althouse: 2010

Thursday, December 30, 2010

"Swedish prison. Like, I could live there, like it's nice ..."

We join the inane chatter about Julian Assange somewhere near the end of the 50th minute:

"... just because he's a rapist doesn't mean I'm saying he's some some sort of violent... It's such a loaded term...."

There's much more, of course, but that gives you a feeling for the discussion. Continue at your own risk.

ADDED: Instapundit repeats the "just because he's a rapist" quote and snarks "It's not rape-rape," which is a reference to what Whoopi Goldberg said about Roman Polanski.

AND: Back in the 1970s, beginning with the extremely influential book "Against Our Will" by Susan Brownmiller, feminist doctrine portrayed rape as an act of violence. I have been in the presence of feminists who would jump on you, quite harshly, if you said there was some sexuality involved. No, it was 100% violence. You were a heretic if you didn't accept that doctrine. I would challenge Maureen Tkacik with the proposition that if you don't think it's violence, then you shouldn't call it rape.

Pink...

... bathrooms.

"The Rose Bowl will be a fascinating matchup of football physics."

"Wisconsin’s average offensive lineman stands 6-foot-5 and weighs more than 320 pounds. The largest T.C.U. defensive lineman, Cory Grant, is 6-2, 305 pounds. The Badgers (11-1) have plowed over the competition, but their offense is far from plodding."

"Because the Constitution is so old, it is written in the 'old-timey' language of people of more than one century ago..."

"... which leads many modern people to get confused and frustrated by it. 'What is this stupid boring thing?' they will ask, then go back to playing Super Mario Cart. These modern people could not be any more wrong, because hidden underneath all the 'so-called' confusing words is an exciting story with twists and turns everywhere. Fortunately, and most importantly, the Founding Fathers also invented the Supreme Court which does a good job of translating the Constitution into modern words and juxtaposing them for all of us, the American people of the United States."

Iowahawk spoofs young Ezra Klein, who's not impressed with the GOP's new requirement that legislation expressly identify the provision of the Constitution that supports Congress's exercise of power.

Here's Ezra Klein's actual column.

Bore....

.........dom.

"Boney M's Bobby Farrell dies on the same day and in the same town as Rasputin..."

"... the subject of one of the band's biggest hits."

Speaking of Boney M and death, I first heard of Boney M in the context of the near-death experience depicted in the movie "Touching the Void," where the memorable line is: "Bloody hell, I'm going to die to Boney M."

The anecdote you've been waiting for...

... to make your anti-Obamacare arguments complete.

"That's pretty cool. I love the open buckles and how they pick up the silver of the tin foil/duct tape..."

Comments on a Sartorialist photo from the scene of the NYC blizzard:

Awesome! I love the boots, but it's the duct tape in classic silver that made me take notice. It just goes to show that even a homeless person or city worker or whoever this person is can accessorize with wit and style, given what's available to them....

Whoever this person is, there's always a slight line between what's ridiculous and what's considered "fashionable"...nowadays it seems that everything can work and be "cool"! ...

I battled with this photo. It affects the emotions in that it could be of a homeless or an eccentric person. Maybe you could have indicated that the guy is a construction worker. It comes close to the bone....

I was outside today photographing snow in Central Park, and let me tell you – this is a smart idea to tape your pants to your shoes! Of course, it is also sad because this picture is most likely of a homeless person, and this isn't a good time for them. Either way, the silver cheers up the idea, if only a little bit...

Why would people be offended with this being a homeless person? Scott's blog isn't just about girls in bandage dresses and high-heels. He takes photos of people coming from ALL aspects of life. Homeless or a billionaire, both are worthy of a photograph. Good golly, you picky, whiney people.

I hate snow falling in my boot tops and have thought of doing this several times. Also, interesting how many people who posted earlier equate functionality with homelessness.

uhh...sorry this isn't creative or stylish at all. If it was deliberate, maybe it'd be cool, but it's just a homeless guy keeping warm. Oh how avant-garde! Not really....

20-inches of snow, people. Add to that the mountains on curbs where you could easily sink in to your mid-thigh. Duct tape dude has the right idea.

Ha. Angst-ing over duct tape in New York City. Meanwhile, in Alaska....

Anorexia awareness...

... taken to a new level.

"Sanitation Department's slow snow cleanup was a budget protest."

Headlines the NY Post in an article that begins:

These garbage men really stink.

Selfish Sanitation Department bosses from the snow-slammed outer boroughs ordered their drivers to snarl the blizzard cleanup to protest budget cuts -- a disastrous move that turned streets into a minefield for emergency-services vehicles, The Post has learned....

New York's Strongest used a variety of tactics to drag out the plowing process -- and pad overtime checks -- which included keeping plows slightly higher than the roadways and skipping over streets along their routes, the sources said.

The snow-removal snitches said they were told to keep their plows off most streets and to wait for orders before attacking the accumulating piles of snow.

Speaking of Venn diagrams...

... that popular Venn diagram with circles for prostitutes, doctors, and TSA agents and the "get paid to touch your junk" punchline in the center is not a proper Venn diagram, as brilliantly and amusingly explained by Rich Skrenta (via Techdirt).

"Relationships are better if you wait over a month to have sex. Huh. I’m not sure I ever did that."

"I’m not even sure I know anyone who did that...."

Says Instapundit, who should picture a Venn diagram with: 1. people who have sex within a month of beginning a relationship, 2. people who wait a month before having sex, and 3. people who inform their acquaintances about the first time they had sex with their partner.

ADDED: After reading some more about Venn diagrams, I don't think you can picture the Venn diagram I've described — unless you can use squares instead of circles.

"Am I the only person left in the world who worries about spilling his coffee on his laptop?"

2 years ago.

ADDED: I ran across that after reading the colloquy between AllenS and Meade in the comments to the post about Brett's fuzzy penis:

AllenS: Jenn Sterger (the woman) was hired because of some sexy pictures of her in Sports Illustrated mag, that Brent Musberger thought would be a good matchup for the male dominated football sports sceen. Jenn and Brent are just as much at fault here. I'm thinking of sending the woman a picture of my penis also. Could I borrow the fish bowl lens?...

Meade: It's a fish eye lens. Fish eye. It's for taking shots of massive objects or scenes which a normal lens can't take all in. A fish bowl lens would be for taking shots of tiny things. Like Brett Favre's... ability to make good judgments.

AllenS: Ok, ok. Can I borrow the lens that makes stuff look bigger?

But, in fact, the fisheye works really well to make something look large if you get the camera lens right up at it. Lots of other stuff is including in the picture, arrayed all around and looking comparatively small. Frankly — and this is not an offer to AllenS — it would be really interesting to take pictures of naked men and get the extreme closeup on the genitalia with a well-composed and interesting background. I went looking through my old posts with the "fisheye" tag to find some that prove my point.

