More on Egypt

Israel may think the US should be world-deciders, but the fine gentleman from New York disagrees. Representative Gary Ackerman had this to say:

President Mubarak has been a valuable partner for the United States, but he has, by his own decisions and successive phony elections, shorn his rule of any mandate or legitimacy beyond that provided by force and arms. His last act of service to Egypt should be to facilitate a fast transfer of power to a transitional government that can prepare for free and fair elections. Accordingly, I believe the United States must suspend its assistance to Egypt until this transition is underway.

The Egyptian people have made their wishes very clear: it is time for President Mubarak to step down and allow Egypt to move forward into a new era of democracy, human rights and the rule of law.

Well played, sir. Well played.

Holy Shit This Is Awesome!

Seriously... kudos Google! While the company has come under some fire for its policies vis-a-vis China, this stands out as quite spectacular:

Over the weekend we came up with the idea of a speak-to-tweet service—the ability for anyone to tweet using just a voice connection.

We worked with a small team of engineers from Twitter, Google and SayNow, a company we acquired last week, to make this idea a reality. It’s already live and anyone can tweet by simply leaving a voicemail on one of these international phone numbers (+16504194196 or +390662207294 or +97316199855) and the service will instantly tweet the message using the hashtag #egypt. No Internet connection is required. People can listen to the messages by dialing the same phone numbers or going to twitter.com/speak2tweet.

Israel Could Not Be More Wrong on Egypt

This is the kind of petty, protectionist and short-sighted thinking that infuriates even the friends of Israel. As dobber so aptly put it: "so Israel's official policy stance is that the US should pick leaders of foreign sovereign nations over the will of their own people?"

The Egyptian Message Censored

Egypt and the people's protests is the biggest story in the world right now. This is especially true on the heels of Tunisia, and Iran. This story dwarfs anything happening in Washington, including assessments over Washington's reaction to what is happening (though, I was quite impressed with SOS Clinton on the morning shows yesterday). I cannot tell you what, exactly I think the importance of these events are; I just have an inchoate sense that we'll look back on these times as momentous. But it's not simply momentous for an American audience, rather, its importance is largely in the example it sets throughout the world; in the opportunity it has to reach out and grab those other peoples feeling the urge of democracy. This is why, especially following Hu Jintao's trip to Washington recently, it is so disappointing to read this story regarding Chinese efforts to suppress the pro-democracy message from Egypt:

The filtering of search result and the blocking of search term “Egypt” in social media websites is to prevent certain interpretation of the political situation in Egypt. The scenes of Tanks moving into the city center, the confrontation between the people and the soldiers are very likely to recall Chinese people's memory of the June 4 incident back in 1989 and the criticism of the authoritarian government in Egypt can easily turn into a political allegory in China. The propaganda department certainly has to issue censorship alert to web-portal and social media websites, where opinions can spread rapidly and become mainstream public discourses in a few hour time.

A Morning Gem

Thank you Political Wire for making my morning with this one:

Failed Nevada U.S. Senate candidate Sharron Angle (R) was in Iowa but wouldn't tell the Des Moines Register whether she was there exploring a run for president or not.

Said Angle: "I'll just say I have lots of options for the future, and I'm investigating all my options.

And then I appreciated Chris Christie's quote from Political Wire as well. I hate to give the Governor credit, but he's saying and doing some smart things regarding his political future. If only he could figure out how to run his state:

"If you don't believe in your heart that you're ready, you have no business running. And just because you see political opportunity, that's not an excuse to run."

-- New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R), in an interview on CNBC, on why he's not running for president.

Quick Thought of the Morning

Why will regulating health insurance companies destroy our republic and represent an overreaching of the federal government into states' rights but the federal government must absolutely as a high priority tell the states how they should decide verdicts in torts cases?

Pre-SOTU Economics Post

Since President Obama is likely to spend a good portion of tonight's State of the Union address discussing government spending, I figured I would take a moment to comment on Eugene Robinson's column from the Washington Post today. Robinson asserts that Republican budget proposals slash spending based simply on spite and politics, not economic policy:

Republicans who feign attacks of the vapors and fainting spells over the big, scary deficit would be more convincing if they didn't begin with the insane premise that defense spending should be sacrosanct. The House leadership in the past few days has begun to signal retreat from this indefensible position, but it's unclear how much of the hyper-conservative GOP majority will follow.

. . .

The Republican "Pledge to America" promised to cut "at least $100 billion in the first year alone," notwithstanding "exceptions for seniors, veterans and our troops." This was never a serious proposal, given that defense, plus entitlements and other mandatory spending, consume about four-fifths of the budget. But it was a nice round number that sounded good.

. . .

Do Americans really want the effectiveness of, say, food safety inspection to be eroded by 30 percent? What about air traffic control? I didn't think so.

Robinson also reminds us that the Republicans political budget play would cut "funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the Legal Services Corporation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Energy Star program, the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change" while continuing to waste $13 billion for a landing craft that Secretary of Defense Bob Gates wants to cut because "we are no longer fighting World War II."

