Oh hi, how's it going? It's me! Every girl ever. I'm really looking
forward to this date. I'm not nearly as attractive as you remember me
being because when we met the bar was dark and you were drunk. Come on
in.
Let's start off with the unavoidable tour of my incredibly typical post-college-girl apartment.
You'll notice that I went ahead and purchased everything that Ikea
and Pier 1 have ever produced. There's my decorative birdcage over
there even though I don't have a bird, and there's my gay wicker basket
with bamboo poles in it. I don't know what the hell that's thing's all
about, but I bought it.
Hey check it out, I have more candles in here than a Roman Catholic
Church. Doesn't it smell like Hazelnut!? If I were to light all of my
candles at once you could see my apartment from space! I fucking love
candles!
A reader considers important theological questions:
OK, they've programmed the rapture website to send out the emails six days after the rapture.
How does the computer know it's the rapture? The people running the site are good Christians, and so they won't be there to tell it.
But you could get around that -- you could have a system that would assume it's the rapture unless someone tells it that it's not. So every day a good Christian would have to click on the button that says, "we're still here!".
"One gets the feeling that Sen. Obama does not easily identify with Israel -- that he is a stranger to the warm feelings of support and solidarity for the Jewish state evinced by, say, a George W. Bush or a John Hagee," - The Jewish Press.
A young girl cries while listening to a speech by US Democratic presidential candidate, Illinois Senator Barack Obama during a rally to officially kick off the general election campaign on June 05, 2008 at the Nissan Pavillion in Bristow, Virginia. By Tim Sloan/AFP/Getty Images.
I am an American who is a graduate student in the UK, and I have been
congratulated by people from around the world over the past couple of
days for the Obama nomination. Strangers hear my accent, and want to
talk about Obama. One British person said, "America didn't become the
nation it did with guns and tanks; it became the nation it did with
ideas. An Obama presidency represents everything that America has told
the world about itself in the past century--and what the rest of the
world wanted to expect out of America. The idea that you talk before
acting, the idea that you make friends, not enemies, and the idea that
anything is possible."
Another Italian told me, "Obama will cause my
country to fall in love with America again."
Soft power?
Most Americans have not quite absorbed the enormous blow to America's image abroad delivered by the Bush administration. Obama has helped erase it already.
As a specialist on Soviet history and more particularly on the Soviet Gulag, I am just so annoyed by the ignorance of statements like this:
"I have said publicly, and I will again, that unless he proves me wrong, he is a Marxist," - Tom DeLay.
"And did the Obama rally begin with the Soviet National Anthem?" - Hugh Hewitt
Put these guys and their ilk in my class for a semester and let them understand what Marxism and Communism were really about. Progressive taxation, no matter how much one might be opposed to it, is simply qualitatively different than the elimination of private ownership of the means of production. Government regulation, even if it interferes with the economy, is not the equivalent of total nationalization of the economy. These are not minor distinctions, but fundamental to the very definition of what Soviet Communism was, and why it had the outcomes it did. The attempt to tie Democrats and liberals (the latter of which was a term of abuse within the Soviet political structure) is incredibly ignorant of the actual history and structure of Soviet Communism.
The Hewitt Award has been added to the Dish's award glossary.
That punched fist is a nice touch, along with Obama's schoolboy serious gaze. Sen. Jim Webb (D-VA) and Democratic presidential hopeful Sen.
Barack Obama (D-IL) wave to supporters during a rally at the Nissian
Pavillion June 5, 2008 in Bristow, Virginia. By Chip Somodevilla/Getty.
I have no idea what was said and would one day love to see a Mike Nichols recreation, but how canny for Obama to go to her house. The symbolism of deference, the crossing of her threshhold, makes for extremely good politics. And since she's the hostess, there are, even for a Clinton, some boundaries of manners. But having aired the idea as a way to bring the party together, I'm now entirely convinced by Clinton's behavior this past month and Obama's cool handling of the last few days that it would be a dreadful idea. He doesn't need her. And she could damage him. George Will explains why:
Surely she, the most polarizing Democrat, is not the only Democrat who
can help Obama appeal to the voters who rejected him in Kentucky and
West Virginia. And as his running mate, she would nullify his
narrative. The candidate embracing the "future" should not glue himself
to Washington circa 1993. Someone promising to "turn the page" should
not revert to an earlier chapter. Someone whose mantra is "change"
should not embrace her theme of restoration...
(Update: it appears Obama did not meet Clinton at her Washington home but merely allowed the press to believe he did.)
They paused the TV show, ran a little mini-commercial for some show
that no one cares about, and then returned to the last two seconds of
the segment before going to commercial. Jesus Christ... I'm sorry that the DVR is ruining your business model, but can you kick the bucket a little more gracefully?
A website that enables the already raptured to pre-send emails to their heathen loved ones giving them one last chance to submit to Jesus or be fried to a crisp:
We have made it possible for you to send them a letter of love and a plea to receive Christ one last time. You can also send information based on scripture as to what will happen next. Each fulfilled prophecy will cause your letter and plea to be remembered and a decision to be made.
