Month: October 2011

Crackdown politics

by digby

Priorities

​In their unrelenting quest to kill legal medical marijuana dead, President Barack Obama and the United States Department of Justice appear content to incur collateral damage.

Last week, property owners who rent to dispensaries were informed that the federal government could seize their properties within 45 days; this week, one of the four United States attorneys who declared open season on anything connected to state-legal cannabis told California Watch that the fourth estate is next. Specifically, the administration says any publication — from print to web to broadcasting — that accepts advertisements from medical marijuana businesses could face prosecution.

It would appear that the President is going to make his “run to the middle” in a different way this time. Apparently, he’s going to make some populist rhetorical feints while selling himself as a hard core law and order/national security tough guy. It’s an unusual approach not seen since … Ronald Reagan. I’m guessing that it won’t work quite as well without the “welfare queen” demagoguery, but maybe Mexican deportations and medical marijuana busts can suffice as stand-ins. After all, it was Nancy Reagan herself who ran the “Just Say No” anti-drug campaign in the 80s.

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From the chronicles of the weepy billionaire

by digby

Tom Tomorrow at Daily Kos:

You can send the bankers a little message if you like.

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The Green Jobs “Myth”
by David Atkins (“thereisnospoon”)

Increasingly when you talk to voters here in California about jobs and the economy, you’ll hear a consistent refrain: “green jobs” are a joke. They don’t exist, they’re a boondoggle, etc. They know this because they hear it everywhere, so they know it must be true. Also, too, Solyndra! And yet, reality sometimes breaks through:

California has 1 in 4 U.S. solar energy jobs, study says

The National Solar Jobs Census 2011 says job growth in the industry grew 6.8% in the one-year period ended in August, and a survey of solar employers suggests employment will rise by 24%, creating 24,000 jobs, during the next year.

One in every four solar energy jobs in America is held by a Californian, and growth in the clean-tech industry is burgeoning nationwide, a new study said.

In August, California had an estimated 25,575 solar-related jobs out of 100,237 for all 50 states, according to the National Solar Jobs Census 2011. The census is scheduled for release Monday by the Solar Foundation, a research and education organization in Washington.

California’s solar jobs tally was more than four times greater than runner-up Colorado, which had 6,186 solar jobs.

The Golden State ranked first in the nation for generating electricity from both photovoltaic solar panels and concentrated solar power systems that use mirrors to create steam to run turbines, the study said.

“This report shows that the solar industry is not only creating green jobs across California but that the industry is forecast to continue growing at a much faster pace than the overall U.S. economy,” said Michelle Kinman, a clean energy advocate for Environment California. “California industry and policymakers have a tremendous opportunity to build on this solid foundation and make solar a centerpiece of the state’s energy policy.”

“Green jobs” are no panacea for the unemployment problem. Some on the left got carried away with the rhetoric from time to time and gave the impression that our jobs plans relied entirely on jobs in sustainable energy.

But the reality is that these sorts of investments take a little time to come to fruition. When they do, the benefits can be dramatic. Not only will California’s solar energy industry create lots of good-paying jobs for both blue and white collar workers, but energy costs will come down in a largely environmentally friendly way.

The “right to work” states that are stripping away all environmental and labor regulations are burning through their middle class and the structural supports of a fair economy in the pursuit of immediate economic benefit for the super-wealthy, combined with a few more minimum wage crumbs for the rest. But over the long run progressive states like California will win out with a more vibrant economy because of the investments they’ve made in infrastructure and quality of life.

That is why blue states largely remain such attractive places to live in spite of high property values that often drive people away, and it’s a fact that will become increasingly clear no matter how much propaganda is thrown out there to the contrary.

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Opening the door … and welcoming their hatred

by digby

Yet another whining billionaire. (Is there any other kind?)

“We are sitting on the 18th floor of a skyscraper the day after protesters have marched on the homes of other Manhattan billionaires. It may seem odd that most of the targeted rich people had nothing to do with creating the financial crisis. But as Mr. Zuckerman ponders the Occupy Wall Street movement, he concludes that “the door to it was opened by the Obama administration, going after the ‘millionaires and billionaires’ as if everybody is a millionaire and a billionaire and they didn’t earn it. . . . To fan that flame of populist anger I think is very divisive and very dangerous for this country.”

