Mark Sanford: The Rime of the Ancient Governor

It is an ancient Governor,
Who, at the wedding feast
Of Piper Palin, grips the arm
Of a Republican high priest.

The priest quick blanches, stark with fright;
His lips go ghastly pale.
"I fear thy skinny hand," quoth he.
"I hate thy gruesome tale."

Whereat the ancient Governor
Replies in steely tones:
"Listen you will to my tale, until
Its dread doth invade thy bones.

I was a Solon, great and good
(So should we all fain be!) --
But idly did I twin my ‘Self’
To John F. Kennedy.

O cursed` be that awe-full name!
I acquired his roving eye:
Whence women – whom my fancy struck --
O’er me might wail and sigh."

The priest crieth, "Stop! I’ll brook no more!
Thy tale is so oft-told,
That men crouched here do quake in fear
Of aping your sins so bold."

The ancient Governor grows now stern.
"The People have spoken loud.
They cherish not our Candidates:
You men of your ‘virtue’ proud."

The priest looks down – "Carry on," saith he --
For he kens the diamond truth:
Whispers of hypocrisy
Are plague in the voting booth.

And so the ancient Governor,
Resumeth his tale of woe,
As if to cauterize the wound
His Party doth vainly show.

"Emails! Innocent and pure!
With such my doom began:
Eftsoons their subject lines did turn
To Maria’s golden tan,

And to her wond’rous fleshly globes,
And to her celestial kiss,
And to her curves, and to her soul --
Thus born: my desperate bliss!

Short-lived my bliss, short-lived indeed,
My lies compounded so:
Tall tales of Appalachian Trails
Vanished in the truth’s warm glow.

Humility – I’ve learned it hard.
Take heed, stout friend of mine:
On my gray headstone wags will scrawl --
He shagged the Argentine!"

* * *

The wedding feast went forth as planned;
The high priest took his place.
He nothing thought of aught he’d heard
Of a sad man’s sad disgrace.


From my main blog: http://partisandawn.wordpress.com/
(It reads much better there.)

My New Blog

Sternly Worded Letters was conceived in the cauldron of the Clinton/Obama wars. I don't regret anything I've written here in the last ten months, but I've come to see things a bit differently. For a fuller explanation, read the "About" section of my new blog, Partisan Dawn.

(http://partisandawn.wordpress.com/)

See you there!

The Joke That Is The Juddster

Obama has hit a rough patch lately, but he’s got to be relieved that his cabinet didn’t get saddled with this hypocrite:

"The practical implications of this is bankruptcy for the United States," Gregg said of the Obama’s administration’s recently released budget blueprint. "There’s no other way around it. If we maintain the proposals that are in this budget over the ten-year period that this budget covers, this country will go bankrupt. People will not buy our debt, our dollar will become devalued. It is a very severe situation."

Gregg, known as one of the keenest fiscal minds on Capitol Hill, also told CNN Chief National Correspondent John King that he thought it was "almost unconscionable" for the White House to continue with its planned course on fiscal matters with unprecedented actual and projected budget deficits in the coming years. (Emphasis added.)

I guess Bush and the Juddster were using Monopoly money when they sent trillions down the toilet to pay for their tax cuts and wars. Where do Republicans get balls big enough to comment on anybody else’s budget? And what sane person would speak of Judd Gregg’s "keen fiscal mind"?


In Washington, any Republican politician without a southern accent who hangs around town long enough is presumed to be sensible, if not an outright genius. But the truth is that they all peddle the same economic snake oil.

Leadership Time

Obama dropped the ball on the stimulus, allowing his obsession with bipartisanship to make the bill weaker than it should have been. He rebounded with a bold budget proposal, telling the country that he intended to fix health care and energy policy. This weekend, he’s facing the third test of his young presidency.


While it’s necessary for Congress to do something about the AIG bonuses, and while politicians need to respond to the anger of their constituents, things have gotten way out of hand. More bonus scandals are going to surface, and each one can’t be Armageddon. Like it or not, Wall Street firms will be buying up the toxic waste they created. That’s Geithner’s plan, and it’s too late to find a new one. (He has no staff.) There’s talk that Treasury might be rolling out the details on Monday, and they need to. Meanwhile, Obama needs to call off the dogs in Congress.


The bonuses are chump change, and not all Wall Street employees are villains. If legislators want to get outraged, let them consider this: Goldman Sachs got a double bailout. Is there anything they can do about it?

