I don't have the discipline today to write on a single subject, like my post on Margaret Spellings. So here are some observations from today's New York Times:

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William Safire wants a constitutional amendment to allow naturalized immigrants to run for president. Usual Arnold-praise, followed by this interesting observation:

My guess is that most liberals will be conflicted as this issue develops; antidiscrimination is an article of faith, but they don't want a yodeling Republican cowboy in the White House.

A yodeling Republican cowboy in the White House? Wouldn't that be horrible.

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Dame Edna is opening a new off-Broadway show. All right! Some snapshots:

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And in the Salt Lake City market, which takes in the whole state of Utah and parts of Nevada, Idaho and Wyoming, "Desperate Housewives" is fourth, after two editions of "C.S.I." and NBC's "E.R."; Mr. Bush rolled up 72.6 percent of the vote there.

Attention, readers back in the beehive state: that fact from Bill Carter's article is perfect for the next time someone tells you that "moral values" decided this election.

I've talked before about how much of a fallacy it is to think that a)"values voters" decided this election, b)Democrats can appeal to said voters or, c)even if we could get them, we'd want them.

First, while 30% of voters checked off "moral values"—whatever that means—as what helped them chose a candidate, that still leaves 70% of voters who did not. Even assuming every single values voter went for Bush, that still leaves 20% of Americans who voted for Bush for other reasons. In an election that was decided by 3%, that 20% decided the election just as much as the values voters.

Second, if we did decide to try and appeal to these values voters, what are we gonna do? Put "God bless America" in our speeches more often? That just makes us look like we're pandering. It would be extremely difficult and time-consuming to change the conception that the Democrats are the party of the Godless Athiests after Pat Robertson has spent twenty years convincing people that voting for a liberal is tantamount to practicing witchcraft or teaching evolution. Am I the only one that thinks it might be easier to appeal to the people who voted for Bush because they believed the Swift Boat bullshit or couldn't sort out Kerry's domestic record or even just liked Bush's style better?

Finally, even if we did bring the anti-gay, anti-choice evangelical fundamentalist voters into a Democratic coalition, they would expect us to earn their vote by doing things to advance their agenda. Get rid of Roe v. Wade and put a marriage amendment in the constitution. Put the FCC in Tarantino's editing booth, and put James Dobson in the FCC. They would require us to abandon our, y'know, values.

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