Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Jesus watching the most hateful people claiming to be his followers

Republicans do not trust women.

“I was told there would be no fact checking.”

Let me eat cake. The rest of you could stand to lose some weight, frankly.

Nothing says ‘pro-life’ like letting children go hungry.

Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.

Radicalized white males who support Trump are pitching a tent in the abyss.

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

When we show up, we win.

These are not very smart people, and things got out of hand.

It may be funny to you motherfucker, but it’s not funny to me.

I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

In my day, never was longer.

The republican caucus is covering themselves with something, and it is not glory.

Dear elected officials: Trump is temporary, dishonor is forever.

We know you aren’t a Democrat but since you seem confused let me help you.

Republicans do not pay their debts.

Is it negotiation when the other party actually wants to shoot the hostage?

This blog will pay for itself.

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

Museums are not America’s attic for its racist shit.

This country desperately needs a functioning fourth estate.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

A democracy can’t function when people can’t distinguish facts from lies.

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Reader Interactions

191Comments

  2. 2.

    different-church-lady

    Why on earth would I read that thing when I can simply repeat all my preconceived notions about Obama?

  3. 3.

    Keith G

    My Administration will aggressively seek to mitigate those concerns through the design of implementation procedures and other authorities available to me as Chief Executive and Commander in Chief, will oppose any attempt to extend or expand them in the future, and will seek the repeal of any provisions that undermine the policies and values that have guided my Administration throughout my time in office

    That settles it. He gave his word.

  4. 4.

    Brutusettu

    And Obama pretends like there isn’t the fact that a later POTUS can ignore what Obama wrote and still follow the law Obama signed.

    And does Obama even need to follow what he just wrote? Or will he be transparent on this?

  5. 5.

    Linda Featheringill

    I read the signing statement.

    He did address the detention issue. Maybe that is as strong as you can get in a signing statement. Sigh.

    I’d like to see a law that limits detention without a trial. Everybody, and I mean everybody, who is detained by the US should be declared a prisoner of war with the attending rights or a suspected criminal, again with the attending rights. This declaration should happen within a reasonable amount of time after detention. I guess we could argue about what is “reasonable.”

    This doesn’t necessarily mean that everybody should be kicked back on the streets. But they should have representation, advocates, and neutral observers.

    I guess that in order to do this, we would have to take back the house and disable the threat-of-filibuster in the senate.

    Oy. It takes so much work to do the right thing.

  9. 9.

    Cermet

    So, if a standard asshole thug gets into power they will use this law to arrest any and all of the 99% that does anything to hurt the 1% (or really, the 0.1%) We had better hope Obama wins a second term and that enough brown/black skin true amerikans get too age/vote to keep democrats in power from now on; otherwise the white skin devils out of power (yes, I’m white but I know the truth regarding those bastard devils and our real enemies in the 0.1%. Those monsters are all white and really dangerous assholes who are turning this country into a police state like Stalin or Hitler had during their rule) … otherwise, we are fucked!

  10. 10.

    Dustin

    Pretty much what I expected after reading it. He had to sign the bill because it funds the military. End of story. Anyone that bitches about it obviously doesn’t understand what the constant use of the phrases “needless interference”, “unwise restrictions”, “executive branch authority” and “interpret” mean when used together.

    This isn’t 11-dimension chess people: it’s the president saying Congress are a bunch of fucking idiots who don’t have the authority to tell him how to do the job he’s already doing and he’ll ignore their meddling. This is what happens when you pit a Constitutional law professor up against morons who don’t actually read the document.

  11. 11.

    Linda Featheringill

    @Brutusettu:

    And Obama pretends like there isn’t the fact that a later POTUS can ignore what Obama wrote and still follow the law Obama signed.

    You’re right. a signing statement isn’t enough. We can’t let it stop there.

  12. 12.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    I gotta say, I was having more fun detailing the medical specifics of Steve Jobs’ islet cell tumor in the previous thread – even with moderation.

  13. 13.

    Linda Featheringill

    @Keith G:

    My Administration will aggressively seek to mitigate those concerns through the design of implementation procedures and other authorities available to me as Chief Executive and Commander in Chief, will oppose any attempt to extend or expand them in the future, and will seek the repeal of any provisions that undermine the policies and values that have guided my Administration throughout my time in office.

    I believe him.

    But Obama isn’t going to stay in office forever.

  14. 14.

    Dustin

    @Linda Featheringill: You act like he had a choice in the matter. Do you have any idea the kind of shit-storm that would decend on the country if he vetoed the bill that funds our military (i.e. pays our troops and VA system)? Do you want to ensure the GOP gets the presidency back next year?

  15. 15.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Linda Featheringill:

    I’d like to see a law that limits detention without a trial. Everybody, and I mean everybody, who is detained by the US should be declared a prisoner of war with the attending rights or a suspected criminal, again with the attending rights. This declaration should happen within a reasonable amount of time after detention. I guess we could argue about what is “reasonable.”

    This, this, this.

    Without it, we might as well declare ourselves the Kafka States of America and toss it on in.

    There needs to be a valid, already discussed REASON to detain someone, and there need to be safeguards in place. Non of this “hostile combatants” crap. If they’re a POW, treat them according to the Geneva Conventions. You do this because you set the example that your adversary should follow. Treat their captives well, and reasonably, or be prepared to welcome back OUR captives in body bags.

    You can detain a POW for the duration (plus a few additional months after the conclusion of hostilities) but you’ve got to treat them in specific ways. For one thing, this creates a ready supply of not absolutely hostile former enemy soldiers who will go back home and discuss how well they were treated. This is how you win hearts and minds…by not being an asshole like Dick Cheney.

  16. 16.

    kindness

    It reads like a giant ‘fuck you’ to republicans. Still, they’ll take the money to run the show though.

    Would ‘principles’ have been better served if he vetoed it and fought on? No. So I’ll call it a win, questionable as it is and take it.

  18. 18.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Linda Featheringill:

    I guess that in order to do this, we would have to take back the house and disable the threat-of-filibuster in the senate.

    Trouble is, who’s “we”? When Obama tried to close Gitmo, “we” did have the House and 60 votes (more-or-less) in the Senate. Max Baucus was the first out of the gate babbling about terrorists walking the streets. I think Jim Webb was pretty vocal (vocal for Jim Webb) about his opposition, too. We didn’t even have to get to Lieberman and the Deep South Blue Dogs

  19. 19.

    Keith G

    @Dustin:

    it’s the president saying Congress are a bunch of fucking idiots who don’t have the authority to tell him how to do the job he’s already doing and he’ll ignore their meddling. This is what happens when you pit a Constitutional law professor up against morons who don’t actually read the document.

    Either in one or five years, this Constitutional law professor will no longer be our president and this law may still be on the books as written. That is what concerns me

  20. 20.

    jamurph

    @Linda Featheringill:

    Is it that it takes effort to do the right thing? Or is it that you won’t be liked by the “right” sort of people anymore? The conventional wisdom types. Also the types who call him every racist name in the book… Those are the people whom he’s reaching out to. The people who voted for and most likely to vote for him again… not so much.

  21. 21.

    Baud

    @kindness:

    So I’ll call it a win, questionable as it is and take it.

    I wouldn’t go so far as call it a “win,” but I don’t blame Obama (this was Congress 100%) and I don’t think he could realistically veto the NDAA over these provisions.

  23. 23.

    Baud

    @kindness:

    So I’ll call it a win, questionable as it is and take it.

    I wouldn’t go so far as to call it a “win,” but I don’t blame Obama (this was Congress 100%) and I don’t think he could realistically veto the NDAA over these provisions.

  24. 24.

    Dustin

    @kindness: “It reads like a giant ‘fuck you’ to republicans. Still, they’ll take the money to run the show though. would ‘principles’ have been better served if he vetoed it and fought on? No. So I’ll call it a win, questionable as it is and take it.”

