US infrastructure falling apart

Since when does a world class country have crumbing infrastructure? The GOP cut taxes, sure, but that's not the only thing they cut. Despite what they'd like people to believe, infrastructure doesn't just happen if you click your heals and hope for the best. The rest of the world continues to invest yet the Republicans have crashed the budget, busted the economy and left us with aging roads and bridges. What a legacy the Republicans have left for America.

It would cost at least $140 billion to repair all the nation's bridges if work began immediately, a nationwide safety organization said in a comprehensive report Monday.

The price tag will rise if the repairs are delayed, the group said.

"States simply cannot keep up with bridge maintenance," the report warns, adding that 73 percent of U.S. road traffic -- and 90 percent of truck traffic -- travels over state-owned bridges.

Nearly one in four bridges needs repairs, and the average age of America's bridges is 43 years -- seven years shy of the maximum age for which most are designed, according to the report, titled "Bridging the Gap."

One in five U.S. bridges is more than 50 years old, the report says.

"Almost one in four bridges, while safe to travel, is either structurally deficient, in need of repair, or ... too narrow for today's traffic volumes," the report from the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials said.

And, lest we forget this disaster from a year ago this week in Governor Tim Pawlenty's state:
Read the rest of this post...

Bush to leave next President record high budget deficit

Yep, those Republicans sure do know economics. Whoever is in there next will be burdened with trying to lift the economy out of its current troubles along with this.

The next president will inherit a record budget deficit of $482 billion, according to a new Bush administration estimate.

A Bush administration official said the deficit was being driven to an all-time high by the sagging economy and the stimulus payments being made to 130 million households in an effort to keep the country from falling into a deep recession. A $482 billion deficit approaching billion would easily surpass the record deficit of $413 billion set in 2004.

Read the rest of this post...

Failed GOP economic policy hurting business

But don't forget, the Republicans know economics. They're the experts and are good for business, so they say.

Banks struggling to recover from multibillion-dollar losses on real estate are curtailing loans to American businesses, depriving even healthy companies of money for expansion and hiring.

Two vital forms of credit used by companies — commercial and industrial loans from banks, and short-term “commercial paper” not backed by collateral — collectively dropped almost 3 percent over the last year, to $3.27 trillion from $3.36 trillion, according to Federal Reserve data. That is the largest annual decline since the credit tightening that began with the last recession, in 2001.

The scarcity of credit has intensified the strains on the economy by withholding capital from many companies, just as joblessness grows and consumers pull back from spending in the face of high gas prices, plummeting home values and mounting debt.

“The second half of the year is shot,” said Michael T. Darda, chief economist at the trading firm MKM Partners in Greenwich, Conn., who was until recently optimistic that the economy would continue expanding. “Access to capital and credit is essential to growth. If that access is restrained or blocked, the economic system takes a hit.”

Read the rest of this post...

McCain attack ad is "literally not true" says NBC's Andrea Mitchell

Senator Richard Burr (R-NC) defends McCain's bizarre ad that falsely claims that Obama went to play basketball instead of visiting injured troops, or some such thing. NBC's Andrea Mitchell was there in Afghanistan with Obama, says it isn't true, and finds the ad's false allegations "inexplicable."

Now watch this, seriously - watch it:



NOTE FROM JOHN: We've been harsh on Andrea Mitchell for being a key player in the phony Wesley Clark brouhaha, but on this one, she did her job, and then some. She was there in Afghanistan with Obama. She personally knows that McCain's ad is a lie. So what did she do? She went public and told us what she knew. She didn't play the he-said-she-said garbage that far too many Washington journalists enjoy, nor did she didn't regurgitate a lie she knew to be untrue. She called McCain on his lie because she had personal facts that were relevant. This is what we keep asking the media to do. Be fair. Tell us what you know. Don't just repeat the other guy's lies when you know them to be false. Mitchell did a great job here, she did HER job here, and we thank her for it. Read the rest of this post...

Polling Update - Daily Tracking & Hispanic Voters

(Note from John and Joe: We're very happy to have Rob Arena writing with us again. Rob was one of the first people to post on AMERICAblog starting way back in 2004, but took a break to focus on his career. He's working on his own now, which means he can start writing with us again. Rob is a great numbers cruncher and an expert in the world of media.)
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Two polls to cover today.

