Our favorite irascible media tyrant is in the news once again, and once again it's time for me to bring you a story of doing one thing while wishing for another.
We have heard a lot about the...how can I put this politely...challenges Murdoch seems to face associating factual reality with his reality, and we could have lots of fun going through his factual misstatements-but instead, I want to take on one specific issue today:
Rupert Murdoch says he hates it when people steal his content from the Internet to draw readers to their sites...which is funny, if you think about it, because he has no problem at all stealing my content (and lots of yours, as well) for his sites.
SEATTLE (FNS)--Longtime activist Geov Parrish unexpectedly revealed to the crowd gathered to celebrate his 50th birthday Friday evening his impending plans to end his decades-long career as a public issues advocate in exchange for new opportunities in the field of corporate communications management and image development.
The announcement appeared to be even more shocking to the glitterati gathered for Parrish's 50th birthday extravaganza at Seattle's tony Rainier Club than the fact that the event was sponsored by longtime Parrish nemesis Frank Blethen, publisher of the "Seattle Times" and a frequent target of Parrish's acerbic criticism regarding the state of corporatocracy and its negative impact upon the state of the Nation.
A new commercial venture and three new business relationships were unveiled: a corporate communications consultancy, tentatively to be named "I Am The State!", is to be opened in the next few weeks, after suitable office space is located, with the United States Chamber of Commerce and The Seattle Times Company as the first two business associates; additionally, Parrish will be joining the Board of Directors of the Strangelove Foundation, an organization devoted to maintaining the purity and essence of our precious bodily fluids.
Of all the various ways that people complain about national media suckitude, there is no type of political media coverage that sucks more than election coverage.
I bet this could be proven as an objective fact. There is an entire cottage industry of useful, accurate election coverage that has sprouted online over the last few years entirely because national political media coverage of election analysis is so downright sucky. Large websites such as Real Clear Politics, Pollster, 538, Electoral-Vote, Daily Kos, MyDD and even Open Left would be a shadow of their current size if not for the abject incompetence in election horserace coverage provided by larger news outlets. And this isn't even to mention the "professional" electoral forecasts provided by CQ, Cook, Rothenberg and others.
What the larger news media primarily lacks compared to the online electoral analysis cottage is context and detail. That is, the broad range of polls and other electoral factors and rarely discussed by media outlets that pay for their own polls, and the drill-down detail on individual states and congressional campaigns.
A perfect case in point came yesterday, when the Gallup poll showed Republicans ahead by 4% in the national House ballot for 2010. This individual poll generated hundreds of news stories across the national media, almost all of them claiming that Republicans were now ahead in the race for the House in 2010. However, what this crappy media coverage failed to tell readers is that the Gallup poll was one of only 18 national house ballot polls produced over the last month, 13 of which still showed Democrats ahead.
Well, that was quick. Yesterday was the announcement that White House interim Communications Director Anita Dunn, who started this fight with FOX, would be leaving. Today is this:
President Obama will give an interview to Fox News' Major Garrett, Drudge reports.
The interview will take place in China next week and comes just one day after it was reported that Obama Communications Director Anita Dunn the so-called general in the administration's war against Fox News will be stepping down.
[...]
Fox News executive Michael Clemente met recently at the White House with Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, and since then the tensions between the two parties have cooled; senior adviser David Axelrod granted an interview to Garrett last week.
I don't have any place to speculate that Dunn was forced out or this is some gesture to FOX or whatever, but it certainly doesn't look good. And how exactly have tensions cooled? Like I wrote back when this first started, this is akin to spanking FOX, sending them to their room, and expecting things to change. They are, and always will be, either the research arm or the communications arm of the Republican Party (and those aren't even mine, those are Dunn's words, speaking for the White House!). They were before Obama came. They will be after Obama leaves. This is a long-term issue, which doesn't justify the White House's "FOX is being mean to us so we spanked them and they'll do better" mindset.
