Cogitamus

McCain Makes Mockery of Legislation Bearing His Name

This afternoon, John McCain is in Bellevue, Washington—a very affluent suburb of Seattle—for a $33,100 per-person fundraiser. No, that is not a typo, admission will cost you roughly the same amount as a BMW 330, and is $30,800 over the maximum federal contrbution. How does this work? Goldy at Horse's Ass has the details. In essence, the first chunk of money goes to McCain for President, the next chunk goes to the RNC, and the last chunk "will be divided evenly between the Colorado, Minnesota, New Mexico, and Wisconsin state parties’ federal accounts". I'm fine with yoking McCain's fundraising to the RNC, which has been a long-standing practice, but state party accounts are a USS Titanic-sized loophole that Senator Straight Talk ought to be ashamed of exploiting. Residents of Washington are supposed to have some interest in building up the state parties of four states, none of which are even adjacent to Washington? Ha!

Conveniently, the district that contains Bellevue is the one where Darcy Burner is running for Congress. Fight back.

What 100 years means

They say, over and over, that John McCain didn't really mean he wanted 100 years of war, he just wanted a 100-year presence of US soldiers in Iraq.  At least 100 years.  To which he compared the US presence in places like Japan and South Korea.

Well, fine, but let's be clear: the US presence in places like Japan and South Korea is only uncontroversial to American neoconservatives.  The Okinawans have a substantially different take on what a long-term US presence looks like.  When you put tens of thousands of any nation's soldiers anywhere, terrible things happen, like murder and rape.  The latest case ended last week, when a US marine was convicted of "wrongful sexual contact".  This is only one of many cases in Okinawa's recent history, including a US sailor's murder of a taxi driver in April, and going back at least as far as an incident in 1995 when three Marines kidnapped and raped a 12-year-old girl.

Incidents like this have seriously strained US-Japanese relations in the past, as well as similar strains in South Korea and the Philippines.  Never mind that these incidents are relatively few and far between: given a military presence of tens, or even hundreds of thousands of soldiers, they're inevitably going to crop up.

America has much, much better relations with Japan than it does, or will have, with the government of Iraq.  How many of these incidents could any future occupation sustain?

Night Of The Links To Female Bloggers Better Than Me

After the GOP convention chairman resigned due to his having lobbied for the vicious rulers of Myanmar, Hilzoy has a typically awesome post looking at all the dictators that McCain's top advisor, Charlie Black, has worked for.  Best quote is probably this one: "Black has represented a more than usually repellent group of dictators. Two of Transparency International's top three kleptocrats in recent history (Marcos and Mobutu); a self-proclaimed God; torturers, murderers, and even someone who deliberately destroys reservoirs in arid country, so people will die of thirst."

Someday I'll be bouncing a little granddaughter (with a last name like McBabubaum, no doubt) on my lap and I'll say, "I once blogged for Ezra Klein, and one of my blogmates, just for a little while, was Kathy Geier!"  And she'll say, "Wow!  Was that when she wrote her post that told you everything you need to know about the minimum wage and employment?"  And I'll say, "No, that's after she moved to Crooked Timber.  But I linked it!"  And she'll shrug, because all her friends, who will be precocious children with weird ethnic fusion names, will have linked it too.

West Virginia, MS-01, NE-SEN Primary et al. Meaningless Coffeehousing Thread

Did I miss any elections that are happening?

Foreign Policy Gaffes That Are True

Here we go again. The mighty Wurlitzer spins into action in response to Barack Obama referring to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a 'constant sore'. Here's the full quote:

JG: Do you think that Israel is a drag on America’s reputation overseas?

BO: No, no, no. But what I think is that this constant wound, that this constant sore, does infect all of our foreign policy. The lack of a resolution to this problem provides an excuse for anti-American militant jihadists to engage in inexcusable actions, and so we have a national-security interest in solving this, and I also believe that Israel has a security interest in solving this because I believe that the status quo is unsustainable.

As you can see, Obama is clearly referring to the lack of resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and not Israel itself. But this distinction is lost of various GOP operatives. Thus it's time for some of that Obama straight-talking, American-deserves-the-truth-and-not-more-spin jujitsu from the Obama camp. Ambinder says "the GOP responses loses a few intellectual honesty points. But you can bet that Obama will be asked to elaborate".

