May 2007 04:57 pm
History will remember him well for this statement:
Just as the right to marry confers important benefits on individuals, the institution of marriage produces incalculable benefits for society, by fostering stable familial relationships. Same-sex couples who wish to marry are not simply looking to obtain additional rights, they are seeking out substantial responsibilities as well: to undertake significant and binding obligations to one another, and to lives of "shared intimacy and mutual financial and emotional support." Granting legal recognition to these relationships can only strengthen New York's families, by extending the ability to participate in this crucial social institution to all New Yorkers.
Face of the Day
10 May 2007 04:31 pm
Chancellor of the Exchequor Gordon Brown leaves the Houses of Parliament on May 9, 2007 in London. He'll be prime minister by July. By Bruno Vincent/Getty.
The Blair Legacy
10 May 2007 04:30 pm
A great piece by William Hague, former Tory leader, on the man who beat him badly in one election. Money quote:
We, the British people, will not look back on Tony Blair and love him: he has been in power too long for that. We, even his opponents, will not hate him: his attributes have always repelled that. But we will, on all sides, look back and ask "What did he really believe in doing? And when was he going to get round to it?"
In Defense of Adam Moss
10 May 2007 04:29 pm
The Radarites are just jealous. But I'm an old friend of Adam's, so don't take it from me. Take it from Ross.
Obama on Habeas Corpus
10 May 2007 04:13 pm
He's on the record as recently as this week:
"We need to bring to a close this sad chapter in American history, and begin a chapter that passes the might of our military to the freedom of our diplomacy and the power of our alliances. And while we are at it, we can close down Guantanamo and we can restore habeas corpus and we can lead with our ideas and our values."
Is Clinton Inevitable?
10 May 2007 03:43 pm
Jim Henley thinks so:
I think there’s a passion for Hillary Clinton’s candidacy that’s almost as invisible to the Democratic-Party netroots as Karl Rove’s vote drive among evangelicals was in 2004. Only very occasionally does this passion glimmer into the view of the progressive blogosphere. My claim is basically that the Clinton voters are out there mostly nursing their allegiance quietly, like the classic quiet conservatives keeping their opinion to themselves until they get into the voting booth.
Clinton's supporters are more anti-war than Obama's and more classic working-class Democrats. Go figure.
(Hat tip: Matt.)
Modern Relics
10 May 2007 03:25 pm
Michael Dell donates a 1984 computer to the Smithsonian. Dell himself is 42.
The Art of Book Covers
10 May 2007 03:13 pm
I miss the old Penguin and Pelican imprints in England - those elegant, simple all-type covers that almost scream at you: it's the text that matters. It didn't occur to me they could inspire high art. But they have, as well as an artist's liberties with various authors and invented titles:
Harland Miller's paintings are unusual in the range of current contemporary art in that they are, first, self-evidently painterly paintings and, second, companionable; they can make you laugh.
I remember the first time I came across the Hemingway painting I'm So Fucking Hard - it was propped against the wall in a studio, an appropriately imposing object, about 6ft by 4ft - I laughed out loud. Ditto its companion painting, Dirty Northern Bastard, attributed to D. H. Lawrence. Also Not Bi-curious by Norman Mailer. I could go on.
And he does. Norman, by the way, has always struck me as very bi-curious.
Spit and Justice
10 May 2007 02:38 pm
Orin Kerr poses an interesting 4th amendment question:
If the police want to collect a suspect's DNA sample, can they mail him a letter under false pretenses, wait for a response, and then analyze the seal on the letter (which the suspect likely sealed with saliva) to collect the DNA, all without a warrant? A divided Washington Supreme Court has just concluded that the answer is "yes" in State v. Athan...
And it happened. More context here.
Another Waas Scoop
10 May 2007 02:35 pm
It's looking grimmer for Rove and Gonzales:
The Bush administration has withheld a series of e-mails from Congress showing that senior White House and Justice Department officials worked together to conceal the role of Karl Rove in installing Timothy Griffin, a protégé of Rove's, as U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas.
How Serious Is The GOP Revolt On Iraq?
10 May 2007 02:07 pm
I use my usual test: is it verboten to talk about at NRO? Yes! Glenn is more forthright and says the following:
I think this is shortsighted and wrong and likely to hurt the country.
I disagree. In fact, a rightly restive Congress is clearly a major advantage Bush and Cheney now have in grappling with Maliki. They can persuasively say: if you don't come through, we're outta here. And we'll be forced to leave by the Congress. If that leverage combined with the surge does not produce a political breakthrough, we'll know that such a breakthrough is likely impossible. And we'll know by September. It's also true that the United States is a democracy. A president who cannot explain a war, cannot show real progress, and cannot command credibility after four years of fighting has no one to blame but himself.
