Or Andrew Jackson? The seventh president has a lifelong love of horse racing and would be very competitive. (For example, Jackson beat up his own would-be assassin with a cane in 1835.)

But you could have Trudeau prance around the infield until Chretien strangles him into submission, Mackenzie King captures "Ace" the Blue Jay mascot and dissects him for clues as to who will win the race, and John McDonald pukes all over secon base. John Turner and Kim Campbell also show up for the race, but are asked to leave before it starts.

What are those, hockey players?

Speaking of which, why did the GOP not bluster and threaten wholesale bombing when NK was close to the bomb? Surely they make the Iranians look perfectly sane by comparison.

take it back to the terrible politics thread.

The reaction in the media, so far, is that even sportswriters who aren’t historians know the two men hated each other.

The Post’s Dan Steinberg asked a local historian how bad the blood was between TR and Taft.

Allan Lichtman, distinguished professor of history at American University, told Steinberg that each man considered the other a backstabber, and they had no qualms taking down each other in a presidential election.

Speaking of which, why did the GOP not bluster and threaten wholesale bombing when NK was close to the bomb? Surely they make the Iranians look perfectly sane by comparison.

Taft is only known for being too fat for his bathtub. A skinny Taft makes no sense. As noted about, it'd be like having a Chretien mascot who doesn't strangle people.

National Review, faced with the news Obama commemorated International Holocaust Remembrance Day, knew exactly what it had to do: It backed the Nazis.

Can you name the other two?

Can you name the other two?



Ford and LBJ?

British subjects on the high seas may be punished by the U.S. under the Volstead Act, if they are hovering with rumful purpose anywhere off the coast of the U.S.

"Those who perished as a result of Nazi terror, millions of individual men and women and children whose lives were taken so senselessly, must never be forgotten."

National Review, faced with the news Obama commemorated International Holocaust Remembrance Day, knew exactly what it had to do: It backed the Nazis.

John Avlon is rightly incensed by this disgusting insinuation - and the whole fracas. But the Senate GOP does not surprise. Even after the catastrophes in Iraq and Afghanistan, neoconservatism in its most paranoid and aggressive form still reigns supreme. We won both wars; we never tortured anyone; there is no such thing as the Greater Israel Lobby and it never intimidates anyone and has never defended any dumb idea (like settling half a million Israelis in a conquered territory). And the proof that the fever still has not broken was Hagel's dreadful, inarticulate surrender on anything he had ever thought or said.

Nazism may have been an ideology to which the United States was — and to which the president is — implacably opposed, but it is hardly “senseless.”

Public Policy Polling: Coming up next- we tested Curt Schilling for fun as a RI Senate candidate, and he did the worst of anyone we've ever polled for the Senate

I'm curious to see if Joe would be able to respond to the National Review article without bringing up once something idiotic MSNBC did to compare it to.

...an assertion that “no Jew can be a member of the race.” Suffice it to say, many sensible Germans were persuaded.

Who are the only three U.S. Presidents whose parents were both alive when he took office?

Are there any editors at the National Review? One look at that article and it should have been dead on arrival. The fact that it's still up is amazing in its own right.

Who are the only three U.S. Presidents whose parents were both alive when he took office?
George W is the obvious one.

Nazism may have been an ideology to which the United States was — and to which the president is — implacably opposed, but it is hardly “senseless.” By the early 1930s, the Nazi party had hundreds of thousands of devoted members and repeatedly attracted a third of the votes in German elections; its political leaders campaigned on a platform comprising 25 non-senseless points, including the “unification of all Germans,” a demand for “land and territory for the sustenance of our people,” and an assertion that “no Jew can be a member of the race.” Suffice it to say, many sensible Germans were persuaded.

Nazism may have been an ideology to which the United States was — and to which the president is — implacably opposed, but it is hardly “senseless.” By the early 1930s, the Nazi party had hundreds of thousands of devoted members and repeatedly attracted a third of the votes in German elections; its political leaders campaigned on a platform comprising 25 non-senseless points, including the “unification of all Germans,” a demand for “land and territory for the sustenance of our people,” and an assertion that “no Jew can be a member of the race.” Suffice it to say, many sensible Germans were persuaded.

Scott Brown - NOT running for Senate.

You know, the Nazis had a pretty good point about the Jews and the Aryan race.

By that logic then , the Klu Klux Klan was also hardly "senseless" as it at one time at a point of few that many Americans subscribed to.

The idea that all violence is “senseless” violence is one that has taken deep root on the left; it’s also, unfortunately, one that poses a major impediment to understanding the world.

Correct. What the NRO author is clumsily pointing out is that people have a tendency to dismiss violence as "senseless" because it allows us to avoid thinking about it; to refuse to engage with it on an intellectual or causal level. By removing meaning from violence, it becomes a free agent, washed clean of causality, and can now be associated with whoever and whatever the speaker likes. She's wrong in attempting to make it a point about the left-right divide, at least with respect to politicians, but it's an interesting point nevertheless. Just not for the reasons she thinks it is.

Nazism may have been an ideology to which the United States was — and to which the president is — implacably opposed, but it is hardly “senseless.”

