Category: The Dish

What would Trollope say about the attorney-general? Scott Horton unloads here.

My Sunday Times column is on the travails of Romney and Giuliani trying to jump effortlessly through the hoop that Rove constructed:

When Karl Rove, the architect of George W Bush’s election victories, first dreamt up the idea of a new and permanent Republican majority, he realised he needed some glue. The anticommunist adhesive was rubbing thin after the cold war, and Clinton-hatred could only do so much without President Clinton. Rove’s solution was religion.

Why not? Many evangelical Christians were already part of the Republican party, many were restive against the abortion and gay rights rulings of the courts, and even secular Republicans were more comfortable with traditionalist religious types than know-it-all liberal atheists.

Rove also had a perfect candidate: a genial fellow – Bush – who indicated clearly his own political philosophy when asked in an early primary debate who his favourite philosopher was. "Christ," he answered, "because He changed my heart." "Christ," many wondered silently in response, "where is all this going to end up?"

Well, it ended up in the current Republican primary season. And what fun it is…

More here.

(Photo: Mitt Romney by Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty).

A Pro-secular Turkish girl looks through a banner during an anti-government rally on May 13, 2007 in Turkey’s western coastal city of Izmir. (Photo by Burak Kara/Getty Images)

That’s the claim, anyway. Scientists have perfected the ideal way to read online. Money quote:

Early results have been encouraging. According to Walker, a study funded by the U.S. Department of Education found that students who read text books in Live Ink are adding 10-15 percentile points on nationally standardized reading tests. Non native English speakers are seeing similar improved proficiency.

A more detailed article about the technology and science behind Live Ink can be found here.

If the technology lives up to its promise, Live Ink represents a veritable breakthrough that could change the way people read online content. With eyeballs moving from dead tree media to a screen near you, readability of online text will become a competitive differentiator for many online content providers.

Here’s a glimpse of the difference.

New Market, Alabama, 9.30 am.

Many are close to insubordination at this point. Check out this devastating LA Times piece on Diyala province. Money quote from former Army Maj. Gen. William L. Nash, now with the Council on Foreign Relations:

"I suspect the new Defense secretary has told general officers to speak their minds. It’s going to be hard for some in the administration — suddenly they’re going to feel it from the inside. I think you’re going to see more of it."

This is what he’s talking about:

[Army Maj. Gen. Benjamin R. "Randy"] Mixon, speaking Friday by teleconference from Camp Speicher, outside Tikrit, to a Pentagon news conference, said that he did not have enough soldiers to provide security in Diyala. The local government is "nonfunctional" and the central government is "ineffective," he said. "I’m going to need additional forces," he said, "to get that situation to a more acceptable level, so the Iraqi security forces will be able in the future to handle that." … Mixon was withering in his criticism of the Iraqi government, saying it was hamstrung by bureaucracy and compromised by corruption and sectarian discord, making it unable to assist U.S. forces in Diyala.

Meanwhile, the one touted success of the surge is now evaporating. Sectarian murders in Baghdad are back up:

Iraq’s Interior Ministry said 234 people — men whose bodies were found throughout the capital — died at the hands of death squads in the first 11 days of May, compared with 137 in the same period of April. The tally so far for May is more than half the total for all of April, when 440 bodies were found. That was a decline from previous months.

See you in September.

Mutually exclusive, according to Harvey Mansfield. Money quote:

MANSFIELD: Well, I talk about this in my book on executive power, which looks at the influence of Machiavelli on modern politics. I argue that executive power is power that exercised in the name of someone other than yourself, so it’s a kind of indirect government. It’s a way of acting without taking responsibility for your actions. In that sense, executive power is something weak or it’s something that you present as, "I’m sorry, I would like to help you, but the law says I can’t" or "I’m sorry, we need to do this because the people have spoken." You always find some other authority besides yourself in which to supply clothing for your own actions. This is something that had not been thought of or invented by the ancients, by Plato and Aristotle, it’s a modern idea.

COLE: This discussion seems to be heading towards manliness. That’s the title of your most recent book, right?

MANSFIELD: Yes.

COLE: At first sight, Manliness seems to be a departure from your earlier work, but it really isn’t, though.

MANSFIELD: Manliness, you could say, is the opposite of executive power. Manliness, instead of being indirect, is very direct. It’s frank and open, and, therefore, somewhat oblivious to one’s surroundings and not, as we say today, sensitive. I’d say the present day opposite of a manly man is a sensitive male.

But a president has to be acutely sensitive to the will of the people, and the other branches of government.

I’ve been trying to give Ron Paul a fair shake on the crazy basis of the issues and his integrity, so why not do the same for the Democrats? What the hell is wrong with Bill Richardson as a presidential candidate? Why has he been demoted by the MSM to a best supporting actor role? Check out these ads. They rock:

(Hat tip: Andy Towel.)

At first it was that he couldn’t hear the question in the GOP debate about firing a gay person; now the explanation for why he thinks it’s fine to fire a homosexual has changed a little:

"I could not wait until the debate got off so I could go to the bathroom."

The Poland Spring defense. Healthier than twinkies.

Finally, Rudy Giuliani realizes the only path he can credibly take in this primary campaign. He cannot duck from his core convictions that gay people are equal citizens and decent human beings, that women should have a choice over whether to have an abortion in the first trimester, that personal freedom in a multi-cultural society often means living in a society that may not always reflect your own moral values. Nor should Rudy have to duck these issues. His live-and-let live approach to conservatism is essential to a diverse, civil society. It was once the hallmark of a "leave-us-alone" coalition called the Republican party. It is extremely healthy to have a major candidate stand for these things in the current GOP. There are many people open to voting Republican who simply cannot support the religious intolerance, fusion of faith and politics, and anti-gay hysteria that fuels so much of the Christianist base. I fear the Republicans have to lose the next election really badly before they realize how extreme they have become. But Rudy is giving them something of a life-line. Money quote:   

"Where people of good faith, people who are equally decent, equally moral and equally religious, when they come to different conclusions about this, about something so very very personal, I believe you have to respect their viewpoint. You give them a level of choice here."

I disagree with Rudy on his opposition to civil marriage for gay couples…

But he does what no other current candidate has done: positively support an alternative for us under the law. He calls it "domestic partnership," which is what I and my fiance have in DC. It’s not marriage; and its mealy-mouthed rights and responsibilities are a social signal to homosexual citizens that their lives and relationships are worth much less than those of their straight peers. But they’re not nothing. And they at least begin a conversation among Republicans about what exactly to do about gay people and their relationships. What’s staggering about the current field is how none of them even take such a stand – at least with any candor or conviction.

Rudy is also right to reiterate his own long-standing position on gun-control. I am not an opponent of gun rights, but I know many cops who’d like to see better control of guns in the hands of criminals, and the issue has assumed within the GOP an almost theological status as unquestionable doctrine. For Rudy to disown his own experience in this area on NYC would be unconvincing and uninspiring.

My own concerns with Giuliani remain. They have mainly to do with his contempt for civil liberties, his support for torture, and my fear of what damage he would do to the Constitution in the wake of another terror attack. I don’t believe he fully understands the difference between being a mayor and being a president, or has any grasp that the leader of a republic is often celebrated for what he doesn’t do as much as what he does. But this speech in Houston definitely prompted me to take a second look at Rudy. On abortion we now have one clear pro-lifer, one clear pro-choicer, and one person who will say whatever is necessary at any moment to advance his own career. That’s a good trio of choices for Republicans. I’m glad Rudy has added the third choice.

(Photo: Jeff Fusco/Getty.)