When Reality Hits

While I have no doubt that the republicans will continue to wage an all-out deceitful campaign about the health care bill that, Lord willing, passes Congress and is signed into law, the reality of the good it does will rapidly become apparent - as long as Dems aren't afraid of going out and selling it. Our President started that process yesterday win a speech to House Dems:

The American people will suddenly learn that this bill does things they like and doesn't do things that people have been trying to say it does. Their worst fears will prove groundless, and the American people's hope for a fair shake from their insurance companies for quality, affordable health care they need will finally be realized.
...
If Republicans want to campaign against what we've done by standing up for the status quo and for insurance companies over American families and businesses, that is a fight I want to have. If their best idea is to return to the bad policies and the bad ideas of yesterday, they are going to lose that argument.

Exactly right. The core reason republicans are fighting this now, and fought it in 1994, is that they realize substantive health care reform would not only be popular, but also that it would demonstrate in a very personal way that government can work to make peoples lives substantially better. Which is exactly the opposite of their core message and beliefs. It doesn't matter to them if this is good policy for America, because they see it as bad for their political prospects.

Sadly, the Fox News/RW Radio people will never be exposed to these ideas through their preferred media, just as they have not been exposed to the unanimous economist's analysis that the stimulus bill is accomplishing precisely what it was designed to accomplish. They have their own reality that is very difficult to penetrate. However, as they, and people they know, suddenly find themselves with access to health insurance/care that was previously denied them, that new reality will start to penetrate. One would hope.
Sullivan: Palin's FNC/RNC Ratings

A smash hit. Ailes' tactic is vindicated. And the media-political-industrial complex grinds forward.

Benen: OBAMA HINTS AT ELECTION-YEAR MESSAGE WITH HOUSE DEMS

President Obama delivered a speech to the House Democratic Caucus Retreat late yesterday afternoon, and made it clear why the chamber is his favorite. He noted that it's "amazing" that "out of the major initiatives we were talking about before we took office, you've either completed or set the stage for almost all of them."

Indeed, the House's to-do list features a lot of checkmarks, which the president was only too pleased to emphasize: economic recovery, health care, cap and trade, Wall Street reform, Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay act, SCHIP, reducing Pentagon waste, cutting spending, reforming credit card rules, regulating the tobacco industry, a new national service bill, expanded hate-crime protections, new investments in education, etc. "In one of America's darkest hours, you answered the call," the president said. "Time and again you stood up and you led."

Specifically on health care, Obama acknowledged "how big a lift this has been." He conceded that he's seen the polls and the "occasional blog post or cable clip that breathlessly declares what something means for a political party, without really talking much about what it means for a country." But the president is nevertheless confident in the message he and other Dems can take to the country:

"The American people will suddenly learn that this bill does things they like and doesn't do things that people have been trying to say it does. Their worst fears will prove groundless, and the American people's hope for a fair shake from their insurance companies for quality, affordable health care they need will finally be realized.

"This year alone, this reform will ban some of the worst practices of the insurance industry forever. They'll no longer be allowed to refuse coverage for preexisting conditions for children or drop coverage when folks get sick and need it the most. They'll no longer be allowed to impose restrictive annual limits on the amount of coverage that you receive, lifetime limits on the amounts of benefits received. They'll be required to offer free preventive care -- like checkups and routine tests and mammograms -- at no cost. Patients will have rights. They will get what they pay for. And that's just the beginning."

And what about the politics of the debate and the 2010 elections?

"Well, let me tell you something. If Republicans want to campaign against what we've done by standing up for the status quo and for insurance companies over American families and businesses, that is a fight I want to have. If their best idea is to return to the bad policies and the bad ideas of yesterday, they are going to lose that argument. What are they going to say? 'Well, you know, the old system really worked well; let's go back to the way it was'? That's not going to appeal to seniors who are now seeing the possibility of that doughnut hole finally closing and so they can finally get discounts on their prescriptions. That's not going to appeal to the small businesses who find out all the tax credits that they're going to get for doing right by their employees -- something that they have been wanting to do, but may not have been able to afford. It's not going to be very appealing to Americans who for the first time are going to find out that they can provide coverage to their children, their dependents, all the way up to the age of 26 or 27.

"And that's why I'll be out there waging a great campaign from one end of the country to the other, telling Americans with insurance or without what they stand to gain; about the arsenal of consumer protections; about the long-awaited stability that they're going to begin to experience. And I'm going to tell them that I am proud we are putting the future of America before the politics of the moment -- the next generation before the next election. And that, after all, is what we were sent up here to do: standing up for the American people against the special interests; solve problems that we've been talking about for decades; make their lives a little bit better; make tough choices sometimes when they're unpopular. And that's something that every one of you who support this bill can be proud to campaign on in November."

It's not a bad message for the electorate over the next 10 or so months.

• from the comments:
  

  OK - President Obama will probably blow the house down with his SOTU address, yet some random Republican (joe wilson) will yell something really awful in order to raise massive amounts of money which will also have the effect of pushing the Presidents message out of the limelight, off the frint pages, and cause John McCain to appear on every Sunday talk show for the entire month of February.

  I really hate Republicans and their sleazy tactics.

  Posted by: bcinaz on January 15, 2010 at 8:50 AM

Sargent: Vicki Kennedy: Yes, It’s The People’s Seat, But Coakley Would Carry On Teddy’s Legacy

The Martha Coakley campaign goes up with a new spot starring Vicki Kennedy, in which she pushes back on Republican claims that Dems feel entitled to the Massachusetts seat because of the identity of its previous inhabitant:

“Tuesday’s election is to fill the term my husband didn’t have a chance to complete,” Vicki says in the spot. “But it’s not the Kennedy seat. It’s the people’s seat — the mother struggling to make ends meet, the father trying to find a job. My husband fought for them, and so does Martha Coakley.”

This is a response to Scott Brown’s now-infamous jab, in which he said it’s not “the Kennedy seat” and is instead “the people’s seat.” As Ben Smith notes, it’s a sign that Brown’s crack is framing the debate. And some D.C. pundits have pronounced themselves transfixed by Brown’s cleverness.

But there’s another level to Brown’s remark that’s worth looking at. Brown recast the claim by Democrats that Coakley is the rightful heir, policy-wise, to Kennedy’s seat as merely reflecting a sense of Dem entitlement to the seat.

But it’s an objectively true fact that in policy terms Coakley would seek to build on Kennedy’s legacy and would support an agenda that reflects Kennedy’s principles and priorities. Brown, by contrast, would do the opposite. Those so taken with Brown’s cleverness might point out this underlying reality, too.

Bellantoni (TPM): Health Care Talks Went Into Wee Hours At White House

After a big hurdle was cleared yesterday when the White House struck a deal with Congressional leaders and labor unions on the excise tax, the team went right back to negotiating late last night.

An administration official told us that several top leaders huddled in the Cabinet room from 9:15 p.m. until 1:25 a.m. That's after a more than 8-hour meeting Wednesday. (President Obama left just before 1 a.m., the official said.)

"The President and congressional leaders continued to work through the differences in the health bills. They made solid progress toward a final package, including common-sense adjustments that strengthen the legislation and make sure it works for middle-class families while bringing down costs and expanding coverage to millions of Americans," the official said.

Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) was at the White House this week discussing health care, TPMDC has learned. Officials wouldn't disclose details of what was discussed, but to be sure Obama and Democratic leaders want to make sure they keep his vote in place for the final health care compromise.

Members attending last night's meeting after the jump.

Speaker Pelosi
Leader Hoyer
Congressman Clyburn
Chairman Miller
Chairman Rangel
Chairman Waxman
Leader Reid
Senator Durbin
Senator Schumer
Chairman Baucus
Chairman Dodd
Chairman Harkin
-- Secretary Sebelius attended a portion of the meeting.
-- Staff attending this evening included Rahm Emanuel, Phil Schiliro, and Nancy-Ann DeParle

Here is the White House's description of the excise tax deal:

Ø Include permanent adjustments based on age, gender and high-risk professions - factors that affect the cost of health plans regardless of the generosity of the benefits they provide. This makes good sense, as it focuses the impact on plans that provide the highest-cost benefits - not those that happen to cover the highest-cost workers.

Ø Phases in an exemption of the cost of dental and vision plans from the cost of coverage. These benefits are outside the core health spending which this provision is aimed at slowing.

Ø Provide transition relief to help employers, insurers and workers adjust to the permanent provision. This includes a transition period for high-cost states, as well as providing health plans for state and local workers and collectively bargained plans a 5-year transition window before being subject to the tax. This is similar to the approach in other areas of the bill - including insurance market reforms and the insurer fee - where transition periods are built in to give stakeholders time to adjust.

Ezra Klein: Do national exchanges wreck Ben Nelson's abortion compromise?

A few of you have been asking me about this, so I may as well put it up on the blog. The abortion compromise that brought Ben Nelson onto the bill essentially calls for states to do whatever they want within their own exchanges. Moving to a national exchange, as the House bill suggests, sounds like it could muck that up.

But it only sounds that way. The national exchange envisioned in the House bill is not national in the sense of being one exchange serving the nation. It's still a separate exchange in each and every state. The difference between the House and Senate bills is that the Senate lets the states regulate and administer those exchanges unless they prove unable to do so while the House bill hands the federal government the job unless the states ask to do it themselves. To put it more simply, the national exchange is really just a federally-regulated state exchange. There's no reason that should harm the Nelson compromise, as different states will still be able to choose different ways forward on abortion.

Thursday Readings: Alarming Developments Edition

Beutler (TPM): House Chairmen Say Health Care Deal Imminent

Two of the House's most influential chairmen say that health care negotiations between the House, Senate, and President Obama have come so far, that they'll be ready to send a package to Congressional scorekeepers this weekend.

Congress Daily caught up with Rep. George Miller (D-CA)--chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee--and Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-NY)--chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee--who both acknowledged that a compromise could be just around the corner.

"We hope to be able to send in the next couple days our changes to CBO," Miller said (sub. req.).

Rangel said they'd have a package ready for scoring by Saturday.

Congressional negotiators and the White House have made significant headway on resolving two of the biggest differences between the House and Senate health care bills in recent days, and it looks like they're just about ready to wrap things up.

Gail Collins:

There are 100 members of the Senate. But as Brown is currently reminding us, because of the filibuster rule, it takes only 41 to stop any bill from passing.

U.S. population: 307,006,550.

Population for the 20 least-populated states: 31,434,822.

That means that in the Senate, all it takes to stop legislation is one guy plus 40 senators representing 10.2 percent of the country.

People, think about what we went through to elect a new president — a year and a half of campaigning, three dozen debates, $1.6 billion in donations. Then the voters sent a clear, unmistakable message. Which can be totally ignored because of a parliamentary rule that allows the representatives of slightly more than 10 percent of the population to call the shots.

Why isn’t 90 percent of the country marching on the Capitol with teapots and funny hats, waving signs about the filibuster?

Here's that 41st vote . . .
Marshall: Busted!

Massachusetts Senate candidate Scott Brown told reporters today that he's "unfamiliar" with the "Tea Party movement." But TPM Reader NM just showed us that his own campaign site features at least two pictures of Brown addressing Tea Party events.

Kurtz: What A Difference A Dodd Makes

New poll of Connecticut Senate race: Democrat Richard Blumenthal is crushing Republican front-runner Rob Simmons, 62-27.

Kurtz: TPMDC Morning Roundup

Gov. Rick Perry withdraws Texas from federal program offering up to $700 million in education grants: "We would be foolish and irresponsible to place our children's future in the hands of unelected bureaucrats and special-interest groups thousands of miles away in Washington." That and the day's other political news in the TPMDC Morning Roundup.

Sullivan: Watching Beck And Palin: "God Played An Essential Role In The Founding Of This Nation"

Just listen to the beginning of their restaurant chat, appropriating both the WTC site and the Statue of Liberty. More to the point, listen to the framework of their discussion. The core concept is a "re-founding" of America. Beck writes a few sentences in his notebook, suggesting that Palin and only Palin is capable of saving the United States from the "radical, revolutionary crazy people" (Obama, Clinton) and relentless progressives (McCain). There's a combination of simmering class ressentiment, and a profound sense of self-pity:

Tomorrow I meet Sarah Palin and family for the first time. I am actually a little nervous as she is one of the only people that I can see who can possibly lead us out of where we are in. I don't know yet if she's strong enough if she's well-enough advised, or if she knows she can no longer trust anyone. I don't know if she can lead us and not lose her soul.

Here you have a confluence of many of the themes of the far right. Distrust of everything in politics, of every politician, of the "system" that has been co-opted by mysterious and menacing elites, and a sense of total beleaguerment in the modern world. And the interpretation of Obama as a hoax foisted on the country by these elites, an alien, subversive danger to "real America".

What you have is a new kind of radical right fusionism. The anti-government, populist streak taps into class resentment, and broader anger at what has been a terrible period for fiscal responsibility. But the narrative also fits precisely into the evangelical-Christianist narrative of being misunderstood and persecuted by the world, a constant humiliation and alienation ... that leads to a series of events in which things on earth get much worse until a leader, a new Esther, emerges to save us.

The more you isten to Palin, you sense a shift in her consciousness, a shift that she is indeed the woman chosen to save this country - chosen by God. "It is God's plan" was Palin's reaction to losing the election.

And the plan is that she will lose once only to be resurrected at the head of a large army of disaffected and alienated Christianists, a brigade of anti-government populists, channeled and organized directly by a media outlet that has abandoned even the slightest pretense of being a political organization.

FNC is now the RNC. The strategy is clear: demonize Obama as a threat from within (the classic McCarthyite paranoid tradition, given more oomph by race and religion), add a whiff of the idea that he is deliberately weakening America to allow Islamic terrorists kill us, portray even obviously emergency moves, like bailing out the banks, as a plan to take over the entire economy and socialize it, and wrap it all up in a coded religious eschatology.

If you are not alarmed by this development - a new, proto-fascist political party being recreated on television in front of our very eyes - then you have not read much history.

Clemons: Cheney Fear-Mongering as Predictable as Penultimate Scene in Slasher Film

Wednesday, Jan 13 2010, 10:00AM

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Last night, I chatted with MSNBC Countdown's Keith Olbermann not only about the predictable fear-mongering from the Cheney wing of America's national security establishment but about the importance of President Obama trying to replace torture chambers and the Kafkaesque detention nightmare crafted by Cheney and his team with rule of law.

As Keith Olbermann pointed out last night, recent polls show that Americans are increasingly immune to Cheney's fear-mongering and a majority are supportive of Obama's actions after the attempted Northwest Airlines bombing by an Al Qaeda operative.

My colleague and friend Steve Coll had a superb piece in The New Yorker this week titled "Threats" that should be read in full. (Coll also writes the "Think Tank" blog at The New Yorker.)

I paraphrased Coll's comment below that Cheney's fear-mongering is as predictable as the penultimate scene in a slasher movie.

