Americans flock to Toyota Prius

At least Detroit is finally moving in the direction of what Americans want to buy instead of telling them what they ought to buy. Detroit may have been wrong as often as Dick Cheney and that's not easy to do. Prius sales shot up 69% in 2007.

Americans bought more Toyota Prius hybrid gas-electric hatchbacks last year than Ford Explorer sport-utility vehicles, the top-selling SUV for more than a decade.

(h/t to J.B.) Read More......

The difference between the Clinton and the Obama campaigns

When Hillary Clinton's people want to hit you hard, you'll never see it coming... or going. When Obama tries to go after you, you'll know it before he does (i.e., it'll be a bit clumsy and less-than-effective). While I'm divided on Hillary's harsh tactics against Obama in the primaries, that kind of take-no-prisoners politics is exactly what we need, and often lack, in the general election. I'm just not sure I like to see it done against fellow Democrats.

Take the recent spate of subtle, many would say racially-tinged, knocks the Clinton camp has been throwing at Obama. They've talked about Obama "shucking and jiving," about how Martin Luther King was a great man but couldn't have done it without President Johnson, about how the idea of a black man being president is a "fairy tale," and then there's the Clinton folks' penchant for lacing far too many conversations with a veiled reference to Obama's teenage drug use (aka young black male on drugs).

Now, the Clinton people will be the first to tell you that race was NOT what they meant in any of the above instances. And that may be true, though it's a tough stretch. On the shuck and jive thing, it's a phrase used to describe slaves. As for MLK, Hillary basically took the accomplishments of America's most famous black man down a notch because Obama was implicitly comparing himself to King. On the fairy tale thing, I didn't interpret it to be a racial thing, but lots of people did. And finally, the drug thing. It's a great smear in and of itself, since Obama admitted his youthful indiscretion long ago, but there's that added little zing of the public thinking "young black male, drugs." In all of the cases, race is there. Why? Because it hurts Obama in the polls, in my view, every time America remembers that he's a black man rather than a man who, oh yeah, happens to be black.

Much more analysis after the jump...

And there is a difference. Think of it this way. You have friends who are white, black, Asian, gay, and disabled. Do you refer to them - do you THINK of them - as your black friend, your gay friend, your disabled friend? Probably not. Of course you know that each has that particular trait, but it's not how you define them - it's practically an after-thought. The more that Obama's race is an after-thought, the better I suspect he does in the polls (I still think race played a role in New Hampshire). In any case, at the very least, it probably doesn't help Obama with most of the white (and non-black) vote to constantly remind people that he's black.

Oh but it gets better. The way the Clinton campaign has framed these issues, and the debate surrounding them, if Obama engages in a tit-for-tat with Hillary, all he will do is remind people that he's black (by saying "no my campaign is NOT about race" Obama is still talking about race while saying he's not), and he'll be reminding people, or educating them for the first time, that he dallied with drugs as a kid (e.g., "Hillary should stop the personal attacks about my youthful drug use") - it's simply impossible to respond to Clinton's attacks, and denials, without further the discussion about the very topics Obama doesn't want us to talk about.

It's a tactic I used when I launched DearMary.com in early 2004 in order to educate the world about the fact Vice President Cheney has an openly lesbian daughter (while it was known in gay circles for years, the media would generally refuse to mention the fact that Mary was gay). After the site was launched, that all changed. How? Because Mary's defenders in the political world and the media kept saying, publicly and loudly, how awful it was that I was publicly talking about her being a lesbian. I went on TV show after TV show to discuss whether it was okay to launch a Web site talking about the fact that the vice president's daughter was a lesbian. Well, at that point, I'd already won. With every bit of criticism I received, the story was out there even further.

And that's the pickle for Obama. When Hillary criticizes him for injecting race into the campaign (or brings up the drug thing), all Obama can do is take the hit or respond and start talking about race (or drugs), which makes people think about the very issues Obama would rather avoid. Read More......