First, the Gallup daily tracking poll has Obama up 9 points over McCain. Normally, a horserace poll this early in the election isn't all that important. In looking at the overall trend, however, it's pretty substantial. From Gallup:

This represents a continuation of Obama's front-runner position evident in the last three Gallup Poll Daily tracking updates. The margin, coincident with the extensive U.S. news coverage of Obama's foreign tour, is the largest for Obama over McCain measured since Gallup began tracking the general election horserace in March.

The Gallup poll is a three day moving average - meaning that the spread over the last couple of nights of calling has been sustained. (A three day moving average usually involves creating a sample of 1/3 from each day of polling - the idea being that short term events, or a single day's bad news can't overly skew results.)

This represents the biggest spread of the election in either direction since they started asking the question in March of this year (full tracking poll results). The most that McCain has lead over Obama is six points - 48% to 42% - back in May. More importantly, this is the highest that Obama has polled and the lowest that McCain has polled.

We're about to come up on the Olympics, and then the Democratic Convention - once those events get started it will be nearly impossible for McCain to get sustained media attention in any positive way. Time is running out for McCain to make a breakthrough against Obama and this helps explain the air of desperation around his new TV campaign. The clock is ticking down on McCain.

The second poll is on the Hispanic vote. Last week the Pew Hispanic Center released data that indicates the Hispanic vote now seems to be moving solidly into the Democratic column. John referenced the poll's immigration issues earlier, but I wanted to pull out a couple of other key points. On the Presidential horserace, Obama beats McCain with Hispanics 66% to 23% The basic favorable / unfavorable numbers for each of the candidates clearly give Obama the advantage - Obama 76%/17%, McCain 44%/47%. The key point - the issues that matter to Hispanic voters are all economic issues. From Pew:

Latino registered voters rank education, the cost of living, jobs and health care as the most important issues in the fall campaign, with crime lagging a bit behind those four and the war in Iraq and immigration still farther behind.

On each of these economic issues, Hispanics believe nearly 3-1 that Obama will do a better job than McCain. But the economic issue goes well beyond just McCain - overall, fewer Hispanics are looking to the Republican party for solutions to the country's problems:

In addition to their strong support for Obama, Latino voters have moved sharply into the Democratic camp in the past two years, reversing a pro-GOP tide that had been evident among Latinos earlier in the decade. Some 65% of Latino registered voters now say they identify with or lean toward the Democratic Party, compared with just 26% who identify with or lean toward the GOP. This 39 percentage point Democratic Party identification edge is larger than it has been at any time this decade; as recently as 2006, the partisan gap was just 21 percentage points.
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More than half of Latino voters (55%) say that the Democratic Party is better for Latinos while just 6% say the Republican Party is better for Latinos.

Much has been written about the death of the Republican "brand" - for Democrats beyond Obama the question is are we winning over Hispanics or are they just disillusioned with Republicans? According to Pew, more Hispanics identify as Democrat than have in the past ten years - the case is clearly being made. This has a potential impact on the entire Fall ticket. For candidates in races with large Hispanic populations, the overall rising tide for Democrats should help open up tight races and may even flip some seats which might otherwise have gone Republican. Read the rest of this post...

GOP Senators filibuster Stroke Treatment, Vision Care for Kids, Paralysis research, Combating Child Exploitation...

This afternoon, by a vote of 52 - 43, Republican Senators stuck with Tom Coburn and voted against moving forward of the Omnibus package, which included numerous vital bills sponsored by some of those same GOP Senators.

The roll call vote is here. Susan Collins (ME) burnished her right wing credentials by sticking with Coburn.

Those Republicans filibustered the bill and wouldn't even allow debate to proceed.

From Harry Reid, a partial list of what was at stake:

“The same Republican Senator who continued to hold up passage of the ALS Registry Act has unfortunately done the same for dozens of other worthy and overwhelmingly bipartisan bills. Just a few of these bills include:

The Emmitt Till Unsolved Crimes bill – Which would help heal old wounds and provide the Department of Justice and the FBI tools needed to effectively investigate and prosecute unsolved civil rights era-murders.

The Runaway and Homeless Youth bill -- Which would provide grants for health care, education and workforce programs, and housing programs for runaways and homeless youth.

The Combating Child Exploitation bill – Which would provide grants to train law enforcement to use technology to track individuals who trade child pornography and establish an Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force.

And the Christopher and Dana Reeve Paralysis Act – Which would enhance cooperation in research, rehabilitation and quality of life for people who suffer from paralysis.

“We tried to pass each of these bills separately, but those efforts have been stalled by the objection of one Senator.

Well, now 41 other Senators have stalled those efforts.

