Um....so, today in Latin at the beginning of class I had the bright idea of doing a post about Horace's Ars Poetica and the oddness of reading it in the 20th century and tying in my music theory class and fun stuff like that. Five hours later as I was leaving Latin I decided I didn't want to talk about the Ars Poetica for a few days. So I'll go to my original idea - Bobby Jindal, because I am a topical person.
So Obama gave his semi-state of the union speech on Tuesday and I watched some of it. You know what to expect - everyone from Congress is there, all the cabinet members and supreme court folks and surprise guests, and they all applaud him every three lines. One girl in my dorm astutely noted that he was actually getting a lot of standing ovations too which didn't happen at the Bush speeches. The upshot is that it was very grand and he came across as an important person and you know Obama's a good speaker and can deliver a good speech.
Anyway, there's always a response to the State of the Union delivered by a member of the opposition party. In 2008 it was Kathleen Sebelius, governor of Kansas. She's a nice lady and good governor, but her response was pretty bland and forgettable as I recall. Even liberals weren't enthusiastic. But like I said, forgettable. No one besides me remembers that she even gave a response. In 2007 it was Jim Webb, senator from Virginia and real hardass, ex military guy, Scots-Irish, born fighting. His address was pretty tough and forthright and aggressively populist, talking about the greed of the rich and the suffering of the middle class. His response was actually good. He also followed George Bush who by that time was about as popular as AIDS in the USA. (Still is.) But...besides Webb, State of the Union (SOTU) responses are generally pretty forgettable and not very good. I mean, part of it is staging. The responder isn't being applauded every three lines by most of Congress. It's hard to rewrite the speech on the fly to actually be a response - I assume they're all written before the president actually gives his speech.
And in 2009 the Republicans selected a young buck named Bobby Jindal (who I like to think of as Robert Jindal - his real name is Piyush) to be the sacrificial responder. Sooo...who is Bobby Jindal? Let's go over this quickly: went to Brown, was a Rhodes Scholar, secretary of the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals, president of the University of Louisiana system, Assistant Secretary of Health and Human Services for Planning and Evaluation, 2003 Republican candidate for governor (he lost), Congressman from LA-01, and finally Governor of Louisiana, elected in 2007. Oh yeah, he's 37 years old. So he's a real prodigy, flitting from one job to the next, and probably angling to be president. He's a rising star of the Republican party.
I mean, who else is there? Sarah Palin, who we all learned about. Forgettable governors like Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota and Mark Sanford of South Carolina. Um, Michael Steele? The Republicans want their own Obama. Right now it's audition time. The response was Jindal's audition.
Let's go to the videotape! Text. Starts off by talking about his own story and it's a hopeful story and all of that. It's a good story, too. Then he talks about Katrina - ruh roh. He's saying that the federal government didn't do a good job during Katrina (definitely) and tells a story about charity during that time. His point is that charity is what helps, not government. Now, couple problems here. One, that story is probably a lie. Two, the problem with Katrina was there wasn't enough government. People shouldn't have to give money to charity so New Orleans can recover. Helping New Orleans recover is the government's job. We can't ask charity to take up the slack, because charity is simply not enough. It's not powerful enough.
Jindal talks about the Republican ideas, which as best as I can tell mostly are tax cuts. One, we all know that Republicans stand for tax cuts. That's not a new idea, that's not a bold solution. Two, anyone watching this response after Obama heard Obama talking about how the stimulus bill gives 95% of Americans tax cuts. It's the largest middle class tax cut in history. And where would we be without awful examples of pork! A maglev line from LA to Vegas? Sign me up! (Perhaps some Republicans don't know that maglev trains already exist?) Volcano monitoring? Mt. St. Helens. YELLOWSTONE. Perhaps hurricane monitoring is also an outrageous example of pork...but maybe it's a public good! It is. Anyway blah blah blah, talks briefly about other things. He doesn't really go into specifics, but it's supposed to be a short speech. He talks about how Republicans need to stand for limited government.
Oh yeah, I loved that too. By now I'm convinced that there's only one Republican who as president would fight for limited government, and his name is Ron Paul. Bush greatly expanded the government. The way I see it, government wants to expand and it's hard to stop it from expanding. And plenty of Republicans are comfortable with expanding the government, seeing as how they mostly voted in lockstep for the policies Bush wanted. So yeah, don't ever believe a Republican who says he will work for limited government besides Ron Paul.
He ends on a note of hope and it's over. So let's talk about my favorite part - his speaking mannerisms. He sounded like someone in a video that plays at a museum, or a museum guide, or someone reading to elementary school children, or I dunno what - but he didn't sound like he was talking to America as adults. (Obama did.) His speaking style really was distracting and detracted from his substance (such as it was). I really thought that he would do better - he's a bright guy, a real policy wonk. But...yeah, stylistically he failed. And another thing I loved was the reaction. Fox News panned it, and every other diary on Daily Kos the next day was making fun of him. My point is his speech was bad, but it was NOT forgettable. It was epic fail. People will remember this speech, people besides me. I understand some Republicans have questioned the wisdom of even doing a response to Obama's State of the Union speeches. (Good idea - whenever McCain made a big speech after Obama during the campaign, he seemed dreadful.) I understand Rush Limbaugh praised the speech, but hardly anyone else has. (Have to throw in - I watched a couple of other Jindal interviews and he does act like a normal human in them.)
