..................................................................................................................................
Tea party attitude toward Obama influenced by race, researchers say
By Lauren Loricchio, November 1, 2013
Following the pledge of allegiance, a group of conservative Marylanders take their seats and listen to Delegate Neil Parrott, R-Washington County, who earnestly urges them to vote in the upcoming state elections.
“One thing we know is that elections have consequences and what we’re seeing at a national level is that Barack Obama has a total different worldview than we do here in this room,” Parrott said before the group of nearly 60 attendees of a Hagerstown T.E.A. Party meeting.
“He wants Obamacare - socialism. This is part of his new America,” Parrott said to the group, whose name stands for “Taxed Enough Already.”
President Barack Obama is an unpopular figure among tea party conservatives across the nation.
“He just has socialist ideas. He thinks you and I should give all of our money to the state and then they - the powers that be - are gonna best decide how we’re gonna live,” said Denny Stouffer, vice president of the Hagerstown T.E.A. Party and a licensed gun salesman.
Tea party supporters say the president’s economic policies are the reason they want him out of the White House, but political scientists argue their dislike of the president goes beyond tangible political issues to his race.
Alan Abramowitz, a professor of political science at Emory University, said racial resentment among tea party members is expressed through their hostility toward Obama, the nation’s first black president.
“It goes beyond just the economic issues,” Abramowitz said. “It’s a reaction against the trends the tea party dislikes. And that includes growing racial and ethnic diversity.
“It’s not old-fashioned racism exactly. It’s not like they want to bring back segregation. But there’s no question that there’s an element of hostility there,” he said.
According to survey data collected by American National Election Studies in 2010 and analyzed by Abramowitz, 55 percent of the Republican Party disliked Obama, compared with 90 percent of tea partyers who said they dislike Obama.
Tea party supporters, however, disagree that racial hostility exists within their movement.
Stouffer said, “I think those people are very much ill-informed or they’re just trying to spread a lie to demonize us because they see us as a threat to them and their power.”
And Parrott said: “It just doesn’t exist from what I’ve seen. There’s certainly no evidence of (racism).”
Parrott, who founded the Hagerstown T.E.A. Party in 2009, said he’s been to tea party rallies in Washington, D.C., and has never seen any racist attitudes among supporters.
The group did not use racist language or symbols at their meeting held at Hager Hall on Oct. 10.
However, photos of other tea party activists at rallies across the nation paint a different picture.
During the government shutdown, a protester waved a Confederate flag - a symbol of the pro-slavery South - at a tea party rally in front of the White House.
House Democrats called on Republicans to condemn the gesture of waving the Confederate flag at the rally, where former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, were present. House Republicans have not done so.
In 2010 the NAACP issued a statement condemning extremist elements within the tea party using racist language in their signs and speeches.
According to the organization’s website, members of the Congressional Black Caucus reported racial epithets were hurled at them as they passed by a Washington, D.C., health protest in 2010.
Abramowitz said racial resentment is not universal among tea party supporters, but it is there.
Thomas Schaller, a political science professor at University of Maryland-Baltimore County, agrees.
“Not every tea party member or agenda item is motivated by or related to race, and I’m sure many tea party members have not a racist bone in their bodies. But empirical, survey-based evidence published by several political scientists have documented racialized attitudes, stereotyping or racial hostility among white tea party members,” Schaller wrote recently in an email.
Both Schaller and Abramowitz said tea party supporters are smart enough not to express overtly racist attitudes.
Todd Eberly, an assistant professor of political science at St. Mary’s College, points to an attempt to portray Obama as Muslim during the 2008 election, as an example of racial resentment on the far right.
“To deny there’s some of that in there would just be disingenuous,” Eberly said.
..................................................................................................................................
Thursday, October 31, 2013
The Republicans, who were counting on Sibelius evading and deflecting, were caught off-guard because she accepted responsibility for the ACA website. Ha ha ha!
..................................................................................................................................
One of the comments in part:
"The "playing to the cameras" has backfired on the Republicans. Now the media has clips of Republican's being rude, telling lies and revealing just how massively misinformed they are. ..."
..................................................................................................................................
Kathleen Sebelius vs. a party without a brain
By Dana Milbank, October 30, 2013
“Some might say that we are actually in the ‘Wizard of Oz’ land.” — Rep. Joe Barton (R-Tex.)
“I’ll get you, my pretty, and your little dog, too.” — the Wicked Witch of the West
Like the Scarecrow, whoever came up with House Republicans’ plan to deal with Kathleen Sebelius on Wednesday didn’t have a brain.
It was their big chance to flambé the secretary of health and human services and the person who has overseen the disastrous launch of Obamacare. Instead, they wound up casting her as Judy Garland’s Dorothy.
“In ‘The Wizard of Oz,’ there is a great line,” Barton, one of the first Republican questioners, informed Sebelius, a former two-term governor of Kansas. “Dorothy at some point in the movie turns to her little dog, Toto, and says, ‘Toto, we’re not in Kansas anymore.’ Well, Madam Secretary, while you’re from Kansas, we’re not in Kansas anymore.”
Thus began several references, each more painful than the last, to Oz, Kansas, following the yellow brick road, pulling back the curtain, the wonderful things the Wizard does — and, for good measure, something about Chicken Little, although he did not appear in the 1939 classic.
And, sure enough, the Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce Committee went after Sebelius like so many flying monkeys. But — spoiler alert! — the film doesn’t turn out well for Dorothy’s persecutors, and the hearing, likewise, didn’t turn out to be the humiliation for Sebelius that Republicans had in mind. Dorothy melted the Wicked Witch with a bucket of water; Sebelius doused her questioners with an unexpected and extended confession of responsibility.
“Access to HealthCare.gov has been a miserably frustrating experience for way too many Americans,” she said in her opening statement. “So let me say directly to these Americans: You deserve better. I apologize. I’m accountable to you for fixing these problems. And I’m committed to earning your confidence back by fixing the site.”
This was a sneaky and dastardly thing for her to do: sneaky, because it wasn’t in the advance testimony she gave the committee, and dastardly, because in today’s Washington, any acceptance of responsibility is so rare that the Republicans — who were counting on her evading and deflecting — were bound to be caught off-guard.
Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) seemed not to have heard the secretary’s apology. “You’re now blaming it on the contractors and saying it’s Verizon’s fault,” she said.
“Let me be clear. I’m not pointing fingers at Verizon,” Sebelius said. “We own the site.”
Blackburn pressed Sebelius to tell her who led the team overseeing the project, and when Sebelius provided it, Blackburn pounced. “Michelle Snyder is the one responsible for this debacle?”
“Michelle Snyder is not responsible for the debacle,” Sebelius said. “Hold me accountable for the debacle. I’m responsible.”
Rep. Gregg Harper (R-Miss.) declined this offer. “The president is ultimately responsible for the rollout,” he declared.
“No, sir. We are responsible for the rollout,” Sebelius replied.
After more such back and forth, Harper insisted: “While I think it’s great that you’re a team player and taking responsibility, it is the president’s ultimate responsibility, correct?”
“You clearly — whatever,” Sebelius said, allowing herself a rare moment of exasperation. “Yes, he is the president. He is responsible for government programs.”
Otherwise, Sebelius, in a gray pinstriped jacket, her white hair well-coiffed and her fingernails manicured, was generally poised, keeping her voice measured even though Republican lawmakers took photos of her with their phones, and their staff members, lined up against a wall, laughed and applauded when their bosses scored points.
She bluntly refused their requests to fire one of her deputies (“I will not, sir”), to make enrollment voluntary for the first year (“No, sir”) and to hand over enrollment numbers (“No, sir”). She answered mildly even as a red-faced Rep. Billy Long (Mo.) and a furious Rep. Cory Gardner (Colo.) demanded that she drop her health-care coverage and join an Obamacare exchange (she pointed out that the law wouldn’t allow it). She did not respond to Blackburn’s contention that Obamacare had deprived people of having a health plan that is “a Ford, not a Ferrari” or a “red Solo cup and not a crystal stem.”
But many of her interrogators were unusually mild, probably disarmed by Sebelius’s self-criticism. “I told the president that we were ready to go. Clearly I was wrong,” she admitted. “No one ever imagined the volume of issues and problems that we’ve had.”
After 3 1/2 hours of Fords and Ferraris and “Wizard of Oz” references, Sebelius finally got to go home. But she had the power to do so all along: All she had to do was click her heels together three times and think, “There’s no place like the House.”
..................................................................................................................................
One of the comments in part:
"The "playing to the cameras" has backfired on the Republicans. Now the media has clips of Republican's being rude, telling lies and revealing just how massively misinformed they are. ..."
..................................................................................................................................
Kathleen Sebelius vs. a party without a brain
By Dana Milbank, October 30, 2013
“Some might say that we are actually in the ‘Wizard of Oz’ land.” — Rep. Joe Barton (R-Tex.)
“I’ll get you, my pretty, and your little dog, too.” — the Wicked Witch of the West
Like the Scarecrow, whoever came up with House Republicans’ plan to deal with Kathleen Sebelius on Wednesday didn’t have a brain.
It was their big chance to flambé the secretary of health and human services and the person who has overseen the disastrous launch of Obamacare. Instead, they wound up casting her as Judy Garland’s Dorothy.
“In ‘The Wizard of Oz,’ there is a great line,” Barton, one of the first Republican questioners, informed Sebelius, a former two-term governor of Kansas. “Dorothy at some point in the movie turns to her little dog, Toto, and says, ‘Toto, we’re not in Kansas anymore.’ Well, Madam Secretary, while you’re from Kansas, we’re not in Kansas anymore.”
Thus began several references, each more painful than the last, to Oz, Kansas, following the yellow brick road, pulling back the curtain, the wonderful things the Wizard does — and, for good measure, something about Chicken Little, although he did not appear in the 1939 classic.
And, sure enough, the Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce Committee went after Sebelius like so many flying monkeys. But — spoiler alert! — the film doesn’t turn out well for Dorothy’s persecutors, and the hearing, likewise, didn’t turn out to be the humiliation for Sebelius that Republicans had in mind. Dorothy melted the Wicked Witch with a bucket of water; Sebelius doused her questioners with an unexpected and extended confession of responsibility.
“Access to HealthCare.gov has been a miserably frustrating experience for way too many Americans,” she said in her opening statement. “So let me say directly to these Americans: You deserve better. I apologize. I’m accountable to you for fixing these problems. And I’m committed to earning your confidence back by fixing the site.”
This was a sneaky and dastardly thing for her to do: sneaky, because it wasn’t in the advance testimony she gave the committee, and dastardly, because in today’s Washington, any acceptance of responsibility is so rare that the Republicans — who were counting on her evading and deflecting — were bound to be caught off-guard.
Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) seemed not to have heard the secretary’s apology. “You’re now blaming it on the contractors and saying it’s Verizon’s fault,” she said.
“Let me be clear. I’m not pointing fingers at Verizon,” Sebelius said. “We own the site.”
Blackburn pressed Sebelius to tell her who led the team overseeing the project, and when Sebelius provided it, Blackburn pounced. “Michelle Snyder is the one responsible for this debacle?”
“Michelle Snyder is not responsible for the debacle,” Sebelius said. “Hold me accountable for the debacle. I’m responsible.”
Rep. Gregg Harper (R-Miss.) declined this offer. “The president is ultimately responsible for the rollout,” he declared.
“No, sir. We are responsible for the rollout,” Sebelius replied.
After more such back and forth, Harper insisted: “While I think it’s great that you’re a team player and taking responsibility, it is the president’s ultimate responsibility, correct?”
“You clearly — whatever,” Sebelius said, allowing herself a rare moment of exasperation. “Yes, he is the president. He is responsible for government programs.”