And by the way, what about the rest of us out here? FOX's hosts will continue to smear ACORN, Alan Grayson, Democrats in Congress, SEIU, and on and on and on. Even if the White House argues that FOX will play nice with them from now on, the rest of us still get thrown under the bus.
So I said it before, and I'll say it again. This was a job half-assed.
U.S. stocks were poised to open higher Wednesday, as Wall Street cheered a number of Republican election wins ahead of the Federal Reserve's latest policy meeting decision.
And later in the story:
But positive market momentum appeared as investors were encouraged by several Republicans victories, including the governor races in both New Jersey and Virginia.
More broadly, the wins reflect a sharp rebuke by Americans of current policies in Washington, including massive spending programs that have helped grow the federal deficit.
"The election results suggest that perhaps the referendum of the Democratic Party, more specifically President Obama, is being challenged in the marketplace," said Mark Luschini, chief investment strategist at Janney Montgomery Scott.
So the stock market, which has been going mostly up for 8 months (apparently cheering uh...something), is set to go up some more this morning. And this is proof that investors are happy about the races for Governor in NJ and Virginia. Nevermind that a lot of investors, like Warren Buffet, George Soros, etc. are Democrats, apparently it is just a given that:
1. Investors are Republicans
2. Happy political results for Republicans = market goes up
Of course the market has been going up and down for the last month. I guess that's because, on some days, Republicans are feeling happy and confident and on other days they are feeling sad.
Obviously this is just as ridiculous as the "markets hate Obama" meme from last February which mysteriously faded away when the markets began moving upward. Amazingly this story is not posted as an editorial but asa front page story on CNN Money.
Anyway, even if you accept the premise, what does that say about the markets? "We like it when Democrats lose because then the gap between the rich and poor widens and we can buy another chateau."
Stewart nails it such that I'll even transcribe it for you.
Interviewer: Do you think FOX News is biased?
Valerie Jarrett: Well of course they're biased, of course they are...
Excellent job. Right on message. But watch her retreat into her shell when asked...
Interviewer: Do you also think MSNBC is biased?
Jarrett: Well, you know what, this is, this is the thing, I don't want, actually, I don't want to just generalize all FOX is biased, or another station is biased...
Wow, that was a train wreck. Jon Stewart dissects:
Stewart: Just say of course MSNBC is biased, but they agree with us! So we're not fighting with them! And by the way, MSNBC wishes they were as good as FOX. They're the Toledo Mud Hens to the FOX's Yankees. MSNBC doesn't even realize their morning show is hosted by a conservative. Obama administration, do you even know your role in all of this?
Jarrett: What the administration has said very clearly is, we're going to speak truth to power...
Stewart: What the %!$@?! Truth to power! You're the White House! You're the power! Here's how it goes in the truth to power statement: it's your job to %!$@ up power, it's FOX's job to %!$@up truth!
One of the interesting elements of the battle with FOX- which I think the Administration is running half-assed, so far- is how people immediately get tripped up when asked about MSNBC. Some say yes, some say no, some say yes but not the same way FOX is. I've never seen anyone be able to answer that dreaded MSNBC follow-up. But this isn't rocket science.
Here's my advice to the Administration. First, sit down together and get yourselves a single set of talking points on this issue. Second, they should say the following: "Every cable news show invites on people with opinion. What makes FOX different is that every element of their show is biased opinion, from their anchors to their commentators to the stories they choose to cover. That's why they're not a news channel, they're an opinion channel that operates as an arm of the Republican Party, and that's why the White House is treating them we do any other biased opinion channel."
Media manipulation by the right-wing to influence public perception has been a decade-long tactic to undermine voter registration in America. While the current media frenzy surrounding the community organization ACORN is only partly related to voter registration efforts, it is important to note that the attacks have been built on a foundation of misinformation and media manipulation by the right-wing over several years, largely surrounding the myth of "voter fraud."
