TEA PARTY HAS ELITES ON THE RUN: Except, of course, for the fearless — and “impactful” — Thomas Friedman. But read the whole thing to find out why a dead Christopher Lasch understands what’s going on better than a living Tom Friedman . . ..
Archive for September, 2010
September 29, 2010
HIGH HOME efficiency.
MULLAHS CRUSHING DISSENT: Iran’s ‘blogfather’ sentenced to almost 20 years in prison. “Hossein Derakhshan was ‘convicted of cooperating with enemy states, making propaganda against the Islamic system of government, promoting small anti-revolutionary groups, managing obscene web sites and insulting Islamic sanctities.'”
They can’t take criticism, these guys. Here’s more from Jeff Jarvis.
DON SURBER: “They Hate Us. They really, really hate us.”
PHIL BOWERMASTER EXPLAINS why he’s promoting The Rational Optimist.
JOEL KOTKIN: The New World Order: “Tribal ties—race, ethnicity, and religion—are becoming more important than borders.”
UPDATE: Reader Jorge Del Rio emails:
I’m extremely busy this week and it’s already almost 10pm here in Luxembourg (GMT+1) but I wanted to know: should I bother waiting up to hear the Left denounce the latest terror warnings as an attempt to scare the American public just prior to an election?
Get some sleep, Jorge.
PUNCHING BACK TWICE AS HARD: At Righthaven and Stephens Media. I love this: “The Review-Journal and Righthaven can’t legitimately complain about cutting and pasting of the type in the Democratic Underground case since Review-Journal writers regularly engage in that practice, he said.”
RAND SIMBERG: Pigs in Space: Utah and Alabama Repubs Lobbying for Space Pork. Not a promising sign for the supposed GOP housecleaning. . . .
FORMER OBAMA WORKER writes on the decay of the “white brain.” ‘Cause, you know, white people think ACORN’s a bunch of crooks and stuff. This is probably a poor move, pre-election, but maybe they’ve just decided that all they can do now is try to energize the base. (Via Dana Loesch, who has further thoughts).
SOUTHERN POVERTY LAW CENTER To Apologize to Prof. Guenter Lewy For False Accusations.
“IT’S LIKE BUILDING A CORVETTE in a Model T factory.”
MICHAEL BARONE: Dems retreat to coasts as GOP rules vast interior. “The Democrats’ Northeast and Pacific Coast bases are heavily populated, and the states where they’re leading in Senate races cast 136 electoral votes in 2008. But the states where Republicans are leading cast 274 electoral votes. These 2010 maps are quite a contrast with the maps you might have drawn just after the 2008 election.”
UPDATE: Related: Youth Vote Shifts Right.
ANOTHER UPDATE: Linda Hirshman: White Women Dump The Dems. “Remember the PUMAs, whose motto was Party Unity My Ass? They were the supposedly angry white women (the horror) so pissed off by Hillary Clinton’s defeat they were going elect John McCain? The PUMAs were sort of lost in the pixie dust storm of the Obama election. I wonder if we declared them an endangered species too soon? There were glimpses that all might not be well with white women in the exit polls even then.” I think the misogynistic attacks on Sarah Palin don’t help.
OBAMA: “The cancer is in Pakistan.”
WORLD WAR I NOW OFFICIALLY OVER:
On September 26, 2010 — 92 years after the WWI officially ended — Germany made her last payment of $94 million in reparations “to private individuals, pension funds and corporations holding debenture bonds as agreed under the Treaty of Versailles.” As Keynes rightly predicted, the unreasonably high French demands for financial reparations led to German economic weakness. The end result was hyperinflation, which was one of the principal causes of Hitler’s rise to power and the start of the Second World War. In spite of losing two world wars, Germany did eventually become the most powerful nation in Europe — through trade, capitalism and German ingenuity.
With some help from a U.S. military umbrella.
BEST-VALUE LAW SCHOOLS: Tennessee Ranks #11 on a list ranking schools based on high bar passage, low indebtedness, and employment after graduation.
THE ECONOMIST: “Congress is lame.” They’re right, but not for the reasons given.
MANAGING THE CRISIS in public pensions.
REVIEWING THE REVIEWERS: A roundup of book reviews from all over.
MANCHIN’S LOOKING WEAK, and Raese is launching a 51 To Repeal Moneybomb.
CHANGE: Nancy Pelosi Is As Unpopular As BP. Well, she’s done a lot more damage to America, so I think she’s getting off light here . . . .
MICHAEL BARONE: America In An Age Of Open-Field Politics.
As I have indicated, I expect a rebound in Republican percentages in 2010 that will make the current period of open field politics look as volatile as the previous 1967–1983 and 1991–1995 periods. But I think it’s possible that this year’s Republican percentages will prove to be no more permanent than I believe the 2006–2008 Democratic percentages will have been proven to be. You don’t know a period of open field politics has been transformed into a period of trench warfare politics until several years after it has happened—or at least so has been my experience.
Well, if the Republicans make the mistake of interpreting a rebuke to the Democrats as an endorsement of the GOP establishment, they won’t last long.
UPDATE: Reader Gregory Hill writes:
In response to Mr. Barone, you say:
“Well, if the Republicans make the mistake of interpreting a rebuke to the Democrats as an endorsement of the GOP establishment, they won’t last long.”
My response? Don’t worry. They will. That’s why the grassroots take-over of the Republican party from within by the Tea Party needs to proceed post-haste. If we are successful in that endeavor, then the damage wrought upon our beloved country by the Ds and Rs will be minimized. Tragic and enormous, but minimized. But if the GOP establishment fights us to the end, then it will take an actual third-party to engage the public in transforming our political system. That will take much more time, and much more effort. And it will be a bloody mess (hopefully only figuratively! my biggest fear is otherwise) for years as we clean up the pieces of the train wreck they have driven us into.
Indeed. As I’ve warned before, if the GOP retakes Congress and then blows it, we’re likely to see not only a third-party Presidential challenge, but a lot of third-party challengers for Congressional seats.
ARE THE DEMOCRATS giving up on Joe Sestak?