Month: May 2011

Tearing Down The Legacy

by digby

That rumble you hear is Teddy Kennedy rolling over in his grave:

Brown discussed the ongoing budget deliberations in similar terms, suggesting the process could be streamlined to greater effect.

“The leaders will bring forward (Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan’s) budget, and I will vote for it, and it will fail,” he said. “Then the president will bring forward his budget, and it will fail.

Be sure to read the whole article where Brown is presented as the most candid, common sense regular guy in the whole world. And yet, he’s going on record promising to vote for an insane plan that ends Medicare and throws the elderly on the mercy of the private health insurance system.

Forget Kansas. What’s the matter with Massachusetts that they could elect this joker to fill Ted Kennedy’s shoes?

.

The Village Phone Tree Lights Up

by digby

I have to admit that I’m really enjoying watching the wingnuts froth and fulminate over the media salivating over the private lives of their candidates. You would never go wrong by betting on GOP hypocrisy. Heather at C&L caught a doozy, from none other than the puritan heartthrob, Cal Thomas.

But nothing beats the Village Quilting Bee and Ladies Backbiting Society weighing in on the subject on Reliable Sources:

You can read the whole transcript here. But here’s a little taste:

KURTZ: Sally Quinn, so, Mitch Daniels’ wife, Cheri, she leaves, she marries another guy, she comes back. She marries her husband.

How or why is that a front page story?

SALLY QUINN, “ON FAITH”: Well, you know, that’s going to play really well one way or the other with the Evangelicals. This is a whole issue that I think people haven’t figured out.

KURTZ: But should it be an issue?

QUINN: With these people it is an issue. You know, Hillary Clinton once said, you know, I had hoped that there would be a certain zone of privacy when I got to the White House.

KURTZ: Yes. What happened to that?

QUINN: Forget it. There is no such thing as a zone of privacy.

And with Mitch Daniels and his wife, people are going to look at them and they’re going to say what a great dad he was. He was there for three or four years.

KURTZ: Bringing up the kids on his own, yes.

QUINN: Bringing up the kids on his own, this is great. Or they’re going to look at her and say what kind of a woman would abandon her children for four years?

So the family values issues is going to play. It’s going to be a big deal in this election if he decides to run.

Right. And Quinn and the other Village gossips are just innocent bystanders in that little scenario.

KURTZ: Now, I confess, Michelle Cottle, when I heard about this from a reporter two days before The Times story, I ordered up a story for “The Daily Beast” for two reasons. I thought it was fascinating, and I said Cheri Daniels holds the key to whether or not her husband runs for president. But at the same time, I’m a little uncomfortable with all the attention it’s getting.

What’s your take?

MICHELLE COTTLE, WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT, “NEWSWEEK”: I think no matter how much we like to say, oh, it doesn’t matter about the family, it’s the candidate, especially when you’re electing a president, people are picking somebody. You know, the joke is that they’re a boyfriend. You’re not picking a president, you’re picking a husband or a boyfriend or a father to run the country.

And people want a glimpse. You know, talking to Republican consultants this week, you know, you hear constantly that they want a glimpse into the candidate’s personal life, what he is like, values. And they look to the wives for that.

Oh good god. I guess this is the female equivalent of picking the guy you want to have a beer with.

No, you are not picking a husband or a boyfriend or a father to run the country. You’re picking a politician. Period. I apologize on behalf of all women for that idiotic statement.

KURTZ: And today’s “New York Times” has a piece about all of this, and says “Voters are hungry for details.” Come on. Is it voters who are hungry, or is it journalists who are looking for a juicy storyline?

COTTLE: Journalists don’t make up kind of what people read. We follow the stuff really —

KURTZ: We make decisions about what to put on the front page and what to put on the cover of your magazine and my magazine.

COTTLE: Yes. But we pay very close attention to what people are interested in and what catches their attention. I mean, this is a business on some level, and we know what they like to read.

KURTZ: Debra Saunders, in this case of Mitch Daniels, there is no scandal here. They split up, they got back together. Is this the kind of journalistic intrusiveness that drives people out of politics?

DEBRA SAUNDERS, “SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE”: Well, I don’t know. I sort of wonder if we in the media are being played. I mean, I don’t have any inside information on this, but Mitch Daniels’ candidacy, if he runs for president, is based on the fact that he’s the guy who can win, he’s the heavyweight. And so, you know, the Ron Pauls, the Rick Santorums, the Haley Barbours, they can’t win. Mitch Daniels has this inevitability.

But he can’t say hey, I’m not sure. He looks like Hamlet.

So what do the Daniels people say? They say, well, we are waiting to hear what Cheri wants to do. And, of course, that puts a lot of attention on her.

Now, we know that there is a story about how she left him and married somebody else for a couple of years. And I think this humanizes her, it makes her look less political. So I don’t know that this is a strategy, but I should hope it’s a strategy, because it’s a really good one. And I think we in the media in a way are sort of being led by a leash.

KURTZ: It hasn’t occurred to me that this might be a grand play by the Daniels’ forces.

Yeah. I don’t think it’s occurred to Daniels either. But hope lives on in the conservative heart and Saunders doesn’t have much to cling to with this Republican field.

The panel of Quinn, Michelle Cottle and Deb Saunders went on for some time dishing about the Schwarzennegers and Newt Gingrich as well, explaining all along that as distasteful as they find all this, well, it’s just so … juicy. How can we help ourselves? The people demand to know!

I was getting that really queasy feeloing I always get when they pull together a group of women like this to explain why it’s so important to gossip about politicians’ sex lives and was even feeling a little bit sorry for the Republicans in their crosshairs in this coming campaign. But then came this:

KURTZ: After Gingrich announces his candidacy on Twitter, actually, he gave his first interview to Fox, Sean Hannity. And this question about his personal life came up in a very, shall we say, indirect way.

Let’s roll it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEAN HANNITY, FOX NEWS: But already, the media, you know, they are going after you. They’re going after your personal life. You have been divorced, all these things that they keep bringing up.
NEWT GINGRICH (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Well, if you are a conservative, you have to start with the assumption that you are not going to get an even break from the elite media. And that’s just reality.

Ok, fuggedaboudit. If there was ever a swine who deserved the full “Quinning” he’s about to get it’s this sanctimonious creep. And judging from that Reliable Sources conversation, no matter how much he tries to insist that he never judged President Clinton for his immoral behavior, he’s going to get it hard.

As Greg Sargent noted a couple of months ago:

[I]n an article for Human Events in 1998 (via Nexis), Gingrich made the high-minded claim that impeachment was all about law and the Constitution, but then he added:

“Around the world today, the institution of the presidency has been degraded to the point that it is viewed as the rough equivalent of the Jerry Springer show — a level of disrespect and decadence that should appall every American.”

What’s more, during the 1998 midterm elections, Gingrich was intimately involved in the creation of a GOP ad campaign that made this claim about Clinton: “What did you tell your kids? … It’s wrong. For seven months he lied to us.”

Have at it, Village gossips. Don’t hold back. Nobody deserves this karmic blowback more than he does.

As for Daniels? I don’t choose presidents to be “my boyfriend” or “my daddy” and I already have a husband so I don’t care about his marriage and I don’t think it says anything about his ability to be president. It’s his association with Bush’ economic policies that creeps me out.

.

The language they can understand

by digby

The right wingers just can’t help themselves. Here’s n email I got yesterday:

LET THIS LIBERAL JEW OWNER PAY FOR ALL THE ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS. STOP DOING WHAT THE DEMOCRATS DO, STICK THE AMERICAN WORKING TAX PAYer WITH THE WELFARE BILL!

Arizona Governor VS: Phoenix Suns Owner

Way to go Jan!! Maybe this is a language he can understand.

Arizona governor vs. Phoenix Suns owner

The owner of the Phoenix Suns basketball team, Robert Sarver, A LIBERAL JEW opposes AZ’s new immigration laws. Arizona ‘s Governor, Jan Brewer, released the following statement in response to Sarver’s criticism of the new law:

“What if the owners of the Suns discovered that hordes of people were sneaking into games without paying? What if they had a good idea who the gate- crashers are, but the ushers and security personnel were not allowed to ask these folks to produce their
ticket stubs, thus non-paying attendees couldn’t be ejected. Furthermore, what if Suns’ ownership was expected to provide those who sneaked in with complimentary eats and drink? And what if, on those days when a gate-crasher became ill or injured, the Suns had to provide free medical care and shelter?” Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer

Try going to any other country without ID.

That’s cute. Except she forgot to mention that security would only be asking everyone who “looked like” a non-paying customer to produce a ticket and if you happened to lose yours you’d be thrown in jail, not just kicked out of the game. Moreover, the people who are sneaking into the Suns games are doing so not to watch the game and get free drinks but to work for very low wages cleaning out the toilets, keeping the grounds, watching the kids and cooking the food, all of which contributes to the concession owners profits, government coffers (they do pay taxes) and the convenience and comfort of everyone who attends the game. Oh, whatever …

The salient part of this silly message is the part where those who protest they are anything but bigoted call Robert Sarver a “liberal Jew owner.” What are you going to do with people like this?

.

Terrorist Sympathizers

by digby

Watch This Week’s round table and tell me if you’ve ever seen a more idiotic group of Chicken Littles than Roger Altman, Sheila Bair and Douglas Holz-Eakin? It’s a wonder Paul Krugman didn’t just resort to banging his head on the table at the obtuseness of the discussion.

Here’s the thing nobody except Krugman would recognize or admit: it’s only Republicans who are threatening to vote against raising the debt ceiling. Only them, nobody else. Democrats have already said they will raise it. In fact, the Republicans have already said they will raise it too! The entire argument is bullshit.

Krugman gives the Democrats the benefit of the doubt, saying that they are being blackmailed. I honestly don’t think they are this time although he’s right about the dangerous precedent this portends for future negotiations. The Dems also know the Republicans are going to vote to raise the debt ceiling. (Since Democrats are all on board, does anyone believe that Boehner can’t put together enough Republican votes to pass that bill? Really?)

No, this is kabuki of the most obvious kind and Altman, Bair and Holz-Eakin, with their rending of garments over what will happen if the Democrats don’t give in and give the Republicans what they want, are the comic relief.

Here’s an idea: why doesn’t Obama take a page from his much ballyhooed bin Laden book and do the “gutsy” thing on this one? Why doesn’t he just say no and issue an assassination order on this stupid debt ceiling threat. The Republicans will back down, (the Navy SEALS in this scenario are the financial sector) and he would win. And I would be among those dancing in the streets celebrating his badassedness.

Seriously, this is the economic equivalent of responding to 9/11 by negotiating with bin Laden over joining the Caliphate.

Update: It has come to my attention that some Democrats have joined the kabuki conga line. It makes no difference. They are not going to let the country default on the debt either. They are just vying to join the “Very Serious People” caucus. And the president knows this too.

There is no “negotiation,” there is simply a political decision in the midst of a big campaign season to pretend there is one.

.

Boo hoo hoo

by digby

So even the NY Times reporter who wrote “Too Big To Fail” and his editors don’t understand marginal tax rates. In his article this morning he frets over the fate of the poor folks at the edge of the $250,000 a year tax hike, worrying that they really aren’t rich enough to afford the burden.

But as Dean Baker points out, if he can’t afford his burden then maybe he’s got other problems:

It told readers that the richest 2 percent of the population face money problems also, suggesting that those near this cutoff for tax increases by President Obama might be unfairly victimized.

The poster child for this story is a person named Mason, who live in Manhattan with 2 young children and reportedly makes $262,000 a year. Since the 3 percentage point increase in the tax rate would only apply to income above $250,000, or $12,000 of his income, Mason would have to pay an additional $400 a year in taxes.

The humanity.

There is a lot of financial illiteracy in this country and I’m sure I suffer from my share. But this one is the one that annoys me the most because the only people who ever seem to use it in argument are the people who stand to gain from the misunderstanding. Perhaps everyone thinks they pay the top rate on every penny of their income. But it’s only the rich people who mischaracterize it this way and rend their garments whenever anyone suggest that rates be raised over 250k a year.

Sorkin, however, is a financial reporter and he should know better. Indeed, if he doesn’t know something this elementary, everything he writes suspect. But then, we already knew that.

.

Saturday Night At The Movies

Lovelorn, non-smoking Huguenot seeks same

By Dennis Hartley

Nice castle: Thierry and Ulliel in The Princess of Montpensier

Oh, royal houses of Europe…how I adore you. My sexy Saxe-Coburgs, my beloved Bourbons, Bonapartes and Burgundys; my saucy Tudors, Windsors and Romanovs; and I want to give a shout-out to any of you sassy Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Gluksburgs who may be in da house tonight. How much I love and admire your pomp, your pageantry…and your colorful, endearingly filthy, ever-subservient peasantry. And your rich history-so rife with war, intrigue, and refreshingly unapologetic in-breeding (*sigh*).

For the purposes of this review, we are going to zero in on the French duchies of Guise and Montpensier. In 1570s France, things aren’t going so well on the religious front. Catholics and Huguenots are slaughtering each other like cattle over New Testament bragging rights. This is the backdrop for The Princess of Montpensier, a well-acted and handsomely mounted (but curiously detached) bodice-ripping costume drama from Bertrand Tavernier (‘Round Midnight). The tale (adapted from Madame de La Fayette’s 17th century short story by Jean Cosmos, Francois-Olivier Rosseau and the director) centers around a fetching young aristocrat named Marie de Mezrieres (Melanie Thierry). Marie has a breathless, Harlequin romance-ish crush on dashing war hero Duke Henri de Guise (Gaspard Ulliel)-and the feeling’s mutual (if yet to be fully, erm… consummated).

Alas, there is a major roadblock straight up ahead for the two lovebirds. Marie’s ambitious father, the Marquis de Mezrieres (Phillipe Magnan) has struck a mutually beneficial backroom deal with the Duke de Montpensier (Michel Vuillermoz) to marry her off with the Duke’s son, the Prince of Montpensier (Gregoire Leprince-Ringuet)-who also happens to be the cousin of Marie’s beloved Henri (following all this so far?). The Prince and his cousin have been friendly rivals since childhood; but now the hot-headed Henri is seething with resentment about the Prince’s pending marriage to Marie. However, since he shares his cousin’s soldierly sense of duty to wipe out the heretical usurpers, Henri puts Jealousy and Envy on the back burner and channels all that hostility into ministering their common cause (i.e. disemboweling Protestants on the battlefield).

In the meantime, Marie receives sage advice from her mother, the Marquise (Florence Thomassin) to essentially do the same; put the romantic stirrings for Henri aside and focus on her “duty” (i.e. happily submit to and learn to love the Prince-like him or no). After an awkward and decidedly un-sexy wedding night, replete with parents and in-laws holding patient vigil just outside the doors of the boudoir and then studiously examining the soiled bed sheets immediately afterwards to confirm consummation, the two do eventually develop a cautious affection for one another (the Prince more so than his wife). Of course, Marie and Henri are still struggling with their smoldering desire to jump each other’s bones. Luckily, Marie soon finds a distraction-in the form of a middle-aged gentleman named Comte de Chabannes (Lambert Wilson), who is also the most interesting and complex character in the film. Chabannes, a seasoned soldier and an intellectual, is the Prince’s long-time friend and mentor, who not only schooled the younger man in the art of swordplay, but in the sciences, arts and letters as well. Chabannes also happens to be a Huguenot-but has declared himself a political neutral in the current conflict, hanging up his scabbard in disgust after having had his fill of wanton killing in the name of God. Eager to groom his Princess for her debut before the Royal Court in Paris, the Prince arranges for Chabannes to tutor her while he is off to war. Before he knows it, the tutor finds himself falling in (unrequited) love with his student.

Tavernier’s effort strongly recalls two older films-John Schlesinger’s Far from the Madding Crowd (1967) and Patrice Chereau’s Queen Margot(1994). The former, which was adapted from Thomas Hardy’s 1874 novel, is set in England, during the much later Victorian age, but features a heroine (portrayed by Julie Christie) who, like the Princess Marie, is headstrong, intelligent and beautiful, and likewise becomes a crazy-making object of desire for three men with disparate personalities (an arrogant young soldier, a wealthy, lovelorn middle-aged landowner and a poor farmer with a heart of gold). The latter film is quite similar in theme to Tavernier’s on several levels; again featuring a strong female protagonist (Isabelle Adjani, as the sister of France’s King Charles IX) who is forced into an arranged marriage that separates her from her true love and plunges her into the midst of royal intrigue. Most significantly, Chereau’s film is also set against the tumultuous backdrop of the Catholic-Huguenot wars (both films feature a re-enactment of the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre). Unfortunately, however, The Princess of Montpensier somehow lacks the spark and passion of those two other films. Tavernier gets the period detail “right”, and his film is gorgeous to look at (thanks to DP Bruno de Keyzer), but “something” is missing. I wouldn’t fault the cast; it’s the characters’ motivations that elude us. There is a detachment in the direction, like watching ornately carved pieces shuffling around on a chessboard. The film is not unlike Marie herself-an obscure object of desire that is at once enticingly beautiful and frustratingly unreachable.

Previous posts with related themes:

Elizabeth: The Golden Age

.

Freeeedom!

by digby

.

