Courting Disaster!

Obama not keeping us safe! Time for some golden oldies:

White House speechwriter Marc Thiessen was locked in a secure room and given access to the most sensitive intelligence when he was tasked to write President George W. Bush’s 2006 speech explaining the CIA’s interrogation program and why Congress should authorize it. Few know more about these CIA operations than Thiessen, and in his new book, Courting Disaster, he documents just how effective the CIA’s interrogations were in foiling attacks on America, penetrating al-Qaeda’s high command, and providing our military with actionable intelligence. Thiessen also shows how reckless President Obama has been in shutting down the CIA’s program and releasing secret documents that have aided our enemies.

Courting Disaster proves: (PROVES!!--ed)

How the CIA program thwarted specific deadly attacks against the U.S.
Why “enhanced interrogation” was not torture by any reasonable legal or moral standard
How the information gained by “enhanced interrogation” could not have been acquired any other way
How President Obama’s actions since taking office have left America much more vulnerable to attack

In chilling detail, Thiessen reveals how close the terrorists came to striking again, how intelligence gained from “enhanced interrogation” repeatedly stymied their plots, and how President Obama’s dismantling of this CIA program is inviting disaster for America.

Thiessen is among the Bush-torture apologists trying to claim now that their torture helped catch and kill OBL. Sully links to Jane Meyer who writes from the New Yorker:

You would think that if the C.I.A.’s interrogation of high-value detainees was all it took, the U.S. government would have succeeded in locating bin Laden before 2006, which is when the C.I.A.’s custody of so-called “high-value detainees” ended. Instead, after the Supreme Court ruled that year that prisoners needed to be treated humanely in compliance with the Geneva Conventions, the C.I.A. was forced to turn its special detainees over to the military for detention and interrogation using more lawful tactics in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. It took five more years before all the dots could be adequately connected.

(snip)

This timeline doesn’t seem to provide a lot of support for the pro-torture narrative. One would think that if so-called “enhanced interrogations” provided the magic silver bullet, and if the courier was a protégé of K.S.M.’s, then the C.I.A. might have wrapped this up back in 2003, while they were waterboarding the 9/11 mastermind a hundred and eighty-three times.

A Fitting End

Well, I really regret turning off the TV before 11 pm last night.

I'll confess that one of the first thoughts I had this morning upon learning of the killing of OBL was one of suspicion about his being buried at sea. As more details of the raid and killing have come in my suspicions have been put to rest. Obviously it goes without saying, Great job, Mr. President and thank you, Navy Seals.

It's particularly fitting that his killing was accomplished by a Democratic president and by this Democratic president especially. Part of the trauma associated with the events of 9/11 was the three year period or so afterwards when both liberals and political dissent were treated as treasononous. Beyond the tragedy and devastation of that day was the hysteria that gripped much of the media and common man alike. The first few years after 9/11 were nothing short of toxic, for many Americans and for hundreds of thousands of Iraqi's in particular.

But the killing of OBL helps put the final stake into that period. There are obvious signs before last night's heroics that the nation has, with at least some awareness, started to move on. But getting OBL "dead or alive" preferably dead, was an important piece of the healing puzzle.

Who Will Protect The Animals?

Amidst all the birther nonsense, not to mention deathly serious issues like abolishing Medicare, some of our "labratories of democracy" are hell-bent on making life more miserable for our animal friends:

Getting caught is a drag.

Just ask Kirt Espenson, whose employees at E6 Cattle Company in Southwest Texas were videotaped bashing cows’ heads in with pickaxes and hammers and performing other acts of unspeakably sickening cruelty.

Yet if some state legislators have their way, horrific but valuable videos like that one will never be made.

But, first, the story: Espenson, who comes off on the phone as sincere and contrite, explained to me that he’d made a “catastrophic error in a very difficult situation,” when ultracold weather caused frostbite in some of his 20,000 cattle. He was short-staffed and had his best employees saving the endangered but viable cows while new workers were asked to “euthanize” those who were near death. Out came the hammers. “We just didn’t have the protocol to deal with it,” he told me. “I made a mistake and take full responsibility.”

The offending employees have been terminated. Nothing like this has ever happened before. Nothing like this will ever happen again.

Much as I’d like to believe Espenson, this sounds like too many other horror stories of animal cruelty, and frankly — without belittling either situation — the excuses echo Abu Ghraib. And this is far from an isolated incident. Remember the four Iowa factory farmers who pleaded guilty in 2009 to sexually abusing and beating pigs, and the abuses of downed cattle exposed by the Humane Society of the United States in 2008 at the Hallmark slaughterhouse in California, which led to the country’s biggest ever recall of meat.

The root problem is not Espenson or his company, any more than the root problem at Abu Ghraib was Lynndie England. The problem is the system that enables cruelty and a lack not just of law enforcement but actual laws. Because the only federal laws governing animal cruelty apply to slaughterhouses, where animals may spend only minutes before being dispatched. None apply to farms, where animals are protected only by state laws.

And these may be moving in the wrong direction. In their infinite wisdom the legislatures of Iowa, Minnesota, Florida and others are considering measures that would punish heroic videographers like the one who spent two weeks as an E6 employee, who was clearly traumatized by the experience. (I spoke to him on the phone Saturday, with a guarantee of anonymity.)

Minnesota’s “ag-gag” law — isn’t that a great name? — would seek to punish not only photographers and videographers but those who distribute their work, which means organizations like the Humane Society of the United States and Mercy for Animals, which contracted the videographer for the E6 investigation. “It’s so sweeping,” says Nathan Runkle, the executive director of Mercy for Animals, “that if you took a picture of a dog at a pet shop and texted it to someone, that could be a crime.” Unconstitutional? Probably, but there it is.

Videotaping at factory farms wouldn’t be necessary if the industry were properly regulated. But it isn’t. And the public knows this; the one poll about the Iowa ag-gag law shows a mere 21 percent of people supporting it. And poll after poll finds that almost everyone believes that even if it costs more, farm animals should be treated humanely.

That is not the norm on factory farms. Espenson insists that it was a coincidence that the investigator for Mercy for Animals showed up just when his workers were hammering cows’ heads; the videographer believes it was routine. And, while the farmer claims that extreme weather had hurt the cows, Weather Underground recorded that the weather was far from extreme during the period in question. The investigator theorizes that weaker, less desirable animals were sickened by living in their own feces.

We can’t know. What we can know is that organizations like the Humane Society and Mercy for Animals need to be allowed to do the work that the federal and state governments are not: documenting the kind of behavior most of us abhor. Indeed, the independent investigators should be supported. As Runkle says, “The industry should be teaming up with organizations like ours to put cameras in these facilities, to advocate for mandatory training and have real euthanasia policies, things that would allow the public to trust these operations rather than fear them.”

The biggest problem of all is that we’ve created a system in which standard factory-farming practices are inhumane, and the kinds of abuses documented at E6 are really just reminders of that. If you’re raising and killing 10 billion animals every year, some abuse is pretty much guaranteed.

There is, of course, the argument that domesticating animals in order to kill them is essentially immoral; those of us who eat meat choose not to believe this. But in “Bengal Tiger,” a Broadway play set at Baghdad Zoo, the tiger — played by Robin Williams — wonders: “What if my every meal has been an act of cruelty?” The way most animals are handled in the United States right now has to have all of us omnivores wondering the same thing.

 

This sh$t is starting to really p#ss me off. First there was the anti-puppy mill referendum in Missouri last year, which the voters passed by a small margin, but which is in the process of being undone by the state legislature. Now this crap. WTF?

Mercy For Animal's website is here and you can make a one-time or regular donation.

The NYT editorial page also includes a short editorial, rightfully denouncing Iowa, Minnesota and Florida's pending legislation.

I'd also love to hear some presidential bully-pulpiting on this.

Richard Cohen blasts "Cult of Lee"

Every once in a while, Richard Cohen erupts into some very shrill:

It has taken a while, but it’s about time Robert E. Lee lost the Civil War. The South, of course, was defeated on the battlefield in 1865, yet the Lee legend — swaddled in myth, kitsch and racism — has endured even past the civil rights era when it became both urgent and right to finally tell the “Lost Cause” to get lost. Now it should be Lee’s turn. He was loyal to slavery and disloyal to his country — not worthy, even he might now admit, of the honors accorded him.

I confess to always being puzzled by the cult of Lee. Whatever his personal or military virtues, he offered himself and his sword to the cause of slavery. He owned slaves himself and fought tenaciously in the courts to keep them. He commanded a vast army that, had it won, would have secured the independence of a nation dedicated to the proposition that white people could own black people and sell them off, husband from wife, child from parent, as the owner saw fit. Such a man cannot be admired.

But he is. All over the South, particularly in his native Virginia, the cult of Lee is manifested in streets, highways and schools named for him. When I first moved to the Washington area, I used to marvel at these homages to the man. What was being honored? Slavery? Treason? Or maybe, for this is how I perceive him, no sense of humor? (Often, that is mistaken for wisdom.) I also wondered what a black person was supposed to think or, maybe more to the point, feel. Chagrin or rage would be perfectly appropriate.

