Month: January 2010

Buying It For Him

by digby

 Because there just aren’t enough corporate Democrats in the Senate:

Encouraged by a group of influential New York Democrats, Harold Ford Jr., the former congressman from Tennessee, is weighing a bid to unseat Senator Kirsten E. Gillibrand in this fall’s Democratic primary, according to three people who have spoken with him.

Mr. Ford, 39, who moved to New York three years ago, has told friends that he will decide whether to run in the next 45 days. The discussions between Mr. Ford and top Democratic donors reflect the dissatisfaction of some prominent party members with Ms. Gillibrand, who has yet to win over key constituencies, especially in New York City.

About a dozen high-profile Democrats have expressed interest in backing a candidacy by Mr. Ford, including the financier Steven Rattner, who, along with his wife, Maureen White, has been among the country’s most prolific Democratic fund-raisers.

“Maureen and I worked hard for Harold in his last race because we think the world of him,” Mr. Rattner said, referring to Mr. Ford’s run for the Senate in Tennessee in 2006. “He has extraordinary drive and intelligence and will excel at anything that he chooses to do.”

Among those who have encouraged Mr. Ford to consider a run are Merryl H. Tisch, the chancellor of the New York State Board of Regents, whose husband, James, is the chief executive of the Loews Corporation, and Richard Plepler, the co-president of HBO, according to people who have spoken with them.

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, who has publicly tangled with Ms. Gillibrand, is open to the possibility of supporting a challenger of Mr. Ford’s stature, according to those familiar with his thinking.

[..]

In New York, Mr. Ford took a job as vice chairman of Merrill Lynch, where he cultivated close ties to many of the Wall Street executives who are now encouraging him to run. A telegenic politician, he has also maintained a high profile through NBC and MSNBC, which feature him as a regular political commentator.

You can’t blame Wall Street. They need somebody to represent their needs, poor dears.

This is a very smart — and very cynical — move. Gotta hand it to the Big Money Boyz.

Update: Wow

Embattled Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd (D) has scheduled a press conference at his home in Connecticut Wednesday at which he is expected to announce he will not seek re-election, according to sources familiar with his plans.

Dodd’s retirement comes after months of speculation about his political future, and amid faltering polling numbers and a growing sense among the Democratic establishment that he could not win a sixth term.

It also comes less than 24 hours after Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) announced he would not seek re-election.

State Attorney General Richard Blumenthal is widely expected to step into the void filled by Dodd and, at least at first blush, should drastically increase Democrats’ chances of holding the seat.

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Bad Voodoo

by digby

Reader JD sent in this amusing bit of color about Desiree Rogers:

I’m a little puzzled about the lack of research done on Ms. Rogers background. She may well be an “old Chicago pal” of Michele’s, but she’s originally from New Orleans. Everyone here knows her, she was Queen of Zulu back in the 70s (which, trust me, is a very big deal here, socially) and her maiden name is Glapion. Her father, Roy Glapion, was a popular city councilman until his death a few years back. He (as well as Ms. Rogers) is a direct descendant of the famed 19th century voodoo queen Marie Laveaux, who’s married name was Glapion.

I’m not surprised that “the Village Tabbies” don’t know this, but they should. Because descendants of “the widow Glapion” are not to be fucked with. Seriously.

Hah.  It sounds like Sally and her society boy-toy Mark Halperin need to get themselves a gris-gris, cher. (And I mean that in both the traditional and recreational definition of the word.)

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Suckers

by digby

Here’s a little earthquake for you:

Rumproast quips:

Man, that is one pissed-off font. So pissed-off that it hates Corporatism and Socialism simultaneously. It also hates “Leftists,” “Liberals” and “Liberal Policies,” although not necessarily in that order. Deep down, I’m pretty sure it hates itself for being such an easily deluded character-set.

