Palin's Vice President Joe Lieberman held a press conference yesterday with newly appointed White House Press Secretary Glenn Beck to explain how the new program would focus on rooting out fascists, socialists, communists and gay people who pose a threat to America's moral fabric and purity. The Press Conference consisted of VP Lieberman saying names and Press Secretary Beck announcing whether they were potential terrorists or not. [...]
I write this as a warning. If Amerca does not hold the Bush/Cheney War Criminals accountable this bit of satirical prognostication may actually come true. Maybe the names will be different, but the power that the next Administration that chooses to go one step farther than Bush/Cheney will be absolute. The only way to prevent that from happening is by bringing the architechts of the Bush/Cheney torture programs to justice.
Reorganizing Government: Take Out the Trash - By Achance
Today’s typical Republican supporter and voter are so antigovernment that they believe, with some justification, that any damned fool can run any government agency better than it is being run. That may be true at the policy level in a Blue or near-Blue state, and it is certainly true even down into the bureaucracy in a doughnut city or one of the big longtime union and Democrat dominated cities. The Party and your supporters are going to give you Hell, but you cannot put people in jobs who don’t know the job – you’re better off leaving it vacant and letting the ‘crats just keep on keeping on. A lot of the positions are unnecessary sinecures for Democrats anyway, so eliminate them.Can you see? There's evil afoot in our politics. It's behind every statement from the opposition, and under every proposed law. It's concealed behind a friendly public diplomacy, a fist under thick velvet for television. Just wait until the moment it reaches power: you'll see horror and doom rain down from above. It's better not to wait: tactics must be changed TODAY!
The Great Lie of Partisan Tolerance - by Beaglescout
One of our jobs as responsible, clear seeing adults is to recognize political correctness and partisan tolerance wherever we see them, identify them by name as a LIE, reject them forcefully, and ridicule and demolish the arguments of any and everyone who advances these destructive memes. We have to make it personal. We have to hurt their feelings.
And maybe that’s the hardest part. Because we are nice. Because we don’t want to turn into mirror images of the hateful, horrible douchebags who are the attack dogs of the Democratic Party.
But even though this is not a fighting war, this is none-the-less a civil war for the culture and soul of America and to maintain the last best hope for real freedom in the rest of the world.
Elizabeth Warren, the core issue, and a policy litmus test - by geomoo
Maldistribution of wealth is the issue at the root of all of our problems, including, believe it or not, the passionate rift here on dailyKos. If we fail to stop and reverse the flow of capital, and thus power, from the middle and lower classes of this country to a few uber-rich, we will fail in our most faithful attempts to address other issues such as climate change, out-of-control military spending, public and private debt, erosion of constitutionality and the rule of law, the economy, media irresponsibility, etc.I could go on, and on, and on. Each one of the above diaries was recommended, at either Daily Kos or RedState. They are only the most recent in a long line of diaries so certain of themselves and their truth that compromise is impossible. I don't claim to be able to evaluate their claims - certainly some of the ideas in the above four are interesting, and worth exploration, but it is the impassable difference between them that concerns me.
Henceforth, we progressives need to evaluate every policy decision in terms of whether it continues the flood of wealth upward or truly provides net value for the middle class. (Perhaps it is more aptly called "downward.") At the very least, we need to understand the forces which can cause a person passionately to hold opinions very much at odds with our own. Assuming their goals are the same as yours—progressive, Democratic—they are likely neither trolls nor fools.
Research has shown that Americans have become more polarized over the past 30 years (Baldassarri & Gelman, 2008) and that government representation has followed the trend (Theriault, 2008), with the near disappearance of moderates in the U.S. House between the 93rd and 108th Congresses (Poole, 2005). Media outlets have followed the trend, catering to specific ideologies and moving away from straight reporting to commentary-based programming, as seen in the different cable network treatments to President Obama's Q&A with the GOP House Caucas (which also featured an observation by the President that recent complements he has given Republicans have been used against them in primary elections).
Most worryingly, the extremists in each party are more apt to raise controversy and a possible primary challenge whenever a representative crosses party lines or compromises, shown in Senator Arlen Specter’s defensive party switch and the withdrawal of moderate Republican Dierdre Scozzafava from the Republican primary after attacks from national figures, such as Sarah Palin. This causes a lack of cooperation and compromise in the formation of national policy. Except in true emergencies such as the financial crisis, policy is less responsive to the current needs of citizens, enabling a short-term win/loss political culture that doesn’t honor good faith bipartisanship, freezing out nuanced consideration of reform. [Note: these two past paragraphs were originally written for my Truman Fellowship application]
From Diggs Brown for Congress:
Response to: Peace Action West Candidate Questionnaire"Not going to be pretty?" Why?
