Just how much liberal bias is there in the Washington Post news and opinion?

Asks the WaPot ombudsman Patrick B. Pexton. He talks about the bias people see in the new articles and then moves on to the columnists:

One aspect of The Post that particularly irks conservatives is the columnists who appear in print and online in news positions (as opposed to those on the editorial and op-ed pages and the online Opinions section). With the exception of Dan Balz and Chris Cillizza, who cover politics in a nonpartisan way, the news columnists almost to a person write from left of center.

Balz and Cillizza are nonpartisan? That assertion screams liberal bias.

Is it any wonder that if you’re a conservative looking for unbiased news — and they do; they don’t want only Sean Hannity’s interpretation of the news...

They. That's telling.

... that you might feel unwelcome, or dissed or slighted, by the printed Post or the online version? And might you distrust the news when it’s wrapped in so much liberal commentary?

Yeah, they need to get a lot of conservative columnists if they want to get away with doing the news liberal-style. Isn't that the Wall Street Journal method?

Should Todd "legitimate rape" Akin step aside?

The editors of the Nation Review Online say he should:

While Akin is a stalwart conservative and an honorable man, we regret to say that he inspires no such confidence. That is one reason why Senator Claire McCaskill, the sitting Democratic senator, boosted him during the Republican primaries with ads calling him a “true conservative.” She knew that she is the weakest Senate incumbent on the ballot this year and that her only hope was to draw a weak opponent. Akin won a three-way primary with a plurality of the vote; there was no run-off. McCaskill’s strategy is now paying off.

Akin has backed off from his remarks, albeit with the politician’s excuse of “misspeaking.” People who make such remarks on television are typically capable of making more like them, or rather incapable of exercising the judgment to refrain. We suspect that this same lack of judgment will cause Akin to blow past tomorrow evening’s deadline for him to leave the race and allow the Republicans to select a better nominee. We hope the congressman, who surely wants to see a Senate with as much conservative strength as possible next year, will prove us wrong.

Akin should...
	Step aside right now.
	Stand his ground.
pollcode.com free polls

ADDED: "National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman John Cornyn (R-Tex.) informed Rep. Todd Akin on Monday that the national GOP will not spend money to help elect him to the Senate...."

AND: Hannity, talking to Akin, essentially tells him to get out:

I think there is one political reality that I think has to be faced by you and your campaign and that is that you know, the reality here is that Democrats now have a ton of ammunition and they are now going to try to use these remarks to hurt everybody they can. And if I was put in that position, I would at least be thinking about what is in the best interest of the party. hat is in the best interest of, you know, Mitt Romney in this case. What is in the best interest of the people of Missouri, are they going to be able to hear a campaign about issues or is this going to be the distraction of the campaign. Are you -- you're not even considering that?"

Krauthammer says Akin must leave:

"He's got to leave... He's toxic. Nobody will touch him. Republicans aren't going to support him. He's not going to get any money. They've tossed away a seat that they could easily have won. It isn't only that it was offensive and toxic; it was unbelievably stupid. And there is enough stupidity in Congress that we don't need to add to it in this large amount. The guy's got to leave."

It was sharp of Republicans to drop Akin cold. No one thought he was worth defending.

Sound bite of the George Zimmerman interview: "I feel it was all God's plan..."

I watched the entire interview Zimmerman did with Hannity, and I thought he made an excellent impression, but looking at the news coverage now, I can see that what was plucked out for quotation in headlines was the "God's plan" line. Even though Zimmerman seemed somber and sincere and truly sorry that Trayvon Martin died — he apologizes and shows empathy to Martin's parents repeatedly — that one phrase makes it sound like he thinks God wanted Martin dead. Here's the "God" quote in context:

HANNITY: Is there anything you regret? Do you regret getting out of the car to follow Trayvon that night?

ZIMMERMAN: No, sir.

HANNITY: Do you regret that you had a gun that night?

ZIMMERMAN: No, sir.

HANNITY: Do you feel you wouldn't be here for this interview if you didn't have that gun?

ZIMMERMAN: No, sir.

HANNITY: You feel you would not be here?

ZIMMERMAN: I feel it was all God's plan and for me to second guess it or judge it --

HANNITY: Is there anything you might do differently in retrospect now that the time has passed a little bit?

ZIMMERMAN: No, sir.

Zimmerman had just described how Martin was beating his head against the concrete — you can see that Hannity was inviting Zimmerman to say: If I had not had the gun, I would have died. In context, you can see Zimmerman brought up God as his way of declining to explore alternate scenarios. Note that he had trouble with Hannity's double-negative question "Do you feel you wouldn't be here for this interview if you didn't have that gun?" Zimmerman answers no, which literally would mean that Zimmerman thinks he would have survived to tell the tale, but, especially given his description of the pre-shooting attack, it seems he would have said that without the gun, he would have died. Hannity rephrases the question: "You feel you would not be here?" And Zimmerman's answer is, essentially, it's not for me to say.

Actually, I think the problem for Zimmerman is less that it sounds like he thought God had a plan for him to kill Martin than that he failed to clearly state that if he hadn't had that gun to shoot Martin, he would have died. But I think the complexity is that in Zimmerman's version of what happened, Martin saw the gun:

ZIMMERMAN: At that point, I realized that it wasn't my gun, it wasn't his gun, it was the gun.

HANNITY: Did he say anything? Because you said he was talking a lot about the gun. Did he say he noticed the gun?

ZIMMERMAN: He said, "You are going to die tonight (EXPLETIVE DELETED)" and took one hand off of my mouth and I felt it going down my chest towards my belt and my holster, and that's when I -- I didn't have anymore time.

So, in the actual story, with the gun, Zimmerman's need to shoot Martin was much greater than it would have been in the alternate scenario with Martin punching him and banging his head on the concrete. Zimmerman declined to comment on the alternate scenario in which there is no gun. His form of expression brought God into the picture. Someone less given to God talk might have said: What happened happened.

But now, the "God's plan" line is out there, affecting what people think about Zimmerman, and it will be used against him in his trial. Such are the risks of doing interviews.

Egyptians taunt Hillary Clinton by chanting "Monica, Monica."

And throwing tomatoes, shoes, and a water bottle at her motorcade.

UPDATE: After many days of black-and-white only, Drudge brings back color with a photo of Hillary for this story. Oddly, the effect would be much better — more dramatic and more flattering — in B&W:

RELOCATED FROM ALTHOUSE2: "So, your blog goes down right after being reported as a cesspool of [misogyny] and homophobia? Hmmmmm . . ."

Says LawGirl, over in the "weasel" post.

The anonymous professor who emailed lawprof Brian Leiter to attack my commentariat said "She has the free speech right to run whatever cesspool she wants, but is she prioritizing her desire for a widely read blog over her obligation to be a responsible member of academia?" — which is quoted by Freeman Hunt, who laughs, calls it the "quote of the day," and paraphrases it: "Free speech is incompatible with academia!" Freeman adds: "Free speech areas are cesspools. Restricted speech areas are responsible academia." Yeah, but can you really expect law professors to drape their brains around that?

Maguro said: "The email is so prissy and self-important that Leiter almost certainly wrote it himself. Anonymous colleague, my ass." Well, let's be fair. Professor Anonymous does call the blog comments here a "festival of misogyny and homophobia." Palladian said: "I hope there's an open bar at your festival of misogyny and homophobia."

Roger J. said:

Professor A: unless I have completely misread you over the last five years, I am thinking you arent going down without a fight--(just dont ask me for money however, my principles arent THAT strong :) )

Hey, good idea. Please! Encourage me:

I need some love!

dbp said:

An interesting logical loop here: Brian Leiter's blog posts an anonymous comment, which presumably is in agreement with the blog's editor. The comment is actively put forward by that blog, unlike at Althouse where comments are all posted and hardly ever deleted.

Both blogs contain what could fairly be described as scurrilous comments. The difference is that Alhouse neither approves or disapproves of the comments while Leiter clearly takes an editorial ownership.

"She has the free speech right to run whatever cesspool she wants, but is she prioritizing her desire for a widely read blog over her obligation to be a responsible member of academia?"

This had got to be the most lame use of a question mark in history. Oh, I make a big long ugly accusation then make it all right with a meaningless squiggle on top of the dot.

If the Leiter post led to the removal of the Althouse blog, then is there a case of slander here?

Good point. But it's not slander. If it's in writing, we lawyers say libel, not slander. But it's not libel. It's just opinion. Lame ass opinion from a lawprof who — in my opinion — envies my readership, which is bigger than his.

