Month: October 2015

It’s about power, people, and learning how to use it

by digby

Dave Dayen patiently explains how primary politics works:

On Wednesday, Clinton decided to oppose the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the just-inked trade deal with 12 nations that is a centerpiece of Obama administration second-term achievements. “The bar here is very high and, based on what I have seen, I don’t believe this agreement has met it,” Clinton said in a statement, cruelly timed to the moment that top White House officials were holding a conference call defending the deal.

This has sent a chill into the hearts of a particular Washington specimen: the self-appointed guardians of order. Mark Halperin flatly accused Clinton of lying about her opposition to TPP. Others pointed to Clinton’s praise for TPP in her recent book, or the 45 times she’s spoken out in favor of it. And Ezra Klein pronounced himself “unnerved” because it shows her as calculating and poll-driven.

In other words, the theory goes, Clinton is pandering, taking a position that she may not sincerely support to appease a faction of the constituency she wants in her corner. Unions don’t like TPP or the Cadillac tax, and with Bernie Sanders breathing down her neck, Clinton had to adjust her profile to keep their endorsements rolling in.

There are definitely signs that Clinton had prior (and very possibly, future) support for TPP. Her top policy advisor on the deal while at the State Department, Robert Hormats, praised it the day before she came out against it. If you take the temperature of those in her policy orbit, you would probably find more supporters than opponents.

But a lot has changed since November 2012, when Clinton called TPP “the gold standard in trade agreements.” One point she made in this week’s PBS interview on the topic is that, while at the State Department, she pushed for higher standards in the South Korean free trade agreement, yet was still disappointed in the results. “Even a strong deal can fall short on delivering the promised benefits,” Clinton said in her statement.

Indeed, the U.S.-Korea deal led to an 80 percent increase in the bilateral trade deficit and 75,000 U.S. jobs, according to the liberal Economic Policy Institute. So a retrospective view, combined with witnessing first-hand the struggles of the American worker on the campaign trail, may have brought Clinton to a considered change in viewpoint.

But the bigger issue is this: What’s wrong with pandering? Our system of government, as it has evolved, offers precious few opportunities for ordinary people to get into the national conversation. Big Money has a tight grip on governance through insistent lobbying, and for the most part they fund national elections.

For once, the Democratic nominating fight, and the emergence of Bernie Sanders, has given public interest groups a voice, a rare channel to impact the political system. We shouldn’t roll our eyes at that; we should respect it. National leaders should have to listen to their constituents and earn their support. Primaries are one of the only moments that allow such an opportunity.

The thing about outside leverage on politics is that it’s not static. It can change, and leaders can drop their panders when it suits them politically. Public interest groups and ordinary citizens must not take anything for granted and remain insistent. They are correct to look at this skeptically.

But here’s what we know from political science, a point made most eloquently by the same Ezra Klein who is so unnerved by Clinton’s position-taking: Politicians typically keep their campaign promises. Presidents may not fulfill them, but that has more to do with Congressional obstruction than a flip-flop.

In other words, locking in a particular endorsement in a primary has real lingering effects. That makes the process some call pandering, which I would call paying attention to your political base, all the more important. If you can move a candidate on an issue you care about, you can keep them in that position for a long time.

Read the whole thing. He’s 100% right. And this piece should also speak to certain progressives who are unfortunately pooh-poohing her opposition as being a meaningless pander and another sign of her inconsistency. That is a big tactical mistake.

Look, we cannot know what is in Hillary Clinton’s heart any more than we could ever know what was in Barack Obama’s heart or Bernie Sanders’ heart or any other politician’s heart. We don’t sleep with them or get drunk with them or share time on the psychiatrist’s couch with them. And we, as citizens, only have limited ability to hold them to their promises. Once elected, they’re in for their term and that’s that. So primaries are the only way we have to push these politicians to take positions that the grassroots care about.

In this race it’s working very well. As it happens a very lefty candidate is getting big crowds and is nipping at the front-runner’s heels. That’s good! Maybe he’ll win! But even if he doesn’t, this race is making all the candidates move left on a number of issues which means the system is working in liberals’ favor for a change. We should be thrilled.

