The pressure is growing on the Justice Department to produce supposedly "deleted" e-mails that could reveal whether government lawyers during the Bush administration were instructed to devise legal justifications for torture.
One of the few Republican ideas brought up at Thursday's Health Care Reform summit that seemed to be really popular with both parties was suggested by Senator Tom Coburn. The idea basically is to have people go and visit doctors, and try to get them to break Medicare rules. I presume that if they created such a program for Medicare they would try to see to it that it was applied to Medicaid as well. It has been compared to the practice that many fast food restaurants and retail clothing stores have been employing for a while now, commonly known as "Mystery Shopping". This is a horrible idea for several reasons, and the comparison to the Mystery Shopper, is frankly weak and ultimately inaccurate. More importantly I have a suggestion that contains none of the yuck factor of Under Cover Patients, and could potentially play a significant role in changing the way that doctors and patients relate to one another.
Among the many striking aspects of the Justice Department's recently-released ethics report on the creation of the "torture memos" are the repeated indications that John Yoo, the memos' principal author, was in frequent direct contact with the White House and under intense pressure to quickly approve abusive interrogation techniques that policymakers had already chosen to implement but knew might amount to torture.
Human Rights activists from more than 25 countries gathered in Washington last week for a meeting designed to mobilize greater support for those struggling to advance respect for basic freedoms in fragile new democracies and repressive authoritarian states. They had a packed agenda, including a meeting with President Obama and senior National Security Council staff at the White House.
Nuclear power, biofuels, clean coal: These are the Obama administration's answers to climate change. The 2011 budget, released this week, promised new loans for the construction of nuclear power plants, and on Wednesday the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), White House, and other departments detailed steps to encourage ethanol and clean coal production.
These initiatives may garner support from conservatives, but their ascendancy comes at a price. Support for renewable fuel sources, like wind and solar, has dwindled. President Barack Obama did encourage Senate Democrats to pass a climate change bill, but some moderates are bucking the cap-and-trade provisions that could tamp down carbon emissions. Those moderates are pushing for legislation that leaves carbon caps out entirely.
It hasn't been a good week for climate advocates. On top of the Obama administration's overtures to crusty, old energy industries, Rajendra Pachauri, the chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), has had to fend off pressure to resign. The IPCC published a report with a badly sourced fact about the rate at which Himalayan glaciers are melting, and when scientists pointed out the error, Pachauri would not cop to the mistake. (If you missed the beginning of this to-do, Mother Jones' Kate Sheppard covered the controversy back in January.)
Given this country's weak efforts to tamp down carbon emissions, though, perhaps the IPCC's prediction that those glaciers likely will disappeared by 2035 will turn out to be accurate.
New nuclear plants-but at what cost?
Obama's budget, as Sheppard reports at Mother Jones, is upping funding for nuclear plant development, even though previous nuclear projects have run wildly over budget. The president has always supported increased nuclear production. As an Illinois Senator, Obama had Exelon Corporation, the country's largest nuclear operator, in his constituency. The company continued to support him as a presidential candidate. The proposed funding runs in the neighborhood of $54.5 billion in loan guarantees for nuclear projects. That's good news for an industry that's in need of cash. As Sheppard explains, without governmental backing, these plants would have little chance of being built.
"Even as public opinion toward nuclear power has warmed, projected construction costs for new plants have soared, with a single reactor now estimated to cost as much as $12 billion," she writes. "In fact, the outlook for nuclear plants looks so dire that even Wall Street banks have balked at financing them unless the government underwrites the deal."
The Obama administration is also backing research into nuclear waste disposal, a prerequisite for nuclear expansion. No matter how "green" nuclear energy production might be, so far there's no safe, sustainable way to deal with its by-products. Finding a long-term solution for nuclear waste disposal will not come cheaply.
