The House Rules committee is currently clearing H.R. 1 (the stimulus package), and all of the amendments to H.R. 1, for floor votes tomorrow. You can watch the hearing here.
As Congressional Democrats chug along, the actual Republican strategy is not to offer an alternative, but to:
Complain about one small aspect of the bill at a time, such as contraception funding, non-existent CBO reports, non-existent earmarks and, now, ACORN.
Demand that, in the name of bi-partisanship, that small aspect of the stimulus be dropped.
Secure meetings with Obama, in order for these complaints and demands to appear relevant to the national media.
Hope that, as Digby notes, Democrats in Congress and / or liberal activists grow publicly angry with President Obama if / when he makes these concessions in order to secure more Republican votes. Thus, Republicans are fulfilling Obama's vision (even though they oppose the stimulus) while Democrats are thwarting it (even though they are writing and supporting the stimulus).
Rinse, lather, repeat.
The possible achievements of this strategy are minimal. Republicans are not going to defeat the stimulus bill, period. Further, they are not going to pass an alternative stimulus bill with the old pattern of unanimous Republican support, plus Blue Dogs, plus a compliant President. That path is also dead. Still further, they will not get any credit for the bill, even if they sign on to it. The party in power gets the blame or the credit, depending on the success of the legislation passed under their watch.
What they might get are small victories on things like contraception or ACORN, a few irritated lefties, plus a lot of media coverage for their meetings with President Obama. It is petty, but it does scratch a lot of Republican itches.
In my book, The Uprising, I wrote an entire chapter about the state of the antiwar movement, and the chapter included a look at Moveon.org. The chapter examined an organization that had - at the time - become a reflexive appendage of the Democratic Party (as opposed to a more movement-based organization focused on progressivism). I experienced a bit of backlash from Moveon partisans for the book, but that was to be expected. Talk about a taboo subject - in this case, the problem of movement-branded organizations becoming megaphones for anyone with a D behind their name - and you are bound to get people pissed.
I consider a lot of the Moveon.org leadership friends, I think they are solid progressives, and my book's chapter was meant as an honest look at both the success and failure of the organization. And I didn't enjoy writing the part about the book that explored Moveon's behavior in early 2007 - specifically, when the organization backed off pressuring congressional Democrats to take a strong position on ending the war. That's why I was thrilled to read this dispatch in the Huffington Post today - it suggests a positive shift:
Cross-posted from the Campaign for America's Future
On Christmas Eve, I appeared on Fox News to discuss the upcoming economic recovery package, only to be told that FDR's New Deal "prolonged the Great Depression" (you can watch the clip here). This is the latest consevative talking point - one specifically aimed at stopping President Obama and the new Congress from passing a New Deal-sized package of public spending.
And so after appearing on Fox, I decided to devote my first newspaper column in the New Year to looking into whether conservatives have any shred of evidence to support their claim that the New Deal prolonged the Great Depression. And what do you know, they don't...at all. In fact, as government data shows, the pre-WWII New Deal era from 1933-1940 - even including the much-hyped recession of 1937-38 - saw the single biggest drop in the unemployment rate in American history (skip down to see the graphs and data that conservatives want us to forget).
As Michael Bennet and potentially Caroline Kennedy head to the U.S. Senate from Colorado and New York, respectively, let me roll out this Congressional Quarterly story for partisans who don't care at all about the democratic - or, really undemocratic - implications of their senate appointments. The article makes the I-don't-give-a-shit-about-anything-other-than-winning case for Democratic governors avoiding aristocrats/insiders and instead appointing people who have at least some shred of experience representing constituents:
"The mix of inexperience as a winning candidate and an appointment to the Senate has seldom proved to be the right recipe. [George] Mitchell is the only Senate appointee to win election after having holding no prior public elective office since at least 1958, according to data compiled by Sen. Robert C. Byrd , D-W.Va., and a review of the appointments made since Byrd's statistical history of the Senate was published in 1993."
