'calculated subtlety and strategic depth'

Benen: ISOLATING THE FAR-RIGHT ON NATIONAL SECURITY

Some fairly prominent conservative voices have tried to characterize the Obama administration's recent efforts on nuclear arms -- a new treaty with Russia, a shift in the Nuclear Posture Review -- as some kind of radical and dangerous step. One right-wing member of Congress went so far as to suggest the moves were evidence of President Obama deliberately betraying the nation.

It's been interesting, then, to see some GOP officials move in the other direction. Nicholas Burns, for example, served as undersecretary of state for political affairs in the Bush/Cheney administration. Last week, Burns praised the Obama White House:

"The president is clearly signaling that we are really decades away now from the end of the Cold War," he said. "That the real threats are no longer just those nuclear weapons states that bedeviled us in the past but they're the terrorist groups, and they're the renegade states like Iran and North Korea that are truly disruptive and a threat to the world.

"It seems to me that this new nuclear policy review by the Obama Administration strengthens the ability to the United States to counter that threat and safeguard American interests."

What's more, Christopher Ford served as U.S. special representative for nuclear nonproliferation under George W. Bush. He told ABC News that he's not fully persuaded by Obama's Nuclear Posture Review, but conceded that the policy is better than he expected it to be.

Ford ... applauded the president's focus -- as evidenced by this week's summit -- on keeping nuclear weapons out of the hands of terrorists.

"This actually represents a very specific continuity in U.S. policy. Make no mistake, there are bad guys out there trying to acquire these technologies and they have no scruples whatsoever," he said. "I think that the Obama administration is quite right to focus heavily upon nuclear terrorism. One might quarrel as to whether the risk of nuclear attack as we are told is actually higher than say during the Cuban Missile Crisis, but that's nitpicking. The bottom line is quite simple: This is an area that has and deserves broad bipartisan support in the U.S. political context."

It's a reminder of a larger dynamic we've seen repeatedly over the last year or so -- the major national security and foreign policy fights do not necessary pit left vs. right, or Democrats vs. Republicans. Rather, they pit the American mainstream against what's become of contemporary conservativism.

In the case of nuclear policy, President Obama is being attacked by far-right personalities like Rudy Giuliani, Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich, and assorted right-wing members of Congress. The White House's approach has been endorsed, meanwhile, by the Secretary of Defense, the chairman and vice-chairman of the Joint Chiefs, and top officials from the Bush and Reagan administrations.

We've seen this same dynamic -- Obama and the mainstream vs. confused conservative clowns -- again and again, on everything from Iran to civilian trials to Gitmo to torture.

And yet, we're apparently supposed to take Giuliani, Palin, and Gingrich seriously.

Steve Clemons: Obama's nuclear wizardry and Iran

Sir Francis Bacon once said, “In civil business, what first? Boldness. What second and third? Boldness. And yet boldness is a child of ignorance and baseness.”

At the Nuclear Security Summit President Barack Obama is presiding over in a transportation-gridlocked Washington this week, he is achieving a boldness — but not of bravado. Rather, it is one of calculated subtlety and strategic depth.

Obama has brought together 47 world leaders to get them to commit to safer nuclear materials management practices and prevent trafficking in weapons of mass destruction.

Obama is changing the direction of global gravity. He is also confronting Iran without the shallowness of bombing vs. sanctions vs. public humiliation that his administration has been flirting with. In the past week, and over the next month, Obama is showing what a U.S.-led world order should look like.

This is a huge shift, for the world hasn’t had much faith in America’s abilities to deliver. For example, in taking on strategic challenges like getting the Israelis and Palestinians on a two-state pathway; or ending the anachronistically simmering Cold War conflict in U.S.-Cuba relations; or persuading Iran to forgo a nuclear weapons track, most of the world has seen an America unable to achieve the objectives it sets out for itself.

In recent years, this has translated into a sense that the United States is a well-branded, globally important but underperforming country, whose influence is weakening — more like a national version of General Motors than Google.

Now, out of the blue, Obama is changing the game.

In a quick succession of deals focused on pre-empting a 21st-century nuclear nightmare, Obama has mended the foundation and infrastructure of a global nonproliferation regime that United Nations Ambassador John Bolton, Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), Vice President Dick Cheney and others of the pugnacious nationalist wing of the last administration worked hard to tear down.

And, by bringing together 47 key leaders, Obama is signaling to all stakeholders that a nuclear crisis with Iran and other potential breakout states would undermine the global commons.

Yet he is not vilifying Iran or its leaders. He is not making the same “axis of evil” mistake President George W. Bush did.

Instead, Obama is showing the benign and constructive side of U.S. power to other great states like India, China, Brazil and Russia. He is also inviting Iran to get in compliance with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and get back into a club that matters — where Iran could be respected for adopting a sensible course.

This comes on the heels of Obama’s release last week of a Nuclear Posture Review. It pledges to cut the size of the nuclear weapons footprint in U.S. arsenals while simultaneously influencing the cost-benefit realities for nations either “in” or “out” of the nuclear nonproliferation club.

The most obvious holdouts are Iran and North Korea — but frankly, there’s also Israel. The nuclear review also makes clear that the biggest nuclear concerns are nonstate actors, not states.

Obama has made a Faustian bargain in this new review. For he is allotting more financial resources to U.S. labs for maintenance and modernization of the current weapons stockpile, while pulling the plug on new weapons development.

Vice President Joe Biden should be given the credit for this crucial deal, which kept the national security right from mugging the president during the process.

Finally, Obama has signed a historic strategic arms reduction treaty with the Russians. This reverses the erosion of a relationship that — like the U.S.-China relationship — is crucial to virtually all the administration’s goals.

The primary reason driving Defense Secretary Robert Gates to stay on in the administration was to reconfigure U.S.-Russia relations. It had become so riddled with suspicion that Russia may well have vetoed any U.S. progress on the Iran front.

Senior Russian officials tell me that the tag team of Gates on the military side and Undersecretary of State Ellen Tauscher on the diplomatic front changed the climate from unproductive mutual skepticism and hostility to pragmatic respect. And this may now lead to new collaborations.

Coming next, in May, is sure to be reactivated U.S. leadership at the once-every-five-years review of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Five years ago, Washington conveyed its disdain through envoys, whose policy postures were shaped by Bolton’s suspicions of international groups that bordered on a hyper-view of U.S. sovereignty.

This NPT review with U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice and Tauscher — and with Obama at the helm — is now a part of a soft but perhaps effective strategy to contain Iran’s nuclear pretensions.

The administration’s team has worked hard to entice China and Russia into a partnership so they do not become more allied with Iran’s course than Washington’s.

Obama has now showed two essential strengths. First, he can deliver what he promised in September 2009, when he chaired a special Security Council session. Second, his team understands the difference between approaches that have strategic depth and can move global players into new positions versus those that are vapidly bilateral and uncompelling to either party.

Before Obama reset this new global contract on nuclear issues, Washington and Tehran had negotiated via public jabs.

Meanwhile, the U.S.-led effort to impose harsh sanctions on Iran was more about feeding U.S. political opinion than successfully steering Iran in a new direction.

Getting key stakeholders sewn together on this, through revitalized global institutions, is a far more effective way to animate the choices Iran may make.

Obama’s global nuclear wizardry — focused on Iran and North Korea — may yet fail.

He still needs to find a way to deal with the Iranian leadership’s paranoia about Western regime change efforts. He also has to balance carrots for Iran with constraints.

