Tag: 2010

Republicans Slip From Unprecedented Lead to a Tie in Gallup Survey

jasencomstock:

notthatkindagay:

Democrats and Republicans are now tied in Gallup’s weekly tracking of voter preferences, just a week after Republicans took an unprecedented l0-point lead.

[…] I think Gallup did this on purpose to tell Washington DC to get off Gallup’s nuts about the generic ballot.

I think we just need better cross-tabs. “Among likely voters who are sure Obama is a US citizen…” and “among likely voters who believe Iraq attacked America on 9/11” would be two very interesting ones. That or sample size needs to go up considerably. When you have subgroups as dutifully uninformed as we do, you have to make serious allowances or change your methodology.

Republicans Slip From Unprecedented Lead to a Tie in Gallup Survey

So basically, here’s what this election comes down to. [The GOP leadership is] betting that between now and November, you’re going to come down with amnesia. They figure you’re going to forget what their agenda did to this country.

Barack Obama, giving a textbook example of “too little, too late” in his labor day speech.
My friend, if you had hammered this message home in every speech you gave from Inauguration Day forward, you might have had a chance. Instead, you went with “look forward, not back.” Which is great if you live in a fantasyworld in which the GOP is willing to pragmatically play ball with you. They are not and never were. And you and your advisers still haven’t worked that out.
But I’m sure the new GOP majority in the House will also take up a look-forward stance, and bypass all the usual investigations into your Christmas card lists and so forth. They are, after all, serious pragmatists with the best interests of the common man at heart.
Source: whitehouse.gov

If the GOP wins the House, the probability that this “liberal-overreach” narrative will be Beltway CW is roughly 100%

Glenn Greenwald, basically right but forgetting that this will be the narrative if Dems hold the House but lose seats, lose no seats, or win every seat contested in 2010. This IS the narrative. Period.

Pundits blame the victims on Obama Muslim myth

southpol:

[…] Dave Weigel came the closest, writing that “At some point it became acceptable to question Obama’s American-ness, which naturally begged the question of whether he was a secret Muslim… and the WorldNetDailys, tabloids, and Drudge Reports of the world were ready to keep begging that question.”

This is the Overton Window in action. Republicans have a host of beyond-far-right outlets to scream and holler relentlessly about whatever their preferred issue of the day is and Democrats never, ever employ a similar tactic with the left. A year-long, sustained chorus about single payer, for instance, simply didn’t materialize. The left wing is either too pragmatic or too cynical with regard to their chances on these issues. That and the Democratic leadership repeatedly lets the GOP determine the talking points; e.g. Boehner is reportedly going to call for the firing of all Obama economic advisers. When The Democrat engages him on that ground, his ground, and they will, the ultimate outcome will then be that some of the advisers have to go or, at best, take a severe public dressing down. All good outcomes for the GOP in an election year.
Whether or not they should go is quite beside the point. You are allowing your opponent to set the agenda and define the margins that contain what will be viewed by the David Broders of the world as the “sensible and serious” solution. Again and again.
This is precisely why Rep. Alan Grayson is such a valuable and yet underutilized asset. With a dozen people like him talking about Cheney’s blood-drenched teeth (or what have you) and a few media outlets doing likewise, suddenly the true moderate position, or even one (gasp!) marginally to the left of center, looks awfully sensible. Instead of using Grayson in this way, the modern Democrat runs and hides from him and others, going so far as to extract the occasional tearful apology when some genuinely affecting truth leaks out. This is the primary failure of leadership in the Democratic party, and nothing will change until this does.
The facts do not matter; presentation and framing is everything. You, the Democrat, are fighting an organized party, its dedicated propaganda outlet that happens to be a wildly popular source of “news,” and a distributed right-wing noise machine on web and talk radio that reliably sets the discourse for the rest of the MSM. You’d better bring your A-game and act like you’re in a 24/7 campaign for your political life. And they never do.

Pundits blame the victims on Obama Muslim myth

No, this has nothing to do with sound economic policy. [It’s] about a dysfunctional and corrupt political culture, in which Congress won’t take action to revive the economy, pleads poverty when it comes to protecting the jobs of schoolteachers and firefighters, but declares cost no object when it comes to sparing the already wealthy even the slightest financial inconvenience.

Paul Krugman summarizing in 50 words or less exactly why all of us on drugs out here are dispirited.

The future does not belong to those who are content with today, apathetic toward common problems and their fellow man alike, timid and fearful in the face of new ideas and bold projects. Rather it will belong to those who can blend vision, reason and courage in a personal commitment to the ideals and great enterprises of American Society.

