I feel depressed, I feel so bad 'Cause you're the best girl that I've ever had I can't get your love, I can't get a fraction Oh, little girl, psychotic reaction And it feels like this!
I feel so lonely night and day I can't get your love, I must stay away Well, I need you, girl, by my side Oh, little girl, would you like to take a ride now? I can't get your love, I can't get satisfaction Oh, little girl, psychotic reaction
We are on the side of individual freedoms and liberties and damn it, we will reclaim the Civil Rights movement. We will take that movement, because we were the people that did it in the first place!
So speaks Glenn Beck, and Leonard Pitts isn't having any of it. Beck and his ilk did something all right, but one doubts that any of their predecessors were standing on the right side of the Pettus Bridge at Selma. Even so, his diatribe was just too much for some:
King was not the man of peace Beck claims he was, and I'm not sure why he panders to him so much. King was a troublemaker...where King went -- racial riots followed.
Some of the riots that followed Martin Luther King:
Thursday, June 10, 2010
I Kid You Not Dept: Jack Coleman of EnergyNorthAmerica tells Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) that the spill is a fair price to pay protecting BP's contractualrights:
What Would We Do Without Her?: The former governor of Alaska, who quit after less than two years on the job to concentrate on lucrative speaking engagements, claims that President Obama's lack of executive experience caused him to commit the grievous error of not telephoning Tony Hayward, BP's lying CEO. According to Palin, who would give Hayward the benefit of the doubt, regular phone calls would be the best way for the president -- who we all know has a Ph. D. in Petroleum Engineering -- to "verify what BP reports." Um, Sarah, there is no "verify:" BP has less credibility than you. As the president says, why would he waste time meeting with someone who would "say all the right things" no matter what the truth of the matter?
Palin went on to brag about a compliance agency created on her watch, an agency that Pamela Miller, arctic program director for the Northern Alaska Environmental Center, says has yet to show "any tangible results in the oil fields" and that claims to the contrary are "hollow." Anyway, Miller added, "She walked. So how is she holding that entity accountable? What kind of executive experience is that?" Of course, Miller is likely an extremist greenie who opposes drilling in the proven and safe ANWR...
John Dickerson isn't my favorite Slate columnist, but he makes some good points here about the contradictory demands and unrealistic expectations put on a president during an emergency. He also gives short shrift to Palin's phone call nonsense...
"I will paint the Macinaw Bridge red with the blood of you and your family members." Joe Kresch, a 73-year Michigander who enjoys the benefits of Social Security and Medicare but who despises socialized medicine, sent this charming missive to Rep. Bart Stupak (D-MI). Among other things, Kresch advised Stupak to follow "the footsteps of your son, Bart, Jr.," who committed suicide. Good man that he is, Kresch doesn't object to the president because "he is half black or half white." Although "not a racist," he opposes President Obama's "...belief of what our country should look like..." and the president's "...hidden black agenda..." As for the teabaggers, Kresch writes confidentially that "I am not a Tea Partier, although that does have some appeal." Indeed...
Arizona's former state attorney general worries that his state may be getting a reputation as intolerant. Gee, I wonder why? Meanwhile state Chamber of Commerce spokesman Garrick Taylor expressed irritation at boycotts of Arizona, opining that "If they were truly invested in the immigration issue, they'd be pressing Washington for comprehensive immigration reform." Apparently, Taylor believes that Sonic Youth should feel more soft-hearted concern Arizona business climate and less moral nausea over the Papers Please law...
Rolling Stone's Tim Dickinson has written an embarrassing article article about the administration's response to the spill that illustrates why a magazine that specializes in puff pieces about rock stars should leave the in-depth political reporting to publications that do in-depth political reporting. The first part of the article would be impressive had it been written before the spill; now, it's hindsight. The entire piece is devoid of political context except for a couple of paragraphs at the end, and even they are narrow in scope. Reading it, one would think that all Obama had to when he took office was straighten out MMS, and that there was no financial crisis, no mortgage crisis, no rapidly rising unemployment, no wars, and no health care legislation. And, naturally, it repeats the bogus assumption that the government could have stopped the spill by taking over, but -- as with everyone else who claims this -- never says how...
Wall Street to Obama: "Okay, first you slap us in the face, now you kick us in the balls. Enough is enough. I mean, we’re done." If you can stand it, read this account of how the most politically tone deaf and gluttonous gang of thieves to ever curse the earth with its presence resents minimal requirements to clean up an act that came close to ruining the global economy. Not only that, the mildest rebuke of their obscene bonuses induces the thin-skinned tantrum of a five-year old who doesn't want to give back the ball he's stolen...
Paul Krugman writes that they don't want to pay their taxes, either? Well, you wouldn't, either, if you had to scrape by on an eight-figure income...
JUST A SONG: Los Tigres del Norte and "La Granja"...
Twitter updates from the Deepwater Horizon Joint Information Center here (thanks, Annette)...
Republicans say that Rand Paul is just a young guy, a regular Nuke LaLoosh who hasn't yet learned to keep his convictions to himself when being interviewed by mad dog reporters like Rachel Maddow. Says Sarah Palin (with a straight face):
...this lesson that I have learned and Rand Paul is learning now is don't assume that you can engage in a hypothetical discussion about constitutional impacts with a reporter or a media personality who has an agenda...