But Obama and his team are finally showing a Nixonian deftness for creating new possibilities at just the time the world believed America was a global has-been.

Steve Clemons is director of the American Strategy Program at the New America Foundation and publishes The Washington Note, a political blog.

Think Progress: Russian President says what distinguishes Obama ‘from many other people’ is that he is ‘a thinker.’

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, one of 47 world leaders gathering for the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington, D.C., appeared on ABC’s Good Morning America to relay his country’s concerns ahead of the summit. During one point in the interview, host George Stephanopoulos asked Medvedev what he thought of President Obama. The Russian leader coyly replied that he believed Obama distinguishes himself from “many other people” — presumably former President Bush — by being “a thinker”:

STEPHANOPOULOS: You’ve now met President Obama many times, at least fifteen meetings and phone calls –

MEDVEDEV: Sixteen times.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Sixteen, OK, I knew it was fifteen, I wasn’t sure about sixteen. What do you make of Barack Obama the man?

MEDVEDEV: [Obama] is a very comfortable partner. It’s very interesting to be with him. The most important thing that distinguishes him from many other people, I won’t name anyone by name, he’s a thinker. He thinks when he speaks.

STEPHANOPOULOS: (laughing) You have somebody in your mind, I think!

MEDVEDEV: Obviously I do have someone on my mind, I don’t want to offend anyone.

Watch it:

A worldwide poll taken last month found that the Obama administration’s global approving rating is 51 percent, a 17 percent jump from the Bush administration’s approval rating during its last year.

Benen: NUCLEAR SECURITY SUMMIT CONCLUDES WITH COMMITMENTS

By most measures, the gathering in D.C. this week was a success. The United States received some key commitments it had sought on nuclear materials, and President Obama took another significant step in securing his leadership role on the global stage.

President Barack Obama's nuclear summit of 47 world leaders met two goals as it ended Tuesday: reaching international consensus on the need to keep weapons-grade nuclear materials out of the hands of terrorists, and re-establishing U.S. leadership on nonproliferation.

Several nations agreed to dispose of weapons-grade uranium, end plutonium production, tighten port security and other voluntary steps. All participants endorsed Obama's call to secure vulnerable nuclear materials in four years, and agreed to seek further cooperation even as they stopped short of any enforceable international agreement.

"We have seized this opportunity," Obama said in a news conference closing the summit. As a result, he said, "the American people will be safer, and the world will be more secure."

Gary Samore, the arms control and nonproliferation coordinator for the National Security Council, told reporters, "We used the summit shamelessly as a forcing event to ask countries to bring house gifts. Almost every country came with something new."

They did, indeed. Ukraine and Chile are giving up their highly enriched uranium; Mexico will accept help in converting a research reactor to lower enriched fuel; Russia is shutting down its last plutonium-production reactor; and China at least expressed some willingness to move forward on new sanctions against Iran.

In the larger sense, David Sanger explained that President Obama could claim two "major accomplishments" from the gathering: "The summit meeting forced countries that had failed to clean up their nuclear surpluses to formulate detailed plans to deal with them, and it kicked into action nations that had failed to move on previous commitments."

As for the president himself, I seriously doubt the American public was following the summit details closely, and it's possible the developments will have no effect on his domestic standing at all. But those who were watching saw a president who took strides in demonstrating new levels of leadership on the global stage.

Love him or hate him, it's hard to deny the notion that Obama is an engaging public figure with skills of political persuasion. This week, we saw the president put these skills to use, perhaps in earnest for the first time, with a large group of international leaders. The French ambassador to the United States noted of Obama, "He's in charge, he's chairing the meetings, and this is where his personality plays a big part. He does it very well. And he feels very comfortable doing it."

In his role as host, though, Obama gave his fellow heads of state a taste of what has been familiar to many Americans who followed the domestic political debate over the past year: the president as seminar leader.

For four hours Tuesday, Obama led a pair of planning sessions to iron out the final details of the communique that was the culmination of the summit.

He sat at the center of the gathering, calling on leaders to speak, embellish, oppose and offer alternatives to the plan taking shape. Only the heads of state and, at times, two senior aides were allowed in the room, an exclusivity some diplomats called rare.

"He's never better than when he's the teacher," said a European diplomat, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the issue publicly.

Obama is trying a new approach to global leadership -- and it's working.

Sully: Congress, Americans, And Israel

AIPAC gets 76 Senators and 333 Congressmen and women to back Netanyahu's far-right coalition in its public fight with the president of the United States. Now, take a look at Jewish-American public opinion:

[Obama] also scores 55 percent approval on how he handles U.S.-Israel relations, which is virtually unchanged since last September, when his handling of the relationship scored 54 percent approval.

General American opinion on how to handle the regional conflict shows solid support for president Obama's insistence that Israel stop building settlements in East Jerusalem and the West Bank:

52% of Americans support, and 31% oppose, the Obama administration’s demand that Israel stop all settlement-building. 62% of those polled said the growth of Israeli settlements in occupied Palestinian territory will only lead to greater hostilities. 52% of respondents support, and 31% oppose, the Obama administration’s demand that Israel stop all settlement-building. 53% thought the US should be ready to get tough with both sides in peace negotiations if necessary, while only 33% disagreed.

So 31 percent of Americans oppose their president's handling of Israel, but 75 percent of Senators and Congressmembers do. 52 percent of Americans back their president in a tough negotiation with a foreign leader, but 75 percent of the Congress back the foreign leader against the president.

What explains this remarkable discrepancy?

Benen: ZAZI PLOT DETAILS EMERGE

For all the talk about Abdulmutallab's unsuccessful terrorist plot on Christmas, I continue to think the Najibullah Zazi case is an under-appreciated victory for the United States. A deadly attack was thwarted; intelligence was collected; and justice was served. No torture, no military commissions, no need to stray from the legal process. The legal system was followed to the letter, and it not only worked beautifully, it saved a lot of lives.

We learned more about the Zazi plot this week, and the details are chilling, to put it mildly.

Zazi and his two Queens friends allegedly planned to strap explosives to their bodies and split up, heading for the Grand Central and Times Square stations -- the two busiest subway stations in New York City.

They would board trains on the 1, 2, 3 and 6 lines at rush hour and planned to position themselves in the middle of the packed trains to ensure the maximum carnage when they blew themselves up, sources said.

During Zazi's brief visit to Queens from his home in Denver last September, he rode the subway multiple times to the Grand Central and Wall St. stations, scouting where to best spread death and mayhem, the sources said. [...]

The attack was to take place on Sept. 14, 15 or 16 - as soon as the bombs had been assembled - with Sept. 14 the most likely date, sources said.

A fourth man, who helped plan this intended attack, has been quietly arrested in Pakistan, following Zazi's cooperation with authorities.

I realize conservatives don't want to talk about this story, which is probably why major media outlets aren't paying much attention to it.

But that's a shame because when it comes to counter-terrorism, this is a big f'in deal. Here we had a serious terrorist threat -- arguably the most important since 9/11 -- and an al Qaeda recruit who was poised to kill a lot of people. Obama administration officials thwarted Zazi's plan, took him into custody, read him his rights, and gave him a lawyer.

And the results couldn't have been better for the United States. Zazi will spend the rest of the his life behind bars, but only after cooperating with federal officials and becoming a valuable source of intelligence.

If Republicans really want to debate the efficacy of Obama's counter-terrorism policies, we can start right here.

