My New Year's wish: surprise me

Over a month of no blogging! I think the reason is simple: nothing shocking has happened, and I am waiting for the new era to begin.

Sure, things have happened that are worthy of comment, but my capacity for shock and outrage and snark are seriously depleted.

I mean, really: is it surprising in the least that a candidate for the GOP chairmanship would send out an offensive "parody" disk to republicans around the country this season? We really don't need any more ammunition in the You Pasty Old White Boys Don't Get It And You Never Will argument, and yet, they just keep delivering. Also not shocking: the possibility that this stupid, stupid move will actually enhance his chances for the seat.

Oh but never fear, rank-and-file, your intellectual leadership has a plan! And it includes Twitter! Because Twitter and Republican are two proper nouns I'd like to see forever linked.

Bush, meanwhile, pardons a man whose father's campaign donations might effectively kill congressional republicans Eric Holder/ Marc Rich outrage machine. So then he decides to take the pardon away, within days of issuing it. Was anyone honestly taken aback by this? Has the Bush administration ever properly vetted anyone?

Congressional republicans are demanding "transparency" and there's talk of them shutting down the president-elect's stimulus/recovery plans if they don't pass GOP muster. They want "fiscal responsibility" again. Of course they do. Whatever.

Also, turns out that OSHA hasn't actually been in the business of occupational safety and health for about... 7 years. Question for the 10% of American workers who're injured on the job each year: does it surprise you that your government's chief concern has been not bugging your employer? Thought not.

Then there's the coal ash spill in Tennessee: turns out that no matter how "clean" your coal operation is, the ash still contains toxic levels of arsenic, lead, barium, chromium, and manganese; tens of thousand of pounds per year. Also turns out that the TVA asserted for days after the spill that the sludge was not toxic. Shocking, shocking shocking. Not.

And the situation in Gaza is terrifying, Bush is in Crawford riding his bike, and Condi isn't on a plane yet. Although, even if she got herself over to Riyadh or something, I don't know how much leverage she has left. And all it leaves me with is a sad sense of deja vu. It's been a long time.

So I'm waiting for a new year, and some new stories to open. A whole new cast f characters who maybe won't be so goddamn predictable and obvious and stupid.

(I had an hour or so of dismay over the Rick Warren thing, but ultimately I realize that the man I voted for reaches out in just this way, compromises in just this way, recognizing that the people who admire Warren and didn't vote for Obama and supported prop 8 need a president, too. Note to Barack, though: it'd be swell if you invited Rev. William Sinkford to the White House before his term is up this summer. Just sayin'.)

I'm waiting patiently for New Years Eve champagne, and then I'll be waiting in a cozy wash of ahhhhhh for January 20, 2009. After which I am certain there'll be lots to get worked up about, and hopefully a few surprises.

"Breathtakingly Hairbrained"

Yglesias:

There are very few members of congress with whom I’ve ever had the opportunity to discuss a substantive matter of public policy. But as it happens, one of them — the one with whom I’ve had the second-longest exchange — is Mike Pence (R-IN) who I’ve seen on television today repeatedly discussing the Republican Study Group’s “plan” for the financial crisis. And I can tell you this about Mike Pence: he has no idea what he’s talking about. The man is a fool, who deserves to be laughed at. He’s almost stupid enough to work in cable television.

Ah, but not only is not working for cable, he's proposing "crisis" legislation. Let's see what Wonk Room has to say:

The phrase “breathtakingly hairbrained” comes to mind when considering the apparent tax cut proposal. We know that for the group authoring this proposal, tax cuts for the rich and corporations are the answer to every problem. But even the administration, which has relentlessly imposed that agenda for eight years, has recognized that the well was dry on that front for this crisis. But it gets worse. Not only is this another tax cut for the rich, it appears to be one that is dead-aimed at doing much more harm than good — abolishing the tax on capital gains.
[snip]
The idea of insuring mortgage backed securities almost seems like a cynical ploy to pretend to be doing something when actually doing nothing. The idea is that the government would sell holders of mortgage backed securities insurance against losses—and that it would charge such premiums that the government wouldn’t lose money on the deal. That’s akin to selling homeowners insurance in New Orleans after the dikes broke.
[snip]
What they propose on deregulation isn’t clear, but the fact that they’re even still talking about “deregulation” when it was slipshod regulatory oversight that got us into this mess shows a profound misunderstanding of what’s going on. One rumored target is the Sarbanes-Oxley regulations which, in fact, impose accountability on Wall Street — not something we want to do away with right now.

