2006 was the year that Syria saw its first KFC opening, which was in fact the first-ever licensed American food franchise in the country. It was also, due to a confluence of international incidents, a year of extremely high tensions between Syria and the U.S., leading to a level of anti-American animus that was far beyond even the usual high baseline level.

How would this cultural imposition by the Great Satan play out then? Would 2006 Syrians treat the Colonel Sanders-led invasion as just further evidence of America’s desire for military hegemony in the region? Or would they put politics aside and just enjoy the delicious chicken? I think you know the answer:

The US flag serves as a doormat to an office and nearby merchants announce "we boycott American goods", but some Syrians can’t seem to keep away from American fast food at the new KFC fried chicken restaurant.

"I oppose American politics totally, but what does food have to do with it? Politics is one thing, and food is something totally different," Tareq Mashnouk, a 26-year-old fashion designer, said.

Amen, Tareq.

"To be honest we were surprised they opened this American restaurant in the midst of our political situation," said Tareq Farzat, 25, adding that he liked his Chicken Burger Combo and would definitely return to KFC with his friend Kalam.

Despite his sub-optimal order preferences which we’ll forgive because he was new at this, Tareq #2 makes a strong point.

It’s true that there were some holdouts who denied themselves delicious chicken due to the Colonel’s conspicuous political affiliations, but:

Many others seem pleased with the KFC experience and trust American brands. "This tastes good, and we’ll definitely come back to eat here when we’re in the mood for chicken," said a 45-year-old woman.

This anonymous 45-year-old woman, with her unimpeachably sensible argument—it tastes good and so she’ll return when she’s in the mood for chicken—cemented my anecdotal KFC-Middle East stereotype for good. For ever.

But today friends, it somehow grows even stronger. Behold, Gaza City, from the NYT:

The French fries arrive soggy, the chicken having long since lost its crunch. A 12-piece bucket goes for about $27 here — more than twice the $11.50 it costs just across the border in Egypt.

And for fast-food delivery, it is anything but fast: it took more than four hours for the KFC meals to arrive here on a recent afternoon from the franchise where they were cooked in El Arish, Egypt, a journey that involved two taxis, an international border, a smuggling tunnel and a young entrepreneur coordinating it all from a small shop here.

“It’s our right to enjoy that taste the other people all over the world enjoy,” said the entrepreneur, Khalil Efrangi, 31.

You’re goddam right Khalil. The piece spins a theory that the Gazans’ love of KFC stems from their broader deprivation due to the Israeli blockade and severe trade restrictions, making them crave everyday items that are not otherwise very special.

Perhaps, but I think this is more on the mark:

Ibrahim el-Ajla, 29, who works for Gaza’s water utility and was among those enjoying KFC here the other day, acknowledged that the food was better hot and fresh in the restaurant, but he said he would be likely to order again. “I tried it in America and in Egypt, and I miss the taste,” he said.

Exactly, Ibrahim. You miss the taste. Ibrahim doesn’t need overdetermined psychological theories to explain the allure of the Colonel’s secret recipe.

The illicit delivery menu from Egypt is unfortunately limited to "chicken pieces, fries, coleslaw and apple pie" because other items like special sandwich orders "could be too complicated." That’s understandable, but nonetheless it’s scandalous that Tareq #2′s counterparts in Gaza can’t even get their beloved, sub-optimal Chicken Burger combos. Freedom deferred is freedom denied.

There is a happy ending though. Well, certainly not for the prospects for Middle East peace, or for the unimaginable carnage and depravity in Syria to end any time soon, or for the Israeli blockade to be lifted, or for Hamas to give up violence and stop immiserating its own people. Just in terms of the chicken, I mean.

Adeeb al-Bakri, who owns four KFC and Pizza Hut franchises in the West Bank, said he had been authorized to open a restaurant in Gaza and was working out the details.

Huzzah, freedom deferred no longer. The Colonel once again acting as the tip of the sphere for the army of democ….well whatever really it’s just chicken.

I was doing research for an epic "The Virginia governor’s race is terrible and Terry McAuliffe is the worst but so is Ken Cuccinelli" post, and it turns out that is a very popular genre on the internet this week, and those sentiments are widely-shared among anyone who has a normally-calibrated sense of decency and an aversion to political nihilism and sociopathy. 

We’ve learned this week—or relearned, since all of this appears in McAuliffe’s own 2007 autobiography, presumably because he actually thinks these awful stories make him look somehow charming or raffish—that McAuliffe prioritizes Democratic fundraisers and media cocktail parties over the birth of his children and the happiness of his wife. Here’s the hilarious time that McAullife made his wife and newborn baby sit and wait in the car on their way home from the hospital, so Terry could pop in at a Democratic fundraising dinner:

We got to the dinner and by then Dorothy was in tears, and I left her with Justin and went inside. Little Peter was sleeping peacefully and Dorothy just sat there and poor Justin didn’t say a word. He was mortified. I was inside maybe fifteen minutes, said a few nice things about Marty, and hurried back out to the car. I felt bad for Dorothy, but it was a million bucks for the Democratic Party and by the time we got home and the kids had their new little brother in their arms, Dorothy was all smiles and we were one big happy family again. Nobody ever said life with me was easy.