The second picture here of the fisheye dog makes this point very well. Get right up to the nose. The scenery in the background isn't as interesting as I'd want for my proposed compositions, but you can see how tiny Meade looks in the background (when in fact he was quite close by). Here's another photograph that illustrates the point, albeit with the female body:

That's from the Khmer Dynasty room at the Metropolitan Museum in NYC. Here's the effect of the lens looking at the room from the other side:

Here's some male and female nudity, to be fair:

That's the Museum of Natural History — not Brett and Jenn. You may recognize that couple from the movie "Election" — which is a great cautionary tale about the inadvisability of cheating on... many things (including your spouse).

And then — searching through the fisheye pictures — I found something that was extremely important to me: the purple tree, which had this.

"Do you guys TRY to not get laid?"

Rosie the Riveter, AKA Geraldine Doyle...

... has died at the age of 86.

[T]he woman in the patriotic poster...

... was never named Rosie, nor was she a riveter. All along it was Mrs. Doyle, who after graduating from high school in Ann Arbor, Mich., took a job at a metal factory, her family said.

One day, a photographer representing United Press International came to her factory and captured Mrs. Doyle leaning over a piece of machinery and wearing a red and white polka-dot bandanna over her hair.

In early 1942, the Westinghouse Corp. commissioned artist J. Howard Miller to produce several morale-boosting posters to be displayed inside its buildings. The project was funded by the government as a way to motivate workers and perhaps recruit new ones for the war effort.

Smitten with the UPI photo, Miller reportedly was said to have decided to base one of his posters on the anonymous, slender metal worker - Mrs. Doyle.

For four decades, this fact escaped Mrs. Doyle, who shortly after the photo was taken left her job at the factory. She barely lasted two weeks.

A cellist, Mrs. Doyle was horrified to learn that a previous worker at the factory had badly injured her hands working at the machines. She found safer employment at a soda fountain and bookshop in Ann Arbor, where she wooed a young dental school student and later became his wife.

Oh, the irony! She couldn't do it. But she could inspire others to do it. And she could do other things, like play the cello and rear 6 children. "We" can do it, each in our own way. You work the machines, I'll help people find the right books.

Here's the Norman Rockwell version of Rosie, who's not nearly so glamorous and is clearly not based on Mrs. Doyle:

The 52-by-40-inch oil on canvas depicts "Rosie" on lunch break, her riveting gun on her lap as she uses a dog-eared copy of Mein Kampf as a foot stool.

Great symbolism, Norman. And I don't mean the book. I mean the manly power tool.

Rockwell's Rosie is posed as an homage to Michelangelo's frescoed depiction of the prophet Isaiah from the Sistine Chapel ceiling.

Here's Michelangelo's Isaiah, who's more respectful of his book, which is about God, not his struggle against lies, stupidity and cowardice.

"The forensic analysis could not establish that Favre sent the objectionable photographs to Sterger."

Aw, come on! Did they examine his penis and compare it to the picture? Yes, the picture may have been fuzzy... but maybe his penis is fuzzy.

Favre has to pay $50,000 anyway, because he "was not candid in several respects during the investigation." Either he failed to cover up in the first instance or he inappropriately covered up in the second.

What Tucker Carlson said about Michael Vick.

"I’m Christian. I’ve made mistakes. I believe fervently in second chances. Michael Vick killed dogs in a heartless and cruel way. I think, firstly, he should have been executed for that. The idea the president of the United States would be getting behind someone who murdered dogs is beyond the pale."

Wednesday, December 29, 2010

"It's really almost criminal what they do with our President."

"There seems to be no shame or anything. They call him all kinds of names all day long, saying he's doing certain things that he's not. It's just a big old political game that I don't want to be part of. There are people spending their lives putting him down. I'm sure some of it's true and some of it's not. I was very surprised to find the man very humble and he had a nice handshake. His wife was very cordial to the guests and especially me. They made a special effort to make me feel welcome. It was not at all the way the media described him to be."

Merle Haggard, on meeting President Obama.

"He's not conceited. He's very humble about being the President of the United States, especially in comparison to some presidents we've had who come across like they don't need anybody's help. I think he knows he's in over his head. Anybody with any sense who takes that job and thinks they can handle it must be an idiot."

I know. You focused on "he knows he's in over his head," didn't you?

At the Red Tail Hawk Café...

... you can be as hawkish as you like. Or dovish.

Monday, November 15, 2010

"I don't think that the government has any business seeing me naked as a condition of traveling about the country."

Don't get snippy. It's either see you naked or feel you up. Just kidding. You also have the option not to travel by plane.

ADDED: "The 'don’t touch my junk' guy speaks."

"Students chatting on Twitter both inside and outside the classroom got higher grades than their nontweeting peers..."

According to a recent study reported in The Chronicle of Higher Education:

At the end of the semester, the tweeters had grade-point averages half a point higher, on average, than did their nontweeting counterparts. And students who tweeted were more engaged. Twitter users scored higher than those who didn’t use the tool on a 19-question student-engagement survey over the course of the semester—using parameters like how frequently students contributed to classroom discussion, and how often they interacted with their instructor about course material.

I have a lot of colleagues who oppose computers in the classroom and even ban them, and I wonder if this will flip any opinion. I've always been very pro computers in the classroom.

The 2010 "word of the year" is "refudiate."

According to the New Oxford American Dictionary:

An unquestionable buzzmaker in 2010, the word refudiate instantly evokes the name of Sarah Palin, who tweeted her way into a flurry of media activity when she used the word in certain statements posted on Twitter. Critics pounced on Palin, lampooning what they saw as nonsensical vocabulary and speculating on whether she meant “refute” or “repudiate.”

From a strictly lexical interpretation of the different contexts in which Palin has used “refudiate,” we have concluded that neither “refute” nor “repudiate” seems consistently precise, and that “refudiate” more or less stands on its own, suggesting a general sense of “reject.”

Congratulations to wordsmith Sarah and to all her detractors and fans. We just can't get enough of Sarah and her unique way of expressing herself.

Was there much competition? The rest of the short list, in alphabetical order, was: bankster, crowdsourcing, double-dip (describing a recession), gleek, nom nom, retweet (did "tweet" win in some previous year?), Tea Party, top kill, vuvuzela, webisode.

So the real question is: Why not Tea Party? My political sensors detect liberal bias. There were 2 words associated with the conservative backlash against Obama and the Democratic Congress, and one carried the connotation that the backlash is full of stupid people. If you say, then why wasn't "tea bagger" on the list? The answer is obviously that it's too scurrilous for the dictionary folk. The best argument against the liberal bias theory is that "refudiate" is a coinage that can be used in all sorts of places. It functions as a new word, not simply a name to designate a new thing.

At the Windswept Café...

(Enlarge.)

... don't stumble.

Daniel Radcliffe is awesomely nerdy.

Singing "The Elements":

IN THE COMMENTS: Chip Ahoy links to this:

"By instinct and archetype, comedy is usually phallic..."

