No point in "bipartisanship" [updated]

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Now that Democrats have sleazed up the economic stimulus package with regressive GOP measures, such as tax cuts targeted at the wealthy, Republicans have predictably withheld their support of it completely along party lines in the first House vote. The linked article predicts that at least a few Republicans will vote for the parallel bill in the Senate. Democrats need to stop worrying about Republican support now; they need to worry about voter support in the next round of national elections.

Maybe congressional Democrats will surprise all of us by using some strategy, brains, and guts now. One move that would demonstrate those qualities might be to strip all compromises they previously made with Republicans out of the stimulus package when it goes to the conference committee. Compromising with modern Republicans is ridiculous... unless its for the purpose of laying a trap to show that Republicans lie about bipartisanship and will do anything to prevent the majority party from rehabilitating the economy. Democrats should hit all the blab shows pounding on the theme that Republicans wasted almost 2 weeks extracting compromises on the stimulus package in bad faith solely for purposes of obstructing the new political majority in this country. They should explain that all compromises made with Republicans in the stimulus package now have been overcome by events, and that Democrats will restore the bill to its original intent in order to jolt the economy back into action in ways most aligned with the national interests.

I did not vote for Barack Obama or Dick Durbin to be bipartisan... unless it is part of a cunning strategy to be highly partisan on my behalf.

Updates: Maybe --- who knows???

GOP rebranding suggestion

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Here is my contribution toward helping to bring the Republican Party's national image into line with the zeitgeist. Even before designing a new logo, effective rebranding requires the composition of a bulletproof mission statement. I offer, at no cost to the party, my suggestion for one:

Failure is not an option. It is our strategic plan.

That idea; where have I heard that idea before?

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...the idea of Senate Democrats leaning on moderate Republican Senators like Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins for support on economic and healthcare initiatives, that is.

Oh, yes: I heard it right here, last month. The Democrats don't need a veto-proof majority in either chamber of Congress. There are surely some Republicans in Congress who would like to ride the coattails of an improving economy back into office in 2010. And healthcare reform. And whatever. All that pragmatic Republicans have to do is tell Mitch McConnell and John Boehner to go fuck themselves from time to time. After all, what could McConnell and Boehner possibly do about that?

Wise sayings

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[Editor's note: this edition of wise sayings was provided by "Ralph" Keenan, Chicago, Ill., 60660.]

"Market liquidity is a measure of the amount of available suckers."

The "inevitability" play

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It didn't work for Hillary Clinton, and it looks like it didn't work for Caroline Kennedy either.

Down and out [updated]

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It seems Dick Cheney is so unpopular that he cannot even find a few pals to help him move boxes to his new secure undisclosed location.

One might think Mr. Cheney could use some of his deferred compensation from Halliburton to hire a moving van and a few heavies. But maybe it's hard to find a competent box mover who also has a TOP SECRET clearance.

Lying until the end and beyond....

Update: seriously... what could have been so important in those boxes that half-invalid cardiac patient Richard Bruce Cheney had to risk injury by carrying them himself?

Asymmetric presidential pardon tactics

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If I were President Bush and I were a total dick, at about 10 a.m. Eastern Standard Time on the morning of 20 January 2009 I would pardon Rod Blagojevich.

More slick politics by Harry Reid

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Senate President Harry Reid says that Senate Democrats will not "attempt" to seat Al Franken, Minnesota's certified Senator elect, when the new session of Congress opens tomorrow. Maybe Reid thinks Franken's election was "tainted" by the fact that Franken actually won the recount, as opposed to losing it like Norm Coleman did. Perhaps Reid does not want to risk seeing his good Republican friends across the aisle humiliate themselves by filibustering the conclusion of a federal election, as certified by a bipartisan state election commission. Reid must think that Mitch McConnell can still get 40 Republicans to vote in lockstep against cloture on an asinine, futile filibuster against the U.S. electoral system.

Harry Reid does not appear to understand which political party holds the majority of votes in Congress these days. I hope liberal activists will consider rechanneling their outrage about Rick Warren into a $20 million fundraising effort for a Democratic primary fight against Reid next time he's up for re-election.

I don't need this kind of aggravation at bedtime. Now I need to heal my brain with more liquor.