Oh, she was in tears! Just Terry being Terry.

Alex Pareene of Salon sums it up: 

So, now we know that Terry McAulliffe is the worst of modern party party politics, a money-raising machine with no core. Everyone probably could’ve guessed that by looking at his resume, which is made up entirely of positions in which he handled money, and getting money, for politicians and the Democratic Party. There is a lot of opposition research on McAuliffe dropping this week and it all confirms what a cursory look could’ve told anyone: He’s the worst of the Democratic Party. [...]

This is all enough to reveal McAuliffe as the oleaginous hack that he is. But if you really want to spend the rest of your day in a state of nauseous terror from all that McAuliffe and his ilk reveal and represent about our politics, go read this NYT Magazine profile from last year. After McAuliffe lost the Democratic primary in his first run for VA governor in 2009, he decided he needed to distance himself from his current job as "political rainmaker, carnival barker and Clinton appendage" and refashion himself as a "business leader" and "entrepreneur" in preparation for his planned second run for governor. So he started an electric car company called GreenTech, and called up his old buddy, fellow party hack, tobacco lobbyist, and proud Boss Hogg doppelganger Haley Barbour, to give him a bunch of tax incentives and abatements to bring the car plant to Mississippi. The piece follows McAuliffe (knows as the "Macker" by his politician friends), his idol Bill Clinton, and Barbour, as they backslap each other during a GreenTech plant opening event in Mississippi. It’s horrifying. Let me quote at length, trust me.

As Clinton prepared to go onstage, I asked him if he would ever consider buying a car from McAuliffe, who he once marveled could “talk an owl out of a tree.” “Absolutely, I would buy a new car from Terry,” he told me. “But a used car? I am not so sure about a used car.” He laughed and wheeled around and repeated the line to Barbour (“Listen to what I just told him… ”), while slapping his fleshy back.

And here we go:

The Washington Political Class, as it’s called by those in the media who are often a part of it, represents a vast and self-perpetuating network of friendships and expedient associations that transcend even the fiercest ideological differences. Membership in the class is the paramount commonality between the various tribes — the journalists, the Democrats, the Republicans, the superlawyers, superlobbyists, superstaffers, fund-raisers, David Gergens, Donna Braziles and Karl Roves. They argue on television and often go into business with their on-air combatants. They can be paid tens of thousands of dollars to do their left-right Kabuki thing in front of big organizations. The Macker did this with Rove a while back — a luncheon speech at the Exxon Mobil headquarters in Texas. He has a few joint events planned with Barbour for the fall. He has also done partisan duets at a combined 50 grand a pop with “my great friend, Eddie Gillespie,” a Barbour protégé and former R.N.C. chairman whom McAuliffe bonded with in the greenroom between their many on-air donnybrooks over the last decade. “I have a love-hate relationship with Terry,” Gillespie joked in one of their public debates. “I love Terry. And I hate myself for it.”

One quaint maxim of the Political Class is that there is no such thing as Democrats and Republicans in Washington, only the Green Party. Green as in money.

McAuliffe has spent a career basking in the glow of the Clintons’ reflected light, and making sure everyone knows about it.

If McAuliffe’s trademark is fund-raising, his principal identity is as a Professional Best Friend to Bill Clinton. The subtitle of [his autobiography] “What a Party!” might as well be “Let Me Tell You Another Story About Me and Bill Clinton.” (One involved South Korean Intelligence agents thinking McAuliffe and Clinton were more than just friends.) If he is not dropping the name of the 42nd president, the Macker is telling you that he just got off the phone with Bill Clinton, or that, what do you know, President Clinton is actually on the phone right now, and can you please excuse him for just a second (“Hello, Mr. President”).

But of course, he’s not an insider.

McAuliffe slightly recoils whenever I suggest that he is a “Washington insider.” (He lives in McLean, Va., a full 20 minutes outside D.C.). “I am an entrepreneur, baby,” he has said to me several times in recent years. “Don’t forget that, I’m an entrepreneur” — albeit one whose wedding party included the former-House-Democratic-leader-turned-superlobbyist Richard Gephardt; who has been a regular at Sam Donaldson’s annual holiday party; who runs into his neighbor Dick Cheney at his daughter’s (and Cheney’s granddaughter’s) soccer games; and who initially put up the money for Bill and Hillary Clinton’s Chappaqua home.

McAuliffe goes on an annual hunting trip on Maryland’s Eastern Shore with a gang that includes the famed Democratic lobbyist Tommy Boggs, the former Senate Republican leader Trent Lott and Lott’s Democratic lobbying partner John Breaux, a former Louisiana senator who as a member of the House famously declared that his vote could not be bought but “could be rented.” (After a member of the House leadership once called Breaux a “cheap whore,” Breaux protested that he was “not cheap.”)