I'm pretty puzzled by it, too.

I suspect the admiration of Lee probably stems from the 100+ years of grace awarded the South upon their military defeat, when a morally exhausted but commercially ambitious country turned its attention from war and bloodshed (and racial justice) to reconciliation among Whites and expansion. More specifically, Lee, being a "warrior", is more apt to be seen as "above the fray" and given reverence not afforded to other, more political Confederates such as Jefferson Davis and Alexander Stephens.

The nation's turn from war to reconciliation, at the expense of racial justice, is addressed in David Blight's Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory. I'm a few chapters into it and recommend it heartily.

If anything, I find the respect afforded Lee by professional historians more puzzling than that of average citizens, particularly those in Virginia, who could be expected to be more generous to one of their state's ancestors.

At the same time, I'm not as irritated by the various signs and other monuments to Lee and other Confederates as I once was. The respect granted to "losers" in American history is in its own way, appropriate. I think it largely serves the interest of a pluralist society to allow for a wide range of "heros". For example, there are monuments and tributes, commercial and otherwise, to the various Native American leaders of the Old West (Crazy Horse, Sitting Bull, etc) in places such as South Dakota, that serve to help educate Ameicans living long after of their lives and causes, leading us to question our own country's treatment, past and present, of the continent's native inhabitants. Many Americans living today no doubt have little sympathy for Indians or the historical preservation of their leaders. Nonetheless, we appropriately remind ourselves of these representatives of American life.

In the case of Lee in particular, it must be said that Lee was not tried for treason (nor really was anyone else from the Southern Confederacy). General Grant, among others, didn't wish to see Lee imprisoned or suffer politically or otherwise for his course of action, despite having fought against him for more than a year. So that his name adorns highways doesn't concern me too much. But it is high time that among our professional class that a more critical appraisal of the Confederal general is provided.

Very grim stuff in Mexico

Hard to know what to say about this, other than I was almost shocked to read it this morning. And given the carnage around the globe, it isn't always easy to be shocked. This reads like it was Afghanistan:

SAN FERNANDO, Mexico — At the largest mass grave site ever found in Mexico, where 177 bodies have been pulled from deep pits, authorities say they have recovered few bullet casings and little evidence that the dead were killed with a gun.

Instead, most died of blunt force trauma to the head, and a sledgehammer found at the crime scene this month is believed to have been used in the executions, according to Mexican investigators and state officials. The search continued Sunday, with state officials warning they expect the count to rise.

They say as many as 122 of the victims were passengers dragged off buses at drug cartel roadblocks on the major highway to the United States.

The mass killings of civilians at isolated ranches 90 minutes south of the Texas border mark a new level of barbarity in Mexico’s four-year U.S.-backed drug war.

As forensic teams and Mexican marines dig through deeper and darker layers here, the buried secrets in San Fernando are challenging President Felipe Calderon’s assertions that his government is winning the war and is in control of Mexico’s cities and roads.

In the past four years, more than 35,000 people have been killed and thousands more have simply disappeared, since Calderon sent the military to battle Mexican organized crime with $1.6 billion in U.S. support. U.S. officials in Mexico worry that criminal gangs are taking over sections of the vital border region not by overwhelming firepower but sheer terror.

On Thursday, cartel gunmen sacked the city of Miguel Aleman, across the river from Roma, Texas, tossing grenades and burning down three car dealerships, an auto parts outlet, a furniture store and a gas station. Three buses were strafed with gunfire Saturday in separate attacks, wounding three people.

The U.S. State Department issued new warnings Friday advising Americans to defer nonessential travel to the entire border state of Tamaulipas and large swaths of Mexico because of the threat of armed robbery, carjacking, kidnapping and murder by organized crime.

In the red dirt tombs of San Fernando, almost all the bodies were stripped of identification, meaning no licenses, bus ticket stubs or photographs of loved ones, according to interviews with local and state officials, making the job of notifying next of kin especially difficult.

Forensic photographs shown to The Washington Post depict mummified bodies caked in dirt and badly decomposed, with signs of extreme cranial trauma. In the largest two graves, holding 43 and 45 bodies, the corpses were piled atop one another in a 10-foot-deep pit dug by a backhoe, that criminals filled over in the past four months.

A Taxing Problem, not a spending problem

I know Faux's Republican bosses are telling them to whine about how our deficit/debt is a "spending problem, not a taxing problem", but if 45% of American households don't have any federal income tax liability, it what sense can that be a "spending problem, not a taxing problem"?

Also, too, it turns out that the average federal income tax rate for "taxed enough already" American households is a staggering 9.3%. Taxed enough already indeed.

The next teabag person who wants to complain about the deficit/debt being a "spending problem, not a taxing problem" and wants to whine out about being "taxed enough already" should be compelled to provide the rest of us a copy of their federal tax return. Or else shut up.

Where are Sarah Palin and Christine O'Donnell when you need them?

Unable to substantively answer Obama's budget challenge from Wednesday, Republicans are left flailing for the fainting couches:

The three Republican congressmen saw it as a rare ray of sunshine in Washington’s stormy budget battle: an invitation from the White House to hear President Obama lay out his ideas for taming the national debt.

They expected a peace offering, a gesture of goodwill aimed at smoothing a path toward compromise. But soon after taking their seats at George Washington University on Wednesday, they found themselves under fire for plotting “a fundamentally different America” from the one most Americans know and love.

“What came to my mind was: Why did he invite us?” Rep. Dave Camp (R-Mich.) said in an interview Thursday. “It’s just a wasted opportunity."

Whaaah. Sounds like these Very Manly Republican Randians need to "man-up".

Then the Post writer adds this:

The situation was all the more perplexing because Obama has to work with these guys: Camp is chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, responsible for trade, taxes and urgent legislation to raise the legal limit on government borrowing. Rep. Jeb Hensarling (Tex.) chairs the House Republican Conference. And Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) is House Budget Committee chairman and the author of the spending blueprint Obama lacerated as “deeply pessimistic” during his 44-minute address.

Have you ventured over to the House Ways & Means Committee website lately? Let's just say it's not full of bipartisany warm and fuzzies.

But I'm sure our Beltway Media will waste no time making Republican hurt fee-fees their obsession for the next few weeks.

A Fairness Doctrine To Believe In

In a very, very shrill and totally unBrave and Not Serious column today, Steven Pearlstein lays into Ryan:

Thursday morning, before a friendly crowd on Capitol Hill, I listened as Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), chairman of the House Budget Committee, his voice dripping with moral indignation, declared that by bringing up the issue of fairness in his budget speech this week, President Obama had stooped to “political demagoguery.”

Political demagoguery? In Washington? We’re shocked, shocked. Certainly we haven’t heard any demagoguery from Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.) or Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) or Ryan himself? Of course not. The budget crisis is much too serious for that.

News flash for Ryan: In deciding what to spend and whom to tax, lawmakers’ fights over budgets are always fights about values and priorities in which fairness has as rightful a place as fiscal rectitude and economic efficiency.

If it’s legitimate to decry the immorality of leaving our grandchildren a legacy of crushing debt, which Ryan and the Republicans do ad nauseam, then it is no less legitimate to talk about the immorality of reducing deficits by cutting nutritional support for pregnant women and infants rather than raising taxes on millionaires.

As Balloon Juice commenter J notes:

One of the signs of the wrong turn we’ve taken as a society, is the near total disappearance of the word ‘fairness’ from our public discourse and, it seems, of the corresponding idea from our thinking. It should be front and center. I’d like to hear Democrats use it far more often than they do and far more often than the mealy-mouthed terms they tend to favor.

Truer words never spoken.

Not Taxed Enough Already (No Tea)

This is the time of year when we are treated to the dual and obviously contradictory claims that (1) Taxes are too damn high and (2) Half the country is a bunch of moochers because they don't pay any damn taxes at all. Whaaaah.

How can these two claims both be true? We know, if we didn't know before, that members of the Republican Party just hate taxes. "They kill jobs." Raising them, even to reduce a debt and deficit that is bankrupting the country, is a "non-starter." And we don't have a "taxing problem" we have a "spending problem".

Except, apparently maybe we do have a taxing problem:

On his August 30, 2010, Fox News show, Sean Hannity said, "If half of Americans now don't pay taxes, and the other half are the beneficiaries of the tax that the other half pay, at some point you say, OK, you got a full voting block and it seems like the Democratic Party ... caters to that." Hannity has repeatedly claimed that 50 percent of Americans don't pay taxes.

So, taxes are job killers, can never be raised on anyone ever, and unfairly rob from the productive in our society. But at the same time, half the country that consists of Democrats don't pay any damn federal income taxes at all!

