Today on the Dish, Herman Cain surged in the polls, his 9-9-9 campaign slogan fell flat, and readers weighed in on his interview with Moore Award nominee Lawrence O'Donnell. Romney is already looking past the primary as he somehow dodges the healthcare bullet, but endorsements aren't pouring in, Limbaugh is freely airing his suspicions, and Chait insists that Perry might rebound. If Romney is elected it's because his supporters are convinced he's a liar, and undoing Obamacare is much easier promised than done. D.R. Tucker suggested that Mitt and the Tea Party are engaged a zero-sum contest, the former probably isn't hiding a secret plan to save the economy, and the latter never followed through on its crony capitalism attack. Meanwhile, a testier Obama raked in $70 million, and we scouted his likely offense for 2012. In our video feature, Andrew previewed his next book, and we marked Lenny Bruce's birthday.
The European press puzzled over the Iranian "plot," Madison Schramm cautioned against freaking out, and we wondered what Iran was thinking here and here. Netanyahu made a significant trade, the Pentagon will be downsized no matter what, and military coups aren't exactly back in vogue. We caught up on Slovak domestic politics, Charles Stimson defended the Obama administration's decision to try Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab in federal court, and human rights groups lobbied Canada to arrest Bush for torture when he visits the country next week.
Matt Taibbi outlined some solid demands for OWS, Nicole Gelinas clarified the movement's notion of "capitalism," and it was largely the incompetent private sector that plunged us into the financial crisis. The war on medical marijuana raged on, Americans are getting more skittish about religion in presidential politics, and a cultural sense of retribution seems to perpetuate capital punishment. We tested the new iPhone's virtual assistant feature, the performing arts entered a depression, and travelers aren't willing to pay more for better-looking flight attendants. We appreciated the scratchwork in classroom porn, women should be compensated for sharing their eggs, and Michele Yulo came to terms with her parents' separate lives by default. Raymond Tallis knocked neuroscience research that tries to explain too much, and Steve Jobs wasn't, in fact, perfect.
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— M.A.
The Dish 