The Plum Line

Adam Serwer of the American Prospect is guest blogging on The Plum Line this week.

This is a trailer for a documentary following four Muslim high-school football players in Dearborn, Mich. that looks pretty interesting and seems well timed, given recent controversies:

Some links to stuff we didn't get to today:

Another oil rig explosion in the gulf; luckily this one wasn't as disastrous as the last.

There sure are a lot of colorful characters on Obama's deficit commission.

Haley Barbour doesn't take the usual GOP line on immigration.

Karl Rove's group is dropping a lot of ads in Senate races.

Does Tom Perriello have a chance?

Positive signs regarding the Israel/Palestine talks.

David Frum writes about the apparent purges at conservative think tanks.

Melissa McEwan on that epic Vanity Fair profile of Sarah Palin.

Adam Serwer of the American Prospect is guest blogging on The Plum Line this week.

Michael Scherer, who generally writes good stuff, succumbs fully to village fever here:

It's not as if the White House didn't see this coming. After a meeting in December 2008 about the severity of the economic crisis, Axelrod pulled Obama aside. He recalls saying, "Enjoy these great poll numbers you have, because two years from now, they are not going to look anything like this." But even as Obama aides were aware of a growing disconnect, it didn't seem to worry their boss. Instead, the ambitious legislative goals usually trumped other priorities. Both in the original stimulus package and then in the health care and energy measures, the White House ceded most of its clout to the liberal lions who controlled the Democratic majorities in the House and Senate. That maneuver helped assure passage of reforms, but it also confirmed some of the worst fears about how Washington works. "I'd rather be a one-term President and do big things than a two-term President and just do small things," he told his team after Republican Scott Brown was elected Senator in liberal Massachusetts and some in the Administration suggested pulling back on health reform.

This isn't even a remotely accurate reading of recent history. Liberals wanted a bigger stimulus package and more infrastructure spending, the moderate Republicans in a position to kill the bill wanted a smaller package and more tax cuts. With health care, liberals wanted a (popular) public option, centrist Democrats in the Senate arbitrarily decided that it was more important to make liberals unhappy than to have a more fiscally responsible and effective health-care bill. In the House, liberals agreed to stronger restrictions on abortion then they wanted to appease the pro-life faction led by Bart Stupak.

With both bills, the point of leverage was somewhere in the center right, not on the left. Which is why liberals ended up making concessions, leaving Democrats feeling more ambivalent about their legislative victories than they should have been.

Furthermore, as an empirical matter, it's clear that it was compromising with Republican centrists by making the stimulus smaller that is hurting Obama and the Democrats now. As Jonathan Cohn points out today, had the stimulus been twice as big, "unemployment would have been more than a full percentage point lower than it is today. And it would be heading down faster." And the Democrats poll numbers would look substantially better.

"Liberal overreach" is a beltway rule of thumb, and in a country where more people identify as conservative than liberal, it's sure to be a crowd-pleaser. But that doesn't mean it's accurate. Liberals didn't "overreach;" they didn't reach far enough. They didn't reach far enough in part because they were unwilling or unable to counter silly beltway narratives of "liberal overreach" with empirical evidence. And now Democrats are paying the price, not just with Americans who are angry about the economy, but with their own frustrated, demoralized base.

Adam Serwer of the American Prospect is guest blogging on The Plum Line this week.

This video of Arizona GOP Gov. Jan Brewer's debate intro yesterday is making the rounds on the interwebs:

This is pretty painful to watch. But her later reaction (flagged by Rachel Weiner) to her Democratic opponent, Terry Goddard*, who hammered her for exaggerating the extent of crime in Arizona with tales of beheadings in the desert, is even worse.

Goddard states that:

What is hurting us right now economically are statements, false statements made by Jan Brewer, about how Arizona has become so violent, that we are a place of fear, and we have beheadings in the desert. Those are false statements. They cause people to think that Arizona is a dangerous place, and they don't come here, and they don't invest here. Because our governor has said such negative things about our state. And, Jan, I call on you to today to say, there are no beheadings. That was a false statement, and it needs to be called out right now.