"... Chaplin has his cane, Harpo his horn, Groucho his cigar, and Dame Edna her gladioli, with which to poke, probe, and goose the world. Pee-wee, by contrast, is the comedian of non-phallic fun."

IN THE COMMENTS: Deborah said:

Unless Pee-wee himself is a phallic symbol. Of sorts:

"Now, as then, Pee-wee is a round-shouldered, knock-kneed picture of arrested development. His voice is high and strangulated, his laugh shrill and affectless, a sound that comes from the throat, not the belly. He occasionally lets out a scream of fear or a wail of loathing; when he throws himself on the floor in a tantrum, he adopts a kind of fetal position."

Yeah. Good point. The name too. Pee Wee. Wee wee. Pee pee.

McCain on Don't Ask Don't Tell.

WaPo reports:

McCain (R-Ariz.), ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said Sunday that he did not think the Senate should lift the ban during the lame-duck session that begins this week.

"Once we get this study, we need to have hearings. And we need to examine it. And we need to look at whether it's the kind of study that we wanted," McCain said on NBC's "Meet the Press."

McCain, who had previously signaled a willingness to support the will of troops, also has mounted an effort to strip it from the defense authorization bill that sets Pentagon policy.

This statement comes after it has leaked out that the Pentagon study group conducted a survey of active-duty and reserve troops and a majority rejected the the idea that allowing openly gay people to serve in the military would have a negative effect. McCain seems to be gearing up to say it wasn't the right kind of study. I can understand thinking the study group was result-oriented in its research and that the lame duck Congress doesn't have the moral authority to make this decision, but it's sad to see McCain making this issue his legacy.

"I object to the proceeding," said Charles Rangel as an 8-member House panel began his trial on corruption charges.

"With all due respect, since I don't have counsel to advise me, I'm going to have to excuse myself from these proceedings."

UPDATE: The hearing goes on without Rangel's presence.

"Bummer! We’re still not doing the right thing."

The trouble with trying to get everything right is that you'll never get everything right.

UPDATE: But that one thing might be right.

Feliks Zemdegs!

That's the world record: 6.77 seconds. (Via Bloggingheads.)

Did you watch "Sarah Palin's Alaska"?

I watched for about 20 minutes. I might have been interested in a reality show — more like "The Osbournes" — where we see some semblance of everyday life in this unusual family, but — as the title warns us — it's more of a travelogue — with Sarah Palin talking almost constantly. They went fishing and saw some bears. Sarah said "wow" and "oh my gosh" a lot. They fished, Todd caught fish, and Sarah complained that Todd caught all the fish. Why shouldn't Todd catch the fish?

Here's the Television Without Pity forum for discussing the show. I love the stern moderator's rules:

What’s on topic in this thread?
Things you saw on the show.
What’s not on topic here?
Politics
Bristol's appearance on DWTS
Politics
Your personal judgements about Palin's fame/family/career
Politics
Posting to tell us that you're not going to watch.
Politics.
In other words, this isn’t a thread to snark on Palin at will. Please take extra care to follow the rules of the board and the special rules for this thread. If you don’t pay attention to the rules, and treat this as a general thread given to you to bash or praise Palin or your fellow posters, you will be warned. Thanks.

Good rules!

Did Paul Krugman endorse "death panels"?

The evidence.

I'd say he thinks you're not serious about the deficit if you let the term "death panels" scare you away from making tough decisions about what medical treatments the government should pay for.

Sunday, November 14, 2010

"While the president has been on a trip to Asia for the past 10 days, all but a few of his top aides stayed behind to figure out what went so wrong and what to do about it."

WaPo reports:

One adviser said they spent the past dozen days "soul-searching."

Another said that, around the White House, "people aren't just sitting around doing soul-searching. They're gaming out the short, medium and long term."

Gaming out.... Am I wrong to hear that as electoral politics?

Advisers also said it will probably take months, if not longer, to develop a strategy for restoring some of the early promise of the Obama presidency, particularly the notion that he was a different kind of Democrat.

In a nod to that ambition, his weekly address Saturday focused on earmark reform, one way, Obama said, of "restoring public trust."

Am I wrong to hear this as a repulsive desire to re-engulf us in a mindless hopey-changey mood? I don't care about a feeling of "promise." I see America's grim sense of reality as a hard-won accomplishment. We're awake now. The dream is over.

Over the next few days, White House officials said they will begin to gauge whether they can forge an alliance with any top Republicans, many of whom are scheduled to attend a bipartisan meeting at the White House on Thursday. Although Obama could benefit from a high-profile compromise - perhaps on extending the Bush-era tax cuts or on other tax initiatives set to expire before the end of the year - officials are also prepared to point out any Republican intransigence.

The medium and long term game plan is the Republicans will screw up enough to take advantage of. The short-term plan is to look willing to so something bipartisan and beneficent.

"If I invoked the Insurrection Act against her wishes, the world would see a male Republican president usurping the authority of a female Democratic governor by declaring an insurrection in a largely African American city."

"That left me in a tough position. That would arouse controversy anywhere. To do so in the Deep South, where there had been centuries of states' rights tensions, could unleash holy hell."

I was struck by that passage in Bush's memoir, "Decision Points." Bush, of course, ended up getting criticized for seemingly not "car[ing] about black people," so it's interesting to think that his delays — at least as he presents them now — had to do with the history of the South. But look closely as the 2 concerns that slowed Bush's imposition of federal authority in New Orleans:

1. Gender. Bush didn't like the image of the male pushing the female aside. He thought he'd be criticized for that.

2. "States' rights tensions." That's a strange way to evoke the history of racism in the south if you want to convey that you cared about the suffering of black people. "States' rights" was the cry of those who resisted federal efforts to advance integration. Bush was, in fact, being deferential to the Southern governor.

Bush, sensitive to potential criticism about sexism and states' rights, exercised restraint, which exposed him to criticism about race.

There was rapper Kanye West who told TV viewers: "George Bush doesn't care about black people." Jesse Jackson compared the plight of some survivors with being trapped in the "hull of a slave ship".

"Five years later, I can barely write these words without feeling disgusted. I am deeply insulted by the suggestion that we allowed American citizens to suffer because they were black... The more I thought about it, the angrier I felt. I was raised to believe that racism was one of the greatest evils in society," Bush writes. "I faced a lot of criticism as president. I didn't like hearing people claim I had lied about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction or cut taxes to benefit the rich. But the suggestion that I was a racist, because of the response to Katrina, represented an all-time low. I told Laura at the time that it was the worst moment of my presidency. I feel the same way today."

He feels bad about this criticism and is contemptuous of those who expressed it, but: 1. His own words indicate that he put racism third on a list of 3 things he was worried he'd be criticized for, and 2. Jackson and West were speaking emotionally at the time when the suffering was going on.

Meanwhile, Kanye West cracked under pussycat questioning from Matt Lauer.

