Month: February 2010

This Brown guy isn't so bad:

In a Jan. 28 interview with the Associated Press, [Scott] Brown said he didn't know Palin, had never spoken with her and that she never reached out to him. Palin spokeswoman Meg Stapleton told the news Web site Politico that Palin did speak with Brown on election night and congratulated him "on his most historic victory for not only Massachusetts but the nation." A Brown aide said the call from the former Republican presidential candidate "had completely slipped his mind," and added that it was very nice of her to make the call.

I'm reliably told that very very few Republicans running in competitive seats want her anywhere near them. In some ways, it appears Scott Brown's success really did hurt Palin's luster. At some point, as Palin mania subsides, even the MSM may begin to investigate who exactly she really is.

“At the Republican caucus, they held up — they said, we’ve got a plan; it’s going to provide everybody coverage at no cost. And I said, well, if that were true, why wouldn’t I take it? My wife Michelle thinks I’m stubborn sometimes, but I’m not that stubborn. Okay, let me think. I could have everybody get health care coverage that’s high quality, and it’s free, which I’ll bet is really popular. But I’m not going to do that. I’m going to go through the pain of really working through this hard process in Congress, getting yelled at and called a socialist, because I just — that’s how I roll. I’m a glutton for punishment. (Laughter.)

No, look, if this were easy and simple, first of all, somebody would have done it before. Seven Presidents have failed at this; seven Congresses have failed at this. If this was simple, it would have already been done. It’s not.” – Barack Obama, yesterday.

(Hat tip: Chait)

Ryan Avent points to this chart:

Reductions in spending associated with the end of activity in Iraq reduced total defense below the levels it reached during the Bush administration. But the base Defense Department budget continues to grow in a more or less uninterrupted fashion. It's hard to say how this increase is making Americans safer.

Megan rebuts a Dish reader over farm subsidies:

George Bush I tried to trim back farm subsidies.  Bill Clinton "ended" them.  Next decade, George Bush II also made a run at killing them off.  Obama's freeze will founder on the same two problems:  farm states wield disproportionate, bipartisan power in the Senate, and Americans think that farmers are really, really cute.  In the American mind, all farms are run by the Ingalls family who skip around solving the problems of the townsfolk between picturesque striding through waving rows of corn.  In truth, they're rather more apt to be high-tech sharecroppers for Cargill and ADM, but we can't shake the image.

Add me to the growing list of bloggers, pundits, columnists, activists, writers and editors supporting a regular interaction between the president and the opposition party, as we saw last Friday. My only suggestion is that this should also occur with the president’s own party. You can sign the petition here. I’ll be on BBC World News America tonight discussing the idea.

Santa Fe, New Mexico, 10 am.

The book, The View From Your Window, with 200 of the best window views published by the Dish over the last three years, beginning at dawn and ending at dusk with a foreword by Andrew Sullivan, can be previewed here and ordered here.

"The reason why I supported the policy to start with is because General Colin Powell, who was then the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, is the one that strongly recommended we adopt this policy in the Clinton administration. I have not heard General Powell or any of the other military leaders reverse their position," – McCain, yesterday.

“In the almost 17 years since the ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ legislation was passed, attitudes and circumstances have changed. I fully support the new approach presented to the Senate Armed Services Committee this week by Secretary of Defense Gates and Admiral Mullen," Colin Powell, today.

Scott Lucas parses:

With his offer last night to send Iran’s 3.5-percent uranium outside the country in exchange for 20-percent stock, the President was reversing a line that had been maintained for months…That is a major shift, and it remains to be seen why Ahmadinejad made his move (and note that he made it in a hastily-called interview on national television), as well as signalling that there was talks about trading three US detainees for Iranian prisoners held abroad. The immediate speculation would be that there have been behind-the-scenes talks with brokers such as Turkey; the International Atomic Energy Agency and the US had both signalled in recent days that a deal was still on the table. At the same time, although the President is staying clear of the internal crisis in his public comments and actions, I have to wonder if he has also made this unexpected move to try and grab some “legitimacy” before 11 February.

Lucas also flags this analysis by Jahanshah Javid:

When Khomeini finally agreed to a ceasefire after eight years of a futile and devastating war with Iraq, he likened it to drinking poison. What he was alluding to was that for the entire course of the war he and the rest of the leadership had vowed that the Islamic Republic would never ever ever rest until Saddam Hossein was punished for invading Iran.

Suddenly the weight of reality had forced Khomeini to surrender. Suddenly all his daily uncompromising speeches, all those "War War Until Victory" slogans rang hollow. He had led hundreds of thousands of young men to their deaths, seen the destruction of much of the country's military and economic infrastructure, sent thousands of young men and women to the gallows for their opposition to the regime, and gotten little satisfaction in return. The tremendous sense of guilt and shame was the poison that killed him less than a year later.

Now the Islamic Republic has again swallowed poison in the face of enormous international pressure and domestic upheaval. Suddenly it is bowing to the U.N. after years of insisting that it would never ever ever compromise over its enrichment program.

The reversal of the banning of so many popular Sunni candidates from the looming election is a huge step back from the brink. And it does help support Petraeus' view that the Iraqi leadership is maturing. I've been a deep skeptic about whether this process could stay on track – and, of course, the future is unknowable and the results of the election could provoke another terrifying moment of truth.

But this is clear evidence for cautious optimism. Let's hope it can be sustained.

A reader writes:

Rep. Duncan Hunter of California, a Marine Corps veteran, just took to the airwaves in defense of DADT. It was a subtle piece of performance art. Hunter spent five minutes on NPR trying to articulate a single solid reason to maintain the status quo. He failed. If this is the best its defenders can muster, then repeal is a fait accompli. Take a listen.

As for Chambliss' dire warning that ending DADT would facilitate "body art" in the military, what planet is he from? Many soldiers have tats. Some of them quite famous ones.