The Green[e]house Effect: a Weblog

Poster Children for Bad Behavior

Asparagirl’s post last weekend about the kids at her high school in Scarsdale reminded me of my own — including the drinking and the drugs. The campus wasn’t a uniform bastion of privilege, but the parents of most kids there had a pretty good lot in life, and it showed. Especially in the parking lot, considering the number of SUVs and Beemers scattered around.

Anyhow, Asparagirl made a good point:

[W]hen Scarsdale parents seem to honestly think that their privileged lives somehow insulate them from life’s realities, that their “position” (and other euphemisms for wealth) gives them some sort of pass on having to actually watch out for their kids, that galls me. It’s ironic, too, because their “position” also creates all sorts of new pressures and influences that can be just as harmful to their kids. It’s just more easily glossed over, that’s all.

Dang straight. The wealth sloshing around my high school made for some wild times, especially among the kids who seemed to have the run of the town.

That said, those students were in the minority. I still keep up with plenty of friends and alumni, and they’re good people . . . but then, they had good parents. When it comes to character, that counts for far more than cash.

Are They Smoking Something?

Is it me, or does a huge swath of the conservative/libertarian blogiverse seem to be coming down with a case of the vapors? I thought Glenn Reynolds had gotten his liberal panic out of his system yesterday with his post on the Democrats’ supposed immolation on This Week yesterday, but he’s kept going:

We saw Gore’s speech last week, which was roundly denounced, followed by Daschle’s overheated speech, followed by this. . . . Are the Democrats’ tracking polls so bad that they think they’re going to lose everyone but the Nation/NPR hard core among their base, so they’re just trying to energize that regardless of the cost among swing voters? . . .

This is a risky game. It’s likely to do a lot of damage in the coming elections. And if there’s another big terror attack, it’s going to kill the Democrats for years. What are they thinking? Are they thinking?

Whoa there — calm down, my friend.

For starters, contrary to blogospheric opinion, Gore’s speech was hardly “roundly denounced,” unless you mistake Sean Hannity and Michael Kelly for the voice of the country. Daschle’s speech, which by any measuring stick except his own fell well short of ‘overheated,’ seems to have had an effect. As for the Democrats tracking polls: surely Reynolds doesn’t think the party’s that far gone. He can look at these polling numbers, which bode well for the Democrats, as well as anyone else. Besides, the Big Pun — smart though he is — hardly makes a plausible stand-in for America’s swing voters.

[On a side note: a terrorist attack would kill Democrats for years!? Who spent a year holding up an independent investigation of intelligence failures? Who’s bungling airport security? Who took six months to even acknowledge the need for a government reorganization? Who made a top FBI priority of investigating brothels in New Orleans? Who spent the first eight months of the Bush administration reworking old recommendations on dealing with terrorists? Who’s in charge here?!]

But there’s more: Sully is in on the act now. [Quelle surprise.]

Congressman Jim McDermott has just accused president Bush of wilfully lying to the American people about national security threats from Saddam or Al Qaeda. He said this not on the floor of the House or in his district — but in Baghdad, the capital city of a despot who is on the brink of war with the United States. At a time when the U.S. government is attempting some high-level diplomatic maneuvers in the U.N., when Saddam is desperate for any propaganda ploy he can muster, these useful idiots play his game. I think what we’re seeing now is the hard-core base of the Democratic Party showing its true colors, and those colors, having flirted with irrelevance and then insouciance are now perilously close to treason.

Eh? Wot? “Its true colors”? Please. Did Jim McDermott and David Bonior look ridiculous yesterday? Sure. But they make up the public face of the Democratic Party about as much as Rep. Joe Wilson and Dick Armey do that for the Republicans — which is to say, not at all.

Besides, in this hothouse atmosphere, it’s easy for political junkies to lose sight of some important truths. How much do average Americans think about politics? Five minutes — per week. What percentage of registered voters outside Washington state could pick Rep. McDermott out of a lineup? Don’t bring out both hands – you won’t need ’em. Would the GOP really clip the tape from yesterday’s This Week into a nationwide generic ad against Democratic candidates? Don’t make me laugh. [They don’t have to, when they have Rush Limbaugh & Co. to do that for them.] So how much chance is there that this story can turn into a tsunami, sweeping Democrats from the political landscape? Hmmm?

The Democrats are just fine, the Bonior/McDermott misstep notwithstanding. Sullivan could stand to follow some advice from White House spokesman Ari Fleischer: “take a deep breath . . . stop finger-pointing and . . . work well together.”

Cheney the Armchair Colonel

I just read a vintage 2000 article from Suck about Dick Cheney’s lengthy education in the ways of war. All I have to say is: wow. Oh wow.

Having figured out that the general [Norman Schwarzkopf] was being too cautious with his fourth combat command in three decades of soldiering, Cheney got his staff busy and began presenting Schwarzkopf with his own ideas about how to fight the Iraqis: What if we parachute the 82nd Airborne into the far western part of Iraq, hundreds of miles from Kuwait and totally cut off from any kind of support, and seize a couple of missile sites, then line up along the highway and drive for Baghdad? Schwarzkopf charitably describes the plan as being “as bad as it could possibly be… But despite our criticism, the western excursion wouldn’t die: three times in that week alone Powell called with new variations from Cheney’s staff. The most bizarre involved capturing a town in western Iraq and offering it to Saddam in exchange for Kuwait.” (Throw in a Pete Rose rookie card?) None of this Walter Mitty posturing especially surprised Schwarzkopf, who points out that he’d already known Cheney as “one of the fiercest cold warriors in Congress.”

