Category Archives: Politics: US

Glenn Greenwald, who seems from his writing to be both shrewd and decent, argues that at present there is no alternative to the politics of the lowest common denominator:

as the MoveOn vote demonstrated, we have the opposite of a healthy political system, and it is thus far preferable — for reasons I I set forth here — to ensure that a corrupt standard is applied equally rather than allow it to be applied by one political faction against another. Taking the corrupt political tactics wielded by the war-hungry Right and applying those same tactics to them (rather than ineffectively protesting the unfairness of the tactics) is the only way to ensure they cease.

Please persuade me he's not right.

George Bush the Texan is 'scared of horses'

President Bush may like to be seen as a swaggering tough guy with a penchant for manly outdoor pursuits, but in a new book one of his closest allies has said he is afraid of horses.

Vicente Fox, the former president of Mexico, derided his political friend as a “windshield cowboy” – a cowboy who prefers to drive – and “the cockiest guy I have ever met in my life”.

He recalled a meeting in Mexico shortly after both men had been elected when Mr Fox offered Mr Bush a ride on a “big palomino” horse.

Mr Fox, who left office in December, recalled Mr Bush “backing away” from the animal.

''A horse lover can always tell when others don't share our passion,” he said, according to the Washington Post.

Mr Bush has spoken of his fondness for shooting doves and cutting brush on his Crawford ranch in Texas, which he bought in 1999.

The property reportedly has no horses and only five cattle.

These two blog posts about the AEI,

• Steve Clemons, Norman Ornstein's AEI/Neocon Problem
• Mark Schmitt's My Life Among the Neo-Cons

are really interesting, and the howls in the comments to them are even more so.

Both are mainstream partial defenses of the AEI-as-it-was (an anti-Brookings) and to a very much more limited extent as it is — a think tank in the tank to donors, overrun with neo-con supports of draconian social policies and extremist militarist aggression eerily reminiscent of the Imperial Japanese Navy General Staff, which nonetheless remains a home to a few policy people who don't live on a full-time diet of Kool-Aid.

In the comments, some people agree that the AEI deserves props for lingering broad-mindedness (and the lingerers don't deserve guilt by association); others say that conditions have reached a point where guilt by association is appropriate; still others attack the very idea of policy 'analysis' that isn't willing or able to subject itself to peer review, there's debate as to whether a think-tank is more effective if it's centrist and nuanced, or extreme and rabid, and so on …. All in all, something to read.

In We Are All Uninsured Now the Mahablog pithily describes the sorry state of current health care politics.

Digby, Hail Caesar.