McAuliffe has arguably seen the inside of more television greenrooms over the last two decades than anyone in Washington. That is where he met Barbour, who in his capacity as R.N.C. chairman used to pulverize Clinton on television while McAuliffe defended him. After a while, through repeated exposures, they became friends. […]

And here’s how the Washington outsider finds opportunities:

It was around this time that Bill Clinton asked the Macker what ambassadorship he wanted for all the work he’d done on his behalf.

The piece is filled with all sorts of financial dealings between co-members of this supra-partisan Green Party. It also quotes Michael Kinsley on why reporters love Haley Barbour so much: "He doesn’t literally wink as he spins, but he manages to send the message: This is all a big game — a big wonderful game — and you have the privilege of playing it with me."

Chilling. McAuliffe absolutely epitomizes this "big wonderful game", where there are no political allies or opponents, just connections, networks, and patrons. No ideological commitments or policy passions, just speaking fees, image curation, and permanent fundraising. No sense of service or sacrifice, just a pit stop on the way to the revolving door and the green room. 

Virginia, I don’t know. Say what you want about Ken Cuccinelli being a reactionary, xenophobic, homophobic fascist. But at least it’s an ethos.

I really enjoyed Ryan Lizza’s New Yorker profile of Eric Cantor. From the piece you get the sense that Cantor doesn’t quite understand how he allowed his public image and that of his party to get so rotten. He’s never considered himself as particularly unreasonable or radical, but now it’s dawned on him that after orchestrating and enabling three years of congressional dysfunction and obstruction, the country sees him as kind of a sleazeball. The piece is tinged with pathos because he’s upset and perplexed about that.

Well boo-fucking-hoo for him.

But another part of the piece really caught my eye. Congressman Raul Labrador, Tea Party leader and strong opponent of any sort of bargaining or compromise-seeking with the White House, explained to Lizza why he felt justified in his posture of permanent defiance despite the president’s clear victory in November:

"I agree that the President won, and I agree that the President had a mandate to propose what he wanted to propose. It doesn’t mean that my mandate is the same as his mandate. I won my election as well.” Many House Republicans said the same thing after the election. “We’re the first branch of government,” Labrador said. “We don’t have a king. We don’t have an emperor.”

And who can say he’s wrong about any of that?

In 1990 political scientist Juan Linz wrote an influential essay called "The Perils of Presidentialism"  (pdf), in which he argued that presidential democracies are inherently brittle and historically tend to devolve into dictatorships, because there is no clear, consistent source of governing legitimacy among the separate branches. He notes how unique the U.S. is as "the only presidential democracy with a long history of constitutional continuity."

But what is most striking is that in a presidential system, the legislators, especially when they represent cohesive, disciplined parties that offer clear ideological and political alternatives, can also claim democratic legitimacy. This claim is thrown into high relief when a majority of the legislature represents a political option opposed to the one the president represents. Under such circumstances, who has the stronger claim to speak on behalf of the people: the president or the legislative majority that opposes his policies? Since both derive their power from the votes of the people in a free competition among well-defined alternatives, a conflict is always possible and at times may erupt dramatically. There is no democratic principle on the basis of which it can be resolved, and the mechanisms the constitution might provide are likely to prove too complicated and aridly legalistic to be of much force in the eyes of the electorate. It is therefore no accident that in some such situations in the past, the armed forces were often tempted to intervene as a mediating power. One might argue that the United States has successfully rendered such conflicts “normal” and thus defused them. To explain how American political institutions and practices have achieved this result would exceed the scope of this essay, but it is worth noting that the uniquely diffuse character of American political parties—which, ironically, exasperates many American political scientists and leads them to call for responsible, ideologically disciplined parties—has something to do with it.

Matt Yglesias wrote about this a few years ago and noted that whereas when Linz wrote the essay in 1990 our two political parties were still somewhat ideologically diffuse, there is now total coherence, with every single Republican in Congress more conservative than every single Democrat, and vice versa.

This process of partisan sorting into ideologically homogenous parties is not necessarily a bad thing, and it’s quite natural. You see above that to Linz and other political scientists, our long history of party incoherence is pretty confounding and endlessly exasperating.

So now that we’ve got complete ideological coherence, and a sufficient number of legislators like Mr. Labrador who claim just as much legitimacy to speak for the people as the president, are we seeing Linz’s analysis come true? Are there more dramatic conflicts and increasing threats of erupting crisis?

Sure seems like it! Bush v. Gore, unprecedented debt ceiling showdowns, regular government shut down threats, fiscal cliffs, sequesters, filibuster abuses, attempts to change state electoral vote apportionment, voting rights abuses. We still do end up defusing these crises before they lead to true constitutional breakdowns. But the problem with government-by-permanent-crisis is that it only takes one mistake in which we don’t find a way to defuse things in time….

