April 30, 2009

4/30: Stay Away From My Primary

The 2010 PA Senate race remains the dominant topic in the political blogosphere following Sen. Arlen Specter's decision to join the Dem party. Liberal bloggers are complaining about the efforts of PA Gov. Ed Rendell (D) and other Dem leaders to discourage people from challenging Specter in the primary. Todd Beeton declares: "I'm now even more determined than ever to both fund a Democratic challenger to Specter and withhold any and all support for the DSCC if they do anything to support Specter prior to the primary." Meanwhile, Chris Bowers argues that a primary challenge would make Specter become a more reliable Dem vote, since recent history proves that "Specter's behavior can be altered by the presence of real threats to the continuation of his political career." On the other side of the blogosphere, conservative bloggers continue to criticize the idea of ex-Gov. Tom Ridge (R) challenging ex-Rep. Pat Toomey (R) in the GOP primary.

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Conservative bloggers (Lane, Geraghty, Levin, Powers) are mocking VP Joe Biden after he said that he would not recommend traveling on commercial airplanes or subways because swine flu virus can spread "in confined places." Several liberal bloggers (Benen, Yglesias) are also criticizing Biden.
• Liberal bloggers (Coates, Bowers, Sudbay, Marshall) were impressed by Pres. Obama's performance at last night's press conference. On the other hand, RedState's Erick Erickson thinks Obama "continued to rely on the Teleprompter" and "has a terrible make-up artist."
• Conservative bloggers (Morrissey, de Rugy, Rubin) are criticizing Sen. Olympia Snowe's (R-ME) New York Times op-ed in which she accuses the GOP of excluding moderates. Liberal bloggers (Cole, Hamsher, Willis) are praising the op-ed but predicting that the GOP will ignore Snowe's advice.
• Liberal bloggers (Marshall, Orton, Cole) are making fun of Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA) after she hired ex-Bill Clinton lawyer (and frequent netroots target) Lanny Davis as a "media advisor."
• Liberal bloggers (McCarter, LithiumCola, digby, Blue Texan, Llorens) are blasting New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman after he became the latest columnist (following The Washington Post's David Broder) to oppose the idea of prosecuting George W. Bush lawyers who authorized torture.

PA SEN: Why Can't The People Choose Their Own Nominee?

Liberal bloggers are complaining about Dem leaders' efforts to deter candidates from challenging Specter in the 2010 Dem primary:

• MyDD's Beeton: "I'm now even more determined than ever to both fund a Democratic challenger to Specter and withhold any and all support for the DSCC if they do anything to support Specter prior to the primary. I don't mind people in the party welcoming Specter with open arms, what I do mind is their shutting down a process by which the voters get to say who their Senator is as opposed to Specter's political friends, especially considering Specter's open opposition to EFCA yesterday and his vote against the president's budget today. Unlike yesterday, Arlen Specter today said today that he welcomes 'all comers in the Democratic primary and the general election.' Let's give it to him."
• Open Left's David Sirota: "No politician should be entitled to an uncontested election -- primary, general, special, or any other kind. [...T]he palace drama in the Senate over Specter's change may make lots of news, but I'm guessing the working stiff in Pennsylvania doesn't care whether Washington hacks want a Specter primary challenge or not, and doesn't care whether those hacks think incumbent senators (even those from the other party) are entitled to be shielded from democracy. I'm guessing that if there is a primary challenge to Specter, there's a good chance the core Democratic voters who have been voting against him for years will continue voting against him, as they should."
• Firedoglake's watertiger: "President Obama, Vice President Biden, and [Senate Maj. Leader] Harry Reid all think that [Specter's] blatant, craven opportunism is just wonderful for the Democratic Party, so fantastic, in fact, that they're willing to deny real Democrats a chance to run for the Senate seat."

Open Left's Bowers argues that someone should challenge Specter in the Dem primary in order to push him to the left: "We better all hope that Specter's obvious lack of principles translates into a massive shift in his voting habits. While Specter has said publicly that there will be no such shift, is there any reason to trust such an obviously unprincipled, power-hungry politician? Further, to help guarantee Specter's leftward voting shift, it is important that [businessman] Joe Torsella stay in the primary campaign, and that Representative Joe Sestak continue to keep the door open to a primary run as along as possible. Clearly, Specter's behavior can be altered by the presence of real threats to the continuation of his political career. Specter is an unprincipled wanker. So, let's use that to our advantage."

PA SEN II: Stay Out Of This, Tom

Right Wing News' John Hawkins criticizes the idea of Ridge challenging Toomey in the GOP primary: "[T]here's a rumor floating around that the NRSC is trying to convince Tom Ridge to compete against Pat Toomey in a primary. Now, if Tom Ridge wanted to run on his own -- fine -- in fact, he might even win in Pennsylvania, where he's very popular -- although I'd prefer it if he stayed out of what would inevitably become a very ugly intraparty fight. That being said, let me give [TX Sen.] John Cornyn at the NRSC the best piece of advice he's ever gotten in his life: stay out of Republican primaries. The moment people sense any idea the NRSC or for that matter, the RNC, or the NRCC are working against conservative Republican candidates in any race, anywhere in America, it will cause a backlash and tens of millions of dollars in donations will stay in people's wallets."

Townhall's Hugh Hewitt asked Toomey about the Ridge rumor on his radio show. Toomey responded: "You know, I don't know what to make of that. I've never heard Tom Ridge express any interest whatsoever in doing that, and I've seen the rumors, but I haven't seen any comments from him that would suggest that he's looking at that. Frankly, I think the head start that I have in this race, the funds that I'm already raising at a really pretty amazing pace, the network of supporters that I have who are really energized, I think I'm in a great position to win this primary against anybody."

Hot Air's Allahpundit: "Ridge hasn't held office in Pennsylvania since 2001, long before the state party began to bleed moderates. Would a pro-choice Republican, even with his credentials, stand a chance against Toomey?"

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Swine Flu Vs. Normal Flu

Think Progress' Matthew Yglesias:

"If I were to say that this year 30,000 Americans would die from the flu, you'd probably think I was offering an alarmist take on the current swine flu outbreak. In fact, I would be offering an extremely optimistic take on influenza in 2009. According to the Centers for Disease Control, the country sees about 36,000 flu-related deaths in a normal year and around 200,000 hospitalizations. It's standard for between five and twenty percent of the population to contract the flu in any given year.

Given all that, not only do we face the risk of an unusually bad pandemic of 'swine flu' we also face a risk of panic. Apparently, very high levels of flu-related hospitalizations and deaths are actually pretty normal. But the media doesn't normally cover them as national news stories. The heightened awareness of swine flu risks, however, means that anything flu-related is going to get dramatically inflated attention."

LEST WE FORGET: Sometimes, There Is A Right Answer

The Internet Food Association's Emily Thorson thinks it's indisputable that dark chicken meat tastes better than white chicken meat:

"Unsurprisingly, when it comes to food most things are a matter of taste. You can prefer chocolate to vanilla or vice-versa. You can love Granny Smiths and hate Galas, or adore red peppers and detest the green ones. But when it comes to chicken, you cannot legitimately like white meat better than dark meat. White meat simply does not taste as good. It is not an opinion, it is a fact. Claiming that white meat 'just tastes better' than dark meat is the food equivalent of claiming that a Coors Lite 'just tastes better' than a Victory Prima Pils. No, it does not. You just don't know what beer is supposed to taste like. Figure that out and then get back to me.

Some have argued that while dark meat is better on its own, white meat is better for sandwiches or in chicken salad. This is incorrect. White meat is acceptable in these situations, largely because its relative tastelessness is disguised by other flavors, but dark meat would be better. It's like when a pretty girl wears a hideous dress. She's still pretty, but it's not because of the dress, it's in spite of it. She'd be a hell of a lot prettier wearing a dress made out of dark meat."

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 12:33 PM

April 29, 2009

4/29: Party-Hopping

If you thought the netroots would rejoice over PA Sen. Arlen Specter's decision to join the Dem party, then you don't know the netroots. To be sure, liberal bloggers love the "political optics" of Specter's switch -- especially his statement alleging that the GOP "has moved far to the right." However, lefty bloggers have significant concerns about the substantive implications of Specter's decision. Many of them were hoping that PA voters would replace Specter with a Dem in 2010, since Specter was likely to lose in the GOP primary to ex-Rep. Pat Toomey (R), whom the netroots consider a weak general election candidate. However, now that Dem leaders have reportedly promised to support Specter in the Dem primary, the netroots are frustrated to find themselves stuck with "a flip-floppety opportunist" whose voting record is "worse than [that of] any other Democrat in the entire Senate". Some lefty bloggers are already talking up potential primary challenges from businessman Joe Torsella (D) and Rep. Joe Sestak (D-PA).

While some conservative bloggers were dismayed by Specter's announcement, the overwhelming reaction was "good riddance". Ed Morrissey sums up the attitude of most righty bloggers when he writes: "[Specter]'s not a fiscal stalwart, a social conservative, or a conservative on judges, and disloyal to boot. What exactly did we lose here?" Many conservative bloggers responded to Specter's announcement by rallying behind Toomey, who they think has a decent chance of beating Specter in a general election.

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Liberal bloggers (McCarter, Llorens) are pleased that Sen. Richard Lugar (R-IN) became the first GOP senator to support Pres. Obama's nominee for OLC chief, IU law prof Dawn Johnsen.
• Liberal bloggers (Greenwald, McCarter, Dayen, bmaz) are pleased that the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the Obama admin.'s claim that a detainee abuse lawsuit should be dismissed because it would force the government to disclose "state secrets."

SPECTER: Wait -- How Is This A Good Thing?

Liberal bloggers aren't exactly rejoicing over Specter's party switch:

• Atrios: "I hope this works out better than I expect, but 60 nominal Ds doesn't equal 60 votes. Specter's still free to be a dick in the Senate, and I expect the state Dem party to welcome him with open arms and push all challengers away from the primary."
• Firedoglake's Eli: "[We've lost] an excellent chance to put an actual Democrat in that seat. [...] So can anyone tell me what the Democrats gain by adding a feckless wanker like Specter to their team? What will become legislatively possible that wasn't possible before? Because to me it looks like the Democrats just richly rewarded D-Arlen for doing nothing more than saving his own ass, and asked for nothing in return. I haven't seen a move this clueless and lame since, well, a few months ago."
• Open Left's Chris Bowers: "Pop quiz! What Democratic Senator did all of the following...(1.) Flipped his vote on the Employee Free Choice Act this year? (2.) Voted against President Obama's budget? (3.) Compiled a voting record far worse than Ben Nelson or [CT Sen.] Joe Lieberman? (4.) Represents a state that President Obama won by more than 10%, and that has a Democratic voting registration advantage of more than 10%? If you answered Arlen Specter, then you would be correct. Unless Arlen Specter's flip to the Democratic Party includes a flip in his votes on meaningful legislation, then his change doesn't help progressives at all. He is joining our party purely for personal political survival. And, as Markos notes, Specter's flip is arguably a net negative, as it hurts our chances of getting a better Democrat in the seat."
• Salon's Glenn Greenwald: "Democrats will understandably celebrate today's announcement, but beyond the questions of raw political power, it is mystifying why they would want to build their majority by embracing politicians who reject most of their ostensible views. Reports today suggest that Democratic officials promised Specter that the party establishment would support him, rather than a real Democrat, in a primary. If true, few events more vividly illustrate the complete lack of core beliefs of Democratic leaders, as well as the rapidly diminishing differences between the parties. Why would Democrats want a full-blooded Republican representing them in the blue state of Pennsylvania? Specter is highly likely to reprise the Joe Lieberman role for Democrats: a 'Democrat' who leads the way in criticizing and blocking Democratic initiatives, forcing the party still further towards Republican policies."
• FiveThirtyEight's Nate Silver: "[T]his is not necessarily an unmitigated win for the Democrats. Unlike [ex-VT Sen.] Jim Jeffords' switch in 2001, this does not affect who controls the Senate Chamber. Rather, it merely effects the filibuster math, which has always been somewhat fuzzy. While the Democrats will have a nominal total of 60 votes once Al Franken is seated, the Senate's fortunes will still be determined by a group of about a dozen moderate senators from both parties (including Specter), just as it was before. [...] The real question is -- how often will Specter's vote change as a result of this? [...] If he goes from voting with the Democrats 40 percent of the time to 60 percent of the time, that is not so terrific for them, particularly if the 60th seat raises expectations and lends credence to Republican claims about the need for divided government."

A few liberal bloggers think that Specter is going to become a reliable Dem vote, but this is clearly a minority view among the netroots.

SPECTER II: We Want A Primary!

Many liberal bloggers still want someone to challenge Specter in the 2010 PA Dem primary, even though Dem leaders have reportedly promised Specter that they won't back another Dem candidate:

• Bowers: "It turns out that Specter has been promised no primary opponent for switching parties. [...] Apart from the image of total Republican fail, [his party switch] isn't a good thing at all. Not only do we have to deal with Specter's voting record, which is worse than any other Democrat in the entire Senate, but we are denied the opportunity to even challenge him. I like sticking it to Republicans. But I am also pretty pissed right now. We need to run a primary challenge against Specter anyway, leadership be damned."
• Firedoglake's Jane Hamsher: "The Democrats seem to be unaware that there is a game on at all. They are saying that they won't field a candidate to challenge Arlen. Well, that's smart. Just let him control everything that happens in the Senate like he does now, and watch him move to the right as he continues to compete with Pat Toomey for the conservative vote. Hey, guess what? Primaries work. . . especially when the candidate has nowhere to go. Specter can't go back to the GOP, so the best way to move him into the 'D' camp is to run a primary challenger against him. Make him compete for the hearts of Pennsylvania Democrats before he gets to Toomey, because they may want to see an actual Democrat take the seat."
• Silver: "[Toomey] will be an underdog against any sentient Democrat. Why should the Democrats settle for a Lieberdem when they can Pennsylvanians to elect a mainline Democrat along the lines of [Sen.] Bob Casey?"
• BooMan: "[J]ust because I welcome him into the party doesn't mean that I don't want a better Democrat representing me in the Senate. Is that unreasonable? Just give me the chance to vote for another viable candidate. That's all I ask. If Specter wins I will respect that just as I begrudgingly respected Casey's win in the primary in 2006."
• MyDD's Todd Beeton: "We need a strong Pennsylvania Democrat to challenge Specter in the primary so he is motivated to be halfway decent as a sitting Senator in the meantime. And I need someone to give my money to because Specter won't be getting any."
• digby: "I hate it when the poohbahs arrogantly foreclose the primary process, especially when there's little chance of a Republican victory. I really hate it when it's done behind closed doors to shut out liberals. If an actual Democrat out there wants to give it a try I think they deserve some support."
• Daily Kos' Markos Moulitsas: "Specter switched because of political expediency, and given his refusal to switch on EFCA, it means that Democrats will still be motivated to take him out in a primary. But as we've seen, Specter has no convictions he won't betray in his naked efforts to remain in power. If Pennsylvania labor was smart, they'd get a real Democrat to say he was going to primary Specter. It's likely Specter expects Gov. Ed Rendell to clear the field for him. But given a serious primary challenger (or even the threat of one), there's little reason Specter wouldn't flip right back on EFCA."
• Open Left's David Sirota: "The idea of Specter running in a Democratic primary is really crazy -- and I'm hopeful it will be a contested primary. State/local Democrats shouldn't simply defer to this guy, who Pennsylvania's rank-and-file Democratic voters/activists have been trying to dislodge for years (and rightly so)."
• The Reality-Based Community's Mark Kleiman: "In [Senate Maj. Leader Harry] Reid's shoes, I wouldn't be inclined to deal. The best way to get Arlen's vote is to make him compete in a Democratic primary. He might well be beaten, giving us an actual Democrat rather than another Ben Nelson or [AR Sen.] Blanche Lincoln. There's simply no reason to have a Senator from Pennsylvania who votes against workers' rights. If Specter were beaten, I can't see the victor then losing to the Club for Growth guy in November."

After analyzing the candidacy of Torsella and the potential candidacy of Sestak, Bowers concludes that Dems should wait until "mid-June" before deciding on a primary challenger: "Specter will have a honeymoon with Democrats over the next two or three weeks, but if he keeps opposing most of President Obama's agenda, he should expect a wave of media coverage that will anger many Pennsylvania Democrats, and make a primary challenge against him quickly viable. As such, it is important that Representative Joe Sestak publicly stay open to a possible run for at least another two months."

Meanwhile, another lefty blogger has started a Facebook group entitled, "I support a real progressive against Arlen Specter."

SPECTER III: This Ain't Your Father's Republican Party

While liberal bloggers don't like Specter, they love the symbolism of his decision to switch parties -- especially his statement alleging that the GOP "has moved far to the right":

• Moulitsas: "We've been systematically making the case since the election that the GOP is now a regional southern party. And what better way to strike home that point than to see a moderate northeastern Republican switch parties, complaining about his party's swing to the far right? And it's a trend that if fully played out, could net us one or two additional seats in Maine, where Sen. Olympia Snowe could be a legitimate Democrat."
• AMERICAblog's Joe Sudbay: "The political optics just couldn't be better. The DC pundits and talking heads love Arlen Specter (kinda the way they love Lieberman.) That crowd believes the hype that Specter is a moderate -- and compared to the rest of the GOP, Specter is definitely more moderate. So, we'll hear endless chatter about how the GOP has become a shrinking party. That means the talking heads will finally get something right."
• The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen: "For three months, the conservative message has been that President Obama, his widespread popularity notwithstanding, is some kind of radical ideologue, far from the American mainstream. Specter's departure from the GOP sends the exact opposite message. Moderate Republicans are teaming up with Obama, and leaving the party that has 'moved far to the right' behind."
• The New Republic's John Cohn: "Specter is one of the better-known senators in America. If you follow politics even casually, you've seen or heard him on the news before. So it's going to register with you that a major Republican senator has decided his party has become too extreme for him. And if you're a Republican, you might wonder if it's become too extreme for you, as well."

Liberal bloggers are also making fun of Sen. Jim DeMint's (R-SC) response to Specter's announcement, in which he said, "I would rather have 30 Republicans in the Senate who really believe in principles of limited government, free markets, free people, than to have 60 that don't have a set of beliefs." Interestingly, several righty bloggers are also criticizing DeMint's statement.

SPECTER IV: Good Riddance

Most conservative bloggers are pleased to be rid of Specter:

• Michelle Malkin: "Arlen Specter, we have just 10 words for you: Don't let the door hit you on the way out."
• Gateway Pundit: "Good-bye. One less RINO."
• Hot Air's Morrissey: "[Specter]'s not a fiscal stalwart, a social conservative, or a conservative on judges, and disloyal to boot. What exactly did we lose here?"
• The Next Right's Conn Carroll: "Good riddance. Specter voted for every ounce of terrible new spending under [George W.] Bush and he has been an equally worthless speed bump to Obama's spend-a-thon. The contrast between the geriatric Washington big government/big business/big labor Specter and Pat Toomey couldn't be greater. This is great news for the GOP's 2010 chances."
• Robert Stacy McCain: "Good-bye and good riddance. [...] One less member of the Senate Republican 'Jellyfish Caucus.' Specter reminds me of the high-school slut trying to sleep her way to popularity -- a weak reed, blown by the shifting winds. The fact that the national GOP apparatus lined up behind this venomous crapweasel in 2004 is all you need to know about what a worthless waste of time the national GOP apparatus was during the Bush/[Ken] Mehlman era."
• RedState's Erick Erickson: "Exactly what good does it do for the Republican Party, which has a serious credibility problem right now with voters over losing its way, to keep in positions of power those people who caused us to lose our way? As much as someone like [AZ Sen.] John McCain is an annoyance, Arlen Specter has actively worked to undermine not conservatives, but Republicans, on a host of issues from judges to spending."

NRO's Mark Hemingway quips: "I read that [Specter] was switching parties, but I was disappointed to learn he's still a Democrat."

SPECTER V: I've Got A Bad Feeling About This...

Other conservative bloggers had a more negative reaction to Specter's announcement:

• NRO's Andrew Stuttaford: "You don't have to be a particular fan of Specter (I'm not) to think that today's news is bad, to say the least, and, yes, the position in which Specter now finds himself must mean that he shifts (further?) left, taking, in a very real sense, the country with him. Disastrous."
• The Weekly Standard's Mary Katharine Ham: "Filibuster-proof majority, here we come. As if we didn't pass enough the first 100 days."
• AmSpec Blog's Philip Klein: "This is a huge blow for Republicans hoping to stop Obama's agenda in the Senate. Specter had been moving to the right on issues such as card check because he was concerned about the challenge from Toomey, but if he's facing a tough battle against a liberal opponent in the Democratic primary, the opposite dynamic comes into play and he's likely to move even further to the left. The only way he'll get the Democratic nod is if he reliably votes with the administration."
• Power Line's Paul Mirengoff: "In the short-term (i.e., until 2011 when a different liberal would likely have taken the seat) this looks like a coup for the Democrats."
• NRO's Ramesh Ponnuru: "The NRCC: 'Good Riddance' to Specter. That's what the GOP House campaign committee is saying in its press release. I guess it will be truly happy when Snowe and [ME Sen. Susan] Collins leave too."

TOOMEY: Go, Pat, Go!

Many conservative bloggers reacted to Specter's announcement by rallying behind Toomey and talking up his chances of winning the general election:

• Erickson: "I just gave money to Pat Toomey. Why don't you do the same?"
• Townhall's Hugh Hewitt: "[I]t is very easy for me to throw in quickly for Pat Toomey, and to note as well that Arlen Specter is the best general election candidate for Toomey to draw. Senator Specter supported the non-stimulus bill and the bailouts that may not play all that well in Pittsburgh. The Dems have agreed to clear a path for Senator Specter to run as a 'D,' and though that might make sense to a lot of Democrats, some are going to sit on their hands, some are going to resent the issue of switiching for personal convenience, and still more are going to wonder about the trust factor given the senator's emphatic declaration -- which will be played a few hundred times between now and November 2010 -- that he was staying put."
• NRO's David Freddoso: "Toomey's smarts and understanding of policy, and his ability to avoid unhinged rhetoric helped him hold down a Congressional District that went solidly for Al Gore in 2000 and for John Kerry in 2004. Provided that Specter manages to get the nomination, a Toomey (R) versus Specter (D) general election in a low-turnout midterm could be good for the GOP. What Republican wouldn't want to pit skeptical Democratic voters for Specter against extremely motivated Republicans, out for revenge and wishing they'd been there for Toomey in 2004?"

Toomey wrote a diary on RedState in which he reassured righty bloggers that his campaign will go on: "For our campaign, not much changes. Instead of having Arlen Specter as an opponent in the Republican primary, we will face him in the general election, that is, assuming Pennsylvania Democrats decide they can trust him enough to give him their nomination. Whichever the case, our message remains the same."

Meanwhile, righty bloggers (Erickson, Lopez, Geraghty) are not happy about rumors that ex-PA Gov./HHS Sec. Tom Ridge (R) is thinking about challenging Toomey for the GOP nod.

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Unprincipled Hack (D-PA)

The New Republic's Jonathan Chait:

"When a politician switches parties, it's customary for the party he's abandoned to denounce him as an unprincipled hack, and the party he's joined to praise him as a brave convert who's genuinely seen the light. But I think it's pretty clear that Specter is an unprincipled hack. If his best odds of keeping his Senate seat lay in joining the Communist party, he'd probably do that.

To be sure, Specter is a real moderate on some issues, but his contortions are so comical that no principled read on his actions is very plausible. Specter favored the Employee Free Choice Act favored by labor, turned against it when he faced a primary challenge, and then abandoned his party altogether when it became clear he couldn't win his primary. In the meantime, he came out in favor of a Hooverite spending freeze after backing the stimulus bill."

LEST WE FORGET: You Had A Bad Day...

From FMyLife.com:

• Today, I was taking the bus home from work. As I was getting off an old man whistled at me; I told him to go to hell and got off the bus. When the bus drove away the old man stood in the back of the bus, holding up the wallet I left that he was trying to give to me. FML.
• Today, I was walking up to girlfriend's house when her terrifying Marine Corps dad threw a football at me. Not being very athletic, I surprised myself by catching it. He gestured for me throw it back and I watched it spiral wildy to the left and hit my girlfriend's mom in the face. FML.
• Today, my father asked me if he could borrow my electric razor because he wanted to "surprise mom later". Anxious to see him without his life-long beard, I willingly agreed. About half an hour later he exited the bathroom. Beard fully intact. FML.
• Today, I was having lunch with my sister and my mother. While my mom was busy ordering food, my sister said to me, "look at this face I can make!" and she grossly contorted her face so that she had a double chin. My mother looked over and said to her, "stop making fun of your sister!" FML.
• Today, my rescue squad unit responded to a 911 call from a woman who felt she was going to pass out. We knocked on her locked door a couple times with no answer. Fearing she might be unconscious, I kicked in the door. She was about to open it and only passed out from the concussion I gave her. FML.

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 01:22 PM

April 28, 2009

4/28: Sue And The Swine Flu

We certainly wouldn't have predicted that the swine flu outbreak would end up putting Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) on the defensive. But liberal bloggers are slamming the moderate GOPer for leading the effort to remove funding for pandemic preparedness from the economic stimulus bill. In the eyes of the netroots, the sudden relevance of this provision (and Collins's role in killing it) illustrates "how utterly absurd and non-substantive her stimulus posturing was." Meanwhile, conservative bloggers are pointing out that Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) also criticized the pandemic preparedness funding.

The good news for Collins? It appears that a different moderate senator will be dominating the blogosphere's attention for the next few days...

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Liberal bloggers (McCarter, Singer, Sudbay, Benen, Partridge) are criticizing GOP senators for threatening to filibuster Pres. Obama's nominee for HHS Sec, KS Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, at a time when the swine flu outbreak has been declared a "public health emergency."
• Liberal bloggers (Dayen, Beeton) are urging their readers to call their members of Congress and tell them to open an impeachment inquiry into Jay Bybee, the former DoJ attorney who wrote one of the controversial interrogation memos and who now serves on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Meanwhile, another lefty blogger is criticizing Senate Maj. Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) for issuing a statement pointing to Bybee's "good professional reputation."
• Conservative bloggers (Malkin, Reynolds, Geraghty, Cianfrocca) are criticizing the Obama admin. after a DoD photo op involving low-flying planes frightened NYC residents. Although WH Military Office dir. Louis Caldera has apologized for the incident, at least one conservative blogger is urging Obama to fire Caldera.
• Conservative bloggers (Morrissey, Mirengoff, Lopez, hogan) are pleased that conservative Harvard law prof Mary Ann Glendon is refusing to accept the Laetare Medal at Notre Dame's commencement in order to protest the university's decision to give Obama an honorary degree.

COLLINS: The Strange Logic Of Moderates

Liberal bloggers are slamming Collins for leading the effort to remove funding for pandemic preparedness from the stimulus bill:

• Firedoglake's Teddy Partridge: "Susan Collins bragged about stripping pandemic flu preparation money from the stimulus bill in February. Doesn't seem so moderate now, does it?"
• MyDD's Josh Orton: "Remember when self-anointed Senate 'moderates' made a big show of wringing their hands about the size of Obama's stimulus package? The political media loved it, partially because such alligator-concern offers the requisite 'he-said she-said' narrative found in most reporting. But it's mostly posturing -- protest about the size of Obama's stimulus package was arbitrary -- Collins would have demanded a reduction no matter the size of the proposal. How else could she inject themselves into the debate as a 'serious moderate?' So what did the moderates slash? Flu preparedness. Of course. Of course."
• AMERICAblog's Joe Sudbay: "Hmm. What's the flu pandemic got to do with the economy? For starters, Reuters reports it's already having an effect: 'Oil prices fell more than 4 percent to below $50 a barrel as investors feared a new blow to an already fragile global economy if trade flows are curbed and manufacturing is hit. [...]' What was that question Collins asked about the flu pandemic again? Oh yeah, 'What does that have to do with an economic stimulus package?'"
• The Reality-Based Community's Mark Kleiman: "It seems as if every time Republicans oppose some bit of 'wasteful big-government spending' the Man Upstairs makes them look stupid. [...LA Gov.] Bobby Jindal sneers at spending money on monitoring volcanoes, and a month later Mt. Redoubt blows. Susan Collins, cheered on by [ex-Bush strategist] Karl Rove (and, to be fair, abetted by Chuck Schumer) insists on taking money for pandemic-flu preparedness out of the stimulus package, and two months later we have swine flu on our hands. Everyone knows that the best way to ensure rain is to leave your umbrella home."

Obsidian Wings' publius: "It's nice to see Senator Collins scrambling to note her support for pandemic flu funding. And I'm sure she's telling the truth about that. The point of the Collins snark, though, wasn't so much to accuse her of endangering public health. It was to illustrate how utterly absurd and non-substantive her stimulus posturing was. It's one thing for people to oppose the idea of fiscal stimulus in general. [...] It's quite another, though, to agree to spend $838 billion, but pull back from spending another valuable $80 billion simply to preen about cutting 'waste.' There was no coherent principle here at all -- indeed, the provisions cut were actually some of the most stimulative in the entire package."

Meanwhile, Jane Hamsher and Markos Moulitsas are mocking Collins after a Wall Street Journal article detailing her opposition to the pandemic preparedness provision disappeared from her website.

SCHUMER: Two Can Play That Game

Conservative bloggers are pushing back against the criticism of Collins by pointing out that Schumer also criticized the stimulus bill provision for pandemic preparedness, calling it "porky":

• Michelle Malkin: "Schumer opposed flu pandemic funding in stimulus, too, you morons."
• RedState's Moe Lane: "Back in the day, Senator Schumer bragged about removing the [pandemic preparedness] funding, in fact. He thought that it was 'bipartisan.' [...] Of course, the people that will scream loudly about [the removal of this provision] will say not a word about Schumer if they can possibly help it. That's because they don't actually care about swine flu. Well, that's not quite true: after all, the more people that die, the more they'll feel justified and righteous about screaming about the Republican party. Sure, it's a tragedy, but the really important thing for them is to elect more Democrats."

Hot Air's Allahpundit: "I can't figure out which prefab lefty narrative Collins's opposition to putting flu prep in the stimulus is supposed to vindicate. Is it that conservatives don't take biological threats seriously? The meta-narrative about us for the past eight years was, I thought, that we take threats too seriously and spend our days in the icy grip of hysterical fear (except over global warming, natch). Is it that Collins symbolizes the GOP's mindless 'party of no' opposition to spending? Can't be -- she voted for the stimulus, of course, and in any case, Chuck Schumer shed no tears about the flu money being stripped out."

Meanwhile, NRO's David Freddoso argues that Collins was right to strip funding for pandemic-flu preparedness from the stimulus bill: "The argument made by Sen. Susan Collins (R, Maine) is that some activities, even worthy ones, do not belong in a stimulus package because they are not stimulative. [The Nation's John] Nichols argues that flu spending is stimulative because a flu can disrupt economic activity, but this sort of loose reasoning justifies any kind of government spending whatsoever as 'stimulative' and could further justify any number of spurious complaints against lawmakers. (Where are the funds, for example, for preventing asteroid collisions, just one of which could bring an end to all economic activity?)"

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Time To Start Worrying?

The Atlantic's Megan McCardle offers some thoughts on the swine flu outbreak (h/t Andrew Sullivan):

"How worried should we be about the Swine Flu? The mortality in Mexico is shockingly high: 81 cases out of 1300, or about 6%. The great Spanish Flu pandemic, on the other hand, had a mortality of about 2.5%. Normal rates for flu are less than a tenth of 1%, with most of those deaths occurring in people who are already weak: children, the elderly, the immunocompromised. [...]

The bright side is that mortality here seems to be a lot lower -- nonexistant so far. People living in poorer countries tend to have weaker immune systems for the obvious reasons. And the strain that's arrived here may just not be as deadly as the one still in Mexico. Still, this seems more worrying than SARS was, and SARS was pretty worrying. And if it gets much bigger, it will deal a heavy blow to an already struggling world economy, because this will have deep impacts on global trade flows."

LEST WE FORGET: How To Motivate Your Students

From Overheard in New York:

Professor: Not only will I take off points, but I will go and TP your house.
Student: It's a really long drive...
Professor: It's worth it to me.

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 12:31 PM

April 27, 2009

4/27: I Love Me Some Reconciliation

Liberal bloggers are delighted that Dem congressional leaders bowed to the White House's wishes and agreed to take up health care reform under the budget reconciliation process, which would shield the legislation from GOP filibusters. The netroots view this agreement as a major development that dramatically increases the probability that health care reform will happen this year. Chris Bowers calls it "the biggest legislative victory for progressives in, well, about as long as I can remember," while Ezra Klein declares: "This could be the day that health care reform went from being unlikely to inevitable." At the same time, some liberal bloggers are concerned about the concessions that may have been granted to Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad (D-ND) "in exchange for [his] not standing in the way of reconciliation provisions."

Some liberal bloggers see this episode as evidence that Pres. Obama learned "the right lesson" from his experience with the economic stimulus bill (which received zero GOP votes in the House). Steve Benen echoes the views of many lefty bloggers when he writes: "If the White House really is done taking Republican outreach seriously, it's about time." On the other side of the blogosphere, Quin Hillyer urges GOP senators to make good on their threat to "use every parliamentary tactic in the book to really punish the Dems."

