Tonight I was over at the vice president's house for one of their holiday parties. It was like a gathering of old friends — friends who likely won't see the inside of the naval observatory for a bit. Cheney aides like David Addington. Conservative Hill aides. Bill Bennett ... Karl Rove.
And that's the picture I want for my Facebook page: Karl Rove with Dick Cheney; Karl was two behind me in the receiving line.
Ah, K-Lo's Facebook page: the gold at the end of the rainbow.
Mark Warren profiles Jon Favreau, Obama's precocious and gifted speechwriter:
He is too busy to read much. "I'm embarrassed to say that since college"--Favreau graduated from Holy Cross in 2003--"I've been so busy speechwriting for Kerry and then Barack that I haven't been reading all the good literary stuff I used to read back in the day." As for speechcraft, while he says the speeches of Bobby Kennedy are his favorites, he also says Peggy Noonan is his all-time favorite speechwriter.
About a quarter of Britons are satisfied with their health care system. Less than a fifth of Americans can say the same. Similarly, a mere 15 percent of Britons want to dynamite the awful beast and start over. More than a third -- a third! -- of Americans feel the same way. Indeed, none of the socialized systems have even half as many of their residents calling for a totally new direction. Germany, where a robust 26 percent want to start over, is the least nationalized of the lot, using semi-private insurance pools known as "sickness funds," and sure enough, they're the system that's closest to ours on total dissatisfaction. I guess you could say that private health care sounds like a great idea unless you live under it.
Satisfaction is a subjective function of subjective expectations. If you have the kind of expectations that many Brits have for their healthcare system, it is not hard to feel satisfied. The Brits are very happy with their dentists as well. And there is a cultural aspect here - Brits simply believe suffering is an important part of life, especially through ill health. Going to the doctor is often viewed as a moral failure, a sign of weakness. This is a cultural function of decades of conditioning that success is morally problematic and that translating that success into better health is morally inexcusable. But if most Americans with insurance had to live under the NHS for a day, there would be a revolution. It was one of my first epiphanies about most Americans: they believe in demanding and expecting the best from healthcare, not enduring and surviving the worst, because it is their collective obligation. Ah, I thought. This is how free people think and act. Which, for much of the left, is, of course, the problem.
Justin Fox writes about those out to kill the savings instrument:
Unlike pensions, 401(k)s are voluntary, and many workers either don't participate or don't set aside enough money to give them a shot at a comfortable retirement. Those who do save enough often bungle their investment choices. Those who choose well pay higher investment fees generally than pension funds do. Even participants in the best-run, lowest-cost retirement funds face the risk that the market will tank — as it has done this year — when they're close to retirement. At retirement comes another issue: pensions insure against the risk that you'll outlive your money, because they pay until you die; 401(k)s don't. And finally, the tax breaks built into the 401(k) — about $80 billion a year — fall mostly in the laps of high earners.
The alternative, Ghilarducci's government-run pension plan, doesn't sound very promising. State governments have vastly underfunded the public pensions they are already responsible for.
I can think of many reasons one might want to live in the USA, but our health care system isn't one of them. Do you seriously believe that a health care system that leaves millions without adequate care, that bankrupts sick individuals and families, that consistently ranks at or near the bottom of all industrialized nations by almost every metric used to evaluate such things, and does so at double or triple the costs of other nations with better overall health care, is a superior system?
[W]hat about a grand bargain? In return for not having a vote in Congress, how about abolishing the federal income tax for DC residents? I suspect there are many who'd be all in favour of that. And of course such a move would do more to repopulate the city - complete with the kind of urban density Matt's in favour of - and regenerate its schools and so on than just about anything else...
Of course, I'm with Massie. We could become Hong Kong on the Potomac.
Chairman and CEO of General Motors Richard Wagoner prepares to testify before the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee about a proposed $34 billion federal bailout for the U.S. auto industry December 4, 2008 in Washington, DC. By Chip Somodevilla/Getty.