Just seat Burris, already

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I believe that Harry Reid will be making a stupid and avoidable error if he refuses to seat former Illinois Attorney General Roland Burris in the U.S. Senate Tuesday. There are two problems:

1. Burris is the official appointee to Obama's vacant Senate seat as selected by the duly elected Governor of Illinois. The U.S. Senate does not have the power to usurp the executive authority of a state governor irrespective of how crooked or insane he is accused of being. Rod Blagojevich has not been impeached, indicted, or convicted.

2. By pulling a stunt like barring Burris from the Senate, Reid and his Democratic supporters forfeit any moral high ground they may have in the face of Republican efforts to block Al Franken from taking his seat.

3. Burris is famous in Illinois only for having been the state's first African American Attorney General and for not having been accused of political corruption. But as a U.S. Senate candidate in 2010, first in a Democratic primary election, Burris will have his tailbone handed to him by current Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan or just about anyone else with statewide name recognition this side of Lieutenant Governor and professional bozo Pat Quinn. No one in the Illinois Democratic Party is interested in sending a 70-year-old freshman to the Senate who will achieve meaningful seniority for the state about the time his last artery hardens, so that makes Burris an excellent 2-year caretaker for the seat.

So just seat Burris, already. It's not up to the Senate President to choose between tainted and untainted Senators when allocating the deck chairs. Burris would be harmless to the Democrats during a short term in the Senate. He would be totally out of his league as a Senate freshman, and therefore totally dependent on direction from senior Senator Dick Durbin, not to mention Rahm Emanuel and President Obama. Therefore, Burris presents no significant political problem either for the statewide Democratic Party or for the Obama administration. The voters of Illinois can purge the taint themselves, so to speak, in the senatorial elections of 2010.

Unfortunately for Burris on a personal level, he sort of doofed into this appointment, and he hasn't handled it with the acumen or grace of a real professional. Burris could have capped off his career with a noble gesture of public service by declaring that he'd accept the Blagojevich appointment reluctantly, and only to ensure that Illinois has full representation in the U.S. Senate during this difficult time; and that he would not seek permanent election to the post in 2010. Opportunity: blown. Advantage: taint. Oh: well.

Meanwhile, could we have DHS check the Senate plumbing system to determine whether someone is putting stupid pills into Harry Reid's water cooler?

Handling petulant Senate Republicans

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I do not understand why the threatened Senate Republican filibuster against the seating of Al Franken should be considered a problem by Senate Democrats. My gut reaction is that by using that tactic, John Cornyn and his radical clique would be luring Senate Democrats into using the nuclear option to break the filibuster, about which they would then wail in despair. They'd call it "liberal fascism," and the corporate media would dutifully take up that story line and run for the goals with it. Sounds pretty tiresome, doesn't it?

Harry Reid and Dick Durbin should let Cornyn and McConnell and the others filibuster the seating of Franken as long as they like. While House Democrats assemble an economic stimulus package and get it passed, Republican Senators can read Bible verses on the floor of the Senate without interruption. Democrats, meanwhile, may visit the cable news shows and recommend that all of us who have an interest in preventing an economic depression consider carpet-bombing the Republican National Committee and Senate offices with hostile phone calls and emails demanding an end to the moronic petulant frenzy. Don't you think it would be great TV to see Louisiana Senator David Vitter reading passages from the Old Testament in order to block the seating of Minnesota's newest duly elected Senator? Don't you think it would be a serious tactical blunder, at the very least, for Republicans to filibuster anything while the rest of America "eats cake" waiting for economic governance? I do.

But wait. Now I remember why a Republican filibuster of seating Franken should be considered a problem by Senate Democrats: it's because Democrat leadership is spinless and does not understand that everybody now hates Republicans.

Happy New Year 2009

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As seen 22.5 hours ago in my living room: two-thirds of Jackanapes! From left to right, Mike, Mike, Mike, Dave. Apologies to James (acoustic bass guitar) and Chris (hand drums), who didn't fit in the lens. These boys play "acoustic gypsy punk," known to some people as "gypsy shit," in Champaign, Ill. Thanks, fellers!

Wise sayings

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I used to think life was too short not to say whatever you want, but now I'm starting to think that life is actually too long to say whatever you want.