"The basis of democratic freedom is freedom of speech... Democracy is when the people keep a government in check."

"Please do not give up hope. There is no reason to lose heart. Even if you are not political, politics will come to you."

Pickpocketing dies out as younger folk turn away from the craft.

The police say the "picks" are all old guys now.

"You are the wrong size for this perfect pair of trousers. You have failed."

What womenswear pants "whisper" to the women who try them on.

Womenswear all too often is constructed to make women feel manipulated, shamed or unworthy. Comfort? Often it's an afterthought.... Women... all too often believe they have to alter themselves -- fix themselves -- to fit the clothes.

By contrast:

Men's apparel owns the language of power and authority. The clothes are in service to the man. They are tailored to him -- designed to make him look good and feel comfortable. Men's suits are stitched to be easily altered. Pants are sold unhemmed. The clothes are not finished until the gentleman says they are. Menswear aims to make men feel like they are the masters of their destiny.

"The Washington Post today reported that the Obama administration has given up on any hope of prosecuting Khalid Sheihk Mohammed in Lower Manhattan."

"Moreover, there is apparently little appetite in the administration to revive plans to try KSM via military commission, and they may simply allow Mohammed to remain incarcerated at Guantanamo Bay indefinitely, without trial."

After all the bold talk in the campaign, Obama apparently has no idea what to do with the detainees. Or, that he had ideas, but they encountered reality. Why not reach out to newly reddened America by saying Bush actually got it right and proceed with the military commissions?

Axelrod on Fox News Sunday.

Man, was he evasive. I'll put up the transcript later and show you what I mean. Meanwhile, Jim DeMint is on after the break. An excellent opportunity to look brilliant simply by answering the questions asked in a reasonably specific and concise manner. Axelrod seemed robotic and anesthetized. His mustache was cut shorter on one side than the other. Asked whether Obama would accept any of what the deficit commission came up with, Axelrod droned emptiness until he latched onto the topic of Nancy Pelosi, which he blathered about until Chris Wallace cut him off.

ADDED: Transcript. [Analysis coming soon!]

ACTUALLY: It's too boring to pick apart. I've got to give Axelrod that. After the break, you can read the interchange about the deficit commission that annoyed me so much.

WALLACE: ... The co-chairs of the deficit commission, Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson, both of whom the president appointed, came out with a plan this week to cut our debt by $4 trillion over the next decade.

Will the president include some of those proposals in his budget in February?

AXELROD: Well, we're obviously very, very interested. The president empaneled this commission for purposes of looking at this very difficult problem, and we're eager to look at all the recommendations once the commission reports. And his commitment to the chairman was to not -- was to refrain from commenting on their work until after December 1st.

But obviously, we're looking for all good ideas to help deal with our long-term debt problem. This is something that is going to affect our economy. It affects our kids. And we need to deal with it.

WALLACE: You say refrain from commenting. Nancy Pelosi didn't refrain from commenting. She immediately rejected the package as, quote, "simply unacceptable." Does the president agree or disagree that this package is simply unacceptable?

AXELROD: Well, I've seen comments from the left and the right on this, Chris, in fairness.

(CROSSTALK)

WALLACE: Well, I'm asking about Nancy Pelosi.

AXELROD: ... on the -- on the -- I understand. But I'm telling you that there were comments on both sides about this. And of course, this is something that we have to confront as we move forward.

One thing I know, Nancy Pelosi had concerns that -- and I understand those concerns and I respect those concerns. The truth is that as we move forward, if one side says we can't raise any taxes on anybody or any interest, and the other side says we can't cut anything, we're obviously not going to make progress on this. And our interest is in making progress on this.

Within that, we're going to protect important equities, for sure. I mean, we shouldn't cut without sensitivity to the impact of those cuts, and certainly Social Security, which is something she's concerned about, is a great concern to us.

But we should move forward in the spirit of cooperation, because we're not going to solve this, one party or the other, alone. We have to...

WALLACE: All right.

AXELROD: ... do it together.

WALLACE: All right. I want...

AXELROD: And that's what we want to do.

Saturday, November 13, 2010

Out on the new mile of the Ice Age Trail.

Near the Merrimac ferry across the Wisconsin River, just north of Lodi. A view:

A bench:

Another bench, with a nice footrest:

"How do you like to go up in a swing/Up in the air so blue?"

How do you like to go up in a swing,
Up in the air so blue?
Oh, I do think it the pleasantest thing
Ever a child can do!

Up in the air and over the wall,
Till I can see so wide,
River and trees and cattle and all
Over the countryside--

Till I look down on the garden green,
Down on the roof so brown--
Up in the air I go flying again,
Up in the air and down!

"The Swing," by Robert Louis Stevenson...

... from "A Child's Garden of Verses." I've known that poem by heart as long as I've known... anything.

Stevenson was born 160 years ago today, something I learned after noticing the Google-doodle, which is completely pirate- and not swing-oriented.

Bonus Stevenson material:

"[T]here was some confusion as to what book young Obama was writing."

"His publisher thought he was writing about race relations. His employer thought he was writing about voting rights law. But Obama seems to have never seriously considered either subject. Instead, he decided that his subject would be himself. The 32-year-old was writing a memoir."

Jonathan V. Last writes in The Weekly Standard:

Obama came clean to the university first. He waited until his fellowship was halfway over—perhaps he was concerned that his employers might not like the bait-and-switch. He needn’t have worried. [Douglas Baird, the head of Chicago’s appointments committee] still hoped that Obama would eventually join the university’s faculty...

And it all worked out in the end. The book Obama eventually finished was Dreams from My Father. It didn’t do well initially, but nine years later, after his speech at the 2004 Democratic convention made him a star, it sold like gangbusters. Obama got rich. And famous. The book became the springboard for his career in national politics.

Only it didn’t quite work out for everybody. Obama left the University of Chicago... Simon & Schuster, which had taken a chance on an unproven young writer, got burned for a few thousand bucks. And Jane Dystel, who’d plucked him out of the pages of the New York Times and got him the deal to write the book that sped his political rise? As soon as Obama was ready to negotiate the contract for his second book—the big-money payday—he dumped her and replaced her with super-agent Robert Barnett.

"President Obama is coming home from his overseas trip pretty much empty-handed."

"After watching his party take a beating in the midterm elections, Obama wasn't able to secure even a symbolic victory on a trip that was expected to give him plenty of opportunities to claim a win.... Obama's inauspicious 10-day, four-nation trip included a failure to land an anticipated slam dunk free trade agreement with South Korea."

At the River View Café...

(Enlarge.)

... there's a subtle color.

ADDED: Video by Meade:

A blogger photography genre: Food I cooked that I delusionally believe looks delicious.

I know I have to give an example of what I'm talking about. So... here.

I'm shocked, shocked to learn that semi-clad models are writhing in the law library!