Diggs: I’m going to assume from the title of your organization and the tone of your first question that this is going to be an interesting questionnaire.
So let’s dispense with the usual political double-talk. I’m a Green Beret. You’re something called “Peace Action West”. This is not going to be pretty.
It's easy to forget that essentially, we all have the same goals as American Citizens. We want to live our lives in a way that satisfies us, and it's safe to say that war and conflict aren't satisfying. I'd wager that given a choice, that Green Beret would rather have a happy world, and that if confronted by a fight-seeking punk, that the leader of "Peace Action West" wouldn't choose to solve the problem with just words. War is to be expected and prepared for; there will always be charismatic leaders seeking empire, and the threat of military action (backed up by preparedness) will be required to stop them. Likewise, peace is to be made ready and hoped for; we all would be better off without spending money for destruction.
And yet the Green Beret cannot anticipate agreement on any issue. Why is that?
It was the summer of 2004. I was in France with a small group of youth at a wonderful place called Taize. We had a bit of drama, though, when there was a misunderstanding between some members of our group and others from a different country and culture. As this is public, I can't get too much further into the details, but we ended up having to move some people into a different room down the hill. As I picked up bags and boxes, silently transporting them across the hill, a thought flashed through my mind: "I have never felt so American in my life."
My identity, in this case, was born of my difference with the others who we had conflicted with. They were suddenly an "other," a potential threat, and I had banded together with my countrymen to rectify the problem. We were prepared to defend ourselves, and I had never been so ready for physical violence in my life. I was polarized.
It was a powerful feeling. To know that I was on the right side, representing myself, my country, and my government, I drew inspiration from the spirits of Washington, Jefferson, and Madison. Here, in this time, my heritage as an American mattered to me in a way it had never before. I knew who I was, and I knew my purpose. It was incredibly empowering.
And then, a few minutes later, came more details. The misunderstanding hadn't been exclusively their fault, and they had apologized. I knew neither of these things, and my worldview couldn't hold them. The enemy "other" I had constructed within my 15-year-old brain didn't apologize, and my American identity could not fail. Yet they and we had done the impossible, and my polarization was broken.
The world has never been so clear since that moment. I've never felt quite so empowered, or grasped a situation with so much certainty, for I was certain, and I was wrong.
My theory is that Diggs Brown knows the power of identification: I'm sure that the military is build on such ideas. A serviceman or woman is a part of a unit, which is part of a larger unit, which is part of a brigade, which is part of a division, which might be under a command, which is a part of a single component in the armed forces. The protests of Vietnam were likewise a part of a larger movement, with smaller component parts, and today's "base mobilization" strategies in politics are based on the same premise: empowering political action through shared identity. Are you:
- Pro-choice? You have a team.
- Pro-life? You have a team.
- Pro-gun? You have a team.
- Anti-gun? You have a team.
- Pro-AAA? You have a team.
- Anti-AAA? You have a team.
- Pro-BBB? You have a team.
- Anti-BBB? You have a team.
Question Time - By Keith Olbermann
But from 8 to 10 PM Eastern tonight, Rachel, Chris Matthews and I will be presenting a two-hour special report on the President's remarks (and answers) to the Republican Retreat (and wow did it live up to that name).This guy's got a team. MSNBC is the overwhelming cable channel of choice I saw in DC Democratic or liberal offices during trips the past year. Fox News was the same way for Conservative offices. One team, with one media, until there's a fragmentation.
We will be aiming for analysis and perspective for sure, but not to the point of carving this up into little soundbites. We will be running, as they say, "large chunks" and then cutting back to the studio to see which one of our jaws can drop the closest to the floor.
Parenthetically, I always said the actual "Prime Minister's Question Time" on C-SPAN was one of my favorite tv shows but the thought of doing an American version gave me the mental image of all of our politicians running screaming into the streets after the first five minutes of questioning.
Apparently that would all but one of our politicians.
Then, it gets ugly. The Primaries were as good as electronic wars. Daily Kos fragmented, and MyDD became the home of the Clintonistas, while the Obamabots and Edwards-whateverthehelltheywere people stayed home. There were ugly comments going in each direction. I got in the middle of them, using an anonymous account that I'd still prefer not to link to, and the diaries I posted were like dynamite, but only when they took one side to task for going to far. Nuance didn't play too well with these people. I even made the Rec List a few times, on the strength of that side. I even got a little attention from people who made headlines. But because I didn't have a real team, my support evaporated the first time I deviated from the party line.
