1) Whistling past the political graveyard: Club for Growth Grand Poobah Pat Toomey, who almost won the 2004 GOP primary against Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter and has a good chance of winning the 2010 GOP primary but virtually no chance of wining the 2010 general election, is back for a second try. The GOP Don Quixote tells the WP: "Rick Santorum lost because it was 2006. It was a terrible year for Republicans. It has nothing to do with 2010." Yes, but everything to do with terrain. And registration is a whipsaw.
2) It's not a sin: Former Hill staffer and now K St. lobbyist Daryl Owen, writing in a WP op-ed [4-3-09]: "I spent 12 years on Capitol Hill...Since then I have been a registered lobbyist. Arguably I have contributed more to public policy from the private sector than I did from the public side....It is because exposure to the private sector has given me insight and perpective I could never have developed as a Senate employee. That knowledge has dovetailed with what I learned on the Hill to make me a useful channel of communication between two worlds that have only the weakest understanding of each other."
3) Welcome to Glennbeckistan: Gov. Rick Perry, he of the "It's my state and I'll secceed if I want to," land of Texas, joined with House sponsors of a resolution affirming state sovereignty. Perry, facing a tough reelection fight, said, "I believe that our federal government has become oppressive in its size, its intrusion into the lives of our citizens, and its interference with the affairs of our state." Hey Rick, we'll check back with you during hurricane season (God forbid!).
4) He named names! Well, at least one. Channeling the ghost of Joe McCarthy, Alabama Rep. Spencer Bachus (R) told the Birmingham News last week that there were 17 Socialists serving in the current Congress. Asked to name names, Spencer offered up only one - Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders - who in the past has identified himself as a Democratic Socialist. Spence, you started this. Go ahead, name the names. 16 to go.
5) A pol who knew the difference: R.I.P. Stephen Minarik III, a New York State GOP political operative who served as state party chair from 2004 to 2006. According to his NYT obit [4-15-09], Minarik never yearned to be a candidate himself: "I love getting people elected. I never wanted to be elected myself. There is a huge difference between being a candidate and being an operative. A candidate is out front every day. He or she has to shake hands and smile. I don't have the personality for that."
6) Do Middle Eastern pols blame the Jinn? No doubt planning for some self-deluded political comeback, disgraced former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer (D) explained to Matt Lauer on the "Today" show [4-6-09] that he's been doing lots of introspection about his addiction to high-end call girls: "I've tried to think about it deeply, address it. There are no excuses. I have tried to address these gremlins, confront them." Let us know how that works out.
7) As Curly Howard once said to his brother Moe, "I try to think, but nothing happens!" Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin was back in the news this week after it was revealed that her nomineee to be state Attorney General had in the past referred to gays as "degenerates," had defended a high-school student's art-project depiction of a Ku Klux Klansman, and had (alledgely) once opined that "If a guy can't rape his wife, who's he gonna rape?" Ya know, Sarah, it's not too late to start a career as a pageant mom.
8) Politics is supposed to be about give and take but mostly take: In the midst of defending his existential angst about taking some but not all of the federal stimulus funds designated for his state, South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford told the NYT [4-4-09]: "I think the fatal flaw of a lot of people in politics is that they want to be loved. I sleep like a baby at night." Let's see how he's sleeping come 2012.
9) When men were men and journalists were CIA assets: Inexplicably, most news media ignored the passing of former journalist Tom Braden, 92, on April 3rd. A syndicated newspaper columnist, creature of Washington and former CIA official, Braden was the liberal counterpart to conservative Pat Buchanan on CNN's original version of "Crossfire" back in the early 1980s, before John McLaughlin taught everyone to start screaming on political talk shows. An original member of Nixon's "enemies list," Braden was Old School and there's just not enough of his generation around this town anymore.
10) Uncle Bob talks Uncle Sam: After opining to interviewer Bill Flanagan that "Politics is entertainment. It's a sport. It's for the well groomed and well heeled. The impeccably dressed. Party animals. Politicians are interchangeable," Bob Dylan went on to gush over President Barack Obama's life story, offering that "his mother was a Kansas girl....with deep roots. You know, like Kansas bloody Kansas. John Brown the insurrectionist. Jesse James and Quantrill. Bushwhackers, Guerillas. Wizard of Oz Kansas," and that Obama's father was "An African intellectual. Bantu, Masai, Griot type heritage - cattle raiders, lion killers." Thanks, Bob.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Friday, April 3, 2009
"Welcome to Washington," or, as Mr. Sinatra once said of another burg of hopes and dreams, "This town is a make-you-town, or a break-you-town..."
