Category: Uncategorized

WHY THEY FAIL

[Axelrod said that] separating out different categories of tax cuts now – extending some without extending others – is politically unrealistic and procedurally difficult

God almighty Christ is there a clearer possible enumeration of why this administration is failing in the eyes of the public? This sentence alone should cost Axelrod his job. Period
Procedurally difficult? How? They all expire at the end of the year. You write a law enacting the sub-$250k part. You put it to a vote. It passes or it doesn’t. We’re meant to believe this is too hard? Yes, it’s “politically unrealistic” because Republicans will oppose it. THAT’S WHAT YOU WANT THEM TO DO, YOU FUCKING IMBECILE. You want to force them to a) take a hard position publicly -or- b) genuinely compromise with you and your still giant majorities and continue only the sub-250k cuts. Instead, after the events since 2008, you apparently still believe it’s best to begin negotiations from the GOP position and then see what sensible add-ons they want once this thing hits the floor. And you wonder why the public loses faith and doesn’t turn out to vote you and yours back in?
Do you seriously expect me to believe that you just do not understand politics at any level? That you are that dense? Or are you just suffering from an overtight necktie? Your job is to help us; not to fuck us up. Does that seem clear to you? I know I’m the one out here “on drugs,” but still. Statements like this makes me think maybe life under our Tea Klan theocratic overlords would, if nothing else, at least be more sensible from a beliefs-vs-governing-stance viewpoint than anything I’ve heard emitted from the raging shitspew that’s been coming out the maw of the national Democrat since November 2nd.

Really, really execrable. Just the worst, most defeatist, circular-firing squad shit I’ve seen coming out of this administration ever. Why not just go into the Rose Garden with Biden and abdicate the day Boehner is named Speaker and make him President? For life, if possible.

Honestly, if this is the way you plan to govern in opposition you may as well just cede the whole thing right off the bat.

[END BLOODRAGE]

WHY THEY FAIL

File under: Things We’re Not Allowed to Discuss.
Much easier to talk about big bad China bogeyman than the simple fact that the car-centric, energy hungry American lifestyle of the late 20th century on is the thing driving our trade deficits, driving our foreign policy decisions, driving our economy into the ditch. Is it any wonder? The economic inducements drive most people to live 50 miles from work and, as a result, drive for hours each and every day, and drive everywhere else you may want to go as well. Insanity. And, far from calling out said insanity, our society seems to look down upon and make life unnecessarily difficult for those who are even able to choose to withdraw from this cycle.
That it is a solvable problem if and when met with sustained will to change it gives me no optimism whatsoever. That the process of solving it would greatly assist our own recovery will never be discussed. Cars today! Cars Tomorrow! Cars über alles!

Does EPA propose we stop breathing?

John Shimkus, (R, IL), showing the intellectual rigor on carbon emissions that he will bring to the Energy Committee, which he hopes to chair.
Similarly, Shimkus believes that God’s Biblical promise not to destroy the Earth again after that whole flood unpleasantness singularly disproves any possible dangers that might arise from that whole imaginary hoax that is climate change.
I look forward to numerous investigations into The Rainbow Connection.

Roadmap to Catfood for Dinner

GREGORY: But then, but where, but where do you make the cuts? I mean, if you’re protecting everything for those, the most potent political groups like seniors who go out and vote, where are you really going to balance the budget?
DEMINT: Well, look at Paul Ryan’s Roadmap to the future. We see a clear path to moving back to a balanced budget over time. Again, the plans are on the table. We don’t have to cut benefits for seniors, and we don’t need to cut Medicare.

As many have noted, the Ryan Roadmap not only cuts benefits for seniors, it eliminates Medicare entirely. DeMint is either utterly misinformed about the content of said “Roadmap”, a blithering idiot, or lying through his teeth. Working out the full slate of combinations possible in the previous sentence is left as an exercise for the student.

