Category Archives: History

The Bipartisanship Racket – NYTimes.com

A couple of excerpts from Frank Rich’s Sunday New York Times Column…

Dead-on accurate, as usual…

The notion that civility and nominal bipartisanship would accomplish any of the heavy lifting required to rebuild America is childish magical thinking, and, worse, a mindless distraction from the real work before the nation. Sure, it would be swell if rhetorical peace broke out in Washington — or on cable news networks — but given that American politics have been rancorous since Boston’s original Tea Party, wishing will not make it so. Bipartisanship is equally extinct — as made all too evident this month by the pathetic fate of the much-hyped Simpson-Bowles deficit commission. Less than a week after the panel released its recommendations, the Democratic president and the Republican Congressional leadership both signed off on a tax-cut package that made a mockery of all its proposals by adding another $858 billion to the deficit. Even the Iraq Study Group — Washington’s last stab at delegating tough choices to a blue-ribbon bipartisan commission — enjoyed a slightly longer shelf life before its recommendations were unceremoniously dumped into the garbage.

AND

WHAT America needs is not another political organization with a toothless agenda and less-than-transparent finances. The country will not rest easy until there are brave leaders in both parties willing to reform the system that let perpetrators of the Great Recession escape while the rest of us got stuck with the wreckage. As Jesse Eisinger of the investigative journalistic organization ProPublica summed up in The Times this month: “Nobody from Lehman, Merrill Lynch or Citigroup has been charged criminally with anything. No top executives at Bear Stearns have been indicted. All former American International Group executives are running free.” For No Labels to battle this status quo would require actual political courage — true bipartisan courage, in fact.

Link to full Article:   The Bipartisanship Racket – NYTimes.com.

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Daily Kos: Kay Hagan betrays key constituency

I was afraid of this….

I supported Kay Hagan and contributed to her campaign.  It doesn’t look like I’ll be doing so again next time.  I will probably vote for her, but that’s it.

These Democrats need to learn they are not Republican-Lites and that is not why we vote for them…

Republicans excel in driving excitement in their Base. Democrats seem to live to disappoint and beat down their Base in order to look more Republican.

Fools….

From DailyKos:

Sen. Kay Hagan is already running for reelection in North Carolina for what she clearly sees as a tough hold in 2016. She will be a freshman senator running for reelection for the first time — the most vulnerable point for any elected official. If the economy and political climate haven’t improved by then — and there’s no guarantee that they will — Hagan’s road to reelection will be a tough slog. And she won’t have Obama’s coattails among African Americans to pad her numbers.

Without that black vote, she’s got a much more difficult path to reelection. She lost the white male vote 67-32, and didn’t fare much better with white women, 62-38. Given that the white vote was 72 percent of the total, and that she lost it 64-35 (with a significant chunk of that 35 percent being young voters), it doesn’t take a math whiz to figure out who delivered the knockout blow. It was brown voters.

Per the exit polls, African Americans were 23 percent of the vote, and Hagan won them 95-5. The four percent who were Latino and Asian were too small for statistically valid data, so their results are not included, but their pro-hagan margins were similar.

Four percent of the 4.1 million votes cast in the race is 165,000 votes. Hagan’s margin of victory in 2008 was about 360,000. So sure, Hagan could’ve won without that vote, but there are more Latinos in North Carolina now than four years ago — growth that will be a big factor in North Carolina gaining a House seat during reapportionment. And Hagan won’t have the benefit of running against absentee celebrity senator Elizabeth Dole again, in the best pro-Democratic climate since forever.

When your winning coalition includes ethnic and racial minorities and young voters, and you face the voters in a non-presidential year that would bring out those low-performing groups, you have two approaches you can take — you can try to win more of that white vote, even though no Democrat has managed to pull it off in a southern state, or you can tap into the growth demographics and make sure they stay highly motivated and engaged.

North Carolina’s rapidly growing Latino population will be a big factor in the state’s expected gain of an extra House seat during reapportionment. They, along with a growing Asian community, could potentially be a key component of her reelection coalition.

via Daily Kos: Kay Hagan betrays key constituency.

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Elizabeth Edwards: The link between who we are and who we could be | National | Independent Weekly

Great tribute from the Independent Weekly:

The day after she died, someone posted a newspaper article about Elizabeth Edwards on a progressive political blog and added this one-sentence introduction: “When all is said and done, she was one of us.”

Whatever “us” he had in mind, it seemed a perfect epitaph.

Was he thinking that she was a passionate advocate—and blogger—for social and economic justice? She was.

Was he thinking she was authentically, even brilliantly representative of the generation of Americans born after World War II? She was that, too.

Or he may have been thinking that the indomitable spirit with which she endured tragedy and continued to seek purpose in her life made her human in the fullest sense of the word. Because she was, millions of Americans—especially, but not exclusively, women—loved Elizabeth Edwards and mourned her passing last week.

