Category: Elections

Anonymous Source Says that Netanyahu Speech is Just to F%$# with Obama

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You know an evil plan is starting to go pear shaped when the rats start leaving the sinking ship insiders start talking to the press.

Case in point, an Israeli source is telling the press that Boehner and Netanyahu actively conspired just f%$# with Obama and the Iran nuclear negotiations:

Retribution is some form of punishment inflicted on someone as vengeance for a wrong, whether the wrong is perceived or real. For the past four years, Speaker of the House John A. Boehner (R-OH) has likely perceived that President Barack Obama has inflicted all manner of wrongs on him due to the ease the President is able to thwart Republican efforts to rule America according to their masters the Koch brothers. Obviously Boehner is frustrated that he has been outplayed and out-maneuvered at every turn by the President, and lacking the wherewithal to take on the President himself, he marshaled support and conspired with a foreigner, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, to “defy and humiliate President Obama.”

Many political observers, the White House, and Democrats were rightly incensed when Boehner invited the foreigner to address a joint session of Congress without going through normal State Department protocols, and their supposition that Boehner deliberately went around the normal diplomatic channels as an act of defiance against the Executive Branch seemed more than credible. Now it is official; Boehner’s illegal invitation to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address a joint session of Congress represents a coordinated attack on President Barack Obama by the radical Republican right-wing and all its bad actors. This official reiteration of what many Democrats suspected all along is according to the Israeli consul general.

As reported [Paid subscription] in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, Yaron Sideman said that Speaker of the House John Boehner, congressional Republicans, the Republican Jewish Coalition, the Zionist Organization of America, and radical Christian leaders’ only purpose “in inviting and supporting Netanyahu’s speech is to defy and humiliate President Barack Obama by addressing the Iranian issue.” In most people’s minds, Boehner and Netanyahu’s conspiracy was more than just to defy and humiliate the President on Iran; it was an attempt to subvert America’s negotiations with Iran over its nuclear ambitions to start another Middle East war at the behest of Israel. In fact, according to Boehner, his illegal conspiracy was specifically to allow Netanyahu “send a clear message to the White House” that in matters regarding America’s Middle East policy, Republicans are committed to Israel.

This has turned into a disaster for both Boehner and Netanyahu.

It’s probably worse for Bibi, because it’s just a few weeks until parliamentary elections.

The two big issues for any party leader in Israel are security and managing their relationship with the United States, and Netanyahu has completely botched the latter.

I disagree with the author as to Boehner’s motivations: I don’t think that this was driven by a desire for vengeance by he speaker.  I think that was driven by the precarious nature of his speakership.

He is the least competent House Speaker in recent memory, having demonstrated that he can neither count nor control his caucus, and the only way that he can hold onto his position is by appealing to the basest instincts of the House Republicans.

It ain’t a lust for vengeance, it’s, it’s incompetence, fear, and a complete lack of any deeply held beliefs.

H/t DC at the Stellar Parthenon BBS.

It Really Sucks to be Bibi Right Now

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And now, the head of the ADL has called for Netanyahu to cancel his speech before Congress.

It really does not get any more mainstream in Jewish American politics than the Anti-Defamation League:

As the controversy surrounding Benjamin Netanyahu speech to Congress reaches new heights, one of the Jewish community’s top leaders is calling on the Israeli prime minister to stay home.

 Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti Defamation League said that the political uproar ignited by Netanyahu’s invitation to speak to a joint meeting of Congress makes such a move unhelpful and therefore it should be scrapped.

 “It’s a tragedy of unintended consequences,” Foxman told the Forward, describing how the idea of presenting Israel’s view on Iran spiraled out of control, reaching even the Jon Stewart show, a step, Foxman said, that “turned the whole thing into a circus.”

 “One needs to restart, and it needs a mature adult statement that this was not what we intended,” Foxman told the Forward. He said that going ahead as planned with the speech would be counter-productive, with all attention given to the political controversy rather than to the issue at stake. “It has been hijacked by politics,” Foxman said. “Now is a time to recalibrate, restart and find a new platform and new timing to take away the distractions.”

 Foxman noted that he does not dispute the seriousness of the Iranian nuclear issue and that he agrees with Netanyahu on the need to strengthen sanctions against Tehran, but he argued that recent events have derailed the initial intention of Netanyahu’s address to Congress.

 Among the potential alternatives mentioned by Foxman for Netanyahu’s congressional speech were coming to Washington only for the AIPAC conference, postponing his address until after the March 17 elections in Israel, or expressing his concerns over the emerging Iran deal in direct conversations.

This is a polite way of telling Netanyahu to STFU, and I don’t recall the ADL EVER rebuking an Israeli PM so strongly.