***

Now, maybe you're wondering just what the hell was in those terrible comments — that supposed "festival of misogyny and homophobia." You try the link at Leiter's, but it gets you nowhere, because Blogger removed my blog. But here's the cached version of the page the Leiter blog links to. Check out the comments and see if you can tell what's really upset the people who are on my case. There are only 32 comments. They are easy enough to read. I pick out a few.

Maguro said:

[The 3 candidates] seem notably lacking in victim-group credentials. Are any of them gay, trans or gender non-conforming?

This is a criticism based on one commenter's sense of what law schools do.

gutless said:

Is Margaret a lesbian? One imagines so in that her background doesn't seem competitive and yet, here she is. If so, she has the job. If not ,she is merely window dressing and the less offensive of the other two gets the nod.

That's obviously another criticism of law schools, reflecting an assumption that law schools make choices based on diversity factors. I'm sure the criticism hurts some people, but it doesn't say there's something wrong with being a lesbian or that the candidate is a lesbian. Maybe a nervous reader could take that the wrong way, in which case, I'd say: that festival of misogyny and homophobia is in your head. Good thing you hid your name!

Thorley Winston said:

I think it’s generally a bad idea to announce the “finalists” when conducting a job interview, particularly for the top position. IMO there shouldn’t be a public announcement until they’ve made their selection.

I agree, but the Law School chose to put the names and their credentials on its official website, obviously inviting public comment. I linked, opening it up to the comments. You know we are a public law school, and it's appropriate that people around the state receive information and have an opportunity to speak. And yet, feelings can be hurt. People in legal academia like to think that their feelings are righteous indignation having to do with women and minorities... but are they really? Think carefully!

Titus said:

If the woman candidate has big tits I say hire her. Otherwise, go with one of the men.

You can't go wrong with big tits.

tits...yum

All right, that's absurd and over-the-top, by our dear, treasured Titus — a gay man. He's been talking like that on this blog for years. The regulars know him. And they know I love him. If that's what Leiter and the Anonymous Professor feel such angst about... it's because they don't understand the community here. They're like Sean Hannity fretting about Common in White House.

COMMENTS (Relocated from Althouse2):


Which brings me back to the conclusion that I think is painfully obvious about him: he deserves every ounce of criticism that he is bringing upon himself.

Freaking idiot.

MAY 13, 2011 6:43:00 PM CDT 
 Danny Vice said...
There are a couple of avenues available to you Ann if you want to preserve your posts. Granted, it will be pretty time consuming, considering the thousands of posts you've published, but the option is there to grab these posts while they are still accessible.

I trust someone on your end has shared some of these options with you. If not, please email me.

Dannyvice (at) hotmail.com

MAY 13, 2011 6:47:00 PM CDT 
 Lincolntf said...
This post has been removed by the author.
MAY 13, 2011 6:49:00 PM CDT 
 Lincolntf said...
Hmmm, the blog has always struck me more as a tidal pool of mythology and arachnophobia, but I'm a lousy reader.

MAY 13, 2011 6:51:00 PM CDT 
 nevadabob said...
They're 86-ing comments here too.

MAY 13, 2011 6:52:00 PM CDT 
 edutcher said...
To be sure Titus is an acquired taste (there's a metaphor), but, let me think, let's work on that phrase, "obligation to be a responsible member of academia"...

Does that include Ward "Little Eichmanns" Churchill?

William "Guilty As Sin" Ayers?

Cornel "Sun People" West?

We may have our disagreements with her, but the lady gives us a forum unrestricted in most ways. As I said, when the roll is called up yonder, the looker with the platinum bob will be conlawproffing with George and Ben and Jimmy while these "academics" will be sharing a barbecue pit with their heroes from Al Qaeda.

MAY 13, 2011 6:52:00 PM CDT 
 Pastafarian said...
You know, there have been many, many more offensive threads in Althouse blog history. Any of the threads to which I've contributed, for example.

I can recall one that featured Freeman Hunt, of all people, dropping f-bombs like Rahm Emmanuel on an acid bender. Good times, good times.

But I will agree with this much of this turd's thesis: If the mysterious outage is politically motivated, then I suspect that it's the politics of your commenters, more than your own politics, that led to it.

MAY 13, 2011 6:55:00 PM CDT 
 TWM said...
"All right, that's absurd and over-the-top, but our dear, treasured Titus — a gay man. He's been talking like that on this blog for years. The regulars know him. And they know I love him."

Oh crap, does Meade know he signed-on for a threesome?

MAY 13, 2011 7:00:00 PM CDT 
 nevadabob said...
"We may have our disagreements with her, but the lady gives us a forum unrestricted in most ways."

In their eyes, that is her sin. She allows people to express themselves however they see fit.

That's racist and homophobic and misogynistic.

People (in their view) need to be controlled so we can end the hate speech once and for all and get on with the war in EastAsia.

Or is it Eurasia today?

I forget.

MAY 13, 2011 7:01:00 PM CDT 
 Michael K said...
If Blogspot did this for political reasons, you need to be out of there as fast as possible. I use Word Press which has a pretty good rep as blogging software and can be customized as Patterico has done. I also use a separate web host, called Blue Host, and have had no problems and doubt very much if Blue Host cares what is on blogs it hosts.

Academics are such humorless people, present company excepted. I have a friend, a science associate professor, who is sweating out tenure after having to leave another institution when it was denied for political reasons. And that is science, not sociology.

MAY 13, 2011 7:08:00 PM CDT 
 TWM said...
Time for Althouse.com . . . you're that big . . . and that threatening evidently . . .

MAY 13, 2011 7:09:00 PM CDT 
 EnigmatiCore said...
Well. On the off chance that guy is not a Google employee and that their abuse system is not manned by him, I flagged one of his remaining comments as abuse and detailed his abuse of power (including, apparently, the ability to mess with Google accounts-- I had to have them send a verification code to my cell phone and enter it in order to access my account because of 'suspicious activity').

That jerkwad belongs nowhere near any position with any kind of authority.

MAY 13, 2011 7:11:00 PM CDT 
 Michael Haz said...
You broke from the borg. The borg will kill you.

MAY 13, 2011 7:11:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
It's obvious to me what the problem is here. I have told you time and again. Stop with the politics. More posts about American Idol and dogs urinating. These commie pinko bastards are very vindictive pricks. You need to lay low.

You said you wanted your blog to be a mixture of Fellini and the Monkee's.

Neither one of them gave a shit about labor douchenozzles.

I hate to say I told you so...but I told you so.

MAY 13, 2011 7:18:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
And they dumped Tourettes Rocker Boy last night and you didn't even have one post on it.

Shame on you.

You. An American Idol blogger.

MAY 13, 2011 7:18:00 PM CDT 
 Pastafarian said...
This really shines a new light on the cowardly banning and deletion at Lawyers Guns and Money. Maybe they're just afraid of being shut down by their liberal over-lords.

I'm not sure if they're on Blogger -- the meager traffic of their little-known boutique blog is so small that they're able to handle it with their dedicated server, a repurposed Commodore 386. The average comment thread there is about 20 comments; there are several that have one or two. The longest I've seen is a little over 100 -- driven mostly by my participation. So they might have their own domain.

MAY 13, 2011 7:19:00 PM CDT 
 JoeDetweiler said...
My understanding is that nitecruzr is just a volunteer, and that seems to me to be the problem. You should be talking to an employee and Google should be seeing to it that you are talking to an employee.

http://www.google.com.tw/support/forum/p/blogger/thread?tid=051824dc719f3fae&hl=en

MAY 13, 2011 7:19:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
Hey I was banned from Television Without Pity after four comments.

They are like Nazi's over there.

Don't think I forgot about you Kay Howard. You are in the book. Just sayn'

MAY 13, 2011 7:22:00 PM CDT 
 Pastafarian said...
Trooper, I was a little disappointed to see that you hadn't contributed to the cesspool of homophobia and misogyny. When I heard that one of the comments speculated on the candidate's tits, you were the first person I thought of.

MAY 13, 2011 7:27:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
Hey I am a well know lover of tits. I coddle them. Put them in the best of lacy bras. Tits are my friend. They should be yours.

MAY 13, 2011 7:29:00 PM CDT 
 Ann Althouse said...
"And they dumped Tourettes Rocker Boy last night and you didn't even have one post on it."

I tweeted it.

MAY 13, 2011 7:30:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
I was busy at a benefit while all this was going on. I asked some of my detective friends to look into it. But so far nobody has a reasonable explanation.

Except that stuff like this is gonna to happen more and more in Barack Obama's America.