The whole thing is well worth a read.

I can't decide what the stupid to evil ratio is here. I suppose it depends on the member. Boehner, for instance, is 99% evil, with a touch of stupid to get him through the door.

Party before Country

Krugman: "Demolition Accomplished"

From his NYT blog:

How did we get to this point? It’s the culmination of many past betrayals.

First of all, we have the Republican Study Committee blowing things up with a complete nonsense proposal — solving the crisis with a holiday on capital gains taxes. How is that possible? Well, if a party runs on economic nonsense for 25 years, eventually many of its foot soldiers will be people who actually believe the nonsense.

More specifically, though, the failure to get a deal reflects the betrayals of the Bush years. Democrats weren’t going to trust Henry Paulson, because behind him they see the ghost of Colin Powell (and Paulson’s “all your bailout are belong to me” proposal, aside from being bad economics, showed an incredible tone-deafness.)

And after the way the Bushies and their allies double-crossed the Democrats again and again in the aftermath of 9/11 — demand national unity, then accuse you of being soft on terrorists anyway — there’s no way Pelosi and Reed will do the responsible but unpopular thing unless the Republicans agree to share ownership.

So what we now have is non-functional government in the face of a major crisis, because Congress includes a quorum of crazies and nobody trusts the White House an inch.

As a friend said last night, we’ve become a banana republic with nukes.

Light 'em up

I've sent emails to my rep, Speaker Pelosi, and my two senators. I will spend some time calling congress, too, as soon as I finish this post.

Don't think for a minute that staff isn't tallying calls and emails from taxpayers, and calculating the political consequences of their next move. Start here to find your rep's contact info.

I am so deeply angered by this situation. Talking the other night about what this means about our government, some of the terms tossed around and weighed were Communism, Fascism, Oligarchy, Hegemony.

Maybe it's because I've been reading Reformation history, but I keep coming back to Feudalism. You know, the princes (Wall Street) deplete the royal stores with their building cathedrals or fighting wars or whatever, and the Monarchy digs the country out of a hole by raising taxes on the serfs (you and me).

And yes, Senator McCain and my Republican friends, you better damn well believe that I want taxes raised on the Masters of the Universe that got us into this disaster. If I have to pay for their malfeasance, I want their responsibility to be substantially larger.

Some bright chatter from various corners this morning:
Brad at SN! shares his congressional talking points.
Matt Stoller has been communicating with members, and hopefully they fight as hard as they email. This one is my favorite:

I also find myself drawn to provisions that would serve no useful purpose except to insult the industry, like requiring the CEOs, CFOs and the chair of the board of any entity that sells mortgage related securities to the Treasury Department to certify that they have completed an approved course in credit counseling. That is now required of consumers filing bankruptcy to make sure they feel properly humiliated for being head over heels in debt, although most lost control of their finances because of a serious illness in the family. That would just be petty and childish, and completely in character for me.

Krugman calls shenanigans.
Josh Marshall has questions about Phil Gramm's once and future role in all of this.
Robert Reich has a pretty good list of conditions.

Get on the phone.

Updated post- stupid crackers

(sigh) I removed the previous quote and link, because until the source is verified in someway, I've decided I don't feel good about it.

h/t still goes to John Cole, who has been all over Palin's bullshit this week.

Instead of the unverified Palin allegations, I'll direct you to some hot hot Stephen Colbert.

This gets funnier by the minute

"It has been brought to the school's attention that a picture of the front of our school, Walter Reed Middle School, was used as a backdrop at the Republican National Convention. Permission to use the front of our school for the Republican National Convention was not given by our school nor is the use of our school's picture an endorsement of any political party or view."

- Donna Tobin, Principal, WR Middle School

Update:

By late afternoon, McCain's campaign was characterizing the use of the picture as a way of illustrating the candidate's call "for public education reforms that empower parents and students before bureaucrats and labor unions," as spokesman Tucker Bounds put it.

Yeah. That's what it was.

But Tamar Galatzan, who represents the North Hollywood area on the Los Angeles Board of Education, was having none of that. She said she was "flattered that Sen. McCain chose to use a school from my district as backdrop to his remarks" but that more federal resources for education seems "not a priority for the McCain/Palin ticket."

