The kind of morality preached by (those in) the entertainment industry has, of course, many attractions for young people who are ever on the lookout for reasons to excuse, justify, or render morally unimportant their own frequently selfish behaviour. It allows them to think that their moral responsibility increases as the square of the distance between themselves and the moral problem; and as the world offers an inexhaustible supply of reasons for righteous indignation, which is one of the few human emotions apart from resentment that never lets you down, they will always be able to think well of themselves. Moreover, their indignation almost always demands sacrifices of others, not of themselves, and to demand sacrifices of others is a pleasure in itself. Shrillness is next to godliness.

…we’d done the whole Gonzales-is-Spanish-for-Souter routine, and then gone in for a lot of identity-group psephology, taking for granted the soundness of John Derbyshire’s line that one thing you can guarantee is it won’t be a white male. We mused on how the politics of Swingin’ Sandra’s retirement demanded a woman replacement, and so that meant Bush would probably want to pick the first Hispanic-American female, and then the legal experts aboard airily threw around likely candidates whose jurisprudence the rest of us pretended to be familiar with: Conchita Rosalita Alcantara Cortez, Carmelita Juanita Suarez Angarita, etc. (I quote from memory.) After a couple of days of being berated by NR readers furious about illegal immigration, it occurred to me the president might want to start the amnesty with a splash and nominate the first Undocumented-American to serve on the Supreme Court.

When nobody’s paying attention, the president nominates the first black female secretary of state and the first Hispanic attorney general, and gets no ethnic rah-rah points for it. But, when the media’s got the quota fever, he nominates a white male. The president’s willingness to evaluate candidates on (as someone once said) the content of their character is a too rare virtue, and we should treasure him for it. He doesn’t boast about an administration that “looks like America,” but he’s got one in the most important sense — they made it on merit.

If (Reporter Robert) Novak did not identify Plame as a secret agent, who did? The other day I realized that I didn’t know the answer to that simple question. When I asked others who were following the Wilson story, I was surprised to learn they didn’t know either. So I conducted a little research to find out who had been the first to use such words as “secret” or “covert” in regard to Plame. It turned out to be David Corn, writing on The Nation’s website, two days after Novak’s column appeared…. Corn’s article contains not a single source — named or unnamed — except one: Joe Wilson.

A blind eye was turned to illegal immigration (in England) — an official report suggests that at least 500,000 illegal immigrants live in Britain. (This figure is probably an underestimate.) Legal immigration procedures were quietly relaxed — and lies to conceal the fact were told to Parliament. Organizations such as Hizb ut-Tahrir, banned in most other countries, were allowed to operate freely. Among those admitted into Britain were vocal supporters of 9/11, Osama bin Laden, and Islamist terrorism in general. Over time a “jihad railway,” bringing together radical Islamic organizations, Pakistani madrassas, terrorist training camps, and disaffected young British Muslims gradually came into being.

Republican appointee after appointee has voted to uphold Roe. The current Court contains 6 pro-Roe votes. Three of them — Kennedy, O’Connor, and Souter — were appointed by Republican presidents committed to overturning Roe. Surely one reason for these disappointments is that Republican presidents have not taken the obvious step of asking prospective nominees where they stand on Roe. Democrats do not share this reluctance: President Clinton pledged to nominate only judges who supported abortion rights, as did John Kerry, and few people suggested that this litmus test violated some code of judicial ethics.