AMERICAblog Podcast: Episode 12

Joe and I just recorded a 25 minute podcast as a post-NH election update. In this episode, we look at increasing nastiness between Hillary and Obama; upcoming primaries in Michigan, South Carolina, Nevada and Florida; the ongoing turmoil in the Republican primaries; and a troubling election lawsuit in Nevada.

You can listen to the podcast by clicking here. For those who don't know, a podcast is really just a radio show. Click the link and your computer should play it automatically, assuming you have speakers and your volume is turned up.

As always, you can subscribe to the AMERICAblog podcast via iTunes here, or you can subscribe to the podcast's RSS feed here. And you can listen to any of our old shows via either of the two links in the preceding sentence. Read More......

Get drunk, turn gay

I could have told you that. Read More......

Bush too weak to walk the walk in Middle East

Bush has been big on talk when it comes to democracy, but despite what he says in America, he's been terrified to speak as boldly with American "allies" in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia and Egypt are both holding bloggers in prison so we ought to be hearing something from the man who loves talking about democracy, shouldn't we? Even in Bahrain, the US could not even accept a letter from a human rights activist without extended debate. Even then, Bush went on to praise the local government despite the lack of democratic reforms.

Bush can talk all he wants about democracy but it's obvious to the world that he's a hypocrite who has little interest in democracy. It's the same old Bush that we already know, which is all talk and no action. What leverage does he even have with discussing democracy? He's running a trashed economy that is burdened with debt and addicted to oil. Even Wall Street is in the Middle East begging for cash. It's not as though he can use the US as a shining example of freedom and democracy, now that he's crossed all of the lines and spies on American citizens. Our own human rights record - including in neighboring Iraq - is not much of an example either. Are we ever going to see him walk the walk? Read More......

Iraq de-Baathification "reconciliation" bill

The recent passage of new de-Baathification regulations by the Iraqi parliament is potentially a big deal, but in none of the articles I've read can I find a vote tally. Major news outlets all report that the bill passed with "barely more than half" of the legislators present, and because of the parliamentary rules, a fair amount of legislation can pass the Council of Representatives (CoR) with a "simple majority" -- i.e., a majority of a quorum. Since only half (of 275 members) is required for a quorum, it's possible that as few as 70 (or roughly 25%) of the CoR passed this, which would hardly be the reconciliation victory US leaders are claiming.

The only info I've seen on Sunni reaction is that Mutlaq (leader of the National Dialogue Front, the smaller of the two major Sunni parties and a relative hard-liner) walked out of the vote, which certainly seems to be a sign that Sunnis don't think this actually helps them. I haven't seen any major Sunni politician endorse it, and reportedly the bill was drafted (and is being hailed by) Sadrists, which makes it pretty unlikely that it will lead to real reconciliation as opposed to misleading press releases. It's no fun being the one to always question stated gains in Iraq, but at first blush this looks like the Iraqi version of the "Clean Skies Act" or something -- calling a piece of legislation something good to hide that it actually sucks. In any case, it's really frustrating not to be able to see who voted for what in the reports about this. It could really indicate any number of things, but it's impossible to determine the reality from the initial reports. Read More......

Support Mark Pera (IL-03)

Donate to Mark Pera safely via ActBlue.

Mark Pera is a progressive who will let Nancy Pelosi be the Speaker she really wants to be. He is challenging establishment Democrat, Cong. Dan Lipinski, in the upcoming Democratic primary. Some background on Lipinski from Markos:

"Since slipping into office, the younger Lipinski has frustrated progressive constituents with a less-than-liberal voting record. He is opposed to stem cell research and a woman’s right to choose, earning him a zero-percent score from Planned Parenthood and NARAL. His ACLU rating is one of the lowest for any Democrat outside of the South, partly because of his support for the Protect America Act, an update to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that the ACLU says "allows for massive, untargeted collection of international communications without court order or meaningful oversight by either Congress or the courts." Lipinski has not done much to end the war in Iraq either, voting with 85 other Democrats to pass an emergency supplemental appropriations bill that lacked a withdrawal deadline."