Mistakes Were Made, Bonuses Were Paid

Edward Liddy:

Mistakes were made at AIG, and on a scale that few could have imagined possible. The most egregious of those began in 1987, when the company strayed from its core insurance competencies to launch a credit-default-swaps portfolio, which eventually became subject to massive collateral calls that created a liquidity crisis for AIG. Its missteps have exacted a high price, not only for the company and its employees but for the American taxpayer, the federal government's finances and the global economy. These missteps brought AIG to the brink of collapse and to the government for help.

AIG is greatest employer in the world. Not only is it impossible to get fired--you can get rich by sticking it to The Man!

AIG: Catharsis Day

Congressional Democrats in the Pelosi-Reid era are defined by their failures, so it's hardly surprising that they got swindled by the sharpies at AIG. As for the Administration, Tim Geithner deserves to be scorned by Republicans for signing off on the bonuses. (David Axelrod’s defense–that the poor kid had a lot on his plate, so leave him alone–is embarrassing.) But folks--we really do need to move on. The fragile, horrendous economy is--believe it or not!--on a bit of a roll right now, and it’s essential that government officials stay on top of things. (Republicans don't count.)


I generally despise all the grandstanding displayed by our elected representatives at committee hearings. Most legislators have no real interest in anything and regard their five minutes on C-SPAN as little more than an opportunity to rehearse their campaign sound bites. But today I say to our brave tribunes on the Potomac–Don't hold back! Now is not the time to grow a collective brain and get yourselves lost in the bonus weeds. Sure, it would be nice if taxpayers didn't get shafted by Wall Street again, but let's face it--if the high-priced legal talent at AIG can’t outwit a pack of panic-stricken Congressmen, they ought to be disbarred. (Maybe Andrew Cuomo in New York will manage to squeeze the crooks for a few token shekels down the road.)


Today, the Liliputians of the Capitol need to do what they do best–bloviate and get outraged. Come on, guys and gals! Show us your righteous indignation! Shout yourselves hoarse!


Your country needs you!

Simple Question, Simple Answer

If the government tries to stop the thieving blackmailers at AIG from getting their bonuses, taxpayers may end up losing money due to expensive litigation. Would it still be worth it?


Yes. Now get started, Mr. Geithner.

Dow Up 240! (Carpe Diem, Mr. President)

Wall Street traders have no credibility on economic issues–they predicted a Clinton Depression in 1993, missed the Bush Recession in 2007, and think the economy will collapse if the rich pay a penny more in taxes–but fluctuations in the Dow are politically important.


If the stock market is going to crater a thousand points because traders are afraid Obama’s health care proposals might cost them money, so be it. We can’t make policy based on short-sighted greed. But if the market is tanking because the Obama Administration is perceived to be dragging its feet on fixing the banks or as being hostile to private enterprise, then a change is in order.


On that score, Obama’s appearance at the Business Roundtable this evening was excellent. Probably the best I’ve ever seen him. He didn’t back down on his budget priorities, firmly tying his initiatives to the overall health of the economy. And he exuded confidence.


Democrats are always going to be suspect when it comes to economic growth. That’s how the corporate media rolls. Anything Obama can do to jump-start the stock market will keep some of the jackals off his back and strengthen his hand for the rest of his agenda.


We might just get through this mess.

Dow Up 380!

CNBC's Larry Kudlow is a supply-side wingnut, but I share his economic optimism. (More on that in a future post).

Last week, on Larry's 7:00 pm show, a savant named "Dougie Kass" called the bottom on the S & P. He made a lot of sense, and tonight he said we were on the verge of a "generational opportunity" in stocks.

Let's see what happens the rest of the week.

Government At Its Worst

No, I’m not talking about "earmarks." I don’t give a shit about those. I’m talking about this:

And, to the embarrassment of Obama — who promised during last year's campaign to force Congress to curb its pork-barrel ways — the bill contains 7,991 pet projects totaling $5.5 billion, according to calculations by the GOP staff of the House Appropriations Committee. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., Obama's opponent in the presidential campaign, called the measure "a swollen, wasteful, egregious example of out-of-control spending" and again criticized Obama for pledging to sign the measure despite his earlier promises on such spending. (Emphasis added.)

Five and a half billion fucking dollars? Are you kidding me? That’s what McCain and the Media are having a cow about? AIG and Citigroup will piss away more than that before breakfast this morning. At least the pork barrel chump change will bring something to the streets of America.


One of Obama’s finest moments in the debates last fall came when he pointed out to Johnny Mac the pitifully tiny role that "earmarks" played in the grand scheme of things. I guess it didn't sink in. We seem doomed to argue endlessly over minutiae. The tiny minds of our legislators aren't comfortable with much else.