    +1

    Principles don’t run the country, nor do they keep the nutcases out of power. When up against the GOP juggernaut the best you can do is damage control. They control the purse strings, now isn’t the time to martyr the country.

  25. 25.

    Keith G

    @Linda Featheringill: I belive that is what he wants to do, but as young Dustin is arguing above: Doing what should be done can come at a price that is too high. And so with this law on the books, can we say that at some future time he would never feel the political pressure to enforce the law as written? Never?

  26. 26.

    Belafon (formerly anonevent)

    @Keith G: From what I remember of 2001-2009, they didn’t have to have a law to follow/ignore in order to do what they want. My hope is that before Big O – imagining a giant robot coming up from the railroad under Washington – leaves office, Democrats with spines in Congress will declare an end to the “War on Terror” maybe because they can’t find it on a map, thus removing the need for this kind of thing.

    Dream big.

  27. 27.

    different-church-lady

    Genuine question: does a signing statement have any influence on how future constitutional challenges are decided?

  28. 28.

    Belafon (formerly anonevent)

    @Dustin:

    Principles don’t…keep the nutcases out of power.

    That is almost as good as Linda’s statement regarding doing the right thing.

  29. 29.

    Benjamin Franklin

    @Keith G:

    I keep posting this exchange, because it seems appropro, but I get no responses.

    WILLIAM ROPER: So, now you give the Devil the benefit of law!

    SIR THOMAS MORE: Yes! What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?

    ROPER: I’d cut down every law in England to do that!

    MORE: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned ’round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man’s laws, not God’s! And if you cut them down, and you’re just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I’d give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety’s sake!

  30. 30.

    Baud

    @Belafon (formerly anonevent):

    Democrats with spines in Congress will declare an end to the “War on Terror” maybe because they can’t find it on a map, thus removing the need for this kind of thing.

    Actually, Obama could probably do this on his own executive authority. May be too much to ask for, but by 2016, who knows?

  31. 31.

    Dustin

    @Keith G: That concerns me to, as it should all of us. But there’s not exactly a lot that could be done about it. The trouble with holding the country hostage is that only one of the party’s is willing to kill the hostage to get what they want. If we learned anything from the credit downgrade it should be that. They’re truly insane, and as I argue with my conservative relatives frequently, borderline treasonous. But they control the House, and all spending bills must originate from them. We have to negotiate with them, if for no other reason than that no matter how fucked in the head they might be.

  32. 32.

    James E. Powell

    It is clear, once again, that Obama has betrayed all of us! He’s worse than both Bushes put together! The only sane thing to do is support Ron Paul.

    But seriously. Whether they are evil or craven cowards, nearly every member of the United States senate made it very clear very early in Obama’s presidency that he had to keep his soshulist Kenyan post-colonial hands off of the national security state. They let him get rid of DADT because doing so was no threat to the empire.

    My sense is that the last American president who actually ran the military/national security part of the government was Richard Nixon.

  36. 36.

    Kola Noscopy

    @Dustin:

    You act like he had a choice in the matter. Do you have any idea the kind of shit-storm that would decend on the country if he vetoed the bill that funds our military (i.e. pays our troops and VA system)? Do you want to ensure the GOP gets the presidency back next year?

    Are you really, really this much of a sucker? How about Obama take to the airwaves and explain, forcefully, and in detail, and over and over again, that it is the Republicans who are putting unacceptable shit in the bill, making it unsignable, and thus causing the military to go without $500 toilet seats for a week.

  37. 37.

    Shawn in ShowMe

    @Linda Featheringill:

    But Obama isn’t going to stay in office forever.

    Which is why it was so important to Obama that Congress actually start doing their jobs. Why he cajoled, lectured and even used the bully pulpit. The GOP responded by doubling down on the crazy.

    The poutrage lobby is enamored of the idea that good government is all about one person. That’s not government. That’s a cult of personality. When that person leaves office, you’re right back to refighting old battles.

    I’ve resigned myself to the idea that this nation is a failed experiment, at least from the perspective of the 99%. As long as the vast majority of citizens remain ignorant about how government actually works, the government will never function properly. They’ll keep looking vainly for a messiah.

  38. 38.

    JGabriel

    I think Obama should use the indefinite detention provisions to detain McConnell, Boehner, Cantor, and Demint next time they co-ordinate actions intended to harm the country economically for political gain.

    Then we’ll see how quickly Republicans repeal those provisions.

    Probably wouldn’t be a bad idea to declare the GOP a terrorist organization, while we’re at it.

    .

  39. 39.

    Linda Featheringill

    @Dustin:

    This isn’t 11-dimension chess people: it’s the president saying Congress are a bunch of fucking idiots who don’t have the authority to tell him how to do the job he’s already doing and he’ll ignore their meddling.

    I did enjoy the part where he told Congress they couldn’t force him to do something unconstitutional. :-)

    I got the impression this was something of a line drawn in the sand.

  40. 40.

    Dustin

    @Kola Noscopy: Ah yes, the “bully pulpit” argument. Remind me again how much actual influence modern media allows democratic messages to get again, because I’m having trouble remembering. Hell the only reason the Occupy movement took off like it did was a combination of the internet, the fact that the media seriously misjudged what their own “look at the dirty hippies” coverage would do, and police brutality.

    But seriously. Show me the last democratic message to get media coverage without a 1/3 split in favor of GOP counterpoint. I’m all eyes.

  41. 41.

    Dustin

    @Shawn in ShowMe: “I’ve resigned myself to the idea that this nation is a failed experiment, at least from the perspective of the 99%. As long as the vast majority of citizens remain ignorant about how government actually works, the government will never function properly. They’ll keep looking vainly for a messiah.”

    I have a theory about that, but as an atheist it tends to just piss off whoever I’m talking to. It’s definitely enough to get a person drinking though.

  42. 42.

    Kola Noscopy

    @Dustin:

    In the context of paying soldiers pay and benefits you’re fucking right that’s all that matters.

    Then, as many of us have previously stated time and again, the MIC has you and this country right where it wants it: By the balls.

    I disagree. The principles this country was founded on, among them the rule of law and a nation of LAWS, not men (trust Obama! he’d never do anything shady!) are far more important than this month’s billions that the pentagon will waste.

  44. 44.

    Belafon (formerly anonevent)

    @Linda Featheringill:

    I did enjoy the part where he told Congress they couldn’t force him to do something unconstitutional.

    And that is why I wanted some people, especially people who stare at constitutional law as often as I stare at code, to discuss the parts of it. His signing statement uses that in a number of places. I wanted to see how people who really understand the law would react to them. The emptywheel link in the previous thread was a good start.

    As for my own bias, I tend to give Obama the benefit of the doubt because 1) he does do constitutional law, and 2) he, like a lot of Democratic presidents, tends to be reasonable, though not perfect. As for the think-of-the-next-president argument, I believe Bush showed us that Republicans don’t need no stinkin’ law to do what they want.

  45. 45.

    Lee Hartmann

    As a frequent critic of Obama on these matters, I’d cut him some slack here, for reasons stated several times above.

  47. 47.

    JGabriel

    Linda Featheringill:

    I’d like to see a law that limits detention without a trial.

    We have one. It’s called the 6th Amendment:

    In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial …

    So the question is, what do we need to do to get it enforced and upheld, instead of being dismissed like a quaint obsolete afterthought?

    .

  48. 48.

    Kola Noscopy

    @Dustin:

    This is the point where I reply: your president can’t do his job, can’t get his message out, can’t influence and intimidate congress into doing the right thing, can’t, can’t, can’t…

    …for god’s sake, look for someone who can.