Here is a clip from Coll's piece:

Compounding this impression, at least on the cable news channels, has been the resurrection--as predictable as the penultimate scene in a slasher movie--of the Cheney World View. Its principal proponent took time off from composing his memoir to issue a statement to Politico that was so lacking in dignity and restraint that it hinted at the presence of a sinister franking machine. On President Obama:

He seems to think if he has a low-key response to an attempt to blow up an airliner and kill hundreds of people, we won't be at war. He seems to think if he gives terrorists the rights of Americans, lets them lawyer up and reads them their Miranda rights, we won't be at war. . . . But we are at war.

Apart from its construction on a false premise ("Now let me be clear: we are indeed at war with Al Qaeda and its affiliates," Obama declared last May; "We are at war," he said again last week), the statement, and the attention it received, suggested that American discourse on counterterrorism policy remains frozen in 2002.

I also very much liked Steve Coll's reference of a line in a speech Barack Obama gave in May 2009 at the National Archives:

From Europe to the Pacific, we've been the nation that has shut down torture chambers and replaced tyranny with the rule of law. That is who we are. And where terrorists offer only the injustice of disorder and destruction, America must demonstrate that our values and institutions are more resilient than a hateful ideology.

Obama deserves a lot of credit for moving forward a "rule of law package" that is replacing the inhumane detainee operations that violated both American and international law. Former White House Counsel Gregory Craig, who left his post on the 3rd of January this year, deserves great praise and much credit for these gains.

Atrios: Big Misses

This is what they're paid hundreds of millions for.

However, Dimon cautioned, "You never saw losses in these products, because home prices were going up."

The sector's failure, he added, was the assumption that prices can only go up.

By 2006 there were plenty of reasons that the existence of a housing bubble was rather obvious, even if all the details weren't known yet and the eventual consequences weren't completely clear.

My main reason, a rather simple one, was that not nearly enough people had the kind of incomes that allowed them to afford homes at those prices. I know that because the helicopter is not my primary mode of transportation.

Sudbay: Obama to collect $90 billion from banks thru 'financial crisis responsibility fee'

At 11:50 a.m., the President is going to announce a new fee on banks, designed to recoup losses from the TARP program. Here's what the “financial crisis responsibility fee" is and does:

President Obama plans to call on Thursday for taxing about 50 big banks and major financial institutions for at least the next decade to recoup all taxpayer losses from the bailout of Wall Street.

The tax on banks, insurance companies and brokerages with more than $50 billion in assets would start after June 30 and seek to collect $90 billion over 10 years, according to a senior administration official who briefed reporters late Wednesday.

But the levy but would remain in force longer if all losses to the bailout fund, the Troubled Asset Relief Program, are not recovered after a decade.

Not sure what safeguards exist to insure that the fee is paid by the banks and not the rest of us. But, this is a political move, too. There's great anger in the country towards Wall Street and the big banks. It's easy to understand why.

For example, yesterday, a number of top bankers testified before the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission (FCIC). ABC's Jon Karl reports that while the bankers appeared contrite during the hearing, that wasn't the case after they left the hearing room:

When they came before the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, the leaders of the nation's top banks were contrite about their role in the financial meltdown. But when ABC News caught up with them after the hearing, they expressed no regret whatsoever for the big bonuses now going to bank executives.

Karl has video to prove it.

• BooMan adds:

  How do Democrats get their mojo back? Well, how about proposing a financial crisis responsibility fee of $90 billion to be levied on the nation's largest banks and financial institutions and then waiting for the Republicans to fall on their face?

  “This is the latest proposal in the Obama administration’s failed attempt to borrow, spend and tax their way into economic prosperity,” Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas) said earlier on Wednesday. “To think that banks will loan more money if you tax them is beyond economic ignorance.”

  That message won't even sell in Texas.

  The $90 billion dollar figure was chosen because that's the administration's estimate of what will be the ultimate shortfall from the $700 billion bailout. So, we'll get paid back $610 billion and assess a tax on the fat cats to get the rest of it back over the next decade.

  Let the Republicans complain about that while they defend the banks.

Benen: ROBERTSON SPARKS OUTRAGE

Yesterday, radical TV preacher Pat Robertson told his national television audience that Haiti is "cursed" because the country "swore a pact to the devil" in order to rid itself of "Napoleon the third, or whatever." In what Robertson insisted was a "true story," Haitians agreed to "serve" Satan in exchange for independence, and is now feeling the effects of its "curse."

To put it mildly, this has not gone over well with the American mainstream, which sometimes forgets how truly deranged the religious right movement can be. Robertson's on-air remarks even came to the attention of the White House.

Robertson's words instantly triggered a firestorm on the airwaves and online, including a rebuke from senior White House adviser Valerie Jarrett on "Good Morning America" today.

"I'm kind of speechless about that kind of remark," Jarrett said. "Our heart goes out to the people of Haiti ... That's not the attitude that expresses the spirit of the president or the American people, so I thought it was a pretty stunning comment to make."

For its part, the Christian Broadcasting Network issued a statement, arguing that Haitians "allegedly made a famous pact with the devil," but Robertson "never stated that the earthquake was God's wrath."

No, of course not. All he said is that is Haiti agreed to "serve" Satan, became "cursed," and is now burdened by a disaster. Why would anyone draw a connection from that?

As for the history, Matt Yglesias has a good item describing the background of the Bois Caiman Ceremony that in Haitian national mythology initiated the revolution. It wasn't a deal with Satan, and Napoleon III didn't lead France until a half-century later.

As for the politics, I can only assume that Robertson has disgraced himself once again in the eyes of the American mainstream, but conservatives and Republicans won't care. Robertson blamed 9/11 on Americans, and he remained a prominent leader on the right. He also blamed Americans for Hurricane Katrina, and was not ostracized from the conservative movement.

The right's tolerance for insanity knows no bounds.

StevenD: Haiti: Limbaugh was Bad, but ...

This is worse, much much worse. From a website promoting Anti-Obama and Anti-Democratic Party rants, Republicans in general, the Tea Party Movement and Conservative politicians comes one of the worst examples of political opportunism over the disaster in Haiti I've seen to date.

It seems several Florida Republican Candidates issued a press release extolling their efforts to provide relief to Haiti. Pretty standard stuff, I expect, considering how the Haitian community in Florida is a not insignificant voting bloc. If those Republican candidates for office want to publicize their efforts to obtain humanitarian relief for the devastated populace of Haiti, fine by me.

No, what I found execrable, especially in light of the massive aid effort to which have President Obama and his administration committed the United States and have already begun to implement, was this little preamble the people at Annuit Coeptis chose as a lead in to their re-publication of those candidates press release:

This shows how Republicans are once again the party of action and compassion, while the Democrats are the party of wanton neglect and disregard. Aside from the on-the-spot effort planned and coordinated last night by Bernard, Tom and myself, the only three congressmen to express concern were our three Republican members from Miami. This should demonstrate how Democrats once again pander to and use minorities to further their ends and throw them under the bus in the time of need. The D now stands for Desolate Destruction while the R stands for Repair, Renew and Reinvigorate.

These people really have no shame, do they? They will take any issue, even a humanitarian tragedy that clearly should have not become a political football and attempt to turn it to their advantage. If Obama promises all the aid and resources of the US Government to help Haiti recover from this catastrophe then, according to Limbaugh, he is doing it merely to garner favor with "light and dark skinned" African Americans.

If Republican candidates issue a press release about their attempt to organize an effort to help NGO's providing relief to Haiti, however, it proves that "Republicans are ... the party of action and compassion, while the Democrats are the party of wanton neglect and disregard." After Bush's response to Katrina, and "Heckuva Job Brownie" you'd think they'd keep their mouths shut. But as I said, no shame.

Just for your edification, here's the video of the press briefing at the Department of State yesterday at which various agencies of the Federal Government gave to the US press, yesterday:

Not only a demonstration of compassion, but also of competence. Compare and contrast that response to how the Bush administration responded to the damage done to New Orleans and the Gulf Coast by Hurricane Katrina. Yeah, that was a real demonstration of compassion by a Republican administration wasn't it?