Once again, earth to SP: What reporter doesn't have an agenda, and when did you ever "engage in a hypothetical discussion about constitutional impacts" ("constitutional impacts'?) with anyone. I can just hear her in a dorm room at one of the many colleges she attended: "Let's not troll for just any group of guys when we go out tonight. Let's find some with whom we can have a meaningful hypothetical discussion about constitutional impacts. I so go for guys like that."
Notice that she's transformed a softball question from Katie Couric about magazines into an ambush by Mike Wallace about the nuances of the Constitution...
While the conventional wisdom has it that Arlen Specter's defeat in Pennsylvania represents a political setback for President Obama, history suggests otherwise. Setting aside 1998 and 2002, which occurred under unique circumstances, presidents have rarely displayed coattails in off-year elections. (It's an overrated phenomena anyway.) You have to go back to John Kennedy in 1962, when Democrats gained four seats in the Senate and held House losses to six, to see any evidence of coattails...
After this commercial hit the Alabama airwaves, Republican gubernatorial candidate Byrne, not about to be Swift Darwined, screamed bloody murder and declared, "I believe the Bible is the Word of God and that every single word of it is true." He went on to attack "powerful government insiders," "corrupt Democrat and AEA (Alabama Education Association practices," and "power mongers" as being behind "these despicable attacks." He proudly concluded by saying, "Like so many other Alabamians, I was raised in a conservative-minded Democratic household," but changed parties fifteen years ago because of the Democratic party's "liberal social policies, wasteful spending habits and big-government expansion." Well.
Byrne, an insider himself who has held elective office off and on since 1994, is apparently the first candidate ever to run for high office because he is uninterested in power. And in Alabama, no less. As for the "conservative-minded Democratic household," that's Newspeak for saying that he was raised to believe in segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever. Does anyone doubt that his parents voted enthusiastically for this man?
But what about the ad? Does Byrne have a point? Yes, sort of. Apparently, the ad was placed by a right-wing PAC called True Republican that outs Byrne as a closet liberal (!) not in touch with Alabama values. The AEA, which has tangled with Byrne for years, helped finance True Republican, evidently on the theory that attacking Byrne from the right will bear greater fruit in Alabama than an assault from the left.
Which has left Byrne crying foul and claiming that he has been smeared, but for what? Telling the truth about natural selection? Not as he sees it: Byrne claims that he has never told the truth about Darwin, and he may be on to something: As a member of the Alabama Board of Education, he supported a science curriculum that includes this:
Explanations of the origin of life and major groups of plants and animals, including humans, shall be treated as theory and not as fact. When attempting to apply scientific knowledge to world problems, no social agenda shall be promoted.
I'm not even going to comment on that last sentence.
According to Sarah Palin, "we're all Arizonans now." Sure, but which Arizonans? I wonder how many times Sarah Palin had been to Arizona before John McCain decided that she would help him get elected president. It wouldn't surprise me if she hadn't even heard of it...
McCain not only created the Palin Frankenstein, he bears responsibility for the demise of ACORN, which began when he made accusations of voter registration fraud that he must have known were groundless (which has been shown again and again and again). Nonetheless, his words stuck in the most impressionable ears outside of a four-year old who believes in Santa Claus, and the relentless hectoring of a respected community organization got underway. Now that he's pandering to the worst elements of the Arizona electorate by tangling himself in stained political bedsheets with the deranged Russell Pearce, McCain is certain to end his career as a bitter crank who willingly sacrificed his integrity because he couldn't bear to leave the U. S. Senate...
Who dat say dey gonna beat dem Saints? Nobody, that's who. With the Colts leading 10-6 at halftime, I told T. that I thought things lookes pretty good for the Saints even though they trailed. The Saints had made several mistakes, the Colts hadn't made any, and all the Colts had to show for it was a four point lead. Plus, the Saints had dominated the ball in the second quarter. All they had to do was batten down the hatches in the second half. Then came the onside kick to open the third quarter...All I can say is that Saints coach Sean Payton has big brass balls that clank when he walks. If the Colts recover, Peyton Manning has the ball on the New Orleans 40 and there's every reason in the world to think that the Colts will open a 17-6 lead. But the gamble worked and the rest is Super Bowl history. This may go down as the single guttiest call in the annals of the game...nola.com has complete -- and I mean complete -- coverage here...
Rasta, if the Saints can do it, so can the Bills and the Seahawks. Our day will come. In the meantime, let's let Cliff savor the moment...
Meanwhile, back in the unreal world, Sarah Palin comes out against hope, change, and law and order. Apparently, she thinks that things are fine the way they are and that people should accept their lots in life. You betcha...
Meanwhile, Paul Krugman an actual serious person, writes that the only people worried about the deficit are the ones who don't know anything about economics. It's all cynical posturing, he says, and the media has gone willingly along for the ride while
All the talk is about how to shave a few billion dollars off government spending, while there's hardly any willingness to tackle mass unemployment. Policy is headed in the wrong direction — and millions of Americans will pay the price...
NPR got in hot water recently over its choice of David Horowitz to rebut Noam Chomsky's encomium of historian Howard Zinn as part of an obituary on All Things Considered. Whether one agrees with Noam Chomsky or not, he is a distinguished scholar, writer, and MIT professor with formidable reputations in linguistics, philosophy, and cognitive science. David Horowitz is a flack whose reputation stems from self-flagellation and denunciation of the ideals of his youth. To claim that his commentary is a fair "balance" to Chomsky elevates Horowitz to Chomsky's level and lowers NPR to the level of Fox News. Couldn't they have found at least one conservative historian with actual credentials? Maybe not...
