Some very good news today- hate crimes protections for the LGBT community is on its way to the President's desk. The Senate voted for cloture on the defense authorization conference report and then passed the full report with the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act attached. The cloture vote was 64-35 with Hatch absent, and our side picked up Collins, Snowe, Murkowski, Voinovich and Lugar. Feingold voted no for reasons related to Afghanistan.
I wrote awhile back about complaints in the LGBT community around how hate crimes was done, that it is attached to the defense bill. I debunked that at the time, but want to emphasize that when the President signs this, not only will it get some good press to Americans who don't know about its importance, but will do a lot of good for the LGBT community. In the end, with a crowded plate for Congress and advocates, the most important thing is getting as much done as possible, and we can check this off our list.
And a special congratulations to Judy Shepard, who has been fighting this long, long fight since 1998.
Two new economic studies just came out that, especially taken in combination, are truly stunning and profoundly troubling. The first, by the Center for Economic and Policy Research (a DC-based think tank), reported that the federal government is essentially subsidizing the Too Big to Fail (TBTF) banks in terms of the interest rates banks must pay to borrow funds. The second, coming out of Rutgers University, tells us that- if all goes quite well- that we don't get back to our pre-recession level of employment until the last half of 2017.
These two things are each worthy of huge concern. In combination, they spell very, very big economic trouble for America.
Yesterday, President Obama went on five Sunday talk shows. FOX was not among them, thankfully. In reading about his coverage yesterday, I came across this:
But Mr. Obama chose to make a statement - and raise a distracting fuss on Fox News - by declining to speak.
And Fox milked it. When he was not talking about Acorn, Mr. Wallace bemoaned the presidential slight, asking, "Whatever happened to reaching out to all Americans?" He told Bill O'Reilly that the White House aides were "a bunch of crybabies."
Apparently, the feeling is mutual. "We figured Fox would rather show 'So You Think You Can Dance' than broadcast an honest discussion about health insurance reform," a White House deputy press secretary told ABC News on Saturday. "Fox is an ideological outlet where the president has been interviewed before and will likely be interviewed again; not that the whining particularly strengthens their case for participation any time soon."
The WH deputy press secretary was Josh Earnest. I like the feistiness from him, especially the reference to FOX's decision to show an entertainment show rather than Obama's address to Congress. In response, Bill O and Chris Wallace admitted Glenn Beck and Hannity have an ideological point of view, claimed they themselves aren't ideological at all, called the Administration crybabies, childish and immature, and claimed every other major outlet is irrelevant. Kind of emphasizes Earnest's point.
So my question is whether the White House position with FOX will continue, or whether this is a one-time punishment of FOX for refusing to air Obama's speech. I have long thought no serious progressive should go on a TV show where the game is fixed, where each question is structured from a "so when did you stop beating your wife" standpoint, and where each big name they have helps their ratings. When Hillary Clinton opted to go on Bill O's show during last year's campaign, a lot of my die-hard movement FOX-hating friends gleefully rubbed their hands and said "ooooh, the belly of the beast! I'm getting popcorn!" Hillary drew a ton of viewers that night. Viewers equals ad revenue, ad revenue equals Bill O, Bill O's success leads to new ventures like the FOX Business Channel. I'm not saying such appearances are entirely responsible for FOX's continued existence. Right-wing donors will always support their own, and FOX is at the top of the heap.
But if you're looking for someone to blame in part for the continued existence of FOX, blame progressives who continue to go on, blindly thinking "surely among that viewer demographic that voted for Bush in 2004 by an 88%-7% margin, there must be a moderate I can speak to." Or "surely, we have to reach out to everyone." Or "I have to build my media profile and brag to all my friends I went on teevee." Then they turn around and whine about FOX for twisted lies and not firing Glenn Beck after he said the President hated white people and wishing Beck would disappear after hit jobs on Van Jones, Yosi Sergant and ACORN.
You can't have it both ways, my friends. I am glad the White House press operation realizes FOX is an arm of the GOP message machine, an ideologically opposed, no-win game. I am glad the deputy press secretary attacked FOX for whining and for being more interested in entertainment than arguably the most important issue currently facing our nation. My question is whether they'll stand their ground when Chris Wallace starts a "Where's Obama" clock or Bill O complains about not reaching out to everybody or whatever.
A New Way Forward is doing nationwide video and town hall discussions of the banking issue and overall economic picture the entire week. Tomorrow morning I'll be speaking ona panel on the same topic, with the esteemed Simon Johnson, Nancy Cleeland, and John Taylor. It's at 9 AM in the Rayburn House Office Building, near the Capitol South metro. You can RSVP here and stop by for a good discussion of the overall picture and what we can do about it.
