Yglesias on DADT

Matt Yglesias on the Daily Beast:

In his letter to Lieutenant Tsao, Obama suggested that the need for congressional approval is the source of the delay. But there's some dispute as to whether or not congressional [action] is needed at all. And there's no doubting that the president has the power to influence the implementation. But more to the point, the White House has much ability to influence the pace of congressional action. Legislation to end discrimination in military service has been introduced, and the president could be strongly and vocally backing it rather than using the purported need for such a bill as an excuse for delay. And ultimately delay does no one any favors. The change will have to come sooner or later. In political terms, the White House may as well act decisively, take whatever hits they're going to take, and be done with it rather than letting this fester like a sore. And substantively, if the military is going to have to adjust they may as well do it sooner rather than later rather than lose more valuable personnel.

Instead of writing more letters to patriotic men and women in uniform who are tired of living a lie, it's time for Obama to start writing letters to members of Congress urging them to change the rules.

Exactly. It's one thing to argue that next year will be better than this to take on the ban. It's another to apparently do little to nothing to use the next year to prepare for the battle. Congress won't vote to lift the ban simply because a gay group says so. Obama will need to actively lobby the public and Congress on this issue, or he risks getting creamed if and when he finally acts on his commitment to repeal Don't Ask Don't Tell. Bill Clinton's mistake wasn't acting too soon. It was acting without a plan for success. Read More......

Dear Stanford, If you're going to talk about war, meet your former provost, Condi Rice

Today, Stanford's Alumni Association magazine arrived at our home (not for me). The cover highlighted a "Special Report" titled "Can Professors Stop Wars." The blurb under the title reads:

Faculty have lessons to share with Washington that might make the world safer. Is anyone listening?

Um, here's the thing, Stanford: We appreciate that there are a number of your faculty members who are coming to D.C. to help end the war. But, you can't talk about stopping the war without referencing how the war started. Because, Stanford gave us Condi Rice. She became a professor at Stanford in 1981 and was the provost ("the university's chief academic and budget officer") from 1993 til 1999. Now, she's back at your Hoover Institution. In between, she was Bush's National Security Adviser when we started that war in Iraq. Then, she was Bush's Secretary of State. Yes, Stanford's Condi was right there with Bush and Cheney every step of the way -- from the lies about WMD to the failed strategy to the torture. But, Condi's name is never mentioned in the article about wars. Funny thing.

So, Stanford, don't be talking about your professors stopping wars unless you want to take credit for your Professor/Provost starting the war. Read More......

Other than 9/11, Iraq, and Anthrax, Mrs. Lincoln, how'd you like the play?

Considering how highly we thought of Dick Cheney when George Bush first chose him - and I don't mean we that we liked him, I mean that we feared him - man he's turned out to be incredibly dumb. It seems that Cheney and Limbaugh are now vying for the title of "Most Likely to Destroy the Party by Not Shutting Up." Dick Cheney, unable to pull himself away for a TV camera, appeared on TV again, today, to boast about how wonderfully the Bush administration handled national security over the past eight years.

What I think we're seeing here is evidence of a total power vacuum in the Republican party. Not only is there no one to stand up and be the party leader on TV, so people like Cheney and Limbaugh won't get all the (negative) attention, but there's no leader of the party to tell Cheney and Limbaugh to shut up already. Can you imagine Michael "Barbi" Steele telling Cheney and Limbaugh to back off? How many seconds before he'd have to apologize again? At some point, someone will likely rise to the top and take charge again, but so far it's not looking like anyone with a scintilla of moderation. And that only means that the mean, nasty, intolerant party of NO is here to stay, for at least a while longer. Read More......

When Petey met Rummy

This past weekend, as we're all too painfully aware, was the White House Correspondents Dinner. I find it a truly mock-worthy event with lots of intrigue about who gets to sit at what table. Although I did love seeing Wanda Sykes take on Rush and Hannity... and, the aftermath of gasps and outrage from Washington's "elite."