A Christmas anecdote

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I was walking down a long hallway in the research complex where I work and spied a pleasant co-worker approaching me from the opposite side of a set of double doors. He is a pleasant fellow, as I mentioned, but sometimes just a bit too breezy in communication style to conform to my expectations for professional interpersonal communications.

I said to myself, "I'll bet this joker is going to say 'Happy Happy!" as a greeting when he walks by me, so I must restrain the demon within me that wishes to laugh in his face or even, on a cranky day, punch him in the neck. Yet also I must reply with an appropriate degree of Yuletide good will in order that I not mar or dent his high spirits."

So this gentleman straight-arms the double doors, bursting through immediately with the following tidings: "Have a Happy and a Merry!!!"

"Same to you!" I replied, and I really meant it at the maximum sincerity level of which I am capable in such exchanges.

As we walked our separate directions, I heard him saying, "I fully intend to... if only the weather will cooperate... murble snurble muf noff etc...."

Holiday Greetings from StuporMundi. Have a Merry and a Happy!!! It has been so decreed. Long live StuporMundi.

My last word on Rick Warren

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Media coverage of issues like the ongoing hissy fit over Rick Warren can make me momentarily forget that the homosexual "community" is not really very homogeneous at all. This lulu, by a HuffingtonPost blogger named Chris Durang, is in my eyes really the nadir of self-marginalizing liberal political thought, and invites both knee-jerk derision and stereotyping even from a kind gentleman such as me. Although he acknowledges, with qualifications, that Pastor Rick "is good on the environment and on AIDS in Africa", Durang's overriding issue is he feels "hurt and upset" by Obama's decision to include Warren in the inauguration. The implication of Durang's argument is that politics are mainly about people's feelings, and that the feelings of gay people are more important the feelings of evangelical-minded people.

Today, as I skimmed over the decreasingly useful HuffPost I did notice some gay and liberal pushback against the guilt-by-association stuff that has been written about Obama. The best one, by Bob Ostertag, ceremoniously dismantles idea that gay marriage is a major political issue for most gay people. The issue, he says, is (as always) equal rights for everyone. Ostertag helpfully notes that weird evangelical beliefs about gay marriage are rooted in even weirder beliefs, such as that the God of The Universe literally sent his only Son to die for earthly sinners, however that might work. The substrate of Ostertag's text is some solid horse sense about political pragmatism from which I think liberals in general could benefit if they paid attention. Furthermore, in a nice act of journalistic integrity, Ostertag also provides some fuller context about Rick Warren's thoughts on gays, as extracted from a widely read beliefnet.com interview that I don't feel like linking to. The upshot is that Warren isn't quite the know-nothing cartoon character he has been painted as by the angry gays and liberals over the past few weeks.

The Ostertag piece is a bit long, but I strongly recommend it. He directly nails several points I was trying to make in my previous post, but he has the benefit of writing about gay and liberal activism as an insider (i.e., he actually knows what he is talking about from experience).

Josh Marshall makes a funny

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His latest deep thought truly rises to the level of a wise saying:

"It's going to take a lot of money to make the rich people rich again."

Liberal priorities

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I said to LuMac the other day that I believe liberal ideas are too important to entrust to liberals. He was amused. Here's what I meant:

Everybody knows that liberalism and democracy are inseparable. Even neocon scum talk in terms of "liberal democracy" when criticizing nations whose authoritarian governments prevent U.S. corporations from stealing their national resources. Liberal ideas are that important: even fascist-leaning swine are forced to pay lip service to them as a desirable way of life. My observations and direct experience with self-identifying liberals have led me to conclude that liberalism became a very different thing in the late 1960s than it had been through the New Deal and earlier times.

Baby boom conformists searching for a unique identity put on liberalism the same way they slipped into their railroad-striped bell bottoms and tee shirts with the Zig-Zag man on them. The minuscule reproduction of a '60s rock show poster (upper left) shows an example of how readily liberal ideas --- in this case the doubly political overtones of the headlining group's name: Big Brother And The Holding Company --- were conflated with accouterments of youth counterculture lifestyle. In order to prove that one was a real hippie in the 1960s, and not just one of those white suburban phonies, the young person had to learn the liturgy of mainstream counterculture liberalism and talk about it earnestly enough to be considered Genuine. The more earnest you were, the more genuine you were. The idea was to never say or do anything to jeopardize your counterculture credentials in the eyes of people who were even hipper than you. Likewise, you could never pass up an opportunity to demonstrate that you were hipper-than-thou, and the easiest way to do that was to "make a statement." Turn everything into a political issue.

