Hullabaloo

Thursday, January 26, 2012

Newtie's riposte

by digby

I wrote about Romney's attack ad against Newt this morning. Here's one from Newt.

I have to give this one to Newt. But then nobody knows more about being vicious than he does.

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digby 1/26/2012 04:30:00 PM |

Green Jobs and Tax Increases on the Rich are Popular

by David Atkins
David Roberts has a good post on Grist today with a reminder of the obvious: green jobs and tax increases on the remain popular planks. Her analysis uses data from a Democracy Corps dial test focus group to reinforce what should already be self-evident:

Overall, there was a striking degree of unanimity, quite in contrast to the polarization in Washington. Reactions to the speech split along party lines on only a few issues. The most interesting split came during the section of the speech on energy:

This section received the highest sustained ratings of the speech from Democrats and independents, but it was also one of the few polarizing sections as Republicans reacted negatively to the President’s call for more support of clean energy (independents, like Democrats, responded very favorably). Overall, Obama gained 22 points on the issue, one of his biggest gains on the evening, as these voters endorsed his appeal to end subsidies for oil companies and instead focus those resources on expanding clean energy in America.

It seems the Republican attempt to drag clean energy into the culture war has reached only the conservative base. Independents outside the Fox-Limbaugh loop still favor it.

In other words, this is a powerful wedge issue that favors Democrats.

With the Wall Street Journal editorial page beating its chest, Politico making sweet, sweet love to the Solyndra non-scandal, and the Chamber of Commerce dumping money into attack ads, Democrats have gotten unduly spooked. They’ve started believing John Boehner’s trash talk, that energy is a wedge to divide unions from greens.

It’s an empty threat. The fact is, overwhelming majorities of Americans — across party, age, and regional lines — support clean, modern energy. A poll conducted by ORC International in November found that 77 percent of Americans, including 65 percent of Republicans, believe that “the U.S. needs to be a clean energy technology leader and it should invest in the research and domestic manufacturing of wind, solar, and energy efficiency technologies.” Last February, a Gallup poll offered a list of actions Congress might take. The most popular option, with an incredible 83 percent support, was “an energy bill that provides incentives for using solar and other alternative energy resources.”

And the data is clear on taxing the wealthy as well:
On to the second significant finding: Americans want to tax the rich.

These swing voters, even the Republicans, responded enthusiastically to [Obama's] call for a “Buffett Rule” that would require the wealthiest Americans to pay their fair share. As one participant put it, “I agree with his tax reform — the 1 percent should shoulder more of the burden than the other 99 percent. He [Obama] talked about being all for one, one for all — that really resonated for me.” These dial focus groups make it very clear that defending further tax cuts for those at the top of the economic spectrum puts Republicans in Congress and on the Presidential campaign trail well outside of the American mainstream.

(See also this Sept. 2011 Gallup poll or this Oct. 2011 Bloomberg poll or this Oct. 2011 CBS News poll or many others).

What this shows is that the Occupy movement has won. Americans across party lines increasingly see things in terms of the 1 percent and the 99 percent. A Pew survey earlier this month found that “conflict between rich and poor now eclipses racial strain and friction between immigrants and the native-born as the greatest source of tension in American society.” Two-thirds of Americans now see “strong conflicts” between the rich and poor. Even Mitt Romney is using Occupy’s language.

These issues — clean energy and taxing the rich — are not unconnected. Properly done, clean energy is a populist issue. Big Oil perfectly symbolizes the 1 percent, and Americans are ready to redirect public resources away from oil and toward a wide network of home-grown cleantech innovators.

There won't be any excuse for blue doggy Dems and their Washington consultants to run away from these issues. The time for using the cop-out of stupidity or cowardice is well nigh at an end. The data is so strikingly clear at this point, that any Democrat who fails to highlight these issues has to be declared either corrupt or so incompetent that they don't deserve to hold office.

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thereisnospoon 1/26/2012 03:00:00 PM |

The real Jesus' General goes back to West Point

by digby

This is cracked:

In a statement issued to ThinkProgress, West Point’s Director of Public Affairs, Lt. Col. Sherri Reed, said the military academy stands by its decision to host Boykin and that the invitation is “in keeping with the broad range of ideas normally considered by our cadets”:
The U.S. Military Academy at West Point prepares cadets to be leaders of character with honor and consideration of others. In order to produce effective 21st Century leaders for our Army, and our Nation, cadets are purposefully exposed to different perspectives and cultures over the course of their 47-month experience at West Point.
The National Prayer Breakfast Service will be pluralistic with Christians, Jewish, and Muslim cadets participating. We are comfortable and confident that what retired Lt. Gen. Boykin will share about prayer, soldier care and selfless service, will be in keeping with the broad range of ideas normally considered by our cadets.
Sadly, the man who West Point has chosen as its representative of the Christian faith dangerously views our military conflicts as a holy war against Islam.
Boykin is worse than that. He's certifiably nuts:

I stumbled across this video of Perkins, Joyner, Boykin and Frank Turek discussing the importance of Christians getting deeply involved in politics.

Perkins explains the absolute necessity of getting Christians into all levels of government while Boykin compared Christians today to the Spartan army and quoted King Leonidas by declaring "molon labe" ["come and get them"] when he and his army were told to lay down their weapons.

Likewise, Boykin declared "molon labe," stating that he will not be silenced and challenged those in Washington who are out to take his liberties, rob his grandchildren, and destroy America to just try to take them from him.

Finally, Joyner announced that Christians have more than enough people to take control, but they need to bind together and, as such, would soon be unveiling coalition called "300".

You're telling me that this freakshow is the only Christian ex-general they could find to do this? Really? But then again it's hard to see how he could do more harm by making this speech than he undoubtedly did in his final years in the Army:

From April 1998 to February 2000, he served as the Commanding General, U.S. Army Special Forces Command (Airborne) at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. From March 2000-2003, he was the Commanding General, United States Army John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center, Fort Bragg, N.C. In June 2003, he was appointed Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence under Dr. Stephen Cambone, Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence.

You'd think after all this time they'd have finally realized that they had a certified lunatic in their ranks, but apparently not.

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digby 1/26/2012 01:30:00 PM |

In your shoes, you know he'll lose?

by digby

I guess this is supposed to be tough, but is it really? It's a purely process argument saying that he isn't electable. Maybe it'll work. But if they really want to stop him, they should try this one:

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digby 1/26/2012 11:30:00 AM |

Ring fencing

by digby

Dday has an important new post explaining that while there is still ample reason to be skeptical of the new financial fraud task force, there is a possibility that New York AG Eric Schneiderman may not have blindly walked into a trap or sold out --- apparently, there is room in the agreement for him to push the investigation in a positive direction. And according to dday's sources, Schneidermann has promised to ostentatiously walk out if it turns out that the administration is trying to "ring-fence" him. (Read his whole post for the full run down of how this could play out.)

Schneidermann has generally been known to be a rare savvy, but principled, politician so it's at least possible that he will be able to navigate these waters successfully. It's an election year, this is a volatile issue in some very important states, and Schneiderman signaling that he will be happy to walk away if that's what it takes is a very big threat.