Will the government ever get serious? To quote Lee Iacocca: Where have all the leaders gone?

Mission: Impossible

The funniest political essay I have ever read is something called "The Husbandman," published by H.L. Mencken in 1924. Here’s an excerpt:

….Let the farmer, so far as I am concerned, be damned forevermore. To Hell with him, and bad luck to him. He is a tedious fraud and ignoramus, a cheap rogue and hypocrite, the eternal Jack of the human pack. He deserves all that he ever suffers under our economic system, and more. Any city man, not insane, who sheds tears for him is shedding tears of the crocodile.

No more grasping, selfish and dishonest mammal, indeed, is known to students of the Anthropoidea. When the going is good for him he robs the rest of us up to the extreme limit of our endurance; when the going is bad be comes bawling for help out of the public till. Has anyone ever heard of a farmer making any sacrifice of his own interests, however slight, to the common good? Has anyone ever heard of a farmer practising or advocating any political idea that was not absolutely self-seeking–that was not, in fact, deliberately designed to loot the rest of us to his gain? Greenbackism, free silver, the government guarantee of prices, bonuses, all the complex fiscal imbecilities of the cow State John Baptists–these are the contributions of the virtuous husbandmen to American political theory. There has never been a time, in good seasons or bad, when his hands were not itching for more; there has never been a time when he was not ready to support any charlatan, however grotesque, who promised to get it for him. Only one issue ever fetches him, and that is the issue of his own profit. He must be promised something definite and valuable, to be paid to him alone, or he is off after some other mountebank. He simply cannot imagine himself as a citizen of a commonwealth, in duty bound to give as well as take; he can imagine himself only as getting all and giving nothing.

I fondly recall this hilarious screed every year at budget-making time, when Kent Conrad and his Midwestern Mafia begin demanding a "Great Plains - Sized" slice of the federal pie. As a taxpayer from the East, I long ago resigned myself to getting the shaft on the issue of agricultural subsidies. Senator Conrad never has any trouble absconding with poor Chuck Schumers’s lunch money. If President Obama ever forces the sainted "family farmers" to take a significant monetary haircut, I will drive to South Dakota and chisel his skinny mug on a soft rock as close to Mount Rushmore as I can get.


(Note: By no means am I endorsing Mr. Mencken’s intemperate insults--at least not all of them. I just think they’re funny.)

Barack and The Fat Man

First principles, Clarice. Simplicity. Read Marcus Aurelius. Of each particular thing ask: what is it in itself? What is its nature? –Hannibal Lecter

So the Republican hand-wringers want Rush Limbaugh to pipe down. Apparently, all the white noise of his recent bloviating has obscured the party’s message.

Stuff and Nonsense! I'm not sure Limbaugh even believes his own bullshit, but he knows full well the iron rules of what passes muster as an Acceptable Republican Idea, to wit:

Government is always incompetent.

Taxes may never be raised.

"Spending" must always opposed in the abstract, yet rarely defined in reality. (Military spending has no upper limit.)

Market solutions are always best, unless they upset our supporters.

Only corporations and wealthy individuals can spur economic growth.

Budget deficits, no matter how large, will be reduced by cutting taxes.

When in doubt, deregulate.

If Republican politicians violate these rules, their party will cease to exist. They will become Democrats. Limbaugh got a bad rap on his "hoping-for-failure" comment, but in stark political terms, he was correct--the Republican Party cannot afford to allow government solutions to succeed. Bill Kristol knew it. Karl Rove knew it. Rush Limbaugh knows it.


Anybody who watched Jon Kyl and Paul Ryan on FOX News Sunday yesterday saw that Republicans have no new ideas. That’s why they keep Newt Gingrich around. He has lots of bullet points, but does anybody really understand what the hell he’s talking about? Have any of his wacky schemes ever been tried? Newt’s chief value to the GOP is as a fund raiser and a supplier of rhetoric. Substantively, he’s a bit player.


Republicans can still win elections, but the Democrats don’t have to worry about countering any bold new ideas. They just have to govern successfully. (That’s all!)

Base Camp

For the upcoming battle over the budget, Obama is at least planting the right flag:

Obama's spending blueprint, with its massive $1.17 trillion deficit and tax hikes on the wealthy, seeks to squeeze billions of dollars in savings out of current spending through competitive bidding among health insurers and ending subsidies and tax breaks for banks, agribusiness and oil companies.