Hi, I'm a member of the "Hateful Left"

Over the course of the Bush administration, I've repeatedly started and repeatedly stopped an essay or a letter on a theme that feels so huge to me, I can't ever get it concisely into words. I'm not sure I can today, but speeches at the Republican National Convention have picked scab after scab, and so I think I'll try to get this theme out, let it be my summation of two weeks of conventions.

My theme has always started with the words George Bush doesn't want to be my president. This week I have come to the conclusion that John McCain doesn't, either. Once I would have thought that, as different as we are, he'd at least assume that "willing patriots" included people like me. At the end of a full week of speeches by his surrogates and supporters, I am left with the inescapable conclusion that that John McCain, if he existed, is now too beholden to the radical community organizers who get out the ideological vote. The rest of us, you moderates and faithful liberals, you whiners, you 70% of the American public, have been cast aside.

Once the campaign of 2000 ended, when George W Bush took the White House still promising to be "a uniter, not a divider", his method for unity was creative: all citizens who disagreed with anything he said or did simply ceased to exist. All decisions were explained with The American People want..., any challenge to a decision was met with, The American People want.... Each time he made a decision, he chose the path guaranteed to be met with the greatest controversy and opposition, and then sneered at any opposition for not trusting his judgement for the sake of The American People.

(Except in his first stem cell decision, summer of 2001. This time, he made a wishy-washy 50-50 call, because The American People had to include both Nancy Reagan and James Dobson.)

When the March For Women's Lives brought over a million people to the National Mall in support of a vast array of policies: comprehensive sex-ed, access to contraception, canceling the deadly global gag rule, and yes: protecting Roe v Wade, We didn't expect the president to acknowledge us, really. He was up at Camp David, anyway, and even though he always acknowledges the comparatively tiny annual anti-abortion demonstrations in DC, it would have been a stretch to think he'd give us a wave.

What we didn't expect was that the media would for the most part ignore the sheer massiveness of the March, or that Karen Hughes would be trotted out to respond. The American People, she said, understand since 9/11 that the US is different from terrorists because we value a Culture of Life.

When challenged her words later, she said she had never compared pro-choice citizens to terrorists- which is true, strictly and carefully speaking. What she did, and what she was not challenged on, was sweep our very citizenship out from under us by excluding us from The American People.

The Bush administration, with back up from the press, did this consistently throughout his first term. There was no thoughtful opposition to the invasion of Iraq: there were Anti-War groups and Pro-America groups. Meaning that my position was, by default, Anti-American. Dixie Chicks CD burning rallies? Pro-America! Get a camera out there! March on the White House by veteran's groups? Never happened, as far as the administration and the media were concerned. A recent analysis of guests on the major news outlets during this period found that opposition to the invasion was consistently presented by foreigners. That is, Americans presented to us by the news media almost uniformly supported the invasion.

It's like being in a dream, where you keep trying to scream, but no sound comes out. Is it any wonder so many of us took to the streets?

This rhetorical exclusion continued apace until finally, Bush redefined the terms. After the election of 2004, rather than attempting to pretend that The American People wanted anything in unanimity, he said he would work with everyone, if they supported his goals. Which meant not Goals, like dealing with Social Security in such a way that the government meets its responsibilities, but specific policies: private accounts for all.

At least this time he was honest.

After the summer of 2005 (Camp Casey, Katrina, and falling poll numbers- trifecta!) surrogates like Mary Matalin, rather than ignoring us entirely, went on the air to offer cheap analysis and faux pity. It's just so sad, these people. They're so angry. Bush began to at least acknowledge that some of The American People disagree with him, on a lot. But that does not mean his style of governing changed, nor has the rhetorical exile for most of us. The press continues to court the fiction that opposing Bush on anything is "leftist" or "extreme", even when poll data belies that.

The party George Bush leads enjoys this kind of with us/ against us bravado, and has no desire to change it. In fact, the party's strength has always been in hardening that rhetorical divide- there is no political gain, for them, in respect for differences, in bipartisanship, in synthesis of ideas.

The mythology of John McCain lies in his perceived rejection of such division. Working across the aisle, all of that. This week, however, a week when he presumably needed to both fire up the Base and make an appeal to moderates and independents, the convention has been about nothing except defining, once again, the The American People who attended his convention and debasing the rest of us.

President Bush, confined to a few minutes from a remote location, still managed to remind the delegates why the campaign mattered: The Hateful Left is obviously still a threat, and John McCain won't let them win.

