B12 Solipsism

When even Norman Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute is calling out Republican bs for the hypocrisy it is…

Any veteran observer of Congress is used to the rampant hypocrisy over the use of parliamentary procedures that shifts totally from one side to the other as a majority moves to minority status, and vice versa. But I can’t recall a level of feigned indignation nearly as great as what we are seeing now from congressional Republicans and their acolytes at the Wall Street Journal, and on blogs, talk radio, and cable news. It reached a ridiculous level of misinformation and disinformation over the use of reconciliation, and now threatens to top that level over the projected use of a self-executing rule by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

In the last Congress that Republicans controlled, from 2005 to 2006, Rules Committee Chairman David Dreier used the self-executing rule more than 35 times, and was no stranger to the concept of “deem and pass.” That strategy, then decried by the House Democrats who are now using it, and now being called unconstitutional by WSJ editorialists, was defended by House Republicans in court (and upheld). Dreier used it for a $40 billion deficit reduction package so that his fellow GOPers could avoid an embarrassing vote on immigration. I don’t like self-executing rules by either party—I prefer the “regular order”—so I am not going to say this is a great idea by the Democrats. But even so—is there no shame anymore?

[Click to continue reading Hypocrisy: A Parliamentary Procedure « The Enterprise Blog]

Amazing really, and if you have the stomach, see how often the Republican talking point is repeated in the next few weeks. I’d wager it will be repeated numerous times, even by the so-called “straight” media organizations¹.

1. not Fox News, in other words [↩]

Paul Krugman laughs at Rep. Paul Ryan’s Social Security Privatization shenanigans:

So, for a few weeks Rep. Paul Ryan was the toast of the punditocracy; his Roadmap was hailed as the serious Republican response to America’s fiscal problems. But it turns out, predictably, to have been a Potemkin plan: it wouldn’t balance the budget, even after two generations. What it would do is massively redistribute income upward, raising taxes and slashing benefits for most Americans, while providing huge tax breaks for the top 0.1 percent of the population.

Naturally, Ryan’s response to these revelations has been a hissy fit. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities — which has always, in my experience, been impeccably honest and careful in its work — does the point by point rebuttal.

But I’d like to follow up on small but revealing point: Ryan’s claim that diverting a substantial share of payroll taxes receipts into individual accounts does not constitute partial privatization of Social Security

[Click to continue reading Saving Ryan’s Privatization - Paul Krugman Blog - NYTimes.com]

But it does mean privatizing Social Security, just that particular phrase does not poll well, so the Republicans are careful not to use the phrase, and complain vigorously whenever the truth is pointed out.

As Ezra Klein points out, the sausage making of legislation is not that interesting nor memorable to most of the country. Results are much more important than process.

Here are some things that happened on the night the GOP pushed the Medicare Prescription Drug Benefit through the House of Representatives:

A 15-minute vote was scheduled, and at the end of 15 minutes, the Democrats had won. The Republican leadership froze the clock for three hours while they desperately whipped defectors. This had never been done before. The closest was a 15-minute extension in 1987 that then-congressman Dick Cheney called “the most arrogant, heavy-handed abuse of power I’ve ever seen in the 10 years that I’ve been here.”

Tom DeLay bribed Rep. Nick Smith to vote for the legislation, using the political future of Smith’s son for leverage. DeLay was later reprimanded by the House Ethics Committee.

The leadership told Rep. Jim DeMint that they would cut off funding for his Senate race in South Carolina if he didn’t vote for the bill.

The chief actuary of Medicare, Rick Foster, had scored the legislation as costing more than $500 billion. The Bush administration suppressed his report, in a move the Government Accounting Office later judged “illegal.”

Rep. Jo Ann Emerson, a “no” vote, spent the night “hiding on the Democratic side of the floor, crouching down to avoid eye contact with the Republican search team.”

Rep. Butch Otter, who provided one of the final votes after hours of arm-twisting from the Republican leadership, said, “I thought there was a chance I would get sick on the floor.”

