Here.
Rather embarrassing.
Why The GOP Is Still Lost In The Woods
It seems to me that conservatives and Republicans have assumed the GOP is the natural governing party, at least regarding the Presidency and to some extent as it relates to Congress since ‘94, which is why so many have continued to insist that America is a “center-right nation” in face of mounting evidence that it is not and hasn’t been for a while. Symbolic gimmickry does stem in part from a lack of confidence, but it is more the product of a movement and party that have ceased to understand, much less address, most of the pressing concerns of working- and middle-class Americans. The party assumes that all it needs to do is show up, push the right pseudo-populist buttons and reap the rewards, and for the most part the movement cheers. See Palin, Sarah.
But of course, the GOP is not reaping the rewards for this strategy, as working- and middle-class Americans in such places as Ohio and Indiana are becoming increasingly center-left. Why? They experience the income stagnation. They experience the war.
As we all know, income stagnation is something that most conservatives and Republicans have spent years pretending was not happening, because it did not fit in with the assumption that working- and middle-class Americans were thriving as part of the “greatest story never told.” It is the failure to acknowledge and address all of these things along with the preference for using symbolic gimmickry that begin to account for the lamentable states of conservatism and the GOP. There is also the war, but movement and party have become so invested in it that I have my doubts whether they can ever recognize its role in discrediting both with the public.
So…. will conservatives adopt a new strategy? Or will their ever-smaller numbers congregate to engage in the more-of-the-same, i.e., spewing populist rhetoric which only receives applause lines from the furthest fringes of the right?
This week is the annual CPAC (Conservative Political Action Conference) convention, typically seen as a necessary speaking place for future GOP candidates. It's also where the rabid right can pose with cardboard cutouts of real-life cardboard cutouts — rightwing icons like Palin and "Joe the Plumber" (In the real world, Joe the Plumber is a nobody; a non-entity that can only muster eleven people to come to his book signing). Perhaps we can find an answer there.
That's Cliff Kincard, a writer and editor for the right-wing organization, Accuracy In Media. That's a rather ironic name for his organization, seeing as how he is shown here touting that Obama is a communist who was not born in the United States.
And Ann Coulter hasn't even spoke yet.
This video is a perfect example of why Americans are taking Republicans less and less seriously. People are seeing conservatism as nothing more than a low-brow, ignorant, mob-inspired, tirade.
UPDATE: Even one prominent conservative blogger laments the GOP's inability to become something new:
I’m writing this from the CPAC convention and judging from the speakers, there’s not a whole lot of recognition of the need to update the intellectual platform to accomodate a changed era. It’s as if Jimmy Carter’s still in the White House and Roe vs. Wade was just handed down.
Writing Your Own Obituary
It must be weird to be a reporter at The Rocky Mountain News — Colorado's oldest newspaper (150 years old) and winner of 4 Pulitzer Prizes — and have to report the death of The Rocky Mountain News.
Broad-based Sex Education Popular In North Carolina
From Public Policy Polling survey results released earlier this week, the question was asked:
A bill being considered in the Legislature would give parents the choice of having their children receive comprehensive sex education or abstinence only sex education. Would you support this proposal?
69% said "yes"; 31% said "no".
Even conservatives (58%) and Republicans (54%) supported the bill by a slight majority. So did senior citizens (63%) and rural voters (69%).
Groups whose support exceeds 80% include liberals (88%), urban dwellers (86%), and African Americans (83%).
Full results here (PDF).
And Jindal Lies
From Jindal's reponse speech earlier this week:
During Katrina, I visited Sheriff Harry Lee, a Democrat and a good friend of mine. When I walked into his makeshift office I'd never seen him so angry. He was yelling into the phone: 'Well, I'm the Sheriff and if you don't like it you can come and arrest me!' I asked him: 'Sheriff, what's got you so mad?' He told me that he had put out a call for volunteers to come with their boats to rescue people who were trapped on their rooftops by the floodwaters. The boats were all lined up ready to go – when some bureaucrat showed up and told them they couldn't go out on the water unless they had proof of insurance and registration. I told him, 'Sheriff, that's ridiculous.' And before I knew it, he was yelling into the phone: 'Congressman Jindal is here, and he says you can come and arrest him too!' Harry just told the boaters to ignore the bureaucrats and start rescuing people.
