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Saturday, March 17, 2007
The Missing Outrage
Posted by on 3.17.07 @ 9:01PM
"Too many people have died and it doesn't solve
anything," said Ann O'Grady, who drove to
Added to that bad feeling, I feel a revolted outrage at the general failure of apparently everyone to scream out against the completely unhinged tactics of Iraq's murdering class, which have absolutely junked nearly all of our sacrosanct laws of war. Even the soulless pro forma bureaucratic reflex of 'strong condemnation' seems now too much, or beside the point, or not worth the effort.
We can't keep this up for much longer without incurring a new moral cost, this one in our own souls. When the conscience despairs itself to silence, cultures die.
Friday, March 16, 2007
Re: Mrs. Giuliani
Posted by on 3.16.07 @ 10:53PM
Wlady: I agree, she comes off fine. I think the reason Ryan had that "ick" reaction is that he lives in the world of New York media, where everyone remembers what a horrorshow Rudy's personal life was when his second marriage fell apart. I don't think the rest of the country looks at her through that prism, and it's not clear that rival campaigns are going to be able to change that.
Re: Mrs. Giuliani
Posted by on 3.16.07 @ 7:53PM
Wlady, I thought she came off fine. The problem, if there is one, is that her presentation was somewhat boring. I think she could deliver a good pro-Rudy speech with some prepared material rather than this kind of reminiscence delivered in the clip you referenced.
McCain Redux
Posted by on 3.16.07 @ 2:45PM
The NY Times reports on John McCain on the campaign trail in Iowa. Unable to attain the status of the inevitable nominee, McCain is back on the Straight Talk Express in an attempt to reintroduce himself to voters. To win over conservatives, McCain will have to remind them that he has a solid voting record on a lot of issues that are important to them. His problem is that when he has deviated from conservatives, he has made a public show of it in the mainstream media. Thus, conservatives' attitudes toward McCain have become so poisoned that any case he makes for himself, however compelling, will be greeted with skepticism.
Even were he to win the nomination, I think he'd face a problem in the general election similar to the one Al Gore faced in 2000. Gore tried to distance himself from Bill Clinton during that election in the wake of Clinton's scandal-plagued second term. As a result, Gore was less identified with the strong economic growth, became resented by Clinton lovers in the party, and missed out on having the most talented Democratic politician of his generation campaign for him. At the same time, people who hated the administration still associated Gore with Clinton anyway.
McCain, too, has somehow managed to get himself in a situation in which he's the Washington insider closely associated with President Bush's most unpopular policy--the war in Iraq. This isn't really fair, because though McCain has been a staunch supporter of the war from the get go, he was always critical of the way it was being waged, specifically arguing repeatedly over the years for increasing the number of troops. But fair or not, he has become associated with the war policy, and yet at the same time, he is viewed with disdain by many Bush loyalists for the occasions on which he very publicly broke with the administration.
About Mrs. Giuliani
Posted by on 3.16.07 @ 2:40PM
If all you know about Judith Nathan is what you read about her or see on the front page of the New York Post, granted she may cause alarms. I was expecting the worst myself when I read Ryan Sager's censorious report on her appearance at the Sheraton fundraiser the other night. But Ryan made the mistake of linking to a video of her remarks. Watching her on tape I had quite a different reaction. She came across as gracious, polite, even elegant. Anyone disagree?
Libertarians for Romney Care
Posted by on 3.16.07 @ 2:03PM
Ronald Bailey argues that the Massachusetts healthcare reform will end up promoting private health insurance. I yield the balance of my time to David Hogberg.
D'Souza and his Discontents Cont'd
Posted by on 3.16.07 @ 1:58PM
Dinesh D'Souza's conservative critics reply.
Phil Tries to Kill Me
Posted by on 3.16.07 @ 1:45PM
Phil, by bringing that utterly inane column to my attention, are you trying to cause me to have a deadly heart attack? I mean, I swear my blood pressure must have jumped by about 50% in three minutes as I read that column by Cohen. The thought of Fitzgerald as AG is scarier than the original Halloween movie. I mean, it's just nuts.
But there are plenty of people out there who would make great AGs. After my column today, I don't think the administration will like me much, so I won't ruin my favorites' chances by mentioning them. But Fitzgerald!!!! I think I need a good stiff drink....
The Somalia Success Story
Posted by on 3.16.07 @ 1:37PM
Matt Lewis catches Russ Feingold citing the Somalia precedent to argue for defunding the Iraq War. Yeah, you read that correctly, the same withdrawal from Somalia that lead bin Laden to conclude that the U.S. would fold like a cheap suitcase at the first sign of casualties.
Fitzgerald For Attorney General!
Posted by on 3.16.07 @ 1:23PM
Andrew Cohen makes the case.
Do you think that would be a good idea, Quin?
Who's Crazy?
Posted by on 3.16.07 @ 10:55AM
Michelle Cottle says Dick Cheney has gone off the deep end. Charles Krauthammer says the vice president's critics, including Cottle, have.
Who's The Mormon in This Race?
Posted by on 3.16.07 @ 10:02AM
In the past few nights, the spouses of current presidential candidates have been front and center. Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney's wife appeared with him on "Larry King Live" last night, and performed just fine.
The real eyebrow-raiser was the latest spouse of "America's Mayor" Rudolph Giuliani. Now we should be clear. We love Rudy. Think he's great. But in political circles, everyone acknowledges that he has two potential weaknesses: his business dealings after his term as mayor expired. And his third wife, Judith Nathan.
That weakness was on full display earlier this week at a fundraiser in New York. "It was not a good performance," says an attendee to the event at the Sheraton-New York. "She clearly thought she'd done well. I don't think the audience would agree."
In the past, Nathan has talked in loving and romantic terms about how she and Giuliani met - when he was still married. "It's awkward, and it doesn't come off well," says another source who has heard Nathan riff on the romance. "It's not like George and Laura or even Ron and Nancy."
Which all raises the question: With Giuliani's three wives compared to Romney's one, who's the real Mormon in this race? And who's going to keep pounding away on that point?
Thursday, March 15, 2007
RE: More Guns and Butter
Posted by on 3.15.07 @ 6:40PM
As someone who is a good deal less supportive of an interventionist foreign policy than Phil but more of an interventionist than Daniel Larison, maybe I can stake out some middle ground. I'd say this: 9/11 was a good opportunity for a debate about what government is actually for. Conservatives, from Chronicles paleo to Commentary neo, have long believed that national defense is a more legitimate function of the federal government than, say, giving old people prescription drugs. A government that tries to do everything ultimately becomes less effective at the things it is really, constitutionally supposed to be doing.
This observation doesn't solve all the problems of a neocon/libertarian fusionism. After all, there can still be disagreements about what constitutes a just national defense or vital national interest. Wars grow government, both in terms of foreign entaglements and domestic functions. But a conservatism based on performing government's vital functions while shedding illegitimate or unsustainable commitments seems a lot more prudent -- and thus more conservative -- than one that fuses compassion at home with activism abroad.