HAPPENING NOW -- Pelosi publicly whipping on robust public option
After Democratic sources told POLITICO that there are not the votes for a robust public option, party leaders have their rank-and-file behind closed doors in the Capitol basement and are going through every name to see where they stand on a Medicare plus-five public option, the so-called robust plan. It's a public whip, often used to shame the outliers into backing their preferred plan.
Kind of tough to still be whipping on a Medicare +5% public option when you have given up on that public option. Pretty awesome reporting there.
Quick Hits was buzzing last night with rumors that President Obama had supported the trigger in a meeting with Senate Democratic leaders. CNN:
In recent days, two administration officials have told CNN that the prevailing White House opinion is for the Senate health care bill to include a so-called "trigger" mechanism proposed by Snowe that would bring a public option in the future if thresholds for expanding coverage and lowering costs go unmet in coming years.
The source familiar with Thursday evening's meeting said Obama "pushed for a so-called trigger, because it's the more bipartisan way to go," due to Snowe's support for the concept. A critical White House goal in passing a health care bill is the ability to call it bipartisan, so Obama officials are wary of doing anything to alienate Snowe.
Then again, CNN's anonymous "administration officials" are countered by the anonymous "Democratic aide" in the New York Times:
Mr. Reid met with President Obama at the White House Thursday to inform him of his inclination to add the public option to the bill, but did not specifically ask the president to endorse that approach, a Democratic aide said. Mr. Obama asked questions, but did not express a preference at the meeting, a White House official said.
So, did President Obama push for the trigger, or did he not state a preference? It probably depends on what you are inclined to believe even before you heard these anonymous sources. If you thought the White House was pushing the trigger beforehand, you will probably read this as confirmation. If you thought it was largely staying neutral and leaving it up to Congress, you will probably read this as confirmation of that.
Personally, I am inclined to believe that the right-leaning source in the Obama administration and on Capitol Hill use these anonymous leaks try and make their positions look more popular with President Obama and the Democratic leadership than they really are. In this case, a trigger-happy administration official wants to make it look like Obama is on his side.
Anonymous Democratic sources are far more frequently used as bludgeons against progressives than not. For that reason, and because there is a conflicting source in this case, I am inclined not to believe that Obama was pushing triggers in the meeting.
But wait--the rumors didn't end there! Next up, Politico claimed this morning that Speaker Pelosi had concluded she did not have the votes for Medicare +5%, based entirely on anonymous source. And you know the source is doing this to spread the truth, rather than to attack progressives, given that the article only has one actual quote:
"Votes aren't there," a top official said. "The progressives are always more optimistic than reality."
Yep--not looking to attack progressives at all with this anonymous quote. The story was immediately contradicted by eponymous sources from Pelosi's office (more in the extended entry):
So the Villagers have circled their wagons around FOX in the name of respect, comity and High Broderism. Why their don't actually join in the fun and report on FOX's biased coverage, since it might ultimately help their own ratings, is beyond me, but that's what we get. Ruth Marcus published an absurd piece in the WaPo on Monday, which Eric Boehlert takes apart, and yesterday ABC's Jake Tapper called FOX a "sister organization" and attacked Robert Gibbs over the White House's position. Other talking heads have taken up the banner. The Village doesn't actually recognize its Idiots, and has become them.
It's all very heartwarming to see all the little media Villagers gather around their wealthy potential future employer, Fox News, and defend it from the big bad White House, but seriously, is there any real doubt that Fox News (not the gasbags ---but Fox News itself) is biased? (As Boehlert asks here --- has Ruth Marcus ever watched Fox News?) There are so many examples that it seems ridiculous to have to make the case, but evidently the villagers are so brainwashed they can't even see what's before their very eyes.
[...]
But just as it took nearly 25 years for the villagers to grok that even though he was invited to dinner parties by important people, Rush Limbaugh is actually a malignant blight on humanity, those who don't watch Fox News (and therefore agree with it) simply assume they must be ok because they hire lots of credentialed journalists and are invited to all the important social events. It would be downright unseemly if it turns out that right wing fascists are walking among them.