Can we ensure that Clinton or Sanders will deliver on every one of these lefty goals in office? Of course not. Unlike the ignorant Tea Party who think that because 12 people in their district elected them that they are entitled to have their agenda enacted unchanged, liberals supposedly understand that our system of government requires some cooperation and compromise within the caucus itself and the government at large. We don’t delude ourselves into thinking they can single-handedly enact the platform they ran on once in office. (Right????) So we try to get these candidates on record, get them to commit to our agenda, try to provide them with a congress that can help them win and back them when they take progressive positions, and givem hell when they don’t. That’s our job as citizens and activists. At election time we try to move even more of our agenda into the platform. Wash, rinse, repeat.

I know that people get personally invested in candidates. It’s human. We all do it. But it’s also very important to keep in mind that this whole game is about leveraging power (and in the progressive sphere, empowering people, particularly those who have been marginalized and excluded.) We lefties don’t have a lot of levers to pull — money from small donors and primaries and that’s about it when it comes to the presidency. Where we have more clout is in the congress and if we spent as much time concentrating on that as we do on the American idol presidential race we might have more luck building progressive power that could actually do some good. A strong congressional check on any president who went back on his or her word without reasonable cause would be the best way to keep them accountable.

If you’d like to support some good progressive for congress this cycle, you can do so here. Blue America is seeking them out and trying to help them all over the country. As always.

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What can be done? 
In September I wrote a piece about changing how the media cover shootings following the WDBJ shootings. Following that I started talking to my friends at States United to Prevent Gun Violence, Media Matters and The Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. I also spoke to friends in the print and TV media. I started writing a few more pieces on steps to take to change the media coverage.
My goal was to help activists in each state better prepare for the next shooting the media deemed newsworthy. Then the mass shooting at Umpqua Community College in Oregon happened.

Lately I’ve been talking to my friends at Ceasefire Oregon, Nebraskans against Gun Violence, Arizonians for Gun Safety and Newtown Action Alliance.  I’ve adopted a 50 state strategy because your state could be next.

Read the rest here at Spocko’s Brain

About that war crime … Who’s taking orders from who in the Afghan war?

by Gaius Publius

There’s new reporting on the U.S. bombing of the Doctors Without Borders (Médecins Sans Frontières, or MSF) hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan. As you may know, Doctors Without Borders wants the incident, in which 22 people were killed, including patients who burned to death in their beds, investigated as a war crime. (You’ll see their reasons lower in this piece.)

Now, thanks to excellent reporting by Ryan Grim at Huffington Post, we have more information. The bombing was apparently done at the request of the Afghan military, who had also attacked the hospital with Special Forces less than three months before the U.S. bombing. 

The implications of the bombing are horrific. The implications of this new story are worse. Let’s say it is a war crime. Did we do it because the Afghans said to? Who’s taking orders from whom in that war? And do U.S. commanders even care whom they’re bombing, if they’re blindly bombing targets chosen by others?

If so, in the game of Genius and Bully, we’re just the bully. From Ryan Grim’s report:

Kunduz Hospital Was Raided By Afghan Special Forces Just Three Months Before U.S. Bombing

The raid hints at a motive for the strike.

Afghan special forces raided the Doctors Without Borders hospital in Kunduz less than three months before a U.S. bombing killed 22 staff members and patients.

The raid took place on the afternoon of July 1, according to a statement from the hospital at the time. U.S. authorities have since said that Afghan forces called in Saturday’s bombing, which lasted for more than an hour, and that the U.S. was unaware it was striking a hospital.

The previous raid suggests that Afghan authorities were aware the facility was a hospital and had a hostile relationship with its staff prior to calling in the U.S. bombing.

According to a statement posted online in July, “heavily armed men from Afghan Special Forces entered the [Médecins Sans Frontières] hospital compound, cordoned off the facility and began shooting in the air.”

“The armed men physically assaulted three MSF staff members and entered the hospital with weapons,” the statement continued. “They then proceeded to arrest three patients. Hospital staff tried their best to ensure continued medical care for the three patients, and in the process, one MSF staff member was threatened at gunpoint by two armed men. After approximately one hour, the armed men released the three patients and left the hospital compound.”

While the motive of the raid is unclear, Afghan forces have long protested the practice of providing medical treatment to insurgents. But international law says that as soon as a fighter is in need of treatment, he is no longer a combatant. […]

Note this: “U.S. authorities have since said that Afghan forces called in Saturday’s bombing…” Do Afghan forces direct American bombing? Again, the implications of just that sentence are pretty bad.

Is This a War Crime?

