Politics

Thanks to Tim Blair, we now know that the good people running the Netscape CNN site have a remarkably expressive file naming system.

As a commentator on Blair’s site says, “winners can laugh … losers are losers”.

(Just in case they fix the file in question, here’s a screenshot)

UPDATE:

As I’m sure everyone’s already seen on Instapundit, CNN and Netscape have announced that the offending filename was created by a junior Netscape (not CNN) employee responsible for posting files (which is what I figured). This person has apparently been fired.

I posted a comment in response to this post by Larry Kudlow, in which he referred to this article on NRO.

My comment:

Agreed in the main with your column about the importance of the “values” constituency.

One point of disagreement, however. You seem to imply we should primarily build the red state base.

I think we can reach deep into blue areas and take many more votes away from the Ds. There are segments of the D coaliton which can be hewn off. African Americans are essential to D success, and they are taken for granted. The GOP needs to tell its story loudly and clearly to African Americans, and listen to their responses. Start this conversation as soon as possible. The GOP can pick up votes here, and this will hack structural members out of the D edifice. Mexicans. This group is up for grabs. There are many areas where the GOP can make a strong appeal. We need to do this. They have children. They are the future. If the GOP can turn the flood of Hispanic voters into a source of strength, or at worst a 50/50 split, then the future of the party is assured. Bush’s plan to move toward choice in schools, health care and retirement planning will take these functions away from D populations such as unionized teachers and unionized government employees and place them in the hands of millions of voters, who will not be willing to give up this control once they have it. This will be a dynamic process which will increasingly strip these important social functions away from government and create new GOP consituencies.

The future looks good.

Let’s just not get “victory fever”. After we celebrate for a little while, let’s do like the Germans did after conquering Poland. Let’s go back and look at the last election and what really happened in all the detail we can gather. Let us study our victory with cold and ruthless self-examination and prepare for future campaigns on the basis of facts and evidence shorn of any wishful thinking or self-delusion. This world-historic realignment will continue if keep our heads.

For now, party on. But as the dust clears, let’s get the real “lessons learned” and keep moving.

We say that Britain has no written Constitution and we here in the USA have a written Constitution. But there are unwritten elements to our public life which are of great importance. The concession speech at the end of an election is an important part of our “unwritten” Constitution.

The concession speech puts an end to the campaign and the mindset of the campaign. It reminds people that the campaign is not everything, that some things are more important even than the hoped for victory and the sadness of defeat, that democracy itself is the most important thing. Done correctly, the concession speech drains the bitterness and anger, it gets people to focus on the future. The candidate takes the failure on himself and, in that way, absolves his followers of responsibility for the defeat and allows them to go on their way with a feeling of closure.

I watched Kerry’s concession speech. It was done with class. He struck the right notes. A gesture of regard for the victor, “the fight goes on” for Democrats, but unity is needed, and we should not have anger, etc., and we are all Americans and this is a great country and it is a privilege to be here. It was formulaic, but so are marriage vows. Language on such ceremonial occasions is supposed to be formulaic. Ceremonies are not “empty ritual” but are affirmations of our common life together, of continuity, and they are the glue that holds our immense, disparate society together.

There is a right way to do it. You hate like Hell when your guy has to be the one to do it, but you know it has to be done. To his credit, Kerry did it right.

The ritual was adhered to. The legitimacy of our democratic process was reaffirmed. The Republic remains secure.

God bless America.

You might want to steer clear of federal plaza today (11/3). The less restrained portion of the Kerry coalition will be protesting the Iraq war at 5 pm. This is part of a 30 city protest tour today. Chicago festivities will continue with a two day protest against bankers, Thursday and Friday. Hopefully the violence will be kept to a minimum.

Kerry is going to concede, and I agree with Ann Althouse and Glenn Reynolds that this is the right thing to do and reflects well on him. The damage from the 2000 election wasn’t caused so much by the uncertainty of the recounts and legal challenges as by Al Gore’s encouragement of shrill and combative behavior among his supporters, which set the stage for much of the hyperpartisan divisiveness that we have experienced since then. The country will be better off for Senator Kerry’s mature restraint in the face of personal bad news.

BTW, I’m not gloating over Kerry’s defeat. I’m relieved that Bush won, but the shoe could easily have been on the other foot. For quite a few hours yesterday it looked like Bush was going to lose, and I did a lot of thinking about the prospects of an upcoming Kerry administration. It didn’t feel good but I was resigned to it, and I imagine that’s how Kerry’s supporters feel today. I wish them all the best, and hope that the election outcome will be revealed by time to have been the best outcome for all of us.