Digby's Hullabaloo Posts

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.

.

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.

.

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

.

Master Of Disaster

Republicans who have been lobbied by Bush say he is uncommonly engaged in the issue and more passionate than they have seen him since he was pushing his signature education initiative in 2001.

“You could see him sitting on the edge of his chair,” said Rep. Bobby Jindal (R-La.).

Bush typically focuses his pitch on detailing the long-term strain on Social Security’s resources and argues that it should be addressed sooner rather than later. “If we are going to be able to address and fix this problem, people need to be educated about the scope of the problem,” one Republican quoted him saying.

Whereas some analysts and associates have portrayed Bush as a brusque manager impatient with policy details, lawmakers see a different picture when he discusses Social Security. He has become a master of actuarial arcana, such as the concept of a “bend point” — a feature of the complex formula for calculating benefits.

Yes. His mastery of actuarial arcana is very impressive:

Because the — all which is on the table begins to address the big cost drivers. For example, how benefits are calculate, for example, is on the table; whether or not benefits rise based upon wage increases or price increases. There’s a series of parts of the formula that are being considered. And when you couple that, those different cost drivers, affecting those — changing those with personal accounts, the idea is to get what has been promised more likely to be — or closer delivered to what has been promised.

Does that make any sense to you? It’s kind of muddled. Look, there’s a series of things that cause the — like, for example, benefits are calculated based upon the increase of wages, as opposed to the increase of prices. Some have suggested that we calculate — the benefits will rise based upon inflation, as opposed to wage increases. There is a reform that would help solve the red if that were put into effect. In other words, how fast benefits grow, how fast the promised benefits grow, if those — if that growth is affected, it will help on the red.

One can certainly understand why people would feel comfortable trusting their financial security in retirement to this man. I’m quite sure it’s why he’s been so successful with the issue so far.

.

Confirmation Conundrum

I haven’t written much about the Bolton nomination because I pretty much said everything I thought about him in the first year of this blog, when I railed considerably about the bizarre notion that an insane, Jesse Helms protege should be in charge of arms control. Garance writes about this over on TAPPED today confriming one of the things that’s bothered me about the Bolton fight; if he isn’t confirmed for the UN, he just goes back to the State Department where he can do even worse damage in his current position. Remember, he was given the UN nomination in order to get him out of there in the first place.

I have no reason to believe that the loyal Bolton will be shamed into quitting the administration entirely. Has anyone? It just doesn’t happen. No, he’ll just continue running around the world having temper tantrums in front of people like Kim Jong Il and browbeating the intelligence community into giving him the names of Americans on whom they are spying.

Nobody leaves a Bush administration official in the corner…any Bush administration. Hell, they’ve revived Eliot Abrams and John Negroponte. Unless Bolton wants to leave, nobody will ask him to. He’ll be back in charge of arms control.

Not that we shouldn’t have fought to take him out. The Republicans have shown that in modern politics you fight every battle to the death and worry about tomorrow, tomorrow. It’s a helluva way to run a country, but there it is.

.

I Know You Are But What Am I

Matt Yglesias wonders why the Republicans have been so blase about nominees lying outright to the Senate during their confirmation hearings when they may very well be at the mercy of Democrats in the future. Yesterday, Bill Frist righteously rebutted the argument set forth by some Republicans that the nuclear option would leave them powerless when Democrats came into power, by saying that if it was wrong for Democrats today it would be wrong for Republicans tomorrow. In truth it doesn’t matter.

The trouble is that the IOKIYAR (it’s ok if you’re a republican) phenomenon is not just a little blogospheric joke. It’s quite real and it’s been demonstrated over and over again. There is absolutely no reason for the Republicans to fear that they will be held to the same standard as they hold Democrats, ever. These lies by Bush appointees are not going to be investigated and they will always remain in the realm of he said/she said, old news, whyareyoubringingthisupnow. Fuggedaboudit.

For instance, Matt brings up the fact that the Bush administration has hired convicted congressional liars from the iran Contra era. But, one must also remember that those same convicted liars were all pardoned by George Bush Sr at a time when he was personally under investigation by a special prosecutor, thus effectively ending the probe. Immediately after Senior left office, however, there began a relentless series of demands by Republicans for special prosecutors investigating a list of shockingly trivial charges that eventually led to the impeachment of the president. The Republicans didn’t worry that someone would make comparisons that would embarrass them. They are unembarrassable because they have found that they can ignore the prinicples of relevant difference, the universality principle, the golden rule or whatever you want to call it, and there will be no repercussions.