(Which is interesting, because on what may be described as McCain's two signature issues over the past 4 years- immigration and torture- he capitulated not to any Hateful Left, but to the nationalist right and President Bush, respectively.)

Romney sneered at us. Guiliani made fun of us. Sarah Palin skinned us like a recent kill. The Senator from Arizona? He made some noise about respecting Obama for what he's accomplished, but it rang empty when followed up with the willing patriots line. Let's face it: Patriot means, to them, whatever they've decided it to mean this week. Willing Patriot means supporting whatever it is they want to do this week. If they win, we are headed straight to rhetorical and practical exile, once again.

McCain does not have the Rove-built get out the vote organization that Bush did. He's counting on those red meat delegates and the Focus on the Family email list to win this thing. They do not want to hear that the other side has a rightful seat at the table, nor will they work to elect anyone who won't harden the divide.

I look forward to packing away my giant Sharpies and giving up the need to march in the streets. I'm hoping that we can have an administration for all Americans, one that won't pretend that faithful opposition and valid counter arguments don't exist, that won't seek to define everything outside of their preferences as "fringe", "left", "hateful", "angry". I am hoping that under such a presidency, I would lose the scream stuck in my throat feeling, and actual work could be done in the federal government, for the betterment of our country.

John McCain, like George Bush before him, does not seek to be my president. To my way of thinking, he doesn't deserve the office.

Who's more scary: the racist "base" or the guys at the top?

The other night at a barbecue, a man asked me, regarding Obama:

Do you really think he'll live through his first term?

I answered first, I certainly hope so. Second, and more importantly, I don't think fear is a rational basis for making such a decision, so I don't contemplate that question very much.

It is very likely true, as Dave Neiwert posits, that when Obama takes the office, there will be a far-right backlash, sort of the '90s on steroids. It is also possible that we will avoid another Oklahoma City, and that presidential security is strong enough to thwart assassination. After all: meth-heads plotting assassination last week were arrested before they could leave their hotel room.

But Neiwert has a frightening post today on those meth-heads: why, when the FBI wanted them charged with conspiracy to assassinate Senator Obama, the Rove appointed US attorney declined.

Amy Goodman was charged this week with Conspiracy to Commit Riot for the crime of stepping off the convention floor and into the street.

These men had a plan and the equipment to carry it out, the fed has weapons and testimony to convict with, and the US Attorney declined?

Another funny thing: When a black man in prison sent a threatening letter containing baby powder to John McCain, Troy Eid brought down the full force of the law, complete with press conferences and public declarations that "We won't stand for threats of this kind in Colorado."
But when it’s a claque of white men with rifles, disguises, and all the accoutrement of a conspiracy – as well as open admissions to it – Troy Eid isn’t worried. After all, they just a bunch of harmless, tweakers, right? … Just like little Timmy McVeigh.
But then, when you’re a Karl Rove operative promoted to deliver justice the Republican way, as Troy Eid is, that’s the way the scales fall. As Marcy reported at the time, Eid in fact nearly didn't get the Colorado job because of concerns about "improper lobbying."
His failure to take this matter seriously is itself a serious matter. When law-enforcement officials let this stuff slip by, they send a dangerous message to other would-be plotters out there. And next time, they may in fact be more competent.

I really don't know what else to say.

Media morning with Palin

Gloria Steinem gives one of the best rebuttals to the idea that Sarah's somehow a feminist pick over at the LA Times.

Palin's value to those patriarchs is clear: She opposes just about every issue that women support by a majority or plurality. She believes that creationism should be taught in public schools but disbelieves global warming; she opposes gun control but supports government control of women's wombs; she opposes stem cell research but approves "abstinence-only" programs, which increase unwanted births, sexually transmitted diseases and abortions; she tried to use taxpayers' millions for a state program to shoot wolves from the air but didn't spend enough money to fix a state school system with the lowest high-school graduation rate in the nation; she runs with a candidate who opposes the Fair Pay Act but supports $500 million in subsidies for a natural gas pipeline across Alaska; she supports drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve, though even McCain has opted for the lesser evil of offshore drilling. She is Phyllis Schlafly, only younger.
[...]
So far, the major new McCain supporter that Palin has attracted is James Dobson of Focus on the Family. Of course, for Dobson, "women are merely waiting for their husbands to assume leadership," so he may be voting for Palin's husband.