Enough said.

Clemons: HAITI: Falling Off the Map for Too Long

When I was last in Haiti, I learned how ignorant I was of some of the missing building blocks for national wealth creation in that poor island country.

As part of the deal for securing independence from the French, the Haitians were forced in 1825 to play 150 million French francs -- valued at about $21 billion today -- to France. To accomplish this, the island was denuded of trees. Valuable minerals in the soil and land eroded nearly immediately out to sea -- and thus a once richly fertile island became one of the real hells in the Caribbean.

I realize, of course, that there are many other reasons why Haiti has been a political and economic tragedy, but the island nation that struck an early deal for independence from colonialism certainly had a rough start.

This New York Times piece captures both the surge of support currently underway for Haiti, as well as the trauma and chaos there.

Help, if you can -- but Haiti has needed deep assistance far before this earthquake made a miserable situation a thousand times worse.

I will have some other thoughts posted soon on soft power collaborations to help Haiti after an oped I have done runs.

Steve Clemons:

Last night, I had a good chat with Rachel Maddow on the mechanics of smart power in the context of the Haiti disaster. A lot of our conversation focused on the role of the U.S. Agency for International Development, or US AID, which plays a vital role coordinating not only the combined US government response in a crisis playing out now on this Caribbean island but also coordinates with other governments.

I am hoping the US is smart enough in this case to get over its Cold War-fashioned anachronistic Cuba allergy and actually begins to work with Cuba's well-trained, natural disaster-focused medical corps which are going to be in Haiti helping as well.

One thing I tried to emphasize with Rachel Maddow is that US AID, which was under extreme attack by former Senator Jesse Helms and House Speaker Newt Gingrich in the 1990s, is one of America's most vital yet under-resourced federal agencies that everyone respects in a time of crisis and neglects when things calm down. This isn't smart strategically -- and trying to change this boom and bust approach to international development and aid is a key priority of the Obama administration -- one I support.

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Politics: "I wouldn't know" Edition

John Amato (C&L):

I love Google, don't you? It's so handy. Why, if I were a Republican presidential nominee and I didn't know who to select as my running mate, I too might use teh Google to determine my pick.

John McCain did that very thing when he selected Sarah Palin. On the Today Show, when Matt Lauer questioned him on his pick, he said that he "wouldn't know." Jesus. McCain tried to bring up the war to divert Lauer from pushing him, and to Lauer's credit he didn't back down.

John McCain refused to comment on it. That is insane.

Lauer asked, that the vetting of Sarah Palin was so woefully inadequate that no one from the campaign traveled to Alaska to interview her husband or any of her political opponents?

"I wouldn't know," McCain said. "The fact is that I'm proud of Sarah Palin, I'm proud of the campaign we waged, she energized our party, she will be a major factor in American politics in the future, and I'm proud of our campaign."

Somewhat taken aback, Lauer told McCain that he found it "somewhat surprising" that he didn't know anything about the vetting process, adding "You were the presidential candidate."

McCain testily shot back by saying that he had no intention of "looking back over what happened over a year ago," adding, "I'm sorry, you'll have to get others to comment on it."

Watch the video below:

Really? That's all Mr. Straight talk had in him? And it's embarrassing that they were so desperate for a female candidate that they actually had to Google Chick-Repubs to see who was available.

Among their revelations is how McCain's campaign manager, Rick Davis, spotted Sarah Palin while searching the Internet for possible female vice presidential candidates.

"Rick Davis saw one interview she did with Charlie Rose where she was very much the Sarah Palin that people find appealing. She was lively, she was engaging, she popped off the screen. And he said, 'Wow, she jumps out,'" Halperin said.

"McCain boxed himself in. He needed a game-changing pick for vice president. And that left them with a last-minute pick of someone who was, to McCain, a virtual stranger, and was, to his senior staffers, an absolute stranger," he added.

Josh Marshall: Are the Dems Going to Blow This?

Charlie Rangel says House/Senate negotiations are at an impasse. "We've got a problem on both sides of the Capitol. A serious problem," Charlie Rangel tells Roll Call. Another senior Dem says no progress has been made at all. And they probably won't have a bill for the president until February. This article in the AP confuses me even more, suggesting the negotiators may drop the mandate for large employers to provide coverage and some other points about the exchange system that don't even square with my understanding of the two underlying bills.

All the details aside, are we really serious about this? Are they going to fumble this ball at the five yard line? February? March? Why not May?

• Steve Benen adds:
  

  It's worth noting that it's generally a mistake to overreact to every discouraging quote from individuals involved in health care talks. Sometimes people get frustrated; sometimes they're talking to the media as part of a negotiating strategy; and sometimes folks just blow off steam.

  But at this point, it seems the final talks on the final bill really aren't going very well. This process has obviously been messy since, well, the moment it began. Nevertheless, a quick resolution of the House-Senate differences is unlikely, with major hurdles on financing options, anti-trust provisions, and the scope of the exchange.

  Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.), who made the Senate reform bill worse by making unpopular changes, said yesterday he may yet betray his party and his country by rejecting the compromise he helped shape. There's some talk of a compromise on the excise tax -- exempting collectively bargained health care benefits for union members -- but Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Texas), co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said it's not enough. Those involved in the talks seem to think the tense negotiations may last several weeks, and make passage in January impossible.

  President Obama hopes to improve the status of the talks today at a White House meeting with congressional leaders, specifically on the status of the reform bill. Stay tuned.

Benen: AHIP'S QUIET EFFORTS TO KILL HEALTH CARE REFORM

Private health insurance companies said repeatedly throughout 2009 that they were sincerely interested in playing a constructive role in the health care reform debate.

Way back in March, Karen Ignagni, head of America's Health Insurance Plans (AHIP), vowed, "You have our commitment to play, to contribute, and to help pass health care reform this year," As recently as October, "Ignagni declared that the insurance industry is still on board with the Democratic health care reform effort, pushing back against the presumption that the two sides have declared war."

But while AHIP was stressing its commitment to the reform initiative, and assuring policymakers of its good-faith intentions, insurers were secretly financing blatantly dishonest attack ads, hoping to kill the entire effort, quietly funneling money to outside groups. National Journal has the story:

Just as dealings with the Obama administration and congressional Democrats soured last summer, six of the nation's biggest health insurers began quietly pumping big money into third-party television ads aimed at killing or significantly modifying the major health reform bills moving through Congress.

That money, between $10 million and $20 million, came from Aetna, Cigna, Humana, Kaiser Foundation Health Plans, UnitedHealth Group and Wellpoint, according to two health care lobbyists familiar with the transactions. The companies are all members of the powerful trade group America's Health Insurance Plans.

The funds were solicited by AHIP and funneled to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to help underwrite tens of millions of dollars of television ads by two business coalitions set up and subsidized by the chamber. Each insurer kicked in at least $1 million and some gave multi-million dollar donations.

At the exact same time as AHIP was telling the Washington Post that insurers "continue to strongly support reform," AHIP was already quietly using its ad budget to mislead the country and weaken support for the plan.

I realize these revelations may have a dog-bites-man quality. "Imagine that -- health insurance companies were being sleazy and dishonest while trying to screw over the country," some of you are no doubt thinking. "Will wonders never cease."

But this story should remove all doubt. There are still plenty of conservative lawmakers, for example, who are prepared to take marching orders from AHIP. Worse, there are still plenty of Americans who've seen AHIP's subsidized attack ads, and don't realize that they're being lied to. Officially, AHIP still wants to maintain the facade that it's a friend of health care reform.