It may be that this is caused by a media that refuses to take a stance on even factual matters, which leaves people with the impression that there are no standards except those which are imposed by the loudest, the most powerful, the most entertaining or whatever. It’s a big problem for us in the reality based community, however, because we remain stuck in this rational mode of argumentation while they careen off into a relativist fallacy whenever they choose.

In other words, there are no rules — only actions that will keep them in power or strip them from it. The fight each battle separately and don’t worry about the one they are going to fight tomorrow. And when the worm has turned and Democrats gain power again, everything will go back to square one and all of the the crimes that we spent that last five years screaming to get covered and investigated will be turned by the Republicans into indictments of Democrats.

Yesterday, James Dobson, alleged arbiter of moral standards, came to a ringing defense of Tom DeLay. Using the approved right wing talking points, he claimed that DeLay was the subject of a witchhunt financed by liberal millionaires. This is, of course, exactly what they did to Bill Clinton for eight long years. They have no sense of embarrassment at this; no sense of irony; not even a little bit of shame for unoriginality. No, it is as if these arguments have never been uttered before and have the full force of moral righteousness even though it is, to our eyes, infuriatingly absurd. And, in truth, because we have uttered these words for so long they are out in the ether with some feeling of received wisdom to those who don’t follow the details of political warfare. (They are good at taking our received wisdom and turing it to their advantage. I wish we would start doing the same.)

The Republicans are rejecting reason in science, economics, rhetoric and governance and therefore we cannot expect that rules based upon a rational assumption that they will be applied to both sides equally are even relevant. We fight each battle anew. It’s never over. Nothing is settled. This is why they hate the courts. Reason and finality are their enemy. These are the “I Know You Are But What Am I” Republicans and they have taken us into a new world of post enlightenment reality. We’d better get used to it.

.

Who Made Mr Gannon?

Huckster Sunday is positively reeking with big huckster news. Raw Story has the results of the Gannon FOIA requests that show that he had some very unusual access to the White House. Why, he was there on days there weren’t even any press briefings. And he frequently appears to have spent the night. (Well, he didn’t sign out, anyway. One wonders if that’s normal protocol.)

But that’s not all the Gannon goodness we have today and it’s not even the best. Michael Dietz of Reading A1 has a great investigative piece on Alternet about how Jimmy became Jeff.

Reading this would almost make you think that somebody helped him form a new identity.

When JD pulled up stakes at the beginning of 2002, Bulldog went with him, at least for a time. His profiles, some of which were live on the web until recently, seem to have stopped being updated after May of that year. His last client review, though, posted Nov. 12, comes weirdly late in the game. Perhaps significantly, that review describes Bulldog as “a very well-rounded man who is interested in talking about everything from the Orioles to politics.” It seems almost like a coded message, a kind of sly wink. Because politics, now, was on the agenda: and Jeff Gannon, the D.C. insider of Bulldog’s dreams, had that very day published his first editorial.

The Birthing of Jeff Gannon

Jan. 18, 2003, a day of nationwide Iraq war protests, was clear and cold in Washington hovering just above the freezing point. The tens, even hundreds of thousands who rallied on the Mall and marched to the Capitol needed whatever warmth they could husband. So did the relative handful of counter-protesters organized by an apparently one-off group called MOVE-OUT (Marines and OtherOther Veterans Engaging Outrageous Un-American Traitors) and by the D.C. chapter of the national Free Republic organization. For those 50 or so pro-war right-wingers, who managed to attract almost as many attending press, warmth was conveniently available in the form of a sympathizer’s apartment located close to their rally point at 8th and I Streets. Joel Kernodle of MOVE-OUT made sure to mention it in his after-event thank-yous:

I would like to thank the Marines who went there with me, the folks at FreeRepublic and especially Kristinn Taylor and Raoul [Deming], U.S. Navy Capt. Frank Davis who gave us a place to call home while we were there, [and] Jeff Gannon “The Conservative Guy” who has a web site and writes and speaks to conservative issues, who let us use his place just off the march route for an on-site headquarters.