And this is the man with the president’s ear? Heaven help us all.

Bush: Imperator?

Jay Bookman writes the best columns at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, and today he wrote a piece that sounded overwrought, but thought-provoking:

The President’s Real Goal in Iraq: As it turns out, this is not really about Iraq. It is not about weapons of mass destruction, or terrorism, or Saddam, or U.N. resolutions.

This war, should it come, is intended to mark the official emergence of the United States as a full-fledged global empire, seizing sole responsibility and authority as planetary policeman. It would be the culmination of a plan 10 years or more in the making, carried out by those who believe the United States must seize the opportunity for global domination, even if it means becoming the “American imperialists” that our enemies always claimed we were.

I don’t agree with him — call me crazy, but I’m a firm believer in Ockham’s Razor. By default, I lean toward simpler explanations. Still, Bookman makes a well-developed argument here. It’s worth a read.

Easy There, Glenn

Glenn Reynolds, on today’s This Week interview with Reps. David Bonior (D-Mich.) and Jim McDermott (D-Wash.) : Just looked for a transcript, but there’s not one online for either show yet, but these accounts suggest that the Democrats’ hopes for the midterm elections just took a fatal blow — from Democrats.

You bet — just like the remarks from Rep. Dick Armey (R-Tex.) this month about Jews sank the Republicans. Good grief.

Random Notes

• Max Sawicky does a great job today of casting a skeptical eye on the worst-case Iraq scenario that Prof. Eugene Volokh wrote for the latest National Review.
• Nick Denton plays up one kind of ‘fair trade’ worth considering: giving third-world countries a better chance to trade with us.
• The Los Angeles Times says this year could be the year of the woman (registration required) in governor’s races; women could double their hold on state houses from five to ten.
• Atrios, Jeff Cooper: Hearty thanks for the links.

Uprooting the Bushes, One Step at a Time

I’m sure many of you readers are ready to get rid of the Bushes — Dubya and his presidential sibling. I want to make a contribution to the Democratic challenger in the Florida governor’s race, Bill McBride, but need to keep my money in Georgia this year. So I had to think of something else to do.

If you look over to the left-hand side of the page and scroll down a bit, you’ll see a button I whipped up this weekend urging voters to ‘Dump Jeb.’ It’s just moral support, and given how much the blogosphere can resemble an echo chamber, it’s small moral support at that. But this race is important enough that all Democrats need to do their part to win it, whatever that happens to be.

The button’s yours for the stealing. Hope you all get good use from it.

Baby, He’s Cold Inside

Vladimir Putin, world-class romantic? Hardly — in fact, in his wife’s new book, he comes off looking like a grade-A cad. For starters, when they were dating, he would meet up with her in the Moscow subway as much as 90 minutes late:

‘I couldn’t come late, because I thought he could be on time,’ she said, remembering the agony of waiting for Putin in subway stations. ‘I would bear the first 15 minutes normally, a half-hour would also be OK. But after an hour would pass, I would nearly cry out of humiliation. And one-and-a-half hours afterward, I would feel no emotions at all.’

He even managed to mess up when he proposed:

‘Look, honey, you know that my character is pretty hard. Now you must make your choice in life,’ she recalled.

She said his words plunged her into instant panic because she first thought he wanted to split up.

Sheesh. What a goof. So unlike the warm, fuzzy guy we see on television. =,

Speaking of world leaders and their love lives: John Major had an affair?!! Good grief — has the world gone mad? =,

Whoo ‘Hoo!

Thanks to a romp of a comeback against Wake Forest yesterday, the Virginia Cavaliers have earned themselves a 3-2 win/loss ratio, getting into positive territory for the first time this season. As the K.C. & the Sunshine Band used to say, that’s the way (uh-huh uh-huh) I like it. =,

Face the Music

In the latest issue of PC Magazine, columnist John Dvorak tells the music industry to grow up. “[L]et’s stop lecturing people about legality and morality. Students in particular are not moral reprobates, nor are they fools. They are pragmatists, and they stretch the rules along with their budgets. This is a crowd that worships the fake ID and is taught to question authority. So you’re going to lecture them about copyrights? Give up. Rethink your business model. The problem will be solved.”

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

Steven Den Beste made merry hay a few days about Jacksonianism, and how Jacksonians — including the Bush administration — take umbrage at German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder’s rhetorical disrespect of the United States. Respect, though, is a two way street, and plenty on the outside of the Bush administration – in America and elsewhere — haven’t felt much of it from the White House lately.

Dwight Meredith covered much of this ground in a post yesterday, and I want to expand on it later. But think for a second — how have we treated the Germans lately? With a brushoff of the support they provided under the North Atlantic Treaty after Sept. 11, except for some special forces; with a barrage of criticism after the government, following German law, declined to pass evidence regarding Zacarias Moussaoui to U.S. prosecutors seeking the death penalty; with contempt from some conservative quarters for its military capability; and with a flick of the hand to some treaties that a majority of Germans care a great deal about, including the Kyoto climate change agreement and treaties on nuclear testing and biological warfare. And when the Germans carped, Bush and company couldn’t be bothered to care — just as they didn’t care, until recent weeks, what Germany or most other European allies had to say about going to war against Iraq. So tell me, who’s seen the brunt of disrespect here — Germany, or the United States?

