Rezko

Want to know what the blah blah blah about Obama and Rezko is about?

Look no further.

How To Stimulate An Economy

Forget the studies... common sense should tell everyone this is true. However -- since the concept is antithetical to Republican "conventional wisdom" -- we'll just keep on putting out ineffective stimulus packages that make the old wise ones feel good.

In findings echoed by other economists and studies, he said the study shows the fastest way to infuse money into the economy is through expanding the food-stamp program. For every dollar spent on that program $1.73 is generated throughout the economy, he said.

"If someone who is literally living paycheck to paycheck gets an extra dollar, it's very likely that they will spend that dollar immediately on whatever they need - groceries, to pay the telephone bill, to pay the electric bill," he said.

[...snip...]

The report pointed to expanding unemployment benefits as the program that gets the next biggest bang for the buck. That's because, although the unemployed are already getting checks, they need to spend the money. For every dollar spent here, the economy would see a return of $1.64, Zandi said.

[...snip...]

Finally, Moody's report says business incentives such as tax breaks for buying new equipment - so-called accelerated depreciation - would give the least bang for the buck and potentially provide the slowest infusion of money. A dollar spent there would generate only 33 cents in the economy because, Zandi said, it takes longer for businesses to implement any benefit received.

By all means, let's follow Republican "conventional wisdom" until we're circling the drain... but gosh dang it, at least we'll be circling by our bootstraps!

Florida

Not really my race and not really my ponies (the Dems aren't counting Florida) but I will watch the returns tonight with interest since it's presumed to predict the winner of the Republican primary season.

As an aside, doesn't that seem lame? All of those moneyed old people in Florida get to make the choice for the rest of conservative America. We really need a new way to run our primary system.

Obama On FISA

What would it be like to have a president who not only understands the constitution (having taught constitutional law) but actually respects it?

It would be like this:

I strongly oppose retroactive immunity in the FISA bill.

Ever since 9/11, this Administration has put forward a false choice between the liberties we cherish and the security we demand.

The FISA court works. The separation of power works. We can trace, track down and take out terrorists while ensuring that our actions are subject to vigorous oversight, and do not undermine the very laws and freedom that we are fighting to defend.

No one should get a free pass to violate the basic civil liberties of the American people - not the President of the United States, and not the telecommunications companies that fell in line with his warrantless surveillance program. We have to make clear the lines that cannot be crossed.

That is why I am co-sponsoring Senator Dodd's amendment to remove the immunity provision. Secrecy must not trump accountability. We must show our citizens – and set an example to the world – that laws cannot be ignored when it is inconvenient.

A grassroots movement of Americans has pushed this issue to the forefront. You have come together across this country. You have called upon our leaders to adhere to the Constitution. You have sent a message to the halls of power that the American people will not permit the abuse of power – and demanded that we reclaim our core values by restoring the rule of law.

It's time for Washington to hear your voices, and to act. I share your commitment to this cause, and will stand with you in the fights to come. And when I am President, the American people will once again be able to trust that their government will stand for justice, and will defend the liberties that we hold so dear as vigorously as we defend our security.

But hey, it's just our constitution. What's the fuss?

Business Ethics For Everyone!

This struck me as rather provocative when I read it. But... why the hell not??

I cannot tell you how many times in the past eight years I have seen my company do morally questionable things in the name of corporate business. As a manager, I wish I had a nickel for the number of times I've heard one of the following:

"The needs of the business demand that we [insert employee, customer, or environmental abuse here]."

"We owe it to our shareholders to [insert employee, customer, or environmental abuse here]."

"Corporate business" doesn't acknowledge human attributes like morality or ethics or decency, and it certainly is not held accountable to work within those boundaries. Instead, "business" is governed by law and regulation, and, most of the time, it abides the least amount of either it can possibly get away with.

SOTU

Watching SOTU.

Hey, it's a miracle -- Bush is a fiscal conservative! It's the other guys who are out of control! The past seven years of actual fiscal performance (including six years of Republican control of both the house and the senate) don't count.

Other than that, it's the same bunch of bullshit we've heard for the past 7 years. I'll give him two points for spinning it with a straight face.

The Point

Matthew Yglesias is getting it:

The fact that big turnout seems to have powered Obama to his big win strikes me as perhaps more significant than his margin of victory as such. Obama's message of "bringing people together" to create "change" is often castigated by his critics as a "kumbaya schtick" but it looks like something very different whenever he can deliver on promises to mobilize new people and bring them into the process. At the end of the day, politicians respond to facts on the ground. A presidential candidate who can change the facts on the ground by bringing new people into the process can carry a lot of supporters on his coattails. A president who can organize people at the grassroots in support of his agenda could get amazing things done.

Could Obama really do that? Well, it's hard to know for sure. But it does fit his background as a community organizer, and it does fit his results in Iowa and South Carolina.

By The Numbers

What the SC data shows:

SC Republican primary turnout: 442,918
SC Democratic primary turnout: 529,789

It's interesting to note, as a Sully reader does, that Obama got more votes alone (294,799) than McCain and Huckleberry Huckabee combined (279,723).

Yes We Can

"We are up against the belief that it's ok for lobbyists to dominate our government - that they are just part of the system in Washington. But we know that the undue influence of lobbyists is part of the problem, and this election is our chance to say that we're not going to let them stand in our way anymore.

We are up against the conventional thinking that says your ability to lead as President comes from longevity in Washington or proximity to the White House. But we know that real leadership is about candor, and judgment, and the ability to rally Americans from all walks of life around a common purpose - a higher purpose.

We are up against decades of bitter partisanship that cause politicians to demonize their opponents instead of coming together to make college affordable or energy cleaner; it's the kind of partisanship where you're not even allowed to say that a Republican had an idea - even if it's one you never agreed with. That kind of politics is bad for our party, it's bad for our country, and this is our chance to end it once and for all.

We are up against the idea that it's acceptable to say anything and do anything to win an election. We know that this is exactly what's wrong with our politics; this is why people don't believe what their leaders say anymore; this is why they tune out. And this election is our chance to give the American people a reason to believe again.

And what we've seen in these last weeks is that we're also up against forces that are not the fault of any one campaign, but feed the habits that prevent us from being who we want to be as a nation. It's the politics that uses religion as a wedge, and patriotism as a bludgeon. A politics that tells us that we have to think, act, and even vote within the confines of the categories that supposedly define us. The assumption that young people are apathetic. The assumption that Republicans won't cross over. The assumption that the wealthy care nothing for the poor, and that the poor don't vote. The assumption that African-Americans can't support the white candidate; whites can't support the African-American candidate; blacks and Latinos can't come together.

But we are here tonight to say that this is not the America we believe in. I did not travel around this state over the last year and see a white South Carolina or a black South Carolina. I saw South Carolina. I saw crumbling schools that are stealing the future of black children and white children. I saw shuttered mills and homes for sale that once belonged to Americans from all walks of life, and men and women of every color and creed who serve together, and fight together, and bleed together under the same proud flag. I saw what America is, and I believe in what this country can be.

That is the country I see. That is the country you see. But now it is up to us to help the entire nation embrace this vision. Because in the end, we are not just up against the ingrained and destructive habits of Washington, we are also struggling against our own doubts, our own fears, and our own cynicism. The change we seek has always required great struggle and sacrifice. And so this is a battle in our own hearts and minds about what kind of country we want and how hard we're willing to work for it.

So let me remind you tonight that change will not be easy. That change will take time. There will be setbacks, and false starts, and sometimes we will make mistakes. But as hard as it may seem, we cannot lose hope. Because there are people all across this country who are counting us; who can't afford another four years without health care or good schools or decent wages because our leaders couldn't come together and get it done."