JD Guckert had left his two-bedroom duplex in Wilmington just a year earlier, and he had left “his guys,” the TKEs, under a small cloud of mystery. It was a deliberate effect. “The only time [JD] had ever actually mentioned working for a living,” the Mu Alpha brother who spoke to us said, “was when he moved to D.C., and even then all that he mentioned was that he needed security clearance and that he would be working as a ‘contract negotiator’ for a DoD subcontractor.” Though likely no more real than JD’s Marine play-acting, in one respect the hush-hush fantasy rings true: having arrived in D.C., James Guckert vanished. His appearance in the background of the Free Republic rally (along with his attendance at another D.C. Freeper event, a Sean Hannity book-signing) marks one of the only times in an entire year when the man who had been JD is visible in any location outside of cyberspace.

Everything solid in JD’s life — his residence, his place of work, his circle of friends — melts into air. We can surmise the actual date of his move only from its probable trace in the internet records: on Jan. 25, 2002, the domain “theconservativeguy.com” was created. (The registration, to a “J. Daniels” of Bedrock Corp., referenced a Delaware address, a mail drop just down the road from JD’s old duplex.) It would be at least another four months of silence before a web site appeared at the new domain, and the Conservative Guy announced his existence.

What was happening in those blank, incubatory months? (An almost identical period of latency, oddly, separates the registration of “jeffgannon.com” in mid-June from the first appearance of Jeff Gannon’s byline on the web in November.) With its crude layout, minimal graphic design and limited, untimely content, the Conservative Guy web site itself hardly demanded so much lead time. Perhaps the work had gone into crafting the identity.

And how, exactly, did he make a living during this period? Did someone “meet” him and think that a man who not one person remembers ever making a political remark in this life could be a perfect blank slate? Did this man whose entire life has been spent as an office worker in dull and colorless businesses in rural Pennsylvania just suddenly have a Walter Mitty fantasy that happened to come true?

Who created Jeff Gannon?

.

Huckster Sunday

James Dobson is quoting Thomas Jefferson right now, a man who would never stop PUKING if he knew what these religions extremists were trying to do.

The delusion is so extreme that he just said that the ultra conservative Rehnquist Court is out of control — because they aren’t conservative enough.

And the Supreme Court caused the civil war.

Bill Frist said some Republicans are opposed to ending thefilibusters, because they may someday want to use the same tactics against the Democrats. He said, “that may be true. But if what Democrats are doing is wrong today, it won’t be right for Republicans to do the same thing tomorrow.” He could have added, “besides, right or wrong for Republicans is irrelevant because we did it yesterday and got away with it and we can get away with it tomorrow; nothing we say or do is based upon any principle whatsoever.”

It is important for people to understand how the Republican Party sold its soul to these radicals and blame those who made it happen. An article from some years back in TNR called “The Right’s Robespierre” which predicted a conservative crack-up back in 1997, laid it all out. The crack-up didn’t happen then and it may not happen now. But if it does, there are some very particular individuals to blame — Paul Weyrich and Morton Blackwell notably at the top of the list:

Finally, on the verge of realizing his right-wing utopia, Weyrich harvested what his friend Morton Blackwell termed “the greatest track of virgin timber on the political landscape”: evangelicals. “Out there is what one might call a moral majority,” he told Jerry Falwell in Lynchburg, Pennsylvania [sic], in 1979. “That’s it,” Falwell exclaimed. “That’s the name of the organization.” Weyrich, who had converted from Roman Catholicism to the Eastern Orthodox church after Vatican II, did more than coin the name; with a handful of activists, he engineered the alliance between the Republican Party and the growing number of evangelicals angry over abortion rights and federal intrusion in parochial schools. Less than a year later, Ronald Reagan walked into the White House.

It seems that people like me have been predicting that the Republican party would splinter because of these extremists in their midst for a long time now. The coalition has never made much sense. Weyrich and Blackwell and their proteges like Grover Norquist don’t give a damn about religion, of course — or at least any religion other than “conservatism.” Evangelicals are just a special interest voting block to these people. And I suspect that being the hucksters they are, most of the preachers who are agitating for political power today don’t really give a damn either. Most of them are simple hypocrites at best and violent immoral power mongers at worst.