Boehner saw it as a way of embarrassing Obama, and Netanyahu saw it as a way of boosting his own electoral prospects, and it looks like they are 0 for 2.
It is so good to see this blowing up in the faces of those weasels (Boehner and Netanyahu).

How Bibi Pulled Defeat from the Jaws of Victory

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So, John Boehner invites Israeli PM Benyamin Netanyahu to speak before Congress without consulting Obama, and what’s more, he does it a few weeks before Israeli elections.

I’m sure that he expected to jack Democrats up over this, and force them to choose between rebuking what is a clear violation of protocol or demonstrating support for the Jewish state.

It turns out that the choice for Democrats was not difficult, and they chose to make the House Speaker look like a complete prat:

Israeli Ambassador Ron Dermer and Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein rushed to meetings on Capitol Hill on Wednesday trying to calm a furor created by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s planned speech to Congress next month and quell a Democratic revolt that has dozens threatening a boycott.

 It didn’t work.

 If anything, Democrats finished the day more frustrated. According to a source in the room, one Jewish Democratic member of Congress even accused Dermer of being insincere when he claimed not to have anticipated the partisan uproar he’d ignite when he skirted protocol and went around the White House and scheduled the speech only with House Speaker John Boehner.

 White House press secretary Josh Earnest, meanwhile, dangled the possibility that the White House would have Vice President Joe Biden skip the speech in what the West Wing acknowledges would be a serious snub.

Actually, the possibility is now a certainty.

Biden has officially announced that he will not attend the speech, and at least a dozen other Dems who appear to be busy washing their hair at that time as well.

It’s gotten so bad that Netanyahu is trying to walk back his diss of Obama:

A senior Israeli official suggested on Friday that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had been misled into thinking an invitation to address the U.S. Congress on Iran next month was fully supported by the Democrats.

Netanyahu was invited by the Republican speaker of the house, John Boehner, to address Congress on March 3, an invitation Boehner originally described as bipartisan.

The move angered the White House, which is upset about the event coming two weeks before Israeli elections and that Netanyahu, who has a testy relationship with Democratic President Barack Obama, is expected to be critical of U.S. policy on Iran.

“It appears that the speaker of Congress made a move, in which we trusted, but which it ultimately became clear was a one sided move and not a move by both sides,” Deputy Israeli Foreign Minister Tzachi Hanegbi told 102 FM Tel Aviv Radio on Friday.

The interviewer asked if that meant Netanyahu had been “misled” into believing Boehner’s invitation was bipartisan, a characterization Hanegbi did not contest.

Asked whether the prime minister should cancel or postpone the speech, Hanegbi said: “What would the outcome be then? The outcome would be that we forsake an arena in which there is a going to be a very dramatic decision (on Iran).”

To be fair, Bibi is not just dissing the President, he is also trying to sabotage the Iranian nuclear negotiations, and he is also trying to make political hay of this just before elections for the Knesset.

It now looks like both Boehner and Netanyahu will both look like intemperate fools, and if anything this controversy will hurt the chances of the Likud in the upcoming elections.

Syriza Wins Election

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He formed a (rather odd) coalition with the, “populist right-wing Independent Greeks party,” as he secured only 149 seats in the 300 seat assembly, Syriza chief Alexis Tsipras has been sworn in as Prime Minister:

A new chapter in Greece’s uphill struggle to remain solvent – and in the eurozone – has begun in earnest as anti-austerity politicians assumed the helm of government following the radical left Syriza party’s spectacular electoral victory on Sunday night.

Ushering in the new era, Alexis Tsipras was not sworn in, as tradition dictates, in the presence of Archbishop Iernonymos but instead took the oath of office in a civil ceremony. At 40, he becomes the country’s youngest premier in modern times.

The leftist, who surprised Greeks by speedily agreeing to share power with the populist rightwing Independent Greeks party, Anel, was on Monday afternoon handed a mandate by president Karolos Papoulias to form a government following his investiture at the presidential palace. Afterwards, the new prime minister pronounced that he will give his all “to protect the interests of the Greek people”.

Earlier, Panos Kammenos, Anel’s rumbustious leader, emerged from hour-long talks with Tsipras saying the two politicians had successfully formed a coalition.

“I want to say, simply, that from this moment, there is a government,” Kammenos told reporters gathered outside Syriza’s headquarters.

This was a bit of a surprise.

It was generally expected that the centrist/center left The River (To Potami) party would be a likely coalition partner, who would be expected to be more attuned with Syriza’s stated policies.