And you just know that font represents all of us regretful Democrats who feel betrayed by Obama, Reid and Pelosi, because it tells us so. And it says “We” right up front, just to be clear. Plus, it uses authentic Democrat-on-Democrat attack-words like “Tax,” “Spend” and “Redistribute.” Like it or not, everything in this video has the Ring of Truth.

Nothing illustrates “disaffected single-payer health care advocate” like images of Old Glory, deranged Town Hall Meeting crashers and militant Red Staters with Gadsden flags.

It is funny, but it’s also quite clever and illustrates how the right hopes to conflate their loathing for taxes and government spending with the unpopular bailouts and co-opt some of their natural enemies in the process.(If the Democrats put immigration on the menu this year, they’ll have the whole package –not that immigration reform isn’t a worthy cause, mind you.)

There’s a name for this. It’s called “sucker punch populism.”

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Comments

by digby

I had to migrate my comments to a new platform. Evidently, it takes a while to work properly and import all the old ones. I’m told it will work fine eventually. Sorry for the inconvenience.

d

Sifting The Runes

by digby

I’m not sure that Michael Kinsley would define his thesis exactly the same way I see the problem, but this is indisputably true:

Newspaper writing … is encrusted with conventions that don’t add to your understanding of the news. Newspaper writers are not to blame. These conventions are traditional, even mandatory.

He says reporters the problem is that reporters fail to get to the point. I think the problem is that they have to spend too much time hiding what the point is, which is a slightly different thing. Either way, I think we agree that part of the problem with journalism is that the story is often incomprehensible. I have written before that one is required to sift through journalistic runes to even vaguely understand what is actually going on. It’s become a translating specialty, in fact, and gave rise to the blogs, which employ people like me to read and synthesize the obscure conventions and tell readers what’s really going on. We wouldn’t even be necessary if journalism wasn’t written in insider code.

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Social Errors

by digby

I write in the post below that the Obamas must have made a Big Social Error that got them in trouble with the Village tabbies, and I think this hilariously predictable Mark Halperin observation pretty much confirms it:

In 2008 the country clearly craved new leadership that would sweep into the capital and change the ways of Washington. But politically and personally, the First Couple and their top aides have shown no hankering for the Establishment seal of approval, nor have they accepted the glut of invitations to embassy parties and other tribal rituals of the political class. In the sphere of Washington glitter, the Clintons were clumsy and the Bush team indifferent, but the Obama Administration has turned a cold shoulder, disappointing Beltway salons and newsrooms whose denizens hoped the uber-cool newbies would play.

And here I thought the Obama people had learned the lessons of the Clinton administration. The Villagers will not be ignored.

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Queen Of The Pride

by digby

On December 4th, I wrote this:

The fatuous gasbags were all atwitter yesterday that the White House is “stonewalling” to protect their “old Chicago pal” Desiree Rogers, the white house social secretary. As I said the other day, this is rapidly turning into a “travelgate” type Village scandal and someone is going to have to go down, preferably one who falls under the auspices of Michelle Obama, who has clearly made some kind of social error.

Just as Travelgate was about Hillary Clinton failing to respect the social pecking order by installing old Arkansas friends in a job in which the press had a personal stake, (Ryan’s comments about “overshadowing” notwithstanding) I’m pretty sure this is about Michele and “her pal” somehow not respecting the pecking order and failing to understand just how sacrosanct are the invitation lists to the White House. (You’ll recall that Michelle had a press avail the day of the state dinner and mentioned that she regretted not being able to invite everyone, which I thought was rather odd at the time.)

The lesson has long been clear. You do not mess with the Village tabbies. They have far more power than you might think.