That pales beside the stories you could tell about recent debate in this country. After Sept. 11, in those days of unity, fellowship, and liking arm-in-arm to sing “God Bless America,” Democrats stood foursquare with the rest of the country as we prepared to beat Al Qaeda back into the caves from whence it came. But what’s happened since? The adminstration trotted out a stimulus package built around a huge package of retroactive cuts in the corporate alternative minimum tax, in an attempt to sneak a treasured campaign goal into an ostensible response to terrorism. Bush’s attorney general told the Capitol that questions about the Patriot Act “aid terrorists, for they erode our national unity and diminish our resolve. They give ammunition to America’s enemies and pause to America’s friends.” Karl Rove, senior advisor to the president for policy and strategy, drafted a PowerPoint presentation that urged Republicans to “focus on war” as a campaign wedge issue. And this week, we heard the President tell a crowd “the Senate is more interested in special interests in Washington and not interested in the security of the American people.” When Senate majority leader Tom Daschle condemned the statement, the president’s spokesman asked “everybody concerned to take a deep breath, to stop finger-pointing and to work well together.”

Does any of that carry the ring of respect?

Jacksonians don’t forgive, Den Beste says. Perhaps that’s right — and that bodes ill for Bush. After all its slights, great and small, the White House somehow expects blithe respect from overseas for its policies on Iraq, and Democratic respect for administration views on Iraq and homeland security. The German public just responded with a one-fingered salute. That might only have been the first, unless Bush learns to try doling out some respect of his own.

The End of the End of an Era

The National Debt Clock in Times Square — unplugged for good during President Clinton’s second term, or so we thought — is back up and running.

Radical Words from a Cautious Man

David Broder — the mild-mannered columnist — said this?!

The Washington Post: Radical Conservatism.

The restatement of the United States’ fundamental defense doctrine issued by the Bush administration last week — substituting preemption of potential threats for containment of aggression — is probably the most dramatic and far-reaching change in national security policy in a half-century.

But it is also part of a pattern of radical revisionism in basic governmental philosophy and structure engineered by President Bush, who is quietly rewriting the classic definition of conservatism.

The word, as this president uses it, has little or nothing to do with the traditional conservative inclination to preserve the status quo. Instead, it suggests a very bold and risk-taking readiness to reexamine, revise and restate basic tenets of government. It is a pattern that now pervades Bush’s economic, social and foreign policy and makes this, in some respects, a truly radical government.

Consider economics. The centerpiece of Bush’s policy is his belief in the efficacy of tax cuts under any and all circumstances. It was hardly novel for a Republican president to push for lower tax rates early in his term, as Bush did last year. And the budget surpluses then accumulating caused opposition Democrats to agree that revenue reductions, slightly smaller in scope, were appropriate.

What is different is Bush’s insistence that tax cutting should continue, even with the return of budget deficits and even with the prospect of staggering, long-term additional spending on the military, homeland defense and the war on terrorism. Facing deficits in his second year, Ronald Reagan acquiesced in Congress’s rollback of some 1981 tax cuts. In a similar situation in his second year, the president’s father made the same concession to a Democratic Congress. This President Bush has broken the pattern.

Consider education. The hallmark of conservative thinking has been the insistence on local control of schools. Bush has pushed through the largest expansion of the federal role in education of any president since Lyndon Johnson, not just in dollars but in standards of performance and measures of achievement, backed by real sanctions.

Consider social programs. Bush has backed a continuing effort to shift the line on church-state relations, bringing civil and religious authority much closer together. He proposed direct public funding of parochial schools and applauded when the Supreme Court approved the Cleveland voucher plan. He has lobbied hard for legislation that would route much more federal money aimed at meeting the needs of troubled individuals and families through churches, synagogues and mosques. For good or ill, he is trying to narrow a gap that has existed between the clergy and the government since the start of this republic.

Consider retirement security. In the face of cautions from members of his own party and strong criticism from the Democrats, Bush has kept on his agenda the proposal to change the Social Security program — that staple of New Deal policy — to permit individual workers far more freedom to devise their own basic pension plans, with all the potential risks and rewards such a change might entail. If Republicans regain control of Congress in this election, he almost certainly will try to make this concept law.

And now Bush has put before the world, first in his West Point speech and last week in a formal state paper, a fundamental revision of American foreign and national security policy.

That policy developed in stages, from the imperialism that marked the decades before World War I, to the isolationism that prevailed between the wars, to the bipartisan “containment” policy that evolved during the Cold War. The common characteristic of the whole 20th century was the readiness of the United States to respond to threats to its security and its reluctance to initiate conflict or issue ultimatums to anyone. When aggressors pushed forward, we pushed back — hence Korea, Vietnam and the Persian Gulf War. But we did not start fights ourselves.

Now, with the doctrine of preemption justified by the all too real threat of terrorism, Bush is proposing to scrap that distinction. Instead, he asserts the right of the United States, as the only superpower, to judge the degree of potential danger itself — and to take whatever action it deems necessary to eliminate that threat.

You may think any one of these changes is wise or foolish. What is remarkable is that all of them have come in so short a time from the hand of a man whose campaign seemed so bland and whose election was so narrow. Bush is redefining what it means to be a conservative.

Consumate professional that he is, Broder keeps his words even tempered. [“You may think any one of these changes is . . . foolish”? “[F]rom the hand of a man . . . whose election was so narrow”?] Read between the lines here, though, and you have to concede that the man sounds highly concerned. And that’s saying something.

