In case anybody missed the news, Rachel Maddow now has a once-a-month column in the Washington Post, and her inaugural effort is excellent value for us Democrats:
… The George W. Bush administration didn’t just cast too much shade on the next generation of leadership — it also apparently poisoned the ground.
The Obama administration’s ability to nurture and support the next round of national leadership in the Democratic Party is going to be a big part of its long-term legacy… Mainstream press may buy big-dollar donors (and more mainstream press), but it can’t buy the passionate volunteers and activists and excitement that are the oxygen for a winning campaign and sustained, effective leadership.
The collapse of national leadership prospects for the Republican Party is one of the greatest political failures and most important legacies of George W. Bush. Barack Obama looks less likely to repeat that fate, but it depends on a strong grove of nationally viable Democrats starting to grow now. The crescendo of attention to Elizabeth Warren is a healthy part of that process, as is the growing national interest in such diverse Democrats as Sherrod Brown, Claire McCaskill, Cory Booker, Wendy Davis, Martin O’Malley, Deval Patrick, Andrew Cuomo and Amy Klobuchar…
Admire the framing: While Dems have all the good candidates (complete with many useful linkbacks to her new employer), the cause of the Repub problem is… that GWB guy who’s already been refudiated by his former teammates. Thereby meeting the Both sides! requirement, and yet giving Team Dumbstate no comfort. Well done, Dr. Maddow.
PsiFighter37
Sitting at Ruby Tuesday’s at the Orlando airport sipping on Dogfish Head 60 Minute IPA. I swear, I NEVER want to fly out of this airport again. The layout of getting from check-in through security check is awful. Not to mention it is filled with kiddies high off their Disney experience.
Commenting at Balloon Juice since 1937
Its amazing how badly W. broke the GOP. They are a party of no ideas and echoes of empty talking points.
IowaOldLady
@PsiFighter37: Sympathies, but I’m not sure there’s an airport I do want to fly out of.
I’m reading The Universe Versus Alex Woods. Someone says, “Better to rule in hell than serve in heaven,” and the 13-year-old MC says, “That’s actually a good way of putting it.”
Made me LOL
aimai
Love her. And since I far prefer getting this kind of information in written form, I’m much more likely to read her op eds than to watch her show.
Corner Stone
@Commenting at Balloon Juice since 1937:
That’s all they’ve ever been. Except for an idea for healthcare deform they promulgated back in the ’90s.
Mandalay
What was the point referring to her as “Dr.”? To give her added credibility?
IowaOldLady
@Mandalay: She has a PhD. I don’t usually use Dr. outside of work settings, but she’d entitled, especially in the kind of light tone Anne Laurie used.
PsiFighter37
@Mandalay: Because when you’re in your ivory MSNBC tower, you want to flip off the anti-intellectuals real hard.
scav
Every man for himself taken to logical extremes. Unchecked Allelopathy, to add to their other pathies. Look at the peace goodwill and siblinghood it has brought to the Bush and Cheney Dynastic Holidays.
Corner Stone
Recently had a running screamfest with a wingnut friend of mine, who’s also the father of a small child in K-4. I’d say something about funding and he’d start some weak rebuttal with a talking point. I’d say, that’s interesting, where can I read the study showing that? Which school board meeting did you go to where that was presented? Is there a website you can at least refer me to?
Nope. None of that. All talking points with no actual effort involved. Just repetition.
c u n d gulag
Outside of Fred Hiatt’s clubhouse,* FUX Noise, and other cable TV gab-fest’s and Op-ed pages, W’s demon-seeds are nowhere to be seen.
Everyone associated with W and Dick have the stench of “FAIL!!!”
They were all inept – but, interestingly, in different ways – but the end result was, national failure of EPIC proportions!!!
*With kudo’s to him for asking Rachel to write – but, why not a weekly, or bi-weekly, column?
PsiFighter37
@Corner Stone: Surprises he didn’t mention some BS study from AEI or Manhattan Institute. I thought the whole point of those joints was to ‘legitimize’ RW talking points.
Corner Stone
Drinking rum punches in an airport in Tahiti. Just coming back after my 17th vacation this last calendar year. Life is hard sometimes. I think I just need to take a couple weeks more off, to refresh myself.
Corner Stone
@PsiFighter37: That’s the level of effort the wingnuts hereabout put toward pushing their viewpoint. They don’t even bother citing bullshit biased false reporting.
Anne Laurie
@Mandalay: Tongue in cheek (as stolen from Mr. Pierce). You’ve noticed how every AEI hack includes his CV going back to kindergarten on their every ‘punish the poors, applaud the parasites’ op-ed…
Mandalay
@IowaOldLady:
Ah, that’s the part I was missing. Thx.