Over at Salon, I have to disagree when Shapiro says:

Palin is unquestionably the Republican vice-presidential nominee least likely to be confused with Dick Cheney, in either a duck blind or the Situation Room. Even as an angry "hockey mom," it is impossible to imagine her browbeating CIA analysts to concoct new rationales for invading Iraq. It seems equally implausible that in a McCain-Palin administration, the vice president's office would be an outside-the-law power center running its own foreign policy. Palin is not a traditional vice-presidential nominee, but if elected she is apt to mark a return to a modest conception of the office that had been the butt of jokes for nearly two centuries.

I can easily imagine Palin bullying people into line. Less capable women have been very successful bullies over the past 8 years- Monica Goodling, anyone?

D. Aristophanes gets serious for a moment with a straight-up assessment at Sadly, No! And while I'm not sure the majority of voters appreciate the nuance, he makes a good point:

- They overplayed the ‘community organizer’ slam. The party that wants to shrink government says service outside of government is worthless? The only service worth anything is as an agent of the state? The Dems need to start talking up community work, church work, charity work, volunteering to coach youth sports, etc. Palin and McCain say Little League coaches and scout leaders and food drive volunteers aren’t doing anything useful?

Meyerson on the golden oldie theme of the evening, at the WaPo blog:

This is Republican Chestnut Night. The speakers’ attacks on the Democratic Party thus far are the very same that Ronald Reagan made 28 years ago, or Richard Nixon 40 years ago. “It’s time to stop the spread of government dependency!” Mitt Romney just vowed -- as if welfare reform had yet to happen. Romney chastised the government in Washington -- even the Supreme Court -- for charting a liberal course, seemingly forgetting who’s on the Court and which president put them there. A more partisan view of history hasn’t been heard from since Stalin wrote Trotsky out of the history of the Russian Revolution.

Over at the local paper, I ventured into the comments thread where people are IN LOVE with Palin's support for abstinence-only sex ed, because it's THE PARENT'S RESPONSIBILITY! And unwilling to question whether Sarah failed in her responsibility to teach her own daughter about birth control and the wisdom of waiting until you're an actual adult to become a parent.
Spoiler alert: if you support comprehensive sex-ed, you're obviously a nazi.

More than one webizen is wondering when teen pregnancy got so popular with the conservative base, by the way.

From emailed comments

The best way to save the Republican Party now is to destroy it. In the marketplace of ideas, social conservatism is a viral infection contaminating the GOP. It represents an evolutionary dead-end whose logical conclusion is fascism if not outright totalitarianism.

Is it not obvious that the imposition of the evangelical ideology--any fundamentalist ideology for that matter--lies in direct opposition to a free people in a democratic land? Our Constitution, specifically the separation of church and state, no longer serves as a bulwark against the morality police, who seek to impose faith-based notions such as creationism upon those of us with rational minds.

Social conservatives aim to constrain freedom of thought, freedom of choice, freedom to pursue happiness. These freedoms live at the heart of an entrepreneurial and economically strong America.

No doubt, the diktat the social conservative movement wishes to impose upon ALL us Americans is antithetical to a free market system, and therefore exists as hypocrisy within the Republican platform. Privatize profits, socialize losses, and make religion the opiate of the masses.

Indeed, this has been a dark eight years of Orwellian doubletalk. Enough! I’m voting for Libertarian Bob Barr.

Another Sarah! update

John Thune (R- echo chamber) is sharing with Brokaw right now that America will really get a sense of Sarah Palin when she gives her speech tonight.

Really? Even though the speech was written for Romney?

Not anticipating that McCain would choose a woman as his running mate, the speech that was prepared in advance was "very masculine," according to campaign manager Rick Davis, and "we had to start from scratch."

On the other hand, every now and again they get caught on an open mic:
Hear that "moderates"? Peggy Noonan and Mike Murphy think Palin's a cynical, unqualified, image pick.

Update: Noonan would like to make clear (go to WSJ, I don't have the link) that when she called Palin's nomination "bullshit politics", she was merely hurting for dear Kay Baily Hutchison. Also note: Noonan is a water-carrying wanker.

Regarding Sarah

If you want to keep up on Palin news, Talking Points Memo is probably the best place to bookmark. Such news is slow in coming, because the campaign has decided that shielding her entirely from the mic is their best bet right now, but there are muckrakers around the country digging up bits. Bits which go entirely unanswered by the campaign, which may be as telling as the bits themselves.