So, if you don't care about legislative policy or democracy and only care about holding Senate seats for people with a D behind their name, it's still gonna take a lot of rhetorical acrobatics to argue that governors appointing people like Bennet or Kennedy is a good move.
Then again, perhaps that's not a lesson about partisan politics - maybe it's also a lesson about small-d democracy, too. Maybe, just maybe, voters like to be represented by people who they've had a democratic representational relationship with in the past. In other words, maybe good democratic policy makes good politics.
Call me crazy, but it seems voters repeated electoral rejection of appointed royalty over the last half century suggests that the old-fashioned American zeal for democracy still impacts our politics.
44% of the state's voters now say they have a lesser opinion of Kennedy than they did before she started vying for the position. 33% say it's made no difference, and 23% report now having a more favorable opinion of her. A plurality of Democrats, Republicans, and independents all say that her efforts have caused them to view her less favorably.
When it comes to whether they would prefer to see Kennedy or Andrew Cuomo appointed, 58% now prefer Cuomo to 27% for Kennedy. Cuomo is favored by 65% of Republicans, 59% of independents, and 54% of Democrats.
I know what you're thinking - Cuomo is a version of political aristocracy, right? Well, sure - but the point here is not that aristocracy is automatically horrible - it's not, and I never said it was. There are terrific leaders with ties to political aristocracy, from Ted Kennedy to Ned Lamont. The point here is that political aristocracy* ALONE should not be the sole or even most important determining factor in American politics - and most especially in appointments.
As I said earlier, it's pretty clear that Michael Bennet was appointed to the U.S. Senate solely because of his aristocratic credentials - ie. connections to money and Establishment power and Beltway insiders. It had almost nothing to do with his relevant experience, because if that was the basis for an appointment, every other major candidate had more of that. And, as the Denver Post notes, it had absolutely, positively nothing to do with his public positions on issues:
But while everyone from business leaders to political heavyweights to education reformers agree that Bennet is almost always the smartest guy in the room, his positions on nearly every key issue facing the country are completely unknown.
"Soon," Bennet said both during and after the official announcement.
Foreshadowing the hard-fought senate race expected in 2010, state GOP chair Dick Wadhams seized on Bennet's silence.
"His continued refusal today to state his positions on issues suggests someone who isn't clear where he stands," Wadhams said. And then he demanded to know Bennet's stance on an upcoming measure in the Senate that would eliminate the secret ballot in union votes.
One of two disconcerting realities is at work here: 1) Bennet's positions are known by the Establishment forces that got him the Senate job, and those positions aren't threatening to that Establishment (read: they are corporate conservative) or 2) Bennet himself doesn't yet have positions on the major issues.
I guess the latter would be better than the former in that it would hold out the possibility that Bennet will end up being a solid Democratic vote on issues like health care, ending the war, and the Employee Free Choice Act. But the fact that Colorado now has a senator whose never held elected office and therefore has no voting record*; has lived most of his life in D.C. and not in state; has served as a key adviser to a right-wing billionaire; and hasn't stated any public positions on key issues before the Senate highlights just how odd - and troubling - Ritter's appointment is.
*Note: I think having served in elected office - or at least having run for such office - should be a key qualification for a Senate appointment not as much for political/reelection reasons, but because in having done so, a candidate has built up something of a public record on many issues (whether that public record is actual votes or public statements) and therefore the citizens being represented have some idea of where that appointee actually stands.
A day after my post on Harry Reid, he appeared on Meet the Press to deny the Sun-Times report that he believes - or told Gov. Blagojevich - that he believed top Illinois African American leaders were "unelectable." I'm glad Reid did this, and in the spirit of "innocent till proven guilty" and in light of what I originally noted was his stellar legislative record on race issues, I am inclined to believe him.