If you're like me, you're putting your monthly retirement account statement directly into the trash without opening it. But it could be worse. An Economist writer who taught financial literacy to homeless single mothers noticed something wild:
One thing that shocked me was how many women had 401(k) plans. You can withdraw some of these funds if you experience severe financial hardship or take out loans, but nearly all of the women did not want to touch their accounts. All the women have substantial credit card debt and are living in a homeless shelter, yet many have an asset they can't access for another thirty years. This struck me as rather perverse. Should the poor really have such illiquid assets when they're prone to these kinds of income shocks?
The idea of 'friendship' through this thing we call a blog really didn't
resonate with me until Monday. When Tanta at Calculated Risk passed
away, it was so much more than just knowing of someone passing; it was
indeed like losing a friend, and the feeling surprised me. I didn't
even know what she looked like, and yet I felt a bound with her through
her interactive writing.
Last night, on Fox News, Sean Hannity insisted that United States
needs to "take out" Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Warren said
he agreed. Hannity asked, "Am I advocating something dark, evil or
something righteous?" Warren responded, "Well, actually, the Bible says
that evil cannot be negotiated with. It has to just be stopped.... In
fact, that is the legitimate role of government. The Bible says that
God puts government on earth to punish evildoers. Not good-doers.
Evildoers."
Some insist that Warren is a centrist, moderate type. He is, in fact, a very hard-core Christianist integrated firmly into the GOP. As such, he sees government as a divine institution authorized to punish evil and promote good - as fundamentalist Christians view those things.
I strongly believe there should be a single, clear standard for interrogation across the federal government, and that this standard should comply with the Geneva Convention, the United Nations Convention Against Torture, and U.S. law. I plan to introduce legislation in January that would close Guantanamo, make the Army Field Manual the single standard for interrogations, prohibit contractors from being used to carry out interrogations and provide the International Committee of the Red Cross with access to detainees. If the incoming administration decides to propose an alternative to this legislation, I am willing to hear its views. But I believe we must put an end to coercive interrogations by the CIA.
Should reporters publish only when they’ve nailed the story six ways to Sunday? Not to endorse journalistic malpractice, but as long as they don’t intend to deceive and believe what they publish, I’d rather read their imperfect reports from the scene of breaking news than wait for a book on the subject ...
The point of this document was supposed to be the presentation of the plan to achieve these operational improvements. But there’s no there there. I guess somebody who’s never read a real business plan might mistake this document for one, but it’s a joke.
Joseph Romm assesses bailout plans submitted by Ford and GM. Yglesias adds his two cents. I'm beginning to hope that the Big 3 go under. Any sign that the tax payer is prepared to rescue these losers means we have all but given up on the market economy in favor of government command and control. Whatever the way out of this crisis, returning to the 1970s is not part of it.
Derb responds to my callingNational Review a "“central pillar of theoconservatism:”
A magazine lives by its personality. The personality of National Review remains, to the best of my perception, as Bill Buckley established it: a broad-minded and literate conservative magazine with a strong line on national defense and a Catholic coloration. It was never, and so far as I can see still is not, the vehicle for an ideology, certainly not a religious ideology. Among the earliest contributors there was at least one atheist (Max Eastman) and one Jewish agnostic (Frank Chodorov).
That dreadful piece - cowardly in its language and stupid in its description of torture opponents as somehow all "left-wing" - also misquoted Senator Feinstein as Ackerman reports. Here's the full quote from Feinstein, which the NYT truncated:
“The law must reflect a single, clear standard across the government,
and right now the best choice appears to be the Army Field Manual,”
Senator Feinstein said. “I recognize that there are other views, and I
am willing to work with the new Administration to consider them.
However, my intent is to pass a law that effectively bans torture,
complies with all laws and treaties, and provides a single standard
across the government.”
How does a competent journalist not print the sentence in italics?