I'm going to quote one of their posts at length here, because it's a very very good one. Submitted to Josh from a friend:

Campbell Brown isn't the story - people are underestimating her, as they always have. No, the story is that Tucker Bounds went on national television without material to answer what is maybe the simplest, most straightforward follow-up question any reporter can ask: "What's your evidence for that assertion?" And I suspect that the reason they canceled Larry King is not to punish CNN (it doesn't work that way) it's that they still couldn't come up with an answer to the question by the time his show aired.
Now look at this comment from McCain honcho Steve Schmidt to Katie Couric last night: "Members of this campaign went to off-the-record lunches with reporters today, and they were asked if she would do paternity tests to prove paternity for her last child. Smear after smear after smear, and it's disgraceful and it's wrong. And the American people are going to reject it overwhelmingly when they see her."
First of all, that's the first time I've heard anyone in the campaign/political press throw out the notion of paternity tests. So Schmidt is to blame for bringing that issue into the mainstream. If anyone is smearing the candidate, it's Schmidt. This is as cynical a tactic as I've ever seen in politics.

Update: I made the mistake of turning on the teevee and checking the web at the same time, and I'm about to vomit.

The teevee is giving me (predictably) a slew of surrogates explaining why American Women Will Love Sarah Palin, and the "journalists" are buying into the mommy-wars-blame-the-media shit.

Meanwhile: why the fuck aren't they asking whether she has a preacher problem? What about whether she has a fringe-freak secessionist problem?

This party needs some cocktails

Or something. Or maybe they're all out at the cocktail bar right now. Dubya is speaking, he was introduced by Laura. The crowd looks thin and their enthusiasm lackluster. For every shot of a cheering loon in a cowboy hat, there's another of a yawn, or stillness.

And Cindy McCain didn't seem to like Laura's speech much, btw.

Raymond K Hessel

From our intrepid attorney, Aristodemus, posted on kos:

For those of you who aren't familiar with 42 U.S.C. Section 1983, it is the cornerstone of civil rights lawsuits under federal law (civil rights lawyers feel free to jump in -- I've only been on the wrong side of these actions). Paraphrasing the statute loosely, any governmental actor who, acting under color of govermental authority, deprives a person of their civil rights, is in deep, deep shit. If memory serves, Rodney King's $3.8 Million settlement with LAPD was pursuant to an action under Section 1983.
Can you imagine being a civil rights lawyer at this moment of history? Glorious. Every one of them woke up this morning feeling like Raymond K. Hessel. Imagine how they feel. Today is the most beautiful day of their lives. Their breakfast today tasted better than any meal you and I have ever tasted.
Amy’s breakfast probably tasted pretty good, too.

Told you so

Rick Davis, campaign manager for John McCain's presidential bid, insisted that the presidential race will be decided more over personalities than issues during an interview with Post editors this morning.
"This election is not about issues," said Davis. "This election is about a composite view of what people take away from these candidates."

They won't run on issues because they can't run on issues: all of their positions are proven failures. So they're hoping you'll like their outfits.

Rick Davis is on my teevee right now, reminding me how mavericky John McCain is. And if by "mavericky" you mean stubborn and irresponsible, sure. I'll give him that.

A Moment of Silence for the GOP

The party is over.

The party of Abraham Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, even Ronald Reagan, but most especially George Dubya Bush, is dead.

Let us bow our heads in a moment of silence.

Okay, moment's up.

Remember when we were afraid of them? Remember when Karl Rove was the most brilliant man ever conceived? Remember when Democrats voted for war, condemned Moveon.org, and made Harry Reid Senate Majority Leader for fear the almighty Karl Rove would smite them with his evil genius?

Remember the permanent Republican majority?

Well, that's all over now.

The GOP has been in critical condition for some time. Republican Congressman Tom Davis admitted as much, way back in May, when the traditional media was still distracting itself with concern that Democratic Party might disolve into an all-out Civil War because we had two extraordinary presidential candidates and a bit of option anxiety.

Said Davis:

The Republican brand is in the trash can...if we were dog food, they would take us off the shelf.

No doubt today's Republican Party looks back fondly on those days, when the GOP brand was merely in the trash can instead of the coffin.

Last week, we witnessed the rebirth of the Democratic Party. It was a week of all-stars laying out a bright, bold vision for America's future.

