As we told you less than a week and a half ago, if you haven't heard the words "Super PAC" yet, you will be hearing them a great deal this year, thanks to the lack of regulation brought on by the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision.
In Florida and in the Omaha media market - thanks to the Iowa caucus - Super PACs have already been cramming political commercials into nearly every media opening they can think of, from TV, to radio, to newspapers, online, and even movie theaters. The ads have already begun in our DC media market too.
According to a new study just released by the Wesleyan Media Project, outside group spending on political ads in this first month of 2012 is already up 1600%. No, we didn't forget a decimal point. That's an increase of sixteen-hundred percent - and that's only been in the Republican primary.
What's more, the same study confirms: it's not just that it's a political year and you're seeing more political advertising. In TV ads alone, in the first month of 2012, 44 percent of all commercials aired on TV were political ads - but they were paid for by not by the candidates, but by those nearly unregulated groups, the Super PACs.
Super PACs aren't just staying on your TV and in your radio, though.
With nearly unlimited amounts of money at their disposal, SuperPACs have now taken to getting involved in things like phone banking, field organizing, direct mail, polling and on-site campaign activities.
While there had been some reported arguments between Super PAC staff and actual campaign staffers at the Iowa Caucuses in early January, in Florida on Monday, the Super PACs took it to the next level. Staffers of a Super PAC that supports Newt Gingrich invaded a campaign event for Mitt Romney, facing off against their rivals - in person - and making pointed claims that Romney is attempting to buy the Presidential election.
To our minds, that kind of conduct is simply uncalled for in political campaigns. If Super PAC staffers had been armed, and slightly less than ethical, who knows what the outcome of a similar conflict could be.
That's what happens when the only rule is money - and the only goal is winning. Absolute power corrupts absolutely - and unlimited campaign contributions cloud the political ocean so much that it's hard to tell the bottom feeders from the candidates.
We're as disgusted as many of you. So many politicians have their lips firmly affixed to the backsides - and nearly every other side - of the Super PACs right now. Because of the lack of regulations, however, the minute a single candidate or political party uses the weapon of a Super PAC, everyone else also has to use a similar weapon, if they want to truly compete.
In light of this kind of grotesque and disgusting display of money over morals in politics, we have a feeling that when this year is done - if not before - that even a Congress as divided as our current one will find a way to put the leviathan of unregulated campaign finance back into its hole.
After all, less than a week after the President mentioned the insider trading that members of Congress still can legally engage in, the STOCK Act – which would effectively ban insider trading by those elites on Capitol Hill – blasted through on Monday, in a 93-2 truly bipartisan vote.
Apparently, when voters get profoundly fed up and riled up with members of Congress on ALL sides of an issue, those elected officials can actually be spurred to take action.
By year's end, after a year of nearly unlimited political hate ads from every direction, we're fairly certain the American people will be ready to spur Congress to take similar action on the issue of campaign finance reform. Whether that watchdog actually will have teeth remains to be seen. Stay tuned.
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Monday, January 30, 2012
The Uncivil War
As a topic, our staff has discussed today's subject matter many times over the last twenty-plus years. In fact, we've been warning our Republican friends of these days since even before the first edition of this publication. Sadly, but not unsurprisingly, our warnings went unheeded.
What we're talking about is the highly un-civil war going on inside the Republican Party.
While it's fairly obvious that the GOP's establishment wing is currently ganging up and attempting to stomp Newt Gingrich flat, the Republican's internal war isn't just happening on the Presidential level.
Tea Party extremists like Congressman Allen West are also being targeted by the Republican Party establishment, who are attempting to redistrict West right out of his Congressional seat. Even right-wing media isn't off limits. Well-known conservative rumor generator Matt Drudge, and even Fox News, are being targeted by certain factions of the Republican Party that both Drudge and Fox have pandered to for years.
Of course, it doesn't help the cause of Republicans and conservatives when those they consider leaders - like Speaker John Boehner - continue insisting on legislative kamikaze maneuvers like Boehner appears intent on doing yet again with the Keystone pipeline.
The intra-party warfare has even shaken longtime GOP stalwarts like anti-tax lobbyist Grover Norquist into admitting out loud things that were formerly only spoken of in hushed tones in back rooms. Norquist's latest failure is in admitting that Congressional Republicans fully intend to find a way to try and impeach President Obama during Obama's second term if they don't get their way. That would be reminiscent of the way they targeted Bill Clinton after the GOP's last major implosion - which, as it turns out, happened under Newt Gingrich in the late 1990s.
Speaking of Newt, even though the polling numbers don't lately seem to be in his favor – Nate Silver's aggregation of polls says Mitt Romney has an almost ninety percent chance of winning Florida – Newt is insisting he will will press on, and continue his campaign for several more months. Thanks to the Citizens United ruling and the millions of dollars in support from multi-billionaire casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, Gingrich could easily do just that, continuing his campaign long after the chance for him to legitimately win the nomination has passed.
There are those sounding the alarm in Republican circles - that the GOP's highly uncivil war will hurt them in the general election on the Presidential level and beyond. It also looks to weaken them down the ballot across America, and in political power centers for years to come. Unsurprisingly, there are few on the right willing to listen to that alarm.
The Republican Party elite have been dreading this battle for years, attempting to keep the Wall Street class together with the evangelical right, the libertarians, and even the old-fashioned centrist GOP members. Maintaining this political Frankenstein became impossible, however, when the GOP leadership allowed the extremists in the Tea Party to take the reins.
The only reason conservative leaders stirred up the extremist elements that became the Tea Party was because they believed the Tea Baggers would get the Republican Party the attention they have long lusted after.
To that extent, they've succeeded beyond even their own wildest dreams.
However, it's exactly the wrong kind of attention a party looking to gain more political power would want to receive.
Somehow, we can't really feel sorry for the political death dance they're going through.
It's not like we didn't warn them.
What we're talking about is the highly un-civil war going on inside the Republican Party.
While it's fairly obvious that the GOP's establishment wing is currently ganging up and attempting to stomp Newt Gingrich flat, the Republican's internal war isn't just happening on the Presidential level.
Tea Party extremists like Congressman Allen West are also being targeted by the Republican Party establishment, who are attempting to redistrict West right out of his Congressional seat. Even right-wing media isn't off limits. Well-known conservative rumor generator Matt Drudge, and even Fox News, are being targeted by certain factions of the Republican Party that both Drudge and Fox have pandered to for years.
Of course, it doesn't help the cause of Republicans and conservatives when those they consider leaders - like Speaker John Boehner - continue insisting on legislative kamikaze maneuvers like Boehner appears intent on doing yet again with the Keystone pipeline.
The intra-party warfare has even shaken longtime GOP stalwarts like anti-tax lobbyist Grover Norquist into admitting out loud things that were formerly only spoken of in hushed tones in back rooms. Norquist's latest failure is in admitting that Congressional Republicans fully intend to find a way to try and impeach President Obama during Obama's second term if they don't get their way. That would be reminiscent of the way they targeted Bill Clinton after the GOP's last major implosion - which, as it turns out, happened under Newt Gingrich in the late 1990s.
Speaking of Newt, even though the polling numbers don't lately seem to be in his favor – Nate Silver's aggregation of polls says Mitt Romney has an almost ninety percent chance of winning Florida – Newt is insisting he will will press on, and continue his campaign for several more months. Thanks to the Citizens United ruling and the millions of dollars in support from multi-billionaire casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, Gingrich could easily do just that, continuing his campaign long after the chance for him to legitimately win the nomination has passed.
There are those sounding the alarm in Republican circles - that the GOP's highly uncivil war will hurt them in the general election on the Presidential level and beyond. It also looks to weaken them down the ballot across America, and in political power centers for years to come. Unsurprisingly, there are few on the right willing to listen to that alarm.
The Republican Party elite have been dreading this battle for years, attempting to keep the Wall Street class together with the evangelical right, the libertarians, and even the old-fashioned centrist GOP members. Maintaining this political Frankenstein became impossible, however, when the GOP leadership allowed the extremists in the Tea Party to take the reins.
The only reason conservative leaders stirred up the extremist elements that became the Tea Party was because they believed the Tea Baggers would get the Republican Party the attention they have long lusted after.
To that extent, they've succeeded beyond even their own wildest dreams.
However, it's exactly the wrong kind of attention a party looking to gain more political power would want to receive.
Somehow, we can't really feel sorry for the political death dance they're going through.
It's not like we didn't warn them.
Friday, January 27, 2012
Friday Funday: No Clowning - Live Life Fully!
As we head to the end of another week, a few events in life gave us pause this week - small but important events we thought were worthy of noting, and learning from.
There was the goofy space talk from Newt, and the bi-polar immigrant wooing and bashing in the GOP Presidential race. You'd also have to consider the offensive, stupid, and greedy tax plan of Nebraska's governor and the strange absence of Florida's governor from the statewide GOP primary. There were some magical moments this past week - and a few sad ones too.
We learned yesterday that a family member of our webmaster passed away after a surgery in Nebraska. She wasn't in the best of health, but it was still a surprise, and a sad one all the same. Our condolences go out to the family.
That sad death also reminded us of another end this past week, the end of the tenure of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and her staff.
It's easy to forget, and time goes so fast for most of us, but just a year ago, Rep. Giffords was shot at point blank range, in the skull, by a mentally ill constituent, and wasn't initially expected to live. This week, Congresswoman Giffords walked back into the chamber of the U.S. House of Representatives, on her own power, and took her designated seat for the State of the Union address - like almost every other member of Congress.
What happened next should humble every member of our government, from every political party.
First, Congresswoman Giffords decided to step down, because while her staff has been incredible over the last year, Ms. Giffords decided she could not give her all to her job of properly representing her constituents. So, for the good of the people she fought so hard to represent, she decided to resign her seat in Congress.
Then, she introduced a real legislative bill - something her constituents wanted, not something she'd necessarily want for herself, and not some kind of a bill for show or a piece of legislation propped up as as a political swan song.
With her last action as a member of Congress, Gabrielle Giffords chose to give a moment she could have easily taken for herself, for a cause like curbing gun violence or helping victims of violent crimes -- and she gave that moment to the people she was sent to Washington, DC to serve.
She chose to serve others first, even as her final act in Congress.
We often joke here at The Daily Felltoon, poking fun at our colleagues in the media, and those we most often focus on in politics. Paul's cartoons make us laugh about the silly ways our politicians act - and more often than many of us would probably be willing to admit, how we are also part of the problem.
We call each other clowns - and often rightfully so, with the ridiculous ways we Americans act.
When the clock ticks down to the end, though - whether it's the end of a life, or just the end of a phase of life - we hope that each of us can go out like Congresswoman Giffords exited her role in Congress this week; with honor and respect, but still giving to the world at 120%.
There was the goofy space talk from Newt, and the bi-polar immigrant wooing and bashing in the GOP Presidential race. You'd also have to consider the offensive, stupid, and greedy tax plan of Nebraska's governor and the strange absence of Florida's governor from the statewide GOP primary. There were some magical moments this past week - and a few sad ones too.
We learned yesterday that a family member of our webmaster passed away after a surgery in Nebraska. She wasn't in the best of health, but it was still a surprise, and a sad one all the same. Our condolences go out to the family.
That sad death also reminded us of another end this past week, the end of the tenure of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and her staff.
It's easy to forget, and time goes so fast for most of us, but just a year ago, Rep. Giffords was shot at point blank range, in the skull, by a mentally ill constituent, and wasn't initially expected to live. This week, Congresswoman Giffords walked back into the chamber of the U.S. House of Representatives, on her own power, and took her designated seat for the State of the Union address - like almost every other member of Congress.
What happened next should humble every member of our government, from every political party.
First, Congresswoman Giffords decided to step down, because while her staff has been incredible over the last year, Ms. Giffords decided she could not give her all to her job of properly representing her constituents. So, for the good of the people she fought so hard to represent, she decided to resign her seat in Congress.
Then, she introduced a real legislative bill - something her constituents wanted, not something she'd necessarily want for herself, and not some kind of a bill for show or a piece of legislation propped up as as a political swan song.
With her last action as a member of Congress, Gabrielle Giffords chose to give a moment she could have easily taken for herself, for a cause like curbing gun violence or helping victims of violent crimes -- and she gave that moment to the people she was sent to Washington, DC to serve.
She chose to serve others first, even as her final act in Congress.