So, to go back to the rising star thing - I'm liking the theory that this was Jindal's audition to be the Republican Obama. That means the Republicans wanted the equivalent of, perhaps, Obama's 2004 keynote speech or better yet a real asskicking take no prisoners speech. Something a little mean. I don't really think Jindal's capable of doing that. I don't view him as mean, and he's not a real fighter like Jim Webb. So, it wasn't that Jindal was terrible (although I thought he did badly) it's that Jindal wasn't amazing. What does this mean? The auditions for the Republican Obama go on. Perhaps Joe the Plumber will deliver a major policy address. Or, if the Republicans want to move in the direction of sanity - heh, not worried about that yet. By now all that's left in the Republican party are bedrock conservatives. No moderation allowed. Still, though, Charlie Crist (governor of Florida) and Jon Huntsman (governor of Utah) would prove a profitable line of inquiry if Republicans continue to fail to find their Obama.
Oh hey I made it through the whole entry without once mentioning that Jindal was Ind
Showing posts with label republicans. Show all posts
Showing posts with label republicans. Show all posts
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Thursday, February 12, 2009
weirdness
That was a pretty intense post I wrote on Tuesday, and I stand by every single word of it. What perhaps I should have made clearer was my moods oscillate. Wednesday I had to do a lot of work for the Horace seminar, and today I had the Horace seminar for 4 hours, and I got out an hour ago, and I'm too tired to be angsty. Make no mistake, though: The US is in really deep doo-doo, and I'm not sure we've stopped digging.
(My metaphors suck.)
Anyway, when I got out of Latin I was quite astonished to learn that my main man Judd Gregg (R-NH) had withdrawn his nomination as commerce secretary. He's going to stay in the Senate and will retire in 2010. Now, the obvious question is: why? Seems to be two reasons: 1. Pressure from other Republican senators and angry constituents. 2. Disagreement with Obama on such things as the stimulus package (Republicans are lockstep against it, or nearly so) and the amount of power in the position of commerce secretary.1
I tend to side with reason 2, which seems more compelling to me, I guess because I don't see why Gregg would be cowed by dittoheads or Republican senators. Accepting reason 2, why did Gregg take the Commerce position at first? NB that Gregg actively lobbied to be named commerce secretary. He wanted that job. No doubt about that. The answer is that he had two years left as senator, probably. New Hampshire has been trending hard Democratic. 2004: Kerry narrowly wins NH, John Lynch (D) narrowly defeats an incumbent Republican governor. Judd Gregg wins reelection to a 3rd term over a Democrat, Granny D - seems like a good person, but not someone who I would vote for. 2006: Democrats take over the state legislature and capture both House seats from the incumbent Republicans. 2008: John Sununu, the junior senator, is defeated by former Democratic governor Jeanne Shaheen. 2010: Judd Gregg comes up for reelection. You see the trend. I figure he wanted to end his career in an honorable way, a way that would look good, rather than face a humiliating defeat.
And here we are: withdrawing his nomination wasn't so honorable or good-looking. Ideology trumped the idea of a nice end to his career. Republicans put their ideology first. And we come back to the question: How do you compromise with people who refuse to compromise?
I wish I had a good answer. (I do have answers, but they all boil down to Fuck them.)
1. Commerce traditionally handles the census. It was moved (by who?) out of Commerce's jurisdiction around the time Gregg was nominated by Obama. Democrats want to count everyone, Republicans don't care so much. Generally it's poor people/minorities who are undercounted, and they prefer to vote Democratic. The census determines redistricting, and the Republicans would prefer to have fewer Democratic districts. This is analogous to the whole vote suppression and voter fraud debate, which I heard too much about in the last election and refuse to recount.
(My metaphors suck.)
Anyway, when I got out of Latin I was quite astonished to learn that my main man Judd Gregg (R-NH) had withdrawn his nomination as commerce secretary. He's going to stay in the Senate and will retire in 2010. Now, the obvious question is: why? Seems to be two reasons: 1. Pressure from other Republican senators and angry constituents. 2. Disagreement with Obama on such things as the stimulus package (Republicans are lockstep against it, or nearly so) and the amount of power in the position of commerce secretary.1
I tend to side with reason 2, which seems more compelling to me, I guess because I don't see why Gregg would be cowed by dittoheads or Republican senators. Accepting reason 2, why did Gregg take the Commerce position at first? NB that Gregg actively lobbied to be named commerce secretary. He wanted that job. No doubt about that. The answer is that he had two years left as senator, probably. New Hampshire has been trending hard Democratic. 2004: Kerry narrowly wins NH, John Lynch (D) narrowly defeats an incumbent Republican governor. Judd Gregg wins reelection to a 3rd term over a Democrat, Granny D - seems like a good person, but not someone who I would vote for. 2006: Democrats take over the state legislature and capture both House seats from the incumbent Republicans. 2008: John Sununu, the junior senator, is defeated by former Democratic governor Jeanne Shaheen. 2010: Judd Gregg comes up for reelection. You see the trend. I figure he wanted to end his career in an honorable way, a way that would look good, rather than face a humiliating defeat.
