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Coloring outside the lines

The candidacy of Darcy Burner gives me a lot of hope.  When you live in a state where your senators are named Kyl and McCain, you look beyond the borders for opportunities to help bring about change....

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Ideas that need to be circulated more widely

Praising Glenn Greenwald to Kos readers probably sounds like preaching to the converted.  Some Greenwald fans may hesitate to dive into A Tragic Legacy: How a Good vs. Evil Mentality Destroyed the Bush...

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Kathleen Parker and the fountainhead of international wisdom

A journalism prof of mine, way way back in Boys on the Bus days, said you should never write a letter to an editor.  "You’re just playing into their hands."   As the news media struggles to come to...

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AZ state hack sticks it to "party of anarchy, flag-burning"

Even for Arizona, this is a pretty shocking bit of political hackery.

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Kids today, part XXXIV

This is an honest-to-God quote from the newsletter of the pre-K-5th grade school my son goes to.  

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'I don't want to hear about al-Qaeda anymore': Ashcroft, July 2001

A review of The Commission by Philip Shenon. NY/Boston: Hachette Book Group/Twelve, 457 pp., $27. "I don't want you to ever talk to me about al-Qaeda, about those threats.  I don't want to hear about...

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Updating 'I don't want to hear about al-Qaeda anymore'

Glenn Greenwald has been on the story about Mukasey's apparently fabricated anecdote.  

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Ich bin ein Nixonlander, and so are you

These cherry-picked bullet points are not intended as a substitute for actually reading Nixonland: The Rise of a President and the Fracturing of America by Rick Perlstein.  

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Impeachment: Will You Tolerate This?

Understood:  Not everybody here sees eye to eye on this issue.  (You mean we're not the Borg after all?) I have pretty strong feelings on impeachment myself.  When Congressman Robert Wexler (D-FL19)...

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Notes Toward a Deconstruction of Ayn Rand

My friends know I'm obsessed with Ayn Rand, who for better or worse I’ve got to own up to as an influence.  For a long time I've been wanting to write about that influence.   I thought I would use...

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I Took the Ed Sullivan/Beatles challenge...

...and lived to tell about it. In a post about Nixonland, Tristero suggested that to really understand that era, you need to watch the DVDs of the Beatles' appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show under...

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Scalia: Not entirely accurate

Some of us are still naive enough to be surprised by things like this.  Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia apparently uses faulty information in his opinions.

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Shhh... be very quiet; we're Republicans...

En Tequila Es Verdad got an email from Washington State Democrats (h/t frostokovich): You may have heard that [gubernatorial candidate Dino] Rossi and 27 other Republican candidates in our state will...

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'A cuckoo clock in Hell': A brief note about Kurt Vonnegut

For some reason -- maybe because it's summer in Arizona; maybe because I'm having a mini-midlife crisis -- I'm re-reading a lot of books I liked in high school and freshman college. This includes the...

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What should I ask Carville/Matalin?

So I have a chance to hear James Carville and Mary Matalin speak next week. Before the Phoenix Chamber of Commerce, no less.  

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Followup:  What should I ask Carville/Matalin?

As promised: So I had the chance to hear James Carville and Mary Matalin speak.  I'd asked Kossacks for question suggestions.  Thanks again to everybody who posted. Sadly ... the Q&A was a bust....

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Raids on (suspected) protesters: This is not America

They will get away with it.   Glenn Greenwald has a couple of important reports up on Salon about massive police raids on -- well, not just protesters, but people only suspected of merely planning...

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So I got one of those 'Obama is a Muslim' emails

It was forwarded to me about a week ago by a left-leaning friend under a can-you-believe-this-nonsense cover note.   I was going to ignore it, but suddenly it seems that asking legitimate questions...

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McCain or 'Sweeney Todd': Which is scarier?

A friend from Pennsylvania send me the following email.  I liked it a lot.  I suggested she start a diary here.  Instead, she gave me permission to post it.  So let's give her a big welcome and see if...

