The Dish

Andy Towle has a great video.

Obama has beaten Clinton 3 – 1 in fundraising this year. If he survives today, it could prove critical.

I’d forgotten this, so I’m glad a reader reminded me:

You wrote this sentence about Hillary:

"Yes, she subsequently sought election in her own right to the Senate."

But no, she sought election to the Senate as Bill’s wife, as the former first lady, as a carpet-bagger in NY state, where she’d never lived, and where the presumptive Democratic candidate before HRC big-footed her way into the race was a woman congressman named Nita Lowey, who had come up on her own, paid her dues in Congress, etc.

Now, Lowey may not be great shakes, I have no idea — and Hillary has been a pretty good senator for NY (never mind the Iraq & Iran votes in that regard for a second, though I do mind them) — but she did not get the job on her own cheek. She got it by way of the reflected star power of her husband and his name and Lowey didn’t stand a chance against her, and the whole party apparatus fell happily in behind her, because who doesn’t want clout and star power?

Maybe this was all smart politics for NY state, and nobody can say Hillary didn’t do her homework — she’s virtually D’Amato like in her constituent services, I’m told. But if the issue is how much of a feminist is she — well, maybe somebody should Ask Nita Lowey.

Brad Delong is furious:

Their reference to "near-record levels" of the deficit doesn’t give a full and fair account of the magnitude of what can only be called a clown show. The headline deficit number ought to be $738 billion–we have a $331 billion Social Security surplus for 2009, and an honest and honorable administration would be using that surplus to pay down the government debt in order to get ready for the challenges that our aging population will pose for the federal budget over the next two generations. The headline number shouldn’t be 2.7% of GDP; it should be 4.8% of GDP. That is how far Bush fiscal policy is from what a prudent and responsible fiscal policy should be.

Lawrence Kudlow wants to know what Romney and McCain plan to do:

What will McCain and Romney do? They both want to expand the defense budget and the size of the military services, as they should, to strengthen our national security in the war on terror. But of course this costs money. Big money. President Reagan argued successfully in the 1980s that low tax rates reignite economic growth — growth that was absolutely essential to generate the resources necessary for a strong national-security posture.

My question is whether McCain and Romney will adopt the Reagan approach, or will they see higher tax rates as a tradeoff to a stronger military à la Eisenhower?

Ah, Eisenhower. Now there was a conservative.

A reader writes:

The fact that the Dead, drug culture and all, became some sort of culture war rallying point is ridiculous. The Dead embody true libertarianism as much as any other rock band in history. In my opinion, that the remaining members would get back together to play for Obama confirms your essay’s thesis far more than refutes it.

Another reader adds:

Despite the collective impression that the Grateful Dead are tree hugging hippies, their sensibility has always been, at the core, libertarian. If they had a motto (they don’t), it might be "live and let live" or more concisely "leave me alone."

It’s not surprising that Bill Weld was a dead head, nor that the Dead’s junior songwriter (John Perry Barlow) worked on Dick Cheney’s 1978 congressional campaign.

One of the last songs that Jerry Garcia recorded before his death was titled "Liberty." It’s not exactly a treehuggers delight:

If I was an eagle I’d dress like a duck
Crawl like a lizard and honk like a truck
If I get a notion I’ll climb this tree
or chop it down and you can’t stop me
Chop it down and you can’t stop me

Ooo, freedom
Ooo, liberty
Ooo, leave me alone
To find my own way home
To find my own way home

Pity the poor guy:

My Obama-loving friends—that is, all my friends—have tried to rationalize my support in a number of ways. Maybe I have a thing for older women? Or it’s some sort of latent Oedipus complex? Dear God, I hope not. Am I just doing it to get a date? No, and unfortunately, it’s having the opposite effect. Being a college guy who supports Hillary is a like being the jock who takes the women’s studies class to pick up girls. It just does not work. It is as if my lack of a second X chromosome sends a signal to women that I am an interloper in Hillaryland, and my support is less than genuine.

Couldn’t resist:

He says Plouffe isn’t spinning:

This isn’t about lowering expectations. It’s about the reality of the situation. Obama has been slowly building up, and has had to overcome huge advantages enjoyed by the Clintons. It’s about the calendar (see below), and how it plays to Obama’s strengths later in the month. There’s no need to bet everything on tomorrow. It’s all about how well he loses. The narrower the loss, the bigger his actual victory.

"He wasn’t experienced enough to authorize the invasion of Iraq," – Robert De Niro on Obama.