Matthew Yglesias

IGNORANCE IS BLISS. Robert Zoellick was pretty ineffective as US Trade Representative, so I’m not sure we should shed too many tears over him not getting the Treasury Secretary job. The explanation for why he’s not getting it, however, is moronic. The White House is looking for someone “who would command more respect on Wall […]

WALL: ACTUALLY BAD, ACTUALLY EXPENSIVE. Jonah Goldberg thinks the arguments against walling off the southern border are all bad. Except, of course, for the symbolism argument which he concedes is good. The other main argument is that it’s too expensive. He doesn’t actually think that’s a bad argument either, but he says of folks who […]

A BLOG BY ANY OTHER NAME. I’m glad Judith Warner is back as a TimesSelect bonus feature, but what’s the deal with the blurb they’ve given her? Judith Warner: “Domestic Disturbances”The author’s blog on modern parenting returns and will now appear every Friday.” If it appears once a week on a regular schedule, that’s a […]

WHY NOT JUST ASK? Ace New York Times reporter Patrick Healy delivers a big scoop on the Clinton family marriage. Take this shocking revelation: Since the start of 2005, the Clintons have been together about 14 days a month on average, according to aides who reviewed the couple’s schedules. Sometimes it is a full day […]

SHOW ME THE BOOK! Lord am I tired of all this whining about how liberals aren’t reviewing Ramesh Ponnuru‘s book, The Party of Death: The Democrats, the Media, the Courts, and the Disregard for Human Life. I think Kevin Drum already wrote the definitive take on this, but I’ll reiterate. On the one hand, at […]

NEW COUNTRY ON THE BLOCK. It looks like we’ll soon be welcoming Montenegro into the family of sovereign states. But don’t believe everything you read in the newspapers: “For supporters of Montenegrin independence, the results, however narrow, are the fruition of a decade-long struggle to enable Montenegro to reclaim its status from 1878 to 1918, […]

WHAT DID DHS KNOW? Jeff Stein reports that some members of Congress are asking questions about whether the Department of Homeland Security may have had access, via its NSA liaison, to the NSA’s illegal wiretap and phone record surveillance programs. This would be the same Department of Homeland Security, we recall, whose operatives were used […]

METAETHICS: THE SAGA CONTINUES. I don’t want to get too bogged down in this, but since Jonah Goldberg‘s written some posts in response to what I said Friday on relativism, here’s a bit more. One thing, for the philosophers in the room, is that “relativism” per se is a vulgar term that just about everyone […]

FRIDAY AFTERNOON METAETHICS HOUR. I don’t want this to be misunderstood, but I’m a moral relativist. Or, rather, I reject moral realism, the view that “moral claims do purport to report facts and are true if they get the facts right. Moreover, they hold, at least some moral claims actually are true.” This is a […]

MCCAIN AND WAR. I loved this line from Michael Kinsley on John McCain: He “has a unique genius for telling the truth from his heart and making people believe that he is lying. And these people are his supporters! They admire him as a straight-talking truth�teller, and they forgive him for taking positions on big […]