MAY 13, 2011 7:30:00 PM CDT 
 blake said...
If your blog returns, you should immediately download it.

Given your traffic, you should consider getting a blogging application that allows you to compose locally and post to multiple blogging sites.

Really, at your level, you should probably get your own domain and hosting service.

MAY 13, 2011 7:32:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
I do notice that none of the "liberals" or "progressives" who post daily on your site has anything to say in support of you. Where is AlpaLiberal, Jeremy,Robert Cook, Jay Retread and all the rest. They are oddly silent about the destruction of a blog that they write multiple posts on to support their point of view which is displayed without censorship or fear or favor.

I hope you see who you can depend on. Just sayn'

MAY 13, 2011 7:33:00 PM CDT 
 NotYourTypicalNewYorker said...
The culture war imperceptibly widens.

Here, there...

The losers start stepping out of the tree line for better shots.

MAY 13, 2011 7:36:00 PM CDT 
 Coketown said...
Oh my God, Titus is gay?!

MAY 13, 2011 7:38:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
This post has been removed by the author.
MAY 13, 2011 7:39:00 PM CDT 
 garage mahal said...
I do notice that none of the "liberals" or "progressives" who post daily on your site has anything to say in support of you.

I'm here. I think the theory that Google shut down this blog pretty goofy though. Fittingly it was hatched by Moe Lane @ Redstate.com

I do feel bad if all the old content is gone though. If nothing else all my old comments gone would be a sad day indeed.

Seriously I hope you get your blog back, fully preserved.

MAY 13, 2011 7:40:00 PM CDT 
 Coketown said...
I also 'encouraged' the blog by buying through the Amazon portal instead of going to Best Buy, even though it means waiting several days to get my merch and have a more fulfilling life.

I encourage everyone else to encourage her in this way. Words of encouragement are less motivating that transactions of encouragement.

MAY 13, 2011 7:40:00 PM CDT 
 Pastafarian said...
blake -- wouldn't that cost a butt-load of money, given what has to be pretty substantial traffic, and a content-rich site, what with all of the photos and the enormous archive?

MAY 13, 2011 7:41:00 PM CDT 
 The Drill SGT said...
All right, that's absurd and over-the-top, but our dear, treasured Titus — a gay man

"treasured"?

amusing and entertaining? perhaps

treasured? no :)

MAY 13, 2011 7:41:00 PM CDT 
 nevadabob said...
I find it striking that Althouse is censoring and memory-holing comments that are critical of Google's leftist and socialist politics.

Looks like Google's action is having the correct effect.

They've convinced Althouse to strangle her commenters.

MAY 13, 2011 7:42:00 PM CDT 
 Barry Dauphin said...
You're too big for Blogger.

MAY 13, 2011 7:43:00 PM CDT 
 Shannon Bell said...
Hey Ann,

Just my opinion, but screw Google and blogger. Buy an awesome URL, go with Wordpress and be done with it.

Who knows what kind of games these jokers are playing.

MAY 13, 2011 7:44:00 PM CDT 
 Shannon Bell said...
Oh, by the way. Thanks for that awesome link at Insty's place yesterday!

MAY 13, 2011 7:45:00 PM CDT 
 Michael Haz said...
Wouldn't have happened if McCain had been elected. Google are Obama's people. They're like Organizing for America, except they hold a horrible lot of power.

MAY 13, 2011 7:46:00 PM CDT 
 Coketown said...
I doubt the old blog is lost. And I highly doubt this is a sinister plot by Google to silence people of Althouse's political persuasion--whatever the hell that persuasion is.

And if it is lost, don't worry: Trooper has the last 4 1/2 years printed out and spiral-bound in a handsome collection titled, "The Collected Wisdom of..." And since they're criminalizing prostitution in Nevada he'll have plenty of time to re-post everything. Idle hands, etc.

MAY 13, 2011 7:51:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
I didn't include you Garage. I don't consider you a real liberal.

You are just stupid.

(You are a Packers fan)

But you know I love you guy!

MAY 13, 2011 7:52:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
Seriously, the same thing happened when the blogger lady got engaged. Garage was one of the few to quickly and unambigously wish them well. The rest were silent for a suspicious long time until they felt they had to begrudingly acknowledge it. Look it up....oh wait a minute.....

MAY 13, 2011 7:53:00 PM CDT 
 Lincolntf said...
The Google/Blogger conspiracy might be a longshot, but the nitecruzr pissant is all too real. Dickless little shit.

MAY 13, 2011 7:54:00 PM CDT 
 Seven Machos said...
I'd be just shocked and amazed if Blogger really took down Althouse for political reasons. That is just not done in the United States. I just figured it was ridiculous technical problems and you, Althouse, took down your own blog in disgust until you found a new home.

Anyway, color me skeptical of the conspiracy for now. If it's true, it's sickening and disheartening and really suggests something seriously morbid about the American left. We all know they are closet fascists, but to be so obvious about it isn't usually the way it goes.

MAY 13, 2011 7:57:00 PM CDT 
 Seven Machos said...
May 13, 2011
Blogger is back

What a frustrating day. We’re very sorry that you’ve been unable to publish to Blogger for the past 20.5 hours. We’re nearly back to normal — you can publish again, and in the coming hours posts and comments that were temporarily removed should be restored. Thank you for your patience while we fix this situation. We use Blogger for our own blogs, so we’ve also felt your pain.

Here’s what happened: during scheduled maintenance work Wednesday night, we experienced some data corruption that impacted Blogger’s behavior. Since then, bloggers and readers may have experienced a variety of anomalies including intermittent outages, disappearing posts, and arriving at unintended blogs or error pages. A small subset of Blogger users (we estimate 0.16%) may have encountered additional problems specific to their accounts. Yesterday we returned Blogger to a pre-maintenance state and placed the service in read-only mode while we worked on restoring all content: that’s why you haven’t been able to publish. We rolled back to a version of Blogger as of Wednesday May 11th, so your posts since then were temporarily removed. Those are the posts that we’re in the progress of restoring.

Again, we are very sorry for the impact to our authors and readers. We try hard to ensure Blogger is always available for you to share your thoughts and opinions with the world, and we’ll do our best to prevent this from happening again.

Posted by Eddie Kessler, Tech Lead/Manager, Blogger

http://buzz.blogger.com/2011/05/blogger-is-back.html

MAY 13, 2011 8:00:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
Hey I just heard they buried the Althouse blog at sea....you know they didn't want to offend the Muslims or something....I don't know ....does that sound reasonable to you....yeah it must just be a crazy conspiracy theory...yeah...yeah...that's the ticket.

MAY 13, 2011 8:00:00 PM CDT 
 The Grand Inquisitor said...
"OpenID nevadabob said...

I find it striking that Althouse is censoring and memory-holing comments that are critical of Google's leftist and socialist politics.

Looks like Google's action is having the correct effect.

They've convinced Althouse to strangle her commenters."

Is she really doing so? That would be quite a surprise, and frankly, I don't believe it.

I wouldn't be surprised if the same people who deleted her blog are now deleting comments critical of their behavior, though.

Althouse linked the redstate theory about Google, so why would she be protecting Google from similar theories?

MAY 13, 2011 8:00:00 PM CDT 
 Seven Machos said...
I'm quite sure Althouse isn't doing whatever the fuck the tool Nevada Bob said.

MAY 13, 2011 8:02:00 PM CDT 
 blake said...
Pasta--

I hosted a bunch of sites on an old machine for years at a nominal cost. Not as heavily trafficked as Althouse, I'm sure.

Aha. So, GoDaddy gives you 10GB of space and unlimited bandwidth for $3 a month if you buy three years at once. $5 for 150GB, which is a LOT of space for text and pix, and the pix are probably gonna stay on flicker, mostly.

Jeez, for $7 a month, it's all you can eat: However many websites, however much bandwidth, however much space, a thousand email accounts (Althouse could offer accounts to donors!), and some other perks.

Curiously, they don't offer as good a deal if you go for their "blog/podcast" offer.

Anyway, $252 over three years doesn't seem like a lot of money to me.

Plus, the data's all yours.

For this deal, Althouse would probably have to buy (or have donated) services to set up her blog. But, you know, blogspot.com kinda sucks, so she might find newer and better technology.

MAY 13, 2011 8:03:00 PM CDT 
 edutcher said...
TWM said...

"All right, that's absurd and over-the-top, but our dear, treasured Titus — a gay man. He's been talking like that on this blog for years. The regulars know him. And they know I love him."

Oh crap, does Meade know he signed-on for a threesome?

