Digby's Hullabaloo Posts

Impulse Control

Quick, somebody ask head security mom, Cokie Roberts, if she thinks it’s ok for Republicans to act like juvenile delinquents on the taxpayers dime? The children are rewriting Democratic amendments to make them sound as if Democrats are trying to protect sexual predators. And no, this isn’t happening in some obscure local backwater. It’s in the US House of Representatives:

DEMS: a Nadler amendment allows an adult who could be prosecuted under the bill to go to a Federal district court and seek a waiver to the state’s parental notice laws if this remedy is not available in the state court. (no 11-16)

GOP REWRITE:. Mr. Nadler offered an amendment that would have created an additional layer of Federal court review that could be used by sexual predators to escape conviction under the bill. By a roll call vote of 11 yeas to 16 nays, the amendment was defeated.

DEMS: a Nadler amendment to exempt a grandparent or adult sibling from the criminal and civil provisions in the bill (no 12-19)

GOP REWRITE: . Mr. Nadler offered an amendment that would have exempted sexual predators from prosecution under the bill if they were grandparents or adult siblings of a minor. By a roll call vote of 12 yeas to 19 nays, the amendment was defeated.

Thank goodness the chairman of the committee stepped in and took control of his unruly charges.

Oh wait; he didn’t:

“And instead of decrying what I certainly expected would be revealed as a mistake by an overzealous staffer…The Chairman stood by those altered
amendment descriptions.

“He made very clear to the Rules Committee that the alterations to these members’ amendments were deliberate.

“When pressed as to why his committee staff took such an unprecedented action, the Chairman immediately offered up his own anger over the manner in which Democrats had chosen to debate and oppose this unfortunate piece of legislation we have before us today.

“In fact…He said, and I quote…”You don’t like what we wrote about your amendments, and we don’t like what you said about our bill.”

Oh boo fucking hoo. The Republicans are in total control. The Democrats can sit around all day long and call them a bunch of fascist nazi bastards and it doesn’t mean anything. And they still can’t stop whining.

The problem is that these people don’t really want to achieve anything. They are both in love with being victims and insist on being right. And they want everyone to acknowledge they are both right and victimized. What a bunch of big babies. It’s not enough to win, the other side must completely capitulate — and apologize.

As Tim Noah observed in this Slate article:

The fact is that the GOP doesn’t have an agenda. It has impulses: to cut taxes, to increase Pentagon spending, and to mollify the Christian right wherever possible. Does it act on these impulses? Of course. But what mostly gives the party appeal to the electorate is its ability to scream and yell while seldom being granted the opportunity to ban abortion or eliminate the Securities and Exchange Commission or declare war on France. It stirs things up satisfyingly, while never requiring anybody to pay the price.

The Republican party has a bunch of action items and a bunch of constituencies who want specific things, but this erstwhile great party of sober, prudent conservatism has shown that when it comes to running the country is more like an wild gang of teen-agers, terrorizing the neighborhood and drawing graffitti on the capital building. They operate on impulses that they cannot control.

There is a strain of macho, pouty, puerile, “Lost Cause” psychology in American politics going back a long way. These same people wielding almost total power and attempting to run our government as an expression of their sense of righteous victimhood is a uniquely undignified and degrading spectacle.

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Charming The Ladies

There has been a lot of talk on the left about how to appeal to the married woman voters who migrated to George W. Bush.

Perhaps we should just tell them that the spiritual leader of the conservative movement for which they are voting (and dear friend of Tom Delay and George W. Bush) has this to say:

“My observation is that women are merely waiting for their husbands to assume leadership.”James Dobson

I just have a feeling that the vast, vast majority of American women might find that a little but insulting. In fact, they might just find George W. Bush’s metaphorical soul kiss with the religious right kind of insulting when they see it in those terms.

Check out this post by Publius at Legal Fiction for an excellent rundown of quotes that we should put on posters and bumper stickers in anticip[ation of the next election.

Here’s one more from our favorite dachshund beater:

Newt Gingrich chooses somebody to respond to the president. Who did he choose? Christine Todd Whitman, the absolute antithesis of everything that [our] constituency stands for. She is pro-homosexual activism. She’s pro-condom distribution. She’s pro-abortion. She’s pro-partial-birth abortion. . . . They put a symbol [Whitman] of the immoral, amoral constituency up in front of the people who had just handed leadership to the Republicans.

