Mr Green is right; she is building a brand. But just so she can be a television hostess? How long would that brand shine if she rebuffed those who will (with very real passion) beg her to run? Yes, she's uniquely successful at infuriating or terrifying liberals—but that's because they think that she might still just become president. How does that 2013 contract look when she's refused to enter the fight? This is hunch-blogging at its most speculative, I confess, but I think she's in. So over to you. I don't see someone who's preparing for a book-writing and lecture-circuit career. What do you see in the estimable Sarah Palin?
She has wanted to be president for much of her adult political life. She wanted it well over a decade ago. She risked a huge amount in saying yes to John McCain, a gamble of monumental proportions, in the pursuit of that goal. She believes sincerely that she is on a mission from God, that she is the Esther of the End-Times. Why is any of this hard to understand? By her words and her actions, she wants to be the GOP nominee. And at a time when Republican extremism is the brand, who better represents the party than she?
Where movement conservatives enable their political leaders to do more or less as they please, progressives seem far more willing to challenge and question “their side.” The siege and persecution mentalities that movement conservatives have long cultivated as coping mechanisms for their long history of domestic policy defeats and losses in the culture wars tend to make them far less willing to break with “their side,” which is why there is such importance placed on conformity and “team” loyalty. That means that movement conservatives typically have had to stifle, mute or otherwise water down any objections they do have to Republican policies under Bush. Then, once Bush is gone, for the sake of “the team” they feel they have to exaggerate their objections to Democratic policies and politicians to the point of absurdity to create sharper contrasts with the dismal record of Republican governance they just spent the last decade making possible.
Those on the right who value facts and intellectual integrity are often quick to dismiss the epistemic closure problem as being a phenomenon that plays out on both sides of the political spectrum. And that's true, to some extent. But it plays out very differently. The reality is that the liberal intellectual community does an infinitely better job of policing the problem. There a far more people on the left who are willing to call out reality denial when they see it, even among their own ranks. This just doesn't happen nearly as often on the right, and those who engage in it — see, e.g., Manzi or David Frum — get ostracized.
Writers at the American Scene or the Frum Forum might disagree with each other, but they're not going to call each other wingnuts, as Manzi did to Levin. You can admire Manzi's courage in speaking truth to power while acknowledging that NR's denizens weren't totally out of bounds in taking offense at his manner.
Of course, this points to an inherent problem with maintaining a blog that functions as a bulletin board for the conservative movement. The standards of entry are extremely low, and the number of contributors is vast. The practical effect of this is to force a huge number of conservatives to grant each other collegial deference. This makes it harder for a conservative like Manzi — who, for all his flaws, does craft arguments with data gleaned from outside the hermetic universe of conservative talking points — to actually call a spade a spade.
James Doty finds the profiling section of the Arizona law vague and unconstitutional and thus unlikely to survive the courts:
The most likely outcome of the legal challenges to SB 1070 may be that the bill survives, shorn of its most offensive parts. This is obviously a good result for civil libertarians, but it's also good news for their frequent adversary, police officers. In requiring officers to check immigration status but providing them no clear guidelines on when or how to do so, SB 1070 places policemen on the razor's edge of violating Arizona law on the one hand and infringing on constitutional rights on the other.
William A. Jacobson, on the other hand, counters concerns that the profiling section is race-based. And Allahpundit plays down fears that IDs would be checked routinely. But when even Tom Tancredo has misgivings, you may have gone a tad too far.
Bryan Caplan thinks that "that adoption is a noble, generous act, and admire those who do it" but he personally doesn't want to adopt. Jason Kuznicki is offended. Tyler Cowen is confused:
I think Bryan understands the selfish reasons for having children differently than I do, though I will defer to his own statement of his view. I put a big stress on how children help you see that a lot of your immediate concerns aren't nearly as important as you might think, and how spending time with children brings you closer to — apologies, super-corny phrases on the way — The Great Circle of Being and The Elemental Life Force. In some (not all) ways, adopted children may be teaching you those lessons more effectively than do biological children. It's an oversimplification to say that "children make you a better person," but they do, or should, improve your ability to psychologically and emotionally integrate that a) you want lots of stuff, b) what you end up getting remains, no matter what, ridiculously small and inconsequential, and c) you can't control your life nearly as much as you think.
I would sooner say that these realizations are gifts which children give to us rather than calling them "selfish reasons" to have children.
Immigration law professor Kevin Johnson outlines his ideal bill. He wants simpler laws:
I am not calling for simplicity for simplicity’s sake. Nor do I advocate the immigration equivalent of some kind of simple, if not simplistic, “flat tax” system. My point instead is that the United States would benefit from a streamlined, less complex, and clearer body of immigration laws.
Along similar lines, the United States often has been unclear in the overall goals of its immigration laws. Consider the exclusion grounds, which have grown over the years to respond to the perceived immigration demons of the day. Accretion of reforms upon reforms has made the immigration laws pull in dramatically different directions, lack any modicum of consistency, and simply have become unwieldy, cumbersome, and excessively complex.
Today on the Dish, Andrew assessed the sustained surge of Nick Clegg, polling continued to look precarious for Labour, Cameron played up civil liberties, the gay vote swung to the Lib-Dems, Massie considered a Lib-Tory deal, Martin Ivens impressed Andrew with his analysis, and a reader explored the need for electoral reform. Round-up of commentary here.
Andrew took a long look at a profile of Palin and her newfound fortune. Reader response here and here. Andrew also checked in on the difficult situation in Iraq. On the immigration front in Arizona, Fallows contrasted the situation with China's and we put together a comprehensive look.