Benen: A TALE OF TWO FAILED PLOTS

Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was at the center of a terrorist plot to kill Americans last year. Najibullah Zazi was at the center of a terrorist plot to kill Americans last year. Both targeted U.S. transportation -- Abdulmutallab intended to attack on a plane, Zazi on a New York subway -- and both, fortunately, were thwarted and taken into custody.

The former became the subject of intense media interest, heated political debate, and far-right apoplexy. The latter has been largely ignored, especially by conservatives. Kevin Drum wonders why.

Am I missing something here? Because I don't remember Fox News putting Zazi on a 24/7 loop and insisting that trial in a civilian court was basically a surrender to al-Qaeda. The right wing world doesn't seem to be objecting to this latest development, either. Why? Is blowing up an airplane somehow different from blowing up a subway? Are civilian courts and Miranda rights OK if the terrorist plot is broken up before it can be carried out, but not after? Or what? I'm a little confused about the conservative position on this stuff. Help me out.

The disconnect is interesting, isn't it? Zazi, who was reportedly close to executing the worst domestic terrorist attack since 9/11, was treated the same way all suspected terrorists taken into U.S. custody are treated -- law enforcement prevented the attack, arrested the suspect, read him his rights, gave him a lawyer, charged him, and put him behind bars.

This should, in theory, outrage Republicans, right? GOP official don't believe counter-terrorism is a law enforcement issue, don't want suspected terrorists to be treated like criminals, and don't want them to be imprisoned on American soil. So why would the right stay silent?

I suspect it's because the Zazi case makes the Obama administration look fantastic, and conservatives would just as soon hope that no American ever hears about the story at all.

Indeed, this story is a classic example of the American system working to perfection, executed by officials who got everything right. A radical, al Qaeda-recruited terrorist and some accomplices were close to setting off deadly explosives in the two busiest subway stations in New York City. The consequences would have been devastating had they succeeded. Instead, federal officials learned of the plot, realized the attack was near, and prevented a catastrophe.

Once in custody, the administration followed the rule of law and it worked wonders -- Zazi cooperated with authorities, provided valuable intelligence, and rolled over on his accomplices. There was no torture, no military commissions, no Gitmo.

By any reasonable measure, from top to bottom, this was counter-terrorism working beautifully. The U.S. officials who made this happen are heroes.

So, why aren't Republicans whining incessantly? Because that would shine a light on the case, and that's the last thing conservatives want.

Conversely, why don't Democrats shine a light on the case, and maybe try to bring the story to the public's attention? Perhaps because, even now, Dems choose not to emphasize national security, even when it's a tremendous victory for a Democratic administration.

Reality Bites

Bernstein: Of Course Its a SCOTUS Filibuster

Apparently there's some sort of argument about whether Senate Republicans "will" filibuster the Supreme Court nominee. Thus Matthew DeLong begins his story in the Washington Post today like this:

Senate Republican leaders declined to rule out a filibuster of President Obama's nominee to succeed retiring Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, if they think the pick falls outside the judicial mainstream.

And Greg Sargent predicts that a filibuster is unlikely.

I don't think this makes any sense. A better understanding of the situation, I think, is that of course the Republicans are filibustering, if by that one means that Obama will need 60 votes to get his nominee confirmed. It may be that, falling short of the 41 votes needed to block a candidate, the Republicans will choose not to force a cloture vote. It may even be that a small minority will insist on losing a cloture vote, and that in response some Republicans will vote yes on (assured) cloture and no on the (assured) nomination. But that's all just playing to the crowds and posturing. The real story is that if there are more than 40 Senators opposed to the nomination, then those Senators will demand a cloture vote, defeat cloture, and defeat the nomination. That's true of this nomination, and it's true of every nomination that Barack Obama has sent up for the courts and for the executive branch since he was sworn in to office.

What Lamar Alexander, Matthew DeLong, and Greg Sargent are talking about is how Republicans will respond to an anticipated failure to reach 41 votes. That's not "will they filibuster?" -- that's if the filibuster fails, how will they stage-manage it.

Benen: WALL STREET REFORM AT THE TOP OF THE AGENDA

As congressional lawmakers return to Capitol Hill after two weeks off, members have plenty of unfinished business on their to-do list, and a closing window of opportunity to act on its agenda before the midterm elections.

And while there will no doubt be plenty of attention focused on the upcoming Supreme Court confirmation fight, some contingents of the Democratic majority nevertheless has their eyes on the new, top legislative priority.

Liberal Democrats see an opportunity to reassert their power in the Senate this spring on the Wall Street reform bill, after being forced to swallow a series of compromises on everything from health care reform to jobs legislation.

A group of Democrats, joined by Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin of Illinois, are planning an aggressive spring offensive to strengthen key provisions of the financial reform bill -- and daring Senate Republicans to vote against them.

"Given that [large financial firms] steered this country into the ditch, it's going to be very hard to stand up on the floor and say don't do financial reform or do it without teeth," said Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.). "There are a number of people in our caucus who feel like there are things that can be done to strengthen it."

Liberal Democrats believe widespread frustration across the country with Wall Street bailouts will make it difficult for Senate Republicans to mount a full-scale opposition to the legislation, particularly as voters near the midterm elections this fall.

I like the Dems' optimism, and it's encouraging to see them weigh the benefits of going on the offensive. On the merits, the strategy makes sense, not only because adding new accountability and safeguards to the financial system would help provide economic stability for years to come, but also because Americans aren't exactly fond of the bailed-out industry that brought the global system to the brink of collapse.

But be on the lookout for two broad angles. The first are the less-ambitious Democratic senators who are more inclined to weaken the bill to get more Republican support. The momentum seems to be moving in the other direction, but the moderates may yet stand in the way of a bold effort.

The second is reflexive, knee-jerk opposition from all Republicans at all times. Whenever anyone thinks, "Republicans wouldn't dare do [fill in the blank]," the GOP invariably does just that. In this case, it seems implausible that Republicans, en masse, would fight against reforming a system that nearly destroyed the global economy, but I'd remind Senate Dems that when related legislation came up in the House, it generated exactly zero GOP votes.

The Politico piece added, "Unions, consumer groups, party activists and liberals on Capitol Hill see regulatory reform as a win-win issue: They get either a strong bill or a strong campaign argument for the midterm elections." That sounds about right, but Dems would be wise to prepare for inexplicable Republican resistence.

Media Matters: Note to Newt: Women really, really don't like Palin

Noted women's rights thinker Newt Gingrich appeared on CNN recently to announce that Sarah Palin is something of a feminist icon. Explaining her appeal, Gingrich seemed to suggest that women --aside from San Francisco liberals-- adore Palin and are drawn to her unique, can-do qualities.

Except that, of course, they're not.

According to the latest CBS News poll, Palin is weighed down by an astonishingly low favorable rating among women; just 21 percent. In fact, women give Palin the lowest marks of virtually any demographic group polled by CBS.

But other than that, Gingrich appears to be dead on in his "feminist" analysis.

The Sarah Palin Network. Excellent!

Jonathan Bernstein: Palin as the Test Case

I've been reading Julian Sanchez's interesting posts on "epistemic closure," or the idea that conservatives have, or are trying to, create a media environment in which they only talk to each other and are totally cut off from the larger flow of information. For conservatives, Sanchez says:

Reality is defined by a multimedia array of interconnected and cross promoting conservative blogs, radio programs, magazines, and of course, Fox News. Whatever conflicts with that reality can be dismissed out of hand because it comes from the liberal media, and is therefore ipso facto not to be trusted. (How do you know they’re liberal? Well, they disagree with the conservative media!) This epistemic closure can be a source of solidarity and energy, but it also renders the conservative media ecosystem fragile...Internal criticism is then especially problematic, because it threatens the hermetic seal.