I'd guess that maybe 30 percent of the people I am characterizing here chose to calcify in their juvenile roles as rabble-rousing freaks, and the other 70 percent became Reagan Republicans after freaking out on dope, or catching an unpronouncable social disease, or growing tired of living like bums. I dropped out of college in 1973, as Watergate was boiling over in pus, then re-enrolled in 1977. Campus liberalism had changed significantly during that span. It was expressed strictly in terms of lifestyle choices, and I remember very little political awareness being expressed --- a bit of interest in U.S. atrocities in Latin America and some anti-corporation rhetoric published in the newspaper I edited as a senior. For most of my latter-day campus peers, the transition from a "liberal" lifestyle into a Reagan Revolutionary presented no real dilemma. As the disco era smeared into the Reagan era, any valuable core of liberal conterculture ideals defaulted into the hands of self-proclaimed "true hippies" who were retrenching in defiance of their fading youth.

To this day the survivors of the liberalism-as-lifestyle tradition don't understand that activities like making earnest statements and contriving political theater have no impact on policy formation. Worse, these obsolete schmoes do not understand how their anachronicstic and self-centered behavior helps to margnalize important ideas of which they purport, by implication of their acting out, to be the sole stewards. Unfortunately for the preservation and promotion of liberalism, many smart and articulate people of the baby boom generation act as if its more important to maintain their self-image than to applying presure in pragmatic ways.

In short, nobody who knows a goddam thing about how power works gives a fuck that Obama selected Pastor Rick Warren to offer the invocation at the inauguration. It's only "optics," as the celebrity pundits now like to say. The decision was a political calculation, just like one might expect from the smartest political strategic thinker we've seen since Kevin Phillips. Does anyone really remember who gave the invocation at Bush's last inaugural? Or his first one? Or either of Clinton's? Or Nixon's? Did the words spoken at those inaugurations by the Holy Men have any impact on policy formation?

I understand that gay people have their reasons for disliking or despising Rick Warren. I do not understand why high-visibility liberals would waste their time with fist-pounding denunciations of Obams's "poor judgment" in this matter if their intent is to "make a difference." Their petulance will not make a difference. But by co-opting Rick Warren for his inauguration, Obama is probably shielding himself from a significant amount of criticism from the middle should he decide, for example, to lift the ban on gays serving in the uniformed military forces.

In this case, the best suggestion I've read for a liberal response to this non-event comes from Atrios: if you're present at the inauguration and deplore the presence of Rick Warren, then turn your back on the invocation. It could be a silent bit of political theater that might actually be heard by the media. Meanwhile, I wish the marquee names in liberal blogging and commentary would try to grow up soon and get their priorities straight. The host of a religious invocation at a public event is not a good reason to "go to the mat," as the wrestlers say. They need to save their zeal for promoting core liberal policy priorities, like progressive taxation, full employment, sustainable economics, and law & order in the worlds of business and finance.

Update before I'm done writing: I predict a small number of inauguration attendees will be arrested for throwing shoes in Warren's direction.

Shoe-hurling hilarity [updated]

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Even though some late-night TV jokers have made a few good funnies based on the Iraq shoe-throwing incident, I don't consider the attack to be all that entertaining. What hilarity: someone tried to assault the President of the United States with shoes! I'm sure there is all sorts of liberal "schadenfreude" justification for the cackling.

Would it have been funny if it had been President Obama at that podium in Iraq on Sunday? And if Obama had been hit? And if the shoes were rocks? Or hand grenades? And if the hurler was wearing a white hood? A regular laff riot! Hey, remember the "shoe bomber"? What was up with that guy anyway?!?

How the fuck does something like this happen in a controlled space in a war zone without the perpetrator getting a Secret Service bullet in the ear before he's done with his first follow-through?