More Guns and Butter
Posted by on 3.15.07 @ 1:47PM
Daniel Larison takes issue with my post from the other day in which I pointed out that defense spending is below the 45-year average, cited the explosive growth of mandatory spending as the primary reason, and advocated a different type of fusionism.
Here is the portion of my post to which Larison had the biggest objection:
To be fair to Larison, I'll acknowledge that the phrase "most practical" was probably too strong on my part. Oftentimes blog posts are written in haste, and don't allow for the type of reflection and precision of language that columns do. With that said, I do think there is something to be said for the brand of fusionism I propose. As I wrote in my initial post, I don't think it would be possible now, given the animosity that has developed between the two groups over the past several years. But Larison argues, generally speaking, that such an alliance would not be electorally viable and that it is fundamentally incoherent. Here we still disagree.
While actually cutting the size of government (and specifically reforming entitlements) will always politically difficult, I would argue that the post-9/11 environment represented a unique time to take such action. It was a dramatic moment that hammered home the idea that providing a strong national defense is the primary function of government. Just as World War II spending put the breaks on the New Deal, a post-9/11 military buildup could have provided the impetus to seriously address our long-term entitlement mess. No doubt, liberals would have attacked this argument on the grounds that Republicans are depriving the elderly of medical care to buy bombs, but this was at least the best environment possible to argue that the government cannot do everything, so given scarce resources, we have to make a choice between national security and entitlement spending. At the very minimum, President Bush could have abandoned the idea of his Medicare prescription drug plan by making the argument that 9/11 changed everything, and now America had to marshal its resources into fighting the war on terror.
While big government conservatives argue that President Bush would have lost to John Kerry were it not for the prescription drug plan, there is scant evidence to back up such a claim. As I've written in the past, comparing exit polls from 2000 and 2004, we see that Bush actually lost ground among voters who identified health care as their most important issue. "In 2000, Gore had a 64-33 advantage among these voters; in 2004, despite the passage of the Medicare prescription drug law (or perhaps even because of it), Kerry was favored by a margin of 77-23."
While the type of fusionism I suggest, like all forms of fusionism, is imperfect, it has a lot to offer both sides. For neoconservatives, such a fusionism would provide the wiggle room in the budget to increase the size of the military to a size they believe is more appropriate. That's just in the short term. Viewing things in the long term, there is simply no way we will even be able to maintain current levels of military spending (and strategically balance the emerging China) given the projected growth of entitlements over the next several decades. Simply put, if neoconservatives truly care about our national security, they need to get serious about reforming entitlements.
If neoconservatives did get serious about wanting to reform entitlements, it would have huge advantages to limited government types. One of the difficulties of arguing for entitlement reform is that opponents of reform can show all the here and now impacts of cutting benefits, but all reformers can counter with are boring actuarial charts and graphs. Linking entitlement reform to national defense would provide a strong argument for why we need to act immediately.
Critics may counter that if money saved by reforming entitlements would be used to increase defense spending anyway, we aren't really shrinking the size of government. My response to that would be that defense spending is much more preferable because it is discretionary, and can be adjusted based on the nature of threats we face (note the "peace dividend" of the 1990s). By definition, there is not much room to control annual mandatory outlays.
Larison notes "a fundamental incoherence of a limited government philosophy at home and an activist, interventionist foreign policy overseas." While this is a fair point, it should also be noted that most advocates of limited government (other than Rothbardian and anarchist types) still acknowledge that defense is a legitimate function of the state. I'd like to discuss this issue further, but given the length of the post already, for now I'll avoid getting into what actually constitutes a legitimate defense of our national interests.
As I noted, a lot of animosity has developed between these two groups in the years since 9/11, and certainly much of that has to do with the Iraq War. However, I believe that such animosity was amplified by the fact that on top of being for military intervention, neocons acquiesced to the Bush administration's spending spree. If neocons were committed to fighting spending, I don't think the gulf between the groups would have become as wide as it has today.
More Hewitt-ology
Posted by on 3.15.07 @ 12:42PM
Over at Redstate.com, Ben Domenech has read part of Hugh Hewitt's Romney book and has an extended commentary on the question of Romney and the life issue.
Incred-Hugh-lous
Posted by on 3.15.07 @ 11:42AM
Prowler, I have the same reaction you did to Hugh Hewitt's spit-take inducing statement about a three man race in NH "with little room for new candidates."
I've been reading Hugh Hewitt for a long time. I was tremendously bothered by his ridiculous Harriet Miers shilling and probably would be more open to Romney if Hewitt wasn't pushing him like some herbal remedy for hair regrowth.
I'll just lay it on the line and be prepared for rebuke if some of the other bloggers at TAS want to offer it:
For quite a while I was puzzled by Hugh's decision to write a book about Romney becoming the first Mormon president. After all, there's really no strong evidence that Romney is even a major candidate, yet. He has money, yes, but so did Phil Gramm, and he didn't last long at all.
To me, the newly published book is a market decision rather than the product of any cold political analysis that honestly believes Romney will win.
Romney will benefit because the book takes him seriously as "the" top tier candidate, "the" guy who will be the first Mormon president. Mormons are an underserved market in the U.S., much like evangelicals used to be. They are likely to buy the book in droves as a matter of religious pride and as a step toward mainstreaming the LDS faith. Hewitt and the publisher will benefit by selling a lot of books.
When Hewitt writes these over-the-top posts like the one about NH being a three man race "with little room for new candidates" his credibility takes a big hit. We all know that a guy like Fred Thompson would be a "new candidate" who would rather quickly change the landscape in NH or in other states and that there is not "little room" for him.
It's unseemly for a guy who spends so much time dogging the MSM for their lack of objective reporting to engage in so much UN-objective boosterism.
Giving Credit Where Credit Is Due
Posted by on 3.15.07 @ 10:37AM
One of the realities President Bush faces as the leader of the war on terror is that he gets blamed for all of the bad things that happen, but doesn't get much credit for bad things that do not happen. The haunting confession of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed demonstrates that the absence of any terrorist attacks on U.S. soil since 9/11 is no accident, but the result of the administration's persistent, even if imperfect, actions in the war on terrorism.
Mohammed not only claimed responsibility for 9/11 "from A to Z," but for more than 30 other terrorist attacks or plots, including: the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, the shoe-bomber operation, the 2002 Bali bombing, as well as assassination plots against Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, Pervez Musharraf and Pope John Paul II. More relevant to the point of this post, he was constantly planning operations against office buildings in Los Angeles, Chicago and New York City, including the Empire State Building, as well as the New York Stock Exchange and area suspension bridges. While terrorist attacks often fail or are aborted, as we saw on Sept. 11, the cost of one large scale attack succeeding is more than any of us can bear. It was only a matter of time before KSM pulled another one off.
This is not to say that defenders of the president should be able to cite the absence of terrorist attacks since 9/11 as a blanket defense of each and every one of the policies of his administration. But if the standard we are operating under is that President Bush should be held accountable for anything bad that happens under his watch, he should be given credit for potential tragedies that have been averted.