A New Way Forward is hosting a live webstream of a discussion on the banking issue and overall economic picture tonight at 7 PM EST, in NYC, with Leo Hindery, Les Leopold, and Alice Kessler-Harris You can watch by clicking here.
Other events webcasted this week are:
San Francisco, 6/10 at 6:30 PM PST with Ernesto Dal Bo, Doug Rucskoff, Donald Goldmacher at Mechanic Library
New York City, 6/10 at 7 PM EST video screening with Danny Shechter, New Roosevelt Institute, Working Families Party at Le Poisson Rouge
Washington DC, 6/11 at 9 AM EST with Simon Johnson, John Taylor, Nancy Cleeland, and me
As many of you know, I have been involved in getting A New Way Forward off the ground and working to re-organize the banking system. They are kicking off a series of forums and town hall meetings next week for Americans to learn about the crisis and get involved in making the system more decentralized and progressive. The first is Monday, June 8th at 7 PM EST in NYC with my friend Leo Hindery, Les Leopold, and Alice Kessler-Harris. It's at The Tank in NYC, a great non-profit performing arts space where I have one of my most fun and interesting book events, and I'll post the video here. You should go if you are in the city.
If you're in DC, on Thursday June 11th at 9 AM, I'll be doing my part at a discussion right at the heart of it, on Capitol Hill at the Rayburn House Office Building (the Gold Room, Room 2168A). Joining me will be Simon Johnson, Nancy Cleeland, and John Taylor. RSVP here.
You can also organize your own video screening or town hall meeting with their help. On a problem this big, with the banking lobby probably the most powerful in the country, we're only going to make progress if we generate momentum everywhere.
So I know this may be a little twisted, but there are a few things more fun for me than being attacked by right wingers. I consider it one of the greatest honors of my life that I have been attacked by Rush Limbaugh (4 times by name), Sean Hannity, Cal Thomas, and Paul Weyrich, and even had an "expose" of me done by National Review. I get a little thrill every time it happens.
It happened again today, this time as a way of attacking the New Way Forward movement, and as usual, they got the most basic facts in their article wrong. A reporter named Judi McLeod, whose work (according to her byline) has appeared on the aforementioned Limbaugh along with Newsmax.com, Drudge, Fox News, and Glen Beck, "broke" the following news flash:
I agreed this week to become an honorary co-chair of A New Way Forward, a spontaneous grassroots movement that is reminding me of the early days of MoveOn.org. This impressive group of passionate organizers got involved because they were listening to progressive economists and business leaders talk about alternatives to the Geithner plan on re-building the banking system, and they decided to get involved. Some of these organizers are old hands like Joe Trippi (who truly is an old hand - I met Trippi when he was helping Walter Mondale in Iowa in 1983, and he already seemed like an old hand then) and Zephyr Teachout of Dean campaign fame, and some are relative youngsters like Tiffiniy Cheng.
I agreed to become a co-chair in part (of course) because I strongly support the principles for banking policy that they have laid out - the same ones supported by all of the economists and economic policy thinkers I respect the most, people like Paul Krugman, Dean Baker, Joe Stiglitz, William Greider, Simon Johnson, Jamie Galbraith, Leo Hindery, and Rob Johnson. But I also agreed to help because the spontaneous passion and obvious organizing skill, completely unsupported with money or institutional DC help, reminded me of the early days of MoveOn.org. Before there was ever the online organizational giant of MoveOn.org, it was a simple internet petition written and put online in the living room of Wes Boyd and Joan Blades and forwarded to a few of their friends. Wes and Joan didn't know anything about how Washington, DC works, or how a PAC operated, or how a poll was conducted. They didn't have any money or institutional support when they started, although a few of us in DC recognized their potential and lent a helping hand. All they had was their passion about an issue (in that case, the impeachment fight) and great instincts about online organizing.
While A New Way Forward does have some old hands at online organizing involved, their spontaneous passion about their issue and their creating a protest with national implications with no financial or institutional support reminds me exactly of MoveOn.org's launch 11 years ago. It also reminds me of the practically spontaneous mass street demonstrations done in 2005 on the immigration issue by prominently young Hispanic organizers mostly driven by text messaging.
One of the reasons I am so excited about A New Way Forward is that this approach to organizing a campaign around the banking issue is exactly what is needed. Traditional DC organizations were always going to be reluctant to get into this fight. For one thing, very few DC organizations work on banking and finance issues. For those that do, they are deeply engaged in working with the White House to get the budget and health care reform passed, and don't want to throw cold water on that White House relationship.
Here is the information about the April 11th rallies. I will be speaking at the one in DC, but please don't let that discourage you from coming. My message will be simple: I support Barack Obama, support his budget and his agendas for health care and climate change and immigration reform and the Employee Free Choice Act. But on banking policy, we need A New Way Forward.
STATE BLOGS