The doyenne of the blogosphere liked my essay on blogging, "Why I Blog". It got lost a little in the election hoopla. But going through my emails today - and finding so many of you venting, explaining, thinking - I was reminded of this wonderful truth:
"Alone in front of a computer, at any moment, are two
people: a blogger and a reader. The proximity is
palpable, the moment human -- whatever authority a blogger has is derived not
from the institution he works for but from the humanness he conveys. This is
writing with emotion not just under but always breaking through the surface. It
renders a writer and a reader not just connected but linked in a visceral,
personal way. The only term that really describes this is friendship. And it is
a relatively new thing to write for thousands and thousands of friends."
The issue won't go away. Ed Morrissey isn't happy:
I’m sure the comments section will fill with various conspiracy theories over Indonesian school records, Kenyan births, and so on. None of it — absolutely none — has any real, solid evidence showing that Obama was born anywhere else than Hawaii apart from sheer speculation and hearsay, and even less evidence that Obama’s stepfather renounced Obama’s birthright citizenship, which he didn’t have the power to do anyway. It’s a conspiracy theory spun by conspiracy theorists (Philip Berg is a 9/11 truther) who use their normal thresholds of evidence for this meme.
Jacob Grier, an indie coffee shop aficionado, praises the corporate behemoth:
The charge that Starbucks was driving other shops out of business was never justified. Competitor Peet’s weathered the attack and continues to thrive. Relative newcomer Caribou Coffee has expanded to become the nation’s second largest coffee chain. Most importantly, there are more independent coffee shops today than ever before. The Specialty Coffee Association of America (SCAA), a trade group that tracks the market for high-end coffee, reports spectacular growth in the industry. In 1989, the SCAA estimated that there were just 585 coffee retailers in the United States. By 2006 that number had risen to nearly 24,000. Sixty percent of these shops are independently owned or part of micro-chains of less than ten units.[...]
Move over, Jon Cohn. Ezra Klein points out the sublime rationality of socialism:
In 2006, adjusted for purchasing power, the United Kingdom spent $2,760 per person on health care. America spent $6,714. It's a difference of almost $4,000 per person, spread across the population. That's $4,000 that can go into wages, or schools, or defense, or luxury, or mortgage-backed securities.
Greenwald points out Feinstein's and Wyden's sudden change in rhetoric on torture:
What makes this so notable is that, for the last year, Feinstein and Wyden were both insistent that the only way to end torture and restore America's standing in the world was to require CIA compliance with the Army Field Manual -- period. But as long as George Bush was President, it was cheap and easy for Feinstein and Wyden to argue that, because they knew there was no chance it would ever happen. As they well knew, they lacked the votes to override Bush's inevitable veto of any such legislation. So as long as Bush was President, it was all just posturing, strutting around demanding absolute anti-torture legislation they knew would never pass.
As I discovered in studying the [NYT's] reporting over a period of year, when a neighbor plays his stereo too loudly in the apartment next door, that is “torture.” But when a man is stripped of his clothing, chained to the floor in a short-shackle position, subjected to sleep deprivation and alternating cold and heat, and left to writhe in his own feces and urine—that, in the world of the Times, is just an “enhanced interrogation technique.” Shane and Mazzetti do us one better in this piece. Figures who criticize torture and Brennan’s fitness to be DCI are, we learn, the “left wing of the Democratic Party.” That’s a remarkable characterization for a group that is led by retired generals and admirals, as well as many of the nation’s most prominent religious leaders.
In so many ways, it's a very small issue, directly affecting only 2 to 3 percent of the population. But the gay issue really is becoming a defining catalyst for Republicanism in many ways. New polling on Prop 8 reveals the kind of political coalition that focusing on same-sex marriage has created for the GOP:
Evangelical or born-again Christians (85%) were far more likely than others (42%) to vote yes.
Three in four Republicans (77%) voted yes, two in three
Democrats (65%) voted no, and independents were more closely divided
(52% yes, 48% no).
Supporters of Republican presidential candidate John McCain
were far more likely than those who backed President-elect Barack Obama
to vote yes (85% vs. 30%).
Latinos (61%) were more likely than whites (50%) to vote
yes; and 57 percent of Latinos, Asians, and blacks combined voted yes.
