Bill O'Reilly: "Center Right" = "stoning to death" liberal NY comedians

I shit you not.

Simple Answers

Steven Benen:

Is there some great hunger out there for this "storyline" about Clinton and Obama?

Only among the D.C. press. Everyone else moved on a long time ago.

The Plentitude of Stupid

They really didn't know what they were doing.

The Quest for 60

There's been to much emphasis on the magic number of 60 for my tastes. Yes, getting a 60 seat Democratic caucus would be better than 57. But (as Steve Benen rightly points out), having a 60 seat caucus is no guarantee that you will be able to break filibusters.

I've been arguing for months now that if the Democrats reach 57 or 58 that the weight of that much influence, combined with a popular President, will tip the scales enough that the few moderates left in the Republican caucus (Snow, Collins, Voinovich and Specter) would be open to deal making.

More is better, but it is not necessary.

The Casandra of Wall Street

This video is pretty extraordinary. I'd never heard of Peter Schiff before, but the guy was a true Casandra. Every single thing he said in these clips has come to pass. But what is even more telling is the statements and reactions of the people around him as he made his dire assessments. You can HEAR them just rolling their eyes, patting him on the head and then sniggering with each other about "Crazy Uncle Peter".

It is to Schiff's great credit that he didn't once let the reactions get to him. He didn't back down, he didn't get defensive. He just calmly stated his opinion and time has proven him right. Obama should seriously consider bringing this guy on board, if for no other reason then he is someone Obama could trust to call bullshit when he hears bullshit.

Thinking about Palin

Following on the previous...

I think it is long past time that we accept the idea that not everyone is qualified to be President. I'm certainly not. Most everyone I know certainly is not. And I suspect most everyone I meet in my day-to-day life is not.

Being President is hard (to quote George W. Bush). The idea that anyone can run for the office, win it and then be good at it is one of those American myths we tell ourselves but which bear no relationship to reality. There's a reason why Matt Damon made the analogy to a Disney movie when talking about Palin's candidacy. It's because such things only happen in the movies (we hope).

Just think what being President involves. You are in charge of the largest bank account in the world. You have the more weapons at your disposal than the rest of the world combined. Your every word is monitered 24/7 by millions of interested parties, all looking for that subtle hint that will tell them what they should do to further their plans to conquer the world (or at least their little scrap of it). With a bad turn of phrase you can sink markets, devastate the lives of thousands, and scar the face of the planet for centuries to come.

And we want to perpetuate the idea that Joe the Plumber could handle that job? The idea that Joe could become President shouldn't make our hearts swell at the possibilities America offers. It should make us shudder at what would inevitably follow.

Just consider this: as much as Bush has fucked things up, it could have been a hell of a lot worse. As out of his element as he was, he was still more qualified to be President than most of the people you meet in your daily lives.

The Onion headline after Obama was elected was, "Black Man Given World's Worst Job."

Let's just hope he's up to it.

Shorter Andrew Sullivan

I'll continue to talk about Sarah Palin because it's not about Sarah Palin.

When to criticize

Criticizing the substance of rumors is fine. In fact, its the best time to do so before they become reality. I'd like to know more about why someone thinks Robert Kennedy, Jr. would be bad at the EPA.

But lets hold of criticizing Obama until such time as he actually does one of the many things he is rumored to be thinking about doing.

The Power of Hope

There's to much good stuff in this piece by Tim Wise to meaningfully excerpt. But, if I could summarize one of its main points, it would be that optimism works better than pessimism as a motivator. Simply put, when things look like they might get better, people get jazzed to try and make the promise real. But when it looks like they will get worse, people get discouraged and start to shut down.

Now, that isn't always the case. There are plenty of people out there who seem to thrive in the bad times, and God bless them for that (they keep the light shining in the dark). But I know that in my case, appeals to pessimism fail spectacularly. The last 8 years have been brutal for me when it comes to the desire to take positive action. There was a brief moment in 2003, during the Dean campaign, when hope inspired me to new heights of activism. But the rejection by the Democrats of Dean's message nearly destroyed my faith in the process.

