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It seems that every couple of months, there is a discussion about the state of disarray of the righty blogosphere. This time it is mostly a different crowd moving it. Dean Barnett of HughHewitt.com writes, ironically, in the Weekly Standard. But then, in response, we get both Dave Wiegel at Reason and Sh+Sh from Newsbusters. [...]

So, it is the day after labor day, and I am catching up on the news, including some big labor endorsement news from John Edwards, via Marc Ambinder: In Pittsburgh this morning, ex-Sen. John Edwards will proudly receive the endorsement of the United Steelworkers and the United Mineworkers of America, giving him the largest bloc [...]

Ross Douthat ends a discussion of Mike Huckabee with: The most important thing, to my mind, is that a Huckabee-Giuliani-Romney race would be a lot healthier for the GOP than a Thompson-Giuliani-Romney race, which is reason enough to wish the Huckster well. Now, assuming that these aren’t battles over personality, what are these candidates running [...]

Reihan Salam responds to one of my recent posts about Mike Huckabee. I had said: On a deeper level, I hear in Huckabee an instinct towards the isolationism that Eisenhower fought against.  … Reihan responds: I say "somewhat strangely" because Eisenhower was the peace candidate (i.e., the one who pledged to end a foreign war), [...]

Yesterday, I wrote a response to Peter Beinart’s op-ed about the Republican Party and the conservative movement. I got some very positive feedback. My friend Patrick Hynes wrote on a related topic. Patrick’s thesis is basically: First, let’s be clear, American conservatism has devolved from a movement into an identity group. Patrick continues by pointing [...]

Peter Beinart, fomerly of The New Republic and a victim of the anti-war online left, wrote an interesting op-ed in today’s WaPo. Basically, he compares the state of the GOP with the state of the Democrats in the 80s: Imitation may be flattering, but in this case, it comes with a large scoop of irony. [...]

Patrick Ruffini takes up my challenge to put some meat on the ideological bones. While I agree with most, I would re-emphasize. First, we have a set of broad principles: Win the War on Terror and advance human rights around the world Embrace globalization and economic competitiveness as a way to improve the lives of [...]

Patrick Ruffini wants a "Movement 2.0." While I agree with the sentiment, I want some specifics. Ruffini starts with: A common thread is that the other shoe won’t likely drop until we have Hillary to unite against. I’d like to pick apart that assumption. The basic assumption is sound. The online right was ascendant in [...]

Update: Since writing this, Glen Johnson at the AP has written on the whole Romney/porn story. He quoted Tony Perkins, the head of the Family Research Council. At the very least, this puts an exclamation point on my second point below. Clearly the Focus/FRC operation has engaged for Thompson and against Romney. A very, very [...]

Patrick Ruffini makes an articulate defense of flip-flopping: It’s easy to turn a blind eye if someone’s flip-flopping in my direction, but that’s not it. Rather, it’s that at some point, you’ve gotta dance with the ones that brung ya. Said another way, the positions Romney et al. are taking now, in the most important [...]