Author: Andrew Sullivan

That’s the view of the Belgian Catholic primate, André-Joseph Léonard.

That is what the Obama Justice Department has said about an immediate repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” as ordered by a federal judge. For the record, from the court filing:

The immediate implementation of the injunction would disrupt this review and frustrate the Secretary’s ability to recommend and implement policies that would ensure that any repeal of DADT does not irreparably harm the government’s critical interests in military readiness, combat effectiveness, unit cohesion, morale, good order, discipline, and recruiting and retention of the Armed Forces.

What they’re saying is both that retaining the ban hurts “military readiness, combat effectiveness, unit cohesion, morale, good order, discipline, and recruiting and retention of the Armed Forces” and that precipitously ending the ban hurts “military readiness, combat effectiveness, unit cohesion, morale, good order, discipline, and recruiting and retention of the Armed Forces.” That’s the exquisite knot they have tied themselves into. And it might work, I suppose, if the orderly process was inevitable. But it seems pretty clear to me isn’t. The Senate has filibustered this once in a Democratic majority session. What are the odds that, using exactly these Obama arguments about “morale” and “unit cohesion”, the GOP will not filibuster again in a lame-duck session even if the military top brass give the go-ahead? I have little doubt there will be enough resistance in the report itself to give the GOP a reason to keep the ban alive. Here is the president last night on the question:

“We are moving in the direction of ending this policy,” he said. But, he added: “It has to be done in a way that is orderly, because we are involved in a war right now. But this is not a question of whether the policy will end. This policy will end, and it will end on my watch. But I do have an obligation to make sure that I’m following some of the rules. I can’t simply ignore laws that are out there. I’ve got to work to make sure that they are changed.”

What does “orderly” mean? No one is saying it should be chaotic. And if, as he says, the ban can only end by changing the law, and not by any executive stop-loss order, how can he also simply state that the ban “will end on my watch”? He does not control the Congress now, and even less next year. So he cannot mean by the end of his two terms, can he?  

Can he?

(PHOTO: Dan Choi by Kris Connor/Getty/AFP)

Larry Sabato updates his predictions:

We noted before Labor Day that whenever the House has flipped parties since World War II, the Senate has changed party control in the same direction, even when election observers didn’t see it coming. If the Senate falls into the GOP column in 2010, it will do so right at the end of the campaign by a relative handful of votes in a couple of states. The closest contests are in Colorado, Illinois, Kentucky, Nevada, Washington, and West Virginia. To take control of the Senate, Republicans must win all of these seats, or pull off an unexpected upset in Connecticut or California. Again, it would have been a lot easier for the GOP with Delaware in hand.

Brian Palmer divulges the nitty gritty details:

With pictures, if they’re available. Technically, the military doesn’t fire people for being gay—it fires them for engaging in “homosexual conduct.” This comprises: touching a member of the same sex for sexual gratification (including handholding or hugging), marrying someone of the same sex, or announcing that you’re gay. So discharge proceedings focus on actions rather than underlying sexual preference. Not does he seem to like men, but did he proposition his male colleague? Or did she publicly hold hands with a female friend? There are few rules of evidence in the proceeding, so military lawyers can present a wide range of proof. They usually call witnesses who claim to have seen the suspicious activity. They may submit photos, such as printouts from a soldier’s Facebook page, marriage licenses, or birth certificates indicating that the soldier’s child has two mothers or fathers. Or the government could present an e-mail or letter that the service member sent to a friend stating his sexual preference.

"This is not only anti-gay, it is anti-human. It is bigotry for sport," – Glenn Beck on the torture of two gay teens and a gay man in the Bronx.

Joyner focuses on one part of the video above:

[Sir Ken Robinson] denies contends that Attention Deficit and Hyperactivity Disorder is either a complete myth or overdiagnosed. Rather, the problem is that we’re expecting them to sit around and keep quiet in an educational system no longer relevant to the modern world.

This may be slightly overblown but I largely think he’s right. 

(Apologies for the original error, now struck through.)