I agree with Robinson. There are plenty of wasteful defense contracts that should be among the first things we cut because they don't exist to keep our troops safe. Some things, like the FDA or the FAA or (I'll say it...) USAID are just as important as building military equipment that doesn't work or fit in with how our military operates in this millennium.

It Took 4 Years?

While we wait for the State of the Union address, which Burnsy confided he hasn't missed in a whopping 17 years now, a trivial bit of news came out:

George W. Bush's White House Office of Political Affairs violated the law by giving political briefings to political employees, concludes an Office of Special Counsel report issued Monday, nearly five years after the fact.

The report, titled "Investigation of Political Activities by White House and Federal Agency Officials During the 2006 Midterm Elections," finds that the electoral success of the Republican Party and possible strategies for achieving it often were on the agenda at some of 75 political briefings at 20 federal agencies from 2001 to 2007, the Associated Press reported.

OSC found that "White House Office of Political Affairs (OPA) employees, as well as high-level agency political appointees, violated the Hatch Act through a number of practices that were prevalent during the months leading up to the 2006 midterm elections," they said in a news release.

OSC wasted 4 years investigating what we all already knew? Taxpayers footing the bill for Republican political campaigns? That's government spending Republicans can believe in!

A Push for Government Investment

Fareed Zakaria laid out his hopes for President Obama's SOTU speech in Monday's Washington Post. It's a forceful call for government investment in research and development, as well as a call for scaling back obscure and harmful regulations. It's really short and definitely worth a read:

During the Cold War, the United States spent 3 percent of its gross domestic product on research and development; the government and private sector each contributed about half. Today, the private sector spends a bit more but government spends less. Obama should propose doubling federal spending on research and innovation. Three percent might have been enough in the 1950s, when Americans could still get millions of jobs in basic manufacturing. Jobs of the future lie in knowledge industries, and that means doing better than we did in the 1950s at knowledge creation.

Rush Holt Up and Coming

I recently read a list of 10 up and coming politicians to keep an eye on. It included all the regulars like Michele Bachmann and Darrel Issa. I think it should have also included Representative Rush Holt of New Jersey's 12th district. Lately, Holt has been finding his voice and getting some national attention. First, he spoke out against the Social Security payroll tax holiday:

Much has been discussed about the effect that the proposed tax-cut compromise between President Obama and Congressional Republicans would have on long-term debt and much has been discussed about how many jobs the proposed agreement would generate and when. Overall, although it would reduce the money withheld from an average American's paycheck in 2011, it ultimately would increase the burden shifted onto that average American's back for funding our government. Probably the greatest damaging effect, though, would result from the 2 percent reduction in payroll tax, an ingredient injected late in the negotiations last week.

The provision puts in jeopardy the long-term survival of Social Security - a centerpiece program that has been popular, efficient, and effective for 75 years. Sixty-four percent of seniors - nearly 22 million Americans - depend on Social Security for most of their livelihood. In 1935 most seniors lived below the poverty line, a fact hard to believe since Social Security has changed that. Also 16 million others - not in their retirement years - surviving spouses and children and people with disabilities depend on Social Security.

Now, Holt is speaking out on Peter King's plan to hold extensive hearings on Muslims:

Rep. Rush Holt (D-NJ), the former chairman of the Select Intelligence Oversight Panel, said he is troubled by Rep. Peter King's (R-NY) plan to hold hearings on the radicalization of Muslim-Americans.

"I feel like my friend Peter has gone way beyond what is called for there, and I do intend to talk to him about it," Holt told TPM of King's plan.

Holt's comments to TPM came after a Brennan Center panel held Tuesday to release the center's comprehensive study of the rules that govern the FBI's authority over domestic intelligence. The rules, approved by former Attorney General Michael Mukasey in 2008, are considerably more lax than previous incarnations, vastly expand the FBI's investigatory discretion and limit oversight, the report argues.

Emily Berman, the author of the Brennan Center report, recommends that the FBI be banned from using certain investigative techniques unless there is some basis in fact to suspect wrongdoing; that agents be required to use the least intrusive investigative technique that is likely to prove effective; and that agents be banned from improperly considering race, religion, ethnicity, national origin or First-Amendment-protected activity in investigative decisions.

Holt told the audience that profiling is "lazy thinking" and mentioned that many provisions of the Patriot Act are up for renewal next month

Holt's possibilities in New Jersey are interesting. Senator Menendez appears safe for reelection but is not really the most popular politician around. I cannot see him not running for reelection, and winning, when his term is up in 2012. The other New Jersey senator, Frank Lautenberg, is a healthy 86 years old, making him the oldest member of the US Senate. When his 5th nonconsecutive term ends in 2014, I'd like to see him retire so Rush could take over. I think that election may be on his radar too.

Lieberman: Signing Off

I touched briefly on Joe Lieberman announcing that he will not seek another term in the US Senate. In my mind, it is very clear he chose retirement over losing a primary and/or general election. Many have expressed their opinions on Lieberman recently. It's funny how conservatives and liberals share his history. Here are two accounts I've read recently. First is David Brooks:

If Lieberman had not been welcomed back by the Democrats, there might not have been a 60th vote for health care reform, and it would have failed.