But even with the "elite" in our neighborhood last Saturday night, Petey had a schedule to keep as well. We headed out for his late night walk, and as we turned on to Connecticut Avenue, we literally bumped into Donald Rumsfeld and his wife (no, Petey didn't bite him). I used to see Mrs. Rumsfeld walking her dog occasionally when I was walking Boomer. Last night, she noticed I had a new dog. (Her dog died at the end of last year.) Petey is a love. Unlike me, he has no qualms about showing love to anyone across the political spectrum (fortunately for the Rumsfelds, dogs don't get the torture thing). And, he showed the Rumsfelds some love. Being friendly to my dog is the one way to make me act nice.

After we left the Rumsfelds, Petey bounded right up to his next victim, Ana Marie Cox (who looked fabulous, btw), who was also walking up Connecticut Avenue. She quickly found Petey's sweet spot (scratching behind his ears.) Petey loved Ana Marie Cox.

Washington is a funny town sometimes. You literally can bump into anyone anywhere. Boomer had an encounter with Obama one morning, and last summer we got stopped by Secret Service once because Biden was across the street. (Boomer made his displeasure known to the Secret Service agents... no one, and he didn't care who, was going to interfere with his routine.)

Petey quickly got back to his old routine, after his brush with greatness (and evil). Celebrities and political affiliations don't mean much to him.
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OMB says AP got it wrong on climate change memo

The AP breathlessly reported earlier today that a White House memo seemed to undercut the EPA's efforts to regulate greenhouse gasses. OMB has weighed in and said "uh, no." Here is what OMB had to say:

Media reports today are suggesting that OMB has found fault with EPA’s proposed finding that emissions of greenhouse gases from motor vehicles contribute to air pollution that endangers public health and welfare. Any reports suggesting that OMB was opposed to the finding are unfounded.

The quotations circulating in the press are from a document in which OMB simply collated and collected disparate comments from various agencies during the inter-agency review process of the proposed finding. These collected comments were not necessarily internally consistent, since they came from multiple sources, and they do not necessarily represent the views of either OMB or the Administration. In other words, we simply receive comments from various agencies and pass them along to EPA for consideration, regardless of the substantive merit of those comments. In general, passing along these types of comments to an agency proposing a finding often helps to improve the quality of the notice.

Perhaps more importantly, OMB concluded review of the preliminary finding several weeks ago, which then allowed EPA to move forward with the proposed finding. As I wrote on this blog on April 17, the "proposed finding is carefully rooted in both law and science." I also noted: "By itself, the EPA’s proposed finding imposes no regulation. (Indeed, by itself, it requires nothing at all.) If and when the endangerment finding is made final, the EPA will turn to the question whether and how to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from new automobiles."

The bottom line is that OMB would have not concluded review, which allows the finding to move forward, if we had concerns about whether EPA’s finding was consistent with either the law or the underlying science. The press reports to the contrary are simply false.

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Liz Cheney is spewing like it's 2004

Okay, I pretty much think no one cares what Liz Cheney thinks and writing about her is a waste of time. She's as rotten to the core as her father (and mother.) Most of the time, she should be ignored. However, Jed has a clip of Ms. Cheney (on FOX News, of course) bashing the Obama administration with language straight out of 2002 and 2004 campaigns. Those were the glory days for the Cheney family (well, except for Mary). Back then, the Cheneys could accuse people of siding with terrorists and the traditional media dutifully played along. These rantings makes the Cheneys look like the delusional right-wing extremists they are:

As painful as she is, it's really, really good for the GOP re-branding effort to have the Cheney family out there spinning away. Read More......

Donald Trump, Miss California, and Barack Obama

I know it sounds like the bad beginning of an even worse joke. And you're tired of hearing about the wicked witch of the west coast. But this is really a story about Barack Obama and whether he's smart enough to avoid the coming buzz saw.

Today, Donald Trump - who is possibly the only person in America a bigger media whore than Miss California (well, okay, not counting Chuck Schumer) - jumped in to the fray and invoked Barack Obama, no less, in an effort to defend (read: get some of the media attention from) the beauty queen turned religious right pin-up girl who simply wants a chance to flash her breasts for Jesus.

In a press conference with the embattled Miss California, Trump invoked President Obama to the beauty queen's defense. Specifically, Trump - and Miss C herself - both cited Obama's supposed views on gay marriage:

At a press conference addressing Carrie Prejean’s disputed title in the Miss USA competition, pageant owner Donald Trump compared Prejean’s stated views on gay marriage to Obama’s.