Corner Stone
The list of diverse Democrats is fairly amusing, as well.
PsiFighter37
I don’t think there are a ton of national figures in either party. It’s a lot different nowadays than it was 50-60 years ago, when the power players at the conventions decided everything.
scav
@c u n d gulag: Perhaps she’s too busy and/or either of them prefers quality and thought-out stuff to constant churn? A deliberate attempt to have a greater mix of opinions? Who knows the planning and negotiations or direction of actions. Distrust Bezos as you please, but I don’t think we’ve solid evidence here.
Anne Laurie
@Corner Stone: Don’t call them ‘talking points’, call them ‘magical incantations’ — because that’s what the speakers intend them to be. Say the RIGHT words often enough, with enough fervor, and the Invisible Hand will reward you, true believer!
I went to a parochial school, where the nuns were rigorous about the emptiness of Faith without the effort of Works to back up one’s talking points. This gave me a head start on understanding the Republicans, once I went away to college and starting meeting them in person.
(P.S. Good to see you back here — I missed you!)
The Other Bob
@PsiFighter37:
They have Dogfish Head at the airport? Stop complaining. Isn’t the airport choice usually between Bud and cheap gin?
mdblanche
I doubt Deval Patrick is really interested in becoming a national political figure. After all he’s been governor of Massachusetts for seven years now and he still hasn’t resigned to become an ambassador or begun mapping out his presidential campaign. The last governor to resist those temptations for so long was… was… well, whoever it was it was before I was born.
@Commenting at Balloon Juice since 1937: And what few ideas they had left they discarded in favor of obstruction. Frankly if they could get back to where they were under W, that would be an improvement for them.
Jose Arcadio Buendía
The article she linked to about Elizabeth Warren challenging Clinton is a few weeks old and was followed up by a pledge from Warren she would serve out her term.
MikeJ
@PsiFighter37: I’ve only flown out of Orlando once, but I got upgraded for being obvious business guy surrounded by screaming children
Mandalay
It seems odd that Rachel Maddow would cite Claire McCaskill as a good example of anything, especially when her link refers to an article suggesting that McCaskill is already throwing her support behind Clinton’s presidential bid for self-serving purposes.
McCaskill is a DINO, cut from the same cloth as Harold Ford and Evan Bayh…
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/political-animal/2011_08/mccaskill_opposes_more_jobless031433.php#13871429006711&action=collapse_widget&id=568444
http://www.thirdway.org/co_chairs/5
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0311/51675.html
http://www.politicsplus.org/blog/2011/03/28/its-dino-dumping-time/#13871437191311&action=collapse_widget&id=4290564
hamletta
@The Other Bob: You haven’t flow in a while, have you?
Most airports these days have good beer and restaurants, usually local.
Mandalay
@Anne Laurie: Gotcha.
Joey Maloney
From TFA:
Bwahaha.
Waspuppet
The day John Kerry conceded the 2004 election, my then-GOP brother ( he’s since wished up) called me to gloat. After a few minutes though, he overreached as GOPers always, always do*.
He said “I don’t even know who you guys are going to run in 2008.” And I said, “Uh, Hillary, John Edwards, maybe that Obama guy – come to think of it, who the hell are YOU guys gonna run?”
He clearly hadn’t thought of it, and sorta mumbled that they’d think of someone.
* (Has anyone ever- EVER – heard one of Our Media Stars say the GOP “overreached”?)
PsiFighter37
@mdblanche: Didn’t he explicitly say he was going back to the private sector too?
@The Other Bob: Yeah, I was surprised a joint like Ruby Tuesday’s would have DFH, even if it’s only in bottle. However, I went to the airline lounge and was told Yuengling is a high-class craft beer…so maybe that evens it out.
c u n d gulag
@scav:
Good point!
Villago Delenda Est
@Anne Laurie:
It’s Wingardium LEVI-o-sa, not Wingardium Levi-O-sa.
Josie
@PsiFighter37:
You are absolutely correct. I dislike all the airports I have flown out of (with the exception of my local one-horse operation), such as Houston, L.A., Chicago, La Guardia, but I reserve my real hatred for Orlando. Getting checked in and inspected is a nightmare.
Davis X. Machina
No one else is reeling from Ron Fournier’s latest emission? Boy, is he pissed he’s not President Romney’s press secretary…
Gex
@PsiFighter37: The dummies who repeat the talking points are often not bright enough to remember the bullshit study that accompanied the talking point. If they ever heard it at all. Most of their stuff is handed down through email screeds in all caps and no links to any studies that might include words that are 3 syllables or longer.
