Author: Andrew Sullivan

Today marks the 65th anniversary of the United States dropping an atom bomb on Nagasaki, killing 74,000 people and precipitating the end of World War II. James Poulos reacts to a Japanese gentleman who wants an apology:

I confess the purpose escapes me of an official apology for the atom bombing of Japan. "We're sorry we didn't follow through with plans for a massively bloody and protracted invasion of Japan, accompanied, as no doubt it would be, by conventional carpet bombings and city-wide firestorms." Hmm. "We're sorry that you proved so unwilling to surrender Iwo Jima and Okinawa that we thought twice about how to win the war of aggression that you started against us." Could enlist the support of our customer service industry? "We're sorry that you feel that way." Atomic warfare is obviously horrific, and we should all be very pleased that Hiroshima and Nagasaki were the last of it. But apologies mean the guilty party should've done something else, because that something else would have been better for everyone.

Robert Fisk argues toward a very different conclusion. Life has photos. And most astonishing is this surreal story about how a survivor of the Hiroshima blast met the pilot of the Enola Gay during a stunt on national television.

(Photo: one of the burnt victims of Hiroshima.)

Funerals are so formulaic; it's time weddings were as well. Enough of this solipsism and self-love, thunders Andrew Brown, echoing a splendid creed from Giles Fraser (at the 1 hr 48 minute mark here):

The great point about completely impersonal ceremonies, whose form is the same for everyone, whether these are religious or entirely civil, is that they remind us that the problems and difficulties of marriage are universal. They come from being human. They can't be dodged just by being our wonderful selves, even all dusted with unicorn sparkle.

On your wedding day you feel thoroughly special, and your guests will go along with this; so that is the moment when the ceremony should remind you that you're not all that. What you're doing isn't a step into fairyland. And if it does turn out to be the gateway to a new life, that is one that will have to be built over time and unglamorously with the unpromising materials of the old one.

I take the point; although we wrote our own vows. Marriage, I discover, is work; it requires patience and forgiveness and a willingness to go to only conventional war over toothpaste lids, sprinkled toilet seats, dog hair, and travel plans. The lower the expectations the greater the rewards.

The barking is getting louder. From the Washington Times, in a piece declaring that "the United States of Arabia has now arrived," Jeffrey T. Kuhner writes:

The battle over the ground-zero mosque is more than another battle in the heated culture wars. It is a watershed moment: the point at which liberal multiculturalism capitulated to the relentless march of political Islam. Muslim radicals around the world rightly will view it as a triumph over the feckless American infidel: Even the site of their deadliest attack against America is not free from Islam's looming presence. This event signifies the loss – the defeat – of American will and purpose in the struggle against jihad.

Even Andy McCarthy wants the tiger he is riding to calm down.

In what could be a South Park parody but sadly isn't, the Wiesenthal Center behind the Museum of Tolerance – which opened in Manhattan last week – slams the Cordoba center for insensitivity. Meanwhile … :

In Jerusalem, Israel – where the Wiesenthal Center plans to open its next Museum of Tolerance – construction of the proposed tolerance museum has “resulted in digging up the remains of people who had been buried in a Muslim cemetery for generations,” [professor Marnia] Lazreg said.  “I am not sure that I would have chosen a site close to Ground Zero for building a mosque and cultural center, although there is no law against doing so,” she said. “But we have to be fair …. The mosque-center promoters have not engaged in acts of physical desecration of the victims of 9/11 attacks.”

Fallows makes the case.

Geocurrents: "Nigeria and Cameroon may have their differences, but they share a passion for Guinness Stout."

Yes, one day, we can all come together, shitfaced though we may be.

Where is the ADL? Didn't Jihadists attack the Pentagon? Isn't it sacred ground? And yet in Room 1E438, the infidels are praying to their alien God! Since, according to Chris Caldwell, there is a "standing fear" that all Muslims can be financed or influenced by Wahhabists, why are we allowing these fifth columnists to worship in the heart of the nation's defense? Take it away, Jeffrey:

You see, what happens is this: First radical Muslims disguised as patriotic American military officers take over Room 1E438, and then, before you know it, they've conquered Room 1E437, and Room 1E439, and from there… well, you know how this ends. These rooms, of course, are holy, because Muslims once attacked the Pentagon.

When will the GOP urge a Muslim ban to replace the gay ban in the military?

Think Progress keeps the heat on Boehner, Pence, and Cantor. Special props to journalist hedge-fund manager Robert Barbera (above). Previous Dish coverage here, here, and here.