The Dish

"We are brought up in the ethic that others, any others, all others, are by definition more interesting than ourselves; taught to be diffident, just this side of self-effacing. ("You’re the least important person in the room and don’t forget it," Jessica Mitford’s governess would hiss in her ear on the advent of any social occasion; I copied that into my notebook because it is only recently that I have been able to enter a room without hearing some such phrase in my inner ear.) Only the very young and the very old may recount their dreams at breakfast, dwell upon self, interrupt with memories of beach picnics and favorite Liberty lawn dresses and the rainbow trout in a creek near Colorado Springs. The rest of us are expected, rightly, to affect absorption in other people’s favorite dresses, other people’s trout," – Joan Didion, "On Keeping a Notebook."

Albert Mohler, president of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, backs a "final solution" for gays:

"If a biological basis is found, and if a prenatal test is then developed, and if a successful treatment to reverse the sexual orientation to heterosexual is ever developed, we would support its use as we should unapologetically support the use of any appropriate means to avoid sexual temptation and the inevitable effects of sin."

Kevin Drum analyzes Joe Klein. We’re all victims of our generations, I’d say.

This is a photo-op I’m guessing Mitt Romney now wishes hadn’t happened.  (Photo: WDCPix.)

A reader remonstrates:

On endless issues I agree with you, but your harshness on the issue of Hillary Clinton’s involvement with the Human Rights Campaign strikes me as extreme and uncalled for. Her husband’s administration was friendlier to gay rights than any of its predecessors and vastly friendlier, to be sure, than the current one. Why is it so awful and incomprehensible for a major gay rights organization to be friendly with a politician who has been, by and large, on their side?  You seem to expect major gay rights organizations to be totally neutral between Democrats and Republicans when the former have been vastly more supportive of gay rights than the latter and when the latter have spent much of their time demonizing gay people and trying to win votes at their expense.  Witness the Bush/Rove effort to boost the Bush vote in 2004 by pushing anti-gay-marriage amendments in the states.  If you doubt me on this, compare the quadrennial Democratic and Republican platforms over the last decades.

Politics is the art of the possible, and of course the Democrats fall far from perfection from a gay point of view. But in politics two-way-street loyalty counts for a lot. Why shouldn’t gay activists reciprocate some of the loyalty to the Democratic Party that it has, on the whole, shown them?

The answer is: they have every right to and equally, I have every right to ask what the gay community is getting from the bargain. Under the Clintons, we gave them our last cent and we got an increase in discharges from the military and the Defense of Marriage Act. Maybe enough people have done the work to change the climate in the country and the new Congress will be more friendly. And if the Democrats repeal "Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell" in this Congress, I’ll take it all back. But my bet is: It won’t happen. So see if they can even get ENDA. Again: I’ll give them full credit for results. But I fear they don’t want results as much as they want access and power. After all: what happens if ENDA and hate crimes laws pass? What will HRC do? Meanwhile, here’s the latest direct mail pitch:

Sturdy, stylish and with our thanks … FREE limited-edition Field Bag for joining today!

HRC is the first civil rights group to tell its members to shop for accessories.

A Republican reader is unimpressed:

For all the kids he bussed in, he still won the straw poll by only four points, 21-17, over Rudy. Hell, even Condi got 10 percent last year! Mitt didn’t exactly run away with the thing.

Down in South Carolina, in a straw poll with a much larger sample, he came in way behind McCain and Rudy. Your take on Romney is dead on: he’s an opportunist – he’ll sell his soul to Dobson and Falwell to get their money. I think Falwell, at least, is smarter and knows that the Big Game is against Hillary and is betting that Rudy is the stronger horse. Dobson simply wants control of the Hard Right and wants someone like Romney whose chain he can yank.

I expected Mitt to do well, but the national polls aren’t lying: Mitt is running yesterday’s campaign. He doesn’t know it yet. Here’s what’s going to weaken Mitt: keep your eye on Duncan Hunter. Hunter is going to sap enough of the True Believers away from Mitt to keep Rudy out front permanently. Lots of Western Republican NRO types will vote for Duncan Hunter as a Plague on All Your Houses vote. Hunter has a solid defense record, as well.

And yes, Coulter is in the process of being exiled by polite company. Aside from being a stupid thing to say, you don’t hand the D’s a gift on a silver platter.

A reader writes:

Regarding your new understanding of what Ms Coulter is all about, I give you just a selection of the most recent posting on her website. The theme is how liberals want to kill everyone.

"Global warming" is the left’s pagan rage against mankind. If we can’t produce industrial waste, then we can’t produce. Some of us — not the ones with mansions in Malibu and Nashville is my guess — are going to have to die. To say we need to reduce our energy consumption is like saying we need to reduce our oxygen consumption.

Liberals have always had a thing about eliminating humans. Stalin wanted to eliminate the kulaks and Ukranians, vegetarian atheist Adolf Hitler wanted to eliminate the Jews, Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger wanted to eliminate poor blacks, DDT opponent Rachel Carson wanted to eliminate Africans (introduction to her book "Silent Spring" written by … Al Gore!), and population-control guru Paul Ehrlich wants to eliminate all humans.

If you’re wondering how a core group of religious conservatives can believe that global climate change is a myth, look no further than someone who can claim with a straight face that "there are more reputable scientists defending astrology than defending "global warming."

A reader writes:

It seems as though there is a certain strain of right-winger today that just cannot argue against those on the Democratic/liberal philosophical spectrum without bringing up slurs against homosexuals – even when to do so makes no sense in the case in hand! Coulter’s remarks concerning Edwards – a happily married father of four children – is just the latest in a long line of such instances. One other recent example:  the actor Alec Baldwin was on a radio show in NYC a short time ago when conservative radio hosts Sean Hannity and Marc Levin called in to hurl insults against him. During the course of the 7-minute battle, Levin, out of nowhere, suddenly seeks to mock Baldwin as "Brokeback Alec."

Which, when you think of it, makes no sense. You can love or hate Alec Baldwin.  But to hurl the epithet "Brokeback Alec" at him – at an actor who was married to, and had children with Kim Basinger, who has had any number of relationships with any number of starlets – to call him "Brokeback Alec" is as nutty, as counterintuitive and just plain silly, as to hurl that epithet against Edwards!

Mark Levin anti-gay? I listened to the exchange. Levin called Baldwin a "butt-boy" as well as "Brokeback Alec." Levin has his own blog at National Review Online.

Here’s part of an interview of Sean Hannity by Michelle Malkin (who has denounced Coulter’s slur):

SH: I didn’t hear it. I’d rather see it before I comment on it and whatever. You know, no other person is responsible for what a person says except that person. And so, if they have a problem with what Ann Coulter says, blame Ann Coulter. You can’t blame somebody else for what she said. So I didn’t see it.

MM: Except that we’re all role models here. And there are so many young people they inspire–

SM: –I don’t use that term, so that’s my answer to you if she used it.

A reader comments:

I can’t count the number of times Hannity has brought someone on his show and demanded that they denounce the comments of someone else. He pushes, and pushes, and pushes that point, implying that if they don’t denounce it outright, they must agree with it. It’s one of his most common tactics. I’m glad to see he holds himself to his own high standards. I never thought I’d say this — but good for Michelle Malkin.

I’m impressed with her too.