Fixing the U.S. economy is much on everyone's mind these days. But mostly those thoughts focus on the acute problems, not the chronic ones that are ultimately behind the acute problems. We naturally worry more about the immediate crises - the fact that so many millions have no jobs and are living on food stamps - than about the long-standing economic issues, which range from stagnant wages to environmental unsustainability, from deferred maintenance on our social and physical infrastructure to poverty and income inequality, from resource waste to overconsumption.  Fixing the economy - really fixing it - can't be done in isolation from the world economy or with disregard of the environment. Nor, obviously, can it be done without curbing predation and pillage by the powers-that-be. And that, needless to say, is something which will take more than a month of Sundays to achieve.

But it's the end of the weekend and all that seriousness is such a drag. So let's take a look at something superficial and fun, changing our currency, just the look of it, not its value.

Although bigger off-center portraits, security threads, microprinting, optically variable ink and watermarks were added to our currency starting in the late 1990s, and we'll be seeing a made-over high-tech $100 bill in circulaton come February, a truly thorough redesign of U.S. currency with new faces hasn't occurred since the 1920s, culminating in 1929 when the government shrank the earlier "horse-blanket" notes by 25 percent to save paper.

After a trip to Brazil in 2007, Richard Smith decided to initiate the Dollar ReDe$ign Project: "We want to rebrand the US Dollar, rebuild financial confidence and revive our failing economy." Well, OK. Good luck. That's a rather taller order than merely retrieving our currency from its stodginess. Smith collected 42 submissions last year for redesigns, ultimately naming Kyle L. Thompson as the winner. Below is pictured the work of 2009 runner-up Istvan Banyal.

If you're interested, and if you hurry, you can vote on this year's submissions. The deadline is Sept. 30. You can also submit your own designs for 2011.

Here are five choices from the 60 entrants in the redesign contest for 2010:

From Carlos Carrilo

From Michaela Gallardo

From Mark Gartland

From Dowling Duncan

From Vincent Kettering

• • • • •

At Daily Kos on this date in 2007:

Welcome to another fine Sundae Bar edition of Diary Rescue. Tonight's servers are grog, Purple Priestess, dadanation, vcmvo2, srkp23, and ybruti, with sunspark says running the soft serve machine and mixing things perfectly for your enjoyment.

It's September 15. On this date in 1964 "Gilligan's Island" premiered on television. I'm not sure if they ever had any ice cream, but I'll bet the Professor could have invented it for them if they didn't.

Here are tonight's delicious goodies floating in bowls of frozen yumminess made fresh for you by today's DR Sundae team. Enjoy them and send their authors all kinds of kudos.

In the Hot Fudge Politics category:

• chichagof introduces us to the Democratic Alaskan Senate candidate in AK Sen, I had brunch with Scott McAdams. (vcmvo2)
• snapples asks the question, Does a 20 Year Old Have More Political Courage Than You? How will you answer? (vcmvo2)
• First-time diarist Cats r Flyfishn has many reasons to say I Want My Country Back. (ybruti)

In the Historical Banana Split category:

• In a frightening story from the Cold War, Johnny Venom presents a reason for us all to say Thankyou Petrov for not killing me and my friends and family. (Purple Priestess)
• Is contemporary poetry socially conscious? RedPencil analyzes that subject in Ginsberg's Howl: A Cry for Revolutionary Poetry. (grog)
• dsteffen teaches a superb history lesson in this installment of How regulation came to be: El Cortito -- the short hoe. (srkp23)

In the Strawberries, Pineapples and Random Toppings category:

• Socratic Method relates a story about taking in his son's friend who has fallen on hard times which gives new meaning to the phrase "charity begins in the home": How Bleeding Hearts Pay Off. (grog)
• rturner229, a teacher and former journalist, insists that It's not education reform, it's a teacher witch hunt. (ybruti)

In the Nuts and Gummies of the Economy category:

• By examining the role of government taonow explains How companies make great profits in a lousy economy. (ybruti)
• jamess provides graphs to show why The Rich just keep getting Richer, and the rest of us.... (ybruti)

In the Whipped Cream of Book Reviewscategory:

• Cassiodorus presents a book review examining the concept of ecosocialism during Today's anticapitalist meetup: Joel Kovel, The Enemy of Nature. (srkp23)

and finally, for a nice little cherry on top:

jotter has High Impact Diaries: September 25, 2010 and High Impact Diaries: September 18-24, 2010 and sardonyx brings tonight's Top Comments: Mostly Comments Edition.

Oh, and one more September 26 item:

On this date also, in in 1962 and 1969 respectively, "The Beverly Hillbillies" and "The Brady Bunch" premiered. Our nation's SAT scores are still struggling to recover.

Don't hesitate even for a microsecond to make your own sundaes and promote your favorite diaries (even your own) in the Open Thread. That's what Open Threads (and Sundae Bars) are for. (At least this one.)

Let's say you have an existing product that needs improvement. You come up with a replacement you're really excited about. After more than a decade (PDF), the replacement product is better than the original 17% of the time. It's worse 37% of the time.

At this point, if you choose to plow forward with the new product without stepping back and sincerely trying to figure out what lessons can be learned from the respective successes of each product, you're proving one of two things about yourself. Either you're really, really stupid, or you have a motivation separate from the question of quality.

That's where the question of school reform stands now -- charter schools, of course, are the new product that is worse more than twice as often as it's better. And yet they are the favored approach of Education Secretary Arne Duncan, a large cadre of super-wealthy donors, and many influential reporters. They're touted in the new film Waiting for Superman (which I haven't seen, won't pay to see, and about which I'd refer you to Dana Goldstein's excellent article in The Nation). They're everywhere -- and as Nicholas Lemann writes in the New Yorker:

It should raise questions when an enormous, complicated realm of life takes on the characteristics of a stock drama.

The issue is not whether schools should be improved. Under almost any circumstances the answer would be yes; under current circumstances in the US the answer is definitely. The issue is how improvement should be carried out. Of course there are fantastic charter schools out there, and ones that are doing excellent work serving specific populations. There are lessons to learn from those schools. Then, there are also lessons to learn from many public schools, but somehow we hear a lot less about that. We also tend not to hear enough about how many of the most successful charter schools are benefiting both from large infusions of money that public schools don't get and from extremely motivated students and parents.

Unfortunately, by now the forces arrayed behind charter schools as the answer are so great that before we can even embark on the project of real improvement, we have to identify the ideology (and the funding) underpinning the charter schools-or-bust movement and make sure the facts are known.

First of all, charter schools are big business, and they're often extremely sketchy business. The charter schools that get the publicity are often the ones started by an educator with a vision, run by a small group of true believers. Those schools exist, and for the students who have access to them, they are a wonderful thing. But evidence suggests they're outnumbered by schools like these:

City Controller Alan Butkovitz yesterday blasted the Philadelphia School District's Charter School Office for failing "to monitor charter schools," which spend millions in taxpayers' dollars.

Butkovitz released a scathing report citing financial mismanagement, excessive executive salaries and "opportunities for possible fraud" at 13 charter schools his office investigated over the last 14 months.

"Many charter schools, through leasing agreements and associated nonprofits, are transferring taxpayer-funded assets to nonprofits that are not accountable to the school district," the report said in one of its key findings.

Imagine Schools runs 71 charter schools in 11 states and Washington DC.

But regulators in some states have found that Imagine has elbowed the charter holders out of virtually all school decision making — hiring and firing principals and staff members, controlling and profiting from school real estate, and retaining fees under contracts that often guarantee Imagine’s management in perpetuity.

The arrangements, they say, allow Imagine to use public money with little oversight. "Under either charter law or traditional nonprofit law, there really is no way an entity should end up on both sides of business transactions," said Marc Dean Millot, publisher of the report K-12 Leads and a former president of the National Charter Schools Alliance, a trade association, now defunct, for the charter school movement.

"Imagine works to dominate the board of the charter holder, and then it does a deal with the board it dominates — and that cannot be an arm’s length transaction," he said.

