Month: March 2012

Chait believes that Republicans are demographically-impaired. Sean Trende rebuts him: 

Ultimately, coalitions are like water balloons. You push on one side, and the other side pops up. In Arizona, Brewer took steps that alienated Latinos (though she still won 28% percent of Latinos), and it cost her. But the Democrats’ stance alienated white voters. I think Chait would say that demographics still doom the GOP in the long run, but if the GOP is winning around 60 percent of the white vote, as opposed to the 50 percent it tended to win for Congress in the 80s or the 55 percent from the 90s, while still holding one-third of the Latino vote, it is going to take a long time for them to take on permanent minority status.

Earlier reaction to Chait's article here.

More details:

Breitbart was walking near his home in Brentwood, Calif just after midnight Thursday when he collapsed according to his father-in-law Orson Bean. Someone saw Breitbart fall and called 911. Emergency crews tried to revive him and rushed him to the emergency room at UCLA Medical Center, Bean said.

The above video was shot a few weeks ago. A reader writes:

As a proud liberal, I take issue with your post "The Sickness On The Left". You link to an article (from the Washington Examiner, not known for post-partisanship) that quotes the tweets from various people no one has ever heard of save Matthew Yglesias.  A tiny percentage of people on Twitter – itself a tiny percentage of any group – said nasty things.  This happens for any given topic and you can't extrapolate that this tiny percentage of people are representative in any way of liberals in general or even liberals on Twitter. I would bet that idiots somewhere on the Internet also made fun of Whitney Houston's passing.

Breitbart made a career out of lying about other people, and I don't think he would be surprised that there are some people, somewhere in the world, who are happy he won't be able to peddle his brand of "journalism" any longer.  But most liberals, myself included, do feel sadness that he had a family that will surely miss him.  He was a young man and any unexpected passing brings sadness.  My Catholic faith would not let me feel otherwise.

Another adds, "The comment '@AndrewBreitbart haha youre dead and in hell being a gay with hitler' doesn't sound 'liberal' to me." Another:

You're being ridiculous.  Five words: Christopher Hitchens on Jerry Falwell.

Hitchens said Falwell's death was a "deliverance".  Now maybe Hitch is more eloquent than those tweets you linked to.  But what he said about Falwell wasn't nice.  And you were okay with that.

Look, I'm not the type to speak ill of the dead, but we go through this every time someone polarizing dies. The same argument comes up: Only say nice things OR be truthful and speak out against that person's sins and express true feelings.  Grave dancing always happens.  Breitbart himself did so when Ted Kennedy died. I'm not saying it's right or wrong, just that it happens every time from people of all political persuasions.

I was always slightly intrigued by Breitbart, who seemed a complex character playing the role of a demagogue.  I liked your story about flying with him.  But the truth is I live in Georgia, and found what he did regarding Shirley Sherrod to be despicable especially since blatant racism still exists here.  Of course, Ms. Sherrod is a classy lady.

Another brings in the "Sickness On The Right" post:

To claim that the tweeting of random, unidentified individuals to that of a sitting federal judge is facetious. That a judge, who presides over all people of his community, would pass racist, glorified rape scenarios is serious. You diminish that seriousness by equating the two under the heading of "sickness."

Another veers from the vast majority of readers showing little sympathy for Breitbart's death:

I just read your decent words about Breitbart's passing. Josh Marshall at TPM made a very gracious comment as well. But I find myself appalled at many of the comments being made out there on the internet message boards, many of them distasteful and a few downright indecent and vulgar. It wasn't unexpected, but it's still deeply disturbing to read.

I didn't like Andrew Breitbart. I also didn't know Andrew Breitbart. I only knew the public figure, not the man. And yes, I found everything about that persona distasteful and damaging and wrong. He supported things that I objected to deeply and some things I found inexcusable (James O'Keefe comes to mind).

But he was a human being. One who effected a bad influence, I believed, on our political discourse. But he wasn't Hitler or Stalin. He was just Andrew Breitbart. And now he's gone and there won't be any chance for him to change his opinion or chart a different or better course.

For some people out there to be almost literally celebrating his death strikes me as morally no different the awful people who cheered for the number of executions in Texas at the GOP debate. It isn't any different at heart, is it?

The argument is that Breitbart himself would have shown no mercy if the shoe were on the other foot, which I think is demonstrably true. But we're better than that, aren't we? As for Hitch on Falwell, I think there is a difference between a man suddenly dying at 43, with four young children, and a veteran hate-monger dying after a long life. Maybe that's an unpersuasive distinction, but it's where my heart is.