What Jindal told Human Events in 2008:
There are thousands of these stories. I talked to a sheriff in an area where they had people with boats that were ready to go in the water and rescue people and they were turned away because they didn't have proof of registration and insurance, they didn't bring the right paperwork. The bureaucracy was just awful.
The implication here is that Jindal talked to the sheriff after the fact, not that he was in his office during the moment of crisis.
Presumably, Sheriff Lee could settle this, uh, apparent contradiction, but he died in 2007. However, Lee did say this, to Larry King:
LEE: I fully believe that when then matter is looked into, we tried to get some boats in the water early on … Those boats where not allowed to get into the water when they were needed and I just found out about seven days later one of the reason boats couldn't get in was they didn't have enough life preservers and some of them didn't have proof of insurance.
Seven days later? Not at the time of the crisis?
Rush, She’s Just Not That Into You
Rush Limbaugh can't figure out why women don't like him:
Women don’t really like Rush Limbaugh. On Feb. 23, Public Policy Polling released findings showing that only 37 percent of women hold a favorable opinion of the hate radio host, compared to 56 percent of men.
As Jill Zimon notes, Limbaugh brought up this poll yesterday on his radio show, noting that it was one of the largest gender gaps Public Policy Polling has seen on any issue it has polled in the past year. His solution? To convene a summit of women to find out why they dislike him:
RUSH: We’ll have a summit of all the women in this audience — or as many of them as we can get into breakout groups — and perhaps devote an hour in an upcoming program to calls only from women who genuinely want to talk to me. They can be liberal, conservative. They could be non-audience members, could be audience members. But I want some of these women to start telling me what it is I must do to close the gender gap — or, if not what it is I must do to close the gender gap, what it is I’ve done that has caused the gender gap; assuming the gender gap is true and that the poll is true. […]
I own the men, and what must I do now to own women? And who better to ask than women? Including some of those who may agree that that I’m unfavorable. So stand by for that.
Well, for starters, Rush, perhaps women are turned off by your misogyny. For example, holding a summit so that you can "own women" is itself indicative of your problem.
And this habit of repeatedly calling women who call for the advancement of women "feminazis"? I'm going out on a limb and suggest that is a bit of a turnoff, too.
Or some of your quotes, most notably:
Rush's marriage advice: "If you want a successful marriage, let your husband do what he wants to do."
Source: Palmbeachpost.com
Or…
“I love the women’s movement. Especially when I’m walking behind it.”
Or…
"You have to understand the mindset of a lot of these feminists and women…These women have paid their dues. They've been married two or three times; they've had two or three abortions; they've done everything that feminism asked them to do. They have cut men out of their lives; they have devoted themselves to causes and careers. And this — the candidacy of Hillary Clinton — is the culmination of all of these women's efforts."
Or…
So the question is this: Will this country want to actually watch a woman get older before their eyes on a daily basis?
Or (from your book)…
One of my fabulous routines concerns a San Francisco men's club which lost its battle to exclude women from membership. The courts ruled that they had to admit women on the basis that businesswomen were being unfairly denied opportunities to do business. This is specious. How much business did women think they were going to get as a result of forcing their way in?
Anyway, after one year, the female members demanded their own exercise room. They were probably tired of being ogled by a bunch of slobbering men while they pumped iron in leotards and spandex. The men offered to install the first three exercise machines in the women's new workout room. The ladies were thrilled. When they arrived on that first exciting day they found, to their stunned amazement, a washing machine, an ironing board, and a vacuum cleaner. Heh, heh, heh. (The Way Things Ought To Be, p.142-45 Jul 2, 1992)
Mystery solved, Rush.
UPDATE: Or maybe it has nothing to do with women's issues at all. Maybe it's just a turnoff when Rush says things like "I hope Obama fails". And in case you didn't get his gist, he reitterated it today, saying "We want something to blow up here politically. We want something to not go right." And Rush says "here", he's talking about the economy and the stimulus as he's saying this.
Can you imagine if a liberal pundit had said in, say, 2004, that he hoped Bush failed in his war on terrorism? That we, the opposition, want something to blow up? That we, the opposition, want another terrorist attack?
Oscar’s Wardrobe Malfunction
Yes, there was one. Photos here.
Best Reaction To Jindel Speech
And it speaks to both Jindel and Palin:
Absent any deep thoughts, the Republicans are going to complain about waste. The high point of Jindal’s address came when he laced into “wasteful spending” in the stimulus bill, and used as an example a $140 million appropriation for keeping an eye on the volcanoes in places like Alaska, where one is currently rumbling.