"These steps won't sit well with the special interests and lobbyists who are invested in the old way of doing business," the president said in his weekly radio address.

"I know they're gearing up for a fight as we speak," he said. "My message to them is this: So am I."

Has the president has been sneaking a few peeks at the CPAC Wingnut Convention?

No more foot massages for Johnny Boehner!

Good Cop, Bad Cop

In a rational world, today's Republican Party would be little more than a kooky fringe group, like the Larouchites. Unfortunately, we live here. And in America circa 2009, on the nation's premier business channel, the utterly discredited economic theories promulgated by George W. Bush and Company are still sacrosanct. (I guess it’s comfort food for CNBC's shell-shocked viewers, who cling to the fantasy of becoming swashbuckling Wall Street Jedi.)


Last evening, on the network in question, Arthur Laffer, legendary father of a ridiculous economic curve, teamed up with Larry Kudlow to denounce the Administration's plan for saving the nation’s banking system. Well, all I can say is Hallelujah! This is the first piece of unadulterated good news I’ve heard in weeks. If Kudlow and Laffer think the plan is a train wreck, then I’m getting bullish on America again. Those guys are always wrong.


Then, this morning, Kay Bailey Hutchison and Judd "We Hardly Knew Ye" Gregg went on Squawk Box to complain about the deficit. No--really--they did. These "Republican moderates"–who never met a trillion dollar war they couldn’t put off-budget–had the audacity to pose as penny-pinching guardians of the public till. Forget the fact that their supply-side snake oil has turned fatally rancid. Hutchison and Gregg deserve to be tarred and feathered around the clock solely on the grounds of criminal hypocrisy.


I’m no fan of President Obama’s rhetoric, but on substance, his speech the other night was excellent. His obsession with bipartisanship drives me up a wall, but it appears to be part of a long-term political strategy. I may just have to get used to it. But what about the rest of the Democrats? You know, the ones who aren’t President? How about this, people--When you're not actually legislating, you might want to try to terminate--with extreme prejudice--the Republican Party's current raison d'etre. That's the enemy. Ridicule mixed with condescension--along with liberal doses of the truth–should be your weapon of choice. Let Obama take the high road.


The stakes are too great, and there’s too much to do, to risk letting the GOP get their hands on the government again. The proponents of such a dangerous and bankrupt philosophy need to be exposed.

Free Market Dead-Enders

Because every generation deserves its own Great Depression. Builds character.

Live-Blogging Hardball: Exit Judd Gregg!

5:25 Chris Matthews and the other Republican are gushing over the Juddster's integrity, but Democrat Steve McMahon is having none of it. Obama's stimulus plan hasn't exactly been a secret, guys. Only now is Gregg noticing that Democrats are (sometimes) more liberal than Republicans? And puh-lease, Tweety! Spare us the bullshit about this guy's devotion to "fiscal responsibility." That dog won't hunt. Not after a trillion dollar war war--off-budget.

5:45 Nancy Pelosi is talking to Chris. She's taking the gloves off, too.

Two nails for the bipartisan coffin. Keep 'em coming, kids!

Can You Beat Something With Nothing?

Krugman is being taken to task by the DLC types. For them, the process reigns supreme:

But in eschewing the strident partisanship that many on the left pine for, Obama is keeping faith with the people who elected him. He’s also maneuvering the Republicans into a position where they appear as dogmatic, lock-step partisans–and politically impotent to boot, since they can’t block a big stimulus bill from passing. And let’s face it: While the president has tried to foster a new spirit of comity and cooperation, the stimulus plans make very few concessions to GOP demands when you look at the big picture.

Some concessions are going to be necessary. But why give up territory before the battle is joined? And why puff up the opposition's "good ideas"? Just tell the public why their ideas are so bad!


The Republicans may look impotent, but do they really care? It’s not as if they think government can actually solve problems. Once they’ve cut taxes for their friends, they might as well go home.


The only thing that motivates the GOP is winning elections. On that score, they’re like Jason in the Friday the 13th movies. He does the same thing in every film, critics be damned. But the audience always knows what to expect, and sometimes they're in the mood for it.


Remember when Democrats were in the Bushian wilderness and Markos Moulitsas was screaming that we didn’t stand for anything? Not much has changed. The Republicans are looking to kick some wishy-washy Demcratic ass in the next movie, and the president is helping them write the script.

Jeb Hensarling (R-TX): Republicanus Moronicus

From his first question to the nation's biggest bankers just now on CNBC:

"What you do with your money is your business. What you do with the taxpayers' money is our business." Delivered with beady-eyed rodent smugness as he puffs out his empty chest.