As if you needed any more evidence that the Senate is dysfunctional and that Republicans are jerks, earmark king Little Dick Shelby (R-AL) provides it here...
As everyone knows by now, the Gift That Keeps On Giving has quit her job before the first term was up. At least that's what the media say: It's hard to tell from the rambling, barely coherent "speech" she gave, festooned as it was with belabored metaphors, exclamation point, all caps, and at least one technique of emphasis hitherto unknown to the study of rhetoric ("...*((Gotta put First Things First))*...".
From beginning to end, Palin's Last Ramble inadvertently laid out one reason after another why she should not be president of the Wasilla PTA, much less of the United States.
She derided quitters, then quit.
She talked about serving the state as a "humbling responsibility," then abdicated her responsibility.
She talked about a good point guard being able to handle a full court press, then took her ball and walked off the court.
She talked about shielding her family, then used them as her excuse for resigning.
She extolled our "bold and selfless troops" who wouldn't "give up," then gave up.
She claimed to love her job and Alaska, then quoted a banal refrigerator magnet saying.
She said that her choice was to "take a stand", then retreated.
She said that she didn't want to "disappoint anyone" with her decision, then threw her supporters under the bus by resigning without warning.
She urged Alaskans to consider entering politics, then ducked out because she couldn't stand the mildest of political pressure.
She quoted Douglas MacArthur to the effect that she was advancing in another direction. She might have taken notice of another MacArthur saying: "Americans never quit"...
We'll see her again, no doubt with her own show on Fox "News"...
The right-wing blogosphere ties itself in knots rationalizing Palin's resignation as smart politics here and here.
Paul Begala vivisects the speech here. Couldn't someone, anyone -- a speechwriter, Levi Johnston, a random Alaskan -- have vetted it for idiocy? I admit that there wouldn't have been much left, but still...
Bill writes:
If you can't stand the heat of being governor of Alaska, I don't see how you can hope to convince people that you could take the heat of being President of the United States.
Her spokeswoman was on CNN this evening trying to say that she's showing great leadership because all the ethics complaints were wasting time. I don't remember FDR stepping away when the Great Depression was devastating the nation, and I don't remember Lincoln stepping away when the country was torn apart by slavery...
More pictures and reports from Ireland soon. In the meantime, Happy Birthday America!
In last Sunday's Wall Street Journal, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner published a densely worded op-ed piece explaining the next step in the Obama Administration's solution to the economic crisis. Arguing that "...no crisis like this has a simple or single cause, but as a nation we borrowed too much and let our financial system take on irresponsible levels of risk," Geithner first reviewed the steps taken to date:
"...a broad program to stabilize the housing market by encouraging lower mortgage rates and making it easier for millions to refinance and avoid foreclosure;"
"...a new capital program to provide banks with a safeguard against a deeper recession;"
"...a major new lending program with the Federal Reserve targeted at the securitization markets critical for consumer and small business lending;"
"additional actions to support lending to small businesses by directly purchasing securities backed by Small Business Administration loans."
Geithner claimed that these programs have reduced mortgage interest rates and lead to a needed increase in refinancing. He then went on to announce the creation of a Public-Private Investment program Public-Private Investment Program "...that will set up funds to provide a market for the legacy loans and securities that currently burden the financial system." ("Legacy loans" is French for the overinvestment in the housing bubble that brought the economy to its knees.)
As Geithner explains it, "the funds established under this program will have three essential design features:"
"They will use government resources in the form of capital from the Treasury, and financing from the FDIC and Federal Reserve, to mobilize capital from private investors;"
"The Public-Private Investment Program will ensure that private-sector participants share the risks alongside the taxpayer, and that the taxpayer shares in the profits from these investments. These funds will be open to investors of all types, such as pension funds, so that a broad range of Americans can participate.
"Private-sector purchasers will establish the value of the loans and securities purchased under the program, which will protect the government from overpaying for these assets."
Fundamentally, Geithner assumes that the "legacy assets" are undervalued and the private sector needs only a boost from the government to get things moving in the right direction. In this scenario, the economic fundamentals are in fact sound.
Paul Krugman disagrees strenuously: "This is more than disappointing. In fact, it fills me with a sense of despair." Krugman stresses that the economy is not fundamentally sound and that the crisis does have a single cause: The working assumption by banks and lending institutions that the housing bubble had no end. He argues that there is historically a way out:
It goes like this: the government secures confidence in the system by guaranteeing many (though not necessarily all) bank debts. At the same time, it takes temporary control of truly insolvent banks, in order to clean up their books.
Moreover, Krugman does not share Geithner's view that the plan does not risk taxpayer investment:
But the Geithner scheme would offer a one-way bet: if asset values go up, the investors profit, but if they go down, the investors can walk away from their debt. So this isn’t really about letting markets work. It’s just an indirect, disguised way to subsidize purchases of bad assets.
In other words, it's the same old song of privatize the gain and socialize the risk. And the risk is that Geithner calls "legacy assets" and Krugman calls "toxic assets" have a significantly higher value than they do now. Because so many of them are tied up in the housing bubble, Krugman does not think it possible that the value of most of them is significantly different than it is right now.
