Month: December 2011

Nothing gets past the Dish reader:

You can badmouth Rick Perry all you want, but he was wearing what looks like a Carhartt jacket with a corduroy collar and Heath Ledger was wearing a different jacket with a shearling collar. That I, a straight guy, has to point this out to you boggles my mind.

I am a very incompetent gay. The sodomy I have down. The rest? Still flailing. Another writes:

I'm not a fan of Perry, but I really gotta comment on the fun people are having with that jacket he's wearing in that new ad. Carhartt jackets are essentially THE working class's uniform, at least in the West. Virtually anyone working outdoors in this part of the country is wearing that same jacket (or a hooded/overalls version).

Doesn't matter whether they're a cowboy, a farmer, a welder, an oilfield worker, an electrician, the guy who delivered my newspaper in sub zero weather last night … or a politician trying to show that group of people that they're "one of them". Hell, there's a picture out there of Sarah Palin stepping into a voting booth wearing one.

I remember during the 2008 Montana primary, Obama and Hillary held rallies just a few hours apart. When summing up the differences between the two rallies, one of the local writers described the crowd at Clinton's rally as being made up of the "Carhartt and jeans crowd"- blue collar and union folks, people working outdoors and in agriculture.

People who look at that jacket being worn by Perry and only see "the Brokeback Mountain jacket" are showing a pretty large disconnect from this country's working class. Literally millions of Americans woke up this morning and put on that exact same jacket to go to work. Not recognizing that jacket from anywhere other than Brokeback Mountain says quite a lot.

Regarding Perry's other "oops" moment, his campaign finally got with it and disabled the "dislike" button on YouTube for their newest ad.

Street art meets mortal combat:

Douthat isn't buying the popular theory that Huntsman is setting himself up for the next election:

If Barack Obama is re-elected and the Republican nomination is up for grabs in 2016, there will be a long list of heavyweights ready and rested and ready to compete for the prize— Jeb Bush, Chris Christie, Bobby Jindal, Marco Rubio, Bob McDonnell, and probably other up-and-comers as well. (Not that all of these big names will run … but if one takes a pass another will be waiting in the wings.) Many of them will more than match Huntsman’s presumed ability to appeal to centrists and independents, while vastly exceeding his (seemingly-limited) capacity too win conservatives. All of them will be able out-raise, out-organize and out-buzz a guy who couldn’t rise to the top of the weakest presidential primary field in my lifetime. 

As the Red Cross reports that the humanitarian situation is getting steadily worse, David Kenner reports on how the impoverishment of Syria's own baby boom generation precipitated the revolt:

As Bashar strengthened his ties with the nouveaux riches in Damascus and Aleppo, the children of the countryside found themselves left out in the cold. The International Statistical Institute's World Fertility Survey's report on Syria shows that rural women birthed roughly three more children, on average, than their urban counterparts during the peak of the country's demographic boom. Many of these youths looked to make it good in Syria's rapidly swelling urban centers, straining the capacity of these cities to the limit.

But whether these Syrians stayed in the country or made their way to the cities, they found it nearly impossible to pull themselves up from the bootstraps.

Stephanie Saldaña examines [NYT] how Assad's crackdown is starting to engulf Syrian Christians. Justin Vela embeds with the Free Syrian Army. Aryn Baker and Walter Russell Mead look at how Hezbollah's support for Assad's brutality is damaging its standing amongst Arab publics. Egyptian blogger Zeinobia unveils a massive collection of videos from Syria. Below is an extraordinary video (via James Miller) of a protest in Homs carrying on with gunfire clearly audible in the background:

This video of a protest comes from Tartus, a Mediterranean port where documentation of protests has been comparatively rare:

Finally, listen to a group of protestors yell for an ambulance after discovering this badly bloodied man has a heartbeat:

Michael Sherer remembers 2008:

As with Gingrich today, Huckabee reacted to the spots by officially refusing to go negative. Instead, he attacked Romney for going negative, and then showed reporters a campaign ad he had decided not to run attacking Romney. It worked for Huckabee. In Iowa in late 2007, the negative attacks only confirmed voters suspicions of Romney as a robot candidate without clear conviction. … The question this time is whether the field and the candidate are different enough to produce a better result for Romney. 