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Eddie Haskell: Republican Role Model

After I was making some calls for Obama this afternoon (trying to set an example, folks), it hit me.  Maybe it's not an original thought, but it explains a lot of downright bizarre behavior we've been...

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Requiem for a well digger

A close relative got spammed with the Cory the Digger email, which has already been dealt with rather effectively on Kos. She asked me if I could rebut, which I did (below). Habits die hard. I told my...

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President-elect Obama: Please do a reverse Ashcroft

And what do I mean by that?   Well, when George W. Bush appointed John Ashcroft as Attorney General, it was insulting on several levels. After all, George W. Bush was not really elected President....

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Seeking the wisdom of Kossacks on countering right-wing extremism

Gotta be something to all that Malcolm Gladwell/James Surowiecki/Freakonomics stuff, right? In a couple of weeks I'm going to have the chance to play host to some visitors from Germany. I've been asked...

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Movie: 'The Take' by Avi Lewis and Naomi Klein

Reposted from my LiveJournal, Social Capitalism: That's OK, isn't it?

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"Before the Storm": Wingnuts then and now

Rick Perlstein’s last book, Nixonland: The Rise of a President and the Fracturing of America, got mostly rave reviews, including mine. I’ve only recommended it repeatedly to every sentient being I’ve...

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My visit to my congressman's office

So I decided I had to do something about healthcare besides tweet really hard about it. I'd dropped by my congressman's office before (Ed Pastor, D, AZ-4 -- the Fighting Fourth!). It was during a...

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Cold War movies

(Cross-posted from Social Capitalism.) Reading Rick Perlstein's book about the 1964 presidential campaign, Before the Storm, sent me to Netflix for a repeat viewing of Dr. Strangelove, or How I Learned...

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The Paranoid Style and What It's Costing Us

One of the most profound political statements of the past decade was written by--give the gasbag his due--Pat Buchanan: ...Democrats have been psychologically damaged by 60 years of GOP attacks on them...

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What I saw of today's anti-Arpaio, pro-reform demonstration in Phoenix

Not to Norman Mailer anybody, but I'd never been to a demonstration this big. The newspaper estimate was 10,000 -- or, to employ the formula Glenn Beck uses for groups he likes, 10 million. So I'm...

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What would YOU do with a Republican opinion survey?

Cross posted from Social Capitalism, where some images reside. Even though I've given up ragging on Republicans for Lent, I can't resist this one. Today in the mail I got a "Republican Strategy Survey"...

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Empire of the Census: In Which Once Again I Bear Witness to History

Many people are interested in the 2010 U.S. Census. Therefore, I thought it might be worth recording what I've seen of it so far. For the last couple of months, I worked the Saturday 6:30 a.m.-3 p.m....

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Census Working Overtime: More of What I Saw of the Great Decennial Headcount

While you read this account of working life, why not open another Firefox tab and enjoy some great more-or-less-on-topic tunes? "Senses Working Overtime" by XTC "Secretarial" by A.C. Newman "Dear...

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Explaining Rand Paul: A recovered libertarian gives it a try

I’m familiar with some of Rand Paul’s arguments against the Civil Rights Act of 1964, because I’ve used them myself, years ago, when I was even younger than he is now. A lot of people are asking...

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Dude, you 'Lost' me (with finale spoilers)

Did I mention there will be spoilers? So no moaning, OK? Musical accompaniment to this post might include a song Sawyer listened to, one that Juliette listened to, and exactly the track you want your...

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My missing Census anecdote, and what I learned

Suggested track to read this entry by: "Industrial Disease" by Dire Straits. Alternative suggested track: Steve Goodman's "The Twentieth Century Is Almost Over" by the Highwaymen. Here's a lost...

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Chatting with NPR about Mara Liasson's possible conflict of interest

It's always been my impression that journalists should avoid covering stories in which they have an interest -- even the hint of a conflict of interest. At the very least, we should expect a "full...

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I Was a Teenage Randroid

Yesterday I got an email from Kos asking if I’d ever been a conservative, and if so, would I please blog about it?I don’t have much to add to what I wrote a while back:Notes Toward a Deconstruction of...

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