We’ve come a long way since World War II, when Nazi atrocities were prosecuted as war crimes, while incidents like the fire-bombing of Dresden and Tokyo, not to mention the destruction of Hiroshima, were not even brought up. Now we have ways to sometimes bring even the powerful to justice. The request of Doctors Without Borders? An independent international investigation.

Here’s a DWB statement (one of several) on the incident that plainly says there’s prima facie evidence of a war crime (my emphasis):

MSF is disgusted by the recent statements coming from some Afghanistan government authorities justifying the attack on its hospital in Kunduz. These statements imply that Afghan and US forces working together decided to raze to the ground a fully functioning hospital with more than 180 staff and patients inside because they claim that members of the Taliban were present.

This amounts to an admission of a war crime. This utterly contradicts the initial attempts of the US government to minimize the attack as ‘collateral damage.’

There can be no justification for this abhorrent attack on our hospital that resulted in the deaths of MSF staff as they worked and patients as they lay in their beds. MSF reiterates its demand for a full transparent and independent international investigation.”

And now from a CREDO petition also calling for an investigation (emphasis and footnotes in the original):

Sign the petition: Justice for Doctors Without Borders

In the middle of the night on Saturday, a U.S. military plane “repeatedly and very precisely” bombed a Doctors Without Borders hospital filled with doctors, nurses and wounded patients in Kunduz, Afghanistan.1

The airstrike killed twelve Doctors Without Borders staff members and ten patients, including three children, and injured scores more. Some patients literally burned alive in their hospital beds.2

So far, the Pentagon has only released incomplete and contradictory accounts of what happened and why.

On Sunday, Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) stated that: “Under the clear presumption that a war crime has been committed, MSF demands that a full and transparent investigation into the event be conducted by an independent international body. Relying only on an internal investigation by a party to the conflict would be wholly insufficient.”3

The world needs to know how and why this grave violation of International Humanitarian Law was committed.4 Those responsible for what we presume to be an atrocious war crime must then face justice. Please join Doctors Without Borders in calling for an immediate and independent international investigation.

Tell President Obama and Secretary of Defense Ash Carter: We join Doctors Without Borders and demand an investigation by an independent international body into the U.S. airstrike on the Kunduz
hospital.

The Pentagon initially claimed that the hospital was hit by accident after U.S. troops nearby came under fire and called in the airstrike, then later changed its story and said that no U.S. troops were in the area and that Afghan troops called in the strike.5

But the Pentagon’s story simply doesn’t add up. According to Doctors Without Borders: “Not a single member of our staff reported any fighting inside the MSF hospital compound prior to the U.S. airstrike on Saturday morning… We reiterate that the main hospital building, where medical personnel were caring for patients, was repeatedly and very precisely hit during each aerial raid, while the rest of the compound was left mostly untouched.”6

Further, “The bombing took place despite the fact that MSF had provided the GPS coordinates of the trauma hospital to Coalition and Afghan military and civilian officials as recently as Tuesday, September 29, [five days before the airstrike] to avoid that the hospital be hit.”7

Shockingly, the bombing continued for more than half an hour after Doctors Without Borders staff began making frantic calls to U.S. and Afghan military officials.

The Pentagon’s claim that the hospital was bombed by accident is also contradicted by statements by Afghan officials, who have tried to justify the attack by claiming that the hospital was used by the Taliban for military purposes. […]

You can sign the petition here. If our military is innocent, what do they have to fear, right?

And if you consider that, after 15 years of war in Afghanistan, it’s time to get out, you might give these folks a little of your time and attention as well.

(A version of this piece appeared at Down With Tyranny. GP article archive here.)

GP

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Thinking of you, Bob Inglis
by Tom Sullivan

The Village media are only slowly, maybe, opening their eyes to the fact that the T-party shock troops in the House really are off their nuts. (“Sie haben nicht alle tassen im Schrank,” as German friends used to say. They don’t have all their cups in the cupboard.) Frank Bruni describes them this way:

Those bomb throwers are mirrors of the voters who are saying no to Jeb Bush, no to Chris Christie, no to John Kasich, no to anyone who was once or could soon be the darling of the northeastern Acela corridor.

That’s describing GOP electeds and their constituents politely.