Hugh's the Man
Posted by on 3.15.07 @ 9:32AM
Well, at least he's former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney's man.
We love Hugh, he's a remarkable radio host, and his approach to blogging and leveraging the Internet's influence is a thing to behold. He's also out humping a book that he - and all of us who do that kind of thing - wants to see sell well.
But this post is strikes us as absurd. A three-man race? From a New Hampshire poll? In March 2007?
When 75% of the field is essentially ignoring New Hampshire (South Carolina, Florida and Iowa are being taken far more seriously), and surrendered it to McCain and Romney (note to Hugh: not a good thing when a neighboring native son can't be the top dog in that poll even if McCain's folks have been living in the state for months).
The reality is the Romney campaign is in trouble. And in trouble in New Hampshire judging by the staff shakeup yesterday. They are burning through their "commitments" like the election was going to be held next Tuesday. Videos continue to pop up that remind us that is the Republican version of a Massachusetts flip-flopper.
And Fred Thompson is sucking all of the air out of the political balloon with one hand tied behind his back.
It may be a three-man race, but if it is, Romney ain't one of the three. That club's membership is John McCain, Rudy Giuliani and Thompson's.
But in reality, it isn't a three-man race. It's more like a six-man race that is going to continue well into the summer.
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
Re: Bear Arms, Not Own Them
Posted by on 3.14.07 @ 7:29PM
In other words, even if the D.C. Circuit is right in holding that the Second Amendment creates individual rights, that does not answer the question as to the level of scrutiny to be used in evaluating gun control laws. I believe that there is a strong argument that the regulation of guns should be treated the same as other regulation of property under modern constitutional law: The regulation should be allowed so long as it is rationally related to achieving a legitimate government purpose. -- Erwin Chemerinsky
Let's pause -- wait, let's grind to a halt -- to remember that neither the Second nor any of the other first ten Amendments CREATED any rights at all, similarly to how neither the Constitution nor any of its Amendments CREATED the right to property. No, those rights were, instead, recognized. Liberal constitutional theorists may be stunned to see repeated in print the fact that property held by American citizens predated the American government, including 'gun property;' the recognized right to the holding of such property cannot possibly derive from the rational relation of the right to the achievement of any type of government purpose, legitimate or otherwise, because rights not created by the Federal government are not, a fortiori, created by the Federal government for some instrumental purpose of policy.
Erwin Chemerinsky is a smartypants, and though I somehow missed learning under him when we both were still at USC Law, I hold his dedication and sincerity in high regard. I hold his understanding of law as a tool by which to deploy political power to change social authority in very low regard, and bemoan the fact that a star jurisprudential scholar poached by my other alma mater Duke actually conceives of the Bill of Rights as a catalogue of entitlements permissively invented by some brooding omnipresence of 'The Government' or other.
Scalia's textualism is supposedly absurd and pernicious on its
face, yet this kind of phantom Hobbesian positivism -- under which
areas of life barred from political reach are in fact conditional
privileges handed down by the political sovereign they preceded --
somehow rises to the level of sacred writ? Silly, then, isn't it,
that any latter-day fundamental rights claimant magically arrogates
what had until one second ago seemed like the extraordinary and
singular power of The Government; but oh, yeah, I forgot -- not
even oppressed citizens seeking the spontaneous enshrinement of
their self-considered liberty interests can create rights. Only as
few as a plurality of Supreme Court justices can do
that.
US Attorneys and Them Attorneys
Posted by on 3.14.07 @ 6:25PM
Much more on this later, but for now, let's not get too carried away in assessing this matter of the Justice Department's replacement of eight U.S. Attorneys. The problem with the reporting and commentary so far is that all sides seem to be failing to distinguish case from case. The usual lefty suspects and their mainstream media fellow travelers are yelling for the scalp of everybody at Justice and in the White House, and the usual conservatives are rushing to defend everybody involved. Hold on, everybody. Take a deep breath. Don't paint with too broad a brush. Some people at the White House screwed up, others didn't. Some people at Justice screwed up, others didn't. Some of the U.S. Attorneys merited replacement, while others didn't. And at least one of the replacements, Tim Griffin of Arkansas by way of the Bush-Rove White House, has been pilloried in an utterly unfair manner, when in truth he is a tremendous public servant. (Full disclaimer: I have known Tim for about 12 years and consider him a friendly acquaintance, but obviously not a close one because I haven't spoken to him for almost two years and have never spent much time with him. I have double-checked my judgment on him with several other knowledgeable people, and closely perused his resume, just to make sure I am not letting that friendly acquaintance cloud my judgment. The truth is that his OBJECTIVE qualifications speak for themselves, and speak well.) Anyway, please watch this web site for a much fuller report by me by week's end. For now, though, let's say this: Some people who have not yet lost their jobs over this "scandal" probably deserve to lose their jobs. Others are being made to take a fall that may not be quite fair. But despite what the lefties say, "scandal" is too strong a word for most of what happened. Stupidity and asininity on some parts, yes, and serious idiocy and jerkiness with regard to the treatment of at least one of the U.S. Attorneys who was replaced (i.e., wrongly replaced). But this pales in comparison with the absolute scandal of the Clintons firing all 93 U.S. Attorneys at once in 1993, which drew almost no comment, much less outrage, from the "mainstream" (i.e. leftward biased) media.
More Thursday or Friday. GOOD stuff.
The Long View of Iraq
Posted by on 3.14.07 @ 4:47PM
I just got back from a panel discussion on Iraq hosted by the Heritage Foundation and featuring AEI's Frederick Kagan (the intellectual architect of the surge plan), Kenneth Pollack of the Brookings Institution and Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic Studies. While there were varying opinions on the
Kagan began his discussion by arguing that the history of American warfare is that we win wars only after first messing them up. And while the administration has made mistakes over the past four years in
Pollack was more skeptical about the potential outcome of the surge, but said he supports the policy because it is the only option that, if it works, means a positive result in
Cordesman was even more pessimistic, and took issue with the surge plan itself. For instance, the plan is focused on
If Massachusetts Had a Republican Party
Posted by on 3.14.07 @ 1:40PM
Departing Congressman Marty Meehan's district would be a good place to recruit a competitive candidate. It contains some heavily Republican suburbs, a relatively high if still paltry GOP registration, and Mitt Romney carried the district with 55 percent of the vote in 2002. (Kerry Healey didn't do quite as well.)
Come to think of it, North Andover might even be in this district.
Harriet Miers Redux
Posted by on 3.14.07 @ 1:32PM
Alberto Gonzales for Supreme Court? This doesn't strike me as one of David Frum's better ideas.
Letting Barry Voters Have Full Rights
Posted by on 3.14.07 @ 12:00PM
As a resident of DC, I have no problem with the fact that we have no full representation in Congress. Thus, I am less than pleased with the decision by the House Oversight Committee to give the DC Representative full voting rights in the House.
This is a city that elected Marion Barry to be mayor, then re-elected him even after it was clear he was a crack-head. And then, after he was no longer mayor, put him back on the City Council. I'm all in favor of equal rights, but let's be smart about it!