That big tent is getting a little bit claustrophobic, isn’t it?

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Who Are We?

Ezra takes Kos to task for his proposed slogan “The Democrats are the party of people who work for a living” saying that it isn’t as effective as the successful Republican mantra “small government, low taxes, family values and strong national defense.” He says that the slogan should reflect an actual agenda, not some ephemeral platitude. I actually think they are both misunderstanding what that Republican list really is. Kos thinks it identifies who the party represents and Ezra thinks it’s a legislative agenda.

I don’t think it’s that simple. The Republicans say they stand for small government, low taxes etc, not that they’d like to pass “small government, low taxes, family values etc.” It isn’t a specific legislative agenda. Neither does it identify who the party represents. It’s a statement of belief. (Which, by the way, is used most successfully as a contrast to the “big government, high tax, ‘make-love-not-war'” hippie straw man they’ve constructed to represent liberalism.)

I’ll take a pass at a simple description of what Democrats stand for that we might successfully use to contrast our beliefs with the other side.

How about “fair taxes, a secure safety net, personal privacy, civil rights, and responsible global leadership?”

Update: Attaturk has a more straightforward idea:

“We aren’t as big a fuckups as those dumbasses.”

That’s good too.

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Hans and Franz

Kevin worries that using John Bolton’s malevolent personality as a reason for scuttling the nomination is bad news for us because it gives people like Bill Kristol an excuse to make the argument that Democrats are sissies.

It seems to me that nominations are almost always scuttled on trivial charges rather than the substantive ones. Nowadays, people are creating nanny problems for troubled nominees who don’t even have nannies. There seems to be a unspoken agreement that nominees will be allowed to bow out for some mistake or character quirk rather than a charge of incompetence or malfeasance. Perhaps it’s a strange form of face saving for the president who nominated the person.

And anyway, this isn’t really the Democrats’ play. As we all know, if it were only Democrats opposing Bolton he’d be in New York destroying the UN as we speak. It’s Republicans who are standing in Bolton’s way and it’s Republicans who Kristol is really taunting with that painfully stupid “girly-man” line.

I guess Voinovich is a girly man by Kristol’s standards, but he looks like a he-man to everybody else. He’s bucking a very powerful Republican machine and that takes cojones. That’s what Kristol is trying to stop. Who knows what might happen if the Republican moderates really start to flex their muscles?

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How Ever Will They Resolve This?

Can you believe this kabuki bullshit?

The Bush administration issued a veto threat again Tuesday against a popular highway bill, saying the president would be likely to reject any legislation that exceeds a White House-set spending ceiling or adds to the deficit.

The administration, in saying the legislation “should exhibit funding restraint,” was at odds with many in Congress, including some conservatives, who say the deteriorating state of the nation’s roads, bridges and public transport demands more aggressive spending.

[…]

The bill currently on the Senate floor, like the House bill passed in March, approves $284 billion over a six-year period for highway, mass transit and safety programs. The White House says anything above that number would subject the legislation to a veto.

It issued a second veto threat Tuesday on any new borrowing that “negatively impacts the deficit.”

[…]

The popularity of the bill was demonstrated when the Senate voted 94-6 on Tuesday to proceed with it. All six voting no were Republicans, several because they said the bill was too expensive.

But the chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, James Inhofe, R-Okla., said, “Those of us who are conservatives really believe this is something we should be doing here.”

Man, that codpiece is tight. Junior’s not gonna let a renegade Republican Majority pass that deficit spending crap. He’s tellin’ ’em to straighten up and fly right, damn it.

Still, with a vote of 94-6, it’s a little but unusual for a president to issue a veto threat since it could easily be over-ridden. How odd.

But hey, guys like Inhofe can at least say they voted for the highway bill which is almost as good as actually passing one. And heck, even if they end up passing one, The Big Kahuna shows that he’s a tough guy, which is almost as good as actually being one.

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Giving Voice To The Voiceless

I must admit that I too am very excited about Ariana Huffington’s new blog. As Roger Ailes put it so well:

The “MSM” has for too long silenced the voices of Jann Wenner, Barry Diller, Walter Cronkite and Norman Mailer.