Remember all this? Probably not. There wasn’t much reporting on it at the time. It wasn’t a major controversy, despite resulting in multiple official investigations.

[Click to continue reading Ezra Klein - Lessons from the Medicare Prescription Drug Benefit vote ]

Bottom line, Democrats currently have a majority in both House and Senate, so they should use this majority to pass health care reform. By 2012, hardly anyone will care how the bill got passed, just that it became law¹.

1. or it didn’t. The Democratic leadership has shown, time and time again, they lack the ruthlessness of the Republican leaders [↩]

A few interesting links collected March 2nd through March 6th:

• Rispondere al telefono in bicicletta costa caro, la multa di Milano – Foto | Polizia a Chicago, swanksalot by Flickr

• 

• Ted Williams on Jim Bunning | Richard Adams | World news | guardian.co.uk – Ted Williams, when he was still playing, would psyche himself up for a game during batting practice, usually early practice before the fans or reporters got there…hen he’d say, “Here comes Jim Bunning. Jim fucking Bunning and that little shit slider of his.” Wham!
• “He doesn’t really think he’s gonna get me out with that shit.” Blam!

You already knew that Jim Bunning (R-loser) is an ass, but it’s been confirmed, by no less a personage than Ted Williams:.

“Ball Four” (Jim Bouton)

Aside from being a politician of eccentric views, and not highly popular among Republicans, Bunning is best known as a skilled major league baseball pitcher of the 1950s and 1960s. He may not have been one of the great pitchers – measured by the standards of Warren Spahn or Bob Gibson, say – but he has the distinction of being one of the few players to ever pitch a perfect game in the majors. (A perfect game being one where no opposing batter reaches first base.)

"Here comes Jim Bunning. Jim fucking Bunning and that little shit slider of his."

There are more details of Bunning’s baseball career here – including Bunning’s appearance in the best book about baseball ever written, Ball Four, by Jim Bouton:

Ted Williams, when he was still playing, would psyche himself up for a game during batting practice, usually early practice before the fans or reporters got there.

He’d go into the cage, wave his bat at the pitcher and start screaming at the top of his voice, “My name is Ted fucking Williams and I’m the greatest hitter in baseball.”

He’d swing and hit a line drive.

“Jesus H Christ Himself couldn’t get me out.”

And he’d hit another.

Then he’d say, “Here comes Jim Bunning. Jim fucking Bunning and that little shit slider of his.”

Wham!

“He doesn’t really think he’s gonna get me out with that shit.”

Blam!

[Click to continue reading Ted Williams on Jim Bunning | Richard Adams | guardian.co.uk]

Seems like the Democrats are calling Bunning’s bluff, and forcing him to really filibuster, or shut up.

Although no final decisions have been made, Democrats confirmed it is increasingly likely that Democrats will force Bunning into an actual filibuster of unemployment insurance extension Tuesday night by repeatedly offering up unanimous consent agreements to bring the bill to a vote.

Although Members often threaten actual filibusters, they rarely materialize. Instead, lawmakers tend to rely on “Cadillac filibusters,” essentially stalling procedures that can be used to block legislation without having to actually stay put on the Senate floor.

Democrats on Tuesday signaled they have the resolve to remain in session throughout the night to force Bunning to abandon his cause. The American people “want an end to these games. And I hope that today we’ll see the end. If we don’t, we’re going to have to have a long, long night ahead of us to make the point that it’s wrong for one Senator to stop our people, our American people, from getting the help they deserve,” Environment and Public Works Chairman Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) said Tuesday.

[Click to continue reading Democrats May Force All-Night Session - Roll Call]

Jim Bunning has theoretically caved

Under increasing pressure from Democrats and members of his own party, Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky.) Tuesday night abandoned his one-man filibuster of a one-month extension to unemployment benefits and other programs.

In the end Bunning agreed to a deal allowing him one vote on an amendment to pay for the bill’s $10 billion cost. That proposal was offered by Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) last Thursday at the start of his filibuster, but Bunning rejected it because he feared his amendment would not pass.