What's next? Will Congress pass a law giving all arsonists a blow torch, a can of gasoline, and directions to the nearest building that's not up to fire code?
You Can Bear Arms But Not Own Them
Posted by on 3.14.07 @ 11:43AM
It seems that the Washington Post op-ed page is hell bent on embarassing itself on the DC gun ban. On Monday it was an hysterical argument, today it is an argument so weird that only an intellectual would believe it. Here is the key passage from this missive by Professor Erwin Chemerinsky:
But where there is little reason to doubt the legislatures' choices, courts give great deference to the legislatures and uphold laws so long as they are reasonably related to a legitimate government purpose. For example, discrimination that is based on characteristics such as age, disability and sexual orientation need to meet only this more relaxed standard. Even rights enumerated in the Constitution, such as property rights, generally receive only this relaxed level of judicial review. For this reason, for 70 years, government regulation of the economy to protect employees and consumers has been upheld in the face of claims that it unduly restricts property rights.In other words, even if the D.C. Circuit is right in holding that the Second Amendment creates individual rights, that does not answer the question as to the level of scrutiny to be used in evaluating gun control laws. I believe that there is a strong argument that the regulation of guns should be treated the same as other regulation of property under modern constitutional law: The regulation should be allowed so long as it is rationally related to achieving a legitimate government purpose.
Under this standard, there is no doubt that the D.C. gun law is constitutional. The city's government was pursuing the legitimate goal of decreasing gun violence, and its means were certainly reasonable.
So let me get this straight. Since the Court lets legislatures regulate property, it should let them regulate guns to the point of banning ownership. To see how ridiculous that is, let's turn that logic onto property. It means that government can ban the ownership of property as long as government has a legitimate purpose. I'm unaware of any court case saying that government can ban the ownership of property. But if Herrdoktorprofessor Chemerinsky's logic catches on, maybe landowners will have more than just Kelo to worry about.
In short, it would seem that fundamental to any right is the ability to exercise it. But Chemerinsky's argument amounts to you have the right to own a gun unless the government says you don't.
Clearly, the Washington Post isn't thinking through the anti-gun commentary that it is letting on its op-ed pages.
I Didn't Know We Ever Left
Posted by on 3.14.07 @ 10:47AM
Hillary Clinton says the vast right-wing conspiracy is back.
But It's My Get Out Of Jail Free Organ!
Posted by on 3.14.07 @ 9:32AM
The legal blog Sui Generis takes note of South Carolina lawmakers' recent "oh-so-brilliant proposal of allowing for an inmate's sentence to be reduced by 180 days should the inmate donate an organ."
Yes, the "brilliant" there is heavily steeped in sacasm.
The RSC and the Blogs
Posted by on 3.14.07 @ 3:15AM
The Republican Study Committee did a conference call with bloggers yesterday afternoon to announce their "American Taxpayer Bill of Rights." (I was on the line but had to run out right after the call, which is why I'm only blogging it now.) Fausta Wertz took notes. In short: Some good ideas that have no chance of passing in the immediate future. But getting the policy proposals out there is an important step toward rebuilding a majority -- you've got to give voters something to vote for -- and it's interesting to note that bloggers give the minority an avenue to publicize what the mainstream press would generally ignore.
Freakononsense
Posted by on 3.14.07 @ 12:47AM
Steven Levitt has a response to the fallacies of Zell Miller. Unfortunately, he doesn't know what he's talking about either.
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
Republicans Cooling on Rudy?
Posted by on 3.13.07 @ 7:17PM
Skeptics of Rudy Giuliani's candidacy who argue that his standing will suffer once voters learn more about him will be heartened by the latest NY Times/CBS poll (story here, full results here), in which his lead over John McCain shrank to 43-34, compared with 50-29 percent just a month ago. In recent weeks, Giuliani's estranged son Andrew said he wouldn't campaign for him, a firefighters' union attacked his record on 9/11, and a series of articles have been written and videos broadcast demonstrating his liberal positions on social issues and troubled family life. This is all just a sign of things to come, and the polls we see over the next few weeks will give us a sense of whether Giuliani's support among Republicans is felt deeply, or merely skin deep.
While the poll gives some ammunition to Giuliani's detractors, his rivals cannot get too excited, because the poll also reveals deep divisions among Republicans and unease about the current slate of candidates.
Among the entire electorate, the percentage of people who have a favorable opinion of Giuliani dropped from 41 percent last month to 33 percent in this poll, while the percentage who viewed him unfavorably remained the same at 18 percent--essentially, more people now say they "haven't heard enough" about him. But McCain's favorables also declined, from 31 percent to 24 percent, with 21 percent having a an unfavorable view. Mitt Romney's boosters are banking on the fact that he's unknown right now, but argue that once people get to know him, they'll like him more and his numbers will improve. This poll reveals just the opposite. The percentage of the electorate that said they "haven't heard enough" about Romney declined to 59 percent from 72 percent in the last poll. And while his favorable rating went up slightly from 6 percent to 8 percent, his unfavorables nearly doubled, from 8 percent to 15 percent, making him the only one out of the three with a net negative rating.
More broadly speaking, by a margin of 59 to 38, Republican primary voters say the GOP is divided, and by a similar margin of 57 to 40, Republicans say they are not satisfied with the current crop of candidates and "want more choices." No doubt, this sentiment is what's fueling the Fred Thompson boomlet. Also, only 46 percent of Republicans believe the next president will be a Republican, compared with 78 percent of Democrats who believe he or she will be a Democrat.
UPDATE: A new CNN poll shows Rudy still with a comfortable 34-18 lead over McCain.Guns and Butter Revisited
Posted by on 3.13.07 @ 6:09PM
Rob Bluey points out the Heritage Foundation's new book of federal spending and revenue charts. While there's a lot of interesting stuff to peruse, what caught my eye was this chart showing that even with the post- 9/11 increase in military spending, "at 4 percent of GDP, defense spending is one and a half percentage points of GDP below the 45-year historical average and well below Cold War and Vietnam War levels." The chart, I would argue, can be explained by this other chart showing the explosive growth of mandatory spending.
 It has been frustrating to watch neoconservatives acquiesce to the runaway spending of the Bush years under the illusion that they have to embrace big government conservatism in order to maintain power and achieve their national security objectives. Not only is big government conservatism not helpful to the cause of maintaining a strong national defense, but the two are incompatible.
As I wrote about this issue nearly two and a half years ago:Â Â Â
When
America marshaled its resources toward fighting World War II, the federal government was able to boost defense spending from 18 percent of the federal budget in 1940 to 90 percent of the budget in 1945. Such fiscal agility would be impossible today, because mandatory spending gobbles up more than half of the budget.