Otherwise, Sebelius, in a gray pinstriped jacket, her white hair well-coiffed and her fingernails manicured, was generally poised, keeping her voice measured even though Republican lawmakers took photos of her with their phones, and their staff members, lined up against a wall, laughed and applauded when their bosses scored points.
She bluntly refused their requests to fire one of her deputies (“I will not, sir”), to make enrollment voluntary for the first year (“No, sir”) and to hand over enrollment numbers (“No, sir”). She answered mildly even as a red-faced Rep. Billy Long (Mo.) and a furious Rep. Cory Gardner (Colo.) demanded that she drop her health-care coverage and join an Obamacare exchange (she pointed out that the law wouldn’t allow it). She did not respond to Blackburn’s contention that Obamacare had deprived people of having a health plan that is “a Ford, not a Ferrari” or a “red Solo cup and not a crystal stem.”
But many of her interrogators were unusually mild, probably disarmed by Sebelius’s self-criticism. “I told the president that we were ready to go. Clearly I was wrong,” she admitted. “No one ever imagined the volume of issues and problems that we’ve had.”
After 3 1/2 hours of Fords and Ferraris and “Wizard of Oz” references, Sebelius finally got to go home. But she had the power to do so all along: All she had to do was click her heels together three times and think, “There’s no place like the House.”
..................................................................................................................................
Did you realize that the filibuster is not provided for in our Constitution? And the GOP is making a total perversion of it!
..................................................................................................................................
Enough! GOP Once Again Proves Too Irresponsible To Handle The Filibuster
By Rick Ungar, October 31, 2013
What does a political party do when they are badly in need of expanding their base to include women and minorities?
I’m fairly sure that exercising its right to filibuster the nominees of a president—one a highly respected woman nominated to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and one a highly respected and well liked African American Congressman nominated to run the Federal Housing Finance Agency—would not be at the top of the list of recommend behavior.
Yet, this is precisely what the Senate Republicans did today.
What makes the blocking of these nominees so remarkable is that there is no shortage of support when it comes to the quality of the nominees among the very GOP Senators that voted to deny the Senate the opportunity to vote up or down on their nomination. Rather, the Republicans’ problem is with the president and the reality that a Democratic appointment to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia will give Democrats a majority on that important judicial body.
Patricia Ann Millet is the Obama nominee to join the US Court of Appeals.
When Ms. Millet appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee, the committee charged with investigating and considering her nomination, not so much as one Republican Senator on the panel had a concern with or so much as a bad word to say about Millet’s qualifications.
Indeed, Ms. Millet was described by none other than Senator Ted Cruz as possessing “very fine professional qualifications.”
Yet, when the matter came to a cloture vote, the Democrats were unable to succeed in rounding up 60 votes and Ms. Millet’s nomination was blocked by a filibuster of the Senate Republicans.
The use of the filibuster to deny Millet’s nomination is but one more example of the Republicans simply refusing to recognize and accept that Barack Obama won the 2012 election and, having done so, gets to appoint people to fill vacancies in the federal court system.
You know, just like the Republican president who was able to appoint a few Justices to the United States Supreme Court, handing conservatives the majority vote in that body.
Currently, there are three vacancies on the DC Circuit Court which is generally regarded as the second most influential court in the nation following the Supreme Court. With the makeup of the DC Circuit Court currently split evenly between conservative appointees and liberal appointees, Senate GOPers cannot bring themselves to approve the nomination of someone they have deemed eminently competent for the job as to do so would give the appointees of Democratic presidents the edge in the vote count—although history confirms that one never knows how a judge will vote once they are seated on the bench.
While I understand that conservatives would prefer not to see the balance tip in favor of more liberal judges on so important a court—just as liberals squirmed as President Bush appointed hard-line conservatives to SCOTUS—anyone who would support this type of Senate behavior has completely rejected one of the most fundamental of Constitutional directives. While the Senate’s [sic] possesses the right to advice [sic] and consent on presidential nominees, that obligation was created to insure that high quality candidates with proper qualifications would fill these important roles.
Note that the filibuster is not provided for in our Constitution. The Founders intended that the Senate would take a vote on nominees and the majority would carry the day.
The vote on Ms. Millet’s nomination in the full Senate was 55-38 in favor of bringing the nominate to the floor for a full vote where Ms. Millet is expected to easily achieve confirmation. This vote included all of the Democrats voting for cloture along two Republicans who also voted to bring up the nomination while three Republicans dogged it and voted “present”.
Yes, I get the irony of the GOP Senators voting ‘present’ after hammering the President for doing the same during his term in the Illinois legislature.
Remarkably, the Senate GOP leadership is not even pretending they have personal or competency issues with Ms. Millet as a candidate.
Said Senate Minority Leader, Mitch McConnell—
“Our Democratic colleagues and the administration’s supporters have been actually pretty candid. They’ve admitted they want to control the court so it will advance the president’s agenda.”
What a shocker! A Democratic president wants to appoint someone to the court who shares his point of view. Who would have thought such a thing would be possible here in America—excepting, of course, every single American President who has ever made his own appointments to the federal bench.
The mere fact that Minority Leader McConnell could make such a comment with a straight face should provide ample evidence of the fact that the filibuster does not belong in the hands of a party that would so abuse both the privilege and their constitutional obligations.
For those senators who justify their actions by claiming that they owe deference to the President when it comes to approving the appointment of cabinet members and other executive branch roles but believe more scrutiny should be exercised when it comes to judges appointed to lifetime terms, one wonders how they explain their filibustering of Congressman Melvin Watts to become the head of Federal Housing Finance Agency.
The refusal to confirm Watts is particularly remarkable when considering that a sitting member of Congress appointed by a President to an executive position has not failed to be confirmed since before the American Civil War.
Mr. Watt’s personal competency, temperament or character has never been questioned by Republicans who oppose his nomination.
Instead, Republican opponents have suggested that they are displeased that Obama appointed a politician for the job. In other words, the senators who are opposed to Rep. Watts on this basis are saying that they wouldn’t even vote for themselves if appointed.
Anyone believe that?
Of course, this might be their best argument given that these Republican politicians likely have special insight into how they are each unfit to hold a position of responsibility.
Some GOPers have suggested that the office to which Mr. Watts has been chosen—one that oversees two rather complex financial institutions—would be better run by a “technocrat”.
That’s a tough argument to make considering that the President’s first nominee for this job back in 2010 —Joseph A. Smith, Jr. the North Carolina banking commissioner—was such a technocrat. Still, there was so much objection to Smith’s nomination by Republicans that Smith eventually chose to withdraw from consideration.
The time has come for the Democratic majority in the Senate to revise the rule and change when and how the filibuster can be used. While I would not recommend complete destruction of the device, it seems clear that it must be modified to bar the use of the filibuster when it comes to Presidential nominees.
As for those who argue that this could ‘backfire’ on Democrats should the GOP gain control of the Senate, I have no problem with this whatsoever. When it comes to presidential appointees—even if that president is a Republican—there ought to be some specific problem with the candidate if the nominee is to be rejected. It cannot be about one party in the Senate or the other getting to deny a presidential appointment because it may shift the balance on a particular federal court.
If a candidate is unfit for the office—think Harriet Meyers—then the Senate should reject that candidate. But if it [is] simply a matter of denying a highly qualified position because the opposition party doesn’t want anyone but someone sympathetic to their own beliefs, that is just not the way things were intended to operate and represents a total perversion of the American system of government.
..................................................................................................................................
Enough! GOP Once Again Proves Too Irresponsible To Handle The Filibuster
By Rick Ungar, October 31, 2013
What does a political party do when they are badly in need of expanding their base to include women and minorities?
I’m fairly sure that exercising its right to filibuster the nominees of a president—one a highly respected woman nominated to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and one a highly respected and well liked African American Congressman nominated to run the Federal Housing Finance Agency—would not be at the top of the list of recommend behavior.
Yet, this is precisely what the Senate Republicans did today.
What makes the blocking of these nominees so remarkable is that there is no shortage of support when it comes to the quality of the nominees among the very GOP Senators that voted to deny the Senate the opportunity to vote up or down on their nomination. Rather, the Republicans’ problem is with the president and the reality that a Democratic appointment to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia will give Democrats a majority on that important judicial body.
Patricia Ann Millet is the Obama nominee to join the US Court of Appeals.
When Ms. Millet appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee, the committee charged with investigating and considering her nomination, not so much as one Republican Senator on the panel had a concern with or so much as a bad word to say about Millet’s qualifications.
Indeed, Ms. Millet was described by none other than Senator Ted Cruz as possessing “very fine professional qualifications.”
Yet, when the matter came to a cloture vote, the Democrats were unable to succeed in rounding up 60 votes and Ms. Millet’s nomination was blocked by a filibuster of the Senate Republicans.
The use of the filibuster to deny Millet’s nomination is but one more example of the Republicans simply refusing to recognize and accept that Barack Obama won the 2012 election and, having done so, gets to appoint people to fill vacancies in the federal court system.
You know, just like the Republican president who was able to appoint a few Justices to the United States Supreme Court, handing conservatives the majority vote in that body.
Currently, there are three vacancies on the DC Circuit Court which is generally regarded as the second most influential court in the nation following the Supreme Court. With the makeup of the DC Circuit Court currently split evenly between conservative appointees and liberal appointees, Senate GOPers cannot bring themselves to approve the nomination of someone they have deemed eminently competent for the job as to do so would give the appointees of Democratic presidents the edge in the vote count—although history confirms that one never knows how a judge will vote once they are seated on the bench.
While I understand that conservatives would prefer not to see the balance tip in favor of more liberal judges on so important a court—just as liberals squirmed as President Bush appointed hard-line conservatives to SCOTUS—anyone who would support this type of Senate behavior has completely rejected one of the most fundamental of Constitutional directives. While the Senate’s [sic] possesses the right to advice [sic] and consent on presidential nominees, that obligation was created to insure that high quality candidates with proper qualifications would fill these important roles.
Note that the filibuster is not provided for in our Constitution. The Founders intended that the Senate would take a vote on nominees and the majority would carry the day.
The vote on Ms. Millet’s nomination in the full Senate was 55-38 in favor of bringing the nominate to the floor for a full vote where Ms. Millet is expected to easily achieve confirmation. This vote included all of the Democrats voting for cloture along two Republicans who also voted to bring up the nomination while three Republicans dogged it and voted “present”.
Yes, I get the irony of the GOP Senators voting ‘present’ after hammering the President for doing the same during his term in the Illinois legislature.
Remarkably, the Senate GOP leadership is not even pretending they have personal or competency issues with Ms. Millet as a candidate.
Said Senate Minority Leader, Mitch McConnell—
“Our Democratic colleagues and the administration’s supporters have been actually pretty candid. They’ve admitted they want to control the court so it will advance the president’s agenda.”
What a shocker! A Democratic president wants to appoint someone to the court who shares his point of view. Who would have thought such a thing would be possible here in America—excepting, of course, every single American President who has ever made his own appointments to the federal bench.
The mere fact that Minority Leader McConnell could make such a comment with a straight face should provide ample evidence of the fact that the filibuster does not belong in the hands of a party that would so abuse both the privilege and their constitutional obligations.
For those senators who justify their actions by claiming that they owe deference to the President when it comes to approving the appointment of cabinet members and other executive branch roles but believe more scrutiny should be exercised when it comes to judges appointed to lifetime terms, one wonders how they explain their filibustering of Congressman Melvin Watts to become the head of Federal Housing Finance Agency.
The refusal to confirm Watts is particularly remarkable when considering that a sitting member of Congress appointed by a President to an executive position has not failed to be confirmed since before the American Civil War.
Mr. Watt’s personal competency, temperament or character has never been questioned by Republicans who oppose his nomination.
