The Dish

Steve Waldman tries to understand Romney’s failure.

"McCain has betrayed his nation by forcefully encouraging the invasion of the USA by a foreign enemy. McCain has betrayed the American people by opposing tax reduction.  McCain has defied the welfare of American citizens by refusing to defend us from domestic enemies.  McCain has betrayed his party time and time again by acting like and voting like a Democrat.

You think McCain will fight a war?   You’re so stupid.  McCain’s goal is to give Democrats everything they want while leaving Republicans to take the blame. McCain will reach across the aisle and lose the war. McCain will reach across the aisle to appoint leftist judges. McCain will reach across the aisle to raise taxes. McCain will reach across the aisle to impose HillaryCare. McCain will reach across the aisle at any time necessary to screw Conservatives," – Bruce Tyson.

Lost in the primary madness, a small step forward for family values.

Judging by the reader response to this post, a lot of you will enjoy this interview.

Jon Cohn explains his logic, in a gracious little essay. I wish Romney had remained the man Jon believes he was. But Romney’s decision to mortgage his integrity for ambition rather refutes the point. It profiteth not a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul.

But for Hewitt?

"It is like now I have to choose between the left and the radical left. John McCain’s appearance here will be like David Duke going before the NAACP," – Jeffrey Goldberg (not my esteemed Atlantic colleague), a Michigan Republican and Romney supporter, at CPAC.

Pruning shears on the new authoritarians.

Rush Limbaugh’s new reason for living. The Republicans desperately need a Clinton victory now. I’ll wager she’ll raise more money for the far right than she ever will for herself.

Ben Dooley explains why they’re not going to made into English any time soon:

There are a number of features of Japan’s language and culture that make a cell phone novel more palatable than it would be in English. First, Japanese grammar is much better suited than English to the kind of short sentences writing on a cell phone encourages. As a high-context language, a complete sentence in Japanese can consist of just a single, lonely verb.

Japanese speakers and writers frequently and freely omit subjects and objects from their sentences, expecting the reader to figure out what’s going on. Go figure. The use of Chinese characters also serves to compact sentences. Since you don’t have to actually spell out entire words, as in English, but can represent them with an ideogram, you can say a lot more in a much smaller space.

Secondly, and perhaps just as important, cell phone novels tap into long traditions of Japanese prose and poetry. First, even a cursory examination of a cell phone novel will show a visual connection to the poetic traditions of haiku and tanka. The connection doesn’t end there, at its best the writing itself has an economy and – I’ll regret saying this – poetry that taps into the same tradition. The medium – you try typing a novel on the keypad of a cell phone – forces the writers to make every word count, and (in Japanese at least) it shows.

It appears that way. The Clintons even spin and lie to their own donors.