-- From Barack Obama's South Carolina primary victory speech 1-26-08

Lame TeeVee Coverage

Hannity & Colmes with "fair and balanced" primary coverage on Fox... yuck.

Bill Clinton speaking from Missouri... grrrr.

Rudy Giuliani speaking from Florida... zzzzz.

O-bam-a!

So... the plan for the evening was to make an early dinner and then watch the South Carolina primary returns come in (polls closed at 6:00 pm local). At 6:15 I was ladling soup into bowls (a ridiculously delicious fat-free creamy asparagus) when Jeff hollered in that they were calling it for Obama with 1% of the votes in. Yowsa! Not that I'm complaining, mind you, but it was a bit anticlimactic.

The talking heads on the teevee are making it sound like Hillabill's liar-liar-pants-on-fire rampage against Obama last week turned off a lot of voters. I can't wait to hear the final voter stats.

Obama speaks at 8:00. Now that he's won SC, I wonder if he'll use tonight (a la Mickey Kaus) to try to undo the "black candidate" role Hillabill cleverly boxed him into.

And now we can look forward to Super Duper Tuesday when the rest of us get to have a say about who we want to represent us [insert rant about the idiotic primary system here]. I volunteered to canvas for Obama here in town next weekend... should be fun.

As an aside, this really pisses me off.

Happy Friday!

Mmmmmm... young Paul Newman... delicious.

Kirst And Ry

Kirsten is home for a few days and she and Ryan have just spent the last hour watching silly videos on Youtube. They seemed to be having a good time!

Smackdown

A Daily Kos diary tonight informs us that Bob Reich has verbally reached out and smacked Billy Boy on the back of the head (Bob Reich served as Clinton's Labor Secretary in the mid-90's).

What can I say? He had it coming.

Bill Clinton's Old Politics

I write this more out of sadness than anger. Bill Clinton’s ill-tempered and ill-founded attacks on Barack Obama are doing no credit to the former President, his legacy, or his wife’s campaign. Nor are they helping the Democratic party. While it may be that all is fair in love, war, and politics, it’s not fair – indeed, it’s demeaning – for a former President to say things that are patently untrue (such as Obama’s anti-war position is a "fairy tale") or to insinuate that Obama is injecting race into the race when the former President is himself doing it. Meanwhile, the attack ads being run in South Carolina by the Clinton camp which quote Obama as saying Republicans had all the ideas under Reagan, is disingenuous. For years, Bill Clinton and many other leading Democrats have made precisely the same point – that starting in the Reagan administration, Republicans put forth a range of new ideas while the Democrats sat on their hands. Many of these ideas were wrong-headed and dangerous, such as supply-side economics. But for too long Democrats failed counter with new ideas of their own; they wrongly assumed that the old Democratic positions and visions would be enough. Clinton’s 1992 campaign – indeed, the entire "New Democratic" message of the 1990s – was premised on the importance of taking back the initiative from the Republicans and offering Americans a new set of ideas and principles. Now, sadly, we’re witnessing a smear campaign against Obama that employs some of the worst aspects of the old politics.

Are We Stimulated Yet?

There seems to be some disappointment over the stimulus package and questions about how effective it will be.

I totally buy the argument that a stimulus package aimed at creating a consumer driven economic recovery is best directed at the people who will actually spend it (aka poor folks). But this time around I am convinced (in my spectating, novice way) that the architects of the stimulus are not trying to create an increase in consumer activity, per se. I think their intention is to pump money back into our financial institutions by enabling debt repayment.

Kind of a back door bailout, if you will. Better than a front door bailout I suppose and in theory it seems like a win-win to me. If it's not too little, too late.

Keep The Party Going

The eeeeeevil George Soros's explanation of the current economic crisis makes sense. Here's a snip but do try to read the whole thing if you haven't already... no idea if this is the general consensus but it makes for pretty interesting reading.

Every time the credit expansion ran into trouble the financial authorities intervened, injecting liquidity and finding other ways to stimulate the economy. That created a system of asymmetric incentives also known as moral hazard, which encouraged ever greater credit expansion. The system was so successful that people came to believe in what former US president Ronald Reagan called the magic of the marketplace and I call market fundamentalism. Fundamentalists believe that markets tend towards equilibrium and the common interest is best served by allowing participants to pursue their self-interest. It is an obvious misconception, because it was the intervention of the authorities that prevented financial markets from breaking down, not the markets themselves. Nevertheless, market fundamentalism emerged as the dominant ideology in the 1980s, when financial markets started to become globalised and the US started to run a current account deficit.

Globalisation allowed the US to suck up the savings of the rest of the world and consume more than it produced. The US current account deficit reached 6.2 per cent of gross national product in 2006. The financial markets encouraged consumers to borrow by introducing ever more sophisticated instruments and more generous terms. The authorities aided and abetted the process by intervening whenever the global financial system was at risk. Since 1980, regulations have been progressively relaxed until they have practically disappeared.

The super-boom got out of hand when the new products became so complicated that the authorities could no longer calculate the risks and started relying on the risk management methods of the banks themselves. Similarly, the rating agencies relied on the information provided by the originators of synthetic products. It was a shocking abdication of responsibility.

World Economic Forum

Sounds like kind of a glum gathering so far.

On the first day of this conference, a parade of bankers, economists, and political officials expressed deep fears about the faltering American economy, peppered with blunt criticism of its institutions, chiefly the Federal Reserve, which some accused of sowing the seeds of today's crisis.

George Soros, the financier who made a fortune betting against the pound, went so far Wednesday as to say that the downturn would put an end to the long status of the dollar as the world's default currency.

"The current crisis is not only the bust that follows the housing boom," Soros said. "It's basically the end of a 60-year period of continuing credit expansion based on the dollar as the reserve currency."

But George Soros is an eeeeeevil activist Democrat, so we can disregard whatever he says. Carry on:

Signs of a new economic order abounded in this Swiss ski resort: the minister of commerce and industry of India, Kamal Nath, noted that China had overtaken the United States as India's largest trading partner - buttressing his view that India could largely sidestep an American recession.

The head of the National Bank of Kuwait, Ibrahim Dabdoub, said Americans who opposed sovereign wealth funds like the one run by his government needed to come to terms with the new reality.

In other words, Kuwait thinks we should get used to the idea of being the world equivalent of a kept woman. Hmmmm.

One of my favs, Nouriel Roubini, had this to say:

Completing the role reversal, Nouriel Roubini, an American economist, said, "the United States looks like an emerging market," with large budget deficits and a swooning currency. By contrast, he said, Brazil, an actual emerging market, had done a better job of overhauling its economy.

Roubini, whose frequent predictions of a downturn have made him something of a soothsayer in Davos, predicted the United States would suffer a recession lasting at least a year. He foresees a flood of defaults on car loans and corporate bonds, as well as a prolonged bear market.

"The debate is not whether we're going to have a soft landing or a hard landing," he said. "The question is only how hard the hard landing will be."

That doesn't sound good. So what about pulling out our handy dandy economy fix-all, the rate cut??

Several economists said the Federal Reserve seemed to have lost control of events since the subprime crisis erupted last summer. Some criticized its steep cut in interest rates Tuesday as a knee-jerk reaction to calm the markets rather than a sound response to a deteriorating situation.

"Policy makers are reaching back into the same playbook that got us into this mess in the first place," said Stephen Roach, an economist who recently became the chairman of Morgan Stanley Asia.

By signaling that it is ready to cushion the stock market from the ravages of the credit crisis, Roach argued, the Federal Reserve risks creating conditions for a new round of inflation in asset prices.

The Federal Reserve "made bad judgments," said Joseph Stiglitz, the Nobel Prize-winning economist. "It looked the other way when investment banks packaged bad loans in non-transparent ways."

Ding ding ding ding!!!

Weird Market Bounce Yesterday

I thought it looked suspicious... and I was right.

