January 2009
69 posts
Priorities
Dylan Matthews:
Former Bush Chief of Staff Andrew Card thinks Obama is disrespecting the office of the presidency. Guess why:
CARD: I found that Ronald Reagan and both President Bushes treated the Oval Office with tremendous respect. They treated the Office of the Presidency with tremendous respect. And some of that respect was reflected in how they expected people to behave, how they expected...
Stimulus skeptics
DeLong:
It’s fine to be a stimulus skeptic! But stimulus skeptics need to be stimulus skeptics for reasons that are (a) theoretically coherent and (b) empirically relevant. To be a stimulus skeptic because you fear that the bill that emerges from congress will have a very low bang-for-buck, or fear that the long-run drag from amortizing the extra debt will cost us more than we gain from...
Will Opposing the Stimulus Makes Voters See Blue?
CQ Politics
Rush Limbaugh may beg to differ, but lockstep votes against President Obama’s stimulus package like the one seen in the House this week are steadily adding blue dye to the electoral map, according to a new poll by Democratic pollster Stan Greenberg.
A survey of 1,200 voters in 40 traditionally Republican congressional districts now held by Democrats Greenberg’s firm...
“Now is not the time for us to lick our political wounds, now is the time for us...”
– Republicans prepare to launch offensive against Democrats | World news | guardian.co.uk
Inflicting political wounds facilitates gaining political position. If their goal is to promote their ideals, they’re going to need to defeat the Democrats. I feel Obama’s going to be more competent than Bush,...
“Now is not the time for us to lick our political wounds, now is the time for us...”
– Republicans prepare to launch offensive against Democrats | World news | guardian.co.uk
Ah. Good to see that, as usual, Republicans are more concerned with partisan bickering than with doing their jobs.
(via robot-heart-politics)(via southpol)
If I’m not mistaken, their job isn’t to rubber stamp...
“Now is not the time for us to lick our political wounds, now is the time for us...”
– Republicans prepare to launch offensive against Democrats | World news | guardian.co.uk
Ah. Good to see that, as usual, Republicans are more concerned with partisan bickering than with doing their jobs.
(via robot-heart-politics)
Obama’s Biting Rebuke of Wall Street →
Cause if there’s one thing that will make Wall Street change its ways, it’s rebuke.
'Tell Congress to support the Obama Plan.'
Mike Allen:
The Republican shutout is a slap at the president in the short term but poses a big risk for Republicans in the long run. The president met privately with House Republicans at the Capitol, Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel had a private White House dinner for House GOP moderates, and the president had members of both parties and both chambers over for cocktails last night - but did not...
Selling the Stimulus Package After the House Vote
vondelpark:
Did the White House staff screw the pooch in sending Obama to booze it up on the Hill and then not secure a single GOP vote? Is Obama staging some elaborate con, head-faking bipartisanship while ramming through a liberal-wet-dream bill? Is he saying, I’ve got a good bill here and you can either get in on the action/credit or look like obstructionist do-nothings? Has he badly...
There's more than pork in the stimulus plan
There are also giveaways!!
At least $23.8 billion in corporate tax breaks have been included in the $825 billion economic recovery package in order to win backing from key business groups and their Congressional allies, even though the team that put the legislation together believes the breaks have little value in stimulating the economy and creating jobs.
Top beneficiaries include banks,...
The Trouble With Lobbyist-Bashing →
Matt Yglesias
ABC News: Another Lobbyist Headed Into Obama... →
jeffmiller:
Has any other President so blatantly and so quickly violated his most sanctimonious campaign promise?
There will be a knee-jerk compulsion among his supporters to excuse these appointments. And that is more depressing than Obama’s broken promise.
How about a knee-jerk compulsion among his detractors to gleefully tell his supporters what they’re going to do? Allow me to roll...
Stimpak Stagnation
Ryan Avent
Our infrastructure and energy policies need to be drastically overhauled. This is going to require careful forethought — and time. New initiatives in the stimulus might well complicate or undermine later attempts at reform. The simplest example is the highway versus transit debate; it’s difficult to make headway on goals to reduce emissions and vehicle miles traveled while...
Chances are they can't
Kevin Drum:
Via Open Left, the unofficial final vote counts for the 2008 congressional election are here. Here’s how the House race turned out:
Two-party popular vote: Democrats 55.5%, Republicans 44.5%.
House seats won: Democrats 59%, Republicans 41%.
Bottom line: Dems won the two-party vote by 11 percentage points, but won the race for congressional seats by 18 percentage...
“Mr. Grantham reminds us that there are really only three ways to deal with a...”
– Thanks, Maestro… | The Big Picture
Settlements in West Bank and Gaza: Key to... →
(via unburyingthelead):
I recommend a stroll through retropolitics:’ roundup of Christian Zionism and the “Settlements in West Bank and Gaza: Key to Fulfilling Prophecy.”
Gershon Gorenberg, an American-born Israeli journalist who is an associate at the Center for Millennial Studies at Boston University, told 60 Minutes:
“They don’t love the real Jewish people. They love us...
Contraceptives/Stimulus
Republicans Irate Over Expansion of Republican-Approved Program:
The Drudge Report and Politico are breathlessly repeating Republican talking points that accuse House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) of hijacking the stimulus bill to promote contraceptive use.
At the risk of giving this ridiculous non-issue still more exposure today, I thought I’d point out a couple of basic facts.
First of...
Kristol Nicht?
So today saw Bill Kristol’s last column in the New York Times. Good. Now we see that his next stop is… the editorial pages of the Washington Post?
[insert simultaneous guffaw and sob]
What Steve Benen said:
In any other field, outside of conservative political commentary, Kristol’s record would be nothing short of humiliating. He’s been wrong, not only in his...
“Nationalization in other countries means that the government has control over...”
– David Sirota, talking with Thomas Frank and Bill Moyers.
As the ITT List puts it, ‘If you’re going to do nationalization, do nationalization’
“President Barack Obama is staffing his Justice Department with some of his...”
– Bush’s legal foes, Obama’s legal team
The sage being sagey
Calculated Risk: PBS Interview with Warren Buffett
WARREN BUFFETT: The answer is nobody knows. The economists don’t know. All you know is you throw everything at it and whether it’s more effective if you’re fighting a fire to be concentrating the water flow on this part or that part. You’re going to use every weapon you have in fighting it. And people, they do not know exactly what the effects...
“Fully 84% of the public wants more money spent by the federal government —...”
– Pollster Frank Luntz - Infrastructure: It’s Job 1 to Americans
“The LSE economist Robert Wade addressed about 1,000 Icelanders recently at a...”
– New age of rebellion and riot stalks Europe - Times Online
A New Age of Rebellion and Riot? Really?
Chinese Health Care
Will China have universal health care before the U.S.?
China just decided to spend $123 billion by 2011 to build a universal health care system for its $1.3 billion people. So they’ll likely have universal health care before we will. This American exceptionalism thing is getting out of hand.
But it’s worth zooming in on why the Chinese are making this a priority right now: Chinese...
“So what are Coke and Pepsi doing to compete against each other for a spot in the...”
– Carbonated Conflict
More Perfect Unions
Progress Illinois says:
One of the big obstacles in advancing the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) is that most people don’t have any idea how union drives actually work and, as such, don’t understand the relevance of the pro-worker reforms included in the bill. If you’re among those who’ve been confused about this debate, we urge you to read T.A. Frank’s latest...
“On his first day in office, President Obama put former president Bush on notice....”
– Obama to Bush: I Can Release Your Records. Don’t Like It? Sue.
What it means to be pro-Israel
Ezra Klein, in Haaretz:
But it is not the criticism that should concern Israelis so much as the response to that criticism, which has exposed a dangerous and counterproductive defensiveness on the part of those who would protect the Jewish state. The resulting fight has manifested itself as a struggle to define what it means to be pro-Israel, and has spawned two distinct camps.
