Waterloogate

In a straw poll, 100% of archival professionals predict that the Nixon library Watergate exhibit, opposed by Nixon's foundation and his White House aides, will be installed more or less as director Tim Naftali has designed it.

Gospel According To Matthew

After a week in Israel and the West Bank, Matthew Yglesias sums up the holy mother of all political conflicts:

I basically buy the fundamental conceit of secular Zionism and want to see a homeland for the Jewish people. I think the occupation of the West Bank and the blockade of Gaza are unjust and that the former is killing Zionism as a project to boot. I’m much more skeptical about the efficacy and morality of force as a tool of policy than are Israel or Hamas. I’m convinced that a peace deal is within reach in the short term if Israel is willing to take risks, and I think Israeli politicians and the Israeli public are gripped by a risk-aversion that if not checked will likely lead to national suicide.

Gingrich's Hate Speech

Former GOP Rep. Joe Scarborough blasts his former leader:

The same man who once compared himself to Napoleon (and grandly told his lieutenants that he was at “the center of a worldwide revolution”) now grabs cheap headlines by launching bizarre rhetorical attacks.

The same politician who once saw himself as a latter-day Winston Churchill — sent by God to save Western civilization — now gets rich off political hate speech.

These days, Newt Gingrich’s modus operandi is to smear any public figure who fails to share his worldview. His insults are so overblown and outrageous that after the rhetorical dust settles, the reputation most damaged is his own.

"The War On Jobs"

Meg Whitman certainly mastered this moment in tonight's debate with Jerry Brown, as reported by the LA Times:

During a discussion of the candidates' prescriptions for curing the economy, Brown jumped on Whitman's proposal to cut the capital gains tax, saying the beneficiaries would largely be wealthy people, including those who have donated $30 million to her campaign.

"How much money will you save if the tax breaks were in effect this year or last year?" Brown asked Whitman.

Whitman demurred but said, "I'm an investor, and investors will benefit from this. So will job creators, and I was a job creator. We have got to get someone in office who knows what the conditions are for small businesses to grow and thrive," she said. "Your business is politics. You've been doing this 40 years and you have been part of the war on jobs in this state for 40 years."

They're Now Mad As Hell, Too

Patt Morrison on the latest self-inflicted wound of New York's GOP gubernatorial candidate, Carl Paladino, who spoke at a synagogue even though female reporters were barred:

Would Paladino have agreed to appear at an event at which the organizers had said, OK, but no black reporters allowed? No Latino journalists? Had that happened, Paladino would have had an even bigger self-made mess on his hands than he does now.

St. John's Sky

5:55 p.m.

La Voz Linda

Linda Ronstadt, a versatile interpreter of American popular songs both norte and sur, was one of the premier voices of the 1970s and early 1980s. I first saw her perform in a bar with peanut shells on the floor in San Diego, just before she became a superstar with her album "Heart Like A Wheel" in 1974. I waved, but I doubt she remembers.

A "No Depression" blogger, in the course of atoning for things he wishes he hadn't said over several beers, offers a compilation of quotations from and about her, including this 2000 look-back at her roots:

I remember the Byrds were happening and doing folk-rock, and I thought, there you go. So I went to the Troubador. I grew up singing Mexican music, and that's based on indigenous Mexican rhythms. Mexican music also has an overlay of West African music, based on huapango drums, and it's kind of like a 6/8 [time signature], but it really is a very syncopated 6/8. And that's how I attack vocals. Rock `n' roll comes from black music, and I came from Mexican music.

Whether any of us understood that or not, let me just say this: She's the only person in the world you probably want to hear sing "Tumbling Dice" besides Mick Jagger. I remember reading that he stopped by the studio to make sure she had the lyrics down. Her 1977 version features the mighty bass guitar and the backing vocals of Kenny Edwards, who died in August.

Ron>space

Noting my post about a Grateful Dead insider's advice to Richard Nixon during Watergate, a friend replied, "The difference between RN and Ron Rakow is that Rakow really was a crook."

Jerry Brown's Empty Blackboard

The Tea Party notwithstanding, Jerry Brown may be the year's true revolutionary. His moderate Republican opponent, Meg Whitman, is spending a large fortune on elaborate plans and advance men with ear plugs without offering any real hope of being able to do anything to fix California's broken government that wasn't available to the moderate Republican incumbent. According to this Joe Hagan account in "New York" magazine, Brown improvises, stumbles, and promises almost nothing. No more likely to fix the state, probably, but his no-plan plan is somehow refreshing:

Brown’s campaign strategy appears to be, let Whitman spend all her money while Brown leans back and declares her a spendthrift and a dilettante.

Kevin Starr, the USC historian, who went to high school with Brown, calls Brown’s non-efforts a “Zen campaign,” which seems to acknowledge that politics itself, the function and purpose of it, has “been erased in California.” Or, put another way, why have a plan if plans aren’t going to work?

“It’s an empty blackboard,” Starr says.

Bibi At The Airport?

Does a flurry of gestures to the Israeli right presage, finally, Netanyahu's China moment?