    I’m well aware you Obots love to mock the idea that someone else could strongarm these motherfuckers into meaningful compromise, could influence and shame and plow though the MSM to get their message out, etc., but that’s because you’re Obots and like to pretend NO ONE ELSE could possibly do anything differently from Barack and thus obtain different, better results. Cult of personality.

    Oh, and NOTHING IS MORE IMPORTANT THAT THE MILITARY!

  49. 49.

    Dustin

    @JGabriel: A Supreme Court that’s not stacked with GOP ideologues? The last time we had a court that screwed up the president expanded their number and stacked the court in his favor. If something happens like that today? I’d say “civil war” but then people refuse to believe that could ever happen again.

  50. 50.

    Keith G

    @Dustin: I do understand, and what really concerns me is the long term, big picture, accumulation of all these momentary “give in just for now because they are crazy” decisions (I hope that made sense).

    the party’s is willing to kill the hostage to get what they want

    Guess what, the hostage is still being killed one piece at a time, but killed nonetheless.

    Sometimes short term pain and a bucket load of shit needs to be experienced immediately in order to derail a slower moving but every bit as certain existential conflagration. Wanting our leadership just to skate by until the next battle (until the odds might be better?) is a form of appeasement. It’s a dangerous strategy with a bad record of success.

  52. 52.

    Kola Noscopy

    @Dustin:

    the grownups are busy trying to prevent the inmates from nuking the asylum.

    blah, blah, blah…you’re no grownup, you’re a fearful child enabling creeping authoritarianism in a country you claim to love.

  53. 53.

    Nellcote

    His veto would have been over ridden anyway.

    Arrest of american citizens is specifically NOT a part of this bill.

  54. 54.

    Dustin

    @Kola Noscopy: Protip idiot. I don’t give a shit who the president is. All I care about is that the GOP stay out of power because they’ve gone from “conservative” to “insane” in the decade and a half I’ve been old enough to participate in politics.

    You call me an OBot all you want, that doesn’t change the fact that your arguments are borderline conspiracy theory 101-level purity trolling. The constitution and historical inertia in America have presented us with a mix of checks and balances. Ignoring that fact, looking to the president to be a messiah who steamrolls over the Congress, won’t fix the problems.

    I’d go so far as to say that these problems can’t be fixed, that we’re a failed experiment, but I’ll be damned if I’ll sit quietly while my country adds itself to history’s list of failed empires.

  55. 55.

    Lojasmo

    @Anal algesia:

    Seems like spending all his time on the air describing how much republicans suck would

    A. Piss off a lot of his constituents
    B. Ignore the FACT that a shit ton of democrats supported the bill
    C. Take a lot of time from the important business of actually running the executive.
    D. Not change your derangement one iota.

  56. 56.

    dmbeaster

    @Linda Featheringill:

    I’d like to see a law that limits detention without a trial. Everybody, and I mean everybody, who is detained by the US should be declared a prisoner of war with the attending rights or a suspected criminal, again with the attending rights. This declaration should happen within a reasonable amount of time after detention. I guess we could argue about what is “reasonable.”

    This is just wrong. This has never been just these two options, and the issue has always been about dealing with unlawful combatants. They are not entitled to be treated as prisoners of war, and they do not have to be dealt with as a suspected criminals. That has been the law since the founding of the country.

    The Bush years involved gross abuses of this issue, which has never been well flushed out legally simply because it was a rare occurrence. We are still dealing with that legacy of Bush illegality, with Congress more than willing to perpetuate those abuses.

    People are just ignorant regarding the underlying issue.

  57. 57.

    Zagloba

    Nellcote@53: If his veto would have been overridden, why not veto? Not like anyone in the real world gets hurt.

    Also, too, I got your bully pulpit right heah.

  59. 59.

    Kola Noscopy

    @Lojasmo:

    Logismo:

    Yeah, to fight back forcefully and publicly would just be toooooooo haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrd and people might be mean in return, and it might shed light on the fact that many establishment Dems are part of the problem, and so you’re right, he should do noooootttthhhhhiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinggggg

    This change we can believe in has been sooooooooo inspiring and really turned the country around the last three years.

  60. 60.

    Professor

    Hey Dumbos, have you checked to see whether your congreeman/woman and/or senator voted for this BILL before the President signed it into law? You know that you can vote them out if you do NOT agree with their votes!

  61. 61.

    Citizen_X

    @Kola Noscopy:

    you Obots love to mock the idea that someone else copuld strongarm these motherfuckers into meaningful compromise, could influence and shame and plow though the MSM to get their message out, etc., but that’s because you’re Obots and like to pretend NO ONE ELSE could possibly do anything differently from Barack and thus obtain different, better results. Cult of personality.

    Ah! So: you believe a Progressive Messiah who can do all these things is out there, and you assume that others believe Obama is that Messiah.

    The Cult of Personality is in your own head. It’s just that the personality in question is “someone else.”

  62. 62.

    Kola Noscopy

    @Dustin:

    that doesn’t change the fact that your arguments are borderline conspiracy theory 101-level purity trolling.

    Yes, because the U.S. government has never carried out any unseemly plans involving more than one person (which would be a CONSPIRACY and principles are for shit.

  65. 65.

    Martin

    Boy, I really need 2012 to go a fuckload better than 2011. Leading off with a chicken little thread isn’t helping.

    Just to review:

    1) The President isn’t Congress or the Supreme Court. Congress often and regularly does insanely stupid things that are out of the President’s power to stop and take time for the Court to fix.
    2) The President isn’t Congress or the Supreme Court. The President often and regularly does insanely stupid things that are out of Congress’ power to stop and take time for the Court to fix.
    3) The President isn’t Congress or the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court often and regularly does insanely stupid things that are out of the President’s power to stop and take time for Congress to fix.
    4) Policy and implementation are completely, totally different things. Just because a law says something may, possibly, might be able to happen, doesn’t mean it will. Ever.
    5) Policy and implementation are completely, totally different things. Even though one group of retards in Congress may pass a law, the President and the Courts can often delay their implementation until we put a new group of retards in Congress to fix the law.
    6) In the United States, we campaign through legislation. Both parties seek to pass inflammatory legislation to energize their base and depress the opposition’s base. Everyone in Congress knows this legislation for what it is – stupid and political. Everyone in Congress knows there will be some rider on some bill down the line that will quietly be passed taking the heat out of the inflammatory legislation so it can actually do no harm. Everyone seems to be aware of this game except for bloggers.

    From these we can conclude: This is bad legislation. Obama knows it’s bad, but there’s a sea of bad legislation out there to which one more drop has been added. Obama can’t stop it but can slow it down – and give the appearance that it’s being slowed down. Congress will probably tone it down on their own, quietly, without any of the chicken littles noticing (because being pissed off isn’t our hobby, it’s a profession!) and if we get off our asses and put Nancy Smash back in charge in the House later this year, and get Obama re-elected, all of that will happen even faster. Elections matter. Turnout matters. That’s what you can do about it.

  66. 66.

    JGabriel

    @Dustin:

    I’d say “civil war” but then people refuse to believe that could ever happen again.

    Seems like most of my political adulthood has been the experience of the GOP doing things we were told could never happen again or things we were told could never happen, from Reagan reviving Hoover’s “trickle-down” theory to Republican congresses repealing post-depression economic and safety protections to W.’s administration lying us into war to an economic crash rivaling the Great Depresssion.

    We’ve been (mostly*) going backward as a society for the past 30 years, doing lots of things we were told could never happen again.

    So, no, while I don’t expect us to resort to civil war again, I wouldn’t be greatly surprised by it either. The last 30 years have been an eye-popping lesson in the capability of societies, particularly ours, to make the same damn stupid mistakes over and over again, and to actually devolve from economically improving to economically regressing.

    Gosh, I’m just all sunshine and daisies today. I think I’l stop ranting before I convince myself, or anyone else, to slit their wrists.

    (*With the obvious exception of the medium in which we’re having this conversation, the internet, and sundry other less paradigm-shifting technological advancements.)

    .

  67. 67.

    Kola Noscopy

    @Citizen_X:

    Oh horseshit. I don’t need or look for, a Messiah. I look for a candidate for the executive who will do as they say and stand forcefully against the right wing trying to take this country down.

    The fact that you are reduced to mocking such a potential leader as a “messiah” shows the depths of cynicism to which your devotion to ONE MAN has taken you.

  68. 68.

    boss bitch

    Folks, if our next president is hungry enough for war, they don’t need precedent. I thought George Bush taught us that.

  69. 69.

    Professor

    @Keith G: Do you have a Supreme Court in the USA? Does this ACT breaches your rights under the Constitution? Why don’t you test it at the supreme court? The supreme court can strike it down if it’s ULTRA VIRES of the constitution.

  70. 70.

    robertdsc-iPhone 4

    Probably wouldn’t be a bad idea to declare the GOP a terrorist organization, while we’re at it.

    This.

  71. 71.

    robertdsc-iPhone 4

    Probably wouldn’t be a bad idea to declare the GOP a terrorist organization, while we’re at it.

    This.

  72. 72.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Zagloba:

    Nellcote @53: If his veto would have been overridden, why not veto? Not like anyone in the real world gets hurt.

    the spot opens with a young woman herding her small children into a late-model minivan in front of a modest ranch house in Smalltown, Heartland, USA. Her anxious voice comes over the scene: “My husband is on his third tour in Afghanistan” /cut to framed photo of square-jawed young dad in fatigues/ “I’m so proud of him for volunteering to defend our country, our kids” /cut to clip of flames shooting out of Twin Towers/ “but it’s hard back here at home”/three seconds of adorable kids laughing in back seat of mini-van/ “I found a part time job, but it’s still hard to make ends meet”/mom and kids scramble into Aldi/ ‘that’s why I was so upset to hear that PResident Obama had vetoed the bill that made sure my husband’s paycheck came through. Times are hard enough for us without politics making it harder. I voted for President Obama because I thought he understood folks like us, but now…” /worried face stares into space in the cereal aisle/ “I just don’t know”
    /fade to black screen with 800 number, authoritative voice-over: “Call this number to let President Obama and Democrats in Washington now that you support our troops and their mission in defense of our freedoms”

    This ad paid for by Crossroads, USA.

  73. 73.

    Emma

    I’m well aware you Obots love to mock the idea that someone else could strongarm these motherfuckers into meaningful compromise, could influence and shame and plow though the MSM to get their message out, etc., but that’s because you’re Obots and like to pretend NO ONE ELSE could possibly do anything differently from Barack and thus obtain different, better results. Cult of personality.

    God, you are a galloping arse, aren’t you? But it’s the first of the year, and I’m willing to be open-minded, even to someone like you. Let’s see. Please look at the current crop of democrats. Find the one that could run against Obama in the primaries from the left. He doesn’t even have to win, just make a creditable run, appealing not only to you puritans of the left; to the country in general. THEN get back here and we’ll discuss the hows and whens.

  75. 75.

    Cheryl from Maryland

    @Professor: Excellent reminder for 2012 — it is not just the President, it is also Congress, Governors, State Legislators, Mayors, The School Board, Dogcatchers, etc.

  76. 76.

    Anya

    @Dustin: You know how that would work:

    POTUS: This bill forces the Executive to do something unconstitutional and that’s why I will veto it.

    Republicans: anti-American Kenyan wants Islamic Jehadits to take over America
    Media: Republicans on Sunday accused President Obama of “endangering America” by apposing a new bill in Congress that deals with the detention of terrorists. We will talk to our panelists: A liberal who thinks Obama is a sellout and worse than Bush on civil liberties, a conservative who thinks Obama is an appeaser of terrorists, and a “neutral” panelist who thinks Obama is weak and he’s losing the message. Let’s discuss….

    Liberal blogosphere: Obama is same as Bush on the rule of law, or Obama is just pretending, if he cared about this he would have fought harder. Also, too, he’s a wimp.
    Dem Senators: I disagree with the President on this
    Liberal Senator who apposes the bill: President should have done…

    On every issues, it turns out this way. No one gets the President’s back when he fights for issues.

  77. 77.

    Keith G

    @Kola Noscopy: I also worry that authoritarianism is getting stronger. I sincerely wish that you would stop the ad hominen attacks that you commonly employ as you type here. It lessens the impact of the argument that you are making. That spills over to others who are saying similar things.

    @Dustin:

    but I’ll be damned if I’ll sit quietly while my country adds itself to history’s list of failed empires.

    Republicans are not the enemy. We will surely behave as a failed state if we do not trust the structures and institutions created for us.
    Have you met a Whig, a Copperhead, a Mug Wump, or a Know Nothing? Of course you haven’t. Those were political entities (some very poisonous) that passed away a century ago.

    Partisan fads come and go. What sustains us are the institutional structures that need constant maintenance. Checks and balances and separation of powers are real and important things that nurture our politics. When president chip away that the permanent structure for a temporal partisan gain, the damage is not temporary.

  78. 78.

    Shawn in ShowMe

    @Emma:

    Find the one that could run against Obama in the primaries from the left. He doesn’t even have to win, just make a creditable run. THEN get back here and we’ll discuss the hows and whens.

    Now you’re just being mean. At least give a fellow Balloon Juicer a chance.

  79. 79.

    Linda Featheringill

    @dmbeaster:

    This has never been just these two options, and the issue has always been about dealing with unlawful combatants. They are not entitled to be treated as prisoners of war, and they do not have to be dealt with as a suspected criminals. That has been the law since the founding of the country.

    Wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Wrong. And wrong. Also, too.

  80. 80.

    sparky

    No one gets the President’s back when he fights for issues.

    objection: supposes a fact (existence of a “back”) not in evidence after 3 years.

  82. 82.

    WereBear

    During the Debt Ceiling debacle, I spoke with a highly intelligent, liberal, Obama-supporting, college student, who expressed her surprise that “the President doesn’t just fix it.”

    After I explained we had decided quite a while ago on NOT having a king, and how the Separation of Powers worked, she was enlightened.

    But that is how we arrive here. If the brightest and most motivated of our citizens still don’t know how it all works… perhaps the worst thing the Republicans did to our democracy was stop teaching civics.

  83. 83.

    suzanne

    @Kola Noscopy:

    I’m well aware you Obots love to mock the idea that someone else could strongarm these motherfuckers into meaningful compromise

    Short of threatening their family members, I honestly don’t think some of these people can be compromised with. Therefore, I don’t think Obama or anyone else can succeed in strongarming them into anything.

    Much as my one-year-old cannot be convinced that if she starts crapping in the toilet and not her diapers that I will buy her a car when she turns 16.

    It’s not that we think THAT highly of Obama. It’s that we think THAT poorly of the lunatics.

  84. 84.

    Citizen_X

    @Kola Noscopy:

    The fact that you are reduced to mocking such a potential leader as a “messiah” shows the depths of cynicism to which your devotion to ONE MAN has taken you.

    You’re right; I’m sorry. I will not mock Fantasy Savior again. Please be patient with me, for Obamamania is such a…such a bitch to overcome. Sob!

  85. 85.

    Shawn in ShowMe

    @suzanne

    Much as my one-year-old cannot be convinced that if she starts crapping in the toilet and not her diapers that I will buy her a car when she turns 16.

    I bow in your general direction.

  86. 86.

    JGabriel

    @Keith G:

    Republicans are not the enemy. … Have you met a Whig, a Copperhead, a Mug Wump, or a Know Nothing? Of course you haven’t. Those were political entities (some very poisonous) that passed away a century ago.