I’ve heard an earful of comment today

about two topics: war and an Al Gore speech. I’ll save war for later, but I thought I could weigh in on Al Gore by reworking some of his older remarks.

Poverty is up; family income is down.
Personal bankruptcies are up; the stock markets are down.
Personal debt is up; consumer confidence is down.
Foreclosures are up; housing starts are down.
Health-care costs are up; health-care coverage is down.
Everything that should be down is up. Everything that should be up is down.

Gore always wrapped up that part of his ‘92 stump speech by saying that while the GOP had put everything upside down, the Dems were ready to turn it right side up again. You’d better believe it — most of the Dems I know are loaded for bear. No wonder Bush wants to talk about the war instead.

Toy Time!

Jumpin’ Jehosophat! Lego just dropped a toy sure to rank atop every geek’s wish list this Christmas: the Imperial Star Destroyer. All 3,000 pieces of it. It’s the biggest Lego kit ever.

Jarrett put it best: “[w]ords are inadequate.”

The Blog of the Moment

Drop what you’re doing and read the latest from Dwight Meredith. The man is en fuego. His latest posts:

• choice words on revered thinker Rep. Dick Armey’s musings on how Jews who vote Democratic have “shallow, superficial intellect”;
• an essay explaining how Bush’s pratfalls stem from his predilection for “mak[ing] a decision first and then “manag[ing]” information to support the decision”;
• a smart write-up of a copyright battle over . . . silence. No, really.

C’mon, what are you people still doing here? Go!

Food. Mmmmmmmmmm.

It’s too bad that no one’s come up with a smell plug-in for web browsers yet. I’ve found a couple of sites lately that provide the next best thing, though, and I’m loving it.

First off, let’s talk about Simmer Stock, where the blogger-in-residence talks about great cookware, books, other food geeks, recipes — you name it. Here’s a post he wrote about a fish:

What do you do if you see something at the store that you’ve never heard of before? Buy it and cook it, damnit! Today the fish department of Bread and Circus had this fish called Opah. It’s from Hawaii and the fillet in the display case looked like a cross between swordfish (it was clearly something you cut into steaks) and salmon (it had this beautiful pale rosy pink color). What does it taste like? Well, like a cross between a salmon and a swordfish, actually (sometimes appearances aren’t deceiving. It was very good: pan seared and served on top of stir-fried orzo with chanterelle mushrooms and onions, and honey and soy sauce braised baby bok choy.

Damn, I wish I could order that in. With writing like that, it’s no wonder this blog rates a 9.5 on Hot or Not.

Just as mouth watering: The Making of a Restaurant, written by two Chicago guys who want to start their own place, In the time, they’re eating their way through one of America’s culinary paradises, and they’re having a jolly time telling the tale. I’m a little worried that no one’s told them yet how hard setting up a restaurant can get, but if dedication counts for much, these two have nothing to worry about.

‘Course, I wouldn’t mind setting up a restaurant myself one day. Maybe a roadhouse. A couple of years ago in a conversation with Tim and his wife Lisa, I had an idea for a tech-geek spot up in the Dulles corridor — I thought about calling it “.root.” That was back when the tech sector was rocking, though, and that’s about as over now as bellbottoms. <--sigh-->

If all this restaurant talk scares you, or you just want to cook some comfort food of your own, try ‘Googlecooking’ — the new craze out of the kitchen of Meg Hourihan’s mother.

Recently I’ve become a Google cook. What I mean is, shortly before supper time I look around for some combination of foods I’ve got on hand and which seem like they might go together. Then I ‘google’ them (an expression I heard for the first time on WXRV the other day) and browse through the results until I find a recipe that appeals to me. My tastiest success was Spicy Corn and Tomato Salad but that was partly just because the farmers’ market corn was so super sweet. I can especially recommend Google cooking when you need possibilities for somewhat odd combinations, like leftover salmon and swiss chard, though in such a case the result may be more pecunious than tasteful.

Guess that rules out working with the meatloaf and hummus stashed in my fridge. Still, maybe one day — on a lark after getting back from the farmer’s market, perhaps — I’ll give that a try. Cross your fingers.

Note: Hey, Avedon — sorry about all that food pornography up there. I’ll give you a heads up next time. =,

Update:Looks like Tim and I crossed wavelengths today — he has a food porn post of his own. Great minds think alike.

Going Nowhere on a Train

London fans of the Green[e]house are minding a huge gap today — the trains aren’t running. Not on the Underground, at least. Blame it on a strike. This morning, only 15 of the Tube’s 600 train drivers showed up.

I feel for the commuters who had to fend for themselves — some lined up for buses, some for taxis, and some for jam-packed trains from the suburbs. One account even described “pedestrian rage” breaking out among people who, after riding a commuter train, had to wait about an hour just to get a bus to work. The Underground set up free Thames boats, and a few smart cookies ditched it all for a bike or a pair of sneakers. Or just stayed home.

I’m with that last group. No way would have bothered commuting there today, if I could help it. In the middle of a traffic meltdown, why battle the madness when you can phone it in?

Driving Along in My Automobile

Things are looking up down here in the Green[e]house, yes indeed. A couple of months back, “car trouble” meant a wheel all but falling off. Nowadays my only worries are a stuck headlight and a stuck window, both of which I’ve been dealing with for months. And I’ll get those fixed this week. Suh-weet!