[Click to continue reading Bunning Accepts Deal Allowing Benefits Bill to Advance - Roll Call]

Wouldn’t it be nice if the Democrats in the Senate learned from this? And forced all the obstructionist Republicans who are threatening to filibuster to actually filibuster?

I sincerely hope the professional gabbers seize on Senator Dick Shelby’s unrequited, forbidden love for Northrop Grumman and mercilessly ridicule him. How is holding up the working of the Senate to demand more political pork for Alabama going to be justified to his Teabagger masters? Even more importantly, wouldn’t be nice if this was the final straw that broke the back of the filibuster?

Gail Collins writes:

Normally, a senator who’s feeling testy will just put a hold on one presidential nomination, the way Jim Bunning of Kentucky did last year when he stopped action on the confirmation of a deputy U.S. trade representative because he was upset that the Canadian Parliament was considering a bill to ban the sale of cigarettes with candy flavorings.

I am not making that up.

Senator Christopher Bond of Missouri had a hold on the nomination of Martha Johnson to be the leader of the General Services Administration since last summer because he was ticked off with the G.S.A. over construction of a new federal building in Kansas City.

The agency kept saying it had responded to Bond’s questions, although perhaps the staff was slow in getting back to him since there was nobody in charge. But Bond held firm until the Democrats forced a vote this week. That naturally involved a great many delays, postponements, overrides and a passionate if incomprehensible speech by Bond, the highlight of which was: “Please bear with me. I know this is confusing.”

Then after many, many months of waiting and several days of total gridlock, Johnson was approved, 96 to 0.

That was a normal Senate procedure. Now Shelby has upped the ante with a blanket hold on everybody. His incredibly grave reasons were the desire to see that a defense contract for a new tanker is awarded to a bidder who will do the assembly work in Alabama. Also, he feels that a new F.B.I. facility for testing explosive devices should be conveniently located in Huntsville.

“If this administration were as worried about hunting down terrorists as it is about the confirmation of low-level political nominations, America would be a safer place,” said a spokesman for the senator.

[Click to continue reading Gail Collins - No Holds Barred - NYTimes.com]

Obstructionist, Party of No, these epithets are too mild for the Republicans in the Senate; Mouth-Breathing Idiots might be accurate, but doesn’t quite have the necessary zing. Got to think of a better phrase for these idiots – what say you?

A few interesting links collected January 30th through February 2nd:

• The Roman Army Knife: Or how the ingenuity of the Swiss was beaten by 1,800 years | Mail Online – The world’s first Swiss Army knife’ has been revealed – made 1,800 years before its modern counterpart. An intricately designed Roman implement, which dates back to 200AD, it is made from silver but has an iron blade. It features a spoon, fork as well as a retractable spike, spatula and small tooth-pick. Experts believe the spike may have been used by the Romans to extract meat from snails.
• 
• Hypocrisy Alert: 68 House Republicans Take Credit for the Economic Bills They Opposed | DCCC – Is this number higher by now? Wouldn’t be surprised

  The DCCC has unveiled the latest entries into the House Republicans Hypocrisy Hall of Fame, which has now grown to 68 Members. These Republicans have been caught trying to celebrate the benefits of projects they opposed in President Obama’s recovery bill, the 2009 Omnibus Appropriations bill, and the Omnibus Public Land Management Act.

A few interesting links collected January 18th through January 20th:

• Change of Subject: W.W.R.D? — What Would the Republicans Do? – [Republicans]

  now control the U.S. Senate, 41 votes to 59.The Democrats, based on this one very notable setback, seem poised now to attempt a strategy of retreat and appeasement, exactly as is being demanded by their harshest critics on Fox News. Evan Bayh, Barney Frank and the coalition of the pouty and lily livered seem to think voters in the fall will be drawn to the sight of their fluttering white flags.

• 

• Chicago Transit Authority urges commuters to report photographers | Photography is Not a Crime -

  The Chicago Transit Authority is so “committed to safety,” that it is urging commuters to report people committing “excessive photography/filming.” The sign posted inside the train stations places photographers on the same level as, say, a non-CTA employee walking the tracks or an unattended package or “noxious smells or smoke.”