(Samples sizes for Asians and blacks are too small to report
separately.)
Voters without a college degree (62%) were far more likely than college graduates (43%) to vote yes.
The trouble for the GOP is that this is one of very few issues on which Asians, Latinos and blacks vote for them. But it reinforces the identity of the party as primarily that of white, less educated fundamentalist voters. I've no doubt there's a place for such a party in American politics. I also have little doubt it will never be a majority.
If the economic team is centrist, the foreign policy team (and I pinch
myself as I say this) leans a little to the right. Did you notice that
in introducing his choices, the president-elect used the term "defeat
our enemies"? ... And that, along with the other appointments, is
enough to keep some of us smiling at a time when we were expecting to
be in deep anguish.
Did Charen not hear Obama promise to defeat our enemies in the debates? Did she never read his iconic Iraq speech where he said he wasn't against war, just dumb wars? Or were her ears and eyes clogged with partisanship?
I've been following you on Iraq this week, and allow me
a dissent. I think your frame is wrong. The fighting in Iraq
was not between Sunnis and Shiites per se, as much as between parties
that sought a confessional war (al Qaeda, the Iranian special groups,
elements of Moqtada al Sadr's Jaish e Mahdi) and those parties that
sought to prevent one (the Iraqi government, the US Marines, the Anbar
Awakening). The anti-competitive-genocide alliance won. The forces that
sought civil war are either destroyed (al Qaeda) or reconciled to the
new order of things (most of JAM).
It's always possible that the forces
of chaos can reconstitute themselves. Iran has an interest in doing
just that. But they will do so without a crucial advantage, support
from the local population, who fought side by side with Americans
against the agents of chaos for the last 2 years. I think those battles
will have a lasting impact and we will see that impact when Iraqis
begin to write the history of this period. Also your thesis has to a
degree been tested. The Marines have largely left Anbar and the
expected reprisals against the Shiite pockets in western Iraq have not
occurred.
This rubric, to be perfectly honest, is the first time I've heard how a frame for success could actually work long term. At least the first time I've heard it laid out so crisply and clearly.
Jamie Kirchick has a helpful piece in the Advocate. He notes that Mormons make up 2 percent of California's population yet contributed more than 50 percent of the funds for Prop 8. He also notes the structure of the church, which makes it, in so many ways, a great complement to Christianist politics. Put all the elements of the LDS church together and turn them into a political movement and you can see why Hugh Hewitt sees it as a vehicle for future political power:
Because the church requests that members tithe 10% of their annual
income, LDS leaders are able to gain an accurate picture of how much
their congregants earn. With this information in hand, bishops in local
communities went from house to house in California asking for specific
amounts of money for the Yes on 8 campaign -- an incredibly effective
fund-raising tactic.
Jamie's also shrewd in noting that the 1950s nuclear family has special theological salience for Mormons:
According to Mormon dogma, marriage extends into the afterlife and
couples continue to have "spirit children" who populate
extraterrestrial worlds.
A secular amendment to a secular constitution was passed partly in order to protect the integrity of "spirit children."
I know of few writers as knowledgeable or as emphatic on the idea that government experts can solve most of our difficult problems than Jonathan Cohn. Here he's summarizing Jonathan Gruber's column in the NYT on universal health-care serving as a fiscal stimulus:
Gruber, who is one of the nation's most respected experts on health care issues, goes on to make a point familiar to readers of this space. Reform, he notes, could eventually create a more rational health care system in which we don't throw away so much money on administration, inefficient care, or unnecessary treatments. And less waste in health care means more money for other, more productive purposes.
Here's one, slightly oversimplified way to think of it: Health care reform would help the economy in the short term--by increasing spending on medical care. It would also help the economy in the long term--by reducing spending on medical care. Pretty neat, huh?
If only more really respected experts would make all of our lives more efficient. Pretty neat, huh?