I think that there were 7 reasons for him to go with Anel:

  1. To Potami was formed roughly a year ago by a TV news personality, Stavros Theodorakis, and as such its existence beyond this election cycle is not by any means a sure thing.  (Anel is only a bit older, having been formed in 2012)
  2. Theodorakis is very much not a Euroskeptic, and drew “Red Lines” (German) on leaving the Euro and a deposit levy, and taking the first item off the table fatally weakens the Greek negotiating position.
  3. To Potami has very much focused on “Structural Reforms” (which appear to be defined as the reduction in patronage and corruption) to the exclusion of everything else, which would also make them an unreliable.
  4. Anel has a history of working left wing parties on issues of common interest. (Panhellenic Citizen Chariot)
  5. Anel is Euroskeptic, and really hates the Germans. (It has a demand for reparations from Germany for WWII).
  6. The founder of Anel is a long term politician, the founder of To Potami is a news talking head.  I think that the latter is far more likely to channel the behavior of pastry chefs.
  7. To Potami seems to be kind of a “Seinfeld” party, in that it doesn’t seem to be about much beyond platitudes, and Theodorakis’ personality.

 In any case, it is significant that Tsipras’ first act as PM was pretty clearly a bit “F%$# You” to the Germans:

His first act as prime minister was to lay flowers at the National Resistance Memorial at Kaisariani, which commemorates 200 Greeks who were killed by Nazis there in the second world war. The highly symbolic act was interpreted by Greek TV commentators as “another up yours to the Germans”.

I would call it a very well deserved “Up Yours” to the Germans.  Merkel has been “n***er baiting” the southern tier of the Eurozone for domestic political consumption, .

As to what it means, a lot of ink (electrons?) has been spilled about how little leverage Greece has, but this has been the same media sources who try to cast Syriza as the new Khmer Rouge.

Two Nobel Prize economists, Joseph Stiglitz, and Paul Krugman, have both weighed in on the damage inflicted by “confidence fairy” based austerity today, and they both gave it a thumbs down.

Stiglitz is very clear, and he blames Germany, not Greece for the disaster that is the policy for Greece: (And Ireland and Portugal, and to a lesser degree, Spain and Italy)

Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz told CNBC on Monday that the euro zone should stay together but if it breaks apart, it would be better for Germany to leave than for Greece.

“While it was an experiment to bring them together, nothing has divided Europe as much as the euro,” Stiglitz said in a “Squawk Box” interview.

………

Greece is not the only economy struggling under the euro, and that’s why a new approach is needed, Stiglitz said. “The policies that Europe has foisted on Greece just have not worked and that’s true of Spain and other countries.”

………

He said the real problem is Germany, which has benefited greatly under the euro. “Most economists are saying the best solution for Europe, if it’s going to break up, is for Germany to leave. The mark would raise, the German economy would be dampened.”

Under that scenario, Germany would find out just how much it needs the euro to stay together, he added, and possibly be more willing to help out the countries that are struggling. “The hope was, by having a shared currency, they would grow together.” But he said that should work both ways.

I’ve been saying that Germany is the problem, and not the solution for a while.

Prof Krugman sees it as primarily a failure of policy brought on by adherence to thoroughly discredited economic theory:

To understand the political earthquake in Greece, it helps to look at Greece’s May 2010 “standby arrangement” with the International Monetary Fund, under which the so-called troika — the I.M.F., the European Central Bank and the European Commission — extended loans to the country in return for a combination of austerity and reform. It’s a remarkable document, in the worst way. The troika, while pretending to be hardheaded and realistic, was peddling an economic fantasy. And the Greek people have been paying the price for those elite delusions.

You see, the economic projections that accompanied the standby arrangement assumed that Greece could impose harsh austerity with little effect on growth and employment. Greece was already in recession when the deal was reached, but the projections assumed that this downturn would end soon — that there would be only a small contraction in 2011, and that by 2012 Greece would be recovering. Unemployment, the projections conceded, would rise substantially, from 9.4 percent in 2009 to almost 15 percent in 2012, but would then begin coming down fairly quickly.

What actually transpired was an economic and human nightmare. Far from ending in 2011, the Greek recession gathered momentum. Greece didn’t hit the bottom until 2014, and by that point it had experienced a full-fledged depression, with overall unemployment rising to 28 percent and youth unemployment rising to almost 60 percent. And the recovery now underway, such as it is, is barely visible, offering no prospect of returning to precrisis living standards for the foreseeable future.

………

Still, in calling for a major change, Mr. Tsipras is being far more realistic than officials who want the beatings to continue until morale improves. The rest of Europe should give him a chance to end his country’s nightmare.

I’m inclined to go with Stiglitz’ here. 

I think that once again, the German sense of exceptionalism has screwed up the Eurozone from day one, and until the rest of the member nations get together to challenge Merkel’s fairy tail, the Euro will continue to circle the drain.

