Ideological rage run amok

The terrible shooting spree in Tucson today occurred at Rep. Gabrielle Giffords' (D-AZ) first "Congress on Your Corner" event to meet and talk with her constituents. A federal judge, a 9 year old child, and one of Rep. Giffords' closest aides were killed, along with at least two others. A total of 18 were wounded, apparently by one man with one semi-automatic handgun.

Rep. Giffords herself is surviving after surgery for a through-and-through gunshot wound to her head; the bullet passed through her temple and out through her forehead, which gives her a better chance of survival than if it had involved the brain stem; but how it will affect cognitive function is not known at this time. Doctors are "optimistic."

Rep. Giffords was one of the Blue Dog Democrats whose late decision as a swing voter helped pass health care reform. The following day a glass panel in her Tucson office was shattered, and she received threats.

Another outcome was that she, along with 19 other Democrats, were "targeted" on Sarah Palin's Map -- a map of the U. S. on her PAC web site, with gunsight crosshairs targeting the districts of those who had narrowly won in areas that McCain/Palin had carried in 2008. They were "targeted" for defeat by a woman who trades on her prowess with a gun and who is urging people to take action against them. Giffords' name and House District are listed in a column along with the others who are targeted in these gunsights.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/03/24/sarah-palins-pac-puts-gun_n_511433.html

A 22 year old, obviously disturbed young man, who recently had to be barred from classes at a local college for unceasing disruptive behavior, has been taken into custody. His YouTube site is a hub of anti-government vitriol and paranoid-type obsessions.

I'm sure Sarah Palin didn’t mean someone should kill Giffords; the action she meant to incite was voting and working to defeat them at the ballot box — but did the nature of her use of the gunsight symbol add to the motivation of this crazy young man, who may not be able to distinguish between symbol and the real thing? It certainly didn’t help. Neither did all the other fear/hate-filled vitriol that fills the airwaves and internet these days.

The federal judge who was killed had in 2009 allowed a $23 million lawsuit brought by (reputedly) illegal residents against a local rancher to go forward. I know nothing about the merits of the case; but apparently the idea that illegal immigrants could sue a local land owner was just the latest proof that the government is against the "real Americans," to use Sarah Palin's 2008 campaign phrase. The decision created a backlash of outrage in Arizona. A local radio talk show host was urging audiences at the time to make threats to the judge and his family, such that they were placed under protection for a month.

It is not known whether the suspect had any connection with this case, but it's unlikely that he hadn't heard of it. The climate of ideological rage has run amok in this country, and nowhere worse than in Arizona -- fueled by their controversy over immigration control but fanned into white heat by politicians during the fall campaign.

The NRA didn't commit the murders. Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, and Rush Limbaugh didn't pull the triggers. All the local radio and internet bloggers who spew forth hatred and violence didn't kill these innocent people. But they contributed to the atmosphere.

Sick minds lead unstable people to commit awful atrocities. They don't need any encouragement. But our present climate of ideological rage run amok is encouragement.

Ralph

New team of Daley and Sperling -- what does it mean?

Obama's appointments of his new chief of staff, William Daley, and his top economic adviser, Gene Sperling, have garnered both praise and concern. Does this mean a further move toward the center? It certainly can't be said to further progressive causes. Or is it merely another example of Obama's pragmatism?

Matt Bai, political writer for the New York Times writes:

It's certainly fair to say that Mr. Obama seems to be repudiating the progressive theory of the election [*] rather than go to war with Republicans and big business. Mr. Obama intends to reset both relationships. And yet, if the appointments of Mr. Daley and Mr. Sperling portend some kind of ideological break from where the Obama White House has been the last two years, then it isn't entirely clear how.

[* By "the progressive theory of the election," Bai refers to progressives' belief that the midterm elections were lost for lack of populist conviction.]

Mr. Daley's politics are essentially indistinguishable from those of the man he replaces. . . . Both men are said to be pragmatists who care less about political theory than about getting things done, and progressives were never any happier with Mr. Emanuel than they are with the choice of his successor.