"WHY" is one last chance to bring them to Christ and snatch them from the flames!
Ben Smith on Obama competing in more states and stretching McCain:
Obama can, for instance, run a real campaign in places like Texas and Arizona — states that an occasional poll suggests he could win but where few observers give him much of a shot. Then McCain has to decide whether to simply ignore it, and risk an upset; or to spend money on television and organization keeping up, money that then can't be spent in Ohio.
A smart colleague pointed out to me yesterday that Obama will try to do to McCain what he did to Clinton in Pennsylvania: Even as he lost the state, he ruined her by forcing her to keep up with his massive spending
I am intrigued by the Boomer’s lament. I also am a Boomer and
supported Obama from the beginning in part because he was not one. I
do not lament the passing of Boomer leadership, but it is not because
one of our number was self-centered and the other was a frat boy.
Boomers are caught in the battles that defined our lives. We cut our
teeth on Vietnam, civil rights, the cold war, and the assassination of
our icons, from Martin Luther King, to Bobby Kennedy to John Lennon.
Our generation is defined by strife and deep despair. Regardless of
which side one chose, we all knew there was an enemy. Virtually
nothing unifying has happened in our lives, and we bear the scars of
the times. The fractious battles that have ensued over the last
sixteen years are nothing more than a continuation of the struggles we
have fought our entire lives.
But we absolutely must get beyond those fracture lines.
Marc Ambinder and I reprised one of our constant chats about politics for a ten-minute video. If you missed it, it's here. Feedback has been good enough to make us do another one next week.
"And historically, losing candidates concede after
the last primary has delivered an insurmountable victory to his or her
opponent - and usually long before."
But the rub is: since February or March it's been obvious that
almost certainly neither Obama nor Clinton could wrap up an
"insurmountable victory" with pledged delegates alone. Therefore, the
historical analogies you are referring to are simply inappropriate
here. I think the appropriate analogy is Gary Hart's capitulation to
Walter Mondale. Hart waited until Mondale passed the "magic number" with pledges from superdelegates.
Btw, congrats on surviving the primary season. Clinton is (mostly)
history. I can go back to reading The Dish with my usual enthusiasm.
Rick recounts the experience of being inside the bunker with Hillary during her non-concession speech:
I’m sure that this speech looked confrontational and intransigent on television in ways that it just didn’t in the hall, inside the bubble. In the hall, you don’t see the speaker in closeup. You see her in the distance, in the midst of a crowd. The effect is communal, not egotistic. There are no replays of selected highlights, no panels of experts. You’re left with a mood, and the mood was calm.
So I felt a certain relief, as did other Obama supporters in the room with whom I spoke. And as the crowd drifted out, I had the clear impression that many in it were letting go of some of their anger, allowing it to soften into disappointment, and beginning to reconcile themselves to reality.
Like most fair-minded people, I’m a lot more optimistic than I was a year ago, and I can see the potential for it going very wrong again. But I do think that there is the prospect now, if this is deftly handled, for a soft as opposed to a hard landing to the United States in Iraq. It won’t be victory, they won’t be throwing flowers at American soldiers again, but there is now the possibility that with careful navigation, the United States could draw its troops down and bring them home, not quickly, over a period of years, and that this will prove not to have been quite the disaster that a year ago it seemed likely to be. But it could equally well turn around, and it could yet again, it could become a situation promising nothing but catastrophe for the United States.
Blogs may turn out to be critical in breaking the grip of the mullahs. From a new Harvard report:
Most of the blogosphere network is visible inside Iran, although the most frequently blocked blogs are clearly those in the secular/reformist pole. Given the repressive media environment in Iran today, blogs may represent the most open public communications platform for political discourse. The peer-to-peer architecture of the blogosphere is more resistant to capture or control by the state than the older, hub and spoke architecture of the mass media model.
Schweitzer is a hell of a smart guy. A soil
scientist and rancher, he spent 6 years in Saudi Arabia working on
irrigation projects. He speaks fluent Arabic and has an intuitive grasp
of the region based on real life experience. Certainly that would open
him up to the sleazy email "Manchurian Candidate" stuff, especially as
the radical Islamic Hussein Osama's running mate. But I have a feeling,
knowing Schweitzer, he'd be asked about it and his response would have
people slapping their foreheads in laughter with, "Yes! That's the
perfect reply!"
As far as other stats, Schweitzer is one of Al Giordano's Catholic governors.
He is known for energy policy, which aligns with Obama's comments about
wanting to find a running mate with executive experience and energy
policy expertise.
She made the decision pretty darn quickly (certainly by historical standards).
There was no serious mathematical possibility for her to win at least a month or two ago. And historically, losing candidates concede after the last primary has delivered an insurmountable victory to his or her opponent - and usually long before. Those were the rules the Clintons set for Jerry Brown back in 1992; they are rules everyone else follows. I see no reason to acquiesce to the delusions and pathologies of Clinton entitlement. And if Bevan weren't desperate to stop Obama being the final verdict on Bush, he'd say the same thing.