That said, it doesn't negate the fundamental point of the original post, which is that in political circles, black candidates are often billed as politically inferior or "unelectable," - and that such latent racism is considered mundane. We need to get over that racism, and if this Reid controversy - whether rooted in fact or rooted in Blagojevich spin - helped forward the dialogue on that racism, then it's a good thing.
NEXT-DAY UPDATE: A day after this post, Reid appeared on Meet the Press to deny the Sun-Times report that he believes - or told Gov. Blagojevich - that he believed top Illinois African American leaders were "unelectable." I'm glad Reid did this, and in the spirit of "innocent till proven guilty," believe him. That said, it doesn't negate the fundamental point of this post, which is that in political circles, black candidates are often billed as politically inferior or "unelectable," - and that such latent racism is considered mundane. We need to get over that racism, and if this Reid controversy - whether rooted in fact or rooted in Blagojevich spin - helped forward the dialogue on that racism, then it's a good thing. - D
If you believe what the Chicago Sun-Times is reporting today*, then its fair to ask whether Harry Reid (D-NV) has some very disturbing - and very disturbingly outdated - views on race and politics:
Days before Gov. Blagojevich was charged with trying to sell President-elect Barack Obama's U.S. Senate seat to the highest bidder, top Senate Democrat Harry Reid made it clear who he didn't want in the post: Jesse Jackson, Jr., Danny Davis or Emil Jones.
Rather, Reid called Blagojevich to argue he appoint either state Veterans Affairs chief Tammy Duckworth or Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan, sources told the Chicago Sun-Times.
Sources say the Senate majority leader pushed against Jackson and Davis - both democratic congressmen from Illinois - and against Jones - the Illinois Senate president who is the political godfather of President-elect Barack Obama - because he did not believe the three men were electable.
Jackson, Davis and Jones are three top African American leaders in Illinois - they are each eminently qualified and have lots of experience winning elections. And yet according to the Sun-Times, Reid believes they are unelectable, while insisting that two non-black candidates are more electable. Sure, you can make individual arguments against each of those candidates - just like racially motivated employers can make individual arguments about why they fired this or that African American employee. But (if this story is correct) what gives away Reid's broader and more disturbing views on race as a whole - what tells us that this is less about individuals and more about an overarching view that black heritage is synonymous with inability to be elected - is his inclusion of Tammy Duckworth in the "electable" category.
Definition: Government by the best individuals or by a small privileged class.
Though I'm not home in Denver right now, I'm guessing there are many who are fairly to quite mystified by Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter's (D) selection of Michael Bennet for U.S. Senate. It makes no political or policy sense whatsoever. Indeed, the only thing that rationally explains this individual appointment (as well as the New York appointment and many of Obama's economic/national security cabinet appointments) is the fact that we are living in a Golden Age of American Political Aristocracy.
Sitting in an airport ready to fly back from vacation, I learned that New York Gov. David Paterson (D), fresh off trying to defecate on his state's middle class, is now going to appoint Caroline Kennedy to the Senate. I also learned that my own Gov. Bill Ritter (D) is about to appoint Michael Bennet to the Senate - the same Michael Bennet who has never been elected to anything and whose longest experience in Colorado politics was serving as the top financial aide to right-wing billionaire Philip Anschutz.
There's so much nepotism/dynasty/money/corruption floating around politics these days I'm constantly amazed that anyone can remain optimistic. I'm also dumfounded at how fast the Democratic Party can turn "change you can believe in" into "the more things change, the more they stay the same." Or, to put it more succintly, I'm finding myself constantly laughing at how insistent the Democratic Party is in trying to turn "hope!" into "sheeeeeeeiiit!"
I'm edging into the last half of a week-long respite here at my secure undisclosed location. I'm not paying much attention to the news (read: I'm not paying any attention to, well, anything). I'm spending my time reading Alexander Hemon's "Lazarus Project," Eric Rauchway's "A Brief History of the Great Depression" and George Saunders' "In Persuasion Nation." Oh, and watching as many episodes of Mad Men as possible.