But of course, in the main Obama is correct. Sure, repression in Burma isn't due to Israeli maximalism, but I'm sure the Democratic party can line up dozens of foreign policy professionals across the political spectrum to point out that, yes, a resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict would sap support for terrorist groups, would free the rulers of other Arab nations to side with the US more often, would tangibly reduce the security threat to Israel, etc. etc. It wouldn't solve all our problems, but it would make a very big difference. As with Obama's original gaffe, that talking to the leaders of Iran and Cuba would not lead to the end of the world as we know it, after a few days people will realize that the man has a point.

Bob O'Patriot for President

The always funny Lee Stranahan with a non-video tour de force about the campaign that Obama could have run in order to please the media and win the white working class.  My personal favorite:  "April 29.  On CNN, Obama states that America doesn't have any problems that can't be solved by 'opening a can of whoop-ass.'  In the same interview, he also threatens to 'kick the hummus' out of Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadjinejad and breaks several chairs."    

And from the Department of WTF -- according to Greg Sargent at TPM, "AFSCME vows to put 'real money' into Hillary ads in remaining states."  I can't think of any conceivable angle from which this makes sense.  I have asked others close to AFSCME to try and explain the union's "thinking."  For the moment I am thoroughly baffled.    

Unfortunate Underage Drinking Polls

I was just looking at these Gallup results from a year ago, and they're not very promising.  By a 77-22 margin, Americans oppose lowering the legal drinking age to 18.  This is basically the same result that we had in 2001.  Then when asked  about the penalties for underage drinking, 60% said the penalties should be made more strict, while only 6% said less strict, and a minority of 31% said they should remain as they are now.  So it seems that the restrictions that prevent universities from taking constructive steps to deal with alcohol use on campus are going to stay in place for a while longer. 

A Thousand Words

Five months of the Presidential campaign, condensed into one chart.

Use the comments to try and name the spikes.

My One (and Only) Veepstakes Post

I confess, I hate the veepstakes. It's the silliest part of silly season, where the campaign turns into nothing but a nationwide office pool. The sooner it's over, the better, I say. I'm told my fellow co-bloggers enjoy it, so I will leave remaining veep-related posting to them, and lay out the pros and cons of each candidate as I see it in one (lengthy!) post.

Cindy McCain Is Sooo Great

I recently received an email touting the inherent goodness, purity, grace, poise, character, ethics, beauty, intelligence, wit, and perhaps even penmanship of Cindy McCain.  You can read it at Snopes.com, which attests to the truth of every statement in that email.

And that's great.  Really, it's wonderful that the woman with whom John McCain had an adulterous affair is such a good person.  I'm truly happy that Cindy McCain's inherited wealth funded John McCain's first Congressional campaign even with their prenuptial agreement that keeps their finances "separate."  And who wouldn't be pleased to know that Cindy McCain's "separate" finances have provided John McCain's campaign with private jets and the homes in which he entertains the journalists assigned to his campaign?

I'm also sure that further evidence of Cindy McCain's fundamental goodness can be found in the way she and her father invested over $300,000 in a shopping center being built by Charles Keating - the largest single investment in a $15 million project.  Since the McCain's keep John's political duties rigorously separate from their personal lives  - why, Cindy and the kids live in Arizona! - I'm sure that this investment, coming as it did a mere year before John's involvement in the Keating Five, had nothing to do with why he became involved, nothing to do with why John stuck with Keating long after everyone else had thrown him under the bus.

Yes, Cindy McCain abused Percocet and Vicodin, stealing pills from the charity she ran to feed her addiction.  But many very good people abuse these drugs - look at Rush Limbaugh!  I think it's fair to say that Cindy McCain and Rush Limbaugh are quite a bit alike.  Perhaps Rush, were he to spend time with Cindy, would not find John McCain such a detestable politician.

Sunday Obama Caption Contest

This should be fun. From Obama's appearance at PV Power in Bend, Oregon.