BTW, I think I'm crushin' a little on John Cole:

I need to get into this line of work. Make all sorts of crazy big commissions on knowingly bad and reckless business transactions, make the bad decisions on such a scale that the entire economy is fucked if the government does not bail me out, and then take big bucks from the government. All I need to do is hold my head low for a few years after the bailout, and I can get back to business as usual. I guess when they said invisible hand, they meant the one robbing the taxpaying public. Free market, bitches!

That Could Work

Mickey Kaus is one of those self-flagellating Democrats that make me wonder why they even bother calling themselves Democrats. I mean, c'mon... when Instapundit links approvingly to every other post, you know you've lost your creds.

Today Mickey has a post that I had to read thrice. The first time I read it with my usual revulsion. The second time I read it, my inner cynic could see where he might have identified a problem. The third time I read it, my inner evil strategist agreed with the solution.

I must be sinking into the muck.

935 False Statements

No, really?

A study by two nonprofit journalism organizations found that President Bush and top administration officials issued hundreds of false statements about the national security threat from Iraq in the two years following the 2001 terrorist attacks.

The study concluded that the statements "were part of an orchestrated campaign that effectively galvanized public opinion and, in the process, led the nation to war under decidedly false pretenses."

If High Treason Occurs...

...but US news outlets refuse to cover it, is it still treason?

I mentioned Sibel Edmonds in passing some time ago. She's been under a gag order but hinting rather strongly about things she uncovered while working as an FBI translator after 9/11. Lukery, via Daily Kos, has been valiantly trying to drive reader interest from the bottom up.

After making a personal decision to come forward to the American people with her story, Edmonds has been unsuccessful in finding a single mainstream media outlet to cover it. She finally got the UK's Sunday Times to run the story few weeks ago (a Rupert Murdock holding, go figure!).

Now the Times's competitor, The Guardian, is running a story about the US media blackout.

And what kind of response have we seen from the US media? Nothing but deafening silence unless you count this excellent story from American Conservative Magazine. First graf:

Most Americans have never heard of Sibel Edmonds, and if the U.S. government has its way, they never will. The former FBI translator turned whistleblower tells a chilling story of corruption at Washington’s highest levels—sale of nuclear secrets, shielding of terrorist suspects, illegal arms transfers, narcotics trafficking, money laundering, espionage. She may be a first-rate fabulist, but Edmonds’s account is full of dates, places, and names. And if she is to be believed, a treasonous plot to embed moles in American military and nuclear installations and pass sensitive intelligence to Israeli, Pakistani, and Turkish sources was facilitated by figures in the upper echelons of the State and Defense Departments. Her charges could be easily confirmed or dismissed if classified government documents were made available to investigators.

Sounds kind of important, no?

Your Tax Rebate

If you qualify for the proposed tax rebate of $800 per person or $1600 per household, what will you do with it?

A. Pay off credit cards and other debt
B. Put it in the bank
C. Spend it

Jeff made an interesting observation the other day. He thinks most people will use it to pay off debt or put it in the bank, and he thinks that's the intention behind the rather large sum... to increase the solvency of our financial institutions.

I think he may have a point. If this recession is the result of a systemic problem in the economy (as opposed to an external factor like 9/11), a little blip of increased consumer activity is unlikely to do much to ward it off.

Interesting theory.

The Hillabeast

I fell asleep while attempting to watch the CNN late-night rerun of last night's Dem debate (oh yeah, I lead a very exciting life) but I caught enough of it to be afraid -- very afraid -- that Obama is not going to pull off a win against the Hillabeast.

Let me say right up front that Billy Bob Clinton and I had a peaceful co-existence during his WH years right up until the moment he disappointed me with that ridiculous "what the meaning of 'is' is" bullshit. Do I think the Lewinsky affair merited all of the over-the-top wailing and gnashing of teeth that followed? Absolutely not. I don't really care where Bill chooses to snuff his cigar. But he insulted my intelligence with the parsing and lying and indignant finger wagging, and that's not so easily forgiven.

I'm seeing that same kind of mendacity now in the powerful Bill-Hill tag-team attacks on Obama. Last night Hillary lied about everything from Obama's Illinois legislature record, to his observations about Reagan, to his vote on the 2005 bankruptcy bill amendments. The Hillabeast and her mate are spouting lies and distortions with such fluidity that uninformed (and otherwise well meaning) citizens will not even recognize them as lies and distortions.

If the shock of Republican vitriol popped her decency cherry in 1992, and if the vast right wing conspiracy hardened her like concrete in the years after, Hillary Clinton has transmogrified into a shark. Cold blooded, ruthless, cunning, and utterly predatory. No depth too low, no prey too innocent, and absolutely no mercy.

I guess that's ok if you like that sort of thing in the White House. Bush-Cheney supporters should feel right at home. On the positive side, she will make an excellent adversary for even our scariest enemy. Plus, she'll eat Republicans for breakfast and spit them out on the sidewalk on her way to lunch (some of us might find that enjoyable sport after the past 7+ years).

Sadly, primary voting Dems don't seem ready to let bygones be bygones and move toward the kind of leadership Obama represents. And, in the end, I don't think Obama has it in him to dwell in the muck with the Hillabeast.

Too bad... I still think he'd carry the general election with a clear majority.

For Reference:
Obama's "Present" votes in the Illinois State Legislature
Obama's GOP "party of ideas" video clip (scandalous!!)
Debate video clip
TPM video clip with Super Tuesday analysis

The Ronnie Years

Bonddad has a diary out today that sorta touches on my "failure of Republican economics" theme of the other day.

Taking A Break

No politics today except to say that I overestimated Nevada Dems and underestimated SC Repubs (but neither by much).

UPDATE: Ok, so a little more politics. I am watching Meet The Press, which offers a panel discussion including the superfabulous presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin and the superdisgusting Peggy Noonan. Noonan just said -- I SWEAR TO GAWD -- that she is "concerned" about the dynastic "sickness" of Bush, Clinton, Bush, Clinton. Of course, she wasn't "concerned" when she was helping to push the disastrous Bush The Lesser down our throats. She's only "concerned" now that the cycle is back to Clinton. Truly vomit inducing stuff. As much as I'm trying to control my inner demons, it's enough to make me vote for Clinton purely out of spite.

Nevada Day

Nevada, Nevada... whatchu gonna do, Nevada?

Obama is trailing in the polls although I'm really starting to wonder how valid polls are anymore with more and more people migrating to cell phones (about 20% have dropped their landlines altogether).

It's kind of an interesting state caucus. I love the idea of Saturday voting... doesn't it seems like the proper day to run a civic errand? And with 60,000 casino workers -- a 24 x 7 industry chock full of hourly laborers who can't just dash out at lunch or between meetings -- I thought locating the caucus in casinos was a great idea. So did Hillary, until the Culinary Workers decided to back Obama. And what's up with the teacher's union complaining about the casino polls? They'd have been the one group to really win out with a Saturday poll. What a bunch of ninnies.

And big day for the 'Pubbies in South Carolina. I predict Huckleberry will be successful in drawing the disproportionately large number of nutters residing in South Carolina to his side. Nutters love other nutters... it's the Law of Nutter Attraction.

Deliberately Stupid

Are people being deliberately stupid about Obama's Reagan comments? That's the only explanation I can come up with for all of the idiotic blah blah blah coming from both Republicans and Democrats.

Look at those maps above showing Reagan's electoral victories in 1980 and 1984. Would you say this country was in a mood? Would you say this country was of a like mind? Would you say this country was looking beyond red and blue? One does not have to be a Ronnie-phile to note that, for a time, this country was powerfully in sync.

"Reagan Democrat"... what else needs to be said?