-snip-

The lack of status as a federally approved nonprofit group is proving to be one of Imagine’s biggest challenges. So it often gets involved with schools at their inception, recruiting board members or hitching its wagon to nonprofit groups that can obtain a charter, as it did in Las Vegas, where it teamed with 100 Black Men of Las Vegas to open an elementary school, the 100 Academy of Excellence. The school opened in 2006, and the county school board soon began documenting problems. It found the school’s bookkeeping under Imagine to be lax, and it said that the school lacked enough licensed teachers.

The school has had three principals in four years, two of whom were pressured to resign after complaining that there was not enough money for essentials like textbooks and a school nurse. The state said that by paying Imagine for necessities like furniture and computers, the school had violated regulations requiring competitive bidding. It further violated state law by running a deficit, which left it in debt to Imagine.

(Read more about Imagine here.)

Expanding this system will make a few people rich, but that's not what the public education system is supposed to do. Yet when you look at the people pushing for charter schools broadly as a system, it's money every which way, and somehow we're supposed to overlook that. Heaven knows lots of major media organizations do:

Consider, for example, arecent article in the New York Times depicting the battle in three New York state Senate primary races.  On the one hand were hedge fund managers and supporters of non-unionized charter schools who were identified as favoring "education reform" on four occasions, "school reform" on another, and simply "reform" on yet another.  Opponents of charter schools were never given that label, even though teacher unions and others who don’t think the track record of charter schools is very good in fact favor lots of reforms – such as teacher peer review to weed out bad educators; rigorous national standards; expanded pre-K programs; reducing economic and racial isolation in schools, and on and on.

What’s particularly galling in the Times story is that in any other context, it is doubtful that the paper would have employed the good-guy "reformer" label to a group of extremely wealthy hedge fund managers who wrote enormous checks to influence the political process, while withholding any positive label from a grass roots effort by workers to resist change that they thought would be harmful to both them and their clients (schoolchildren.) 

That, of course, is one of the central things going on here: big money going after yet another union, this time in the name of what's good for kids. Even when the evidence suggests it isn't what's best for kids, and while much is made of the waiting lists at some charter schools, many parents don't seem to think much of this so-called reform either.

Which brings us to elections. Even as the New York Times and the Washington Post and Arne Duncan and hedge fund managers are all about charter schools -- not just the 17% of charter schools that are outperforming traditional public schools, either -- charter school and other education "reform" advocates were recently dealt some losses at the polls in the Washington DC mayoral primary and the three New York state senate primaries mentioned above. Again, it's portrayed as "reformers" vs. teachers unions. But, as Diane Ravitch writes of the DC mayoral race:

The election was widely viewed as a referendum on Rhee, who attained a national reputation in her role as schools' chancellor. Her allies considered her bold and combative; her opponents considered her divisive and mean-spirited. In the closing days of the Fenty campaign, she went to the districts where Fenty had his strongest support—the largely white districts in the city's Northwest section—to rally voters.

When the results came in, Fenty was trounced in largely black districts. In Wards 7 and 8, his opponent, Vincent Gray, won 82 percent of the vote. In Northwest Washington, where white voters predominate, Fenty won 76 percent of the vote. Fenty decisively lost the black vote and decisively won the white vote. D.C. public schools are about 5 percent white, so it is a reasonable supposition that the anti-Fenty vote was fueled to a large degree by parents of children in the public schools. Gray won handily, 53 percent to 46 percent.

Journalists attributed Fenty's loss to the power of the teachers' union, but such an explanation implies that black voters, even in the privacy of the voting booth, lack the capacity to make an informed choice. When the Tea Party wins a race, journalists don't write about who controlled their vote, but about a voter revolt; they acknowledge that those who turned out to vote had made a conscious decision. Yet when black voters, by large margins, chose Vincent Gray over Adrian Fenty, journalists found it difficult to accept that the voters were acting on their own, not as puppets of the teachers' union.

It's probably too much to hope that we could have a discussion about education that puts the things most responsible for academic performance on the table and tries to deal with root causes like poverty and inequality. But it's at least time for a discussion about education that deals honestly with the evidence, that doesn't put billions of dollars behind a predetermined yet deeply flawed choice, that takes lessons from traditional public schools as willingly as from elsewhere, that does not actively seek to lay problems at the feet of teachers and their unions. And it's time to lay bare the ideology underpinning the relentless push for charter schools. Unless we're willing to buy that these people are just that stupid.

   This Rescue Diary covers the period from 6 PM, Saturday, 9/25 to 6:00 PM EDT, Sunday, 9/26

Today's Menu Includes :
26 Diaries Overall

- 5 On House races

- Covering 4 individual Districts in 3 states

- 6 On Senate races

- Representing 4 different states

- 8 On Various election races and ballot issues

- Encompassing Governor, Secretary of State, Local, and more

- 7 General election-related diaries

And be sure to follow the Election Diary Rescue on Twitter

(Tonight's compilation and more after the jump............)

The Wonk Room at Think Progress has been taking a look at Republican Senate candidates on the issue of climate change, and it should come as no surprise that when it comes to Republicans and science, never the twain shall meet.

A comprehensive Wonk Room survey of the Republican candidates for the U.S. Senate finds that nearly all dispute the scientific consensus that the United States must act to fight global warming pollution. In May, 2010, the National Academies of Science reported to Congress that “the U.S. should act now to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and develop a national strategy to adapt to the inevitable impacts of climate change” because global warming is “caused largely by human activities, and poses significant risks for — and in many cases is already affecting — a broad range of human and natural systems.”

This finding is shared by scientific bodies around the world. However, in the alternate reality of the fossil-fueled right wing, climate science is confused or a conspiracy, and policies to limit pollution would destroy the economy.

Remarkably, of the dozens of Republicans vying for the 37 Senate seats in the 2010 election, only one — Rep. Mike Castle of Delaware — supports climate action. Even former climate advocates Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) and Rep. Mark Kirk (R-IL) now toe the science-doubting party line. If Castle loses his primary on Tuesday to Tea Party candidate Christine O’Donnell, the GOP slate will be unanimous in opposition to a green economy.

Castle, of course, was teabagged out his race, leaving the Republicans in unanimous opposition to reality. The Wonk Room's Brad Johnson has compiled the statements of GOP Senate nominees, so for those that care about the actual science of scientific issues, let's compare some of those statements with those of actual scientists.

• Sharron Angle, Republican Senate nominee from Nevada:

  I don't, however, buy into the whole ... man-caused global warming, man-caused climate change mantra of the left. I believe that there's not sound science to back that up.

  The National Academy of Sciences:

  As part of its most comprehensive study of climate change to date, the National Research Council today issued three reports emphasizing why the U.S. should act now to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and develop a national strategy to adapt to the inevitable impacts of climate change.  The reports by the Research Council, the operating arm of the National Academy of Sciences and National Academy of Engineering, are part of a congressionally requested suite of five studies known as America's Climate Choices....

  The compelling case that climate change is occurring and is caused in large part by human activities is based on a strong, credible body of evidence, says Advancing the Science of Climate Change, one of the new reports.  While noting that there is always more to learn and that the scientific process is never "closed," the report emphasizes that multiple lines of evidence support scientific understanding of climate change.  The core phenomenon, scientific questions, and hypotheses have been examined thoroughly and have stood firm in the face of serious debate and careful evaluation of alternative explanations.

  "Climate change is occurring, is caused largely by human activities, and poses significant risks for — and in many cases is already affecting — a broad range of human and natural systems," the report concludes.  It calls for a new era of climate change science where an emphasis is placed on "fundamental, use-inspired" research, which not only improves understanding of the causes and consequences of climate change but also is useful to decision makers at the local, regional, national, and international levels acting to limit and adapt to climate change.  Seven cross-cutting research themes are identified to support this more comprehensive and integrative scientific enterprise.

• Ken Buck, Republican Senate nominee from Colorado:

  I’ll tell you, I have looked at global warming, now climate change, from both sides. While I think the earth is warming, I don’t think that man-made causes are the primary factor. I am one of those people that Al Gore refers to as a skeptic.

  (At about the 24:00 mark of this video.)