We often joke here at The Daily Felltoon, poking fun at our colleagues in the media, and those we most often focus on in politics. Paul's cartoons make us laugh about the silly ways our politicians act - and more often than many of us would probably be willing to admit, how we are also part of the problem.
We call each other clowns - and often rightfully so, with the ridiculous ways we Americans act.
When the clock ticks down to the end, though - whether it's the end of a life, or just the end of a phase of life - we hope that each of us can go out like Congresswoman Giffords exited her role in Congress this week; with honor and respect, but still giving to the world at 120%.
"Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, Chocolate in one hand, Martini in the other, body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming: GERONIMO!"
- Hunter S. Thompson
Thursday, January 26, 2012
No Harmony Here
As the week and the political campaigns roll on, and yet another of the seemingly never-ending political debates happens tonight, the loudest sound we keep hearing from voters and potential voters isn't the sound of questions being asked or answered. Right now, the dominant theme seems to be the muffled grumbles of voter disgust, blasting at top volume through the GOP presidential primary season.
We can't say we blame them.
The GOP candidates for President can't seem to agree on anything these days - and their claims are getting more crazy by the day. Yesterday, Newt Gingrich stated - almost as though it were already a sure thing - that by the end of his second term, America would have a working, livable base on the Moon.
Even foreign leaders like Fidel Castro, the retired Cuban leader, are fed up with the insane claims, posturing, and mud slinging going on in U.S. politics. Writing a column for a Cuban government website, Castro recently called the current state of American politics in general, "the largest competition of crap and ignorance that has ever been heard."
To our surprise, we somewhat agree with Señor Castro on this.
Just focusing exclusively on the way the two GOP frontrunners have been running their campaigns so far is enough to make anyone want to scream.
Mr. Gingrich has attacked the media for keeping the last debate civil. Mr. Romney attacked Mr. Gingrich for attacking the media. Republican supporters like Marco Rubio attacked Gingrich for running anti-immigrant ads - while Gingrich was trying to court minority voters, many of whom are legal immigrants. The level of unnecessary political vitriol being poured into the media right now is unprecedented - and that's not including the multi-million dollar campaigns of the totally unregulated SuperPACs.
Two of the GOP candidates, Rick Santorum and Ron Paul, are so fed up with the timbre and cost of the race, they both appear ready to leave Florida before next Tuesday's statewide Republican primary. It's not just that Paul and Santorum are not gaining ground in Florida. Reports are that they're both just sick and tired of the mean-spiritedness, tired of the false political piety - and frankly, they're just plain tired.
We can't blame them for being tired of it, either.
On the issue of fake political piety, Nate Silver and the team over at FiveThirtyEight.com discovered a statistic that makes us want to jam our fingers in our ears even deeper when it comes to the Republican Presidential primaries. In the eighteen official debates that have happened so far, Newt Gingrich has mentioned President Ronald Reagan fifty-five times. Rick Santorum has tried to revive the ghost of Reagan fourteen times, while both Gov. Romney and Rep. Paul have only tried to resurrect Reagan's ghost six times, in the GOP debates.
One of our staff members is an acquaintance of Ron Reagan, Jr, who has assured us previously - his father would find this kind of deification offensive and completely against what his political party used to stand for. As many have pointed out over the last year, however, even Reagan wouldn't likely be able to win an election as a Republican today.
If there was one question we could ask each of the GOP Presidential candidates at this very moment, the only thing we would request is, "Could you please make it stop, now?"
We have a sick feeling they wouldn't be able to agree on an answer for that, either.
We can't say we blame them.
The GOP candidates for President can't seem to agree on anything these days - and their claims are getting more crazy by the day. Yesterday, Newt Gingrich stated - almost as though it were already a sure thing - that by the end of his second term, America would have a working, livable base on the Moon.
Even foreign leaders like Fidel Castro, the retired Cuban leader, are fed up with the insane claims, posturing, and mud slinging going on in U.S. politics. Writing a column for a Cuban government website, Castro recently called the current state of American politics in general, "the largest competition of crap and ignorance that has ever been heard."
To our surprise, we somewhat agree with Señor Castro on this.
Just focusing exclusively on the way the two GOP frontrunners have been running their campaigns so far is enough to make anyone want to scream.
Mr. Gingrich has attacked the media for keeping the last debate civil. Mr. Romney attacked Mr. Gingrich for attacking the media. Republican supporters like Marco Rubio attacked Gingrich for running anti-immigrant ads - while Gingrich was trying to court minority voters, many of whom are legal immigrants. The level of unnecessary political vitriol being poured into the media right now is unprecedented - and that's not including the multi-million dollar campaigns of the totally unregulated SuperPACs.
Two of the GOP candidates, Rick Santorum and Ron Paul, are so fed up with the timbre and cost of the race, they both appear ready to leave Florida before next Tuesday's statewide Republican primary. It's not just that Paul and Santorum are not gaining ground in Florida. Reports are that they're both just sick and tired of the mean-spiritedness, tired of the false political piety - and frankly, they're just plain tired.
We can't blame them for being tired of it, either.
On the issue of fake political piety, Nate Silver and the team over at FiveThirtyEight.com discovered a statistic that makes us want to jam our fingers in our ears even deeper when it comes to the Republican Presidential primaries. In the eighteen official debates that have happened so far, Newt Gingrich has mentioned President Ronald Reagan fifty-five times. Rick Santorum has tried to revive the ghost of Reagan fourteen times, while both Gov. Romney and Rep. Paul have only tried to resurrect Reagan's ghost six times, in the GOP debates.
One of our staff members is an acquaintance of Ron Reagan, Jr, who has assured us previously - his father would find this kind of deification offensive and completely against what his political party used to stand for. As many have pointed out over the last year, however, even Reagan wouldn't likely be able to win an election as a Republican today.
If there was one question we could ask each of the GOP Presidential candidates at this very moment, the only thing we would request is, "Could you please make it stop, now?"
We have a sick feeling they wouldn't be able to agree on an answer for that, either.
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Together, America Is Strong
Our initial plan today was to do as we have done here for several years now. In the day before and the day after the President's address, outlining the state of our nation, we have first previewed, and then reviewed the words of the President, along with the ideas outlined in the address.
We will do some of that today. Then we will let the President's words speak for themselves.
In short, President Obama made it clear; We can accomplish the challenges that face our country by working TOGETHER. If there are those who wish to fight against what is best for everyone to retain an unequal advantage or stay locked in a rigid ideology, that is their choice. But the rest of us will fight against them - and we will win, as we have already been doing.
Yes - this speech was very aspirational, more poetry than prose, more ideals than details. Obama didn't shy away from accepting responsibility, however. He made clear that he, and the Executive Branch, have work to do to fix the problems of the branch of government he directs - and that Congress MUST do the same thing.
He made it very clear, that we can accomplish anything, TOGETHER, specifically noting the actions of those who took down Osama Bin Laden. He made it even more clear, noting that the auto company Americans rescued - General Motors - is now the number one automaker in the world, again.
President Obama also called on corporations to do what is best for their country, as corporate citizens. He called on American companies and corporations to insource jobs - to bring them back to America - and to pay their fair share of taxes, no matter where in the world they may bank their profits.
The President also made clear that the days of severe economic inequality are over - and that it is high time that the laws on financial fraud have REAL teeth. "We will not go back to an economy weakened by outsourcing, bad debt and phony financial profits,” Mr. Obama said. "I will not go back to the days when Wall Street was allowed to play by its own set of rules.”
He hit on the poisonous effects of money in politics, of judicial appointments being held hostage, and even the issue of insider trading among members of Congress. He tackled the fact that we have already dealt with debt and the deficit, and that we have more work to do - including a desperate need to invest in our own nation.
As one commentator said after the speech, President Obama hit those in Congress, who would rather have ignored him, right where they lived.
By the looks on the faces of those in the chamber, some extremist members of Congress appeared VERY worried indeed, that they will no longer have a place to hide, and still be able to be to be considered ethical and honest, if they choose to work AGAINST the President and the nation.
The President finished with these words:
"Each time I look at that flag, I’m reminded that our destiny is stitched together like those fifty stars and those thirteen stripes. No one built this country on their own. This Nation is great because we built it together. This Nation is great because we worked as a team. This Nation is great because we get each other’s backs. And if we hold fast to that truth, in this moment of trial, there is no challenge too great; no mission too hard. As long as we’re joined in common purpose, as long as we maintain our common resolve, our journey moves forward, our future is hopeful, and the state of our Union will always be strong."
We will do some of that today. Then we will let the President's words speak for themselves.
In short, President Obama made it clear; We can accomplish the challenges that face our country by working TOGETHER. If there are those who wish to fight against what is best for everyone to retain an unequal advantage or stay locked in a rigid ideology, that is their choice. But the rest of us will fight against them - and we will win, as we have already been doing.
Yes - this speech was very aspirational, more poetry than prose, more ideals than details. Obama didn't shy away from accepting responsibility, however. He made clear that he, and the Executive Branch, have work to do to fix the problems of the branch of government he directs - and that Congress MUST do the same thing.
He made it very clear, that we can accomplish anything, TOGETHER, specifically noting the actions of those who took down Osama Bin Laden. He made it even more clear, noting that the auto company Americans rescued - General Motors - is now the number one automaker in the world, again.
President Obama also called on corporations to do what is best for their country, as corporate citizens. He called on American companies and corporations to insource jobs - to bring them back to America - and to pay their fair share of taxes, no matter where in the world they may bank their profits.
The President also made clear that the days of severe economic inequality are over - and that it is high time that the laws on financial fraud have REAL teeth. "We will not go back to an economy weakened by outsourcing, bad debt and phony financial profits,” Mr. Obama said. "I will not go back to the days when Wall Street was allowed to play by its own set of rules.”
He hit on the poisonous effects of money in politics, of judicial appointments being held hostage, and even the issue of insider trading among members of Congress. He tackled the fact that we have already dealt with debt and the deficit, and that we have more work to do - including a desperate need to invest in our own nation.
As one commentator said after the speech, President Obama hit those in Congress, who would rather have ignored him, right where they lived.
By the looks on the faces of those in the chamber, some extremist members of Congress appeared VERY worried indeed, that they will no longer have a place to hide, and still be able to be to be considered ethical and honest, if they choose to work AGAINST the President and the nation.
The President finished with these words:
"Each time I look at that flag, I’m reminded that our destiny is stitched together like those fifty stars and those thirteen stripes. No one built this country on their own. This Nation is great because we built it together. This Nation is great because we worked as a team. This Nation is great because we get each other’s backs. And if we hold fast to that truth, in this moment of trial, there is no challenge too great; no mission too hard. As long as we’re joined in common purpose, as long as we maintain our common resolve, our journey moves forward, our future is hopeful, and the state of our Union will always be strong."
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
American Checkup
Tonight, the President of The United States will give his third official State Of The Union speech, and his fourth annual address to the combined Congress of the United States. In light of that pivotal moment, we think it's a good time to take stock of what's happened over the last few years - and what our next steps should be.
Four years ago, when Barack Obama took over the Presidency from George W. Bush, this is what Mr. Obama found waiting for him at the entrance door to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
The American economy was in a freefall. America lost close to three-quarters of a million jobs that January, most before Mr. Obama set one foot inside the White House. This was after the worst year for jobs since 1945. The housing market collapse was in full roar as well. Our nation was also deeply entrenched in two wars, one in the heart of the Middle East, and one in Afghanistan. Osama Bin Laden was still alive, and Wall Street titans were still highly unregulated. On top of all of that, the worst drag on our Federal budget into the future was the ever increasing cost of health care - and there were no legitimate plans in Congress to staunch that fiscal wound.
This is the job that Barack Obama was handed that cold January four years ago.
He was also given to work with, to help govern our nation out of the mess he'd been handed, a Congress full of weak-kneed Democrats, along with many angry and arrogant Republicans. The latter had a single goal, clearly stated by one of their leaders, Mitch McConnell: to make Obama a one-term President, above all else. To top it all off, Mr. Obama was also "gifted" with a conservative-leaning, activist Supreme Court, where the members most likely to retire were those on the political left.
To say that the task set before him was monumental is probably one of the greatest political understatements ever.
Fast forward four years, to now.
Even Mitt Romney agrees the economy is now getting better. Unemployment is going down, with some of the best numbers in years - though it's still not getting better as fast as we'd like. Even so, America has seen twenty-two months of private sector job creation. If extremist Republicans wouldn't continue to insist on gutting our public services without ethically and legitimately collecting more revenue, the private sector jobs level might be further into recovery than it is now. That many legislators - mostly Republican, though some Democratic - still keep trying to rob cities, counties, and states to pay for tax cut proposals we can't afford is a problem that voters no longer seem blind to.
The housing market is showing positive - though shaky - signs, for the first time in years, Wall Street has begun to be put under control again, and the insurance and medical cost curve appears to be bending lower. Osama Bin Laden is dead, and thousands of Americans are already home from one war and beginning plans to get out of the other.
All of this has been done with a Congress made up of a large number of Republicans who did not want ANY of this this done as much as they wanted to see President Obama fail.
If he had failed, our nation would also have failed. As evidenced by the difference between four years ago, and now, President Obama did not fail, and we did not fail him or our nation - but that does not mean our nation is healthy.
Unemployment is still far too high. We are not yet out of Afghanistan. The foreclosure crisis is a long way from over. Wall Street needs more regulation - and the big banks must be made to pay for their own "gambling" debts, instead of expecting taxpayers to bail them out. Corporations and the rich need to pay the amount in taxes they're supposed to. Lastly, the poisonous levels of hate and fear that have been evident in many of the recent GOP debates and candidate rallies still infect far too much of this nation, and must not be allowed to determine the future for the rest of us.
There are a great many Americans who believe that regardless of what our challenges are, we can, we should, and we have - RECENTLY - worked together to solve some of America's worst problems in generations, regardless of our class, race, age, sexual preferences - or even political affiliation.
The state of what America CAN be is still strong, but to keep improving our collective health, we will need a leader like the one we already have, who has proven over the last few years that he is the President of ALL of us - not just the President of those who agree with his ideology.
Four years ago, when Barack Obama took over the Presidency from George W. Bush, this is what Mr. Obama found waiting for him at the entrance door to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
The American economy was in a freefall. America lost close to three-quarters of a million jobs that January, most before Mr. Obama set one foot inside the White House. This was after the worst year for jobs since 1945. The housing market collapse was in full roar as well. Our nation was also deeply entrenched in two wars, one in the heart of the Middle East, and one in Afghanistan. Osama Bin Laden was still alive, and Wall Street titans were still highly unregulated. On top of all of that, the worst drag on our Federal budget into the future was the ever increasing cost of health care - and there were no legitimate plans in Congress to staunch that fiscal wound.
This is the job that Barack Obama was handed that cold January four years ago.
He was also given to work with, to help govern our nation out of the mess he'd been handed, a Congress full of weak-kneed Democrats, along with many angry and arrogant Republicans. The latter had a single goal, clearly stated by one of their leaders, Mitch McConnell: to make Obama a one-term President, above all else. To top it all off, Mr. Obama was also "gifted" with a conservative-leaning, activist Supreme Court, where the members most likely to retire were those on the political left.
To say that the task set before him was monumental is probably one of the greatest political understatements ever.
Fast forward four years, to now.
Even Mitt Romney agrees the economy is now getting better. Unemployment is going down, with some of the best numbers in years - though it's still not getting better as fast as we'd like. Even so, America has seen twenty-two months of private sector job creation. If extremist Republicans wouldn't continue to insist on gutting our public services without ethically and legitimately collecting more revenue, the private sector jobs level might be further into recovery than it is now. That many legislators - mostly Republican, though some Democratic - still keep trying to rob cities, counties, and states to pay for tax cut proposals we can't afford is a problem that voters no longer seem blind to.
The housing market is showing positive - though shaky - signs, for the first time in years, Wall Street has begun to be put under control again, and the insurance and medical cost curve appears to be bending lower. Osama Bin Laden is dead, and thousands of Americans are already home from one war and beginning plans to get out of the other.
All of this has been done with a Congress made up of a large number of Republicans who did not want ANY of this this done as much as they wanted to see President Obama fail.
If he had failed, our nation would also have failed. As evidenced by the difference between four years ago, and now, President Obama did not fail, and we did not fail him or our nation - but that does not mean our nation is healthy.
Unemployment is still far too high. We are not yet out of Afghanistan. The foreclosure crisis is a long way from over. Wall Street needs more regulation - and the big banks must be made to pay for their own "gambling" debts, instead of expecting taxpayers to bail them out. Corporations and the rich need to pay the amount in taxes they're supposed to. Lastly, the poisonous levels of hate and fear that have been evident in many of the recent GOP debates and candidate rallies still infect far too much of this nation, and must not be allowed to determine the future for the rest of us.
There are a great many Americans who believe that regardless of what our challenges are, we can, we should, and we have - RECENTLY - worked together to solve some of America's worst problems in generations, regardless of our class, race, age, sexual preferences - or even political affiliation.
The state of what America CAN be is still strong, but to keep improving our collective health, we will need a leader like the one we already have, who has proven over the last few years that he is the President of ALL of us - not just the President of those who agree with his ideology.
Monday, January 23, 2012
Swing And A Miss
After a weekend filled with football, politics, some REAL winter weather in our Northern locations, and little bit of fried fair food for our South Florida staff [They have regional fairs in winter in South Florida; who knew?], we still have yet to process everything that happened over the last two days.
Rep. Gabrielle Giffords has announced she'll resign her Arizona House seat sometime this week to focus on her recovery, and Arizona's extremist Republican Governor Jan Brewer is already preparing to set the special election for Giffords' seat. Former Penn State football coach Joe Paterno died of cancer over the weekend - a fate we wish on nobody, no matter what they did or did not do in life. The NFL playoffs also finished up over the weekend, with the New England Patriots and the New York Giants set to play a rematch in this year's Super Bowl.
The biggest news over the weekend - or at least the story that received the most major media coverage - was the South Carolina GOP Primary contest. In a win that didn't really surprise us, noted hypocrite, adulterer, and former U.S. House Speaker from Georgia, Newt Gingrich, nominally defeated former Masssachusetts governor, Willard "Mitt" Romney, along with Rep. Ron Paul and former Pennsylvania Rep. Rick Santorum.
The truth is, the real winner this weekend may once again have been President Obama.
In extensive exit polling, it became starkly obvious that the kinds of voters who backed Newt Gingrich on Saturday were exactly the kind of voters the right-wing ideologues and media talking heads have been increasingly stoking for most of the last twenty years. We could have guessed their makeup, though the data confirms it: Older, angry, less educated extremists, who are also so-called evangelicals, who are scared about the economy - and most importantly, who want to beat President Obama in this election at ALL costs. That includes making the economy temporarily worse, and even increasing the debt.
It should be no surprise after looking at those exit polls, that those who claim to be conservative yet are hypocritical about their own beliefs, would push so heavily for the nomination of a man who is also a hypocrite and an extremist. That Republicans in MANY other areas of the country - including the Midwest - do not generally share South Carolinians' blind hatred of President Obama quite obviously meant nothing to the Republican primary voters there.
What the blindly ignorant in South Carolina don't seem to understand is that - no matter how angry they are - the fact is, Newt Gingrich will not likely be the GOP nominee. As journalist Josh Marshall pointed out over the weekend, Gingrich's unfavorables - the number of people who dislike him, for any reason - are around 60%. Nominating Gingrich would not only drive away moderates and independents - where much of the election could be won. As multiple Republican party members and supporters also pointed out over the weekend, Gingrich is so divisive that if he were the nominee, the GOP stands a significant chance of losing support down the entire rest of the ballot. That could cost Republicans the House, and chances at the Senate and the Presidency, as moderate, sane Republicans would also likely abandon the party.
That kind of logic doesn't seem to matter to the Tea Party extremists currently in control of the Republican Party, however. After wildly swinging at the President over tax cuts and the Keystone pipeline in December - and beating themselves silly in the process - the GOP extremists in Congress look to be trying another attempt at the same action. Even though they've just returned to DC, they're already threatening to hold the country hostage unless the President ties immediate approval of the Keystone pipeline to an extension of middle class tax cuts.
The President is on firm ground; the deadline on Keystone that the GOP wanted in December was a phony made-up time limit. The State department and the state of Nebraska have both said it would take about a year to gain environmental and planning approval for a new path for the pipeline. No amount of foot stomping, huffing in Congress, or bloviating in the media will change those facts, any more than the anger of the extremist Republicans will make Newt the GOP's eventual nominee.
There's a reason politics at this level is sometimes called "pro ball." The amateurs in the Republican Party need to learn when to put down their makeshift bats, before they hurt themselves any worse then they already have.
Rep. Gabrielle Giffords has announced she'll resign her Arizona House seat sometime this week to focus on her recovery, and Arizona's extremist Republican Governor Jan Brewer is already preparing to set the special election for Giffords' seat. Former Penn State football coach Joe Paterno died of cancer over the weekend - a fate we wish on nobody, no matter what they did or did not do in life. The NFL playoffs also finished up over the weekend, with the New England Patriots and the New York Giants set to play a rematch in this year's Super Bowl.
The biggest news over the weekend - or at least the story that received the most major media coverage - was the South Carolina GOP Primary contest. In a win that didn't really surprise us, noted hypocrite, adulterer, and former U.S. House Speaker from Georgia, Newt Gingrich, nominally defeated former Masssachusetts governor, Willard "Mitt" Romney, along with Rep. Ron Paul and former Pennsylvania Rep. Rick Santorum.
The truth is, the real winner this weekend may once again have been President Obama.
In extensive exit polling, it became starkly obvious that the kinds of voters who backed Newt Gingrich on Saturday were exactly the kind of voters the right-wing ideologues and media talking heads have been increasingly stoking for most of the last twenty years. We could have guessed their makeup, though the data confirms it: Older, angry, less educated extremists, who are also so-called evangelicals, who are scared about the economy - and most importantly, who want to beat President Obama in this election at ALL costs. That includes making the economy temporarily worse, and even increasing the debt.
It should be no surprise after looking at those exit polls, that those who claim to be conservative yet are hypocritical about their own beliefs, would push so heavily for the nomination of a man who is also a hypocrite and an extremist. That Republicans in MANY other areas of the country - including the Midwest - do not generally share South Carolinians' blind hatred of President Obama quite obviously meant nothing to the Republican primary voters there.
What the blindly ignorant in South Carolina don't seem to understand is that - no matter how angry they are - the fact is, Newt Gingrich will not likely be the GOP nominee. As journalist Josh Marshall pointed out over the weekend, Gingrich's unfavorables - the number of people who dislike him, for any reason - are around 60%. Nominating Gingrich would not only drive away moderates and independents - where much of the election could be won. As multiple Republican party members and supporters also pointed out over the weekend, Gingrich is so divisive that if he were the nominee, the GOP stands a significant chance of losing support down the entire rest of the ballot. That could cost Republicans the House, and chances at the Senate and the Presidency, as moderate, sane Republicans would also likely abandon the party.
That kind of logic doesn't seem to matter to the Tea Party extremists currently in control of the Republican Party, however. After wildly swinging at the President over tax cuts and the Keystone pipeline in December - and beating themselves silly in the process - the GOP extremists in Congress look to be trying another attempt at the same action. Even though they've just returned to DC, they're already threatening to hold the country hostage unless the President ties immediate approval of the Keystone pipeline to an extension of middle class tax cuts.
The President is on firm ground; the deadline on Keystone that the GOP wanted in December was a phony made-up time limit. The State department and the state of Nebraska have both said it would take about a year to gain environmental and planning approval for a new path for the pipeline. No amount of foot stomping, huffing in Congress, or bloviating in the media will change those facts, any more than the anger of the extremist Republicans will make Newt the GOP's eventual nominee.
There's a reason politics at this level is sometimes called "pro ball." The amateurs in the Republican Party need to learn when to put down their makeshift bats, before they hurt themselves any worse then they already have.
Friday, January 20, 2012
Friday Funday: Going Bananas
It's been an incredibly busy week for our staff this week, both in performing our duties here, and in handling our duties elsewhere. From communicating about meetings, to getting raw content, to sending finished documents and images where they need to be, we use the internet for nearly some part of every job, club, or organization we're a part of.
Our collective knowledge and understanding of how complex the Internet is made us chuckle a bit this week, when the fight dealing with the overly broad proposals of SOPA and PIPA spilled onto the front pages, television screens, and radio newscasts around the country.
In case you missed it, a group of large companies - primarily large media companies - have been pushing several pieces of legislation this past year in Congress. The supporters of the two biggest bills - SOPA and PIPA - continued insisting right up until Wednesday that both bills only have one main purpose: to prevent copyrighted works from being stolen.
When Wednesday came, however, the old media companies ran into a few hard truths - chief among them, that the old media companies are not as important or as powerful as they've led millions of Americans to believe.
The day of protest online this past Wednesday, by huge Internet entities like Wikipedia, Google, Wordpress, and Mozilla (the company behind the Firefox web browser some of you are using right now), along with an online petition drive that collected over 7 million signatures in a single day, pushed more than a handful of Representatives and Senators to run away from both the SOPA and PIPA bills like the poison they are.
We agree that protecting original online content is important. Paul works hard to draw his cartoons, and we know more than a few other cartoonists, photographers, and other media pros who do the same.
That said, neither of these bills would have truly solved the problem that the big old media companies wanted it to: stopping overseas web users from stealing the content - music, movies, pictures, graphics, and words - of websites based in the U.S. On the contrary, both bills would have made even daily life online nearly impossible.
Under SOPA and PIPA, if your Mom posted the cute video of your neighbor's kid where everyone stands around and sings "Happy Birthday," Warner Brothers - the current owner of the disputed copyright for "Happy Birthday" - would be able to sue the hell out of both you and YouTube, unless you were able to get rid of all copies online. Until you did, you and YouTube would both continue to rack up fines. This drastic threat would be enough to push most people offline altogether, as well as completely shutting down companies like Google and YouTube. Such extremism is exactly why we oppose both bills; we don't feel that either one is salvageable in its current form.
Something good was salvaged from the conflict, however.
According to at least two Capitol Hill sources, many members of Congress actually read both bills for the first time, for themselves, as the protest caught fire Wednesday, of rather than merely taking as gospel the lies the wealthy media companies had been feeding them. After reading the bills, these members realized the potential chilling effect of this legislation - and changed their position on the bills to "oppose" immediately.
If millions of individual Americans joining a protest, while temporarily and voluntarily shutting down large chunks of the Internet, is what it took to get Congress to actually read the legislation and listen to their constituents - instead of listening to the hordes of lobbyists - then we're at least glad our legislative branch finally did their jobs properly.
We can slide into the weekend happy, knowing that - at least on this issue - Congress doesn't appear to be monkeying around anymore.
Our collective knowledge and understanding of how complex the Internet is made us chuckle a bit this week, when the fight dealing with the overly broad proposals of SOPA and PIPA spilled onto the front pages, television screens, and radio newscasts around the country.
In case you missed it, a group of large companies - primarily large media companies - have been pushing several pieces of legislation this past year in Congress. The supporters of the two biggest bills - SOPA and PIPA - continued insisting right up until Wednesday that both bills only have one main purpose: to prevent copyrighted works from being stolen.
When Wednesday came, however, the old media companies ran into a few hard truths - chief among them, that the old media companies are not as important or as powerful as they've led millions of Americans to believe.
The day of protest online this past Wednesday, by huge Internet entities like Wikipedia, Google, Wordpress, and Mozilla (the company behind the Firefox web browser some of you are using right now), along with an online petition drive that collected over 7 million signatures in a single day, pushed more than a handful of Representatives and Senators to run away from both the SOPA and PIPA bills like the poison they are.
We agree that protecting original online content is important. Paul works hard to draw his cartoons, and we know more than a few other cartoonists, photographers, and other media pros who do the same.
That said, neither of these bills would have truly solved the problem that the big old media companies wanted it to: stopping overseas web users from stealing the content - music, movies, pictures, graphics, and words - of websites based in the U.S. On the contrary, both bills would have made even daily life online nearly impossible.
Under SOPA and PIPA, if your Mom posted the cute video of your neighbor's kid where everyone stands around and sings "Happy Birthday," Warner Brothers - the current owner of the disputed copyright for "Happy Birthday" - would be able to sue the hell out of both you and YouTube, unless you were able to get rid of all copies online. Until you did, you and YouTube would both continue to rack up fines. This drastic threat would be enough to push most people offline altogether, as well as completely shutting down companies like Google and YouTube. Such extremism is exactly why we oppose both bills; we don't feel that either one is salvageable in its current form.
Something good was salvaged from the conflict, however.
According to at least two Capitol Hill sources, many members of Congress actually read both bills for the first time, for themselves, as the protest caught fire Wednesday, of rather than merely taking as gospel the lies the wealthy media companies had been feeding them. After reading the bills, these members realized the potential chilling effect of this legislation - and changed their position on the bills to "oppose" immediately.
If millions of individual Americans joining a protest, while temporarily and voluntarily shutting down large chunks of the Internet, is what it took to get Congress to actually read the legislation and listen to their constituents - instead of listening to the hordes of lobbyists - then we're at least glad our legislative branch finally did their jobs properly.
We can slide into the weekend happy, knowing that - at least on this issue - Congress doesn't appear to be monkeying around anymore.
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Puppets & Bystanders: The Effects of Citizens United
If you have yet to hear the words "Super PAC" this year, plan on hearing them a great deal between now and the November General Election. Sadly, they're the effects of something we've been telling you about for quite a while now.
We've written about it extensively before, so we'll only summarize it here.
Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission first came before the Supreme Court in 2008, and it was decided two years ago this month. In short, the Supreme Court decision eliminated most major regulations on campaign financing, and left the door open for a special type of Political Action Committee to develop - the Super PAC. That type of PAC has truly altered the entire political landscape - and not for the better.
Unlike candidates, who have a limit on how much money they can take from individual donors, corporations, and unions, Super PACs have NO limit on how much money they can take in - or what candidate or cause they can support. What's more, Super PACs don't have to disclose who is giving them money in a timely fashion, and to a large degree, even how much money they've received, until long after the election is over. From casino magnates to former employees, and from major religious officials to members of a candidate's family, almost any American can be a Super PAC donor or operator.
That lack of timely reporting is a major loophole. While U.S. election law says that foreign interests, individuals, and corporations aren't supposed to donate money to American political campaigns, since Super PACs don't legally have to tell the FEC - the Federal Election Commission - who their donors are before the election, if a Super PAC is taking foreign money, who can tell? By the time it's known they've broken a rule, they can get away with paying a relatively small fine - with the candidate they helped sitting safely in office.
Of course, Super PACs can't directly coordinate with the candidate or the cause they nominally support. But other than that one major rule, Super PACs can do pretty much anything they want. They can even do what candidates say publicly that they don't want the Super PAC to do.
Of course, what those behind the Super PACs want to do is to collect vast sums of money.
So far this year, the numerous Super PACs that already exist have spent - not collected, but SPENT - $27.5 million dollars, according to a report by the Center for Responsive Politics. The final figure you've likely heard bounced around - as we have - for the final cost of all this political deregulation looks to be more than two billion dollars, for just this year's Presidential race. That's more than a billion dollars apiece spent by or for both the President and whoever the GOP nominee ends up being (likely Mitt Romney) by the finish of the Presidential election this year. The total tally looks to be closer to $6 billion dollars.
All because there are very few election rules with any kinds of teeth right now, mostly thanks to the Citizens United decision by our activist Supreme Court.
This ridiculous farce of swiss-cheesed pseudo-rules has become the primary focus of comedians Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart of Comedy Central, over the course of the last couple of weeks. Colbert has created a legitimate and fully legal Super PAC of his own, and using our currently worthless laws, has already run political ads on TV and online that have jokingly called Mitt Romney a serial killer and told South Carolina voters to vote for "Herman Cain" - while a picture of Colbert fills the screen.
The point that Colbert and Stewart make - and the point of a growing number of media figures from across the political spectrum, including us - is that having a system where these kinds of entities are allowed is a farce and an insult to our democratic republic.
For those idealists who somehow believe money doesn't rule our political system, this fact should make things crystal clear - right now, 94% of all federal offices go to the candidate who raises the most money.
What we have is no longer a system of politics and justice. It's the world's most expensive puppet show. As long as we allow it to continue, only the richest individuals and corporations will get a real say in how our government is run. The rest of us will simply be bystanders, while our politicians remain puppets controlled by the whims of the wealthiest idiots on Earth.
We've written about it extensively before, so we'll only summarize it here.
Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission first came before the Supreme Court in 2008, and it was decided two years ago this month. In short, the Supreme Court decision eliminated most major regulations on campaign financing, and left the door open for a special type of Political Action Committee to develop - the Super PAC. That type of PAC has truly altered the entire political landscape - and not for the better.
Unlike candidates, who have a limit on how much money they can take from individual donors, corporations, and unions, Super PACs have NO limit on how much money they can take in - or what candidate or cause they can support. What's more, Super PACs don't have to disclose who is giving them money in a timely fashion, and to a large degree, even how much money they've received, until long after the election is over. From casino magnates to former employees, and from major religious officials to members of a candidate's family, almost any American can be a Super PAC donor or operator.
That lack of timely reporting is a major loophole. While U.S. election law says that foreign interests, individuals, and corporations aren't supposed to donate money to American political campaigns, since Super PACs don't legally have to tell the FEC - the Federal Election Commission - who their donors are before the election, if a Super PAC is taking foreign money, who can tell? By the time it's known they've broken a rule, they can get away with paying a relatively small fine - with the candidate they helped sitting safely in office.
Of course, Super PACs can't directly coordinate with the candidate or the cause they nominally support. But other than that one major rule, Super PACs can do pretty much anything they want. They can even do what candidates say publicly that they don't want the Super PAC to do.
Of course, what those behind the Super PACs want to do is to collect vast sums of money.
So far this year, the numerous Super PACs that already exist have spent - not collected, but SPENT - $27.5 million dollars, according to a report by the Center for Responsive Politics. The final figure you've likely heard bounced around - as we have - for the final cost of all this political deregulation looks to be more than two billion dollars, for just this year's Presidential race. That's more than a billion dollars apiece spent by or for both the President and whoever the GOP nominee ends up being (likely Mitt Romney) by the finish of the Presidential election this year. The total tally looks to be closer to $6 billion dollars.
All because there are very few election rules with any kinds of teeth right now, mostly thanks to the Citizens United decision by our activist Supreme Court.
This ridiculous farce of swiss-cheesed pseudo-rules has become the primary focus of comedians Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart of Comedy Central, over the course of the last couple of weeks. Colbert has created a legitimate and fully legal Super PAC of his own, and using our currently worthless laws, has already run political ads on TV and online that have jokingly called Mitt Romney a serial killer and told South Carolina voters to vote for "Herman Cain" - while a picture of Colbert fills the screen.
The point that Colbert and Stewart make - and the point of a growing number of media figures from across the political spectrum, including us - is that having a system where these kinds of entities are allowed is a farce and an insult to our democratic republic.
For those idealists who somehow believe money doesn't rule our political system, this fact should make things crystal clear - right now, 94% of all federal offices go to the candidate who raises the most money.
What we have is no longer a system of politics and justice. It's the world's most expensive puppet show. As long as we allow it to continue, only the richest individuals and corporations will get a real say in how our government is run. The rest of us will simply be bystanders, while our politicians remain puppets controlled by the whims of the wealthiest idiots on Earth.
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
A Distinct Lack Of Enthusiasm
While we're definitely not planning on using the new delivery service by Burger King that's being tested in the D.C. metro area, like most people, we're a bit sapped of energy after hard work. This year is an election year, and we're running harder than ever, so tired has almost become a normal state of mind for us.
That said, as we're looking at how the 2012 political landscape is beginning to shape up, one side of the standard political divide seems not only a bit more lacking in energy, but frankly disheartened. Both poll numbers and political action across the country are beginning to make it clear which side of the political ledger may be more ramped up this year - and it may not be who you expect.
Take the latest GOP debate on Monday in South Carolina.
The crowd at the event was obviously riled up, and some of the moments they cheered and jeered were actually pretty inappropriate. Yet it was clear that those people attending the debate were conservative, leaning extremist, and they were fired up - especially on the idea of cutting taxes.
Yet, new data from the Pew Research Center says the majority of Americans think they currently pay the right amount of taxes, and that a near majority think the total tax revenues the federal government are taking in are LESS than they should be. In fact, another recent study also made clear that Americans see significant and rising inequality between rich and poor - including majorities of persons in all three major political designations (Republicans, Democrats, and Independents). In short, Americans know the government needs more tax dollars - and they think it's high time the rich actually pay at least as much as the rest of us.
Looking at political actions, the enthusiasm seems to point even more strongly to a political left that's far more fired up and ready to go than their counterparts on the right.
Yesterday, in Wisconsin, Democrats gathered more than one million signatures to recall extremist Republican Governor Scott Walker. That number is almost double what was necessary to recall tthe governor, and represents nearly a quarter of all the votes cast in Wisconsin in 2010. Democrats got all those signatures in just sixty days, in one of the most difficult states in the nation to collect signatures.
Left-leaning Wisconsinites weren't the only ones cheering their own efforts on Tuesday.
Just next door in Michigan, a group collecting signatures to repeal the anti-democratic and highly draconian "Emergency Manager" law only needs to collect 161,000 signatures - and they say they already have nearly 200,000. They're temporarily delaying turning in their paperwork, however. They just want to make sure the number of signatures they have is so overwhelming, like in Wisconsin, that there will be NO question as to the will of the people.
This says nothing regarding the embarrassingly low Republican voter turnout numbers in both the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primaries, along with a GOP nomination process that is all but over (even though the 24-hour news media continues valiantly stringing the process along).
All that, and in the first official poll of the 2012 season, taken by Public Policy Polling, President Obama is already posting a five-point lead on Mitt Romney, before the President has even begun seriously campaigning. Meanwhile, the President's re-election committee - the group with far and away the most money so far of ANY campaign in 2012 - is just BEGINNING to secure its media buys.
We're with most of you - certain that this year, many of the most important elections at all levels will be fought by impassioned groups on many sides of different issues.
Even so, there is an increasing amount of evidence that no matter how hard Republicans and sane conservatives cheer this year, their hearts just may not be in it to win it.
That said, as we're looking at how the 2012 political landscape is beginning to shape up, one side of the standard political divide seems not only a bit more lacking in energy, but frankly disheartened. Both poll numbers and political action across the country are beginning to make it clear which side of the political ledger may be more ramped up this year - and it may not be who you expect.
Take the latest GOP debate on Monday in South Carolina.
The crowd at the event was obviously riled up, and some of the moments they cheered and jeered were actually pretty inappropriate. Yet it was clear that those people attending the debate were conservative, leaning extremist, and they were fired up - especially on the idea of cutting taxes.
Yet, new data from the Pew Research Center says the majority of Americans think they currently pay the right amount of taxes, and that a near majority think the total tax revenues the federal government are taking in are LESS than they should be. In fact, another recent study also made clear that Americans see significant and rising inequality between rich and poor - including majorities of persons in all three major political designations (Republicans, Democrats, and Independents). In short, Americans know the government needs more tax dollars - and they think it's high time the rich actually pay at least as much as the rest of us.
Looking at political actions, the enthusiasm seems to point even more strongly to a political left that's far more fired up and ready to go than their counterparts on the right.
Yesterday, in Wisconsin, Democrats gathered more than one million signatures to recall extremist Republican Governor Scott Walker. That number is almost double what was necessary to recall tthe governor, and represents nearly a quarter of all the votes cast in Wisconsin in 2010. Democrats got all those signatures in just sixty days, in one of the most difficult states in the nation to collect signatures.
Left-leaning Wisconsinites weren't the only ones cheering their own efforts on Tuesday.
Just next door in Michigan, a group collecting signatures to repeal the anti-democratic and highly draconian "Emergency Manager" law only needs to collect 161,000 signatures - and they say they already have nearly 200,000. They're temporarily delaying turning in their paperwork, however. They just want to make sure the number of signatures they have is so overwhelming, like in Wisconsin, that there will be NO question as to the will of the people.
This says nothing regarding the embarrassingly low Republican voter turnout numbers in both the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primaries, along with a GOP nomination process that is all but over (even though the 24-hour news media continues valiantly stringing the process along).
All that, and in the first official poll of the 2012 season, taken by Public Policy Polling, President Obama is already posting a five-point lead on Mitt Romney, before the President has even begun seriously campaigning. Meanwhile, the President's re-election committee - the group with far and away the most money so far of ANY campaign in 2012 - is just BEGINNING to secure its media buys.
We're with most of you - certain that this year, many of the most important elections at all levels will be fought by impassioned groups on many sides of different issues.
Even so, there is an increasing amount of evidence that no matter how hard Republicans and sane conservatives cheer this year, their hearts just may not be in it to win it.
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Showboating & Complacency
As people who enjoy traveling and do a good bit of it for business - and especially since at least one member of our staff has worked for a travel agency in the past - we often keep an eye out for stories of both positive and negative travel experiences. The most recent travel horror story didn't take an eagle eye to spot in the media - though its similarities to another voyage that also ended in disaster this week may not be readily apparent.
Over the weekend, off the coast of Italy, a massive passenger cruise ship, the Costa Concordia, one of the many ships of the Carnival cruise line, ran aground and had to be abandoned by over 4200 passengers and crew. It now appears that the Captain wanted to show off his ship to some people on the ship, as well as those watching from the shoreline.
To say that the Captain was stupid, immature, and criminally selfish isn't far from the truth, since at least six people died because of his literal showboating. Sixteen souls - including two Americans - remain missing. The captain is facing manslaughter charges, and his career is effectively over. The problem here isn't just the Captain's actions, but the entire shipping and sea travel industry - as well as multiple governments, including that of the U.S. and Italy.
In a similar way, this week, as the 2012 GOP Presidential race steered its way toward South Carolina, former Utah Governor Jon Huntsman took a quick trip to the state, brought nearly his entire family and campaign staff with him to begin the next leg of his presidential campaign - and then proceeded to run his campaign aground, in front of all of them, ending his adventure after just one caucus and one primary election.
After Huntsman's announcement, and the now nearly certain verdict that Mitt Romney will be the GOP's nominee, one Republican party official we know commented, "What the hell is up with that? One caucus, one primary, and the nominee is already decided?!"
With politics in the United States right now, everyone involved, from campaign staffers and party personnel, to members of the media who cover politics know; the problem is Citizens United, and there doesn't appear to be a rescue likely to come anytime soon. With a campaign finance system that has very few regulations, and gaping holes in the regulations it does have, money continues to capsize the opportunities of great candidates who simply can't raise the enormous sums needed to stay afloat in today's political jungle. The only way to currently win an election is to have at least as much money in your campaign coffers - if not more - than your next closest challenger.
As solid a candidate as Jon Huntsman was for the GOP - and he was truly the candidate with the broadest potential that the GOP had running - when his campaign ship ran out of money, his race to the finish line was sunk.
What many don't realize about the cruise business, is how closely its problems mirror those of the U.S. electoral system. There is very little oversight in much of the sea travel industry. As a New York Times story about the crash points out, "While airline pilots are directed and guided by controllers on the ground, sea captains are considered to be in complete control." Company directors - some of whom have little or no experience captaining ships at all - determine ocean travel routes for cruise liners, and sometimes shipping routes these days. On passenger ships, many times safety lessons are treated the same way pre-flight safety instruction is treated on planes - as a nuisance, something that if the passengers miss, they won't miss much.
In short, what few regulations they have for navigational safety amount to complete trust in their leader, that he would never run their ship aground.
As moderate Republicans and former Huntsman backers - and now the last passengers on the Costa Concordia - can tell you, simply trusting your leader not to capsize your vessel is a very poor safety system indeed.
Over the weekend, off the coast of Italy, a massive passenger cruise ship, the Costa Concordia, one of the many ships of the Carnival cruise line, ran aground and had to be abandoned by over 4200 passengers and crew. It now appears that the Captain wanted to show off his ship to some people on the ship, as well as those watching from the shoreline.
To say that the Captain was stupid, immature, and criminally selfish isn't far from the truth, since at least six people died because of his literal showboating. Sixteen souls - including two Americans - remain missing. The captain is facing manslaughter charges, and his career is effectively over. The problem here isn't just the Captain's actions, but the entire shipping and sea travel industry - as well as multiple governments, including that of the U.S. and Italy.
In a similar way, this week, as the 2012 GOP Presidential race steered its way toward South Carolina, former Utah Governor Jon Huntsman took a quick trip to the state, brought nearly his entire family and campaign staff with him to begin the next leg of his presidential campaign - and then proceeded to run his campaign aground, in front of all of them, ending his adventure after just one caucus and one primary election.
After Huntsman's announcement, and the now nearly certain verdict that Mitt Romney will be the GOP's nominee, one Republican party official we know commented, "What the hell is up with that? One caucus, one primary, and the nominee is already decided?!"
With politics in the United States right now, everyone involved, from campaign staffers and party personnel, to members of the media who cover politics know; the problem is Citizens United, and there doesn't appear to be a rescue likely to come anytime soon. With a campaign finance system that has very few regulations, and gaping holes in the regulations it does have, money continues to capsize the opportunities of great candidates who simply can't raise the enormous sums needed to stay afloat in today's political jungle. The only way to currently win an election is to have at least as much money in your campaign coffers - if not more - than your next closest challenger.
As solid a candidate as Jon Huntsman was for the GOP - and he was truly the candidate with the broadest potential that the GOP had running - when his campaign ship ran out of money, his race to the finish line was sunk.
What many don't realize about the cruise business, is how closely its problems mirror those of the U.S. electoral system. There is very little oversight in much of the sea travel industry. As a New York Times story about the crash points out, "While airline pilots are directed and guided by controllers on the ground, sea captains are considered to be in complete control." Company directors - some of whom have little or no experience captaining ships at all - determine ocean travel routes for cruise liners, and sometimes shipping routes these days. On passenger ships, many times safety lessons are treated the same way pre-flight safety instruction is treated on planes - as a nuisance, something that if the passengers miss, they won't miss much.
In short, what few regulations they have for navigational safety amount to complete trust in their leader, that he would never run their ship aground.
As moderate Republicans and former Huntsman backers - and now the last passengers on the Costa Concordia - can tell you, simply trusting your leader not to capsize your vessel is a very poor safety system indeed.
Monday, January 16, 2012
Why Doing Well Is Worth It
For several years now, we've had a saying at The Daily Felltoon we've shared with you, our readers, more than once. It's a saying that the granddad of of one of our staffers Mr. Strehlo, coined, we'd guess nearly a century ago: 'Anything worth doing is worth doing well."
We have a feeling Mr. Strehlo would have agreed fully with Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., who said, "All labor that uplifts humanity has dignity and importance and should be undertaken with painstaking excellence."
These two men - a first-generation German-American painter and handyman, and an American slave-descended Baptist preacher and civil rights activist - couldn't have been farther apart in many ways. One grew up speaking German and English, mixed together, in rural Minnesota. The other grew up speaking Southern-accented American English in a segregated Atlanta, Georgia.
Yet both men believed in that if a person was going to do something, they should always do it well - and do it right the first time, if at all possible.
With that in mind today, Martin Luther King Jr. Day - what would have been Dr. King's 83rd birthday - we have to wonder what kind of internal justification went through the minds of those responsible for the mangled and truncated quotation on the MLK monument in Washington, DC.
If you haven't yet had a chance to visit the MLK Memorial in DC - and we recommend that you do - like many of the best national and state monuments in DC and around the country, it's not just the marble, stone and brick facades that make the structure memorable. There are words and phrases carved in many places at the memorial that help bring the words of Dr. King to life, and help give visitors a better idea of who he was beyond the stories told about him.
One of those phrases is boldly carved into the right side of the primary monument that displays King's likeness - except that the quote is really a misquote. That poorly edited quote currently reads: "I was a drum major for justice, peace and righteousness." According to multiple sources, including a recent Washington Post piece, King's words were apparently truncated on the memorial because the architect and the sculptor for the project simply thought the memorial "would look better with fewer words."
Over the weekend, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar gave the National Park Service 30 days to begin fixing the massive screw-up that effectively inverted Dr. King's original words. The current misquotation almost makes King sound arrogant. The original comes from a 1968 speech where King was denouncing self-centered, egotistical, short-cut style thinking that others might use to attempt to define him: “If you want to say that I was a drum major, say that I was a drum major for justice. Say that I was a drum major for peace. I was a drum major for righteousness. And all of the other shallow things will not matter.”
No one yet has any idea what the repair will cost, but we're certain that it will not come cheap. The monument itself was more than twenty-five years in the making, and cost more than $120 million dollars, though most of the cost was not tax dollars, but was raised through private donors.
This monstrous misquote however, is OUR collective mistake as Americans. Many in the media, and in the park service knew about it, even before the monument was unveiled, but let the misquote stand anyway. American taxpayers should and will pay for the repair to the monument, as we would to any other similar monument.
Our staff believes that neither our own personal mentors, like Mr. Strehlo, or a national guide like Rev. King, would want this repair to happen without using the incident as a teachable moment.
So here's our lesson for the day: It's true that doing anything well has its own rewards.
Doing things well also prevents one from having to pay the price for selfishly cutting corners at some later point in time.
We have a feeling Mr. Strehlo would have agreed fully with Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., who said, "All labor that uplifts humanity has dignity and importance and should be undertaken with painstaking excellence."
These two men - a first-generation German-American painter and handyman, and an American slave-descended Baptist preacher and civil rights activist - couldn't have been farther apart in many ways. One grew up speaking German and English, mixed together, in rural Minnesota. The other grew up speaking Southern-accented American English in a segregated Atlanta, Georgia.
Yet both men believed in that if a person was going to do something, they should always do it well - and do it right the first time, if at all possible.
With that in mind today, Martin Luther King Jr. Day - what would have been Dr. King's 83rd birthday - we have to wonder what kind of internal justification went through the minds of those responsible for the mangled and truncated quotation on the MLK monument in Washington, DC.
If you haven't yet had a chance to visit the MLK Memorial in DC - and we recommend that you do - like many of the best national and state monuments in DC and around the country, it's not just the marble, stone and brick facades that make the structure memorable. There are words and phrases carved in many places at the memorial that help bring the words of Dr. King to life, and help give visitors a better idea of who he was beyond the stories told about him.
One of those phrases is boldly carved into the right side of the primary monument that displays King's likeness - except that the quote is really a misquote. That poorly edited quote currently reads: "I was a drum major for justice, peace and righteousness." According to multiple sources, including a recent Washington Post piece, King's words were apparently truncated on the memorial because the architect and the sculptor for the project simply thought the memorial "would look better with fewer words."
Over the weekend, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar gave the National Park Service 30 days to begin fixing the massive screw-up that effectively inverted Dr. King's original words. The current misquotation almost makes King sound arrogant. The original comes from a 1968 speech where King was denouncing self-centered, egotistical, short-cut style thinking that others might use to attempt to define him: “If you want to say that I was a drum major, say that I was a drum major for justice. Say that I was a drum major for peace. I was a drum major for righteousness. And all of the other shallow things will not matter.”
No one yet has any idea what the repair will cost, but we're certain that it will not come cheap. The monument itself was more than twenty-five years in the making, and cost more than $120 million dollars, though most of the cost was not tax dollars, but was raised through private donors.
This monstrous misquote however, is OUR collective mistake as Americans. Many in the media, and in the park service knew about it, even before the monument was unveiled, but let the misquote stand anyway. American taxpayers should and will pay for the repair to the monument, as we would to any other similar monument.
Our staff believes that neither our own personal mentors, like Mr. Strehlo, or a national guide like Rev. King, would want this repair to happen without using the incident as a teachable moment.
So here's our lesson for the day: It's true that doing anything well has its own rewards.
Doing things well also prevents one from having to pay the price for selfishly cutting corners at some later point in time.
Friday, January 13, 2012
Friday Funday: On Truth Vigilantes
As many of our readers and friends know, the members of our staff are a unique group of people who enjoy many different pasttimes, including games with words and images. Give us a doodle pad, a crossword puzzle, a game of Pictionary or Scrabble, or just an evening of conversation with good friends, and we'll show you some happy folks.
When it comes to journalistic pursuits, however, we take our contribution to the media landscape fairly seriously, and we often wish more of our professional colleagues in the media would do the same.
With those thoughts in mind, it was with an explosive mixture of shock, surprise, laughter, and sarcasm that we read the messages flowing into our Twitter feeds and e-mail accounts on Thursday. Arthur Brisbane, the current Public Editor for the New York Times, asked one of the most inane and ridiculous questions we'd heard posed in public, by a media figure, in quite some time.
Brisbane's initial question - and the headline of his piece - was simply: "Should The Times Be a Truth Vigilante?"
After we all had nearly fallen out of our chairs, and recovered from what seemed to us - and apparently most of the journalistic world - as one of the dumbest questions ever, we did what media folks often do in similar situations.
First, we checked our clocks and watches to make sure we hadn't drunk too much. Then we checked the time Brisbane published his initial column, to make sure he hadn't been drinking too much when he hit "publish." After reading his initial piece, to say that Arthur poorly asked the question he wanted answered, or that he didn't really communicate what he wanted to know clearly, may already be the understatement of the year. That is, if it weren't an election year.
Most members of the media who we talked with or read about on this incident thought the question Brisbane was asking could be easily rephrased as: Should members of the news media tell the truth? The reactions from our colleagues to this question ran the gamut from a satirical piece in Vanity Fair asking if they should spell words correctly, to some very thoughtful and serious responses from respected journalists like Jim Romanesko, Jay Rosen, Greg Sargent, and Rem Rieder.
On its face, the question Arthur published as his lead wasn't the one that he meant to ask, and in his follow up, he made the acknowledgement of that miscommunication painfully clear. The question he ended up asking was a very important one, though, and as Jay Rosen points out, it's one that far too many in our media profession have ignored for far too long. In short, for a sickening number of people in our profession, "...truthtelling moved down the list of newsroom priorities" a long time ago.
Like Greg Sargent, we're also somewhat sympathetic to Brisbane's concern, specifically because of so many modern media issues, "that regular fact checking by reporters could mean some statements will get checked and others won’t." As Sargent makes clear, newspapers – and really ANY organization that ethically and honestly uses the word "news" to describe any part of what they do – have a duty to make sure they're reporting the truth before anything else they do, now more than ever.
Rieder followed up in the American Journalism Review, "beware of false equivalency. If Democrats are prevaricating more than Republicans, or vice versa, don't succumb to the temptation to be equally tough on both sides." As one of our colleagues (who wishes to remain private) has said for several years now, "If you want to be both an ethical and an honest journalist, you can be fair, or you can be balanced. But it's damn near impossible to be both at the same time."
As Rieder notes, partisans on all sides will work the media ref these days, now more than ever. One has to accept, bad reporting happens too. Crappy commentating, sloppy cartooning, and poor editing also happen, from time to time (though hopefully not here). Even blatant propaganda happens these days – though for some in our business, that's all they do anymore.
What made us smile and truly enjoy Brisbane's accidental stumble into brutal honesty was that the question of ethics in the media is still being asked – and answered with a resounding, positive reply that truthtelling IS the most important thing we in the media can do. We owe it to those who take in what we write, draw, say, and otherwise produce.
We owe it to ourselves too.
When it comes to journalistic pursuits, however, we take our contribution to the media landscape fairly seriously, and we often wish more of our professional colleagues in the media would do the same.
With those thoughts in mind, it was with an explosive mixture of shock, surprise, laughter, and sarcasm that we read the messages flowing into our Twitter feeds and e-mail accounts on Thursday. Arthur Brisbane, the current Public Editor for the New York Times, asked one of the most inane and ridiculous questions we'd heard posed in public, by a media figure, in quite some time.
Brisbane's initial question - and the headline of his piece - was simply: "Should The Times Be a Truth Vigilante?"
After we all had nearly fallen out of our chairs, and recovered from what seemed to us - and apparently most of the journalistic world - as one of the dumbest questions ever, we did what media folks often do in similar situations.
First, we checked our clocks and watches to make sure we hadn't drunk too much. Then we checked the time Brisbane published his initial column, to make sure he hadn't been drinking too much when he hit "publish." After reading his initial piece, to say that Arthur poorly asked the question he wanted answered, or that he didn't really communicate what he wanted to know clearly, may already be the understatement of the year. That is, if it weren't an election year.
Most members of the media who we talked with or read about on this incident thought the question Brisbane was asking could be easily rephrased as: Should members of the news media tell the truth? The reactions from our colleagues to this question ran the gamut from a satirical piece in Vanity Fair asking if they should spell words correctly, to some very thoughtful and serious responses from respected journalists like Jim Romanesko, Jay Rosen, Greg Sargent, and Rem Rieder.
On its face, the question Arthur published as his lead wasn't the one that he meant to ask, and in his follow up, he made the acknowledgement of that miscommunication painfully clear. The question he ended up asking was a very important one, though, and as Jay Rosen points out, it's one that far too many in our media profession have ignored for far too long. In short, for a sickening number of people in our profession, "...truthtelling moved down the list of newsroom priorities" a long time ago.
Like Greg Sargent, we're also somewhat sympathetic to Brisbane's concern, specifically because of so many modern media issues, "that regular fact checking by reporters could mean some statements will get checked and others won’t." As Sargent makes clear, newspapers – and really ANY organization that ethically and honestly uses the word "news" to describe any part of what they do – have a duty to make sure they're reporting the truth before anything else they do, now more than ever.
Rieder followed up in the American Journalism Review, "beware of false equivalency. If Democrats are prevaricating more than Republicans, or vice versa, don't succumb to the temptation to be equally tough on both sides." As one of our colleagues (who wishes to remain private) has said for several years now, "If you want to be both an ethical and an honest journalist, you can be fair, or you can be balanced. But it's damn near impossible to be both at the same time."
As Rieder notes, partisans on all sides will work the media ref these days, now more than ever. One has to accept, bad reporting happens too. Crappy commentating, sloppy cartooning, and poor editing also happen, from time to time (though hopefully not here). Even blatant propaganda happens these days – though for some in our business, that's all they do anymore.
What made us smile and truly enjoy Brisbane's accidental stumble into brutal honesty was that the question of ethics in the media is still being asked – and answered with a resounding, positive reply that truthtelling IS the most important thing we in the media can do. We owe it to those who take in what we write, draw, say, and otherwise produce.
We owe it to ourselves too.
Thursday, January 12, 2012
All Bark
For those of our readers who are tired of hearing about the pointless verbal attacks and useless posturing going on in the GOP Presidential nomination race, or the pointless verbal attacks and useless posturing going on in the U.S. Senate race in Nebraska, we thought we'd change things up today by focusing on a subject that hasn't garnered many headlines lately.
That subject is the pointless verbal attacks and posturing going on between Iran and nations all over the world.
In case you missed it - and the so-called news organizations in the U.S. have made it easy to miss - for some time now, there has been a growing level of tension between Iran and other nations, both those it sees as enemies and those it sees as allies.
The two major topics of contention, of course, are the enrichment of uranium, for the purpose of making nuclear weapons and the transport of oil from the Persian Gulf.
It wasn't a shock to anyone on Wednesday when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton 'categorically denied' any U.S. involvement in the assassination of a top Iranian nuclear scientist. He was killed in what Iran's government is labeling a 'terrorist car bombing' earlier in the day. However diplomatic Madame Secretary has to be with these kinds of announcements, we're fairly certain she was 100% honest when she said the U.S. wasn't actually involved, this time.
One major reason for that position is that the U.S. has no reason to rile up either Prime Minister Ahmadinejad or the other source of political authority in Iran, the mullahs.
The other reason is that the world economy could suffer if Iran shut off its oil production - and virtually every country on the planet knows that.
Iran's leaders have been threatening friend and foe alike for some time now. Should anyone anger them too much, they've promised Iran's navy will try to shut down the Straits of Hormuz, the only way tanker ships can get in and out of the Persian Gulf. In turn, that would drive the price of oil through the roof and serve as a major punch to the gut of economies all over the world - including to Iran itself.
As a recent Reuters article noted, "To block the Gulf would verge on economic suicide [for Iran]: Petroleum products account for 20 percent of Iran’s gross domestic product, 80 percent of exports and 70 percent of its government revenue."
In short, Iran would be cutting off the world to spite themselves, an action that would likely end up finally pushing the Iranian people to declare another civil war, and overthrow their leaders.
It's no secret that some in the U.S. military and diplomatic sector would like to help new Iranian revolutionaries overthrow the current regime. That wish has been the same in some high-level enclaves stretching all the way back to the Reagan years.
The fact is, the U.N. authorized sanctions already in place have been causing an ever-greater level of hardship in Iran over time. If diplomacy is used wisely, Iranian politicians and the mullahs may have to deal with putting out their own political fires before they worry about taking a bite out of anyone else. In the meantime, even as other nations assume their own assertive postures against Iran's sabre-rattling, the U.S. government remains the primary target for Iran's pointless verbal attacks and pointless posing.
In short, for more reasons than we can list here, the barking of some in Iran, that the U.S. and the West are going to attack them - or that Iran is doing nothing that warrants attention - simply doesn't stand up in our collective opinion. Until the price of alternative fuels drops significantly, Iran isn't going to bite - and no other country is going to seriously smack Iran on the nose, either.