Courtesy of Josh Orton, here are some other bills the Republican Senators rejected today:

Senator Thad Cochran - introduced - Stroke Treatment and Ongoing Prevention Act (S. 999/HR 477)

Sen. Christopher S. Bond - introduced - Vision Care for Kids Act (HR 507/S. 1117)

Sen. Sam Brownback- introduced- Prenatally and Postnatally Diagnosed Conditions Awareness Act (S. 1810/HR 3112)

Sen Domenici, Pete V - introduced - Mentally Ill Offender Treatment and Crime Reduction Reauthorization and Improvement Act (S. 2304/HR 3992)

Sen Vitter, David - introduced - Enhancing the Effective Prosecution of Child Pornography (S. 2869/HR 4136)

Sen Lugar, Richard G. - introduced - Reconstruction and Stabilization Civilian Management Act (HR 1084/S. 613)

Sen Coleman, Norm - introduced - Torture Victims Relief Reauthorization Act (HR 1678/S. 840)

Sen Stevens, Ted - introduced - Ocean Exploration, Mapping & Research (HR 1834/HR 2400/S. 39)

Sen Snowe, Olympia J. - introduced - Integrated Coastal and Ocean Observation System Act (S. 950/HR 2342)

Sen Voinovich, George V. - introduced - Appalachian Regional Development Act Amendments of 2008 (S. 496)

Read the rest of this post...

It's election season, so you know what that means: RED ALERT!

ABC News breathlessly reports that we are entering a period of heightened alert for terrorist attacks. Uh huh. I'm sensing a period of heightened alert for patriotism attacks. The sad part is that the Republicans have so gamed the system that I just don't believe them anymore. And I suspect, and fear, that many Americans join my skepticism. Not a great way to run a country and keep it safe. It really is time to clean house. Read the rest of this post...

Police: Man went on shooting spree in church because its stances were too "liberal"

Wonder what our friends on the religious right have to say about this? You know, the ones who publicly demonize "liberal" churches. Think their hate had a hand in this? Yes it did. Read the rest of this post...

McCain "had a spot removed from his face on Monday"

Reuters:

Republican presidential candidate John McCain, who has suffered from skin cancer in the past, had a spot removed from his face on Monday during a routine checkup by a doctor in Phoenix, an aide said.

"At this point it was just a precautionary removal," the aide told reporters on McCain's campaign plane.

The aide described the spot, on one of McCain's temples, as being like a mole. It was visible on the side of his face and covered with a bandage, the aide said.

McCain has had four malignant melanomas -- a potentially lethal type of skin cancer -- surgically removed since 1993. Three of them were limited to the top layers of the skin and were not invasive.

The fourth melanoma was invasive and was removed from his left temple in 2000. During that surgery, doctors also took out lymph nodes to see if the cancer had spread. The lymph nodes showed no evidence of cancer.

Read the rest of this post...

GOP Senator Hagel: McCain 'treading on some very thin ground' calling himself more patriotic than Obama

I find that people who go out of their way to claim they're more patriotic than you, that they love our country more than you, that they love the troops more than you, that they love God more than you - usually don't. In fact, people who wear their "love of" on their sleeve usually have some sort of problem. Normal people don't need to publicly extol their own love of country, family, or faith. They show it - they don't crow it, as it were.

Hagel and Reed returned to the United States from Jordan, while Obama continued on to Israel, Germany, France and Britain.

"At that point, it was a political trip for Sen. Obama," Hagel said Sunday on CBS' "Face the Nation." "I think it would have been inappropriate for him -- and certainly he would have been criticized by the McCain people and the press and, probably should have been -- if, on a political trip in Europe, paid for by political funds, not the taxpayers, to go essentially then and be accused of using our wounded men and women as props for his campaign."

Hagel also lit in to McCain for, as host Bob Schieffer put it, stating that Obama's views on Iraq were based on political expediency, "that he chose -- and these are Sen. McCain's words -- 'a political path that would get him the nomination.'"

"I think John is treading on some very thin ground here when he impugns motives, and when we start to get into 'You're less patriotic than me, I'm more patriotic,' " Hagel replied, adding: "John's better than that."

Then again, John McCain didn't love America until he was 31 years old. So perhaps he thinks he has some catching up to do. Read the rest of this post...

Former Bush Treasury secretary for Obama

Hey, that hurts. Read the rest of this post...

