What Happens When Burned Out Leftists at Berkeley Meet To Discuss The Tea Party?

It gets weird real quick:

"There is that U.S. DNA that goes all the way back and does provide the conceptual source for this lynch mob mentality," says Steve Martinot, who teaches at San Francisco State University. "And that is white supremacy. Shouldn't we be looking at the Tea Party through that?"

Perlstein moves around the question. "The thing that makes America different, and this is a very dialectical, paradoxical concept, is that we have a lot of democracy," he says. "The idea that everyone has an opinion of about what they're hearing is both the glory and the tragedy of American democracy."

And this one:

"I wonder if we're likely to see a Timothy McVeigh situation," says Nicholas Robert, an attendee originally from Australia, who basically wonders if any Tea Partiers can be arrested. "It seems to be that we're being very polite. I wonder if there are any legal mechanisms—one that comes to mind are the provisions used to crush the Wobblies."

He gets no sympathy from the academics. "I think that's a dangerous road to go down," says Berlet.

Abramowitz finds me and whispers into my ear. "In Berkeley," he says, "you're seeing the other side of polarization."

Yeah. Sheesh. I mean, I said this before, but sometimes people just bring heat on themselves. This reads like an Onion article, I swear.

The Nobel Peace Prize, and the Wartime President

In the continuing discussion over Obama's Nobel Prize, there has been much talk of what this means for Afghanistan. Certain people are wondering if Obama, as the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, will continue the fight in Afghanistan. According to Bob Kerrey, he has to:

Then, against all reasonable predictions, President Bush chose to increase rather than decrease our military commitment. The "surge," as it became known, worked. Victory was snatched from the jaws of defeat.

From what I have seen, President Obama has the same ability to step outside the swirl of public opinion and make the right decision. While success in Afghanistan may not look the same as it does in Iraq, I believe there is a very good chance that a stable democracy can survive there. If it does, it would be good for the Afghan people, good for the security of the region, and good for the United States. The heroism of Afghan voters who turned out this past August in spite of the Taliban's violence should inspire us to stand by their side until security and stability are established in their country.

He continues:

Afghanistan is also not Iraq. No serious leader in Kabul is asking us to leave. Instead we are being asked to withdraw by American leaders who begin their analysis with the presumption that victory is not possible. They seem to want to ensure defeat by leaving at the very moment when our military leader on the ground has laid out a coherent and compelling strategy for victory.

When it comes to foreign policy, almost nothing matters more then your friends and your enemies knowing you will keep your word and follow through on your commitments. This is the real test of presidential leadership. I hope that President Obama—soon to be a Nobel laureate—passes with flying colors.

Indeed.

HT: Althouse

"...by the prevailing Democratic "logic," this means that Obama supporters yesterday were casting their lot"

"...with Communist dictators."

Glenn Greenwald, in a must-read rebuke to the DNC, and the far-Left, over their hypocrisy in criticizing the critics:

What's particularly bothersome about yesterday's attacks is the premise that it's improper, unpatriotic and even Terrorist-mimicking to do anything but cheer -- have a "national celebration" -- when Obama is awarded the Nobel Prize. Whether Obama is actually pursuing policies of peace happens to be an extremely legitimate topic of debate. The same is true for whether he's done anything meaningful yet to merit the award. Numerous liberals in good standing objected to Obama's award -- from Ezra Klein ("It is undeserved. It is a bit ridiculous") to The Nation's Richard Kim ("I woke up, read the New York Times website and thought I had come to the Onion instead . . . Obama doesn't deserve the prize, yet") to Naomi Klein ("disappointing, cheapening of the Nobel Prize"). While there are arguments to make in his favor -- I even made some myself yesterday in the first two paragraphs of what I wrote -- there is something unquestionably bizarre about awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to a leader who did not merely "inherit," but is advocating, actively prosecuting and escalating, a major war that is killing large numbers of civilians with no plans to stop, while at the same time building prisons to house people who will have no due process.

Unquestionably, those are and must be legitimate topics of debate. Some smart people yesterday made some reasonable arguments for Obama's Prize. But to insist that it's the patriotic obligation of every American to stand and cheer -- and that those who don't are "casting their lot with the Terrorists" -- is creepy and repugnant. It's also a very dangerous game to play.

And this:

If George W. Bush had won the Nobel Peace Prize as Klein suggested he might deserve, would it have been the solemn obligation of every American -- including liberals -- to stand up and cheer, to hold a "national celebration," to congratulate and express support, happiness and patriotic pride? Or would it have been appropriate even for Americans to make arguments about why that Prize was wrongly awarded? If Bush had won, surely the Taliban and Hamas would have objected, just like they did yesterday with Obama. Would Bush critics have been guilty of "casting their lot with the terrorists" if they echoed those objections? Karl Rove and Fox News would have done so, but would Media Matters have condemned liberals who questioned Bush's Nobel Peace Prize as "unseemly and downright unpatriotic." Please.