It’s easy to see that Elizabeth and her husband, John Edwards, reached for the political heavens, and they came to grief. The Greeks would understand. But if this was hubris, surely it was more the gods’ fault than hers, or even his. After the death of their son, in a nation and world yearning for uplift, was it arrogant to think they were called to serve their country? Say instead that it was audacious and that Elizabeth’s efforts were, as the Edwards’ longtime friend Glenn Bergenfield said at her memorial service, never fueled by ego but rather by duty—and a sense that it was time someone of her generation tried for greatness.

 

MORE:   Elizabeth Edwards: The link between who we are and who we could be | National | Independent Weekly.

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Hoyer: Senate Has Votes Needed To Repeal DADT

I’m hopeful, but will believe it when I see it…

Lieberman and Collins are not exactly the most trustworthy folks in the Senate…

Still, this should happen.  The polls show almost 80% of American’s support repeal.  But that never matters to Republicans…

The Senate has enough votes to pass a standalone repeal of the military’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy, Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) has been told by Senate counterparts, he said in an interview with HuffPost Wednesday evening after the House approved its own version of the bill.

Hoyer said that he’s been working closely with Sens. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine), the leading reform advocates in the Senate, and that he suggested last week to Lieberman that the House move first.

“Senator Lieberman and Senator Collins determined that they would introduce a bill,” said Hoyer. “I called and talked to a number of people. I then called Senator Lieberman and said ‘Joe, my intent will be to talk to Congressman Murphy’ — who’s the sponsor of the amendment that was adopted in the defense bill — ‘and put this in as a free standing bill, because we can probably send it over to you more quickly than you can send to us.’ And he agreed and we introduced exactly the same bill that they have in the Senate.”

via Hoyer: Senate Has Votes Needed To Repeal DADT.

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Gay Bashing at the Smithsonian – NYTimes.com

Frank Rich is really on this morning in his weekly New York Times column.

Here’s an excerpt.  I encourage you to click the link and read the full column.

It still seems an unwritten rule in establishment Washington that homophobia is at most a misdemeanor. By this code, the Smithsonian’s surrender is no big deal; let the art world do its little protests. This attitude explains why the ever more absurd excuses concocted by John McCain for almost single-handedly thwarting the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” are rarely called out for what they are — “bigotry disguised as prudence,” in the apt phrase of Slate’s military affairs columnist, Fred Kaplan. Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council has been granted serious and sometimes unchallenged credence as a moral arbiter not just by Rupert Murdoch’s outlets but by CNN, MSNBC and The Post’s “On Faith” Web site even as he cites junk science to declare that “homosexuality poses a risk to children” and that being gay leads to being a child molester.

It’s partly to counteract the hate speech of persistent bullies like Donohue and Perkins that the Seattle-based author and activist Dan Savage created his “It Gets Better” campaign in which gay adults (and some non-gay leaders, including President Obama) make videos urging at-risk teens to realize that they are not alone. But even this humanitarian effort is controversial and suspect in some Beltway quarters: G.O.P. politicians and conservative pundits have yet to participate even though most of the recent and well-publicized suicides by gay teens have occurred in Republican Congressional districts, including those of party leaders like Michele Bachmann, Mike Pence and Kevin McCarthy.

Has it gotten better since AIDS decimated a generation of gay men? In San Francisco, certainly. But when America’s signature cultural institution can be so easily bullied by bigots, it’s another indicator that the angels Keith Haring saw on his death bed have not landed in Washington just yet.

More:   Gay Bashing at the Smithsonian – NYTimes.com.

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Elizabeth Edwards ‘A Lighthouse to All of Us,’ Says Daughter Cate at Funeral

Sounds like a fine farewell to a great lady….

RALEIGH, N.C. – Elizabeth Edwards was remembered as a loving mother and loyal friend in a memorial service that acknowledged the turmoil she confronted with “grace and strength,” in the words of her daughter, Cate Edwards. Politicians with headline names joined the public in saying goodbye Saturday at Edenton Street United Methodist Church in this city she called home years before she became a national figure and symbol.

On Tuesday, Elizabeth Edwards, 61, died of cancer. On a gray, rainy Saturday, lifelong friends and family gathered to mourn and remember Edwards’ intelligence, sense of humor and uncompromising attitude. Following her mother’s draped casket into the church, Cate, 28, held hands in a line with her 10-year-old brother, Jack, their father, John Edwards, and sister, Emma Claire, 12.

In her tribute, Cate called her mother “feisty and smart as a whip.” She never held that against people, said Cate, “unless she was right and they were wrong.” She said her mother was a “consistent source of wisdom,” about everything from wearing solid colors to never marrying the first boy you date. (“You would never buy the first pair of shoes you try on.”)

“She’s been a lighthouse to all of us, a point of guidance when we all feel lost,” Cate said of her mother. “Even in her last days, she was comforting us.” She quoted from the letter to her children Elizabeth Edwards had long been working on: “All I ever really needed was you,” it said, “your love, your presence, to make my life complete.”

via Elizabeth Edwards ‘A Lighthouse to All of Us,’ Says Daughter Cate at Funeral.