A couple participates in a symbolic group commitment ceremony for
same-sex couples to kick off National Gay Pride Month at The Abbey bar
and restaurant on June 4, 2008 in West Hollywood, California. The
California Supreme Court has refused to stay its decision legalizing
same-sex marriage which will become legal starting June 17. By
David McNew/Getty Images.
Most Americans say two years tops, and a plurality wants us out of there by this time next year. Americans are not natural imperialists however much Bob Kagan would like them to be.
"She will crush Barack Obama. Barack, just sit it out. It's going to be ugly. I promise you. You heard it here first," - Joe Scarborough, December 20, 2006, from last night's Daily Show.
Awards glossary here. I rely primarily on readers for nominations in all categories.
The Economistreports on the situation in Zimbabwe:
The beating, kidnapping and killing of MDC activists has gravely weakened the opposition party’s local organisations. Areas that were former strongholds of ZANU-PF, the ruling party, which dared to switch to the opposition in March, have now been turned into no-go areas for the MDC. Mr Tsvangirai plans to visit the ZANU-PF heartland of Mashonaland but ensuring his safety there will not be easy, as his party has not been licensed to carry firearms or even radios. A prominent human-rights lawyer fled to South Africa this week following threats against his life.
Volokh defends a French court annulling a marriage because the bride lied about her virginity:
People are entitled to choose their spouses based on any reason at all,
and to my knowledge French law allows them to agree to divorce based on
any reason at all (again, at least if both agree). Saying that they may
also annul the marriage based on any misrepresentation that they saw as
material strikes me as no different: It's an accommodation of people's
choices about whom to have a tremendously important relationship with,
and we should generally accommodate those choices even when we think
they are partly unwise — I say partly because while the insistence on
virginity strikes me as unsound, the concern about the lie strikes me
as much more proper — or reinforce unsound community attitudes.
“Yesterday, the brothers unveiled 13 of the [Hitler] watercolours, on which they had added psychedelic rainbows, stars and love hearts, and placed them back on the market for £685,000.”
"The apparent decisiveness and deftness with which Obama and his team seem to be resolving with the Hillary Clinton problem is an impressive opening move in his general election campaign," - Bill Kristol.
Despite my sincere respect for many of the good things Sam Nunn has done, I also think it is important for those whispering about the possibility of putting Nunn in the VP slot on the Obama ticket -- or in Obama's cabinet -- to realize that this blog and many others will not stand for someone who still harbors long standing, institutionalized discriminatory views against gay men and women, particularly in the arena of national security when we should be applauding any who want to serve this country.
It's time for us to be asking Sam Nunn what his views on gays in the military now are -- and he should tell us.
My mom owns a restaurant in a tiny Illinois town. This is the type of place where farmers come in at 4:30am before the doors are ‘officially’ open. It is the type of place where dozens of people gather every morning to talk about the day’s news. Anyway, my mom told me a story about a group of older gentlemen who were discussing Senator Obama. And, over the course of their discussion the men managed to utter a few derogatory/racist remarks concerning a black man becoming President.
The story isn’t about racist small towns. The real story is my mother’s reaction. Instead of simply chalking this situation up to ignorance and letting the comments go - my mom confronted the table.
Caleb Crain analyzes Zogby's poll on American reading habits:
The Zogby poll reflects not only the way that Americans buy books, but what’s socially acceptable to say about buying books. For example, Zogby reports that only thirty-two percent of Americans borrow books, while seventy-one per cent lend them. That might be true; it’s possible to reconcile the disparity by supposing that a small cadre of predatory moochers are taking advantage of a vast cow-like herd of good-hearted people who can’t say no. But the disparity is awfully large. A likelier explanation is that people would rather say that they give books than that they take them.
"I mean, they have teeth whitening products today. Just ask Chuck
Norris. There's also photoshop. No one at Camp McCain thinks this is
relevant or worth fixing?" - Markos Moulitsas. A glossary of Dish Awards can be read here.
Polls in Georgia and North Carolina over the past two weeks show Mr.
Barr winning 8 percent and 6 percent, respectively, of the
presidential vote. That would help keep presumptive Democratic
presidential nominee Sen. Barack Obama within striking distance of Mr.
McCain in those states, which together account for more electoral
votes than Florida, Pennsylvania or Ohio.
When Betsy Myers first met with Obama in his Senate office on Jan. 3,
2007, about two weeks before he announced he was forming an
exploratory committee to run for President, Obama laid down three
ruling principles for his future chief operating officer: Run the
campaign with respect; build it from the bottom up; and finally, no
drama. Myers was struck by how closely Obama had studied the two
campaigns of George W. Bush. "He said he wanted to run our campaign
like a business," says Myers.
June 1, 2008 - June 7, 2008
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