Deregulation now, deregulation forever. Isn't that how we got here?

Idiot. Dangerous, cretinous idiot.

Who Died And Made Him Boss?

David Sirota is getting nasty emails from Clinton supporters who aren't thrilled with Obama:

Movements and activists and voters have to choose the best among this imperfect pool of possibilities. Journalists like me--if we're interested in the truth--will end up being both critical and supportive of candidates because those candidate aren't typically 100% bad or 100% good. That doesn't make the criticism or the praise "hypocritical"--it makes the reporting authentic and real, rather than sycophantic and propagandistic, and it certainly doesn't make it "hypocritical." {Emphasis added}

I get it--David Sirota is in charge of dispensing The Truth. If he said Barack Obama was the best available progressive--well, then--

To Clintonites, just STFU and slither back to your rathole of bitterness. Your candidate lost because she helped create the problems we now have to fix. Deal with that and become a productive member of society, or again, just STFU.

Listen, David. Thanks to you and the rest of the Democratic/Media establishment, we'll never know what kind of president Hillary Clinton would have made. One thing's for sure, though. Pretty much every negative prediction I made about your candidate's weakness is proving true. Shouldn't you be showing a little humility?

I don't feel like shutting the fuck up. As a matter of fact, David--Can I have your job? You seem to suck at it.

State of Denial

So how are things going these days in the Mainstream Liberal Blogosphere? Not too good, I'm afraid. Here’s georgia10 from Daily Kos:

Democrats must shake off this stale stench of the minority that still wafts about them. They need not cling to the vessel of bipartisanship as if there were no other manner by which to reach the shore.

They need to realize that their efforts are buoyed on the backs of some 68 million strong that voted in favor of bold Democratic principles. As several Democrats (including the president) have noted, the American people voted for change. By selecting a man labeled as the most liberal Senator to the White House and by strengthening Democratic majorities in both chambers, they rejected the Republican policies that have left Americans alone to tread water for so long.

The American people voted for "change," but they didn’t vote for "bold Democratic principles." Barack Obama’s signature campaign promise was to find common ground with Republicans, and that’s exactly the strategy he's been pursuing. If Democrats are "clinging to the vessel of bipartisanship," it’s because they’re following the lead of their Captain.


And here’s Joe Sudaby from Americablog today (I can’t seem to find the link):

While that's all playing out in the Capitol Hill bubble, Obama is taking his show on the road. He's going to talk directly to the American people. Probably a good idea since the traditional media and pundits, a.k.a the Villagers, would rather talk about the very inside political game instead of the dire state of the economy. The perilous state of our country is an afterthought for them.

Get your head out of the sand, Joe. The Villagers aren’t the only ones talking about the "inside political game." The president can’t stop talking about it either. This weekend, instead of using his bully pulpit to press his own "bold" agenda, he’s out there praising the Lieberman Caucus for its wisdom in gutting the stimulus bill. But as always, nothing is ever Barack's fault in Obamaland.


Physician, heal thyself!

Iceberg Ahead

Paul Krugman today:

Count me among those who think that the president made a big mistake in his initial approach, that his attempts to transcend partisanship ended up empowering politicians who take their marching orders from Rush Limbaugh. What matters now, however, is what he does next.

It’s time for Mr. Obama to go on the offensive. Above all, he must not shy away from pointing out that those who stand in the way of his plan, in the name of a discredited economic philosophy, are putting the nation’s future at risk. The American economy is on the edge of catastrophe, and much of the Republican Party is trying to push it over that edge.

David Axelrod got his candidate elected by placing him above the political fray, and he'd like to keep him there. But he didn't foresee that President Obama would have to enact the most important economic legislation legislation of the last fifty years right off the bat.

The whole world is watching. If Obama screws this up because he still wants to be President Gandhi, he's going to pay a political price.

Are you listening, Mr. Axelrod? Time to change course.

Bush: A Love Supreme

Bernard Goldberg’s new sop to the wingnuts--A Slobbering Love Affair: The True (and Pathetic) Story of the Torrid Romance Between Barack Obama and the Mainstream Media--probably contains a fair amount of truth, but his audience needs to know that a real journalist would have already written the same book about George W. Bush.

After 9/11, Dubya got a four-year fluffing the likes of which we’ll not see again (short of the USA going all Kim Jong Il in the wake of a massive terrorist attack). Chris Matthews’ fixation on the manliness of his president is well documented, and I’ll never forget Howard Fineman writing a whole column about Bush’s belt buckles. Yowza!

