The New Republic’s "Baghdad Diarist" outs himself this morning. "Scott Thomas" is … drum-roll, please …. Scott Thomas Beauchamp. He’s a soldier and fully accountable for the stories he has written. Obviously, my love for TNR and my respect for its new editor, Frank Foer, makes me hope that every single aspect of his stories is true. But I cannot know from where I’m sitting. I do know that TNR will be honorable and honest in following up. I also know that we have rarely been pleasantly surprised in this war by details of its reality.
Bring On The Phonies!
A reader writes:
Your reader embraces HRC for the qualities that turn so many others off. But maybe he’s on to something …
After 8 years of obstinate, stubborn, intransigent, wayward, bullheadedness, maybe the American public will be kinder towards the type of candidate that has traditionally been despised and ridiculed. Maybe 2008 will be the year of the phony politician. Who would have thought that the pandering, vote groveling, insincerity, and focus-group calculating of Romney and HRC might actually be an asset. But it’s almost the polar opposite of what we get from Bush, and look where we are now. By their sheer vanity and narcissism, this class of never-previously-widely-liked politicians are incapable of letting their approval ratings dip so low. And so yes, this does guarantee a degree of "responsiveness".
Bring on the phonies!
(Photo: Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty.)
The Race
Todd-Ambinder August analysis:
Probably the best way to describe this campaign right now is that Clinton is going 75 mph; Obama is going 50 and has plenty of gas to spare. Obama looks like he can eventually go faster in his campaign car, but he’s not doing it yet.
Obama will make his move in the late fall. This is a 1500 meters run. We’re at the first lap and it’s fine for Clinton to stay in the lead for a while.
Quote for the Day
"Going forward, Iraq is no longer about how we win — it’s about how we overcome the mistakes we’ve made," – Matthew Dowd, former Bush adviser, in Foreign Policy.
Best Movie Line Ever
"I saved Latin. What did you ever do?" Rushmore.
A Backdoor Deal With Iran?
I don’t know what to make of this (and it’s firewalled) but for the record:
Luckily, the cayenne cloud was largely a smokescreen for what appears to be some real progress in the "full and frank" negotiations. While the talks theoretically were limited to Iraq, they quickly expanded to include other "bilateral issues" – code for Iran’s nuclear program, which Tehran hopes to use as a trump card for extracting concessions from Washington in Iraq.
Meanwhile, Iran separately – and simultaneously – agreed to allow the International Atomic Energy Agency to send nuclear inspectors by the end of July to Iran’s heavy-water reactor site in Arak. This kind of reactor is valued primarily for its ability to quickly produce large amounts of plutonium, an element that is critical to the production of mushroom clouds. It is no coincidence that Iran is putting up a cooperative front on the nuclear issue just as the Iraq talks move forward.
More important, Iran and the United States now appear to have made enough progress to begin implementing agreements from the May meeting. After the second round of talks, Crocker said the U.S., Iraqi and Iranian governments plan to create a security committee to discuss containing violence in Iraq, addressing everything from "support for violent militias" to al Qaeda to border security.
Translation: The two countries will create a purge committee; the United States will kill any Iraqi Sunnis who do not cooperate, while the Iranians do the same to rebellious Iraqi Shia.
In A Filipino Jail
Michael Jackson lives!
The Damage We’re Doing
A hymn to the toll gay marriage is imposing on our society.
Now Perjury?
The latest goods on Bush’s tool, Gonzales.
Conservatives for Hillary, Ctd
A reader writes:
Count me as another Republican who is starting to see her as an appealing candidate. I realize looking at the polls that Republicans that favor her are a rare breed, but I have to imagine that, if someone like ME can come around, anyone can.
I’m not entirely sure what has done it for me. I have a hard time really putting my finger on it, but I’ve grown increasingly comfortable with the concept of an HRC administration so much so that I’m actually looking forward to it as a possibility.
And it’s not just the absence of appealing Republican candidates, though that is a large part of it.
In part, it may be that after 6 years of defending to myself and others Bush’s record, I’ve realized that it’s easier to attack than defend a president and that some of my criticisms of Bill Clinton were unfair. He simply was not as liberal as I once believed him to be.
Related to that point, it doesn’t hurt that some of my more liberal friends don’t trust her. I like her for exactly the reason they don’t: We all have a good feeling that she has learned Dick Morris’s lessons of triangulation well.
I’ve also been impressed with her during the debates. She does seem presidential to me.
Another dissents:
Hang on now. Your conservative reader is basically saying "Hillary’s so uber-cynical that she won’t do anything dumb." One, they might be right. Two, hell of an endorsement there, isn’t it? I’m inspired.
Fact is this: Hillary, whether conservatives know it or not, is the safest, most comfortable choice for them (and everyone else). She’s familiar, experienced, etc. Unfortunately, I don’t think that’s what we need now. After the Bush-Clinton years., "comfortable" is not enough.
That’s the question. Do we need to manage the current mess or try and transform it? The former is a rationale for the Clinton candidacy; the latter is the rationale for Obama’s. Alas, no Republican so far appears capable of doing either.
(Photo: Brendan Smialowski/Getty.)