But maybe the Taxed Enough Already party is hedging their bets a bit:

KILMEADE: I just want to go through some things. Before people raise taxes on the somewhat so-called fortunate people in this country, because that's how they were labeled over the weekend, let's take a look at this chart: 97.11 percent of the taxes comes from 50 percent of the wage earners. There's a lot of people not paying taxes. And also, about who pays taxes, only 2.7 percent of taxes come from the bottom 50 percent of wage earners. So of course they're not -- the burden's not going to be on them. It's going to be on the people that are paying most of it anyway. [Fox News, Fox & Friends, 4/12/11]

The "bottom 50 percent of wage earners" sure are some serious deadweights, not paying their share. I wonder if any of these below-the-median hammock-laying Others are Taxed Enough Already teabag people? Are we to believe that all members of the TEA people's front of liberty are above-the-median John Galts, providing for all the rest of us?

Well, I kinda suspect that at least a few of these TEA bags belong to that despicable class of non to too low tax paying good for nothing wage earners.

I wonder when someone will point this out?

Aside: No, of course I don't believe the lower half of the wage earning distribution is a glot of no good bums. I do happen to think that even though low earners pay Social Security and Medicare taxes at the federal level and sales, income, property and other taxes at the state and local levels, that every wage earner should incur at least some post-tax-refund federal tax liability for things such as defense, national parks, food safety regulation, etc. We're all in this together. Let's just not let the reichwing, especially its supposed taxed enough already teabagging fringe continue to talk out of boths sides of its collective mouth. The country is not taxed enough already. And some of you teabaggers are lying.

Appropriations Fallout

Steve Benen notes a "pattern" that is "hard to miss":

At the time, this seemed, at least to me, like a plausible defense. Obama wanted an extension of unemployment benefits and to prevent a middle-class tax increase. With an imposing deadline, Republicans wouldn't budge on either point, so the White House struck a deal. These were "unique circumstances."

Except, the circumstances may not have been unique at all. We saw a situation in which Republicans were prepared to shut down the government, forcing the president to strike a deal he didn't want to make. We see Republicans poised to create a global crisis by blocking a debt-ceiling increase, pushing the president again into a situation where he may have to strike another deal. We see the next fiscal year's budget fight coming down the pike, and another shutdown threat.

The pattern is hard to miss -- a broad threat emerges, Republicans exploit through a hostage strategy, and the president, playing the role of responsible grown-up, takes steps to protect those who'd be "directly and immediately damaged."

Matt Yglesias has a good idea about how to approach the upcoming Armageddon over raising the debt ceiling:

It’s a two pronged strategy. The first one is a credible, repeated commitment not to surrender anything in exchange for getting congress to agree to the debt ceiling being increased. After all, why should anything be given up. Everyone knows that increasing the debt ceiling is the right thing to do. If the government were operating under uniform Republican control, the GOP would be increasing the debt ceiling. There’s nothing to bargain over. If some members of congress genuinely think that no increase in the debt ceiling is a superior options to raising it, then they’re entitled to be wrong. But there’s no reason that Obama should be trading votes with guys like John Boehner who know perfectly well that an increase is in order. This frames the issue correctly as one of whether or not Republicans who think an increase is warranted will nonetheless refuse to allow one in order to extract unrelated concessions.

The second prong, important for credibility, is to move to thinking about what happens as we reach the ceiling.

Moral Absolutes

Ruth Marcus:

Nothing justifies spending nearly $700 billion to extend tax cuts on the wealthiest Americans while cutting even more, $771 billion, of health care for the poorest.

Ruth Marcus is so silly. Why does she want all those Medicaid recipients driving around in their caddies and lounging on their hammocks?

Deep thought

I hadn't realized the last election was fought over funding for non-abortion related services of Planned Parenthood.

"No Compromise"

This is what the teabags want:

“I know they all go up there and want to compromise,” said Phil Spence, vice chairman of the 2nd Tuesday Constitution Group in Roanoke. “I’m against compromise. Either we have principle, or we don’t have principle.”

No compromise. The teabags cannot deign to negotiate with The Enemy. The views of Other Americans cannot be considered. We are not worthy of their "democracy".

Let the gushing begin

Paul Ryan, House Budget Committee Chair, and Ayn Rand lunatic, is proposing to phase out Medicare and Medicaid as we know it. To the tune of $5 trillion or so over the next 10 years, give or take. But our "liberal" media is pretty nonplussed about all of this at best, practically orgasmic at worst (see David Brooks today).

This NYT article by Robert Pear this morning is a case in point, although I'll admit it read a little better the second time than the first. Still, Pear refers to the whacking of these important programs and social safety-net pillars of our economy as merely a "fundamental rethinking of how the two programs work", excused as the need to "address the nation's fiscal challenges". As to the scope of the cuts, Pear understatedly reports that

the proposals on Medicaid and Medicare could shift some costs to beneficiaries and to the states.

Later, Pear discusses the plan's Medicaid component:

The Congressional Budget Office recently estimated that a Medicaid block grant, of the type proposed by Mr. Ryan and Ms. Rivlin, could save $180 billion over 10 years. House Republicans could save an additional $434 billion by eliminating the expansion in Medicaid eligibility scheduled to take place in 2014 under the new health care law.

Just think of it--if we could just whack that rather silly expansion in Medicaid provided by Obamacare we could save a whole nuther $434 bill. Wouldn't that be great?

The whole thing is a radical, drastic proposal to increase poverty, misery and economic inequality (as the plan also includes further cuts in the highest marginal tax rates).

Of course, if President Obama had not given away the store already in agreeing that "middle class" taxes can never be raised by any amount, ever, there might be the basis for offering an alternative to this nihilism. In the absence of that, in the "fierce urgency of now", our medial villagers will likely work double-overtime to assure us all how wonderful this fabulous budget blue print is.

Signs that the apocalypse is upon us, #801

Reality television star Donald Trump, still moving forward with presidential campaign plans, will headline a major Republican dinner in Iowa this June.

Maybe The Donald is jealous that that pizza company guy is getting all the attention.

My father always acts that way when he's drunk

From notable obits, former blues pianist and compadre of Muddy Waters, Pinetop Perkins, recently passed away at the fine old age of 97.

I especially got a kick out of this depiction of the late blues great:

From his days in the groups of Waters and the slide guitarist Robert Nighthawk to the vigorous solo career he fashioned over the last 20 years, Mr. Perkins’s accomplishments were numerous and considerable. His longevity as a performer was remarkable — all the more so considering his fondness for cigarettes and alcohol; by his own account he began smoking at age 9 and didn’t quit drinking until he was 82. Few people working in any popular art form have been as prolific in the ninth and tenth decades of their lives.

Not that I advocate cigaretting and drinking, mind you. Just amusing and a little heartening to see someone live it up for a long time.

I Can't Believe We're Losing To These People, Vol. 382

Sen. Richard C. Shelby (R-Ala.) recently accused Warren and the CFPB of leading “a regulatory shakedown,” because of their aggressive push for strict penalties against servicers in the pending settlement negotiations.

(snip)

Warren quickly encountered skepticism from House Republicans who criticized the broad powers granted to the new bureau and its seemingly untouchable budget, both of which they argued could lead to a lack of accountability and the creation of unnecessary and burdensome new regulations.

Fortunately, it sounds like Warren got in a few good licks herself:

“If there had been a cop on the beat with the authority to hold mortgage servicers accountable a half dozen years ago, if there had been a consumer agency in place, the problems in mortgage servicing would have been exposed early and fixed while they were still small, long before they became a national scandal,” Warren said in testimony before a House Financial Services subcommittee. She is the Obama administration’s point person for setting up the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

If anything, Warren said, the uproar over shoddy foreclosure practices illustrated the need for an agency dedicated solely to protecting ordinary borrowers from abuses by lenders.

“I am glad that the consumer agency has been able to provide assistance in this important matter,” Warren said. “I thank Congress for creating this agency to provide a voice for American families. That’s why we’re here, and that’s what we’re doing.”

They Just Don't Want The Bill (Update)

It never really changes, does it?

Two weeks ago Maryland's state Senate passed legislation approving same sex marriage by a vote of 25-21. The bill is currently being debated by the lower house and is, was, expected to be put up for a vote today. It's prospects for approval are unclear. Delegates previously on record for supporting marriage equality, even those who originally co-sponsored the bill, have backtracked, deterred by opposition in their districts, largely from church groups. And of course this is a very proper and necessary feature of our democracy, that legislation not be rushed through, that citizens from all walks of life have a chance to become aware and knowledgeable about the various courses of action being undertaken by their government.

At the same time, allow me to call BS. Marriage equality, to paraphrase Thomas Jefferson, doesn't pick anyone's pocket or break anyone's leg. Nor would it cause anyone to suffer. Nonetheless, there are people who just "don't want the bill".

So nothing ever really changes. Slow, hard-fought, incremental process is made on some matters. But if it appears someone else might get a right I reserve for myself, that I cannot abide. Yes, it's true, a certain legislative act might not hurt me in any material way, it might not take money from me or cause me direct injury. It might not even cause suffering to someone, or something else. But it would nonetheless offend me, it would present a different reality than what I subscribe to, it would lessen the degree of control I feel in this chaotic world. So, and perhaps even because, it would help others be happy and more fulfilled, I just "don't want it".