The whole thing reminds me of when Dana Milbank called HuffPo's Nico Pitney a "planted questioner" and a "dick", jealously upset that a new media outlet like HuffPo actually got a question in a live White House press conference. It's Villagers guarding their corridors of power, whether the people trying to come in is the HuffPo or the Obama administration.
I'm watching for the reaction of congressional Democrats, which I haven't seen much of. FOX gets elected Dems, former elected Dems, and Dem strategists on their network as their bread and butter, and a key to their legitimization and continued existence.
In something of a win, FOX was told that they should not "expect" Obama to appear on their network for the rest of the year. MoveOn launched a petition yesterday asking Democrats to follow his lead and stay off the network. It's a start towards "fringe-ifying" FOX by taking away those that gets it legitimization and viewership.
Last week, in the midst of the Obama Administration's smacking of all of us as "internet left fringe", they gave me some HopeTM when Anita Dunn decided to engage in something of a war against Fox. I wrote at the time:
Simultaneously, White House Communications Director Anita Dunn has engaged in something of a week-long war this past week against FOX News, on the record. Earlier she said FOX is "opinion journalism masquerading as news" to TIME Magazine, then followed up on CNN yesterday, saying FOX is "either the research arm or the communications arm of the Republican Party", then did an interview with the New York Times published today, saying "We're going to treat them the way we would treat an opponent... As they are undertaking a war against Barack Obama and the White House, we don't need to pretend that this is the way that legitimate news organizations behave."
Ms. Dunn [...] stressed that administration officials would still talk to Fox, and that Mr. Obama was likely to be interviewed on the network in the future. But, she added, "we're not going to legitimize them as a news organization."
Then, yesterday, Axelrod and Emanuel, appearing on the Sunday talk shows, confirmed they would allow WH officials to continue to appear on FOX.
The whole thing seems rather akin to spanking FOX and sending them to their room. As a strategic matter, is this effective? FOX's senior vice president for programming, as well as Roger Ailes, both have said they like it when the White House attacks them, in terms of how it helps their ratings and appeal among their demographic, which voted 88% for Bush in 2004. I actually believe them. On the other hand, there are other Americans who listen to the White House's comments and tune out FOX. It might be a little of both.
But what this comes across to me as akin to is not finishing what you started. Does the White House actually believe that if they send FOX to their room, FOX will ask fewer biased questions, Glenn Beck will talk about how the stimulus is working, etc.? And if my theory is right, and the White House's comments get Democrats and independents to stop watching FOX, and get hard-core Republicans to watch FOX even more... then, um, in terms of their audience, aren't they even more of what Dunn called an opponent, a research/communications arm of the Republican Party? And if that's the case, then why continue going on? Hell, why doesn't Obama start going to state Republican conventions? Same demographic, same biased questions, same communications arm of the Party. I have trouble finding the difference, with the exception that Obama might get booed. On the other hand, that might play into his team's brilliant strategy to not appear as a captive of the movement left or movement right.
Dunn said "we're not going to legitimize them as a news organization." What doesn't make sense about that statement and then today's news is that legitimizing is appearing on FOX. If I formed a liberal talk cable TV station from scratch today, my legitimacy would only go up if I got a White House official to appear for an interview on my program. Otherwise I would just be considered fringe.
Now, you can argue that FOX is already considered "mainstream". The objective, then, is to fringe-ify FOX, which is what Dunn was trying to do. Either Axelrod and Emanuel undercut her altogether, or this White House is doing a job half-assed.
Open Left has learned that political news website The Politico has a cozy relationship with controversial film director Roman Polanski. Polanski pled guilty to unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor in 1977 and is currently being held in Switzerland for extradition to the U.S.