  The American Geophysical Union:

  The Earth's climate is now clearly out of balance and is warming. Many components of the climate system-including the temperatures of the atmosphere, land and ocean, the extent of sea ice and mountain glaciers, the sea level, the distribution of precipitation, and the length of seasons-are now changing at rates and in patterns that are not natural and are best explained by the increased atmospheric abundances of greenhouse gases and aerosols generated by human activity during the 20th century. Global average surface temperatures increased on average by about 0.6¡C over the period 1956-2006. As of 2006, eleven of the previous twelve years were warmer than any others since 1850. The observed rapid retreat of Arctic sea ice is expected to continue and lead to the disappearance of summertime ice within this century. Evidence from most oceans and all continents except Antarctica shows warming attributable to human activities.

• Linda McMahon, Republican Senate nominee from Connecticut:

  I think there's evidence to the positive and to the contrary about global warming.

  The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration:

  The 2009 State of the Climate report released today draws on data for 10 key climate indicators that all point to the same finding: the scientific evidence that our world is warming is unmistakable. More than 300 scientists from 160 research groups in 48 countries contributed to the report, which confirms that the past decade was the warmest on record and that the Earth has been growing warmer over the last 50 years.

• Marco Rubio, Republican Senate nominee from Florida:

  In an interview with the Tribune on that subject Friday, Rubio called Crist "a believer in man-made global warming."

  "I don't think there's the scientific evidence to justify it," Rubio said.

  Asked whether he accepts the scientific evidence that the global climate is undergoing change, he responded, "The climate is always changing. The climate is never static. The question is whether it's caused by man-made activity and whether it justifies economically destructive government regulation."

  American Association for the Advancement of Science (pdf):

  The scientific evidence is clear: global climate change caused by human activities is occurring now, and it is a growing threat to society.

• Rand Paul, Republican Senate nominee from Kentucky:

  Now Osama bin Laden had a quote yesterday. He’s says he’s after the climate change as well. It’s a bigger issue, we need to watch ‘em. Not only because it may or may not be true, but they’re making up their facts to fit their conclusions. They’ve already caught ‘em doing this.

  (At the 2:56 mark of this video)

  Science:

  Pennsylvania State University has completed the second half of a two-part investigation of Michael Mann's role in the so-called "Climategate" affair. The 2-month inquiry has found that Mann is innocent of the remaining charge of scientific misconduct that had been raised by e-mails uncovered in November....

  A previous investigation found him innocent of suppressing data, deleting e-mails, and misusing confidential information.

  House of Commons Science and Technology Committee (pdf):

  In addition, insofar as we have been able to consider accusations
  of dishonesty—for example, Professor Jones’s alleged attempt to “hide the decline”— we consider that there is no case to answer. Within our limited inquiry and the evidence we took, the scientific reputation of Professor Jones and CRU remains intact. We have found no reason in this unfortunate episode to challenge the scientific consensus as expressed by Professor Beddington, that “global warming is happening [and] that it is induced by human activity”.

• Pat Toomey, Republican Senate nominee from Pennsylvania:

  There is much debate in the scientific community as to the precise sources of global warming.

  American Chemical Society:

  Careful and comprehensive scientific assessments have clearly demonstrated that the Earth’s climate system is changing rapidly in response to growing atmospheric burdens of greenhouse gases and absorbing aerosol particles (IPCC, 2007). There is very little room for doubt that observed climate trends are due to human activities. The threats are serious and action is urgently needed to mitigate the risks of climate change.

• Roy Blunt, Republican Senate nominee from Missouri:

  There isn’t any real science to say we are altering the climate path of the earth.

  American Meteorological Society (pdf):

  Indeed, strong observational evidence and results from modeling studies indicate that, at least over the last 50 years, human activities are a major contributor to climate change.

  Direct human impact is through changes in the concentration of certain trace gases such as carbon dioxide, chlorofluorocarbons, methane, nitrous oxide, ozone, and water vapor, known collectively as greenhouse gases.

• Dino Rossi, Republican Senate nominee from Washington:

  I believe the Earth is warming. There is still debate in the scientific community about the level of human impact on climate change, which is why I think the more important question is what we are actually going to do in order to reduce carbon emissions. Promoting new technology and providing incentives to cut emissions is the best way to accomplish that goal.

  The city of Seattle admits that personal efforts to be efficient have had far more impact on greenhouse gas reduction than government regulations. My approach is to allow individuals to make choices.

  American Physical Society (pdf):

  The evidence is incontrovertible: Global warming is occurring. If no mitigating actions are taken, significant disruptions in the Earth’s physical and ecological systems, social systems, security and human health are likely to occur. We must reduce emissions of greenhouse gases beginning now.

• Carly Fiorina, Republican Senate nominee from California:

  Q: Is climate change real?

  Fiorina: I’m not sure. I think we should have the confidence and courage to test the science.

  (At 0:08 of this video)

  Joint statement by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Chemical Society, American Geophysical Union, American Institute of Biological Sciences, American Meteorological Society, American Society of Agronomy, American Society of Plant Biologists, American Statistical Association, Association of Ecosystem Research Centers, Botanical Society of America, Crop Science Society of America, Ecological Society of America, Natural Science Collections Alliance, Organization of Biological Field Stations, Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics, Society of Systematic Biologists, Soil Science Society of America, University Corporation for Atmospheric Research:

  Observations throughout the world make it clear that climate change is occurring, and rigorous scientific research demonstrates that the greenhouse gases emitted by human activities are the primary driver. These conclusions are based on multiple independent lines of evidence, and contrary assertions are inconsistent with an objective assessment of the vast body of peer-reviewed science. Moreover, there is strong evidence that ongoing climate change will have broad impacts on society, including the global economy and on the environment.

This would be funny if it weren't so dangerous. This isn't a debate between Republicans and Democrats about what to do about climate change, it's a debate between Republicans and reality about the very existence of climate change. And it's clear that no amount of science will convince Republicans of something they just don't want to believe. The question is whether the voters want to listen to the scientists or to those whose beliefs are not based on anything remotely rational or factual. And it's only the future of the world as we know it that's at stake.

The reversal of fortunes for Democrats in the Delaware Senate campaign two weeks ago, precipitated by Christine O’Donnell’s upset victory in the Republican primary, has reinvigorated an old watercooler discussion among Democratic pundits. Are Dems better off with less-polished, reactionary candidates winning Republican nominations? In the same vein, would Democrats be better off if Sarah Palin were to win the 2012 Republican nomination for President? From where I sit, the answer is a big “yes” to both questions.

Not everyone agrees. For example, Peter Daou and Matthew Yglesias have articulated the two main arguments against Democrats benefiting from the rise of Republicans like O'Donnell. Daou has been warning Democrats not to cheer for tea party candidates, and other Palin-type reactionaries, because they actually can win general elections (for example, Ken Buck in Colorado and Sharron Angle in Nevada). Yglesias has argued that the rise of Palin and reactionary right-wing candidates in Republican primaries is a net negative, because it means that when Republicans eventually take back power, it will result in more damaging policy outcomes.

I believe Yglesias and Daou are underestimating the impact of less popular Republican candidates on both electoral and legislative outcomes. For example, take Sarah Palin. Pollster.com shows Palin at 38.0% favorable, and 51.1% unfavorable, for a net unfavorable of 13.1%. By contrast, Romney is at a net 0.4% unfavorable, and Huckabee is at a net 5.7% favorable. As such, while it is likely that Palin is more reactionary than either Romney or Huckabee, if Palin were to win the Republican nomination in 2012, it would be a positive for Democrats. In fact, even if she were to go on to become President, I say better her than either Romney or Huckabee.

Allow me to explain both points further:

1. Less electable: No matter how much grassroots energy a person can generate, Palin’s favorability rating (which, admittedly, can change) would make her a much less formidable opponent for President Obama in 2012 than any other top-tier Republican (with the possible exception of Newt Gingrich). She would still have a shot to win, as anyone who gets nominated by a major party can win the Presidency in the right combination of circumstances. However, she would be less likely to win. Additionally, she would likely have a less positive impact on Republicans downticket, putting Democrats in a better position in the 2012, 2014, and 2016 congressional elections.