Instead, Republican opponents have suggested that they are displeased that Obama appointed a politician for the job. In other words, the senators who are opposed to Rep. Watts on this basis are saying that they wouldn’t even vote for themselves if appointed.
Anyone believe that?
Of course, this might be their best argument given that these Republican politicians likely have special insight into how they are each unfit to hold a position of responsibility.
Some GOPers have suggested that the office to which Mr. Watts has been chosen—one that oversees two rather complex financial institutions—would be better run by a “technocrat”.
That’s a tough argument to make considering that the President’s first nominee for this job back in 2010 —Joseph A. Smith, Jr. the North Carolina banking commissioner—was such a technocrat. Still, there was so much objection to Smith’s nomination by Republicans that Smith eventually chose to withdraw from consideration.
The time has come for the Democratic majority in the Senate to revise the rule and change when and how the filibuster can be used. While I would not recommend complete destruction of the device, it seems clear that it must be modified to bar the use of the filibuster when it comes to Presidential nominees.
As for those who argue that this could ‘backfire’ on Democrats should the GOP gain control of the Senate, I have no problem with this whatsoever. When it comes to presidential appointees—even if that president is a Republican—there ought to be some specific problem with the candidate if the nominee is to be rejected. It cannot be about one party in the Senate or the other getting to deny a presidential appointment because it may shift the balance on a particular federal court.
If a candidate is unfit for the office—think Harriet Meyers—then the Senate should reject that candidate. But if it [is] simply a matter of denying a highly qualified position because the opposition party doesn’t want anyone but someone sympathetic to their own beliefs, that is just not the way things were intended to operate and represents a total perversion of the American system of government.
..................................................................................................................................
"Republican obstructionism has once again gotten completely out of control"
..................................................................................................................................
'Phil A. Buster' must die
Posted by AzBlueMeanie
The other day, Ryan Cooper wrote at the Washington Post's Wonkblog, The filibuster must die. He is absolutely right.
The Septegenarian Ninja Turtle, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, has once again reneged on his agreement with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid from earlier this year that tweaked the Senate filibuster rules for executive department nominees, and led to a brief respite from GOP abuse of the filibuster rules for these nominees.
After the Tea-Publicans suffered a humiliating defeat and surrender of their hostage taking strategy on the CR budget and full faith annd credit of the United States, the Septegenarian Ninja Turtle has returned to his old ways of rendering the U.S. Senate a dysfuntional institution incapable of basic governing.
Steve Benen writes, GOP pushes Senate to breaking point:
..................................................................................................................................
'Phil A. Buster' must die
Posted by AzBlueMeanie
The other day, Ryan Cooper wrote at the Washington Post's Wonkblog, The filibuster must die. He is absolutely right.
The Septegenarian Ninja Turtle, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, has once again reneged on his agreement with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid from earlier this year that tweaked the Senate filibuster rules for executive department nominees, and led to a brief respite from GOP abuse of the filibuster rules for these nominees.
After the Tea-Publicans suffered a humiliating defeat and surrender of their hostage taking strategy on the CR budget and full faith annd credit of the United States, the Septegenarian Ninja Turtle has returned to his old ways of rendering the U.S. Senate a dysfuntional institution incapable of basic governing.
Steve Benen writes, GOP pushes Senate to breaking point:
In July, with Senate Democrats prepared to execute the “nuclear option,” the chamber reached an agreement that calmed the waters. Indeed, at the time, it seemed like quite a breakthrough for routine governance – the Senate was allowed to hold confirmation votes, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was allowed to function, the EPA was allowed to get a new chief, and the National Labor Relations Board was allowed to go back to work.
It was nice while it lasted.
Today, after a brief respite in the confirmation wars, Senate Republicans re-embraced mindless obstructionism again. In fact, they did so twice.
Senate Republicans on Thursday blocked Rep. Mel Watt’s nomination to serve as one of the nation’s top housing regulators.
The Senate voted 56-42 to end debate on Watt’s (D-N.C.) nomination to lead the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), but 60 votes were needed to overcome a Republican filibuster.
Republicans didn’t have any specific objections to Watt, but since they preferred the current official at FHFA, GOP senators refused to allow the chamber to vote on Watt’s nomination. It’s the first time in 170 years in which a sitting member of the House lost a confirmation vote in the Senate.
Shortly after blocking a qualified African-American man, Senate Republicans then blocked a qualified woman.
Senate Republicans blocked Democrats attempt to vote on whether to confirm Patricia Millett as a U.S. Circuit Judge for the D.C. Circuit, renewing Democratic conversations of possible rule changes.
On Thursday, the Senate voted 55-38 against ending debate on her nomination. Democrats needed at least 60 votes to overcome the Republican filibuster.
Again, Republicans had no substantive objections to Millett whatsoever, but simply don’t want President Obama to fill any of the D.C. Circuit vacancies with anyone.
It’s against this backdrop that Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) intends to block a vote on Janet Yellen’s nomination to lead the Federal Reserve, and Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.) intend to block all confirmation votes altogether until someone pays attention to their [Benghazi! Benghazi! Benghazi!] conspiracy theories.
Or put another way, Republican obstructionism has once again gotten completely out of control – there is simply no precedent in American history for tactics like what we’re seeing today – and if Democrats aren’t considering drastic measures, I’d be very surprised.This Tea-Publican tyranny of the minority against democratic government must end. As Steve Benen, says, "The status quo, as evidenced today, is a madness. It’s plainly unsustainable."
..................................................................................................................................
Wednesday, October 30, 2013
Politicians play the shakedown game
..................................................................................................................................
Politicians’ Extortion Racket
By Peter Schweizer, October 21, 2013
We have long assumed that the infestation of special interest money in Washington is at the root of so much that ails our politics. But what if we’ve had it wrong? What if instead of being bribed by wealthy interests, politicians are engaged in a form of legal extortion designed to extract campaign contributions?
Consider this: of the thousands of bills introduced in Congress each year, only roughly 5 percent become law. Why do legislators bother proposing so many bills? What if many of those bills are written not to be passed but to pressure people into forking over cash?
This is exactly what is happening. Politicians have developed a dizzying array of legislative tactics to bring in money.
Take the maneuver known inside the Beltway as the “tollbooth.” Here the speaker of the House or a powerful committee chairperson will create a procedural obstruction or postponement on the eve of an important vote. Campaign contributions are then implicitly solicited. If the tribute offered by those in favor of the bill’s passage is too small (or if the money from opponents is sufficiently high), the bill is delayed and does not proceed down the legislative highway.
House Speaker John A. Boehner appears to be a master of the tollbooth. In 2011, he collected a total of over $200,000 in donations from executives and companies in the days before holding votes on just three bills. He delayed scheduling a vote for months on the widely supported Wireless Tax Fairness Act, and after he finally announced a vote, 37 checks from wireless-industry executives totaling nearly $40,000 rolled in. He also delayed votes on the Access to Capital for Job Creators Act and the Small Company Capital Formation Act, scoring $91,000 from investment banks and private equity firms, $32,450 from bank holding companies and $46,500 from self-described investors — all in the 48 hours between scheduling the vote and the vote’s actually being held on the House floor.
Another tactic that politicians use is something beltway insiders call “milker bills.” These are bills designed to “milk” donations from threatened individuals or businesses. The real trick is to pit two industries against each other and pump both for donations, thereby creating a “double milker” bill.
President Obama and Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. seemed to score big in 2011 using the milker tactic in connection with two bills: the Stop Online Piracy Act and the Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act. By pitting their supporters in Silicon Valley who opposed the bills against their allies in Hollywood who supported the measures, Mr. Obama and Mr. Biden were able to create a sort of fund-raising arms race.
In the first half of 2011, Silicon Valley had chipped in only $1.7 million to Mr. Obama’s political campaign. The president announced that he would “probably” sign antipiracy legislation — a stance that pleased Hollywood and incensed Silicon Valley. The tech industry then poured millions into Mr. Obama’s coffers in the second half of 2011. By January of 2012, Hollywood had donated $4.1 million to Mr. Obama.
Then, suddenly, on Jan. 14, 2012, the White House announced that it had problems with the antipiracy bills and neither passed. “He didn’t just throw us under the bus,” one film executive and longtime supporter of Mr. Obama anonymously told The Financial Times, “he ran us down, reversed the bus and ran over us again.”
To be sure, not all legislative maneuvers are extortive; sincere and conscientious political deeds occur. Still, the idea that Washington gridlock is an outgrowth of rank partisanship and ideological entrenchment misses a more compelling explanation of our political stasis: gridlock, legislative threats and fear help prime the donation pump.
The reason these fund-raising extortion tactics succeed is that politicians deploy them while bills are making their way through Congress, when lawmakers possess maximum leverage. That’s why at least 27 state legislatures have put restrictions on allowing state politicians to receive contributions while their legislatures are in session.
Why not do the same in Washington? It would reduce politicians’ penchant for cashing in on manufactured crises. Perhaps it would even compel Congress to be more efficient while in session.
We have focused for too long on protecting politicians from special interests. It’s time we stop pitying the poor politicians and start being wary of them — for they play the shakedown game as well as anyone.
..................................................................................................................................
Politicians’ Extortion Racket
By Peter Schweizer, October 21, 2013
We have long assumed that the infestation of special interest money in Washington is at the root of so much that ails our politics. But what if we’ve had it wrong? What if instead of being bribed by wealthy interests, politicians are engaged in a form of legal extortion designed to extract campaign contributions?
Consider this: of the thousands of bills introduced in Congress each year, only roughly 5 percent become law. Why do legislators bother proposing so many bills? What if many of those bills are written not to be passed but to pressure people into forking over cash?
This is exactly what is happening. Politicians have developed a dizzying array of legislative tactics to bring in money.
Take the maneuver known inside the Beltway as the “tollbooth.” Here the speaker of the House or a powerful committee chairperson will create a procedural obstruction or postponement on the eve of an important vote. Campaign contributions are then implicitly solicited. If the tribute offered by those in favor of the bill’s passage is too small (or if the money from opponents is sufficiently high), the bill is delayed and does not proceed down the legislative highway.
House Speaker John A. Boehner appears to be a master of the tollbooth. In 2011, he collected a total of over $200,000 in donations from executives and companies in the days before holding votes on just three bills. He delayed scheduling a vote for months on the widely supported Wireless Tax Fairness Act, and after he finally announced a vote, 37 checks from wireless-industry executives totaling nearly $40,000 rolled in. He also delayed votes on the Access to Capital for Job Creators Act and the Small Company Capital Formation Act, scoring $91,000 from investment banks and private equity firms, $32,450 from bank holding companies and $46,500 from self-described investors — all in the 48 hours between scheduling the vote and the vote’s actually being held on the House floor.
Another tactic that politicians use is something beltway insiders call “milker bills.” These are bills designed to “milk” donations from threatened individuals or businesses. The real trick is to pit two industries against each other and pump both for donations, thereby creating a “double milker” bill.
President Obama and Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. seemed to score big in 2011 using the milker tactic in connection with two bills: the Stop Online Piracy Act and the Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act. By pitting their supporters in Silicon Valley who opposed the bills against their allies in Hollywood who supported the measures, Mr. Obama and Mr. Biden were able to create a sort of fund-raising arms race.
In the first half of 2011, Silicon Valley had chipped in only $1.7 million to Mr. Obama’s political campaign. The president announced that he would “probably” sign antipiracy legislation — a stance that pleased Hollywood and incensed Silicon Valley. The tech industry then poured millions into Mr. Obama’s coffers in the second half of 2011. By January of 2012, Hollywood had donated $4.1 million to Mr. Obama.
Then, suddenly, on Jan. 14, 2012, the White House announced that it had problems with the antipiracy bills and neither passed. “He didn’t just throw us under the bus,” one film executive and longtime supporter of Mr. Obama anonymously told The Financial Times, “he ran us down, reversed the bus and ran over us again.”