And here we are: withdrawing his nomination wasn't so honorable or good-looking. Ideology trumped the idea of a nice end to his career. Republicans put their ideology first. And we come back to the question: How do you compromise with people who refuse to compromise?
I wish I had a good answer. (I do have answers, but they all boil down to Fuck them.)
1. Commerce traditionally handles the census. It was moved (by who?) out of Commerce's jurisdiction around the time Gregg was nominated by Obama. Democrats want to count everyone, Republicans don't care so much. Generally it's poor people/minorities who are undercounted, and they prefer to vote Democratic. The census determines redistricting, and the Republicans would prefer to have fewer Democratic districts. This is analogous to the whole vote suppression and voter fraud debate, which I heard too much about in the last election and refuse to recount.
Thursday, January 15, 2009
One party to rule them all
For some reason I was thinking about an interesting fact earlier today: The last time Massachusetts elected any Republicans to the House or Senate was 1994. Today Massachusetts has 10 D representatives and 2 D senators. Are there any other states so single-party on a federal level?
When people think of rock-ribbed Republican states, they think of states like...Utah. Home of Jim Matheson, D-UT-02. (That is, he is a Democrat from the second district of Utah.) Wyoming? Gary Trauner lost by only a few percent in 2008, and by circa 1000 votes in 2006, for Wyoming's at-large House seat. (At-large means a state only has one House seat.) Idaho? Walt Minnick, D-ID-01. Also, four-term Senator Frank Church. Let's see, what else...The only federal-level Republican from both Dakotas is Senator John Thune of South Dakota. North Dakota's delegation is all Democratic, mostly because of the lingering influence of the NPL. Nebraska divides its electoral votes by congressional district, and Obama won in the Second CD (Omaha). Kansas has a D representative, Dennis Moore, and so does Oklahoma (Dan Boren).
Any other Republican states? All the southern states have at least one Democratic representative, mostly because they are required by the Voting Rights Act to have black majority districts. So as a consequence we have Bennie Thompson, Artur Davis, John Lewis, Jim Clyburn, etc. Can't forget Texas, that state is pretty damned Republican. Plenty of Democratic representatives, again mostly from (minority) - majority districts. Texas might elect a Democratic senator in the not too distant future, but that is a subject for another post.
Democratic states! Can't forget Vermont, which elected a socialist senator in 2006. Last Republican elected federally was Jim Jeffords in 2000, who later started caucusing with the Democrats. Rhode Island also elected a Republican in 2000, Lincoln Chafee - he was defeated in 2006. Both Jeffords and Chafee were of that vanishingly rare breed the Liberal Republican. Chafee endorsed Obama in 2008. New York has Republican parts Upstate and Illinois has Republican parts Downstate. California is very Republican once you get away from the coast. Maryland has one Republican representative. Hawaii is mostly one party, except...
I've noticed something interesting. A lot of "red states" elect Democratic governors, and vice versa.
"Blue states" with Republican governors: Hawaii, Vermont, Connecticut, California, Rhode Island, and if I turned the clock back three years, I could add New York and Massachusetts.
"Red states" with Democratic governors: Wyoming, Kansas, Oklahoma, Tennessee
...Anyway, might as well answer my initial question. As far as Republican states, Utah is pretty one party. It has a D representative, but I cannot imagine a D winning statewide. I would say the same for Idaho and most states in the South. Utah and Idaho both have large Mormon blocs, and generally Democrats in the South are minorities with political views that the white Republicans disagree with. Democratic states: A lot of the really Democratic states do have Republican governors, but they have no Republican bench: that is, the congressional delegation and state legislature are overwhelmingly Democratic. Why do they elect Republican governors sometimes? For balance, perhaps. To keep the legislature in check. Often the Republicans are from outside government, they are businessmen. Anyway.
One more day in Houston and then I fly back on Saturday.
When people think of rock-ribbed Republican states, they think of states like...Utah. Home of Jim Matheson, D-UT-02. (That is, he is a Democrat from the second district of Utah.) Wyoming? Gary Trauner lost by only a few percent in 2008, and by circa 1000 votes in 2006, for Wyoming's at-large House seat. (At-large means a state only has one House seat.) Idaho? Walt Minnick, D-ID-01. Also, four-term Senator Frank Church. Let's see, what else...The only federal-level Republican from both Dakotas is Senator John Thune of South Dakota. North Dakota's delegation is all Democratic, mostly because of the lingering influence of the NPL. Nebraska divides its electoral votes by congressional district, and Obama won in the Second CD (Omaha). Kansas has a D representative, Dennis Moore, and so does Oklahoma (Dan Boren).
Any other Republican states? All the southern states have at least one Democratic representative, mostly because they are required by the Voting Rights Act to have black majority districts. So as a consequence we have Bennie Thompson, Artur Davis, John Lewis, Jim Clyburn, etc. Can't forget Texas, that state is pretty damned Republican. Plenty of Democratic representatives, again mostly from (minority) - majority districts. Texas might elect a Democratic senator in the not too distant future, but that is a subject for another post.