  In other words, it accuses photographers of being possible terrorists or just suicidal maniacs.

  The problem is that these signs not only encourage commuters to dial 911 when seeing someone taking photos, which will tie up real emergencies, it contradicts the CTA’s own policy on photography and videography within train stations

• 

• Econundrum: 10 Eco-Apps for Your iPhone | Mother Jones – Econundrum: 10 Eco-Apps for Your iPhone

A few interesting links collected November 12th through November 14th:

• More on Franken Amendment, elitism… at StarkReports.com – In an effort to increase my ability to do this kind of reporting, I’ve exchanged contact information with several Democratic Press Secretaries. I’ve explained that I am a progressive news service and that my goal is to quench a thirst for timely progressive news… that it’s not enough to complain about Fox, Nedra Pickler, John Solomen or an inability to get your message out… that growing a progressive media requires cooperation from the news-makers that want to see the progressive media grow…

  Perhaps I’m too impatient… But the truth is that I’m having a really difficult time getting my calls returned from most offices.

  That’s something I’d understand if my web videos hadn’t been viewed nearly 500,000 times. But hell, it’s clear my work is reaching people, so it’s difficult for me not to see a certain form of elitism in the Democratic communications establishment.

• Hullabaloo That Commie Bastard Al Franken Broke the Rules – Are those Senators not insensitive to rape victims? It’s quite obvious that they are.

  The good news is that the Republican senators have learned their lesson:

  Privately, GOP sources acknowledge that they failed to anticipate the political consequences of a “no” vote on the amendment. And several aides said that Republicans are engaged in an internal blame game about why they agreed to a roll-call vote on the measure, rather than a simple voice vote that would have allowed the opposing senators to duck criticism.

  Right, they forgot to hide their misogyny. (Man, you let your guard down for one minute and those bitchuz are all over you.)

• 

• There is no time to be tactful – For fans of Mad Men it will prove difficult to learn of the story behind ‘Peace, Little Girl’ – a brutal 60 second television spot which first aired on September 7, 1964 – and not imagine the offices of Sterling Cooper. The ad was conceived by agency Doyle Dane Bernbach on behalf of President Lyndon Johnson, in an effort to kill off Republican candidate Barry Goldwater’s march to the White House. DDB, desperate for success with their first political client, threw 40 of their best men at the campaign and chose to aim for the jugular by capitalising on comments Goldwater had previously made concerning nuclear weapons. The following letter was written by DDB co-founder and legendary ad-man Bill Bernbach just months before the election, at a time when Goldwater had managed to regain the public’s confidence and the DNC had started to drag their heels.
• Blind Man’s Penis -John Trubee’s infamously great song:

  I got high last night on LSD My mind was beautiful, and I was free Warts loved my nipples because they are pink Vomit on me, baby Yeah Yeah Yeah.

  Stevie Wonder’s penis is erect because he’s blind
  It’s erect because he’s blind, it’s erect because he’s blind
  Stevie Wonder’s penis is erect because he’s blind
  It’s erect because he is blind

  Let’s make love under the stars and watch for UFOs
  And if little baby Martians come out of the UFOs
  You can fuck them
  Yeah Yeah Yeah.

  The zebra spilled its plastinia on bemis And the gelatin fingers oozed electric marbles Ramona’s titties died in hell And the Nazis want to kill everyone.

• 

A few interesting links collected October 1st through October 2nd:

• The Outfit: A Collective of Chicago Crime Writers: If You Wanna Win You Gotta Learn How to Play – The whole Olympics is going to be like this–a game in which Chicagoans will be made to feel like they should be emotionally invested when the real players will be behind the scenes: the guys with contracts waiting to be signed, and properties on the Olympic venue Monopoly board … Maybe the games will lose money on the whole, but some people, people on the inside, are going to make Benjamins by the bagful. These are the people who exaggerate the benefits, who make it sound like Chicago needs the Olympics more than the Olympics needs Chicago (a dubious claim if only because the IOC stands to make another half billion or so in television rights for summer games on US soil) so that you’ll support an endeavor that will line their pockets.
  