To be sure, not all legislative maneuvers are extortive; sincere and conscientious political deeds occur. Still, the idea that Washington gridlock is an outgrowth of rank partisanship and ideological entrenchment misses a more compelling explanation of our political stasis: gridlock, legislative threats and fear help prime the donation pump.
The reason these fund-raising extortion tactics succeed is that politicians deploy them while bills are making their way through Congress, when lawmakers possess maximum leverage. That’s why at least 27 state legislatures have put restrictions on allowing state politicians to receive contributions while their legislatures are in session.
Why not do the same in Washington? It would reduce politicians’ penchant for cashing in on manufactured crises. Perhaps it would even compel Congress to be more efficient while in session.
We have focused for too long on protecting politicians from special interests. It’s time we stop pitying the poor politicians and start being wary of them — for they play the shakedown game as well as anyone.
..................................................................................................................................
Of course, things didn't go smoothly-- the Republicans did their best to see that they didn't!
..................................................................................................................................
GOP's hypocrisy on Obamacare
By Aaron Carroll, October 28, 2013
Last spring, the Senate Finance Committee held a hearing on implementation of the Affordable Care Act, otherwise known as Obamacare. Sen. Max Baucus, a Montana Democrat and the chairman of the committee, was not pleased with how things were going.
The Obama administration originally had asked for more than half a billion dollars to spend on public relations and outreach for the law. House Republicans had returned with an offer of nothing. That's right: zero dollars. Without necessary funds, the Department of Health and Human Services worried it would not have the necessary money to pay for navigators to help people enroll in health care, for the technology needed to implement the exchanges and for the public relations campaign that was required to inform citizens about what the law actually did.
HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius made the controversial move of asking insurance companies and nonprofit organizations to donate money and help. Republicans were outraged. She asked for more money. She was refused.
Then, when she tried to move some money from the PR budget to replace cuts to other areas, Baucus became quite upset. He was concerned that if the administration did not do more to inform people about the law and get implementation going, there would be problems:
"A lot of people have no idea about all of this," he said. "People just don't know a lot about it, and the Kaiser poll pointed that out. I understand you've hired a contractor. I'm just worried that that's gonna be money down the drain because contractors like to make money. ... I just tell ya, I just see a huge train wreck coming down."
As I've said before, it's important to note that the "train wreck" Baucus was describing was a botched implementation because not enough was being done to make things go smoothly.
It wasn't a description of the law itself but of what might occur if the government did not devote enough resources to making it work. Sebelius' response was not surprising to those who were paying attention. She said that she was "incredibly disappointed" that all her requests for resources were being denied by Republicans.
That was then. Today, implementation has arrived, and if it's not a train wreck, then it's certainly close. The administration is still under fire because people cannot get the insurance they want through the exchanges. But while I will continue to point out the problems with implementation and fault the administration for mistakes they've made, how does one ignore the apparent hypocrisy from many politicians who are now "outraged" about the very problems they've helped to create.
Republicans refused to appropriate money needed to implement Obamacare. When Sebelius tried to shift money from other areas to help do what needed to be done, she was attacked by Senate Republicans. At every step, Republicans fought measures to get money to put towards implementation.
Is it really a surprise then that implementation hasn't gone smoothly?
Federal legislators aren't the only ones to blame. Let's remember that original versions of the bill called for one big national exchange. This would have been much easier to implement. But conservatives declared that insurance should be left to the states and kept out of the hands of the federal government. So as a compromise (yes, those did occur), exchanges were made state-based instead of national.
As a precaution, the law stipulated that if states failed to do their duty and enact exchanges, the federal government would step in and pick up the slack. This was to prevent obstructionism from killing the law. Surprisingly, it was many of the same conservative states that demanded local control that refused to implement state-based exchanges, leaving the federal government to do it for them.
That made implementation much harder.
There have been books, webinars and meetings explaining how to sabotage the implementation of Obamacare. There have been campaigns trying to persuade young adults not to use the exchanges. It is, therefore, somewhat ironic that many of the same people who have been part of all of this obstructionism seem so "upset" by the fact that people can't easily use the exchanges.
For goodness sake, the government was shut down just a few weeks ago because some of the same people who are now bemoaning poorly functioning websites were determined to see that not one dime went to Obamacare.
Lest you think I'm defending this month's rollout, I encourage you to review my last article here. I still maintain that the administration has had a failure in management in overseeing and reporting on progress towards October 1. But I'm also sympathetic that they've had a hard job to do. I would like to see this go better. I'd like to see millions more get insurance. I'd like to see the law of the land function as well as it can, and if it doesn't, I'd like to see Congress continue to amend it to make it work better. I'd like a better health care system.
What I cannot ignore, however, are the many people who actively worked to see implementation fail now get the vapors over its poor start. The truth is, they got what they wanted. A victory lap is somewhat warranted, not concern-trolling.
If, on the other hand, their concern is real, then I'm sure the administration would welcome their help in making things right.
..................................................................................................................................
GOP's hypocrisy on Obamacare
By Aaron Carroll, October 28, 2013
Last spring, the Senate Finance Committee held a hearing on implementation of the Affordable Care Act, otherwise known as Obamacare. Sen. Max Baucus, a Montana Democrat and the chairman of the committee, was not pleased with how things were going.
The Obama administration originally had asked for more than half a billion dollars to spend on public relations and outreach for the law. House Republicans had returned with an offer of nothing. That's right: zero dollars. Without necessary funds, the Department of Health and Human Services worried it would not have the necessary money to pay for navigators to help people enroll in health care, for the technology needed to implement the exchanges and for the public relations campaign that was required to inform citizens about what the law actually did.
HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius made the controversial move of asking insurance companies and nonprofit organizations to donate money and help. Republicans were outraged. She asked for more money. She was refused.
Then, when she tried to move some money from the PR budget to replace cuts to other areas, Baucus became quite upset. He was concerned that if the administration did not do more to inform people about the law and get implementation going, there would be problems:
"A lot of people have no idea about all of this," he said. "People just don't know a lot about it, and the Kaiser poll pointed that out. I understand you've hired a contractor. I'm just worried that that's gonna be money down the drain because contractors like to make money. ... I just tell ya, I just see a huge train wreck coming down."
As I've said before, it's important to note that the "train wreck" Baucus was describing was a botched implementation because not enough was being done to make things go smoothly.
It wasn't a description of the law itself but of what might occur if the government did not devote enough resources to making it work. Sebelius' response was not surprising to those who were paying attention. She said that she was "incredibly disappointed" that all her requests for resources were being denied by Republicans.
That was then. Today, implementation has arrived, and if it's not a train wreck, then it's certainly close. The administration is still under fire because people cannot get the insurance they want through the exchanges. But while I will continue to point out the problems with implementation and fault the administration for mistakes they've made, how does one ignore the apparent hypocrisy from many politicians who are now "outraged" about the very problems they've helped to create.
Republicans refused to appropriate money needed to implement Obamacare. When Sebelius tried to shift money from other areas to help do what needed to be done, she was attacked by Senate Republicans. At every step, Republicans fought measures to get money to put towards implementation.
Is it really a surprise then that implementation hasn't gone smoothly?
Federal legislators aren't the only ones to blame. Let's remember that original versions of the bill called for one big national exchange. This would have been much easier to implement. But conservatives declared that insurance should be left to the states and kept out of the hands of the federal government. So as a compromise (yes, those did occur), exchanges were made state-based instead of national.
As a precaution, the law stipulated that if states failed to do their duty and enact exchanges, the federal government would step in and pick up the slack. This was to prevent obstructionism from killing the law. Surprisingly, it was many of the same conservative states that demanded local control that refused to implement state-based exchanges, leaving the federal government to do it for them.
That made implementation much harder.
There have been books, webinars and meetings explaining how to sabotage the implementation of Obamacare. There have been campaigns trying to persuade young adults not to use the exchanges. It is, therefore, somewhat ironic that many of the same people who have been part of all of this obstructionism seem so "upset" by the fact that people can't easily use the exchanges.
For goodness sake, the government was shut down just a few weeks ago because some of the same people who are now bemoaning poorly functioning websites were determined to see that not one dime went to Obamacare.
Lest you think I'm defending this month's rollout, I encourage you to review my last article here. I still maintain that the administration has had a failure in management in overseeing and reporting on progress towards October 1. But I'm also sympathetic that they've had a hard job to do. I would like to see this go better. I'd like to see millions more get insurance. I'd like to see the law of the land function as well as it can, and if it doesn't, I'd like to see Congress continue to amend it to make it work better. I'd like a better health care system.
What I cannot ignore, however, are the many people who actively worked to see implementation fail now get the vapors over its poor start. The truth is, they got what they wanted. A victory lap is somewhat warranted, not concern-trolling.
If, on the other hand, their concern is real, then I'm sure the administration would welcome their help in making things right.
..................................................................................................................................
Throw the bums out!
..................................................................................................................................
In politics, Americans hate the players, not the game
By Sean Sullivan, October 18, 2013
“Don’t hate the player, hate the game,” Ice-T famously rapped. But when it comes to Congress, Americans take the opposite view.
A new Pew Research Center poll released Friday shows that a majority of Americans blame lawmakers for the problems that plague Congress, not the political system in which the[y] operate. Fifty-eight percent say the system is fine and that members of Congress are the issue. Just 32 percent blame the system.
Americans have increasingly blamed lawmakers, not the system, for dysfunction in recent years, as the chart above shows. And there’s little disagreement across party lines, with majorities of Democrats (64 percent), Republicans (57 percent) and independents (55 percent) holding members of Congress more accountable for problems than the political backdrop of their actions.
The poll was taken from Oct. 9-13, just before lawmakers reached an agreement to reopen the government and avoid hitting the debt ceiling.
So what does it all mean? Two things. One, the public isn’t as fed up with the political and governing framework itself despite the many declarations that “the system is broken.” What’s broken, in their view, is the people who are running it.
Which leads into the second big takeaway: Here’s yet another reason incumbents should be on notice this cycle. Thirty-eight percent of Americans say they do not want to see their own member of Congress reelected in 2014, according to Pew data released this week. That’s the highest percentage wanting to toss out their own member in more than two decades of Pew surveys.
..................................................................................................................................
In politics, Americans hate the players, not the game
By Sean Sullivan, October 18, 2013
“Don’t hate the player, hate the game,” Ice-T famously rapped. But when it comes to Congress, Americans take the opposite view.
A new Pew Research Center poll released Friday shows that a majority of Americans blame lawmakers for the problems that plague Congress, not the political system in which the[y] operate. Fifty-eight percent say the system is fine and that members of Congress are the issue. Just 32 percent blame the system.
Americans have increasingly blamed lawmakers, not the system, for dysfunction in recent years, as the chart above shows. And there’s little disagreement across party lines, with majorities of Democrats (64 percent), Republicans (57 percent) and independents (55 percent) holding members of Congress more accountable for problems than the political backdrop of their actions.
The poll was taken from Oct. 9-13, just before lawmakers reached an agreement to reopen the government and avoid hitting the debt ceiling.
So what does it all mean? Two things. One, the public isn’t as fed up with the political and governing framework itself despite the many declarations that “the system is broken.” What’s broken, in their view, is the people who are running it.
Which leads into the second big takeaway: Here’s yet another reason incumbents should be on notice this cycle. Thirty-eight percent of Americans say they do not want to see their own member of Congress reelected in 2014, according to Pew data released this week. That’s the highest percentage wanting to toss out their own member in more than two decades of Pew surveys.
..................................................................................................................................
Face it, the hard core GOP base IS losing politically and losing control... serves them "right" [snicker]
..................................................................................................................................
