Glenn Greenwald makes an obvious rejoinder to Dana Goldstein:
If one accepts Goldstein’s premise — that no decent person would ever support any pro-life politician regardless of other concerns — it is difficult to understand how her position is reconciled with support for Democrats generally, given that they have installed in one of their two most powerful positions — Senate Majority Leader — a fairly dogmatic pro-life politician in Harry Reid.
A reader writes:
So far this month Mrs. Clinton has "apologized" for two Iowa county volunteer coordinators’ forwarding Obama-is-a-Muslim emails; Bill Shaheen does the Obama-is-a-druggie routine; Howard Wolfson goes on national TV and repeats it; Bill Clinton says we’re "rolling the dice" with Obama, and now Kerrey is "apologizing" for his Obama-went-to-a-Madrassa remarks. This many events in a three-week span indicate a coherent plan. If one accepts Mrs. Clinton’s explanations that these events are not what they obviously are, then the only other explanation would seem to be that she cannot control her campaign staff. That seems fairly incompetent leadership for someone who claims to be ready to lead on day one.
"Rush doesn’t think for himself. That’s not necessarily a slap because he’s not paid to be a thinker — he’s an entertainer. I can’t remember the last time that he has veered from the talking points from the DC/Manhattan chattering class. If they were praising Huckabee, he would be too. Also, I have to think that he’s dying to have Hillary in the White House. Bill Clinton made Rush a megastar. Having another Clinton back in power would make him the Leading Voice of the Opposition once again," – a Huckabee ally explaining Limbaugh’s aversion to the former governor of Arkansas.
Well, he actually didn’t, you know, see anything:
On Wednesday, Romney’s campaign said his recollections of watching his father, an ardent civil rights supporter, march with King were meant to be figurative.
As in when he was figuratively pro-gay and pro-choice, I suppose. He really is an almost fathomless bullshit artist. I guess that’s what it takes to keep the GOP somehow together. And the awful truth is: if Clinton is the Democratic nominee, it may be enough. The background on this story can be read here and here.
Hat tip: Jennifer Rubin.
"Bin Laden, al-Zawahri, and others fled at the beginning of the American bombing [in Afghanistan], to the point of abandoning their wives and families to be killed along with other innocent people. I think that a sharia court should be established, composed of reliable scholars, to hold these people accountable for their crimes — even if in absentia — so that those who are ignorant in their religion do not repeat this futility," – Sayyed Imam al-Sharif, senior al Qaeda theologian and Jihadist pioneer.
I don’t mean to make light of this. It seems like a big deal to me and hugely encouraging in the effort to expose and defang the credibility of al Qaeda among many Muslims. It’s a reminder that al Qaeda is often its worst enemy, as we’ve seen in Anbar and Jordan most spectacularly. Ed Morrissey notes:
Critics of Sharif claim that he has been tortured into his recantation. Undoubtedly, the Egyptian authorities have applied their usual techniques to Sharif, but Rohan Gunaranta says it matches a trend in Egypt over the last few years. The author of Inside al-Qaeda believes that Muslims have begun to see the disaster that 9/11 has brought to their standing in the world, and even the radicals want a new direction. The personal revelations of Zawahiri as a snitch may make it easier for them to make that transition, and for us to then destroy what remains of AQ.
There are times when the best strategy is to give the Jihadists enough rope to hang themselves in the Arab-Muslim world. Know hope.
Soren Dayton looks at their history with the evangelical movement:
In both Republican and Baptist politics, Thompson represents the old conservative movement trying to keep power that it has in many ways already lost. Huckabee represents a new movement in American politics and American Protestantism. Who is winning? I refer you to the numbers.
That’s Omar’s metaphor for what needs to be done to return our Iraqi imperial province to some kind of normalcy:
Most people would say it’s impossible. No one could eat an elephant. Others would argue that one actually could eat an elephant—with patience, one bite at a time.
Maybe some Iraqis are now nibbling at the tail. If the politicians cannot accomplish it at a national level, the desire of ordinary Iraqis for some kind of sanity does seem to be gaining pace. It cannot substitute for national decisions, but it is a hopeful sign.
Could Mukasey have turned into something more disappointing? Horton:
So while the Justice Department’s number one was pleading to his own employees for clemency for corporate wrongdoers (a function normally accorded to high-priced lawyers in private practice), its number two to be was giving a series of carefully rehearsed and highly disingenuous answers to an oversight committee designed to shield those who have committed war crimes and to justify the continuing official use of torture—a crime under the laws of the United States and the laws of nations. And its powerful new national security division was busily obstructing a Congressional inquiry into the destruction of evidence sought by two federal judges—destruction in which a bevy of Bush Administration lawyers, including a former Attorney General, are now deeply linked.
A fascinating Fallows dispatch from China.
My fellow bloggers at the Atlantic form their very own McLaughlin Group. Ross bravely predicts that Clinton will be the Democratic nominee.