Look, it is hard for me to believe this notion that Schneiderman, after everything, was angling for big wet kiss from the administration. None of that tracks with dday's reporting which says that the deal wasn't coming together at all as recently as last week-end and once Iowa AG Tom Miller publicly pulled the deal it was all over for the moment. The politics suggest to me that while the administration may indeed be trying to "ring-fence" Schneidermann, the real purpose is the glaringly obvious: to cover for their failure to settle this. (Isn't the truism in DC that when you can't get something done, form a commission?)The power in that scenario lies exactly where it did before the task force was announced --- with the state AGs, who as far as I can tell are more empowered not less. (See Kamala Harris'statement below.) I'm willing to suspend judgment for a while to see if that means Schneidermann is actually a corrupt chameleon who's taken progressives for a wild ride through his entire career in order to sell himself to the highest bidder or whether he believes he can affect this from his perch on the task force.

I don't see this as a sky is falling sort of thing just yet. There are very good reasons to be skeptical and you'd have to be a fool to buy into the premise at face value. But there are worse things than temporarily tabling a bad deal. And there actually are politicians in the world whose self-serving ambitions are dependent upon being perceived as crusaders rather than players. Everything I know of Schneiderman suggests that the former is the path he's chosen.

I guess, for me, it comes down to this: I don't think the administration is nearly as slick as people think and I don't believe that in an election year like this one they will go out of their way to make enemies of their political allies. Everything suggests that they are trying to make at least a rhetorical pivot to a populist(ish) campaign to face the out-of-touch fop*, Mitt Romney. It is what it appears to be: plastering lipstick on this pig of a negotiation and pretending they have a path to a cheap settlement in order to keep both the banks and the people on the hook through the election. They are not working with a strong hand.

And because of that, what dday says here is very true:
I...can see some path where this task force is not harmful and, in an absolute best case, helpful in bringing accountability and justice. The key for Schneiderman is to maintain his independence. A lot of people walk into Washington thinking they can outsmart people and work on their own terms. It doesn’t always work out. The grassroots will be a powerful spur in this. They need to not spike the ball in the end zone and continue to do what they have been doing, forcing the White House into uncomfortable positions and blowing up an insufficient settlement.

I suppose people may differ on how to do help Schneiderman maintain his independence. My feeling is that he should be given the benefit of the doubt at this point. Some people believe that the only thing that ever motivates human beings is pain, delivered constantly and without mercy, so maybe he's better "spurred" by being called a whore and a sell-out and abandoned by his progressive allies. We all have to follow our own instincts on that.

But regardless of where you fall on that point, dday's admonition to keep pushing is absolutely correct. Even if activists eventually vote for the president, they can cause huge headaches for the campaign in an election year, particularly in individual states. This is when they have maximum leverage and they should use it.

*h/t to greg sargent
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digby 1/26/2012 09:44:00 AM |

Kudos to CA Attorney General Kamala Harris

by David Atkins

With New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman likely being disempowered to stop the MERS whitewash, it's up to other Attorneys General to stand firm. Fortunately, California's Attorney General Kamala Harris appears to be doing just that:

Calif. Atty. Gen. Kamala D. Harris' office has called a proposed $25-billion settlement with the nation’s mortgage industry “inadequate.”

"We've reviewed the details of the latest settlement proposal from the banks, and we believe it is inadequate for California,” Shum Preston, a spokesman for Harris, said in a statement. “Our state has been clear about what any multistate settlement must contain: transparency, relief going to the most distressed homeowners and meaningful enforcement that ensures accountability. At this point, this deal does not suffice for California."

Many analysts consider California's participation to be key to a strong deal. Harris walked away from talks with the banks last year, saying not enough was being offered by the financial institutions for California homeowners.

Since then, certain terms have been added to lure the Golden State back to the table, and Harris has opened separate inquiries into the mortgage business.

State attorneys general have received drafts of a $25-billion settlement with the nation's biggest banks that would overhaul foreclosure and mortgage servicing practices. No deal has been officially reached among the states, federal agencies and the nation's five largest mortgage servicers: Bank of America Corp., JPMorgan Chase & Co., Wells Fargo & Co.,Citigroup Inc. and Ally Financial Inc. Individual states must decide whether they will join a settlement or pursue independent lawsuits and investigations.

The proposed $25-billion settlement would cover only mortgages held by the banks privately and exclude those from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Hopefully Ms. Harris will continue withstand Administration pressure to cover up massive fraud on the part of the banks.

Please take a moment to thank her for her courage. When politicians do the right thing, they deserve our support.

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thereisnospoon 1/26/2012 07:30:00 AM |

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Woof!

By tristero

Man, that Ricky Santorum is barking up the wrong tree.:
I would say any type of sexual activity has absolutely no place in the military
I think it will probably come as a huge surprise to all those 18 year-olds in our armed forces to learn that a man who, incredibly, is considered by a many Republicans a very serious contender for the job of Leader of the Whole World believes that they took a vow of celibacy when they signed up to defend their country.

Good luck with that.

tristero 1/25/2012 07:30:00 PM |

Zombies are eating election officials brains

by digby

Not that this will stop the wingnuts from their crusade but it should. Turns out that the South Carolina zombies weren't zombies after all:

A top state election official disputes a recent claim that more than 950 people who voted in recent elections could actually be dead. Of the six names her office was allowed to examine, all were eligible to vote.

But to hear some Republican officials tell it, you’d think that on Election Day in South Carolina, graveyards all across the state empty out and hordes of zombie voters lurch to the polls.

But dead people can’t vote. They’re dead.

This apparently needs some clarification, because during testimony at a Jan. 11 House hearing, S.C. Department of Motor Vehicles director Kevin Shwedo estimated that 950-plus dead people had voted since – well, since being dead.

So alarmed was Shwedo – who Gov. Nikki Haley appointed to the DMV post last January and who registered to vote here the following month at age 54 – sent the data to state law enforcement.

The reliability of that data, however, came into question today during another hearing on the issue where State Election Commission director Marci Andino testified that some of the voters the DMV data said were dead are very much alive – and were eligible to cast a ballot.

But you know this will be a rural legend throughout Real America. They are just determined to believe that a bunch of people are trying to steal elections. Because that's what they're trying to do.

In this case they seem to be more than a little bit confused. It was a Republican primary. I know these people think these Democratic zombies are stupid but do they think they're so stupid that they would commit fraud to vote for Obama in an uncontested election? Or is it that they want to elect ... Romney? Hard to figure either way.

Let's just say that this one doesn't make a lot of sense.

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digby 1/25/2012 06:00:00 PM |

Blood for oil? You've got to be kidding.

by digby

Something's fishy in Tripoli? Daniel J. Graeber of Oilprice.com:

Way back in early 2011, members of the U.N. Security Council had no problem getting a resolution through that authorized military force in Libya ostensibly to protect civilians from attacks by forces loyal to strongman Moammar Gadhafi. The year before, lawmakers on both sides of the Atlantic were bickering over who did what and why in terms of the cancer-stricken Lockerbie bomber. This Scottish decision to release him, depending on which U.S. lawmaker you spoke with, was tied to a BP deal to drill for oil in Libya. Despite fractures in the new interim government in Tripoli and reports of renewed protests, a decision by the Italian government to quietly discuss trade relations suggests something isn't quite right in the way Western allies pick their fights.

Read on.