Biofuels move us backwards
The administration's support for biofuels was bigger slap in the face to environmentalists, though. Just a few years ago, ethanol made from corn or switchgrass ranked high on the list of renewable fuels that could spring America from its Middle East oil addiction. In practice, however, biofuels have proven more environmentally destructive and less efficient than advocates had hoped. With farmers in the Midwest knee-deep in corn marked for ethanol production, though, backing away from biofuels is politically dicey.
The consequences are more than political, however. At Grist, Tom Philpott argues that support for biofuels will ultimately drive global carbon emission up, rather than down.
"As ethanol factories continue sucking in more and more corn, plantation owners in places like Brazil and Argentina will put more grassland and even rainforest under the plow to make up for the shortfall, resulting in huge carbon emissions," Philpott writes. "That dire effect of our ethanol program, known as indirect land-use change, likely nullifies any scant climate benefits from ethanol."
It's not just corn and switchgrass that pose a problem, either. As Gina Marie Cheeseman reports at Care2, algae farms, another potential source of biofuel, face their own challenges. Algae demands high energy input and could release more carbon dioxide emissions that it would save, according to a new report from the University of Virginia.
There's more research to be done before writing algae energy production off, however. In January, the Department of Energy said it would sink $44 million into work on algae pools. Industry players like ExxonMobile are also underwriting research on the subject, Cheeseman writes.
No room for innovation
Moving towards energy sources like nuclear power and ethanol does take the country a step closer to responsible energy production. But right now, the Obama administration is not leaving room for new or ambitious ideas that could do more. Wind and solar, which would form the best foundation for a sustainable energy future, have few advocates in Congress. They also seem to have no role in the near-term energy plan.
Ethanol was the Midwest's first green industry, for instance, but there are other possibilities for juicing up the region's clean energy production. In The Nation, Lisa Margonelli lays out the case for "gray power," which is recycled energy produced by the old, dirty smokestacks that ring cities like Cleveland.
In this vision, twentieth century industry can produce twenty-first century energy. Waste energy, Margonelli argues, "can be profitably "recycled" onto the grid to create power as clean as that from solar and wind but far cheaper."
"In fact, energy now lost as steam and gases by the region's manufacturing plants, as well as municipal and agricultural waste, could create as much energy as sixty-nine nuclear power plants, according to figures commissioned by the Environmental Protection Agency," she says. "This power could strengthen the region's electrical grid and preserve jobs by making local manufacturing plants more economically stable, while making the region a leader in greener technology."
A project like Margonelli imagines, however, would require significant commitment and vision from the federal government, both of which are lacking right now.
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Do you know one? Perchance your mother, father, brother, or sister is a person you would characterize as lovingly protective. He or she maybe an individual who works to shield loved ones from harm. This fine fellow or femme plots and plans in an attempt to prevent any crisis. People come to depend on caring souls such as he or she. Indeed, you may be the cautious crier who actively expresses concern for the health and welfare of those you treasure. It is a tough task, but you, or someone in your life may have assumed responsibility for the well-being of another. Surely, someone must keep us safe and sane. One never knows who might lurk or linger in the halls, bathroom stalls, on a plane, boat or train. Credentials must be checked. If family and friends cannot safeguard us from the crazies and fanatics certainly, our sweet Uncle Sam will.
It's the jumpy season for health care reform, this end game with a thousand twists and turns. Rumors fly around, meetings happen where things said get misinterpreted. Senators get nervous, groups get nervous, and your friendly neighborhood blogger and consultant gets called sometimes.
All of this is natural to an intense legislative battle, and (some of the time) it's healthy too, because trial balloons get popped or false rumors get discredited. So here's my story: a worried Senator, and a couple of groups working on the health care battle, called me last night to tell me they were extremely nervous that the White House was on the verge cutting a deal with Olmpia Snowe on her trigger-that's-not-a-trigger amendment. That rumor got combined with a story about the White House discouraging a floor fight over the public option, and suddenly a lot of folks were very upset, especially because things were moving fast in the Finance committee.