“Instead of monitoring volcanoes, what Congress should be monitoring is the eruption of spending in Washington, D.C.,” Jindal claimed.
I don’t know about you, but my reaction was: Wow, what a great stimulus plan. The most wasteful thing in it is volcano monitoring.
Louisiana has gotten $130 billion in post-Katrina aid. How is it that the stars of the Republican austerity movement come from the states that suck up the most federal money? Taxpayers in New York send way more to Washington than they get back so more can go to places like Alaska and Louisiana. Which is fine, as long as we don’t have to hear their governors bragging about how the folks who elected them want to keep their tax money to themselves. Of course they do! That’s because they’re living off ours.
Emphasis mine.
Broadway To Become More Pedestrian
This sounds like a good thing:
The city plans to close several blocks of Broadway to vehicle traffic through Times Square and Herald Square, an experiment that would turn swaths of the Great White Way into pedestrian malls and continue Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s effort to reduce traffic congestion in Midtown.
Although it seems counterintuitive, officials believe the move will actually improve the overall flow of traffic, because the diagonal path of Broadway tends to disrupt traffic where it intersects with other streets.
The city plans to introduce the changes as early as May and keep them in effect through the end of the year. If the experiment works, they could become permanent. The plan was described by several people who were briefed on it this week.
***
The plan calls for Broadway to be closed to vehicles from 47th Street to 42nd Street. Traffic would continue to flow through on crossing streets, but the areas between the streets would become pedestrian malls, with chairs, benches and cafe tables with umbrellas.
Seventh Avenue would be widened slightly within Times Square to accommodate the extra traffic diverted from Broadway.
Below 42nd Street, Broadway would be open to traffic, but then would shut down again at Herald Square, from 35th Street to 33rd Street. Then, below 33rd, it would open again.
Here's how it will look from Broadway and 7th Street, looking north (before, after). Note the pedestrian mall in the background (going all the way to 47th Street) as well as the foreground.
And a view of Herald Square (Macy's on the right) before and after. Again, pedestrian malls are in the foreground and background.
Ways To Make Money In A Bad Economy
What's up in this down economy? Gold. Gold parties are a big big thing. I've not been invited to one, but I wouldn't go anyway, not having any gold.
And here's another way you know we're living in a different world economically. Gone are the commercials about making a fortune in real estate. Instead, it's commercials about — yup — gold.
Which leads me to this spoof:
Sometimes I Worry About My Friends
Someone very near and dear to me is in love with Ben Linus, the charactor on Lost.
Mind you – not in love with Michael Emerson, the actor who portrays Ben Linus, but Ben Linus.
Ben Linus, who is not only a murderer, but a fictional murderer at that.
I'm going to watch my back around her….
But seriously, Lost is getting pretty good. Unfortunately, I missed a few shows in Season 3 and 4, and I'm not quite sure I follow everything. Then again, maybe I'm not supposed to.
Obama Won The Night
A CBS News poll of approximately 500 people saw approval of the president rise from 62 percent before the speech to 69 percent afterward.
Meanwhile, a poll on CNN showed that 68 percent of respondents — who skewed a bit Democratic — viewed the speech positively, 24 somewhat positively, and only eight percent not positively. Eighty-two percent supported the president's economic plan as outlined in the speech, while 17 percent opposed it.
Those results were buttressed by the findings of longtime Democratic pollster Stan Greenberg. In his own dial poll, which included 50 participants of mixed gender, education and politics, Greenberg found a large swath of bipartisan support for Obama's addres. That included a 14 percent jump, from 62 to 76 percent, in the favorability rating for the president.
Saying at the onset that this was an "immensely successful speech," he highlighted a few issues on which Obama won over the audience.
* On taxes, "there was a 26-point gain," from 38 to 64 percent, "the biggest gains that he made."
* On the deficit, "there was an 18 point swing… from 42 percent to 60 percent."
* On Iraq, "there was a 18-point swing" (no numbers were offered)
"I've never seen this," Greenberg added. For a large part of the speech, all three, the Republican, Democratic and independent line where virtually in the same place."
What was striking, Greenberg concluded, was "how un-polarized the reaction was to this speech. I have not quite seen that."
Jindel? Really?
I was going to make fun of Bobby Jindel's response to the Obama address, but everyone else beat me to it. Ezra Klein was spot-on when he suggested that Jindel had the oratorical stylings and naive optimism of Kenneth, from 30 Rock.
What was most striking about Jindel's response was using Katrina to stand as the example that government help is bad, but the will of the American people is good. As if Americans had forgotten who was President during Katrina.
Look, if Katrina served as a lesson, it is this: Do not put government in the hands of people who think government is incapable of doing good and helping the citizenry. Because inevitably, they'll muck it up so that they can say "See? Government can't solve problems."
Cognitive dissonence also never striked Jindel when he flag-waived about America's illustrious past — how we overcame slavery, segregation, etc. Of course, it was government that brought about these changes (despite the often forceful protestations of conservatives).
But I think satirist Jon Swift said it best:
But what really inspired me was the story he told about how people in leaky little boats tried to save the citizens of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina even though government bureaucrats tried to stop them. If the government had stayed out of New Orleans entirely and encouraged more people to use their boats or to make their own boats out of things around the house, more people would probably be alive today. And instead of waiting for inefficient government workers to fix the levies, ordinary New Orleans citizens could have patched them up using bubble gum and duct tape and good old American know-how.
Instead of relying on the government to build magical magnetic levitation trains, the people of Las Vegas should be encouraged to bring some tools from their garages and build the train themselves, the way the Amish do. And while it's true that the magical levitation part might prove to be technologically difficult for the average Las Vegas citizen, if they all put their minds together and pray, I bet they would be able to levitate the trains. The power of prayer worked for Gov. Jindal when he and a few friends exorcised some demons and cured a woman of cancer back when he was in college so it could probably work for trains, too. And praying may also be the answer to our health care crisis.
Swift went after the GOP cure-all to every problem — tax cuts — which Jindel predictably championed, while ignoring the fact that Obama's stimululs bill just created the largest tax cut in history:
Finally, the best part of Gov. Jindal's speech was when he talked about tax cuts. Cutting taxes for 95% of Americans as Pres. Obama promises is extremely unfair to the 5% of Americans who work hard, too, but already pay a lot more taxes than everyone else does despite all of their efforts to shield their assets in offshore accounts. Somebody needs to represent the 5% minority of people who are discriminated against by Obama's tax plan. Gov. Jindal and the new Republican leader Michael Steele understand what it's like to be minorities so it is no surprise that they are willing to stand up for the minority of people who make more than $250,000 a year like bank executives who are often the victims of bigotry in the liberal media. Most Americans want our millionaires to do well because someday we may win the lottery or appear on a quiz show and become millionaires ourselves.
When all is said and done, Jindel's performance was a disappointment, even to the folks at Fox. It was a littany of the same GOP mantras of the past 8 years: a lot of pro-America cheerleading, lacking substance but for the tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts.
Other Jindel reactions:
- TPM's Josh Marshall: "I thought Jindal's comments and presentation was just weird and cringy and awful."
- Think Progress' Matthew Yglesias: "Bobby Jindal apparently believes it's appropriate to address the citizens of the United States in a tone that suggests we're all nine years old."
- Firedoglake's Eli: "Why does he sound like he's narrating a children's movie?"
- Silver: "If it sounds like Jindal is targeting his speech to a room full of fourth graders, that's because he is. They might be the next people to actually vote for Republicans again."
- Beeton: "Is it just me, or does Bobby Jindal sound an awful lot like Kenneth from 30 Rock?"
- Sudbay: "[Jindal] was awful. Unimpressive and uninspiring. […] Let's admit it: Sarah Palin has nothing to worry about from Jindal."
- TAPPED's Dana Goldstein: "[Jindal's] basic message was that government causes problems, and can't fix them. The thing is, during this time of economic uncertainty, Americans are looking toward government for help and reassurance, not for a cold shoulder."
- The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen: "[A]s bad as Jindal's performance was, his ideas were even worse — tax cuts, drilling, school vouchers, spending bad, government bad. Why bother picking a fresh face if all the party has to offer is stale ideas? Why ask a young governor with a reputation for innovation to present the same old agenda that the GOP has pitched for a generation?"
- Ezra Klein: "[This is] a speech that [House Min. Leader John] Boehner could have given in 2007 and that [ex-Senate Maj. Leader Bill] Frist could have given in 2005 and that [ex-Senate Maj. Leader Trent] Lott could have given in 1998 and that [ex-House Speaker Newt] Gingrich could have given in 1993. Jindal made a mistake accepting the GOP's invitation to give this response. Yesterday, he seemed like a different kind of Republican. Today, he doesn't."