Behind the Roar of Political Debates, Whispers of Race Persist
By John Harwood, October 30, 2013
President Obama last week sought to turn attention from health care to immigration — in other words, from one racially divisive issue to another.
Whites tend to hold negative views of Obamacare, while blacks tend to like it. Specifically, 55 percent of whites, an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll found this year, consider Mr. Obama’s health care law a bad idea, while 59 percent of blacks call it a good idea. On immigration, 51 percent of whites oppose legal status for illegal residents, but 63 percent of blacks and 76 percent of Hispanics favor it.
The statistics mirror the core philosophical division in Washington’s fierce battles over taxes, spending and debt. Whites say government does too much, while blacks and Hispanics say it should do more to meet people’s needs.
Those attitudes, and the continued growth of the nonwhite population, have produced this sometimes-overlooked result: American politics has grown increasingly polarized by race, as well as by party and ideology.
That reality promises to command more attention as the day draws closer when whites will no longer make up a majority of the population, which the Census Bureau projects will be in 2043.
Race receded from public dialogue in the mid-1990s for reasons that served both parties. Republicans grew fearful of criticism of the racially charged tactics that began with Richard M. Nixon’s “Southern strategy.” And a Democratic president — Bill Clinton — and a Republican Congress overhauled welfare, draining racial electricity from partisan combat. By 2008, Mr. Obama sought to dial back talk of race in his campaign to become America’s first black president.
Now two factors have combined to raise the racial volume. First, the growing voting strength and allegiance of black, Hispanic and Asian-Americans have made nonwhites an increasing share of the Democratic coalition. Second, conservative whites are bitterly resisting both Mr. Obama and his agenda.
Thus a crucial variable before last November’s election was the racial composition of the electorate. As the Obama team predicted, the proportion of white voters fell to 72 percent. The president won by drawing eight in 10 black, Hispanic and Asian-American votes, even as Mitt Romney won six in 10 white votes.
Electoral geography punctuated those disparities with historical resonance. In the 11 states of the Confederacy, Mr. Romney outpolled Mr. Obama by nine percentage points. Elsewhere, Mr. Obama won by 10 points.
Against that backdrop, Congressional Republicans have pursued cuts in food stamp spending, and Republican-controlled state legislatures have enacted voter-identification laws. A Republican official in North Carolina recently resigned after telling a “Daily Show” interviewer that ID cards could diminish voting by “a bunch of lazy blacks that wants the government to give them everything.”
Senator Rand Paul, Republican of Kentucky, wrote his 2011 book, “The Tea Party Goes to Washington,” with a former radio host known as the Southern Avenger who wore a mask decorated with the Confederate flag. This summer, the co-author left his job as the senator’s social media director after news reports emerged about that earlier work.
Stanley Greenberg, a pollster for Mr. Clinton and other Democrats, said that recent focus groups among core Republican voters highlighted anxiety that “big government is meant to create rights and dependency and electoral support from mostly minorities who will reward the Democratic Party with their votes.”
“While few explicitly talk about Obama in racial terms, the base supporters are very conscious of being white in a country with growing minorities,” Mr. Greenberg wrote. “The base thinks they are losing politically and losing control of the country.”
One risk for Democrats is reacting to those cultural fears with stridency, as Representative Alan Grayson of Florida did recently in likening the Tea Party to the Ku Klux Klan, drawing a rebuke from the Democratic Party’s national chairwoman.
Some Republicans strike similar chords. In Kentucky, an ally of Senator Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader, hit Mr. McConnell’s Tea Party-backed primary challenger for having once supported a third-party presidential candidate “found on YouTube giving a lengthy speech in front of the third national flag of the Confederate States of America.”
Fred Steeper, a Republican pollster who advised both Presidents Bush, worries about renewed attention to racial divisions for two reasons.
One is that it could taint what he calls the Republican Party’s “legitimate argument” in favor of self-reliance and smaller government. The other is the difficulty of winning national elections if the party’s hard-line on immigration continues to alienate Hispanics. “Racism may be a part of it,” especially among working-class whites, Mr. Steeper said of the immigration stance. “The Republican Party needs to stop pandering to that.”
He added, “The Republican Party needs to throw in the towel on the immigration issue.”
The Democrats’ problem is winning over whites. At the moment that’s a challenge of governance — as Mr. Obama’s struggle to implement his health law demonstrates. “The challenge we have with the health care law is similar to the challenge we’ve had in our politics more broadly,” Mr. Obama said in a recent interview. “There have been caricatures of what we’re trying to do.”
Most uninsured Americans who will be helped by the law, he added, “are going to be white.”
The risk for the country is heightened racial tensions. Mr. Obama’s advisers play down that prospect for the long term, noting younger Americans’ instinct for tolerance. “As rising generations replace older ones,” a study by the liberal Center for American Progress concluded last week, “concerns about rising diversity will recede.”
In the meantime, Mr. Steeper hopes Republicans can persuade more Hispanics, Asian-Americans and blacks to align with their message of opportunity. “We should have two parties based on a different approach to the role of government,” he said. “I don’t want our parties to be representing racial groups.”
..................................................................................................................................
Behind the Roar of Political Debates, Whispers of Race Persist
By John Harwood, October 30, 2013
President Obama last week sought to turn attention from health care to immigration — in other words, from one racially divisive issue to another.
Whites tend to hold negative views of Obamacare, while blacks tend to like it. Specifically, 55 percent of whites, an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll found this year, consider Mr. Obama’s health care law a bad idea, while 59 percent of blacks call it a good idea. On immigration, 51 percent of whites oppose legal status for illegal residents, but 63 percent of blacks and 76 percent of Hispanics favor it.
The statistics mirror the core philosophical division in Washington’s fierce battles over taxes, spending and debt. Whites say government does too much, while blacks and Hispanics say it should do more to meet people’s needs.
Those attitudes, and the continued growth of the nonwhite population, have produced this sometimes-overlooked result: American politics has grown increasingly polarized by race, as well as by party and ideology.
That reality promises to command more attention as the day draws closer when whites will no longer make up a majority of the population, which the Census Bureau projects will be in 2043.
Race receded from public dialogue in the mid-1990s for reasons that served both parties. Republicans grew fearful of criticism of the racially charged tactics that began with Richard M. Nixon’s “Southern strategy.” And a Democratic president — Bill Clinton — and a Republican Congress overhauled welfare, draining racial electricity from partisan combat. By 2008, Mr. Obama sought to dial back talk of race in his campaign to become America’s first black president.
Now two factors have combined to raise the racial volume. First, the growing voting strength and allegiance of black, Hispanic and Asian-Americans have made nonwhites an increasing share of the Democratic coalition. Second, conservative whites are bitterly resisting both Mr. Obama and his agenda.
Thus a crucial variable before last November’s election was the racial composition of the electorate. As the Obama team predicted, the proportion of white voters fell to 72 percent. The president won by drawing eight in 10 black, Hispanic and Asian-American votes, even as Mitt Romney won six in 10 white votes.
Electoral geography punctuated those disparities with historical resonance. In the 11 states of the Confederacy, Mr. Romney outpolled Mr. Obama by nine percentage points. Elsewhere, Mr. Obama won by 10 points.
Against that backdrop, Congressional Republicans have pursued cuts in food stamp spending, and Republican-controlled state legislatures have enacted voter-identification laws. A Republican official in North Carolina recently resigned after telling a “Daily Show” interviewer that ID cards could diminish voting by “a bunch of lazy blacks that wants the government to give them everything.”
Senator Rand Paul, Republican of Kentucky, wrote his 2011 book, “The Tea Party Goes to Washington,” with a former radio host known as the Southern Avenger who wore a mask decorated with the Confederate flag. This summer, the co-author left his job as the senator’s social media director after news reports emerged about that earlier work.
Stanley Greenberg, a pollster for Mr. Clinton and other Democrats, said that recent focus groups among core Republican voters highlighted anxiety that “big government is meant to create rights and dependency and electoral support from mostly minorities who will reward the Democratic Party with their votes.”
“While few explicitly talk about Obama in racial terms, the base supporters are very conscious of being white in a country with growing minorities,” Mr. Greenberg wrote. “The base thinks they are losing politically and losing control of the country.”
One risk for Democrats is reacting to those cultural fears with stridency, as Representative Alan Grayson of Florida did recently in likening the Tea Party to the Ku Klux Klan, drawing a rebuke from the Democratic Party’s national chairwoman.
Some Republicans strike similar chords. In Kentucky, an ally of Senator Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader, hit Mr. McConnell’s Tea Party-backed primary challenger for having once supported a third-party presidential candidate “found on YouTube giving a lengthy speech in front of the third national flag of the Confederate States of America.”
Fred Steeper, a Republican pollster who advised both Presidents Bush, worries about renewed attention to racial divisions for two reasons.
One is that it could taint what he calls the Republican Party’s “legitimate argument” in favor of self-reliance and smaller government. The other is the difficulty of winning national elections if the party’s hard-line on immigration continues to alienate Hispanics. “Racism may be a part of it,” especially among working-class whites, Mr. Steeper said of the immigration stance. “The Republican Party needs to stop pandering to that.”
He added, “The Republican Party needs to throw in the towel on the immigration issue.”
The Democrats’ problem is winning over whites. At the moment that’s a challenge of governance — as Mr. Obama’s struggle to implement his health law demonstrates. “The challenge we have with the health care law is similar to the challenge we’ve had in our politics more broadly,” Mr. Obama said in a recent interview. “There have been caricatures of what we’re trying to do.”
Most uninsured Americans who will be helped by the law, he added, “are going to be white.”
The risk for the country is heightened racial tensions. Mr. Obama’s advisers play down that prospect for the long term, noting younger Americans’ instinct for tolerance. “As rising generations replace older ones,” a study by the liberal Center for American Progress concluded last week, “concerns about rising diversity will recede.”
In the meantime, Mr. Steeper hopes Republicans can persuade more Hispanics, Asian-Americans and blacks to align with their message of opportunity. “We should have two parties based on a different approach to the role of government,” he said. “I don’t want our parties to be representing racial groups.”
..................................................................................................................................
Tuesday, October 29, 2013
Telling it like it should be
..................................................................................................................................
Another letter to the editor.
One of the comments:
Yes, we definitely need two ( or more) healthy political parties. Just not the two we have now.
..................................................................................................................................
We need two healthy political parties
By Michele Meeks, October 19, 2013
I seem to have hit a nerve with some people with my last letter. Well, I meant to. I am also well aware of the difference between a republic and a democracy. I also know what most Americans think of when the term democracy is used today—the U.S. If you want to quibble over terms, be my guest.
I most certainly did not call all Republicans extremists, but those on the far, far right who call themselves tea partiers, yes, they are extremists. Most Republicans are more towards the middle and believe in fiscal conservatism and believe in negotiation and compromise. Quite often the extremists call them RINO’s and want to purge them from the party. Purges, no less: Now that is a hallmark of extremists of any variety. There are many Republicans nowadays who feel that their party has been hi-jacked by the tea party and others on the far right. It most certainly is not the party that Abraham Lincoln or Teddy Roosevelt or even Ronald Regan knew.
I am a Democrat and a liberal and proud of it. But, I deeply believe that we need to have two healthy, strong political parties that put this nation first and foremost before ideology. We need representatives who are willing to work together to make this nation of ours work, not ones who are so wedded to their ideology that they shut the government down and threaten the “full faith and credit” of the U.S. And, for what? The tea partiers in Congress acted like small children throwing a temper tantrum and deciding to smash everything in sight because they did not get their way.
I am also very tired of the disrespect shown a president of the United States by citizens of the United States. I disagreed strongly with President Bush, but I would not have called him the names that are thrown at President Obama or made the comparisons to various dictators. Anyone who has ever actually lived in a dictatorship would laugh at you. Also, you should really remember that dictatorships arise from the extreme right as well as the extreme left, and President Obama is much closer to the center whatever you might like to believe. That is a case where some people would do well to read their history.
..................................................................................................................................
Another letter to the editor.
One of the comments:
Yes, we definitely need two ( or more) healthy political parties. Just not the two we have now.
..................................................................................................................................
We need two healthy political parties
By Michele Meeks, October 19, 2013
I seem to have hit a nerve with some people with my last letter. Well, I meant to. I am also well aware of the difference between a republic and a democracy. I also know what most Americans think of when the term democracy is used today—the U.S. If you want to quibble over terms, be my guest.
I most certainly did not call all Republicans extremists, but those on the far, far right who call themselves tea partiers, yes, they are extremists. Most Republicans are more towards the middle and believe in fiscal conservatism and believe in negotiation and compromise. Quite often the extremists call them RINO’s and want to purge them from the party. Purges, no less: Now that is a hallmark of extremists of any variety. There are many Republicans nowadays who feel that their party has been hi-jacked by the tea party and others on the far right. It most certainly is not the party that Abraham Lincoln or Teddy Roosevelt or even Ronald Regan knew.
I am a Democrat and a liberal and proud of it. But, I deeply believe that we need to have two healthy, strong political parties that put this nation first and foremost before ideology. We need representatives who are willing to work together to make this nation of ours work, not ones who are so wedded to their ideology that they shut the government down and threaten the “full faith and credit” of the U.S. And, for what? The tea partiers in Congress acted like small children throwing a temper tantrum and deciding to smash everything in sight because they did not get their way.
I am also very tired of the disrespect shown a president of the United States by citizens of the United States. I disagreed strongly with President Bush, but I would not have called him the names that are thrown at President Obama or made the comparisons to various dictators. Anyone who has ever actually lived in a dictatorship would laugh at you. Also, you should really remember that dictatorships arise from the extreme right as well as the extreme left, and President Obama is much closer to the center whatever you might like to believe. That is a case where some people would do well to read their history.
..................................................................................................................................
Sad to say, having degrees in political science or American history apparently puts some of us out of the running for political office
..................................................................................................................................
Relevant Experience Becoming a Political Liability
By Howard Steven Friedman, October 28, 2013
A waiter hands you the menu while mentioning, "Our chef has never taken a cooking class in his life. After 20 years of owning a successful construction company, he just decided that other people don't know how to cook. This is his first day on the job and we've never tasted a single dish he's prepared but he tells us great stories about how he made a fortune as a job creator." You immediately: (a) say, "Fantastic! Let me order the $100 filet mignon." or (b) reach for your coat.
Time to have that surgery you've been avoiding for years. Right before the anesthetist places the mask over your face she whispers, "This is the surgeon's first operation ever. He never went to med school or residency but he has watched the first season of Nip/Tuck and knows every joke from M.A.S.H. by heart. We all call him Hawkeye." You immediately: (a) say, "Why not? I have a terrific life insurance policy so my family will benefit if anything goes wrong." or (b) jump off the operating table.
Your twins are starting their first day in kindergarten. The teacher greets your children at the classroom door enthusiastically. You smile while saying, "My twins are so excited for their first day at school." She immediately replies, "Me too. This is my first day teaching. I was thrilled to get this job, since I have no teaching degree, never took teaching classes and dropped out of school myself. Anywho! Let's learn." You: (a) say, "Best thing possible for my kids. I also hope no one forces some overbearing government regulation like requiring the bus driver to have a license." or (b) immediately start looking for a different school.
Politics often seems to be a different animal. At the local and national level, we are seeing the adulation of political candidates who proudly pound their chests pronouncing they have "no political background or experience". Some of these newcomers state with great joy that they haven't voted themselves in years, explaining that they previously ignored elections because they didn't believe in politics before, but, now that they are a candidate they will selflessly represent the populace. Emboldened with financial backing from themselves, wealthy friends, family or party money, they dive into the political scene.
If elected, they often pride themselves on being an iconoclast while doing their best to draw attention to themselves. While conformity in a broken system is nothing to celebrate, simply jumping up and down to gain the media spotlight and set yourself up for a good TV position or prominent lobbying job when your term is over (or when you prematurely resign) doesn't help the public.
Experience isn't always a benefit but it at least provides voters with some understanding of the person's history and what they might do if elected. Bringing in career political hacks to provide "more of the same" can often add little value as they may be too mired in the inertia of their own political baggage or planning their reelection campaign in the first few weeks of their arrival.
Politics seems to be one of the few places where a lack of experience, or even more, a disdain for experience, is being treated as an asset rather than a liability. As we watch national level politicians with no relevant experience, keep in mind that enough voters heard the candidates stump speeches and decided, "Yes, I want that person as my representative" rather than choose to leave the restaurant, jump off the operating table or look for a different school.
..................................................................................................................................
Relevant Experience Becoming a Political Liability
By Howard Steven Friedman, October 28, 2013
A waiter hands you the menu while mentioning, "Our chef has never taken a cooking class in his life. After 20 years of owning a successful construction company, he just decided that other people don't know how to cook. This is his first day on the job and we've never tasted a single dish he's prepared but he tells us great stories about how he made a fortune as a job creator." You immediately: (a) say, "Fantastic! Let me order the $100 filet mignon." or (b) reach for your coat.
Time to have that surgery you've been avoiding for years. Right before the anesthetist places the mask over your face she whispers, "This is the surgeon's first operation ever. He never went to med school or residency but he has watched the first season of Nip/Tuck and knows every joke from M.A.S.H. by heart. We all call him Hawkeye." You immediately: (a) say, "Why not? I have a terrific life insurance policy so my family will benefit if anything goes wrong." or (b) jump off the operating table.
Your twins are starting their first day in kindergarten. The teacher greets your children at the classroom door enthusiastically. You smile while saying, "My twins are so excited for their first day at school." She immediately replies, "Me too. This is my first day teaching. I was thrilled to get this job, since I have no teaching degree, never took teaching classes and dropped out of school myself. Anywho! Let's learn." You: (a) say, "Best thing possible for my kids. I also hope no one forces some overbearing government regulation like requiring the bus driver to have a license." or (b) immediately start looking for a different school.
Politics often seems to be a different animal. At the local and national level, we are seeing the adulation of political candidates who proudly pound their chests pronouncing they have "no political background or experience". Some of these newcomers state with great joy that they haven't voted themselves in years, explaining that they previously ignored elections because they didn't believe in politics before, but, now that they are a candidate they will selflessly represent the populace. Emboldened with financial backing from themselves, wealthy friends, family or party money, they dive into the political scene.
If elected, they often pride themselves on being an iconoclast while doing their best to draw attention to themselves. While conformity in a broken system is nothing to celebrate, simply jumping up and down to gain the media spotlight and set yourself up for a good TV position or prominent lobbying job when your term is over (or when you prematurely resign) doesn't help the public.
Experience isn't always a benefit but it at least provides voters with some understanding of the person's history and what they might do if elected. Bringing in career political hacks to provide "more of the same" can often add little value as they may be too mired in the inertia of their own political baggage or planning their reelection campaign in the first few weeks of their arrival.
Politics seems to be one of the few places where a lack of experience, or even more, a disdain for experience, is being treated as an asset rather than a liability. As we watch national level politicians with no relevant experience, keep in mind that enough voters heard the candidates stump speeches and decided, "Yes, I want that person as my representative" rather than choose to leave the restaurant, jump off the operating table or look for a different school.
..................................................................................................................................
Geez, Ann, you're a good one to talk about seeking media attention!
..................................................................................................................................
Ann Coulter Bashes Republicans 'Attacking Their Own': 'Just Become A Democrat!'
By Catherine Taibi, October 28, 2013
Ann Coulter had strong words for certain Republicans when she visited HuffPost Live on Monday.
The conservative political commentator spoke about immigration reform, the 2016 presidential election and her new book, " Never Trust A Liberal Over 3: Especially A Republican," in which she targets a rather unexpected group: Republicans.
"I've always felt this way about them," Coulter told HuffPost Live host Marc Lamont Hill when he asked about the reason for her turn against Republicans like Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.).
"It's just particularly painful," Coulter continued. "Look, if you're a liberal, if your brain is wired that way, ya know--fine. But in the case of people like Rubio and McCain, Lindsay Graham, Huckabee, I think an awful lot of it is so they will get favorable press in the media."
Coulter's comments refer to recent Republican infighting following the 16-day government shutdown.
"To be turning around and attacking your own, just become a Democrat!" she concluded.
Watch the video for the full interview.
..................................................................................................................................
Ann Coulter Bashes Republicans 'Attacking Their Own': 'Just Become A Democrat!'
By Catherine Taibi, October 28, 2013
Ann Coulter had strong words for certain Republicans when she visited HuffPost Live on Monday.
The conservative political commentator spoke about immigration reform, the 2016 presidential election and her new book, " Never Trust A Liberal Over 3: Especially A Republican," in which she targets a rather unexpected group: Republicans.
"I've always felt this way about them," Coulter told HuffPost Live host Marc Lamont Hill when he asked about the reason for her turn against Republicans like Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.).
"It's just particularly painful," Coulter continued. "Look, if you're a liberal, if your brain is wired that way, ya know--fine. But in the case of people like Rubio and McCain, Lindsay Graham, Huckabee, I think an awful lot of it is so they will get favorable press in the media."
Coulter's comments refer to recent Republican infighting following the 16-day government shutdown.
"To be turning around and attacking your own, just become a Democrat!" she concluded.
Watch the video for the full interview.
..................................................................................................................................
Point taken: the country is pulling apart due to the growing party loyalty of voters and is not due to redistricting
..................................................................................................................................
The political middle is dying. But it’s not redistricting’s fault.
By Chris Cillizza, October 29, 2013
In our piece Monday detailing the death of the political middle, we blamed two main factors for the movement of Congress toward the ideological poles: closed primaries in which the nominees are chosen by the most liberal/conservative voters and redistricting, which over the last two decades has largely worked to create as many safe districts — for both parties — as possible.
Emory University political science professor Alan Abramowitz wrote us to take issue with putting the blame for the death of the middle on redistricting. (Our friends at the Monkey Cage Blog took issue with our blame game too.) He wrote:
Here’s a look at how the states shook out — by victory margin — in the 1976 presidential election between Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter:
And here is that same chart for the 2012 race between President Obama and Mitt Romney:
Here’s a look at the presidential margins in House districts across the country in 1976:
And here it is for the 2012 election:
The point is clear. Yes, the political middle is dying (or dead). But the fact that so many states were decided by a close margin in the 1976 presidential race and so few states were decided by a close margin in 2012 affirms Abramowitz’s argument that the disappearance of the center is more about a broader polarization in American politics than about how congressional lines are drawn.
Point taken.
..................................................................................................................................
The political middle is dying. But it’s not redistricting’s fault.
By Chris Cillizza, October 29, 2013
In our piece Monday detailing the death of the political middle, we blamed two main factors for the movement of Congress toward the ideological poles: closed primaries in which the nominees are chosen by the most liberal/conservative voters and redistricting, which over the last two decades has largely worked to create as many safe districts — for both parties — as possible.
Emory University political science professor Alan Abramowitz wrote us to take issue with putting the blame for the death of the middle on redistricting. (Our friends at the Monkey Cage Blog took issue with our blame game too.) He wrote:
”If you compare the competitiveness of states and House districts today with the 1960s or 1970s, there are a lot fewer swing states and districts and a lot more safe or strongly D or R states and districts. So the country is pulling apart as well as Congress and it’s not a result of redistricting as the same trends are evident in the states as in House districts. There is no incentive for members of Congress in safe or strongly D or R districts or states to try to appeal to voters outside of their own party. And this trend is compounded by the growing party loyalty of voters so you don’t need a very strongly D or R state or district to feel pretty secure. That makes the primary the key election which reinforces the tendency to stick with your own party on votes.”And, to illustrate his point, Abramowitz included four charts comparing the relative competitiveness of states and House districts in 1976 and today.
Here’s a look at how the states shook out — by victory margin — in the 1976 presidential election between Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter:
And here is that same chart for the 2012 race between President Obama and Mitt Romney:
Here’s a look at the presidential margins in House districts across the country in 1976:
And here it is for the 2012 election:
The point is clear. Yes, the political middle is dying (or dead). But the fact that so many states were decided by a close margin in the 1976 presidential race and so few states were decided by a close margin in 2012 affirms Abramowitz’s argument that the disappearance of the center is more about a broader polarization in American politics than about how congressional lines are drawn.
Point taken.
..................................................................................................................................
"Republicans can scare away libertarian voters."
..................................................................................................................................
Most U.S. libertarians do not identify with Tea Party: survey
By Mary Wisniewski, October 28, 2013
Most American libertarians do not consider themselves part of the conservative Tea Party movement despite a public perception that the two political groups are linked, according to a national survey released on Tuesday.
Libertarians, who generally support maximizing individual rights and minimizing the role of government, differ sharply with the Tea Party and religious conservatives on issues such as abortion and decriminalization of marijuana, according to the survey by the non-partisan Public Religion Research Institute.
Sixty-one percent of libertarians do not identify themselves as part of the Tea Party, the survey showed. About 7 percent of the adult population is consistently libertarian and that includes 12 percent of those who describe themselves as Republicans.
"There's largely agreement on economic issues - the gap is in how libertarians approach social issues, " said Robert P. Jones, CEO of PRRI, which conducts an annual "American Values Survey" on political and social issues.
While the survey showed that libertarians tend to favor Republicans, they are a swing group that can turn away from the party if it starts to favor too much government spending or interference with individual liberties, said Brink Lindsey of the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank in Washington.
"Libertarians are not part of the Democratic Party's base, that's for sure, but they're not a reliable part of the Republican Party's vote," said Lindsey, who saw the survey. "Republicans can scare away libertarian voters."
He noted that the libertarian vote swung against Republicans in the 1992 presidential election, which included third party candidate Ross Perot, a businessman who favored a balanced budget and abortion rights. Both Perot and Republican incumbent George H. W. Bush lost to Democrat Bill Clinton.
In the current Virginia governor's race, Robert Sarvis, a libertarian who supports gun rights and same-sex unions, has the support of 11 percent of Republicans and 2 percent of Democrats, taking potential votes from front-running Democrat Terry McAuliffe and Republican state Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, according to a Quinnipiac University poll of likely voters released last week.
The PRRI survey identified libertarians through questions about their views on taxes and other policies, and by self-identification. A total of 13 percent of those surveyed called themselves libertarians - while 7 percent were inferred as consistent libertarians by how they answered certain questions. An additional 15 percent were seen as leaning libertarian.
Jones said it was crucial to understand libertarians since they will be an important part of conservative coalitions going forward. Most are under 50 and slightly more likely to vote in primaries than Republicans overall. More than two-thirds are men and nearly all are non-Hispanic whites.
Libertarians are more opposed to government involvement in economic policies than those affiliated with the Tea Party and Republicans overall, the survey found. For instance, 65 percent of libertarians were opposed to increasing the minimum wage, while 57 percent of Republicans overall supported it, the survey found.
Ninety-six percent of libertarians oppose President Barack Obama's landmark healthcare restructuring compared to 89 percent of Republicans.
But nearly 60 percent of libertarians oppose making it more difficult for a woman to get an abortion, while 58 percent of Republicans and those affiliated with the Tea Party favor such restrictions, according to the survey.
More than 70 percent of libertarians favored legalizing marijuana, while about 60 percent of Republicans and Tea Party members opposed such a move, the survey found.
Among libertarian voters who favor Republicans, U.S. Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky was the favorite potential presidential candidate with 26 percent support, while 18 percent preferred Senator Ted Cruz of Texas. Among Tea Party voters, Cruz was the favored candidate at 22 percent, with Paul at 13 percent.
The survey interviewed 2,317 adults and has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points.
..................................................................................................................................
Most U.S. libertarians do not identify with Tea Party: survey
By Mary Wisniewski, October 28, 2013
Most American libertarians do not consider themselves part of the conservative Tea Party movement despite a public perception that the two political groups are linked, according to a national survey released on Tuesday.
Libertarians, who generally support maximizing individual rights and minimizing the role of government, differ sharply with the Tea Party and religious conservatives on issues such as abortion and decriminalization of marijuana, according to the survey by the non-partisan Public Religion Research Institute.
Sixty-one percent of libertarians do not identify themselves as part of the Tea Party, the survey showed. About 7 percent of the adult population is consistently libertarian and that includes 12 percent of those who describe themselves as Republicans.
"There's largely agreement on economic issues - the gap is in how libertarians approach social issues, " said Robert P. Jones, CEO of PRRI, which conducts an annual "American Values Survey" on political and social issues.
While the survey showed that libertarians tend to favor Republicans, they are a swing group that can turn away from the party if it starts to favor too much government spending or interference with individual liberties, said Brink Lindsey of the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank in Washington.
"Libertarians are not part of the Democratic Party's base, that's for sure, but they're not a reliable part of the Republican Party's vote," said Lindsey, who saw the survey. "Republicans can scare away libertarian voters."
He noted that the libertarian vote swung against Republicans in the 1992 presidential election, which included third party candidate Ross Perot, a businessman who favored a balanced budget and abortion rights. Both Perot and Republican incumbent George H. W. Bush lost to Democrat Bill Clinton.
In the current Virginia governor's race, Robert Sarvis, a libertarian who supports gun rights and same-sex unions, has the support of 11 percent of Republicans and 2 percent of Democrats, taking potential votes from front-running Democrat Terry McAuliffe and Republican state Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, according to a Quinnipiac University poll of likely voters released last week.
The PRRI survey identified libertarians through questions about their views on taxes and other policies, and by self-identification. A total of 13 percent of those surveyed called themselves libertarians - while 7 percent were inferred as consistent libertarians by how they answered certain questions. An additional 15 percent were seen as leaning libertarian.
Jones said it was crucial to understand libertarians since they will be an important part of conservative coalitions going forward. Most are under 50 and slightly more likely to vote in primaries than Republicans overall. More than two-thirds are men and nearly all are non-Hispanic whites.
Libertarians are more opposed to government involvement in economic policies than those affiliated with the Tea Party and Republicans overall, the survey found. For instance, 65 percent of libertarians were opposed to increasing the minimum wage, while 57 percent of Republicans overall supported it, the survey found.
Ninety-six percent of libertarians oppose President Barack Obama's landmark healthcare restructuring compared to 89 percent of Republicans.
But nearly 60 percent of libertarians oppose making it more difficult for a woman to get an abortion, while 58 percent of Republicans and those affiliated with the Tea Party favor such restrictions, according to the survey.
More than 70 percent of libertarians favored legalizing marijuana, while about 60 percent of Republicans and Tea Party members opposed such a move, the survey found.
Among libertarian voters who favor Republicans, U.S. Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky was the favorite potential presidential candidate with 26 percent support, while 18 percent preferred Senator Ted Cruz of Texas. Among Tea Party voters, Cruz was the favored candidate at 22 percent, with Paul at 13 percent.
The survey interviewed 2,317 adults and has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points.
..................................................................................................................................
Going after "Senator Gridlock"
..................................................................................................................................
Mitch McConnell, political arsonist?
By Chris Cillizza, October 28, 2013
In Alison Lundergan Grimes’s first ad in the Kentucky Senate race, a narrator accuses Mitch McConnell of “light[ing] the house on fire and then claim[ing] credit for putting it out.” As those words are said, there is a house on screen being incinerated. Literally.
Check out the ad:
“Mitch McConnell has been going around Kentucky for the past week trying to rewrite history and deceive Kentucky voters, and Alison isn’t going to let him get away with it,” explained Mark Putnam, Grimes’s media consultant. “We’re setting down a marker early that Senator Gridlock caused this mess in Washington and will be held accountable.”
A few observations:
1. The ad will stand out and will get attention both in the state and outside it.When you set a house on fire in an ad and accuse the Senate minority leader of doing it — not literally but you get the idea — people will talk. That is, of course, at least part of the point. Grimes needs national attention — particularly from the Democratic donor class — to stay financially competitive with McConnell. And national donors loathe McConnell, so implying that he is single-handedly destroying the democratic process will appeal to them.
2. This is a very process-y ad. Aside from the arresting visual, the script focuses on procedural matters — noting that McConnell has called himself a “proud guardian of gridlock” and adding that he has “blocked” the Senate more than 400 times. Count us as generally skeptical that these sorts of process arguments work. Yes, people in Kentucky likely know that McConnell is the top Republican in the Senate but are they engaged enough to grasp the filibuster/hold rules? And given the conservative nature of the electorate in Kentucky, is being seen as a blockade for President Obama’s legislative priorities all that bad a thing? (To return to point No. 1, it’s uniquely possible that this ad was made and aired with a focus on the national Democratic donor base.)
3. Holy cow is this going to be a nasty race. When your first ad of the campaign accuses your opponent of symbolically burning down the government, it’s an indication that there aren’t going to be all that many positive ads coming down the pike. Again, this makes sense. Lundergan Grimes must persuade the electorate to fire someone they have been sending to Washington for the past three decades, and that’s no easy task. And, she and her campaign know that McConnell will be ruthless in trying to portray her as a tool of the national (liberal) Democratic Party. This is a fight-fire-with-fire moment. (Pun intended.)
..................................................................................................................................
Mitch McConnell, political arsonist?
By Chris Cillizza, October 28, 2013
In Alison Lundergan Grimes’s first ad in the Kentucky Senate race, a narrator accuses Mitch McConnell of “light[ing] the house on fire and then claim[ing] credit for putting it out.” As those words are said, there is a house on screen being incinerated. Literally.
Check out the ad:
“Mitch McConnell has been going around Kentucky for the past week trying to rewrite history and deceive Kentucky voters, and Alison isn’t going to let him get away with it,” explained Mark Putnam, Grimes’s media consultant. “We’re setting down a marker early that Senator Gridlock caused this mess in Washington and will be held accountable.”
A few observations:
1. The ad will stand out and will get attention both in the state and outside it.When you set a house on fire in an ad and accuse the Senate minority leader of doing it — not literally but you get the idea — people will talk. That is, of course, at least part of the point. Grimes needs national attention — particularly from the Democratic donor class — to stay financially competitive with McConnell. And national donors loathe McConnell, so implying that he is single-handedly destroying the democratic process will appeal to them.
2. This is a very process-y ad. Aside from the arresting visual, the script focuses on procedural matters — noting that McConnell has called himself a “proud guardian of gridlock” and adding that he has “blocked” the Senate more than 400 times. Count us as generally skeptical that these sorts of process arguments work. Yes, people in Kentucky likely know that McConnell is the top Republican in the Senate but are they engaged enough to grasp the filibuster/hold rules? And given the conservative nature of the electorate in Kentucky, is being seen as a blockade for President Obama’s legislative priorities all that bad a thing? (To return to point No. 1, it’s uniquely possible that this ad was made and aired with a focus on the national Democratic donor base.)
3. Holy cow is this going to be a nasty race. When your first ad of the campaign accuses your opponent of symbolically burning down the government, it’s an indication that there aren’t going to be all that many positive ads coming down the pike. Again, this makes sense. Lundergan Grimes must persuade the electorate to fire someone they have been sending to Washington for the past three decades, and that’s no easy task. And, she and her campaign know that McConnell will be ruthless in trying to portray her as a tool of the national (liberal) Democratic Party. This is a fight-fire-with-fire moment. (Pun intended.)
