Category: The Dish

Recession Or Not?

James Pethokoukis argues that we aren’t in a recession. Try telling that to the 81% of Americans who think we are. Paul Krugman writes:

The point is that the official definition of recession has become delinked from peoples’ actual experience. Right now, we’re in an economy with deteriorating employment and incomes, collapsing home prices, and business retrenchment. Is it also an economy in recession? Who cares?

Sorry, but it seems to me that we should stick with the previous clear definition of a recession. If we’re not in one by those measures, we’re not in one.

Al Qaeda In Somalia

It’s always good news when we manage to kill an Islamist terrorist. But Graeme Wood provides some sobering context:

According to official sources, the U.S. air strike neutralized a key al-Qaeda figure, a Bin Laden-linked regional honcho who wanted to turn Somalia into an incubator for terrorists in the style of 1990s Afghanistan. What that account leaves out is a realistic assessment of why Somalia is a vastly less attractive haven for al-Qaeda than Taliban-ruled Afghanistan. Even if more violent Salafists set up operations on the Horn of Africa, Somalia will remain the same war-torn, dysfunctional place it is now, and the Islamists will have to cope with an environment that offers way too much insecurity and way too little food. In Afghanistan, once the Taliban pushed the Northern Alliance back, rule of law prevailed, and the al-Qaeda camps flourished in part because they enjoyed the blessing of the government. Ayro stood no chance of establishing the same sort of dominance, or achieving the same sense of security. In Somalia, only the north has anything like order, and its government has made clear that it doesn’t intend to import or export jihad.

A mass migration of jihadists to Somalia would, in a way, be the ideal outcome for the U.S.:

it would put al-Qaeda in a place where few of its members speak the language, and almost none of them could blend in with the local population. Somalia is a damnably difficult place to do business, and it is a place where loyalty can be bought. Nearly everyone lives at subsistence levels, so the influx of moneyed foreigners would be obvious and would attract attention from all over. Most important, the establishment of Somalia as al-Qaeda’s next base would demonstrate the success of efforts to evict it from other countries. No one moves to Somalia unless he is welcome nowhere else — unless every other neighborhood has become too secure, too pleasant, to permit terrorist training. Who knew gentrification would reach the Middle East so soon?

Obama And The Gays

It’s so strange to me that some believe that Obama’s politics represents some kind of messianism, while he consistently tells people that they have to be the change they want in the world and that no leader can do it for them. And that’s also his message to gays:

I have always said that I don’t think that the LGBT community should take its cues from me or some political leader in terms of what they think is right for them. Real change comes from the bottom up, not the top down.

Some of us have been saying this for years; and it’s incredibly heartening to hear a politician echo it. This is a core difference between Obama’s and Clinton’s philosophy, it seems to me. Clinton believes government can save people and she, as the benign representative of government, can bestow equality on minorities. You just have to vote for Democrats, give money to the Democratic party interest groups (like the Human Rights Campaign) and your equality will come eventually (but always later than they say). I prefer an approach that tells gay people that they need to get off their asses, talk to straight people, build their relationships, support their community, empower themselves and win the argument for inclusion and integration. No politician can do that for us. And Obama is one of the few politicians who is honest enough to say so.

Malkin Award Nominee

"When we just saw that man, I think it was Mr. Myers [i.e. biologist P.Z. Myers], talking about how great scientists were, I was thinking to myself the last time any of my relatives saw scientists telling them what to do they were telling them to go to the showers to get gassed … that was horrifying beyond words, and that’s where science — in my opinion, this is just an opinion — that’s where science leads you," – Ben Stein.

Dissent To The Gen Y Reader

An older reader writes:

With respect to the Gen Y person who wrote to say that he is abandoning politics for good if Obama loses, please tell him and his demographic cohorts to grow up! Obama is a young, one-term Senator. He may have to make a couple of runs to have a shot at the White House. Even John Kennedy had more Congressional experience under his belt (not to mention combat experience and a well-funded family political and media machine). God willing, this is not the last Presidential election in American history, and Obama, like Reagan, Nixon, and others before them, may have to try another time if he doesn’t win this one. For myself, I’m not going to vote for Obama (I’ll probably vote for the Libertarian candidate, if that candidate is pro-life like Ron Paul), but I’d be happy to see him win, since he is the closest thing we have to an antiwar candidate who could actually win. I would just be happier if he had a bit more experience.

The more I listen and read the more thoughtful people who oppose Obama the more I think that the very simple fact of his newness and youth and inexperience in Washington is what gives many pause. And I think these are completely valid reservations. I don’t see it that way. I think of politicians as jejune as Tony Blair was when he won office – with absolutely zero executive experience – and see in Obama qualities that will serve him well. An Obama-McCain match places these two qualities – freshness versus experience – baldly in front of is and gives them a new and profound contrast.