With Titus, are you sure it would only be three?

Trooper York said...

I do notice that none of the "liberals" or "progressives" who post daily on your site has anything to say in support of you. Where is AlpaLiberal, Jeremy,Robert Cook, Jay Retread and all the rest. They are oddly silent about the destruction of a blog that they write multiple posts on to support their point of view which is displayed without censorship or fear or favor.

I hope you see who you can depend on. Just sayn'

The One Whose Name We Cannot Mention found us, but only because he was trolling elsewhere.

PS Keep it down, we don't want the rest to find out we're having fun without them.

PPS Agree with Shannon.

PPPS BlogHer is taking up Ann's cause with a fetching photo of Herself.

MAY 13, 2011 8:04:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
It does seem kind of fishy that as big a blog as Althouse is taking so long to get back on line. I mean this is a big dealio. Shouldn't they be paying attention to this or what?

MAY 13, 2011 8:07:00 PM CDT 
 Seven Machos said...
I agree it's all very fishy. I just can't believe it all. The blog gets destroyed with no warning whatsoever and it just happens to be during a time of tumult and outage at Blogger?

Doesn't add up.

MAY 13, 2011 8:09:00 PM CDT 
 blake said...
With Titus, are you sure it would only be three?

With Titus, could you even be sure it was one?

By the way, I think the Google "conspiracy" thing is far-fetched. The most likely issue is just exactly what it seems: a technical glitch of the sort Google isn't supposed to have.

However, could someone(s) in Google use this as a cover to eff with someone (t)he(y) didn't like? Or minimally put that person at the end of the service line?

Sure. Probably not Sergey or Larry--that seems too far-fetched for words. But some middle manager type getting pissy? Petty bureaucrats are petty bureaucrats wherever.

(Typed on a Google CR-48. Heh.)

MAY 13, 2011 8:11:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
I wonder if they will release some photo's from the situation room at Blogger? Just sayn'

MAY 13, 2011 8:11:00 PM CDT 
 Tibore said...
It's back! I just checked it. It's completely blank, but the original URL is responding.

Now, the question is, where's all the previous content?

MAY 13, 2011 8:11:00 PM CDT 
 Lincolntf said...
Yup. The big blog is showing signs of life. Conspiracy theory over (?), Google volunteer hatefest continues.

MAY 13, 2011 8:13:00 PM CDT 
 Michael said...
Nitecruzer looks like Jeremy's dog, the one on the right.

MAY 13, 2011 8:13:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
I also think that the other big time bloggers are taking this too casually. If they can do this to Althouse they can do it to anyone.

MAY 13, 2011 8:13:00 PM CDT 
 FlaviusJulius said...
It is back up.

MAY 13, 2011 8:13:00 PM CDT 
 FlaviusJulius said...
This post has been removed by the author.
MAY 13, 2011 8:13:00 PM CDT 
 Seven Machos said...
Seconded Tibore.

MAY 13, 2011 8:14:00 PM CDT 
 EnigmatiCore said...
Your blog is back up (sans any of your previous posts, which I assume will be forthcoming).

A Blogger employee seems to have put a stop to Nitecruzr's nonsense as well, as the Google 'help forum' thread is open for comments once again after the Blogger employee commented.

Hopefully they will take his keys away.

MAY 13, 2011 8:14:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
I told you man. They buried all the old content at sea.

It's the latest thing.

MAY 13, 2011 8:14:00 PM CDT 
 garage mahal said...
You are just stupid.

Awwww! Thanks Troop.

MAY 13, 2011 8:14:00 PM CDT 
 Seven Machos said...
Or minimally put that person at the end of the service line?

This I can certainly see.

Move, Althouse. Fuck this shit.

MAY 13, 2011 8:15:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
You know I love you man.

Anybody that loves road kill sandwiches is ok in my book.

MAY 13, 2011 8:15:00 PM CDT 
 EnigmatiCore said...
It will be interesting to see what happens to Mr. Croll now. I might even have to read his blogs to find out what he eventually says about the whole kerfuffle.

MAY 13, 2011 8:16:00 PM CDT 
 The Grand Inquisitor said...
I won't out nitecruzr, but apparently he wrote a wikipedia entry about himself, and how famous he is for defending freedom of speech while having such a useful blog.

What a dweeb. He wanted to be famous, and now he'll have his little 26 minutes of fame/lame.

MAY 13, 2011 8:17:00 PM CDT 
 madawaskan said...
Althouse

You can find a lot of your stuff in this "feedburner".

feed://feeds.feedburner.com/blogspot/eOqB


I'm not going to hot link it so you can *see* the complete address.

MAY 13, 2011 8:17:00 PM CDT 
 Tibore said...
Yeah, the old content is gone. But the Google cached versions are intact, at least. Not the best thing, granted, but that should mean that somehow the old posts can be resurrected.

MAY 13, 2011 8:19:00 PM CDT 
 Lincolntf said...
"I might even have to read his blogs to find out what he eventually says about the whole kerfuffle."

Guerrilla marketing by being an insufferable prick? So dumb it actually worked. Anyway, you should have plenty of material to look at. According to his "bio" he's got at least half a dozen pseudo-eponymous blogs.

MAY 13, 2011 8:19:00 PM CDT 
 garage mahal said...
Odd seeing the comment on the masthead at the original blog. And the blog being gone. Maybe her husband didn't stop reading Althouse afterall

MAY 13, 2011 8:19:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
Yeah we never figured out who that woman was....Michelle.....hello...
Michelle....Buellar...anyone...

MAY 13, 2011 8:21:00 PM CDT 
 madawaskan said...
It has the photos also.

It looks like because there is so much data associated with your blog that it took them longer.

I know in some management decisions sometimes you make the decision to "sacrifice" the bigger table...

Hard to explain-but that's probably all that happened.

I mean really how big a threat can the only blogger who voted for Obama because McCain scared her because he was too much of an ideologue but at the same time not Conservative enough-really be?

MAY 13, 2011 8:21:00 PM CDT 
 FlaviusJulius said...
Where is my Profile pic?

MAY 13, 2011 8:23:00 PM CDT 
 madawaskan said...
This post has been removed by the author.
MAY 13, 2011 8:24:00 PM CDT 
 madawaskan said...
I think the only person that followed that *logic* married you and came to that conclusion after a 2 1/2 year delay...

And was probably threatened with...

sex.

Or no sex-or well-*scary sex *but with not too much idealism.

Jeebus.

MAY 13, 2011 8:26:00 PM CDT 
 blake said...
It's not really back, just responding. At least, =I= wouldn't consider it back if someone said "Hey! You're back--you just lost everything you've done for the past 8 years!"

I presume this means Althouse is at the front of the queue now. That's what I'd do were I in charge of this mess. It's one thing to be politically strident and another to have it seem as though that were impacting your business decisions.

(It does, of course, but they pick on the small fries whom no one cares about.)

MAY 13, 2011 8:26:00 PM CDT 
 Browndog said...
Not seeing many conservative bloggers rushing to Ann's defense--as I've seen them do with other bloggers with similar issued in the past.

Maybe they're still stuck on the "glitch" meme...waiting to see how this shakes out.

I saw it was removed this morning and was surprised. Now, I'm just shocked. Still.

Kinda shocked at myself for feeling a little bummed not being able to read Althouse.

MAY 13, 2011 8:28:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
It's a really big deal if all the old content was lost.

I mean we lost about 1000 comments of Titus pinching a loaf and Loafing Oaf pinching Sarah Palin's vagina.

MAY 13, 2011 8:28:00 PM CDT 
 Lincolntf said...
AoS put up a thread on the possible bannage,with links, etc.

MAY 13, 2011 8:29:00 PM CDT 
 Noah Bawdy™ said...
Your main blog is coming up now, no posts though.

MAY 13, 2011 8:30:00 PM CDT 
 Coketown said...
I would consider it a great personal tragedy if the Downward Spiral post from last fall was lost.

MAY 13, 2011 8:30:00 PM CDT 
 Seven Machos said...
Somebody pointed out no word verification right now.

Fuckinay! Anybody want to buy some cheap herbal Viagra? I give very good price.

MAY 13, 2011 8:32:00 PM CDT 
 Michael said...
Well, I would say that this incident is not a positive advertisement for buying a cloudbook powered by google with all your work and software residing in the google administered "cloud." Good luck with that comrades.

MAY 13, 2011 8:33:00 PM CDT 
 chickelit said...
Trooper York said:
Garage was one of the few to quickly and unambigously wish them well.

Why that's just fogblather, blogfather! Here, check it out yourself: link.