Regardless, I think it’s clear that they believe their time has come. They are flexing their muscles. Maybe Weyrich and Blackwell think it’s just fine and maybe they will win in the end. But, when they invited religious zealots to sit at the table with them and run their movement they gambled that a majority of the American people would go along if it came down to it. It looks like we’re about to see if it paid off.

And it’s interesting to note that on Tim Russert’s Sunday Mass, it wasn’t even mentioned.

Update: Here’s a sincere and righteous liberal vow on Justice Sunday from Shakespeare’s Sister.
.

Shaking ‘Em Up

Just in case there’s any question about what the Religious Right is up to:

An audio recording obtained by the Los Angeles Times features two of the nation’s most influential evangelical leaders, at a private conference with supporters, laying out strategies to rein in judges, such as stripping funding from their courts in an effort to hinder their work.

[…]

“There’s more than one way to skin a cat, and there’s more than one way to take a black robe off the bench,” said Tony Perkins, president of the conservative Family Research Council, according to an audiotape of a March 17 session. The tape was provided to The Times by the advocacy group Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

DeLay has spoken generally about one of the ideas the leaders discussed in greater detail: using legislative tactics to withhold money from courts.

“We set up the courts. We can unset the courts. We have the power of the purse,” DeLay said at an April 13 question-and-answer session with reporters.

[…]

The March conference featuring Dobson and Perkins showed that the evangelical leaders, in addition to working to place conservative nominees on the bench, have been trying to find ways to remove certain judges.

Perkins said that he had attended a meeting with congressional leaders a week earlier where the strategy of stripping funding from certain courts was “prominently” discussed. “What they’re thinking of is not only the fact of just making these courts go away and re-creating them the next day but also defunding them,” Perkins said.

He said that instead of undertaking the long process of trying to impeach judges, Congress could use its appropriations authority to “just take away the bench, all of his staff, and he’s just sitting out there with nothing to do.”

These curbs on courts are “on the radar screen, especially of conservatives here in Congress,” he said.

Dobson, who emerged last year as one of the evangelical movement’s most important political leaders, named one potential target: the California-based U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

“Very few people know this, that the Congress can simply disenfranchise a court,” Dobson said. “They don’t have to fire anybody or impeach them or go through that battle. All they have to do is say the 9th Circuit doesn’t exist anymore, and it’s gone.”

[…]

“Folks, I am telling you all that it is going to be the mother of all battles,” Dobson predicted at the March 17 meeting. “And it’s right around the corner. I mean, Justice Rehnquist could resign at any time, and the other side is mobilized to the teeth.”

The remarks by Perkins and Dobson reflect the passion felt by Christians who helped fuel Bush’s reelection last year with massive turnout in battleground states, and who also spurred Republican gains in the Senate and House.

Claiming a role by the movement in the GOP gains, Dobson concluded: “We’ve got a right to hold them accountable for what happens here.”

Both leaders chastised what Perkins termed “squishy” and “weak” Republican senators who have not wholeheartedly endorsed ending Democrats’ power to filibuster judicial nominees. They said these included moderates such as Sens. Olympia J. Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine, Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania and Chuck Hagel of Nebraska. They also grumbled that Sens. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky and George Allen of Virginia needed prodding.

“We need to shake these guys up,” Perkins said.

Said Dobson: “Sometimes it’s just amazing to me that they seem to forget how they got here.”

Every day that Dobson and Perkins are on television is a good day for Democrats. Keep them in the spotlight.

Via Crooks and Liars. (Go there for the latest Jeff Gannon media appearance.)

.

Authenticity

Terrence Samuel writes a very interesting article on legislative strategy in The American Prospect that I hope gets wide readership. He discusses the fact that the Democrats have found “their inner no” and are realizing that as the opposition party their primary job must be to stop the other side from doing their worst. Tom DeLay and his minions are going to continue to screech that democrats have no ideas and no beliefs and that is why they are opposing the GOP agenda. Aside from being an asinine statement, it is also overlooking one important thing and it’s something that Samuel mentions in his final paragraph:

Chafee, who had once been the Dems’ best hope for stopping Bolton, seemed to be back on the fence. “The dynamic has changed,” Chafee said. “A lot of reservations surfaced today. It’s a new day.”

And maybe for the Democrats as well. “The passion on the other side on this — I don’t think it’s political,” Voinovich said. So the Democrats may be becoming not just the opposition but the principled opposition. A new day, indeed.

This is what happens when Democrats fight for something that hasn’t been poll tested and focus grouped to death. They actually persuade some people by the virtue of their passion and their argument. Voinovich apparently was simply struck by the fact that his Democratic colleagues really seemed sincere about this which made him stop and think about it.

Of course Democrats have to put forth a vision and they do and they will do more of it. The lesson is that, in the immortal words of Al Gore, sometimes you have to “let it rip,” even if you are going to lose. It’s how people come to see what you care about — and even if they disagree they respect the fact that you give a damn.

Which brings me to this Salon interview with the new Governor of Montana, Brian Schweitzer, which I’ve been mulling over for a couple of days now. As all of my 4 readers know, I’m a proponent of an electoral strategy to capture back the mountain west. I don’t say that the south is lost forever, but short of an economic disaster (which may very well happen) I just don’t see Democrats winning it back for a while. So, I’m extremely interested in Democrats who win in the mountain red states and how they believe that they did it.

I’ve read a lot about Schweitzer and am predisposed to like him. Contrary to myth, latte swilling liberals like me don’t actually look down on everybody but coastal elitists. I happen to like fiesty political personalities with regional color whether they are flinty Vermonters or silky Mississipians. I find the TV anchor style of politics boring. And I agree that part of the way to gaining ground in the heartland is to embrace a cultural style with which people who aren’t like me feel at home. Fine.

Schweitzer says some very smart things:

“You know who the most successful Democrats have been through history?” he asks. “Democrats who’ve led with their hearts, not their heads. Harry Truman, he led with his heart. Jack Kennedy led with his heart. Bill Clinton, well, he led with his heart, but it dropped about 2 feet lower in his anatomy later on.

“We are the folks who represent the families. Talk like you care. Act like you care. When you’re talking about issues that touch families, it’s OK to make it look like you care. It’s OK to have policies that demonstrate that you’ll make their lives better — and talk about it in a way that they understand. Too many Democrats — the policy’s just fine, but they can’t talk about it in a way that anybody else understands.”

I’m with him on the message being straight and true and talking in language that people can understand. But there are times he’s so over the top “aw shucks” that I’ve got to tell you that I find it hard to believe that he’s being straight himself. His “authenticity” sometimes sounds contrived — this is a guy who spent many years all over the world as an expert on irrigation techniques. He’s a trained scientist. But there are times in this interview that he seems quite shallow. I know he’s a real rancher and down home guy, but c’mon, the whole point of the interview is to find out what Democrats should do to win in the heartland, and he dispenses advice about it quite freely. But then he says stuff like this:

Q: Do you have to show the voters that you’re a regular guy — the “who would you most want to have a beer with?” test — or is it a matter of building some kind of link with voters on political or social issues?

You’re asking me? Hell, I’m out here in Montana. I don’t have any idea what the big shots in Washington, D.C., are doing. I don’t think I’ve got any great solutions for the rest of the world, but I think I understand Montanans.

[…]

Q:Does that kind of personal authenticity trump everything else in the minds of voters?

There’s more that the big shots from big cities will never understand. I probably shook hands with at least half of the people who voted for me, maybe two-thirds. You can do that in a place where there’s only 920,000 people.

Q:But you can’t do that when you’re running for president. How would you translate that sort of personal appeal into a national campaign?

You’re asking me about a national campaign? What the heck would I know about a national campaign?

Look, I started this out by saying that Democrats can win if they lead with their hearts. Let people feel you! Don’t try to verbalize. Let them feel you first. If you’re not a passionate person — I happen to be. If I’m for something, you’re gonna know it pretty quick. And if I’m agin it, you’re gonna know it too. I’m straight about those things. Some people can’t do that. Maybe they’ve had a lot of time in politics, or they’re lawyers, or it’s just their makeup. And they have all these highfalutin pollsters and media people, and they say, “Well, there’s this demographic that kind of bleeds into this demographic, and you don’t want to lose these over here because you were on this.” I don’t believe any of it. I think most people will support you if they know that you’ll stand your ground.