As a friend of one of our staffers is known to say, "That dog don't hunt."
That subject is the pointless verbal attacks and posturing going on between Iran and nations all over the world.
In case you missed it - and the so-called news organizations in the U.S. have made it easy to miss - for some time now, there has been a growing level of tension between Iran and other nations, both those it sees as enemies and those it sees as allies.
The two major topics of contention, of course, are the enrichment of uranium, for the purpose of making nuclear weapons and the transport of oil from the Persian Gulf.
It wasn't a shock to anyone on Wednesday when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton 'categorically denied' any U.S. involvement in the assassination of a top Iranian nuclear scientist. He was killed in what Iran's government is labeling a 'terrorist car bombing' earlier in the day. However diplomatic Madame Secretary has to be with these kinds of announcements, we're fairly certain she was 100% honest when she said the U.S. wasn't actually involved, this time.
One major reason for that position is that the U.S. has no reason to rile up either Prime Minister Ahmadinejad or the other source of political authority in Iran, the mullahs.
The other reason is that the world economy could suffer if Iran shut off its oil production - and virtually every country on the planet knows that.
Iran's leaders have been threatening friend and foe alike for some time now. Should anyone anger them too much, they've promised Iran's navy will try to shut down the Straits of Hormuz, the only way tanker ships can get in and out of the Persian Gulf. In turn, that would drive the price of oil through the roof and serve as a major punch to the gut of economies all over the world - including to Iran itself.
As a recent Reuters article noted, "To block the Gulf would verge on economic suicide [for Iran]: Petroleum products account for 20 percent of Iran’s gross domestic product, 80 percent of exports and 70 percent of its government revenue."
In short, Iran would be cutting off the world to spite themselves, an action that would likely end up finally pushing the Iranian people to declare another civil war, and overthrow their leaders.
It's no secret that some in the U.S. military and diplomatic sector would like to help new Iranian revolutionaries overthrow the current regime. That wish has been the same in some high-level enclaves stretching all the way back to the Reagan years.
The fact is, the U.N. authorized sanctions already in place have been causing an ever-greater level of hardship in Iran over time. If diplomacy is used wisely, Iranian politicians and the mullahs may have to deal with putting out their own political fires before they worry about taking a bite out of anyone else. In the meantime, even as other nations assume their own assertive postures against Iran's sabre-rattling, the U.S. government remains the primary target for Iran's pointless verbal attacks and pointless posing.
In short, for more reasons than we can list here, the barking of some in Iran, that the U.S. and the West are going to attack them - or that Iran is doing nothing that warrants attention - simply doesn't stand up in our collective opinion. Until the price of alternative fuels drops significantly, Iran isn't going to bite - and no other country is going to seriously smack Iran on the nose, either.
As a friend of one of our staffers is known to say, "That dog don't hunt."
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
Flagpoles & Consequences
In the midst of the New Hampshire primary on Tuesday - which unsurprisingly, Mitt Romney won - the political discussions around the country, especially from many on the right, continued to be about Mitt Romney's moment of honesty on Monday.
As we noted briefly in our commentary on Tuesday, when Romney was captured saying "I like being able to fire people," this week, his words were taken out of context. Some on the right have claimed taking comments like that out of context are unfair, wrong, and shouldn't be allowed in something as important as the election for President.
What may surprise them is that we agree.
We also think the latest news about Newt Gingrich's multi-billionaire donor should do far more than just raise eyebrows. After all, when the eighth wealthiest person in the U.S., and one of the wealthiest people in the world, single-handedly decides to bankroll a candidate for President - and has the money to do it - the idea that the candidate receiving the financial benefit has no bias towards such a donor is ludicrous.
Thanks to a Supreme Court that has several extremist members who rail against judicial interference in the law - unless and until they do it themselves - the near outright purchasing of elections in America, due to the Citizens United ruling, is perfectly legal.
Thanks to that legal decision, an avalanche of supposedly outside money in Iowa, from forces that supported Mr. Romney, was probably the single biggest external factor in the decline of Newt Gingrich's chances to be President. We believe that Mr. Gingrich now wants revenge on Romney probably more than he wants the presidency. Sadly, it appears he has the money do just that.
Why anyone in their right mind would want to stick their neck out and jump into this kind of political landscape to run for a national office - like President, Senator, or Congressperson - is beyond our understanding. To us, Bob Kerrey looking at running for the U.S. Senate from Nebraska is akin to licking a metal flagpole in winter: there are going to be consequences for that kind of action, and they likely won't be good.
Now, all those Republicans are now decrying the intra-party warfare going on - like well-known conservative pundit Bill Kristol - and screaming worriedly that their civil war will destroy their chances to win the presidency. We simply say: "You should have thought of that before."
Progressives and liberals, along with sensible conservatives, warned that taking most of the rules off campaign financing was highly dangerous to civil politicking. The conservatives and Republicans, however, wouldn't listen.
In a similar way, Mitt Romney, and those defending his "firing" gaffe have no real standing in their complaints of unfair treatment. We understand what Mitt's position was; that specifically, he thinks it would be a good thing to able to "fire" your health insurance company, if they weren't giving you the service you need. If the health insurance system in America actually allowed an affordable, acceptable choice for most people - as it will by 2014, thanks to the Affordable Care Act - we'd agree with his point. We can't even disagree with Gov. Romney's greater point, that firing incompetent workers and replacing them with competent staff is good for individuals, businesses, and the economy, in general.
The problem, as we noted yesterday, is that when Mr. Romney's own campaign had the chance to act with class and honor regarding the President, they instead chose to take the President's words out of context - and then attempted to blow off criticism of their actions as acceptable conduct in political warfare. If it was fair for Romney to do to others, then it is fair for others to do it back to him.
We suggest all of those milling about in the political field this year take a good hard look at their own conduct before they complain about the conduct of any of their rivals.
Actions have consequences - so don't lick the political flagpole. It's a long time until the post-election thaw.
As we noted briefly in our commentary on Tuesday, when Romney was captured saying "I like being able to fire people," this week, his words were taken out of context. Some on the right have claimed taking comments like that out of context are unfair, wrong, and shouldn't be allowed in something as important as the election for President.
What may surprise them is that we agree.
We also think the latest news about Newt Gingrich's multi-billionaire donor should do far more than just raise eyebrows. After all, when the eighth wealthiest person in the U.S., and one of the wealthiest people in the world, single-handedly decides to bankroll a candidate for President - and has the money to do it - the idea that the candidate receiving the financial benefit has no bias towards such a donor is ludicrous.
Thanks to a Supreme Court that has several extremist members who rail against judicial interference in the law - unless and until they do it themselves - the near outright purchasing of elections in America, due to the Citizens United ruling, is perfectly legal.
Thanks to that legal decision, an avalanche of supposedly outside money in Iowa, from forces that supported Mr. Romney, was probably the single biggest external factor in the decline of Newt Gingrich's chances to be President. We believe that Mr. Gingrich now wants revenge on Romney probably more than he wants the presidency. Sadly, it appears he has the money do just that.
Why anyone in their right mind would want to stick their neck out and jump into this kind of political landscape to run for a national office - like President, Senator, or Congressperson - is beyond our understanding. To us, Bob Kerrey looking at running for the U.S. Senate from Nebraska is akin to licking a metal flagpole in winter: there are going to be consequences for that kind of action, and they likely won't be good.
Now, all those Republicans are now decrying the intra-party warfare going on - like well-known conservative pundit Bill Kristol - and screaming worriedly that their civil war will destroy their chances to win the presidency. We simply say: "You should have thought of that before."
Progressives and liberals, along with sensible conservatives, warned that taking most of the rules off campaign financing was highly dangerous to civil politicking. The conservatives and Republicans, however, wouldn't listen.
In a similar way, Mitt Romney, and those defending his "firing" gaffe have no real standing in their complaints of unfair treatment. We understand what Mitt's position was; that specifically, he thinks it would be a good thing to able to "fire" your health insurance company, if they weren't giving you the service you need. If the health insurance system in America actually allowed an affordable, acceptable choice for most people - as it will by 2014, thanks to the Affordable Care Act - we'd agree with his point. We can't even disagree with Gov. Romney's greater point, that firing incompetent workers and replacing them with competent staff is good for individuals, businesses, and the economy, in general.
The problem, as we noted yesterday, is that when Mr. Romney's own campaign had the chance to act with class and honor regarding the President, they instead chose to take the President's words out of context - and then attempted to blow off criticism of their actions as acceptable conduct in political warfare. If it was fair for Romney to do to others, then it is fair for others to do it back to him.
We suggest all of those milling about in the political field this year take a good hard look at their own conduct before they complain about the conduct of any of their rivals.
Actions have consequences - so don't lick the political flagpole. It's a long time until the post-election thaw.
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
The Replacements
For all the partisanship coursing through both politics and the media today, there are some groups that have more in common with their political opposition than common wisdom would have us believe. For example, take ANY random Republican from across the country, who is interested in the race to be the GOP's 2012 standard bearer - and any Nebraska Democrat interested in who's going to run for the U.S. Senate seat currently occupied by Ben Nelson.
The Republicans have some massive problems, and not just because they are so heavily divided internally as a party. They've also got a massive problem with the candidate who more and more looks to be their Presidential nominee, Mitt Romney.
Sure, among GOP hopefuls, Willard 'Mitt' Romney appears to have the best chance against President Obama according to current polling. What the polls also say is that nearly 60% of Republicans aren't yet comfortable with Romney - or any of the other options - as their final choice for President in 2012.
Of course, it may not have helped when Mitt blurted out this week, "I like being able to fire people."
Not surprisingly, that quote was taken somewhat out of context when Romney said it on Monday. Just a few short months ago, however, Romney's campaign team put together a slanderous ad against the President, taking all kinds of quotes out of context. When the Romney campaign was confronted with their less-than-ethical attack on President Obama, their response at the time was a sheepish excuse that the President had actually said those words, so it was ok to take his words out of context. Now that Romney has to taste his own campaign's medicine, the flavor doesn't seem nearly as sweet.
In a collapsing economy like the one President Obama has begun to turn around, someone who has a history of being a corporate raider in the Michael Milken / Gordon Gekko mold - especially a guy who says in ANY way that he ENJOYS firing people - isn't exactly the wisest choice as national poster boy for the GOP.
To make things worse, Romney's comments appear to have lead the rest of the Republican field to gang up on the traditional supporters of the GOP on Wall Street. From Newt Gingrich, who has taken to a full-force attack against Bain Capital specifically, and the private equity industry in general, to Jon Huntsman and Ron Paul, who are proudly repeating the idea that the biggest Wall Street banks should be broken up.
All this wonderful chaos goes on thanks to Mitt Romney, the guy most likely to be the Republican Party choice for President this year.
As you can guess, many of the GOP faithful are sitting by their proverbial phones, wishing, hoping, and praying that a better candidate for President will call them.
Meanwhile, Nebraska Democrats are in a similar boat.
While both Rep. Lee Terry and Rep. Jeff Fortenberry made clear this week that neither of them is going to run for Nelson's old seat, and Gov. Dave Heineman increasingly appears like he too will sit out, Nebraska Democrats continue to look at a 2012 U.S. Senate campaign with no serious Democratic candidate.
Right now, the best chance Nebraska Democrats have is Bob Kerrey, the former U.S. Senator and Governor of Nebraska - and the man who occupied that seat for Nebraska before Ben Nelson came along. Kerrey is visiting Nebraska this week, so state Dems are more excited than ever - but Kerry hasn't made any assurances one way or another.
Thus, Nebraska Dems, like their national GOP counterparts, sit anxiously awaiting a call.
We suggest to both groups that neither one holds their collective breath on those magical calls coming through.
The Republicans have some massive problems, and not just because they are so heavily divided internally as a party. They've also got a massive problem with the candidate who more and more looks to be their Presidential nominee, Mitt Romney.
Sure, among GOP hopefuls, Willard 'Mitt' Romney appears to have the best chance against President Obama according to current polling. What the polls also say is that nearly 60% of Republicans aren't yet comfortable with Romney - or any of the other options - as their final choice for President in 2012.
Of course, it may not have helped when Mitt blurted out this week, "I like being able to fire people."
