Come for the politics, stay for the snark.
Been dealing with nonsense since 7 am this morning, so this pretty much sums up how I feel right now:
Only one thing can make this better. Mexican food.
BTW- I hear Hillary was on the Hill today? Anything exciting happen?
*** Update ***
My God, Sarah Palin is such a train wreck. If I wasn’t enjoying watching her destroy her future viability so much, I might tell her to just be quiet for her own sake. You really have to read this exchange to believe it.
It never stops, does it?
White House reporters for The New York Times predict that the market collapse will force President-elect Barack Obama to abandon for now many of his campaign promises.
If his stimulus plan “doesn’t work out, he may very well be a one-term president,” said Jeff Zeleny, who covered Obama’s campaign. “It’s hard to imagine that he could be reelected if the economy’s in the exact same position four years from now.” (via)
Princeton, N.J.: Most of us far left, anti-war, pro gay marriage, single payer, high marginal tax rates, strong regulation types strongly supported Obama. But he has appointed people who were just wrong, on the war, on regulation, on the economy, on health care, etc. Obviously we have no where else to go, but do you think our lack of enthusiasm will hurt Obama?
Shailagh Murray: Perhaps. The big test will come in the 2010 midterm elections. If folks like you don’t show up, Democrats could suffer some surprising defeats.
I never thought a president elected with such fanfare would prove to be such an obvious failure before even taking office. But there you have it.
It’s hard to say who benefits most from all of this, Rudy Giuliani or Mitt Romney.
Obama still has a chance to save his embattled presidency by naming Mitt to be his auto czar.
Greenwald, in a long post on why it is important to hold team Obama to the fire, provides an example of what happens when only one side of a debate has anyone working for them:
We just witnessed the results of that dynamic with the ugly spectacle last week of a virtually unanimous Congress approving a completely one-sided Israel/Gaza Resolution. That Middle East war is an issue which, whatever else one might want to say about it, generates intense controversy, division and passion around the world. But not in the U.S. Congress. There, virtually the entire Congress (510 of the 535 members) — from the furthest left precincts of the Democratic Party to the furthest right-wing of the Republican Party, from all four corners of the U.S. and everywhere in between — looked at this war and just-so-happened to reach the same exact conclusion: not only is Israel 100% in the right, but the U.S. should involve itself publicly and squarely on Israel’s side.
Does anyone actually believe that, in the absence of extremely effective political pressure, 510 ideologically diverse members of Congress — at exactly the moment when worldwide opposition to the Israeli assault is growing in response to documented civilian horrors — would all have jointly decided that Israel was right to bomb and invade Gaza and that it is in America’s interests to insinuate itself on Israel’s side? Even Governors, such as Democrat Martin O’Malley of Maryland, ludicrously popped up to follow the pro-Israel script.
That happens for one clear reason: because one side of the debate (the AIPAC faction) is strong and aggressive in its criticisms and pressure tactics and the other side (the faction wanting an even-handed U.S. approach) is not.
And, just to drive the point home a little bit more, Ehud Olmert takes to the media to show us who is boss:
In an unusually public rebuke, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel said Monday that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice had been forced to abstain from a United Nations resolution on Gaza that she helped draft, after Mr. Olmert placed a phone call to President Bush.
“I said, ‘Get me President Bush on the phone,’ ” Mr. Olmert said in a speech in the southern Israeli city of Ashkelon, according to The Associated Press. “They said he was in the middle of giving a speech in Philadelphia. I said I didn’t care: ‘I need to talk to him now,’ ” Mr. Olmert continued. “He got off the podium and spoke to me.”
Israel opposed the resolution, which called for a halt to the fighting in Gaza, because the government said it did not provide for Israel’s security. It passed 14 to 0, with the United States abstaining.
Mr. Olmert claimed that once he made his case to Mr. Bush, the president called Ms. Rice and told her to abstain. “She was left pretty embarrassed,” Mr. Olmert said, according to The A.P.
I am not sure what Israel has on us that they can extract billions of American taxpayer dollars every year and dictate our foreign policy, but it must be something pretty good. The craziest thing about this is the silence of the jingosphere. Had this been any other nation bossing around Bush’s Secretary of State, or, god forbid, France, can you imagine the wingnut Voltron that would have been formed in outrage? As it is, crickets.