  One Billion Dollars

• Senator Helped Mistress’s Husband, Raising Ethics Flags – NYTimes.com – A Republican Senator and an ethical scandal? What a a surprise!”The senator also put his chief of staff at the time, who had raised concerns that Mr. Hampton’s activities could violate the one-year ban on lobbying, in charge of dealing with him.”
• 
• Michael Wolff on Rupert Murdoch | vanityfair.com – more than being about cost, [Rupert Murdoch's] strategy is about pain. What he is always doing is demonstrating a level of strength and will and resolve against which the other guys, the weaker guys, cower. He can take more pain than anybody else. While others persist in the vanity of the Internet, he will endure the short- or medium-term pain necessary to build a profitable business.

Texas Governor’s race is already amusing, even though it hasn’t officially begun yet

Charges of economic cluelessness and political hackery are flying in Texas as U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison challenges Gov. Rick Perry for the Republican nomination for governor.

The primary isn’t until March and the big bucks haven’t yet been spent on advertising, polling or voter-luring barbecues in this large and heavily Republican state.

But from the get-go the race has been fierce, even by the bare-knuckled standards of Texas politics. For instance, both sides have taken to posting attack videos on YouTube, referring to one-another as “Kay Bailout” and “Tricky Ricky.”

Mr. Perry, who appeals to the conservative wing of the party, took office in December 2000 and is already the state’s longest-serving governor. Ms. Hutchison, who was elected to the Senate in 1993 with 67% of the vote, is more moderate and considered one of the most popular officials in the state.

That makes for a high-profile battle, one that is often seen as a microcosm of the national debate within the Republican party over its future direction.

[Click to continue reading Gloves Are Off in Texas Race - WSJ.com]

What I’m hoping for is that the loser of this race of losers pulls a Joe Lieberman, and runs in the general election as an Independent, thus splitting the Republican vote.

No wonder I hate football, the overwhelming majority of coaches are Republicans, at both college and professional ranks.

During the 2008 campaign cycle, college and NFL head coaches (and their wives) contributed a total of $13,286 to John McCain and the Republican National Committee. From that same group, Barack Obama and the Democratic National Committee received just $4,600—half of it from Lovie Smith of the Chicago Bears and the other half from San Jose State’s Dick Tomey.

In all, 20 coaches active in the 2008 season gave to Republican candidates seeking federal office. Three donated to Democrats. This disparity is even more striking given that, among the individual donors in the ‘08 campaign cycle, Mr. Obama outraised Mr. McCain by more than a 5-to-1 margin.

Some coaches display their largely conservative instincts in non-financial ways. Jack Del Rio of the NFL’s Jaguars led the crowd in the pledge of allegiance at a Sarah Palin rally in Jacksonville last fall. Longtime Washington Redskins coach Joe Gibbs addressed last summer’s Republican National Convention. Lou Holtz fired up congressional Republicans with a pep talk in 2007 and recently flirted with running for Congress in Florida. Ralph Friedgen, the portly University of Maryland coach, good-naturedly called one of his Canadian players a socialist last fall.

There’s no evidence that coaches with a conservative bent are better coaches or more likely to get jobs. Football coaches aren’t the most diverse group, which may help explain their political similarities.

[Click to continue reading Why Your Coach Votes Republican - WSJ.com]

The reasons the Wall Street Journal opines as to why Republicans are pretty ridiculous¹: more marketing for the Republican brand, in my opinion, but you can make up your own mind whether Republican virtues translate onto the grid iron.

1. discipline, self-reliance, loyalty to core values – yeah, the Republicans I know and read about don’t fit any of these parameters [↩]

A few interesting links collected July 9th through July 10th:

• Think Progress» David Brooks: A Republican senator put ‘his hand on my inner thigh’ for a ‘whole’ dinner party. – “BROOKS: You know, all three of us spend a lot of time covering politicians and I don’t know about you guys, but in my view, they’re all emotional freaks of one sort or another. They’re guaranteed to invade your personal space, touch you. I sat next to a Republican senator once at dinner and he had his hand on my inner thigh the whole time. I was like, ehh, get me out of here.”