I wrote a story about what I was hearing this morning, and by the end of the day, it now looks like my sources and I jumped the gun. The White House has denied, on the record to Sam Stein at Huffington Post, they are pressuring anyone on the trigger proposal, and I have been privately been told by very senior White House staffers that my report was wrong.
I am glad to hear that, because this trigger amendment is awful, written on purpose to avoid ever being triggered. But having things like this happen is a very good thing, because it provides some clarity as to what is happening in this debate. I don't think my sources were wrong to be nervous, there is a whole lot of deal cutting going on, and I am glad that the White House responded so clearly and firmly that they are not interested in pressuring anyone to support this rotten trigger idea. We still have a long way to go in this fight, and we don't know what will happen in the end game.
But for the moment, I've never been so pleased to have gotten it wrong.
Rahm Emanuel, the White House chief of staff, said the heated opposition was evidence that Republicans had made a political calculation to draw a line against any health care changes, the latest in a string of major administration proposals that Republicans have opposed.
“The Republican leadership,” Mr. Emanuel said, “has made a strategic decision that defeating President Obama’s health care proposal is more important for their political goals than solving the health insurance problems that Americans face every day.”
The White House on Wednesday pushed back against reports suggesting that President Barack Obama is ready to concede that he can’t get Republican votes for health care overhaul legislation, asserting that the administration still believes a bipartisan bill is possible.
“We continue to be hopeful that we’ll get bipartisan support, and we’ll continue to work with those that are interested in doing that,” White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said. “The president has said countless times he will work with anybody in any party who wants to work constructively on health care reform.”
Gibbs directly rejected the contention in an article in Wednesday’s New York Times that said administration officials are “increasingly convinced” they will have to focus their effort solely on uniting fractious Democrats.
A contention based on...White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel's on-the-record quote.
One could parse, and say Rahm's quote could still include the possibility of bipartisanship, but still: there's something called message discipline. The last four days have seen: statement, backtrack, statement, backtrack.
Barack Obama put together the outlines of a really solid health insurance reform plan in his 2008 campaign, and sent a similar package of ideas to Congress earlier this year. While not everything I would have wanted, I have strongly supported him in getting those basic ideas passed, as have three House committees and one Senate committee, and the overwhelming number of Democratic activists and voters. He has said he would remain flexible about specifics, but that to him, health care reform needed to achieve certain goals, including dramatically expanded coverage of the uninsured, serious cost containment, and providing enough choice and competition to keep health insurers honest. I agree 100%.
My question now is why are certain anonymous White House officials trying to undermine the President? I ask this question in all seriousness, because this is exactly what happened in the Clinton fight for health care reform. We would do these terrific, thoughtful, complex policy meetings where we go over various options on the health care bill but make no firm decisions. The next day in the New York Times or The Washington Post, some particularly controversial aspect of the bill would be headlined as in "High-ranking administration officials say Clinton is considering X." It was without question one of the things that eventually killed health care reform.
What I discovered when I worked in the White House was that there were plenty of people who work in that building whose primary loyalty is not to the President but to themselves. They leak things to reporters to cultivate them and make sure they write puff job articles about them. They help certain lobbyists because they might want a job in their firm someday. They empower certain powerful Senators or members of Congress because they are personally close to them, and/or because they might want to get paid big money to lobby them someday soon. Maybe they want to run for office themselves one day, and so they cultivate certain donors.
So while it is possible that all the back-tracking on the President's bill from anonymous staffers is all a carefully laid-out strategy, since it's a strategy that is really not working, I think it is also quite possible it is just classic disloyalty from self-interested staffers. In part I say this because what kind of brain-dead strategy would it be for an anonymous staffer to say on the front page of The Washington Post "I don't understand why the left of the left has decided this (the public option, a core part of Obama's health care plan) is their Waterloo." I mean, why would you undermine and attack the people who are actually fighting for the President's plan? Talk about a dumb strategic move. And the Obama people are smart, so I have to assume that his is just pure disloyalty, perhaps someone trying to suck up to Max Baucus, for example.