Only if you are doing it right -- and other deep thoughts

1.  Ah, the Pope weighs in with his deep knowledge of matters sexual;

2.  Speaking of which I've become a huge fan of The G Spot (stop that snickering -- I could so find it) --Kathy G. writes about politics, economics, labor, and feminist issues among other things -- more importantly, she seems to hate the same fatuous media assholes that I do and expresses it with elan.

3.  And old favorite Roy Edroso of Alicublog continues to bring the pain to the right wing blogosphere.  To those of you who didn't see his capsule summary of same in the Village Voice -- with the patented "stupid to evil ratio" -- it is a must read.  Roy is one of the finest writers on the net and the possessor of a keen mind and devastating wit.  Read him.   

4.  The U.S. calls for election monitors in Zimbabwe.  It would be nice if our country hadn't sacrificed so much moral authority in the last few years. What Robert Mugabe has done to Zimbabwe is beyond criminal and into the realm of tragic.  Embarrassing confession -- as a twenty year old junior in college I had a Robert Mugabe ZANU poster on my wall -- next to the Sex Pistols.  I thought Mugabe would turn out to be what Nelson Mandela eventually was in South Africa.  Wrong, wrong, humiliatingly wrong.  One can only hope that his incomprehensibly evil 27 year reign is coming to its end. 

5.  I saw Andrea Mitchell in Starbuck's today -- wearing shorts (it could have been worse, it could have been Greenspan in shorts -- objectivism, varicose veins and knobby knees in one magnificent package) -- I almost snorted my "skinny grande cinnamon dolce latte" through my nose.  (That's for you Stephen.)

6. Nice to know that McCain's convention chief was lobbying for the Myanmar junta -- the junta formerly known as SLORC.  Well, they'll always be SLORC to me.  (Really, wouldn't you draw the line at clients like this?)  Good to know that lobbyist influence in the McCain camp is diminishing by attrition.  Maybe he can lose a crazy pastor or two as well.

Michael Brown hasn't been seen anywhere near Myanmar, has he?

         

Name Fusions For Nuclear Families

Congratulations to Michael and Diana Bijon, who got the ACLU's help in overturning the California law barring men from taking their wives' names when they marry.  From older news coverage, I recall that Michael had a bad relationship with his father, and was very close to his wife's family, and thus wanted to take her name.  I don't know exactly what we should call his old name now -- "maiden name" isn't appropriate.  Bachelor name, I suppose? 

My preference is for both spouses to keep their names, and to invent clever name fusions for their offspring.  So if I were to marry a woman named, say, Von Argebargebruger, the kids would be Sinhabargebrugers or Von Sinhas or Argebargebabus or something, depending on how many extra syllables of adversity we wanted them to overcome. 

Philosophers Steven Yablo and Sally Haslanger call their clan the 'Yablangers', which always sounded kind of nifty to me.  Definitely for academics and other people whose names show up in bibliographies, having people retain their names seems the way to go.  You don't want people thinking, "Whatever happened to that book that Von Argebargebruger said she was going to write?" or "Why didn't Baroness Sinhababu publish anything until she got tenure?" 

Comfort Food for Thought - A Simple Minded General Election Analogy

Okay, let's say we offer a 100 different people the choice between strawberry cheese cake and well, how about rice pudding. (No raisins -- can't stand 'em.) (I keep running afoul in my dessert choices -- chocolate eclairs versus vanilla pudding, devils food cake versus creme brulee -- well you get the drift.)  Anyway, 53 of you choose the cheese cake -- love that damn cheese cake in fact -- while 47 opt for the rice pudding -- opt isn't really strong enough -- you feel passionately about the rice pudding.  Well majority rules and cheesecake it is.

Now at our next meal, in the dessert category cheesecake competes with -- what do I hate -- ah, cabbage.  Not only cabbage, but really old, overdone cabbage.  I am guessing that when given this choice, even many of the most passionate rice pudding lovers will choose the cheesecake over the cabbage.  And that's why cheesecake is going to kick cabbage's sagging, wrinkled ass in November.  Even in Pennsylvania.  Bank on it kids.   

