*
In a Florida speech today, John McCain said it's time to put Americans "back in charge" of their own health care. The idea is that you and I are in the best position to shop for healthcare insurance. If by "are in the best position" he means "don't know crap about how to", then he may be right.
I respectfully suggest that a reporter ask McCain if he has ever shopped for his own healthcare insurance, and whether he had any difficulties selecting a plan. Then ask him if all of his "friends" can sign up for the same healthcare plan that he is covered by, for an affordable price. And whether he supports full, immediate enrollment in that same plan for all combat veterans from all wars as a paid-in-full benefit of the GI Bill.
PS: click through to the NPR transcript and get a load of the commentary by one Regina Hertzlinger, a Harvard Business School professor and "leader in the consumer-driven health care movement." Something about people wanting a Toyota when their employer would rather buy them a tricked-out Harvardmobile, and how that would be a shame, or something. I think Dr. Hertzlinger might be better described as a " leader in the right-wing idiotic simile movement."
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Thursday, April 24, 2008
Scribefire!
Pay no attention: I'm just trying a Firefox plug-in called Scribefire, which supposedly will let me post to this blog without actually logging in. The purpose of this technology? I have no idea. But it's sure awesome!
Immediate update: Scribefire messes with my precious ledding (that's line-spacing to you nonspecialists). Therefore, my interest in it has seriously declined over the past 90 seconds.
Immediate update: Scribefire messes with my precious ledding (that's line-spacing to you nonspecialists). Therefore, my interest in it has seriously declined over the past 90 seconds.
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Fifty50 in-depth analysis: Pennsylvania Democratic Primary
*
You've heard the liars and BS craftsmen spinning their primary analysis to the craven official media. Everybody wants to tell you what it all means. Well, allowing for the fact that I have my own biases, I think a few basic facts are hard to dispute. And the meaning is self-evident to us rubes in Champaign, Illinois, if not the bitter imbeciles of central Pennsylvania and the Beltway Cocktail Circuit.
First, look at these Pollster.com charts. I'm not good at this stuff, and these are probably not the best charts to use, but they look good enough to show that Obama has been steadily been closing the gap on Clinton's lead since the beginning of 2007 or the beginning of 2008 --- take your pick. As far as I can tell, that fact has not been widely reported, or reported as being significant. You may remember that a similar failure of communication led to stories about how Obama got trounced in the New Hampshire primary, even though he steadily gained on Clinton up until primary day. (Obama got "trounced" because he did not live up to the hype or inaccurate opinion polling after the Iowa caucuses.)
Second, there is some irritating and disingenuous "conventional wisdom" being dispensed about how the Democrats are doing themselves tremendous harm through self-destructive negative campaigning tactics. Well, no, that's not really true: Hillary Clinton and her peckerwood husband, and their surrogates, have been directly appealing to the bigot vote by invoking the names of Scary Negroes and their purported association with Obama. Then there's her disingenuous shot-and-beer pandering to morons who think Chablis and Merlot are not manly, and her ridiculous purported love affair with guns. And she has been aided in her tactics by the official media, especially Gibson and "George" on the ABC debate. As far as I can tell, Obama has retaliated by referring to Hillary as "Annie Oakley."
To summarize, both a casual and a careful reader of the news would be justified in concluding that after months of throwing the kitchen sink, all the rolling pins in the drawers, and a bushel of bigoted personal attacks at her opponent, Hillary Clinton was not able to stop the slow and steady gains made by Obama in Pennsylvania over the past year or two.
Update while I'm still writing the original post: now The New Republic is comparing Obama to McGovern, meaning that he is a Don Quixote figure with an increasingly isolated band of fanatics as his only support. Expect to hear a lot of this "meme" in the next two weeks and beyond. Obama will be portrayed as the Democrat who is tearing the party apart.
You've heard the liars and BS craftsmen spinning their primary analysis to the craven official media. Everybody wants to tell you what it all means. Well, allowing for the fact that I have my own biases, I think a few basic facts are hard to dispute. And the meaning is self-evident to us rubes in Champaign, Illinois, if not the bitter imbeciles of central Pennsylvania and the Beltway Cocktail Circuit.