Digby already posted the transcript and video of Republican congressmen Charlie Dent and David Brat going at each other yesterday on Meet the Press. What was astounding was watching conservative talk-show host Hugh Hewitt dress down both of them:

HUGH HEWITT:

A pox on both your wings. I am very and desperately hoping that Paul Ryan is praying about it and accepts this and here’s my question. Yesterday a Russian jet was set down in Turkey. Yesterday almost 100 people were killed in Ankara, Turkey. The world is on fire. How dare you, with the American people waiting for leadership, paralyze the House? Charlie, you have to stop going on CNN and blasting David. And David, there are like 15 of you people. The Freedom Caucus is, like, 15 people. Paul Ryan’s is like by 225 Republicans. Get with the program, guys.

What Hewitt means is, can’t we all just drop some bombs? Real ones, not rhetorical? And the Götterdämmerung Caucus is a few more than 15.

The GOP insanity is bad news for Hillary Clinton, of course, but nothing Villagers have any journalistic reason not to have noticed before now. Michele Bachmann, Herman Cain and Rick Santorum four years ago were just the warm-up acts, Bruni notes. Plus South Carolina’s Trey Gowdy who defeated not-conservative-enough Bob Inglis in a June 2010 primary. Back home, the T-party called him “Bailout Bob” for voting to prevent the collapse of the U.S. financial system.

Who were those voters who pitched Inglis for T-party Trey Gowdy? Inglis, if you recall, discussed that in a post-primary interview with Mother Jones:

During his primary campaign, Inglis repeatedly encountered enraged conservatives whom he couldn’t—or wouldn’t—satisfy. Shortly before the runoff primary election, Inglis met with about a dozen tea party activists at the modest ranch-style home of one of them. Here’s what took place:

I sat down, and they said on the back of your Social Security card, there’s a number. That number indicates the bank that bought you when you were born based on a projection of your life’s earnings, and you are collateral. We are all collateral for the banks. I have this look like, “What the heck are you talking about?” I’m trying to hide that look and look clueless. I figured clueless was better than argumentative. So they said, “You don’t know this?! You are a member of Congress, and you don’t know this?!” And I said, “Please forgive me. I’m just ignorant of these things.” And then of course, it turned into something about the Federal Reserve and the Bilderbergers and all that stuff. And now you have the feeling of anti-Semitism here coming in, mixing in. Wow.

To any Villager just catching on to where these people are coming from, the immortal words of John McClane: Welcome to the party, pal!

Bo is 7

by digby

All first dogs are great. Always better than any human in the White House, no matter what party. But I don’t think there will ever be a better one than this:

And, by the way, no self respecting dog thinks any human is cool, as Bo proves here. To a dog we’re all dorks, even the president:

Via POlitico.

Dent vs Brat

by digby

(Are those a couple of evocative names or what?)

Anyway, if you missed it this morning the Charlie Dent, a very conservative member of the House who nonetheless understands how the government is structured and David Brat the braindead giant slayer who defeated Eric Cantor in a primary appeared on Meet the Press today and almost scratched each other’s eyes out:

CHUCK TODD:

Well, to discuss what Ted Cruz calls utter panic inside the Republican party, I’m joined by two strong voices representing two different wings of the party inside the House: Dave Brat of Virginia, he’s the man who arguably fired the first shot of the conservative revolution, or the most recent one within Congress, with his primary defeat of then House Majority Leader Eric Cantor back in June of 2014.

Also with us is Congressman Charlie Dent of Pennsylvania. He’s a strong moderate voice within the party. And he actually represents one of the few swing districts left in Congress. President Obama carried his district in 2008, and Mitt Romney narrowly carried it in 2012. Gentlemen welcome to both of you.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

Thanks Chuck.

CHUCK TODD:

Congressman Brat, let me start with you. You’re a member of the Freedom Caucus. What is it that you want, and what is it that Speaker Boehner, Kevin McCarthy, and Eric Cantor haven’t delivered?

REP. DAVE BRAT:

Right. Well, they all ran on a pledge to America. And just like your 72% of the folks out there in the real world, say, “We make these promises when we run, but then when we get up here, we’re called ‘unrealistic’ by the Washington establishment and the bubble up here.” What we want is what the American people want.

We have $19 trillion in debt, $100 trillion in unfunded liabilities. All federal revenues will be spent in 11 years on just entitlement programs and interest on the debt. There will be not one dollar left for the military, education, transportation, and all of running government. So the American people want us to make progress on that.

