The is another essential piece in TAC by W. James Antle III. He asks:  Is the GOP
becoming a single issue party?

The money quote (as Andrew Sullivan calls these things):

Together [Giulian and McCain], they receive majority support among those who plan to vote in a Republican primary next year. Between the two of them, they make virtually the entire conservative domestic agenda—lower taxes, limited government, gun rights, the pro-life cause, and the defense of traditional marriage—negotiable. Yet on one issue, Giuliani and McCain are both unflinchingly orthodox: the war in Iraq. - W. James Antle III

It's an interesting question. If the threat of terrorism seems to recede at all, will the GOP continue to be dominated by the politics of war. It seems inevitable that there will be a hard-core section of GOP voters that adopt a stab-in-the-back narrative when the United States disengages from Iraq. Another part of the GOP constituency will blame Bush's poor leadership saying, "The cause was good." Or in the case of some, "Our ideas were right."

Continetti was essentially correct when he wrote:

The polarization that has characterized American politics since the presidency of Ronald Reagan has extended its reach to foreign affairs. Never have the differences between the two parties on issues of war and peace been so distinct. At no time since World War II has the divergence of partisan support for an ongoing war been as great. Nor have attitudes toward power--its origins, nature, and application--reflected ideological and partisan identification to the extent they do today.- Matthew Continetti

The conservative consensus was originally glued together by anti-communism- but had substantial agreement on domestic policy driving it from election to election. When the Soviet Empire disappeared the conservative movement logically would have focused on domestic issues. 1994 seemed to show that reform of Washington would henceforth be the primary mission of the movement. But with a corruptible GOP leadership that task proved difficult. After all, Washington, unlike Moscow has not been a willing participant in its own transformation. Out of desperation and a quest for an identity the conservative movement may now be defining itself by its pro-active (I would say hyper-active) foreign policy. This despite the fact that the conservatism of the larger movement doesn't necessarily commit itself to any strategy of foreign engagement. It just so happens that conservative voters are naturally drawn to candidates they see as "patriotic" for which "aggressive" is often a shorthand. A "multi-polar" vision of geopolitics will never appeal to these voters.

The only alternative foreign policy rhetoric that resonates with them is, frankly, that America-First type. It's easy to aim this arrow at conflicts that seem to have flimsy humanitarian grounds.The lesson is this: a conservative foreign policy must always be sold as a nationalist foreign policy - one that enhances the security, prosperity and stature of America and its people.

Scott McConnell, Editor of The American Conservative (and my boss), has done the commentary world a favor by writing on the parallels between the American experience in Iraq and the French experience in Algeria. As he notes, far from perfect is illuminating.

What lessons might Americans draw from the Algerian war? They are not obvious. The brutal conflict, which gave rise to an extraordinary memoir literature in French, impinged on France’s national life far more than Iraq has yet touched America. But some common features are clear. The Algerian war was more or less part of our own historic era, influenced by international air travel and mass communications. A Western democracy was facing off against Arab Muslims; terrorism against civilians—first employed by the Arab guerrillas and later by the French far Right—was a central aspect of the war; and the use of torture to root out the terror networks produced a moral upheaval in France. Indeed, the war very nearly cost France its democracy. - Scott McConnell

Curiously, the only two wars with which our commentariat seems familiar are WWII and Vietnam. In the first case America is employed in the noble cause to rid the world of Nazis and the terror of imperial Japan. That's the good war. Vietnam is the war in which Americans, swept up by anti-communism (a dubious motive, it's often implied), involved themselves in a third-world conflict that they did not understand and then worsened their situation by continuing to fight long after the strategic situation revealed that the U.S. could not win. That's the bad war. Those who say the war is good invoke Churchill and Bastogne. Those who say the war is bad name L.B.J. and Tet. My suspicion, and admittedly I am a cynic, is that these wars figure prominently in our commentary not just because they are the two largest wars within historical memory but because our historical knowledge as a people is so thin that the public and our intellectuals can only talk about the wars that are most often portrayed in our popular entertainment. This also explains how the lessons drawn from these conflicts are so simplistic. Every dictator is an intolerable Hitler. Every setback is a new Tet.

But read literature from the American Civil War. It is filled with references to the battles of Antiquity, to Agincourt in the middle ages, to Thermopylae and scores of other conflicts from the Biblical times into their own era. I would propose that by expanding our knowledge of history, we would expand our strategic and moral imagination. As persons we understand ourselves by encountering others. When we engage a personality from another era in a good historical biography our own era's prejudices and perspective are made visible to us, often for the first time. The same is true for nations and history. America's public and intellectual elites do not know history. How can we say we know our enemies or know ourselves. Sun Tzu would be ashamed, no?

Oh- and just so you don't think I'm on my high horse. I like watching Band of Brothers as much as anyone.  

That means baseball and rain and my first layer of sunburn. Every spring the women take my breath away. Where were they all winter? Were the sweater so chunky that I forgot the shape of a woman?  The sudden appearance of dew kissed decolletage has sent most of my friends reeling. We don't recover ourselves until the fourth of July. This is my first full summer away from New York - and so that is just an excuse to link to this classic from Manhattan Transfer

Opera in the park, with bits of cheese and chilled Sancerre in plastic cups. Lingering lunches in shaded sidewalk bistros. Rooftop parties overserving beer out of garbage cans filled with ice and sand. Sunrise whiskeys with bartenders in the Rockaways. Girls in short skirts with beads of sweat on the small of their backs. Falling asleep on the lawn alongside the Hudson River. Aperitifs at A60. Midday movies to escape the humidity... - Manhattan Transfer (read the whole thing, please)

Oh, take me home! We'll see if D.C. inspires anything similar in a few weeks.

In the meantime spring also means a load of unusable recommendations in men's magazines. But not at the San Francisco lifestyle blog, Poetic and Chic. At some point, it seems I took a moment away from criticizing Barack Obama to make some recommendations. I normally like to speak in generalities about fashion but I was specific this time. I'm impressed with the other recommendations, particularly the brogues.

Obama is an interventionist. Robert Kagan is delighted. Daniel Larison and I are horrified.

It's not just international do-goodism. To Obama, everything and everyone everywhere is of strategic concern to the United States. "We cannot hope to shape a world where opportunity outweighs danger unless we ensure that every child, everywhere, is taught to build and not to destroy." The "security of the American people is inextricably linked to the security of all people." Realists, call your doctors.

[snip]

Obama never once says that military force should be used only as a last resort. Rather, he insists that "no president should ever hesitate to use force -- unilaterally if necessary," not only "to protect ourselves . . . when we are attacked," but also to protect "our vital interests" when they are "imminently threatened." That's known as preemptive military action. It won't reassure those around the world who worry about letting an American president decide what a "vital interest" is and when it is "imminently threatened." - Robet Kagan

Regrettably,  I think Obama's candidacy will reveal that most progressives will turn out to have only been striking a pose against this foreign policy consensus. So long as a Democrat is expanding the managerial state at home, American hegemony abroad is just peachy. Perhaps if the left-liberals do embrace a progressive internationalism it may make room for a larger portion of the right to recover one of their two lost foreign-policy traditions: realism and non-interventionism. It probably just means a stronger interventionist consensus, but a guy can hope - can't he?
 

Many friends have encouraged me to return to blogging on a regular basis. As you may have noticed, I've been modifying the blogroll and I've added a social-bookmark java script so you can read the stuff I've enjoyed reading but haven't necessarily blogged about.  One friend has handed over (without excepting payment) the machine on which most of my blogging will now be done. It's beautiful. I know. I know you have strong feelings about the Mac. People are downright tribal about their loyalties in this area. They plead: You can date a Latina girl, you can marry a Buddhist, but please don't bring a Mac into this home.

But what is truly amazing is that I have a copy of Windows Vista running on this machine right now. If only there was an alt/option key on women and you could pick their operating system as it suited you.

A few thoughts sparked by Reihan: Speaking of women. You may have noticed that Reihan loves Ariel Levy. Who doesn't? Due to a few pictures in one of those men's magazines, I'm falling for Isla Fisher (pictured above.) Will this spark jealousy in her former co-star? Keep checking in for updates. Click below for one more Isla Fisher.

Click to read more ...

As usual, Daniel Larison beats everyone to it. I also agree with all the main points Phil Klein makes here. But let me add a little to this. Obama's remarks are downright unsettling. The estimable Matthew Yglesias touts the speech - in a post saying,

The "vision thing" is what Obama's good at, and I think it's on display here. An appealing vision of American leadership embedded in an interconnected, fundamentally cooperative world. I think he does a good job of putting the terrorism issue in the appropriate context, as a serious problem on a par with several other serious problems rather than the organizing principle of everything we do in the world. He's also very strong on nuclear non-proliferation, which happens to be the most important issue. The section on when to use force is fuzzy, and manages to not distinguish Obama's view from things Edwards or Clinton could also espouse. There are a couple of head-nods in the direction of indicating that Obama understands the central role the Israeli-Palestinian conflict plays in the mess that is the broader Middle East, which is great if I'm reading the head-nods correctly. - Matthew Yglesias

Uhm. Fuzzy? After mentioning the Ukraine, Israel/Palestine, Sudan and Kenya Obama says

In today’s globalized world, the security of the American people is inextricably linked to the security of all people. When narco-trafficking and corruption threaten democracy in Latin America, it’s America’s problem too. When poor villagers in Indonesia have no choice but to send chickens to market infected with avian flu, it cannot be seen as a distant concern. When religious schools in Pakistan teach hatred to young children, our children are threatened as well. - Barack Obama

This is interventionism on steroids. Is there no matter in the world too small for American leadership? Perhaps American leadership can promote fuel standards in Tibet. What is the average glycemic index in the national diet of Lichtenstein? I want to see a state department paper on this!

The worst part is that every electable candidate in both parties basically believes that America will have to manage the world. Nearly all opinion-writers do too. They just differ in the exact ratio of how much of the world's affairs will be managed by the U.S. Department of Defense or the U.S. Department of State. Oh wait - they may also differ on the exact number of countries that have to be bribed into participating in the crusade of the week. For Yglesias this is an appealing vision of "American leadership embedded in an interconnected, fundamentally cooperative world." Has geopolitics ever worked like this? One might as well say America ought to be the chief angel in a world of angelic nations.