DOJ IG report concludes that Monica Goodling discriminated against asst. US attorney because she was gay

This just in, from today's release of the Department of Justice Inspector General/Office of Personal Responsibility Report on “An Investigation of Allegations of Politicized Hiring by Monica Goodling and Other Staff in the Office of the Attorney General.” The report concludes that, among other things, Goodling discriminated against an assistant US Attorney on the basis of her sexual orientation. Click the photo, left, to read the conclusion of the Dept of Justice Inspector General report pertaining to this matter. More on the report generally from Chairman Conyers. Read the rest of this post...

Double whammy on McCain's negative attack from NBC: Not believable and not true

NBC is going to get kicked off the McCain campaign bus.

First, Chuck Todd and his crew think McCain's attack ads aren't quite believable:

McCain's latest TV ad hit on Obama blasts the Illinois senator for canceling a visit to meet with wounded US troops at the Landstuhl military base. Like other McCain attack ads on the air, it’s a bit over the top; it asks the voter to believe something that seems hard to believe -- that Obama doesn’t care about US troops. (In fact, in the advertisement, the McCain campaign contradicts its message by using footage of Obama actually playing basketball with US troops in Kuwait.) This McCain ad follows another one blaming Obama for high gas prices -- once again, an attack that doesn't seem believable. (Will voters actually believe Obama's to blame for high gas prices?) A negative ad is always more effective when the attack is believable, when it speaks to a question the voter has already pondered in his own head. And just asking: If the McCain campaign is airing TV ads that voters don’t find believable, what does that do to McCain’s straight-talk image? McCain seems off message. The good news for some conservatives is that McCain is disproving the prediction that he wouldn't be personally tough on Obama. But how long will McCain be comfortable in this role? Can't you picture McCain deciding he doesn't want to be the attacker anymore and suddenly decides he wants to go a different route?

Then, we learn that the premise of the McCain's attack ad about visiting the troops is just plain wrong:

NBC’s Andrea Mitchell reports that there was never a plan for Obama to take the press to Landstuhl, despite the claim by McCain folks and others. The plan was to go with his military aide, retired General Scott Gration. The Pentagon said Gration was off-limits because he had joined the campaign -- violating rules that it not be a political stop.

Obama had gone to see wounded troops in Iraq earlier in the week, without even confirming he'd been there. No press, no pictures. He has done the same when he goes to Walter Reed -- never any press.

The Straight Talker isn't talking so straight these days. Read the rest of this post...

McCain's newest, bizarre, and rather robotic non-answer on the issue of gay couples adopting

A few things are clear. McCain doesn't want to even talk about the issue. He's going to massively avoid giving a clear answer to either the pro civil rights or the homophobic side of the argument. And at the same time, he's trying mighty hard to pander to the religious right by constantly saying he's for family values, whatever that means. Well I'm for family values too, but I'm pretty sure that my definition is a lot different than Pat Robertson's. Why won't McCain simply answer the question? Is it okay for gay men to adopt small children or not? Seems we can't get straight or gay talk out of McCain any more. Why aren't more in the media hounding McCain for a a straight answer? Mrs. Greenspan, you there?

Oh, and a quick aside to James Dobson: Please do endorse McCain. The man is terrified of cultural issues and doesn't seem to want to touch them with a ten-foot poll. We'd like nothing better than to watch you religious right chumps endorse yet another Republican who's telegraphed that they're going to blow you off once elected, and then does. Read the rest of this post...

More backlash on McCain's "churlish" attacks -- from the GOP

John McCain has been especially nasty lately -- even for a guy who is pretty nasty (remember, McCain has that temper problem - here, and here, and here, and here and here - oh and don't miss this one). His attacks on Obama's patriotism have been especially vicious, but they're falling flat. According to this blurb in today's Washington Post, the attacks aren't sitting well in the GOP:

One GOP strategist with close ties to McCain's campaign said the new line of attack reflected the operation's "schizophrenic" nature. He said that tendency was also on display last week, as McCain spoke at length about media coverage of Obama rather than sticking with his plan to focus on the economy.

"They couldn't help themselves," the strategist said, adding that the ad over the hospital visit is "churlish and unlike McCain, and hardly will resonate with the swing voters who are going to decide this election." The strategist continued: "They're doing it because the candidate, and the campaign, is not happy with where they are and they're lashing out."

If McCain hopes to win the election, the strategist added, "he needs to be a happy warrior."

McCain as "happy warrior" isn't going to happen. More of McCain "lashing out" is going to happen.

Jed reports that the none of the usual suspects in the GOP/right wing noise have been echoing McCain's line of attack. Read the rest of this post...

