Cheney * helping * Obama?

Columnist David Corn has a different take on the cheney criticism: that it is actually helping Obama.

Here's his reasoning:

Obama won the presidency partly because he was the anti-Bush (or anti-Cheney). An impressive person on his own, Obama especially looked good compared to the fellows on the way out.

Now that Obama is a president rather than a candidate, he has lost the advantage of comparison. A commander in chief stands on his own before the public for judgment. His policies are evaluated by voters on absolute terms: Are they working? People no longer ask: Are they better than the other guy's? . . . And even his best efforts and decisions might not lead to good outcomes on these fronts. There actually may not be solutions to implement. Obama could well end up in deep political trouble because of such challenges.

But by interjecting himself into the discourse, Cheney sends up a flare: Hey, don't forget about me and Bush! And that reminder is great for the White House. If the issue is, can Obama succeed in Afghanistan, there's reason for Obama and his aides to worry. If the debate is Obama versus the Old Gang, the president is the big winner.

Interesting take. In that case, Bring it on, old man XVP.

Ralph

A simple fact

Anthony Weiner (D-NY) has stated a simple fact that should become a main talking point for Democrats pushing the public option plan:

55 Republican opponents of the public option are themselves on Medicare, which is, of course, a government sponsored, single-payer health care system.

This makes them first class hypocrits for denying similar coverage to all Americans.

Let's "re-brand" the public option as "Medicare-for-All," and I'll bet it would pass with votes to spare.

Ralph

BRAVO ! ! !

Political analyst Lawrence O'Donnell said what needed to be said. On a recent TV show, Morning Joe, O'Donnell got into a heated debate with host Joe Scarborough over Dick Cheney's accusations that Obama is "dithering while America's armed forces are in danger." Said O'Donnell, as reported on HuffingtonPost:

The dithering thing is great because Cheney, of course, did not dither, did not dither for a minute, when the time came to make a wild guess, an outright crazy wild guess, about are there weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. And Cheney sat there in the White House and said, you know what, I've got everything I need to make my wild guess. On the basis of my wild guess I'm going to tell the country it's an actual fact, and then I'm gonna help send American soldiers there to die over a lie. No dithering when it came time to do that.

An upset Scarborough replied that "every major Democrat on the national scene, including Joe Biden, believed Saddam had weapons of mass destruction." O'Donnell countered that no Democrats had access to the high-level intelligence available to Cheney, evidence that painted a far more skeptical picture of Saddam's nuclear capabilities than the one Cheney painted for the American public.

That is exactly what needed to be said -- again and again until dick cheney crawls back into his bunker over there on "the dark side."

Ralph

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/10/22/lawrence-odonnell-battles_n_330034.html

BRAVO Squared ! ! ! !

Retired General Paul Eaton, senior adviser to the National Security Network was even tougher in hitting back at Cheney's comments about Obama's "dithering." In a press release from NSN, Eaton let him have it:

The record is clear: Dick Cheney and the Bush administration were incompetent war fighters. They ignored Afghanistan for 7 years with a crude approach to counter-insurgency warfare best illustrated by: 1. Deny it. 2. Ignore it. 3. Bomb it. While our intelligence agencies called the region the greatest threat to America, the Bush White House under-resourced our military efforts, shifted attention to Iraq, and failed to bring to justice the masterminds of September 11.

The only time Cheney and his cabal of foreign policy 'experts' have anything to say is when they feel compelled to protect this failed legacy. While President Obama is tasked with cleaning up the considerable mess they left behind, they continue to defend torture or rewrite a legacy of indifference on Afghanistan. Simply put, Mr. Cheney sees history throughout extremely myopic and partisan eyes.

Now that's telling him. But Cheney's speech was at a hyper-partisan sort of Bush crowd reunion, at which they gave him an award as "Keeper of the Flame" and Scooter Libby was also honored. So who really cares what he says?

I try not to. But he is so outrageously wrong and contemptible that I can't help it. I want him to be publicly repudiated until he stops doing it.

Ralph

High Drama

It's not often that my life takes on the drama of a tv action movie. But it almost happened this morning.

I went to the SunTrust branch bank right in the middle of the medical complex of hospitals in my quiet suburb of Sandy Springs. I pulled into the drive through and put my deposit in the pneumatic tube and sent it off. After a minute of sitting there reading my paper, a young woman teller came on the little screen and said: "We have a security issue here, and I'm going to have to return your deposit."