Obama isn't singing the praises of Reagan's policies. Obama is noting that for a brief time this country was aligned in the direction it wanted to go (whether Reagan actually took it there isn't really the point). For whatever reason, people saw their hope for America reflected in Ronald Reagan and, in their unity, gave him the mandate to make real change.



All of this nonsensical fuss about what seems like a perfectly insightful observation makes me think this country isn't ready for Obama. Maybe we're more comfortable with morons like Giuliani and Romney. Either way, we'll get the government we deserve.

UPDATE: The Great Orange Satan had some good comments here and here.

Hmmm...

Forget Race Bait '08... this is a far more interesting intra-party conundrum.

On the one hand we have the anti-immigration camp: people who want to build a giant fence to keep the Mexicans out.

And on the other hand we have the you'll-take-my-land-over-my-dead-body camp: people who are about to have their land confiscated to build the giant fence to keep the Mexicans out.

Which sentiment is more Republican?

The Ridiculousness That Is Republican Economics

The success of Republican economics is a very convenient lie misrepresentation. Like 9/11, it's been used to sell policies to the American people that are neither good for them nor for the greater economy.

Let me say this first: when taxes are too high, they can choke off economic prosperity. Less money in my pocket means less money I am going to spend (or "reinvest" into the economy). Taxes aren't an economic black hole, though. For example, government spending also puts money back into the economy. A good deal of all of the "pork" everyone gets so fired up about finds its way back to local economies, and localized spending does a great deal of good for the general prosperity of the country.

Also let me say this: long term deficits are bad. Think of it the way you would in the context of your household. There's "good" debt, such as debt used to buy a house. Short term debt that you leverage in a low-risk way to finance assets. Then there's bad debt... out of control credit card spending on fast food and designer shoes. A new Toyota Landcruiser. Trips to Vegas and the Cayman Islands.

Republicans have created the myth that they're the party of fiscal conservatism, which is such a widely believed -- and cherished! -- myth that it continuously boggles my mind. People repeat it kind of mindlessly. They don't really understand why Republicans are fiscally conservative, exactly, but since everyone says it all the time they've come to treat it like a fact.

Except it's not.

Memo to America: cutting taxes while running a deficit doesn't count as fiscal conservatism. It would be like you telling your boss you want a 5% paycut and then using a charge card to buy new clothes, a Toyota Landcruiser, and a trip to Grand Cayman. Sadly, by the way, most of that money you just spent on imported goods isn't even for the greater good of the national economy... it's on a one way trip out of the country.

Reagan turned the whole 'taxcut and spend' scheme into a masterful sleight of hand. He said, in effect, "Here, look at these shiny new tax cuts!!" while diverting attention away from his irresponsible pile of debt. Later, poor Papa Bush took the hit for the fallout from Reagan's policy. He made a feeble attempt to raise taxes in order to cover the debt before it sank the economy (remember where interest rates were at that point?). Everyone saw Papa Bush as the bad guy but he was really just paying the price for Reagan's drunken cowboy economic policy... heartbreaking, really. Reagan's legacy remains intact today, an icon of the Republican party. Papa Bush will be remembered for "Read my lips."

Clinton, on the other hand, was two parts lucky and one part smart. Luck brought him the tech boom, one of those freakish moments in time that changes the course of the entire world practically over night. In a flash, a single industry propelled the US to instant prosperity. And he was one part smart because, instead of spending it all, he conspired with Greenspan to balance the budget. The tech market became over-invested and burst at the end but the ginormous productivity gains from the tech boom itself were a solid contribution to the US economy. They were real and not undone by the market adjustment. Plus, we weren't saddled with debt... we had some cash in the bank. *whew

As an aside, I kind of liked the "pay as you go" philosophy. Remember when that was a widely used phrase? Haven't heard that lately, have we?

So anyway, along comes Bush the Lesser, determined not to make the "mistakes" of his father, focused instead on making the mistakes of Reagan. Bush The Lesser's economic policy is turning out to be the unmitigated disaster it was destined to be, though, without the divine intervention of a tech boom. Unfortunately for Bush, his only boom was in real estate, triggered by playing loose with monetary policy. Unlike the tech boom, which actually made a solid underlying contribution to the economy via productivity, when the real estate bubble burst it was like watching money evaporate into thin air. POOF! On top of our pre-existing mountain of debt, the long term fallout is going to be bad. Very bad. We've effectively announced a fire sale on US assets.

I don't mean to simplify this. Obviously there have been a ton of variables interwoven into the fabric of US economic performance over the last few decades... not the least of which is globalization. It is complicated, which is why true cause and effect relationships often get masked.

I am getting tired of hearing the same old GOP talking points regurgitated in this election cycle as the economy becomes of more and more importance. This election counts, people. We need to bring our economy back into balance or else we're going to become as irrelevant as the other half of the Wonder Twin superpowers, the former USSR.

Yuck

Someone needs to pull his head out of the Hillabeast's vajayjay. It's starting to creep me out.

Despite the 'witty' post-debate banter from the unholy one, I thought the Dem debate was decent. I liked the roundtable format, the conversational tone, the two hour forum. All three candidates behaved like grown ups. No major gotcha's, no major upsets, no major screw ups. Obama reverted back to wonky professor from rockstar speaker... it's like he's on some kind of crazy switch or something. Trippy.

This Made Me Laugh

From TPM:

Rudy Giuliani has a new Spanish-language radio ad running in Florida, courting the Cuban vote. Rudy watchers will be glad to know that he's no longer exploiting the pain of September 11.

Instead, he's now exploiting "el dolor de aquel 11 de septiembre."

Wow

BREAKING: In the Nevada debate, Hillary just said she is against illegal guns and illegal gun dealers.

Brilliant!

Interestingly, Russert asked about banning guns (specific type? I didn't hear) and Obama said, flatly, "I don't think we can get that done". The directness of that took me aback.... I am entirely unused to directness in a politician.

Things I've Been Meaning To Say...

• The great Democratic MLK controversy of 2008 is absurd. Who is more responsible for the the Civil Rights Act of '64, MLK or LBJ? Chicken, meet egg. LBJ may have used his bully pulpit with the congress but that only worked in combination with MLK's movement, which applied a tremendous pressure for change. Congress might have gotten around to eventually enacting the law, I suppose, but in the end they couldn't ignore the demand of a unified voice. Hmmmm... what a great idea... unified voice... forcing change... where have I heard that?
  

• The primary system sucks. What makes Iowa and New Hampshire so damn special? Why should Michigan be "punished" by Dems for wanting some love? Michigan needs some love.
  

• Watching Cafferty on CNN. Why are the crusty old white men on TV obsessed with projecting their racial attitudes on the rest of the country? It's bizarre. I wonder if they are at least peripherally aware that when their generation dies off en masse, the world will become a much different place.
  

• McCain is looking kind of old and slow but, knowing what his body has been through, I wonder how he's still moving around as much as he does. I've always admired him, our little gang of 14'er. His position on the war (Iraq forever) is wrong but I understand why he sees it that way... he's old school responsible. He's not going to walk away.
  

• If Clinton stumbled on those tears by accident, she sure learned how to play 'em up fast.
  

• There's a scene in Bridget Jones' Diary where Bridget's brain intercepts her boss's boss's name, Mr Fitzherbert, and translates it to "Mr Tits-pervert" because he has a habit of staring at her breasts. My brain hears Huckabee but, for some reason, immediately translates it to "Huckleberry".
  

• Huckabee seems like a really nice guy but he's a nutter. I am strangely amused by him and actually welcome a national race between, oh, any Dem and Huckabee. I'm willing to wager a bet that at least 51% of voters, while perhaps wanting God in their lives, don't necessarily want God running their lives. I'm just saying.
  

Swiped From Facebook

I swiped this pic from KK's Facebook account. She's a monkey, not a mouse!