Joey Maloney
@IowaOldLady: I’m not sure there’s an airport I do want to fly out of.
Honolulu – the concourses are open-air. Hibiscus and diesel are a heady mix. And there are two Japanese gardens where you can rest and wait for your flight.
Incheon has a whole “passenger comfort” mezzanine where you can take a shower for free, get a mani-pedi or a massage, rent a bed by the hour, or for $20 use a lounge with an open buffet and beer tap.
Gex
@Joey Maloney: The airport may be nice. But “wanting to fly out of it” seems questionable to someone who is currently sitting in MInnesota.
dmsilev
@Josie: In Chicago, fly into Midway if your routes/airlines allow. It’s not wonderful, but at least it’s not the Fifth Circle of Hell better known as O’Hare. Closer to downtown as well.
Edit: The one big big problem with Midway is that there’s a huge bottleneck at the security checkpoint; if it’s busy, the ID checking stations back way way up and it can take an inordinate amount of time to clear that stage. The actual security screening is faster.
Josie
@dmsilev: Good to know. I’ve never used Midway.
smintheus
R.I.P. Peter O’Toole, 14th Earl of Gurney.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2C5pjMqKqrg
The Very Reverend Battleaxe of Knowledge
@IowaOldLady:
Sea-Tac’s not as bad as most, but its main advantage is I can get on a Metro bus 50 feet from my door and it’ll take me right to the terminal. That covers a multitude of sins.
MikeJ
@dmsilev: Also, the runways are shorter so sometimes the plane will just drive you onto city streets and let you skip the airport completely.
Kay
@Davis X. Machina:
But he has a source!
That guy said Obama is much, much worse than his former boss.
Patrick
@Davis X. Machina:
The guy who gave those encouraging words to Karl Rove really doesn’t like President Obama? Big surprise. Fournier is no different than Halperin in his bias against our President.
Corner Stone
@Josie: Midway is, by far, the better option when flying into CHI. Not bad flying out of, either. Relatively speaking.
MikeJ
@Kay: So the guy who is in charge of executive branch of the government wants to know about what the executive branch is doing before they do it?
What a bastard.
Hill Dweller
@Kay: The only good thing about Fournier opening his trap is Charlie Pierce’s entertaining response.
PsiFighter37
@Corner Stone: Do any of the big airlines fly to Midway? I ask as a United member…and I think O’Hare is one of their hubs. So I may be shit outta luck.
I think out of the various airports I’ve frequented, I’m okay spending time in SFO the most. LAX is old, EWR is not as bad with security as it seems, but not enthralled with the food choices. I used to like SEA, but I feel like maybe the United terminal isn’t as good as the others.
I also just got stealth bombed by a fart from someone sitting in front of me. I hope this doesn’t become a regular occurrence on this flight.
KG
This predates GWB, actually. The GOP wasn’t ready for a generational shift in the 90s, thus running Bob Dole in 96 (because it was his turn). They had nobody plausible in 2000, and thus it was GWB mostly by default and name recognition. McCain and Romney got their nominations by being next in line. But after basically 20 years, they’ve reached the end of the line and are stuck with Christie, Santorum, Huckabee, or the other Bush
KG
@KG: and, for the record, I don’t believe Christie will win because it’s not yet his turn, and that’s just how the GOP rolls unless there are no other options
dmsilev
@PsiFighter37: United and American are O’Hare-only. Southwest is Midway-only. I think Delta has a presence at both.
Dead Ernest
@scav:
Scav,
I’m not inclined to be pedantic (not in public anyway, thinking it more a guilty pleasure. Something to be done alone & in private), however, being a fan & admirer of your on-line persona and writing, in the spirit of assisting your excellence, I’ll whisper from the shadows that allelopathy goes both ways. It can impair other the well being of other species, but it can also benefit the ‘other’s’ existence. Probably just unfortunate that the word includes ‘pathy,’ suggesting ‘disease’ or ‘destructive condition.’
Cheers.
Corner Stone
@PsiFighter37: Southwest does, which is key for me as Hobby is much more convenient for me than IAH.
Not sure about any of the int’l routes.
NotMax
@IowaOldLady
The Maui airport is 100% generic blah since they enclosed it, added a second level, installed jetways and removed the majestic banyan tree which used to rise up high above the (no longer) open-roofed courtyard.
Bonus points to anyone who knows why its designation is OGG, without looking it up on the interweb.
mdblanche
@PsiFighter37: I must have missed that. I can’t say it would surprise me.
@Kay: Um, isn’t the White House supposed to do this? I imagine that the Office of Air and Radiation and the EPA in general was a backwater under W but is now being paid attention to again.