If it's questions are answered in the most obvious way it will end up being one of the quickest debunking of a casus belli in modern history. Not that anyone's too surprised, I'm sure.

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digby 1/25/2012 04:30:00 PM |

Pedal to the metal is the new normal

by David Atkins

It's remarkable that this is treated as humdrum news these days:

The Federal Reserve said Wednesday that it was likely to leave short-term interest rates at rock-bottom levels at least through late 2014, pushing out its easy-monetary policy even further into the future than previously indicated.

In a statement at the end of its two-day meeting, policymakers at the central bank acknowledged the recent improvements in the economy but said that they expected “economic growth over coming quarters to be modest” and the unemployment rate, currently 8.5%, to decline “only gradually.”

The decision was what many analysts had expected.

Since August, the Fed had said it was likely to keep the federal funds rate, which broadly influences rates on loans for businesses and consumers, at near zero “at least through mid-2013.” Financial markets, however, most recently have been betting that the shift won’t happen until early 2014.

People tend to forget that a zero federal funds rate is supposed to be an emergency measure. Low interest rates help people afford to buy houses and other investments, but they hurt traditional savers. People who speculate on homes and stocks do better, while people on wage income with CDs and savings accounts get screwed, further incentivizing the bubble economy. It's a pedal to the metal approach to keep asset values as inflated as possible while doing nothing about wages. But beyond even more "quantitative easing", there's no farther for the Fed to go on this front even to reinflate assets.

We've been at "pedal to the metal" for years, and we're apparently going to stay there with no end in sight.

That's not to say that a zero interest rate environment isn't necessary during a major recession. It probably is. But a zero-interest rate environment for years and years on end during a largely jobless recovery is more proof that the economy is broken. There's an argument to be had over whether the governmental and financial elites in this area are greedy, incompetent or both. But the notion that they deserve unquestioned respect as arcane priests of economic wisdom is ludicrous.

They're essentially throwing every asset-inflating policy against the wall to see what sticks, and praying something works.

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thereisnospoon 1/25/2012 02:54:00 PM |

Laugh til it hurts

by digby

We often say in these parts that conservatives don't have a sense of humor. But that's wrong. It's just that it's the kind of cruel stupid humor most of us get past before we're out of high school.

Here's the mayor of East Haven Connecticut:

Talk about digging yourself a hole ...

Here's the context:

Police Gang Tyrannized Latinos, Indictment Says

By PETER APPLEBOME

They were known as Miller’s Boys, police officers who worked the 4-to-midnight shift, patrolling the largely working-class town of East Haven, Conn., including the small but growing Hispanic community that has spread out in recent years from New Haven.

The officers were more than well known in that community; according to residents and federal authorities, they were feared. They stopped and detained people, particularly immigrants, without reason, federal prosecutors said, sometimes slapping, hitting or kicking them when they were handcuffed, and once smashing a man’s head into a wall. They followed and arrested residents, including a local priest, who tried to document their behavior.

They rooted through stores looking for damning security videotapes of how they had treated some of their targets, described by one of them on a police radio as having “drifted to this country on rafts made of chicken wings.”

And after it became known that the Justice Department was investigating the department, according to an indictment unsealed on Tuesday, a picture of a rat appeared on a police union bulletin board, and in the locker room, an ominous note: “You know what we do with snitches?”

On Tuesday, the Federal Bureau of Investigation arrested Sgt. John Miller and three of his officers — David Cari, Dennis Spaulding and Jason Zullo — on charges of conspiracy, false arrest, excessive force and obstruction of justice over what the indictment described as years of mistreatment of individuals, especially Hispanics, and efforts to cover it up.

Following on the heels of a scathing Justice Department report in December that found the East Haven police had engaged in widespread “biased policing, unconstitutional searches and seizures, and the use of excessive force,” the indictment portrayed a harrowing picture of arbitrary justice for Hispanic residents.

Just eat some tacos, it'll be fine.

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digby 1/25/2012 01:30:00 PM |

Civility

by digby

In a heated hearing Wednesday on Capitol Hill, Democratic Congressman Henry Waxman called upon the billionaire Koch brothers to be subpoenaed over their alleged monetary interests in the controversial Keystone XL pipeline. Republican Congressman Ed Whitfield angrily cut off Waxman. “We’re not going to be subpoenaing the Koch brothers … because the Koch brothers have nothing to do with this project,” Whitfield snapped.

“Point of order!” Waxman exclaimed. “You cut me out in the middle of a sentence!”

“Your time was up, Mr. Waxman!” Whitfield shot back. “We are going to recess this hearing for ten minutes and then we’re going to come back.”

“Are you calling the Koch brothers during the recess?” Waxman sniped.

“If you want to talk about that, let’s talk about the millions of dollars the Obama administration gave companies like Solyndra and people like George Kaiser and other campaign bundlers,” Whitfield fumed.

“Why are you interrupting members and then you take unlimited time for yourself?” Waxman responded.

“I’m the chairman! And I’m telling you right now we’re going to recess for ten minutes!” Whitfield boomed, before storming out of the hearing.

For background on this, read this article in The Hill. The Kochs are a great symbol for the Democrats and they're smart to use it. But in case you think this is terribly uncivilized, get a gander at what the GOP has in mind:

In 1996, Republicans pivoting to the second year of control of the House realized they made a strategic error in aggressively thumping environmental regulations.

“Let’s stop shooting ourselves in the foot on that one,” House Speaker Newt Gingrich told his lieutenants, as chronicled by Washington Post reporters David Maraniss and Michael Weisskopf in their 1996 book, “Tell Newt to Shut Up!”

“We kinda looked up one day and said ‘This wasn’t smart,’” recalled Rep. John Boehner (R-Ohio) in the book. The revelation spurred approval of major changes in 1996 to the Safe Drinking Water Act even as Republicans looked to knock off Bill Clinton from a second term in the White House.

In 2012, with Gingrich on the campaign trail and Republican front-runner Mitt Romney tied with Obama in a new CNN poll, Boehner, now speaker, and his House GOP crew aren’t second-guessing their agenda. Instead, they see energy as a wedge issue they can use to appeal to independent voters with a pro-jobs message, especially if gasoline prices start to increase this summer.

Nah, politics haven't moved right. Both sides do it, remember? It's a wash!

I do hope the Democrats aren't also forgetting the lessons of the past in terms of how this Solyndra pseudo-scandal is developing. The Republicans will spend as much money as it takes to get this to penetrate to at least "smell test" level. It's what they do and they're good at it. I don't know if it has the potency they think it has, but it will be a distraction and an annoyance if it takes off regardless --- and make the public question alternative energy as nothing more than a scam. Which is the point.

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digby 1/25/2012 12:00:00 PM |

Dirty Laundry

by digby

This is just pathetic:

Tina DuPuy writes:
Mitt Romney’s hurdle in winning the love/respect/admiration/fear of his party can be summed up in one photo: It was taken by his son, Tagg (doesn’t Sarah Palin have a kid with that name?) and put on Twitter this week. It’s of Romney and his wife Ann, presumably in a hotel basement, side-by-side pouring detergent into washing machines. Mitt is, of course, wearing a starched button up shirt and jeans, which is what people who never do laundry think people would wear when they do laundry. (Personally, if I have a clean starched shirt and jeans that’s an indication I don’t need to do laundry yet.) “Nothing like the glamorous life on the road,” the intermittent front-runner’s son tweeted with the pic.