Tony Blankely for too long has been denied a platform to slander George Soros.

Where else could Conrad Black’s dogsbody, David Frum, find a space to suck up to his beleaguered master?

Where else would Michael Medved find an wide audience for his completely sane theory that “oil companies are always anti-semitic.”

Where would the malnourished John Fund find a buffet that hasn’t blacklisted him?

And where but such a blog could Mort Zuckerman publish his thoroughly researched, scholarly papers on tort reform?

Finally, a forum for those who’ve been shut out of the dialog for far too long. This could be the blogging breath of fresh air that could finally shake up the establishment.

As the New York Times reports:

Having prominent people join the blogosphere, Ms. Huffington said in an interview, “is an affirmation of its success and will only enrich and strengthen its impact on the national conversation.”

Absolutely. None of these people have nearly enough influence on the national conversation. It’s long past time they spoke out.

Update: Lest anyone think I’m being a snotty nobody, let it be known that I think it’s great that Democrats (which Huffington now proudly calls herself) are putting some money into countering Drudge. But I do think the idea that these people need a separate media platform to be heard is kind of hilarious. Is anyone in the least bit in the dark about what Tony Blankley thinks about everything?

I am, on the other hand, curious to see if Maggie Gyllenhall has anything interesting to say. She was one of the few celebs who had the guts to speak out against the Iraq war when she was getting an acting award (Independent Spirit) so I find her admirable. Everybody ese, except for the Dixie Chicks and Michael Moore were disgustingly chickenshit. So, I’ll give her posts a read, out of appreciation for her courage if nothing else.

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Reading The Tea Leaves

Citing Yglesias for the second time (how does he do it?) I have to wholeheartedly agree with him on this one. This report by the PPI on why we should take on popular culture seems to follow all the blog talk in which it’s just assumed that this is an issue that will move votes. I’ve seen absolutely no actual data to indicate that people will vote Democratic if we join the moralizing bandwagon.

I do however, see evidence in the polls that says people don’t like this incursion into people’s personal lives by the Republican party — which would suggest that adopting this “morals-lite” agenda may just backfire.

Here’s some data from the Washington Post poll (pdf):

Do you think a political leader should or should not rely on his or her religious beliefs in making policy decisions?

Should:40%
Should Not:55%
Depends:4%
No Opinion:2%

Would you rather see religion have GREATER influence in politics and public life than it does now, LESS influence, or about the SAME influence as it does now?

Greater:27%
Less:35%
Same:36%
No opinion:1%

23; Do you think that people and groups that hold values similar to yours are gaiing influence in American life in general these days, or do you thinks that they are losing influence?

4/24/05:
Gaining:35%
Losing:58%
Neither:6%
No opin:2%

8/16/98:
Gaining:35%
Losing:55%
Neither:6%
No opin:4%

24. Which political party, the Democrats or the Republicans, do you think better represents you own personal values?

4/24/05:
Dems:47%
Reps:38%
Neither:10%
No Opin:2%

3/14/99:
Dems:47%
Reps:39%
Neither:8%
No Opin:3%

25. Generally speaking, which political party, the Democrats or the Republicans, do you think is more:

4/24/05
a. tolerant of different
kinds of people and
different points of view:

Dems:63%
Reps:24%
Both:4%
neither:5%
No opin:4%

b. sympathetic to religion
and religious people

Dems:34%
Reps:48%
Both:6%
neither:6%
No opin:7%

9/17/00
a. tolerant of different
kinds of people and
different points of view:

Dems:62%
Reps:22%
Both:4%
neither:4%
No opin:8%

b. sympathetic to religion
and religious people

Dems:41%
Reps:36%
Both:6%
neither:5%
No opin:11%

27. Do you think religious conservatives have too much influence, too little influence or about the right amount of influence over the Republican Party?

4/24/05
Too Much:40%
Too Little:17%
About the right amount:37%
No Opin:6%

Do you think liberals have too much influence, too little influence or about the right amount of influence ovewr the Democratic Party?