Uh, Mort? I know you’re sensitive. But if you think Obama’s tepid little “fat cat” remark and polite request that corporate jet owners pay a little more in taxes is fanning the flames of populist anger, I’d have your butler get some smelling salts ready for this one:

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Pleasing Wall Street
by David Atkins (“thereisnospoon”)

Today brings more news that Mitt Romney is raking in the bucks from Wall Street, particularly from donors that used to support Barack Obama:

Mitt Romney has raised far more money than Mr. Obama this year from the firms that have been among Wall Street’s top sources of donations for the two candidates.

That gap underscores the growing alienation from Mr. Obama among many rank-and-file financial professionals and Mr. Romney’s aggressive and successful efforts to woo them.

The imbalance exists at large investment banks and hedge funds, private equity firms and commercial banks, according to a New York Times analysis of the firms that accounted for the most campaign contributions from the industry to Mr. Romney and Mr. Obama in 2008, based on data from the Federal Election Commission and the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.

This is a good thing. The Obama campaign had more money than it even knew how to spend in 2008. The Obama Administration needs an anti-Wall Street message right now far more than it needs Wall Street cash. Nothing could be better than to portray vulture capitalist Mitt Romney as the tool of Wall Street he is.

Still, it does lead one to wonder what the Obama Administration was thinking in being so cozy with the “financial community.” If the point of doing so was to make friends and secure support in exchange for campaign cash, the Administration obviously underestimated the thin-skinned narcissism of the Masters of the Universe. Nothing short of a full giveaway of the entire nation’s wealth will please them, and even one cross word about “fat cats” will send them running into the arms of the opposition.

If the point of being really nice to Wall Street was actually policy related in the sense that the Administration felt that a strong and confident financial sector would be the key to economic recovery, well, that clearly hasn’t worked out so well, either.

So either way, the the decision to be super friendly with the Wall Street crew was deeply misguided. But it’s never too late for the Administration to realize their error and work to correct the mistake.

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Krugman:

“They need to understand who their constituency is”

by digby

I don’t know how much more clearly they can say it:

“Who do you think pays the taxes?” said one longtime money manager. “Financial services are one of the last things we do in this country and do it well. Let’s embrace it. If you want to keep having jobs outsourced, keep attacking financial services. This is just disgruntled people.”

He added that he was disappointed that members of Congress from New York, especially Senator Charles E. Schumer and Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, had not come out swinging for an industry that donates heavily to their campaigns. “They need to understand who their constituency is,” he said.

I’m guessing he’s very jealous of the likes of Mary Landrieu who takes gobs of money from the oil industry and never fails to stand up for them. Sadly for him, Wall Street happens to be in New York, where voters are a bit less inclined to believe that the Big Money Boyz are looking out for them.

That’s not to say that Shumer hasn’t been very, very good to the financial industry over the years. They’re just disappointed that he hasn’t been publicly defending them as the demi-gods they believe themselves to be.

Generally, bankers dismiss the protesters as gullible and unsophisticated. Not many are willing to say this out loud, for fear of drawing public ire — or the masses to their doorsteps. “Anybody who dismisses them publicly is putting a bull’s-eye on their back,” the hedge fund manager said.

John Paulson, the hedge fund titan who made billions in the financial crisis by betting against the subprime mortgage market, has been the exception. His Upper East Side home was picketed by demonstrators earlier this week, but Mr. Paulson offered a full-throated defense of the Street, even going so far as to defend the tiny sliver of top earners attacked by the Occupy Wall Street protesters — whose signs refer to themselves as “the other 99 percent.”

“The top 1 percent of New Yorkers pay over 40 percent of all income taxes, providing huge benefits to everyone in our city and state,” he said in a statement. “Paulson & Company and its employees have paid hundreds of millions in New York City and New York State taxes in recent years and have created over 100 high-paying jobs in New York City since its formation.”

The messages coming from the protesters are by no means in accord. They have myriad grievances, though many see Wall Street as the most powerful symbol of the income inequality and “economic injustice” they are railing against. There is ample indignation over banks being bailed out while their customers are being foreclosed upon, and over banks handing out hefty bonus checks and severance packages so soon after the crisis erupted.

Similarly, executives keep getting generous payouts when they leave. Just last week, Bank of America disclosed it was paying a total of $11 million in severance to two executives forced out in a management reshuffle, Sallie Krawcheck and Joe Price, even as the company said it would begin laying off roughly 30,000 employees over the next few years.

“Wall Street continues to underestimate the degree of anger among citizens and voters,” said Douglas J. Elliott, a former investment banker who is now a fellow at the Brookings Institution. For the most part, bankers say that they see the protests as a reaction to the high unemployment and slow growth that has plagued the American economy since therecession and the financial crisis of 2008. Despite all the placards and chants plainly indicating otherwise, some bankers suggest that deep down, the protesters are not really all that mad at them.