Policymakers struggling to resolve differences on the final reform bill may want to keep a simple adage in mind: don't let AHIP's duplicitous campaign win.

DougJ: A cool million

In all the mockery of Harold Ford, it’s easy to lose sight of this question: what the hell is Bank of America paying Harold Ford a million dollars for? He can’t even be working full time, not with his regular “Morning Joe” gig. He doesn’t seem all that smart or capable.

It’s true that lots of people make a million dollars a year at big banks. And I don’t know exactly what most of them do. I have one friend who makes about that much at a bank, but he’s been there for ten years, headed up two hugely successful large-scale projects, worked 90-hour weeks for a few years, had 200 people working under him, and so on (not that any of this justifies the salary in a sane world). I don’t know how typical that is—maybe most of the people making seven figures at banks don’t really do anything and have never done much of anything.

I’m left with the impression that Harold Ford is being paid for future services rendered, that he is being bribed to do the bank’s bidding should he ever become Senator or head of the DNC (remember, Carville was pushing him for that long ago) or something of that nature. I can’t see any other explanation.

Benen: CANTOR REDEFINES 'SUBSTANTIVE'

With the House poised to return from its recess, House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-Va.) has another Poltico op-ed today, describing his hopes/expectations for the year. It's not an especially compelling look.

The thrust of the piece is to complain about, well, pretty much everything. President Obama, Cantor said, had "a unique opportunity to unite the country" last year, but that didn't work because the White House refused to govern with far-right priorities in mind. (The nerve of the president to follow his campaign platform.) The big bad president and those mean Democratic leaders expressed no interest in right-wing ideas, and as a result, Obama's desire to be "the great unifier" came up far short.

From Obama's first day in office, [congressional Republicans] stood ready to work with him on common-sense, mainstream solutions to return the economy to prosperity and get Americans working again.... Despite efforts like these to work together, the Obama administration, in tandem with Democrats on Capitol Hill, has forged ahead with a rigidly ideological agenda. [...]

It didn't have to be this way. From the stimulus to the budget to health care, Republicans have offered substantive solutions on every piece of major legislation in a good-faith effort to get things done for Americans facing tremendous challenges. During the rare occasions when we have held discussions at the White House, the president has paid our proposals mere lip service when the cameras are on, only to rebuff our ideas in their entirety once the meeting ends.

The column gets dumber -- for example, he urges the administration to "cast aside political correctness to keep the American people secure" -- which is to be expected. Cantor is, after all, the quintessential post turtle.

But these claims about the GOP agenda from last year warrant a little fact-checking.

Republicans offered a "substantive solution" during the stimulus debate? Actually, no. Republicans offered a five-year spending freeze and a new round of tax cuts. Even prominent conservatives described the GOP recovery plan as "insane."

Republicans offered a "substantive solution" during the budget debate? I wish they had. Republicans actually offered two genuinely ridiculous alternative budgets, one of which didn't include any numbers, and one of which sought to privatize Medicare out of existence.

Republicans offered a "substantive solution" during the health care debate? Not in this reality it didn't. The GOP plan was nothing short of laughable -- it did nothing for the uninsured, nothing for those with pre-existing conditions, and nothing for those worried about losing coverage when it's needed most. It was an entirely partisan plan, written in secret. The Republican proposal sought to create a system that "works better for people who don't need health care services, and much worse for people who actually are sick or who become sick in the future. It's basically a health un-insurance policy." And as we learned in November, the plan included provisions that "mirror the suggestions put forth by the lobbying entity of the private insurance industry way back in December 2008."

When Obama reached out to Republicans on the climate bill, the GOP said it would refuse to accept the idea that global warming is real. When Obama reached out to Republicans on a plan to cut spending, Cantor & Co. came up with only $23 billion in cuts over five years -- less than Obama's plan. When Obama met with GOP leaders in the White House, and started talking about the kind of concessions he was prepared to make as part of a bipartisan compromise on health care, he asked what Republicans might be willing to do in return. They offered literally nothing.

Obama, we're told, chose "to rebuff [Republican] ideas in their entirety." Maybe that's because the Republican ideas were a pathetic joke, unworthy of consideration, and unbecoming of a national political party that strives to be taken seriously?

• From the comments:
  

Five minutes later, Cantor posed for cameras and took credit for the parts of Obama's rigidly ideological agenda that benefitted Cantor's district.

Posted by: scrappled on January 12, 2010 at 2:55 PM

Benen: TO BE A FLY ON THE WALL

I don't imagine there's much point in a president being gracious towards those who will do anything to destroy him, but Obama has a stubborn side.

President Barack Obama has accepted an invitation to appear at the House GOP issues conference later this month, and Republican leaders made it clear Tuesday that they will use the opportunity to push their solutions to the country's economic woes.

"House Republicans are grateful that the President of the United States has accepted our invitation to meet with the Republican Conference later this month," House Republican Conference Chairman Mike Pence (Ind.) said in a statement. "House Republicans look forward to presenting the president with our proposals to protect our nation, create jobs, control federal spending, lower the cost of health care, achieve energy independence and strengthen families."

I'd love to be a fly on the wall for that one. The two sides want to take the country in entirely different directions, and one has spent a year trashing the other as an illegitimate, foreign socialist intent on destroying capitalism and the American system of government. Now that it's an election year, they're really prepared to get nasty.

Last February, after the president was urged to continue his bipartisan outreach, Obama said, "Well, I will certainly do that ... because I'm just a glutton for punishment. I'm going to keep on talking to Eric Cantor. Someday, sooner or later, he's going to say, 'Boy, Obama had a good idea.'"

It's a nice idea that's never going to happen, but the president at least gets points for persistence.

CW Wrong Again

Beyond spin, Obama's productive year Jan. 12: Michael Beschloss, presidential historian for NBC News, talks with Rachel Maddow about how the first year's accomplishments of President Obama rate in the context of typical presidential productivity.

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

Benen: 'UNPRECEDENTED SUCCESS RATE'?

When it comes to the White House and its relationship with Congress, I tend to think the conventional wisdom is largely right -- President Obama entered office with an ambitious agenda, but institutional hurdles and unprecedented Republican obstructionism led to far fewer first-year victories than the president and his supporters had hoped for.

Hoping to quantify this a bit, Congressional Quarterly did some research, and came to a conclusion that challenges the assumptions.

In his first year in office, President Obama did better even than legendary arm-twister Lyndon Johnson in winning congressional votes on issues where he took a position, a Congressional Quarterly study finds.

The new CQ study gives Obama a higher mark than any other president since it began scoring presidential success rates in Congress more than five decades ago. [...]

All presidents demand specific action by Congress -- or at least they ask for it. But when you look at the votes of 2009 in which Obama made his preference clear, his success rate was unprecedented, according to John Cranford of Congressional Quarterly.

Cranford noted, "[Obama's] success was 96.7 percent on all the votes where we said he had a clear position in both the House and the Senate. That's an extraordinary number." What's more, it's without rival -- in 1965, LBJ's score was 93%.

I suspect some of the president's champions will point to this as an impressive accomplishment, but there's more to it than that. First, the Democratic congressional majorities are unusually large, following spectacular Bush-era Republican failures. Of course a Democratic majority this big is unlikely to pursue an agenda at odds with a Democratic White House.

Second, the score only reflects "success" in the broadest possible way -- the president asked for a bill, and Congress passed it. But that doesn't include compromises that forced changes the president may not have liked. The administration wanted more spending for cash-strapped states in the stimulus package, but Republican moderates forced the measure out. The administration wanted the Senate to pass a health care bill with a public option, but Lieberman and Nelson forced it out. The administration wanted a more robust cap-and-trade bill, but House Dems from industrial states watered it down. Similar concessions and compromises were common throughout the year.