For years, neoconservatives have called for expanding the size of the military, but the nation has been largely handcuffed because of entitlements. This will only get worse over time, and given the projected growth of Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, it's not infeasible that decades from now the
For all the recent talk about fusionism, the one blend of fusionism that's the most practical has been largely ignored: neoconservative hawks uniting with advocates of limited government to take on entitlement spending so that
Fitz is a Putz
Posted by on 3.13.07 @ 5:37PM
I just can't stop myself from going more than a couple of days without noting that Specially Obnoxious Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald is a pitiful excuse for a public servant. And it STILL is worthy of note that he continued to make reference, during the trial, to Valerie Plame's supposedly secret status and lives supposedly risked even after the judge said that was neither proven nor relevant. In terms of layman's ethics, at least, that amounts to prosecutorial misconduct. Maybe we should appoint a special prosecutor to investigate Fitz's own tactics....
I'm not entirely serious, of course. But Fitz doesn't deserve to be taken seriously. He's not a prosecutor; he's just a grudge-holding bully.
Can We Hold You To That?
Posted by on 3.13.07 @ 5:07PM
Dennis Kucinich was just on FoxNews saying that he he thinks it is wrong to tell any news program what news it must cover.
Oh, really?
Patriotism is the Last Resort
Posted by on 3.13.07 @ 2:05PM
I want to be first, Wlady! Can I be first? In McCain's case, patriotism is very, very real. Nobody can deny that. But also in his case, it is the last refuge of a scoundrel, because he has such a long history of extending the middle finger toward conservative groups and ideas, just for the perverse pleasure of extending the finger. I would not put it past him to receive an invitation from a conservative group that he doesn't like and to say, "Ahh, give me an excuse to shaft these folks: I know, let me go to Iraq again!"
I believe that he supports the mission in Iraq with every fiber of his being. His political courage on that issue has been second to none. I applaud him for it. But really, the man carries grudges like some people carry religious icons, never letting them out of his grasp and nursing them with strange intensity. His recent behavior in snubbing CPAC was abominable, and his treatment of the Club for Growth now remains suspicious as heck.
So there, I'll say it again: Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel -- even of a scoundrel whom I supported for president in 2000.
Doan Should Be Up
Posted by on 3.13.07 @ 1:58PM
Just returned from a weekly conservative bloggers' meeting at the Heritage Foundation, where the guest was GSA Administrator Lurita Doan, about whom I have blogged here several times in the past. She is under fire from Henry Waxman (reason enough to rally around her!), in one of Waxman's regular witch hunts. Anyway, I had never met Ms. Doan before today's briefing, but I came away from it more convinced than ever that she is the real deal. Rarely have I met an administrator more excited about cutting waste, improving efficiency, bolstering service, and better using the resources of government where they can be better used rather than letting them be wasted.
The GSA is huge. Doan said that it is the world's largest landlord, the world's largest credit card service, the world's largest fleet service with about 190,000 vehciles, and the world's largest consrvator of art, among other things. She came in and immediately tried to get rid of a deficit by targeted cuts amounting to about 9% of the total budget. "Trips to Australia and Kuala Lumpur," she explained, would no longer be par for the course. And so on. Good for her.
Waxman's hearing about utterly piddly complaints about her management will be next Tuesday. Conservatives should provide support for her before and after the hearing.
Re: Club vs. McCain
Posted by on 3.13.07 @ 1:55PM
According to the McCain campaign, their man isn't snubbing anyone: he had already committed to an Iraq trip on the dates when the Club for Growth is scheduled to meet in Florida at the end of this month. Now he stands to score political points at his rivals' expense. As John McIntyre puts it: "The contrast of McCain's rivals being in Palm Beach while Senator McCain is with the troops in Iraq should mitigate the political fallout from his absence." Who'll be the first to retort that patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel?
Ben, Wrong Again
Posted by on 3.13.07 @ 1:32PM
I had to shake my head when I read this line in Ben Stein's column from yesterday:
The average wage of the American worker adjusted for inflation is lower than it was in 1973.
No, it hasn't. What has changed is the structure of work in our society. There are far more jobs available for people like housewives and immigrants in the passed thirty years. The jobs they take are often low-wage. Since these workers have been flooding into our economy, they have had a depressing effect on a statistic like "average wages."
Average wage is a highly misleading statistic used by the left. I'm sorry Ben bought into it.
Clubbing McCain
Posted by on 3.13.07 @ 11:31AM
John McCain's issues with the Club for Growth, and vice versa, involve more than just McCain's voting record. In the 2002 election, Club for Growth ran ads supporting Jeff Flake against a candidate favored by McCain. This did not sit well with the senator.
McCain told Wolf Blitzer during the 2002 campaign that his ban on issue ads 60 days before an election was "because of outfits like this so-called Club for Growth. They came into Arizona last year and ran hundreds of thousands of dollars of negative attack ads. No one knew who they were. No one knew who their funders were."
Well, the club says it did not run negative ads. Plus, its list of donors who give more than $200 is public record. McCain was not being truthful. The Club, I'm sure, remembers well that McCain singled it out as the reason Washington has to silence citizen speech two months before an election. And Mccain, no doubt, remembers the Club's strong opposition to McCain-Feingold. There is no love between the two.
In fact, I think McCain could well have a devil of a time getting the nomination solely because of McCain-Feingold, for this reason: He tried to silence conservative activist groups like Club for Growth and Americans for Tax Reform that have impressive mailing lists. How many GOP activists and conservative primary voters belong to or listen to any number of the non-profit conservative organizations McCain tried to silence? Lots.
Sincerity and Abortion
Posted by on 3.13.07 @ 11:22AM
Rich Lowry has a column today arguing that pro-lifers don't have the luxury of demanding sincerity from the 2008 Republican presidential field. He concludes: "Politicians aren't like you and me. Most of them consider (to the extent they must -- they'd prefer not to think about it) one of the most profound moral issues of the day and see primarily a potential obstacle or boon to their ambitions."
This is undoubtedly true. It is also hard to find a high-profile abortion convert in either direction who switched back, which bolsters Lowry's case. (Rudy Giuliani went from pro-life, to modified pro-choice, to taking the NARAL line, and back to modified pro-choice again, which isn't quite the same thing.) But when pro-lifers still have the option of evaluating multiple candidates with records of opposing abortion, they ought to at least contemplate whether a candidate will stick with them when the political climate is hostile.
Sincerity isn't everything. Yet, in assesing how stable a candidate's position on abortion is going to be, it has to count for something.
RE: Toomey Hammers McCain
Posted by on 3.13.07 @ 11:07AM
I think the fact that this report was coming has a lot to do with McCain snubbing the Club for Growth. Their negative assesment of his fiscal policy record seems largely justified, though I'm surprised they didn't give him any credit for voting to drop the top income tax rate to 28 percent in 1986.
Toomey Hammers McCain
Posted by on 3.13.07 @ 10:54AM
Pat Toomey writes about the Club For Growth's new white paper on McCain's fiscal record, and it isn't flattering:
This is the Club's third paper on the presidential candidates. In previous reports they gave a mostly good grade to Sam Brownback, while Mike Huckabee got the thumbs down.