I watched the final Bush press conference this morning, and something was bothering me all day about something he said regarding the “Mission Accomplished” banner. Here is the relevant portion of the press conference:
THE PRESIDENT: Yes.
Q And I’m not trying to play “gotcha,” but I wonder, when you look back over the long arc of your presidency, do you think, in retrospect, that you have made any mistakes? And if so, what is the single biggest mistake that you may have made?
THE PRESIDENT: Gotcha. I have often said that history will look back and determine that which could have been done better, or, you know, mistakes I made. Clearly putting a “Mission Accomplished” on a aircraft carrier was a mistake. It sent the wrong message. We were trying to say something differently, but nevertheless, it conveyed a different message. Obviously, some of my rhetoric has been a mistake.
I pretty clearly remember that event, because I was in full-fledged wingnut phase, and I remember cheerleading the landing on the carrier. But something about Bush’s version today just didn’t seem right, and just a couple minutes ago while watching the Colbert Report, it dawned on me- what Bush said today was incompatible with what the administration said back when this happened.
If you remember correctly, when things started to go to shit six months after the Mission Accomplished banner, the administration said it was the Navy’s idea:
The president told reporters the sign was put up by the Navy, not the White House.
“I know it was attributed somehow to some ingenious advance man from my staff — they weren’t that ingenious, by the way,” the president said Tuesday.
Now his statements are being parsed even further.
Navy and administration sources said that though the banner was the Navy’s idea, the White House actually made it.
***White House spokesman Scott McClellan told CNN that in preparing for the speech, Navy officials on the carrier told Bush aides they wanted a “Mission Accomplished” banner, and the White House agreed to create it.
“We took care of the production of it,” McClellan said. “We have people to do those things. But the Navy actually put it up.”
They later walked back even more:
The perfect photo-op has flopped. Engineered by the most image-conscious White House in history, the carrier landing portrayed Bush as master and commander, an ideal bookend to his spontaneous performance with a bullhorn in the rubble of the World Trade Center after 9/11. Instead, the hothouse tableau already sharply at odds with the reality in Iraq did even more damage to White House credibility last week. Asked at a news conference whether the “Mission Accomplished” banner had been prematurely boastful, the president backed away from it, saying it had been put up by the sailors and airmen of the Lincoln to celebrate their homecoming after toppling Saddam’s regime.
Not long afterwards, the White House had to amend its account. The soldiers hadn’t put up the sign; the White House had done the hoisting. It had also produced the banner — contrary to what senior White House officials had said for months. In the end, the White House conceded on those details, but declared them mere quibbles. The point was, they said, that the whole thing had been done at the request of the crewmembers. Even that explanation didn’t sit well with some long-time Bush aides. “They (the White House) put up banners at every event that look just like that and we’re supposed to believe that at this one it was the Navy that requested one?” asked a senior administration official. Others remember staffers boasting about how the president had been specifically positioned during his speech so that the banner would be captured in footage of his speech.
And now, today, Bush confirms what some of you knew all along. The Navy had nothing to do with the “Mission Accomplished” banner- it was a complete Bush WH operation.
Red State pick for RNC chair, Ken Blackwell:
If in fact you would feel better for me to say to you that, one, I believe homosexuality is a compulsion that can be contained, repressed or changed, and that makes you feel better, then that is what I’m saying in the clearest of terms.
Presumably, there will at some point be a web poll in which I can vote for Ken Blackwell as RNC chair. When that day comes, I and the rest of the Red State Strike Force will be ready to rain down on Katon Dawson and “Chip” Saltsman like a bolt of lightning followed by sudden thundershowers.
TEH GAY: You can’t stop it, you can only hope to contain itPost + Comments (37)
Senate Democratic leaders today cleared the way for Roland Burris to be seated as a senator from Illinois, after his appointment by the state’s now impeached governor had turned into a weeklong spectacle shifting between the nation’s capital and the corruption scandal back in Illinois.
Now, it’s likely that Mr. Burris, 71 and a former state attorney general, may be sworn in to the Senate as early as later this week in a ceremony presided over by Vice President Cheney. His seating will bring the Democratic Senate majority to 58, including two independents.
Shocking.
Other things that will probably come as a surprise to Harry Reid and the Democrats:
Pink Panther II will suck, and most likely worse than the first Steve Martin remake.
Republicans will call Democrats socialists for the next four years no matter what they do.
Arlen Specter will continue to be a hack.