The fear is that this recent period of extreme dysfunction is not just a contingent symptom of Obama-derangement, but rather it’s a manifestation of a structural problem that has always been latent in our system of government. For the first time ever our national parties are coherent and disciplined enough to make serious mischief, and they restrain themselves from provoking actual constitutional crises only because of entrenched norms against such behavior. But norms break down, as they have any other time a country tried to sustain this type of governing arrangement.

The slightly good news is that though there is unprecedented party coherence, as the Cantor article makes clear, intra-party factionalism is still alive and well in the U.S. House of Representatives. Although that leads to lots of legislative gridlock, and it makes Mr. Cantor’s job as majority leader very difficult, perhaps ironically it’s also helping to keep the old Republic together. Maybe by consistently failing to harmonize the factions in his caucus, Cantor is doing a more noble task than he realizes.  

There will be plenty more to say about the incipient immigration reform effort as it moves from the general framework released today by eight bipartisan senators to (maybe!) actual legislation in the coming months. I’ve written before on the general contours of the immigration debate in America, but I want to comment on one part of this new framework.

Under the framework, undocumented immigrants can come forward and declare themselves, pay fines and back taxes, then receive "probationary legal residency." Not citizens, not green card holders, just "legal". They can then become eligible to apply for full citizenship (waiting at the proverbial "back of the line) only after a variety of national enforcement metrics have been met: additional border security, a system for employers to verify the legal status of their employees, and stronger checks to prevent immigrants from overstaying visas.

But who certifies that these enforcement metrics have been met, thus allowing this group to move beyond their probationary status?

As Adam Serwer notes, the framework envisions a commission "comprised of governors, attorneys general, and community leaders living along the Southwest border" that will certify that the enforcement measures have worked. Serwer notes that this essentially puts "final legalization of the country’s 11 million undocumented immigrants in the hands of Republican officials like Arizona Governor Jan Brewer who don’t want it to happen." This commission "put[s] a veto in the hands of people who are likely to oppose the plan even if those conditions were met."

The upshot of this is the probationary phase may end up lasting far longer than expected. Or maybe this is by design: tying citizenship to a subjective menu of goals, and giving final judgment to a bunch of immigration-reform skeptics, is a way to "create a pathway" without ever specifying when or where the pathway may end.

I understand that politically, there simply must be some punitive aspect to the process of normalizing the status of immigrants who came here illegally. But I’m torn by the tradeoffs in creating a semi-permanent, non-voting underclass of low-skill, low-wage workers in this country.

For these individuals, conferring even sort-of-legal status is a terrific boon to their welfare. They will have more employment opportunities, more ability to participate in civic life, and will remove the ambient level of anxiety associated with living in constant fear of deportation. But how do we measure these unequivocal individual benefits against the social and political impact of creating a massive bloc of non-voting, hence politically powerless, lower-skill workers? What are the distributional and civic consequences of legislating into existence an economically and politically marginal sub-class in this way? As David Frum concluded pithily on Twitter: "Lots more low-wage non-voters! Couldn’t do better if they were trying for oligarchy on purpose."

The framework may actually exacerbate this tension by singling out two classes of undocumented immigrants for fast-track citizenship: DREAM Act-eligible children, and agricultural laborers. These are extra sympathetic (DREAM kids) or economically crucial (farm workers) groups of immigrants, which is why it’s easy to give them special attention. But might elevating certain classes of immigrants in this way just serve to increase the political and civic distance between full members of the American club and the underclass "probationary" members?

There are tradeoffs like this slicing through every facet of the immigration debate. It’ll be interesting to see who the various partisan players perceive their demographic audiences to be. But on this one, it just doesn’t seem conducive to long-run civic health to be creating what amounts to an official caste system in this country, particularly if the built-in remedy—the mythical pathway to citizenship—is so ill-defined.

A solid majority of gun deaths are suicides. This unsettling fact seems to be completely absent from the official debate, and it’s hard to understand why: These preventable deaths are just as traumatizing and destabilizing to a family or a community as gun homicides are, and seem to me to require as vigorous a public health response as any other cause of preventable death.

Another reason we should be focusing more on this side of the problem is that some of the gun control measures currently being discussed, while having a mixed record when it comes to reducing gun crime, have proven quite effective at reducing suicide rates.

In 2006 the Israeli Defense Forces began a policy whereby soldiers were no longer allowed to take their firearms home with them on weekends. As a result, weekend suicide rates among soldiers dropped by 40%. Interestingly, the weekday suicide rates stayed the same, indicating that soldiers were not just postponing their suicides until the weekend was over and they had their gun back. That’s because suicidal intentions can be transitory and circumstantial, the product of a crisis moment aligned with easy opportunity. Absent a ready method—such as a loaded firearm within reach—a large percentage of these soldiers made it through the moment and the impulse subsided. 