I just checked my email, only to find the usual raft of hate mail about my last column (shocker - I got an email from a millionaire who didn't like that I discussed the need to raise taxes on millionaires...in the business of politics/writing that has become suffocatingly cliche, it's kinda depressing when even the hate mail I get is becoming cliche...)
Anyway, since this is New Years Eve, I wanted to offer up a few wishes for 2009 in no particular order:
I appeared on Fox News to discuss both the Blagojevich flap and the imminent economic recovery package from the Obama administration. You can watch the clip here. As you'll see, on that latter issue, Fox News is starting its campaign to stop Obama's big spending plan by stating - as assumed fact - that "historians pretty much agree" that Franklin Roosevelt prolonged the Great Depression, and that therefore, Obama shouldn't try another New Deal.
When I say Fox News' assertion about historians is patently false, they literally laugh at me as if I've said something so clearly untrue, something Americans supposedly assume is so obviously stupid, that it's worthy of ridicule.
The Depression issue was brought up by conservative pundit Monica Crowley - not surprising since this is the conservative talking point du jour ever since the "center-right nation" meme started looking idiotic and ever since fringe-right-wing bloviator Amity Shlaes published her since-discredited book claiming FDR essentially created the Great Depression. Crowley supported her the "FDR ruined the country" meme with the very authoritative-sounding statement that "based on all kinds of studies and academic work done on the great depression" she knows that the New Deal's "massive government intervention prolonged the Great Depression."
Of course, she doesn't offer up a single study or "academic work" as any kind of proof, and yet, when I say her assertion is absurd, Fox News anchor Greg Jarrett starts laughing at me - as if my assertion that FDR's New Deal helped end the Great Depression is so fantastical as to prompt guffawing. Jarrett proceeds to state that historians "pretty much agree" that FDR prolonged the Great Depression, and resorts to insisting that he knows that's true because "it's in the books" - whatever the hell that means. Indeed, Fox wants us to believe that what was only very recently the deranged propaganda of a handful of conservative political pundits is now such a consensus opinion among historians that to say otherwise is to evoke laughter.
Now, it's true - back in 2004, two UCLA professors published a little-noticed report claiming the New Deal's government intervention prolonged the Great Depression. But that assertion has been subsequently eviscerated by, ya know, actual data.
Note: I'm hosting AM760 here in Denver this morning, and we're going to talk with Damon Silvers, one of the congressionally appointed overseers of the Wall Street bailout. Stream it at www.am760.net, and feel free to call in at 303-713-7600. If you miss it live, it will be up as a podcast here.
Last night, Rachel Maddow did something I never thought I'd see a journalist do: In the name of transparency, she went back and clarified that a bailout-justifying guest of hers actually had a blatant conflict of interest. Watch the clip here.
On Monday, Maddow had on Berkley professor Laura Tyson to talk about the bailout. You can watch that clip here. As you'll see, Tyson defended the firms that have received bailout money, saying they are not at fault in either how they are using the money, or in how they are refusing to answer questions about their use of the money. She also insisted that companies that get bailout money should be able to keep paying dividends to their shareholders.
Yet, Tyson didn't tell viewers that she sits on the board of directors of Morgan Stanley, a bank that has received $10 billion in bailout money. That's right - according to Morgan Stanley's SEC filings, Tyson makes about $350,000 a year from Morgan Stanley in total compensation from that position, and she now owns about 79,000 shares of the company. In other words, she has a direct financial interest in defending the bailout, absolving bailout recipients of wrongdoing, and justifying the use of bailout money for shareholder dividends.
Obviously, it's really unethical to appear on a show billing yourself as an objective disinterested professor at the same time you aren't telling people you are on the board of directors of the company you are effectively defending. But, as a recent New York Times story about defense commentators shows, this kind of thing happens all the time. It's completely corrupt - quite literally, paid industry spokespeople are being allowed to cloak themselves in the veneer of objectivity and use the media to limit the parameters of our political debate on major issues.