 

How To Help People In Burma, Part II

So I've given some famine relief money through the Buddhist monks (see post below) and the humanitarian superheroes at Doctors Without Borders (see links below, but this right here is the easiest donation link, and everyone I've talked to has been impressed by Doctors Without Borders).  Don't you want to be the benevolent rich person who buys the superheroes the awesome weapon they use to save humanity from the villain?  So give some money and say to your awesome self, "Yeah!  I'm kicking evil's ass!  I'm the reason little Burmese kids aren't going to drink sewage-contaminated water and die of cholera!"

The awesome NGO woman cited in the post below has forwarded me an email that a dude in the region forwarded to people he knew.  I've reprinted the entire thing below, except for fixing and spam-proofing the email address.  If you want to discuss some of this stuff with the people involved, email me (it's at the top of the page) and I'll see if I can put you in touch. 

How To Help People In Burma

The basic outlines of the situation are laid out here.  Tens of thousands of people have already died, and the ruling dictatorship (they're the ones who renamed the country Myanmar) believes that letting outside aidworkers care for the people would destabilize their rule and let outside organizations that don't like them gain a foothold in the country.  So they're hardly permitting any aid in at all, and many thousands more people may die from the diseases that result when flooding mixes sewage and clean water.  This is why dictatorship isn't the best form of government. 

I've been communicating with a friend who works in an NGO in Vietnam, who knows a guy who works in Burma, to ask for aid advice.  She writes:

I did get another brief email last night from this guy in-country, but the only thing of note that he really said was: "Things in Yangon are improving rapidly. Obviously that's not the case in the delta. But to be honest, here in the city, the recovery has been faster than in nola."

Still, the situation in nola was so terrible that saying the recovery is faster than nola isn't saying much...also, the situation in the delta is the real disaster. He also says that "save the children seems to be the best organized INGO on the ground right now". But maybe the network of monks can deliver supplies in areas where save the children can't (?)

Brilliant

Just completely brilliant.

The Map

<p>&lt;p&gt;&amp;lt;p&amp;gt;&amp;lt;strong&amp;gt;&amp;gt;&amp;lt;a href='http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/interactives/campaign08/electoral-college/'&amp;gt;Electoral College Prediction Map&amp;lt;/a&amp;gt;&amp;lt;/strong&amp;gt; - Predict the winner of the general election. Use the map to experiment with winning combinations of states. Save your prediction and send it to friends.&amp;lt;/p&amp;gt;&lt;/p&gt;</p>

At the moment, this is what the general election map probably looks like. On defense, Barack Obama appears to be in very good shape to retain all of the Kerry states except New Hampshire, which may eventually flip back. On offense, he's better positioned to win Colorado, New Mexico, and Nevada (19 electoral votes) than Ohio (20 EVs). I know polls in Missouri don't look very good now, but in February Obama was outpolling Clinton in head-to-heads and winning the state, so it seems possible to flip it back.

Florida and West Virginia appear out of play, but this election is fluid enough that things may change.

Conditional Compassion

Myanmar's government has confiscated aid shipments entering the country, declaring that it will take responsibility for distributing needed food and supplies to the victims of last week's cyclone.  In response to this the UN World Food Program has halted its shipments.  The Red Cross is apparently having no real trouble getting in, though it seems that no foreign aid workers are being allowed into the disaster zone itself.

These situations are always difficult.  Aid groups are certainly justified in their fears that the military government in Naypyidaw will misuse the food and supplies they send, given both its appalling treatment of Myanmar's citizens and what has happened in other countries ruled by authoritarian governments.  The goal is to make sure that the victims receive food, medical care and other help such as shelter and clothing, not for a nation's military or ruling class to reap the benefits of international aid.

I don't have a judgment to make in terms of the morality or the politics of the UN's decision to stop aid shipments, nor would I for any other group or nation that does the same.  But one thing is very clear:  while the government's actions might keep needed food and supplies away from the cyclone victims, refusing to send aid into the country will definitely keep needed food and supplies away from them.