As for serious scrutiny of the Cheney regime’s policies and crimes–Sorry, America. Not in a time of war. (After Chimpy’s stage-managed press conference on the eve of the Iraq debacle, Elizabeth Bumiller of the New York Times admitted she was too scared to risk upsetting him with a hard question. Thanks, Liz.)


The media still loves Obama, and his honeymoon is far from over, but he’s not going to get the Bush treatment. They managed to embarrass even themselves with all their carrying on over the worst president ever.

Unforced Errors

Each of the last three presidents, immediately upon taking office, loudly proclaimed that when it came to running an ethical administration, he was going to make George Washington look like a sleazebag. Then, when the inevitable nanny problems and IRS issues cropped up, they each had to spend a week getting pummeled by their own lofty rhetoric.

Why can't these guys just keep their pieholes shut to begin with?

Who's the Boss?

E. J. Dionne writes:

The president's quest for a new tone in Washington. . . has a practical motive. He believes that economic recovery is about psychology as well as money and that Americans will have more confidence in the future if they see the nation's politicians cooperating to resolve the crisis.

Obama may believe this (although I have my doubts), but is it true? Will people start spending again if they see John Boehner and Nancy Pelosi prancing arm in arm through the cherry blossoms? I don’t know why they should. Maybe there’s some abstruse economic theory at work here, but to me it just seems. . .dumb.

Dionne continues:

If achieving bipartisanship takes priority over the actual content of policy, Republicans are handed a powerful weapon. In theory, they can keep moving the bipartisan bar indefinitely. And each concession to their sensibilities threatens the solidarity in the president's own camp.

Now you’re making sense, E. J. At some point, President Obama is going to have to stop acting like a spectator in his own administration. Thus far, he’s been happy to let a thousand flowers bloom, even some smelly Republican ones. That better not last much longer.


Politics abhors a vacuum.

Zero

That’s the number of House Republicans who voted for the stimulus bill, despite the best efforts of a Democratic president to water it down for them. Is this how we’re going to spend the next four years?


The Republicans aren’t going away and they aren’t going to change. I don’t care how many Michael Steeles they trot out to "put a new face on the party." They’re wedded to a right-wing, trickle-down ideology because 1) their base demands it 2) it’s lucrative and 3) its simplemindedness makes it a powerful campaign tool--in the right circumstances.


This is not a good year to be a Republican, yet Barack Obama insists on giving them credibility. (If he really thinks the GOP is brimming with good ideas, we’re in big trouble.) On substantive terms, getting more Republican votes than are absolutely necessary is going to make virtually all legislation worse than it need be. That’s just a fact. So the only justification for pandering to them has to be that it’s part of a long-term political strategy.


Does Obama believe that spending quality time with John Boehner is going to pave the way for a grand, bipartisan compromise on health care or anything else? That doesn’t pass the laugh test.


Maybe he thinks "going the extra mile" will make the GOP look obstructionist and strengthen his hand with the public. That might happen, but he’d better not be counting on Wolf Blitzer and company to hammer home the message. At Think Progress, they’re complaining about continued Republican dominance of the cable news guest list. Duh! What do they expect? Barack Obama has made bipartisanship the lodestar of his presidency. (As if the corporate media needs any more incentive than it already has to prop up Republicans!)


Then there’s the noxious influence of David Axelrod, Obama’s uber-Rove. His job in the White House is to prepare for 2012. Here’s how I see his political calculus:


"I’d rather not have to re-invent the wheel. We won with a feel-good campaign in 2008, and my client has a nice-guy image worth its weight in votes. So--where do we stand today? For the foreseeable future, elections will be won or lost on the economy. But here’s the thing–to a great extent, this recession will end when it ends. We might be able to ameliorate its awfulness, but how much credit will we get? What’s the difference between 9% unemployment and 8.5% unemployment? Barack is still going to get hammered. Is it worth it to fight for better policies at the risk of alienating our friends in the media? They’re so touchy when it comes to their precious bipartisanship. Isn't half a loaf better in the long run? After all, the world will still need Barack in 2013."

Does Obama see it like this? Who knows. But he certainly hasn’t embraced the James Carville strategy–which I endorse--of throwing your drowning opponent an anvil.