My first thought was she meant the computers were down due to a computer security issue. Then someone pulled down the venetian blinds that closed off the real window into the bank building, and that did make me wonder. But I thought they just meant to indicate that they were closed.

So I got my deposit back and drove off. It did occur to me that maybe there was a bit more of an ominous tone -- and as I drove around through the parking lot to get back onto the street, the thought went through my mind that maybe I should tell that nicely dressed business man about to go into the back that he shouldn't. And then I thought -- had she really been trying to tell me to call the police? I even looked at my deposit slip to see if she had written a note on it. But no.

So I pushed those thoughts aside as being overly dramatic. Until two blocks up the road -- here they came 1 . . . 2. . . 3. . . 4. . . 5 police cars one right after the other, really speeding with blue lights flashing, heading to the bank.

Nosey as I am, I turned around and drove back by. The bank was surround with police with guns drawn and all looking expectantly at the entrance -- and even more police cars coming from the other direction.

That's all I know, except that I went back a couple hours later to try to make my deposit -- and to find out what happened. The bank was locked and a sign said: Closed due to an emergency over which we have no control."

How's that for a quiet morning in Sandy Springs? The chilling thing is that I could just as well have decided to go in to make the deposit, because I have a CD that's about to mature and I need to find out what the renewal interest rate would be. If I had decided to do that this morning, I would have been inside instead of safely at the drive through.

Whew !!! It's nice to have a little high drama when you're safe. But I worry about the tellers who I've come to like over the years. I hope no one was hurt.

Ralph

"Don't give comfort to the enemy"

Every voter should know who tried to prevent the American people from having effective health care reform -- and they should vote accordingly in 2010 and 2012.

Steve Champlin , a lobbyist for America's Health Insurance Plans (AHIP)

, the major private insurance trade group, had this advice for Republicans:

"There is absolutely no interest, no reason Republicans should ever vote for this thing. They have gone from a party that got killed 11 months ago to a party that is rising today. And they are rising up on the turmoil of health care. So when they vote for a health care reform bill, whatever it is, they are giving comfort to the enemy who is down."

"Long before the Republicans discovered that the House bill was a strategy to kill seniors and all that kind of stuff the plan was already unpopular," he added, underscoring why Republicans shouldn't attach themselves to the legislation. (from Sam Stein at HuffingtonPost).

Unpopular? Republicans have tried to scare people into being confused and afraid. But people want reform and they want a public option plan -- by a huge majority.

Any unpopularity is the result of lies and distortions by just such people as this lobbyist and those he works for.

Ralph

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/10/22/ahip-lobbyist-to-gop-dont_n_329828.html

MidEast nukes -- good news?

Two pieces of news today could be harbingers of a major change in MidEast nuclear tensions.

1. Iran's negotiating minister has accepted a plan whereby Iran would ship a major portion of its enriched uranium to another country for conversion into peaceful energy use. This would reduce their stockpile and buy at least a year's time before Iran could build a bomb, thus allowing for more definitive negotiations. It has yet to be ratified by Iran's leaders, and they could derail it; but it's a lot further down the road than anything the Bush administration even tried to obtain.

2. Haaertz.com, a reliable Israeli news source, is reporting a secret meeting in Cairo in late September between a representative of the Israel Atomic Energy Commission and a senior Iranian official. Iran has denied it. But Haaertz's information gives details of the meeting at the Four Seasons Hotel in Cairo under the auspices of the International Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament.

Also participating were representatives of the Arab League, Jordan, Egypt, Tunisia, Turkey, Morocco, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, along with European and American officials.

We don't know how much Obama directly brought about these two promising events, but he has certainly made a major about face in the U.S. position in this part of the world, which is undoubtedly a necessary step for such movements toward peace to occur.

Ralph

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/wires/2009/10/22/iran-and-israel-hold-secr_ws_329720.html

News Flash !!!!

This just in. Michele Bachmann is NOT planning to run for president in 2012 ! ! ! !

We can thank God -- quite literally. It seems that Michele would only run on one condition. As she told DailyNews:

I will not seek a higher office if God is not calling me to do it.

Please, God. Just keep on NOT calling Michele. In fact, how about not calling her to run for re-election to the House.

I have mixed feelings about this. Michele at the debates might be even more fun than Sarah Palin, and it would guarantee a GOP defeat. It would . . . . wouldn't it?

Ralph

Who knows what it means?