Here's the connection to The Politico: the site's Executive Editor is Jim VandeHei who is a graduate of the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh where former XFL promoter Shane Schutz also matriculated. Shutz is friends with Jeff Dowd, real life inspiration for The Big Lebowski. Actor Steve Buscemi appeared in that film and also appeared in New York Stories with then little known Adrien Brody. Brody later starred in The Pianist directed by, you guessed it, Roman Polanski. To recap:
The Politico --> Jim VandeHei --> UW-Oshkosh --> Shane Shutz --> Jeff Dowd --> Big Lebowski --> Steve Buscemi --> Adrien Brody --> Roman Polanski
No word yet from the Politico about this sordid relationship. However, they would like you to know that some Polanski supporters contributed, last year, to the DNC and the Obama campaign.
I was on MSNBC this morning talking about the Obama administration's difficulties in passing their agenda. There were three other guests on for a five minute segment, so I only ended up getting in one line. That is very frustrating, because there is something I really wanted to day: being more civil won't solve any of our problems.
All three of the other guests, and the host, at least partly blamed increasing in our political discourse for the problems we face. Pardon my French, but that doesn't make any fucking sense.
Being more civil won't create a single job.
It won't prevent a single home from being foreclosed.
It won't give a single person health insurance.
It won't lower the cost of health care by one cent.
It won't take a single molecule of greenhouse gas out of the atmosphere.
It won't stop a single soldier or civilian from dying in Afghanistan or Iraq.
Incivility is not the source of our problems. However, thinking that our problems are caused by things like incivility is a major problem we face. If we keep suggesting fake, bullshit solutions to serious problems, then we will never get to the actual source of those serious problems and thus have no chance of solving them.
Even when Democrats are in charge, our government has becoming overwhelmingly responsive to corporate, moneyed interests. That is the problem. That is why real income for the bottom 90% of Americans hasn't increased in 30 years. That is why health care costs so much. That is why we are unable to address climate change. That is why we are funneling hundreds of billions of dollars to Wall Street even after they crashed the economy. Just becoming more civil won't change any of that. Thinking otherwise is akin to just sticking your fingers in your ears and singing "lalalalalalala."
What we need are Democratic leaders who are as willing to take on these corporate interests-and their lackeys in Congress--as they are willing to take on the lack of civility in our political discourse. We don't have that right now. The Democratic leadership in the White House and Congress are much more interested in coddling the conservative, corporate Democrats who are a barrier to even modest reforms. They help them avoid key votes, close off primary challenges, and even work to shut down progressive advertising campaigns that seek to hold them accountable. We should be holding these corporate Democrats accountable with every political means at our disposal instead of talking about being more civil. Until we do, don't expect any change from the status quo.
Gallup has some polling data that should provide a bit of optimism about the state of the country. Over the past decade, there has been a steady increase in the percentage of Americans reporting that they are paying "very close" attention to the news:
Even adjusting for the peaks around Presidential elections, that is clearly an upward trend. Just guessing, but some factors involved in this increase include:
New technologies and media that make it easier to follow the news
Political and economic turbulence
An aging population
It is also worth noting that Democrats actually pay less attention to the news than do Republicans:
Reasons for this gap are largely demographic. According to Gallup, there is a correlation between high income, older age and paying close attention to the news, which favors Republicans. Also, according to Gallup's data, men (42%) pay significantly closer attention to the news than women (30%), which also favor Republicans.
The Republican advantage shows that while there is an increase in civic engagement taking place in America, that engagement does not necessarily favor progressives. More people are paying attention to the news, but not necessarily the lower-income, largely younger people who have been most severely hurt by the economy of the past decade. No matter how successful Democrats have been in wooing and increasing turnout among young people, there is still a lot of work to be done.
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.
In the midst of ongoing legislative struggles over health care and climate change, today comes the first victory on a progressive feedback loop under the Obama administration: Net Neutrality.
