The Dish

A big presence in early voting.

A reader writes:

The interesting thing about Bush’s Wilsonian intervention policy is that he was able to secure large scale support from Jacksonian America to make it happen, which is highly skeptical of Wilsonian foreign policy endeavors.  How he did it will probably be the ticket to someone’s PhD. in history someday, but in short he sold Jacksonians on a threat, promised “Shock and Awe” against the enemy, and demanded nothing short of victory.  Bush viewed Jacksonians as simpletons with a bloodlust, and used their patriotism to further an admittedly clueless strategy to reshape the Middle-East.  As far as our reasons for being in Iraq go, the only issue left to sell to Jacksonians is victory over a multitude of fifth rate bad guys.

Those of us who identify with Jacksonian America, and the legitimate need for a total national commitment to war from time to time just don’t buy it any more. The Bush/McCain GOP is going to have a hard time bringing Jacksonian America along for another four to eight years of pandering and failure.

How did he do it? The key, I think, to his narrow 2004 victory was the invocation of religious loyalty. It is sometimes astonishing to see how much damage one president can do to so much in so little a time.

An hilariously dead-on account by Al Giordano. And yes, it has already begun:

The day begins with the Clinton campaign “leaking” something to the Drudge Report to set expectations for the day. That then gets repeated on political blogs and cable news, where Clinton surrogate Terry McAuliffe elaborates. Today’s “expectation”: That the Clinton campaign expects a “15 point” defeat in North Carolina. Clinton’s yapping puppies in the news media repeat the manufactured expectation all day long, in which the bar is supposedly now that if Clinton comes within 15 points in that state that she has somehow “won” with a 14 point (or 6 point) defeat.

You know the rest … God I hate the Clintons. More goal-post moving here.

Assume the Congress is solidly Democratic. What would his first legislative actions be? Immigration reform and climate change. Ha! When you realize that, you also realize how a McCain presidency could finally detonate the GOP base. It would be like the first Bush administration on steroids. Mickey and Michelle would go nuts. In fact, she already has. Can you wait for his speech to La Raza? I’ll be reading the Corner that day, won’t you?

"“When any society says that I cannot marry a certain person, that society has cut off a segment of my freedom,” – Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.  in 1958.

May one woman who pioneered the fight for marriage equality, the remarkable Mildred Loving, rest in peace. There’s a lovely obit here. Her work is not over for the last Americans denied the right to marry the person they love. And in California, we may be facing our next civil rights watershed, as the state court prepares to issue its own ruling 60 years after it was the first state to invalidate anti-miscegenation laws in 1948. The work goes on. But Loving’s poignant, quiet heroism will always inspire.

How much can one people be forced to suffer? Mong Palatino has a round-up of Burmese bloggers on the natural disaster. Here’s a collection of eyewitness accounts:

“Some were killed by flying trees, some from exposure to the cold, some died when they had gathered to shelter from the storms in monasteries and they collapsed."

“The sea rose by around 5 feet and swamped the town at the time of the storm, causing most of the damage and sweeping away small homes and buildings."

“There was water, rain and wind. The shore road was submerged and on the high ground the water was at knee level. The whole town was underwater. There were heavy waves all over, and water snakes. Some died from the snakes."

“Local people in Rangoon and monks have cleared roads themselves due to the lack of authorities. The clearing has been done by a system of “self reliance” according to one participant. People are also sharing small quantities of water and other essentials among themselves to get through this period.”

Bridget Welsh chides politicians (from within and outside Burma) for delaying relief efforts. The Economist focuses on the Junta’s attempt to consolidate power regardless of the national tragedy. And Hilzoy voices her disgust with the  US providing aid conditionally, linking to non-governmental organizations where individuals can donate.

(Photo: Destroyed fishing boats lay in the port of Rangoon after cylone Nargis on May 4, 2008. By Khin Maung Win/AFP/Getty.)

While the bloggy right continues in its nasty McCarthyite tactics, Newt sees the underlying reality:

The Republican brand has been so badly damaged that if Republicans try to run an anti-Obama, anti- Reverend Wright, or (if Senator Clinton wins), anti-Clinton campaign, they are simply going to fail.

This model has already been tested with disastrous results.

In 2006, there were six incumbent Republican Senators who had plenty of money, the advantage of incumbency, and traditionally successful consultants.

But the voters in all six states had adopted a simple position: "Not you." No matter what the GOP Senators attacked their opponents with, the voters shrugged off the attacks and returned to, "Not you."

The danger for House and Senate Republicans in 2008 is that the voters will say, "Not the Republicans."

And then when you read his actual proposals to right the ship – "1. Repeal the gas tax for the summer" – you realize he doesn’t have any better ideas.

You can even see the old Cajun’s logic as making Obama the rightful nominee. Does Carville really think Clinton has the "patience and skill" to unify people? Please.

Back in 1992 – before they mortgaged their souls and their minds for power:

(Hat tip: Ben.)

A reader writes:

The email from Indiana finally inspired me to send this to you, although I wanted to the day it occurred.

Two days ago I pulled into the CVS parking lot here in Brevard, NC. I saw a very elderly, very stooped older gentleman getting out of the passenger side of a Ford pick-up truck and hobbling toward a curb. As soon as I parked I walked over to check on him and saw a young woman with a toddler already by his side. She had seen him fall and beat me to him. Another gentleman witnessed this and he, too, came over to help. The older man was so sweet, and a bit disoriented, but welcomed the help from us all. We got him back into the truck, and I was able to glean that his "boy" was inside the store.  We asked them to page his son and when he came forward, I knew it was him instantly.

Even though for that brief second in time, the primaries were the last thing on my mind, if you had stopped me and asked me which of the three candidates I thought the father and son would vote for, I’d say either Clinton or McCain.

White, blue-collar, seemingly not highly educated, small, western NC town folk, born and raised here…,etc. As I left the store, they were just pulling out. On the back of the truck window was an Obama ’08 sticker. I cracked the biggest, spontaneous smile and I felt my heart loosen up a bit. I’d been having a pretty shitty, self-centered, emotional day up till then. And then I found myself tearing up. And I felt both soaring hope and some sort of communal, corny, we are the world joy. That moment felt like a MoveOn Obama commercial. You had a representative from nearly every age group involved in the scene, and four or five generations. Apparently, I do not really know what an Obama supporter looks like. I felt like such a judgmental elitist. A hopeful judgmental elitist.