2. Less dangerous if elected: Even if Palin were to win the White House, it is likely she would start her Presidency (shudder) with weaker poll numbers than any of the other potential Republican Presidents. This would make it relatively more difficult for her to pass damaging legislative initiatives than it would for any of the other potential Republican Presidents.

The ability of a President to pass legislation through Congress is significantly dependent upon his or her popularity. This is even the case with George W. Bush, who is often thought of as a President who was able to pass a lot of legislation despite his low popularity. However, most of Bush Jr.’s major legislative initiatives passed Congress from 2001-2003, during the peak of his popularity. To a very significant degree, political power is derived from popularity.

The same goes for competence--less competent Republican candidates and elected officials are better for Democratic and progressive causes. Again, George W. Bush is not an effective counterpoint to that statement. Ask yourself if a more competent version of Bush would have resulted in such strong elections for Democrats in 2006 or 2008. Ask yourself if a more competent version of Bush, with the same ideological views, would have been able to push the envelope of public policy even further to the right. A more competent version of Bush would have been more dangerous to progressives.

Ultimately, a two-party system is a zero sum game. One side is better off when the other side is unpopular and incompetent. As such, no matter how disturbing the trend may appear on the surface, Democrats are better off as a result of the continuing rise of Palin and O’Donnell-type candidates within the Republican Party. Even if they are more reactionary, the less popular and less competent Republicans are, the better the situation is for us.

• Fort Hood Sentinel:

  A Soldier who bounded forward to recover wounded during an ambush in Afghanistan will be the Army’s first living Medal of Honor recipient since the Vietnam conflict.

  Staff Sgt. Salvatore Giunta got a call Sept. 9 from President Barack Obama, letting him know he will be a Medal of Honor recipient because of the efforts he made in Afghanistan to save the lives of fellow Soldiers, even though doing so put his own life in the balance.

  It was for Giunta’s actions, Oct. 25, 2007, in the Korengal Valley’s Gatigal Spur in Afghanistan, that he earned the nation’s highest honor. It was then, serving as part of 1st Platoon, Battle Company, 2/503 (Airborne) Infantry, that he and his team were ambushed by anti-Afghan forces armed with AK-47s, machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades.

  "Everyone in our squad had a round go through their equipment or clothes in some way, or was wounded or killed," said Spc. Kaleb Casey.

• Rising Republican star, Rep. Kevin McCarthy, of California:

  The other fact is, no one has a proposal up to cut Social Security.

  Not that he's known for knowing what he's talking about, but perhaps McCarthy should read the new book "Young Guns: A New Generation of Conservative Leaders," which features the budget plan proposed by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI):

  The Ryan plan would cut traditional guaranteed Social Security retirement benefits substantially compared to the benefits now scheduled to be paid. Much of the reduction would stem from the adoption of what is called "progressive price indexing," which would reduce the benefits of future retirees except for the bottom 30 percent of wage earners. For the average new retiree, defined benefits would be reduced by about 16 percent in 2050 and about 28 percent in 2080. Reductions would be greater for retirees with higher earnings.

  The book was written by Ryan, Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA), and... Rep. Kevin McCarthy.

• A Tea Party convention is canceled as rival teabagger factions turn on each other.
• In these times of great change, it's reassuring to know that at least one thing remains the same: the health insurance industry is without conscience.
• And yet another example of how well some industries function when government regulators keep out of their way.
• From the Earth Institute, at Columbia University:

  BP’s leaking oil well in the Gulf of Mexico was conclusively sealed this week, but even now, questions remain about the amount of oil that actually came out of it. Initially after the April 20 explosion, officials claimed that the flow could not be measured. Then, as public pressure for information mounted, they looked for ways to measure it, and started producing estimates: at first, 1,000 barrels a day; then 5,000; then 12,000 to 19,000; then upward from there. Now, in the first independent, peer-reviewed paper on the leak’s volume, scientists have affirmed heightened estimates of what is now acknowledged as the largest marine oil accident ever. Using a new technique to analyze underwater video of the well riser, they say it leaked some 56,000 to 68,000 barrels daily--maybe more--until the first effective cap was installed, on July 15. Their estimate of the total oil escaped into the open ocean is some 4.4 million barrels--close to the most recent consensus of government advisors, whose methods have not been detailed publicly. The paper appears in this week’s early online edition of the leading journal Science.

  The study can be found here.

• The European Parliament finally voted to establish pan-European laws and agencies to regulate their financial industry.
• Mark Cooper, at Grist:

  In a recent analysis, ("Policy Challenges of Nuclear Reactor Construction: Cost Escalation and Crowding Out Alternatives"), I examined the history of nuclear reactor cost projection and cost escalation in the U. S. and France (which is frequently held up as a role model for the U.S. to follow). I included both historical and contemporary patterns.

  The bottom line: There is no evidence to support the claim that nuclear reactor costs will come down. Costs have continuously escalated over time. The underlying problems that afflict the industry stem from the nature of the technology. The complexity of nuclear reactors and the site-specific nature of deployment make standardization difficult, so cost reductions have not been achieved and are not likely in the future. Building larger reactors to achieve economies of scale causes construction times to increase, offsetting the cost savings of larger reactors. More recent, more complex technologies are more costly to construct.

  The only two French nuclear construction projects to date in Western nations (an export project at Olkiluoto, Finland and a home-country project at Flamanville), both originally projected to take four years to complete, are years behind schedule and billions of dollars over budget.

• Science Daily, from last month:

  How is it possible to fly 11,000 kilometers without a single break? The record holder for long distance flight outdoes all human-made aircraft. The bar-tailed godwit has very low energy consumption, but this is not enough to explain its success.

  Every autumn the bar-tailed godwit undertakes an eight-day journey from Alaska to New Zealand. The bird flies non-stop, without once breaking the journey to rest or eat. Then when spring comes, the bar-tailed godwit makes the 11,000-kilometre journey back to Alaska.

  Professor of Ecology Anders Hedenström from Lund University has pondered over how this species of bird can fly so far without stopping. The distance is twice as far as previously known non-stop distances for migratory birds.

• Ben Miller and Phuong Ly, in Washington Monthly:

  Nationwide, low-income minority students are disproportionately steered toward colleges not where they’re most likely to succeed, but where they’re most likely to fail.

  School reformers, including President Obama, often talk about high school "dropout factories." These are the roughly 2,000 public high schools, about 15 percent of the total, with the nation’s highest dropout rates. The average student at these schools has about a fifty-fifty chance of graduating, according to the Everyone Graduates Center at Johns Hopkins University. But the term "dropout factory" is also applicable to colleges. The Washington Monthly and Education Sector, an independent think tank, looked at the 15 percent of colleges and universities with the worst graduation records—about 200 schools in all—and found that the graduation rate at these schools is 26 percent. (See the table at left for a listing of the fifty colleges and universities with the worst graduation rates.) America’s "college dropout factories," in other words, are twice as bad at graduating their students as the worst high schools are at graduating theirs.

  Nearly everyone considers it scandalous when poor kids are shunted into lousy high schools with low graduation rates, and we have no problem naming and shaming those schools. Bad primary and secondary schools are frequently the subject of front-page newspaper investigations and the backdrop for speeches by reformist mayors and school district chiefs. But bad colleges are spared such scrutiny. This indifference is inexcusable now that a postsecondary credential has become virtually indispensable to anyone hoping to lead a middle-class life. If we want better outcomes in higher education, we need to hold dropout factories like Chicago State accountable in the same way the Obama administration proposes to hold underperforming high schools accountable: transform them—or shut them down.

• The more things change...

Three weeks ago, I pointed out that one of the favorite parlor games of political junkies like myself is to heap praise or scorn on the latest polling data based on the demographic assumptions buried within the poll.

This is often, of course, a defense mechanism. Confronted with a poll whose toplines are giving one side or the other a bout of anxiety, nothing calms the stomach more than to dismiss the poll because of its ridiculous split among conservatives and liberals, or how far it deviates from this exit poll or that one.

It is a practice as old as the polling game itself, and I freely confess to doing it myself often. Indeed, I have done it as recently as this month, when something in the Quinnipiac polls in Ohio and Pennsylvania caught my eye.