There certainly would have been no victory for “don’t ask, don’t tell” repeal without Lieberman’s tireless work and hawkish credentials. The Kerry-Lieberman climate bill came closer to passage than any other energy bill. Lieberman also provided crucial support or a swing vote for the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, the stimulus bill, the banking bill, the unemployment extension and several other measures.

So while Lieberman is loathed by many liberal activists, he has always had much better relations with Democratic practitioners. Vice President Biden sent me a heartfelt e-mail on Thursday that ended: “The Senate will not be the same without Joe’s leadership and powerful intellect. But it is his civility that will be missed the most.”

And here is Emily Bazelon:

My corner of Connecticut was covered in ice today, until news broke of Sen. Joe Lieberman's impending retirement. Magically, a warm glow spread. It was a delicious feeling: the end of the reign of the politician I despise most.

Why do I loathe, loathe, loathe my 68-year-old four-term senator? My feelings are all the stronger for being fairly irrational. Lieberman's views are closer to mine than many politicians on whom I don't expend one iota of emotional energy. This, of course, is his power: He never loses his power to disappoint. Then there is the spectacle of it all: After each act of grand or petty betrayal, each time he turned on his former supporters, the Democratic Party and the Obama administration came back begging for more. Throughout the last Congress, he never let anyone forget he was the 60^th vote.

Bazelon then lists a litany of reasons why she despises Lieberman. I think Lieberman irreparably tarnished his image in my opinion during the health care debate. In an effort to soothe his ego and remind everyone how important he was, Lieberman kept threatening filibuster unless he got his way, while moving the goalposts every time Harry Reid caved to his demands. Instead of holding the Senate hostage because the bill wasn't exactly what he said he wanted (after the concessions of course), Lieberman should have voted for cloture but against the bill. Democracy rules. So I say, "Good riddance, Mr. Lieberman."

UPDATE Re: Olbermann and the Prime Time lineup

Update here:

MSNBC announced that O'Donnell, who had frequently filled in for Olbermann before starting his own 10 p.m. show, will take over Olbermann's time slot starting Monday. "The Ed Show," with Ed Schultz, would move to 10 p.m. Cenk Uygur of the Web show "The Young Turks," will fill Schultz's vacated 6 p.m. time slot.

"We may be at risk of being bored to death by our better angels."

Kathleen Parker expresses an opinion regarding political speech and reaction thereto that I largely agree with. I especially agree with her closing thought:

Every now and then a public person is going to say or do something regrettable. I am beyond certain that our most beloved leaders were imperfect and must have said something inexact, without proper forethought or prescience. Ben Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and Franklin Roosevelt, among other notables, would be deeply grateful that they avoided these hyper-observant times.

Clearly, leaders are held to a higher standard and should be guardians of the light. Or, as the French philosopher Bernard-Henri Levy recently put it with passionate precision: "We are guardians of ze words!"

But human beings are not built for perfection or for constant scrutiny. We need time alone in our caves to reflect and imagine. We also need to be able to express our thoughts without fear of instant condemnation, granted time to reshuffle and regret, time to say, hey, I was wrong about that. Perhaps most of all, we need space to think more and talk less.

BREAKING NEWS: Keith Olbermann out at MSNBC!

In breaking news this evening, Keith Olbermann has left his post hosting "Countdown" on MSNBC.

I was home tonight, drinking a glass of wine, waiting for the wife to get home from work and, as usual, my default channel is MSNBC, so I hear Keith in the background, and all of a sudden I hear him talking about how it's his last show. I wondered what the hell was going on and jumped onto the google machine to check it out. Sure enough, no one had anything about this story. It was news (albeit marginally important news) being made in real time.

I've never been a huge Keith Olbermann fan, but it was kind of nice having an over-the-top, in-your-face voice on the Left to counteract the right wing insouciance of Fox News. Again, while I'm not a big fan, it's safe to say I'll miss his voice being there.

What limited coverage I've seen, exists here.

A Mockery of Personhood

That is what the U.S. Supreme Court made in Citizens United. AT&T is now asking our dearly beloved Court to take that one step further and recognize corporations as having a personal right to privacy in FCC v. AT&T. Dahlia again has the best write up on yesterday's oral argument, as she has taken AT&T's argument seriously and personified it:

AT&T slips into the Supreme Court chamber this morning, moments before arguments are set to start. He feels slightly affronted that nobody seems to notice him. (AT&T is a very emotional guy.) AT&T is handsome in the obvious way. . . .

Thankfully, it appears that there is little support for the argument:

AT&T dies a little inside when Scalia asks: "Did some members of Congress who had passed FOIA say, 'This is outrageous; what about the personal privacy of General Motors?' I'm not aware of any objections along those lines. . . ."

Even CJ Roberts, who earlier in argument did his best to trot out some defense of the contention, however halfassedly, raises an issue with AT&T's counsel:

The chief justice isn't done, either. He takes up AT&T's claim that since "person" is defined elsewhere in FOIA to include corporations, "personal" should be applied to corporations, too. Mulls Roberts: "I tried to sit down and come up with other examples where the adjective was very different from the root noun. It turns out it is not hard at all. You have craft and crafty. Totally different. Crafty doesn't have much to do with craft. Squirrel, squirrely. Right? I mean, pastor—you have a pastor and pastoral. Same root, totally different."

