Election Night 2010 Open Thread

UPDATE @ 2:09 AM: Okay, I'm heading to bed. Still outstanding are Governor's races in Florida, Maine, Minnesota and Illinois. And, there's no winner yet in the Washington, Alaska and Colorado Senate races. In Alaska, the write-in candidate leads.

UPDATE @ 1:34 AM: Waiting for results from Senate races in Washington, Alaska and Colorado. Unfortunately, California's Prop. 19 to legalize marijuana lost but the climate change measure, Prop. 23, which had the support of Texas oil companies, lost. (UPDATE: We need to keep an eye the results for Prop. 26, of which Brian Leubitz said, "Prop 26 is just as, if not more pernicious. If it passes, it makes the implementation of any new environmental legislation difficult if not impossible." H/T Rick)

UPDATE @ 1:04 AM: The Co-Chair of the Blue Dog Coalition, Stephanie Herseth Sandlin, lost her bid for reelection. Last July, she's famously proclaimed, “It is because of the Blue Dog Coalition that there is no floor vote before the August break.” Yes, that was a big victory. How's that working for you know, ex-Rep. Sandlin.

UPDATE @ 12:31 AM: Harry Reid won. Wow.

UPDATE @ 12:17 AM: Mark Kirk has been declared the winner of the Illinois Senate seat held by Barack Obama. Kirk, who voted against the DADT repeal amendement, will become Senator immediately, meaning he'll serve in the lame duck.

UPDATE @ 12:13 AM: Arizonans just elected Jan Brewer as their Governor. Now, they've got no excuse. She got the job initially because Janet Napolitano left to join the Obama cabinet. But, now Arizonans have elected her. There's no excuse now.

UPDATE @ 12:06 AM: Still waiting on the Illinois, Nevada, Colorado and Washington Senate races, but it's clear that the Dems. will control the Senate -- for what it's worth. They didn't do much with 59 or 60.

UPDATE @ 11:53 PM: Pat Toomey won the Pennsylvania Senate race. I really thought Sestak would pull it out. It's an ugly night in PA all around.

UPDATE @ 11:43 PM: Boehner says he wants to cut government spending, which should be interesting, since it may very well plunge the country into another recession or worse. I'm sure the White House and Democratic leaders will forcefully make that point. Oh, that's right, the President already endorsed the GOP talking point that the deficit simply must be addressed now, so never mind.

UPDATE @ 11:39 PM: MSNBC says Harry Reid race still too early to call.


Big surprise here... Evan Bayh thinks Dems lost because they were just so gosh darn liberal - he's so confident that he wrote an oped explaining why we lost even before the election happened! Bayh says the Dems' biggest problem was trying to address gays in the military, immigration and Bush's tax cuts right before the election.  Uh, gays in the military polls consistently at 70% and Dems didn't bring it up - it was in the Defense Bill.  Does Evan Bayh think we shouldn't talk about the Defense Bill before elections too?  As for immigration, it didn't come up at all.  As for Bush's tax cuts, the GOP did a bang up job, with Obama's help, making the deficit such a concern that Bush's tax cuts fit perfectly in that theme.  So why not bring them up?   If Evan Bayh thinks Democrats lost because of gays in the military,  immigration, and Bush's tax cuts, he must be sniffing a bit too much hair tonic.  The party's problems began long before the last month's legislative agenda.

UPDATE @ 11:19 PM: Some good news from California. Jerry Brown has been elected Governor and Barbara Boxer has been reelected to the U.S. Senate.

UPDATE @ 10:44 PM: Very bad news. Via TPMMedia:

BREAKING: Patrick Murphy (D), DADT repeal leader, goes down to Michael Fitzpatrick (R) in PA-8 http://tpm.ly/bRrGst

UPDATE @ 10:38 PM: MSNBC just reported that Ron Johnson has defeated Russ Feingold. That's tragic.

UDPATE @ 10:35 PM: Via GayPolitics.com, David Cicilline was elected to Congress tonight. He'll make the fourth openly gay member of Congress. Congrats to Rep.-elect Cicilline.

UPDATE @ 10:18 PM: MNSBC reported that John Hickenlooper has been elected Governor of Colorado. Great news. His main opponent was that renowned racist Tom Tancredo, who ran as an Independent. The GOPer, Dan Maes, came in a very distant third. If Maes finishes below 10%, the GOP's status as a "major party" comes into question.

UPDATE @ 10:14 PM: According to a tweet from Howie Klein, it's a bad night for Blue Dogs:

More Blue Dogs losing seats: Kratovil (MD), Pomeroy (ND), Bishop (GA), Marshall (GA), Space (OH)-- worse than predicted

Can't say I'm sad about that.

UPDATE @ 9:52 PM: In Massachusetts, Governor Deval Patrick won reelection.

UPDATE @ 9:47 PM: I am very sad to report that Roy Blunt won in Missouri. The Chamber and Karl Rove bought themselves a Senator -- and he is for sale. Robin Carnahan ran a great race in a very tough year.

UPDATE @ 9:27 PM: David "DC Madam" Vitter won reelection. Really, Louisiana? Wow.

UPDATE @ 9:20 PM: At FDL, Jane Hamsher is tracking the seats that have changed parties tonight.

BREAKING @ 9:00 PM: MSNBC just predicted that the GOP will take control of the U.S. House. GOP will hold 237 seats to 198 for the Dems.

UPDATE @ 8:51 PM: Democrat Alan Grayson just lost in Florida.

UPDATE @ 8:35 PM: In Connecticut, Richard Blumenthal won the Senate race. In Arkansas, incumbent Democrat Blanche Lincoln lost to John Boozman. And, a House race downer, Rep. Tom Periello in VA-05 lost.

UPDATE @ 8:06 PM: The Governor of New Hampshire, Democrat John Lynch, was reelected. Also, Democrats picked up the GOP-held House seat in Delaware with John Carney.

UPDATE @ 8:02 PM: MSNBC just made a slew of calls: Florida Senate race for Marco Rubio; NH Senate race for Kelly Ayotte over Paul Hodes; Chris Coons defeated Christine O'Donnell in Delaware and Barbara Mikulski won in Maryland.

UPDATE @ 7:53 PM: Polls close at 8:00 PM ET in Alabama, Connecticut, Delaware, Washington, D.C., Illinois, Kansas, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Tennessee and Texas.