Similar "means-restriction" policies have been studied by the U.S. Department of Defense, in an attempt to decrease the staggering suicide rate among active-duty soldiers and veterans. The NRA, bravely protecting the Second Amendment rights of our suicidal soldiers, successfully lobbied for a law last year barring commanders from asking troops about their private weapons even if there was cause to believe a soldier was at high risk of suicide. Mercifully, the most recent defense authorization bill amended that provision to allow these sorts of conversations and interventions by commanders and mental health professionals if suicide is suspected.

So while adding minor delays into the process of legally acquiring a gun—with universal background checks and waiting periods, for instance—almost surely won’t deter or frustrate the plans of hardened criminals, they could be particularly effective at saving otherwise law-abiding citizens who are in the depths of suicidal thoughts. And despite the NRA’s fundraising-driven hysteria, such delays are not a significant impediment to recreational shooters, hunters, or collectors.

But what about the impetus for this whole debate, the mass shooting in Connecticut? While the empirical record on the effects of gun control on ordinary violent crime is thin (making particularly important the president’s executive action directing the CDC to research the causes and prevention of gun violence), it does seems reasonable to assume that simply finding a way to slow things down at each step could indeed help prevent some mass shootings at the margin: lengthening the planning and procurement phase leading to a potential massacre would at least increase the odds of someone—law enforcement, friends, family—discovering the plot in time.

But even if you’re a fatalist about mass shootings, let’s not be blithe about the tremendous failure of public policy and wasted human capital represented by the 17,000 gun suicides each year in this country. 

As House Republicans agonize over the question of whether to raise taxes on millionaires or near-millionaires, and as they remain deadlocked on other important debates ranging from the deficit to immigration and climate change, there’s at least one issue on which your United States Congress has reached a happy, bipartisan accord. They’ve come together to strip you of your right to due process and habeas corpus:

Lawmakers charged with merging the House and Senate versions of the National Defense Authorization Act decided on Tuesday to drop a provision that would have explicitly barred the military from holding American citizens and permanent residents in indefinite detention without trial as terrorism suspects, according to Congressional staff members familiar with the negotiations.

It’s unclear whether the president will veto this defense bill; even if he intends to it can be attached to other spending bills that are difficult to defeat.

You may find it hard to understand how Congress can be on the verge of legislating away the most fundamental natural rights in the history of civilized humanity. And you also may wonder why you didn’t know about it.

Conor Friedersdorf brings the perfect amount of astonished indignant eloquence to the occasion:

It may seem like imprisoning an American citizen without charges or trial transgresses against the United States Constitution and basic norms of Western justice dating back to the Magna Carta.

It may seem like reiterating the right to due process contained in the 5th Amendment would be uncontroversial.

It may seem like a United States senator would be widely ridiculed for suggesting that American citizens can be imprisoned indefinitely without chargers or trial, and that if numerous U.S. senators took that position, the press would treat the issue with at least as much urgency as "the fiscal cliff" or the possibility of a new assault weapons bill or likely nominees for Cabinet posts. […]

But it isn’t so.

Oh, but you’re not a terrorist suspect, you say? Nothing to hide, nothing to fear?

Behold the mindset of the serf. The mantra of the defeated. All part of the ongoing craven capitulation to unseen enemies. We cower, fearful, oxymoronically insisting on repudiating rights that are inalienable (do look that word up); the zombie war on terrorism that will go on eating our brains and our rationality for the rest of our lives.  

Allow me one cheap shot: I do wish that those who bleat about the sanctity and inviolibility of their consititutional right to keep and bear arms would at least raise an eyebrow at this. There’s a perpetual NRA-driven fantasy that the Feds are coming for your guns. This has never been true. What’s true is that, when this NDAA passes, they can come and take you away and indefinitely imprison you without charge, merely at the president’s say-so, on the basis of secret evidence. It’s a confused mind that fears the president’s intentions regarding the former but unquestioningly trusts his judgment and discretion on the latter.

The price of freedom, it seems, is freedom. The prize, false and illusory security, is meager comfort indeed.

And do enjoy your naked airport scans and invasive patdowns this holiday season. Arms up! Nothing to hide, nothing to fear. Happy Christmas!

I know it’s not shocking to point this out, but the gender double standard at work in Susan Rice’s removal from Secretary of State consideration is really extraordinary.

In this NYT piece detailing the rise and fall of her candidacy, we learn that her "blunt-speaking style — which helped cost her the job — had always been, for Mr. Obama, a part of her appeal."

Ms. Rice…has so often been criticized as being an unusually undiplomatic diplomat, direct to the point of rudeness. But friends and former White House aides say that Ms. Rice’s style is a reflection of Mr. Obama’s own: impatient with niceties, uninterested in small talk or long dinners, focused solely on results.

Of course, Mr. Obama has somehow managed to ride his debilitating weakness of blunt speaking and focus on results to become a celebrated two-term president, while the same "style" cost Susan Rice a promotion. Strange.