As Klineberg (counsel for AT&T) suggests that AT&T doesn't adhere to the "grammatic imperative" used in the 3^rd Circuit ruling, AT&T seems to understand that somewhere along the line, he has lost the confidence of the chief justice. Maybe he isn't a real person, capable of dignity and shame and other strong emotions after all. Maybe if you prick him, he does not bleed. If you tickle him he does not laugh. If you poison him, well. AT&T rises to leave the room. But he suddenly finds that he has no legs to stand on.

At least it appears that the current Court "gets it" in the sense that it cannot yet fully personify a corporation. What is most troubling is that this is even a question that can make it to the SCOTUS. Why must corporations seek refuge in personhood and continued to make a mockery of that notion? If we want to develop a bill of rights for corporations, I think the congress could do so, or we could amend the constitution. Isn't that what the judicial conservatives always suggest?

"I've been a racist since 1921..."

The year 2010 has long since disappeared from the review mirror, but I just came across this nice, cynically whimsical essay on 2010 from George Will. Among the revelations is that in 2010, it was revealed that Mussolini was hurt by people saying he copied Hitler. This caused him to protest to his mistress that he had been a racist since 1921 and he didn't understand how anyone could think he was imitating Hitler!

Take a moment to read the whole article here. Some of my favorites:

“I still can’t believe they took our yogurt,” said a staffer at Rawesome Foods in Venice, Calif., when crime-busting L.A. County officers with drawn guns descended on the health-food store in search of … unpasteurized dairy products. Elsewhere, TSA airport personnel exemplified government’s hands-on concern for our safety. In Quincy, Ill., police twice arrested a man who, by offering free rides to intoxicated persons, committed the crime of operating a taxi service without the government’s permission.

In Ottawa, the sensitivity police in a children’s soccer league announced that any team attaining a five-goal lead would be declared to have lost, thereby sparing the feelings of those who were, if you will pardon the expression, losing.

An Exercise in Futility

Very cute. The House is trying to play government today by passing a bill to repeal the health care law that probably won't come to a vote in the Senate, stands little chance of passing the Senate if it comes to a vote (I bet the Republicans will regret the 60-vote requirement if this comes up), and will certainly be vetoed. Regardless, Speaker Boehner rammed the repeal down our throats today to use his terminology.

Since they spent so much time pretending to care about the deficit, I will remind the Speaker that his bill raises the deficit by a whopping $230 billion.

The President Says Bunghole!

God Bless America! This is an actual, taped phone call of President Johnson calling Mr. Haggar about some pants. Enjoy:

Put This On: LBJ Buys Pants from Put This On on Vimeo.

(Hat Tip: The Daily Dish)

Bush Era Warriors

As Bob Dylan said: "The times they are a changing." Remember back in the Bush era when Majority Leader Bill Frist was diagnosing Terry Schiavo via video and generally stirring up a different kind of crazy? Well, now he's out of politics and saying the strangest things for a Republican. He was quoted in the Huffington Post with this little gem:

"It is not the bill that [Republicans] would have written. It is not the bill that I would have drafted. But it is the law of the land and it is the platform, the fundamental platform, upon which all future efforts to make that system better, for that patient, for that family, will be based."

He noted the law "has many strong elements. And those elements, whatever happens, need to be preserved, need to be cuddled, need to be snuggled, need to be promoted and need to be implemented."

A little creepy, but it's nice to see some bona fide conservatives speak rationally instead of calling everything "job killing" and insisting that anything the President does will spell the end of the republic.

(H/T Taegan Goddard)

SLC Punk

I had a fascinating conversation over dinner this weekend with my new friend from Utah. We were talking generally about politics, and more specifically about Utah politics. Then, the conversation moved on to Orrin Hatch's future. As if on cue, an article from KSL.com pops onto my Google reader today on that very subject:

A new Utah Policy poll shows Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, could be fighting off Republicans and Democrats in 2012. University of Utah political scientist Tim Chambless says Hatch will fight an uphill battle because of age, health and distrust of incumbents." There is a possibility that Senator Hatch, the incumbent, would be challenged from within his own party and would be vulnerable to the same fate as Senator Bob Bennett," Chambless said. When Hatch is put up against possible Republican challengers he falls behind both former governor John Huntsman, Jr. and Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah:

• 48 percent support Huntsman, who hasn't said what his plans are for the 2012 election
• 23 percent support Chaffetz, who has hinted he might run
• 21 percent support Hatch, who says he's definitely running again
• 7 percent said they favor someone else
• 1 percent said they don't know

But it's not just Republicans. According to the poll, Representative Jim Matheson is close behind Hatch, who doesn't cross that magical 50% threshold for incumbents. Hatch would win that election 48%-41%. The margin of error on these polls was 4.5%. Now, 2012 elections are still a long way away, and a lot can happen in that time. But for now, I'm very intrigued in what could become of Senator Hatch - indeed, with Kent Conrad announcing his retirement recently and Joe Lieberman set to announce his retirement tomorrow, three more long term senators could be leaving the Senate. SLC, if you're reading this, what do you think of the polls? Are they an anomaly? Is the sample size too small? Will Hatch's political acumen allow him to survive anyway?

