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- There is not enough space here to properly discuss the fascinating conversation between Sanchez, Yglesias, Millman, and Larison on the closing of the conservative mind, but here's an illustrative example of the phenomenon. David Frum goes on Larry Kudlow's show and Kudlow argues that a mere 5 percent to 10 percent cut in federal payrolls could have a "major impact" on the budget deficit. Frum senses this is absurd, and discovers later that "even if we fired every single federal civil servant and shuttered the entire non-defense federal government, three-fourths of the budget deficit would still be with us." At this point we would usually ask whether Kudlow actually believes his own claims or if he is merely toeing an ideological line. At this point the distinction is pointless. Kudlow's premise is that there is waste and inefficiency in the federal government, and he believes it with such totality that he also believes such waste is a major contributor to deficits.
- Veronique de Rugy runs a new stimulus regression taking into account Nate Silver's observation that state capitals receive more stimulus funds because they are the main point of disbursement and finds that "the original findings still hold," before saying, "The average Democratic district receives 81 percent more than the average Republican district. Even after taking out the money spent through state capitals, the average Democratic district receives at least 30 percent more than the average Republican district." I'll wait for Silver to address the statistical significance of this, but this strikes me as a substantial concession, not validation of de Rugy's original hypothesis. Again, the problem here is that she is working off an specious premise -- Democrats intentionally directed stimulus dollars towards their districts -- and is looking for whatever evidence she can find to support this assumption.
- Will Wilkinson labors mightily to predict Libertarianism: The Next Generation in a future cohort turned off by the regressive right-wing, but Jon Chait is not impressed. The problem, of course, is that 18- to 29-year-olds do not profess much sympathy for libertarianism on the crucial axis of fiscal conservatism. They do not, on the whole, object to government offering services. They are sympathetic toward social liberalism, which makes them "libertarian-ish" but this obviously does not make them libertarian. And without strong libertarian-in-the-electorate numbers, libertarianism will remain a niche political philosophy that continues to draw strength precisely from its outsider status.
- Remainders: Glenn Beck is in it for the money; Henry Farrell finds Ross Douthat's efforts to put some of the blame for the Catholic Church's transgressions on sexual liberalism "intellectually dishonest and rather contemptible"; this is a less charitable look at what motivates the Tea Partiers; and I completely agree that this is the quintessential Fox News freeze frame, repulsive to the last pixel.
--Mori Dinauer