Dana Milbank also has a hatchet job in the Post about Rice’s long dubious record of advocating forcefully and passionately for her positions, including the following troubling incident:

Among those she has insulted is the woman she would replace at State. Rice was one of the first former Clinton administration officials to defect to Obama’s primary campaign against Hillary Clinton. Rice condemned Clinton’s Iraq and Iran positions, asking for an “explanation of how and why she got those critical judgments wrong.”

Huh? Can you find the alleged "insult" or "condemnation" there?

Milbank also bizarrely passes along criticism of Rice from the Russian foreign ministry, who Milbank evidently feels deserves a voice on American cabinet appointments. Well the ministry wants it known that they believe Rice is “too ambitious and aggressive,” and her appointment would make it “more difficult for Moscow to work with Washington.” Too ambitious? Outright sexism from the Russian government is not surprising, but why are its views being transcribed as serious critiques by the Washington Post?

Maybe Ambassador Rice is more impolitic than is ideal for the nation’s top diplomatic post; I really have no idea. But that is simply not the usual standard used to judge presidential appointments. As someone stated so eloquently:

I believe there are significant numbers of the American people who do take into consideration the consequences of a presidential election, and that is the earned right of a president, under anything other than unusual circumstances, to pick his team.

Oh, that would be John McCain, speaking in 2005 in support of John Bolton’s nomination to the job Susan Rice now holds. McCain of course initiated and led the effort to sink Susan Rice’s candidacy, using the Benghazi incident as the stated rationale for his opposition. Makes sense, seeing how the United Nations Ambassador is traditionally held responsible for leading U.S. intelligence and security in North Africa.

When John Bolton came under intense pressure during his UN confirmation process for his own blunt-speaking style and impatience with niceties:

McCain secretly tried to shepherd his nomination to the United Nations — a nomination that was held up in Congress over Bolton’s controversial anti-UN statements and policies.

"He was very active behind the scenes," said Bolton, who was ultimately sent to the UN via a presidential recess appointment. "He thought I was the type of ambassador that ought to represent the United States at the United Nations."

How thoughtful. It’s very important to point out that there is no comparison between Rice and Bolton when it comes to their relative impolitic instincts. Bolton was not just a "unusually undiplomatic diplomat", he was a serial bully and abuser of subordinates, and a propagandist who pressured State Department intelligence officials to distort their analyses on Iraq to make the case for war.

From Wikipedia’s summary of his confirmation hearing for the UN post:

On April 20, it emerged that Melody Townsel, a former US AID contractor, had reported to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that Bolton had used inflammatory language and thrown objects in the course of her work activities in Moscow…Townsel told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee staff that Bolton had made derogatory remarks about her sexual orientation and weight, among other workplace improprieties. […]

I’ve never seen anybody quite like Secretary Bolton. … I don’t have a second, third or fourth in terms of the way that he abuses his power and authority with little people," former State Department intelligence chief Carl W. Ford Jr., said. Ford also characterized Bolton as a "kiss-up, kick-down sort of guy", implying that he was always ready to please whoever had authority over him, while having very little regard for people working under him.

But a post to the loathsome United Nations is one thing. Republicans would never want someone with Bolton’s sociopathic tendencies to run the State Department, right? Right?

Republican insiders are discussing likely people for top Cabinet posts in a Romney administration…. John R. Bolton, the U.N. ambassador during the George W. Bush administration and specialist on arms control and security issues, is said to be a leading candidate for secretary of state.

“’If he accepts it, I will ask John Bolton to be secretary of state,’ said former House speaker Newt Gingrich."

But Milbank tells us that Susan Rice once "appalled colleagues" by giving the middle finger to (legendary ill-tempered diplomat) Richard Holbrooke. Outrageous! Kind of like that time Vice President Cheney told Senator Leahy on the Senate floor to go fuck himself, later smirking that "I thought he merited it at the time." Oh that’s just lovable rogue Cheney being Cheney! His orneriness didn’t seem to hamper his rise to the vice presidency, or the Secretary of Defense, or the White House Chief of Staff.

Bluntness and an eschewing of niceties is seen as the mark of gravitas, ambition, and serious leadership when emanating from the likes of Mr. Bolton, Holbrooke, or Cheney. For some reason Susan Rice is not accorded the same generous intrepretation. I do wonder why.

It turns out Mitt Romney won eight of the 10 states with the lowest population density: Alaska, Wyoming, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Idaho, Nebraska and Utah. (The other two, New Mexico and Nevada, have very large Hispanic populations.) And President Obama won the 14 states with the highest population density, plus DC. (And 15th and 16th on the list are North Carolina and Indiana, both of which Obama won in 2008.)

Here is a clever graphic which shows the relationship between population density and candidate preference in this election. I’ve pulled out the relevant maps. On the left is national population density, with darker tones indicating increased density by county. On the right is where Romney’s vote came from, by county: 

And here is Obama’s vote; notice the overlap with the national map:

Politically I can see this presenting a few problems for the GOP. First, the fastest growing areas in the country are in the south and west. Of the ten metro areas projected to grow most in the coming years, four are in Texas: Austin, Houston, Dallas, and San Antonio. Raleigh, NC and Atlanta, GA also make the list. And on a census list of fastest growing metro areas since 2010, Phoenix and Yuma, Arizona both make it.