Old School Politics in Virginia

In Virginia, the General Assembly is back in session and the sweet, sweet aroma of political payback is in the air:

Del. Albert C. Pollard Jr. (D- Northumberland) wants some constituents of Del. Jackson Miller (R-Manassas) to be penalized after Miller submitted legislation that prohibits menhaden fishing in the Rappahannock River -- something Pollard claims will impact the economy in his region.

Pollard said he plans to introduce a bill Tuesday that would require all Virginia Railway Express riders in Manassas and Manassas Park to pay an extra $1 per trip to ride the commuter rail. The proceeds, Pollard said, will go to fund economic development projects in the Northern Neck.

In the words of President Obama and Sean Connery, if they bring a knife, you bring a gun. If they ban menhaden fishing, you make his people pay an extra $1 for the same amount of service!

Growing up in Michigan, a state with a full-time, permanent legislature, I am always amazed at the alacrity with which the Virginia General Assembly operates. And it's stories like this that are less likely to happen in a place like Michigan. It's also stories like this that remind me of why I love politics and that all politics is local.

Cheaters never prosper!

Elie at ATL hits the nail on the head with his analysis of the purported Georgetown cheating scandal and the purported perpetrator's email in response:

What a great email. Report me or STFU.

And really, this is a skill that every lawyer should have. You have your discussions, your negotiations, and your alternative dispute resolutions, but when all that breaks down you have to have the stones to say, “Screw you, sue me.” That’s what this guy is essentially saying. No more innuendo; if you have any evidence, bring it.

It’s a great lesson for the other students in his section too. If you are going to make policing other students your business, then go out and police. That’s what people expect from future lawyers. You get no points for just knowing ethical rules, you get points for being ethical. And if that means you end up looking like a tattletale douchebag, you’ve just got to stand up to that criticism.

Criminal Justices

Dahlia Lithwick does the absolute best reporting on the U.S. Supreme Court these days. Her most recent breakdown of a couple criminal cases recently before the Court is worth a read.

Beyond the style of the piece, the substance is equally attention getting. It's in the matter of Fourth Amendment jurisprudence that "sliding scale" is an apt metaphor. Any analyst of the Court's work in this area always finds themselves asking where the facts put you on the metaphorical scale? In the King case discussed in Lithwick's column, it seems the Court finds itself considering allowing the police to put their heavy hand on the scale and create exigencies out of idiocies.

Crafted Self-Importance

In Slate, Matt Feeney destroys the notion held by some that there is something deeper to Jared Loughner's rage than mania and narcissism. Or, that somehow, his nihilism developed from reading Nietzsche. The destruction of these myths and the cultish following of Nietzsche by the young and disaffected make "Angry Nerds" a must read. Some quotes:

The attraction of Nietzsche to socially maladjusted young men is obvious, but it isn't exactly simple. It is built from several interlocking pieces. Nietzsche mocks convention and propriety (and mocks difficult writers you'd prefer not to bother with anyway). He's funny and (deceptively) easy to read, especially compared to his antecedents in German philosophy, who are also his flabby and lumbering targets: Schopenhauer, Hegel, and, especially, Kant. If your social world fails to appreciate your singularity and tells you that you're a loser, reading Nietzsche can steel you in your secret conviction that, no, I'm a genius, or at least very special, and everyone else is the loser. . . .

If you're a thoughtful and unhappy young man, in other words, why wouldn't you want to read someone who seems to reflect both your alienation and your uncontainable desire back to you as masculine bravery and strength? Indeed, there's something in every book you're likely to pick up—some enticement of form or content or both—that addresses your horniness/alienation and flatters you in the pretense that, though you have no formal training and are actually kind of a crappy and distracted reader, you are doing philosophy. . . .

. . . in Beyond Good and Evil, it's the aphorisms—a section entitled "Epigrams and Interludes" comprising over a hundred one- and two-sentence masterworks of moral paradox and counterintuition, calculated outrage and elegant eye-poking. Nietzsche is aphoristic even when he's being systematic, and when he's being aphoristic, his writing is simply unmatched in its beauty and mayhem, its uncanny mix of compression and infinite suggestion. And for a young guy who's intellectually hungry but doesn't much enjoy reading, finding this section of philosophy-bits in the middle of this famous book is like a homecoming. You don't even have to know what these epigrams mean to enjoy them. You just feel manly and brave in entertaining them at all, not flinching but laughing when Nietzsche says: "One is best punished for ones virtues." (You even get to work out some of your girl-troubles by lingering over Nietzsche's several jabs at women.)

It's definitely worth the few minutes it will take to read the entire article. Enjoy!

Another One on Health Care Reform

This video reminds me of the beginning of the town hall meetings last August with a more reasonable tone and no paranoid accusations of death panels.

So its great that Republicans want to add to the deficit by putting on their show in the House of repealing a bill that won't pass the Senate or a veto, but what is their plan to replace the popular parts? Like their other plans for cutting spending, there isn't one.

One Issue News Week

I really try to avoid writing about Former Half Term Governor Sarah Palin. She contributes nothing but vitriol and only is where she is because the press repeats every nonsensical, trivial thought someone on her staff posts on Facebook or Twitter ad nauseum. So, I apologize in advance, but our wonderful media (should I call it lamestream media - its so creative!) seems to be only covering one non-issue these past few days. I'm going to post The Daily Beasts's comparison and move on, hopefully to not talk about Palin for quite some time:

The prematurely retired Alaska governor had to serve up her remarks, really a litany of complaints against her critics and political adversaries, while seated in front of a non-working stone fireplace, apparently at her home in Wasilla—a claustrophobic setting framed by an outsize American flag.

The president got to deliver his affecting half-hour of heartfelt reflection and soulful inspiration—repeatedly interrupted by standing ovations—to an arena at the University of Arizona filled to the rafters with 14,000 mourners, notably members of his Cabinet and the Supreme Court, the governor of Arizona, the astronaut-husband of wounded Rep. Gabby Giffords, the heroes who risked their own lives to save others, the doctors and nurses who tended the injured and bleeding, and the friends and families of the six people, including a 9-year-old girl, who were killed by a gun-wielding maniac Saturday morning at a shopping center.

So Palin pulled her typical nonsense - playing the victim and throwing out terms she doesn't understand to incite others ("blood libel"). Obama orates eloquently and moves an entire nation. Seems about on par.

H/T Daily Kos

Virginia's ABC Stores

In some local news, Virginia's Governor, Bob McDonnell, has been trying to come up with a plan to privatize the sale of liquor in the Commonwealth. So far, his plans have yet to gain any real support. Try again, Governor:

Gov. Robert F. McDonnell will unveil a proposal Wednesday to close 332 state-owned liquor stores and replace them with 1,000 private retail outlets -- a scaled-back version of a plan he's pushed for months to end Virginia's monopoly on the sale of distilled spirits.

Under the proposal, the state is expected to reap at least $200 million upfront for the sale of new liquor licenses and $13.1 million more than it now collects each year in profits and taxes at Alcoholic Beverage Control stores, according to the governor's office.

. . .

Under McDonnell's new liquor proposal which he will unveil Wednesday, the state will continue to act as the wholesaler of liquor in Virginia, buying thousands of cases of booze directly from distilleries and selling it at a profit to private retailers, which would then set prices for consumers.

I'm really torn on this issue. I'm not really in favor of the Commonwealth banning private liquor sales. However, the Commonwealth relies on the money they make from the ABC stores, which makes it difficult to end the revenue stream without some way to offset the loss. It hurts even worse in Northern Virginia where we send lots of tax revenue to Richmond and get very little back. Therefore, I think any privatization plan needs to find raise enough revenue to replace that lost by the sale of the ABC stores, whether it be from liquor licenses or some other source. I know, real solid plan I have.

Back to Spending

Eventually, life on Capitol Hill is going to go back on. When it does, I think the tea partiers are going to be rather disappointed when the Republicans don't have a plan to cut spending. Brian Williams recently asked Speaker Boehner what programs he would cut:

WILLIAMS: Name a program right now that we could do without.

BOEHNER: I don’t think I have one off the top of my head.

It's not like this was a question out of left field. This is all Republicans have been talking about for over 2 years. I have seen this question asked so many times that you would think he would at least have some obscure program or pork to eliminate. Usually the answer is "discretionary spending." I guess I can't complain too much, this might be the first honest answer from Speaker Boehner in a long, long time.

The rush to blame the Right for Tucson...

I think dobber is correct in his stated desire to withhold judgment over the Tucson attack. However, most sources, particularly on my side of the aisle do not seem to share this sense of prudence. Consequently, I find myself in (at least minimal) agreement with some of the points raised by George Will in this article (certainly I do not agree with every point raised, but merely those I'm highlighting here):

The craving is for banishing randomness and the inexplicable from human experience. Time was, the gods were useful. What is thunder? The gods are angry. Polytheism was explanatory. People postulated causations.

And still do. Hence: The Tucson shooter was (pick your verb) provoked, triggered, unhinged by today's (pick your noun) rhetoric, vitriol, extremism, "climate of hate." . . .

A characteristic of many contemporary minds is susceptibility to the superstition that all behavior can be traced to some diagnosable frame of mind that is a product of promptings from the social environment. . . .

The whole article is worth a quick read. As I said, the portions I've quoted are the one's I agree with. There are several other points in the article that I strongly disagree with, as Will simply goes too far. But he hits on a point that I think is rather important: at this point, this is just a tragedy, attributable to nothing except a crazy man with a gun, detached from reality. Let's try and keep that in mind when processing this tragedy.

Is Vitriolic Rhetoric to Blame?

I'm not ready to comment on the assassination of Chief Judge John Roll or the attempted assassination of Representative Gabrielle Giffords. I don't know all the facts and would prefer to learn as much as I can about what happened and why before forming an opinion. However, there has been much debate about whether the increased rhetoric about revolution and excessive hyperbolic metaphors are to blame for the events on Saturday (by the tea party, by both political parties...take your pick). Anyway, I just wanted to link to 3 NY Times columns I happened to read this morning that I found interesting. I'm not saying either are right or either are wrong.

Matt Bai

Paul Krugman

Ross Douthat

What do you guys think? Have you formed an opinion yet? Are there any other columns or opinion pieces that are worth mentioning? Have at it in the comments.

Speaker "Boner"

Apparently, our classy former President "Dubya's" nickname for now-Speaker of the House John Boehner was the overly-clever "Boner." This is one of the great anecdotes contained in the latest slasher piece by the Rolling Stone's Matt Taibbi. It's a lengthy piece that is well worth a read, including great little bits such as this:

The fact that Boehner supported TARP and No Child Left Behind and mega-handouts to the pharmaceutical industry and a range of other federal subsidies is hardly surprising, for this is what mainstream Washington politicians of both parties do — they take great buttloads of money from giant transnational companies, play golf with the CEOs of those same companies ("If someone I've gotten to know on the golf course comes into my office with a good argument," Boehner once said, "I tend to want to listen"), and deliver taxpayer money back to their buddies when the need arises, or sometimes even when the need doesn't arise. In this regard, Boehner has had a lot more in common with campaign-contribution-devouring Democrats like Chris Dodd and Harry Reid than he has with the Tea Party Republican voters he now ostensibly represents.

Taibbi sets out Boehner as the anti-Tea Party leader of the Tea Party folks in Congress, which as dobber has already suggested, should provide us with fantastic blogging fodder. One thing is for certain, you'll want to have your Kleenex handy. And you'll want to watch and see if the Tea Party changes "Boner" or if "Boner" changes them:

The new speaker represents an increasingly endangered class of Beltway jobholders who know how to raise money and get elected, but not much beyond that. He now finds himself the party's last line of defense against millions of angry voters who, for the first time in recent memory, are at least attempting to watch what Congress is up to. The tee times are over.

This scenario could have a lasting impact on the interaction between Congress and the people they represent, or the people could once again turn their eyes from the incestuous orgy that has been Washington for 40 plus years.

(Hat Tip: A.L. Burns)

When the Constitution Gets in the Way of the Right's Agenda

I think we're all familiar now with how the right fawns over the Constitution. They even went so far as to mark their property the other day by reading it into the Congressional record, just not all of it. It kind of reminds me of how my dog pisses on trees when I walk him to mark his territory. Except sometimes that damn document just gets in the way of hating foreigners and loving church in public. Slate ran a great piece on how the right absolutely loves the Constitution, except for the 1st, 14th, 16th, and 17th amendments (I'll throw in the Supremacy Clause for good measure):

This newfound attention to the relationship between Congress and the Constitution is thrilling and long overdue. Progressives, as Greg Sargent points out, are wrong to scoff at it. This is an opportunity to engage in a reasoned discussion of what the Constitution does and does not do. It's an opportunity to point out that no matter how many times you read the document on the House floor, cite it in your bill, or how many copies you can stuff into your breast pocket without looking fat, the Constitution is always going to raise more questions than it answers and confound more readers than it comforts. And that isn't because any one American is too stupid to understand the Constitution. It's because the Constitution wasn't written to reflect the views of any one American.

The problem with the Tea Party's new Constitution fetish is that it's hopelessly selective. As Robert Parry notes, the folks who will be reading the Constitution aloud this week can't read the parts permitting slavery or prohibiting cruel and unusual punishment using only their inside voices, while shouting their support for the 10th Amendment. They don't get to support Madison and renounce Jefferson,then claim to be restoring the vision of "the Framers." Either the Founders got it right the first time they calibrated the balance of power between the federal government and the states, or they got it so wrong that we need to pass a "Repeal Amendment" to fix it. And unless Tea Party Republicans are willing to stand proud and announce that they adore and revere the whole Constitution as written, except for the First, 14, 16th, and 17th amendments, which totally blow, they should admit right now that they are in the same conundrum as everyone else: This document no more commands the specific policies they espouse than it commands the specific policies their opponents support.

The most recent offensive the right is taking up against the Constitution is birth right citizenship. The 14th Amendment clearly reads: "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside." Nevertheless, right-leaning state legislatures in three states want to strip citizenship from children born to illegal immigrants in this country. Too bad the Constitution, which they so dearly love, says these babies are citizens. According to the state legislatures, the phrase "subject to the jurisdiction thereof" means these babies do not have to become citizens. The Constitutional Law Prof Blog explains why their wrong in a fascinating article for us legal nerds:

They seem pretty confident in their interpretation, but there's good evidence against them. Start with the congressional debates over the Fourteenth Amendment--a debate eerily similar to that today. The debate in the 39th Congress focused on Chinese immigrants in California and Gypsies in Pennsylvania (among other groups), with opponents of birthright citizenship claiming that Chinese and Gypsies would take over those states. Opponents of birthright citizenship in the Amendment (obviously) lost that debate in the 39th Congress.