I know most folks would get exercised about a stuck window, but naaaah, I’m feeling pretty blithe. When you find out your dealer left your car outside the shop with windows open on the day of a hurricane, a few droplets here and there just don’t seem so bad.

Drips and droplets are the order of the day here in Atlanta right now, where we’re seeing some well-needed gray, lousy days full of mist and downpours. It all makes me feel a little like pulling on an old black t-shirt and listening to The Smiths, but complain I won’t. After watching the new grass I spent weeks tending early this summer dry up like Spanish moss, I say we need any rain we can get. Georgia just wrapped up one of its driest 12-month periods ever — the more rain, the merrier.

Later tonight I do my part for the youth of America with my LSAT prep class over at Morehouse — but before then I think I’ll slink over to the record store to check out the new releases from Beck, Steve Earle and Peter Gabriel. I can only buy two — curse these crowded release dates! — but with artists like these, I can pick at random and still win.

But for now, back to working on a web site I’m developing for another political project. Can’t talk about it now — maybe I’ll shed light on it some other time. But trust me, it’s a good one. Even if it does cut into my blogging time. =}

Senate Democrats Fell ‘Healthy Forests’ Initiative

The Bush administration plan to stop forest fires by stopping forests has run into hard times, and might not make it through the Senate this year. Hallelujah.

The White House plan, dubbed the ‘Healthy Forests Initiative,’ was of a piece with the adminstration’s other flashes of policy brilliance. Just as Bush wrote an energy plan with corporate giveaways and an economic plan with tax giveaways, he wrote a forest fire plan with tree giveaways. The initiative would have given loggers a fast-track through the regulatory process, including guaranteed protection from the possibility of enforcement suits under the National Environmental Policy Act. White House officials hoped that foresters, given free rein to haul more old-growth trees off federal land, might find it within themselves to clear fire-prone underbrush.

Democrats have balked, though, and say the plan would “[do] little to address the problems of tinder-like underbrush and fire-prone trees near heavily populated areas while giving loggers greater leeway to cut larger, more commercially valuable trees in remote regions that pose less of a fire hazard.” Their alternative: an expansion of an existing forest-thinning plan, paired with a relaxed regulatory regime that would still let citizens sue to enforce the laws when necessary. Senate majority leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) insists on settling the impasse with a 60-senator supermajority vote — a feat neither side looks likely to achieve anytime soon.

We need to stop forest fires, but we can do that without destroying the forests in order to save them. Let’s give Daschle and company a hand.

From the ‘He’s Not an American, He’s a Democrat’ Dept.—

“The House responded, but the Senate is more interested in special interests in Washington and not interested in the security of the American people.”

—President Bush, sharing his take on congressional reaction
to the homeland security bill with an
audience in Trenton, N.J.

The New Kid on the Block

Psssst — The New Republic has a blog. Tell your friends.

Why I’m a Democrat

Last Friday, after receiving the gift of a one-month severance, my cousin C. joined the ranks of the jobless. Once upon a time she planned to make a career at the company. She’d worked there for more than ten years.

The company? WorldCom. Her parachute? Tattered. Her stock options went underwater long ago. By now they’ve probably drifted into the Marianas Trench. Same with her 401(k).

Holding the parties responsible for every tick in unemployment is a fool’s game. In the months since the Worldcom scandal broke, though, I’ve heard Republicans:

• blame Bill Clinton for setting a terrible moral example for his slavish 50-year-old CEO followers;
• blame congressional Democrats for giving otherwise confident investors a case of the heebie-jeebies; and
• change the subject.

No one expects the Republicans to work miracles. But can they at least stop for a moment to pay attention?

And no, the kabuki show economic summit in Waco last month doesn’t count.

A Quick Clarification

Despite all rumors to the contrary, I have not — not — been sent packing by the Chicago Tribune. You can all breathe out now. =,

Iraq: We Break It, We Buy It

Josh Marshall and Tapped beat me to the punch with posts on this, but James Fallows spends a good number of paragraphs in the next issue of The Atlantic detailing how America’s duties in Iraq would continue long past the close of a war.

[T]he day after a war ended, Iraq would become America’s problem, for political and practical reasons. Because we would have destroyed the political order and done physical damage in the process, the claims on American resources and attention would be comparable to those of any U.S. state. conquered Iraqis would turn to the U.S. government for emergency relief, civil order, economic reconstruction, and protection of their borders. They wouldn’t be able to vote in U.S. elections, of course — although they might after they emigrated. [Every American war has created a refugee-and-immigrant system.] But they would be part of us.

How to Scramble a Senate

If Robert Novak didn’t mess up your head yesterday with his column on a possible Republican push to run a lame-duck session of the Senate, just wait — Wyeth Ruthven, with an assist from U.Va. political scientist Larry Sabato, has cooked up a possible outcome that sounds even weirder.

The Doomsday Scenario

Nov. 4: The current Senate (50 Dem - 49 GOP - 1 Ind) DEM CONTROL
Nov. 5: Talent beats Carnahan, Dems only pick up one other Senate seat, Murkowski wins in Alaska.
Nov. 6: Talent is seated. (New Senate: 50 GOP - 49 Dem - 1 Ind) GOP CONTROL
Dec. 2: Murkowski resigns to become governor (New Senate 49 GOP - 49 Dem - 1 Ind) DEM CONTROL
Dec. 7: Murkowski appoints a GOP Senator (New Senate 50 GOP - 49 Dem - 1 Ind) GOP CONTROL
Jan. 7: New Senate convenes, Dem pickup Senator is seated (New Senate 50 Dem 49 GOP 1 Ind) DEM CONTROL

The Man’s Full of Surprises

Jason Rylander sings? Wow, what a multitalented guy. Best of luck at the audition.