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• While some liberal bloggers (Jaikumar, Partridge) are portraying Rep.-elect Scott Murphy's (D) win over Assemb. Jim Tedisco (R) as a big upset, others are urging Dems not to read too much into the results. Several lefty bloggers (Green, digby) are urging ex-MN Sen. Norm Coleman (R) to follow Tedisco's lead and concede to Al Franken (D). Meanwhile, some conservative bloggers are "bummed" about Tedisco's defeat, while others argue that "Murphy is likely to be vulnerable in 2010 against the right candidate."
• Liberal bloggers (Clemons, McCarter, Lakoff) continue to call for an independent "truth commission" to investigate the use of harsh interrogation tactics during the George W. Bush presidency. Liberal bloggers (Greenwald, hilzoy, digby, BooMan, Lemieux) are also hammering one of their favorite targets -- Washington Post columnist David Broder -- after he wrote a column urging Obama to "stand against" prosecutions of Bush lawyers who may have authorized illegal interrogation techniques. Meanwhile, conservative bloggers (McCarthy, Erickson) are denouncing the idea of prosecuting Bush lawyers, while others (Liebau, Mirengoff) are defending the use of the harsh interrogation methods described in the OLC memos.
• Liberal bloggers (Hamsher, digby) are pleased that the CA Dem Party passed a resolution calling for a Congressional inquiry into Jay Bybee, the former DoJ attorney who wrote one of the controversial interrogation memos and who now serves on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Other lefty bloggers (Yglesias, Serwer, Black, Tim F., Benen) are criticizing the 4/25 Washington Post article which provides anonymous quotes from Bybee's friends who claim that Bybee feels "regret" about the controversial memo.
• Now that U.S. health officials have declared that the swine flu outbreak is a "public health emergency," liberal bloggers (Yglesias, Houle, Benen) are criticizing Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) for leading the effort to remove funding for pandemic preparedness from the stimulus bill. Meanwhile, conservative bloggers (Malkin, Geraghty) are arguing that the swine flu outbreak (which scientists believe originated in Mexico) demonstrates the need for increased border security.
• Several liberal bloggers (Rosenberg, O'Connor) are buzzing about a possible 2010 primary challenge for Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA).

HEALTH CARE REFORM: A Big Win For Progressives?

Liberal bloggers are delighted that Dem congressional leaders have agreed to take up health reform under the budget reconciliation process, which will "protect major health care legislation from Republican opposition by shielding it from last-minute Senate filibusters":

• Open Left's Bowers: "Without the filibuster available to Republicans, it is highly likely that in 2009 Democrats will succeed where they failed in 1994. This might be the biggest legislative victory for progressives in, well, about as long as I can remember."
• Klein: "It's hard to overstate the importance of this decision. This could be the day that health care reform went from being unlikely to inevitable. Without reconciliation, the incentives for the minority are very simple: Kill the bill. Do as [ex-Speaker Newt] Gingrich did in 1994 and hand the majority a failure. With reconciliation, killing the bill just means you're locked out of the final legislation. It's a death sentence for your involvement in the process. It is not, however, the end of the process itself."
• Obsidian Wings' publius: "The agreement to use reconciliation for health care is huge -- it's arguably the single best development since Obama's inauguration. It not only means that health care reform will be much easier to pass -- it means that the ultimate legislation will also be much better (with a public plan, etc.). And that's how it should be. Obama ran on an ambitious health care platform and won convincingly. The American people put him and a 59-strong Democratic majority in charge. And they -- rather than Susan Collins and [NE Sen.] Ben Nelson -- should get to decide whether and in what form health care gets passed."
• The Washington Monthly's Benen: "[This] certainly makes sense. The GOP is awfully unpopular, and the more the administration can pass its agenda without having to water it down for the right, the better it is for the president. [...] If the White House really is done taking Republican outreach seriously, it's about time."
• The Reality-Based Community's Mark Kleiman: "No unilateral disarmament. [...] If the Republicans want to compromise on health care, the door is open. If they want to obstruct, they won't be able to. Seems right to me. As to the Republican threat to throw a temper tantrum and tie up the Senate procedurally, I say: Bring it on."
• MyDD's Todd Beeton: "Sounds like the White House learned the right lesson from the stimulus debate and vote."

At the same time, some liberal bloggers are worried about the concessions that may have been granted to Sen. Conrad "in exchange for [his] not standing in the way of reconciliation provisions":

• Klein: "It says something about the state of American politics that the Democratic chairman of the Budget Committee has to be bribed so he doesn't stand in the way of efforts to ensure that 50 million people receive health insurance coverage. Obviously, his incentives are to maximize his own influence, but it's still weird."
• Beeton: "[T]there is a big question that's yet unanswered: what does Kent Conrad want for not blocking reconciliation[?] Some are speculating, disturbingly, that he's been promised the chance of, as Ezra Klein puts it, 'tinkering with Social Security.'"

Meanwhile, conservative blogger Hillyer hopes GOP senators push back hard: "Senate Republicans say they will use every parliamentary tactics in the book to really punish the Dems if the Dems push through health care nationalization via 'reconciliation' that unfairly limits debate, etc., utterly against all Senate tradition on what the reconciliation process is for. I won't believe it until I see it. They (GOP senators) have made such pledges many times before, but they always capitulate like emasculated chihuahuas when the time comes to really act. That's what they did in mulitiple failed battles (or non-battles, because they didn't really fight on judges. And, considering that it is dififficult for invertebrates to find spines, that's what i fully expect again: Craven capitulation without having achieved much of anything. I sure hope I'm wrong."

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: The Case For More Waterboarding

Think Progress' Matthew Yglesias:

"The orthodox conservative position at this point, it seems to me, is that waterboarding is not torture. Nor is having someone dangle from his shackled arms in a manner so painful as to prevent sleep for a period of days. What's more, these non-torturous 'harsh techniques' are highly effective at gathering intelligence. But if that's true, and these are legal and effective means of securing reliable information, why are we doing so little of it?

After all, people doing organized crime investigations face a lot of challenges in terms of getting information from people. Maybe cops should do routine undercover drug buys, build a case against low level dealers, and then waterboard the guys they've arrested and move further up the food chain. Maybe waterboarding and 'stress positions' should become routine treatment for battlefield detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan. Why not?

Well I would say because it's wrong. And also because it's very unlikely to work. And also because this is the mentality that gave us Abu Ghraib and abuses at Bagram and all kinds of other horrible problems throughout the system. But if you take the view that these 'enhanced techniques' aren't illegal torture, and that 'enhanced techniques' are highly effective, and that systematized approval of torture doesn't inevitably lead to abuse, then why not?"

LEST WE FORGET: FEMA Unveils Nationwide Phone Tree In Case Of Emergency

From The Onion:

"WASHINGTON -- The Federal Emergency Management Agency on Monday unveiled its new $48.2 million Phone Tree Response System, a program designed to alert every American in the event of a large-scale disaster. 'The safety of our great nation is the responsibility of all 300 million of its citizens, so make sure you memorize the names and phone numbers of the three people you are supposed to call,' said acting FEMA administrator Nancy Ward, who assured reporters that, in the event of a chemical or biological attack, President Obama would be notified first so that he could inform Vice President Joe Biden, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, and Meredith Soto of Winslow, AZ. 'Remember: If they don't pick up, leave a message telling them there's a national emergency, and then call the next name listed in the 176,935-page, 253-volume directory until someone answers.' According to FEMA officials, regular tests of the phone tree will be conducted on a semiweekly basis to identify any numbers that are no longer in service."

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 01:34 PM

April 24, 2009

4/24: A Tortuous Debate

A week has passed since Pres. Obama ordered the DoJ to release the controversial OLC interrogation memos, but torture remains the most-discussed topic (by far) in the political blogosphere. The liberal netroots still want AG Eric Holder to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate the lawyers in the George W. Bush admin. who authorized these brutal interrogation techniques. However, lefty bloggers are also stepping up their calls for an independent "truth commission," which is the option favored by Speaker Nancy Pelosi. While Obama and Senate Dem leaders are opposed to the creation of such a commission, liberal bloggers are pleased that Pelosi and other prominent Dems (such as NY Rep. Jerrold Nadler and MO Sen. Claire McCaskill) have expressed support for a congressional inquiry.

Conservative bloggers, meanwhile, are echoing Rep. Pete Hoekstra's (R-MI) claim that the congressmen who were briefed on these interrogation methods are just as culpable as the Bush lawyers who authorized them. Righty bloggers are specifically attacking Pelosi, accusing her of hypocrisy for criticizing interrogation methods that she was apparently briefed on. Liberal bloggers are responding to this argument by declaring that they don't care whether an investigation implicates congressional Dems as well. John Cole writes: "[F]or most of us, we don't care if the person has a (R) or (D) behind their name when they were instituting a policy of torture. [...] If Jane Harman and Nancy Pelosi knew about this and ok'd it, they are just as culpable."

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Liberal bloggers (Aravosis, Beeton, Benen) are buzzing about the fact that House Min. Leader John Boehner referred to the Bush admin.'s interrogation methods as "torture techniques." Although Boehner's spokesman claimed that Boehner "was simply using liberals' verbiage," lefty bloggers contend that Boehner was simply admitting what everyone already knows. Meanwhile, other liberal bloggers (Greenwald, Serwer, Huffington) are criticizing the media's coverage of the torture debate.
• Conservative and liberal bloggers are both welcoming the news that GOP Senators are threatening to shut down the Senate if Dems use reconciliation to pass health care reform. Conservative bloggers think that such a move would humiliate Dems, while liberal bloggers think it would backfire spectacularly.
• Liberal bloggers (Benen, Willis, Thers) think the GOP is becoming increasingly unhinged, as evidenced by the fact that 16 state GOP leaders are urging RNC Chair Michael Steele to start referring to Dems as "socialists." Conservative bloggers are divided on this issue: some are in favor of calling Dems "socialists," while others have reservations.
• Liberal bloggers (Yglesias, Ackerman, digby, Black) are congratulating The American Prospect's Ezra Klein on being hired by The Washington Post. Klein will become the second liberal blogger hired by the Post this year, joining ex-TPM blogger Greg Sargent.

INVESTIGATIONS: A Sword That Cuts Both Ways

Conservative bloggers are echoing Hoekstra's claim that the congressmen who were briefed on these interrogation methods are just as culpable as the Bush lawyers who authorized them.

• Hot Air's Ed Morrissey: "We have known for years that Congressional leadership had at least seen some footage from waterboarding, and had unanimously approved it, with one exception after the interrogations had already ceased. Hoekstra has identified himself as one of those attendees, and Jane Harman would have been another; Nancy Pelosi has been confirmed as another as well. If more names in Congress get released, especially among those today demanding prosecution, get identified with specific dates and the procedures discussed, and their commentary during the briefings, shouldn't they also get prosecuted for 'war crimes'? After all, as Hoekstra says, they approved the effort."
• RedState's Erick Erickson: "Way back in 2002, when Nancy Pelosi was actually rooting for us to win the war, she was happy for us to be water boarding terrorists. But in 2006, when she wa more interested in winning back Congress for the Democrats than the U.S. actually winning a war, she decided to throw under the bus all the people who kept us safe."
• Hot Air's Allahpundit: "[W]e've seen this movie before: The Democrats start strong on foreign policy ventures, drift left as their base's shrieking grows noisier, and then play dumb to get themselves off the hook. The more I think about the show trials Obama wants for 'torturers,' the more I think they're going to blow up in his face: Much of the GOP is up front about its support for enhanced interrogation but revelations about how Democrats backed it too will be genuinely shocking. By all means, more sunshine on their hypocrisy, phony sanctimony, and opportunism. Pelosi's just the beginning."

Liberal bloggers concede that Dem congressmen who were briefed on the interrogation methods may be implicated by an investigation -- and they don't care:

• Balloon Juice's Cole: "[F]or most of us, we don't care if the person has a (R) or (D) behind their name when they were instituting a policy of torture. That is what is so depressing (to me, at least) about the Ari Fleischer's and the [Marc] Thiessen's of the world. They honestly seem to think this is nothing more than a partisan witch-hunt, the same old Washington gotcha poltics. It isn't. When you torture people, you have crossed a really clear line. Innocent people are dead. Lives have been ruined. Our international reputation has been destroyed. Yes, the Bush administration will get most of the blame, but that is because they were in charge and they did this, not because of what party they happen to belong to. If Jane Harman and Nancy Pelosi knew about this and ok'd it, they are just as culpable."
• Oliver Willis: "[W]hether Nancy Pelosi knew or didn't know about the Bush administration's authorization and execution of torture doesn't matter. Either Pelosi didn't know or she abdicated her responsibility as a political leader and American by not speaking up and opposing it. Either way, it doesn't matter. What matters is that the government tortured people."
• BooMan: "What Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R-MI) doesn't understand is that confessing to committing war crimes doesn't make it less likely that you'll be prosecuted for them. This kind of teenage excuse that 'everyone was doing it' is cute but not exculpatory in any way."

SENATE: Taking Obstruction To A Whole New Level

Several bloggers are discussing the news that GOP Senators are threatening to shut down the Senate if Dems use the budget reconciliation process to pass health care reform:

"According to a former Senate Republican leadership aide, the GOP might first go after White House nominations. Republicans could require each appointee to get a separate hearing and a separate roll call vote. They could stop attending committee hearings, and decline to provide 'unanimous consent' to move forward on even the most benign issues or routine Senate business. Republicans could also demand that the text of bills, which are often hundreds of pages long, be read aloud. These tactics could grind the Senate to a virtual halt, Republicans say."

Conservative blogger Jillian Bandes welcomes this report: "In other words, Republicans can essentially bring the Senate to a standstill if the Dems push through reconciliation. Awesome! I've already said that the more Congress is on vacation and doing nothing, the better off we all are. Now, we'll not only have a totally inactive branch of Congress, but also a completely humiliated Democratic majority."

Liberal bloggers Chris Bowers thinks GOP Senators would be foolish to carry out this threat: "Yeah, that will really be a big electoral winner for Republicans. While Democrats give Americans cheaper and more affordable health care, Republicans give America extreme partisan gridlock. Oh please, please don't do this to us Republicans! How can we Democrats ever survive as a political party if Republicans were to engage in such brilliant political tactics?"

Meanwhile, Matthew Yglesias writes: "[W]ith the Senate GOP acting yesterday to block a vote on [KS Gov.] Kathleen Sebelius' confirmation on the grounds that she's pro-choice, it's time for a little Real Talk. There's no indication that Republicans have any serious desire to cooperate on a serious health care reform bill. Instead, they seem to be interested in using the carrot of cooperation as a way to get Democrats to unilaterally abjure procedural methods and revenue sources that would make reform possible. [...] What I worry is that there are a certain number of Democrats who, deep down, just join their Republican colleagues in not wanting to see health care reformed. But they don't want to say that. So they may first block efforts to prevent the GOP from blocking reform, and then let the GOP block reform, all the while posing as reformers. Keep your eyes open."

Other liberal bloggers are criticizing the GOP senators on the Finance Cmte who voting against confirming Sebelius.

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Do I Contradict Myself?

The Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan thinks he has caught WSJ columnist Peggy Noonan in a contradiction:

'The Democrats had long labeled the impeachment debate a distraction from the urgent business of a great nation. But the Republicans argued that the pursuit of justice is the business of a great nation. In winning this point, they caught the falling flag, producing a triumph for the rule of law, a reassertion of the belief that no man is above it, and a rebuke for an arrogance that had grown imperial,' -- Peggy Noonan, December 21. 1998.

'It's hard for me to look at a great nation issuing these documents and sending them out to the world and thinking, "Oh, much good will come of that." Sometimes in life you want to keep walking... Some of life has to be mysterious.' -- Peggy Noonan, April 19, 2009.

Remember also that the issue with [Bill] Clinton was perjury in a civil suit. That required impeachment. But war crimes? Faster, Peggy, faster.

LEST WE FORGET: Seymour Hersh Uncovers New Thing Too Sad To Think About

From The Onion:

"NEW YORK -- Sources at The New Yorker said a new article by investigative journalist Seymour Hersh 'blows the lid completely off' a subject matter far too soul-crushing for the human brain to process. Hersh, renowned for breaking stories on events such as the My Lai Massacre and Abu Ghraib, is said to have plumbed every last, depressing detail of the newly uncovered topic, which likely involves an inconceivable combination of violence, drunken abuses of power, wanton disregard for the sanctity of human life, and a chain of deceit and corruption leading all the way to the top. According to a recent poll, none of The New Yorker's nearly 1 million subscribers had summoned the strength to crack the story's first paragraph, instead turning to the new Roz Chast cartoon on the next page."

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 01:27 PM

April 23, 2009

4/23: To Investigate Or Not To Investigate

The topic of torture continues to dominate political blogosphere chatter. Liberal bloggers are urging AG Eric Holder to appoint a Special Prosecutor to investigate lawyers in the George W. Bush admin. who authorized brutal interrogation techniques. While conceding that prosecuting Bush officials would probably cause a political firestorm, John Cole asks: "What are we supposed to do when our government has done this? Just look the other way because otherwise it might be politically difficult?" Liberal bloggers are also echoing Dem congressmen in calling for the creation of an independent "Truth Commission." However, conservative bloggers are fiercely opposed to both prosecutions and Truth Commissions. They're arguing that going down either path would be politically disastrous for Dems.

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Liberal bloggers (Yglesias, Drum, Duss) are buzzing about a new McClatchy article alleging that the Bush admin. "applied relentless pressure on interrogators to use harsh methods on detainees in part to find evidence" of a Saddam Hussein-al Qaida link.
• Liberal bloggers (Benen, Cole) think House GOPers are crazy to demand that HHS Sec. Janet Napolitano resign, but conservative bloggers (Allahpundit, Malkin) continue to bash Napolitano.
• Liberal bloggers (Logothetis, Lemos) continue to criticize Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA), who was allegedly caught on wiretap promising favors to a suspected Israeli agent. While some conservative bloggers are defending Harman, others are criticizing her.

BUSH: I Want The Truth!

Liberal bloggers continue to push Holder to appoint a Special Prosecutor:

• Balloon Juice's Cole: "[AZ Sen.] John McCain says prosecuting will have a 'chilling effect.' Isn't that the point of prosecuting crimes -- to have a chilling effect on future potential criminals? I know deterrence is always cited by death penalty advocates. I have no idea if Holder will decide to prosecute people for any of this, and realize that if it happens, DC will just explode, but at the same time, if these people did commit crimes, why shouldn't they be prosecuted? [...] What are we supposed to do when our government has done this? Just look the other way because otherwise it might be politically difficult?"
• MyDD's Charles Lemos: "I have taken the view that those who provided the intellectual underpinnings such Jay Bybee and John Yoo and those who made the political decision such [Defense Sec.] Donald Rumsfeld to institute torture as an instrument of state policy should be held accountable for such blatant violations of American jurisprudence and accepted legal international standards of conduct."

Bloggers are also calling for an independent "Truth Commission" to conduct an investigation:

• Daily Kos' mcjoan: "CQ is reporting that Senate Judiciary Patrick Leahy is determined to proceed with a torture inquiry. [...] An independent commission would be preferrable [to a committee probe], but so would a Republican party that didn't support the premise that Republicans are above the law."
• The Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan: "We should not trust Obama to investigate this in secret any more than we should have trusted Bush and [ex-VP Dick] Cheney to run it in secret. Let's have a Truth Commission; give it time; give it money; and then let us see all of it. Then, and only then, should the attorney general decide whether to launch prosecutions. And, in my view, those at the highest levels of authority should be those first prosecuted. If that means prosecution of a former president, so be it. He is not above the law."

BUSH II: I Don't Give A Damn What You Think You're Entitled To!

Conservative bloggers are strongly opposed to both prosecutions and Truth Commissions:

• Townhall's Carol Platt Liebau: "Do the Democrats understand the precedent this sets for the future? If Bush officials are tried for 'war crimes' because they authorized coercive measures on a limited basis against terrorists (measures that helped save American lives, according to Obama's own intelligence chief), it opens a lot of doors, none of them good -- for anyone."
• Commentary's John Podhoretz: "If this goes forward, and I mean this seriously, anyone reading this blog post who is a friend of or a relative of someone working in high precincts in the Obama administration had better strongly advise their loved one to quit and get the hell out of Washington. Because it won't end here. Because it is all political, in the end. Because one day, they will be caught in the vise just as surely."

Conservative bloggers are also arguing that prosecutions and Truth Commissions would be politically disastrous for Dems:

• RedState's Brian Faughnan: "Do Democrats really believe that the American people will become angry at the way the Bush administration handled detainees in the War on Terror? It's more likely that such an investigation will anger the political center of this country, and convince them both that America has not treated detainees badly, and that Obama is going too far in rolling back Bush's policies."
• Power Line's Paul Mirengoff: "I hope that there are no prosecutions and no hearings. They would be bad for the country, bad for the defendants, and unjust. However, the prosecutions, and even more so congressional or other hearings, would probably be good politically for Republicans. [...] Obama understands this. That is why he -- and even more tellingly, his smartest political operative Rahm Emanuel -- initially seemed to be against the idea of prosecutions and showed little enthusiasm for congressional hearings."
• Right Wing News' John Hawkins: "There are, at a minimum, tens of millions of people in this country who would consider it to be far beyond the pale and even dangerous to democracy to attempt to jail members of the Bush Administration for waterboarding terrorists. Obama and Company would be very wise to take heed of that sentiment before they do something extremely foolish that we may all end up regretting before it's over."

BUSH III: Keep Torturing 'Em Until They Give The Right Answer

Liberal bloggers are buzzing about a new McClatchy article alleging that the Bush admin. "applied relentless pressure on interrogators to use harsh methods on detainees in part to find evidence of cooperation between al Qaida and the late Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein's regime":

• Think Progress' Matthew Yglesias: "Now here's a good reason to torture someone. As explained by Jonathan Landay one important use of torture to the Bush administration was to force detainees to cough up 'evidence' of the Iraq/al-Qaeda ties that Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, etc. already 'knew' existed. [...N]ot only does torture appear to have vastly eroded key elements of America's strategy of self-presentation in the world, it contributed to our undertaking a massive policy blunder that led to much more loss of innocent life than occurred on 9/11."
• Dylan Matthews: "It was contemptible enough to try to scrounge up whatever evidence possible to support a preordained conclusion. And it was contemptible enough to torture suspects for whatever reason. But the combination of the two reaches grand new heights of deplorability."
• Mother Jones' Kevin Drum: "One of the common observations of the anti-torture crowd is that, historically, torture has been used primarily to extract false confessions, not genuine intelligence. Which is really a very tedious thing to say. After all, even if you don't like the guy, everyone knows that George Bush was trying to prevent future attacks by al-Qaeda, not extract false confessions. Right?"
• Think Progress' Matt Duss: "I suppose it's fitting, if disturbingly ironic, that techniques adopted wholesale from methods intended to extract false confessions were used in an attempt to generate evidence of a non-existent Al Qaeda-Saddam operational relationship. In addition to the basic issue of illegal torture, however, we have the issue of mis-allocation of resources. The time spent and assets used in attempting to torture out a justification for what we now know was a predetermined Iraq invasion could have been better spent actually protecting America. In other words, the Iraq war was damaging U.S. national security even before it began."
• Obsidian Wings' hilzoy: "If I were Dick Cheney or Donald Rumsfeld, the idea that there might be a just God would make my bones freeze with terror."
• Firedoglake's Spencer Ackerman: "[This] seems like something that a Congressional investigation into torture would be interested in."

Sullivan: "McClatchy's story is the most eye-popping of the last week in my view, certainly a twist I didn't fully foresee. [...] The first reason to use torture is to prevent a ticking time bomb that could kill millions; the second reason is as a routine part of intelligence gathering; the third is to produce false confessions to justify a war already planned. Torture is a powerful weapon, isn't it? Look how many it corrupted so completely and so fast."

NAPOLITANO: The Right's Next Target?

Liberal bloggers are ridiculing House GOPers who are calling on Napolitano "to step down or be fired in the wake of a controversial department memo" about right-wing extremism:

• The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen: "It's hard to overstate how truly crazy this is. The Republican Study Committee has simply gone stark raving mad. [...] If these clowns keep screaming bloody murder over meaningless flaps that fall apart under scrutiny, it will be that much more difficult for them to be taken seriously when a genuine controversy arises."
• Cole: "These people are seriously not going to last four years. We should probably take out a few more of them in the 2010 elections just so they can take a breather and pull themselves together, because they clearly didn't get the message in 2006 and 2008. The Republican Study Committee is fundamentally no different from the wingnuttiest blogger."

Conservative bloggers, on the other hand, continue to criticize Napolitano:

• Hot Air's Allahpundit: "She doesn't know immigration law or how the 9/11 hijackers got here, and she can't manage a report on a topic as sensitive as domestic terrorism without insulting vets, but hey -- at least she doesn't owe back taxes. Who could have guessed that the title of Most Hapless Obama Appointee would pass so soon from [Traesury Sec. Tim] Geithner? Nothing says 'smart power' like having foreign media wonder how your chief of security got her job."
• Michelle Malkin: "Too bad we don't have a DHS Secretary serious or informed enough to speak competently about these matters without cue cards. Maybe she needs her own teleprompter, too."

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: The Blair Bombshell?

Allahpundit:

"Ed [Morrisey] has been all over the Dennis Blair story today but let me add my two cents in calling it a nuclear bombshell in how it incinerates the left's bad-faith 'torture' calculus -- or rather, non-calculus. They're unwilling to concede that there's any moral choice to be made here because, when push comes to shove, they're unwilling to say flatly that they'd risk American lives so that Abu Zubaydah doesn't have to spend time in a box with a caterpillar or whatever. That's why the Times buried the Blair story today and that's why Hillary [Clinton]'s lip service about getting everything out in the open, in reply to a question about Cheney claiming that abuses were corrected, is so stunningly disingenuous. The very last thing [Obama] wants is getting everything out in the open about how waterboarding or belly slaps prevented attacks because that means an honest debate on the subject, which in turn leaves him caught between the nutroots and a whole lot of swing voters. The beauty of the Blair story is that, for the very first time, they've got someone saying torture works whom they can't dismiss as 'unreliable.' Like I say, nuclear bombshell."

LEST WE FORGET: Feel The Love

John Cole:

"An actual phone conversation with my mom a moment ago:

Mom: Your dad and I just heard a story about a guy who lived to be 110. Who would want to live that long? All your friends would be dead.
Me: Well, in 40 years or so I could be at the old folks home with you.
Mom: Are you trying to prove our point?

I'm getting her nothing for Mothers Day."

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 12:45 PM

April 22, 2009

4/22: On The Chopping Block

After Pres. Obama spoke to reporters yesterday about the OLC memos, various journalists reported that the President had "opened the door" to prosecution of George W. Bush lawyers who authorized brutal interrogation techniques. Liberal bloggers dispute this characterization of Obama's comments, since (as many of them are pointing out) Obama doesn't have the authority to decide whether or not to prosecute people; only AG Eric Holder can make that decision. Of course, liberal bloggers hope that Holder decides to launch an investigation, but some don't think this will happen (and certainly not without activist pressure).

Conservative bloggers, meanwhile, are strongly opposed to the idea of prosecuting Bush lawyers. David Frum (a former Bush speechwriter) warns that prosecutions would create "a nightmare future," while Hugh Hewitt complains that Obama's refusal to rule out prosecutions "will be devastating to the security of the United States." John Hinderaker argues that prosecuting the Bush lawyers who authorized these brutal interrogation methods would be tantamount to "criminalizing conservatism" -- which may be accurate, since so many conservative bloggers seem to have embraced these controversial methods.

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Conservative bloggers (Morrissey, Johnson, Klein) are buzzing about National Intelligence Dir. Dennis C. Blair's private memo to his staff, in which he wrote that that harsh interrogation techniques banned by Obama "did produce significant information that helped the nation in its struggle with terrorists."
• Liberal bloggers (Serwer, Marshall, Ackerman) are urging the CIA to heed ex-VP Dick Cheney's call to "declassify files that he claims would vindicate the CIA's use of coercive interrogation techniques."
• Liberal bloggers (Yglesias, Black, Orton) continue to urge Congress to impeach Jay Bybee, the former DoJ atty who wrote one of the controversial interrogation memos and who now serves as a federal judge.
• Conservative bloggers (Erickson, Lewis, Allahpundit) aren't very excited that Minuteman founder Chris Simcox (R) is challenging Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) in next year's GOP primary. While righty bloggers don't care for McCain, they think their money would be better spent helping ex-Rep. Pat Toomey (R-PA) defeat Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA).
• Liberal bloggers (Houle, Smith, O'Connor) are stepping up their criticism of Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA) now that it's been confirmed that she did urge the NYT "not to publish its big expose of Bush-era warrantless wiretapping, apparently before the 2004 election." Other liberal bloggers (Greenwald, Hamsher, Black, Cole) are accusing Harman of hypocrisy because she consistently supported the warrantless wiretapping policies that she's now criticizing. Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas is urging Harman to resign.

PROSECUTIONS: How Can Obama "Leave The Door Open" When It Was Never His Door To Shut?

Various journalists are reporting that Obama has "opened the door" or "left the door open" to prosecution of Bush lawyers who authorized brutal interrogation techniques. However, liberal bloggers are pointing out that Obama doesn't have the authority to decide whether or not prosecutions will occur:

• Salon's Glenn Greenwald: "Obama's statement today is being somewhat melodramatically presented by establishment journalists as his 'leaving the door open' to prosecutions, but the real point is that this was never his door to shut in the first place. Presidents have the authority to set general policy for the Justice Department (which would include general investigative and prosecutorial priorities), but not to dictate individual decisions about prosecutions. In fact, for a White House to try to influence those decisions is a form of corruption."
• Atrios: "I'm not the first person to bring this up recently, but the point is that it shouldn't be Obama's and [WH CoS] Rahm Emmanuel's decision whether to prosecute anybody. If there's suspicion and clear evidence that people broke laws, an inquiry should begin. If the AG feels undue pressure from President Change and his gang then he should appoint a special prosecutor to try to wall off the investigation from political pressure."
• dday: "Obama said he could support an investigation emanating from Congress, and that the decision for prosecution is up to the Attorney General. In other words, shorter Obama: 'Leave me out of this.' Nobody need rely on his support. And the President is correct. He doesn't get to decide who is and is not prosecuted in America. That's the responsibility of the Attorney General. And if he wants to take it out of politics, the Attorney General ought to appoint a special prosecutor, as MoveOn and others have called for."

Mother Jones' Kevin Drum doesn't think Holder will appoint a special prosecutor: "There's no way you could prosecute the OLC lawyers without also prosecuting the guys who accepted their memos and ordered the torture carried out. That means people like [ex-AG] John Ashcroft, [ex-CIA dir.] George Tenet, Dick Cheney, [ex-VP CoS] David Addington, and George W. Bush. Would Eric Holder do that without Obama's approval? It's hard to believe that he would. Might he appoint a special prosecutor instead? I doubt it. That might delay things a bit, but the conclusion would still be foreordained: anyone with even a modest bit of integrity would conclude very quickly that President Bush and his staff did indeed authorize illegal torture of prisoners under U.S. control."

On the right side of the blogosphere, Hot Air's Ed Morrissey makes a similar observation: "Holder can prosecute Tenet, but then he'd also have to file charges against several members of Congress who were briefed on the procedures and never objected -- including current Speaker Nancy Pelosi. If Tenet would get prosecuted for ordering the interrogation techniques, then Pelosi and others would have to get prosecuted for being accessories in not taking action to stop them."

PROSECUTIONS II: Don't Go There, Obama

Conservative bloggers are strongly opposed to the notion of prosecuting the Bush lawyers who authorized harsh interrogation techniques:

• Power Line's Hinderaker: "Many liberals don't just want to defeat conservatives at the polls, they want to send them to jail. Toward that end, they have sometimes tried to criminalize what are essentially policy differences. President Obama hinted at another step in that direction when he said today that he is open to the idea of bringing criminal charges against the Justice Department lawyers who wrote opinions to the effect that waterboarding and other harsh interrogation methods could legally be used on al Qaeda detainees. [...] The idea of prosecuting a lawyer because a wrote a legal analysis with which the current Attorney General disagrees is so outrageous that I can't believe it would be seriously considered. Still, President Obama and his party may achieve another objective by publicly making this kind of threat: deterring Republicans from serving in public life."
• New Majority's Frum: "President Obama is sliding toward one of the most dangerous decisions of his administration -- and very possibly one of the most dangerous in the history of the American republic. [...] If the president's words represent his intentions, this country may be about to plunge into a cycle of partisan reprisal that will make the years from Watergate through the [Bill] Clinton impeachment look like a golden age of good feelings. [...] If overzealousness under Bush becomes a crime under Obama, underzealousness under Obama will become a crime under the next Republican president. Revenge will be exacted for revenge, the costs of government service will escalate, mobilizing cross-party support will become practically impossible for any important action, and the political life of the American republic will take another step toward the play-for-keeps destructiveness of the last days of the Roman republic. It's a nightmare future."
• Townhall's Hewitt: "The president's decision to open the door to prosecuting former Bush Administration officials for policies developed and used in the war on terror is not just the threat of the worst sort of unconstitutional ex post facto prosecution, it also greatly endangers the United States by obliging current front-line prosecutors, intelligence operatives and even uniformed members of the military that if it becomes politically useful to classify their conduct as 'potentially criminal' this Administration will do so. The impact of that posture will be devastating to the security of the United States."
• RedState's Dan Spencer: "Instead of standing by his previous obfuscation that 'we need to look forward as opposed to looking backwards,' Obama gave a green light to Attorney General Holder to start the show trials -- a political theater relic of Joseph Stalin's Great Purge of political opponents from the former Soviet Union."
• NRO's Peter Wehner: "[Obama] has detonated a debate he may well lose control over and which may prove to be deeply divisive and embittering for America. More importantly, he has taken a series of steps that, particularly as it relates to our intelligence agencies and their capacity to protect Americans from mass death, he, and his countrymen, may well come to regret. We can hope and pray a future attack doesn't happen -- but there is reason to fear it might."

NRO's Jim Geraghty thinks it would be inconsistent to prosecute the Bush lawyers who authorized these interrogation methods but not the CIA operatives who carried them out: "I strongly disagree with the idea of prosecuting members of the American government at any level for the actions they took to protect the country. But Obama's new position -- that no CIA personnel will be prosecuted for their actions, but Bush administration officials might be, if Attorney General Eric Holder decides it is worthwhile -- is incoherent. Are we to take it that the Obama administration's position is that waterboarding is not a crime, but ordering it to be done, or approving its being done, is?"

BLAIR: See? Waterboarding Works!