They would be wrong. The dismissive bankster attitude has been clear from the beginning of the financial crisis when they took bailouts and then had hissy fits when anyone suggested that those who caused it be required to forego their massive bonuses. It’s hard to believe they thought that but they are just that deluded.

A commenter reminded me of this lovely little email that made the rounds of Wall Street a few months back:

“We are Wall Street. It’s our job to make money. Whether it’s a commodity, stock, bond, or some hypothetical piece of fake paper, it doesn’t matter. We would trade baseball cards if it were profitable. I didn’t hear America complaining when the market was roaring to 14,000 and everyone’s 401k doubled every 3 years. Just like gambling, its not a problem until you lose. I’ve never heard of anyone going to Gamblers Anonymous because they won too much in Vegas.

Well now the market crapped out, & even though it has come back somewhat, the government and the average Joes are still looking for a scapegoat. God knows there has to be one for everything. Well, here we are.

Go ahead and continue to take us down, but you’re only going to hurt yourselves. What’s going to happen when we can’t find jobs on the Street anymore? Guess what: We’re going to take yours. We get up at 5am & work till 10pm or later. We’re used to not getting up to pee when we have a position. We don’t take an hour or more for a lunch break. We don’t demand a union. We don’t retire at 50 with a pension. We eat what we kill, and when the only thing left to eat is on your dinner plates, we’ll eat that.

For years teachers and other unionized labor have had us fooled. We were too busy working to notice. Do you really think that we are incapable of teaching 3rd graders and doing landscaping? We’re going to take your cushy jobs with tenure and 4 months off a year and whine just like you that we are so-o-o-o underpaid for building the youth of America. Say goodbye to your overtime and double time and a half. I’ll be hitting grounders to the high school baseball team for $5k extra a summer, thank you very much.

So now that we’re going to be making $85k a year without upside, Joe Mainstreet is going to have his revenge, right? Wrong! Guess what: we’re going to stop buying the new 80k car, we aren’t going to leave the 35 percent tip at our business dinners anymore. No more free rides on our backs. We’re going to landscape our own back yards, wash our cars with a garden hose in our driveways. Our money was your money. You spent it. When our money dries up, so does yours.

The difference is, you lived off of it, we rejoiced in it. The Obama administration and the Democratic National Committee might get their way and knock us off the top of the pyramid, but it’s really going to hurt like hell for them when our fat a**es land directly on the middle class of America and knock them to the bottom.

We aren’t dinosaurs. We are smarter and more vicious than that, and we are going to survive. The question is, now that Obama & his administration are making Joe Mainstreet our food supply…will he? and will they?”

Seriously, these people are way dumber than dinosaurs, which I believe had brains the size of walnuts. I’ve been tracking this aspect of the meltdown since it happened and at every turn these so-called Masters of the Universe simply could not shut the fuck up. The insisted on not only reckessly pillaging the economy but belligerently demanded that the people of this country thank them for their service. Anyone who wasn’t running on cocaine and testosterone would have guessed that keeping a lower profile after having destroyed the fortunes of tens of millions of people would be a good idea.

Gone but still present

by digby

Looks like we’re getting out of Iraq at the end of the year after all. Well, sort of:

Regardless of whether U.S. troops are here or not, there will be a massive American diplomatic presence.

The U.S. Embassy in Baghdad is the largest in the world, and the State Department will have offices in Basra, Irbil and Kirkuk as well as other locations around the country where contractors will train Iraqi forces on U.S. military equipment they’re purchasing.

About 5,000 security contractors and personnel will be tasked with helping protect American diplomats and facilities around the country, the State Department has said.

The U.S. Embassy will still have a handful of U.S. Marines for protection and 157 U.S. military personnel in charge of facilitating weapons sales to Iraq. Those are standard functions at most American embassies around the world and would be considered part of the regular embassy staff.

When the 2008 agreement requiring all U.S. forces leave Iraq was passed, many U.S. officials assumed it would inevitably be renegotiated so that American forces could stay longer.

The U.S. said repeatedly this year it would entertain an offer from the Iraqis to have a small force stay behind, and the Iraqis said they would like American military help. But as the year wore on and the number of American troops that Washington was suggesting could stay behind dropped, it became increasingly clear that a U.S. troop presence was not a sure thing.