You’ve Got to Be Kidding Me

An FBI agent was what?!!

[Link courtesy of Tom Tomorrow.]

Pot Kettle Black

“It’s unfortunate that Sen. Daschle would seek to politicize such an important issue as the environment.”

—White House spokesman Taylor Gross, commenting on
last night’s remarks by Sen. Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) at a
League of Conservation Voters dinner

Avast, Ye Scurvy Mates!

Today, according to NPR, is International Talk Like a Pirate Day. Arrrrrrrrrr!

Note: Charles Kuffner went to town on this yesterday, and then some. The boy’s starting to scare me. =,

What to Make of This?

What to Make of This?
I learned late this morning that Atlanta’s mayor and city council president have both found invitations in their inboxes to have a sit-down lunch with . . . Donald Rumsfeld. Yep — the SecDef himself.

He probably wants to talk about Fort McPherson and Fort Gillem, two local posts that host the headquarters of the First Army. No need to fear. Of course not. I just wish I could get the peach fuzz on my forearms to quit already with the horripilation.

On the Web Today

Lots of great information popping up all over the place this week. Here’s a roundup:

• Sen. Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) dropped the H-word on the president in a speech yesterday: addording to The New York Times, Daschle “cit[ed] a ‘tragic trend’ of two million lost jobs, weak economic growth and a stock market decline he called unparalleled since Herbert Hoover.”
• Hank Perritt, dean of the Chicago-Kent School of Law and a Democratic candidate for Congress from the Illinois North Shore, weighed in with what might be the first cogent liberal critique of war in Iraq I’ve seen.
• On the Wired website, you can read a profile of Lawrence Lessig, Stanford Law’s in-house cyberlaw guru, from the magazine’s October issue. Read it for the commentary on the Microsoft case and the coming Supreme Court appeal in Eldred v. Ashcroft — and while you’re at it, check out his blog.
• Jessica at the Blog of Chloe and Pete tells us what’s really on the mind of Mickey Kaus.
• At the Daily Kos: A labor hero gets a stamp. It’s about time.
• Quoth the Sahara Desert: “Re-treeeeeeat!” [Courtesy of Nick Denton.]
• Eric Raymond writes about another risk posed by war in Iraq: “I’m not joking about the moral hazards of imperialism, either. They may be a more serious danger to a free society than the short-term exigencies of war. Witness the fact that I, a radical libertarian anarchist for more than twenty years, find myself arguing for a position not all that easy to distinguish from reactionary military expansionism. Urgent survival threats make strange bedfellows. And it is all too plausible that. if we take this path, we might degenerate from imperialists by necessity to imperialists by habit and predilection.”
• Sam Heldman offers sharp thoughts on how to handle the Senate confirmation hearings of conservative law professor Michael McConnell — then posts about one of my favorite bands ever. [Did I mention that he went to my high school? Good grief — what a small world. =, ]

Out With the Old, In With the New

My blogroll had started to get seriously out of whack this month, so I worked with it this morning to get it current, adding some great sites I’ve stumbled across since starting this blog. I had to toss a few links aside, too. The biggest change: no more Sully. I might explain why in another post. [Nick Denton, of course, beat me to that decision — he dropped that link yesterday.]

Anyhow, I’m way more comfortable with this new set of links, and I think some of the sites over there are the bees’ knees. Get to reading ‘em.

I’ve also toyed with the design in the last few days, as you might have noticed — I got sick of the old template, and opted not to switch back after going half-dark on Sept. 11. I think I’ve taken a step up, but something’s missing — the color scheme and the layout don’t play off well against each other, leaving the page looking a little wan.

Any suggestions? Fire away.

Giving the Debit Card a Workout

In between blogging, work, procrastination and all that, I’ve neglected a few of my responsibilities lately — like, for instance, my responsibility to keep my collection stocked with new music. Now there’s a job I’ve fallen down big time on; I haven’t plunked down for much since picking up Yankee Hotel Foxtrot back in April.

Since I didn’t feel like heading straight back home after the blogger meetup, I walked a couple of doors down to check out the shelves at Criminal Records. I’ve spent a few weeks stuck in a music rut, as I said, so the challenge was holding myself back from buying half the store.

I fared pretty well by that standard, but I couldn’t resist the urge to ditch my alt-country leanings for a second to play some catch-up. I picked out the new DJ Shadow right off the bat, but then found myself getting tugged by the latest Flaming Lips CD. Not to mention the other discs trying to get my attention: Koop, Neko Case, Beth Orton, Solomon Burke, Los Lobos. Just too darned many to pick from. [And that’s after having forgotten some.]

Eventually I whittled out the Flaming Lips record — good as it sounded, it felt too pretentious tonight. I needed to hear some straight-on sounds. So on top of the DJ Shadow record, I threw in the Trail of Dead disc, which blew me away with just a couple of cuts. To round out the threesome, I went mainstream: I bought the import version of the Strokes CD, hype notwithstanding. So what about all the hot air? The songs sound plenty good, if you ask me.