Krugman fears that, by relying on "financial hocus pocus" doomed to failure, the Obama Administration will lose its credibility with Congress and the American people, and that it will be "...unlikely that he’ll be able to persuade Congress to come up with more funds to do what he should have done in the first place."
Over the last three weeks the markets have pulled back from the precipice. As Geithner and the Obama administration have laid out most of their plans, we have gone from a desperate and pervasive fear that bank stocks might drop out of sight altogether—leading to a depression after all—to a steady rebound in financial securities. Whereas a month ago there was a real danger the major banks would all collapse at once and become government wards, today even the massively mismanaged Citigroup is no longer a pathetic penny stock (it's soared to the $3 range).
Maybe. But Hirsch's expertise is in foreign policy, not economics. Even he recognizes that "Geithner is working on the theory that the financial system is still functional and solvent," an assumption that is not readily apparent to the millions of Americans who have lost their homes and jobs (or who fear the loss of them) and who have watched helplessly as their retirement nest-eggs dwindled. These people and others may wonder why the Administration believes that it can successfully partner with bankers who have demonstrated that they cannot bank and big investors who have proven that they cannot invest. Maybe things will be different with the government watching over them, but it's hard to see why these people would enter into a public-private partnership that does not get them out from under their toxic assets by transferring the risk to the public sector (i.e., us).
Stocks have rallied before and fallen after, so I don't see the point in reading too much into the current rally. Why taxpayers should bail out this institutions without getting seats on the boards is beyond me. However, Obama looked and sounded confident and assured during his prime time press conference last night, so maybe he feels as if a corner of sorts has been turned. Krugman's point about the housing bubble nags at me, though...
The Brickyard reports that former Alaska state senator and mid-level Obama appointee Kim Elton actually received a larger per diem than Sarah Palin:
I have a source in Alaska who did some digging through the “Alaska Legislature 2008 Salary and Business Expense Report” – put out by the state’s Legislative Affairs Agency - and it’s truly amazing what was going on. According to my source, Elton charged the state a grand total of $20,681.25 in per diem for the year 2008 – several thousand dollars more than Gov. Palin. That comes out to $122.25 per day through the normal legislative session between January 15 and April 15. Then he charged $160.50 per day for two of the year’s four special sessions (30 days each). So, just on these facts alone, the man is far more “guilty” than the Governor when it comes to per diem.
The problem with the allegation, as a number of comments point out, is that all Alaskan legislators take a per diem as part of their compensation because their salaries are so low, and that as a Juneau representative, Elton actually took less because he already resided in the state capitol. The comments applauding the "scoop" quickly turn into the usual low comedy of rationalization and defensiveness, then somehow transition into attacks on Obama. Anyway, reading through the mental contortions and gyrations makes for good clean fun...
This morning, I received a very nice email praising my recent review of a Hank Williams collection. The writer added that he had linked to the review from his blog, called A Hank Williams Journal. I checked out the blog and found that not only had he linked to my review, he wrote that
A blogger known as Citizen K has written the best review of “Hank Williams The Unreleased Recordings” that I have read yet.
I’m including in this opinion the articles written in major national and international publications which I posted links to in an earlier post.
Wow! Talk about making my day! Anyway, check out A Hank Williams Journal. A great place to start is the two-part entry about Williams and Leonard Cohen, here and here...
OK, enough about me. This morning, Barack Obama held his third press conference in three days. As usual, he was poised, confident, and articulate. Among other things, he gave the right answer to a question about why he has turned to veterans of the Clinton Administration for part of his economic team. Obama reminded the questioner that this was the only Democratic administration since 1980 and that he was hardly going to keep on members of the current administration. Obama added, correctly, that had he not looked to experienced Democrats, he'd be criticized for the lack of expertise on the team. Then he got to the real point, which is that Barack Obama will be president, not the members of his team, and that he will set direction. Obama added that he wanted a mix of experience and new blood to advise him and that he had gotten just that...
Listening to Obama, I wondered how George Bush was taking all of this. Whatever delusions Bush may hold about the vindication of history, he knows that the country repudiated him. And as far as his replacement is concerned, Bush can't invoke the "majesty of the office" stuff, and has to deal with Obama as peer. And even the stunted, entitled mind of George Bush must have figured out that his successor is in every way his intellectual superior. I'll say this much: Watching Obama in action is a reminder of the great extent to which Bush has been in over his head. People aren't missing that, either...
Speaking of people in over their heads, don't miss today's Doonesbury (click to enlarge):
Then there's this TV ad -- apparently on the level -- slated to run today in Alaska and cable outlets:
What can you say? It's like watching an episode of Green Acres, only minus the comparative drollery...
Since the publication of Jane Mayer's New Yorker article about Sarah Palin, I've been monitoring the comments on the Draft Sarah Palin For Vice-President blog alluded to by Mayer. Most of it is dull and fatuous. There's a lot if whistling in the dark, media and poll bashing, and reassurances that whatever happens on November 4 will be God's will. Of greatest curiosity is the debate between supporters of one crackpot idea -- that Obama is actually a citizen of Kenya and not the United States -- and those of an utterly shattered pot -- that he is actually an illegitimate child fathered by a Marxist pedophile friend of the family. I kid you not.
Plainly, both "ideas" hold about as much water as a butterfly net, if that much. One poster is convinced that as soon as the truth about Obama's lineage emerges (she subscribes to the citizen of Kenya theory), he will be forced from the ticket and replaced by Hillary Clinton. Her main concern is that Obama's trip to visit his ailing grandmother in Hawaii is actually a cover story that will allow him to personally destroy the evidence, and hopes that the media will tail him. Again, I kid you not.