The issue of legal protection for the Americans was the deal-breaker.

Iraqis are still angry over incidents such as the Abu Ghraib prison scandal or Haditha, when U.S. troops killed Iraqi civilians in Anbar province, and want American troops subject to Iraqi law.

I’m guessing the 5,000 contractors will not be subject to any legal authority at all as per usual.

The bottom line is that the Iraqis just didn’t want troops in their country anymore. Imagine that. But deals can certainly still be made …

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Walking and Chewing Bubble Gum
by David Atkins (“thereisnospoon”)

Karoli at Crooks and Liars has a nice slideshow of the Occupy Ventura protest happening just a 20 minute walk from my apartment over the weekend (it’s unknown what will tonight once the park permit expires.) Ventura is a relatively small city and a minor part of the massive Occupy movement that has become a global phenomenon, but it’s a nice reminder of how universal the movement really is. I’ve attended the general assembly, spent some time down there yesterday and will do so again today.

But I’ll also be managing a phonebank today for our local Democratic endorsed city council candidates down at our local Dem Party headquarters. Why, you might ask? What could be more important than solidarity with the movement at this critical time?

Well, there’s the fact that even as Occupy Ventura is taking place, vote-by-mail ballots are already on the coffee tables of every permanent absentee voter in the city, ready to decide its fate. Our seven-member council is evenly divided with 3 Dems, 3 Republicans, and 1 conservative-leaning Decline-to-State. The seats of two of the Dems and the DTS are up for grabs. And the local Tea Party is doing everything they can to take those seats over. Particularly frightening are Carla Bonney, stealth tea partier extraordinaire who believes that Google Earth represents a violation of her 4th Amendment rights and would move to take the city off of Google Earth, and conservative Bill Knox who wants to replace the unionized fire department with a volunteer fire department. No, I’m not kidding. I’ve also been fighting alongside my awesome local Assemblymember Das Williams to keep these people from privatizing our libraries, a move that will likely go through if the council falls into Republican hands. So our local Dem clubs and our local Ventura Dem Central Committee have endorsed three great dems (Danny Carrillo, Cheryl Heitmann and incumbent Carl Morehouse), and we are supporting them with phonebanks, door-to-door walks and slate mail to likely voters.

Why mention all this local backyard stuff? Because it’s an object lesson in why it’s necessary to walk and chew gum when considering political activity. Yes, it’s true that the reason Ventura and nearly every other city in America is in dire financial straits is that America has collectively failed to hold Wall St. and the plutocrats accountable. Political change in my backyard and across the country cannot truly take hold unless something is done about that, and it will take in part a popular uprising to do it.

But it’s just as true that no matter how long and aggressively the Occupiers hold their ground here in Ventura, if a lack of interest and enthusiasm in local elections leads to a conservative Republican sweep of the city council, the libraries will be privatized, the open spaces turned over to the hands of developers, the unions will be crushed underfoot, the professional firefighters will be replaced by undertrained volunteers, and city services will be further slashed once again, in turn reducing the public’s faith in local government.

And yet, one of the challenges I face locally is that several local influential Democrats, including former Assemblymember Pedro Nava and even a member or two of my own Central Committee, are actively supporting and/or endorsing the conservative-leaning Decline-to-State, weakening the position of our endorsed Dems and facilitating the further erosion of progressive power in the city. They are doing this partly out of personal friendships, and partly as an intentional slap to the face of the local progressive movement of which I’m a part.

I have taken a lot of heat here and elsewhere from all sides: critics from my left flank argue that I am foolish to continue to believe in the necessity of the electoral process to create change, and foolish to support Democrats at all; critics from the “Third Way” side argue that I should be less forceful in asking that influential Democrats actually support Democrats, and that they should be able to openly support more conservative politicians without repercussion; still others feel that I should be less critical of elected Democrats and be a better “team” player. Obviously, it’s logically impossible to make everyone happy–and that’s just on the supposedly left-of-center side of the aisle, to say nothing of conservatives.

In the end, what I’m really trying to do is walk and chew gum at the same time. As a progressive, it’s my obligation to do all of the following:

• support populist movements like our local chapters of Occupy Wall Street
• phonebank, walk, fundraise and recruit volunteers to do what’s necessary to keep the nutcases who want to privatize libraries and fire departments out of office
• rout out and reduce the influence of “Third Way” Dems who can’t even be bothered to support regular Dems, to say nothing of more progressive candidates
• continue writing here and elsewhere on the insanity of the conservative movement, and on the fecklessness of elected Democrats who do not hold to progressive principles.