UPDATE @ 7:34 PM: Via Jake Tapper, ABC has called the Ohio Senate race for former Bush administration official Rob Portman. He defeated Lee Fisher.

UPDATE at 7:04 PM: MSNBC has called the Kentucky Senate race for teabagger Rand Paul. He defeated Jack Conway.

UPDATE @ 7:02 PM: Per CNN, Senator Leahy was reelected in Vermont. Senator DeMint won in South Carolina (he's going to be huge problem.) And, a corporate Republican, Dan Coats, will replace the corporate Democrat, Evan Bayh, in the Indiana Senate contest. Coats beat Blue Dog. Rep. Brad Ellsworth.

Polls closed in Indiana and Kentucky at 6:00 PM. Just about now (7:00 PM), voting is ending in Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, Vermont and Virginia. At 7:30 PM, polls close in North Carolina, Ohio and West Virginia. We'll update this poll with actual results when races are called.

There are leaked exit poll numbers for races floating around. Huffington posted them here. But, be advised, we've been burned by them before. AP is reporting on the issues and trends:

Voters across the nation Tuesday said they were intensely worried about the future of the economy and unhappy with the way President Barack Obama and Congress are running things.

Voters in overwhelming numbers were dissatisfied with the way the federal government is working and majorities disapproved of both the Republican and Democratic parties, according to an Associated Press analysis of preliminary exit poll results and pre-election polls.

Voters say the economy eclipses any other issue.

CNN has more:

Voters in both parties are upset with how activist the government's been. Two out of three Democrats say it isn't doing enough. And four in five Republicans say it's doing too much.

Sixty-one percent of Democrats say the new health care law needs to be expanded. And 82 percent of Republicans say it should be repealed.

Read More......

Volcker unimpressed with Fed easing potential

And for good reason.

Many analysts expect the Fed to announce a $500 billion buying programme over about six months.

"I don't look for any overpowering results of this action," Volcker, currently chairman of the Obama administration's Economic Recovery Board, said in Singapore as part of a dialogue on financial reform.

He said a fresh injection of Fed cash into the economy could create a risk of inflation longer term, but "I don't think it's beyond the capacity of a central bank to deal with that problem...but they're going to have to deal with it."

Read More......

ABC uninvites far-right activist Breitbart from election night coverage

Good for ABC. It's unfortunate that they had to experience first-hand what a wackjob Breitbart is. I said from the beginning, ABC could have invited a number of normal online conservatives to help with their election night coverage, including Krempasky, Captain Ed, and Jim Geraghty. But they went for sensationalism, and it burned them. At least they're doing the right thing now. Read More......

More turnout anecdotes

Just go read em over at DailyKos. Read More......

The 'Professional Left' didn't take its ball and go home

From Sam Stein at Huffington Post:

As approaches to the 2010 campaign go, the AFL-CIO's is, perhaps, the most illustrative of the mindset adopted by the disaffected or "professional left" -- as the White House pejoratively labeled it. Griping over the way the past two years played out and eager to demonstrate its discontent, the community nevertheless bit its tongue and invested itself in the elections. It wasn't spending money for the sake of it. And with respect to the cable chatterers, it was hardly full-throated endorsement of the president or his approach. Rather resources were offered and arguments made with specified purposes and the begrudged recognition that as disapointing as the Democrats were, it could get worse.

The problem is how you motivate the followers even if the leaders are finally, begrudgingly, on board.

In some quarters, the animus towards the party has been too palpable to ignore. The gay community, in particular, has found self-motivation for Democrats difficult, certainly after conservatives began co-opting the same-sex marriage debate and Congress and the White House punted on their key issues. Gay donors stopped taking out their checkbooks for Democrats in June. And little has changed since, save the protests at Obama rallies, which have grown increasingly louder.

"[W]hat do I tell my LGBT readers this time around?" said John Aravosis, editor of AMERICABlog. "'Vote for Democrats. They won't keep their promises, but they suck less?' Of course I'm voting, and of course I'm urging our readers to support Democrats who have actually kept their promises. But it's difficult motivating people to vote once again for the same guys who already threw them under the bus."

And the problem is really worse than that. If Sam's story is true, then the "Professional Left" risks sending the message to Democrats that regardless of how often politicians break their promises to us, we'll still support them come election time. What's the incentive for Democrats to keep their promises if they know we won't hold them accountable the only time we can hold them accountable, election time?

I'm not sure what the answer is. I don't want the Republicans running Congress and sitting in the White House. But I also don't want Democrats to think they can break any and all promises with impunity, or they will. So what's the solution? Read More......

It doesn't matter if you make change, if you don't communicate change

I'd argue that not enough change was made, but in any case, the administration's and the Democrats' messaging was abysmal over the past two years, as we've been saying for, oh, two years.

How else to explain "death panels," and the odd number of Americans who still think Obama is a Muslim? Yes, the right wing noise machine is good.  And the left wing noise machine is ignored (by the Democratic establishment). There are some Democrats who are great at messaging, who routinely get quoted in the media, and who are unusually good at branding their opponents. They're called the Netroots. And the party, the Congress, and the White House give them far too little respect.

PoliticalWire via Peter Daou:

A Bloomberg National Poll finds that by a two-to-one margin, likely voters in the midterm elections think taxes have gone up, the economy has shrunk, and the billions lent to banks as part of the Troubled Asset Relief Program won’t be recovered.

The facts: The Obama administration cut taxes for middle-class Americans, has overseen an economy that has grown for the past four quarters and expects to make a profit on the hundreds of billions of dollars spent to rescue Wall Street banks.

Said pollster Ann Selzer: “The public view of the economy is at odds with the facts, and the blame has to go to the Democrats. It does not matter much if you make change, if you do not communicate change.”

Obama already moved to the middle, and he got branded a Socialist for it.  He's a Christian, and people think he's a Muslim.  He was born in Hawaii, and they think he's from Kenya.  He created or saved between 2 and 4 million jobs, and 94% of the American people either aren't sure, or don't believe it.

The truth is irrelevant when communication is the problem.

No amount of tweaking the Obama, and Democratic, agenda will make one iota of difference if the party doesn't learn, fast, how to message. Read More......

How stinky voting booths make you vote Republican (seriously)

I voted this morning in Washington, D.C. at a local protestant church, with a huge cross with the words “Jesus Saves” imprinted on it and quotes from the Bible posted everywhere.