The article is definitely worth the 5 minutes it will take to read. It really underscores how the right will urinate all over the place claiming to own the Constitution and then at the same max volume (turn it up to 11) disclaim many of the parts that affect us most. This is why Charles Krauthammer's most recent column angered me and caused me to tell to Burnsy that it was "utter trash." But that's a column for another time.

Love America...

I found this video to be absolutely fascinating:





(Hat Tip: The Daily Dish)

Home School Tax Credits

Professor Paul Caron of the TaxProf Blog wrote today about a proposal to give tax credits to home schooled students:

The new Republicans in Congress have vowed to challenge Washington's role in American public education, and said they will seek to turn more power over to the states on many fronts. But one of their priorities is a new federal rule: to give parents in every state tax credits if their children are home-schooled.

Previous efforts in Congress to adopt a nationwide tax break have failed, and currently only three states -- Illinois, Louisiana and Minnesota -- allow some benefit for home schooling

I really don't see why the federal government would give tax credits to pay for someone to not use their local schools? It does sound like the typical Republican proposal though - more spending with no effect on most of the country. Additionally, its an area the states should handle, especially since your local taxes pay for schools. Am I missing something?

Those Phantom Budget Cuts

I've been saying this since before the election, but the Republicans are bound to upset the Tea Partiers when they're unable to actually make any significant cuts to federal spending. I remember Chris Matthews on election night asking Republican leaders what programs they would cut, and not a single one could name a program they would cut, including mumbling nonsense from Michele Bachmann and Eric Cantor. The only thing we knew they were against was the Affordable Care Act, which, according to the CBO would reduce the federal deficit by a significant amount. In other words, the Republicans would increase spending.

Now, we have evidence that the Republicans never had a plan to actually reduce spending:

Many people knowledgeable about the federal budget said House Republicans could not keep their campaign promise to cut $100 billion from domestic spending in a single year. Now it appears that Republicans agree.

Now aides say that the $100 billion figure was hypothetical, and that the objective is to get annual spending for programs other than those for the military, veterans and domestic security back to the levels of 2008, before Democrats approved stimulus spending to end the recession.

It was hypothetical? I don't remember hearing that word during the campaign or any tea party rally. Funny timing.

I Wonder if the Rules Will Still Apply

A combination of the President's vacation in Hawaii, the end of the 111th Congress, and our own vacations have brought this blog to a screeching halt. But as the 112th Congress returns, we're going to see some hilarity coming out of the House. I'm really wondering if the Republicans will keep harping about their "deficit reductions" and "new rules" in the House when it's fairly obvious they are merely words with no meaning behind them. Case in point:

CAF's Bll Scher makes what would be a very good point about the House GOP's new "cutgo" spending rule.

The House Republican leadership has announced it will enact two things immediately upon taking control of the House this week: a new "CutGo" rule to require revenue offsets for any increases in spending, and the repeal of the Affordable Care Act health reform law.

The Republicans might want to pass health reform repeal first.

Because if they install "CutGo" rules first, they won't be able to repeal health reform without also finding $1 trillion in spending cuts over the next two decades to make up for the taxpayer savings they'll be throwing away.

Which would have been the case had they not already blown a big ol' loophole in their own rule

This should be rich. No pun intended.

"You don't say 'Creep, Creep' unless you're quoting TLC..."

The title to this post is simply an excuse to quote the Will Ferrell-Mark Wahlberg film, "The Other Guys," which I watched and quite enjoyed over the weekend. Though, it's not entirely irrelevant to the latest piece by Krauthammer. Charlie and George Will have been writing about the President's latest liberal designs and how he attempts to circumvent the half-Republican congress through regulation:

On Dec. 23, the Interior Department issued Secretarial Order 3310, reversing a 2003 decision and giving itself the authority to designate public lands as "Wild Lands." A clever twofer: (1) a bureaucratic power grab - for seven years up through Dec. 22, wilderness designation had been the exclusive province of Congress, and (2) a leftward lurch - more land to be "protected" from such nefarious uses as domestic oil exploration in a country disastrously dependent on foreign sources.

The very same day, the Environmental Protection Agency declared that in 2011 it would begin drawing up anti-carbon regulations on oil refineries and power plants, another power grab effectively enacting what Congress had firmly rejected when presented as cap-and-trade legislation.

For an Obama bureaucrat, however, the will of Congress is a mere speed bump. Hence this regulatory trifecta, each one moving smartly left - and nicely clarifying what the spirit of bipartisan compromise that President Obama heralded in his post-lame-duck Dec. 22 news conference was really about: a shift to the center for public consumption and political appearance only.

I think the regulatory scheme is largely the prerogative of the executive and that, so long as the implementation of legislation does not exceed the scope of the legislation, then the executive does not run afoul of the constitution. I also think that this complaint by Krauthammer is alarmism over an alleged creeping of the executive power. I think that perhaps the fear is legitimate but that the complaints regarding the Obama administration are, at best, premature. How much regulation is permitted under our scheme? What is an acceptable level of regulation by the executive.?