Carter, Evangelicals and the GOP
10 May 2007 01:54 pm
The former president is going to stir up the usual passions with this initiative:
Christian Zionists can be better friends of Israel by challenging its government's policies, while accepting Judaism as a legitimate path to God, Carter told a group organized by Rabbi Michael Lerner in California last week, according to the rabbi.
"He said it was a terrible error for Jews to become allied with Christian Zionists who actually desire our conversion or burning in hell," Rabbi Lerner related in an interview Tuesday.
More here.
Five Americans
10 May 2007 01:54 pm
They all changed Tony Blair, argues Danny Finkelstein.
Child Mortality In Iraq
10 May 2007 01:32 pm
It's up 150 percent since 1990. Adult mortality has increased as well - a lot since the invasion.
Baby TV
10 May 2007 01:15 pm
A new study finds 40 percent of 3-month-old babies now watch television. Maybe that explains the survival of Blake.
Fort Dix
10 May 2007 12:48 pm
Not so alarming in the first place, but now we find this out:
The informer, sent to penetrate a loose group of men who liked to talk about jihad and fire guns in the woods, had come to be seen by the suspects as the person who might actually show them how an act of terror could be carried off.
Indeed, over the months that followed, as the targets of the investigation spoke with a sometimes unfocused zeal about waging holy war, the informer, one of two used in the investigation, would tell them that he could get them the sophisticated weapons they wanted. He would accompany them on surveillance missions to military installations, debating the risks, and when the men looked ready to purchase the weapons, it was the informer who seemed to be pushing the idea of buying the deadliest items, startling at least one of the suspects.
So the main instigator of Jihad was a government informer! It will be interesting to see how this unfolds in court. At least they'll have access to a court.
Is Rudy Excommunicated?
10 May 2007 12:21 pm
As head of the doctrinal watchdog, Joseph Ratzinger wanted to refuse John Kerry communion for being pro-choice. Only some deft footwork from the American bishops avoided a mega-clash. But as Pope, Benedict seems to have ratcheted up the pressure on his way to Brazil:
On the plane from Rome, Benedict appeared to go further than the Vatican had before on the contentious issue of Catholic politicians who favor abortion rights. He seemed to suggest that Mexico City legislators who recently voted to allow abortion in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy had excommunicated themselves.
"Yes, the excommunication isn't something arbitrary — it's part of the code" of church law, the pope said in Italian, in response to a question during the first full-fledged news conference of his two-year pontificate. "The killing of an innocent human child is incompatible with going into communion in the body of Christ," ...
Continue reading "Is Rudy Excommunicated?" »
The Politics of Thymos
10 May 2007 11:37 am
How does one write about a former teacher? It's hard, because my respect and affection for Harvey C. Mansfield is immeasurable. One thing I'd say, though, is that his lectures are designed to be provocative and fun. I attended scores at Harvard and taught for him, so I'm aware that much is sometimes lost in translation. His thought is often designed to shock people into a deeper understanding of the world, as his mentor Machiavelli did. And as Mansfield has grown older, I sense more of old Nick's influence than one of his early interests, Burke. Harvey is also absolutely right, moreover, to disdain the rationalist and quantitative approach to political matters now so dominant in the school of political science. He's right, as well, to identify thymos as a vastly under-rated human impulse behind all politics. Perhaps in his attempt to remind people of this phenomenon, he has slighted the fact that liberal constitutionalism was designed to control and check exactly thymos - not by ignoring it, but by pitting the thymos of some against the thymos of others. At least that is what Harvey taught me about liberal constitutionalism in grad school.
One insight that this Washington Post piece highlights is worth underlining. Harvey understood the civil rights movement as motivated by thymos ...
Continue reading "The Politics of Thymos" »
The View From Your Window
10 May 2007 11:14 am
San Francisco, California, 6.28 pm. For an interactive gallery of Dish readers' window views across the world, click here.
Quote for the Day
10 May 2007 10:47 am
"So how about it Senators Clinton and Obama? You too John Edwards. It's not your vote yet, but you could sure tell us where you stand on what should be the least controversial topic of our time: respect for habeas corpus (a well established principle in the Western tradition since...the freakin' Magna Carta!). If you can't spine up about that, what good are you. Habeas corpus is deal breaker territory," - Eric Martin, American Footprints.
Here's a list of congressmen to call. I'm saddened but not surprised that only the "left" part of the blogosphere is fighting for this most basic and ancient of political liberties. But there you go. That's what American conservatism has now become. Just count me out, okay?
