Category: Yglesias Award Nominee

“What you’re hearing from some folks about the status of the sequester simply tells you that there’s a group of Republicans who are willing to look at the Defense Department equally with the other departments. I think Republicans lose credibility when they say we have to look everywhere for savings except defense,” –  Mick Mulvaney (R-SC), a sophomore congressman who has been leading the campaign for spending cuts, including at the Pentagon.

“The world has changed beneath us. Shrillness and extreme language are driving away the voters who could help us build a majority. We’re not speaking to them as reasonable conservatives. Republicans have to decide if they want to govern or play ideological parlor games. Young people today have a more tolerant, hands-off perspective. Their libertarian philosophy, for example, has to be taken into consideration. Yet we keep projecting anger at the gay community and the Hispanic community, even though they’re open to many of our ideas,” – Jim Gilmore, former RNC chair and governor of Virginia.

More evidence of this.

“A few years from now, when the two-state idea is dead and buried, I’m afraid we will look back on Netanyahu and curse him for his blindness. Right now, he has time to design an orderly transition out of the West Bank, but he’s doing everything in his power to keep the Palestinian state from being born,” – Jeffrey Goldberg.

“While I have the greatest respect for a great many of you, the days where I can in good conscience remain silent about the issues that set me apart from the rest of FReeperdom have past. For clarity, or perhaps catharsis, I’m not entirely certain which, I’ll lay them out on the table an call the ZOT™ down upon myself.

The racism: I just can’t handle it anymore. FR has become increasingly racist since President Obama took office, and enforcement has dropped. Now, not a single crime can be reported with an “amish” comment, and I’ve yet to see a post express embarrassment or shame when lo and behold sometimes the perpetrators turned out to be lily white.

Homosexuality: FR is on the wrong side of history on this one, and I’ll just leave it at that.

Mostly though, it’s the hate. More and more posts reference violent solutions to political disagreements. Some subtly couched, others make no pretense. I wouldn’t be surprised at all if I read in the morning paper that a FReeper murdered a federal bureaucrat or a federal judge,” – long-time Free Republic poster Melas, in his farewell “opus”.

Know hope.

“Since 1965, arguably the most important conservative politician after Ronald Reagan is Newt Gingrich. He achieved some remarkable, impressive things. But he practiced a style of politics that was quite different from Reagan’s. It was characterized by apocalyptic and incendiary rhetoric, anger, impatience, and revolutionary zeal. While his positions on issues were often conservative, Gingrich’s temperament and approach were not. Yet it is the Gingrich, not the Reagan, style that characterizes much of conservatism today. It would be better for conservatism, and better for America, to recapture some of the grace, generosity of spirit, and principled politics of America’s 40th president,” – Pete Wehner, Commentary.

"I will continue to listen to Chief Keef’s music, and I reserve the right to praise it. But I probably won’t get off this easy. Or I shouldn’t, anyway. As much as I’d like to consider rap music, and all art, in a moral vacuum, that’s not possible. Not in America, not with our history. The past is still with us, and we share—to widely varying degrees—in the pain and the guilt. Chief Keef serves as a reminder to those of us who may have forgotten: There are some things that should make us uncomfortable. But that’s exactly why we should confront these things, all of us," -  Dave Bry, reviewing a new, stylized and violent album by rapper Chief Keef.

"SO OVER THE YEARS I’VE OFTEN SAID that in my ideal world, happily married gay couples would have closets full of assault weapons. You’d think that right now, with all the gun-owner-hating going on, that the second half of that statement would be the controversial part. But you’d be wrong. I was just disinvited from a scheduled speech by the Utah County, Utah GOP because — after a special meeting to discuss the subject — I was deemed "too controversial" because of my support for gay rights. Er, okay. Having an unpaid speaking gig (which I seldom do anymore) canceled is no hardship. And people are welcome to believe what they want to believe, and invite whom they want to speak — but as the GOP looks at why they’re viewed as intolerant, well, this kind of thing might be part of it. "Big tent" or teepee? Your choice," – Glenn Reynolds.

"Will the American people be better off if this law passes relative to the alternative? In the final analysis, the answer is undoubtedly yes. I came to Congress to make tough decisions—not to run away from them," – Paul Ryan, explaining why he broke ranks with Eric Cantor and Kevin McCarthy.

My take on the deal and Obama's long game is here. Reax from the blogosphere is here and here.

"I believe that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is suffering from a concussion. She has never shied away from a fight (assuming the testimony would even amount to that), she has never declined to testify before in her decades of public service … and very significantly she has agreed to testify in January so they will hear from her," - Greta Van Susteren