And it is not an exclusively left-of-center tendency, as evidenced last night by this tweet from Meg Whitman campaign advisor Mike Murphy:

Polls: Party ID numbers in sample: Field/reality: 44D 35R 21DTS. LAT: 55D 35R 9DTS. Trust Field. LAT poll is way, way off. 10 pts too Dem

All too often, "reality" in those cases is defined by whatever creates the data that is most amenable to your candidate. Confronted with a bad poll (something the Whitman campaign has not been used to in recent months), Murphy went with the simplest reply--he refused to accept the premise on which the poll was built.

Given that they have been on the receiving end of more crappy polling this cycle than Republicans, we have seen this technique employed far more often by Democrats.

And, while I proudly count myself within their number, there is a lot of wishful thinking in their complaints.

A lot of the comments I see deride the numbers in recent polling compare the partisan or ideological breakdowns to those in the most recent election.

Comparing current polling demographics to 2008 exit poll demographics is, it must be said, optimistic to the point of being unrealistic. It is fair to say at this point, I would think, that this is not 2008.

For one thing, and this can't be pointed out enough, even the most optimistic assumptions about 2010 turnout will create an electorate that has 30-40 million fewer voters than showed up at the polls to elect Barack Obama in 2008. By that standard alone, it is awfully tough to make any direct comparisons between 2008 demographics and 2010 demographics. Large shifts are practically inevitable when you are chalking off one quarter of the previous electorate.

Furthermore, motivation is intrinsically different, even if Democrats get more fired up between now and November. There is a gulf of difference between smelling blood in the water (as the Democrats did when they chased the control of Congress in 2006 and the White House in 2008) and being the body bleeding into the water, which comes with the territory of being in the majority.

It's not 2008. Nor, we must say, is it 2006.

However, that doesn't mean that the assumptions being made by the pollsters during the 2010 cycle (particularly in their likely voters screens) aren't way, way off.

My colleague DemFromCT made a pretty compelling case to that end yesterday. Looking at exit polling data, it does not seem unreasonable to question those likely voter screens, at least to some extent.

For the obvious reasons stated above, 2006 or 2008 exit polling were not used to draw that conclusion. They are tempting because they are the most recent numbers (and demographics in states do change over time), but they were cycles where the terrain tilted far too palpably to the Democrats. 2004 wouldn't be a bad exemplar, because it was arguably the best election cycle for Republicans in recent years (remember, 2002 had no exit polling). However, as a presidential election cycle where 120+ million voters participated, it seemed incongruent, as well. Therefore, the decision was made to go into the wayback machine and pull exit polling data from one neutral midterm election (1998) and one historically GOP midterm election (1994).

EXAMPLE #1: SurveyUSA poll--New York--September 21
The SUSA poll's most eye-opening piece of data was not its partisan breakdown. That (Democrats +9) was roughly in line with both the 1994 and 1998 exit polls. Where this poll drops jaws in it the ideological breakdown. The SUSA poll is presuming an electorate that is 35% conservative and 20% liberal. Now, there is nothing earth shattering in finding more self-described conservatives than liberals, but in a state as blue as New York, that gap is much, much closer. Even in the most Republican-friendly electorate in recent history (1994), the Con-Lib gap in New York was smaller on Election Day (34 C/22 L). In 1998, the gap was considerably less (26 C/23 L). If a relatively neutral midterm electorate turns out (1998), then the poll goes from 49-40 Cuomo to 52-38 Cuomo. Even if the midterm electorate skews a bit to the R's (say...a midpoint between 1994 and 1998), the result still moves to the double-digits (50-39 Cuomo). The only way you get a single-digit result is if you presume that the electorate will be even more conservative than the best election for Republicans in recent memory.

EXAMPLE #2--Quinnipiac Poll--Ohio--September 16
SurveyUSA could have been used here again, since pretty pessimistic poll on September 13th had both samples whose partisan and ideological makeup created an electorate further to the right than either 1994 or 1998. But, in this state, Quinnipiac is the better bet. While Quinnipiac does not break down their samples by these characteristics the way that SUSA does, we can look at their breakdowns of the trial heat and figure a few things out. And what one can figure out quickly is that the Q poll is assuming an electorate that is considerably more Republican than any election in history. Even if you apply the 1994 voter turnout (37 D/37 R/26 I) to the partisan breakdowns of their mid-September poll, you get dramatically different numbers in the two marquee races. What Quinnipiac forecasts as a seventeen point lead for John Kasich in the gubernatorial race becomes a considerably less lofty ten points (51-41), even by the depressed standards of the 1994 electorate. The effect is even stronger on the poll in the U.S. Senate race. Recalibrating that by the 1994 electorate's party ID, you see a twenty-point GOP lead whittled down to twelve points (53-41).

Double-digit deficits, even modestly reduced ones, aren't exactly anything to write home about. But there is a pretty big psychic difference for the candidate and his supporters between a ten-point race and a twenty-point race. And, remember, that is assuming the worst case scenario in recent history. Bear in mind that Quinnipiac seems to be assuming a decidedly more pessimistic electorate for Democrats than even showed up at the polls in 1994.

Something they were assuming in another state, as well.

EXAMPLE #3--Quinnipiac Poll--Pennsylvania--September 21
As in neighboring Ohio, Quinnipiac's most recent polling in the Keystone State seems to be portending an electorate more slanted to the GOP on Election Day than any we have ever seen.

Consider: typically, more Democrats show up to the polls than Republicans in Pennsylvania. The lone exception to that was in the tsunami year of 1994, where the electorate tilted incrementally to the GOP (41 R/39 D/20 I). If one were to break down the most recent Q poll in the state, and crunch the numbers with the 1994 partisan breakdowns in place, the numbers become dramatically different. In the gubernatorial race, where Quinnipiac saw a blowout in the midst (Republican Tom Corbett +15), a recalculation with the '94 party ID numbers gives a pretty different assessment of the race. Where Corbett led 54-39 in the Q poll, he leads by just 51-42 with the '94 numbers in place. While, on a pure percentage level, the effect was more muted (a seven-point Toomey lead drops to four points), there is a tangible difference in how seven-point races are covered in the press and how four-point races are covered (even if float within the nargin of error could account for all of that difference).

Of course, both pollsters (and others, like Rasmussen, who seem to be assuming a historic R/D spread in November) could be correct. This electoral environment could be worse for the Democrats than even 1994. Gallup released numbers this week that indicated that the gap between how voters feel the political parties "represents their values" leans Republican for the first time since...well...1994. However, as a compendium of polls over at Polling Report makes clear, the GOP is not necessarily seen as a suitable alternative. The majority of recent polls still finds that voters are more likely to say that Democrats would do a better job of solving the country's problems than Republicans. This would seem to make a 1994-esque tsunami a bit more difficult to achieve for the GOP. In typical wave elections, as this excellent piece from DemFromCT pointed out last week, the out-party is more liked than the party in power. In 2010, that simply isn't the case.

Which might challenge the partisan assumptions being made by pollsters throughout this cycle. The post-election postmortems, no matter the outcome, are bound to be fascinating.

You would have thought that they would have relished the opportunity. At a time when embattled Democrats in more conservative areas would have most needed a chance to remind voters why they turned out the out-of-touch Republicans they voted against in 2006 and 2008, a wondrous opportunity presented itself in the form of the expiring Bush tax cuts.

The Democrats in the Senate could have seized on it. Could have taken an opportunity to see whether the Republicans actually would hold a middle-class tax cut hostage to their desire for more breaks for millionaires. But they didn't. They chose to punt on the issue, apparently afraid that if they brought up a vote on middle-class tax cuts, that Republicans accuse them of raising taxes.

The concerned Democrats in the Senate--as well as their Blue dog allies in the House of Representatives--are desperately concerned that only by getting a vote on extending all tax cuts, including those for people making over $250,000 a year, that somehow, they will take off the table possible Republican attacks that they are tax-raisers. However, anyone who had seriously taken stock of what Republican party operatives have actually done this election cycle would have realized by now just how futile a hope that actually is.

The truth is, there is no such thing as taking an issue off the table. There are two main reasons why:

First, today's GOP political machine is filled with shameless prevaricators, as Congressman Difazio of Oregon found out firsthand. Attack ads have historically done their best to stretch the truth to the maximum limits of acceptability, even before the Citizens United ruling. But now, we face a larger problem than that posed by the pernicious influence of unlimited corporate donations: the front groups to which these corporations donate for the purpose of producing these attack ads are not required to disclose who is funding the ads, and Republicans continue to vote against any efforts to require sunlight on these shadowy attacks. The ultimate consequence of a lack of disclosure is a lack of accountability. If no organization or individual can be held accountable in the public eye for false and malicious campaign advertisements, there is no incentive whatsoever to tell the truth.

But the second problem is more pernicious: even if there were a way to tell who might be accountable for distorted advertising, there's far from any guarantee that the members of our fourth estate would be up to the task of caring to correct the record. Our DC media village, for instance, is far too busy getting the vapors about Stephen Colbert's sarcastic testimony before Congress on migrant workers to create any opprobrium about the fact that Leader Limbaugh has taken to calling the President "Imam Obama" (which would be less appalling if not for the continued bafflement that such a large percentage of the population believes Barack Obama is a Muslim).

But there is evidence of the DC media's total abdication of their professional responsibilities that is far more than anecdotal, and it is very relevant to the issue at hand: despite the fact that the stimulus package passed by President Obama earlier in his administration lowered taxes for a significant majority of American households, a full third of the country believes that under President Obama's administration, taxes have been raised on most American families, compared to only eight percent who believe the objective, uncontestable truth: that taxes have gone down under current leadership.

The bottom line is that if vulnerable Democrats think that they can take the issue of taxes off the electoral table simply by ignoring it and hoping it doesn't come up, they're wrong in every single imaginable way. Republicans--or, rather, their allied shadow groups--will claim that Democrats are raising taxes. They will cite some sort of misleading figure or statistic someplace, just as we've seen them do on the so-called "Pledge to America." And like it or not, nobody in the "respectable" media establishment will call them on it lest they be seen as "liberal" or "partisan."

In a situation like this, the only way out is through. Democrats must go on the attack, instead of sitting on the sidelines making concessions hoping that this time, unlike any other time, the concessions will be enough to spare them the sorts of withering attacks that have come from the GOP under every single other circumstance. It never will be--and yet when the same thing happens that always happens, these Democrats will wonder why the GOP just couldn't play nice since they had already gotten their way.

Now, it's entirely possible that Nancy Pelosi could rescue the Democrats single-handedly by bringing a middle-class tax cut bill under suspension, which would disallow any amendments and force an up-or-down vote on tax cut extensions for the middle class. At that point, we will see if the GOP is willing to vote against tax cuts and hide behind procedure while doing so. For the sake of her Party, she needs to. It has been her willingness to stand up and fight the GOP, rather than make concessions or even abandon signature policy initiatives, that has provided the Democrats with the only fighting chance they currently have.

Wall Street is upset. Sure, they were handed a trillion dollars. Sure, their industry was pulled from the toilet, propped up, dried off, and allowed to return to its never-ending party. Sure, they're looking forward to what may be the biggest bonus year ever while the rest of us are dealing with a little thing called a recession. But hey, they are upset that people have been talking mean about them. They don't like that. They don't like that so much that they're pouring record levels of money into Republican campaigns, just to make sure that Democrats get the point.

After all, being "too big to fail" means never having to say you're sorry.  Heck, it means never having to face up to the fact that you failed at all. It certainly means that guys wearing Alexander Amosu suits don't have to say thank you to the people digging ditches, flipping burgers, or sweating out a stint of unemployment. You know, the people who chipped in so that the Wall Streeters could keep their jobs. Being too big to fail means being able to go on pretending that you're a tough, take care of yourself, fiscal conservative and that this little bump never happened. It certainly means that you don't have to be the least bit contrite, or demonstrate any sense of either guilt or gratitude.

And I absolutely agree. They don't. There's only one thing I want from these guys -- I want to tax the holy crap out of them.

I'm not suggesting this because it would be satisfying (though it would), but because it would be a good thing to do. The right thing to do. Not just to start repairing the hole these guys drove through the federal budget, but good for the whole economy. Even good for Wall Street.

Over the last four decades, we've become a nation where the Laffer Curve is hardwired in our brains. A nation that believes in always carrots, never sticks. Republicans have pushed the idea that reducing taxes is an universally effective way of growing the economy. No matter what the problem, there's bound to be a tax cut to solve it.

The problem is, that's nonsense. Always has been nonsense. Continues to be nonsense. The truth is that cutting taxes is the least efficient way of addressing economic issues.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office this year analyzed the short-term effects of 11 policy options and found that extending the tax cuts would be the least effective way to spur the economy and reduce unemployment. The report added that tax cuts for high earners would have the smallest "bang for the buck," because wealthy Americans were more likely to save their money than spend it.

Not only is extending the Bush tax cut an unfathomably stupid idea, the tax cuts that President Obama has proposed for business? Also a bad idea.

Corporate lobbyists have been seeking these tax cuts, because corporations are investing in automated equipment and software. These investments are designed to boost profits by permanently replacing workers and cutting payrolls. The tax cuts Obama is proposing would, therefore, make such investments all the more profitable.

Get that? The exact tax cuts Obama is proposing would make it easier for businesses to permanantly get rid of employees. Not only that...

Obama's whopping proposed corporate tax cuts help legitimize the supply-side dogma that the economy's biggest obstacle to growth is the cost of capital, rather than the plight of ordinary working people.

Tax cuts are not the solution. In fact (if you're a conservative you may need to sit down for this) tax cuts are the problem.

The current structure of our tax system exerts so little incentive on wealthy individuals and corporations to do anything with their wealth other than roll in it, that we've gestated a nation peppered with Smaugs, each of them perched atop their private hordes and ready to defend every jeweled goblet. The amount of wealth held by the top 1% of individuals is at record levels. The amount of money that corporations are sitting on is at record levels. So tell me, how will reducing taxes so they can made another Scooge McDuck dive into the gold pool help things? The inequality that now exists is harmful in multiple ways, but we're still nodding along with the same nonsense that put us in this spot.

The idea that sending money to the wealthy is helpful was once recognized as idiocy even inside the Republican Party. George Bush -- sans 'W' -- knew "voodoo economics" when he saw it. But along with the sanctification of Ronald Reagan we seem to have absorbed this conservative fairy tale so throughly that leaders both 'left' (at least what passes for left in Washington) and right can recite it in their sleep: if you start taxing someone so much because he's wealthy, he'll stop trying to make more money.

You know what? I believe that idea. I also believe that's a very, very good thing.

When someone is looking for a spot to park the third Ferrari, allowing them to take home more of their money should be the least of our concerns. In periods when there were higher taxes (including top rates that exceeded 90%) the incentive was there for CEOs and company owners to stop padding their own paychecks and turn more of the funds back to expanding their companies and rewarding their employees. That incentive is long gone.

By reducing the top tax rate we have driven a philosophy of short term profit, disregard for product quality, mistreatment of employees, and disdain for community relationships. We have directly rewarded the worst possible behavior. There's not one shred of evidence low top tax rates have ever been beneficial, and there's every indicator that they have proven a long term disaster.

The low tax rates on the wealthy are directly responsible for the rapid concentration of wealth, the stagnation of the median income, and the decline of the middle class. It's not something mysterious. It's not something that's being inflicted on us. It's something we are doing to ourselves.

The problem is that we've forgotten something -- you can't run a country on carrots alone. Every situation can't be addressed by giving someone a prize. Sometimes you have to reach for a stick. When the nation was founded, Washington and Hamilton were faced with deficits at the federal level and a group of states on the brink of bankruptcy. Their reaction was not "gee, maybe we give wealthy planters more money and hope they use it to buy extra wigs and waistcoats." Instead, they raised both taxes and tariffs. We seem to have forgotten that such an option even exists.

In the case of Wall Street in 2008, there was little choice but to rescue these "captains of industry" from their own sinking ships. They don't have to be grateful, but we aren't required to be stupid. If we don't start structuring our tax system in such a way that some of the gold gets dragged out of the hoards, we'll soon find ourselves in an even bigger dilemma -- one that we won't be able to repair, no matter how many working class people cough up.