Garage didn't even post in that thread.

MAY 13, 2011 8:33:00 PM CDT 
 Henry said...
Shocking Meat Video is back!

MAY 13, 2011 8:35:00 PM CDT 
 Anga2010 said...
First they came for the CrackMC, but I didn't care because I'm not CrackMC...

MAY 13, 2011 8:35:00 PM CDT 
 Browndog said...
What the hell is this?

I just checked the old site--

It's there, empty.

But, this is the masthead:

Althouse

"I'm so glad you posted this. I've been trying to convince my husband
not to read your blog for weeks and this finally did the trick."

MAY 13, 2011 8:37:00 PM CDT 
 Palladian said...
Notice that the archives list the post counts for each year. The content isn't lost, it just hasn't found its way home yet.

MAY 13, 2011 8:38:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
I don't know if it was that post but I seem to remember Garage wishing her well. I could stand corrected.

I am willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

You have to be nice to stupid people. Just sayn!

MAY 13, 2011 8:40:00 PM CDT 
 Prosecutorial Indiscretion said...
This post has been removed by the author.
MAY 13, 2011 8:43:00 PM CDT 
 edutcher said...
Trooper York said...

It does seem kind of fishy that as big a blog as Althouse is taking so long to get back on line. I mean this is a big dealio. Shouldn't they be paying attention to this or what?

I think Insta and Jacobson are. And I mentioned BlogHer, but, yes, if the Google Thought Police are pulling something cute because Ann doesn't censor - and because she took a stand in the recent troubles in Madison - then the Conservative and Libertarian blogospheres ought to be a lot more wound up about this.

MAY 13, 2011 8:44:00 PM CDT 
 garage mahal said...
Trooper
I'm almost positive you are correct. One of those threads anyway.

MAY 13, 2011 8:45:00 PM CDT 
 chickelit said...
I am willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

You have to be nice to stupid people. Just sayn!

I like garage too. He's one of the few people I've ever spoken to IRL from this blog.

MAY 13, 2011 8:46:00 PM CDT 
 Roger von Oech said...
Ann:

Good luck fighting your way through this current crap. I know you'll prevail!

For what's worth: I remember your saying a few years ago that you liked Blogger because it was free (as opposed to Typepad), and you didn't have to worry about having to pay to have access to your old posts. I assume you've changed your opinion.

MAY 13, 2011 8:47:00 PM CDT 
 Trooper York said...
That's how I remember it Garage. You were conspicious by being one of the few who did have something nice to say.

MAY 13, 2011 8:47:00 PM CDT 
 Seven Machos said...
Althouse ought to leave blogger. No matter what Google did to cause this, it's unacceptably bad.

Technical glitch. Bad.

Political censorship. Bad.

Chicanery because of glitch. Bad.

MAY 13, 2011 8:48:00 PM CDT 
 chickelit said...
garage mahal said: Trooper
I'm almost positive you are correct. One of those threads anyway.

Well maybe. It wasn't the engagement thread though. Check for yourself above.

Oh, and I think reader was the first to congratulate them after their wedding.

MAY 13, 2011 8:48:00 PM CDT 
 Chip S. said...
My first thought in seeing that the blog was a desaparecido was the same as garage's, and that the woman in question had mad hacking skills.

MAY 13, 2011 8:48:00 PM CDT 
 DADvocate said...
reflecting an assumption that law schools make choices based on diversity factors.

My assumption is that nearly all departments/schools/colleges in a university make choices based on diversity factors. My father was a psychology professor at a large state university. During the late 1970s/early 1980s, his department needed to hire a new department head. They tried for 2-3 years to hire a minority/female, preferably a female minority.

They failed because the supply was limited, the demand high and their salary too low. Instead they settled for the president of the APA who was merely a white male.

MAY 13, 2011 8:48:00 PM CDT 
 chickelit said...
@Palladian (if he's around):

Do you happen to know what happened to backtype.com? They no longer seem to host back comments from Althouse.

MAY 13, 2011 8:49:00 PM CDT 
 Matt said...
Your blog is back. Sadly, with no posts.

MAY 13, 2011 8:51:00 PM CDT 
 blake said...
Notice that the archives list the post counts for each year. The content isn't lost, it just hasn't found its way home yet.

Well, not to get too geeky 'cause I'm sure you're right BUT I would imagine the post counts are updated when posts are made, and not recalculated on every page load.

In other words, the counts being there just mean the counts are there, not the posts.

MAY 13, 2011 8:53:00 PM CDT 
 Chip S. said...
Uh oh. I just realized that I've contributed to the cesspool of homophobia by presuming that someone with a husband was a woman.

MAY 13, 2011 8:53:00 PM CDT 
 Michael said...
Why has your blog been on useless, clueless Blogspot since 2005 anyway?

I don't mean to blame the victim, but really, you could at least pay for your own server and use Blogger to publish it, or better yet WordPress.

This is like asking Ford why your Pinto blew up. That's what Pintos DO.

MAY 13, 2011 8:56:00 PM CDT 
 Quayle said...
If you were teaching a class - say at Northwestern - and you lauded big tits on a woman, you'd be a smash hit with the professoriate.

But you're commentators on a blog? You're unworthy of your title and position.

MAY 13, 2011 8:57:00 PM CDT 
 Chip S. said...
But you're commentators on a blog? You're unworthy of your title and position.

Unworthy of the exalted title of blog commenter?

MAY 13, 2011 9:02:00 PM CDT 
 Quayle said...

Unworthy of the exalted title of blog commenter?

Unworthy of the title professor and as a member of the academy.

MAY 13, 2011 9:05:00 PM CDT 
 RuyDiaz said...
I'm sorry but, it was Titus who offered the only (remotely, if at all) mysogynistic comment? That's pretty much all Titus does!

Between the snarky law professor, and Blogger Trouble, it has been farce all around.

MAY 13, 2011 9:06:00 PM CDT 
 RuyDiaz said...
Uh oh. I just realized that I've contributed to the cesspool of homophobia by presuming that someone with a husband was a woman.

Oh, shoot.

When I was a 14-year-old boy, back in 1990, I remember wondering just how big Benazhir Bhutto's breast were. It was hard to estimate, with her dressing in that unflattering Islamic dress and all.

That's mysogynistic and Islamophobic: take that!

MAY 13, 2011 9:12:00 PM CDT 
 Ralph L said...
Is it misogyny to admire someone's tits, or just to talk about them? I doubt he's interested in her "gyn" parts.

Leiter's blog could be a hotbed of Cfud-caliber anti-semitism. He's got a post called "Hung from Temple to Colorado."

MAY 13, 2011 9:13:00 PM CDT 
 blake said...
Unworthy of the title professor and as a member of the academy.

Probably the nicest thing anyone's said about Althouse all day!

MAY 13, 2011 9:14:00 PM CDT 
 Chip S. said...
@Quayle, Oh, OK. I reread your comment and now I get it. One of those times when "you're" vs. "your" wasn't clear from context.

Did you see that Northwestern recently dropped that sex class? Too high a ratio of hardware to soft porn.

MAY 13, 2011 9:19:00 PM CDT 
 starboardhelm said...
Ann, I would love to host your blog on my own server at writecraft.net (as althouse.writecraft.net or any domain name you want) for a very reasonable rate. I will even migrate your database if you can get a copy out Blogger. If you're interested, please contact me at support@writecraft.net.

MAY 13, 2011 9:19:00 PM CDT 

Sarah Palin talks about Tucson with Sean Hannity.

The video.

"Sean Hannity in my back pocket, and I can go on his show and raise money by attacking you guys."

Bragging and threatening, Christine O'Donnell-style. Wait. Did she really say that? Howard Fineman, in HuffPo, says that 2 "top GOP insiders" told him she said that. I'm skeptical, especially about the verbatim quote. What sort of top insiders hurt their party's candidate so badly?

If there really are such people and O'Donnell has to deal with them, maybe it's good that she has the balls to push them back like that. Who are they? What was the whole context of the discussion? Hey, remember when it was oh-so-horrible to take quotes out of context?

And isn't it funny, now that the Democrats are over-the-top desperate, that the GOP is desperate too? Could somebody please remain calm and sane? We're going to need some folks left with enough mental stability to govern. It can't be the tea partiers, can it? They've always been so crazy and angry. I read it in HuffPo.

O'Keefe on Hannity.

Explaining the Landrieu incident.