...plug-in hybrids and electric cars still look like the cleanest, surest way to end our dependence on oil, though lest anyone think that's entirely cost-free from a sustainability standpoint, the BBC had a recent piece on analysts who are fretting about whether there's enough lithium in the world to make all those advanced car batteries. (One official from Mitsbuishi, which is unveiling an electric car soon, expects lithium demand to outstrip supply in less than ten years, unless new reserves are brought online.) Chile, for one, has been dubbed the Saudi Arabia of lithium—a light metal that's most easily harvested from the brine under salt flats—but the world's largest reserves may be in Bolivia. Yet Bolivia's president, Evo Morales, isn't terribly keen on welcoming in foreign mining companies to exploit the area, which could become a bone of contention for electric-car makers trying to keep battery prices down. Never a dull moment in the resource wars...
Heritage Foundation Senior Research Fellow James Jay Carafano wants to use friggin' lasers on the Somali pirates:
Less-potent lasers "would be effective for addressing a range of threats." The weapons "could, for example, disable the engines of small boats." Or they could "detonate shoulder-fired missiles before they strike their targets." Or they could "trigger IEDs [improvised explosive devices] from a safe distance before they threaten passing convoys," Carafano offers. Why, there's practically nothing the ray guns can't do.
A reader notices that Goldberg isn't just intellectually dishonest, he's incapable of taking a stance on the issue:
Probably because half my family is Mormon, I was more sympathetic toJonah's column and more bothered by the anti-Mormon stuff that (while somewhat exagerrated) I've witnessed here in CA.
But on a more substantive note, take a look at Jonah's
view on same-sex marriage and on the impact of the campaign in its
favor: "My own view is that gay marriage is likely inevitable and
won't be nearly the disaster many of my fellow conservatives fear it
will be. But the scorched-earth campaign to victory pushed by
gay-marriage advocates may well be disastrous, and "liberals" should be
ashamed for countenancing it."
Note, as is typical of him: He doesn't actually take a stand on
anything other than whether someone else ought to "feel" a particular
emotion about his conduct. He does this over and over in his writing.
"I should confess that behind my passion on this subject
is a core religious conviction - that all human beings have dignity in
the eyes of God and that treating any human being in this way is an
absolute moral evil."
I am a confirmed, confident atheist, and yet I am in complete agreement
with you on this.
Only 31% of black Democrats in America say homosexual relations are morally acceptable, roughly the same as the 30% of Republicans who agree, while very much different from the 61% of nonblack Democrats who say homosexual relations are morally acceptable.
And does anyone believe that it is a coincidence that the most homophobic racial group in America also has the highest rate of HIV transmission?
There is no recession. Despite all the doom and gloom from the economic pessimistas, the resilient U.S economy continues moving ahead—quarter after quarter, year after year—defying dire forecasts and delivering positive growth. In fact, we are about to enter the seventh consecutive year of the Bush boom," - Larry Kudlow, December 2007, the month that the recession officially started.
I wonder at times how people like Kudlow still manage to opine with such sublime confidence. Denial, I guess. Dow 36,000, anyone?
Virtually the entire neoconservative "intelligentsia" (using that term as loosely as it can possibly be used) is one big paean to nepotistic succession -- the Kristols, the Kagans, the Podhoretzes, Lucinanne Goldberg and her boy. Upon Tim Russert's death, NBC News excitedly hired his son, Luke. Mike Wallace's son hosts Fox's Sunday show. The most influential political opinion space in the country, The New York Times Op-Ed page, is, like the Times itself, teeming with family successions and connections. Inter-marriages between and among media stars and political figures -- and lobbyists, operatives and powerful political officials -- are now more common than arranged royal marriages were among 16th Century European monarchs.
From a distance, it's more obviously corrupt than up close. I mean: what are the odds that of all the people who could edit Commentary, the son of the former editor ends up in charge? It's not entirely a function of the right, of course. The Kennedys were as bad. Biden's son toyed with succeeding him. And I see that Bill Clinton wants a role in the new administration. If it weren't for Obama, we'd be the Philippines.