I won't even venture a guess on what this could mean. But it is, as they say, interesting.

As polls closed on election night 2008, Duke University (my medical school) and the Univ of Michigan researchers tested testosterone levels of 183 men and women. Then a few hours later, as the election results became known, they tested again.

What they found was that men who voted for Obama maintained stable testosterone levels, while men who voted for McCain had a 25% drop in their testosterone level.

Women, who have a much lower level of testosterone and therefore less reliable measure of small changes, did not show this fluctuation.

Researchers say this study shows how stress affects our physiology and that the hormone change is in line with results of men playing video games -- supposedly winning or losing makes the difference. They also hastened to reassure McCain voters that the testosterone drop was temporary.

What they didn't report, which is what would interest me, is whether there was a beginning difference in testosterone levels of Obama voters and McCain voters -- given that testosterone is often associated with aggression.

Beyond that, I will not venture a guess what this means, if anything. Probably it has nothing to say about politics. Perhaps it's nothing more than the difference in winning and losing. The Duke researchers plan to do a similar study measuring the testosterone levels before and after a Duke-UNC game.

Ralph

Little-known, big issue

Why haven't we heard more about this?

The health insurance industry has been operating with a distinct advantage to the big companies that most of us didn't even know about: exemption from anti-trust laws that prevent a monopoly and squelch competition. It has occupied little of our current debate on reform.

But now the House Judiciary Committee has voted 20 to 9 to strip this exemption.

Although I didn't know much about this, my friend Richard wrote recently in a response to my blog that BlueCross/BlueShield dominates the health insurance market in North Carolina. I can't find his comment now, but as I remember it was something like 87%, and his rates had gone up some 300% along with increases in co-pay as well.

It seems to me that eliminating such monopolies would be on a par with the public plan in terms of competitive price lowering.

Ralph

The danger

The Carville-Greenberg focus-group survey of Republican base voters that I commented on here a couple of days ago found no evidence that opposition to Obama is racial.

Maybe not, but then what would explain the 400% increase in death threats against Obama over those against Bush?

The only other explanation I can think of is that the right-wing opposition is more violent than left-wing opposition. And I'm sure that is true. I think it's built into the sort of people attracted to and repelled by the two sides. Right wing nuts tend to be paranoid; left wing nuts tend to be dreamy idealists.

Whatever the explanation, it is a serious cause for alarm about the safety of our president. The article from the Boston Globe was also about the inadequate financing for the Secret Service, with this increased demand. This is one Congress has got to fix, and quickly.

Ralph

A no-brainer

The only possible rationale -- repeat, THE ONLY POSSIBLE RATIONALE -- for opposing a public option plan in the health care reform is to protect the insurance industry's profits and influence.

It will be good for the people. And the latest non-partisan Congressional Budget Office estimate is that it is the most cost-effective measure, actually reducing the federal deficit.

So why don't the conservatives, who oppose health care reform as a run-away government spending program, jump on board?

Because they are more beholden to the lobbyists of the insurance industry than they are to their ideology of cost containment.

"Socialism"? Nah. Nobody screams "socialism" when we talk about other publicly provided services, paid for by taxpayers: like schools, police and fire protection, libraries, the ARMY, for crying out loud !!! Why isn't our health in that same category?

So, again . . . and again, until everybody gets it:

The only question to answer in this whole debate is: Which is your top priority? (1) the health of our nation's people? or (2) the health of the insurance industry's profits?

Ralph

Loud does not = popular

Beck, Limbaugh, Hannity, and Steele may have captured the prize for making the most obnoxious political noise and inciting the most fear; but like Liberace, who cried all the way to the bank over people ridiculing him, the Dems may be able to cry all the way to the ballot boxes in 2010.

The insinuation lately has been that the Republicans could take back control of the House in 2010, and they've been doing everything possible to stonewall the legislative agenda so they can declare Obama's presidency a failure.

An ABC/WashingtonPost poll shows that the Repub's self-congratulations may be premature. Only 20% identified themselves as Republicans, the lowest number since 1983.

Moreover, only 19% trust Republicans in Congress to make the right decisions, compared to 49% who trust Obama to do the right thing.

On a pairing of a generic Democrat and a generic Republican in a Congressional race, the Democrat has a 51-39 point edge.

Now think what it might be once health care reform is passed !!! And it's looking increasingly likely that this will happen -- even with a public option plan of some sort.