Re: Dead Wrong Dissent
Posted by on 3.13.07 @ 8:37AM
I was taking myself around in circles on this one yesterday. The trouble with Second-Amendment protection for non-states is simple: the Bill of Rights was -- originally -- a curb solely upon the power of the new Federal government. Only through judicial construction was the Bill of Rights imputed to apply to state governments as well as to Washington. By "Washington," of course, I mean the government, not the District of Columbia; it took another court case, if I remember right, to impute the Bill of Rights to the District. But it's hard for any originalist to hold nowadays that imputation is not settled law. So saving DC from gun bans comes about in suitably torturous fashion as a legal outcome, but that's often the way we do things in the USA I suppose.
Dead Wrong Dissent
Posted by on 3.13.07 @ 1:13AM
Robert VerBruggen ought not be so impressed by the Henderson dissent in Parker. The argument that the Second Amendment doesn't apply to DC because the District is not a state is completely implausible, at least from an originalist perspective. The "security of a free State" language was understood at the time of ratification to mean "security of a free country" -- as Eugene Volokh notes, it's a formulation that comes from Blackstone's Commentaries. Blackstone used "state" as a synonym for "nation," and so did the Framers; the word "state" is used in that sense in several places elsewhere in the constitution, in reference to "foreign state[s]." And remember that when the constitution was written, the US included the Northwest Territory; does it really make sense to think that the Framers would deliberately deny rights to Americans in that region?
(UPDATE: Robert VerBruggen replies here.--Ed.)
The AIPAC Primary (UPDATE)
Posted by on 3.13.07 @ 12:41AM
The AIPAC gala dinner drew over 6,000 people, with half of the Senate and more than half of the House on hand to hear Harry Reid, Mitch McConnell and Ehud Olmert (via satellite). But presidential politics dominated the discussion among attendees. While Sam Brownback and Joe Biden both held receptions after the dinner, most of the interest was in the duel between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.
I was able to see both Obama and Clinton speak in receptions of a few hundred people each (Hillary's was a bit larger) and it was amusing to watch both of them try to integrate support for Israel with their broader campaign themes. Obama tried to frame things in terms of being the healer, the man who wants to fight bigotry and make everybody get along with one another. He described the Holocaust as a "universal" tragedy, just like American slavery or the crisis in Darfur were and are universal struggles. Then he said (paraphrasing): "The biggest enemy isn't Hamas and isn't Hezbollah, it's cynicism." That single line made me fear an Obama presidency more than anything else I've heard him say, or anything I've read about him. Put aside for a moment that the statement underplays the evil, fanatical nature of terrorism. The fact that Obama wants to inject the multicultural platitudes of American liberalism into how he views a conflict with deep religious, cultural, historical, and ideological roots really says something about how he's likely to conduct U.S. foreign policy. The idea that somehow the audacity of hope will not only cure what ails America, but bring peace to the world, strikes me as pretty shallow and naïve. I guess you can call me a cynic.
So, as if I weren't feeling bad enough about our nation's prospects in the event of an adverse electoral outcome in 2008, I shuffled down the hall to see Hillary speak. Her reception was better funded--while Obama had a few regular signs hanging on the wall behind him, Clinton had a whole campaign podium set up, with a "Hillary for President" billboard and American and Israeli flags on the sides of the stage. The room went dark when she entered the room, like at a basketball game. Most of her speech seemed to be spent rattling off a bunch of supporters with Jewish last names. And in keeping with her tradition of piggy-backing off of her husband's alleged accomplishments, Tom Lantos, the only Holocaust survivor ever to serve in Congress, nostalgically recalled traveling to Israel with Bill and Hillary. After giving the boilerplate AIPAC line about the importance of strong U.S. relations with Israel, she discussed the need to use diplomatic leverage against Iran while not taking the military option off of the table. Then, rather awkwardly, she transitioned into her domestic policy themes: universal healthcare, different energy future, fighting the war on global warming, and improving the education system.
As for the other candidates, I caught the tail end of Biden's
speech, at which point he said that if Israel didn't exist, America
would have had to invent it anyway, because we need a democratic
ally in the Middle East. Thus, the U.S. needs Israel just as Israel
needs the U.S. Brownback was wrapping up as I walked in, shaking
hands, and posing for photos. Oh, and I met a guy doing Jewish
outreach for Mitt Romney who was handing out stickers saying "Mitt
in '08" with Mitt's name written in Hebrew.
UPDATE: Ben Smith has the full Obama quote I paraphrased above:
"The biggest enemy I think we have in this whole process (and why I'm so glad to see a lot of young people here, young in spirit if not young in age) -- the reason I think it's so important, is because one of the enemies we have to fight -- it's not just terrorists, it's not just Hezbollah, it's not just Hamas -- it's also cynicism," Barack Obama told a reception after the AIPAC policy conference last night.
Kudos to The Gray Lady
Posted by on 3.13.07 @ 12:37AM
Here's an excellent article on what scientists think of Al Gore. It's scrupulously fair, presents the full range of views, and overall doesn't make the former VP look very good. Amazingly, it appears in the New York Times.
Re: The Trouble With Hari
Posted by on 3.13.07 @ 12:15AM
Christopher: I don't particularly approve of Bruce Anderson's rhetorical style (there's a reason the Brit satire mag Private Eye calls Anderson "The Brute"), but the line you highlight from Hari's review bothered me, too. (And by the way, Hari may be completely correct in his assessment of Steyn's thesis; I'm generally skeptical of all doomsday scenarios.) To say that Mark Steyn is uneducated is moronic, and suggests a totally misguided obsession with academic credentials. When it comes to being educated, the right piece of sheepskin is neither necessary nor sufficient.
Monday, March 12, 2007
The AIPAC Primary
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 7:28PM
Just arrived at the site of AIPAC's gala dinner and upon entering the building dueling volunteers for Biden and Obama were holding signs and handing out flyers for separate receptions each of them is holding.
So far, no sign of Jimmy Carter.
Just Askin'
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 6:35PM
Chuck Hagel gives a press conference today to announce the he isn't announcing for president just yet, and the media is on the scene. Ron Paul actually does announce for president and the coverage is, shall we say, scarce. Sure Paul doesn't have a prayer, but does he have that much less support than 1 percent Hagel? Among the people who buy ink by the barrel, perhaps.
Both Fly Off the Handle
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 6:26PM
Philip, the Vitter endorsement probably will help Giuliani some, it's true, but in one sense it is a case of like attracting like. Just as stories are becoming rampant about how obnoxiously and outrageously the mayor was known to berate reporters (not that I am a big defender of the media in general, but we're talking flying way off the handle here), he gets an endorsement from another politician prone to totally freakazoid behavior of the same sort. I once wrote a rather positive notes package about Vitter, only to have him call me up and go absolutely bonkers on me for nearly 10 solid minutes --we're talking large decibel level here -- because the notes mentioned that he already had blanketed the state legislative district for which he was running with high quality glossy flyers handed out door to door.The problem? Vitter was furious that I had used the word "glossy," because he said I was trying to imply that he was a slick politician without substance. Never mind that nothing else in the notes package hinted at that, nor that anybody had publicly suggested such a thing during the race that was just beginning, not that I even believed that myself. And of course never mind that "glossy" is, obviously a precisely accurate description of a type of photo paper, which is of course the way the word was used. I mean, the Vitter eruption came totally out of left field. But people who know him know that he's wound about five times more tightly than an old Titleist balata golf ball. That same characteristic in both Giuliani and in McCain make them easy targets for Hillary's henchmen to exploit in a general election campaign with a media biased in Hillary's favor. It is a very, very good reason why conservatives should not leap on board too soon for the mayor, even though he does have much to recommend him. This does not mean that conservatives should write him off, not at all, but only that there is no need for any early commitments.