What’s bothersome isn’t so much that Church and State are teaming up, though some have made that case (this year, the debate has been particularly fierce in Iowa, where one local church encouraged members of the congregation to vote after the service). My bigger concern is that the religious imagery and messaging might affect voter behavior, and determine the outcome of elections.

It’s not far-fetched. Recent research at Cornell suggests that something as seemingly insignificant as having a hand sanitizing dispenser in the room makes people express more conservative views; people also expressed more conservative views when researchers made the room smell bad. It sounds weird, but these are well-documented effects.

These subtle cues also play a role in the voting booth. A 2006 study [PDF] from Stanford University found that voters in Arizona were more likely to cast ballots in support of a state sales tax funding education if they voted in a school. In experiments, the researchers further found that voters were more likely to oppose stem-cell research if primed with religious images. These effects appear even if you control for demographics and political affiliation.

There is a simple explanation for these voting patterns: Voting behavior -- like human behavior more generally -- is often not rational, and is affected by our social environment in ways we don’t even realize. Part of the problem is that, especially when faced with a dauntingly long ballot like Californians are this year, voters save time and effort by relying on social cues and their ingrained assumptions about how the world works.

For instance, voters tend to assume reflexively that female candidates are less conservative than male ones, and also make assumptions about candidates based on race and occupation (if someone’s bio says they’re a small-business owner, that means they’re more conservative, right?). It’s part of an area of social psychology called “heuristics and biases,” and it looks at the ways in which our brains take shortcuts to reduce the cognitive load.

What it reveals about us is unsettling: Could the outcome of something as crucial as the 2000 presidential election, which came down to a handful of votes in Florida, have been determined by the number of people voting underneath some huge painting of the crucifixion?

Maybe -- which is why I think we should all vote at home, online, and far away from a garbage can. Read More......

BP adds nearly $8 billion more to spill estimates

With Joe "I apologize" Barton on the comeback trail, how long before the numbers are revised downward? Reuters:

BP lifted its estimate of the likely cost of its Gulf of Mexico oil spill by $7.7 billion to $39.9 billion on Tuesday, pushing its profits down sharply in spite of higher oil and gas prices.

BP [BP-LN 430.80 6.80 (+1.6%)], the world's biggest non-government controlled oil company by production last year, said delays in capping its blown out well prompted the increased charge for ending the leak, cleaning up the damage and compensating those affected.

Read More......

No one owns my vote

A key point missed by this gentleman from the Financial Times is that if so many Democrats are disaffected that their lack of support is harming someone's chances at re-election, the person to blame isn't the voters, it's the politicians who let them down.  You earn my vote, you don't own it.

But in any case, while attempting to smear the base of the Democratic party, this writer actually empowered it immensely. According to him, had the left not been disillusioned with the Obama administration and the Democrats in Congress, the President could have focused more on wooing support from the middle and possibly turned the mid-terms around. That sounds like a healthy lesson for the future - turn on your base at your own peril.

In any event, suppose that the Democratic base had not been sulking. Suppose it saw, for example, that persisting with a historic healthcare reform was politically challenging in the middle of an economic crash. Suppose it granted that radically overhauling a health system – some 20 per cent of the US economy – that many Americans rather like was a lot to take on. Suppose it was impressed that Mr Obama did it anyway, and was ready to go further.

Supposing those hopelessly implausible things, Mr Obama’s midterm strategy could have been different. Sure of the loyalty of the base, he could have addressed himself to the anxious middle, defended his policies as centrist compromises (which they were), and told the country (as he did in 2008) that its concerns were his concerns. In this alternative universe, he would have had his base and at least a shot at bringing the centre back.

So credit please where it is due. The whining utopian left has a very full schedule of despising Republicans and the idiots and scoundrels (a little over half the country) who keep voting for them. Yet it can always find time to attack its own team, cry and complain, and demand to be patted on the head. The left’s role in Tuesday’s elections should not go unacknowledged.

Read More......

More evidence of high turnout in MO and MN

More anecdotal reports on turnout from around the country.

"Very heavy" in parts of Missouri where the big race is the Senate contest between Robin Carnahan and one of the GOP's biggest corporate sellouts, Roy Blunt:

"It's a very heavy turnout," said Rich Chrismer, director of elections in St. Charles County. He had predicted a turnout of 65 to 70 percent of the county's registered voters. Statewide, the secretary of state's office is estimating a 67 percent turnout

Voting will remain steady, with "the big show starting at 4 p.m.," Chrismer said, indicating that is when the biggest crush of voters will arive at the polls and keep election workers busy until 7 p.m.

In downtown St. Louis, at Centenary Church, 55 Plaza Square, election judges said the first two hours had been just as busy as two years ago, when voters formed long lines to cast a ballot in the presidentail election.

I've confirmed that Centenary Church is in a heavy Democratic voting area. So, that's positive.

"Higher-than-expected" in Minnesota where the Governor's race is the critical battle between Democrat Mark Dayton and right-wing Republican Tom Emmer:

Minnesota Secretary of State Mark Ritchie says Election Day is going "smooth as silk" with higher-than-expected voter turnout Tuesday morning.

Ritchie had predicted a turnout of 60 percent but a surge of early morning voters and good weather throughout the state had him questioning at midmorning whether that was too low.

However, he noted that there was a similar surge in the morning of Election Day on 2008, but voting tailed off later in the day.

In Ramsey County, Elections Manager Joe Mansky says morning turnout was also higher than he expected and the county could beat his estimate of 52 percent by day's end.

Gallup sees high enthusiasm, particularly among GOPers. Read More......

Third Way's supporters in Congress are going to lose, but the group wants to run the Democratic Party

This was inevitable. Third Way, the same people who helped weaken and undermine the Democratic agenda over the past two years, are now blaming the Democratic base for the upcoming losses.

We have nothing but disdain for Third Way. It's a group whose motto should be "compromise first." They've got no constituency, no grassroots and no membership, except for wealthy funders. And they don't believe in core Democratic values. But they want to control the Democratic Party:

The long-simmering battle between moderates and liberals for the soul of the Democratic Party is about to explode.

That presents a golden opportunity for Third Way, a five-year-old think tank that remains largely unknown outside the Beltway.

The group has spent months preparing to capitalize on this moment and take a more central role in the party.

And it’s coming down squarely on the side of centrism — and planning to vigorously challenge the left.