I guess I'm saying that if I stop seeing Andrew as a human being behind the public persona, even in death, then I truly have lost my way. And if I do not think of his young family at this moment, then the personal really has become political. As a conservative – which Andrew surely wasn't (he was a revolutionary) – I believe in keeping that distinction. The other way lies madness. And I fear we are in danger of collectively losing it. Grace, people. Grace.

May he rest in the peace he sadly often didn't experience in life. And long live pop.

Gal Luft floats some signs to look for when reading the tea leaves on an Iran strike:

Getting an Israeli commitment to hold its planes on the ground until after the November elections means Israel would have to postpone the attack by at least a year, as a winter strike is more difficult to execute. This is a non-trivial request that — if even considered — would come at a hefty price. While such a quiet agreement would never be publicly acknowledged, there would be telltale signs galore. The release of imprisoned spy Jonathan Pollard, a job-creating U.S. weapons deal, or an overturning of the decision to cut missile-defense spending for Israel in the administration's fiscal 2013 budget proposal would indicate to the outside observer that the president may have bought himself more time.

West Yellowstone, Montana, 5.35 pm

I kid you not:

"North Korea is halting its nuclear program in order to receive aid in food, and this is what should be done with Iran as well," one unnamed official [in Jerusalem] said. "Suffocating sanctions could lead to a grave economic situation in Iran and to a shortage of food," the source said. "This would force the regime to consider whether the nuclear adventure is worthwhile, while the Persian people have nothing to eat and may rise up as was the case in Syria, Tunisia and other Arab states."

"The Western world led by the United States must implement stifling sanctions at this time already, rather than wait or hesitate," the official said. "In order to suffocate Iran economically and diplomatically and lead the regime there to a hopeless situation, this must be done now, without delay."

This from Nico Pitney's new live-blog on the forced march to war on Iran.

Sabato's Crystal Ball believes that "Maine is now the Democrats’ top opportunity to win a Republican-held Senate seat." Should no independent candidate run, Silver calculates that the Democrats are the overwhelming favorites:

Conceived as a two-candidate race … Democrats are heavily favored in Maine, perhaps having an 80 percent chance of picking up the seat in a head-to-head race against one of the Republicans. 

Earlier commentary here.

Larison counters me:

Huckabee would make an interesting choice [for veep]. It would mean that Romney was tying himself to the person who once said that he had no soul. The Democratic ads would practically write themselves: "Even Mitt Romney’s running mate has said that he has no integrity and will say anything to win an election." It would likely horrify the economic conservatives who found Huckabee so unacceptable last time, and it would also saddle the ticket with Huckabee’s ethical baggage that the media never bothered digging into last time.

Yeah, I hadn't thought of that. A plan better on paper than in reality. A reader also thinks the pairing is implausible:

Okay, so I know Romney is pretty "flexible" when it comes to the indignities he'll suffer for the nomination, but do you really think that after Huckabee asked if Mormons believe that Jesus and the Devil are brothers, that Romney would choose him?  I know that former rivals come together, but Bush Sr. correctly identifying supply-side dogma as voodoo economics is significantly less personal than attempting to leverage electoral gain by impugning one's faith. Could a former leader in the Mormon church really sink that low?

Romney has long since proven he'll do or say anything for power. Sinking low is his specialty. But on balance, almost certainly won't happen. Which in this volatile campaign doesn't count for much any more.

Bob Wright dispels neocon fantasies about being able to surgically strike Iran's nuclear research facilities and keep Iran from going nuclear, without troops on the ground.

New polling from Jersey:

Support for same-sex marriage in New Jersey climbs to a new high, 57 – 37 percent, but voters split 48 – 47 percent on whether Gov. Christopher Christie did the right thing in vetoing same- sex marriage legislation, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released today. Voters support 67 – 28 percent Gov. Christie's proposal to let them decide the same-sex marriage issue by placing it on the ballot for a November referendum …

Christie may, in other words, have played this thing rather shrewdly. If marriage equality wins, he can say democracy worked, while touting his veto to the fundamentalist base should he run for president one day (as I hope he does). He could also use the vote to embrace marriage equality himself and tell his own party to get over their increasingly anachronistic obsession with keeping the gays in their second-class place. But I may be letting my hopes overwhelm reality here.

Note also the following:

Support for same-sex marriage is 61 – 32 percent among women and 51 – 44 percent among men. White Catholics support the move 52 – 43 percent while white Protestants are opposed 50 – 42 percent.

The hierarchy has lost their flock on this – again, especially among women. What we're seeing here is along the lines of the Santorum coalition: Christianity American religion is splitting into two factions – most mainstream Catholics, mainline Protestants and Jews vs Theocon Catholics, Christianist evangelicals and Mormons. It's telling to me that this split is really about politics, not religion. The theological divisions are far less important to these groups than political rallying cries.