Zell's Questionable Zinger
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 6:18PM
Over at The Corner, there is some discussion of former Sen. Zell Miller's recent comments about legal abortion causing a birth dearth responsible for military shortages, Social Security's looming insolvency, and a labor market dependent on illegal immigration. In my view, these arguments are a distraction from the pro-life position that unborn children are human beings with a right not to be killed. If I did not believe that to be the case, I would not find most abortion restrictions to be justified -- even if we faced a demographic crisis like Russia's, I might explore natalist policies instead.
As it happens, Miller is wrong about the demographic impact of legal abortion in the U.S. By some estimates, 75 percent of the fetuses aborted since Roe would not have been conceived in the absence of abortion. The increase in conception rates is believed to exceed the reduction in birth rates. There isn't much reason to assume there would be 45 million more Americans if abortion were illegal. Judging from the comments thread on the post I linked above, many people who disagree with Miller on abortion aren't much better informed on the issue.
The Trouble with Hari
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 6:11PM
From Johann Hari's review of America Alone in The New Statesman:
"Mark Steyn, an uneducated former disc jockey turned pundit, is today being greeted as a sage by the likes of Dick Cheney."
Hari, "an uppity little queer" (columnist Bruce Anderson's words) was fortunate enough to attend King's College, Cambridge, and get his job handed to him, so I guess that gives him the right to call Steyn, a guy who worked his way up from the bottom, "uneducated."
Rudy and Political IOU's
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 4:59PM
Today, the Giuliani campaign announced the first significant endorsement from a Southern social conservative--Louisiana Sen. David Vitter. One aspect of the story that hasn't been mentioned in news accounts I've read is that in 2004, Giuliani campaigned for Vitter when he was seeking the seat being vacated by Sen. John Breaux. According to a New Orleans Times-Picayune article from back then, Giuliani headlined a $300,000 fundraiser for Vitter. This made me wonder whether with the Vitter endorsement we're beginning to see Giuliani cash in some of the political IOU's that he's built up over the past three election cycles, in which he's used his star power to campaign and raise money for many Republican candidates.
Who's Afraid of Climate Change?
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 4:55PM
University of London Professor Philip Stott argues that the world "will be less prone to 'crisis' with warming."
McCain Snubbing the Right
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 4:34PM
The Club for Growth is happy to announce a star-studded array of guest speakers for its 2007 Annual Winter Conference in Palm Beach, Florida to be held March 29 - April 1, 2007. Joining the Club for Growth for its policy forums are declared or potential presidential candidates former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney; former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani; Kansas Senator Sam Brownback; and former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich. Arizona Senator John McCain was invited to attend, but declined.Someone needs to explain to McCain that to win the nomination, he does need to make nice with conservatives -- and one National Review cover isn't going to cut it.
Giuliani Campaign Bloggers' Briefing
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 3:27PM
Just got off a bloggers' briefing with Giuliani pollster Ed Goeas (of the Tarrance Group) and stratagist Brent Seaborn. They attempted to fend off the argument that once conservative primary voters learn more about his liberal social views, they'll abandon him. Goeas and Seaborn said that according to their internal polling, even those social conservatives who identified Giuliani as a social moderate/liberal still supported him in large numbers. I asked whether they could give any more specifics, in light of public polling I've seen showing that less than half of conservatives correctly identified Rudy as pro-choice, but they said they wouldn't disclose internal numbers. Also, when asked whether they thought polls showing Giuliani with big leads were meaningless this far out, Seaborn said because of the accelerated election cycle, people have been paying more attention to the presidential race than they have in the past.
RE: Hillary, Goldwater, and MLK
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 1:03PM
It was actually the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that Goldwater voted against; he wasn't in the Senate anymore by the time the Voting Rights Act of 1965 came up for a vote. Goldwater might have opposed that bill too, though he had backed voting rights provisions in the Civil Rights Acts of 1957 and 1960. Goldwater later said he supported all but two sections of the 1964 law as well, but voted against the legislation because he felt those sections were unconstitutional.
That said, Hillary's invocation of MLK does sound a bit like the standard Clinton yarn-spinning, much like when Bill recalled Arkansas church burnings in his youth that apparently didn't happen. While Goldwater was committed to color-blindness like King, in the political climate of the 1960s it would have been unlikely for someone to have been a fervent admirer of both. Goldwater was increasingly critical of the civil rights movement's politics; King likened to Goldwater to Hitler.
The El Salvador Option
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 12:58PM
A report in the LA Times:
WASHINGTON - American military planners have begun plotting a fallback strategy for Iraq that includes a gradual withdrawal of forces and a renewed emphasis on training Iraqi fighters in case the current troop buildup fails or is derailed by Congress.I'm not sure what I think of that idea (it seems like the kind of thing that demands slower-than-blog-speed reflection). But as I suspected, the "no Plan B" story in the Washington Post appears to have been utter nonsense.Such a strategy, based in part on the U.S. experience in El Salvador in the 1980s, is still in the early planning stages and would be adjusted to fit the outcome of the current surge in troop levels, according to military officials and Pentagon consultants who spoke on condition of anonymity when discussing future plans.
Hillary, Goldwater, and MLK
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 12:42PM
While Hillary Rodham Clinton came out second best to Barack Obama in their long-range oratorical duel at Selma, Ala., the real problem with her visit there a week ago concerned her March 4 speech's claim of her attachment to Martin Luther King Jr. as a high school student in 1963. How, then, could she be a "Goldwater girl" in the next year's presidential election?That's unfair to Hillary, because it's unfair to Goldwater. Goldwater was very explicitly in favor of civil rights for blacks; what he opposed was federal imposition of civil rights on the states. He and King disagreed on that point, of course. But while admiring both King and Goldwater may have been unusual -- especially in the Southern states that Goldwater managed to win (but remember that young Hillary wasn't from the South) -- it wasn't inconsistent.The incompatibility of those two positions of 40 years ago was noted to me by Democratic old-timers who were shocked by Sen. Clinton's temerity in pursuing her presidential candidacy. Barry Goldwater's opposition to the 1964 voting rights bill was not incidental to his run for the White House but an integral element of conscious departure from Republican tradition that contributed to his disastrous performance.
Democratizing Pakistan
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 12:27PM
Benazir Bhutto argues in a WaPo op-ed that we shouldn't fear Pakistani democracy:
For too long, the international perception has been that Musharraf's regime is the only thing standing between the West and nuclear-armed fundamentalists.I was at a CSIS event a while back where Pakistan wonks pointed out that, Musharraf not being immortal, the choices basically come down to a transition back to democracy or an Islamist coup. It would be criminally negligent not to push toward the former option.Nothing could be further from the truth. Islamic parties have never garnered more than 13 percent in any free parliamentary elections in Pakistan. The notion of Musharraf's regime as the only non-Islamist option is disingenuous and the worst type of fear-mongering.