4/24/05
Too Much:35%
Too Little:21%
About the right amount:38%
No Opin:5%

Now, none if this proves anything with respect to whether the Democrats should attack popular culture as a way of connecting with voters on the allegedly all important values issues. Clearly, this doesn’t address that specifically. But it does address the fact that people seem to be more concerned at this point that politicians are too influenced by religion than that they are not influenced enough. And that tells me that we would be going in exactly the wrong direction if we think to capture a majority by twisting ourselves into pretzels on morals and values. The proponents certainly haven’t produced any data that would say otherwise.

It is true that the Republicans are perceived as more sympathetic to religion nowadays than they were back in 2000, but why wouldn’t they be? They are drenched in religious rhetoric and seem to be wholly at the mercy of the religious right. (You’ll note that at least some of their gain on the issue stems from many fewer people saying they have no opinion on the matter. It didn’t used to be understood that politics and religion were so intertwined.)

And in that respect, it doesn’t appear to be a net positive that they are now perceived as more sympathetic to religion, particularly considering the first question I highlighted, which is “do you think a politician should or should not rely on his or her religious beliefs in making policy decisions?” A clear majority say no. And 71% of people say that religion should have the same or less influence as it has today.(Significantly, more people think it should have less influence than think it should have more.) It does not appear to me that people are clamoring for more religious moralizing from politicians.

Indeed, the most interesting result in all of this is that more people say that Democrats represent their personal values than Republicans, and that number hasn’t changed since 1999. So if more people have identified with Democrats on personal values since 1999, the genesis of the Bush Frist Travelling Salvation Show, it seems pretty clear to me that values aren’t the reason we are losing. In fact, if they keep it up, it’s looking as if the Republicans will be the ones to lose on that issue in 2006.

I think that the question that pollsters have to ask is if people think it is more important for the government to be tolerant of different kinds of people and different points of view or if they think it’s more important for government to be sympathetic toward religion. In that choice lies the answer to how we should proceed.

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Living In The Now

Matt Yglesias makes thepoint today (along with a number of other liberal publications and intellectuals) that the Democrats would be better off without the filibuster:

“…however opportunistic the judges-only anti-filibuster stance is, the reality is that the nuclear option will pave the way for Democrats to eliminate legislative filibusters as well whenever they find themselves in the majority. When that happens, the GOP will find that while their only big legislative idea — tax cuts, tax cuts, and more tax cuts — is already immune to the filibuster, they can no longer block Democratic ideas.”

I think that this would be true only in a world where double standards and lack of accountability did not rule. One would think that in the future, you could argue quite reasonably that the Republicans insisted back in 2005 that the filibuster against judicial nominees was undemocratic and the Democrats now just want to end that undemocratic practice altogether. Surely, since the Democrats acted out of principle then, the Republicans will act out of principle now and support this change. After all, they wouldn’t want to be called hypocrites for saying one thing in 2005 and another now, would they?

Needless to say, this will never happen. The modern Republicans do not worry about such things as consistency and the press shows no inclination to hold them accountable for anything they’ve ever done.

Crooks and Liars has the video today of the Walter Cronkite broadcast of October 2, 1968 — the day that Abe Fortas withdrew his nomination for Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Why? Because THE REPUBLICANS FILIBUSTERED IT!!!!

Here’s the quote from the Republican minority leader at the time Robert Griffin:

I believe that any chief justice should have widespread support among the people and the senate of the United States. In view of the deep division and the controversy that surrounds this nomination, I think Mr Fortas’ decision was very wise.

Just as the GOP argues that the fact that Orrin Hatch routinely prevented Clinton’s nominees from getting an up or down vote bears no relationship to filibustering nominees for the same end, the Republicans say that the principle involved in the Fortas filibuster was entirely different. He was being nominated for Chief justice which is nothing like being nominated for federal judgeships or just plain old Supreme Court judges. The principle is entirely different! Apples and oranges, my friends.

And I have read almost nothing in the press that makes it clear that the Republicans are being hypocritical on this issue. In fact, the Sunday gasbags and the likes of Dean Broder seem to be more concerned about the “principle” that Bush should be allowed to get anything he wants while the Democrats negotiate for the right to breathe the same air as he does. And Broder, anyway, should surely remember that Fortas was filibustered. He wasn’t young, even then.