It’s going to take a long time to clean up the mess in this country. Politics needs to be about something. Democrats need to set the terms of the debate. They need to be clear about their solutions while attempting–respectfully–to highlight an unbroken line of Republican failure stretching from Hoover to Reagan to Bush to Boehner. They need to discredit–respectfully–the GOP and its policies the way the right-wing discredited the New Deal. (Leave the vicious, partisan name-calling to the blogosphere. I’m more than happy to do my part!)


Of course, presidents may have their own priorities. That’s why Obama needs to be pressured.

Team Of Professionals

I suppose it’s possible that Hillary Clinton, George Mitchell and Richard Holbrooke will need a full-time referee, but is it likely? I think not. In any case, I’d rather have them managing our diplomacy than a pack of lightweights.


The media is always is always looking for a soap opera, and Hillary is their favorite scheming harpy. Rest assured that anytime a lazy reporter needs a story, he’ll find a bureaucrat willing to trash her. Or else he’ll just make something up. After all, there’s no downside in being 100% wrong about a Clinton (as long as you’re vague enough), and you may get a mention on Hardball or in Maureen Dowd’s trashy column.


Barack Obama seems to understand that a restoration of American economic strength is essential to a successful foreign policy. That’s where he plans to deploy his political capital. He also seems to recognize his own limitations, which is why he turned to Hillary Clinton in the first place.


Let’s just say I have a lot more confidence in our foreign policy team than in our domestic policy team. More on that later.

Live-Blogging Hardball: Once An Asshole...

Chris "I’m Afraid of Arlen Specter!" Matthews is all over the Senate’s 94-2 confirmation of Hillary Clinton for Secretary of State--

Beware, Democrats! You’re ALL going to be held responsible for whatever fresh Clinton-bashing that David Vitter, Jim DeMint and ME--Tweety Matthews--decide to dispense!

MSNBC. Same as it ever was. A joke.

Geithner on C-SPAN

---Grassley is trying to get himself righteously worked up over the IRS thing, but his heart doesn’t seem to be in it. He’s reading from his notes as if for the first time. Yawn.

---Chairman Baucus is being a hard-ass on senatorial question time, and Kerry doesn’t like it. Neither do I. Big John is as windy as ever, but his "good bank/bad bank" line of inqiry is right on point and deserves a long answer. (God forbid any distinguished senator be shorted his full five minutes to spew nonsense.)

–-Surprise, surprise. Hatch wants to cut corporate taxes again. Groundhog Day in the Republican caucus.

–-Bunning is an idiot. No wonder he runs around the Senate in his pajamas–no, wait--that’s Domenici. (Maybe they’re the same person?)

---Snowe seems out of place here. Succinct, intelligent questions. Who let her in?

–-Ensign: Stimulus? We don't need no stinking stimulus. And tax increases caused the 1937 mini-depression. GOP Groundhog Day continues.

–-Bunning again. He hasn’t gotten any smarter in the last ninety minutes.

–-Kyl is asking the same question about the stimulus plan that Ensign asked. Same answer. (The Republicans seem to think this recession is going to be over by December. Trillion dollar stimulus–bad! Trillion dollar wars–good!)

I've seen enough.

Adios, Au Revoir, Auf Wiedersehen, Goodbye!

Tomorrow afternoon at 12:01, having utterly failed at the only real job he’s ever had, George W. Bush will take his place at the bottom of the presidential barrel. His media mea culpas have already vanished into the ether. His apparent graciousness during the current transition (in marked contrast to his reprehensible behavior in 2001, when he allowed his staff to spread preposterous lies about Clintons having "trashed" the White House) will do him no permanent good. (It’s like Chris Rock’s riff about sleazy people demanding credit for doing what they’re supposed to do.) The world and we have seen enough. Bush’s unprecedented blend of incompetence and villainy will serve him well as he battles the stygian shade of Richard Nixon for the title of Worst President Ever. And unless the Middle East transforms itself rapidly enough for a critical mass of historians to somehow give Bush and his bloody wars a share of the credit, his fate is sealed.



Still, in ways large and small, the Bush Reclamation Project is already underway. Here’s Karl Rove in the Wall Street Journal, on the president's prodigious White House reading:

A glutton for punishment, Mr. Bush insisted on another rematch in 2008. But it will be a three-peat for me: as of today, his total is 40 volumes to my 64. His reading this year included a heavy dose of history -- including David Halberstam's "The Coldest Winter," Rick Atkinson's "Day of Battle," Hugh Thomas's "Spanish Civil War, "Stephen W. Sears's "Gettysburg" and David King's "Vienna 1814." There's also plenty of biography -- including U.S. Grant's "Personal Memoirs"; Jon Meacham's "American Lion"; James M. McPherson's "Tried by War: Abraham Lincoln as Commander in Chief" and Jacobo Timerman's "Prisoner Without a Name, Cell Without a Number."