Andrew mused about the spiritual component of playing and shared some footage of his beagles and husband at play. The Simpsons stood with South Park, Thoreau struggled with his caffeine addiction, and R.L.G. at Democracy In America did the same with polling on Israel. Yglesias award here and cool ad here.
Good grief. Your beagle videos first made me feel a bit better (I'm rather sickish right now), made me smile, and then cry. You have done much to make me believe that not all beagles are dangerous. I gotten bitten as a child, (by a beagle very unlike your own) and still have the scar on my left ankle. But your "kids" are so sweet, and obviously so loved. A universal thing that can cheer a person up.
Then I realized how much you must miss them..and then I started thinking about my son–who now lives in another state again. Hence, the tears. But thankfully in our "modern" age we can connect via methods so wondrous.
Anyway, thanks for making Charlie Brown seem right after all.
Massie highlights a longer Cameron pitch and is underwhelmed:
These clips are neither one thing nor another, neither a fireside chat nor a fully-trumpeted stemwinder. Instead, he falls somewhere in between and the result is oddly discordant – as though he aims for the full Lloyd George only to restrain himself for fear that it would sound and look ridiculous. The result is a delivery that, sometimes at least, is both passionless and lacking in reassurance.
My argument against proportional representation (PR) is here. David McKie's thoughts:
It is possible to envisage a system with a less proportional outcome, such as the Alternative Vote, which is not acceptable to strict adherents of PR as it by no means guarantees a proportional outcome, but is finding favour with Labour. But even the Alternative Vote would seriously diminish the chances of the Conservatives (or Labour) forming an outright government, even in years when they are stronger than they are now. Maybe the only prospect of a Cameron government after May 6 will be one with some form of Liberal Democrat backing. Yet to abandon all hope of another Conservative dawn such as the Lady achieved 31 years ago must amount to a…version of heresy [for certain Tories]– even a vision of hell.
I was leader of the Tory MEPs during the 1999 Euro-election and held a seminar at Central Office, at which Oxford academics Vernon Bogdanor and David Butler spoke of fairness and change. I couldn't get Professor John Curtice to come from Glasgow, but he told me that he had always been astonished by the Conservative reluctance to go for real PR for Westminster, since it would actually give them a significant lift because of their broadly-based support.
There is a need for a national debate about a genuinely fair electoral system, and this election must be the catalyst.
[T]here is no way Cameron, if he led a minority government, would be able to get his party to pass a bill allowing a referendum, even if he wanted it to do so and even if he then promised to campaign for a no vote. So the search is on for a compromise. Some Tories are dreaming up elaborate schemes in private to rebalance parliamentary voting, which would benefit the Lib Dems whilst leaving first the post intact. But they will get nowhere. More likely, I think, is a standoff, a minority government and probably a second election later this year.
Iain Martin is given some good advice from a friend:
The concept [Tory "Big Society" idea] is an attempt to explain how civic society might fill the gap when the state does less. This didn’t get much of a response. The Big Society sounds far too wimpish, said someone else. Like a song by U2, Then Jerico or Big Country from the 1980s. And it is so vague that it reinforces the widespread feeling in the country that Cameron and his ideas lack definition.
A friend, not involved in politics or journalism, then made a brilliantly clear point that stopped the discussion in its tracks. “Wouldn’t they have been better calling it The Strong Society? Much tougher and far less vague. Strong is a good word.”
Larison goes after Clegg's opposition to replacing Trident:
Just a month ago, Clegg was rightly railing against the major parties for having effectively ceded British sovereignty over matters of war, and yet he argues for a position that could very easily reinforce all of the worst habits of the British government in its relations with the United States concerning matters of war. If Clegg wants to repatriate British foreign policy, as he says he does, scrapping Britain’s nuclear deterrent does not make very much sense.
Peter Hoskin says some Tory MPs are warming to the idea of a hung parliament:
One corollary of the Lib Dem surge is that it seems to have made certain Tory MPs more accepting of a hung parliament in private. They still don't like it, of course – and there's still plenty of anger being directed at the party leadership, that the Tories aren't miles ahead in the polls. But they do regard Cleggmania as something of a freak occurrence, which could barely have been guarded against in any event, and which is slightly more excusable than being run close in a straight race with Labour. Whether this will smooth any post-election deals and recriminations remains to be seen.
Dizzy sketches out arguments for and against a hung parliament. But will the public go for it? Anthony Wells digs into the Sunday YouGov poll:
YouGov also asked if various election results would delight or dismay respondents. 24% would be delighted by a Cameron majority government, the highest figure, but 47% would be dismayed. As you might expect, most Conservatives would be delighted, most Labour and a significant majority of Lib Dem supporters would be dismayed. Asked about a Brown majority goverment 17% would be delighted (since almost a third of Labour supporters said only they wouldn’t mind), 50% would be dismayed.
Now it gets interesting – asked about a Cameron led Con/LD coalition, it is less popular than a Conservative majority. Only 8% would be delighted, and 52% would be dismayed (the highest figure). The reason is 53% of Lib Dem supporters would still be dismayed by such a result, and only 6% delighted, while 33% of Conservative supporters would be dismayed by such a result. What about a Gordon Brown led Lab/LD coalition? This is slightly more popular, 10% would be delighted and 49% dismayed, but still less popular than a Labour majority. Contrast this with a Lab/LD coalition under a different Labour leader – 11% would be delighted (including 24% of Lib Dem voters), and only 43% dismayed.
The Dish 