“The party is about to come to a major fork in the road,” said Jonathan Cowan, Third Way’s president. “A left turn at this juncture is a turn toward permanent minority status.”

Sounds like Third Way wants to abandon the Democratic base. I guess that means they'll be doing all the fundraising, phonebanking and GOTV from here on out. Oh, that's right. Third Way has no members or organization.

There is one other problem for those political geniuses at Third Way:

In addition, many of Third Way’s most sympathetic Democratic allies now appear likely to lose.

So, their supporters are losing, but they want to control the Democratic agenda. Yeah, that makes sense.

I agree with Ari Berman:

“A big tent is great but not just for the sake of having a big tent,” said Ari Berman, a contributing writer for The Nation and the author of “Herding Donkeys: The Fight to Rebuild the Democratic Party and Reshape American Politics.”

“What I don’t understand is: why is Third Way expending all this energy justifying people who are consistently voting against Obama’s agenda?” he said in an interview. “It seems to me like they’re using Democratic defeats as an excuse to once again blame the liberals, which happens pretty much every single time the Democrats lose.”

That's exactly what they're doing. Opportunistic, but for what?

Don't forget, Third Way encouraged dropping the public option. And, for some reason, they had a seat at the table when the DADT compromise was crafted. They've got access -- and use their access to undermine overwhelmingly popular Democratic values.

Third Way's candidates are going to lose. Their message alienates the base.  And their proposals are out of kilter with what the majority of the public wants. So, just give them the keys to the DNC. Read More......

Washington Post leaves DC, Puerto Rico, American Samoa and the Commonwealth of the Northern Marianas off its 'where do I vote' list

How did they forget Washington, DC?  Check it out - no DC, or the other three places.  (I contacted the Post, and they're fixing it. It's a surprisingly common mistake, leaving DC out of lists like this.) Read More......

In PA's Lehigh Valley, high voter turnout is 'shocking polls workers'

Yesterday, via email, I got a memo from Rich Sestak, the campaign director for his brother's Senate campaign:

There is no enthusiasm gap in Pennsylvania. In an election year characterized by a Democratic enthusiasm gap and despite being significantly outspent, U.S. Senate candidate Joe Sestak has defied the conventional wisdom and erased the gap with his rival. With a 1.2 million Democratic voter registration advantage and enthusiasm building on our side, Joe Sestak is well-positioned to be the next United States Senator from Pennsylvania.

I believe Rich. I've been thinking Joe Sestak is going to win.

Pennsylvania doesn't have early voting, so it's all about today's turnout. And, while I know this article is anecdotal, when poll workers are shocked, something is going on:

Voter turnout is reportedly higher than normal, shocking polls workers across the Lehigh Valley area who were not expecting much interest in races for key positions like senator in Washington, D.C., and governor in Harrisburg.

In Allentown's mostly Democratic 7th Ward, Gus Kruz, the judge of elections, was seeing high interest in voting already a few minutes after polls opened at 7 a.m. Although not a large district, a dozen people had already voted in the 7th Ward by 7:15 a.m. At that point, Kruz couldn't predict if more Democrats would come out than Republicans.

The same was true in Bethlehem's 15th ward, 2nd district at the Education Center on Sycamore St. There' Craig Hynes, judge of elections, said he's seen crisp turnout. By 7:45 a.m., 66 voters had cast ballots despite mechanical problems with two of three machines, including one that had to be placed prior to the polls opening.

"For a nonpresidential election we are running above normal for this time of day," Hynes said.

I imagine we'll keep getting reports like this all day from around the country. We won't always know what it means, but I take this as a good sign. Read More......

Sam Seder's GOTV message: It's Not BS

Sam has five main reasons to vote against the Republicans:
Read More......

Tuesday Morning Open Thread

Good morning.

Well, it's Election Day 2010. The TODAY Show just showed me the video of Christine O'Donnell at her polling place. Thanks, NBC. That was really important.

No doubt, it's going to be an annoying day. The pundits and pollsters have already called the election. They're just hoping those pesky voters don't muck up their predictions.

Around mid-afternoon, the cable networks will start getting their exit polling information. That will start to shape coverage. They won't tell us what they know, but they'll hint at it.

The first polls close at 7:00 PM ET in Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, South Carolina, Vermont and Virginia. From then, til the last polls close in Alaska and Hawaii at Midnight ET, we'll be on wild ride. It could be a late night -- and early morning -- as we wait for results in what could be some close races. Who knows when we'll get results from that three-way contest in Alaska.

The President and Vice President will be working the phones today, calling into radio shows across the country. It's all about getting out the vote.

There's a lot of blame to go around. I think much rests at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW. We'll deal with that tomorrow. But, if history is any judge, the Democrats won't learn the right lessons from this debacle. They'll become the GOP-lite instead of standing for -- and fighting for -- principles.

Today, we all need to vote. Just vote. It matters. Read More......

Please don't feed the polar bears... your microphone

Read More......

Miniature livers have been grown in a lab

Now they're trying to grow miniature people to fit the miniature livers. (Not really.) Read More......

Brazil elects first female president

Very cool. Read More......

A Dunkin Donuts has decided to stop accepting pennies

Other than sentimental value, it's not clear why we continue to use them. It's true, you can't buy a thing with them. Read More......

Crazy Jean Schmidt talks abortion with six-year-old 1st graders

How does this woman keep getting elected?

“She defined abortion as the taking of a child's life in the mother's womb,” Teller wrote in the letter. "She indicated that abortion involves the killing of a child before it is born."

"She received a follow-up question, which she answered consistent with Catholic teaching," her spokesman Bruce Pfaff told Cinncinati.com.

When students kept asking about abortion, Pfaff says Schmidt told them to talk to their parents.

Read More......

Kuttner on Obama and the elections tomorrow

Robert Kuttner at Huffington Post:

[L]iberals are dismayed with Obama not because this or that initiative was insufficiently lefty. They are mad at Obama for blowing what had to be a Roosevelt moment, and thereby ushering in a totally needless period of far-right resurgence, dominated by a lunatic right that makes Newt Gingrich and Karl Rove look like moderates.

Obama did not decide to be bold in his first two years in office. He decided to be timid and conciliatory. People on his own economics team, such as Christina Romer, were telling him that the stimulus was far too small, and that it was too tilted to tax cuts.

Even more important than the scale of the recovery program was Obama's failure to be bold enough when it came to reorganizing failing banks. But his economic team, led by Larry Summers and Tim Geithner, opted for propping them up and disguising the big holes in their balance sheets rather than cleaning the banks out.