Pass the Popcorn

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Pass the Popcorn

The DoJ has opened an inquiry on Michelle and Marcus Bachmann for campaign finance violations in her 2012 run for President:

Representative Michele Bachmann’s presidential hopes ended 20 months ago, but her brief and chaotic campaign continues to be the focus of ethics investigations.

The latest is a federal inquiry into whether an outside “super PAC” improperly coordinated strategy with Mrs. Bachmann’s campaign staff, including her husband, in violation of election laws.

The Department of Justice demanded records from the super PAC last week of its finances and its communications with Mrs. Bachmann; Marcus Bachmann, her husband; and former staff members, according to a grand jury subpoena reviewed by The New York Times.

The investigation appears to stem from a complaint a former campaign staff member made to the Federal Election Commission and to the F.B.I. The staff member told of overhearing the president of the super PAC asking a Bachmann senior adviser about buying advertising on radio and TV stations in Des Moines ahead of the Iowa caucus on Jan. 3, 2012.

Her political career is already over, but some jail time would be a nice message to those who think that they are anointed by God to rule over us.

The message is, “Pride goeth before a fall.”

That Tom Tomorrow Cartoon Is Looking More and More Prescient

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Over at the Washington Post, Chris Cillizza has an analysis of Obama’s coat tails, and it shows that Obama has been the most disastrous 2 term presidential tenure in 60 years:

Everyone knows by now that 2010 and 2014 were very good to the Republican Party. What they don’t understand (or understand well enough) is just how good. Yes, Republicans now control the Senate and have their largest majority in the House since World War II. But it’s downballot (way downballot) where the depth of the Republican victories over the past three elections truly reveal themselves — and where the impact will be felt over the long term.

………

As NCSL notes, Republicans now control more than 4,100 seats — their highest number since 1920. After taking over 11 legislative chambers from Democrats in 2014, Republicans now control 30 state legislatures completely — and have full control of state government (state legislature and governorship) in 23 states. Democrats, by contrast, have full control of 11 state legislatures and total control of state government in just seven states. (Click here for an amazing NCSL chart that details which side controls every state legislature.)

………

st
The Fix
Republicans have gained more than 900 state legislative seats since 2010
By Chris Cillizza January 14 Follow @thefix

Everyone knows by now that 2010 and 2014 were very good to the Republican Party. What they don’t understand (or understand well enough) is just how good. Yes, Republicans now control the Senate and have their largest majority in the House since World War II. But it’s downballot (way downballot) where the depth of the Republican victories over the past three elections truly reveal themselves — and where the impact will be felt over the long term.

In the past three elections, Republicans have gained 913 state legislative seats, according to calculations made by Larry Sabato at the University of Virginia. Here are Sabato’s figures in chart form — and with historical comparisons — via GOP lobbyist Bruce Mehlman.
Now, there are more 7,000 state legislative seats in the country, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures, which makes that 913 number slightly less eye-popping. Still, the Democratic losses between 2010 and 2014 amount to 12 percent of all state legislative seats nationwide.

As NCSL notes, Republicans now control more than 4,100 seats — their highest number since 1920. After taking over 11 legislative chambers from Democrats in 2014, Republicans now control 30 state legislatures completely — and have full control of state government (state legislature and governorship) in 23 states. Democrats, by contrast, have full control of 11 state legislatures and total control of state government in just seven states. (Click here for an amazing NCSL chart that details which side controls every state legislature.)

Why does the lopsided state of legislative control matter to national politics? For lots of reasons.

1. Policy is made at the state legislative level. That’s policy pertaining to states and policy that gets bumped up to the federal level. With Republicans in control of so many state governments, the policy incubator for their side will be vastly superior to what Democrats can do at the state and local levels.

2. State legislatures and governors redraw congressional lines. In most states, how the nation’s 435 House districts will look after the 2020 Census will be determined by state legislators and governors. And guess what? Republican legislators (and governors) are more likely to draw lines that are friendly to their side. Unless Democrats can reverse their state House and Senate losses before the 2021 redraw, Republicans could control the House for a very, very long time.

3. State legislatures are the minor leagues. Most of the politicians — President Obama included — who have gone on to great things, politically speaking, honed their craft in the state legislature of their home (or adopted home) state. Republicans’ farm system to grow the sort of talent that might one day run for House, Senate or even president is now significantly larger than that of Democrats.

Yes, in the near term, nothing matters more than which party hold the majority in the U.S. House and Senate. But, if you are playing the long game — and both parties have to if they want to stay vibrant and effective — what happens at the state legislative level has huge import. And, in that contest, there is no contest: Republicans are winning in a landslide.

Obama could not have done worse for the party if he had been trying.

This begs the question, how much has he actually concerned himself with the welfare of the party, which is the de-facto head.