These, not coincidentally, are also the battleground states of the future. North Carolina is already there of course. Arizona and Texas are seeing massive increases in their Hispanic population; in Texas, Hispanics accounted for 65 percent of the population growth over the last decade. Both states are expected to become competitive for Democrats within the next few cycles. In Georgia, Bush won by 12 points in 2000, and by 17 points in 2004. In 2008 and 2012, Obama came within 5 and 8 points, respectively.

I don’t know if liberals all move to cities or cities make people more liberal, I’m sure there’s plenty of scholarship on the subject. But on the latter point, I’d say one clear reason why high density areas are and remain overwhelmingly Democratic is that the Republican platform offers essentially nothing when it comes to the concerns of urban residents and families. Of course then these urban residents, piqued by Republican hostility and neglect, become ever-more alienated and unreachable for the party. The folks pouring into southern and western metropolises may very well find themselves interested in issues like school quality, mass transit, drug policy, family planning, economic mobility, health care access—Republicans must have something to say to these people if they want to stay relevant in increasingly urbanizing red states. Banging on incessantly about top marginal tax rates and deregulating Wall Street has led to this: In the election, voters who were looking for a candidate that "cares about people like me" went for Obama 81-18. That’s astonishing, indicative of a party that is completely befuddled about the country it has pretensions to lead.

A party can’t be all things to all people, but as long as the GOP is a party that clings to the country and disdains the town, it’s in for some dispiriting election nights to come.

You’ve probably read a dozen times already that the GOP lost because it has failed to recognize and address its growing demographic irrelevance. Simply put, a party that appeals exclusively to older white men from the country is not long for this world. (Bonus mind-blowing statistic of the day: Before the election, white men constituted 53% of House Democrats, and 86% of House Republicans. After the election it’s 46% for Democrats, and 92% (!!) for the GOP.)

So what to do? Well, expand the tent, right? Republican party reformers or those just sick of losing know that this starts by figuring out how to somehow "embrace Hispanics"; by which they mean, at a minimum, dropping the overt demonization and nativist fear-mongering. Nice idea. Many go further and insist that the party must liberalize its stance on immigration. Another nice idea. Some think they just need only to keep pointing frantically at Marco Rubio and Susana Martinez and saying, "See? See?"

Unfortunately, all of these are deeply insufficient solutions to the GOP’s problem. Republicans don’t primarily have a demographic crisis, they have an ideological crisis.

David Frum, whose every fear and prediction about the Republican death spiral has been proven true, is characteristically shrewd on this issue as well:

Any idea that the immigration issue – and the immigration issue alone – would enable Republicans to staple a good chunk of the Latino vote to the conservative coalition – without changing anything else – is a dangerous self-deception.

It’s necessary of course to refrain from insulting Latinos, or, for that matter, anybody. But the crying need in the GOP is for a more middle-class orientation to politics, one that addresses concerns like healthcare as well as debts and deficits. But the ideas that dominated the past four years won’t become more attractive if all conservatives do is translate them into Spanish.

Exactly right. The simplest proof that the Republican problem is policy rather than identity, is that Barack Obama won the Asian-American vote by a margin of 73-26. What can explain this? There has been no sustained Republican campaign to antagonize Asians or restrict their immigration opportunities. Asian-Americans are disproportionately wealthy and college-educated, and own a disproportionate number of small businesses. So why are Republicans at a devastating 47% deficit?

I think there are a few good reasons which also help explain the Latino gap, and why neither are going to be easy to solve for Republicans any time soon. 

First, I believe there is some ethnic spillover from the GOP demonization of Latinos. Other minority groups, while not affected directly, are bound to see this hostile dynamic and think, "Hmm the GOP doesn’t seem very welcoming or inclusive. Perhaps we could be the target of their next nativist freakout."

But mostly, it’s the policies.

Minorities and immigrant groups are disproportinately urban. Like all other metro-area residents, immigrant and minority families are preoccupied with local school quality, effective public transportation, access to health care, and affordable higher education to ensure opportunities of upward mobility for their children. Republicans have exceedingly little to say about any of these topics. While good on school choice, the GOP is completely silent on issues of urban poverty. It has overt disdain for the very idea of public transportation, and its most recent nominee told a roomful of young people to just borrow money from their parents to afford college. Also, the highest uninsured rate in the country is among Latinos (41%). GOP insistence on repealing Obamacare while offering nothing as a replacement, along with their pledge to cut 30% from Medicaid spending, is simply more evidence that the party has no interest in allaying the anxieties of struggling Americans, particularly those in and around metro areas. Recall that one of Mitt Romney’s signature middle class proposals was to zero out the capital gains tax for low and middle income people, as if immigrant and minority bank accounts are overflowing with capital gains!