Corner Stone
@KG:
I quibble only slightly that GWB was “by default”. It was clear, at least to we unfortunate many, that they were grooming him to go for it all. They had him executing people left and right for a couple last years of TX Gov, then whiplashed the other vulnerable voting pool with the “compassionate conservatism” nonsense.
But, I will agree with you a bit and say that Gore wrapped both fucking hands around his own neck and continued to squeeze during his campaign. If he had picked just about anyone besides Lieberman as VP he would have probably put it out of “stealing range”.
Sinnach
The best part is that WaPo posted that the 11th – one day after Mandela’s memorial. It’s a thoughtful and insightful analysis both of Bush’s legacy and potential pitfalls ahead for Obama.
So what are the first 1000 comments? Obama shook hands with Castro! and Selfiegate! over and over and over again. It’s amusing in the ‘fiddle while Rome burns’ line of entertainment. The level of political discourse in this country is brain-dead and proud of it.
Davis X. Machina
@Corner Stone: If he had picked just about anyone besides Lieberman as VP he would he’d have lost Florida outright…. You didn’t like him. I didn’t like him. But a lot of transplants from the NE liked him.
And that kept FL close.
KG
@Corner Stone: I don’t think the Lieberman pick is what killed Gore. I think he tried to run too far away from Clinton’s record. Trying to separate yourself on a personal level makes sense, but policywise, it was a mistake. That, and I believe that he never really appeared comfortable in his own skin (and kept changing his presentation – the debate sigh, the earth tones, etc). On some level, I think voters ask themselves, which of these people do I want to see on tv every day for the next four years? Combine that with a misallocation of resources, it’s history
RepubAnon
@Commenting at Balloon Juice since 1937: The greatest gift the Republicans gave this country was George W Bush. Before then, Republicans were slick con artists – pitching a good con and then quietly enacting their true agenda. George W Bush broke that mold, and clearly explained the true Republican agenda to everyone.
With the help of Dick (Darth) Cheney, everyone with eyes to see knew what would result from another Republican administration. All the Democrats need to do is remind the voters.
Case in point: Republicans claim that universal health care is an evil thing – instead, they believe that if you are seriously injured, say, in a shooting resulting from unregulated gun sales, your friends should need to start up a collection to pay your medical bills.
Corner Stone
@KG: My reply to you and DMX @58 is similar.
The Lieberman pick killed him because it isolated him away from claiming any mantle of the Clintonian Era successes. Gore clearly didn’t want to do that, which is why he picked the moral scold in the first place. But with Joey on the ticket, there was never any possible chance of pivoting or using recent history to bolster an otherwise uninspired and tedious campaign.
And contra DMX, I am doubtful that Joe L. actually kept FL close. I just don’t remember it that way, but maybe it was a net positive for Gore in FL.
Hence my characterization of Gore mightily wrapping his own hands around his neck and squeezing.
Mike G
@NotMax:
Kahului airport was named after a Mr. Hogg, an aviation pioneer. They had the choice of airport code HOG or OGG, and went with the more diplomatic option.
Unrelated but also in the realm of unfortunate names, there were influential Texans by the names of Ima Hogg and H.E. Butt.
scav
@Dead Ernest: Thanks, I fear I did rather ellide that bit when I looked up the correct spelling (having started with “what’s that pathy with the juglone and black walnut? and aren’t euks similar?” ) Explanation so gets in the way sometimes, and I just wanted to pull in the psychos and socios. The stuff with rice looked interesting. What pathies are you cultivating both publically and privately?
KG
@Corner Stone: and if he’d have won Tennessee (his home state) or Arkansas (Clinton’s home state), that Clinton won in both 92 and 96, Florida would have been a historical footnote… Or four other states that were within 3%. At the end of the day, Gore ran a terrible campaign and didn’t deserve to win
scav
@scav: Should have added professionally, as I’m wondering which sort of biogeek you might be.
The Very Reverend Battleaxe of Knowledge
@KG:
And yet he did win—leave us never forget that.
Citizen_X
@Mandalay: @Anne Laurie: Why is that tongue in cheek? Dr. Maddow’s her fucking name, using the title that she damn well earned.
NotMax
@Mike G
Bingo!
Still folks here who refer to the airport as NASKA, its acronym from its construction during WW2 when it was Naval Air Station, Kahului (what there was of a civilian airport had been more inland, at Puunene, which was later taken out of air service in favor of OGG and for a time converted to a drag racing course).
Ruckus
@Joey Maloney:
Kona as well has a lot of open air. Sometimes hard to find enough shade.
doug r
@The Very Reverend Battleaxe of Knowledge: I found SeaTac to be very efficient, once we found parking.