(The above web ad is from American Bridge, a Democratic Super PAC)

The shift in Israel from a democratic – even socialist – society into a fundamentalist-driven, expansionist state, contemptuous of its closest ally, and aggressively hostile to all its neighbors is one of the most depressing developments in our time. It is driven by the religious parties, the settler movement and the opportunism and paranoia of Netanyahu. To give a flavor of his government, note that his neo-fascist foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, just went to Moscow to give Putin an embrace after the latest rigged elections, and denigrated the Russian opposition. The idea that a man like Lieberman is interested in democracy for the Palestinians on the West Bank is ludicrous. To him, the Palestinians are sub-human irritants, one day to be expelled or subdued.

All of this would be disastrous enough, but we now know that the two likeliest Republican nominees next year back neo-fascists like Lieberman to the hilt. Today, Gingrich has all but declared that under his presidency, the American position would be that of Netanyahu's. This is Pamela Geller territory:

"I believe that the Jewish people have the right to have a state, and I believe that the commitments that were made at a time. Remember there was no Palestine as a state. It was part of the Ottoman Empire. And I think that we've had an invented Palestinian people, who are in fact Arabs, and were historically part of the Arab community. And they had a chance to go many places. And for a variety of political reasons we have sustained this war against Israel now since the 1940's, and I think it’s tragic."

So the Palestinians should have fled entirely. And the implication is that they should now leave the West Bank as well. Does Gingrich not understand that the concept of an "Israeli" is also as old as the term "Palestinian"? Or did he pick John Bolton as a secretary of state in part because he just wrote the foreword to Pamela Geller's latest screed? Ben Smith, the best reporter on the US-Israel struggle, quotes Hussein Ibish:

To call the Palestinians 'an invented people' in an obvious effort to undermine their national identity is outrageous, especially since there was no such thing as an 'Israeli' before 1948," he said. "Arab and Jewish identities are very old, but Israeli and Palestinian nationalisms are both 20th-century phenomena, and arose at the same time in competition with each other. The idea that either is more 'invented' and hence less 'authentic' than the other is ignorant, ahistorical claptrap.

Romney is not far behind. And the reason was clearly laid out by the Likudnik Charles Krauthammer:

98 percent of pro-Israeli Americans are gentile. It’s a very strong, important issue among the evangelical Christians. The association [of Israel] only with Jews is missing a very large story here.

Indeed it is. But that makes it all the more worrying. You can view the US as a global power, assessing its values and interests in a secular fashion. Or you can view the US as the most powerful Christianist force in the world, and its foreign policy as one shaped by fear and loathing of Islam and fusion with Judaism.

If you believe the former, you will see why you'd want to keep the US on the right side of the Arab Spring, calm Jihadism by getting Israel to accept a two-state solution soon, and then embrace a defensible Israel as a vital democratic country in the world. But if you believe the latter, you believe that Israel has a Biblical right to all of the West Bank, and to a permanent apartheid-style Greater Israel with a permanently disenfranchized and restive Arab majority. Moreover, you see Israel's clash with Iran as a no-brainer. In the Judeo-Christian war with Islam, it fits right in. Of course, the US should back such a war. As the leader of the Judeo-Christian front against Islam, it should initiate it.

My view is that no one has attempted to destroy the Obama administration's promise more than Benjamin Netanyahu. He, more than McConnell or Cantor or Cheney, wants Obama to be a one-term president. And now he has dropped any pretense of being apart from America's internal politics, by fusing his agenda with that of the Christianist right. It is a new alliance based not on shared national interests but a common religious war. It is a direct route to another 9/11. Or worse.

Frum poses the question:

What presidents must inescapably do is respond to emergencies: eg, the financial crisis of 2008, the 9/11 terror attacks, the financial crises of 1997-98, the invasion of Kuwait, etc. And there, what usually ends up mattering most is not the president’s philosophy, but his judgment, coolness and steadiness. Those are the grounds on which Romney reassures and Gingrich terrifies.

Earlier thoughts of Newt's finger on the button here.