So, yeah, I'm calling bullshit on Delegate Alston's reversal of course in apparent acceptance of her community's mood. She, and the state's citizens, deserve a better argument, a better opposition, than just "not wanting the bill".

The failure of the anti-gay marriage contingent to come up with a reasonable, coherent argument was on full display during the proceedings in which a federal court heard evidence on California's notorious Proposition 8. Perhaps better publicized hearings and debate in Maryland would have helped highlight the opposition's lack of thoughtfullness on this issue. And maybe that opportunity will present itself again, either in future bills or in a referendum, should matters come to that.

But for now, the timid, uncritical acceptance of prejudice by some Maryland delegates is enough to make me sick.

Update: There was apparently not enough support in the House, so the delegates have kicked the bill back to the Judiciary Committee, effectively killing the effort on behalf of marriage equality for the year.

Marriage Equality in Maryland: Vote Expected Tomorrow

It hasn't gotten much attention nationally (there have been, admittedly, a few other things going on), but the Maryland state Senate recently passed a bill permitting same sex marriage (marriage, not civil unions). The bill is currently being debated in the state House, where it's prospects are less certain. Governor Martin O'Malley has promised to sign the bill if it is passed by the House. Opponents likewise promise to force a referendum on the 2012 ballot if the House passes the measure. Although Maryland is heavily Democratic, church groups, especially those in primarily African American Prince Georges County have spoken out against the bill.

Obviously I want the bill to pass, and have contacted my House delegates about it. All of them (Howard County Democrats) support it, and at least one is a co-sponsor.

However, even if the vote tomorrow is successful, the effort for marriage equality would be far from over. It's also apparent that marriage equality proponents have more work to do in broadening our supporting coalition.

Private money for schools?

The Wash Post editorial page likes the idea, waxing eloquent in its perpetual promotion of school "reform" by any means necessary:

Ms. Henderson's appointment will bring much-needed stabilization to the system. Many lower-ranking officials recruited by Ms. Rhee and attracted by the prospect of serious reform will feel comfortable staying on. Ms. Henderson also will be able to recruit strong new colleagues as needed and maintain the private financial support that Ms. Rhee managed to attract.

I wonder why this aspect of school "reform" hasn't attracted much notice. It seems like kind of a big feckin deal. The whole thing about the "public" part of public schools is the idea that the public funds them and has input on them. With, and how much, private funding of public schools, the public's influence over it's public schools is questionable.

The Post's editorialists have long weighed in against the supposed "pay for play" culture of neighboring Prince Georges County. But private funding of public schools carries its own brand of pay-for-play. The givers of private funds are presumably, and usually, more than a little casually interested in seeing those dollars implemented for certain, policy-specific reasons.

A Liberal Case for Social Security Reform

I raised this subject two months ago after the President's Debt Commission released its report. The nashing-of-teeth that's greeted the release of the President's 2012 budget over entitlements seems a good enough reason to raise again.

The most common liberal objection as I can tell is that reforms now won't guarantee conservatives won't come back three or six years from now demanding privatization or further cuts. And that's true. But the conservative case for post-reform privatization will be much weaker if the program has been put on the path to sustainable fiscal solvency. In such a case, conservatives won't have a basis for claiming there's a "crisis" if the program's annual reports begin to establish in the public mind that the program is indeed projected to be solvent for the next 75+ years. I'll return to this point later.

Broadly speaking, a liberal case for Social Security reform now is primarily one of political risk (combined with the economics and demographics affecting the program). Simply put, doing something now is better than waiting till later when the problem (long term actuarial imbalance) is worse. Beyond economics, the state of American politics might be worse later, too. If so, the "Overton Window" might have shifted towards a full dismantling of the program.

An additional factor worth mentioning is that for every year for the past two decades or so, Social Security's annual reports have projected the program to reach a point of insolvency at some time in the future. Many liberals tend to be dismissive of these projections in the sense that the year of projected insolvency is always said to be many years, usually several decades in the future. Why give in to pressure to reduce benefits now when the problem is many years away?

Well, one of the reasons is that because the program's funding gaps are reported every year, the public is made aware of them and legitimately or not, has cause to think the program's fiscal health is shaky. Hence the frequent mentions among polling respondents and radio call in shows that the system won't be there for "them" and will in fact be bankrupt. I have reason to attest that some version of this belief is common even among otherwise well-educated, politically involved, progressive people. Kevin Drumm recently made reference to a member of the political class' holding such an opinion.

It's tempting to castigate the media for its failure to properly educate the public or to blame members of the public, especially those who we think should know better, for this state of affairs. But the fact remains, these concerns and beliefs, while not totally accurate, do reflect information grounded in official publications and projections. And one way to help alleviate these concerns is to put the program back on solid footing for the long term.

The Social Security program, and its rich history for helping lift many of the aged out of poverty, will be the better for it. Let's not wait for 2028 or some other later year when the program's circumstances, and the public mood, could more than likely be considerably worse than today and supporters of the program have less room to maneuver. I'm not suggesting reform today will suddenly strengthen and improve everyone's perception of the program. But it would be a start.

On a related note, I largely buy in to the case made by Andrew Sprung and others that the best way for the President to lead on matters such as entitlements is through the Congress and negotiations with leaders from both parties, and not necessarily through the yearly budget requests or even for now, through public appeals. So I'm not necessarily looking for the President to be up front and vocal about this right now. But I do hope he and other progressives in and out of Congress begin to consider the matter of Social Security reform for the reasons discussed here.

Who's Defaulting?

Andrew Sullivan seems to think the U.S. is on the verge of fiscal default. How likely is this? What would cause it? The failure of Congress to increase the debt ceiling?

The term "default" has come up in several of Sullivan's recent posts, as in unless drastic budget cuts (or tax increases) are enacted to balance the budget right now the country will be in default/in a state of bankruptcy.

This seems a rather drastic and questionable interpretation of the current situation. For one thing, unemployment is still almost 10 percent; Surely this has something to do with our growing deficits. And up till now elites such as Fed Chairman Bernanke have warned Congress of the need to increase the debt limit unconditionally.

But I'll be curious to see if Andrew's invocation of "default" rhetoric will soon find it's way into the mouths and keypads of Media Villagers looking for a rationale to cut "entitlements".

The GOP's Entitlement Game

Matt Yglesias has an extremely shrill post up about the GOP and Social Security:

Right now we have conservatives simultaneously calling for huge spending cuts and also getting the line’s share of old people’s votes even while the vast majority of non-security spending is on old people. In essence, by first separating the domestic budget into “discretionary” and “entitlement” portions and then dividing the entitlement programs up into “what today’s old people get” versus “what tomorrow’s old people will get” the political class has created a large and vociferously right-wing class of people who are completely immune from the impact of their own calls for fiscal austerity. In my view, that reality is the biggest driver of our current political dysfunction. There’s some need for spending to be lower over the long term than it’s currently projected to go and I think it’s politically and morally vital that the adjustments be made in a balanced way. You frequently hear of the need to exempt everyone over the age of 55 from any possible cuts. That’s nice for them and encourages them to go right on complaining about out of control spending. But the average 55 year-old will still be alive and collecting benefits in 2035 so the long-term budgetary implications of this “let the geezers keep their full benefits while they whine about how Democrats are bankrupting the country” are actually pretty significant.

I agree with Yglesias and others in pointing out that Social Security is not the cause of the deficit or the debt that's accumulated over the past decade. All the same, if conservatives, teabaggers, and Media Villagers are going to clamor for "entitlement" cuts generally, and Social Security cuts in particular, then the cuts should apply to everyone, right now. No more of this "austerity for thee, but not for me" shell game.

Barbara Jr. Does A Good

I know Atrios is a bit under-whelmed, but I think this is worth applauding:

Another high-profile Republican is breaking ranks to advocate for gay marriage -- George W. Bush's daughter Barbara. The New York Times reported late Monday that the dark-haired twin has taped a video for the Human Rights Campaign, to be shown at their annual gala in Manhattan Saturday, calling on the Empire State to legalize same-sex marriages. Bush, 29, has kept a lower profile than her author/"Today" correspondent sister Jenna, but recently founded the Global Health Corps, which sponsors do-gooder work in poor communities worldwide.

Barb Jr also seems to be doing a variety of good things. Kudos to the Bush twin.

Proof-texting

I guess I'm not surprised Republican opted for the white-washed version of the text for yesterday's Let Us Read Our Glorious Constitwoshion Day.

It parallels the Bible fundamentalism popular among the conservative coalition in which while the whole of the Sacred Text is defended vociferously against all potential defamers and urged upon all heretics, literalist believers actually make very little use of the full material available.