Daddy, What's a Neocon?
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 12:04PM
Here's a excerpt from an Alexander Cockburn interview with Democracy Now's Amy Goodman wherein the Rumsfeld biographer lays out a scene that defies even the suspension of disbelief Hollywood logic, yet nevertheless plays so perfectly into liberals' ideas about George W. Bush that it will no doubt soon become as sacrosanct in their lore as the bit about God telling Bush to smite Iraq:
Goodman: In 2006, you write that George W. Bush said to his father, "What's a neocon?"
Cockburn: That's right. One of the rare moments of sort of communication between the two. Bush said to -- they were out at Kennebunkport, and Bush Jr. says, "Can I ask you a question? What's a neocon?" And the father says, "Do you want names or a description?" The President says, "I'll take a description." He says, "I'll give it to you in one word: Israel," which is interesting on all sorts of levels, including the confirmation that our president doesn't really read the newspapers.
Goodman: Explain what you mean when you say that. And how do you know that this conversation took place at their vacation home?
Cockburn: Well, I can't really say who told me, but it's someone who was -- I have absolute confidence in both in their -- that they're telling the truth and also in their position to be aware of this conversation.
Funny to imagine the sort of chap who would pal around with both Cockburn and the Bushes, isn't it? And here's another funny, similarly unlikely bit as well:
Goodman: So what does it say about George W. Bush, that one of the few men who were in that circle that, as you put it, the former president and George W. Bush's father, of course, despised, that he made one of his top key people in his own administration, George W. Bush?
Cockburn: Well, isn't that very interesting? I mean, it tells us a lot about the relationship between the two Bushes. You know, we've heard this before, that there was an antipathy certainly on the younger Bush's side towards his father. I mean, who knows? Unless we get him on the couch one day, we'll not really find out where this came from. But it's certainly there. I mean, you know, there's so much anecdotal evidence of him expressing resentment -- I mean, his famous remark that he didn't pay attention to his own father, but he answered to a higher father, as he told Bob Woodward. So it's there. And how can one not assume that the appointment selection of Don Rumsfeld to be his Defense Secretary was, in a way, one more jab by the son toward the father?
If that's true, I guess the real question isn't 'Why did Bush choose Rumsfeld?' but, 'Why wasn't Saddam Hussein named Secretary of State?'
There's Always Tomorrow
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 11:41AM
Chuck Hagel has boldly announced that he is -- going to put off a decision on whether to run for president in 2008. This strikes me as a way of begging off without immediately losing the media buzz that surrounds him as a potential presidential candidate. Asterisk candidates don't have the luxury of putting their ambitions off til tomorrow.
NRA? No Way
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 11:03AM
Over at Hit and Run, Radley Balko makes the case that the court ruling against D.C.'s handgun ban was a victory for gun rights but not the NRA: "While I have no doubt that the organization will mention yesterday's decision in its fundraising letters, it's worth noting that the NRA fought yesterday's winning lawsuit every step of the way." (Follow the link to the Robert Levy/Gene Healy piece in the Washington Times.)
Cheney at AIPAC
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 10:47AM
I'm at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) conference, where I just saw Dick Cheney speak. It's probably one of the few remaining places in DC outside of CPAC where the VP still gets a standing ovation.
Speaking before a crowd of about 6,000, Cheney began by reiterating the Bush administration's steadfast support for Israel and commitment to a Palestinian state if its leaders renounce violence and recognize Israel. But Cheney focused most of his remarks on defending the Iraq policy. He did so within the context of outlining the four biggest myths of the war on terror.
The first myth, he said, was that Iraq is a distraction from the war on terror. He pointed to statements by bin Laden to make the case that Iraq was not only not a diversion from the war on terrorism, but, in fact, the central front. "If you support the war on terror, it only makes sense" to support the war in Iraq, he said. The second myth was that you can support the troops without giving them the tools to get the job done. He took aim at Democrats who unanimously approved Gen. Petraeus, and yet voted against the increased troop levels that he said would be neccessary to get the job done. The third myth Cheney identified was that it would make us safer to pull out of Iraq. He said that it would, in fact, be a "full validation of the al Qaeda strategy," which is based on the idea that though they cannot defeat us militarily, they can inflict enough casualties on us so that we lose our nerve and give up. The fourth myth he mentioned was that we can withdraw from Iraq without it having adverse implications on the broader Middle East. He said that U.S. withdrawal would broaden the conflict throughout the region among different nations and religous sects. Iran would aid Shiites and the Gulf states may be forced to come to the aid of the Sunnis. If the Sunnis win, then al Qaeda would have a base in Iraq as well as access to the oil wealth. If the Shiites win, the radical Iranian regime will be able to expand its own influence in the region.
"Either we are serious about fighting the war on terror, or we are not," Cheney said, as he was wrapping up his remarks.
D'Souza and his Discontents
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 10:44AM
Dinesh D'Souza defends his book from conservative critics.
Judgy Loves You, Cutie Pie!
Posted by on 3.12.07 @ 10:44AM
If you live in fear of state Supreme Court justices taking their jobs seriously, this should set your mind at ease.
Sunday, March 11, 2007
Fear of a Non-Sycophantic Press
Posted by on 3.11.07 @ 1:22PM
How pathetic is it that the Democrats are running from a debate hosted by Fox News? The excuse -- an extremely mild joke by Roger Ailes based on an Obama-Osama pun (it was not "comparing Obama to bin Laden," as has been reported in some venues; if anything, it was a Bush-is-dumb joke) -- just doesn't hold water. The Nevada Democratic Party is just glomming onto a convenient excuse to join the Edwards-led effort to appease the Fox-hating base. Ailes is absolutely right: "If you are afraid of journalists, how will you face the real dangers in the world?"
Surge Update
Posted by on 3.11.07 @ 1:04PM
Robert Kagan -- leaning heavily on Iraq the Model's reporting -- argues that the surge is working, and slags the media for not noticing:
A front-page story in The Post last week suggested that the Bush administration has no backup plan in case the surge in Iraq doesn't work. I wonder if The Post and other newspapers have a backup plan in case it does.Even with the hopeful signs, I wouldn't be so flip about not having a Plan B. But the WaPo article that Kagan references isn't particularly convincing; Bush and Gen. Pace won't talk about what to do if the surge disappoints, but SecDef Gates says its on policymakers' minds ("I would be irresponsible if I weren't thinking about what the alternatives might be"), and there's no reason to think he's lying.
Mitt Romney, Major Donor
Posted by on 3.11.07 @ 12:22PM
David Kirkpatrick of the New York Times has an interesting story detailing Mitt Romney's recent contributions to various conservative organizations. Was this ever an issue in past campaigns by rich guys of the right -- say, Steve Forbes?
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