Things Previously on My Chest

Judge Roberts...Clearly qualified, not clearly an ideologue. Is he the ideal nominee? No. But the Democrats lost the election, so we should get over ourselves and consider that it might have been worse (and that if Roberts is defeated, it could yet be worse).

NARAL...I understand that they are just playing a part in Roberts saga, but issue ads only work if there's nothing for the opposition to latch onto and make the story about the advocate instead of the message. By overselling their opposition, they gave the right the stick with which they were then bludgeoned.

Cindy Sheehan...Just once, couldn't liberal activists leave well enough alone? The symbolism of a grieving mother keeping a vigil while the President blows by in the limo on the way to a fundraiser is powerful, simple and compelling. Don't try to coopt this quixotic crusade or make it more than it is; the story plays better if she's a burr under the President's saddle instead of face of the antiwar movement. (For one thing, her public statements both before and during this protest suggest she's not the best front person; for another, to build a groundswell against the war, liberals need to build a grassroots coalition of hundreds of thousands of actively engaged citizens, not a cult of one.)

Judy Miller...It's not a free-speech issue. It's a signature example of mainstream journalists becoming part of the story rather than reporting on it. The politics of smear and slime thrive on the supposition that some lofty principle (protection of "confidential" sources) is at stake; the slimers appeal to this so that they won't be outed by a skeptical and independent media. Playing First Amendment martyr belittles actual instances of unjust impositions on a free press by overzealous prosecutors. (Bad facts make bad law, something that President Clinton's arguments on executive privilege made clear. The same is true here.)

Washington press corps...Please please please could you either be skeptical investigators who ferret out and call politicians on the bullshit that they feed you daily or just admit that you're lazy and like going to fancy dinners with important people? I'd prefer the former, but would accept the latter as a fact of life. I just don't like the facade of one cloaking the reality of the other.

Conservative pundits...Dissent is patriotic and is the lifeblood of a vibrant democracy. Slandering dissenters as unpatriotic betrays a shocking ignorance of what this country was founded on, dishonors the ideas that your obsessive flag worship supposedly glorifies, and is a disgrace to everyone who died for the right of each of us to think for ourselves. Furthermore, it betrays a degree of sophomoric insecurity in your positions that would be amusing if it weren't so corrosive.