Monday's News

Oh, lots of stuff out today, none of it extremely interesting. Sorry for the weekend absense, I was out of town.

George Will gets intellectual on Howard Dean in the Washington Post today.

Will says, "[Dean] is the candidate of America's professoriate and others whose strongest passion is as much aesthetic as political -- intellectual contempt for George W. Bush. But Dean's bantam-rooster pugnacity is not unlike Bush's shoulders-squared jauntiness, which critics consider an enraging swagger. Bush's imperturbable certitude infuriates Dean's supporters because they believe it arises not from reflection but from reflex. Actually, Dean really resembles his supporters' idea of Bush."

This is valid. Still, I think there is some intellectual activity occuring in the balding brain of Howard Dean. And a thought-to-thought comparison between the Dr/Gov and our sitting president would likely reveal more and better quality thoughts within the Dr/Gov's head. But that's all theoretical.

The Post also talks about the emerging Dean "Southern Strategy" which apparently is to call Republicans divisive (on race, gender, religion, etc., etc.) and then talk non-stop about, oh, what's the word.... oh yes, issues. Education. Healthcare. Can this work in the south?

As a southerner, let me express my skepticism, but let me also say it's a good start if the Dems are to become (in Zell Miller's now famous parlance) a national party again.

In the New York Times, Bob Herbert editorializes on Medicare reform, calling the package to be signed by President Bush today, "the first cold drafts of bitter reality to the G.O.P.'s long dream of dismantling Medicare as we've known it."

Is this accurate? I'm having trouble believing at this point that the Republican party actually stands for anything at all. I thought they were the party of fiscal responsibility and playing by the rules, but the activities of the last three years and especially the last three weeks have left me deeply skeptical about assertions by Paul Krugman and others that there is a larger ideological agenda at work. I think the larger ideological agenda involves November 2004 and ends there, and that most Republicans, like most Democrats, will say and do anything to aquire and retain power, deficits be damned.

The Times also has a piece on Joe Lieberman, who is running for president (you may have heard something about this at some point, but then again it appears not to have registered with very many people).

Basically a bio piece, it of course paints a pretty nice picture of someone whom everyone seems to agree is a very good person. Here's one quote that I find terribly interesting given our current leadership: "He was a reader of history. The stories that impressed him most were the stories of leaders like Winston Churchill, who, as he put it recently, 'saw the evil of fascism and Nazism and rallied the world to stop it,' and Harry S. Truman, 'who saw the outbreak of Communism for what it was and was instrumental in creating NATO and keeping America strong to push back Communism.'"

What's that? Leader rally the world to stop evil? That's so, like, old school, Joe. Everybody knows that Leaders stop evil singlehandedly and often beat the crap out of the their friends just to prove how bad ass they are. Oh well, don't worry folks. It's not as though Joe Lieberman with his internationalist ways is likely to be president any time soon, but he is, it turns out, running.

Ah, Thomas Friedman of the New York Times. A liberal who sees in George W. Bush a lot to (kind of) like. I really enjoy reading Friedman because he is ardently not a Bush hater, so his analysis is refreshingly clear-minded. He has applauded "Bush's liberal war" to free the Iraqis from Saddam-era conditions and he frequently makes a good case for lightening up on the President.
This piece continues Friedman's analysis of Bush as a president who is increasingly revolutionary and liberal in his foreign policy stances. I usually hope that Friedman is right, and I almost always think that Friedman's is a voice that should be given greater prominence. He's a smart writer with a real fairness streak in his commentary.