"... Brooklyn Law School officials rented Diesel its library expecting a tasteful photo shoot for a jeans ad -- but what they got was a steamy display of writhing young models in skimpy lingerie grinding against books and computers."

Wait. Why did they expect a tasteful photo shoot?

"It's gross. I work on those computers every day!" fumed a female student, referring to a shot showing two bra- and panty-clad women climbing over the machines toward an open-mouthed man....

The frisky photos, shot last spring, show off the hot bodies of male and female models as they prowl around the library's floors, tables and bookshelves -- while wearing tight-fitting panties bearing various seductive messages.

If the law school — I emphasize law school — did not impose restrictions when it took Diesel's money then it has nothing to complain about.

"We are as shocked and mortified as you must be by these photographs," interim dean Michael Gerber wrote in an e-mail yesterday to students, faculty and staff.

"When the school gave its permission to do the shoot, the school was assured that the photos would be in good taste. They are not."

"Assured" "good taste" — that's not specific enough to make me believe Diesel violated a contractual term. The school took Diesel's money and had to know that any advertising for clothing for young adults is likely to involve some display of sexuality. Especially if the scene is a library. That's what I'd expect.

What exactly was the school assured of? The models aren't naked. They've got on underwear. And what is even so gross and shocking about this? Man, Diesel is getting way more great publicity than its stupid underpants deserve. Where did this controversy really start? I'm inclined to suspect that the administration is only shocked* after the fact and only because some students have managed to create the impression that the school might be accused of contributing to a "hostile environment" form of sexual harassment.

As for the young woman who is grossed out that a model in panties writhed in the vicinity of a computer she uses... do you realize how many people type on those things with hands they didn't wash after they went to the bathroom?

----------------------------------------------

*Shocked!

"High-speed rail may be among the casualties of last week's midterm elections."

Says NPR and I rejoice.

The moves to oppose the Obama administration's efforts to get high-speed trains whisking through some parts of the country appear to be the first of many fights between Democrats and newly elected Republicans who campaigned on promises to rein in spending....

High-speed trains whisking...

... dreams of fast trains full of passengers zooming through the Midwest....

Whisking, zooming choo-choos are not our dream. Now leave us alone. We drive cars. Face reality.

How can they take away the mortgage interest deduction?

It's one of the deficit commission's proposals:

“The mortgage interest deduction is one of the pillars of our national housing policy,” said Michael D. Berman, chairman of the Mortgage Bankers Association. “Limiting its use will have negative repercussions for consumers and home values up and down the housing chain.”...

But:

[O]nly those in the top third of wage earners even itemized their deductions, meaning that two-thirds of taxpayers weren’t eligible for the break.

“No one can make a serious intellectual argument in favor of the mortgage interest deduction,” [said Calvin Johnson, a tax professor at the University of Texas]. “Why should the government subsidize homeowners rather than renters? The only thing it’s good for is middle-class votes.”

Then why did "House Speaker Nancy Pelosi blast[] the commission’s suggestions, saying it would force middle-class homeowners to subsidize tax breaks for the wealthy"? I guess there are a lot of "middle class" people in the top third of taxpayers.

It's a complex policy question, and since there are other, offsetting tax breaks, it's hard to see who will be hurt the most. But generally, isn't it fairer to have lower tax rates than a bunch of deductions? With deductions, they only help if they're more than the standard deduction and if you do the thing the government has decided to favor.

Wouldn't it be better if you made housing decisions — rent or buy, big or small — without the government adding weight to one side? But if you've already bought a house, and the government's encouragement factored into your decision, you might feel cheated if they take that deduction away. Of course, the government always had the power to take the deduction away, and there's always the argument that you should have factored that in when you made your decision.

But that argument is going to piss people off unless they can remain calm long enough to see that a lowering of the tax rates more than offsets the bottom-line value of their deduction. But is that true? Does anyone know?

Friday, November 12, 2010

Who should be TIME's Person of the Year?

Here's a list. They are taking votes. Inanely, Lady Gaga is in first place by a lot. I'm going to say Nancy Pelosi.

The Supreme Court leaves Don't Ask Don't Tell in place — with Kagan not participating.

The 9th Circuit stay on the order ending DADT will keep the policy in effect pending appeal. There were no dissenting opinions, and, most interestingly Justice Kagan did not participate:

While it was not a surprise that Justice Kagan had opted not to take part in the order, that was nevertheless a significant development. It raised the prospect that, when the constitutional challenge reached the Supreme Court, the Justices might split 4-4 on it; that is always a risk when only eight Justices are taking part and the issue is a deeply controversial one. Should the Ninth Circuit Court upheld [sic] the policy, that result would simply be affirmed; without an opinion, if the Justices were actually to divide 4-4 in reaction to it....

If it should turn out that Congress does not repeal the policy, despite the requests by President Obama and some of the Pentagon’s top civilian and uniformed officers, the constitutional challenge in the Log Cabin Republicans’ case would be the only potential way to end the policy, at least for several more years.

"Can you imagine what little Zoes would have to endure on the playground, and even worse..."

"... when they get a little bit older and someone comes up to them in a bar and says, ‘Can I see your airbags?' or ‘Can I shine your bumper?'"

A French lawyer tries to get a court to prevent Renault from naming a new car model "Zoe." He loses, but the very idea of bringing such a suit makes you stop and wonder about France:

France is known for taking first names seriously, even going so far as to block parents from giving children ridiculous names if officials deem it detrimental to their future.

(Via Above the Law.)

"A human mind is a wandering mind, and a wandering mind is an unhappy mind."

"The ability to think about what is not happening is a cognitive achievement that comes at an emotional cost."

A report of another one of those "happiness" studies. If unhappiness correlates with a wandering mind, is it because a wandering mind makes you unhappy or because it's when you're unhappy with what you're doing that you think about doing something else?

"Actually, I find it useful to contemplate my white privileges..."

"... and any other privileges into which I was born, like being a citizen of the richest country on earth, and did not obtain for myself," says Roy Edroso.

In fact, when I was growing up, it was customary for adults to remind children of such luck as they had inherited, like the food we had and "people starving in other countries" didn't. This was meant as a spur to gratitude and humility, and to not being such a whining little shit.

He's reacting to a program that in which government officials are prodding adult citizens to think about how privileged they are. The analogy to a parent-child relationship comes so easily to the left-wing mind.

And what kind of families — back in the olden days — encouraged their kids to think about how lucky they were to be white? Only racist parents would have said anything like that. Kindly parents back then had a simple message for their kids on the subject of race: There is only one race, the human race. It wasn't hard for them to figure out that that was the right thing to say, and it wasn't at all hard for kids to understand it.

Argument by nostalgia is highly manipulable.

Talking Points Memo turns 10.

"The post was about Ted Olson making his debut as the chief Bush lawyer in the emerging Florida Recount battle."