Well guess what? The Queen Tabby made her move today:

Many in Washington wondered why the director of the Secret Service, Mark Sullivan, did not resign over the state dinner security breach. At least Sullivan testified before Congress on the subject. White House social secretary Desirée Rogers came under fire after the Salahi scandal erupted. From the start, Rogers was an unlikely choice for social secretary. She was not of Washington, considered by many too high-powered for the job and more interested in being a public figure (and thus upstaging the first lady) than in doing the gritty, behind-the-scenes work inherent in that position. That Rogers stayed and that the White House refused to allow her to testify before Congress reflected badly on the president. He, not a member of his staff, ended up looking incompetent. Although it has emerged that a State Department protocol error is to blame for the presence of a third uninvited guest, both Rogers and Sullivan should step down. The administration’s problem extends beyond these failings. When White House counsel Greg Craig was fired over disagreements about the timing and publicity of closing the prison at Guantanamo Bay, many Obama supporters were troubled. Craig was one of the most admired and trusted men in Washington. His firing was a turning point for a lot of people, who began to question the president’s judgment.Whether or not the Craig decision was the president’s idea, somebody else should have taken the hit for it… Emanuel, the most political animal in this town, also should understand that keeping Rogers on as social secretary reflects upon the president’s judgment.

Obviously, the Obamas have made a Big Social Mistake somewhere along the line and it’s time for those who really run things to assert themselves. She put it in terms of “protecting” the president, but if you read the whole thing, it’s quite clear that it’s actually a threat: unless they straighten up and understand who’s really in charge, right quick, this could get ugly. Sally says heads must roll … or else.

Let the games begin.

Update: A reader points out that only Sally Quinn would characterize the social secretary’s job as “gritty, behind-the-scenes work.” Yeah. But it is. Obviously, you have to spend all your time kowtowing and genuflecting to Sally and her fellow Villagers. Sounds pretty gritty to me.

Update: Tto those who are accusing me of lazily “patting myself on the back” and doing nothing to advance the story of the egregious Sally Quinn, I would just ask that you google this blog and her name and you will find approximately 51,789 posts about Sally Quinn. If there is anyone in the blogosphere who has written more about her pernicious influence on American politics, I don’t know how it might be.

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Divisive

by digby

I didn’t know that a vast majority of Jews dislike Sarah Palin, but evidently they do. This post discusses the debate that’s going on in Jewish circles about what that means. But I particularly like this quote from David Frum:

Just guessing, but I think the real and most fundamental problem Jews have with Palin is not her gleeful ignorance, but her willful divisiveness. More than any politician in memory, Palin seems to divide her fellow-Americans into first class and second class citizens, real Americans and not-so-real Americans. To do her justice, she has never said anything to suggest that Jews as Jews fall into the second, less-real, class. But Jews do tend to have an intuition that when this sort of line-drawing is done, we are likely to find ourselves on the wrong side.

That just strikes me as funny coming from the guy who coined the term “axis of evil.”

Seriously, is Palin any more divisive than any other movement conservative?

h/t to bb

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Turf War

by digby

I don’t quite know what to make of this Richard Wolffe interview:

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

Maybe he’s just being hyperbolic, but if he isn’t the the great experiment in consolidation of all the intelligence and police agencies is one big fat failure.

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Journalism 101

by digby

It’s come to this:

Today (Jan. 4) 21 policy experts sent a letter (below) to Washington Post Board Chairman Donald Graham, requesting a meeting. Why? Because we’ve gotten no response to our protest letter to The Washington Post’s ombudsman. In that earlier letter we demanded an explanation for publication by the Post of an article about the U.S. federal deficit by The Fiscal Times, a “news content provider” founded and financed by Wall Street billionaire Peter G. Peterson, whose budget-cutting ideology promotes cuts to Social Security and Medicare. The group noted that while The Fiscal Times article focused on the Peterson-promoted Conrad-Gregg budget commission—and quoted several Peterson-supported “experts”—it ignored the views of those who oppose that approach to the deficit, including a coaltion of 40 groups representing workers, women, seniors and others.

read on

I know the journalism business is tough these days. But they aren’t going to solve their problems by selling their news pages to biased organizations and calling it journalism. (On the other hand, if what they want is to protect their personal wealth from all but the most token taxation, then maybe this makes a little bit more sense…)

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