Adventures in cable

Late night cable-surfing. First, Glenn Beck telling his audience that after you spank your child, you give him a hug so he knows he's loved. After the health reform vote Beck felt like he'd been spanked. But where's the hug? Instead, Democrats propose immigration reform, an issue that "split us apart" (by which I think he means split the pro-business wing of the Republican party apart from the racist wing). He concludes, logically, that the Democrats are not "evolutionaries" but "revolutionaries." Food for thought.

Next, Mitt Romney on Larry King. Mitt says he wants Congress to repeal Obamacare. Then when King asks how Romney describes himself politically, he says "conservative." Unbidden, he explains that the personal mandate for health insurance under the Massachusetts law he signed is a conservative idea, because it says that individuals cannot rely on government for health care, they need to pay for it themselves. King did not ask: how is the personal mandate under Obamacare different from the personal mandate under Romneycare? Which parts of Obamacare are worth saving, which need to go? Commentators have begun to argue that passage of a health reform plan that is basically a national version of Romney's and the Republican party's total opposition to same dooms Romney's chances for the Republican nomination in 2012. I say the commentators vastly underestimate Republicans' capacity for cognitive dissonance.