Yes, it's also the 10-year anniversary of the big Florida recount. I wish I'd been blogging then! It would have been so much fun to write about that every step of the way. I'd have liked to show you in real time that I really wanted my guy, Al Gore, to win, and I also accepted nearly everything the Supreme Court did in the complicated litigation over the recount. But there are so many missed blogging opportunities in the past. I'd have loved to have blogged the Clinton scandals too. And the Clarence Thomas hearings. The Bork hearings.

Here's that first TPM post:

As if things couldn't get any weirder, did you notice the name of the lawyer who made the Republicans' unsuccessful arguments before that federal judge today? That would be Ted Olson, a man Washingtonians often refer to as a 'Washington super-lawyer.' Who is Ted Olson? Well, that would be the same one knee-deep in the Arkansas Project, which in league with the American Spectator spent a ton of money digging dirt on Bill Clinton in Arkansas....

Well, now, isn't that weird? I just blogged this morning about that Think Progress blogger who confronted Justice Alito and he was going on about the Arkansas Project:

Last night, the American Spectator — a right-wing magazine known for its role in the “Arkansas Project,” a well-funded effort to invent stories with the goal of eventually impeaching President Clinton — held its annual gala fundraising event....

That first TPM post wove Justice Scalia into its conspiracy-ish riff:

Of course, Olson... is also the Olson from Morrison v. Olson, the supreme court case which upheld the constitutinality of the Independent Counsel statute. Olson was against it. Come to think of it, we Dems now think he and Scalia were right. So maybe chalk one up in his favor.

So that's how TPM first talked about law. Yikes. Spelled "constitutionality" wrong too.

I'm going to start reading the lefty blogs more and writing about them, I think. I'm interested in the way they string ideas together, and I think they need some more push back.

Are Cindy and John McCain in a serious marital breakdown over Don't Ask Don't Tell?

John Aravosis says:

John McCain is leading the filibuster against the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" "repeal" legislation in the Senate (it's not an actual repeal, but we'll leave that for another time). Today, Cindy McCain joined a number of celebrities in a video about gay youth suicide and bullying. Mrs. McCain's part of the video condemned DADT and then accused our government of sending bullies a message that what they do is okay.

The woman basically accused her husband of sharing the blame for gay kids killing themselves.

I'm astonished. And impressed as hell.

Husband-wife teams work like that sometimes. It's not really evidence of a marital breakdown or even necessarily a real conflict at all. Try this exercise: Begin with the assumption that they are a partnership. Now, explain their behavior. Do you see how it makes sense? I sure do.

Robert Downey Jr. is Mr. Peanut.

Great! I've always loved Robert Downey Jr. and Mr. Peanut:

But why is the nutcracker named "Richard"?

Background on Mr. Peanut:"Mr. Peanut was created in 1916 after Planters Peanuts held a contest to create a logo and a 14-year-old boy drew a nut with human features." I'd really like to see the original drawing. According to Wikipedia, the boy (Antonio Gentile) just drew a some sort of man-peanut — and "an artist later added spats, a top hat, a monocle, and a cane." So... did the boy's drawing have the gloves? The unfailingly optimistic smile?

"Supreme Court Justice Sam Alito Dismisses His Profligate Right-Wing Fundraising As ‘Not Important.'"

Think Progress blogger Lee Fang confronts Justice Alito. Later, recording video, he yells at him and is threatened with arrest.

Thursday, November 11, 2010

"We liked it that the name carried no image of masculinity, that it would free him from all preconceptions and let people see him as unique."

A comment that (supposedly) exemplifies a trend.

Bush says "damn right" he approved of the waterboarding of 3 detainees and he'd do it again — and the American people approve.

Overwhelmingly. Mostly silently. To the distress of the small sliver of the population that includes Dahlia Lithwick.

Tina Brown.

Victorious.

"Top Tweets: Jonah Goldberg Rides a Plane Edition."

Well tweeted, I'd say.

"The Top 100 Influential Figures in American History."

I'm going to click through all this, beginning with Herman Melville at #100 — he's "the American Shakespeare." Come with me. #99 is Nixon! Why's Nixon only 99? I know. He's ugly. And we hate him. Have to click to 86 to get to the first woman. It's Mary Baker Eddy, who, of course, influenced health care reform. Another lady at 81. It's Margaret Mead, famous for being had by 3d world pranksters. Nothing more American than that. A woman at 77: Betty Friedan. I never read her book. I thought it was for my parents' generation. My — my my my — generation transcended sex roles. We were star dust, we were golden.

Frank Lloyd Wright is 76. Architects may come and architects may go, and never change your point of view. Not Frank. He'd sock you in the head with a low-hanging roof as soon as look at you. He was from Wisconsin. That's important. So was Georgia O'Keeffe, who might be on this list. She's a woman, you know. 20 bonus points for being a woman? Here's Jane Addams at 64. Another woman. And I, your humble female blogger, would like to register a complaint against my high school speech teacher who rejected my proposal to do a speech on the topic of Jane Addams. He said she wasn't important enough. I used to want to be a social worker.

Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. is 53. The only judge so far. Another woman at 51: Margaret Sanger. (A "thoroughgoing racist" says Jonah Goldberg.) Not too many Presidents. After Nixon, you have to wait until #44 for another President. It's Lyndon Johnson. I call him "LBJ." Works better in rhyming chants. LOL! It's Eleanor Roosevelt at #42. "She used the first lady’s office and the mass media to become 'first lady of the world.'" Women playing the media to focus attention on themselves. Yeah, I guess that's a big deal in American culture. She's responsible for that? All right then.

Harriet Beecher Stowe. #41. The power of novels. Rachel Carson is #39. She saved the eagles... and the mosquitoes. Susan B. Anthony is 38. Elizabeth Cady Stanton is #30. Women's rights. Earl Warren is 29. A second judge. Eisenhower is 28. A third President. Eli Whitney deserves to be 27: "His gin made cotton king and sustained an empire for slavery."

John Adams at 25? Come on? Is HBO/David McCullough the arbiter of history? But yeah, he was President. Truman is 21. A 5th President. Man, get a David McCullough biography about you to cement your historical importance. Andrew Jackson is 18. A 6th President. Reagan's 17. That's 7. Theodore Roosevelt is 15. The 8th Prez on the list, and the 2d of what I predict will be 3 Roosevelts. James Madison is 13. The 9th President, a Founding Father. Ulysses S. Grant gets to be 12. A 10th Prez. And he won the war. Woodrow Wilson is #10 and the 11th President on the list. Martin Luther King Jr. is only #8. John Marshall is #7, the 3d judge. Ben Franklin is 6, deservedly. Another Founder at 5: Alexander Hamilton. FDR snags #4 and is the 12th President on the list. Jefferson is #3, so you know who ##1 and 2 are. And Lincoln beats Washington for the top spot. A total of 15 Presidents.