Emails continue to flood in over the Broncos QB. A reader writes:

I've been following the recent series of posts on Tim Tebow, but I find it curious that the subject of his eye black hasn't yet been raised yet. While in college at Florida, Tebow drew a lot of attention for using it to display Bible verses. Tebow was drafted into the NFL in 2010, but just one week before he joined the Broncos, the NCAA approved a new rule banning the use of eye black that contained symbols or messages. (In my opinion, that may have been one of the few things the NCAA's done right during the past few years…)

Another is more direct:

There is absolutely zero reason to display Scripture on your face if you are only interested in connecting to God.  There is a good reason for doing it if you want the cameras to take a picture of your religiosity.

But another asks:

What do any of Tebow's actions have to do with Christianism? 

Your definition, from my understanding, is that Christianism is the fusion of Christianity with politics.  I'm not aware of any advocacy Tebow has done for any political position.  Even his controversial pro-life Super Bowl ad was really just encouraging people to choose not to have an abortion, not any sort of endorsement of legal restrictions on abortion.  You get much undeserved criticism for using the term "Christianism", but by your own definition, I don't think it applies in the case of Tebow.

A good point. Evangelism is not Christianism. And Tebow has only evangelized. What I was thinking of was the reclamation of the public square with Christianity – a core Christianist objective. But my reader is right about that too, on reflection. Again: I have no objection politically to Tebow's  very public religiosity. The Dish covered the Super Bowl ad controversy here, here and here, and my take at the time was: "I have to say I see nothing wrong with it." So, yes, I was sloppy in using the word "Christianist" in this context, and, on reflection, withdraw it.  Another reader points out:

Proving that you can connect almost any Dish thread with some other long-standing Dish obsession: Tim Tebow's missionary service in the Philippines included giving circumcisions to children. According to one of his colleagues, "You could see he was really into it.  He thought it was cool. I'd make a stitch, he'd cut a stitch. He got his hands a little wet in surgery."

Another keeps the heat on:

I think you're being unfair and disingenuous with your proof-texting of Matthew 6 and writing that "there's a gratuitous display here that seems very counter to Jesus' directive to humility, privacy and simplicity in prayer." Do you similarly believe that Christians should eliminate all forms of public prayer? Should the Pope stay in his room on Christmas and celebrate the mystery of the Incarnation in private? Ought we dispense with the Mass and instruct bishops not to lead inter-faith prayer services on the anniversary of 9/11?

Of course not. But those are public celebrations: masses and other rituals. And this Pope and the last were known for their private, solitary devotion and prayer. And they were and are Popes, not quarterbacks, introducing public individual prayer in front of millions at a sports event. One more:

There's a striking similarity between the way that some people feel about homosexuals and the way some people feel about Tim Tebow. In one case, people who find homosexuality a sin or otherwise objectionable often say that public display of gay love is shoving something in the face of the public. Similarly, those who don't believe in Christ (and apparently some who do) feel that Tebow's expression of his faith is too "in your face." As somebody who is neither gay, Christian, nor bothered by the expression of either, the similarity is obvious.

Again, I agree. I just think it is not in the spirit or verse of the Gospels. More reader commentary at our Facebook page.

(Photo: Florida quarterback Tim Tebow wears the Bible verse Isaiah 40:31 on his eye black for their game against Kentucky at Commonwealth Stadium in Lexington, Kentucky, Saturday, September 26, 2009. By Gary W. Green/Orlando Sentinel/MCT via Getty Images)

Rebecca Traister is upset with the president's opposition to the sale of over-the-counter emergency contraception to girls under the age of 17:

The logic expressed [yesterday] by the president, and [Wednesday] by Sebelius, is ludicrous: Medicines like Tylenol – which have been proven to have adverse effects in high doses – are available by the truckload on drugstore shelves, at prices far cheaper than the $30 to $50 it would cost a preteen to purchase just one dose of Plan B, let alone go wild with it.

Sal Gentile sorts through the science surrounding the issue:

Medical experts have for years urged the federal government to make emergency contraception available to teens without a prescription, noting that the drug is safe and highly effective, preventing as much as 80 percent of pregnancies in teens and young women, according to the [American Academy for Pediatrics]. … The AAP also found no evidence that the availability of emergency contraception increases rates of sexual activity, or the frequency of unprotected sex, among teens. …

There’s also a case to be made that wider availability of Plan B emergency contraception could help lower the rate of teen pregnancies that end in abortion, experts say. According to the Guttmacher Institute’s numbers, 82 percent of teen pregnancies in the U.S. are unplanned, and nearly a third — 27 percent — end in abortion.