Indeed. I guess all the liberals who criticized the decision are casting their lot with the terrorists as well? What putrid nonsense. Over the last nine months, many on the Right have accused Obama supporters of trying to stifle dissent. Most of the time, that charge has been off target, but in this case, it's true. Shame on the DNC.

It is never unpatriotic to question the President. Even in wartime. Even when he's a Democrat. Even Barack Obama.

May Update; Checking In

Blogging's been infrequent lately, and I've been neglecting my own blog for quite some time now. Most of my blooging as of late has been at my second home. I plan to resume my regular blogging pace, and I'm planning to touch on all the latest topics, including the torture debate, Obama vs. Cheney, and the my thoughts on Judge Sotomayor (and the circus-like atmosphere like will surround her confirmation).

Stay tuned.

"Sooner or later, he just might have to stand for something."

Ouch. Apparently, the fallout over Obama's choice of Rick Warren to perform to invocation at his inaguration has yet to subside, and many of Obama's committed supporters are damn near close to having buyer's remorse:

Not that he was planning to attend, but Barack Obama should know that my sister's inauguration night party -- the one for which she was preparing Obama Punch -- has been canceled. The notice went out over the weekend, by e-mail and word of mouth, that Obama's choice of Rick Warren to give the inaugural invocation had simply ruined the party. Warren is anti-gay, and my sister, not to put too fine a point on it, is not. She's gay.

Richard Cohen explains further, why his sister has called the party off:

Obama has chosen above all other religious figures to represent him in this most solemn moment. He likens my sister's relationship -- three children, five grandchildren, so loving as to be envied and so conventional as to be boring -- to incest or polygamy.

The conventional thing to say is that Obama has a preacher problem -- first the volcanic Jeremiah Wright and now the transparently anti-gay Warren. But the real problem has nothing to do with ministers and everything to do with Obama's inability or unwillingness to be a moral leader. Sooner or later, he just might have to stand for something.

OK, then. Now, I come at this issue from a different perspective, and I happen to have a much more positive view of Warren than most involved here. I'm an evangelical Christian myself. I've discussed my views on gay marriage elsewhere, and yet I understand why people have taken issue with many of Warren's statements here. I think many of his statements are problematic, to be polite. That being said, I don't see Warren as the raving bigot many others see him as, and I don't think Obama does either.

There's no doubt that Obama (and most of his supporters) and Warren, on many key social issues don't end up in the same place, but I think Obama has made it clear that he is going to try to build bridges to various constituencies that haven't exitsed in a long time. Most of the political moves Obama has made regarding his new administration have been basically those of a pragmatic centrist liberal. This is good news in my book, although there is something to be said of the limits of pragmatism. Pragmatism only gets you so far, and there is a difference between cautious moderation and self-serving political calculation. I'm saying he's anywhere near that point yet, but a lot of his supporters voting him into office expecting a sweeping revolution. This is the view they imposed upon him, not so much what he promised, although he did not do that much during the campaign to dispel those notions, and frankly used them to his benefit. I voted for a centrist, so I'm not upset, although some lefties are starting to feel like they've been hosed.

I'm also not disappointed, because what I've seen from the President=elect so far hasn't fallen below my expectations. I voted for Obama, because I liked most of what he brought to the table. I did not however, fall in love with him to the extent that others did. Like I've said before, we may have elected a new kind of politician, but we still elected a politician.

HT: Simon

UPDATE: Mileage is your own, and I'll have to check this out as far as Warren's views on torture and global warming are concerned, but as Sara Robinson explains here, it's not just gay marriage that's the issue here.

UPDATE#2: Via Pat (with clear-headed wisdom as usual), comes this spot-on defense of Rick Warren, from that crazy, closeted right-winger named....Melissa Etheridge. Read it folks. Like I told you, things aren't always what they seem at first:

I told my manager to reach out to Pastor Warren and say "In the spirit of unity I would like to talk to him." They gave him my phone number. On the day of the conference I received a call from Pastor Rick, and before I could say anything, he told me what a fan he was. He had most of my albums from the very first one. What? This didn't sound like a gay hater, much less a preacher. He explained in very thoughtful words that as a Christian he believed in equal rights for everyone. He believed every loving relationship should have equal protection. He struggled with proposition 8 because he didn't want to see marriage redefined as anything other than between a man and a woman. He said he regretted his choice of words in his video message to his congregation about proposition 8 when he mentioned pedophiles and those who commit incest. He said that in no way, is that how he thought about gays. He invited me to his church, I invited him to my home to meet my wife and kids. He told me of his wife's struggle with breast cancer just a year before mine.

Not the hate-monger you might have been expecting, huh? Now, as noted earlier, others may still take issue with Warren's pro-life views, or his supposed squishiness on global warming, or his supposed endorsement/non-rejection of torture. I choose to take those with a grain of salt at this point. At this point, Obama has embraced someone with whom he disagrees. Wow, who knew he'd get so much heat for living up to his campaign promises?