The new Steve Earle hits the street next week, so that means I’ll make another trip to the record store in the next few days. To whet my appetite, music critic Robert Christgau wrote a column about the CD in the latest Village Voice:

What has been the chief domestic casualty of this war on terrorism that keeps changing its spots? The Bill of Rights as exemplified by political dissent, most believe. How to fight back? Exercise the right to dissent. That’s the joy of this record, which . . . gives off a sense of freedom and defiance that’s rock and roll, not protest music. This artistic effect is made possible in part by all the play Earle has relinquished — by what might be construed as his ultimate political ineffectiveness. The Rising [by Bruce Springsteen] is dragged down, with a few magnificent exceptions, by the overburdened emotions and conceptual commonplaces of the great audience that inspired it. Jerusalem travels light and gets where it’s going.

Sounds like a winner. After buying that, though, I’ll have to go rootsy again and fetch the Ralph Stanley bluegrass record. I live down South, after all — if I want one iota of a political future down here, the New York Times tells me, I’d better keep my country bonafides polished up.

[Village Voice link courtesy of Brian Linse.]

Speaking of Southern Democrats: Don’t even think about cajoling me into taking up NASCAR, people. Every man’s got his limits. That’s a few parsecs past mine. =,

Evening Update

After work, I dropped by the Atlanta blogger meetup in Little Five Points on a lark, and had a pretty good time. Only four of us were there, but we ended up talking for a couple of hours about all sorts of fun stuff: the joy of TiVo, the SxSW interactive festivals, wish lists, blogging for profit, the warblogger/tech blogger divide — you name it. If tonight was any indication, these meetups are definitely worth spending some time to check out.

Cynthia Loses It

Breaking news from Max Sawicky, kung-fu economist extraordinaire: at a speech last weekend at the Congressional Black Caucus annual conference, Cynthia McKinney finally, demonstrably, took leave of her senses. Bathing in the glow of her brave stance against — what was it? Oh, yes — deliberately allowing terrorist mass killings to happen in order to let family profit, the deposed congresswoman told the audience about:

• the conspiracy linking the deaths of the Kennedys and Martin Luther King, Jr.;
• the “mortal blow” her defeat dealt to “the future of independent black leadership”; and
• how vindicated she feels about asking the question “[w]hat did the Bush Administration know, and when did it know it?”

This is how she plans to get elected president? Good luck. As Max put it, “[a]fter this week’s swan song, she’s going to have to be born again to rebuild her reputation.”

F-F-F-Foolin’

Sage words from the President today on the need to train a watchful eye on Iraq: “There’s an old saying in Tennessee.  I know it’s in Texas, probably in Tennessee.  It says fool me once . . . shame on . . . uh . . . shame on . . . you. . . . Fool me . . . can’t get fooled again.”

I want to do a favor for the country and the president. I want to get Bush more into reading books, and I want to spare us the flush of embarrassment that hits us every time Bush does yet another hatchet job on the English language.

In short, I want a win-win solution here. I want to buy the president one of these.

The collection fund starts tomorrow. Anyone with me?

Note: You can hear an audio clip of the president’s latest malaprop here, courtesy of Media Whores Online.

Peace Breaking Out All Over

In a development at the other end of the Axis of Evil, Yet-Not-Quite-So-Threatening-As-It-Looked-A-Few-Months-Back, North Korea has struck up a rapprochement with the Japanese government, confessing to the kidnapping of 12 Japanese nationals and signing deals that lay the groundwork for billions of dollars in reparations to North Korea for Japan’s wartime occupation. [The kidnappings are absolutely contemptible, and should be investigated and condemned.] In return, North Korea agreed to terminate its ballistic missile testing program — the existence of which, as you might recall, the Bush adminstration said proved the need for national missile defense.

That’s two down in a week. Iran, got anything interesting to say today?

Bush, Rove: “What Do We Do Now?”

The Daily Kos has the definitive take on what happens now that Saddam has pulled the rug out from under the Bush war party:

From a campaign standpoint, Iraq is a dead issue. Bush could’ve declared victory and embraced Iraq’s offer with a variation of Reagan’s “trust but verify”. Instead, the UN (and even Democrats) can take credit for averting war, while the nation and its press turn their attention back to Enron, 401(k)s, ballooning deficits and rising unemployment.

As if to drive the point home, Senate majority leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) has done a volte-face on the timetable for an Iraq debate:

In Washington today, Vice President Dick Cheney lobbied Congress for swift action on a resolution authorizing force against Iraq, and the Senate Democratic leader, Tom Daschle, who had earlier said a debate might take a long time, predicted a vote “well before the election.” Asked why, Mr. Daschle said that the administration had done much of what Democrats wanted, by going to the United Nations and consulting Congress, and that “now we are reciprocating.”

Heh. There you go, Mr. President. Now, what were you saying about corporate excesses?