Edward M. Kennedy, in an undelivered paragraph written for his RFK eulogy. Print out and post in the White House if you please because we are not on drugs. We have judged the evidence and find you timid and fearful in the face of old ideas and positively cowering in the face of anything like a new idea.
We were not deceived by the idiotic rhetoric of the far right. We knew you were a centrist and a pragmatist from the get-go. We are inherently sympathetic to the cause and appreciate the moments of progress, no matter how diminished or incremental they may be, when those moments have stumbled and sputtered into being. Unlike the people you classify as not on drugs, we actually give you credit for them. And but so we’re getting awfully tired of being portrayed as a villain by the same group that treats FOXnews as a thoroughly impartial and purely journalistic concern.
As was noted on the crazed liberal outlet msnbc the other night, right now in China people are commuting on a spanking-new ~200mph MagLev train. In America, we’re un-paving roads because we can’t afford them anymore. Precisely where in that sentence can you find the “great enterprises of American Society,” Mr. Gibbs? That’s what makes us uneasy. That’s why we’re crying out for some leadership, especially if it’s just tilting at windmills. Because that’s a part of leading: taking up an important cause, no matter how unpopular or unheralded, and fighting for it, whatever may come. Yes: even if you lose.
And, not coincidentally, that is precisely what we have never seen out of this administration. Must be all the drugs.

In that spirit, let me end by saying I don’t pretend to have all the answers to the challenges we face, and I look forward to periodic conversations with all of you in the months and years to come. I trust that you will continue to let me and other Democrats know when you believe we are screwing up. And I, in turn, will always try and show you the respect and candor one owes his friends and allies.

Barack Obama sounding oh so 2005 on the Great Orange Devil, and apparently Gibbs would agree: that was all a bunch of meaningless horseshit aimed primarily at the center-right that is so desperately underserved by American “politics.”
Abandon those that put you there and then blame them when you’re not there anymore. That’s change we can believe in, all right.

Tough lesson for Obama team: trying to please everyone, you end up pleasing no one. Better to fight for a set of principles & let chips fall

Peter Daou, pretty much defining leadership.
And, win lose or draw, I feel like if the Obama administration had taken hard stands on something, anything, the excitement gap yawning between the Tea Party and the progressives simply would not exist; the simple fact is that the Democratic majority over in Congress is flatly afraid to lead. Anywhere. On anything. Too little time in the wilderness, apparently. I wouldn’t mind so much if the GOP leadership-in-waiting had even one good idea in its collective head. Rest assured: they do not.
Keep hammering away at that flag, Tashtego.

The main criticisms of the piece have come from Republicans, and their argument (for example, David Frum’s—still doing the hard work of keeping both sides honest) is that what looks to the left like obstruction is really only the minority party reflecting the public’s reservations about Obama’s agenda, and, beyond that, fulfilling the Senate’s constitutional mandate. (Mitch McConnell offered a rebuttal in this Post article today.) I would answer that, on health care, for example, where the public was truly divided and, by some polls, increasingly skeptical, the Senate Republicans should have tried to negotiate a less sweeping bill. Instead (as Frum himself famously pointed out), they shut down negotiations altogether, leaving Olympia Snowe as the lone party holdout, and not for long. They weren’t trying to legislate better; they were trying to prevent any legislation at all. The same with the stimulus bill and financial reform.
…
And the daily toll of legislative blockage is also staggering. The filibuster has become the everyday norm in this Senate—which has nothing to do with the constitution, moderation, the saucer that cools the coffee, or anything else written and said two hundred twenty years ago.

George Packer, defending against criticisms for his article here (via jonathan-cunningham)

This is exactly right. And, not just on health insurance reform. There is no example available in which the Democratic majority pushed legislation for which the GOP presented “Our Conservative Plan” for comparison and/or consideration. At most, they’ve run out what amount to platform planks: broad, non-actionable concepts and mission statements as opposed to actual legislation for debate.
The notable exception here is Paul Ryan. I think it speaks volumes that the rest of the GOP summarily runs and hides (or blathers about not needing to “pay” for tax cuts) whenever his three trillion dollars (or more) in painful (but specific) cuts are trotted out. If we, as a country, can ever get to actually discussing issues and engaging the general public in such a “The Ryan proposal is (A): these are the cuts and changes in it, the Obama proposal (B) saves such and so programs, but cuts this and does this other thing with tax rates” debate we will have made substantial and potentially Republic-saving progress. I am not optimistic. The GOP and the media at large will continue yelling about non-issues until the whole thing collapses around us. And then blame the Democrats as the last inch of railing disappears below the surf.