This approach, about as bold as Hank Paulson, had huge political and economic costs. Politically, it fed right wing populism by putting Obama in bed with Wall Street. Economically, it led to the Japan scenario that we are now suffering, in which even zero interest rates can't pull the economy out of the ditch.

And this is not Monday morning quarterbacking either. Several of America's best economists--Joseph Stiglitz, Paul Krugman, Simon Johnson, Nouriel Roubini--were making these criticisms at the time. So was the Congressional Oversight Panel ably led by Elizabeth Warren, which explains why Tim Geithner keeps trying to do her in.

The downside is that Obama and his orthodox economic team have ceded a moment of populist rage to a right wing that is not interested in governing or in problem solving, but only in tearing institutions down.

Obama will save his presidency and the economy by belatedly deciding to practice the boldness mistakenly ascribed to him--by putting forth a genuine recovery program, fighting for it, and exposing Republican obstructionism.

Read More......

Here we go with the bogus spin about how Dems lost (if they lose)

Hotline On Call:

When polls close Tuesday, Republicans are overwhelmingly expected to win enough seats to take back the House. Just two years ago, the GOP was all but left for dead. How did Democrats squander the major electoral gains they achieved and snatch defeat out of the jaws of long-term victory?

The answer, both Democratic and Republican pollsters agree, is two-fold: Democrats over-promised on their first major initiative, then overreached on their most defining legislative effort. That combination has doomed Democrats to a disastrous election as voters take out a mix of frustration and anger on the party in charge.

He means they over-promised on the stimulus, and over-reached on health care reform.

No, and no. In fact, Democrats wimped out on both, and that's why they're in trouble tomorrow.

It all comes down to backbone and messaging. The President told the public the truth about how much a good stimulus bill could lower unemployment, he didn't over-promise at all. The only problem, the President didn't ask for a good stimulus bill. He asked for half of what we needed, then gave another 35% of what remained to the Republicans in the form of stimulus-useless tax cuts. So it's not surprise the bill didn't sufficiently lower unemployment. Few outside of the White House thought it would.

And if the President didn't think he could get a costlier bill, he should have gone to the public and embarrassed those members of Congress who opposed him, and opposed the nation's recovery. Speaking of recovery, whose brilliant idea was it to rename the stimulus bill the national recovery act, blah blah blah. I don't even know the law's new name. There was a sign recently in my neighborhood, near some construction work, touting some national recovery act blah blah. I think it was the stimulus. I had to take a picture and send it to a friend to be sure. That's seriously bad messaging.

And that brings us to the second part of the problem: messaging. The Republicans, from the beginning, claimed that we had no economic crisis, that the stimulus was unnecessary, and that it wouldn't produce results. The administration (and Congress) didn't fight back nearly hard enough on any of that messaging, and the GOP lies stuck. It's as simple as that. Even when CBO concluded that the stimulus saved or created millions of jobs, the public didn't believe it because, by that point, the GOP controlled the message. And in fact, who could blame the public? Unemployment is at 9.2% and expected to stay high for years.  That sure makes it sound like the "cure" didn't work.

Then there's health care reform. Same problems. The President refused to get engaged, and fight for what he promised, and the Democratic messaging was abominable. How else could Sarah Palin get away with her "death panel" garbage? Had a Democrat tried that kind of a lie on the Bush administration, he'd have been strung up alive. But Palin, and her Teabagger minions, were given a pass.

And tomorrow it all comes back to bite the Democrats in the ass.

No one over-promised, and no one over-reached. The President and the Democrats in Congress lacked spine and an ability to message. They ticked off the base, left the economy in more shambles than it needed to be, and permitted the GOP to lie with impunity. And that's the stuff of losing elections. Read More......

Oil hits six month high of $83.45

Not what a less than robust recovery needs. Read More......

How important is this election compared to other elections?

Yglesias:

The 2008 elections led, after all, to a very important piece of health care legislation that’s not going to be repealed during the 112th congress. In other words, even after the soon-to-come revival of conservative political fortunes the health policy status quo is going to settle well to the left of where it was before the election. And it seems overwhelmingly likely to me that had Kay Hagan and Al Franken not won their close elections in North Carolina and Minnesota that the Affordable Care Act never would have passed. So as far as elections go, that’s a pretty big deal.

By contrast, looking ahead even if the Democrats defy expectations and eke out a narrow House majority they’re not going to turn around and pass a cap-and-trade bill. And if Republicans defy expectations and pick up 65 House seats instead of 55 House seats, that’s not going to conjure up the votes to scrap the minimum wage. In any remotely plausible range of outcomes, we’ll be looking at an era where either nothing happens or else compromises are reached between the party leaders.

Or the 2008 elections were the chance of a lifetime for Democrats and they blew it, on health care (where they might have gotten much more had they simply tried) and on everything else. Even the stimulus was botched (asking for half of what was needed, then giving away another 35% in near-useless tax cuts) - thus the 9.6% 9.2% unemployment rate that's dooming Democratic control of Congress. And, if you're gay, an enviro, an immigration advocate/Latino, a civil libertarian, an AIDS activist, or a union member, to name a few categories of the Democratic base, the results of the 2008 election weren't nearly so laudable, since most of the big biggest promises made to you were broken, and now are toast. Read More......

Stewart/Colbert rally attendees not up on their own local congressional races

I've been following a back and forth between progressive leaders about whether Jon Stewart should have made his march more election-focused, even urging people to vote, let alone for Democrats. The response from some has been that Stewart's voters, especially in the DC area, already know who to vote for.

Not necessarily.

This new video by New Left Media interviews a sampling of people attending this weekend's rally. And while most are more coherent and sane than you'd find at a Glenn Beck rally, what's troubling is what happens at 8 minutes 42 seconds into the video. Chase asks a number of the most outspoken attendees about their own local congressional races back home. Not a one had any idea who was running.

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Top Republicans are trying to figure out how to stop Palin

Politico:

Top Republicans in Washington and in the national GOP establishment say the 2010 campaign highlighted an urgent task that they will begin in earnest as soon as the elections are over: Stop Sarah Palin.

Interviews with advisers to the main 2012 presidential contenders and with other veteran Republican operatives make clear they see themselves on a common, if uncoordinated, mission of halting the momentum and credibility Palin gained with conservative activists by plunging so aggressively into this year’s midterm campaigns.