Plus, President Obama, when I came in last year in November, we had the unconstitutional amnesty. Our leadership said we were going to fight tooth and nail on that thing. It’s unconstitutional. President Obama said it 20 times on TV. Then you have overreach on all sorts of Dodd-Frank on the financial side, EPA regulation, a bad Iran deal. The people say, “Hey, step up and make the case for us.” And so that’s what we want to do.

CHUCK TODD:

Well, and Charlie Dent, Congressman Dent, I’ve heard and I think you’re one of those who have said this, your response to him, particularly in spending issues would be, “You’ve done what you can with a Democratic president.” Is that right?

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

Well, that’s correct. But in order to address all the policy issues David just discussed, we have to get back to functionality. We have to prove to the American people we can govern. And that means we have to make sure the government is funded. We must make sure that we’re not going to default on our obligations. We have to take care of transportation issues, tactics, extenders, et cetera.

To the extent that we are dysfunctional, we can’t address these major policy issues. So really the issue is this: is we need to expand the governance within the Republican party. Those who have the capacity to say yes. What we’ve seen in Washington are a lot of people who hope no, and then they vote yes. We saw that on the continuing resolution a few weeks ago, and we’re going to see it on a number of other issues going forward.

CHUCK TODD:

You know, it’s interesting. You were nodding, nodding, nodding, and then you went, “No, no, no.” Okay. Define the nod, and define the nos.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

The governing up in this place seems to always mean increased spending. That’s what it means up here in D.C. That’s not what governing means to the American people. Governing means getting the ship going in the right direction. So we have this budget chaos. Every year, right before Christmas, right? So we’ve got a CR coming up, we’re going to fund it. Then we have an omni coming up second week of December.

CHUCK TODD:

Using a lot of Washington speak here. I just want to say, a short-term budget deal, or a long-term compromise.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

Right. And so the point is, guess what? It’s going to be utter chaos. The left is going to throw in all their toys they want into this thing, the right’s going to throw it in. This was orchestrated on purpose, in my view. The budget committee finished its work back in April, May. Yeah, we voted the next step in the budget process, it goes to appropriations, 12 bills.

We passed five, the Senate only one. The Senate is a major problem. But we shouldn’t be waving a white flag ahead of time. Charlie’s kind of saying we should just give in and cave because we don’t have the votes in the Senate.

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

That’s not what I’m saying at all.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

The compromise comes later when we get to the White House.

CHUCK TODD:

Let me push back though on two different things here from each side of your argument. With you, Congressman Brat, at the end of the day, the conservative movement’s not a majority. And you don’t necessarily even have a governing majority inside the House. So if you don’t have that, how –when do you say, “Okay, I’m getting 50% of what I want, and it’s the best I can do now, as I go to the campaign so I can go elect a Republican president.”

REP. DAVE BRAT:

Totally disagree with the premise. We do have a majority. Last week on the CR, we had 153 Republicans vote against leadership’s budget. That’s the 153. The press is the only people that talks about these 40 guys and all the press today in The Washington Post said there’s chaos.

The only chaos up here is on K Street and then Democrats are freaking out because if we actually have to balance a budget, right, even Keynes, a liberal economist, knew you had to run surpluses in the good years so you could pay for the deficits in the bad years. We’ve had seven years in a row of $500 billion deficits. It’s terrible.

CHUCK TODD:

Let me– and Congressman Dent, one of, I think, Congressman Brat’s and other people’s complaints, and over half of the Republican Congress has been elected in the last six years. And their complaint is this: you know what, we get here, and we don’t have an opportunity to actually vote on the change, vote on some of the issues that we would like. Leadership tells us what we can or can’t do. We don’t get that opportunity to lose, essentially. Maybe we will lose. Maybe leadership’s right, but you don’t give us the opportunity to do it. What do you say to him on that?

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

Well, I think the leadership has been frankly very accommodating to those members who don’t vote for the bills at the end of the process. This happens routinely. And I think a number of us have had enough of it. David just mentioned 150 Republicans voted against the continuing resolution. I can tell you that over half the Republican caucus strongly supported the continuing resolution. Only 91 voted for it.

CHUCK TODD:

Why?

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

Why? Because again we’re back to hope yes, vote no. And they’d rather let the 91 of us take the flack, they can go home and tell folks that they stayed strong. This is a bill, by the way, that just level-funded the government for two and a half months. That’s all it did.