- Sudbay: "[U]sing Katrina as an example to tout the GOP? That was sheer brilliance."
- digby: "[M]y God, I'm gobsmacked by the fact that he actually raised Katrina in the way he did, suggesting that they didn't need government help. I just don't know what to say about that."
- AMERICAblog's John Aravosis: "Let's think for a moment. Who was it who abandoned New Orleans again? Uh, that would be the Republican president who ignored Katrina, the Republican presidential candidate who ate an oversized birthday cake in California while citizens of New Orleans drowned, and the Republican Congress who refused to investigate what went wrong. Your point would be what exactly, Mr. Jindal? That voters shouldn't trust Republicans to protect them in time of need?"
- Klein: "It's as if [GOPers] don't think Americans are smart enough to remember who was running the government in 2005."
UPDATE: A geology website has something to say about Jindel's claim that volcano monitoring is "wasteful spending":
I have two questions.
1. Do Republicans (or moderates who don't have a kneejerk anti-Republican reflex) also feel like he's talking to the nation as though we were all kindergarteners? I was flabbergasted, but I don't know how to properly account for my rather strong political biases here.2. DID HE SERIOUSLY JUST SAY THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT BE MONITORING VOLCANOES??!?!!!????@#$@!
Ignoring for the sake of argument the value of the basic science that always results from the data collected during routine monitoring – ignoring the general function of increased spending as an economic stimulus to the nation's earth scientists, instrument manufacturers, etc., – even ignoring all that, volcano monitoring is still a very sensible investment in national security. A $1.5 million investment in monitoring at Pinatubo (near a U.S. air force base) earned a greater than 300-fold return when the volcano erupted explosively in 1991: hundreds of millions of dollars worth of property (mostly airplanes) was saved, as were thousands of lives. That 30,000% figure comes before you attempt to put a value on human life.
***
In other words: If the USGS didn't monitor volcanoes, the Defense Department would have to. And we all know that would cost eleventy-squillion times more than the current shoestring budget.
What Was *That*?
I just saw something I've never seen before in my quarter-decade of following politics.
I was flipping around the dial, and came to CNN. Wolf said that they were going to cut live to the White House where Obama was about to speak at a "fiscal responsibility summit". Yawn, right?
It's hard to describe what I saw. It looked like Obama speaking to reporters — a typical press conference. But then he called out for questions and comments from the people sitting in front of him. The first person he called on? Senator John McCain.
What Obama had done was call in a bunch of knowledgeable people — Democrats, Republicans, people in government, people in the private sector — and put them into various work groups to talk candidly about issues relating to fiscal responsibility (specifically, how to deal with the deficit). That is apparaentlyl what they were doing today. Then he called them all back in, and gave this summit. Each group is going to prepare a report, showing where everybody seems to be in agreement, where there is disagreement, and providing thoughts about what to do next. John McCain, for example, was in the military procurements group, and reported to the President that all in his group seemed to agree on military overspending. He noted that the President's new helicopter was going to cost more than Air Force One. (Obama quipped that the helicopter he had was just fine, and didn't need a new one).
It was remarkable in that I have never ever ever seen a President hold a nationally-televised summit where there was a back-and-forth between himself, his political opponents, and members of the public. It was clear that Obama was there to listen. Remarkable.
I don't think it was just for show. Obama was clear — and stated repeatedly — that he understands there are going to be politics, but he wanted agreements on policies. It was leadership like I have never seen before.
At one point, a Republican Congressman from Texas rose and spoke to Obama, noting that his obvious bi-partisan approach to fiscal responsibility issues were essentially meaningless if it was going to be handled like the stimulus package, where Republicans felt they were left out. Obama had a brilliant response. He essentially said that while his administration is dedicated to bi-partisanship, it is the responsibility of the minority party to step up with ideas, rather than simply rejecting Obama's proposals, which was essentially what happened with the stimulus package.
Was this political theater? A cynic might say so. But it just didn't look that way. It was an intelligent conversation between opposing factions on what they could and should do to reduce the deficit. One thing that came out was that health care is going to be the key.
Anyway, this should be on Youtube shortly. I'll try to post the link. But if you get a chance to see it, you will see something that is virtually unheard of in American politics. Even the media was astounded.
Jai Ho
The big winner: