Hullabaloo

Sunday, October 07, 2012

 
Virtually Speaking at 6pdt with Joan McCarter and Me

by digby

Digby and Joan McCarter Virtually Speaking Sundays
by Jay Ackroyd Featured Host
in Politics Progressive
Sun, October 7, 2012 06:00PM/pdt

Call in to speak with the host
(646) 200-3440

Joan and digby will talk about the debates and about the future of our social insurance programs, in the wake of the debates.

Culture of Truth satirizes the Sunday Morning 'news' shows at the Bobblespeak Translations. Each week, he provides us with a pre-recorded segment: the most ridiculous moment from that Sunday.


.
digby 10/07/2012 05:30:00 PM

 
Goldwater to Ryan to what?

by digby

Elias Isquith has written a piece on Barry Goldwater and Paul Ryan that's filled with interesting insights. And he brings up something important which I don't think most people realize:

The treatise on what Ryan calls the "moral consequences" of the welfare state recalls nothing so much Goldwater's Conscience of a Conservative. In the surprise bestseller, he warned, "The effect of Welfarism on freedom will be felt later on -- after its beneficiaries have become its victims, after dependence on government has turned into bondage and it is too late to unlock the jail." Ryan's rhetoric is never quite so apocalyptic, but his frequent warnings that his country approaches a threshold "beyond which the Nation will be unable to change course ... [with] disastrous fiscal consequences, and an erosion of economic prosperity and the American character itself" come close.

The Republican Party's antipathy toward the welfare state is well known. Less appreciated is the fact that what really defined Goldwater in the public's eye was his comfort with, or even celebration of, the violence of the state.

Isquith goes on to discuss this in the context of Goldwater's anti-communism and points out that Ryan mouths all the same BS about "exceptionalism" and "not apologizing" on foreign policy and I think he's more than likely to be as bloodthristy as all right wingers when it comes to national security. But I also think Ryan believes in state violence domestically. He has never deviated from the standard authoritarian POV of the conservative mainstream, whether in terms of civil liberties of crime and punishment issues. Goldwater was anxious to kill off communism, but I never got the sense that he thought police violence and incarcerating large numbers of America citizens should be standard operating procedure. (There's not a lot of moral difference there, I grant you, but it does show a difference in scale.)

Isquith goes on to note the most glaring difference between the two avatars of economic freedom: the religious right. Goldwater didn't have any use for them while Ryan goes out of his way to ensure that his Randroid extremism can fit in with their worldview. And increasingly, it does. We've got plenty of Christian right leaders extolling the virtues of low taxes and agitating to end the welfare state these days.

I'm sure Old Barry would still have disliked their incessant desire to meddle in people's personal lives, but Ryan doesn't seem to mind at all. After all, to Goldwater, even the commies were still human beings. Does Ryan think that individual liberty applies to parasites?

In any case, read the whole piece. Let's just say these wingnuts aren't getting any saner with time.

.
digby 10/07/2012 04:30:00 PM

 
"Fox News will help you"

by digby

The Republican party of Florida says this call was "off script" but it sure sounds like it was on message to me:

Well think really heard, you all sound like senior citizens, no? …. Yea, you don’t want Obama, you don’t want Obama because he’ll get rid of your Medicare. You might as well say goodbye to it. … Yea, and I don’t know if you have done any research on Obama or not, but he is a Muslim. He has got a socialistic view on the government, economy, the whole nine yards. If he had his way, we would be a socialistic country. …. Pay attention to Fox News. If you can get out and watch that movie 2016, do so, it has a lot of really good information. Just really read the newspapers and Fox News will help you.

This is what Fox news and talk radio say all day long. Even the Muslim stuff is easily tolerated on the network and the rest is by the book Fox commentary. Rush, Hannity and the rest as well.

I would guess that there are many Romney volunteers who are saying this all over the country. They believe it.


.


digby 10/07/2012 03:00:00 PM

 
So much for the Year of the Woman

by digby

Chris Hayes and his panel today talked about the most mystifying omissions in the debate:

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

I think Hayes is right and that the President didn't prepare. Confidence is a necessary trait in a president, but I think his achilles heel is believing his own hype. And I think the hype was that he was good at debating and Romney isn't. Unfortunately for us, losing a presidential debate to Mitt Romney is probably the least significant negative consequence of this particular character trait.

I personally don't think this debate means as much as some people do. I get why the right is having a field day. If the Democrats were the underdogs, they'd be doing the same happy dance if their guy trounced the Republican in the first presidential debate. It's natural. If the polls show a substantial shift over the next couple of weeks in Romney's favor, then I suppose this will have been an important event. But, unless Obama screws the pooch in the rest of the debates I'd be surprised if it ends up being a big deal.


.
digby 10/07/2012 01:30:00 PM

 
A proposal to change the structure of debates

by digby

Considering the fact that the Republicans have openly admitted that they lie in presidential debates and don't care if they are fact-checked, perhaps something needs to be done to change them. Michael Froomkin has an interesting proposal:

Can something be done to prevent lying in Presidential debates? I have a simple suggestion that will greatly reduce the opportunity for lies, admitting that nothing can eradicate them completely: The moderator’s key questions on the issues should be released to the candidates and the public 48 hours in advance of the debates.

It is silly to think that the element of surprise adds value to these events. Allow the candidates to do scripted talks and then have the surprises be the back and forth as they interact and ask each other followups. Allow followups from the moderator if you trust him or her to be less milquetoast than the hapless Jim Lehrer. But if you must have surprise as to the basic questions, reduce it to a fraction of the event.

Releasing at least a substantial fraction of the questions in advance will unleash the fact-checkers on all sides. It will promote debate. It will allow campaigns to set up web sites in which they give backup for their claims. In a more perfect world than we actually have, we could aim for a week in advance, and hope that a consensus dataset would evolve in real rather than nominal dollars, but I know that is just an academic pipe dream. It won’t happen, and a week is a long time in politics anyway.

Of course, the two campaigns control the debate formats and they'll never agree. But it's just possible that if for some reason the media had a collective epiphany and decided to do their jobs, they could insist which would mean the candidates would have to choose between cancelling the debates (no great loss to the public considering what mendacious kabuki pageants they currently are) or adhering to these new rules. Scroll down to the post below to see why I am very pessimistic about that possibility.


.
digby 10/07/2012 11:00:00 AM

 
The Villagers circle the wagons

by digby

It's one thing for each side in the political divide to accuse the other of lying. But when someone suggests that the press is partly responsible for the fact that Americans are being misinformed, just watch the fur fly. Here's the entire This Week panel attacking Paul Krugman for suggesting the press fell down on the job in reporting Romney's epic lie fest in the debate:

This was on and on and on, with Matalin sneeringly referring to Krugman as "doctor professsssser" as if that was synonymous with child molester. I especially love walking cliche Jonathan Karl jumping in with the "he said/she said." If you wrote him as a character in The Newsroom, we'd consider him a cartoon --- even by that show's standards.