Michelle Obama gave us the picture of the all-American family of the 21st century.

Hillary Clinton gave us a history lesson of women's suffrage and the Democratic Party, culminating in that moment when we could all celebrate 18 million cracks in a glass ceiling that surely will be shattered in my lifetime.

Bill Clinton reminded us of all that is possible when a Democrat who believes in science and education and civil rights and equal rights sits in the Oval Office.

And Barack Obama gave us a reason to be proud again, to hold our heads up high and say, "You're damn right I'm a Democrat."

And then, the next day, John McCain gave us Sarah Palin.

The jokes write themselves. In fact, it must be difficult to be a writer at The Onion or The Daily Show or The Colbert Report. What could you possibly say that's any funnier than the headlines?

The Republican Party is so desperate this week that President Bush would rather pay attention to a natural disaster than play politics at the Republican National Convention.

That's pretty damn desperate.

In one weekend, 100 issues surrounding Governor Palin emerged. Read Bobo2020's comprehensive list.

And that was just the weekend.

The Republicans have become so desperate they are now accusing the Democratic Party of sexism.

Carly Fiorina, the disgraced former CEO of Hewlett-Packard, had this to say:

[I am] appalled by the Obama campaign's attempts to belittle Governor Sarah Palin's experience. The facts are that Sarah Palin has made more executive decisions as a Mayor and Governor than Barack Obama has made in his life. Because of Hillary Clinton's historic run for the Presidency and the treatment she received, American women are more highly tuned than ever to recognize and decry sexism in all its forms. They will not tolerate sexist treatment of Governor Palin.

She further condemned Obama for daring to compare his responsibilities as the head of a national presidential campaign with Palin's staff of 50 when she was the mayor of Wasilla, Alaska.

In other words, the Democratic Party is sexist for telling the truth. The party that supports equal pay and reproductive freedom is sexist because it dared to suggest that Palin's "executive experience" as the mayor of a town of 8,000 -- a town that apparently she left in worse shape than she found it -- does not compare with the national and international experience of the Democratic ticket.

That's pretty desperate.

And, as noted by ksh01:

CNN is reporting that John McCain has canceled today's scheduled interview on Larry King due to Campbell Brown's interview with Tucker Bounds yesterday! Holy Shit. This is imploding.

Remember when John McCain called the media his "base"?

This is the end. This where the Republican Party dies. All that is left now is the small group who believes the earth is flat, global warming is a hoax, oil drilling will save our economy, and, oh yes, abstinence-only education works.

Or not.

There will be no permanent Republican majority. There will be no continuation of Reagan's legacy.

Even if Governor Palin removes her name from nomination to spend more time with her -lawyers- family, is there any Republican in the country who would volunteer to be the sacrifical lamb who was second choice to Governor Palin?

I think not.

Goodbye, Republican Party.

Rest in peace.

Cross-posted at DailyKos

The militarization of St Paul

The raids on DFHs from Food Not Bombs and the like was followed on Monday with tear gas and pepper spray, heavily armed cops marching in formation and herding what looks like anyone out-of-doors into impossible corners, arrests of journalists including Amy Goodman and at least one AP photographer, buzzing helicopters and big black humvees- a rather impressive show of force to bring out for a constitutionally protected display of assembly and speech. Greenwald has a ton of key links in his post: video and audio, local and web-wide coverage, so best to visit him for the particulars.

I've been at major marches, and I cannot imagine how I's have avoided trouble if police were lobbing tear gas and herding us into corners for arrest. But then, the police don't seem to have been there to keep people out of trouble. They seem to have been there to fight a preemptive war, on crazy dirty fucking hippies and the journalists who cover their presence.

While there is no accounting for crazy, and sure it's possible that a few people may have been drawn to St Paul to create some havoc, it is simply not believable that the city was under the kind of serious threat this kind of presence would warrant. I don't know much about St Paul's mayor or its police force, but I do know that the FBI was there, and so it seems obvious that the heightened state of alert was their doing. Perhaps the St Paul police were really convinced that there were large-scale plans for violence and anarchy. Perhaps the FBI is, once again, the president's private police force.

Is it me, or do the FBI's weekend raids remind anyone of Tom Delay calling out Homeland Security to track Texas legislators?

What is the advantage to the GOP from this kind of abuse of power? It's highly unlikely that any march would garner much national coverage, the media has been focused on hurricanes and Sarah Palin, why worry about a bunch of DFHs in the streets?