In the meantime, how about trying one of the ideas to stimulate the economy that wasn't rated worst on the list. If you want to increase employment, hire people. Government jobs are no less real, no less honorable, and no less necessary than those created by private industry. No matter what Republicans may say.

Sunday punditry.

Maureen Dowd:

Holy Roddy McDowall.

Christine O’Donnell doesn’t understand why monkeys can’t turn into people right before her eyes.

Bill Maher continued his video torment of O’Donnell by releasing another old clip of her on his HBO show on Friday night, this time showing one in which she argued that "Evolution is a myth."

Maher shot back, "Have you ever looked at a monkey?" To which O’Donnell rebutted, "Why aren’t monkeys still evolving into humans?"

The comedian has a soft spot for the sweet-faced Republican Senate candidate from Delaware, but as he told me on Friday, it’s "powerful stupid to think primate evolution could happen fast enough to observe it. That’s bacteria.

CIDRAP:

As some of the key provisions of the Obama administration's healthcare reform law took effect this week, Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius today announced details of a public health funding component of the law that includes resources to help prevent and manage disease outbreaks.

The nearly $100 million in grants that Sebelius announced involve the law's Prevention and Public Health Fund, which are designed to help states and localities support a host of critical public health programs such as HIV prevention and testing, tobacco cessation efforts, and obesity prevention, according to an HHS press release.

NY Times:

Already a prominent presence as an analyst on Fox News Channel and a columnist at The Wall Street Journal, Mr. Rove is also playing a leading role in building what amounts to a shadow Republican Party, a network of donors and operatives that is among the most aggressive in the Republican effort to capture control of the House and the Senate.

He has had a major hand in helping to summon the old coalition of millionaires and billionaires who supported Mr. Bush and have huge financial stakes in regulatory and tax policy, like Harold C. Simmons, a Texas billionaire whose holdings include a major waste management company that handles some radioactive materials; Carl H. Lindner Jr., a Cincinnati businessman whose American Financial Group includes several property and casualty insurance concerns; and Robert B. Rowling, whose TRT Holdings owns Omni Hotels and Gold’s Gym.

Rove's got The Math, and The Math sez tax breaks help Republican donors.

Dana Milbank:

"You know, the Republicans, I think, merged with the Tea Party, and in many instances they're finding out it's the Donner Party," Tim Kaine told CNN's Candy Crowley last Sunday, "because it's knocking off Republicans left and right."

The chairman may have thought it was a harmless people-eating joke, one that he had already served up to the New York Times and to reporters on a teleconference. But it set my teeth on edge. Comparing Republicans to cannibals is deeply offensive -- to the cannibals.

John Harwood:

Many in Washington fault President Obama’s cool public style. But in midterm elections, in a bad economy, showing empathy has rarely helped a president.

Since when have "many in Washington" known what they were talking about?

NY Times editorial:

If your premiums are spiking suddenly, you can blame economic reality. The cost of medical care continues to soar upward, and the recession led many healthy people to drop coverage, leaving less-healthy enrollees who cost more to insure.

As for health care reform, the major elements, and major costs, don’t even kick in until 2014. The only provisions with the potential to affect premiums right now are a handful of consumer protections that are popular with the public, and not especially costly to implement.

Matthew Yglesias:

As health care goes into effect and the GOP lays plans to repeal it, progressives are sitting on their hands. Matthew Yglesias on the case for going to war to help sick kids.

On Thursday, House Republican leaders surrounded themselves with even more tools to unveil their long-awaited "Pledge to America".

Although the "Pledge" drew nearly universal praise from across the political spectrum, President Obama denounced it as a carbon copy of Newt Gingrich's failed "Contract on America".

Well, whatever...

He's probably just upset that the GOP's ideas are so much better than the Democrats'.

This evening's Rescue Rangers are claude, srkp23, HoosierDeb, rexymeteorite, shayera, and dadanation, with watercarrier4diogenes at the wheel of the Editmobile

Tonight's diaries take us on a roller-coaster ride from prehistoric cultures to current gender biology, from politics to gold. We hope you'll enjoy this bounty. Read them, rec and comment in them, let the diarists know that you appreciate their efforts and their viewpoints (even if you don't happen to completely agree with them).

• Ojibwa presents us with a primer of American Indian cultures before the first Europeans landed on America's soil in Ancient America: 2,000 Years Ago. (rexymeteorite)
• jetfan says that If Media Did Its Job GOP Disappears - Tax Cuts Don't Work! (shayera)
• La Gitane reverses stereotypes and works to promote race relations by talking down a neighbor in A$$holes Come in All Colors. (rexymeteorite)
• Inoljt does a terrific job Analyzing Swing States: Colorado, Part 2. (srkp23)
• In Beyond Male and Female: The Biology of Who We Are, Rei explores the differences and similarities in the development of sex between men, women, transmen, and transwomen while in the womb. (rexymeteorite)
• gjohnsit explains (in spite of Glenn Beck, the johnny-come-lately shill for GoldLine) why gold is still a good investment in Glenn Beck and Golden Bubbles. (rexymeteorite)

jotter has graced us with another magical analysis of the High Impact Diaries: September 24, 2010 and carolita has 5,824 reasons to bring us Top Comments 9-25-10 – Road Trip Edition.

Enjoy and please promote your own favorite diaries in this open thread (even if you're the author! Here's where that's actually appreciated). And, of course, since it's an open thread, PLAY NICE, OK? 8^)

As summer finally arrives in Southern California (albeit a few months late), the politics game is also heating up. For a weekend edition of the Wrap, we have quite a bit of data to peruse.

Indeed, we have 23 polls to check out today, including a rarity--Democratic internal polling at the House, Senate, and gubernatorial level. Also, a Republican pollster shocks the Silver State with both Reids looking better than they have in months, and Ras has their most Ras-esque performance in weeks.

All that (and more!) in the weekend edition of the Wrap...

THE U.S. SENATE

CA-Sen: Field Poll confirms movement to Boxer, LAT confirms
The Field Poll, long considered the gold standard of California polls, weighed in on the U.S. Senate race at the end of the week, and found that Barbara Boxer's recent resurgence in the polls may well be legit. Field found Boxer leading Republican challenger Carly Fiorina by six points (47-41). Just tonight, a new LA Times poll (conducted by the Univ. of Southern California) confirmed the movement, putting Boxer up 51-42 among likely voters. Boxer has been all over the airwaves, juxtaposing positive advertising on jobs with a brutally effective attack on Fiorina's tenure at HP. It clearly is having an impact, as Fiorina's momentum has been stalled, if not reversed.

KY-Sen: DSCC poll shows Conway on the move
A Benenson Strategies poll, conducted on behalf of the DSCC, shows Democrat Jack Conway within striking distance of Republican Rand Paul in the Bluegrass State. The poll, conducted earlier in the week, set the margin for Rand Paul at just three points (45-42). Public polling in the state has been hard to come by in the past couple of weeks. It will be interesting to see if the next wave of public polls confirm a tightening race or not.

MO-Sen: Is another GOP open seat tightening, as well?
Another Democratic internal, this one a little further west than Kentucky, comes to a similar conclusion--the Democratic nominee closing in on the GOP frontrunner. The poll, by Garin Hart Yang, gives Republican Roy Blunt a lead of just a single point (41-40) over Democrat Robin Carnahan. A poll taken for the Democratic Party of Missouri earlier in the week showed Blunt up by just four points (with leaners included) against Carnahan.

NV-Sen: Indie pollster says tie, while GOP pollster says Reid leads
This is counterintuitive, and more than a little interesting: a new poll by the GOP polling outfit Public Opinion Strategies is one of the first to show some daylight between Democrat Harry Reid and Republican challenger Sharron Angle. The poll, taken for the Retail Association of Nevada, gives Reid a five-point lead (45-40) over his GOP rival. Meanwhile, a Mason Dixon poll has the race still as a coinflip, with both candidates sitting on 43% of the vote.

NC-Sen: GOP pollster confirms growing gap in Burr race
Granted, this is a GOP-friendly polling outfit, but the crew from Civitas Institute has gone into the field in their home state of North Carolina, and they see a widening lead for incumbent Republican Richard Burr. The new poll has Burr leading Democrat Elaine Marshall by twenty points (49-29). This echoed recent polling from both Rasmussen and SurveyUSA. This week could provide a key test of the true state of the race, as PPP also heads back to their home state to take the temperature on this once-close contest.

THE U.S. HOUSE

AZ-01: Slightly dusty Dem internal says incumbent leads narrowly
Congressional Quarterly got their hands on some Democratic internal polling taken right after the August 24th primaries in Arizona, and the news is (at best) mixed for Democratic incumbent Ann Kirkpatrick. The poll, conducted by Lake Partners, gives the Democrat a four-point lead over Republican challenger Paul Gosar (43-39). The polling memo also says that after "tough messaging" for the incumbent on the informed ballot test, Kirkpatrick held her lead. Republican pollsters have released multiple polls in the district putting Gosar in position to take this seat back for the GOP.

FL-22: GOP candidate plays dueling internal polls with Klein
Just days after Democratic incumbent Ron Klein's campaign released an internal poll showing them leading Republican Allan West by eight points, West's campaign decided to provide a numerical counterweight, dropping their own poll from Wilson Research. The poll showed West out in front by six points (48-42) over Klein. Interestingly, the poll showed both candidates with positive net favorabilities, though it claims that West (+12, 39/27) does a bit better on that count than Klein (+3, 41/38).

MI-01: Dem pollster says tough race, 3rd party a potential spoiler
Greenberg Quinlan Rosner has headed into northern Michigan, and they find an uphill slog for the Democrats to hold Bart Stupak's seat in the 1st district. The GQR poll puts Republican Dan Benishek out in front with a 41-38 lead over Democratic state legislator Gary McDowell. Interestingly, the poll shows the potential for a major third-party impact in the race, as Indie candidate Glenn Wilson nabbed 12% of the vote.

PA-16: Herr internal poll indicates potential shocker
If a new poll being promoted by the campaign of Democrat Lois Herr is legit, then the Dems just might have a race to add to the target lists. The campaign internal poll, conducted by PPP (who mostly releases internal polls but does some campaign work), has incumbent Republican Joe Pitts leading by just seven points (41-34) over Herr, who is seeking a rematch against the six-term Republican incumbent.

THE GUBERNATORIAL RACES

CA-Gov: New LAT/USC poll puts Brown up five over Whitman
After ceding the airwaves to Republican Meg Whitman for the better part of the year, the counterattack for Democrat Jerry Brown has clearly paid some dividends. A new Los Angeles Times poll (conducted by the Univ. of Southern California) gives Brown a five-point lead over Whitman (49-44). There has already been some grumbling on Twitter (from the Whitman team, in particular) that the sample seems to lean heavily to the Democrats. While this is more than a tad amusing (can't help but notice that they haven't complained about polls that have had samples more GOP-leaning than any exit poll in decades), it is worth a small caveat vis-a-vis the results.

ME-Gov: Dem internal poll says Mitchell still alive, within four
Remember that one of the caveats for releasing internal polls when you are behind is if other polling out there shows you getting thumped. That may well be the catalyst for this release by the campaign of Democrat Libby Mitchell in Maine. GQR, polling on Mitchell's behalf, found that Republican frontrunner Paul LePage leads Mitchell by just four points (38-34), with Dem-turned-Indie Eliot Cutler back at 10%. LePage has led by double digits in a handful of public polls, including a PPP poll earlier this month.

NV-Gov: Conflicting polls paint rosier picture for Dems
Either way you slice it, things are looking up for Democrat Rory Reid in Nevada. While he still faces an uphill fight in the Silver State, it appears that his campaign has cut into the vast lead held by Republican Brian Sandoval. Surprisingly, the GOP pollster (Public Opinion Strategies) had the more optimistic outlook for Reid the younger. That poll, conducted for the Retail Association of Nevada, has Sandoval leading by just six points (45-39). That is, by a wide margin, the closest margin of any poll of recent vintage. The other poll, conducted for the Las Vegas Review-Journal by Mason Dixon, had a wider gap for Sandoval. Even at that, the fourteen-point GOP lead (51-37) is less than has generally been registered in recent weeks.

NY-Gov: Marist also gives Cuomo a big lead in Empire State
We now have the entire spectrum of possible outcomes in the state of New York, as Marist College chimes in with their data on the state of the suddenly interesting gubernatorial race. Their conclusion: the race could be close at some point, but it isn't now. The pollster has Democrat Andrew Cuomo at 52% of the vote, well ahead of both Republican nominee Carl Paladino (33%) and Conservative nominee Rick Lazio (9%). Lazio hinted on primary night that he was going to fight onward to November, but he has since gone quiet.

THE RAS-A-POLL-OOZA

Rasmussen goes as GOP-friendly as we've seen them in quite a while with their collection of polls to close out the week. They put themselves on a gubernatorial island, for example, by putting Rick Scott in the lead in Florida and Tom Emmer out in front (albeit barely) in Minnesota. Wall-to-wall, though, it is a very Ras-sy weekend.

AL-Sen: Sen. Richard Shelby (R) 58%, William Barnes (D) 30%
FL-Gov: Rick Scott (R) 50%, Alex Sink (D) 44%
MN-Gov: Tom Emmer (R) 42%, Mark Dayton (D) 41%, Tom Horner (I) 9%
ND-Sen: John Hoeven (R) 68%, Tracy Potter (D) 25%
OK-Gov: Mary Fallin (R) 60%, Jari Askins (D) 34%
SC-Gov: Nikki Haley (R) 50%, Vincent Sheheen (D) 33%
TX-Gov: Gov. Rick Perry (R) 48%, Bill White (D) 42%

   This Rescue Diary covers the period from 6 PM, Friday, 9/24 to 6:00 PM EDT, Saturday, 9/25

Today's Menu Includes :
34 Diaries Overall

- 5 On House races

- Covering 4 individual Districts in 4 states

- 7 On Senate races

- Representing 6 different states

- 11 On Various election races and ballot issues

- Encompassing Governor, Secretary of State, Local, and more

- 11 General election-related diaries

And be sure to follow the Election Diary Rescue on Twitter

(Tonight's compilation and more after the jump............)

Tonight is our first crack at a on-line, right here on the ding dang front page, book club.  So take a (brief) break from sharpening your political skills and dive in to help with the discussion.

I'm going to post some questions, one at a time, in hopes of sparking the conversation. But if you feel like tackling this book from another direction, go for it.

And one more thing we really need tonight: suggestions for the next book club title.

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Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer

Jon Krakauer's 1996 book follows the story of Christopher McCandless.  In 1992, McCandless graduated from Emory University.  He came from a well-to-do family and he'd been a top student at school, but on graduation he didn't return home to his family as expected. Instead he disappeared from Atlanta after giving $24,000 -- all his savings -- to a charity. Weeks later, his car was found abandoned in the desert Southwest. His wallet and all his remaining money had been burned. Despite increasingly desperate efforts from his frantic parents and sister, they found no trace of McCandless. It was only months later, after Christopher McCandless' decomposing body was found in the Alaskan wilderness, that some portions of his journey began to be filled in. But despite Krakauer's research and the contents of McCandless' own diary, it can't be said that the details of his story have ever really become clear.

Question 1
Krakauer clearly sympathizes with McCandless and finds similarities with his own life. However, many readers find it hard to have any sympathy for McCandless. For some, he comes off as a pampered kid who goes into a tough situation unprepared and gets what he deserves. Do you find anything sympathetic in McCandless' feelings? Anything admirable in his actions?

Question 2
How do Krakauer's accounts of his own exploits affect your reading of the book? Do these incidents distract from the main narrative, or do you find them helpful in drawing a connection with your own life?

Question 3
Here's a bit from Walden, "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived." Do you think this fits with McCandless' motivation?

Update [2010-9-25 22:40:8 by Mark Sumner]: Thanks, everyone, for your participation. It seems like we had more than enough interest to justify giving this experiment another go. Please email me if you have a suggestion for a book to tackle next month.