This is why Republicans are in trouble. They can’t simply assert that they’re now "embracing" Latinos and other minority groups, then just wait for the big tent to swell with brown faces. Addressing the issues above would require a complete reorientation of the party’s platform and goals. If such a drastic pivot were even possible, it would likely spell worse electoral doom in the short term: First, Democrats have a decades-long head start on these issues and would be happy to have an excuse to outflank Republicans on the left; and second, any precipitous change would alienate the base of older white rural men it relies upon currently.

The party is stuck: can’t reform too far, can’t stay the same. I expect it will quickly come around on no-brainers like the DREAM Act, and maybe even comprehensive immigration reform if it gets cover from respected leaders like Jeb Bush. But this battleship isn’t turning so quickly. As the new congressional makeup shows, the party is older, whiter, and more male than ever before, while the Democratic coalition becomes broader and more representative every year.

This is even before we consider the social and cultural chasms. Republicans must contend with a 23-point under-30 gap, an 11-point gender gap, and its needless throwing away of the 5% of the electorate that is gay. Some of this is eminently doable, some will take far longer as we simply wait for old mores to die out.

Republicans can take heart: there is no such thing as a permanent majority in American politics. Eventually things will return to an equilibrium clustered around the median voter, wherever that median happens to lie. But it could take a while. In the meantime Republicans can rest easy that Democrats still don’t know how to convince people to vote in midterm elections. And the clever gerrymandering of Congressional districts will make the GOP House majority far more robust than it should be. That’s about it for good news though. On the rest, buena suerte!

Update: Ha, well, that was quick.

My election day message is that it’s all about the ballot questions. The presidential race itself rarely reflects fundamental issues of liberty and freedom. Of course the candidates and campaigns love to frame the choice in these apocalyptic terms, but in reality the stakes just aren’t so high. Marginal tax rate preferences, ideas about how to tweak the provision of health services to old people, fretting over 30-year budget projections, it’s all certainly important, but it’s the state ballot measures where you can actually vote to expand or restrict the individual rights of yourself and your neighbors. 

Most people vote for president based on cultural affinity and for whoever agrees with them on abortion, gay rights, etc. That takes about 5 seconds of deliberation, so we spend the rest of the election cycle rationalizing our choice by building a substantive policy case around it. I do this too. I can think of plenty of policy reasons that I prefer Barack Obama, but when it comes down to it I mostly just don’t want to affiliate with social positions I consider retrograde.

But of course the president doesn’t set national social policy. It’s in these state-level ballot questions where the scope and limits of individual liberty are up for a popular vote. They directly regulate the private behavior of millions of Americans. Whereas to know how the presidential vote will affect your interests, you must contemplate various elaborate scenarios regarding the congressional makeup, and game-theorizing about the trajectory of future partisan negotiations. More reliable to read up on your local ballot measures.

Here’s a list of all the ballot measures by state. Some highlights:

California is looking to abolish the death penalty, as well as end their disastrous "three strikes" law. That’s 38 million Americans deciding whether their state government can execute them or not, and under what specific conditions they may allow their state to imprision them for life. I’d call that consequential. 

Marijuana liberalization laws are up for grabs in Arkansas, Colorado, Massachusetts, Montana, and Washington. That’s 22 million people deciding which private behaviors they want their state to police or not.

Same-sex marriage is on the ballot in Minnesota, Maine, Maryland, and Washington.

Anyone who lives anywhere near Maryland will know from the incessant ads that the expansion of casino gambling, and the legalization of table games, is on the ballot. It’s mostly an attempt to stick it to those damn West Virginians who have been siphoning off Marylanders’ hard earned gambling dollars for years.

Four states, Kentucky, Idaho, Wyoming, and Nebraska, want to strike a preemptive blow against, well, nobody in particular, and enshrine in their constitutions an inviolable right to hunt and fish.

Massachusetts is trying to legalize physician-assisted suicide.

In the category of Best Correction of an Old-Timey Injustice: North Dakota’s Poll Tax Amendment. This (if it passes!) eliminates the section of the state constitution that authorized a $1.50 poll tax on males aged 21-50. It also removes language referring to "paupers, idiots, insane persons and Indians" who were, quite generously I think, exempt from the poll tax.

Here in D.C. we voted on a measure that "would make anyone who is convicted of a felony while holding the office of Councilmember [or Mayor] ineligible to remain in office and ineligible to ever hold the office again." PoliticsInVivo voted strongly against this measure. If I want to vote for a felon I want that option! Liberty!

So there you go. Remember, if you’re not very informed about national public policy, no sweat, maybe voting for president just isn’t for you! But it’s often said that Americans are not comfortable voting to restrict personal freedoms in the long run. That’s as it should be, and there are some pretty important personal freedoms at stake tonight. Particularly for the coveted pauper/idiot demographic. Vote well America.