Republican Leadership..

During the state of the Union-senate minority leader Mitch McConnel was smirking during most of the speech. Wasn't this the same guy who called President Clinton "a douche bag"? During the historic and brave meeting that the President had with Republican leaders, those leaders kept distorting the part of the debt that the President was responsible for. There was no mention of the debt caused by the Bush tax cuts. There was no mention of the debt caused by two unfinanced wars. There was no mention of the subscription drug program that was not financed either. As Senator Moynihan would say, everyone is entitled to their own opinion but not their own facts. This is leadership? Is it any wonder that there hasn't been any significant policy accomplishment since medicare/medicaid?

Bravo Obama and The Governor of Virginia

The contrast between President Obama and the Governor of Virginia was fascinating. While the president was articulate,forceful and very specific,witty and realistic, the new Governor of Virginia seemed out of the Robert Redford movie The Candidate-right out of central casting. Every line was out of a Conservative script. Nothing was related to any specific issue. It was as if he had a string behind his neck and talking about the smaller role of government,about states rights, about the government taking over health care, about the government bailout,about the government,about the government causing high unemployment. Cut to the tearfully smiling wife; cut to the tearful beautiful teenage daughter (at least he didn't offer his daughter out for dates). After a while I couldn't watch it anymore. The governor spoke in rebuttal without apparently listening to the speech. There is no Republican health care plan. Does he not know that medicare, Medicaid, the health care of congress and the VA are the most efficient health care delivery system? Doesn't he know that states are hemorrhaging in debt and laying off essential workers? Doesn't he know that the auto industry as we know it would have coll aped without the government bailout? What would that have done to employment in his state? Doesn't he know that unemployment would be closer to higher double digits without the government bailout? Doesn't he know that without the bailout (which the president noted that no one really likes) kept the US from the Greater Depression and a greater foreclosure rate? (Cut to the smile and the script-cut to rousing crowd cheers).
What bizarro world are these guy living in? It was the reckless behavior bordering on anarchy of the Bush years reading from the same script that got us into this mess. This is psychotic..not politics.

Obama and the myth of a balanced budget.

Suddenly President Obama is concerned about a balanced budget and a need to rein in spending.Just what happened to him the great intellect with a sense of history and his sense of connection with FDR vs Hoover? With unemployment at technically 10% and much higher actually, this is a crazy plan of action. First where are you going to cut? What programs are going to be removed? If people don't have jobs, they don't spend and consumer spending is what fuels the economy. The private sector is creating enough jobs at this point and local governments are being starved as well. Government spending is the only thing that fuels the economy. There is no inflation at this point.Virtually no lending is being done and banks still haven't learned their lessons.
The deficit was caused by conducting a war without a tax increase and due to the Bush tax cuts that benefit ted a small part of the population. These are issues repeated here ad infinitum. Revenues were depleted intentionally (Remember Clinton left office with a balanced budget) I just wish the President would stop defending what he has been forced to do to clean up the mess he inherited. I wish the President and the Democratic Party would just stop defending. Defending from my therapist's/therapy days is buying into someone else's idea that you did something that needs defending. (I would like to see Obama act more like my favorite character of Agent Gibbs on NCIS-vs Oliver in Love Story)
Everyone complains about the size of government and that programs need to be cut. Yet when you ask someone,a Republican senator and especially the Tea Party people just what would they cut, you don't get an answer. Farm subsidies, their social security, their medicare, education grants,school lunch programs, food stamps, FEMA, disaster relief,FDA protection, veterans benefits,infrastructure repairs,military bases in their communities. (Ask the people in Minnesota about the dangers of bridge disrepair) The cutting back on government spending is what made the great depression worse. The economy needs to be fueled by programs such as public works and rebuilding energy efficient rails and green jobs that would be the greatest investment "in our children's future"-Ever notice that everyone is concerned about "our children's future" in the short run, but really screws it up long term? This is the worst time to be cutting back on spending. The talk of "earmarks" is also a joke' Earmarks make up 1% of a $3trillion plus budget. This is basically nothing and each request eg help for mass transit is considered essential by the group who had lobbied for it.
Infrastructure repair puts people to work and puts money back into the system. Every dollar of public works money is multiplied. People out of work don't pay taxes, and cut their spending.
The idea of being concerned about balancing the budget is theoretically a nice idea in different economic times-such as during the Clinton years. The reality of today's times makes the concerns about a balanced budget is totally insane. It also makes me wonder about the political philosophy of the man elected with such hope. There are times when I am just not sure what he stands for. The only thing that matters now is jobs.

Republicans As Populists- Democrats as Elitists?