Inter-Party Cultural Class War

Now Ross Douthat, usually a bright guy, and Michael Franc have managed to punch a few searches into the fundrace tool to show that people with various working-class occupations are more likely to give to Republicans than Democrats. Thankfully, Ross discovered the fundamental flaw here, which is that campaigns don't disclose employer information for small dollar contributions. Even then, this sort of analysis is pretty rough cut. A better way to do things would be to take a weighted average of the median household income of each contributor. But even I don't have the patience to wade through that much data.

As for CEO's and company president's giving more to Democrats, this is undoubtedly a new phenomenon, due to the fact that (a) for the first time since 2000, Democrats are raising more money over all, and (b) 60% of the country is tired of having Republicans run it.

Not About The Primary

So you can untwist those knickers.  I'm going to follow the encouragement of people much smarter than I and get back to it.  But I don't know how much I'm going to wade into the mess we've made of our primary this year. 

Anyway. . .apparently Chris Matthews has red hair now.  Wowee, I guess.  The only thing interesting part of this, to me at least, is being pointed by digby to Shenanigans, one of the Politico's blogs.  Shenanigans has this tagline:

Shifting the spotlight from the buttoned-up, straight-laced world of politics to the fun, tawdry side of Washington

Have I missed something here?  Are my irony and cynicism detectors broken?  Or is Anne Schroeder Mullins a real person who actually thinks that what this nation needs - and doesn't already have in an embarrassing overabundance - is a focus on the "fun, tawdry side of Washington?"  I'm not saying she's doing a bad job, though Shenaniganz is hardly the first blog to cast a cynical-critical eye on politics.

On a related bleg, does anyone have a copy of irony's obituary anywhere?  I apparently missed it, and I'd like to see what the NYT or the WaPo said about it. 

It's a Big World Out There -- Someone's Got to Bomb it

I know that there's an election going on, but a few other things are happening out there that might be worthy of our attention.  The most disturbing to me -- well not counting Myanmar, which is just unfathomably horrible -- is what appears to be a full scale U.S. military assault on Sadr City, a crowded urban slum of Baghdad with some 2.5 million residents.  This is apparently an attempt to undermine the power of militias loyal to Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. 

In so doing, U.S. power appears to be aligning itself with the Shiite factions associated with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.  In other words, we are increasingly being sucked into internecine Shiite power struggles as though they reflect our national interests.  And in waging this battle we are bringing to bear air power and armored patrols ill suited for an urban campaign.  Civilian deaths will inevitably ensue, including those of many of the children caught in the crossfire.  How this will help facilitate the political progress that the sainted General Petraeus has indicated is a pre-condition to success in Iraq is a mystery to me.

Simon (Rosenberg) Says

I'm glad to see that Simon Rosenberg of NDN is generating the sort of media coverage that will serve Barack Obama well in the general election:

"The game changer in the last week was when Clinton went after him on the gas tax," said Simon Rosenberg, head of the Democratic advocacy group NDN. "Obama pivoted very well to the economy and figured out how to talk about the struggles of everyday people... The new Obama, who has survived Jeremiah Wright and now has a powerful economic argument, is a significantly better candidate than he was three weeks ago," Rosenberg said.

"Clinton is the one who moved the national conversation from Jeremiah Wright. Her campaign did that. It was the greatest gift," he said.

The presuppositions, in order: Obama won the gas tax debate, he's credible on the economy and the struggles of ordinary people, and Jeremiah Wright is no longer the focus of the national conversation.  Rosenberg, by the way, was the good netroots Democrat's #2 choice for DNC chair behind Howard Dean last time around.  I saw a wonderful ad he made to promote the Democratic Party among Hispanics, and I'd be happy if he got the position in 2009. 

What Is Hillary Implying About Black People?

Shorter Betsy Reed: There's been a lot of sexism directed at Hillary Clinton, but it hasn't come from Barack Obama or his people.  There's been some racism thrown at Barack Obama, and a lot of it has come from Hillary Clinton and her people.  This is discouraging younger feminists from supporting Hillary. 

This isn't one of those critical 'shorters' where you encapsulate the offensive features of a bad argument -- it's a summary of a long, good argument.  Take today's Hillary line, citing an AP press release that she described as showing that "Sen. Obama's support among working, hard-working Americans, white Americans, is weakening again, and how whites in both states who had not completed college were supporting me." 

