Author: Andrew Sullivan

Megan isn't impressed by Felix Salmon's tax analysis:

To me, this chart shows how dependent the US federal tax take is on income taxes on higher earners, which tend to plummet precipitously in recessions, and are at historical lows simply because we're in an exceptionally bad recession.  Even the things that presumably worry progressives, like the lower revenues from corporate income taxes, are to some extent simply showing up elsewhere, as taxes on capital gains income.  But you can't complain about this, and also complain that tax revenues are so low right now; broadly, the most stable taxes are also the most regressive–they're the taxes on necessities.  In bad times, non-luxuries tend to get cut back and then so does your tax revenue.

Greg Ip watches the market:

Treasury bonds sold off sharply today, sending the 10-year yield up 20 basis points to 3.12%. This is mostly a continuation of the risk-on trade that’s been working for several weeks now as the economic data have turned positive. It’s nice that risk appetites are returning, but there’s a less comforting message as well: America should not take its rock bottom borrowing costs for granted. Perhaps, if this bond sell-off continues, it will do what half a dozen commissions couldn’t: create political momentum for fiscal reform to accompany stimulus.

A man dressed as the Russian Santa Claus 'Ded Moroz' is pictured on December 7, 2010 at Strasbourg's Christmas market of Strasbourg, eastern France. By Frederick Florin/AFP/Getty Images.

Ed Kilgore looks at the GOP race from the opposite side of the aisle: 

How should Democrats feel about Huck? He has a surprising reservoir of good will from many progressives in part because he's not a snarler, and in part because he was the rare Republican who didn't routinely defend Wall Street or pretend the economy was just great in 2008 (qualities that alienated him from the GOP's Economic Royalist wing). But look a little deeper, and Huckabee shares every obnoxious position Republicans have taken since they lurched heavilty to the right after 2008, in addition to his better-known hard-core stand on cultural issues like abortion and gay rights. There's also reportedly a rich lode of crazy stuff in his large library of sermons, which presumably oppo research types are plumbing as we speak.

Fallows' tribute here.

It appears the Obama administration has thrown in the towel in trying to get Netanyahu to agree to a new moratorium on settlements in the West Bank. That presumably means none of the promised goodies either. Now what? Clinton is due to speak at Brookings on Friday, when the next step may be announced.

I favor an end to aid for Israel because a) Israel doesn't need it and b) we need the money and c) it doesn't seem sensible to me to keep rewarding an ally that refuses to offer minimal cooperation. I also favor the US laying out its own preferred solution, perhaps as a way to recognize a Palestinian state in the UN, whatever Netanyahu wants. He has had his chance to frame a deal. Now it's time for the US to assert its own interests and goals.

A reader writes:

Dude, you're killing me!  Keep it coming with the dog videos. I wrote you over 2 years ago when I was deployed, and as I write this, I find myself in Iraq yet again. I log-on to The Dish this morning at 4am (our time) and what do I see?  More cool/heartwarming/badass videos of dogs.  I love it … motivational as hell.  Totally made my day, man.

Take care.  And keep rocking the beard – I live vicariously through you, since we military guys can't have them!

In Israel, a disturbing new sign of radicalization:

A number of leading rabbis who signed on to a religious ruling to forbid renting homes to gentiles – a move particularly aimed against Arabs – defended their decision on Tuesday with the declaration that the land of Israel belongs to the Jews. Dozens of Israel's municipal chief rabbis signed on to the ruling, which comes just months after the chief rabbi of Safed initiated a call urging Jews to refrain from renting or selling apartments to non-Jews.

There is, mercifully, plenty of blowback from the Israeli left and center, including Netanyahu. But the logic of fundamentalism is as powerful within Judaism as it is within Christianity and Islam. And it's taking over in a way that makes politics and diplomacy impossible and religious war a theological necessity.

David Kurtz calls Obama's press conference today "a turning point if not in his Presidency then in how we understand and perceive him and his approach to politics":

What we saw and what I think we'll see borne out by subsequent events is Obama revealing in a very public way the choice he has made between the two political personas he has simultaneously inhabited throughout his candidacy and his presidency. He has tried to be both pragmatist and progressive savior. And even when he stopped trying to be the savior after he was elected, he was at a certain level content to let supporters continue to project that persona on to him.

Today, he very clearly and loudly said: that savior persona is not me. I am the pragmatist. And you know what, I don't have a whole lot of patience for the idealists. I share their ideals, but I don't share their approach and I'm not going to get bogged down in recriminations over not living up to some abstract ideal.