“It's the same answer that the president of the United States gave,” Trump said. “She gave an honorable answer. She gave an answer from her heart.”

In her own remarks moments later, Prejean echoed Trump’s statement, telling reporters: “The president of the United States, the secretary of state, and many Americans agree with me in this belief.”

Let's put aside for a moment the utter idiocy of Trump's comments. The controversy isn't about Miss California being anti-gay. It's about her posing for nudie photos and lying about it, about her joining up as a spokesperson for an organization just this side of a hate group, while shirking her official duties as Miss California, and about her being quite possibly the biggest sore loser in beauty queen history. But putting even all that aside, is Trump now saying that no future pageant judge can vote against a contestant if she invokes God in her answer and the judge disagrees? Or that anyone who invokes a position that Barack Obama also holds will be forever exempt from criticism?

But hey, far be it for me to get between Donald Trump, a blonde's fake breasts, and a camera.

Much more important is the comparison to President Obama. It's part of a pattern that started last year during the Prop 8 battle over gay marriage in California. The religious right, at that time, invoked Barack Obama's "opposition" to gay marriage as a reason to vote for their cause. Since that time, the comparisons to Obama have only grown louder. I was on CNN recently, and conservative talk show host Dennis Prager invoked Obama on gay marriage. In today's Washington Post, Obama's opposition to gay marriage is compared to crack-smoking convict Marion Barry. And then we have Donald Trump and the beauty queen. (It's happened a lot more often than that, I just don't have all the cites.)

What does this mean and why am I writing about it? Because we've come to the point where Obama can no longer duck the question. Gay civil rights are roaring ahead like a runaway freedom train, and it's only a matter of time before the Obama administration, whether they like it or not - and it increasingly looks like "not" - are going to have to start answering some questions, if not actually do something, about their commitment to gay civil rights.

Will Obama and his staff reiterate his past (supposed) opposition to gay marriage when asked about the hateful comparison the religious right is making between their own prejudice and America's first black president? If so, then Obama will appear to be validating the comparison and agreeing with some of the most hateful bigots in American society. Let me assure you, that won't go over well at all. Why? Because, while gays might have cut Obama some slack a long while back, a series of poorly-resolved gay bimbo eruptions have dogged Obama from the campaign to the White House.

From Obama's embrace of anti-gay activist Donny McClurkin, to his choice of anti-gay bigot Rick Warren to give the inauguration invocation, to the bizarre disappearance of most of the gay civil rights promises to the White House Web site, to the continual backtracking on the President's commitment to repeal Don't Ask Don't Tell, to the upcoming firing of more gay service members, to the fact that the White House Web site still has not restored the President's public commitment to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act, to the White House's obvious reticence to choose an openly gay person for Obama's cabinet, the list goes on and on. And gay Americans continue to go from hopeful to skeptical to bitter. The goodwill, along with Elvis, long ago left the building. What could have been a disagreement with a friend is quickly heading towards a major, damaging showdown.

It doesn't have to be this way. I don't for a minute believe that Barack Obama is opposed to gay marriage. Nor do I believe that most Democratic politicians are. It's politically expedient to be for gay rights, but not for gay marriage. I get it. But at some point, expediency can bite you in the ass. And Obama is quickly approaching the ass-biting phase of the gay rights debate.

To paraphrase the bigots who incessantly like to quote our President for support: The storm is coming. Let's hope that someone in the White House realizes it before it's too late. Read More......

AIG CEO: stop picking on us

Waaaahhhhhh. The numbers are so insanely high and the general public has been so extremely shafted here, I don't think anyone really cares about the impact on AIG. They've bamboozled Congress and Treasury into letting them get those obnoxious bonuses despite being losers so they can all go rot. Go bankrupt and lose it all. It's not as though anyone is getting anything out of this other than the overpaid team at AIG.

American International Group Chief Executive Edward Liddy will speak out against criticism of the insurer's employees on Wednesday and talk about the company's future plans, the Wall Street Journal said.

Liddy will speak to a U.S. House oversight committee and ask for a better partnership with the government, according to the paper.

"Rampant, unwarranted criticism of AIG serves only to diminish the value of our businesses around the world," the paper quoted Liddy's prepared testimony.

"Unwarranted" huh? Thanks for feeding the flames you idiot. Read More......

Testy testy, Mitt

Someone's a bit touchy. From CNN's Political Ticker:

In an unusual move for the person tasked with being his party's top cheerleader, Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele is shining a light on the political vulnerabilities of one of the GOP's top figures and a likely frontrunner for the 2012 Republican nomination — former presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

Now Romney's team is hitting back.

Steele, guest-hosting on Bill Bennett's radio show Friday, cast doubt on Romney's conservative bona fides and blamed the Republican base for rejecting Romney last year because "it had issues with Mormonism" and was unsure of Romney's commitment to opposing to abortion rights. Those comments aren't sitting too well with Romney's political team.

"Sometimes when you shoot from the hip, you miss the target," said Romney spokesman Eric Ferhnstrom. "This is one of those times."

Not to defend Michael Steele when he's down, but Steele is right. In a Rasmussen poll taken during the primaries, 51% of evangelicals said they would never vote for a Mormon. So Steele was telling the truth. Maybe Romney was just lying for the lord. You know how testy those Mormons can get when you try holding them to the church.

UPDATE: Steele has already apologized. Kind of. He apologized that others misinterpreted his words. Which is actually kind of bitchy. Regardless, Steele was right, as the Rasmussen poll proves. Read More......

Obama is taking on Middle East peace this month, too

Health care reform, the budget, Iraq, swine flu, Afghanistan, new Supreme Court Justice....now Middle East peace. It really is a very good thing Obama can do more than one thing at a time.

Robert Gibbs released this statement earlier today:

The President looks forward to welcoming key partners in the effort to achieve a comprehensive peace in the Middle East to the White House later this month. Prime Minister Netanyahu of Israel will visit on May 18, President Mubarak of Egypt will visit on May 26, and President Abbas of the Palestinian Authority will visit on May 28. With each of them, the President will discuss ways the United States can strengthen and deepen our partnerships, as well as the steps all parties should take to help achieve peace between Israelis and Palestinians and between Israel and the Arab states.

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Gay soldier to Obama: "I beg you today: Do not fire me."

An American service member, about to be discharged for being gay, penned an open letter to his commander-in-chief on CNN's Web site. Here is an excerpt:

As an infantry officer, I am not accustomed to begging. But I beg you today: Do not fire me. Do not fire me because my soldiers are more than a unit or a fighting force – we are a family and we support each other. We should not learn that honesty and courage leads to punishment and insult. Their professionalism should not be rewarded with losing their leader. I understand if you must fire me, but please do not discredit and insult my soldiers for their professionalism.

When I was commissioned I was told that I serve at the pleasure of the President. I hope I have not displeased anyone by my honesty. I love my job. I want to deploy and continue to serve with the unit I respect and admire. I want to continue to serve our country because of everything it stands for.

Please do not wait to repeal Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. Please do not fire me.

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Florida's hard core GOPers take aim at Charlie Crist's Senate run

UPDATE @ 9:49 a.m.: Crist made an announcement on Twitter a short time ago:

After thoughtful consideration with my wife Carole, I have decided to run for the U.S. Senate.

I think some of the D.C. pundit types are under-estimating just how ugly this could become for Crist -- and the ugliness will be coming from Crist's fellow Republicans.
_________________________

You knew this was going to happen.

Florida's photogenic (and newly wed -- to a woman) Governor, Charlie Crist, is going to run for the U.S. Senate. He's not quite the neanderthal that most Republicans are. So, Crist is getting a primary -- and the real right wingers are lining up behind his GOP opponent, Macro Rubio. This primary could get really ugly:

[Crist] will be facing a vigorous fight from former Florida House Speaker Marco Rubio, a young, outspoken Hispanic conservative who is capturing the attention of activists in Florida and across the country.

Rubio began telegraphing his attacks against Crist even before the governor’s formal announcement. In an interview with POLITICO, he singled out Crist for abandoning conservative principles and compared the governor to moderate Republican Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine and Republican-turned-Democrat Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania.

