Pejman Yousefzadeh's blog
Posted at 5:11pm on Apr. 15, 2008 On Taking Things A Bit Too Far
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
This is going to be rather inside-baseballish but James Ho, the future Solicitor General of Texas, is under attack because he wrote a memo along with John Yoo, stating that unlawful enemy combatants are owed neither the status of POWs nor the status of criminal defendants. This has attracted some criticism, with Charles Kuffner writing that "One could very reasonably argue that an administration that had already shown a willingness to embrace torture would clearly not take the measured path, and thus any assistance given to them on the issue, no matter how defensible on its own merits, is at best questionable."
Posted in Al Qaeda | Enemy Combatants | Law | Torture--Or The Lack Thereof — Comments (3) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 2:13am on Jan. 30, 2008 Quotes That Catch My Fancy
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
From the backseats of freezing cars and vans you're hustled into overheated coffee shops and those packed school gymnasiums with the stink rising to the rafters and then the oppressive hush of corporate meeting rooms, where your nose starts to run and a film of sweat forms under your wool pullover, and you press the outstretched hands that carry every bacterial pathogen known to epidemiology. You open your mouth and you release the same cloud of words you recited yesterday and the day before. And in the Q&A, when you stop to listen, you hear the same questions and complaints from yesterday, the same mewling and blame-shifting, all imploring you to do the impossible and through some undefined action make the lives of these unhappy citizens somehow edifying, uplifting, and worth living. And you always promise you will do that; you have no choice but to tell this kind of lie.
Posted in 2008 | Fire In The Belly | Fred Thompson | Gastroenterologists —
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Posted at 2:11am on Jan. 27, 2008 On Pro-McCain Articles That Make No Sense
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
Benjamin Storey and Jenna Silber Storey have written a doozy of a bad article. Let's unpack some of this nonsense, shall we?
The main current of opposition to McCain faults him for departures from strict free-market ideology. McCain's decisions about tax cuts, campaign finance, and greenhouse gas caps may be prudent or imprudent, and it is important to debate their practical effects on our economy and on our nation's well-being. Nonetheless, if conservatives succeed in marginalizing anyone who does not toe the doctrinaire line of their free market ideology, they will lose an important--indeed the most central and precious--aspect of their creed: the faith in the virtue of individuals to make a good society for themselves, rather than the faith in an ideology to make a good society for us.
Posted in Policy | Why Do Kindergarteners Write For The Weekly Standard? — Comments (19) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 2:08am on Jan. 27, 2008 As Surely As The Sun Rises . . .
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
Mike Huckabee makes it clear that he knows nothing about economic policy or infrastructure issues.
Yes, I know his campaign is close to dying. And yes, I know that it is unseemly in a way to kick him while he is down. But it is fun nevertheless. More importantly, in the event that Huckabee does re
Posted in Mike Huckabee | Policy | Policy Illiteracy — Comments (1) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 9:57am on Jan. 25, 2008 The Economic Illiteracy Of Mike Huckabee (Cont'd)
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
Good grief. From last night's Republican Presidential debate:
Huckabee offered qualified support for the stimulus package, saying he was concerned the tax rebates would be financed by borrowing from foreign lenders such as China, and that consumers would then turn around and spend the money on Chinese products.
Posted in Don't Know Much About Economics | Economy | Mike Huckabee — Comments (3) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 2:02am on Jan. 22, 2008 Quotes That Are Chilling In Nature
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
I would rather have a clean government than one where quote First Amendment rights are being respected, that has become corrupt. If I had my choice, I'd rather have the clean government.
--John McCain. I had no idea that free speech and "clean government" were mutually exclusive.
Posted in 2008 | Freedom Of Speech Is NOT Overrated | John McCain — Comments (118) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 1:53am on Jan. 21, 2008 I've Just About Lost Patience With Michael Gerson . . .
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
But it is nice to see that at the very least, Jonathan Adler has the patience to take Gerson down yet another peg, which he entirely deserves. Once again, it is clear that at best, Gerson is intellectually lazy and cannot do the necessary research and thinking before writing one of his patented and easily dismissed screeds.
Posted in How Can We Miss Michael Gerson If He Will Never Leave? | Policy — Comments (3) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 1:38am on Jan. 19, 2008 Clueless Columnist
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
That most unheroic of conservatives--if he can still be called a conservative--Michael Gerson, gives us yet more evidence for the proposition that he is auditioning to become the Kevin Phillips of the 21st Century. In this column favors us with his insight that because Fred Thompson looks askance on the proposition that government exists to do God's work, he "lack[s] moral seriousness." Specifically, Thompson was asked if "as a Christian, as a conservative," he supported the Bush Administration's global AIDS initiative. Gerson records Thompson's response was as follows:
Posted in Fred Thompson | Michael Gerson | Policy | Small-Government | Unheroic Conservatism — Comments (1) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 1:33am on Jan. 19, 2008 Checkmated
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
Bobby Fischer is dead.