Don't Panic
10 May 2007 09:28 am
Pakistan's government - besieged by Islamists and providing a safe haven to al Qaeda - has placed ads in national newspapers asking people for information on missing radioactive material. They say not to worry:
A spokesman for the nuclear authority said that there was a "very remote chance" that nuclear materials imported 40-50 years ago were unaccounted for.
Reassured? Me neither.
Romney's Bigotry
10 May 2007 08:48 am
Well, well, well. It's good to see that there's some bigotry Hugh Hewitt won't be a shill for. He has five posts on Al Sharpton's bigotry toward Romney. I agree that Sharpton's tone and remarks were bigoted; I certainly defend the right of Mormons to run for any public office without their faith being used against them. But then I haven't made religious faith a central tenet of my conservatism, unlike Hewitt and Romney. And Romney, for his part, has gone further in bigotry than Sharpton. Romney has stated that "we need to have a person of faith lead the country." Atheists, in other words, should not apply. How is that different from Sharpton exactly? Or is bigotry only bigotry when it's directed at people who have faith and not bigotry when it's directed at atheists? Somehow, I don't think Hewitt will address that point.
Romney 2002
10 May 2007 08:35 am
Who are you going to believe? K-Lo or the man's wife?
Albert The Albatross
10 May 2007 07:32 am
A story to break your heart.
Wednesday, May 9, 2007
Now Available
09 May 2007 09:02 pm
The book Rumsfeld could have spent a little more time on.
The Oil-For-Food Scandal ...
09 May 2007 08:52 pm
... and Condi Rice. Money quote:
Rice wasn't just on Chevron's board when the company was paying kickbacks to Saddam Hussein, she was in charge of the company's policy committee, which existed to look for potential political problems.
Uh-oh.
A Criminal Case?
09 May 2007 08:28 pm
The latest in the US Attorneys scandal from the Seattle Times.
Oil-Free By 2050?
09 May 2007 08:26 pm
Amory Lovins explains how.
YouTube Propaganda, Ctd.
09 May 2007 07:53 pm
A reader writes:
Not so much accidental Nazi aesthetics as reflecting the influence of Soviet Constructivism. The aesthetics of the "YouTube Propaganda" video echo the iconic style of early Soviet design, such as that of El Lissitsky and any number of classic Soviet posters from the twenties through WWII. Nazi propagandists freely appropriated constructivist imagery, so it's not at all surprising to see a resemblance. Given the references, I'd be surprised if the aesthetic was a coincidence. It can be viewed as both an extension of the visual rhetoric of Soviet propaganda and a means of portraying the U.S. in terms of fascist iconography.
Romney and Abortion
09 May 2007 07:02 pm
He keeps getting slicker.
Romney and Scott Card
09 May 2007 06:35 pm
He told Hughie he was a fan.
Vive La France
09 May 2007 05:30 pm
Sarkozy gives us a reason:
"I want to launch a call to all those in the world who believe in the values of tolerance, of liberty, of democracy and of humanism, to all those who are persecuted by the tyrannies and by the dictators, to all the children and to all the martyrized women in the world to say to them that the pride, the duty of France will at their sides, that they can count on her. France will be at the sides of the Libyan nurses locked up for eight years; France will not abandon Ingrid Betancourt; France will not abandon the women who are condemned to the burqa; France will not abandon the women who do not have liberty. France will be by the side of the oppressed of the world. This is the message of France; this is the identity of France; this is the history of France."
Wow. And Amen.
(Photo: Andreas Solaro/AFP/Getty.)
Continued ...
09 May 2007 05:29 pm
You may have noticed I've adopted Matt's and Ross's practice of cutting short some of my longer posts with a "Continue reading ..." link to the full version. It keeps the blog packed with items and helps it move more quickly. Really long posts tended to crowd out others, and the pace of blogging has meant only a day's worth of posts can be viewed on one page at the same time. So I've made the adjustment. Let me know if you have any objections or experience any problems.
Republican Party News, Ctd.
09 May 2007 05:15 pm
There was an error in my post below about the Utah County Republican Party's convention. The resolution does not speak of the dangers of "self-invasion" but of "stealth-invasion." The full resolution is quite a remarkable document in the annals of Christianism. Here it is, in full:
Resolution opposing Satan's plan to destroy the U.S. by stealth invasion
Whereas, "And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him." (Revelation 12:9)
Whereas, in order for Satan to establish his "New World Order" and destroy the freedom of all people as predicted in the Scriptures, he must first destroy the U.S. There are ways to destroy a nation other than with bombs or bullets. The mostly quiet and unspectacular invasion of illegal immigrants does not focus the attention of the nation the way open warfare does, but is all the more insidious for its stealth and innocuousness.
Whereas, Americans will have to make a choice ...