Hawkish hobgoblins and corporate whores

by digby

It looks like the deficit hawks and the defense hawks have no problem reconciling their foolish inconsistencies:

If you dropped in from outer space to watch the House Armed Services Committee debate the latest defense spending bill on Wednesday morning, you could be excused for not realizing that this country is facing a budget crisis.

The United States is expected to hit its debt ceiling this month, and some leaders in Congress are refusing to lift it on the grounds that the federal government spends too much and is growing too big.

As House Armed Services Committee Chairman Howard “Buck” McKeon has complained: “Democrats simply do not care how large the deficit grows.”

But somehow, that issue just isn’t coming up among McKeon and his usual “deficit hawk” supporters when it comes to defense spending. One representative after another argues for this or that fighter jet engine or firing range or other pet project that the U.S. military has said it doesn’t need, while looming over the entire budgeting process is the whopping amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act, proposed by McKeon, that includes a new and expanded declaration of war.

The government doesn’t need that, either.

The United States has already spent more than $1.283 trillion on military operations since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, according to the Congressional Research Service. With the orchestrator of the attacks dead and a federal shutdown looming if Congress can’t get a new budget in order, it seems an odd time to be expanding the “war on terror” beyond Iraq and Afghanistan, to reach potentially anywhere in the world that the President decides it should. Yet that’s exactly what McKeon’s “Detainee Security Act” (now incorporated into the NDAA) would do.

Remember, to this particular hawk species “deficits” mean government spending on things they don’t like. It’s always fine as long as it’s to give payoffs to the rich and kill foreigners.

By the way, it isn’t just Republicans. Get a load of this, (via Susie at C&L):

Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), facing reelection next year, spoke up to oppose a plan being drafted by Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad that would impose a new surtax on millionaires of about three percent on top of the higher tax rates they would face when the George W. Bush tax cuts expire next year, according to several people familiar with the exchange.

Nelson later explained through a spokesman that he was opposed to “double taxation,” even on the wealthy.

Another centrist on the budget committee, Sen. Mark Begich (D-Alaska), has also opposed the idea.

Several centrist Democrats have been voicing concern in private sessions that Conrad’s draft may be shifting too far to the left in order to placate liberals on the committee whose votes are needed to move the legislation, according to aides.

You’ve got the Republicans threatening to blow up the country if they aren’t allowed to have every last item on their wishlist and these “centrists” can’t even let the Democrats bluff that they will ask for more than the extension of the Bush tax cuts? They’re not even trying to hide their subservience to their wealthy masters, are they?

They’d rather be seen as sycophantic corporate whores than have even one person get the idea that the Democrats might have a liberal base it needs to placate just as the Republicans have the Tea Party. That would be unseemly and embarrassing. And extremely unserious. Plus, it might mean the Democrats have to actually negotiate instead of simply delivering outright for their donors, which seems to be a requirement if they are to get a piece of those billions in profits that are gushing into the political system. Hippie punching for dollars is part of the deal.

.

The Best and the Brightest Syndrome

by digby

Here’s a fascinating article that I missed when it was published a couple of years ago. I know that it doesn’t track exactly with what’s happened, but the general premise is one that I’ve been nibbling at around the edges for a while. The Best and the Brightest syndrome is a long standing problem and not just for liberals. And it’s been one of my greatest worries about Obama’s technocratic impulse.

Why was Herbert Hoover so reluctant to make the radical changes that were so clearly needed? It could not have been a question of competence or compassion for this lifelong Quaker, who had rushed sustenance to starving people around the world regardless of their nationalities or beliefs. Ultimately, Hoover could not break with the prevailing beliefs of his day. The essence of the Progressive Era in which he had come of age—the very essence of his own public image—was that government was a science. It was not a coincidence that this era brought us the very term “political science,” along with the advent of “nonpartisan” elections and “city managers” to replace mayors.

Since the 1890s, Hoover and his contemporaries had promoted this brand of progressivism as an alternative not only to the political and corporate corruption of the Gilded Age but also to the furious class and regional warfare that progressivism’s predecessor, populism, seemed to promise. Progressivism aspired to be something of a political science itself, untrammeled by ideological or partisan influence: there was a right way and a wrong way to do things, and all unselfish and uncorrupted individuals could be counted on to do the right thing, once they were shown what that was.