The 96.7% number makes it seem as if Congress simply hands the president everything he's requested on a silver platter. Anyone who's kept their eyes on the Hill lately knows that's not true.

And finally, also note that the legislative success rate doesn't include Senate confirmation of judicial nominees and nominees to a variety of administrative posts. As you may have heard, GOP obstructionism has brought the confirmation process to a halt, with threatened filibusters and ridiculous holds.

Obama's success rate in '09 was impressive, but we're a long way from a rubber-stamp dynamic.

Benen: DOWD WAS WRONG

Just a few days ago, the New York Times' Maureen Dowd explained what Americans expect from their president, especially when terrorism is in the news.

Obama's problem, she said, is that while he's inclined to "exert mental and emotional control," it's "not O.K. to be cool about national security when Americans are scared." As Dowd sees it, the president's calm, unflappable demeanor isn't good enough -- he should be "the strong father who protects the home from invaders."

As difficult as this may be to believe, Americans' attitudes and Dowd's impression of Americans' attitudes are not necessarily the same thing. Take the new CNN poll (pdf), for example.

Please tell me whether you agree or disagree that Barack Obama has the personality and leadership qualities a President should have.

Agree 64%
Disagree 35%

As Greg Sargent put it, "Whatever problems the voters have with Obama's policies, his temperament just doesn't seem to an issue for them. They don't seem to want him to flaunt his emotions more or throw his weight around more or treat voters like children. No matter how many times we're told otherwise."

Also note, the same poll found that, despite the hype surrounding the failed Christmas-day plot, the public is less concerned about becoming a victim of terrorism than they were a few months ago.

This comes the same day as a CBS News poll (pdf) that found a 57% of the country approves of the way the president handled the matter.

Dowd's take seemed fairly silly on its face, but public opinion is making her argument appear less insightful, not more.

Ezra Klein: What a difference a black president makes

"Despite the bad economy, blacks' assessments about the state of black progress in America have improved more dramatically during the past two years than at any time in the past quarter century, according to a comprehensive new nationwide Pew Research Center survey on race." More here.

Poll a sign of Afghan optimism Jan. 12: Rachel Maddow relays the results of a poll of Afghans showing a hopefulness for the future.

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

Tuesday Morning: Be Afraid /NOT Edition

Cheney daughter ignores tough questions Jan. 11: Chris Hayes, Washington editor of The Nation, joins Rachel Maddow to explore the strategy by Dick Cheney's daughter, Liz, to simultaneously overlook and distort the facts of former President Bush's record on terrorism while attacking President Obama.

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

Greg Sargent: Poll: Majority Confident In Obama On Terror, Backs Handling Of Xmas Plot

Okay, some new polling from CNN just landed in the old in-box, and it appears to suggest that the public isn’t buying claims that Obama’s handling of the Christmas Day plot was too detached, cool, or weak:

As you know, a man has been charged with attempting to use an explosive device on Christmas Day to blow up a plane that was flying to Detroit. Do you approve or disapprove of the way Barack Obama has responded to that incident?

Approve 57%
Disapprove 39%
No opinion 4%

The real way of telling whether Obama’s handling of that particular plot has hurt him is to poll on overall confidence in him, and here’s what CNN finds along those lines:

How much confidence do you have in the Obama administration to protect U.S. citizens from future acts of terrorism — a great deal, a moderate amount, not much or none at all?

A great deal 24%
A moderate amount 41%
Not much 19%
None at all 16%

These numbers are generally good for Obama, but not completely. Only one fourth has a “great deal” of confidence in Obama to protect them. That said, a big majority — 65% — has a great deal or a moderate amount of confidence.

And only 35% adopt the Cheney clan’s view that we should be curled up in the corner with our teeth chattering uncontrollably over lack of confidence in the Obama administration’s ability to protect us. That’s pretty remarkable, given that the Cheneys have been all over the airwaves making this case for months and months.

Now, it’s true that a majority thinks the bombing suspect should be tried in a military court, as the Cheneys and other GOPers have argued. But solid majorities don’t believe that the intel lapses that occured leading up to the foiled bombing should raise alarms about Obama’s overall approach — a pretty clear sign that terror may not yet have been reignited as a potent national political issue, as we keep hearing.

Benen: READING FROM THE WRONG SCRIPT

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution's Jay Bookman noted earlier, "Cheney, Kristol and a lot of top Republicans in Washington are acting as unpaid PR agents for al Qaida, trying to turn even its failures into successes. The attempted bombing of Flight 253 was a terror attack; a terror attack succeeds only if it terrorizes its target audience."

Conservatives would, I suspect, find this deeply offensive. Suggesting that prominent right-wing voices are "acting as unpaid PR agents" for terrorists makes it sound as if conservatives hoping to undermine support for America's leadership are unpatriotic -- or worse.

But that's not the argument. The point isn't to characterize the Cheneys and other GOP attack dogs as terrorist sympathizers, it's to note that, in their zeal to weaken Obama's presidency, they're inadvertently giving U.S. enemies exactly what they're looking for. Fareed Zakaria wrote:

The purpose of terrorism is to provoke an overreaction. Its real aim is not to kill the hundreds of people directly targeted but to sow fear in the rest of the population. Terrorism is an unusual military tactic in that it depends on the response of the onlookers. If we are not terrorized, then the attack didn't work. Alas, this one worked very well.

And it worked in part because prominent conservatives, desperate to make the president look bad, did exactly what al Qaeda hoped for: they characterized the failed terrorist attack as a "success." Indeed, both Brit Hume and Bill Kristol used that very word last week. As Matt Duss explained very well the other day, conservatives are "interested in promoting a specific, and politically advantageous, narrative about the nature" of terrorist threats. It just so happens that this narrative overlaps perfectly with the propaganda goals of al Qaeda -- an inconvenient detail Republicans prefer to ignore.

Or, as Adam Serwer put it just three days after the failed Abdulmutallab plot, "It's hard to imagine that even al-Qaeda thought they would get so much good publicity for a failed attack that resulted in the alleged attacker setting himself on fire and being neutralized by unarmed civilians.... Republicans have used the incident to exaggerate the ongoing threat al-Qaeda poses to the United States in order to score points against the administration, and in doing so, have given al-Qaeda the best reaction they could have hoped to get under the circumstances.... Islamic terrorists are criminals who like to imagine themselves as nigh-unstoppable holy warriors -- and the GOP's knee-jerk panic responses have helped cultivate that image."

Again, this is not to say that the Cheneys, Pete King, Pete Hoeksta, Michael Steele, Jim DeMint, and a wide variety of media personalities are secretly supporting al Qaeda or are actively trying to undermine U.S. counter-terrorism efforts. They're not. The point is that the GOP's reflexive, reactionary response to current events, driven entirely by an obsession to undermine U.S. leadership politically, unintentionally makes terrorists' p.r. efforts easier and more successful -- and Republicans' partisan blinders make this fact invisible to them.

A Lott of Reiding

Sullivan: Ungovernable?

My column yesterday focused on the impact of deep cultural and partisan polarization on the ability of the president to get things done:

Look. There is a real and vital role for political opposition, and a robust, healthy, even vicious critique of Obama’s policies and a clear alternative to them is not just legitimate but essential for a democracy to work. But these statements from key players at the very top of the Republican party do not reflect this. They reflect a partisanship that seeks to impugn the core motives of the president, implying that he is, in fact, something alien and destructive to America, and must be opposed in everything he does, whatever it is, because his success would mean the end of America itself. It is not a declaration of opposition; it’s a declaration of war.