I am going to keep fighting for the President's plan and goals. I will not give in until the fight is done. I just hope all the anonymous White House staffers will keep fighting with me.
From the makers of FightTheSmears.com comes this today over email from David Axelrod:
Given a lot of the outrageous claims floating around, it’s time to make sure everyone knows the facts about the security and stability you get with health insurance reform.
That’s why we’ve launched a new online resource — WhiteHouse.gov/RealityCheck — to help you separate fact from fiction and share the truth about health insurance reform. Here's a few of the reality check videos you can find on the site:
There's more information and a number of online tools you can use to spread the truth among your family, friends and other social networks. Take a look:
The immigration discussion is sometimes reduced to symbols or a war of "sides," be it on blogs, comment threads, or conference calls between legislators, media outlets, and activists. But it's important to remember what this fight is about: People. In last week's Wire, we covered the White House's June 25th meeting with lawmakers, during which an intention to address immigration reform was formally announced. The meeting yielded much celebration and discussion by advocacy groups and activists alike, but waiting for reform does not change the situation on the ground. This week, we look at everyday situations-from students who are deported upon graduation to the growing number of hate crimes-that make a clear argument for reform now, not later.
The fight for 2012 is here. Beltway media insiders rejoice!
Who's it going to be? Spunky Sarah? Moneyed Mitt? Holy Huckabee? Some dark-horse candidate flying under the radar? One thing is for sure: While the media clamors for every tiny detail in the looming battle for the Republican presidential nomination, the real fight for 2012 is taking place right before their very eyes.
With the last debate over, an Obama lead strongly established, and GOTV being the biggest thing left for the campaign to do, the Players- inside the campaign and out- are beginning to maneuver in earnest for power in an Obama administration. Hell, this kind of maneuvering was happening in the Gore campaign, who was down in the polls, and the Kerry campaign, who was essentially tied, so you know it's happening in Obamaland. It's just in the nature of politics, and while the distance between pre-election and post-election is in many ways a million miles apart, chronologically it's only 2.5 weeks, so while an old campaign guy like me cringes at this kind of thing going on before the election is done, I understand it at some level.
Last December, the White House simply refused to open an e-mail from the Environmental Protection Agency because it contained the unwelcome conclusion that greenhouse gas emissions pose a threat to public health and therefore need to be regulated. The EPA finding was a response "to a 2007 Supreme Court ruling that required it to determine whether greenhouse gases represent a danger to health or the environment," the New York Times reported last Wednesday.
Faced with the proverbial inconvenient truth, the White House not only refused to open the e-mail, they ordered Jason Burnett, the EPA official who sent the document, to "recall it," according to the Washington Post.
Burnett, who has, not coincidentally, since resigned, told the Post:
"In early December, I sent an e-mail with the formal finding that action must be taken to address the risk of climate change...The White House made it clear they did not want to address the ramifications of that finding and have decided to leave the challenge to the next administration. Some [at the White House] thought that EPA had mistakenly concluded that climate change endangers the public. It was no mistake."
I'd accuse the administration of foot-dragging, but that implies some kind of forward movement, however glacial (now, there's a word that's headed for extinction, thanks to climate change.) The dinosaurs who've been dictating our energy policy in this country are as encased in asphalt as the fossils at the La Brea Tarpits, and just as unlikely to budge.
Jon Stewart highlighted this new low point from the Petro-Pusher-In-Chief on the Daily Show last Wednesday with a segment called "Be Patient - This Gets Amazing":
Jason Rosenbaum has an interesting take on the Obama accountability question we've been discussing here the last couple of days. He argues that we should do all we can to elect Obama, but then be ready to take him on aggressively as soon as he is elected. I think Jason's position is well argued, but I thought I would throw out a somewhat different perspective, based in part on my experience in the Clinton campaign, transition, and White House. It's not that I disagree with Jason, but just wanted to add more to the discussion.
I want two things out of an Obama Presidency:
-That it produces big progressive changes
-That it is a success
I think those two things are pretty closely linked, because our country's problems right now are huge enough that we need big, bold progressive things to happen to really change them. I also think that voters are in a bad enough mood that if Obama and the Democrats in Congress don't deliver big and important things that actually help in people's daily lives, they will get kicked out of office at the first available opportunity.
Now you may be asking: who do I care so much about whether Obama is successful or not? Lots of reasons, many of which might be obvious. Democrats are far more likely to keep Congress if he is; if he has 8 years rather than 4, he's a lot more likely to get some good things done; I would deeply hate for the first black President to be bad at the job, it would make electing another one that much tougher.
So given that I want Obama to succeed, does that give me pause about Jason's plan to be tough on Obama starting the day after he's elected? Well, not really, but I do think the progressive movement needs to have a sophisticated, multi-level strategy. I think progressives should, and very likely will, break into 3 types of players during an Obama administration.
1. Going on the inside. I hope that the Obama team can be convinced to place as many genuine progressives in government jobs as possible.
2. Friendly outsiders who are pushing them toward progressivism. These are the progressive organization people, bloggers, donors, and other activists who stay on the outside, and are generally friendly to, and supportive of the Obama team, who still gently push them to pick the progressive path as much as possible.
3. Outsiders who bang away. Those organization people, bloggers, donors, and other activists who decide their best role is to aggressively bang away, who work day in and day out to hold Obama accountable.
I believe we are best served when we have lots of people in all 3 of these categories. A movement does not succeed without having all 3 kinds of people in place, each playing their part. The progressive things that did happen during the Clinton years came as a direct result of each of these 3 kinds of people playing a big role.
The key is that the folks in all these categories need to forge a constructive working relationship with each other. There will definitely be tensions between the three at times, but if they can respect each other in their different roles, good things will happen.
The lesson of history is that big progressive change has come when a President open to change and a movement driving it worked together. That happened in the 1860s, the early 1900s, the 1930s, and the 1960s. But in each of those cases, the eventually progressive President ran a cautious, centrist campaign, was very nervous about making the big changes needed, and had to be pushed into doing the right thing by a combination of progressive insiders and outsiders. I hope that a decade from now, we'll be able to say that the Obama administration, helped by an effective, aggressive progressive movement, was able to deliver major progressive change for the American people.
The single man most responsible for the fiscal wreckage that is our budget, other than Bush himself, is up to his old tricks. I'm talking about Max Baucus.
A little bit about the 2001 tax fight before I get to the main point. In the heat of the fight over the massively irresponsible Bush tax cut, Tom Daschle in a much under-reported and under-appreciated speech to the Senate Democratic caucus told his colleagues that the only way to have power with Bush in the White House and Republicans controlling the House and Senate was to hang together and have each others backs. If we stay together, Daschle said, Bush will be forced to come to the table on this and every other bill.
Baucus, ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, promptly went out and cut a deal with the Bush White House, giving them virtually everything they wanted. It ended any chance the Democrats had to stop Bush on his most important single policy, and set a pattern for a lack of Democratic solidarity against Bush that continues to this day.
Now Baucus is screwing his fellow Democrats again. The Hill has a new article by Alexander Bolton describing how Baucus is helping Gordon Smith, using Smith's language and giving Smith lots of credit on an Iranian sanctions bill. Smith is one of the most vulnerable Republicans in the Senate, and Baucus is delightedly helping him out on a highly questionable bill. That is just pathetic.
Baucus has never been a progressive, spending way too much time sucking up to big corporate interests, as David Sirota has documented many times. But, jeez, Max, at least don't screw over your fellow Democrats politically - again.