CHUCK TODD:

Alright, I want to do something. Go back to the future here meeting the rest of the press. I’m going to bring in my panel in here to join in the question. Eugene Robinson from The Washington Post, Hugh Hewitt, of course, who probably both of you have been on his radio show, Nathan Gonzales, who you both had an interview with before you actually won your office, and Kathleen Parker of The Washington Post. Hugh, fire away.

HUGH HEWITT:

A pox on both your wings. I am very and desperately hoping that Paul Ryan is praying about it and accepts this and here’s my question. Yesterday a Russian jet was set down in Turkey. Yesterday almost 100 people were killed in Ankara, Turkey. The world is on fire. How dare you, with the American people waiting for leadership, paralyze the House? Charlie, you have to stop going on CNN and blasting David. And David, there are like 15 of you people. The Freedom Caucus is, like, 15 people. Paul Ryan’s is like by 225 Republicans. Get with the program, guys.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

How do you know we’re not on the program? I mean, you’re doing fine.

HUGH HEWITT:

We support Paul Ryan. If he wins the conference, no, we support his agenda.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

Yeah, we have a constitution as a country, I’ve got five policy principles, and–

HUGH HEWITT:

And it’s not a hard question. Will you support Paul Ryan–

REP. DAVE BRAT:

Well, if you let me answer it, it’d be easier. I’ve got give policies on my webpage and five process. If he goes with that, we’re gonna give him a strong look.

HUGH HEWITT:

You’re holding the caucus hostage.

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

The answer is, yes, I will support Paul Ryan. But Paul Ryan is also a very smart man. The underlying governing and political dynamic of the House has not changed. Paul Ryan, if he becomes speaker, and I hope he does, what will happen is he will have to make accommodations and collaborate with the Democrats to pass a debt ceiling, to pass a budget agreement, and an omnibus appropriations bill.

If he does those things, he will have his legs taken up by some of his own members. We all know that. Now, if he chooses to go through the status quo, with the status quo, then the House will continue to be mired in this paralysis and the institution will be weaker, the speaker would be weaker. He’s going to have the same problems that John Boehner had and Kevin McCarthy is about to experience.

CHUCK TODD:

All right, Gene Robinson fire.

EUGENE ROBINSON:

Congressman Brat, your litany of complaints about the Obama years, ObamaCare, immigration, all the things that you complained about illustrate that you cannot set the national agenda from the House of Representatives. You simply cannot, that cannot be done. You have to win the White House. Are you not, with the Freedom Caucus, essentially making it less likely that there will be a Republican president elected next year? And then less likely that you’ll be able to set the national agenda?

REP. DAVE BRAT:

No, absolutely not. I mean, we’ve got pox on both of us coming from D.C. talking heads. And then–

(OVERTALK)

REP. DAVE BRAT:

What everybody up here is missing are the objective economic numbers. We have a guaranteed financial crisis in law coming up in 11 years. And we’re missing the American people. Go poll the American people. You want to know my response? I follow the American people. i don’t– Charlie here wants us to follow, like, a caucus or whatever. He wants to kick us out of our conference for voting our conscious.

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

I don’t want to do that.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

Well, you’re on record last week saying it.

EUGENE ROBINSON:

Populist support for Congress is–

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

I never said any such thing. That’s an outrageous thing to say.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

— It’s Sunday morning–

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

That’s an outrageous thing to say.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

–No, it’s absolutely true.

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

That’s not true. No, that’s–

REP. DAVE BRAT:

You said we “need to be punished,” end quotes.

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

No. I said we should marginalize people that don’t know how to governor, who don’t want to govern. I believe that members of Congress have a responsibility to govern. And that means, you know, Hugh raised the issue of the world being on fire.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

Yeah, right.

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

Shutting down the government in the middle of this would be a terrible thing. Our men and women in uniform need us to provide–

REP. DAVE BRAT:

Right, right.

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

–Some certainty and stability. He’s right. The world is on fire. So we have to get our act together. But the point is, for those who don’t want to govern, we have to establish bipartisan coalitions to pass any meaningful legislation–

REP. DAVE BRAT:

There you go again.

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

But that’s what we’ve had to do all year.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

So you want Nancy Pelosi to help determine our speaker for the Republican conference.

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

No, I want Republicans to, but you won’t support Paul Ryan.

REP. DAVE BRAT

Our own leadership, if I could just finish my sentence–

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

He just asked the question.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

How do you know that? I never said that.