    Through opposition by political forces that treated them, and the poisonous aspects of their respective ideologies, with enmity.

    If Republicans and their tax-dodging, top .1%, paymasters aren’t the enemy, what are they and who is?

    What sustains us are the institutional structures that need constant maintenance.

    The same maintenance that Republicans want to either outsource or deregulate out of existence. Kind of difficult not to see them as a pernicious force tearing away at the foundations of our society and government.

    .

  88. 88.

    Fed Up In Brooklyn

    Shorter Dustin:

    It is better to incrementally surrender in battles over a long period of time than to fight and potentially lose the entire war immediately. The former guarantees a lost war, eventually. The latter at least gives one a chance at victory.

  89. 89.

    Belafon (formerly anonevent)

    I would like to recommend to everyone here that you ignore Koala No Scopy’s posts. Just completely ignore the person. We can all having meaningful discussions by just skipping those lines.

  90. 90.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Kola Noscopy:

    The fact that you are reduced to mocking such a potential leader as a “messiah”

    I am very interested in the candidacy of Potential Leader. What kind of grass-roots organization does s/he have? What are his/her policy positions? How is her/his fund-raising operation set up? How will s/he get legislation through Congress?

  93. 93.

    sparky

    @Keith G: the sentiment you express is a sensible one; however, i think it underestimates the problem: attachment to a party or that party’s leader may force adherence to the party/leader’s position. no one who is a party person, or for that matter, many unaffiliated people, want to consider the implication of the phrase “the Ds are less bad”: either way the republic (Empire) is drowning, just not as quickly with the Ds. should tone be relevant in this context? no, that’s not a rhetorical question.

  94. 94.

    TooManyJens

    It’s not that we think THAT highly of Obama. It’s that we think THAT poorly of the lunatics.

    This. Anyone who doesn’t understand exactly what we, Obama, and the country are up against needs to STFU and read something other than Reddit and PL blogs until they are informed.

  96. 96.

    Dustin

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: “the spot opens […]”

    This, or a hundred derivatives of it, are why he voted for the bill despite the poison pills.

    But heavens to Betsy we have to worry about the “military industrial complex” and try to kill it anyway, even though doing so would put the biggest xenophobes, bigots, and jingoists in the country back in charge. I don’t know about you, but a purity enabled backstab or two sure is a great way to start the new year, isn’t it? Especially in a term that’ll probably determine the balance of the Supreme Court for a generation.

    @Anya: You know how that would work:

    What floors me is that there are still people following politics that haven’t figured that out yet. But then, Ron Paul has to get his “he was right about the war so we can ignore everything else” supporters from somewhere, I suppose.

  97. 97.

    Davis X. Machina

    Demographic puzzle. There appear to be more true Scotsmen than can possibly fit in Scotland, what with its population of only 5,000,000 or so….

  98. 98.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @wrb: To be fair, the prints on those knives don’t just come from the left. Obama hadn’t been inaugurated when Evan Bayh tried to form a Senate caucus that was effectively dedicated to undermining Obama’s economic agenda. One of the rumored members was “Boulder hippie” Mark Udall.

  101. 101.

    Martin

    @Anya:

    POTUS: This bill forces the Executive to do something unconstitutional and that’s why I will veto it.

    Well, that delegates power back to Congress, actually. Honestly, the proper thing is to do what he did. Yes, the next president can override the signing statement, do the unconstitutional thing, and then Congress impeaches – or the thing finds its way to SCOTUS. Yeah, I know that’s all theoretical, but all of this is at this point. You need to evaluate the thing in the context of how likely it is to be implemented – which is pretty unlikely, to be honest. Bush didn’t need legislation like this to do what he did, yet he did it.

    And let’s establish something else here – the goal here is not to seek a state where the US doesn’t do anything bad. We do bad things. We’ve always done bad things. Doing bad things is inevitable in a construct this large and where the outcomes are so often unclear. The goal is to do fewer bad things, and to point out when bad things happen.

    But when we fuck something up, that doesn’t mean the nation is about to unravel – because we’ve been fucking up 24/7 for 200+ years now. Deal with it. Governments are imperfect things. But against the backdrop of this thing that potentially makes us do somewhat more bad things, we have the departure from Iraq which guarantees that fewer bad things will happen there by us.

    For a group of people so concerned about human rights in one context, y’all seem to be totally blind to human rights in almost every other context. There are bigger problems that need solving than this one, and this isn’t even real – it’s a hypothetical and it’s been dealt with as a hypothetical. Move on to actual people actually dying which government can prevent, or which government is causing, because this thing being argued over doesn’t affect anybody at all.

    (Not directed at Anya or anyone specifically – just pivoted off of her statement)

  102. 102.

    Keith G

    @Professor:

    Why don’t you test it at the supreme court? The supreme court can strike it down if it’s ULTRA VIRES of the constitution.

    This Supreme Court? And you were calling other folks “dumbos”?

    Snark aside:
    SCOTUS is a blunt and inefficient instrument of Justice. Much evil gets done before an appropriate case even gets to their attention if at all. Todd Willingham’s execution certainly violated due process rights, and yet he is still quite dead.

    And no, I would never call you a dumbo as I feel that would be childish.

  104. 104.

    Fed Up In Brooklyn

    @Belafon (formerly anonevent):

    In case you haven’t noticed, the country has been moving steadily rightward for the past 40+ years, with little sign of reversing. We are clearly losing the war. If the massive electoral call for “change” in 2008 couldn’t stop the trend, whatever makes you think anything will? Perhaps we need to rethink our “pragmatic” ways when in power? It’s not working, long term.

  105. 105.

    dmbeaster

    @JGabriel:

    Seems like most of my political adulthood has been the experience of the GOP doing things we were told could never happen again or things we were told could never happen, from Reagan reviving Hoover’s “trickle-down” theory to Republican congresses repealing post-depression economic and safety protections to W.’s administration lying us into war to an economic crash rivaling the Great Depresssion.

    As a basic matter, the same lessons have to be relearned every generation or so to keep the ideas alive. Its sad but true. People genuinely forget that child labor is a bad thing, and so do not automatically react with disgust to Gingrich’s nonsense on the issue. People genuinely forget that we tried unregulated capitalism for 50+ years, and made a point of adopting various regulations from the 1900s onward (particularly in the 1930s) to police those excesses. So they have to relearn the wisdom of all those rules (like what is wrong with insider trading, or the deregulation of capital markets).

    In the meantime, the Heritage Foundation is busy claiming that Progressives even as of the 1900 era are what has wrecked our country, and Teddy Roosevelt is allegedly one of the wrongdoers. Don’t expect people to understand automatically how our values are preserved in these rules when such powerful forces seek non-stop to destroy ever last one of those principles. There is an ongoing huge ideological war afoot, and it has become more pitched in the last 30 years as Republicans become more crazy.

    I would also say that every Republican administration since Nixon has boldly embraced illegality as a means to accomplish their ends (with Bush Sr., oddly enough given his family legacy, being the least bad odd the lot). The fight has only gotten more ugly over the years.

  106. 106.

    Dustin

    @pete: Well damn now I feel like an ass on that one, thanks. I’d always heard part one (courts blocked so he tried to stack), and part three (new deal passes muster) in class decades ago and figured he’d won that fight. Didn’t realize the problem fixed itself through retirement and death. I guess that’s what I get for focusing all my attention on founding documents and post Reagan history at mostly the expense of the middle. Thanks.

  107. 107.

    pete

    @Shawn in ShowMe: Yeah, FDR also got elected four times (which incidentally is why Bill Clinton was not President in September 2001). However, that’s not why he dropped the court-packing plan, he just couldn’t get it through Congress. And time passed. Which is something we might all bear in mind.