First, look at these Pollster.com charts. I'm not good at this stuff, and these are probably not the best charts to use, but they look good enough to show that Obama has been steadily been closing the gap on Clinton's lead since the beginning of 2007 or the beginning of 2008 --- take your pick. As far as I can tell, that fact has not been widely reported, or reported as being significant. You may remember that a similar failure of communication led to stories about how Obama got trounced in the New Hampshire primary, even though he steadily gained on Clinton up until primary day. (Obama got "trounced" because he did not live up to the hype or inaccurate opinion polling after the Iowa caucuses.)
Second, there is some irritating and disingenuous "conventional wisdom" being dispensed about how the Democrats are doing themselves tremendous harm through self-destructive negative campaigning tactics. Well, no, that's not really true: Hillary Clinton and her peckerwood husband, and their surrogates, have been directly appealing to the bigot vote by invoking the names of Scary Negroes and their purported association with Obama. Then there's her disingenuous shot-and-beer pandering to morons who think Chablis and Merlot are not manly, and her ridiculous purported love affair with guns. And she has been aided in her tactics by the official media, especially Gibson and "George" on the ABC debate. As far as I can tell, Obama has retaliated by referring to Hillary as "Annie Oakley."
To summarize, both a casual and a careful reader of the news would be justified in concluding that after months of throwing the kitchen sink, all the rolling pins in the drawers, and a bushel of bigoted personal attacks at her opponent, Hillary Clinton was not able to stop the slow and steady gains made by Obama in Pennsylvania over the past year or two.
Update while I'm still writing the original post: now The New Republic is comparing Obama to McGovern, meaning that he is a Don Quixote figure with an increasingly isolated band of fanatics as his only support. Expect to hear a lot of this "meme" in the next two weeks and beyond. Obama will be portrayed as the Democrat who is tearing the party apart.
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Bill Clinton: against fearmongering before he was for it
*
Josh Marshall, my online journalistic hero with at least one editorial foot of clay, posted this video flashback of Bill Clinton yesterday. It's from 2004; click through after you read Josh's introduction.
It's difficult for me to understand why smart younger guys like Marshall, as well as Atrios and others, still lionize the Bill Clinton of the past and to this day cannot understand that they bought a Bill of goods back in the early 1990s. The words Clinton speaks in Josh's video clip are fine words, and true, even if they reflect irony on the campaign of his wife today, 4 years hence. But those fine and true words were uttered by a slippery peckerwood who has even stopped trying to sound sincere since he started earning $50K/hour flicking his silver tongue at corporate audiences following his "retirement."
Look, fellas: Bill Clinton was never a liberal, and was never even a "progressive." His program has always been basically the same as the Rockefeller Republicans, including their twisted heirs such as G.H.W. Bush. Not liberal. Not progressive. Not concerned in the slightest about you or me. This fact was obvious to liberal adults in 1988 and 1992 and 1996. So guys, stop waxing nostalgic about the "old" Bill Clinton. The "new" one is same as the "old" one.
Do you disagree, Puny Human? OK: send me one example of any truly liberal or progressive initiative that arose from either of the two Clinton administrations. And Al Gore accomplishments don't count. Neither do things that just look liberal in comparison with the Reagan/Bush administration. Neither do botched healthcare policy reforms....
Josh Marshall, my online journalistic hero with at least one editorial foot of clay, posted this video flashback of Bill Clinton yesterday. It's from 2004; click through after you read Josh's introduction.
It's difficult for me to understand why smart younger guys like Marshall, as well as Atrios and others, still lionize the Bill Clinton of the past and to this day cannot understand that they bought a Bill of goods back in the early 1990s. The words Clinton speaks in Josh's video clip are fine words, and true, even if they reflect irony on the campaign of his wife today, 4 years hence. But those fine and true words were uttered by a slippery peckerwood who has even stopped trying to sound sincere since he started earning $50K/hour flicking his silver tongue at corporate audiences following his "retirement."