That is why in the week before Obama’s inauguration the most influential voice on the right, Rush Limbaugh, openly said he hoped the president would fail. That is why, in the first real test of the opposition, Obama’s stimulus package — with vast tax cuts in the middle of the steepest downturn in memory — garnered zero Republican votes. Zero. That’s why a health insurance reform plan that is in many ways more conservative than the Republican leader Mitt Romney’s Massachusetts pilot, a reform that cut the deficit, ruled out a public option, and gave the health insurance and drug companies millions of new private sector clients, won zero Republican support in the Senate and one, yes, one, Republican vote in the House.

Now recall Bush’s first signature proposal, his massive 2001 tax cut. Unlike Obama, he came to office with fewer votes than his opponent. In the wake of that election, 12 Democratic senators voted for Bush’s campaign promise, and 28 Democrats followed suit in the House. McCain actually voted against his own party on this critical first test. Now look at him. That is a sign of how partisanship and polarisation have only deepened since 2000, and Obama’s attempt to overcome it has simply fallen on barren ground. The response of the Republicans to Obama’s open hand has been pretty close to that of the Iranian junta: a clenched fist.

Benen: NOT A LOT LIKE LOTT

As you've probably heard, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has been the subject of intense Republican criticism over the last couple of days. It seems that Reid, in 2006, was speculating about Barack Obama's chances as a presidential candidate. Reid was "wowed" by Obama's skills and was confident that Americans were open to supporting a black presidential candidate, especially one like Obama, who Reid described as a "light-skinned" African American "with no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one."

After the quote was reported, Reid quickly apologized, and the White House quickly accepted. The senator has since received support from prominent leaders from the African-American community and members of the Congressional Black Caucus.

Reasonable people can disagree about the seriousness of Reid's unfortunate choice of words. I argued yesterday that, given the larger context and Reid's record on race-related issues, the apology should suffice. Mark Kleiman has a compelling piece arguing that this brouhaha is largely meaningless. Kevin Drum said "this whole thing is ridiculous" and is just "part of the kabuki of American politics." Even George Will found it preposterous when Liz Cheney attacked Reid as a "racist."

But the comparison that reporters and Republicans seem to love tries to draw parallels between Reid's comments and Trent Lott's pro-segregation remarks from 2002.

Even for our stunted political discourse, this is hopelessly silly.

GOP attack dogs are actually trying to make the case that Lott was forced to give up his leadership post in 2002, so Reid should do the same now. Anything less would be a "double standard." The media is playing along, as if this were a legitimate argument.

It's not. Josh Marshall, who knows a bit about the Lott matter, had a great item on this.

Two things in tandem ended Lott's career in the senate leadership. First, Lott had a long history of support for and association with segregationist and white supremacist groups in the South. Not in some distant past but in the year's just before his downfall. (He was also a staunch opponent of virtually all civil rights legislation. But that actually didn't distinguish him that much for many other Southern Republicans of his generation.) To a lot of us at the time it was always a bit of a mystery how someone with his record could have risen as high as he had. This was all widely known in Washington, DC but it was by common agreement overlooked and excused. (In many ways, because of this, it was a scandal of official Washington -- as much as Lott.)

Then one day, Lott said this remarkable thing -- if only the candidate of segregation (Strom Thurmond) had been elected president in 1948, we'd have avoided all the problems we've had in recent decades.

Most other politicians could have walked away from this remark with the claim that they just hadn't thought through the implications of the statement. The problem for Lott was that almost everything from his past suggested that he knew the implications exactly and believed them deeply. To put it more baldly, too many past statements and actions made it clear he was a supporter of white supremacist politics and segregation. Suddenly what official Washington had always ignored was open to intense scrutiny and his days were numbered.

Folks can make an argument for Reid's punishment on its own terms; but the Lott analogy is laughable.

Right. Lott's adult life was filled with racial controversy, including his membership in the Council of Conservative Citizens and his public praise of Jefferson Davis. In 2002, he didn't just talk up Thurmond's 1948 presidential campaign -- Lott expressed nostalgia for segregation.

Chances are, Republicans realize how absurd the comparison is, but don't care -- this is about scoring points against a vulnerable incumbent in an election year, not making sense. But for the media to play along -- and create a controversy basically because the GOP told them to -- is ridiculous.

Josh Marshall: Not Offensive At All

From TPM Reader JF ...

Dear Josh,

I'm disappointed with your post on Reid's now-famous remark.

You state that "Reid's was an offensive remark." That is just not true.

Even George Will can see that Reid's remark was not offensive at all (I'm sure you've watched the video of him arguing with Liz Cheney on this point).

It's true that "Negro" is archaic, and shouldn't be used. But that doesn't make Reid's remark "offensive." Far from it. (And I don't know what on earth you mean by "race-tinged." How is it "tinged"? The comment is _about_ race.)

Calling Reid's comment racist and offensive is part of something much bigger. Reid was calling out American racism. He was saying -- correctly -- that America is a nation that does not easily elect a black President, because we are still a fairly racist country, and that Obama had a better chance than most black candidates because of his skin color and way of speaking. This is a (true) comment about racism in America. The right LOVES to argue that pointing out racism in America is racist. ("We are shocked, shocked. How DARE you suggest that America is racist? Certainly none of my friends are racist. Maybe you 'liberal elites' are, but we're not." That's basically the gist of Liz Cheney's commentary today on this topic.)

In other words, the right is on a mission to argue that people who complain about or notice racism are racist.

If they can't call such a comment racist, they at least want the media to call it a "racial" remark, as though that's a bad thing one step shy of racist, rather than being a neutral description of any commentary about race. When you say "race-tinged" I hear the same thing -- you're unintentionally supporting a narrative in which calling out racism in America is "racial" or "race-tinged" or ultimately "racist."

Please don't feed this monster! Listen to George Will for once.

Ezra Klein: Reid and Obama

I'm trying really hard to understand why Harry Reid's comments about Barack Obama's electability were offensive. Do people seriously dispute that light-skinned African Americans have traditionally been more palatable to white Americans? We literally have studies on this subject. Is there a real argument over whether African American politicians use different cadences in front of primarily black audiences? Ask a political reporter about this sometime. Or go read any of the coverage from any speech Barack Obama has ever given at a black church, which inevitably will mention his "classical preacher's cadence," a description you will not find in any of the write-ups of, say, his health-care speech to the Congress.

It's weird, of course, that Reid used the word "negro" as opposed to "black" or "African American." But that seems to have a lot more to do with age than with racial attitudes. After all, Reid is the same guy who, In 2007, told Obama, "If you want to be president, you can be president now." Reid has also spent the past year working to push Obama's agenda through Congress and make sure the nation's first African American president has a successful first term and a good shot at reelection. If that's what counts for racism these days, then America has come a long way.

Benen: A CLASSIC OF THE GENRE

The teaser paragraph highlighting Maureen Dowd's NYT column yesterday said, "President Obama is no doubt on top of the Christmas terror crisis in terms of studying it top to bottom. But his inner certainty creates an outer disconnect."

My very first thought was, "I'll bet everything I own that she makes another 'Spock' reference." And sure enough, just as she did two columns ago, Dowd returned to her preferred cliche.

Alas, that wasn't the worst part of the column. Dowd's basic pitch is familiar: the president is calm and on top of things, and that's just awful. Her column makes note of Obama's "mental and emotional control," but it's intended as criticism, not praise.

No Drama Obama is reticent about displays of emotion. The Spock in him needs to exert mental and emotional control. That is why he stubbornly insists on staying aloof and setting his own deliberate pace for responding -- whether it's in a debate or after a debacle. But it's not O.K. to be cool about national security when Americans are scared.