Conservative bloggers are buzzing about Blair's private memo to his staff, in which he claimed "that the harsh interrogation techniques banned by the White House did produce significant information that helped the nation in its struggle with terrorists" -- an assertion that was "deleted from a condensed version of his memo released to the media last Thursday":

• NRO's Andy McCarthy: "Obama's Intel Chief: Coercive Interrogations Worked (and Did I Mention that Democrats In Congress Approved?)"
• Power Line's Scott Johnson: "[T]he logical inference is that Obama wants to release information that he thinks will smear the Bush administration, but does not want the American public to be fully informed about the benefits that were gained from the Bush administration's policies."
• AmSpec Blog's Philip Klein: "This would seem to be an important part of the overall torture debate, but somehow this portion of the memo was conveniently left out by the Obama administration when it released the Bush-era interrogation memos last Thursday."
• Morrissey: "In other words, the Obama administration covered up the fact that even their own DNI acknowledges that the interrogations produced actionable and critical information. When Dick Cheney demanded the release of the rest of the memos relating that information, he wasn't just going on a fishing expedition. [...] We need to have an honest debate on interrogation techniques and securing America against attack from radical, committed terrorists. Conservatives should stop pretending that waterboarding isn't a form of torture that the US has opposed for decades when used abroad, especially against our own citizens. But everyone else should stop pretending that it doesn't work, and that we would have been safer without its use."

Meanwhile, RedState's Erick Erickson makes a prediction: "I do not doubt that more Americans will die at the hands of terrorists under the watch of Barack Obama than under the watch of George W. Bush. [...] Barack Obama is happy to throw real men under the bus who made the tough decisions and did the dirty work to keep us safe. He is happy to undermine our intelligence efforts to placate the left. And he is willing to leave out key details Americans might want to know about the effectiveness and necessity of the techniques. How many Americans will die because of Barack Obama's weak national security leadership?"

CHENEY: Call His Bluff, Obama

While the netroots despise Cheney, they think the CIA should heed his call to "declassify files that he claims would vindicate the CIA's use of coercive interrogation techniques that President Barack Obama has banned":

• TAPPED's Adam Serwer: "It's a bluff. The administration should call it. But even if it isn't, it's important that the American people have all the details about what was done and why."
• Daily Kos' mcjoan: "All possible information about the torture program should be declassified, and I'm assuming with that release, we can have Dick Cheney's full cooperation. He should be available to come to any hearing room to talk about this 'successful' program and his role in it. Let's encourage his new-found commitment to transparency."
• TPM's Josh Marshall: "Cheney's claim seems more than a little improbable since all the available information suggests that the administration's torture tactics -- whatever their legal and moral standing -- just didn't produce much information. But why not take Cheney up on the offer? And not just the handful of documents he wants to cherry-pick but everything. Or perhaps more realistically, assemble a diverse and accountable panel of distinguished Americans who will review the most secret records, lean forward in the direction of disclosure while taking a due account of the need to protect genuine national secrets and simply get about the business of letting us know what happened."
• Firedoglake's Spencer Ackerman: "By all means: disclose, disclose, disclose. Disclose how we'd know that we got valuable, accurate information from torture that saved Americans' lives. We know that in at least one case, rendering an al-Qaeda detainee to Egypt named Ibn Shaikh al-Libi to be tortured resulted in claims about nonexistent ties between al-Qaeda and Saddam Hussein that administration officials like [ex-Sec/State] Colin Powell publicly stated as part of the case for invading Iraq. The CIA retracted those claims as unreliable a year after the invasion. Let's see whatever memoranda exist about determining when a detainee should be interrogated by the CIA and when he should be sent to a foreign country to be tortured. No half-measures here. Dick Cheney just made a case for a robust truth commission. Thanks!"

Meanwhile, many liberal bloggers are delighted that Cheney is emerging as one of Obama's leading critics:

• Daily Kos' Markos Moulitsas: "I love how Cheney won't shut the frack up. If the one person less popular than George W. Bush wants to be the public face of the GOP, who are we to complain? [...] Every time Cheney emerges from his lair, Democrats win."
• Oliver Willis: "The only way this could be better for the Dems to have an unpopular discredited ghoul like Cheney out there is if Cheney shot somebody in the face. Again."

MCCAIN: Save Your Money, Conservatives

Although conservative bloggers support Toomey's bid to defeat Specter in next year's PA GOP primary, they don't feel the same way about Simcox's bid to unseat McCain:

• Erickson: "I'm not a fan of John McCain. I was not a fan of his campaign for President. I think he tends to be a bully. But in the grand scheme of things, John McCain does not throw his own party under the bus as much as some of his colleagues in the Republican Conference. 2010 is going to be a tough year for Republicans to rebuild in the Senate. One seat shy of a filibuster proof Senate, we cannot afford losses and need resources to make gains. [...] Given the choice between opposing John McCain with Chris Simcox in a primary or opposing Arlen Specter with Pat Toomey, I think our money is much better spent beating Arlen Specter. We only have so much money, so many volunteers, etc. that we can put on the battlefield. And I believe, looking at the demographics of both Arizona and Pennsylvania, it is far, far more likely that Pat Toomey could win a general election than Chris Simcox."
• Townhall's Matt Lewis: "I actually think McCain would have been much more vulnerable a year or two ago than he is right now. Since losing the presidency, McCain has been fairly conservative -- and has been a vocal opponent of Barack Obama's policies. In short, unless McCain starts being all McCainy again -- I don't think there is a tremendous amount of interest in ousting him. [...] Moreover, I think it's safe to say that the Minutemen are not universally admired or liked -- even among conservatives to oppose illegal immigration. To be sure, a lot of conservatives will support Simcox -- but this is nothing like a Pat Toomey versus Arlen Specter race where conservatives will coalesce around the challenger (Toomey, a former conservative Congressman and president of the Club for Growth is a much more credible and respected candidate -- and Specter is also much more vulnerable incumbent than is McCain)."
• Hot Air's Allahpundit: "Ben Smith thinks [Simcox will] be a 'serious local headache' for McCain, but I suspect that depends on how hard The One pushes amnesty this year. If it turns into the sort of galvanizing issue for the base that it was two years ago, Maverick's in trouble. If not, not. [...] Bear in mind that if he does upset McCain, the seat will almost certainly go blue in the general."

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: A Question Of Ethics

NRO's Mike Potemra:

"The two top headlines on Drudge right now are 'MEMO: Banned Techniques Yielded "High Value Information" for CIA' and '"I Can Clone a Human Being."' Both stories suggest that human beings are indeed very creative and imaginative, and can do remarkably clever things that end up helping some other human beings. But no matter how much good may come of any particular course of action, we must never entirely abandon curiosity on the question, 'Is it morally right to do it?'"

LEST WE FORGET: College Courses For The 21st Century

McSweeney's contributor Robert Lanham provides an "Internet-Age Writing Syllabus And Course Overview":

Course Description:
Instant messaging. Twittering. Facebook updates. These 21st-century literary genres are defining a new 'Lost Generation' of minimalists who would much rather watch Lost on their iPhones than toil over long-winded articles and short stories. Students will acquire the tools needed to make their tweets glimmer with a complete lack of forethought, their Facebook updates ring with self-importance, and their blog entries shimmer with literary pithiness. All without the restraints of writing in complete sentences. w00t! w00t! Throughout the course, a further paring down of the Hemingway/Stein school of minimalism will be emphasized, limiting the superfluous use of nouns, verbs, adverbs, adjectives, conjunctions, gerunds, and other literary pitfalls.

Prerequisites:

Students must have completed at least two of the following:

ENG: 232WR -- Advanced Tweeting: The Elements of Droll

LIT: 223 -- Early-21st-Century Literature: 140 Characters or Less

ENG: 102 -- Staring Blankly at Handheld Devices While Others Are Talking

ENG: 301 -- Advanced Blog and Book Skimming

ENG: 231WR -- Facebook Wall Alliteration and Assonance

LIT: 202 -- The Literary Merits of Lolcats

LIT: 209 -- Internet-Age Surrealistic Narcissism and Self-Absorption

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 01:00 PM

April 21, 2009

4/21: The Handshake That Shook The Blogosphere

Nothing seems to anger conservative bloggers more than the perception that Pres. Obama is projecting weakness during his trips abroad. Earlier this month, righty bloggers spent several days in a frenzy over Obama's apparent bow to Saudi King Abdullah at the G-20 summit. Conservative bloggers described Obama's greeting of the Saudi king as a "disgrace" and an "unprecedented embarrassment". Now the rightroots are up in arms over Obama's friendly handshake with Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez at the Summit of the Americas. One righty blogger calls the interaction "sickening" while another declares, "I thought Barack Obama couldn't sink lower than he did in his apology tour of Europe. I was wrong."

Liberal bloggers are aggressively pushing back, calling this line of attack "painfully absurd" and claiming that the right's reaction to the handshake episode is indicative of their "extreme emotional insecurity". Many lefty bloggers are directing their fire at ex-Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA), who has emerged as one of the leading critics of Obama's approach to diplomacy. The netroots are also praising Obama's response to his critics, in which he mockingly described them as "imaginative."

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Conservative bloggers (Malkin, Hinderaker, Impomeni) are accusing the judges of this year's Miss USA pageant of giving the title to Miss North Carolina instead of Miss California because the latter expressed opposition to gay marriage.
• Liberal bloggers (Greenwald, McCarter, Aravosis, Heilbrunn, Benen) are buzzing about the CQ article alleging that Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA) was caught on wiretap promising favors to a suspected Israeli agent. While liberal bloggers don't quite know what to make of this story yet, it's clear that many of them (BooMan, Wheeler, Morrill) strongly dislike Harman.
• Liberal bloggers (McCarter, Beeton, digby) continue to urge Congress to impeach Jay Bybee, the former DoJ attorney who wrote one of the controversial interrogation memos and who now serves as a federal judge. Lefty bloggers are also arguing that AG Eric Holder is obligated to appoint a Special Prosecutor if he believes that laws against torture have been violated, regardless of how Obama feels about the matter.
• Conservative bloggers (Reynolds, Morrissey, Riedl, Klein, Freddoso) are accusing Obama of making a meaningless gesture by ordering his Cabinet members to identify $100M in budget cuts. At least one Obama supporter is criticizing the move as well.

CHAVEZ: Venezuela 1, America 0?

Conservative bloggers continue to criticize Obama for smiling and shaking hands with Chavez at the Summit of the Americas (as well as his approach to diplomacy more generally):

• Commentary's Jennifer Rubin: "It is too much to hope that Obama might have followed the example of Richard Nixon's 'kitchen debate', but it is not too much to expect he would firmly defend his country rather than ignore [Nicaraguan president Daniel] Ortega's rant or fawn over Chavez's gift selection. [...] Because of his celebrity status, Obama has the ability to make it cool to be pro-democracy, pro-American, and anti-dictator. Instead, he is signaling it is cool to slam Uncle Sam."
• RedState's Warner Todd Huston: "The real issue is whether or not we think we should grovel at the feet of foreign dictators like Hugo Chavez over any mistakes real or perceived? It just so happens that a patriotic American sees no reason to supplicate ourselves as a nation at the feet of some foreign despot just to make America haters feel good about themselves. Sadly it seems that Obama does."
• Townhall's Hugh Hewitt: "The miscues are piling up ala [Jimmy] Carter, and the costs will follow unless the new president genuinely commits to defending the country and all that it has accomplished and stands for rather than apologizing for it like a tweedy professor in search of the approval of his international colleagues at a conference."
• NRO's Victor Davis Hanson: "Does Obama think that the American people really want to hear their country ritually trashed from those anti-democrats -- who are, at the same time, jostling to keep our borders open to ensure more dollar remittances and more sanctuary for their own fleeing citizens? These Victory Column-like foreign campaign stops are now getting stale, and at some point I think [WH CoS Rahm] Emanuel and [WH advisor David] Axelrod will see that these magical mystery tours have the potential, in their scripted regularity, to really turn off the American people -- and convince bad players abroad that it is about time to test the waters."

Commentary's Max Boot is one of the few righty bloggers who wasn't upset about Obama's interaction with Chavez: "All Obama did was shake the guy's hand, and offer him a smile. Far from being a disaster, this could actually be a smart strategic move. Chavez, after all, derives much of his demagogic appeal from his claim to be an inveterate enemy of Uncle Sam. He thrives off provoking us and using the resulting reaction to 'prove' that we are as bad as he claims. Obama is a lot harder to demonize than George W. Bush, however, and by shaking hands with Chavez the president may be undercutting his appeal more effectively than anything Bush did. If Obama starts making substantive concessions to Chavez or other dictators, I will start to get worried. But I don't think anyone should have a meltdown over a handshake."

CHAVEZ II: The Latest Faux Outrage

Liberal bloggers are mocking conservatives for being outraged over Obama's handshake with Chavez at the Summit of the Americas:

• dday: "The fauxtrage of the day concerns Barack Obama doing this country the terrible dishonor and shame of shaking a foreign leader's hand. IMPEACH NOW [...] Worse, he was smiling! Smiling!!!1!!eleventy! How dare he sell out this nation with his facial expressions! Why, it's positively... well, Reaganesque."
• TPM's Josh Marshall: "We do realize that the US has the most powerful military in the world and Venezuela has little ability to project military power beyond its own borders. It's a non-entity militarily, even compared to Iran and North Korea. Will [Chavez] be emboldened into calling Obama el Diablo? Maybe provocatively give away more books?"
• The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen: "Leading Republicans make it sound as if America's stature is so fragile, it is easily weakened by casual courtesies at an international forum. President Obama, in contrast, acts as if America's stature is strong, and can withstand a handshake with a foreign head of state. Since when does the GOP find it useful to promote the idea of American weakness? [...] Really, though, it doesn't matter. The U.S. president was photographed shaking hands with the twice-elected head of state of a large South American democracy at a forum for hemispheric leaders. That's it. That's the whole story. That's what has Republicans screaming today. It's painfully absurd."

GINGRICH: Only Republicans Are Allowed To Shake Hands With Dictators

Liberal bloggers are blasting Gingrich after he slammed Obama for smiling and shaking hands with Chavez. Lefty bloggers are disputing Gingrich's claim that "we didn't rush over, smile, and greet Russian dictators," pointing out that there are various photographs of U.S. Presidents smiling while meeting with Soviet and Russian leaders:

• Think Progress' Satyam Khanna: "Dr. Gingrich, who has a Ph.D. in European history, should re-read his history books. As the Cold War waned, President [Ronald] Reagan (whose foreign policy Gingrich repeatedly praises) met with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev at four summits, leading to nuclear arms reductions. President George H. W. Bush negotiated the Start II treaty alongside Russian President Boris Yeltsin, and President [Bill] Clinton discussed foreign investment with Yeltsin. President Bush, of course, said he saw into Vladimir Putin's soul after a private engagement. Each meeting had smiles all around."
• Benen: "Does Gingrich even remember the Soviet Union? U.S. presidents didn't just shake hands with Soviet leaders; they also engaged them in direct negotiations -- after the USSR vowed to wipe the United States off the map and pointed enough nuclear missiles at us to make that happen. [...] It's certainly possible that ol' Newt knows full well that his talking points are ridiculous. It's more than likely Gingrich actually remembers the Cold War, and is simply hoping that Americans don't realize that his claims are completely and wildly wrong. But we're left with one or the other -- either Gingrich doesn't know what he's talking about or he assumes we're idiots."
• TAPPED's Tim Fernholz: "Newt Gingrich's criticism of President Barack Obama for shaking hands with Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is silly and hypocritical, not to mention embarrassing for the GOP. Seriously, this is the guy who's taking the lead on the Republican foreign affairs message -- the long-retired former Speaker of the House? The ranking Republicans on the congressional foreign affairs committees, [IN Sen.] Dick Lugar and [FL Rep.] Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, haven't made comments on this that I've seen yet. Perhaps they're too busy with their day jobs to try to score political points off a non-controversy."
• Balloon Juice's John Cole: "It goes without saying that Newt Gingrich is a complete and total idiot. Of course our Presidents frolicked around with Russian and Soviet leaders."

Firedoglake's Blue Texan thinks this is a foolish line of attack: "McPalin (and Hillary [Clinton], for that matter) loudly and repeatedly criticized Obama for saying he'd meet with Hitler Ahmadinejad and Castro during the campaign. The country yawned, then enthusiastically installed Obama in the White House. So why Gingrich & Co. think this is a politically useful line of attack -- after it's failed twice -- is anyone's guess."

Meanwhile, Daily Kos' Jed Lewison argues that Gingrich, by criticizing Obama's conduct abroad, is violating his previous claim that "politics end[s] at the water's edge."

OBAMA: Socrates' Philosophies And Hypotheses Can't Define How I Be Droppin' These Mockeries

Liberal bloggers love Obama's response to the right-wing criticism, in which he appeared to subtly mock his critics:

"Venezuela is a country whose defense budget is probably 1/600th of the United States'. They own Citgo. It's unlikely that as a consequence of me shaking hands or having a polite conversation with Mr. Chavez that we are endangering the strategic interests of the United States. I don't think anybody can find any evidence that that would do so. Even within this imaginative crowd, I think you would be hard-pressed to paint a scenario in which U.S. interests would be damaged as a consequence of us having a more constructive relationship with Venezuela."

• Daily Kos' Markos Moulitsas: "Very nice. Conservative criticism of Obama's foreign policy approach is so patently ridiculous, that he's now openly mocking the wingers freaking out over his handshake with Hugo Chavez."
• TAPPED's Mori Dinauer: "I'm glad that President Obama is openly mocking the insecure man-children of the American right wing who think that shaking the hand of a local elected demagogue constitutes some sort of showing of weakness -- they should be mocked, and if they didn't possess so many megaphones, we could advance to completely ignoring them, too."
• dday: "I think mockery remains the only option for dealing with these people. We have hard evidence of torture at the highest levels of government, we have a broken economy, we have a crisis in health care and climate change. And the Republicans, still acting like the normative goal of political parties are to win the news cycle, throw up a 'Obama didn't wink the way I wanted him to wink' or 'Obama bent his knee when you shouldn't bend your knee and as a result we're all going to be killed or forced into burqas' every day. I don't know that there's another, more reasonable response than pointing and laughing."

MISS USA: Perez Vs. The Rightroots

Conservative bloggers are accusing the judges of this year's Miss USA pageant of giving the title to Miss North Carolina instead of Miss California because the latter expressed opposition to gay marriage:

• Michelle Malkin: "The pageant is a lost cause. Beauty contests are out. P.C. panderfests are in."
• Gateway Pundit: "It looks like the Far Left has even hijacked beauty pageants."
• Power Line's John Hinderaker: "We all know that if Miss California had answered [guest judge Perez] Hilton's question by saying that she believes in equal rights for all, and that means gay marriage, there would have been no controversy and, very likely, she would have won the title. [...] It isn't surprising, perhaps, that gay marriage advocates would like to stigmatize and silence their opponents. But why is it, exactly, that our media establishment has fallen in with this preference?"
• RedState's Mark Impomeni: "What happens when a judge asks a beauty pageant contestant in front of a live television audience her opinion about a political question? If you answered that the contestant risks her crown if she gives anything other than the liberal-approved answer, you would be right. [...] Why does any of this matter? Because with liberals in power and emboldened, scenes like this will be playing out with greater and greater frequency over the next four years. As the Department of Homeland Security's report on alleged 'right-wing extremism' shows, there is a movement afoot to marginalize, if not outright criminalize, mainstream conservative beliefs. Wherever conservatives see a public figure bravely standing against the liberal onslaught, they must rally. [Miss California's Carrie] Prejean, and the reckoning that is coming for her, provides just such an opportunity, and from the unlikliest of places."

Conservative bloggers are directing much of their criticism at gossip blogger Perez Hilton, the guest judge who asked Miss California about her position on gay marriage (and who later criticized her on his blog):

• Malkin: "The Miss USA pageant should be ashamed for providing Perez Hilton a platform for his intolerant bigotry and abuse of Carrie Prejean."
• NRO's Maggie Gallagher: "Perez 'You dumb b-tch' Hilton is typical of the new face of the gay-marriage movement in America. (Joining Frank 'you are all bigots' Rich among others). And I would like to nominate Miss California as the new face of the marriage movement. Much better than mine!"

On a related note, Townhall's Matt Lewis criticizes the recent National Journal poll indicating that 29% of conservative bloggers think that the GOP should support gay marriage: "Let me say that I have serious doubts about the selection process. For one thing, you could argue that Townhall.com, RedState, and National Review Online are the three most prominent conservative blogs -- yet I don't see anyone from any of those venues listed (you can find a list of the bloggers queried here). There are also several folks on the list whom I've never even heard of. [...] Does anyone doubt that if National Journal had instead queried Hugh Hewitt, Michelle Malkin, Erick Erickson, and Rich Lowry -- all equally (or more) prominent bloggers than the ones included (and, I would argue, more within the mainstream of conservative thought) -- that National Journal might have gotten a dramatically different responses?"

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Don't Be So Insecure, Guys

Marshall thinks conservatives are foolish to make a big deal about Obama's friendly handshake with Chavez:

"I've been listening to a constant stream -- mainly but not only on Fox -- of talk through the day about whether we should feel weak or ashamed or tarnished or any other number of things because President Obama had a friendly handshake with Huge Chavez of Venezuela. The whole idea seems so deeply silly to me that it's hard to know how exactly to even comment on it. But I'm struck once again by the sort of psychologically arrested mentality and extreme emotional insecurity that seems at work in the minds of many foreign policy conservatives -- or more specifically, so as not to paint with too broad a brush, those of the neo-conish flavor.

Sure, a lot of this is just political posturing -- trying to sound the story out for possible political vulnerabilities on Obama's part. Throw a bunch of mud up against the wall and see what sticks. What's striking to me though is that a lot of it seems like a very genuine, gut-level emotional response. (A related example is what Matt Yglesias pointed out a few days ago -- how many right-wingers seem to have convinced themselves that North Korea, a borderline failed state on the possible brink of economic collapse somehow has the US over a barrel.)

In the course of our normal lives, few of us have much difficulty identifying habits of defensiveness or a penchant for histrionic or petulant interactions as signs of weakness, not strength. Really powerful people don't need stunts and usually signal their power by a certain graciousness and indifference in such interactions. They have nothing to prove. But American power, respect, command of public opinion -- however you want to define it -- must be in these people's minds an extremely brittle thing. They really do seem like extremely insecure people."

LEST WE FORGET: ...And Refrain From Entering My Office For At Least Half An Hour

From Overheard in the Office:

Boss: What's wrong?
Red-faced receptionist: I just picked up a call and you could hear people having sex on the other line! I'm afraid to answer the phone now...
Boss: From now on, put those calls through to me.

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 01:03 PM

April 20, 2009

4/20: The Past Is Never Past

Pres. Obama's decision to release the controversial OLC interrogation memos continues to reverberate throughout the liberal blogosphere. While lefty bloggers are praising Obama for having "the political courage" to make the memos public, some are criticizing him for declaring that CIA agents who used these interrogation techniques won't be prosecuted. Michael O'Hare complains that Obama, in making this statement, "has made it national policy to ignore violations of international law...and stepped on everything we've believed since Nuremberg." Other liberal bloggers are defending Obama's decision, arguing that the George W. Bush lawyers who authorized these brutal techniques are more deserving of punishment than the CIA agents who performed them. Kevin Drum writes: "I hate the idea of spending time prosecuting the little guys while the big fish go free."

Whether or not they support Obama's decision to let the CIA interrogators off the hook, liberal bloggers agree that there should be consequences for the Bush lawyers who wrote the OLC memos. Several lefty bloggers are urging AG Eric Holder to appoint a special prosecutor who will investigate the actions of these lawyers, even though Obama is apparently opposed to this idea. Others are demanding that Congress impeach Jay Bybee, the former DoJ attorney who wrote one of the controversial memos and who now serves as a federal judge.

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Conservative bloggers (Malkin, Hinderaker, Huston, Liebau, Klein) are outraged that Obama had a friendly interaction with Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez at the Summit of the Americas.
• Liberal bloggers (Marshall, Attaturk, Serwer, DougJ) are buzzing about a new CQ article alleging that Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA) was caught on wiretap promising favors to a suspected Israeli agent. Several lefty bloggers (BooMan, O'Connor) are demanding that a progressive candidate challenge Harman in the 36th district's 2010 primary. Several conservative bloggers (Malkin, Morrissey) are also taking notice of the allegations about Harman.

OLC MEMOS: What Happened To The Nuremberg Principles?

Several liberal bloggers are arguing that Obama was wrong to rule out prosecuting CIA agents who may have tortured detainees:

• The Reality-Based Community's O'Hare: "Obama has made it national policy to ignore violations of international law, human decency, and stepped on everything we've believed since Nuremberg, promising no prosecutions of CIA torturers and hinting at no prosecutions of their enablers and commanders."
• Firedoglake's Kirk James Murphy: "Under international treaties the US has ratified, we are obligated to prosecute torture -- a war crime. When Obama announced Thursday that he would not prosecute line officers who were just following orders 'in good faith' to commit torture -- a war crime -- he ensured America will continue to violate international human rights law. He also kicked the Nuremberg Principles in the teeth."
• Daily Kos' Meteor Blades: "According to the BBC, the UN special rapporteur on torture, Manfred Nowak, says the United States must, under the U.N. Convention against Torture, prosecute those who engage in it. That apparently makes no difference to the Obama administration, which, in spite of all the welcome talk about the rule of law, has come to the astonishing conclusion that holding people accountable for criminal behavior or ordering others to commit criminal behavior is not about justice but rather retribution. It should be instructive to see how such a perspective plays out when it comes to this document. Surely, using the same logic, we can empty the federal prison system and deeply slash the federal court budget."
• Open Left's Paul Rosenberg: "[T]here were Nazi defendents who nonetheless tried to argue that they were 'only following orders,' which in fact came to be known as the 'Nuremberg Defense'. It was not accepted. But now, Obama thinks the Nazis were right, after all. Movement conservatives have always thought so, of course. But this is the first time that a Democratic President has agreed with them, in flagrant opposition to the rule of law. So, score one for Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and all their wingnuts legions. Obama may not be Hitler, but he agrees completely with Hitler's underlings, and he thinks that the Nuremberg prosecutors, Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman and Winston Churchill were all dead wrong."
• Open Left's Daniel De Groot: "CIA agents cannot be 'ordered' to do anything in the legal sense, since they are mere civilian employees of a federal agency. They can quit and should do so when instructed to do things contrary to the Laws of War and numerous international treaties. These aren't scared 18 year old kids being intimidated into following Lt Calley into atrocity, nor do they go through months of indoctrination into a culture of rigid discipline as is done in the military. They are independent moral agents, and should not get any kind of pass for this."
• digby: "[T]o those who say that if the CIA isn't excused over and over again for their proven excesses and failures they will stop doing their jobs, I can only reply that this means they should all be fired immediately. You cannot have a clandestine service that blackmails the American people into granting them immunity from the law. They are unpatriotic at best for even threatening such a thing and treasonous at worst if they actually carried it out. This kind of blackmail should not be tolerated."

Other lefty bloggers are pointing out that Obama technically doesn't have the authority to prevent Holder from appointing a special prosecutor:

• digby: "[T]he president does not actually have the power to decide who gets prosecuted in this country and neither does his chief of staff. We have an independent justice department that is supposed to operate outside of politics. Holder's job is to 'look back' and see if crimes were committed. Just because Bush's Attorneys General were all toadies doesn't mean that's the way it's supposed to be. A special prosecutor would solve this whole problem for Obama and Holder. The best way to get the hot potato off their desks is to give it to an independent, career prosecutor."
• Salon's Glenn Greenwald: "As a strictly legal matter, that is a decision for the Attorney General, independently, to make; it is Eric Holder who has the obligation to enforce the law, independent of anything Obama wants or says and regardless of what public opinion demands. [...] Demanding that political leaders be subjected to the rule of law -- and finding ways to force the appointment of a Special Prosecutor -- is what citizens ought to be doing."
• BooMan: "Regardless of what Obama wants, his Attorney General has the ultimate authority to make these decisions. And regardless of what Eric Holder does, there are still the Congressional oversight committees. And regardless what Congress does, there are still the civil courts. And regardless of what our Supreme Court decides, there are still International courts. After that, the historians get involved."

OLC MEMOS II: C'mon, Guys, We Have Bigger Fish To Fry

Other liberal bloggers are defending Obama's decision not to prosecute CIA interrogators who performed these controversial techniques:

• Mother Jones' Drum: "I hate the idea of spending time prosecuting the little guys while the big fish go free. If there's anyone we should be prosecuting, it's Bush, [Dick] Cheney, [ex-VP CoS] [David] Addington, Bybee, [ex-OLC atty John] Yoo, and [ex-CIA dir. George] Tenet. Until that happens, it's hard to justify prosecuting their underlings."
• TAPPED's Adam Serwer: "In the end, I just think it's far more important to go after the people who enabled these policies, who wrote incredible legal rationales for why certain kinds of torture weren't torture, or rather how they weren't torture because we were using them. It was the OLC's responsibility to say no, to say this wasn't legal, and to prevent it from happening. Instead they encouraged it. Ultimately, I just think they're far more culpable, and they're the ones any effort to prosecute should be focused on."

Think Progress' Matthew Yglesias has a different reason for opposing prosecution of CIA interrogators: "Accountability for torture is less important than building political consensus. [...T]here's a continuing sense of partisanship -- Democrats say torture is wrong, Republicans say torture is good, so the media talks about 'contorversial' 'interrogation tactics' and everyone knows that in the event of a new terrorist attack conservative politicians will run, aggressively, on an assertive pro-torture platform. That's a very grave problem. But that is the real problem that needs a solution. We need to find ways to politically delegitimize torture, to help build bridges to people who may disagree with us about tax rates or abortion or even the wisdom of bombing North Korea about the point that torture is wrong, shouldn't have been done in the past, and shouldn't be done in the future. And, importantly, about the point that torture actually shouldn't be done -- that you shouldn't be looking for loopholes in anti-torture rules and seeing legal prohibitions on torture as a big hassle."

The Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan also (tentatively) supports Obama's position: "My view is that those who pay the legal price should be, first and foremost, those who authorized this at the highest levels. My view is also that it is a travesty that the Abu Ghraib reservists were prosecuted, and yet far, far more culpable people are claiming it would be too divisive to prosecute them. My view is that no one is above the law, and that when a society based on law prosecutes the powerless and excuses the powerful, it is corroding its own soul. But my view is also that the president has acted wisely in this. As president in wartime, he knows how wounding it would be to engage in this kind of activity right now. But he has also ensured that a process of transparency continue. A full accounting of all of this -- by people from both parties with real power to investigate and report (a 9/11 style commission, in other words) would be a natural next step."

Daily Kos' mcjoan agrees with Sullivan that there should be an independent investigation: "[A]t the very least, there must be investigations. Whether through the special prosecutor that the ACLU has called for, or Senator [Pat] Leahy's proposal for a commission of inquiry, America has to know how this happened, gruesome step by gruesome step. There is no other way to prevent it from happening again."

Needless to say, liberal bloggers were not pleased when WH CoS Rahm Emanuel declared that the Obama admin. "opposes any effort to prosecute those in the Justice Department who drafted legal memos authorizing harsh interrogations at secret CIA prisons."

BYBEE: Impeach The S.O.B.!

Liberal bloggers are joining the New York Times editorial page in calling on Congress to impeach Bybee, the former OLC attorney who wrote one of the controversial memos and who now serves as a judge on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals:

• The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen: "The question shouldn't be whether to impeach Jay Bybee, but rather, how quickly the impeachment hearings can begin. [...] Unlike memo authors like John Yoo and Steven Bradbury, Jay Bybee currently enjoys a lifetime appointment on a federal appeals court. The nomination was an insult, and his confirmation was absurd."
• Think Progress' Matthew Yglesias: "The idea of the author of one of these memos sitting on the federal bench makes a farce of the whole legal system. One doubts the votes would be there to remove Bybee in the Senate, but even if that's the case I wouldn't mind seeing Senators go on record on this issue."

Other liberal bloggers are urging the CA Dem Party to pass a resolution demanding that Congress impeach Bybee:

• dday: "California members of the [House Judiciary Cmte] include Zoe Lofgren, Maxine Waters, Howard Berman, Brad Sherman, Adam Schiff and Linda Sanchez. The last five, at least, have part or all of LA County in their districts, and could be told RIGHT NOW that their local party has resolved unanimously to impeach Bybee. Should the entire state party agree, all the California members, including the Speaker of the House, and the two Senators (both of whom voted against confirming Bybee) can be told the same. And resolutions like this could spring up all over the country, increasing pressure from the bottom up for the Congress to act."
• digby: "[L]et me just emphasize that this is not an obscure, tilting at windmill exercise. The fact is that the Speaker of the House is from California and as dday points out below, there are numerous members of the house Judiciary Committee from California, Los Angeles in particular. Bybee is on the 9th circuit Court, which covers California. This is something where the state delegation should have plenty of juice if we can exert grassroots pressure for them to take action."
• MyDD's Lucas O'Connor: "While resolutions such as this have no inherent power, they can be extremely effective as tools to prod our elected officials to action -- and action here is necessary."

Meanwhile, dday was pleased to learn that Sen. Claire McCaskill is open to impeaching Bybee, while digby notes that Yale Law prof. Bruce Ackerman was urging Congress to impeach Bybee back in January.

