The Dish

Following the inglorious end to "Mouthpiece Theater," WaPo gives viral comedy another try.

A Birther infomercial! It will play across the South.

The parallels on the economy are getting eerier. Will Obama ride forward on an unexpectedly strong recovery? Even AEI is beginning to wonder.

Vitoria, Brazil, 5 pm

Will Wilson disagrees with Conor Friedersdorf's defense of betraying the president's trust:

Is Conor really telling us that loyalty to an abstraction (”the people”) is preferable to loyalty to a person (”the President”)? As a conservative, does he think that the former is even a well-defined concept? Possible given human nature? Desirable? Let’s ignore, for now, the fact that “the President” is in some ways just as damnable an abstraction as “the people”, Bennett doesn’t use that language — almost certainly on purpose.

"It is doubtful that any historian of stature would buy the comparison the prime minister made between Hamas and the Nazis. If we can compare a poorly equipped terrorist organization to the horrific Nazi killing machine, why should others not compare the Nazis' behavior to that of Israel Defense Forces soldiers? In both cases, the comparison is baseless and infuriating," – Gideon Levy, Haaretz.

Juan Cole piles on:

[Netanyahu's] appearance at the UN was decried by Israeli liberals as clownish. He seemed to take Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's bait by trying to offer documentary proof of the Holocaust (the event is not in doubt and doesn't need to be proven) and then by referring to little Hamas in Gaza (pop. 1.5 mn.) as Nazis. Isn't there a rule that if you make an analogy to the Nazis in your argument, you automatically lose?

COMBO a collaborative animation by Blu and David Ellis (2 times loop) from blu on Vimeo.

Elizabeth Pisani throws some cold water:

Yes, it is exciting that something has finally been shown to work, even a bit. And yes, it will encourage a new look at combination vaccines. So why do I say it is the worst possible type of good news? Because a vaccine that reduces the risk of infection by a third presents an agonising public health dilemma.

With most infectious diseases, reducing everyone’s risk by a third would make quite a difference across a whole population. But the problem with HIV is that it is both an infectious disease and a behavioural one. I can get it by sharing needles with other drug injectors, I can avoid it by using condoms every time I have sex. If I know I have been vaccinated, will that make me more likely to share needles, or less likely to use condoms? And if it does, will that change outweigh the 30 per cent reduction in risk that comes with the vaccine?

If you believe that the only strategy American can have is bombing, invading and torturing, today's events must be a little disorienting. Here's Goldfarb desperately trying to spin against the administration:

There seems to be real bipartisan support in both the House and Senate for Congressionally-mandated sanctions that are not held hostage to this president's naive focus on diplomatic engagement and the faith this president obviously has in his own powers of persuasion.

Heh. Then this piece of undigested prose from another Kristolite. Jonah Goldberg approvingly reprints the following email:

So let me get this straight, our crack intelligence community knew about this second Iranian nuke plant a year ago (so it couldn't have been that big of secret to begin with) which means our Wonderful and Gracious Dear Leader knew about this second facility and STILL felt the need to reach out to the Iranians as if they were rational actors who could be trusted along with canceling the missle defense site site in Europe?

The sheer simple-minded dumbness of these people never ceases to amaze. Obama has maneuvered these past few months to isolate Iran without seeming to bully or dominate. Because of that, he has a decent chance of getting real sanctions approved by Russia and maybe even China. But this delicate piece of diplomacy and public relations infuriates the unchastened neocon right. They like their foreign policy crude and simplistic and … well, Cheneyesque. Even after such an approach failed to provide any real results except the occupation of two countries and the nuclear empowerment of North Korea and Iran. Ideology remains entrenched, immune as ever to the facts on the ground.

Obama is more the conservative than they will ever be.

This strikes me as huge news and a major coup for the new president. It’s a statement from the Moscow government:

Iran’s construction of a uranium enrichment plant violates decisions of the United Nations Security Council. The International Atomic Energy Agency must investigate this site immediately, and Iran must cooperate with this investigation. Russia will assist in this investigation by any available means. Russia remains committed to a dialogue with Iran on the nuclear issue, and urges Iran to provide proof of its commitment to a peaceful nuclear program by the October 1 meeting of the P5-plus-1.

Meanwhile:

Mr. Obama is planning to visit Beijing and Shanghai in early November, just around the same time that a sanctions resolution is expected to be introduced at the Security Council.

Beep. Beep.