This photo comes in the same week as Romney’s tax return where we learned Romney doesn’t actually work. He is in fact, as he’s claimed, unemployed. His money…makes his money. Millions and millions. He pays a tax rate of 13.9 percent – far lower than your average laundromat owner.

Which leads me to ask: Why is Mitt being photographed doing his laundry? Were there no Dukakis tanks available?

Apparently pleased with his Average Joe “real street” cred, Romney happily explained the image to NBC News, “We do our laundry at least once a week, because we’ll be on the road for 30 straight days. Who else do you think is going to do our laundry?”

"We do our laundry at least once a week because we'll be on the road for 30 straight days?" Huh?

Maybe he should have Tagg do it for him. After all, he owes him big:

David Kay Johnston: The Romneys gave $100 milliion to their sons and paid not one penny of gift tax. They were able to take assets they have that are producing enormous income and, under the law, give that money to their children and not pay any taxes on it.

Sambolin: Is that something you specifically found in what has been released to you?

Johnston: Yes. I have suspected this and written about it in my column that this is what happened, and last night, Brad Malt, the attorney for the Romneys, confirmed to Reuters that we were correct. They have not paid a penny of gift tax. That's because Congress allows a very tiny group of people — the Romneys by their income are in the top 1% of the top 1% — to not count as having any value the real source of their income, something called carried interest, if they give it to their children.
Talk about dirty laundry.

I think it might be time to recycle this again.

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digby 1/25/2012 10:00:00 AM |

Fooled again

by digby

So, according to dday, New York AG Eric Schneiderman is either a whore or a dupe, as were those who initially thought it was probably good news that he was tapped for the president's new "financial fraud task force." Too bad. Even among the most rabidly cynical, Schneiderman had been touted as a smart person of integrity and one of the only powerful Democrats in the land on the right side of this issue. So much for that, I guess.

I will say this. It could have been worse. As long as no deal is reached, there's at least a chance that a better one can happen.

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digby 1/25/2012 09:00:00 AM |

Banning fetuses in food: when morons are in charge of our laws

by David Atkins

Oh good lord:

A Republican state senator from Oklahoma City introduced a bill Tuesday that would ban the use of aborted human fetuses in food, despite conceding that he’s unaware of any company using such a practice.

Freshman Sen. Ralph Shortey said his own Internet research led him to believe such a ban is necessary and prompted him to offer the bill aimed at raising “public awareness” and giving an “ultimatum to companies” that might consider such a policy.

Shortey said he discovered suggestions online that some companies use embryonic stem cells to develop artificial flavors, but added that he is unaware of any Oklahoma companies doing such research.

In an e-mail to The Associated Press, U.S. Food and Drug Administration spokeswoman Pat El-Hinnawy said: “FDA is not aware of this particular concern.”

The executive director of the anti-abortion group Oklahomans for Life, which has successfully pushed some of the strictest anti-abortion laws in the country through the state’s GOP-controlled Legislature, also said he had never heard of human fetuses being used in food research.

“I don’t know anything about that,” said Tony Lauinger.

"His own Internet research." If this sounds to you like your crazy right-wing aunt freaking out over bullshit in a chain email, that's because you're not that far off the mark. The only significant story in recent years about this apparently crucial issue is this bit of interesting science involving Pepsi and stem cells from last year:

A bizarre controversy is unfolding over an impending low-calorie soda from Pepsi (PEP), which the company is creating with the help of the biotech company Senomyx (SNMX). Numerous anti-abortion groups have started a boycott of Pepsi products because they say Senomyx, which develops new ingredients intended to enhance sweetness and other flavors, has done so using embryonic kidney cells that were originally taken from an aborted baby.

This accusation presents a two-fold problem for Pepsi. The first, most obvious one is that the beverage giant has now ardent anti-abortionists breathing down its neck. The second, and possibly more troubling, issue is that some of Pepsi's attempts to create groundbreaking and healthier products are now associated with fetal kidney cells.

Is this claim true? Neither Pepsi nor Senomyx returned calls, so we don't know the companies' side of the story. But a perusal of Senomyx's patents suggests that it may well be. All but 7 of the company's 77 patents refer to the use of HEK 293 (human embryonic kidney) cells, which researchers have used for decades as biological workhorses. (For the bio-geeks among you, these cells offer a reliable way to produce new proteins via genetic engineering.)

The company appears to be engineering HEK cells to function like the taste-receptor cells we have in our mouth. This way, Senomyx can test millions of substances to see if they work as different types of taste enhancers without subjecting human volunteers to endless taste tests.

To non-scientists this may sound a bit strange, but the reality is that HEK 293 cells are widely used in pharmaceutical research, helping scientists create vaccines as well as drugs like those for rheumatoid arthritis.

So Pepsi's research affiliates were using stem cells to test food substances the same way pharma companies test vaccines. Interesting and kind of cool. So naturally last year the nutcase womb police boycotted Pepsi; and now partly due to this ridiculous nontroversy, Pepsi has disaffiliated from Senomyx.

And less than a year later, this embarrassing incident for America has trickled down into the fevered imagination of some elected moron in Oklahoma that people are being fed fetus parts on their dinner plates. So naturally he steps into legislative action based on his "Internet research."

Welcome to the heartland "values" to which we unAmerican coastal elites are supposed to give deference and utmost respect.

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thereisnospoon 1/25/2012 07:30:00 AM |

Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Electric Teabag Acid Test

by digby

Dick Armey lets the cat out of the bag:

“I think the [Tea Party] movement, very broadly,” Armey began, “has forsaken the possibility of having a reliable, innovative, small government conservative emerge through the Republican Party’s process. So we put our focus on — ”

“What do you mean?” Banfield interrupted, “I thought that was Ron Paul, Congressman?”

“Well, Ron Paul, we– we sa– we don’t believe he will emerge, uh, as the candidate through this process,”

“So why aren’t you backing him?” Banfield asked. “And all your very strong Tea Partiers? I mean the numbers are in the hundreds of thousands, if not millions.”

“One of the things you have to understand about small government activists,” Armey explained, “is that we all, each and very one of us, individually, march to our own drummer, so there are many people in our movement that are backing Ron Paul, but there are some that are backing some of the others, as well,”

“But that means you don’t have sort of a block of power, if what I’m hearing is, uh…”

“We’re not about power,” Armey said. “That’s one of the things that’s confusing to a lot of people who are used to analyzing the behavior of real politicians that are in biz for themselves. We are about what’s good for the nation, individual liberty, personal freedom, and everybody being free to do their own thing.
If it feels good, do it baby Tune in, turn on, vote GOP.

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digby 1/24/2012 06:00:00 PM |

The "A" Team

by digby

So we're going to have the Mitch Daniels Experience tonight. Feel the magic:

This guy and Christie, Jindal and Jeb Bush are the supposed "A Team" that didn't take the field in this cycle. I think they make Newtie and Santorum look like Churchill and Roosevelt by comparison.

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digby 1/24/2012 04:30:00 PM |

To Mitt or Not to Mitt

by David Atkins

I'm sure you've seen the numbers by now:

Mitt Romney’s campaign released hundreds of pages of tax documents on Tuesday morning, providing an inside glimpse into his sprawling investments, both in the United States and abroad, in an effort to dampen the attacks on his wealth that have become a central focus of the Republican presidential nominating battle.