What Do The 1920s And 2000s Have In Common?

Quite a bit, it seems.

Happy Birthday, Kirsten!

KURTAAAAN! WILL YOU BE MY FWEND?

My beautiful eldest daughter turned 19 today. In the grand tradition of our family matriarch I will comment thus: Nineteen years ago tonight, at 8:58 p.m., I saw my Kirsten's face for the first time and fell completely, unconditionally in love. Her only flaw was her stubborn resistance to being born... two weeks past due, induction required, and then fifteen hours of intense labor. Fortunately she was cute as hell or else I might have hung on to my resentment for a bit longer.

I won't go into the medical details but Mom taking me (10 months pregnant and waddling like a duck) to the drugstore to pick up a diaphragm prescription the night before she was born is, like, the funniest story ever.

Kirst came down from Madison today and we all went to dinner at Shogun for sushi (and, for two of us, saki). It's our birthday tradition to reserve one of the private little side rooms with a sunken table... always fun.

The really fabulous sad news of the evening, though, is that she and her boyfriend broke up. Kirsten told us that, to mark the occasion, she and one of her roommates tossed all bf related photos (and an old t-shirt) into a homeless man's garbage can fire. The homeless man, thinking they were concerned for his warmth, thanked them for their contribution. Win-win!

From tonight:

Words That Have Meaning

Catapultum habeo. Nisi pecuniam omnem mihi dabris, ad caput tuum saxum immane mittam.

Fun at cocktail parties.

30 Hours Up And...

...13 hours on the phone.

Exhausted and euphoric!


UPDATE: Haven't actually been able to get off the phone yet due to miscellaneous problems. That makes this 36 hours up and 19 hours on the phone.

Still exhausted... euphoria starting to wear off. I am getting way too old for this shiz.

Annoyed

Am I the only one who gets annoyed when Drudge posts about some crazy cold spell somewhere and then right next to it immediately links to a global warming article with some kind of headline in 'quotes'? It's become an internet constant.

We get it, you clever, clever man... there can't be global warming if some places are still getting cold. It's all a Democratic ruse!

Nevermind that the effect of global warming is really about weather extremes and changes in precipitation patterns, and not, as a six year old might understand it, about making every place on earth really, really hot.

Global warming is a real phenomenon and it's supported by actual, factual data. It's the nature of global warming that's up for debate. Is it part of a natural cycle? Is it man made? Will it have a significant impact? Can we affect that impact?

I can understand why, given the known facts, people would choose to take action instead of opting for inaction. Wouldn't it suck to realize after it's too late that we've allowed a disaster we could have prevented? After analyzing probability and impact, this could be one of those times when inaction is the wrong way to go.

What I don't understand is why Republicans are so intent on making global warming a political issue. What's the point of that? As with all things Republican, it's probably about the money. After all, energy is the only booming industry we have left.

The Invisible Hand

Regarding the economy and it's current state, I am reminded of this quote (one of my favorites) from John Maynard Keynes:

Capitalism is the astounding belief that the most wickedest of men will do the most wickedest of things for the greatest good of everyone.

Not that I'm anti-capitalism, per se -- I just feel rather strongly that capitalism is an economic tool, not a religion. It should be tweaked with regulation to prevent EXACTLY the kind of greed-fueled shit that has created this and every preceding economic crisis.

Somehow US capitalism has become alternately a mandate and an excuse for criminally bad behavior.

Letting Allah Sort Them Out

The WHO and the Iraq government released a new study that estimates over 150,000 Iraqis died a violent death in the three years following the Iraq invasion. Unlike the Lancet study, folks seem to be agreeing (more or less) that this number is reasonably correct. For anyone interested in tracking such things, that would be the equivalent of sixteen 9/11's per year.

On average, the US had about 16,500 homicides per year during the same period (the US is 10 times the population of Iraq).

The report also indicates an increase of non-violent death by 60%, which also seems like a reasonable estimate considering the conditions in the country after the war.

Certainly a good percentage of the violent death total is violence related to ethnic cleansing (i.e. Iraqi on Iraqi violence). This is hardly a comfort. The US bears full responsibility for what it unleashed in Iraq when it deposed Saddam. For that kind of madness to ensue under our watch, under our occupation, because of bad planning and the kind of political stubbornness that insisted we should "stay the course" when it was clear the course was bad, is unforgivable.

Think about that the next time someone says, "They hate us for our freedom." There are at least 150,000 thousand families in Iraq who have every reason to hate us for our policies.

If you lost your kid under the same circumstances, wouldn't you? I would. I would be a giant ball of fanatical seething hatred until the day I took my final breath.

The Big Night

For the past six weeks I've been managing a complex project full time, trying to make a given date deadline. Tonight it all comes to fruition. At midnight I become the command and control point for about fifteen people focused on making this thing happen.

As of this morning, all of my planning is done. The i's are dotted and the t's are crossed. Now I'm relaxing, surfing the net, trying not to let myself get too anxious.

I used to live for this kind of adrenaline rush and I used to be good at command and control. It's been a few years, though... 4 or 5? Now I'm just hoping I'm not too old for it... it requires a certain amount of focus and energy, neither of which I'm exuding these days.

Anyway, by 9:00 a.m. tomorrow morning I will either be exhausted and euphoric or exhausted and depressed.

Wish me luck!!

Frenemies

One of the best friends money can buy:

The rugged area has long been considered a likely hiding place for al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden and his top deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, as well as an operating ground for Taliban militants planning attacks on coalition forces in Afghanistan.

The New York Times reported last week that Washington was considering expanding the authority of the CIA and the U.S. military to launch aggressive covert operations within the tribal regions. Several U.S. presidential candidates have also hinted they would support unilateral action in the area.

Musharraf told The Straits Times U.S. troops would "certainly" be considered invaders if they set foot in the tribal regions.

"If they come without our permission, that's against the sovereignty of Pakistan. I challenge anybody coming into our mountains. They would regret that day," he said in the interview.

Cat And Mouse

Our beloved hamster, Payton, died last summer, and over the past few months my son has been pestering us for a new critter. After much deliberation and a few visits to the pet store, he decided on a mouse. Since mice are said to be social critters by nature, we bought two... now named Rose and Lilly. Rose was named for her reddish-pink eyes (only a ten year old boy could look into the beady eyes of a mouse and find them so beautiful as to decide they're rose-like). Lilly, as it turns out, isn't very social.

The three cats have all had varying reactions to their new housemates. Maverick (or Princess Girl Kitty, as we've taken to calling her), finds the mice beneath her contempt and ignores them completely. Rambler (aka Bubba) studies their cage with gentle interest but lacks the motivation for a more personal relationship. Scooter, on the other hand, thinks he's got new friends.

Agile Scooter has taken to jumping atop the bookcase where the cage is located. At first he was content to merely lie on the cage with a birds eye view of mouse activities. Eventually, though, he discovered an engineering flaw in the cage whereby he could knock a component of the lid loose, thus freeing the inmates.

The first time he did this we found Rose wandering down the hallway with Scooter ambling behind her. Not realizing it was Scooter who enabled the escape, I put a heavy book on the lid.

The second time he did this, I found Rose darting between the articles of clothing Ryan left scattered on his bedroom floor. Scooter was watching her intently from Ryan's bed. With the heavy book now beside the cage, I was beginning to suspect a connection.

This morning I woke up to mouse squeaks. Upon investigation, I found Scooter lying on his side, lazily dangling his paw over the terrified mouse he had trapped in a corner of my office.

I think I've finally resolved the problem with duct tape which, as everyone knows, can be used to resolve all manner of household problems. Rose is safely back with Lilly, and Scooter, who doesn't yet understand that I'm on to his little scheme, is asleep on my bed... probably dreaming of his next play date.

Chilling

The last bit of news I posted last night is really depressing. When we gave up manufacturing to become the world's bankers, I'll bet nobody foresaw the day our banking industry would start getting auctioned off to the likes of Dubai.

I'm saying it now: hubris and greed will be the downfall of this country. And all the while we're in the death spiral, the robber barons will continue to gut the country and excuse their actions by chanting "Capitalism!" and we'll all accept it as the American way.

How Low Can It Go?

This makes me wonder just how bad the problem really is:

Citigroup Inc. (C.N) and Merrill Lynch & Co Inc. (MER.N) are in discussions to receive more capital from investors, primarily foreign governments, The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday.

Citigroup could get as much as $10 billion, likely all from foreign governments, while Merrill is expected to get $3 billion to $4 billion, much of it from a Middle Eastern government investment fund, the report said.

[...]

In December, Merrill Lynch shored up its capital base by as much as $7.5 billion after selling a stake to a Singapore government investment fund and an asset manager. Morgan Stanley (MS.N) has said it would receive $5 billion from China after recording $9.4 billion of writedowns.
Citigroup in November agreed to sell up to a 4.9 percent stake to Abu Dhabi for $7.5 billion, while UBS (UBSN.VX) accepted a $9.75 billion investment from a separate Singapore state fund.

This comes after December's blind auctions:

The Federal Reserve, working to combat the effects of a severe credit crunch, announced Friday it had auctioned another $20 billion in funds to commercial banks at an interest rate of 4.67 percent. Fed officials pledged to continue with the auctions "for as long as necessary."

The central bank said it had received bids for $57.7 billion worth of loans, nearly three times the amount being offered, indicating continued strong interest in the Fed's new approach to providing money to cash-strapped banks.

It was the second of four scheduled auctions. The first auction, on Monday, of $20 billion resulted in loans being awarded at an interest rate of 4.65 percent. There were 93 bidders seeking $63.6 billion at the first auction and 73 at the second.

Two more auctions will occur in early January. In a statement Friday, the central bank said it would continue with further auctions "for as long as necessary to address elevated pressures in short-term funding markets."

The new auction process was aut the federal funds rate and the discount rate by a quarter-point at its last meeting on Dec. 11, disappointing investors who had hoped for a bigger half-point reduction in the funds rate.

Many economists believe the Fed will keep cutting rates with three more quarter-point reductions expected in the funds rate at the Fed's first three meetings of the new year.

Analysts believe that a serious slowdown in overall economic growth will force the Fed to continue cutting rates even though some Fed officials have expressed worries that the rate cuts could exacerbate inflation pressures, which have flared up again, reflecting a renewed surge in oil prices.

Foreshadowing?

Bummer:

American Express Co., the third- largest U.S. credit-card network, will take a fourth-quarter charge of $275 million as more cardholders failed to repay their debts and the company forecast first-quarter earnings below analysts' estimates.

The stock fell 7 percent in extended trading. American Express, based in New York, said its first-quarter earnings from continuing operations will be less than the 90 cents a share in the same period in 2007, missing the 93 cent average estimate of 12 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg.

Bush's Amazing Superpowers

If Bush can bring peace to Israel and Palestine -- something a string of well intentioned US presidents have tried, in vain, to do -- he may yet redeem his otherwise spectacularly failed presidency.

President Bush on Thursday predicted that a Mideast peace treaty would be completed by the time he leaves office, and named a U.S. Air Force general to oversee compliance with a U.S.-backed peace plan.

Bush said he's convinced that both Israeli and Palestinian leaders understand "the importance of democratic states living side by side" in peace, and noted that he has a one-year deadline for progress on his watch.

Fortunately Bush has super superpower powers that enable him to see things that are not clearly visible to the rest of us. Like Putin's soul, and the hearts and minds of Iraqis.

I'm sure it will be a cakewalk.

AT&T Wants To Sniff Your Packets

One might ask why AT&T and other ISPs are suddenly so keen to become the censors of the interverse? That seems like a whole lotta power, not to mention a strange role for an ISP to be asking to take on.

Network-level filtering means your Internet service provider – Comcast, AT&T, EarthLink, or whoever you send that monthly check to – could soon start sniffing your digital packets, looking for material that infringes on someone’s copyright.

“What we are already doing to address piracy hasn’t been working. There’s no secret there,” said James Cicconi, senior vice president, external & legal affairs for AT&T.

Mr. Cicconi said that AT&T has been talking to technology companies, and members of the MPAA and RIAA, for the last six months about implementing digital fingerprinting techniques on the network level.

“We are very interested in a technology based solution and we think a network-based solution is the optimal way to approach this,” he said. “We recognize we are not there yet but there are a lot of promising technologies. But we are having an open discussion with a number of content companies, including NBC Universal, to try to explore various technologies that are out there.”

Internet civil rights organizations oppose network-level filtering, arguing that it amounts to Big Brother monitoring of free speech, and that such filtering could block the use of material that may fall under fair-use legal provisions — uses like parody, which enrich our culture.

While pondering the strangeness of this, one might recall that AT&T has been BushCo's partner in crime for some time in illegally spying on Americans. I remember shaking my head at this story about the whistle blower (an IT guy), which should be a good lesson for our politicians... you can get away with lying to the low-tech people who don't know any better but you can't get away with lying to the techies.

"The president has not presented this truthfully," said Klein, a 62-year old retiree. "He said it was about a few people making calls to the Mideast. But I know this physical equipment. It copies everything. There's no selection of anything, at all -- the splitter copies entire data streams from the internet, phone conversations, e-mail, web-browsing. Everything."

What Klein unearthed -- you can read it here -- points to a nearly unbounded surveillance program. Its very location in San Francisco suggests that the program was "massively domestic" in its focus, he said. "If they really meant what they say about only wanting international stuff, you wouldn't want it in San Francisco or Atlanta. You'd want to be closer to the border where the lines come in from the ocean so you pick up international calls. You only do it in San Francisco if you want domestic stuff. The location of this stuff contradicts their story."

The Day After

I've recovered. A few thoughts:

• It didn't really occur to me that people would find Obama shallow because he's chosen to focus on change at the primary season kickoff. I've been linking to Obama's position papers for over a year... he has taken strong positions (Google is your friend). For another thing, after the first few snooze-fest debate performances where he was painfully wonky and professorly, I kept wondering when he was going to start showing off some of his oratorical skill. It's an incredible strength and he should use it.
  

• It doesn't matter how strong Hillary is on the issues if she can't build a working coalition to get stuff done. Being POTUS is not like being dictator. Is the Hillabeast really capable of forming a productive working relationship with those with whom she already shares a well established adversarial relationship? I don't see how.
  

• To my lefty, Bush hating, revenge minded friends: Me too! I've dreamed of sticking it right back at the 'Pubbies for the next eight years... derisively, mockingly, blatantly. Our turn to have a president who only speaks to half of the country (our half, of course). Who better for that than Hillary? I've also thought about how sweet it would be to have a Democratic president use all of that brand new executive power Bush discovered. In my gut, though, I fear this country has some dark days ahead... and I'm ready to put pettiness aside for the sake of getting us the hell through it.

• Enough with talking about the Hillabeast crying. It was not calculated. She was exhausted and she had a moment. I, for one, have had many such moments. In fact, I've had several this week.

• Bush, Clinton, Bush, Clinton. We're Americans... we don't do dynasties. What in the hell is wrong with people????

• Still, this is very good news: The Dems drew 270K votes in NH last night and the Repubs drew 210K... record voter turnout.
  

Gah

The Hillabeast looks poised to win New Hampshire.

I don't want to talk about it.

New Hampshire Day

Will the Republicans really be happy to see Hillary defeated in the primaries? Wasn't "Fear Hillary!" part of the GOP election strategy for November?

Inquiring minds want to know.

New Hampshire Eve

Do you believe great leaders are born or made?

Sadness

An off-season tornado ripped through our area this afternoon, causing some drama in our neighborhood with the community sirens roaring just as the kids were getting out of school. Fortunately it was just a funnel cloud when it passed over us and there was no damage.

The same cannot be said of the entire region. An actual tornado touched down northeast of us, in Poplar Grove, and did some substantial damage to -- of all places -- Edward's Apple Orchard.

The trek out to Edwards' Apple Orchard has been an autumn ritual for over 30 years, first as a child with my parents and eventually with my own kids. It's hard to imagine it being wiped out in a day. The orchard itself is still intact but all eight of the outbuildings are destroyed. The house was significantly damaged.

Doesn't sound like there were any injuries.

Post Debate Commentary

Via Andrew Sullivan, I thought these were excellent observations:

As with many of Obama's best formulations, this seemed simultaneously to rise to the moment and be the fruit of long reflection. He exactly captured the strength and the weakness of the Clinton presidency in an assessment that is generous, fair, but dead-on accurate as a critique. Bill Clinton outmaneuvered the Republicans year after year on budget essentials but he never built the coalition (generous of Obama to say "we never built...) to reform health care, or revamp energy policy, or build any other major policy bridge to the 21st century. Hillary would say that's because the vast right-wing conspiracy sabotaged them at every turn. But Bill kept handing them swords to gore him, so he never built the trust that underlies a mandate. So Obama manages to bury Clinton and to praise him. "I give him enormous credit" but....

On top of this, Obama has here the perfect response to the "he's just talk" line of attack. Politics is almost literally all talk. You've got to be good in the cloak room, at the negotiating table, on the debate floor. What gives a politician the ultimate strength to push through change, though, is to convince the mass of voters to support his or her effort for something major like health care reform. "Don't discount that power, because when the American people are determined that something is going to happen, then it happens." That says it all. That's a real political philosophy at its deepest.

Also, note the organic riff on "the fierce urgency of now": But in fact there have been periods of time in our history where a president inspired the American people to do better, and I think we're in one of those moments right now. Obama's slogans are the fruit of long reflection. They don't become fixed like a smile for the camera; they weave themselves into his language and ripen over time. He manages to shake off that broken record effect that encrusts almost every campaign.

It's funny how people who claim to take such pride in the concept of the American dream, in the idea of who Americans are, are so quick to dismiss Obama as just an empty dreamer. It's about damn time someone reminded this country what it's capable of.

Obama, Hillary, And The Meaning Of Change

I'm watching the CNN rerun of last night's Dem debate. In a clear swipe at Obama's focus on change, Hillary said, in effect, "I don't just talk about change, I've been making change happen for 35 years."

She obviously doesn't get it.

Regardless of which political party people identify with, regardless of which ideology they favor, most people are worried about the same things. What's happening to the economy? What happens if I get sick? Are we safe from our enemies? What will the future look like for my children?

Sadly, these questions are only a secondary concern in institutional politics these days. The primary concern of institutional politics is power. The two parties have become so bitterly, ruthlessly opposed that they're no longer working together to solve the problems that face us. In fact, their primary mission seems to be to blocking the other from actually getting anything done.

That kind of political self indulgence is a luxury this country can no longer afford. A growing number of Americans are starting to realize that the petty bullshit that's been contrived to divide and subdivide us serves only the establishment machines. The power elites would gladly leave this country to burn while its citizenry squabbles over gay marriage.

That is what Obama is trying to say. That is his message of change. That is why he doesn't pander to the Democratic base and why he doesn't whack on Republicans for sport. He is setting an example... he is breaking the cycle of destructive partisan politics. His timing is perfect... I think people are starting to wake up.

Obama has written plenty of policy position papers to appeal to the wonks. I'm not in agreement with every position he's taken... I don't expect my ideals to align perfectly with any candidate. What I believe, however, is that Barack Obama is uniquely able to redirect this country's energy back to solving our problems instead of merely fighting over them.

No other candidate, Republican or Democratic, will do that. I know not everyone sees and appreciates what I'm seeing here but I'm hoping enough of them will come November.

Immigration

Didn't get to see the debates on CNN last night so I'm watching the rerun tonight. The Republicans are up first... the big topic is (of course) illegal immigration. Most of the candidates don't seem too wildly apart in their ideas (illegal immigration is bad, amnesty is undesirable, can't realistically deport 12 million people) but they sure did spend a lot of time trying to foul each other up on the details.

I used to be rabidly anti-illegal immigrant. I remember sitting on the deck with my conservative brother a few years back, chatting about illegal immigration. He was commenting on the inhumanity of deporting illegals who have lived here their whole lives, who don't know anyone in Mexico, who don't even speak Spanish. I believe I shocked him a bit when I said that was too damn bad, that they've got to go.

I've softened my position considerably since then.

For one thing, I'm trying hard to separate my pissed offedness about the impact of greed fueled globalization from my thoughts about general immigration policy. It's been inappropriate to let one issue cloud the other.

It's true that sealing the border is a matter of national security... a porous border in this day and age seems unbelievably stupid, no matter how much business *hearts* the low cost labor. I also think migrant workers creeping back and forth across the border is a really bad idea culturally. If they're still calling Mexico home while working in America then they're not really incented to integrate like previous generations of immigrants were.

In the end I agree that illegal immigration is bad, that we've got to seal the borders, and that we can't realistically deport 12 million people. So what do we do with them? It serves no one to maintain a shadowy subclass. Undocumented people are a logistical and security nightmare... it seems very naive to insist on principle that we shouldn't try to document them.

IMO, the only way out of this mess is to seal the border, integrate the people who want to stay (amnesty doesn't bother me as long the borders are sealed first), and adjust our immigration quotas to mirror our labor requirements (those boomers are going to leave a gaping hole when they drop out of the workforce in a few years).

Obama And The Right

Is the right's current Obama tolerence only skin deep? Glenn Greenwald and John Cole think so. Love this quote from Greenwald:

There’s a prevailing sense that Obama is not as offensive to the right-wing GOP faction as other Democratic and liberal candidates in the past have been, or that he’s less “divisive” among them than Hillary. And that’s true: for now, while he tries to take down the individual who has long provoked the most intense hatred—literally—among the Right. But anyone who doesn’t think that that’s all going to change instantaneously if Obama is the nominee hasn’t been watching how this faction operates over the last 20 years. Hatred is their fuel. Just look at the bottomless personal animus they managed to generate over an anemic, mundane, inoffensive figure like John Kerry. At their Convention, they waved signs with band-aids mocking his purple hearts while cheering on two combat-avoiders.

Obama isn't courting the right, per se. I don't think he cares if the GOP powers that be find him offensive or not... he's a Democrat, not a Demopublican. He just happens to understand that the Democratic establishment and the Republican establishment have become so powerfully entrenched that they no longer serve their masters... they exist only to serve themselves. Americans have been deliberately divided because it's convenient for the machines (divide et impera).

Think about it. I'll write more on this later.

Good Fox, Bad Fox

Fox does good. (I love love love the way this was written!)

Fox does bad. (Barring Ron Paul after he got 10% in Iowa?)

This Makes Me Happy

From Devilstower at Daily Kos:

Who walked away with the most impressive number of the night? We did.

In 2000, the last time there was a caucus in both parties, Republicans turned out 87,000 voters, while Democrats produced 59,000. There are around 600,000 registered Democrats in Iowa, and about 550,000 Republicans, but when you consider that on caucus nights, Republicans just need to show up and point to a name, while Democrats are committing to two hours of public wrangling, it's not a surprise that more Republicans show up to be "first in the nation."

Except for yesterday.