What the NRO author is clumsily pointing out is that people have a tendency to dismiss violence as "senseless" because it allows us to avoid thinking about it; to refuse to engage with it on an intellectual or causal level. By removing meaning from violence, it becomes a free agent, washed clean of causality, and can now be associated with whoever and whatever the speaker likes.

Nazism may have been an ideology to which the United States was — and to which the president is — implacably opposed, but it is hardly “senseless.”

Unfortunately, as you note, the author is more interested in squaring the ideological circle and firing idiotic broadsides at Obama and "the left" than making this point coherently. As such, I think this point is well made, but similar to the posts in the Robert Fick-Dmitri Young thread where folks started making nuanced and considered arguments for what Robert Fick might have been thinking, in the place of simply acknowledging that the point actually made was crude, stupid and categorically wrong.

That's way over the top. Loopy and wingnutty as NR is whenever its authors write about anything but baseball, there's never been anything about it that would suggest any sort of sympathy with Nazi ideology. The past tense in that quote is nothing but a factual reference to the policy of the United States during the historical period in question, and doesn't imply in the least that that policy was misguided or outdated.

That NR article was definitely Out There, but it was hardly "backing the Nazis". Here's the operative paragraph, written in response to Obama's reference to the Holocaust's "senseless" violence:

Nazism may have been an ideology to which the United States was — and to which the president is — implacably opposed, but it is hardly “senseless.” By the early 1930s, the Nazi party had hundreds of thousands of devoted members and repeatedly attracted a third of the votes in German elections; its political leaders campaigned on a platform comprising 25 non-senseless points, including the “unification of all Germans,” a demand for “land and territory for the sustenance of our people,” and an assertion that “no Jew can be a member of the race.” Suffice it to say, many sensible Germans were persuaded.



It's a stupid column on many levels, which most NRO columns usually are but you have to be looking to be offended to read any pro-Nazi intent into it.

Jolly Old St. Nick is right - we shouldn't overstate their position. They point was far more like "You know, the Nazis had a fairly reasonable position on Jews and the Aryan race." - good is overstating it.

Mel Brooks, Sean Connery, Sylvester Stallione and the Temptations are on it, among many others.

Where do you sign up for that list? Any list that includes Mel Brooks, Sean Connery and the Temptations is all right by me. Stallone I can take or leave but if the NRA doesn't like him, perhaps I should re-evaluate my position.

Loopy and wingnutty as NR is whenever its authors write about anything but baseball, there's never been anything about it that would suggest any sort of sympathy with Nazi ideology.

Hey look - the NRA publishes an Enemies List

Maybe they should take Ed Koch off the list?

I think it's a reasonable interpretation, and hardly as "generous" as you imply. Where the NR author gets unhinged isn't when she implicitly argues that all violence isn't equally senseless; it's when she ascribes the opposite view to Obama and "the left" and then proceeds to attack the strawman.

I just more found it amusing than anything. I don't *literally* think the author of that was pro-Nazi or something. But, you know, if you're going to go Godwin, at least have the good sense not to have it so hamfistedly worded as to leave what you're saying open to interpretation.

Loopy and wingnutty as NR is whenever its authors write about anything but baseball...

Or - you could just do what any rational blogger does when you can't think of anything to write about on a given day... just post pictures of cats.

Or - you could just do what any rational blogger does when you can't think of anything to write about on a given day... just post pictures of cats.

You do realize, don't you, that one of the few coherent conservatives on BTF writes regularly on baseball for NRO? That's the only reason I made that qualifying statement.

You do realize, don't you, that one of the few coherent conservatives on BTF writes regularly on baseball for NRO? That's the only reason I made that qualifying statement.

Maybe they should take Ed Koch off the list?

According to the latest report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the economy created 157,000 jobs in January, a solid number, though behind what we need to see a robust recovery. More important, as always, are the revisions. November’s job growth was revised to 247,000 (up from 161,000) and December’s was revised to 196,000 (up from 155,000).

These are big revisions, and when analyzed as part of a trend, it’s clear that the government was been underestimating job growth for most of 2012, to the tune of 28,000 jobs a month.

It should be said that this makes Barack Obama’s re-election victory even easier to explain. If the president’s standing was higher than expected, it’s because economic conditions were much better than we thought. And if Obama’s approval rating has seen a big, post-election bump—and it has—it might have something to do with the fact that employment growth broke the 200,000 barrier in November.

Had November's 247K number been announced at that time, rather than climbing 53% through revisions, then the Election Day stomping might've been even more impressive.

Or the election is sensitive to actual employment not the estimates? The reality not the announcement? That's at least one possibility, which would explain why the weakish announcements didn't hurt him but also suggest that a better announcement might not have helped much either. Presumably this is something one could answer by looking at other disconnections between announced and revised employment numbers around election times?

Or the election is sensitive to actual employment not the estimates? The reality not the announcement? That's at least one possibility, which would explain why the weakish announcements didn't hurt him but also suggest that a better announcement might not have helped much either. Presumably this is something one could answer by looking at other disconnections between announced and revised employment numbers around election times?