History

The Journal Gazette turns in a standard-issue civics lesson editorial lamenting the record-low 26 percent turnout in this year's city election. The piece goes through the usual list of possisble turnout inhibitors (the negative mayoral campaign, apathy and cynicism, the too-complex main issue of municipal finance, civic burnout) before concluding that nothing can probably be done in the end and delivering the final lecture to recalcitrant voters:

Tracy Warner contemplates the Occupy movement and the conflict between First Amendment rights and setting a precedent of not enforcing the rules: "Still, at least in Fort Wayne, the Occupiers don't seem to be causing trouble or costing much money, so it seems their First Amendment rights should prevail." He then dips into the magic bag of historical analogy and comes up with the Boston Tea Party, wondering what would have happened if that event from almost 238 years ago had been denounced as the Occupi

Herman Cain's lawyer, on the claim that the candidate had a 13-year-affair:

Newt Gingrich's personal baggage isn't as interesting (or damaging, I think) as his political baggage. He's been on all sides of as many issues as Mitt Romney. And if Romneycare is the one thing of Mitt's that I have the most trouble getting over, this is Newt's.

(Via Nick Gillespie of hit & run, who reminds those who have fogotten what an "opportunistic changeling" Gingrich is.)

Boy, I don't know about this; seems risky to me. Don't some of you secretly distrust those of us with facial hair, as in, "Hey, what've you got to hide?"

It's not particularly shocking that friends of Margaret Thatcher suspect the new Meryl Streep movie of her life might be a "leftwing fantasy." That's about what you'd expect given the opinion Hollywood and the right have of each other. But the reason for the suspicion is interesting:

Universities of Michigan and Chicago law professor Catharine A. MacKinnon, 1998, on Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky:

So much for pledges:

Grover Norquist's grip on the House Republican Conference is loosening.

A growing number of GOP lawmakers have disavowed Norquist's pledge against supporting tax increases in recent days, telling The Hill they no longer feel bound to uphold a document that they signed, in some cases, more than a decade ago.

I think National Review columnist Jonah Goldberg was trying to be so earnestly serious that he let a joke go right over his head:

Still the support for Cain is interesting in its own right. In all the coverage as well as in the comments sections from readers and in my own email and conversations you find people saying, in effect,  “He made a pass, he took no for an answer, what's the big deal?”

New from the Cato Institute, Libertarianism.org, a resource on the theory and history of liberty. From the opening page introduction: