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Month: August 2011

Compromise Spin Win

Published by digby on August 4, 2011

Compromise Spin Win

by digby

The DNC is pushing back hard on the notion that the Democrats were losers in this debt ceiling negotiation:

The rush to frame the winners and losers in the debt ceiling deal stands in stark contrast to the protracted negotiations over the debt ceiling themselves. On Thursday afternoon, the Democratic National Committee engaged once again, issuing a memo arguing that political pundits got their analyses wrong when they deemed the final result a win for the Republicans.

“The fact is, since President Obama reached a debt and deficit compromise with Republicans over the weekend, CNN and Gallup polls show that a hefty majority of Democrats and Liberals support the deal while a hefty majority of Republicans, and particularly the all-important Tea Party Republicans, oppose it,” says the memo, authored by DNC Executive Director Patrick Gaspard and sent to The Huffington Post. “If you’re waiting for the rush of stories, columns and blogs with the inside the beltway intelligentsia admitting they missed the mark on this – don’t hold your breath. The very folks who rush to judgment on these things are rarely in a rush to admit they were wrong.”

Going through the actual polling data — which showed that two-thirds of Republicans and conservatives opposed the deal while a majority of Democrats and liberals approved of it — Gaspard argues that reporters were basing their assumptions off either faulty or uninformed insight.

“The numbers show that while Democrats and liberals supported the President’s commitment to reaching a fair compromise, Republicans and Conservatives overwhelmingly opposed compromise,” the memo concludes. “Of course this should be of little surprise. Poll after poll during the course of this discussion showed that Democrats by large margins favored compromise while the vast majority of Republicans opposed any compromise with Democrats whatsoever.”

He’s got a point. Evidently, the President is in tune with the Party on this. They do say they prefer compromise over principle. And they say they approve of this deal. So perhaps the President can continue to take this approach in the future without any drop-off in support from Democrats.

But since this “compromise” the Democrats love so much requires 98% compromise from them and 2% from the Republicans (by John Boehner’s own definition) they are eventually going to run out of things to compromise — at which point all these Democrats can simply re-register as Republicans and never have to listen to partisan bickering again. After all, the Republicans are all very unhappy with the deal because they believe they didn’t get enough, so they certainly aren’t going to ever come around. (Evidently, they were holding out for public floggings of liberals or something and really feel sold down the river on that one.)

I was a dinner last night with a civilian who, when I asked what she thought the president believed in, she said “compromise.” She doesn’t think that’s so great, but the polls indicate most Democrat think otherwise. So if compromise really is the defining principle of the Democratic Party I would imagine they will be very happy to see their leaders strongly holding the line.

But then … that wouldn’t be in the spirit of compromise, now would it? What a conundrum.

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Yes Virginia, the GOP is planning to use Medicare against the Democrats

Published by digby on August 4, 2011

Yes Virginia, the GOP IS planning to use Medicare

by digby

This talking point is from the RNC’s web-site:

Reach Out And Touch Medicare

4
August 2011Posted by: Research

For The Record…It Was Obama Who Offered To Cut Hundreds Of Billions In Medicare During The Debt Debate

OBAMA AND DEMOCRATS PUT MEDICARE CUTS IN DEBT CEILING DEALUSA Today: “Cuts in Medicare and other entitlement programs are on the table.” (Susan Page and Fredreka Schouten, “Political Damage Even If A Debt Deal Is Done,” USA Today, 7/31/11)Obama Agreed To Medicare Cuts In Debt Ceiling Deal. “The deal announced on Sunday by Congressional leaders and the White House would make across-the-board cuts in military spending, education, transportation and Medicare payments to health care providers if Congress does not enact further deficit-cutting legislation by the end of the year.” (Robert Pear, “Congress Must Trim Deficit To Avoid Broader Cuts,” The New York Times, 7/31/11)

  • Obama Said “Adjustments” Must Be Made To Medicare. OBAMA: “Yes, that means making some adjustments to protect health care programs like Medicare so they’re there for future generations.” (President Barack Obama, Remarks On Budget Control Act, Washington, D.C., 8/2/11)

    DURING DEBT CEILING DEBATE, OBAMA OFFERED $650 BILLION IN CUTS TO MEDICARE, SOCIAL SECURITY, AND MEDICAID

    [More news articles her]

    DEMOCRATS WORRIED OBAMA WHITE HOUSE TOOK MEDICARE OFF THE TABLE AS AN ELECTION ISSUE

    [More news articles her]

As I have said a million times, the GOP has retired the concept of hypocrisy. The fact that every last one of them voted for the Ryan plan — which turned Medicare into a “voucher” system to force the elderly to “shop smarter” — is no impediment to them using Obama’s inexplicable decision to offer up Medicare in the proposed Grand Bargain against him. There is no “holding hands and jumping over the cliff together.” They run to the edge with you — and then push you over.

The President wanted a Grand Bargain, a Big Deal, a Great Compromise that would bring the two parties together to offer the necessary human sacrifices to the Market Gods. But he may have ended up being the sacrifice himself.

Update: Greg Sargent reports that the Democrats and Republicans are already taking different tacks on the Super-Committee with the Republicans saying upfront they won’t appoint anyone who will agree to raise taxes and the Democrats saying everything is on the table:

[L]iterally two days have passed since Obama signed the debt ceiling deal creating the super-committee, and the debate over it is already carrying echoes of the last one, in which Dems were confident they would win if they occupied some sort of reasonable middle ground while painting the GOP as uncompromising and ideologically rigid.Indeed, Nancy Pelosi told new media reporters today that if Republicans “want to draw lines in the sand” they will “look like the obstructionists.”“You won’t see me drawing lines in the sand,” Pelosi continued. She was making a purely political case here, and given Pelosi’s track record, I expect she will push hard for committee appointments that will try to hold the line on entitlements benefits and new revenues. But Congressional Dems appear to be again proceeding from the assumption that they will win politically if they signal more flexibility at the outset on core prorities, while painting Republicans who are making it clear that they won’t budge on their priorities as extreme and crazy.

I’m sure you all know the definition of insanity, right?

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A Fly in the Free Market Ointment by David Atkins

Published by digby on August 4, 2011

A fly in the free market ointment
by David Atkins (“thereisnospoon”)

In other news, there’s a record turkey recall going on:

More than 36 million pounds of fresh and frozen ground turkey are being voluntarily recalled by food giant Cargill Inc. because of the possibility of salmonella contamination.

Health authorities say the poultry could be contaminated with Salmonella Heidelberg, a strain of salmonella that killed a California man and caused the illness of 79 others.

Cargill said the ground turkey was produced at the company’s Springdale, Ark., facility between Feb. 20 and Aug. 2. Production at the plant has been suspended.

“Given our concern for what has happened, and our desire to do what is right for our consumers and customers, we are voluntarily removing our ground turkey products from the marketplace,” Steve Willardsen, president of Cargill’s turkey processing business, said in a statement.”

“This is, if not the largest, one of the largest class-one food recalls to happen in U.S. history,” said William D. Marler, a Seattle attorney who specializes in food safety litigation. A class-one recall involves a health hazard that has a reasonable probability of causing health problems or death.

So far there’s no indication of overt malfeasance by Cargill, though it’s possible and even likely that damaging information might come out in the future. The recall will obviously be very expensive to the company, thanks to pinpointed work by the FDA.

I suppose this would be a bad time to point out that conservatives think that consumers would be better served by defunding the FDA, freeing up money that would best go into the Cargill CEO’s next tax cut, which will enable him to magically create manservant and maid jobs in his multiple mansions. That will totally make all those salmonella cases worth it in the grand scheme of things.

And if Cargill makes a bunch of people sick or dead? Why, the magic power of the free market will deal Cargill a huge blow without the need for burdensome government intrusion. Consumers will know which brands of turkey are produced by Cargill just as surely as consumers know which brands of paper towel are manufactured by Koch Industries. Isn’t it obvious?