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

He just asked the question.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

You’re missing it, Charlie. I just said I will support if he’s for the process and for the policy that the American people want. Everything I said, you want Nancy Pelosi to be in on speaking in our– and you want to kick out conservatives out of our own conference. It’s unbelievable–

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

You empowered Nancy Pelosi when you sided with her on the DHS appropriations bill. You sided with Nancy Pelosi on the Iran disapproval resolution.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

Charlie, you’re doing a discharge position and you sided with her on trade, a Republican–

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

–the Republican principle

CHUCK TODD:

Let him finish this sentence.

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

Not me, that was you who sided.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

That’s a sentence, good. Charlie, this week is doing a discharge petition with 40 Republicans to go with Nancy Pelosi to get the export/import bank back into play this week, going around the whole–

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

I’ll tell you why.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

–going against the whole committee structure of the Republican Congress–

CHUCK TODD:

Right.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

–that we’re trying to bring–

CHUCK TODD:

I’m going to jump in here, the final question.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

We need good process.

CHUCK TODD:

Final question here. When do you need to hear from Paul Ryan about whether he’s in or not? Does it need to happen in the next 24, 48 hours?

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

I don’t think it has to happen in the next 24, 48 hours. This is a tough decision. Paul’s a smart guy. He’s got to make a hard choice. May I address the discharge petition?

CHUCK TODD:

Very quickly.

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

Very quick.

CHUCK TODD:

Very fast.

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

Some of us, the governing wing, want to use the process to advance good legislation. Others want to use the process to obstruct–

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

–legislation.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

Crony capitalism.

REP. CHARLIE DENT:

We’re going the save a lot of jobs in Pennsylvania. We sent locomotives to developing countries that don’t have foreign capital market–

REP. DAVE BRAT:

Free markets.

CHUCK TODD:

Let me pause right here. Congressman Brat?

REP. DAVE BRAT:

Yeah?

CHUCK TODD:

Are you okay with Kevin McCarthy staying as majority leader?

REP. DAVE BRAT:

Yeah, absolutely. We have good talks with him. He came and talked with us. The whole conference is making great progress toward these reforms we’re talking about, getting back to regular order. Kevin was, “Yes, yes, yes” on that. So the talking points that we’re in this war, it’s overblown. Get to the facts.

CHUCK TODD:

All right, I am over time already. I promise.

KATHLEEN PARKER:

I didn’t get a turn.

CHUCK TODD:

Well, you’re going to get a turn later in the show. These guys have to get going. Thank you both.

Congressman Dent, I really think viewers got an understanding of the differences inside your conference. I appreciate it.

REP. DAVE BRAT:

Yes, thank you, thank you.

I think that speaks for itself.

And Howard Kurtz said that the liberals are over-hyping the GOP’s problems in the House:

KURTZ: Kevin McCarthy’s stunning decision to drop out of the election for speaker has thrown the house into an uproar. A very big story, no question about it, but some liberal commentators seem to be taking a certain glee in the GOP’s troubles. […]

Are the media in general and some liberal commentators in particular, turning this into, I don’t know, Armageddon?

Uh huh.

H/T to John Amato

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QOTD: Matt Yglesias

by digby

He responds to that disgusting piece of work Keith Ablow and his friend Ben Carson’s sick, anti-semitic implication that the Jews of Europe didn’t fight the Germans and if they’d just had a couple of shotguns in the basement and a few more handguns they would have beaten the SS and Wehrmacht. O at least they would have proved to armchair tough guys like Carson and Ablow that they were worthy of respect by pretending to be Hollywood’s Butch and Sundance and going out in a hail of gunfire.

Yglesias points out what anyone with a 6th grade education should know, which is that the wh9ole fucking world had trouble beating the Germans including untold numbers of Jews who died trying to do it.  (Grrrr, this is so outrageous that we even have to argue about it!)

He concludes with this:

The problem was that defeating the German military was hard. Here’s a photo of some Jewish partisans being hanged in Minsk in modern-day Belarus. Minsk is about 600 miles east of Berlin but the German military was there hanging Jewish anti-Nazi fighters because they had successfully defeated the Polish military, and then defeated the Soviet military in a number of battles allowing them to occupy vast swathes of Soviet territory. Hitler also conquered France, Norway, and a number of other countries that — like Europe’s Jewish population — fought back. They were simply unsuccessful. If you’re interested, here are ten great stories of Jewish resistance but they tend to end up being rather sad — the German war machine was sophisticated and ruthless.

