The inevitable spin out of the Bush Administration will be that the NIE is proof that their approach on Iran has worked. In fact, expect to hear and read lots of analysis and punditry about how Chris Hill’s success in North Korea, positive surge-induced developments in Iraq, the promise of progress emanating from Annapolis and even, why not, Venzuela’s narrow rebuff of Hugo Chavez are all the product of Bushian diplomacy. A quick check of conservative blogs yields no reaction yet, but it will come. As Joe points out, if the election next year is fought on domestic rather than national security grounds, history says that benefits the Democrats. But what if the GOP nominee doesn’t have to pretend he never heard of George W. Bush? It’s possible – perhaps likely — that independents and other swing voters have soured on Bush so irrevocably that no amount of improvement internationally will turn him into anything but a liability. We’ll see.
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Latest on Swampland
Rick Santorum Wants to Fight ‘The Dangers Of Contraception’
Candidates often say things when polling in the single digits that come back to haunt them when they start leading the polls. Last October, Rick Santorum gave an interview with an Evangelical blog called Caffeinated Thoughts, in which he said contraception is “not okay,” and that this would be a public policy issue he would tackle as President. In particular, he said he would “get rid of any idea that you have to have abortion coverage or contraceptive coverage” as a government policy. Start watching the following video at 17:55.
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Occupy the Regulatory Open Comment Period!
There’s nothing “wrong” with protests built around placard-hoisting and park-squatting, but Occupy the SEC is definitely doing something right with its radically different tack. The OWS-offshoot has submitted a 325-page letter to federal financial regulatory agencies on the Volcker Rule, a controversial measure designed to prohibit banks from proprietary trading, or making investments with their own dollars rather than their customers’, that was passed as part of the Dodd-Frank financial reform law.