Goldilock soup

Published by digby on August 4, 2011

Goldilocks soup

by digby

I have spent years mocking the Village press for their “Goldilocks” analysis of politics. Imagine what a surprise it was to hear this last night on Piers Morgan:

MORGAN:Has the battle made compromise a dirty word on Capitol Hill? Here to explain, my CNN colleague John King.

John, I’ve never it seen a more miserable reaction from almost everybody in the world to what is supposed to be a good deal.

JOHN KING, HOST, JOHN KING, USA: Well, Piers, I like to use the Goldilocks rule of politics. Is it too hot, is it too cold or is it just right? And you have this compromise. Is it just right because nobody loves it or is it just awful? And I think that’s the question we’re going to deal with going forward.

But there’s no question, on the left in American politics, they think it cuts too much already and they’re worried this new super committee will touch Social Security and Medicare, and they’re mad President Obama didn’t get a tax hike.

On the right, they think it doesn’t cut enough. They’re worried it could cut defense more in the super committee. And they’re worried there’s still a door open to tax increases.

So nobody loves it. Everybody calls it a down payment. What it does do is what you said. The president who lives in this house will not be the first American president to ever have this country go into default. Now we’re going to have, though, another round of this debate over taxes and spending and the role of government with the super committee first, and then in the 2012 election campaign.

Make no mistake, this issue is not dying down.

MORGAN: No. I mean in it terms of the politics here, John, the real winners appear to be the Tea Party. Who else do you think can come out of this genuinely feeling it’s been a good period for them?

KING: In an odd way, the president of the United States wins even though he loses. When I say loses, remember he said he wanted $4 trillion over 10 year deal. He got a little more than half that. He wanted this done one installment, raise the debt ceiling, he’ll have to do two. The second one comes through that super committee.

He said it had to be balanced, and by that the president means tax increases. He didn’t get tax increases in the first sweep. There’s no guarantee he’ll get tax increases in the second.

So he did not get what he said he wanted setting into this. In fact, what he signed he described pretty much as unfair just a week or so ago. And yet he does not default. He’s not the president who gets that stain.

And look at all the other economic data, Piers. Unemployment, growth, consumer spending down confidence, consumer confidence down. The last thing this president needed as a candidate for reelection is another piece of turmoil in a very fragile recovery.

So the president wins even though he loses a bit.

Seriously, do we really need to wonder why the American people are confused? This sort of idiotic “analysis” sheds absolutely no light on the the politics, the policies or even the horse race. It’s simply vacuous. And Morgan gave him an opening to at least discuss the Tea Party’s refusal to take yes for an answer in spite of the huge policy win they just got. That, at least, would have been interesting.

But somehow, he had to find a bowl that was juuuust right, and so he came up with the silly idea that the President is a winner because he managed not to be the first president to bear “the stain” of default. I’ve rarely seen a bigger stretch.

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I’d love to hear it

Published by digby on August 3, 2011

I’d love to hear it

by digby

This is funny. Apparently there were some words exchanged yesterday at a White house meeting with liberal groups:

Yesterday, Sperling faced a series of questions about the White House’s concessions on the debt ceiling fight, and its inability to move in the directions of new taxes or revenues. Progressive consultant Mike Lux, the sources said, summed up the liberal concern, producing what a participant described as an “extremely defensive” response from Sperling.

Sperling, a person involved said, pointed his finger back at liberal groups, which he said hadn’t done enough to highlight what he saw as the positive side of the debt package — a message that didn’t go over well with participants

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I’m dying to know what the positive side of the debt deal is! Somebody please spill the beans.

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Signing away the signature

Published by digby on August 3, 2011
Signing away the signature

by digby

During the long, tedious lead up to the debt ceiling vote, I often wrote that I thought that the one policy Obama would protect would be his health care reforms. It’s his signature legacy. As time wore on it became clear that he might be willing to cut Medicaid in some ways, which was heartbreaking since it was the most liberal part of the reforms. Still, I had always known that this was the most likely to be cut back and was only surprised that the President himself would be involved in it.

But this, I have to say, really stuns me. Jonathan Cohn reports that a consensus is emerging that Democrats should root for the automatic triggers over what will surely be an even more hideous “deal” by the Super Committee:

Why would Democrats prefer the automatic cuts? President Obama and the Democrats largely shielded the big entitlements and programs from the poor. Media reports have suggested that Budget Director Jack Lew and National Economic Adviser Gene Sperling were particularly adamant about protecting Medicaid. The super-committee, by contrast, would surely look to these programs for cuts, perhaps substantial ones. Ideas like reducing federal funding for Medicaid or raising the eligibility age for Medicare, both of which figured into earlier negotiations between Obama and House Speaker John Boehner, are sure to get a close look.But don’t kid yourself: The automatic cuts will still hurt, because they’d still affect plenty of important programs. And among them is the administration’s signature legislative accomplishment, the Affordable Care Act.The new health care law will make insurance more affordable by providing subsidies to people who buy insurance on their own. And these subsidies come in two forms. There are tax credits, which people can use to offset the cost of their premiums. And there are subsidies to defray cost-sharing: In other words, the government will help reduce people’s out-of-pocket costs. Under the debt ceiling deal, the tax credits are exempt from automatic reductions, because they are a tax credit and not a form of spending.But, as both administration and congressional sources are confirming, the cost-sharing subsidies are not exempt. They will decline. And that’s worrisome because the subsidies were already pretty low. In fact, many of us were hoping that, over time, lawmakers would see fit to raise them rather than reduce them. Exactly how much the subsidies would decline is unclear, as nobody I’ve contacted seems to have run the numbers yet and it depends partly on some variables impossible to know right now. (I don’t even want to guess until I get more information; I’ll update this item when I do.)

This is a big deal. First of all it allows them to start cutting into the ACA before it even gets started in the name of projected deficit reduction. It doesn’t get any more abstract than that and the fact that the administration that is credited with the reforms signed on is a very ominous sign. As Cohn says, the subsidies are inadequate as it is and need to be raised. (Indeed, that was a huge point of argument by the supporters of the reforms — “we’ll fix it later.”)
“Deficit reduction” without tax hikes is a recipe for this kind of disaster and it’s fairly clear the President and the Democrats had no fall back plan if the Grand Bargain failed. But I’m still fairly shocked that they allowed the HCA to be messed with before it’s implemented. If there’s any merit to the argument that bad negotiation was a feature of this trainwreck, this supports it.
(On the other hand, the health reforms don’t poll well with Independents so maybe they’ve decided it’s not worth defending.)
The worst of all possible worlds will be if the Super Committee decides to hold the HCA hostage as a way to pass their own hideous agreement and put liberals on the hook again for the same program. (Maybe they can sneak in some anti-abortion nonsense at the end and we can all party like it’s 2010.) I certainly wouldn’t put it past the Republicans to play both sides of that argument. After all, they win either way.
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Blue America: A new day and Green Day

Published by digby on August 3, 2011
Blue America: A New Day and Green Day

by digby

I was on Nicole Sandler’s radio show this morning and we were chatting about what liberal activists should do in the face of disappointment in the establishment and the President. I said, to support progressive candidates. There are good people who are willing to run for office and fight the good fight on behalf of our values. Sometimes they have their own money, but for the most part they depend on the generosity of average people to fund their races. Either way, they aren’t going to get any from the usual sources. After all, hard core progressives aren’t the type of candidates that the Party establishment or the Big Money Boyz back — they aren’t on the same side.