At long last, the FCC will pass a rule requiring network neutrality--a provision that makes it illegal for internet service providers to block or slow individual websites based on their content, format, or ownership. To put it a different way, ATT&T, Comcast and Verizon can't block or slow access to your website just because they don't like you, what you publish online, or that you are not giving them a kickback to publish it:
FCC Will Get Passing Votes for Net Neutrality
The Federal Communications Commission's proposal of new rules to prevent companies such as AT&T, Verizon and Comcast from deliberately blocking or slowing certain Web traffic is expected to receive a passing three votes out of the five-member agency, according to sources.
The proposal, to be announced Monday by FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, will include an additional guideline for carriers that they make public the way they manage traffic on their network, according to sources at the agency. The additional guideline would be a "sixth principle" to four existing guidelines adopted in 2005 on Internet network operations. A fifth principle is expected to be announced by Genachowski on Monday during a speech at the Brookings Institute that would prohibit the discrimination of applications and services on telecommunications, cable and wireless Internet networks.
There had been some question about whether there were three votes in favor of Net Neutrality. The fifth and final commissioner, Mignon Clyburn, was appointed back in the spring. Her record on open media issues was thin and worrisome. Her father, Representative James Clyburn, had voted against Net Neutrality in 2006, and telecommunication companies were ecstatic about her appointment. Not a promising appointment, but victory on Net Neutrality at the FCC appears imminent nonetheless.
The FCC is expected to vote on the proposed rulemaking of so-called net neutrality regulations at its October meeting. That vote will set off a series of regulatory procedures, and a final rule is expected to be introduced in the spring.
In addition to the FCC ruling, it would be best to have Congress pass a law enshrining Net Neutrality as well. That way, there would be multiple roadblocks to undoing Net Neutrality, once administration change.
Net Neutrality doesn't garner the headlines of health care or climate change, and can often seem like a niche issue. However, giving everyone with access to the Internet equal ability to publish content online is a major victory for democracy. Total cultural output has increased exponentially since the rise of the Internet, as have the total number of people who can participate in that production. Without Net Neutrality, it was always possible for the corporations that provide Internet access to simply seize control of all content, dictating both what can be produced and who can produce it. That would have put an end to the biggest cultural explosion in all of human history, and would have also reversed the profoundly democratic trend of that cultural production.
This is also a victory for progressives and progressivism. Partly, that is made clear by the Republicans on the FCC opposing this rule, and the Democrats supporting it. Partly, this is because it reducing the power of corporations over our cultural production, and corporate power has almost invariably worked to push the country to the right. Partly, this is because progressives have an organizing edge online, at least for now. Mainly, it is a victory for progressives because Net Neutrality makes it a lot more difficult to impose values on other people. It is an important step toward a more pluralistic and user-generated culture.
The past decade, which allowed the Bush Administration, American corporations and the great financial giants to turn the country into a dispeptic ulcer, which was mostly Bush and some Obama administered, has left us in a slump. It has taken so much energy to try and turn things around that we wonder if we can summon up more just to keep going.
I have written several times of the media's fixation with the bill that comes out of the Senate Finance Committee on health care. It's finally starting to move now, creaking its way up the track like a half-dead carcass. Traditional media will act like whatever is in the Senate Finance bill will be the bill, that the deal is done. Not even close, folks.
Here's why the Senate Finance markup that will come out next week is nowhere close to what will be in the final legislation:
1. Finance chair Max Baucus has already messed up by not consulting with a half-dozen of the more progressive members of the committee. I am hearing numerous reports, some of which have surfaced publicly, that some of them are rebelling at the awful piece of mangled legislation being thrust in front of them. Given that Snowe is the only Republican that there is even a ghost of a chance of voting for the bill, Baucus has to get all or at least most of the Democrats on board, and I believe if the committee progressives work together, they can force some changes for the better.
2. The bill that makes it out of Finance will be so convoluted, contradictory, distorted, held-together-with-duct-tape because of all the compromises Baucus is making that Democrats will have to remake it in later stages even if they don't want to- and a great many of them want to.