Not surprisingly, that quote was taken somewhat out of context when Romney said it on Monday. Just a few short months ago, however, Romney's campaign team put together a slanderous ad against the President, taking all kinds of quotes out of context. When the Romney campaign was confronted with their less-than-ethical attack on President Obama, their response at the time was a sheepish excuse that the President had actually said those words, so it was ok to take his words out of context. Now that Romney has to taste his own campaign's medicine, the flavor doesn't seem nearly as sweet.
In a collapsing economy like the one President Obama has begun to turn around, someone who has a history of being a corporate raider in the Michael Milken / Gordon Gekko mold - especially a guy who says in ANY way that he ENJOYS firing people - isn't exactly the wisest choice as national poster boy for the GOP.
To make things worse, Romney's comments appear to have lead the rest of the Republican field to gang up on the traditional supporters of the GOP on Wall Street. From Newt Gingrich, who has taken to a full-force attack against Bain Capital specifically, and the private equity industry in general, to Jon Huntsman and Ron Paul, who are proudly repeating the idea that the biggest Wall Street banks should be broken up.
All this wonderful chaos goes on thanks to Mitt Romney, the guy most likely to be the Republican Party choice for President this year.
As you can guess, many of the GOP faithful are sitting by their proverbial phones, wishing, hoping, and praying that a better candidate for President will call them.
Meanwhile, Nebraska Democrats are in a similar boat.
While both Rep. Lee Terry and Rep. Jeff Fortenberry made clear this week that neither of them is going to run for Nelson's old seat, and Gov. Dave Heineman increasingly appears like he too will sit out, Nebraska Democrats continue to look at a 2012 U.S. Senate campaign with no serious Democratic candidate.
Right now, the best chance Nebraska Democrats have is Bob Kerrey, the former U.S. Senator and Governor of Nebraska - and the man who occupied that seat for Nebraska before Ben Nelson came along. Kerrey is visiting Nebraska this week, so state Dems are more excited than ever - but Kerry hasn't made any assurances one way or another.
Thus, Nebraska Dems, like their national GOP counterparts, sit anxiously awaiting a call.
We suggest to both groups that neither one holds their collective breath on those magical calls coming through.
Monday, January 9, 2012
If Ya Can't Beat 'Em, Cheat 'Em
After a weekend filled with listening to the nearly incoherent babbling of either sports fans who think Tim Tebow is the second coming of Jesus, or Republican political candidates pandering, lying, and tripping over social issues like marriage equality and contraception, we're more ready than ever to get back to work today.
If you absolutely need to know who won the two GOP debates this weekend, the short answer is the same one that Republican primary voters keep pushing to the top of their wish list: not Romney. The fact is, Jon Huntsman - the only Republican candidate we see who might give President Obama some real, fair competition in the general election - did very well in New Hampshire over the weekend. Rick Santorum also made a decent showing both days, though his popularity appears to have stalled. Everyone else was hit-or-miss at best.
If you didn't have to watch the debates this weekend, and you prefer to focus on issues of real importance, one of our media colleagues homed in on a topic we agree has significantly more importance than the GOP horserace - the increasingly important topic of voter restriction efforts.
As Leonard Pitts of the Miami Herald noted over the weekend, the decision to implement voter I.D. laws by some states - especially those states more heavily controlled by the regressive wing of the Republican party - is effectively a poll tax against minorities, the poor, and the young, all of whom vote significantly more often for Democrats than they do Republicans. Thankfully, in December, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder blocked a version of a voter I.D. law from that bastion of ethics, South Carolina, as discriminatory and unjust legislation.
From the embattled Republican governor of Wisconsin, Scott Walker, to right-wing state lawmakers in Pennsylvania, conservatives all over the United States are attempting to make it more difficult than ever for many Americans to vote in 2012. Already in Wisconsin, voting rights groups along with the ACLU have filed suit on behalf of Americans with a legitimate right to vote, including 84 year old Ruthelle Frank, who does not have a birth certificate, and never has had one.
The Brennan Center for Justice has done extensive work debunking the propaganda of the right on the nearly non-existant problem of voter fraud. Even the George W. Bush Administration, which undertook a five year investigation of the issue, said that voter fraud was not a real and significant problem in America.
Unfortunately, that didn't stop the extremists on the political right who made a focused and targeted effort last year to restrict voting rights in states across the country ahead of the 2012 elections. More and similar voter restriction laws are being proposed by Republicans nationwide as state legislatures begin to reconvene this year. Sadly, many Americans - including those most likely to have their constitutional right to vote blocked by these new laws - are also unlikely to know that they may have effectively lost that right to vote last year.
We applaud the efforts that voter rights groups like the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty and the ACLU are undertaking on behalf of the poor, minorities, young, and old, to strike down the laws panicked Republicans have set in place to try and unfairly tilt the elections in their favor. Apparently, the only way the twisted party elite in the GOP believe they can win in 2012 is by cheating.
If you absolutely need to know who won the two GOP debates this weekend, the short answer is the same one that Republican primary voters keep pushing to the top of their wish list: not Romney. The fact is, Jon Huntsman - the only Republican candidate we see who might give President Obama some real, fair competition in the general election - did very well in New Hampshire over the weekend. Rick Santorum also made a decent showing both days, though his popularity appears to have stalled. Everyone else was hit-or-miss at best.
If you didn't have to watch the debates this weekend, and you prefer to focus on issues of real importance, one of our media colleagues homed in on a topic we agree has significantly more importance than the GOP horserace - the increasingly important topic of voter restriction efforts.
As Leonard Pitts of the Miami Herald noted over the weekend, the decision to implement voter I.D. laws by some states - especially those states more heavily controlled by the regressive wing of the Republican party - is effectively a poll tax against minorities, the poor, and the young, all of whom vote significantly more often for Democrats than they do Republicans. Thankfully, in December, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder blocked a version of a voter I.D. law from that bastion of ethics, South Carolina, as discriminatory and unjust legislation.
From the embattled Republican governor of Wisconsin, Scott Walker, to right-wing state lawmakers in Pennsylvania, conservatives all over the United States are attempting to make it more difficult than ever for many Americans to vote in 2012. Already in Wisconsin, voting rights groups along with the ACLU have filed suit on behalf of Americans with a legitimate right to vote, including 84 year old Ruthelle Frank, who does not have a birth certificate, and never has had one.
The Brennan Center for Justice has done extensive work debunking the propaganda of the right on the nearly non-existant problem of voter fraud. Even the George W. Bush Administration, which undertook a five year investigation of the issue, said that voter fraud was not a real and significant problem in America.
Unfortunately, that didn't stop the extremists on the political right who made a focused and targeted effort last year to restrict voting rights in states across the country ahead of the 2012 elections. More and similar voter restriction laws are being proposed by Republicans nationwide as state legislatures begin to reconvene this year. Sadly, many Americans - including those most likely to have their constitutional right to vote blocked by these new laws - are also unlikely to know that they may have effectively lost that right to vote last year.
We applaud the efforts that voter rights groups like the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty and the ACLU are undertaking on behalf of the poor, minorities, young, and old, to strike down the laws panicked Republicans have set in place to try and unfairly tilt the elections in their favor. Apparently, the only way the twisted party elite in the GOP believe they can win in 2012 is by cheating.
Friday, January 6, 2012
Friday Funday: Reaching For The Goal
From a football and movie filled New Year's Day, to a Husker football game where our favorite team may have actually won something better than a trophy, to a major political event in a neighboring state, to our President setting the tone for work in Washington, DC this year, it was anything but a short week for us. If the first week of 2012 is supposed to set the tone for the rest of the year, we hope that everyone is ready for the most intense twelve months in recent memory.
To begin the week, our favorite college football team lost their bowl game this year. Of course, we would have preferred a different outcome. However, after talking with some of our media contacts around the country, we think the Husker football team may have earned something more than a trophy this week.
More than once this past week, the topic of the bowl game, the on-field fight, and the post game behavior of the opposing team came up in conversations with our colleagues. Each time, the person we were speaking with would give their take on the game and note how classless South Carolina was in letting their ejected player become the game's MVP. Then, they would remark on how classy Nebraska Head Coach Bo Pelini was in speaking about the Gamecocks (compared to how Gamecocks fans and players were acting), and how stern Pelini was with disciplining his own player. Nearly everyone we talked to used words like "classy," respectful," and "sportsmanship" when privately describing the performance of our favorite college football team in that tough moment – a moment that made us proud of being Nebraskans.
We were proud of our friends in Iowa too, even our Republican friends, this week. If anything, the Iowa GOP Caucus this year still proved two of our favorite axioms about American government – that those who show up and participate can make a difference, and that almost anything is possible.
We couldn't have been more proud of President Obama this week either, for following through with actions on what some thought was merely a campaign catch phrase for 2012. "We can't wait," is what the President has been saying, and this week, he followed through on that, appointing the first head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Richard Cordray, along with three new members of the National Labor Relations Board.
The facts are clear: as an arm of the government, whether or not a policeman or military service member agrees with the rules and laws they have a sworn duty to uphold and enforce, they do their duties, fulfill their roles, and keep the system moving.
Sadly, many Congressional Republicans have, for far too long, acted like they were better than our servicemembers and police personnel, doing the DC equivalent of crossing their arms and stamping their feet, and impeding ALL progress, simply because they didn't want to enforce the law that created the CFPB - a law that some of them supported.
That the President finally treated the obstructionist Congressional Republicans like the petulant children they've been imitating has been something a long, long time in coming. We can only hope that the GOP members of Congress now decide to act like grownups the rest of the year - though we're not willing to hold our breath they will do so.
The best news from this week? The jobs numbers are up in the U.S., while the jobless numbers are down substantially, and unemployment has continued it's decline, a trend we vigorously hope continues throughout the rest of this year.
As you can see, even while we felt like we were being pulled in all directions this week, there were still some moments that make us think that 2012 may actually end up being a very positive year. It won't be easy - but as we've said for years, anything worth getting is worth working for. Some things are especially worth reaching for.
In the spirit of one of our more well-known media colleagues, congratulations on getting through another week of this stuff.
To begin the week, our favorite college football team lost their bowl game this year. Of course, we would have preferred a different outcome. However, after talking with some of our media contacts around the country, we think the Husker football team may have earned something more than a trophy this week.
More than once this past week, the topic of the bowl game, the on-field fight, and the post game behavior of the opposing team came up in conversations with our colleagues. Each time, the person we were speaking with would give their take on the game and note how classless South Carolina was in letting their ejected player become the game's MVP. Then, they would remark on how classy Nebraska Head Coach Bo Pelini was in speaking about the Gamecocks (compared to how Gamecocks fans and players were acting), and how stern Pelini was with disciplining his own player. Nearly everyone we talked to used words like "classy," respectful," and "sportsmanship" when privately describing the performance of our favorite college football team in that tough moment – a moment that made us proud of being Nebraskans.
We were proud of our friends in Iowa too, even our Republican friends, this week. If anything, the Iowa GOP Caucus this year still proved two of our favorite axioms about American government – that those who show up and participate can make a difference, and that almost anything is possible.
We couldn't have been more proud of President Obama this week either, for following through with actions on what some thought was merely a campaign catch phrase for 2012. "We can't wait," is what the President has been saying, and this week, he followed through on that, appointing the first head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Richard Cordray, along with three new members of the National Labor Relations Board.
The facts are clear: as an arm of the government, whether or not a policeman or military service member agrees with the rules and laws they have a sworn duty to uphold and enforce, they do their duties, fulfill their roles, and keep the system moving.
Sadly, many Congressional Republicans have, for far too long, acted like they were better than our servicemembers and police personnel, doing the DC equivalent of crossing their arms and stamping their feet, and impeding ALL progress, simply because they didn't want to enforce the law that created the CFPB - a law that some of them supported.
That the President finally treated the obstructionist Congressional Republicans like the petulant children they've been imitating has been something a long, long time in coming. We can only hope that the GOP members of Congress now decide to act like grownups the rest of the year - though we're not willing to hold our breath they will do so.
The best news from this week? The jobs numbers are up in the U.S., while the jobless numbers are down substantially, and unemployment has continued it's decline, a trend we vigorously hope continues throughout the rest of this year.
As you can see, even while we felt like we were being pulled in all directions this week, there were still some moments that make us think that 2012 may actually end up being a very positive year. It won't be easy - but as we've said for years, anything worth getting is worth working for. Some things are especially worth reaching for.
In the spirit of one of our more well-known media colleagues, congratulations on getting through another week of this stuff.
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