  That’s just creepy. And creepier that David Brooks didn’t make the Senator remove his hand, or otherwise stop him from caressing him.

• Extra, Extra – Chicagoist July 9 2009 – sunsets and Yeats

• 

• Bring island taste to your home | Frugal Village – photo by swanksalot

  Pineapple offers a sweet, tropical flair for summer dishes. It’s a good source of vitamin C

By a certain logic, exactly and completely true. Strangely enough, I blogged about one aspect of this back in 2004.

Barack Obama would probably never have become the Democratic Presidential nominee if he hadn’t first won the Senate race back in 2004… and there was a good chance that Obama would never have become senator if Jack Ryan hadn’t withdrawn from the election… and Jack Ryan wouldn’t have withdrawn from the election if the story had never broken about he and Jeri Ryan visiting swinger clubs… and his visits to swinger clubs never would have become public record if his wife, Jeri Ryan, hadn’t mentioned it in their divorce proceedings… and maybe Jeri might not have wanted to get divorced in the first place if Jack hadn’t tried to pressure her into sexual situations at swinger clubs that she wasn’t comfortable with… and maybe she would have actually gotten turned on that night back in 1997, and said “Yes” to swinging if only she hadn’t seen my bare naked ass.

I hate that someone (anyone) was adversely affected by simply going to a swinger’s club. Especially someone like Jack Ryan. But that pebble was dropped into the water here in New Orleans back in 1997 and it rippled until Jack Ryan’s campaign was doomed. Funny how much can happen… just by dropping a stone.

[From Obama's Presidential Bid Linked to Swinger's Club | Kasidie.com, April 2008]

As an aside, too bad the Chicago Tribune does not believe in permanent links to its archives, because I would like to read (and link to) the original Eric Zorn column. In 2004, every blog post was related to me reading the actual print edition of something¹ – yet the original article is lost to the ether now. Too bad, I’d like to revisit the complete article.

1. in this case, the Chicago Tribune [↩]

Scott Horton of Harper’s Magazine catches Condoleezza Rice speaking lazily, as if she were still bantering with the complacent White House press corp and not being questioned by young folks not yet part of the corporate system.

For eight years, Condoleezza Rice dealt with the Beltway punditry and the access-craving White House press corps. The reception she got, with a handful of exceptions, was fawning. Which leaves her totally unprepared for a return to an academy populated with the Daily Show generation: bright young minds with a very critical attitude towards the last eight years. In a meeting with Stanford students at a dormitory reception on April 27, the school’s former provost got off to a shaky start and ended in a train wreck. She may in fact have her last words in the exchange quoted back to her some day in a law court.

…

Rice insists that waterboarding is not torture. Why? Rice pulls a Nixon. It was not torture because the president authorized it. In Condiworld, apparently, “when the president does it, that means that it is not illegal.” What lawyer was advising Rice through this process? That’s a pressing question–the Senate Intelligence Committee suggests that legal counsel at the National Security Council was guiding her at every step–and evidently giving her some very peculiar ideas about the law.

(6) Whereas the Senate Intelligence Committee’s summary shows Rice giving authorization for waterboarding, Rice has a different recollection. “I didn’t authorize anything. I conveyed the authorization of the administration to the agency.” This is dicing things very finely. But I think I know how Judge Garzón will understand this: Rice just confessed to a focal role in a joint criminal enterprise. Nixon White House counsel John Dean, who has a lot of first-hand experience with the legal issues in play, had the same take: Rice just admitted to her role in a conspiracy to torture, a felony under 18 U.S.C. sec 2340A.

[Click to continue reading Condi’s Really Bad Day—By Scott Horton (Harper's Magazine)]

Ms. Rice should go to prison for her crimes against humanity, but doubt seriously if justice will ever be served on any of the Bush Administration criminals.