This is absurd and laughable. It's pure presidential scorekeeping. Bush undoubtedly counts "books I've read" the way Bill Clinton counts golf strokes. (Although, if Rove is telling the truth for once, it might explain why his boss demanded one-page national security memos. He was too busy reading about Dean Acheson to worry about Osama bin Laden.)


Unfortunately for Karl and George, other people are going to keep talking about the Dark Side of Dubya. Here’s Lawrence Wilkerson, quoted in this month’s Vanity Fair:

We had this confluence of characters—and I use that term very carefully—that included people like Powell, Dick Cheney, Condi Rice, and so forth, which allowed one perception to be "the dream team." It allowed everybody to believe that this Sarah Palin-like president—because, let’s face it, that’s what he was—was going to be protected by this national-security elite, tested in the cauldrons of fire. What in effect happened was that a very astute, probably the most astute, bureaucratic entrepreneur I’ve ever run into in my life became the vice president of the United States.

He became vice president well before George Bush picked him. And he began to manipulate things from that point on, knowing that he was going to be able to convince this guy to pick him, knowing that he was then going to be able to wade into the vacuums that existed around George Bush—personality vacuum, character vacuum, details vacuum, experience vacuum.

Ironically, George W. Bush has left the country in such a sorry state that his successor and the Democratic Congress are unlikely to have the time to hold him accountable, even if they have the stomach for it--which they don’t.

For me, the jury is still out on Barack Obama. I need to see some results. I won’t be getting any thrills up my thigh tomorrow.


Unless I get to see a commercial jet–not Air Force One–taking off for Texas with George W. Bush aboard. One way.

Thanks, But No Thanks

The GOP is returning to the scene of the crime:

"Tomorrow will be an opportunity for Republicans to respond to President-elect Obama’s request to offer solutions that help put America back on the path to prosperity," Cantor said. "Top national experts will offer innovative approaches that address the needs of working families and small businesses and put American back on the path to prosperity."

Politicians and economic experts participating in Thursday’s hearing include:
*John Boehner, Republican leader (R-Ohio)
*Eric Cantor, Republican Whip
*Mike Pence, Republican Conference Chair (R-IN)
*Mitt Romney, former governor of Massachusetts
*Meg Whitman, former CEO, e-Bay
*Alex Brill, American Enterprise Institute
*Bill Breach, The Heritage Foundation
*Grover Norquist, Americans for Tax Reform

This is a joke, right? Grover Fucking Norquist? Are they planning to resurrect the K Street Project in broad daylight?


I sincerely hope Barack Obama’s talk of "bipartisanship" is just window dressing for the media. (Nobody else really gives a shit.) The Republican Party, as an institution, is currently unfit to participate in the making of public policy. Democrats need to push through their own agenda by picking off the few remaining decent Republicans and making it clear that the Grover Norquist "drown it in the bathtub" approach to government is no longer acceptable.



Wingnut economics is simple, stupid and appealing. The GOP will never abandon it. It’s their once and future meal ticket.


And there will be another K Street Project if they return to power.

Apocalypse. . .Now

"Walt Kurtz was one of the most outstanding officers this country has ever produced. He was brilliant and outstanding in every way, and he was a good man, too. Humanitarian man, man of wit, of humor. He joined the Special Forces. After that his ideas, methods have become unsound. . .Unsound."

The Republican Party has utterly devolved.

Dwight Eisenhower. . .Ronald Reagan. . . Tom Coburn.

A bankrupt economic ideology clings to the inherent cruelty of its Gipperesque myths.

Will the Democrats ever decide to win this war?

The Care And Feeding Of Wingnuts

On C-SPAN I’m watching James Inhofe--possessor, by consensus, of the lowest IQ in the Senate--warn the Republican base that Socialist Democrats are planning to muzzle the drug-addled Rush Limbaugh and the dim-witted Sean Hannity by re-instituting the Fairness Doctrine. I’m not sure how Pelosi and Reid should play this, but they need to understand the opposition party.


In terms of an effective governing philosophy, the Republicans bring nothing to the table. Any "compromises" that Democrats find necessary must be accompanied by a clear rejection of the GOP's phony "freedom" agenda. This is critical to any hope of cleaning up Bush's unholy mess.


The Fairness Doctrine should come back, but it’s not worth the distraction of Wingnut Armageddon.