Mr. Romney and his wife, Ann, had an effective federal income tax rate in 2010 of 13.9 percent, paying about $3 million in taxes on an adjusted gross income of $21.6 million, the vast majority of it flowing from a myriad of stock holdings, mutual funds and other investments, including profits and investment income from Bain Capital, the private equity firm Mr. Romney retired from in 1999.

The part of me that wants to see an easier win in November desperately wants Gingrich to win the nomination.

But the fighter in me wants to see Romney win this nomination so that we can have the tax the rich conversation undistracted all through November. Sadly, I don't get to choose. That's for the crazies on the other side to decide.
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thereisnospoon 1/24/2012 02:54:00 PM |

From the stating the obvious files

by digby

Friendly reminder:

The United States’ continued operation of the Guantanamo Bay prison camp in Cuba is a “clear breach of international law,” United Nations human rights chief Navi Pillay said today, Reuters reports. Only six trials have been completed in 10 years, while eight detainees have died at the prison. “While fully recognizing the right and duty of states to protect their people and territory from terrorist acts, I remind all branches of the U.S. government of their obligation under international human rights law to ensure that individuals deprived of their liberty can have the lawfulness of their detention reviewed before a court,” Pillay said. “Where credible evidence exists against Guantanamo detainees, they should be charged and prosecuted. Otherwise, they must be released.”

Might as well be talking to a wall.

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digby 1/24/2012 01:30:00 PM |

The Earl of Romney

by digby

I think Atrios explains the problem with Lord Romney's taxes perfectly:

Romney has said he was unemployed. He's right. He actually does nothing to earn most of his income. He's just in possession of a giant pile of cash. He pays some people to do stuff with that giant pile of cash so it earns a rate of return. And because we are ruled by horrible people who think the lives of the 1% are more important than everyone else, the tax rate on any money that pile of cash earns is much lower than it is on the money earned by people who actually work.

Now the .01% like Romney will tell you that they work actually work much harder than the rest of us and as a result they should be allowed to keep all of their money. After all, if they didn't work harder they wouldn't be rich, right?

Indeed, Romney likes to say that his father gave him nothing and he pulled himself up by his bootstraps. If you believe that growing up with a very famous family name in both the world of business and politics --- in a world made up of other people with vast wealth and famous family names in business and politics --- counts as up from nothing, I suppose that might be true. But Mitt was born with every advantage, many more than his father who really did work his way up the ladder of success. It's insulting that he even tries to relate to average people in this way.

There's nothing wrong with being wealthy and running for office. But if you are nothing but a privileged plutocrat, without any sense of noblesse oblige, everyone will rightly see your self-serving policies for what they are: a chance to enhance your own wealth, that of your wealthy peers and, most importantly, that of your heirs. In other words you are just another in a long line of would-be aristocrats trying to game the system for your own.

We've had many wealthy presidents in America, but never one as rich as Mitt whose policies were so blatantly geared to make himself even wealthier at the expense of the rest of the nation. If he wins this election we will know once and for all that deep down, Americans really want to be subjects, not citizens.

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digby 1/24/2012 12:00:00 PM |

Patriotic Self-deportation

by digby

PATRIOTS FOR SELF-DEPORTATION
www.SelfDeport.org
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
AUSTIN (January 24, 2012) The grassroots organization Patriots for Self-Deportation, formed last year in response to legislative inaction on the issue of birthright citizenship for children of illegal immigrants (also known as the “anchor baby” problem), announced today the launch of their website, SelfDeport.org. The group describes SelfDeport.org as a resource for patriotic Americans who wish to set an example of responsible citizenship by proving their own rights to remain in this great nation.
The group hopes the website and issue benefits from Republican candidate Mitt Romney's endorsement of self-deportation as a solution to the problem of illegal immigration, according to spokesman Stephen Winters.
"A surprising number of authentic patriots have found in their own genealogical searches that one or more of their ancestors came here or stayed here illegally, and yet continued to make a living in this country and have children who in turn became instant citizens," said Winters. "Some patriots, faced with this moral dilemma, have decided to set an example for others. Knowing that their own presence in this country is not on moral solid ground, they have decided to demonstrate the highest level of civic dedication and sacrifice, and engage in self-deportation."
In order to address the surprisingly large number of such cases, Patriots for Self-Deportation launched SelfDeport.org to support, inform, and assist those undertaking or considering a similar move. At SelfDeport.org, patriots can answer for themselves the following questions:
How can I know if ancestors of mine came here legally?
If I suspect that an ancestor should never have received citizenship, am I morally obliged to do something about it?
What support is available if I decide to self-deport?
If several of my ancestors came over illegally, how do I decide which country of origin to return to?
How do I go about self-deportation?
Patriots for Self-Deportation urges all patriotic Americans to visit SelfDeport.org for answers to these questions and more, and for testimonials by patriots who have chosen to live in accordance with their values. "We hope that this resource will help guide other patriots in carrying out this difficult but essential duty," said Winters.

The problem, as one wag put it, is "who want to take all our patriots?"

Update: Here's what "self-deportation" is rally all about.

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digby 1/24/2012 10:26:00 AM |

Bring back thecircus

by digby

Newtie's upset:

“I wish in retrospect I had protested when Brian Williams took [the crowd] out of it because I think it’s wrong,” he said. “I think he took them out of it because the media is terrified that the audience is going to side with the candidates against the media, which is what they’ve done in every debate.”
Gingrich’s debate performances are widely viewed as having propelled him to an overwhelming victory at Saturday’s South Carolina primary.

His fiery performances often came at the expense of the debate moderators for questions he deemed inappropriate, and the conservative crowds often rewarded the former House Speaker with applause and even a standing ovation for his attacks against the media.

But NBC asked the crowd to hold their applause until the breaks, and moderator Brian Williams didn’t offer any opportunities for Gingrich to go after him.

As a result, some of Gingrich’s attacks that might have energized his supporters at previous debates seemed to fall flat. At one point Gingrich even seemed flustered, and paused in silence to collect his thoughts.

“We’re going to serve notice on future debates that we won’t tolerate — we’re just not going to allow that to happen,” Gingrich continued. “That’s wrong — the media doesn’t control free speech. People ought to be able to applaud if they want to. It was almost silly.”

Uh, no. Not silly enough obviously.

He's a cheerleader not a politician. Without the "fans" screaming for blood his allegedly brilliant debating skills fall flat.

As Alan Grayson said:

"The Republicans can't give them bread so they just give them circuses."

*Who knew Florida had become forced childbirth central? Santorum should do well once they find out about his macabre practices.

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digby 1/24/2012 09:00:00 AM |

The wingnut test of wills

by David Atkins

Newt Gingrich has surged into the lead not only in Florida, but nationwide as well.

That means one thing: the GOP has about a week to discover who is more powerful: its establishment or its base. If Newt Gingrich wins an upset in Florida and proceeds to roll through to nomination in spite of all predictions, he will almost certainly lose the general election against a vulnerable President. The conspiracy-minded will declare that the big money men are pleased with Obama and are throwing the race to ensure four more years. But that assumes a level of coordinated puppeteering that doesn't likely exist. Even if one assumes that on certain issues the Parties don't differ all that greatly, there are a very large number of influential people who depend on the tendrils of power and influence that alter depending on whether a Democrat or a Republican holds the White House. There is simply no way that the vast bulk of the Republican establishment is lying down for four years, allowing its favored sons and daughters to languish while Democrats fill all the appointments in the White House's power.

No, the Republicans want to win in 2012. They have to. They've spent enough time, energy and money labeling the first African-American President a socialist, communist unAmerican professorial elite aligned with Black Panthers and food stamp cultures of dependency, that they can't afford to lose to him and still save face.

That's the danger of using ridiculous hyperbole to smear your opponents. If you lose, it means that the people either didn't believe the best lies your money could tell, or worse, believed them and didn't care.

The Republican establishment can't afford to see Gingrich win the nomination. But the base isn't about to let a Mormon governor from Massachusetts with a more moderate record be their standard-bearer.

In the next week, we'll find out if the GOP wizards are still in control of their monster, or if their monster is about to eat them alive. If the former, the monster won't exactly be happy about going back in its cage. If the latter, it could mean no less than the beginning of the end for the Republican Party: the year when its rabid base officially seized control, hastening the demise of a political party in rapid demographic decline.

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thereisnospoon 1/24/2012 07:30:00 AM |

Monday, January 23, 2012

Debate night drinking game

by digby

Drink on "frankly" and prepare for a massive hangover.

But it will be nothing compared to the hangover in the GOP if Newtie pulls this off:

SCHMIDT: Look, I think, not only are we not moving towards a coalescing of support by the Republican establishment for Newt Gingrich, we're probably moving toward the declaration of war on Newt Gingrich by the Republican establishment. And if Newt Gingrich is able to win the Florida primary, you will see a panic and a meltdown of the Republican establishment that is beyond my ability to articulate in the English language.

People will go crazy and you will have this five week period until the Super Tuesday states which is going to be as unpredictable, tumultuous as any period in modern American politics. It will be a remarkable thing to watch should that happen in Florida.

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digby 1/23/2012 05:45:00 PM |

Sir It Gets Better Sir

by digby

I don't think anything can illustrate the change in our society better than this:

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digby 1/23/2012 04:30:00 PM |

Mitt Romney, Uncreative Destructor

by David Atkins

Mitt Romney had a fascinating take on the foreclosure mess today. Dave Dayen and Digby have superb rundowns of Romney's comments particularly as they relate to strategic default and the Administration's foreclosure settlement, but I want to focus on a specific part of Romney's answer to struggling homeowners:

"The banks are scared to death, of course, because they think they're going to go out of business," Romney said. "They're afraid that if they write all these loans off, they're going to go broke. And so they're feeling the same thing you're feeling. They just want to pretend all of this is going to get paid someday so they don't have to write it off and potentially go out of business themselves."

"This is cascading throughout our system and in some respects government is trying to just hold things in place, hoping things get better," Romney continued. "My own view is you recognize the distress, you take the loss and let people reset. Let people start over again, let the banks start over again. Those that are prudent will be able to restart, those that aren't will go out of business. This effort to try and exact the burden of their mistakes on homeowners and commercial property owners, I think, is a mistake."

It takes a while to think through what Romney is saying here, but at its core what you get is a terrifying view of Romney's perspective as a vulture capitalist.

The single silver lining to the cloud of vulture capitalism is the principle of creative destruction. From a business point of view, creative destruction rests on the notion that while killing and carving up struggling firms may entail short-term pain, in the long run the economy benefits by freeing up capital and resources to function in smaller, more dynamic parts or even just the broader economy. It's not much of a silver lining to those who lose their jobs or to the towns that die when factories are closed, but a halfhearted case for the role of vulture capital in helping along creative destruction can be made by an economist.

So when Romney says to simply flush all the bad debt out of the system for both homeowners and banks alike, he's resting on this same worldview: that things will be better off once the current mess is destroyed, so that the housing market and banking market can be rebuilt from the ground up. It's the same perspective he had when he insisted that Detroit be allowed to go bankrupt. Creative destruction is the name of Romney's game. It also serves the Libertarian economic project fairly well, because the alternative to creative destruction is direct intervention, usually by a government entity.

But applying the principle of creative destruction to the entire housing and banking market is nothing short of terrifying. It's one thing to do it in the Rust Belt or Silicon Valley, where factories and offices can be liquidated so that mechanics and engineers can theoretically be assigned to more productive industries. It rarely works out that way, of course: usually the engineers and mechanics stay unemployed or are rehired at far lesser wages, even as the vulture capitalists make off like bandits. But at least there's a sound theory behind it.

Banking isn't like manufacturing or technology, though. Banks don't produce anything but loans and interest on investment. You can't take a banker and reassign her to a more productive type of finance, even in theory. Banks are less like factories themselves, and more like cogs in an economic machine that are allowed to take profits in return for the service they provide. Banking is a boring and often ugly business that is in many ways a necessary evil--so much so that most societies have historically placed stringent, usually religious rules or even bans on the activity, forcing social outcasts to provide the service. "Creativity" in banking is almost always a bad thing, as is financialization of economies. There's no "creativity" to be had in destroying banks; rather, the only reason for destroying banks is essentially to regulate them by limiting their power.

Homeownership is even less subject to the rules of creative destruction, unless one is literally leveling homes in a process similar to gentrification--which even then, obviously, has its own social costs. Homes are not an economic engine, or rather they're not supposed to be. They're places where people live, grow up, raise families and retire. Turning families out of their homes isn't like turning them out of a dead-end job with the hope of their landing a more productive, economically efficient job later. It simply means another transplanted or homeless family.

That the big zombie banks should be broken up rather than allowed to stagger on pretending their bad debts will be repaid is without question. That homeowners with no home of repaying their mortgage should have alternatives to walking away, such as own-to-rent or mortgage write-downs, seems intuitive.

But Romney's stated approach of simply allowing the housing market to bottom out and the banks to go under without government intervention is not only cruel; it's economically insane. It's not creative, just destructive. It's the approach of a man who understands only the business of vulture capital, not the business of running an economy.

It's proof that the last thing America needs in office is a businessman, or at least one who cut his chops in the financial sector.

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thereisnospoon 1/23/2012 03:14:00 PM |

Romney the socialist

by digby

This is pretty amazing:
Richard Wood of Bradenton, Fla., told Romney he'd folded his title insurance company in October 2010. "I invested in some real estate, some rental properties, made what I considered to be very conservative investments during the boom times and right now I am negotiating with the same bank who has mortgages on each of those and an approximate $200,000 deficiency," he said. "We have been exploring the possibility of moving to another to another country where we might be able to live on our retirement and our Social Security."
"Yeah. It's just tragic, isn't it? Just tragic, just tragic," Romney said. "We're just so overleveraged, so much debt in our society, and some of the institutions that hold it aren't willing to write it off and say they made a mistake, they loaned too much, we're overextended, write those down and start over. They keep on trying to harangue and pretend what they have on their books is still what it's worth."

"Also, Gov. Romney, we got hit with a double whammy," Wood continued. "My wife, she's a Realtor -- she is in the process of filing for bankruptcy on some debts that she needed to take out in order to try and stay in business the past five years. I'm probably right behind her."

"That's tragic," Romney said. "In some cases, if the debt is not in something you can service, it's like you have to move on and start over away from those debts. It's helpful if you get an institution that's willing to work with you, but if you don't you have no other option."

The Sunshine State had the seventh-highest foreclosure rate of any state in 2011, according to RealtyTrac, an online foreclosure marketplace and data firm. All of the homeowners at the table Monday said they owed more than their homes were worth and that their banks wouldn't negotiate on modifications or refinancing. More than 22 percent of all residential properties in the U.S. are "underwater," according to housing research firm CoreLogic. In Florida, a full 44 percent of mortgage properties are underwater.

"The banks are scared to death, of course, because they think they're going to go out of business," Romney said. "They're afraid that if they write all these loans off, they're going to go broke. And so they're feeling the same thing you're feeling. They just want to pretend all of this is going to get paid someday so they don't have to write it off and potentially go out of business themselves."

"This is cascading throughout our system and in some respects government is trying to just hold things in place, hoping things get better," Romney continued. "My own view is you recognize the distress, you take the loss and let people reset. Let people start over again, let the banks start over again. Those that are prudent will be able to restart, those that aren't will go out of business. This effort to try and exact the burden of their mistakes on homeowners and commercial property owners, I think, is a mistake."
Wow. This seems to me to be a huge move in a very different direction than any politician in the race. He's supporting the concept of strategic default which until now has been considered something only very sophisticated rich people were allowed to do. The CW is that it's a huge moral hazard for the rubes.

In fairness, these people sound as if they were heavily involved in Real Estate speculation and weren't just your average homeowner screwed by the crash, so maybe it's not as unusual after all. But still, the language the "empathy" the idea that it's "prudent" for non-billionaires to get a restart are all anathemas to the 1%ers. I will be shocked if Romney doesn't walk this back if it's picked up by the press. It's a class betrayal of epic proportions.

That's if he means what he's saying which I very much doubt. This has all the hallmarks of Mitt's compassion chip misfiring and mistakenly saying what these voters want to hear. If it isn't, and he sticks with it, we will see Romney to the left of the administration on the foreclosure crisis, which is fairly shocking. After all, this is what's happening right now:

Rumor has it that on Monday, after months of negotiation with big banks, the White House may announce a settlement that would let the banks off the hook for their role in the foreclosure crisis -- paying a tiny fraction of what's needed in exchange for blanket immunity from future lawsuits.

We hope these rumors are untrue.

President Obama has the ability to stop and change the direction of this sweetheart deal. He should reject any deal that benefits the one percent and lets the big banks get away with their crimes. Instead, the president should stand with the 99 percent and push for real accountability and a solution that will help millions of people in this country.

Here are the hard facts about the housing crisis we face:

3.5 million Americans are homeless.
18.5 million homes sit vacant.
Since 2007, more than 7.5 million homes have been foreclosed.
Default and foreclosure rates are now several times higher than at any time since the Great Depression.

If President Obama is serious about solving this crisis, he must ensure three things:

First: The banks must pay a minimum $300 billion in principal reduction for homeowners with underwater mortgages and/or restitution for foreclosed-on families. This is essential. Every effort to date to reboot the housing market has failed because it has not done the most essential thing -- actually reduce the massive debt load carried by homeowners.

As it stands, the deal likely to be announced Monday would have the banks pay only $20 billion, an astonishingly small fraction of what's needed. Add up all the underwater homes in America, and there's an estimated $700 billion in negative equity in the country, according to a recent study. If banks fix what they broke and write down principals for all underwater mortgages, this would free up millions of people to pump billions of dollars back into local economies, create jobs, and ultimately generate revenue to help invest in things that will help our economy grow.

This was addressed on Up with Chris Hayes yesterday with Eliot Spitzer:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Florida has been ground zero for foreclosure fraud and the housing slump. It stands to reason that the GOP would be trying to find a populist appeal to the average people in the state. It will be especially helpful to them if the administration does their dirty work for them and they can run against this settlement. The politics are very, very stupid. On the merits, it's just plain wrong.

Update: Also too, this:
The nation’s top six banks -- Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Citigroup, Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs -- paid out $144 billion in bonuses and compensation for 2011, second only to the record $147 billion they paid out in 2007 at the height of the economic boom, according to a report released today by The New Bottom Line. Four banks – Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, and Morgan Stanley – were awarded record high bonuses and compensation in 2011, despite their bleak stock performance during the year.

“Even though top bank executives have claimed that bonuses are down as much as 30 percent for 2011, total compensation has not decreased at all,” according to The New Bottom Line’s report, “Pulling Back The Curtain: The 1% Behind The 2011 Big Bank Bonuses.”

Update: Dday has a detailed analysis of Mitt's comments. (I had missed the part where he praised Pam Bondi .. oy vey, he is confused.) His political analysis is the same as mine.

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digby 1/23/2012 01:00:00 PM |

Help out a pal

by digby

Susie Madrak, writer, blogger extraordinaire had to have gallbladder surgery and it cost more than she has:

In addition to paying for the health insurance, I have a $5000 copay on the surgery and about $30,000 in assorted medical bills from when I was hospitalized previously. I don’t expect to pay all of that, but I will have to pay something.

Obviously, some of you are in the same leaky financial boat and the last thing I want is for my readers to donate to me when they’re in bad shape themselves. But for those of you who can spare a few bucks, and would like to support what I do, I’d really appreciate your help.

Click over to her page and throw in a couple of bucks if you have it. It's Ayn Rand's world and we have to live in it.

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digby 1/23/2012 11:30:00 AM |

The age of Citizens United

by digby

This is an interesting discussion on Up With Chris Hayes yesterday morning about campaign finance.
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

The disagreement between Eliot Spitzer and Melissa Harris Perry is instructive. It's clear that many of us are confused about Citizens United --- the fact is that nothing any wealthy individual like Sheldon Adelson is doing in this cycle is a result of that ruling. Citizens United lifted the restrictions on corporations and union spending in elections, period. It had nothing to do with wealthy individuals donating to PACs in order to support candidates. That has been legal since 1976:
The Supreme Court's ruling in Buckley v. Valeo (1976) held that expenditures made independently of a candidate's campaign could not be limited under the Constitution. If expenditures are made in "coordination" with a campaign, however, they may be regulated as contributions.
Citizens United brought about the SuperPAC in order to facilitate the newly legal unlimited corporate giving, but the huge donations from wealthy individuals to these PACs is something they always could have done. Indeed, the single largest donation to Romney's SuperPAC is "John Paulson, a billionaire and hedge fund manager who is, according to Politico, 'famous for [having enriched] himself by betting on the collapse of the housing industry.'" There was nothing stopping him from doing this before either.

So why the big change? I think it has to do with two things, one cultural and one economic. The first is simply that wealthy benefactors are willing to put their names on their politics. The overt lobbying for Randroid values among the super wealthy has been well documented. They are shameless.

The second, and probably more important, is that these wealthy people have so much more money than they had before. Adelson is the 8th richest man in the United States. The Koch Brothers are the 4th and 5th. And their wealth has grown exponentially in recent years as everyone else has been struggling:

When you have this much money, buying elections is a very cheap investment. It's these two factors --- the swashbuckling culture of wealth and income disparity that lie at the heart of our current problems.

This is not to say that campaign reform isn't useful. There are many groups out there coming together to try to overturn corporate personhood, Citizens United and demand public funding of campaigns, among other things. In this interesting analysis, Mark Schmitt concurs with Eliot Spitzer in the clip above about the potential dangers but posits that process could yield tangential results around the margins even if it fails to reach the intended goals. Schmitt likens it to the anti-abortion crusade on the right, in which the organizing ends up depending on the failure to reach goals to sustain itself, but I think there is a positive tangential result in terms of the cultural and social pressure such a campaign could produce. There will always be shameless rich people of course. But there's no reason society should allow them to celebrate their shamelessness. There have been many things that were once socially acceptable and no longer are --- it's hard, but not impossible.

Still, more campaign finance reform probably won't eliminate the total corruption of the DC institutions where 25 year old staffers are enticed by the early prospect of mid six figure lobbyist salaries and where everyone expects to cash out big. And it can't change the crumbling foundation of a nation that's perfectly willing to allow vastly wealthy individuals and institutions to evade the rule of law and brag about it while hoarding more and more of the nation's wealth for themselves.

In that Chris Hayes clip I think David Stockman probably has it right and it's a very uncomfortable observation. In order for our democracy to function as it should we may end up having to restrict free speech in some limited way around our elections. It's an appalling solution to an appalling problem. But until we can make a very substantial cultural shift that makes corruption shameful and an economic shift that redistributes some of this wealth back to the middle class, we're going to be seeing more and more ostentatious corruption of our democracy. That's a very tall order. I'm guessing we're going to have to come up with a way to do it all.

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digby 1/23/2012 10:00:00 AM |

State intrusion

by digby

It's good that Rand Paul is taking on the TSA's security theatre by refusing to comply with a pat down request. Perhaps it will lead to more discussion about why this is a ridiculous approach to anti-terrorism. When the authorities find themselves groping a US Senator's crotch in public without any suspicion of criminal activity, something's gone wrong.

Having said that, I cannot help but be reminded of the fact that his home state of Texas just passed a law that goes a good deal further: forced vaginal probes of women seeking an abortion. To me, that seems like at least an equally intrusive state action, but when asked about it his allegedly highly principled father replied:

When GOP presidential hopeful Ron Paul was asked today about Tuesday’s federal court ruling upholding an aggressive new sonogram law in his home state of Texas, the congressman said the requirement that women seeking an abortion first get a sonogram “should always have been a Texas state position.’’

“Like Roe v Wade should never have been heard in the Supreme Court,” he said after a midday speech and rally at the Columbia Metropolitan Airport at the Eagle Aviation Building...

This is the usual dodge. Paul could claim that since abortion would be illegal in Texas (as it surely would) there would be no need for intrusive sonograms. But in states where abortion is legal, if they wanted to pass this law, he would be perfectly fine with it.

Brian Williams should ask him tonight at the debate whether he would agree that a state government has the right to demand pat-downs at its airports. I'd be curious to hear the answer.

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digby 1/23/2012 09:00:00 AM |

Reading the Tea Leaves

by David Atkins

The latest poll out of Florida:

Newt Gingrich leads Mitt Romney by eight points in Florida, according to a poll conducted the day after the former House speaker won the South Carolina primary.

According to the Insider Advantage poll, Gingrich has 34 percent support, Romney has 26 percent, Texas Rep. Ron Paul has 13 percent, and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum garners 11 percent.

But there's just one problem: Newt has a +34 unfavorable rating with the American public. The latest PPP poll shows that 60% of Americans have an unfavorable opinion of Gingrich, compared to only 26% who like him. Ouch. Mitt Romney's, meanwhile, is only +18 unfavorable.

The President has only a +10 job disapproval, making him more popular than either leading Republican in spite of everything. If the economy continues to improve over the next year (no sure thing, of course), that number will only get better.

In a national matchup, President Obama beats Gingrich by 7 points, but only beats Romney by 5.

What does all of this mean? Watch for the long knives from the GOP establishment to come out against Mr. Gingrich over the next week. They know that Mitt Romney for all his 1% vulture capital warts, is the only one with a prayer of taking the White House in 2012.

And then watch in response as the Tea Party base spits fury at the Republican Party.

It's helpful in these situations to remember that Democrats aren't the only Party with a serious "base" problem. If anything, the Republicans have it worse right now.

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thereisnospoon 1/23/2012 07:30:00 AM |

Sunday, January 22, 2012

Suffocating lunacy

by digby

Good God:

The owner of the Atlanta Jewish Times apologized for an opinion column in which he counted President Obama's assassination as among Israel's options in heading off a nuclear Iran.

"I very much regret it, I wish I hadn't made reference to it at all," Andrew Adler told JTA on Friday.

He said he would publish an apology in his next edition, and that reaction from readers had been overwhelmingly negative.

Fox News reported late Friday on its website that the Secret Service was investigating the column. In his interview with JTA, Adler said he had not been approached by the Secret Service.

In a Jan. 13 column, Adler, who is also the paper's publisher, outlined what he said were three possible responses by Israel to Iran's acquiring a nuclear weapon: a pre-emptive strike against Hamas and Hezbollah, terrorist groups that he said would be emboldened by a nuclear Iran; a direct strike on Iran; and "three, give the go-ahead for U.S.-based Mossad agents to take out a president deemed unfriendly to Israel in order for the current vice president to take his place, and forcefully dictate that the United States policy includes its helping the Jewish state obliterate its enemies."

He continued: "Yes, you read 'three' correctly. Order a hit on a president in order to preserve Israel's existence. Think about it. If I have thought of this Tom Clancy-type scenario, don't you think that this almost unfathomable idea has been discussed in Israel's most inner circles?"

What in the world is wrong with people? I feel like I'm drowning in conspiracy theories coming from every direction. Ugh.

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digby 1/22/2012 07:30:00 PM |

Standoff politics

by digby

Gird yourself --- it looks like we're in for another standoff:

On Fox News Sunday this morning, House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) told Chris Wallace that “We’re going to do everything we can to make sure the Keystone Pipeline is approved.” When Wallace pressed him whether Republican leadership would make the pipeline a condition for extending the payroll tax holiday, Boehner admitted, “We may,” adding (several times) that “All options are on the table.”

One can't help but wonder what would have happened if the administration and the Democrats had said "go ahead, make my day" when Boehner and the Destroyers first started this debt ceiling nonsense last spring. At this point it's hard to see how it's ever going to end.

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digby 1/22/2012 04:24:00 PM |

Fatuous rich guy quote of the day

by digby

A senior official at the Bank of Scotland explaining why they need to pay their CEO an obscene bonus:

If the chief executive turned down his bonus it would “demoralise” staff members and would send a signal that they now effectively “worked for an arm of the civil service or a utility, rather than for a bank”.

Yes, he has to take the money because the staff wants him to have it, so they can feel a part of the exciting and glamorous world of ... banking.

Update: Atrios sez:

And it isn't the Bank of Scotland, it's RBS, an almost wholly owned entity of the British government, and a very poorly performing investment so it's not entirely clear why any bonuses for top management are deserved at all.
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digby 1/22/2012 02:00:00 PM |