  108. 108.

    pete

    @Dustin: FDR’s struggles, and Truman’s, are really worth bearing in mind, because their successes were not handed out on a plate. (Mind you, the founding documents and post-Reagan history are important too!) Truman’s election is going to be cited over and over this year, as Obama runs against Congress.

  110. 110.

    Keith G

    @Citizen_X: Some of them are beyond hope and many others have lost what I hope would be considered good sense.

    But this is our country we are talking about, not a frat house election. If we talk about enemies and evil, how can we fix what needs to be fixed? If we match bad behavior with bad behavior than certainly this ship is going down.

  111. 111.

    Emma

    @Shawn in ShowMe: Well, I’m willing to give any politician that can get me where I’m going a good look. But considering the bench, I think I’ll keep the “evil I know”, as the saying goes.

  112. 112.

    Yutsano

    @TooManyJens:

    Anyone who doesn’t understand exactly what we, Obama, and the country are up against needs to STFU and read something other than Reddit and PL blogs until they are informed.

    Uh-oh. You’re attempting to oppress the troll’s freedumbs by telling it to shut up and get in line. It LIVES for contrarian thought, even if it doesn’t think said thought all the way through.

  113. 113.

    Martin

    @Fed Up In Brooklyn:

    In case you haven’t noticed, the country has been moving steadily rightward for the past 40+ years, with little sign of reversing.

    No it’s not. Every major legislative battle has fallen in the left’s favor except for militarization and taxes. The social conservatives have lost EVERY battle. The left is winning steadily on every civil rights front, more slowly and intermittently winning on every environmental front, steadily if intermittently expanding the social safety net, and so on. The only reason it seems like we’re moving rightward is that the Reagan generation wield disproportionate power at the moment, but they’ll die soon, and because the left has won so much of the trajectory of where things are going that the debate is to the right of what seems inevitable. Does anyone really think that we won’t have gay marriage in 50 states in the foreseeable future? That’s not a rightward movement. Do people really think that the PPACA will be repealed? Or that Medicare or SS will be torn down? Seriously? I don’t deny that these things are under attack, but they’re under attack because they’re all Democratic victories. If they weren’t there’d be nothing to attack.

  114. 114.

    The Dangerman

    Obama is such a disappointment; I think I’ll stay home in November given how well that tactic worked in 2010.

  115. 115.

    Professor

    @Keith G: Thanks. But it is better to test the law than to despair. Don’t you have faith in the Supreme Court of the USA? It is the THIRD LEG of the stool of Government! That is what the American Revolution was For! People DIED for the establishment of the REPUBLIC! If you don’t have Faith in the instruments of your government then you(Americans) have a BIG problem!

  116. 116.

    Yutsano

    @Fed Up In Brooklyn:

    In case you haven’t noticed, the country has been moving steadily rightward for the past 40+ years, with little sign of reversing. We are clearly losing the war. If the massive electoral call for “change” in 2008 couldn’t stop the trend, whatever makes you think anything will

    Waitaminute. You freely admit that the process of the country going rightward took 40 years, and you expected a noticeable change after ONE ELECTION?? It will probably take at least as long to correct things, with the added bonus of accelerated climate change and Peak Oil coming in to muck things around. What made you think it was ever going to be that easy?

  119. 119.

    Dustin

    @Keith G: “Republicans are not the enemy. We will surely behave as a failed state if we do not trust the structures and institutions created for us.
    Have you met a Whig, a Copperhead, a Mug Wump, or a Know Nothing? Of course you haven’t.”

    Just as a point-of-fact you’re talking to a Modern Whig. Is it the same party? No, that had a two-decade run that ended right before Lincoln was elected president. But the party lives on all the same.

    Right now, in this political climate, being a Whip pretty much means that vote for whoever will keep the GOP out of power because they’re anathema to my beliefs. We have a dual-party system and it’s really the only option. But if that ever changes my votes will as well. Just thought I’d put that out there.

  120. 120.

    Fed Up In Brooklyn

    @Martin:

    “Every major legislative battle has fallen in the left’s favor except for militarization and taxes.”

    And yet we still see the quality of life of the average american in a freefall. Why is that? If the left has really been winning so many important battles, why are the bottom line results so terrible, and getting worse? I’ll tell you why. Social issues are only important to the powers within the right in that they can be used as propaganda to fool people into supporting politicians who pay lip-service to those issues, while enacting ECONOMIC policies which move the country further to the right. Money equals power in this world, in the west in particular, and under that truism, we are getting crushed by the right. In other words, social victories are pretty trees, but the forest is about economics. And that forest is burning down…

  121. 121.

    ruemara

    @Yutsano: Haven’t you seen Mr Smith Goes to Washington, or West Wing? Dur, those are totally how things work. Plus, Legally Blonde 2.

  122. 122.

    Dustin

    @Martin: No it’s not. Every major legislative battle has fallen in the left’s favor except for militarization and taxes. The social conservatives have lost EVERY battle.

    This is an extremely important point. Our demographics and history are in our favor. We also need to remember the equally important point that a wounded animal, when cornered, will eventually lash out. That’s where I see the GOP now. They’ll lose eventually; it’s our job to mitigate the damage they cause while they die off.

  123. 123.

    BO_Bill

    President Obama’s last written record was an anti-war magazine piece from his time at Columbia University. Balloon Juice was nice enough to allow me to link to it and its multiple noun-verb errors. That particular magazine piece has since been taken off the internet.

    We now do not witness a signing statement. We witness a signing essay, cleverly written.

    As an aside, you are now subject to indefinite detention, without due process Mistermix. Think about it.

  124. 124.

    WereBear

    @Keith G: If we match bad behavior with bad behavior than certainly this ship is going down.

    I’ve long been fascinated with the comic book obsession with “How One Fights Evil Without Becoming Evil” but I think it is a vital point and one we often don’t discuss enough.

    I think it’s the Military Channel that is doing a series on Nazi Collaborators; and yes, some of them were power-mad from the beginning and simply took advantage of the opening the Nazis gave them. But some of them seemed to get sucked in by “it’s going to happen anyway, I’ll do it more humanely” and recognized too late that helping old ladies into cattle cars instead of kicking them through the door doesn’t really matter that much… either way, they are helping to murder old ladies.

    It’s actually High Principle that President Obama offers the opposing party a chance to do the right thing; that he doesn’t get all King George the W on their asses; that he continually models how a President is supposed to act.

  125. 125.

    Kola Noscopy

    @Keith G:

    I sincerely wish that you would stop the ad hominen attacks

    hmmm…ever notice the shit I put up with in reverse? Only non-bots have to be civil? Please.

  126. 126.

    Keith G

    @JGabriel: You are right.

    The same maintenance that Republicans want to either outsource or deregulate out of existence. Kind of difficult not to see them as a pernicious force tearing away at the foundations of our society and government

    .
    This is the political ground on which we must fight. Call out the pernicious and faulty thinking. And as hard as it may seem to believe, trust that a critical mass of Americans (note that I did not say “majority”) will listen and eventually understand.

    It’s hard fucking work.

  127. 127.

    dmbeaster

    @Linda Featheringill:

    Wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Wrong. And wrong. Also, too.

    Yes, you are ignorant. As a starting point, non-citizens caught in the course of espionage may be denied all protections of civil courts, and sentenced to death by military tribunals. Ex parte Quirin 317 U.S. 1 (1942). The only rights they have to habeas corpus is the determination that they have in fact been properly classified as unlawful combatants. Once a court makes that determination, they have no further rights in civil courts. Unfortunately, even that minimal right had to be litigated in view of Bush excesses in locking up people without any right to review whatsoever. As for the procedures of military tribunals, it is unclear what the minimum standards of process must be, but it is clear that they can be conducted in a way fundamentally inconsistent with minimum standards for criminal trials. However, it also had to be litigated in the Bush years that unlawful combatants had a right to a trial before a military tribunal at some point, and could not be detained forever without any process. We still have the legacy of that problem with Guantanamo, with Obama fighting with Congress to end that (but not fighting hard enough in my opinion).

    So your belief that it has to be POW status or civilian courts as the only alternatives has never been the law, and is a false premise. We are dealing with serious problems from the Bush era of detaining forever without process those seized as unlawful combatants (and trying also to do that to US citizens – see Padilla), but we have never been is a situation in which the basic facts of military detention and tribunals for unlawful combatants was not allowed. It always has been. Get your facts straight.

  128. 128.

    Fed Up In Brooklyn

    @Yutsano:

    It’s funny, the massive 2008 populist uprising is now suddenly seen as simply “one election.” My point is that we are very unlikely to see such a huge electoral victory again any time soon and the results of what could be the biggest electoral victory in our lifetime has barely slowed down our economic move to the right.

  129. 129.

    Citizen_X

    @Keith G: I agree to a point. For an example: I certainly don’t consider my parents to be the enemy. However, when I hear them rev themselves up over some obscure, irrelevant thing Obama did (that Fox News has been hammering on for weeks), I despair over the idea of ever breaking through. What to do, then?

  130. 130.

    Kola Noscopy

    @Belafon (formerly anonevent):

    I would like to recommend to everyone here that you ignore Koala No Scopy’s posts. Just completely ignore the person. We can all having meaningful discussions by just skipping those lines.

    So you’re the head mean girl, eh? “No one talk to Mary Ann! She stole my boyfriend, and she’s smarter and prettier than me, so let’s just ignore her! Goddammit!

    You are pathetic.

  133. 133.

    Kola Noscopy

    @TooManyJens:

    Good for you, dear. Install your little thing and run along now. Sorry to “dominate” a thread without your express permission.

  134. 134.

    Davis X. Machina

    @Dustin: I’m not sure history has a plot like this.

    Any member of the SDP, or Labour, or urban US Democrat, or your favorite Western social-democratic party, who didn’t say this in 1949, or 1959, or 1969, would have been derided as mad. By 1979-81, it had all changed. Social conservatism might be on the downtick, but it’s not been a good 30-35 years for social provision.

  135. 135.

    Shawn in ShowMe

    @Martin:

    Every major legislative battle has fallen in the left’s favor except for militarization and taxes. The social conservatives have lost EVERY battle.

    It’s the military-industrial complex’s influence and tax policy that holds the budget hostage. If you can’t get control of those two things every other item in the budget is at risk. Look no further than the current showdown with the GOP just to extend the payroll tax cut.

    You can’t maintain your domestic agenda without sane foreign and tax policies. Not with our mature economy and aging population.

  136. 136.

    Dustin

    @Belafon (formerly anonevent)

    Seconded. One can only listen to the same broken record so many times before things devolve into food fights. Didn’t we just get scolded by JC for feeding trolls? Given their behavior I’d rather not do what the host just asked us not to do. There are plenty of grownups here to talk to.

  138. 138.

    Benjamin Franklin

    I sincerely wish that you would stop the ad hominen attacks

    Republicans would like nothing more than their opposition taking lessons from them on their own cannibalism. We’ve learned far too much from them, as it is.

  139. 139.

    burnspbesq

    @Linda Featheringill:

    “I’d like to see a law that limits detention without a trial.”

    The Suspension Clause in Article 1, Section 9 of the Constitution isn’t good enough for ya?

  140. 140.

    Keith G

    I@Kola Noscopy: I know

    I have been called a butt hurting emoprog (filled to the eyebrows with white privileged) more times than I can recall. but now ABL and Stuck visit here less often – I kid

    It was frustrating, but I got to the point were I realized the infantile nature of such communication. The name caller do not have an argument that they can put into words so they name call.

    That’s why I wish you would not. We have some really good arguments. They do not need to be watered down.

    Ironically, my rational support of Obama as an important political leader and my President is second to none. I just think there could be some improvement.

  142. 142.

    Dustin

    @Davis X. Machina: My first political memory was the Clinton impeachment trial. My first call to action in HS was watching 9/11 in study hall. My true awakening was entering the job market post-college with a family and seeing how stacked against us the economy was.

    I’m not worried about the direction my post-internet generation will take the country. We’re fighting the good fight just fine. I’m more concerned with how much damage the legacy bigots and plutocrats will do on their way out. It may be cliche, but I really do think the access to information provided by the internet was a game changer the GOP wasn’t equipped to fight.

  143. 143.

    ruemara

    @Fed Up In Brooklyn: What populist uprising in ’08? You think a vote for Obama was a populist uprising? LAWL! Most incumbents won re-election and the leader of the other dominant party won election. There was no populist uprising, it was the shift from one state to another. The same meek people who had a mild distaste for Republicans after a 8 years of a moron, then failed to show up in 2010-or went out and voted for even more conservatives. Where the fuck are you living that you see 2008 as some sort of vast sea change? Jesus, the anti-war movement in the 70’s lasted longer than that so-called uprising.

  144. 144.

    Davis X. Machina

    @JMY: Yeah, but you could still veto it. Now I realize that may not be tactically a good idea, because having a veto overridden is the political version of having a kick-me sign taped to you.

    But hell, man, he could at least have attached a signing statement.

  148. 148.

    Keith G

    @Citizen_X: Not to be cavalier, but grace, humor, and persistence can be a good recipe.

    Interestingly, what moves people, what influences them, is known. Retail American has been using it for many decades (so has the GOP since at least 1980).

    It appears that many on my side of the contest are so into the purity of their fact-based arguments that they forget about the human need for persuasion (and the mechanics therein).

  150. 150.

    Dustin

    @Davis X. Machina: “But hell, man, he could at least have attached a signing statement.”

    Uhhh… did you even read the post? It’s entirely about the signing statement. It’s quite long, actually, if you’d care to read it.

  151. 151.

    Martin

    @Fed Up In Brooklyn:

    And yet we still see the quality of life of the average american in a free fall.

    Are they? 40 years ago we were fighting serious childhood malnutrition in this country – we were a few years after Johnson declared a War on Poverty. 40 years ago African Americans were barely able to freely use the water fountain of their choice. 40 years ago the poverty rate had dropped from 22% to the level it’s currently at, and it’s stayed between 12% and 15% ever since. High school graduation rates are way up, college attendance is way up.

    This is going to be harsh, but you’re suffering from the GOP nostalgia problem – where everything from the 50s and 60s looked great because the only people then that counted were WASPs, and their lives have gotten harder whereas everyone else’s has gotten easier – because 40 years ago, the lives of white protestant males were lubricated by the toil and oppression of everyone else. That’s changed profoundly, and all for the better.

    Yeah, we’ve gotten more free-market, but that’s not a byproduct of right-wing policy nearly so much as it’s a byproduct of progress. Technology and globalization made that happen – not policy. It’s no more a failure of the left than population growth or erosion. Blame the left for not doing more to get things back in balance, but it’s a really hard problem to solve and nearly impossible to accurately anticipate, and the right merely needs to dig in and do nothing to stop any progress on that front from happening. Fracking didn’t happen because of some legislative victory by the right, it happened because of technological advances that the left hasn’t yet figured out how to intercept legislatively. That’s inevitable, and if that’s what you deem to be a failure by the left, you’re doomed, because the earth is going to keep spinning and the Dems are going to constantly be chasing that tail.

  152. 152.

    Dustin

    @Keith G: And that’s why you, and not Kola, get listened to. You try to pursuade people in the framework of the world we live in, not political theory. I’m still a big fan of the occasional “fuck you buddy”-style rhetoric too, but that’s more for others than the one I’m arguing with.

  154. 154.

    Martin

    @JMY: They don’t care. They have convictions and nobody is standing up for them. They are liberal John Galts, oppressed by the vermin of centrism.

  156. 156.

    Fed Up In Brooklyn

    @Martin:

    Wow, I’ll just leave it there…. let’s just say we are literally living on two different planets. Cheers….

  157. 157.

    wrb

    @Kola Noscopy:

    There has got to be a cheap online civics course, perhaps for GED prep, from which you can learn the answers to the questions that you post over and over here.

  158. 158.

    pseudonymous in nc

    @Professor:

    The supreme court can strike it down if it’s ULTRA VIRES of the constitution.

    The Supreme Court’s constitutional authority extends to cases and controversies. Other countries have constitutional courts that can and do offer pre-emptive rulings on the constitutionality of legislation; that’s not without its drawbacks, but it’s largely a useful function, and modern constitutions tend to build it in, especially if they have a codified legal system in the continental tradition.

    The US does not do this.

  159. 159.

    Dustin

    @Martin: “Yeah, we’ve gotten more free-market, but that’s not a byproduct of right-wing policy nearly so much as it’s a byproduct of progress. Technology and globalization made that happen – not policy.”

    Don’t bother looking back 40 years, just look back ten or fifteen. Our country in 2003, the year I graduated HS, was vastly different. The country I grew up in before that even more so. Times really were better, and no rose-colored glasses are needed to think so. And just for the record what criteria, exactly, are you using to state that our globalization has nothing to do with right-wing policy? Globalization was a policy decision, and in hindsight it’s turning out to be one that’s biting us 99%ers in the ass. It wasn’t an inevitable progression.

  161. 161.

    eemom

    isn’t there some old story about how whatever you are doing on the New Year, you’ll be doing all the rest of the year?

    Voila this thread.

  164. 164.

    Dustin

    @pseudonymous in nc:

    We’re version 1.0 of a modern democracy. Things like constitutional courts and multi-party runoff elections didn’t happen until version 1.5 and 1.7. Don’t you check the changelogs?

  165. 165.

    Belafon (formerly anonevent)

    @Fed Up In Brooklyn: Remember this: Reagan raised taxes at least 4 times during his time in office, totally undermining the conservative agenda he was trying to accomplish.

  167. 167.

    burnspbesq

    @Professor:

    “Sure. Glen Greenwald, D.Dayen et al who come on here to moan about the President not doing ‘something’! about CIVIL LIBERTIES of the ‘American Peiple!”

    Wow. Your ignorance of the law of standing is truly breathtaking.

  168. 168.

    pseudonymous in nc

    @Dustin:

    Things like constitutional courts and multi-party runoff elections didn’t happen until version 1.5 and 1.7. Don’t you check the changelogs?

    You stop looking at the CHANGELOG once you resign yourself to the fact that the hardware probably can’t cope with an upgrade, and that even if it did, the upgrade process would probably require a wipe and reinstall.

  169. 169.

    dmbeaster

    @Dustin:

    Add in the wrinkle that there hasn’t been a declaration of war since 1942 and things become a real legal cluster.

    That is not strictly true in view of the AUMF of 2001 and 2002, but there is still the weirdness of a war against Al Queda. There is also the problem of whether non-state terrorists can be viewed as unlawful combatants, and tried by military tribunals under the laws of war. These problems have more to do with the changing nature of war, and having to re-evaluate old legal principles in a new environment.

    Unfortunately, we had the misfortune of having this happen with Bush in power, and they went crazy with extreme views on these questions (even worse was the torture nonsense). But it is worth noticing that the basic question of executive power in a war situation was hotly debated even in 1942 when Quirin was decided, and Justice Jackson had similar extreme views. He circulated a draft opinion that was withdrawn, but which looks like a Bush era legal brief on executive power.

  171. 171.

    burnspbesq

    @Lojasmo:

    Sorry, but no. Pretty much the only people who have standing to challenge the NDAA provisions related to detention would be detainees.

  172. 172.

    Dustin

    @pseudonymous in nc: I still read it, I just drink heavily while I do. And the since the Magna Carta was only the barons, and not the serfs, expressing power it got stuck in version 0.6.

  173. 173.

    pete

    @Martin: Increasing inequality was a political decision, whose alleged justification was “trickle-down economics.” The assault on unions was a political decision. Regulatory shenanigans with the EPA resulted from a political decision. Ditto for the FDA. Ditto for the Bayh-Dole Act. And on and on. These things did not “just happen” — they were political goals that motivated, radical right-wingers pursued ardently and rather successfully for at least 30 years.

    They can and must be changed. Recognizing the political drift is step one.

  174. 174.

    Anya

    @Dustin:

    What floors me is that there are still people following politics that haven’t figured that out yet. But then, Ron Paul has to get his “he was right about the war so we can ignore everything else” supporters from somewhere, I suppose.

    I really don’t understand how any sane person supports Ron Paul. I have a great uncle just like him, but from the left. He’s adorable and entertaining at family gatherings, but I would never entrust him with a responsible role in any level of the government. At every gathering my grandpa always warns us about arguing with uncle Arthur, he says without a fail: ” kids, just remember don’t argue with uncle Arthur about politics.” You know why, because Uncle Arthur is always yapping non-stop about Bilderbergers, Federal Reserve, Rothschild, and other conspiracies, just like Ron Paul.

  175. 175.

    Yevgraf

    I may never drink again. My head hurts.

    Great party, though. It devolved into drunken naked hot tubbing.

  176. 176.

    Keith G

    @burnspbesq: That’s not the case at all. There are some really good comments and ideas from progressives and liberals (same?) about the need for a bit more attention on civil liberties and other traditional Constitutional values such as separation of powers and checks and balances.

    Not everything needs to be considered fighting words.

  180. 180.

    Davis X. Machina

    @TooManyJens: I apologize — it’s a matter of not keeping up.

    In the old days, you could get a keyboard for $20 at Staples, plug it in and keep on going, but with so many of us working on laptops, today it’s a potential $600 oopsie.

  183. 183.

    JPL

    I did not read this thread but earlier today I was talking to a friend and mentioned that I want a President who will come out and show some anger. He mentioned that early in the President’s term they (meaning msm and repubs) tried to paint a picture of Obama being the angry black man and it didn’t work because the President is the adult in the room. As upset as I am about the bill, I’m still glad he is the President and my name is not Lily Ledbetter or happily enlisted Gay Jones.

  186. 186.

    Keith G

    @JPL: I wish I knew your friend. She/he seems to be repeating a comforting tale which may have scant evidence as support.

    Obama has been a consensus seeker (almost to a fault)from day one. Now, I don’t doubt that one could find places where he has been referred to as “angry” etc. That’s what happens to presidents. All sorts of rhetorical crap gets shoveled their way. If Obama let’s such rhetorical excess prevent him from taking reasonable and important political actions, he is not much of a leader.

  187. 187.

    JPL

    @Keith G: Just using the google most articles are from 2010. I typed in obama angry black man. In fact a bj article came up. I’m not sure what your point is though.

  189. 189.

    Keith G

    @JPL:
    What I am getting at is the conflating of fighting hard for deeply held principles with being angry.

    If I were Obama’s opponent (on any issue) I would love to get inside his head. I would certainly hope that he and his side would be so concerned about being labeled “angry” that they would pull their punches and not engage in a tough and complete competition of ideas.

    Again, google any leader on any negative descriptor. That shit is out there. Leadership means overcoming it. It means educating the public about “first principles”. It is a tough job.

  191. 191.

    wilfred

    Here’s part of the ACLU statement on this:

    “President Obama’s action today is a blight on his legacy because he will forever be known as the president who signed indefinite detention without charge or trial into law”.

    That’s it. I’ve had it those motherfuckers. I’m never giving the ACLU a dime again.

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