What I haven’t seen mentioned elsewhere is that not only are these new and exciting Ryan Medicare Vouchers initially of lower value than the current benefit, their value never increases against inflation or other cost increases. So, barring some later legislative intervention, you’d have less of a benefit each and every year until you finally saw fit to just go die in the streets. Presumably a number of golden years subsisting on catfood and other low-cost comestibles would precede that fine day you scuttle out into the gutter to die, but still. That’s just not an “America’s Future” that I want a roadmap to.
And I’m confident that the vast majority of Americans agree with me on this one; it’s just that we’re not allowed to actually talk about any of this. Ever. Gregory, who never bothers to follow up on anything actually manages to get close for once, but then seemingly panics at witnessing such undiscovered professional realms and gives it the old “we’ll leave it there.” Top notch work as per usual. Look, a shiny penny!

Of the Zillionaires, by the Zillionaires, and for the Zillionaires

C.E.O.’s of the largest American companies earned an average of 42 times as much as the average worker in 1980, but 531 times as much in 2001. Perhaps the most astounding statistic is this: From 1980 to 2005, more than four-fifths of the total increase in American incomes went to the richest 1 percent.

[…]

The richest 0.1 percent of taxpayers would get a tax cut of $61,000 from President Obama. They would get $370,000 from Republicans, according to the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center. And that provides only a modest economic stimulus, because the rich are less likely to spend their tax savings.

[…]

So we face a choice. Is our economic priority the jobless, or is it zillionaires?

Of the Zillionaires, by the Zillionaires, and for the Zillionaires

We had a whole generation of journalists who sat by and did nothing while, for instance, George Bush led us into an idiotic war on a lie, plus thousands more who spent day after day collecting checks by covering Britney’s hair and Tiger’s text messages and other stupidities while the economy blew up and two bloody wars went on mostly unexamined… and it’s Keith Olbermann who should “pay the price” for being unethical?

Matt Taibbi, nailing it.

GOP: Party of Compromise

Greg Sargent talks Bush tax cuts and GOP/Democratic comity and compromise:

There is a way a one-year or two-year temporary extension could represent a compromise of sorts: If Republicans signal a willingness to at least entertain the idea of letting the high end cuts expire after that temporary extension. But many of them aren’t doing that. Their position is that the high-end cuts need to be made permanent. Full stop.

Exactly right. The GOP idea of compromise here is permanent Bush tax cuts. I suspect they might be willing to dump the tax cuts for the bottom 99% of America, but that top 1% isn’t going anywhere and they don’t want some two-year fix, they want it made permanent.

Democrats need to get through their heads that losing the entire Bush tax cuts package is actually the best long-term policy outcome; that this is also the “no deal, time expires” outcome makes it all the more powerful as a bargaining chip. Always be willing to walk away from the entire thing, and always make clear that all blame rests on the GOP by making clear that full-extension is their position, so partial repeal is the compromise position. Yes, walking away means short term harm to everyone making below $250k/yr, but if that’s what it takes to roll back the tax cuts for the richest of the rich: so be it. Only from that position of relative strength do you get the GOP to even approach the table. And, I’ll let you in on a secret: they still won’t.

This is why it’s the perfect issue for the Democrats. It’s important, easy to understand, and directly pits the hyper-rich against the interests of most Americans. Swing for the fences. You’ve got nothing to lose. If you force the GOP to accept short-term, top 1% cuts, it’s a win. If you force the media to face the fact that the GOP has zero interest in compromise on anything, it’s a win, and if you force the true compromise position of time-limited cuts for 99% of Americans and an immediate roll-back to Clinton-era rates for the top 1%: it’s a giant win of the sort that could redefine the terms and dimensions of exactly how policies do or don’t get done over the next two years. So why not try?

I have said it before and I will say it again: Impeachment is off the table.

Nancy Pelosi.  I wonder if we will be so fortunate with Speaker Boehner.  (via jonathan-cunningham)
I’d say it’s actually more important to recall that Pelosi was fairly literally dragged in front of cameras and forced to make this statement before it was even entirely clear just how many laws the Bush/Cheney trek to the DarkSide had broken or denied the existence of. Has Boehner even been asked? Of course he hasn’t. And won’t be. After all, Obama sets the agenda, and the GOP is certainly now pursuing a life of diligent Broderism.