Ralph

GOP playing "political games"

Some pretty harsh words for the GOP:

"The Republican leadership in the House right now is constantly trying to play a political game" and only interested in the next couple days of headlines.

That was Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (Republican-Calif.) speaking. He went on:

"The American people rightfully think the Republicans are just complaining, because we had power -- we had both houses of Congress and we had the presidency. What did we do with it? All of these changes that we could make to have improved our healthcare system we didn't do during the Bush years when we had both houses in Congress."

That, coming on the heels of former Senate Majority Leaders Bill Frist and Bob Dole coming out in support of health care reform, might not make a difference; but it does sound like a few party stalwarts are waking up to the fiasco that Boehner and Mitchell, and Limbaugh and Beck, are making of their party.

Ralph

The Republican base

The extreme opposition to Obama from the right-wing Republican base is ideology, not racism.

So says a survey done by James Carville's and Stan Greenberg's Democracy Corps. They used focus group techniques with two contrasting groups who both voted for McCain: (1) a group in Georgia identified as the Republican base and (2) a group of swing voters in Ohio, either independents or weakly identified with either party.

The results shows the GOP base as being motivated by a fundamentally different worldview than the McCain voters who are in the middle or on the Dem side -- and they see the country as being under a dire threat. Here are some excerpts from TPM:

"They believe Obama is ruthlessly advancing a 'secret agenda' to bankrupt the United States and dramatically expand government control to an extent nothing short of socialism . . . they overwhelmingly view a successful Obama presidency as the destruction of this country's founding principles and are committed to seeing the president fail."

. . . .

One thing that the firm makes clear, though, is that this is not about racism, but about ideology . . . "we gave these groups of older, white Republican base voters in Georgia full opportunity to bring race into their discussion - but it did not ever become a central element, and indeed, was almost beside the point."

The voters in these focus groups saw Obama as being deliberately out to destroy the American economy in order to undermine personal freedoms, and that the speed of his agenda was a part of this strategy: . . .

By contrast, Democracy Corps also interviewed a separate group of somewhat conservative-leaning swing voters [in Ohio], and these attitudes were not to be found. . .

"Conservative Republicans passionately believe that they represent a group of people who have been targeted by a popular culture and set of liberal elites - embodied in the liberal mainstream media - that mock their values and are actively working to advance the downfall of the things that matter most to them in their lives - their faith, their families, their country, and their freedom."

And who is the spokesman these GOP base voters most identify with? Glenn Beck, by a long shot -- more than Rush Limbaugh. In fact, there is a common fear for his personal safety because of his willingness to take on the "powerful liberal interests."

Read the entire report at:
http://big.assets.huffingtonpost.com/TheVerySeparateWorld.pdf.

Ralph

Specter speaketh

Just six months ago, Arlen Specter was a registered Republican senator.

Today, the converted Democrat (was it a genuine change of political belief or the knowledge he could not win against a more conservative primary challenger?) said that there's no working with the GOP:

"On the Republican side, it is no, no, no. A party of obstructionism. . . . You have responsible Republicans who had been in the Senate like Howard Baker, Bob Dole, and Bill Frist who say Republicans ought to cooperate. Well, they're not cooperating."

He gets extra points for saying it on FOX News.

Now let's see him bring his moderate Repubican pals (Snowe, Collins, Graham, Lieberman) along with him to vote FOR health care reform.

Come on, Arlen. Obama has promised to campaign for you, so do your part.

Ralph

Afghanistan

Well, it looks like the administration may be setting the stage for something other than just sending the 40,000 more troops that McChrystal says we need.

John Kerry (now Chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee) said yesterday that it would be "irresponsible" to send more troops when we don't know what outcome of the election recount will be.

Today on the talk shows, Rahm Emanuel said: "It would be reckless to make a decision on U.S. troop levels if in fact you haven't done a thorough analysis of whether in fact there's an Afghan partner ready to fill that space that U.S. troops would create and become a true partner in governing."

And then he added: The central question "is not how much troops you have but whether in fact there's an Afghan partner."

At least this stance takes the wind out of the Republicans' sails when they try to claim that Obama is weakening America by not going in with dominant forces.

What a change from the bush war thinking, which was more like: we will send troops and then "fix" the intelligence to show we need to.

Ralph

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/10/18/rahm-emanuel-no-troop-esc_n_325099.html

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/10/18/rahm-emanuel-no-troop-esc_n_325099.html