And just as the Republicans would not be held responsible for their hypocrisy on this issue, neither would the Democrats be given any credit for being consistent. Nobody in the chattering classes gives a shit about any of that so it has absolutely no salience for future battles. The only thing that matters in these situations is if one of the parties reaches a point at which it will force the other to play chicken. This only happens when one party is so arrogant that they are willing to bet that they will not be retaliated against in the future. This battle is the Democrats’ way of saying that they most certainly will face retaliation — and right here and right now. Damn the future of the filibuster. At some point you just have to let bullies know that you won’t be rolled.

I suspect that the American people would find it disconcerting if they knew that the GOP is shamelessly hypocritical, but there is no evidence that they will be informed of this, so it isn’t going to happen. What does appear to be happening is a common sense response to majoritarian bullying — by more than 60%, the public doesn’t want the filibuster to be eliminated. I suspect this is because they figure it’s always good to have some brakes on the party in power. And that would very likely be the response if Democrats tried to end it when they are in power as well.

At this point I think there is no margin in trying to strategize with the idea that we will want to do something when we get back into power. As they have often done in the past ten years, the Republicans will merely adjust the argument to suit their needs at the time and the media will not call them on it.

Besides, we need to win as many battles as we can, right now. Our biggest problem isn’t that the American people don’t agree with us on the issues; I think it’s that they don’t think we are willing to fight for them. Look at this Washington Post poll (pdf). Not only does it show that a majority of Americans agree with our position on the issues, it shows that they agreed with our position on the issues before the election. The Repubicans have convinced themselves that our losing record on elections proves that the country is strongly behind them and that they cannot lose again. And just as they did in 1992, they are going to lose their minds when this is proven wrong.

This Democracy Corps (pdf) poll says:

The most visible political battles of the last three months have taken place around the Congress – the president’s Social Security initiative, Terri Schiavo, Tom DeLay’s ethics issues and the debate around the filibuster rule for consideration of judicial nominees. Even when presented in the most neutral way, people respond to the totality and say, most often, that something is very wrong. Indeed, in the open-ended follow-up to this discussion in the survey, the mostfrequent reactions are “wrong, wrong, wrong,” “very wrong,” “wrong in every sense.” One in five offers a simple declarative negative: “bad,” “horrible,” “pathetic,” “unbelievable,” “disturbing,”or “shocking.”

Other sets of comments, each mentioned by about 6 percent, focused on the Republicans
acting irresponsibly or recklessly (“out of control”) and the Republicans being intrusive and (interfering in personal matters.]

The open-ended reactions focused on the totality, though more about Schiavo than any
other piece – which included interfering and being moralistic – and some talked about wrong priorities, wrong direction and the conservatives’ ideological agenda, but there was very little specific recall of the Social Security reforms.

When given a list of options that might describe these events, the voters gravitated to “arrogance of power” (35 percent) and priorities (26 percent), that is, Republicans devoting their time to the wrong things. Somewhat further down were people saying “out of touch” (20 percent)and “forcing views on others” (20 percent). But for independents and moderates, 45 percent say this is arrogance, the top mention by far.

The Republicans are finally showing their spots. We must allow that revelation to unfold and as we do it, we will show that we stand for something by standing together against this arrogance of power. I doubt that eliminating the filibuster for judicial nominees will accrue to our advantage even when we obtain a majority; I’m certain it will not accrue to our benefit today. Acceding to the Republicans’ arrogance and hubris is the surest way to reinforce the idea the Democrats are simply useless.

Updtae: This is rich. Read this post by DHinMI at The Next Hurrah about the Fortas nominations. The son of above mentioned Republican leader Robert Griffin, is one of the judges being denied an up or down vote. Sweet.

And be sure to read the tortured argument from that hack C. Boyden Gray about why this is entirely different. Not only is it absurd, it’s factually incorrect.

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Public Service

I am on a couple of right wing mailing lists for which I am grateful because it allows me to keep up with the real Americans and what they are thinking. Here’s what they are sending around on social security.

TO TRUST A MATTRESS OR A DEMOCRAT?

Democrats, and Republicans too, have got us all confused about Social Security, but here is an explanation that even the mentally retarded can follow. The average American makes $16.05 per hour according The Bureau of Labor Statistics; lives to age 77 according to the Center for Disease control, officially retires at age 66 according to a law passed by Congress, and contributes 12.4% of his income to Social Security according to a legalized scam perpetrated by the Democrats.