The link goes to Gawker, which strains to make every little thing sound awful, but the video is there. I thought Jim O'Keefe did a good job justifying himself while showing some remorse related to security issues. He admitted that he needed to think more carefully in the future about how he does his exposés, but he defended the practice of tricking people to do an investigation. I note that the government tricks people when it does undercover investigations, so how wrong is it to pretend to be someone you are not to try to find out something valuable?

ADDED: This seems important:

O'Keefe... was "framed" by the media and the U.S. attorney's office, Andrew Breitbart, publisher of BigGovernment.com, told Fox News Monday.

Hours later, Jim Letten, U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Louisiana, recused himself from the case....

"James O'Keefe sat in jail for 28 hours without access to an attorney, while the U.S. attorney leaked the information about his arrest, helping the media frame it as 'Watergate Junior,'" Breitbart said.

The charge against O'Keefe is entering federal property under false pretenses for the purpose of committing a felony. What felony does the government say they intended to commit?

Hannity interviews Limbaugh.

The transcript.

Here's the part about Sotomayor:

And I got a little grief from people for saying that there's no such thing as reverse racism, just call her a racist, so - and they're right. That ["wise Latina" remark] is a racist thing to say and it's bigoted. And she would bring, no question about it, racism and bigotry to the court, if she is confirmed.

But, Sean, I've been thinking about this, and there's something else going on with Sonia Sotomayor. We don't know what she thinks about Roe versus Wade. She hasn't said. Now we know that she's Catholic. We know that she's Puerto Rican - Hispanic Catholic. They tend to be devout.

She has no record. She hasn't said much about it. If, and I'm speaking for me personally, if I learned, if I could be assured, that she is actually a pro-life person and does think that Roe versus Wade is bad constitutional law, and if she would rule on the right side on the life issue, I might look past this racism and even deal with that, but that's something very, very important to me, and she could be stealth in that regard.

And I know that - well, there's no record. Normally most liberals, they love to tell you how pro-choice they are and abortion. She doesn't have any of that.

Sean Hannity interviews Sarah Palin.

Video: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3.

Excerpts.

Commentary:

1. TBogg mocks Palin's speech. She does chatter through a lot of phrases that often don't hang together as sentences. And she gets words wrong, saying "lack" for "lax" (or "lacking") and "verbage" -- twice -- for "verbiage." This is a fair criticism. I get the feeling she tries to impress by speaking quickly and without the filler words like "uh" and "you know" that many people (including Barack Obama) use to steal the time to make better sentences. TBogg makes a wisecrack that has a reek of racism: "Her first language is Alaskimo."

2. Unbossed complains about the lack of content: "What? What? Government 'can play a very, very appropriate role'; 'when we see the collapse that we’re seeing today, you know that something is broken'; 'McCain has a great plan to get in there and fix it'. I know nothing more about their plans than when she started to 'explain' them." Me neither. There's a problem and they are going to fix it. Long answers boil down to that.

3. Andrew Sullivan detects a lie. Did she ask her daughters if they wanted her to run for VP or suddenly surprise them with the news? Then, in an update, he undetects a lie. That post is a good example of why you should hesitate to use the word "lie." I recommend language like "seeming contradiction" and allowing time for explanations to filter in before concluding "lie."

4. Lawyers, Guns & Money works the "pig" insult: "I would suggest here that Sarah Palin is pig-ignorant, but that would be an insult to pigs. Pigs, after all -- being pigs -- know what it is that they're supposed to do each day, what with the rooting and wallowing and squealing and such." Driving home the point that Palin is an idiot, LGM uses the nonword "spindler."

5. Personally, I found the interview tiresome. I think we are well beyond the yes-I-can-speak phase. And the fact is that she doesn't really speak very well when you start looking for structure and content. There's a superficial gloss to it that may be enough if you want to like her or think you need to give her a chance to settle into this new role. But now it's time to calm down and really communicate.

He cheated on his wife, so we can't trust him. Is that the rule you want?

Colmes wrestles Hannity to the floor.

Sebelius, Kaine, Bayh, Biden — take your pick of the apparent finalists.

Seems like Biden is really the best...

ADDED: Adam Nagourney on why it's probably not going to be Clinton.

"I don’t want them punished with a baby."

A quote from Barack Obama, talking about the importance of teaching kids about contraception.



Or do you think he was talking about abortion? Sean Hannity does. And the blogs go wild.

Obama is obviously talking about contraception education, but there is an implicit — albeit deniable — signal about abortion rights. Note that he says "I'm going to teach [my daughters] first of all about values and morals, but if they make a mistake, I don't want them punished with a baby." If they make a mistake, doesn't that mean they failed to use contraception? It suggests that to a lot of people, but I think he took the position that it would be a mistake to have sex at all, and therefore he wants them to know to use contraception — that is, to make a mistake with less consequence.

That's not personal!

In the email:

A Personal Note from Sean Hannity

Dear Fellow American....

"You wanna know what I think? You guys who think 9/11 was an inside job are crazy as hell."

"My wife was the senator from New York when that happened. I was down at Ground Zero. I saw the victims' families. You're nuts."

Said Bill Clinton to some Ron Paul supporters who were interrupting him and shouting that 9/11 was an inside job. A few points:

1. I'm not sure how Hillary's being a Senator from New York and Bill's seeing Ground Zero and the victims' families disproves the inside job theory — though it explains why he's especially outraged by it.

2. What is the connection between thinking 9/11 was an inside job and supporting Ron Paul? Amorphous nuttiness?

3. Why do Ron Paul supporters think it's a good idea to harass people? There's also this other story today that they chased after Sean Hannity. Watch the video at the link — they look like the mob from the movie "Frankenstein," but with American flags instead of torches. (And look at all those commenters at the link — to Crooks and Liars — who seem to think it's just great for a mob to rush after someone and cause for hilarity if they scare him — as long as you hate him.)

ADDED: Bad link fixed. Sorry.

Watching the Iowa caucuses.

Are you watching? I'm hanging out with CNN, where Wolf Blitzer is talking about entrance polls. (Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton in a tight race, with Edwards trailing.) They've got a camera at a 53-person caucus that's taking place in someone's living room in Persia, Iowa. It's folksy and boring. And every single person is white.

UPDATE #1: Now, we're wandering the hallways of a middle school, where there are are caucuses in the gym, the cafeteria, the library, and the auditorium. CNN is doing some terrific camera work with a journalist in the hallway, swaying about under a curved ceiling with a lighted trophy case in the background. They've got a nice Americana vibe going. White Americana.

UPDATE #2: It's a Norman Rockwell illustration. Don't you love these people? From that middle school hallway, we're hearing a description of the human drama of having to abandon the sticker of your first choice and stick on the second choice. Now, we're being told there are lots of women, older women. And 60% of the Republicans are evangelical Christians.

UPDATE #3: Bill Bennett offers commentary "as a former philosophy professor": "We've been watching pictures out of Kenya, of people with machetes killing each other, watching pictures from Pakistan, the Bhutto thing. People like to make fun of Iowa, but there they are, in their homes, you know, welcoming each other and talking. There's no violence. There's no killing. There's no imposition of will. It's a great country. It's a great system. An incredible thing."

UPDATE #4: "It's a clash of generations of epic proportions." 17 to 29 year olds are 57% for Obama, 11% for Clinton. With the over 65 voters, Clinton is at 45% and Obama at 17%.

UPDATE #5: CNN projects Huckabee as the winner of the Republican caucuses. "A dramatic, dramatic development... A huge win... " says Blitzer.

UPDATE #6: Maybe I should be watching Fox. I see from the NYT blog that Romney just conceded on Fox.

UPDATE #7: "Did you want to knock his teeth out?" Chris Wallace asks Huckabee's campaign chairman Ed Rollins, referring to this story. Wallace also asked him about this Town Hall blog that reports an evil conversation of his that was overheard. Rollins admits it all but says it was a private conversation with his wife. Rollins has an insanely nasty edge that's totally at odds with Huckabee's image. This is how he acts when he's just won a big victory? The hell? From that Town Hall blog: "He distinctly talked about going negative in South Carolina and told someone on the phone to 'put some good in there if you have to, with the bad. Do what you gotta do.'"

UPDATE #8: Fox declares Obama the winner of the Democratic caucuses.

UPDATE #9: CNN declares Obama the victor too.

UPDATE #10: Juan Williams: "For a black man to win... astounding... historic... a 95% white state..."

UPDATE #11: I'm leaning toward Fox now. Bill Kristol, Fred Barnes, and Juan Williams are better commentators than the group over on CNN (led by Bill Bennett).