Larison arrives late to the debate:

The reality is that Republican gains this year are the product of immense economic discontent and anxiety to which few conservatives have plausible answers. One doesn’t have to like the policy recommendations of “reformist” conservatives to acknowledge that they have been just about the only ones on the right trying to provide those answers. Their answers have tended to dominate discussions of reforming conservatism because they’re the only ones actively engaged in the conversation. When the dust settles and Republican office-holders are looking for advice on policy and legislation, “reformists” will win the day for lack of serious competition.

A reader writes:

What are we to make of this story? The American Dream is "nonexistent" because a gainfully employed professional can't quit in summer 2008 when the economy is already starting to fall off a cliff, enroll in an overseas masters degree program, and then get a dream job?  The American Dream is "like Santa Claus" because a successful businessman shuttered his one business to open another that later failed?  The American Dream is just a "story told to keep kids in line" because a 55-year-old woman with no education and no resume has a hard time finding a professional job?  This is just self-serving venting.

The health insurance part of the email, however, is a nightmare.  But it's one that shouldn't happen again once all of ACA is implemented.  In that regard, this would be better classified as a view in your series about health insurance nightmares than a recession view.

A reader writes:

I work in a factory for $13 per hour. I have three children under the age of six.  We have had to move several times, first from apartment to apartment to chase lower rent, then into a mobile home to escape the crazy people and the roaches that infest low-rent apartment complexes. Car repairs make it impossible to put any money away. I'm attending junior college with no assurance of getting a job in my chosen field.  It's incredibly difficult and I am fed up with this economy.

Oh wait, that was me in 1982 (except I made up the part about being fed up with the economy). I married at 19 and worked in the factory for five years.  All my difficulties resulted from my own choices. 

I got my degree in a field that was exploding: computer programming.  I made good money and had the usual financial challenges along the way. After years of self-imposed difficulties I learned to pay myself first by saving till it hurt and avoiding debt. That habit has given me peace of mind and financial security in good times and bad. I refused to be dependent on any clockwork functioning of the larger economy to "guarantee" my future.  There are no guarantees except those I can purchase.

I could have just kept the factory job and told myself that I was doing everything expected of me.  But expected by whom? Does everyone deserve success just for showing up?  It would be nice if that were so, but it is not that way now and it was not that way in 1982. 

Your reader's wailing about the lie of the American Dream is weak and foolish.  The essence of the dream is that you can succeed if you work hard and make the right choices, not that you will have an easy road just by making any attempt.  Please wake up and look around at the incredible energy of recent immigrants (legal and otherwise) to the U.S. and note their approach to getting ahead.

What I see in your View From Your Recession stories are people hugging their recession mindset – the mindset that presages failure at the first downturn – and trying to top each other with the most compelling litany of woe.  Astoundingly, they often include actions such as quitting a paying job and taking on student loans to pursue some dream or another, only to find themselves unemployed and deep in debt. Here's an idea: don't do those things. Free idea #2: don't blame the world for your decisions.  Their recession really does start on the inside and then manifest itself in their external condition, and it would probably do so in a good economy too.

People, please refuse to HAVE a view from within your recession.  The recession should be a thing you refuse to inhabit.  It should be a thing that you avoid in advance but if you find yourself in it, work your way out of it with no tales of woe and no excuses. I know my tone will strike some as harsh, but I really think most people can pull themselves out of their difficulties but they must first refuse to wallow in them.

Today on the Dish, Andrew marvelled at Obama's record thus far, even if his messages sometimes suffered for it. Andrew nodded in agreement with Douthat over climate change, and still believed conservatives should seek to conserve. Tim Lee and Andrew expressed concern over the rise of absentee ballots, and Christine O'Donnell was the perfect product of America's talk show culture.

Andrew stayed firm on the Chamber of Commerce foreign funding hoopla, while Wilkinson didn't mind the foreign countries watching out for their interests. Valerie Jarrett redeemed herself with her genuine apology, Dale Carpenter destroyed the myths about heterosexual frailty and DADT, and Andrew seconded this reader about gay pride parades as adult affairs. Jews and Andrew were in agreement over gallivanting, and Israel and America had a lot in common about not being able to see what's being done in their name. Obama didn't listen to his own advice on defense spending, Ron Paul may have been right about terrorism and military occupations, and Africa is officially huge.