To me, the most interesting aspect of this is the extent to which it permeates not to the rank-and-file, but to the leaders themselves. Sanchez doesn't think so for some of those leaders:

The New York– and D.C.-based conservatives who staff the movement’s think tanks, magazines, and advocacy shops don’t in fact inhabit a different universe from their liberal counterparts. They all read the New York Times and drink lattes and go to parties together. There’s some clustering, to be sure, but nobody acts like they really believe the folks on the other side are insidious hellspawn. The pose is for the benefit of the base, who—not because they’re conservative, but because they aren’t urban media professionals—are likely to draw on a narrower range of trusted news and opinion sources.

I tend to think that's correct, but I'm not as sure as I used to be, at least not for one group of conservative leaders -- politicians and the people they get information from. Steve Benen is confident that Mitch McConnell and Saxby Chambliss weren't faking it when they couldn't manage to talk about health care reform beyond their talking points in a recent interview. Former White House staffer Keith Hennessey was almost comically wrong about the chances of health care reform passing (and see also this Megan McArdle post). But of course it's possible that McConnell and Chambliss understood the issue well be simply refused to discuss some aspects of it, and it's possible that Hennessey (and McArdle, or at least the conservatives she spoke to) were just playing for the rubes.

Sarah Palin's presidential ambitions, it seems to me, will be the test case. Presidential nominations are, for the most part, top-down contests; voters matter mainly when party leaders cannot agree on a candidate, or as a means for party leaders to test whether candidates they like for other reasons have broad appeal (see my article here -- gated -- or Cohen, Karol, Noel, and Zaller's book). In other words, if party leaders don't want Palin to be nominated, her chances are slim at best. My assumption is that most Republican leaders should be capable of seeing that Palin would be a poor general election candidate and a potentially disastrous president for them if she was elected. If they can't see that, and support her despite all the warning signs, it seems to me that it will constitute fairly strong evidence that Republican pols and the people they listen to have entered the closed information loop that Sanchez discusses.

See also Matt Yglesias on the causes of the situation. I think he's partially right; I also think that Steve Benen is partially right when he asserts that Republicans just don't care very much about policy (some certainly do, but I don't think he's totally off). And see also TNC on the related subject of the relative importance of, uh, lunatics on the two party coalitions.

digby: Climate Economics

There's lots of talk today about Krugman's article in the NY Times magazine about the green economy. Adam Siegel writes:

The New York Times Sunday magazine will feature a tour de force on climate economics by Nobel Prize winning economist Paul Krugman. Entitled Building a Green Economy, a more appropriate title might be Climate Economics 101 and it should be required reading of every single Member of Congress and any journalist who writes on the issue of costs and benefits of action to mitigate climate change.

Sadly, I don’t have time to do Krugman’s excellent work full justice. He examines the costs and benefits of action on climate change, tackles issues (cogently) about the science, and highlights the critical importance of ‘insurance’ — valuing the potential, in decision-making, not just of ‘Climate Change’ but of catastrophic climate consequences — the low probability but incredible serious in impact risks.

Siegel points out some weaknesses in the article and gives some context so I'd take a look at the full post as well as Krugman's article. But this article forms one of the core progressive arguments we should have been having for the past year about the economy and the environment. Let's hope our politicians are listening and take this one on the road for the fall campaign.

DougJ: Principled opposition to big government

Carl Paladino, a Tea Party candidate for governor in New York State has been sending out stuff like this emails (via WNYMedia—scroll down the link with caution as the larger article contains many NSFW images):

I can’t ascertain how official Tea Party support for Paladino is, but he is mentioned (favorably) in 20 local Tea Party emails I have received over the past few months (I added myself to their mailing list).

DougJ: Mainstream fringe

I spoke with some people at WNYMedia about how mainstream Carl Paladino is within the Western New York Republican party. They told me:

[H]is announcement a week ago was attended by a who’s who of Republican hackerama. (Republican Congressman) Chris Lee was there. The head of M&T bank was there. ECRC (Erie County Republican Committee) Chair Domagalski was there.

Paladino had been sending this crazy racist stuff around to local Republicans for months. Chris Lee and Domagalski certainly knew about this already.

As with the Confederate History Month in Virginia, Republicans make no effort to distance themselves from what they know full well is insane, racist, hateful nonsense. And why should they, I guess? Objecting to it would just piss off the base and there’s no political price to be paid for not objecting. Everyone knows that the objectionable images were photo-shopped or created by liberal plants or by created by FBI plants, and even if they weren’t, MoveOn did the same stuff to Bush. Plus none of it is really racist.

Ezra Klein: The political case for immigration reform

I'd say it's pretty unlikely that comprehensive immigration reform happens this year. But then, who cares what I think? Harry Reid is in charge of the Senate, and he says he's got 56 votes, and it's gonna happen. “We need a handful of Republicans,” he told an immigration rally in Las Vegas.

The cynical take, of course, is that Reid is running for reelection in a state that's about 20 percent Hispanic. But that suggests an important change in the political reality: The cynical thing for Democrats to do in an election year might be to pursue immigration reform. And that would make immigration reform a much likelier addition to the agenda.

As Ron Brownstein frequently points out, Obama won fewer than 40 percent of working-class whites in 2008. Congressional Democrats may well do even worse this year. But it's hard to believe they can do that much worse, or that they can do much to change their standing among this group. It's also not clear that immigration is a big motivator for these voters: The GOP tried to use it in 2006 against the Democrats, and the effort pretty much fell flat on its face.

Actually, it did worse than that: It drove Latino voters toward the Democrats. Obama won 67 percent of Hispanics in 2008 -- a much better showing than Democrat made in 2004. The fear in 2010, however, is that Hispanics won't show up to vote. If Democrats actually pursue immigration reform, their participation becomes likelier. And if Republicans -- or tea partyers, or conservative talk radio -- overreact to the prospect of immigration reform, their participation becomes virtually assured.

That last bit also suggests another reason Democrats might want to see immigration on the agenda: It's got the possibility to tear the Republican coalition apart. Beltway Republicans are very, very concerned about losing Latino voters, and so they try to be careful on the issue. Remember that the last effort at immigration reform came while Bush was in the White House.

But grass-roots conservatives tend to be very, very opposed to immigration reform. Remember that it was conservatives -- led by talk radio -- who killed the immigration reform effort. So what do Republican politicians do when their base goes into anti-immigration overdrive but their consultants beg them to tread carefully? It looks like Harry Reid, for one, would like to find out.

karoli (C&L): Michele Bachmann says repeal and pass the same provisions over again

By karoli Sunday Apr 11, 2010 7:00pm

Oh, Michele Bachmann. I take it you really, really didn't read that bill before you voted against it. Minnesota voters, how does that make you feel, knowing that your elected representative couldn't be bothered to read something before voting against it?