Please help us, and a coalition of other blogs (FireDogLake weighs in as well), get 5,000 total contributions for Mark Pera by January 21, 2008. He's already got around 2,300 contributions, so with all of your help we can show Pera that the netroots supports real and better Democrats.

Donate to Mark Pera safely via ActBlue. Read More......

Wash Post's John Solomon to become executive editor of the Moonie paper

Gee, no one saw that one coming. The blogosphere has been saying for years that Solomon was a biased right-wing hack. And now he goes and takes over the Republicans' largest print propaganda organ, the cult-run Washington Times. Enough said. Read More......

Romney wants more handouts for Detroit

Now it's Mitt's day to talk about handouts. Until Detroit can show they know how to compete and hire Americans, forget it. We have a long way to go until we get that point and there are much more pressing issues for the country. It may not be hunting season, but it's obviously pandering season.

Note to Mitt: It's not 1950 anymore so quit thinking Detroit is going to rescue the US economy. Read More......

Democrats for Romney (freaking hysterical)

Another bit of genius from actor/comedian Andy Cobb and his cast of thousands. A bit of background: Markos started the ball rolling with his campaign to get Michigan Dems to vote for Romney in the primary.

Read More......

Antarctica is starting to melt because of climate changes

The Washington Post informs us today that ice sheets in Antarctica are starting to melt -- but no one expected these ice sheets to be melting. Here's the money quote:

Climatic changes appear to be destabilizing vast ice sheets of western Antarctica that had previously seemed relatively protected from global warming, researchers reported yesterday, raising the prospect of faster sea-level rise than current estimates....

"Something must be changing the ocean to trigger such changes," said Rignot, a senior scientist with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "We believe it is related to global climate forcing."

More from the article after the break.

Not good. And, this is somewhat unexpected:

Climatic changes appear to be destabilizing vast ice sheets of western Antarctica that had previously seemed relatively protected from global warming, researchers reported yesterday, raising the prospect of faster sea-level rise than current estimates.

While the overall loss is a tiny fraction of the miles-deep ice that covers much of Antarctica, scientists said the new finding is important because the continent holds about 90 percent of Earth's ice, and until now, large-scale ice loss there had been limited to the peninsula that juts out toward the tip of South America. In addition, researchers found that the rate of ice loss in the affected areas has accelerated over the past 10 years -- as it has on most glaciers and ice sheets around the world.

"Without doubt, Antarctica as a whole is now losing ice yearly, and each year it's losing more," said Eric Rignot, lead author of a paper published online in the journal Nature Geoscience.

The Antarctic ice sheet is shrinking despite land temperatures for the continent remaining essentially unchanged, except for the fast-warming peninsula.

The cause, Rignot said, may be changes in the flow of the warmer water of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current that circles much of the continent. Because of changed wind patterns and less-well-understood dynamics of the submerged current, its water is coming closer to land in some sectors and melting the edges of glaciers deep underwater.

Read More......

Iran confrontation: all smoke, no fire

There's been extensive discussion about the "confrontation" between US and Iranian navies in the Persian Gulf last week, and I've refrained from commenting thus far because the details have been murky, at best. I was suspicious of the initial furor simply because routine contact between "opposing" ships happens *all the time* in the Gulf, and this really doesn't seem like it was anything unusual. It's just that it sound like a big deal when you don't know it's a common occurrence. Despite hyperventilating initial reports, it turned out that US government accounts were exaggerated, the US officers didn't think it was a big deal at the time, and the US tape was likely not an accurate portrayal of the incident. Pretty disgraceful, not to mention misleading.