Readers joined the tea with unicorns party on Clinton era tax rates, Paladino thought girl on girl porn was awesome, and Alex Gibney rewrote the Spitzer saga. Frum knocked Jonah Goldberg down a notch over his anti-elite elitism and Greg Easterbrook didn't feel so sorry for seniors. Foreclosure journalists invaded privacy but with good reason, and readers set the record straight on Rand Paul and Kentucky's meth problem. Starbucks slowed its baristas down, and the Kindle may be bringing the pamphlet back. Prohibition birthed Nascar, which Dish readers already knew, the Insane Clown Posse were awed by magnets, and W.G. Grace batted through the greatest sports beard ever.

View from your recession here, MHB here, VFYW here, opinions on the miners here, Drezner's Dish toast here, Juan Cole's here, FOTD here, readers on straight men fruit flys here, and Andrew on Parker Spitzer here.

–Z.P.

A reader writes:

Haven't you ever seen the Dukes of Hazzard? The reason the General Lee stock car – which they also used to race – was so ginned up and boss hog was always after them was because they were bootleggers!

Another writes:

The NASCAR-prohibition link is pretty widely known, and is a bit of a point of pride among NASCAR fans.  (I am not a big fan, but living in North Carolina, am surrounded by them.) This is well known enough that it gets mentioned in the Will Ferrell movie, Talladega Nights.

In the context of Prohibition, it's worth mentioning that while the period between the 18th and 21st Amendments was certainly a high point for the whiskey runners, the phenomenon both started before it and continued afterwards.

The high tax on whiskey made (and continues to make) the production of untaxed liquor a profitable venture. It's still very possible to get a quart of lightning in a Mason jar (and in order to avoid self-incrimination, I'll neither confirm nor deny having sampled some fine homemade peach brandy from Surry County), and the NC Alcohol Law Enforcement division still has agents dedicated to hunting down the odd unlicensed still.  In fact, it should say something about how much influence Prohibition had on this that these agents have been called "revenuers" for over a century.

Still, despite the ongoing presence of unregistered whiskey production, the stills are run largely by individuals, and the revenue is not sufficient to support organized crime around it.  Take home message for pot: the underground market will persist after legalization, but probably without supporting gang activity.

Another:

“[David Okert] says it emerged in the South after Prohibition ended, when all the former runners of liquor needed new uses for their driving skills and fast cars now that they could no longer make a profit smuggling booze.”

First, it’s Daniel Okrent – the same Danny Okrent who was public editor of the NYT.  Second, this southern historian finds the dating all wrong.  There’s a long-standing legend (popularized by Tom Wolfe in “The Last American Hero”) that NASCAR racers were ex-moonshiners – and indeed some of them (not all) were.  But the end of Prohibition didn’t mean the end of moonshining by a long shot; indeed, Junior Johnson, the subject of Wolfe’s story, was a legendary moonshine runner in the 1940s and 1950s before turning his attention to NASCAR.

Another:

I thought you might be interested in Esquire's Tom Wolfe feature on Junior Johnson. I'm not a NASCAR fan, and this isn't about Prohibition as it was under the Eighteenth Amendment, but any article about a guy who ran moonshine, invented the so-called "bootleg turn", used fake police sirens to blow through roadblocks, was never caught during a chase, won 50 races in the days when auto racing was appallingly dangerous, ended up being pardoned by Reagan, and voted for Obama after being disgusted with John McCain's campaign tactics is worth a read, yes?

Another:

Related to your post on NASCAR, you and your readers might be interested in a review by Clay Risen, published earlier this year in Bookforum, of Real NASCAR by Daniel Pierce and He Crashed Me so I Crashed Him Back by Mark Bechtel. Risen refers to the connection between Prohibition and the rise of NASCAR at the very beginning:

Pioneered by bootleggers and shade-tree mechanics, stock-car racing was long a sport exclusive to the rural, southern working class. Races took place on red-clay tracks, and the cars were often the same ones drivers had used to haul moonshine the night before, with few modifications save for wider intake valves. Early drivers were famous womanizers and drinkers; one, Buddy Shuman, told a reporter, "Ma'am, I just take 'er down the straightaway. 'Lord Calvert' takes her through the turns."

I think your readers might be interested in the review since Risen makes clear the connections between NASCAR and both the culture and politics of contemporary US. 

VBS.TV has a great little documentary on moonshining in South Carolina.