Palin responds, in her own version of the English language:

Shortly after the article was posted, Palin went on Fox News, where she is a paid commentator, to criticize POLITICO and any unnamed critics.

"[T]hese are the brave people who want to lead the nation and run the world. And but they're not brave enough to put their name in an article," she told Greta Van Susteren. "I learned back in the day that who, what, when, where, why of journalism. You report that facts; you let other people decide what their opinion is going to be. So having unnamed sources in an article like this is very, very, disappointing, you know. And it doesn't do anybody any good. It doesn't educate anybody. … I'm getting used to it though."

That would be the same Greta Van Susteren who has a huge conflict of interest ever interviewing Sarah Palin, but this is FOX after all. Read More......

NYT: Young voters feeling awfully disaffected

This could be any Democratic constituency. From the NYT:

Others, though, said the administration or Organizing for America, the group that grew from the Obama campaign, could have done more. Why didn’t Mr. Obama, who appeared on “The Daily Show” this week for the first time since taking office, go there more often, they asked? Why did he seem to refocus on young people only in the last few months, with campus rallies? The health care debate seems to have been where the momentum was lost. Even though Organizing for America held campus “teach-ins” with experts to explain the legislation, all the talk about Medicare led many young people to feel alienated and ignored by the president.

Younger voters said older ones seemed to become the priority. “He made young people feel important, then he got into office and there was no one talking to us,” Ms. Kirsner said.

Then there's this.

“People were infatuated in 2008,” said Maddy Joseph, 20, a member of the group. “The reality has set in, and that’s frustrating for a lot of people.”

No, it's not the reality. It didn't have to be the reality. The President, and Democrats in Congress, chose not to push the agenda they promised, and they chose not to fight back when the Republicans repeatedly lied about the weak-tea agenda the Dems were in fact pushing. You bet that's dispiriting. But was it inevitable? Only to the extent that today's Democratic leaders have no backbone, yes. But it's not inevitable in the sense that our leaders couldn't have fought back harder. Yes, they could have. They simply chose not to. Read More......

Next Senate unlikely to include black members

Funny that the Republican wave doesn't include blacks. Read More......

Who are 'the American people'?

A short video montage and commentary I put together about the Jon Stewart/Stephen Colbert rally:

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Beltway predictions become more dire as Election Day approaches and Rachel gives her take

Just so you know what the inside-the-beltway pundits are thinking, Howard Fineman talked to some Democratic consultants -- and it doesn't look good:

Publicly, Democratic campaign officials are putting a brave face on predictions of House losses, with House Campaign Chairman Chris Van Hollen claiming that the party might hold the chamber, meaning that they would lose fewer than a net of 39 seats. Other officials are pegging the expected losses at 50-55 seats, in line with consensus independent public forecasts, such as those of Charlie Cook and Nate Silver.

But within the last 12 hours I've spoken to two top Democratic consultants -- very active on the battlefield this fall and with 60 years of on-the-ground experience between them -- who told me some shocking news.

Separately, and privately, they each told me that they thought the Democrats could lose 70 seats on Tuesday. That would be a blowout of historic proportions.

So, there you have it. Howard Fineman and two "top Democratic consultants" think we're doomed. I think Democratic consultants, who are a big part of the professional Democratic class, are as much to blame as anyone else. They tend to preach moderation and timidity to candidates. And, most of their ads just suck.

UPDATE: Rachel Maddow offered some perspective from outside the Beltway:

And yet the latest polls also show that Americans prefer Democrats to Republicans, in general, by a small yet clear margin. The only way to clear those mixed signals up is by voting and then tallying it all up.

Rachel Maddow on the special Sunday election show:

The distance between Democrats winning versus Democrats losing on Tuesday is the distance between your tuchus on the couch if you're going to vote for Democrats and your tuchus actually making it to the voting booth on Tuesday if you're going to vote for Democrats. That's the distance. Common wisdom, schmommon-wisdom.

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Monday Morning Open Thread

Good morning.

It's November. And, we all know what that means. Tomorrow is Election Day. I was just thinking about past elections. In 2006 and 2008, most of us were ecstatic. When November rolled around in 2006, we knew that Democrats be taking back the House and possibly Senate in 2006. We knew for sure that right-wing creeps, like Rick Santorum, were going to lose. In 2008, we had strong sense that Obama would win the Presidency. Ah, good memories. Now, not so much.

The punditry over the next few days will be particularly painful. But, we've still got to see what happens. Make sure you vote. It matters.

The President has nothing on his public schedule. No events. No appearances.

Biden is going to be campaigning in Vermont for the Democratic candidate for Governor, Peter Shumlin. Then, he's heading home to Delaware to rally for the Democratic ticket. There's been a lot of focus on the Senate race, which Chris Coons will win, thankfully. But, there's an open seat currently held by a Republican. The Democratic candidate, John Carney, is looking good. This is one of the few seats that could be a pick-up for the Dems.

One more day...then the real fun begins. Read More......

Yemen arrests two related to bomb threat

NY Times:

The powerful bombs concealed inside cargo packages and destined for the United States were expertly constructed and unusually sophisticated, American officials said Saturday, further evidence that Al Qaeda’s affiliate in Yemen is steadily improving its abilities to strike on American soil.

As investigators on three continents conducted forensic analyses of two bombs shipped from Yemen and intercepted Friday in Britain and Dubai, American officials said evidence was mounting that the top leadership of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, including the radical American-born cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, was behind the attempted attacks.

Yemeni officials on Saturday announced the arrest of a young woman and her mother in connection with the plot, which also may have involved two language schools in Yemen. The two women were not identified, but a defense lawyer who has been in contact with the family, Abdul Rahman Barham, said the daughter was a 22 year-old engineering student at Sana University.

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Mail bomb traveled on passenger flights within Middle East

While the TSA is busy destroying our civil liberties, the enemy has moved on to other tactics. What's especially annoying is that some are questioning the effectiveness of the new intrusive body investigations. Enough is enough with this nonsense.

One of two powerful bombs mailed from Yemen to Chicago-area synagogues traveled on two passenger planes within the Middle East, a Qatar Airways spokesman said Sunday. The U.S. said the plot bears the hallmarks of al-Qaida's offshoot in Yemen and vowed to destroy the group.