It’s a constant struggle to try to do all of those things almost entirely in an unpaid capacity, in addition to the boring mostly non-political work that actually puts food on the table. It’s a lot of balls to juggle. But each of them is critically important in its own way, and each piece of the puzzle is necessary for the success of the movement.

The protests won’t do any good if conservative bozos win elective office, but electing Democrats won’t do much good if there isn’t an angry populist movement and a solidly progressive Democratic infrastructure to back them up and hold them accountable if they backslide. It’s the only real theory of change that makes any sense to me, and that doesn’t smack of magical thinking.

Fortunately, I believe that we as progressives can walk and chew gum at the same time.

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Saturday Night at the Movies

I saw a film today, Pt. 1: Confessions of a Beatle fan

By Dennis Hartley

In the Summer of ’67, I discovered two things that changed my life. As much as I would like to be able to tell you that it was body painting, and sex on acid…I can’t. Mainly because I had only recently turned 11. The first thing I discovered was Mad Magazine (which undoubtedly explains a lot, to long-time readers). The second thing was record collecting. I still remember my very first vinyl purchase, blowing at least three months’ worth of allowance at the JCPenney in Fairbanks, Alaska. I purchased two LPs (at the whopping price of $3.98 each), and one 45 single. The LPs were Revolver and Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, and the 45 was “Penny Lane”/”Strawberry Fields Forever”…all by that band that, you know… Paul McCartney used to be in before Wings.

Flash-forward about 35 years or so. I was enjoying my first visit to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland. At the Beatles exhibit, I happened upon a glass case that contained some weathered pieces of paper with scribbles. I lingered over one in particular, which was initially tough to decipher, with all the crossed-out words and such:

“But you know I know when it’s a bean”? Huh? It still wasn’t really registering as to what I was looking at (the mind plays funny tricks sometimes). However, when I got to: “I think I know I mean-er-yes, but it’s all wrong. That is I think I disagree” I realized, Oh.My.(Rock) God. This is John Lennon’s original handwritten draft of “Strawberry Fields Forever”. I am bearing witness to the genesis of one my favorite songs. Here I stand, head in hand, with my eyes but inches away from a tangible manifestation of pure inspiration and genius. Suddenly, I panicked. Was I worthy enough to keep looking? Was my face going to melt, like the Nazis in Raiders of the Lost Ark when Belloq lifts the lid of the Sacred Object? “Don’t look at it, Marion!” I exclaimed, to no one in particular. At any rate, I was overcome; there was something profoundly moving about this experience.

Devoted Fabs fans may find themselves welling up a bit after viewing a slightly flawed yet still essential documentary from Martin Scorsese called George Harrison: Living in the Material World, which debuted on HBO last week. Clocking in at an epic three and-a-half hours (presented in two parts), it is the most in-depth cinematic portrait to date of “the quiet Beatle”. In fact, Scorsese (who, you may recall, so memorably employed Harrison’s “What is Life” for one of the musical cues in Goodfellas) seems to be on a mission to prove just the opposite. Harrison, we learn, not only had quite a bit to say, but was anything but reserved when it came to speaking his mind; he was no shrinking violet.

Nor did he necessarily spend all of his off-hours steeped in meditative Eastern spiritualism, sitting in full Lotus and strumming his sitar. He was, after all, a rock star; along with his three mates one of the biggest rock stars who ever lived, and wasn’t adverse to fully taking advantage of the perks at his disposal during the heights of Beatlemania. “He was a guy,” Paul McCartney offers coyly (referring to what one would imagine to be a lost decade of revelries that would probably make an ancient Roman blush). Harrison was very spiritual, but like any human being he was not perfect. Scorsese illustrates the dichotomy well, and it’s the most compelling element of this film.

Like its subject, the film is not 100% perfect. While nicely capturing the mood and the spirit of Harrison’s distinct musical eras (via a treasure trove of vintage footage, intercut with interviews) there is an occasional disconnect with the historical timeline (the uninitiated may be left craving more contextualization) There’s not too much 60s footage that I haven’t seen before (I’ve seen virtually everything Beatles). Still, Scorsese is such a great filmmaker, he makes what would seem a retread in lesser hands feel fresh and vital.

(Intermission)

Next Week: Top 10 Fab 4 Flicks! (same Beatle time, same Beatle station)

Very wrong of me to step on Dennis’ post I know, but in light of today’s events, this seems apropos — digby

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