Must See Video May 1, 2012 My thanks to Matt Ball for these links (and so many others over the years): E.L. DOCTOROW Herewith, the path to unexceptionalism. It is distressing: we are already well down that path, as you’ll recognize (even if, like me, you’re not quite as dismissive as Doctorow about the need for some of our anti-terrorist measures). PHASE ONE If you’re a justice of the Supreme Court, ignore the first sacrament of a democracy and suspend the counting of ballots in a presidential election. Appoint the candidate of your choice as president. If you’re the newly anointed president, react to a terrorist attack by invading a nonterrorist country. Despite the loss or disablement of untold numbers of lives, manage your war so that its results will be indeterminate. . . . Suspend progressive taxation so that the wealthiest pay less proportionately than the middle class. See to it that the wealth of the country accumulates to a small fraction of the population so that the gap between rich and poor widens exponentially.By cutting taxes and raising wartime expenditures, deplete the national treasury so that Congress and state and municipal legislatures cut back on domestic services, ensuring that there will be less money for the education of the young, for government health programs, for the care of veterans, for the maintenance of roads and bridges, for free public libraries, and so forth. Deregulate the banking industry so as to create a severe recession in which enormous numbers of people lose their homes and jobs. Before you leave office add to the Supreme Court justices like the ones who awarded you the presidency. PHASE TWO. . . There are four phases. It doesn’t have to be this way. Vote Democrat. PAUL RYAN . . . [H]e manages to maintain his fiscal-hawk street cred and his reputation for gravitas despite all the indications that he’d triple the deficit if necessary to cut taxes for the wealthy and remains in the grip of a philosophy that treats Medicaid beneficiaries as thieves who are morally debasing themselves. Read it here. And note that Romney is a Ryan man. MUST-SEE VIDEO It may not be fashionable to say when times are so tough, but we really have a ton to feel good about — starting with the quality of the guy steering the ship. Watch!