So, last season ended poorly for Mets fans. I was in a new city and without SNY. I would make my way to a local sports bar and ask them to dedicate one television to my beloved Amazins. But, because I was broke and combing my carpet on a weekly basis for enough dimes to buy the day's meal of Kraft macaroni and cheese, I didn't do that often. For important games the day's meal became a gin and tonic. It's fun to be young and broke. And honestly I was glad to be losing weight.

This year things are a bit different. I can check out a few games on the internet. I've even played with the idea of starting a D.C. based Mets-supporters club. (Let me know if you are interested.) Obviously the club name has to be Shea's Rebellion. I couldn't be more excited about this season and its largely because of John Maine who has so far gone 3-0 with a 1.71 ERA. He throws plenty of strikes and has some movement in the zone. "Nasty" is what the commentators call it.

 One note about the Mets this year. Are people outside of New York getting angry that almost every highlight of Jose Reyes on ESPN is accompanied by the rote words, "the most exciting player in baseball today?" I imagine that chafes many a Baseball Tonight-viewer. Just know that one of the best things about Jose Reyes is that he has enabled me to act like a jackanapes on the streets of Brooklyn. When I meet a Yankees fan, I try to work this line into the conversation:

(Consoling) Me: Oh yeah, I mean the Yanks might have a great year this year. After all you guys do have the second-best shortstop in New York.

Yankee Fan: (silence)

Me: (smiling so hard)  

Matthew Yglesias agrees with some guy that in the future cinema will be created on an amateur peer production basis. He frets that we're going to see plenty of Stars Wars sequels and giant robot features. But that such projects will likely be unattractive to skilled actors who will work for free.

That may be true in itself, but I have a feeling the web and video editing isn't any longer the domain of headgear wearing nerds. Instead I think the future of amateur web television is going to be a huge variety of sit-coms trying to sound and feel like "The Office".  They will revolve around the lives of 20-something, hyper-verbal, over-educated white Brooklynites. I think this because the web is a powerful tool that levels the playing field between the money-men of Hollywood and underrepresented communities of Ivy-leaguers in hip neighborhoods.

Oh, shoot. The future is now.

Happy Easter everyone! Le Monde has described Pope Benedict XVI as a reactionary. My thoughts on this will be saved for later in this week. Instead, I would like to take a moment and welcome Johnny Drama back into our lives. For an overview of Johnny Drama's significance, read this profile of him, in the New York Observer. Welcome home Drama. You're just in time.

The obvious question that hangs over this season of Entourage: How will the writer's convincingly reconcile Vince with the second best character on the show, Ari Gold? Unfortunately, I will be on the road during tonight's episode - making my way back from my beloved hometown to D.C.

For those of you who wonder: what exactly does Dougherty (and Larison) or anyone see in this show? I can't explain it. You can say what you like: It's not family fare. It's obviously the product of an off-the-rack culture. It's shallow. And I can give you the usual justifications, saying:  deep down it's about friendship, it's also a bit of a goof on Hollywood culture - etc. But all I can do is laugh and point at Johnny Drama and say. "C'mon, Bro." 

I know I have a very diverse audience for this blog. Disaffected conservatives, the fashion-conscious, culture-warriors and Entourage fans, Catholics and hedonists. I will try to keep everyone happy as it ramps up again.  

Since my last post, I've received notes from readers. Some were happy that I had written something rather lyrical. Others were glad that I didn't seem to be assimilating into the lifestyle of Washington D.C. But not a few of you expressed concern for my mental state. The actual number of hits to this blog seems to be going up. This despite - like what?- a month of inactivity. My readers are anxious for some word -- some sign of what is happening behind the curtain. Like de Gaulle (one of my predecessors) I say to the gathering throng: Je vous ai compris.

For those concerned about my mental state, I can report to you that things have gotten much, much worse since I last checked in. I've spent weekends just driving up and down Route 95 listening to that extremely maudlin Beck album, Sea Change. I was usually on my way somewhere, but it sometimes felt like I was engaged in mid-20's angst.

What can you expect from the return of Surfeited with Dainties? More personal stories. Important reflections on basketball shorts, and iced tea. Also my adventures along the way to becoming a dandy. In them, the protagonist can be found in a boxing ring, and sitting at a poker table in a casino whilst being called, "suit." Occasionally I may share with you my incredible political insights. Just so you know, secretly I've been giving them all away to Daniel Larison, Matt Yglesias, Ross and Reihan and Ezra Klein.   For serious.

Now, if you'll indulge me (this is Surfeited with Dainties, after all.) For purposes of an inside joke (and also to justify the beautiful picture above) I now include four lines from tonight's episode of 30 Rock - exchanged between Alec Baldwin and the lovely, Tina Fey.

Liz Lemon: (shocked) What made you think I was gay?

Jack Donaghy: (coldly) “Your shoes,”

Liz Lemon: Well, I’m straight,

Jack Donaghy: Those shoes are definitely bi-curious.