The comparison to the USS Cole is one that I've been hearing a lot, but it's not really a helpful analogy, and here's why: the Cole attack was carried out by terrorists, i.e., there was nobody for us to hit back against. Were an Iranian navy ship to suddenly decide to randomly carry out a suicide attack against a US ship, we'd bomb Iran back to the stone age, and of course they know that. There's absolutely *no* incentive for them to do such a thing, which is why we can coexist all the time in the Gulf with their ships. Iran is absolutely not going to attack us (at least not openly) because they're a state, not a terrorist organization. So while they *could* have done something to the ship, it's so extraordinarily unlikely that to hype it like it was a close call or something seems pretty disingenuous of the administration. Read More......

Clinton ally seems to hit Obama's teenage drug use, then apparently lies about it

I hate to be constantly harping on Hillary because I'll be happy regardless of who gets the nomination on our side (and I still harbor concerns about how well Obama will fight back against the GOP machine in the general election). But. I have a hard time watching the Clinton folks beat the crap out of Obama with personal attacks, then deny it. The latest incident, the African-American billionaire president of BET who said the following about Obama, then denied that he was insinuating Obama's teenage drug use:

"To me, as an African American, I am frankly insulted the Obama campaign would imply that we are so stupid that we would think Hillary and Bill Clinton, who have been deeply and emotionally involved in black issues — when Barack Obama was doing something in the neighborhood; I won't say what he was doing, but he said it in his book — when they have been involved," Johnson said.

Obama wrote about his teenage drug use — marijuana, alcohol and sometimes cocaine — in his memoir, "Dreams from My Father."

Johnson later said his comments referred to Obama's work as a community organizer in Chicago "and nothing else. Any other suggestion is simply irresponsible and incorrect," he said in a statement released by Clinton's campaign.

Right. Because Obama's work as a community organizer would be something so horrible, so nasty, that Johnson simply couldn't mention it in polite company. Give me a break. We all know what Johnson was doing, he was launching the same personal attack on Obama that numerous other Clinton campaign workers have launched. I'm really astounded that the Clinton people are interested in dredging up dirty laundry about Obama because there's an awful lot of dirty laundry to go around, some of it fresh. I suspect the Clinton people are counting on Obama being too nice to "go there." They'd better hope they're right, because they keep opening the door, and some day Obama might finally walk through. And the last thing we need is to have both our top candidates severely damaged walking into the general election. Read More......

Monday Morning Open Thread

Is this the week for Mitt's big comeback? He's in full pander mode and even outdoing himself in Michigan. Just want those Republicans to keep fighting and tripping over themselves.

Ok, let's just get started. Read More......

What happens when the American consumer stops consuming?

Read my lips.

The impact of rising gasoline prices “is just profound on middle- and lower-income families,” said Mr. Kohut of the Pew center. “Our surveys are showing one of the lowest levels of satisfaction with national conditions in any recent presidential election year. You have to go back to 1992 to get a lower number of people saying the national economy is excellent or good.”

Will Bush II cause Bush I-like problems for the presidential elections? Americans are still buying as much gas as ever (gas needs to go much higher for that to change) but they are buying less of most other goods. High end and low end retails are seeing less business complementing signs of cutbacks in personal spending spreading, the first possible decline since 1991. The economy has stayed afloat thanks to the American consumer but the run appears to be over. Americans love to spend, so someone is going to pay the price at the polls for this inconvenience. Dick Cheney, wrong again. Read More......

Citigroup: $20 billion more write downs, 20,000 jobs gone

At least Prince (former CEO) who dragged the company into this situation is sleeping well at night with his comfortable retirement plan. Isn't that what America is all about? Screwing up so badly that you lose a Fortune 500 company billions, force tens of thousands onto the streets and you retire without a care in the world? Nobody bothers to ask for that money back since it was all perfectly legal, right?

We should all be so proud of this great time in American history. No one is ever wrong, except for the schmucks in the middle. I'm sure Citi already has a nice plan to buy another failed subprime lender so they can avoid even more taxes that will be picked up by the middle class.
UPDATE: CNBC reporting Citi write downs could be up to $24 billion, with a $15 billion cash injection from Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal who is already the largest shareholder. Read More......

A song about Mike Huckabee and clemency

Read More......