Certainly, Obama ran the catastrophic 2010 campaign with the goal of it being a dry run for his 2012 run for reelection, which was precisely the wrong policy for an off-year election, and in 2014, he eschewed taking any policy actions that would have (a) been popular, and (b) would have improved the morale of the base, until after the election.

It does make this Tom Tomorrow cartoon a much more plausible:

H/t Digby.

Pass the Popcorn

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The Greek Parliament failed to elect a new President, which means that snap elections need to be held, and it looks like the left leaning Syriza Party, which has been dismissive of the “stay in the Euro zone at all costs” of the mainstream parties looks likely to win:

Greece will hold early national elections on Jan. 25, stoking concerns over the future of the country’s financial bailout, after lawmakers failed to elect a new president in a third and final round of voting Monday.

 The conservative-led coalition government’s candidate for the presidential post, 73-year-old former European commissioner Stavros Dimas, garnered 168 votes from parliament’s 300 seats — short of the 180 votes needed to win.

 According to the country’s constitution, parliament must now be dissolved within 10 days. Prime Minister Antonis Samaras said national elections will be held “at the soonest possible date” — Sunday, Jan. 25.

 ………

 Investors are worried that the main left-wing main opposition Syriza, which is consistently ahead in opinion polls, might try to renege on the terms of the bailout deal that is keeping the country afloat.

 Syriza has pledged to roll back some of the reforms the country has implemented in order to qualify for billions of euros in rescue funds from other eurozone countries and the International Monetary Fund — although it has recently somewhat softened its rhetoric about unilaterally pulling out of the bailout deal.

Seeing as how the “bailout deal” has Greeks chopping down their forests to stay warm in the winter, massive unemployment, and hospitals without necessary equipment or drugs in order to repay German and French bankers, I understand why the Syriza party is a bit skeptical that this is in their best interests.

BTW, the IMF is already trying to influence the election:

The International Monetary Fund announced Monday that it would suspend the disbursement of financial aid to Greece until a new government takes power following next month’s elections.

 In a communique, IMF spokesman Gerry Rice said that talks with Greek authorities over the international financial bailout would be resumed as soon as a new government is chosen after parliamentary polls are held in late January or early February.

 The announcement came shortly after the sharply divided Greek parliament once again failed to elect a consensus candidate to occupy the largely ceremonial office of the presidency, making the legislative elections originally set for 2016 inevitable.

Tell me that this is not a flat out threat from the so-called “technocrats” at the IMF.

If Syriza were smart, they would promise an aggressive program of going after the big name tax evaders and soaking the rich.

Technically, it would fit the requirements of the bailout, and it could very allow for sanctions against the foreign banks who have facilitated the hiding of assets.

A few bounties to people who leak bank data, and some snatch and grabs of particularly egregious offenders among the Greek upper class by the national constabulary, and they would be well on their way to solvency.

Dumb-Ass………

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Taking a page from the Barack Obama book of pre-capitulation as a negotiating tactic, the Syriza party has ruled out any possibility of Greece exiting the Euro:

Last week, the stock market in Athens suffered its worst day in decades, and Greek politicians bickered over the political uncertainty provoked by the presidential vote.

Greece’s largest opposition party, Syriza is currently ahead in the polls. A snap election could find the party into power.

In an interview with EurActiv Greece, Papadimoulis, an influential figure in Syriza, attempted to dash these fears, saying that a Syriza government is committed to keeping the country in the eurozone.

“There is absolutely no case for a Grexit. Those who invoke such a possibility play a propaganda game against the Greek and European economy,” Papadimoulis said.

He added that the actual danger for Greece is its social disintegration and its transformation intoto a “debt colony” and for Europe, a new phase of recession, higher unemployment and poverty.

In an attempt to appease international lenders and possible investors’ fears, Papadimoulis made it clear that there is no Syriza party member who speaks in favour of returning to the drachma.

If you want to avoid Greece becoming a debt colony of Frau Merkel,* you cannot unilaterally disarm.

To the degree that you take a Greek exit from the Euro Zone, or possibly an exit from the EU off of the table, you are weakening your bargaining position.

Look at what Iceland did, and take f%$#ing notes.

*Horses whinnying.

F%$# the South

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Michael Tomansky, writing for The Daily Beast, suggests that the Democrats are wasting resources trying to win in the South:

I don’t remember a much sadder sight in domestic politics in my lifetime than that of Mary Landrieu schlumpfing around these last few weeks trying to save a Senate seat that was obviously lost. It was like witnessing the last two weeks of the life of a blind and toothless dog you knew the vet was just itching to destroy. I know that sounds mean about her, but I don’t intend it that way. She did what she could and had, as far as I know, an honorable career. I do, however, intend it to sound mean about the reactionary, prejudice-infested place she comes from. A toothless dog is a figure of sympathy. A vet who takes pleasure in gassing it is not.