For example, while Exodus 20 (The Ten Commandments) are a key part of Christianism's creed, I have yet to hear a sermon based on Exodus 21:

2 “If you buy a Hebrew servant, he is to serve you for six years. But in the seventh year, he shall go free, without paying anything. 3 If he comes alone, he is to go free alone; but if he has a wife when he comes, she is to go with him. 4 If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the woman and her children shall belong to her master, and only the man shall go free.
5 “But if the servant declares, ‘I love my master and my wife and children and do not want to go free,’ 6 then his master must take him before the judges.[a] He shall take him to the door or the doorpost and pierce his ear with an awl. Then he will be his servant for life.

7 “If a man sells his daughter as a servant, she is not to go free as male servants do. 8 If she does not please the master who has selected her for himself,[b] he must let her be redeemed. He has no right to sell her to foreigners, because he has broken faith with her. 9 If he selects her for his son, he must grant her the rights of a daughter. 10 If he marries another woman, he must not deprive the first one of her food, clothing and marital rights. 11 If he does not provide her with these three things, she is to go free, without any payment of money.

12 “Anyone who strikes a person with a fatal blow is to be put to death. 13 However, if it is not done intentionally, but God lets it happen, they are to flee to a place I will designate. 14 But if anyone schemes and kills someone deliberately, that person is to be taken from my altar and put to death.
15 “Anyone who attacks[c] their father or mother is to be put to death.

16 “Anyone who kidnaps someone is to be put to death, whether the victim has been sold or is still in the kidnapper’s possession.

17 “Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.

18 “If people quarrel and one person hits another with a stone or with their fist[d] and the victim does not die but is confined to bed, 19 the one who struck the blow will not be held liable if the other can get up and walk around outside with a staff; however, the guilty party must pay the injured person for any loss of time and see that the victim is completely healed.

20 “Anyone who beats their male or female slave with a rod must be punished if the slave dies as a direct result, 21 but they are not to be punished if the slave recovers after a day or two, since the slave is their property.

So when conservatives talk about Constitutional "originalism" and Biblical inerrancy/literalism, they don't really mean it.

Genocidal Deregulation

Steven Pearlstein is really shrill:

What's particularly noteworthy about this fixation with "job killing" is that it stands in such contrast to the complete lack of concern about policies that kill people rather than jobs.

Repealing health-care reform, for instance, would inevitably lead to thousands of unnecessary deaths each year because of an inability to get medical care.

Although lack of effective regulation led directly to the deaths of 78 coal miners last year in West Virginia, Republicans continue to insist that any reform of mine safety laws is bad for miners' employment.

Republicans also continue to oppose food safety legislation that could save the lives of hundreds of Americans killed each year by contaminated food, just as they oppose any regulation that would effectively keep assault weapons out of the hands of convicted criminals and narco-terrorists who kill thousands of innocent victims on both sides of the Rio Grande.

And although a blue-ribbon panel has now concluded that a lack of effective government regulation contributed to an explosion in the Gulf of Mexico that led to the deaths of 11 oil rig workers (along with countless numbers of birds, fish and other wildlife), all Republicans can talk about is the jobs that might be lost as a result of more vigorous oversight of deep-water drilling.

I wonder how Republicans and their media posse would like it if Democrats started referring to "genocidal" deregulation or the "murderous" repeal of health-care reform. Or if Republican economic policies were likened to the infamous neutron bomb - they kill the workers but leave their jobs intact.

More of this, please.

There are numbers from the CBO, and then there are numbers...

Republicans have scribbled on a napkin:

House Republicans countered with their own report, containing their portrayal of the financial effects of keeping the law intact. The report, filled with the incendiary language the GOP has adopted to discuss the law, is entitled: "Obama-care: A budget-busting, job-killing health care law" and features on its cover a gate padlocked with a thick chain.

Considering napkin-scribbling gang is also the same outfit whose new House rules stipulate that tax cuts won't increase the deficit, it's not hard to decide who's being more truthful here.

I remember when this was a free country: special debt-deficit edition

With all the media outcry over the past two years about deficits and the debt (but no noticeable outcry in the eight years prior), it's worth remembering that only a mere ten years ago, the country had a balanced budget.

Of course, then, the top marginal income tax rate was an "unconscionable" 39.6%, there was still a real estate tax, we weren't occupying two middle eastern countries and...

America: Dollar Stores are our business and business is GOOD

Remember when America used to make things, like cars?

Dollar General plans to create 6,000 new jobs in the next year, the discount retailer said Monday.

The increased hiring is part of Dollar General's (DG, Fortune 500) plan to open 625 new stores during the year, the company said in a statement.

The retailer said the hiring is the latest phase in its ongoing expansion. Dollar General will have created more than 15,000 new jobs from 2009 to 2011, the company said.

In addition to the 35 states where Dollar General already operates, the retailer will open stores in Connecticut, Nevada and New Hampshire. It is also planning to "remodel or relocate" 550 stores.

Shares of Dollar General rose slightly in Monday trading.

The news is part of what many economists believe is a brightening employment picture nationwide, with forecasts of between 2.5 million and 3 million jobs created in the coming year.

So, remember this little tidbit the next time you hear something about private sector job growth and our recovering economy, etc.

I wonder how the Israeli's handle it

And all the other sane countries to which the USA has finally added itself in allowing open gay service in the military.

Also, too, Massachusett's teabaggers apparently weren't happy with Scotty Pickup Truck Brown's support in the Senate for ending DADT. Maybe Christine O'Donnell can move to the Bay State and run in its teatard primary thus subtracting another Senate seat from the Republican column.

Also, too, teabaggers don't care about social issues, etc.

Forget Slavery For A Minute

Even if southern secession had not been based entirely on the rights of white men to own black men, which it was, why would the act of southern secession still be worth celebrating?

Isn't secession, the abandonment of the union, the ultimate rejection of the American national state, just plain old fashioned treason? Would it be if only northern states had seceded?

I can see the purpose and interest in a remembering of the people and events surrounding secession and the Civil War. But to celebrate a rejection of the country and flag that today's conservatives loudly proclaim to value and defend? What's worse is the tendency of today's conservatives to brand themselves as the only true "patriots" in the country while insinuating that liberals fail to express adequate devotion". Total chutzpah.

Democratic Idiocy on Taxes

Tax cuts for everyone forever:

Perhaps more consequential at the moment are the Democrats' intra-party negotiations over the Bush tax cuts. House leadership is still looking to hold a standalone vote on the tax cuts for income under $250,000. But some in the Senate -- including Chuck Schumer, Bob Menendez, and Claire McCaskill -- are pushing a compromise that would extend $400 billion of the $700 billion in tax cuts for income above $250,000 by extending them for everyone making less than $1,000,000. So those struggling members of the middle class making between $250,001 and $999,999 will get their tax cuts, too, and Democrats will have extended about $3.6 trillion of the $4 trillion in Bush tax cuts, or 90 percent of the total.

If that's the ultimate agreement we see on the Bush tax cuts, it'll be worth taking a moment to appreciate how far Democrats have backslid on this issue since BIll Clinton. Clinton, of course, raised taxes in the face of large deficits. The Obama campaign, by contrast, swore not to raise taxes on any family making less than $250,000, and Democrats might now effectively raise that to $1,000,000. In setting up the expectation that taxes can't go up for anyone but millionaires, Democrats take most of them off the table. And given that Republicans have no interest in taxes, either, that basically removes them as a tool of fiscal policy going forward.

This is embarrassing. And completely nonsensical.

Senate Passes Food Safety Bill

Senate actually does some good. Although Glenn Beck's disciples don't like the bill because...

As with any business regulation, opponents protest that "it'll hurt small business/farms." As if we should allow small farms to poison us. But apparently, George Soros has single-handedly thwarted the Faux media complex in getting this bill passed.

This might be the best news we have for a long time.

Caught Off Guard

Obama re-nominates a conservative chairman of the Federal Reserve, nominated previously under a conservative president, who, because U.S. unemployment is generously listed at about 10%, is finally taking some action to fulfill the institution's mandate for full employment, is feeling the wrath of President Palin and her teatard followers in the Faux media:

WASHINGTON — Faced with unusually sharp ideological attacks after its latest bid to stimulate the economy, the Federal Reserve now faces a challenge far removed from the conduct of monetary policy: how to defend itself in a hyperpartisan environment without becoming overtly political.

Caught off guard by accusations from Congressional Republicans, Sarah Palin, Tea Party activists and conservative economists, the central bank and its chairman, Ben S. Bernanke, are pushing back, making their case on substantive grounds but also haltingly adopting the tactics of Washington battle, like strategically placed interviews, behind-the-scenes assuaging of opponents and reaching out to potential allies on Capitol Hill.

The stakes are high. Last week, one House conservative announced legislation to strip the Fed of its mandate to promote jobs and have it focus solely on containing inflation.

The attacks, coupled with criticism from foreign officials, have introduced enough uncertainty into global financial markets to potentially undercut the Fed’s plan to drive down interest rates, which rise or fall as investors anticipate Fed action.

(snip)

Mr. Bernanke, who had thought the worst was behind him, was unsettled by the suddenness of the recent attacks. He has said that the Fed was in a no-win situation; if it had not acted, it would have been criticized for ignoring the painfully slow pace of the recovery.

This is really quite astounding. The conservative position is now that no branch or institution of the federal government should have to address the problem of unemployment.

This seems like a pretty big fekin deal

Sebellius's Department of Health and Human Services issues new health insurance regs:

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration issued new federal rules on Monday that will require many health insurance companies to spend more on medical care and allocate less to profits, executive compensation, marketing and overhead expenses.

The rules, intended to benefit consumers, vastly expand federal authority to direct the use of premiums collected by companies like Aetna, Humana, UnitedHealth and WellPoint. While some states have had such requirements, Monday’s announcement is the first such mandate by the federal government and grows out of the new national health care law.

“Millions of Americans will get better value for their health insurance premium dollar,” Kathleen Sebelius, the secretary of health and human services, said in issuing the rules.

Ms. Sebelius said the rules would protect nearly 75 million people: 10.6 million with individual policies, 24.2 million with small-group coverage and 40 million covered by large employers.

Starting next year, she said, insurers in the individual and small-group markets must spend at least 80 percent of their premium revenues on medical care and activities to improve the quality of care. Insurers in the large-group market must spend at least 85 percent of premium dollars for those purposes.

Insurers that do not meet the standards next year will have to pay rebates to consumers, starting in 2012. Ms. Sebelius estimated that up to nine million people could get rebates worth up to $1.4 billion. About 45 percent of people with individually purchased insurance are in health plans that do not meet the new standards, known as medical loss ratios, federal officials said.

I can't wait for the hysterical freak out by the teatards.

Stripping the FED

The Media Villagers, through the pen of spokesman George Will (Washington Post station, no linky), have begun jumping on the Hell No Quantitative Easing! bandwagon. With 10% unemployment, zero percent inflation, and a Federal Reserve that possesses the Congressionally-set mandate to ensure Full Employment (which it has heretofore done little to nothing), our new teabagging elite, from Sarah Palin to Eric Cantor to Fred Hyatt's crayon scribble page, instead wants the Fed to cease and desist?

So all of sudden the Fed isn't supposed to do anything about high unemployment? When did this happen? How did this suddenly become acceptable discourse, let alone conventional economic wisdom?

So our institutions are basically not supposed to respond to economic emergencies now?

To make this all the more bizarre, Fred Hyatt's crayon scribble page also includes, next to Will's Hell No QE! column an even more bizarre rant from the Media Village Dean, David Broder (no linky, trust me, it's just a bad column), complaining because the Dems have...added a third leadership member in the House when the loss of the House majority was supposed to result in them only having two. And that this atrocity amounts to the Dems "changing the rules" and not "making the hard choices" in regards to the 2009 stimulus bill and HCR, which Broder apparently hated.

I can't make sense of it. It shoudl be a fun next two years.

On Social Security, Dems Should Take The Deal

President Obama's deficit commission released its preliminary proposals yesterday, which include changes to Social Security. While I can't applaud the commission's broader tax and spending proposals, Democrats should welcome the commission's Social Security options. The Social Security changes include:

1) an increase in the "tax max"--the amount of taxes subject to Social Security taxes;
2)a new, wage-indexed, special minimum benefit for lifelong low earners;
3)an additional minimum benefit for the oldest Social Security beneficiaries, to kick in later in retirement;
4)a slight reduction in the annual cost of living adjustment (COLA);
5)a slight reduction in the benefit formula that will only affect those with higher than average earnings; and
6)a very gradual increase in the full retirement age (FRA) from 67 to 69.

Of these, only the FRA change can be considered as "regressive", but it's by no means a radical proposal, and there are several minimum benefit sweetners to make sure the lowest lifetime earners aren't adversely affected.

But why agree even to these? Because it isn't going to get better. A poorer performing economy means the estimated exhaustion date for Social Security's Trust Fund, currently projected to be 2037, will in all likelihood, only continue to creep closer. And the longer a long term fix is put off, the worse the fixes will need to be. Besides this, we can't know what the political climate will be in six, ten or 18 years. Quite possibly, it could well be worse than today.

This Social Security package would restore long term solvency, go a long way towards protecting it from would-be privatizers, and enhance benefits for the lowest lifetime earners through two new provisions. It also includes a tax max increases, which progressives tend to support. The benefit formula reduction--which some Progressives erroneously liken to "means-testing"--is actually just an extension of the already existing progressive benefit structure. This criticism seems particularly odd coming from progressives who normally want the more well to do to bear the brunt of any Social Security fixes. Progressives can't clamor for higher payroll taxes or higher limits to the "tax max" while simultaneously criticizing benefit reductions that affect higher-than-average earners. In short, this is overall a pretty progressive package of changes to the program, which Progressives and Democrats should support.

The point of being in Congress is to actually do good stuff

This seems like kind of an important point:

To me it seems obvious that having the 111th Congress press hard to get big things done was the right call, even if it contributed to electoral defeat. This is especially true because as I said yesterday you need to do the analysis at the margin. Losing 65 House seats is way worse than losing zero House seats. But dropping the Affordable Care Act wouldn’t have saved 65 House seats. Maybe it would have saved 15. But that’s not nearly as big a deal. The reason you try to win elections is it gives you the chance to pass important laws, so saying you want to avoid passing laws in order to slightly reduce your midterm losses seems silly.

Yglesias goes on to quote conservative writer Ross Douthat:

Politics often gets covered as though the legislative sessions are just a long prelude to the real action of election season. But for all the breathless horse-race coverage, elections only matter to the extent that they produce (or forestall) actual legislation. And where the policies of the United States government are concerned, all the ground the Republicans regained tonight doesn’t change the fact that what liberals achieved in Barack Obama’s first two years in office was more consequential than any conservative victories in recent memory.

So, the point of being in Congress and holding majorities in Congress is to actually get good legislation that helps people passed. The point of being in Congress and holding majorities in Congress is not to just keep being in Congress and holding majorities in Congress the next time. Hopefully the no-guts, no brains assclowns muttering about Nancy Pelosi will figure that out.

Surviving

Even though the Democrats got shellacked in the U.S. House, I'm feeling much better today than maybe I should. At the moment it appears that the Democrats will hold the Senate with a 53-47 edge. If Republicans had not nominated teabaggers in several key states, we would be looking at a Democratic minority in the Senate as well. And locally, Maryland Democratic candidates generally did really well.

But the House losses were huge and it will take several more cycles, and probably a lot of bad legislation, to reverse those. And the Democratic's hold over the Senate may be short-lived because they will need to defend more tough seats in '12. So, it's possible that even though last night's vote prevented an outbreak of full-blown-crazy, it might only be a temporary salve, especially if the economy does not improve significantly or if there is another significant terrorist attack.

Nonetheless I was greatly relieved to see Harry Reid win his seat over Sharon Angle. Hopefully, Patty Murray will hang on in Washington State.

I doubt any legislation of consequence will get passed in the next two years. Any that will, will be bad (i.e. extending all of the Bush tax cuts).

Elsewhere in Maryland

Martin O'Malley cruising to a re-election victory over Bob Ehrlich. This was a closer race at one point, and Ehrlich signs are ubiquitous in my area of central Maryland (above DC, below Baltimore). Maryland, Oh My Maryland. Guess signs don't win elections.

Also too, Frank Kratovil, blue dog "independent" Dem who voted against the HCR bill is losing to the Repub. Kratovil's ads have been all over the tv. Can't feel sorry for this guy. See ya, Frank.

Dems to hold Senate

CNN has the Dems with 47 seats in the Senate (counting the two Independents) with Hawaii, Oregon and California still to close. Assuming the Dems win those three Senate seats, and there aren't any party switches, that would give them 50, with VP Biden providing a tie-breaker. And there's still Murray in Washington and Reid in Nevada in close races. So the Senate looks promising. At least we may forestall the really supercrazy for another two years.

Hoyer could be in trouble (updated below, update II, update III)

The #2 Dem in the House, Maryland Rep. Steny Hoyer is trailing his Republican opponent 53%-46%, with 14% of the vote in. Still early. But the Repub is an African-American and this is a heavily African American district.

Good Democrat Rush Holt of NJ also trails with about 25% of the vote in.

Update I: CNN is now projecting Hoyer to win, although he still trails 53%-46% with 17% of the vote in. State-wide, the Republican vote tends to come in earlier, but for this district, I don't know.

Update II: 39% of the vote now in and Hoyer way ahead with 65% of the vote. Sorry for the false alarm.

Update III: CNN has now projected that Good Democrat Rush Holt of NJ will retain his House seat. Very good news.

Before the Morning After

I know tonight's going to be bad, but I did a lot of hand-wringing after the ‘94 mid-terms, then again in ’95 when the pundit class told me Clinton was toast, then in ’98when the pundit class wanted Clinton impeached before Dems won seats, then in 2000, then in 2002 when it looked like The War On Terror had Changed Everything, and I doubly wrang my hands again in 2004 when the pundit class told me it was all about the Values Voters. In 2006 the pundit class and my own pessimism had me convinced there was no way the Dems could win Congress again. Then in 2008 I couldn’t believe Americans would elect a black dude with the middle name of Hussein and the last name of Obama.