Imagine how we all would have roared with laughter in 1963 if Kennedy had only gotten a dumdum bullet through the crown of his fedora instead of the crown of his skull. But that's not the way history played out. What did happen, though, starting in 1964, was a statistically improbable increase in naming newborn baby boys "Lee Harvey".

Update: shoe throwing is not just for laughing at. It's also a golden opportunity for narcissistic liberal sanctimony. Things like this tempt me to launch an "Oh brother..." feature on this blog.

Bye, Bettie

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A lot of stories like these have been published in the past day about the passing of Bettie Page, who died Thursday evening, December 11, in Los Angeles. In the various reports I've read or heard on the radio, Bettie is packaged as some sort of bellwether of the '60s sexual revolution or an "infamous" bondage model. I am not a Bettie expert, but I do know a little about her and her contemporaries in the figure modeling profession. The obits are generally heavy on caricature and short on context.

First, Bettie did not "set the stage for the sexual revolution"; that had been under way since World War II even if it was mostly excluded from Hollywood movies and the other popular media. Second, she was really not a superstar in her day. She was a popular figure model who posed in lingerie and various stages of nudity, but only one of many, and I strongly doubt that she was ever the most popular pinup model even during her heyday --- the early and middle 1950s. At that time, the colossal sex symbols were burlesque and strip-tease superstars like Tempest Storm, Blaze Starr, and Lili St. Cyr (prononced "Sincere"), some of whom were pulling down four-figure wages per week in Las Vegas while bedding first-tier entertainers and mobsters, not to mention the occasional state governor or president. Then there was also Marilyn Monroe, who really did traipse fairly unabashed sexuality into middle class consciousness via the movie screen. And third, Bettie was certainly not the most infamous cutie to pose in fetish gear, bondage poses, or catfight vignettes --- there were plenty who specialized in that market, as advertised "back of the book" in pulpy paper in men's "cheesecake" and "adventure" magazines. But that fact is known mainly to the original purchasers of such photos and to latter-day collectors, not to corporate journalists looking for a way to sensationalize a light, campy takeout on the death of a faded sex symbol.

Photographers and publishers made carloads of money selling copies of Bettie's likeness. She was left to deal with exploitation and broken marriages, and a past of sexual abuse by her father, by herself. I've read that even though she turned to Christianity at the end of the Eisenhower era and remained devout to the end, she never disowned or even expressed shame about her modeling career. That struck me as touching, and an indication of strong character.

News media have their reasons for sensationalizing Bettie now, possibly because it allows even NPR to talk about her "endless legs, tiny waist, and beautiful bustline" --- not to mention bondage and leather --- in respectable, well modulated tones of voice. I, as an admirer of vintage figure and pinup art, have my own reasons, and here they are:

In terms of anatomy alone, during her prime time, Bettie was a force of nature. Physically, every molecule of Bettie was in exactly the right place when she posed. Strictly speaking, the molecules were the product of her genetic heritage. But I feel that what arranged those molecules so exquisitely in front of a lens was her spirit. The magic had to have been her personality. A few of Bettie's contemporaries may have rivaled her "physical plant." Lili St. Cyr comes to mind, but her molecules radiate aloofness and even arrogance. Others, such as Rose La Rose and Betty Howard, exuded terrific personalities but may have lacked certain indispensable fine points, for example, below the knees and above the ankles. Winnie Garrett, my favorite model, was a tall, "flaming redhead" who by all accounts overflowed with personality, intelligence, and genuine niceness. No red-blooded American he-man could ask for more, then or now. But even so, I must admit that Winnie was a bit exotic-looking in the direction of "school marm"; that's fine by me, but it nevertheless falls short of Bettie's unfailing appeal to almost anyone with a Y chromosome.

As in the Irving Klaw snapshot above, from my photography collection, Bettie stands alone. She was not a trailblazer or a self-promoter: she was exploited for her charm and forgotten by some of those who profited from the light that her molecules reflected and her personality radiated. I can't remember ever seeing a picture of Bettie in which she looks tired, bored, or bitter. It's as if the camera brought her to life, and she returned the favor. Bettie was stunning without even a hint of self-importance. She could clown for the camera without seeming stupid or trivial. She was supremely generous --- not to her photographer, but to her audience. Look at any picture of Bettie: you can almost hear her Tennessee accent, thick as pine tar, declaring "Sir, I am so glad to be able to share this picture with you."