And that is what Louisiana, and almost the entire South, has become. The victims of the particular form of euthanasia it enforces with such glee are tolerance, compassion, civic decency, trans-racial community, the crucial secular values on which this country was founded… I could keep this list going. But I think you get the idea. Practically the whole region has rejected nearly everything that’s good about this country and has become just one big nuclear waste site of choleric, and extremely racialized, resentment. A fact made even sadder because on the whole they’re such nice people! (I truly mean that.)

With Landrieu’s departure, the Democrats will have no more senators from the Deep South, and I say good. Forget about it. Forget about the whole fetid place. Write it off. Let the GOP have it and run it and turn it into Free-Market Jesus Paradise. The Democrats don’t need it anyway.

Actually, that’s not quite true. They need Florida, arguably, at least in Electoral College terms. Although they don’t even really quite need it—what happened in 2012 was representative: Barack Obama didn’t need Florida, but its 29 electoral votes provided a nice layer of icing on the cake, bumping him up to a gaudy 332 EVs, and besides, it’s nice to be able to say you won such a big state. But Florida is kind of an outlier, because culturally, only the northern half of Florida is Dixie. Ditto Virginia, but in reverse; culturally, northern Virginia is Yankee land (but with gun shops).

………

 But it’s not just a question of numbers. The main point is this: Trying to win Southern seats is not worth the ideological cost for Democrats. As Memphis Rep. Steve Cohen recently told my colleague Ben Jacobs, the Democratic Party cannot (and I’d say should not) try to calibrate its positions to placate Southern mores: “It’s come to pass, and really a lot of white Southerners vote on gays and guns and God, and we’re not going to ever be too good on gays and guns and God.”

Charlie Pierce disagrees strongly:

I sympathize with Mike. I truly do. But I still will stand with Governor Dean and the 50-state strategy, at least applied judiciously. To me, the key to the problem is to break the stranglehold of the Washington-based consultant class over what candidates will be run in what places. It wasn’t the Beltway crowd who found Jon Tester in Montana, or Jim Webb in Virginia. The national party should be involved in these races only as a means by which money can be shrewdly spread around, and as a means of employing some sense of party discipline. No, Mr. Breaux, we won’t be following your easily rented ass any more. We will find progressive populists, white or black, and we will run them and support them, and maybe the first five tries won’t work but, sooner or later, there will be a breakthrough, and it will not be led by the next Bill Clinton and the next DLC.

For example, Bernie Sanders is drawing big crowds in South Carolina and in Mississippi. He wouldn’t come close to winning anything in either of those states, but there is a working-class audience there that is interested in listening to him, and that is worth respecting in our politics. There always has been a kind of working-class populism in the South, and it always came to grief over race. But it’s 2014, and forging an actual alliance of working people, black and white, in the places that need it the most, is a worthwhile effort whether it fails initially or not. To abandon the people trying to forge that alliance — and, therefore, to abandon the people on whose behalf that alliance is being forged — would be political malpractice of the highest order. It would be an odd kind of confirmation of Willard Romney’s first bumbling attempts to run away from himself on health care, whereby G.I. Luvmoney averred that what worked in Massachusetts would not work in Mississippi, as though Those People were expendable because the Mississippi Republicans would have them die by the side of the road. Sometimes, the fight alone is enough.

The problem is much like the supporters of Julian Schwinger’s and Sin-Itiro Tomonaga’s competing theories of quantum electrodynamics.

They are actually saying the same thing, but they are talking past each other and arguing about notation.*

Neither one of them is actually suggesting that we not run candidates.

They are both asserting that the current campaign for seats in the south is being done by compromising Democratic Party values, and neither of them are suggesting that candidates not be run.

In order to support the clearly doomed campaigns of Landrieu in Louisiana and Pryor in Arkansas, Obama held off on an executive order to help illegal immigrants.

Over the past 6 years, Obama has engaged in the most aggressive deportation policies in our nation’s history in an attempt to support southern candidates.

It’s been bad policy and bad politics.

*I am making no claims here to my having anywhere near the intellectual heft of the man who resolved this dispute, Richard Feynman. He is way out of my league.

Whiny Loser of the Day

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Mary Landrieu, of course.

I understand that she is upset that she is about to be turfed out of office.

It’s a reasonable feeling.

But if the DSCC were to steal the British Crown Jewels, and pawn them for money to help her campaign, she would still lose, and even if she were to win, the Republicans would still have control of the Senate.

Even so, they let you have your stupid vote on the Keystone bitumen pipeline, so you could kiss oil company ass one last time.

Get over yourself, and start lining up that cushy K Street lobbying job.

The DSCC has done way more for you than you deserve.