Wait, what? When the public is scared about a terrorist threat, it's not all right for the Commander in Chief to be calm and in control? Isn't this backwards? As tristero put it, "In fact, being 'cool about national security' or other potential emergencies (say, huge, city-wrecking hurricanes) is exactly what I want my government to be. I want -- expect -- reasoned, intelligent responses from my government to the problems we face. That's what I voted for, not hysteria or phony displays of emotional connection."

Dowd concluded:

[The president is] so sure of himself and his actions that he fails to see that he misses the moment to be president -- to be the strong father who protects the home from invaders, who reassures and instructs the public at traumatic moments.

He's more like the aloof father who's turned the Situation Room into a Seminar Room.

It's almost as if Dowd has become a parody of herself.

Matt Yglesias' response was spot-on: "Sorry, no. The Situation Room is not a Seminar Room, but it's also not the Reassuring Dad room. It's a place where the President meets with key officials to decide what to do in response to emergencies. The "moment to be president" starts when you swear the oath of the office and it ends when your successor takes office. And the job is to make decisions that reflect a realistic assessment of the risks, of the available policy options, and of the costs and benefits involved in the different options. Reassuring children is a job for parents. Treating adults like they're little children is, perhaps, a job for newspaper columnists."

digby: Awful

Oh man. This excerpt about the Edwards campaign from the exciting new political gossip tell-all is really unpleasant. It's a Shakespearean tragedy --- or a farce, I'm not sure. Both John and Elizabeth are portrayed as pretty awful people in the midst of a pretty awful situation. And there are some gratuitous, personal details in it that really shouldn't have been published, IMO.

A lot of people wondered about Edwards. On paper he had everything and seemed to have a real populist touch at a time when populism was increasingly relevant. But a lot of people I knew felt there was just something "off" about him, they just couldn't put their finger on it. Perhaps this is one of those cases where heuristics really do make a difference.

Whatever. I'm sure Heilemann and Halperin are very proud to be the top, tabloid journalists in the country providing much shaudenfreude for the Villagers and entertainment for everyone else. They'll sell a lot of books --- it's human nature to like mean, nasty gossip --- and this one looks like it gives TMZ a run for its money. I'm sure we'll be hearing every sordid detail on a loop for the next week at least.

Update: Andrea Mitchell just reported that personal detail I found so offensive on NBC Nightly News. Elizabeth Edwards isn't a sympathetic character in that article, but to me she seemed, in that moment, a woman in terrible, primal pain. Let's say that no matter how awful a person she is, any woman who is diagnosed with incurable bone cancer and then finds out that her famous husband is sleeping with another woman (and knows she is about to suffer an epic public humiliation when it all comes out) is likely to act like a freak at times. Nice of the villagers to turn that into entertainment.

Just Another Manic Monday

The endless navel gazing of the news media, in which they pretend not to have a role in public perceptions, is nauseating. Here's what I saw on the Times home page this morning:

Week in Review

Opponents love to cast Democrats as weak, and labels stick. What it might take for the president to look strong.

What utter bullshit. The article itself isn't bad, but the lede is often all that matters for a majority of readers. Just how difficult is it for the news profession to learn this.

DougJ: Geriatric and insular

I liked Michael Calderone’s piece on the Sabbath gasbags, especially this:

The shows are particularly ripe targets for critics who see them as the epitome of insider Washington and conventional wisdom. James Wolcott, writing in Vanity Fair last year, for example, described watching the show that Stephanopoulos recently vacated to be “like receiving an engraved invitation to apoplexy.”

“With occasional exceptions, the Sunday shows come across as geriatric and insular, having long been eclipsed and upstaged by Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert, Bill Maher, Fox News, MSNBC and much of the Web,” New York Times columnist Frank Rich, a frequent critic, said in an e-mail to POLITICO.

I always wonder if the reason that these shows have such old guests (McCain, Broder) is that they have such old audiences. But, honestly, I’m pretty sure my 89 year-old grandmother is sick of Cokie Roberts and David Broder by now. So that can’t be the whole explanation.

Sullivan: Lieberman And McCain Back Netanyahu Against Obama - In Israel

One critical aspect of president Obama's Middle East policy is finding a way to stop Israel continuing to expand settlements on the West Bank. Without a permanent cessation of such activity, there's no way to get the two sides together. But Israel simply refuses to cooperate, as it has refused for two decades in its land-grab, and is eagerly anticipating the end of its temporary semi-freeze of some settlements, while it maintains its policy of populating East Jeruslame with as many Jewish-Israelis as possible. In such a situation, having some leverage over Israel is essential to advancing US interests in forging a settlement that could help undercut some of the rationale for Islamist terror.

So what do several sitting Senators do in such a delicate situation in which George Mitchell has recently raised the option - a remote one, but an option - of withholding loan guarantees as the first Bush administration did. They go to Israel and back prime minister Netanyahu against their own president in an open news conference.

The man who lost the last election reacts by directly undercutting the victor's foreign policy goals, and does so abroad in the very country Obama is trying to push toward change.

Lieberman, for his part, is effectively telling the Israelis that Obama does not control US foreign policy with respect to Israel, and that he will be prevented by Congress from exerting any pressure. He says this with a certainty, as if the autonomy of the president is simply moot. And remember that Lieberman and McCain often invoke the necessity for sanctions against foreign countries the US is trying to nudge or persuade in one way or another. Here's Lieberman's quote (and the video of his backing Netanyahu against Obama is here):

Any attempt to pressure Israel, to force Israel to the negotiating table, by denying Israel support will not pass the Congress of the United States. In fact, Congress will act to stop any attempt to do that.

Message to a foreign government: if the US president tries to pressure you in any way, we will stop him and back you. McCain endorses Netanyahu's position entirely, ignoring the settlement issue, and boldly supports a foreign leader over his own president. For good measure, they also both back the Netanyahu government's position on Iran, calling for massive, general crippling sanctions rather than more targeted measures against the Revolutionary Guards. This again is effectively backing Netanyahu against Obama.

Are you surprised? Me neither. As an Israeli reader writes:

I was under the impression that foreign policy was formed in the White House, not congress, and isn't it a bit weird for two right-wingers to attack the US administration on foreign soil? Then again, It's Israel.

Think Progress: GOP plans on reintroducing legislation to ban and deport immigrants from ‘terrorist’ countries.

This past week, Rep. Gresham Barrett (R-SC) announced his intention to update and reintroduce the Stop Terrorists Entry Program Act (STEP) that would prohibit “the admission of aliens from countries designated as State Sponsors of Terrorism as well as Yemen to the United States.” Barrett originally introduced the legislation back in 2003 and believes recent events have created an even greater need to “secure America” by amending the Immigration and Nationality Act to ban immigrants from Cuba, Iran, Sudan, Yemen and Syria from ever stepping foot in the U.S.:

While President Obama may have declared an end to the War on Terror, it is clear our enemies did not get the message. Twice in the past two months, radical Islamic terrorists have attacked our nation and the Administration has failed to adapt its national security and immigration policies to counter the renewed resolve of those who seek to harm our citizens…In light of these unfortunate facts, I intend to introduce legislation that will enhance our national security through common sense changes to our current immigration laws. The STEP Act of 2010 bars the admission of aliens from countries designated as State Sponsors of Terrorism [...]

However, the National Iranian American Council (NIAC) points out that neither alleged Fort Hood shooter Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan nor Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who has been charged with trying to detonate a bomb on a Detroit-bound plane on Christmas Day, would’ve been “affected in the slightest” by Barrett’s proposed bill. NIAC has launched a national campaign against the bill, which it describes as “offensive to American principles, harmful to US interests,” and discriminatory. Barrett is currently running for governor of South Carolina and was recently criticized for missing more than one-third of all votes taken in 2009, “by far the highest number among all members.”