Category Archives: Political Commentary

What I Saw At The Revolution

A report from the front lines:

In truth, those camped out in Zuccotti Park are running a commune more than a protest. They have established a small communitarian village, which is punctuated by a small cabal of the angry, the insane, and the ignorant. Nothing I have seen is representative of a serious movement, and even less is indicative of any substantive thought. John Maynard Keynes is nowhere to be seen; instead, Occupy Wall Street has become an irresistible magnet for performance artists with generic grievances, and those who consider Stéphane Hessell’s absurd pamphlet, Indignez vous!, to be a serious rallying cry. So prevalent are these types, in fact, that a significant portion of those in attendance might as well be wearing t-shirts announcing, I’m Only Here For The Drum Circle And Organic Arugula.

As he says, they’re not the 99%. They’re not even the one percent.

[Update a while later]

The children of la revolucion are eating their own.

Groundhog Day

Guy Benson reports on the president’s latest press conference, so you don’t have to have had to suffer through it:

In summary: Pass this bill. It’s paid for. Republicans have no ideas. Mitch McConnell controls Congress. Independent economists love it. Millionaires and billionaires. Fair share. Not my fault. Japanese Tsunamis. I didn’t know. Bush. Pah-kee-stahn. Pass this bill.

What is it he wants us to do with the bill again?

Why The Libyan Intervention Was Such A Disaster

Because it’s likely to prevent an intervention where it really matters:

If we are going to bomb Syria, it will have to be the way we bombed Serbia, or worst case the way we invaded Iraq: with cheaper, lower grade holy water sprinkled by the less sacrosanct NATO priests on the bombs as in Serbia, or with just some Potomac water hastily and unconvincingly sprinkled by Pentagon chaplains on the bombs as in Iraq.

But for the foreseeable future, as long as he is reasonably discreet and possibly even if he isn’t, President Assad can murder as many of his subjects as he wants with no fear that the UN will do anything about it. We stopped a relatively small scale massacre in a country that posed little threat to our interests (and from which we were getting some excellent intelligence cooperation I am told) at the cost of enabling what looks ultimately like a much larger bloodbath in a country where our vital interests are much more engaged, and whose government actively supports some of our most dangerous enemies in the region.

As Glenn often says, a replay of the Carter administration is a best-case scenario.

In Praise Of Entrepreneurs

Over at Pajamas Media, I have some thoughts this morning on Steve Jobs and people who really change the world.

[Update a few minutes later]

The business of Apple was business, not politics.

[Update a while later]

Did Jobs die from quackery?

[Update a few minutes later]

Here’s the WSJ obit.

[Update a while later]

More thoughts from Lileks.

[Update a while later[

Michael Malone remembers Steve Jobs.

[Update a couple minutes later]

How his philosophy changed technology.

[Late morning update]

The Onion says we’re doomed.

[Update in the afternoon]

Rob Long: The right kind of tyrant.