I Guess You Cannot Buy an Election if You Blow Up the Town ……… Twice Thrice

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Richmond, California, whose town is dominated by a Chevron oil refinery, had local elections, and Chevron’s dumping $3 million into the race netted them nothing:

Richmond voters handed Chevron a resounding rejection in Tuesday’s election, defeating all four candidates supported by the oil giant despite Chevron outspending its opponents by a 20-to-1 margin.

Voters elected City Councilman Tom Butt as mayor and outgoing mayor Gayle McLaughlin, incumbent Jovanka Beckles and retired teacher Eduardo Martinez to the City Council, giving the panel a potential 6-1 left-leaning majority.

“It’s extraordinary. This is a celebration of democracy,” said San Francisco State political science Professor Robert Smith, who studies Richmond politics. “This means that big money doesn’t always win, that ordinary people can defeat huge corporate power.”

Chevron spent more than $3 million supporting Charles Ramsey, Donna Powers and Albert Martinez for council, and longtime Councilman Nat Bates for mayor. Butt won with 51.4 percent of the votes, with Bates trailing at 35.5 percent.

Seeing as how that refinery has had fires and explosions in 1989, 1999, and 2012, (along with a long history of toxic emissions, and litigation over taxes, which Chevron lost) and the fact that the Richmond City Council was working on a lawsuit over the last fire, it’s pretty clear what this massive dump of election cash was about getting a “friendly” city council.

Unfortunately, I cannot see how this could be applied more general.

Wonkett Nails It

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Democrats Have Great Exciting New Idea: Being Democrats:

Here’s an idea that’s so crazy, it just might work! After the thorough ass-kicking the Democratic Party suffered on Election Day, some Democrats are considering the possibility that maybe running “Democratic” candidates who are embarrassed to be Democrats is not the best way to appeal to the Democratic Party. Crazy, huh? With candidates refusing to support Obamacare, refusing to support Democratic policies, refusing to even say “Hell, yes, I voted for Barack Obama because I am a Democrat, DUH,” the new minority is thinking maybe it’s time to get back to being Democrats.

According to Faiz Shakir, a senior adviser to the soon-to-be-ex Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, the new plan for 2016 is to maybe — maybe — run Democratic candidates on a Democratic platform.

Your mouth to God’s year, Faiz.

Cowardice is bad politics.

I Want My Howard Dean!!!

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What Atrios says:

One thing that I think people tend to forget is that Howard Dean’s 50 state strategy wasn’t simply about fighting everywhere, it was about shoveling money out of DC before the vultures there could get their hands on it. It was about the idea that people who run campaigns out of Washington don’t know what the hell they’re doing, but that as long as the money was sitting there, candidates didn’t have much choice but to deal with them.

In case you doubt the wisdom of his words, note what some anonymous Democratic Party functionary asshat said about all this:

“This is a tsunami. Heads will roll at 1600. And if they don’t, shame,” the insider said, adding: “The president has 60 days to clean house, regrow his spine, and lay out an aggressive, centrist agenda. If he fails at any of those, he might as well just start writing his memoir.”

Note that in the same article, there is someone who gets it:

“Democratic operatives who refuse to acknowledge this is the White House’s fault are out of their f—— minds,” the operative said. “These operatives who don’t understand that the White House fucked up are the same hacks who overcharge House and Senate candidates for shitty consulting work and help lose elections year after year.”

The operative also said Obama and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid hurt the party by delaying ambitious action on immigration and other hot-button issues to protect incumbent senators in southern states.

“It also doesn’t help that Dems completely broke their promise to enact immigration reform. Reid’s strategy of ‘no big bills’ this year that could protect [Arkansas Sen. Mark] Pryor, [North Carolina Sen. Kay] Hagan, and [Louisiana Sen. Mary] Landrieu obviously backfired,” the operative said. “They lost anyway, and we pissed off our base at the same time.”

Let me make a note here:  Were the Democratic Party to adopt a “F%#@ the South strategy”, much in the same way that Republicans have adopted a “F%$# New York City & Hollywood & San Francisco & Boston & non white Americans”, there really wound not be a down side.

Over the past 40 years, the Democratic Party has devoted increasing resources to keep its foothold in the white South, and that is simply not going to happen.

The dynamic that LBJ said over 50 years ago, “I’ll tell you what’s at the bottom of it. If you can convince the lowest white man he’s better than the best colored man, he won’t notice you’re picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he’ll empty his pockets for you. I’ll tell you what’s at the bottom of it. If you can convince the lowest white man he’s better than the best colored man, he won’t notice you’re picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he’ll empty his pockets for you.“

We as a nation are not going to change this dynamic until we as a nation stop pandering to it.

Needless to Say, I Wish that I Wasn’t Right

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The Republicans have taken over the Senate, as I predicted 12 days ago.

Needless to say, I am kind of bummed about being right.

I expect there to be pressure in the next Congress to impeach Obama, and in response, I expect Obama to try to gut Social Security and Medicare.

I would also lay even odds that, in the spirit of hope and change bipartizanship cowardice, Obama will end up sending troops back to Iraq.

We are unbelievably screwed.

Yes, I Voted Today,

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This morning, before I went to work.

With the exception of voting for Peter Franchot as state comptroller, it was a thoroughly depressing lesser of two evils experience.

And now, I am watching MSNBC, where Rachel Maddow is so happy to be covering the election that it looks like she is having a newsgasm.

Why Republicans will take the Senate in November

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Because when the populace is in a state of abject pants soiling terror, people are more likely to vote conservative, and between Isis, Ebola, and the shootings in Ottawa, when juxtaposed with the hysterical coverage of our national press, leaves me unable to reach any other conclusion.

So, I expect Democrats to lose the Senate, and I expect Obama to use it as an excuse to try and privatize Social Security, which he has been itching to do since his election in 2008.

I hope that it fails because the Republicans are unwilling to give him a win.

History Repeats Itself, First as Tragedy, then as Farce.

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After having seized defeat from the jaws of victory in her race against Scott Brown for Senate in 2007, it looks like Martha Coakley is about to turn over the Governor’s Mansion to the Republicans:

National Democrats are haunted by memories of Martha Coakley’s unforced stumbles and missteps in 2010, which cost them a U.S. Senate seat in one of the country’s bluest states.

 Four laters later, the Massachusetts attorney general might be about to blow another major contest: The race to succeed Deval Patrick as governor.

 With two weeks left to go, a new poll by WBUR, which tracks the race weekly, found Coakley trailing for the first time against Republican Charlie Baker, a former health care CEO who served as secretary of finance and health under Gov. William Weld in the 1990s.

 It’s still a close contest: Baker has 43 percent while Coakley has 42 percent, well inside the poll’s 4.4 percent margin of error.

 But the troubling sign for Coakley is that Baker appears to be gaining steam down the stretch after consistently trailing throughout the campaign.

I was a bit alarmed when Coakley got the nomination, seeing as how she had run the worst campaign this side of Kathleen Kennedy Townsend in 2002.

I’ve always had this suspicion that the Democratic Party establishment in Massachusetts discovered that they preferred having Speaker of the state House, and the President of the state Senate as the most senior Democrats in the state, and as such, they have subtly worked to make Republicans governor.

It’s what I call the Iron Law of Organizations Institutions, where people will work for power within an organization at the expense of the power of that organization.

Scott Walker is Betting that the People of Wisconsin are Unbelievably Stupid

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The goggle-eyed homunculus hired by Koch Industries to manage their midwest subsidiary formerly known as the state of Wisconsin, as the inestimable Charlie Pierce calls him, is trying to sell himself as a pro choice candidate:

How do you know Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker is in serious re-election trouble? He just tried to declare himself pro-choice.

Of course, he didn’t use those words specifically. What the Republican governor did do, however, is attempt to repaint himself as someone who is not an extremist when it comes to abortion and birth control, despite a decade in politics that shows otherwise.

It is impossible to deny Walker has an extensive political career promoted on blocking the right to abortion and birth control access. Walker’s legacy on women has been clear: He proposed cuts to Badgercare, the health care insurance program for low-income Wisconsinites; defunding Well Women programs, which provide free preventative health care screenings to women; limiting birth control access to teens; signing anti-abortion legislation that was so restrictive that it ended all medication abortion in the state (before a court overturned it) and later attempted to closed nearly every abortion clinic. He has been a one-man war on women. Signing bills on holidays to hide his actions doesn’t change that.

Now, in the waning days of his re-election campaign, all of these moves are coming back to haunt him. Walker and his Democratic challenger, Mary Burke, continue to be tied in the polls, and, when it comes to women voters, Burke is leading him by a whopping 14 points.

………

Walker, too, has been on a personal crusade against reproductive autonomy since he stepped into office, and yes, that means birth control, too. In the most recent example he attempted to use the Hobby Lobby decision to ban birth control coverage in Wisconsin’s own insurance plans, which is mandatory under the state’s contraceptive equity law. Pile that on top of the efforts to defund Planned Parenthood, quest that has shut down a number of clinics across the state that did not offer any abortion services, and it’s clear that contraception is just as big of a target to him as abortion is.

The question here is a simple one:  Whether or not the people of Wisconsin are so stupid that they cannot be trusted to cut their own meat, or not.

Anyone who buys Walker’s line of baloney about his seeing abortion and contraception as an issue between a woman and her doctor should really be kept away from pointy objects.