The fixation of the right with Obama's ancestry fascinates. It echoes, resoundingly, the slaveholding and southern and colonialist system of defining "black" according to the fraction of African ancestry. The French colonialists of Sainte-Domingue constructed a system of classification that identified 64 different types of black person, from full-blooded African to one-sixty-fourth African. (No link; my source is an appendix of the complete nomenclature in All Soul's Rising, Madison Smartt Bell's novel about Toussaint Louverture and the Haitian slave revolution.) It was an obsession aimed at preserving white status and, no doubt, at assuaging doubts about the legitimacy of slavery. Psychologically, it springs from the same poisoned well as the frenzied right-wing attempts to project Obama as not one of us...
Readers from Seattle are will appreciate this bit of comedy from one of the blog comments:
"Have you ever read the Wikipedia bio of Obama? Barry' mother came of age not in Kansas (another fantasy) but in liberal Seattle in one of the most liberal schools, Mercer Island High School. Many of her teachers were socialists or maxists. It makes sense that she would be infatuated with one."
(The "one" being the family friend who allegedly impregnated her with the next President of the United States.) Now, when Ann Dunham attended high school in the late Fifties, you would no more likely spot a Marxist on Mercer Island than you would see an African-American in a noncustodial job. Until a few years ago, it was as rock-ribbed, country club Republican as it gets...
Parts 2 and 3 of the LA Times series about the health care system are here and here. Part 2 shows how insurers, using Healthcare Savings Accounts as a spearhead, are "moving away from their traditional role of pooling health risks and are reinventing themselves as money managers -- providers of financial vehicles through which consumers pay for their own healthcare." Part 3 explores the extent to which insurers have dedicated resources to not paying hospital and doctor bills that they had already agreed to cover, and the stress that puts on the system's capacity for providing health care...
Apparently, the McCain campaign did not permit the Muslim state campaign chair from the video to appear on CNN. I suppose that at this point they are looking at such an electoral rout that they are unwilling to ruffle the feathers of the right-wing base even to publicize something that might appeal to independents...
Meanwhile, Chris Matthews obliterates McCain spokesperson Nancy Pfotenhauer on the topic of Palin's weird contention that the vice-president is "in charge" of the Senate:
K3: Governor Palin, what, specifically, will a McCain/Palin administration do to ease the financial burden of middle-class families?
"I have to get up on Saturday mornings and take the kids to their hockey games, just like millions of Americans. My family is certainly diverse, just look at us (self-conscious giggle). I've been a hunter for about as long as I can remember, so I can relate to Joe Six Pack and his Soccer Mom wife."
My take: It's sad when the bar for a vice presidential candidate had been set so low that you "win" by not making a total fool of yourself. I also didn't realize that it was necessary to mention that you have a family (a diverse one, at that!) whenever possible -- as if there's never been a family-man in the White House.
I'm not a big Biden fan, but he more than held his own.
Finally: On CBS they had Joe Lieberman on afterward, asking for his take on the debate! Like that guy has a gram of credibility left. Ay caramba!
K5: Agree. I thought Biden did exceptionally well. He maybe could have hit her harder after the "white flag" BS, but all in all he did a great job.
She didn't implode, so she wins expectations game. But I don't think anyone outside of the Republican Party was buying what she was selling. You can only say "maverick" so many times before it starts sounding like an excuse for not getting anything done.
No harm. Advantage us.
(Note: K5 has been working in Democratic party politics in one way or another for his entire career, and so has an actual informed opinion.)...
Hrrmph! has the complete list of Palin's lies, half-truths, and misstatements here...
Breaking news! Someone in the McCain camp has apparently leaked the strategy for preparing Palin for the debate...
The Great Schlep: Sarah Silverman explains to Jewish children how they can persuade their grandparents to vote Obama...
Lame duck Republican congressman Wayne Gilchrist takes some parting shots at his party...
Friday's Choice: Encore! Encore! Paolo Szot and Kelli O'Hara sing "Some Enchanted Evening" from the revival of South Pacific:
For good measure, here's Mary Martin and Ezio Pinza from the 1949 original Broadway cast:
So, I'm gone ten days and what happens? Conservatism collapses as a viable ideology. A new Quinnipiac poll shows Obama trouncing McCain in Florida, Ohio, and Pennsylvania and he leads in every national poll, often by numbers that can't be explained away as a "statistical tie." Sarah Palin wilts under the relentless questioning of Katie Couric. (Tina Fey dined on Palin's carcass with exquisite gusto.) In fact, the only remotely sour note for me personally was actually finding myself on the same side as ultra-right Republicans in opposing the bailout...
One columnist tut-tutted his fellow liberals for gloating over the Wall Street collapse and the disarray among Republicans. This is serious business that should be treated seriously; it's no time for schadenfreude. Well, I beg to differ. I'm quite capable of feeling concern for the middle- and l0wer-class people hammered by financial deregulation while at the same time enjoying the implosion of the malignant ideology that visited this mess on my country. For over thirty years, conservatives have ridiculed liberals, impugned our patriotism, and attacked us savagely at every turn in a effort to polarize the country to their political benefit.
Now, a month before the election, their economic philosophy has been exposed as a fraud, their foreign policy based on military might lays in tatters, and they are in grave danger of losing the presidential election to a black liberal. Why shouldn't I enjoy the moment? I'm not made of stone, you know...
The Audacity of Hype: I'm published!And by a publication I respect and that I've been reading for twenty years! The new issue of Rock and Rap Confidential, an e-zine edited by Dave Marsh and Lee Ballinger, includes a version of my blog entry "Tom Joad Lives". For a free copy of RRC -- available only via email -- write to rockrap@aol.com. Thanks to Stupid & Contagious for his support. And to Premium T. for getting me to write again...
"Dukes" Fan Cries Foul: Dave Archer writes to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer:
I am so incensed by Bill Maher's recent incendiary comments about Sarah Palin that I can barely hold my hands steady enough to type this letter. To say that the only type of people dumb enough to vote for Palin are the people who would wait in line to watch a "Dukes of Hazzard" movie is totally offensive and untrue. You are free to call me a dumb hillbilly who was weaned on the hilarious adventures of those good old Hazzard boys -- just don't insinuate that someone like me is dumb enough to vote for Sarah Palin.
We Report, You Decide Dept: A typical example of the "fair and balanced" reporting exclusive to Fox News:
We had a great trip to New York. I'll list the restaurants, the menus and review the highlights tomorrow, In the meantime, we're going to hit the ground running tonight when we see Alison Krause and Robert Plant:
This morning, John McCain attempted to blame the Wall St. meltdown on a failure of the SEC to enforce some obscure regulations. What he didn't say is that the Bush Administration began to hamstring the SEC's regulatory abilities as far back as 2002 by cutting its budget. Nor did the s0-called party maverick add that he was silent on the matter, or that as a "fundamental deregulator," he no doubt supported Bush's efforts anyway...
McCain cites his membership on the Commerce Committee as proof that he has the experience to manage the economy. A few days ago, McCain ran against the "old bulls" of Washington. Now, he's running as one. Problem is, the Commerce Committee specifically does not handle legislation involving credit, financial services, and housing -- the very areas now in crisis...
Katha Pollit has ten questions for Sarah Palin, starting with this one: "Suppose your 14-year-old daughter Willow is brutally raped in her bedroom by an intruder. She becomes pregnant and wants an abortion. Could you tell the parents of America why you think your child and their children should be forced by law to have their rapists' babies?"....
Joe Biden thinks that it doesn't matter what committees McCain is on or not on: When it comes to the economy, the guy just doesn't get it In other words, most people know that their house is on fire before they fire engines pull up outside, sirens blaring. Unless, of course, they were at one of their other seven houses at the time...
Duh Dept: Michael Kinsley writes that no matter which set of numbers you use or how you slant them, Democrats are better for the economy than Republicans...
Trivial Pursuit: Sarah sez "If you want specifics and specific policy or countries, go ahead, you can ask me. You can even play stump-the-candidate if you want." Great. Running Trivial Pursuit's "Geography" category now qualifies you to be President of the United States...
It turns out that you can see Alaska from Russia. What that has to do with foreign policy, though, is less clear than a foggy day on the Bering Strait...
Somewhere on the road to Tampa, John McCain decided that the economy was not "fundamentally sound," as he had claimed. A searing light knocked him off of his elephant, and it came to pass that he had a vision. And he saw that the economy was in crisis. And it came to pass that he knew that the cause of the crisis was the deadly sin of "unbridled greed" of Wall Street. Elect me, O People, he cried, and I will clean up the mess...in Washington.
He didn't explain how cleaning up a mess in Washington created by himself and his fellow Republicans would address problems with Wall Street. Nor did the man who describes himself as "fundamentally a deregulator" mention that, as a deregulator, he helped remove the bridles of greed by supporting legislation to reduce the SEC's oversight of financial markets. Nor did the candidate who claims to be maverick explain his lemming-like fealty to Republican free market orthodoxy. Nor did the so-called straight talker show enough respect to the American people to offer any actual proposals. Instead, the self-styled scourge of bureaucracy says that Wall Street greed is best bridled by forming a committee! If his convention speech is any indicator, the committee will serve as a smokescreen while McCain "solves" the problem by applying the same measures that brought it about. Go figure...
If ever there was a prophet without honor in his own country, it's Bob Herbert. An excellent columnist with an unfailing nose for the powerful screwing the middle class and the poor, here he exposes the McCain health plan as being " right out of the right-wing Republicans’ ideological playbook: fewer regulations; let the market decide; and send unsophisticated consumers into the crucible alone..."
What Did She Say? According to McCain advisor and former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina, Sarah Palin may be qualified to run the country, but she's not qualified to run Hewlett-Packard:
I watched some of John McCain's town hall meeting this morning at the gym. God, but the man is dull as dirt! And, it took him forever to get around to making anything resembling a point. And when he did...
...He blamed the current financial crisis on the New Deal banking and financial regulations of the 1930s and on the failure of federal regulators to do their jobs. Problem is, conservatives have been chipping away at those regulations practically since their inception. The pinnacle of their efforts came in 2000, when then Senator Phil Gramm, a long-time McCain friend and advisor, succeeded in passing legislation that not only greatly deregulated the banking and financial businesses, but underfunded the Securities and Exchange Commission to the point that they couldn't enforce what regulations remained. This legislation created the base for the finance business to get involved in the mortgage business and encouraged the predatory loans that have spelled grief for home buyers and that are crippling Wall Street. That'sthe source of the problem. David Corn explains it here...
How McCain will repair this when he has by his own admission paid little attention to the economy and when his chief economic advisor is the author of the current catastrophe, he doesn't say. Nonetheless, in the same town meeting, he assured us that he "knows how" to fix the economy. Well, if that's the case, why hasn't he done more as a senator?...
McCain also bragged about how he has "bucked" his party, then ironically moved on to the topic of immigration reform. I say "ironically" because here is an example of an issue where he started off in opposition to his party, then changed his views when the blowback from the right became too strong. For that matter, he wanted Joe Lieberman as his running mate, only to bow to pressure from the right that he choose someone else...
Sarah Palin didn't go to Ireland on the same trip that she didn't go to Iraq. It's becoming plainer and plainer that she has as tenuous as link to reality as George Bush. The great E. J. Dionne wonders whether the media will be as tough on her about this as they were when Hillary Clinton claimed she had come under sniper fire...
Somebody was hard at work last night on our porch swing:
Saturday, two other Obama volunteers and I registered voters at an intersection in downtown Kirkland. 80% of eligible voters in King County are already registered, and the office staff told us in advance that they would be happy with 3-4 new registrants. We got ten, however -- some first-time voters, one brand new citizen, and a couple of address changes. We also heard a lot of encouragement and support. The campaign regards Washington as a swing state, but in truth if Obama is in big trouble if he can't win here. They just don't want to take anything for granted, and that kind of running scared is a good thing...
...Still, how can this be anything but depressing? "An elderly woman in a New Jersey hair salon is overheard complaining about Barack and Michelle the other day, about how blacks supposedly have larger bones than whites, and about how she’s fleeing America if Obama wins..."
Even Republican operatives admit the truth of the matter: "'“I know a lot of Republicans who are aware of surveys in this race that ask the ballot question ‘Who are you voting for?’ and then ask the ‘Who are your neighbors voting for?’ question,” says a GOP operative, referring to a common pollsters’ tactic of seeing through obfuscation revolving around race. “And between the first and second question, you see a five-to-ten-point shift in the answers. There’s a great big lump under the rug...'”
In Defense of Community Organizers. This letter appeared Sunday in the Seattle Times:
Along with many other Roman Catholics, I was deeply offended at Sarah Palin's demeaning reference in her acceptance speech to Barack Obama's experience as a community organizer in Catholic parishes on the South Side of Chicago.
Community organizing is so important to Catholic social teaching that the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has operated the Catholic Campaign for Human Development, its domestic anti-poverty and social-justice program, since 1969.
In 1968, the U.S. Catholic Bishops issued "Economic Justice for All," a pastoral letter on Catholic social teaching and the economy, which said, "Human dignity can be realized and protected only in community."
In the 1980s, Obama worked in several Catholic parishes, supported by the Catholic Campaign for Human Development, rather than pursue a lucrative career on Wall Street.
The McCain campaign owes an apology to the thousands of community organizers, the organizations that have supported them, including the Campaign for Human Development, and particularly the countless working families who have been helped in communities across our country.
— The Rev. Roger G. O'Brien, senior priest, Archdiocese of Seattle
Father O'Brien might well have added that without community organizers, Sarah Palin wouldn't have the right to vote, much less serve as governor of Alaska or run for vice-president...
Don't forget Rachel Maddow's debut tonight on MSNBC...
The R's make a big deal out of Sarah Palin being a middle-class mom who has worked her way up to governor blah blah blah -- a typical woman who realized atypical aspirations. But you know, when I was in high school, I couldn't stand the Sarah Palin types: The entitled beauty queen cheerleader who wouldn't give the rest of us the time of day had she known we were alive which she didn't. This story in yesterday's Seattle Times only reinforces my perception...
Well, I didn't think much of Palin's speech -- I switched over to "Project Runway" after a half hour -- but then I'm hardly her target audience. What I did hear was yet another Republican struggling with the rudiments of pronuciation ("pundints" and "childern") and showing a blase disregard for the facts. The "pundints" mostly agree that she made a great impression, although it does seem as as if they have some responsibility to point out at the howlers in her speech. For example, it is not even remotely the case -- as she implied here -- that the petroleum reserves in Alaska's North Slope offset the combined output of Iran and Venezuela. But that's the MSM for you: Focus on sweeping Lincolnian rhetoric like "Take it from a gal who knows" and ignore the nonsense that comes after...
It's not like McCain campaign manager Rick Davis hasn't spelled it out: "This election is not about issues...This election is about a composite view of what people take away from these candidates." In other words, we're going to our level best to make people ignore the last eight years of perfidy and incompetence to focus on what is really important. Which is: Who do you want running the country? An uppity black and an old bull Democrat, or a military hero and the beauty queen next door? Well, Barack Obama is an exceptionally able politician, so won't be like running against Michael Dukakis or John Kerry. But the strains of racism run deep in this country...
The Daily Show has the forgotten story of Hurricane Gustav:
It is by now an article of faith among Republicans that Sarah Palin's 20 months as governor of Alaska and six years as mayor of Wasilla (pop. 8471) give her an experience edge over Barack Obama. Obama, they point out, has no executive experience, ergo Palin is more qualified to be president and plenty qualified to be vice president. It's a familiar right-wing gambit, in which they speciously confer equal stature on two competing ideas and then stack the deck in favor of their side.