OBAMA: Pallin' Around With Chavez

Conservative bloggers are outraged that Obama had a friendly interaction with Chavez at the Summit of the Americas. Righty bloggers are particularly incensed about the photograph of Obama and Chavez shaking hands, which was heavily promoted by Matt Drudge:

• AmSpec Blog's Philip Klein: "Sickening."
• Townhall's Jonathan Garthwaite: "Obama/Chavez: BFFs."
• Michelle Malkin: "At least he didn't bow. [...] I can't stand to look at our president's dumb grin as he warmly greets Venezuela's thug-in-chief: Gag. And another handholding pic here: Ew. Did anyone smell sulfur during the photo op?"
• Power Line's John Hinderaker: "I thought Barack Obama couldn't sink lower than he did in his apology tour of Europe. I was wrong. Now it's Latin America, where Obama is attending the Summit of the Americas. While he doesn't seem to have actually bowed to anyone in Trinidad, he has adopted a submissive posture at every opportunity, telling Latin America's leaders that he 'has a lot to learn.' I'm afraid that's truer than Obama knows. One can only speculate as to what was running through Hugo Chavez's mind when Obama humiliated himself by posing for this photo. [...] Does Obama really not understand that hostile foreign leaders are making a fool of him and of the country he purports to lead? Apparently not. I don't think Barack Obama is a stupid man, but he is in so far over his head that every time he ventures onto the international stage he not only embarrasses himself -- and us -- he damages, if ever so slightly, our national security."
• RedState's Warner Todd Huston: "Barack Obama has just taken the next step towards a complete disregard for America's foreign policy by back slapping self-professed enemy to the 'great Satan,' tin pot dictator and oppressor, Hugo Chavez. As Obama grins and associates with such low-end characters, treating them as worthy members of the international community, he drags down both the United States and any country that strives to treat its people with the dignity they deserve as human beings."
• Townhall's Carol Platt Liebau: "[Chavez] is a man who is a close ally of Iran and Syria. He called President Obama's predecessor 'the devil.' In 2006, he said that 'The United States empire is on its way down and it will be finished in the near future, inshallah,' [Arab for 'God be willing']. And yet, President Obama is ready and willing to exchange cordial smiles and friendly handshakes with the avowed enemy of the country he leads. How can this be? [...] It's easy to befriend any enemy in the world if you're willing to accept their ugly, irrational and distorted assessment of what this country is all about."
• Hot Air's Allahpundit: "Funding FARC, imprisoning dissidents, staging wargames with Russia, and of course consolidating dictatorial power -- none of it's enough to ruin a photo op for The One."

NRO's Jim Geraghty: "As we see Obama accepting Chavez's anti-American book with a smile, as we see him traveling around the world and apologizing incessantly, as we see him starting a trade war with Mexico, as we see his Department of Homeland Security demonizing conservatives, as we see him bowing to the Saudi king, as we see him taking a meat cleaver to the defense budget, as we see him doubling already-enormous deficits...we find, he is who we thought he was."

Meanwhile, liberal bloggers (Benen, Lemos, Chris in Paris) are criticizing their conservative counterparts for making a big fuss about Obama's greeting with Chavez.

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Sorry, Ross, But The Parallel Doesn't Work

One of Andrew Sullivan's readers rejects Ross Douthat's comparison of last week's "tea party" protests to the anti-Iraq war protests of '02-'03:

"I'm an Army vet and a Navy family member and prior to the invasion of Iraq I was one of the ragged, resentful, and naive out on the streets demonstrating against the inevitable invasion. Except I am neither ragged, resentful, nor naive. I was exceptionally well informed and took to the streets out of a crisis of conscience. The folks I stood vigil with and marched with were, for the most part, some of the most thoughtful and gentle people I've ever dealt with. Like me, most of the people I met out there were brand new to the world of protest.

We didn't have a friendly media outlet promoting our every move. The media was hostile and interpolated us in a way that was unrecognizable. There was no anti-war blogosphere to speak of, even people like Josh Marshall over at TPM had bought into the rush to war (I forgive him). Move-On was active but nothing close to the force it would grow into. We were alone.

When I protested the war I was made out to be the scum of the earth. What must it be like to show up for a protest, denounce your Country, bad mouth the President, threaten armed revolt, and have your very own media outlet brand you a patriot."

LEST WE FORGET: Supreme Court Justices Keep Citing Cases Roberts And Alito Are Too Young To Remember

From The Onion:

"WASHINGTON -- Although three years have passed since both men joined the court, Chief Justice John Roberts, 54, and Associate Justice Samuel Alito, 59, said they still feel foolish whenever more senior justices refer to cases decided 'way before' they joined the court. 'One time -- one time -- I asked what World-Wide Volkswagen v. Woodson was, and Stevens goes off on this tear about me still being in diapers when Earl Warren was inventing Miranda rights,' Alito said of the 88-year-old justice appointed by President Gerald Ford. 'God, sorry I didn't get my law degree before World War I, geez.' According to court clerks, the two younger justices occasionally get so frustrated with the constant teasing that they take a bus to go spend time with their friends in the 9th Circuit."

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 01:37 PM

April 17, 2009

BLOGGER SPOTLIGHT: Warner Todd Huston

Today the Blogometer talks to Warner Todd Huston, who blogs at RedState and Publius' Forum.

(If you're looking for Friday's edition of Blogometer, click here).

Where did you grow up?
Cincinnati, Ohio until I was 17. Then in the Chicago land area ever since.

Where do you live now?
Just west of Chicago city limits and still in the same county Chicago is situated in.

If you have an occupation other than blogging, what is it?
I have been in printing and publishing since 1979.

What's on your iPod right now?
Classic rock like the Beatles, the Eagles, Led Zeppelin, Blue Grass, Jazz, New Age, a lot of soundtracks, some Rag Time, a tiny bit of country and a bit of Classical. NO RAP EVER! Rap is not music. In fact, I am sure that the whole genre is a joke and that the name was originally Crap music and they took that first "c" away because they found it didn't focus group well.

What book do you think every person should read?
One book!? That is a tall order. I guess the Bible, then.

Please finish this sentence: "When I'm not blogging, you'll probably find me..."
...getting ready to blog.

What has been your favorite blog post, or your favorite story to write about?
I revisit union thugs and the Second Amendment quite a lot. American history and education is also a favorite subject. I love mine titled "I am a tired American", though. I am preparing to make a video of that one.

Which blogger(s) do you consider indispensable, if any?
If I say me is that gauche? OK, then I'll say Ed Morrissey. RedState, NewsBusters, HotAir, Lucianne.com and Free Republic are my daily visits.

Who's your favorite non-conservative blogger?
The only blog I visit that isn't political is Aintitcool.com. They hate conservatives there and routinely ban anyone that has a conservative opinion on anything, but I enjoy their coverage of movies nonetheless. I just wish someone would teach those guys some basic grammatical rules. They all write like 12-year-olds over there. As to the liberal bloggers I visit, I won't say. I refuse to give them the publicity!

Who's your favorite active politician? Least favorite?
John Shadegg is one of the best. I also love Joe Biden but only because he is so stupid as to give me so much material to make fun of him with... but then that makes him one of the least favorite, too, doesn't it? I have to say, though, that I really despise Senators Chuck Schumer and Dickie "Turban" Durbin. There are few people as disingenuous and as filled with lies as they.

What would you realistically like to see Republicans accomplish in 2009?
To successfully paint Obama as the anti-American, socialist that he truly is.

If you could give President Obama advice, what would it be?
Go away.

What keeps you up at night?
That he isn't going away. OK, that was for comedic effect... what really keeps me up at night is how our educational system is undermining our nation. Our schools are far worse than any politician because the poor education being inculcated in our children about America, its culture and its political mores and system is destroying this nation. The education system is the single most important ally that the anti-American left has in this country.

Why do you blog?
I either have the biggest ego in the world or I truly believe that if just one person finds some value in what I do and leads them to better understand the US and find value in it then I have helped this country be at its best. You decide which is true.

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 02:29 PM

4/17: Letting The Light In

Liberal bloggers are praising Pres. Obama for releasing detailed DoJ memos describing controversial interrogation techniques used by the CIA. These memos -- which were authored by lawyers in George W. Bush's OLC -- authorized the use of harsh interrogation methods such as waterboarding, keeping detainees awake for up to 11 straight days, and "placing them in a dark, cramped box or putting insects into the box to exploit their fears." Liberal bloggers describe these memos as "chilling" and claim that the described methods clearly constitute torture. While a few conservative bloggers are defending the techniques described in the memos, most are either declining to comment or are criticizing Obama for releasing the memos in the first place.

While some liberal bloggers disagree with Obama's decision not to prosecute CIA agents who used these controversial techniques, others think the President made the right call -- assuming that he does go after the Bush lawyers who authorized these techniques. For that reason, the liberal blog Firedoglake has created a petition urging AG Eric Holder to appoint a special prosecutor "to determine if criminal proceedings are warranted for Justice Department lawyers who legalized these crimes, and the high level executive branch officials who ordered them." Lefty bloggers are also calling for the resignation or impeachment of Jay Bybee, the former OLC attorney who wrote one of the memos and who now serves as a judge on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Conservative bloggers (Goldberg, Lopez, Allahpundit, Johnson, Hengler) are buzzing about a report from the conservative Cybercast News Service which claims that Obama officials asked Georgetown Univ. to cover a religious monogram on the stage where Obama spoke (Obama officials "denied that there was any effort to specifically cover up religious imagery or symbols").
• Conservative bloggers (Huston, Painter, Mirengoff, Klein, Allahpundit) continue to criticize CNN correspondent Susan Roesgen after she had several testy exchanges with tea party protesters in Chicago.
• Conservative bloggers (Lane, Reynolds, Hawkins, Vadum) are blasting Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) after she criticized the tea party protests.
• Liberal bloggers (Beeton, Benen, Bowers) continue to criticize TX Gov. Rick Perry (R) after he "refused to back away Thursday from his words of empathy for secessionists." Other liberal bloggers (Aravosis, Willis) are criticizing the GA Senate after it "threaten[ed] by a vote of 43-1 to secede from and even disband the United States."
• Liberal bloggers (Yglesias, Aravosis, Khanna) are criticizing Rep. Mark Kirk (R-IL) for declaring that IL residents "are ready to shoot anyone who is going to raise taxes" to the degree that Gov. Pat Quinn (D) is proposing.

Finally, please check back later today for our interview with RedState's Warner Todd Huston!

OLC MEMOS: Good For Obama...But Now What?

Liberal bloggers praised Obama for releasing the OLC memos over the objections of various current and former CIA officials:

• Firedoglake's Jane Hamsher: "President Obama deserves huge applause for releasing the OLC torture memos, as do the people in the Administration who fought for it. It's a brave move certain to bring down right wing howler monkeys crying about threats to national security, but a huge step toward restoring the rule of law in the United States."
• digby: "[G]ood for Obama for releasing these OLC memos. I know that he was under tremendous pressure from the intelligence community not to do it and it was an act of principle for him to defy them. [...] I reamin very, very disappointed that he refuses pursue charges against those who ordered these atrocities, but I am grateful that he's at least releasing this information."
• Salon's Glenn Greenwald: "Obama did the right thing by releasing these memos, providing all the information and impetus the citizenry should need to demand investigations and prosecutions. But it is up to citizens to demand that the rule of law be applied."

However, some liberal bloggers are criticizing Obama for announcing "that C.I.A. officers who were acting on the Justice Department's legal advice would not be prosecuted." In their view, granting immunity to C.I.A. personnel who tortured detainees would violate the Geneva Conventions and the Nuremberg principles:

• dday: "[I]t goes without saying that indemnifying the CIA personnel who committed the torture because they were acting under what they believed to be a legal basis violates the Nuremberg principles."
• Greenwald: "I agree entirely that it is the DOJ lawyers who purported to legalize torture and the high-level Bush officials ordering it who are the prime culprits and criminals, as compared to, say, CIA agents who were proverbially just following orders and were told by the DOJ that what they were doing was legal. But leave aside the question of whether prosecutions would produce good or bad outcomes. After all, the notion that the law can and should be ignored whenever we think doing so would produce good results or would constitute good policy was the engine that drove Bush lawlessness. If, as Barack Obama proclaimed yesterday, 'the United States is a nation of laws' and his 'Administration will always act in accordance with those laws,' isn't it the obligation of those opposing prosecution to justify that position in light of these legal mandates and long-standing principles of Western justice? How can they be reconciled?"

Other liberal bloggers are OK with Obama's promise not to prosecute CIA officers, as long as he prosecutes the Bush lawyers who authorized these interrogation methods:

• Anonymous Liberal: "I think Obama did the right thing by promising not to prosecute CIA officers who acted in accordance with the OLC's prior advice. Given the kind of things these folks are asked to do and the important missions entrusted to them, they have to be able to rely on the legal advice they're given by the government. If we start prosecuting people for conduct they were specifically advised was legal by the OLC, it will severely hamper our ability to conduct future intelligence work. No one will trust the advice they are given, they'll worry that the rug will be pulled out from under them at some point down the road. That's an untenable situation. The people who should be punished are the people who gave the advice. The lawyers. The Jay Bybees, John Yoos, and David Addingtons of the world."
• The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen: "Attorney General Eric Holder said in a statement, 'It would be unfair to prosecute dedicated men and women working to protect America for conduct that was sanctioned in advance by the Justice Department.' How about, then, pursuing criminal charges against those who did the sanctioning?"

Meanwhile, the liberal blog Firedoglake has created a petition urging Holder "to immediately appoint a special prosecutor to determine if criminal proceedings are warranted for Justice Department lawyers who legalized these crimes, and the high level executive branch officials who ordered them."

OLC MEMOS II: Bybee Needs To Say Bye-Bye

Liberal bloggers are directing much of their fire at Bybee, the former OLC lawyer who wrote the first memo and who now serves as a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit:

• TalkLeft's Jeralyn Merritt: "Obama plans on amnesty for the torturers, because they followed orders. How about punishing the people who gave the orders? Or at least removing their rewards? Former President Bush promoted torture memo author Jay Bybee to a federal appeals judgeship in 2002. He was confirmed in 2003 and still sits on the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals."
• The Reality-Based Community's Jonathan Zasloff: "Amidst the uproar over the torture memos, it's important not to lose sight of a crucial fact: its responsible author, Jay S. Bybee, is now a federal appeals court judge. Thus, apart from any issue of criminal prosecution, he can be impeached by the House and removed by the Senate. This would be appropriate."
• Hamsher: "Jay Bybee's job, since 2003, has been sitting on the 9th Circut Court of Appeals, deciding what is an isn't constitutional. In the wake of the release of these documents, which Andrew Sullivan rightly calls an 'unprofessional travesty of lawyering,' he ought to resign."

OLC MEMOS III: Welcome To 1984

Liberal bloggers (and torture opponents like Andrew Sullivan) were horrified by the content of the memos:

• digby: "[O]nly having read through the Bybee memo (pdf) authorizing the torture of Abu Zubayda, I feel like vomiting right now. This is the very definition of the banality of evil --- a dry, legalistic series of justifications for acts of barbaric cruelty."
• Sullivan: "[T]he Bybee memo [is] as chilling an artefact as you are ever likely to read in a democratic society, the work clearly not of a lawyer assessing torture techniques in good faith, but of an administration official tasked with finding how torture techniques already decided upon can be parsed in exquisitely disingenuous ways to fit the law, even when they clearly do not. This is what Hannah Arendt wrote of when she talked of the banality of evil."
• Think Progress' Matthew Yglesias: "The OLC memos released today make for chilling reading. They also make it clear that we're talking about interrogation methods that were whipped up by a group of people who were incredibly eager to torture some of their fellow human beings. [...] The bug box, the slap, the stress positions, the waterboarding, etc. have all the hallmarks of torture. If they were done to your dad, you would call it torture. But some folks who are both creative and demented managed to come up with a bunch of ways of torturing people that didn't fit the weird definition of torture they dreamed up."
• Mother Jones' Kevin Drum: "Reading the OLC torture memos is enough to make you ill. The techniques in question are plainly and instinctively abhorrent by any common sense definition, and the authors of the memos obviously know it. But somehow they have to conclude otherwise, so they write page after mind-numbing page of sterile legal language designed to justify authorizing it anyway. It's not torture if the victim survives it intact. It's not against the law if it takes place outside the United States. Waterboarding is OK as long as it isn't performed more than twice in a 24-hour period. Sleep deprivation of shackled prisoners for seven days at a time is permissible as long as the victim's diaper is changed frequently. And on and on and on."

While most conservative bloggers didn't comment on the content of the memos, a few of them denied that the interrogation methods described in the memos constitute torture:

• Power Line's John Hinderaker: "I find much to agree with in the memos and little, if anything, with which I disagree from a legal standpoint. Several things about the memos are striking: the concern that is shown for the health and well-being of the detainees; the very limited circumstances under harsh interrogation techniques were used (only when the CIA had reason to believe that the detainee had knowledge about pending terrorist attacks, among other limitations), and confirmation of the fact that thousands of American servicemen have been waterboarded and subjected to the other techniques in question, as part of their training -- a practice that continued at least up to the dates of the memos."
• RedState's Jeff Emanuel: "No, I won't call them 'Torture Memos'. [...] Co-opting the word 'torture' to include methods far less offensive than the majority of interrogation techniques I underwent in military SERE training isn't a victory for moralists and humanitarians in any form; rather, it's an Orwellian perversion of a word that once had meaning by those who have spent the last eight years on constant lookout for some greviance to hold against a president whose mere existence they resented."

OLC MEMOS IV: The Reaction From The Right

The conservative blogosphere's reaction to the release of the memos was muted, especially when compared with that of the liberal blogosphere. However, several conservative bloggers criticized Obama for releasing the memos:

• Townhall's Carol Platt Liebau: "President Obama is willing to release CIA memoes that will have an adverse effect on our national security."
• NRO's Andy McCarthy: "[This was] a terrible decision, pushed for aggressively by AG Eric Holder."

Meanwhile, Townhall's Hugh Hewitt defends the Bush lawyers who wrote the memos: "The DOJ legal analysis was the best effort of front-line lawyers in the aftermath of a massive attack on the United States. Their Congressional critics of today who did not demand a defining vote on what constituted torture are the worst sort of hypocrites. They are the lawmakers, and chose -- even when House and Senate were controlled by Democrats from January 2007 to the present -- to avoid passing a law bringing clarity to the very gray areas of the law of interrogation."

Hot Air's Ed Morrissey makes a similar point, although he is more critical of the legal reasoning employed by the Bush lawyers: "Bybee and the OLC were asked what interrogators could do within the law, and instead the OLC reverse-engineered a legal opinion to allow them to violate it. I understand why they did, but it still violated the statute. That's what was wrong with John McCain's assertion that a president could just break the law and hope Congress justified it later, rather than rewrite the statutes to make plain what could be done in the 'ticking time bomb' scenario. The law is supposed to hold all people equally accountable. If we foresee a need to work outside the law, then change the law to make sure it covers those situations."

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Hyperbole, Anyone?

David Frum:

"...Republicans seem to be making up their mind that they lost in 2006 and 2008 because they were not conservative enough. Like the proverbial Englishman on vacation, they seem to think that if the locals aren't responding to what they have to say, the thing to do is to say it louder. And are they getting loud!

Obama has been in office nearly three months. Far and away his most important initiative over that time has been to continue George W. Bush's costly Troubled Asset Rescue Plan. Next most important: a mortgage rescue plan that likewise follows ideas bequeathed by his predecessor. Obama has not yet raised taxes. He has not yet introduced a healthcare plan. He has not yet detailed a climate-change policy. He has declined to rescue the automobile companies. [...]

Yet to listen to Fox News and other conservative media, you'd think we were living in Czechoslovakia in the final hours before the 1948 communist coup. Anchors end interviews by solemnly pledging to defend liberty and oppose tyranny. The network's rising star Glenn Beck has mused about the coming turn to totalitarianism -- and warned his audience that he has not been able to 'debunk' fears that the Federal Emergency Management Agency is constructing an archipelago of concentration camps for political opponents of the Obama administration."

LEST WE FORGET: Area Woman's Safety Net Braces For Another Impact

From The Onion:

"ALBANY, NY -- Despite already being stretched to its breaking point, the strained threads of Patricia Hapsburg's social safety net have once again begun readying themselves to absorb the emotional impact of the 29-year-old finding out her ex-boyfriend is now engaged. 'We have white zin chilling in the fridge, her comfiest sweats laid out, and Under The Tuscan Sun cued up in the DVD player,' said one friend, Leanne Shuyin, whose strength has been repeatedly tested by Hapsburg's numerous professional stumbles and tendency to fall for men who move into her building. 'I can't say how long we'll be able to support her, though. Janet has been looking pretty frayed since she agreed to accompany Patricia on that spiritual retreat.' For her own mental stability, Hapsburg will spend the next four weeks joined at the hip to Mike Gantz, her unusually resilient and supportive gay lifeline."

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 01:15 PM

April 16, 2009

4/16: Tea Party Hangover

Tax Day has passed and the "tea party" protests are over, but conservative bloggers are still buzzing with excitement. Righty bloggers are portraying the coordinated demonstrations as a "smashing success" and are posting tons and tons of pictures from various protests across the country. Liberal bloggers, on the other hand, are posting pictures of racist and otherwise offensive signs that various protesters were holding. Lefty bloggers are also accusing the tea party protesters of lacking a coherent message.

It's worth noting how much the rightroots' current tactics differ from those of the Democratic netroots. Liberal bloggers have little use for street protests; Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas recently derided Code Pink as "an ineffective, self-indulgent, obnoxious and tone-deaf organization." The netroots' stated goal is electing Democrats -- preferably progressive ones. But while most (albeit not all) lefty bloggers are dismissive of activism that doesn't have to do with winning elections, their conservative counterparts have become increasingly interested in street demonstrations. Prominent righty bloggers Glenn Reynolds and Michelle Malkin have been relentlessly promoting these tea party protests for months.

Perhaps this shift in the rightroots' focus is an inevitable consequence of the fact that the GOP is no longer in power and lacks the ability to make policy. But do these protests serve a purpose, other than providing frustrated conservatives with an emotional outlet? Reynolds says yes, suggesting that the organizing that's currently being done by these protesters could "revitalize" the GOP and impact the 2010 and 2012 elections. Moulitsas disagrees, arguing that conservatives are wasting their time waving signs in the street when they should instead be "fighting for an electorally viable Republican Party."

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Conservative bloggers (Emanuel, Malkin, Hewitt, Hemingway) are blasting CNN correspondent Susan Roesgen after she had several testy exchanges with protesters at a tea party rally in Chicago.
• Liberal bloggers (Benen, Cole, Lemos, Sudbay, Yglesias) think TX Gov. Rick Perry (R) crossed the line with his comments about TX seceding from the union. Some conservative bloggers are praising Perry, but others think he went too far.

TEA PARTIES: A Smashing Success

Some conservative bloggers are implying that the tea party protests were effective because they made Democrats and reporters nervous:

• RedState's Pejman Yousefzadeh: "The tea parties that went on to commemorate Genuflection To The IRS Day have been a smashing success. [...] Try as some of the various news organizations did to downplay the effect of the tea parties, it cannot be denied that they made an impact. Naturally, this success worries the defenders of Big Government; so much so that while pretending not to be concerned about the effect of the tea parties, opponents of small government have gone on the warpath to make their disdain clear."
• Power Line's John Hinderaker: "Are the tea parties the start of something big? We'll see. But one thing we know for sure is that they are making the establishment very nervous."
• Right Wing News' John Hawkins: "The Left has never been as freaked out by Al Qaeda or the Soviet Union as they are over the Tea Parties."

NRO's Jim Geraghty speculates about "where...the tea parties go from here": "Several sites are attempting to ensure that the enthusiasm of yesterdays tea parties isn't a flash in the pan, including AfterTheTeaParty.com and TaxDayTeaParty.com. [...I]f conservatives want to make sure stimulus funds don't get spent on crap, applying pressure at the local level is a way to leverage the tea party energy into something with real impact on the ground. Who knows? It might even get some conservatives involved in government on a more regular basis. Back in 1996, an obscure Chicago lawyer and law school lecturer was motivated to get involved in state legislature, and within a decade, he was running for president."

Meanwhile, RedState's Erick Erickson echoes Moulitsas's claim that elections are what really matter, not protests: "The tea party protests...are frankly meaningless. Showing up to protest does nothing. You and I can put meaning into these protests by harnessing the day's energies for real change -- throwing the bums out and restoring freedom in a free market."

Erickson's co-blogger Jeff Emanuel argues that the tea parties will have an impact on the 2010 elections: "Those who participated (and are participating in) any of the thousand modern-day tea parties being held around the country today get it -- and when this movement grows through 2009 and into 2010, and when its momentum is felt at the polls next year, [Democrats will] start to get a clue just what magnitude a sleeping dragon they awoke with their profligate spending, their spreading of the wealth, and their encroachment into people's personal lives and decisions."

TEA PARTIES II: What's The Message?

Liberal bloggers are accusing the tea party protesters of lacking a coherent message:

• BooMan: "The problem with these tea parties is that they are really just expressions of unarticulated rage. And any successful piece of activism has to be specific and coherent. Even the core message (Taxed Enough Already) isn't particularly helpful because the vast, vast majority of the protesters just received a modest tax-cut. Their grievances are all over the place, although they're mainly pissed off about deficit spending. I think they've made it plain that they don't want to pay more taxes to fix the deficit problem, but they have no message about what wars and programs they'd like to slash. We're left with nothing to chew on."
• Atrios: "[T]here's obviously nothing wrong with the right attempting to engage in protest politics. The problem is that it was never clear what they were protesting. So far Obama has cut taxes for most of the population and... well, that's it. The protests of 'The Left' have long been mocked for lacking message discipline. That criticism has often been fair. The difference is that our side's protests generally have a single point ('don't do this stupid fucking war in Iraq') which gets hijacked by a bunch of other causes when the speakers hit the stage. But the teabaggers... honestly, I still have no idea what it was about. I mean, I know it was about tribal allegiance against Barack Mumia Saddam Obama III. But it wasn't actually about anything else."
• Pandagon's Jesse Taylor: "Tea Partiers are hoping that if they mimic the energy of anti-war protests and the savvy of Obama's new media operation, that at some point an actual movement will spawn. Getting together a bunch of pissed off middle-aged white people with no clue about how the tax system works in public areas will generate a coherent agenda designed to combat the stimulus; if it gets enough media coverage, they will DOMINATE THE AGENDA. It's like taping a horn to a horse and waiting for it to alight on a magic cloud of stardust and pixies."
• Obsidian Wings' publius: "I'm sure our modern-day Samuel Adamses aren't supporting big military spending cuts. I doubt they care that taxes are unchanged or lowered on 95% of families. I suspect they had almost nothing to say about the spending and executive overreach of the [George W.] Bush years. Logical consistency, remember, isn't the point. The point is that tea parties give them an opportunity to reaffirm their own ideological self-image. In their own heads, they want to be 'small government' people. In this sense, the tea parties are simply atonement -- trying to 'out out' the damned spot."
• MyDD's Todd Beeton: "[M]aniacs around the country are gathering to protest the...errr..biggest middle tax cut in history, or something? Or is it the bailouts that began under Bush? Or perhaps that scary bogeyman big government spending? All? Either? No one seems to really know."
• Balloon Juice's John Cole: "You know what really irritates me about the tea parties? The basic fact that if right now, it were President John McCain and not President Obama, and nothing else had changed, these tea parties wouldn't exist. You know it, I know it, and even the teabaggers know it. It is just such transparent bullshit that it is offensive. The most these guys ever did during the last lost eight years was put a limp Porkbusters logo on their website, but now that we have President Malcom X George McGovern Shabazz, they are freaking out like there is no tomorrow. So absurd."

The Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan thinks the tea party protesters need to present a clear alternative: "Protesting government spending is meaningless unless you say what you'd cut. If you favor no bailouts, then say so. If you want to see the banking system collapse, then say so. If you think the recession demands no fiscal stimulus, then say so. If you favor big cuts in Medicare, Medicaid, social security and defense, then say so. I keep waiting for [Glenn] Reynolds to tell us what these protests are for; and he can only spin what they they are against. All protests against spending that do not tell us how to reduce it are fatuous pieces of theater, not constructive acts of politics. And until the right is able to make a constructive and specific argument about how they intend to reduce spending and debt and borrowing, they deserve to be dismissed as performance artists in a desperate search for coherence in an age that has left them bewilderingly behind."

MEDIA CRITICISM: You Call This Objective?

Conservative bloggers are blasting CNN's Roesgen after she had several testy exchanges with protesters at a tea party rally in Chicago:

• Hot Air's Allahpundit: "Unreal: CNN reporter openly contemptuous of tea parties."
• Malkin: "CNN earns the Tax Day Tea Party Big Loser Award: Biased. Busted. Beclowned."
• Townhall's Greg Hengler: "CNN's first interviewee is a man who does not know why Obama is a fascist but can't stop repeating that he is. The second interviewee is a man who, once recognized as a non-fringe element, gets the mic taken away so Roesgen can defend Obama. Bottom line: This segment is a time capsule. Mark it under 'CNN's unapologetic bias.'"
• Emanuel: "From the department of pathetic ignorance or willfully not getting it (not sure which to file this one in yet) comes this clip of a CNN reporter shouting down a Chicago Tea Party attendee for not displaying the appropriate appreciation and gratitude to President Obama for his gift to the state of Illinois of billions in borrowed money and trillions in new debt."
• Townhall's Hugh Hewitt: "This biased coverage was nicely summed up by the hilarious and instantly archetypal 'report' by CNN's Susan Roesgen, which begins with Susan plucking from the hundreds of available tea party participants one guy with an Obama/Hitler sign, and then follows this superb bit of news gathering with a contentious, argumentative interview with a man with a baby who wants to talk about the principles of Lincoln. When Roesgen morphs into [WH Press Sec.] Robert Gibbs and begins to lecture the man about his eligibility for a tax refund and the amount of stimulus spending the state of Illinois is going to receive, Roesgen does more to end the media bias debate in this country than a dozen books by Bernard Goldberg. We can all rely on Roesgen and her producers to keep a close watch on the White House and the Democratic majorities in Congress, right?"
• NRO's Mark Hemingway: "Of all the leftist protests I've covered over the years -- and I've covered many of them -- I have never seen a reporter enter the fray and act personally offended by the many, many examples of outrageous behavior at a protest. There's little to be gained by it, and it's simply not professional. What Roesgen is doing here pure hackery. Even as grandstanding, she fails. She goes about things with all the subtlety of a brick through a window, and in the end it appears she's just an angry jerk."

Liberal bloggers, on the other hand, were more offended by the protesters whom Roesgen interviewed:

• The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen: "Obviously, it's not fair to suggest all of the far-right activists attending Tea Parties were as confused as the strange folks CNN talked to in Chicago, but the 'movement' has a long way to go if these guys were in any way representative of the whole."
• AMERICAblog's Joe Sudbay: "I hope America is getting a good look at the teabaggers (but not while they're actually teabagging.) They really hate the president. It oozes out of them in a very disturbing and creepy way. The talking point for the day is that Obama is a fascist. [...] These people don't live in the same country I live in -- or even on the same planet. These are the people who made Rush [Limbaugh] the leader of the GOP. No wonder the party's got no future."

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: You Can Laugh, But...

The Atlantic's Ross Douthat thinks the tea party protesters have the right idea, even if some of them look silly:

"[The tea parties] have all of the weaknesses of the anti-war marches: Their message is intertwined with a sense of disenfranchisement and all kinds of inchoate cultural resentments, they've brought various wacky extremists out of the woodwork (you know, like Glenn Beck), and just as George W. Bush benefited from having opposition to his policies identified with peacenik marchers in Berkeley and Ann Arbor, so Barack Obama probably benefits from having the opposition (such as it is) associated with a bunch of Fox News fans marching through the streets on Tax Day, parroting talk radio tropes and shouting about socialism. Obama is a very popular President, at the moment, his unpopularity among Republicans notwithstanding, and it's awfully hard to see the Tea Parties doing much to change that reality in the short run; if anything, they're far more likely to reconfirm the majority in its opinion that American conservatism is increasingly wacky, echo-chamberish, and out-of-touch.

Still, here we are in the sixth year of the Iraq War, and all those anti-war protests, their excesses and stupidities notwithstanding, look a lot more prescient in hindsight than they did (to me, at least) when they were going on. So if you're inclined to sneer and giggle at the Tea Parties, keep in mind that just because a group of protesters looks ragged, resentful, and naive, that doesn't necessarily mean they're wrong to be alarmed."

LEST WE FORGET: This Ain't So EZ

McSweeney's Christopher Mah posts "Excerpts From My 2008 Tax Return, Form 1040EZ":

Line 1. Wages, salaries, and tips. This should be shown in box 1 of your Form(s) W-2. If it is not, you might not technically be employed. Attach your Form(s) W-2.

Line 2. Taxable interest. If the total is over $1,500, you cannot use Form 1040EZ. It is not our job to tell you which form you should use instead. It is your responsibility, resourceful citizen, to determine this on your own.

Line 3. Unemployment compensation and Alaska Permanent Fund dividends (see page 11 of booklet)

Booklet, page 11: Unemployment compensation and Alaska Permanent Fund dividends (see line 3 of Form 1040EZ)

Line 4. Add lines 1, 2, and 3. Divide by ?. Add 17. Multiply by Avogadro's number and subtract your resting heart rate. This is your adjusted gross income.

Line 5. If someone can claim you (or your spouse if a joint return) as a dependent and you're earning enough income to pay taxes, you're probably old enough to move out of that person's basement by now. If no one can claim you (or your spouse if a joint return), enter $8,950 if single or $17,900 if married filing jointly.

Line 6. Subtract line 5 from line 4. If line 5 is larger than line 4 but less than line 2 and greater than line 1, what time will Train A overtake Train B? This is your taxable income.

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 12:34 PM

April 15, 2009

4/15: Somebody's Watching Me...

As we noted yesterday, the conservative blogosphere is in an uproar over the leaked DHS document warning law enforcement officials about a rise in "rightwing extremist activity." Many righty bloggers believe that the document's description of "right-wing extremism" is so broad that it could apply to any American with conservative views. One blogger complains: "I took the time to read this [document] and what it boils down to is trying to say anyone who opposes [Barack] Obama, like they did with [Bill] Clinton in the 1990's, is a domestic terrorist."

Liberal bloggers are pushing back by arguing that (a.) the DHS is right to keep on an eye on right-wing extremists, and (b.) conservative bloggers are hypocritical to complain about DHS policies when they supported George W. Bush's expanded use of domestic surveillance. Meanwhile, it's worth noting that many lefty bloggers have been arguing that the rhetoric of many conservatives is beginning to resemble that of right-wing extremists. As examples, these bloggers cite Glenn Beck's rhetoric about secession and TX Gov. Rick Perry's rhetoric about the "oppressive" federal government.