Land of Lincoln sanity checks

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Governor Blagojevich returned to "business as usual" today, which for him is the administrative equivalent of spraying a tommy gun inside the capital rotunda hollering "Made it, Ma! Top of the world!" Meanwhile, most state officials are making serious noises about meeting to develop a framework to draft a resolution calling for the study of possibly impeaching our modern day Baby Face Nelson. Our remaining U.S. Senator, Dick Durbin, pulled a blindingly stupid PR stunt on Tuesday when he immediately called for a special election to fill Obama's vacant Senate seat. Dumb idea: the next Congress will have been in session for months by the time a special election is set up and concluded. Nobody even knows how one would be administered in Illinois under current circumstances. And a special election would open the seat to being won by any Republican skilled enough to play the backlash card of downstate resentment of corrupt city slickers. Anybody who thinks that couldn't happen is a fool: the Land of Lincoln is not as "blue" as celebrity journalists seem to think. If I were Obama, I'd be tempted to have Durbin skinned with poultry shears for throwing a special election on the table. Bonehead.

And Armageddon must be near: I agree with a Republican. Former governor Jim Edgar said on public radio Wednesday morning that he thinks a special election is a bad idea because it would get partisanship all stirred up at a time when we need two U.S. Senators in Washington. He also suggested that Blagojevich's successor appoint a panel to help select the new senate nominee. That could work, but I don't think it's necessary: the appointment power lies with whomever is governor or acting governor.

I figured that the legislature could have Blagojevich impeached by Christmas if there was a will to do it, but serious observers seem to think that impeachment requires hard evidence of criminality and a reasonable-doubt standard for guilt. I doubt it. They don't have to impeach Blagojevich for bribery: lawyers can figure it out. For example, if Blagojevich were insane enough to appoint someone to the seat, I believe he would be violating at least the spirit of Illinois state ethics laws in the conflict-of-interest arena. [Allow me to interject that anyone accepting a Senate appointment by Blagojevich now would be an imbecile... unless Blago pulled the supreme jiu jutsu move of appointing an Republican to the seat. Think about it. You heard it here first.]

The Attorney General, Lisa Madigan, can appeal to the Illinois Supreme Court to remove a governor who is incapable of performing his duties. Madigan has indicated that she is smart enough to wait for awhile, though, necessarily letting state government twist in the wind long enough so even a mischevous Republican justice might think twice about voting against a removal petition. (The Supreme Court decision must be unanimous.) Normally, I would have thought Madigan would have been a slam-dunk appointment to the Senate seat. But under these circumstances, and given her likely role as Blagojevich's putative executioner, the Lieutenant Governor might find it awkward to be seen as "rewarding" her for the kill.

I know that people smarter than me don't believe this is a serious danger, but he longer chaos persists in Illinois government, the better it is for Republicans here. At the state level, Illinois Republicans are pathetic: divided, devoid of viable leaders, and they stand for nothing except fueling resentment against Chicago. But nothing unites Republicans like chaos.

And it's also better for the national Republican Party: without a Democrat in Obama's seat by January, the new President has one less vote to beat down the twin menace of Mitch McConnell and "Diaper" Dave Vitter.

Editor's note: the illustration of James Cagney from White Heat is used above solely for nonprofit education and research purposes, and this fair use is believed not to diminish the commercial value of the image to the copyright holder.

Where I've been

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There's just too much to unpack in Illinois and national politics these days for me to try documenting everything I write here with links to source material. Part of the problem is that I've taken on an exciting new role in life that dominates my free time: raising a set of illegitimate triplets I unexpectedly sired last winter... er, I mean, helping to administer my aged mother's transition into assisted living. Both of these factors have crimped my substantive blogging output.

For the time being, just for the sake of writing something on a regular basis, I must devolve to basic punditry and speculation modes. Unfortunately, my posts will mainly be supported only by my background knowledge, the considerable amount of news reports that I blow through every day, my need to think like Machiavelli, and my joy in fabricating hypotheses and strategies.

I rarely expect anyone to take anything I say just on the basis of my own authority anyway, but now that the lack of time forces me to relinquish some of my documentary rigor, caveat emptor totally, OK? I don't like it, but I don't like shutting up even less.