Here's an example of Matalin the arbiter of truth:

MATALIN: You have mischaracterized and you have lied about every position and every particular of the Ryan plan on Medicare, from the efficiency of Medicare administration, to calling it a voucher plan, so you’re hardly credible on calling somebody else a liar.

Think Progress:

But this is exactly what the Ryan proposal is — turning Medicare from a “defined benefit” into a “defined contribution” plan. Seniors would get a voucher from the federal government that they could use to help pay for a selection of private plans.

Although the Romney/Ryan campaign has shied away from this phrase in favor of the euphemistic “premium support,” Ryan himself has specifically referred to his proposal as a “voucher” program in the past.

The woman has chutzpah.

I also enjoyed Carville saying the good news is that the Republican base is fully embracing Romney and so will not be able to disavow him if he loses. Shortly thereafter, Peggy Noonan lugubriously declared that the Romney who showed up at the debate was the grown-up, reasonable moderate Governor of Massachusetts. Does anyone believe that those two comments compute?

All in all, this show made me miss Ann Coulter. I don't think I need to explain just how bad that makes this particular show.

.

digby 10/07/2012 09:18:00 AM

 
Drowning in a dwindling sea of white

by David Atkins

L.A. Times photographer Maeve Reston was at the Romney rally in Florida yesterday, and took this photo, which copyright restrictions don't allow me to paste.

So go look at it..

What do you see? Or, more precisely, what do you not see?

Mitt Romney may or may not squeak out this election against a vulnerable president. Probably not. But one thing is certain: this will be the last time anyone tries to do this. Many of those in that photograph won't be around to vote four years from now. And many more progressive voters will be in the ranks.

They'll try to paper it over with different looking candidates, but it will still be a losing proposition for them.


.

thereisnospoon 10/07/2012 07:30:00 AM

Saturday, October 06, 2012

 

Saturday Night At The Movies Will it go round in circles? By Dennis Hartley

My dinner with me: Willis and Gordon-Levitt in Looper

 

If there’s one cardinal rule of time-travel that I’ve gleaned from watching sci-fi movies over the years, it’s this: make sure that you never, ever “meet” yourself. Why? Dunno, really, just that you’re not supposed to. I imagine it could be quite unnerving, in either direction. I mean, it’s traumatic enough looking at that dorky version of my younger self in that yearbook photo, and who in their right mind is chomping at the bit to get a sneak preview of themselves in drooling dotage? In his stylish and ultra-violent sci-fi thriller Looper, writer-director Rian Johnson not only gleefully breaks the cardinal rule, but manages to violate a few that haven’t been invented yet (see what I did there?). Johnson has himself a jolly time exploring the potential fluidity of the time-space continuum, toying with causality and paradox like a kitten batting a ball of yarn all around the room.

The year is 2044, and America is a dystopia (it took that long?). The economy has gone 2008 for good, crime is rampant and 1 out of every 10 people has a mutation that gives them the power to levitate objects at will (although for a majority of the afflicted, their abilities are limited to the occasional Uri Geller level parlor trick). Jobs are scarce; the biggest “job creator” is organized crime (again…it took that long?). And yes, they still have plenty of gigs for hit men in the future; especially for a unique subset known as “loopers”. Loopers have a relatively easy time of it; unlike your standard assassin, who has to meticulously plan the right time and the right place to do a hit, the looper simply shows up for “work” at a designated spot, where the target (bound, hooded and festooned with a set of silver bars) is delivered to him like an overnight FedEx package…from 30 years in the future (don’t ask…just enjoy your delicious buttered popcorn and accept it).

Pretty easy job, wouldn’t you say? The hours are good, the wages are decent, and loopers party like rock stars when they go out on the town. However, there is a calculated risk every looper takes by choosing this career path. “Retirement” (at least in the traditional sense) isn’t necessarily part of the equation. Should your bosses (who can be a fickle lot) determine that for whatever reason your services will no longer be required, they send the older version of yourself back to the present so that your younger self can take you out. This is referred to by the higher-ups as “closing the loop”. Naturally, they don’t give you a heads up; it’s just another anonymous hooded victim who appears out of thin air in the middle of a cornfield somewhere in Kansas. Either way you look at it, you never see it coming. Ergo, as looper Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) confides with self-effacing irony in the opening voiceover, this is not a profession that tends to attract “forward-thinkers”. Joe does have plans; he’s stashing all his silver bars and learning to speak French. Everything is going swimmingly for young Joe until that one fateful day in the cornfield, when his Victim du jour turns out to be… “old” Joe (Bruce Willis), who manages to flee.  Uh-oh.

As it is nearly impossible to divulge further plot detail without dropping a trail of spoilers in my wake, I’ll leave it there, and let you discover and enjoy the surprising twists and turns in your own time (in a manner of speaking). While there are some obvious touchstones here (primarily 12 Monkeys, The Terminator  and Logan's Run , with a few echoes of Groundhog Day.) Johnson has fashioned a clever and original thriller that’s smarter than your average modern sci-fi actioner, yet not so self-consciously “meaningful” as to drown in its own self-importance (the director has not forgotten to entertain the audience along the way). Most notably, there’s an emphasis on character development (remember that?) and a palpable focus on the quality of the writing that is sorely lacking in most genre entries these days. The production design, special effects and atmospheric flourishes are “futuristic” without going over the top. It’s the little touches I especially enjoyed, like the fact that the time travel device is clearly modeled after George Pal’s design for his 1960 version of Time Machine . Gordon-Levitt and Willis are terrific, and there are strong supporting performances from Jeff Daniels and Emily Blunt. See it now. See it later; it doesn’t really matter (time being relative and all).

Saturday Night at the Movies review archives

Dennis Hartley 10/06/2012 05:30:00 PM

 
Romneybot the lying regulator

by digby

Chris Hayes featured a lively discussion this morning about Mitt Romney the born again regulator and scourge of Wall Street:

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

I'll just repeat this from from Michael Moore a couple of days ago:

"'You can say anything you want during a debate and 80 million people hear it,'observed Peter Teeley, press secretary to Vice President Bush. If reporters then document that a candidate spoke untruthfully, 'so what? Maybe 200 people read it or 2,000 or 20,000.'" – New York Times, November 1, 1984

It would likely be many more these days. But unless it can break through the din of a thousand other stories I think the rule still applies.


.
digby 10/06/2012 04:30:00 PM

 
The people in charge

by digby

Someone sent this around the other day and I can't recall what it was in regard to. But it doesn't matter. Just watch.

Keep in mind that this is one of your leaders, folks. Makes you proud to be an American, doesn't it?

Well, at least we know we're free.



.
digby 10/06/2012 03:30:00 PM

 
Movement politics and electoral politics are continually intertwined

by digby

A smart observation from Frances Fox Piven and Lorraine C Minnite:

The familiar question of whether we work on electoral politics or on movement politics is fraught with emotion and argument about whether movement or electoral politics is more effective for the left. We think it is the wrong question. Both are needed, and without both, neither is effective.

