Domestically, if I were the Republicans (not that I expect them to take my advice) I’d offer up enough votes to pass Obama’s plan and then wrap it around his neck. Essentially the too little, too late gamble that the economy will still suck in November and make Obama totally own it.
I wouldn’t be too surprised if Republicans did this. Apparently, Fox hasn’t reacted too strongly against Obama’s speech, and Republicans have been making compromise noises. They realize that being blamed for the do-nothing Congress with the 20-something approval rating puts the House in play.
That said, if Republicans tried to blame Obama, I think the effort would fail. Whatever bill came out of Congress would be a sacrifice on the holy altar of bipartisanship, and therefore would be cleansed by the blood of the both-sides-do-it lamb in the eyes of the media. The bill probably would be stripped of at least some of Obama’s proposals, so he could reasonably claim that those were the secret sauce that woulda-coulda-shoulda worked. And there’s the little matter of Republicans actually voting for the bill, when they’ve voted for almost nothing else Obama wanted. It’s going to be hard to sell the vote as an act of loyalty to the office of the President when they haven’t blindly followed him on any other issue.
That’s what was politically cunning about the speech — it drew a line that connects what everybody wants (jobs) to policies that Republicans have always supported. If Republicans agree, they at least partly own the solution, since many of the ideas were theirs. If they disagree, their prior intransigence on everything makes them look like they won’t lift a finger to help the unemployed. And, as Freddie noted earlier, the message is simple enough to communicate clearly to low-information voters.
Culture of Truth
If they vote for it (which I doubt) would they not own it too?
sherifffruitfly
Pundits need to keep in mind that “progressives” will be joining with the teabaggers in the BLAMEOBAMA strategy.
That’s how republicans have gotten this far – there’s no reason whatsoever to expect that tag-team behavior to change at this point.
Pretending that dynamic doesn’t exist isn’t a recipe for predictive accuracy.
catclub
Sorry, the days of running succesfully against the do nothing congress are past. It required moderately informed voters.
The GOP will categorically oppose,
as they have done for the last 9 months, and will have little or no comeuppance 14 months from now.
The Dangerman
Not a chance; it will be given the Roberta Flack treatment and killed softly with Boehner’s song (I bet he could do a killer Karaoke cover of it with a tear in his eye). It won’t be done loudly, but dead is dead.
Zifnab
Why? You can kill the bill and accomplish exactly the same thing.
Alternately, you can do what Boehner did on the debt deal and keep demanding more and more and more until a $450 billion stimulus package morphs into a $1 trillion cut to Social Security and Medicare. Draw the whole process out for 10 months, until you’re right in the thick of election season. Then laugh as the Democrats pass it with the thinnest majority of Republican support and run an endless series of ads saying how Republicans don’t support these terrible Democratic policies. :-p
I’ve seen this dance too many times before. Democrats do not have the votes to pass good legislation. The only bill that will get through Congress is one that will hurt them.
At this point, the best thing for Democrats to do is grand stand like crazy and refuse to compromise, then call Republicans a “Do Nothing” Congress and try to dump the entire mess of the last two years in the Republicans’ laps. Then pray to the FSM that the public hates Republicans more than Democrats in November.
boss bitch
I agree with you MM. What Atrios said doesn’t make any sense to me.
Emma
It’s amazing how viciously some of the great “progressives” have turned against the president. It’s not opposition to policies, it’s personal.
Cat Lady
You know those movies where the room shrinks because the walls are moving in? That speech was like that for the goopers. They have WAY less room to maneuver today than they did yesterday.
trollhattan
Reax seem a little different from the normal, “Your mama!” but I’m not taking that to mean the Republicans won’t gather their skirts and get back to business as usual.
Chait has some funnyz this morning.
http://www.tnr.com/blog/jonathan-chait/94742/obama-pulls-the-impossible
Also, too, he mentions he’s leaving TNR for New York Magazine.
http://www.tnr.com/blog/jonathan-chait/94722/still-not-done-arguing-yet
cat48
Drew Westin, Author of NYT oped blaming Obama for breathing & the “failure” of his presidency, is demanding an apology!!!!! NOW! Last night’s speech is not enough. He wants his feet washed,too. Evidently, Fareed Zakaria & Chait hurt his fee fees when they gave their opinion of O after the Westin screed. All the elites are waiting for their apology…..Hmm
joes527
On what planet?
On the planet: Prospective-Republican-Voters blaming Obama (no further details required) works just fine.
kindness
But it won’t stop Republicans from lying out their asses. I’ve already heard bunches of that and it isn’t even 24 hours later yet.
Hunter Gathers
Why do I keep getting the impression that Atrios will be happier than a pig in shit if Obama loses next year?
JPL
@sherifffruitfly: I agree with you. The Repubs know it’s to their advantage to prove that the government can’t help.
redshirt
This theory would make sense, perhaps, if you were dealing with people using logic and good faith. Unfortunately, Republicans have neither.
Tom Hilton
Why am I not surprised that Atrios used the jobs speech as yet another opportunity to bash the President?
MattF
At least there’s something like a tactic here from Obama. But it’s possible that the Republicans are so far out into the Gamma Quadrant that none of this will matter. We shall see.
Stranger
Atrios. I used to read that blog before it turned into the Kool Kids Klub.
I hate cliques.
wrb
It needs to be repeated:
This bill won’t cure the economy.
It is a first step.
For a healthy economy the bills that follow need to pass too.
If that is kept absolutely clear, I think the Republicans can still be punished for their obstruction of later bills.
Jose Padilla
Atrios is wrong. First, the bill is big enough to make a difference. Second, the Republican goal is to make Obama look weak and ineffective. Anything that gets passed defeats this meme.
cat48
With progressives who are still bashing them, it’s PERSONAL. It has nothing to do with Jobs.
Dexter
May be Atrios should come up with a jobs bill and a plan so that it gets through teh Congress fast, unchanged yet progressive.
Mike Goetz
A lot depends on whether the Republicans judge that the economy will improve over the next year or not. If they think it will, then they will vote for some version of Obama’s plan in order to claim credit. If they do not think it will, then the bill is dead and they will lay blame on Obama. That’s the calculation.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Now that Obama has done what everyone in the Pure Left assured us he never would, they are noticing that he is not a Dicator-Wizard, but are suddenly aware of this thing called “congress” that hasn’t existed for three years.
maye
. . . except that for two years they’ve been preaching “Government doesn’t create jobs” !!! And they’ve been winning the message war (what else is new?)
They’ve staked their careers on a one-term Obama, and they’ve made him wrong at every turn. They can’t stop now. Train has left the station………..
Mike Goetz
BTW, is there a group more loathsome than the PCCC?
Samara Morgan
might as well link Jane Hamsher as link freddie, mistermix.
from his blog….gee he sounds so different here…
and he does!
why does BJ have a firebagger frontpager, mistermix?
General Stuck
The republicans are primarily “boxed in” from selling their pol soul to the tea party and it’s nihilistic scorched earth opposition to Barack Obama, even past the office he holds, to the personal.
The speech by Obama, was primarily his being freed from the comity requirements of a sitting president, to a president campaigning for reelection. So increased bluntness and some more anger will pass as campaigning passion. IMHO>
So when people say the Obama last night was the Obama of 2008, that is no coincidence and there is a good practical reason for it.
The republicans are set on auto pilot rejectionist politicks, and I don’t see anything changing that much. But they will squirm more mightily as a freed up candidate Obama squeezes their nuts a little more each day.
This is all my opinion, and subject to being totally wrong.
Marc
@Dexter:
He’d need to write more than a few sneering words to do that. That’s far too much work.
LGRooney
This is why the GOP so vociferously opposes Obama. He keeps offering up their own economic solutions (tax cuts, tax breaks, public-private partnerships, etc.) and they can’t vote for the policies lest the economy completely fail. The Dems would then come back and say, “Okay, vote us in and let us show you how it’s done.” Of course, the GOP leadership does not say this to their own politicians but rather they couch it in terms that the policies are really socialism because they are socialist. Actually, they don’t have to add that tautology. Their own people are stupid enough to not know that Obama has tried to deploy many of their own policies or dishonest enough to ignore the rhetoric and understand why they must oppose.
Yevgraf
It’ll never happen. The teatards will primary any Pubster that votes yes on it, and the fear will rule the day.
Think of the teatards as the South Carolina legislature, circa 1860. They desire neither a solution nor success, as their dogma is “rule or ruin”.
cat48
It’s personal with Freddie, Atrios, & Westen. Krugman really cares about jobs & people without them. My apologies for calling Krugman an Obama hater. He is not.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
@Samara Morgan: Isn’t there some rule about posting the same quote twiced?
homeruk
I have been lurking on the previous posts but something has been bubbling up inside me that has little do with last night’s dinner. Leaving aside all the usual emo progressive suspects, the blogosphere is once again alive with “that’s the President I voted for” or “where’s he been for the past three years?”. My answer to that – he’s always been there. He’s been saying a lot of this shit for some time now. He’s been calling out the republicans for some time now – anyone remember the republican retreat where he handed them their collective asses? I fully predict that this blogoeuphoria will last no more than 2 weeks after which we will hear the usual tropes of the difference between rhetoric and substance (no matter that the same people will then decry the lack of use of the “bully” pulpit) until the next time the President gives a great speech about something or other where he says almost precisely what he has been saying for the past few years, whereupon the cycle will start again. I only hope that as of the election the cycle is at its zenith rather than at its nadir.
srv
@sherifffruitfly:
Except that there’s maybe one or two progressives in Congress and 242 wingnuts.
Can there be any greater example of y’alls distorted sense of reality?
Villago Delenda Est
@Hunter Gathers:
You would be mistaken.
Atrios has been critical of Obama’s seeming timidity in dealing with the real issues about the economy, from day one. For one thing, giving the criminal vermin of Wall Street a free pass off the bat.
Obama’s real problem is the GOP base utterly hates his guts, on the basis of his party and his nearness. The GOP dogshit in the House is terrified of the GOP base.
The question then becomes persuading the mushy middle that the problem lies with the Rethuglicans blocking all attempts to make things better out of pure hatred of Obama.
harlana
@Stranger:
I can relate, it seems BJ is turning into the same thing, at least as far as I’m concerned, but then i never was kool kid to begin with (not in my DNA) so i just keep coming back and taking my lumps for some reason / i suppose I feel more comfortable being the despised outsider, it’s all i’ve ever known
Dennis SGMM
There is a third way. The Republicans can load the measure with any number of poison pills (Massive corporate and cap gains tax cuts, so-called regulatory reform – you know the drill) and dare Obama not to sign it into law. If he does sign it then we’ll have a shit bill under his name. If he doesn’t sign it then the Republicans will have a field day declaring that “Obama didn’t have enough faith in his own bill to sign it.” Or “See? It was all politics, just like we said it was.”
pete
@homeruk: Yes, it is frustrating how the cycle of praise and blame has relatively little connection with reality. And let us not forget the level of projection from the last campaign, in which a significant number of people seem to have been thinking “I support Obama, therefore he agrees with me.” But such is life. Unfortunately, we have another 14 months of up-and-down flailing before the election; but on the bright side, the distilleries are still working, and may be hiring.
Kola Noscopy
@Emma:
Would it be your assertion that this turning has come about thru no fault of Obama’s? Is it your position that all of these people, most of whom fully supported Obama three years ago, have turned on him just for fun or spite?
wrb
@cat48: @homeruk:
Alternately, if he makes this the start of the campaign, and stages a series of big campaign events at which he speaks, maybe he’ll get coverage, because the media is much more interested in the contest, in scoring the horserace, than they are in policy.
cleek
the Atrios hate here seems odd. i’ve never gotten any kind of Obama-hate vibe from him; and he doesn’t really partake of the “if he’d just pound the podium some more!” magical thinking, either; nor do i think he’s much of a party purist. he just seems really frustrated at many of the fiscal and economic policy choices Obama and the Dems have made (like, why does Obama keep the same basic economic team in place after 30 months of lackluster results ? – seems like a valid question, even to me). his tone is definitely weary and cynical, but i don’t think he enjoys the state of things, nor do i think he wants it to continue.
odd.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@cat48: Krugman may care about the unemployed, but he’s indulged in a few too many “I told you so” posts, and “he wasn’t the one we were waiting for” to get a pass from me. Interesting that his indirect response to Chait was “I’m just talking economics, not politics”– that could charitably be called disingenuous.
General Stuck
@Samara Morgan:
LOLwut? I have my times of disagreements with mistermix, but I absolutely do not consider him a firebagger.
Kola Noscopy
@Stranger:
hahaha…and BJ, as we know, has none of those.
Cat Lady
@homeruk:
And that’s exactly right. The idiots who call themselves progressives have the attention span and temperament of an average three year old.
Frankensteinbeck
The great thing is, it doesn’t matter – at least, politically. We’re discussing ‘politically’ right now. This is a lovely little win/win, and all the GOP can do is damage control. Either they pass the bill and Obama gets another huge stimulus passed and has helped people who desperately need it AND looks like he’s the guy who cares… or they don’t pass the bill and the 2012 campaign has begun with the Republicans rejecting jobs.
Oh, and he’s hammered his ‘the rich need to pay their fair share’ message again, which polls show is actually working. For the first time in 30 years, raising taxes might be a winning election message.
I’m extremely pleased.
Kola Noscopy
@cat48:
What is it, exactly, that they have against Obama personally?
Samara Morgan
@General Stuck: freddie is an emoprog firebagger. and a front pager.
/shrug
might as well link hamsher.
The Dangerman
@Villago Delenda Est:
I heard something the other day that shocked me; it may be fiction, but the source is solid. I heard there are some freshly minted Eagle Scouts (or perhaps it was the Parents) that are pissed that their congratulations letter is signed by Obama. The ODS is strong with these people.
Samara Morgan
@Frankensteinbeck: me too.
O gets no credit.
the supercommittee turned defense cuts into revenues. why doesnt anyone see that?
it was brilliant.
General Stuck
@Samara Morgan:
I see. My Matako gibberish enigma device must be malfuntioning. I’ll send it to the shop.
Frankensteinbeck
@Kola Noscopy:
Who knows? Might be different for each one and anybody can speculate. But since they ignore his historic achievement record, demand things he’s already done, throw screaming fits suggesting that any tiny action they don’t like is somehow equivalent to Republican policies, and occasionally just plain make shit up to complain about, it’s pretty obvious that they’re not bitching because of anything substantive and can never be pleased. The proof is empirical, you might say. You look at the end point of how their actions reflect reality, see how immune their actions are to reality, and conclude they’re based on some internal bias.
Brachiator
Some good analysis, once again marred by the phony distinction between “low-information voters” and wise voters (which always includes supposedly sage Balloon Juicers). But things are rarely as simple as they seem.
The real question is whether Obama’s plan has merit, which it does, even though it is too modest, is framed badly, and may not treads water more than it actually stimulates employment.
@Zifnab:
This is probably not doable, and anyway is not typical GOP strategy.
There are 65 tax provisions set to expire December 31 (ask your friendly CPA to get you a copy of the CCH analysis, I can’t post links to proprietary material). A couple of biggies are AMT relief, possible extension of adoption credits, and extension of 100% expensing of business property. The GOP loves to tie their proposals to getting concessions from Democrats in exchange for an extension of expiring benefits. There is every reason to believe that they will keep using this tactic, because it always works well for them.
And if they drag this fight out too long, they will increase uncertainty and also create confuse for taxpayers. Of course, the GOP don’t much care about this much anymore either. It’s September 2011, and the IRS is only now releasing instructions for the 2010 Estate Tax Form 706, largely in part due to delays in the aftermath of the last round of tax law battles.
Also, too, there are about 37 tax provisions set to expire December, 2012. Promises of more fun and frolic here, after the presidential election. And if a Republican wins, you can expect some Tax Armageddon as any law previously enacted by Democrats gets killed deader than dead.
Marc
@cleek:
A lot of annoying people parrot his quips. And they’re typically shallow and reductive, which feeds into a cynical approach to politics. e.g. he can’t be bothered, in the quote above, to mention why Obama’s plan is too small, or what an acceptable plan would look like. It’s just all one-liners and sniping.
And he’s awful fond of “we’re ruled by the worst people in the world” lines, of the sort that blur together Democrats and Republicans. Or “maybe someone should do something”, or “wheeee!” or…well, you get the picture.
He’s the Gallager of blogging…just keep whacking that watermelon Duncan…
Samara Morgan
@Raven (formerly stuckinred): not that i know of.
freddie keeps his emoprog firebagging on his own blog.
Think of it as a PSA.
he just hangs out here for the pageclicks.
i think he wants to get on at the Atlantic….he links sully a lot, and has kangaroo slap fights with the sully borg when andrews gone.
ppcli
@maye: But that message was kind of undercut when Romney and Perry were trying to one-up each other on the subject of how many jobs were created during their terms as gov’nor. Maybe state governments create jobs but federal doesn’t?
Also, I wish that media talking heads would just react appropriately when anyone says “Government has never created a single job”: “Now that’s just as bonehead crazy as saying ice doesn’t melt when heated with a blowtorch. Of course government creates jobs – it does it all the time. How do you earn your living, Senator/Congressman? Who pays the military? Who funds defence contractors?…”
I know – but I can dream, can’t I?
aisce
@ frankensteinbeck
or c)
pass their own version of a jobs act in the house which looks nothing like obama’s version, tie the senate up in procedural knots as usual, tangle everything up with the debt commission work, hold stuff like unemployment insurance hostage to negotiate greater leverage on said debt commission, and fight like hell to reconvince the american public that washington is broken and that it’s all the president’s fault.
now…which one do you think they’ll do again?
Cat Lady
@Marc:
It’s more like late stage hipsterism, and I’ve gotten too old to care about being hip. Ironic detachment can be put next to “both sides do it!” on this country’s epitaph, under “killed by a narrative arc”.
srv
@cleek:
It would only be odd if it was otherwise here.
Marc
@Kola Noscopy:
The online left built up a lot of well-justified anger during the Bush years, and now that anger has been turned within and against friends and allies.
A verbal scorched-earth policy feels great, and doesn’t matter as much if it gets used against people who aren’t there to receive it (e.g. language directed at rightists by leftists talking to one another on blogs.) It’s incredibly destructive when used to attack someone else in the same (virtual) room. And that’s what we’re seeing, and that’s what is provoking such strong reactions.
Samara Morgan
@General Stuck: lolwhut?
are you denying freddie is a firebagger?
let me refresh your memory.
ummm…why is freddie a frontpager again?
Hamsher would be more honest at least and have stronger arguments.
schlemizel - was Alwhite
I predicted this twice here this morning. I know what I would have done – it would have been cynical and deeply political and probably would lead to nothing getting done. But the failure would have been owned by the Republicans. Now it will be owned by the Democrats. We will pay for this November 2012.
jibeaux
Isn’t the sticking point with the theory that Republicans will do something the fact that that something would probably have to include a tax hike somewhere and they’ve gone all Grover? They recently came out against an extension of the payroll tax cut. What portions would they vote for and how would they pay for it?
4tehlulz
Atrios is high. The House GOP is not going to risk angering the teahadists, who would likely look at the House passing this as the same as Chamberlain at Munich.
cat48
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I was just trying to be positive about one of his critics & he had a good oped today. :) Westen has a 4 page screed at CNN today that basically shows how personal his gudge against the prez really is. It’s complicated for a lot of people.
schlemizel - was Alwhite
@Culture of Truth:
No because they will only let enough ‘safe’ members vote to get it passed (after they lard some additional tax cuts are remove or delay as many jobs as possible). They will also announce that it will fail & remind everyone that they told us it would fail.
This is what they did with the stimulus bill & it paid big dividends for them
FlipYrWhig
@cleek: It bothers me, a lot, that Atrios is an economics Ph.D. and former economics professor, with a very large audience, and yet he never explains fuck-all about economics. Or really analyzes anything, or provides any original content. Or even appears to enjoy himself while doing it. The best analogue, which I bring up repeatedly, is David Letterman, endlessly recycling old Letterman bits, not to be funny but in order to trigger his audience’s memories of having heard those bits before, and doing it with a pained expression on his face about how he can’t believe people are actually being entertained by this.
Sorry, I really have an issue with him. There are plenty of people in the blogosphere I don’t like, but usually they _try_. Greenwald _tries_, very hard. Hamsher and Aravosis try. Yglesias tries, or at least takes a risk. Atrios doesn’t even go through the motions of trying, and hasn’t for a good five years.
trollhattan
@General Stuck:
Twenty quatloos for the enigma ref.
Uncle Clarence Thomas
.
.
Fortunately, President Obama understands that “modest adjustments” are exactly what this country needs to right itself. He gets that. Anything bolder or fiercer would only inflame public opinion against his savvy businessman friends and cause unnecessary tension on the back nine.
.
.
schlemizel - was Alwhite
@The Dangerman:
@Zifnab:
No, if they kill the bill they might be held accountable. The more cynical and political play is to weaken it, bleed some more tax cuts out of it & let it pass. They will then run around saying “We told you so”
There is no risk in this for them – to kill the plan outright would be risky
General Stuck
@Samara Morgan:
freddie is the front pager Cole chose. I will respect that, unless he or any other front pager goes off the deep end one way or another. And I don’t see freddie doing that so far on BJ, and that is the only place that matters to me while commenting here.
cleek
@FlipYrWhig:
yeah, i can see that.
i wouldn’t mind if he put a bit more effort into it, m’self.
FlipYrWhig
@schlemizel – was Alwhite:
“We told you so, we knew it would turn out badly, but some of us voted for it anyway,” isn’t a great thing to say while running around, IMHO.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Kola Noscopy:
I’d guess for a third or so, he’s NotHillary; for the rest, he actually got elected, and thus has to deal in and with our actual political system rather than the Fantasy USA in which the electorate is far-sighted, generous spirited and has a profound understanding of (just for starters) Keynesian economics, and in which Dennis Kucinich is a viable presidential candidate, or even an effective legislator.
Samara Morgan
@General Stuck: then its fine for me to deconstruct freddies weak posts and point out what he says on his own blog is kinda waaay different than what he says here?
or not?
Marc
@schlemizel – was Alwhite:
The 2010 election changed things. They’re playing with a radical primary audience. It didn’t make sense for them to avoid token concessions on taxes for the rich either, and yet they wouldn’t do so.
schlemizel - was Alwhite
another common thread on BJ in general and on these threads particularly is that anyone who sees any problem with this speech/plan hates Obama and wants him to fail.
Thats not it at all. I worked for him, I voted for him, I contact my Senators and Congressman regularly to voice support for him. I just happen to think he has chosen a poor strategy given what he should know about Republican behavior at this point. I think he has handed the Republicans THE issue for 2012 if they play it like they played the stim. I want him to succeed but believe he is not only failing but taking the Dems down with him by strengthening the “the gov does not create jobs” bullshit theory
cat48
@Kola Noscopy:
Samara Morgan
@General Stuck: and i admit its kinda hard for me to respect Cole at this point…after all….he and DougJ promised me that Kain had turned liberal, but it turns out he was just another nasty little embryo douthat all along.
FlipYrWhig
@schlemizel – was Alwhite:
Number of Republicans who voted for the stimulus bill in the House: zero.
In the Senate: three. One of whom subsequently became a Democrat.
So that’s not what they did with the stimulus bill.
General Stuck
@Samara Morgan:
You are free, my little butterfly, to flutter about as you wish. But I wouldn’t venture too close to the net, IIWY.
Marc
By the way, my favorite pie quote so far in this thread:
My name is Little Debbie, baker to kings:
Look upon my pies, ye Mighty, and despair!
Thank you, thank you, thank you cleek. It’s even better than disenvoweling, which makes trollish stuff gibberish.
schlemizel - was Alwhite
@FlipYrWhig:
They won’t say “but some of us voted for it anyway” Those that HAVE to will be able to say “I didn’t vote for it”. Where it would not matter they will not have to defend the vote.
Mino
Clever Obama. Today he’s giving a speech in the middle of Eric Cantor’s district.
schlemizel - was Alwhite
@FlipYrWhig:
They DIDN’T HAVE TO – there were enough Dems to get it passed without them. But not before they gutted some of the better parts & larded useless tax cuts to inflate the final cost so they could blame Obama for the total.
So, yes, it is exactly what they did with stim
wrb
@cat48:
Jesus, Westen’s article today is twisted.
There may be sentences in it that don’t contain a distortion, but there aren’t many.
There is a whole lotta psychology bubbling away in that boy.
Perfect example of the strangeness of some of the obsessed Obama critics.
FlipYrWhig
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I agree, except I’m not sure I would call the latter two-thirds’ opposition to Obama “personal.” They’d be doing the same thing with President Hillary Clinton or President Russ Feingold: regretting all compromises and deeming them to show weakness. If anything, if a Democrat other than Obama had won, the pro-Obama blogosphere — which _really_ turned me off during primary season, especially on DailyKos — would have been moaning and gnashing its teeth about how President Obama would be fixing everything by now and it was such a mistake not to go with him and that he should primary the president.
Frankensteinbeck
@aisce:
That requires control of their voting block in the House. They don’t have it, and they don’t have the will to pass anything but tax cuts for the very rich that so far they’ve failed to convince the public are jobs bills. Even if they somehow pulled it off, it’s only a defensive move to lessen the blow on themselves, and gives them no attack opportunities they didn’t already have.
eemom
@General Stuck:
“or another”? You mean like launching petty personal front page attacks on another FPer and some commenters?
Nah. Never happen here.
Samara Morgan
@General Stuck: what net?
no one here can touch meh.
they either pretend they cant understand me or pie me or time me out or flag my comments as spam.
everday im shufflin
:)
Jewish Steel
@Frankensteinbeck:
.
Me too. That’s my favorite part.
cleek
@Marc:
my pleasure.
b.t.w., if any of you have witty pie phrases you’d like to get added to the list, you can submit them here.
askew
@Emma:
Most of them haven’t turned against Obama. They’ve always hated him. Lots of the blogosphere will never like Obama because he went around them to set-up OFA. Progressive pundits don’t like him because he cares more about passing policy that helps people than throwing red meat to the base. Most of these bozos worshipped John Edwards. Edwards who co-sponsored the Iraq War and had a voting record similar to Evan Bayh. That was the guy they all rallied around. They care more about speeches and not at all about actions.
@Mike Goetz:
No. How this group has managed to bilk so much money out of naive progressives is beyond me.
The Dangerman
@schlemizel – was Alwhite:
I don’t think so; then they have at least partial ownership. Worse yet, even if they weaken it severely, the economy might incrementally improve on the margins, which is the last thing they want happening. They are now effectively economic terrorists that want to blow shit up (without being blamed for it, of course, so leaving their fingerprints isn’t an option).
This thing was DOA; Congress will obstruct and Obama gets to run against an obstructionist Congress. We’ll have 14 months within those game parameters, but the game itself is set.
FlipYrWhig
@schlemizel – was Alwhite: I was particularly speaking to the part where you wrote:
Well, Republicans didn’t let “safe” members vote for the stimulus, at all.
Maybe you mean that Republicans will negotiate in bad faith about the balance between spending projects and tax cuts and then not even support the resulting bill. That’s closer to what happened. But that’s not the same as lending support to the bill, then running against its failure.
Jay B.
Atrios is wrong here — unless he’s trying actually goad the GOP into doing the right thing by saying it’ll be a great thing to hang around Obama’s neck, in that light, his post makes some sense — Obama has asked for a pretty good plan and certainly made a great speech.
But it’s still so charming to see you whiny cobags looking for wrongthink. Krugman’s OK again! Atrios is unfair! But don’t forget Krugman said that he’s been right all along — can’t have that! You’re right! Krugman is still suspect! I particularly like this line: “But since they ignore his historic achievement record”
Yes, how dare people not see all that he’s done for us! It’s not fair. Plus he’s now actually articulated a jobs plan. What more do you want?
It’s like watching the Pravda editorial board try to come up with its story budget for the day.
mistermix
Just to be clear about Atrios. I read his blog, I like his blog, I don’t think he’s a reflexive Obama-basher, and I’m interested in his take on things. He put out a scenario and I commented on it. That scenario contains a couple of hypotheticals, and I think if one is true, the other will go a different way that Atrios predicts. But who knows how things will turn out. He could well be right, unlike a lot of stuff I read that seems completely from left field.
aimai
@schlemizel – was Alwhite:
Forget about it. The BJ conventional wisdom is, and always has been, that there are only two kinds of people: good Obama voters and bad anti Obama voters. We were good, but for the wrong reasons, when we fundraised, door knocked, and worked our assess off for him in 2008 but we are bad now when we are proposing to fundraise, door knock, and work our assess off for him this time but without a sunny sense of optimism that he is the greatest politician in our adult lifetimes.
Atrios is a pessimist who is critical of many of the Democrats (not Obama’s) political and policy choices. He believes, though I agree he’s phoning it in, that we are in two struggles: to save the country from destruction by a virulent combination of corporate and conservative interests and also to win the next election cycle and get into power to keep trying to drag the country back from the brink. I think the same thing. I think Obama has done some incredible things, against a huge headwind, and that he and his team have done some unnecessarily stupid things on both the policy and the politicking front. On the politicking front they , have not grandstanded enough, haven’t been populist enough in a visible enough way. That’s not because I think those things matter to the economy, but because I think those things matter to the next election cycle.
Personally, I love the President and his family and I think they’ve brought honor to the White House and to this country. That doesn’t mean I don’t also think he’s made some piss poor decisions about the economy, about the bankers, and about the hand he’s been dealt politically. Please do explain to me how I’m a “firebagger” and probably a “Puma” or racist for disagreeing on some policy issues?
aimai
TooManyJens
@wrb: I like the part where he implies that he’s responsible for the Wall Street reform bill getting passed “in record time” (which is not how I remember it, but whatever), and thus he really really knows what he’s talking about when it comes to the political process.
cat48
@wrb:
It’s over the top & desperate. I don’t think he was expecting any push back from anyone. He was on Charlie Rose with Fareed & Chait right after he wrote the oped.
SiubhanDuinne
@Samara Morgan:
And that has to do what, exactly, with mistermix?
jibeaux
@askew: I think that’s a good point. Having had John Edwards as my Senator and having heard him say several times about how we don’t need any damn unions, I was flat amazed at his “transformation” into the Two Americas guy. Sure, I’m glad someone’s talking about poverty, but that’s all he was doing was talking about it. I think because he didn’t have much of a record he could be the recipient of an awful lot of projection and wishful thinking.
Samara Morgan
@General Stuck: its sort of a basic disconnect…i think people are responsible for what they say on their own blogs….and its pretty obvious freddie is here to farm page clicks on his way to a paid gig like Kain was…because he says way different things at l’hote and gets pissy when i link them ….so i take it you support that?
Monkey Business
The absolute best case scenario for the American Jobs Act is for it to go to Congress and pass both houses, unmodified, to be signed by the President.
The subsequent fallout in the GOP would be astounding. The Tea Party, who are adamantly against cooperating with the President at all, would bleed Congressional Republicans like stuck pigs with primary challenges. A few of them would lose those challenges.
Coming into next fall, the GOP would have a cadre of insane Tea Party candidates, absolutely frothing at the mouth, and a bunch of Congresspeople who are exhausted, financially and personally, from fighting off challenges from the right. Moreover, you would hopefully have a decent Democrat waiting in the wings with cash and a video library of awful soundbites from his or her opponent.
That’s how you take back Congress.
Dennis SGMM
@aimai:
Well said.
jibeaux
I’m not trying to say everyone here has to pay attention to me, but I really would like to know what the vision is for what Republicans would pass — even a highly watered down version would seem to involve some spending, and then you’re boxed into either deficit spending or raising taxes, both of which supposedly raise your unmitigated horror. I realize that unpaid-for tax cuts don’t arouse the same scrutiny, but I think it would be pretty easy to reject a plan consisting of nothing but tax cuts as not exactly bargaining in our happy bipartisan good faith way.
Samara Morgan
@SiubhanDuinne: mistermix linked freddie.
that is why i asked him the question.
SiubhanDuinne
@Samara Morgan:
Gee. Considering how disdainful you are of him, you sure do know a lot about Freddie and what he says and what he links to.
Marc
@aimai:
I agree with you on pretty much everything you said, and I’m actively puzzled about what you’re reacting to.
There is also such a thing as stupid, wrong, or counterproductive attacks on Obama. The same distinctions that you make about Obama also apply to his critics, no? If not, why not? I can have high regard for Krugman on economics and place lower weight on his opinions on Obama because of what I view as some pretty obvious personal animus. That isn’t “obotism”. Why are Krugman, Atrios, etc. exempt from any disagreement?
And FlipYrWig has pinpointed the actual critique of Atrios: lazy, glib, and cynical is not what we need more of right now.
William Hurley
“Cunning”? Really?
Punting all control of the “pay-for” side of the proposal, a stupid idea from the outset given the practical and rhetorical value of pushing growth not measured prudence, by giving the “super congress” even more power and an inflated mandate to cut more than the law demands.
Those cuts will come from SocSec, Medicare, Medicaid and other programs core to facilitating cultural coherence.
Will Barry & Michelle both go back into “law” or with they follow different career paths in 2013?
Villago Delenda Est
@4tehlulz:
Atrios is speculating on what non-near-guy-hating people would do, politically, to help their own electoral chances.
But you’re right…the GOP can not get past its blind hatred of the man for his two sins: being a Dem, and being near.
It’s like the situation with Clinton…Clinton could have walked across the Potomac to cure cancer and pass out loaves and fishes, and the Rethugs still would have hated him blindly.
It’s the same with Obama. There is literally NOTHING he can do, policy wise, to overcome their visceral hatred of him for being firstly, a Democrat Usurper of the Rethuglican Owned Executive Branch, blessed by the Sacred Saint Ronaldus Maximus, and secondly. he’s near.
SiubhanDuinne
@Samara Morgan:
You are an idiot. Lots of front pagers and commenters link to all kinds of sites. A link per se implies nothing except . . . it’s a link.
And as far as I know, mistermix doesn’t make FP hiring decisions around here. I think that would be, um, THE OWNER OF THE BLOG!!
debit
I have to remind myself again and again that using logic with some posters does not work, because they are INSANE. If I, who admittedly has poor impulse control, can resist, why can’t others?
Mino
@schlemizel – was Alwhite: This is what drove me nuts, or nuttier, back when Dems had enough votes to actually pass something. Dems let the Repubs wreck their bills with negotiations, not amendments that had to actually pass, and then, at the end, when the Repubs said, “Nope, can’t vote for that,” they didn’t throw out the negotiated garbage and pass the better bill.
fuckwit
@Kola Noscopy: Two things. 1) Same thing they had against Clinton personally: he’s a Democrat, and a smart, optimistic one too, like Clinton, and one that wins, like Clinton, the worst kind, a smart, optimistic Democrat that beats Repugs. 2) He’s black. In that order, I believe.
The most interesting question to me is, will this get them to actually pass something? The stick that Obama is threatening to use, is that he is going out on the campaign trail, and he may use this time not so much to run for re-election, but to sell this bill and raise awareness of how our government actually works and turn people against these miserable, lazy, work-shirking, overpaid, obstructionist Repugs.
The core problem is that way too many Americans– including too many so-called high-information liberal bloggers, writers, and commenters– seem to have failed 4th grade Social Studies!! Way too many voters in this country seem to think that Presidents make laws or implement policies. Uh, no.
Congress makes the laws. Congress is not only important, but before the Constitution, under the Articles of Confederation, Congress was the ONLY branch of government. That’s how critical and powerful it is. And too many Americans just yawn their way through “off-year” elections, and wait for the president to “do something”… or to change presidents. Wrong, wrong wrong.
I saw a Daily Show schtick recently that made me puke blood. It was Jon Stewart guffawing about how Nixon “created the EPA, signed the Clean Air Act, signed the clean water act” etc etc. Well, let’s see. You are giving him credit for “signing” something? HOW FUCKING STUPID ARE YOU? What was the percentage of Democrats in Congress at the time, eh? What takes work– drafting and passing something, or SIGNING it? What is the percentage of votes required to override a veto? How the fuck could Nixon have vetoed those? Come on, Jon, I kept saying, stop that, stop hurting America.
“Signing” something is NOT WORTHY OF CREDIT. Nixon HAD to sign it, otherwise his veto would have been overridden, and he’d have looked like a weak chump. As for the EPA, he headed off something that otherwise would have come by legislation FROM THE CONGRESS anyway. He was evil, but not stupid, and he knew what was politically shrewd.
The problem now is not the president. The problem is Congress. Who put those clowns in office in Congress? We did. Therefore…. wait for it, this is important… THE PROBLEM IS US. And nobody wants to take blame for that, I guess.
Want a new New Deal or a new Great Society? Then elect 70% supermajorities of Democrats– the kind that I’m tired of hearing FDR and LBJ getting credit for having. Want a modern president to be as “liberal” as Reagan or Nixon seem to have been in retrospect? Then give them the kind of Democratic supermajorities that, for example, overrided more vetoes by Reagan than ever before in history. We the people have the power– if we want it.
We all need a remediary damn civics lesson. If Obama goes out on the road and gives one in every city for over a year, then that’d be a great service that could help save America in the long run. And if the THREAT of him doing that gets Repugs to pass this bill, then it may be a great thing in the short run too.
/RANT
aisce
@ monkey business
well golly geepers, i wonder if they’re not gonna do that then? it’s a mystery.
Samara Morgan
@aimai: you arent.
but dont you agree that freddie and jane hamsher are?
FlipYrWhig
@aimai:
I think you do him vastly too much credit. I don’t see a lot of awareness of struggle or power. All I see is a record-store clerk going “Pfft” at the other record-store clerks when a kid wants to buy Maroon 5.
Disagreeing on policy issues, despite the hype, has never been key to the definition of a “firebagger.” IMHO it’s (1a) the willingness if not the active desire to believe the worst intentions and the worst possible interpretation of Obama’s words and actions, (1b) the discounting of the role of Congress, including Congressional Democrats, in shaping law and policy, (2) the wishful thinking that “fighting,” “toughness,” and sharp rhetoric lead smoothly and easily to more liberal policy, and (3) the persecution complex that flares up anytime those interpretations are challenged.
TooManyJens
@debit: This is in no way a criticism of the pie filter, but damn, sometimes I wish it would also block out any replies to the pied people.
Lyrebird
@aimai: aimai, I think you are brilliant and insightful, and have ever since reading your News Blog comments. (FTFY BTW)
I don’t see the same consistency you’re reporting about BJ, & I’m not sure if you mean front-pagers or commenters. I hope that many of us can work together in (independently) getting in touch w/congressfolk, etc and (here) in stepping back to laugh and critique. John Cole hosts a kindof rowdy party in my experience, and one that helps me stay sane I think.
SiubhanDuinne
@Samara Morgan:
Why are you asking General Stuck and mistermix this question? Why don’t you ask John? It’s his blog.
UncertaintyVicePrincipal
@mistermix:
It’s funny to me that simply quoting Atrios in a more or less neutral way, i.e. “here’s this interesting thing that Atrios posted, discuss” requires you to add a disclaimer that explains that you think it’s okay to quote him because he’s not a “reflexive Obama-basher”.
Funny, or you know, sad. After checking in with other sites, I was interested to see what Balloon-juice had to say about this major Presidential address on employment and the economy and all I found, for a solid day, was a post by someone I’ve never heard of claiming essentially that anyone who disagreed with anything Obama said in the speech was a racist.
The dumbing-down of this site is really too bad, if you ask me. It seems to have become even more just a fan club, where “pro or anti-Obama” is how every subject is evaluated, sorted, or you know deemed okay to post about or not.
My two cents on the speech (after 98 cents on the above): It’s not going to matter unless it works. People are putting way too much weight on “Obama made them look like they don’t care about jobs”. If we’re deep in recession a year from now some complete lunatic stands a chance of getting elected if he plays his cards right, by blaming the President for the economy. If this is watered down through negotiation to 200 billion and all that’s left is tax cuts, then it’s likely to have no effect at all, in which case pointing at the Republicans and saying “It’s their fault” won’t do a bit of good. People keep saying that it will, but it never does.
Robert Reich thinks its clear that it’s way too small to get employment going the right direction even if it passed, Krugman thinks it would “make a dent” in unemployment if it passed, but that it won’t pass.
David Brooks likes it.
The prospects are not good, IMO.
I think it’s about the best Obama could do at this point by the way. That’s because it’s all been such a complete screwup before now, for what it’s worth, but that’s water under the bridge….
PS: What @aimai said.
aisce
@ frankensteinbeck
there’s basically no part of this that isn’t completely wrong. go look at the vote totals for the december, april, and august compromises.
republicans have this mysterious ability to vote for things when they aren’t actually obligated to give up anything they actually care about. even when they aren’t getting tons in their favor.
if you don’t think they won’t just strip out all the aid to states and infrastructure stuff, and get to work passing tax cuts for small businesses and veterans, i don’t know what to tell you. the president cannot compel congress to actually pass his bill as he has written it.
@ jay b.
both obots and firebaggers are all alike. there are no rules. it’s fucking calvinball.
what is the president doing? demanding congress rubber stamp his legislation and going over their heads with the american public to do so.
which is what the firebaggers have been demanding, and what the obots have been shrieking is “unpragmatic” and “oblivious to separation of powers and the importance of congress.”
and yet, now that it’s happening, the obots will swear up and down that it’s a brilliant strategy and the firebaggers will pout that it isn’t enough. because neither side has any scruples. they’re reflexive idiots.
Brachiator
@FlipYrWhig:
Interesting. I did not know this about Atrios. This reinforces my disappointment with economists who emphasize the impact of law on the economy as a whole, but who have little insight into tax policy and the impact of laws on individuals and families.
Duckest Fuckingway: Ask not for whom the Duck Fucks. . .
Becuase JCole (rightly) thinks that the ‘tako-chin is a fucking moron.
Also, isn’t anyne the least bit worried about her steadfast faith in Obama’s reelection? It gives me pause.
cat48
@aimai:
I always agree with your posts, even when they’re critical of the admin, because the posts don’t seem like personal attacks. I think they’re always constructive.
Samara Morgan
@SiubhanDuinne: i asked mistermix because he linked freddie. just like he links Kains Forbes blog at least once a week to farm pageclicks for him. stuck was just confused.
i’ve known freddie and erik since culture 11. just like james poulos, jim manzi and conor friedersdorf, ross douthat, and reihan salam.
they are all glibertarian assclowns.
freddie usta be a liberal…..but that doesnt pay so now hes trying for a slot on the glibertarian gravy train.
Davis X. Machina
He used to. Years ago, on Salon’s Table Talk, when he was still passing himself off as a substitute gym teacher he did, a lot, and well. He was good at it.
Somewhere along the way, though, he became the victim of his own schtick. Jon Stewart, avant le letter.
fasteddie9318
@Samara Morgan:
Most likely the reason is similar to the reason why you haven’t been IP-banned yet.
Marc
@UncertaintyVicePrincipal:
The full text of that post you refer to:
“Harpers cartoon from Civil War_drowing man
This cartoon from 1862 could run in the papers tomorrow as an example of the typical Republican/Wingnut reaction to President Obama’s speech (it would also cover the reaction of more than a few firebaggers as well). This has been the reaction to everything President Obama has done so far, so I see no reason why it would stop tonight.”
————————
The claim “there will be racist responses” is a wee bit different from “all criticism is racist”.
debit
@TooManyJens: It would be an awesome feature and would make this blog so much more readable. Or banning works too. My offer of blow jobs on demand for a perma ban still stands, Cole.
Social outcast
Waah, I hate atrios because he doesn’t write the way I want him to write. Why not just read a different blogger that you do like?
central texas
“If Republicans agree, they at least partly own the solution, since many of the ideas were theirs.”
Uh huh, that worked SO well on Health Care.
–ct
cleek
@TooManyJens:
sadly, tis not possible.
hueyplong
We all have takes that are influenced by our differing perceptions and biases, but my view of Republican “strategy” is that they’ll oppose literally anything Obama proposes, regardless of what it is. They want any jobs bill worthy of the name to fail. Period. The more that hurts the economy/country the better, because their view is that at least 51% of the American public will believe that Obama “owns” whatever disaster has befallen us as of November 2012, regardless of who did what, when, and how much.
To assume Republicans are following any game plan more nuanced or complicacted than that flies in the face of any fact or action I’ve perceived to exist since the night the 2008 election was called in Obama’s favor.
It’s Obama’s job to sell 51% of the public on the notion that he’s done as well as any human can while being mindlessly opposed by evil (not well meaning and mistaken, but evil) people bent on taking away what few benefits the public still has (Social Security, Medicare). That must be hammered in a way that is extra simple, said in very few words, and endlessly repeated.
An improved economy would be great, but the GOP simply isn’t going to let that happen. And it seems prudent to plan with that as an assumption. The GOP will ask if we’re better off in 2012 than in 2008. The Dems have to ask the same question, and because the answer is “no,” argue like hell that the GOP — not Obama — is to blame.
Better to go down fighting for a bill that shows the Democrats to be the protectors of Social Security and Medicare than to pass a “compromise” that gives away the one thing the Democrats have going for them (other than the fact that they aren’t Republicans): the fact that they created, maintained and protect Social Security and Medicare.
The GOP can only be blamed if it is clearly perceived ruthlessly to have killed something valuable, and to have done so without the connivance of the Dems. Gotta run on anger and resentment about a loss that is the GOP’s fault if we can’t run on a triumph.
Samara Morgan
@fasteddie9318: both freddie and Kain asked for me to be permanently IP banned.
join the club.
TooManyJens
@cleek: I figured as much. I still love the pie filter.
UncertaintyVicePrincipal
@Marc: So you’re in agreement that “Firebaggers” being critical of Obama are doing so because they’re racist? Most of them? A lot of them? Any significant percentage of them, which is what the expression “more than a few” means in common usage?
“There will be racist responses” is your wording, not the post’s. It’s disingenuous at best, especially presenting it in quotation marks, to pretend that it’s what the post actually said.
The post was idiotic.
General Stuck
@debit:
Oh my. Matako should be glad it ain’t my blog. Cause I’m cheep and easy that way.
Emma
@Kola Noscopy: No. Some created this “super-progressive” Obama in their heads and continually react to it. Others seem to believe int he magical pony theory of politics, to wit, if the president wanted to he could make it do it because he’s the president and he can make it happen by just wishing for it.
I knew before I voted for the man that he was actually to the right of me, and that was fine, because the alternative sucked big ones. I have big disagreements with some of his policies, especially in foreign relations, but I have yet to find a president that I couldn’t smack around the head for that, so it’s not personal. I also see the limitations created by having a substantial minority in his own party ready to bolt to the enemy at any time, and an enemy that seems so focused in destroying him that they will destroy the country if that is what it takes.
Americans idolize the idea of the President, if not the man himself. They think of it as a super-powerful office (the most powerful office in the world!). And it is that, but it is also constrained by being part of a government where there are two other co-equal branches that can always throw a wrench into the works. And it seems to me that a lot of the “progressives” conveniently forget that. They want a George Bush and a Dick Cheney of the left. And they got a constitutional scholar and a solid old-school politician. And it’s driving them bonkers.
Southern Beale
The Moonie Times has jumped the shark, even for them. They photoshopped Obama’s face on Amy Winehouse’s body and added a hammer and sickle tattoo.
I mean, jeez. I guess they’re trying to say Obama is a drug addict? WTF? It’s not just disrespectful to Obama, it’s disrespectful to Winehouse. Body is barely cold, people.
Cripes.
harlana
@aimai:
b/c shut up, that’s how! you emobagger person, you! ;)
Samara Morgan
@General Stuck: why dont you mail Cole and suggest it?
ichi! ni! san!
and it prolly depends on if debit is gurrlstyle or guystyle.
LOLOOLLLLL!
Chyron HR
@aimai:
I’m pretty sure nobody in this thread said anything of the sort.
Well, the Balloon Juice Bag Lady is screaming about firebaggers, but surely you recognize that’s a special case.
Davis X. Machina
@General Stuck: The mintory example of E.D. Kain rises before us, like the heads on pikes on the Southwark end of London Bridge.
wrb
@Emma: well said
geg6
@aimai:
Someone called you a firebagger or a PUMA or a racist? For reals? Glad I missed it because that would be ridiculous. I think, for the most part, you and I pretty much agree on what the president has done well and what he has done badly. I don’t (and I don’t recall you having done it either) go around screaming and waving my hands in every post about how Obama is the FAIL king and we need to primary him RIGHT NOW. I say what I don’t like, but I still support him, I still like him, I still respect him, and I still understand political realities and what can get done and what, sometimes, has to wait for the propitious moment. I think you do, too.
And yet, I get called out as a prototypical Obot by some of the more liberal than thous around here. And, apparently, someone is calling you a firebagger. Just shows how ridiculous the whole thing is.
dww44
@Stranger: I have to agree. Never read the comments, therefore there’s mostly nothing to read, except stuff about his urban hellhole.
cleek
@aisce:
he’s also apparently starting his campaign. the big, symbolic-but-doomed policy proposals will do essentially nothing, legislatively – as most people here seem to be well aware. but speeches will probably do a lot, electorally. so, we’ll see more of this from now until the election. it’s not going to gain him much in terms of enacted policy, but it might illustrate to the general public that it’s not entirely his fault.
not quite. the firebaggers have been demanding podium-pounding while seeming to believe that it will lead to legislative victories. which is just plain stupid. symbolic podium-pounding is good public opinion, not for swinging House votes. but, elections are upon us, so symbolism it is.
Southern Beale
Don’t know how legit this poll is (note, it’s a Politico link) but it says a Republican has a good chance of taking Anthony Weiner’s seat in next week’s special election.
Thanks a lot, asshole. Had to send out pics of your dick, and now the Democrats may lose another seat. God I hate this shit.
Samara Morgan
@Chyron HR: innocent. i said freddie and jane hamsher are emoprog firebaggers, not aimai.
whats a Puma? and i think Marc said the racist thing.
try to keep up.
Samara Morgan
@Emma:
well said indeed.
and hes a master gamer and a machiavellian pragmatist too.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@trollhattan:
And FDL wonders why they keep getting stereotyped (from Chait):
MTiffany
Not necessarily. Bullshitico and their ilk only trot out the “both-sides-do-it” crap when they need to give the Republicans cover for some atrocious transgression or blatant hypocrisy that Democrats, in fact, don’t do.
oklahomo
@TooManyJens: I love mine so much I modified it to use the rotating captions from ASCII Art Farts and some of the dialogue from Jerk City.
There’s just something deliciously right when a m_c spew gets turned into a simple DADDY I’VE BEEN BAD or HLUAUHAHHHGHGHAUA.
TooManyJens
@Belafon (formerly anonevent): I actually assumed that was a shot at Rick Perry and his bloodthirsty fans, but I guess you never do know with FDL.
Linda Featheringill
@Samara Morgan:
Puma refers to some diehard Hillary supporters in 2008 who didn’t want to switch their support over to Barack for the general election. Puma stands for Party Unity My Ass.
Samara Morgan
@Davis X. Machina: sweet engraving.
and yes, i plan to dip freddies head in tar and put it on a pike on the battlements of Castle BalloonJuice…..to ward off the other glibertarians seeking pageclicks that may venture this way.
FlipYrWhig
@cleek:
I’d give this a minor tweak — I think it’s less “all he has to do is pound the podium!” and more “he doesn’t even try to pound the podium!” But, by and large, yes: pounding the podium is a decent way of speaking to the public. It’s not a good way of tangibly helping the public. Even at another degree’s remove, it’s not like pounding the podium is going to scare Republicans into voting the way the public wants. But if you’ve given up on tangibly helping the public, and all you have left is a podium, you may as well pound it. I KAN HAS MOAR PODIUMN?
Samara Morgan
@Linda Featheringill: thank you.
Dennis SGMM
@Southern Beale:
A Republican would have kept the seat, done a mea culpa with his long-suffering wife at his side, and then gone on about his business.
The unfortunately-surnamed Weiner felt that the honorable thing to do was resign. That’s both his loss and our party’s. FWIW, I am cynical enough to believe that the only difference between A.W. and many of his colleagues is that they haven’t been caught yet. Power does weird things to people.
fasteddie9318
@Southern Beale: Weprin hasn’t helped; he’s run a terrible campaign from what I understand. I don’t get how the Democrats keep nominating losers for what should be easy holds (see also Coakley, Martha).
dww44
@aimai: Thanks, Aimai. Based on Obama’s speech last night, I believe some of the progressives’ complaints got thru to him. Certainly the part about him going on the offensive. The part about truly laying the blame on the obstructionist GOP, not so much so. I guess he still believes in leaving the door cracked just a bit. Nevertheless, if he will consistently fight for his legislation and for working Americans between now and Nov 2012, that will help turnout those of his base who’ve been disappointed and demoralized by some of his policy decisions and his heretofore apparent unwillingness to speak forecefully for Democratic values.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@TooManyJens: You may be right. But that would seem to qualify as damning with faint praise.
El Cid
Republicans in the House didn’t campaign so strongly on the subject of their majority vote for TARP.
Why would this be seen as leaving Republican hands clean with their fakely anti-spendin’ base more so than the TARP?
(Thanks again, to Nancy Pelosi for making sure the bill only passed when a majority of Republican House members voted for it.)
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@dww44: If he wants to get something through, then he can’t go too hard on the spoiled Republicans running the House. For a lot of those members, their constituents are willing to suffer so long as Obama loses. While I expect him to switch to campaign mode – read his history as a Senator running for office – he would still like to actually get something passed.
J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford
@Kola Noscopy:
Fyp
catclub
@Davis X. Machina: “he never explains fuck-all about economics.”
I imagine that after 1500 times of explaining that expanding government spending to counter a recession is the sensible keynesian approach, but getting dumb looks from the head of the European Central bank every time, you might just give up.
dww44
@cleek: Agree. Atrios’ focus has always been on the economic issues and his fundamental disagreement with Obama’s approach. Still, of late, as another commenter said, Atrios seems to be phoning it in. Very little to read there.
catclub
Wasn’t it Benen and/or Atrios that coined ‘Pass the damn bill?’
catclub
@Dennis SGMM: Of course, Justice Thomas’s conflicts of interest are long, and conveniently, forgotten.
Which was probably behind the whole kerfluffle.
Mnemosyne
@catclub:
IIRC, it was Benen, who does still do 5 to 8 substantive posts a day (and often more) unlike Mr. “Heh-Indeedy.”
ETA: Of course, the “heh-indeedy” thing started as a parody of Instapundit, but it’s become Atrios’ very own tic at this point.
gene108
Obama’s a lot like Reagan, in the sense that most of the electorate thinks well of him as a person and if things improve on the employment front, he will get the bump in approval ratings Reagan got, as the economy started to improve in 1983-1984.
Knowing this, I think Republicans have fought hard to make sure his Presidency will be as ineffective as possible, even if things are worse for most Americans.
In a nutshell, Obama has been holding almost all the cards, this year. People like him and loathe Republican Congresscritters.
It should be interesting how the battle on the jobs bill boxes in Republicans.
Hopefully Democrats will stand firm.
Hoodie
@dww44: It cracks me up how some progressives think that Obama’s world revolves around them. Obama’s doing this now because now is the time to do this, both for practical and political reasons. We’ve had a solid year of deficit monomania and endless budget cuts and 9% unemployment. A possible double dip recession is now upon us. Hence, the practical necessity.
As for the politics, the campaign has started. The Republicans had their first real debate the night before. Rick Perry said he wants to put grandpa on a ice floe, soon to be followed by you, assuming you don’t get busted in Texas for homicide first. Obama’s jobs bill just relegated Romney’s glossy 59-point plan to the sale table at Walmart. The difference? Obama’s is definite and it’s here and now, Romney’s is at least 14 months away, whatever it is. The Republicans have punched themselves out on negativity, to the point that their standard-bearer may be a caricature of George W. Bush and their candidate with the best chance of beating Obama is a punching bag for their base. Romney can’t even fall back on the war hero stuff like McCain, and he can’t trumpet the stuff he actually didn’t fuck up too badly, like when he was a Republican governor in a deep blue state.
Dennis SGMM
@Belafon (formerly anonevent):
Arrrrrgh! Some days I get so annoyed with the pack of ruthless fucks known as the GOP that I would, if I was Obama, I’d detail one of the gov’s unheralded three-letter agencies to put key members of the asshole club under surveillance until they got pics of them with a sheep, or live boy, or a dead girl. Then just call them into his office one at time and ask them how they’d like to see those photos on the Internet.
On those days when I’m not so annoyed I’d merely prefer that the Secret Service release a few hundred shit-eating pigs in the halls of Congress.
gene108
@Dennis SGMM:
You left out something important. The Republican would’ve, with his wife at his side, look to Jesus for forgiveness and reaffirm his faith in Jesus Christ.
That sort of contrition works well among Republican voters, for whatever reason.
I doubt Weiner will convert to Christianity, which creates a problem for him among conservative Christian voters that they don’t have with folks like Vitter and his “come to Jeseus” moment, after being outed for soliciting hookers.
EDIT: Therefore the right-wing wurlitzer would’ve been cranked to 11, until Weiner resigned because there’s nothing he can do to make amends for his mistakes.
catclub
@Hoodie: “Romney can’t even fall back on the war hero stuff like McCain”
I was in a pow camp during the vietnam war… in france.
It was horrible! They made me eat snails and goose liver.
and red wine, and stinky cheese.
Dennis SGMM
@catclub:
“Justice Thomas?” Slowly I turned. Step-by-step, inch-by-inch…
catclub
@Dennis SGMM: “a few hundred shit-eating pigs”
How about man eating pigs as in ‘Hannibal’? Or is that what you meant?
Dennis SGMM
@catclub:
Pretty much. I felt that shit-eating pigs would be more likely to spare Democrats – other than the Blue Dogs. Sooooooeeeeey!
FlipYrWhig
@catclub: Definitely Steve Benen, who also wrote up a memo about why passing the damn bill was a good idea under the circumstances. I don’t remember what Atrios thought about the damn bill.
Earlier you responded to Davis X. Machina, but, for what it’s worth, I’ll own up to being the one who griped about Atrios and “fuck-all about economics.” I still find it frustrating that the country is in dire need of liberal/progressive/left economic rhetoric and arguments, and Atrios is both an academic economist and someone who prides himself (too much, IMHO) on his concision, and yet his big contribution to economic discussion even in the blogosphere is, what, “Someone Should Do Something” or “SUPERTRAIN!” Tremendous waste of talent and expertise.
It’s the opposite problem demonstrated by Yglesias, who is prolific, engaged, and unpredictable, but has no gift for clarity, no expertise in anything, and terrible instincts.
Davis X. Machina
@catclub: Krugman manages, somehow. And he’s also blogging only part time.
Quantity has a quality all its own, in both directions. I know Atrios from back when he was just Kurt Foster, substitute gym teacher. He can do better, and he can do different.
jwest
Blackadder: “Am I jumping the gun, Baldrick, or are the words ‘I have a cunning plan’ marching with ill-deserved confidence in the direction of this conversation?”
Obama is making this too easy.
Republicans in the House will quickly pass whatever the final form of legislation the president wants, with only the 100 or so Tea Party members voting against. All republican members in the House and Senate will find microphones to say:
“The President has promised that this bill will lower the unemployment rate substantially right now and fix the economy, all by making drastic cuts in Medicare and taxing job producers more. Personally, I don’t think this same failed policy will work, but he’s the leader of the country and we owe it to him to see if it works. If not, the people can chose a new, better direction in November of 2012.”
If the economy magically turns around in the next 8 months, Obama wins. If not, the entire democrat party will be destroyed for a generation.
MikeBoyScout
A couple of things here…
Seems we all mostly agree that the President seems to have crafted a reasonable American Jobs package and political approach with more options of WIN in it than we’d expected.
Naturally, how it started is no guarantee as to how it will go, but I’ll take Big O at his word to stay on message with this.
Regarding Atrios’ comment over at Eschaton, some of you are having an unpleasant reaction. You seem to think he’s looking to rearrange your map in the Year of the Depend Adult Undergarment and thus throw us all into the Great Firebagging Concavity.
Or maybe “not that I expect them to take my advice” is a clue to how generally skeptical salt water econ bloggers are going to play this match differently than the Iraqi fiasco.
Also too K-Thug clue – “The good news in all this is that by going bigger and bolder than expected, Mr. Obama may finally have set the stage for a political debate about job creation. For, in the end, nothing will be done until the American people demand action.”
If you’re confused just think of how Chinless Mitch and the Great Orange One are wandering around inside the box.
catclub
@FlipYrWhig: Yglesias also can’t type.
I really do agree with your comments on Atrios. The heh-indeedy style of Glenn Reynolds really needs more meat behind it.
ETA: Luckily no typoes here.
lawguy
Let’s see a compromised based on the idea the the republican party in power will respond in a way to help the country.
How could that possibly go wrong?
Marc
@jwest:
Republican fantasies are so cute.
Corner Stone
The short term revisionism, and complete 180 involved, regarding the mythical “bully pulpit” is amazing and truly a thing to behold.
Dennis SGMM
@FlipYrWhig:
I was a long-time commenter at Eschaton until it turned into the Kewl Kids Circus with Atrios as ringmaster.
Kola Noscopy
@Southern Beale:
You may recall the virtuous and holy Nancy Smash demanding his resignation…so hope you’re saving some blame for her.
karen marie
@Stranger: That was a long time ago — 2004, in fact.
arguingwithsignposts
SUPERTRAINS!
jibeaux
Now, that is just flat funny.
catclub
@Marc: heck, I hate it when someone like jwest appears to enjoy Blackadder, which I enjoy. Of course, I get over it.
The religious right has to deal with the fact that Lincoln, when he was older, limited his reading almost exclusively to the Bible and Shakespeare.
jibeaux
@catclub: jwest’s a spoof.
Villago Delenda Est
@Kola Noscopy:
What did him in is he lied to Nancy Smash after the accusations were made.
That’s why she wanted his hide.
It’s always the coverup. That’s what did Weiner in. Asswipes like Vitter don’t cover up, they just do their come to Jeebus thing, and the pathetic Jeebusworshippers fall into line.
jwest
@jibeaux:
jwest is as serious as a heart attack.
kc
Wow, that’s the longest post Atrios has written in a while.
lawguy
@Southern Beale: I do believe that 56% of his constituants wanted him to stay.
David in NY
Per word posted, Atrios is still not bad. I grant you, not many words. And often a few words with no content whatsoever. But when he goes to a full paragraph, it tends to be at least as thought provoking as the others mentioned here. But when I want comments, I come here.
Dennis SGMM
@jibeaux:
He’s Atanarjuat’s Anglo cousin.
jibeaux
@jwest: Yes, yes, I know. Very serious. Pat pat pat.
burritoboy
Of course the Republicans will try to engage in fake negotiations, load bills up with poison pills and so on. That’s expected and I think everyone would be astonished if it didn’t happen. But:
Obama is exploiting the following – it is now getting closer and closer to the election. In 2009, he correctly had to focus on getting policy as close as possible to being right. That’s the right thing to do if you have a 3.5 year runway. That, in turn, meant that he had things (policies) that he wanted to get from Congress and that need could be (and was) exploited by his opponents. Now he doesn’t have that need anymore – there’s not enough runway to matter. Republicans had substantial hostages, and they lose them as the election approaches.
As they lose hostages because of the simple passage of time, the Republican strategy of extreme opposition begins to backfire. They pass almost anything (no matter how crappy objectively), Obama runs around thanking them for their help (he’s put all of the major options – including the ones any Republican president would try – into his proposal), which pisses off the Republican base. Any nonsense they put in the bill will either happen entirely after the election or will not have enough time to cause substantial damage even if the nonsensical stuff does go into effect.
If they don’t pass anything, Obama gets to run against a do-nothing Congress. So the number of hostages is much reduced, and Obama has some hostage-taking ability on his own. The airplane hijackers have only a few remaining hostages, and Obama’s grabbed some of their family members as leverage of his own.
some guy
awesome, Atrios has now been added to the BJ Center-Right 2 Minute Hate Club. he’s in good company, it seems.
is it OK to still like Cheerleader Benen and Cheerleader Chait?
TooManyJens
@Dennis SGMM: Wow, there’s a name I haven’t seen in a while.
jibeaux
@Dennis SGMM: He should find some version of Country First to be his little “peace out”.
Elie
@harlana:
Harlana, what on earth are you talking about?
Did I miss the “kool kids” here?
Its one of the only reasons that i come here — its a free for all sometimes, but its pretty much unfettered. A few folks are time out and back in but sheesh, I don’t see that kind of purposeful self centered clique stuff you see elsewhere..
kc
@LGRooney:
Hmm, maybe that’s why some Democrats oppose him too.
Dennis SGMM
@TooManyJens:
À la recherche du spooftrolls perdu.
jwest
@Dennis SGMM:
Il découle de spooftrolls toute sagesse.
FlipYrWhig
@Dennis SGMM: The Kewl Kids Circus makes me think of Kate Beaton’s Mystery-Solving Teens. And another one…
Brachiator
@dww44:
I suppose that this is good to some degree as far as the upcoming political campaign season goes.
But speaking forcefully about Democratic values is not quite the same thing as advocating and getting approval for effective policies.
@Frankensteinbeck:
I have mixed feelings that this is actually working because it is hardly the best explanation for the need to increase taxes. But sometimes you have to go with what you’ve got.
Dennis SGMM
@FlipYrWhig:
Nice links! I’ve bookmarked the site.
Samara Morgan
i agree with Nate.
Samara Morgan
@Elie: there are no kool kidz here…but there is a “community.”
thus the pie filter.
I’ll let Julian explain…..
FlipYrWhig
@some guy: I also dislike “Two and a Half Men.” Maybe it’s because that’s also too politically radical for me, not because it coasts on the constant reuse of tired formulas.
arguingwithsignposts
@Samara Morgan: Nobody cares who the fuck you agree with, cudlip
Samara Morgan
@some guy: is there a difference between some guy and someguy?
because i usta know a someguy at TAS the Glibertarian Hivemind.
agrippa
No disrepect intended, by why do so many of the blogs I read lead me to say:
“That makes no sense to me”; or, “Why would he believe that?”
What Atrios wrote did not make much sense to me.
Samara Morgan
@arguingwithsignposts: because im not in the community.
and because the community doesnt give a fuck about the material, but just about peer value protocols.
:)
arguingwithsignposts
@Samara Morgan: No, because you’re a stalker who shits on every thread she goes in with FdB and EDK hate and bullshit disproven theories.
ETA: But you’ll keep thinking it’s because you’re just all that much smarter than the rest of the people here.
You aren’t a troll. You’re worse than a troll.
Samara Morgan
@arguingwithsignposts: give an example of a disproven theory plz.
link?
Samara Morgan
@arguingwithsignposts: any thread that links Kain or de Bore, and any thread de Bore authors (because hes a frontpager), and any Amerikkka Fuck Yeah thread gets this treatment.
arguingwithsignposts
@Samara Morgan: dead child, I do not have that much time.
Samara Morgan
@arguingwithsignposts: liar liar
you got nuthin’
Jennifer
@Dennis SGMM: As was I. I can go you one better, however, in that I was banned, allegedly for using the word “guillotine” but in actuality, because I from time to time respectfully disagreed with the Kewl Kidz – and sometimes, when they were less than respectful of me, I returned the favor. So Atrios was looking for an excuse to drop the ban-hammer, especially after I exchanged a few words with the queen of Eschaton, NYMary, about how she was being less than honest about how every single gathering of regulars was being organized in a locale which was both cheap and easy for her and the other Kool Kidz to reach, and how she had stepped on plans that were being made for the first gathering, to be held in Chicago to help EVERYONE be able to attend, when she first showed up at the blog.
There was, I understand, this back-biting flow of emails between said Kool Kidz that flew back and forth whenever any of them were offended or challenged by anything any of the “lessers” said. It was pretty fucking obvious whether you knew about it or not.
So anyways, the word “guillotine” became Atrios’ excuse for banning me, and a patently ridiculous one it was – so much so that there was a lot of noise about it for several days until he started making threats that no one was to speak of it again…the whole time, Big A was making up bullshit excuses about how he had been “freaked out” by seeing the word “guillotine” used in comments, etc etc. He made excuses via email to those he considered cool enough to respond to, but of course I wasn’t worthy of an explanation.
It was at that point that I decided I really didn’t give a rat’s ass about the political prognostications of a grown man who behaved like Nellie Olsen. The guy’s a douche. He is, or was at one time, a competent aggregator of news – I wouldn’t know if he is now, because I haven’t given him a click since 2007 – so while I recognized the “phoning it in” syndrome, I still found his site useful for other reasons. But after that shit – and this was after his shameful “pulling up the ladder” BS “blogroll amnesty” move, in which he and others attempted to make sure that any money to be made from blogging would end up with those already established – I was done. The most unfortunate thing about it is that I now have trouble having respect for anyone who continues to make his blog their internet home. Because there were a lot of cool people there, at least back in the day, and he didn’t appreciate most of them. I’ve had to conclude that the ones who stick around don’t appreciate themselves adequately, if they’re looking for the the seal of approval from king douche and his in-crowd.
singfoom
@Samara Morgan: Well, that just tears it. I mean, since Assange just said that stuff, it has to be true.
I mean, it’s not as if different peer groups might operate differently or anything. I just think you and he are completely full of bullshit.
There are some posters on this board who I like to read consistently, and when an actual discussion gets going that’s not emprog/obot flamewars or shutting down a troll, it can be very interesting.
Yours and Assange’s assertion that it’s just a peer group ego stroke circle jerk is just that, an assertion.
Please, go shit somewhere else.
Samara Morgan
@singfoom: its empirically true at BJ.
i offer the pie filter.
out-group ideology is shunned.
mds
@fasteddie9318:
Well, to be fair, if NY-9 is a Dem hold it almost certainly goes on the chopping block due to redistricting. Why would anyone with real political talent and ambition spend time running in a special election for a district that was going away? Of course, the irony is that if it becomes a Republican seat, the NY Senate will require a D district to be eliminated elsewhere … which turns it into a 2-seat loss. At least the DCCC has finally realized that it might want to spend some money on the race because of the redistricting ramifications. Win or lose, Weprin can console himself with the thought that at least he got more party support than Kate Marshall in Nevada.
jwest
Wow. There seems to be some big personal issues a few of you need to iron out before delving into the world of politics.
On a happy note, here’s the New York Times giving us information we can all agree on.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/10/us/10iht-currents10.html?_r=4&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1315569719-RpR5AuX40tZqZl8xOiUg7g
singfoom
@Samara Morgan: Failblog, MC, fucking Failblog. The pie filter doesn’t prove shit about what your chosen savior Assange said or what you said.
You can think it does. You can use psuedo scientific method and offer it up as evidence to support your already arrived at conclusion.
Or, you might consider the idea that the pie filter is used by individuals who value the high signal discussions I was talking about in my earlier comment and use it to filter out the noise.
Such as assange information theory gibberish or “HEY HEY, Remember that time you said this thing? When are you going to say you’re wrong.
You might have a very very tiny leg to stand on if the pie filter was a community thing, but it’s used by individuals….
Go ahead, hang out and think you’re just ostracized because of some stupid dynamic that you named after Assange, but honestly, if you get pied, it’s because you fucking stalk FPers that you disagree and have very little to offer in substantive discussion.
Aren’t there evil glibertarians that you need to oppose somewhere else? I’m sure there are worse glibertarian offenders than the FPers that you stalk here.
Elie
@Samara Morgan:
There is some truth to that..
Still I like the community. I guess I just don’t have the expectation that big change comes from opinions alone.
I do find that discussing my opinions and reading others’ helps me in learning to think and write better.. and criticism by others helps me see the flaws in my thinking.
Its hard to “know” people on a blog, but I feel I do to some extent.
I guess I would think of BJ and some of the blogs as “salons” where people gather to discuss topical issues and exchange ideas. From wikipedia:
Changing the world — actually changing the world — or even knowing who is truly effected by what is several orders of magnitude from this
Elie
@Hoodie:
the comment award goes to this (in my opinion)
right on..
Shlemizel - was Alwhite
@aimai:
Sadly, I have come to the same conclusion. Its a ‘feature’ of the modern Republican Party that you are not allowed to disagree on any point of strategy or tactics. I have a higher opinion of the folks here but some of them seem to have adopted that mindset.
Add in that there are a good number of people here who seem to think that the mere fact that the Republicans are on their way to nominating a complete loon guarantees Obama’s reelection and I think we are well on our way to President Perry. That, of course, will be the fault of those who didn’t clap loud enough.
Duckest Fuckingway: Ask not for whom the Duck Fucks. . .
Shlemizel: Not so much adopted as brought with them.
Samara Morgan
@singfoom: i always link source.
for example.
freddie is a firebagger, and Kain flipped on teachers unions when he got a paid gig at forbes.
yup, theres lotsa glibertarian blogs. freddie should go there, and Kain already went.
is this a liberal blog or not?
harlana
I would love an opportunity to speak one-on-one with my lovely and talented governor about how SC does have an unemployment problem. Sad thing here is that working for the dem party is like peeing into a tsunami.
“Does she really believe that drug use is a matter of education and poverty? She must think those Wall Street guys she parties with are just extremely energetic workaholics.”
Odie Hugh Manatee
@FlipYrWhig:
This definition belongs in the lexicon here. F’ing nailed it.
Samara Morgan
@Odie Hugh Manatee:
counselor, i rest my case.
:)
bob h
I think you will see a GOP strategy of pretend cooperativeness coupled with delaying moves to keep any meaningful help to the economy by election time.