Look, fellas: Bill Clinton was never a liberal, and was never even a "progressive." His program has always been basically the same as the Rockefeller Republicans, including their twisted heirs such as G.H.W. Bush. Not liberal. Not progressive. Not concerned in the slightest about you or me. This fact was obvious to liberal adults in 1988 and 1992 and 1996. So guys, stop waxing nostalgic about the "old" Bill Clinton. The "new" one is same as the "old" one.
Do you disagree, Puny Human? OK: send me one example of any truly liberal or progressive initiative that arose from either of the two Clinton administrations. And Al Gore accomplishments don't count. Neither do things that just look liberal in comparison with the Reagan/Bush administration. Neither do botched healthcare policy reforms....
Saturday, April 19, 2008
A Brooks & Shields joint
*
Driving south on Prospect last night I had the misfortune of punching the radio through a transcription of the PBS NewsHour, and some insane punditry by Mark Shields and David Brooks. You just have to listen to it to appreciate the, what --- I don't know: stupidity, mendacity, mental illness? Depends on who was talking at a given moment. Examples:
1. Listen to how Shields immediately goes off the deep end in renouncing debate moderator questions about flag lapel pins while at the same time implying that people who agree with his opinion may be internet-based left-wing conspiracy nuts.
2. Marvel at how smarmy Brooks sounds right out of the gate, lecturing Shields (but really lecturing all of us rubes in the audience) about how important it is for moderators to ask presidential candidates questions to discover whether they are really like "us," possibly not aware of the fact that most of "us" wear lapel pins of any kind, and even fewer wear lapels.
3. Wrap your puny human mind around this bit of analysis by Shields: Pennsylvania have lost 237,00 manufacturing jobs since the beginning of the Bush administration; change has not been good for Pennsylvanians, and change is not a welcome message for these people because change has hurt them. Therefore, Pennsylvania is a "good fit" for Hillary Clinton. [I solemnly swear that my paraphrase of his clanging is accurate.]
4. Mystify yourself wondering why Brooks thinks it's appropriate to slip in an endorsement of retired Senator and unretired DLC A-hole Sam Nunn for VP. What?! That's some nice "being in touch," there, fella.
The insight of the evening, which both of these soiled specimens seemed to think they were uttering for the first time in American history: these (Democratic) people will just say whatever it takes to get elected without any regard for what they would actually have to do once in the Oval Office! Next week: Soylent Green is PEOPLE!
Driving south on Prospect last night I had the misfortune of punching the radio through a transcription of the PBS NewsHour, and some insane punditry by Mark Shields and David Brooks. You just have to listen to it to appreciate the, what --- I don't know: stupidity, mendacity, mental illness? Depends on who was talking at a given moment. Examples:
1. Listen to how Shields immediately goes off the deep end in renouncing debate moderator questions about flag lapel pins while at the same time implying that people who agree with his opinion may be internet-based left-wing conspiracy nuts.
2. Marvel at how smarmy Brooks sounds right out of the gate, lecturing Shields (but really lecturing all of us rubes in the audience) about how important it is for moderators to ask presidential candidates questions to discover whether they are really like "us," possibly not aware of the fact that most of "us" wear lapel pins of any kind, and even fewer wear lapels.
3. Wrap your puny human mind around this bit of analysis by Shields: Pennsylvania have lost 237,00 manufacturing jobs since the beginning of the Bush administration; change has not been good for Pennsylvanians, and change is not a welcome message for these people because change has hurt them. Therefore, Pennsylvania is a "good fit" for Hillary Clinton. [I solemnly swear that my paraphrase of his clanging is accurate.]
4. Mystify yourself wondering why Brooks thinks it's appropriate to slip in an endorsement of retired Senator and unretired DLC A-hole Sam Nunn for VP. What?! That's some nice "being in touch," there, fella.
The insight of the evening, which both of these soiled specimens seemed to think they were uttering for the first time in American history: these (Democratic) people will just say whatever it takes to get elected without any regard for what they would actually have to do once in the Oval Office! Next week: Soylent Green is PEOPLE!