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War On Christmas Spreads To Lincoln Tunnel : NPR

Interesting article from NPR….

This “War on Christmas” crap normally just makes me tired.

I’m of the “live and let live and go to whoever’s party is best today” school of thinking…Just stay in the moment, enjoy the season and don’t think about any of it too much..

And people really should know by now, it’s a waste of time and energy to argue about religion…

Holidays are time for traditions, and one of the biggest American traditions this time of year is arguing about religion.

Some years, a community is torn over a manger on the lawn in front of city hall or a missing menorah.

This year, the season’s biggest religious controversy is in an unlikely place: the Lincoln Tunnel connecting New Jersey and New York.

For the last three weeks, New Jersey commuters entering the tunnel have had to sit in traffic and contemplate the sight of a billboard with a picture of a nativity scene, a star and three wise men. Its message: “You know it’s a myth,” courtesy of a group called American Atheists.

Drivers can mull over this challenge for the few minutes of purgatory it takes to cross under the Hudson River. Once they make it through the tunnel into New York, however, they’ll encounter another billboard, this one from the Catholic League.

It’s the same nativity scene, but this time with a retort: “You know it’s real.”

More:   War On Christmas Spreads To Lincoln Tunnel : NPR.

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The secret life of Julian Assange – CNN.com

A little more info about the Man behind WikiLeaks..

He grew up constantly on the move, the son of parents who were in the theater business in Australia.

Now, Julian Assange, 39, on the move for months, was arrested Tuesday in Great Britain in relation to a sex crimes investigation spearheaded by Swedish authorities.

“It sounds like good news to me,” U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said to reporters who asked him about the arrest.

Since this summer when his Web site WikiLeaks began releasing reams of classified U.S. intelligence, Assange has stoked the ire of top officials like Gates. Politicians and power-players the world over have called for his arrest for exposing sensitive documents. Supporters contend Assange represents free speech at its finest. They say he is a man and an organization committed to outing injustices.

Yet despite unrelenting global media attention, Assange has remained an enigmatic figure. Perhaps that’s because he learned as a child to cope with living a solitary life.

More:   The secret life of Julian Assange – CNN.com.

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Where are the Republican Scientists? | Mother Jones

Short, very interesting article….

Roughly speaking, though, this doesn’t seem like such a hard question to me. The more time you spend practicing science, the more time you’re going to spend discovering that conservatives hold scientific views that you find preposterous. Sure, liberals have PETA and the odd vaccination fetishist, but really, it’s no contest. In the Democratic Party those are just fringe views. Even the anti-GM food folks don’t amount to much. The modern Republican Party, by contrast, panders endlessly to the scientific yahooism of its base. What would be amazing is if much more than 6% of the scientific community identified with the Republican Party.

via Where are the Republican Scientists? | Mother Jones.

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Is the Payroll Tax Holiday a GOP Trojan Horse? | Mother Jones

This article makes me feel a little better about this…

I’m really worried about the GOP trying to find any sneaky way they can to undermine Social Security…

 

Part of the Obama tax deal is a small, one-year cut in the Social Security tax rate, and a fair number of liberal commenters are afraid that this is nothing more than a Trojan Horse for Republicans. After all, won’t they just come back a year from now and start screaming that if the cut is allowed to expire it’s a tax increase? Just like they’re doing with the Bush tax cuts? And won’t Democrats cave? And won’t that ruin Social Security’s finances, leading to demands for benefit cuts?

It might. But I think this worry is overblown. Here’s why:

Republicans don’t care about middle class taxes. They care about taxes on the rich. I don’t doubt for a second that they’ll make some noise a year from now about how Democrats are increasing your taxes, but their hearts won’t be in it. They’ll fight to the death over taxes on millionaires, but when it comes to payroll taxes it will just be pro forma partisan kvetching. (And the payroll tax cut expires in a year and isn’t linked to anything else. So it won’t be a hostage to upper bracket cuts.)

This is explicitly a one-year cut. Republicans all assumed that the 2001 Bush tax cuts would be renewed at some point, but no one is assuming that here. And 12 months isn’t long enough for conservative talkers to muddy the water on this score.

The public strongly associates payroll taxes with future Social Security benefits. Demagoguing payroll taxes simply doesn’t work as well as it does with income taxes.

Beltway elites are really, really obsessed with Social Security solvency. For once this will work in our favor. Calls to allow the cuts to continue will be met with almost unanimous establishment condemnation.

December 2011 is far enough away from an election that Democrats can withstand the moderate heat Republicans will put on them over this.

Bottom line: a few Republicans here and there will try to work that old-time tax jihad magic, but it won’t find much purchase. The tax cuts will expire on time with only modest fuss.

POSTSCRIPT: Am I underestimating just how craven and spineless Democratic pols can be? That’s always a possibility! But I don’t think so. In this case, luckily, most of the political incentives line up in the right direction.

via Is the Payroll Tax Holiday a GOP Trojan Horse? | Mother Jones.

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