Category: Barack Obama

If Only the Czar Knew

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This is an interesting article on how Larry Summers and Tim Geithner have successfully neutralized Paul Volcker’s attempts to create meaningful reform in the financial industry.

The subtext that the article misses is that this is that this is not Summers’ or Geithner’s doing, it is Barack Obama’s doing.

The fact that Paul Volker has been marginalized is obvious to anyone with two brain cells to rub together, and President Obama is not a stupid man.

The increases in regulation and the reform have been held to a minimum because that is what Obama wants.

Obama’s Weak Tea on Gay Rights

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So, Obama is extending ‘some’ federal benefits to gay partners, and as Pam Spaulding notes, it’s awfully meaningless and ill conceived.

First, as is noted in the New York Times, but buried in the last ‘graph, it’s not intended to be meaningful change:

But administration officials said the timing of the announcement was intended to help contain the growing furor among gay rights groups. Several gay donors withdrew their sponsorship of a Democratic National Committee fund-raising event next week, where Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. is scheduled to speak.

Further, it’s not even an executive order, but an administrative memorandum, so it expires when he leaves office.

It also does not cover health benefits, so what is left to cover? The only thing that comes to mind is relocation benefits.

And they are leaking the reasons to make clear that people don’t think that this is the start of a trend to support gay rights, it’s just a ploy to appease people before a fundraiser.

LBTG’s of America, welcome to under the bus, where supporters of government transparency, accountability for war crimes and torture for Bush and His Evil Minions™, and meaningful reform of the financial system were thrown months ago.

It’s not particularly comfortable here, and now it’s getting very crowded.

Obama Getting Hammered on Selling Out Gays

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It’s got the Human Rights Campaign up in arms, finally.

They’ve been a captive of the Obama administration for some time, and it’s nice that they have found some guts.

What’s more it looks like people are bailing from the DNC’s very high profile $1000 a person gay fundraiser as a result.

Additionally, the New York Times blasted Obama on his call to defend the law, noting that Obama’s assertion that the DoJ was compelled to defend the statute is simply not true.

Let There Be No Kings

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So, one of the proposals in Barack Obama’s speech is a proposal for permanent preventive detention on the say so of the President:

“But even when this process is complete, there may be a number of people who cannot be prosecuted for past crimes, in some cases because evidence may be tainted, but who nonetheless pose a threat to the security of the United States. Examples of that threat include people who’ve received extensive explosives training at al Qaeda training camps, or commanded Taliban troops in battle, or expressed their allegiance to Osama bin Laden, or otherwise made it clear that they want to kill Americans. These are people who, in effect, remain at war with the United States.

Let me repeat: I am not going to release individuals who endanger the American people. Al Qaeda terrorists and their affiliates are at war with the United States, and those that we capture — like other prisoners of war — must be prevented from attacking us again. Having said that, we must recognize that these detention policies cannot be unbounded. They can’t be based simply on what I or the executive branch decide alone. That’s why my administration has begun to reshape the standards that apply to ensure that they are in line with the rule of law. We must have clear, defensible, and lawful standards for those who fall into this category. We must have fair procedures so that we don’t make mistakes. We must have a thorough process of periodic review, so that any prolonged detention is carefully evaluated and justified.

I know that creating such a system poses unique challenges. And other countries have grappled with this question; now, so must we. But I want to be very clear that our goal is to construct a legitimate legal framework for the remaining Guantanamo detainees that cannot be transferred. Our goal is not to avoid a legitimate legal framework. In our constitutional system, prolonged detention should not be the decision of any one man. If and when we determine that the United States must hold individuals to keep them from carrying out an act of war, we will do so within a system that involves judicial and congressional oversight. And so, going forward, my administration will work with Congress to develop an appropriate legal regime so that our efforts are consistent with our values and our Constitution.”

This is contemptible.

If they are prisoners of war, then treat them as such, and grant them the rights therein, including the Geneva conventions, which among other things, prevent their transfer to 3rd countries (Bagram and the CIA gulags).

If they are not, then try them by jury.

This was also the reaction of civil libertarians who had an off the record meeting with him at the White House.

I’m sure that Barack Obama has read the Declaration of Independence, and amongst the grievances given by the founding fathers were, “depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury,” and “transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences,” which sound a lot like what he wants to do.

His argument is that unlike Bush, he can be trusted.

This is a lie. Any agency of government who wishes the grant or extraordinary power on this basis is inherently untrustworthy, and the same goes double for his successor.

Sorry, but, “Because I’m so awesome,” is not a reason.

His speech frightened me more than Dick Cheney’s, because Dick Cheney no longer has the power to do what he wants.

Let There Be Contested Primaries

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Barack Obama must be listening to Rahm Emanuel again, because he just successfully pressured Rep. Steve Israel to drop out of the New York primary race against Kristen Gillibrand.

I guess we see yet another case of incumbent protection.

I do not know whether or not Gillibrand would win in a real contested primary. She probably would, she is a prodigious fund raiser.

What’s more, she seems to be moving a little to the left now that she is representing the state of New York, as opposed to just her Neanderthal district.

But none of that earns her, or any candidate, the right to a primary without a meaningful challenger.

Lying Two Faced Rat Bastard!

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I have a joke for you:
Q:What’s the difference between Barack Obama and Dick Cheney?
A: I have no damn clue, because Barack Obama is restarting the military tribunals:

Military Tribunals Will Resume, Obama Says

By Peter Finn
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, May 15, 2009 1:55 PM

President Obama said today he will revive military commissions but with greater legal safeguards for defendants to try some terrorist suspects held at the military base in Cuba.

The decision, which follows an intense internal debate, represents something of a reversal by the president who said during the campaign that military courts martial or the federal courts offered a better route to successful prosecution because he said military commissions had been an “enormous failure.”

In recent weeks, however, the administration appears to have bowed to fears articulated by the Pentagon that bringing some detainees before regular courts presented enormous legal hurdles and could risk acquittals.

Risk acquittals? You are doing this because of a Risk of Acquittals?

That’s the F$#@ING POINT OF A F$#@ING TRIAL, YOU F$#@ING ILL CONCEIVED F$#@ING SON OF A F$#@ING WOMBAT!

If you don’t have a “risk of acquittal”, it’s a F$#@ING show trial. So you are pre-announcing that the military commissions are a fraud, because, you don’t want to “risk acquittals”

He’s claiming that they will be fairer than the commissions that Bush came up with, because….Because, He’s Barack Obama, and he’s just so F$#@ING awesome.

Wrong! We are the United States of America, our whole system of government is about not relying on our leaders being, “so F$#@ING awesome,” it’s about the F$#@ING rule of F$#@ING law.

I don’t care how F$#@ING awsome you F$#@ING think you are, that’s not how Americans do things.

That weren’t bad enough you also have this:

The administration is still grappling with how to handle the cases of detainees that are deemed too dangerous to release, but that some in the Pentagon fear cannot be prosecuted in any legal forum. That could lead to the creation of a system of indefinite detention without charge backed by some form of regular court review.

Well, there’s another wonderful bit of accepting who we are as a nation: If there is anything that defines American jurisprudence, and the things that our founding fathers, commie pinkos like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Ben Franklin, it was that they found the very idea that someone could use the state could detain someone forever without any recourse to legal process to be an anathema.

It’s wrong, it’s stupid, and it’s un-American.

Glenn Greenwald, who is far kinder than I am, or perhaps more well spoken (better writer is a given), calls this “Obama’s kinder, gentler military commissions.” He quotes many people who are now serving in the Obama administration, as well as President Obama when he was candidate Obama, noting that the problem is not just that the processes were wrong, but that the entire idea of a special court with special procedures is wrong.

What is most pernicious, quoting a letter in response to Greenwald’s article is this:

The other aspect of it, and you hinted at this the other day, is this: Under Bush, half the country was trained to recite all sorts of dangerous propositions about how important it is to vest The President with all sorts of powers to keep us safe, how vital it is that he keep things secret to protect us from the Terrorists, how we can trust in our leaders to exercise in ways we don’t understand because we know he’s good at heart.

And now, with Obama, a significant portion of the other half of the country is being trained to recite the same things.

Once again proving that almost any person on the Internet can write, and think, more clearly than I can.

And then there’s what Digby said:

By the way, I have to wonder why it’s taken centuries to come up with the civilian and military justice systems? Apparently, creating a new one is piece of cake. Why all the sturm and drang with appellate court challenges and legislation? Just put it in a presidential memo and carry on.

What has been announced today is disgraceful.

Self-Important Wankers

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It appears that the members of the Washington, DC press corps are miffed because Barack Obama won’t be attending their annual Gridiron dinner:

But some Gridiron veterans make clear they don’t understand. Chicago Tribune columnist Clarence Page said, “People feel uncommonly saddened, miffed and burned.

“I don’t think he understands the implications of not coming to the club in the first year. It’s not your ordinary state dinner. I think it would be helpful for him and his relations with the Washington establishment to come to the club.”

Mr. Page, by “some people”, you mean “Chicago Tribune columnist Clarence Page,” and you need to get over yourself.

Beyond bruised feelings among the pundit class, Obama’s snub is a revealing cultural moment.

Gridiron has for decades been an inner sanctum of Washington’s political press corps. The club’s mostly aging members were considered highly prestigious because they said so — and because they had the ability to summon the capital’s political elite to a spring frolic of skits and songs.

But if a young and glamorous president decides he can afford to blow off an august and tradition-bound institution, one has to at least entertain the possibility that this institution may not be quite as august as its members assumed.

It never was anything but a mutual masturbation society.

Obama decided that spending spring break with his girls was more important, so good for him.

Adult in Charge

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Note this quote from an interview:

In evening interviews on broadcast and cable television networks, Mr. Obama said he took responsibility for the errors. “And so I’m frustrated with myself, with our team,” he told NBC, “but ultimately my job is to get this thing back on track because what we need to focus on is a deteriorating economy and getting people back to work.”

He added, “I’m here on television saying I screwed up and that’s part of the era of responsibility.”

(emphasis mine)

Think about that for a second….A president admitting error….Like a non psychopathic adult….

Barack Obama , Bite My Shiny Metal Ass

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So, Barack Obama was there to unveil Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine as the new head of the DNC for the press, but Howard Dean, the outgoing head of the DNC, was not invited, “at the request of Obama advisers.”

Dean took a lot of heat for his 50 state strategy, with people like James Carville and Rahm Emmanuel lambasting him for things like putting resources into the hands of local Democrats in places like Alaska, where Democrat Mark Begich defeated longtime Republican incumbent Ted Stevens in a tightly contested race this cycle.

We know who was right, and John Aravosis nails it when he says, “There is a real problem when Joe Lieberman is treated better than Howard Dean.”

The argument is that he was on travel, but, his his brother Jim notednoted, “If he had been asked to go to that event, he would have been there.”

While it’s true that Dean was noted by Obama glowing terms in his prepared statements, it was literally in the same sentence as Rahm Emmanuel.

It’s entirely true that Obama might not have been aware of what is going on with his staff, most likely Rahmbo, and Dean, but as Harry S Truman said, “The buck stops here.”

Obama Decides to Try to Kowtow to Republicans

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Well, it now appears that Barack Obama is looking at about $300 billion of the stimulus package being taxcuts.

Why? Because he wants to get more than 80 votes in the Senate.

This is delusional, and it is wrong. The Republicans don’t care about making government work for the people, and if it doesn’t work, he will get the blame anyway.

Anything worth passing will not get Republican votes. Obama need only remember that Social Security passed without a single Republican vote….Not one.

I agree with Josh Marshall when he says, “Can someone help me come up with an argument for why the Obama stimulus plan isn’t turning out to be a painful joke?“

The Shrill One, Paul Krugman, makes the best point on his blog:

Look, Republicans are not going to come on board. Make 40% of the package tax cuts, they’ll demand 100%. Then they’ll start the thing about how you can’t cut taxes on people who don’t pay taxes (with only income taxes counting, of course) and demand that the plan focus on the affluent. Then they’ll demand cuts in corporate taxes. And Mitch McConnell is already saying that state and local governments should get loans, not aid — which would undermine that part of the plan, too.

He follows up with another good point in his column, that Republicans are already, “setting up roadblocks to stimulus legislation while posing as the champions of careful Congressional deliberation,” and then he follows up with the point that action needs to be taken quickly, and Republicans have no interest in taking action at all.

They believe that action in and of itself is evil.

Hilzoy notes, tax cuts give among the smallest GDP bang for the buck:

Sooner or Later, He Just Might Have to Stand for Something.

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On the reliably wankeriffic Washington Post editorial page, Richard Cohen is generally one of the more reliably wankeriffic. He’s not up to the truly delusional level of Krauthammer, but he consistently shows a lack of ability to think and even to understand what he just said. I have noted this in the past.

That being said, Richard Cohen gets one right today, because, unlike most of the time, he actually knows the people who are effected by a political event.

In this case, it is his sister, who is a lesbian and in a 19 year committed relationship, and a supporter of Barack Obama who traveled to volunteered for the campaign, has canceled her inauguration party because of his invitation to for bigot preacher Rick Warren to give the invocation.

It’s amazing how much more sane and thoughtful the pundits are when it’s them and theirs that are effected by an action…Kind of funny huh?

Cohen rightly castigates Obama on this, though, with typical aplomb, he buries his lede:

The conventional thing to say is that Obama has a preacher problem — first the volcanic Jeremiah Wright and now the transparently anti-gay Warren. But the real problem has nothing to do with ministers and everything to do with Obama’s inability or unwillingness to be a moral leader. Sooner or later, he just might have to stand for something.

Of course his point on Wright was that Barack Obama needed to leave his church because a publication edited by Wright’s daughter gave an award to Farrakhan, because black politicians are in lock step with everything done by their church….Something he would never suggest of a white politician.

That being said, this is a case of a stopped clock being right twice a day: Sooner or later Barack Obama has to stand for something.

Update on Bigot Little Rickie Warren

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In addition to being a virulently anti-gay, anti-abortion bigot, I forgot to mention that Obama’s choice to give the invocation at the inauguration also supports the assassination of foreign leaders:

HANNITY: Can you talk to rogue dictators? Ahmadinejad denies the Holocaust, wants to wipe Israel off the map, is seeking nuclear weapons.

WARREN: Yes.

HANNITY: I think we need to take him out.

WARREN: Yes.

HANNITY: Am I advocating something dark, evil or something righteous?

WARREN: Well, actually, the Bible says that evil cannot be negotiated with. It has to just be stopped. And I believe…

HANNITY: By force?

WARREN: Well, if necessary. In fact, that is the legitimate role of government. The Bible says that God puts government on earth to punish evildoers. Not good-doers. Evildoers.

and views gay marriage marriages as being equivalent to incest, child rape and polygamy:

Rick Warren: But the issue to me is, I’m not opposed to that as much as I’m opposed to the redefinition of a 5,000-year definition of marriage. I’m opposed to having a brother and sister be together and call that marriage. I’m opposed to an older guy marrying a child and calling that a marriage. I’m opposed to one guy having multiple wives and calling that marriage.

Steven Waldman: Do you think, though, that they are equivalent to having gays getting married?

Rick Warren: Oh I do.

BTW, while I’m sure I don’t have enough readers to get a comment to the effect that this was not Obama’s decision, but that of the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies, headed by Diane Feinstein.*

Well, the word is out that this was Obama’s pick:

A powerful Democratic friend contacted me this morning to let me know that they talked to the key players yesterday, and Diane Feinstein, chair of the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies, had nothing to do with the pick of Rick Warren as Obama’s invocation speaker at the inaugural. The decision was made by Obama himself, I’m told, and Feinstein just assumed that he had vetted it with his staff. Difi went along with Obama’s decision, not the other way around. If this is true, then our apologies to Senator Feinstein for suggesting that she was involved.

This has the ring of truth.

Feinstein made her statewide political career on reaching out to the gay community as mayor of San Francisco following the assassination of Moskone and Milk.

It’s one of the few things that she has never wavered on.

*Full disclosure, my great grandfather, Harry Goldman, and her grandfather, Sam Goldman were brothers.

Obama Throws Gays Under the Bus…..Again

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Over a year ago, I called out Barack Obama for throwing gays under the bus with his gospel concert in South Carolina, when he let an anti-gay bigot (who’s also … you know gay … but all better now really … no … really … he’s all better now…) take the stage … scratch that take over the stage…

Well, I’m not stunned and amazed: He handled the McClurkin contraversy in the way most calculated to be hurtful, and now he
is having bigot Christo-Fascist* Rick Warren to give inaugural invocation.

The PFAW president describes himself as ‘Profoundly Disappointed’ by this development, and Atrios gives Obama the coveted Wanker of the Day award.

The good folks at Right Wing Watch have the scoop on just what this man has done and said, which includes:

  • Coming out vociferiously in support of Prop 8 stripping the right to marry from gays in California.
    • This also includes him lying like a dog, and saying that this would allow pastors to be arrested for sermons
  • Declaring that marriage, abortion rights (anti), and stem cell research were “non-negotiable” issues for Christian voters.
  • Has said that the difference himself and James Dobson is a just tone.
  • He has compared abortion to the Holocaust.
  • Declared that those who do not believe in God should not be allowed to hold public office.

I’m a bit disappointed, but I am far from surprised, I expected some sort of backhand to “te gay” as a demonstration of “bipartisanship.”

My gay friend who thinks that Obama sh%$s ice cream though….I don’t know how he’ll rationalize this.

If you are expecting a move on Don’t Ask Don’t Tell in the military before the 2010 elections, you are sorely mistaken.

*I could also use the term “Talibaptist”….Your thoughts on which works better?

Obama Goes for Massive Infrastructure Spending

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This is not a surprise. It’s a good way to prime the pump, and the needs in terms of deferred maintenance on roads, bridges, water supplies, etc. are very real.

One thing that does concern me is that some of this infrastructure spending is on broadband (good), but they are (at least according to what I heard on Marketplace Money Sunday) planning to use incentives to private firms.

While Obama is correct in saying that it’s unconscionable for the US to be number 15 in broadband penetration, the idea that the private sector would save this is absurd and misguided.

This was tried in the 1990s, with the incumbent telcos getting over $100 billion in incentives, but they spent the money that they got on cementing their position as incumbents, rather than on improving the communications infrastructure.

This is not surprising. Monopoly and near-monopoly generate the best profits, which is the objective in a capitalist system.

I do believe in competition in broadband, from the curb to the home phone/TV/PC, where the incumbent advantages are small, but in the last mile from the “central office” to the curb, having a private entity in running the business is an epic fail, and it is why the US lags behind state owned Telcos in both performance and price in places like Korea and Japan.

Just in Case You are Wondering….

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The selection of former Army Chief of Staff Eric Shinseki as head of the Department of Veterans Affairs IS a big steaming helping of f$#k you to Bush, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and and the rest of their Evil Minions.™

Shinseki, as you may recall, was basically fired for saying that we would need around ½ million troops in order to make sure that post invasion needs were attended to.

He was promptly cashiered, and both Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz made a point of not showing up to his retirement ceremony.

Rummie and Wolfie, suck…on…this.