3. Harry Reid still needs to marry the Finance bill and the HELP committee bill. Tom Harkin, who took over the chairmanship of the HELP Committee after Ted Kennedy passed away, is from what I hear bound and determined to make a major push to have the language of the HELP bill be a major part of the package that goes to the floor, including on the big issues like the public option and affordability for the middle class. He is being supported not only by the Democratic members of his committee but by outside progressive forces.
4. The floor fight will be wild and wooly, but I suspect that progressive forces may have an advantage in adding positive amendments to the mix in the light of day in a floor fight. The Republicans will offer all kinds of goofy amendments designed to mess up the bill, but they have two problems: they only have 40 votes, and the public polling on the GOP's actual health care proposals are very bad. Given that, Republican efforts to worsen the bill have little chance to succeed. Progressives, on the other hand, want to improve the bill by doing things that are actually popular: the public option (consistently polls in the 60s and 70s); taxing the wealthy instead of middle class workers with good insurance plans; making health insurance more affordable to the middle class. All of these are going to be pretty hard to vote against on the Senate floor.
5. Finally, to return to a theme I have been rather repetitive about in recent months, it is abundantly clear that House progressives, if they stay strong and stay together, have the negotiating power to block a bad bill. If they don't wilt, if they don't let themselves get picked off one by one, they can negotiate for a good health care bill, one that has a public option, one that is affordable for the middle class, one that forces insurers and providers to do real cost containment.
The traditional media will fall all over themselves to pronounce whatever Senate Finance does to be chiseled in stone. But progressives, if they work together and negotiate tough, can write a bill that will work, a bill on comprehensive health reform that we can all look back on as one of the greatest accomplishments of the era.
The FCC's broadband task force is tasked with developing our national broadband policy. This is a project that FCC Commissioner Michael Copps ranks of the highest importance:
"I'm enthused as I can be that this country is finally, finally going to develop a national broadband plan," Copps said Wednesday in an interview for C-SPAN's "The Communicators" series.(...)
"We're way behind in broadband," he said. "There is a need to do something now."
Copps said he is not underestimating the importance of the FCC's task: "It's the biggest thing that's come to the FCC since I've been there," he said.
And so, because our government is run by corporations and for corporations even when it is controlled by Democrats, a telecom industry shill, Scott Wallsten, was named as economics director of that task force. From a source close to the process, in the extended entry I proivde a thorough background on Wallstein's industry connections and long history of fighting against American consumers:
For those of us continuing to fight for the President's proposals on health care- including covering everyone at a price they can afford, strong regulations on insurers, tough cost containment measures, and a public option to keep insurers honest- it can get discouraging sometimes. I continue to be concerned by the number of progressive friends I have who have become convinced that we cannot win this fight, and are on the verge of giving up. I believe that we are very much in this fight, that there is a clear path to victory, and that it would be a tragedy for those of you who have been fighting for this moment for so long to give up now.
It is easy to get discouraged. The array of forces in outright opposition- insurance companies, somewhere between 98% and 100% of Republicans in Congress, the massive right-wing attack machines- is huge and very loud. Traditional media is so relentlessly negative and cynical that it frequently seems as if they have just joined the coalition mentioned in the previous sentence- I guess they prefer covering a train wreck to seeing something substantive done. And the conventional wisdom/establishment-oriented Democrats who are all too ready to give up the fight for really comprehensive reform and just take the easier path of not really taking on the powerful insurance industry are perhaps the most discouraging of all- they have probably done more to undermine enthusiasm for the President's goals than anyone.
But for those of us fighting this battle in the trenches every day, it is clear that there is a path to victory. It's far from a lock, it will require work and backbone by progressives, but the path is in front of us. And my sense is that more and more people are seeing it as a real possibility- David Sirota had a column today on it, Chris Bowers has been writing about it, Digby and many others as well. And progressive groups and the Congressional Progressive Caucus are doing meetings every day, continuing to work the strategy.
