The Anchoress

First up: Tim Blair has cancer. GM Roper has a moving message for him. Godspeed with the treatment, Tim, hopefully you’ll be back at it very soon.

President Bush meets with Kuwaiti women in politics. Consider how unthinkable that sentence would have been a decade ago. And imagine what the press would have made of it, had a Democrat president whose vision had shifted the Middle East, taken this meeting.

AJ says Bush has a few more hat-tricks.

Three examples of solid, good, insightful and entertaining writing:

1) David Brooks thinks Hillary did herself no favors on Meet the Press. That seems to be the general opinion.

Clinton refused to admit any real errors. She implied that Barack Obama is unfit to be president, without ever honestly taking responsibility for what she actually believes.

She broadcast her own humility: “You know, I’m very other-directed. I don’t like talking about myself.” She also described the central role she plays in the lives of all living creatures in the universe: “The Iraqi government, they watch us, they listen to us. I know very well that they follow everything that I say.”

But Clinton’s real problem is that she is caught in a trap, which you might call The Identity Trap.
[...]
All the habits of verbal thuggery that have long been used against critics of affirmative action, like Ward Churchill and Thomas Sowell, and critics of the radical feminism, like Christina Hoff Summers, are now being turned inward by the Democratic front-runners.

Indeed. And I think the Democrat candidates rushing to play victim and the GOP candidates rushing to play preacher will encourage the left and right extremes to step center. So let it play out!

2) Christopher Hitchens nails Candidate Clinton to the wall, and her husband, too.

In the New Hampshire primary in 1992, she knowingly lied about her husband’s uncontainable sex life and put him eternally in her debt. This is now thought of, and referred to in print, purely as a smart move on her part. In the Iowa caucuses of 2008, he returns the favor by telling a huge lie about his own record on the war in Iraq, falsely asserting that he was opposed to the intervention from the very start. This is thought of, and referred to in print, as purely a tactical mistake on his part: trying too hard to help the spouse. The happy couple has now united on an equally mendacious account of what they thought about Iraq and when they thought it. What would it take to break this cheap little spell and make us wake up and inquire what on earth we are doing when we make the Clinton family drama—yet again—a central part of our own politics?

That’s the mild part of his piece. Read it all. Hitchens has quit smoking, by the way. It doesn’t seem to have dulled his pen.

3) And what a great lede, by John Dickerson:

Hillary Clinton has a fair point about Barack Obama. He should be vetted more thoroughly than he has been so far during the primary process. He has not gotten the scrutiny she has. But every time she opens her mouth to make this point, a brass band starts playing, an 18-wheeler backfires, and the water heater explodes. This might create sympathy for Clinton—except that her campaign is causing the ruckus.

As my Li’l Bro Thom would say, “Gawd, that’s good!”

Maybe being the only guy on the ballot is not always a good thing. Jim Geraghty explains what it means to the Hillary campaign in Michigan.

Perhaps the Clinton campaign should rethink endorsing an idea to disenfranchise voters. Or, if not endorsing…certainly not condemning. Over at Ace the question is asked: This is the stuff presidents are made of?

Betsy says Hillary needs a better hiding place.

Meanwhile this book sounds interesting: A Magnificent Catastrophe: The Election of 1800 by Edward J. Larson. Might be worth picking up, if for no other reason than to read something that is not about Hillary and Obama.

Ann Althouse on the Michigan Shenanigans in play. And yes, I linked that mostly so I could write Michigan Shenanigans, because a good Irish word like shenanigans can’t be used enough.

Tom Maguire looks at the recession that has been looming for five years, according to the “experts”.

Captain Ed has Rush Limbaugh having too much fun. (Via Hot Air). I’m not a regular Rush listener, and I missed that one, but my goodness, no wonder the left wants him off the air…he dares to laugh at them. They should buck it up. The right gets laughed at all the time.

Zoe Romanowsky at Inside Catholic, cleans her fridge and finds newspaper clipping worth re-reading.

Remember when Al Gore and Joy Behar got mad at President Bush for - among other things - ignoring the Iran Study Group? Seems he understood something they did not. Cooked.

Are you interested in UFO’s? Wired Magazine says Lake Erie is apparently a hotspot and links to entertaining video. Dude!

This is Fred Thompson’s wife? Wowee. Pretty and articulate. And he’s pretty clear-speaking, too.

President Bush should never have signed McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform. Although, it does sound like this film crosses a line, to me.

Siggy has Stem Cell News that ought to make everyone glad, even if they hate Bush.

The Koran undergoes Da Vinci Code-ish scrutinies.

Flopping Aces says commerce fears a Democrat win? (Now I can’t get that damn song out of my head: Come on, Mary, don’t fear the reaper…)

Cutting through the Katrina Krapola. With a knife. I kind of liked some of the things Vanderleun grouses about, here, but I take his point.

A new year seems like a good time to consider cultural and moral relativism, doesn’t it? Neo-neocon thinks about it here and here, in pieces that strike me as excellent conversation pieces for the workroom lunch area. Or, maybe not. Depends on how you go about it, I guess. Neo also wonders why so many clever writers consent to be so useful to others, in such an idiotic way.

Has anyone tried this coffee yet, and if so, could you tell me what you thought of it? I talked about picking it up at Christmas, but never got around to it. The Rosary bracelets I gave were big hits, though, particularly the tree agate (green) and the obsidian (black). I see they have newer, better pictures of the bracelets up, and I’m tempted to buy more.

Greetings from Buster, back at school and unable to sleep due to a loud, rowdy neighbor. He sends this your way - Joe Cocker singing “Unchain My Heart” - damn, it’s good:

On being home-schooled. From the student.

Catholic Media Review has hit the ground running - they’ve got lots posted - most recently, Julie introduces a review Faith, Reason, and the War Against Jihadism (my own review of it is here - and Fr. Thomas Berg has a review and interview with the author here) and Christine talks about the Islamic Jesus film.

Speaking of film, Greg Kandra makes me want to see Sweeney Todd, and to fear it!

Speaking of books, a friend who is coming back to church tells me this is a good’un: The Catholicism Answer Book