Politics
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A Second Contract with America
From Chris Floyd's post "Clowntime Is Over": Some of us have been writing for years about Bush's piecemeal assumption of dictatorial powers. We have watched in rage and amazement as the Establishment meekly accepted Bush's repeated, brutal insults to democracy. Time and again, I've quoted the words of the Emperor Tiberius, after the lackeys of
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Warrantless Wiretaps
I haven’t commented much about the Cheney/Bush torture policy, and now this business about the wiretaps. All of this is beyond what reasonable people can disagree about. It has come to a point where I find it all but impossible to even engage in conversation with people who would still support this administration. It’s beyond
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Murtha and American Survivor’s Guilt
If you haven't seen it, check out this video clip of Jean Schmidt, the woman who recently just barely beat Paul Hackett, the anti-Bush Iraq War veteran, in his bid for a seat in the House. Essentially she calls John Murtha, a vet from the Korean and Vietnam wars, a coward for his proposal that
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Just Say Anything
I haven't had much to say about the unraveling of the Bush White House. It's amazing to think that just a year ago he was exulting in his recent victory. In many ways I feel sorry for him. He was from the beginning a guy who was in way over his head manipulated by Rove
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I’m Not a Moderate
I'm a radical centrist. Moderates are compassionate listeners and peacemakers, and they look for ways to split the difference between warring factions. That's an important role to play, but it's not taking a stand in what we need to come to understand as the radical center. (I would locate in a place different from where
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The Illusion of Objective Journalism
This from an interview with Larry Beinart, author of Fog Facts: The weakness of objective journalism is that, on principle and on what used to be sound moral principles, it does not make judgments. It says we’re not here to tell you who’s right, who’s wrong. We’re here to report the facts and, like Fox
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Liberal Interventionism & World War IV.
I’ve been meaning to get around to a discussion about the whole idea of liberal interventionism. It’s a subject that is getting some very interesting treatment at TPM Cafe’s America Abroad table. The main question is why were the liberal interventionists so wrong? Why did they think that it was a good idea to support
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West Wing Debate
I didn’t catch all of it, but I found it to be an interesting exercise in which two fictional presidential candidates have the gloves-off debate we all long for, but which never happens because of safety rules the campaigns always insist on. It was a debate essentially between liberalism (Jimmy Smits) and libertarian conservatism (Alan
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Alito Confirmation as a Bellwether
I have not yet formed an opinion one way or another about Alito as a man or a judge. It could be that ultimately the issue for me will not be whether he is fit to sit on the supreme court; he well might be. Rather the issue for me is one of balance, and
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Culture of Deception II
The republican party is currently driven by an alliance of religious-right Pharisees and Jacobin neoconservatives. While there can be some policy overlap between them, they have very different concerns. Their similarity lies in how they are inclined in their different ways toward self-delusion. Both are dangerous when they have power insofar as they live in