At one point in time, Fischer achieved the exalted status of Greatest Chess Player Ever, a status he solidified with his triumph over Boris Spassky for the World Chess Championship in Reykjavik in 1972. He could have kept his status throughout his life if it weren't for the fact that he was--for lack of a better word--mad.
Posted in Miscellanea | The Death Of Bobby Fischer — Comments (1) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 12:23am on Jan. 18, 2008 Fred Thompson On Energy Policy
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
Behold. Genuine reality-based voters will appreciate the following:
Appearing on CNN, Thompson was asked whether, as president, he would turn to Saudi Arabia for help as Bush did.
Thompson, a former Tennessee senator, said the problem was a "little bigger" than Saudi Arabia.
Posted in Energy | Fred Thompson — Comments (5) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 11:18pm on Jan. 15, 2008 I Don't Often Agree With Kathryn Jean Lopez . . .
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
But she is dead-on accurate here. Mike Huckabee's campaign is this is a class warfare campaign pure and simple. It is one thing to poke fun at Randolph and Mortimer. It is quite another to trash the people who put themselves on the line in order to make a great economy with lines like "The American people should have a President who reminds them of someone they work with, not someone who laid them off." Yeah? Really? What if the person you work with is not the nicest of people? What if your boss is actually a good person? And is it so remarkable to think that your boss might indeed be a good person and your co-worker a jerk?
Posted in 2008 | Fred Thompson | Mike Huckabee — Comments (7) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 7:42pm on Jan. 12, 2008 Stay Classy, Mike
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
Mike Huckabee has decided to try to defend his conservative credentials against an attack by Fred Thompson. How does Huckabee do this?
Huckabee said Friday that the lawyer-turned-actor-turned-politician had little to show for his time in the Senate.
"Eight years is a pretty long time to get a check from the federal government and not be able to say" he passed a major bill, Huckabee sniped.
Posted in 2008 | Fred Thompson | Mike Huckabee | The True Conservative — Comments (35) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 7:37pm on Jan. 12, 2008 And This Is Why I Like Fred Thompson
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
From the diaries by Erick. . .
John and Ann Berenberk dutifully watched the umpteenth Republican presidential debate on television on Thursday night and had an epiphany. It was about the candidate they had previously referred to as the tall, silent one. Fred D. Thompson.
The last of the candidates to enter the race, Mr. Thompson, 65, a former Tennessee senator, has so far seemed to distinguish himself mainly by a laconic style that has made him almost invisible beside the others on the stage in past debates, the Berenberks said.
"But then last night -- we hadn't even been thinking about him -- all of a sudden it was clear he was the one," said Mr. Berenberk, a retired teacher. "The bluntness, the forcefulness. He was really impressive."
How impressive? Well, remember all of those comments about Republicans being stupid? They were and are stereotypical and ridiculous, of course, but it bears pointing out that even the Times can't make those arguments with a straight face when it comes to Fred Thompson:
Read on . . .
Posted in 2008 | Fred Thompson — Comments (48) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 11:56pm on Jan. 2, 2008 Fred Thompson Holds Up A Mirror To American Politics
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
. . . [Senator Fred] Thompson is running the kind of campaign -- substantive, policy-laden, not based on gimmicks or sound-bites -- that pundits and journalists say they want, but he's getting no credit for it from the people who claim that's what they want. It's like in Tootsie when Dustin Hoffman tries doing the things he's heard women say they want from men, only to discover that they don't really want those things at all . . . .
Posted in 2008 | Fred Thompson — Comments (51) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 10:26pm on Dec. 30, 2007 The Facts On Fred Thompson
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
Promoted by Erick.
Reported much more fairly here, here and here than they have been in other fora. I certainly believe that Thompson has an obligation to his supporters to show that he wants to be President of the United States and that he will fight for the job. But it is even more important that Thompson show that his ambition is for his ideas and for his country, rather than being for himself. We have seen enough grasping politicians these days. "Fire in the belly" is a laudable trait but when the fire is reserved solely for one's own personal ambition, voters ought to look twice.
Fred Thompson's life won't come to an end if he is not President of the United States and it does not appear to have been a lifelong ambition for him to be President. We cannot, of course, say that about a number of other politicians and that may indeed be to the detriment of the Republic.
Posted in 2008 | Fred Thompson | Lousy Reporting — Comments (19) / Email this page » / Read More »