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Conservative bloggers (Malkin, Reynolds, Hinderaker, Carroll, Hanlon) are excited about today's "tea party" protests, which many of them are attending. Liberal bloggers (Waldman, Hamsher, Smith) continue to argue that there is nothing "grassroots" about these protests.
• Liberal bloggers (Klein, Benen) were generally impressed by Obama's speech at Georgetown Univ., but some (Bowers, Dayen, Yglesias) were not persuaded by Obama's explanation of why his admin. has resisted temporarily nationalizing insolvent banks.
• Liberal bloggers (Yglesias, Greenwald, hilzoy, Dayen) are pleased that Spanish prosectors will reportedly seek criminal charges against ex-AG Alberto Gonzales and five other Bush officials for sanctioning torture at Guantánamo Bay. However, lefty bloggers believe that the Obama admin. should conduct its own torture investigations instead of "let[ting] Spain do our dirty work."
• Conservative bloggers (Erickson, Hillyer) are unhappy that the NRSC will support Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) in his upcoming primary contest against ex-Rep. Pat Toomey (R-PA).

DHS: Who You Callin' Extremist?

Righty bloggers view the leaked DHS document as evidence that Obama's DHS is targeting conservatives:

• Michelle Malkin: "In the eyes of Obama's DHS, we are all 'haters' now."
• Townhall's Dwayne Horner: "I took the time to read this [document] and what it boils down to is trying to say anyone who opposes Obama, like they did with Clinton in the 1990's, is a domestic terrorist. [...] So now if you want to oppose the President and work to get him out of office in four years, the Department of Homeland Security will have a file on you much like the KGB did in the Soviet Union. I can only imagine what mine says there in the O-GB Bureau?"
• RedState's hogan: "In a blatant propaganda effort designed to characterize conservatives as racist, anti-American, dangerous extremists, the Obama Administration is attacking many law abiding citizens -- from veterans and pro-lifers to anyone who dares question the wisdom of Washington. For the many Americans increasingly skeptical of an out-of-control federal government that is more interested in international popularity than preservation of liberty -- [this document] is an unfair characterization and is without question a naked, political effort to marginalize those who would question the wisdom of those in Washington."
• NRO's Mark Krikorian: "[T]his is an unmistakable step toward not just delegitimizing dissent but actually criminalizing it, and Americans of whatever party need to push back, hard. [...] I wasn't going to go to a Tea Party event tomorrow because I'm not the protesting type. But I sure am now [...]"
• Power Line's John Hinderaker: "Millions of Americans -- not just 'rightwing extremists' -- are concerned about the administration's positions on immigration and many other issues. [...] It's hard to avoid the conclusion that this Homeland Security report is politically motivated, and reflects the authors' political prejudices more than an objective evaluation of a significant terrorist threat."
• NRO's Jonah Goldberg: "[Some of my] readers insist the report is focused solely on violent groups, and they're probably right that this is the authors' intent. But that isn't how it reads necessarily. Indeed, it goes out of its way to note that many of these groups haven't done anything violent. The concern is that because they are right-wing they might be violent as if there is causation between being right-wing and being violent. Again, I have no doubt that there are plenty of groups that are right-wing that deserve scrutiny from law enforcement. But this document reads like it is written to lend credence to a political argument more than it should."

Townhall's Hugh Hewitt thinks the DHS should be spending its time and resources worrying about Islamic terrorists, not right-wing extremists: "There are indeed right wing extremists in the U.S., a few of whom are dangerous. They are nowhere near as numerous or as dangerous as the jihadists here and around the globe. When Islamist terrorists strike at Americans or American interests here or abroad, it will be a fair question why DHS was allowed to waste its time and resources on such dribble."

On the other hand, Little Green Footballs' Charles Johnson thinks conservatives are overreacting: "First, this DHS assessment was begun more than a year ago, before Barack Obama was even nominated. It has absolutely nothing to do with 'tea parties,' and it was not done at the behest of the Obama administration. Second, I'm seeing it brought up repeatedly that the report contains a reference to veterans, mentioning that some of these groups are seeking to recruit them. This is nothing more than a fact, and the report even says that only a tiny number of veterans would join such groups -- but that their talents could bring a great deal of capability to the extremists. Has everyone simply forgotten that Timothy McVeigh was a veteran? The DHS report is not intended to target anyone but the most extreme elements of the far right, and it's depressing to see so many bloggers jumping to totally unwarranted conclusions."

DHS II: Remember Timothy McVeigh?

Liberal bloggers are arguing that the DHS is right to keep an eye on right-wing extremists:

• Think Progress' Matthew Yglesias: "[T]his seems like an eminently reasonable thing to be doing. If you don't believe that, you need to see Dave Weigel's reporting from the machine gun show this militia stuff and Dave Neiwert's stuff."
• The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen: "Now, I'm sympathetic to concerns about 'big government' monitoring law-abiding Americans, and was offended when some law-enforcement agencies started monitoring peace groups who protested the Bush administration's policies in Iraq. There is, in other words, room for abuse here. But let's recognize this for what it is. If the available evidence is accurate, the law-enforcement efforts aren't about tapping Bill O'Reilly's phone; it's about monitoring the organizing efforts of right-wing militias who are bragging about stockpiling weapons and ammunition."
• TAPPED's Michelle Goldberg: "We've all read the stories about weapons stockpiling by various racists, survivalists and paranoids. So, it's heartening that the DHS is taking this stuff seriously. Despite conservatives' tough talk on terrorism, the truth is that the most violent domestic terrorism has in recent decades been a product of the right, from abortion clinic bombings to Oklahoma City."
• Balloon Juice's John Cole: "For the life of me, I can not imagine why any conservative would read that nothing burger of a DHS report that talks about pretty commonly known stuff (have these people whining about the report never been to the SPLC or ADL website, for goodness sakes?), look at it and say to themselves 'When they are talking about dangerous right-wing extremists, they are talking about me!' Too absurd for words. Unless, of course ... In other news, Glenn Beck rambled on about secession again today while the Texas legislature worked on a bill regarding their sovereignty. I'm sure you all remember that the right-wing extremist who just killed three cops in Pittsburgh was very concerned about those issues. Just a coincidence, of course."
• Firedoglake's Blue Texan: "Memo to wingnuts: if you don't want to look like a bunch of crazy right-wing extremists, it's probably best not to criticize the federal government for keeping an eye on crazy right-wing extremists."

DHS III: Now Republicans Are Worried About Government Surveillance?

Liberal bloggers are also arguing that conservative bloggers are hypocritical to complain about the DHS document when they supported the Bush admin.'s domestic surveillance policies:

• Salon's Glenn Greenwald: "When you cheer on a Surveillance State, you have no grounds to complain when it turns its eyes on you. If you create a massive and wildly empowered domestic surveillance apparatus, it's going to monitor and investigate domestic political activity. That's its nature. [...] This is all as laughable as it is predictable. Just a couple months out of power and they have suddenly re-discovered their fear of the Federal Government and their belief in the need to limit its powers."
• Yglesias: "I think it'd be great if some non-insane conservatives were to be a bit bothered by this [document]. Legitimate concerns about security really can serve as a cover for abuses or misconduct. This was the problem with the surveillance organized by the Bush administration, and it's a very real problem even with Barack Obama in the White House. As long as Bush was president, folks on the right seemed curiously blasé about this whole thing."
• Benen: "What's especially interesting today is the response from conservative bloggers -- the ones who used to argue the government should have practically unlimited surveillance powers to prevent possible terrorism on U.S. soil -- who are outraged by DHS's efforts."
• TAPPED's Adam Serwer: "I don't think there's anything wrong with skepticism about what the government does with its authority, in fact I encourage it. But [Michelle] Malkin and her ideological comrades have been arguing for years that such skepticism is a form of treason. Now of course, dissent is patriotic, and the government keeping tabs on non-violent, if enthusiastic, dissenters is a form of persecution. If only they had felt that way eight years ago, instead of mocking those who fight to protect all of our civil liberties -- even theirs."

The Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan makes a similar point to conservative bloggers criticizing the DHS document: "Glad to have you back on the side of liberty. One small question, though: Where the fuck have you been these past seven years?"

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Americans And Taxes

Lately bloggers have been buzzing about the new Gallup poll indicating that 48% of Americans believe that the amount of federal income taxes they pay is "about right," while 46% say it's "too high." Mother Jones' Kevin Drum writes:

"Consider this: about 40-50% of Americans pay no federal income tax at all.* That's zero dollars. I think we can safely assume that these are the people who think their taxes are about right. What this means, then, is that virtually every American who pays any income tax at all thinks they're paying too much. There are various reasons why this might be so (a sense of unfairness regardless of amount paid, a fuzzy sense of how much they're paying in the first place, simple bloody-mindedness, etc.) but overall it's not exactly a testament to our collective willingness to fund the machinery of state.

*Of course, all of them pay other taxes. There's more to life than just the income tax. But this question was strictly about federal income tax, and it demonstrates that nearly everyone with a nonzero 1040 payment thinks they're paying too much."

LEST WE FORGET: Exactly.

From Overheard in the Office:

Director: How do you spell "dumb"? "D-u-m" or "d-u-m-e"?
Account executive: It's "d-u-m-b."
Director: What?
Account executive: "D-u-m-b." B, b, b...like "boy."
Director: What about boys?

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 01:00 PM

April 14, 2009

4/14: The Ball's In Norm's Court

Now that a MN court has ruled that Al Franken (D) won the most votes in the 2008 Senate race against ex-Sen. Norm Coleman (R), liberal bloggers are speculating about what Coleman will do next. The consensus view among the netroots is that Coleman knows it's over but that he will continue to appeal in order to prevent the Senate from seating Franken. Meanwhile, several liberal bloggers are urging one of the MN Supreme Court justices to recuse himself if Coleman appeals, since this justice has donated money to Coleman in the past.

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Conservative bloggers (Gordon, Malkin, Huston, Morrissey) are complaining about a leaked DHS document entitled, "Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Environment Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment." Righty bloggers see this document as evidence that Janet Napolitano's DHS is targeting conservatives.
• Conservative bloggers (Hewitt, Hanna, Reynolds) are buzzing about the 4/15 "tea party" protests, in which conservatives will protest Pres. Obama's economic policies. Liberal bloggers (Hamsher, Gavin M., digby) argue that the "tea party" movement is a creation of corporate lobbyists rather than a spontaneous grassroots uprising, but conservative bloggers (Glover, Henke) disagree.
• Liberal bloggers (Black, Sudbay, Benen) are praising Obama for abandoning restrictions on the ability of Cuban-Americans to visit and send money to family members on the island. Others (Yglesias, Fernholz) are urging Obama to go further and lift the embargo.
• Liberal bloggers (Klein, Benen, Yglesias, Dayen) are angry that the private student lending industry and its congressional allies are gearing up to fight Obama's plan to "end a subsidized loan program and redirect billions of dollars in bank profits to scholarships for needy students."
• Liberal bloggers (Lewison, Waldman, Benen, Drum) are blasting conservative pundits who criticized Obama's handling of the Somali pirate hostage situation while the crisis was still unfolding.

MN SEN: Sometimes You Gotta Know When To Fold 'Em

Now that a MN court has ruled that Franken won more votes than Coleman in the 2008 Senate election, liberal bloggers are speculating about what Coleman will do next:

• Daily Kos' Markos Moulitsas: "We know that this decision will be appealed to the state Supreme Court. Will the Supremes issue an injunction to block the issuance of the certificate of election? Will [Gov. Tim] Pawlenty refuse to sign it? And what role will the federal courts play after Coleman inevitably runs out of appeal courts in Minnesota?"
• Mother Jones' Kevin Drum: "[H]ere's something to watch for: how long will it take Coleman to file his appeal? He's known this decision was coming for a long time. His legal team almost certainly knew the grounds on which he was going to lose. They've had plenty of time to prepare their argument. They could probably file it tomorrow if they wanted to. But do they want to? If they're genuinely trying to win a Senate seat, they'll file quickly. After all, the faster they file, the faster Coleman can win the case and return in triumph to Washington. But if they don't think they can win -- if they're merely trying to stretch out a losing argument as long as possible in order to deny Franken his seat -- then they'll wait the ten full days. Which do you think it will be?"
• dday: "In most countries, this pruling] would mean that Franken would receive that certificate and actually enter the Senate. But as long as Norm Coleman has a few wealthy benefactors willing to bankroll him, he can appeal. Again and again. Now, the Supreme Court might not have anyone available to hear that appeal, since two justices served on the state canvassing board, and one has donated money to Norm Coleman in the past. But of course, the Minnesota Supreme Court is just a stepping stone to a federal district court of appeals. Which is just a stepping stone to the US Supreme Court. Which is just a stepping stone to some other judicial body Coleman can find. Which is just a stepping stone to the 2014 rematch. Franken will only have been an incumbent for a few months by then."
• Think Progress' Matthew Yglesias: "It's worth remarking a bit on the incredible solidarity the Minnesota GOP is showing with their colleagues' broader interest in obstructing the inevitable here. Representatives John Kline, Erik Paulsen, and Michele Bachmann, along with Governor Tim Pawlenty, are all seeing their quest to get Minnesota's fair share of pork and other parochial interests undermined by the fact that their state only has one Senator. Normally, I would expect politicians in that kind of situation to put the interests of themselves and their state ahead of the interests of their political party."

Liberal bloggers are also urging MN Supreme Court Justice Christopher J. Dietzen to recuse himself if Coleman appeals, since Dietzen has donated money to Coleman on two previous occasions:

• Senate Guru: "[O]ne of the remaining Justices that will decide Norm Coleman's electoral fate is a two-time Norm Coleman donor! Heck, one of the two contributions occurred in the six years leading up to Coleman's 2008 re-election bid -- in other words, it was put toward this very election whose result Coleman is preparing to appeal. This is a crystal clear conflict of interest. Justice Dietzen should recuse himself from any Coleman appeals to the state Supreme Court in order to prevent the (rather obvious) appearance of bias."
• Benen: "I can appreciate the fact that judges are Americans, too, and they may want to participate in the electoral process, just like everyone else. That might mean voting for a candidate, and it might include financial support. When Judge Dietzen backed Coleman in 2004, it probably never occurred to him that he'd be asked to weigh in on Coleman's election-related lawsuit in 2009. But here we are, and Dietzen's support for Coleman's campaign raises legitimate questions about whether he's a neutral, objective arbiter on Coleman's political future."

DHS: Targeting Conservatives?

Conservative bloggers are buzzing about a DHS document (which the Washington Times describes here) entitled, "Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Environment Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment." Righty bloggers believe that this document implies that every American with conservative views is a potential terrorism suspect:

• The Liberty Papers' Stephen Gordon: "According to this new Homeland Security report, all it takes to fit the terrorist profile is to have general anti-government feelings or prefer local/state government to federal control over everything. [...] Also targeted in the report are veterans, folks anticipating additional restrictions to their Second Amendment rights, and those concerned about the loss of U.S. sovereignty."
• Michelle Malkin: "The 'report' (PDF file here) was one of the most embarrassingly shoddy pieces of propaganda I'd ever read out of DHS. I couldn't believe it was real. [...] Well, the [DHS] press office got back to me and verified that the document is indeed for real. [...] In Obama land, there are no coincidences. It is no coincidence that this report echoes Tea Party-bashing left-wing blogs (check this one out comparing the Tea Party movement to the Weather Underground!) and demonizes the very Americans who will be protesting in the thousands on Wednesday for the nationwide Tax Day Tea Party."
• Townhall's Matt Lewis: "This is almost unbelievable. The message is simple: If you are a conservative, you might be dangerous..."
• RedState's Warner Todd Huston: "In a world where Islamist terror is appearing in every corner of the earth, Obama and his policemen are trying to gin up fear about Ron Paul followers, conservatives, Republicans, constitutionalists, and Second Amendment supporters. Apparently to the lefties under Obama, other Americans are far more worrisome than Islamic terrorists. [...] Why are we paying millions for our intelligence services to focus on patriotic Americans for holding average right of center ideas when we have Islamist terrorism all across the globe? Why is Obama, like [Bill] Clinton, more interested in attacking his own political enemies than in attacking actual enemies to this country?"
• Hot Air's Ed Morrissey: "Imagine, if you will, what the Left would say if we took this entire document and replaced all references to 'military veterans' with 'Muslims', and all references to 'abortion' with 'universal health care', and then predated this DHS report to 2008, during the Bush administration. They'd be screaming about being smeared as traitors for their political beliefs, and they'd be right to do so. That's exactly what the Obama administration and Janet Napolitano has done here. This is a disgrace. Congress should demand Napolitano's resignation immediately, and the White House should apologize for this attack on normal political dissent."

Robert Stacy McCain thinks the DHS is wasting its time: "People are saying that Mexico is teetering on the verge of becoming a 'failed state,' and already the U.S.-Mexico border is plagued by narco-terror violence. What does DHS have to say about that? Why this apparent assumption that we are due for something like a Timothy McVeigh/Eric Rudolph scenario? They're 'fighting the last war,' so to speak, expecting the immediate future to resemble the immediate past. Well, history repeats itself, but not usually in such a direct manner. I'd hate to think DHS was spending so much time checking out every fringe kook in Idaho that they ignored the continuing Al-Qaeda threat."

CUBA: A Step In The Right Direction

Liberal bloggers are praising Obama for ending "longstanding restrictions on the ability of Cuban-Americans to visit and send money to family members on the island":

• Atrios: "[Our] Cuba policy is dumb all around, so any easing is good."
• AMERICAblog's Joe Sudbay: "Good move. And, it is a big step in the right direction."
• MyDD's Todd Beeton: "This is a great development and one wonders if with it, President Obama single-handedly turned Florida forever blue."
• The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen: "The hardline restrictions imposed by the Bush administration, which only followed in the footsteps of restrictions imposed by every other modern president, moved U.S. policy in precisely the wrong direction. The result, not surprisingly, was more of the same. Obama's break with the past is far more likely to pay dividends."
• Balloon Juice's John Cole: "Hopefully this is the right thing to do. It can't be worse than the status quo, which seems to me to have been pointless."

Many liberal bloggers want Obama to go further and lift the embargo:

• TAPPED's Tim Fernholz: "Each bullet point is in and of itself a good move, but is certainly not enough -- there's no reason our policy in Cuba to be any different than our policy in China, for instance, where trade and travel are taken for granted."
• Yglesias: "What they've done here, pretty clearly, is tightly target those measures where a clear case can be made that relaxing restrictions does much more to weaken the regime than anything else. That's clever politics and probably a smart start. But the plain fact of the matter is that the whole embargo is based on faulty logic. Making the Cuban population as poor as possible isn't going to bring democracy to the island, and the idea that a more prosperous Cuba could somehow become so prosperous as to pose a security threat to the United States is ridiculous. A Communist economy running without subsidies from the USSR is bound to be pretty poor no matter what, but there's no reason for us to contribute to the situation."

The Washington Note's Steve Clemons is concerned about the precedent Obama is setting: "Our President and our Congress should be crafting foreign policies with other sovereign states that fit the preferences and interests of most Americans, not a sub-class of them. But today, remarkably, our nation's first African-American President has just issued executive orders that create preferences and opportunities for a specific class of ethnic Americans. Even if a good step on one level, at a macro level, this sort of cynical gaming of domestic politics at the expense of broader national interests is fundamentally wrong. [...] So, applause for the Cuban-American oriented efforts. Better than nothing -- but not nearly enough. And the precedent is worrisome and disconcerting."

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: A Gayer GOP?

The Next Right's Kristen Soltis:

"In [Monday]'s Daily Beast the daughter of Sen. John McCain, Meghan McCain, wrote about the need for 'a gayer GOP' in order to expand the Republican Party's hopes of winning back a majority coalition and in particular in order to appeal to young voters. I recently completed research on the topic of young voters and the GOP: where the Republican Party is losing young voters, how serious the threat is to the party, and how the Republican Party should respond. And on this point, Ms. McCain has it right -- the issue of gay marriage is one on which young voters and the Republican Party diverge significantly. [...]

[W]hether the Republican Party amends its actual policy stance on gay marriage or whether it simply makes efforts be more tolerant and inclusive of homosexuals generally, the Republican Party cannot ignore the vast differences in public opinion between young and old voters on the issue. This difference certainly presents a serious challenge to the party's long-term ability to swell its ranks among young voters."

LEST WE FORGET: Michael Bay Signs $50M Deal To Fuck Up 'Thundercats'

From The Onion:

"LOS ANGELES -- In the largest deal ever made to shit out a movie, Warner Bros. and director Michael Bay announced a landmark $50 million agreement this week to monumentally fuck up ThunderCats.

'I couldn't be more excited to completely fuck this up,' said Bay, who plans to begin production single-handedly destroying a live-action version of the 1980s-era cartoon series next month. 'ThunderCats has a great story, endearing characters, action, adventure, space-travel, and fantasy. It will be an honor to run it into the ground.'[...]

According to executives, Warner Bros. settled on Bay after a 12-month search of Hollywood's most reviled directors, including Joel Schumacher, Roland Emmerich, and Brett Ratner. In the end, the studio decided only Bay could be relied upon to deliver a 220-minute cinematic clusterfuck with enough tedious performances, overblown cinematography, and CGI explosions to make even the most casual fan want to scratch their eyes out."

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 12:35 PM

April 13, 2009

4/13: Obama's 3 A.M. Moment

Conservative bloggers spent much of the past weekend accusing Pres. Obama of demonstrating weakness in his response to the kidnapping of an American sea captain by Somali pirates. Righty bloggers called Obama "our Eunuch-in-Chief" and accused him of "intend[ing] to hobble the United States of America" through his policies of "accommodation and capitulation". After U.S. Navy SEAL snipers killed three of the pirates and freed the captain, a few conservative bloggers praised Obama for authorizing the Navy's use of force. However, most righty bloggers refused to give Obama credit for the rescue, complaining that his administration was "too cowardly to let slip the dogs of war" and arguing that the situation was resolved only because the captain and the Navy took matters into their own hands. Liberal bloggers, meanwhile, are accusing their conservative counterparts of rooting for the Navy's failure out of a short-sighted desire to humiliate Obama.

What can we take away from this episode? Although the economy has replaced national security as the most important issue in the minds of Americans, conservative bloggers remain quite preoccupied with foreign affairs issues, as demonstrated by their recent frenzy over Obama's bow to Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah. While righty bloggers are obviously opposed to Obama's domestic agenda (hence the "tea party" protests), they are equally opposed to his approach to foreign policy, which they warn will lead America to "the precipice".

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Andrew Sullivan (1, 2, 3, 4) and various liberal bloggers (Yglesias, Lewison, Hamsher, Benen) are criticizing the right-wing "tea party" protests, arguing that they're not spontaneous grassroots uprisings because Fox News and other outlets have been promoting them.
• Conservative bloggers (Horner, Lewis, Powers, Hinderaker, Reynolds) are buzzing about the upcoming tea party protests and pushing back against liberal critics.
• Conservative bloggers (Liebau, Powers, Painter) are criticizing Obama for flying a pizza chef from St. Louis to Washington so that he could prepare lunch for 140 White House guests.
• Liberal bloggers (Yglesias, Morrill, Benen, Willis) are criticizing Rep. Spencer Bachus (R-AL) for alleging that 17 unnamed House members are "socialists."
• Liberal bloggers (Greenwald 1, Greenwald 2, Roth, digby) are blasting Obama for adopting some of George W. Bush's controversial legal positions on detainee rights.

SOMALI PIRATES: See, Obama? Nobody Respects You!

Conservative bloggers spent much of the weekend accusing Obama of demonstrating weakness in his response to the kidnapping of an American sea captain by Somali pirates:

• RedState's bs: "The Somali 'pirates' are at it again, and this time they've provided the United States with that foreign policy crisis that VPOTUS [Joe] Biden predicted would occur. The pirates terrorists are now targeting US-flagged and manned vessels, and that puts our Eunuch-in-Chief in a position where he must (heaven forbid) make a real decision. To no one's surprise, he and his administration have decided to play nicey with the terrorists and negotiate with them. [...] It's very simple: the pirates are terrorists. Terrorists only understand force. Using 'hostage negotiators' simply shows the Somalis and the other Muslim (and other) terrorist communities out there that Fluffy isn't going to lift a finger to stop them. The emasculation of the United States is well underway, and it will not stop until something far worse than a rowboat full of buffoons with guns hits us."
• Pajamas Media's Roger Kimball: "The Age of Obama is shaping up to be another age of 'negotiation,' i.e., an age of accommodation and capitulation."
• Power Line's John Hinderaker: "This could be a sort of acid test: if the Obama administration can't bring itself to visit harsh retribution on pirates, when will it ever be willing to use force to defend American citizens and American interests?"
• Hot Air's Ed Morrissey: "The pirates have not heeded our power because thus far we have shown an unwillingness to wield it. Just as with religious-extremist terrorists, they will feast on American targets as long as they sense that reluctance to seriously deal with the problem."
• NRO's Victor Davis Hanson: "Piracy may or may not be a matter of American national security, but the American people will not for long stand the notion that a captive brave American ship captain risks his life to escape, while formidable American naval power either cannot or will not punish the miscreants."
• RedState's Warner Todd Huston: "[T]hese skinny, underfed, unorganized and ill-equipped pirates are making a fool of what is ostensibly the most powerful man in the world. [...] Obama is being tested from the most unlikely of sources. He is failing that test and showing the world that his 'America Sucks' tour of Europe was not mere glad-handing boilerplate. Obama is proving that he means to defang the most powerful nation in the world. Obama apparently intends to hobble the United States of America. If this is not the case, he'd better step up to the plate and end this pirate outrage quickly."

SOMALI PIRATES II: You Still Suck, Obama

Although CNN reports that Obama "granted two separate requests from the Defense Department to go forward with a military operation to rescue Captain Richard Phillips," most conservative bloggers are denying that Obama deserves credit for the rescue:

• Gateway Pundit: "Sorry libs. Obama did not give the direct order to kill the Somali pirates. You'll have to wait another day for the cut-and-runner to earn his hero badge."
• RedState's Jeff Emanuel: "Despite the Obama administration's (and its sycophants') attempt to spin today's success as a result of bold, decisive leadership by the inexperienced president, the reality is nothing of the sort. [...] Instead of taking direct, decisive action against the rag-tag group of gunmen, the Obama administration dilly-dallied, dawdled, and eschewed any decisiveness whatsoever, even in the face of enemy fire, in hopes that the situation would somehow resolve itself without violence -- thus sending a clear message to all who would threaten U.S. interests abroad that the current occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue has no idea how to respond to such situations, and no real willingness to use military force to resolve them."
• RedState's Caleb: "Playing pansy politics with pirates put the Captain's life at increased risk. His first escape attempt was thwarted by the thugs as Phillips remained adrift from the aid and cover of the US Navy, which sat restrained by an administration too cowardly to let slip the dogs of war. Each day the tension and humiliation of a nation grew. The emboldened pirates fired upon our men of action, who thus restrained could not yet act in kind. The terrorists' defiant lack of fear inspired their fellows to target other American vessels. All while the community organizer in chief flipped through his conflict resolution handbook. But here, at long last, the captive captain is free. He leapt clear and our faithful Navy, apparently at last free to take the safety off, rid the world of three contemptible degenerates and have the fourth in custody to question. So the bold leap into the sea frees the President of the burden to act. In the end, Captain Phillips wasn't saved by the President, but by his own courageous plunge and the deadly professionalism of our men with guns. The President, you see, was saved by the Captain."
• Hinderaker: "Scott [Johnson] noted earlier this morning that the White House is taking credit for the rescue of Captain Phillips. That's OK with me; in fact, I hope Obama gets some credit, as it may embolden him in future crises where military force may be necessary. However, based on what we know so far, it doesn't appear that the rescue owed much, if anything, to the White House. [...] In fact, the White House gave the most cautious authorization for the use of force that it possibly could have. Obama -- like, more significantly, Captain Phillips -- was saved by the willingness of the on-scene commander to stick his neck out and the skill of the Navy's snipers."

SOMALI PIRATES III: Credit Where Credit's Due

Other conservative bloggers offered Obama mild praise for his handling of the situation:

• NRO's Jonah Goldberg: "Good for President Obama. He approved the rescue. It was the right thing to do, with no small amount of risk. And God bless the SEALs."
• Morrissey: "Kudos to the SEALs, and kudos to Obama for making the right call. If this had gone badly, he would have taken the blame, so it's fair to credit him with taking the steps necessary to finally bring this to a happy conclusion."
• Right Wing News' John Hawkins: "I suspect that I will rarely have a chance to say this over the next four years, but I think Obama did a reasonably good job of handling the Somali pirate crisis. All the Americans are safe, three pirates are dead, and we have one captured pirate. Personally, I think we should hang the pirate without a trial, dump his body overboard, and go on a massive pirate killing spree in Somalia to show them what's going to happen every time they take an American. However, in all fairness, I do have to admit that George Bush probably wouldn't have gone that route either and it's entirely possible that this incident will have a deterrent effect. After all, what's the ultimate message here? You capture a typical vessel and they pay you ransom. You capture an American vessel and not only do you not get paid, the Navy shows up and kills you."

SOMALI PIRATES IV: America Wins, Conservatives Lose

Liberal bloggers are blasting their conservative counterparts who criticized Obama's handling of the hostage crisis:

• Daily Kos's DarkSyde: "This should never have been a political issue. And for most red, white, and blue Americans it was about as non-partisan as it gets. But nutballs on the fringe right just couldn't help themselves: while armed terrorists were holding a brave, innocent American at gunpoint, a few extremists elements were barely able to contain their glee at the thought of the terrorists winning, or at least for Phillips to remain captive or worse, all so that they could try and make the President look bad for a news cycle or two. What was for the rest of the nation a joyous Easter miracle has right-wing eliminationists furious. They're angrily denouncing the details of the rescue, vainly trying to revise events to fit their failed ideology. It's revolting, beyond the pale, and something this nation will not soon forgive or soon forget."
• AMERICAblog's Chris in Paris: "As the hostage crisis developed, the hard right had been mocking Obama, hoping that he and yes, America, would fail. As much as they try and run away from their desire to see everything fail during this Obama administration, it is their own hatred of Obama that failed. They have been all too willing to give him none of the credit for a success and all of the blame should anything go wrong. The reality, of course, is that both extremes are not correct though it never works out that way in the real world."
• Balloon Juice's John Cole: "Anyone who thinks that several most likely illiterate Somali thugs, armed with AK's and probably geeked to high heaven on khat, decided to attack a flagged American container ship as a test because there is a perception that Obama is weak, is just a full-fledged idiot and should be institutionalized."

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Thanks For Nothing, Evan Bayh!

Open Left's Chris Bowers:

"It is becoming increasingly obvious that the Senate, rather than the Obama administration, is the biggest obstacle to progressive governance right now. If we were dealing with only the House and the Obama administration, there would be a noticeably more progressive government in America. From health care reconciliation, to 100% auction cap and trade, to a larger stimulus package, to bailout reform, to bankruptcy 'cramdown' reform, and even to executive compensation, the Senate has moved to the right of both the House and the Obama administration. As such, it is the Senate, and not the Obama administration, against whom we should be directing more of our distrust and pressure.

Just imagine what we would have accomplished in terms of legislation without the Senate over the past few months. The stimulus would have had a hundred billion more in spending, 100% auctions would be on their way, hundreds of billions for new health care would be on its way, bankruptcy 'cramdown' would be law, EFCA would be law, executive compensation limits would be far more severe, and on and on and on. However, if we had the Senate but there was no President, the legislative accomplishments would have been pretty much the same."

LEST WE FORGET: Some Guy Who's Not Stephen Colbert To Deliver College's Commencement Speech

From The Onion:

"STATE COLLEGE, PA -- Penn State students were devastated Monday to learn that their commencement speaker will be 'some dork scientist' who discovered DNA, authored the groundbreaking book The Double Helix, helped establish the Human Genome Project, and is not late-night talk-show host Stephen Colbert. 'This is so lame,' said senior biochemistry major Beth Reiss, whose hero ever since she discovered her love for science has been Stephen Colbert. 'We didn't work our butts off in the lab for four years to sit and listen to some brainiac without his own insanely popular television show.' As of press time, the Nobel Prize-winning nobody was deliberating over perhaps opening his commencement speech with a joke."

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 01:30 PM

April 09, 2009

4/9: Funky Math

As we reported on Tuesday, liberal bloggers reacted very positively to the defense budget proposed by Defense Sec. Robert Gates, which included "deep cuts in many traditional weapons systems but new billions of dollars for others, along with more troops and new technology to fight the insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan." To be sure, some lefty bloggers were disappointed that Gates's budget did not reduce overall defense spending (in fact, Gates's $537B budget represents an increase over the $513B appropriated in the final year of George W. Bush's presidency). However, most online progressives praised the budget anyway because they liked the spending shifts that Gates advocated (e.g., less money for missile defense programs and F-22 fighter jets, and more money for increasing the size of the Army and Marine Corps).

Consequently, liberal bloggers are upset that various journalists and politicians are portraying Gates's budget as a reduction in military spending when the budget's bottom line is actually higher than last year's. Steve Benen complains: "Neither Gates nor [Pres.] Obama are proposing defense 'cuts.' Maybe they should, but they're not. Conservatives -- including conservative Democrats -- who argue otherwise just aren't telling the truth."

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Conservative bloggers (Malkin, Klein, Morrissey) are warning that Obama will be making a big mistake if he pursues comprehensive immigration reform this year.
• Liberal bloggers (Aravosis, Hamsher) and conservative bloggers (Erickson, Hawkins) are complaining that political advocacy groups aren't advertising on their blogs.

DEFENSE BUDGET: Addition Means Subtraction?