1) Somewhere, Lyndon is smiling: Writing in his WSJ column [4/2] Karl Rove reveals that he somehow thinks the term "new politics" doesn't include the word "politics." Rove is in a dither about the AP-reported anecdote in which Pres. Ob pulled Oregon Rep. Peter DeFazio aside in a "closed door" meeting and said, "Don't think we're not keeping score, brother." DeFazio had voted against the administration's stimulus bill. C'mon Karl, you know that keeping score is what this is all about.
2) People who give this town a bad name: The WP's too lengthy Style section profile of LegiStorm website creator Jock Friedly [4/2] waited until the very end to inadvertently reveal why this misguided soul thinks it's essential for the fate of the Republic that everyone in America know the salaries of every employee in Congress (along with their home addresses, info on their investments and what their spouses do for a living). Says Friedly, "Washington dirties people. They come to Capitol Hill wide-eyed and wanting to do the public good. Washington changes them." Hey, Elliot Ness, why don't you spend your time going after real crooks, like say the Sinaloa drug cartel? Let us know how it turns out.
3) Go Johnny Go: Having to explain yet again just what it is our members of Congress do, Pennsylvania Rep. John Murtha tells the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: "If I'm corrupt, it's because I take care of my district. My job as a member of Congress is to make sure that we take care of what we see is necessary. Not the bureaucrats who are unelected over there in whatever White House, whether it's Republican or Democrat. Those bureaucrats would like to control everything. Every president would like to have all the power and not have Congress change anything. But we're closest to the people." Murtha was responding in part to having been branded "One of the most corrupt members of Congress" by the "watchdog group" Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, who, at last count, has yet to get a highway paved or a bridge repaired.
4) What passes for political commentary these days: After making fun of the fact that Pres. Ob's Kenyan immigrant aunt (whose deportation has been delayed for a year) walks with a limp and a cane, cable talk show host Glenn Beck proceeded to instruct his listeners thus: "Don't hate Mexicans!" Ahh, Father Coughlin for the twitter generation.
5) Things they forget to teach you in political science class: A report released by the American Association for Public Opinion Research (and written by eleven pollsters and academics) concluded that that the polling that erroneously predicted that Sen. Barack Obama would win the 2008 New Hampshire Democratic presidential primary was wrong because the pollsters stopped surveying voters too early and thus did not capture last-minute changes in voter opinions. Oh, and yes, the fact that Hillary's name was near the top of the ballot and Barack's down towards the bottom may have had something to do with it too. Ballot position, people!
6) Madam, your black helicopter awaits! Although it's old news, we cannot overlook Minnesota GOP Rep. Michele Bachmann's ramblings on the March 25th edition of the Sean Hannity radio program in which she said: "Right now I'm a member of Congress. And I believe that my job here is to be a foreign correspondent, reporting from enemy lines." Illustrating once again that the difference between an opinion and an informed opinion is sometimes a gulf too insurmountable for some folks to cross.
7) Most insightful political reporting of the last two weeks: WSJ reporter Susan Davis, profiling the lay of the land for Sen. Arlen Specter's 2010 reelection fight [3/23], rightly points out that the central problem for the incumbent will be the GOP primary fight. After Democrats succeeded in getting 239,000 Republicans and independents to switch parties in order to vote in the 2008 Democratic presidential primary last spring, Specter now faces a smaller, much more conservative pool of voters for the 2010 GOP primary election. Facing a likely rematch from Club for Growth's Pat Toomey as well as perennial wingnut Peg Luksik, Specter really has to get a lot of folks to decide to become registered Republicans again, "even for just one day."
8) Meet the new GOP leadership: Bemoaning the Democrats' budget, GOP Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin opined: "We are spending like drunken sailors. Wait, I apologize to the drunken sailors of America for that comment." Paul, the joke been used like a thousand times by McC and look where it got him. It's over. It's like talking about Nintendo. Plus, for it to work you really have to have served in the U.S. Navy yourself.
9) Okay GOP, Newt basically says it's over: Former Speaker Gingrich: "If the Republicans can't break out of being the right wing party of big government, then I think you would see a third party movement in 2012." Quick, get me Admiral Stockdale!