Michele's solutions are either in the bill already or are just restatements of the same old arguments with different words. After explaining just how difficult it will be to repeal health care reform, she then enumerates how the country can best cover the "thirty-thousand uninsured". Here is her list:

1. Sell across state lines - That's already in the bill in the form of regional co-ops that can form with regulatory approval by all involved states. What ISN'T in the bill: Basing operations in a US territory or state with very little in the way of insurance regulation and selling into states that are heavily regulated. If Bachmann had her way, insurers would move their base of operations to the Cayman Islands and insure only those who made more than $250,000/year. The rest of us could be screwed, but hey, at least we could buy insurance across state lines!
2. Make insurance 100% deductible - This is in the bill, too. Of course, for those receiving subsidies, the insurance is not 100% deductible because the government is picking up all or part of the cost. What Bachmann fantasizes about is having everyone skip off to their friendly offshore insurer and shelling out big bucks up front that they might be able to get some tax benefits from on the back end. That's how the wealthy folks live, not the rest of us.
3. Make health care costs 100% deductible - Strange. Wouldn't that be like the government picking up all of our health care costs by reimbursement on the back end? What happened to that Health Savings Account idea where contributions are limited to a fraction of what might actually be paid in a year? I'm sure glad the Democrats are the fiscally responsible party.
4. Tort reform - The bill provides funding and incentives for states to innovate around liability and tort issues. Bachmann and the rest of her Republican cronies should know that tort reform is a state-by-state issue. Jurisdiction for how torts are litigated belongs to the states, not the federal government. After all, isn't that part of the argument for repealing health care reform?

What struck me about Bachmann's list of includes was what she excluded. Nothing about pre-existing conditions exclusions. Nothing about lifetime caps. Nothing about rescissions. Nothing about stopping insurers from excluding children born with pre-existing conditions.

She didn't mention even one of those. They didn't cross her mind. It wasn't an accident. The battle lines were always drawn at pre-existing conditions. It's driving the Republicans crazy that the middle class actually might be able to get health care without selling their souls, homes and assets to do it.

Benen: DAVID GREGORY'S SENSE OF FACT-CHECKING

The Washington Post's Howard Kurtz noted this morning that NBC's "Meet the Press," still the most watched Sunday public affair show, is posed to undergo some cosmetic changes. It will not, however, follow ABC's lead on the fact-checking front.

[A]ccepting a challenge from New York University's Jay Rosen, interim host Jake Tapper has arranged for the St. Petersburg Times' PolitiFact site to fact-check what "This Week" guests say after each program.

An "interesting idea," Gregory allows, but not one the NBC show will be emulating. "People can fact-check 'Meet the Press' every week on their own terms."

I'm not entirely sure what this means. At face value, it suggests a certain misunderstanding of the point of the exercise.

One of the Sunday shows invites a high-profile guest to discuss current events. The guest responds to pointed questions, and makes a variety of claims and arguments. Some of those claims and arguments will be accurate, and some won't. For the news consumer watching at home, the information gleaned from the interview is only useful if he/she knows whether the guest's comments are factual.

With that in mind, the Sunday shows have a couple of choices. First, hosts can become knowledgeable about the subject matter and fact-check the guests' claims during the program. Second, the shows can partner with independent fact-checkers like "This Week" has done with PolitiFact. Or third, some combination of the two.

Gregory's comments suggest a more traditional approach: let viewers figure things out "on their own terms." Why separate fact from fiction for news consumers when they can do that on their own?

Perhaps because they aren't well equipped to do this on their own, and rely on professional news outlets to provide them with reliable information.

For what it's worth, PolitiFact's fact-checking isn't part of the "This Week" broadcast, at least not yet, but has partnered with the show online. The first installment was published yesterday afternoon, and will apparently be updated again today.

Benen: CASUAL ACCUSATIONS OF TREASON

Rep. John Fleming of Louisiana, a relatively obscure Republican freshman lawmaker, published a piece this week on the Obama administration's nuclear policies and counter-proliferation efforts. Fleming, apparently, isn't impressed, and rehashed a variety of tired right-wing cliches and demonstrably false claims.

In particular, Fleming repeatedly urged President Obama to be more like Reagan, which made his opinion piece "dishonest and nonsensical," given Reagan's support for nuclear disarmament and treaties like the one Obama signed in Prague this week.

But Fleming's conclusion is what stood out for me.

As a member of the House Armed Services Committee, I work daily to ensure our men and women have the resources they need to protect this country, and I continue to be dismayed by the national security policies coming out of this White House. Simply put, President Obama is disadvantaging the United States one step at a time and undermining this country's national defense on purpose. Whether he is catering to the anti-war leftists or truly doing what he thinks is best for our security, the president is leading this nation down a very dangerous path. [emphasis in the original]

Now, most of the piece is boilerplate garbage. Fleming, or someone on his staff, wrote an op-ed without bothering to understand the details of the policy it seeks to critique. It's the kind of superficial, misleading, and uninformed "analysis" we've come to expect from congressional Republicans.

And if Fleming had simply characterized the approach endorsed by the president, the Pentagon, and the Joint Chiefs as misguided, and even potentially dangerous, it'd hardly be worth mentioning. But note that one line that the congressman italicized -- he believes the White House is "undermining this country's national defense on purpose."

Ignorance is commonplace. Belligerence is routine. Stupidity has become habitual throughout much of the caucus. But let's not overlook the fact that Fleming spoke directly to President Obama's motives. Fleming argued that the president isn't just mistaken, but rather, is deliberately trying to make the United States less safe and more vulnerable.

In other words, Rep. John Fleming of Louisiana effectively accused the President of the United States -- the Commander in Chief during two wars -- of treason. For Fleming, Obama is choosing to betray the nation, in his words, "on purpose."

I write a lot about the excesses of Republican rhetoric, in part because I find GOP remarks illustrative of a party gone mad, and in part because of the impact the rhetoric has on the larger political culture/discourse. Most of the time, the temptation is to mock the absurdities.

But once in a while, we find a case like this one, in which a sitting member of the House of Representatives -- not a Fox News personality, not a host of right-wing radio show -- suggests, in print, that the president is a traitor.

Is nothing beyond the pale for Republican officials in 2010? Must there be no difference between GOP lawmakers and unhinged right-wing activists? Are we to believe that we should simply expect and tolerate the casual accusations of treason against American patriots?

Sully: "The Jump Backward"

Jon Meacham gets candid with his fellow Southerners:

If the slaves are erased from the picture [of the Civil War], then what took place between Sumter and Appomattox is not about the fate of human chattel, or a battle between good and evil. It is, instead, more of an ancestral skirmish in the Reagan revolution, a contest between big and small government.

We cannot allow the story of the emancipation of a people and the expiation of America’s original sin to become fodder for conservative politicians playing to their right-wing base. That, to say the very least, is a jump backward we do not need.

Yglesias goes deeper:

Something that links the mentality of today’s right to the mentality of the slaveowners and segregation proponents is the white southern political tradition’s very partial and selective embrace of majoritarian democracy.

As long as national institutions are substantially controlled by white southerners, the white south is a hotbed of patriotism. But as soon as an non-southern political coalition manages to win an election—as we saw in 1860 and in 2008—then suddenly the symbols of national authority become symbols of tyranny and the constitution is construed as granting conservative areas all kinds of alleged abilities to opt out of national political decisions.

Even if you think opposition to the Affordable Care Act has nothing whatsoever to do with race, the underlying political philosophy by which a George W Bush or James Buchanan is a national president but an Abraham Lincoln or a Barack Obama merely a sectional one remains incoherent and pernicious.

Economics: a phenomenal run

Benen: REMEMBER THOSE TAX CUTS?

April 15 comes this week, so taxes will no doubt be on the minds of many. President Obama used his weekly address to remind the public about a little detail that usually goes overlooked: he cut taxes.

"All across America are good, decent folks who meet their obligations each and every day," the president said. "They work hard. They support their families. They try to make an honest living the best they can. And this weekend, many are sitting down to pay the taxes they owe -- not because it's fun, but because it's a fundamental responsibility of our citizenship. But in tough times, when many families are having trouble just making it all work, Tax Day can seem even more daunting. This year, however, many Americans are seeing some welcome relief.

"So far, Americans who have filed their taxes have discovered that the average refund is up nearly ten percent this year -- to an all-time high of about $3,000. This is due in large part to the Recovery Act. In fact, one-third of the Recovery Act was made up of tax cuts -- tax cuts that have already provided more than $160 billion in relief for families and businesses, and nearly $100 billion of that directly into the pockets of working Americans.

"No one I've met is looking for a handout. And that's not what these tax cuts are. Instead, they're targeted relief to help middle class families weather the storm, to jumpstart our economy, and to bring the fundamentals of the American Dream -- making an honest living, earning an education, owning a home, and raising a family -- back within reach for millions of Americans."

Obama went on to describe, in some detail, all of the tax-cut measures he's approved, including the Making Work Pay tax credit that started last year, the American Opportunity Credit to help defray the costs of college tuition, new tax breaks for first-time home buyers, new tax breaks for those who invest in making their homes more energy efficient, expanding the Earned Income Tax Credit, allowing more families to qualify for the Child Tax Credit, and new tax credits for the unemployed.

The president may need to repeat the message a few more times as the midterm elections draw closer -- a recent NYT/CBS poll asked Americans if they think the Obama Administration increased taxes, decreased taxes, or have they kept taxes the same. Only 12% accurately noted that taxes have done down; twice as many (24%) mistakenly said the opposite.

It's hard for a president and his party to get credit for cutting taxes when so many have forgotten what's already happened.

Dorning (Business Week): Why the Obama economics plan is working: Ignore polls, watch the markets: Economy is perking up

It's never easy to separate politics from policy, and the past 18 months have only increased the degree of difficulty. The U.S. has been through a historic financial crisis followed by a historic election and a series of historic federal gambles — from bailing out AIG and GM to passing a $787 billion stimulus and a $940 billion health-care reform bill. All that risk has made policy more complicated and politics more fraught ("You lie," "Baby killer").

A Bloomberg national poll in March found that Americans, by an almost 2-to-1 margin, believe the economy has gotten worse rather than better during the past year. The Market begs to differ. While President Obama's overall job approval rating has fallen to a new low of 44 percent, according to a CBS News Poll, down five points from late March, the judgment of the financial indexes has turned resoundingly positive. The Standard & Poor's 500-stock index is up more than 74 percent from its recessionary low in March 2009. Corporate bonds have been rallying for a year. Commodity prices have surged. International currency markets have been bullish on the dollar for months, raising it by almost 10 percent since Nov. 25 against a basket of six major currencies. Housing prices have stabilized. Mortgage rates are low. "We've had a phenomenal run in asset classes across the board," says Dan Greenhaus, chief economic strategist for Miller Tabak + Co., an institutional trading firm in New York. "If Obama was a Republican, we would hear a never-ending drumbeat of news stories about markets voting in favor of the President."

Little more than a year ago, financial markets were in turmoil, major auto companies were on the verge of collapse and economists such as Paul Krugman were worried about the U.S. slumbering through a Japan-like Lost Decade. While no one would claim that all the pain is past or the danger gone, the economy is growing again, jumping to a 5.6 percent annualized growth rate in the fourth quarter of 2009 as businesses finally restocked their inventories. The consensus view now calls for 3 percent growth this year, significantly higher than the 2.1 percent estimate for 2010 that economists surveyed by Bloomberg News saw coming when Obama first moved into the Oval Office.

The U.S. manufacturing sector has expanded for eight straight months, the Business Roundtable's measure of CEO optimism reached its highest level since early 2006, and in March the economy added 162,000 jobs — more than it had during any month in the past three years. "There is more business confidence out there," says Boeing CEO Jim McNerney. "This Administration deserves significant credit."

It is worth stepping back to consider, in cool-headed policy terms, how all of this came to be — and whether the Obama team's approach amounts to a set of successful emergency measures or a new economic philosophy: Obamanomics.

For most of the past two decades, the reigning economic approach in Democratic circles has been Rubinomics, a set of priorities fashioned in the 1990s by Bill Clinton's Treasury Secretary, Robert E. Rubin, the former co-chairman of Goldman Sachs. Broadly, Rubinomics was a three-legged stool consisting of restrained government spending, lower budget deficits, and open trade, which were meant in combination to reassure financial markets, keep capital flowing, and thus put the country on a path to prosperity.

On the surface, Obamanomics couldn't be more different. The Administration racked up record deficits as it pursued a $787 billion fiscal stimulus on top of the $700 billion bailout fund for banks and carmakers. Obama has done close to nothing to expand free trade. And while Clinton pleased the markets with a moderate, probusiness image, Obama has riled Wall Street with occasional bursts of populist rhetoric, such as his slamming of "fat cat bankers" on 60 Minutes last December.

The rallying markets haven't been bothered by these differences, largely because of their context. Martin Baily, who was a chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers during the Clinton Administration, says he suspects Rubin and the rest of the Clinton economic team would have made similar decisions — on bailouts, fiscal stimulus, and deficit spending — had they faced a crisis of similar magnitude. "I think we would have gone the same way," he says. The Obama team, he continues, navigated the financial crisis while never losing sight of the importance of private enterprise and private markets (a point Obama stressed in his Feb. 9 interview with Bloomberg BusinessWeek). "A lot of people on the left were urging them to nationalize banks. Instead they injected capital, and now they're pulling capital out. That looks more like Rubinomics than a set of socialist or left-wing economic policies." The Obama economic team looks a lot like Rubin's, too; three of its most prominent members — Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, National Economic Council Chairman Larry Summers, and White House budget director Peter Orszag — are Rubin protégés.

While the Administration's call for a consumer financial protection agency has aroused opposition from banks, Obama's regulatory reform plan largely leaves the financial industry's structure intact and ignores proposals to break up large financial institutions, unlike the reforms pursued after the Crash of 1929. Amid an uproar over bonuses at government-assisted banks, Obama for the most part chose to respect private employment contracts.

In short, Obama's instincts during the crisis were exceedingly Rubin-esque. Even the $787 billion stimulus package, while large by historical standards, didn't reach the scale called for by many liberal economists, including the chairman of his own Council of Economic Advisers, Christina Romer, who initially advocated spending more than $1 trillion. Today, Romer doesn't shy away from comparisons to the last Democratic Administration, but she also makes no grand claims about a new economic philosophy. What unites Rubinomics and Obamanomics, she says, "is the focus on results, the pragmatism of what's right for the economy. We each took the policy that was appropriate at the time."

The similarities go deeper. Like Clinton, Obama has tried to reduce income inequality. Clinton's 1993 deficit-reduction plan raised income tax rates for high-income families to 39.6 percent; Obama plans to return the top rate to the Clinton-era level. He also raised Medicare taxes for individuals earning over $200,000 to finance his health plan. Clinton aided the working poor with the Earned Income Tax Credit; Obama is doing the same with insurance subsidies in his health plan. A national health plan was an aspiration of both Presidents. Baily argues that the Obama approach is "at least in principle closer to Rubinomics than was the Clinton plan. [Obama's team] is trying to use market incentives to raise the quality and lower the cost, and that looks like Rubinomics."

Any comparison must take into account the vastly different circumstances each Administration confronted. Clinton entered office as the end of the Cold War generated a peace dividend, then rode the tech boom — and the tax-revenue-generating stock options that came with the runup in tech stock prices — to a balanced budget. Obama inherited two wars and the scariest financial crisis since the Great Depression. Clinton's deference to the bond market was necessary because long-term interest rates were high — above 7 percent on 30-year Treasury bonds — when he took office. Interest rates have been the least of Obama's concerns, with yields below 3 percent when he took office and the Fed effectively keeping short-term rates at zero.

Despite a budget deficit that is projected at $1.5 trillion this year, Obama wants to move the country toward the kind of fiscal balance it enjoyed fleetingly in the Clinton era, though his budget plans falls short of that. He recognizes that the federal debt load is unsupportable. Alan Greenspan — the tacit ally of Clinton and Rubin in the 1990s — warned last month that a recent uptick in yields on 10-year Treasury notes might signal a surge in long-term interest rates driven by investor anxiety over the budget shortfall.

Economic stabilization has not been Obama's handiwork alone. In the months before he took office, President George W. Bush and Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson halted a market free fall with the bank bailout. Obama's stimulus complemented the Federal Reserve's aggressive monetary easing. To build a floor for housing prices, the Fed intervened to support mortgage markets and the White House pledged unlimited financial backing for mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and rolled out tax credits for home buyers and mortgage modification programs to stave off foreclosures. It's the entire package that has made the difference.

"When you take it all together, the response was massive, unprecedented, and ultimately successful," says Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Economy.com. Even Obama critics like Phil Swagel, assistant Treasury secretary for economic policy under George W. Bush, acknowledge that White House policies have been successful. "They could have done a better job" by spending more of the stimulus on corporate tax cuts to boost hiring and investment, says Swagel, now an economics professor at Georgetown University's McDonough School of Business. "But their economic policies, including the stimulus, have helped move the economy in the right direction."

While jobs have been slow to return, the country has experienced "an incredible productivity boom" that strengthens the economy for an expansion, says Greenhaus of Miller Tabak. Labor productivity, or worker output per hour, grew at a 6.9 percent annual pace in the fourth quarter, capping the biggest one-year gain since 2002. Over the long run, productivity growth is what raises living standards. Corporate profits also have been rising, up 8 percent in the fourth quarter, putting businesses on a sounder financial foundation to invest and hire as customers return.

The public, alas, does not see the signs of life that economists do, as the downbeat views in the Bloomberg poll demonstrate. And as long as job security remains a concern, it's easy to understand why psychology may trump data. Among those who own stocks, bonds, or mutual funds, only 3 out of 10 say the value of their portfolio has risen since a year ago, according to the poll —a near-impossibility given the size and breadth of the market gains.

The early stages of an economic rebound do not bring political safe haven for Presidents. (Just ask George H.W. Bush, who won a war against Iraq only to lose reelection a year after the 1990-91 recession ended.) Obama, however, may now have reached a pivot point with the economy finally beginning to add jobs. "He can make great strides in short order," says Steven Jarding, a former Democratic campaign strategist who is now a lecturer at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. "Any indicator he can build on is a good thing. He'll be able to focus all his energy and attention to say, 'Here's what happened this year in the economy.'"

With seven months to go before midterm elections, and more than two years before Obama reaches his own reelection day, there's still time for the President's policies to swing to his political advantage. Again, follow the money: Consumer spending has been rising for five straight months. That may not last, but it suggests Obama is already on the right track with voters' wallets. If the Clinton Administration is a trustworthy precedent—and job growth continues — their hearts and minds could follow.

Copyright © 2010 Bloomberg L.P. All rights reserved.

Good and Bad Media

Slajda (TPM): Stewart Blasts Fox's Coverage Of Nuke Treaty: Throw Off Your 'Fact Shackles' (VIDEO)

Last night, The Daily Show's Jon Stewart attacked Fox News and Sarah Palin for ignoring the facts about President Obama's nuclear treaty with Russia.

Stewart reminded them that President Reagan had also called for a one-third reduction in nuclear arms, and spoke of a world without nukes.

He also wondered why Megyn Kelly's head exploded.

Watch:

Steve Benen adds:

It's worth emphasizing the fact that Fox News personalities got just about every aspect of this story wrong. And by "wrong," I'm not just referring to areas of judgment and consistency; I mean they told viewers things that aren't true, making claims with no foundation in reality.

Jon Stewart referred to the network's "willful misunderstanding of the policy," and characterized a back-and-forth between Newt Gingrich and Sean Hannity as "purposeful idiocy."

Stewart added, "We're at the point now that the by far number one ranked news network in this country, no longer feels the need to report what a policy document says in black and white."

Coburn is picking a fight with Rachel on the facts. Bad move. Rachel: "I am reporting on your record, and this is what that feels like."

Senator Coburn not discouraged by hypocrital record

April 8: Rachel Maddow reviews Senator Tom Coburn's record of hypocrisy in voting for things that aren't fully paid for, and responds to his accusation that she is too emotional by coolly asking him several basic questions.

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

Marshall: Idiocy Revealed As Key Tool Against the (Domestic) Terrorists

Yesterday I flagged the new information released about Gregory Giusti, the fine gentleman arrested for threatening Speaker Nancy Pelosi in more than 48 threatening and/or harassing phone calls over almost a two month period leading up to the Health Care Reform vote. But there was some pretty hilarious comedy wrapped into this otherwise ugly event.

It seems Giusti had rather overstated his clandestine skills as a wannabe domestic terrorist. Giusti allegedly used the Internet phone service Magic Jack to make his threatening calls. And in one call to Pelosi's office taunted "and the number I'm calling from is untraceable so if you're trying to trace it have fun."

Needless to say, though, it seems that the security mountain in front of Magic Jack was no match for the tech folks at the FBI. As the first commenter on the post snarked: "Another idiot is rudely introduced to the difference between what your casual user can get from caller ID and what the FBI can do when it wants."

Greg Sargent

* Let’s get started with the understatement of the day. From President Obama, in an interview with George Stephanopoulous, after being asked to respond to Sarah Palin’s criticism of his new nukes policy:

I really have no response. Because last I checked, Sarah Palin’s not much of an expert on nuclear issues.

But Mr. President, surely you recall that Alaska is closer to Russia than any other state?

* Steve Benen asks the question of the day: “Why is George Stephanopoulos using an idiotic quote from a dimwitted former half-term governor of a small state as the basis for a question to the president?”

* Also in the ABC interview: Obama ripped Bob McDonnell’s omission of slavery from the Confederate History Month proclamation as “unacceptable.”

* It just won’t go away: Mitt Romney’s vexing Obamacare-Romneycare conundrum gets the full treatment in the Wall Street Journal.

* Also in the above link, a great line about Romney from MIT economist Jonathan Gruber, who helped design Romneycare: “He designed the structure of the federal bill.”

* And a great catch by ABC’s The Note blog: Michele Bachmann thinks the threat of nuclear retaliation is necessary to deter cyber attacks.

Greg Sargent: Stephanopoulos Defends Palin Question

George Stephanopoulous is catching some heat today for asking President Obama in an interview to respond to Sarah Palin’s claim that the new nukes policy is akin to a kid saying, “go ahead, punch me in the face and I won’t retailate.”

I asked Stephanopoulos what the justification was for confronting the President with Palin’s criticism, given its obvious childishness. He emailed back:

Whatever you think of Sarah Palin, she’s a former VP candidate — and a potential challenger to President Obama — with a strong following in the GOP. She made a pointed critique of a new Presidential policy. By getting the President’s response, I was doing my job.

After initially thinking Stephanopoulos’ question was daft, I actually find this persuasive. After all, it’s true that Palin has a strong following among Republicans right now, many of whom apparently take her foreign policy and national security views seriously. It’s also true, as far fetched as it may seem, that she has at least a shot at becoming the 2012 nominee. So her views do, in fact, matter!

• from the comments:
  

lmsinca | April 9, 2010 at 10:07 am

I disagree with George on this one, sorry. I think he would be doing his job if he asked Sarah Palin to go into more detail about her remarks. Oh yeah, she doesn’t do Q & A with anyone other than Fox. Until she comes out of her buffer zone the media should give her opinions no legitimacy.

Reply

Paul W. | April 9, 2010 at 10:10 am

Ah, exactly lmsinca. I think your response is probably better than mine. His JOB would be to ask her why she doesn’t hold a press conference about this issue or take questions on it if she thinks it is so important and that her knowledge of the issue is so superior to just about every international expert on nuclear arms control in the world.

Reply

Debra | April 9, 2010 at 10:14 am

I agree with this strongly.

Greg, You should ask Stephanopoulos if he has been able to secure an interview with Palin to discuss her expert position on our nuclear policy. Or is he just willing to carry water for her?

Paul W. | April 9, 2010 at 10:09 am

If his job is to find out how Obama would respond to any political celebrities’ opinion, why not get a f*cking quote from the actual GOP presidential candidate of 2008 who has at least some international experience: John McCain.

Sarah Palin had left the country once before 2008, was a governor of the second smallest state by population in the US which also receives the highest proportion of federal funding per capita, and didn’t even do so much as direct the Coast Guard for Alaska. What in the world makes her opinion relevant?

I have an opinion for George:

“A nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought. And no matter how great the obstacles may seem, we must never stop our efforts to reduce the weapons of war. We must never stop at all until we see the day when nuclear arms have been banished from the face of this Earth.” – Ronald Reagan, 1984, in China.

There is no faster way to make cable news less relevant than to not even shoot for the journalistic standards of Jon Stewart.

Sully: Going Rose

No I haven't gone soft. It's just very hard to remain serious in the face of this farce of a politician/celebrity. Here's her analysis of the president's and Bob Gates' marginal recalibration of US nuclear policy:

"It's unbelievable. Unbelievable. No administration in America's history would, I think, ever have considered such a step that we just found out President Obama is supporting today. It's kinda like getting out there on a playground, a bunch of kids, getting ready to fight, and one of the kids saying, 'Go ahead, punch me in the face and I'm not going to retaliate. Go ahead and do what you want to with me.'

Seriously. We're supposed to take this seriously? Then we get this far-right conspiracy theory:

"Steps towards insolvency. Steps towards socialism with some of their programs."

The insolvency reference is clearly designed to echo the far right theory that for some reason Obama wants to bankrupt the US in order to take over the entire economy and run it like the Soviet Union's. Obama was trapped into responding. But there is no response to this kind of, well, playground taunts. Which, of course, is why they're effective.

And so you return to the Palin conundrum. The sheer crudeness of her rhetoric, the vast ignorance it champions, and the charisma of a beautiful white woman rallying heartland male voters against commie evil is a combination it's simply impossible to grapple with effectively.

She can plagiarize Slate writers in a stream of consciousness at the Wine and Spirits Wholesalers Convention, and chirpily host a clip show, and headline Tea Party events with writing on her hand ... and somehow remain a credible figure, getting world-weary, post-everything encomiums from the likes of David Carr. And the sane WTF response - how does one do otherwise? - simply feeds the Palin media machine.

That's why I remain so concerned about her and what her future candidacy for president could do to this country and the world.

That's why she really is to be feared.

Greg Sargent: Rudy Has No National Security Authority, Part II

Newsweek’s Ben Adler has a long and thoughtful post taking on yours truly for suggesting that CNN shouldn’t give a platform to Rudy Giuliani to discuss national security issues.

The crux of his argument is that Rudy’s trafficking in falsehoods, more than his lack of foreign policy experience, is what should be disqualifying. He adds that Repubs with far more experience are prone to saying the same stuff Rudy does.

That’s fine, but I’m simply concerned with addressing Rudy’s case here, which is, at bottom, unique. Adler says that someone with two terms running New York as mayor is a valid pick to discuss such topics. But let’s get real: The sole reason Rudy is booked to discuss national security and terrorism is because he’s associated in the public mind with 9/11. If 9/11 hadn’t happened, Rudy wouldn’t be on your TV. Period.

And his association with 9/11 is not a good enough reason to confer any national security authority or credibility on him. The fact that Rudy lies nonstop is also a good reason not to have him on. But that doesn’t undercut my initial point about the networks’ sloppy thinking in giving him a platform in the first place.

Adler raises a good question: If not Rudy, then who is qualified to represent the Republican position on these issues? Mitt Romney? After all, he has less executive experience than Rudy does, right? True, but Romney has a shot at becoming president. Rudy doesn’t. Therefore Romney is a far more defensible choice.

More broadly, I’d rather hear from any GOP lawmaker with foreign policy experience, or any Republican critic who has spent real time on these issues, even if he or she says much the same stuff as Rudy does. At least you have a shot at a real discussion. With Rudy there’s nothing beneath the talking points. There’s no basis whatsoever for networks to book Rudy to discuss these issues. Ever.

Murphy (C&L): CNN's "Fox Envy": Details Behind Their Fawning Tea Party Coverage Exposed

It's no secret that CNN is tacking hard right, trying to pick up Fox News viewers. Hiring the likes of Bushie, Fran Townsend, and more recently, bringing right wing extremist "blogger" Erick Erickson on board and of course, their inexplicably positive coverage of the ongoing sham known as the Tea Party Express.

Tommy Christoper at Mediaite posted a story on April 4th respectfully refuting some claims made by C&L's Karoli, that CNN was actively pimping the tea party movement:

Upon closer inspection, however, it appears that while the effect of CNN’s coverage may be to promote the Tea Party Express, that’s not the intent. I think CNN is looking for another kind of gold in them thar Tea Party hills.

Fair enough. He disagreed with Karoli's opinion, but he kept digging and what do you know -- it appears that CNN is actively reaching out to far right propagandists like Newsbusters, touting how "fair and balanced" they really are:

A few days ago, I took a look at a Crooks and Liars post that suggested CNN was “pimping” the Great American “Tea Party Express PR and Propaganda Tour.” While I agreed with much of the post, I didn’t think CNN’s motivation was to promote the Tea Party tour, but rather, to be in the right place at the right time when something juicy happens.

As it turns out, reporting by conservative Newsbusters seems to confirm elements of liberal Crooks and Liars‘ thesis, or at the very least, that CNN is trying to have it both ways.

Apparently, CNN has become so desperate to boost ratings and attract Fox viewers, that they've actually stooped to wooing conservative bottom feeders like Michelle Malkin. (warning, link goes to her site) Christopher also posts an e-mail sent to Newsbusters from someone at CNN attacking their lefty critics:

“Clearly our critics from the left don’t think we should be covering the Tea Party movement in the way we are and clearly CNN thinks it’s a legitimate and important story.

If anyone from Newsbusters is interested in this angle – let me know.”

Well, this CNN employee is right - we lefties would definitely prefer that they not cover an illegitimate, astroturfed group of white, angry, racist fringe lunatics and militia nuts as though they were a legitimate, grass roots political organization. What next? Will CNN hire Charles Dyer as a "military analyst?"