Liberal bloggers are pushing back against the journalists and politicians who imply that Gates is cutting overall military spending:

• Balloon Juice's John Cole: "2009 Pentagon budget: $513 billion. 2010 proposed Pentagon budget: $534 billion. Seriously, I can't be the only person to notice that this 'gutting' of the military includes spending 21 billion more than this year. I remember back in the day when Republicans and conservatives would get upset when Democrats framed increases in spending as cuts. Guess I am just getting old."
• The Washington Monthly's Benen: "[T]his explains why Republican policymakers have so much trouble with budgeting. They've convinced themselves that $534 billion is less than $513 billion. It's long been apparent that GOP lawmakers are bad at governing; it now appears they're also surprisingly bad at arithmetic. It's hard to believe the political discourse could be this ridiculous. The Obama administration not only wants to spend more on the military than Bush did, it also wants to spend more than China, Russia, North Korea, and Iran spend on defense combined -- times three. Neither Gates nor Obama are proposing defense 'cuts.' Maybe they should, but they're not. Conservatives -- including conservative Democrats -- who argue otherwise just aren't telling the truth."
• TPM's Brian Beutler: "[B]y retooling the Pentagon, Obama and Gates plan to move a lot of money around, but they also plan to increase the overall defense budget. [...] But you'd never know that from the news coverage."

Daily Kos' Markos Moulitsas slams Rep. Dan Boren (D-OK) after he questioned Obama's commitment to "providing a strong national defense": "Expect to see shit like this from elected officials from states that live off the military-industrial complex, like Oklahoma. The Oklahoma officials are less concerned with national security, than in protecting a defense cash-cow -- the Future Combat Systems, a network of aerial- and ground-based systems that allow hitting enemy armor without having line-of-sight. [...] While in true defense contractor fashion, the program is being developed in 41 different states (the better to protect funding in Congress), the Oklahoma portion is worth $500 million over three years. [...] Problem is, today's battlefield is less about massive Soviet tank armies, and more about counter-terrorism and counter-insurgency. And existing weapon systems are still technically far superior to anything the Russians or Chinese would be able to field. It makes sense to shift funding from obsolete battleground systems to bolstering the capabilities we most need at this time. Last time anyone checked, Al Qaida or the Taliban aren't running around with T-90s or fielding any artillery heavier than mobile mortars."

Moulitsas continues: "[A]ssholes like Boren and [OK Sen. James] Inhofe, unable to defend the Future Combat Systems on its merits, have to resort to claiming that Obama is weakening national security, even as he bolsters the already bloated defense budget beyond 2008 figures. Rest assured, they care far less about America's security than their defense contractor buddies back home. Otherwise, they'd be fighting for a force configured to fight today's wars, and fighting to protect the investment American taxpayers make in their national security."

DEFENSE BUDGET II: You Should Know Better, Contessa

Liberal bloggers are singling out MSNBC's Contessa Brewer for special criticism after she asked ex-Defense Sec. William Cohen "about this cut in defense spending" (Cohen proceeded to correct her, saying, "it's not a cut; it's a four percent increase"):

• TPM's David Kurtz: "A few minutes ago, Contessa Brewer had on former Secretary of Defense William Cohen, one of that vanishing breed of moderate New England Republicans, and asked him 'about this cut in defense spending.' To his credit, Cohen corrected her: 'By the way, it's not a cut. It's a four percent increase.'"
• Benen: "I get the sense the train has the left the station, and it's not coming back. News outlets -- including real ones, not Fox News -- have already accepted the bogus notion that Gates' plan cuts defense spending. Republican lawmakers aren't just repeating the false claim, they're practically apoplectic about it. The political world has apparently skipped right over the 'some critics of the administration charge....' and gone right to accepting false GOP talking points as fact without debate. Our political discourse can be awfully frustrating sometimes."
• Beutler: "I should say, I don't think this tendency stems from an intentional malice -- it's more of an epiphenomenon rooted in years of being led to believe that the president is obligated to a). increase military spending, and b). do so in a way that preserves or expands all existing Pentagon programs, however wasteful. Anything else computes as a 'spending cut'."

BooMan is frustrated: "Even though Obama's proposed Pentagon budget is more expensive than last year's budget, the Republicans insist on calling it a huge cut in defense spending. [...] I'd prefer to slash the Pentagon's budget by about 20% over Obama's first-term, but re-prioritizing defense spending is just as important as cutting. Obama's defense budget is an improvement in spite of its overall higher pricetag. But if the pricetag is higher to fend off criticism, the only way that will work is if the national media is willing to tell the people the truth without hedging. And when has that ever happened?"

IMMIGRATION: You Sure You Want To Do This Now, Obama?

Conservative bloggers are buzzing about a New York Times article (which was heavily promoted by Matt Drudge) alleging that Obama "plans to begin addressing the country's immigration system this year, including looking for a path for illegal immigrants to become legal." Most righty bloggers think Obama will be making a big mistake if he tries to pass comprehensive immigration reform during an economic recession:

• Michelle Malkin: "Since the last immigration battle, more and more citizens and local and state officials have begun to recognize the ravages of lax enforcement. When Obama moves forward with his official shamnesty legislation, he better be prepared. We've been there. Done that. And the White House should know that we are ready to stop the Open-Borders Express again."
• Power Line's John Hinderaker: "I suppose the Democrats figure they can pass anything they want, so they may as well take advantage of the time from now until 2010. Maybe they've forgotten the groundswell of opposition that arose a couple of years ago when President Bush tried to work with Congress to achieve comprehensive immigration reform. Bush's approval numbers never recovered from that effort; the reaction now, with unemployment much higher and the federal government already in disfavor due to bailouts, deficits, etc., is likely to be even stronger. As with so much that the Obama administration does, whether this is a good thing or a bad thing depends on whether you focus on the well-being of the country, or of the Democrats' political opposition."
• AmSpec Blog's Philip Klein: "The NY Times report that President Obama is planning to address immigration reform this year is pretty surprising. And by surprising I don't mean that it's unexpected that Obama would support legalizing illegal immigrants, but that he would risk a backlash on such a passionate issue that could seriously hinder is ability to achieve other aspects of his agenda. With unemployment at 8.5 percent, Republicans more likely to oppose a path to legalization now that a Democrat is president, and with Democrats having gained seats in a lot of conservative districts by talking tough on immigration, the political environment does not seem conducive to legalizing millions of illegal immigrants."
• Hot Air's Ed Morrissey: "With America bleeding jobs at the moment and unemployment at 8.5% and rising, the sympathy for blessing those who drive wages downward will not flow easily. [...] Democrats elected in traditionally conservative districts will lose those seats in 2010 if they push Obama's view of immigration reform, while Obama doesn't have to face voters for another two years. It could provide a game-changer for the mid-terms, and even [Speaker] Nancy Pelosi has to be smart enough to know that."

On the other hand, Gateway Pundit is nervous: "Democrats will push to legalize millions of illegal immigrants this year thus enslaving America under their socialist agenda for decades. This comes as no surprise. [...] They've got the votes. They've got the media to back them. They've got millions of new voters in the palm of their hand. It's only a matter of time now."

Right Wing News' John Hawkins thinks Obama is bluffing: "I have absolutely no doubt that Barack Obama would love to push amnesty through; however, my gut instinct is that he's going to turn out to be all talk and no action on this issue. Why? Well, I think Obama feels a need to throw a bone to the liberal Hispanic groups that helped get him elected. So, he's bringing this up to give them the impression he's working hard on an issue they care about."

BLOG ADVERTISING: Where's The Love?

As the economic recession takes its toll on online ad spending, liberal bloggers are complaining that political advocacy groups aren't advertising on their blogs. The Washington Post's Greg Sargent reports:

"Some of the leading liberal bloggers are privately furious with the major progressive groups -- and in some cases, the Democratic Party committees -- for failing to spend money advertising on their sites, even as these groups constantly ask the bloggers for free assistance in driving their message."

Two of the liberal bloggers quoted in Sargent's piece -- AMERICAblog's John Aravosis and Firedoglake's Jane Hamsher -- wrote additional posts elaborating on the issue:

• Aravosis: "There is the perception on the right that all of the top liberal blogs are funded by George Soros. I wish. We, for example, are funded by advertising and by your individual donations. Both are dropping in a terrible economy. No one subsidizes my blog. I wish they did. But they don't. [...] The immediate concern, that led to Greg's article above, is the plethora of liberal organizations who ask us for help -- wanting us to promote their pet cause, or simply their executive director's latest uttering -- but who never think of asking us if there's any way they can help us in return. These groups would never, in a million years, ask another liberal organization to post one of their press releases on the other group's Web site. In fact, they'd pay another organization, and do, for access to its members. But these same groups come to the blogs, time and again, and beg for our help, for free, and never give it a thought."
• Hamsher: "If you're Christian Dior and you want your clothes in Vogue, you have an interest in making sure Vogue is there tomorrow and the next day, so you buy advertising. If the New York Times Book Review section is an important part of your plan to sell books, there is a symbiotic interest in making sure your products are on display there, it isn't an attempt to purchase a positive review. So when the AARP announces a million dollar ad campaign to promote health care, and then sends us a press release assuming they'll get free exposure on the blogs, what's wrong with this picture?"

BLOG ADVERTISING II: Throw Us A Frickin' Bone Here

Conservative bloggers are voicing similar complaints:

• Robert Stacy McCain: "What Hamsher and the other progressive bloggers complain about, of course, is true on the Right, too. A conservative 501(c) outfit would much rather hire a 26-year-old dweeb with a master's degree in political science as a policy analyst -- figuring total cost of annual salary and benefits, at say, $80,000 -- than to give $4,000 a year in online grants to 20 right-leaning blogs. Exactly why that's true, I don't know, since $4,000 annually would buy a lot of linky-love, but it is true."
• RedState's Erick Erickson: "One area where the left has done a much better job than the right online is investing in blogs as a component of left-wing activism. [...] In the past few years, SEIU, AFL-CIO, NEA, DCCC, and a host of other left-wing organizations have been buying ads on left of center blogs keeping those blogs going -- allowing the bloggers on the left some financial incentive to keep blogging for the left. In addition to all of that, you've got the Soros gang and SEIU engaging in a host of left-wing activities online that recruit and fund online writers -- bloggers, journalists, etc. The right has not made the investment. In fact, I dare say RedState is one of the very few places where real collaborative work and outreach goes on among right of center organizations. And even here there is no real investment in advertising, etc."
• Hawkins: "We have deep pocketed think tanks and very few of them (Americans for Prosperity and the Sam Adams Alliance are notable exceptions) promote, link, or spend money on blogs. There are loads of deep pocketed donors in the GOP who toss around millions of dollars to fund huge ad budgets -- but, how many of them spend money on blogs? Not many. I got a promo from one of them, that shall remain nameless, a few days back. They were bragging that they were running a million dollar ad campaign. While that's great, as far as I can tell, they're not spending a cent of that ad campaign on conservative blogs -- and do you know how much it would cost to run an ad on every single blog in the conservative advertising network at Blogads for a week? At the moment, only $5,686. That's roughly 1/176 of the amount they're going to spend on this campaign, but they're not even willing to go that far to support the Rightroots that are out in the trenches every day."

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Are The Rightroots Emulating Code Pink's Tactics?

Moulitsas thinks conservative bloggers are wasting their time by putting so much effort into the "teaparty" protests:

"Back in our early years, we had better things to do with our time, like organizing for upcoming elections -- the things that actually matter in our modern political system. But the wingers have never been much for electoral organizing, what with their dreams of becoming the next Rush Limbaugh-style media sensation. Their single-minded obsession with punditry leaves little room for the hard work of fighting for an electorally viable Republican Party. And given that it's their ideology specifically that has made them toxic to the voters, they'd have to come up with ideas and whatnot. That wouldn't exactly play to their strengths, know what I'm saying? I mean, their best idea right now is to wave tea bags.

So the poor saps at the Next Right -- the closest thing on the Right they have to what we were doing back in 2002 -- are pretty much ignored and marginalized, while the rest of the conservative netroots is reading from Code Pink's playbook, working hard to replicate their stunning failure at relevancy. Bizarre, but hilarious."

LEST WE FORGET: "You're Fired" -- No, Really

The Hollywood Reporter describes the latest Fox reality show:

"'You're fired' -- but for real.

Fox has ordered a one-hour unscripted series that turns real-life company layoffs into a reality contest. The show's working title is 'Someone's Gotta Go.' Employees are called to a meeting and informed there will be layoffs, but with a reality show twist: The staff will be allowed to determine who is fired. The employees will have access to the company's internal information -- budgets, HR files, salaries, etc. -- to help make their decision.

It's the anti-'Apprentice': Instead of contestants vying for a dream job, they're fighting to keep the lousy one they already have."

The Hater's Amanda Gillette is disgusted:

"Kudos, Fox. In addition to making lay-offs that much more humiliating, you've now forced people to come up with a new low to hyperbolically say that reality television is close to sinking to. 'What's next? Televised executions?' doesn't quite cut it in the wake of Someone's Gotta Go.

How about: 'What's next? Televised slaughter of bald eagles, kittens, and the merciless de-winging of the last pegasus?' Or 'What's next? Who Wants To Be Hobbled?. Or 'What's next? Someone's Gotta Bomb This Orphanage?'"

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 12:30 PM

April 08, 2009

4/8: Norm's Road Gets Tougher

Now that the counting of improperly rejected absentee ballots has extended Al Franken's (D) lead over ex-Sen. Norm Coleman (R), liberal bloggers are calling on Coleman to end his legal battle. The netroots are arguing that Coleman has "no good reason" to keep fighting and are warning the GOP that it will do "severe lasting damage" to its future prospects in MN if it prevents the Senate from seating Franken soon. Lefty bloggers are also making a big deal of the fact that a prominent conservative blogger (Ramesh Ponnuru) is now calling on Coleman to concede. However, few (if any) conservative bloggers have joined Ponnuru in urging Coleman to give up the fight, although they are clearly pessimistic about his chances.

In other news, liberal bloggers are delighted that the VT House and Senate voted to override Gov. Jim Douglas's veto of a gay marriage bill. Most conservative bloggers haven't commented on the decision, but those who have are either praising it or declining to criticize it. Rod Dreher writes: "I am opposed, as you know, to gay marriage, but if states are going to have it, Vermont just got it the right way: democratically, through legislative action."

Finally, Pres. Obama continues to take significant heat from the netroots after his lawyers adopted some of the George W. Bush admin.'s legal theories in order to conceal information about the controversial NSA surveillance program. To say that Obama's actions thus far have been disappointing to civil libertarians would be a major understatement.

MN SEN: Give It Up, Norm

Now that the counting of improperly rejected absentee ballots has extended Franken's lead over Coleman, liberal bloggers are calling on Coleman to admit defeat:

• Beeton: "Thanks Norm! As a result of the former Senator's lawsuit, these ballots were opened and counted and the result reinforces what we've seen since election day: the more votes that are counted, the more Al Franken's lead grows. Tell Norm to give it up."
• The Reality-Based Community's Jonathan Zasloff: "Republicans now need to consider whether the possibility of delaying Senator Franken for a few more months, or even up to a year, will be good enough if it does the GOP severe lasting damage in the state itself. During the most severe economic crisis since the Great Depression, it's clear that the Republican Party -- and only the Republican Party -- is responsible for Minnesota being underepresented. [...] Does the GOP want to write it off for the next several election cycles?"
• BooMan: "I know that there is no good reason, but why would Norm Coleman bother to appeal now that the remaining ballots have been opened and added 87 votes to Franken's count? He has no hope of overturning the case and the whole process will cost him (and his donors) money. He may even have to pay Franken's court costs if he appeals. And his reputation isn't going to improve among Minnesota's voters. Is Coleman seriously willing to do all this just to delay by six months the day when Al Franken is sworn in as a U.S. Senator? With [AR Sen.] Blanche Lincoln and [PA Sen.] Arlen Specter both saying that they will filibuster the Employee Free Choice Act, there isn't even a pending piece of legislation that might justify excluding Franken for the remainder of this session. The EFCA is killed for this Congress regardless of Franken's situation. Any possibility that Coleman won't appeal? At what point should the Democrats attempt to seat Franken even without a certificate signed by [Gov. Tim] Pawlenty?"
• Moulitsas: "...Republicans ceased making this about justice and democracy a long time ago. At this point, they're merely fighting to prevent that 59th Democratic vote from being seated in the Senate."

MN SEN II: Listen To Your Friend Ramesh -- He's A Cool Dude

Liberal bloggers are also buzzing about the fact that a prominent conservative blogger -- NRO's Ponnuru -- is now calling on Coleman to "give up this fight":

• Zasloff: "Ramesh Ponuru is by most accounts a decent guy, and he showed it today, coming out clearly to say that it's time for Coleman to 'give up this fight.' Yes, yes: it shouldn't have even have gone this far, but you can't accuse Ponuru of just trying to string things out forever."
• Aravosis: "It was bad enough for Coleman when some in the media starting asking if it was time for him to give it up, but with lead conservatives joining the chorus, things are looking increasingly over. The only remaining question is whether Coleman himself realizes that."
• MyDD's Jonathan Singer: "With today's news that Al Franken's lead is actually growing, narrowing Norm Coleman's already extremely narrow path to overtaking Franken, Ponnuru's right. I'm surprised to hear him say this, and I'm not holding my breath for other conservatives to say the same thing (though who would be the next to chime in on this -- David Brooks?). Nevertheless, a semblance of reality from The National Review doesn't often happen."
• The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen: "[Coleman] has enjoyed considerable patience as he's dragged this process out, especially since he vowed in November to drop out, in the interests of public healing, if he trailed Franken in the vote totals. In light of this general tolerance, Coleman has felt practically no pressure -- from the media, from Democrats, from voters -- to face facts and get out of the way. Just the opposite; he's felt emboldened to keep going. But that's why I find Ponnuru's comment interesting -- it suggests even patience among Coleman's ideological allies is wearing thin."

Meanwhile, conservative blogger Allahpundit is pessimistic about Coleman's chances: "Three months ago I said [Coleman] might as well claw all the way to the bitter end, but we're near the bitter end now and at some point the costs of clawing will exceed the benefits. From what I can tell of this byzantine case, his last legal challenge in state court is essentially an equal protection argument modeled on Bush v. Gore. If that fails then he has to decide whether to start over in federal court, as the Senate GOP leadership wants him to do. I'm pessimistic. [...] If this drags on without any realistic chance of victory, the Democrats get red meat for their narrative of the GOP as an obstructionist 'party of no' and the likelihood of a months-long reprisal court challenge from the left (in [Jim] Tedisco's House race, maybe?) will rise. There are consequences potentially for Coleman, too: If and when Pawlenty moves on bigger things, he might want to run for governor, in which case a gracious concession even at this late date could polish his image."

GAY MARRIAGE: Vermont Strikes A Blow For Equality

Liberal bloggers are excited that the VT House and Senate voted to override Gov. Jim Douglas's veto of a gay marriage bill -- which marks "the first time [that] gay marriage has been legalized in a state through the formal legislative process" (as opposed to court-ordered legalization):

• Atrios: "This is awesome."
• Mother Jones' Kevin Drum: "Score one more for the good guys."
• The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen: "This is a breakthrough moment in the history of social justice, and Vermont -- my adopted home state -- has every reason to be very proud."
• MyDD's Todd Beeton: "What an amazing week this has been for equality."
• digby: "This time they can't say it was judicial activism or executive fiat that 'gave' gay people the right to marry. The legislature did it. (I'm sure they will find some way to make it seem illegitimate anyway, but it's going to be tough. It's democracy in action.)"
• Daily Kos' Markos Moulitsas: "Congratulations to Vermont, which is now the fourth state to offer full marriage equality to its residents, and the first to do it via the legislature. Being a [Howard] Dean partisan back in the day, I remember vividly how controversial it was when the state's judiciary imposed civil unions in the state. Remember, Dean had to walk around in a bulletproof vest for some time given the howls of outrage and the death threats that now-mundane move generated. Today, just six years later, civil unions is the 'reasonable' position. Crazy."
• AMERICAblog's John Aravosis: "This is huge. On many levels. First, Iowa and Vermont both making marriage legal within days of each other, that creates the sense of a trend. Second, in Vermont, the legislature made marriage legal. Not the courts, the legislature. Why does this matter? Because Republicans have been arguing for years that the problem with gay marriage is that THE COURTS are making these decisions, rather than the people via their elected representatives. Well, today the people made the decision to legalize same-gender marriages through their elected representatives. What will Republicans say now? We've met their test, and passed. Either the GOP simply hates gays, or they need to admit that we won, fair and square, even by the rules they set down."

Meanwhile, The Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan thinks the rightroots have been oddly quiet about the news from VT: "I'm struck by the stunned silence on the bloggy right to Vermont's momentous decision to pass marriage equality. The reason, I suspect, is that the anti-gay right has placed a lot of eggs in the judicial activism argument. They felt safest there, on procedural grounds, even if the logic of their position brought them into a very radical originalist jurisprudence that would largely eviscerate the social and cultural landscape of modern America (on race, particularly)."

GAY MARRIAGE II: Better The Legislatures Than The Courts

Most conservative bloggers haven't commented on the VT legislature's decision, but the few who have seem to accept it:

• Glenn Reynolds: "Though I've argued elsewhere before (coauthor [David] Kopel didn't entirely agree) that judicially recognized gay marriage is reasonable, there's no question that, politically, this is something that's much better done by legislatures than by courts. The big question is whether Obama will have the guts to push for a repeal of the [Bill] Clinton-signed Defense Of Marriage Act. Given Obama's lukewarm support for gay marriage, and his strongest supporters' role in voting in Proposition 8 in California, I kind of doubt that he will. Without that repeal, of course, Vermont marriages won't be respected in many other states."
• Belief Net's Rod Dreher: "I am opposed, as you know, to gay marriage, but if states are going to have it, Vermont just got it the right way: democratically, through legislative action. Of course it didn't start that way in Vermont, but that's how it's ended. A social experiment as radical as same-sex marriage should not be attempted without democratic consensus. Vermont has that now, and even though I think they've done the wrong thing, at least the elected representatives of the people have done this."
• Hot Air's Allahpundit: "[Vermont is] the first state to [legalize gay marriage] the old-fashioned way, i.e. legislatively, instead of by court ruling. [...] Normally this is where I'd gauge whether a constitutional amendment to overturn the decision is feasible or not, but since Vermont's gone off-script I'm without an angle here."

Other righty bloggers are arguing that the VT legislature wouldn't have legalized gay marriage had the VT Supreme Court not "forced the issue" in 1999:

• NRO's Matthew J. Franck: "Vermont has now adopted same-sex marriage, but has done so democratically, with the legislature's override of the governor's veto of a bill. This is how things ought to be done in a democracy, as I argue at The Public Discourse today. But let's not forget that the history of Vermont's struggle over this issue goes back ten years, to the state supreme court's decision in Baker v. Vermont, when the judges illegitimately instructed the legislature to choose between full-fledged marriage or civil unions with all the essential privileges of marriage. [...] Would same-sex marriage have arrived in Vermont in 2009 without the state supreme court forcing the issue in 1999? It's impossible to be certain, but I think probably not. So this is still, in part, a story of the leverage that judicial usurpation can produce in generating social change that legitimate representation of the people would continue to resist."
• AmSpec Blog's W. James Antle, III: "Judges played a role even here -- the civil unions regime was judicially imposed on a state without any mechanism for the people to vote directly; it is highly unlikely that this would have come to pass had that not been the case [...]"

OBAMA: Taking Heat From The Netroots

Liberal bloggers are blasting the Obama admin. for adopting the Bush admin.'s controversial legal theories in order to conceal information about the NSA's surveillance program:

• Salon's Glenn Greenwald: "Obama has repeatedly done the exact opposite of what he vowed he would do: rather than 'seek full accountability for past offenses,' he has been working feverishly to block such accountability, by embracing the same radical Bush/Cheney views and rhetoric regarding presidential secrecy powers that caused so much controversy and anger for the last several years."
• BooMan: "The Department of Justice is making insane and insupportable claims of executive power (.pdf) in an effort to prevent the public from learning the true scope of Bush's illegal warrantless surveillance. They are even making arguments that are broader than anything (except the Unitary Executive nonsense) that the Bush administration attempted in court. It is extremely disappointing, it is unjustifiable, and it is dangerous. If the Obama administration's position prevails we will have fourth amendment rights but no means of protecting them."
• dday: "I agree with President Obama that torture hasn't made us safer, but the continued failure to deal with what the Bush Administration has done CONTINUES to cripple our political influence around the world and our moral capability to lead. [...] It's not just about ending these practices. By refusing to investigate them, and even actively invoking claims like the 'state secrets privilege' to shield any possibility of a reckoning, the Administration implicates itself. Because they must use the same extreme claims of executive power, in some cases more so, to facilitate the cover-up."
• Daily Kos' mcjoan: "In three separate cases in as many months, the Obama Justice Department has used the same arguments that the Bush administration Justice Department used to attempt to stop judicial review of extraordinary rendition and warrantless wiretapping."

Aravosis thinks this could become a political liability for Obama: "I'm getting a number of emails about this. People are pissed. After all, Obama did promise to filibuster FISA, once upon a time."

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: The Role Of The Courts

Think Progress' Matthew Yglesias agrees with conservatives who argue that courts have played a role in pushing the public to accept gay marriage:

"The interesting thing about the Vermont legislature's strong vote in favor of gay marriage is that I think it illustrates that far from provoking a backlash against gay rights, pro-equality legal decisions on this front tend to drive the pace of change forward. One factor is that the more people see gay equality in practice, the less frightening it looks. But another factor is the dynamics of political leaders. This isn't really a topic that politicians want to deal with, even politicians with progressive views and progressive constituents. They would just as soon focus on something else. But a court case smokes the politicians out, and forces the better ones among the bunch to take up the cause and do the right thing.

That, in turn, can help push public opinion forward. Once people see political leaders who they respect debating the issue, it looks like a 'mainstream' topic. And when that happens, for a lot of folks basic values of fairness wind up trumping the fact that they've lived their whole lives with the rules being a certain way and it seems 'unnatural' to change them."

LEST WE FORGET: Historic Senator Robert Byrd Imploded In Controlled Demolition

From The Onion:

"WASHINGTON -- Thousands gathered Monday to watch the demolition of Sen. Robert C. Byrd, 91, who was torn down after nearly five decades as a prominent Beltway fixture. At 2:30 p.m., the once-modern senator was strategically detonated with explosive charges, causing him to collapse in a cascading succession that drew loud cheers from those in attendance. 'Sen. Byrd has been a beloved Washington institution for as long as most people in this city can remember,' House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said of the longest-serving senator in U.S. history, who was marked for implosion due to his leaky, dilapidated exterior and his failure to meet congressional health and safety standards. 'But alas, the time has come to make way for a new generation of leadership.' Sources reported that commemorative pieces of the legislator will be available for sale in the Capitol gift shop."

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 12:47 PM

April 07, 2009

4/7: You Go, Gates!

Bloggers are buzzing about the defense budget proposed by Defense Sec. Robert Gates, which includes "deep cuts in many traditional weapons systems but new billions of dollars for others, along with more troops and new technology to fight the insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan." Liberal bloggers are praising Gates for demonstrating "that the Obama administration is serious about finally shedding the legacy of the Cold War and building a military that is suitable for the 21st century." Another blogger writes: "You'd almost think that this budget was planned in the interests of national security rather than either defense contractor and lobbyist satisfaction or providing new toys for the boys." While some lefty bloggers worry that Gates' proposals are "too audacious" for Congress to accept, others are hopeful that Gates' background as a GOPer and a George W. Bush appointee will provide the Obama admin. with the necessary political cover.

Conservative bloggers, on the other hand, are accusing Gates of initiating "a hollowing-out of the military." Righty bloggers are particularly upset about Gates' proposal to cease production of the F-22, a fighter jet that they consider "a key to total air superiority". Michael Goldfarb warns that "ending production of the F-22...will seriously jeopardize America's current dominance of the skies" and predicts that this proposal will be "extremely controversial in Congress" (a prediction which quickly proved correct).

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Liberal bloggers (Bok, digby, Drum, McCarter) are outraged that GOP senators are reportedly threatening to filibuster Obama's legal nominees if he declassifies the Bush-era interrogation memos.
• Conservative bloggers (Lewis, Hinderaker, Hawkins) are accusing Obama of sounding too apologetic in his speech to the Turkish parliament.
• Liberal bloggers (Blue Texan, Lewison, Benen) are criticizing Rep. Michelle Bachmann (R-MN) for claiming that the Serve America Act will establish "re-education camps for young people."

DEFENSE BUDGET: Nixon Goes To China

Liberal bloggers are praising the defense budget proposed by Def. Sec. Robert Gates, which includes "deep cuts in many traditional weapons systems but new billions of dollars for others, along with more troops and new technology to fight the insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan":

• The Huffington Post's Max Bergmann: "The budget laid out by Gates gives a clear indication that the Obama administration is serious about finally shedding the legacy of the Cold War and building a military that is suitable for the 21st century. In fact, this budget closely resembles what many progressives have been calling for on defense over the last few years."
• The Reality-Based Community's Mark Kleiman: "New DoD budget in brief: Less F-22's, gold-plated Presidential helicopters, cruisers, amphibians, aircraft carriers, missile defense. More Predator drones, intelligence/ surveillance/ reconnaissance, special forces, Army choppers, F-35s, F-18s. You'd almost think that this budget was planned in the interests of national security rather than either defense contractor and lobbyist satisfaction or providing new toys for the boys. So far, Obama's decision to keep Gates is looking pretty good."
• TAPPED's Robert Farley: "Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has struck a staggering blow to a number of defense programs. [...] This is why Bob Gates is still secretary of defense; Obama didn't believe that such cuts would be possible under a Democratic secretary."
• Obsidian Wings' hilzoy: "It remains to be seen whether this survives Congress. But I'm really glad to see the administration take this on."

DEFENSE BUDGET II: The Audacity Of Gates

Some liberal bloggers are wondering if Gates' proposals are too audacious:

• Think Progress' Matthew Yglesias: "These are important shifts and this is audacious policy. Frankly, you've got to worry that it may be too audacious. The defense budget looks the way it looks because that's how the key players in congress want it to look, and I don't really know what Robert Gates or Barack Obama can do about that."
• Mother Jones' Kevin Drum: "[Gates is proposing to cut] a lot of platforms. Question: is going after so many programs at once (a) brilliant or (b) insane? I can make a case for either, but I can't quite convince myself which one it is."

Other liberal bloggers think Gates' background as a GOPer and a Bush appointee will help provide the Obama admin. with the necessary political cover:

• AMERICAblog's John Aravosis: "Gates [is] not just cutting some defense programs and increasing others, but proposing a total restructuring of our entire military -- something the Republicans will likely flip out over, since they really do enjoy their big toys (come on Aaron and Lindsey, you know you do). What's interesting, of course, is that Gates isn't just Obama's defense secretary. He was George Bush's defense secretary. So we basically have George Bush's war guy proposing this restructuring. [Richard] Nixon just went to China, folks. And Barack Obama orchestrated the entire thing by keeping Gates on in the cabinet. Not too shabby, this new president."
• The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen: "I can imagine that President Obama asked Gates to stay on precisely for days like today -- Republicans might, just might, be slightly less willing to attack the administration on Pentagon spending with a Republican Defense Secretary hand-picked by Bush-Cheney."

Firedoglake's Spencer Ackerman: "[I]f Gates were a Democratic defense wonk, I think it's fair to say, this budget submission would be pretty much inconceivable. A Democrat would have to build up a lot of credibility within the Pentagon; would have to work with [Gen. David] Petraeus and [Gen. Raymond] Odierno on Afghanistan and Iraq; would have to build a relationship on the Hill; and would probably end up running out the clock on all of that before getting around to a massive apple-cart-overturning about the most entrenched issues in the Pentagon budget. By keeping Gates, Obama's got a plan for withdrawal from Iraq that has attracted no significant Pentagon or uniformed acrimony; a refocus on Afghanistan with same; and a sprawling, huge, massive, ginormous, Herculean effort at getting rid of Pentagon bloat in the third month of his presidency. Gates is like the Abdul Sattar abu Risha of the GOP foreign-policy establishment."

DEFENSE BUDGET III: Save The F-22!

Conservatives are criticizing Gates' proposed budget:

• Commentary's Jennifer Rubin: "[O]ne wonders what arguments have persuaded [Gates] to reverse course and abandon these [missile defense] programs. The message to Iran and North Korea is clear: their provocations will be tolerated and we will not take the necessary steps to protect ourselves. Obama is the un-Reagan -- attempting to achieve peace through weakness. Our allies and foes are no doubt watching with interest."
• Townhall's Hugh Hewitt: "Against the backdrop of wild spending and massive deficits, the Pentagon cuts are startling. The first mission of the federal government is the nation's defense, and the president's budget spends billions on unnecessary and wasted spending while taking the knife to the country's weapons' systems. [...The military] needs the weapons of the next generation to remain capable of winning on the battlefields where it fights. Americans are right to worry that a hollowing-out of the military has begun.
• RedState's Moe Lane: "[E]ven if you consider all of these programs pork, there's a ludicrous amount of nonmilitary pork that has been enshrined into federal law. Asking the question of why it's acceptable to trim fat/meat/bone here and not elsewhere inevitably leads to the suspicion that the administration has decided that the net vote loss ratio is most favorable to the Democratic party here. Which is another way of saying that the White House has just subordinated American military policy to its domestic political strategy."

Conservative bloggers are particularly upset about Gates' proposal to end production of the F-22 fighter jet:

• Hot Air's Allahpundit: "Missile defense isn't even the worst cut, in my very poorly informed opinion. Scaling back the F-22 -- a key to total air superiority -- is."
• The Weekly Standard's Goldfarb: "Ending production of the F-22, a far more capable air superiority fighter than the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (which still has many obstacles to overcome before entering mass production), will seriously jeopardize America's current dominance of the skies. It will also be extremely controversial in Congress, where a not insignificant number of legislators represent the workers who assemble and manufacture the aircraft's component parts."
• Hewitt: "As recently as December, the Times ran a story reporting that the Air Force wanted 60 more F-22s, and though the cost of the additional planes was estimated at $9 billion, in the era of trillion dollar deficits, that seems hardly the sort of expenditure that would cause a blink of an eye, especially given the number of jobs that will be lost if the plane's production lines are shuttered."