The greatest myth is being perpetuated by the Republicans is that they are populists and the Democrats have done little to disuade the public otherwise. Republican tax cuts benefitted the top 1% of the population-which created the biggest budget deficit in history. The Republicans plan of deregulation of financial institutions led to the greatest global crisis since the great depression. Republican's started an unnecessary war in Iraq without raises taxes-the first time in history that a war was conducted without raising taxes. The soldiers of the war in Iraq were from a small part of the population. No draft..no shared sacrifice. No one at risk from the elites of our country. Republicans are for the elimination of the estate tax which effects less than 1% of the population. The party of "no" made it very clear that they are against the expantion of health care for 39,000,ooo Americans when 45,000 die each year for lack of health care.
While Republican decry that Democrats are tax and spend, Republicans are spend and not tax. This is populist? Now the Roberts Court (basically an extension of the Republican Party as Gore v Bush has shown) just overturned a 60 year ban on corporate spending on campaigns. Where are the Democrats on this? What are they doing to pull the curtain on what is really happening? Where is the fight by President Obama to stop trying to negotiate with people who have shown that they would like to see him fail no matter what the cost?
Where is the courage by the Democrats to let the Republicans fillibuster and let Americans know that they stand for nothing? Where is the courage to stand for something and at least if you lose,lose on principle. Rachel Maddow made a great point last night. Policies and politics are two different things but are intertwined. Politics is about winning elections (which is a lesson Al Gore forgot-another story) and policies is about governing and getting things done. If you have good policies, that wins elections. Democrats have to remember that they have a majority-a huge majority. This is not the time to withdraw and say poor me. In a democracy its 50 plus 1 to get things done. As all of us know growing up, the only way to deal with the school yard bully is to stand up and fight back.
Its time for Democrats to not worry about the next election and their jobs. If they don't do their job now, it won't matter anyway. Republican's as populists and Democrats as elitists? How did this happen?

An Amoral Victory in Massachusetts

Senator-elect Brown's victory in Massachusetts should not be seen as a moral victory for Republicans. The victory should not be seen as a "demoralizing" loss for Democrats. The only moral issue here is that in spite of who controls congress 45,000Americans die each year due to a lack of health insurance. This is not about a bunch of silly boys and girls making rules in a club like the Little Rascals. Its about savable lives.It is about needless human suffering. Its not about 59 or 41 its about 45,000 lives a year-some one's mother,father,daughter or son.
Just one other thought here about a moral victory-Senator Brown voted for the health care plan that insures health care for everyone in Massachusetts and now he is going to obstruct health care for everyone else?

Ricky Nelson Democrats

I hope the Democratic Party learned a lesson with the loss of the Senate seat in Massachusetts,(I don't want to call it the "Kennedy Seat" because I don't believe in royalty). The lesson I hope they learn is the lesson of the Ricky Nelson song "The Garden Party" where he sings "you can't please everyone, so you've got to please yourself". The Democratic Party tried to be everything to everyone for the sake of a filibuster proof health care bill. By worrying about the threat of a filibuster, they formulated a bill that went against their own principles of being populists,by putting women's reproductive rights at risk, by basically selling out to the insurance companies and by not pushing for a public option. There was ambivalence to the issue of doing away with the exemption of anti-trust status for the insurance companies as well. (Of course the multi-million dollar lobbying by the insurance companies framing the message with their adds also skewed the process.)
By trying to please Ben Nelson,Blanche Lincoln,and Joe Lieberman the promise of Obama and the promise of real health care reform was lost. The goal of 60 votes distorted the whole legislative process.(Medicare was passed by just one vote by the way) The result was worse than the threat. Its important for the Democrats to not lick their wounds now but to develope a health care bill with competition for the insurance companys,dealing with the issue of pre-existing conditions, and cost containment-which the current bill does.
First its important to keep the message simple: expansion of medicare for those 55-65; no denial of coverage for pre-existing conditions and the doing away of the exemption of insurance companies from anti-trust laws. Its also important that the Democrats not be afraid of the reconsiliation process so that the issue of majority rules does not get distorted as it has with the blackmail of the fillibuster.
Working with the republicans or Blue-dog Democrats has proven to be a waste of time due to their obstructionist attitude about changing the status quo. Compromise I heard once is the art of neither party getting what they want. The art of leadership is having a position,a specific agenda and sticking with it and leading from a position of moral and political authority and standing for something. As Ricky would say "you've got to please yourself".

Red States and Red Faced....

People in red states continue to kick themselves in the head while others pick their pockets and distract them. They don't have jobs, don't have health care yet it seems like their main concern is that the gay couple next door can't get married.