Similarly Mr. Sperling, who worked for Goldman Sachs before joining the Obama administration, may fairly be called a centrist theorist, but he's certainly no more of a centrist than his immediate predecessor, Lawrence H. Summers. . .

Mr. Bai asserts that the appointments' apparent shift "has less to do with ideology than with a theory of presidential power and how to use it."

E. J. Dionne said on NPR yesterday that Sperling could be thought of as a "progressive centrist," whatever that might mean. I'd like to think it means that his ideals are progressive, and he leavens his idealism with pragmatism, meaning in the current climate operating from a centrist position out of necessity, but willing to move in more progressive directions when possible. I like that.

Sheryl Gay Stolburg, also writing in the Times, says of Daley that he is "Blunt, yet charming, he is a skilled negotiator and smoother around the edges than . . . his predecessor, Rham Emanuel." Although Obama may have been seeking to improve his relations with business by choosing a top executive at JPMorgan Chase, those who know both the president and Mr. Daley well say that he is more pragmatist than ideologue.

Here's my guess: Obama has sized up the position he is in vis a vis Congress and has made the decision to follow Bill Clinton's playbook: move to the center and become more bold. So we should not expect to see any decisive progressive causes championed for the next two years, but we might see more decisive wielding of presidential power in dealing with Congress.

And, as Bai points out, this is a signal that Obama will take "his legislative priorities directly to the American people."

Or, to put it another way: the ideology may move a bit more to the center but it will be a stronger voice than we heard before. And it will be followed by more decisive action, more efficiency, less adversarial relationships with Congress, and a clearer position articulated.

Both Howard Dean and Joe Biden praise the Daley appointment. That helps. And many of us thought Bill Clinton's presidency was successful, given his similar "shellacking" in the midterm elections. Daley was Clinton's Secretary of Commerce; Sperling was Clinton's National Economic Adviser.

That's the positive side. On the other hand there are worries that they will pull the administration too far away from center-left toward the center, if not center-right. Daley opposed the health care reform, at least in the form it was passed. And Sperling was part of the negotiating team that gutted the Glass-Stegall Act in 1999, a change that many credit with leading directly to our current financial disaster.

It comes down to this: at this point, with this congress and this president and this economic climate and this level of unemployment, the best we can hope for is pragmatism that is really effective and doesn't move us away from the possibility of more progressive changes in the future. This might be enough to earn Obama a second term; and, with success as a pragmatist, and hoping for continuing internal chaos confusing the right, perhaps even gains in congress in 2012 -- we could set the stage for a better second term.

Ralph

Faux devotion to the Constitution

The new GOP majority in the House trumpets its devotion to the U. S. Constitution by (1) reading its full text from the floor of the House on the first day; and (2) instigating a new rule that says any bill introduced in the House must contain the section of the Constitution that authorizes such legislation.

OK. That's fine.

The trouble with the reading and the faux devotion to the document, as a New York Times editorial today points out, is that they did not read the original constitution. They read it as it has evolved today, but by obscuring this point they created the false impression that their devotion is to the original wording, to the "intent" of the founders.

Bullshit. If they had read the original version, it would have included:

1. The part where slaves "bound to service" are to be counted as three-fifths of a person;

2. The part where fugitive slaves cannot gain their freedom by escaping to a free state;


3. The part where ordinary citizens do not get to cast a direct vote in chooseing their senators;

4. The part where the right to vote does not include anyone of the female gender.

The United States Constitution is a remarkable historic document, creating an experiment in democracy that has endured. But the Constitution was not perfect, nor finished -- as these faux patriots imply that it was.

Those who decry the "interpretation" of the Constitution as next thing to treason are just blowing smoke. Part of its genius is that is has to be interpreted in each generation according to the times -- and this leads to an evolving, perfectable document.

Let's have a good history lesson for these new zealots. They're blowing smoke and looking in mirrors.

Ralph

McNothing flips again

Jon Stewart says it's just his inner cranky-old-man coming out. I think John McNothing is sliding into senility, and it may have to get worse before his family and aides intervene.

He took at least a moderate position on repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell -- until it looked like it actually had a chance, and then he flipped and destroyed any credibility he ever had by opposing exactly he had once said he favored.

He made a fool of himself, storming out of the Senate chamber during the vote, he was so mad.

Now, in an interview with Don Imus this morning, he flipped again:

"I think I have to do everything I can to make sure that the [impact on the] morale, retention, recruitment and battle-effectiveness of the military is minimized as much as possible. . . . It is a law and I have to do whatever I can to help the men and women who are serving, particularly in combat, cope with this new situation. I will do everything I can to make it work."

Is this damage control? Wanton flipping? Lost in a fog? More pouting? Trying to appear he has some importance in the matter?

I don't know. But my advice to Sen. McNothing: Just shut up. DADT passed in spite of your doing everything you could to defeat it. You have become irrelevant.

You can't just jump back in from of a parade you quit. Ask Newt.

Ralph

Already, the promises break down

On their first day in control of the House, the Republican leadership is already backtracking on that much-hyped promise to cut $100 billion in government spending.

Did we say $100B? Well, er . . . not exactly. That was a "hypothetical," aides now explain. Simply can't be done, others say.

Hypothetical?

"A Pledge to America," their manifesto of promises to the American people in the campaign, says this:

“We will roll back government spending to pre-stimulus, pre-bailout levels, saving us at least $100 billion in the first year alone.”

And as of yesterday, Speaker Boehner's web site still contained the link to his pre-election radio address in which he said:

"We're ready to cut spending to pre-stimulus, pre-bailout levels, saving roughly $100 billion almost immediately."

Doesn't sound hypothetical at all, does it? But so what? Politicians make promises all the time that they can't keep. Obama did it too. But this seems a little cynical to cite a specific figure, build your campaign around shrinking government, and then on the first day in power to say they didn't really mean it.

More fuel for the fire between the Tea Party freshmen and Boehner and between the Tea Party enthusiasts and the GOP.

And more reason to think that having lost control of the House may not be the worst thing that could happen to the Democrats.

Ralph

The power of negative spin

Some things just aren't worth the fight and are better left out rather than give your opponents free ammunition. Still it rankles that the likes of She Who Shall Not Be Named and her ilk, through innuendo and out right lying, can kill something that is worth while -- something that even conservatives would support if it had not been turned into a shibboleth to discredit the health care bill and Obama.

I'm talking about "end of life counseling," aka "death panels."

First, the House version of health care reform specifically included funding for doctors to spend the time to talk with and encourage their patients to make advance decisions about how they would like to be treated when quality of life can no longer be sustained.

The whole purpose of it is to encourage people to make THEIR OWN PLANS, with a signed directive to carry out THEIR wishes, rather than leave such decisions up to family and doctors who may not know the patient's preference or may have their own differing agendas.

The genius of the Republican perfidy in politics is that they know how to turn something good into something scary and paranoid, simply in order to gain political control over gullible voters.

So, She Who, etc. blathered about death panels and pulling the plug on grandma or on her Downs baby -- conjuring images of forced euthanasia and rationing of health care. The provision was dropped from the final bill.

Then it surfaced again last month in the regulations for implementing health care reform. And again "death panels" began to echo over the landscape.

The White House announced today that this language is being removed from the regulations.

The idea is sound, it is important, and we ought to be able to have it in there. But, as a practical matter, it isn't worth the price of the negative spin from the other side. What hurts most is that She Who, etc. can now crow about having got rid of the death panels. However, not specifically authorizing it won't prevent doctors from doing it as part of regular visits from their patients, as many do now.

Heck, it's done now on a routine basis in many hospitals when a patient checks in for surgery. Leaving it out doesn't prevent it; it just removes the encouragement that would have come from a separate item that could be billed for.

As our infamous governor Lester Maddox once said, to explain what was needed to improve our terrible prison system: "What we need is a better class of prisoners." What we definitely need to improve our political/governmental system is a better class of voters.

Or we need to unleash Joe Biden and allow him to go on TV 24/7 and say: "That's bullshit" until people start to listen and think.

Ralph

It's the money, stupid !!

Frankly, it is really a no-brainer, no-argument matter: Republicans demand tax cuts for the wealthy, despite all evidence that it does not work as a means of creating jobs or helping the economy.

And now there is a poll that shows it's not what the majority of the American people want, either. According to a 60 Minutes/Vanity Fair poll released yesterday, 61% would choose to increase taxes on the wealthy as a means of dealing with the deficit. Another 20% would choose cutting defense spending as the top priority. Both of these (combined 81%) are the opposite of what the Republicans are pushing.

So why do they keep trying to sell an unpopular policy that has been proven not to work?

Two explanations:

#1. It's the money. The wealthy and big businesses give politicians lots and lots of money to vote against higher taxes for the wealthy -- and against cutting defense spending.

#2. It's part of the Republican scheme to shrink the government. But this argument doesn't seem as explanatory -- because many of those same Republicans have been profligate spenders, as long as the spending serves special interests of the wealthy and the friends of the GOP.

No, I think the bottom line is: it's the money, stupid !!

And, thanks to the recent Supreme Court decision, that will only get worse.

Ralph

Health care

Republicans are fully aligned with their Tea Party freshmen's demand that every new bill introduced in the House must state what authority in the Constitution authorizes it. Infuriated by the health care reform requirement that everyone purchase health insurance, they intend not to let such things become law.

The courts are already hearing cases about health care, with conflicting decisions by different courts. Eventually it will be decided by the U.S. Supreme Court. It hinges, very simply, on the interpretation of the provision in the Constitution for the federal government to regulate interstate commerce. And that's just it: a matter of interpretation of the extent of a vague, general power.

I have a solution for those who oppose this requirement. If the objection is really to being forced to buy something, let's scrap that and design a health care system where everybody is given health care, and it's paid for by taxes. Even Republicans don't argue that Congress lacks the power of taxation. We could call it a single-payer plan, much like what other developed nations have -- even some of the less developed nations.

I would swap the commerce clause argument any day for universal, single-payer, government sponsored health care. It could even be very simple to set up: expand Medicare to cover everyone.

This idea is not new. They already rejected it and screamed "socialism." But it would solve the problem of interpreting the commerce clause and being forced to buy something.

Of course, their real objection is to "big government" that benefits the masses. Big government to benefit big business, the defense industry, and the wealthy is just fine. There's not going to be a meeting of minds on this one, I'm afraid.

Ralph

Sonny's legacy

As his eight year term as GA governor ends, Sonny Purdue's legacy may well turn out to be this: He left the state taxpayers saddled with the cost of paying off bonds on three pet projects for his home county that will amount to nearly $4 million annually for the next 20 years. That totals about $80,000,000.

This, at a time that an austerity budget forced the state to lay off teachers and limit health care for needy citizens.

What projects?

(1) The "Go Fish" aquatic wildlife and fishing education center. That sounds essential, doesn't it? Do Georgians really need a $14 million facility (total cost with debt service: $19,275,260) to teach them how to fish?

(2) New horse and lifestock facilities at the Georgia National Fairgrounds. Umm. State Fairs are important. But would you travel to Houston County to see their prize pigs? Well, it is in the middle of the state. Anyone can get there within a few hours by car. And don't forget: 135,715 Georgians actually live there. Price tag: $25 million.

(3) Purchase of the Oaky Woods conservation property at a price of $2,874 per acre that sold six years ago for $1,600 per acre. Many legislators protested that the price was too high, but the governor pushed for the purchase, pushed really hard. Oh, yes, the property is adjacent to land owned by the governor, and the plan was for a multi-use development project, obviously set to increase surrounding land values as well. We borrowed $17.8 million for that purchase.

What's the defense? These things will benefit the state in the long run; and, besides, all governors do it.

Tell that to the teacher who lost her job or the parent with a sick child and no affordable health care.

Mike Luckowich's cartoon depicts his everyman couple, who loom large, looking down at a tiny pair of shoes. The caption: "Purdue left shoes for the next governor to fill." And, in the background, an even tinier Nathan Deal saying, "I promise to grow into them."

Of course you will, Little Nathan. Your history promises that you already know how to manipulate state agencies to benefit your own private business interests, even when you sat doing nothing in Washington all those years. We expect more of the same from you.

Ralph