Traditionally,...
Why isn't Al Franken in the Senate?
Coleman Could Still Win - Marc Ambinder
In some ways, Al Franken’s 225 vote lead the Minnesota Senate race is an illusory number. That’s his margin after the state canvassing board completed its recount. Why isn’t he in the Senate? Thank Gov. Rod Blagojevich. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, in trying to delay Blagojevich’s appointment from taking the seat, stated for...
First 10 things
Dear President Obama,
Here is a list of the first 10 things you should do as president:
1. Fly to the White House in a helicopter. 2. Walk in. 3. Wipe feet. 4. Walk to the Oval Office. 5. Sit down in a chair. 6. Put hand-sanitizer on hands. 7. Enjoy moment. 8. Get up. 9. Get in car. 10. Go to the dog pound.
— Chandler Browne, age 12, Chicago
Dear Sir Obama - Presidential Advice -...
Card Check, Common Ground, and Compromises
Obama on The EFCA (Card Check):
I think the basic principal of making it easier and fairer for workers who want to join a union, join a union is important. And the basic outline of the Employee Fair Choice are ones that I agree with. But I will certainly listen to all parties involved including from labor and the business community which I know considers this to be the devil incarnate. I will...
“Ann Coulter is very popular. She has got a niche,” Perino explained Friday...”
– White House Press Secretary Dana Perino
The context is that Perino is thinking about a book on the topic of ‘popular misperceptions of Republican women.’
Judging by her use of Coulter as the ‘unrepresentative’ Republican woman, I think she may be talking about assumptions...
Torture and Selective Outrage
jeffmiller:
southpol:
Why limit it to prison rape? There were 272,350 victims of rape, attempted rape, or sexual assault in 2006. This is a terrible thing and a terrible number… .
…..
But insofar as there is some sort of moral equivalence between criminals sexually assaulting other criminals and the U.S. government inflicting torture in my name, I think you’re just trying to sensationalize...
Torture and Selective Outrage
jeffmiller:
I believe that it is disgraceful that our country has tortured prisoners in conjunction with the “War on Terror.” However, I think we’re a little too selective with our outrage. Consider this:
According to the report, released [in December 2007] by the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS), “Sexual Victimization in State and Federal Prisons Reported by Inmates, 2007,” 4.5 percent of...
Eric Holder confronts the ticking time bomb...
Well, I’m not sure if he confronted it, but he was certainly confronted with it. And he said the right things in this actual universe (the one that isn’t an episode of 24):
John Cornyn, repeatedly invoking the “ticking time bomb scenario,” attempted to box Eric Holder into a corner on waterboarding. Cornyn’s hypothetical relied on the false premise that the only way...
“Like The World is Flat, a book borne of Friedman’s stirring experience of seeing...”
– Matt Taibbi, destroying Thomas Friedman yet again (via hellofriend) (via cajunboy) (via shorterexcerpts)
That piece is brutal.
Stimulus Bill Draft Circulated By Dems: Full Text →
An Urban President for an Urban Nation
Nate Silver:
[I]f you are going to pit big cities against small towns, it is probably a mistake to end up on the rural side of the ledger. Last year, Obama accumulated a margin of victory of approximately 10.5 million votes in urban areas (see chart), far bettering John Kerry’s 3.6 million. Obama improved his performance not only among black and Latino voters but also among urban whites,...
“I know as much or more than Cheney,” Mr. Biden...
katiebakes:
Gooood morning! Biden Biden Biden Biden Biden Biden.
“The proof of the pudding is in the eating,” Mr. Biden said in an interview Wednesday. “The Bush-Cheney relationship hasn’t tasted very good. Not a single person you can name for me” — at this point, he leaned forward in his chair, jabbed his finger in the air and punctuated his words sharply. “Look at me, now — a single one can...