Yet even with all of the worry, the web united fairly seamlessly around Obama upon his final selection. There remained a small band, called PUMAs, who remained against Obama. Some are still active. The GOP faced much of the same problem, though I didn't observe it first-hand as an Obama supporter.
In this month that I've observed Daily Kos, I've noticed that to some degree, the primary wars are back. Now, though, the split is between those who support Obama and those who think he's been too moderate and compromising. It's caused many to leave the site with "Goodbye Cruel World" diaries.
The diaries run in two directions: either Obama is a great betrayer, or he's working within the system as best he can. He's either with the team or against it. The truth, of course, is much more nuanced. Simple logic dictates that Obama's policies will probably align with those of progressives some of the time, and not at other points. This will create a grey-area, something that I've noted the blogosphere cannot appreciate.
Let's imagine that we have a continuum of ideas on a subject, say taxation. We can probably agree that taxing at 100% is a bad idea, and that taxing at 0% also won't work for obvious reasons. That means the right answer is going to lie somewhere between the two. It also means that the right answer won't practically exist, since whatever is "right" will depend on a judge's individual priorities. The logical result is to approach the policy of taxes with an awareness that one's specific preference is not going to be universally "right," be that for increased taxation of the rich or for lower taxes overall. But in the polarized blogosphere (and the 4th diary above) there is one answer, and one answer only. Compromise, for some, is tactical stupidity, because it yields ground to another team that wil not compromise.
This is a prisoner's dilemma. It used to be that legislators built stronger relationships with each other in Washington, making compromise possible through shared trust. No longer: Alren Specter was recently quoted as saying the Senate's reputation for being the world's foremost deliberative body is ended. I actually think the problem started further back than that. As Obama said in The Audacity of Hope:
Isn the world's greatest deliberative body, no one is listening.It is likewise true in the blogosphere. Places of debate and discussion are wearying, and dno't engender much community. So people recede and withdraw into their own camps, writing diaries for each other, instead of for everyone. Yet the two-party system demands that these websites gather up and ally with others within the party, even when the different groups have opposite beliefs. We have to let go of this notion that our politics can be encompassed in two camps.
But that's another post.
Just How Serious Is the Threat Level for Conservative Bloggers? - by vassar
We’ve spoken of this before, and will again, but the heat will rise very soon, this year for sure. In the end it is not for us to spend too much time trying to decide whether it is childish self-love, deep megalomania, or a deep bitter vengeful anger that has Barack Obama on this (I am now convinced, after Wednesday’s State of the Union and Friday’s showcase to House GOP members) path toward self-destruction. I must first take all necessary steps to insure that he does not take me, or even more importantly, the things I love and hold most dear down in flames with him. The book hasn’t been written, but Adolph Hitler destroyed many noble things in Germany is just 12 short years. Stalin literally destroyed the fixed beacons of morality in Russia within 30 years, the fallout of which we have yet to see. So yes, Obama & Co can destroy many things in a very short period of time.
Dissenters fear they will be silenced by force.
Activist Alito must be impeached - by clammyc
Last night, not only did Justice Alito breach that protocol, but he called into serious question whether he is fit to serve as an independent arbiter of justice, or if he is merely another partisan cheerleader.
Americans can no longer be sure that he can faithfully execute his duties on the Supreme Court without having his political bias or personal vendetta against President Obama and his supporters come into play. If he couldn't even keep his emotions and disagreement to himself during the President's State of the Union speech, then how can he keep them hidden in complex cases that require independence and a lack of bias towards any one political party?
A single shake of the head requires impeachment.
So, what should the rest of us do? I admit that I'm more than a little polarized: I've found that the GOP, free of government's constraints, is having fun opposing everything Obama seeks to do. Politically, it's a winning strategy. The reforms championed by Bob Dole are now part of a leftist agenda. Reagan's policies against terrorism (which was significant in his time) would now be labeled as radically liberal. The reason is that I think the far-left has be de-legitimatized in this country, but the far right has not. The Unitary executive theory that allowed Bush to unilaterally ignore the law was absurd, but it remains part of our normal political discourse. Communism, not so much.
That approach to governing failed, but the party that built it is second in line for power. Until we can get away from the two-party system, the furthest in each party will continue to set the agenda, and the more dangerous our policies might be. We need Instant Runoff Voting.
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