I'm not aware of exit poll data breaking down the Democratic primary electorate into "hard-working" and "lazy" categories.  So an advantage among non-college white people is basically being spun into an advantage among hard-working people.  This only holds if everybody else is disproportionately lazy, which  (1) is flatly wrong, as far as I know, and (2) isn't the sort of thing a Democrat, or anybody else, should be saying.

(Update: And of course, Hillary basically equates the categories 'hard-working American' and 'white American', which makes it explicit.)

Lots of Paths to 50% + 1

There's a bit of consternation about Hillary Clinton's open statement that her base is "much broader" because it consists of white non-college voters, while Barack Obama's consist of eggheads and African-Americans. It's the first time Clinton herself has explicitly said that her voters are more important--usually this is left to surrogates-- but that's not what bugs me. After all it is at least true and Clinton ought to be able to observe demographic facts like this without being called names.

Keep it Clean, Folks

No "99 Problems" references in the Obama campaign slogans. As has been ably documented, there's way to much casual chauvinism/misogyny in language choice when it comes to the treatment of the Clinton campaign. You (and I!) may find it annoying that Clinton pressed on when the nomination was effectively over, insulted the intelligence of American voters with the Gas Tax Pander, but there's no need to engage in base name-calling within the primary, especially now that the race is winding down.

Test Drives

The Barack Obama Campaign is running its first Nationwide Vote For Change event this Saturday. As with the nationwide canvassing day in 2007, this is likely a test drive for the Obama campaign[1], to see how many people on its email list will respond on fairly short notice, and to gauge where their campaign's volunteer infrastructure has strengths and weaknesses.

[1] There was a long piece in some magazine ... GQ? Esquire? Vanity Fair? ... during the heady days of late January or Early February ... about the logistics behind the Obama volunteer organization. Does anyone remember the essay I'm talking about?

Obama Girl—The Remix

Now we just need a version featuring T-Pain, Diddy, and Nate Dogg and we'll be all set.

The Next Day

Chris Bowers wonders why last night's split decision seems to be bringing about an effective end to the nominating campaign. Part of the reason is that the press has been indulging the Clinton campaign's off-the-wall nomination scenarios since Wisconsin, but the other reason is that Clinton and various campaign staffers now have to be thinking about the next four years. Clinton's chances at winning the nomination have dropped from something like two percent to one tenth of one percent; the only way for her to win would be to find video of Barack Obama taking the podium after Reverend Wright gave an inflammatory sermon, and immediately thanking him for his wonderful speech. He's going to be the nominee, he has demonstrated a greater ability to raise money than either Hillary Clinton or John Kerry, he's young enough that he could in theory run again in 2012, and there are enough Senators (including the chairs of several important committees) who don't want the campaign to go on much further than it already has.

On top of that, the campaign staff has had the jitters for some time. There were reports that on March 4th, had Clinton lost the Texas primary, enough staffers would have resigned as to make her campaign untenable. Anyone who wants a decent job in the Obama administration needs to start backing away from Clinton now, or at least stop offering full-throated support. Anyone who would prefer to work on a Senate race, should Obama become the nominee, needs to start sending their resume around as soon as humanly possible.

Now, the attrition of campaign staff won't be enough to completely end the race, and West Virginia and Kentucky still have to vote, but Clinton won't be able to keep pace in Oregon (which started voting last week thanks to Vote-by-Mail). The tone of the campaign will probably change fairly soon.

Cherry Picking

Look, White voters in Virginia and North Carolina just aren't comparable. Only 22.5% of North Carolina adults hold college degrees, compared to 29.5% in Virginia. In addition, Democrats maintain a registration edge in the Tarheel State that they don't have in the Commonwealth, so there were more working-class whites in the available voter universe yesterday then there were on February 12th. And, of course, Virginia and Georgia represent Barack Obama's high water mark among Southern whites; he did much worse in Tennesse, South Carolina, Mississippi, and Alabama.

If this is the advice Geoff Garin is giving to Clinton in private, he should be sued for political malpractice. Of course, the same is true of Mark Penn, so make of that what you will.

It's going to be a very annoying next few weeks ...