Month: December 2010

The latest black eye for Fox. But to be honest: Bill Sammon as a "fair-and-balanced" editor? It would be like appointing Michael Vick in charge of an animal shelter.

DeMint threatens to derail the lame-duck session with a stunt. Gingrich backs him. Romney is now (check your watch) against the McConnell-Biden tax deal, Limbaugh is furious, and the tea-party right is going to hit the roof once the details of the backroom deal with Obama are fleshed out. I suspect DeMint is trying to sabotage both START and DADT if he cannot sabotage a highly popular tax compromise. He's either trying to wage war on McConnell or, more likely-insulate him from the tea-party explosion that's now well on its way.

Will he succeed? The Senate has passed the tax bill; the House looks highly likely to. So DeMint is merely doing double-damage to national security by trying to retain DADT, despite its negative effect on military readiness, and to scupper a key arms agreement with Russia.

And so the forces of nihilism meet the forces of realism. And which one has been strongest in the GOP these past couple of years?

A message from his iPhone to Rex Wockner and Pam Spaulding:

I wanted you to know because you are important to me and I think you can explain my situation best to those in our community who may be still interested. I was involuntarily committed to the Brockton MA Veterans Hospital Physchiatric Ward on Friday Morning after experiencing a breakdown and anxiety attack. …

I did not initially want to publicize this but I now realize it is critical for our community to know several things: veterans gay or straight carry human burdens. Activists share similar burdens, no activist should be portrayed as super human, and the failures of government and national lobbying carry consequences far beyond the careers and reputations of corporate leaders, elected officials, high powered lobbyists, or political elites.

They ruin lives. My breakdown was a result of a cumulative array of stressors but there is no doubt that the composite betrayals felt on Thursday, by elected leaders and gay organizations as well as many who have exploited my name for their marketing purposes, have added to the result. I am certain my experience is not an isolated incident within the gay veteran community.

At the same time, those who have been closest to me know that I truly appreciate their gracious help and mentorship. I am indebted to their hospitality and leadership.

I feel for Dan because the intensity of his struggle and his passion for justice was clearly burning him alive. I recognize this syndrome, having dealt with it to a lesser degree most of my time in the gay activist world. The work is emotionally draining at every level – because your life and soul are on the line – and only when you put your life and soul on the line do you convince others of the rightness of your cause. And that is why you have to learn to step away at times, to retain balance, to seek nurture and support – or the individual bit in the collective drill is worn down to nothing but a spiritual nub.

Stay strong, my friend and hero. You've seen the mountaintop – and the view will be better soon.

Jack Shafer reports on the joys of a nutmeg high, now made far more likely by countless local TV scare stories about this deadly, killer teen-craze drug. And it is actually a killer, if taken in sufficient quantities. Still, for most curious teens, just a miserable, sleepy if trippy couple of days. Still: notice how untoxic cannabis is in comparison.

So the poison that makes you vomit is legal; and the herb that cures the nausea isn't. To see what is in front of one's nose needs a constant struggle. But don't snort either, please.

Jeremy Lott is interviewed on the book he wrote about William F Buckley:

Did Buckley’s anti-communism during the Cold War hide, to a degree, his more libertarian side?

To a degree, it did. When you are concentrating on using one national security apparatus to grind down another, more threatening one, you are going to appear less libertarian.

But there’s also the fact that his libertarian side emerged from a political theory, dubbed “fusionism,” that was really developed in the 1960s. Fusionism said virtue that is coerced is not virtue, and so government should get out of the virtue-promotion business. This eventually inspired his call to end the war on drugs, but it took awhile.

How is the National Review of today different from the magazine WFB created and ran for so many years?

It’s more reliably Republican. In 1956 and 1960, NR declined to endorse the GOP nominee, and Buckley regularly criticized Eisenhower and Nixon. That started changing in 1968 when the magazine threw its weight behind the Nixon-Agnew ticket. In 2008, it endorsed Mitt Romney in the primaries and John McCain in the general.

And on a critical moment in NR history:

How significant (both short and long term) was the damage from the ill fated NR Civil Rights editorial? The almost immediate reversal seems to be forgotten.

I was shocked to learn that National Review’s stance in favor of barring blacks from the ballot lasted for only one issue. In the very next issue, NR reversed itself. And yet this is often cited as some long-standing policy of the magazine. Very odd.

It did a lot of damage, obviously. It helped defenders of the Civil Rights Act to brand all of its critics as racists. The professional anti-racists really haven’t changed their script since.

Another way to put this is that by publishing its abhorrent editorial, National Review managed to illustrate that much opposition to the Civil Rights Act was racist. But I have to say I never realized it was reversed a fortnight later. Pretty staggering I didn't know that. My fault, of course, but I wonder how many others remain under the impression that the magazine stood by its civil rights low-point (until the era of gay equality, that is)?

(Photo: WFB by Mario Tama in 2005.)

A new poll:

77 percent of Americans say gays and lesbians who publicly disclose their sexual orientation should be able to serve in the military. That’s little changed from polls over the two years, but represents the highest level of support in a Post-ABC poll. The support also cuts across partisan and ideological lines, with majorities of Democrats, Republicans, independents, liberals, conservatives and white evangelical Protestants in favor of homosexuals’ serving openly.

McCain wants to filibuster a measure with 77 percent public support, majorities in both Houses, the support of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and a Republican defense secretary? When it could also be chaotically imposed by the courts at a moment’s notice?

"When your life hangs on a line, on the intuitive behavior of the young man … who sits to your right and your left, you don't want anything distracting you. I don't want to lose any Marines to distraction. I don't want to have any Marines that I'm visiting at Bethesda (hospital) with no legs," – Marine General James Amos, in opposition to repealing DADT.

Says Allahpundit, "Marines cope daily with the “distraction” of seeing their best friends shot to pieces, and yet … this is going to bother them to the point of absent-minded recklessness?"

Daniel Brumberg and Barry Blechman advocate for engagement with Iran:

In the coming decade, Iran's politics will be defined by a slow, agonizing struggle waged through rather than against the institutions of the Islamic Republic. If we indulge in the seductive dream of a sudden democratic revolution — whether delivered by bombs from above or by popular resistance from below — we will destroy the seeds of a political change in Iran. But we if we push for a process of engagement that moves Iran and the U.S. from conflict to diplomatic coexistence, we can help nurture Iran's own capacity to change and transform from within.

Ryan Avent points out that "America is forecast to grow by over 100 million people in the next few decades":

The smart critics with whom I’ve debated tend to argue something along the lines of this: in a world in which current transportation planning and pricing weren’t bollixed up, [high-speed rail (HSR)] would make more sense, but given that they are, it doesn’t. With heavy auto subsidies, HSR becomes a boondoggle rather than a savvy investment, and so bollixed is better than bollixed plus HSR. But that’s not actually the choice we face. Amid heavy congestion and with the pressure of 100 million more Americans bearing down on governments, new construction will take place. And so the decision is between bollixed plus HSR and bollixed plus new highways. And on almost every measure, bollixed plus highways is the worse of the two options.

Medical Lake, Washington, 8 am