It’s hard to say who had the better night, Barack Obama or John Hickenlooper. It was Obama who was able to escape the White House bubble to eat some Wazee Supper Club pizza with a few supporters, to fist-bump some Denverites out on the street and to shake hands with a guy in a horse head (let’s hope he’s just a crazed Broncos fan). Then Obama headed to the Wynkoop for a beer and a game of pool. Just another night out in LoDo? It’s not the kind of night the president usually has. It’s more in line for Hick, who met Obama at the Wynkoop and was the one who played pool with him. It didn’t look as if Hickenlooper was too concerned about being seen with Obama, at least not until the Koch brothers do the inevitable 8-ball attack ad. Via Fox News 31.
Dave Leonardt wonders if difficult times will turn the young liberals of today into the conservatives of tomorrow. It has happened before. Via the New York Times.
Jeffrey Goldberg writes in the Atlantic that the Israeli police beating of a Palestinian-American teenager is a failure of the state. Goldberg, a longtime supporter of Israel, writes: “I think that while the murder of 16-year-old Muhammad Abu Khdeir is a terrible crime, the non-fatal beating of his cousin, the Palestinian-American teenager Tariq Khdeir, by Israel’s Border Police, is, in one way, more consequential. Obviously, murder is the ultimate crime, but this murder was committed, we believe, by thugs operating independent of state authority. The beating of Tariq Khdeir was conducted by agents of the state. We judge countries not on the behavior of their criminal elements, but on 1) how they police their criminal elements; and 2) how they police their police.”
If you’re wondering how badly Republicans have damaged themselves with Latinos, we might learn the answer, Greg Sargent writes, from the Udall-Gardner Senate race. Via the Washington Post.
Katrina Vanden Heuvel argues that Barack Obama‘s response to the Republicans’ threatened lawsuit over executive actions should be to raise the stakes. Via the Washington Post.
Five reasons to be delighted and worried about Cleveland hosting the Republican convention. Only one of them has to do with the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Via Time.
In case you missed it: “My Travels with the Curse of Maracanå,” that World Cup notebook/Brazil journal by Christoph Niemann and Jon Huang, is a multi-media internet wow.