UPDATE #12: Giuliani on Fox, talking to Sean Hannity and Alan Colmes. How to not seem irrelevant? The words "Tested. Ready. Now." appear on the backdrop screen behind Giuliani's glistening pate. Colmes is badgering him about various policies and scandals. Not enough about the amazing Huckabee.

UPDATE #13: It's John Edwards. "The status quo lost, and change won. And now, we move on..." He's almost claiming Obama's victory as his own.

UPDATE #14: Hillary speaks. Thanks for voting ... for a Democrat....

UPDATE #15: Dodd drops out. Do we even care if he endorses someone?

UPDATE #16: Huckabee speaks. With Chuck Norris at his shoulder. "A new day in American politics." The banner behind him reads: "I like Mike." We need to be more concerned "about going up" — he says, pointing heavenward — and not just to the left or right.

UPDATE: #17: Finally, Barack Obama. "To end the political strategy that's been all about division, and instead make it about addition. To build a coalition...."

UPDATE #18: Biden drops out.

UPDATE #19: What a night! It feels historic, doesn't it? Not just for the reason stated by Juan Williams (see update #10), but because the old, predictable candidates were upset, upset by 2 fresh, new individuals who, it seems, invented themselves and succeeded by revealing what they were to us.

"Do people really want a woman President? Do they want the Clinton circus back in town?"

"Do they want to keep trading the presidency between these two weird families?"

Joe Klein has some questions (in a big, rambling Time piece):

"Who knows?" said Karl Rhomberg, a former Scott County Democratic chairman, after watching Clinton perform in Davenport, Iowa. He pointed out that four years ago, in November, Howard Dean was inevitable, and John Kerry was over. "But 40% were undecided going into the last week of the caucus. It'll be the same this time. Hillary is 20% smarter than the guys, but a woman has to be just to pull equal. And I can't stand thinking about what Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity are going to do to her. People are just sick of that. They love Obama. He's very inspiring. But in the end, Iowans vote on electability. I hate to say it, but my guess is they'll vote for the white guy — Edwards — this time, just like they voted for the war hero last time."

It was a chilling thought. I'm sure Edwards wouldn't want to win that way, and I'm not so sure he will. But Rhomberg's scenario wasn't at all implausible. It certainly raises the central issue of this Democratic campaign: whether Hillary Clinton's excellence as a candidate will be enough to overcome her family's garish political history, the undiluted hatred that will be directed against her and the demons that still haunt our nation.

Oh, that drooling over Clinton is a little repulsive. Excellence. 20% smarter. Ugh! But what's worse is pushing the offensive notion that if we don't like her, we're sexist. It's hatred. Demons! Haunting our nation!

Edwards wouldn't want to win that way. Please. First of all, Edwards wants to win any way he can. He'll even claim to be more womanly than Hillary if he thinks we want a woman.

But we've all been thinking about 2004 and Howard Dean in connection with Hillary's current seeming inevitability, haven't we? Can't you picture the scenario playing out the same way in '08? Scream and all.

ADDED: "Why is Hillary playing the gender card?" Peter Beinart and Jonah Goldberg diavlog.

"Why do we wear pins? Because our country is under attack!"

Sean Hannity raves. And everyone's talking about the fact that Barack Obama stopped wearing his American flag lapel pin. We're hot for our symbols and we love to talk about what they mean. (It's so much easier than talking about the substantive issues. Can you compare the health care plans of the candidates?)

And speaking of symbols: This Is Your Elephant on Drugs.

“You exhibit all the signs of a petty and cruel dictator.”

Columbia University president Lee Bollinger said to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Ahmadinejad's response:

I think the text read by the dear gentleman here, more than addressing me, was an insult to information and the knowledge of the audience here, present here. In a university environment we must allow people to speak their mind, to allow everyone to talk so that the truth is eventually revealed by all.

Oh, isn't that nice? He believes in the marketplace of ideas when he's over here and he's been given a big stage.

And why did Bollinger call him a petty dictator? He's running a country with 67 million people.

ADDED: Giuliani on Hannity's show:

HANNITY: “While Bollinger in his introduction said his views were ridiculous, the Holocaust is not an issue in dispute, that his arguments were absurd.”

GIULIANI: “But then he turned the podium over to him.”

HANNITY: “Well then he turned the podium over to him and I’ll tell you what was more frightening to me, immediately thereafter, here was Ahmadinejad basically saying he found the introduction insulting but more importantly I want you to listen to the students’ reactions and clapping for Ahmadinejad in the background. … Does that student reaction frighten you as much as it does me?”

GIULIANI: “Well here’s—this is really to my point, Sean. It frightens me because I don’t know what kind of reaction Ahmadinejad has to that, which means he comes away from this thinking, hey there’s a strong level of support for me in the United States of America, maybe I can push these people a little further, maybe I can take advantage of them a little bit more. That’s why I say in spite of the fact that the president of Columbia introduced him with an insult, he turned the podium over to him and he comes away from it. Ahmadinejad comes away from it saying, ‘Sure there are people there that don’t like me and opposed me and booed me, but hey, there were an awful lot of people there that applauded for me too. So I have some support there.’ And who knows what that results in when you’re dealing—look we have to come to the conclusion that Ahmadinejad is an irrational man. You don’t say the things he says if you’re working on, kind of a rational script. The denial of the Holocaust, the threat of—against Israel, the ways in which he gives five different versions of every single answer. This is a man who’s living in this fantasy world of jihad and world domination by Islamic extremism.”

HANNITY: “And providing the weaponry to kill American troops.”

GIULIANI: “And providing weaponry right now, right as we’re speaking possibly taking the lives of American troops. And we hand him a podium at Columbia University. And have no idea of what impact that can have on him? And the idea that it’s in the name of free speech, well that isn’t correct. Not everybody gets to speak at Columbia. …”

Has Rudy Giuliani gotten incoherent about abortion?

Here's a NYT piece about how Rudy Giuliani is reframing his stance on abortion to appeal to conservatives. It contains a quote that I found puzzling:

“On the federal judiciary I would want judges who are strict constructionists because I am,” he said last week in South Carolina. “I have a very, very strong view that for this country to work, for our freedoms to be protected, judges have to interpret, not invent, the Constitution.

“Otherwise you end up, when judges invent the Constitution, with your liberties being hurt. Because legislatures get to make those decisions and the Legislature in South Carolina might make that decision one way and the Legislature in California a different one.”

How is "strict construction" supposed to protect liberty, and why would it help to have legislatures in different states making different decisions about "your liberty"? The NYT article leaves us hanging -- Rudy seems incoherent -- and moves on to what he said to Sean Hannity the other day about "partial-birth" abortion and parental notification laws.

This seems to be the full context of Giuliani's statement. It adds one more sentence that made me get his point, which in fact makes sense:

"On the Federal judiciary I would want judges who are strict constructionists because I am. I'm a lawyer. I've argued cases in the Supreme Court. I've argued cases in the Court of Appeals in different parts of the country. I have a very, very strong view that for this country to work, for our freedoms to be protected, judges have to interpret not invent the Constitution. Otherwise you end up, when judges invent the constitution, with your liberties being hurt. Because legislatures get to make those decisions and the legislature in South Carolina might make that decision one way and the legislature in California a different one. And that's part of our freedom and when that's taken away from you that's terrible."

The meaning is none too obvious, so I'm not criticizing the NYT for dropping that last line, but it was enough to tip me off that he was talking about federalism (a subject I teach and write about).

I'm not surprised that Giuliani didn't launch into a discourse on federalism in front of a crowd of non-lawyers. But there is a constitutional law point is embedded in these few words. The idea is that constraining the scope of federal constitutional rights leaves more room for legislatures to regulate in ways that suit the preferences of the people in the difference states, and this power to make different law in different places is an aspect of freedom. The people in South Carolina might like things one way and -- look at the other state he chose to name -- the people of California might like something else.

Why is federalism an aspect of freedom? Here's a good passage written by Justice O'Connor that ties federalism to the protection of freedom (from Gregory v. Ashcroft, 501 U.S. 452 (1991)(citations omitted)):

Perhaps the principal benefit of the federalist system is a check on abuses of government power. "The 'constitutionally mandated balance of power' between the States and the Federal Government was adopted by the Framers to ensure the protection of 'our fundamental liberties.'" Just as the separation and independence of the coordinate Branches of the Federal Government serves to prevent the accumulation of excessive power in any one Branch, a healthy balance of power between the States and the Federal Government will reduce the risk of tyranny and abuse from either front. Alexander Hamilton explained to the people of New York, perhaps optimistically, that the new federalist system would suppress completely "the attempts of the government to establish a tyranny":

"[I]n a confederacy the people, without exaggeration, may be said to be entirely the masters of their own fate. Power being almost always the rival of power, the general government will at all times stand ready to check usurpations of the state governments, and these will have the same disposition towards the general government. The people, by throwing themselves into either scale, will infallibly make it preponderate. If their rights are invaded by either, they can make use of the other as the instrument of redress." The Federalist No. 28, pp. 180-181 (A. Hamilton).