GOP SENATORS: Nobody Stonewalls Like They Do

Liberal bloggers are buzzing about Scott Horton's report that GOP senators are threatening to filibuster Obama's legal nominees if he declassifies the Bush-era interrogation memos:

"Senate Republicans are now privately threatening to derail the confirmation of key Obama administration nominees for top legal positions by linking the votes to suppressing critical torture memos from the Bush era. A reliable Justice Department source advises me that Senate Republicans are planning to 'go nuclear' over the nominations of Dawn Johnsen as chief of the Office of Legal Counsel in the Department of Justice and Yale Law School Dean Harold Koh as State Department legal counsel if the torture documents are made public. The source says these threats are the principal reason for the Obama administration's abrupt pullback last week from a commitment to release some of the documents."

Lefty bloggers are angrily denouncing the GOP's tactics:

• digby: "[I]t appears the Senate has taken Dawn Johnsen and Harold Koh hostage and are threatening to go nuclear if the president doesn't agree to hide [Dick] Cheney's torture secrets. [...] Let's hope Obama stands up to them. If he shows weakness with the Republicans on this, there will be no end to it when it comes to judicial nominees. And it is vitally important that Obama balances out the courts after the past 25 years of centrist to far right appointments."
• Firedoglake's Phoenix Woman: "As it turns out, the Republicans are stonewalling Johnsen and Koh because they don't want to suffer any form of accountability for their actions, especially their wholehearted backing of torture. [...] Spread the word, folks. They were hoping to get away with their stonewalling by keeping it under wraps. But the more We the People squawk, the more sunlight hits them."
• hilzoy: "[W]hat the Republicans are doing is really unprecedented. First, the President has traditionally been given deference in the choice of his advisors. If some President wants to have someone in his cabinet, the presumption is that he ought to be able to do so, absent illegality or some sort of manifest incompetence. [...] Second, what the Republicans are trying to do is to dictate to the President a matter that is purely his prerogative: deciding whether or not to unclassify documents. This is insane: it's as though Obama threatened to withhold funding for the Senate unless [KY Sen.] Mitch McConnell fired some staffer he didn't like. [...] And the combination -- holding appointments hostage while trashing people's reputations in order to keep Obama from making a decision he plainly has the right to make -- is unconscionable."
• Drum: "These memos must be real time bombs. So much material has been released already, both officially and otherwise, that I've long assumed we already knew everything the Bush administraton had done -- in broad terms, anyway. But apparently not. If these memos just confirmed our use of things like stress positions and black sites, it's hard to imagine they'd prompt such ferocious opposition. There must be some truly new -- and truly gruesome -- disclosures in them."

Liberal bloggers are still urging the Obama admin. to release the Bush memos:

• Daily Kos' mcjoan: "Republican obstructionism is not a good enough reason for President Obama to reverse himself on one of his primary pledges: transparency. In fact, it's a pretty great political set-up for making the Republicans look even worse -- they're really fighting to protect torturers? Bottom line, those memos have to be released."
• Salon's Glenn Greenwald: "There is absolutely no justification whatsoever to continue to conceal these memos, and the fact that the GOP will stomp its feet and obstruct nominees doesn't come close to constituting an excuse for ongoing concealment."
• TAPPED's Adam Serwer: "This is a question of justice, and a question of democracy. Obama has said before that no one is above the law. For the administration to disobey a court order to release these memos flies in the face of that assertion. The Republicans trying to prevent disclosure by blocking Obama's legal nominees have already shown their contempt for the idea that the law applies to everyone, that some rights are inviolable, and that the American people have a right to know what their government does in their name."

OBAMA: Blaming America First?

Conservative bloggers are criticizing Obama's speech to the Turkish parliament:

• Townhall's Matt Lewis: "If the notion that a President of the United States can improve the image of his country by apologizing for a past President (as well as for his own nation's past actions) angers you -- it ought to. [...] By breaking the tradition of not criticizing your own country abroad, Barack Obama has undermined this nation in an attempt to be popular with Europeans and the Muslim world -- and to perceived as a 'reasonable' American."
• Power Line's John Hinderaker: "Obama's seemingly compulsive need to apologize to foreign audiences on behalf of the United States cannot be explained as a rational approach to diplomacy. As Paul [Mirengoff] suggested here, the roots of Obama's America-bashing seem to lie in a combination of ideology and psychology."
• NRO's Victor Davis Hanson: "In this great age of atonement, in a mere two or three days the world has been reminded that (1) the U.S. has been arrogant; (2) dismissive and derisive to Europe; (3) was a slave-owning society; (4) practiced genocide against native Americans; (5) did not let blacks vote; (6) was the only nation to have used nuclear weapons; (7) embraced torture; (8) alienated the world under Bush, and on and on. The subtext has been that those of a different race, of a different era, or under a different president have done terrible things, which I, from my own moral Olympus, must now apologize for."

Meanwhile, Right Wing News' John Hawkins criticizes Obama for saying, "We do not consider ourselves a Christian nation, a Jewish nation or a Muslim nation." Hawkins writes: "This country was founded by Christians seeking religious freedom and Christian principles shaped our founding documents and our culture. This nation would not be a great nation without Christianity and it will not remain a great or moral country without the majority of its citizens remaining Christian."

BACHMANN: Still Taking Crazy Pills

Once again, liberal bloggers are blasting Rep. Bachmann for making an inflammatory statement. This time, they're criticizing her for claiming that the Serve America Act mandates the creation of "re-education camps for young people, where young people have to go and get trained in a philosophy that the government puts forward and then they have to go to work in some of these politically correct forums":

• Firedoglake's Blue Texan: "I didn't think it was physically possible, but over the weekend, the performance artist known as Michele Bachmann out-crazied herself. [...W]e have a sitting Congresswoman telling people that the government is going to brainwash their kids in modern-day gulags. There's going to be a lot more Pittsburghs if this kind of talk continues, I'm afraid."
• Balloon Juice's John Cole: "I just can't think of anything clever to say regarding the latest outburst from Bachmann. This woman is clinical."
• Daily Kos' Jed Lewison: "Bachmann's nutty theory is straight out of the conservative playbook, accusing the Obama Administration of taking away basic freedoms held by Americans. It's no different than Fox's absurd claim that Obama wants to impose Sharia law, or their irresponsible attempts to fuel fear of a gun ban, and it's yet another sign of just how badly broken the modern GOP is -- and of how careless they are with the facts. Hopefully it's not necessary to point out that there are no government sponsored political 're-education camps' -- whether mandatory or voluntary. If you need more proof, FactCheck.org has debunked Bachmann's conspiracy theory."
• Benen: "First, there's nothing in the legislation requiring public service. It's about expanding service opportunities for those who choose to pursue them. Second, support for the expanded community service programs was bipartisan. The bill passed the Senate with 79 votes, and passed the House with 275 votes. Bachmann apparently believes some of her own conservative Republican colleagues backed an initiative to mandate public service and force young people into re-education camps that only exist in her twisted imagination."

The Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan: "It's now very clear just what happened in Pittsburgh when Mark Poplawski killed three policemen. He was acting out of far right conspiracy theories, and was armed with an AK-47. [...] The only person responsible for these murders is Poplawski. But it's a reminder that whipping up paranoia can lead to unintended consequences, especially as gun sales go through the roof in the wake of Obama's election. When someone like Michele Bachmann talks about the Obama administration forcing people into re-education camps, or forcing a global currency on the US, and other insanities, she needs to know the tinder box she is busy throwing matches into."

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: What's Wrong With Nuclear Proliferation?

NRO's Mark Steyn is disturbed by Obama's goal of establishing "a world without nuclear weapons":

"The wish for 'a world without nuclear weapons' is not merely a pacifist delusion but one that obliquely subscribes to the false equivalence so assiduously promoted during the Cold War. I wouldn't lose a moment's sleep if I read in the paper that New Zealand and Switzerland had decided to become nuclear powers. It's not the technology (which can't be un-invented, any more than the rifle or the spear or the sling could). It's the regime. North Korea and Iran going nuclear is not the same as Norway and St. Lucia going nuclear. It is so depressing to see the president of the United States mired in obsolete Cold War non-proliferation bromides.

Consider two possible responses to the inevitable Iranian nuclearization:

a) The Sunni Arab dictatorships (Saudi Arabia and perhaps Egypt) decide to go nuclear rather than live under Iran as the regional hegemon.

b) The Sunni Arab dictatorships knuckle under the Iranian nuclear umbrella and Teheran becomes the de facto controller of Arab oil supply and much else.

I'm not sure proliferation wouldn't be the least worst option.

It's not just embarassing to hear the so-called 'leader of the free world' talking like a 14-year old who's been up in his room listening to 'Imagine' for too long. I fear this presidency has the makings of global tragedy."

LEST WE FORGET: Assimilate This

From Overheard in New York:

Cashier: Wow, you speak really good English. Where are you from?
Hipster Asian dude: I'm from Tokyo and I've been taking classes since I was three so I'm really articulate and speak great English.
Cashier: Really?
Hipster Asian dude: Fuck no. I'm from Queens.

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 12:56 PM

April 06, 2009

4/6: But Why, Bayh?

Sen. Evan Bayh (D-IN) has taken a lot of heat from the netroots ever since he announced the creation of a moderate caucus intended to push back against Pres. Obama's budget proposals. On Friday, Bayh incited a fresh round of blogger criticism when he and Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) became the only two Senate Dems to vote against Obama's budget. Liberal bloggers are calling Bayh "the new Lieberman" and are blasting him for siding with the GOP "on the most important domestic policy vote of his career." Lefty bloggers don't buy Bayh's claim that he voted against Obama's budget out of genuine concern about the growing deficit, since he also voted for an amendment that would cut taxes on multimillion-dollar estates (and deprive the government of an estimated $250B in revenue). Matthew Yglesias points out that "someone horrified by the prospect of increased deficits wouldn't be pushing for estate tax cuts," while Ezra Klein observes that Bayh's voting record seems to swing to the left or the right depending on what office he's running for.

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Conservative bloggers (Huston, Boot, Johnson) are accusing Obama of demonstrating weakness in his response to North Korea's rocket launch.
• Conservative bloggers (Whelan, Dreher, Erickson) are decrying the Iowa Supreme Court's decision to strike down a state law limiting marriage to a man and a woman.
• Liberal bloggers (Drum, Yglesias, Bok, Dayden) are urging the Obama admin. to release the classified Bush-era interrogation memos.

BAYH: Hypocrisy, Thy Name Is Bayh

Liberal bloggers are criticizing Bayh after he and Nelson became the only two Senate Dems to vote against Obama's budget. Lefty bloggers are also angry that Bayh and Nelson voted for Sen. Mike Johanns' (R-NE) amendment, which "would have resulted in a budget that all-but-froze non-defense discretionary spending":

• The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen: "Yes, Bayh is the new [Joe] Lieberman."
• Oliver Willis: "Evan Bayh and Ben Nelson should just be Republicans. Because not only did they vote against the President's budget, they voted for the Republican budget from planet insane. On a defining document like that, to be against the ideology of what we're trying to do here is just simple betrayal and a desire to put your own political capital ahead of fixing the country. I feel totally justified that my 'Oh Hell No' sense went off the charts when Bayh was being bandied about by the media as a possible veep choice."

Bayh defended his "no" vote by arguing that the budget would cause our national debt to "skyrocket." However, liberal bloggers aren't buying Bayh's rhetoric about fiscal responsibility, since he also voted for the Lincoln-Kyl amendment that would cut taxes on multimillion-dollar estates (and deprive the government of an estimated $250B in revenue):

• dday: "So how did [Bayh and Nelson], who voted affirmatively for a Republican budget, justify their votes? They said it costs too much. [...] These same two Senators, the ones whining and crying about fiscal responsibility, voted last night to shield millionaires from taxes on their estates, costing the government $250 billion dollars."
• Think Progress' Yglesias: "[S]omeone horrified by the prospect of increased deficits wouldn't be pushing for estate tax cuts. More broadly, someone specifically horrified by deficits would be concerned not only about reducing spending but about increasing revenues. I, for one, am inclined to agree that the long-term deficits envisioned in the Obama administration's budget plan are too high. I would advocate lower spending on the defense side than Obama's envisioning, and more revenue through any of a number of possible mechanisms. Bayh, by contrast, seems to have a rather one-sided aversion to spending on domestic programs. That's not a unique sentiment in the United States congress, but it's a curious belief set for a Democrat."
• Klein: "I understand Evan Bayh's decision to vote against the budget. In a Senate with 59 Democrats, the opportunity to emerge as the marquee swing vote is undeniably attractive. It brings with it real power over policy and real celebrity in Washington. And there's even a legitimate argument that Bayh developed in his statement today. [...] But then why vote -- on the very same day -- for the Kyl-Lincoln bill lowering the tax rate on estates over $7 million from 45 percent to 35 percent and reducing charitable giving? That's $250 billion more debt over 10 years. It's in direct conflict with Bayh's statement on the budget. It makes him look insincere."
• Obsidian Wings' hilzoy: "I really do have to give a special shout-out...to those Senators who go on and on about fiscal responsibility and yet found it in their heart to vote for [the Lincoln-Kyl] amendment."

BAYH II: What's Really Motivating Him?

Several liberal bloggers are speculating about Bayh's motives for voting against the budget:

• The Democratic Strategist's Ed Kilgore: "Best as I can tell, Bayh's vote was motivated by a sincere horror of deficits and debt, which is so strong that he doesn't mind abandoning his party and indeed, his fellow 'centrists' on what was, after all, the most epochal budget vote since at least 1993 and probably since 1981. For that very reason, he ought to step back from his leadership role in the Senate 'centrist' group, in favor of senators whose agreement with and loyalty to the Obama agenda is much less in question. If this group remains the 'Bayh group,' it will struggle to achieve the credibility it needs to become anything other than a crude power bloc looking to shake down the administration and the congressional leadership for personal, ideological, and special-interest favors."
• Atrios: "Bayh already announced that he and the rest of the Bayh Dogs have no agenda, which means he gathered a bunch of people together and said, 'Here's my plan to make us more powerful and give us more leverage.' Maybe they'll figure out an actual agenda eventually, but for the moment the agenda is whatever Bayh says it is. Whether his yapping puppies follow along on a regular basis remains to be seen..."
• Klein: "[Bayh]'s running for reelection in Indiana this year, but this is also the year that Indiana's tectonic plates shift and the state chooses that Obama guy. So I'm not going to pretend that I fully understand the motivations behind the sharp swings in Bayh's voting record. But they're undeniably present, and seem to be keyed to political campaigns. Bayh is much steadier during the 107th and 108th Congresses, when no elections loom."
• BooMan: "Ezra Klein wants to know why Evan Bayh was uncharacteristically liberal in 2005-2008 and why he is uncharacteristically conservative now. Simple. Between 2005 and 2008, Evan Bayh was either thinking of running for president or auditioning for vice-president. As such, he did not want to appear too conservative. When he got passed over by Obama for the veepee nod, he decided to exert his revenge by organizing a caucus of 'moderates' to screw everything up and maximize his influence."

Yglesias: "I've heard some see this as an act of political cowardice on Bayh's part, but I think that's wrong. Obama carried Indiana. There are many Senate Democrats in more vulnerable states who voted 'yes.' Bayh just made a decision of conscience and principle to stand with [KY Sen.] Mitch McConnell and [SC Sen.] Jim DeMint on the most important domestic policy vote of his career. It's not clear to me where this leaves the Bayh Bunch of 'practical' moderates, since virtually none of its members followed their leader."

OBAMA: A Weak Response?

Conservative bloggers are accusing Obama of demonstrating weakness in his response to North Korea's rocket launch:

• RedState's Warner Todd Huston: "Behold the fecklessness of Obama's foreign policy. On the heels of the Bush administration kicking the North Korea can down the road, we get The One's tepid response [...] After his love letter to Iran not long ago, now we get this from The One...'STOP it or we will say STOP it again!' The world is getting more dangerous every day and this fool is touring the world on vacation while it happens."
• Commentary's Max Boot: "'Rules must be binding. Violations must be punished. Words must mean something,' Obama thundered. Yet at the same time North Korea's violation of existing United Nations sanctions was being met with toothless debate at the UN, to be followed apparently by an announcement that the Department of Defense will cut funding for missile defense. Meanwhile, the administration has affirmed its willingness -- nay, burning desire -- to conduct one-on-one talks with Tehran and Pyongyang, thereby in effect legitimizing those criminal regimes regardless of all their provocations and violations of existing treaties. This approach sends a dangerous message of American weakness in the face of growing nuclear threats."
• Power Line's Scott Johnson: "Given North Korea's existing nuclear weapons, the launch presents a threat to the the United States. Working in tandem with Iran, North Korea helped Syria install the nuclear reactor that Israel bombed last year. Iran's nuclear program is itself on the verge of producing a nuclear weapon. With the Obama administration now working feverishly to conciliate Iran, one senses that we are sleepwalking toward the precipice."

OBAMA II: Release The Torture Memos!

Liberal bloggers are urging the Obama admin. to release the classified Bush-era interrogation memos, even though nat'l security advisor John Brennan is "fiercely lobbying" against the release of these memos:

• Mother Jones' Kevin Drum: "Brennan's argument is that release of the memos might embarrass allies who helped us torture prisoners. He might even be right. But if that makes foreign intelligence services more cautious about helping us commit war crimes in the future, that would be a argument in favor of releasing the memos, not against it."
• Yglesias: "As Kevin Drum says if the best argument against releasing the last still-classified Bush-era torture memos is that doing so might embarrass people, countries, and institutions that were involved in war crimes, then that's not really much of a reason at all. That's embarrassing, shameful stuff. That's why you need to release the memos."
• hilzoy: "Fear of embarrassing countries who cooperated with us cannot possibly be the reason for not releasing the memos. The solution is too simple: just redact their names and any identifying details. Are we supposed to believe that this has not occurred to [CIA dir. Leon] Panetta or [AG Eric] Holder? Or that there is some identifying detail that is so thoroughly intertwined with the legal arguments that it cannot possibly be edited out? Give me a break. President Obama: let us see what our public servants defended as lawful, and the arguments they used. If necessary, don't name the countries who, to their shame, decided to assist us. But don't insult our intelligence by pretending that you and your administration have never heard of White-Out."
• dday: "Clearly, Brennan wants to keep open the option of torturing in secret, or at the least save his pals some heartburn. Boy, I know I'm sure glad liberal bloggers fought the good fight and denied Brennan an important voice inside the Administration. We sure showed him, right?"
• TalkLeft's Big Tent Democrat: "President Obama needs to make clear that he stands against torture as a legitimate policy. He must order these memos released."

The Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan: "'Holy hell has broken loose over this,' is how one of Mike Isikoff's sources has described John Brennan's attempt to prevent release of three damning OLC memos drafted by the Bush administration in its systematic program for torturing terror suspects. One begins to realize how deeply important it was that Brennan didn't get the top CIA job. You see now his attachment to the torture regime he pretended to oppose and his fierce loyalty to CIA officers who may have committed war crimes and now seek to prevent the American people from finding out what was done in secret, against the law, in their name."

IOWA: Damn Activist Judges!

Conservative bloggers are decrying the Iowa Supreme Court's decision to strike down a state law limiting marriage to a man and a woman:

• NRO's Ed Whelan: "The lawless judicial attack on traditional marriage and on representative government continues."
• Belief Net's Rod Dreher: "Thus does seven men and women overturn the meaning of an ancient and fundamental social institution, in a single stroke."
• RedState's Erick Erickson: "Iowa and the other state courts that have overturned legislatively enacted bans on marriage have done so by substituting the judges' policy preferences for the legislatures. In doing so, they have then stretched beyond meaning or intention the constitutions of the various states. [...] Until we make a regular habit in this nation of impeaching activist judges who put their personal policy preferences ahead of the constitutions of the several states and nation, we will just keep bowing lower and lower to our black robed masters."

Conservative bloggers are also speculating about how the ruling will affect the 2012 IA GOP caucus:

• RedState's Josh Painter: "While it's still a bit early to be counting votes (straw or otherwise) in Iowa, the action by that state's Supremes should indeed make the race more interesting. Look for [ex-MA Gov.] Mitt Romney to be talking up his opposition to gay marriage in the coming months."
• The Next Right's Soren Dayton: "This [ruling] could lead to a further minimization of the Iowa Caucus. My understanding is that Mitt Romney, who must be considered the front-runner, is already trying to figure out how to avoid Iowa or somehow reshuffle the deck. A number of candidates could reasonably try to skip it."

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: The Tide Of History

Anonymous Liberal reacts to the Iowa Supreme Court's gay marriage ruling:

"When you take a step back and look at the basic legal argument behind these cases, the correct answer is remarkably clear. So clear, in fact, that I'm quite certain that future generations of lawyers and law students will look at these cases and wonder why it took so long for the courts to reach such an obvious conclusion, particularly in light of the extensive (and directly analogous) case law dealing with miscegenation laws and segregation. Once you accept the premise that there is nothing wrong with being gay (a premise which, I think, the vast majority of people -- especially educated people like judges -- accept), it becomes nearly impossible to make a principled legal argument in defense of laws that prohibit gay people from being married. It's just such an obvious and straightforward violation of equal protection.

I'll go out on a limb and predict that -- within 10 years -- the U.S. Supreme Court, in an opinion authored by Justice [Anthony] Kennedy, will issue a landmark ruling striking down prohibitions on gay marriage. I also believe that the next Democratic presidential nominee will be unapologetically pro gay marriage, and it's not inconceivable that at some point during his time in office, President Obama himself will publicly reverse his position on this issue. The political and legal trajectory of this issue is pretty easy to chart out at this point. And when it reaches its logical endpoint, with full marriage equality across the country, we're all going to look back and wonder why it took so damn long to recognize something so obvious."

LEST WE FORGET: He Has A Great Jump Shot, But What About His Eye Spacing?

ESPN's Bill Simmons posts the following e-mail from "Kevin" in Boulder, Colorado:

"Anyone who watches the Discovery Channel knows that a predator's eyes are in the front so they can gauge the distant to their prey, while a herbivore's eyes are on the sides of their head so they can watch for predators. Look at a picture of Tracy McGrady and tell me that his eyes aren't on the sides of his head. The guy is clearly built to graze, not to hunt. Eye separation is going to be the new wingspan. Mark my words, 15 years from now Jay Bilas will be raving about Lil' Lebron's 'eye spacing.'"

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 01:22 PM

April 03, 2009

BLOGGER SPOTLIGHT: Joe Sudbay

Today the Blogometer talks to AMERICAblog's Joe Sudbay.

(If you're looking for Friday's edition of Blogometer, click here).

Where did you grow up?
Portland, Maine

Where do you live now?
Washington, DC

If you have an occupation other than blogging, what is it?
Consulting with progressive groups on blogging, new media and political strategies.

What's on your iPod right now?
I don't have much of an ear for music, but just bought the song "Jai Ho" from Slumdog. I'm always looking for songs that will motivate me on long runs.

What book do you think every person should read?
Not in order of importance but, start with the complete works of Calvin and Hobbes. Every activist should read 'Taking on the System' by Markos Moulitsas to know how to work around -- and end the influence of -- the 'gatekeepers.'

Please finish this sentence: 'When I'm not blogging, you'll probably find me...'
Walking my dog, Petey.

What has been your favorite blog post, or your favorite story to write about?
Back in 2005, we spent a lot of time writing about the Ohio GOP's "rare coin" scandal. That really started a backlash against Republicans in the state and helped lead to Democratic leadership. I like finding issues that are bubbling at the state and local level, and trying to get them some more attention.

Which blogger(s) do you consider indispensable, if any?
It waxes and wanes a bit depending on what's hot. On a daily basis (sometimes hourly) I check in on the liberal blogs: DailyKos, Talking Points Memo, FireDogLake, Sam [Stein] and Nico [Pitney] and their crew at Huffington, PoliticalWire, 538, ThinkProgress, Atrios, MyDD, Digby.

Who's your favorite non-liberal blogger?
I didn't know there were any. I really don't read the conservative blogs, but I'm a fan of David All and hope that the Republicans don't listen to his advice on new media.

Who's your favorite active politician? Least favorite?
I have to name a couple favorites: [Barack] Obama, for starters.. I'm a big fan of [Sec/State] Robin Carnahan in Missouri and think she has an amazing future ahead of her. And, since he's active again (at least diplomatically) [ex-Sen.] George Mitchell from Maine. Least favorite: Long list starting with [KY Sen.] Mitch McConnell and [ex-MN Sen.] Norm Coleman.

What would you realistically like to see Democrats accomplish in 2009?
Real Health care reform. If they don't do it this year, it probably won't get done. And, it needs to get done. I don't know anyone who has not had problems with their health insurance company. This fight is against a lot of money and lobbyists, but the opponents aren't liked at all by the public. Democrats need to deliver, and we can if we don't settle (see next question and answer).

If you could give President Obama advice, what would it be?
Avoid getting caught up in the DC bubble. The times call for bold action and the DC "elite" are averse to boldness. Don't ever listen to the pundits (which doesn't preclude listening to liberal political bloggers on sites like AMERICAblog, for example). Feel comfortable enough to ignore advisers and consultants who want you to temper your agenda or water it down. That guarantees you, at most, half of a very bad loaf -- and in any case, caving never wins any votes from the other side, and simply makes you look weak. Also, keep using new media to talk and interact with the American people (And, call on more bloggers at the press conferences -- and read more blogs).

What keeps you up at night?
My dog's snoring. Literally.

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 01:36 PM

4/3: Abandoning The Dodd Ship

How much longer are the netroots willing to stand by embattled Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT)? Not much longer, it appears. After yesterday's Quinnipiac poll showed ex-Rep. Rob Simmons (R-CT) leading Dodd by 16 pts, liberal bloggers have begun to talk about either pushing the five-term senator to retire or fielding a primary challenger. Arjun Jaikumar declares that Dodd is "screwed" and warns that "if [Quinnipiac's] polling numbers are legitimate, we need a new candidate." Several bloggers are mentioning CT AG Richard Blumenthal as a potential replacement, while Nate Silver suggests CT Reps. Rosa DeLauro, Chris Murphy, and Joe Courtney. Silver then articulates what appears to be the consensus view in the liberal blogosphere: "[I]f the Democrats want to have any realistic hopes of picking up a 60-seat majority in 2010, they can't afford to be underdogs in states like Connecticut."

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Conservative bloggers (Steyn, Johnson, Malkin, Greenwald) are criticizing Pres. Obama for bowing before shaking Saudi King Abdullah's hand at the G-20 summit.
• Liberal bloggers (Benen, Sudbay, Yglesias, Aravosis) are criticizing House Min. Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA) for praising Rush Limbaugh and suggesting that Washington was "over-reacting" to the economic crisis.
• Liberal bloggers (Marshall, Lewison, Benen, Drum) are defending Obama's nominee for State Dept. legal adviser, Yale Law School dean Harold Koh, in response to conservative attacks.

Finally, please check back later today for our interview with AMERICAblog's Joe Sudbay!

DODD: The Netroots Want A New Candidate

Now that a new Quinnipiac poll shows Simmons leading Dodd by 16 pts in a hypothetical 2010 Senate race, liberal bloggers are just about ready to give up on Dodd:

• Daily Kos' Jaikumar: "Dodd [is] screwed. There's no other way to put it. [...] Even assuming this is a crazy outlier, Dodd is in huge trouble, and has been for months. If this polling is in the least accurate -- and Quinnipiac's last poll, along with Research 2000's March poll for Daily Kos, differ substantially -- Dodd is dead in the water. [...] We can only hope this is an outlier. Because if these polling numbers are legitimate, we need a new candidate."
• MyDD's Todd Beeton: "The one way to ensure that we keep the seat would be for Dodd to step aside and let CT Attorney General Richard Blumenthal jump in. Dodd has insisted that he has no intention of stepping aside but that was before a poll showed him with a double digit deficit. If subsequent polls confirm Quinnipiac's findings, I think Dodd's really got to revisit that decision."
• Open Left's Chris Bowers: "[R]etaining this seat will probably require either Dodd not seeking re-election, or Simmons being defeated in a Club for Growth fueled primary. If Dodd were to step aside, it is a lock that Attorney General Richard Blumenthal would be able to retain the seat for Democrats. A February Q-poll recent poll showed Blumenthal defeating [Sen. Joe] Lieberman by 28% in the general election, and with a 79%-12% approval rating. While it would be unfortunate to lose such a rock-solid chance to defeat Lieberman, recent polling from Research 2000 has shown that Ned Lamont is still primed to defeat Lieberman in 2012 if he decides to run again."
• FiveThirtyEight's Silver: "While we have a long way to go until November 2010, it's fairly startling to see a four-term Democratic incumbent down by 16 points in a deeply blue state. And make no mistake: this is all about Dodd's negatives, rather than anything in particular that former U.S. Rep. Rob Simmons, the declared Republican challenger, is doing. [...] On paper, the most compelling alternative is probably Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro, a longtime champion for working class interests. But DeLauro was Dodd's former chief of staff, and it's hard to envision her running against her old boss. Chris Murphy, however, could present a compelling alternative, as could potentially Joe Courtney."

Meanwhile, conservative bloggers are offering their own thoughts about the upcoming CT Senate race:

• NRO's Ramesh Ponnuru: "Dodd's numbers are bad news for Republicans, aren't they? If the Democrats get Dodd to withdraw, or someone beats him in the primary, the seat becomes much harder to take. Republicans need him bleeding but not dead."
• Hot Air's Ed Morrissey: "[O]ne commenter noted that the worst thing that could happen to Republicans would be to have Dodd retire instead of run for re-election. Ned Lamont might wind up taking Dodd's place, and you can bet the netroots would love to see that happen. After a couple more years of Dodd fronting for Democrats in the Senate on financial policy, though, even Lamont and the netroots won't be able to save this seat."
• AmSpec Blog's W. James Antle, III: "If these numbers hold up, they will also make the Republican primary more competitive. [State Sen.] Sam Caligiuri is more conservative than Rob Simmons. While Simmons continues to look like the strongest candidate, Caligiuri supporters will be able to argue that their candidate could potentially win the seat."

OBAMA: Bowing And Scraping?

Conservative bloggers are furious and disgusted that Obama bowed before shaking Saudi King Abdullah's hand at the G-20 summit:

• NRO's Mark Steyn: "So let me see if I understand American protocol in the age of Obama: The First Lady hugs Queen Elizabeth as if she's some granny at a seniors' center photo-op, but the President of this republic prostrates himself before King Abdullah as if he's a subject of the Saudi pseudo-Crown."
• Power Line's Scott Johnson: "Americans do not bow to royalty. In my view, when the royal is the ruling tyrant of a despotic regime, the wrong is compounded. Putting aside the breach of American protocol, it is akin to Jimmy Carter succumbing to [Leonid] Brezhnev's infamous kiss at the signing of the arms accord in Vienna in 1979. It is a disgrace. As in Carter's case, Obama's supplicant attitude signifies his spirit. In this respect I distinguish it from George Bush's otherwise embarrasing handholding with the the king."
• Michelle Malkin: "I hope all the lefties who tore into Bush over his Saudi prostration will express equal disgust with President HopeAndChange's literal bowing and scraping to King Abdullah. [...] Bleccch. Is this diplomatic protocol? And if so, when did diplomatic protocol start mattering to Obama, anyway?!"
• Townhall's Carol Platt Liebau: "The image actually highlights what, for me, seems to be one of the biggest problems for this administration: The line between courtesy and symbolic subservience."
• The American Thinker's Clarice Feldman: "I am quite certain that this is not the protocol, and is most unbecoming a President of the United States."
• Jules Crittenden: "Al Qaeda's going to love this: Apostate House Negro of the Hated Crusaders abases himself before Abdullah the Crusader lackey and apostate Zionist-lickspittle."
• RedState's Jeff Emanuel: "Look, I know he said he was going to go out of his way to get on other world leaders' good sides, but this seems to be going a bit overboard."
• Commentary's Abe Greenwald: "Barack Obama has literally bowed before King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. Here's the question: Was this unprecedented embarrassment the result of the Obama team's inexperience, incompetence, or inclination toward American humility on the world stage? Here's the answer: Who cares? Whatever the cause, the fallout will be the same. Among Muslim democrats and human rights advocates, utter dejection that the 'leader of the Free World' has offered himself as a 'subject' of the Saudi monarch; among Islamists, bliss over America's seeming prostration before Salafist Islam; among international bad actors, assurance that America poses no threat; and among our allies, depression about the new systemic instability of the most dependable superpower in history."
• Hot Air's Allahpundit: "If this is a bow, it's more than Elizabeth got when The One met her yesterday. Maybe if she started beheading people for not practicing the state religion, she'd have received a little more deference."

Meanwhile, liberal bloggers are mocking their conservative counterparts for making a big deal about this incident.

CANTOR: Guys, I Know The Economy Sucks, But Let's Not Overreact

Liberal bloggers have spent much of the past 24 hours criticizing Cantor for praising Limbaugh and suggesting that Washington was "over-reacting" to the economic crisis:

"As far as Rush, Rush has got ideas. He's got following. He believes in the conservative principles that many of us believe in -- of lower taxes, of making sure that we turn back towards a focus on entrepreneurialism in this country, to promoting innovation and not stamping that out by over-reacting, if you will, which this town often does, to crisis."

Many liberal bloggers are blasting Cantor for suggesting that Washington was "overreacting" to the economic crisis:

• The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen: "It's hard to imagine what Cantor was thinking. Democrats care too much about fixing the economy? That's the pitch from the House Republican leadership?"
• Oliver Willis: "From the people who brought you John McCain's 'the fundamentals of the economy are strong'. Republicans remain completely and absolutely out of touch with the people."
• AMERICAblog's Joe Sudbay: "Eric Cantor just pulled a McCain. He showed just how out of touch the Republican Party is. It's bad enough that Cantor and his fellow Republicans created the economic crisis. It's worse that they're doing everything possible to prevent it from being fixed."
• Think Progress' Matthew Yglesias: "Hm...it seems that rising star Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA) thinks Democrats are 'overreacting' to the economic crisis and ought to do less to try to help the economy recover. [...] I think this is criticism Obama can survive. I wonder if Cantor really wants to repeat the 'fundamentals of the economy are strong' fiasco of last fall? Obviously, we're dealing with some extremely serious problems and most people are looking for action to be as forceful as possible in response."
• Ezra Klein: "I'm getting the sense that the Eric Cantor bubble is bursting."

