Category: The Dish

Bill Kristol thinks racism is essentially over in the younger generation:

With respect to having a national conversation on race, my recommendation is: Let’s not, and say we did.

But let’s keep using coded racist messages to goad people to vote Republican. But on the downlow. Ofr course, not all Republicans seem to agree. Heilemann:

In GOP circles, the incendiary video clips of Obama’s former pastor are seen, not surprisingly, as a gift that will keep on giving.

Actually discussing race frankly and candidly would wound this kind of strategy. Which is why Kristol wants to avoid it.

War criminal John Yoo, a man who has defended the right of George W. Bush to crush the testicles of an innocent child as part of his presidential powers as commander-in-chief, and who defined torture out of existence in a non-infamous memo, lectures the Democrats on the dangers of unelected unaccountable "super-delegates."

Howell Raines is back and worrying.

Andy Bacevich joins a growing, if still fledgling, throng. Money quote:

The Iraq War represents the ultimate manifestation of the American expectation that the exercise of power abroad offers a corrective to whatever ailments afflict us at home. Rather than setting our own house in order, we insist on the world accommodating itself to our requirements. The problem is not that we are profligate or self-absorbed; it is that others are obstinate and bigoted. Therefore, they must change so that our own habits will remain beyond scrutiny.

Of all the obstacles to a revival of genuine conservatism, this absence of self-awareness constitutes the greatest. As long as we refuse to see ourselves as we really are, the status quo will persist, and conservative values will continue to be marginalized. Here, too, recognition that the Iraq War has been a fool’s errand—that cheap oil, the essential lubricant of the American way of life, is gone for good—may have a salutary effect. Acknowledging failure just might open the door to self-reflection.

Conservatism, at its core, is about the frailty of human goodness, the limits of human knowledge, the virtue of self-doubt when that is required, restraint on government executive power, and the correction and admission of error when necessary. What has happened to conservatism under Bush is that it has become a messianic, ruthless, totally certain imposition of ideology (fused even more lethally with theology). Obama is not the answer to this conservative predicament. He is a "progressive" liberal – but his liberalism contains more conservative elements of reason and prudence and restraint than the current Republican party. And although I admire John McCain immensely, and he is far and away one of the more principled and decent conservatives around, I fear that doubt, complexity, restraint and an understanding of the need for government to do less rather than more at times are not the strongest impulses in his make-up. To put it mildly.

Supporting Obama may well empower liberalism for a generation. I’ve said that for almost a year now. But it might also help defeat the corruption and degeneracy of "conservatism" that now dominates the Republican Party. That I once gave this faux conservatism too much benefit of the doubt and enabled it in part myself does not lessen the fact that I now believe it’s the obligation for many thinking conservatives to repudiate it. That was the core of my book, "The Conservative Soul." Other conservatives have seen this and will continue to see this – and do the right thing by putting the long-term interests of a more responsible Burkean conservatism before the narrow short-term interest of their party.

A reader writes:

Howard Wolfson was on MSNBC this morning and, based upon his response to the incredibly tepid questioning he received on this matter, you shouldn’t be giving the Clintons "the benefit of the doubt" on it. Wolfson, in a stunning illustration of the cliche of "the pot calling the kettle black," attempted to put the issue "in context" by complaining that since Obama’s "stinging defeats" in Texas and Ohio, his campaign has done nothing "question Clinton’s character" over whether "she could be Commander in Chief".  He then pulled out a handful of old press clippings (including one from the White House press office) to prove that Clinton had flown into a "war zone", and that she had been "protected by a machine gun" emplacement.  He said nothing (and he wasn’t challenged by the zombie like anchors) about Hillary’s claim that she was "under sniper fire", had to nix a welcoming ceremony, and "run" to her car under fire!

Just for the record – her recent speech:

"I remember landing under sniper fire. There was supposed to be some kind of a greeting ceremony at the airport, but instead we just ran with our heads down to get into the vehicles to get to our base."

And from her own book:

"Due to reports of snipers in the hills around the airstrip, we were forced to cut short an event on the tarmac with local children, though we did have time to meet them and their teachers and to learn how hard they had worked during the war to continue classes…"

The video of her arrival in Tuzla. No sniper fire. No running with heads down. A clear greeting ceremony with the acting Bosnian president. Chelsea is also walking, smiling, easily walking toward the entourage.  Last week: "There was no greeting ceremony, and basically we were told to run to our cars." Whan asked about Sinbad’s recollection that the only thing he was scared of was the food, Clinton said," Well, he’s a comedian." He’s not the only one.

A reader writes:

I can’t help but notice the effect Obama”s race speech had on the Daily Dish. Before the speech, your blog was mostly filled with anti-Clinton posts. They were so many that even I, a pro-Obama anti-Clinton reader, was getting annoyed at the negativity and vitriol that filled the dish.

Since the speech, you have returned to posting mostly about
a)  the positive aspects of Obama’s candidacy
b)  a substantive debate and reflection about the issue of race

If this doesn’t sum up the difference between the two candidates, I don’t know what does.

He brings out the best in a lot of us, doesn’t he? In the end, that’s my definition of leadership – not what he does, "the decider" – but what he inspires others to do, "the catalyst." I think this difference would be the defining distinction between a Clinton and an Obama presidency and it was what I was trying to express in Goodbye To All That. How great it would be to have a president with whom we could intelligently engage and from whom we could learn civility again. I think it’s already happening.

The South Park team have been at work on this for a while now, and if you’re a South Park groupie (as a lot of you are), you won’t be disappointed. It’s still in Beta but almost every episode is now available, and a ton of clips. People forget that South Park began online, and it’s great to see it now have a site that really pioneers the fusion of the web and television. Bonus Super Adventure Club clip:

Matt and Trey are interviewed here. Money quote from Matt:

I love the fact that Trey and I have gotten awards for being topical and satirical, but at the end of the day, we are just making jokes. If you ask me how to really solve the health-care crisis, I have fuckin’ no idea, and I don’t want to be a part of it. But I can make a little fat kid yell some emotional truth about it. That’s what we’ve figured out over the years. If you’re gonna make it a TV show, you would never do the actual politics of something, but you would do the emotions behind the politics. Who cares if it’s a right-or-wrong policy—here’s how it makes me feel. You’re not gonna get into a policy discussion with Cartman and Mr. Hankey and Jesus and shit.

Somehow easier and harder than blogging.

Andrew Patner helps unpack and explain what Obama’s neighborhood means to the candidate, and what it could mean for the rest of us. Well worth a read.

" They think they have a sense of entitlement to the presidency," – Bill Richardson on the Clintons. I still think an Obama-Richardson ticket is an intriguing idea.

You really have to read this Derbyshire post to believe it. I wonder what Michelle Malkin thinks.