Epiphany
*
Small-town crackers are so stupid that they need elitist pundits to convince them that Barack Obama condescended to them.
Small-town crackers are so stupid that they need elitist pundits to convince them that Barack Obama condescended to them.
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Should-Never-Have-Left Department
*
Jeez, I take a sabbatical and the political discourse becomes so unimaginably stupid that I'm literally frightened to say anything about it.
I believe that thinking people, and especially people of good intentions, are natural suckers in what passes for political discourse today. We behave all politely and try to address the disingenuous points made by professional right-wing liars and troublemakers. We try to play by civil rules of discourse, and observe the principles of logic. And they don't. I wonder when a political leader or presidential candidate will just say to Russert or Matthews or Stephanopolous, live on TV, that no, he or she will not answer the moderator's carefully engineered double-bind question because it was deliberately contrived to elicit an answer that can be interpreted by the elite media to offend a significant portion of the population. Or that it is just too stupid to answer, and that an answer would offend the intelligence of the viewing audience. What would someone like Obama have to lose with a statement like that? Really.
It terrifies and sickens me that the elite media present right-wing talking points as if they're the touchstone of fact that we must all acknowledge before we are allowed to utter a sound. I can assure all you young people out there that there was a time when journalism and public discourse at least resembled a truth-seeking activity.
Yes, all that I'm presenting here are gross generalities, but it's time to jump back into the blog again, so this is where and when I choose to do it. Consider this a bit of throat-clearing. But, really, where can I intelligently begin when the hottest topic in the establishment media for the past week has been an off-the-cuff remark by Obama, taken entirely out of context, liberally spiced with dog-whistle racism and anti-gay subtext, courtesy of the sociopaths running Hillary Clinton's campaign (i.e., the Clintons) and the sociopaths who make their living talking on your TV, your radio, and probably, soon, in the fillings of your molars?
My fervent hope is that, finally, we are on the verge of a watershed event: someone (the Republican/DLC establishment) may finally go broke by underestimating the intelligence of the American people. First chance I get, I'm sending $25 to Obama, if for no other reason than I'm awed by his ability to maintain his dignity so far.
Jeez, I take a sabbatical and the political discourse becomes so unimaginably stupid that I'm literally frightened to say anything about it.
I believe that thinking people, and especially people of good intentions, are natural suckers in what passes for political discourse today. We behave all politely and try to address the disingenuous points made by professional right-wing liars and troublemakers. We try to play by civil rules of discourse, and observe the principles of logic. And they don't. I wonder when a political leader or presidential candidate will just say to Russert or Matthews or Stephanopolous, live on TV, that no, he or she will not answer the moderator's carefully engineered double-bind question because it was deliberately contrived to elicit an answer that can be interpreted by the elite media to offend a significant portion of the population. Or that it is just too stupid to answer, and that an answer would offend the intelligence of the viewing audience. What would someone like Obama have to lose with a statement like that? Really.
It terrifies and sickens me that the elite media present right-wing talking points as if they're the touchstone of fact that we must all acknowledge before we are allowed to utter a sound. I can assure all you young people out there that there was a time when journalism and public discourse at least resembled a truth-seeking activity.
Yes, all that I'm presenting here are gross generalities, but it's time to jump back into the blog again, so this is where and when I choose to do it. Consider this a bit of throat-clearing. But, really, where can I intelligently begin when the hottest topic in the establishment media for the past week has been an off-the-cuff remark by Obama, taken entirely out of context, liberally spiced with dog-whistle racism and anti-gay subtext, courtesy of the sociopaths running Hillary Clinton's campaign (i.e., the Clintons) and the sociopaths who make their living talking on your TV, your radio, and probably, soon, in the fillings of your molars?
My fervent hope is that, finally, we are on the verge of a watershed event: someone (the Republican/DLC establishment) may finally go broke by underestimating the intelligence of the American people. First chance I get, I'm sending $25 to Obama, if for no other reason than I'm awed by his ability to maintain his dignity so far.
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