The Dish

"Is [Fred Thompson] anything beyond a standard Republican conservative? Will he have anything beyond a Mideast policy that consists of win in Iraq, support the surge, and oppose any timetable? Does he stand for any strategic thinking apart from what John McCain unconsciously but aptly characterized as "Bomb-bomb-bomb, bomb-bomb Iran"? On domestic issues, can Mr. Thompson go beyond standard conservative thought? I happen to be standard conservative myself, but sometimes old things need to be made new, the obvious needs to be made fresh," – Peggy Noonan, a breath of fresh air. She gets the conservative crisis. I’m not sure the boomlet for Thompson is a cure or a symptom.

TCS comes through with an honest defense of Paul’s account of the longterm question of blowback in the Middle East. George W. Bush has made the same "absurd" point (to quote Rudy the Waterboarder). Buchanan naturally liked what he heard. Here’s another angry Paul-supporting conservative. John Dickerson, no conservative, makes the obvious case for keeping Paul in the debates. Michelle Malkin, who regularly lambastes the MSM for spreading lies, has not yet retracted her own on-air lie about Paul believing that Bush knew about 9/11 in advance. It’s a useful test of her integrity. Is she an honest blogger or a lying propagandist? If she doesn’t retract, she’s telling us she’s the latter.

A reader writes:

Been following your coverage of Paul with great interest. I just wanted to add a note of perspective. I grew up in Highlands, Texas, on the gulf coast very near the northern boundary of his congressional district (TX 14). In the 1980s, during his first run in congress, Paul was widely regarded, and not just by Democrats, as an eccentric, to put it mildly. Weirdly, principled, though. But more importantly, in light of the present debate, he was regarded as the most extreme of right-wingers.

When I was working in Democratic politics in Austin in the mid-80s, we’d just shake our heads at Ron Paul and his gold standard, etc., and think Whew, guy’s an extremist. And looking back, he was certainly the most conservative member of the Texas delegation, even then a conservative delegation. Well, that delegation has changed manifestly. To a number, the rest of the Republicans in the Texas delegation are now far to the right of Paul. They’ve changed, reflecting the rightward slide of the politics in America in the past 25 years. Ron Paul has remained the same, still weirdly principled (in that it’s now kind of weird to be principled) a time capsule for what American conservatism used to look like.

I think the GOP has just adjusted to being the party of Dixie.

The fundies are everywhere.

"When I ask myself how I know I believe, I have no satisfactory answer at all, no assurance at all, no feeling at all. I can only say with Peter, Lord I believe, help my unbelief. All I can say about my love of God, is, Lord help me in my lack of it. I distrust pious phrases, particularly when they issue from my mouth. I try militantly never to be affected by the pious language of the faithful but it is always coming out when you least expect it. In contrast to the pious language of the faithful, the liturgy is beautifully flat," – Flannery O’Connor, in a letter to Elizabeth Hester, August 2, 1955.

(Photo: Johannes Simon/Getty.)

Jut in case you had your hopes up, here’s a useful backgrounder.

Mesa, Arizona, 10.30 am.

For an interactive gallery of Dish readers’ window views across the world, click here.

They’re slowly killing off editorial cartoons:

What troubles today’s publishers and editors is less a matter of subtlety than cost. Faced with declining advertising revenues and evaporating print audiences, newspapers increasingly opt to buy cartoons through syndication, which offers access to hundreds of prints for as little as $35 a week, compared to more than $35,000 a year for a staffer. Faced with such an opportunity for savings, many penny-pinching outlets forget loyalties and lose their honor fast. In the late 1990s, for example, The Village Voice told cartoonist Jules Feiffer that, after forty years and a Pulitzer Prize, it wanted to squash his $75,000 salary but still run his work. Universal Press Syndicate offered the rights for some $200 a week.

When I was a kid, editorial cartoons were one of my first introductions to political debate. They are a precious and vital resource. If newspapers kill them off, they will be committing suicide. But that suicide is already well-advanced, isn’t it?

India is the latest democracy to be forced to grapple with the political claims of fundamentalist religion. Hinduists are threatening the secular balance of the largest democracy in the world. Money quote:

What has been happening in India is a serious threat to the future of democracy in the world. The fact that it has yet to make it onto the radar screen of most Americans is evidence of the way in which terrorism and the war on Iraq have distracted us from events and issues of fundamental significance. If we really want to understand the impact of religious nationalism on democratic values, India currently provides a deeply troubling example, and one without which any understanding of the more general phenomenon is dangerously incomplete. It also provides an example of how democracy can survive the assault of religious extremism.

In May 2004, the voters of India went to the polls in large numbers. Contrary to all predictions, they gave the Hindu right a resounding defeat. Many right-wing political groups and the social organizations allied with them remain extremely powerful, however. The rule of law and democracy has shown impressive strength and resilience, but the future is unclear.

Uh-oh:

Sam the English springer spaniel, Coco the mutt, turtles Cuff and Link, Oreo the black and white cat, a ferret, three parakeets and 13 saltwater fish.

Rudy will be after him. Giuliani has none. No dog would have him.

(Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty.)