In historical fact, movement politics and electoral politics are continuously intertwined. The fundamental dynamic is triggered when politicians have to deal with voter blocs composed of the same people to whom movements direct their appeals. We can see this dynamic on both the right and the left. The Tea Party picked up steam when Republicans eager for re-election began to repeat its slogans. So did the labor movement of the 1930s gain momentum from Franklin Roosevelt’s rhetorical appeals to the “common man,” just as the civil rights movement was energized by Lyndon Johnson’s echo of the movement refrain “We shall overcome.” When politicians echo a movement’s demands, they signal a degree of vulnerability to its constituency, and the movement gains traction.

It’s also worth remembering that when politicians are dependent on electoral blocs that are also movement constituencies, they will often hesitate to use the full arsenal of the state’s repressive capacities against movement actions and may even make uncertain efforts to protect movements—as when Robert Kennedy, as attorney general, grudgingly tried to protect the Freedom Riders.

And a movement can have a division of labor on this while remaining allies with shared goals. This is why Howie, John and I support progressive candidates with Blue America and try to help them even when they are engaged in long shot races. You have to cross pollinate movement with electoral politics and electoral politics with the movement if you hope to have any effect. Changing the discourse, applying outside pressure, electing allies are all part of it.

But I always go back to what longtime activist and congressional candidate, Norman Solomon said:

Norman Solomon: We need to occupy - literally and figuratively - Congressional seats for the 99 percent. Social movements need a healthy ecology, which means a wide array of activities and manifestations of grassroots power. That includes progressives in Congress. I say on the campaign trail that we need our feet on the ground and our eyes on the stars of our ideals.

It's not good enough to have one or the other. State power matters - we've seen that from county and state offices to Washington, D.C. And, as somebody who has written literally thousands of articles, 12 books, gone to hundreds of demonstrations and probably organized hundreds of demonstrations, I believe we always have to be protesting; we always have to be in the streets. It's not either-or. I want our feet on the ground to include change for government policies. Laws matter. Whether or how they are enforced matters.

I think people sometimes confuse their own individual preferences, talents, strengths and interests with the totality of what an effective movement needs to do. In Latin America, we have seen the tremendous power of combining social movements that permeate the grassroots with the ballot box. Whatever their shortcomings, if you look at what's happened in Brazil in terms of hunger and in other countries in the southern cone and elsewhere that not more than a couple decades ago were ruled by vicious dictators, they have been implementing genuinely progressive policies. We have an opportunity here to get beyond dualistic thinking and start thinking of synergy rather than this counterposing of our options, which creates a false either-or scenario.

Right now there is a tremendous awakening in this country about income inequality. People are fed up with war, and so many people are seeing that the status quo is a prescription for more suffering. We have to see this time as not for being dogmatic about one tactic or another, but seeing that in the context of non-violent, small-d democratic action here. Another way to put it: it is a historic mistake for progressives to leave the electoral arena to corporate Democrats and Republicans.

.



digby 10/06/2012 02:00:00 PM

 
The Plutocrat elites of "Fix the Debt" get down with the grassroots

by digby

As regular readers know, I have been writing about the latest Pete Peterson Propaganda campaign called "Fix the Debt" for many months. You'll recall its the latest offshoot of the BS Deficit Scare tour, starring Ed Rendell and Judd Gregg and a whole boatload of CEOs rushing to rescue us from our overly indulgent lifestyles and hit us with a bracing splash of tough love.

Or, as they put it:

An organization founded by Erskine Bowles and Al Simpson announced Tuesday that it has raised more than $25 million to launch a national campaign to encourage policy makers to pass debt legislation in the coming months.

The Campaign to Fix the Debt has collected contributions from corporate CEOs and others for a national media campaign and advertising campaign to urge lawmakers reach a solution to the debt crisis.

Who are these knights in shining armor?

Some grown-ups who have been noticeably absent from this conversation have been the heads of the country’s major corporations, who talk a good game about deficit reduction but haven’t invested the time, money and political capital necessary to jolt the political system from its dysfunctional equilibrium.

That’s about to change. Last week, the first battalion of CEOs showed up in Washington, reporting for duty.
[...]
During the past year, there have been quiet meetings put together by chief executives such as Cote, Aetna’s Mark Bertolini and JPMorgan’s Jamie Dimon, and Senators Mark Warner (D) and Saxby Chambliss (R), the ringleaders of the bipartisan Gang of Six. Nudging it along and pulling it all together has been Maya MacGuineas, who for a decade has been sounding the deficit alarm from the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.

In addition to Cote, Dimon and Bertolini, the charter business members include Sandy Cutler of Eaton, Gregg Sherrill of Tenneco, Marty Flanagan of Invesco, Gary Loveman of Caesars, Thomas Quinlan of R.R. Donnelley & Sons and financiers Steven Rattner and Pete Peterson.

Well, they're finally getting down with the grassroots. Bold Progressives has the dirt:

If you sign up as a volunteer for the group, you’ll be e-mailed a “toolkit” that you’re supposed to use to engage in pro-austerity activism on behalf of the billionaires who run the group.

One of the instructions in the tool kit is to “bird dog” campaign events and town halls that feature Members of Congress. Here’s the sample questions that the campaign is asking people to dog lawmakers with. Notice that they are designed to pressure legislators to agree to cuts to Social Security and enact other devastating spending cuts.

The took kit also instructs activists to “get to the event early to hold signs or pass out literature about the debt,” and to “have somebody ready to record the answer with video, if possible.” Finally, it reminds you to “raise your hand as quickly as possible when the candidate takes questions, speak clearly and confidently!”

Don't you just love the fact that a 25 million dollar campaign financed by millionaire CEOs is telling average people to go to Townhalls and hold up signs? I guess they just don't have any access to power to make their case ...

No, they're brainwashing the citizens, trying to persuade them to sell-out their on interests on behalf of these greedhead plutocrats. But you knew that.

Back in July I started writing about this latest scheme. Before it was called "Fix the Debt" it was called something else: The Moment of Truth Project (and before that something else again.) Bowles and Simpson and their allies have been working this relentlessly:

In researching the Simpson-Bowles fast track solution and came upon a group called the Moment of Truth project: the era of deficit denial is over. It turns out that this is Simpson and Bowles own group, which is out there preaching the gospel. That's to be expected. I suppose it's also to be expected that this is also a project of the New America Foundation, one of our most revered establishment think tanks. 

This is the heart of the Village, the studious centrism that also erroneously defines the leftward end of political power in our country. Certainly many people who are associated with the liberal side of the dial are involved, although it's almost impossible to find any liberal policies among the group's recommendations. 

And they are deadly serious about slashing "entitlements." 