10) Argentine Pres. Raul Alfonsin, R.I.P.: Raul Alfonsin, who upon being elected President of Argentina in 1983, led the investigation and ordered the prosecution of the military figures responsible for the murders of thousands during that country's dark days of dictatorship, has died at age 82. According to his WP obit, an Argentine Supreme Court Judge wrote last fall, "All of those who are holding a public post aspire to be able to walk in the streets afterwards without any problem. Alfonsin is the only ex-president who can walk the streets at ease." And, in the end, isn't that also what this is all about?
2) People who give this town a bad name: The WP's too lengthy Style section profile of LegiStorm website creator Jock Friedly [4/2] waited until the very end to inadvertently reveal why this misguided soul thinks it's essential for the fate of the Republic that everyone in America know the salaries of every employee in Congress (along with their home addresses, info on their investments and what their spouses do for a living). Says Friedly, "Washington dirties people. They come to Capitol Hill wide-eyed and wanting to do the public good. Washington changes them." Hey, Elliot Ness, why don't you spend your time going after real crooks, like say the Sinaloa drug cartel? Let us know how it turns out.
3) Go Johnny Go: Having to explain yet again just what it is our members of Congress do, Pennsylvania Rep. John Murtha tells the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: "If I'm corrupt, it's because I take care of my district. My job as a member of Congress is to make sure that we take care of what we see is necessary. Not the bureaucrats who are unelected over there in whatever White House, whether it's Republican or Democrat. Those bureaucrats would like to control everything. Every president would like to have all the power and not have Congress change anything. But we're closest to the people." Murtha was responding in part to having been branded "One of the most corrupt members of Congress" by the "watchdog group" Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, who, at last count, has yet to get a highway paved or a bridge repaired.
4) What passes for political commentary these days: After making fun of the fact that Pres. Ob's Kenyan immigrant aunt (whose deportation has been delayed for a year) walks with a limp and a cane, cable talk show host Glenn Beck proceeded to instruct his listeners thus: "Don't hate Mexicans!" Ahh, Father Coughlin for the twitter generation.
5) Things they forget to teach you in political science class: A report released by the American Association for Public Opinion Research (and written by eleven pollsters and academics) concluded that that the polling that erroneously predicted that Sen. Barack Obama would win the 2008 New Hampshire Democratic presidential primary was wrong because the pollsters stopped surveying voters too early and thus did not capture last-minute changes in voter opinions. Oh, and yes, the fact that Hillary's name was near the top of the ballot and Barack's down towards the bottom may have had something to do with it too. Ballot position, people!
6) Madam, your black helicopter awaits! Although it's old news, we cannot overlook Minnesota GOP Rep. Michele Bachmann's ramblings on the March 25th edition of the Sean Hannity radio program in which she said: "Right now I'm a member of Congress. And I believe that my job here is to be a foreign correspondent, reporting from enemy lines." Illustrating once again that the difference between an opinion and an informed opinion is sometimes a gulf too insurmountable for some folks to cross.
7) Most insightful political reporting of the last two weeks: WSJ reporter Susan Davis, profiling the lay of the land for Sen. Arlen Specter's 2010 reelection fight [3/23], rightly points out that the central problem for the incumbent will be the GOP primary fight. After Democrats succeeded in getting 239,000 Republicans and independents to switch parties in order to vote in the 2008 Democratic presidential primary last spring, Specter now faces a smaller, much more conservative pool of voters for the 2010 GOP primary election. Facing a likely rematch from Club for Growth's Pat Toomey as well as perennial wingnut Peg Luksik, Specter really has to get a lot of folks to decide to become registered Republicans again, "even for just one day."
8) Meet the new GOP leadership: Bemoaning the Democrats' budget, GOP Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin opined: "We are spending like drunken sailors. Wait, I apologize to the drunken sailors of America for that comment." Paul, the joke been used like a thousand times by McC and look where it got him. It's over. It's like talking about Nintendo. Plus, for it to work you really have to have served in the U.S. Navy yourself.
9) Okay GOP, Newt basically says it's over: Former Speaker Gingrich: "If the Republicans can't break out of being the right wing party of big government, then I think you would see a third party movement in 2012." Quick, get me Admiral Stockdale!
10) Argentine Pres. Raul Alfonsin, R.I.P.: Raul Alfonsin, who upon being elected President of Argentina in 1983, led the investigation and ordered the prosecution of the military figures responsible for the murders of thousands during that country's dark days of dictatorship, has died at age 82. According to his WP obit, an Argentine Supreme Court Judge wrote last fall, "All of those who are holding a public post aspire to be able to walk in the streets afterwards without any problem. Alfonsin is the only ex-president who can walk the streets at ease." And, in the end, isn't that also what this is all about?
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