James Madison made much the same point:

"In a single republic, all the power surrendered by the people is submitted to the administration of a single government; and the usurpations are guarded against by a division of the government into distinct and separate departments. In the compound republic of America, the power surrendered by the people is first divided between two distinct governments, and then the portion allotted to each subdivided among distinct and separate departments. Hence a double security arises to the rights of the people. The different governments will control each other, at the same time that each will be controlled by itself." The Federalist No. 51, p. 323 (J. Madison).

One fairly can dispute whether our federalist system has been quite as successful in checking government abuse as Hamilton promised, but there is no doubt about the design. If this "double security" is to be effective, there must be a proper balance between the States and the Federal Government. These twin powers will act as mutual restraints only if both are credible. In the tension between federal and state power lies the promise of liberty.

So Giuliani was referring -- I think -- to the idea that the preservation of the legislative autonomy of the states is an important constitutional structural safeguard that works to protect individuals. We tend to be so used to the idea that courts protect freedom by enforcing individual rights that we forget to think about how the original Constitution embodies a belief in protecting the people from the abuse of power by dividing it up.

Of course, you're entitled to be suspicious about whether federalism protects freedom. O'Connor expressed the skepticism that the history of states rights in the United States demands:

One fairly can dispute whether our federalist system has been quite as successful in checking government in checking government abuse as Hamilton promised....

By failing to explore the idea that Giuliani was talking about federalism, the NYT deprived readers of an opportunity to understand the coherence of his remark, but it also spared him a criticism. There he was in South Carolina letting people know -- if they could pick it up -- that he cared about states' rights.

The Times article, as noted, moves on to the subject of what Giuliani said about "partial-birth" abortion:

[H]e told Mr. Hannity that a ban signed into law by President Bush in 2003, which the Supreme Court is reviewing, should be upheld....

[But when a]sked by Tim Russert on “Meet the Press” in 2000 if he supported President Bill Clinton’s veto of a law that would have banned the disputed abortion procedure, Mr. Giuliani said, “I would vote to preserve the option for women.” He added, “I think the better thing for America to do is to leave that choice to the woman, because it affects her probably more than anyone else.”

Is this a contradiction? No. To say that the Court should uphold a statute is to say that it is not a violation of constitutional law. The question from "Meet the Press" is about whether, as the executive with the veto power, he would sign the law. One could think a law should not be passed -- because you want "to preserve the option for women" -- without also thinking that the law would be unconstitutional. The language "the option for women" itself suggests that he was talking about what is good policy rather than the scope of rights that courts need to enforce.

If you look at the transcript of the Hannity show, you can see this:

HANNITY: There's a misconception that you supported partial-birth abortion.

GIULIANI: Yes, well, if it doesn't have a provision for the life of the mother, then I wouldn't support the legislation. If it has provision for the life of the mother, then I would support it.

Is that inconsistent with what he said in 2000 about Clinton's veto? The bill that President Clinton vetoed did contain exception for the life of the mother: It did not apply to "a partial-birth abortion that is necessary to save the life of a mother whose life is endangered by a physical disorder, illness, or injury: Provided, That no other medical procedure would suffice for that purpose."

There's room to wriggle out of the contradiction by saying that is not a proper "life" exception, and I would cut Giuliani some slack for not going into the details on the Hannity show. What "other medical procedures" would women be forced to endure to save their own lives? Would you require a woman with a life-threatening medical condition to have a Caesarean section -- as long as she could survive it -- in order to remove a fetus that was only going to die in the womb?

The NYT article also points to a seeming contradiction about parental notification laws. Here's what Giuliani said on Hannity (from the transcript) in response to the two word question "Parental notification?":

Parental notification, I think you have to have a judicial bypass. If you do, you can have parental notification. And I think the court -- I mean, that's the kind of thing I think the court will do with abortion.

And here's the NYT:

[O]n a 1997 candidate questionnaire from the National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League of New York, which Mr. Giuliani completed and signed, he marked “yes” to the question: Would you oppose legislation “requiring a minor to obtain permission from a parent or from a court before obtaining an abortion.”

This is definitely not a contradiction. On Hannity, Giuliani was clearly talking about how constitutional law should be interpreted. On the 1997 questionnaire, he was clearly talking about how he would exercise his role in the legislative process.

Now, you can say, but he's running for President now, and he'll have the veto power, so what matters is how he handles federal legislation. If he would veto anti-abortion bills, shouldn't pro-lifers reject him? I think you need to see how Giuliani's various statements point to the federalism solution. Let the law vary from state to state, reflecting the different preferences of decentralized majorities at the state level. This solution depends not only on the Supreme Court's interpreting rights narrowly enough to leave room for state regulation, but also on the absence of federal legislation that would preempt state law.

If your conservatism extends to federalism, you should see why Giuliani's seemingly complicated position is perfectly coherent.

UPDATE: Andrew Sullivan agrees with me about Rudy and goes on to say that he has long favored the federalist solution to the abortion controversy. Read his whole post, but let me highlight some of it:

The South is a very conservative place. Forcing them to move more quickly on issues of basic human dignity has historically led to even worse spasms of hatred...

It seems to me that if the conservative coalition is not going to fracture completely, then federalism is its only option. That way, centrists like McCain, Romney and Giuliani can actually become Republican presidents.... Opting to use federalism as the mechanism to allow the social conservatives to support him on other issues like national security and a more competent government, while personally supporting women's freedom and gay dignity, is extremely smart politics.

I think Rudy is the best and most viable candidate the Republicans now have....

Let me flag two posts of mine from last fall about abortion and federalism: this one (responding to a lecture from Harvard lawprof Richard Fallon) and this one (reprinting an op-ed I wrote in the Wall Street Journal).

Glenn Reynolds also links and writes:

First, Ann refers to federalism's role (under the inaccurate moniker of "states' rights") as a shibboleth for anti-desegregation forces.

I agree that "states' rights" is a misnomer and use it here only to refer to the historical rhetoric. I used to think only people who didn't like federalism would use the term "states' rights" other than to call to mind the bad old days of slavery and segregation, but I was surprised back in 2000, when I participated in the (now famous) "Constitution in Exile" conference at Duke Law School, that lawprofs Lynn Baker and Ernie Young used the term "states rights" in a positive way in their article "Federalism and the Double Standard of Judicial Review." I was one of the commenters on their article -- my piece is "Why Talking About 'States' Rights' Cannot Avoid the Need for Normative Federalism Analysis" -- and I wrote:

Baker and Young boldly employ the inflammatory term "states' rights." Before reading their wonderfully assertive new article, I had thought the term states' rights survived only in the vocabulary of opponents of the Supreme Court's recent efforts on behalf of the states. "Federalism," I would have thought, is the term of choice for supporters of the Court's current jurisprudence. The term federalism conjures up more functional and pragmatic ideas about the role of the states....

But Baker and Young openly, eagerly embrace not just federalism but "states' rights." Their use of the term "rights" is not accidental. The way they would treat states corresponds to the way American law treats individual human beings when it is said that they have rights. The law protects individual freedom of speech even though that freedom will be used by persons who have hateful, ugly, or disturbing things to say; the law, however, may justify this individual autonomy on the theory that, over time, good will emerge from the marketplace of ideas. By the same token, Baker and Young are willing to take the risk that some states might do bad things with their freedom. They want protection of state autonomy and rely on a belief that in the long run what the states do with their independence will accrue to the good. Just as some First Amendment libertarians advocate a marketplace of ideas, Baker and Young might be said to advocate a marketplace of states, offering Americans a choice of fifty different cultures....

This argument for diversity -- at least in cases in which uniformity is not necessary -- is a strong one, yet its appeal inevitably will vary depending on how one answers the normative question. As long as Americans fear that states will do too much harm and too little good if left to their own devices, they are likely to prefer not states' rights, but, at most, a flexible, pragmatic federalism.

(I hope regular readers of this blog see the resonance between what I was saying there and the dispute I had with the libertarians recently -- here, here, and here.)

Anyway, you should read the rest of Glenn's post. And Baker and Young's article is really good. More on the "Constitution in Exile" notion here and here.