The key thing there is the fact that they are slashing across the board (except for defense, of course.) And then there's the revenue portion of our program, which should be lots of fun to watch since it's composed of magical thinking. (One would think that a debt crisis wouldn't be the perfect moment to lower tax rates, but that's what they're proposing.) 

This is how they propose to fix the deficit. Slash spending and lower taxes. I don't know how they are getting away with this sophistry, but they are. They feel this is their best opportunity to force the rubes to give up whatever small piece of financial security they have and they have no intention of stopping until they achieve this goal.

And as long as they adhere to the idea that low taxes equal more growth,which they explictly state above, they will always have the excuse they need to dispense favors to the "job creators." In other words, for every loophole they close, two will be opened. If you doubt it, read about the machinations behind the scenes of the Dodd-Frank implementation. This is the full employment act for lobbyists and tax attorneys.

And keep in mind that this isn't Pete Peterson, folks (although he is a major contributor.) This is one of the most staid, non-partisan DC institutions doing this. And they are rolling out new projects every few months with the same agenda. (Here's the latest, announced by Simpson and Bowles just last week on CNBC --- with Warren Buffet sitting by their side.)

I hope nobody is under the illusion that this fight is over. I'm not sure it ever will be. When the budget was balanced in the 90s (without radical slashing of "entitlements" much to the dismay of those who want to do it) these folks just laid low and let the government spend all the money in tax cuts and wars. They could have fought it, insisted that the surplus be spent to shore up social security and Medicare but they didn't utter a peep. Then once the deficit returned, they cranked up the old "sacrifice" machine once more.

Thus they have proven over and over again that their real agenda is to degrade our already pitiful welfare state. Their "solutions" prove this --- lower spending, lower taxes ---which leads inexorably to drowning the poor safety net in the bathtub. They don't say this. They say they just need to hold the baby's head under the water a little bit and the baby won't even mind it. (And anyway, it's more important to keep the bathtub clean so they'll be able to "bathe" even more babies.) But no matter how they dress it up as a debt problem, it's austerity lite- soft Randism. 

And sadly, it isn't just Pete Peterson and his billion dollar foundation doing this. It's virtually the entire political establishment.

I don't know anymore what to say about this. Ryan Grim wrote it up for Huffington Post last week, but I'm sure it got lost in all the shuffle.  But here is what all that money is buying:

MacGuineas said she has raised close to $30 million for the Campaign to Fix the Debt, but the goal is "bigger than that." The largest contribution so far has been $5 million from a single donor, she said. (HuffPost guessed that donor was Peterson, and MacGuineas said, "You could go out on that limb.") The rest of the money is being raised from corporate CEOs and other wealthy donors.

The operation has hired 25 to 30 staffers, with plans to potentially double. Along with a paid-media campaign, it looks to influence press coverage in some 40 states with locally focused teams.

The project is growing so rapidly that when HuffPost asked why it wasn't in all 50 states, MacGuineas thought and decided that maybe it should be. "Maybe you just changed policy. Maybe we'll be in all 50 states," she said.

If the president does win a grand bargain -- as he pledged to do during his convention speech -- he will have betrayed voters, New York Times columnist Paul Krugman argued earlier this week. If Obama is reelected, "[n]ow is the time, he'll be told, to fix America's entitlement problem once and for all. There will be calls -- as there were at the time of the Democratic National Convention -- for him to officially endorse Simpson-Bowles, the budget proposal issued by the co-chairmen of his deficit commission (although never accepted by the commission as a whole)," Krugman wrote. "And Mr. Obama should just say no."

Yes, he should.

.


digby 10/06/2012 12:30:00 PM

 
Justice Scalia thinks it's "absolutely easy" to channel the minds of dead people

by digby

He's so sure of himself:

Antonin Scalia isn’t sweating it. At a book reading and lecture at Washington’s American Enterprise Institute this week, the 76-year-old associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States and self-described “textualist” entertained the crowd by rattling off a litany of his top judicial no-brainers.

“The death penalty? Give me a break. It’s easy. Abortion? Absolutely easy. Nobody ever thought the Constitution prevented restrictions on abortion,” he said. “Homosexual sodomy? Come on. For 200 years, it was criminal in every state.”

Slavery and Jim Crow used to be legal and women weren't allowed to have their own money or vote. But in Nino's world, America is suspended in amber in 1789 and that's where it will stay forever more.

I cannot understand why this man is considered so brilliant. To me, this view is infantile. This simplistic deification of the founders as if the constitution was something other than a simple organizing document that can be changed and interpreted however the people of the United Stated choose to interpret it. It's not a sacred document. If he wants to think such things exist, there are plenty of them out there. Obviously, he should have been a priest.

But even if you believe that everything must be guided by the "plain words" of the constitution, as Ian Millhiser at Think Progress points out, it's complicated. For instance:

"...the death penalty. The Constitution prohibits “cruel and unusual punishments,” but it provides no other guidance on just how vicious a punishment must be to become “cruel” or how uncommon it must be to become “unusual.” Does the fact that the death penalty is increasingly rare in the United States meet the threshold of unconstitutionality? The Constitution doesn’t say."

I have to say, it's even more obscure than he says. I always assumed that "unusual" meant "bizarre" not uncommon. Shows what I know.

Antonin Scalia cannot know what was inside the founders heads. They weren't Gods, they were a bunch of colonial farmers. And even they disagreed on what the "plain words" meant. Half the time they were the result of compromises that nobody particularly believed in. He must know that the founders weren't all of one mind or that many of them might have not had a strong opinion about certain things one way or the other. You don't have to be a historian or a Supreme Court Justice to know that. You just have to have been alive on planet earth for a time observing how human beings act --- particularly powerful arrogant men with axes to grind. Like Antonin Scalia.

I assume that his view is held in great esteem by many in legal circles, but I think they are missing the forest for the trees. As a lowly layperson, I can easily say that it is simply absurd on its face that Americans in 2012 are bound by the mores and habits of the 18th Century. I'm sorry, it's just stupid.


.

digby 10/06/2012 09:30:00 AM

 
What Taibbi said

by David Atkins

Matt Taibbi on the first presidential debate:

Romney told a series of outright lies – the bit about the pre-existing conditions was incredible – while Barack Obama seemed unaccountably disinterested in the intellectual challenge of the exercise, repeatedly leaving the gross absurdities hurled his way by Romney unchallenged.

Romney's performance was better than Obama's, but only if you throw out criteria like "wasn't 100% full of shit from the opening bell" and "made an actual attempt to explain who he is and what his plans are." Unfortunately, that is good enough for our news media, which drools over the gamesmanship aspects of these debates, because it loves candidates who sink their teeth into the horse-race nonsense that they think validates their professional lives.