Ruckus
@Corner Stone:
I agree that JL was a very bad pick by Gore. At the level of WTF. Did he lose other states because of it? I’ll bet it is possible that he did. I’ve heard it’s rare that a VP will create win for the candidate but I think it is likely that the wrong VP can create a loss.
Mike E
@KG: Correct.
Ruckus
@The Very Reverend Battleaxe of Knowledge:
Yes but I don’t remember him being president.
Violet
@Ruckus:
Certainly Snowbilly Snooki didn’t help McCain in 2008. Definitely not with women voters who seemed to be the voters he was targeting with the pick.
Ruckus
@Violet:
I think he got as much crap for picking her as she did for being a breathing, used crash test dummy. But think who could he have picked that would have given him plus points? He may have been able to find a better pick (he sure couldn’t have found a worse one) but he is so flawed that I’m not sure that would have helped. He was for all intents the last one standing.
polyorchnid octopunch
@IowaOldLady: Try any one outside the US. It’s your national mania about security and risk destruction that make them so shitty.
Stella B
@KG: and whose turn is it? Rick Santorum, puleeeese?
KG
@Stella B: my gut is that it’ll be Huckabee. Remember, he’s spent the last 8 years talking directly to the base via his Fox News show and radio show. I could honestly see a Huckabee/Santorum ticket
Ken
@Stella B: That’s the problem this time. Usually there’s an obvious second-place finisher out of the primaries. In 2012, there were a half dozen. Heck, you could argue that Romney was the second-place finisher – it took long enough for everyone else to be rejected.
Corner Stone
@KG: Not a chance. No one is giving money to The Huckster.
Chris
@KG:
That’s funny. It means that the line of succession for Republicans operates the same way it does in the Saudi royal family – an entire generation of old farts all have to have “their turn” before you can hand over the reins to the next one. (When a Saudi king dies, his brothers have precedence over his sons – every king since 1953, including the current one, has been one of the sons of the original king who founded the country).
These fuckers have a lot in common, it seems.
Chris
@KG:
No, Huckabee is in that shit spot where the Republican base and the Republican establishment both distrust him. For the base it’s because he’s pardoned a couple of convicted murderers (one of whom went on to kill again) and because he’s occasionally made noises that sound sympathetic to Hispanic immigration. For the establishment it’s because he’s occasionally made noises about the need to pay more attention to Main Street than Wall Street (the odds of him becoming another William Jennings Bryan are remote, but, figures Wall Street, why take the chance?)
Matt McIrvin
@IowaOldLady: From here, it’s Manchester-Boston Regional if I possibly have the choice. The amenities are nothing special, but it has short lines, relatively cheap parking, and the terminal is small enough that it’s easy to walk everywhere. And it’s like a half hour from my house, whereas getting to Logan is a horrifying ordeal.
Manchester is Southwest’s main airport for the Boston area, so there are usually good fares available to anywhere they go. It took me way too long to figure out that Southwest doesn’t list their flights on the aggregator sites.
Karla
@Citizen_X: Yes.
Fred
You can’t give Dubaya all the blame. The GOPers finally got their X-Mas wish list about filled. They got the keys to the government and 9/11 made the Dems compliant as lambs. They already pretty much had the media in tow but once again, 9/11.
Starting off they got the repeal of Glass- Steagall with Gramm-Leach-Bliley (was there ever a more appropriate name?)
They got to ’bout eliminate taxes on the rich and corporations.
They got WAR, WAR and more WAR! with the attendant propaganda and STFU you DFHs.
They got to stock all levels of government with born agin wingnut flacks who happily ignored all regulations the rich disapproved of.
They got more privatization of all gubmint services funneling lots bucks to corporate buddies.
Black box computer voting systems to shave points.
Screwed the USPO with that crazy pension mandate.
I could go on but it’s too depressing. Anyway, the result was predictable (and predicted): THEY CRASHED THE FRICKIN’ ECONOMY! BUT GOOD!
Dubaya just lent his doofus voice and face but it was the GOPers all the way. They got what they had been clambering for since FDR and now they claim the trouble was they didn’t go far enough.
Now I think I’ll go read Maddow’s article ’cause I just love her all to crazy.
Ramalama
Love Rachel Maddow. I’ve taken to downloading her show audio only and walking with the ipod, her pop sense on political nonesense in my ears. I haven’t been able to read her book yet. The Washington Post column is a fantastic idea. An idea from the new owner (Amazon?)?
brantl
Repudiated or refuted, not refudiated, for god’s sake.
Jebediah, RBG
@brantl:
Internet tradition requires that Saint Sarah’s retarded neologism live on forever.