When the Des Moines Register poll was predicated on a turnout of 200,000, I was scornful. And they were wrong -- but only because they were too conservative.

Last night, the Republicans produced around 115,000 voters -- an impressive 30% increase.

But the Democrats turned out 236,000. That's an increase of roughly one whole helluva lot.

And it's a huge indicator of both how energized Democrats are this year, and how ready independents are to put their chips on the D line.

The heartland has heart.

The Defectives

There are those among us who were born without a functional empathy chip. This chip is what allows the rest of us to relate to the experience of others without necessarily having to endure the same experience. We can visualize and understand in the abstract what others are going through without having to actually go through it ourselves. It opens our minds to ideas and concepts we'd never consider on our own.

The empathy defectives tend toward smug. I can spot them a million miles away. Their world is limited to their direct experience with it; their perspective is myopic. Most importantly, they don't see anyone else's experience as valid until the very moment it becomes their own.

Glenn Beck, uber-conservative TV and radio host, has apparently had such a moment.

I saw this link via Drudge, where Glenn, from his sickbed, seems to have concluded that no matter how much money he has accumulated, no matter how much private insurance he carries, health care in this country is FUBAR'd and he's been personally affected by it.



Compare and contrast with this clip from his show six months ago:



It's an epiphany!

We here at Think, Dammit! aren't total dogs, though... we do wish him good health and a speedy recovery.

Iowa Day (Final)

With 95% of the results in...

Dems:

Obama -- 38%
Edwards -- 30%
Clinton -- 29%

Repubs:

Huckabee -- 34%
Romney -- 25%
Thomspon -- 14%

Looks like I didn't do so well in my predictions but, still... I got the one that counted. :-)

A few points:

• Juan Williams and Bill Kristol rightly point out that Obama took a state that is 95% white. So there, MSNBC talking heads!
• I can't wait to see the voter turnout numbers... rumor has it Dem numbers were up 20% over 2004 and outshowed Repubs 2-1. Lots of newbies to the caucus. And I heard there was a huge turnout for ages 18-30. Looks like the next generation is politically engaged. Fucking A!!!!
  
• I am proud of the Iowa Dems for selecting a candidate that insisted on taking the higher road regarding pandering for votes among the base (he didn't) and negative campaigning (he didn't). A candidate for the non-sheeple.
  
• Huckabee. Hmmm. As far as evangelicals go, I suppose he seems fairly likable. And it'll be fun to watch Fred Barnes's head explode.
  

On to New Hampshire!

UPDATE: Some turnout numbers from Townhall...

Projections showed a turnout of 220,588 for Democrats, compared to 124,000 who participated in 2004. Most projections had estimated turnout would be about 150,000.

Turnout was also up on the Republican side, where projections showed about 114,000 people taking part.

The last contested Republican caucuses in 2000 drew 87,666 in caucuses won by then-Gov. George W. Bush.

Iowa Day IV

Initial results are in with 28% of the precincts reporting.

Edwards-Obama-Clinton and Huckabee-Romney-Thompson.

Thompson?

Criminy!

UPDATE: 8:00
MSNBC just called the Republican race for Huckabee by quite a margin (36% to Romney's 23%). And with 39% of the precincts in for Dems, now it's Obama-Edwards-Clinton.

UPDATE: 8:25
McCain just did a little speechifying... he exudes class. MSNBC is calling it for Obama. Whahooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Iowa Day III

So what if Keith Olbermann is the lone liberal host (not co-host) of cable news. He easily outshines the likes of Tucker Carlson, Joe Scarborough, Glenn Beck, Laura Ingraham, and the entire staff of Faux News.

Except for the fake voice he uses when quoting Bill O'Reilly... that's getting a little old.

Iowa Day II

I wish I lived in Iowa or NH. It's always kind of sucked to live in staid, under-the-radar, election year snoozer Illinois.

I should note, however, that this year Illinois has joined the Febuary 5th crowd to help evolve Super Tuesday into Super Duper Tuesday (I'm not trying to be funny here... it's really Super Duper Tuesday). I don't think it'll have quite the same impact now that half of our united states are participating in Super Duper Tuesday, though.

I want candidates to come here and grovel for my vote, damn it! I want to see Hillary stopping in for a surprise breakfast at the Sunrise Family Restaurant. I want McCain to pop in for the grand opening of Menard's.

Where are my platitudes and empty promises????

Iowa Day

It's surreal to hear the talking heads on MSNBC fretting over how Iowa voters might behave. Will they really support a woman? Will they really support a black man? I suppose it's an interesting discussion to kill air time until the caucus results are in.

Speaking for myself, the fact that Hillary is a woman is such a non-factor that I didn't even consider having a Helen Reddy "I Am Woman" moment and supporting her. Nor did I consider not voting for her based on gender.

I also think you'd really have to stretch things to take issue with Obama's blackness. Even black people don't think Obama is black -- except for the brownish pigment of his skin, he seems as "white" as Huckabee. I suppose older Americans (those having lived through the national trauma of desegregation) might not be able to get past his skin color but it's hardly like he's represent'n, yo.

Anyway, I doubt my kids' generation will be listening to that kind of busybody chatter when they rule the world.

The Contortionist

Mitt Romney loves hates lovates the gays. From John Aravosis at AmericaBlog:

Sorry, Charlie, that pink boat sailed years ago. I've mentioned before that Ted Kennedy's campaign recruited me back in 1994 to help them fight Romney's attempt to convince voters in Massachusetts that he was really more pro-gay, and would do more for gays, than Ted Frigging Kennedy. They asked me to write a letter to the editor of the gay paper in Boston (and I did) explaining that Romney wasn't really as good an honorary homosexual as Kennedy. That's how bad things were, that's how successful Romney was in pleading his case that he was the best thing to hit the gay agenda since Judy Garland and disco.

Ted Kennedy, folks. That was Romney's mentor - nay - the guy Romney claimed didn't hold a candle to him on his support for gay rights. It's no wonder Romney is pulling out all the stops to convince Republican primary voters that he's not REALLY pro-gay. If Romney were any more pro-gay, his wife would be his husband.

So there you have it.

Iowa Eve

Very exciting times for those of us who have been following this presidential election since the last presidential election. It's the 2008 election kickoff!

Obviously I'm anxious to see how my favorite candidate (Obama!) fares but let's face it... a Styrofoam cup would be an improvement over the Bush Triumvirate.

As I dream of our future state on this Iowa Eve, I am hopeful. Even the worst thing that could happen among Dems in this election is not the worst ever (no matter how much I rag on Hillary, she's not Bush). Yes, this is just the first of many state races but Iowa does offer a certain momentum. I will try to be patient.

Since the Repubs are having a hard time getting support for their slate of candidates (the angst on Redstate is pretty humorous these days), I'm starting to relax a little. Obviously I'd be happy with a McCain victory since I favor McCain. A Huckabee win would be a laugh riot as the old school 'Pubbies try to figure out what to do with a tax-and-spend Evangelical. Faux News still has its heart set on the flailing Giuliani... corrupt machine politics being their forte, I guess. Romney might be a good bet if he's managed to contort himself artfully enough: "Look, I'm a religious dude!" "Don't worry, I'm not a crazy religious dude! "I'm a real conservative!" "But I'm a really moderate conservative!"

So does anyone care to guess what tomorrow will bring? Here's mine, a bit uneducated:

Obama, Clinton, Edwards (in that order)... and... Huckabee, Romney, McCain (in that order).

Black Gold

Oil prices hit $100 today, at least for a little while. Get used to it.

Technology
Real estate
Oil

Can you smell it? Oil is about to become the hottest new must-have asset for investors. Let the speculatin' begin... there's money to be made in them thar hills!

The rest of us can just sit around and wait for the resultant economic crash and fallout.