Taibbi mentions a few examples of fact-free horserace "journalism" about the debate, and mentions the Kennedy-Nixon example of television appearance outweighing substance:

Journalists who cite that Nixon-Kennedy debate always forget that the lesson of that night is that the new broadcast media technology made superficiality and nonsense more important – that thanks to the press, it was now possible to get someone elected to the most powerful office on earth because he had a superior tan. Reporters love this story because it reminds everyone that the medium they work in has the power to overcome substance and decide elections all by itself. What's amazing is that they don't have the good sense to be ashamed of this.

I read the transcript of the debate and all I got from Romney was either outright factual lies, or total rhetorical dishonesty. He even tried out a version of the for-years-debunked death panel business...

And after taking down several of Romney's various lies and evasions, finishes with this:

So the answer to the question, "What will you do to rein in the biggest budget deficit in history?" comes down to, "I'll cut PBS, which is about one millionth of the federal budget, and some other stuff."

For God's sake – "I'll take programs that could be run more efficiently at state and send them to state"? Is that a joke? That's worse than a Bill Belichick answer: "What's our plan against the Broncos? We're going to watch the film and do what's best for our football team."

Reporters should have instantly pelted Romney with bags of dogshit for insulting the American people with this ridiculous non-answer, but he was instead praised for the canny "strategy" hidden in the response. Despite the fact that Romney is running as a budget hawk and yet has refused to name any actual programs (except Obamacare and PBS) he will cut, reporters gave him credit in the debate for being willing to be the bearer of bad budgetary news, because he essentially advance-fired Jim Lehrer on TV. Many also complimented the "humor" of the line about Big Bird.

Don't blame the electorate for being bamboozled by this stuff. Just as we hire politicians to delve into public policy so we constituents can go about our lives, so too we pay media figures to tell us what is going on in the world, and to hold those who would lead us accountable.

The media has fallen down on the job in spectacular fashion.


.
thereisnospoon 10/06/2012 07:00:00 AM

Friday, October 05, 2012

 
Ganja reprieve in La La land

by digby

I guess it's kind of hard to look someone in the face and tell them it's just tough luck, they can't have their medicine:

In a faint and gravelly voice, Los Angeles Councilman Bill Rosendahl delivered an impassioned plea Tuesday asking his colleagues to lift the ban on pot dispensaries, asking them: “Where does anybody go, even a councilman go, to get his medical marijuana?”

Minutes before the council voted 11-2 to rescind its recently passed ban on storefront pot shops, Rosendahl said the council’s decision had created “a very emotional moment” for him. Rosendahl has been battling cancer for the past three months and relying on medical marijuana during that time.

“On the 20th of July, I had an MRI that was very, very serious. And the bottom line on that was, they didn’t give me much time to live. And I said, ‘No, no no no, I'm not ready to go. I certainly want to live a long time,’” said Rosendahl, who has been undergoing chemotherapy treatments and relying on a walker to move around in recent days.

Rosendahl, 67, said he began taking medical marijuana a decade ago to manage his neuropathy, a stinging pain in his feet, taking it “occasionally at night.” But on Tuesday, he put the issue in the context of his battle with cancer, which has made it difficult for him to speak above a whisper.

“If I can’t get marijuana, and it’s medically prescribed, what do I do?” he asked his colleagues.

Rosendahl criticized President Obama’s handling of the issue and spoke against some of the recent federal raids of dispensaries. And he said Los Angeles should work with state lawmakers to make California law regulating medical marijuana clearer.

But as moving as that was, it wasn't the reason they rescinded the ban:

The Los Angeles City Council's decision to repeal its ban on medical marijuana dispensaries underscores the political savvy of the increasingly organized and well-funded network of marijuana activists.

The activists sought to place a referendum overturning the ban on the March ballot, when the mayor and eight council seats will be up for grabs.

Tuesday's repeal of the ban marked a major victory for the coalition. The effort was led by an advocacy group called Americans for Safe Access, a group of dispensaries called the Greater Los Angeles Collective Alliance and the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 770 which has organized workers at more than 50 dispensaries.

By collecting tens of thousands of signatures to qualify the referendum, the activists forced council members to decide whether to rescind the ordinance or put the matter on the March ballot.

That's some savvy organizing. And see? It can be good for business to unionize. There's a lesson in that.

.
digby 10/05/2012 06:00:00 PM

 
If you're looking for a doctor steer clear of Paul Broun

by digby

Wow. This is one scary video:

Ed Kilgore writes:

Now as a practicing Christian, I’m more offended religiously than politically at Broun’s rant. The Bible, he says, is a “manufacturer’s handbook,” that shows “how to run our lives individually, how to run our families, how to run our churches…how to run all of public policy and everything in society.” What an astonishingly, depressingly unspiritual way to look at the Good Book; what an appallingly illiterate way of understanding it, particularly if you get that the only scriptures people like Broun want to use to control the lives of everyone in the world just happen to reinforce the kind of smug white conservative patriarchal world-view from a bygone era they consider ideal.

It’s saddening and maddening, worse yet because among the “amens” greeting Broun’s soul-deadening paen to religious and political authoritarianism there wasn’t one voice saying “Really?”

No kidding.

I'm not a religious person so I'll take the political side and say that this represents the line of thought that makes me extremely leery of conservative Christian involvement in politics. These people have an authoritarian streak that makes my skin crawl and I feel that I must fight them. And I can't help but resent the fact that creepy people like Sally Quinn extol this cretin's belief system while dismissing people like me as some sort of freak:

This is a religious country. Part of claiming your citizenship is claiming a belief in God, even if you are not Christian.. We’ve got the Creator in our Declaration of Independence. We’ve got “In God We Trust” on our coins. We’ve got “one nation under God” in our Pledge of Allegiance. And we say prayers in the Senate and the House of Representatives to God.

An atheist could never get elected dog catcher, much less president. (Democratic Rep. Pete Stark of California is a nontheist but doesn’t talk much about it).

But this lunatic, who Kilgore rightly points out has bastardized Christianity --- and science --- into some hideous, simple-minded freakshow, is just one of many elected members of the US congress who think this way. The rest of us are supposed to grant this nonsense extra respect because it's a religious view and therefore cannot be challenged. It's frustrating.

Oh, by the way, this man is allegedly a physician.


.
digby 10/05/2012 04:30:00 PM

 
Republicans are still trying to stifle democracy

by David Atkins

Lee Fang at The Nation reports:

This morning, ProgressNow New Mexico, a left-leaning advocacy organization, released a video showing the New Mexico Republican Party instructing its poll watchers to engage in what could be illegal voter suppression.

The poll watchers are told to request identification from voters, even though the law in New Mexico does not require voter ID. There are other troubling parts of the video and poll watcher instruction manual, including a call for poll watchers to instruct some voters to vote by provisional ballot even if they are registered correctly in their precinct. Poll watchers are told to deceive Spanish-speaking voters by telling them ballots that interpreters are not available, when in fact New Mexico law provides for language assistance for minorities and Spanish-language ballots.

At CPAC Colorado, a conservative conference today in Denver, I asked Congressman Steve Pearce, a Republican lawmaker who represents New Mexico, about the brewing controversy. Pearce appeared to be aware of the NM GOP’s poll watching efforts, and supported them.

