The Commentariat -- November 26

Roger Cohen of the New York Times: "The unfettered growth of the Department of Homeland Security and the T.S.A. represent a greater long-term threat to the prosperity, character and wellbeing of the United States than a few madmen in the valleys of Waziristan or the voids of Yemen." ...

... You Will Be Smeared. Glenn Greenwald writes an "anatomy of a journalistic smear job" -- The Nation publishes a story questioning, without evidence, the independence of John Tyner, the private citizen whose "Don't Tough My Junk" video went viral.

Paul Krugman: "... Ireland is now in its third year of austerity, and confidence just keeps draining away. And you have to wonder what it will take for serious people to realize that punishing the populace for the bankers’ sins is worse than a crime; it’s a mistake."

In an exposé that will disgust you, Robert O'Harrow of the Washington Post "shows one way federal agencies, [in this case, the Army,] have increasingly avoided contracting competitions.... And it underscores how a small [Alaska native corporation] (ANC) subsidiaries run by nonnatives have benefitted from an unprecedented surge of outsourcing by the military at a time of war. Army officials acknowledged using [an ANC] firm to avoid competition, saying they did not have enough time or contracting workers to seek other bids."

Tony Karon of Time: "On Saturday Nov. 27, the United States and its allies will reach a grim milestone: they will have been in Afghanistan a day longer than the Soviet Union had been when it completed its 1989 withdrawal."

"Hack Thirty." Alex Pareene of Salon lists his "least favorite political commentators, newspaper columnists and constant cable news presences, ranked roughly (but only roughly) in order of awfulness and then described rudely. Criteria for inclusion included writing the same column every week for 30 years, warmongering, joyless repetition of conventional wisdom, and making bad puns." Click back to see the whole list. CW: my friends & are disappointed that Pareene placed David Brooks at #30; we thought he should have made the first page.

We think if he'd done less compromising in the last two years, there's a good chance we'd have had a jobs bill that would have created real jobs, and then we wouldn't even be worrying about having lost elections. -- Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-Calif.), on President Obama

... Oops! Missed This One. Julie David of the AP: "Behind Democrats' decision to keep [Speaker] Pelosi as their leader after historic losses lies intense concern among liberals who dominate the party's ranks on Capitol Hill: They fear [President] Obama will go too far in accommodating the GOP in the new era of divided government, and they see Pelosi as a counterweight."

Amy Wilenz in a New York Times op-ed: Sunday's elections in Haiti "are unlikely to produce a president who can address the country’s multiple woes."

We gotta stand with our North Korean allies. -- Sarah Palin

... Huma Kahn of ABC News: "Palin's gaffe immediately caught fire on the blogosphere. Liberals jumped to show her response as evidence of Palin's lack of foreign policy expertise." ...

... Class Act. The Lede Is All You Need. Shira Toeplitz of Politico: "Sarah Palin took the media and even President Barack Obama to task Thursday in a Thanksgiving message posted online."

"There are hardly any decision points at all." Sorry, one last review of Dubya's Decision Points, this one by George Packer of The New Yorker: "Though Bush credits no collaborator, his memoirs read as if they were written by an admiring sidekick who is familiar with every story Bush ever told but never got to know the President well enough to convey his inner life. Very few of its four hundred and ninety-three pages are not self-serving.... The steady drip of these elisions and falsifications suggests a deeper necessity than the ordinary touch-ups of personal history."

Here's your presidential promo of the week. I like these for the behind-the-scenes clips. Watch for Vice President Biden's comment on the press:

Since the Times moderators have been sleeping in this morning, you can read my comment on David Brooks' column here. Brooks has been reading about the life of Leo Tolstoy, and reports that Tolstoy became a wacky crusader in his later years:

... most historical leaders write pallid memoirs not because they are hiding the truth but because they’ve been engaged in an activity that makes it impossible for them to see it clearly. Activism is admirable, necessary and self-undermining — the more passionate, the more self-blinding. -- David Brooks

Forgive me, Brooks; I am always looking for the point of your little essays.

So maybe it's, "George Bush wrote a 'pallid memoir' because he really had no idea what he was doing." That's possible. But, unlike many of my liberal friends, I think Bush knew very well what he was doing. He was waging unnecessary wars of aggression to satisfy his Napoleonic complex and at the same time reward his Haliburton-type friends. He was decimating the American economy to help out his bankster buddies. He was depleting the government larder to force entitlement cutbacks. If his memoir is "pallid," it's because telling the truth would be a confession of guilt, not a memoir.

Or maybe your point is that "activists are nuts, just like Tolstoy." It is activists who got us every societal advantage we enjoy today. Were it not for revolutionary activists, we might still be singing "God Save the Queen" (though I doubt it). If not for reformers, we might still have indentured servants (of course, informally, we do). If not for abolitionists, we might still have slaves (here is Southwest Florida, there are still slave rings, but at least they're illegal). If not for suffragists, women would not have the vote. If not for later feminists, women would still not be allowed to perform "men's jobs" and they would not be entitled to equal pay for equal work (of course, we're still not getting that). If not for activists, gays would be treated as second class citizens (oh, wait, they still are).

Activism isn't nuts, Brooks, it's a badge of honor. As you so often do, you looked at a set of facts -- in this case, your reading of Tolstoy's life -- and drew a conclusion in direct opposition to its true meaning. I suppose for those who choose to applaud the status quo, it is satisfying to observe the failures of the righteous. But your self-satisfaction is hollow. In the end, we must hope, for the sake of humankind, that the smug indifference of the privileged falls into the dustbin. In the long arc of history, that's pretty much where such thoughts now lie, sometimes scooped up & regurgitated by fools, but mostly employed in the service of historians deciphering what went wrong.

You, Mr. Brooks, are once again cheering for the team who always gets it wrong.

(My comment on Krugman came up at 8:35 am ET -- it's #2.)

Happy Thanksgiving!

With a little aluminum-foil ingenuity, Thanksgiving can be just another day at the beach....  An easy way to surprise your Thanksgiving dinner guests: (1) Cut out aluminum foil in desired swimsuit-inspired shapes. (2) Arrange the turkey in the roasting pan and position the foil carefully. (3) Roast according to your own recipe and serve.

... AND, while you're stuffing that bird, why not listen to some soothing Thanksgiving music like this old favorite from Adam Sandler:

Sadly, NBC has cut the opening of this best Thanksgiving musical effort ever, but here's the monologue that follows (The still shot isn't loading, but the video is fine):

... So you'll just have to imagine Simon is wearing his turkey costume here:

Loudon Wainwright III may remind you of some of your own family Thanksgivings:

While the turkey is roasting, you may want to enjoy some Thanksgiving Day TV, or in this case, radio:

AND take two minutes to read Roger Angell's tale of Thanksgiving moose.

BUT, Don't Miss the News:

       Two Ways to Pardon a Turkey. There's President Barack Obama's careful, deliberative way:

      ... And Half-Gov Sarah Palin's way. Caution: unpardonable turkeys are slaughtered as she speaks: