I stopped reading Kevin Drum a while ago because he was always writing about what thoughtful points “Megan” had made recently, but this article about Wisconsin (via) is worth a read.
Andy Kroll’s reports on the ground are worth reading too.
Mother Jones has been tearing it up on Wisconsin. They’re worth donating to/subscribing to (I don’t like hard copies so I just donate).
A Commenter at Balloon Juice (formerlyThe Grand Panjandrum)
According to Drum, Obama is a liberal Democrat. I generally like his writing but he has this propensity for spoiling it for me with your above mentioned “Megan made a thoughtful point” bullshit and things like the opening sentence of the linked piece.
I agree that Mother Jones is good publication to subscribe to and read regularly.
Metavirus
Hey, you guys aren’t giving Scott Walker enough credit. Walker makes a great point about Reagan’s union-busting leading to the fall of the Soviet Union.*
Maybe Walker’s union-busting will lead to the fall of Islamofascism; and the George Soros-funded Muslim Brotherhood to boot?
* Yes, he really said that
Metavirus
Hey, you guys aren’t giving Scott Walker enough credit. Walker makes a great point about Reagan’s union-busting leading to the fall of the Soviet Union.*
Maybe Walker’s union-busting will lead to the fall of Islamofascism; and the George Soros-funded Muslim Brotherhood to boot?
– * Yes, he really said that
Metavirus
(sorry for the dupe but something is messed up with ajax comment editing/deleting :-( )
Paul in KY
Excellent, if very depressing, article by Mr. Drum. We are well & truely fucked, I deem.
Poopyman
I think Blue Gal’s contribution is worth noting as well.
Kay Shawn
I always try to cut Drum a little slack since I believe he originated Friday Cat Blogging. Yes, that article is a very chewy read.
Herbal Infusion Bagger
Kevin’s a very polite and level-headed blogger, but I find the “McMegan has an interesting point…” posts usually he subtly eviscerates McMegan’s innumeracy.
Like McMegan, he has an MBA, unlike McMegan, he’s numerate (he switched from a math to a marketing major at Caltech); unlike McMegan, he’s actually had a fucking real job in a tech company.
“I always try to cut Drum a little slack since I believe he originated Friday Cat Blogging. Yes, that article is a very chewy read.”
I can claim a partial role in that, as after the first kitty photo he posted back in the old Calpundit days I emailed him asking for more. He then later said one guy kept emailing him for more pictures and he’d make it a regular feature. If not for me, a great internet meme may not have been created.
Culture of Truth
Thus George Meany’s surprise when he got his first look at the New York delegation at the 1972 Democratic convention. “What kind of delegation is this?” he sneered. “They’ve got six open fags and only three AFL-CIO people on that delegation!”
Then there was that one suspiciously well-dressed Teamster….
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@Metavirus:
So Lech Walesa and Solidarity have gone down the memory hole, huh? I take it that there aren’t any Polish-Americans left in Wisconsin then?
burnspbesq
You can get an electronic subscription to MJ through Zinio.
NonyNony
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
Yeah right. Like American conservatives would ever let anyone from Eastern Europe or the former Soviet Union have any credit for the failure of Communism.
For American conservatives it was all Reagan, striding mightily across the nation like a colossus, who walked across the ocean to Europe in a few short strides and who said, in his booming voice, “Mr. Gorbachev, I’m going to tear down this wall”. And then he singlehandedly took a sledgehammer to the Berlin wall and knocked it down himself.
Afterward he and his blue ox Babe carted the bricks from that wall off and used them to build Ronald Reagan Airport – which is why it has his name today.
Bob Loblaw
As opposed to you, Doug, who’s also always writing about McArdle, just without the technical and wonkish competency in your other stuff. Score.
@A Commenter at Balloon Juice (formerlyThe Grand Panjandrum):
That’s really not so outlandish. Obama is a steadfast social liberal and multiculturalist, who made an aggressive effort at more egalitarianism in the health care sector and public services (though education, a little iffy there), reasonably environmentalist and technology friendly, and a proponent of vaguely left-center realist foreign policy multilateralism.
He’s neoliberal as hell economically, with obvious supply-side and financialist undercurrents, but more sensible than people like the governments of the UK or Germany or Japan. Not a redistributionalist, but not regressive either. He’s straight right wing on matters of military and national security and civil liberties policies (though since Republicans are outright fascists in comparison, we’re supposed to thank him for this), but other than that, I think he’s a fairly conventional modern liberal technocrat.
eemom
I think if I see McMegan’s name on ONE MORE FUCKING blog post, I might die.
I will then haunt my tormentors mercilessly from beyond the grave.
That is all.
Doug Hill
@Bob Loblaw:
Huh? I think the only time I show much wonkish competence is when I criticize McMegan.
trollhattan
@NonyNony:
That was (sniff) beautiful. I can’t wait for my kid’s first U.S. history class when she’ll learn about the time St. Ronny beat the steam-powered hammer and went on to invent the atomic bomb that beat the Germans and still have time for a tickle fignt with Tip O’Neill.
Library Grape
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ: yup, seems like
You Don't Say
@Herbal Infusion Bagger: He does the same to Matt Yglesias, which I thoroughly enjoy.
Brandon
I stopped reading Drum years ago when he was Calpundit because he sided with that cretin Mikey Kaus on issues of race and welfare benefits. I also grew tired of his penchant for concern trolling.
I can tolerate and take interest in hearing arguments about many views that are divergent from my own, but I draw the
line on issues of race and particularly have no time for the Lee Atwater inspired, Bobo Brooks tote bagging proxies for racial intolerance of “polite company”.
cleek
@Brandon:
got a link?
I’ve been reading Drum since before he got comments on CalPundit, and I have never detected even a hint of unpleasant attitudes about race from him.
Bob Loblaw
@Doug Hill:
Which is why Drum >> DougJ. The math demands it.
gene108
I don’t agree w/ Kevin Drum that the loss of one house of Congress, equals the end of the Obama era.
Ronald Reagan never had control of the House, House Republicans lost seats badly in the 1982 mid-terms and Republicans eventually lost control of the Senate, while Reagan was President.
None of this has been attributed to be a repudiation of Reagan.
I think there’s plenty of time for President Obama to put a stamp on the Presidency and this country.
Kay Shawn
Thanks, Herb! Though Tunch may not agree [about Cat Blogging].
Doug Hill
@Brandon:
I vaguely remember something like this too.
slag
Hasn’t ED Kain linked to this Drum article at least twice?
It’s OK, DougJ, we read Balloon Juice so you don’t have to.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@gene108:
Alex, I’ll take the category “Superbly well organized and orchestrated political progaganda and media toe-sucking hagiography”, for $500.
Herbal Infusion Bagger
“Hey, you guys aren’t giving Scott Walker enough credit. Walker makes a great point about Reagan’s union-busting leading to the fall of the Soviet Union.*”
For fuck’s sake, there was no U.S. organization outside of the U.S. Government that was more anti-Soviet, and effective at anti-Soviet policies, than the AFL-CIO. It’s like Meany and Kirkland disappeared down the memory hole.
catclub
@NonyNony: “Like American conservatives would ever let anyone from Eastern Europe or the former Soviet Union have any credit for the failure of Communism.”
Well, I think there might be a few Roman actholic conservatives who will give a certain Cardinal Karol W. – later Pope John Paul II, some credit.
NonyNony
@catclub:
You’d think so, but in my experience they don’t tend to. At least not without being prodded.
But ask them point blank why the Soviet Union fell and the answer they recite always starts with “Ronald Reagan”. “Ronald Reagan forced them to spend too much on defense”. “Ronald Reagan scared the crap out of them”. “Reagan was tough on the Commies and they folded.”
The idea that anyone in Poland could have helped chart their own destiny or, God forbid, Mikhail Gorbachev might have been a relatively honest broker who saw his country falling apart and wanted to end it doesn’t enter their minds. If you point out “but of course John Paul II made toppling Communism a big part of his time as Pope” then they will resoundingly agree with you (good conservative Catholics give the Pope his due), but they typically won’t come up with it on their own outside of external prodding. The myth of Mighty Reagan is just embedded too deep in the psyche at this point.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@NonyNony:
If their positions were reversed and it was Dems who insisted on giving all the credit to a Dem President and none to Solidarity and JP II, you could bet your booty that the GOP would make sure every last Polish-American in the country knew about it and was sorely pissed off about it.
Brandon
@cleek:
I don’t want to unfairly malign Drum and it is possible that my recollections are faulty. Unfortunately Calpundit is no longer online, however I have been skimming the non-searchable archive via The Wayback Machine.
I am growing increasingly uncertain about my specific claim re: Kaus during his Calpundit days. However I am certain that I stopped reading Drum for reasons in the young bucks and t-bone steaks vein, and it is very well possible that it occurred during his days as Political Animal.
I will certainly keep looking.
Mart
A labor leader is Mother Jones magazine’s namesake. In Mount Olive, IL, just east of I-55 at mile marker 44 (south of Old Rt. 66), there is a memorial to the fearless southern Illinois coal miner union organizer Mother Jones. Seems like the local labor folks keep pretty good care of the site, which is a bit tricky to find. Recommend for a quiet diversion to the interstate. Also worth a little internet searching on what she was all about.
You Don't Say
@Brandon: I’m with cleek on this.
Triassic Sands
@Herbal Infusion Bagger:
Yeah, because with billions of people on Earth only the magical combination of you and Kevin Drum could ever come up with the idea of posting pictures of their cats (or pets) on the Internet.
Let’s see Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace came up with evolutionary theory independently, but pet blogging was the unique creation of two and only two people.
You’re not serious, are you? (Shaking head in disbelief.)
Herbal Infusion Bagger
“You’re not serious, are you?”
No, I’m not. But I did pester Drum for more kitty pictures, after which he decided to make it a regular feature. Remember, it’s Friday Cat Blogging which Drum invented.