“We’re simply saying that we’re going to start, we’re going to take it back it into our hands,” said Pearce. “We should check for ID since you have to show an ID to do anything in America.”

He did, however, admit that doing so would be against the law. “It’s against New Mexico law to check for ID,” the congressman conceded.

Yes, it is. And state supreme courts are blocking efforts to prevent early voting.

Here's the video in question.

These people just hate the democratic process.

.
thereisnospoon 10/05/2012 03:00:00 PM

 
It's not lying if he doesn't mean it

by digby

Just don't call it lying:

Strong conservatives understand that Romney was lying about being a moderate in the debates and they're perfectly comfortable with that. Gingrey has no doubt that he'll govern to the right of center, but he'll use his humility and knowledge to work across the aisle and make those sniveling left wing bitches do what they're told. (No he didn't really say that, but you know know that's what he meant)

Keep in mind that this is coming from the people who destroyed the careers of Bob Bennett, Richard Lugar, Bob Inglis and a whole lot of other Republicans because they weren't pure enough. Suddenly, none of that matters anymore and they love them some Mormon Mittster from Taxachusetts.

Somehow, I have a feeling they won't be quite a s forgiving when their new BFF loses in November. I hope Soledad O'Brien has Gingrey back on the show after the election and asks him if he thinks Romney lost because he wasn't conservative enough. I think I can guess the answer.

.


digby 10/05/2012 01:30:00 PM

 
Damn lies and statistics

by digby

Oh fergawdsakes, they can't be serious. After making utter fools of themselves insisting the polls are all skewed in favor of Obama, today they're insisting that the jobs numbers are corrupted too.

Some are even saying it's a conspiracy of democratic voters all lying and saying they have jobs when they don't. Seriously. And as we all know, the vote is in the process of being stolen as well. The left wing conspiracy is so massive at this point, including so many different people across the nation, that I'm afraid these people are going to have no choice but descend on Galt's Gulch and form a big tent city on the outskirts of town. (No worries about handouts, for these folks, though. They'll all be starting businesses just as soon as they cash their Social Security checks.)

This is yet another bit of proof that the right is incapable of believing that anything that doesn't adhere to their worldview can possibly be legitimate. And frankly, I think it's gotten worse with the right wing propaganda machine so closely mirroring itself in all media. From Jack Welch to Honey Boo Boos daddy, they're all watching Fox and listening to Rush.

But that's not the only problem. Check out how NPR reports the story:

Former GE CEO Jack Welch, for instance, through a tweet, questioned the timing of the September jobless rate falling to 7.8 percent:

"Unbelievable jobs numbers..these Chicago guys will do anything..can't debate so change numbers."

The "Chicago guys" would be Obama and his campaign team, which is based in the nation's third largest city.

Coming to the Bureau of Labor Statistics' defense was Lawrence Mishel of the Economic Policy Institute, a progressive think tank.

"It is simply outrageous to make such a claim, and echoes the worrying general distrust of facts that seems to have swept segments of our nation. ... BLS is a highly professional agency with dozens of people involved in the tabulation and analysis of these data. The idea that the data are manipulated is just completely implausible."

It was just the latest example of statistics being seen through a partisan lens.

Actually, no it isn't. The statistic were accepted by all these same Republicans when they were down, and used as evidence that the economy was depressed and Obama should be ousted. The progressives weren't claiming at the time that the numbers were wrong and that the economy was doing much better. Can we all see the difference there?

So, basically what we have in the media today are right wing outlets living in an alternate universe and mainstream outlets simply saying that there's no way of knowing the truth.

It's very fashionable to claim that nothing anyone says in politics has any affect that everyone is voting on some sub-conscious rationale based upon their personal economic status but I just have a sneaking suspicion that this disconnect from the truth is unhealthy for a democracy anyway. But what do I know?

Mishel's full analysis is here in case you are wondering about those pesky old facts.
.
digby 10/05/2012 12:30:00 PM

 
Witchy Woman of Washington

by digby

This person is actually allowed to write columns for a major newspaper and is widely considered to be an arbiter of our nation's capitol's social network. And she's nuts:

At a New York panel Monday on spirituality earlier this week, Quinn recalled how she used her psychic powers in the world of southern magic (emphasis added):

What we really believed in and practiced was voodoo, psychic phenomenon, Scottish mysticism, palm reading, astrology, seances, and ghosts. And I have many, many stories about those, real stories. And that—those things were my true religion, aside from dances. Aunt Ruth was psychic, my aunt Maggie was psychic, and I'm psychic. We actually put hexes on people and they really worked. It was actually really scary and I finally stopped when my brother who has a PhD in religion from the University of Chicago and is a theosophist and a practicing Buddhist told me I had to cut it out because it would come back at me three times. Anything that I did later that was troublesome I kept thinking, I brought this on myself, I should never have put a hex on her.

She writes a column on religion these days, which is fine. But I wonder if people know that her religion is Voodoo.


H/t to BD

Update: link fixed.

Update II: Here's what the Voodoo Queen wrote yesterday:

Citing the Declaration of Independence, Romney said: “Second, is that line that says we are endowed by our Creator with our rights, I believe we must maintain our commitment to religious tolerance and freedom in this country. That statement also says that we are endowed by our creator with the right to pursue happiness as we choose. I interpret that as, one, making sure that those people who are less fortunate and can’t care for themselves are cared by -- by one another.”

This is a religious country. Part of claiming your citizenship is claiming a belief in God, even if you are not Christian.. We’ve got the Creator in our Declaration of Independence. We’ve got “In God We Trust” on our coins. We’ve got “one nation under God” in our Pledge of Allegiance. And we say prayers in the Senate and the House of Representatives to God.

An atheist could never get elected dog catcher, much less president. (Democratic Rep. Pete Stark of California is a nontheist but doesn’t talk much about it).

Up until now, the idea of being American and believing in God were synonymous.

When the Republicans tried to take away the flag it took a long time for the Democrats to realize they had been hijacked. For years, Democrats were wary of wearing flag pins for fear of seeming to pander. They finallygot the message.

Now it’s God. The Republicans have claimed God as their own this entire campaign, each candidate trying to out-Christian the other. Even Obama, though 17 percent of registered voters think he is a Muslim, has talked about being a Christian as often as he can.

Oh shut up.

.
digby 10/05/2012 11:00:00 AM

 
Droney comes to visit

by digby

The strip above reminds me of a conversation I had with a friend of mine the other day. We were talking about drones and he said, "I wonder how Americans would feel if those things were flying overhead appearing to sporadically and randomly strike houses, weddings and other gatherings killing a bunch of people in the vicinity. I casually replied, "well, they'd be terrified." Of course.

I'm afraid that for all the excuses about how they really are "more humane" than all out warfare, they are really instruments of terror. It's true they might be a replacement for "boots on the ground" (assuming that boots on the ground would even be possible)but while they may make it less dangerous for American soldiers it has much the same effect as those who use more conventional terror tactics. It's just high tech "asymmetric warfare" also known as terrorism.

Now it's entirely possible that the American public thinks it's just fine to use terror tactics on civilian populations. But I don't think we've had that discussion. Instead, to the extent we talk about it in anything but hushed tones and without any detail, we are talking about how "careful" we are to only kill the "bad guys" with our precise hi-tech weapons. But how different is it, really, from an Islamic extremist setting off a bomb in a shopping center where a politician might be present? Would the effect on the civilian population be any different here than the drone attacks in Pakistan?

This film by Brave New Films examines how they feel about it:

Brave New Foundation has the honor of releasing a video to accompany a seminal report by human rights law experts at Stanford and New York University law schools. The report, entitled Living Under Drones presents chilling first-hand testimony from Pakistani civilians on the humanitarian and security costs of escalating drone attacks by the United States. The report uncovers civilian deaths, and shocking psychological and social damage to whole families and communities – where people are literally scared to leave their homes because of drones flying overhead 24 hours a day.

This report continues to call into question the U.S. strategy of drone strikes, and presents evidence of profound humanitarian consequences as well as concerns that the strikes actually may have adverse security impacts by fomenting anger against the U.S.

The report is based on nine months of research, including two investigations in Pakistan. The Stanford-NYU research team interviewed over 130 individuals, including civilians who traveled out of the largely inaccessible region of North Waziristan to meet with the researchers. They also interviewed medical doctors who treated strike victims, and humanitarian and journalist professionals who worked in drone impacted areas.

Brave New Foundation is committed to shedding light on the true impact of U.S. drones, and with this video we hope to help share the voices – from the other side of the globe – of those most impacted by the policies of our government. Our campaign War Costs has a coming full-length film exposing the truth about drones, and additionally we are working on a number of shorter videos. We are traveling soon to Pakistan ourselves to collect more stories.

As U.S. citizens, we feel a responsibility to know the real impact of the policies of our government. We hope you will join us at www.WarCosts.com to be part of this fight for a more humane and just world.

.
digby 10/05/2012 09:34:00 AM

 
Mr. Etch-a-Sketch rides again

by David Atkins

Having finally discovered that attempting to play entirely to the conservative base was going to get him crushed, Mitt Romney has clearly decided to pretend that the last year never happened and that voters were born yesterday. That was the debate strategy that left the President flummoxed at how to respond to a man who shamelessly lied about his positions of just a week ago. With "Severe conservative Mitt" a sure loser, "Bill Clinton Mitt" has suddenly emerged from his chrysalis. And guess what? "Bill Clinton Mitt" just now realized that his statements about 47% of Americans being worthless loafers was completely wrong:



Mitt Romney may be the most dishonest politician I've ever had the misfortune of watching. This is a man who seems to literally believe that there is no consequence at all for shamelessly contradicting himself from one week to the next.

Those who believe that Mitt "won" the first debate hands down seem to believe that Romney is justified in his complete cynicism about the process and the electorate. Those who believe, as David Axelrod and I do, that Romney mortgaged long-term political pain for a 24-hour news cycle win, have just a little more faith in this creaky old electoral system.

American democracy is broken. But it's not that broken.


.
thereisnospoon 10/05/2012 07:30:00 AM

Thursday, October 04, 2012

 
Second chances

by digby

Because you need this:



Via Jess Zimmerman at Grist who writes:

Probably my favorite part is when the ducks keep running away from the water in what, as one Woodstock worker points out, looks just like a Benny Hill routine. Or maybe it’s the part where the sanctuary workers go for the “tough love uncle” approach to swimming lessons, and just chuck the birds in the pond. Or maybe it’s watching that first duck figure out that the water is amazing. Or maybe it’s watching ALL of them figure out that the water is amazing!

Sometimes it's the little things that make your day.

Update: And, by the way, you should feel no guilt or shame for enjoying this. It's good for your concentration. Really.


.
digby 10/04/2012 06:30:00 PM

 
Are the whining plutocrats' tender feelings hurt that Mitt said Dodd-Frank is a big kiss to NY Banks?

by digby

I'll be very curious to see if any of the whining Masters of the Universe will have themselves a good old fashioned cry when they realize what that mean old Mitt Romney said last night. This is the sort of thing that usually sends them into a tizzy:

Dodd-Frank was passed. And it includes within it a number of provisions that I think has some unintended consequences that are harmful to the economy. One is it designates a number of banks as too big to fail, and they're effectively guaranteed by the federal government. This is the biggest kiss that's been given to -- to New York banks I've ever seen. This is an enormous boon for them...

Look, we have to have regulation on Wall Street. That's why I'd have regulation. But I wouldn't designate five banks as too big to fail and give them a blank check. That's one of the unintended consequences of Dodd-Frank. It wasn't thought through properly.

My goodness, that sure sounds disrespectful to me. Why calling Dodd-Frank a big "kiss to New York Banks" might even rank up there with that horrifying "fatcat" insult President Obama slung at them that one time. It's enough to made a Wall Street banker call in sick, put on his jammies and curl up in the corner with a gallon of Rocky Road and a great big spoon. I mean, it's just so hurtful.

Somehow I just have a feeling they aren't going to pull their money though. As friendly as Obama has been to their cause, he's not a real member of the club like ole Mitt. They just can't quit him no matter how abusive he is in public. They know deep down, he really loves them.


.

digby 10/04/2012 04:30:00 PM

 
Romney begins to pay the price

by David Atkins

I said last night that Romney lost the debate last night, or won a Pyrrhic victory at best. One of the reasons I pointed to was the fact that he lied continually in a surreal way, and would pay the price:

Romney's lies will come back to haunt him. Part of the reason the President may have been caught off guard was Mitt Romney's hard tack to the center, essentially throwing the modern conservative movement under the bus and pretending that his last year's worth of campaign statements never happened. On every issue from Romneycare to cutting taxes for the rich, the challenger basically pretended that he was the Mitt Romney of 2002 again.

It may be that Romney was trying to shake the etch-a-sketch starting tonight, or it may be that he was trying to win over the undecided voter who pays little attention to news except to watch one or two debates. If the latter, then it won't matter to him how much fact checkers rip apart his statements...

But the Obama campaign may see fit in the coming weeks to put Romney's sudden pretenses at being a moderate tonight alongside his actual speeches and statements from no more than a few days ago. That will have the effect of reinforcing Romney's image as an ambitious used car salesman who will say anything to get elected. And that will hurt him as voters go to the polls.

Less than 18 hours later, that pushback has already begun:



Expect to see much more of this.


.
thereisnospoon 10/04/2012 03:00:00 PM

 
QOTD

by digby

From Michael Moore:

"'You can say anything you want during a debate and 80 million people hear it,'observed Peter Teeley, press secretary to Vice President Bush. If reporters then document that a candidate spoke untruthfully, 'so what? Maybe 200 people read it or 2,000 or 20,000.'"

