1/ Gen. Wesley Clark, from last night’s Verdict on MSNBC:
2/ Andrew Bacevich (who contributed to this piece) in “What Hath Bush Wrought” in the Boston Globe:
The burden of identifying and confronting the Bush legacy necessarily falls on Obama. Although for tactical reasons McCain will distance himself from the president’s record, he largely subscribes to the principles informing Bush’s post-9/11 policies. McCain’s determination to stay the course in Iraq expresses his commitment not simply to the ongoing conflict there, but to the ideas that gave rise to that war in the first place. While McCain may differ with the president on certain particulars, his election will affirm the main thrust of Bush’s approach to national security.
The challenge facing Obama is clear: he must go beyond merely pointing out the folly of the Iraq war; he must demonstrate that Iraq represents the truest manifestation of an approach to national security that is fundamentally flawed, thereby helping Americans discern the correct lessons of that misbegotten conflict.
By showing that Bush has put the country on a path pointing to permanent war, ever increasing debt and dependency, and further abuses of executive authority, Obama can transform the election into a referendum on the current administration’s entire national security legacy. By articulating a set of principles that will safeguard the country’s vital interests, both today and in the long run, at a price we can afford while preserving rather than distorting the Constitution, Obama can persuade Americans to repudiate the Bush legacy and to choose another course.
1/ Donald Barthelme, “For I’m the Boy” (1964):
The bottle was old and dirty but the brandy when Huber returned with it was tasty in the extreme.
2/ Grateful Dead, “Brown-Eyed Women” (1971):
The bottle was dusty but the liquor was clean.
1/ From “Ferraro Is Unapologetic for Remarks and Ends Her Role in Clinton Campaign” by Joyce Purnick in today’s NYT:
Speaking from her midtown Manhattan law office shortly after e-mailing the letter [of resignation from Clinton’s finance committee], Mrs. Ferraro, a former vice-presidential nominee, said in a characteristic rush of words that she stood by her remarks and repeatedly accused the Obama campaign of deliberate distortion.
“If you point to something that deals with race, you are immediately a racist?” she said over the phone. “Give me a break.”
[…]
Ms. Ferraro made no apologies. “Am I sorry? No, no, no,” she said. “I am sorry there are people who think I am racist.”
2/ From “Ex-Obama aide explains self after ‘monster’ mistake,” John Marshall’s interview with Samantha Power in yesterday’s Seattle Post-Intelligencer:
Q: What is the biggest lesson you have learned in the aftermath of your controversial comments about Hillary Clinton?
A: Well (pauses)… What is so abhorrent about my comments is not only are they hurtful and hateful; they don’t reflect my real views of Senator Clinton. These are not thoughts I had been having alone in my own home, storing up to vent over these 14 months.
I really just had one of those bad moments when you lose your temper and you say something that sticks. It sticks out there as something associated with Senator Clinton and also with me — all because of me.
What is the lesson? The lesson is that I wish somebody would invent a device that would allow me to go back in time. (Chuckles). People keep saying to me that the lesson is: Don’t say anything off-the-record. But I think the real lesson is don’t say hateful and hurtful things anywhere. I know that sounds too ponderous. You got to keep control of your temper and not let the heat of the campaign…cause those sentiments to bubble up in you.
(Photo of Geraldine Ferraro by Ruth Fremson/New York Times. Photo of Samantha Power by Getty Images.)
1/ Dante, Inferno 26.112-120
Brothers…who through a hundred thousand
Dangers have reached the channel to the west,
To the short evening watch which your own sensesStill must keep, do not choose to deny
The experience of what lies past the sun
And of the world yet uninhabited.Consider the seed of your generation:
You were not born to live like animals
But to pursue virtue and possess knowledge.
2/ Louis MacNeice, “Thalassa”
Run out the boat, my broken comrades;
Let the old seaweed crack, the surge
Burgeon oblivious of the last
Embarkation of feckless men,
Let every adverse force converge–
Here we must needs embark again.Run up the sail, my heartsick comrades;
Let each horizon tilt and lurch–
You know the worst: your wills are fickle,
Your values blurred, your hearts impure
And your past life a ruined church–
But let your poison be your cure.Put out to sea, ignoble comrades,
Whose record shall be noble yet;
Butting through scarps of moving marble
The narwhal dares us to be free;
By a high star our course is set,
Our end is Life. Put out to sea.
1/ Gustave Doré’s illustration of Paradiso XXXI*:
2/ From An Exceptionally Simple Theory of Everything,” Garrett Lisi’s proposed model of the universe, which is based on the E8 geometry**:
1/ “Signals at Sea,” a poem by Annie Dillard built of passages from Cugle’s Practical Navigation and published in Mornings Like This:
(If the flags in A’s hoist cannot be made out,
B keeps her answering pennant at the “Dip”
and hoists the signal “OWL” or “WCX.”)CXL Do not abandon me.
A I am undergoing a speed trial.
D Keep clear of me - I am maneuvering
with difficulty.
F I am disabled. Communicate with me.
G I require a pilot.P Your lights are out, or burning badly.
U You are standing into danger.
X Stop carrying out your intentions.
K You should stop your vessel instantly.
L You should stop. I have something
important to communicate.R You may feel your way past me.
2/ “ROMEO AND JULIET,” a poem by Hannah Weiner built of passages from the International Code of Signals and published in The Code Poems (now available in Hannah Weiner’s Open House, a new selection of her poems edited by Patrick Durgin):
MFD Juliet: Try to enter
KZU Romeo: I am in difficulties; direct me how to steer
OOX Juliet: You should swing and enter stern first
HBK Romeo: What is the nature of the bottom or what kind of bottom have you?
HAY Juliet: Double bottom
FHR Romeo: Stern way. Going astern
LK Juliet: Go astern easy. Easy astern
ODI Romeo: I am going full speed
HC Juliet: It is not safe to go so fast
KZY Romeo: It is difficult to extricate
BK Juliet: Is anything the matter
VLA Romeo: Cock broken or damaged
EHR Juliet: What do the cost of repairs amount to?
DF Romeo: With some assistance I shall be able to set things to rights
Next Page ->