I wouldn’t worry much about the long-term impact of tonight’s results. It’s a mid-term (see 1982 1994), the economy is really bad (see 1982). If it stays bad, we might have more to worry about.

Profiles in Courage: Kent Conrad, ND

Today's Post:

At a time when many lawmakers are running away from the hated 2008 bank bailout, Sen. Kent Conrad is holding it close - and waging a one-man campaign to rehabilitate the program in the eyes of angry voters.

Over the past week, Conrad, a Democrat from North Dakota, has crisscrossed the state, delivering speeches to college economics classes and lecturing skeptical editorial boards, in addition to making his pitch on national television.

On Thursday morning, thousands of North Dakota newspaper subscribers awoke to a full-page ad with colorful charts and graphs about the improving economy, alongside a vigorous defense of the bailout and the equally reviled 2009 economic stimulus package.

The ad describes the perilous economic conditions that prompted a terrified Congress to approve the $700 billion bailout - officially, the Troubled Assets Relief Program, or TARP - just before the 2008 presidential election. It argues that TARP not only helped save the nation from a full-blown depression but cost much less than expected, with parts of the program turning a small profit.

And it cleverly reminds readers, front and center, that TARP was conceived by a Republican president, who just last week defended it during a lecture at the University of Texas at Tyler.

"President George W. Bush Explains Why He Created TARP," the ad says by way of introducing Bush's remarks, which are highlighted in yellow: "Depression, no depression . . . It wasn't that hard for me . . . I made the decision to use your money to prevent the collapse from happening."

Conrad, who chairs the Senate Budget Committee, is not on the ballot this year. And he has not decided whether to seek re-election when his term ends in 2012. So he has little to lose personally from defending the bailout.

Meanwhile, Democrats in North Dakota and nationally are getting hammered over their TARP and stimulus votes. Conrad said his campaign is an effort to help alleviate what he called "the major drag" on Democrats this campaign season.

Voter anger over the programs stems from "a fundamental lack of understanding," Conrad said. "At the time, we absolutely failed to help educate the American people as to how serious the situation was and how essential these steps were."

In addition to a Republican president, his Treasury secretary, his Federal Reserve chairman and Republican congressional leaders, Conrad said, Republican business leaders "came to us in droves" demanding aid for the banks and more liquidity through stimulus.

"Now all of a sudden they've all got amnesia," Conrad said. "But had people not stepped up, we would be in extremely serious shape."

The Post's Continued Love Affair with Michelle Rhee and Education "Reform"

I'm sure the Washington, DC schools need improvement, and I'm sure these folks are well-intentioned and quite generous, but this item in The Post's Metro section today is a little creepy.

You've got all these, may I say, Elite folks, throwing money at the DC schools and wanting certain processes put into place as a consequence for giving that money. One can read this article and reasonably conclude that public education policy in DC is being set by a highly select group of private donors. The article does note that Gray and his associates are trying to stress that as happy as they are to receive this money and attention and as committed as they are to school "reform", that there are still the actual parents of kids who go to the schools and residents who pay the taxes for the schools that, you know, actually need to be involved in the process.

This Is The Dumbest Thing Ever Written

Richard Cohen, Washington Post columnist, come on down.

Those and a general distrust of government are what motivate most Tea Party members, The Post discovered. Their allegiance to any political party is minimal. Obama, with almost no political record, might have made inroads with these people. Instead, he managed to become the personification of Big Government -- not just with his programs (necessary though they might be) but with his persona and isolation in the White House. He banned lobbyists but managed to transform himself into the biggest one of all. He blew it.

Yeah, Obama surely blew it by not finding common ground with this gang.

Very Serious People we should revere

Ruth Marcus in today's Post:

Asked what had inspired her to fly to the capital from Colorado, Andrea Carrasco started with God and ended with light bulbs.

She came, Carrasco said, to "ask God to restore the country. Our freedom is lost. My freedoms are lost. To be able to preach anywhere we want, to have God in our schools, to drive any kind of car we want and if I want to drive a gas guzzler, I can, if I want to eat a lot of sugar and salt, and I shouldn't be forced to buy medical care."

Carrasco paused, but only briefly. "To be able to burn the kind of light bulb I want," she added. "The list goes on."

I'm not aware of any laws preventing anyone from buying the latest gas guzzling SUV on the market, but I guess she hasn't considered that maybe "God" doesn't want her to "drive any kind of car we want."

Like most evangelicals, God seems to exist to indulge her every material desire whether or not such desires deplete scarce natural resources.

She also doesn't want to be "forced to buy medical care". I wonder who she wants to foot the bill when she or one of her rugrats ends up in the emergency room?

Murphy for half-term governor

In her nation-wide endorsement-tour, former half term Alaska governor and current Fauxbot Sarah Palin has endorsed a little known Maryland businessman--Brian Murphy--for governor of The Free State. In snubbing former full-term Republican governor, Robert Ehrich, who is running to regain the office he lost in 2006 to Democrat Martin O'Malley, Palin apparently was convinced that Murphy would follow her lead and abandon his office half way through his term.

Mission Accomplished 2

Bob Herbert is not impressed:

July was the deadliest month yet for American troops in Afghanistan. Sixty-six were killed, which was six more than the number who died in the previous most deadly month, June. The nation is paying little or no attention to those deaths, which is shameful. The president goes to fund-raisers and yuks it up on “The View.” For most ordinary Americans, the war is nothing more than an afterthought.

We’re getting the worst of all worlds in Afghanistan: We’re not winning, and we’re not cutting our tragic losses. Most Americans don’t care because they’re not feeling any of the tragic losses. A tiny, tiny portion of the population is doing the fighting, and those troops are sent into the war zone for tour after tour, as if they’re attached to a nightmarish yo-yo.

Some kind of shared sacrifice is in order, but neither Mr. Bush nor Mr. Obama called on Americans to make any real sacrifices in connection with either of these wars. The way to fight a war is to mobilize the country — not just the combat troops — behind an integrated wartime effort. To do that, leaders have to persuade the public that the war is worth fighting, and worth paying for.

The Ownership Society

Via Atrios.

I don't think "ownership" means what some policy elites think it means.

Meanwhile, back in The Media Village

I don't watch any of the Sunday talking head shows. But, and maybe even because of this, I can't for the life of me fathom what lies underneath the Washington Post's "TV Critic"'s smear of new This Week host, Christiana Amanpour.

"...the Grand Duchess Amanpour approached on her royal barge from overseas."

Grand Duchess?

And,

And it didn't require any globe-trotting Fancy-Pants (Amanpour) to do it.

Globe-trotting Fancy-Pants?

Does the Washington Post have people who edit, or at least review, what it plans to print?

Shale's good old boy, America F*ck Yeah sympathies were also apparently slighted by this:

Perhaps in keeping with the newly globalized program, the commendable "In Memoriam" segment ended with a tribute not to American men and women who died in combat during the preceding week but rather, said Amanpour in her narration, in remembrance of "all of those who died in war" in that period. Did she mean suggest that our mourning extend to members of the Taliban?

Oh, I don't know. Maybe Ananpour was thinking of the women, children, and other unarmed people killed by our drones or by Driving While a Citizen in one of the dozen or so countries the U.S. is current occupying. By for Shales, and apparently the Washington Post, the world only consists of Our Men & Women In The Military and The Terrorists. And wasn't referring to Americans killed overseas used to be some kind of defeatism?

Jeffersonian "Independence"

Conservative think tank welfare recipient, Faux pundit and apparent crack smoker Michael Barone thinks the nation is moving away from "the redistributional policies of progressives towards America's traditional 'culture of independence' " and that the nation is becoming "once again, as in the days of the early republic and not in the heyday of the Progressives and New Dealers, a republic of property owners."

Well. Uwe Reinhardt highlights retirement income data to challenge this idea.

Meanwhile, just a few minutes on the Intertubes this morning yielded these items of interest:

Recession was deeper than government previously thought
How the older half lives
How bad is Nevada?

So, (1) the economy continues to suck; (2) fewer people are saving for retirement, more of the aged are living alone and there will be more aged and alone people in the future, a majority of whom depend on government Social Security for their income and (3) the economy continues to suck, and this "republic of property owners" contains a lot of property without owners.

So, yeah, great "culture of independence" you got there. At least the top quintile is doing pretty well, and they're the group Barone hangs around with and thinks about.

On a more positive note, early returns on the much derided government directed automaker bailouts are good:

Robert Gibbs, the White House press secretary, was asked if the administration was in effect saying “we told you so” to conservative critics like Rush Limbaugh who have continued to denounce the auto bailout.

Some wanted to walk away, Mr. Gibbs said. But he added, “The president didn’t think that walking away from a million jobs in these communities made a lot of economic sense.”

Barone needs to get out more.