Brewer avoided responding directly to Goddard, but she was hammered by local reporters afterward.

Now, it's hard to see hitting Brewer on SB 1070 affecting her chances too much. At the moment, she's still ahead of Goddard, by 57 to 38 percent according to Rasmussen; another poll taken in July found Brewer ahead by twenty points. Despite having her basic facts on immigration wrong, her handling of the matter is very popular in Arizona. Rasmussen finds that 65 percent of Arizona voters continue to favor the state's draconian immigration law, and another recent poll from the Morrison Institute found similar margins of popular support.

But here's what's shrewd about what Goddard is doing -- rather than attacking the law or its faulty empirical justification, he's merely questioning Brewer's personal honesty. That allows him to avoid running into the buzz-saw of SB 1070's general popularity, which is probably the only thing Brewer ultimately really has going for her. In March, before she signed the law, her approval rating as measured by Rasmussen was only 41 percent. Last year one poll even found her trailing Godard. Now her approval is at 65 percent. The problem for Goddard is, it's not clear that the Brewer campaign will agree to any more debates, especially after how this one went.

*Terry, not Steve Goddard. Thanks to the folks who emailed. 

Adam Serwer of the American Prospect is guest blogging on The Plum Line this week.

Massive Democratic losses in the House are past the level of conventional wisdom -- because of the state of the economy, a GOP takeover is almost at the level of foregone conclusion. Today Larry Sabato piles on:

Given what we can see at this moment, Republicans have a good chance to win the House by picking up as many as 47 seats, net. This is a "net" number since the GOP will probably lose several of its own congressional districts in Delaware, Hawaii, and Louisiana. This estimate, which may be raised or lowered by Election Day, is based on a careful district-by-district analysis, plus electoral modeling based on trends in President Obama's Gallup job approval rating and the Democratic-versus-Republican congressional generic ballot (discussed later in this essay). If anything, we have been conservative in estimating the probable GOP House gains, if the election were being held today.

But as Jonathan Martin reports, the Senate now looks like its in serious danger of flipping as well, with Senate races in Wisconsin, California, and Washington that looked fairly safe for Democrats tightening. Sens. Russ Feingold (Wisc.), Barbara Boxer (Calif.), and Patty Murray (Wash.) are looking vulnerable:

All three had won their last elections comfortably. And they were stockpiling the sort of money that flows readily to three-term senators.

But with the political environment turning toxic for Democrats and incumbents, Murray drawing perhaps her toughest possible opponent and Boxer and Feingold facing self-funders, the three Class of 1992 veterans are in the fight of their long political lives as the battle for control of the Senate moves from traditional battlegrounds to blue state venues.

Sabato offers some grim historical perspective, writing, "Since World War II, the House of Representatives has flipped parties on six occasions (1946, 1948, 1952, 1954, 1994, and 2006). Every time, the Senate flipped, too, even when it had not been predicted to do so."

Adam Serwer of the American Prospect is guest blogging on The Plum Line this week.

Pro-gay rights Republicans seem to be less of an oxymoron these days. Former Solicitor General Ted Olson is, along with Ted Boies, leading the fight in the courts against California's ban on same-sex marriage and schooling Fox News on what fundamental rights are. Former RNC Chair Ken Mehlman has come out and begun raising money for the pro-equality group Americans for Equal Rights. Conservative commentator Ann Coulter, who once called Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards a "faggot," is headlining a political convention for gay and lesbian conservatives, and Sen. John Cornyn, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, and Rep. Pete Sessions, the chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, will be appearing alongside other GOP elected officials at a dinner hosted by the Log Cabin Republicans. Even Glenn Beck has said he doesn't think gay marriage is a "threat to the country."

Not all of these cases indicate an instance in which Republicans have embraced gay rights or even marriage equality -- Cornyn and Sessions for example, are merely attending the event -- but it's hard not to conclude, as Marc Ambinder writes, that "it's becoming less of a stigma for bigwigs to associate with gays in the Republican Party."

That, according to Sam Stein, has some Democrats worried. Stein quotes a "prominent Democratic consultant":

"I think they have been put in a tough place by these conservatives and they should be," the consultant said. "There are a whole group of people who are to the left of them on gay rights. And they are Republicans. It should make them feel uncomfortable."