Other liberal bloggers are criticizing Cantor for praising Limbaugh:

• Daily Kos' BarbinMD: "Eric Cantor embraces Rush-o-nomics."
• AMERICAblog's John Aravosis: "Are these guys nuts? After a month debating whether Limbaugh was the intellectual leader of the party, the number 2 Republican in the House confirms that Limbaugh is the guy inspiring their solutions to the economic crisis?"
• Firedoglake's Blue Texan: "Keep praising super unpopular public figures, Eric. Electoral gold."

CANTOR II: Nice Try, Eric

Cantor's spokesperson reportedly claimed that Cantor wasn't referring to Democrats when he suggested that certain people were "over-reacting" to the economic crisis. However, the netroots don't buy this argument:

• Benen: "Cantor's office is arguing, aggressively, that he wasn't referring to Democrats when he talked about the 'overreaction.' It's unclear, though, who else he might have been referencing."
• BarbinMD: "[I]f Cantor wasn't talking about the Democrats, what did he mean? Who was he talking about?"
• Aravosis: "Who did GOP leader Eric Cantor mean when he said that Rush Limbaugh had great ideas for fixing the economy, versus other people 'in this town' who were 'overreacting'? If he didn't mean Democrats, which we hear he's now claiming, then who 'in this town' is taking the economic crisis too seriously, according to the number two Republican in the House? Maybe folks should call Mr. Cantor's office and ask them who he was talking about."

KOH: Fighting The Smears

During the past week, conservative bloggers and pundits have been attacking Obama's nominee for the post of Legal Adviser to the Sec/State, Harold Koh. After Slate's Dahlia Lithwick wrote a column complaining that the mainstream press was ignoring the right's "character assassination" of Koh, liberal bloggers have begun defending him:

• TPM's Josh Marshall: "Koh is a highly respected and utterly mainstream figure who the right-wing echo chamber is now accusing of wanting to apply Sharia law in US courts. It's really ugly stuff and deserves some strong push back."
• Benen: "There is no excuse for this character assassination. The conservative movement is obviously incapable of shame, but now would be an excellent time for some."
• Daily Kos' Jed Lewison: "[D]espite the obvious malice behind the assault on Koh, it continues unabated in the wingnut-o-sphere and on Fox and on Glenn Beck's program. Lithwick writes that the silence of the mainstream media in the face of these vicious attacks is effectively complicity in the face of character assassination, and she's right. Reporters may not feel like it's their obligation to come to Harold Koh's defense. But if they continue to let falsehoods about the Koh's of the world stand, one day some of them will find that they have become the targets of Rupert Murdoch's media empire. When that happens, will they wish they had spoken up when they still had a chance?"
• Mother Jones' Kevin Drum: "The right-wing nutcase machine really does seem to have picked up from its [Bill] Clinton-era follies without missing a beat. [...] We can't stop the wingnuts, but we can take the wind out of their sails by taking away their platform. After all, is there really any reason why the Senate needs to confirm the legal advisor to the State Deparment in the first place? No? I didn't think so."

digby explains why the netroots were relatively late in coming to Koh's defense: "If there were any chance that [OLC nominee Dawn] Johnson and Koh could actually be denied their places, I would guess that the liberal blogosphere would be intensely engaged. But from what I understand, the filibuster threat on Johnson is just hot air and that nobody takes the nutty Koh critics seriously. There is a certain amount of procedural kabuki that these targets have to undergo, but in the end they'll be confirmed. It's horrible that people have to put up with this, of course. But the modern conservative movement has a malignant, destructive impulse at its very core that will persist in doing this no matter what."

Meanwhile, The Washington Post's Greg Sargent notes that ex-Bush atty Theodore Olson is defending Koh, calling him a "man of great integrity."

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: The Naive Opposition

On Wednesday, Ezra Klein complained that the GOP alternative budget was a political messaging device instead of a serious proposal, writing: "It's not what you do when you're responsible for running the government. It's what you propose when you're responsible for running the messaging." The Atlantic's Ross Douthat disagrees:

"I understand what [Klein]'s getting at, but this phrasing makes it sound like the House Republicans' budget is an exercise in cynicism and partisan political calculation -- which is exactly the wrong way to look at what's going on with the House GOP. Sure, there may be some cynicism involved in how the [Rep. Paul] Ryan proposal makes its numbers add up. But the overall outline -- an across-the-board tax cut and a flatter tax code, substantial means-testing for Social Security and Medicare, and a five-year discretionary spending freeze -- strikes me as the opposite of cynical. Rather, there's a kind of deep innocence about it: The purity of its small-government vision is more detached from the grubby realities of American politics than any similar document I can remember. It's as if the Democratic Party, in the aftermath of it's 2002 and 2004 defeats, had proposed an alternative to George W. Bush's wartime budgets that slashed defense spending dramatically, raised income taxes across the board, and invested all of the resulting revenue in a revivified AFDC, a massive cash grant to the UN, and a big new federal jobs program for 'green-collar' workers, community organizers, and Planned Parenthood clinicians.

Now maybe the Democrats should have done just that. Certainly there are left-liberal voices who would have welcomed an explicitly social-democratic alternative to Bushism, as a means of widening the bounds of political discourse, and opening new vistas on the left. Sometimes naivete in the short run is wisdom in the long run. And maybe by providing such a rigorously small-government alternative to Obamanomics, the Congressional GOP will succeed in pushing the conversation rightward, and moving important but hard-to-sell ideas like means-testing entitlements into the mainstream where they belong.

But sometimes naivete is just naivete. Sometimes, putting your least-popular ideas together in one agenda just makes it easier for your opponents to run circles around you. And right now, I think the country could use a right-of-center party that paid a little more attention to its messaging, and a little less attention to its blueprints for the ideal small-government society."

(Klein responds here...)

LEST WE FORGET: Cheering Fans, Thrilling NCAA Tournament Disgust BCS Officials

From The Onion:

"DETROIT -- Claiming that determining an unquestioned national champion through a playoff system 'went against the very idea of sporting competition,' and that the sheer exuberance of college basketball fans was 'a shocking and nauseating display of everything wrong with collegiate athletics,' top BCS officials roundly condemned the NCAA Tournament Monday.

'I frankly cannot even believe what I'm seeing, and I can't stomach the sight for long,' said a pale, trembling Jack Swarbrick, the Notre Dame athletic director who, along with the commissioners of the major conferences, manages the complicated system of polls and computer rankings that make up the Bowl Championship Series in college football. 'The elegant logic of actually having teams play one another instead of having a council of their betters select which team is superior to which -- that is not what sports is all about.'

'And the fans...urgghh...simply enjoy their teams' triumphs or mourn their defeats. Where are the heated arguments? Where are the unsettled disputes that will fester forever?' said Swarbrick, a sheen of feverish sweat curdling on his face. 'Oh, God, I think I got vomit on my tie.'"

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 12:31 PM

April 02, 2009

4/2: You Can't Be Serious!

After ridiculing the 19-page alternative budget that the House GOP leadership released last week, liberal bloggers are now attacking the more detailed version that was released yesterday. Lefty bloggers are calling the GOP budget "ridiculous" and are describing the GOP House leaders as "clinically insane". The netroots were particularly critical of the GOP proposal to impose a five-year freeze on "discretionary spending," which Ezra Klein notes is "far beyond anything George W. Bush or Ronald Reagan ever contemplated." Liberal bloggers believe that a five-year spending freeze would have disastrous consequences in an economic recession, and they're accusing House GOPers of pandering to their conservative base instead of proposing a serious alternative to Pres. Obama's budget.

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Conservative bloggers (Malkin, Allahpundit, Johnson, Emanuel) are criticizing Obama for giving Britain's Queen Elizabeth II "a video iPod with inscription, songs uploaded and accessories, plus a rare musical songbook signed by Richard Rodgers."
• Conservative bloggers (Morrissey, Klein, Lopez) are buzzing about a new Quinnipiac poll showing ex-Rep. Rob Simmons (R-CT) leading Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) by 16 pts in a hypothetical 2010 Senate race.
• Liberal bloggers (Yglesias, Benen, Atrios, Bowers, Lemos) are criticizing prominent conservative blogger Erick Erickson for suggesting that "rage is building" and that armed "riots" are imminent.

GOP BUDGET: A Five-Year Spending Freeze? Why Not?

Liberal bloggers are slamming the House GOP leadership's alternative budget:

• The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen: "On taxes, spending, Social Security, Medicare, energy policy, the Republicans' budget isn't just wrong, it's ridiculous. The party failed miserably at governing, and yet, it apparently hasn't quite hit rock bottom when it comes to credibility and seriousness."
• Think Progress' Matthew Yglesias: "[GOP Rep.] Paul Ryan reaches deep into the conservative movement's storehouse of ideas on America's most pressing policy programs and comes up with an innovative agenda of tax cuts mostly tilted toward the wealthy and corporations paired with a five-year freeze on discretionary spending. If, superficially, this seems like a warmed-over version of the [John] McCain campaign economic agenda that the voters rejected just a few months ago, you need to pay more attention -- McCain was just calling for a one-year freeze on discretionary spending after which reductions in government outlays would be achieved by magic. Ryan, by contrast, is proposing a five-year freeze."
• TPM's Josh Marshall: "[T]he Republicans running things in the House GOP caucus are still as clinically insane as in years past. We see today from their House GOP 'budget' that their new-found allegiance to fiscal discipline has them lowering the top marginal tax rate to 25% (it's currently 35%, with the Bush tax cuts), which for anyone who knows anything about the federal budget would pretty much inevitably lead to gargantuan federal deficits and the Treasury exploding probably some time early in the next decade. They manage to still have the deficits coming down by bunch of nonsense hokum about oil rigs and other foolery."

Lefty bloggers were particularly critical of the GOP's proposal to impose a five-year freeze on "discretionary spending":

• Klein: "A five-year spending freeze is far beyond anything George W. Bush or Ronald Reagan ever contemplated. It's not what you do when you're responsible for running the government. It's what you propose when you're responsible for running the messaging."
• Mother Jones' Kevin Drum: "The gist of [the plan] is the classic, time-tested approach taken by 'fiscal conservatives' who are too gutless to propose actual, concrete spending cuts: an across-the-board spending freeze. (Except for the Pentagon, natch, because they're such paragons of efficient procurement.) That way they can release a 53-page document without taking the political risk of naming an actual program that will get cut."
• The Huffington Post's Bob Cesca: "Not only does the Republican plan freeze discretionary spending for five years in the midst of a recession which, by most accounts and proved by history, will countermand any sort of economic recovery, but it also cuts taxes by 10 percent for the same Wall Street executives whose actions largely got us into this economic mess in the first place. In other words: Congratulations, Republicans, you just released a budget that rewards wealthy corporate executives while blocking any attempt to dig us out of the economic catastrophe they created. Smart!"

GOP BUDGET II: Why Would People Choose To Pay More Taxes?

Liberal bloggers are also accusing the GOP of using budget gimmicks in order to ensure that their proposed tax cut didn't blow up the deficit. The Huffington Post's Ryan Grim explains:

"The Republican budget blueprint released last week called for 'a marginal tax rate for income up to $100,000 of 10 percent and 25 percent for any income thereafter,' which would result in a massive reduction in government revenue and a generous tax break for the wealthy, who currently pay a 35 percent rate. [...T]he real way that Republicans offer the tax cut without factoring it into the budget's revenue is to suggest that Americans won't actually take advantage of the lower rates. Instead, the GOP budget permanently extends President Bush's 2001 and 2003 tax cuts. A Republican budget committee aid said that the revenues assumed in the GOP budget are based on the current tax structure that resulted from those cuts. In other words, Republicans are assuming that given the choice between a higher rate and a lower rate, Americans will choose the higher rate."

Lefty bloggers are accusing the House GOPers of being dishonest:

• Cesca: "[G]et this. Under the Republican plan, Americans are given the option of paying the old tax rates instead of the new, expensive and regressive Republican rates. So, for example, if your household income is $100,000, you could pay the same tax rate as someone earning $15,000. Or you could be a swell egg and go back to your old rate. Aside from the utter lack of fairness in the notion of a $100,000 household paying the same rate as a $15,000 household, who in their right mind would voluntarily pay higher taxes?"
• Benen: "If you like the tax system left by Bush/Cheney, you could choose to stick with it. Or, if you prefer the lower rates proposed by GOP lawmakers, you could choose to go that route, instead. Of course, the current top rate, applied to the wealthiest Americans, is 35%. Republicans support a proposal that would let the rich choose between paying a 35% marginal rate or a 25% marginal rate. I wonder which one they'd choose? But that's not the funny part. The hilarious angle to this is that the House Republicans run enormous budget deficits while assuming the top earners would voluntarily pay the higher rate."
• Yglesias: "It would be nice to have a real debate between progressive and conservative ideas about the course of public policy instead of needing to spend all this time hunting around for gimmicks."

GOP BUDGET III: Paul Ryan's Awesome Graph

Liberal bloggers were particularly critical of the graph that Rep. Ryan placed next to his Wall Street Journal op-ed introducing the GOP budget. Lefty bloggers believe that this graph -- which suggests that Dems want gov't spending to comprise 50% of the GDP by 2060 -- is dishonest:

• Marshall: "As you can see, predicting ideological stances over as yet unborn Democratic members of Congress, the GOP scoring appears to have us on track for the government owning about 90% of the economy in the early-mid-22nd century, which if I remember is about the time period of the invention of the warp drive. So I don't know if they've figured that in too."
• dday: "[The GOP] helpfully scored the competing budgets over a 70-year time-frame, and while I think they're off a bit in 2072, you can plainly see that government under Robot Obama, who will be governing until he is 117, will explode in size."
• Cesca: "[S]uggesting a deficit that's 50 percent of GDP is like presupposing a living human being that's 50 percent marshmallow man. It's insane. Furthermore, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projections only extend out to 2019. Yet the Republican chart somehow extends out to 2080. The steep upwards slope of the Democratic budget begins at around 2030 -- 11 years after the furthest CBO projections stop."

On the right side of the blogosphere, Philip Klein complains that the GOP budget doesn't adequately address the deficit: "[I]t shouldn't surprise readers of this blog to know that while I think the GOP alternative would be preferable to the Obama plan, I don't think it goes far enough in terms of really attacking runaway spending. In fact, if Republicans could actually get their way, we'd still be looking at the debt exploding from the $5.8 trillion it was in 2008 to $13.7 trillion by 2019, or from 40.8 percent of GDP to 65.1 percent. For American taxpayers, it really is choosing between Scylla and Charybdis."

OBAMA: Another Crappy Gift?

Conservative bloggers are accusing Obama of making a diplomatic error by giving Queen Elizabeth II "a video iPod with inscription, songs uploaded and accessories, plus a rare musical songbook signed by Richard Rodgers":

• Michelle Malkin: "My kids love those Kidzbop music CDs. I hope the Queen of Englad is enjoying the Queenzbop playlist our cheesy president chose for her iPod. [...] The Age of Obama: It's the April Fool's Day that never ends."
• RedState's Jeff Emanuel: "President Obama's gift to the Queen was...an iPod? Wow. At least it wasn't cheesy American region 1 DVDs..."
• Hot Air's Allahpundit: "Because, after all, nothing says 'special relationship' like a gadget you can buy in every mall in the western world. What'd he get Prince Philip? An Xbox? [...] Turns out there was more loaded on there than just 2007 mementos. [ABC News' Jake] Tapper shares the somewhat horrifying detail that they added some music for her too, leaving us to wonder what America's diplomatic brain trust considers appropriate for a royal mix tape. [...] Seriously, none of this merits a firing or three in the protocol office?"
• Power Line's Scott Johnson: "[A]ccording to Jake Tapper, Obama outdid himself. He extended the Queen, not Queen's greatest hits, but rather Obama's greatest hits and more. Tapper reports that Obama gave the Queen an iPod loaded with fabulosities including Broadway show tunes, photos of Obama's inauguration, audio of then-state senator Obama's speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention and audio of Obama 2009 inaugural address. Unfortunately, Obama must have forgotten the autographed compact disc of himself reading Dreams From My Father on the tarmac in Washington. Maybe next time!"

Liberal blogger John Cole pushes back: "I find it endlessly amusing that the usual suspects keep getting the vapors about what gifts President Obama gives people, but if the autographed Rodgers and Hammerstein songbook and IPod aren't good enough for the Queen, that is just tough for her. [...] I guess it could have been worse, wingnuts. He could have given her a backrub."

Meanwhile, The Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan notes that The Guardian's Michael White praised Obama's gift as one "that managed to combine thoughtfulness, modernity and a dash of history."

DODD: Crashing

Conservative bloggers are buzzing about the new Quinnipiac poll showing ex-Rep. Simmons leading Sen. Dodd 50-34% in a hypothetical 2010 Senate race:

• NRO's Kathryn Jean Lopez: "Even without [CNBC host Larry] Kudlow Running, Dodd can lose."
• Hot Air's Ed Morrissey: "Get this man a sinecure in Academia! Chris Dodd looks like he will need a golden parachute in 2010, if he chooses to run for re-election to the Senate at all. The man who thought he could win his party's nomination for President now looks like he couldn't get elected dogcatcher in his own state, according to the latest poll from Quinnipiac. [...] If those numbers don't improve dramatically, Dodd can't run for re-election. In fact, it's hard to imagine that the Democrats would let him. Maybe Barack Obama will provide a nice escape hatch for Dodd, perhaps replacing Dan Rooney as Ambassador to Ireland in 2010. I hear he already has quite the house there."
• AmSpec Blog's Klein: "While Republicans are no doubt salivating at their oppourtunity here, they shouldn't get too far ahead of themselves. If things continue to look this bad for Dodd, he'll most likely be challenged in the Democratic primaries, perhaps by Ned Lamont, who of course won the 2006 Democratic primary against Joe Lieberman before Lieberman became an independent. And in an overwhelmingly Democratic state, a Democrat without Dodd's baggage would have a good chance of holding the seat, especially because ads will Rebulicanize somebody like Simmons in a general election. For that reason, I'd be curious to see how Simmons would poll against other Democrats."

ERICKSON: Give Me Dishwasher Detergent Made With Phosphates, Or Give Me Death!

Liberal bloggers are criticizing prominent conservative blogger Erickson (the managing editor of RedState) after he made the following comments about a Spokane, Washington law banning "dishwasher detergent made with phosphates, a measure aimed at reducing water pollution":

"At what point do the people tell the politicians to go to hell? At what point do they get off the couch, march down to their state legislator's house, pull him outside, and beat him to a bloody pulp for being an idiot? At some point soon, it will happen. It'll be over an innocuous issue. But the rage is building. [...] Were I in Washington State, I'd be cleaning my gun right about now waiting to protect my property from the coming riots or the government apparatchiks coming to enforce nonsensical legislation."

• Yglesias: "At issue here is...an environmental regulation relating to dishwasher detergent. I think it's safe to say that we're not going to see violence in the streets over this one. [...] But recall that it used to be considered beyond-the-pale for liberal bloggers to sometimes use naughty words. You see, though, that the minute conservatives lose power they go back to 1990s-style incitements to violence."
• Benen: "Yes, Erick Erickson is recommending residents of Washington state prepare for mob violence in the streets because state lawmakers are prohibiting dishwasher detergents that contribute to water pollution. Let's also not forget that Erickson is not a fringe, obscure right-wing blogger, but a prominent conservative voice and a writer popular in the Bush White House."
• Atrios: "I've long rolled my eyes about armchair revolutionaries, the ones who dream of revolution but can't quite manage to get out of their chairs. We do have people on our 'side' who express such sentiments, but they're limited to anonymous people in comments sections and not, you know, prominent bloggers and commentators."
• Open Left's Chris Bowers: "So, Erick Erickson of Red State wants people in Washington State to start dragging state legislators into the street, and beat them into a bloody pulp, over a new law mandating higher environmental regulations on dishwasher detergent. Or, maybe that isn't exactly what he wants, but he certainly implies that he wouldn't object on the off chance that people reading his blog might actually decide to start doing that. Such action is worth considering, according to Erickson, and he is going to give his gun a good cleaning."
• MyDD's Charles Lemos: "Good thing Erick Erickson lives down in Georgia and not up in Washington State. Otherwise, we might have ourselves the 'Cascade Revolution.'"

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: It's The Economy, Stupid

The American Conservative's Daniel Larison discusses the NY-20 special election:

"What is absolutely amazing about the outcome [Tuesday] night is that Murphy declared his opposition to the death penalty, even in cases of terrorist attacks, and he may have won anyway. It is possible that his victory, like [Don] Cazayoux's in Louisiana, will be short-lived and will be reversed in 2010 because of this and similar issues. Murphy's stance on this is fairly left-leaning for someone who wants to join the Blue Dog caucus, but instead of becoming a huge liability it barely registered. It barely registered despite an NRCC ad highlighting this position. Four years ago, to say nothing of seven years ago, he could not have survived politically had he taken the same position. One of the interesting things about this race, then, is the degree to which economic issues have completely overwhelmed the old politics of national security and terrorism on which the GOP relied since '02, and they have done so even in one of the more culturally conservative districts in that part of the country."

LEST WE FORGET: Obama Depressed, Distant Since 'Battlestar Galactica' Series Finale

From The Onion:

"WASHINGTON -- According to sources in the White House, President Barack Obama has been uncharacteristically distant and withdrawn ever since last month's two-hour series finale of Battlestar Galactica.

'The president seems to be someplace else lately,' said one high-level official, speaking on condition of anonymity. 'Yesterday we were all being briefed on the encroachment of Iranian drone planes into Iraq, when he just looked up from the table and blurted out, "What am I supposed to watch on Fridays at 10 p.m. now? Numb3rs?"' [...]

Since the end of the series, Obama has reportedly brushed off key budgetary decisions, ignored his wife and children, and neglected his daily workouts, claiming that he no longer cares if he lets himself go 'just like Lee did before the rescue on New Caprica.'"

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 01:01 PM

April 01, 2009

4/1: It's A Walk-Off

Liberal bloggers are "cautiously optimistic" that businessman Scott Murphy (D) will defeat Assemb. Jim Tedisco (R) once all of the absentee ballots are counted in the NY-20 race. However, while the netroots are rooting for Murphy, many are annoyed that ActBlue has raised nearly $360k for him despite the fact that he plans to join the Blue Dog Coalition if he wins. Chris Bowers complains: "We can criticize Blue Dog behavior all we want, but as long as we keep funneling their members millions of dollars every two years in small, online donations, then we will actually be ratifying, not criticizing their behavior." On the right side of the blogosphere, Jim Geraghty thinks that Tedisco has "a great shot at making up the difference in absentee ballots." That said, several conservative bloggers are complaining that Tedisco ran a poor campaign and are criticizing him for "blowing a 16-point lead."

NY-20: Lookin' Good For Murphy?

Many liberal bloggers are cautiously optimistic that Murphy will prevail once all of the absentee ballots are counted:

• Daily Kos' Arjun Jaikumar: "This was a remarkably high-turnout special election, and Scott Murphy's performance already is nothing short of amazing in a district where the GOP enjoys a huge registration edge. We haven't won anything yet, but there's every reason to be cautiously optimistic."
• TPM's Josh Marshall: "This ain't over. But you'd rather be Murphy than Tedisco."
• Firedoglake's Attaturk: "It looks like Scott Murphy might pull off victory in NY-20, up by 65 after all today's votes are in. Absentee ballots still need to be counted (just short of 6,000 of them), but the old canard about that being by definition 'good for the GOP' has pretty much died. So at this moment, in a district with 70,000 more registered Republicans than Democrats -- a seat the GOP had desperately hoped and committed resources to pick up -- things are looking mildly up. Because now there's a very good chance, but not certainty, we'll have a blue dog Democrat to frustrate us, rather than another Republican to make us angry. So there's now a guarantee of no worse than disappointment."
• BooMan: "[I]n a way, [Republicans have] already lost since it's clear that Obama was a huge strength to the Democratic challenger. In any case, we're headed for recount territory and the Republicans will try to steal it. I didn't really care who won this race but I really don't like it when Republicans don't respect the will of the voters."

Meanwhile, FiveThirtyEight's Nate Silver analyzes the implications of the race: "From an analytical standpoint, whether Scott Murphy remains ahead of Jim Tedisco after absentee ballots are counted (and that is anything but a sure thing) is largely immaterial. One of the candidates is going to win by not more than a hundred, maybe a couple hundred votes (and possibly by quite a bit less than that). The difference between winning and losing could be because someone's daughter got an ear infection and they drove her to the doctor instead of going to the polls, or someone happened to turn on their TV five minutes after a Tedisco commercial aired rather than five minutes before. When elections are decided by hundredths of a percentage point, there is a lot of luck involved. [...] What this very narrow fragment of evidence suggests -- it may be dangerous to overgeneralize -- is that not much has changed since last November."

NY-20 II: Another Blue Dog In Congress. Great.

While most liberal bloggers want Murphy to win, many of them are annoyed that ActBlue has raised nearly $360k for him, considering that he plans to join the Blue Dog Coalition if he beats Tedisco:

• Open Left's Chris Bowers: "I hope the Democrat, Scott Murphy, wins. However, I am also frustrated that Murphy has received nearly $360,000 on Act Blue from around 2,000 donors. Given that Murphy has made it clear that he will attempt to join the Blue Dogs if he wins the election, the progressive small donor world should not have given him a single dime. [...] In politics, money speaks a lot louder than either voting or public criticism. We can criticize Blue Dog behavior all we want, but as long as we keep funneling their members millions of dollars every two years in small, online donations, then we will actually be ratifying, not criticizing their behavior. We will be supporting their efforts to push the party to the right, not working to push the party to the left. We will be sending a clear signal of support for their votes, not working to hold them accountable for those votes."
• Daily Kos' Markos Moulitsas: "I have no interest in raising a single dime for any Blue Dog wannabees. It's no longer 'more Democrats'. The biggest danger to a progressive agenda in the House isn't the irrelevant Republicans, but obnoxious Blue Dogs. It's time for Better Democrats."
• digby: "I have nothing against Murphy and I'll be happy if he wins, but the Blue Dogs have their own financing system and they can pay their own freight. I ask for financial support only for those congressional candidates whose values and positions on the issues are truly progressive. Somebody's got to do that or there will never be anything but Blue Dogs in congress."
• dday: "There are definitely national implications to Tedisco losing this seat, in a Republican-leaning area, to a virtual unknown in the district, especially because the race has turned in many ways on Murphy's support for President Obama's stimulus package. And on taking joy in watching Republicans flail about and continue their losing streak I take a back seat to no one. However, I never asked readers to support Scott Murphy financially, only wrote about the race a few times, and whenever I did I included the caveat that Murphy has planned to join the Blue Dogs. And I completely agree with Chris Bowers that we cannot keep supporting Democrats just because of the D next to their name, especially after they announce their intentions to undermine our values."

Meanwhile, other liberal bloggers are annoyed that there was a special election for this seat in the first place:

• AMERICAblog's Joe Sudbay: "Picking Kirsten Gillibrand to be the U.S. Senator was a dumb move by NY Governor David Paterson. It put a Democrat seat (in a Republican area) at risk. For what? A Senator who keeps flipping and flopping on core Democratic issues. A lot of time and money went into trying to save this seat for the Democrats and it never should have happened. Can't Democratic Governors think through the political implications of their moves? This election really never had to happen in the first place (and, yes, I know this is Monday morning quarterbacking, but it bugs me.) And, now, thanks to David Paterson's poor judgment, it's going to go on and on for weeks."
• TAPPED's Dana Goldstein: "Another recount? Say it ain't so. But that's what Gov. David Paterson served up for the NY-20 Congressional district when he sent Kirsten Gillibrand to the Senate in the most infuriating (legal) nomination process known to man (or woman). With her Republican upbringing and center-right messaging on various social issues, Gillibrand was a good fit for a district that just barely supported Obama. As a Senator, though, Washington has heard mum from Gillibrand so far, and I'm not holding my breath. Simply stated, in terms of profile and policy experience, she is a poor replacement for Hillary Clinton."

NY-20: Who Knows...

Conservative bloggers don't seem to have a strong feeling one way or the other as to whether Tedisco will win:

• NRO's Jim Geraghty: "Republicans think they have an advantage in absentee ballots, both in terms of voters they know who used absentee ballots, and traditionally in the district. [...] The good news for Tedisco is that he's got a great shot at making up the difference in absentee ballots, and he seemed to shift momentum back in his favor in those last couple days. The bad news is, he lost a lead, and the race is probably going to end up very, very close."
• RedState's Moe Lane: "[J]ust because we haven't lost yet doesn't mean that we've won, either. Don't assume that the absentee ballots are going to flip this race dramatically."

A few conservative bloggers are complaining that Tedisco ran a poor campaign:

• Michelle Malkin: "Obvious bottom line: The winner will overstate the significance of victory. The loser will downplay the ramifications of defeat. And conservatives will be left wondering why the best their candidates can do is punt on fundamental questions about whether they are for generational thievery or whether they are against it. Sigh."
• AmSpec Blog's W. James Antle, III: "Wake me when the Republican Party can handle something in an even remotely competent fashion. [...] For those who don't get what I'm bellyaching about, I'm referring to the Republicans blowing a 16-point lead in New York's 20th congressional district. I'm also not sure that being too moderate or too conservative was the biggest problem in a race where the Republican candidate was a career politician who didn't live in the district, took almost a month to take a position on the stimulus package, and then campaigned like it was 2002. Tedisco could still pull it out from the absentee ballots and Republicans are going to point to how much better he did than Gillibrand's 2008 challenger, but it really shouldn't be this close."

In a separate post, Geraghty argues that RNC Chair Michael Steele's job is secure even if Tedisco loses: "The result won't be the panic-button moment for Michael Steele's reign at the RNC; in fact, with the race so close, Steele can argue that every penny the committee spent in the district was money well spent -- would Tedisco be trailing by a lot more than 65 votes without that money?"

SEBELIUS: Here We Go Again

Conservative bloggers are mocking Sebelius after she paid $8k in back taxes:

• Malkin: "Another day, another Obama nominee with tax problems."
• Hot Air's Allahpundit: "By CBS's count, this is the sixth nominee to have tax trouble. Yes, really."
• RedState's Jeff Emanuel: "Given President Obama's track record in terms of nominations for high positions and of character judgment as a whole, it would have been surprising had Sebelius turned to be clean, on both the tax-error and lobbying front. Unsurprisingly, the former lobbyist and now-repaid back tax ower isn't clean on either. All that remains is the question of whether or not the Senate will bring itself to confirm yet another Obama nominee who has a history of tax issues."
• NRO's Victor Davis Hanson: "[T]here is a real ethical crisis among the liberal elite who, we are learning for the nth time, suffer the additional wage of hypocrisy, by calling for higher taxes on the upper-middle-class (often punctuated by self-serving qualifiers that they themselves are willing to pay more in taxes), only to scheme to find ways to cut down their tax liability contrary to the law."
• NRO's Veronique de Rugy: "[E]ither these nominees are cheating on their taxes because they are dishonest, and we should not want to have them in office, or the large number of nominees with tax issues is the reflection that the tax code is too complicated and needs to be reformed."
• AmSpec Blog's Doug Bandow: "Worried about the explosion of debt under President Obama? Don't be. Another Obama Cabinet nominee is paying her taxes."

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Why The Democrats Can't Govern

The New Republic's Jonathan Chait explains why Senate Dems are "killing Obama's agenda":

"Unless you are a high school student reading this article in your civics course, in which case I'm sorry to dispel your illusions, you will not be stunned to learn that the affluent carry disproportionate political weight with elites in both parties. So, while people who earn more than $250,000 per year make up just a tiny slice of the electorate, they make up a huge chunk of any congressman's friends, acquaintances, and fund-raisers.

What's more, whatever their disposition toward business in general, Democrats feel it is not just a right but a duty to slavishly attend to the interests of their home-state businesses. That is why [ND Sen.] Kent Conrad upholds even the most absurd demands of agribusiness, or why even a good-government progressive like Michigan's Carl Levin parrots the auto industry's line on regulating carbon dioxide.

Taken as a whole, then, the influence of business and the rich unites Republicans and splits Democrats. A few Republicans no doubt felt some qualms about supporting [George W.] Bush's regressive, extreme pro-business agenda, but their most influential donors and constituents pushed them in the direction of partisan unity. Those same forces encourage Democrats to defect. That's why [NE Sen.] Ben Nelson is fighting student-loan reform, coal-and oil-state Democrats are insisting that cap-and-trade legislation be subject to a filibuster, and Democrats everywhere are fretting about reducing tax deductions for the highest-earning 1 percent of the population."

LEST WE FORGET: Twitter Switch For Guardian, After 188 Years Of Ink

The Guardian's Rio Palof (h/t Kevin Drum):

"Consolidating its position at the cutting edge of new media technology, the Guardian today announces that it will become the first newspaper in the world to be published exclusively via Twitter, the sensationally popular social networking service that has transformed online communication. [...]

A mammoth project is also under way to rewrite the whole of the newspaper's archive, stretching back to 1821, in the form of tweets. Major stories already completed include '1832 Reform Act gives voting rights to one in five adult males yay!!!'; 'OMG Hitler invades Poland, allies declare war see tinyurl.com/b5x6e for more'; and 'JFK assassin8d @ Dallas, def. heard second gunshot from grassy knoll WTF?'

Sceptics have expressed concerns that 140 characters may be insufficient to capture the full breadth of meaningful human activity, but social media experts say the spread of Twitter encourages brevity, and that it ought to be possible to convey the gist of any message in a tweet. For example, Martin Luther King's legendary 1963 speech on the steps of the Lincoln memorial appears in the Guardian's Twitterised archive as 'I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin but by', eliminating the waffle and bluster of the original."

Posted by Ian Faerstein at 12:25 PM

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