But are Palin and Obama of equal stature? Eman of Daily Kos thinks not, and lays out a side-by-side comparison that proves his point. What emerges is a considerable intellect on the one hand and a probable lightweight on the other. Which is my real objection to Sarah Palin: Her presence on the Republican ticket is an endorsement of the cult of stupidity that has engulfed the Oval Office for the past eight years.
Teach both. You know, don't be afraid of information....Healthy debate is so important and it's so valuable in our schools. I am a proponent of teaching both. And you know, I say this too as the daughter of a science teacher. Growing up with being so privileged and blessed to be given a lot of information on, on both sides of the subject -- creationism and evolution. It's been a healthy foundation for me. But don't be afraid of information and let kids debate both sides.
On surface, what could be more fair-minded? The problem is that there's no equality of ideas at work here, a distinction she can't seem to grasp. Nor does she appear to understand that a scientific theory is not an opinion: It's an explanation that attempts to unify disparate empirically observed facts, and that is stated in a way that can be empirically disproved. There is no factual information about Creationism. Neither it nor its Trojan horse -- Intelligent Design -- have ever been formulated in any way that invites scientific research: There is literally no Theory of Intelligent Design, even if its proponents blather about "design theory."
By contrast, Darwin's Theory of Natural Selection (which is what she means by "evolution") has been challenged and tested for more that 150 years, with literally billions of data points resulting. And every test has confirmed his theory, filled in gaps, and widened our understanding of biology, chemistry, statistics, and the origins of life. It is an accepted scientific fact that has resulted in tremendous scientific advances.
Consider Palin's statement again with the context changed and you will see how ridiculous it is:
Teach both. You know, don't be afraid of information....Healthy debate is so important and it's so valuable in our schools. I am a proponent of teaching both. And you know, I say this too as the daughter of a science teacher. Growing up with being so privileged and blessed to be given a lot of information on, on both sides of the subject -- flat earth and round earth. It's been a healthy foundation for me. But don't be afraid of information and let kids debate both sides.
From a scientific perspective, this statement and her actual allegation have the same value, which is to say none whatsoever. And yet, this person is about to be the Republican party's nominee for vice president.
The comparison of her and Obama is typically specious. It's also typically lazy of the MSM to consider it outside of the greater context of their respective abilities and not ask the real question: What could possibly have possessed John McCain to select a running mate so insubstantial that she makes Dan Quayle look like Jean-Paul Sartre?...
Republicans used to make a big deal out of the inability of Democrats to run the country like a business. Republicans, they claimed, would be efficient and balance the budget, just as any business must do. (This claim was cold comfort to some of us who had lengthy careers in business. I can't think of a single place I worked that paid more than lip service to the god of efficiency.) While eight years of a failed CEO presidency marked by profligacy and cronyism have stilled that voice somewhat, it's nonetheless instructive to apply the business model to John McCain's approach to choosing a running mate.
Here's how McCain, Inc. decided that Sarah Palin should be next in line for the presidency:
Because of concerns about their commitment to key aspects of the corporate culture, otherwise preferred applicants like Joe Lieberman and Tom Ridge were not offered the position
Sarah Palin filled out a job application
She interviewed with the 71-year old male hiring manager, impressing him deeply with her charisma (read: pulchritude)
Smitten on the spot, the manager decided that he didn't need to check references and immediately offered her the job
There's no fool like and old fool, and John McCain isn't the first one to fall under the spell of a pretty face. But this wasn't an audition for Vegas chorus girl, either (even if certain parts of his body argued otherwise). You think I'm exaggerating? Read it and weep...
Look, I don't think we should be jumping on a 17-year girl who -- stop the presses -- got pregnant any more than I think people should make ugly homophobic "jokes" about children. But surely we're permitted a certain degree of schadenfreudewhen we learn that her mother supported abstinence-only education...
It's funny how the same gang that thought swift-boating John Kerry and drive Vince Foster to suicide was all aboveboard now cringes sanctimoniously at the supposed "mud-slinging and lies" surrounding Bristol Palin's pregnancy...
Max Blumenthal of The Nation reports on a secretive right-wing group that did vet Palin (after a fashion) and liked what they found...
President Bush speaks to the Republican convention tonight, but only after the flaming oratory of Fred Thompson and Joe Lieberman has sedated the delegates...
As Hurricane Gustav bears down on the Gulf Coast, take 10:51 to view the video below, which dispels certain myths about Hurricane Katrina:
Hurricane Katrina was a natural disaster. As the video points out, Katrina was an engineering disaster.
New Orleans is in the wrong place. New Orleans lies 125 miles from the Gulf of Mexico and -- until they were dredged -- protected by a vast screen of wetlands.
New Orleans is below sea level. While some parts of the city are below sea level, so are parts of many other cities and countries, including New York, London, and 24% of Holland.
Because of New Orleans' unique geography, this can't happen anywhere else. In fact, many municipalities depend on functioning levees. For example, Sacramento is at particular risk.
Authorities are aware of the problems and working to fix them. The Army Corps of Engineers has done nothing to change its mode of operation.
McCain's choice offends Gail Collins of The New York Times, although she hasn't lost her sense of humor:"McCain does not believe in pandering to identity politics. He was looking for someone who was well prepared to fight against international Islamic extremism, the transcendent issue of our time. And in the end he decided that in good conscience, he was not going to settle for anyone who had not been commander of a state national guard for at least a year and a half. He put down his foot!..."
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