I think the lunatics at the head of the republican party, lacking any issue positions that would go over with the majority of Americans right now, are pushing more fear of change. They aren't getting enough traction with "Obama's black, and maybe his church is scary". So they're hoping for a scene that will recall the late '60s, and put the fear of hippie radicals in every middle-aged mind. That's why they keep dragging up Ayer's name, even though there is no there there. That's why surrogates were openly speculating about floor fights at the democratic convention, and whether the scene would be another Chicago '68 melee.

As it turns out, we on the dem/liberal side do conduct ourselves fairly well, and last week's convention was a hue success. But if they can still scare people with images of war in St Paul, well, why not give it a try?

I really hope that the sheer number and randomness of the gassing and arrests backfires. And I hope that if the '60s spring to the American voters minds, the images remembered will be of police dogs and water hoses, and bullets flying into crowds in Ohio.

When the Grand Old Party comes to town

College students, hide your laptops and whatever you do, don't stay with a bunch of friends in a single house. Because freedom of assembly is not guaranteed to dirty fucking hippies.

Jane Hamsher and Glenn Greenwald are in Minneapolis, and when word got 'round of SWAT raids on 5 DFH houses, they took their cameras and hit the streets.

Black clad, heavily armed officers entered without warrant, handcuffed occupants and laid them face down on floors for up to 45 minutes. Laptops and political materials confiscated, no charges filed, except for two people who will be charged with "conspiracy to commit riot", a vague statute which has, apparently, never been used up to know, and which will almost certainly face a constitutional test in the courts after this weekend's raids.

Glenn's post has video and links to local coverage. Jane has more.

I was at an end of summer pool party yesterday, and talking with a man who's political cynicism was palpable. You know the drill: both parties corrupt, no difference, we're screwed. I made a rather impassioned plea for practical engagement over cynicism: of course we can screw it up if we win, on any number of fronts and in any number of ways. The point is to try, and to put your support behind the candidate who lays out ideas that you believe are most likely to give good results.

"But it doesn't bother you that they can record all of your email and collect all of your data and spy on you without reason and," etcetera.

Of course that matters to me! It matters deeply to me! Which is why I cannot fathom allowing the party that has worked so hard to strip us of constitutional protections to retain power.

This weekend's raids underscore this for me, in dramatic fashion. Police in Denver may have behaved badly with protesters, and the DNC may have been overly aggressive in keeping the scene media-friendly for the candidate.

But the RNC will preemptively attack anyone who may pose a political threat: through political prosecutions approved by the justice department, and by raiding groups whose crime is, say, non-violent political protest.

The RNC is criminal. Their use of local and national law enforcement is criminal.

Wondering what kind of media coverage this story will get.

Why does God hate Republicans?

Here they are, trying to protect marriage and man's right to plunder, and yet: on the heel's of the anniversary of Katrina, Gustave is headed for land.

WaPo:

Republican officials said yesterday that they are considering delaying the start of the GOP convention in Minneapolis-St. Paul because of Tropical Storm Gustav, which is on track to hit the Gulf Coast, and possibly New Orleans, as a full-force hurricane early next week.
The threat is serious enough that White House officials are also debating whether President Bush should cancel his scheduled convention appearance on Monday, the first day of the convention, according to administration officials and others familiar with the discussion.

via TPM:

"The Republicans can't seem to get a break when it comes to August and when it comes to the weather," said Rove, a FOX News analyst. "I know this is being thought a lot about in Washington and at the White House and discussed and I suspect they will monitor it carefully and figure out what to do."

And Greg says,

Yeah, Katrina (which hit in August 2005) was really rough on those Republicans, no question about it.

I was in Crawford, Texas, when Katrina hit. And I watched him fly overhead on his way to Arizona, where he presented McCain with a cake that both of them discarded after the photo op.

And unlike Bush and McCain, the people on the ground in Crawford that day were sorting batteries and blankets and non-perishable foods, loading buses and vans for immediate delivery to New Orleans.

I love New Orleans, really great memories of that city. So Katrina felt personal to me- self involved white woman that I am.

And if- and I say if- if the convention next week is in any way adversely affected by a storm like Gustav, I will take it as a sign that karma or the gods and goddesses have some scores to settle.

You could take it as a random act of weather, sure. But as a feminist ACLU member, I've been taking blame for years, and I would love th chance to spread it around.