Democratic states! Can't forget Vermont, which elected a socialist senator in 2006. Last Republican elected federally was Jim Jeffords in 2000, who later started caucusing with the Democrats. Rhode Island also elected a Republican in 2000, Lincoln Chafee - he was defeated in 2006. Both Jeffords and Chafee were of that vanishingly rare breed the Liberal Republican. Chafee endorsed Obama in 2008. New York has Republican parts Upstate and Illinois has Republican parts Downstate. California is very Republican once you get away from the coast. Maryland has one Republican representative. Hawaii is mostly one party, except...
I've noticed something interesting. A lot of "red states" elect Democratic governors, and vice versa.
"Blue states" with Republican governors: Hawaii, Vermont, Connecticut, California, Rhode Island, and if I turned the clock back three years, I could add New York and Massachusetts.
"Red states" with Democratic governors: Wyoming, Kansas, Oklahoma, Tennessee
...Anyway, might as well answer my initial question. As far as Republican states, Utah is pretty one party. It has a D representative, but I cannot imagine a D winning statewide. I would say the same for Idaho and most states in the South. Utah and Idaho both have large Mormon blocs, and generally Democrats in the South are minorities with political views that the white Republicans disagree with. Democratic states: A lot of the really Democratic states do have Republican governors, but they have no Republican bench: that is, the congressional delegation and state legislature are overwhelmingly Democratic. Why do they elect Republican governors sometimes? For balance, perhaps. To keep the legislature in check. Often the Republicans are from outside government, they are businessmen. Anyway.
One more day in Houston and then I fly back on Saturday.
Sunday, January 4, 2009
Republicans? Future???
A followup comment to the RNC chairmanship, Magic Negros, etc.: The new DNC chair has been named, Gov. Tim Kaine of Virginia. It's my understanding that when a party is in power, the chair is usually named by the president and elected unopposed. You won't see any Magic Negro BS from Tim Kaine, though. He was the first person to endorse Obama outside of Illinois. He speaks Spanish. He was probably a contender for the veep position.
I didn't know what I was going to write about today, but after reading two posts about the future of the Republican party, I knew I had my topic. Here is one, here is the other. (Absolutely read those. They're much better than anything on this shitty blog.) Not knowing much about technology, but having a loud mouth, I decided to use this entry to perhaps answer a question that's been nagging at me, a question that must be answered in order to properly debate the future of the Republican party...
So what do they do with Sarah Palin?
Ugh. Now if there's one person in the world who drives me to irrational hate, it's Sarah Palin. If I talk about her in front of you, make sure you are out of spittle range. Ugh, ugh. A vile woman. And the most popular, most energizing person in the Republican Party! Yes, if there's one person who knows how to fire up the Republican rank and file, it's Sarah Palin. Problem is, she's not so popular in the reality based community. She believes dinosaurs are Jesus horses. She believes that you shouldn't teach your child about birth control, or that your kids should go to college. She believes it's acceptable for the First Dude to listen in on Alaska cabinet meetings. She believes in grifting, like grifting the RNC for shopping sprees at Neiman Marcus. She will be, after Jan. 20, the most dangerous person in American politics. At least in my opinion.
Problem! She's governor of Alaska. Now Alaska, it seems, is quite far away from the mainland US. A guy like Rick Perry, or Mark Sanford, or Bobby Jindal can go jet off to Iowa or NH easily and build a national following. But Wasilla is rather farther away from Iowa and NH than Austin or Columbia or Baton Rouge. What's a governor to do?
Of course, one answer is that unlike those three men, Palin is quite widely known. So she can just run for President (you know she will) based on name recognition. It worked for Hillary Clinton (sorta), although not for Rudy Giuliani. So she can run for reelection in 2010 and win, and still make a credible run for President. But there's another, more interesting scenario: Run for Senate! Senators, it seems, don't do shit. Look at Obama and McCain, especially McCain: They didn't attend to their Senate duties at all (or hardly at all) during the campaign. Washington DC is much closer to Iowa/NH than Wasilla. Now, yeah, I know, there's an incumbent senator already, a Republican: Lisa Murkowski. Palin, you might recall, beat an incumbent Republican governor in 2006. His name? Frank Murkowski, father of Lisa Murkowski, a former Senator who appointed her to his vacated Senate seat when he became governor. That's some pretty ballsy nepotism. A little too ballsy - although Lisa won reelection in 2004 (by 3 points), Frank was consistently unpopular for his first term. Don't you think it would be tempting for Palin to slay another Murkowski? I know I do.
What would a Palin/Murkowski battle look like?
Interesting results. And that's why I think she'll go for the Senate. Being governor will get a lot harder soon enough. Those checks everyone in Alaska gets are gonna be a lot smaller with the decrease in oil price. And the reason she is so popular in Alaska is because of the checks.
Anyway. I've done an awesome job of answering the question: What does Sarah Palin's future look like? And a piss poor job of answering the question: So what do they do with Sarah Palin?
Here's my answer: Well, shit. They really can't do anything. McCain's campaign couldn't control her at all (just look at the insider accounts), so the RNC/Republican muckety-mucks definitely can't control her. She's a maverick ;) dontcha know. Seriously, I don't see her responding well to pressure. If they pressure her not to run for Senate, they will fail. Unless they bribe her of course. But Sarah Palin has expensive tastes. Same goes for President.