So, $16.05 (per hour) x 40 (hours per week) x 52 (weeks per year) x 46 (years worked) gives you $153,566 that is now stolen by the Democrats, but might have been put in your mattress. To disguise this grand larceny the Democrats give back $952 (average Social Security monthly check) and say, ” the math is very complicated but trust us, this is a great deal; we love you and care for you, and those Republicans are just so selfish and mean.”

But, if you had been free from Democrats to put the 12.4% each pay period ($153,566 in total ) in your mattress until retirement, and then lived the average 11 years longer, you could take 22% more ($1163) per month in retirement income than the Democrats give you!

For those who are fortunate enough to fall above the retarded level of intelligence it is known that money, rather than being invested in a mattress, can be invested in a balanced Republican fund of stocks and bonds where it might return, conservatively, 5%, in which case the return would not be 22% above the Democratic grand theft return, but rather 422% above the Democratic grand theft return.

In point of fact, many Americans retire to a life at or near the poverty level because the Democrats steal their money by convincing them they are the caring Socialist Party. Sadly, those who can’t understand this are not functionally above the mentally retarded level, but rather have fallen prey to the same pack animal mentality that throughout history caused them to worship and trust strange Gods and stranger men who were far more likely to use that trust to kill or abuse them rather than to care for them. It all makes you wonder if the Jeffersonian concept of freedom from Gov’t is too unnatural to prevail in the end.

It’s interesting that they use the term mentally retarded, isn’t it? But then, it’s real Americans like this who elected fellow math whiz and actuarial expert, Junior Codpiece, to the presidency.

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Diluting The Argument

Via Talk Left, I find this interesting article by constitutional scholar (and self-professed moderate) Marci Hamilton. She seems to be a true centrist, seeing the limitations and extremism coming from both sides of the political divide. She’s obviously very smart, which is why I cannot believe that she begins her argument with this:

In recent years, the Supreme Court has been pilloried by the far right for being “activist” – while at the same time also being castigated by the far left for being “imperialistic.” When these kinds of allegations are trotted out by both ends of the political spectrum, it is very good evidence that what the Court is doing is neither activist nor imperialistic.

That’s not good evidence at all. All it means is that both sides have criticized the court; it says nothing about whether those criticisms are correct. Her reasoning is that if two parties criticize something, the object of their criticism must,therefore, not be guilty of either sides’ criticism. That’s nonsense. It could very well be true that the court is activist or imperialist or both or neither.

The press often uses this fallacious reasoning to fail to investigate whether criticisms of them might be true. If both liberals and conservatives are angry with something they wrote, then what they wrote must be correct. It’s lazy rubbish.

In fairness Hamilton goes on to make a persuasive case that the court is neither activist nor imperialist, but it is based upon her analysis of the arguments not the “evidence” that the court is criticized by both sides.

I would argue, however, that there is a difference in scale and power that she should have taken into account. The alleged attacks coming from the “extreme” left about imperialism are many magnitudes less significant than those coming from the right. By framing this argument as if both “extremes” are equal in the daily discourse she gives a false impression of the weight of the arguments and their practical implications in the coming judicial battles.

The liberal argument about “imperialism” is simply not on the table. Nobody is talking about it and there is no notion that any judicial nominee or any public criticism of the court is going to be swayed by this point of view. Hamilton makes an excellent argument against the idea that the Supreme Court is activist. But to offer this analysis as if the left’s criticism of the Court has the same level of relevance at this time and place is to dilute the power of her reasoning.

These are difficult times for moderates of all stripes, I know. But the present danger is coming quite clearly from the far right. Left wing legal arguments are simply not important at the moment and trying to use their academic musings to create a sense of balance, when the real danger the court faces is from right wing extremists who have the ear of a very powerful and ambitious Republican establishment, is a mistake. This is no theoretical discussion. Moderates can make a real difference this time and they need to be careful that they don’t give anyone reason to believe that this is politics as usual. This is one issue on which they need to take a clear and uncompromising stand — if they don’t, the default goes to those with the political power and the consequences of that are quite stark.

correction: spelling corrected

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