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Archive: Jan 2009

Bret Baier: Why he sucks

Howard Kurtz of the Washington Post had a fawning story today about Bret Baier, who has just replaced Britt Hume as the head of Fox’s Washington newscast. “Hume was a…

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Herrick for Twelfth Night

Now, now the mirth comes, With the cake full of plums, Where Bean’s the king of the sport here; Besides we must know, The pea also Must revel, as queen,…

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Weekly Review

Israel extended its occupation of the Gaza strip, sending in ground forces and cutting the territory in two. Hamas fired 32 missiles at Israel. The Palestinian health ministry reported that…

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More Times-Speak

Here’s the New York Times’s Eric Lichtblau reporting today on the trio of superlative appointments announced for the Justice Department today: David Ogden to be Deputy Attorney General, Elena Kagan…

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The Gaza Fallout

From Marc Lynch: However this round of violence ends — and it’s hard to see any scenario in which it produces remotely positive results for anyone involved — the outcome…

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Civilian To Head CIA

Michael Hayden will not be kept on at CIA, which, according to a source I spoke to over the weekend, will come as a relief to many at the agency.…

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Language, Behavior, History

Imaginative literature traffics in selves. The statement can be read variously. The selves can be the creatures in the writing—narrators and characters who present or appear in a novel or…

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Bookmark This

Foreign Policy has launched its newly revamped website, which has lots of great features, including two of my favorite bloggers: Laura Rozen on national security and foreign policy, and Marc…

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The Lawless World of John Yoo

John Yoo, still (amazingly) a law professor at the University of California at Berkeley, teams up with unconfirmed Bush U.N. ambassador John Bolton (last seen advocating a pre-emptive war against…

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Six Questions for Louis Fisher, Author of The Constitution and 9/11

The Bush Administration has labored to convince the American public that the imperial powers it assumed in the wake of 9/11 are consistent with historical precedent, and in so doing…

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Will Hayden Stay at CIA?

Barack Obama still hasn’t gotten around to naming his CIA director, and there’s still talk that he might retain Michael Hayden. A former senior CIA official I spoke with thinks…

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Why Richardson Withdrew: Sí Se Puede

It’s not pretty. From the Washington Post: A grand jury in Albuquerque is looking into whether CDR Financial Products received a contract with the New Mexico Finance Authority because of…

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L’Arte del Violino

Here is some music for an early January afternoon. The settecento is filled with wonderful violin music, but the real gem of the epoch is Pietro Antonio Locatelli’s L’arte del…

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Why Israel Attacked

From Augustus Richard Norton and Sara Roy: Hamas’ strategic miscalculation in rejecting an extension to a six-month truce with Israel was a gift on a “golden platter” to Israel, as…

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The Smaller-than-life President?

In the last four years of the Bush administration, Karl Rove and his minions labored hard to sell Bush to Americans as a modern Lincoln, leading the country to greatness…

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Herbert’s Man

Man is all symmetrie, Full of proportions, one limbe to another, And all to all the world besides: Each part may call the farthest, brother: And head with foot hath…

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Bush a “Total Failure” Says Former Iraqi PM

Iraq’s former prime minister Iyad Allawi gave a wide-ranging interview to Asharq al-Awsat in which he discusses Bush and his project in Iraq. Allawi was hand-picked by Bush to head…

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Cusanus and Van Eyck: The Eye Behind the Mirror

Beryllus lapis est lucidus, albus et transparens. Cui datur forma concava pariter et convexa, et per ipsum, videns attingit prius invisible. Intellectualibus oculis si intellectualis beryllus, qui formam habeat maximam…

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Justice for Tom DeLay?

In theory, our legal system affords equal access to justice. But, as George Orwell offers in Animal Farm, some of us are more equal than others, and Tom DeLay is,…

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None Dare Call it Stupidity

CNN reports that a Muslim family is hustled off a plane after some morons misunderstand their conversation. (For the film version of this incident, check out Harold and Kumar Escape…

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New Year’s Read: A Whole Variegated Chorus of Yells

With all the dark talk this week about the falsity and mediocrity of memoir, it seems only fair to celebrate three bright examples of memoir at its best. Neither of…

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Wilkerson on the Cheney Shogunate

Colin Powell’s chief of staff, Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, previously claimed that there was a “secret government” inside the Bush Administration. He pointed to Dick Cheney as the man who made…

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The Insider’s Path to Bush Pardons

Charlie Savage reports on how you get a pardon from George W. Bush. The Justice Department’s website suggests that you fill out some paperwork and file it with the Justice…

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Our Man in Kabul

From the New York Times: Kept afloat by billions of dollars in American and other foreign aid, the government of Afghanistan is shot through with corruption and graft. From the…

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A New Year’s Concert

One opera seems perfect for this New Year’s Day. It portrays a triumph over tyrannical abuse and an affirmation of the dignity and worth of human beings against a backdrop…

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