Putting the Teabaggers on notice

Guest-blogging at Andrew Sullivan's place, Dave Weigel thinks the fact that the NAACP's resolution calling for the teabaggers to repudiate the racists in their midst generated a series of nasty responses from the teabaggers means that the NAACP's resolution failed.

Weigel thinks the proper means of calling attention to the racism in the teabagging bowel movement is to...what? I don't know.

Unlike Weigel I think the NAACP's resolution succeeded. It got the teabaggers to respond in an ugly, defensive way, and getting the media to talk about it. The resolution was also a means of putting the teabaggers on notice. Anytime the teabaggers want to invite the Tom Tancredo's of the world to their meetings and applaud their calls for literacy tests and as long as their leaders continue to be like Mark Williams who hate on the NAACP and write ugly, racist mock letters trying to tell African-Americans what's good for them, the wider media and political world will be forced to consider the teabagging bowel movement's true character. And if they don't, the NAACP is on record for making the group's racism visible.

Besides passing HCR, Wall Street reform and reviving the U.S. Auto Industry, what have the Romans/Obama Administration ever done for us?

There's been a great deal of blog-chatter about the State of Obama lately, with its defenders offering the passage of HCR, the stimulus, financial reform, energy legislation in the House, etc, and its detractors complaining about the inadequacies of much of the accomplishments, not to mention the Administration's war, civil liberties and civil rights policies being mostly lacking.

One thing I don't hear much discussion of (besides conservative complaints about it being a bailout or takeover of the industry) has been the survival, if not outright revival, of the U.S. auto industry, particularly that of Chrysler and GM. When the Obama Administration took office, these two key automakers were entering into bankruptcy or worse. Some erstwhile American "patriots" seem to wish them to die off. So on top of trying to revive the economy in general, Obama faced the potential vanishment of at least two members of the U.S. auto industry's Big Three, not exactly an encouraging prospect.

To preserve two of the premier pillars of American capitalism, the Obama Administration did take an assertive approach: buying company stock and pushing for company reorganizations, among other tactics. While a few steps were taken earlier, the Administration rolled out the parameters of its plan in March of 2009. General Motors streamlined itself, eliminating the product lines of Saturn and Pontiac. Since then, GM and Chrysler have begun paying back government loans, the Toyota car company experienced notorious safety recalls, and the U.S. industry seems to have returned, albeit in a slightly different form and admittedly not to the level of its boom years. But the companies are continuing to do business and represent America in the world of manufacturing, something we elsewhere aren't doing much of these days.

It seems to me like this is a rather under-reported story. Perhaps it's a bit too early to say how Chrysler and GM will ultimately fair. But if we're going to assess the Administration, its record with the auto companies seems like a rightful element to consider. The Administration could help by giving the country an update as to the industry's progress and engaging in a little self-promotion, if such is warranted. And maybe our press, along with liberal bloggers disenchanted with the president, could take note.

Consider a counter-factual in which Chrysler and GM were allowed to go out of business--as seemed highly possible--in Obama's first year. It's highly likely that Faux news and Glenn Beck would have spent the last 18 months charging Obama with treason or incompetence for failing to "save" the American auto companies. Their collapse would have been attributed to his failures and so forth.

Deep Thoughts - 17th Amendment Edition

Without the 17th Amendment to the Constitution, which the teabaggers would like to do away with, the teabaggers wouldn't have been able to help get Pickup Truck Scotty Brown elected to the Senate. Democrats hold supermajorities in both chambers of the Massachusett's General Court.

"Obama Disses White Guys"? Really, Washington Examiner?

That was the headline that blared out from the freebie tabloid known as the Washington Examiner this morning. The basis for this accusation springs from the usual DrudgeFauxMalkinLimbaugh cesspool, and concerns Obama's singling out of African American, Hispanic and female voters as being crucial for the Fall campaign.

Maybe this is news to the Examiner, but African Americans, Hispanics and female voters have historically been marginalized in the voting process. African American and Hispanic voters also tend to vote in smaller proportions to their share of the population, especially in mid-term elections. Maybe this is news to the Examiner as well. And yes, some of these marginalized groups have tended to vote Democratic. How about that. Maybe it's because Democratic and Progressive reformers were instrumental in helping previously disenfranchized Americans obtain the vote. Obama didn't say anything about not wanting or needing White votes, or not wanting Whites to vote. Whites tend, and have tended, to be well represented in the voting process. It's possible the Examiner doesn't know this. Nor did Obama reveal any elaborate, conniving plans in combination with the now defunct ACORN, or Michael Moore, or George Soros, to deny Whites, male or otherwise the vote. So the Examiner, doing its duty to pass along the Republican message of the day/year/term, is just making shit up.

This is probably a good place to say something about the appearance of the Washington Examiner, which started showing up around DC Metro stations on or about 2008. While the financial and personnel troubles at the conservative Washington Times have drawn some attention in recent months, its decline has been supplemented by the arrival of the free Examiner. Seems as if the conservative money behind the Times, after deciding it couldn't sell it's paper, just decided to hand it out for free. It hired Faux News regular Michael Barone and Byron York of the National Review to write for it, rendering its political coverage a "fair and balanced" mix of conservative and more conservative. But it is pretty slickly produced and more substantive than the similar but more Style-feature oriented Washington Post Express, a freebie tabloid that began showing up a short time before the arrival of the Examiner.

The Examiner's trafficking and packaging of the republican noise machine's memes has been apparent from the getgo, but in today's edition, it's hit a disturbingly new low. At long last, Examiner, have you no decency?

I know none dare call it racism to expose the confederacy celebration movement's racism, but it's time for those of good conscience to speak up and loudly about the distribution of shit like this. The Examiner's ad sponsors would be a good place to start.

The Return of "State's Rights"/Arkansas Refuses to Join In

There's a very good and for these days when the rights of the unelected teabaggers seem to take precedence over our dually elected representatives, reassuring article noting the refusal of Arkansas's Governor and Attorney General to join in on the latest Nullification movement.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/29/AR2010032903590.html

Actually, the "Hopey-Changey" thing is going pretty well.

Thanks for asking.

Smearing Stupak

Fred Hiatt's Crayon Scribble page has a very whiny oped by one of the many conservatives it now employs making it sound as if the HCR bill that just passed is some kind of abortion-mandate machine, while attacking anti-abortion Michigan Rep. Bart Stupak as somehow "unprincipled" for supporting it. In addition to bitching about the limitedness of the Executive Order signed by the President, which was designed to appease anti-abortion Dems, nothing in the oped references the abortion restrictions mandated by the Senate Bill's language on abortion, itself a restriction demanded by anti-abortion Senator Ben Nelson as a requirement for passing the overall bill.

Anyway, all of this is just an excuse for me to post something Matt Ylegias wrote earlier in the process, after the Nuns and other Catholic organizations came out in support of the legislation:

"Some of the efforts to prove that the bill “really” includes federal funding of abortion despite not actually providing federal funding of abortion have gotten a bit silly. I mean it’s true that if we pass universal health care this will probably increase the market demand for those sterile gloves doctors wear during exams, which will increase the earnings of people who deliver boxes of gloves, and some of the glove-deliverers might use that money to pay for abortions. Short of making abortion illegal, and then very rigorously enforcing the law, there’s no way to ensure that no dollars will reach an abortion clinic through some roundabout path. But the exact same consideration holds for any conceivable legislation on any subject."

Conservatives are truly in the midst of their final death throes where it concerns the HCR passage.

He Signed The Damn Bill

Repeal this, you no talent bunch of teabagging assclowns.

And Richard Cohen, of all people, is surprisingly good this morning. Someone must have spiked his oatmeal with a hefty dose of Progressive Win.

The Morning After

Still feels really good.

Can't help noticing that some of the usual blogs I read don't sound all that excited about last night's historical vote. I know there's no public option. I know the bill still leaves insurance companies in business. I know there is some questionable abortion language, although I can't see this significantly changing current law for the worse.

So, sorry, I'm not having any of the regret soup today. This was a smashing victory. The most significant and progressive piece of legislation to pass in my lifetime. While Obama's victory in 2008 was also historic in a symbolic sense, the ultimate purpose of electoral victory is to accomplish something meaningful. Last night a very large down-payment was made on that pledge. It's like paying 75% of your mortgage the year after you bought your house. There's still some left to pay but doinig so has become much more manageable. And your house feels a lot more like it's really yours than it was before.

They Passed The Damn Bill

Smells like...victory.

31 No's

While I think Ezra Klein makes a good point here about the level of interest group consensus on HCR, all the stress surrounding final passage would be pretty much moot were it not for a whopping 31 "No" votes looming in the Democratic camp. That's really pretty astounding. And sickening. Not that I ever have, but I couldn't ever justify sending any money to the Democratic Party's Congressional Campaign Committee. Not if any of that money ever went to any of these "No" tools.

Social Justice Christianity

I realize this is so last week, but here's a pretty good riff on Beck's latest attempt to smear those who don't share his regressive views of life.