A policeman speaks into his phone as Indians gather for a peace rally in order to pay homage to those slain by the militants during the recent terror attacks in the city at the Gateway of India in Mumbai on December 3, 2008. People from all walks of life took part in the rally to condemn the recent terrorist attacks and urged the government to take strong measures to curb such attacks in future. By Indranil Mukherjee/AFP/Getty.
I'm a fourth-generation Mumbaikar
who loves reading your blog, but your post about the name Mumbai (linked to
Hitchens) left me seething.
Hitchens is completely wrong. As
someone whose roots go back many generations in Mumbai, let me assure you that
we've always called the city Mumbai in our local language Marathi. The name
Bombay was given to the city by the British. What do you think the city was
called before the Europeans arrived? It was called Mumbai.
One wonders how out of it NRO can get, and then one reads this from Victor Davis Hanson:
FISA and wire-intercepts of terrorist communications in the pre-Obama
president months were once derided as more of Ashcroft-Bush stomping on
the Constitution — except that now ABC News reports that, in fact, US
intelligence agencies supplied India with general knowledge of the
rough time period, place, and perhaps even method of terrorist attack.
Are we to believe that such newfound capability to warn a country 7000
miles away about terrorist infiltration on its borders would be of no
utility here at home?
Does Hanson actually believe that opponents of the Bush warrantless wiretapping were actually against all wire intercepts of terrorist communications? Does he really believe we wanted no intelligence procured through spying or wiretapping? Or is he actually aware that we were concerned about checks and balances so that these powers could not be abused or adopted in secret or given to the president alone? And just lying about it?
You wrote today regarding torture, "I should confess that behind my
passion on this subject is a core religious conviction - that all human
beings have dignity in the eyes of God and that treating any human
being in this way is an absolute moral evil."
I need to read this more in depth before commenting more, but I can't get over the deliberate lack of mention of chemical terrorism. It may not be a capability to take out a city, but certainly chemicals are more available and easier to use than either biological or radiological hazards. For biological terrorism being such the threat that they insinuate, they do not assess the government's current biodefense efforts (which are collectively getting $5-6 billion a year).
Goldberg sets up more straw-men in an additional post on Mormons and prop 8:
If opposition to gay marriage is morally indistinguishable from Jim Crow racism, anti-Semitism and the like (as so many of you say), why on earth aren't you screaming bloody murder at Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, Harry Reid and the other Democratic politicians who run the US governmemt? [sic] Surely, they matter more than a few Mormon donors. Why aren't they bigots even though they hold the same fundamental position as Mormons?
Er: all those people opposed Prop 8. The Mormons maxed out on contributing money for it. And some of us have held Democrats, including Obama, to account. But at least they support civil unions with the same rights and responsibilities as civil marriage. The LDS church doesn't, and neither does Jonah, so far as I know. Here's a practical question for those seeking civil unions that are not the equal of civil marriage: what marital rights should be withheld from gay couples - and why?
“We had John McCain and Mike Huckabee and Gov. Romney and Rudy
Giuliani, but Sarah Palin came in on the last day, did a fly-around
and, man, she was dynamite,” Chambliss said. “We packed the houses everywhere
we went. And it really did allow us to peak and get our base fired up.”
Benedict's envoy to the United Nations, Archbishop Celestino Migliore, has announced that the Vatican will oppose a proposed U.N. declaration calling for an end to discrimination against homosexuals. At first blush, no one should be surprised to find the Catholic Church hierarchy butting heads with gay rights activists. But this particular French-sponsored proposal, which has the backing of all 27 European Union countries, calls for an end to the practice of criminalizing and punishing people for their sexual orientation.
Should Republicans have reason to crow about their chances in 2010? On the one hand, there's no Bush on the ticket. Ok, there might be one, but he'll be in Florida, and besides, he's not THAT Bush. Two: the Democrats are in charge, and Republicans will have something to rally the base with. Three: ... three is a "but." But... more Republican retirements are expected, including at least two in blue states (Chuck Grassley of Iowa and George Voinovich of Ohio.)
November 30, 2008 - December 6, 2008
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