The final count for women was 10. 10 out of 100. (I think.) Fair enough. I'm not going to say there should have been more. If they'd counted femaleness as a plus factor, they'd have had to "plus-factor" a lot of other groups, and they didn't. Not one Native American?! That's politically incorrect.

ADDED: Actually there were a couple more Presidents, Polk and John Quincy Adams. I'm noticing this leaning over Meade's shoulder as he clicks through. Sorry. My effort was studiously haphazard.

"A cruise is bad enough -- locked aboard a floating death-trap with people -- other people! -- with no means of escape."

"And then the ship stops. And the toilets stop working. And everything stinks like a sewer, which is a nice smell to smell when you're already possibly sea-sick. And then, worst of all, you find out that you're surrounded by magicians. What could be worse than a no-way-out floating sewage-smelling magician convention?"

On the up side, consider that people who go on a cruise are people who go on a cruise. How sensitive can they be?

Dino De Laurentiis, "the high-flying Italian film producer," has died.

He was 91. His name is attached to some of the greatest films ever — notably "La Strada" and "Nights of Cabiria" — and some all-out trashy pop entertainment — like "Bararella" and "Mandingo."

Here's a list of his 166 movies. How many of them have you seen? I've got to say I've managed to steer clear of de Laurentiis films. Other than "La Strada" and "Nights of Cabiria" — 2 of my favorite films, directed by Fellini — the only one I've seen — and we watched it for a laugh — is "Conan the Barbarian."

I never saw the de Laurentiis remake of "King Kong," which was filmed in New York City in 1976. I was living there then, and I remember the open invitation to anyone to come down to Lower Manhattan to be in the crowd scene. I considered going but didn't. I read this article in the NYT on June 22, 1976:

Drawn by 1930's nostalgia and 1976 excitement, a horrified crowd of more than 5,000 New Yorkers surged past police lines at the World Trade Center last night on cue and fought its way to the spot where a giant gorilla lay dead after a 110-story fall from the North Tower.

The ape, constructed of styrofoam covered with horse hair and bleeding a mixture of Karo syrup and vegetable coloring was of course King Kong, the resurrected star of the 1933 thriller being remade by Dino de Laurentiis.

Ah! The unreachable past! When the the death was fake and not even human. What absurd fun we had!

The extras cheered when a technician climbed on the chest of the fallen 40-foot ape to replenish its oozing "blood."

"I'm a female in the entertainment business who has been working 48 years consistently. My stage is my safe place."

"It doesn't scare me, like I guess it scares some people. And I knew that if I didn't get back on stage that I may never get back on stage."

Marie Osmond goes on "Oprah" to talk about her son's suicide and the "calculated decision" she made to go back to work 2 weeks later. It's not that the death didn't have a big impact on her. Please understand. She's "unique," she tells us, and that suicide was "probably the hardest thing I've been through."

USA Today, reporting these quotes, uses that last quote in its headline and sensitively omits the word "probably."

"Who is this woman, this fruit bat in fleece and Gore-Tex, clenching the side of the rock face above a glacier..."

"... screaming 'Tahhd! Tahhd!' at her husband, piercing the tranquillity of the Alaskan paradise?"

The Washington Post staff writer — Hank Stuever — doesn't know what to make of Sarah Palin's reality show.

You're flipping channels and you randomly land on "Sarah Palin's Alaska"... It's a show about . . . hmmm.

About a busy mom with a sporty husband. Their many offspring run from a soldier son in his 20s down to a mentally disabled adorable toddler and an unexpected grandson with curly blond hair. But quick enough it seems to be a show about a woman who fancies herself as something of a nature enthusiast who wants to take advantage of the short-but-sweet Alaskan summer. So is it about the li'l town where she lives? Is it about flowers and birdies and double rainbows? Is it like "Northern Exposure" meets "An American Family?"

You still don't know....

Stuever is imagining "you" flipping channels and arriving at this show, but for "you" to have this reaction, "you" would need not to recognize the celebrity or the celebrity-at-home genre of reality show. Maybe 10 years ago, this hapless "you" would have puzzled over a show like that, back before "The Osbournes" was the next big thing. But now? Come on, "you" is dumb!

(Mumbled "fuck" warning.)

“Obama Twists Own Arm, Says ‘Uncle’ to Extending Bush Tax Cuts.”

A lefty blogger response.

A lawprof puts it more haughtily...

"Obama caving on the high income tax-cut issue guarantees that he will attract an intra-party opponent from the progressive wing of the Democratic Party... The White House misreads the mood of the country. Tea partiers do not reflect that mood. Independents and Democrats disenchanted with Obama’s lack of conviction do."

... and more delusionally.

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

At the Pink Leaf Café...

... don't be a paleface fink.

Why do the Dems win all the close races nowadays? It's uncanny!

"Am I crazy to think that close elections—the ones that are separated by a mere hundreds of votes, that go into overtime and threatened recounts well past Election Eve—almost always are won by the Democrat these days?"

Crossing the pedestrian bridge the other day...

... I happened to catch a combat scene.

"OK, let’s say goodbye to the deficit commission," says Paul Krugman.

"If you’re sincerely worried about the US fiscal future — and there’s good reason to be — you don’t propose a plan that involves large cuts in income taxes. Even if those cuts are offset by supposed elimination of tax breaks elsewhere, balancing the budget is hard enough without giving out a lot of goodies — goodies that fairly obviously, even without having the details, would go largely to the very affluent."

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood leans on 2 new GOP governors about the high-speed rail project.

This is about our new Wisconsin governor, Scott Walker, and the new Ohio Governor John Kasich La Hood says — understandably — that the stimulus money for high-speed rail can't be used for other things. Walker and Kasich — understandably — are fighting to keep the money and put it into highway construction and that sort of thing.

Bush on Harriet Miers, John Roberts, and Samuel Alito.

Jan Crawford finds the stuff about Supreme Court nominations in Bush's book, "Decision Points":

"While I know Harriet would have made a fine justice, I didn't think enough about how the selection would be perceived by others," Mr. Bush writes. "I put my friend in an impossible situation. If I had to do it over again, I would not have thrown Harriet to the wolves of Washington."...

--After he tapped Roberts for chief justice when William Rehnquist died, he only considered women candidates to replace O'Connor. "I didn't like the idea of the Supreme Court having only one woman."

But Roberts was originally picked for the O'Connor position. The idea of appointing a woman, then, didn't matter all that much.

--There were "frustrating roadblocks" for most of the women candidates. When several senators said they were impressed by Miers, he concluded "she would make an outstanding justice." Miers was "shocked" when he asked if she was interested.

--No one in the White House ever suggested conservatives would revolt over her nomination. Bush suggests the opposition was elitist because Miers didn't go to an Ivy League school and "is not glib."

In addition to Miers, Bush says he considered Patricia Owen, but he thought Miers would be easier to confirm. After all the trouble with Miers, he switched to Alito, who, he writes, was "ill at ease" with Bush at first. Bush relaxed him by talking about baseball.

