The Dish

"It will make you feel better to say, I didn’t lose the election; Foley lost it for me. Your wife and kids will believe it," – Grover Norquist, the president of Americans for Tax Reform.

If the Republicans lose this election, it will be for a simple reason. They have forgotten what conservatism means. You cannot spend and borrow more than any Democratic Congress since FDR and remain a credible conservative. You cannot elevate executive power permanently above individual liberty and remain a credible conservative. You cannot wage a war without the care, resources, and troops needed to win and remain a credible conservative. You cannot wage a religiously-based culture war and remain a limited government conservative. It’s not that complicated really.

Every now and again, the plight of the heterosexual male deserves some sympathy. Wired for sex, yet programmed for marriage, and forced to deal with an opposite sex they can neither fully understand nor easily resist, straight men do not have an easy time of it. Gareth Keenan, in a deleted scene from the British comedy classic, "The Office," explains:

Here’s David Kuo’s appearance on Colbert.

My favorite line:

"I think someone had to point out that Jesus and George W. Bush are different people…"

Yep, one was tortured; and the other tortures.

"One day I will be asked whether I have been in touch with someone who told me we would win, and I will respond: ‘Yes, I have been in touch with God’," – Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. (Hat tip: Tom Gross.)

Not so fast, says Clive Davis, with a particularly sharp elbow toward Mark Steyn.

If you didn’t know that before, you do now.

This quote can’t be good news for Rove:

"The Republican leadership spent $1 million on helping Chafee, and then it wonders why conservatives don’t think they’re wanted in this party. They think the leadership wants them to come out every year, shine your shoes, then go sit in the back of the bus, take their Bibles and read them and shut up."

Rocco has a leak of the imminent document from the American Catholic bishops on pastoral care of homosexual Catholics. No big surprises – but a nod toward baptizing the adopted children of same-sex couples.

Attacking Jerry Brown – and "flaky liberals" everywhere. The last words? "Amen to that."

Here’s a graph compiled from data provided by Brookings.

A first-person account of the unraveling of civil order in much of the country can be read here.