It should be the goal of rights movements to work themselves out of a need for existing. The fastest way to do that is to get both parties competing for your favor. And the point of this movement is to secure LGBT rights, not to get Democrats elected. The latter is merely a means to the former.

That said, I don't think Republicans are on the verge of seriously competing for the votes of people for whom gay rights is their first priority.

Adam Serwer of the American Prospect is guest blogging on The Plum Line this week.

Don't want to deprive you guys of your happy hour thread. Here's some interesting stuff we didn't get to today:

With Lisa Murkowski conceding, does Democratic candidate Scott Adams have a chance in the Alaska Senate race?

Ross Douthat on Iraq. Also, George Packer on Iraq.

New York tells schools to stop demanding students' immigration status.

Get the feeling like they're deliberately not calling this a stimulus?

The military is now bragging about air strikes in Afghanistan.

I find this heartwarming.

It's all you.

Adam Serwer of the American Prospect is guest blogging on The Plum Line this week.

Earlier this week, the Sept. 11 victims' families group "Where to Turn" sent out a letter expressing opposition to a planned Sept. 11, 2010 protest of the proposed Islamic community center near Ground Zero. "Such activities... disrespect the memories of our loved ones on this sacred day at this sacred site," read the letter, which was signed by the group's founder, Dennis McKeon, and posted on Politico.

Today, I spoke with Anti-Defamation League director Abe Foxman, who said he agreed with "Where to Turn" that the rally shouldn't take place. Among those slated to appear is Dutch MP Geert Wilders, whom the ADL has previously criticized for anti-Muslim bigotry. Foxman called the planned rally, and the recent incidents of anti-Muslim bigotry across the country, "un-American."

On the rally:

I would agree with [Where to Turn], this is not a place for political demonstrations, for advocacy, especially on 9/11. This is a place for memory, for families to be together, to memorialize their loved ones, [to have] a moment of reflection and introspection. For people with political agendas to use the place and the moment for their own interests and their own platforms is desecrating the memory and very sad. Especially if some of the families of the victims are asking, their view should be taken seriously and respected.

Foxman had some harsh words regarding the presence of Wilders, as well as for conservative blogger Pamela Geller and her group Stop Islamization of America, which is organizing the protest:

[Wilders] is a bigot, he's an anti-Muslim bigot, and one of the demonstrations being called for is being headed by someone who has an anti-Muslim agenda, often under the guise of fighting 'radical Islam.' The group vilifies Islamic faith and is engaged in [claiming] there's a conspiracy to destroy American values, which is nonsense. The organizer in fact has stated that part of her agenda is to help garner support for Wilders, who is a bigot, who has a long record of anti-Muslim bigotry.

Adam Serwer of the American Prospect is guest blogging for The Plum Line this week.

A recent report from the Pew Hispanic center shows illegal immigration declining by nearly 67 percent, reports Tara Bahrampour:

Between 2000 and 2005, an average of 850,000 people a year entered the United States without authorization, according to the report released Wednesday. As the economy plunged into recession between 2007 and 2009, that number fell to 300,000.

According to the report, the America's illegal immigrant population has actually decreased by 8 percent.

One more thing that's important to note from the report: "In addition to the decline in Nevada, three other Mountain states -- Arizona, Colorado and Utah -- experienced a decrease in their combined unauthorized immigrant population from 2008 to 2009." That contradicts the arguments of supporters of Arizona's SB 1070 and other border hawks that more restrictive laws are necessary because of a recent flood of undocumented immigrants. Although the report may still shed some light on why Arizonans feel that way: the larger trend is that, between 1990 and 2009, Arizona's share of the illegal immigrant population in the U.S. increased.

The report also offers more evidence that the criticisms of Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer and other Republicans about lax enforcement on behalf of the federal government are overblown, let alone hyperbole about an ongoing "invasion" from across the border. While careful to state that "the data in this report do not allow quantification" of all the factors involved in the decline of the illegal immigrant population, it lists major shifts in the level of immigration enforcement and in enforcement strategies," as one of the major factors that "undoubtedly contribute to the overall magnitude of immigration flows."