Bush says wanted to avoid appointing another Souter — Souter, who disappointed Bush's father, by "evolv[ing] into a different kind of judge."

--Roberts was not the unanimous choice. Vice President Cheney and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales backed Judge Mike Luttig. Miers supported Alito. Chief of Staff Andy Card and adviser Karl Rove favored Roberts. (Which means J. Harvie Wilkinson and Edith Brown Clement, the other two contenders early on, didn't have prominent backers.)

--Brett Kavanaugh, now a federal appeals court judge, told Bush Luttig, Alito and Roberts would all be solid justices. He suggested Bush ask a "tiebreaker question" of which man would be the most effective leader. To Bush, that was Roberts.

It seems that Roberts has a special appeal to Bush, who liked his "gentle soul" and "quick smile."

In case you don't understand what death is.

The government is here to help.

How misspelled can a write-in vote for Murkowski be before it shouldn't be counted at all?

Joe Miller is arguing for 100% correct spelling.

Lt. Gov. Craig Campbell, who oversees Alaska elections, has indicated that he will accept minor misspellings of Murkowski's name as long as the "voter intent" is clear.

Intent of the voter. Ah! That brings back delightful memories of the Bush v. Gore recount.

Miller is overdoing it. Clearly, they've got to count stuff like "Murakowski" and "Murkowsky" and "Murcowski" and even "Mercowsky." But where's the line? What about "Merssky"? Or "Murk."? What about "Lisa"? That's dimpled chad territory, no?

ADDED: A poll:

After the break, a second poll:

"I wasn't gonna punch back because, again, I think the office of the presidency is precious."

George Bush, speaking to Rush Limbaugh — transcript, audio — consistently expressed the idea that a President should handle himself with dignity and concentrate on doing what he thinks is right:

RUSH: ... What's it like to sit in the Oval Office, or wherever you happen to be as president and believe the people are tired of you, and do you want to do anything about that?

PRESIDENT BUSH: ... [Y]ou know, sometimes if you're president and people are tired of you, you just have to soldier on....

RUSH: ... In my lifetime, I don't recall a political party ever opposing their own country at war, seeking a defeat as the Democrats were. I mean Harry Reid was out there, Mr. President, "This war is lost."

PRESIDENT BUSH: ... You can disagree with the policy, disagree with whether we should work to establish democracy in Iraq after we liberated it, but to condemn soldiers heading into mission to a lost cause is just, you know, is inexcusable, as far as I was concerned.

RUSH: Why didn't you do more about it? Why didn't you comment more about it at the time?...

PRESIDENT BUSH: ... I do believe in the institution of the presidency, and I didn't think it was right then, I still don't think it's right to engage in name-calling if you're the president of the United States. I was focused on the mission... I still feel very strongly that's the way a president ought to conduct himself.

RUSH: Well, some of the people in your administration, Karl Rove, have said in hindsight that they think -- maybe Karl is speaking for himself, certainly other people in the administration -- should have done more to defend you and the administration against these attacks....

PRESIDENT BUSH: That's right. Now, Karl feels that way. I read his book and recommend it, he'll be happy from me to hear. And, yeah, I mean Karl felt like we shoulda punched back harder. I can't remember if he was referring to I shoulda punched back harder or we shoulda punched back harder. I wasn't gonna punch back because, again, I think the office of the presidency is precious. It's an institution that needs to be strengthened and getting into a verbal mud fight with people, in my judgment, demeans the office. And so I chose not to do that....

... You know, and eventually the truth wins out, and this book is an attempt to set the record straight from my perspective.

RUSH: Is that your faith speaking, "the truth will out"?

PRESIDENT BUSH: Do I think that? Yeah, I do.

I'm hearing the Sermon on the Mount in that: "But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also." And:

Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven.

So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you....

Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. 2But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

Obviously, the phrase "punch back harder"— which Bush introduces — is a reference to Obama, so there is an implied attack on Obama for fighting like a politician while he is President. And yet, Obama too resists defending himself as much as some people would like.

ADDED: After Bush is off the line, Rush comments:

I try to put myself in his shoes, try to imagine myself president of the United States, and in my mind, I'm doing everything I'm doing for the benefit of this country. If it's a terror attack that I'm responding to with military policy, it's to keep the country safe. If I'm coming up with an economic policy, Social Security reform, it is to benefit the people of this country. And to have that maligned, be personally maligned, I could not -- if I were inclined not to sully the office and not respond to it personally, I would not silence my administration. I would turn 'em loose. It's too serious. It matters too much. I would make sure the people that voted for me understood that they had a leader, but he was hell-bent on not sullying the office of the presidency. He told me that I can't tell you how many times, and to this day it's tough for me to understand, even now. We've got an economy unlike any since the Great Depression. He's being blamed for it. The Democrat Party and the media are blaming him and he's content to let long-term history be the judge of this. Now, I know that his faith in God is what gives him the comfort and the confidence to do this, but I would not be able to stand mute about it like he is.

Are you going on a diet?
	Yes.
	No.
	I'm doing something but there's something about the term "diet" that brings out the quibbler in me.

pollcode.com free polls

What are you thinking of eating in the new year?
	The same old stuff.
	A variety of truly health-enhancing foods.
	Smaller portions of basically the same stuff, leaning a bit more toward the healthful.
	I'll cut out carbohydrates.
	Cut the junk food, but otherwise the same basic stuff.
	I'll set a calorie limit and count calories.
	I'll pick a few foods that I'm allowed to eat -- maybe only one food.
	Tiny plates. I can eat what I want, but it must fit on that plate.
	A liquid diet.
	Fasting, maybe one day a week.

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How much do you want to lose?
	0
	5-10 pounds
	Over 10 pounds but less than 25 pounds
	More than 25 pounds but less than 50 pounds
	More than 50 pounds

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Will you meet your goal?
	No, of course not. It never works.
	Yes, because I'm strong and determined.
	Yes, because I'm saying "yes" here and that's gives me new incentive.
	Probably not. I may lose some, but these things tend not to work out in the long run.

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What will you do?
	Go through the "naked" screener thing.
	Submit to the quick feel-up.
	Not fly.

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Do you want me to write more about lefty blogs?
	No. Don't give them traffic.
	No. I don't care what they say.
	Yes. They need monitoring and criticism.
	Yes. Broaden your view and see what happens.
	Eh. Not sure. Depends on how sharp and funny you make it.

pollcode.com free polls

How strictly would you judge the write-ins?
	Miller's right. The spelling must be perfect.
	It must be phonetically accurate or only 1 or 2 letters off.
	If you can tell it was meant as a vote for Murkowski, it should count.

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Now, be honest:
	My preference for Miller influenced my choice on the first poll.
	My preference for Murkowski influenced my choice on the first poll.
	I gave a neutral, principled response to the first poll.
	Honestly, I can't vouch for how my mind worked.

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Friday, December 31, 2010