Andrew Sullivan's Blog, page 2764

Palin Gets Factor'd Again

by Chris Bodenner

First on BP, now immigration reform. But despite the heat O'Reilly puts on Palin, he essentially walks her through interview, providing talking points in the form of leading questions. For instance:

BO: Alright, so no amnesty. But what do you do with these folks
you make them register with the federal government? Do you tell
they have 60 days to get out of here before we put you in jail? What
you do with them?

SP: Do … do we make them register with the federal...

Anchorage after Palin

by Dave Weigel

ANCHORAGE - In the words of one of the great mid-1990s indie movie characters: I wasn't even supposed to be here today. Alaska Airlines gave me what I thought was an obscenely good deal to visit the Aleutian Islands -- a plane left Washington, D.C. at 8 a.m. Sunday, and a third plane would get me to Dutch Harbor, AK by 10:30 p.m. eastern time. Important information was not known to me when I booked this. Dutch Harbor flights are canceled all the time. The landing strip down...

How Big A Threat Are Failed States?

by Patrick Appel

Paul Staniland probes the "link between state weakness/failure and US security interests." Bottom line:

The major threats to US interests are...primarily derived from
regimes that view the US as its enemy – not regimes too weak to control
their territory.

Security interest - Security - Business - Consultants - General and Freelance

Guest-blogging again, for the first time

by Dave Weigel

I'm Dave Weigel and a few weeks ago I would have written a different -- longer, probably -- introduction to my guest posts. But I have a happy history with this blog. Back in the summer of 2006 Andrew graciously asked me to help guest blog for him while he took  a week off. This was, to my surprise, a news story. (For some reason people like to write articles about bloggers. It seems rather silly to me. Why not just tweet?)

At the time, I was an assistant editor of Reason...

Africa FTW

by Chris Bodenner

Dayo Olopade reflects of the real winner of the 2010 Word Cup:

For one month of one South African winter, the tournament brought aninternational celebration to a continent more widely known formalnourished bodies, grandstanding leaders and the ravages of AIDS.Rather than indigence, the world saw balls sailing into the net, crisptackles, sweat. Ten gleaming stadiums and the collective warmth of 50million South Africans offered thousands of football pilgrims the timeof their...

How We Got Here

by David Frum

Perhaps a word ofbackground about what I'm doing here in these unexpected surroundings. Andrewand I have been acquainted since the mid-1980s, when he was a Harvard graduatestudent and I was enrolled in the law school. I led a section of the lateJudith Shklar's class in the Government department. The section met in aclassroom that was used by a section led by Andrew that ended immediatelybefore. All semester I wiped his handwriting off the blackboard, but I don'tthink we ever...

What A Kidney Is Worth

by Patrick Appel

Harold Gershowitz and Amy Gershowitz Lask, a kidney recipient and an uncompensated kidney donor,  desperately want to reform our organ donation system:

The math is simple. In a country the size of the United States, apayment, either direct (cash, vouchers, or tax credits) or indirect(tuition, charitable donations, etc.) of, say, $20,000 to kidney donorswould probably produce enough donated kidneys each year to eliminate ordrastically reduce the backlog of approximately 83,000...

San Francisco's Hamster Crusade

by Chris Bodenner

The city could become the first to ban the sale of all pets (except fish):

The idea originated about two years ago, when the commission beganlooking into a ban on dog and cat sales as a way to discourage puppyand kitten mills. But the city's animal control staff said that excesspuppies and kittens are not the problem at the city shelter, thanks tothe plethora of rescue groups. In any case, only one or two pet storesin San Francisco sell dogs and cats. The rest stick to...

How Much Do Candidates Matter?

by Patrick Appel

Bernstein fears that we are about to find out:

Candidates aren't completely irrelevant.  The statistical models
capture everything that happens (and don't claim to); it's
very possible that a good candidate could do a bit better than a
one.  But absent something spectacular, that's apt to be in the
of a percentage point or two.

Now, the one thing to add to this, and getting back to Palin, is thatso far all the major party nominees -- at least in the...

The Lobby Strikes Back

by David Frum

Behold the insidious reach
of the Israel lobby. Andrew Sullivan takes a holiday and he invites me of all
people to join Dave Weigel as a guest bloggers. I'll be cross-posting all this
week here at the Daily Dish and at my own site, FrumForum.com.

Now - time to rethink the
Middle East!

We'll start with the
Economist's cringing obituary of the Lebanese Shia cleric, Grand Ayatollah Muhammad Fadlallah:

"Once damnedby Westerners as a mentor to hostage-takers and suicide-bombers, he was...