Thankfully, when I pointed Tyson's conflict of interest out to Maddow and her show's staff, they did the responsible thing and made a big effort to inform viewers about what happened. Indeed, in doing this follow-up piece, the Rachel Maddow Show displayed the kind of integrity and respect for their audience that is almost unheard of in political journalism. In being so honest about this, they really showed what their program is all about, and how they aren't willing to be used or deceived by corporate spokespeople.
I'm guest hosting the big Denver progressive radio show this week on AM760. Today in the last hour, I had the opportunity to interview newly appointed Colorado Secretary of State Bernie Buescher (D) and T. Boone Pickens. Listen in here - I discuss Pickens' involvement in Republican politics, and ask him why progressives should trust his motives on energy considering his career.
Has anyone bothered to explain how giving a gay basher a national platform is a decision made in the name of ending division? I'm really confused - there are lots of clergypeople in America who haven't gay bashed. And remember - it's not just that Rick Warren is against gay marriage, it's that he's very publicly attacked gay people with the worst kinds of slander.
How are Barack Obama and Joe Biden publicly claiming that their selection of Rick Warren to deliver a prayer at the inauguration is in the interest of ending division?
I mean, if they want to say its in the interest of appeasing right-wing Christians, fine - at least that makes some logical sense (as odious as such a motivation would be). But in the interest of ending division? Say what? Since when did elevating a person who bashes one group of Americans become a move specifically designed to stop division?
Sounds like Obama and Biden are interested not being dividers in the George W. Bush "I'm a uniter not a divider" kind of sense. That is, they seem interested - at least during the inauguration - in injecting a little bit of dividing, not uniting. Either that, or they are suggesting they believe that a great way to bring the country together is to unify America around the promotion of a gay basher.
Is that what they're saying - that they think gay bashing is the best way to build national unity?
UPDATE:Yglesias essentially concedes the point. I appreciate him doing that - shows he's arguing from good faith (which I always assumed). The key here is making sure these debates are on the merits, and I think his clarification helps do that.
Writing about the debate over the bailout, CAP's Matt Yglesias says there existed a "Sirota/Pence view that government intervention was unnecessary" (Pence, referring to right-wing Rep. Mike Pence). When I read this, I was stunned - did I ever say I thought government intervention was unnecessary?
I went back through all my columns and blog posts on the bailout and found that actually, no, I never said government intervention was unnecessary. I didn't even say anything close to that, nor did any leading progressives I know. I said the bailout - as constructed - was a sham designed to rip off taxpayers, but that government intervention on much different terms was necessary and desirable.
The week before last, I traveled to Las Vegas for the annual Progressive States Network/EARN conference for state legislators. It was a great event - lots of terrific legislators are planning to do a lot of really progressive things in the upcoming legislative sessions. But as I say in my new newspaper column this week, I left struck by the city of Las Vegas itself - and specifically struck by how it is such a perfect symbol for the predicament our country now faces.
Note: It's Sunday, and so because we're off the usual mid-week news cycle, I thought it might be a decent time to air out a little meta content about our community here at OpenLeft. If you don't care about being part of the community, or about meta content, then feel free to skip this diary. Remember, nobody is forcing you to read it. Additionally, to those who may complain about a commenter's comments being discussed in this diary, I say to you only that this is a community, and when you publicly comment in the community, you should expect that your comments will be taken seriously, and potentially be used in future discussions, such as a diary like this. This is, after all, a community - and that means nobody should be immune from having their statements taken seriously. - D
Commenter cupcake gives us a healthy dose of examples of what Chris was recently referring to when he said that productive commenters are those interested in "participating in our community" and those who deserve banishment are those who are interested in "just ridiculing it."
If you're a procrastinator like me, then you are frantically scurrying at the last minute to pick up holiday gifts for friends and family. So let me suggest four great gifts for you or any progressives you know - gifts that make great presents and that also help build and support the progressive movement. Here they are in no particular order:
