Happy Birthday to Gavin McLeod, 82.
Some good stuff:
1. Kevin Drum on outrages.
2. Worth reading: Ross Douthat on Rand Paul's foreign policy.
3. Joe White on sequestration and how we got here.
4. And Brad DeLong on Amity Shlaes and Calvin Coolidge. It's a good thing he stopped reading before he got to the point where she blames FDR for the Depression. Not for prolonging it. Just for the Depression.
Oy, Douhat.....
ReplyDeleteThe existence of a politician in a party that espouses a certain view does not equal that party entertaining that argument within it. American parties don't have universal control over their nomination processes.
Yes, it is theoretically possible that Rand Paul could make arguments that could win over some in the GOP base and move the party towards his position. However, I'm a little skeptical of this: his dad tilted at that windmill from a much larger platform (at least, over the last 6 years), and look how far that got the party.
Now, there really and truly are tea partiers who agree with the Pauls. But, they're largely drowned out by the "kill em all" crowd.
Thanks for the DeLong link. The article he had just before the one you cite is "American Conservatism’s Crisis of Ideas," and it's also absolutely super.
ReplyDeleteTime Travel!
ReplyDelete