So we'll have Palin to kick around for many years yet. What does this mean for the Democrats? If Obama makes things better, the Democratic Party will be fine. They have a lock on the youth vote and minorities, as I explained earlier. If everything keeps going to shit and there's no improvement by 2012, that will be troublesome for Obama and the Democrats. I suspect Palin will be the Republican nominee in 2012. If she becomes President, God help us all. She certainly won't.
To follow on from my Moment of Zen yesterday, here is another pretty funny video. Wang Cares.
I didn't know what I was going to write about today, but after reading two posts about the future of the Republican party, I knew I had my topic. Here is one, here is the other. (Absolutely read those. They're much better than anything on this shitty blog.) Not knowing much about technology, but having a loud mouth, I decided to use this entry to perhaps answer a question that's been nagging at me, a question that must be answered in order to properly debate the future of the Republican party...
So what do they do with Sarah Palin?
Ugh. Now if there's one person in the world who drives me to irrational hate, it's Sarah Palin. If I talk about her in front of you, make sure you are out of spittle range. Ugh, ugh. A vile woman. And the most popular, most energizing person in the Republican Party! Yes, if there's one person who knows how to fire up the Republican rank and file, it's Sarah Palin. Problem is, she's not so popular in the reality based community. She believes dinosaurs are Jesus horses. She believes that you shouldn't teach your child about birth control, or that your kids should go to college. She believes it's acceptable for the First Dude to listen in on Alaska cabinet meetings. She believes in grifting, like grifting the RNC for shopping sprees at Neiman Marcus. She will be, after Jan. 20, the most dangerous person in American politics. At least in my opinion.
Problem! She's governor of Alaska. Now Alaska, it seems, is quite far away from the mainland US. A guy like Rick Perry, or Mark Sanford, or Bobby Jindal can go jet off to Iowa or NH easily and build a national following. But Wasilla is rather farther away from Iowa and NH than Austin or Columbia or Baton Rouge. What's a governor to do?
Of course, one answer is that unlike those three men, Palin is quite widely known. So she can just run for President (you know she will) based on name recognition. It worked for Hillary Clinton (sorta), although not for Rudy Giuliani. So she can run for reelection in 2010 and win, and still make a credible run for President. But there's another, more interesting scenario: Run for Senate! Senators, it seems, don't do shit. Look at Obama and McCain, especially McCain: They didn't attend to their Senate duties at all (or hardly at all) during the campaign. Washington DC is much closer to Iowa/NH than Wasilla. Now, yeah, I know, there's an incumbent senator already, a Republican: Lisa Murkowski. Palin, you might recall, beat an incumbent Republican governor in 2006. His name? Frank Murkowski, father of Lisa Murkowski, a former Senator who appointed her to his vacated Senate seat when he became governor. That's some pretty ballsy nepotism. A little too ballsy - although Lisa won reelection in 2004 (by 3 points), Frank was consistently unpopular for his first term. Don't you think it would be tempting for Palin to slay another Murkowski? I know I do.
What would a Palin/Murkowski battle look like?
Interesting results. And that's why I think she'll go for the Senate. Being governor will get a lot harder soon enough. Those checks everyone in Alaska gets are gonna be a lot smaller with the decrease in oil price. And the reason she is so popular in Alaska is because of the checks.
Anyway. I've done an awesome job of answering the question: What does Sarah Palin's future look like? And a piss poor job of answering the question: So what do they do with Sarah Palin?
Here's my answer: Well, shit. They really can't do anything. McCain's campaign couldn't control her at all (just look at the insider accounts), so the RNC/Republican muckety-mucks definitely can't control her. She's a maverick ;) dontcha know. Seriously, I don't see her responding well to pressure. If they pressure her not to run for Senate, they will fail. Unless they bribe her of course. But Sarah Palin has expensive tastes. Same goes for President.
So we'll have Palin to kick around for many years yet. What does this mean for the Democrats? If Obama makes things better, the Democratic Party will be fine. They have a lock on the youth vote and minorities, as I explained earlier. If everything keeps going to shit and there's no improvement by 2012, that will be troublesome for Obama and the Democrats. I suspect Palin will be the Republican nominee in 2012. If she becomes President, God help us all. She certainly won't.
To follow on from my Moment of Zen yesterday, here is another pretty funny video. Wang Cares.
Friday, January 2, 2009
Scott Free
What happened?
Scott McClellan was the press secretary for the Bush administration. He was the sweaty guy who had to dole out lots of thick BS in answering the press's inane questions because the Bush administration didn't like being truthful about their real intentions.
Anyway, he left in 2006. Flash forward a couple years, as the Bush administration sucks more than ever, and we get yet another self-serving book settling scores and blaming everyone in the administration but the author, who shall remain blameless. We've seen this pattern from George Tenet, Paul Bremer, and (according to recent news) Alberto Gonzalez. Also, Paul O'Neill, but that was something of a special case.
