The Republican Youtube Debate

Question: How would you improve the image of America in the Muslim world?

Rudy Giuliani: Stay on offense.

John McCain: Continue the surge.

Duncan Hunter: I will never apologize for America.

And there you have it.

Question: Is waterboarding torture?

Romney: It's not my place to say. I'm against torture. But I think what happened to Khalid Sheik Muhammad should continue to happen.

McCain: I don't know how anyone could favor torture like waterboarding. [Good for McCain--ed.]

Question: What commitment will you make to the Iraqi people?

Ron Paul: The best thing we can do for the Iraqis is to give them their country back?... What we achieved in peace [vis-a-vis Vietnam] was unachievable in 20 years of French and American war? [Boos, hisses follow]

McCain: We never lost a battle in Vietnam. We lost because American public opinion made victory impossible. So, he's against torture but for stab-in-the-back mythology.

Question: Rudy Giuliani, is it true that your entire campaign is based on saying "September 11" over and over again?

Giuliani: Not at all. For example, I worked in the Reagan Justice Department to enforce an obscene double-standard viz. Cuban and Hatian immigration. [Not quite how he phrased it, and the rest of the answer wasn't bad, but that is, in fact, what he was claiming--ed.]

Question: I'm a retired special forces general. And I'm gay. Why do you think soldiers aren't professional enough to serve with gay men and women?

Hunter: You can't use Israel or Britain as an example, because Americans are conservative. Conservatives can't serve with gays because gays make them uncomfortable.

Romney [after Anderson Cooper pointed out that Romney once said he looked forward to the day when gays could serve openly]: Now is not that time. Because we're at war.

McCain: DADT works.

Question: What does the Confederate flag represent to you?

Romney [his circuits visibly frying]: I don't like John Edwards.

Remember Dennis Miller?

I do. Looks like Dan was prescient. DM has a show on VS. network --- quite a career path --- where he does standup about sports. I caught one joke: "It looks like Barry Bonds is going to prison. No word yet about whether he'll be violated in his cell as a Pirate or a Giant."

Eh, it's okay, but I think we need to hear more about how Gerhard Schröder makes Ramsay Macdonald look like Oliver Cromwell.

Announcements, Announcements

Well, I got a paid gig writing for jewcy.com's group politics blog, The Cabal. My first post is here (see if you can spot the homage to the actual Rod). Hopefully this will spur me to produce more content here (which isn't really saying much).

Debate Fallout

Well, I'm somewhat surprised and very pleased to see the CW congealing around Tuesday's debate that, whoever won, Hillary Clinton definitely lost. She comes in for a gentle ribbing from Chris Dodd here, and a sharp attack from John Edwards here (politics of parsing indeed!). At the same time, Barack Obama responds to one of the Clinton campaign's least attractive features (among many contenders), namely its woe-is-me brand of feminism, here. [Isn't some opposition to Hillary rooted in misogyny?--ed. Sure. And Clinton and her retainers' tactic of reducing all criticism of her to expressions of latent misogyny is all the more repugnant.]

Observing all this, Andrew Sullivan comments: "This race is shifting a little, isn't it?" In the beltway, undoubtedly, it is. Elsewhere, I'm far from optimistic. Since Democratic primary voters somehow have found Clinton's position(s) on the war not only not disqualifying, but indeed unobjectionable thus far, and assuming the gender-baiting nonsense actually works with them, she will be very tough to beat.