– New York Times, November 1, 1984

How many times do these people have telegraph exactly what they're doing before people pay attention?

They admit they don't really care about deficits, that supply side economics is a fraud, that they create their own reality, fact-checking is for suckers and on and on. And yet everyone keeps acting as if they are serious people with sincere intentions.

Republicans admit to being liars in order to get elected all the time. Why doesn't anyone believe them?


.


digby 10/04/2012 01:30:00 PM

 
The Romney surrogates are all waaay over-stimulated

by digby

Obama's performance last night may have been somnambulant but Romney's aggressive lying has put his surrogates on the defensive. It started last night with this amazing exchange between Rudy Nineleven and Chris Hayes:

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

This one was epic. Watch John Sununu lash out at Andrea Mitchell like a rabid dog:

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

I'm beginning to think that all this "tweaking" talk doesn't mean what we thought it meant. These people are all very ... over-stimulated.

The Romney campaign has been very open about their total disdain for the truth throughout this campaign. Recall this, from the campaign pollster:

“We’re not going to let our campaign be dictated by fact-checkers.”

Last night they certainly made that clear.

Here is just a partial list of the many posts this morning outlining Romney's numerous lies in last night's debate. At Last Night’s Debate: Romney Told 27 Myths In 38 Minutes Romney’s Successful Debate Plan: Lying Mitt Romney's debate performance: 'Mostly fiction' The First Debate: Mitt Romney's Five Biggest Lies Romney lied about pre-existing conditions during debate Debate Debrief: Romney vs. The Truth Romney's big Medicare lie takes center stage in debate

.
digby 10/04/2012 12:30:00 PM

 
Let's not forget that Mitt made his fortune picking winners and loser. And he picked plenty of losers.

by digby

Kevin Drum looks into Romney's green jobs claim last night and find that he was lying. (I know, hard to believe ...)

Here is Mitt Romney last night, criticizing the green energy loan guarantee program that was part of the stimulus bill:

You put $90 billion into green jobs....And these businesses, many of them have gone out of business, I think about half of them, of the ones have been invested in have gone out of business.

Close! The DOE 1705 program has approved 33 loans worth about $16 billion. So far there have been three failures (Solyndra, Beacon, and Abound), which works out to a failure rate of....

9%.

By dollar volume, these loans will cost a maximum of about $600 million if the government ends up on the hook for the entire loan amount. That comes to maybe 4% of the total. By other measures, the failure rate is less than 1%

Let's talk about failure rates, shall we?

Much of the firm's profits was earned from a relatively small number of deals, with Bain Capital's overall success and failure rate being about even. One study of 68 deals that Bain Capital made up through the 1990s found that the firm lost money or broke even on 33 of them. Another study that looked at the eight-year period following 77 deals during the same time found that in 17 cases the company went bankrupt or out of business, and in 6 cases Bain Capital lost all its investment. But 10 deals were very successful and represented 70 percent of the total profits.

It takes a lot of chutzpah for Mr Bain to attack the government for investing in some companies that lost money. Romney made his fortune picking winners and losers. That's his business model. He's lying about the green jobs initiative (of course) but he's also acting as if he's never had a losing proposition in his life. In fact, he's the one who broke even on the picks, not the government.


.
digby 10/04/2012 11:16:00 AM

 
Tweaking our lives

by digby

All I can say about the debate last night is that Romney looked like he accidentally drank President Obama's double espresso. But I think what was really surprising about it was the fact that Romney lied so much to make himself appear moderate, yet did it in a way that was so aggressive his bloodthirsty base won't mind. It's a pretty savvy strategy.

Unfortunately, President Obama's strategy seemed to be based on the bizarre idea that people are yearning for him to agree with Mitt Romney.

For instance, this:

LEHRER: All right? All right. This is segment three, the economy. Entitlements. First — first answer goes to you, two minutes, Mr. President. Do you see a major difference between the two of you on Social Security?

OBAMA: You know, I suspect that, on Social Security, we’ve got a somewhat similar position. Social Security is structurally sound. It’s going to have to be tweaked the way it was by Ronald Reagan and Speaker — Democratic Speaker Tip O’Neill. But it is — the basic structure is sound.

(I guess Joe Biden was just speaking out of turn again...)

Let's examine that "tweak" shall we? First of all, the tweak is commonly (although perhaps erroneously) said to be based upon the recommendations of what's known as the Greenspan Commission. (That's right, the man who just a few years before had written a letter to the New York Times literally decrying "parasites" and saying they should perish, headed a commission to "save" Social Security.)

If the proposed fix follows the same logic as 1983, it will raise the payroll tax on everyone and raise the retirement age. The hike in the payroll tax was sold as necessary to shore up a short term shortfall in the system and then have the baby boomers pre-pay into the system for their own retirement (as well as pay for their parents and grandparents as had always been done.) The higher retirement age came about because the congress eventually decided that they needed to deal with a possible shortfall far into the future and couldn't get any consensus to raise the cap. Any of this sound familiar?

Now they are talking about "tweaking" the way benefits are calculated, which will probably hit the baby boomers, mostly women, who manage to live the longest, the hardest. Of course, if they don't fix that once they see the misery they've caused among the oldest and most vulnerable part of the population, the oldest Americans of the next generation will suffer just as much.

These "tweaks" always look unexceptional on paper. But if you are one of the millions of people who are looking at a very meager income in your elder years, barely enough to survive really, a "tweak" becomes a life-threatening blow.

The problem with this entire conversation is that Social Security is already inadequate. It's barely enough to keep the elderly out of grinding poverty and compared to other industrialized nations it's a joke. Benefits need to be raised not cut. But the grand success of the relentless fear mongering from deficit fetishists like Alan Greenspan and Pete Peterson over the years is that the entire conversation revolves around the idea that the system is so unstable that the only possible "compromise" is to agree to "tweak" benefits and pare them back over time --- until the system loses its essential value to the American people and they can finally turn it into an investment vehicle.

The president says he's ready to "tweak." And we know that Mitt Romney can hardly wait to take a meat ax to it. If he were to win, I'm guessing the conservative Democrats in congress would rush to jump on his bandwagon. (They certainly always have before.) So, it would appear that your best chance is to vote for progressives who will stand up to either Romney or Obama when it comes to Social Security.

You can contribute here to our Blue America 12 House candidates and here to our Senate 2012 page, for Elizabeth Warren, Tammy Baldwin and Bernie Sanders.


Update: After being chastised for failing to recognize that president Obama has always talked up bipartisanship, let me put back in a line I initially removed from this post because I thought it was too snarky:

I felt like I was watching a replay of 2008 with all the Reagan worship and blurring of differences.

I know that some people thought Obama was very liberal in 2008. I wasn't one of them.

.
digby 10/04/2012 09:33:00 AM