That should sober up these inane right wing freaks but it won’t. They believe they would be able to hold off the US Military, a fighting force 100 times more powerful in every way than Germany in WWII. It doesn’t even occur to them that by blindly supporting the American global military empire, the government they fear and loath so greatly could turn on them and there is nothing they could do about it.  Having a cute little arsenal in your garage isn’t going to keep out Jade Helm, boys. Not if they really want to do it.

And the sick, depraved thing is that if this were to happen here it would be some right wing fanatic deciding to round up Muslims or Mexicans and Ben Carson and Keith Ablow would be right there helping the military do it. You know they would. In fact, Carson goes on and on about how armed Americans could “help” the military fight off a foreign invader:

“What I’m talking about is the reason we have a Second Amendment in there,” Carson explained. “In case of an invasion by foreign power, the people will be able to aid the military. And also, if we have a time when we have the wrong people in office and they want to dominate the people, the people will be able to defend themselves.”

As if the American military needs a bunch of yahoos with Ar-15s running around. But it’s worth thinking about exactly what he’s talking about there. He’s the guy who says we should use drone planes on the border, after all. And he’s not sure at all that Muslims can be loyal Americans.

He’s a very short-sighted person.

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The only way to stop a bad guy with a dildo is a good guy with a dildo

by digby

I think this should go national:

Students at the University Of Texas at Austin are planning to protest a new law that permits the concealed carry of handguns on campus — with dildos.

The “campus carry” law passed by the Texas legislature and signed by the Governor in June, requires UT Austin and the other campuses in the UT system to allow students to carry guns on campus. It gives the schools some discretion on how to implement the law.

The protest is designed to draw attention to the fact that carrying a dildo to class could be “prohibited expression” under university rules. The rules prohibit “any writing or visual image, or engage in any public performance, that is obscene.”

“You’re carrying a gun to class? Yeah well I’m carrying a HUGE DILDO. Just about as effective at protecting us from sociopathic shooters, but much safer for recreational play,” the organizer, Jessica Jin, wrote.

That’s what all this gun nonsense is really all about. Might as well make it explicit. I suppose there’s probably a case or two somewhere where a dildo killed someone. But it’s pretty rare.

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Sunday Funnies

by digby

Guns:

(Actually not so funny …)

McFadden:

Biden the healer


by digby


Here’s a good piece by Noam Scheiber about what happened in the 2011 budget negotiations.  I bring it up for those who buy this morning’s Village meme that Joe Biden is the man who can bring the country together.  If by bringing it together you mean getting hosed in negotiations with Republicans you might be right. The budget battles of 2011 were the lowest point of the Obama presidency and are the ugliest part of his domestic legacy. And no thanks to Biden.  Indeed, if it hadn’t been for the loons on the right who simply didn’t know what a fantastic deal they were being offered, if he’d had his way it would have been a whole lot worse. 

It turns out Obama made a critical if underappreciated mistake in the final hours of the back and forth: sending Joe Biden to haggle with Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell once McConnell’s talks with his Democratic counterpart, Harry Reid, had broken down.

From my after-the-fact discussions with Democratic aides in the House and Senate leadership, it’s clear that Reid had a plan for resolving the cliff and considered the breakdown of his talks with McConnell very much a part of it. By involving Biden, Obama undercut Reid and signaled that he wanted a deal so badly he was unwilling to leave anything to chance, even when the odds overwhelmingly favored him. It suggested that even if Obama plays his cards exceedingly well in the run-up to the debt-limit showdown, he could still come away with a worse deal than he deserves because of his willingness to make concessions in the closing moments.

Here’s what happened near the end of the cliff talks, as I understand it.

Read on for the details. In recent years Reid has banned Biden from negotiations and for good reason. 

But it is true, the Republicans love the guy so I’m sure Villagers are thrilled:

Mr. Cantor said he hoped the president would engage Mr. Biden more, recalling when the vice president negotiated a deal with presumptive Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Kentucky Republican, to head off the so-called “fiscal cliff” of tax increases and spending cuts at the end of 2012.

“Hopefully, I think the president may see the light and say if you want to get a deal done, bring in the deal man, Joe Biden,” he said.

Yeah, let’s bring in the “deal man”.

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