Georgia Politics Roundup

I need to get y’all caught up on Georgia politics, don’t I? Well, since I lost the script last Wednesday:

• Political novice and card-carrying Sons of Confederate Veterans member John Noel, 31, beat the ur-Cynthia — Billy McKinney — in a primary runoff for the state House of Representatives seat he’s held for 30 years. When asked, the elder McKinney blamed blacks for staying home in droves, and everybody else for voting for a “Klansman.”
• His daughter blames the Democrats, and spends her time these days musing about running for president on the Green Party ticket. It wouldn’t be the first time a politician failed upward, of course. How do I know? Check Harken Energy’s stock price.
• GOP gubernatorial nominee Sonny Perdue preaches about self reliance and cutting “unnecessary bureaucracy,” but longtime political observer Bill Shipp tells us that Perdue and family — including his late father — took in nearly $280,000 in farm subsidies between 1996 and 2001, enough money to put him in the top fifth of subsidy recipients. Property taxes on his Houston County farm haven’t risen a cent in ten years, and he owes Peach and Gordon counties thousands of dollars in back taxes dating back to 1997. Those pesky facts, always getting in the way . . .
• But wait, there’s more: hints from the National Rifle Association have Perdue losing the gun lobby’s endorsement to incumbent Roy Barnes, who earned its blessing in 1998. The GOP challenger has a plan, though: hey, governor, let’s duel!

  According to the Associated Press, Perdue sent a note to the Barnes yesterday challenging the governor to a clay pigeon shoot-off, with he who cracks the most clay taking home the NRA endorsement. In comments to the press, Perdue urged the NRA to “choose wisely” before endorsing Barnes a second time around.

  The governor’s campaign office, oddly enough, has yet to issue a response.

. . . and the Cookie Monster, Too

If cartoonist Mike Luckovich has it right, the Feds have found yet more Al Qaida:

Should I Stay or Should I Go?

It had been a while since my last trip, but I’ve finally rested up from spending the weekend in Washington. As always, I had a good time.

And that’s the problem.

When I ditched the law firm in Chicago, I thought I’d spend a couple of weeks airing out, then hop right up to Washington. I had an offer from a cool company an old friend set me up with, friends galore to get back to — all was right with the world. I got a case of butterflies, though, about whether quitting private practice was the right decision.

That was two and a half years ago, and I’ve gotten way more comfortable with the choice I made. Thing is, though, I’m nowhere near Washington. Every time I go there, I get seriously reflective — I think about everything from goofing around in Adams Morgan to reading the Post on the Metro, dabbling in Virginia politics, walking around Old Town, noshing at Chesapeake Bagel . . . all the stuff I used to do more often. It’s like feeling homesick — ‘cept I’m homesick for a place I’ve never lived. =,

I’m fine living down South, but my home’s in Alabama, not Atlanta. The town has lots to offer, but it isn’t where I grew up. Don’t get me wrong — I work with a great outfit, and I don’t mind having the family around. Whenever I fly back here, though, I keep waiting for that fuzzy sensation you get when you’re heading home. It never comes.

Last month at Denise Majette’s victory party, the thought occured to me that I might want to follow her to Washington. She’ll need a staff, after all. I’ve got the phone number of one her strategists sitting in my inbox. Come tomorrow, I think I’ll call it.

No Need to Feel Bummed

The Daily Mail [London]: “Why your bum looks big in this.” What gives Jennifer Lopez her well-covered assets? According to researchers, it’s all in the genes. The chief study had to do with sheep, but according to the article, “far from worrying about the size of their bottoms, women with the curvaceous shape of a Marilyn Monroe or Jennifer Lopez should be aware that a fuller derriere is often a sign of good health. A recently completed 25-year study of women showed those with large bottoms were less likely to suffer heart attacks, diabetes or cardiovascular disease.”

In other news, at a Seattle press conference today, Sir Mix-a-Lot announced plans to relaunch his career with a series of health-oriented public service announcements. =,

Are You Ready for Some Football? Mais Non!

This might seem strange in the land of soccer moms and Brandi Chastain, but The New York Times reports today that the French are about as perplexed at girls’ soccer as we Statesiders are about Jerry Lewis. Only one in 25 kids who play on organized teams in France are girls, and “[t]he stigma they suffer,” the paper reports, “often makes them feel they have to keep it a secret.”

Wait — is this the same France that forces political parties to guarantee that half of their candidates for local, legislative or European posts are women? The mind reels at the disconnect — a country with rigid gender quotas for a matter as basic as political representation can’t loosen up enough to handle the thought of girls wearing cleats.

Call America imperfect, but it’s managed to introduce women to team sports without going through a full-fledged societal collapse. Heck, women’s sports haven’t just survived, they’ve thrived — most bellyaching these days comes from men’s teams in lesser sports who’ve been run over by the Title IX onslaught.

At the same time — sacre bleu! — we’ve managed to find some potent female political talent without passing a law. In my town, Atlanta, women run the show, serving as mayor and city council president. Up in Washington, meanwhile, electing women has all but become a cottage industry — Emily’s List, a group dedicated to putting women in office, has managed in a few short years to turn itself into one of the most feared political action committees in the land. France? It once had a woman prime minister, Edith Cresson — but she got herself fired in ten months, then managed to bring down the entire European Commission when she took her act to Brussels.

Comical, but quintessentially French. While Americans went after gender inequality on the playing fields, French officialdom made war on gender inequality in the places of state. In a place where the most sought after college admission letter comes from a school for civil servants, and where even today, officials can kick up a dust storm over the notion of selling of a textbook and dictionary company to foreign interests — that probably makes sense. But that sort of top-down government management, or dirigisme, hardly worked wonders for French industry. Why expect better results here?

Memo to France: relax about political quotas, and concentrate on helping young French women get a chance to kick a football before the age of 13. Plant ideas with them when they’re young, and there’s no telling how far the girls might go.

Note: Whatever we do, though, we have to keep quiet about women’s football and boxing. Methinks the French can’t handle that yet.