The airline spokesman said a package containing explosives hidden in a printer cartridge arrived in Qatar Airways' hub in Doha, Qatar on one of the carrier's flights from the Yemeni capital San'a. It was then shipped on a separate Qatar Airways plane to Dubai in the United Arab Emirates, where it was discovered by authorities late Thursday or early Friday. A second, similar package turned up in England on Friday.

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A dog day Halloween

Sasha waits for her buddy Chato to join her on the way to the Halloween party.

Chato in his jockey costume.

An adorable toy poodle dressed as a lobster.

No clue.

Bumblebee

No costume, just adorable.

Sasha tucks herself in after a long day.

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Frank Rich: The Tea Party's job is to 'distract attention' from people 'who've cashed in and cashed out'

There's no question that Frank Rich fully gets the Billionaires' Coup (his phrase; my eager theft). Here he is again on the rich complexity that is:

(a) Tea Party hubris; (b) the billionaires who fund it; and (c) the acknowledged (by both sides) "country club" split between the Roves and the Rubes (Mike Huckabee and the "lesser" ilk).

This will have to be just a taste, with less than the usual commentary — I'm soon to embark on trains, planes, and strangely-named buses again. Your taste (the first one is free; click for more):

But whatever Tuesday’s results, this much is certain: The Tea Party’s hopes for actually affecting change in Washington will start being dashed the morning after. The ordinary Americans in this movement lack the numbers and financial clout to muscle their way into the back rooms of Republican power no matter how well their candidates perform.

Trent Lott, the former Senate leader and current top-dog lobbyist, gave away the game in July. “We don’t need a lot of Jim DeMint disciples,” he said, referring to the South Carolina senator who is the Tea Party’s Capitol Hill patron saint. “As soon as they get here, we need to co-opt them.” It’s the players who wrote the checks for the G.O.P. surge, not those earnest folk in tri-corner hats, who plan to run the table in the next corporate takeover of Washington. Though Tom DeLay may now be on trial for corruption in Texas, the spirit of his K Street lives on in a Lott client list that includes Northrop Grumman and Goldman Sachs.

There really is more, and that more is sweet (or bitter, depending on your mood):

What made the Tea Party most useful was that its loud populist message gave the G.O.P. just the cover it needed both to camouflage its corporate patrons and to rebrand itself as a party miraculously antithetical to the despised G.O.P. that gave us George W. Bush and record deficits only yesterday. ... The more the Tea Party looks as if it’s calling the shots in the G.O.P., the easier it is to distract attention from those who are actually calling them — namely, those who’ve cashed in and cashed out as ordinary Americans lost their jobs, homes and 401(k)’s.

At least someone with New York Times inches (and Sunday inches at that) is onto them in print. Read on.

GP Read More......

Small Hong Kong apartment that converts into 24 rooms

This architect did an amazing job with a very small space. Even with the rolling walls that convert, I suspect one would have to be highly organized and tidy to make this work. Read More......

Rand Paul head-stomper charged with assault

Good. Read More......

'France is the only nation in the first world where there is meaningful resistance'

Chris in Paris has been regularly covering the French strikes and Sarkozy's intransigence (for example, here and here and here). Ian Welsh puts a bottom line to it: 'Pray for France.'

At this point in time, France is the only nation in the first world where there is meaningful resistance to the rush of Austerity (aka. Hooverism) and the attempt by elites to permanently break the power and wealth of the middle and working class.

Pray for France. Because if they fall, no one is even trying, and if they fall the elites will know they can take anything away from any first world’s nation’s population.

So very true. And he puts his finger on the mechanism, the so-called cost of doing business:

Notice something here: the protesters are doing economically damaging things. They aren’t just showing up in the mall ... Elites think in terms of costs. If the cost of something is less than the benefit of doing it, assuming the return is also high enough they will almost certainly do it. ... The benefit of raising the pension age is that it pays for bailouts, bonuses and high salaries for the elites (since it helps pay to continue the financial casino.) Unless the cost is clearly going to be higher than the gain, they will do it.

I've been fortunate enough to witness this resistance first-hand. So far, no one has blinked. The French Senate passed Sarkozy's "reform" last week. Ian is right; it's what happens next that counts.

Pray for the French; they appear to be mounting the only real resistance in the developed world.

GP Read More......

Brilliant, scathing, Maureen Dowd piece on Obama

When she doesn't try to be funny, she's viciously right on target. Read the entire column, please. It's that good and on point. (And she also mentions Joe's gay marriage question to Obama this week.)

His inner circle believed too much in the power of the Aura and in protecting the Brand. They didn’t think they needed to sell anything or fight back when the crazies started sliming them. They didn’t care that the average citizen needed an M.B.A. to understand the financial plan and a Ph.D. to fathom what the health care plan would mean.

Because Obama stayed above it all on health care and delegated to Max Baucus, he missed the moment in August of 2009 when Sarah Palin and the Tea Party got oxygen with their loopy rants on death panels. It never occurred to the Icon that such wildness and gullibility would trump lofty rationality.

As the president tries to ride the Tea Party tiger, let’s hope for this change: that he puts some audacity in his audacity.

Funny she should mention August of 2009.  That was when the Teabaggers were disrupting all the Democratic health care townhall meeting.  When no one had the balls to stand up to the little fascists, Speaker Pelosi alone penned an op ed in USA Today calling them un-American.  When the White House got asked if they agreed with Pelosi, they threw her under the bus.

Bad political decisions have consequences.  And when you string too many bad decisions together in a row, you get a Republican Congress.

PS Why is it that journalists still think it okay to quote the work of bloggers without giving us credit? The gay marriage question to Obama that Dowd mentions in another part of the same article is Joe's question to the President. Dowd doesn't mention Joe, but she does, at another point, mention the NYT's Peter Baker (why cite one and not the other?). The Washington Post pulled the same crap last week about the same topic. If we can give them credit when we cite their work, they can do the same. Read More......

Sunday Talk Shows Open Thread

Good morning. Happy Halloween...it's an especially scary holiday this year given the looming elections. Based on my cursory observation of costumes in DC, Christine O'Donnell sure made witches relevant again. There were also a lot of Chilean miners roaming around.

The Sunday shows are rife with politicos today, but there is one guest on all of the main shows: Obama's terrorism adviser John Brennan. He's on NBC, CBS, ABC and CNN.