..................................................................................................................................
Monday, October 28, 2013
Let's hope that the women of Texas DO get mad enough to vote
..................................................................................................................................
GOP: Women Love Jumping Through Hoops
By Jason Stanford, October 27, 2013
Women of Texas, Republican Attorney General Greg Abbott is here to tell you how good you have it. In fact, he recently said, “I’m proud to say there is nobody in the state of Texas who has done more to fight to help women than I have in the past decade.” You’ll have to excuse the man. He’s running for governor, and it’s becoming clear that his right hand doesn’t know what the far-right hand is doing.
Abbott says he has prosecuted sex traffickers and collected $27 billion in child support. He deserves credit for doing his job, but the applause might be louder if his campaign weren’t lying about Sen. Davis’s record and giving a forum to sexist attacks on her.
He went trolling for e-mail addresses by circulating a petition that claimed, “Wendy Davis wants to bring gun control to Texas.” Hogwash. Among Davis’ pro-2nd Amendment votes is one giving the Attorney General the power to block local gun control laws. Let’s hope Abbott’s aim is better with a gun.
That lie quickly became a sideshow as thousands of people left comments on Abbott’s Facebook page that can’t be printed in newspapers. Abbott’s campaign deleted a couple of death threats but left up these and others like them: “She looks like a throw rug,” wrote one. “Piss on her,” suggested another. Someone called her a “whiney, panty waggin’ broad.” The comment “Someone needs to flush her where she belongs” was what passed for subtlety on this litany of online abuse.
This happened as voters started trickling into the polls to vote on constitutional amendments. Texans are always bragging, but no one can hold a candle to us when it comes to not voting. Texas has the worst voter participation rates in the entire country.
To Abbott, that’s a good start. Despite the fact that he can cite only two cases of voter impersonation in the last decade, Abbott pushed a law now in effect requiring voters to show a valid photo ID before voting. Wildly popular and seemingly logical, the law ignores real life. For example, two-thirds of Texas women do not have a photo ID that shows their current legal name, according to the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law. To vote, the names have to match.
This happened to me when I voted. My driver’s license spells out my middle name, whereas the voter file only uses the initial. I filled out a form stating that I, Jason Andrew Stanford, was indeed Jason A. Stanford, and was allowed to vote. At best, Voter ID poses a useless bureaucratic annoyance to voters. At worst, it’s another reason not to vote in a state where hardly anyone votes.
The women who have different names on their photo ID and their voter registration cards have it better than the Texans who don’t have an ID at all, says Sondra Haltom, the president of Empower the Vote Texas, a non-profit defending voters’ rights. She found that the Secretary of State, which runs Texas elections, says 795,955 voters lack either a state ID or a driver’s license.
Many of these voters, Haltom has found, are little old ladies who don’t drive or need an ID—except now to vote—and now they have long since lost the supporting documentation needed to get an ID card.
“Voter ID disproportionately affects women simply because women more often change their names when they get married and then change them back when they get divorced,” said Haltom. “I think this is an unintended consequence that those who wrote this law didn’t think through the details. Now we have the unintended problem of women having to jump through hoops in order to vote.”
If there’s one thing women like it’s having to jump through hoops simply because they’re women, especially to prevent something that almost never happens. And Abbott is adding insult to inconvenience by running a deceitful, negative campaign that runs down Wendy Davis partly because of her gender.
Any more defending from you, Greg, and the women of Texas might get mad enough to vote. Heckuva job, Abbott.
..................................................................................................................................
GOP: Women Love Jumping Through Hoops
By Jason Stanford, October 27, 2013
Women of Texas, Republican Attorney General Greg Abbott is here to tell you how good you have it. In fact, he recently said, “I’m proud to say there is nobody in the state of Texas who has done more to fight to help women than I have in the past decade.” You’ll have to excuse the man. He’s running for governor, and it’s becoming clear that his right hand doesn’t know what the far-right hand is doing.
Abbott says he has prosecuted sex traffickers and collected $27 billion in child support. He deserves credit for doing his job, but the applause might be louder if his campaign weren’t lying about Sen. Davis’s record and giving a forum to sexist attacks on her.
He went trolling for e-mail addresses by circulating a petition that claimed, “Wendy Davis wants to bring gun control to Texas.” Hogwash. Among Davis’ pro-2nd Amendment votes is one giving the Attorney General the power to block local gun control laws. Let’s hope Abbott’s aim is better with a gun.
That lie quickly became a sideshow as thousands of people left comments on Abbott’s Facebook page that can’t be printed in newspapers. Abbott’s campaign deleted a couple of death threats but left up these and others like them: “She looks like a throw rug,” wrote one. “Piss on her,” suggested another. Someone called her a “whiney, panty waggin’ broad.” The comment “Someone needs to flush her where she belongs” was what passed for subtlety on this litany of online abuse.
This happened as voters started trickling into the polls to vote on constitutional amendments. Texans are always bragging, but no one can hold a candle to us when it comes to not voting. Texas has the worst voter participation rates in the entire country.
To Abbott, that’s a good start. Despite the fact that he can cite only two cases of voter impersonation in the last decade, Abbott pushed a law now in effect requiring voters to show a valid photo ID before voting. Wildly popular and seemingly logical, the law ignores real life. For example, two-thirds of Texas women do not have a photo ID that shows their current legal name, according to the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law. To vote, the names have to match.
This happened to me when I voted. My driver’s license spells out my middle name, whereas the voter file only uses the initial. I filled out a form stating that I, Jason Andrew Stanford, was indeed Jason A. Stanford, and was allowed to vote. At best, Voter ID poses a useless bureaucratic annoyance to voters. At worst, it’s another reason not to vote in a state where hardly anyone votes.
The women who have different names on their photo ID and their voter registration cards have it better than the Texans who don’t have an ID at all, says Sondra Haltom, the president of Empower the Vote Texas, a non-profit defending voters’ rights. She found that the Secretary of State, which runs Texas elections, says 795,955 voters lack either a state ID or a driver’s license.
Many of these voters, Haltom has found, are little old ladies who don’t drive or need an ID—except now to vote—and now they have long since lost the supporting documentation needed to get an ID card.
“Voter ID disproportionately affects women simply because women more often change their names when they get married and then change them back when they get divorced,” said Haltom. “I think this is an unintended consequence that those who wrote this law didn’t think through the details. Now we have the unintended problem of women having to jump through hoops in order to vote.”
If there’s one thing women like it’s having to jump through hoops simply because they’re women, especially to prevent something that almost never happens. And Abbott is adding insult to inconvenience by running a deceitful, negative campaign that runs down Wendy Davis partly because of her gender.
Any more defending from you, Greg, and the women of Texas might get mad enough to vote. Heckuva job, Abbott.
..................................................................................................................................
An astounding representation of the situation in Congress!
..................................................................................................................................
The death of the political middle, in 1 PowerPoint slide
By Chris Cillizza, October 28, 2013
Looking for the political middle in Congress? It’s gone.
Check out this amazing chart courtesy of Bill McInturff of GOP polling firm Public Opinion Strategies — that uses National Journal’s vote ratings to illustrate the decline and near-disappearance of the political middle over the past three decades.
In 1982, there were 344 Members whose voting records fell somewhere between the most conservative voting Democrat and the most liberal voting Republican in the House. Thirty years later, there were 11. That means that in 1982 the centrists — or at least those who by voting record were somewhere near the middle of their respective parties — comprised 79 percent of the House. In 2012 they made up 2.5 percent of the House. So, yeah.
There are any number of reasons for this disappearance — partisan gerrymandering and closed primaries being the two most obvious — but the numbers are unbelievably stark, particularly when you consider that roughly 30 percent of the electorate consider themselves political independents. (According to exit polling, 29 percent of people named themselves independents in the 2008 and 2012 presidential elections.)
The slide above also explains why there will be no grand or even big bargain on debt and spending — or much of anything else — anytime soon. The political incentive to make deals simply does not exist in the House and, in fact, there is almost always a disincentive for members to work across the aisle. (This is less true in the Senate where a centrist coalition — Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, Kelly Ayotte, Joe Manchin, Mark Pryor, Mark Begich etc — exists although that coalition has shrunk in recent years too.)
The deal-makers — as we have seen from the last month in the House — are largely gone. The two people who do seem capable of crafting deals — Vice President Joe Biden and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell — come from a different time in politics. (Biden was elected to the Senate in 1972, McConnell in 1984.) The middle’s voice in the House is so soft as to be almost non-existent. And it’s hard to see that changing — at least in the near term.
All of which means one thing: No deal(s).
..................................................................................................................................
The death of the political middle, in 1 PowerPoint slide
By Chris Cillizza, October 28, 2013
Looking for the political middle in Congress? It’s gone.
Check out this amazing chart courtesy of Bill McInturff of GOP polling firm Public Opinion Strategies — that uses National Journal’s vote ratings to illustrate the decline and near-disappearance of the political middle over the past three decades.
In 1982, there were 344 Members whose voting records fell somewhere between the most conservative voting Democrat and the most liberal voting Republican in the House. Thirty years later, there were 11. That means that in 1982 the centrists — or at least those who by voting record were somewhere near the middle of their respective parties — comprised 79 percent of the House. In 2012 they made up 2.5 percent of the House. So, yeah.
There are any number of reasons for this disappearance — partisan gerrymandering and closed primaries being the two most obvious — but the numbers are unbelievably stark, particularly when you consider that roughly 30 percent of the electorate consider themselves political independents. (According to exit polling, 29 percent of people named themselves independents in the 2008 and 2012 presidential elections.)
The slide above also explains why there will be no grand or even big bargain on debt and spending — or much of anything else — anytime soon. The political incentive to make deals simply does not exist in the House and, in fact, there is almost always a disincentive for members to work across the aisle. (This is less true in the Senate where a centrist coalition — Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, Kelly Ayotte, Joe Manchin, Mark Pryor, Mark Begich etc — exists although that coalition has shrunk in recent years too.)
The deal-makers — as we have seen from the last month in the House — are largely gone. The two people who do seem capable of crafting deals — Vice President Joe Biden and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell — come from a different time in politics. (Biden was elected to the Senate in 1972, McConnell in 1984.) The middle’s voice in the House is so soft as to be almost non-existent. And it’s hard to see that changing — at least in the near term.
All of which means one thing: No deal(s).
..................................................................................................................................
Sunday, October 27, 2013
Let’s use some common sense about the GMO labels
..................................................................................................................................
The proponents say that the GMO labels won’t cost anything. Let’s think about this, though. Are those labels going to appear out of thin air? Hardly– they have to come from somewhere! Somebody has to design them– that’s a cost. Somebody will have to decide where on the packaging they will be placed– that’s a cost. They will usually be printed using ink, and the ink will cost money– that’s a cost. Governmental bodies will have to rule on all those points— that’s a cost. Cost + cost + cost + cost = COSTS!
So don’t try to tell us that the labels won’t cost anything. There are always costs involved with things like this!
..................................................................................................................................
The proponents say that the GMO labels won’t cost anything. Let’s think about this, though. Are those labels going to appear out of thin air? Hardly– they have to come from somewhere! Somebody has to design them– that’s a cost. Somebody will have to decide where on the packaging they will be placed– that’s a cost. They will usually be printed using ink, and the ink will cost money– that’s a cost. Governmental bodies will have to rule on all those points— that’s a cost. Cost + cost + cost + cost = COSTS!
So don’t try to tell us that the labels won’t cost anything. There are always costs involved with things like this!
..................................................................................................................................
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)