There were plenty of progressives, led by Teddy Roosevelt, who understood that bringing real change meant fighting to bust up trusts, regain public ownership of utilities, and secure rights for labor, women, and others. But the great national effort inspired by World War I softened memories of the bitter class conflict that had characterized much of American politics since the Civil War, just as the rollicking prosperity of the 1920s erased memories of the postwar Red Scare and the crushing of labor unions. Throughout the decade, big business sought to co-opt any lingering labor resentments by forming “company unions” under what they called “the American Plan.” Volunteerism and boosterism would take care of the rest. Prosperity would come through an always rising stock market.

Hoover’s every decision in fighting the Great Depression mirrored the sentiments of 1920s “business progressivism,” even as he understood intellectually that something more was required. Farsighted as he was compared with almost everyone else in public life, believing as much as he did in activist government, he still could not convince himself to take the next step and accept that the basic economic tenets he had believed in all his life were discredited; that something wholly new was required.

It will hopefully turn out much better this time. But it’s something we should think a bit more about when we select our leaders. “Competence” and expertise are characteristics progressive elites especially have valued very highly. But there’s more to being a successful leader than simply gathering all the “right” people in a room to figure out the right solutions.

.

Live Chat: Blue America Welcomes Eric Griego (D-New Mexico)

by digby

Please join us over at Crooks and Liars for a Blue America chat with our newest endorsee Eric Griego who is running for the Democratic nomination for congress in New Mexico, state senator Eric Griego.

Howie writes:

…[a] very different kind of Democrat than the kind of conservative Big Business shill the DCCC is rumored to be recruiting to run against Eric for the Albuquerque seat opening up due to the departure of our old friend Martin Heinrich for the open U.S. Senate seat. Right now Eric’s only declared opponent is an extremist religious-fanatic, Republican pastor named Dan Lewis, who is hellbent on wrecking government regulations. The Albuquerque chapter of DFA first alerted us to Eric’s decision to run for the seat, describing him as “a hard-nosed progressive fighter for families, children and workers who’s ready, willing and able to take on the right wing attacks on education, Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.” That’s the picture his record in public service paints. The first thing I ever heard him say was “The last thing we need to send to Washington is a Democrat who’s a kinder, gentler version of the Republicans, frankly.” Blue America has spent weeks talking with him since then. He’s exactly the kind of unapologetic progressive leader we need in Congress, an antidote to the dozens of Blue Dogs and conservatives always scurrying across the aisle to vote with the Republicans against the interests of working families and for their corporate donors. In contrast, Eric led efforts at the state level to do what our kind of Democrats are trying to do at the national level– “Before cutting core spending on kids, seniors and working families,” he told me passionately, “we should ask big oil and other corporate tax evaders to pay their fair share. We should also repeal the Bush tax cuts for those earning more than $250,000 a year. For the Republicans to defend subsidies for big oil is indefensible given their outrageous profits. To say taxes on the richest CEOs and multinational corporations are ‘off the table’ is outrageous when at the same time the Republican leadership is willing to ration Medicare, Medicaid and limit Social Security.” In the state legislature he sponsored several tax reform bills that would have raised personal income taxes on the wealthiest two percent of New Mexicans and to limit subsidies to large out of state corporations. The bills were killed by state Senate leaders. “In my first year in the Senate, I passed a green jobs bill that provides state-funded training for solar, wind and other renewable energy workers. That year [2008] and in 2011 I sponsored comprehensive ethics and campaign finance reform legislation including public financing for all state elections, contribution limits, and a state ethics commission. The ethics and campaign finance bills never got heard due to opposition from Senate leadership.” In 2005 Eric was behind the successful Albuquerque initiative to provide voluntary public financing for local elections. “We are now one of the few cities in the nation with public financing of local elections.” Kicking off his campaign a couple weeks ago, Eric told his supporters in Albuquerque why he’s the right man for the job. Those reasons resonate perfectly with Blue America:

“We need a Democratic Congressional candidate who will unapologetically stand up for Democratic values. The current Republican leadership in Congress wants to dismantle the protections that it has taken generations to build, like Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. We need a strong courageous advocate for working families and who has a record of taking on those who put the interests of the richest two percent of Americans and the largest corporate interests ahead of our children, our environment and our local businesses.”

If that kind of message appeals to you– and, by the way, I should mention that Eric is also the Executive Director of New Mexico Voices for Children, a non-profit research, policy and advocacy organization that fights for the state’s vulnerable children and working families– please consider making a donation to our newest endorsed candidate, Eric Griego

Join us over at Crooks and Liars at 11PDT for chat with Eric.

.