“If we’re offering the same thing as the Democrats, but with different packaging, what’s the point in having a Republican Party?” Rubio said.“I’m going to offer Floridians a clear, consistent, authentic small-government choice in the primary.”

Indeed, Rubio expects the primary to receive national attention as a referendum between the party’s moderate and conservative wings. He just received a glowing profile in the Weekly Standard, which called him the “perfect recruit for statewide office.”

GOP fratricide. They just can't help themselves. Read More......

Tuesday Morning Open Thread

Good morning.

Your president had a busy, busy day yesterday. He cut that deal with the health industry, which seemed to pave the path for reform legislation later this year (although anyone who has dealt with a health insurer knows they change the rules without warning.) So, be wary. Then, he fired the top general in Afghanistan. Today, Obama is meeting with the recipients of the "Top Cops" awards.

So, yesterday was a very busy news day. But, as predicted, cable news and its talking heads were in a frenzy because Wanda Sykes picked on Rush Limbaugh. After a day of that blather, Jon Stewart reviewed the situation and put it into perspective: "Bad jokes and gay marriage are destroying this country, but torture can save it."

Get it started... Read More......

Wall Street analyst: don't buy into US banks

Chairman Bernanke is saying quite the opposite but then again, when has Bernanke not made rosy claims? It's not even worth listening to what he has to say because it sounds so ridiculous and is often downright laughable. Who believes him? At least not everyone is believing the same old drivel being pumped out. CNBC:

Whitney, a former analyst at Oppenheimer who has her own firm, is renowned for calling out the problems with banks' toxic assets before the issue became widespread.

"This is the great government momentum trade," Whitney said on why bank stocks had seen some improvement lately. "But the underlying core, earnings power of these banks is negligible."

Whitney also said that consumer spending is still going to remain slow. "There's a massive retraction in consumer liquidity," said Whitney. "Credit contraction is happening at an accelerated pace. Consumer spending is going to be less than people expect going forward."

She cited Bank of America as an example of credit contraction. "They cut more than $200 billion in credit card lines in the first quarter of this year," said Whitney. "Consumers are not going to spend money."

It does look like some are promoting a banking industry that will not return to its past glory any time soon. Who are the mysterious consumers who will be returning to peak credit spending? Not. Going. To. Happen. Read More......

UK conservatives move to right, alienate themselves from EU right

Fellow conservatives across Europe are pushing back against the move. Whether this will have any impact is another story, but it's interesting to see the British right move away from their attempts (which have been successful) to play the middle. At the heart of the argument is whether or not the Tories will continue to support a European Union constitution as previously stated. The end result is anger and distrust.

"David Cameron tried to leave the [EPP] group in this [parliamentary] term, despite a commitment to stay until 2009. This was in contradiction to the commitment they had with our group," Poettering said. He also criticised Cameron's stance on ­ratification of the Lisbon treaty.

In her first public criticism of Cameron's European policies, Merkel told a campaign rally in Berlin at the weekend that you could not oppose the Lisbon treaty while urging more EU enlargement – the ­Conservative position. The treaty ­streamlining the way the EU is run is expected to come into force at the end of the year if the Irish support it in a second referendum in October. The Tories are fiercely opposed to Lisbon and promise a British referendum if they come to power with the treaty not fully ratified.

Merkel said: "We refuse to extend our hand to those who reject the Lisbon treaty ... and who at the same time speak of enlargement."

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OECD report: UK, France, Italy, China may be past worst

It sounds good though I'd like to see more to be convinced. It still strikes me as a false start, that something else is still out there to disrupt the positive signs but maybe the OECD is right. The surprising part of the new report is that the OECD has yet to see the US economy hit a bottom. Many have been talking a lot about the US hitting the bottom and progressing. The Guardian:

Releasing its monthly "composite leading indicator" (CLI) for the world's major economies, the Paris-based watchdog pointed to "tentative" signs of a slower pace of decline in the UK, Italy, France and China, even though the world economy as a whole remained in deep recession.

The OECD's leading indicators are a basket of economic data that in the past have had a good record of showing economic turning points.

"Weak though these signals are, they are present in the majority of the CLI component series for these countries," the OECD said.

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