Obama's campaign has restored some of that faith, but not enough to get me over the burnout I suffered after 2004. Fortunately for America it worked for a lot of other people. And it worked far better than the appeals to a darker view of humanity.

And that's really what gets me down. There's this idea among some that pushing the crap is the best way to motivate people. I suspect that this is because it is what motivates them. But, with the rare exception of the individuals noted above, people react to negative motivation with negative responses: apathy and despair. That doesn't help anyone.

Bush pissed me off, but Naderism destroys my faith in humanity.

On Idealism and Realism

The Heretik

It’s already starting to get thick.  You can be an idealist.  Or a realist.  But you cannot be both. Unless you are a politician.  Than you can be  everything to everybody.  Or nothing. That’s pragmatic BS.

I must respectfully disagree. An idealist is someone who believes we can achieve great things. A realist is someone who knows that doing so will require a lot of hard work.

I like to distinguish idealists from ideologues. Idealists are guided by their ideals, but they don't let them blind them to the reality of the world they live in. An ideologue, on the other hand, mocks the very idea that idealism should bow to pragmatic conditions. An ideologue suggests that anyone who acknowledges limitations lacks the faith necessary to enact real change (the Republican version of this is the "faith-based community").

I despise ideologues of all stripes. Ideologues short-circuit nascent change with their cries of "sellout!" any time a practical leader compromises in order to achieve long-term goals. They attack their allies with greater vigor than they do their enemies. Then they complain when no one wants to work with them to achieve their goals.

I admire idealists who temper their actions with realism while not letting realism destroy their faith in their ideals. It's a tough row to hoe and not one for the faint of heart. Especially when dealing with the ideologues who question their resolve (or just sneeringly call them "politicians").

Shaft!

Making the Ukulele cool again.

Wasting time

When it comes to electoral stats I defer to Nate Silver.

Certainly, the No on 8 folks might have done a better job of outreach to California's black and Latino communities. But the notion that Prop 8 passed because of the Obama turnout surge is silly. Exit polls suggest that first-time voters -- the vast majority of whom were driven to turn out by Obama (he won 83 percent [!] of their votes) -- voted against Prop 8 by a 62-38 margin. More experienced voters voted for the measure 56-44, however, providing for its passage.

I don't think anyone seriously disputes that there is an outreach problem between the GLBT and black communities, but this search for a boogeyman to blame for the passage of Prop 8 is turning into a farce. As Nate points out, Prop 8 would have failed if those over 65 hadn't come out. Do we therefore blame them for its passage?

I prefer to blame EVERYONE who voted for it and then ask, how do we defeat this next time?

The angels of bipartisanship

dday:

Clearly there is this emerging consensus that Obama simply must govern in a bipartisan fashion (I remember so clearly the same exact demands put on George W., don't you?)

Actually, I do remember those demands. They were quite prevalent and were premised mostly on the idea that, since Bush came in second in the popular vote, he had to govern as a bipartisan moderate. What made Bush different was that he ignored that advice and went extreme from day one. And, for the most part, got away with it.

Three tips for sanity as we wait for Jan. 20th.

1. If Obama does something you don't like, feel free to criticize him.
2. If a rumored policy proposal (ex. continuing torture), cabinet appointment (Larry Summers), or proposed political action (leave Lieberman alone) leaks out and you don't like it, feel free to criticize it.
3. If said proposal, appointment or action has not, in fact, been publicly embraced by Obama then don't criticize him for it.

There's going to be a lot of bullshit floating out there for the next 10 weeks. Some of it will come from our side (Democrats trying to influence Obama's decisions). Some of it will come from the other side (Republicans trying to get Democrats to fight with each other). Some of it may actually be trial balloons from Obama himself.

But, until such time as Obama publicly approves of the thing you are critical of, don't waste your time criticizing him for it.

(riffing off this by John Cole)

Scandinavian contributions to world culture

Swedish edition.

(Hey, I'm Norwegian, so I'm allowed to make fun of Swedes.)

I've been dreaming about Texas

Seems I'm not the only one.

I mean really, why is winning Texas such a bizarre idea? Obama made up nearly 20 points in Indiana in just four years. Surely we can overcome 11 in Texas!