McCain's Latino problem

Very interesting article. McCain is faring worse than Bush with a key group of Hispanics. Basically, because of the GOP effort to demonizes Latinos during the immigration debate. And as the article notes, McCain, yet again, flip flopped on this issue too, so now he's cozying up to the hard-line anti-Latino crowd in his own party. So why should Latinos vote for him if he's going to woo the racists in his own midst? They shouldn't, and aren't.

While he earned the support of about seven in ten Hispanics in his last Arizona Senate race, a Pew Hispanic Center poll released Thursday shows that just 23 percent of Latinos intend to vote for McCain in the presidential contest, barely half of the four in ten Latino voters who exit polls showed voted for President Bush in 2004....

While McCain’s support of the immigration bill — which was eventually voted down — appealed to many Hispanics, it infuriated some conservatives. McCain, his campaign then floundering, promised primary voters that he had “got the message,” vowed to prioritize enforcement and even claimed he wouldn’t have voted for his own bill it if was to have come up again.

The shift in tone placated conservatives while infuriating many Hispanics....

John McCain’s problem looks to be most pronounced among Protestant Latinos, who had seemed to be the GOP’s doorway into the Hispanic population.

“McCain’s problem is the problem of his party demonizing Hispanic people,” Cortes said. “His party demonized us. You can’t switch off the immigration rhetoric and think it will work. In the context of the immigration issue, Hispanics define the enemy as the Republican Party and you don’t erase that overnight.

Read the rest of this post...

Monday Morning Open Thread

Good morning.

What's the week have in store? V.P. picks? The Olympics start August 8th, which is a week from Friday. There's a general sense that the Beijing games will preempt politics. Does McCain try to get back in the game by picking his Veep in the next couple days? That's the rumor buzzing around.

McCain is pretty much writing the ads about himself. He's continually getting facts wrong or saying one thing, then denying it the next day. Now, if only there was an entity that could run those ads. If only.

So, let's get this week started.... Read the rest of this post...

Over $4 billion in failed rebuilding projects for Iraq

So where has McCain been when this was collapsing? Iraq is his pet project, so let's hear what he's been doing to protect American taxpayers and make sure that our money is spent wisely in Iraq. The Republicans can't stop telling everyone how well they run the economy but the facts say something radically different. Their friends fail to meet the terms and conditions of contracts and yet they're still paid. Everyone else should be so lucky.

The pages also add another narrative to the wider probes into the billions lost so far on scrubbed or substandard projects in Iraq and one of the main contractors accused of failing to deliver, the Parsons construction group of Pasadena, Calif.

"This is $40 million invested in a project with very little return," Bowen told The Associated Press in Washington. "A couple of buildings are useful. Other than that, it's a failure."

In the pecking order of corruption in Iraq, the dead-end prison project at Khan Bani Saad is nowhere near the biggest or most tangled.

Bowen estimated up to 20 percent "waste" — or more than $4 billion — from the $21 billion spent so far in the U.S.-bankrolled Iraq Relief and Reconstruction Fund. It's just one piece of a recovery effort that swelled beyond $112 billion in U.S., Iraqi and international contributions.

But the empty prison compound — in the shadows of more than two dozen watchtowers now dotted by birds' nests — is an open sore for both American watchdogs and local Iraqi politicians who had counted on the prison as an economic boost.

Read the rest of this post...

Inflation to start increasing, even more

If you thought that the rising food and energy costs were bad, just wait for the next round. Many retailers and restaurants have held off on passing on inflation but those days are nearing an end. With all of the basic food costs going up, McCain is going to need a larger cheat sheet to keep track of prices. Perhaps Phil Gramm can give him the answers on the fly the way Lieberman does for Iraq. Now that's leadership.

Most inflation this year has come from food and fuel, as retailers resisted passing along to strapped consumers the higher prices manufacturers charged them, but coming increases from companies such as Johnson & Johnson and Hasbro Inc. may leave them with no choice.

"While these increases have not for the most part been passed on at the retail level, it is inevitable that they will be at some point," said Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research. "Car dealers and other retailers cannot continue to absorb rising costs at the wholesale level and not pass some of these increases on to consumers."

Sherwin Williams Co. on July 17 announced its third price increase in eight months. The company has been having "difficult discussions" with retailers, Chris Connor, chairman and CEO, said on its quarterly conference call.

The price increases are "well supported with facts in terms of why the company needs them," he said. "Our customers, to the best of their ability, are passing them on."

Read the rest of this post...