For politics, you can watch the chairs of the Senate campaign committees, Menendez and Cornyn, duke it out on "This Week." The Chair of the DNC is on "Meet the Press." The Chair of the RNC is on "State of the Union." Not sure you'll hear anything new from any of them.

Oh, FOX is hosting reality show star Sarah Palin. She might run for Prez "if there's nobody else to do it." Surely, no one could do it like Sarah.

One last thing: Congrats to our colleague and friend Naomi Seligman on her marriage to Andrew Gumbel last night. Read More......

Goldman Sachs reviewing early bonus payments

Because paying taxes back to the country that saved their ass is asking too much. CNBC:

In a break from recent practice, Goldman Sachs has considered paying out 2010 compensation before the end of the year, rather than early next year, according to people familiar with the matter.

That move, if Goldman were to make it, would be one way to combat the uncertainty hanging over income tax rates in 2011 and beyond by allowing employees to take advantage of the current tax rates. But an early payout could also be perceived by critics of the firm as a way to enrich Goldman employees by gaming the system.

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TSA rolling out new pat-down procedure

Why are we allowing the TSA to take over so much control? Everyone wants to be safe but not at the expense of our civil liberties. In my limited samples of experience with the TSA I find that some locations are friendly and do their best to limit the unpleasantness of the experience and others (such as Philadelphia) are downright offensive. There needs to be a much more consistent process implemented in all locations and it's about time this process receives a more serious debate from politicians rather than a police organization. CNN:

Rosemary Fitzpatrick, a CNN employee, said she was subjected to a pat-down at the Orlando, Florida, airport on Wednesday night after her underwire bra set off a magnetometer. She said she was taken to a private area and searched, with transportation screening officers telling her the pat-down was a new procedure.

According to Fitzpatrick, a female screener ran her hands around her breasts, over her stomach, buttocks and her inner thighs, and briefly touched her crotch.

"I felt helpless, I felt violated, and I felt humiliated," Fitzpatrick said, adding that she was reduced to tears at the checkpoint. She particularly objected to the fact that travelers were not warned about the new procedures.

NOTE FROM JOHN: They did this to me coming back from Europe a few weeks ago (Amsterdam airport boarding KLM/Delta flight). It was the most thorough pat down I've ever had in my life - and yes, he touched everything. But it was quick, and honestly, I'm okay with it if it means there's a chance of me not blowing up at 35,000 feet. Read More......

Video: Labrador swimming with a dolphin

This is a really adorable video for animal lovers. I don't think that I've ever seen anything quite like it. Read More......

What Pelosi accomplished

Kerry Eleveld at the Advocate makes a good point:

I would be remiss if I did not mention that Nancy Pelosi could very possibly lose her post as speaker of the House if the Democrats get pummeled next Tuesday. She may not have scheduled all the LGBT votes the community would have hoped for, but Pelosi hammered home hate-crimes legislation early on and steamrolled “don’t ask, don’t tell” with 39 votes to spare. From a broader perspective, she near seamlessly pushed through Democrats’ agenda, stocking the Senate with more than 400 bills that never saw the light of day. Quite frankly, Speaker Pelosi delivered the change Obama promised more ably than the White House could either message or capitalize on those achievements.

If the House Democrats are ousted on election night, it will be a true irony that the single most effective legislator of the 111th Congress will be rewarded with a demotion.

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Park Service says 'well over 200,000' attended Stewart/Colbert rally

Told ya so. Read More......

Daylight savings may be bad for our health and the environment

I'm not much of a morning person anyway and would much rather have the sunlight later in the day.

Countries across Europe, the United States, Canada and parts of the Middle East mark the start of winter by ending Daylight Saving Time (DST) and putting their clocks back by an hour -- often in late October or early November -- a move that means it is lighter by the time most people get up to start their day.

But this also robs afternoons of an hour of daylight, and some experts argue that in more northern regions, the energy needed to brighten this darkness, and the limits it puts on outdoor activities are harming our health and the environment.

Leaving clocks alone as winter approaches would allow an extra hour of daylight in the afternoon and could boost levels of vitamin D as well as encourage people to exercise more.

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An insane number of people turned out for Stewart/Colbert rally in DC

Click photo for larger image

In my 25 years in DC, I've been to a lot of the biggest rallies, save the Million Man March and the Pro-Life rallies. I have never, ever, seen anything this big. It was wall to wall people.  You couldn't even walk across. It took us half an hour to go across maybe 100 feet. I have never seen anything like this. I wouldn't be surprised if there were half a million people there or more. I've seen rallies of a quarter million - they were puny compared to this.

A few more photos.  There were a good number of costumes and funny signs.

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Dems held abstinence hearings, Repubs impeached Clinton - LA Times thinks it's the same thing

And by the way, the GOP is planning to gut the EPA.

LA Times:

Using control of congressional committees — and their investigative powers — to attack the opposition is not a new idea. After Democrats gained control of Congress in 2006, they held critical hearings on everything from an energy task force run by Vice President Dick Cheney to the Bush administration's support of abstinence-only sex education.

Similarly, during the Clinton administration, when Republicans took over they appointed independent counsels to investigate various aspects of the administration, leading to the Whitewater probe and the impeachment proceedings, among others.

Similarly?

The Poles said "please don't invade us." Similarly, the Germans did. Read More......

McDonald's in northeast Ohio handing out voting advice to employees

There's a good reason to avoid that revolting place.

A handful of McDonald's employees in northeastern Ohio received handbills in their most recent paychecks suggesting they vote for three Republican candidates.

"If the right people are elected we will be able to continue with raises and benefits at or above our present levels," the insert said. "If others are elected we will not."

The fast food chain's corporate headquarters in Oak Brook, Ill., distanced itself from the action by Canton franchisee Paul Siegfried, saying it was not reflective of the company's position. Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner, the Democratic elections chief, said she was launching an investigation because the action appeared to violate Ohio election laws.

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Yemen warns of 26 more suspicious packages

Some may have already been sent out of the country.

After intercepting two mail bombs addressed to Chicago-area synagogues, investigators are searching for two dozen more suspect packages that terrorists in Yemen attempted to smuggle onto aircraft in a brazen al-Qaida terror plot.

Authorities on three continents thwarted the attacks when they seized explosives on cargo planes in the United Arab Emirates and England on Friday.

The plot sent tremors throughout the U.S., where after a frenzied day searching planes and parcel trucks for other explosives, officials temporarily banned all new cargo from Yemen.

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