None of this is likely to change the politics of comprehensive immigration reform. Since completely "securing the border" is beyond our technical means, restrictionists can always call for more enforcement in lieu of actually working on legislation.

Adam Serwer of the American Prospect is guest blogging on The Plum Line this week.

Popular liberal firebrand Florida Rep. Alan Grayson is sending out a fundraising e-mail on behalf of Florida Democratic Senate candidate Kendrick Meek, as part of the Meek campaign's efforts to remind everyone just what a loyal Republican Charlie Crist used to be.

The subject line, "President Palin?," recalls Crist's praise for his former party's one-time vice presidential nominee:

"She'd do a great job." That's what Charlie Crist said about Sarah Palin as President of the United States. If that doesn't tell you where he stands,then I don't know what does.

Crist may want us to forget he's a conservative Republican, but the past keeps coming back to haunt him.

That's just one reason I'm supporting Kendrick Meek. Kendrick understands that you don't send politicians to Washington to flip flop--you send public servants there to get things done.

You know where you stand with Kendrick because he doesn't change his values and beliefs based on which way the political winds are blowing.

The task for Meek is to persuade the voters who went for Obama in Florida that by supporting him, they won't be ensuring a victory by Republican candidate Marco Rubio, particularly since at least one recent poll shows Rubio with a large lead in the three-way race. Part of that is making Crist look like a less palatable alternative to Rubio, which means reminding Democrats of Crist's past statements as a Republican. As part of the same effort, Meek's campaign just put out a radio spot featuring audio of Crist calling himself a "Jeb Bush Republican" and stating "I'm about as conservative as you can get."

Being hit from the right and the left at the same time has left Crist in a tight spot -- he isn't even willing to say whom he'll caucus with if he makes it to the Senate.

Full e-mail (with contact info redacted, per Post policy) after the jump.

Adam Serwer of the American Prospect is guest blogging on The Plum Line this week.

The message the White House wants you to take away from President Obama's Iraq speech last night is that the president is respectful and grateful for the troops' sacrifice. In hindsight, it was probably a mistake to view this speech through an ideological prism -- while the president made sure to remind everyone that he kept his campaign promise to end the war, most of the speech was focused on honoring those who fought it.

That's appropriate. While much of the public discourse recently has focused on whether the president has done enough to inspire or placate his base, the end of combat operations in Iraq was not the right time to emphasize that Iraq was a "dumb war" that he opposed from the beginning. It was not a time to say I told you so.

Conversely, while conservatives are busy angrily denouncing the president for not giving more credit to Bush for implementing the surge -- by which they mean not acknowledging that conservatives were right -- that wouldn't have been appropriate either. This speech was about the commitment of those who actually served, not the better part of valor displayed by those who sat in front of their keyboards and hammered out empirical or ideological arguments for or against the war.

That's not to say that the speech was devoid of politics. Obama's style of politics is to pretend he's above politics, and this speech fits that mold. But the biggest reason not to rehash the argument over going to war in Iraq is that he won it already. It's part of why he's president. Obama doesn't need to convince the American people that the war in Iraq was a mistake, because a majority of Americans already believe that. Conservatives want to reargue the war from 2007 onward, but treating the Iraq war as though it began with the surge is a bit like running over someone on the street, backing up over the body a few times, and then demanding a special merit badge for finally deciding to call 911. And as I wrote yesterday, this still isn't really over.

The most disappointing part of the speech was that the president failed to acknowledge the suffering of the Iraqi people as a result of the war. Doing so would not have diminished his tribute towards American servicemembers, but it would have been a helpful reminder that treating the rest of the world like a game of RISK has real human consequences. Unlike the president's refusal to reargue the war, his failure to acknowledge the suffering of Iraqi civilians -- more than an estimated 100,000 of whom died as a result -- is an inexcusable omission.

For more Post opinions on Obama's speech, read Richard Cohen's A speech without a theme, Michael Gerson's Historic moment, forgettable speech and Eugene Robinson's Obama's gravitas was great.