Is McClellan a special case? I'd say one difference between him and the guys I named above is McClellan wasn't responsible for anything important. He was the front man, not the director of the CIA. He didn't create the BS, he just slopped it onto your plate like at a cafeteria. It's probably worth recalling his background - he was one of the old Texas hands, like Karen Hughes, who came with Bush to Washington. His mother is a figure of some fame in Texas. Her name is Carole Keeton McClellan Rylander Strayhorn, and my parents voted for her for governor in 2006. My point is that McClellan is a true believer, the type of person who saw that Bush worked on a bipartisan basis with Texas Democrats like Lt. Gov. Bob Bullock, and who believed that Bush would work on a similar bipartisan basis with Democrats in Washington.
Did Bush work on a bipartisan basis with Democrats in Washington during his two terms?
No.
Of course people in the reality-based community like you and me figured that out years ago. But perhaps being in the White House bubble imparts a different perspective. Now it's probably worthwhile to look at what was in the book. Most of it concerns his time in the Bush White House, first as deputy press secretary under Ari Fleischer, then as press secretary. There's information about his experiences during 9/11 (he was in Florida with Bush), his experiences during Katrina, his relationship with Bush, how he was hired in 2003 and fired in 2006 (ah, we'll get to that), and most of all the Valerie Plame scandal. We'll get to that.
Humanizing Bush - yeah, McClellan includes some anecdotes that show his personal relationship with Bush, who I must say comes off pretty well. McClellan claims he still likes and admires Bush. I think a lot of people hate Bush so much that they forget that Bush is a person, capable of kindness and warmth to his friends, like Scott McClellan. But that being said, Bush's administration has a record which speaks for itself. And the responsibility for that record rests with the president. Also I doubt McClellan is a friend of Bush anymore.
I suppose I first learned of McClellan from watching the Daily Show so much - there would always be that sweaty guy spooning out the bullshit and you could tell he knew he was spooning out bullshit and furthermore he didn't like it. The reason for this was the Plame scandal, which is worth a very long entry on its own. Basically: Someone (Karl Rove, Richard Armitage, Scooter Libby) told some reporters that Valerie Plame was a CIA agent, and it's a crime to reveal that someone is a CIA agent. But for such a simple sort of crime - and certainly nothing so big as starting a war or neglecting a ruined city - this scandal has had some pretty astounding repercussions. For one, it caused McClellan to not like spooning out his bullshit. McClellan had to answer many questions about the scandal, naturally, so to prepare for these he asked Karl Rove if Rove had leaked Plame's name. Rove said no. McClellan asked Libby too, iirc - Libby said no. Turns out, they were both being disingenuous. McClellan disliked this, and in 2006 he decided to quit, but before he could announce that, Josh Bolten (chief of staff from 2006 on) fired him. That's a pretty good summary of the last half of the book. It's a portrait of McClellan becoming increasingly disenchanted with the Bush White House because of its tendency towards deception and the permanent campaign. Now we come to McClellan's thesis.
McClellan's thesis is that the Bush White House, like the Clinton WH before it, is always in permanent campaign mode. Always concerned with selling its product and not so concerned with hammering out compromises in Congress. The permanent campaign mode also led both administrations to not be honest enough with the public. To remedy this we need more bipartisanship and transparency in government. And here's where my disagreements with McClellan kick in. Transparency - yeah, I think everyone can agree we need more transparency in government. But bipartisanship? There's this strange bipartisanship fetish which is undercut by looking at the facts of the last 8 years. For the last 8 years, the Republicans have consistently been wrong and the liberals (not necessarily Democrats) have been consistently right. Too often acting bipartisan in Washington these days means agreeing to the Republicans' demands. How can you compromise with Republican ideologues who won't compromise? Seems to me if you act all nice and bipartisan with them, America gets screwed again. To that I say: Don't work with them, call them out! If they want to filibuster a raise in the minimum wage (for example), make them do it! There's much more I could say on this subject but this entry seems pretty lengthy already.
Would I recommend McClellan's book? Not really. If you've read this entry, you've read the book. But I suspect it will be a useful primary source in years to come for people wanting to understand the strange Bush years.
In October 2008, McClellan endorsed Barack Obama for President of the United States.
Scott McClellan was the press secretary for the Bush administration. He was the sweaty guy who had to dole out lots of thick BS in answering the press's inane questions because the Bush administration didn't like being truthful about their real intentions.
Anyway, he left in 2006. Flash forward a couple years, as the Bush administration sucks more than ever, and we get yet another self-serving book settling scores and blaming everyone in the administration but the author, who shall remain blameless. We've seen this pattern from George Tenet, Paul Bremer, and (according to recent news) Alberto Gonzalez. Also, Paul O'Neill, but that was something of a special case.
Is McClellan a special case? I'd say one difference between him and the guys I named above is McClellan wasn't responsible for anything important. He was the front man, not the director of the CIA. He didn't create the BS, he just slopped it onto your plate like at a cafeteria. It's probably worth recalling his background - he was one of the old Texas hands, like Karen Hughes, who came with Bush to Washington. His mother is a figure of some fame in Texas. Her name is Carole Keeton McClellan Rylander Strayhorn, and my parents voted for her for governor in 2006. My point is that McClellan is a true believer, the type of person who saw that Bush worked on a bipartisan basis with Texas Democrats like Lt. Gov. Bob Bullock, and who believed that Bush would work on a similar bipartisan basis with Democrats in Washington.
Did Bush work on a bipartisan basis with Democrats in Washington during his two terms?
No.
Of course people in the reality-based community like you and me figured that out years ago. But perhaps being in the White House bubble imparts a different perspective. Now it's probably worthwhile to look at what was in the book. Most of it concerns his time in the Bush White House, first as deputy press secretary under Ari Fleischer, then as press secretary. There's information about his experiences during 9/11 (he was in Florida with Bush), his experiences during Katrina, his relationship with Bush, how he was hired in 2003 and fired in 2006 (ah, we'll get to that), and most of all the Valerie Plame scandal. We'll get to that.
Humanizing Bush - yeah, McClellan includes some anecdotes that show his personal relationship with Bush, who I must say comes off pretty well. McClellan claims he still likes and admires Bush. I think a lot of people hate Bush so much that they forget that Bush is a person, capable of kindness and warmth to his friends, like Scott McClellan. But that being said, Bush's administration has a record which speaks for itself. And the responsibility for that record rests with the president. Also I doubt McClellan is a friend of Bush anymore.
I suppose I first learned of McClellan from watching the Daily Show so much - there would always be that sweaty guy spooning out the bullshit and you could tell he knew he was spooning out bullshit and furthermore he didn't like it. The reason for this was the Plame scandal, which is worth a very long entry on its own. Basically: Someone (Karl Rove, Richard Armitage, Scooter Libby) told some reporters that Valerie Plame was a CIA agent, and it's a crime to reveal that someone is a CIA agent. But for such a simple sort of crime - and certainly nothing so big as starting a war or neglecting a ruined city - this scandal has had some pretty astounding repercussions. For one, it caused McClellan to not like spooning out his bullshit. McClellan had to answer many questions about the scandal, naturally, so to prepare for these he asked Karl Rove if Rove had leaked Plame's name. Rove said no. McClellan asked Libby too, iirc - Libby said no. Turns out, they were both being disingenuous. McClellan disliked this, and in 2006 he decided to quit, but before he could announce that, Josh Bolten (chief of staff from 2006 on) fired him. That's a pretty good summary of the last half of the book. It's a portrait of McClellan becoming increasingly disenchanted with the Bush White House because of its tendency towards deception and the permanent campaign. Now we come to McClellan's thesis.
McClellan's thesis is that the Bush White House, like the Clinton WH before it, is always in permanent campaign mode. Always concerned with selling its product and not so concerned with hammering out compromises in Congress. The permanent campaign mode also led both administrations to not be honest enough with the public. To remedy this we need more bipartisanship and transparency in government. And here's where my disagreements with McClellan kick in. Transparency - yeah, I think everyone can agree we need more transparency in government. But bipartisanship? There's this strange bipartisanship fetish which is undercut by looking at the facts of the last 8 years. For the last 8 years, the Republicans have consistently been wrong and the liberals (not necessarily Democrats) have been consistently right. Too often acting bipartisan in Washington these days means agreeing to the Republicans' demands. How can you compromise with Republican ideologues who won't compromise? Seems to me if you act all nice and bipartisan with them, America gets screwed again. To that I say: Don't work with them, call them out! If they want to filibuster a raise in the minimum wage (for example), make them do it! There's much more I could say on this subject but this entry seems pretty lengthy already.
Would I recommend McClellan's book? Not really. If you've read this entry, you've read the book. But I suspect it will be a useful primary source in years to come for people wanting to understand the strange Bush years.
In October 2008, McClellan endorsed Barack Obama for President of the United States.
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
Barack the Magic Negro!
Apologies for my lack of posting since Christmas. Not much happening in the political world, and as a bonus I've been sick. But I'm back now.
I finally saw something that moved me to write a blog entry: Barack the Magic Negro! This is a song that's been played sometimes on Rush Limbaugh's radio show. You can listen to it here, but fair warning, it's pretty revolting. When I first heard about the song, I thought it was hilarious, in the sense that I couldn't believe anyone could think this song was a good idea. But after having heard the song, I'm quite sickened.
To the present: Here's an account of the story. We have an interesting situation here: apparently most Republicans are standing by Saltsman, but they won't go on TV to defend him (at least that's what my dad says). I find the whole situation absolutely crazy. Think about it: The Republicans lost big on election day partly due to their lack of votes from minorities and young folks. People 18-29 voted for Obama by a 2-1 margin, which is quite amazing. And now we have the potential RNC chair sending this song out as a sort of holiday gift. Does he want the Republicans to keep on losing? It's not so much the actual act of sending out the song - most people will probably never hear about that - it's about the Republican attitude. If you're a minority, if you're a young person, they don't want you in their party. That is boneheaded: there will be more Millennials than Boomers or Gen X voting soon enough. We've already made our political voice heard (black president). Minorities! Yeah, there's going to be more of them too. In Texas, white people are no longer a majority. (Insert joke about me being Asian here.)
You look at Congress: no Republicans in the Congressional Black Caucus. I guess that's obvious enough. There are 4 Republican Hispanics in Congress, all of them Cubans from Florida. (I can't find the exact number of Democrats - it's about 25.) Asians - it's kind of funny how one Republican face I've seen a lot is Governor Bobby Jindal of Louisiana. Why? He's young (37) and a minority! Besides the aforementioned Cuban Hispanics, he is literally the only Republican minority in a prominent elected position. He's their token minority. (Vote Republican, young people! We've got a Desi!)
Watch Jindal. Mark my words, the Republicans will nominate him for president one day. (2016)
But I'm getting too far from Barack the Magic Negro! My point is this: It's patently obvious to me that a song like Barack the Magic Negro is offensive. And I think such a song is offensive (or at least obviously stupid) to most young folks and minorities. Republicans have few prominent minorities. Republicans were pretty bad at winning over young people in the last election. (There just aren't a lot of young people in Congress of either party. John Sununu, at 44, is the youngest senator.) And now we have this song being sent out and most Republicans like it. Are they trying to continue down the path toward electoral irrelevance?
My opinion: Well, not intentionally. Obviously. But next I expect there will be purges! The moderate Republican is dead. (Namely, Chris Shays, the last Republican representative from New England, who was defeated in November.) Oh, there will be purity tests galore. Don't you dare support that Magic Negro (Muslim!) or you'll get primaried by the ever shrinking Republican base.
And now we're getting into the topic of The Future of the Republican Party, which I'll be writing a lot more about. My thoughts about that are pretty twisty, as this entry's incoherence has no doubt shown.
I'll be doing one post a day for the entire month of January, so you can expect several entries on that. Also you can expect posts on Scott McClellan - I'm most of the way through his book, and let me tell you, he's my personal favorite person named Scott. I'm also about halfway through the biography of Senator Church, which is quite a read. I'll be writing about that as well. I said earlier that in Texas, white people are no longer a majority. That's important and shouldn't be glossed over. I'll talk about that as well. I also understand our first black/Magic Negro/Muslim president is going to be inaugurated at some point and he'll start doing stuff and (according to most liberal blogs) failing utterly!
JINDAL 2016
I finally saw something that moved me to write a blog entry: Barack the Magic Negro! This is a song that's been played sometimes on Rush Limbaugh's radio show. You can listen to it here, but fair warning, it's pretty revolting. When I first heard about the song, I thought it was hilarious, in the sense that I couldn't believe anyone could think this song was a good idea. But after having heard the song, I'm quite sickened.
To the present: Here's an account of the story. We have an interesting situation here: apparently most Republicans are standing by Saltsman, but they won't go on TV to defend him (at least that's what my dad says). I find the whole situation absolutely crazy. Think about it: The Republicans lost big on election day partly due to their lack of votes from minorities and young folks. People 18-29 voted for Obama by a 2-1 margin, which is quite amazing. And now we have the potential RNC chair sending this song out as a sort of holiday gift. Does he want the Republicans to keep on losing? It's not so much the actual act of sending out the song - most people will probably never hear about that - it's about the Republican attitude. If you're a minority, if you're a young person, they don't want you in their party. That is boneheaded: there will be more Millennials than Boomers or Gen X voting soon enough. We've already made our political voice heard (black president). Minorities! Yeah, there's going to be more of them too. In Texas, white people are no longer a majority. (Insert joke about me being Asian here.)
You look at Congress: no Republicans in the Congressional Black Caucus. I guess that's obvious enough. There are 4 Republican Hispanics in Congress, all of them Cubans from Florida. (I can't find the exact number of Democrats - it's about 25.) Asians - it's kind of funny how one Republican face I've seen a lot is Governor Bobby Jindal of Louisiana. Why? He's young (37) and a minority! Besides the aforementioned Cuban Hispanics, he is literally the only Republican minority in a prominent elected position. He's their token minority. (Vote Republican, young people! We've got a Desi!)
Watch Jindal. Mark my words, the Republicans will nominate him for president one day. (2016)
But I'm getting too far from Barack the Magic Negro! My point is this: It's patently obvious to me that a song like Barack the Magic Negro is offensive. And I think such a song is offensive (or at least obviously stupid) to most young folks and minorities. Republicans have few prominent minorities. Republicans were pretty bad at winning over young people in the last election. (There just aren't a lot of young people in Congress of either party. John Sununu, at 44, is the youngest senator.) And now we have this song being sent out and most Republicans like it. Are they trying to continue down the path toward electoral irrelevance?
My opinion: Well, not intentionally. Obviously. But next I expect there will be purges! The moderate Republican is dead. (Namely, Chris Shays, the last Republican representative from New England, who was defeated in November.) Oh, there will be purity tests galore. Don't you dare support that Magic Negro (Muslim!) or you'll get primaried by the ever shrinking Republican base.
And now we're getting into the topic of The Future of the Republican Party, which I'll be writing a lot more about. My thoughts about that are pretty twisty, as this entry's incoherence has no doubt shown.
I'll be doing one post a day for the entire month of January, so you can expect several entries on that. Also you can expect posts on Scott McClellan - I'm most of the way through his book, and let me tell you, he's my personal favorite person named Scott. I'm also about halfway through the biography of Senator Church, which is quite a read. I'll be writing about that as well. I said earlier that in Texas, white people are no longer a majority. That's important and shouldn't be glossed over. I'll talk about that as well. I also understand our first black/Magic Negro/Muslim president is going to be inaugurated at some point and he'll start doing stuff and (according to most liberal blogs) failing utterly!
JINDAL 2016
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