progressive politics and regressive entertainment. like peanut and butter.
January 21, 2012 2 Comments
In the debate on Thursday night, Romney was reminded that his father released 12 years of tax returns when running for president. Romney was booed for equivocating on how many years he would release, but he was also cheered when he pivoted from the specifics of tax returns to generalities about success. When watching the video, what makes him look bad is his stumbling, and the awkward failed levity.
January 20, 2012 Leave a comment
President Obama sings (just a few seconds) of the Reverend Al Green’s “Let’s Stay Together.”
January 11, 2012 Leave a comment
The inimitable Charlie Pierce has a blog posting up which parses David Gregory’s exquisite mix of idiocy and elitism. Over the weekend, Gregory pressed John Huntsman on how he would make the American people feel pain. Pierce points out the basics: that the mainstream media equates being serious with inflicting pain on the commoners.
January 9, 2012 1 Comment
Image by TalkMediaNews via Flickr
Asked … why he opposed the right of same-sex couples to wed, [Rick Santorum] responded that … it was akin to legalizing polygamy.
–Sandhya Somashekhar, Washington Post
January 9, 2012 Leave a comment
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I’m reminded again of Todd’s comment advising against viewing Mitt Romney as an inevitability, as a reader of Talking Points Memo details his reasons why he thinks Romney might not make it. It all has to do with how the delegates are apportioned and the necessity of winning over 50% of them in order to avoid a brokered convention. It’s an interesting look into the process, but I still think that the Republican-Powers-That-Be will prevent a fractured convention and force the troops to salute Mittens.
January 5, 2012 Leave a comment
Todd’s comment on my post about the Iowa caucus got me thinking about what I would like to have happen in the Republican primaries, as opposed to what I suspect will actually happen. It would certainly be fun to see someone like Santorum upset the Republican establishment, and like Mike Huckabee a few years back, he might at least make a run for it. But do I actually want a tea bagger or complete right wing kook to win the Republican nomination?
January 4, 2012 Leave a comment
Well, at least there’s something Obama is willing to stand firm on. Looks like we’ll have a Consumer Financial Protection Bureau after all–unless Obama withdraws Richard Cordray’s nomination to appease Republicans who claim he’s overstepped his authority, or until the next Republican president throws the bureau’s director in jail.
January 4, 2012 8 Comments
Talking Points Memo excels at the nitty gritty of politics, and Josh Marshal’s gut reaction to the Iowa caucus is the best I’ve seen of the bunch. Josh suspects that this puts more of a damper on Romney than we might have expected for a tie, and that the GOP establishment will now start to rally round their Romney. He also thinks that Romney might have made Newt Gingrich angry…and Mitt won’t like him when he’s angry.
Certainly it’s difficult to imagine anyone winning the nomination other than Mittens, but the one thing that could save Obama from having abandoned and insulted his base is how the Republican base dislikes Romney. Of course, rather than recognizing that dynamic, if Obama wins re-election the common wisdom will continue to be that it’s good for Democrats to reject their base. That’s what the mainstream media considers democracy.
January 2, 2012 Leave a comment
Over the weekend, President Obama signed some horrific legislation. As The Huffington Post wrote,
Indefinite military detention of Americans became the law of the land Saturday, as President Barack Obama signed a defense bill that codified that authority, even as he said he would not use it.
December 27, 2011 Leave a comment
Atrios is a master at putting individual political events into the larger socio-political context. When he writes that…
pretty soon we’re going to find out if Iowa caucus is the most important thing ever, if those nice people vote for Mittens, or utterly irrelevant, if they vote for Paul or maybe even Gingrich.
…he is correct on both the small and big picture.
Of course that’s how much of the political narrative gets created. The mainstream commentators have a story and, gosh darnit, they’re sticking to it come heck or high water.
December 26, 2011 Leave a comment
The New Yorker has an excellent (and short) article about the double standard when it comes to corporate versus personal bankruptcy.
December 26, 2011 Leave a comment
News that France has agreed to pay for women with faulty breast implants to have them fixed could be viewed by the anti-health advocates as evidence of government waste, but it’s ridiculous to frame it against the European debt crisis, as the Times of India does. $78 million simply isn’t a large expenditure for France when it comes to the health of its people. This is a case of the government paying to fix the problems caused by an out-of-control private industry that puts profit ahead of people.
