I somehow doubt that David Brooks’ glowing endorsement of Barack Obama will darken liberal doubts that he has what it takes to fight for progressive values. Basically, you face the same choice over and over again — is Obama’s undeniable ability to win sympathy and praise from the more mild-mannered and open-minded segments of the right evidence of his internal frailty or is it evidence of his ability to build a dominant political coalition. It counts, in a sense, as “evidence” for either thesis. I’ll admit that I liked Obama from before I ever heard a word from him about politics or policy, so obviously I’m biased, but I see it more in the pro-Obama way.

At any rate, maybe Ed Kilgore or Mark Kleiman will convince you.

Reuters reports that the “U.S. embassy in Iraq is investigating another deadly shooting incident involving its Blackwater bodyguards — this time of the New York Times’s dog.” The Times’ Baghdad bureau staff said that their office dog, Hentish, was shot by Blackwater bodyguards just prior to a visit by a U.S. diplomat:

Blackwater spokeswoman Anne Tyrrell said the dog had attacked one of Blackwater’s bomb-sniffer dogs while a security team was sweeping the compound for explosives.

“The K-9 handler made several unsuccessful attempts to get the dog to retreat, including placing himself between the dogs. When those efforts failed, the K-9 handler unfortunately was forced to use a pistol to protect the company’s K-9 and himself,” she said in an e-mail to Reuters.

State Department investigators have made two follow-up visits to the Times compound to investigate the shooting of Hentish.

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In a speech on the Senate floor today, Sen. Gordon Smith (R-OR) paid tribute to Sen. Trent Lott (R-MS), who recently announced his resignation. Smith remembered Lott’s “warm slap on our backs” and the “steely look in his eye.” He also defended Lott’s comments in 2002, which heralded the segregationist platform of former senator Strom Thurmond:

I watched over international news as his words were misconstrued, words which we had heard him utter many times in his big warm-heartedness trying to make one of our colleagues, Strom Thurmond, feel good at 100 years old. We knew what he meant. But the wolfpack of the press circled around him, sensed blood in the water, and the exigencies of politics caused a great injustice.

Watch it:

In 2002, however, Smith claimed he was “deeply dismayed” at Lott’s statements about Thurmond.

UPDATE: Former attorney general John Ashcroft remembers Lott as “Lincoln-esque.”

UPDATE II: Sens. Arlen Specter (R-PA) and Orrin Hatch (R-UT) also defend Lott’s statements on Sturmond.

UPDATE III: Politico has more samplings of the praise heaped upon Lott today.

Last November, Keith Ellison became the first Muslim elected to the U.S. Congress. When he announced that he was going to take the oath of office with his hand on the Koran, right-wing talk show host Dennis Prager protested, arguing that Ellison would “embolden Islamic extremists“:

He [Ellison] should not be allowed to do so — not because of any American hostility to the Koran, but because the act undermines American civilization. [...]

Insofar as a member of Congress taking an oath to serve America and uphold its values is concerned, America is interested in only one book, the Bible. If you are incapable of taking an oath on that book, don’t serve in Congress. [...]

Ellison’s (taking the oath on the Koran) will embolden Islamic extremists and make new ones, as Islamists, rightly or wrongly, see the first sign of the realization of their greatest goal — the Islamicization of America.

Prager’s outrage was based on nothing but his own need to create controversy. What’s most interesting is that today — when a Republican candidate, former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, is under attack for his Mormon beliefs — Prager seems suddenly concerned about the role religion plays in the political choices of some Americans:

(T)he theological beliefs of a public figure should matter only when one is choosing a theological leader, never a political leader — unless those beliefs form the basis of social and moral values that one abhors. It is very important to know the theological beliefs of one’s clergyman or the head of one’s seminary, but as far as the head of one’s country is concerned, only his moral and social values matter. I would much sooner vote for an agnostic whose values I shared than for a believing Christian or Jew whose values I did not share.

Ah, Dennis, but what if Romney wants to swear-in on The Book of Mormon?

– t-dub

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Yesterday at a speech in Virginia, President Bush was forced to correct his own misinformation campaign when a questioner mistakenly said that Iraq currently has nuclear weapons:

Q But I’m concerned about the nations like Iraq, who now have nuclear weapons –

THE PRESIDENT: Iran.

Q Iran and Iraq both.

THE PRESIDENT: Not Iraq. (Laughter.)

Watch it:

Commenting on the exchange, MSNBC’s anchors called it a “light moment” because there’s “nothing like being corrected by the President of the United States.” Bush, however, was the one who needed the correction. The most recent NIE found that Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003. As late as April 2006, Bush himself still believed Saddam had WMD.

UPDATE: Mike Link points out the last time Bush joked about the missing WMD, in 2004.

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