So, if you are a disgruntled progressive, there is still a way to influence national politics in a positive way. In fact, it’s more necessary than ever. The Right has just shown us in living color that we have entered a new era of hardball parliamentary style politics that the Democratic centrists aren’t able to counter (even if they wanted to, which it appears they don’t.) We had better find some ballast on the progressive side or things are going to go from bad to worse.
It won’t happen overnight, but as I told Nicole, this commitment to electing progressives to congress is the most mature leg of the movement and the most invested for the long haul. We have the patience and the commitment to go beyond these various ups and downs and we keep our eyes on the prize from election cycle to election cycle. 2010 was brutal. But we’re in a period of political disequilibrium and there’s good reason to believe that we can come back from that.
And anyway, what choice do we have, aside from moving to another country? (And right now, there aren’t a whole lot of safe havens — the whole world is in turmoil.)
So, Blue America continues its long and arduous quest to elect more progressives to congress and help them form an independent bloc, answerable to their supporters. It’s not easy changing a Party’s political culture but we believe it’s essential that we try.
Howie has the latest and it’s really good:

Looking for the silver lining in the passage of the Boehner debt ceiling bill?

There is none.

Okay, okay. There are some bright spots we can look to amid the current Tea Party madness. That’s what Blue America is all about. And one of our brightest glimmers of hope comes from the campaign of Ilya Sheyman, who is running for Congress up in Illinois’ 10th District (Chicago’s northern suburbs)– the most Democratic district in the country currently held by a Republican.

We’ve written about Ilya before, because he’s a serious progressive with a real chance to kick out Rep. Robert Dold, a Republican freshman who has shown he’s more than willing to put anything, including Grandma’s Medicare, on the chopping block, if his Tea Party so dictates.

In the midst of the House debate around this fabricated debt ceiling “crisis,” Ilya was one of only a few Democratic candidates around the country willing to take the potentially risky position against the debt deal, saying, very clearly, he would have voted “no” if he was able.

In the 10th, Ilya was the only candidate with the chutzpah to take the right position. The only other Democratic candidate, a business consultant named Brad Schneider, sided with incumbent Dold and Republican Sen. Mark Kirk in supporting the bill. I should mention that Schneider has also donated big bucks to Kirk over the years. Oh, and, he says he’ll not only be more “bipartispan” but also “pro-business” if elected. Not the kind of Democrat we need in Congress, especially if we hope to win back the Democratic Party for the Big Business special interests.

Ilya, on the other hand, stood with neighboring Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky in opposing the bill, which he called “a bad deal for the American people.”

“It would be irresponsible to support legislation that reduces the deficit on the backs of struggling working families and the most vulnerable” Sheyman said in an article published by the local Patch site yesterday. “By putting at risk Medicare and other core services, this plan will make conditions worse at a time of tremendous economic strain.”

So here’s our point of optimism. We can seize this moment and reject the Tea Party politicians who hijacked this process (and the Blue Dogs who proved their willingness to sell out working families once again). Let’s support Ilya and other candidates who actually took the right position, even when it meant standing up to powerful forces within their own party.

Here’s the Act Blue page we set up for him and the other progressives who are standing up for working families against the corporatocracy. Now’s our chance.

Off the topic, we’d like to raise $2,000 for Ilya’s campaign in the next 24 hours. I don’t expect any one person to contribute that much, of course, but if enough people give $10 and $20 contributions, it’s going to mount up fast– and that will set off the trigger. Trigger? A different kind of trigger from the one in the SatanSandwich bill. You see, I used to run Reprise Records, Green Day’s record company, and Ilya mentioned to me that he’s a huge Green Day fan. So, when we hit the trigger, someone will be eligible to win an autographed– like in signed by Billie Joe Armstrong, Trey Cool and Mike Dirnt– Fender strat that the band gave me around the time they were recordingWarning. So who gets the guitar? If we were Republicans, we’d give it to whoever gave the most money. But we’re not. So everyone has an equal chance. As soon as we reach $2,000 we start a random drawing. We’ll pick one name out of a bowl on Thursday at 6pm (PT). and I’ll send you the guitar. Enter here.

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