I get the straight shooter business and I agree with the essence of what he’s saying. I think that people will be particularly receptive to some straight talk after the Bush administration is done. But I’ve got to tell you, after George W. Bush I have a feeling that people aren’t going to be too impressed with leadership that goes overboard to pretend that they don’t understand the way the world works. I don’t think that will work again.

And frankly, I just don’t underestand what the hell he’s saying here, other than that the voting public is stupid:

Q: Howard Dean, who earned an “A” rating from the National Rifle Association as governor, has said almost exactly what you’ve just said about guns. But people in Montana probably don’t think of him as a friend to rural gun owners.

Most people that matter in Montana have never heard of Howard Dean or anybody else we’ve talked about today. People who are into politics — they’ve already decided how they’re going to vote not only in 2008 but in 2012. They’re not persuadable. The more people follow this, the less persuadable they are. Anybody that knows the names I just talked about is either a hard “R” or a hard “D.” They already know how they’re going to vote for the rest of their lives.

So Joe and Mary Six-Pack, they don’t have time to watch “Hardball With Chris Matthews.” They haven’t any idea who Pat Buchanan is, or Robert Novak. They don’t watch that stuff. They don’t read about it. They open the newspaper; they read a couple of headlines on the front page to see if they know anybody that got in a pickle, and then they go right to the sports page or the comics. And if they see something about politics in there — hoo, they’re not reading that.

Q:Don’t you think any of it seeps through? The Republicans’ involvement in the Terri Schiavo case, for example?

Sure it does. Maybe a little [on] Terri Schiavo because it was blasted on the national news. But I don’t think anybody figured out what was going on there, except that it looked to them like it was a big political move by some rascals in Washington.

Do they make any distinction about which “rascals” those were?

You know, Joe and Mary Six-Pack, they don’t disassociate. They’re pretty much all in the same box.

Q: They may not differentiate among Democrats, either. Again, Howard Dean has a record that’s not at all unlike what you’re trying to pull off in Montana, but it’s hard to imagine Dean as the kind of national candidate who would do well here.

The first time people heard of Howard Dean, they heard of him as some guy from Vermont — and people vaguely know where that is, but it sounds like it’s where lots of hippies live — and that he was against the war. So even before they saw him on TV, they figured he had a ponytail and a nose ring. Turns out, if they had gone three or four pages deep, they would have found out that the guy was a well-respected, moderate Democrat. But in the course of national politics, you’ve got about a blink or two to make up your mind whether you like somebody.

I just don’t get that. You couldn’t possibly have formed an opinon of Howard Dean if you didn’t follow the news at least somewhat. And what’s the point of being a straight shootin’ sonofagun if nobody listens to what you’re saying? If Joe and Mary Six Pack know nothing about politics and haven’t formed any opinion, then they are not likely to vote. Besides, there definitely are swing voters and ticket splitters in Montana, which is proven by the fact that he won the governorship while Bush won the presidency there.

I spent many years in Alaska, a quintessential western red state, where guns are worshipped and individualism is a religion. I thought that the ethos was fierce independence, not unwillingness to understand the details. And I certainly thought they didn’t like anybody telling them what they think.

But, this guy knows more about it than I do, so perhaps he’s right and we should rely almost entirely on style and not sweat the details.

I like him and I understand his basic message. I’m grateful that he’s out there as an example. But he seems a little bit shallow in this interview so I’m not sold on the idea that he’s the guy to lead us out of the wilderness.

Update: After reading the comments and having an e-mail exchange with a very smart friend, I think the problem is that guys like Schweitzer should not give interviews about strategy. His mystique is all about not caring about strategy, just telling it like it is. There’s a little cognitive dissonence in someone like him trying to finesse that. He’s better off talking about what he believes, not talking about how other people should talk about what he believes.

This was one of my biggest gripes about Dean. He talked about process constantly — “I want guys in pick-up trucks to vote for us” — when a candidate ought to just make his pitch to the guy in the truck. (Now as the Democratic chairman it’s his job to talk about process, so it’s perfectly approcpriate.)

Straight talking guys should never talk about politics in purely political terms. It takes away their mystery and makes ’em look like politicians. Which they are — but it’s exactly the image we are trying to dispel.

.

.